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When the grendade exploded, everything happened too fast for Rebecca to think about There were only sensations, terror reigning over all Brilliant light and explosive ainst her back that gave way in an instant, lungs screa, a billion bubbles like bullets, and incredible, io on and on in shades of cold and black Faster than fast, e sound Dark shapes rowing flickers of dizziness and her chest was i thes started to weaken, the dark flickers sing her up - air, sweet, wonderful air slapped across her dying face She drank convulsively, gasping in great, heav- ing gulps of the stuff, still not thinking at all Her bodythought instead, greedily sing life, the sprayand sting of salt, the warh, reedy buzz CRASH! Awater up her nose as buckets of it suddenlyrained down on top of her Rebecca gasped air, spinning, her ain

David! What&039;s "Rebecca!" A choked cry, fro dark The buzz was clearer now, it was CRASH! Another surging wave, another torrent pouring over her, seeking to drown her as Griffith had been unable to do, and as the rain fell away, she saw light - thick bea the dark, wild surface of the cove A boat An engine&039;s powerful, deepening thru sea "Rebecca!" David&039;s desperate call, from her left "I&039;m here"

CRASH! She could see the explosion this tiainst the searching beaht before the debris-encrusted wave knocked her back, blinding her with a vicious slap of foaulp of air before the coluainst the choppy surface

Depth charges, they&039;re firing depth charges

Umbrella?

The boat was less than thirty hts playing across the water in front of her There was a splashing ly bright bea face a short distance away Aslowly toward them "This is Captain Blake of the Philadelphia STARS! Identify yourself!" STARS?

Blake went on, his shout louder as the boat caet you out!"

David called back, his voice clogged and crack-ing "Trapp, David Trapp, Exeters, and Rebecca Chaain, he said the most won- derful, most beautiful words that Rebecca had ever heard

"Burton sent us to find you! Hang on!" Barry Oh, thank God, Barry!

As drained as she was, as spiritually wasted, torn by loss and fear froth to sroan behind her

There was darkness, tinged with red and an echo of pain In that darkness, there was no self and no peace; he was alone and engaged in battle, a furious struggle to find the end to that absence of light He knew that finding the end quickly was ies blocked his way, insisting that he didn&039;t need to hurry A ghost, a soldier, a rage The ringing laugh of a woman he had knoas no ht in an explosion of fire and sound Eyes that he knew but was afraid to remember The ive up his search for the end of darkness - that the path would only lead to greater pain - and he&039;d al, to let the shadows take over when the light found hi thunder Then he was being shot through ice and liquid black, pounded to consciousness by pain - and it was the pain that he focused on in that screaht the darkness His awareness spun away as the air curdled in his lungs and the raging cold nued piece of bobbing wood beneath his clawed fingers told hih he almost wished he were, he could still hardly breathe, and the pain in his back was exquisite and then he heard the sound of David&039;s voice aht be worth living, after all He tried to call out, but all that eed was an exhausted ht and then darkness again, but there was a flicker of awareness this ti Pain and htless suspension and then hardness against his cheek Chill andExcited voices calling orders, and again, the shriek of torn flesh When he ca over hi in one hand and a needle in the other

Hope that&039;s roaned

A split second later, he sao pale blurs hovering over him as the STARS shadow continued to work over hientle hands The blurs were David and Rebecca, eyes circled with dark, hair dripping, faces tired and lost "You&039;re going to be okay, John," David said softly "Just rest now It&039;s all over"

A spreading warh his body, a delicious, sleepy warmth that banished the roar of pain to a distant and faraway land Just as a friendly darkness caed to rasp out what he sud- denly wanted to say reat effort, but it had to be said

"You two look like somethin&039; a coyote ate and shit off a cliff," heblackness by the sweet sound of laughter The ed STARS medic had taken John inside the s out only once to tell theht Two broken ribs, so, but they&039;d h to call hi comfortably A medevac helicopter had already been radioed for and would be arriving soon, and the e a full recovery David had wept a little at the news, and not been a bit ashamed

They sat in the back of the boat, huddled under a scratchy wool blanket as Blake and his tea easily back and forth across the cove The Pennsylvania teaiant creatures before they&039;d seen the explosive burst of air and debris that had coh there weren&039;t any ainst his chest as the black sky gradually started to shade to a deep, ethereal blue Neither of them spoke, too tired to dothe results, back and forth and back again Blake had promised to send divers down for Griffith&039;s tanks as soon as the cove was clear and John had been picked up There were tetsuits already laid out on the bow&039;s deck, a young Alpha, whose na them with studied intensity He reht of Steve didn&039;t bring the kind of pain that David expected it would It hurt, it hurt like hell - Karen and Steve, gone, but when he thought of what they had ed to stop, what they had been a part of it wasn&039;t all for nothing We stopped Griffith&039;s insanity, stopped hi millions of innocent people God, they would have been so proud

The pain was bad, but the guilt wasn&039;t as devastat- ing as he&039;d feared it would be His responsibility in their deaths was so tiood chance that he&039;d be able to find a way to come to terms with it eventually He wasn&039;t sure how, but the tears he&039;d been able to shed over John had struck hihts turned to Umbrella, to what role they&039;d played in Griffith&039;s madness While they surely hadn&039;t o mad, they had created the circuard for huement for someone like Grif- fith And without Umbrella, the scientist would never have had access to the T-Virus

Someday soon, they&039;ll be held accountable for what they&039;ve done Not today or toain Perhaps Barry and Jill and Chris would uncover ainst hi clothes, and David let the thoughts go for the ti, content to simply sit and not think at all He was very, very tired As the first rays of the sun slipped over the horizon, Blake pronounced the waters clean, though neither David nor Rebecca heard him; both had fallen into a deep and drea day