[TWD x Resident Evil] — Chapter 559 - Injecting the T-Virus into Plants

The three biochemical researchers immediately threw everything out of their heads, the G-Virus, the super-soldier program, all of it.

Their minds were now entirely occupied by a single question: how do you grow a tree that bears T-Virus fruit?

Half an hour later.

Leon pushed open the lab door.

He'd come to check on William's progress with the safety-grade T-Virus formula.

What he found instead were three scientific lunatics crowded around a massive glass incubation chamber.

Inside it sat a potted orange sapling, hastily dug up from the greenhouse.

Rebekah was holding a specialized syringe, carefully pushing a pale green liquid into the trunk.

William stood beside her with his eyes fixed on the monitoring instruments, murmuring to himself.

Marcus had his arms crossed, wearing the expression of a man bracing for something terrible.

"What are you three doing?" Leon walked over, hands in his pockets.

"Switching careers? Becoming gardeners?"

Rebekah didn't turn around. Her full attention was locked on the sapling.

"We're solving the bottleneck problem for full-squad enhancement."

William turned around, excitement written all over his face, impossible to suppress.

"Boss, you struck gold."

He pointed at Rebekah.

"This girl just came up with a solution worthy of a Nobel Prize."

William laid out the theory, building T-Virus tolerance through oral consumption of the fruit, and walked Leon through it.

Leon listened to the end. His eyebrows climbed steadily toward his hairline.

Using tree cultivation to mass-produce super-soldiers?

That imagination ran wilder than his own.

He had to admit, though: the plan sounded damnably reasonable.

"What's the success rate?" Leon looked at the sapling.

"Who knows." Marcus shrugged. "This is entirely uncharted territory."

"But if we never try, we'll never succeed — and your super-soldier idea stays a fantasy forever."

"The fusion process between plant cells and the T-Virus is loaded with variables."

"It could wither and die. Or it could mutate into another Plant 42 and eat us all."

Marcus grinned, flashing teeth that were very white.

"But science has always been a dance on the edge of a blade."

Leon gave a single nod.

"Whatever resources you need, go straight to Ashley — she's already up and moving. For manpower, you can pull from the Patrol Squad to handle any unexpected risks."

He turned to leave.

"I only care about results."

Right at that moment.

The sapling inside the chamber mutated.

The edges of its bright green leaves began spreading a deep, dark crimson, crawling outward fast. The bark split open like shed skin, exposing pulsing fibrous tissue underneath. Growth accelerated, visibly, physically, in real time.

Within minutes, the sapling that had been barely half a meter tall had doubled in height.

At the tips of the upper branches, small white flowers bloomed. Each one gave off a faint, cold luminescence.

"Good lord." Rebekah stepped back half a pace, hand over her mouth.

Every reading on the monitoring instruments was spiking into the red.

"Growth rate is 2000 times normal!" William shouted. "The virus hasn't consumed the host, they're in symbiosis!"

The white flowers withered all at once.

Several unripe fruits began to swell at a pace that had no business existing in nature, swelling and reddening until three fist-sized oranges hung in the chamber, their skin laced with dark crimson veins.

A sweet fragrance began to fill the air. Strange, thick, deeply wrong in a way that was hard to name.

This was not the scent of ordinary fruit.

There was something underneath it, a pull that made the body's cells restless, like they recognized it.

Leon looked at the three fruits through the glass.

"It's done?"

"In theory." William swallowed. "But whether it's safe to eat, and what side effects it might carry, that still needs live testing."

He looked at Leon.

"Boss, should we find a test subject?"

Leon pulled open the chamber door.

The sweet fragrance rolled over him.

He didn't hesitate. He reached in and plucked one of the dark crimson oranges.

"What test subject."

He wiped it on his sleeve.

"We've got a perfectly good testing opportunity right here."

Under the stunned gazes of all three of them, Leon peeled it open.

The flesh inside was crystalline, translucent, like red gemstone held up to light.

He broke off a segment and tossed it into his mouth.

His teeth came down.

Juice detonated across his tongue.

He focused on what was happening inside him. The cells in his body were going haywire, surging, almost jubilant. And the mutated factor in this fruit was attempting to resonate with the T-Virus already in his system.

It genuinely seemed like there was something to this.

The lab went completely quiet.

Rebekah had her fingers locked around the edge of the workbench. She'd forgotten to breathe.

William stared at Leon like a man watching a grenade with the pin pulled, terrified he'd mutate into something in the next second.

Marcus wore the expression of a true believer waiting for his god to show up, hungry for the data.

Leon swallowed. He closed his eyes.

Three seconds.

He opened them, and let out a long, slow breath.

He raised his hand and looked at his palm.

"Hm. Tastes decent."

He turned to Rebekah.

"A bit like a blood orange. With a hint of alcohol."

He set the remaining half down on the workbench.

"Take the other two and run a full component analysis."

"If this thing actually works," he said, "we can mass-produce super-soldiers."

"Good work, all of you."

Rebekah immediately grabbed a sealed bag and loaded in the remaining fruit.

"I'll start the cross-section analysis right now!"

The truth was, the T-Virus concentration in Leon's body was in a class of its own. He'd injected an entire vial back then, eating one of these like a snack was nothing, and if anything it left him with the vague, nagging sense that his physical capabilities had just ticked upward again.

For everyone else, though, that was a completely different story.

To be safe, a proper test subject was still needed.

He'd find time to grab some troublemaking bastard from outside. That would count as their contribution to the world. That kind of person wasted resources alive, and attacked the living when dead, either way, they were a net negative.

Leon turned and walked toward the door.

He had new guests to check on.

Chris and his group should have had enough time to tour the prison by now.

Time to put them to work.

He pushed open the blast door connecting the Underground Laboratory to the surface.

The sunlight hit hard.

Barry was standing in front of an open patch of ground with a notebook, gesturing and pointing at things like he was already drawing up blueprints in his head. Dawn stood beside him, handling logistics with her usual professional detachment.

"I've got my eye on this plot." Barry pointed at the dirt under his feet. "I want to build a small wooden cabin with a yard right here. My daughter likes growing flowers."

Dawn held her registry.

"No problem, as long as you have enough contribution points. Go scavenging outside for supplies, help dig the Leech Moat, or put in time on the dome support columns. All of that earns building materials."

Barry patted his chest.

"Digging mud is Tyrant work. I'll go outside and get you the building materials myself."

Chris and Jill were standing near the training ground not far off, watching Shawn Greene and Merle run a group of survivors through close-quarters combat drills.

"Technique's too rough." Chris shook his head. "They're running on pure aggression. Against an enemy with real tactical training, they won't last three rounds."

Jill nodded.

"Their firearms stances are off too. Reload speed is way too slow, in actual combat, that's a fatal window."

Leon strolled over with his hands in his pockets.

"Since you've already spotted the problems," he said, "their training is yours from now on."

Chris turned and looked at him.

"You're planning to squeeze every bit of value out of us?"

Leon didn't blink. "My territory doesn't feed idle hands. You joined, you work."

"I need you to turn these people into a proper combat unit capable of fighting real battles, and I need it done fast. Think of it this way: the stronger they get, the less they'll drag you down."

Chris broke into a grin.

This was exactly what he'd been hoping for. Training new recruits was the last thing that intimidated him.

"Relax, Leon, I'm not that petty. I'll take care of them." He clapped his hands together. "But I need full authority over the training program."

"Done." Leon agreed without hesitation. "Rick handles coordination — he'll work with you."

He walked over to where Jill was standing.

"Getting used to life here?"

Jill was still watching the survivors on the training ground, sweat-soaked and grinding through their drills.

"Better than sitting at Fort Benning waiting to die."

She turned to look at him.

"How many cards are you still hiding?"

Leon raised an eyebrow.

"Depends on how much pressure Umbrella Corporation decides to put on me."

➤ Next: Ashley's Strength