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Be warned, the following is stream of consciousness rambling.
Alright. So. 90% of the information we “know” about Project-W (the eugenics bioscience project that produced Albert and Alex Wesker) comes from an OOC document presented in Resident Evil 5 directly to the player. We know that this is an OOC document, and not an internal in-character document being presented OOC to the player, because it presents motivations and thoughts of characters as fact rather than as speculation.
This document presents a few ideas that are incongruous with other information that we know, lore-wise, suggests something other than it directly says, or that is difficult to reconcile in some way.
The primary difficulty that I am having in reconciling the information in this document is that it asserts that administering the progenitor virus to the children of Project-W was the second phase of the experiment, rather than the initial phase.
The document suggests that the children of Project-W were–
🔸first “gathered” from intelligent parents. (It does not say how, but we can draw the conclusion from the fact that they were not given BACK to their parents later that they were either stolen or purchased.)
🔸next “indoctrinated/manipulated”. The document does not elaborate but it would not be a stretch to, looking at later Umbrella practices, imagine that they were perhaps indoctrinated in some form of orphanage or group home. The document does not elaborate on how long this indoctrination took, but it must have been at least a year and more likely several.
🔸then “placed in controlled environments under Umbrella’s watchful eye, unaware they were being monitored.” They “received the best educations available in the field they pursued” thanks to the invisible assistance of Umbrella.
🔸 Next, speaking of Albert Wesker specifically, the document says that he “was sent to Umbrella’s Training Facility in Raccoon City”. We have a concrete age for Wesker at this time period elsewhere in the lore. This was in 1977, and he was 17 years old. It is important here to note that William Birkin (16), who was not a member of Project-W, also attended the training facility at this time.
This is where the document states that Spencer enacted the ‘second phase of his plan’.
The document states thusly:
All the Wesker children would be administered an experimental virus.
This virus was administered to screen out the more gifted of the Wesker children.
Some took the virus on the recommendation of a friend; others were given the virus as part of their medical treatment; still other had it forcibly administered to them.
Albert Wesker was not different. His partner, William Birkin, gave him the experimental virus, and he administered it to himself.
This strongly suggests a few things.
It suggests that Spencer did not want the Project-W children to know the origin of the virus they were being administered.
It suggests that the Project–W children were not in contact with one another at this time (as otherwise inconvenient understanding could be gained if they discussed the virus with one another.)
We also know for a fact that Alex Wesker was familiar with Albert Wesker, and was familiar with Project-W– even having a list of all the candidates– by 1998 when Albert faked his death in the Arklay incident. So that’s odd and incongruous here. So at some point, both of them must have become aware of the origin of this virus they were injected with.
It suggests that someone gave 16 year old William Birkin an experimental virus and convinced him to recommend to his friend/partner Albert Wesker that he should take it without knowing what it was or what its origin was. By this time they were both studying the t-virus together. This makes absolutely no sense. At bare minimum I have to imagine that one or both of them would at least try to figure out what they were putting in Albert’s body.
It also suggests that Spencer spent 10 or so years (at literal minimum least) paying for the indoctrination and education of children he hadn’t yet physically experimented on, which seems unlikely, given that this was 1977 and experiments with the progenitor virus started in the 1960s.
I hesitate to give credit to the idea that Spencer waited until the Wesker project children were adults to virus them up. To me, it seems far more likely that they would have been given at least the initial dose of the virus as children, in a setting Umbrella could easily control and monitor and account for, and then dispersed the ones who lived through the initial treatment to monitored homes.
I don’t know, it seems more cost effective. It seems less likely to have been discovered, or remarked upon. It seems easier to experiment on compelled children rather than unknowing adults.
But what do I know. This is “no lab safety, we die like men” Umbrella we’re talking about.
It’s just an odd document, and its frustrating to have this kind of vital information presented to the OOC to the player rather than the information being given in-universe to the character.
As I said. Just rambling.
Discussion ¬