Whew! This is my very first try at anything Resident Evil, and in present tense! D: Surprisingly enough, I couldn't get up the motivation to even attempt anything as cool as RE before.. so I'm very iffy on how this turned out.. Also, there's the fact that I've had writer's block for about a year... But hooray for sudden inspiration! I've been playing RE 5 recently and so I figured I'd give it a go. It's basically a pointless one-shot, but it's better than writing nothing.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything here but the plot, the characters belong to Capcom, not me.

Spoiler: There aren't many spoilers about the game in here, just a few hints to things that you won't understand if you haven't beaten it.

Rated T:There's a few bad words, some disturbing thoughts here and there..

Summary: Set an undetermined amount of time after the events in Resident Evil 5. Chris has been struggling to fight against something dark within himself ever since Kijuju, but is it his fate to win, or to lose?

Everto Animi

It's moments like the one he's currently in that make Chris question everything he's ever believed in. His palms sweat, his skin is itchy and his vision swims like he's watching life as if someone glued the fast-forward button down. The tight knot in his stomach makes him cringe, and he vaguely remembers he's had no nourishment since two days ago. All of this is nothing, though, compared to the events going on in his mind.

The voices, oh god the voices plague him night and day... They whisper into his soul as if they were a part of him... Sometimes it feels as if they are, and those times are when it's the worst. He looses all semblance of sanity, and he morphs-twists until he can't twist anymore-into some new creature. He knows when it's about to happen, too, and that's probably the worst part. No matter what he tries, Chris can't seem to stop these 'attacks' from happening. In fact, he can feel the symptoms now... There's a slight tickling in the furthest reaches of his mind, the darkest corners where things hide, bad things that he's afraid to let out, and then the dull ringing in his ears as if warning him of the tragedies sure to transpire.

It isn't so bad now, he suggests to himself, now that he's gotten used to it. Denial, his sister had called it. After he'd told her of his attacks she had said it was the mind's way of coping with the 'traumatic events' he's gone through, and that it wasn't a virus or a parasite. Just his mind trying to make sense of it all.

"Bullshit." He mumbles, only realizing he's spoken aloud when out of his peripheral vision he sees the woman next to him shift nervously in her seat. Slowly, almost as if it pains him to do so, he turns towards her, opening his mouth to apologize for his odd behavior. The expression on her face, however, stops his apology before it can even form on his lips. He's seen such an emotion before, Hell, he's felt it more times than he can count. Having it directed at him was entirely different situation altogether.

All hope flew out the window the second he saw the look of disgust on the woman's face. The slithery sensation was crawling into his brain, coating his thoughts in a sinister, oily black venom. His toxic-green cat eyes narrowed into slits, focusing with dangerous accuracy on every vein and potential weak spot in the human before him. His lips pull back into a savage grin, graciously showing the woman his full set of wickedly gleaming teeth, sharper than they should have been. Chris feels his heart race, faster than he thought possible, further dilating his pupils and fueling the urge inside of him to listen to the whispers that are now the only thing he hears... they are everywhere and nowhere all at once.. and so he has no choice but to listen. They are everything and nothing, and so he has only one choice... to obey the desire to rip, tear, killkillkillkill...

"Chris?"

The red haze that had begun to fill his vision, unbeknownst to him, is abruptly fading as a familiar soothing voice interrupts his breakdown. Bringing his hands to grasp his head, trying to keep it from imploding, Chris greedily sucks in the cool oxygen his body had apparently forgotten to acquire during his little trip to Twisted-Motherfucking-Wonderland.

He feels like laughing-no, more like cackling; the treacherous things he'd been about to do... He almost listened to the damned voices! The gruesome demons he's been trying so hard to keep inside are finally cracking him in the right places, digging their way out and into the open. This attack was definitely the worst one he's had, he surmises, nodding his head to no one but himself.

Jumping when a small hand squeezes his shoulder, Chris pivots to the petite blonde that's smiling down at him and forces a smile in return. She's saved him in more than one way, and she hasn't even the slightest clue. He doesn't tell her, nor does he plan to.. After all, he doesn't want to worry her. Jill has been through too much shit already; the last thing she needs is to hear her boyfriend is a complete psycho and hears voices telling him to RIP...TEAR...SHRED..KILL...

"Chris, it's going to be okay. Are you alright?" She speaks gently, eyes full of compassion and love... and god he doesn't deserve it..

He follows her as she descends down the hallway of the place that used to fill him with purpose, the place he used to need... Now all of it wasted away because of one man.. They turn to a door that's heavily guarded, people that he used to know. Not anymore, no...he doesn't even know himself.

Panic sets in when they enter the room and he sees Him. The man who has caused all his pain and suffering; the origin of his madness is standing not five feet from him, smirking in sadistic glee. As if triggered by the man's presence, the all too familiar tingling begins in his head. Chris gasps in shock as this time the slippery sensation travels down his spine, separating and spilling into his veins like a toxin. Suddenly his fingers twitch, and the rest of his body following after in a spasm that has Chris on his knees in seconds. Everyone near him is forgotten as he gasps for air, each intake of breath scraping painfully as it enters his lungs. His eyes squeeze shut and a cry of agony escapes his lips.. his skin is on fire, did someone douse him in gasoline and strike a match? The image of fire stirs a long buried memory that Chris had fought to ignore... The memory of how he and the Tyrant had clashed in the volcano, and how, unknowingly to Sheva, Wesker had shoved his wretched abomination deep inside of Chris's flesh, ruining him forever. He had been tainted the moment those tentacles slid into the exposed gash in his arm, thinking naively at the time that the feeling of something moving, remaining long after the appendages were gone, was just a phantom pain. What a fool he had been... It makes him wonder if Claire had known, would she have loved him as her brother still, the monster that he is?

Chris also thinks of Jill in that moment, wondering, half delirious from the pain, if she'll notice that all the knives are missing from their holder in the kitchen. He hadn't trusted himself around anything sharp, not when she was around him. He laughs at the thought, though to everyone watching him it comes out as a sickeningly wet, unintelligible gurgle. His heart lurches to an agonizing halt, and as the black starts to engulf him, Chris numbly notices how much the laughter in his head sounds like the monster's, who's blazing golden-red eyes now stare into his soul with an intensity that sends his last breath away in seconds.

I'm pretty sure this will stay as a one-shot, but hey things could change.. Furtermore, if this is confusing, well I wrote it at 6 a.m. running on no sleep, so apologies for that...x3

Oh and if there are those reading this while looking for an update on my other stories, well please hang in there, I haven't given up on my stories.. they're just taking a little needed vacation...

Thanks for reading, and please leave a comment to let me know what you think! =D