A/N: Okay, here it is...THE LONG AWAITED FIRST CHAPTER OF THE SEQUEL TO VAS DOMUS! I'm so excited! So much so that I've been dancing in my chair. It's gonna get pretty dirty. Lots of sex and violence may be prevalent here. So as a friend I'M WARNING YOU! if what I have said so far will disturb you, you do not want to read. I mean to make no one uncomfortable but somewhere inside of me I feel as if I can push this story to perhaps three or even four installments, and I'm going to push the limits as far as possible to get there. So...enjoy, and for those of you excited to read even though my warning has been heard loud and clear, I URGE you to take this with a grain of salt. It's merely my imagination, nothing else, I mean to offend no one. HERE WE GO!...
Oh...right..ahem..
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Resident Evil, or the characters used within. I own only my computer, my OC's, my imagination and a really awesome mini statue of Wesker.
Breaking The Glass
Sequel to Vas Domus
...
I
[Force]
...
We can't both become the same pawn that's made to fall
Oil that tastes like blood stole the summer scent from me to you
You're stabbing me through you, you're stabbing you through him
And betting most of this world, we'll add enough of the world
...
A sleek black SUV parked on the pavement outside of the apartment building, shortly followed by another black SUV and a BMW of the same shade. The doors swung open on the larger vehicles in tandem, several men dressed from head to toe in hazmat gear got out, followed by men in combat armor. One of the soldiers stepped to the BMW to open the door on the back passenger's side and a man with blond hair and green eyes placed his perfectly shined shoes on the cement. He was dressed to the nines in an expensive suit and looked as if he had never seen a true day's work in his life.
This couldn't be further from the truth.
"I want this entire building locked down until we have retrieved the subject." His voice was raspy and soft as he instructed the man who had been standing by his side. He moved forward towards the door that read 213 flanked by the hazmat men and the soldiers on all sides.
A small vein protruded from his temple, irritated with the sheer longevity of this particular search and was sure to lose his temper if this turned out to be another false lead. He had been playing some silly wild goose chase with this project and the lead he had received not ten hours ago proved to have just the truth he needed. Or so he hoped.
He knocked on the door and in seconds a man with brown hair and a blue tactical vest appeared. Leon S. Kennedy, he presumed
"Can I help you?" The question was polite enough but he didn't miss the underlying tone of indignancy of having been intruded upon by this stranger. A red haired female appeared behind him, wiping her hands on a dish towel, before Leon could speak the man in black recognized her immediately; after all he had been chasing after her for over a year now.
"Claire Redfield. I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to come with me."
...
Her eyes widened when she saw him, thinking him to be someone else. However uncanny the resemblance was she quickly dispelled the notion. This man had green eyes instead of the blue ones that had haunted her dreams for so long; besides it couldn't be him.
He was dead.
Still it left much to the imagination at how she had ended up at Leon's a year ago and sometimes she wondered if it was his doing. Had the half handed method of bringing his vitality back work? Was he still out there, roaming around in the shadows?
These were questions she had asked herself for months after waking up in Leon's bed, the said man frantic about where she had been and what had happened. And all she had to give him for reassurance was a halfhearted 'I don't know'. Soon enough, after patching things up with Leon, she had fallen into whatever life she was leading now and her mind had left him behind. And so far she had managed to keep her infection secret enough to go on unhindered and unnoticed. She was sure that if Leon had noticed, he surely would have said something about it. Her life had been uncomplicated and normal for awhile, things had seemed to all die down.
For the most part.
But now this blond stranger who sent warning bells off in her head and seemed to look quite like him was standing at their door and demanding she come with him.
"May I ask what for?" She asked, wringing her hands around the dishtowel nervously. She eyed the personal army behind him and she realized that whoever this man was, he wasn't here for any friendly business. She prayed that there hadn't been some sort of biohazard incident and couldn't help but wonder what she would have to do with something like that anyway?
"Do you have a warrant?" Leon asked, barricading himself between Claire and the man hoping to show that she wasn't unguarded. His only response was a cold smirk as he delivered a punch directly into Leon's gut.
"Don't need one." The brunette fell to his knees as if he had been hit in the stomach with a steel pole, conciousness wavering in and out as the blond walked into the house followed by his men. He ignored Claire's gasp as he spoke to the men, "Subdue her and put her in restraints. We can't risk an incident."
Claire deftly grabbed a kitchen knife that had been on the table behind her and slashed at one of the men swarming her; he leaned out of reach and gripped her arm before she swung out at him.
"Miss Redfield, don't be fool-" The man speaking had been cut off when she delivered a kick to his face and he yelped, cradling his face that was dripping with blood. She had struggled through them for several moments before she felt a pinprick on her neck and she swung around to find the blond man holding an empty syringe behind her. In seconds her eyes closed as she dropped down falling to the floor. One of the men in the combat gear scooped her up and restrained her before removing her from the house.
"Search this house for any evidence and return to the facility in exactly two hours, I will escort Miss Redfield to her new home." The blond turned and left, half of the soldiers following him, leaving the other half and the hazmat men behind.
Once safely inside the sedan he pulled a laptop from under the seat as they took off, the redheaded woman secured in the SUV behind them. A panel of scrolling codes flooded the screen for a moment before a window popped open displaying a map of the Western seaboard. A series of red dots came up gradually along with corresponding times and dates and he couldn't hide the nasty smirk that grew on his face.
It seemed that his brother had been quite the busy man.
...
Droplets of blood splattered the walls in what seemed like a gruesome painting. If one looked close enough they could make out random shapes and patterns; a macabre Rorschach. A symphony of screams rang out through the large and overly embellished conference room as body after body collapsed to the floor, piling up like some sort of corpse landfill. The ones who weren't dead -yet- merely stood frozen in fear as a blur flew past them, snuffing out lives in it's wake. In the end only one survived, a young woman dressed in a powder blue three piece skirt suit with wide blue eyes and bold red hair. She did nothing as the executioner stepped past her, removing a simple USB drive from the laptop at the head of the table before walking out the door. She was frozen to the spot, drenched in blood that wasn't her own, numb and so shocked that had it not been for the evidence all around her she might have not believed it had actually happened. Of course it had, her coworkers all lay dead at her feet. She wanted to cry, or scream out, or even call for help. Instead she stayed still, afraid that he would come back and finish the job.
There was no help now; even the security detail for the building were dead as well. Everyone was dead.
She presumed he had spared her because she was female-a simple receptionist who really had no doing in the affairs of the company she worked for. All of her superiors were male and thus all dead. Everyone who had some crucial part of the inner workings of VitaLife's Sacramento headquarters were now reduced to lifeless corpses. She didn't know her theory about that was terribly wrong, but it didn't matter anyway.
In a daze she grabbed the phone and dialed 911. Had she not been in such a stupor she might have been surprised that the line was still active but she didn't think about it much.
It only took a few minutes before the police sirens filled her ears and she dropped to the floor, feeling overcome with dizziness.
She barely heard the stampeding of heavily booted feet before the door was thrust open.
...
He hadn't killed the girl. There simply was no logical reason to do so. Then again, was there any reason to kill everyone responsible for the company's plans?
Of course there was. If he had let any of them live they would have interfered with his own work and that simply wouldn't do. No, he had spared her because she had no doing in that business save for getting coffee and typing out files; no point. Not to mention, he had a feeling that everyone there didn't account for all parties involved anyway.
That was all, he mused to himself. He knew deep down that there was another reason why he hadn't killed that young secretary although he'd never admit it to himself. The fact that those big blue eyes and that red tinted hair looked like hers was merely a coincidence and nothing else.
During the first few months after leaving her in the care of that Kennedy man he had thought about her often, a little too often for his tastes he'd admit.
Now it had been nearly a year since that night and she hardly entered his thoughts anymore. For all intents and purposes he was done with her.
Or so he kept telling himself.
He was covered head to toe in blood; it almost sickened him to have it on him but such things would have to wait for a better time. He needed to copy the data he had acquired to his own personal files and destroy the original. He never took the time to sit at the desk instead he leaned over sturdy but old computer that was located in an old and abandoned Umbrella facility that he was using as a temporary hideout until he returned to his own lab in Alberta. He pushed in the usb drive, quite thankful that a computer so outdated even had flash drive capabilities at all. He pressed the icon for the drive on the desktop and opened the files, an irritated furrowing of his brow the only outside indication that the several windows that had opened were not what he had expected to find. Most of them were random codes and scripts-trivial and useless business applications. He deleted those, finding no use in such things and was soon about to exit the building empty handed when something popped up in to view.
It was a rather large encrypted file but the encryption was awfully juvenile even if it was locked in several different areas; as if the creator of the file desperately wanted to keep it out of prying eyes but simply didn't know how so he used several novice codes instead of one or two very advanced ones. Another testament to the uselessness and sheer idiocy that was the mockery of this company. He opened another window and his fingers flew across the keyboard almost faster than a human eye could catch, strings and strings of code filling up the box. Soon the file was open and as he clicked it the first thing that popped up was a 3D model of what looked like an Umbrella manufactured tyrant. He pressed another button and the model began to turn as a list flowed down the screen. This was exactly what he was looking for. His eyes quickly roamed through the rest of the lists and files and he felt his smirk widen.
Apparently VitaLife had been working on manufacturing some new virus, as he had suspected. It was a descendant of T and, according to the files, would be able to create an indestructible breed of bio-weapons. He wanted to laugh at this. While the virus itself looked very promising, there was no way that those idiots would have been able to make something of this magnitude. His own team of researchers dating back to his days with Umbrella and through Tricell hadn't even been able to create something that was unable to be destroyed. The closest thing that even reached the levels of that kind of power was the G-Virus and all it did was continuously mutate the host until there was nothing left to mutate, eventually leaving the remains in a formless mush.
William had been a clear display of that irrationality.
Even Lisa Trevor, the first successful attempt at B.O.W weaponry, was more apt to immortality than William had been. That girl had been a nuisance in the worst sense. He remembered during his short stint with humanity feeling sorry-bad even-for what had become of the young girl. The reinstatement of the virus coursing through his veins seemed -for the most part - to rid him of those emotions now. Although there was still something he couldn't shake settled in the deepest recesses of his soul.
Or whatever was left of it.
Nonetheless, he couldn't help but snort at those feeble attempts he was reading at the moment. The only virus that could help them now was currently residing in one Claire Redfield and he had gone to great lengths to keep any nosey parties off of her trail.
Even if that band of morons could find a way to make something like that they would never be able to handle that sort of power. Power was one of those things that was a fickle master and it never chose anyone by chance. Too much power could destroy a person if left in the wrong hands.
'Like you?'
Certainly not, he reasoned, he was still here wasn't he? He was still alive and well when they weren't. Even the largest thorns in his side had been reduced to nothing.
'It's not as if you would still be here if it wasn't for-' He cut that thought off before it could even finish. He was alive and he was much more powerful than before; that was all that mattered.
All. That. Mattered.
With no time to spare -and a plane to catch- he copied the important parts of the data onto his own personal drive before removing it and swept out of the area briskly. This place had reached it's threshold for usefulness and quite frankly it was an eyesore. He pocketed the drive and strode through corridor after corridor until he reached the elevator. Hitting the switch for the bottom most floor he slid his sunglasses onto the bridge of his nose. His light sensitivity had increased over the past year and he had to purchase even darker glasses recently. It was quite frustrating, which was why he didn't go out often in the daylight hours -not like he usually did anyway- and kept to his business at night. The business of recapturing stolen and purchased Umbrella information was one that required a sense of stealth anyway. Usually, anyway, but his last endeavor had gotten particularly bloody. He hadn't anticipated so many people being there at that time of night and he wanted to leave no trail behind. Unfortunately he left a very large trail but he knew it wouldn't be traced back to a dead man. The girl had barely seen him, hell no one had really seen him.
The elevator jolted to a stop and he walked out, taking a sharp right and entering the large bulkhead-like doors for the power room. A control panel was settled directly in the middle and without so much as a delay he entered the code for the self-destruct. It was probably unnecessary but he never liked to be unprepared and he always covered his tracks, no matter what situation he was in. If there was one thing he knew, it was that with his power and his infamous reputation trouble followed him wherever he went.
He was the most wanted man in the world. Or...he was, before he died. Now he wasn't so sure if word had gotten out that he was back, but if it had it wouldn't be too long before commotion followed.
Three minutes was plenty of time to get out of the old facility and he set it for such. He spun through empty corridors with ease, almost surprised when nothing popped out at him with large fangs and claws the size of him alone. History was repetitive so he could be surprised it hadn't happened yet.
Soon enough he was walking on the crisp grass in a forest leading away from the facility. Now it was time to get down to the real business.
...
He had overseen the preparations with ease, pleased that the girl hadn't regained consciousness between the time period of capturing her and placing her in stasis. He couldn't have her running about after all, not with what she had running through her system. A virus like that of T-Veronica was a powerhouse and could be completely unstable. According to the files he had acquired, the creator and last harbinger of it had to place her body in hibernation for fifteen years to prevent it from unstable mutation. In the end, she had still been unsuccessful in containing it and had ultimately been destroyed by his newfound host and her brother. This was something that would not be underestimated by him.
Green eyes roamed the tank that held the girl, curiously wondering just how she had been able to keep the viral mutation from happening with no antivirus whatsoever. It was likely a genetic marker that Alexia Ashford hadn't had, similar to the one that Albert Wesker carried.
He knew the two weren't related, that much was obvious, but there was some kind of link there that he was missing. He knew that the two had spent half a year together shacked up in the Rockies but he had never checked into it far enough to figure out why. When news had reached him that Albert had been purged of his virus he had no need to track the man down; the burden of living as a human was far greater - and more pleasurable to him - a damnation than killing him.
Recent reports however, had brought to his attention the philandering and destruction that Albert had been causing as of late. Taking out several different pharmaceutical companies and stealing their vital information? He knew exactly what the man was up to. It also revealed a clue as to the fact that perhaps he wasn't as mortal as he had thought him to be.
His brother was smart but he had been just the slightest bit sloppy lately, something that lead him on the trail to the elder Wesker.
Alex smirked again, placing his hand on the glass.
The reports had included that the several people killed in Albert's trail had the distinctive trademark that his older brother seemed to favor. Gaping holes in the corpses' chests was a dead giveaway.
When he had received word that his own company had been infiltrated and purged he had been quite pleased, despite the financial setback it had caused, knowing that having a lock on his brother's trail was an irrefutable ticket to getting on his trail.
And when he learned of the little stint Albert had with the ever so lovely Claire Redfield he knew that he had stumbled upon the one thing that might cause him to come out of hiding.
Obviously if the girl had been around during his brother's time without the virus, she had been a valuable personal asset to Albert. And from the way her eyes lit up upon seeing himself, surely recognizing the similar features between he and Albert, her time with him had not been one of great distress for her.
It seemed as if this girl had wormed her way into his brother's weak spot. Perhaps she was his weak spot.
But personal attachment? He found himself clicking his tongue, he had thought his ever powerful brother to be better than that. And with the sister of his long time enemy? Well that was just too delicious.
There had been a strong rivalry from the beginning, Albert being the golden child of Spencer's legacy and Alex had to fight for his chance to be recognized amongst his trail of overachievement. It was always 'Albert' this and 'Albert' that and 'Oh you aren't as advanced as your brother, Albert.' He clicked his tongue again
.
One day that all changed when Spencer came to him, asking for help to keep an eye on his brother who he was afraid had let his position get to his head and had it in mind to usurp Spencer. He agreed but when the time came for Spencer to meet his timely end at the hand of the man he had sung the praises of for so long he had stood in the shadows watching pleased as the old man got what he deserved. Once it was all over, he took it upon himself to take over the secret works that he had been allowed access to after the older Wesker had taken off to fight his own way through the world. Albert went off in the direction of things that had been far above his head and Alex had stayed behind to begin a project of his own.
The development and further research of the Tyrant project was his new baby and it was far more advanced than anything that loon Spencer or his brother could have ever hoped to achieve.
Claire Redfield was the cornerstone of his new success. Sure he hadn't created her but he could certainly use her and her blood to breed an all powerful army of tyrants. The fact that she had shacked up with his brother? Icing on the cake. She'd lead his brother right to him.
He eyed the tank longingly, gliding one hand over it gently.
"You'll be the mother of a new race, my dear."
...
Leon Kennedy's head was pounding so hard that he wasn't sure his brain wasn't hemorrhaging and when he woke up he found with shock that Claire was nowhere in the apartment. He knew immediately that the blond bastard had taken her and the man in question rang some alarming bells from the very beginning.
He had never met him but from every report and photograph he had read and seen, the resemblance to Wesker was nearly uncanny.
He popped several over the counter pain killers before taking his cell phone out and dialing a number he hadn't dialed in so long, he was surprised he remembered it.
Three rings was all it took for her to pick up, "Hello?"
"Jill," He exhaled nervously, "It's Leon. I have a serious problem."
"Oh my god, Leon! What happened? Is it Claire? Is she okay?" She was frantic with worry and with good reason. He wanted to tell her that yes, Claire was okay but he had to be honest, for Claire's sake.
"I'm not sure what happened," He began truthfully," Some blond guy came to the door with a horde of other men and said that he needed Claire to come with him-"
"blond guy?" He could sense the dread in her voice.
"Yeah, I asked him if he had a warrant and he laid me out. Hit me so hard it felt like I had taken a steel girder to the gut. When I woke up, she was gone." He hated having to tell this to Jill, hated to involve her but he knew that if he didn't tell her something she would eventually find out he'd hid it from her. The end result of that would be even worse than what was happening now.
"Leon," She started, her voice low as if she didn't want anyone else to hear her, "It wasn't-"
"No. I'm pretty sure it wasn't him."
"How could you tell?"
"His eyes were green, like an almost startingly shade of green. No sunglasses either, but the resemblance was uncanny. From the pictures I've seen..."
"So what the hell does this mean? There's a guy running around who looks just like Wes- just like him? That doesn't make any sense."
"Yeah well, it doesn't matter who he is right now. He took Claire, Jill." Leon sighed, loading his Beretta, the phone shoved between the crook of his shoulder and his neck.
"You said that there were men with him?"
"Yeah, a bunch of guys in hazmat suits and combat gear."
"What would he need a decon team for?"
"I don't know but...I'm going to find out." Leon said, stuffing some supplies in a small pack. He had developed a sense of protectiveness over Claire and he felt as if it were his duty, not just to Chris, to help her in any way possible. Something wasn't right with this entire situation and he had a feeling that it had something to do with the six months that Claire had been missing for.
"You can't handle this alone, Leon, I'll take the next flight to D.C and-"
"No. I didn't want to involve you to begin with but I felt it was better that you know." The woman on the other side went silent for nearly two minutes, thinking about how the girl she had thought of as a sister for so long.
"Leon," She began, moving past the lump that was forming in her throat, "I promised...that I would look after Claire. I can't just leave her like that. Chris," It was obvious that even talking about her late partner still burned her with great pain and Leon couldn't help but feel bad for her. She was still carrying the memory of a man she had never really gotten the chance to be with, "he would have wanted me to make sure she was okay."
"Shit...alright," Leon said, knowing that if Chris was watching over them he would never forgive Leon if something happened to Jill, "Take the next flight out. Call me as soon as your plane lands, I'll meet you at the airport."
"Okay. Thanks Leon, I know you and Chris didn't particularly get along but he always thought highly of you."
"Yeah... I know. Bye Jill."
"Bye."
Placing the phone on the table a little harder than he meant to, Leon leaned back in his chair and held his head between his hands. He couldn't help the distinct feeling of dread seeping into his stomach; the exact same dread he had felt once he stepped foot in Raccoon for the first time.
He had no idea that what was ahead would prove to be far more difficult than a few zombies.
...
"Heart rate is steady, as is pulse. Infection level is very high though but no signs of mutation at all, how is that even possible?" Victor Guffy scribbled on his notepad as his wire frames slipped down his nose. He stood about five foot eight but with the bad posture he exhibited he usually seemed a bit shorter. Running a thin pale hand through a head of hair that looked like it hadn't been washed in weeks he typed in something on the computer in front of him and then averted his dark eyes towards the girl in the tank on the other side. He remembered when he was first recruited to be on the research team at Umbrella, or when it used to be Umbrella. The name had long since been abandoned when the scathing words of the Raccoon survivors got out and ensured that the company would be buried along with all of it's secrets in the crater that was formally known as Raccoon City.
Fortunately for him, and his job, when Spencer was reported dead someone else rose to take reigns of the old man's abandoned work.
VitaLife was established soon after, overseen by Alex Wesker.
Under the guise of a normal pharmaceutical company, VitaLife provided the utmost care to keep it's true intentions hidden beneath the surface; it's main laboratory was run out of Russia and had at least six subfloors that he knew about below it.
Very few of it's employees knew the true face of this manufacturer of run of the mill health and wellness products; none of which who hadn't been Umbrella employees previously.
Guffy had been assigned as the head researcher for the third sublevel, that which dealt with diseases such as small pox and rubella. The fact that he was in the sixth sublevel right now was that of a small miracle. Chairman Wesker had hand chosen a team of what he had called his best to oversee the project regarding the host of T-Veronica, whom he had brought in just that morning.
On this same team was Heather Tract, one of the researchers for the fourth sublevel - usually dealing with slightly more dangerous viruses, such as hemorrhagic fevers like Ebola - who was busy dropping some of the host's blood into a vial filled with clear liquid.
"It's strange, the file says that she had been in contact with this virus over a year ago, yet she shows no signs of mental decay, cell death or mutation. What the hell is keeping this virus under wraps?" Guffy said, eyes wide with awe and fixated on the naked woman in the tank.
"I have no idea," Tract said quietly, "Have you checked the body for any sort of sign of mutation?"
"Yeah, nothing that I could see."
"Have you checked her eyes?"
"Her eyes? Yes, but what would that matter?" Guffy looked over increduously. He didn't appreciate this woman second guessing him or his thoroughness in his work. Tract let out a small chuckle, as if having a joke at his expense and he crossed his arms tightly.
"I take it you didn't read that part of the file."
"What are you talking about?"
The woman stood and stretched her arms over her head before walking over to stand next to him at the base of the tank, she waited awhile before speaking, "It says that Miss Redfield here spent over six months with," She lowered her voice, as if worried about being heard even though there was no one else on this level, "Albert Wesker."
"Yeah. And?" Guffy didn't see the point to this and was clearly irritated with Tract.
"And," She started, flipping a switch on the panel to increase the sedative in the tank, "He's the only known person who's body is said to have bonded with the T-Virus. It's basically the same thing as with her. The only noticeable sign of mutation is his eyes."
"Yeah but Wesker doesn't have the virus anymore. What does this have to do with her anyway?"
"I overheard the Chairman the other day, saying something about Wesker and the virus possibly having been reentered into his system." Tract seemed uneasy, knowing all about the fact of the history Alex Wesker had with his brother and if the older Wesker decided to come looking for him it could mean bad business for everyone involved.
"What are you saying?" Guffy was still obviously confused. If he was this dense, she thought, it was by sheer luck he managed to make it in this business as long as he had.
"I'm saying that perhaps he did something to her, recoded her DNA, possibly even given her something that would keep T-Veronica at bay for so long. She was with him for quite some time."
"Well, I checked her eyes. They're normal."
Tract gave a small but sly smile that made him somewhat uneasy, "I guess we have nothing to worry about then. I'm going to hit the hay, if you're staying make sure to up that sedative in an hour. I'll be back at four." She gathered her laptop and locked the keypad on the metal door containing various samples in the temperature controlled enviroment. With a wave of her hand she was gone, beyond various contamination showers and sterile rooms, leaving Guffy all alone with a possibly dangerous specimen. The fact that she was heavily sedated and behind triple reinforced glass did nothing to quell the growing discomfort he had at being near her. He couldn't help but feel quite a bit pride at the situation though. He had been hand picked by the Chairman himself to be on what would possibly be the most important project of his career. A real live carrier of the T-Veronica virus and he got to handle it directly. Despite his unease, he allowed himself a silent pat on the back.
He broke his gaze from the woman floating above him and sat down at the metal office chair in front of the desk with the computer on it. He sighed and rubbed his eyes.
It was going to be a long night.
...
Above ground, in his personal suite on the sixth floor of the facility, Alex Wesker sat in a black leather arm chair, his silver laptop open on his lap. He had been monitoring his brother's actions for hours and found that the man had taken a flight out of New York City and was scheduled to land in Canada in a few minutes. He had thought about meeting his long lost sibling when he landed, but had decided to have him come to him instead.
That way his dear brother could see the surprise he had in store for himself.
He was no fool, he knew that a meeting with Albert could have dire consequences for him if he was not prepared. He may have the Progenitor running through his veins but he did not have the T-Virus that allowed his brother all of his perks.
That was what the Redfield girl was for, amongst other things.
Soon she wouldn't be the only one capable of bonding with T-Veronica and he knew that the potential of T-Veronica far outweighed that of the T-Virus. He would be faster, stronger, and far better than his oh so perfect brother in due time. He just had to ensure that he could produce a strain stable enough that he wouldn't need years of stasis to keep it at bay. As soon as he could ascertain that the virus would be under his control he would have the pleasure of ripping the elder Wesker's heart from his chest. A dream of his that had only grown since their childhood.
He laughed darkly, giddy that his plan was coming along so perfectly.
He snapped his head at the window behind him when the entire facility went dark for a few seconds, followed by the sound of sirens and bright red lights illuminating the outside buildings and towers. His eyes narrowed as he barked towards the ceiling.
"Red Queen, status report." In an instance a panel on the upper wall slid open and was lit with a bright red light.
"It seems that there is an outbreak in the lower levels." The feminine child's voice spoke with clarity and as emotionless as any computer could be.
"Which level did it start in?" He barked, clearly frustrated that this was happening. Those morons in the labs couldn't be trusted to keep anything without his help. He stood hurriedly and threw on his suit jacket, rushing into the hallway and toward the elevator. The voice followed him accurately throughout the halls, speaking clear over the sirens indicating the biohazard.
"My sensors indicate that it began in the sixth sublevel." The elevator doors slid open as if sensing his arrival, the Red Queen bypassing the security codes instantly for emergency and the button for B6 lit up as he stepped in.
"What caused this?" He hissed.
"No information is present. Sensors in sublevels three, four, five and six have just been shut down."
He seethed silently during the ride down. Someone was definitely going to pay for this.
...
Thirty minutes prior...
A pair of blue eyes snapped open and with them the entire facility was plunged into darkness, immediately causing a panic, screams filling the halls shortly. A quiet beep was heard to her right as the sound of fluid draining filled her ears and lowered her body to the bottom of the tank. She sighed irritatedly as the glass slid open in front of her and with ease she leapt down to the cold tile below, landing softly on her feet.
It was about time she had gotten out of that thing, she mused, as she snapped her fingers. The entire room was lit in an eerie blue, that of her doing, and as much as hated doing this there was no way she was going to stay in that tank for another day. No sooner than the wailing sounds filled the room did the man who had been keeping watch over her snap up to his feet. She rolled her eyes as he screamed and sped over towards the door, jamming his finger on the keypad next to it in a vain attempt to open it, even though there was no power. She sighed loudly as the door swung open - her doing, mind you -and he stumbled over himself in order to escape.
She didn't want to hurt anyone unless they got in her way, all she wanted to do was get the hell out of there. Unfortunately for her, due to the screams and howls in the hallways ahead, her accidental overload of the systems had apparently let out some nasty things. Or so she figured when the bloody and half eaten corpse of the oily haired man who had just left was thrown at her feet.
Damn, she knew she should have been more careful. She even waited until most of everyone had cleared out of this level for the night to execute this plan; she had been trying to prevent as many casualties as possible.
Even though she had managed to gain proper control over the virus, there were still some things she had problems with and she always tried to prevent abuse of her powers. It wasn't like she had wanted this to begin with. At least she hadn't lost complete control more than twice since she had woken up in Leon's apartment a year ago and lucky for him and her he wasn't present when it happened.
She often wondered why it was she could lose herself to the virus and still manage to come back as if nothing happened. Alexia had mutated to several stages and probably would have continued to do so if she hadn't been stopped.
Stopping at the glass to look into the halls ahead she caught sight of herself and gasped slightly. Somehow she had forgotten how entirely nude she was. She grabbed the lab coat hanging over the office chair that the now dead man had been sleeping at and wrapped it around herself, pleased that it ran to her knees. Buttoning it all the way down she then proceeded to enter the halls, slowly at first and then speeding up as she ensured that nothing remained down there.
She ran through at least half a dozen halls, untouched and unbothered, until she was faced with an elevator that seemed to moving down.
"Aw, fuck." She hissed as she bolted in the opposite direction, knowing that whatever was on the other side of that door, it couldn't be good. She took refuge in the corner of a dark hall when she heard hard footsteps on the tile coming in her direction. She really, really didn't want to have to kill anyone, and she really hoped it wasn't that blond bastard that had taken her.
The fact that he looked almost like him was just too much anyway. A sight of blond in the darkened hall had confirmed her worst.
He apparently hadn't sensed her there as he took a turn into the lab that she had been in previously. Of course in a matter of seconds he'd see that she wasn't there anymore and he'd be looking for her shortly. In a mad dash she made a break for that elevator, knowing that if she could just get past that door without him seeing her, she could make it out of here without being touched.
Once again, luck was not on her side tonight. His head turned swiftly as he raced after her, calling out loudly, "Red Queen, engage elevator shut down!"
She skidded to a halt before making contact with the metal doors as they shut firmly. He was gaining on her, and before she could run off he had latched on to her shoulder.
"Well, well, well, what have we here?" He shoved her against the wall, stronger than that of a normal person. He clearly had similar displays of superhuman strength like Wesker, although they were nowhere near his caliber. Nowhere near hers either, "Be a good girl and get back in your tank." He delivered a swift punch aimed for her head and she ducked to the side with ease, flinging herself on the floor away from him. Distantly she wondered if this man was some relation to him. Had to be. The resemblance and the strength wouldn't lie.
"Don't make me hurt you, Miss Redfield. I'm willing to forget the damage and money you've cost me tonight if you agree to back down now." He was bargaining with her? She wanted to laugh. This guy was a joke. He leaned over to appraise her. Maybe he was afraid of touching her? Either way he seemed to be keeping his distance. Probably because he knew she could kick his ass.
"Right, I'll just hop back into that tank just because you asked. Go to hell." Previous reservations forgotten about hurting anyone during her ill-planned break out were lost as she flew upwards, legs first and latched onto his neck with her thighs, pulling him over her.
Soon it was an all out brawl and though she had been attempting to keep her most devastating powers at bay, mostly because the more she unlocked the virus the more she ran the risk of losing control, he was really wearing on her nerves. Not to mention she couldn't keep this up long, channeling all of her mental capacity into shutting down the electricity downstairs. There was no more time to spare and she decided that if she didn't incapacitate him soon, she'd never get out of here.
So she hit him in the face with a punch hard enough to crack bone and smiled triumphantly as he screamed and cradled his nose that was gushing blood like a faucet. She broke free and bolted towards the back, a door that read Fire Exit her main location. She was met with another metal door on the other side, locked by another damn keypad and without thinking, kicked through it with the force of a hundred men. Metal was bent at awkward angles as she flung herself through it and up so many flights of stairs that she had lost count. Victory was close and she shoved open the door at the very top, the smell of fresh air greeting her like an old friend as she thrust herself through.
The ceremonious click of about twenty Assault Rifles met her ears and she swore softly and rose her hands in the air. They were standing in a line, all twenty of them, wearing enough armor to prevent even a multitude of bullets from hurting them. And if that weren't bad enough, the beating sounds of a helicopter rising above the rooftop she was on and the priming of it's own machine turret would have been enough to have her give up and go back to where she came. Would have, had she been the Old Claire.
She slowly turned her head and peered over the edge as one of them spoke, voice distorted through the face cover on his visor, and realized with a mild freak out that she was about twenty floors in the air.
"You are surrounded, give yourself up quietly or we will not hesitate to shoot you down."
A raised eyebrow and quirked lip were the only warnings they got before she bolted towards the edge.
Soon she was flying, the tink-tink-tink of bullet against metal and concrete filling her ears as she fell, mouth and eyes wide open in what could only be described as the greatest high in the world. Wind rushed past her, her hair flying wildly as she fell on and on and when she hit the ground with ease she took off running in the snow as if she had never fallen off a twenty floor building at all.
...
"No, no, no! You incompetent excuses for human beings! You let her get away!" Alex ground out, staring all of the men down with death glares that made them shrink back as a whole.
"Sir, she jumped off the building. There's no way she survived that." The man in front said, trying not to fidget.
"Oh, is that so? Then explain to me, you idiot, why there's not a bloody mess of brains and entrails in the snow?" He motioned over the edge of the rooftop and the leader peered over the side, clearly at a loss for words.
"But how-"
"Do you know what she is, Commander Gleeson? Do you know what she has?" His green eyes burned with fury and it was clear that Gleeson had no idea at all, "I want her found, you hear me? Bring her back to me at once. I don't care if she's dead or alive, if you don't find her by morning I will make sure that you and your useless team are terminated permanently. Is that clear?"
"Yes, sir." Gleeson said, who by this time looked as if he might need a change of underwear. He turned back towards his team and motioned to continue the search as the Chairman disappeared back into the building.
He certainly didn't want to be the one who was terminated permanently. If he hadn't been so concerned with the thought of being murdered by his violent boss, he might have noticed the silhouette of the person watching the scene with dark exotic eyes from their post above.
...
Wesker's red eyes widened behind his frames only a fraction of an inch as his phone beeped to indicate an incoming call, with a smirk he answered, knowing that it could only be one person. What a surprise, considering he hadn't heard from her in years.
"Ms. Wong, how nice of you to ring me. What's the occasion?"
"Always one for formalities, Wesker. Just thought I'd call and say hello." Her smooth, velvet voice sighed delicately, though this woman was hardly delicate.
"I'm sure that's just it, Ms. Wong." He couldn't help but smile. It had been so long, after all.
"There was something I thought you should know though. Consider this one a freebie from an old friend." Something in her voice told him that was exactly what is wasn't. Still her informational services weren't cheap to come by and usually if she had information for him it was important enough to warrant those high prices.
"Oh, and what would that be, dear? A shoe store having a sale?" He mocked, although mostly good naturedly.
"Nothing like that I'm afraid, just thought you'd like to know that a man who seems to look a lot like you recently had an old pal of your's in custody," He could hear the smile in her voice but his mouth tightened to that of a stern line, "That was of course until she made her brave escape off of a roof."
"Who?" He hissed, his good mood lost in favor of something else, something he didn't want to feel.
"Well, I didn't catch the name, but she certainly looked familiar. I believe it was the Redfield girl. Claire I think?" This was impossible, he reasoned, there was no way.
"You said this man looked like me?" He had to hear it from the horse's mouth herself to believe it.
"Quite similar, I'd say. You seem surprised." The smirk was quite evident on her face even if he couldn't see it. He was a slight bit surprised and he could only imagine what foolhardy scheme his little brother could be concocting with the girl. It could only be something involving the virus she had.
"Where was this, Ms. Wong?" He chose to ignore the snarky side comment, after all his plans had just taken a turn in a more extreme direction.
"Russia. I don't know the exact name of the city but it's pretty far from civilization. Pretty tight security but nothing I can't handle, I'm sure you'll have no trouble getting there."
"And she escaped?" He threw on his heavy leather coat and tucked his favored Samurai Edge into the holster attached to his chest, "Which way was she headed?" A long period of silence passed, as if Ada was thinking, "Ms Wong?"
"Yeah...sorry...just thought I saw something. I'm not sure she made it out the gates yet but she was headed in the direction of Moscow. How she's going to make it there on foot with no shoes in the snow I have no idea. I could...follow her if you like." Wesker was taken aback, it was unlike her to be so generous with her prized information but he had a feeling that it had less to do with him and more to do with the fact that Claire was close to the object of Ada's affections. She thought he didn't know about it but not many things went past him. Her obvious feelings for the Kennedy were one of those things. She must have known that any harm towards Claire would place Kennedy in an unstable state and probably figured that if she could keep Claire out of danger's way it would help him ultimately.
"No. I've got it under control. Goodbye Ms. Wong."
"Wesker wait-" He did not in fact wait, unable to waste anymore time. He couldn't allow that sniveling little bastard to get his hands on Claire. To allow him the only remaining sample of T-Veronica would be disastrous for more than Wesker and something even deeper than that. Within minutes he was on a helicopter, en route to Russia to find Claire before Alex could.
...
It had been a few hours since she had jumped the fence with enough electric charge to kill a man and now she was treading through the snow at a much slower pace than when she began. The intense burning in her feet had started about ten minutes ago and she knew that if it weren't for the virus she would most likely have collapsed or succumbed to hypothermia by now. She had never praised her infection and she probably never would flaunt it around proudly but she couldn't help but appreciate a bit more.
Thank Wesker for small miracles.
She punched herself mentally, not wanting to think about him ever again if at all possible. She knew that wouldn't happen, as she thought about him in just everything she did. She tugged the lab coat tighter even so around her shivering form, knowing that it wouldn't be long until her decreased temperature would drop even more; the virus could only do so much. At least that merry band of idiots the blond guy had sent after her had gone in the wrong direction in order to retrieve her.
Claire one, blond douchebag zero.
Still she didn't know how long she could keep this up considering she couldn't feel her feet or the bottom half of her legs anymore. Her knees shook from the strain and her joints ached badly from the freezing temperatures. Her head was spinning and her heart beat was slowing to a dangerously slow thud, as if it wanted to give out.
A white expanse of snow covered nothing traveled on as far as she could see and she had to prevent herself from crying out in grief. She walked on further until something black against the white backdrop caught her eye and she broke out into as much of a run as she could manage; more like a floppy stumble, she mused depressed. A large package, wrapped in plain black paper sat in the snow, looking as if it hadn't been there long. She reached for it but stopped herself quickly. There was no telling what was in that seemingly unthreatening package.
Something told her that she had ran out of options about two hours ago, and whatever it was it had to be better than nothing. Unless it was a bomb, which would really suck. It seemed as if it had been left there recently with the intent of her finding it.
With trembling hands she picked it up, slowly unwrapping it, and couldn't contain the squeal of delight at what was inside of it.
In her hands she held a black jacket, a pair of dark blue jeans, a black hoodie sweatshirt, a cozy pair of socks, a pair of leather gloves and pair of black knee high boots. All of which were in her size. Whether it was a trap or someone had been watching out for her she didn't know but she didn't care at the moment and managed to put the entire outfit on in a matter of minutes.
Oh that was so much better.
Once she was better equipped she began to move again, stopping when she felt something hard swing against her leg inside of the coat pocket. She retrieved the contents of the pocket and found a small black wallet in her hand and opened it. There was also a sleek black flashlight.
Inside was exactly five hundred dollars and a little slip of paper. She clicked on the flashlight and skimmed it over the note, reading it slowly.
It was the best I could do for you at the moment. It should help. On the back of this note is a small map leading into the closest town to you. Be careful.
-A. Wong
She searched her brain frantically for the mention of this name and although it seemed very familiar she really couldn't place where she had heard it before. However she was too busy praising this person to worry about it too much. Turning the sheet of paper over she found directions written on top of the map and she exhaled in relief to see that she wasn't too far from civilization after all.
She still didn't know where she was though, country or otherwise. Pending on how cold it was though, she had to deduce that it was a long ways away from the U.S. Hell she didn't know if she was even still in the North American continent. There were some things she did know though, such as that she was most likely in Europe and nowhere near the southern hemisphere. Unless she was in Antarctica, which she doubted. There was no civilization out there anyway, not really. She treaded on, feeling much better than she did before but distantly wondering that if this A. Wong person knew she was out here, why they didn't make themselves known to her. Had they been watching her this whole time?
Were they still watching her?
Another hour passed and when she caught sight of a barely lit up town she broke out into a furious run, the feeling of relief and happiness so great that she wanted to cry. She had enough money here that she could pay for a room to sleep in and get some food and maybe even supplies. If she ever met this A. Wong, she would make it first priority to kiss them right on the mouth.
She made it into town and blended into the small groups of people walking past, noting that they seemed to be speaking Russian. This was kind of disheartening, considering she didn't know a word of the language. She just had to hope that she wouldn't need to.
Fortunately however, it appeared to be a quite pleasant town and it's occupants didn't give her any strange once overs. They either flashed her a small quick smile in passing or ignored her altogether.
Soon enough she had located what she hoped was a motel, which it was, and stepped through the door, exhaling in relief at the warm air that wrapped her in it's arms. The interior was cozy looking, much like that of someone's home and if it hadn't been for the set of older elevators near the back she may have thought that's where she was. There was an older lady behind the counter, with a head of long graying brown hair and ice blue eyes. She had her nose buried in a book, and Claire noted with appreciation that it was a Dean Koontz novel. A rather good one, she mused.
This also showed that the woman most likely spoke English. Something that made Claire feel loads better.
"Excuse me?" Claire spoke softly, not wanting to startle the lady. The woman's eyes snapped up at her and a large smile crossed her pretty face.
"Ahh hello. An american, yes? We don't get many of you around here. Vot can I do for you, dear?" Her English was quite good and Claire relaxed upon the realization that the woman seemed to appreciate her heritage instead of reacting to it the way Chris had told her all Russians would. Considering she had only ever met one Russian in her life and he had been an asshole who tried to rape and kill her and murdered Wesker, she hadn't much to go on.
"Yes, ma'am. I'd like a room for the night. Do you accept American currency?" Claire fidgeted with her wallet, feeling still a bit nervous.
"Of course. Vill that be one or two beds?"
"Just one, please." Claire smiled at the lady, sincerly hoping that all of the people in the town were just as nice.
"And vot's your name, dear?" She asked, writing something in a book on the desk.
Claire froze, unsure of whether to give her actual name. Instead she blurted the first thing that came to mind, not really caring if it sounded real or not.
"Sharon White."
"Alright. There you go, dear. Checkout is at 2 and there's a phone. Just dial 9 to go out and dial 1 for the front desk. If there is anything I can do for you, let me know." She reached under the desk and handed Claire a shiny key with a tag attached to it that read 304,"Your room is on the third floor."
"Thank you so much, how much do I owe you?" She reached for the money in her wallet , expecting the bill to be lengthy.
"That vould be thirty dollars in American cash." Claire almost choked.
"Wow, that's all?"
"American money is vorth quite a bit more than rubles here, dear." The lady said with a small laugh, "You haven't been in Russia long, have you?"
"Actually, no. I was kind of just...dropped here."
"Vell you needn't vorry. Like I said, if you need help vith anything, just ask."
Claire moved towards the elevator, thanking the woman again. She probably should have asked where the best place to eat or get clothes was but right now sleep called to her. Her condition generally didn't call for much sleep or food but under the right amount of strain and duress it would buckle and she would give in.
It made her feel just the tiniest bit more human.
Absently, as she rode the old elevator up, she wondered if Wesker required food in his virally enhanced state. She was sure he did but like her not often.
She shook herself mentally, clearing all thoughts of the man she had come to grow feelings for despite what he was.
He hadn't been the same when she knew him.
She honestly didn't know if he was even alive really. For all she knew, his remains could be lying under the dirt beneath the scrap of that facility.
Still it did leave a lot to wonder in regards to how she wound up in D.C when she had resigned to her fate before she had collapsed from exhaustion.
No. It didn't matter now, he was nowhere in sight and thankfully neither was that creepy doppelganger of his. She wondered what exactly the deal was with that? Did Wesker have a brother he hadn't told anyone about? If he did perhaps even he didn't know. That thought struck her as somewhat ridiculous; that damned man knew everything. Or he thought he did. On a different note, perhaps the man wasn't related to Wesker at all, at least not in the traditional sense, he could be a clone.
No, she shook her head as the elevator opened and she walked slowly down the hall for the plaque that read her room number, he didn't look exactly like Wesker, just similar.
So what? Wesker had some freaky look-a-like roaming around doing the almost exact thing he was doing? What the hell was he? The leader of some creepy Wesker fan club?
That was too weird. She popped the key in the lock and stepped into the modest yet clean and crisp room. Wasting no time she began to strip her clothes and mindlessly trudged into the small bathroom attached to the room. Running the water she'd need for a nice, super hot shower.
As she stepped into the searingly hot water, not a drop of cold water used, it felt as cozy as a normal shower would. The virus had significantly changed her body's reaction to temperature and she could only feel them properly if they were at extreme temperatures, be it scalding hot or below-freezing cold. Even then it was still numbed and she would have to be exposed to it for a long time for it to truly cause her body to register as harm.
She was sure she wouldn't have been out in the snow long without the T-Veronica before she had frozen to that of a human popsicle.
Grabbing the complimentary motel shampoo she began to lather her hair fervently, feeling as if being in that tank for so long had instilled in her a stale and disgusting smell.
And speaking of smells, what in the hell was that?
She sniffed curiously and despite the plain scent of the soap she could significantly smell something that immediately brought a sense of deja vu along with it. Technically it was two scents blended together but her keen nose could seperate them; being an avid motorcycle aficionado she recognized the first.
Leather and the other seemed to be that of a crisp ocean breeze wafting over a smoldering flame.
The introduction of these new scents instilled in her a sense of caution and she hurriedly rinsed her hair and scrubbed herself clean before stepping out of the shower quietly, not bothering to turn off the water just yet in order not to give herself away to whoever was waiting in her room.
And she was sure there was someone out there.
Quietly she slipped a towel across her body, happy that it covered her completely but cursing herself that she hadn't had the foresight to bring her clothes into the bathroom with her. Turning the knob painstakingly slow, she opened the door and stepped out, shutting the lights off immediately, the sound of the shower still muffling any noises she could have made. She peered around the corner and when she found that no one was there she let out a sigh of relief and set towards the bed to retrieve her clothes.
"Evening, dear heart."
She froze when the words slipped through her ears like the satin she was sure they were made of. In that brief moment she wasn't sure whether she should be relieved or surprised that he was in her room with her and not elsewhere or better yet, dead. There was one thing she wasn't however, and that was the thing that sent warning bells off in her head immediately.
She was not afraid of Albert Wesker.
...
A/N: Okay, here's the deal. I have already written the next two chapters and am 70 percent done with the fourth. They will all be about this length. Nice and loooong. If you want the next I will post but only after I see some reviews here! Gimme some love! Anyways, as soon as you guys critique I shall post. Thanks!