Jill did not belong in this world.
This strange unbelonging followed her as she moved from bed to window, staring outside. The sickly rotten odor of death crept in, haunting her. She counted the faces of people she had once known.
As if they could smell her vitality, her life, the creatures moaned in unison, gathering at the door. Creaking, the old wood wouldn't hold out against many more of the undead.
An odd sense of nostalgia welled within her. Quickly, methodically, she cleaned. Unsure of why she was doing this, she tried to stop. But it was unbearable. Soon the lemon scent filled her house, attempting weakly to mask the thick stench just outside the thin walls.
Prayers meant nothing now. Action meant nothing now. This was life or death, once more. She was outnumbered, once more. Yet this wasn't the same terrible July night where things had gone so terribly wrong. Her city, her home, lost to the infection of death.
It was painful not to cry, but tears did not solve her problem. She stopped crying hours ago, when the tenth one had arrived at her door.
All of them had names. Cindy from the grocery store, teenaged and pierced. Hannah from the pizzeria, bloated with a mutated pregnancy that ate a hole through her body. Rick from the bank, missing a portion of his brain, the hair still attached to the loosely swinging skin. Young, old, it didn't matter.
Infection did not discriminate.
She shook with fear, trying to breathe in the clean, filter out the filth. Nothing worked. The utter, heartrending loneliness did not help her control her fear.
Stupidly enough, Jill had next to no ammunition. She had a single handgun which she kept at home for burglars, never dreaming that she'd need a million magazines. Six bullets. That was all that lay within the carefully wrapped up, tucked away handgun. Not nearly enough.
The mansion incident had been deadly, scarring. Traumatized, all the survivors insisted on telling their story, to the point where STARS had been dissolved and all members publicly ridiculed and tried for insanity. None of them had been believed, even by their closest friends. Chris had disappeared, Barry had moved from town, and Rebecca had likely lost her life hours ago, at the hands and teeth of the infected. But they all had believed it was over with the destruction of the mansion and Albert Wesker.
They were wrong.
Especially Jill. Vigilantly, she had watched both the RPD and the Umbrella Corporation, devouring newspapers and researching the matter herself. Wasted time, all of it.
Because now she was going to die.
It had all been for nothing: her entire life had been meaningless. Her survival at the hands of Wesker, the foes she battled within the confines of the labyrinth-mansion, they were pointless accomplishments.
The mirror gave her insight to how she must appear to others. Beautiful, tired, sad. Jill was a creature that thrived in adversity, who continued to battle on after all the fights had been lost, after anyone else would've given up.
But the circles beneath her cerulean eyes attested to her exhaustion. She was tired, bone tired. It was no longer worth it to try and face to those monsters who waited outside, who had been her friends and neighbors.
Pale and wan, she watched herself in the mirror. Who was Jill Valentine? An officer of the law? That wasn't her identity.
Funny that her midlife crisis was during her mid-twenties, at the end of her life.
Sunlight spilt from the windows, leaving shadows where the monsters blocked the light. Jill had just cleaned the windows two days ago. Now blood spattered and smeared against the sharp, shining glass.
Slowly, she meandered through the house, remembering. The yellow kitchen with the hideously ugly faux-marble countertops, where Chris and Forrest had gotten disgustingly drunk and thrown up. Her bedroom, where she had let the two sleep, taking off their vomit-speckled shirts, letting them wake up the next morning with yelps of hung-over panic. Her bathroom, where Claire Redfield had gotten her first period at fifteen and cried, too embarrassed to tell her brother. In the room she kept her washing machine and dryer, the STARS team had hidden Barry's dog in her empty dryer, terrifying her with the furious barks coming from her supposedly 'off' machine.
Smiling at the memory, she stopped at her living room, where the front door was.
This memory made her frown.
Once, when her car had broken down, Albert Wesker had driven her home and kissed her in the fading sunlight. She had felt him smile when their lips touched. Instinctively, she had wanted more, known that there was a motive to his actions, that there was something he wanted. But right when she was perfectly amenable to inviting him inside, he had departed. Simply left without a goodbye, or even acknowledgement. The memory made her burn with shame.
Neither had ever brought it up again. Then, when she discovered his betrayal, she had weakened at the knees, her sense of honesty and justice dirtied by his mouth and lingering tongue.
Rage flickered within her, only to be defeated by the sight of a monster bashing at her window. Jill was deflated.
Righteousness had no place in purgatory. Her home, her sanctuary, was purgatory, her waiting room. The great outdoors, the concrete jungle of Raccoon was hell. And heaven?
Where was heaven?
Faith had never been part of Jill's life. Sternly atheist, she had never even given a thought to the afterlife. But now, in the sharp sunlight streaming through the windows like a serrated knife, she could think of nothing else.
It was her only option, to be sure. A quick and painless death was far preferable to being slowly devoured, to being turned into one of the insatiable undead, remaining in a half-life limbo until mercy came for her.
But mercy would never come, not while she was in limbo. She had to choose, and quickly. Her door strained against the rotten collection of zombies.
She didn't know, couldn't have known that mercy was flying as fast as she could to her rescue, bringing with her salvation. And mercy couldn't have known, never would've dreamed that Jill Valentine had given up hope.
Rebecca Chambers brought with her an arsenal, and more than enough ammo to destroy each creature crowding about Jill's silent home. But when she made it inside, she saw the blood littering the floor, blood that had been spilt by its owners own hand.
Suicide had been Jill's heaven, her haven, her choice. Swiftly and before self-doubt had overtaken her, Jill carefully unwrapped her little handgun and with shaking hands, held it to her temple.
Jill never heard the shot that killed her, never felt the powerful kick of the trigger that dislocated her pale, bloodless wrist.
Rebecca came late enough that her friend's blood had congealed across her once beautiful face, late enough that Jill Valentine, who never stopped trying, had weighed her options as systematically as possible and chosen what she believed to be the wisest course.
Rebecca gaped at the mess of her friend and did not cry. She had tried to come for Jill, and she had almost made it.
The medic turned away sadly, feeling hollow. A few zombies stirred, but she ignored them. Little Rebecca Chambers, rookie officer of STARS Bravo Team, was not going to weigh her options and scare herself.
There are two ways to overcome a hurdle: to leap over them, or to plow through them. Or in Rebecca's case, use the magnum to splinter it apart. A loose plan began to formulate in her mind, gathering ideas that would make her missing teammates proud. Reloading all her weapons and climbing into her car, she hoped that no roads were blocked. Because plowing through wasn't the plan.
Driving past the staggering bodies, Rebecca shoved down her fear. Part of the charm of Raccoon had been its ability to make anyone feel welcome. But now, a sense of unbelonging overcame her, a sad, lonely façade that tried to wedge its way through her mind and disrupt her plan.
She drove on, refusing to count the faces of her friends, of family members, of neighbors and acquaintances. Remembering was weakness, and forgetting was salvation. Her world was broken, but not her determination. Holding her together was her faith in justice, her faith in the world. Since nobody else was around to do it, Rebecca would save herself.
As tightly as she clenched her jaw, though, she couldn't hold back the tears muddying her vision. A few dripped from her lashes, puddling on the swell of her cheeks. Sniffing loudly, she told herself she couldn't cry. It wasn't safe here. But slowly, she stopped accelerating until she had stopped in the middle of the abandoned streets. Nothing was here except for a few wandering monsters. Completely alone, she tried to pull herself together until she shattered. Crying for a few minutes, she wiped her tears away and willed herself to be strong. Decisively, she put in a cassette, cranking the music. She didn't care if she drew attention to herself.
Rebecca was going to escape, even if it meant she had to do it alone.