Authors Note: So far so good.

I really like this chapter, to be honest. Mostly it's because of the little folk tale Chris tells Claire about in this chapter. I really like twisting the facts to make things seem different from what they really are and I love dark foreboding and bitter irony.

On with the show.

Part 2: The legend of Raccoon City.

Opening the letter that clearly hadn't been tampered with, Claire read the following:

Dear Miss Claire Redfield.

She chuckled at that. So unnecessarily formal. He had obviously followed some kind of template for writing letters and it had caused him to come out with something as ridiculously stuffy as that.

I'm sorry that I haven't contacted you in a while. Couldn't think of what to say. Probably shouldn't even say it when I do think of it. I've done some messed up things in order to survive these past few months, things that I know you'll hate me for if I tell you about them.

But I told Wesker about them.

This made Claire frown. Her own brother trusted this random 'Wesker' guy more with his dirty little secrets than he did his own sister?

Wesker is the asshole man who gave you this letter. ('Asshole' had been scribbled out thoroughly, though it had been written with such force and intensity in the first place that it had marked into the very paper) I know you'll be angry that I said I told him everything when I won't tell you, but try to understand: I don't want you to get hurt and if you know about the sort of people I've worked for and pissed off your life could be put in danger. Wesker understands this. Wesker helped me with this.

I'd done 'something' stupid that had caused me to get arrested in Raccoon City, the place run by that pharmaceutical giant 'Umbrella'. I won't go into details or name names but it had something to do with being a hired gun for certain illegal pharmaceutical substances. I know what you're thinking. 'But Raccoon is only several miles away! Why didn't Chris visit?' Like I said, I knew some dangerous people and you would've gotten hurt if they knew about you.

Anyhow long story short, there was a sting, some people got shot and yours truly ended up with the boot of non-other than Barry Burton on my face. That was the only reason he managed to apprehend me, by the way. I was so shocked to see my former boss and partner from the Air force pointing a freakin' .50 caliber pistol square at my chest that he took me out without a hitch. He always was a quick thinker in a crisis….

Actually now that I think about it, don't you think blasting disenfranchised young men and women with a freakin' magnum is a little bit excessive?

Claire chuckled at that but couldn't help but agree. It was a little much…

Claire suddenly noticed she was getting cold, then she remembered she was still wearing wet clothes.

"Damn, I'm the dumbest girl who ever lived!" She said to herself, putting down the letter and heading back to the bathroom to get a towel. She blew out the creepy candles, drained the bath and disconnected the deathtrap radio while she was there, too. She left the figures, though. Couldn't be bothered to deal with that nonsense right now.

After changing out of her wet outfit into something a little more casual, Claire continued to read the note this time from the comfort of her living room couch, wriggling down into the piles of trash and laundry that had accumulated in her unfortunate months of partially self-inflicted hermitage.

Anyway, after 'Officer Burton' arrested me, we had a nice long chat in the R.P.D cells. He was actually in the cell with me with the door wide open. I guess he knew I wouldn't bolt and wanted to show me that he trusted me.

Turns out that after I left the Air force, he'd argued my case pretty hard. All the flack I'd given was aimed at him after all and he insisted he could handle it. That's when the higher ups started to question if he really could handle it…

Basically what I'm saying is that I got Barry fired.

"Holy shit Chris you never think before you act…" Said Claire to herself. It wasn't as if this was the first time someone had gotten hurt because of her brothers reckless behavior. Her little bathroom adventure was testament to that…

I felt like such an asshole after that but that's when I realized that my running away from home might've caused you some problems, Claire.

"Damn right it did, big brother!" Claire part-yelled. Only now did he see what he had done?

I was desperate for Barry to call you to check up on you but when he did, he got no answer. I'm worried sick about you, Claire.

She hadn't been answering the phone. It had been mostly spiteful prank calls, anyway…

I wanted to go back home to see you but I was in too much trouble to be released and that grease ball asshole who runs the R.P.D wouldn't even grant compassionate leave because I'm too much of a flight risk.

Turns out that this Wesker guy, the man who had tracked me down and organized the sting, (and the man who gave you this letter, I think I need to point that out to you)

Huh… So he was Wesker…

had been listening in to every piece of god damn information I just told Barry. I had spilled my freakin' guts out to my old partner and this stuffy weirdo had heard every embarrassing, dirty little detail.

Needless to say when he confronted me about this fact in the interrogation room, I tried to fuck him up. Just ended up with his boot on my face for my troubles.

Claire smirked at this. And still he hadn't learnt to think before he rushed in… "Chris… You'll never change…" She said.

Anyway after I had cooled off, he asked me a lot of weird questions. About you, about our parents, about my childhood… And for some reason, I answered them. No one had ever really shown an interest in those things before, I guess… And Wesker…. He just listened. Listened to everything…. When I told him about the things I had done, the people I'd killed, he didn't even yell or scream or ask me how I sleep at night, fuck, he didn't even flinch…

Claire flinched… 'The people I'd killed'? Just what the hell had he been doing these past few months?

I had no idea how much I needed someone to just listen…. And not smile stupidly and nod and go 'uh-huh, uh-huh, sure honey' like the shrinks did after Mom died… He actually seemed to care, asking questions in all the right places and offering acknowledgement for what I'd said… And I really respect Wesker for being the sort of man who can do that…

Claire smiled thoughtfully… It was intriguing that her brother thought so highly of this 'Wesker' guy after he'd just played shrink with him. Chris despised psychiatrists and councilors. Called them modern day snake oil salesmen. 'They only pretend to listen and care because they're paid to' he would say. 'They don't really give a damn about us, Claire and if they knew us outside of work they'd probably shun us just like everyone else. If they really cared, they'd stop flapping their gums and actually do something to help us. They're scum. Every last one of them.'

But not Wesker apparently.…

Anyhow after I was sent back into the cells with Barry, Wesker came back a few hours later. Turns out there was 'insufficient evidence linking me to the crime' and that I was free to go. There was tons of evidence, Claire. My prints on my gun, gunpowder residue on my hands, all those kilos of drugs… Dozens of dead bad guys…But apparently that wasn't enough evidence to convict me…

As I left the cell Wesker grabbed me by the arm and said he was setting up a counter terrorism unit here in Raccoon City called S.T.A.R.S and that Officer Burton had given him glowing praise on me in regards to joining, though he had warned him I'd be a constant pain in his ass if he did take me. I accepted his offer.

And just like that, he's my new boss. The guy who had me on the floor like a little bitch just a few hours previously.

He set me up with an apartment –just a studio thing, nothing fancy- and a few hundred in a new bank account to get me started…Even food in the fridge, though nothing to my taste… Who the hell would willingly eat a soy yogurt?

Claire laughed at that. Chris was well built, but it was a wonder given the crap he put in his body. If it wasn't for Claire's mothering of him, he'd live entirely off of soda and Hawaiian pizza, and she hated Hawaiian pizza because she'd had to eat it for breakfast lunch and dinner every day for a week after their parents had died before she finally snapped and said enough was enough.

She continued reading.

Anyway I'm getting off topic. Wesker told me to write you this letter and that he'd head to our hometown to pick you up to visit me in my brand spanking new life. I was expecting him to punch me square in the face the second I said we lived in a town called 'Crapwood' but as luck would have it, he already knew about the place. Said it was apparently set up by an indirect ancestor of Ozwald Spencer –the founder of Raccoon City and of Umbrella by the way- blood line.

According to Wesker, there had been two Spencer brothers of aristocracy back in classical England. The oldest had a fondness for gambling and the whores and got the family into debt. Rather than deal with the disgrace and humiliation and not to mention the tax man, the oldest brother used the last of his money to run away to the 'new world', leaving the younger brother in a real heap of trouble.

The elder brother founded that town you're in in hopes of setting up a new fortune what with the lush woods there for the pillaging and Arklay Mountains a short trip away but as it turns out his plans were doomed right from the start.

The resident Indians viewed the local forests, particularly the woods near the base of the Arklay Mountains near what's now Raccoon City, as a sacred place where the dead and their cohorts live in peace for all eternity. They believed that if the sacred shrines built to house the spirits in Arklay forest were destroyed, then the dead would spill into their city on the outskirts of the woods in vengeance for their fallen homes, an army of evil spirits lead by a great and merciless Tyrant king.

The people of Raccoon still adhered to this old tradition, respecting the forests privacy. Some of the more superstition people here in Raccoon actually live in fear that someone might find those houses of the dead and anger the spirits to this very day...

I think Wesker said the legend was known as the 'Resident Evil'…

Claire stopped reading the letter for a moment. It was quite a tall tale after all and was worthy of consideration. Monsters in the woods, spooky cities of the dead… and a Tyrant king of evil….

She thought it all sounded rather romantic…

Anyhow about the Spencer brother who set up the town. Crapwood, not Raccoon, I mean.

As you can imagine, the constant attacks on his lumber workers who tried to pry into the forest caused the place to fast become a ghost town. That's when he re-named it Crapwood, once all the other citizens but him left. I think it was actually called Raccoon before then…

Anyway he died alone and penniless of a mysterious illness. Although what with a legend like 'Resident Evil' going around, there are some people who still think that Spencer guy is still alive, biding his time and waiting for the day he can claim those woods finally for himself.

The brother who stayed behind in England managed to sort out all the mess his brother had made and beget the current air Ozwald E Spencer's line.

Funny how choosing to run from your problems created such a tale…

And that was all he wrote.

Literally.

Sighing, Claire threw the bundle of papers to one side and gathered up a few banknotes and her door keys, all she really needed to take with her at this point and proceeded down the corridor to her closed front door.

Oddly enough, just beyond the front door, she could hear that Wesker guy talking with someone. She could tell it wasn't her brother but she couldn't really tell if it was male or female, the second voice being even more muffled than Wesker's.

When Claire opened the front door and the talking stopped.

Wesker was sitting on the boot of his jet black SUV with this arms folded and one leg crossed over the other up upon the knee. There was no one else to be seen. Wesker looked over to her and smiled briefly out of an attempt to be ever so slightly sociable.

"Good read was it?" He asked and Claire couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic or not.

"Who were you talking to just now?" Claire asked, approaching the man.

"No one you need to worry about Dear H- Claire." He corrected himself. He proceeded to round the car and open the passenger door for her. Claire didn't really feel like pushing the issue further right now and climbed into the passenger seat, making sure she fastened her seatbelt. For some reason, this act made Wesker smile warmly down at her.

Once Wesker had gotten into the vehicle, fastened his own seatbelt and started the engine, Claire decided to pipe up: "Why did you look at me weird like that when I put my seatbelt on?"

"I always have to remind your brother to do that." Was his response. And he turned around to look out the back of the rear window as he pulled the car out of its parking position. "I'm pleased to see you are far more sensible." He continued. "I wasn't looking forward to the prospect of spending a few hours trapped in a box with another Redfield but you seem like pleasant company so far, unlike your brother."

Claire shook her head. "You've got him all wrong. Chris is a good guy"-

-"He just doesn't think." Wesker interrupted. "Yes, I've heard that excuse made for him several times already. It may be a reason for his behavior, but that doesn't mean I should excuse his actions."

Claire didn't argue with that. It was true but she loved her brother deeply and couldn't bring herself to look upon Chris so harshly. Wesker however, seemed like a pretty intelligent, observant, objective guy. It made him seem a little cold and stuffy but Claire guessed that was ok so long as he was one of the good guys.

And Wesker was a good guy.

Claire smiled as Wesker took the car on the road. It'd be interesting to get to know this guy… Maybe even fun….

From the window of Claire's neighbor's house, a haggard old woman peered through the gap she had made between her net curtains, her nose sticking through them like a pointy little beak of a vulture, squinting through wiry spectacles at the sight before her.

"It looks like the government is finally taking away that last horrible Redfield." She observed to her pet cat who was lounging on the windowsill just under her chin. The cat turned to face her as if it understood its mistress. "I knew that after that crazy male one went missing she'd be taken away. I bet she killed him. I bet he got drunk and violent and she had to do him in. We should consider digging up her garden, I bet we'll find him in there. I bet that's not all we find either! There's probably dozens of dead lovers stashed under those marigolds! I should call the Sherriff and have him conduct a thorough search of the premises immediately! I'm sure that's what that charming gentleman who apprehended her would want, anyway."

The woman proceeded to go to her old fashion ring-dial telephone and call on the Sherriff of Crapwood thus serving to spread her delusion amongst its citizens.