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Chapter 3.
Focusing Efforts -
Leaving the room had been difficult, but in the end Alexia just grabbed the Senator impatiently and lightly through him out on his arse, to the great amusement of the majority of their party. Trying to find any humour in the dark situation had been terrible but the Ashford's actions had brought a ray of light to the survivor's hearts – well bar Ron Davis of course.
"Are you trying to get us killed?" obviously silence wasn't something the senator was good at unless it involved avoiding making press statements. Climbing to his feet with difficultyDavisturned to face his rescuers, indignant irritation covering his face. "How dare you treat an elected official in such a disrespectful manner?" The pudgy faced senator practically bellowed towards them, a few disgusting pieces of spittle landed themselves on the front of the blonde agents' jacket. "I don't care if that stupid slut did survive Raccoon city all that means is she was fast enough to suck off some guard who let her out – urk."
The senator let out a choked scream of fear as Alexia, who had been steadily growing more infuriated with each passing second, lifted the man up with one arm her now taloned hand clutching tightly around the inconsiderate senators neck. A sneering mask of a tormenter well versed in the arts of torture gazed up at the man lifted above her head before after hesitating for a moment threw her captive into the wall with enough forces to dent the cheap plaster. With a groan the senator sat up rubbing his head, directing his fearful gaze towards the Ashford heir he tried to scramble back further into the broken plaster of the wall corridor.
One of the accompanying marines turned his gun which had been briefly focused on the terrifying Ashford and aimed it at the terrified senator. "Wait I'm sorry she's not a whore! I'm sorry I didn't mean to insult your girl-friend. Please!" the man begged with frantic speed. The gun sounded and two shots impacted near the senators head. "Let's move. Now!"Leon's voice brought the group back to attention, poking through the plaster was the front maw of a dog, a dog which whose flesh had become damaged and had already begun to decompose.
Obviously one of the other VIP guests had ignored the quarantine rules and brought their pet into one of the VIP lounges to keep them company causing the animal to become infected by the outbreak. The completely dead dog's mouth was opened and inches away from sinking its teeth into the Senators shoulder. The plaster had been weakened enough for the poor beast to break through and take advantage of the easy prey before it. Frantically pushing himself away from the terrific find the obtuse senator scrambled with all haste towards the rest of the party.
Claire however was now looking annoyed again, though it looked like she couldn't decide who she was more annoyed with Alexia orDavis. Alexia on the other hand was looking strangely content. "Stop messing around or you're gonna get us all killed." The Redfield demanded as the group began to move again, Senator Davis nodded desperately. The Ashford heir still had a content smile on her face, whether from inflicting violence on someone or from a stray thought Claire was unsure, neither did she want to ruin her temperamental Ashford's mood. As the party continued down the dark corridors Claire pondered one of the comments made by Senator Davis and poked the man in the back with her finger making him flinch in dear. "And another thing Alexia isn't my girl-friend."
"I'm not?"
The whole party froze, before turning to look at first the Ashford and then back to Claire. Claire turned hesitantly the faint smile was gone and replaced by a look of hurt desperation as If she had just been abandoned by all she held close to her. "Well er… no?" Claire questioned cautiously, hopping she hadn't misunderstood something in their relationship, she saw Alexia as a younger sister if anything else more than a friend. It was then the accompanying guard with the itchy trigger finger spoke up again for the first time, since making his complaints upon the escape plan ofLeon's. "You know if you don't want to admit it we don't mind but you should probably make-up with your girl-friend, maybe a nice kiss to cheer her up?" He had barely finished his intrusive question before his dirty blonde haired partner slammed her foot into his toes before smashing him over the back of the head with the light side of her automatic. A snarled grimace of "Oh Gregg" could be heard before the soldier regained his footing and chuckled sheepishly rubbing the back of his head.
Suddenly Claire realised that it was another new age slang that the Ashford heir was not used to yet. "No I'm not her girl-friend." She reiterated while Alexia's expression sank deeper into a solitude of depression. "I'm her friend who happens to be girl." Alexia's head snapped up, faint tear drops disappeared instantly while a slightly confused expression adorned her beautifully pale features. "Now we should get going." A cough fromLeonand a nod were her approving answer as the party started up again. A soft padded sound was making its way towards them while the majority ignored it Claire and Leon froze, a second later a sniff from Alexia confirmed their horror. It appeared they had moved out of the VIP suite but that the quarantine zone was not quite as secure as a British airport, both had heard the sound many times before while escaping the nightmare of Raccoon city, it was the sound of an infected Doberman. Doberman seemed to be the only species of dog that once infected became faster stronger and more intelligent; they partially bonded with the virus before losing themselves to more primal instincts.
When Claire had travelled with Sherry through the car park of the police station she had shielded Sherry's eyes on more than one occasion. Not because she was trying to spare her from the horror the poor girl had already witnessed but because the Redfield had figured that Sherry probably didn't need to see two undead dogs in a mating frenzy while bits of flesh fell from their bodies due to all the shaking. On the plus side the dogs had been to busy 'going at it' to notice the two humans passing so close to their territory, but it was one more nightmarish horror that Claire thought her protectee could do with out.
Quickly coming out of her reprieve into the past she refocused on the present. "Three low-level infected heading this way, at high speeds?" Alexia questioned confused at the reason low level infected would be even able to move faster than a slow stumble. Drawing their heavy weapons and moving to the front of the party the two soldiers aimed their weapons whileLeonheld his ground cautiously, observing the situation.
Hearing a sound of separated thuds and groans they prepared themselves, as the party reached a quad-junction in the hallway. Bounding past them ignoring them completely two infected dogs ran past them, a long lead attached was dragging what must have been the owner but was now just another zombie-like infected man. They continued further down into the adjacent corridor and out of site. The group stopped and stared, Claire's eyes bulged in disbelief. That had to be the weirdest thing she'd ever seen infected doing – including when she caught the dozen un-dead dogs rutting against each other in Raccoon city – not even including that one of her friends could turn into a giant ant. She was very relived whenLeoncommented "Well moving on.." and pushed past the two soldiers to lead the party to safety.
Some how the building around them had taken steps to crumble, the initial assault of having a plane crash into it couldn't have been very healthy for the building but moving past the pillars in the main corridor Claire couldn't help be reminded of the madness of the Rockford Island Mansion and its hidden pathways. It seemed to Claire, sometimes, that some idiot had let an accountant design everything and letting them near planning designs was never a good idea. Everything always seemed to end up extra complicated. If there was one thing Claire abhorred it was complications, maybe there was a side effect of her position but she had gotten used to getting around minor legal issues that seemed to exist just to make her life difficult.
They had managed to progress through the 2nd floors main corridor and as they approached the stairs Clare heard Alexia sniff before sighing deeply, "A mass number of infected are ahead, it seems to be the basis for a horde." The armed members of the group took out their weapons more obviously and got ready for the long-haul.
Psyching herself up Claire lifted Rani up into her arms for a better accessible protection scenario. As they emerged into the open area corridorLeon took the lead gunning down each infected with calculated quick hits. The Inexperienced soldiers continued to fire with minimal accuracy wasting the majority of their limited ammunition rounds. At first Claire had been the same, the beginning of her nightmare inRaccoonCity she had wasted many bullets with her inaccuracy and failure to aim for the head of her targets. When Aiming she had always aimed for the legs, the chest and just over the head. This mistake had caused her to run many times and barley survive her first encounters with the monsters of the Umbrella cooperation.
As the rest of the party progressed in the near centre, Claire was forced to swing to the left of the corridor and near one of the tall cement pillars, an infected emerged at close range, startled she from the encountered foe Claire stumbled to the side, Rani swung to her waste before being deposited roughly on the floor. Scrambling to her feet she was just in time for Claire to pull her to relative safety asLeonreleased another series of accurate and calculated shots to the open air, easily taking down the threats. Behind them the Ashford heir was decimating the majority of the small horde refusing them the majority of access towards the remaining survivors.
While Leon was distracted the solider 'Gregg' was struggling to maintain his calm and was shooting off a broad range of rounds only clipping the majority of his targets, he therefore failed to notice the infected that made a grab for his shoulder as he continued to hoist the Senator to safety. Luckily the infected wasn't tall enough to bite the aforementioned limb and only forced the two to stumble. With a frightened yell Davis was sent stumbling to the floor while his rescuer turned to face the infected, he didn't have to as a second later a tentacle impacted through the infected's head, continuing through and destroying another that had been creeping up from the male soldier's far right which happened to be the Ashford's left.
With a scorned look and a quick nod from Gregg he turned back to protecting the Senator while Alexia bought the group, and her beloved Claire, more time.
While reaching the level had been hard the final escape looked near impossible for those who hadn't suffered the horror of an outbreak before. The floor had caved in and while this made getting to the ground floor easier, it certainly did not make it safer. Sliding down the ramp like surface could be achieved but the rubble at the bottom increased the chance of injury, combined with the active threat from the surrounding infected Claire could see that this situation wasn't close to being resolved yet.
As the party assembled and Alexia blocked the doors with… a door? Probably from the plane, Claire planned possible outcomes and strategies in her head, but once moreLeon's military based mind resolved the situation faster. "Right, now we've got a chance at this." Pausing he looked for any nearby threats before reloading and aiming at the nearest 'zombie' on the floor below. "We'll take out the nearest and try to clear a path, then slide you down here, one by one." While Claire could see the merits of this plan she wasn't sure on its practicality, she was starting to wonder ifLeonknew her brother Chris from the competence of his plans. Chris was a quick thinker, but not one to think his plan all the way through. Though her brother usually escaped relatively unharmed, the majority with him did not seem to share his luck.
Being the Chief Advisor for Terrasave International was a job that had grown to enjoy but Claire had lost some off her brothers support from her actions over the years, it had taken him a good few months to notice her change in attitudes and still insisted seeing her as a glorified little sister to be babied and kept safe like some porcelain doll. She had not seen Chris since he'd objected to Alexia's release at her trial, he'd said that she was as bad if not worse than Wesker and then proceeded to order Claire to stay away from the monster before it corrupted her. Claire had never listened to a direct, uncompromising order from her brother before and wasn't going to start not. That had been her reaction. Since then they hadn't talked, seen each other or even briefly communicated through their friends. Claire couldn't help but wonder if he'd even care if he found she'd been in another outbreak or if he'd just arrive hug her; tell her off and proceed to accuse her friend Alexia for the attack.
Either way it didn't matter now, with heavy trepidation she turned her attention back to the battle. Not for the first time wishing she'd commandeered a weapon from Leon or one of his solider escorts. With three armed crack shots taking down the field of undead, the rest of the party hovered at the brink, Senator Davis had become increasingly grumpy now he was not in any immediate danger, this was easy to judge by the increased speed of his complaints though from Alexia's lesson earlier they now lacked a great deal of ferocity.
"Can't you kill them any faster!" Claire looked over to the right, trying to ignore the troublesome man, while Rani clutched desperately to her waist in terror her eyes closed to the horror encompassing them. Observing the right area appeared to have paid off as a smaller horde had been approaching from her direction, quickly gathering her wits she set about alertingLeonto the fact that his plan was already seeing a few floors. Frankly Claire was amazed that no one had died yet, then again maybe it was the Redfield luck preserving them, though she couldn't help but think maybe she was being a little arrogant. Claire didn't want to turn into Chris over night.
"There starting to gather to our right, guys you might want to lay down some fire here too!" She didn't have to wait long as the Ashford heir hurled another piece of rubble at the approaching foes. Needless to say this act of violence didn't reassure the others, "We're not going to make it out of here are we, well not alive anyhow?" Davis was getting even more whiny by the minute and the battering on the barricaded stairwell behind them was beginning to breach.
Nevertheless even with Alexia's support Leon rushed over, reloading his favourite pistol on the way, the 44. magnum was slow but its power offshoot any difficulty, pity he was stuck with a desert eagle and .357 bullets though. With a quick corny catch phrase which Claire ignored, Leon pulled the hammer back on his gun and set about taking down as many of the gathering swarm as possible. Angela the blond haired female, soldier backed her blonde counterpart up while the terribly inaccurate 'Gregg' continued to lay down a wide birth of fire over the far-off horde's shambles.
"Aiiiiieeee!" A scream startled all of them as the, air hostess fell back from a crack in the crashed plane where she had been cowering. The crack was now swarming with infected as they stumbled, groaning out of the crack. Turning his sights on the shambling opponents Leonquickly opened fire dropping the first few while the male solider turned and pull the terrified woman to safety. While Claire's attention was occupied the panicking Senator had pushed himself to the brink, the next sound Claire heard made her whirl around in horror. "Rani!" The senator had slid down the stone rubble to safety from the approaching horde but in his haste had knocked the poor Asian
girl down as well. While the senator had landed roughly, Rani had at least been fortunate to bounce off a dull blue hamper bag.
Without even thinking things through first Claire hurled herself off the brink and down to the frightened girls defence. Hugging her tight she turned to shield the girl from the approaching undead. Claire needn't have worried, for the next second a burst of fire shot down from above scorching the 'zombie' to burning ash in seconds. Past the infected hordes Claire could see the accursed Senator actually pause in his break for freedom and look in terror as something behind them. "SCHREEE!" Hearing the frenzied bestial scream a happy smiled adorned Claire's face, with room to move in the open area the small party now had a huge advantage. Alexia giant ant form leapt into the fray, cutting down infected after infected. Impaling some while setting the others ablaze; Claire continued to smile even when she caught the giant ant's two red glaring eyes.
The monstrous form of Alexia Ashford hesitated for a moment before seeming to nod; it then turned back to its slaughter, clearing a far more impressive path than the soldiers had done so far. "You alright?" Turning to look up past the rubble to the previous level Claire gaveLeona nod whilst ruffling the Asian girls' hair. "My, Claire you've certainly got friends in high places these days." At first she thoughtLeonwas taunting her official position but then looking up she chuckled, Alexia was hanging from the ceiling again. The Redfield had wondered how exactly the Ashford did that she transformed into an ant, not a spider.
As the rest of the party dropped to the lower level, lights flicked on in the distance. The few remaining stumbling undead turned towards the new source of noise and movement and resumed their shambled stumbling with a vengeance. "Head toward the Light!"Leonshouted, as the party broke into a light run Alexia brought up the rear covering their retreat. As they exited the building Claire pushed Rani intoLeonand the special agent stumbled for a minute before grabbing her, giving Claire a puzzled look as the Redfield turned to return to the main outbreak area. "I've got to get Alexia," she managed to get out before darting back into the building. Inside the foray the Ashford heir was still throwing periodic blasts of fire at the surrounding hordes but with her earlier attacks the amounts remaining, while still numerous were now severely depleted.
"Alexia! That's enough we're safe, you can stop!" The Ashford paid no heed to Claire's words immediately and continued to unleash her fury against her foes, of course Alexia had spent years in prison she must have a lot of anger to work through, Claire thought. Another fact might be the contempt that the Ashford held for the T-virus, in comparison to her own Veronica strain, 'V' beat 'T' hands down. "Please?" Claire smiled tugging gently on one of the long legs; Alexia hesitated then shook herself free and scuttled back. A bright green light enveloped her form, in actuality it was the meta-phasing proprieties of her acid that had to be reapplied to her skin so she could shift back into her second-evolution form. Claire knew better than to approach her yet and the Ashford heir stood and the acid ran down her form causing welts that in turn caused her blood to be released setting fire to her body's outer skin and burning away the remnants of the deadly acid.
With the grey and plant-like form now in place, Claire smiled sadly at her friend and went to comfort her. A further shake and the grey skin faded to pinkish white and her companion reached for her unsteadily. The force of pushing herself through a genetic-recombinator in the time-span of a few seconds would be risky with a team of lab technicians in a controlled environment but to be accomplished quickly and seemingly easily by the Ashford in this time-span was impressive to say the least.
Taking off her white Jacket Claire hosted it over the Ashford's shoulders to try and preserve a modicum of the heir's modesty; she needn't have worried as Alexia didn't seem at all perturbed by her state of nakedness and proceeded calmly to the exit. Nevertheless it didn't stop Claire from catching up with her friend and stubbornly draping the jacket over her shoulders anyway. As they left the entrance the marching soldiers on the way in only gave them a brief professional glance before they took up shooting positions ready to clear out the building of any and all remaining infected forces.
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Chapter 4.
Explosive Negotiations' -
The Survivors' all made their way over to the V.I.P.Q.T or Very Important Person Quarantine Tents, while the soldiers were informed of their need to be de-briefed Rani ran to the fence, her worried guardian pushing against it trying to reassure her young charge that it was all going to be alright, while more soldiers held her back to keep the quarantine zone intact. Once assured that Rani was alright Claire absconded to her now primary priority; reassuring her charge, Alexia Ashford, last of the Ashford Family. Alexia seemed to have taken the outbreak in her stride but Claire was still worried, not only had the poor women been only properly released hours ago but now had to contend with the public outcry of being present at Americas' second worst bio-terror event of the last decade.
Looking around Claire spotted Alexia she was being leered at by the obese senator, having had enough of the man's impudent attitude Claire took the most calm and responsible attitude she walked up to him and punched him in the face. "GAAGH!" Ignoring his strangled cry as the Senator clutched his nose in agony; Claire turned to face the Ashford heir and gave her a calm smile. "Now are you alright, dear?" Alexia had smiled at the punch and looked touched until Claire had added the 'dear' part to her enquiry.
Choking and still holding his nose while two soldiers tried to help him to his feet the Senator looked like he was preparing for a rant, Claire didn't give him time and spun once more before cruelly kicking the man between his legs. "EEEh-ooofh." The shock combined with the pain and the man dropped to the hard tarmac ground in further agony. "Congratulations, your stupidity could have gotten a young girl killed tonight." Furiously the Red-head turned her families temper away from the irritating man and back to the Ashford heir. On the ground dark green eyes cringed as the grey-suited man clutched at his multiple injured areas. "So are you ready to go now?" Alexia produced a rather amused smile as the man beside them mumbled a rather pained "mummy…"
Blushing from the smile she was getting from her friend the Red-head made to turn taking Alexia's hand in hers, "Now let's get you some proper clothes." Before they could get anywhere there was a shout and the sound of running feet. "CATI!" Groaning Claire turned to see one of her many assistants running between the guards towards her. The woman had short dark hair startling blue eyes and a pair of large round glasses perched and subsequently practically falling from her nose. Dressed in a dark-green uniform fitted with the sliced leaf logo Claire had re-designed from the original logo with a gun overlapping, finally heavy black boots adorned the young woman with her black tracked trousers. Sophie Gallio finally reached her boss panting as a few of soldiers arrived to try and drag her back and away from the quarantine zone.
Sighing, the Redfield released the Ashford heir and made her way forward to the struggling girl. "Sophie, I've told you not to call me that, it's just 'Claire', alright." Once more Claire Redfield cursed the day that one of her assistants' had contented the name CATI as her designation, while it did make sending her papers faster it was very annoying for general conversation and extremely humiliating, but Claire had, had to except sacrifices as the organisation was still predominantly made up of people with hippie like attitudes. CATI stood for Chief advisor, Terrasave International. The name itself had stuck and when trying to pass on information quickly it had been delegated that Claire was not only one of the most senior members of the organisation but the easiest to approach.
"Calm down and tell me what's wrong." The girl looked startled at something behind Claire but restored her attention to the Redfield quickly enough. "It's WilPharma!" Immediately her attention snapped back to her assistant. "What! What have they done now?" The young woman swung free off the soldiers again long enough to stop her glasses from falling off before proceeding. "There coming here, they've been authorised to use their new vaccine, someone presented the order to the president and he accepted." Damn. Claire cursed in her mind; they'd been blocking the Pharmaceutical Company for months over the issue of their supposed new vaccine. The company had been holding back its release until the USgovernment revoke Order 679 of the constitutional amendments. The order had been put in place before Umbrellas holdings had been seized and the company forcibly shut down. The order prevented any company from legally experimenting on human test subjects no matter the cause, or even if said subjects had claimed to sign consent forms. In total the company had been blackmailing theUnited States into removing the law before they would hand over the vaccine.
Claire personally didn't think much of the supposed vaccine, for one it only worked on humans, people with AB Negative blood (while rare) were immune to it and vaccination didn't stop another infected from biting you to death. All in all for what the company was asking in return Claire didn't think it was worth the price and now thanks to this incident the order had been revoked and the drug was being administered soon. There was nothing she could do, if she refused to allow people to take the vaccine then Terrasave would have the blame placed on it and if she did nothing then all the work would be for nothing anyway.
Suddenly the Redfield felt a hand in hers, the Ashford had stepped forward and in a rare display of emotion had tried to comfort her in the best way the emotionally stunted woman knew how. Besides Claire had achieved things and better than that, she'd finally secured the Ashford's release, this wasn't so bad after all. She'd also acquired a lot of political blackmail to employ on her own, if Claire moved quickly enough she could ensure a more semi-permanent victory over not only WilPharma but the government that had approved Umbrellas actions to begin with.
Taking a moment to collect herself Claire sighed then prepared herself for the worst, "lets get your some better clothes first, eh?" her Ashford nodded but did not release the grip on her hand. Turning towards one of the military on site operations tents the Redfield pulled her companion on, as she made it to the tent, she called back to her assistant. "Get Robert from the lawyer's office on the phone and make sure we register a injunction, don't make it public, also get Sally to start writing up press briefings on how the promised vaccines seem to have been ready to deploy before the 679 amendment was pushed through." Red hair swaying in the light breeze Claire entered the tent leaving her assistant to finish scribbling down notes on her Personal Data Assistant (PDA for short).
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Once equipped in a more professional uniform, though originally belonging to that of a startled solider, they departed for arrivals quarantine zone. Claire arrived just in time to see the first WilPharma operatives' starting to open the trucksLeonwas nearby talking to… wait wasn't that? "Fredrick, what are you doing here?"
Turning in surprise the grey suited man, smiled slightly before nodding to her, "Mrs Redfield." Walking out from behind one of the trucks a revitalized Senator Davis came to stand next to Downing, before smugly introducing the man, as he did so all Claire could think was 'why do I have such bad taste in men?' "He's WilPharma's Head researcher. It was his work on the T-virus that made this vaccine possible, may I introduce Fredrick Downing." The Redfield could only stare in shock at the two men "I bet you thought the infection in the terminal was an attack by WilPharma or a terrorist attack by members of the former Umbrella Corporation?" To be fair Claire still thought that, but she wasn't about to reveal this until she was ready.
She ignored the droning voice of the obese man, until she heardLeon's voice "Claire its true." The redhead wondered what he'd been agreeing to from the Senators' little monologue, maybe she should have been paying more attention after all.
"The Terrorists' attacks inIndiawere the work of General Grundy's Peace-Keeping forces, WilPharma arrived in time to treat the infection and test their vaccine to try and save lives, and they weren't just randomly giving out vaccines and hopping for the best." The agent gave a quick nod to Angela and Gregg who were stoically stationed beside him.
"Unlike Umbrella we like to plan, plan and then implement scenarios after covering all possible outcomes, we don't want to end up creating Bio-terror incidents unlike the unprofessionalism of the Umbrella Corporation."
It was a nice speech and a good sentiment further but Claire could no longer bring herself to trust this man, he had sat next to her, not recognized her and considering his position with WilPharma Claire thought this coincidence was a little too suspicious. Limping forward the Senator smirked, "Just think if you and your little 'Peace Playing Force' hadn't been protesting then WilPharma could have inoculated the entire population by now." While they nodded in unison and the red-head and her entourage received a further pep-talk from WilPharma's new propaganda machine, Claire was desperately formulating plans in her mind, the only way she could see clear now was to take the blame for the delay. Downing had seemed interested in her, maybe it was because the company had told him to spy on her or maybe he just wanted her for her body.
The Redfield had lost a lot of her innocence in that regard, Claire knew she was attractive, and was saddened to say she took advantage of it when meeting with the opposite sex for business deals. She'd never had sex with any of them but she'd played the teasingly-innocent girl up to its limit to fast track results. Downing could be the weak link and if so she'd exploit it up to and beyond the hilt. The propaganda machine was drawing to a close and with a start to her knew plan Claire was ready to proceed.
"So this is all my fault, if I hadn't campaigned against the human testing then…"
Leon spoke up, interrupting her casual confession "Claire we still needed permission from the appropriate Indian authorities to test the vaccine political pressure from the public didn't impact this decision in any way, it's not your fault. Besides you were…" at this the dull-blonde turned his head to look at the Ashford heir standing beside her, "Pre-occupied."
Claire knew the situation was out of her control know if even Leon was siding with… wait what had Leon said? 'Claire we still needed permission' Oh fuck! Leon was working for the government, the government that Claire suspected had known about Umbrella's testing of B.O.W the abductions of citizens for testing and the Nuking of the city to cover-up and contain the situation. Kennedy might be an unwilling or knowing pawn but in this situation Claire could no longer count on her old ally for support, she was on her own.
With nothing more to be gained from this disastrous turn of events the red-head turned on her heel and headed into the nearest tent to be alone.
After a while Leon entered the tent, and approached the redhead as she sat on the chair awkwardly, the two SRT team members, Gregg and Angela hovered awkwardly at the tent flap. "Claire this wasn't your fault, the villain's here are the ones who used the virus, worse than them are the ones who made it." Letting out a deep breath Leon started pacing, "Seven years ago, our lives were changed forever, Raccoon City stolen from the face of the earth, by the virus from Umbrella Corp." Turning to face the redhead the government agent hesitated again, "Umbrella Collapsed, but their viral legacy lives on. You took the path of a saviour, I of a destroyer." Claire looked up startled by his admission, "You try to save those caught in events like these, while I hunt out its instigators and end them before they can poison more lives with their hate."
"You chose the role of rescuer, rather than fighter like me, we both make mistakes but it's better to try and fight evil than to stand by and let it spread." Looking up at Leon, Claire could help but wonder who Leon was any more, he'd always been a take charge kind of guy but he really sounded like he believed in this. "You choose a path that your brother and I couldn't follow, you weren't wrong you just took a different approach."
"Though to be fair you could tone down the aggression a little bit." At this Claire's jaw dropped before she burst out laughing, sobbing and crying all at once at the absurdity of the statement Leon had uttered, machine gunning government special agent Leon Kennedy had just informed her that she was the violent one. Clapping a hand down on her shoulder Leon smiled, now lets go save some people – alright?"
Nodding the Redfield stood and they made their way to exit the tent.
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They had just made it outside, Downing was looking worriedly at Alexia and rubbing his next, the Senator was looking a mixture of smug and constipated. Stepping forward the head researcher addressed her directly, "Miss Redfield perhaps secrecy is at fault here, if we'd made it more clear on what we were hoping to develop we might have received more support. On that subject I was wondering if you'd like a personal tour of WilPharma's newest research lab?"
Startled at the suggestion Claire was about to reply when the party were rocked of their feet from a nearby explosion, climbing wearily to their feet the redhead first noticed the destruction of the vaccine carrying trucks, beside her Downing hadn't even bothered to get to his feet he was just staring blankly at the wreckage a shocked expression marring his previously calm face.
"That offer of a tour sounds like a pretty good idea right now, maybe we can find out who was behind this." Placing a hand gently on the head researchers shoulder Claire nodded towards Leon and they began to help the devastated man to his feet. Army soldiers swarmed around the trucks with fire extinguishers while trying to help the few workers in hazmat suits who had been in the process of unloading the trucks contents, but were now scrabbling to safety or attempting to put out the fires that had started on or around their clothing.
Cries of help and pleading were commonplace, it was eerily similar to Claire's time on the Ashford's home island but by the time Claire had gotten outside the majority of the facility had been dead and so she had just seen the fire, not having to listen to the cries for help. Raccoon city had been similar; the shocked panic that had ensued left citizens with only fleeing as there option for survival, calling out was just asking for trouble and to attract the attention of either the undead or Umbrella's clean-up teams.
Taking charge of the situation Leon strode forward, "How soon can you get more vaccine here?"
Looking helplessly at the government agent, Downing replied slowly "We can't everything we had was in those trucks, we had to scrape it together from samples inside to company, we barely had enough with us to successfully treat everyone." Eyes widening the dull-blonde turned to the Senator before bringing his attention back to WilPharma's head researcher. "Do you think they could be after the research data, and destroying all other samples to prevent us having a cure?"
Slowly as if coming the same conclusion Downing nodded his head, "Yes it's possible but then the only people left would be the lead researchers who worked on the vaccine and myself who coordinated the whole thing." Just then a solider rushed up and saluted Leon, "Sir, report in from HQ, Hunnigan says that all of the lead T-Virus vaccine workers have been assassinated!"
"What!" A collective shout hit the party, "They must be going after the data?" Downing looked like he was panicking now, Claire couldn't blame him if the data was to disappear he'd be the only one left with the capability to re-make the vaccine, it hadn't been a very effective vaccine in the Redfield's eyes but it was a starting point to making a better solution. "Do we have any leads? Anything at all?"
"If they're going after the data, then that's where we should head next." Addressing Downing Leon made the plan know, "Take Claire with you she's got knowledge on surviving outbreaks and will keep you safe while you get a copy of the research data." Turning back to Davis, "Senator We'll escort you to safety…" To the redhead's surprise, the Senator shook his head.
"No, the data is more important I'll go request reinforcements, you get going right now!"
Nodding Leon turned again, "Right. We'll get suited up, Claire you go on ahead and get to WilPharma, take this." Passing the redhead a standard issue glock pistol. The Ashford heir who had been silent through our planning spoke up, "I'm with you." It was a statement, practically an order, but it made Claire smile, if Chris had said something in this situation it would have been to tell her to go home. But the blond was putting her faith in Claire and someone with Alexia's abilities would be too valuable to pass up even if she hadn't offered herself up for the task.
"That's settled then, move out!"
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