A/n's: Finally, here you be – Chapter 8! Sorry it took so long. Please note, no "fin" at the end, so no, this is not the last chapter. ;) Never fear, there are more to come.

A quick shout out to new reviews, readers, and favorite-ers (and I did note something of an upswing after the last chapter; lol, the Wesker-smut compels you!): You guys rock! Thank so much for your time. 3

Warnings: Swearing, gore, sexual references, violence, death.


Chapter Eight

The Tower

"No card scares a Tarot reader like the Tower – it is one of the clearest cards when it comes to meaning. False structures, false institutions, false beliefs are going to come tumbling down, suddenly, violently and all at once. Shaken up, torn down, blown asunder. And the only thing to soften the blow is the assurance that it is for the best. Nothing built on a lie, on falsehoods, can remain standing for long. It is not going to be pleasant or painless or easy, but it will be for the best."

-Thirteen, Aeclectic Tarot

My first response, if I was completely honest with myself, was not the mind-numbing fear Sarah seemed to be gripped with. Nor anything even remotely like it. Truly, I was more annoyed than anything else. Warm and sleepy, I wanted to just lay there.

Plus, if I had to guess, it was probable that Daryl had just found himself some quiet hidey to hole up in while he stewed over our "discussion" from the night before. After all, it's what I'd done – at least until Wesker had shown up.

Wesker….I turned my head, looking though I didn't really expect to find him.

The space beside me was, indeed, empty and cool.

I wasn't surprised; somehow he didn't strike me as the type, but still...

I passed my hand over the vacant cushions and slowly sat up, deliciously aching muscles – muscles in deep, intimate places Wesker had spent the better part of the night, and the wee hours of the morning, exploring – protesting as I held a blanket to my naked chest and leaned back against the wall.

I rubbed one blurry eye and used the other to look around for my clothes. "Your certain Daryl's missing?"

Sarah nodded vigorously. "He was supposed to go on patrol with Phil, but Phil couldn't find him, so they-"

"They?"

"Andrew and Kyle, they helped Phil look. But Daryl wasn't in his room or anywhere else. He really is missing!"

Even with just one eye I could see she really was terrified and I dropped my fist from my eye to give a tendril of burgundy hair a playful little tug. "I'm sure he's here, Sarah. Safe and sound. He probably just wanted to be alone for a bit and lost track of time."

She fixed me with a furrowed look. "Why would he want to be alone?"

I hesitated. "It's adult stuff, Scout."

"It's because you were fighting, isn't it?"

My mouth snapped shut and she looked suddenly uncertain, flushing with color.

"I heard you. Everybody did."

The wince escaped before I could stop it. "Everybody?"

"Well, maybe not everybody," Sarah allowed, looking for a moment sympathetic to my discomfort. "But they've been talking about it." Then her expression melted into something carefully curious. "Is it true you like Wesker more than Daryl?"

That caught me off guard. Not so much that our names were being whispered by the others – gossip was as rare a treat as red meat around here – but that Sarah was so direct in questioning me about it.

I really had to stop underestimating her.

"It's not so much that I like one more than the other…" I tried.

"But you do like him," Sarah interjected pointedly. "Like, like-like. And you don't Daryl."

'Like-like' wasn't quite the term I'd have used, but for the intents of a conversation with an eleven-year-old….

"Yes," I replied softly, fingers flexing and tightening unconsciously at the blanket I still clutched to my breast.

Her head tipped. "Daryl like-likes you."

I felt my shoulders slump as if something heavy had suddenly taken roost upon them, and was pressing them back against the cold, hard wall. "I know."

Sarah looked at me, her pale eyes sliding over my bare shoulders and taking in the rumpled, empty space beside me. For a moment her little shoulders dipped as well. "Adult stuff sounds complicated," she admitted sadly.

I could only nod.

For a moment neither of us said anything, a woman and a girl each to her own thoughts, then Sarah said, "But we should still find Daryl. Phil needs him for patrol – it wouldn't be fair to ask someone else to do it."

I allowed the corner of my mouth to turn up. "True."

She started to push up from the kneeling position she'd taken beside my bed and I said, "Get Phil, and the twins. Carl…and Bill."

"He's making breakfast," Sarah pointed out.

I paused, considering. "Ask, nicely, if Amy will cover for him. I'd really like Bill."

"Okay." She started for the door, then suddenly turned back. "Do you want me to get Wesker too?"

Wesker and Daryl together…I tried to imagine what that confrontation would be like – Daryl, proud and hurt, against Wesker, cool and dangerous - and shook my head. "No, I don't think that'll be necessary. Just get the others, have them meet me down on the main floor."

Sarah nodded, confirmed my request with another "okay" and then disappeared, closing my door behind her.

I waited several beats to see if she was going to come barging back in with more questions, then, when satisfied that she was really off and away, slowly stood and let the blanket fall away as I eased into movement and began cataloging the various twinges and pulls ticking through my body.

None of them really hurt. In fact, as I took in the soft green-yellow smudges along my thighs and hips I found myself smirking, almost…pleased by the proof of Wesker's possession. The muscles low in my belly and high between my thighs were oddly cramped, but that too was more of a pleasant reminder than an irritation. Perhaps that was odd, or wrong, or even morbid, but I couldn't help myself. I'd enjoyed myself. A girl was allowed, wasn't she?

Amused, and fighting back the increasing urge to laugh, I hunted for my clothes, and finally found them, not on the floor in a hasty, passion induced pile I'd imagined, but instead on the desk, in a neat, folded stack. And resting on top, cradled in the fabric of my shirt, was my knife.

Somehow I doubted that Sarah was responsible and so lingered for a moment, pleased, and yes, slightly touched that Wesker had even thought to bother. I trailed my fingers over the grip of my knife, proud that it was mine and that he had left it for me. It wasn't, certainly, the way I'd imagined regaining it, but was, in its own way, fitting.

As different as we were, we'd found common ground. As strong as he was, I too had strength. I was deserving; and not just in my eyes, but his as well. It, of course, might just have been because of the sex, but I didn't think so. He seemed smarter than that, stronger than to let just a physical act get the better of him….

I picked up the knife, curling my fingers around the familiar handle.

I hoped anyway.

I allowed myself to hold the knife a moment longer, then firmly put it aside so I could get dressed. I discovered as I began to pull on my shirt – and I had to dig out a new one of those besides as Wesker had torn the other up the side – a sharp pain in my shoulder that had me ducking into the bathroom to look in the mirror. I found a dark, horseshoe shaped bruise waiting for me.

I couldn't actually remember when exactly Wesker had bitten me; perhaps it had been during that first, fast, frantic coupling on the floor by the window, or maybe it had this morning when we'd laid together and watched the sky dissolve into soft golds and reds and he'd reached for me without a word, slipping between my thighs as I'd arched and gasped against him, or maybe it had been neither, but instead some time in between….

Whenever…whichever, the pain faded as I realized what it was and instead I found myself tickled by its existence. After I finished dressing I could feel it rubbing against the fabric of my shirt like a reminder, a promise…a warning. My own private talisman – with any luck it'd help me get through what was inevitably bound to be a painful reunion with Daryl.

With a deep breath I tied on my boots and slipped my knife into its sheath before heading downstairs.

~.~

Bill, Carl, and Phil were already waiting by the time I arrived, and Amy stood before the old grill, slowly stirring a pot from which the familiar stagnant scents of boiled root were wafting. The twins, however, were no where to be seen.

Eyebrows lifting, I asked. "Where's Andrew and Kyle?"

"Outside," Phil intoned, soundly slightly bored. "Looking to see if Daryl decided to go for a stroll."

I could have been angry, or frustrated, by the blatant dismissal of my request for them to be present – but instead, I was actually more bemused, tipping my head as I sighed. "Oh good, that'll save time. That's what I was going to ask them to do anyway."

Carl had his old baseball cap in his hands and was wringing it anxiously, bending the bill all out of shape as he asked, "Do you really think Daryl's missing?"

I moved close enough to pluck the poor abused cap from his hands, reshaping it as I replied, "No-" I heard Phil snort. I ignored him. "I'm sure he's about somewhere, probably sleeping if I know him." I handed Carl his hat back (he smiled sheepishly and pulled it down over his hears) and nodded at the trio of men. "Phil, Carl – you two take one side, Bill and I will take the other."

"Aye, aye, oh fearless leader," Phil muttered dryly as he pushed off the table he'd been leaning against. "But which way shall we take – left or right?"

I tried to resist the urge, but inevitably gave in to temptation and instead said sweetly, "Does it matter? You can't fuck up any worse on one than the other."

Carl's eyes widened, making him look wildly uncomfortable, while Bill just sighed and warned, "Play nice children, or it's to bed with no dessert."

"Whatever." Phil rolled his eyes and gestured at Carl before turning on his heel and heading off toward the far stairwell.

As they moved out of earshot Bill shot me a side-long look. "Why not just challenge him to two-by-fours at dawn and be done with it?"

I inclined my head in the direction of the second stairwell and we started to walk together. "One of these days you're going to have to pry my teeth from around his throat."

He chuckled and reached for the door, "You better keep your strength up then – let's find Daryl quick so we can get back down for breakfast."

I was only slightly shamed by my immediate hope that Daryl would stay missing long enough for the food to run out.

~.~

We worked quickly and in silence broken only by the occasionally call of Daryl's name. I wanted to talk, wanted to confide in Bill and use him as a sounding board - it was why I'd sent Sarah after him, why I'd wanted him specifically – but before I could decide how to begin, before I could work up the necessary nerve, the stairwell door was bursting open and we were both turning on it, surprised and hopeful.

It was Kyle…or maybe Andrew? No, definitely Kyle. The pistol at his hip gave him away; his brother carried the machete.

"We found something." He didn't come to us, but rather stood in the doorway, waiting for us to come to him. He was breathing hard, his eyes wild.

"Daryl?" Bill asked, eyebrows plunging into a deep v-shape.

Kyle looked between us, mouth working uncertainly.

I felt my face pull into an expression similar to Bill's as I turned away from the room I'd been about to check. "Kyle, what is it?"

He shook his head. "You'd better come see."

There were no words as Kyle turned and Bill and I fell in behind him, but I was certain, in the second's glance we shared, that Bill was hearing the same voice in his head that I was.

This couldn't be good.

~.~

Kyle led us downstairs and outside. We moved away from the mill, flowing along the fence that kept us safe toward the river. The water moved fast along this stretch, the current strong, and I could hear it even at this distance…but I didn't get the chance to see it. Kyle stopped us before we got that far.

He paused at a stretch of chain-link that at first glance appeared no different from that which we'd passed, but then he pulled on it and to my horror it gave way, pulling back to reveal a hole – a flap – in our defenses.

"My God," I heard myself whisper. "Someone cut the fence…."

But Kyle shook his head. "I don't think so. Look-" He dropped the fence back into place and waved Bill and I closer. "See this part?" He pointed along the seam where the two edges met. "See how the metal gets thin and stretched on either side of the break?" He looked from me to Bill and back again. "Cutting wouldn't do that. This is more like if someone grabbed a hold-" he demonstrated, curling the fingers of both hands through the metal coils, "-and pulled until the fence broke."

I felt myself tense, felt my heart skip a beat.

"But that's steel," Bill's horrified whisper gave voice to the fearful questions rolling inside my own skull. "Who…what could do that?"

Kyle hesitated. "This…isn't all. There's more." He pulled open the fence again and nodded for us to go through. "On the other side."

Bill went through first, I followed, and Kyle brought up the rear, the fence falling closed behind us like a stiff curtain once we were through.

The forest was dense on this side of the mill, the underbrush thick and Kyle took us into it, pushing in deeper. Thirty yards out we hit a wide patch of berry plants whose stems were covered with sharp thorns – stems that were broken wildly, snapped and crushed, thorns that were glistening, still wet with the blood of whatever had crashed through the brambles.

I slowly began to understand – slowly began to fear.

We didn't go through the thicket, but around and it was easy to spot where the runner had emerged from the thorns. There were more damaged plants, a disturbance of the earth as if there had been a struggle…then a thickening trail of blood that lead away from the bramble patch and a over a large fallen tree with lots of sharp, dangerous to negotiate branches. From one sharp point something small and tattered fluttered.

Beyond we got our first glimpse of Andrew, facing us, but not looking at us. His eyes were trained downward, on something I couldn't see until I stepped up onto the trunk of the tree...

Someone cried out. Me? Maybe, I couldn't tell. I could feel myself falling, dropping away – until something, someone, caught me. They squeezed, pulled, and cradled me against their warmth. With one ear, I could hear their heart hammering, with the other I could hear them whispering…gasping.

"Oh dear God, oh dear God..."

The same thing, over and over, was all I heard.

All I could see was Daryl. Daryl lying on his back in the grass, staring up at the sky with dead eyes. Daryl with his bare arms and face horribly lacerated by thorns. Daryl dead with his throat ripped out – with his torso torn open from neck to navel.

I didn't want to believe, I tried to tell myself it wasn't real…but the ground was sticky with his blood, and swarming with thousands of ants busy trying to clean up. Some marched into his body, fought with white maggots for his remains.

There was no way I could imagine that horror, the gore, the writhing sea of insect life…the scent of death that hung in the air.

It was real.

Daryl was dead.

And the last thing I'd done was yell at him.

My eyes burned and I squeezed them shut – the image of Daryl's body didn't waver. It was burned onto the inside of my eyelids.

"Where's the zombie? Did you kill it?"

There was no response. No sound other than the pounding heart beneath my ear. The silence stretched so long I began to wonder if I'd spoke them aloud…or just in my head. Then, finally, Kyle, or maybe Andrew, who knew – who cared – spoke, "I don't think it was one." The voice continued slowly, carefully. "A zombie wouldn't have left the…the body. And it would have consumed everything, not just – pieces."

"If it wasn't a zombie…then what was it?" A new voice rumbled from beneath my ear and I finally realized who was holding me, who was cradling me like a child fearful of the night. "An animal?"

One of the twins again. "Maybe one of those dogs – the dead ones. We thought we got 'em all….maybe not?"

"We'd have seen it by now – heard it," replied the other twin.

Silence crashed around us again. I cracked open my leaking eyes and fixed them away from Daryl, looking for something safe, something that didn't remind me of the way Daryl had looked last night – so angry, so hurt….

The dark bit of something caught on one of the fallen tree's branches flapped a few inches away.

Closer now I could see it for what it was – a piece of fabric. Probably torn from Daryl's clothes as he'd gone over the tree, as he'd tried to escape….except….

Expect Daryl was wearing green – his favorite color – and this piece was…

Blue.

Dark blue…like the shirt Wesker….

Something wet on his face…the familiar taste of his kiss….

Could it...had it been – blood? Daryl's blood? Had Wesker….?

Oh God.

There was a sharp intake of breath – but not from me. From Bill as my fingers dug into his arm, as I spasmed and jerked in his embrace.

"What?" he gasped. "What is it?"

But I didn't reply. There were no words, no way...I tore from his arms, hit the ground, and scrambled up. I tripped over the tree, scrapped my palms on the rough, biting bark, but I didn't stop, didn't give the pain time to register before I was up again – up and running.

The others cried my name, not understanding, wanting me to explain…but I left them behind, crashing through the brush, racing back to the mill.

I had to see…I had to know…I had to find Wesker.

I slammed into the fence, moving too fast to be able to stop properly, and struggled through the gap. The ragged edges pulled at me, scratching and tearing at my clothes, my skin, but I didn't stop. It didn't matter – the pain, the hurt…none of it. Nothing but the dawning horror and my need to have Wesker tell me it wasn't true. That it was all coincidence, that he couldn't possibly have…that he didn't….

I wrenched through the fence and fell again. My gaze spun skyward as I hit the dirt and I saw, above, a silhouette against the azure sky.

Dark…looming…watching from the rooftop.

I stared, and knew, just as I had known last night, that Wesker was staring back.

I clambered to my feet and took off again.

Breakfast was being served, a dozen startled faces were nothing more than a blur as I whizzed by, slamming into the stairwell and taking the steps two at a time. My head was whirling, my heart careening inside my chest; my ears were full with a roaring noise that blocked out everything else…a roaring noise that got louder, and louder until I not only heard it, but felt it. My insides trembled with it, the air vibrated, dust drifted down from the ceiling overhead.

I stopped, realizing then that it wasn't just in my head, wasn't just me. The noise was beyond and growing louder by the second.

I needed to find Wesker, needed…but the noise…what was it?

Torn, struggling with myself I ducked out of the stairwell and into the next hallway. I found myself in the office block where several of my fellow survivors were leaning from their rooms to stare up at the ceiling or to look around at each other bewilderedly. They shot questions at me as I passed, confused, anxious queries that I ignored. No time. I would look, I would see, and then I would find Wesker.

Then, then everything would be okay, then everything would make sense again.

My room was as I left it, but loose objects – on the floor, on the desk – were bouncing, jumping and rattling with the fierce thrumming in the air. I crossed to one of my windows and tilted my head back just in time to see something disappear over the mill's roof.

Something big. Something dark. Something that had moved so fast I hadn't a hope of telling what it was.

At least…until another one showed up.

It soared above the trees at a distance, drawing closer and more distinct as I stared. I wouldn't have thought myself capable of being anymore shocked, anymore confused, but somehow I was.

Somehow I was caught off guard enough to remain frozen, rooted to the spot, and silently watch what was clearly a plane flying toward the mill.

The roaring was the engines, the rotors chopping through the air, and it was so loud because there was more than one…the shape I glimpsed must have been the first one dropping in over the roof, preparing to…land?

Could it be?

I pressed closer to the window, determined to watch this one, determined to have at least one question answered.

It followed the same path as the one before it, but just before it passed out of sight it tipped its wings, flashing me with the symbol inscribed on the black underside – a red and white rosette, almost like a flower – a flower I had seen before; in newspapers, and on television, next to headlines like "Disaster in Raccoon City" and "Pharmaceutical Giant Indicted."

Umbrella.

Umbrella had been everywhere, had once been the world's leading supplier of computer technology, medical products and healthcare and had, if one believed the reports, been responsible for the end of the world. It had been said that Umbrella had been playing with a new, designer virus in their own backyard and when it had gotten loose Raccoon City had paid the price. They'd denied it, of course. Their chairman had declared their innocence, claiming the city's death had been caused, not by some mysterious outbreak, but rather some sort of accident at their nuclear power plant…but then cases of a strange, new disease started cropping up across the country, around the world, and eyes had turned again on the corporation, whispers growing louder, questions growing more insistent and Umbrella's chairman-

-an electric flash of memory hit me.

When Wesker had first introduced himself his name had stuck in my craw like a thorn – familiar, but unplaceable. Now I remembered…and I could feel the world slipping out from underneath me with the realization.

Umbrella's head, Umbrella's chairman had been one Albert Wesker.

I blinked, felt myself stagger.

How had I not seen? How could I not have remembered?

The past few days rolled back in my head. I saw him, heard myself talking to him, saw myself touching him…letting him touch me, felt his lips against mine...I saw a wealth of fabric – the parachute we'd carried him in – red and white, just like Umbrella's logo.

Why had I not seen?

I stumbled back away from the window and arms like a vice came around me as I collided with someone I hadn't heard enter behind me.

~.~

It wasn't Wesker, though that was my first wild thought. No, this man – and it was certainly a man – was neither tall enough nor broad enough to be him. I could see only his arms – encased in black fabric – wrapped around my chest and waist, and his boots – also black – beside mine. He didn't say a word, just pulled, dragging me backward.

I struggled, and unable to move my arms, snapped my head back. I connected and pain exploded in the back of my skull, but I was rewarded by a grunt from my attacker as well. His grip slipped and I dug my boots into the carpet, shoving back, hoping to trip him. He held on, but we stumbled back and slammed into something hard-

-and with a crack of metal and the hiss of rent air an explosion ripped through the room. Dust and bits of wood popped into the air, shreds of carpet cleaved from the floor.

I felt my assailant jerk, stiffen, and go still as his arms dropped from around me.

I staggered forward and he slumped, falling against the backs of my knees. A few more steps and he hit the floor with a dead thump.

I slowly turned, and for a moment just looked.

Untested, I could never say before whether or not my homemade bomb would work; now I had my answer. Like a charm it had gone off, the nails I'd packed into the can had burst outward, shredding everything they'd come in contact with, including the stranger. His light, assault style, gear had provided no protection and taking the brunt of the impact his back was like well tenderized hamburger.

Gingerly, I nudged him with my shoe, then rolled him. His face was covered by a dark, reflective faceplate, but I didn't need to see that. The emblem on his chest – the red and white flower again – was enough.

Umbrella. The chairman had called in the reinforcements.

For what exactly, I couldn't say. But given what they'd done…remembering Daryl, I doubted it was to invite us 'round for tea.

As if to confirm a scream suddenly ripped from the hall.

Sarah!

Pushing everything else aside I moved without thought, relying on instinct and nerve. I snatched up my bow and quiver and snagged the strap of my father's bag as I passed it, sliding it over my shoulders.

Readying an arrow I darted into the hall.

How long had I stared out the window? How long had I been distracted? Only a few minutes I'd thought…but apparently that had been long enough.

Open warfare had broken out – my friends against Umbrella attackers. Bullet holes pot-marked the walls and ceiling and ahead a body was sprawled, hanging half-in half-out of a bedroom. I recognized Phil, saw him swing a hard right-hook at a masked invader. He connected and for a moment our eyes locked – then he was jerking, spasming uncontrollably before abruptly dropping to the floor.

Another Umbrella employee appeared behind him as he fell, busily reloading the taser gun he'd used to drop Phil. Over the man's shoulder I saw Sarah, struggling, fighting, as someone dragged her toward the stairwell.

Before I even knew what I was doing, I had aimed and released.

The arrow snapped down the hall and with a sound like wet fabric being ripped, tore into Sarah's captor's throat, nailing him back against the wall. He struggled, groped at the arrow, and went still.

Sarah wrenched away from him, turning wide eyes on me.

The man who'd taken down Phil was leveling his weapon at me, I screamed at Sarah to run and grabbed at another arrow – but I knew there was no way I'd have enough time to pull it free from the quiver, his finger was already tightening on his trigger...Suddenly another man in black appeared, slamming his hand down on the first's gun, sending the electricity laced bolts directly into the carpet.

"No!" I heard him shout above the din. "You know the orders! She's not to be-"

Whatever their orders were, and whatever they meant for me, he didn't get a chance to say. A well placed arrow took him in the chest, silencing him. I pulled another, aimed at the other, but he jumped aside, diving into an open room and the sharp head buried into the jam.

Deciding not to wait for him to reappear, I took off, scrambling into the stairwell – where I ran smack into a thick cloud of noxious smoke.

My throat immediately began to close, my eyes to water. Gagging and choking I bumped into the wall, struggling to orient myself. I found the stairs by almost falling down them; I caught the railing just in time to save my neck.

There were more screams and shouts, gunfire, and above it all, the relentless droning of the planes. I felt something – someone - brush against me, but I couldn't see…I pushed at it, knocking whoever it was away, and stumbled down the stairs.

It was a burning, nightmare run that seemed to go on forever, but I did eventually break into the main floor and eyes streaming, lungs screaming I took stock – more bodies, what might have been Amy's hair pooling out from behind the couch, what was definitely Spade, bloodied and dead, his barrel chest riddled with bullets, more of Wesker's goons…everywhere.

What could I do?

Nothing.

Nothing but turn-tail and run.

~.~

I abandoned the mill, the home I had known for the last two years, and burst outside. The roar of the planes doubled as soon as I hit open air and over my fear, over my anger and shame and guilt I could feel him – his eyes suddenly on me as I streaked across the yard, running…running without thought, without any greater direction than away.

I could have unlocked the gate and gone that way. I could have pushed through the newly discovered hole in the fence and escaped there…but I couldn't stop. I'd started running and now it was all I could do.

I sprinted along the fence, over the grass and rocks, and down, finally down into the river. The water was cold, and yanked viciously at my legs, trying to pull them from under me as I plunged forward.

But I didn't stop.

The current dragged at me, began to pull me away, pull me down. Water rushed up over my waist, my chest, my neck…over my head. My clothes, the bag, even my bow weighed me down, pulled me deeper.

My lungs burned, I couldn't breathe, and slowly black crept in.

Cold and dark washed over me. Took away everything.

No pain, no thought, no feeling...

Just cold…and dark.