A/N:

(( A couple of things: All past chapters have been updated (Checked for errors, new sections added where lacked, and chapter two was rewritten with same idea.), I would really, really, really like to get to 100 reviews by chapter ten because I worked hard and I deserve some good ones! So go back and review chapters you haven't =), on my profile page I made a fun book cover for Captive with Claire's mellow-aroused eyes when she shows the red!, this chapter's location is based on 'the prison' in mercenaries, and last but not least EXPLICIT CONTENT.

Be sure to check my profile, made lots of updates including the honoring of some of you (besides those of you who asked not to be)!

Staind – It's Been a While))

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Chapter 9: It's Been a While
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It's been awhile,
since I could hold my head up high.

And it's been a while,
since I first saw you.


Every man dies, but not every man lives, this was not the case for Albert Wesker, who stood naked before me in a cylinder, glass tube. The man had lived to see the fall of man, see a company prosper past its grave, and still manage to steal a heart of an enemy in more than one way. Yes, he was not completely dead yet, but the parts of his body I adored so fondly were severed.

He was missing his right arm; it was torn from the bottom of his shoulder, leaving rugged flesh and bone dangling freely. Boils and burns sprouted from the tips of his toes to his torso, completely altering his skin color to that of a horizon within the sky. The exit wounds to which Uroboros's tensed tentacles parted from his inner body were left crusted over by a black, tar secretion. Forever would such a sight haunt my most pleasant of dreams.

"Okay, this is from the blood I just took." My head jerkily wheeled around to view a filled syringe in Sherry's gloved hand.

"Take it," she insisted while forcing it upon me.

As I carefully rested my fingertips in all the right places, my radiant hues shifted back and forth as I pondered all the capabilities of the substance. Fear shook my core and created a tremendous Earthquake of regret and question. Should I save him? He is the only one who can save me, after all.

I could end this all by leaving it be and allowing our time to be up, but we weren't ready to die.

The hallow needle penetrated the injection area of the tube located near the control panel which repetitively took vitals and kept his heart pumping. As my thumb administered the injection, I watched in awe as the liquid passed through the IVs and into his chest.

Then, it all crashed before my eyes.

His hues resembled that of a dragon, irked for being disturbed from the decades of slumber, and they were tearing a hole right through me. My mouth hung open, inviting a suction of air to gasp as his body began to move. This time, the regret I felt was towards what I had just done.

A snap was followed by a circular indentation of cracked glass as Wesker's good fist punched into his tube to escape. The second blow sent water and flying shards crashing down around us. Wesker never let me out of his sight, staring down at me into my soul.

There was no one else here, just us, in a point between times when the world stood still.

I began to back up, to free myself from the situation at hand, but his monstrous hand wrapped around my neck and prevented my own escape. I grunted in agony as my weight was supported by my head and neck enclosed in his palm. My hands at his wrist were trying to hoist myself up enough to breathe. I began kicking as a second resort.

"You betrayed me, Claire. You left me to die," His voice roared, squeezing my neck until my breath was a staggering peep, "Now, you shall die."

Another loud snap sounded this time, followed by my body slumping to the floor, my last bit of air leaving me, never to return. My pupils dilated and the reflection within them were charred feet preparing themselves to walk away.

And so they did. They just walked away.

But I could not … I, was dead.

-=-=-=-=-=-

"Claire!" I woke up as if I was taking my first breath into the new world, making one huge gasp towards the ceiling of the plane with my face's expression in full, startled alert.

"Claire you were having a nightmare." tiny hands stroked my arms and I placed my hand on my chest.

"I'm – I'm sorry," I swallowed down my choked words before peering about, "where are we?"

"Africa," she said softy and my eyes began to glaze.

Before I had fallen asleep I had quite a few questions for Sherry Birkin. It seemed Wesker had made a promise to his long-time friend William and brought it upon himself to bring Sherry in should the worst become of the situation. I had searched for Sherry for years after the Raccoon City disaster upon learning of her abduction by men posing as Government agents.

Not a thought crossed my mind that told me she was dead.

Apparently, Sherry became one of Wesker's more humanly tasks. Although resistant at first, he eventually was able to "warm up" to the matured pre-teen and find use for her. From there, the two worked on two ends of the world. Sherry ensured me that it was better this way, she liked to work alone and so did he. However, they both thrived for that one something to fill the inevitable human nature void. I think Wesker found it his weakness in the end.

"But you knew what he was going to do with Uroboros!" I had cried to her, to which she responded:

"Yes, but I am one person who is more than likely a chosen one. Dad would have suited me so, or Wesker could have granted me that. I wasn't exactly normal when I left Raccoon. Apparently, I was experimented on without knowing it. Some father, huh?" She was a very somber talker, quiet and withdrawn.

She hadn't changed a bit.

"Why are you suited up in that cloak? Can't I see you?" I had also asked, but she was reluctant. Only when I read about it within Wesker's journal did I find the meaning.

It seemed that the cloaked outfits were designed for her. She would often sit upon windowsills, watching the birds outside, and think positively to herself. She even admitted to me that most of her thoughts were me coming for her and that that was the reason she made it through. My heart fluttered with sheer flattery.

"Anyways," she continued on, "Wesker said if I kept staring at them one day the bird DNA will genetically mutate and be able to be passed on into my blood by just eye contact, making me one of them… for lack of better terminology as he had used." I still remembered the rise I got out of this statement, laughing within and a little on the outside as well.

When she was seventeen, there was a horrid accident in the laboratory in Australia she worked at. Apparently, she was allergic to an airborne substance that was immensely unstable - it melted her. So as if a horror villain, such as Jason, she hid behind a mask and cloak. She hid what was once so beautiful…

"He made me a mask, much like a bird, as a sense of 'get well,'" her shoulders then slumped towards the painful memories, "he told me he'd make something to fix it, but not before he finished a project he worked on for many years later on." Uroboros…

"He never got around to it. I may have made him more interested in the average human, but I could never warm him up enough to get him to care for someone before himself." Had I even done that?

"I just wasn't strong or emotionally stable enough..."

I made a new promise to myself: I will fix her. I will find a way to reduce the effects of the chemical. I will help her. It is the least I could do…

The helicopter made a landing on a high platform above various volcanoes. I could sense the heat radiating off the windows and it instantly made me uncomfortable. This is where he died, I thought helplessly as the plane finally stopped shaking from the engine being killed.

"You'll see some grotesque things. Please, just keep moving." Did she really think it would bother me by now?

We proceed onto a helipad made of wooden boards that were slowly flaking away with decay. I pushed myself passed Sherry to overlook the facility we were at and to my surprise found something completely different than I had imagined.

Lava surrounded us, threatening an instant death to those who fell over the poorly boarded pathways around the main building below.

We descended down a ladder and took a left down a ramp that lead us to a half working railroad. I must say that this place, built with old stone and the most heat resistant metal around, wasn't too shabby. That was, until I saw the prisoner area of those who were defiant, stained with blood, with a foul smell lingering.

"Just a bit further." I was assured as together we rode in a railroad cart through the twists and turns of the volcano caves.

Our first stop was upon a metal platform, lava moving beneath us and administering steam that melted the rubber of my tennis shoes. Apparently, Sherry's boots were custom made for such temperature; Wesker really thought of it all. We proceeded through several heat resistant doors, the metal surprisingly cool to touch, and entered a large room filled with tubes. Within the tubes, lied no humans, only flowers.

"He's in the back." I felt my stomach drop. This was really it.

Only a few steps behind her we entered what she referred to as "the back room" that was a radiant white. The floor was surrounded by luminescent light bulbs in each corner and several metal cupboards about; it looked like a normal storing room.

A creaking noise gave behind me, the sound of un-oiled nuts and bolts being tampered with, and I immediately turned to observe Sherry. Her white cloaked self was opening a type of door that concealed a tube that emitted fog from the temperature change. Whatever it was, it was being kept cool. I slowly approached the revealed object, walking sideways with my head tilted as if peeping around a nonexistent corner.

And there he was.

He was just as I pictured him, minus the burns and severed parts. He seemed worn, wounds from Uroboros's escape covered his flesh and it was worse than I thought. I know that he could survive heat due to the Veronica Virus, but rockets to the face? I could see his cheek bones, white as a snowy day, piercing through the flesh of his face. Clearly, he had made some sort of dodge, but the more I glanced over him the more I realized what was wrong; his skull was showing as well. He had suffered a great trauma.

"He has lost a lot and we have no A/W left except for what is in your blood. He may have not admitted it, but you're more useful than he ever participated. Maybe that's why he was so fascinated with you. You adapted way beyond the standards for any human and became a key for his life. He can heal with you…" Sherry spoke behind me, her voice slightly distorted by the tin.

"You don't have to do this… you both can end this and just die…," She said gravely, knowing that he was the only one who had answers for me. Yet, how did she know what was wrong with me?

"I want to," I said far more quickly than I could think about it, despite my dream.

Her gloved hand extended over my shoulder and touched a few buttons upon his containment until a hand print formed.

"It will only hurt for a moment," She assured me to which I nodded.

I fit my hand into the shape of the figure on the tube and rested as a light scanned my palm; it didn't hurt at all.

Suddenly, a jolting pain shook through me as 2.75 mm needles penetrated each fingertip and a 10.0 mm stuck through my palm to the bone. I cried in pain, not because it truly hurt, but because something unknown was happening within me: my eyes began to burn until tears streamed continuously down my cheeks, my stomach distorted until acid engulfed my ribcage, and my whole body throbbed with a numb sensation over and over, letting pain in and out.

My blood began to change color somewhere between the exit of my body and entrance into his personal IVs. I watched it swirl as pint after pint left me and all noises around became the echo of a solitary space. At one point, I rendered Sherry leaving me or calling out to me. I sensed panic, even in this complicated situation, and it was not of my own.

I heard the sound of cracking flesh, as if human skin was being stretched over a surface and laid out to dry, and nearly lost myself as my world began to spin. Memories came back to me, that of happier times when Chris used to take me to the park, then, the meeting of Sherry Birkin and somehow filling the lonely void in her young heart. Next, came the memory of little Rani, holding the bear she had named after me protectively tucked beneath her chin as she slept.

Yet, there was one memory that gave me peace of mind, one that soon bled through all the rest flashing before me.

A blonde man with eyes of gold embers smiled down at me awkwardly, as though he never once smiled in his entire life – as though, he was saving them all for me. He extended a hand and together we viewed the wolves chase their prey, watched a town fall apart to flames and havoc, and witnessed a love of two complete opposites unfold.

An electric pulse surged through me, ripping my hand from the needles, and slamming my body to the floor. I am unsure of how long I laid here, tears streaming involuntary as my eyes burned, but I was now beginning to sit up. I propped myself up on a hip, my arms flimsily quivering beneath me, and my multi-colored hues searching through white, blurred vision. Who threw the flash grenade? My mind screamed, but no one had.

A naked man stood before me, outstretching a hand in such a similar way I about mistook him for Leon, and I rested a bloody palm within his. I was then hoisted up, nearly thrown to Jupiter by the gesture to get me to my feet, and I paused, staggering, waiting for the blood to settle with me.

No words came as my lips parted; I hunched at the stomach and threw up the last of my energy. My stomach growled with a want that needed to be met, but there was no time for that.

"Wesker…" I whispered in distress through my purging process as I permitted more vomit to release.


And it's been awhile,
since I could stand on my own two feet again.

And it's been awhile,
since I could call you.


"Look at me." A voice, raspy and unfamiliar commanded me, and so I did.

I stared at Albert Wesker, my foe, my wolf in sheep's clothing… and my lover.

"I suppose I should thank you. It was in your best interest assist me," He arrogantly seemed to spat, but I knew his ego had been demolished by my brother.

"Don't be… don't be stupid," I cradled my stomach and gazed up at him painfully.

His hands rested on my shoulders and straightened me. I then noticed that he was as perfect as he ever was; I had healed him.

"Were the N.G.O.s happy for your return?" He scoffed bitterly, to which I began to get angry at.

"Chris was able to pull a few strings and say I had to leave for a mission to assist him, one which no one knows."

"How charming," Wesker began to laugh, his words laced with acid.

"So everything is fit and wonderful for you, living in a world as a normal human, but also living a lie," He continued on. His voice drove me into a step back away from him.

"What are you talking about? I thought you were dead, if it wasn't for Sherr –"

"If it wasn't for the last person on Earth to remain loyal to me to the point where they would kill their own sibling if they had one? If it wasn't for someone you forgot all about as your perfect life resumed, you wouldn't have known I was still alive? Would you have cared? Or would I fall into the category of all the people in the past you have unfulfilled promises tp?" His voice could shatter glass despite its low frequency.

My heart was crying – he had it all wrong!

"Albert, that's not it! I'm only one woman fighting a war covered with top secret files and complicated passwords. You forget how much you've lied to me and all the things I am just finding out!" I spat back as I stepped forward again.

"He who cannot lie does not know what the truth is!" His head tilted with his words, strangling my ears with his velvet accent.

"If you're going to use quotes on me then: an eye for an eye. Tell me what is wrong with me!" My near shouting tone camouflaged the tears wanting to release themselves.

"Nothing is wrong with you!" Nothing?... Nothing?!

"You are simply jam-packed with emotions, in heat if you will, and acting as though you're pregnant." He is right, I just finished my period,

"Being away from me triggered the need to "find your mate." It is our blood connection, nothing more." 'I tried to tell myself it was our blood connection and nothing more' words from his journal came back to haunt me.

"It will pass, now leave!" He said harshly, my eyebrows indenting in with anger as I paused before him.

"Didn't you hear me? I don't want or need you anymore! Leave the premises at once." He snapped a bit louder.

I had been right from the start. I was just a pawn in his game.

I reached within the hand pouch of my white sweatshirt, which now had a smear mark of blood from my hand, and retrieved his journal. My lilac hues glanced at it longingly, but I had read every page that my mind was now telling me was false, that he had pre-written everything to fool me. I threw it at his feet, the African cloth and creased flower flying from the pages.

"You may have stolen my blood, my dignity, and my heart Albert Wesker… but you will never… ever… steal my sanity as you have done my brother," I said with a tone that reminded me of Sherry's: dead, lifeless, and reserved.

I sharply turned on the balls of my feet and stalked out of the room, picking up into a run after I was around the corner. And after I heard, from the little voice of Sherry Birkin:

"What have you done?"


And everything I can't remember,
As fucked up as it all might seem.

The consequences that I rendered,
I've stretched myself beyond my means.


-=-=-=-=-=-

Once I got home, I had already wasted a day flying alone, plus my short time with Wesker. Chris had returned and coincidently was reading my note just as I burst through the door.

"Gone to free your mind, huh?" He said in a voice that did not fit his booming, burly stature.

"Yeah," I said weakly as our eyes met, both tired and seeming a bit lost. My eyes then traced his towards the speckles of blood across the floor.

"We had a visitor," I covered truthfully.

"I believe that," He nodded, "He's not still alive… is he?" I had prepared myself for this.

"No," I lied, and then gave him a fake smile that he deemed truthful. We would deal with the future as it came; everything after all was back to square one.

"Before I read your note Rani and her aunt stopped by. I told them you were out to the doctor because you were sick, which isn't really a lie; you look like a love sick puppy or something." My eyebrow rose and he caught my inner emotion.

"It's not a bad thing, first real expression you've showed since you've been back. Anyways, Rani left something for you in your bedroom. Don't worry about the mess, I'll clean it as a thank you for staying with me in my…" He paused, searching for the words he hated to admit to, "'healing' process," I forced a smile and nodded.

"Thanks big B – I'm going to retire now," I said as I turned to go to my room.

"And Claire..." I stopped.

"You will tell me where you were some day, right?" I nodded.

"Of course… some day," I had been open with him to the point of excluding my involvement with Wesker as the only thing. He accepted what I was, because I could hide it, and maybe he even saw me being useful for future missions.

I sluggishly sauntered into my room and blinked through the darkness, my hues adjusting accordingly to lead me to my bed. There, sat a more worn Claire-bear, with a note written in green crayon to boot. It read:

"Dear Claire,

Claire-bear always makes me feel better when I am sick. You have her for now, bye!"

I should have smiled at how cute her handwriting is, at the motherly instincts that boiled up within me, but instead my shoulders vibrated with tears. I began to sob unrelentingly against my pillow as I collapsed. It's over, it's finally over! Yet, that was not why I was crying… I missed him, oh god did I miss him…

But he doesn't NEED you, he doesn't WANT you…

Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! I chucked one of my extra pillows at the wall, it was the only thing quiet enough not to disturb Chris, who was working in the kitchen. I bit my lip with my eye teeth, tasting my own blood upon my swollen tongue that I had also bitten prior. I was a wreck and personally battling to not unleash the horrid monster within me. I could completely lose myself in this darkness, sorrow, and hatred that was expanding.

Was this what he wanted?

I screamed at the back of my throat through my closed mouth, making a shrill that was muted and enjoyed the sting I found from it. I began to breathe through my nostrils and focus on that sensation; I realized I was back to hurting myself, just as I had in the beginning. This was just one big roller coaster.

My tear dampened arms weakly wrapped around Claire-bear, pulling beneath my chin as Rani had, and smelling the scent of Aunt's home.

"I love you," Claire-bear said with a low-battery voice and I choked out a laugh that was far from being happy, but close for that moment.

I closed my eyes, feeling my cool, damn lashes touch the rise of my cheeks sorrowfully as I tried my best to refocus on the sensation of breathing; I attempted to hibernate, to forget all that has happened and move on, all while enduring the sensation of my heart ripped from my chest that seemed to linger as an internal radar searched from my missing piece.

I sniffled and cleared my throat, snuggling Claire-bear tightly as sleep fell upon me rather quickly.


And it's been awhile,
since I could say I wasn't addicted.

And it's been awhile,
since I could love myself as well…


"Since when does the strapping Claire Redfield sleep with stuffed animals?"

My eyes burst open.

-=-=-=-=-=-

I gruff, muscular hand covered my mouth tightly as a sprung up in bed with a similar protect urge.

"Calm yourself and control your heart rate," The velvet voice cooed, "with all this emotion you summoned up and the disconnection between us, one small surprise could lead to doomsday by your fists." I tried to speak against his hand and he released only when he figured I could whisper. I took in a deep breath.

"What are you talking about? How did you –" His hand returned then separated as soon as I was cut off.

"Don't ever underestimate the connection of our blood… like I did," He said lowly. Was he admitting a mistake? "I'm going to stay with you tonight to ease your hormones despite the fact a progeny could be rather unfortunate for me," He purred.

Wait a minute, back up, back up – Actually, wake up, Claire! I cried within.

"And because I love you. I have made a grave mistake," Albert Wesker owned up to something and cared about something other them himself.

And it was all I wanted to hear.


And it's been awhile,
Since I've gone and fucked things up just like I always do.

And it's been awhile,
But all that shit seems to disappear when I'm with you!


His lips pressed into mine, his hands instantly upon the mounts on my chest and cupping them strongly. Claire-bear, who was accidently tossed to the side, administered a soft giggle. I raised my hips to him as my hands worked their way like crafty snakes around his own to touch his ribs. He tensed and grunted. His muscles were still tender and I suddenly felt concerned.

"W-want me to stop?" I trembled, regretting the words as soon as they parted from me.

"Claire…" He breathed as his hands were placed between my naked shoulder blades and scooping me up into him as his thick, bulbous head touched the wetness of my lower lips.

My jaw dropped as my head tilted back and my chin pointed at the ceiling, a gasp escaping. He found it the perfect opportunity to devour my neck with the most passionate, lustful kisses I had ever experienced in my life.

"Put me inside of you," He whispered and I reached between us, tackling the heat from our bodies that warmed my hand upon decent between my flat and his washboard stomach.

The length of his shaft was intimidating to my hand, but yearned for by my turning stomach that tensed and fluttered with anticipation. He member jumped to my touched, fully erect it seemed almost sore, and I put him to ease by directing him passed my wet folds.

He moaned softly to me, shuddering some within as he resumed dominance and slid past my ridges in my slippery excrement. His hips dug pleasurably into my inner thighs, using their tone shape to roll into me at a loving, passionate pace.

Wesker began to explore my body as if it was new, something that fascinated him, and he showed all the interest he may have hid before. He cupped my breasts, one at a time, and pampered each on with circular caresses and tender licks of tongue. This led my swollen nub to pulsate, as if the sensation in my nipples could be felt in two separate areas.

"Albert!" I cried loudly and a finger was instantly shoved into my mouth.

"Shh…" For a moment, I thought he'd spew the normal "relax" but he didn't.

I enclosed my mouth around his forefinger, using the ability to indent my cheeks to create suction and bring him further into my mouth. His fingertip touched the tissue at the back of my throat and I began to lick the salty flesh of him clean, to which his member throbbed with desire to the point where he claimed his finger back.

His fingertips rushed down my body, starting at my neck and moving down my taut breasts and risen nipples, to my ticklish ribcage and wide, sexual hips where he grasped for momentum. However, he didn't remain there for long; he threw himself back into me and kept me near. At one point, lifting my up into his thrusting lap without making me do a single bit of the word as my climax was being met.

I couldn't help but moan and whine, let Chris think I was just simply masturbating! I don't care anymore!

My head flew back, my body trembling on his as the strongest orgasm I shall have yet to experience poured down on my like a warm rain.

"I'm going to –" I mumbled between pants.

"I know, I know," He hushed me warmly, "You have to… be quiet." Even he was struggling; surly my tightness was satisfactory and never ceasing to amaze him.

I nodded urgently to his words and we began prepping each other for our climax at similar times… First, his warm substances touch my upper walls, leading them to contract against his still hard shaft as both our muscles tensed. I cried out, straining my voice but ended up making it sound like I was dying…

I was dying in pleasure.

His hand covered my mouth and our eyes locked, both burning with lava fires. A flush rushed over me, that protective attribute that had been so strong since he had been gone even worse.

Because I didn't want him to leave.


And it's been awhile,
Since I've seen the candles light your face.

And it's been awhile,
But I can still remember just the way you taste.


"Claire?" Chris's voice closed in, but only my eyes widened.

"No…" Wesker whispered as he observed my hues become a fiery gold-yellow as I saw reflecting in his own.

I heard the lock retract as a doorknob was turned. Wesker could easily pick up is clothes and leave like a bolt of lightening, but he didn't. Why isn't he leaving?!

The door flung open, sheer panic from my brother becoming the emotion within the air. My heart skipped a beat. I was engulfed by my hormones, my need to protect an offspring that I hoped to have in the near future, and the darkness consumed me.

"Greetings, Christopher, I suggest you leave now before it is too late," A velvet, accented voice cautioned before a female banshee's warning cry sounded.