Here we go folks. I want to shout out a thanks to those who keep me going on this. A lot of my stories I simply lost my way on. I have a feeling we're going to see this one through to the end.
In this chapter we're going to explore a little piece of Five that I wanted to mess around with. It gets a little sad here but worry not, we shall return to the humor and the action in the coming chapters.
Let's see how it goes eh?
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Chapter 10: Over the river and thru the woods….
So our erstwhile hero began a new quest. Freed from the bonds of his previous experience, immersed in the promise of his new love, flanked by the friend who'd stood beside him countless times before, Chris Redfield prepared to unravel the riddle of the destruction of the town he'd grown up in and the safety of the world he'd known.
Jill paused at a set of double doors at the end of a long, dark, musty hallway.
The entire castle had been void of life. In fact, had Chris not trusted Rebecca's intel so completely, he would have turned around and left after the first hour of useless wandering.
But then they'd come upon the bodies.
Ten, fifteen, twenty and more dead bodies had been tossed, turned over, discarded around the courtyard. They'd been hanging from trees, floating in the moat, broken and beaten and forgotten on the stairs in the great hall. They were guards, lots of them, guards with guns and trained by a man who'd single handedly orchestrated the destruction of an entire town. And they were all dead.
Not only were they dead, of course, but they'd all popped off more rounds then Chris had ever seen. Empty shell casings covered the floor like metal confetti at a birthday party. Some of them were still warm. The only blood that was scattered around seemed to be from the dead men. Whatever they'd been aiming at, the numerous bullet holes in the walls told Chris they'd missed. And badly.
One man's head was completely twisted around his neck, his eyes staring off into the distance at the world beyond his shoulder blades. Another two had been twisted together like some kind of macabre pretzel, their arms and legs wound around each other in a sickening kind of bone breaking hug.
Something had come along and killed these men. And not just killed them, played with them before they'd killed. Played like an evil god with a grudge against mankind.
There was one room left at the end of the hallway after a circular trek to the top of the highest watch tower. One room where voices could be heard speaking just beyond the wood.
Finally, Chris thought, and saw it echoed on Jill's face beneath her cap, answers.
He pulled his gun, jacked a round into the chamber and saw Jill mirror the gesture. And then he kicked the door open.
Two seconds was all he had to assimilate the situation. The old man, dead on the floor in a pool of blood, the wheelchair abandoned. The window that exposed the southern most wall and the world immersed in a raging storm beyond the glass. And the man…the man in front of the window illuminated by the flicker of lightening.
"Wesker!"
Someone shouted it. It didn't matter who. And they were both firing.
He almost told Jill they'd never hit the other man. But it didn't matter. They fired and separated and shifted and moved, the way they were trained.
Wesker moved like nothing human. He just wasn't there and then he was and Chris was being knocked back, Jill being kicked. A punch, a smash and his gun went flying. Chris dove to get it back and Wesker caught the back of his uniform and tossed him, he rolled, caught the gun and came up firing.
Wesker teleported (the only word he had for it) kicked Jill in the ass playfully and sent her sprawling and was suddenly at Chris's side again. A fist to the jaw that had Chris's vision bisecting and a punch to the ribs that sent him doubling over trying to breathe.
Jill leapt with her knife and Wesker caught her throat, shook her like a rapid dog, and tossed her. She flew up and out, smashed into a book shelf and slid to the floor in a heap.
"Silly girl." Wesker said in a sing song voice. Chris spun a back kick, easily blocked by the other man, and Jill was firing. Poof, gone from the path of the bullet, and then he was punching Chris hard enough to send him sprawling.
A rib cracked, he was pretty sure, with that punch. Chris stumbled, Jill was being tossed again like a toy. And Wesker was back, gripping his throat, picking the taller man clear up off the ground.
Choking, Chris kicked in vain before he was being smashed into a table and thrown down it like a well tossed bowling ball down a lane. He couldn't do more then brace for the impact before Wesker was there again, jerking him off the ground and holding him up in the air by his throat.
He tilted his head like a curious dog, studying the other man. "I tire of you. You've become tedious. This ends…now."
And he squeezed.
Chris had been choked before. In those split seconds, his brain flashed back to the first time he'd faced the tyrant. The monster unleashed by the other man at the Spencer's Estate to test the meddle of his personally trained team of soldiers.
The tyrant had choked him; its long fingers closing over his throat as it had lifted him clear off the ground and pulled his other hand (the one laden with claws as long as a man's arm) and prepared to eviscerate him.
That choking…had sucked. Big time. His throat had sported beautiful bruises for a week after that night.
But it was nothing next to this one. Wesker had more power in his human shaped hand then that Tyrant had had in its whole mutated body.
He was dying. Quickly, if his darkening vision was any indication. His brain latched onto Sheva and he chose to keep it there while he died. There were worse things to think of when life was leaving your body then the woman you loved.
The air rushed back into his lungs almost painfully as he was dropped unceremoniously to the floor.
He had a moment of surprise before it happened. And he knew he'd remember it for the rest of his life.
Jill Valentine, his partner in crime, his best buddy, his pal and the woman who'd saved his ass so many times in the past, did it again.
She hit Wesker broad side in a tackle worthy of the NFL and took them both through the window to his left.
Glass shattered, raining down on Chris as the two of them seemed to hang, suspended, in mid air for a brief moment.
His eyes met Jills, his hands shot out to grab her.
And they were plummeting, plummeting, turning and tossing in the window down the endless craggy edges of the cliff into the perilous dark beneath it.
.NO.
"JILL!!!!!" Chris was reaching out with both hands into the darkness, watching the emptiness of that dark brought to horrid life by the flashing of the lightening around him.
The darkness didn't answer. There was nothing now but the body of Ozwell Spencer. And the death that had come with him.
The death toll had risen over the years with Spencer and Wesker's evil machinations. They'd destroyed Raccoon, taken Chris's parents, his friends, cost him everything.
And now…
"Jill…" He stayed there, on his knees, for some time. For a long time, it seemed until Kirk came to get him. He'd heard it all over the headset. He knew.
He informed Chris they'd already sent a team to the better of the ravine to try to…find her.
Find her. Right. Kirk was being kind. He should have said…to recover her body.
"Chris…" Kirk's voice again, this time speaking to him like he was a roof jumper and he was trying to talk him back from the edge, "Your nose is probably broken. And you're listing to one side. We need to get you medical attention."
Chris blinked. That made sense. He supposed. But he was numb.
He was numb and Jill was dead. Jill was dead. Jill…
"Jill.." It seemed to be the only word he knew at the moment.
"Yeah." Kirk gestured to someone who was arriving behind him. "Yeah. We'll find her. Let us fix you up, okay?"
"Okay." Chris turned and let the medical team take him.
He thought maybe he was in shock. Shouldn't he be feeling grief or something? Something at all would be nice. He just felt empty.
Someone gave him a shot of something. A woman with blue eyes and dark hair. Dark hair like…
He must have passed out because the next thing he remembered was sitting on the edge of a cot in a hospital room. He was shirtless, his ribs taped and bound, his nose splinted.
Machines beeped lazily around him. A few nurses came and went, checking his vitals, scribbling in charts. Occasionally one would draw a tube of blood and ask him how he was feeling.
Fine, he would answer, fine. But he felt far from fine. He felt…empty. Dead.
The door to his room opened and Claire stood there, her face devoid of her usual make up, her hair in a sloppy ponytail with pieces sticking out in every direction around her face. She was puffy, shaky, and grieving.
"Claire."
Her face collapsed into lines of grief and sadness. "Christopher. Oh god…Chris. You're alright."
"Yeah." He shifted a little on the bed. "Jill fell. I couldn't catch her. She fell."
He sounded so blank. There was no emotion in his voice at all.
Chris held his hands out in front of him, palm up. "All these muscles…I couldn't help her. I couldn't stop him."
Claire crossed to him at nearly a run and gathered him in against her. It was a good hug, a hard hug, it pained his ribs and he didn't care. Because the hug felt like home.
"Chris…" Claire's voice shook, "They…couldn't find her. They looked for nearly two days…no sign of her. No sign of Wesker. No sign of anything. They think…maybe…the river…swept their bodies away."
His arms lifted and wrapped around her, squeezing. The emptiness inside of him began to ache. Every pain in his body began to throb like a bad tooth. But it was nothing…nothing against the pain in his chest that opened up like a hungry mouth and started to gnaw at his soul.
"They're saying…they're saying she's dead Chris. They're saying she's dead…and so is Wesker."
"It's over." His voice was still so empty. "He's dead. It's over."
"Yes honey. Yes." Claire sounded so soothing. She sounded like…his mother. "It's over now."
"Jill's dead?" The ache was beginning to feel like stomach cramps. It was starting to feel like food poisoning. It was starting to feel like he was going to throw up. "She's dead?"
God, Claire thought frantically, her brother was the strongest person she knew. He was her hero, her strength. And he sounded so lost, so broken, like a little boy who's discovered the monster under the bed is real…and it's eaten Mommy and Daddy.
She leaned back and cupped his face, looked into eyes that were a mirror of her own. "Yes. She's dead. I'm so sorry, honey."
Jill…the first day at the Academy in Raccoon City. Her hair was so short, bobbing around her chin like brown silk. She was one of the only girls there to scale the wall in under a minute. She was one of the only girls to fox crawl beneath the barbed wire without bitching about the mud. She was one of the only girls that didn't hit on him.
They'd shared a soda outside the cafeteria on break. She'd commented on his pretty boy looks and skinny arms. It was the first time he knew he had to start buffing up.
He'd crushed on her a little then. Jill Valentine with her dark hair and blue eyes and long legs. Jill Valentine, the only girl he'd ever met who'd had the balls to tell him when he was out of line. He'd tried to steal a kiss the day they'd graduated from the Academy.
He remembered her face when he'd pulled back. She'd looked as appalled as he had. Because the kiss…had felt like family. It had felt damn close to kissing his sister.
Jill…the day they'd received their acceptance into S.T.A.R.S. She, the daughter of an imprisoned thief, so proud to have pulled away from her past. And Chris, following in his Dad's footsteps, and then stepping so far outside them when he'd joined S.T.A.R.S.
His mother constantly asking when he was going to marry that Valentine girl.
Jill…opening the cell door to release him. Freeing him from that cage that had come so close to being his coffin.
Jill…tumbling over that cliff to save his worthless life.
"Chris?" Claire was gently stroking the side of his face.
"Claire…Jill's dead." And his blank voice was suddenly so full of pain.
"I know honey. I know."
He collapsed into her arms and sobbed. It was the most horrible sound Claire had ever heard. It was broken and wrenching and real. He cried like he'd spill his guts all over the floor and keep on going.
Claire pulled him in as tight as she could and cried with him. He'd finally stopped the man who'd taunted and chased them for years…and he'd lost his best friend in the world doing it.
Chris held onto his sister and sobbed…because he was pretty sure a part of him had died with her.
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