Chapter 10! Happy reading!

(/!\ Warning! This chapter is long, very long, abominably long. So long that I wanted to cut it in two, but if I had then my spoiler at the end of the last chapter would have been a lie. And so as to avoid any suspicion that I'm giving you all false hope, I wanted to keep my word! But don't you worry, today we've got Jake back!

Post-injection 10.

Jake:

When Nivans left the hospital, which had been some time ago now, I was convinced that we'd never see each other again. That now that he lived with his dear old Redfield, we'd have the kind of relationship where you send each other a greeting card maybe once a year, and an announcement for special occasions, but when you see each other at the store, you exchange uncomfortable smiles and say something like, 'It's been so long, it's crazy! Time sure flies, huh? I would love to get drinks with you, but I just don't have the time, I'm double parked outside, so sorry!'

But actually, that's not what happened at all. Just the day after his release, he showed up back here with a pack of beer to proudly tell me about how he had managed to take the bus all by himself like a big boy. And since then, he had continued to come see me regularly, not every day but as often as he could. Sometimes he came with Claire, other times by himself. He would bring me chips and magazines and he would tell me about all his efforts to NOT bang Redfield. Because yeah, as soon as he had a chance, and I swear that Redfield's actions were ambiguous even from an objective point of view at times, Piers seemed to make a point of sabotaging himself on purpose. And he was proud of it, that idiot. Did you see, he'd say with a big smile, he wanted to hold me in his arms and I was dying to let him but instead I told him to get lost like a huge snob. Who's good?

Their messed-up logic gave me headaches I seriously hadn't thought possible, both of them.

Redfield had continued to come visit too, and that had been even more surprising. He would come by around noon, when hours recruits were at the cantine, since he worked just 100 feet or so from the hospital. He always brought me food.

The first few times that it had been just the two of us, it had been weird and kind of freaked me out. We didn't say anything to each other, he and I. But it was still company, and any old bastard would do during the off hours, I was seriously bored out of mind. His grub was too good, which was a plus.

Over time, we fell into a sort of routine: the first thing Redfield did as he came in was to nab the remote from me and turn off the TV. Then he opened the blinds up wide and lectured me about how I had an unhealthy lifestyle. And inevitably, we'd end up going at it like dogs. I didn't know that Chris was such a mother hen, and I have to say that I didn't really hate it. But that didn't make it any less annoying. And even if he let the TV go, if he talked about something nice like his recruits, or Nivans, or the progress on the situation in Edonia and China, it ended in us going at it regardless. I think it was just how we communicated with each other, I don't know. I never stopped giving him hell. Maybe it was a sort of vengeance for killing my father, or maybe it was because he was so slow to get with the times about Nivans that it made me want to shake some sense into him. But okay, even though I was hardly ready to admit it out loud, I was touched that Redfield and Nivans hadn't let me go, and that Claire also came to see me from time to time, because things weren't going so well with Sherry.

These last few months, our relationship seemed to be falling apart. But I loved her, I really did. What I felt for her I can't even describe, I had never loved anyone before her. There were a bunch of things that weren't working, a bunch of problems, and it all boiled down to my confinement in the hospital, more or less.

Let's just cut to the chase, I'm talking about sex. We had no privacy, the medical personnel never knocked, and there were glass walls and glass windows that didn't hide anything. But we did the best we could, we made do with the situation, we got a little creative. It was even kind of fun for Sherry. She said it would make a good story to tell the kids in thirty years. I thought it would be kinda messed up to tell them that, but I mean, she was only joking. That was the only thing that we both agreed on right away in fact, that we didn't want to have kids. Our respective parents had traumatized us both, having abandoned us, wanting to destroy the world, or inject us with a virus.

At the beginning, it wasn't too hard to find ways to get it on, the researchers hadn't yet begun their experiments on me and mostly left me in peace. They had started getting on my case about it a little before Nivans had been moved into my room. And then, it had been even easier: as soon as Sherry and I got a little too handsy with each other, Nivans went to stand guard out in the hallway, like college kids did to their roommates. When a nurse would come by to try and enter, he stalled them by asking a ton of stupidly basic questions about his state of health, often going into gory detail about this giant patch of raw skin, or that unsightly section that had calloused over. Half the time he was actually did have to go in for some tests, but it gave me and Sherry the time to get dressed. And after the fact, it actually made us laugh.

When he left to go live with the Redfields, things got more complicated. The doctors increased the frequency of their tests, and they wouldn't get off my back, and in the end we inevitably got caught. You see the thing is, is that the hospital had officially forbidden me from copulating (yeah, that's actually the word they used) as long as the experiments were in progress; in other words, as long as I was still confined here. And as if it hadn't been humiliating enough getting caught in the act, they then proceed to yell at us like we were a bunch of kids. Sherry didn't take the whole thing very was nervous about visiting from then on, and the medical personnel did their fuckin' best to discourage her from coming back for good. The nurses called her the slut, and the medical researchers told her that she had fucked everything up and now I'd have to stay here even longer than before. And then they never left us alone. They removed the blinds on the windows facing the hallway, and every time that Sherry was there, a nurse stood outside watching us. It was horribly stressful.

The best thing to do was to not care, and to remind ourselves it was only temporary, that I wouldn't be stuck there forever. I told Sherry that she was in no position to complain, seeing as how she got to go home at the end of visiting hours, while I had to deal with the Gestapo watching me 24/7. Sherry replied that I had no idea where she lived, and so I'd do well to shut it. Things weren't so lovey-dovey between us after that.

Normally, Sherry actually lived in New York, but the BSAA base and the antibioterrorism research center and hospital complex were located in the Nevada desert, forty minutes away from the closest city. To be able to come visit me as often as possible, Sherry had rented a room with an old hag who was at least a hundred years old and acted like my girl was a whore every time she went out, then asked her sweetly for a foot massage as soon as she got back. Sweet as a lemon, I'll bet.

So yeah, it must have been hard for her. But when she was telling me about it, I said to her: here, take my money and check yourself into a five-star hotel, and she refused. I didn't understand why she wouldn't take the money, shit, we were dating, after all. What did she have to complain about, if she wanted to keep living with that old crone when I gave her the means to get out?

We also argued more and more. She would leave before visiting hours were over. And the next day she wouldn't call me. And some days after she would come back, we'd say we were dumb for having acted like that, but nothing would change. The problems stayed the same.

Just yesterday, we got into an argument for the dumbest reason. She had told me that she might not be able to come tomorrow because she had a big interview on the other side of the state. The thing that bothered me, it wasn't that she couldn't come see me, but that she was looking for a job when I'm a millionaire. I mean, I was sure that she was thinking about dumping me in the near future, why else would she be looking to work? Unless it was to be independent or some other feminist bullshit… Nah, she was going to leave me, she just had to be. She already came to see me less and less… she was just waiting for the right moment to break it to me, was all.

Nivans said it was all my fault. What a pal. He said it was only natural that she wanted some space, since every time she came to visit, which was already hard enough because the doctors hated her, I just yelled at her. But what can I do, I just… I just would have liked to spend more time with her, y'know? I was sick of seeing her leave every time at 5 o'clock, I needed more than that. I needed to get out of this hospital, it was this place that was destroying our relationship.

I realized with each passing day that we had been much happier during the days that we were hiding in dumpsters to escape Ustanak. We had been a lot closer than, compared to now. And it was sad.

Everything would work itself out when I got out of the hospital, I kept telling myself. Everything would work out. The problem was, that it didn't seem to be happening anytime soon.

At the moment, I was still in the midst of an experiment: forbidden from eating, forbidden from moving, and fed through an IV that set off an alarm if I tried to remove it. Sherry was giving me the cold shoulder and Redfield had left for Alaska over a week ago. At this rate, I was going to die here all alone and nobody'd even notice.

But wait: the door opened and I saw Nivans come in, flanked by two nurses. It wasn't visiting hours though, it was barely 7 AM.

"Hey," he said.

"You just couldn't stay away, I knew it!"

"Yep," he responded a bit absently.

He looked like shit, even worse than normal. His left side was all pale, his eye inflamed, his forehead beaded with sweat. He didn't look much like the Nivans I had seen last week, more like the one we had found half-dead down in the underwater facility. His right side was nothing new. It was still the same mincemeat as before.

He had his big sports bag with him. He set it on the bed, a sign that he was gonna be staying for a few days at least. I asked him what was up, he told me he had a fever, maybe the flu, and the doctors wanted to keep him under observation just in case.

He left again with the nurses to have a few tests done, then he came back an hour later to curl up in his bed. It was really the perfect timing for me to get Two-Face back. Just when I was starting to get depressed.

Okay, so he really wasn't in a mood to talk that much, he was seriously not doing so hot. In the morning he was still doing okay, but once it was past noon, he spent half his time throwing up in the bathroom. If he came back just to give me the stomach flu, I really could have done without, thanks!

I might have been saying that, but I didn't really mean it. Even if he didn't say much, it was nice to have someone near me. And he also listened, at least. I could gripe about Sherry all morning, it felt good! But even with a 104-degree fever Nivans still found a way to lecture me anyways, saying it was my fault that I didn't show my girlfriend enough respect. Jesus christ…

"Oh yeah, well y'know what? You and your Redfield, I think you respect him a little too much!"

Nivans, who was on his knees in the bathroom, puking his guts out, flashed me the finger without even taking his head out of the toilet. Ha, what style!

Still, it was crazy. Redfield was gone a week and Nivans was already close to dying of a brain fever. Did he do it on purpose or what? Was he choosing to let himself die now because he couldn't stand being apart? Shit, that's love for you!

"Yeah yeah, laugh it up," groused Piers, returning with his face red and green like the Portuguese flag. "It won't be so funny when you've caught your death."

You're telling me!

In no time at all, everything was back to the way it was, before he left the hospital. We joked around, we argued, we talked about love…

The state of Piers' health wasn't improving despite all the drugs the nurses were giving him. Nobody knew what was wrong with him. The doctors were betting it was just a bad case of the flu, but Nivans said he was feeling pain near the place where he had been amputated, and then they went off on calling it a psychosomatic illness of the highest degree. Especially since Nivans couldn't sleep anymore, he couldn't stop thrashing about and waking up every five minutes. They had given him some sleeping pills, but he always ended up puking them back up before they could take effect. Seriously, I was never setting foot in that bathroom again.

Finally, after two days, the doctors resorted to getting him to sleep by injecting him with something, so that he could at least get a full night's rest. Oof. It was a nice break for me as well, not having to hear him thrashing about anymore.

I slept like a baby. Nivans hadn't made a sound. I woke up a little before the first of the nurse's rounds of the morning. I stretched out a bit, then I turned on the TV. I hadn't been in such great shape either, going on a few weeks now. I didn't know if it was Nivans or the experiments they were doing on me. But oh well, nothing too alarming for the time being. I shot a glance over at Two-Face and then...

"Oh shit. Shit!"

Blood. Blood everywhere. Blood and something even more disgusting, like the pus from a J'avo. I didn't waste time going around the side of my bed to drag my coat rack of an IV stand with me to reach Nivans, I just ripped everything out and jumped on top of him. I tried shaking him, then slapping his face when that failed. He wasn't waking up.

"Nivans, fuck! Get up! What the hell is all that? Jesus christ, your arm!"

His hideous mutant arm was back where the amputated arm had been. It looked exactly like it had in the underwater facility, all fishy and gross, covered in boils and blisters, exposed tissue and gristle, and spasming from electric shocks. It had regrown, this thing, and it had taken over again in a single night. It was an absolute horror.

I pressed the button to call for the nurses, and then I returned to trying to wake Nivans, shaking him and yelling for him to get up. He finally blinked his eyes open, groaning.

"What?"

Oh thank god, good to see he was still himself.

"Don't worry, I already called the nurses, they'll take care of it. But what the hell happened?"

I asked him without thinking. I was no longer shaking him, but I still hadn't let go of his shoulder. Hell, he had really scared me for a second.

And then he saw the arm and froze. How many times was this scene going to repeat itself?

"Jake…"

His voice was barely a murmur, full of terror. His breath turned ragged, wheezing in his panic. He gripped my arm with his normal hand.

"Oh god, Jake, this can't be real."

It was definitely surreal, yeah. He moved his J'avo arm little by little, opening and closing the pincer-things on his arm. You could hear a faint sparking sound coming from it, electricity crackling over the surface. It was the arm that had saved our lives, Sherry's and mine, down in the facility. It was a bit shorter, a bit atrophied compared to back then, but it was continuing to regenerate before our eyes.

Piers began to panic in earnest, then, jerking about suddenly, but he kept his right arm held up, as far from his body as possible. His left arm was pinned down by me, I wasn't about to let him go like that. I was able to hold him there easily until the doctors arrived. They administered a sedative, Nivans let them do what they had to, and they took him away. They gave me a piece of their mind for having unhooked the IV and all that, and then I was left all by myself.

Christ, talk about a rude awakening.

When they brought him back in the afternoon, they had amputated him again and he looked utterly lost. He didn't even try to smile in attempt to reassure me he was okay. Instead, he just lay there facing the wall, unmoving since the nurses had put him back in bed.

"You okay?"

No response. I tried again.

"Helloooo? You there? I'm talkin' to you here, Two-Face!"

He turned towards me slowly, he looked at me for a while, and then let out a totally out-of-it,

"Huh?"

"... never mind."

He was like that the next two days as well. He was like a brick wall. He didn't react to anything, he only responded with monosyllables. In his head though, was another a story, it must have been going at 100 miles an hour. Why did this happen? What am I becoming? All sorts of things like that, none of them good for his mental state, no doubt. Thanks to that second mutation, the researchers were now able to confirm that the vaccine was only effective it administered preventatively. If the C-Virus had already spread through your body, you were looking at a lifelong treatment.

I tried everything to get him out of his head. I turned the TV on, I turned it off, I talked and I talked, I read him all the worst jokes I could find on the internet, (I wasn't kidding when I said I tried everything…) I yelled at him, I insulted Redfield, I talked smack about Sherry… nothing worked. I ended up letting it go. Whatever he needed, it wasn't me. It wasn't my friendship or my cringey jokes that would help him at the moment.

For the past hour now, he had been fiddling with his phone. He pored over his messages, he typed a few words and then deleted them, over and over again… he wanted to call Redfield, but he didn't dare. Were you able to bring your cell phone with you, in the army? I was almost certain the answer was no. But Claire had said that in case of emergency, you could always contact the BSAA, who could call HQ, who would then decide whether or not contacting the soldier would be permitted. No chance that Piers was gonna do that. He didn't even dare to… fuckin' hell, even in a situation like this he didn't even dare to call Redfield just to hear his voice on his answering machine. It was heartbreaking, genuinely painful to watch. Where were you, Redfield? Where were you, you bastard, when your lieutenant needed you?

The phone suddenly started to vibrate in his hand, making Nivans jump. Phew, finally, a reaction! In a second, he had looked over to me.

"I called him, so what. Aren't you gonna pick up?

"I just… It's Chris."

"Then pick up."

He was suddenly super stressed, for someone who had been so apathetic for the last two days. He fumbled a bit to answer the phone and then:

"Hello?" he croaked, his voice totally nervous, not at all in control.

Within seconds, I watched as his whole face relaxed, and he leaned back to settle comfortably in his pillows.

"Captain…" he began, much more at ease now. "How are you managing, over there?"

There was a short silence, and then Nivans let out a fragile laugh. Incredible. And here I thought I was the only one who knew how to make him laugh. What a blow to my ego.

They chatted for a short time. I didn't even try and pretend that I wasn't listening in. Piers wasn't paying attention to me in any case, he was all too happy talking to his beloved captain. At the beginning, it was mostly Redfield that talked. Nivans only gave one- or two-word answers that weren't enough to guess what that were talking about. But at one point, things started to get good:

"Yes…" came Nivans. "Yes… okay, that works…"

Followed by:

"Ah, sorry, I can't pass it to her, I'm not at your place."

"..."

"At the hospital."

Shouting came from the other end of the line. I wasn't sure what time it was in Alaska, but it was nearly 11 pm here. Way past visiting hours.

"No, don't worry, nothing serious."

Yeah right!

"Yes… yeah, I know… yes… I went through surgery, but…"

"..."

"...Appendicitis."

Appendicitis? Fucking appendicitis? Jesus, what the hell was he getting himself into this time? But at the same time, it really wasn't all that surprising.

The conversation lasted for a little while longer, and then Piers hung up and turned towards me. He gave me a great big smile.

"Chris is coming back in a week to present a report on the situation. He's going to stay 48 hours."

His eyes were shining, he was above the moon all of a sudden. I didn't know why, but it bothered me, it hurt a little to see. How could Piers manage to celebrate when his life was so shitty, so fucked up in every aspect? 48 hours, that's hardly anything. It was stupid. Definitely not enough to look so happy about.

"Cool," I threw out anyway.

He nodded, still smiling. He had really been doing so awful these past few days that I really didn't want to burst his bubble with anything even slightly negative. After a bit of silence, he added:

"I think I'm going to tell him…"

What? What was he gonna tell him? He took a deep breath:

"That I need him. That I'd like him to stay. His Alaska mission is mostly infiltration, that's not his field of expertise. In his report, if he chooses to, he can recommend a more qualified captain. He said that he wanted to hear my opinion. I'd like to tell him that I would prefer that he stayed here… Do you think that's selfish?"

Selfish? Aw pffff! For a second there I thought he was finally going to tell Chris that he loved him, but I don't know what I was thinking. At this point, I'd settle for him not lying to him about the fact that he had a relapse of the C-Virus.

"Nah. Christ, it's about time, is what I think."

But I mean, that's if he actually tells him. Just watch, he'll chicken out.

Piers:

One week. Just one short week and Chris would be back here, in the flesh. I really couldn't wait, I couldn't stop thinking about it. And honestly, it was better that way. It kept my mind off of everything that happened with the virus.

I didn't tell Chris, and I didn't plan to. Well, it would have to depend how things went when we saw each other again. Who knows? I spent hours and hours imagining it: he comes into my room, he's so overcome with emotion that he can't speak, I get up, he wraps me up in his arms, he lifts me up off the ground like he did with Claire, he whispers in my ear: I missed you so much! I'm never going to let you go again, you hear me? Never again! He kisses me, confetti rains from the sky, all of the hospital staff clap like in a romantic comedy… I dreamed about all the possibilities in my head.

I very well knew that it wouldn't play out like that, but honestly, the only thing that really mattered was that he was coming back. It was okay if we weren't exactly where we left off before his mission, emotionally speaking. It was just nice to dream. I needed it.

What I had felt after that second mutation was fear, above all. And disgust, of course, like before. The virus hadn't been eliminated, it was only inactive, and I had to be treated for life for it to stay that way. Otherwise it would resurface, because if this episode taught me one thing, it's that the C-Virus was stronger than me.

There was another thing, too, that was equally terrifying but more insidious. For five minutes that day, I had had a right arm. It was an abominable arm, mutated, destructive, and horribly painful, but it was an arm, nonetheless. An arm that I could feel, that I could move. For the past three months where everyday tasks had become challenges to overcome, it had been beyond strange to be able to bend my elbow, turn my wrist, curl and uncurl what served as my fingers… Every day since the amputation, I had been missing my arm. I was startled every time I looked down to find nothing there. It wasn't anybody's fault, but I couldn't help thinking that it was cruel. I hadn't wanted anything to do with that mutated arm, but now I wondered if life might be easier with it. Why did I struggle to look as human as possible? Appearance-wise, I was already messed up anyways, I was hardly fooling anybody. Even Jake thought that I shouldn't have cut off my badass arm. What had always been certain for me, I had now begun to question.

All of these doubts, on some level, had been caused by Chris' absence. Because as soon as I learned he was coming back, and then later on when he was right there in person, I knew that I had made the right decision. The C-virus, that wasn't me. I'm human. I lost my arm out of love and out of duty, and I didn't regret it. I was proud of it. I certainly didn't need a substitute that was so traumatizing. But when things got rough, the uncertainty came back systematically. It was something I'd need to get used to. That's how it was going to be for the rest of my life.

I missed Chris terribly in his absence, more than I could ever have imagined. I knew it didn't seem like much, a few weeks with him being gone, but these last three years we had been together almost 24/7, often in very close proximity due to the nature of our work. The only time we had been separated had been when he disappeared in Edonia. But that didn't count; every day during that time had been dedicated to finding him. I had been motivated, active, and my life had still revolved around his. Whereas now, not so much. Other than thinking about him, there wasn't much I could realistically do to maintain ties between us. And I couldn't get used to it, it made me utterly depressed. I felt alone and abandoned. After three years of working so intensely together, it was really jarring to not have him close at hand anymore.

The day of his return, I had a hard time staying still. I had gone to a whole lot of trouble convincing my doctor to authorize my release from the hospital the same day. I hardly needed to stay a whole month this time, I wasn't new to recovering from being amputated this time. That way, I'd be able to spend the evening with Chris and Claire, just like before.

When he came knocking at the door, I felt like a little kid who had been waiting for Santa Claus to appear on Christmas.

"Hey, you two," he said as he came in.

"Hey."

"Good afternoon, Captain!"

I immediately felt like an idiot. I had to start calling him Chris, like he had asked, but caught up in all the emotions I was feeling I had let it slip. He didn't call me out though. He looked like he was in great shape, and the Alaskan sun had given him a nice tan. He was smiling, and he had a good amount of stubble going. Completely alluring. I couldn't help but smile as well. He didn't wrap me up in his arms and there was no rainbow shining through the window, but it was magical even still.

He then stepped aside to allow another man to enter.

"Piers, there's somebody I'd like you to meet."

My face froze seeing this stranger in uniform. My uniform.

"This is Danny, my new lieutenant."

Was I supposed to take this well? Did he think this would make me happy? Because Chris still had that magnificent smile on his face, but for me, it was like I had been struck by lightning. His new lieutenant? Of course he had a new lieutenant, he was the captain of Alpha team. But why did he have to bring him here? How was that supposed to help me?

The guy approached me. I couldn't bring myself to say anything, do anything.

"Piers Nivans, is it? Happy to finally meet you. The captain talks about you all the time. Day and night, it never stops! I have to admit, it's starting to give me a complex!"

He laughed, joking before holding out his hand. I just stared at it, not reacting. Shit, shit, I'm not normally one to get jealous, what's wrong with me? I didn't get the least bit upset when Chris spent a night grabbing drinks with Captain Valentine, just the two of them, and that was much more likely to lead to something. Was it because he was a guy? It's true that I wasn't terribly pleased when Finn always started gushing around the captain, acting all starstruck like ooh look at me, I'm young and impressionable and his speeches make me cry. But that didn't even come close.

Chris had replaced me.

Danny still had his hand out towards me. I didn't not shake it to be mean. It's just that I didn't know how to react. Psychological shock, or post-traumatic stress, or whatever the doctors said, only in this case it didn't apply to the amputation, or even the virus.

Replaced.

Chris approached his new lieutenant and touched him on the arm about the biceps, which nearly sent me into a nervous fit. He lowered the man's arm, and the guy seemed to catch on. He apologized with a laugh, and held out his other hand, his left. I lifted mine, trembling. I felt weak. I felt worthless. I wanted to crawl into a hole and disappear, go back and off myself in the underwater facility.

His hand was warm, his smile sincere and welcoming. He hadn't even shown the slightest hint of disgust for my ravaged face. I wanted to cry.

"Danny, you're looking at a hero," Chris began. "Lieutenant Nivans has put himself on the line for me on countless occasions. I owe him my life."

"He's told me about a million times," Danny told me, mock-whispering behind his hand and giving me a wink. "You know Captain, you can drop as many hints as you'd like, but don't count on me to cut my arm off for you!"

"I hope not!"

The two then laughed it up, guffawing like the redneck uncles that I despised at family reunions before I cut ties, who got shit-faced and said inappropriate things in front of the kids. I know that I was exaggerating, but that's honestly what it felt like. And in my disarray, I began to felt a tinge of anger. Were they making fun of me? Was this new lieutenant trying to make the point to Chris how stupid I was for having ripped my arm off? As if there had been all the time in the world to come up with a better idea! As if it had been easy to think straight with all the fear and the pain, being stared down by that 150-foot-long monstrosity. Maybe in hindsight, it was stupid, yeah, and I was being punished for it every day, but I had done my duty!

I wanted to scream. Stand up and spill everything that I felt in my heart at that moment. Insult that new lieutenant that had taken my place in the BSAA, scream to the heavens in protest like in a Greek tragedy. But instead I just grit my teeth the best that I could, because this guy with his clammy hands had at least made Chris laugh. How many years had it taken for me, to draw even the shadow of a smile from Captain Redfield? If I said anything I was going to break down crying, and that, I couldn't do in front of him. Not in front of Chris.

But he wasn't helping at all. He pressed me with questions. He wanted to know if I was doing well, how the surgery for the appendicitis went. The only response to that I could form in my head was that I never had appendicitis, you asshole. I lost my arm for the fourth time because I had been dumb enough to inject myself with the virus for you, to save you, Chris Redfield. So I might be weak, but you have no right to laugh, you have no right because I'm the one paying for my stupid mistakes. Me and me alone, you're doing just fine, you're in great shape and you went and replaced me with the first big oaf that came along. And you wouldn't even be here today if I hadn't been so stupid, so just shut up, just shut up Chris, and get the hell out of my room because if you and your precious lieutenant continue to smile at me like that, I'm going to burst into tears, and then it'll be you who'll feel bad. It'll be you who looks dumb, and mean, at that. If I decided to make you understand to what extent it hurt that you had replaced me so easily, Chris, I promise that you wouldn't be laughing like that.

"That's how it went," I squeaked out, taking a deep breath to hold in everything I could.

I was as stupid for forgiving Chris as I was stupid for injecting myself with this goddamn virus in the first place. I was too stupid for loving him. He asked me something else that I hadn't even heard. I was still reeling over the last one. And then suddenly:

"Okay, that's enough, get out."

It was Jake. Chris looked at him, surprised.

"What's up with you?"

"You guys are getting on my nerves, that's what's up with me," Jake snapped. "Do I need to explain myself? This is my room and I don't wanna see your ugly mugs, so get out!"

Chris shot me a questioning glance. But Jake's outburst had given me a bit of courage. Just a bit.

"You'd better listen to him, Captain," I said meekly. "He's been having a rough time lately."

"Okay," Chris nodded as he got up. "You coming with us?"

"He's staying put," Jake replied, unwavering. Because of his… appendicitis, y'know. He's staying put."

Chris seemed a bit surprised that I didn't rise to defend him with Jake speaking to him like that. But I didn't even try to react. I just wanted them to leave so I could cry.

"Okay then," Chris sighed, looking from me to Jake, and then back. "Piers, I'll come get you after I've given my report, alright?"

I nodded, keeping my eyes fixed on the floor. When he had closed the door again, Jake flashed me a toothy grin.

"Who's the best?"

I tried to respond, to return his smile, but I couldn't, I had a lump in my throat. But god only knows how grateful I was. I wanted to thank him for everything. Not just for putting Chris and his lieutenant outside, but also for having been there when the virus reawakened. For listening to me mope all the time, and for trying to help me with Chris. For giving me his antibodies, and also his friendship. But I couldn't manage. I went straight to the bathroom and shut the door behind me.

I breathed deeply, in through the nose. You have no reason to cry, I told myself. There were so many people who had it worse than me in this world. People who were taken as prisoners of war, people who scraped by in the most miserable of slums, people who died without ever getting to see the light of day. You're in no place to complain with your stupid jealousy.

I braced myself on the sink with my one arm and I leaned over to look at myself in the mirror. I hadn't done so since I had gotten out of the underwater facility, I had always tried to avoid my reflection as much as possible. But at that moment, in the dim light of the bathroom, I looked myself straight in the eyes.

I instantly shuddered in disgust. God, it was unsightly. It looked as if my face had turned rotten. I recoiled, horrified, and it hit me like a ton of bricks: I lose against Jill Valentine, I lose against the sexy chicks that Chris ogled in the magazines, okay, I accepted that. But I also lose against pretty much any other random guy on the planet. Those people who win the world records for the trashiest accomplishments were more desirable than me. My bigoted, racist 87-year-old grandpa was more desirable than me.

And Danny the lieutenant, I had called him ugly with his fat, chubby cheeks and his beady little pig eyes. At the height of my jealousy, I thought to myself: you're not gonna bang Chris Redfield with that ugly mug, lieutenant.

But look at you! Like you're one to talk! Look at that hellish gash in the middle of your face! At what point...fuck, at what point did I think that I had a chance? When did I lose contact with reality so badly that I thought I'd be able to seduce Chris with this face? With this body looking like mincemeat? How did I become so delusional?

Don't cry… don't cry…

Crying's only for women and fags, my father said. I had spent half my life trying to fight that prejudice.

Danny the fatty, with his sausage fingers and his beer belly, he blew me out of the water. Even if he weighed 300 pounds and quit bathing, he'd still have me beat, hands down. And on top of that you could tell at a glance that he was a good guy, whereas I was mean and jealous. In Edonia, I had been a jerk to Finn to the end, all because he followed the captain around like a little kid. If I were Chris and I had the choice between Danny or me, I wouldn't hesitate a second before choosing him. Shit, if I were Chris, I'd rather sleep with a leper before Piers Nivans the J'avo.

At some point Jake had started knocking on the door to the bathroom.

"Come out this second Nivans, you hear me?" he shouted. "C'mon, you're too old to be crying in the toilet, jesus!"

I obeyed. Not because of his flimsy argument (and what, was he not too old to be giving me shit?), but out of respect and out of habit.

When I had woken up from my coma and that had first put me in a room with Jake, it hadn't been easy. We didn't get along very well, and among the many things we argued about nearly all the time, was the fact that Jake didn't want me to lock the bathroom door. Which is to say, those first few days, everyone thought I was going to kill myself, and they had asked Jake to watch over me. To me, it had been completely out of the question that I risk someone walking in on me and seeing the upper half of my mutated body, from my torso to my back. We had argued dozens of times about the subject, and then we finally stopped and began to trust each other, it just happened on its own. But if Jake asked me to open up, I opened. That's how it worked. And besides, I don't cry.

Jake:

Damn, poor guy! When he looked at me that little puppy face of his was on the verge of tears. He kept his head held high, he clenched his jaw, he tried to act tough and strong, but unlike Redfield, I actually noticed when Nivans was playing pretend. I felt bad for him. Okay, so he was a liar, and okay, so he wasn't progressing well with Redfield, but he certainly didn't deserve for their reunion to go like that. He had been looking forward to that moment so much!

I mean what was I supposed to do? I'm not capable of comforting anybody, I don't know how to say things to help people feel better. In face of his eyes that were searching for some sort of help, I did the only thing I knew how to do: be an asshole.

"Y'know what, Two-Face? Never mind, you can go back and cry in the toilets, actually."

I expected him to tell me off, to say that I was heartless and it was because of things like that that I couldn't hold on to Sherry. Or for him to laugh, why not? But neither was the case. He simply hung his head in submission and turned right around back towards the bathroom. That broke my heart.

"Wait! I was just kidding!"

I grabbed him by the t-shirt. It's a habit I had adopted with him; Piers didn't like to be grabbed by the arm, since it cut off his freedom to move.

"I was kidding Nivans, stay here."

He was facing me once again. He had his hand covering his face and he stood there, not moving. I didn't realize he was crying until I heard a sob. So I moved his hand away from his face, and we looked at one another. His eyes were full of tears.

"Jake I don't want you to think that…"

Still with that damn unhealthy pride! Who did you think you were fooling, now? Who could miss the tremble in your voice, the redness in your eyes? In principle, I detested crybabies. When I saw someone crying, I stuck it to them. I humiliated them. But this was Piers. It was horrible to see him so devastated. Since the time I had found him sitting on the ground in the underwater facility, he hadn't complained even once about having lost an arm or being disfigured for life. He surmounted it all. Redfield was a real piece of work to put him in this state. And that moved me more than I could have ever thought was possible. Those silent tears that fell all the way down his mutated face because he couldn't manage to wipe all of them away, his way of sniffling, still trying to hold something back but failing to hide the trembling that racked his body - it gave me the blues like I'd never felt before.

I grabbed my IV stand with one hand, and Nivans' shoulder with the other, and I steered us over to my bed. He sat up on the side, brought his knees in close to his chest, buried his head against them, and only then did he open the floodgates. I heard him let out a deep sob, and I felt his whole body tremble as I held my hand against his back. I didn't know what to do, so I tried to copy what I had seen on TV in this kind of situation.

"There, there… it's gonna be okay…"

And all that bullshit. After hearing Nivans fantasize for hours about how their reunion was gonna go, each scenario even cheesier than the last, I had been thrown for a loop seeing Chris come in with that potato in uniform. So for Nivans, I can't even imagine. Even if deep down, I was convinced that Chris didn't have the intention to hurt him. In fact, he probably thought Nivans would like to meet his successor, it was like a way to keep him included. If Redfield totally botched things, it was because he didn't have the least idea of who his lieutenant was or how he responded outside an assault unit. And that was because Nivans hid as much as he could from him. But despite his ineptitude, I was still firmly of the belief that Redfield loved him in his own way.

Without letting go of Piers' back, I grabbed a box of tissues and I rested it gently against his leg to let them know they were there. He babbled out a thank you and blew his nose loudly in a tissue, and then gave me an absolutely miserable look.

"'m sorry."

"Don't."

Like he was the only one to ever cry. Like I was still holding up perfectly myself, stuck here night and day.

He finally finished blowing, then he tossed the used tissue at the trash can sitting next to the door. He missed.

"I hate that I only have one arm now," he said, without even looking at me.

Boy did it feel incredible to hear him say that. Finally, he accepted it! Finally, after all this time, he could stop deluding himself that he wasn't suffering, a fact which only served to protect Redfield. Of course he was disgusted to have lost an arm, anybody would be in his position. Just because he had lost it saving his beloved captain didn't mean that he had to be happy about having lost an arm. It was honestly fucked up.

"Right, yeah. That sucks."

"And I hate looking like Two-Face."

Well okay, that was kinda my fault maybe, with all my digs.

"You're not that ugly!"

He shot me a look, unamused.

"I'm not joking, I swear! Your mutation is neat, it looks styled. I've seen J'avos with eight eyes, you don't even come close to looking that nasty! It doesn't even take up half your face! And you want me to be honest with you, I thought that your face looked kinda dumb before. You looked too much like a pretty boy and you seemed annoying. I prefer you this way."

He made a sound in between a stifled laugh and a sob. Yes, now we were getting somewhere! The worst part was that it was true. Mutant Nivans was cool. I continued:

"And besides, a scar doesn't change anything. When I got this scar on my cheek, I thought it was gonna make me look badass 'n' hot, but it really didn't. I still had the same ugly mug.

This time, I got him to laugh a little for real.

"Chris is an ass," he hazarded a bit timidly.

"The biggest. I can't believe you're only realizing that now, I've been tryin' to tell you for ages!"

He gave a sort of half-smile, not quite convinced. He threw another tissue towards the trash. Little by little, he was calming down.

"What did you think of him, the lieutenant?"

"Who, Piglet? Dumb, ugly, good-for-nothing. What else?"

He laughed, rubbing his eyes. I managed to make him laugh even in times like these, I was proud of myself. I felt useful, like I had done something right.

We were in the middle of gleefully bitching about the poor lieutenant when Redfield barged back in without knocking.

"By the way Piers, I needed to talk to you about-"

He stopped short, stunned. What had taken him so much by surprise? That Nivans was on my bed? That I had my hand on his back? That he was more or less pressed up against me? Or rather that his face was a mess of dried tears and snot, that there was a mountain of tissues on the ground, and that his good eye was as red and swollen as the mutated one?

Whatever the case, Piers was up in an instant. I think that in his list of top five catastrophic disasters that could rip the universe apart, there was "Ohmygod Chris saw me crying." And using his messed up logic that he followed when it came to their relationship, he just cut and run. He barreled past Redfield at the door with his head down and booked it, like a shoplifter caught red-handed.

And Redfield… oh fuck, Redfield. It's been six thousand years since writing was invented by humanity. Chris Redfield had six thousand years of fiction behind him, from pagan myths to made-for-TV Lifetime movies, centuries upon centuries of literature, philosophy, science, etcetera, and all of the knowledge and wisdom in the world accumulated over the entire history of mankind were saying, "WELL RUN AFTER HIM, GOD DAMN IT!" What godforsaken hole have you been living in, to just stand there doing nothing when you see a guy who loves you running away?

Pfft… but honestly I wasn't even too surprised. Between the one who took off like Cinderella and the other who just sat there gawking like a fish, I don't know why I even still bothered with these two hopeless idiots.

Redfield watched as the door slammed behind his former lieutenant, and then he turned towards me, looking like a complete moron in his shock.

"What's wrong with him?" he asked, like it was a perfectly natural occurrence.

Facing his calmness and his complete unawareness, as if Piers had just lost it for no good reason, which was so far from the truth it wasn't even funny, I felt the anger welling up.

"HE LOVES YOU, THAT'S WHAT'S WRONG!" I exploded. "For christ's sake! What is it gonna take for you to get that? He's been in love with you for years, and all it took was him losing an arm and you replaced him with the first guy who came along! What the hell do you think?"

Maybe I shouldn't have said that. I had promised Nivans that I'd keep his secret. But over time, I had seen him get nowhere, I had seen him suffer, I had seen him cry, and that made me want to cry, too. Where the hell was this gonna go, this relationship, if nobody ever said anything, nobody ever knew? How much rejection and loneliness was Nivans capable of withstanding? I didn't want to find out, I had had enough. It was absolute garbage that Piers was still trying to protect him after already giving an arm and a leg for him. Well- an arm and half a body full of scars, I guess. He was the one who needed help right now, and Redfield definitely owed him at least that. Jesus, he didn't even have any idea about all the shit Nivans had gone through just last week, when his mutated arm had grown back.

All of that was over now, I was certain, as I watched Chris' face, his eyes growing wide with surprise. But the was no joy in those eyes, no hint of any positive gleam whatsoever. Shit, I hope I didn't just monumentally fuck things up.

"Enough with the innuendos, Muller. Your jokes aren't very funny," he tried, lacking any sort of conviction. What an absolute...

"DO I LOOK LIKE I'M JOKING?"

Well, no turning back now. I guess we'd just have to wait and see. They couldn't have kept going like that, in any case. So c'mon Redfield, time for you two to stop perpetually giving me stomach ulcers and for you to finally worm the truth out of him!

Are you guys still with me? I kept my promise, see? Is it how you all imagined it? I personally couldn't see Piers confessing himself XD

In your opinion, what's going to happen to our favorite pairing…?

I don't find it easy to "break" the characters, I already kind of did it in my last fic, and I always got the impression that if they were real, they'd make it through. (I'm a horrible person XD) But well, fortunately, it's just a fanfic!

I don't know if you guys guessed, but the new character Danny isn't an OC, it's the guy who appears for all of two and a half seconds in the cinematic at the end of Chris' campaign, the new lieutenant who basically seemed to replace Piers. (When I watched that, I was already in tears because of his death, I had already composed the intro and the outline of my three body paragraphs for my letter of insult to Capcom, and I was OUTRAGED that Chris replaced him so quickly? Like WTF? WHAT ABOUT OUR FEELINGS, CAPCOM? OUR FEELINGS?! D:)

And I was nothing but mean to this character! I'm a little ashamed because he didn't do anything and in the cinematic he looked like a nice guy… but he replaced the wrong person!

Well you're all caught up now! I really hope you guys liked this chapter, and I hope you're liking the story's turn of events! (And if you despised Danny, don't worry, he won't be coming back any time soon!) I want to give you all a big thanks for reading and learning your reviews, and I wish you all well until next time!