Author's Note:

A virus. A battle. A bullshit villain about to get his ass kicked. And a pretty girl about to be a hero.

She's not a hero.

Or is she?

What makes a hero anyway? Let's find out.


XII. Love is the Hero


DULVEY, LOUISIANA, 2017

The stairs spilled them into the dark. But it didn't last long.

Strapping on the helmets they carried, they were granted nightvision. It was like viewing the world through green fog. Zoe paused, scanning the narrow passages with the weird green filter tossed it all.

It somehow made the cave simultaneously less and more scary.

Zoe murmured, gently, "He'vy."

And it echoed in their helmets.

A voice came back, female, and amused, "Redfield, you earned yourself a roadie, it seems."

Chris laughed, lightly, "Looks that way. Zoe? The voice in your ear is the utterly underappreciated, always fantastic, most often not seen…Jill Valentine."

Zoe smiled a little, "Ah. That Jill."

Curious, Jill's voice came back to her, "You know about me?"

Studiously, Zoe returned, "Not exactly. When Chris wasn't….Chris….he mentioned a pah'tner. He mentioned you."

Impressed, Jill replied, "You remembered me even with your brains scrambled, big guy?"

Chris chuckled, "Apparently. For the record, you're pretty hard to forget, Valentine."

"Aw. You heartbreaker. Save the sweet talk for someone who likes big muscles and dirty looks, would ya?"

Zoe pursed her lips inside her helmet as they walked. Chris spoke and joked with the girl in their ears easily, effortlessly. It was the kind of dialogue which told the story of years of perpetual companionship. Each word, each laugh, each carelessly flirty remark…it grated on her nerves.

She was jealous.

And it didn't sit well with her.

They turned into a small tunnel and Jill signed off to track their progress. As they moved, Chris kept glancing at his arm. There was a device attached to him that was reading the mold content in the cave. Zoe watched it fluctuate and flare a warning at him.

He said, quietly, "Come here."

She moved to his side and he clicked something on her helmet. It fired off a filter that activate with a hiss of pressure. She could suddenly breathe clean air. Impressed, she eyed him inside the helmet. "What's floating around us?"

"Spores. And something pretty nasty from the look of it. Keep that high grade filter on at all times, ok? I don't know if the vaccine we made for you works against this shit or not. But let's not take chances here."

Zoe said nothing. She just nodded and stepped around him to keep moving into the cavern.

Brow lifted, Chris followed her.

They moved in companionable silence for a while. At one point, the mine spilled them out to result in the necessity of pushing carts to break barriers and open new tunnels. He followed the map on his arm display. She stayed close but quiet.

Jill Valentine popped up in their ears occasionally with guidance.

The more they spoke, the quieter Zoe became.

As they turned into a small tunnel and came to an elevator, Chris finally spoke to her. "What's wrong?"

She eyed his helmeted face.

Shaking her head, she waited with him for the elevator to arrive.

He stood there, staring at her. At least she thought he was staring at her. Between the night-vision and the helmet, it was so hard to tell. She felt like Storm Troopers trying to read each other. It was weird.

They stepped into the narrow elevator car and rode it upward. It chugged along, quiet but steady. He tried again, "Zoe? What?"

She shook her head.

The elevator opened and they were suddenly in a factory or something. There were steel beams and barrels of god knew what piled all around them. The room was narrow but square, the floor was makeshift and mostly scraps of sheet metal. Zoe started forward and he grabbed her arm and hated her.

"Wait."

"What?"

"Wait, Zoe and look."

She looked and barely made out the hissing lines of lasers in the dark. Her gaze shifted around the room, curious. In the middle of the makeshift maze of lasers, a body lay. Chris called to it now, and his voice shook.

Concerned for him, Zoe wanted to comfort him, but she stood resolutely by his side.

The body shifted and gasped, gently. "Chris?"

"Gunner, you're alright?"

The body shifted again but was VERY careful to remain on its back. "I don't know. I'm surrounded by lasers in the middle of a rickety platform. I feel, maybe, I'm also subject to a trap here."

"Yeah…yeah…I agree." Chris shifted, "Give me a minute to see if I can shut these mother fuckers off, ok?"

"Sounds like a plan, Cap. Maybe you could…hurry?"

Chuckling dryly, Chris shifted under the first line of lasers. Zoe watched him move, ducked, and slink through. He was turning and shifting toward the lever on the wall. It was such a set up. It was so wrong. It was all going to go so, so wrong.

He caught the lever, tugged it down, and the lasers went off a pop and hiss of releasing electricity.

They were suddenly in a quiet dark.

Zoe helped up the man on his back. He studied her inside his helmet. She couldn't tell if he was handsome or young or white or black or Asian. He was just another storm trooper in the dark. She said, "I'm Zoe."

And he said, "Gunner. Nice to meetcha. Thank you. For coming."

She laughed a little, "You bet. You're alright?"

"I seem to be." He turned his head a little, "There's a ladder this way. I know because I've been laying here in the dark for…like a hundred years. I've been unable to do anything but look back and forth."

They followed him to the ladder. He asked, quietly, "You found Mendez or Oliveira?"

Chris shook his head, "No. Not yet. Any idea where they might be?"

Gunner shook his head in response as they reached the ladder. "Nope. Baker snatched us in the field. I went down first. I heard them shouting as I went down. I don't know what the hell he did with them."

They moved up the ladder one at a time. At the top, Gunner said, "He fit you with a bomb, Cap?"

Chris nodded, helping Zoe over a narrow ledge. They shifted down a small incline, spilling rock.

Gunner shook his head, "What's this dude's game here anyway?"

Zoe answered, "He's sick. He was always sick. Now he's worse. I don't know what he wants."

The voice in their ears said, "He wants test data for the Connections. The theory about him betraying them was right on. But the little son of a bitch is trying to get back into their good graces. Whatever game he's playing, it doesn't end well Chris."

They turned the corner and found a man dangling inside the room that waited. He was dangling and suspended from the ceiling. It seemed innocuous enough. He was bound at the arms and legs like a crucifixion. He was watching them with desperate eyes.

He shouted, "Leave me! Please!"

Gunner was already moving into the room. Chris was hot behind him.

The dangling man cried, "DON'T! IT'S A TRAP!"

And just like that, the trap was sprung.

The door sealed shut behind them. Zoe was trapped beyond the bars in the room they'd left behind. Behind her, a shutter lowered and something enormous and awful emerged. It was a fat bloated belly on a ten foot tall monster. It was wobbling on legs as big as tree trunks. It was an open mouth filled with fangs that dripped acid. And it's mouth was in the center of its bloated gut. It squealed like a pig and ran toward her.

Chris hit the bars between them, shouting, "RUN! ZOE, RUN!"

Gunner shouted, "Captain! OH GOD!"

And the loud whir of a buzz saw fired up. The room flashed. Mendez, bound in the chains, was weeping. And the buzz saw above his head was dropping steadily toward his face. It whirred, showing blood stained jagged teeth as it spun. Gunner started grabbing desperately for his bound friend.

But the wrists were secured with chains. The ankles locked with shackles.

The battle behind the bars raged on. Zoe was firing into the fat thing that chased her. The buzz saw was moving further down. And Lucas' voice echoed, "I warned you, you fucking hero! I WARNED YOU! You keep comin for me and I'll bounce your fucking head off the ceiling. In the mean time? I'm gonna watch you SCREAM! And as for my sister? You get to stand there and save NO ONE. Who's the fuckin hero now!?"

Chris roared it, "LUCAS! YOU FUCKING COWARD!"

"You got that right, hero! But guess what? The coward LIVES. The hero? He only gets to be a hero by dying like an idiot. Who you gonna save, hero? The girl or the comrade? I'll give you one choice. The other one is dead where they stand. PICK. And say sayonara -you stupid bastard!"

Gunner was shouting. Zoe was out of bullets.

And Chris was out of time.

"CHOOSE!" Lucas taunted, "Before you LOSE THEM BOTH!"

Mendez held his gaze through the helmet. And he breathed it, softly, "Get the girl, Captain. GET HER. I was dead the moment he took me. Go save her."

Gunner screamed now, grabbing at him, "NO! Mendez! NO!"

Chris answered, "I'll avenge you, I swear to god."

Mendez, shaking and weeping in fear, nodded, "I know you will. Now GO! HURRY!"

Chris turned and grabbed the gate, "Let me out…you FUCK!"

The gate went up, the buzz saw came down, Gunner screamed in rage and the world went red in blood. It was bathed in it, splashed in it, washed in it. It was blood and screaming and horror. Mendez was crunching and screaming and jerking. His face was obliterated in a spinning symphony of death and despair. Gunner fell to one knee weeping, feeling the numbness of bone deep rage; Chris rolled under the gate and jerked his gun up.

And the fat monster grabbed Zoe by her face.

It lifted her while she kicked and screamed.

It echoed in their helmets.

He fired into the fat monster and punctuated it with the roar of a battle cry that permeated the fiber of his being. Gunner came out beside him, carrying Mendez's rifle that was soaked in his blood. They filled the fat thing full of rounds while it squealed and staggered.

Zoe was dropped to her belly and she scrambled away.

She grabbed the rifle as she ran back toward them. Chris shouted, above the rapid thunder of gun fire, "Grab a spare mag off my vest and reload!"

She did, quick and efficient.

And then she took up his other side. She wasn't terrible with the damn rifle. She could hit the big fat thing that turned to race toward them anyway. She filled it full of heavy rounds.

And it finally went to its back on the dirty ground with a thud and rumble like an earthquake.

Gunner's ragged breathing filled their helmets.

Lucas' voice echoed, "WOO! What a game! Should we keep playing?! How about we see how fast you can run!? What do you think? BAM!"

Chris' neck beeped. Zoe glanced at the device there in horror.

It said 10 minutes.

It was counting down.

She breathed it now, "Oh gawd. No. NO."

Gunner was already running for the far shutter. "Captain! We can disable it! I disabled mine! Follow me! HURRY!"

They rushed through the open shutter into the dark beyond. He led them down a wet embankment and into a warehouse. It was filled with explosives. It was horrifying how much. From TNT to C-4, the room was filled with death. Some was strapped to mannequins that had been exploded for fun and for trial and error. Some was strapped to barrels filled with smoking liquid. Some was strapped to walls and the ceiling.

The hair on the back of Zoe's neck stood up.

Gunner was tearing the lid off one of the barrels. "We need to disable the mechanism. We can freeze it."

Chris answered, calmly, "It's on my neck, Gunner. I can't put my head in a barrel of nitrous oxide."

Gunner glanced over his shoulder him. "Sir, we just…we need to find a way to get the liquid on the device without getting it on your skin."

Chris, calm and patient, replied, "How? It will freeze anything it touches. There's no way to do it. It's done."

Zoe shook her head. She grabbed one of the mannequins and jerked its head off. Curious, Chris watched her move.

The timer on his helmet said four minutes.

She dipped the mannequin head in the liquid. She raised it up. The liquid turned to vapor and the head was frozen. Scooping it wasn't going to work.

Chris watched her, calm, still.

Gunner was searching the room for something to use as well.

Chris spoke, gently, "Listen to me – it's done. You two, find Carlos. Stop Lucas. This is as far as I go."

Jill's voice echoed in their helmets, "Redfield! Don't you fucking DARE give up! Find something! NOW!"

Chris answered, complacent, "What? What Jill? What's good enough?"

There was nothing they could use that could withstand the liquid well enough. They needed something made to resist cold. They needed something that could transport the liquid. Zoe was panicking. Her breathing was ragged and thick. WHAT!? She wasn't a scientist. What would work!? WHAT!?

The timer on his neck said one minute.

Terrified, she ignored him when he spoke gently. "Zoe…"

"No."

"Zoe, stop. Please."

She shook her head. Gunner had given up. He put one hand on Chris' shoulder, shaking. "I'm so sorry, Captain. I'm sorry."

In their ears, Jill said, "Zoe….your helmet."

Of course.

The helmet was MADE for it.

THE HELMET.

Zoe jerked hers off. She dunked it in the liquid. Chris shouted at her, "NO! ZOE, the SPORES!"

And she saw the timer on his neck say fifteen seconds. NO.

There was NO MORE TIME. She gasped, "I'm so sorreh, suga'."

She raised the helmet. Gunner backed away. Chris lifted his hands in horror, "Zoe! Don-"

She threw the contents of her helmet all over his neck. It froze where it struck. It froze everything it touched. It touched his skin between his helmet and the device and burned. It burned him where it touched. And he….screamed.

She'd never heard someone scream like that.

She knew the pain had to be excruciating. She was so sorry for it. But he was ALIVE. And the timer was frozen at five seconds.

Gunner was already grabbing his screaming Captain. Zoe swung her rifle and smashed the butt into the frozen device. Chris stopped screaming so suddenly she was afraid. She was terrified. But his vitals were strong on his suit. He was alive. Just unconscious. The pain had put him down like a sedative.

She struck the device again. It cracked and shivered. A third hit and it smashed away from his throat. She ripped it free and threw it into the smoking barrel of freezing Nitrous Oxide.

His neck was a mess beneath it. It was welted and raw. He'd scar. Badly.

But he was ALIVE.

Gunner dug into his hip pocket. He pulled a syringe of liquid. Zoe glanced at his helmet. He said, "It's ok. It's for pain." He jabbed it into his Chris' outer thigh. Zoe took the tiny tube of cream he handed her and rubbed it gently all over the burns on Chris' neck. It was bubbled up the side of his neck. She couldn't see under his helmet to know how far up it had trickled.

The first tear slipped out and down her cheek. She made a small sob and Gunner put his hand on her shoulder. His helmet offered no comfort. But his touch did.

He said, "He'll be ok. He's survived way worse. He's alive because of you."

Zoe nodded, stroking the cream over the burns. "I would never hurt him. Ever. Look what I did."

Gunner rubbed her arm, shaking his head, "Not you. LUCAS. Not you. You saved his life. Remember that."

Lucas voice echoed around them, "Well PLAYED! The hero lives another day! And what about the sidekicks? WAIT FOR IT….BOOOOOM!"

There was a series of beeps. Loud, close, echoing.

In horror, the room around them started to count down. But there was no time to run. There was no time at all.

They couldn't do anything but brace for it as the world exploded around them.

Gunner grabbed her arm, he grabbed Chris' vest in the other hand, and he threw them toward the depression in the floor. There wasn't room for more than two of them.

Zoe grappled to hold on and he cried, "Find Carlos! Stop Lucas!"

"GUNNER!"

He jerked his helmet off and threw it down to her. "Save him."

"WAIT!"

The explosions kept on going. She had no choice but to hunker down in the small depression and cover Chris with her body. Gunner was obliterated in a burst of fire and light. He didn't even scream. Zoe curled around Chris' still body, shaking.

The tears started while the world burned.

She wept copiously into Chris' vest. Light and fire kept on going. It was explosions and endless cacophonous roars. The clatter of stone and bursting rock settled all around them.

And finally, finally, finally…the world went quiet save for the last vestiges of rocks thunking down in a swan song.

The room was reduced to little more than rubble and the hidey hole where they cowered.

Gunner was gone. The room was gone. The world was smoking ashes.

Were they trapped? Were they screwed?

They kept losing everyone. She wasn't saving anyone. She was no hero. She was the girl who threw acid on Chris Redfield.

She was just a stupid little redneck running for her life.

She'd killed them all. Her family had killed them all. There was no way to set that right. No way to make it ok. She made a small sound and started sobbing gently into her hands.

The smoky air was acrid. It was punctuated by the quiet sound of her weeping. There was no more hope; she thought desperately, they were going to die here. There were no heroes. Just people trying so hard to survive.

She had to leave him here. She had to leave him safe in this little depression. Maybe…maybe if Lucas thought he was dead he'd focus on her. Maybe he'd focus on her and Chris could escape.

Maybe THIS was how she was his hero.

She rose, shaking a little. He'd come out of that chair and changed her life. He'd saved it. This was how she saved him.

She slipped on Gunner's helmet. She picked up Mendez rifle. And she stood over their Captain.

She said, gently, "I'm going to stop him. Live. Please. I love you."

And she left him in amongst the rubble.

It was the bravest thing she'd ever done.

Sometimes, that's how you made a hero…by walking away when you wanted to keep holding on. And protecting the only thing in the world that mattered.

As she emerged out into the empty warehouse, that voice echoed around her. "OHHHHH! She comes out ALONE! Where's the hero, sis?! Where'd he go?"

She spoke, loud and calm, "You know where he is. He's gone. You know that. They both are. It's just us now, Lucas. Just you and me. So let's end it."

The harsh laughter grated on her nerves. "Why not?"

The door at the top of a long steel stair case opened with a creaking groan. "Come on up to my web, said the spider to the fly. Let's see if you can save the last soldier boy alone. Shit. Far as I can tell, dude is fucked. He had half a shot with the hero running around. You though? You just a two faced skinny bitch without a prayer. But why not!? Give it your best shot. At least I get the fun of watching you DIE."

And maybe that was how you made a hero too. You gave them a bad guy worth killing. You gave them a purpose greater than themselves.

She couldn't right the wrongs done to those they'd lost. But she could do this.

She could stop Lucas.

And she could save Chris Redfield.

It turned out...love was all it took to make a hero after all. And it was the last thing she had to offer him.

Love...and Lucas' head on a platter.