::::::::::::::::::::::::Twenty-Five::::::::::::::::::::::::::
XXV. Revolver: Spin the Wheel
A Priori
"To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
Schloss Wiedereinführen, Germany 2017
"You're fucking insane."
The helicopter hovered, dangling the rappel lines down into the darkness of the castle beneath. The man who spoke was watching them with narrow, angry eyes. "I can't just drop you here."
Leon strapped the pully to his vest and tested the strength. "Sure, you can. The two of us can get in much smoother without a big show. I don't want a hundred guys storming that damn castle. You'll get everyone killed."
"Three of us," Said Kevin Ryman, "Three."
Leon met his eyes, held them. "You should stay behind. You aren't trained for this kind of thing."
"So? Figure even my old dumb ass can follow orders."
The constant whoosh of helicopter blades disturbed the silence inside the chopper. He finally shrugged and moved to check Jill's pulley. She said nothing, watching him. They were all in black fatigues, vests and camouflage with any available part as protected as they were going to get. They were outfitted with weapons and strapped for attack. They were hoping to sneak in, locate Chris and Rebecca, and sneak out but…of course nothing ever went as planned.
The helicopter pilot threw up his hands. "Ya'll are nuts but whatever. You get into a tight spot, radio for backup."
"Yup." Leon moved to secure his line to the pulley, "We know what we're doing. I've been going in undermanned, outgunned, and generally screwed forever. This won't be the last time."
"Are you sure you're ready?"
He met Jill's long look and nodded. "You bet. Let's do it."
Oh, she wanted to do it. She wanted to do lots of things. She let the little niggle of shame make her cough. Stop, her brain said, quit staring at him with big googoo eyes.
Leon went down the line from the chopper, smooth and fast. The movement was controlled and precise. He slid down with as little sound as possible. He landed on the cold cobblestone roof soundlessly and unhooked the pulley from his vest.
Jill and Kevin landed after him, soft and silent.
They knew the basic layout of the castle. A phone call to Alyssa Ashcroft had netted them the right person to get them blueprints and help them plan their attack. A direct assault had been nixed. They'd kill Chris and Rebecca the minute it was discovered. Stealth was their only hope here.
They moved across the roof of the castle, crossing the ramparts of the old guard towers. It was a massively sized, if slightly crumbling affair. The maintenance on it had slipped since Arias' death a few years before. Locating it had been easy. It was in his former wife's maiden name.
The guard tower offered a set of stone steps down into the bowels of the castle. The night breathed around them, cool and quiet. The fall was in full swing and the first smell of snow was kissing the air. It wouldn't be long before it started to turn to winter.
Leon went down the steps first, clearing the base of the stairs when he got there. The castle was…too empty. On high alert, they made their way across the grand foyer and it was eerily reminiscent of the Spencer Mansion. From the portrait hung beyond the dual staircase, to the formal dining room with the fireplace off to the left.
They hurried behind the grand stair case to find the stairs leading down into the dungeons. Again, there was no one. The place appeared to be abandoned.
They cleared the dungeons quickly. It was dank, dark, ominous…and deserted. Cells stood open and forlorn. Inside there was no sign of life or any residual suggestion that anyone, ever, had lived there.
At the top of the stairs again, they joined eyes in a semicircle.
"This stinks worse than a weeks worth of unwiped ass."
Leon nodded at Kevin's remark, very aware that it was a bad idea to keep looking. But what choice did they have? The answers were here somewhere.
"Could the intel have been wrong?" Jill queried, studying the hallway where they stood.
"Unlikely. The transmission came from here. No question."
"Ok. So we keep looking."
They moved up the small flight of steps to the door leading out into the gardens. The gardens were ornate, beautiful, and headed toward their initial stages of winter slumber. There was a large and beautiful fountain with three dancing nymphs spilling water from their hands. There was a series of twists and turns and tight corners.
And not a bad guy in sight.
The other side of the immense garden spilled them into a courtyard with large, looming, endless tower. Clearly this was where prisoners of importance had been kept back in the castle's prime. The courtyard was wide and beautiful, flanked on either side by trees with beautiful falling leaves. Lamps lit the walk way toward the tower, flickering in the cool night breeze and casting long shadows on the cobblestone path.
In the center of the courtyard, a sculpture of a warrior stood nearly twenty feet tall, in full armor and clearly meant to speak of justice and valor that the prisoner's in the tower were lacking. The giant statue gave them all the creeps as they moved toward. They hurried across the courtyard toward the tower.
The tower door opened and Alesio stepped out. Just like that, the trap was sprung.
Alesio wore a floppy little hat like the three musketeers might have worn in powder blue. He wore an expensive suit in the same shade. He had his katana on his back and a smile on his face.
"Oh I couldn't believe it! I did not! But it is true. You are here…and you have brought me another beefy toy to play with."
Kevin made some sound of disgust, "Did we fall into a time warp or something? What's this dude's get up supposed to do, inspire a fashion crisis?"
Jill aimed her pistol at him. "Where is he, you perverted sack of shit, where's Chris?"
"Oh!" Alesio gestured and out of the shadows beside the statue came Chris Redfield. "He's right here!"
Chris leaned on the statue, watching them. He was dressed in full combat gear, with his big knife strapped down his back. He watched them and his expression was empty.
Jill hurried toward him and Leon put his hand out, halting her. "Don't."
The warning was clear and very calm.
She stopped. "Chris…come with us. We've come to get you."
Chris said nothing.
Alesio smiled, "He has been my toy for so long. He is not yours anymore but mine. You didn't save him, little girl. You let him rot here. And I…loved him back to life."
Jill felt the wet ball of dread in her belly. She lowered her gun and took a step toward Chris. Leon held her back again, shaking his head. "We couldn't find you. We tried. We came as soon as we knew. I'm so sorry."
Again, Chris said nothing and his face showed the same.
Alesio gestured, "Chris…show them what I taught you. Show them the power of pain."
Chris drew the big knife down his back. Jill shook her head and shook it again. "He won't hurt me."
"Jill…" Kevin stepped up beside her, "That's not him. Look at him. He's not in there."
Kevin lifted his gun and Jill slapped it down. "NO! Don't you dare!" She holstered her own weapon. "You two take care of the big guy….I can handle Chris."
Leon watched her face, waited, and finally nodded.
She had to do this. It was the only way she could finish the story her way. It would end how it would end.
Leon turned back to Alesio. "We have unfinished business, you and I."
"Look at you, little American agent. You are not so pretty now. Did Maria destroy your pretty face? She took all your pretty hair as well. I guess you have been broken after all."
Leon drew the katana off his back and the wakizashi from beside him. He watched the other man, considering. "Not yet. Why don't you come see how broken I am?"
Alesio drew his sword, twirling it with a whistle of blade and wind. "Will we dance as before, pretty samurai? Will you sing so pretty as you bleed so red?"
"Only one way to find out."
Alesio rushed him, inhumanly fast. He swung the blade toward him and Kevin fired the shotgun, once, twice, three times. It blasted him in the face, in the chest, in the stomach. Alesio staggered, surprised, and Leon brought both blades down against him.
The found flesh and bit through, hit bone and kept on going. Leon split him into three pieces that hesitated, held and finally slid apart. Alesio stared, wide eyed, and sprayed blood like a geyser. It pumped out in squirts and madness, staining the ground red beneath him as he fell to his knees. Kevin unloaded another round in his gushing body as he fell backward on the ground.
"…this guy kicked your ass before?" Kevin seemed surprised as they watched Alesio's body bleed and twitch on the ground.
"Yeah. He probably didn't think you'd shoot him."
"How fucking stupid is that?"
"Pretty fucking stupid."
Kevin and Leon locked eyes and both of their faces said the same thing: that had been too easy. This was not right. Something was terribly, horribly, desperately wrong here. They turned in tandem and Jill was on her knees.
Chris had his hand around her throat, choking her.
"Hey!" Kevin hoisted the shotgun. "Let her go, you fucking asshole!"
Chris lifted his head, twitched. Jill seized the opportunity. She pushed up under his arm and broke his hold and grabbed his wrist before she rolled back, drove her feet into his stomach, and pushed. She tossed him, fast and perfect.
Chris flew through the air and came down on his back, writhing from the pain of it.
Kevin put the shotgun to his face. "Stay down, big guy. Do us both a favor."
Chris was breathing heavily, watching them. He twitched but said nothing. There was a wet gurgle of sound. It was like bubbling breath beneath the water.
Leon and Jill turned toward it.
Alesio's body was reknitting so fast it was like watching a fast-forwarded movie but where it reknit, it burst with mutation. The bubbling and breeding of flesh and bone turned into a grotesque and grimacing monster. Kevin swung the shotgun toward it, Chris kicked him in the stomach, and Jill kicked Chris in the balls.
Kevin got the shot off and it smashed into that growing, writhing, horrible mass that still somehow on that macabre freak show, managed to look like Alesio. Leon rushed it, smooth and fast, the blades bit and swirled, sliced and diced. It burst with blood and screamed but it just kept getting bigger.
A tentacle flew out of its back and smashed into him. It tossed him up and out. He lost his swords in flight and came down in a heap of pain and speed. No time to reflect on it, Leon rolled and the tentacle smashed into the ground where he'd been.
Jill jerked him to his feet, pulling him into step behind her. She took a brutal slash at the waving tentacle and split it open in a gush of blood and black goop. It waved madly, furious. Chris was on his knees and trying to choke Kevin to death.
Leon spun a back kick into Chris' side and kicked him again in the stomach. Kevin rolled away, gasping. "Fucker! God damn giant muscles."
Alesio was now about fifteen feet tall and made of a mass of gross, bubbles, exposed muscle and tentacles. To try to define the horror of it was like trying to define a nightmare. It was, simply, horrifying and getting bigger.
It looked one tentacle around Leon, one around Kevin, it grabbed Jill with a third and brought them all crashing together above it. There were shouts and grunts of pain. It separated them, squeezing tighter and tighter and tighter. It smacked them back together with a crash of skin and pain. They were either going to die crushed to death or smooshed together. What a way to go.
"I told you I wasn't going to leave you guys. It's a good god damn thing I didn't either. You can say you're welcome later." The voice of the pilot was loud in their headsets. The whoosh of the RPG was even louder. It zipped by in a burst of sound and light and smashed into the monster that was trying to turn them into silly putty.
The explosion was massive and awesome and gross. The thing that had been Alesio screamed as it was blown into pieces, chunks, and flopping, sizzling, acid like goop. It exploded like a burst water balloon, splattering everything it touched as it did, covering them in filth, muck, and stench. They all tumbled down, hit, rolled, crawled and tried to take cover. But it was hard to take cover from massive, disgusting, all encompassing putrid rot, death, and rain.
"Get some cover!"
They scrambled, ducking and running and the choppers guns started rattling off loud, sparking, constant rounds. It blasted the smoking pieces of the still screaming monster, turning them into smears on the grass. In the midst of the madness, Chris grabbed Leon and jerked him up to his feet.
Face to face, they eyed each other.
"What did they do to you?" Leon whispered, his voice nearly lost to the rapid thunder of constant gun fire.
Chris lifted him off his feet by his vest, shaking him like a dog with a bone. Leon kicked him in the groin. Poor Chris, his nuts were going to fall off from such continuous abuse. He followed up the blow to the groin with a kick to the knee. Chris went down on all fours.
Jill was there now, grabbing him and binding his hands behind his back. They cuffed him and dropped him to his face in the dirt. The whirling motor of the guns above them came to an end and the ensuing silence was nearly painful.
But there was nothing left of Alesio now but a few steaming streams of smoke and blood stains on the grass. The pilot said, "You're welcome, you idiots."
And the chopper lifted up into the air again.
Leon kinda liked that angry pilot.
Jill sat on Chris' back, holding him down. He grunted and snarled. They all stood and leaned and panted for a long moment. Finally, Jill spoke, "There had better be a cure for the man under my ass right now. I will not kill him."
Chris finally went still, breathing hard.
"Thank you," Jill remarked, "I was tired of the rodeo. I usually have a man buy me a drink first before I let him buck beneath me so hard."
Kevin chuckled.
They all looked…awful. Dirty, nasty, soaked in goop and slime and shit. Jill had a blob of something gross and jiggling on her head. Leon looked like he'd gotten a cumshot of blood delivered dead center to his face. Kevin smelled like an old man's ass.
It was a pretty gross trio of hapless heroes.
Jill looked at Leon, "So what now?"
He glanced at the tower. "Now we go up."
Jill sighed, "I was afraid you were going to say that. But maybe Kevin should wait here with Chris."
"Wait, what?"
"I'm going to get the pilot to evac him. He can't be left alone while he waits though."
"Why me though?"
"Because Kev, honestly. You're in good shape but not Wesker good. Last time, Leon and I barely even survived it. He'll wipe the floor with you."
Kevin blinked at her, offended. "Well…that smarts a little."
On the ground, Chris finally spoke, "Get off of me."
"No." Jill bounced on his back to emphasize her point. "Stay down or I'll hurt you."
"Your ass is already hurting me. It's bony."
She blinked. Kevin blinked. Leon blinked.
Finally, she said, "It is NOT bony. It's fabulous."
Muffled, Chris retorted, "Tyra Banks has a fabulous ass. Yours is white girl skinny."
Jill laughed, loudly, and rolled him over. She hugged his bound body to her. He grunted again and sniffed. His face collapsed into lines of disgust. "Woman, let go of me right now. You smell worse than shit, piss, and three day old cum. Seriously."
She didn't let go but she laughed again. "I don't care, you stupid pig. I don't care. I thought you were dead."
She kissed his face and made him cringe. "No more. Please. I beg of you. Uncuff me."
No one moved.
"Seriously…uncuff me."
Jill shook her head and stepped back from him. "Jill, what the fuck?"
"No. Sorry Chris. But think about it. We have no clue what you could do if we did that. I don't want to risk it."
Chris sighed, "I'm fine. Seriously. I don't even feel anything like before. I have completely control of my body. I swear."
From within the tower, Albert Wesker emerged.
Chris said, a little more desperately, "Jill…let me go. NOW."
Jill stepped in front of him. She protected him with her lithe body. He was aware of it. Kevin and Leon were aware of it. That was love right there. And it was kinda beautiful. "I wondered where your Benedict Arnold ass was. Figure you for the type of coward that shows up when the cavalry is dead."
"I would suggest we stop this showdown before it starts. Drop your weapons."
Surely he was joking.
"If you don't, I will have Ada Wong killed Rebecca. She is on the top floor of this tower, right now, holding the little scientist hostage."
Leon lowered his gun. Kevin did the same.
Jill shot Albert Wesker in the stomach. He stumbled, teetered on the stairs of the tower and fell off, hitting the ground in a heap. The twenty or so Ganado that were ranged around him looked terribly confused about what to do next.
Shocked, everyone stared at her.
She turned to Leon, "Go. Get Rebecca. I will hold him here." She knelt and uncuffed Chris. "Betray me again, I will shoot you in the dick."
Chris rose and Kevin handed him the shotgun. Thunder rumbled in the distance. "Let's finish this."
Kevin said, "You heard her Kennedy." Kevin handed him the katana, hilt first, "Get the hell out of here. Go save the girl."
Leon nodded, nodded again, and started running. He broke through the gathered Ganado flanked by cover fire from his comrades. When there should have been one to block him, a head would explode. When there was a fist, there was a shot to the shoulder that spun it away. The best in the business had his back.
It was time to go it alone.
He burst into the tower at a full run. The stairs curled in circles up to the very top. The staircase was narrow, claustrophobic and dark. He drove a kick when they came around the corners to fight him. He put a bullet in a knee and jerked, throwing them behind him. When the stairs narrowed, he pulled the sword and kept going.
He spitted two together on the blade and ripped the blade clean, kicking them back as they fell in a burst of blood. Where there were faces, he lunged. Where there bodies, he struck. He reached the top of the stairs, panting, covered in blood.
The roof of the tower was a large circle and high enough in the sky that the wind was a desperate, shoving thing. Lightning snaked across the sky, the perfect backdrop to what was waiting there. The first spatter of rain hit his face as he moved, slowly.
"Drop it please."
Ada held Rebecca against her, the gun to her temple. She was frightened but unharmed. She was softer, fuller, more beautiful than he'd been able to remember. The sight of her nearly broke him at the same time it empowered him.
He tossed aside the sword and it clattered across the rooftop.
"The gun too."
He jerked it clean and tossed it.
It didn't matter. It wasn't about weapons now. Not anymore. The thunder rumbled and the wind kicked up more rain. Down below, the sounds of fighting rose to echo on the wind.
"You didn't come alone."
Leon shook his head. "Not this time."
"It doesn't matter. I've done all I can for you. This is how it has to end."
"Yeah…this is how it has to end." He held his hands out, palms open, "Let her go, Ada. Just once, do the right thing here."
The rain converted to a steady pouring. Lightning split the sky and flashed, bright and close. Down below, gun fire peppered the air like fireworks.
Ada said, "For what it's worth, I wanted to love you. It seems some of us just aren't capable of that."
"That and a buck fifty might just be enough to get me on the subway. But otherwise, it doesn't matter a great deal. Let her go, Ada. Now."
"I've done what I can to repay some past mistakes. I let the game get ahold of me and made a few missteps. But I never intended to lose. Somehow I'm standing here the loser."
"So, make it right. Let Rebecca go."
Ada sighed, centering herself.
"Rebecca?" He called to her but kept his gaze on Ada, "You ok?"
"Yes. I'm not hurt. They told me you were dead. They told me you were gone. I knew they lied. I played it safe and close to the vest. I knew you would come."
He laughed a little and touched the cross on his chest. "Thanks to this."
"No. That's a symbol. The strength has always been in you."
Ada shoved Rebecca away from her, just like that. Rebecca ran toward him. He caught her, one armed, against his body and put her behind him. He wanted to hold her until he fell apart from it but he put her behind him.
And he faced the bitch in red.
Rebecca said, softly, "I have so many things to tell you."
"Me too."
Ada moved to the edge of the roof. "I have to go get Albert. This isn't where his story ends. But ours? I think ours ends today, Leon. Not how I wanted it to. But sometimes, we just have to take the ending we get."
"Ada! Don't!"
He started for the gun and she shot him. Just like that. She drilled him. The bullet drilled him in the chest plate and put him on his ass. He skidded backward from the impact. He felt like he'd been drop kicked by a buffalo.
"Stay down, Leon! The next one goes in your head!"
"You first, you bitch!"
He turned his head and saw Rebecca there, aiming his pistol at Ada. Thunder rumbled, crashing loud and infuriating. Lightning flashed, too close. He could all but hear it sizzle.
He rose to one knee.
Rebecca stood between him and Ada.
Ada tilted her head, studying her. "Little mouse. Don't be a fool. Think about what you're risking."
"Sometimes you have to risk everything."
"If you kill me, he'll still have been mine first. You can't erase me with a bullet."
"No but I can kill you with one. You don't get to run away this time. Not this time. It's time to face the music, Ada. Your dance is over."
Down below the fighting had gone silent. The good guys were dead or they were coming. And time was up.
"Stupid little fool. You die for nothing." Ada pulled the trigger. Two guns went off simultaneously in a flash of lightning. Thunder echoed the boom of it.
Ada Wong was clutching her throat. Blood pumped between her fingers as she staggered back. Shock was written all over her beautiful face even as she slipped and tumbled back into the darkness.
Leon rose and hurried to Rebecca. He couldn't believe that she'd done it. He grabbed her arm to turn her.
She turned and the gun slipped from her fingers. It bounced onto the stone beneath her with a clatter of metal. She grabbed at the hole in her chest.
"No…" He wasn't aware that he'd shouted it. He caught her as she fell forward and laid her on the roof. His gloved hands slapped over hers, putting pressure over the gushing wound. "No."
He said it again as if it would matter. The wound didn't seep, it poured. It gushed between his blocking fingers. He didn't realize he was saying no over and over again. He kept trying to stop the bleeding.
She grabbed his wrists and held him. "Leon…" The blood spilled from her mouth. "Stop. Stop it! Look at me, please, hurry."
"Hold on, ok? Just…" He glanced desperately at the sky for the chopper, "Where the fuck is the back up!?"
"They won't make it. Leon, they won't make it." Her voice whispered, "Please."
"Shh. Stop talking. Save your strength."
The good guys were on the roof now and running toward them. Jill shouted, "NO!" Chris slid to his knees beside her and jerked his shirt off. Leon stuffed it against he wound and leaned on it, hard. Rebecca coughed, pale now and cold. "Please…Leon…so much to tell you…"
"There's time! Hold on!"
The chopper was close now and getting closer.
"Leon…I love you."
"Stop! Please!" His face was desperate, lost, and broken, "Just hold on for me."
"You came…I knew you'd come. I need you to…have….faith."
"Don't…please. Don't. Rebecca."
But she was silent now and the air slipped once more, wet and weak, from her lungs. The chopper was right above them now. "Rebecca?" Her name was soft, a whisper.
The blood wasn't gushing now. He pulled her into him and sat up, holding her in his lap like a child. He rocked, making some sound that was so much worse than crying. It was the sound of grief that penetrates fast and hard. It was the sound of failure. It was the sound the soul makes as it breaks and scatters uselessly in the pouring rain.
Chris rose and turned away. Kevin turned away. Men, Jill thought desperately, supposed to be the strongest creatures on earth. But they couldn't stand in the face of Leon Kennedy's grief.
"Leon…"
Leon shook his head.
Jill knelt beside him. She touched his face. He turned his eyes to her. "Let go now. Leon? Let go."
He shook his head again.
"She's gone, Leon. Let me take her now. Let me take her."
His eyes turned down to her. Boneless, she lay in his arms. Her face was pressed against his chest and the cross that lay there. He started to shake, uncontrollably, like he had hypothermia. He kissed her and her mouth was cold.
The grief sank its teeth so hard into his throat he was pretty sure it would rip him open and spill his blood with hers all over the rooftop. Jill, feeling useless and lost, touched his arm and waited. He made a sound like a wounded animal and started weeping.
She'd thought there would be nothing worse than watching him fight his way back from the hammered mess he'd been. She was wrong. This…this was the most horrible thing she'd ever seen. His loss was so deep, so raw, and so wide that it drew blood where it cut, forcing you into his mourning with you.
A few long moments passed and the silence rose to surround them. There was nothing now but the pouring rain and the whir of the helicopter blades. Thunder rumbled in the distance. The rain washed the blood away in a pink river.
Chris turned back and crouched down. He grabbed Leon's forearm. The other man shifted his grip on Rebecca and grabbed him back. Their hands locked just at each other's elbows and held, hard. It was a boy hug when Leon needed a boy hug.
"Let me take her."
He opened his eyes. Two sets of blue. Two sets of grief.
Leon nodded and he let her go. It was the hardest thing he'd ever done. He let her go.
Chris lifted her, easily, bonelessly. He held her against him like she was precious and small. And she was. This tiny little girl who'd stood in front of him and protected him. He felt the loss in his bones, in his blood.
Leon shifted to his knees on the rooftop. His hands were still filled with her blood. Her blood was on his hands. He made some sound and Jill slid between his hands and put her arms around him. He wrapped his arms around her and wept. He cried like he'd leave pieces of himself on the rooftop around them. He cried with his whole body, his whole being.
He ground his head at her neck and shoulder and she held him so tight she was pretty sure they'd both bruise from it. But she'd stay there, kneeling with him forever, if that's what it took. The rain eased back, a soft misty drizzle now against them.
Finally, he let her go. She eased back, looking at his face. "Are you ready?"
Was he? No.
But he got up anyway.
He got up.
Because Rebecca wouldn't have it any other way. So, he got up.
He looked at her, watching him in the rain. "Wesker?"
She shook her head, slowly. "One of those big fat Ganado grabbed him. We lost him in the fray. Ada?"
Leon stared off into the rolling clouds, breathing. He was breathing, so that meant he was alive. But he felt dead. He felt dead. Empty. "Rebecca shot her in the throat. She fell over."
"We'll have someone get her body."
He didn't care.
He shook his head and moved to the edge of the roof. He looked down. And he knew what he'd see when he did. He knew.
She wasn't there.
She wasn't splattered on the ground beneath them.
She wasn't dead.
And Rebecca had died for nothing.