It was a long flight back to Rockfort. He'd flown out of Arklay City, to Lima, and from Lima, flew to Rockfort. Rain splattered against his tiny window. A storm was rolling in, and the little plane bounced through the air like a toy, and the Pacific, far below, swelled and churned and frothed in a way which made him think of sickness, of sputum in the lungs.
Alone in the cramped cabin, which smelled of cigarettes and old leather and important people who had come and gone, Grayson ate a ham sandwich and thought about several things. He thought about Raccoon City, about Annette, about the government being interested in Sherry, and why that was. And then Grayson fell asleep, and he dreamed he'd met Annette and Sherry in an airport, in a gray country with gray fields and gray mountains, and they'd boarded a plane and flown somewhere, to start their new life.
Grayson landed in Rockfort that evening. Alfred was waiting for him in the terminal, dressed in a white button-up, white slacks, and a red sports-jacket, and he was flanked by two big guys in fatigues, one Hispanic, the other white. Alfred had a pale face and pale blonde hair, which he'd slicked back with pomade, and he looked kind of like a young David Bowie. But there was something vaguely reptilian in his features too, something which suggested cold-bloodedness.
"Do you know how bloody worried I was?" Alfred barked, making his way over in long, unhurried strides. His two lackeys hung back, still as statues.
"I'm alive," Grayson said, clutching his bag. The bag contained the clothes he'd bought on the line of credit Alfred had extended to him. "It's good to see you, Alfred. And I mean that."
Alfred hugged him. It was a stiff, awkward hug, the sort of hugs which came from people who never hugged anyone. "You bloody wanker, I thought your were dead." He let go and looked up at Grayson. Alfred wasn't short, but he wasn't quite as tall as he was. "When I heard Raccoon City was obliterated, I thought it was over. Thankfully, Nikolai found you. He treated you well, I hope?"
"He treated me just fine," Grayson said, and smiled. "I'm exhausted, Alfred. If you don't mind, I'd like to get some rest."
"Take a few days off before you resume your duties," Alfred told him, as they walked down the narrow concourse. One of the guards buzzed them through a security gate, then another, and then they were walking up concrete stairs, across wet tarmac, rainy sea-wind licking their cheeks, the lights of the comms-towers glittering like watercolors on the ground.
Alfred dismissed his security escorts—they almost looked relieved to finally be away from this man—and they climbed into a jeep, which Grayson drove, around the perimeter of the prison compound, up a bumpy road into the mountains, through dense jungle. Monkeys hooted and whooped in the darkness, and insects buzzed loudly, annoyingly, and birds of some nocturnal variant warbled in the trees.
The jeep bounced and rocked on its suspension, because the roads here were rough; nobody but Alfred ever came this way. The radio sputtered some kind of satellite-delivered 80s music that might have been It's The End of the World, but the quality was so dirty that it was hard to tell.
"How bad was Raccoon City?" Alfred asked him.
"Pretty bad," Grayson said, frowning. He didn't really want to get into it. "I'll tell you later."
The mansion came into view like a picture from a pop-up book. It was built in some nameless Victorian style which sat uneasily between the Addams Family house, and the set of a Hammer Productions film. The front yard was terraced and mostly concrete, and the flower-beds looked ill, some already dead, which didn't surprise Grayson. Nobody but Alfred and him were allowed near the mansion.
"You can replant the beds," Alfred said cheerfully, as they walked up a set of weathered concrete steps. "I think I'd like some gardenias and hibiscus. Perhaps jasmine?" He fished his key-ring from the pocket of his sports jacket, and unlocked the front doors of the mansion with a key worked in gold, in the shape of an eagle, its talons curled around a halberd.
The doors creaked open, and they walked into the perfumed foyer of the mansion. Antiques, which Alfred had shipped from his family estate in England, decorated every inch of the room. Cherry wood wainscoted the walls. Several bookcases, most of them containing Alexia's old books, and glass showcases displaying heirlooms, lined the walls, dusty and neglected. A massive crystal chandelier hung from the coffered ceiling, like a glittering upside-down layer-cake.
"I'm thinking of getting rid of the chandelier for something a little… unconventional. A pet project," Alfred mused, and they thumped up the staircase, then another. On the third floor, they went through a door, into a carpeted hallway cluttered with antiques and books, and the scowling marble busts of dead Ashfords.
The twins' bedrooms were up here, and so was Grayson's old room, which sat opposite of Alexia's. Rather, he reminded himself, it was a replica of Alexia's room in Antarctica; Alexia had never lived here. Just like his room wasn't really his room; it was just a copy.
His room was exactly as he'd left it. The bed was still neatly made. There wasn't any dust on the furniture, the Persian carpet. His wood-paneled television—the only television in the entire house—sat on its entertainment stand, his collection of video tapes displayed in the glass cabinets.
"Scott kept everything the same," Alfred told him, standing in his doorway, a tapered silhouette against the sickly glow of incandescent lamps. "And before you ask, he's fine, but he's not here. He's in the United States right now. Convalescing with your family."
"Hoped I'd get to see him," Grayson said, and laid his suitcase on his bed. He unlatched it, removed the neatly folded contents and laid them out on the bed. "Does he know I'm alive?"
"Not yet, but he will," Alfred assured him. "I will personally ring him, Grayson."
"Hey, Alfred?"
Alfred fiddled with the fat sapphire ring, his family proof, on his finger, and it caught the light, glinting. "Yes?"
"I changed my mind about the USS."
Alfred nodded, stopped fiddling with the ring. "I understand."
"Umbrella destroyed my life," Grayson said, mildly. "I'm only here because of you."
Their plane was flying somewhere over the southern Atlantic when Alexia looked at him and said, "You haven't said a word since take-off, Grayson."
"He is upset," Nikolai said, lighting a Russian cigarette, to the dismay of everyone in the cabin, who vocalized their displeasure with grunts and grumbles, and the occasional cough. He grinned, and his teeth looked like iron in the cabin-lighting. "He has been through quite a lot, Dr. Ashford."
"So he told me," Alexia said dryly.
"Ah," Nikolai said, his grin widening, and he looked like the villain from that Bond movie, the one with the metal teeth. "So you know all about Annette Birkin."
"I do."
"You," Nikolai said, and pointed his cigarette at Grayson, "are in deep shit, my friend."
"I'm not dead yet," Grayson said.
"Dr. Ashford doesn't seem like the sort of woman who kills quickly, Mr. Harman."
Alexia just smiled.
They landed in Europe, in some remote part of it (nobody told him where they were, probably because Spencer had told them not to), and Grayson waited four hours in an opulent sitting room while a Polish maid, who spoke no English, served him tea and cookies, and little cakes and sandwiches.
Alexia appeared. She'd changed into a suit that might have been black, but looked dark violet in certain lighting, and she smelled like expensive perfume.
"I," she announced, and threw her arms out as if embracing the world, "am the new Chief Researcher at NEST 2, in Arklay City." Her heels clicked sharply against the floor as she made her way over to him, and she kissed him, suddenly and deeply, and raked her fingers through his dark hair. "Lord Spencer has given us one of his properties," she told him. "It's near Arklay City. I would have preferred to return to England, but it seems Umbrella USA needs me more than Umbrella Europe."
"Of course Umbrella USA needs you more," Grayson said, and popped another sugary wafer into his mouth. He licked the powder-sugar on his lips, then said, "They're the ones dealing with the Raccoon Trials."
"I've already been briefed about it," Alexia told him, and she accepted tea from the maid, sipping. Her lipstick was subtle and pink, but left a smudge on the lip of the porcelain cup. "Umbrella has its legal team on the matter. Should I be subpoenaed, I'll go from there."
"What about that thing you promised me? In Antarctica? Sherry."
Alexia finished her tea. "I'm supposed to have lunch with a distant cousin of mine in Washington, who is very, very curious as to why I'm not dead." She passed the cup to the maid, who took it, hurrying off. "She'll put us through to the right people." Alexia paused, pursed her lips. "Assuming," she began, "she's feeling charitable to do her estranged British relative a favor."
"Who's this cousin?" he asked.
"Someone very high up the federal ladder," Alexia told him, and smiled. "Don't worry your pretty head, Grayson. You know I always keep my promises to you." She clicked her tongue. "I'm such a soft touch for you. Really, it's absolutely disgusting."