Chapter 22

Sunlight streams through the linen curtain. The room is freezing again.

Claire's clothes are gone. So are Claire, Redfield, and the assault rifle.

I go into the kitchen. The boot prints are long dry. I open the front door. Snow drifts to the ground, blanketing any evidence of last night. Two figures stand talking in the long, winding driveway. Claire and Redfield. She has the assault rifle slung over her shoulder. Redfield has his phone out. I check mine. 8:24 AM on December 22nd, 2009 with only 29% and not one bar.

Awesome.

Closing the door, I return to the bedroom and change. I keep the sweater on. As I come out, Claire and Redfield enter the cabin.

Redfield stands in front of the door. "We're done dawdling. We want answers, and we're not going anywhere until you give them to us."

"You can't be serious," I say. "We're stranded in the middle of the woods during a snowstorm."

Claire sits on the couch. "We're aware, and we are serious. And the more stubborn you are, the harder the BSAA will go on you. Now tell us: who was that man last night? What does he want? How is he connected to Gaea and how does the T-Veronica virus fit into all of this?"

"So you two want us to hang out here until we die of hypothermia. Perfect plan. But hey, at least I'll get to complete my mission."

"Claire and I are getting along fine," says Redfield. "You, on the other hand, seem to always need someone to bail you out. Almost like you've got no experience whatsoever doing this."

"Fuck you -"

"Guys, stop," says Claire. "We're just trying to help you, Steve. Snake -"

"No, you're trying to help a kid who's been dead for eleven years."

"And who was infected by the T-Veronica virus. People who are infected by T-Veronica can 'become one' with it and develop abnormal mutations - not just regenerative powers but also insectile or reptilian features, green skin and scales, super strength, flammable blood. The ability to control anyone or anything infected by a raw sample of their strain of the virus. Infectees can become one with it through a fifteen-year coma or multiple organ transplants."

"So fucking what?"

"I can tell by the surgical scars on your body that you've undergone at least twenty different procedures. And your buddy said he used the same virus to make that Tyrant as he used to make you. It looks and functions exactly like something infected with the T-Veronica virus. Plus, he can control it. Look, there's a virus research facility that opened where Raccoon City once stood - a woman who became one with the virus lives there. They're working on a cure for her. We can get you help -"

"I am a BOW who was designed to kill, Claire. I was sent to kill your brother. I am not human. And I'm definitely not some dead kid who magically came back to life and found his way back to you."

"How do you know? You won't tell us anything. You won't hear us out. You just blindly accept whatever they or that woman tells you -"

"Because if there is one thing I do know, it's that you can't change who or what you are. No matter how much you might want to." I take out the photo of Steve and his family and toss it on the couch. "Face it: you made a mistake. Now drop it."

Claire stares at the photo.

"Are we done here? Or are we going to play 20 Questions until we all freeze to death?" I say.

She tucks it into the old wallet. "We're done. Chris, let's go. The BSAA can deal with him."

Without looking at him or me, she goes outside. I try to follow, but Redfield blocks the doorway. His finger grows tight on the trigger.

"I don't show mercy to anyone who hurts someone I care about," he says. "But I can see in your eyes that you don't want to hurt anyone and that, more than anything, you're afraid.

"I don't know who or what you are, but I do know that what Claire is going through is what I went through when I found my friend Jill, who I thought was dead. Claire is one of the kindest, smartest, most compassionate people I've ever known, and she's put her life on the line for me more times than I can count, just like she and I have both done for you. You owe it to her to hear her out. Regardless of what's going on, you'll be helping yourself and your friend."

"Are you coming?" Claire calls from the driveway.

"Right behind you," Redfield says.

He pushes me forward.

xxx

We follow the snow-blanketed road north. Claire leads by a good distance. Redfield and the assault rifle bring up the rear. We stay under the trees, where cover is denser and walking is easier. At one point, we hear a whirring sound in the distance. We stop beneath a canopy of branches until the whirring fades.

Not long afterward, Redfield's phone battery dies.

Seas of forest become rolling hills of field. We follow an old, rotted fence to keep to the road. No one drives by. Silence lingers heavily, like the scent of blood and sweat after a fight. The sun starts to fall.

We spot a thick knot of trees. A sturdy metal fence winds behind them. We break under a big evergreen.

"I'm going to scout out the area. See who's around, if anyone," Redfield says. He holds out the assault rifle to Claire. "Here. In case you need it."

She shakes her head. "You need it more than I do."

"You sure?"

"Yeah. I've still got this." She pats the knife.

"Okay." He glances at me. "Be careful, baby sister."

"I will, big brother."

After Redfield crunches away, she disappears behind the trunk. I check my phone. It's holding at 16%. No trace of a signal anywhere.

No sound from Claire, either.

She's leaning against the trunk, looking at the photo of Steve's family. She doesn't so much as glance at me as I approach.

"He had this on him when he died," she says. "I kept it to give to his family. If it weren't for Chris's report, I don't think anyone would have believed me about his death, or anything else for that matter.

"His school and his parents' friends put together a memorial at the community center. Chris went with me. I felt as small as I did during my parents' funeral when I was 12. I gave them this photo to put on the picture boards beside the flowers. They showed a video of him playing with two other boys in a school talent show. He was the guitarist and back-up singer. And they showed a video of him and his dad watching his mom sing at an open-mic night. She had a sweet, delicate voice.

"I told everyone that he died saving my life. I said I'd always remember him. When it was over, they asked me if I wanted the picture back because he and his dad had been the last ones and there was no one to give it to."

"Claire -"

"You're just a thing to them. They hurt you and make you kill people, so I don't understand why you're still protecting them when we're offering to protect you."

"The only one I care about protecting is my...my friend."

"Why? After what she's done to you?"

The snow drifts to the ground as steadily as sand in an hourglass. The fields, hills, and trees all rest in silence.

"It was nine months ago, back in March, when I first woke up," I say. "It was cold. There was a bright light. A bunch of people in lab coats were standing over me. They were talking back and forth. I couldn't understand anything they were saying.

"One of them noticed I was awake. A balding man with glasses. He was the BOW that attacked us. He was smiling. The man you saw yesterday - the one that turned the other man into a BOW - he was there, too. He looked at me with disgust. All the others looked at me in awe. Amazement. Fear.

"Dr. - the man with glasses started talking to me. He wouldn't shut up. And then I suddenly got what he was saying. He was saying, 'Wake up, wake up - and welcome to the world.'

"He asked me a bunch of questions. How I felt. If I could understand what he said. He said if I could answer, to say something. I tried, but it came out as a garbled mess. They all laughed. I tried to move. He told them to restrain me. He shot some kind of blue sedative in my arm. It knocked me out cold.

"When I woke up, it was quiet. They'd all left except for a woman. I could tell by the look on her face that she was scared of me. She sat in a chair on the other side of the room the whole time.

"When she saw I was awake, she stood up. She walked along the wall to the door. By then I was trying to sit up again, but I couldn't because they'd belted me down. I moaned at her. It was all I could do. She stopped, turned around, looked. I guess she noticed me shivering because she got a blanket from a cabinet, and laid it over me. I looked up at her. She told me she was going to leave for just a minute to get the doctor.

"When she came back, it was with the balding man and all the others. They took off the blanket. Then they poked me. Prodded me. Stuck me with stuff. Hooked me to monitors. The works.

"She stayed through it all. Even helped. But she also talked to me through it all, told me it was okay. That it would only hurt for a little bit. That I could sleep again afterward. When it was all done and they had left, she stayed and covered me up again.

"She's the one he assigned to be my handler. To take my blood, make sure I'm healthy, and I'm where I need to be and all. She helped me learn how to walk, talk, do everything that humans do. She was there when they started testing me for powers. Cutting me. Shocking me. Burning me. She helped them when they told her to. And she was there when they told me what they created me for. Started making me train. She was always there during it, no matter how horrible it got, and she was always there after.

"I tried so hard to say her name right. But I couldn't, not even her first name, not until later. So I gave her a nickname. One I could pronounce. In return, she started calling me 'Snake' when it was just the two of us. Not just because of my eye and skin. Snakes are wise creatures in some human cultures, she said. She said I was like them because I was smart.

She's always been there for me. She's always been kind to me. Patient. Caring. She's even saved my life. I wish we could be free like you and your brother. But Gaea has connections everywhere. They'll hunt you down and kill you, or experiment on you until you die. And I can't leave her to die like that."

"You don't have to," Claire says. "It's been less than 24 hours. If she's still in New York, we can get to her before they do."

"And if she's already back with them?"

"We will find a way to get her out. Just please, Snake, please accept our protection."

Sighing, I keep my eyes on the white. "I can't."

"So you're going to, what, kill my brother and then keep killing for them? Keep going back to them so they can hurt you and rob you of your dignity, assuming they don't kill you once they've developed the next model? What kind of life is that, for you or her? You have a choice -"

"Oh gee, it sure is easy for you to talk, huh? You've got all this freedom. You can go wherever you want, do whatever you want, be whoever you want. But I don't. And she doesn't either, not anymore. We do what we're told, or we're no good to them. If we're no good, we die. Even if they do kill me in the end, at least they won't kill her."

"You are so naive if you think that's going to save her."

"Yeah, well, at least I'm not stupid enough to keep searching for someone who's been dead for over a decade."

She glares at me, then marches to the other side of the tree. She squats along the edge of the tree's canopy.

"Claire?" I say.

"What?"

"I'm sorry for what I said. I'm the stupid one, not you. I just wish there was an easy choice here. One where no one got hurt."

She looks over her shoulder. "It isn't just your friend, is it? You're afraid of something else. What is it?"

I squat beside her. "The possibility I'm not who or what I thought I was. That I was lied to. That I went through all of it for nothing. So...everything, I guess."

Kneeling, she opens the wallet. The first photo is one of the photos on Redfield's dresser - the one of their parents.

"My mom was an English teacher," she says. "She had a reputation for being tough, but she knew you had to excel in order to succeed. Dad was the same way. He owned his own autobody repair shop. The best one in town. This wallet was his.

"Something they often told me and Chris is that nothing is safe. Everything has risks. Never make a decision thinking you'll be safe, because you never are. I try to keep that in mind when I have to make a tough decision and I'm scared I'll choose wrong."

"It's hard to imagine you scared. You're so brave, and smart, and strong. You can kill when you need to -"

"Killing doesn't make you any of those things. Making the right decision, no matter how hard it is, does."

She flips the photo. The next photo is the one of Steve and his family. They look so happy. So loving. So like Claire's family.

Is this something I actually had? A human life? A happy, loving family? A home?

Is this something I want?

"How sure are you that I'm Steve?" I ask. "I mean, you didn't know him that long. What if you are making a mistake?"

"Survival forces you to get to know people in ways you normally wouldn't. I don't think he ever realized just how brave he really was, not even when he gave his life for mine. Before he died, he said something to me, something that's stuck with me and made me realize that the greatest hope any of us have of surviving the pain and destruction that bioterrorism causes is compassion."

"What did he say?"

She sticks the wallet in her jacket. "Something that makes me really sad knowing what kind of life you live, and that you're willing to walk back to it instead of fighting for something better for yourself and your friend."

A heavy breeze gusts through the trees. The branches above us shake. Snow spills on us.

I shake out my hair. "Awesome."

"My thoughts exactly."

Snow plasters her hair, face, and chest. I bust out laughing.

She bats off the snow. "What's so funny?"

"You look like Frosty the Snowman."

"Oh, I look like Frosty the Snowman, do I?" She grabs some snow and creams me in the face. "Now who looks like -"

I get her in the chest and shoot to my feet. Snagging some snow, she throws a ball at me. It hits me in the shoulder. She dashes behind the tree.

"This is a bad idea, you know," I say, grabbing a fistful of snow. "You don't have regenerative powers. You could get sick. You could develop pneumonia."

I sneak to the tree and peer around. A snowball hits me. I throw my ball, but she races right.

"I'm already cold and wet. Might as well have some fun," she says.

I go for more snow, but another ball hits me.

"You know, you are really slow," she says.

I snag more snow and sling it.

She sidesteps it. "You are really, really, really slow."

"Lady, you're asking for it."

"Oh? What am I asking for?"

"This."

I reach overhead and shake one branch. Snow topples free, creaming her.

She brushes away the snow. "That's a foul!"

"Yeah? What're you going to do about it?"

She bends down and packs together a big ball. "You know exactly what I'm going to do about it."

I step behind the tree. "You know it's not the size that matters, right? It's whether or not it hits the other person."

She whips the ball at me. It gets me in the hip. She runs into the sunlight. I race after her. She cuts left. I hook her with one arm. We slip and hit the ground. She lands on top of me, face buried in my chest, laughing. Placing her hands on either side of me, she props herself up so she's looking down at me. Her hips are digging into mine.

The snow has stopped.

"Are you okay?" she asks, smiling. Her bangs curtain her eyes.

"Huh?"

"Are. You. Okay?"

"Oh. Yeah, I think so. Are you?"

"Yeah. You broke my fall."

"You're welcome."

"I didn't say 'thank you.'"

I tuck her bangs behind her ear. "No thanks needed."

She lingers on top of me, eyes locked with mine. Lips parted. Heart beating against mine.

Something sharp jabs me.

"I'm sorry," she says, pushing herself off me. She repositions the knife. "Are you okay?"

There's no blood on my sweater. The blade didn't even pierce the fabric.

"Yeah. It just stung," I say.

She climbs to her feet. I swipe my arms and legs back and forth in the snow.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

"Making a snow angel, to see if it actually looks like an angel. Kindly deliver me unto my feet, milady."

She pulls me up. "That's a good one. No handprints or footprints," she says.

"Eh. Looks like a bug to me."

"How? You can very clearly see the head, the wings, the legs -"

"All of which a bug has."

"Well, here. I'll show you." She kneels by the head and draws a halo above it, then two eyes and a smile. "See?"

I see it, all right. The angel. The snow-whitened fields and hills and trees glimmering in the sunlight. Snowball fights. Claire.

I want it all. To have this freedom. To be happy. To feel the things I'm feeling.

But should I want them?

Should I let myself want them?

Do I even have the right?

Her smile falls. "What's wrong?"

"What happens if I'm not Steve? What if I am just some experimental BOW?"

She walks around the angel to me. "Then you and your friend would still be free."

"What about you? How would you feel if I'm not Steve?"

Her blue eyes shine like sapphires in the winter sun. She says, "If you weren't Steve, I would be sad I didn't find him. But I'd also be proud of you for making such a brave choice. And I'd be happy that you made it."

"Claire!"

Redfield is standing at the top of a nearby hill. "I found a house!"