Welcome To The Jungle
By the Hyperactive Hamster Of Doom
Summary: Years have passed since the incident, yet Billy Coen still can't forget what happened in the jungles of darkest Africa. But after years of suffering in silence, he's finally found someone he can turn to, and now he returns to Africa one last time to face his demons.
Disclaimer: I don't own Resident Evil or anything associated with it. Never have, never will. Satisfied?
1: It Began In Africa
The smell of the jungle filled the young lieutenant's nostrils as he and his companions marched on through the trees. Long grass rustled as their movements parted it, sweeping it briefly aside and then letting it close behind them as they walked away, as if they had never been there at all.
The jungle had a hot, damp, leafy smell; it smelled almost the same as being in a greenhouse full of plants on a hot summer's day. Except that this was a wilder version, tinged with unfamiliar plants and trees, recent rainfall, men's sweat, and undergrowth trampled beneath booted feet. There were overtones of rotting vegetation, and the scent of animals hidden somewhere in the trees. Monkeys, birds, or possibly something more dangerous; you never knew, here in the jungles of darkest Africa.
Even through the cover of the trees, there was no escaping the heat. It was too intense, too overwhelming; the heat of the hidden sun squeezed every drop of sweat out of you, sucking out every ounce of moisture and burning your skin so badly that your every movement was agony.
Worse still was what the heat did to your mind. It could addle your brain so much that you thought you were walking through a sunny field in the countryside, instead of trudging miserably through the jungle with your CO bellowing at you every time you stopped to catch your breath. Two days ago, one of the Marines, delirious with thirst, had sprinted right into a tree in the mistaken belief that it was his own front door and that he was back home in Wichita at last.
He wasn't in Kansas any more, that was for certain. They'd left his body hidden in the undergrowth and promised themselves that they'd come back for him, so they could bring him back to base with them once they'd completed their mission.
The unfortunate man's life had been one of many claimed by the jungle - or its inhabitants - in the past few days. Now there were just a handful of weary Marines left, and they still hadn't reached their destination.
For the tenth time in half as many minutes, the young man paused to wipe the beads of perspiration that were dripping from his forehead. It had been days since he'd even seen a shower, let alone had one, and he and his clothes were soaked in sweat. Not even the heat could distract him from how much he stank.
"Coen! Move it!" bellowed the commanding officer from somewhere ahead.
Lt. Billy Coen sighed, and started walking again, shifting the weight of his backpack slightly to one side in an attempt to relieve the pain that gripped his shoulder blades. Every one of his muscles ached, but he pressed on nevertheless, trying to ignore his discomfort.
How long had they been here in the jungle? Days? Weeks? Months? It was easy to lose track of time out here; it felt as if they'd been here forever, and there seemed to be no end in sight to this relentless march.
It was so tempting to just stop and rest for a while, but Billy knew that he had to keep moving; if he succumbed to the fatigue that was seeping like poison through his body, then the heat would kill him.
He gritted his teeth, and carried on.
Gotta keep moving… gotta keep moving…
The man in front of him sagged suddenly, and collapsed in a heap at Billy's feet. Billy tried to pick him up, but the man was barely conscious. Fumbling for the water bottle at his side, Billy unscrewed the cap and splashed some of the water in the man's face.
"Come on, Foster, wake up! We're almost there!"
The man coughed, spluttered, and blinked once or twice.
"Thank God," he mumbled, staggering to his feet again. "You sure, Billy?"
No, thought Billy. No, I have no idea. We could be miles away.
"Yeah," he said aloud. "Yeah, we're almost there. Come on, man, you can do this. Just keep moving, you'll be fine. Don't stop now. Don't give up. We're gonna make it."
Foster nodded gratefully and carried on, a little unsteadily.
"Almost there," called the captain from the front of the little group. "Just another hundred yards and we'll be able to see the enemy base clearly from our position."
Billy felt his spirits lift for the first time since they'd set off from their base camp. Soon this nightmare would be over - they'd carry out their mission, and then they'd go home again. No more anti-malarial pills, no more mosquito nets, no more flies and dust or blistering heat.
And no more Captain Harris. As the heat became insufferable, so did he. He was forever barking at them to hurry up, even hitting them across the head with the butt of his rifle if he didn't think they were walking fast enough.
It was typical, thought Billy, that the enemy could hit good men right between the eyes but completely fail to miss Captain Harris. Even the heat didn't seem to affect him. It really wasn't fair that good men dropped dead and people like Captain Harris survived.
He walked the last hundred yards in a dream; his vision was clouded by flies and the heat haze, but inside he was rejoicing. His torment was almost at an end. All they had to do now was destroy the rebel base, and that would be that. He could go home again. Home to his little apartment, and -
There was a loud groan from ahead. Captain Harris and one of the other men had parted the branches at the edge of the trees.
"What is it?" said Foster, going over to see what the matter was. Billy watched, wondering what could be wrong.
"Aw, hell no!" he heard Foster cry. "You gotta be kiddin' me!"
"What? What's the matter?" Billy called.
"You ain't gonna believe this, Billy-boy!" Foster called back. "Those dumb bastards at HQ gave us the wrong coordinates!"
Billy's mouth dropped open.
"What?" he gasped, hurrying over to the others and peering through the gap in the branches.
He saw a clearing just beyond the trees, and a collection of straw huts. There were some people walking around, one or two sitting by a fire and stirring something in a pot. But these weren't the rebels they'd been told about. None of them were wearing uniforms, and there was no sign of military activity anywhere.
"That's no rebel base," said the other soldier, disgusted. "It's just a village. Bunch of African natives."
Billy's heart sank. They'd come all this way, they'd lost so many men to heat and the enemy, only to find a small village instead of the enemy base that they'd been expecting. That long and terrible journey through the jungle had been pointless, wasted time; all that effort for nothing. A lesser man would have broken down and cried, but Billy didn't cry. He wasn't the type to cry over any kind of setback.
"What we gonna do, captain?" said the other soldier, whose name might have been Carson. "We gonna turn round an' go back to base?"
There was a long silence.
"No," said Captain Harris, and he spat on the ground. "No, we're not going back to base. We've come too far to turn back now."
"So what we gonna do?" said Carson again.
A shorter pause.
"Kill them," said Captain Harris shortly. "We kill them all."
Until then, Billy had been too depressed to even bother listening to what the others were saying, but the shock of what he was hearing shook him out of his thoughts right away. He stared at his commanding officer, aghast.
"What?" he said weakly. "You mean kill innocent people?"
"Why not? These bastards all look the same to me anyway," said the captain, shrugging. "Once we've killed them, we plant some ammunition in those huts of theirs and tell HQ they were sheltering the rebels. Nobody'll know any different."
"But - but sir!" said Billy, horrified. "We can't do that! They're just villagers - innocent people! They've done nothing wrong, sir! We can't kill them for a crime they didn't commit! It's immoral!"
The captain snapped.
"Damn it, Coen, we didn't come all the way out here just to turn round and go home again! We've been walking through that goddamn jungle for days and I am not going home empty-handed! Now get out there and round those people up right now!"
"Sir, please, you can't do this! You mustn't!" protested Billy.
"Don't you tell me what I can and can't do, lieutenant! I'm the one who gives the orders out here! And I'm telling you to round those people up! Now!"
"No!" said Billy. "I won't do it!"
"Are you defying orders? That's insubordination, Coen! When we get back to base, you'll be on a charge!" bawled the captain.
"I don't care!" Billy shot back. "I didn't join up to murder innocent people! There are women and children out there, sir! Please, I'm begging you, don't hurt them! Don't make us do this!"
"Don't make me shoot you for disobeying orders, Coen!" snarled Captain Harris. "Get out there now! Foster, Carson, you too! Round them up and kill them all! I don't want a single person left alive in this place!"
It was depressing how quickly Carson and Foster ran out of the trees and into the village, brandishing their rifles. Already Billy could hear screams of terror as the two men fired into the air.
The captain glared at him.
"Like it or not, lieutenant, you're coming with me," he said, grabbing Billy by the shirt and pulling him along after him as he marched into the village. Billy had no choice but to follow the man, or risk being dragged along behind him in the dirt.
He was released suddenly, and he collapsed onto the dusty ground near one of the villagers' huts. He watched helplessly as the captain ran into the village and seized a fleeing villager by the arm, flinging him to the ground.
Billy struggled to his feet and picked up his assault rifle, which had fallen to the ground. When he straightened up, he saw a woman and three children from the village, one of them just a babe in arms. They were standing stock still in front of him, staring in terror at the gun which, Billy suddenly realised, was pointing right at them.
He moved it hastily, and saw them all breathe out again. The baby started to cry. The other two children still stared at him with wide, scared eyes. The mother looked just as frightened as her children. She said something in a language that Billy didn't understand.
"You have to get out of here," said Billy urgently. "The captain's insane, he's going to kill everyone!"
The family stared at him in incomprehension.
"You have to leave now! Go into the jungle and hide until - until it's safe!" said Billy, pointing to the trees. "Quickly, while you still can!"
More gunfire. Screams in the background. The woman glanced back at the village and saw the other Marines dragging some villagers along by their feet, throwing others to the ground and kicking them viciously in the ribs.
"Please!" said Billy desperately. "Please, just go!"
The woman looked back at him, and this time she seemed to understand. She said something to her children, who nodded, and they started to run for the safety of the treeline. Billy watched them go, praying that nobody would notice their escape.
Nobody did. Mother and children soon disappeared into the trees, melting into the jungle like ghosts.
Billy turned back and saw his comrades and the captain herding the last of the cowering, terrified villagers into a circle at the centre of the village. He ran towards Captain Harris, shouting, pleading, begging him to stop, but the man didn't seem to hear him.
"Fire!" he ordered, and Carson and Foster unleashed a volley of bullets into the helpless group of people.
"No!" yelled Billy, still running. "No, stop! Please!"
Screams, cries as lead pierced sun-darkened skin and bullets ripped through the bodies of the villagers. They raised their arms in a futile attempt to shield themselves, but to no avail. One by one, bodies started to fall to the ground, bleeding, dying or already dead. Blood was darkening the dust and running in little rivers through the cracks in the parched earth.
"No!" Billy shouted, and grabbed his commanding officer's arm to try and stop him from pulling the trigger again. "Stop it! Leave them alone!"
The captain shook him off, and continued firing at the rest of the villagers. Billy, still screaming at him to stop, launched himself at the captain and tried to bring him to the ground. The man staggered, and his finger slipped off the trigger, but then he regained his balance and swung his rifle around -
It struck Billy in the head with a sickening crack. Tumbling to the ground, too stunned even to cry out, the last thing that Billy saw before he passed out was one last, trembling old man standing amid the bloodied corpses of the fallen villagers. A final shot rang out, and the old man fell lifelessly to the ground, blood streaming from his temple.
"No…" whispered Billy, as the darkness closed in around him and the vision faded to black. "No…"