Legal disclaimers: Anything that is directly part of the "Resident Evil" games belong to Capcom and everyone involved in their creation in their relevant ways. Anything else which appears in this story belongs to me. I'm just borrowing the "Resident Evil" set-up for a fictional story and make no claim on anything which isn't mine in any way.
Disclaimers: This is a "Resident Evil" story, so you should know what to expect if you read on from here, i.e. gore, bloodshed and death in large amounts.
Important note: This story is a prequel to Matt6's story "Operation:Falling S.T.A.R.S." focusing on the character of Serena Baccarin. It covers how Chris Redfield came to be discharged from the Air Force and how the two of them connect to Matt6's story. If you want to know more, read the Disclaimers in Chapter One. All Reviews welcomed.
Lost Souls Chapter Two/June 6th 1996, Kamala village, the Kuwait-Iraq border/
Serena Baccarin was not happy, for a variety of reasons. First and foremost, the six men, who were supposed to be professional soldiers all from what she understood, had precisely three minutes to make their rendezvous. There was not the slightest sign of them to be seen, and that was more than simply annoying. She was a professional, when she made plans she kept to them, if the soldiers sent on this mission couldn't understand that little they were off to a /bad/ start. Apart from that, the village was far too small for her to feel comfortable. She could get lost in a crowd, disappear in a mob and never be seen in a group. By herself she slipped in and out of places and lives as though she'd never been there with casual ease. With the villages population barely being above fifty she had much less in the way of options. She couldn't easily disguise her height without constantly adopting a bent-backed posture and walking in a particular way, while her sheer physicality was a significant problem since simple physical presence and her striking looks made people who saw her clearly remember her face.
With her skin darkened, her eyes coloured a dark, dull brown by contact lenses, a veil covering her lower face and a headdress her head, a long dress masking her physical attributes, her make-up and movements making her appear ten years older than she actually was as well as a cripple, she'd done what she could without taking radical measures. It didn't change the fact that she was a stranger in a place where strangers came less than once every ten years, nor did it change the fact that anyone who paid close enough attention with sharp eyes would spot that she was no Arab nor a natural native of the region. She couldn't wait long enough for someone to put the clues together, so if the soldiers didn't turn up on schedule she planned to leave, call it in and see just what "They who must be obeyed" ordered next.
A rumble in the distance caught her attention as sharp ears noticed something amiss, and she almost smiled where no-one could see. Vehicles were non-existent in the village beyond the antique car owned by the village Elder, so a truck engine roaring out loud in the middle of nowhere, coming fast closer, could and should mean only one thing. They were just going to make it, if it was them. Now, if they only remembered the plan about how her Extraction from the village was supposed to go...
*
The first thought Chris Redfield had on seeing the mud huts, small, sand-worn wooden buildings and tiny brick town hall of the village they were heading towards at speed in their battered old truck, was that he'd been wrong, there was worse than the shanty towns he'd seen in Mexico when flying border patrols than sometimes crossed over to guard against Smugglers, illegal immigrants and all other problems that the Border Guard apparently needed help with. The second was that he'd kill for a shower if the village had one, or even a bath if they had a watering hole where people did these things, but he was fantasising and he knew it. He'd done the research like a good little soldier for this one, he knew that these people had to walk miles daily just to get water to live, let alone wash with. The most he could perhaps hope for was a splash of cold water on his face and a quick swallow of tepid traces. Unlike he and the others, who had water stored in cooled flasks that would keep the water cold and reviving for a day easily and refilled whenever they had the opportunity, that was...
The big truck had massive wheels and a powerful engine that drove it through just about any terrain by sheer brute force, they'd been happy to discover. With a big canvas covering over the back section, two-thirds the length of the truck, despite the sweltering heat it also provided some shade for anyone who could stand it, which was just a bit better than sitting in the cab all day, which he'd been doing along with Tom Brown, who had somehow wound up driving, even with the windows wide open and their heads half out of them. The US Rangers Sergeant had looked like he was considering murder when ordered by Mickey Webb, the commanding officer, to drive, but he'd knuckled down and done the job, more because he felt safer with his hands on the wheel than anyone else, Chris strongly suspected. More to the point, he was actually a brilliant driver, Chris had discovered. The only reason they weren't early to the rendezvous was that the truck had broken down, and it had taken a despairing Aaron Bradley ten minutes to fix it as he complained about sub-standard gear, missing parts and a total lack of maintenance that had make the repairs more of attempt at partial reconstruction of the trucks engine than a "Mr. FixIt" quick effort. Chris was quite sure that he hadn't seen Aaron look as happy as when he was working hard on the old truck before or since the event, though, and the truck had run like a dream ever since, outside of a grinding changing of gears.
The dirt road was just that, someone had carved out a direct route to and from the village and driven heavy vehicles up and down it to solidify the dirt into a track. It was the kind of road Chris would have ridden Dirt bikes on as a teenager back in the States, and most certainly wasn't intended as a passage for a big vehicle like the truck, loose sand all over the place making it slippery, dips and ruts making the truck bounce up and down as though gravity wasn't sure what to do, the trucks failing suspension not helping in the least. Tom dealt with it all stoically, however, and had driven like a madman to get them to the village in time regardless of obstacles.
They pulled into the village in a cloud of sand and dust before stopping sharply, right on time by Chris's watch-one which he'd made sure couldn't be traced back to him or the USA should he loose it after repeated warnings. Tom turned the engine off while Chris got out and started to look around, closely followed by Webb, Aaron and Bill Stamper, the small, pale Stamper not looking at all comfortable in the heat and sunlight. It was late in the day, almost seventeen hundred hours, but the sun was still high and the temperature had barely even begun to fall towards the freezing cold of night. All of them were wearing light clothes, trousers, T-shirts, sunhats and soft, open-top shoes, while Webb and Tom were wearing shorts. Suntan cream had been liberally applied as a vital necessity and they were all careful to take their water rations when required. Added to all of their inoculations-as soldiers, they had already been inoculated against almost any disease or pest-transmitted problem they might pick up even in a country like Iraq-they were all keeping healthy and active, although all of them had to be careful not to take too much hard exercise. Tom had driven then rested while Chris drove for a while at points, but had still done the lions share of the work while the others rested in the back.
Once he got clear of the stink of burning exhaust pipes, Chris nearly doubled over and threw up his lunch at the sheer stench of the place. The villagers had no sewers so they threw their waste in the streets, creating a stink that defied description even as it burned its way into the brain for the rest of ones life, while animal dung, rotting wood, the strange smell that Chris couldn't identify but didn't like at all and a slight breeze which mingled all of it together into a rotten cloud and shoved it straight up the nostrils made him go cross-eyed as his eyes began to weep. Naked children ran around in the streets while adults wearing worn and tattered old clothes glared at the pale-skinned newcomers with open distrust and hostility. Chris couldn't blame them, since the war in '91 they'd undoubtedly been through nine kinds of Hell he couldn't even imagine with the imposition of Sanctions by the United Nations and Saddam in charge being increasingly brutal, even by his standards, to maintain his hold on power, but his feeling sympathy for them didn't extend to letting them beat him up or worse. He didn't need to be able to see the future to know that worse was on the way if they stayed here for long, so they needed to get in, find their contact and final team member and get out, fast. Webb, apparently, had seen the same things and drawn an identical conclusion.
"Alright boys, you all got some idea what were here for, so get your asses in gear and start looking. You see anyone or anything, holler. You may not get a second chance if you get it wrong, mind, so be as sure as can be before letting rip" said Webb, deliberately speaking loudly enough for the locals to hear. Knowing that they were American would either buy them a few more minutes from the villagers or start a fight faster, nobody had been quite sure. Webb being Webb, though, he'd gone for the direct approach on the basis that he could handle it if things got out of hand. This was part of the plan, Chris had to remind himself-after all, who would be so stupidly obvious if they were here in an attempt /not/ to be noticed...?
Chris decided that he just maybe wanted to die of old age rather than having his throat slit in his sleep and followed Webb's orders. The problem was he, Aaron, Bill and Webb didn't know who they were looking for in reality, they had just been told very tall, dark and unmistakeably female, give or take a few choice words. Whoever it was would be dressed like a native to the point they would unlikely be able to tell her apart, would not approach them directly to avoid drawing attention to herself of the kind they didn't want and would identify herself with only one English word, "Yes", when asked if she wanted a ride. Intelligence knew that the vast majority of Iraqi's outside of the cities and towns didn't even understand English, let alone speak it, so the decision had been made that this was an adequate "tag" for the agent. However, no-one could control chance, so Chris had discreetly crossed his fingers and hoped for the best when they were being briefed. He didn't believe in God any more, not since a single, careless individual human being had effectively wiped out his family in one terrible, impossible moment...
He scanned the groups of people he was almost confronting, looking for anything at all out of the ordinary while doing his best not to stare. The last thing that he needed was to accidentally offend some native without even realising it and have them come after him with guns, but he didn't know enough about the people to be sure of what was and was not acceptable. All things considered, that just meant that-no surprise there-he'd have to be quick.
Aaron, Bill and Webb were doing much the same thing, but in a different way. Aaron, despite his imposing size, was somehow managing to not seem at all threatening while he almost scuttled amongst the people, glancing left and right like he knew what he was looking for and only had to see it. Bill, looking distinctly uncomfortable in the heat and humidity of the desert, was succeeding in not offending or annoying anyone because no-one would come near him and most wouldn't even look at him, deliberately stepping away in most cases.
Webb, though, was being Webb. Big, broad and loud, he was almost staring down everyone near him as though threatening them to do their worst while the expression on his face made clear that he knew worse. He almost visibly itched to start cracking heads together to get the answers he wanted, and was likely going to in short order regardless of consequences if something didn't happen which let him work off his growing bad temper soon. Chris had decided that he hated the man on the flight into Kuwait from the USA, based on no more than what he'd seen and knew about the man by then, and nothing he'd seen since had done anything to change his opinion. Considering what he was seeing now, he very much doubted anything the man could or would ever say or do would shift his opinion anywhere but downhill, ever. It went a long way to explaining why Webb was along on the mission, in fact.
Moralto's comment about individuals in a mans army, where everyone was told, all of the time, that teamwork, teamwork, teamwork was the key, was all too true where Webb was concerned, to say the very least. The man was a temperamental loose cannon with a serious attitude problem who clearly relished his command and expected everyone to follow his orders as though he had a direct line to God and no-one else had a real military mind. Chris had served under some bad leaders who carried the rank of officer in his time in the Air Force before, but Webb was right up there with the worst of them. The only redeeming factor was that Webb also had to be very, very good at his job in reality to have reached the rank of Colonel in Delta Force.
A figure caught Chris's eye, a strangely bent woman, tall, walked with a limp as though she had a curved back from some old injury. She was standing apart from the crowds, /wasn't/ looking at any of them or the truck, and failed to stand out from anyone else in the village. Instinct told Chris that he was on to something, the same instinct that he had so successfully followed throughout his career, that kept him alive, despite getting him into trouble with his superiors on a regular basis. He'd always listened to it before, he saw no reason to stop now.
He strolled over to the woman as casually as he could, pretended to glance at her back as though assessing her state of health and physical infirmity, then smiled at her. "Want a ride?" he asked, quietly, just loudly enough to be heard, not so loudly that everyone else nearby could hear.
He couldn't see her face, but he got the distinct impression that she momentarily smiled at him. "Yes" she replied, just as softly, in English with a noticeable American accent-put on deliberately, he would later work out. /Score/ he couldn't help but think, already imagining the expression that Webb would have on his face when he discovered that Chris had been the one to find the contact...
*
Serena Baccarin was almost impressed, which was something she hadn't expected. The young soldier had spotted her almost immediately on stepping out of the beaten-up dark-brown painted truck they'd arrived in, while his comrades almost ambled around in a daze. That was excepting the dark-haired loudmouth, of course, but there was always one, and she automatically assumed that such an individual had been sent along for his talents in areas other than common sense. She'd half expected to have to practically wave at them to get their attention, but hadn't had to do anything of the sort, which was a satisfactory result given the efforts of some individuals she'd dealt with. Now she would just have to wait and see what happened next, a good start never meant a perfect follow-through.
The young soldier put a hand around her left upper arm, being careful not to do more than make it look convincing, and gave a very gentle tug to lead her towards the truck, which she made a point of "hesitantly" responding to. The plan was for a group of American "tourists" looking, apparently, for an interpreter and maybe a bit of fun, to roll into the border village without a care in the world, grab a moderately attractive woman who apparently spoke English who was unlikely to put up a struggle and leave in a hurry, before any of the village men became angry. So far, it had gone perfectly, which meant that something was bound to go wrong in her experience.
The young soldier "helped" her into the back of the lorry, where bench seats were set into the sides and a small, closed, pale wooden box sat on the floor. The loud one was the first to join her, followed closely by the big, quiet one and the pale, slim one even as the young soldier climbed back into the cab of the truck. They were ready to go, the truck started and began to move-before it lurched sharply, then came to a dead stop, the sound of the engine dying away abruptly. The whirr of the starter motor sounded, stopped, then sounded again, continually, as Serena's sharp ears began to pick up the sounds of a growing mob approaching the truck over hard earth and soft sand, people evidently being unhappy about the apparent abduction in process... She hoped that this was going to be the only failure of the day, she really did...
*
Tom, whose expression hadn't changed at all, continued to try and start the truck again as the mob began to move towards them from the village. He didn't look or seem worried in the least, probably because he'd been in this situation, or very similar, before, and knew what to do-or so Chris presumed. Chris, for his part, was getting increasingly nervous, and he was becomingly more than a little worried that the mob was going to either wreck the truck, kill its occupants-bar the woman-or both, at the very least. He was too young to die, and had no wish to discover just how inadequate his intimate knowledge of pain was just yet, either. Worst of all, he wasn't even armed, a precaution in case they ran across anyone who they couldn't easily explain their presence to, the guns were held in the closed box in the back. So if the mob did decide to do something, all that he and Tom had available was harsh language in a language their attackers wouldn't understand and any natural gifts, such as hands, feet and head, to hand. As a Special Forces man Tom probably didn't worry about this. Chris, with no more than basic training, little experience and bad attitude to rely on, couldn't help but feel the beginnings of panic...
"Tom, talk to me..." he muttered, trying and failing to keep a tremor of fear out of his voice. He hoped that the other soldier hadn't noticed it, but Tom didn't even appear to be paying attention, concentrating on starting the truck. He replied abruptly, however, with no change of tone or manner evident.
"Sand in the works, I reckon, might need a jump-start. Nip round the back and tell the boys, would you?" said Tom, glancing briefly at Chris to make sure that he understood, apparently. Chris took a second to realise that Tom was serious that he actually get out of the truck, then he leapt out and ran around back. Webb just stared at him as he appeared, with the look on his face suggesting that he'd stepped in more pleasant things. Chris ignored the man, he-/they/ had much bigger problems than Webb's irritation at Chris's apparent inability to follow the simplest of orders, such as "Stay in the truck once we've found the operative until she says otherwise".
"Tom thinks we need a jump-start, there's a mob coming to kill us, so lets /move/!" snapped Chris, making fast "come here" motions with his hand. Aaron, not a man who was short on muscle or brains, leapt out a second later and braced himself against the back of the truck, flexing heavy muscles. Webb literally threw the reluctant Stamper out, the small man landing with a grunt, then jumped out and joined in himself, shooting Chris a look which spoke of trouble later. Chris ignored him, he was well-used to looks from officers like that. Stamper took a moment to stagger to his feet and join in, then Webb slapped the back of the truck, hard enough to cause a noticeable "crack".
"Alright, people, on three... One, two, THREE!" snarled Webb, throwing all of his considerable strength and weight into the effort, just as the others did. Survival tended to override any personal problems anyone had which prevented the job getting done, Chris had noted time after time, and the same was true here, even though the concealed weapons they were carrying would probably have been enough to hold off the mob had the worst really come to the worst. They all strained for a few endless seconds against the trucks dead weight, then it began to move, tires crunching over ground slowly but surely. Tom began trying the starter motor again, but it just whirred unhelpfully-then a cough, followed by a series of coughs sounded, before the trucks engine suddenly roared to life.
Webb vaulted into the back of the truck after taking no more than a step back with ease, Aaron simply lifting himself in with huge arms before he reached back and gave Stamper a hand, practically taking the smaller man right off of the floor with ease. Chris turned and sprinted for the cab, even as the truck started to move-a crack sounded from the cab, then something audibly clanged as it hit the metal front of the truck. Chris slowed down, wondering what was going on...
Tom put the truck in reverse and hit the gas so fast that Chris was nearly bowled right over, forcing him to leap aside as the truck went past him. This gave him an intimate portrait of the closing mob, who were throwing stones they'd gathered at the truck, one of which had cracked the drivers-side windscreen-the rest of which were now being aimed at him. He took off after the accelerating truck, which was still going backwards, at a turn of speed that would have impressed his old High School Coach, who had been of the opinion that Chris only stayed relatively fit and healthy for the girls, never for the challenge, but it barely helped. Rocks went past so close that he felt the air move, while one clipped his arm, drawing a hiss of pain and a trickle of blood as he ran for his life. If they caught him he was dead, no question existed in his mind.
The truck stopped as Tom hit the brakes and shifted to first fast, before he hit the accelerator so hard that the wheels span in the poor traction before they gripped and the truck lurched forwards, veering sharply around to the right as Tom took the fast route far away to safety. Chris threw everything into the last few meters and dove full length, just grabbing hold of the trucks tailboard in time to stop it getting too far away from him, just as a rock hit him high in the back.
He was lucky that the small stone didn't break a rib or two, as it was it blasted the air from his lungs like a Baseball bat to the stomach and the sensations which followed made him feel like he'd been kicked in the head by someone with steel-toed boots, stars and spots flickering across his vision as he almost blacked out. Worst of all, he felt his grip slip and knew that he wouldn't be able to hold on in his condition-a pair of strong hands caught his wrists in an iron grip, and pulled him inside easily, as though his weight and clothes were less than no impediment. He thumped down to the baking wooden floor, hard but not enough to bruise, and, as his vision cleared, he glanced up to see his rescuer, to thank them-and lost his voice as he found himself looking into the somewhat amused eyes of the Operative they'd been sent to meet...
/End of Chapter 2-I know, there's been no action, little bloodshed and no Umbrella/T-Virus/Conspiracy/related problems yet. Patience, this chapter and the first were set-ups for the action and difficulties which lie ahead, of which there will be LOTS. In Chapter 3 things WILL get moving, so you'll just have to wait and see what I have in store. Reviews, please? All comments welcomed/