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61. Claire
Claire sat in her office, staring blankly at the white sheet of paper in front of her. Too many images came into her mind, and it was difficult to isolate one to start working.
"You accept yourself now?"
Claire looked up. Her doppelgänger sat in front of her with her legs crossed and a mysterious smile on her lips.
"Acceptance is not important. If I have all these memories in my head, shouldn't I give them to use?"
"But those will awaken curiosity, and curiosity carries questions. What happens when they start asking you?" her doppelgänger asked. "Will you be able to tell them everything you did to survive?"
"I did what I had to do," Claire said softly.
"We did, but would they understand?"
Claire's pencil stopped. Would they? She wasn't sure if they could ever understand. It was one of those things that you could only understand once that you'd gone through it, but Claire would rather die than allow anyone to suffer what she had to go through.
"I don't expect them to understand," Claire replied weakly.
"Yes, they wouldn't understand why we did it. To them we would look like monsters, right?"
Claire didn't answer. She continued to draw the monsters, feeling a sense of Deja vú: yellow pages stained with blood and dirt, rushed letters, and delirious thoughts.
"You claim you want to go back to protect them, but we know that's a lie."
"I have unfinished business in Blackwell. It is time I go back."
"Vengeance, hatred...anger..." the doppelgänger said. "Promises?"
"They are still there. I know they are. I won't leave them, not again..."
"It's been long. They might be gone, or worse. Will you be willing to do it again?"
"If they're gone, then I should be the one to end it, too."
"From even the greatest of horrors, the irony is seldom absent."
Claire looked at the girl's pale face. Now her hallucinations were quoting Lovecraft on her? She sure had a very peculiar subconscious.
"Maybe you should tell them, you know? Warn them of how much of a monster you are."
"That's not gonna work," Claire said in a whisper. "I can't let them go through that..."
"But they will find out. It is a matter of time. You have no alternative but let them know...let them see."
"There's always an alternative," Claire sighed.
"You're taking them to the devil's lair. They will see what lies within, and our secrets will be revealed. Nothing will change that..."
Claire rubbed her temple, feeling her head hurt. There was an annoying whistle in her ears, making her lose her patience.
"Go away. I need to focus..."
The doppelgänger smiled cryptically, but she didn't move. The girl remained still, sitting on the chair in front of Claire's desk. Claire exchanged looks with the phantom for several minutes, but her staring contest got interrupted by knocks on the door.
Claire looked at the door, and then back the doppelgänger. The girl was gone, leaving an empty chair in her place. The woman took a deep breath and tried to fix the mess on her desk.
"Come in."
As she expected, Leon appeared behind the door, looking gracious as he always did. The agent stepped inside the office and looked around as if he was looking for something.
"Leon? Is something wrong?" Claire asked, taking off her glasses.
"I thought I heard you talk to someone..."
Claire cursed in her insides. Leon had heard her speak to her doppelgänger, now she needed a good excuse or Leon would think she was crazy.
"Oh, that. I do it a lot. Scientist habit, you know. Saying stuff out loud helps when you are thinking."
That was a half-lie. A lot of people liked to say their ideas out loud when they were thinking. It did help, but Claire had not been doing that.
"Right," Leon said, but Claire could see that he didn't believe it. Thankfully, the agent didn't press the matter.
He approached her and stared at the papers over the table as he leaned over the desk. Claire wasn't an artist, she knew that she lacked that talent, but her drawings weren't that bad. At least, she could feel some pride from it. She had only learned to draw that kind of art because her major in University had been biology.
"What are all these?" Leon asked, picking up one of the papers from her desk.
He had taken the sketch of the Howler. He wasn't the prettiest of her works, but Leon seemed quite impressed by her work.
"Told you I was gathering intel," Claire smiled. "That one is the easiest to handle. They aren't very smart or fast, but they are quite resilient."
"You drew this?" Leon asked.
"I took Scientific Drawing when I was in University. It was an elective course for biology," Claire said. "I am not an expert, but I am decent."
"These are really good, Claire."
"Thanks," Claire answered, with a smile. "I don't think my professor ever expected me to use his lessons to draw BOWs, though."
"I am pretty sure he'd be proud. How many are they?"
"Many, unfortunately, probably more than I can catalog. Blackwell was a testing facility," Claire answered.
Claire could recount for the ones she had met, but there were many sections of the hunting grounds that she hadn't visited, so there were many specimens that she had not met. Besides that, she'd left the island for several months now, there were probably new creatures as well.
"Not all of them were successful cases. I saw many people turn into monsters in front of me; some were people I had never spoken to, some others were friends. It didn't matter in the end. One way or another, they were gone."
She had seen innocent succumb and turn into abominations; she had seen those abominations kill innocent people, and she had killed many of those abominations. Some who had once been friends of her at some point.
"Sometimes the right decisions are ugly, and sometimes...they are the hardest to understand."
Her doppelgänger was back. The girl was standing by the bookshelf with her back facing them. It was as if she was reading the titles of the books.
"If the time came, would they understand what you had to do?"
"I know it is hard," Leon said, catching Claire's attention once again. "I understand you are doing this to help us, but if it's torturing you, you don't have to do it. You already did enough with the regression therapy and by offering to accompany Chris into the island. You don't have to do this."
"Don't I? Sometimes, I feel like I am the one who has all the clues," Claire answered. "I can't shut it only because I am scared of it, can I?"
"Being scared is normal, Claire. That doesn't make you less brave than you have always been," Leon tried to soothe her. "You were way braver than me when we met at Racoon City, and you still are, Claire."
She'd never felt brave. Back then, at Raccoon City, all she had tried to do was survive and protect Sherry. A lot of the things she'd done were the product of teenage naiveness and adrenaline.
"It hasn't been too different now that we are older, has it? Once more you fought to survive, and once more, you had something you wanted to protect. I guess some things never change."
Claire ignored the doppelgänger's voice and chuckled half-heartedly.
"Are you using your charm with me, Leon?"
"Maybe," the blonde answered, giving her a bright smile.
Something about Leon's company seemed to soothe her, making her forget the situation and making her feel like she could live in a happy world where she didn't have to worry about viruses and terrorists. Of course, that utopia would soon fade, but that didn't make Claire feel less grateful to the man's affection. Affections that she would have never ever believed would come to exist.
"The worst part of it is that it is working," Claire said, locking her arms around his neck, and Claire felt him wrap his arms around her waist.
The sense of his touch was comforting in too many ways.
"Well, good for me," Leon smiled, resting his forehead against hers, kissing her delicately.
Claire would have never phantom the idea of kissing Leon, but it was funny how things could easily change. Kissing felt natural and perfect as if it was something she had done all her life. Claire wasn't a romantic, her experiences had taught her that romance only existed inside books and fairytales, but she felt like a romantic in Leon's arms.
"We shouldn't be kissing when we are working," Claire chuckled, ignoring the blush she felt in her cheeks.
"Why not?" Leon smirked. "You need a break once in a while."
"I just came back from a break," Claire laughed.
"I'm not telling anyone that."
"Dork. Wallace is going to throw a tantrum when he checks the security feed," Claire said, nudging her head at the camera. That was a lie. The man already knew, and after an overdramatic act, he congratulated her and wished her the best.
"Yeah, he had a crush on you, right? Well, maybe he should know you're taken."
"You are lucky Chris doesn't check my security feed, or you'll be in trouble."
"Who knows," Leon smirked. "That might actually help me break the news on him."
"Oh, no. Chris would lose it if he finds out like that, and he might kill you. I hope my boyfriend won't die at my brother's hands..."
"Husband," Leon corrected, kissing her hand. "You still have the ring."
She had a ring, but it was a fake ring. However, she couldn't help but wish it wasn't.
"Isn't it supposed to be fake?"
"The papers are signed. I think it is pretty valid."
"You're terrible, Leon."
"You already knew that."
Claire slapped his arm and laughed. Their playful exchange was interrupted by a gentle knock on the door.
"I guess Wallace came to check?" Leon whispered in her ear, and she rolled her eyes.
"Come in," Claire said, trying to step back from Leon, but the agent's arms were reluctant to let her go. The door opened, and Hiwamura stepped into the office. The medic gave Claire a meaningful look that made Claire's face redden even more.
"Sorry to interrupt, lovebirds," Hiwamura said, smirking.
"Hey, took you long enough. I thought you wouldn't come today at all." Claire said, ignoring the medic's giggles.
"Yeah, I am just checking in with you. I'm heading back to Terra Save-HQ in a bit."
Claire nodded. TerraSave didn't have many members in their medical forces, and considering the number of attacks, Claire was not surprised that Saya was busy. Part of her felt annoyed that she could jump in and assist them.
"How bad is the situation?" Claire asked.
"Bad," Hiwamura sighed. "BSAA took care of the monsters, I think, but there were too many casualties and injuries. Terra Save is doing what it can, but I'm afraid we are not enough."
"That's bad news. Anything we can do to help on our side," Leon asked.
"No, DSO is pretty out of it right now." Hiwamura answered, "You guys should stay out of it. For all we know, they are trying to lure Claire out by doing all this."
Lure. They didn't need lures when they were alphas in the game. Claire herself was an alpha, she could easily sense the presence of another alpha if it were nearby, so if Mobius wanted to catch her, they didn't need to put such an act.
No, there were other reasons behind the attacks. Reasons that Claire could only speculate.
"No, they don't need to do that to get me. Alphas would easily track me down. If they wanted me, they would be right over us now."
"So the attacks have nothing to do with you," Hiwamura said. "That's a relief. I need to get back to TerraSave. We don't have enough hands, but I got you this. I figured you could play miracles with it."
Hiwamura walked to Claire's desk and put a small tin canister on the flat surface: a biosafety container. Claire looked at her friend with a dubious look.
"BSAA took the bodies, saying they would dispatch them, but I managed to take this with me when they weren't looking."
"Why didn't BSAA send the bodies our way?" Claire asked.
Chris had made sure that all the monsters were sent to Claire's lab to be identified and run tests on the creatures, so she was surprised to hear that the organization had taken the bodies somewhere else.
"That's a good question," Hiwamura said. "I don't know. Maybe they thought the DSO was busy, who knows, ask your brother."
"We just talked this morning," Claire said. "He didn't even mention it."
Claire looked at the canister. She took it and spun it in her hands.
"Is it from an alpha?" Claire asked.
"I don't know. I just picked up the ugliest one," Hiwamura shrugged. "Those are your favorite, aren't they?"
Claire rolled her eyes. She opened the canister and took out the thin sample tube, and examined it closely. The blood inside was dark, almost black, and too thick to be human, but its appearance wasn't the only thing that gave out its origin to Claire.
It was its scent. Even inside the tube, Claire could sense the acrid smell of the monsters. It was a skill that she had unlocked with the return of her memories. She had unlocked many abilities with that hypnosis session, and her improved sense of smell was the least unpleasant of most.
"What's wrong?" Leon asked.
"This is a beta," Claire said. "Did BSAA get the alpha?"
"I wouldn't know. This one gave them problems, however," Hiwamura replied. "They lost several men trying to kill it."
"This one is a pure beta. It has at least 72h of infection. For such a good one, the alpha had to be an almost perfect one. He or she would look normal unless it mutated." Claire said. "Where is this from?"
"A recent attack on a suburban town called Poppy Hills. It seems BSAA has it under control now..."
The chances for the alpha to still be alive were high, and Poppy Hills was too far for her to try to sense it.
"No, if they didn't get the alpha, the attack isn't under control. The alpha will infect new betas, and the attack will continue," Claire said. "have people been evacuated?"
"Yes, survivors had been taken to TerraSave shelters. Why?"
Was the alpha hiding among the survivors? It was a long shot. The last two alphas had been unstable, and none of them had been conscious enough to act or move like normal people, so there was no way that this one was any different.
"I'm just...paranoid..." Claire replied, "Forget about it. I'll take a look at this, but Saya."
"Yeah?"
"Be careful..."
"Of course. I am always careful," Hiwamura smirked."I'll see you around. You two behave, would you?"
Saya winked at them mischievously before leaving and closing the door behind her. The medic had not said anything, but Claire got the insinuation loud and clear. The brunette rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to the blood sample.
A beta sample could give clues of the virus mutation, but it wasn't as pure as an alpha's, so the virus would not be 100% infectious. T-Lyssa and T-Morpheus' mechanism was far more complicated than she'd expected, but perhaps she would get a little more info once she visited Blackwell.
"Claire?"
"What?" Claire said, startled. "Sorry, I spaced out. Give me a minute, alright? I'm going to prepare this sample real fast, and I'll be back with you."
Claire smiled at Leon as she headed to the lab to work on the new sample. Leon followed her, and the agent stayed behind her watching her work from afar. The man was silent, but Claire was aware of his gaze following her wherever she went, and that made her feel a little self-conscious.
When Claire finished her task and put things in order in the lab, she felt Leon hug her from behind. The gesture made her smile, and she leaned into his arms as he kissed the top of her head.
Part of her felt that she shouldn't be doing it. There was no time for romance when a potential biohazard was around the corner, but she was human and, as corny as it sounded, in love.
"Finished?" Leon asked.
"Yes, just in time, because I need to get my medicine..."
"I know, I prepared it for you."
"Wow, that's thoughtful of you," Claire snorted, turning to see him. "Are you my nurse now?"
"I could be," Leon chuckled. "I was afraid you would miss a dose, so I thought I should prepare it."
"Thanks," Claire smiled, hugging him.
"No need to thank me, so...how about you take it and we can head home? Perhaps we can have a romantic dinner?"
"Romantic dinner?" Claire asked, taking the syringe and preparing to use it. "What's the occasion?"
"Do we need one?"
"One would think that yes," Claire replied. "Romantic dinners aren't an everyday thing."
"I'll think of one on the way."
Claire patted him with amusement and the pair stepped out of the lab. To their surprise, they came almost face to face with Helena, who seemed to have come looking for them.
"Well, good timing. Are you done?" Helena said, and Claire nodded.
"More or less," Claire answered, "at least with what I could do today. Did you need us?"
"Not really," Helena shrugged. " Chambers just left, so I figure it was about time for you to be done, too. I came to check on you."
"Oh, sorry," Claire said, tilting her head. "Was I keeping you?"
"What?" Helena said, surprised. She then let out a scoff and shook her head. "Oh no, on the contrary. I was afraid that Leon was distracting you or getting in the way of your work, so I thought I could come and take him off your shoulders."
"I wouldn't distract her, unnecessarily," Leon defended himself. "Only if I thought she needed a break."
"That's a poor excuse, Leon," Helena replied teasingly. She turned to Claire and gave her a meaningful look. "That's why you shouldn't bring your husband to work."
Claire laughed. She wasn't that stupid not to know that Helena's random banter was meant to cheer her up. Maybe she thought the whole situation about going back to the island would put her in a hard place. Claire was lucky to have such good friends.
"Even if we are putting them in danger?"
"Well, it will please you to know that Leon was well behaved, and he didn't distract me from my duties," Claire said between chuckles. "Shall we head home?"
"Sure. We can get dinner on the way."
The trio made their way to the office area, where Wallace was still sitting in his cubicle, eating what seemed to be a sandwich.
"Leaving already?" he asked when he saw them.
"Yeah, how did the tournament go?" Claire asked as she put some things on her desk.
"I am in the top 10. Heading to semifinals tonight."
"Oh, good for you," Claire snorted.
"Ah, also..." Wallace said, taking out a folder from his cabinet. "I figure you would want this."
Claire took the folder and began looking through it. They were autopsy reports; autopsies that she had not done.
"What's this?"
"The BSAA reports on the last two attacks," Wallace replied. "I found it a little suspicious that they hadn't asked us to do it, so I might have checked."
"You hacked into BSAA?"
"I just went sightseeing. Seriously, they should hire a new cybersecurity team. That system is shitty as hell."
Claire frowned at him and put the folder in her bag.
"You'll be getting into trouble."
"Nope, I will only get into trouble if, and only if, they find out I was there. Which they won't," Wallace replied. He winked at her and leaned back in his chair. "I don't know about the biological information, but there's certainly something fishy about those files."
"Fishy?" Leon asked. "What do you mean?"
"Aside from the fact that they didn't ask us to do it?" Wallace asked, "the reports were sent directly to the chief office instead of someone from the science department. Usually, they would want a researcher to look into it before letting the head look at it, right? Isn't it unusual that they'd send the raw data to an administrator?"
Wallace was right. The usual procedure at the BSAA was that the administrative department was the end of the line. Most of the members in that department, to not say all of them, had no background in science, so reading the raw report from the autopsy would be confusing to them.
"Let's not take rushed conclusions. I'll ask Chris later," Claire sighed. "We are going home now. Take a break, Wallace. Too much gaming can't be healthy."
"Never is too much gaming," Wallace replied. "Have a good night and see you tomorrow."
The traffic was fluid, and the snow was all over the city. Claire was looking at the street through the window. It was New Year, but for Claire and her loved ones, it was a non-existent holiday between one crisis and another, te
Claire couldn't deny that she was feeling a bit disappointed. She had hoped for a quiet holiday season with all her friends, but Mobius had taken it upon himself to destroy those hopes.
"People are all in a festive mood," Helena commented. "I feel like I should be festive, but I just don't feel it."
"I know that feeling," Claire nodded. "You see everyone so happy, and then you remember that somewhere else is under attack and all comes crumbling down."
"Yeah, that makes you think, huh?" Helena sighed.
They didn't talk for the rest of the trip as everyone seemed quite thoughtful and melancholy after the mention of the new year, and the road was silent up until they arrived at the apartment complex. Claire suggested that Helena spent the new year with her and Leon, but the agent politely declined the invitation, saying that she had plans for the night.
Claire didn't inquire. There was a hint of sadness in Helena's voice, so Claire and Leon said their goodbyes and left Helena at her apartment before heading to theirs.
Their apartment. It still sounded weird, and it made Claire feel funny.
"I guess I have an excuse for that romantic dinner," Leon said, hanging his coat on the coat rack, and Claire dropped on the couch to pet Midnight.
"What?" Claire asked, looking at him in confusion.
"I told you I'd find an excuse on the way."
"You just thought that up, didn't you? Otherwise, you would have used that as an excuse earlier..."
"Honestly," Leon sighed. "I had forgotten the date. The new year isn't a holiday I've celebrated in years."
"I know you are busy, but isn't that too much?" Claire said, putting the cat on the ground and walking to the kitchen for a glass of water. "Didn't you visit your family?"
"DSO duties were demanding, so I only visit once or twice when I'm free, and those occasions aren't always on holidays."
"That's sad," Claire sighed. "Well, if it wasn't for me, I guess Chris would have been the same."
"I can believe it, considering how you were with Christmas."
"All things considered," Claire said, leaning against the breakfast table with the glass in her hands. "I am a little old-fashioned. There's a magic in holidays that, no matter how bad things are, makes everything get forgotten for a while during the holidays."
Claire said. Perhaps it was a bad example, considering that their holidays had been ruined by her problems.
"I know it might not apply to us," Claire admitted, "but when I worked at TerraSave, I remember when we had those great holiday parties for our refugees. It made them all happy despite their situation, so it was contagious."
"And yet, you spent your holidays alone."
"Like I said," Claire sighed. "It might not apply to us, but in my defense, I might have been alone, but I always called Chris."
Leon snorted. He opened the refrigerator and took out the ingredients for dinner as he spoke.
"I believe you. Sorry that you won't have your loneliness this year."
"I can't complain," Claire chuckled, picking the knife and helping him dice the vegetables. "Having some company isn't a bad thing."
Claire winked at him, and Leon let out a snort.
The year was coming to a close. That fact was taking some effort to sink in. For Claire, it was an odd sensation since she had lost eight months trapped Blackwell. Eight months in which she had jumped between sanity and delusions.
"Time that has been lost can't ever be recovered."
Her doppelgänger was sitting in the living room with her legs crossed and her head slightly tilted.
"Lost time is lost forever..." Claire whispered with her doppelgänger.
"What?" Leon asked.
Claire had spoken unconsciously. It'd been a whisper, but with Leon standing so close, he would have heard her.
"Nothing," Claire quickly replied. "I was reminiscing about my achievements this year."
Claire had intended the comment to sound good-naturedly, but it had come to a lot more sarcastic and bitter than she'd intended.
"Sorry, that was uncalled."
"No, not at all. It's understandable," Leon answered, putting down the knife and dropping the vegetables in the pan. He didn't say anything for a while, and it seemed as if he was deep in thought. "You missed eight months, but it wasn't your fault."
"I know. It's just frustrating to think that the year is ending, and I pretty much did nothing useful for the world."
"Oh, you did something useful for the world," Leon replied sheepishly. "You married me."
Claire looked at him in disbelief and found Leon laughing. She sighed and slapped him in his arm.
"Oh, stop. Our situation hardly counts as that."
"As I have told you before, the papers are there, it's a matter of how we see it, and I have no problems seeing you as my wife."
Claire almost dropped the bowl she'd just taken from the shelf.
Had she heard wrong, or could that be even considered some sort of proposal? No, she had to be overthinking it.
"You're teasing me again," Claire said, turning away to mix the salad so that Leon wouldn't see her blush.
Leon chuckled, but he didn't say anything else and continued with his task. They finished preparing dinner and sat down to eat while talking about more amiable topics. Claire couldn't help but think that they really were like a real marriage.
She remembered her parents being like this, too, and the feeling warmed her heart. Then suddenly, she felt a stabbing pain in her head, and she let out a groan.
"Claire?"
She heard Leon's voice as if it was very distant, so she barely understood his words. At first, it felt like a relapse, but then she heard the soft whistle. It was guttural, low, and it sent shivers into Claire's gut.
"Claire!"
Leon's voice was closer now, and she felt his grip on her shoulders, but Claire couldn't react. The whistle and the oppressive sensation had sent the whole system into alert. She could feel adrenaline starting to build up, urging her to run. It was her automated reaction, a preconditioned behavior that she'd developed to survive many months ago.
"It's calling... and it is close," her doppelgänger said, looking outside the balcony. "Very close."
"Claire. What is it? Do you need the injection?"
"No," she replied, trying to push away the sickening sensation.
Her stay at Blackwell had taught her how to tune out the "call", as they called it. All alpha forms, perfect and failed, could sense and communicate to each other through low-frequency waves. It worked similarly to how elephants and whales could send sound signals through long distances, but somehow, the viral mutation complicated the mechanism in so many ways. After being hunted and chased by monsters during experiments, Claire had eventually learned that the communication also created some link between sender and receiver. That link could mean death. If she could break that connection, the other party wouldn't be able to find her, but on the downside, she wouldn't be able to track it either.
"No, Leon, it's not that," Claire replied, taking deep breaths. She wasn't in the mood to beat around the bush, so she just blurted out the answer. "There's an Alpha BOW nearby."
Leon's expression darkened as he processed her words.
"Here?" Leon asked. "In the building?"
"One mile to the south. It seems it hasn't found us. We can shut it down, but as soon as we close the communication, we will lose track of it," her doppelgänger turned to her, and her lips curled into a sheepish smile.
"No, it's not here yet, but it is close by," Claire replied, rubbing her temple. "One mile south, I think..."
"One mile?" Leon said. L
Leon's expression was conflicted, but he said nothing, picking his tablet and scrolling through the city map.
"There are only houses in that area; this could be bad..."
Houses. Families gathered together to celebrate the new year. It was the recipe for a tragedy. From all the places to attack, did it have to be a residential area?
They had to do something before it happened.
"But what can you do? Let it find you?"
"Is there any civilian-free area nearby?" Claire asked.
If Leon found the sudden question weird, he didn't show it. He looked through the city map silently.
"There is a forest area to the west of the residential area. Why?"
Wilderness. It wasn't the greatest spot, but it was good enough.
"I'll lead it there," Claire replied. "If we tell Chris, they might be able to intercept it and stop it before it causes too much damage. It will be better if we can lure it away from the houses, right?"
"Wait, what?" Leon said, "What do you mean "lead" it?"
"I'll explain later," Claire sighed. "How fast can you drive without making us crash?"
Maybe the joke was uncalled, but it served its purpose as she saw Leon smirk.
"Don't patronize me, Claire."
"I don't," Claire snickered, "but you don't have the best record at driving under pressure."
Leon snorted. The mood seemed to lighten up with the exchange, and he stepped away to call Chris.
"That's a risky bet," her doppelgänger said, stepping by her side. "Many might get hurt. Chris, Barry, Helena, Leon..."
Claire frowned. It'd be a lie if she said she didn't know it was dangerous, but what else could she do? If they didn't do anything, the BOWs would massacre so many innocent people. She couldn't live with that outcome, knowing that she had- even if it was small- a chance to prevent it.
The auburn-haired girl rushed to her room and rummaged in her back, retrieving a square tin box.
"Oh, I know what you plan to do..."
"You are in my head," Claire said, opening the box and retrieving a pair of steel syringes. She made herself a tourniquet and began extracting blood from her arm. "There's nothing in my head that you won't know."
"There are easy ways to do it."
"I won't let it bite me. I won't go through that again."
Claire released the tourniquet and secured the syringes in a safety case. She was watching the locked tube with a frown when Leon knocked at the door and opened it.
"Chris and his team are on their way."
"Good, let's go then."
Claire had to give Leon some credit. She could see the sea of questions that popped inside of the agent's mind. However, like the professional he was, Leon pushed them aside to focus on the current situation. Helena was already awaiting them in the parking lot, and Claire felt another pinch of guilt.
"We could have done this alone, you know?"
"I still don't get your plan, Claire," Leon said. "How exactly are you planning to lure it?"
"I will come to me."
"You sound sure," Helena replied. "But what if it doesn't?"
"It will," Claire sighed. "All alpha's share a connection. It's too difficult to explain now, but that alpha is probably after me. That's why it came, all I have to do is let it know where I am, and it will come."
"Wait, what?" Helena said with surprise. "What do you mean?"
"I'll explain later," Claire sighed. She turned to Leon and looked at him with a frown, "I'll let it know where I am. It will chase after us, so you will have to be careful to avoid them..."
Leon looked at her with a questioning frown, but Claire didn't give him time to ask. The woman took a deep breath and put down all the walls she'd built to keep the invasive consciousness of the BOW find her. The hit was hard. Claire's back curved, and she let out a soft moan as the wave of sensations hit her. The buzzing in her ears made her dizzy, but she could feel the connection. It was there. It felt like an electric current overloading Claire's nervous system.
"It found us..." her doppelgänger smirked. "Here's where the fun begins."
"Claire!" Leon grunted in alarm.
"It's nothing," Claire replied, as she tried to lead the BOWs to the hills. "Keep driving. The BOWs are heading our way. We should find Chris's group before the monsters catch up with us."
There was an unpleasant feeling about the familiarity she felt with the "connection." It was only natural since she had relied on that ability to survive during the eight months of captivity, but it wasn't a happy memory.
The last couple of months of blessed ignorance had made her skills a little rusty, but body memory was a help. After some painful minutes, her instincts had kicked in, and her body had adjusted to the overload of stimuli. All that was left was a strange numbing sensation.
"You are pale," Helena said. "Are you feeling okay?"
"Yeah, it's been a while since I...did this. I had forgotten how sickening it could be, but I am fine now."
"What exactly do you mean with this?" Leon asked.
"It will sound crazy, but do you remember that I told you the virus gave its host the ability to perceive fellow infectees?"
"I remember you mentioning it, yes. Why?"
"It's a link between us. It's like a way of communication, similar to what some animals in nature do. We can sense each other through low-frequency waves, and that's how we can find each other and even communicate if we want to. That's how I knew about that BOW in the first place. I think it was calling for me, but I am not sure."
"Calling for you? Why?"
"Animals interact under two premises," her doppelgänger whispered. "Or they want to kill, or they want to breed...right?"
Claire shook her head, disgusted by both ideas.
"I don't know. It could be anything. Alphas' mental functioning isn't always reasonable..."
And that applied to herself, too. Claire thought.
"Wait, but if that's the case," Helena said. "Are you putting yourself as the lure?"
"Yeah, it's my fault, to begin with; I am still dealing with remembering all the shit that happened on the island, and I forgot to conceal myself. That alpha was searching for me when I cut off that link, and as a result, it went for the residential area instead of the apartments. It was my mistake, so I should rectify it, no?"
"Claire, that's not your fault."
"Yeah, if you want to blame someone, it should be Mobius," Helena nodded.
Claire smiled at them. They sure were supportive.
"Leon! Watch out!" Claire cried out.
A large shadow jumped in front of them. The creature had an elongated body with a small head. The face was absent, except for its mouth and its arms were long and bony, ending in a set of long and sharp claws. The monster was hunched in all fours, causing its back to arc in a hump.
Leon spun the wheel and managed to avoid the creature. He let out a grunt and stepped on the gas pedal, speeding up. The monster let out a howl and began to give them chase like a dog chasing a car.
"What the fuck?" Helena groaned.
"That's ... ah..."
Claire grabbed her head when she felt a nauseating feeling hit her, but she pushed it aside and looked up.
Leon was driving almost at 130 km/h, and the BOW was chasing behind them for a very short distance.
"Shit, that thing is fast," Helena said, looking behind them.
"You don't say," Leon grunted. "Hold tight. The road will get bumpy."
Bumpy would have been an understatement. Leon did a sudden turn, leaving the highway and entering a gravel road that led into a forested area. The car jumped with the unevenness of the road.
"How far are we from the reunion point?" Helena asked, looking behind them.
"Close. Only about 750 m."
"Well, those will be the longest 750m of our lives," Helena growled. "I lost the thing."
"What?" Leon asked.
"I don't know. It must have jumped to the trees. I don't see it and..."
Helena didn't get to finish her sentence. A crash echoed overhead as something heavy hit the roof of the vehicle. Leon managed not to lose control of the car, but that did not improve their situation. The monster's sharp claws penetrated the car roof cutting through the metal and causing a horrible screeching sound.
Helena tried to shoot the creature, but her efforts seemed to be fruitless. The bullets did not do significant damage to the monster, and it kept making its way through the ceiling.
"Fuck!" Helena groaned.
"Hold on to something," Leon shouted.
Suddenly, Leon stepped on the breaks. The car's speed and the sudden stop made them launch forward. The monster fell off, hitting a large tree in front of them with a loud crack. The impact would have been enough to kill any living thing, but Claire knew it was still alive.
Leon threw the car in reverse before the monster recovered from the crash and headed down another alternate path. The alternate route was much less friendly than the main route. It was dark and full of ice, rocks, and branches that slammed into the car as they sped through the forest.
Suddenly, something crashed into the car from the side, causing it to go off the road and hit some trees.
"Shit," Leon cursed. "Is everyone alright? Claire?"
"I'm fine," Claire mumbled, "But there are other things to worry about."
Claire released her seatbelt with her eyes on the window. It was dark, and if it weren't for her enhanced senses, she wouldn't be able to see the BOW that had hit them.
"Crap," Leon said, taking out his gun. "Out, now..."
"Agree with that..." Helena mumbled.
Running was a great idea, but would it do any good? This monster was an alpha form. It was more than safe to say that the BOW was a thousand times faster than them.
"It wants us, not them. You know that…"
Leon and Helena were at a disadvantage, but Claire was not. She was its target, but she knew how to deal with them, so Claire decided to take a leap of fate. Before Leon and Helena could react, Claire had jumped out of the car and started running into the darkness of the forest.
Claire ran through the forest, feeling the adrenaline rush through her bloodstream. It was like deja vu: the cold, the darkness, the sense of alarm and urgency, and the need to survive.
The BOW suddenly appeared in front of her, blocking her path. However, Claire dropped to the floor, slid under it before it could react. She stood back up and stared at the hideous monster. The blind creature could not see her, but it didn't need to. Claire saw its mouth move as it sniffed the air, searching for her.
"Do...not...escape...me..."
Claire had begun to step back, slowly, but stopped in her tracks. It had spoken. Mutated alphas didn't talk. The mutation destroyed most of their mental functioning, leaving only their innate animal instinct.
"Oh, maybe we have more in common with this one than we thought..." her doppelgänger whispered.
"Mine, you..." the monster hissed. "Be...lflower..."
Claire's eyes widened in shock. There was someone who had given her that nickname long ago. The name had no affectionate meaning. It was a depraved gesture of provocation, or so Claire remembered it. The words didn't wake any warm feeling in her, just an intense disgust.
Suddenly, almost as if Claire was watching a movie, the image of a file appeared in the woman's mind. Jacob McMillan was a 45 years old patient in Blackwell. He'd been previously condemned for sexual assault and manslaughter, but he'd been declared mentally ill, so instead of being sent to jail, he ended up in a psychiatric asylum. His diagnosis was hypersexuality, erotophilia, and borderline personality with mild bipolar tendencies. The man had developed a nasty interest in Claire. She'd overheard that Jacob's victims had all been brown-haired women with clear blue eyes, and unfortunately, Claire fit that description uncannily.
The last time she'd known Jacob, he had been transferred to another wing of the asylum due to misconduct. At that time, the man was still human-looking, even if he was a brutal beast within.
"Mine...mine..." he kept hissing, "You...mine..."
"Even as a monster, his human desires are still flowing strong. Pathetic," the doppelgänger said.
The BOW was breathing heavily, savoring the air. The gesture reminded her of the nasty tick he had when he was still human. The man had many clashes with Claire during her captivity, most of them inappropriate. The man had tried several times to have his way with her, but Claire wasn't one of his victims, and she had defended herself in a way that she knew Chris would have been proud of her. Those incidents earned her several punishments, but she didn't regret it. Jacob had already assaulted some other patients, and the asylum staff never did anything about it. The simple thought made Claire's blood boil.
The mutated Jacob moved its head from one side to another. It knew Claire was close to him, but he didn't seem to know where. He hadn't moved even though Claire was only a couple of steps away from him, which made Claire frown with distrust.
A fully developed alpha would have easily located her only by using the connection unless she blocked it, but she wasn't. If Jacob couldn't find her, it was clear that he wasn't used to doing it. That could only mean that he had turned only recently, and that would also explain why he still could use human speech.
The realization put a bitter taste on Claire's mouth. If he had recently turned, maybe there was a chance to reverse the mutation, but did he deserve that? Jacob McMillan was a nasty criminal who had done awful things.
Claire's distraction was a big mistake. She barely managed to avoid one of the BOW's sharp claws, but the sudden move made her slip. She fell flat in the snow as the mutated Jacob hunched over her.
Claire rolled over, avoiding the BOW's sharp claws, and tried to get up, but the snow made it difficult, and she stumbled down again.
"Mine... Bellflower," Jacob hissed in a guttural growl. Claire could feel the acrid breath on her face as the mutated monster snuffed her. It was Jacob's habit, a nasty and disgusting ritual that he did. Even as a monster, his sickening ways remained.
Claire reached out for the syringes inside her pocket, it would be difficult to do it, but she had to try. If only she had a distraction.
Suddenly, gunshots filled and broke the silence. Jacob winced with the impact. The monster staggered, stepping away from Claire, and she noted that its wounds healed slower than other BOWs she'd confronted before.
The mutated Jacob let out a cry of fury at the interruption. The monster forgot about Claire for a moment as it roared menacingly at Leon and Helena, who stood several feet from her with their guns raised. Claire took the opportunity to pull out one of the syringes and drive it into the back quarters of Jacob's misshapen body. The BOW let out a cry and began to squirm, giving Claire a chance to get away to a safe distance.
Almost immediately, she felt someone pick her up and hold her tightly.
"Claire, god, don't ever do that again," Leon said. She could hear the relief in his voice. "Are you hurt?"
"No, I am fine," Claire replied, turning back to the mutated Jacob.
The BOW had fallen to the ground like an ill dog. Its chest went up and down in heavy breaths. Her version of the virus was deadly to other infected. Claire had figured that out halfway through her captivity, so she resorted to it whenever it was an emergency.
Her infection was painful to other alpha carriers. The virus literally devoured the infected tissue. Depending on the infection rate, the damage was significantly more or less. She should have felt bad for Jacob, but part of her thought that he had it coming.
Helena's gun was still pointing at the twitching creature, but she looked away for a moment to check on Claire with concern, but seeing that she was safe with Leon, the woman's eyes returned to the decadent monster.
"Is it...dead?" Helena asked
"No, not yet," Claire replied. Jacob was in pain, that was certain, but Claire wasn't entirely sure that it would die. Physically, it seemed like it was fully mutated, but perhaps it still had some hopes of surviving.
The thought gave her conflicted feelings.
"It isn't fully transformed," Claire said. "I injected it a sample of my blood. My virus is taking apart the one in his bloodstream. There's a dim chance he might survive."
"Your...blood?" Leon asked, turning to her.
Claire looked at Leon. A thousand questions ran through his face, but he didn't get a chance to voice them. The silence of the night was interrupted by the sudden arrival of Chris and his companions. Chris's eyes traveled from Claire and Leon to the agonizing monster on the snow and frowned.
"You're late," Claire sighed, sounding mocking and accusing. Her comment broke the tension in the air, and she almost saw Chris smirk when he approached her.
"Sorry, we found some resistance on the way. I had to leave Jill to deal with the aftermath so that I could meet with you," Chris said, looking at his sister. "What happened here? Is everyone alright?"
"We are fine," Claire asked. "You found the rest of them?"
"Yeah," Chris replied. "They were lurking, exactly where you told us. They were, unusually, easy to dispose of, though."
"There were more?" Leon asked.
"Yeah, not as many as usual. Three. With this one," Chris said, pointing at Jacob, "four. Is it still alive?"
"For now," Caire replied, "All of them are new alphas. I don't think they turned too long ago."
"How do you know that?" Chris asked.
Claire pointed at Jacob without much energy.
"I know him, and he kind of recognized me..."
"Friend of yours?" Helena asked, and Claire scoffed with irony.
"More like a depraved, stalker admirer..." Claire sighed. "His name is Jacob McMillan, a Scottish criminal committed for sexual offenses and manslaughter. He was a patient of Blackwell..."
The implication of Claire's first comment and the identity of the BOW seemed to dawn on them. Leon and Chris made a visible grimace of disgust and anger while Helena glared at the twitching creature.
Jacob let out a painful cry. It squirmed and stopped moving, and Claire knew that it had died.
"Send it to my lab," Claire told Chris. "We will want to look into how it died."
"Yeah, of course," Chris answered. He gave his men some instructions and turned back to them. "So, care to explain how the hell did you get the tip of these monsters?"
Leon looked at Claire. So Leon hadn't told Chris the details. The agent probably thought that she should be the one to explain it to him.
"That's a long story..." Claire sighed.
"Well, you know I am all ears..."
At that moment, the sound of an explosion and bright, colorful lights lit up the sky. The group looked up and saw the fireworks burn high, bringing an odd festive feeling to the scene.
"Happy New Year..." Helena mumbled behind her.