: Chapter 7 - An unexpected Guinea Pig :


Chris gritted his teeth as he felt Jill's nails dig into his left arm as she hid her face from the scene up on the projector of a woman being torn apart by zombies, sparing absolutely no details as guts and blood spilled all over the zombie and onto the ground. "Jesus.." she whispered, mostly to herself. Chris internally smirked and wrapped both arms around her, lying her head up against his chest. She was so damn perfect it hurt sometimes. He planted a soft kiss on her head as he continued to watch.

"Fucking awesome." Claire whispered as she grinned at the screen. "Way too much blood for it to be realistic, but still awesome."

Chris nearly laughed at how polar opposite the two women at either side of him were. And he had never met two more perfect people in his life.

A woman on the screen let out a shrill scream as she ran from a horde, and at that Jill jumped and groaned into Chris' chest. "Shake me when its over." Jill whispered. Chris hummed in response and rested his head on hers, watching the screen.

"Jill you're gonna miss the good part!" Claire threw popcorn up in the air and caught it in her mouth in amusement of how scared the female STARS member was. Snickering when Jill didn't response, she lightly tapped her shoulder, "Its over, she got away." she said in faux disappointment.

Jill sighed with relief, only to look up at the screen to see 5 zombies over the woman's corpse, eating her brains. Jill's scream could of been heard from space.

"Claire!" Chris hissed as he held Jill's head against his chest protectively, but id did nothing to hinder Claire's laughing, that was just as loud if not louder than Jill's scream. Chris really did try to be angry, but Claire had gotten Jill good and he'd be lying if he said it wasn't funny.

Jill grew angry as she felt the quick heaving of Chris' chest, indicating his held in laughter. When she looked up she noticed the siblings staring each other down, with a barely contained smirk, ready to burst out laughing.

Sighing loudly, she threw up a hand. "Fine. Laugh! laugh all you want!" and so they did, for a good 5 minutes, leaving over their seats, dying with laughter at the sheer volume of Jill's scream. Eventually, the woman gave up being pissy and skipped onto joining in laughing with them. They were both idiots in every way, but one was her boyfriend and the other was her best friend, so she didn't really mind.

Once they all came down from laughing, Jill practically begged Chris to leave the drive-in, offering the siblings dinner if they could just leave early. Neither were all that happy about it, but the movie had about 20 minutes to go and it was easy enough to see where it was going. They both figured they could always just go see it again another time without Jill.

As they pulled up to Emmy's, they three smirked to themselves noticing the place was empty, and inside lied a rather drowsy looking Emmy. She was closing in an hour so the trio decided they'd take her to closing time.

They all ordered the same thing, a burger with fries and a strawberry milkshake each, though chocolate for Chris.

"So Claire, are you gonna stay with me and Rebecca during the trip?" she asked the younger Redfield who was dipping a fry into her milkshake. She eyed Jill curiously, silently telling her to explain.

"There are 3 rooms they give the STARS when we go to visit them for recruitment, last year we did it as Girls get one room: me and Rebecca, then Wesker and the Alphas, and Enrico and the Bravos."

Claire swallowed her fry and nodded in understanding. "Sweet, then its just us girls!" she said with a squeal of delight. The two girls starting going over the things they'd bring, namely different candies and hair straighteners. Chris realized rapidly that the conversation was getting way too girly and cleared his throat.

"So Jill, did Wesker mention who was going to be my replacement for the trip next week at training today?" Chris ventured.

Jill froze up and slowly turned her head to Chris with a sympathetic smile on her face. "Sorry Chris, he didn't say a thing."

Chris huffed in frustration. Wesker was more of an asshole for the past two days than he really needed to be. He had first teased Chris with the sign up sheet on Monday, plucking it out of his hands and placing it in a shredder when he handed it to Claire in the lobby and Wesker had caught him. Then he'd ask the group who was carpooling, and when Chris offered, he'd received the iciest glare he'd ever gotten. Then finally, he'd noticed his name on the attendees form hung up on the bulletin board scratched out heavily, with the word BANNED beside it. He instantly recognized the words to be in Wesker's writing.

"I can maybe talk to him Chris?" Claire offered, a little unsure if she was in any kind of position to offer something like that, since Wesker and Claire weren't exactly best friends, but they were getting along, so it was worth a try wasn't it?

"Wouldn't hurt to try i suppose." Chris answered, shrugging at the idea. He didn't want Claire getting in trouble, but the Captain seemed to like her, like her enough not to curse her out of the room if she asked, so maybe it wouldn't of been a complete waste of time.

Suddenly, a pained groan ensued from beside Claire, the source being Jill. "Whats up Jill?" Chris asked, concern lining his words. "No idea.." she answered honestly, placing her right hand over her stomach. "My stomach feels awful all of a sudden.."

"You better bring Jill home Chris." Claire said as she pulled Jill closer to her, gently rubbing her back in the hopes of comforting her. She noticed her subtle shaking and how pale her face went and knew that she badly needed to get home and sleep off whatever this was.

"Yeah.." he said absently, patting his pocket for his keys. "Come on Jill, lets get going." The three stood up, Claire helping Jill up and Chris picking her up bridal style as soon as he saw how unsteady she was on his feet. As she trailed behind them, she couldn't help but smile at how worried and sweet Chris was as he whispered comforting words in her eye as she whimpered in pain.

"Chris, i'll walk home, you should stay with Jill tonight." Chris raised his brow in suspicion and clear disapproval, but Claire continued anyway. "Just in case she gets really bad and needs someone to get her to a doctor."

"Claire its getting dark, i'll have you dropped him in a minute."

"Jill's apartment in a 5 minute drive, Our house is a 10 minute drive! Just get her home, i'll be fine, we've lived in Raccoon our entire lives!"

Chris groaned. "Not the point Claire! Anything cou-"

They were both interrupted by the sound of Jill's loud whimper as she clenched her side. Both the siblings stared at her with worry. Chris pursed his lips in thought for a moment, but then finally growled. "You better run home Claire! and if anything happens to you, i'm gonna kill the person who did it and then i'm gonna kill you, got it?"

Claire smiled and nodded. "You got it, now get her home!" she turned and jogged up the street in a beeline for home. As she stopped to look up and down the street though, she glanced back to see Chris and Jill in his car, going to opposite direction towards Jill's.

She continued to keep a fast paced jog until Chris turned the corner and was out of sight, to which Claire switched over to a nice and easy stroll. Chris was over reacting as usual. You'd swear that Raccoon was full of cannibals, murderers and rapists from the way Chris talked of it. She shook her head and smiled. She loved her brother, even with his sometimes unbearable over-protectiveness. She loved him unconditionally, and once more she was glad he had Jill, and was a sweet enough guy to take her home and look after her.

As she began to leave the central area of Raccoon and approached the more secluded part where nothing but houses lined the street, and the Raccoon park stretched for a good few miles on her right, she felt something strange.

She stopped a few times and looked around, but she neither saw nor heard anything, she snorted quietly to yourself. Not the best idea to watch a horror movie and walked home at night. She mused. Even though the movie wasn't that scary from her perspective, she couldn't help but feel as if she was the main character in the movie, and if she turned around she'd spot 5 zombies shuffling towards her.

The idea made her shiver, and suddenly her ears picked up the sound of a small twig being snapped.

Gasping and turning around, she saw nothing, but knew better. "Who's there?" she called out to the darkness. Nothing.

Well isn't this a movie cliché she thought to herself, her heart thundering in her chest. The poor defenseless idiot actress alerts the predator of her position and instantly becomes a target.

With that thought she turned and ran, not wanting to be another idiot who got caught by the zombies.

She gasped as she heard foot steps, but they sounded strange, smaller than a persons foot steps.. like..

Claire turned around to see a Doberman had been following her a few feet behind, tilting its head to the side as Claire let out a sigh of relief. "Jesus!" she said to no one in particular, dramatically clutching her chest as she smiled with relief. "You scared me buddy." she mumbled as she crouched, beckoning the dog to come closer. At first the dog whimpered, strangely enough, but then it came over. Claire frowned as she noticed the dog limping ever so slightly.

"Whats wrong buddy?" she asked as she gently patted the top of the dogs head. He did look a little tired, the poor things eyes were red. She'd have to call a vet of some sort and get the stray checked out, but what if it wasn't one. It was pretty dark so Claire gently patted the dogs neck to feel for a collar, but recoiled her hand as she felt something warm and sticky.

Her eyes widened as she smelled the blood instantly.

Instantly putting her hand back to the dogs neck to feel the wound, or whatever it was, she instantly regretted it as she felt the dog stiffen and growl low. as she slowly pulled away her hand, trying not to make any sudden movements, the dog pounced on her arm that she had only just begun to retract, violently biting and tearing at Claire's wrist.

"Jesus!" Claire screamed from the pain as she noticed the torn skin and blood spilling from her wrist, but she felt like her heart had stopped when she noticed it was her right arm. Being an artist, her right arm was essential, and the most precious thing to her, and the thought of her wrist being damaged and hurting any possibility in a career in the future was enough to instantly bring her to her feet and kick the rabid dog in the side.

She felt terrible when the dog let out a yelp of pain and ran off towards the woods, but quickly lost the feeling when she looked down at her blood soaked wrist and hand that were shaking uncontrollably and stung like absolute hell. "Shit.." she whispered as she felt tears run down her cheek from the awful sting of her wrist.

Not being anywhere near to a friends, she had no option but to turn around and walk back towards the gas station she had passed around 10 minutes ago. She whimpered from the pain as she cradled her blood soaked arm to her chest, holding it against her shirt tightly in an attempt to slow down the blood seeping from what looked like a weep wound. "Fuck fuck fuck!" she cursed in pure frustration and fear that her arm was badly messed up.

The thought pushed her to run to the gas station.


Nothing particularly tickled Wesker's fancy as he perused the home made section of the small shop. He contemplated a donut but sniggered at how cliché it was for a police man. He wasn't particularly in the mood for anything as heavy as a sandwich, just a small snack. Deciding he was taking too long, he went with his usual fall back of chewing gum. He could always get something to eat when he got home anyway. If he remembered right, there was still some left over chicken breast from the night before.

He took a sip from his black coffee as he took the change from the blonde cashier girl who smiled politely at him. He nodded in acknowledgement and walked out of the store, enjoying the piping hot coffee that was sure to help him get through a long night of patrol.

Though as she closed the door behind him and adjusted his glasses, he stopped dead in his tracks, noticing Claire Redfield gawking at his RCPD cruiser he had parked in front of the gas meter. She must of heard the door close as she turned around in that instant, and the smile that had appeared on his face vanished. Her shirt was drenched in blood, her face was tear stained, and she looked as pale as a ghost.

"Captain Wesker! Thank god!" Claire said aloud as she cradled what he now noticed to be the source of the blood, a nasty looking and badly torn up wrist that was shaking uncontrollably.

Instantly he was in front of her, placing the coffee on the ground and taking the injured wrist into his hands. He winced as he realized just how bad the wound was, and knew without a doubt that she'd need stitches, how bad the damage would be in the long run though was hard to say without taking a proper look at it.

"What happened?" he asked as he wiped away a stray tear that was rolling down her cheek. Her heart skipped when she heard what she thought to be genuine concern in his voice, but she couldn't be sure.

"A dog.. this injured dog came out of an alley and it bit me, got me really good too.." she said, trying to keep her voice strong and free from any wavering, and she was proud to say that she hadn't cracked by the time she trailed off, motioning to her wrist as she held it protectively. He nodded and quickly opened the passenger seat door and without any prompting, she sat in.

When he started up the car, he noticed how comfortable Claire was in the passenger seat. in fact, She looked as if she was about to fall asleep. "Claire." he stated firmly, jolting her out of the limbo between awake and asleep. She looked over at him and noticed his jaw was hard set. He looked.. scared? nervous? anxious? who could tell. It was Albert Wesker.

"Do not close your eyes." he stated firmly. She nodded but didn't seem to properly grasp the importance of it. She was losing blood, fast, and he needed to have her arm stitched and bandaged, before she lost too much blood, or the permanent use of her arm.

Growling when he saw her shut her eyes, he knew he had to keep her talking. "Tell me exactly what happened." he demanded as he made a left turn for Raccoon General Hospital.

Whimpering from the sting in her arm, she clutched it closer to her chest. "This dog, like a doberman or something i think, it was just on the path, and it looked friendly so i bent down to rub him.."

Wesker wanted to scream at her for her stupidity. Why would anyone ever lay their hands on a stray dog? It could of easily gone for her face and done a lot worse, she had gotten lucky.

"But when i felt its neck, it felt like flesh.. all exposed, like it had just been shaved, and then i felt blood." Claire looked at the window and began to feel very lightheaded.

Wesker scrunched up his face for a moment, angered by the mere thought of an abused and clearly rabid dog walking the streets, going unnoticed. How had a clearly sick and aggressive dog gone unnoticed by the area? Claire had been in an area full of state housing with families, surely someone had to of noticed this stray?

Unless..

Wesker slammed on the breaks, jolting Claire forward roughly before gravity pulled her back to her seat. "Huh?!" Claire gasped as she looked over at Wesker. He was silent for a moment while he gathered his thoughts. "A doberman bit you?" Wesker asked, his voice low. She noticed his face had gone a shade paler.

"Y-yeah?" Claire answered hesitantly. She loved dogs, so she knew very well that it was a doberman.

Wesker looked to his left, staring at his reflection in the mirror before he ran back the information in his head.

A damned Cerberus had bitten her. A T-Virus infected experiment had infected her.

Wesker slammed on the accelerator and did a U turn in the middle of the street, heading in the exact opposite of the hospital. "Uh.." Claire started. "Wesker, the hospital is-" she never got to finish her sentence as she was cut off by the feeling of a cool needle in her neck, and as it was retrieved, her head fell heavily on the window.


"Yeah. Infected with T." William said, shaking his head as he read the results. "She probably has another 4-5 hours before her heart stops and her brain starts to break down and decay."

Claire was lying on the marble table turned makeshift examination table, completely still. Her only sign of life was the now slowing down of her chests rise of fall as she breathed.

Wesker was about ready to pull his hair out. "That damn Chris will be looking for her day and night if she dies here. He is not the brightest bulb in the shed, but he has the whole team on a string." he stated, pacing the length of the room. "If he wants to find her, he'll have the entire damned department looking for her like the shepherd he is, and if too many people dig, they will be lead here.."

"Nobodies died yet." Willam interjected over his colleagues rambling. "Think about this rationally Al!" he said stepping in front of the pacing scientist, stopping him when he thought the pacing would never end. The man in front of him was tense and his jaw was hard set. If this were a cartoon, he would of had steam coming out his ears.

Wesker looked at him angrily for a moment before William tried again. "You want to save her? Think about it!" he growled, fed up of this side of his friend. He had gotten into the lab in something akin to panic and demanded William clean her up and they find a way to combat T. Hell he'd only come in to work to collect some files for Annette, today was his god damn day off! Talk about wrong place wrong time.

Wesker seemed to regain a sliver of his composure as his shoulders relaxed and he sighed, glancing back at the slowly dying Redfield behind him and forcing himself to stop replaying the worst case scenario in his mind.

"Did the 3rd floor R&D come up with a proper vaccine for T?" Wesker asked, decidedly more calm. For this, William was eternally happy.

"Already called ahead, they say its still beta, and barely even ready for animal testing."

Wesker cursed under his breathe and slammed his fist on the counter. It sounded like the hit hurt him, but he showed no change in expression. William had been contemplating the solution he was about to voice for the past 30 minutes, but had convinced himself not to even suggest it until they'd reached desperation. It seemed that desperation had already arrived.

"We could infect her with G."

"What?" Wesker asked, no anger or surprise in his voice, just curiosity. And here William was, thinking he'd be thrown off the tallest building in Raccoon by Albert Wesker for even thinking it. He let out a small sigh of relief and continued. "G is stronger than T, it could combat T and overtake the system."

"We haven't tested your fortified strand yet, i have no idea-"

"I haven't tampered with the structure itself, if it was Claire's blood that melded with the virus in the first place to stabilize it, then it will meld with her DNA just fine." William quickly interrupted.

Wesker's eyes dropped to Claire's lifeless body. If she died, Chris would dig, and if Chris dug deep enough, he'd be finished at the RCPD, and then Umbrella, but did he really believe that? Sure Chris was resourceful, but would he ever uncover the tracks Wesker worked so hard to cover? He highly doubted it, but something was clouding his judgement, something in the back of his head saying to take any chance in keeping Claire alive.

He hoped that this was the right move.

"Inject her, i want updates on her blood work every 30 minutes, if she shows any signs of mutation, we'll have no choice but to put her down." He tensed every so slightly at his last words.

He growled in frustration when he realized that there was a possibility that all this effort to keep her alive wasn't entirely to keep Chris out of his hair. He didn't really care for her, did he? He could of laughed at the idea. He'd met women far more attractive in his life, like Ada Wong or Jill Valentine, at least those women had brains and a body to go with them. What the hell made Claire Redfield so important? Nothing. She was a pawn in this game of chess, and for the time being, she had to be the most important woman to him. She was his chance to avoid any excessive social contact with his team. He so loathed the nights when the team invited him to one of their houses, or out for a drink. He didn't do beer, and he didn't do house calls. Claire was valuable at this point in time, and he needed to take risks with her health for the time being.

Aren't you the lucky one, dear heart?

William slowly applied pressure to the top of the needle as the contents were deposited into Claire's blood steam, and as he pulled the needle out, the two scientists watch Claire like a hawk. 5 minutes passed in complete silence.

"No immediate change in the subjects demeanor or appearance." he called out, mostly to himself as he jotted it down on a clipboard. "Al, can you get started on the blood work testing? there are extra needles in that drawer there."

This would be a long night indeed.


Claire slowly opened her eyes to see the familiar contents of her sitting room around her. She heard muffled voices to her right but didn't care too much to focus on them. She had quite possibly the worst migrain of her life and it was blocking out everything. She sighed and rested her heavy head against the couch arm where she was resting.

She lifted her right hand to rub her head but instantly remembered what had happened when she felt a dull pain there. Looking down, she saw it completely cleaned and bandaged. When she ran her fingers along the bandage, she could feel stitches there. I wonder how many stitches i have...

She began fumbling with the bandages in an attempt to rip them off but a hand reached out and held hers to stop her.

"It wasn't as bad as you thought dear heart, you have 4 stitches." Wesker announced, gently letting go of her arm as he watched her for any signs of change.

At around 10 PM, he called the house to see if Chris had come home, but he was still out, only god knew where, so he kept Claire for a little while longer. She had lost quite a lot of blood so Wesker had donated some of his own, attempting to get some colour back in her face, which eventually returned as the minutes ticked by.

Her wound healed rapidly. It was fascinating. The wound slowly but surely clotted the blood and healed the skin, only leaving a small wound open with slight skin discolouration, but when Claire woke up, he was sure she'd remember everything, so the stitches in her arm were for mere show, and to make sure she didn't grow suspicious. He would tell her of the incident with stretched truth in due time, but for now, he needed to make sure she didn't turn on him.

Her blood work had come back the same for the 5 tests him and Birkin had run, showing she had fully accepted G, and was now accepting all the benefits. She showed no signs of turning but to be sure, he had stayed by her side as her heart rate slowly returned to normal, checking her pulse periodically.

He would have to test her limits though. He needed to see what she could now do, what she could with stand, and the recruitment trip in a few days would give him a wonderful chance to get alone time with her and track progress.

"I thought it was a lot worse.." she mumbled, examining her arm with fading interest. She lost interest completely when she felt him sit on the couch at the other end. "How do you feel?" he asked, sounding almost like a doctor as he gently brushed his fingers along her wound.

"I-I'm okay, my arm hurts a little, not as bad as before. Plus a headache." she answered as she watched him. He looked tired, like he hadn't slept. His hair wasn't in the cool slicked back style it always was, and his sleeves were rolled up to his elbows. She was around him long enough to know that when his sleeves were rolled up, he was working on something, but what?

"How did-" she started, but Wesker quickly interjected. "You fainted in the car from blood loss. I attempted to get in contact with Chris once i had you in the hospital but the doctors kept asking me to sign paper work and such, and i had no time until you were cleaned up and ready to come home around 12 PM. Chris met us here and he let us in. He allowed me to watch you as i was given your proper prescription information for your injections, so i stayed the night."

The injections of course were periodic low doses of G that Wesker was hoping would speed up her healing process, but he'd given her her last injection just 15 minutes ago. Now all he had to do was wait.

Claire slowly nodded. "Thank you.." she whispered. "Thank you so much Wesker."

He flashed a ghost of a smile and nodded. She was shocked when she saw no sarcasm or hate in his smile. It wasn't condescending or meant to torment, and she loved it. She wanted to see him smile like that a lot more, even if she only barely caught it.

"It was not a problem dear heart." he answered honestly.

God lord. His mind screamed in the back of his head. I'm like a love sick puppy.

But he was excited to see what she could do. The prospect of having made the perfect virus in a host that fully accepted it would be more than enough to have him and William easily accepted in the higher circle on the board with Oswell and Edward, though he would of course thank Marcus for his help. Though he recognized that the man was quite demanding when it came to progress and analysis, Albert Wesker and William Birkin owed a lot to him. Wesker was not an unfair man, he would elevate those who deserved it.

And his dear heart. What would he do once he presented her to the board? Perhaps refine her virus and inject it into himself, giving himself all the perks, and work out all if any kinks the virus ever presented for Claire, making him the strongest. Then he would do the one thing he was not doing for anyone else in STARS, or anyone in his life period.

He would give her a choice.

But that was all in due time. "Now my dear, i must return to the RPD, i have a team to lead." he stated as he stood. Claire nodded and smiled at him. Sure the guy could be an asshole, but he'd proven that he could be sweet and caring. To Claire at least.

"Please rest, and don't do anything too strenuous." he asked as he stood, fixing his shirt. Claire nodded once again. "Thanks again Wesker, i'll see you tomorrow."

"Of course Dear Heart." he finished as he walked out. As soon as he cracked the door open to walk out, Chris ripped it out and ran in past him. "Claire!" he said in relief, giving her the tightest hug ever.

She wanted to grunt in pain but she didn't want him to let her go. "Hey Chris." she said giggling. He pushed her back and held her shoulders, looking her straight in the eye. He looked pretty pissed but he finally sighed and shook his head. "I'll murder you if you ever do anything like that again Claire.. jesus you scared me." he whispered that last part as he pulled her into another hug.

She smiled as she could almost feel the worry rolling off Chris. She was really lucky she had him to worry about her. She looked up when the front door closed, signalling Wesker's exit. Make that two guys who were worried about her.

Wait. Did this mean Wesker cared about her well being? Well of course he did you idiot! you came to him with a blood soaked arm, he was hardly going to turn you away! Yeah. That was true. She tried not to think about it, this stupid crush was ridiculous.

"Are you hungry? Thirsty? do you want the remote?" he asked with worry. She giggled at his care. "Ill take a glass of water if its going." she smiled up at him when he nodded furiously and practically ran to the kitchen. Poor guy must feel terrible for being at Jill's.

"That reminds me.." she whispered to herself. "Is Jill okay?" she shouted out to him.

"Fine!" he answered. "24 hour bug, shes over the worst of it."

Claire smiled at the relief, she was afraid her friend had something a lot worse brought on by the nerves she had at the movie. She turned her head to hunt for the remote and spotted it on the end table by the couch and stretched out to grab it with her right.

She yelped as she felt one of the stitches pull and presume cause a tare as she saw blood. Retracting it quickly, she lifted the bandages and saw a deep cut from the stitch and growled.

Suddenly, the damaged skin began knitting itself before her eyes, and literally within seconds, it was as if it had never happened.

Before she could even stop herself, she screamed from the utter shock of what she'd just witnessed.


I want to give a huge shout out to Tenebrarum who give me nice and descriptive passages about the virus's and their effects! i really appreciate it Tene! you rock !

Sorry this took a bit to get out, school absolutely and positively sucks! and as usual, if you have the time, leave me a review!

OH OH TRIP NEXT, what exactly is Wesker planning? and more importantly, what do you think i'm planning ;) HEE HEE HEE