Christmas time for the survivors of Raccoon City and beyond was just an excuse for excessive drinking. Chris, Leon, and Carlos would head down to the nearest liquor depot and spend an exorbitant amount of money on beer, wine, and spirits. Whoever was hosting the party would string up the required lights and throw a tree in the corner, but the most important part was reminiscing with friends.
An entire chunk of time was dedicated to comparing scars and the person with the worst one would win. Horror stories usually came next, with more rounds of alcohol to dull the pain of the rehashed memories. Thankfully, Sherry never had to relive her time in Raccoon City; everyone knew what her father had done to her. They did ask her all about her time in China, her reunion with Leon, and how it felt to work with the spawn of Albert Wesker.
She blamed it on the heat of the fire, but her cheeks flushed at the mere mention of Jake. Claire Redfield was the first to notice, and she was quick to alert everyone else.
"Oh, my God, she's blushing!" Claire squealed, slapping the arms of the people seated beside her. "Look, it's creeping up her neck!"
Her brother, Chris, excused himself as hoots and a chorus of "ooohs" erupted from the living room. Sherry deflected questions and ignored a litany of rude remarks before following Chris's escape path into the kitchen. She pulled a bag of frozen vegetables from the freezer and placed it on her neck, hoping to ward off the heat waves radiating through her body.
"If you're overheating, you should go outside. It's freezing out there," Chris suggested from the corner. Sherry shoved the vegetables back into the freezer and followed his advice, stepping out onto the deck with Chris following suit.
"Thanks for the suggestion, this is much better," Sherry sighed, adjusting her sweater dress to allow the cold air to tickle her skin. Chris swirled the ice in his glass and let out a deep sigh. The silence between them was getting awkwardly uncomfortable, so Sherry formed a quick snowball and launched it towards Chris.
Naturally, he deflected it and it exploded against the side of the house, sprinkling soft snowflakes down his collar.
"Sherry, I know," he said finally, setting his drink onto the snow-covered railing.
"Know what?" Sherry knew damn well what he was talking about, but it seemed instinctual to ask, if only to bide herself some time.
"The cameras are standard in all BSAA bases, monitored 24 hours a day. I was alerted to your excursion with Muller and the subsequent, uh…fraternizing. The data was erased and I made sure that word didn't get out." Sherry ran a hand through her hair and reached for Chris's drink, swallowing down the remainder in one gulp. "I think a lot of us forget that you're not the little kid you were when we met you. You're a grown woman capable of making your own decisions, and as much as it pains me to see you and Wesker's illegitimate son together…what can I do?"
Sherry crossed her arms tightly in front of her chest, the warmth leaving her body in a sudden rush. "We're not 'together'," she started, grimacing at how immature she sounded. "It was a mistake, I mean—a momentary drunken lapse in judgement. I haven't spoken to Jake since I got back the states, and I'm certain he doesn't want to talk to me."
"Why not?" Chris inquired.
"I was an ass to him after I had realized what had happened. I said some things that weren't really true, and I think I hurt his feelings."
"You mean he isn't just some robotic anger machine?" Chris grinned.
"He's complicated, but a real person with feelings just as real as your or mine. I kinda failed to see that at the time, I guess. It didn't help that I realized there were cameras in the rooms, either. But if I'm being completely honest, I miss him."
Chris held out his arms and pulled Sherry into a hug as she started shivering. "Then you should talk to him, Sher. I don't pretend to know what he's thinking, but he was mighty protective of you whenever our paths crossed back in China. He's gotta be missing you, too. Admit that you were wrong to say whatever it was that you now regret and take it from there. What's the worst that can happen?"
"He'll hang up and never want to talk to me again."
"And the best?"
The heat starting rising from Sherry's neck again and Chris gave her a playful jab in the ribs. She let out a squeal of laughter and swatted him away.
"Fine, I'll think about it. I can call under the guise of wanting to say Merry Christmas," Sherry suggested as they headed back into the house.
Long after dinner and dessert was served, Sherry decided to call it a night. Truth be told, she was trying to work up her nerve to call Jake, but every time she tried to leave, there was one more joke to be told, or one more scar to flaunt.
It was long past midnight when Sherry finally escaped out to her car and turned her key in the ignition. Nothing happened—the lights didn't come on, and the engine didn't make a sound. With a long groan, she popped the hood latch and climbed out of her car. She had little to no knowledge about cars, but when she shone the light of her phone over the engine block, she could tell what the problem was immediately: the battery was gone.
She should have expected the attack to come from behind, but the wine and spirits were dulling her senses. The hit from the Taser knocked her to the cold, wet ground instantly. She was dragged into the backseat of an awaiting car that smelled like a potent mix of marijuana and those tree-shaped air fresheners.
Her body wouldn't respond to the signals her brain was sending out as the car pulled away from the curb with her assailant behind the wheel. Sherry tried to tense her fingers, hoping beyond hope that her cell phone would still be in her hand. As soon as someone realized something was amiss, they could track her phone, unless it was laying on the pavement in front of her car.
Moaning with the effort, Sherry turned onto her back and tried to regulate her breathing. Her eyes darted around the car in search of something she could use to disable her abductor. It took several seconds before she realized that he was wearing some kind of a mask, and several seconds more to register that the car's interior was filling up with smoke. She coughed and tried to force her limbs to move, but they felt like jelly. Her vision blurred and she felt herself slump against the seat cushion before losing consciousness.
Jake's leg bobbed incessantly as he checked the flight status for the hundredth time. He poked at the monitor on the seat in front of him, grimacing at how far he still had to go. Claire had called him only a few hours ago, and in his impatient haste, he hopped aboard a commercial jet within twenty minutes.
Now he was sandwiched between two old people with hours to go before he even touched down. An old, wrinkled hand settled on his bouncing knee, and he snapped his head to the right.
"Don't be nervous, dear," the elderly woman said. "Air travel is very safe if you disregard all of the recent plane crashes."
Despite the fear twisting in his gut, Jake barked out a laugh. "Thanks for reassuring me. I'm not a nervous flyer, just worried about someone," he admitted.
The old woman passed over a skein of yarn and picked up a pair of knitting needles. Jake stared down at the gray yarn in confusion.
"You can make yourself useful and help me finish this scarf. It's for my nephew, and I'd like to finish it before we land. See the yarn coming out of this end?" she pointed with a thin finger. "Just pull that out a bit at a time so I don't have to yank it constantly."
"Like this?" Jake questioned, gently tugging the yarn from the skein.
"You don't have to be so careful, see?" she laughed, her hand pulling a yard of yarn that draped over Jake's legs. He watched her work the needles expertly, slipping stitches onto a separate bent needle.
"What's that?" Jake inquired, pointing at the weird-looking needle.
"This is how you make a cable-this pretty, twisted thing here. I like cabling because the finished product is so beautiful. What's your name, dear?"
"Jake Muller," he let his name slip, biting his bottom lip in frustration. His entire existence was kept secret from the rest of the world, but he had no doubt that someone out there knew who he was and where he was at all times. It was unlikely that this old woman was a spy for some agency, but any of the other passengers nearby could be.
"Well, it's lovely to meet you, Jake! I'm Rosemary St. Cloud, but all my friends call me Rosey. There were a lot of girls named Rosemary when I was young, and so we all tried to give ourselves different nicknames. I didn't like Ro, or Mary, or Rose. All the girls wanted to be Rose, as though they would be so beautiful and sweet if people called them the name of a flower. Rosey the Riveter was my inspiration, I guess…or at least that's what I came to tell people," she babbled on, the rhythmic clacking of her knitting needles slowly pulled Jake's chin toward his chest.
Pine. Fire burning. The crunch of snow and ice. Nausea.
Sherry opened her eyes, confused as her vision bounced around like she was riding a horse upside down. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to regulate her breathing, but her stomach hitched and she began to vomit.
Whoever was carrying her dropped her onto the ground and let out a string of curses, but she didn't really care so long as she could empty her stomach. Her eyes watered and her nostrils burned with the smell of whatever her abductor has used to knock her out. Twice more, her stomach lurched and forced out the toxins that had been sloshing around since who-knows when.
Sherry reached for a handful of snow to clean her mouth, pausing when she realized that her wrists were zip tied together.
"Are you about done? I'm freezing my ass off," someone barked. Sherry turned and decided rather quickly that she could take him down once she was feeling better.
"Where are we?" she asked, her throat raw.
"Neverland. Come on, on your feet," he ordered, grabbing her by the arm and yanking her up. He was young, maybe in his mid-twenties and the kind of skinny you get when you're addicted to narcotics. He shoved her forward and she stumbled in the snow, her high heels catching on something buried beneath the fresh cover.
"Where are you taking me? And why? Who are you?" she fired the questions off in rapid succession, hoping her voice would carrying through the wooded area she found herself in. It was too late for any sane person to be out, but she had to hope.
"Shut up," the man ordered, shoving her forward again. She made herself fall and let out a cry, whimpering on the ground as though she was some helpless girl. She knew better than to attack him now; she didn't have her bearings and there was nothing but trees as far as she could see.
"Please, just let me go!" Sherry whined, swallowing some snow to soothe her throat while the man grabbed her by the waist and tossed her over his shoulder.
"I said shut up! I got orders to deliver you in one piece, but they said nothin' about roughin' you up a bit."
Sherry closed her eyes and forced herself to think logically and process the information she had gotten so far. There was no way to tell how long they had driven before getting out to walk. Her assailant was a hired man, and likely had no loyalty to the people who gave him his orders. She couldn't remember much about the car she had been thrown in, other than its smell. She presumed there was some sort of shelter nearby that the man was trying to get to, unless there was some kind of rendezvous planned in the middle of the night.
There were undoubtedly numerous people who would like to see Sherry dead or figure out what gave her the ability to heal from any injury. She had spent far too much time stuck in a hospital bed while people poked at her with sharp instruments, but she had a bad feeling that that was the reason behind her abduction.
The man was breathing heavily, and Sherry almost offered to walk. She needed him to be winded—jonesing for a hit of heroin or meth would be even better. The only advantage he had on her was height and free movement of his arms, but she had no idea what was in the smoke she had inhaled.
"I think I'm going to be sick," Sherry announced. It was half true, but she really wanted to test her own strength to prepare for taking her assailant down. He dropped her ungracefully onto the ground and backed away as she dry heaved, eating more snow to replenish some of the fluid she had lost.
"The cabin's not much farther. Think you can walk?" he asked impatiently. Sherry nodded and allowed him to lift her from the ground. It was difficult walking through the snow in heels, but she played it up to make it seem like she was still unsteady on her feet. If she could get this guy to drop his guard, then it would be that much more easy to escape.
Sure enough, a cabin finally came into view and Sherry was eager to get off her feet. The man pushed the door open without needing to unlock it and pushed Sherry towards a dusty looking couch. She fell over the arm rest, stiffening when her abductor sidled up behind her. He pressed himself into her, thrusting his hips while yanking her hair.
"We're gonna have us some fun here, missy," he promised, releasing her and moving towards the fireplace. Sherry's eyes darted around the room in search for any kind of weapon. There was a poker by the fireplace, and an ax lodged into the wall by the front door. She didn't need her hands free to wrap them around the ax and plant it deep into her assailant's back.
He was busy piling logs into the fireplace, shoving old newspaper in the cracks but as Sherry took a step towards the ax, the floorboards groaned beneath her feet.
"I need to use the bathroom," she said quickly, hoping he didn't see her eyeing the ax.
"You are too fucking needy," the man spat, rising from the floor to push her towards the bathroom. Everything was coating with a layer of dust, which Sherry tried to clean with some toilet paper.
"I can't go like this," she whimpered, holding up her hands.
"Do you think I'm some kinda idiot? The second them cuffs are off, you're gonna try and make your escape. I know you work for the government like 007 or some shit. I'll gladly lend you a hand if you need help wiping."
Sherry swallowed down the fury rising in her throat and shook her head. "I'll be fine," she assured him, trying to push the door closed. It didn't have a lock, but the thin door at least prevented the letch from watching her.
Quickly, she kicked off her heels and removed her stockings so that her feet would have more traction on the floor. Taking the opportunity, she relieved her bladder and washed her hands before pretending to vomit again. She could hear the man pitching a fit outside the door, so she flushed and grabbed the heavy porcelain lid of the toilet tank.
He shoved the door open as she was hunched over the bowl, breathing heavily and making a lot of pathetic moaning noises.
"Will you get a grip—" He never saw the hit coming. Sherry swung the porcelain lid as hard as she could, slamming into the man's face with a sickening crunch. He flew into the wall and collapsed to the floor, out cold as blood streamed from his nose and mouth.
Jake's dreams were dark, full of shapeless demons and an overwhelming sense of despair. He tried running, but his legs moved so slowly that he couldn't put any distance between himself and what he was trying to escape from.
A bump of turbulence jerked him awake and he clutched the arm rests in panic. Rosey's skein of yarn rolled from under his chin and onto the floor, so Jake bent to retrieve it.
"Your head was bobbing and I could just imagine the pain in your neck when you woke up, so I stuck my yarn under your chin. You're useful even when you're asleep, Jake," Rosey smiled, lifting the scarf to show Jake her progress.
"Glad I could be of service," he remarked, rubbing his face tiredly. "Excuse me." He escaped to the bathroom, climbing over Rosey with his long legs, narrowly avoiding getting tangled in yarn.
He made his way down the plane towards the bathroom, eyeing each passenger with suspicion. Most people were sleeping or using some kind of device or another, but Jake wouldn't let his guard down. Sherry disappeared without a trace, her cell phone left behind on the ground in front of her disabled car.
After relieving himself, Jake scrubbed his face until he felt any remnants of his dreams wash away. He needed his full faculties if he was going to save Sherry…but the chances of even finding her were slim.
Someone impatiently rapped on the door, so Jake took one last look at himself in the mirror before exiting the cramped space. He made his way back to his seat, his memories floating back to the last time he had seen Sherry.
"Oh, God, what did we do?" Sherry sat up and pressed her palm to her head as Jake came a step closer.
"You regretting something?" he surmised from her body language. She refused to meet his eyes, opting to wrap herself in a sheet instead. "Say something."
"Good morning," Sherry managed, finally meeting his eyes. "This was a bad idea."
Jake didn't expect it to hurt as much as it did. It was the truth, wasn't it? He had the same thought last night, but he didn't let it stop him. Sherry was a government agent; she was responsible for bringing him in to save the world. She jeopardized her reputation and career by spending the night with him.
"Yeah, probably," Jake agreed. "I'll just go back to my room and we can pretend like this never happened."
The wound was still sore despite how much time had passed. Jake slumped in his seat and Rosey put him to work again, but she wasn't very talkative at least. He hadn't even said goodbye to Sherry before she headed back to the states and their only communication was when he lowered his asking price. He thought it would be easier for Sherry to talk business with him instead of emotional manners. When she didn't respond, Jake buried himself in work at the BSAA.
He was game to any test they wanted to run, and the doctors eventually put a permanent line in his arm so they could get a sample of his blood without having to stick him again. Try as he might to forget, his thoughts would always run back to Sherry. He imagined how she dealt with being a guinea pig for the government for all those years. At least Jake felt like he had some semblance of a choice in the matter.