A/N: Sorry for the delay. Work is winding down, so it's been crazy. Thanks for the reviews and follows! 3
Chris tried hailing their helicopter, but as expected, the pilot had to turn back shortly after their descent. The blizzard was in full effect as the trio trudged through the snow until a dark structure finally came into view. Leon passed Sherry over to Chris and took point with Jill. They made sure the area was secure before signaling to Chris that it was safe to come in.
"There are a couple of fireplaces we can get going," Jill told Chris as he lowered Sherry onto a dusty couch.
Leon helped Chris extricate Sherry from her blood-plastered jacket, wincing at the condition of her clothing underneath. Her shirt was split down the middle and coated with nearly-frozen blood. Her bra was also sliced in half, stained pink and looking like a macabre Rorschach test.
Jill took her vitals with the field medical kit they had, shaking her head at the results. "She
needs blood," she stated. "There's a transfusion kit in here, but—"
Chris was already removing his jacket. He rolled up his sleeve and held his arm out to her. "Take mine—we're the same blood type."
Leon took over the fire-building duties and took stock of what supplies were in the cabin. There wasn't much, but they could definitely make use of the kettle and instant coffee he found in the kitchen. He found some musty but clean sweat pants and shirts in a closet, so he brought those in for Sherry.
Jill and Chris had removed her clothing and draped a blanket over her body. Chris had a latex tourniquet wrapped around his bicep and his veins were practically begging to be drained. Jill sterilized Sherry's arm and started the transfusion process.
"How long does it usually take you to put out a pint of blood?" she asked Chris.
"About ten minutes," Chris answered after a pause.
"You're lying. I've seen you clear a pint in under six minutes. We can't have you passing out from blood loss because you're too eager to play the hero."
Leon snorted and shoved some kindling into the fireplace behind Jill before opening the flue and setting it ablaze. The heat was a welcome relief from the bitter cold inside the cabin. Leon repeated the process with the fireplace on the opposite end of the cabin, hoping that ambient temperature might hover above freezer soon.
He returned to the front room and grabbed the large cast iron kettle, gesturing towards the door with it.
"The pipes are frozen, so I'm going to go get some snow to warm up. We can wash the blood off of Sherry, then make some hot coffee," he suggested.
"Coffee sounds great," Chris remarked, shooing Jill away when she tried to pull the needle from his arm. "Leave it. We can't risk Sherry dying just so I don't get lightheaded."
Jill set her jaw, but said nothing. Leon returned with a kettle full of snow and set it over the fire to melt. As Chris started to wobble in his chair, Jill swiftly removed the transfusion line and held his arm above his head.
"Leon," she called as Chris started to slump towards the floor. Together, they caught him and eased him against the back of the couch. Jill pressed a square of gauze into his elbow pit to slow the stream of blood dripping down his forearm. Leon slapped Chris on the cheek a few times until he opened his eyes again.
"What happened?" Chris mumbled, blinking rapidly.
"You fainted," Leon answered with a tone of bemusement in his voice.
"What?"
Jill was too busy cleaning up the line from the transfusion to smack Chris for being so stubborn. She wrapped a bandage around Sherry's arm, then did the same for Chris. Leon made a kettle of instant coffee, grateful to have something warm in his belly.
Carefully, Jill poured some coffee into Sherry's mouth to rehydrate her and increase her body temperature, if only by a minute amount. They huddled around the fire in silence for several minutes until Leon remembered the clean clothes he had found.
Jill went in search of a towel or wash cloth while Leon poured some warm water into a basin from the kitchen. Once Chris finished his cup of coffee, Jill ordered him to get some rest in the other room. Leon supervised and returned to Jill's side once Chris was safely on the sofa bed in front of the other fire place.
"Chris was right," Jill said once Leon was in earshot. "She healed. Several bullet holes and a deep gash from neck to navel."
"Fucking hell," Leon muttered, looking away. Sherry's flesh had knitted itself back together, leaving behind thin pink scars that would eventually fade with time. "How did this happen right under our noses?"
Jill washed the towel in the basin and glanced up at him through her eyelashes. "Don't do that," she warned.
"What?"
"Blame yourself, flood your mind with the what ifs."
Leon sucked his teeth and gestured to Sherry. "How could she have been snatched from right outside Claire's door? A dozen of the most skilled soldiers and officers were under one roof, maybe thirty feet away. We were useless."
Jill rose to dump the soiled water and held the bowl as Leon poured fresh water from the fire. "We're not useless now," she told him. "The instant we knew something was wrong, everyone sprang into action. Jake Muller is flying halfway across the world—"
"What the hell does he think he's gonna do? By the time he gets here, Sherry will probably be back to normal and he'll have wasted his time," Leon interrupted.
"I doubt Sherry would agree with you."
As much as he didn't want to admit it, it was glaringly obvious that Sherry and Jake had a thing for each other. He didn't want to see it before, or maybe he was more focused on keeping everyone alive back then.
"It's a nice gesture," Leon admitted finally. "Sherry will be happy to see him again."
"And you?"
"I'll be happy for her."
Once Sherry was cleaned up, the two removed her soiled clothing and dressed her in the gray sweat clothes that Leon had found in the closet. They added more logs to the fire and Leon slid into bed beside Sherry. The fire hadn't raised the temperature in the cabin very much, so they would have to rely on body heat to get through the night.
Jill climbed onto the sofa bed beside Chris and listened to the sound of his steady breathing above the crackling fire. She shivered, wishing that there was another blanket she could cocoon herself in. Chris's arm hooked around her middle and he pulled her body next to his, the warmth of him spreading over her like a river. He didn't open his eyes or say a word, so Jill was left to wonder if he could tell she needed him without even being conscious.
Jake was a bundle of nervous energy when the driver finally pulled into a small airport with a helicopter waiting. The pilot jogged over towards the car, waving his hands.
"We can't fly in this weather," he shouted over the wind.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" Jake exclaimed, holding his arms out in disbelief.
"I just got back from dropping your team off, so they should reach your partner soon if they haven't already. You can drive and walk the rest of the way, let me show you on the map."
The pilot climbed into the car to escape the wind and snow before pulling a map from his jacket pocket. He unfolded it and pointed to a road that snaked through dense forest.
"This here is Route 6. I dropped your team at this red x, so if you take Route 6 for about twenty miles from here, you should be able to get to that location. The roads were iced ahead of the storm, but the way the snow is falling, they won't stay clear for long. I'd leave now if I were you," the pilot explained.
Jake took his advice and commandeered the car, promising to send someone to pick up the driver. He called Claire and relayed the information to her, frowning when she had no updates.
"I haven't been able to get through to anyone," Claire explained. "I don't know if the storm is affecting the cell signal, or if the area is in a low-service zone."
"Probably a bit of both. The pilot believes they should have reached Sherry by now, and I should get there under a half hour, provided the roads are clear and I don't get lost in the woods," Jake replied. "The cell signal is likely to get lost the further in I go, so I wouldn't panic if you don't hear from any one tonight."
"I've been trying to convince myself that once they found Sherry, they assessed her injuries and took the proper steps to ensure their safety. If she wasn't in bad shape, they probably went to the cabin to hunker down until tomorrow. The news said the storm might blow over by noon tomorrow, so I'll try to keep calm until at least one p.m."
"Good deal. Thanks, Claire."
Despite having never met the woman, Jake found that he liked her. Sherry admired Claire, and it was easy to see why. She had managed to keep a cool head, even when most of the people she cared about were in trouble. He hadn't realized it at the time, but knowing that he had someone else he could rely on helped ease some of the tension in Jake's mind.
The snow was beginning to accumulate on the road, but there weren't any other cars around. Anytime Jake felt the car start to skid, he was able to ease it back into the right lane without having to jerk the wheel to avoid a collision. The odometer finally clicked over to 20 miles, so Jake looked for a place to pull over. He saw an older car partially covered with snow on the shoulder, so he pumped the brakes and pulled to a stop.
Jake stared at the car, grinding his teeth as he imagined some dirt bag grabbing Sherry and tossing her into the trunk or backseat. Acid and fear bubbled in his gut, so he sent a quick message to Claire to let her know he had made it that far. She sent back a plethora of emoji, ending with ten thumbs-ups.
Despite the situation, Jake laughed as he headed into the woods. He kept an eye on the cell signal, which dropped a bar at a time until there were no bars at all. Wanting to conserve the battery, he turned the phone off and slid it into his pocket before continuing forward. He kept his eyes on the ground, looking for any sign of foot traffic. He found some prints likely belonging to a deer before finding the large, clumsy prints that had to be Chris, Leon, and Jill.
He followed them towards a fallen tree before they turned east and continued for what seemed like an eternity. The white out conditions made it nearly impossible to see, and by the time he spotted the cabin, he was practically at the front door.
With frozen fingers, Jake pulled his weapon and held it in front of him as he approached the door. He could see a warm, orange glow from the windows through the thin curtains that obscured the view. Keeping the gun trained on the door, Jake grabbed the knob and gave it a twist. Of course it's locked.
He was about to knock on the door when it was opened from the inside. A wary looking Leon Kennedy stood on the other side, aiming a gun at Jake.
"Muller?" he asked groggily, obviously jolted out of his sleep by the rattling door handle.
"Kennedy," Jake greeted, holstering his gun. "Is Sherry..?"
Leon held the door open and stepped aside to allow Jake into the cabin. He shook the snow from his head and stomped his boots gently by the door.
"She's alive," Leon said, gesturing to the pullout sofa. Jake swallowed deeply and approached, only breathing a sigh of relief when he saw Sherry's face illuminated by the glow of the fire. Leon handed him a cup of hot coffee, which he took gratefully. He let the cup warm his fingers before taking a cautious sip.
"She was in pretty bad shape when we found her," Leon started, refilling Jake's cup when it was empty. "We brought her back here and cleaned her up, but she had already healed by then."
"Did she lose a lot of blood?" Jake asked, thinking back to the pristine snow cover he saw.
"Yeah, her blood oxygen levels were low. Chris gave her a couple pints of his, all too eager to play the hero." Jake didn't even have the energy to roll his eyes, but he appreciated Leon's humor nonetheless. "I've never, uh, experienced this before. Her healing, I mean."
Jake looked up from his coffee. "No?"
"I'm not sure what to expect. I don't think Sherry's ever been hurt like this before."
"It was snowing the first time I saw it," Jake realized. "A huge chunk of shrapnel right in the back. I thought she was fucking crazy when she told me to take it out."
"Yeah, she told me about that. She was worried that you thought she was a freak."
Jake stretched his legs towards the fire, pulling off his boots to warm his toes. "We're all a little freaky," he noted with a smirk.
Leon couldn't exactly argue with that. "Jill and Chris are using the other bed. I've been sleeping here to keep Sherry warm; she was out in the snow for a while. I'm sure you've had a hell of a day," he gestured towards the bed. "It's not the greatest mattress, but it sure beats the floor."
"I've had worse," Jake acknowledged. "The floor's fine. You're too old for anything other than memory foam anyway."
Leon flipped Jake off before crawling into bed, thankful for the comfort and consideration. Jake eased himself down until he was curled in front of the fire place. He bunched up the scarf Rosie had given him and used it as a makeshift pillow. The paltry sleeping conditions brought him back to his youth, which was surprisingly comforting. He succumbed to exhaustion and drifted into a restless sleep.