Dreams aren't real.

They never will be.

Upload date: 20th March 2023.

I told ya this one would be a short one, but it was a little something I slotted in.

Enjoy this brief little read!

"Oh Chloooo-eeeee!"

"What? Who's that?"

"Oh? Finally you notice I'm here? Not like this is my first little visit."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm here every. Single. Time. You sleep."

"What?"

"Every little nightmare you have. It's coz of me!"

"You give me nightmares?"

"Yup! Every time you dream of Captain Boulder Boy, I make him die!"

"Wait, Mom is now dying in my dreams, is that you as well?!"

"How observant of you!"

"Why?!"

"They deserve it!"

"Wait, you look like me, but taller!"

"Mm hm! You clever observant little girl again!"

"Are you me?"

"Nope, I'm the sister that Mother lost coz she's a dumb bitch!"

She's not a dumb bitch!"

She's sooo dumb, do you know why I look like a taller, broader version of you?"

"Are you really Minnie? How are you in my dreams as an adult! You were miscarried or stillborn, weren't you?!"

"Yeah I'm here as the adult I could've been if Mom wasn't such a screw up!"

"Why though? How?"

"We're Moldy Moldy, Chloe, you silly girl, do you not have any shred of memory from aaaany other times I've shown up?"

"Very vaguely?"

"Remember when I kept telling you that people aren't always what or who you think they are?"

"Er…kinda?"

"Oh I love toying with you! You don't even fucking know do you?! This big secret of our family!"

"How are you speaking so lucidly to me? There's no way my dreams would pull this off."

"Because Mother dearest infected us both with the Mold!"

"Mold? That stuff that Rose's dad was infected with?"

"Yup! But it seems I got a lot of it, while you only have a tiny spore, you lucky little shit!"

"I'm infected with Mold? What? Is this the big secret that no one wants to tell me?!"

"It's not, I'd say that this was hidden from you too, but no one even knows you have the Mold besides your buddy Verminus! I hope he gives you and the rest of this sorry family hell!"

"Why are you so horrible?! Why are you so bitter? Is it because of the Mold? Because you died? Why?!"

"Maybe I'm so jealous of you and you actually being alive! Mother never fucking let you die, did she?! Of course she didn't, you're just too damn precious, aren't ya?!"

"So you're salty?"

"If I had never died, I guarantee that you wouldn't exist, Chloe!"

"No, I would've!"

"Chloe, little sis, you were an accident, just like me! We both should've been stains on the mattress! In fact neither of us should have ever existed! Not me, not you, not those two babies that Mom lost, not Corey! None of us should have ever been conceived!"

"Why?"

"I've been telling you every time I invade your dreams! You've been lied to you all your life! All five of us have the same father!"

"How? Mom said there were two different baby dads!"

"Better speak to our uncle when he gets here then, huh?!"

"Why? Does Chris know who our dad is?"

"Oh he knows alright!"

"Then who? Tell me, Minnie!"

"Maybe you should let-"

"Chloe, hey." Grandpa gently shook Chloe's shoulder and she stirred, slowly rolling over and stretching her whole body out.

"Yeah?" she responded with fatigue, and she hid a yawn behind her hand.

"It's lights out in the lab. Time to make our move. Are you ready?" whispered Grandpa, and Chloe waved a hand at him.

"Yeah, just…let me wake up for five minutes."

"Ok, just make sure you're ready. We only get one chance. And don't fall back to sleep."

"Yeah…" Chloe trailed off.

She stretched again before scratching her hairline.

It was a textbook dream from the movies; a vast empty void, and only the people contained within were illuminated. Sometimes as fuzzy shapes with distorted voices like crackles on a badly tuned old style radio (who even uses radio these days?) or they could be crystal clear with crisp voices. And this one that Grandpa woke her up from was no exception.

So it was Minnie fucking with her dreams this whole time? She was so…vivid, like not even Mom or Chris were ever so clear to her, and yet she only ever saw Minnie in photos. Her looks resembled somewhere between herself and Claire, but slightly broader and taller. Her eyes were blue though dark, and reminded her of Chris when his anger was unleashed. Them Redfield genes were a tight pool alright, but then she knew that already.

Chris…What secret did he know, really? Had he and Mom lied about her dad? Was Mom always seeing the same guy? But how? Chloe had known for as long as she could remember that her dad was dead.

Chloe slid her hair tie off her ponytail and tied her auburn whorls back up again. Was Mom constantly banging some guy who didn't want anything to do with any of his kids? God, she thought, imagine if he was alive this whole time but deliberately kept himself away. A deadbeat dad.

Then why was Mom repeatedly going back and getting pregnant by this guy if he was going to be such a shit parent with no interest in the result of his own sexual actions? Did Claire hide all of her pregnancies from him? How fucking irresponsible of her!

Chloe stretched again and yawned.

t-Phobos…and now…

Did she really have the Mold in her body?

Wait!

Minnie said Claire was infected with Mold?! She frowned. Any kind of words she heard in her dreams eluded her, always, and she never believed in her dreams as if they were gospel. She silently ticked her fingers off:

Chris dying, her mom dying, Mold, real father, same father for her and all of her siblings. Surely it was all bullshit. These were dreams, not fucked up premonitions. Minnie was simply raiding her dreams out of spite to scare her, nothing more. She was subconsciously building an image of what Minnie would have looked like and her brain was tricking her into these thought patterns. She licked her lips and looked up at the photos of Chris.

She had never been bothered about him being hurt, not at least in the last few years, sometimes she even wanted him to get hurt, as if his pain would teach him a lesson in some obscure, seemingly opaque way, but now she was more than bothered.

She was petrified. Petrified that he'd be hurt or worse because of her. She told him not to come here, but if she knew her uncle, and she certainly did, then he would totally ignore her pleas for him to keep himself away from danger.

"Uncle Chris! You're hurt!"

"I'm fine, Pebble, it's nothing."

"Why do you do a job that gets you hurt, Uncle Chris?"

"Because I want to make the world a better place, a safer place, and sometimes it means I have to get hurt to make it better and safer."

"But that's silly! No one should get hurt!"

"Sorry, but the big world is far trickier to understand than you think. You'll see when you're older."

"It's not tricky, it's silly! Why do people hurt people? Why?"

"There are bad people out there, and they hurt people because they feel that it gives them power."

"But power comes from power plants!"

"I'm not talking about electrical power, just…it's ok, Chloe, just leave it."

"No, Chris! You're hurt and someone hurt you!"

"It doesn't matter, I'm home and I'm safe."

"But you're still hurt!"

"And it will heal, you hear me? Here, get back to your homework, do you need help?"

"Why do you always try to change the subject?"

"Because your schoolwork and your future is more important than a few stitches on my arm, alright?"

"But I don't want a future where you get so hurt that you're not here anymore!"

"Chloe-"

"I get sad when I see you hurt, Chris…"

"Oh God, Chloe, not the tears, please."

"I don't want you hurt, I don't want Mommy hurt, I don't want anyone hurt!"

"Jesus-"

"Can you have a job where you don't get hurt?"

"It's not that simple, Chloe."

"Pleeeeaaase?"

"Oh my God, please. Look, you haven't done this math question, do you need help?"

"The answer is 47, and you need help to get a job where you don't get hurt."

"Fucking hell-"

"I'll tell Mommy you swore."

"Tell her then. Chloe, this IS my job, and I'm not quitting it, not yet."

"Can you be more careful, then, Chris?"

"I can try."

"If I see you come home with stitches then I'm going to tickle you."

"Oh no, Chloe, not the tickling, ANYTHING but the tickling."

"Are you scared?"

"Oh Chloe I'm terrified, oh no whatever will I do?"

"You're silly, Uncle Chris."

"I know I am, and you love it, Pebble. Now do your homework before dinner is ready!"

She stood up and stretched once more after her memory faded out of her mind, before nodding to Grandpa.

"Ok, let's make like a tree and leave." Chloe smiled, and Grandpa patted her back as she opened the hatch.

She didn't believe in her dreams, and she thought back to her dream book. They were never as crystal clear as they seemed, no matter how sharp the images were, or how resonating the voices were, there was always some subtle underlying thing that might be on her mind. Even so, she had so many questions right now. So many. She simply just couldn't press those doubts hard enough away. Chris had better have some good listening ears when they get back to New York.

And he better have some fucking good answers.

She looked back at the photos on the wall, sickeningly scared that it would be the last time that she'd see Chris' face intact.

Dreams aren't real.

They never will be.

The song for this chapter is In The Middle Of The Night by Within Temptation.

Ok, so, RE4r is released in four days from the date of this being put out. As I said, I won't be getting to play it upon release, and I'll be avoiding social media for a while (my DMs are still open though :) ) not because of spoilers, but because I'm already burnt out from seeing it everywhere.

It will also be a while before the next chapter will be out, maybe another month. I'm also gonna try to do another chapter or Remember Me, Remember You but I am so fkn lost on how to word stuff XD Either way, at a rough guesstimate, HFE could still be about six months away from being completed.