Disclaimers: I do not own anything out of Resident Evil. All of the contents belongs to Capcom.

Chapter XXI: White Snow

'You are all I have left now.' - Jake Wesker

'Jake, I hope you are well.
If you are seeing this, I have gone back to the Maker. God knows what would happen to you when I am gone. But I have faith in you my son, you will grow up to be the same fine man as I saw in your father when I first met him. never a day I had lost faith in you even after how you changed six years ago I only hope that you acknowledged how happy I am when I heard from Jill that you stepped up on the court and saved a life. It was small, but that reinforced what I believed in you to be: a benevolent ruler who spoke for the sake of his people. The kingdom will flourish under your rule, my son.

About your father, Jake. The King was actually a good man behind his cold demeanor, you should have known how sweet he was when we were not betrothed to each other. But know this, my son: There was something that the King had done in the past that you might not able to forgive him for that, that I beg you, forgive him. He only did that for the sake of the three of us. Especially to you, my son. He did that for you because he loves you.

I know he still think about you, even right now.

Jake stared at the piece of paper blankly; the candle light flickered and so did his eyes to a corner and his thoughts run deep. Something that King Albert Wesker had done in the past?

He heaved a deep breath, his lungs were heavy and his eyes were burning.

At least the last paragraph lifted his burden, even for a little.

By the way, Jake, Sherry is a nice girl, isn't she? I like her. Remember when I asked you the questions back in my room that day? I suppose you have the answer by now. And I wanted you tell you that you should pursue whatever you are telling yourself to do, and that I encourage you to do so too.

Jake, my son. Know that whatever deed you have done, be it the good and the bad, I will treasure you and forgive you all the same.

I love you.

Gabrielle Muller Wesker

Raccoonia Castle

It's been five days since Jake Muller Wesker shut himself off in his own chamber next to his beloved late mother, he found sanctuary in solitary.

And for these five days, it was Sherry who cared for him than anyone else in the castle, his door was always open for her, and that was how Sherry sent him food and prepare baths for him. There was something amiss though, because in these five days, Jake hadn't ever spoke to anyone at all, not even to Sherry. Every time when Sherry brought him food, Jake would be there, laying sideways on his bed with his back to the door. She had once tried calling his name, but the only reply she got was a simple grunt of "leave me alone".

At least he ate the food she prepared for him. Although there were many left-overs on his plate, at least Jake know that he shouldn't starve himself.

"Prince..."

Silence was her only reply, his eyes were covered by the length of his arm so she wasn't sure if he was really asleep or he was pretending to, "I just wanted to tell you that the Queen's funeral would be on the next three days... And..." She stopped mid-way, because the cold silent-treatment he was giving her was too suffocating to bear, "...I—Everyone was worried about you."

Sherry was hoping that Jake would talk to her, or the least for an answer, but she get none.

It made her wonder if he would be attending the ceremony at all.

Meanwhile, Derek Simmons had been bothering Albert Wesker of their secret agreement they made a week ago about the fate of Edonia. His good plan was ruined when Jill showed up the night at the ball and announced the bad news at the wrongest timing. For five days, Wesker had shunned Simmons off his study, claiming that he was busy with his wife's funeral (which he really did). And each day draws closer to the time that Simmons must leave to Tall Oaks to attend for his own matters.

On the sixth days, that was when Simmons (accompanied by Ada) confronted Wesker of his ignorance.

"Edonia will be yours, Simmons. I am not delaying off any of our time, but it will have to wait after the end of my late wife's burial. To discuss political affairs in these time was not at all a wise decision." said Wesker when Simmons barge into his study, "the people would be suspicious if I perform such drastic action only days after their Queen was gone. They might think that neither if us ever cared about the Queen."

"True." agreed Simmons, he backed off away from the King's table with a much calmer look, "But I wanted to make absolutely sure that that piece of land will be under my name. I did not come to the Palace for the sake of a vacation, your Majesty. I certainly didn't want this trip of mine fruitless."

"It shall not, Simmons. In fact, I had planned another surprise for you, an addition of the Edonia I will present you."

Simmons was flabbergasted, but his face remained as stoic as the King.

He made no comments on the King's decision, fearing that he might have changed his mind.

Wesker gave the nervous man a small sinister smile, "I will not go back on my words, Simmons. I am the King of Raccoonia after all. Now rest assured and return to Tall Oaks. The surprise will be delivered to you the same day I give you Edonia."

On that, Simmons turned his heels and walked out without further argument.

Unbeknowst to him, Ada gave the King a meaningful wink behind Simmons and then Wesker returned his attention back to the document on his desk.

The click of the door close was when a smirk appeared on Wesker's empty face.

"A shame you didn't know that the surprise was following you home, Simmons."

Raccoonia Castle

Everyone dressed in all black to commemorate the event. It was the Queen's funeral, which she will be buried on the castle ground where the rest of the royal family had been. Solemn faces and grave silence, nobody utter a word as the pastor spoke for the Queen, of her life, her merits, and her death.

The King's expression was unreadable as always, Albert kept his stoic mask on and he shed no tears on that day; unlike everyone else whom some were already wiping their tears away and some sniffles.

Jill Valentine, given the prestige as the Queen's best friend, she was allowed to stand beside the glass coffin.

"Anyone would like to speak on her Highness, Queen Gabrielle Muller Wesker's behalf?"

Sherry stood by Jake silently, her tears were streaming down her cheek - yet Prince Wesker was just like his father: unreadable and stoic. Throughout the process Jake spoke of no word and his face of what people say as empty as a bare land. As King Albert Wesker walk past the coffin of the deceased Queen, Jake reacted with a slight twitch of his face until Albert's voice echoed.

"Queen Gabrielle Muller Wesker," he began, "ever since she discovered that she was contradicted with the fatal illness, she hid away from the society, even her own family. In which she avoided consulting me... It breaks my heart."

"But she was still my wife." he sighed, "The love of my life. And I still love her as much as the first day I presented her flowers and down to my knees. She was still a Queen in my heart, and so did a Queen to the rest of my loyal subjects. I always made sure that everyone still listen to her as such."

Albert was only down to a short pause before his next series of sentence and Jake suddenly snapped.

Everyone gasped breathlessly when Jake Wesker suddenly stood from his seat and marched to the exit without a word. Obviously, Sherry followed after his trail as soon as he was out of the door.

Albert had guessed himself of why Jake was behaving this sort of way. But he kept it to themselves.

And everyone believed the King that the Prince needed time for rest.

She had lost him when they had reached to the courtyard. Sherry did followed after him to his abrupt leave, but somewhere around the stairs, Jake burst into a mad sprint away from her and easily outrun her, given that Sherry was in no condition to keep up with him in her heels.

The Palace was suffocating with deadly silence, nobody was in vicinity. Everyone had gathered at the front castle for the Queen's funeral. With now the exception of herself and the Prince after they made their leave.

Sherry saw him setting off to the courtyard earlier. A good guess might be that Jake was heading towards the rear castle where his mother's chamber was and his room had been. With long strides and quickened pace, Sherry made her way there at once: the Queen's chamber.

It was all for a naught.

Jake wasn't there in his own room.

And when she pushed the door to Queen's chamber, she was disappointed to find that there was no one in there too.

The now vacated Gabrielle's room felt oddly cold and... empty. Everything was the same as before but, there was still something... distant to this room now. For a moment, Sherry stopped everything she was doing and took in her surroundings. Her eyes hovered to the bed first where the Queen had ridden herself to since the cancer. The gentle floral breeze was indifferent whenever Sherry entered this room. But Sherry still felt the contrast around her.

Queen Gabrielle was gone.

"You will be missed, your Highness." She whispered quietly and shutting the door behind her. She had to focused herself on the priority to lookout for the Prince.

That was. Until she heard a soft melody echoed through the halls.

She knew well what sound it was. It was the piano. There was only one person in the world (or at least here in the Palace) who knew how to operate that device with adept skills, but she was gone.

'Maybe it is...?'

That was where she headed, The Queen's Hall where Gabrielle used to go. There was a soft breeze gushing on her face as she quietly pushed the door open and there was the man she was looking for; alone, by the piano, playing the back was facing hers but she recognized him through his buzzcut and his large build. He was too absorbed with himself that his fingers kept their fluid movements among the keys even after her body had entered the hall.

She never knew that Jake Wesker could play the piano so well. He was on par with Gabrielle.

Sherry approached him carefully, contemplated whether she should let her presence known or she should just leave him alone like this. The melody was soft and... sad, Sherry could almost heard the melancholy in the tune. He was mourning for his mother, no doubt.

Her feet stopped when she was one feet behind Jake, when the song stopped abruptly and Jake moved his head to his side to see his intruder. 'Please don't be angry with me. Please don't be angry with me.' Sherry had imagined if Jake would snap and threw her out of the hall but he didn't. Seemingly undisturbed by her appearance, Jake returned his gaze back to the piano longingly. She thought that he would resume where he had left off, but he didn't.

Instead, he spoke.

"Six years ago, when I was seventeen, I was sent off to an expedition to the south."

I went there with a squad, there were twelve of us. It was my third expedition I was sent off to and there was this guy on my platoon whom I got close to; said his name was Caius or so I remembered. Guy thought me how to fight and he was there alongside me during my last two mission so I trusted him.

We made it to the South no problem at all. We even stopped by this village and the people there were great to us.

That was until we set off deeper into the woods and my platoon got jumped.

The enemy surrounded us with bows and arrows that our encirclement was completely covered, there was no escape for us at all. I was ready to fight them off until I was bashed by the back of my head and I passed out.

And I woke up at the very village which I said it was great.

There was a bonfire in the middle of the snow.

I woke up with my hands and feet bounded, suspended in the air while the people cheered and danced around the fire.

"Would ya' look at that... The Prince is awake!"

The roar of glee stopped when I felt each eyes were on me. I was trying to peel my eyes open and someone punched me in the face, my sense came back all at once.

The first thing I know is that I wasn't the only one like this. The rest of my platoon was too tied up but they weren't bounded like myself. They were all over the village as my captors beat the crap out of them - beating their already dead body, yelling something about the 'royal dogs' and 'the King's leftovers'... But there was only ten of them...

"Rise and shine, your Highness!"

Someone hollered from my side and it was whom I expected to be the least.

Caius.

He was completely unscathed, unbound, and there was even a smirk on his face as he came in closer to me with a knife in hand. "Oh, did I knock the senses out of you? Was I being too hard, your Highness?"

It was him.

He sold us out to the enemy! We are stepping into his mouse trap all along!

"You fucking asshole!" I spat venomously, anger seething right out from the core. How I wished that I could rip the jaws out from this back-stabber. But all I could do now was to endure as a strong jab landed on my left chin, metallic taste began pooling the insides of my chin. Another hook to the right, I knew one of my teeth was knocked out from the gums.

I swallowed some of my own blood, the rest, I spat it out to the pure white snow along with the broken tooth. Caius looked very please with the crimson coming out from me and his knives flashed around my cheek, the snow melting on my skin was nothing compared to the coldness of the steel.

Who could have guess that this little rat here joined the castle as a small infantry for the sake of revolting my father?

Caius began ranting about what my father did to their people, I learnt then that Cauis was the leader of a revolt team who tried to overturn The King's throne three years ago but were thoroughly defeated. His real name was Heinrich, a General for my father who opposed his method of rule, until Chris brought him down.

Heinrich escaped death penalty and was deported to a faraway land. He returned for his revenge to the royal family. And his first target was me..

"You are only a tool for us to use, an instrument for us to procure the throne which was rightfully ours. Just like how your father used you, foolish man."

That psychopath was still adamant on taking on my dad's throne. He wanted to use me as hostage and demanded the throne from my father as a ransom. Asked me to write a letter back to the castle.

Of course, I spat on his face.

Turns out later when Heinrich beat the crap out of me, came another bigger man with a scar on his forehead with bodyguards behind him.

Heinrich guy? He was just a small fry after all.

He held my bloodied face between his fingers to inspect me. "So, this is the Prince of Racconia, huh? Pretty tough for a young un'."

"Who the hell are you?" I hissed.

"Oh, that you need not to worry. But really, I suggest that you would worry about yourself because-" he smirked, taking the cold blade form Heinrich's hand and began waving it in front of my face. He pressed the hilt to my cheek but soft enough not to make a mark.

Yet.

I couldn't do anything, "What the fuck are you think you're doing?"

"Giving you a quick reminder."

"NO!"

"So that's how you..."

Jake's finger skidded across the hollow across his cheek - the pain had long gone but the trauma remained with him. The burning pain as the cold blade digging his way into his flesh, it was not something easily forgotten, which he curses himself for that. Sherry didn't know whether she could cry or not hearing his story behind that scar that became his trademark; the only thing to differentiate between his father and himself.

How could anyone do this to him?

She hadn't realized when she had gotten so close to the Prince that she was already sitting beside the bench facing the grand piano. The look he cast to the instrument was forlorn and shallow, clearly his mind was still in the snowy ground where his blood and his belief had shed.

His finger touched a few notes again, the short tune was meant to be random but it came out melodious and harmonious. "He was about to reach my jaws that I started to fight back. I snapped the ropes up my wrist and I gave him one." Next, he glared at his formerly brutalized knuckled, "And I avenge myself."

It was hard for her to believe how Jake defeated his enemy all by himself, then again, nothing was predictable when it comes to an angry man hunger for revenge. She had heard from the Queen before, after missing for weeks, The King sent help to the South and they found Jake eventually, only himself surrounded by the dead bodies of his former comrades in the village. The revolt team must have escaped when they witness Jake's dark side.

"The bastards were captured a month after I woke up. Dad offered that I may behead them one by one."

She gasped involuntarily.

"But I didn't do it... I walked away." He added after a regretful sigh.

"Why didn't you, Prince?"

A short second of silence. "Because I stopped caring anymore."

Something in his words must have struck himself that Jake turned his face away from her view. He shook his head twice and resentfully he admitted, "I stopped trusting everyone, because sooner or later you would only be betrayed or to be used like a string puppet. So I began distancing myself away from everyone - including my own mother and myself. Thus, I became the asshole that you see I was."

Was that a sob?

"The scar haunted me every night. So much that I began to fear that even my own mother would betray me too. But I... I didn't know I failed her. Of all people, I didn't trust my own mother! I should have known better that... she loved me the most all along."

"Even now when she's gone, she never get the chance to know."

She made no comment of the resentment and the regret etched in his voice, Sherry was more preoccupied with how Jake was acting right now - the subtle rise and fall of his shoulders, the way he kept his face away from her as if he was hiding from her.

Gently, as gentle as the touch of a feather, the woman reached out for the side of his face with her agile fingers and was silently glad that Jake take no action to push her away. She could tell how tense Jake was, his jaw stiffen as she carefully drawing his chin so that she could see him.

Tears.

Breathlessly, she gasped in awe. He was like a totally different person in her plain view right now. The red rims of his always cold blue eyes, the faltered look of his always tough demeanor. She simply could not believe it. The ego he always withheld as a steel heart bad guy shattered before her very eyes just like that. To say that he was not embarrassed was a lie, Jake tried to shun himself away from her but her fingers locked onto his chin firmly that he would be going nowhere.

"I miss her, Sherry. I miss her."

Now she understand what Gabrielle meant when she said that there was never love lost in Jake. He had locked away his love for anything for so long that he had forgotten what it felt like to love.

Tears prickling down the side of her face too and she stroked his cheek, his scar that served as his constant reminder. How she had wanted to make it disappear.

He wanted to pull himself away again to spare himself from the tears flowing from his pores but Sherry kept him still in her hands. thumbs brushing away the salty moisture on his face.

To her, the display of his emotion did not indicate his weakness, but he was a better man than he was.

He pulled her in then, wrapping both his arms around her petite flush and tucked her head securely beneath his chin.

"You are all I have left now." He was begging her, he made point that he had no one else left to trust but her. "Don't you ever leave."

"I won't." She whispered back into his neck. Arms around his shoulder just as tightly. It was a promise she made to keep.

After Albert Wesker had presented his final red rose to his wife, it was Jake Wesker's turn to present his white rose as a filial son to his mother.

Sherry stood by him silently as the choir sang and the Queen was laid to rest in the earth of the Palace.

The apprehension in his eyes were no longer present as she had seen him, it was replaced by his new determination.

Jake will live up to his mother's wishes.

A.N: I finished this in time for an update just for today, 1st of July (my time here is 1st of July). Hey, today is the day that Sherry and Jake will be getting out of the underwater facility in China. I thought it should be yesterday (30th of June) since they will be getting out of the hospital/lab/casino/whatever. But my injuries prevent me from doing so... =.=

Shoutout to my sister for helping me beta so that I can update this with minimal typos! XD

Oh, and did I mention that this fic will be seeing its ending soon? Perhaps chapter 25 or something, after I reevaluate all my plans, chapter 30 is not possible. :( Just a heads up.

Next update will take me a while like this one but I am getting a lot better, I promise. When I do, mach speed I will write.:)

RFF!