Chapter 2: Quietly Waiting

Also re-edited! Enjoy! -Chris

Jake Muller

I sat there on the bench, hands in my pockets, staring at a couple teenagers having a snowball fight. I felt like having a beer, but I was supposed to sit here until the BSAA's scientist people had decided if they needed more of my blood. I was back in America, at least, where the virus wasn't spreading. But I felt...bored. Just...out of it. I mean, I hadn't enjoyed getting smacked around by giant bloodsucking monsters and a psychopathic clone, but I'd felt like I was making a difference, getting somewhere. Now...well, I was still making a difference—the biggest one there could be, perhaps, but I just felt like I had gotten, I don't know, stagnant.

Maybe it was just that I had stopped traveling. I had moved around a lot, but not on the scale I had during 2013. Until then, I had really just been trying to like out a careful life. I hated my dad, I did. But I guess I had a pretty rough start with Chris Redfield and Piers Nivans. I felt kind of bad about that now that Piers's life was dependent on my blood.

I got up. I needed to shake the imagery of those teenagers as zombies out of my head. I walked up the street and over the the BSAA lot.

Piers Nivans

I looked down at my arm. It sat there, huge and green and pink and blue and gray and callous. I flexed my claw. A few sparks traveled up and down the tentacle lazily. It no longer felt so weird or cumbersome carrying this arm. I took my left hand and felt down my right forearm, something I'd been doing lately. I could tell that the virus anti-mutagen was working. A few veins stood out up and down the limb, and the flesh was going from green to gray. The bulbous lumps here and there were no longer quite so pronounced. I looked in the mirror situated on the table. My right eye was back to its normal hazel. And thankfully, I was no longer covered in bruising. I looked back down at my arm.

I didn't see it as a freak show as much as I used to. It was still heavy and kind of a burden, but it was still my arm. My shooting arm. It was just mutated. And that was my own fault. Then there was my left arm; I had kind of started to see them as two separate entities lately. It wasn't only my right arm that was a cripple, it was my left arm. I couldn't do anything with it. I couldn't dress myself, I sure as hell couldn't write, and even holding a coffee cup was a challenge. Driving? As if. I was pretty capable with both my arms before Haos—being a soldier, I had to be—but since my right arm went down, my left arm had fallen with it. My right arm, on the other hand, had still managed to stay useful, despite the mutation. Flashing back, I remembered how much electricity I could generate and how I had destroyed Haos with it. My right arm was still shooting strong. It felt like a friend who wouldn't leave me, even injured. My left arm was going to have to get in the spirit of things.

Damn, look at me, I thought. I was calling my left arm guilty like a judge. I was going to have to do so much training to get back in my usual condition. Hopefully though, I can make it happen quick, and maybe even get better.

My bedside buzzer rang. I picked up the receiver. "Yeah?" I said gruffly.

"Mr. Nivans, sir, we're going to need you at Drekker Street, in about twenty minutes. We're running some new tests."

I hesitated. "Isn't that the...?" I asked. What the hell?

"Yes, and you'll need to bring a change of clothes." the casual lady said. Then she hung up. Drekker Street was another place where a building had been re-purposed for bio-testing, an exercise center. They had a lot of pools and tanks there. I knew it was going to be something to anticipate: another day of seeing how well I adapted, and experimenting with the qualities the Enhanced C-virus had left me. I didn't want to think about trying to swim with this thing again with all the scientists staring me down. But I did as the woman had said and slipped on my half-shirt and packed up an extra set of underwear, jeans, back-up boxers, another half-shirt, swim trunks, and a towel. I put it all in a bag, slung it over my shoulder, and walked out of the little mini-section that the BSAA Central had reserved for me. After I had gotten through to the lot and out of the gates, then walked down to the blue car at the end of the street. Opening the door with my left hand, I climbed into the back seat and squeezed myself into a safer spot—the last thing I wanted was to injure myself in any way in another crash or explosion. I looked up front.

"Helena?"

"Hey." Helena said, flashing a smile at me. "How's it going, Survivor?"

"Good, I guess." I said, shaking my garment on into a more covering position.

"Where to?" she asked nicely.

"Drekker Street." I said sulkily.

She raised an eyebrow. "You okay?" she asked.

"Nope."

"Alright then." she said, then started to drive. For about five minutes, we were silent. At the corner of Drekker and Tolulla, I finally piped up, inquiring why Helena Harper, who worked in a completely different section of the government, was driving my anywhere. "Shouldn't you be somewhere else?" I asked.

"No, actually. I'm on a mostly independent little excursion, just trying to check on some computers-today in fact. Thought I'd come do you a favor before I left the state, since it's on the way. Shame it can't last a little longer. I suppose I should have come and visited you earlier."

"It's no trouble." I said meekly. I didn't really know Helena all that well. We were at the cordoned-off parking lot now.

"Well, I'll be back soon enough. 'Til then, keep my friends company." she said. I found it odd that she said 'keep her friends company' instead of them keeping me company. Not that I felt, I don't know, verbally neglected or whatever, just thankful that she wasn't trying to baby me. I got out of the car, closed it, and stepped up onto the sidewalk, turning around. She waved, and pulled out of the parking lot. I lifted my right arm a little before realizing my error, then waved goodbye to her with my left. Then she was gone.

I sighed, and walked up through the drive and into the hallway. Sure enough, a woman was sitting around the pool with a bunch of her scientists associates. There was nobody else here, of course. None of them seemed the least bit fazed that it was November and there was snow on the ground.

"Good to see you again, Piers. We're just going to see if your lungs and mutations react to water."

"Again?"

"Yes, again. Just get into the pool, submerge yourself, and we'll see if your mutation has affected your lungs, and if it will stay that way should it have."

"So, try and breathe underwater?" I asked. She nodded.

I took a deep breath, then slid into the pool. That water was cold like a bitch to start with, but I sucked it up. I sat still for a second, then submerged my head. I tried to suck in water, but my reflexes kicked in and I surfaced. Nope, no breathing underwater at the moment. But I saw the looks on researchers' faces, and sank again. This time, I held my breath, and tried to see what might trigger some gill or something that I might have.

After a while, it clicked. I was holding my breath, but also not holding my breath. Looking down, I saw my chest moving in and out, and I could definitely feel the flow. I was holding air in my lungs, but water was...I don't know, saturating me? I could feel it tickling my skin just so slightly. Then I got it—I was breathing through my skin, not gills or whatever. I looked down at my right arm. Despite the weightlessness that held me up in the water, my arm felt heavier, more active than normal. More water was being taken in by it than the rest of my body. Oddly, the water wasn't blurring my vision in the slightest. I surfaced, and released the air I'd been holding.

"I can do it." I said shortly to them. "I can breathe underwater."

The woman brightened up. "Fantastic!" and then she scribbled something on her clipboard along with all the other scientists. "Now, about your bioelectric properties." she said.

"What about them?" I said carefully. "Well, do they work underwater?" the man next to her asked.

Jesus Christ. I don't ask to be the center of attention, but I would've thought they'd have heard what had happened with Haos. "Yeah, fine."

"Can you show us?"

Of course. But I submerged myself again, this time for my own pleasure, and tensed up my right arm. It took a second, but I soon saw sparks flowing up and down the giant green claw. I willed myself to push it further, and with a flex of my nerves, the sparks started to flow outward in the water. I was careful not to overdo it and electrocute myself, because for all I knew, that could happen. Then I brought myself back up to the surface again.

"Excellent!" the doctor said, clapping. "We're still going back and forth about it, but we might be able to adjust the anti-mutagen to allow for these properties to stay with you."

My gut lurched. I wasn't a someone to be souped up with superpowers. That was Neo-Umbrella's job. "What do you mean?" I said cautiously.

"Well, if we can work it out, and you were able to keep these abilities, well, it could only be helpful, right?"

That's some attitude for a scientist to have. If only it were on some other occasion. "I don't know how I feel about that." I said.

They looked crestfallen. "Right, of course. With your consent only, Mr. Nivans. Let us know if you think about it."

"I will." I said, not really wanting to think about it at all.

After a few more tests and simulations of whatever they were trying to do with me, that didn't accomplish much else, the doctor and her team of researchers said I was free to stay here for as long as I wanted, since the pool was private property. I could call to be picked up later, or could come with them, dry off, and get back home. Since the option of having some downtime to myself in the water was open, I chose that option. After they left, I went into the gym area, haphazardly stripped off my jeans and underwear (the top had fallen away a long while ago) and struggled into my swim trunks. I ran on the treadmill for a while, pushing myself to handle the fastest speed it would go at the highest angle. I imagine I probably would have looked less like a complete freak and more like an incomplete freak to anyone who would have seen me in any other case. But soon, after I'd warmed up and worked up a good sweat, I stopped. Then, in a moment of vain weakness, I looked in the mirror.

I wasn't attractive. Though, once you got past the combination squid and lobster on my arm and the green skin receding down the right side of my face, well...I looked pretty human. I was getting healthier, at least. Still not in the shape I was used to though. I was going to have to come here more often.

After that, I lifted some weights, pulled some cords, did some thrusts, and generally just exercised until I was bored. After that, I thought about getting back in the pool for a while, but the air was cold enough as it was, so I put on what clothes I could and got ready to go. Except I saw someone coming in.

"You seem to be doing well."

Jake Muller was standing across from me. This was embarassing. "Oh, uh...hey there."

Jake didn't seem to be too interested in me, or anything for that matter, but spoke anyway. "It's pretty cold out here. You've got balls to come here without a sweater."

If he was trying to be funny, I wasn't laughing.

Jake nodded. "I can believe that." After a few moments of silence, he said "Look, it's an icy bitch out there, they got a jacuzzi here?" he said. I shook my head. "This was an exercise center that got repurposed for the BSAAs use. You shouldn't be here."

"I wanted to talk to you." I didn't answer him, but eventually he went on. "And I think you need to talk to me, right?"

I didn't think that. I didn't hate Jake Muller, but I didn't like him. He was arrogant, rude, volatile, and I don't like people like that. But I swallowed that and spoke.

"I guess. I do owe you a thanks. You've saved my life. And a lot of others, too." I said quietly.

"There's a lot of other people to thank besides me." Jake said, looking away from me.

"I'll get to writing some notes when I get back home.", I answered roughly. Even if I knew this was his way of being modest, I didn't like it.

"I'm sorry."

I blinked. "Sorry for what?"

"For you needing the blood in the first place. My father created this whole war, and it's because of him that people are turning into monsters, including you."

That stung a little.

"So it's my responsibility to reverse the damage he's done. I owe it to them...and to you."

This hit me pretty hard. After a few seconds, I pooled my courage and said "You're not like your father at all."

"I know." Jake said coldly. "Don't talk about him any more than you have to after this, okay?"

"Alright." I answered. Rude for rude was fine by me.

After staring him down for a few minutes, I made to move past him, "You want a smoke?" he asked awkwardly, offering a cigarette when I approached.

"No, sorry, what I need is to wake up a little. I'm leaving." I told him.

"Uh, yeah-I'll gonna get going too. Later." he said quickly, walking out and hopping the gate.

It was my opinion that if he was sincere, that was great. But he could have picked a better time than when I was away from CHQ, unless he just got nervous around people, and I found that to be a trait hard to imagine in Jake Muller.

I sat out on the sidewalk in the lot for a while. About five minutes after I saw Jake walk off, a man walked out of the pool building. "Sorry, was at a meet...ing..." he said, trailing off at the sight of me. "Ah, yes, well, I'm here to drive you home now." I nodded courteously and got in. I noticed he looked in his mirror a lot. In fact, if he looked any more frequently, he'd be causing a wreck. "Eyes on the road." I reminded him, and he stopped.

Ten minutes later, I was situated in my room, laying on the bed. I had hardly done any work, but why not get some rest? Maybe I should go see someone and tire myself out again. Just something to occupy myself with. Anything at all.

Not quite satisfied with the ending myself, or the general chapter, but I'm working on the plot, so bear with me. Thanks for reading, please review! —Chris