Chapter 17

-The Thin Line Between Good and Evil-

After about ten minutes of walking, the building Wesker had spotted came into view. The building turned out to be a very rundown looking shed and the disappointment was obvious on all of their faces. Except for Wesker and Eva of course, who remained ever so emotionless as they took in the sight of the worn shed as they drew nearer. Claire was walking beside her brother and Chris noticed her continuous looks of concern and curiosity she kept giving him as they walked. The BSAA soldier sighed loudly.

"What is it, Claire?"

"What? Uh..nothing, nevermind," she stammered, startled that he had seen her looking.

"What's on your mind, Claire?" Chris asked, pressingly.

"Is something wrong, Chris?" Claire finally asked him after a moment of hesitation.

The group had reached the shed and now temporarily paused as they waited to see what Chris's reply would be to Claire's question. Chris smiled at his sister reassuringly.

"Nothing is wrong, Claire. We're back in Africa safe and sound. Everything's fine now," he assured her.

His answer sounded sincere and confident but Claire wasn't convinced in the slightest. She met Chris's gaze and the two siblings stared at each other before Claire shook her head sadly. "You're lying."

Chris seemed genuinely surprised. "What do you mean?"

Everyone was looking at him now, their piercing eyes bothered him and made him very uncomfortable as he tried to block them out and focus on his sister. He didn't even know these people... Except for the whole keeping each other alive all day kind of deal...

Claire seemed reluctant to answer and she scuffed the dirt ground with her shoe. But finally she returned her eyes to her brother who was smiling at her as if she would realize her mistake and how silly she had been, and told him flat out how she knew.

"I can always tell when you're lying. Your mouth smiles but your eyes don't." Claire revealed.

Chris's smile faltered and in an instant it became painfully obvious that Claire was right. Now everyone's eyes boring into Chris made him feel like too much pressure was on him and his shoulder wound chose to start throbbing right at that moment. Placing a hand to the bothersome injury, he took a deep breath and admitted to it.

"You're right. I just don't feel like this is over. I don't believe Sin is finished with us yet and I have this bad feeling that something awful is going to happen."

"Don't worry, Chris. Nothing bad is going to happen." Eva said comfortingly. "Sin told us there was a traitor in our group. That they were lying about their true intentions and that that someone was going to try to kill one of us and kidnap another. But it never happened. Sin was just lying and deceiving us like always."

"But what if that's what this is. What if Sin is deceiving us right now by making us believe we're safe and that it's all over..." Chris trailed off, unwilling to think about what that would mean were it to be the truth.

Eva came over to him and rested a hand on his arm. "Relax, nothing bad is going to happen to you."

Chris looked solemnly at her. "I know. I don't think it's going to happen to me."

The way he was staring straight at Eva when he said that gave her the impression he meant her. She searched his eyes for some evidence that she was right in feeling that way but he was looking past her now, at the shed.

"I suppose we should take a peek inside while we're here." Chris decided, forgetting his fears for the time being.

No one made a move to follow and the agent went in alone. They were all wondering about whether Chris's feeling had any solid basis to back it up. Eva was staring at the spot Chris had been standing in, still puzzled at the way he had looked at her before. Wesker came to stand beside his daughter.

"He's made a connection with you so now he thinks the worst is going to happen to you." Wesker said to her as he stared out at the vast openness of the dry landscape around them.

Eva lifted her head to look at him in confusion. "I don't understand."

"A connection, a bond. For some reason the two of you are able to see eye to eye with one another. Maybe it's because you both lost parents at a young age. Or perhaps it's because you both live to fight and would never back down even when all the odds are against you. I don't presume to know why, but I do see how he trusts you and you trust him. Regardless of the why, now that the connection has been made, Chris fears losing it." Wesker explained to her, still staring straight ahead of himself.

Eva frowned slightly. "He helped me to stop you from making the biggest mistake ever. He did that even though I gave him every reason not to trust me. Chris won't lose me if I have any say in the matter. I know you don't like him but I do. I want to stay with him, dad..Wesker... He makes me feel important."

A slight twitch of Wesker's jaw was the only thing that gave away his aversion to her feelings but he chose not to voice his objections and instead continued what he had been trying to explain.

"You have to understand, Chris has had a very difficult life which makes him constantly worried about losing the ones he cares about most."

"Why is he so afraid of losing them?" Eva asked curiously.

Wesker's reply was immediate and simple. "Because he always does."

He left her with that and went to join Chris's search of the shed. Eva stayed where she was thinking over everything her father had said and it was then she remembered the woman in the black suit whose body had been in the foyer of the mansion. Eva had met the woman when she had come to stay with her father for a while. Excella Gionne had described the woman as one of her playthings and Eva had once overheard the two of them talking about the device on the woman's chest which apparently injected her with a chemical... Something called P30 that was able to control her actions.

It all hit Eva then. Jill was the woman who fell through the window with Wesker after saving Chris's life in Spencer's estate. Jill was also the woman who had died in the mansion's foyer earlier that day. The same woman who's corpse Eva had so coldly shot in the head without hesitation. A woman who was actually immune to the T-Virus so that had also been an unnecessary action. She was horrified at how insensitive she had been. Chris had just lost someone incredibly important to him for the second time in two years, this time for good, and Eva hadn't even blinked an eye. Right then and there she became determined to make it up to Chris one way or another.

With that decided, she headed past the others standing around and went inside the shed. Chris had already given up his search of the room and stood leaning against a wooden shelf attached to one of the walls as Wesker continued to rifle through meaningless pieces of paper. Eva noticed a top shelf and leaned up on the tips of her boots to reach what looked like a thin metal briefcase. She miscalculated her reach a bit and her hand accidentally sent the case crashing to the ground. It snapped open and a handgun fell out. Chris and Wesker turned their attention to the case when they heard it fall and watched Eva bend down to pick it up. When she lifted the case, two pieces of paper fluttered out. One of them was wrinkled and ripped while the other seemed fresh and rather new. Snatching the papers up, she turned them over to skim their contents and instantly felt her blood run cold as certain words jumped out at her on the page. She stared at the pieces of paper for a very long time and Wesker grew impatient.

"Well? Anything of interest?" he asked her.

Eva tore her eyes from the paper and numbly nodded. "Everyone needs to hear this."

She avoided Chris's gaze and walked out of the shed to join the others with the pieces of paper held tightly in her hands. Wesker and Chris followed and stood near the entrance to the shed as she stood in front of the entire group.

"What's going on?" Sheva asked Chris as she came to stand by her partner.

Claire was with Sheva, giving him the same curious look and Chris just shook his head. He didn't know what this was about any more than they did but already a sinking feeling was beginning inside of him. When everyone was giving Eva their full attention, the girl began to read from the wrinkled and slightly torn piece of paper.

"Memo 3174. Revitalization of Umbrella. The Bio-terrorism Security Assessment Alliance (BSAA) has been created under the guise of a bio-terrorism government agency. The organization's true purpose is to revive the Umbrella Corporation and using a bio-terrorism agency will allow us access to information on virus activity. As planned, ex-STARS members and survivors of the mansion incident C. Redfield and J. Valentine have been recruited to the BSAA agency so their anti-Umbrella activities can be closely monitored."

Eva did not allow time for anyone to say anything about what she had just read as she moved on to the next piece of paper. The second sheet of paper looked much fresher and newer than the previous one.

"Delta team-Mission Orders. Alpha team has been sent to Kijuju with C. Redfield as commander and have been given false information regarding the bio-weapons dealer Ricardo Irving. Their team is completely in the dark about our true goals and should prove to be a successful distraction in keeping A. Wesker occupied until your team is ready to deal with him. Mission objectives: Retrieve sample of Uroboros, retrieve sample of Progenitor virus (can be procured in diluted form by retrieving a sample of A. Wesker's blood), eliminate A. Wesker upon retrieval of the viruses, capture test subject E. Wesker for further experimentation and observation."

Eva lifted her eyes from the paper and glared furiously at Sheva. "You were with Umbrella this entire time!"

Sheva stared wide-eyed at her in shock. "What? No! I had no idea!"

The woman turned to Chris, her eyes pleading for him to listen to her. "You have to believe me, Chris. I didn't know my team was working for Umbrella. I'm just as surprised as you! I thought Umbrella was finished, destroyed. How could I have known they were involved in the events here? Don't you believe your partner, Chris?"

He stared at her with uncertainty but he was leaning towards believing her. Not only because he always gave people the benefit of the doubt. He would listen to her because this was Sheva. She was a good person who had saved his life numerous times on their mission in Kijuju and he wasn't going to turn his back on her now. At least, those were his initial thoughts. His thoughts and opinions rapidly changed when Eva revealed more.

"You say you're not involved with Umbrella? And that you had no knowledge of these orders?" Eva asked her.

Sheva nodded her head vigorously. "That's right. I had no idea of Umbrella's involvement!"

Eva's expression turned instantly harsher. "Then why is this letter written to you?!"

Sheva stared at Eva, her story falling apart in front of her as Eva read the last lines on the piece of paper.

"The fate of the Umbrella Corporation now rests in your hands, Sheva Alomar. Do not disappoint us as so many have before."

When she was finished reading, Eva marched over and handed the papers straight to Chris. It was his partner who had betrayed them, giving him the right to see the evidence with his own eyes so there would be no doubt.

"Someone is betraying you all, someone is lying, someone will try to kill one of you and kidnap another..." Eva spoke loudly, recalling Sin's warning for them. "Sin was right. Sheva is the liar! She was working for Umbrella all along!"

Chris was numb as he stared at the pieces of paper in his hands. In printed letters was the evidence of his partner's betrayal and it stung him like a thousand sharp knives piercing his heart. It was horrible enough that all this time he was working for the BSAA he had actually been working for Umbrella. But somehow the fact that his new partner was involved from the very beginning, intentionally working for the evil Corporation made the realization much worse. Chris could feel the pain of betrayal ripping away at his insides and he just couldn't shake this terribly hollow feeling that was growing inside of him. It was only when he realized Sheva had drawn her gun and was pointing it at Wesker that he forced himself to snap out of his stunned daze.

Sheva was backing away from the group but keeping her gaze on Wesker. Her eyes displayed pure hatred for the tyrant opposite her and she paid little attention to anyone else. The African woman kept the gun level with Wesker's chest as he stared back at her quite calmly. Even though he was the one with the gun pointed at him, he appeared to be the most composed and unaffected out of them all.

"The serum was supposed to kill you. Why didn't it kill you?!" Sheva demanded, her anger evident in her tone.

Wesker folded his arms against his chest as he met her furious glare. "Correction. Your superiors thought an overdose of the serum might kill me. Umbrella had no way to know if it would work or not but I suppose they didn't bother to inform you of that little fact. And I'll also assume they didn't mention the Kijuju area was swarming with infected majini either. Umbrella sent you and your team on a suicide mission, my dear. How does that make you feel, hm? Knowing you are just another dispensable pawn for Umbrella."

"Shut up!" Sheva screamed at him.

Her voice trembled and it was obvious she was losing control rapidly. Chris quickly moved to stand in the space between Wesker and Sheva as her finger pressed dangerously tighter on the trigger of her handgun.

"Sheva, you don't want to do this!" Chris reasoned with her. "You're not a killer. You're a good person, Sheva. It's not too late for you to back out of your mission. You can still get away from Umbrella."

She tore her eyes away from Wesker, her gaze still angry but now mixed with fear as well. "No, I can't. Nobody leaves Umbrella. If they're done with you, then you're as good as dead. And if you try to get out yourself, then you're as good as dead. There is no leaving. And if I fail them, they won't just come after me either. They'll come after my friends and family too after I'm dead. Umbrella doesn't leave loose ends. I mean shit, Chris, these people blew up an entire city just to cover what they'd done."

Chris knew she was referring to Raccoon City and he sadly thought about the place which had once been his home. An entire bustling, crowded city completely wiped off the map just so Umbrella could avoid a lawsuit. Meeting Sheva's fearful gaze he could see that she was becoming more and more unstable.

"I know better than anyone, the things Umbrella's done," he informed her, speaking soothingly to try and calm her down. "But I also know people who have escaped Umbrella's grasp. I know people who have survived them and I'll help you do the same. You have a choice, Sheva."

"Yeah." Chris's sister piped up.

She came to stand on Sheva's left side but far enough away so as not to freak her out and cause her to start shooting. Claire smiled at Sheva, encouraging her to listen to her brother's words.

"You get to choose whether you're going to be good or whether you're going to be evil. If you side with Umbrella then you're just like them, evil to the very core. Give the gun to Chris, and you're one of us. You'll be one of the good guys." Claire told her softly.

Chris watched as indecision flickered across Sheva's features and he used that for his moment to seal her cooperation with them.

"Sheva."

Her thoughtful eyes darted to him when he spoke her name. He'd only known her for the extent of their mission but he was usually a good judge of character, barring his ex-captain Albert Wesker, and he knew Sheva was capable of making the right decision. Chris only had to use his next words appropriately.

"You told me about what happened to your parents." Chris formulated. "They died in an accident similar to the ones Umbrella Corporation has let happen again and again. Do you really want to work for people no different than those who caused your parents' deaths?"

The haunted look in her eyes caused Chris to feel a bit guilty for reminding Sheva of how her parents had died but he knew that look also meant he had convinced her. He held out a hand to take the gun and after a few seconds of hesitation, she handed the weapon over. Once the gun was out of her grasp, the younger Claire came over to Sheva and smiled gently at her.

"Now you're one of the good guys." Claire Bennet said to her happily.

Sheva tried to force a smile but failed miserably. The rest of the group were eyeing her with much deserved distrust and suspicion. She doubted anyone would be relying on her anytime soon. The worst stare was coming from the youngest member of their group, Eva. The girl's green eyes pierced Sheva's brown ones with such force that the young African field agent quickly averted her gaze to stare at the dirt ground. Feeling Eva's eyes were still on her, Sheva lifted her eyes to meet the younger girl's own again. Confusion filled her when Eva's gaze became horrified.

"Danko, no!" Eva hollered.

Wondering what Eva was so upset about, the female BSAA agent turned around and found Danko standing no more than a foot away. Time seemed to freeze as Sheva heard two muted blasts and a sudden pain in her stomach but couldn't grasp that the two things were connected. Then she couldn't feel anything below her neck any more and felt strangely detached from herself.

Danko was looking at her stomach now, and numbly, she lowered her gaze to look down. Sheva didn't understand why she couldn't feel anything, but when she saw a wet red substance spreading across her shirt, she knew it was blood. She stared back at Danko as she realized he had shot her twice.

"Oh," was all she managed to utter as she collapsed onto the dirty and dry ground.