"Just some kids," said Grayson, hoping Alexia would let it go, but knowing her well enough to know she wouldn't. "They're not worth your time, Lex," he interjected, before she could slide the first two syllables of an argument off her tongue. "One of them helped me in Raccoon City. That counts for something, right?"
"Grayson, we can't let them go," said Alexia, staring coldly at him.
He tried to shift the subject. "Look, I saw this weird swarm-monster—the ants are nesting in the bodies."
"Of course they are," said Alexia. "Each body is its own nest, with its own queen. Think of them as vassals. They're all subordinate to the primary nest."
"Are you controlling them? Those things."
"No," said Alexia, "I'm not. But the ants know to stay away from me. Now step aside, Grayson."
He opened his mouth to argue, but closed it when he heard the sudden, loud kick and sputter of an engine on the other side of the door, and the squeak and rumble of treads. "That fucking idiot."
The pistenbully was halfway across the garage, moving at a crawl. Grayson grimaced; he'd forgotten how slow they moved. "Did they really think they'd get far in that?" said Alexia, amused. She watched the snowcat chugging along, grinning a little wider with each slow turn of the treads. "I'm just going to watch this for a bit," she told him, strolling unhurriedly into the garage. "This is bloody hilarious."
"Lex, just let them go."
"Grayson," said Alexia, skewering him with a look. "What do you think will happen when they reach Casey, hm?" She waited for him to answer, and when Grayson didn't, she said, "They'll talk."
"Rockfort's gone. Just blow this place up," he said. "Can't do shit if there's no evidence."
Her voice took on an excessively saccharine, condescending quality. "Umbrella is already on shaky ground, I imagine, thanks to that rubbish in Raccoon City. If those two talk, it's a chance for our opponents to gain more ammunition, more reasons to poke their nose into places they don't belong. It's scrutiny we don't need."
"You don't have to kill them, Lex."
"Not immediately," she said, reaching over to pinch his cheek. "But I do hate loose ends."
Just as the pistenbully cleared the shutter, the ground quaked underneath him, and four long hyphae burst through the concrete in a shower of snow and ice, snatching up the truck and squeezing. The frame popped and whined and began to crumple as the hyphae heaved the truck off the ground, whipping it across the garage like a toy. It rolled and bounced, and teetered for a moment before settling on its side with a creak. Grayson smelled gas and something like burning machine parts, and he was sure neither Steve or Claire had survived.
But he heard the metal groan, and the driver-side door heaved and popped, clattering to the ground. Claire and Steve scrambled out of the snowcat and away from it, just as it erupted into flames. Flames that were steadily spreading, following veins of fuel.
"We need to get out of here," said Grayson. Before Alexia could reply, he bolted across the garage to help Steve and Claire. They were pretty banged up, but nothing, by some miracle, that looked life-threatening. Hauling them to their feet, he said, "I got you both. Come on," and they started back toward the doors, Claire and Steve hobbling a few paces behind him.
Alexia was seething. "What are you doing?"
"What's it look like, Lex? Helping them."
Steve pulled his gun, pointing it at Alexia. "Fuck off, Alfred," he warned, blood dribbling down his chin.
Alexia said nothing. She stepped forward, carefully peeling off a glove, and clamped her hand around Steve's wrist. He screamed, the gun dropping from his hand and clattering on the concrete. The smell of chemicals and cooked flesh filled the air. "I," she said, "am not my brother. Unfortunate for you."
The pistenbully moaned as some component inside it shifted and settled.
As they fled the garage and the warehouse, the dull thunder of an explosion rocked the facility—and Grayson supposed it had taken most of the garage with it. Alexia accompanied them, not out of any concern for Claire or Steve, but out of concern for him. "You don't have to come," Grayson told Alexia. "You've done enough already. Kid's got a nasty burn on his wrist."
Alexia ignored his comment about Steve, who moaned and clutched his wrist, a band of raw, red skin encircling it. "The ants won't bother you as long as I'm with you."
"You're supposed to be dead," said Claire, watching Alexia as if she still wasn't entirely convinced she was real.
"I'm surprised you can even talk."
"I survived Raccoon City. I can survive a snowcat wreck. So you control those tentacle things."
"What of it?"
"Are you even human?"
"I'm not really sure," said Alexia. She looked at Claire, and Grayson moved to interpose himself between them; but Alexia didn't attack. She stared at Claire as if she were an interesting curio, and said, "Grayson said you helped him in Raccoon City."
"We helped each other," said Claire.
Her gaze shifted to Steve. "So the boy's done nothing of note."
"Fuck you, you crazy bitch."
Alexia backhanded Steve so hard that his head whipped to the side.
"Leave him the fuck alone!" exclaimed Claire, and if Grayson hadn't stopped her, she would have made the fatal mistake of swinging on Alexia.
"Before," said Alexia, grabbing Steve's ear and twisting it so violently that Grayson thought the cartilage would tear, "you called me Alfred. Why?"
Steve yowled—and then he winced because he'd yowled, mewling about bruised, maybe broken ribs. Grayson was inclined to think the former; if his ribs had been broken, Steve would have been in a lot more pain. Alexia let go of his ear; it glowed a bright, angry red. "She doesn't know 'bout her weird-ass brother, does she?" he asked Grayson.
Alexia struck Steve again, and he yelped and swore at her. "Speak ill of my brother again," she warned, ignoring Steve's vituperations, "and I'll do worse than hit you."
Grayson wanted to point out that she'd tried to kill Alfred, but decided against it. "Just leave him be," he said to Alexia. "He's a dumb kid."
"Fuck you, dude."
Alexia wound her hand back for another strike, but stopped, then said, "I suppose you're right."
Once they reached the infirmary, which was a couple doors down from the barracks, Alexia departed for the mansion, and Grayson, after convincing Alexia he would be right behind her, lingered a little while longer to keep an eye on Steve and Claire, just to make sure they were okay. Steve's burn, as it turned out, wasn't as severe as it had looked. After applying some burn gel and gauze, and swallowing a couple of pain-killers, Steve was feeling better.
The infirmary was a pretty basic room with rows of IV-drips and cots lining each wall. Each of the units were divided by a plastic curtain, and contained a small plastic bookcase stocked with old paperbacks and magazines. There was a TV too, hooked up to a VCR. A copy of Roadhouse was loaded into the VCR, half-watched.
Steve limped over to a cot and laid down with a miserable groan, pressing an instant ice-pack against a dark, ugly bruise on his ribs, and Claire sat by the TV, cleaning and bandaging her cuts. "Thanks for the save back there," said Claire, smoothing the last butterfly over a gash on her cheek. "I think she would've killed us if you hadn't been there, Gray."
"She would have," he agreed.
"So," said Steve, sitting up with a grimace, "now that our fucking snowcat's gone, any ideas on how we get the fuck outta here?"
Grayson shrugged.
"Well, that's just fucking great," said Steve acidly. "Thanks, Captain Useless."
"Look," said Grayson, "this is a situation, okay?"
"Chris knows I'm here," said Claire.
"Like your brother's gonna come all the way to fucking Antarctica for us."
"You don't know Chris, Steve."
Grayson stared at the smiling stock-photo doctor on the wall above Steve, on a poster advertising the importance of a balanced diet (Remember, said Dr. Smiley, you'll fit in those jeans if you stick to your greens). It reminded him of the posters he'd seen plastered all over Sherry's school, and he idly wondered if Umbrella had bought it from some overstock of shitty middle-school posters. He looked over at Claire, then said, "I believe it."
"Duh," said Claire. "You know him."
"Not very well," corrected Grayson. "I met him and the other members of S.T.A.R.S on occasion at Jack's Bar. Used to play a lot of gigs there. Jack always made me play bluesier numbers. He said it lent a 'roadside ambience' to the place."
"Isn't that where you met Annette?"
"Not met, Claire. Reconnected."
"So that's our plan," said Steve to Claire, wrinkling his nose. "We just gotta fucking hope your brother shows up?"
"Maybe Alexia wouldn't have destroyed the truck if you hadn't tried to take off in it while she was standing outside the door," said Grayson.
"Up until just now, I thought she was fucking dead. How was I supposed to fuckin' know she was there?" asked Steve. "I wasn't gonna sit the fuck around with my thumb up my ass, dude. I saw an opportunity, and I took it."
"And look where it got you."
"You also told us she was dead," said Claire.
"I lied," he said.
