Nightmare Revisted 5
Totally just realized how far behind on this I was...
Title: Nightmare Revisted
Fandom: Resident Evil
Genre: Horror, Romance, Action
Pairings: Wesker/Claire (main), Chris/Jill
Rating: M (overall), PG13 this chapter for a bit of action violence
Warnings: Sexual situations, blood, guts and gore, and a little bit of high school level biology.
Summary: Claire never thought that the poison from Antarctica would come back to haunt her. She never realized what it and its antidote were slowly doing to her body. Now she finds herself in the hands of a man she considers the devil himself wondering if she can ever be normal again.
Claire woke the next morning feeling like she had been hit full on by a Mack truck. She groaned as she pushed herself into sitting position. No doubt this was the result of getting smacked around by Wesker the day before, but shouldn’t the virus have taken care of this? She stood and frowned as she forced the muscles in her calves and thighs into action. As far as she knew the damn thing only healed injuries and soreness wasn’t exactly an injury. It was likely the result of going so long without any physical activity, which was something she could easily remedy via use of the gym in the lab. Sighing, she shoved on socks and boots, and wrinkled her nose in disgust, at the fact, she was going to be forced to work out in her makeshift pajamas. But there was a washing machine that was perfectly workable, and she doubted that Wesker was going to leave his work to watch her, so lack of sports bra would not be too much of a problem.
She crossed her arms as the chill from the lab level hit her. She knew that the place was kept cold on purpose. Something about the temperature helping to keep bacteria from growing as rapidly as it could in warmer temperatures. So, she didn’t bother to complain too much. She passed by the door she knew led to the room Wesker had taken her blood samples in and stared at the little bit of glass in the upper corner of the door. The light was on. That likely meant the blonde tyrant was in there. Maybe she should stop and ask him if they could get some weapons for the firing range. It would be one more thing to keep her from growing bored. She could always threaten to go gallivanting through the town if he refused. Mind made up, Claire punched her code into the side of the door. There was a little whirling symbol to indicate that the machine was thinking before the words access denied flashed across the screen. She glared at the door before walking the few feet to the window next to it. What she saw had her temper boiling over. There was someone in there. The man was hooked up to more machines than she was sure had been in there to begin with.
“Red Queen,” Claire ground out between clenched teeth. The hologram of the little girl appeared next to the door. “Where’s Wesker?” her voice was barely above a whisper as she spoke.
“Mr. Wesker is in the control room…,” whatever the rest of Red Queen’s sentence was, it was lost as Claire marched over to the door and began to bang on it, already guessing that he code won’t work.
“Wesker!” she yelled all the soreness in her limbs forgotten after seeing the plight of the man in the other room. Just what was he doing to him in there? “Open this door, right this second! I want to know what you’re doing to that man! WESKER!” She raised her hand to level the door if she had to only to find her fist hitting a solid black kelvar vest. There was a grunt from the hit as she looked up to find Wesker looking down at her without his glasses. His hair was out of place-it looked almost like he had been running his hand through it too much for it to stay in place or that he had been sleeping. The long black coat he normally wore or its white lab coat twin was gone. He was simply in dress pants and vest. This was the closest she had ever seen him come to looking disheveled and the sight had her frozen.
“Was there something you wanted, Miss Redfield?” he asked his voice a tone lower. She swallowed thickly as he raised an eyebrow in amusement. It was the amusement that snapped her out of the semi-trance his appearance had put her in.
“Don’t call me that!” Claire said straightening to her full height. It wasn’t anywhere near his, the top of her head just reaching his shoulders. “I want to know what you are doing to that man!” She pointed down the hallway as if he wouldn’t know who she was talking about. His eyes left her face to look where she was pointing before coming back to look at her.
“I’m treating him for poisoning,” Wesker told her before turning around and heading back into the dark room that was the Red Queen’s control room. Claire followed him, not registering what he said in her anger.
“What gives you the right to…,” she trailed off as she saw him grab his sunglasses off what looked like a cot along one wall of the room. She had interrupted him from sleeping? He slept? That was such a human thing, something she thought that he was without. She blinked and his words registered. “Oh…”
“Yes, oh, dear heart,” Wesker said sounding more than a little amused by her as he put the sunglasses on. “Was there anything else I can do for you before I get back to work?” Claire frowned at him, but what could she say? Wesker was actually doing something nice for someone. But she knew better than to allow herself to believe that everything was as it seemed.
“I want to meet him,” she said doing her best to look him in the eye despite his shades. He studied her for a moment.
“Are you sure you want to do that, Claire?” he asked moving to where she was. He was close, invading her personal space, forcing her to inhale his scent. She recognized what he was doing. She had seen Chris use his size to intimidate others before. She wasn’t about to let this man do that to her. She looked up at him and glared.
“Never more certain,” she hissed before turning on her heel and walking towards the door. She paused when she got to the doorway and looked over her shoulder at him. His hands were crossed across his chest and he was merely watching her. “I’d also like you to stock the firing range. If I’m stuck here the least I can do is keep in practice.” He watched her leave tilting his head to the side. He had known that Claire Redfield was like her brother: short fuse, every thought that entered her head came out of her mouth, and she was undeniably soft. The fact that she asked to see HUNK, completely unknowing of his circumstances demonstrated that. But she was also strong; strong enough to stand up to him. He had seen leaders of entire countries quake in fear at the sight of him. And she had the nerve to make demands? It was quite amusing. Maybe he would even let her see HUNK once the poison was purged from his system. Not without telling her what he had done, of course. It was time she met the real man responsible for what happened at Raccoon City.
Two hours later found Claire leaning against the tiled wall of the shower, eyes closed in ecstasy as the water washed away the dried sweat on her body. She had pushed her body to the limit, partially to see what it could do, and partially because while she was forcing herself to move she didn’t have to think. Thinking, she was learning, was not something that was good for her here. She simply thought too much and ended up chasing herself in circles. She sighed and turned the water off. Stepping onto the floor mat she hoped her clothes would get here soon. She had tossed the pajamas/work-out clothes into the washer before getting into the shower and had washed her clothes from the day before last night. She pulled the clothes on and left the bathroom pulling her hair up into a ponytail in order to keep it out of her way. The second she hit the door another smell hit her nose. It smelled good and spicy. She hadn’t had a chance to eat yet and it made her stomach grumble in need. She put one hand on it and headed down the stairs wondering who was cooking.
Claire followed her nose into the kitchen to a sight she had never thought to see. Wesker was standing in front of the stove sautéing what looked like a combination of meat and vegetables with something else cooking next to it. He had his back to her and an open bottle of white wine on the counter. The scene was utterly domestic and completely surreal. Sure, she figured he had to eat sometime but she never would’ve thought that he ate normal food. In her worst imaginings, she could see him eating the infected like a larger-than-life monster himself.
“It is impolite to stare, dear heart,” he said without turning around and turning something off on the stove. Claire frowned at him and crossed her arms to lean against the doorway.
“I thought you were above such human things as eating,” she said before she could stop herself. Great, now she sounded like some kind of bitch. His eating habits were really none of her business. He turned around after dumping what she assumed was pasta into a colander in the sink.
“One of the results of my virus is a slow metabolism,” he said conversationally pulling a wineglass from behind him and pouring some from the bottle. “I need to eat only once every two to three days.” He set the glass on the island and slid it towards her before returning to the vegetables which he flipped using a deft turn of his wrist. Claire took the wineglass and raised it so that she could smell it. She doubted he would poison her but there was little doubt in her mind that he would knock her out if he thought it more convenient. She sipped the wine, the light fruity taste dancing on her tongue.
“Well, that explains the pasta for breakfast,” Claire said watching him as he got out two plates and silverware without taking his eyes off the skillet on the stove.
“You don’t have to eat it if it is not to your liking, Claire,” Wesker told her flatly as he removed the skillet from the heat. She felt her cheeks color at his words.
“That’s not what I meant. I’ve had odder things for breakfast. I just…,” she was rambling. She snapped her mouth shut recognizing the slight tilt of the corner of his lips as a sign of his amusement. He filled two plates with the pasta and what was in the skillet before handing one to her. He made no move to head to the dining room or sit at the island. Claire set her glass on the island and carefully twirled a bit of pasta onto her fork. She bit into it and closed her eyes in pleasure. Damn, that was divine. Not that she would ever tell him that.
“I got your genome results last night,” Wesker said the clear note of amusement in his voice telling her she had failed to keep her delight to herself. “It looks like the virus didn’t alter your DNA the way I was thinking. Rather than change the sequencing or add on to your normal strand, it bonded its DNA with yours.” And Claire wondered how it was possible for him to lose her so completely while he was speaking English. Her confusion must have shown on her face because he sighed and tried again. “Normal DNA represents itself with a double helix pattern kind of like a ladder twisted into a corkscrew. Yours is like two ladders that share one leg-one set of ‘rungs’ belongs to your DNA the other set to the virus’ DNA.” Well, the explanation gave her a better picture, but not much else.
“So what does that mean?” she asked finishing the last dregs of her pasta and moving towards the sink.
“It means your chances for a ‘cure’,” he said putting his own dishes into the sink and earning a glare he didn’t see. Honestly, the dishwasher was like three more inches away. “Are nearly non-existent. I would have to break apart the molecular bonds that held your DNA together and then somehow put the right pieces back together.” She frozen in the process of closing the dishwasher and looked at him. Her chances of going back to a normal life were gone. The blow was harder for her to deal with than she thought. She closed the dishwasher door in a controlled movement, before beginning to make her way to the hallway. She needed to be alone with this news right now. He reached out before she could move more than a few feet and grabbed her wrist. “I’m not finished, dear heart,” she looked up at him and wished for the first time that he wasn’t wearing those damn sunglasses. She’d give anything for some kind of hint as to the nature of the news he was about to give her. “While not curable, it should be possible to suppress it. Cells naturally suppress the parts of their DNA that they don’t need in order to do their jobs. That’s how you get red blood cells and white. They all have the same DNA, just different parts turned on and off,” he let her go as he finished and she rubbed her wrist absently. It wasn’t like he had hurt her. She watched with unseeing eyes as he left the kitchen to go back to the lab. Why was he still offering her hope?
Wesker had barely set foot in the room he had set up as his actual lab when his phone rang. He pulled it out and put it to his ear as he went about turning on the various machines he had shut down last night. He would see about making her the suppressant for no other reason than the fact that he wanted to see if he could do it. He was also working on meticulously reconstructing her virus for further use and study. Not that she needed to know that. He had a feeling she would make his work most difficult if she knew about it.
“Miss Wong,” he greeted the only person who would be calling him right now. Sherry should be in class this time of the morning and he knew that they wouldn’t call him over something like her getting sick.
“I’ve got that information that you wanted on that woman,” her voice was slickly amused.
“Good,” Wesker said absently as he slid a slide under one of the microscopes behind safety glass. He knew it was better to be safe than sorry when dealing with viruses. “You know where to send it.”
“I’d like to discuss payment,” she said and he felt an eyebrow climb towards his hairline.
“Name the price, and it will be wired to your account,” really, the woman was just getting too expensive. There was a mirthless chuckle on the other end of the phone.
“I don’t want money, sir,” she said flatly. “I want information-a very specific piece of information.” Wesker felt his eyes narrow at her words and was forced to pull his hands out of the mitts in order to make sure he didn’t drop the slide in shock. Ada was a good agent precisely because she didn’t ask questions. She followed his orders to the letter, did everything he asked, and never divulged his information. Why? The perfect blend of fear and money, now she was trying to bargain with him?
“What piece of information would that be, Miss Wong?” he kept his tone carefully in check as he spoke. He had a feeling that the information she asked for would be very telling.
“Was Claire Redfield the living sample of T-Veronica?” she asked him and he frowned. He knew Ada would not take any job that put her into direct opposition to him. Her survival instincts were very well tuned, but the fact that she was asking…
“Can I ask just what your fascination with the young Miss Redfield is?” Wesker needed to know what was going on and Ada had been his eyes and ears for so long. He was beginning to see the folly of allowing her to become that. If she turned on him who would he have?
“There are two separate bounties out on her, sir,” Ada told him. “Both of them are beyond anything her brother or his friends could put together unless one of them was holding on the rest of them. I’ve managed to trace one to the US government and your Mallory. The other I’m still working on. But this is all you’re going to get until you answer my question.” Wesker sighed and close his eyes. Two bounties? Claire was getting hotter by the minute. Soon he was either going to have to move the two of them to somewhere more secure or dispose of her.
“Not anymore, Miss Wong,” Wesker settled for. Let Ada take that how she would.
“What?” the woman asked and Wesker sighed.
“The answer to your question,” he growled patience stretched to the limit. There was a reason he thought humans were beneath him. So slow on the uptake. “I expect the information in my inbox within the hour.” He hung up before she could say anything and turned back to his slide. He needed to get his hands on what he was thinking about calling the T-Claire Virus. He needed to do it before events forced his hand.
The building was new pristine and white. It screamed money, power, and capitalism. But that was not what made it different than the other buildings in the Santa Fe skyline. No, what made it different was the sudden appearance and influx heavily armored men, trucks, and barricades. News crews were as close as they could get making a sub-barrier to prevent the curious from seeing very much. In the midst of this swarm of humanity, Capt. Alica Mallory stood. Her blonde hair was pulled up into a tight bun, and she wore tactical gear. The blue digital camouflage was hot under the southwest sun, and the rig holding her weapons was not the most comfortable weight. But she had to be here for this, it had taken her team forever to find one of his puppet companies that were almost guaranteed to have live samples of his work. Horizon Inc. had fit the bill. She could see the interpretative sunrise that was their logo as she pushed open the glass lobby doors. The place was swarming with police and the National Guard. She got a sharp salute upon entry, and a young ensign approached her, clearly her escort.
“Capt. Mallory,” he said falling in step with her as she walked through the lobby. “We managed to locate several live samples, though no human ones. We’re having trouble moving them out, because of the press.” Mallory stopped to look at a paper that some chief needed signed.
“What do you mean?” she asked beginning to walk again. “Is the press carrying guns? Threatening to shoot you or the samples?”
“No, sir,” the ensign said looking slightly confused.
“Then I fail to see what the problem is,” Mallory snapped as she stopped walking.
“But they’ll see the samples,” the man said going pale at her glare. Mallory massaged her temples. How stupid were these people? The whole point of this raid was to let Wesker know that they were looking for him, and that the little bit of protection he had within the government was gone. Maybe they would even get a little good press from it for seeming to crack down on companies that were doing illegal viral research. None of that would happen if the samples were hidden from the press.
“That’s the point,” she snarled and the man scurried away to inform the rest. She looked up at the ruby colored sunrise and saw only a bloody sunset. She smiled at it. Brighter horizons were certainly on the way for her.
Claire sat in the living room a bowl of popcorn in her lap. She had managed to finally figure out how the TV worked after enlisting much aid from the Red Queen and had been happy to learn that they had satellite. It was after dinner and a Friday night which meant there would be plenty of movies on. She wondered when the last time she had actually sat and watched TV was. Her life was full of trips for TerraSave, and jetlag had long since become a dear friend. When she wasn’t doing that she was filling out paperwork, or advocating for people in those out of the way countries that no one really wanted to help. Being the only Raccoon City survivor to go into this line of work, she was also the public face of TerraSave a lot, not that she minded it. It was her helping people, which was all she wanted to do. She wondered if she would ever be able to do that again. She sighed and turned on the TV. What she saw was enough to just about cause her a heart attack. It was a pharmaceutical company surrounded by reporters, and the military was taking out things that haunted the deepest darkest parts of her memory in cages right in front of reporters. The bowl of popcorn was forgotten as they brought out a Licker in an open bar cage like it was some kind of lion. She watched in abject horror as its tongue slid out to grab one of the soldiers by the neck. It shook him like a demented ragdoll before the man’s comrades shot the hell out of the creature. It gave a cry as it died, but Claire knew from the way the man landed he was long dead. A woman stepped onto screen. The woman was pretty if severe looking in her uniform. She began yelling at the men and Claire watched in horror as the Licker she thought dead began trying to get up. She raised a hand to cover her mouth, only to let out a little scream as one of the side tables made impact with the television screen.
“That BITCH,” Wesker roared from behind her, and Claire turned to look at him in shock. There was a piece of paper crumpled in one hand, and his chest was heaving with rage. He didn’t seem to even notice her sitting on the couch. “Three years! Three years’ worth of work gone,” he growled the last and she watched as he swept a bunch of bric-a-brac onto the floor. Seconds later it was followed by his fist impacting the dark wood of the shelving it had sat on. Wood splinters flew into the air, a few harmlessly bouncing off her. She had never seen anything like this before. He was like some kind of human tornado as he swept about the room in wave after wave of destruction. She could hear him talking about some woman and research in between the incoherent swearing. This rage, it was almost inhuman. But he’s not really human, is he? Oh, God, when had she started to think of him as something other than the monster from her and her brother’s nightmares? She saw him reach for a bookshelf, and she felt herself snap. Her body moved of its own accord, and she found herself next to him with a vice grip on his wrist.
“That is enough,” Claire snarled as he looked up at her. She could almost feel the rage flowing off him, but she refused to back down. “You’re acting like an overgrown two year old.” He sneered at her.
“Me?” Wesker said yanking his arm from her grasp. “Like you would know anything about children, you’re the one who so foolishly left a little girl in the care of the foster system to selfishly chase your brother. Damn near killed him while you were at it.” Claire reacted like she had been slapped, but she stashed the lid on her temper. He was trying to get a rise out of her. He needed an object for his rage to focus on and she refused to give him that. She needed a coherent man in order to find out what was going on, not a murderous tyrant.
“Maybe,” she said getting into his personal space, “but at least I have someone to go running after. I doubt any of your precious experiments would bother to do that for you. I can almost see why you have no friends. Do you tear the place apart every time something doesn’t go your way, or is this a special occasion?” He refused to back down from her and their chests were nearly touching as he looked down at her.
“You have no idea had close you are to being hurt, Miss Redfield,” Wesker growled it and Claire swore she could feel the vibration in his chest. She glared up at him. There was a tension here as she looked up at him. This rage was so deep; it was like she could get pulled in and never let out again. She wondered what made him so angry. There was a sharp edge to his scent as she stood there breathing it in-it was like all the jagged edges of the rock candy were sliding down her throat. Here, she had the feeling, in this place between rage and the sharp snap of action she had found the man behind that carefully controlled manipulator. But he was waiting for some kind of response and as much as she wanted to stay here and study him like the puzzle he was, she couldn’t.
“Then hurt me,” Claire whispered thickly. His hand reached out and grabbed her shoulders. For one split second she thought he was going to pull her closer, but it was hard to read anything behind those sunglasses. Then she was airborne, and her back was coming in contact with what was left of the TV. She let out a cry as shards of glass from the screen pierced her back. She landed and rolled in the junk that was littering the floor. Her head hit the corner of a bookend and blackness took her.
Claire woke to the bright lights of one of the lab rooms. She was lying on her side, shirt discarded and clad only in her rather lacy bra. It took a second for the pain of an incision followed by something probing at the wound to hit her. When it did she let out a whimper and rolled over to see Wesker leaning over her, his glasses long gone. She felt her cheeks heat as she jumped up and just about ran from the lab table she had been lying on. Wesker sighed and for a second Claire swore she saw every one of his years cross his face.
“Sit down, Claire,” he said motioning with a pair of tweezers in his hands. He wore a pair of latex gloves and a scalpel sat in a small tray next to him. Another tray was on his other side and it held dozens of small pieces of glass. She ran her hand across her back as she remembered the fight. She let out a little whimper of agony as she brushed one of the cuts that still held glass. Things made sense then. He was pulling the glass out of her back. But why? Last she remembered he had been pissed at her. She decided she didn’t need to know as she sat on back down. It wasn’t like she could take the glass out herself. She bit her lip against the pain as he settled into a rhythm.
“That was foolish,” Wesker said flatly nearly startling Claire into moving. “You knew I was in a rage.” She felt like rolling her eyes and would’ve if it wasn’t for the fact that he chose that second to go after a particularly deep piece.
“You were going to destroy the house,” she told him as though it made perfect sense.
“The house can be replaced, dear heart,” he said and she heard the sound of glass hitting all the other little pieces. She heard what he had left unspoken and she couldn’t help the warmth it created. She could not be replaced. Claire inhaled and closed her eyes. His scent was normal again; the rock candy and ozone thick and calming. She found herself lulling into the pattern of pain and wondered what it said about her. She barely noticed as he finished. “Don’t do that again,” Wesker said standing and she rubbed her arms from the cold as she heard him dispose of the gloves with a set of snaps.
“What was that all about anyway?” she asked looking around for her shirt.
“That would be the US military reminding me that they know who took you, dear heart,” he said sounding completely cool. There was no trace of the murderous rage from before, and Claire found herself wondering if she had imagined the moment in the living room. But she couldn’t have, the glass he had spent time pulling out her back attested to just how real it was. “They are trying to annoy me into giving you up.” Claire narrowed her eyes as she found what was left of her shirt. The once white material was everything from pinkish to red from her blood and there were numerous cuts in the material of the back. What was with her clothes getting destroyed every time she had a tussle with Wesker? Maybe the universe was trying to tell her something? She shook her head and sighed.
“Do you have a shirt I can borrow?” Claire asked as the blonde as he made to walk past her out of the room. He turned and looked at her for a long moment. She couldn’t help the heat that rose to her cheeks and flushed along her neck. She knew with the skin tone she had that the color would run all the way to the tops of her breasts, but refused to cross her arms. It would make the problem worse and tell him how uncomfortable she was. He shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it to her. She caught it and wasted no time in pulling it on. It dwarfed her, but she could hold the front closed and cover everything that mattered.
“I came upstairs to tell you that your clothes had arrived at the delivery entrance. I put the boxes in your room,” he told her before disappearing into the hallway. Well, that was nice to know… She hadn’t even been aware they had a delivery entrance.
Wesker poured over the information that Ada had managed to dig up on Capt. Mallory. Most of it was useless and utterly boring. She had been born to a long line of military people and clearly groomed to one day become an officer. She had graduated from Harvard with a degree in microbiology. She had spent the last seven or eight years making a name for herself. She was so squeaky clean it hurt. No husband, no kids, not even a boyfriend. He folded his hands and looked at the monitors in the dark room. He had lost a lot of money with the way Horizon’s stock had bottomed out, but that wasn’t what really bothered him. The company had merely been one of the many that made up the Organization. There were plenty more a lot further on the research he needed done. No, the loss of the company would’ve happened sooner or later. What bothered him was the sheer nerve of it. She was about to learn why his name was the most feared in the underground, by the time he was through she would be begging him to kill her. He scrolled through his email until he came across a piece that would normally go into his trash bin. It was perfect. When was the last time he had gone to the American Society of Microbiology’s Annual Gala? Mallory was member, after all. He knew just how frustrating it could be to have what you wanted dangled in front of you. He wondered what the look on her face would be. He was sure it would be perfect.
Title: Nightmare Revisted
Fandom: Resident Evil
Genre: Horror, Romance, Action
Pairings: Wesker/Claire (main), Chris/Jill
Rating: M (overall), PG13 this chapter for a bit of action violence
Warnings: Sexual situations, blood, guts and gore, and a little bit of high school level biology.
Summary: Claire never thought that the poison from Antarctica would come back to haunt her. She never realized what it and its antidote were slowly doing to her body. Now she finds herself in the hands of a man she considers the devil himself wondering if she can ever be normal again.
Claire woke the next morning feeling like she had been hit full on by a Mack truck. She groaned as she pushed herself into sitting position. No doubt this was the result of getting smacked around by Wesker the day before, but shouldn’t the virus have taken care of this? She stood and frowned as she forced the muscles in her calves and thighs into action. As far as she knew the damn thing only healed injuries and soreness wasn’t exactly an injury. It was likely the result of going so long without any physical activity, which was something she could easily remedy via use of the gym in the lab. Sighing, she shoved on socks and boots, and wrinkled her nose in disgust, at the fact, she was going to be forced to work out in her makeshift pajamas. But there was a washing machine that was perfectly workable, and she doubted that Wesker was going to leave his work to watch her, so lack of sports bra would not be too much of a problem.
She crossed her arms as the chill from the lab level hit her. She knew that the place was kept cold on purpose. Something about the temperature helping to keep bacteria from growing as rapidly as it could in warmer temperatures. So, she didn’t bother to complain too much. She passed by the door she knew led to the room Wesker had taken her blood samples in and stared at the little bit of glass in the upper corner of the door. The light was on. That likely meant the blonde tyrant was in there. Maybe she should stop and ask him if they could get some weapons for the firing range. It would be one more thing to keep her from growing bored. She could always threaten to go gallivanting through the town if he refused. Mind made up, Claire punched her code into the side of the door. There was a little whirling symbol to indicate that the machine was thinking before the words access denied flashed across the screen. She glared at the door before walking the few feet to the window next to it. What she saw had her temper boiling over. There was someone in there. The man was hooked up to more machines than she was sure had been in there to begin with.
“Red Queen,” Claire ground out between clenched teeth. The hologram of the little girl appeared next to the door. “Where’s Wesker?” her voice was barely above a whisper as she spoke.
“Mr. Wesker is in the control room…,” whatever the rest of Red Queen’s sentence was, it was lost as Claire marched over to the door and began to bang on it, already guessing that he code won’t work.
“Wesker!” she yelled all the soreness in her limbs forgotten after seeing the plight of the man in the other room. Just what was he doing to him in there? “Open this door, right this second! I want to know what you’re doing to that man! WESKER!” She raised her hand to level the door if she had to only to find her fist hitting a solid black kelvar vest. There was a grunt from the hit as she looked up to find Wesker looking down at her without his glasses. His hair was out of place-it looked almost like he had been running his hand through it too much for it to stay in place or that he had been sleeping. The long black coat he normally wore or its white lab coat twin was gone. He was simply in dress pants and vest. This was the closest she had ever seen him come to looking disheveled and the sight had her frozen.
“Was there something you wanted, Miss Redfield?” he asked his voice a tone lower. She swallowed thickly as he raised an eyebrow in amusement. It was the amusement that snapped her out of the semi-trance his appearance had put her in.
“Don’t call me that!” Claire said straightening to her full height. It wasn’t anywhere near his, the top of her head just reaching his shoulders. “I want to know what you are doing to that man!” She pointed down the hallway as if he wouldn’t know who she was talking about. His eyes left her face to look where she was pointing before coming back to look at her.
“I’m treating him for poisoning,” Wesker told her before turning around and heading back into the dark room that was the Red Queen’s control room. Claire followed him, not registering what he said in her anger.
“What gives you the right to…,” she trailed off as she saw him grab his sunglasses off what looked like a cot along one wall of the room. She had interrupted him from sleeping? He slept? That was such a human thing, something she thought that he was without. She blinked and his words registered. “Oh…”
“Yes, oh, dear heart,” Wesker said sounding more than a little amused by her as he put the sunglasses on. “Was there anything else I can do for you before I get back to work?” Claire frowned at him, but what could she say? Wesker was actually doing something nice for someone. But she knew better than to allow herself to believe that everything was as it seemed.
“I want to meet him,” she said doing her best to look him in the eye despite his shades. He studied her for a moment.
“Are you sure you want to do that, Claire?” he asked moving to where she was. He was close, invading her personal space, forcing her to inhale his scent. She recognized what he was doing. She had seen Chris use his size to intimidate others before. She wasn’t about to let this man do that to her. She looked up at him and glared.
“Never more certain,” she hissed before turning on her heel and walking towards the door. She paused when she got to the doorway and looked over her shoulder at him. His hands were crossed across his chest and he was merely watching her. “I’d also like you to stock the firing range. If I’m stuck here the least I can do is keep in practice.” He watched her leave tilting his head to the side. He had known that Claire Redfield was like her brother: short fuse, every thought that entered her head came out of her mouth, and she was undeniably soft. The fact that she asked to see HUNK, completely unknowing of his circumstances demonstrated that. But she was also strong; strong enough to stand up to him. He had seen leaders of entire countries quake in fear at the sight of him. And she had the nerve to make demands? It was quite amusing. Maybe he would even let her see HUNK once the poison was purged from his system. Not without telling her what he had done, of course. It was time she met the real man responsible for what happened at Raccoon City.
Two hours later found Claire leaning against the tiled wall of the shower, eyes closed in ecstasy as the water washed away the dried sweat on her body. She had pushed her body to the limit, partially to see what it could do, and partially because while she was forcing herself to move she didn’t have to think. Thinking, she was learning, was not something that was good for her here. She simply thought too much and ended up chasing herself in circles. She sighed and turned the water off. Stepping onto the floor mat she hoped her clothes would get here soon. She had tossed the pajamas/work-out clothes into the washer before getting into the shower and had washed her clothes from the day before last night. She pulled the clothes on and left the bathroom pulling her hair up into a ponytail in order to keep it out of her way. The second she hit the door another smell hit her nose. It smelled good and spicy. She hadn’t had a chance to eat yet and it made her stomach grumble in need. She put one hand on it and headed down the stairs wondering who was cooking.
Claire followed her nose into the kitchen to a sight she had never thought to see. Wesker was standing in front of the stove sautéing what looked like a combination of meat and vegetables with something else cooking next to it. He had his back to her and an open bottle of white wine on the counter. The scene was utterly domestic and completely surreal. Sure, she figured he had to eat sometime but she never would’ve thought that he ate normal food. In her worst imaginings, she could see him eating the infected like a larger-than-life monster himself.
“It is impolite to stare, dear heart,” he said without turning around and turning something off on the stove. Claire frowned at him and crossed her arms to lean against the doorway.
“I thought you were above such human things as eating,” she said before she could stop herself. Great, now she sounded like some kind of bitch. His eating habits were really none of her business. He turned around after dumping what she assumed was pasta into a colander in the sink.
“One of the results of my virus is a slow metabolism,” he said conversationally pulling a wineglass from behind him and pouring some from the bottle. “I need to eat only once every two to three days.” He set the glass on the island and slid it towards her before returning to the vegetables which he flipped using a deft turn of his wrist. Claire took the wineglass and raised it so that she could smell it. She doubted he would poison her but there was little doubt in her mind that he would knock her out if he thought it more convenient. She sipped the wine, the light fruity taste dancing on her tongue.
“Well, that explains the pasta for breakfast,” Claire said watching him as he got out two plates and silverware without taking his eyes off the skillet on the stove.
“You don’t have to eat it if it is not to your liking, Claire,” Wesker told her flatly as he removed the skillet from the heat. She felt her cheeks color at his words.
“That’s not what I meant. I’ve had odder things for breakfast. I just…,” she was rambling. She snapped her mouth shut recognizing the slight tilt of the corner of his lips as a sign of his amusement. He filled two plates with the pasta and what was in the skillet before handing one to her. He made no move to head to the dining room or sit at the island. Claire set her glass on the island and carefully twirled a bit of pasta onto her fork. She bit into it and closed her eyes in pleasure. Damn, that was divine. Not that she would ever tell him that.
“I got your genome results last night,” Wesker said the clear note of amusement in his voice telling her she had failed to keep her delight to herself. “It looks like the virus didn’t alter your DNA the way I was thinking. Rather than change the sequencing or add on to your normal strand, it bonded its DNA with yours.” And Claire wondered how it was possible for him to lose her so completely while he was speaking English. Her confusion must have shown on her face because he sighed and tried again. “Normal DNA represents itself with a double helix pattern kind of like a ladder twisted into a corkscrew. Yours is like two ladders that share one leg-one set of ‘rungs’ belongs to your DNA the other set to the virus’ DNA.” Well, the explanation gave her a better picture, but not much else.
“So what does that mean?” she asked finishing the last dregs of her pasta and moving towards the sink.
“It means your chances for a ‘cure’,” he said putting his own dishes into the sink and earning a glare he didn’t see. Honestly, the dishwasher was like three more inches away. “Are nearly non-existent. I would have to break apart the molecular bonds that held your DNA together and then somehow put the right pieces back together.” She frozen in the process of closing the dishwasher and looked at him. Her chances of going back to a normal life were gone. The blow was harder for her to deal with than she thought. She closed the dishwasher door in a controlled movement, before beginning to make her way to the hallway. She needed to be alone with this news right now. He reached out before she could move more than a few feet and grabbed her wrist. “I’m not finished, dear heart,” she looked up at him and wished for the first time that he wasn’t wearing those damn sunglasses. She’d give anything for some kind of hint as to the nature of the news he was about to give her. “While not curable, it should be possible to suppress it. Cells naturally suppress the parts of their DNA that they don’t need in order to do their jobs. That’s how you get red blood cells and white. They all have the same DNA, just different parts turned on and off,” he let her go as he finished and she rubbed her wrist absently. It wasn’t like he had hurt her. She watched with unseeing eyes as he left the kitchen to go back to the lab. Why was he still offering her hope?
Wesker had barely set foot in the room he had set up as his actual lab when his phone rang. He pulled it out and put it to his ear as he went about turning on the various machines he had shut down last night. He would see about making her the suppressant for no other reason than the fact that he wanted to see if he could do it. He was also working on meticulously reconstructing her virus for further use and study. Not that she needed to know that. He had a feeling she would make his work most difficult if she knew about it.
“Miss Wong,” he greeted the only person who would be calling him right now. Sherry should be in class this time of the morning and he knew that they wouldn’t call him over something like her getting sick.
“I’ve got that information that you wanted on that woman,” her voice was slickly amused.
“Good,” Wesker said absently as he slid a slide under one of the microscopes behind safety glass. He knew it was better to be safe than sorry when dealing with viruses. “You know where to send it.”
“I’d like to discuss payment,” she said and he felt an eyebrow climb towards his hairline.
“Name the price, and it will be wired to your account,” really, the woman was just getting too expensive. There was a mirthless chuckle on the other end of the phone.
“I don’t want money, sir,” she said flatly. “I want information-a very specific piece of information.” Wesker felt his eyes narrow at her words and was forced to pull his hands out of the mitts in order to make sure he didn’t drop the slide in shock. Ada was a good agent precisely because she didn’t ask questions. She followed his orders to the letter, did everything he asked, and never divulged his information. Why? The perfect blend of fear and money, now she was trying to bargain with him?
“What piece of information would that be, Miss Wong?” he kept his tone carefully in check as he spoke. He had a feeling that the information she asked for would be very telling.
“Was Claire Redfield the living sample of T-Veronica?” she asked him and he frowned. He knew Ada would not take any job that put her into direct opposition to him. Her survival instincts were very well tuned, but the fact that she was asking…
“Can I ask just what your fascination with the young Miss Redfield is?” Wesker needed to know what was going on and Ada had been his eyes and ears for so long. He was beginning to see the folly of allowing her to become that. If she turned on him who would he have?
“There are two separate bounties out on her, sir,” Ada told him. “Both of them are beyond anything her brother or his friends could put together unless one of them was holding on the rest of them. I’ve managed to trace one to the US government and your Mallory. The other I’m still working on. But this is all you’re going to get until you answer my question.” Wesker sighed and close his eyes. Two bounties? Claire was getting hotter by the minute. Soon he was either going to have to move the two of them to somewhere more secure or dispose of her.
“Not anymore, Miss Wong,” Wesker settled for. Let Ada take that how she would.
“What?” the woman asked and Wesker sighed.
“The answer to your question,” he growled patience stretched to the limit. There was a reason he thought humans were beneath him. So slow on the uptake. “I expect the information in my inbox within the hour.” He hung up before she could say anything and turned back to his slide. He needed to get his hands on what he was thinking about calling the T-Claire Virus. He needed to do it before events forced his hand.
The building was new pristine and white. It screamed money, power, and capitalism. But that was not what made it different than the other buildings in the Santa Fe skyline. No, what made it different was the sudden appearance and influx heavily armored men, trucks, and barricades. News crews were as close as they could get making a sub-barrier to prevent the curious from seeing very much. In the midst of this swarm of humanity, Capt. Alica Mallory stood. Her blonde hair was pulled up into a tight bun, and she wore tactical gear. The blue digital camouflage was hot under the southwest sun, and the rig holding her weapons was not the most comfortable weight. But she had to be here for this, it had taken her team forever to find one of his puppet companies that were almost guaranteed to have live samples of his work. Horizon Inc. had fit the bill. She could see the interpretative sunrise that was their logo as she pushed open the glass lobby doors. The place was swarming with police and the National Guard. She got a sharp salute upon entry, and a young ensign approached her, clearly her escort.
“Capt. Mallory,” he said falling in step with her as she walked through the lobby. “We managed to locate several live samples, though no human ones. We’re having trouble moving them out, because of the press.” Mallory stopped to look at a paper that some chief needed signed.
“What do you mean?” she asked beginning to walk again. “Is the press carrying guns? Threatening to shoot you or the samples?”
“No, sir,” the ensign said looking slightly confused.
“Then I fail to see what the problem is,” Mallory snapped as she stopped walking.
“But they’ll see the samples,” the man said going pale at her glare. Mallory massaged her temples. How stupid were these people? The whole point of this raid was to let Wesker know that they were looking for him, and that the little bit of protection he had within the government was gone. Maybe they would even get a little good press from it for seeming to crack down on companies that were doing illegal viral research. None of that would happen if the samples were hidden from the press.
“That’s the point,” she snarled and the man scurried away to inform the rest. She looked up at the ruby colored sunrise and saw only a bloody sunset. She smiled at it. Brighter horizons were certainly on the way for her.
Claire sat in the living room a bowl of popcorn in her lap. She had managed to finally figure out how the TV worked after enlisting much aid from the Red Queen and had been happy to learn that they had satellite. It was after dinner and a Friday night which meant there would be plenty of movies on. She wondered when the last time she had actually sat and watched TV was. Her life was full of trips for TerraSave, and jetlag had long since become a dear friend. When she wasn’t doing that she was filling out paperwork, or advocating for people in those out of the way countries that no one really wanted to help. Being the only Raccoon City survivor to go into this line of work, she was also the public face of TerraSave a lot, not that she minded it. It was her helping people, which was all she wanted to do. She wondered if she would ever be able to do that again. She sighed and turned on the TV. What she saw was enough to just about cause her a heart attack. It was a pharmaceutical company surrounded by reporters, and the military was taking out things that haunted the deepest darkest parts of her memory in cages right in front of reporters. The bowl of popcorn was forgotten as they brought out a Licker in an open bar cage like it was some kind of lion. She watched in abject horror as its tongue slid out to grab one of the soldiers by the neck. It shook him like a demented ragdoll before the man’s comrades shot the hell out of the creature. It gave a cry as it died, but Claire knew from the way the man landed he was long dead. A woman stepped onto screen. The woman was pretty if severe looking in her uniform. She began yelling at the men and Claire watched in horror as the Licker she thought dead began trying to get up. She raised a hand to cover her mouth, only to let out a little scream as one of the side tables made impact with the television screen.
“That BITCH,” Wesker roared from behind her, and Claire turned to look at him in shock. There was a piece of paper crumpled in one hand, and his chest was heaving with rage. He didn’t seem to even notice her sitting on the couch. “Three years! Three years’ worth of work gone,” he growled the last and she watched as he swept a bunch of bric-a-brac onto the floor. Seconds later it was followed by his fist impacting the dark wood of the shelving it had sat on. Wood splinters flew into the air, a few harmlessly bouncing off her. She had never seen anything like this before. He was like some kind of human tornado as he swept about the room in wave after wave of destruction. She could hear him talking about some woman and research in between the incoherent swearing. This rage, it was almost inhuman. But he’s not really human, is he? Oh, God, when had she started to think of him as something other than the monster from her and her brother’s nightmares? She saw him reach for a bookshelf, and she felt herself snap. Her body moved of its own accord, and she found herself next to him with a vice grip on his wrist.
“That is enough,” Claire snarled as he looked up at her. She could almost feel the rage flowing off him, but she refused to back down. “You’re acting like an overgrown two year old.” He sneered at her.
“Me?” Wesker said yanking his arm from her grasp. “Like you would know anything about children, you’re the one who so foolishly left a little girl in the care of the foster system to selfishly chase your brother. Damn near killed him while you were at it.” Claire reacted like she had been slapped, but she stashed the lid on her temper. He was trying to get a rise out of her. He needed an object for his rage to focus on and she refused to give him that. She needed a coherent man in order to find out what was going on, not a murderous tyrant.
“Maybe,” she said getting into his personal space, “but at least I have someone to go running after. I doubt any of your precious experiments would bother to do that for you. I can almost see why you have no friends. Do you tear the place apart every time something doesn’t go your way, or is this a special occasion?” He refused to back down from her and their chests were nearly touching as he looked down at her.
“You have no idea had close you are to being hurt, Miss Redfield,” Wesker growled it and Claire swore she could feel the vibration in his chest. She glared up at him. There was a tension here as she looked up at him. This rage was so deep; it was like she could get pulled in and never let out again. She wondered what made him so angry. There was a sharp edge to his scent as she stood there breathing it in-it was like all the jagged edges of the rock candy were sliding down her throat. Here, she had the feeling, in this place between rage and the sharp snap of action she had found the man behind that carefully controlled manipulator. But he was waiting for some kind of response and as much as she wanted to stay here and study him like the puzzle he was, she couldn’t.
“Then hurt me,” Claire whispered thickly. His hand reached out and grabbed her shoulders. For one split second she thought he was going to pull her closer, but it was hard to read anything behind those sunglasses. Then she was airborne, and her back was coming in contact with what was left of the TV. She let out a cry as shards of glass from the screen pierced her back. She landed and rolled in the junk that was littering the floor. Her head hit the corner of a bookend and blackness took her.
Claire woke to the bright lights of one of the lab rooms. She was lying on her side, shirt discarded and clad only in her rather lacy bra. It took a second for the pain of an incision followed by something probing at the wound to hit her. When it did she let out a whimper and rolled over to see Wesker leaning over her, his glasses long gone. She felt her cheeks heat as she jumped up and just about ran from the lab table she had been lying on. Wesker sighed and for a second Claire swore she saw every one of his years cross his face.
“Sit down, Claire,” he said motioning with a pair of tweezers in his hands. He wore a pair of latex gloves and a scalpel sat in a small tray next to him. Another tray was on his other side and it held dozens of small pieces of glass. She ran her hand across her back as she remembered the fight. She let out a little whimper of agony as she brushed one of the cuts that still held glass. Things made sense then. He was pulling the glass out of her back. But why? Last she remembered he had been pissed at her. She decided she didn’t need to know as she sat on back down. It wasn’t like she could take the glass out herself. She bit her lip against the pain as he settled into a rhythm.
“That was foolish,” Wesker said flatly nearly startling Claire into moving. “You knew I was in a rage.” She felt like rolling her eyes and would’ve if it wasn’t for the fact that he chose that second to go after a particularly deep piece.
“You were going to destroy the house,” she told him as though it made perfect sense.
“The house can be replaced, dear heart,” he said and she heard the sound of glass hitting all the other little pieces. She heard what he had left unspoken and she couldn’t help the warmth it created. She could not be replaced. Claire inhaled and closed her eyes. His scent was normal again; the rock candy and ozone thick and calming. She found herself lulling into the pattern of pain and wondered what it said about her. She barely noticed as he finished. “Don’t do that again,” Wesker said standing and she rubbed her arms from the cold as she heard him dispose of the gloves with a set of snaps.
“What was that all about anyway?” she asked looking around for her shirt.
“That would be the US military reminding me that they know who took you, dear heart,” he said sounding completely cool. There was no trace of the murderous rage from before, and Claire found herself wondering if she had imagined the moment in the living room. But she couldn’t have, the glass he had spent time pulling out her back attested to just how real it was. “They are trying to annoy me into giving you up.” Claire narrowed her eyes as she found what was left of her shirt. The once white material was everything from pinkish to red from her blood and there were numerous cuts in the material of the back. What was with her clothes getting destroyed every time she had a tussle with Wesker? Maybe the universe was trying to tell her something? She shook her head and sighed.
“Do you have a shirt I can borrow?” Claire asked as the blonde as he made to walk past her out of the room. He turned and looked at her for a long moment. She couldn’t help the heat that rose to her cheeks and flushed along her neck. She knew with the skin tone she had that the color would run all the way to the tops of her breasts, but refused to cross her arms. It would make the problem worse and tell him how uncomfortable she was. He shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it to her. She caught it and wasted no time in pulling it on. It dwarfed her, but she could hold the front closed and cover everything that mattered.
“I came upstairs to tell you that your clothes had arrived at the delivery entrance. I put the boxes in your room,” he told her before disappearing into the hallway. Well, that was nice to know… She hadn’t even been aware they had a delivery entrance.
Wesker poured over the information that Ada had managed to dig up on Capt. Mallory. Most of it was useless and utterly boring. She had been born to a long line of military people and clearly groomed to one day become an officer. She had graduated from Harvard with a degree in microbiology. She had spent the last seven or eight years making a name for herself. She was so squeaky clean it hurt. No husband, no kids, not even a boyfriend. He folded his hands and looked at the monitors in the dark room. He had lost a lot of money with the way Horizon’s stock had bottomed out, but that wasn’t what really bothered him. The company had merely been one of the many that made up the Organization. There were plenty more a lot further on the research he needed done. No, the loss of the company would’ve happened sooner or later. What bothered him was the sheer nerve of it. She was about to learn why his name was the most feared in the underground, by the time he was through she would be begging him to kill her. He scrolled through his email until he came across a piece that would normally go into his trash bin. It was perfect. When was the last time he had gone to the American Society of Microbiology’s Annual Gala? Mallory was member, after all. He knew just how frustrating it could be to have what you wanted dangled in front of you. He wondered what the look on her face would be. He was sure it would be perfect.