came rushing across the bridge, trying desperately to
console their young master as they asked one another
how such a terrible thing could happen. And later, much
later, Alexia came into my room and kissed my cheek,
her lips warm and soft, her silken tresses tickling my
throat...
The monitors tore his attention away from his sweet
memories, Claire now standing at the same spot where
Burnside had hesitated. Quite put out with himself for
his lack of care, Alfred spent an uncertain moment
searching for the young hoodlum, switching between
cameras, finally spotting him on the very steps of the re-
ceiving mansion. Quickly, Alfred checked his console's
control panels to be sure that all of the mansion's doors
were unlocked, suspecting that the boy would probably
hang himself easily enough...
... and crowed with delight when he saw that Claire was following, having chosen the same path as her
young friend.
How much more exquisite her terror will be, when she
pleads for her life kneeling in Mr. Burnside's cooling
blood...
If he meant to greet them properly, he needed to leave
right away. Alfred stood and opened the wall once more,
his excitement rising as he closed it behind him and
stepped out into the great hall. He very much wanted to
tell Alexia his plans before leaving, to share a few of his
ideas, but was concerned that time was a factor.
"I'll be watching, my dear," she said.
Startled, Alfred looked up to see her at the top of the
stairs, not far from the life-size child doll that hung from
the uppermost balcony, one of Alexia's favorite toys. He
started to ask her how she knew, but realized how silly a
question it was. Of course she knew, because she knew
his heart; it was the same that beat within her own
snowy white breast.
"Go now, Alfred," she said, gracing him with her smile. "Enjoy them for both of us."
"I will, sister," he said, smiling in turn, thankful anew that he was brother to such a miracle of creation, lucky
that she so understood his needs and desires.
It was like some bizarre reality twist, Claire decided,
closing the mansion doors behind her. From the ram-
shackle, death-filled cold of the dark prison yards to
where she stood now ... it was hard to believe, and yet
so like Umbrella that she had no choice.
But goddamn. I mean, seriously.
The grand, beautifully designed sunken lobby spread
out in front of her was marred only by a few sets of
muddy footprints across the hand-tiled floor, a few
splotches of blood painted across the delicate eggshell
walls. There were also a number of large cracks near the
ceiling, and a single maroon handprint drying on one of
the thick decorative columns that lined the west wall,
thin rivulets of red streaking down from the base of the
palm.
So the prisoners weren't the only ones to suffer a
shitty afternoon. It was classist and petty of her, she knew, but it made her feel a little better to know that the
Umbrella higher-ups had taken an ass-kicking along
with everybody else.
She stood where she was for a moment, relieved to be
out of the cold and still mildly shocked by the different
faces of the Rockfort facility as she took hi the layout.
Behind one of the columns to her left was a blue door, a
second door in the northwest corner of the spacious
room. Straight ahead was a polished mahogany recep- tion desk, abutting an open flight of stairs along the right
wall that led up to a second floor balcony, richly hung
with a strangely damaged portrait. The face of the por-
trait's subject had been scratched out for some reason.
Claire stepped down into the lobby, crouched and ran
a finger through one of the muddy footprints; still wet,
and more tracks leading to the corner door. She couldn't
be certain they were Steve's, but thought the odds were
pretty good. He'd left a trail, from the open prison gate
to a couple of dropped shell casings just outside the
mansion, along with two more dead dogs. For such an
obviously troubled young man, he was a surprisingly
accurate shot...
... so why am I going through so much trouble to help him out? She thought sourly, standing. He doesn't want my assistance, doesn't seem to need it, and it's not
like 1 don't have anything better to do.
When he'd taken off running, she hadn't followed im-
mediately, wanting to get a message to Leon ASAP;
she'd also felt obliged to run a quick search of the office
for medical supplies, something to help Rodrigo, but
she hadn't found anything useful...
"Help! Help meee!" A muffled shout, from some- where in the building.
Steve?
"Let me out! Hey, somebody, help!"
Claire was already running for the comer door,
weapon up. She slammed into the heavy wood, the door
crashing open into a long hallway. Steve shouted again,
from the far end of the corridor. Claire hesitated just
long enough to see that the three bodies sprawled on the
tiled floor weren't going to get up and then ran, fixing
the door straight ahead as the one.
"Help!"
Jesus, what's happening to him? He sounded panic- stricken, his voice breaking with it.
Reaching the end of the hall, Claire shoved at the door,
ran in sweeping with the handgun - and saw nothing, a
room with display cases and stuffed chairs. An alarm was
buzzing somewhere, but she didn't see its source.
Movement to the left. Claire spun, desperate for a tar-
get - and saw that a piece of film was being projected
on a small wall screen, silent and flickering. Two attrac-
tive blond children, a boy and girl, staring intently into
each other's eyes. The boy was holding something,
something wriggling -
- a dragonfly, and he's -
Claire looked away involuntarily, disgusted. The boy
was pulling the wings off of the struggling insect, smil-
ing, both of them smiling.
"Steve!" Why wasn't he shouting anymore, where was he? She had the wrong room, must be...
"Claire? Claire, in here! Open the door!"
His voice was coming from behind the projection
screen. Claire dashed across the room, searching the
wall, absently aware that the towheaded children had
dropped the tortured dragonfly into a container full of
ants, were watching the crippled bug being stung to
death.
"What door, where?" Claire shouted, running anxious hands over the wall, pushing at a glass display case,
pulling at the screen -
- and the screen raised up, disappearing into a slot.
Behind it was a console, a keyboard, and six picture
boxes in two rows of three, a switch beneath each one.
"Claire, do something, I'm burning up!"
"What do I do, how did you get in there? Steve!"
No answer, and she could hear the rising desperation
in her voice, could feel it eating into her brain -
- concentrate. Do it, now.
Claire clamped down on her near panic, the clear
voice in her mind the voice of intellect. If she panicked,
Steve would die.
There's no door. There's a console with boxes.
Yes, that was it, that was the key. Steve yelled out an-
other terrified plea, but Claire only looked at the boxes,
focusing, each is different, a boat, an ant, a gun, a knife, a gun, an airplane...
They weren't all different, there were two guns, a
semiautomatic handgun and a revolver, the switches la-
beled "C" and "E." Nothing else matched, and her first
thought was that it was like one of those grade-school
tests, which two are alike. Without questioning her rea-
soning, Claire reached out and flipped the two switches,
the two boxes lighting up -
- and to her right, a display case slid out from the
wall. The buzzing alarm stopped, and a blast of dry, bak-
ing heat expelled from the opening, washing over her. A
half second later, Steve stumbled out and dropped to his
knees, his arms and face beet red. He was holding a pair
of matching handguns, what looked like gilded Lugers.
Guess I picked the right boxes.
She leaned over him, trying to remember what the
signs of heatstroke were - dizziness and nausea, she
thought. "Are you okay?"
Steve gazed up at her. With his flushed cheeks and
vaguely embarrassed expression, he resembled nothing
so much as a little boy who'd had too much sun. Then
he grinned, and the illusion was lost.
"What took you so long?" he cracked, pushing him- self to his feet.
Claire straightened, scowling. "You're welcome." His grin softened and he ducked his head, pushing
thick bangs away from his forehead. "Sorry ... and I'm sorry about before, too. Thanks, seriously."
Claire sighed. Just when she'd decided he was a total
asshole, he decided to be nice.
"And look what I got," he said, snapping both hand- guns up and aiming at one of the display cases. "They were hanging on a wall back there, fully loaded and
everything. Cool, huh?"
She had to resist a sudden urge to grab his shoulders
and shake some sense into him. He had nerve, she'd
give him that, and he obviously had at least a few sur-
vival skills ... but did he not understand that he would
have died, if she hadn't heard him calling for help?
This place is probably full of booby traps, too; how
do I keep him from running off again?
She watched him pretend-shoot a bookshelf, won-
dered absently if the whole macho tiling was just his
way of dealing with fear - and a different approach sud-
denly occurred to her, one that she thought might actu-
ally work.
He wants to play Mr. Tough Guy, let him. Appeal to
his ego.
"Steve, I understand that you're not looking for a
partner, but I am," she said, doing her best to look sin- cere. "I ... I don't want to be alone out there."
She could actually see his chest puff out, and felt a
huge sense of relief, knowing that it had worked before
he said a word. She also felt a little guilty for manipulat-
ing him, but only a little; this was for the best.
Besides, it's not lying, exactly. I really don't want to
be alone out there.
"I guess you could tag along," he said expansively. "I mean, if you're scared."
She only smiled, teeth gritted, aware that if she
opened her mouth to thank him, she didn't know what
would come out.
"And anyway, I know how to get us out of here," he added, his bluff manner slipping, his youthful enthusi-
asm spilling out. "There's a little map under the counter at the front desk. According to that, there's a dock just
west of here, and an airstrip somewhere past that.
Which means we have a choice, but my piloting skills
are a little iffy, so I vote cruise. We can go right now."
Maybe she had underestimated him a bit. "Really? Great, that's..." Claire trailed off. Rodrigo, she couldn't forget about Rodrigo, between the two of us we could probably get him to the dock...
"Would you come with me back to the prison, first?"
She asked. "The guy who let me out of my cell is back there, he's pretty badly wounded..."
"One of the prisoners?" Steve asked, perking up. Uh-oh. She could lie, but he'd know the truth soon enough. "Urn, I don't think so ... but he did let me go, and I kinda feel like I owe him..."
Steve was frowning, and she quickly added, "... and it seems like the, uh, honorable thing to do, to at least get
him a first-aid kit, you know?"
He wasn't buying. "Forget it. If he's not a prisoner, he works for Umbrella, he deserves dick. Besides, they'll
be sending troops in soon enough; it's their problem, let
them deal with it. Now, are you coming or not?"
Claire met his gaze squarely, reading anger and hurt
in his dark eyes, surely caused by Umbrella. She
couldn't blame him for how he felt, but she didn't agree
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