Claire took a step toward the open cell door and hesi-
tated, wondering if it was some kind of trick - being
shot trying to "escape" crossed her mind, and didn't
seem all that far-fetched, considering who he worked
for. She still clearly remembered the look in his eyes
when he'd shoved that gun in her face, the cold sneer that had twisted his mouth.
She cleared her throat nervously, deciding to probe
for an explanation. "What are you telling me, exactly?"
"You're free," he said, muttering to himself again as he sank deeper into the chair, chin lowering to his chest.
"I don't know, might have been some kind of special
forces team, troops were all wiped out ... no chance of
escape." He closed his eyes.
Her instincts told her that he really meant to let her
go, but she wasn't going to take any chances. She
stepped out of the cell and picked up the bottle he'd
thrown, moving very slowly, watching him carefully as
she approached. She didn't think his wounded act was a
fake; he looked like hell, an ashy-white pallor over his
dark skin, like a transparent mask. He wasn't breathing
all that evenly, either, and his clothes smelled like sweat
and chemical smoke.
She glanced at the bottle, an empty syringe vial with
an unpronounceable name on the label, catching the
word hemostatic in the fine print. Hemo was
blood ... some kind of bleeding stabilizer?
Maybe an internal injury... She wanted to ask him why he was releasing her, what the situation was out-
side, where she should go, but she could see that he
was on the verge of passing out, his eyelids fluttering.
I can't just walk out, not without trying to help him -
- screw that! Go, go now!
He might die...
You might die! Run for it! The internal dispute was brief, but her conscience triumphed over reason, as
usual. He obviously hadn't set her loose because of some
personal affinity, but whatever the reason, she was grate-
ful. He didn't have to let her go, and he'd done it anyway.
"What about you?" She asked, wondering if there was anything she could do for him. She certainly
couldn't carry him out, and she was no medic.
"Don't worry about me," he said, raising his head to glare at her for a second, sounding irritated that she'd
even brought it up.
Before she could ask him what had happened outside,
he lost consciousness, his shoulders slumping, his body
growing still. He was breathing, but without a doctor,
she wouldn't want to bet on how long.
The lighter was getting hot, but she endured the heat
long enough to search the small room, starting with the
desk. There was a combat knife thrown casually on the
blotter, a number of loose papers... She saw her own
name on one of them and scanned the document while
fixing the knife sheath to her waistband.
Claire Redfield, prisoner number WKD4496, date of
transfer, blah blah blah ... escorted by Rodrigo Juan Raval, 3rd Security Unit CO, Umbrella Medical, Paris.
Rodrigo. The man who'd caught her and set her free,
and now appeared to be dying right in front of her. She
couldn't do anything about it, either, not unless she
could find help.
Which I can't do down here, she thought, snapping the overheated lighter closed after she finished the rest
of her search. Nothing but junk, mostly, a trunk of
musty prisoner uniforms, endless stacks of paperwork
stuffed into the desk. She'd found the pair of fingerless
gloves they'd taken from her, her old riding gloves, and
put them on, grateful for the minor warmth they pro-
vided. All she had to defend herself with was the combat
knife, a deadly weapon in the right hands ... which, un-
fortunately, hers weren't.
It's a gift horse, don't complain. Five minutes ago you
were unarmed and locked up, at least now you have a
chance. You should just be happy that Rodrigo didn 't
come down here to put you out of your misery.
Still, she pretty much sucked at knifeplay. After a
brief hesitation, she quickly patted Rodrigo down, but
he wasn't carrying. She did find a set of keys but didn't
take them, not wanting to carry anything that might
draw someone's attention by jangling at the wrong mo-
ment. If she needed them, she could come back.
Time to blow this Popsicle stand, see what there is to
see out there.
"Let's do it," she said softly, as much to get herself moving as anything else, aware that she was basically
terrified of what she might find ... and also that she
didn't have a choice in the matter. As long as she was on
the island, Umbrella still had her and until she assessed
the circumstances, she couldn't make plans to escape.
Holding the knife tightly, Claire stepped out of the
cellar room, wondering if Umbrella's madness would
ever end.
Alone, Alfred Ashford sat on the wide, sweeping
stairs of his home, half blind with rage. The destruction
had finally ceased raining down from the skies, but his
home had been damaged, their home. It had been built
for his grandfather's great-grandmother - the brilliant
and beautiful Veronica, God rest her soul - on the iso-
lated oasis that she had named Rockfort, where she had
made a magical life for herself and her progeny over the
generations ... and now, in the blink of an eye, some
horrible fanatic group had dared to try and destroy it.
Most of the second floor architecture had been warped
and twisted, doors crushed shut, only their private
rooms left whole.
Uncouth, uncultured miscreants. They can't even fathom the measure of their own ignorance.
Alexia was weeping upstairs, her delicate rose of a
heart surely aching with the loss. The mere thought of
his sister's needless pain fueled his rage to greater inten-
sity, making him want to strike out, but there was no
one to submit to his anger, all the commanding officers
and chief scientists dead, even his own personal staff.
He'd watched it happen from the safety of the private
mansion's secret monitor room, each tiny screen telling
a different story of brutal suffering and pathetic incom-
petence. Almost everyone had died, and the rest had run
like frightened rabbits; most of the island's planes were
already gone. His personal cook had been the only sur-
vivor in the common receiving mansion, but she'd
screamed so much that he himself had been forced to
shoot her.
We're still here, though, safe from the unwashed
hands of the world. The Ashfords will survive and pros-
per, to dance on the graves of our adversaries, to drink
champagne from the skulls of their children.
He imagined dancing with Alexia, holding her close,
waltzing to the dynamic music of their enemies' tor-
tured screams... It would be nothing short of bliss, his
twin's gaze locked to his, sharing the awareness of their
superiority over the common man, over the stupidity of
those who sought to destroy them.
The question was, who had been responsible for the
attack? Umbrella had many enemies, from legitimate
rival pharmaceutical companies to private sharehold-
ers - the loss of Raccoon City had been disastrous for
the market - to the few closet competitors of White Um-
brella, their covert bioweapons research department.
Umbrella Pharmaceutical, the brainchild of Lord Os-
well Spencer and Alfred's own grandfather, Edward
Ashford, was extremely lucrative, an industrial em-
pire ... but the real power lay with Umbrella's clandes-
tine activities, the operations of which had become too
vast to remain entirely unnoticed. And there were spies
everywhere.
Alfred clenched his fists, frustrated, his entire body a
live wire of furious tension and was suddenly aware of
Alexia's presence behind him, a trace of gardenia in the
air. He'd been so intent on his emotional chaos that he
hadn't even heard her approach.
"You mustn't let yourself despair, my brother," she said gently, and stepped down to sit beside him. "We will prevail; we always have."
She knew him so well. When she'd been away from
Rockfort all those years ago, he'd been so lonely, so
afraid that they might lose some of their special connec-
tion ... but if anything, they were closer now than ever before. They never spoke about their separation, about
the things that had happened after the experiments at the
Antarctic facility, both of them just so happy to be to-
gether that they would say nothing to spoil it. She felt
the same way, he was certain.
He gazed at her for long seconds, soothed by her
graceful presence, astounded as always by the depths of
her beauty. If he hadn't heard her weeping in her bed-
room, he wouldn't have known that she'd shed a tear.
Her porcelain skin was radiant, her sky-blue eyes clear
and shining. Even today, this darkest of days, the very
sight of her gave him such pleasure...
"What would I do without you?" Alfred asked softly, knowing that the answer was too painful to consider.
He'd gone half-mad with loneliness when she'd been
away, and sometimes still had strange episodes, night-
mares that he was alone, that Alexia had left him. It was
one of the reasons he encouraged her never to leave their
heavily secured private residence, located behind the
visitor mansion. She didn't mind; she had her studies,
and was aware that she was too important, too exquisite
to be admired by just anyone, quite content to be sus-
tained by her brother's affections, trusting him to be her
sole contact with the outside world.
If only I could stay with her all the time, just the two of
us, hidden away... But no, he was an Ashford, responsi- ble for the Ashford's stake in Umbrella, accountable for
the entire Rockfort compound. When their basically in-
competent father, Alexander Ashford, had gone missing
some fifteen years before, the young Alfred had stepped
up to take his place. The key players behind Umbrella's
bioweapons research had tried to keep him out of the loop,
but only because he intimidated them, cowed them by the
natural supremacy of his family name. Now they sent him
regular reports, respectfully explaining the decisions they
made on his behalf, making it clear that they would get in
touch with him immediately if the need arose.
I suppose I should contact them, tell them what's hap-
pened... He'd always left those matters to his personal secretary, Robert Dorson, but Robert had left his service
some weeks before to join the other prisoners, after ex-
pressing a bit too much curiosity about Alexia.
She was smiling at him now, her face glowing with
understanding and adoration. Yes, she was so much bet-
ter to him since her return to Rockfort, truly as devoted
to him as he'd always been to her.
"You'll protect me, won't you," she said, not a ques- tion. "You'll find out who did this to us, and then show them what one gets for trying to destroy a legacy as
powerful as ours."
Overcome with love, Alfred reached out to touch her but stopped short, all too aware that she didn't like phys-
ical contact. He nodded instead, some of his rage return-
ing as he thought of someone trying to harm his beloved
Alexia. Never, not as long as he lived, would he allow
that to happen.
"Yes, Alexia," he said passionately. "I'll make them suffer, I swear it."
He could see in her eyes that she believed in him, and
his heart filled with pride, just as his thoughts turned to
the discovery of their enemy. An absolute hatred for
Rockfort's assailants was growing inside of him, for the
stain of weakness they had tried to paint on the Ashford
name.
I'll teach them regret, Alexia, and they'll never forget
the lesson.
His sister relied on him. Alfred would die before let-
ting her down.
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