Blue on Black

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Leon Kennedy starred at his gun as he heard the truck shudder into the drop zone. It was never going to get any easier. It didn't matter how many times he came into these towns and cleaned them out. 
It had nothing to do with the people. It was Claire Redfield. He saw her everywhere. The same scenario played out in his mind. In the end he was in her arms. Except...he wasn't. For the most part, he was alone. Until he was calling a phone number that made his chest hurt just to make the chill inside him go away. 
"Claire..." He breathed as he stepped off the truck and looked around. "Will you ever forgive me?" 

Rebecca Chambers didn't share Leon's sense of loneliness. The mousy haired woman was rather happy living alone. She'd seen far too many of her friends and loved ones die to believe in anything but science. 
At the moment she was seated on the floor of her office chewing on her pen, watching a video about the bio-experiments that had been newly discovered from Raccoon city. She didn't seem to be buying a word of it.

Chris struggled with the tentacle before realizing he had a knife. But before he could grab it another one wrapped around his wrist. He was losing air fast. The element of surprise was not on his side.

Sherry stared at Jake for a long moment before diving into the water after Chris. She'd been tracking him since she'd heard the BSAA had gone to Africa. 
To her dismay she'd shown up as the whole thing ended. Or so she thought. Jake had warned her not to go into the water but how could she not? This was her family.

“Sherry! Get your ass back in the boat!” Jake was roaring, already complaining about not wanting to get wet. “Goddammit!” He brought the small craft around and to a halt, searching the depths for his lover.

Up in the air Jill had shaken Sheva off with ease and was already tearing apart the chopper for some sort of weapon to after Chris with. “Fuck!” She roared the one word, and was already heading back to the open doorway when she realised there was nothing beyond the rockets they had already expelled, and she could risk the mounted guns injuring Chris anyway.

Sherry barely missed a tentacle as it swept past her in persuit of the helicopter. It grasped the landing gear and yanked the craft down into the water just as Chris managed to surface.

The impact of the helicopter sent the boat racing away on a wave, tossing Jake overboard in the process. 
As he was cursing and complaining about how much he hated getting wet, Jill was pulling Sheva back to the surface to rest on a piece of floating fuselage. She barely paused before scanning the carnage for signs of either Chris, or the tentacle that had pulled him down.

Sherry pulled Chris to the surface, worriedly looking for Jake. She panicked when she didn't she him. Holding tight to Chris she screamed her lover's name. She didn't even see the people that floated nearby.

Jill felt the ripples from the movement as much as she heard Sherry’s voice. Something else she had to hate what was done to her for. “Sherry? Sherry is that you?” She called, though was already diving through the water. This wasn’t over. A massive creature that had once been a man erupted from the inky depths, Jake grasped in one tentacle as it crushed the air out of him, Jill held in another.

Wesker was informed of the danger his son was in moments after Rebecca had been taken back into surgery. 
The assistant showed him an image of Sherry trying desperately to reach Jake, while an unconscious Chris floated nearby. Jill and the young man fought the monster as best they could. It seemed that Sheva and the helicopter pilot had not survived.

His staff had rarely seen Wesker lose his temper, but that was about to happen. “I thought you said fire killed it!” He roared, grabbing the poor assistant by the front of his shirt. “Explain to me how it is still alive?!” This creature was supposed to be no more than a decoy to keep Chris busy while Wesker himself made other plans. The thought that it was growing out of control would draw attention he didn’t want nor need. 

In the water Jill was tearing at the tentacle holding her with her bare hands. Barely able to keep from throwing up as black blood oozed between her fingers and ran down her arms. 
Jake saw what Jill was doing and realised it was drawing the creature attention. As she did that, he squirmed about until he reached his gun, hoping it wasn’t too water logged.

"Piers is their son." Rebecca said hoarsely. She'd woken up to Wesker sitting beside her bed. "I retrieved the body after he'd buried it. Claire told me he'd told Jill he'd burned it. But he couldn't." She couldn't look at her lover. She wasn't sure how he would take this information. "I took samples of blood from Claire while pretending to help her and Leon have a baby. I gave it to him while helping him to grow. It's how that school was able to force growth on Jake and Sherry. They stole my research." She pulled on the blanket, and stared at the fibers. "I'm sorry. I never meant for Jake to get hurt." 

"Jake! Don't!" Sherry shouted, shoving herself onto the boat. "Jill!" She screamed the other woman's name as soon as she'd surfaced. "Don't! Hurt him! It's Piers! He's trying to protect Chris. He doesn't know..."

For once, Wesker seemed speechless. All this, without him knowing. “Walk me through it.” He finally answered simply, carefully setting down the data pad he had been reading. “Who exactly are the parents? How did you manage this? Was it in the BSAA lab?” He was firing off questions, once again amazed. Y Rebecca’s duplicitous nature. 

Jill stopped what she was doing when she heard Sherry’s voice, looking down at the creature so intent on squeezing the life right out of her. “Piers is dead!”

Rebecca shook her head. "It was in the Tricell lab. The one that I'd worked so hard to build. It was my dream and no one even cared to notice. Claire only seemed to notice when I offered to help her and Leon have a baby but that was after the lab was established. 
"The baby was Chris and Jill's. She got pregnant during that time when they believed things had calmed down. But then Umbrella showed up with a Nemesis. Jill believed the baby infected with the virus from the monster and not from herself. It was the reason she never saw him for what he really was. Chris either. They chose to see a monster and not a terrified child begging for his life." 
Rebecca got up and moved to her purse, digging through it to show Wesker pictures of a perfectly normal baby. "Piers was fine. Though he never cared much for the woman that raised him, he was an obedient kid. He grew fast but that was part of the medications I gave him. He grew out of the deformities that Jill had given him. Though I will say that part seemed to cause him alot of pain. I had different people teach him his skills. You yourself taught him how to fight. And then I set him up to meet with Chris again. And here we are."

"Not dead!" Sherry cried, grabbing for Jake's gun. "He's looking for Chris. Tell him he's okay. Tell him you're both okay... Jill... I need you to...sing to him!" She nearly tumbled back into the water as Jake almost let go of his gun in surprise at her words. Her lover was giving her a strange look now. She was soaking wet and feeling rather sheepish. She was also hoping that Claire's e-mail was right.

Wesker was staring at the photo with obvious shock. He remembered Piers. The young man had been so singleminded in becoming the best he could possibly be. If not for his need to be ‘a hero’, Wesker would have recruited him himself before this point. “Did he know, all this time? Who his parents were?”

“Sing?!” Jill hissed, almost choking on water herself, more at the thought of singing in general than taming a monster by doing so. “Sherry, you can’t be serious!”
Jake had blind faith in his super girl, and nodded to her before starting a painful rendition of Livin’ on a prayer.

Rebecca nodded. "I had a recording of Jill singing to him when he was first born. I played it when he would get sick or hurt." She whispered. "He rejected me as his mother." It was obvious the confession hurt." She knew what Wesker would say. She didn't meet his gaze. "Before you tell me I wasn't strong enough...I know. That's why I've never had a child of my own." She added softly.

"Not you, dummy." Sherry laughed softly, giving him a gentle elbow. "Jill has to sing to him. He'll remember her voice when she does..." The young woman was preparing to dive back into the water as another tentacle surged up and toward the boat. "You wake up Chris!"

“Children are overrated.” Wesker assured Rebecca almost gently. “And often they are bestowed upon the least deserving. After all, Redfield and Valentine certainly do not deserve the mantle of parenthood after what you told me they did.” 

“I thought I had a lovely voice.” Jake sniffed as he turned away, slapping Chris on the back to force him into coughing up whatever water he may have inhaled. 
Jill was still staring at the creature thrashing about, unable to comprehend what Sherry was implying. Finally, with a quivering voice she began singing a french lullaby her own father had sang to her on the rare occasions he wasn’t drunk, or incarcerated.

Chris frowned at the man that was interviewing Jill for what seemed like the hundredth time. Angrily he gave him a hard punch in the shoulder. "Charlie, that's enough. She said whatever she said. Let her alone. You can tell she's the same. Just like Piers. Go poke at the Dynamic Duo out there. Make sure the boy isn't lying about his relationship with Wesker." He shoved the man out of the chair and faced his former lover with a quick wink. "After all, he's a closer to him than Jill ever was. Now go...shooo..." He waved Charlie off and reached across for Jill's hands, though he knew she wouldn't let him touch her. Things had changed between them. Even a thousand apologies and confessions of love couldn't change it. 

Rebecca found herself laughing at her lover as he stood in front of the bathroom mirror, scowling at his hair. She wasn't sure she'd ever seen him this way. Quietly she crossed the room and sat herself on the counter, reaching for his brush. "What's on your mind?" She asked softly, reaching forward to deal with his wayward hair.

Jill’s wide blue eyes looked up at Chris, thankful he had intervened. On arrival she had understood that the interview was needed, but as the hours had worn on she had simply wanted to take a hot bath and change into her own clothes. “You look good, Red.” She finally breathed, even making an effort to smile up at him. He had been her anchor all these years, even if he hadn’t known it. Jill Valentine would’ve died a long time ago if she had had her thoughts of him to come back to.

Wesker didn’t say anything for a moment, allowing Rebecca to fix his hair, something no one else could have gotten away with. “We lost several assets.” He finally replied. “It will be expensive to replace them, and…” He finally met her gaze. “I saw that look in your eyes when you spoke about the Redfield boy, and helping Claire with conception problems. You want to be a mother.”

Chris gave her his best grin and flexed his arm. "I know." He teased. "I've been working hard on these babies." He made a show of kissing his bicep. "I have to say that blonde hair looks nice. We could really make a go of the beach bod Ken and Barbie bit." He added. "I'm so sorry about these guys are getting too big. This place isn't anything like you'd remember it."

Rebecca couldn't meet his eyes. That twinge to her stomach made it hurt. "The first of those problems will be easy to fix. I'm already working on something. But the other... that's nothing to worry about." She kissed his forehead as she finished the gel and smiled sadly. "I was born without a uterus. I can't carry a child. So..." Ever so slightly her chin trembled. "It's fine. I don't know why that's even on your mind."

“I knew you were lying to me all these years, you DO prefer blondes!” Jill exclaimed, still able to tease him even now. “I like that thought though, you do have the himbo look down…” She smirked again, not really thinking about it as she pulled her blonde ponytail over her shoulder and toyed with the end of it. Suddenly her smile faded. It had been so many years… She didn’t expect that Chris had waited for her all this time. Was the life she thought she had left behind no longer even here?

Wesker simply accepted this revelation and nodded as though it were nothing, but the cogs in his head were already turning. “Then you were spared a lot of pain, from the female perspective.” He commented, tilting her chin up gently and dropping a kiss to the tip of her pert nose.

"I'm sorry." Chris' voice cracked. "Jill...I never stopped looking for you. You have to know that." He reached out a hand for her but came up short until he saw the bracelet. He almost choked on tears. "You got it." This time he did touch her, his fingers sliding over her wrist. 

Rebecca laughed. "Yes. I suppose so." She gave him a tight hug. "Now come on. We have a lot to do." She hopped off the counter and moved into the other room to get dressed, her thoughts on other things.

Jill didn’t pull her wrist back, instead she closed her eyes, remembering all the ways he had once touched her so gently. “If I hadn’t left it in your cabin before the mission, I…” She quickly wiped at a tear with her free hand. “I always remember the day you gave it to me. We had been camping at Big Sur, and it was so cold that night, we…” She smirked and wiped at her eyes again. “Do you remember what you told me when you bought it?”

Wesker’s thoughts had lingered as he glanced at his reflection again. He hadn’t aged a day since Arklay had gone up in smoke. Would he ever die from old age? Was this what Spence had been grasping for all those years, without realising the solution had been right there all along? It was why he now worried for Rebecca. How would she feel if he remained this way forever? It was such thoughts that pushed him into his own research that had an entirely separate goal from her own.

"Did the man who gave it to you not tell you? He was supposed to say it. It was how you were supposed to know...damn it...I screw everything up don't I?" Chris groaned. He still hadn't let go of her wrist, now rubbing it with both his hands. "Claire quit talking to me. Sherry shacked up with Wesker's kid...Leon ran off with Ada... and I think you sing like shit..." His rant ended with him laughing through his tears, waiting for her to punch him. 

"I have a surprise for you." Rebecca said as they walked down the hall to the labs. She wasn't aware of where his thoughts had taken him. 
"Remember the Kennedy guy and how you said you'd like to taste his genetics? Well...what if I told you that it's possible?"

“He told me the person who sent it, thought I was made in heaven.” Jill breathed, reaching up on her tip toes and touching her lips to Chris’, her slender wrist still in his own hands.

Wesker’s brow furrowed slightly, intrigued where Rebecca was going with this. “Kennedy, as in… Ada Wong’s Kennedy?” He asked curiously.

Chris pulled Jill against him, deepening the kiss. This woman was truly his soul. He had been dead inside without her. But now it was all better. "Never leave me again." He whispered. "I can't live without you."

Rebecca nodded. "She brought him to me when he refused to play her games." She brought him to room where they kept most of their specimens in cages. Leon Kennedy sat in the first one chained to the wall, naked and angry. 
"We've taken tests from him and Claire. Their first child is over there." She pointed to a tube where a teenager was floating. "Claire wanted to name her first son, Ethan."

Jill simply had her cheek pressed to Chris’ chest now, letting her eyes flutter closed as she listened to the steady thump of his heart. “I’m not sorry.” She breathed after a moment. “I’d do it all again if it were your life or mine.” She needed him to know that. Ever since that fateful argument that had caused Chris to leave her behind while he left RC for Europe… Jill felt they had done nothing but lose even more time with each other. It was always… Something, and she hated that. Chris had wanted them to get married before leaving for the Spencer estate two years ago… She had argued that they would just disappear to a beach in Bali once this was all over. She had regretted that with every single breath she took. 

Wesker followed to where Rebecca gestured, then looked down at her with an amused smirk. “You never cease amazing me.” He mused, leaving down to kiss the tip of her pert nose gently. “Do you have Claire here too? What are the vitals like? Are Redfield genes truly as strong as those idiots would have use believe? What about Kennedy? Are his…” He realised he was asking too many questions and smiled almost sheepishly. “Again, I have to ask… How did you keep all this secret?”

Chris finally managed to get Jill into the room where Piers was being held. "So have you heard any of the details about this?" He asked, wishing he had more time to approach the subject. 
The room they were in held a small viewing window. At the moment they were on the other side, watching as Sherry tried to doctor some of the other man's wounds while a scowling Jake watched from the corner.

Rebecca couldn't help but laugh. Wesker was like a kid at Christmas. "I gave him a dose of the original virus, Albert... I can honestly say that with the mixed genes, he's almost perfect. He's more like you than a Redfield or Kennedy. There's just something missing...I'm not sure what it is though..."

Jill was staring past Chris through the window to where Piers was being held. “We’re awful people.” She whispered. “I… I thought he was…” She leaned against the wall and simply slid down it until she was sat on the ground, fat tears pricking at her lashes. Perhaps it was the withdrawal now she was off Rebecca’s drug, or perhaps Jill had never come to terms with the secret no one but they had known. 

“Like me? I feel I should be offended.” Wesker mused as he picked up the computer pad that held Ethan’s vitals. “No one is like me.” He added, though was merely teasing her.

Chris shook his head. "I don't care what they're trying to feed us. He didn't look like that when I buried him." He said firmly. "I refuse to believe that that kid is our son."

Rebecca balked. "Well no. I didn't mean exactly. He's nothing really. More like a copy..." Her blush was all the way down her neck. "I was using him to...help...I was hoping to...give his blood to you in order to make you even stronger..." She stammered. "If you wanted..."

“Our son is dead.” Jill whispered, her knees pulled up to her chest. “I killed him. My infection…” She was still staring at the wall, trying to understand how the virus had made her stronger, but apparently punished her offspring for it.

“You’re that far along with him?” Wesker asked, his mind falling back on his earlier thought about making Rebecca more like him.

"You two stop that." Sherry's eyes flashed. She could hear them. She turned her head toward the glass and shook her head. "Piers is alive. If you need to see the report blood wise fine."
She turned her head back to the young man in front of her and sighed. "And you. Stop fighting this. You have to let me help you. You're not going to get better like this."

Rebecca nodded, even though Wesker was staring up at the floating young man. "It was easy. Piers was the jumping off point. Once I understood what I was doing...it was a walk in the park. I've already tested his blood on a lower level creatures. Their limbs grow back at a rate you wouldn't believe when removed for any reason."

“I need to see it.” Jill breathed, a fat tear finally rolling down her dirty cheek as she looked up at Chris from where she still sat on the ground. 
“Tell me, Agent Birkin… How is there a ‘better’ in all of this?” Piers asked bleakly. He could hear them too.

“Salamander DNA?” Wesker postulated, once again swiping through the notes on the computer pad. “No… no visible mutation… But then…” He was muttering to himself, his thoughts again running away with him.