Means to an End

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Parker smiled at Chris slightly, patting him on the shoulder. "For what it's worth... I'm sorry too. I was so obsessed with finding Alex... I didn't stop to see the signs. I should have found out Jill was pregnant... Had I known that..." He paused and ran his fingers through his hair. "I do blame myself for what happened to her."

Chris never responded to this. As soon as they were inside the building he muttered something about needing to get Parker certified and left the other man to navigate the holding cells alone.
Jessica, it seemed, had been waiting all day and half the night for him. She visibly brightened when he was let into her cell. "Parker!" She gushed, leaping to her feet to throw her arms around him. "I knew you wouldn't let me down!"

It didn't seem that Chris even noticed Jill's absence in that moment. He was glaring daggers at his baby sister. "Maybe if you'd have told me the truth I wouldn't be disappointed!" He roared. "Don't you think that I, of all people, would understand your need to do something to help?!"

"No!" Claire replied bluntly. "I think you would have done everything in your power to keep me tied up in red tape somewhere!" she shook her head slightly, her sapphire eyes sad. "You're just like Leon, you both treat me like a child."

"And yet you're still going back to him." Chris whispered, clearly done with the whole subject. "Listen...I need your help with something and I have a feeling you'd do better at it than Parker did." He was giving up on making his sister feel bad. It was rather pointless nearly four years after the fact. Besides, it would keep her from talking to Jill. "Parker went into Tricell to find Rebecca. All I know is that he did but...she wasn't herself. I don't know why or anything. He hasn't been awake long enough to tell us that. But I was hoping you could get to her and extract her. You know, it would be easier for you because you don't have that emotional attachment. Would you do that for me?"

"Yeah... No emotional attachment to the best friend who cut me out of her life because she chose you over me." Claire replied darkly. "I am not one of your lackeys you can just send in to battle, Chris. You're doing this so you don't have to deal with the real issue here! Jill needs help!" She didn't even continue the argument about Leon. She never won that one, as Chris never understood how that friendship... It died the moment Leon chose to give his life to the government.

"I can't trust you anymore, Claire." Chris told his sister. The truth hit him hard but he swallowed it back, much the same way he'd been doing with what had happened to Jill. "She's too fragile and I won't let you turn her over. I can handle this. I don't need anyone's help."

Claire's sapphire eyes widened slightly, the shock of Chris' words coming out of nowhere. "You can handle nothing." She told him quietly. "Jill called me five times in the past three days. Clearly she has something she wants to say to me, something you are too pig headed and selfish to listen to!"

"Do you really want to go there about being selfish?" Chris snarled, glaring down at his sister. "Rethink that statement before you open your mouth again!" He roared.

Claire looked up at her brother for a long moment, then shook her head. "You love Jill so much? Where is she?" Claire replied calmly, just able to see Jill's foot where she had collapsed after rounding the corner.

Chris found himself hating his sister. Jill remained in a coma two weeks later and he had barely slept. He blamed the whole thing on Claire.
It didn't help that Parker had yet to wake. There was nothing to go on about Rebecca and he was certain now, that she was the only one who could help Jill.

Claire was able to use her position at TerraSave to gain access to both Jill and Parker, keeping up to date in their conditions. Chris hadn't said a single word to her, and she k we that wouldn't change any time soon. Like her brother, Loire barely slept, working through most of each night to find any information she could on Rebecca.

Chris certainly didn't believe that his sister would even try to find Rebecca. He was all but giving up on the tiny woman. He'd gotten word that Alex's school was closed down and that Alex had disappeared. He didn't know what to do about this information any more than he knew what to do with the comatose Jill.

"She can hear you, you know." Jill's doctor told Chris gently. "It may even be good for her to hear your voice." She added. "From what we can tell, it's was severe emotional stress that put her into this state."

"And you think talking to the one who put her there is going to make it better?" Chris scoffed, his nasty attitude the only thing he had to hold onto at the moment. "How much do they pay you to spit out bullshit like that?"

The young doctor glared at Chris over the top of her rimless glasses as she glanced up from inspecting Jill's chart. "I would be careful what you say, Mr. Redfield. Words like that are the sort of thing I can use when I tell the police I found a woman being abused by her lover. It seems your sister was right about you, despite my protests; you are only here out of some idiotic obligation! You don't love your fiancée!"

Chris surged to his feet, yanking back his fist to punch the doctor. It didn't seem like glasses, or the fact that she was a woman was going to save her.

"Is that how you solve all your problems with women, Mr. Redfield? With abusive behaviour?" The doctor asked, her hazel eyes filled with defiance, silently daring Chris to strike her down.

Chris dropped his fist, horrified by his own actions. This was not him. Jill would never stand for this. "I...I'm sorry." He breathed. "I just...I don't know how to deal with all of this. None of it is getting any better."

"And none of it will get any better until you learn to control your temper." The doctor warned, already back to writing notes on Jill's chart. "It took some digging, but I found your fiancées medical files. After what she went through as a child, you think an abusive relationship is the best thing for her?" She added, then der the chart back in its rightful place and left the room.

"I never hurt her." Chris whispered, his shoulders slumping as he dropped back into the chair. He sat like this for a long moment then leaned over and picked up the file, allowing his curiosity to get the better of him.

The doctor had lingered out in the hallway just long enough to make sure Chris had found the file she had left behind. He needed to know everything, if he was going to help the one he loved.

Chris opened the file, almost worried by what he would find. He knew there was a lot that Jill hadn't told him. He just wasn't sure just how much.

Jill had barely even told Chris the worst of what had happened to her. The things described in that file... They would have broken anyone else. Not Jill Valentine. It made her the the kind of strong she was today, of course... Even the strong have their breaking point.
Claire had put her search for Rebecca on hold for the moment. Her 'package' had arrived at the hospital. Whenever little girls needed help, everyone always seemed to turn to her. Even after everything she had seen, even Claire was disturbed by the condition the dark haired child was in when she arrived.

Chris climbed into the bed with Jill and held her tightly. He wept for her. For the first time in his life he cried openly for her pain. He couldn't stand it anymore. He wished he had been there for her from the moment she was born. But that wasn't possible. And then...even when he'd been supposed to protect her, he'd let Albert Wesker break her all over again.

Claire had come looking for her brother, not expecting to find him with his face buried in Jill's hair, envy sobbing. Part of her wanted to simply turn around and leave him to it, but that was a very small part. "Chris..." She reached out for him, resting a hand lightly against his shoulder. "What happened?"

"Nothing." Chris whispered, closing up as he'd done before. He saw no reason to make anyone else a part of his misery on any level. "What do you want? Jill can't talk right now."

"It was you I wanted to talk to." Claire replied, pulling her hand back. "I... Have a problem. A BOW problem, I think..." This wasn't going well at all. "Someone brought a little girl in, she's an orphan, but her blood... The tests showed something strange in it."

"What?" Chris was sitting up now, turning to stare at his sister. His stomach was suddenly in knots though he completely sure why. "A little girl?" He asked, making sure she wasn't speaking of Alex. "Who is she?"

"We don't know yet." Claire replied softly. "But Chris... She's in pretty bad shape. It looks like she's been living out there all alone." She breathed. "We can't get her to say much, so I don't know any more than that."

"I want to talk to her." Chris said, surprising himself with the urgency in his voice. "Take me to her...get someone to stay with Jill..."

"Chris... She isn't a prisoner you can interrogate... She's just a little girl." Claire reminded her brother. "About the same age Sherry was..."