Chapter Text
Carving a path through a small army of feral lycans out for his blood, Ethan was not in the mood for any further games. Yet he played along nevertheless. His body bloodied and bruised, he sat on a chair as instructed by the rugged man in front of him. The same man who had captured him in Castle Dimitrescu before. Ethan couldn’t even tell how long ago that has been, the unconsciousness in the dungeons and the hallucinations at House Beneviento taking their toll on his perception of the passage of time.
The hatted man, satisfied that Ethan obeyed his command, started his spiel, while using his supernatural powers to fling a metal dagger around, impaling the portraits of the people he mentioned.
“Lady super-sized bitch… ugly-ass psycho doll...and that moronic freak… All still kickin’, yet here you are, having taken what you needed from them all. Aren’t you just a mister pacifist. I don’t think Miranda is very pleased by this outcome.”
Annoyed by the bespectacled man’s showman-like antics, Ethan growls out, frustrated. “I don’t give a damn about your little family issues. I just want to fix my daughter and get out of here!”
Clearly happy with that particular response, Karl turns towards Ethan, arms outstretched and a satisfied smile upon his face. “So do I, Ethan, on both counts!” Interrupted by the loud engine-like noise from down below, Heisenberg loses his cool for a moment, cursing the offending object loudly, before smiling wide again. Taking off his glasses to reveal surprisingly ordinary eyes, he continues, while gesturing with hands wildly. “You and me, Ethan. Together we go save Rose and then we can use her to grind Miranda into paste!”
The spoken implication of weaponizing his poor, innocent baby daughter is almost enough for Ethan to reach for his newly-obtained magnum to wipe the smirk off the hatted freak’s face. Remembering Bela’s gift to him at the last second, however, he calms down and takes a deep breath, before responding: “You’re even more insane than you look if you think I’ll let you use my daughter as your weapon.” Seeing Heisenberg’s feature harden at that, Ethan continues: “...However, we can take Miranda down in another way, that will leave us both satisfied.”
At that, Karl’s right eyebrow goes up, curiosity flashing across his face, before he speaks: “What other way? You planning on talking her to death? Unless you’re hiding a nuke in your backpack there, I don’t like your chances versus her very much, no offense.”
Giving the man a smirk of his own now, Ethan pulls out the ebony dagger, carefully wrapped in white cloth. Revealing the weapon, he offers: “One of Dimitrescu's daughters - Bela, gave it to me. She was certain that this dagger here is capable of killing Miranda.”
Now having adopted a shocked expression, Karl carefully takes the dagger, inspecting it slowly, making sure not to touch the edge. After several moments, he returns the weapon, and addresses the still sitting man calmly, almost reverently: “The dagger of death flowers...a local legend. A myth, or so I thought. Normally, hearing something like that, I’d tell you to go have your head checked or something but…” Taking several moments to contemplate, while pacing around the room, he continues: “You’re saying the blondie bugspawn gave it to you? A good head on that one’s shoulders, I admit. Not prone to flights of fancy. Seeing you here with it, instead of you being a red smoothie drink for her big-ass bitch mama must mean she trusted you…”
At the silence that followed, Ethan felt the bombastic man might have been unsatisfied with his offer and stood up, not wanting to be kicked into the hole with that generator-like sounding creature in it. Defying his expectations once again, he is presented with a hand instead, palm open.
“Something tells me you’re not full of shit, after all, Winters. Seeing how you dealt with my freaks of a ‘family’ must be making me soft. Fine. We will try it your way.”
Shaking the offered hand, Ethan feels like he made the correct choice.
***
Not long after returning to the chalice where he had left his daughter, Ethan is finally, but expectedly confronted by Miranda herself. Quickly surrounded by pillars of black fungus that had suddenly sprouted from the earth itself, the man feels like he bit more than he could chew, previous preparations for this moment seemingly insufficient against the powers on display here.
That bitch has Rose now… I will do everything in my power to take her back. No matter the odds.
Feeling in control, the devil woman that had taken his child and had turned this whole valley into her personal playground for more than a century circles around her prey, all the while mocking and taunting him. Shifting forms after each cruel sentence.
“Poor Ethan. You never knew I took Mia’s place in your house, didn’t you?” Speaks the snake in Mia’s guise, chuckling softly all the while. “I wonder how Rose came to be? Was it because of her parents? You truly are a special case yourself, after all…”
Fading behind one black pillar just to appear behind another, now taking the form of a crone from the village, she speaks in the same confident voice: “I must admit I am disappointed in you, however. I expected you to rid me of my... ‘children’, “the witch sneers as she pronounces that word slowly “ instead you chose to play nice with them... No matter, I will just have to deal with them myself, after I am done with you.”
Pointing his gun at the shapeshifter, even as nervous sweat runs down his brows, Ethan holds the black blade tightly with his left hand, clutching it between his back and the backpack on it. Just as the cursed witch vanishes again, he yells out: “Enough games! Miranda, you coward! Come out and face me!” His false bravado betrayed by his unsteady aim, he searches with his eyes wildly, desperate to catch a glimpse of her shifting form.
Her mocking voice comes out of nowhere and everywhere at once: “I’ve learned all I can from you. Your worth as a lab rat has run out. But don’t worry. Your death will be swift.”
As if knowing what will happen next, Ethan tenses, adrenaline running rampant in his own unnatural body. Every muscle taut and ready, yet still unable to stop the clawed hand rushing at him from the ground itself, he feels his skin break under its unnatural strength. Flesh and bone give way, until his very heart is savagely pulled out from its rightful place. Dropping his gun from his right hand, but still not bereft of his strength, Ethan uses every ounce of love and hate to move his left hand with as much haste and power he could possibly squeeze out of his rapidly fading flesh. Just as he drops to his knees, his body no longer able to support its own weight, he plunges his ebony dagger into her own black heart.
As he falls down on his side, he is rewarded by a piercing, agonized shriek. The woman in black backs away from him, clutching the dagger, trying to pull it out. No longer arrogant or mocking, the expression on her face is that of terror and unspeakable agony. Tendrils of black rapidly spread from the wound in her chest, until they take over her entire form completely. Her horrified expression still on her face, Miranda becomes still as a statue, inky black veins covering her from head to toe. The last thing Ethan sees before the darkness claims him is the form of Heisenberg, handmade flamethrower in hand, coming over him, generously pouring the hungry napalm all over the blackened form of his nemesis.
***
Donna Beneviento, Angie ever present at her side, observed a small mushroom cloud blooming over the village in the distance uncaringly. The shockwave from the explosion knocked her off her feet while breaking the windows in the house behind her. She is unbothered by the sudden violence or a gust of dirt and filth that now barrages her downed form. Waiting for the calamity to pass, she stands up calmly, fixing her veil and dusting her dress off once she is up.
However, as the living mutamycete network below the village, where the massive explosion took place shudders for the last time and finally perishes, the dollmaker feels something strange happening to her. As if the haze that has been surrounding her mind all these long years started to lift, just a notch. As a modicum of awareness started to return to her, she looked at her life-long companion and spoke slowly, the quiet words rolling off her tongue still muddled and unsteady.
“What… do you say.... we visit brother...Salvatore, Angie?”
The doll stomped her feet angrily at that, yelling loudly: “No! I hate stinky!”
Undaunted, the woman in black funeral garb gives her friend a tiny, barely perceptible smile, perhaps for the first time in a very long while. “I remember...he...showed us...kindness... We should...return it…”
***
Karl Heisenberg stands over the still burning ruins of his beloved factory, his fists clenched, teeth grinding against each other in anger.
“That boulder-punching asshole blew up my factory after all...I will so murder him!”
Watching his lifelong work crumble into dust was painful, to be sure. Yet that could hardly ruin his good mood, not after seeing his lifelong goal itself complete.
Ethan Winters… you actually did it, you glorious bastard.
Surely, no matter how potent the poison on that dagger was, Miranda could regenerate from it, eventually. But he wouldn’t give the bitch that chance. After he made sure there was not a speck of her left around, he had looked at Ethan’s prone form. Unbelievably, the man was still alive somehow, despite his obviously mortal injury. Quickly doing what he could do to stabilize his condition, he had brought the man to the Duke, before returning to his own factory, only to see it go up in flames, in the same moment as whatever explosive was planted inside the fungal caves under the village detonated.
Eh. I suppose I didn’t really need it anymore anyway. I am a free man now! Finally free of that bitch’s leash. Surely a man of my talents will be able to find a spot under the sun! Watch out world, here comes Karl Heisenberg!
Scrounging the ruins for anything valuable, the hatted man considered the vast possibilities now open to him while singing a happy tune.
***
Waking up with a mother of all headaches, Ethan grunted out a muffled “Motherfucker” before trying to open his eyes. His whole body felt like it was run over by a school bus. Twice.
“Ethan! You’re alright!” Yelled a familiar voice that he was sure he would never hear again.
Looking astounded at the source of the voice, Ethan was treated to Mia’s face, her eyes red, happy tears running down her beautiful cheeks. “Mia!? Is this really you? You’re alive!”
The woman in question quickly hugged him, as if her life depended on it. He returned the gesture eagerly, even as the pain from his numerous injuries ran throughout his body. He felt her tears flowing down on him and just held the woman he loved. The woman he went through hell and back to save. They were taken out of their happy reverie by a baby’s gurgling voice. Not believing his ears, Ethan looked at the source of the noise. Seeing his beautiful baby daughter in one piece, laughing happily at him made it all worth it. All the suffering and loss he had to endure, this one moment made it all count.
“Rose… “
Glancing from the happy, smiling face of his wife, to his gurgling baby daughter, Ethan finally became aware that he was in some kind of aircraft in motion. Suddenly, a powerful, deep and familiar voice shook him out of his happy stupor.
“Ethan, I am glad you made it...I am glad you all made it.”
Looking to his right, Ethan saw Chris Redfield sitting on one of the seats in the aircraft’s hall; several other operatives were also seated nearby, looking at him with wonder in their eyes.
“Chris… What the hell happened, is Miranda really dead? Are we really safe?” Asked Ethan the larger man with uncertainty in his voice. The mentally-scarred blonde dreaded this was just a too-good-to-be-true dream and he would soon wake up in Dimitrescu dungeons once again, with Cassandra giggling over him, knife at the ready.
“Yes, Ethan. Miranda is dead. You and...Heisenberg made sure of that. You’re all safe now.” Answered the powerful man in his deep voice, not quite able to mask his own astonishment at the fact, though.
Looking at his wife again, Ethan mumbled out: “I can’t believe you’re alive Mia, I thought I would never see you again…”
Answering him as if recalling a particularly unpleasant memory, Mia spoke: “That crazy bitch kept me alive for her insane ceremony… She planned to have us both to be fed to the mutamycete.” She suddenly gave Ethan’s lips a long, passionate kiss, the man quickly leaning into it, before pulling back and continuing. “But it’s all over now, finally. Chris found me and blew up that fucking place while you made sure that horrible woman will never come for us again. We are all together again…” At that, Ethan finally took his baby daughter in his hands, who cooed cutely at him.
“I have just one question for you, Ethan.” Once again, interrupted by the larger man commanding voice, the blonde looked puzzled at the bulky captain.
“You’ve visited all the Lords, right? Heisenberg gets a pass since he helped us and I’ve already ‘disarmed’ him, but what about the rest? I trust you’ve dealt with them all appropriately? I’d hate to go back there…”
Now that was a question Ethan didn’t expect. Should he tell him that the monsters in question were still alive and kicking, probably looking for their next victims even as they spoke now? This world of theirs certainly could do with a couple of less bloodthirsty monsters in it, right? Just as he was about to confirm their still present threat, an image of Bela popped into his head. Her beautiful laughter, intelligent molten-gold gaze, witty and joyful words; kind and gentle hands, treating his broken body. She might be a part of a bloodthirsty monster family and he might be condemning innocent people with his next words, but he just couldn’t bring himself to condemn her himself.
“Yes, Chris. I’ve dealt with them all, appropriately.”
An act of kindness, repaid.
***
Bela was looking outside the window in her room, everything was calm now, the earthquake that shook their castle to the core having had subsided hours ago. Gentle winter sun that was close to the horizon shone down through the cloudy sky, as small specks of snow slowly fell around. The previous scene of devastation was replaced with an almost serene setting now. Standing up from her spot near the window, keeping the curtains open, she took a look at her room. Her personal collection of books, courtesy of Duke, occupied a large portion of the space in their many shelves. The room was sparsely but tastefully decorated. A large flower-decorated bed was placed in one corner and a solid, oaken writing desk in another. A collection of labeled black-red flasks stood on a shelf next to the desk.
Suddenly and without a warning, the door to her room slammed open and in barged her younger sister, Cassandra.
“When are you going to learn some manners already, dear sister?” Said Bela, exasperation plain in her voice.
Cassandra just scoffed at that, before saying: “You should think about how close you came to being tossed to the wolves outside, instead of my manners. One day that silver tongue of yours is not gonna save you anymore, you know.”
“You’d like that to happen, don’t you?” Asked the blonde, more spiteful than she wanted to.
Surprising her, instead of confirming the accusation, the brunette briskly stomped up to her and gave her a bone-crushing hug. The blonde returned it, unsure.
“You know that’s not true… we might not see eye-to-eye on many things, but... You’re still my sister and...I love you… there, you made me say it, happy?” The brunette grumbled out even as she held onto her older sister tightly.
Beaming, the blonde intensified their hug, while answering: “I love you too, Cassandra… I am so sorry for all the lies…”
Breaking the hug, the brunette backed off, giving her older sister a playful glare, before smiling at her, no malice in her expression now. “At least they borne fruit. The Duke just came by. Mother had a long conversation with him, Daniela eavesdropping on everything, naturally.” Pausing for a moment, Cassandra picked a flask labeled ‘Ethan W.’ from the table, gently rolling it in her gloved hands, as Bela watched with interest. “Miranda is no more. Beneviento, Heisenberg and Moreau are all still kicking. Guess your human came through, after all.”
Giddy at the news, but curiosity still unsated, the blonde asks, meekly: “What about the human himself?”
Giggling, as if from some unspoken joke, Cassandra jovially answers: “He is still alive, believe it or not! What a wonderfully resilient creature. If only I had a bit more quality time with him…” Seeing her sister frown at that last notion, the brunette just dismissively waved a gloved hand at her, before continuing: “Duke said that he had turned him over to his own people, they are probably long gone from here by now. A shame.”
He did what he promised to do and now he is gone, back to his own world. I wonder how differently things would’ve worked out for us, if I left him at my mother’s mercy, all the way back then…
Cassandra’s voice takes her out of her small reverie: “What do you think comes next for us?”
Turning back to the window and looking at the desolate terrain outside, Bela slowly glides her gloved hand down the glass, as she answers. “I don’t know, sister. But I don’t think there is anything left for us here. With nobody left to hold our leash and with all the wealth our family accumulated over the centuries, provided the Duke is willing to help us, I imagine we could go anywhere we wanted. I am so sick of this eternal cold, myself. Perhaps someplace warm? I am sure Daniela would love to visit a beach.” At that, a bundle of red hair peeks through the door and yells out a chipper “I’d REALLY love that!”
The older siblings giggle at the youngest antics, even as all three of them come close to the window, gazing out at the setting sun over the snowbound, mountainous expanse before them.
“One chapter ends, another begins…” Bela softly mutters, even as she puts her arms around her sisters at her sides. Unbeknownst to them, a surprisingly quiet figure, especially considering her grand height, is standing right outside the room, smiling gently at the most unexpected outcome out of this whole mess.
The three sisters watch the setting sun in silence, content in their embrace, their previous woes forgotten, as they contemplate the possibilities that await them. Bela doesn't remember how long ago was the last time she felt this kind of contentment. As the sun finally goes over the horizon, one more stray thought comes running through her blonde head.
Perhaps we will meet again, Mister Winters, in another life, in another world?