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Claire’s hands don’t shake as she reloads her revolver, even as the hungry dead use the short lull in combat to drag their battered bodies closer to her position. Chris had drilled “staying calm under pressure” into her over and over again when she was growing up, and though she knows he would hate to see her having to actually put his lessons to use, she’s so, so grateful for them now. Still, she’s been keeping track of her ammo usage and knows she’s running dangerously low. “You got that lock off yet?” she asks.
As though she’s said the magic words, she hears the lock finally slide off the gate. “On three,” the woman says. “One,” and Claire hears the metal grinding as the other woman pulls back the heavy bolt latch, “two,” so she shifts her weight off the gate and onto the balls of her feet, “three!” The gate swings open and Claire wastes no time, quickly retreating to safety and dropping the muzzle towards the ground as Grace slams the gate shut once more, sliding the bolt shut and replacing the padlock with a slight huff of exertion. The woman smiles at Claire, something almost amused dancing in her tired eyes. “Well, that’s not the worst trust-building exercise I’ve ever done,” she jokes, “but it’s definitely up there.”
Claire laughs, amused despite the situation. The joke was unexpected, but she appreciates it nonetheless. She needed that burst of levity. “Claire Redfield,” she introduces herself. “Thanks for the save there. I would’ve found another way into the station if I’d had to, but…”
“I’m glad I was able to save you the hassle.” The woman holds out a shaking hand that Claire is all too happy to grasp. “Grace W-Winchester. I guess we’re both friends of Leon?”
“I guess we are! I caught a ride into town with him earlier tonight, but, well…” Her body still aches from the crash, and there’s a long, black stripe up the side of her jacket from when the cruiser burst into flames. “Our road trip got cut a bit short and we had to split up,” is what she settles on instead of getting into the entirety of that mess, “but he told me to rendezvous here to see if we could get some answers.”
Grace’s smile slips, her earlier cheer dissipating into something more painful. “I… right before Leon found me, some, someone I cared very dearly for d-died saving me,” she says, and the barely-leashed grief in her voice makes Claire’s heart squeeze in her chest. “I wasn’t… I… if he h-hadn’t found me, I think I would’ve…”
And oh, Claire knows that look in Grace’s eyes, is more familiar with it than she ever wanted to be. It hides behind Chris’ boisterous laugh and showed itself in the endless, endless firearms drills he made her run as a child. It drove him to the gym night after sleepless night and made itself at home in a small living room that held nothing but empty photo frames and a rolodex of names. “I’m sorry you lost your friend,” she says earnestly, memories of Chris screaming in his sleep echoing in her ears, “but you’ve got Leon, and you’ve got me now, too, and we — all three of us — are going to survive this. No one is getting left behind. Survive for your friend and live for us. Promise me. We’ll get through this together.”
Claire squeezes Grace’s hand. Grace squeezes back — weakly, with fingers that twitch with strain, but she squeezes back, grabbing onto the lifeline Claire has thrown out. “Okay,” she says softly. “Okay.”
Grace takes point as they traverse the darkened station, illuminating the hallways with a flashlight so bright it’s nearly blinding. Claire makes a mental note to ask her where she got it after this is over — her own flashlight is about as bright as a matchstick in comparison to the miniature sun Grace wields. “Leon did a pretty good job of clearing a path, huh?” Claire quips. The corpses they find are motionless and riddled with bullet holes, but her revolver stays ready in her hand anyway. She’s learned the hard way that the dead never quite stay down. Not anymore, anyway.
Grace makes a sound that isn’t quite a laugh. “He’s good at that,” she agrees, voice wobbly and strange. “Always… always g-going ahead to… to save…” The flashlight beam wavers as her hand clenches tighter and tighter with every quiet word. “W-why did he have to die?” she eventually whispers, almost as though speaking to herself. “Why… everyone I love, they, they all… all because I…”
A window shatters. Before Claire can even raise her gun, Grace pulls something from a pouch and hurls it at the zombie attempting to climb through the broken glass. Claire watches in distant, horrified awe as the zombie claws at its face, screaming as what can only be acid eats away at its rotting flesh, howling until it can’t anymore, falling to the floor and staying there. Silence reigns heavy for a moment as they stare at the partially dissolved corpse, and then — “Fuck, I needed that,” Grace mutters dejectedly.
“What in the world could you possibly need a bottle of acid for?!” She can’t help the question that bursts from her mouth, incredulous and confused. Grace jumps as though she had forgotten Claire was behind her, swinging around to face her — and in the same movement, completely blinding her with the flashlight.
Every curse word she’s ever learned from Chris comes spilling out of her, squinting and raising her free hand in a futile attempt to block the light. “Oh, sh-shit, I’m so —!” The blinding light hastily swings away from her face, and there’s a shaky hand hesitantly patting at her shoulder. “I f-forgot you were — I’m so sorry, a-are you okay?!”
Claire blinks the spots from her eyes, the world a melting kaleidoscope of cracked plaster and enormous blind spots. Her vision slowly comes back, and Grace’s worried expression is devastating. She looks just like a kicked puppy, dirty blonde hair and watery eyes only adding to the comparison, and Claire, despite herself, finds her irritation melting away. “I’m okay, just…” She musters up a weak smile. “Please don’t do that again.”
Grace nods so earnestly it makes Claire’s heart squeeze. The blonde turns back to face the lifeless hallway and begins leading them down it once more. “I, I really am s-sorry,” she says quietly. “I was, my mind was…” Her voice tapers off for a moment before she continues, “D-did I tell you the name of my friend? The one that… that d-died?”
Though she doesn’t understand where this conversation is headed, Claire replies, “No, I don’t think you did. Why?” A cold feeling swoops through her and she rushes to add, “Was it Chris? Chris Redfield?”
“N-no, I don’t… I don’t know a Chris Redfield,” Grace says, and Claire is guiltily relieved at her answer, “although… that name… wasn’t there something about…? Weren’t the Hounds…?” Her voice trails off into incoherent mumblings, too quiet for Claire to make out. After a few moments, Grace raises her voice again and asks, “H-he’s a S.T.A.R.S. member, right? Is he your… dad?”
Claire can’t help but giggle a bit at the question. “No, he’s my older brother,” she explains. “I thought he was somewhere in the city, maybe even here in the station, but…”
“I haven’t met anyone with that name here,” Grace confirms apologetically. “Maybe he made it out of the city before the outbreak got this bad?”
“It’s not like him to leave when people are in danger,” Claire says, “but it’s possible. I just wish he’d told me where he was instead of making me look for him!”
Her irate statement startles a laugh out of her companion. “Men, huh?” she says somewhat snidely, and, no matter how much she loves her brother, Claire can only sigh in agreement.
Distracted as she is, it never occurs to her that Grace doesn’t pick up the original thread of their conversation.
The fire shutter closes behind them with a metallic groan as they step into the comforting lights of the main hall. “We should be safe in here for now,” Grace tells her, shoulders relaxing slightly as she pockets her flashlight. “The barricades have been holding so far, and I — Leon too, clearly — have been taking out the undead while exploring.” She flashes a nervous smile over her shoulder at Claire. “It… this won’t hold forever, I’m sure, but I’m choosing to be thankful while it lasts.”
Claire finally lets her hand drift away from her revolver, allowing herself to slowly drop out of her hyper-vigilant state. Every muscle in her body aches from being tense for so long, so the temporary reprieve is more than welcome. She sinks to the floor and leans against the sturdy front desk with a sigh, letting more tension seep from her muscles. Grace wanders away, dipping behind a battered curtain and muttering something quietly. A male voice answers her. It’s an unfamiliar voice, one rough and tight with pain, but it’s warm and alive beneath the flickering lights. Claire doesn’t get up. Whatever Grace and that unseen stranger are talking about is probably none of her concern.
Leon isn’t in the hall, but Grace doesn’t seem worried by his absence so Claire chooses to take the path of least resistance and puts it out of mind for now. He wouldn’t leave them behind. Besides, there’s a half-visible passageway at the foot of the giant statue overlooking the entrance and Grace had offhandedly mentioned something about Leon solving a puzzle to open an escape route hidden within the station. She assumes he’s off in another hall, looking for whatever keys remain to get that passageway fully operational.
Taking the reprieve for what it is, she takes stock of her heavily depleted inventory. Ten lonely bullets stare back at her from the bottom of her ammo pouch. That’s… not good. Loathe as she is to interrupt Grace’s conversation, Claire hauls herself up and makes her way over to where the other woman disappeared. It’s a bit of a long shot, but maybe her new-found friend has some spare ammo to make up for her losses.
As she approaches, the conversation becomes more clear. “— for much longer,” she hears Grace say, voice worn out and grieving. “T-the infection, it’s t-too much. E-even if I —”
“It’s not your responsibility to save me, Grace,” the man replies calmly. “I was dead… long before you got here… remember? Just because you’re here now doesn’t… make it any less true.”
Grace whimpers like she’s holding back tears. “But it’s not fair,” she whispers. “If I can’t s-save anyone, why am I still —”
When Claire peeks around the curtain, she finds Grace kneeling next to a bloodied man in a torn police uniform laying on a couch, his discoloured hand resting over hers. “There’s still time,” he tells her gently, cutting off her words. “There are still… other people to save. Leon… he’s still here, remember? He’s still alive. And your new friend, Claire… she’s still alive. All those people you love… you can save them. Save yourself. Don’t… waste your grief on me.”
Grace sniffles. “I’ll j-just waste a bullet on you in-instead,” she chokes out, hand spasming against the unfeeling leather. “Just one bullet. Just for you.”
Fuck.
Claire shouldn’t be listening to this. She should’ve turned back around as soon as she realised what they were talking about and sat her ass back down on that floor and stopped eavesdropping. She slowly backs away from the conversing pair, footsteps as silent as she can make them as she returns to the front of the hall, breath easing as their voices fade back into unintelligible noise. The bullets can wait. That conversation cannot.
Leon stumbles back into the main hall with fresh gore splattered on his uniform and a frustrated yet triumphant look on his face. Claire watches with raised eyebrows as he stalks towards the statue and slams what looks like some sort of badge into an open slot at the base of the statue. The entire hall shudders as the base begins to move, marble and stone splitting apart to reveal an old iron gate. Grace glances up, obviously startled by the commotion, but doesn’t move from her position near the terminal behind the front desk. She looks over at Claire, a concerned furrow marring her face. “You… you should go check that out,” she says distractedly as she turns back towards the screen. “There’s something here that… I could’ve sworn I saw…”
Confused by Grace’s refusal to move but curious about the passageway, Claire leaves her chair near the barricaded front doors and joins Leon at the newly-revealed gate. She peers around his shoulders as he shines his flashlight through the wide bars, revealing a stairway swallowed by shadows and the bare outlines of a room at the bottom. “So it goes underground…” she remarks. “Huh. That makes sense, I guess.”
Leon jumps at the sound of her voice, turning to face her with a wide smile. Had he truly been so focused that he hadn’t heard her approach? “Claire! You made it!”
He’s so earnestly happy to see her it makes her smile in return. “Grace is here too,” she tells him, already knowing why his eyes are flickering past her shoulder, “but she’s busy looking at something on the cameras. I’m sure she’ll join us in a bit.”
He doesn’t look all that reassured by her words, but he simply nods in acceptance instead of saying anything. Clapping her on the shoulder, he steps past her and starts jogging towards the man lying on the couch. “Lt. Branagh! Marvin!” he calls. “It’s time to go!”
When there’s no response, Claire quickly runs over to see what the situation is. The man — Marvin — looks… bad. There’s really no other way for her to put it. His skin is almost entirely discoloured and his breathing is erratic, fingers twitching and convulsing in a sickeningly familiar way. When Leon shakes his shoulder, Marvin bolts up with a snarl, eyes bloodshot and nearly glassy. Claire’s heart drops to her stomach but she puts her hand on her revolver’s grip, ready to do what she must in case Leon cannot. But against all odds, Marvin’s eyes clear and he turns his head away, gasping and clutching the wound on his side. Oblivious to the tragedy waiting to unfold — or, perhaps, simply hoping against all hope — Leon says, “Come on, we gotta get going. We need to get you to a hospital right now.”
There’s a devastating resignation in Marvin’s eyes as he looks at Leon. “No… no, I…” He groans, face contorted in pain, and grits out, “Save… save yourself…”
Claire watches helplessly as realisation crashes over Leon like a bucket of ice water, but he still reaches out to try and grab the lieutenant. The man violently shrugs Leon’s hand off. Hopelessly determined, Leon reaches out again. “Look, we can still make it out together if you just give me —”
“JUST GO!” When Marvin turns to face Leon, he’s holding a pistol, finger curled around the trigger. Claire carefully puts her hand on Leon’s shoulder in a silent gesture of support. She can feel him trembling. “It’s too late,” Marvin whispers. “I tried, Leon… but I couldn’t stop it.” She can see how hard he’s fighting to stay human, to save Leon from watching his mentor turn into just another mindless monster. Even though she barely knows the man, has never even spoken to him, it breaks her heart to see him like this. “We can’t let this thing spread.” His hand shakes even as his voice stays even. “It’s on you now.” Marvin’s eyes dart towards Claire and she gives a solemn nod. She’s part of this too. She’ll do anything she can to stop this, and though Grace isn’t standing with them at the moment, she knows the other woman will do the same. “Just… just go…”
In a sudden burst of movement, Grace comes sprinting up the ramp. “You two need to get going,” she says, suddenly pushing them towards the gate with all the strength she can muster. “It’s — it’s breaking through th-the barricades, you have t-to —”
“Grace, what the hell are you talking about?” Leon asks before Claire can get a word out. “And what do you mean ‘you two,’ you’re clearly coming with us!”
Her eyes are wild with unbridled terror. “N-no, not yet, I h-have to buy you time, there, there’s no time, there’s no time —” In slow, stumbling steps, she pushes them until they’re right in front of the gate. “You have to go, y-you have to go now, I c-can’t let it g-get you —!”
A loud boom echoes through the hall. Grace goes sheet white. Claire grabs the other woman’s wrist. “You have to come with us,” she tells Grace. “Whatever that is — whatever’s coming — if you’re so worried, you shouldn’t stay here and try to do — whatever it is you’re planning to do —”
“There’s no time!” she screeches, yanking her arm back with more strength than Claire was expecting. “I — t-there’s still —” Another boom, this time accompanied with the sound of splintering wood. “I, I have to — t-the lieutenant, I p-promised, I promised —”
“Just one bullet. Just for you.”
It goes against every instinct screaming in Claire’s body, but she grabs Leon’s arm and takes a step towards the gate. “Promise me,” she says urgently. “Promise me — promise us. You’re going to make it out of here alive.”
“Claire — Grace — what are you —?!”
All at once the terror in Grace’s eyes crystalises into steely resolve. “I promise I’ll meet you. Wherever you are — I’ll find you.” She turns her back on the pair and Claire rushes to push the gate open, shoving Leon into the stairwell despite his protests and following close on his heels. As the door slams shut and the statue base begins to reset itself, Claire watches as Grace, silhouette illuminated by the flickering lights above, draws her massive pistol with determination written on the lines of her back. “I’ll find you,” she whispers as the darkness closes in around Claire and Leon, “and I’ll get you out of here. No matter what.”