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Reluctantly, Leon stops banging his hands uselessly against the sealed entrance. He can’t get the image of Grace standing there at the top of the stairs out of his mind, Requiem in hand, clearly terrified out of her mind but choosing to make a stand anyway — a stand he can’t make heads or tails out of. What was so pressing, so important, that she would choose to stay behind instead of retreat to safety with them? Fear, worry, confusion, panic — unable to work his way through the overwhelming torrent of emotions, they all coalesce into a ball of rage that sits like molten lead in his chest, and without any conscious thought, he unleashes them on the only other person around. “Claire, what the hell was that?!” he yells, storming down the stairs. She doesn’t look up, busy throwing handfuls of ammo into a small ammo pouch hanging from her waist. All her silence does is stoke his useless fury higher. “Why did you leave Grace up there? It’s dangerous! What if something happens?! What if she dies out there and it’s all because we left her —!”
Claire stops rifling through drawers and slams her hands against the top of the dust-covered desk. “I’m just as upset as you!” she yells, whipping around to a jaw that trembles with terrible dread. “Do you think I’m happy about this?! I didn’t want to leave Grace up there by herself, but —!”
“But what?! Explain it to me, Claire! What could possibly be so important that you would just let her —?!”
“BECAUSE SHE DIDN’T WANT MARVIN TO BECOME A MONSTER!” The words ring in the enclosed room, heavy with awful emotion. Claire swallows. She’s shaking. “Because she — because she promised him. She promised that she… that she would…” She abruptly looks away, fingers digging furrows in the dust.
All of Leon’s anger vanishes, replaced by cold certainty. He doesn’t want to believe it. He can’t believe it. “Claire… you don’t mean —”
“I’m sorry, Leon.” Her voice is steady but he can see the wobble in her lips. “She just… didn’t want Marvin to suffer. And she didn’t want you to be the one to have to pull the trigger.”
He wants to sit down. He needs to sit down. Leon drops to the floor in a graceless heap and buries his face in his knees. His heart aches, a deep, pulsating pain in the centre of his chest. “She shouldn’t have had to do that,” he says bitterly. “Grace is…” He sees flashes of her in his mind, the way she rubs her too-thin wrists after shooting the Requiem and the all-consuming grief that lingers in her eyes even as she pastes on a smile. She’s already lost her Leon to the outbreak — probably lost even more people than he even knows about, really — and now she’s taken on this solemn, thankless duty just to spare him the pain of it. “She’s too kind,” he finally whispers. “None of this should’ve happened.”
Boots scuff against the wooden floor as Claire walks over to him. “None of this is fair,” she says softly, laying her hand on his shoulder, “but we have to accept her decision. And besides, it’s not like she’s unreachable.” She taps the radio affixed to his vest. “You’ve still got this, don’t you?”
His radio. Of course. He can’t believe it slipped his mind. Every fibre of his being cries out to radio Grace immediately, to check in with her and see if she’s okay, but — “Before we went down her,” the words come slowly as he thinks back over the frantic flight towards the secret passage, “you said she was looking for something on the cameras. And she was…”
Claire’s grip on his shoulder spasms. “She was terrified of something. Something that was coming. Something that was breaking through the barricades.” The pair lock eyes as the realisation sinks in, worry and fear swimming anew in their hearts. “She stayed for Marvin, of course that was one of the reasons, but… oh, shit, do you think she was also —?”
Leon’s throat clicks as he swallows dryly. “She’s trying to buy us time to escape something,” he finishes. “She’s trying to buy us time, and all we’ve been doing is wasting it.”
“We have to go. Now.”
A burst of static erupts from the radio, shattering the tense silence blanketing the unlit passageway. “Leon?! Claire?! Can you hear me?!” Grace pants, voice tight with something Leon can’t quite identify with the low-quality audio.
Claire immediately crowds into Leon’s space to hear the radio more clearly. “We hear you!” Leon answers quickly, fiddling with the radio to turn the volume up as high as possible. “What’s going on up there? Are you okay?”
“Um, w-well, I’m… alive,” Grace replies, a strange waver in her voice, “b-but the, the Tyrant, it’s…” There’s a barely audible sound, almost like compressed air being released, and Grace’s voice rises to a near whimper. Claire and Leon share a confused glance. What was that? “N-nevermind that, i-it’s not important right n-now,” Grace continues, oblivious to her friends’ confusion, “there’s — the water, it’s, it’s in the water, that’s how it — the city, all of it, t-that’s how it spread so fast — there were papers about this, h-how did I forget, I should’ve known — you have to be careful —”
“Wait, Grace, hold on,” Claire interrupts. “What’s in the water?”
“The, um, virus. The T-virus, I think. I-it’s why everyone is, um, infected.”
Horrible realisation breaks across Claire’s face. “Chris,” she whispers nonsensically, barely remembering to keep her voice loud enough to be picked up by the radio. “After he came back from that mission in the Arklays, the one he wouldn’t talk about — he bought bottled water. Cases upon cases of bottled water. And wouldn’t explain why we couldn’t just drink from the tap anymore.”
Grace titters nervously. “Your brother must’ve s-seen something in the mountains, o-or guessed something was happening,” she says. “Y-you should thank him if you r-run into him.” Another burst of compressed air. Another choked whine. “I — I h-hate to say this,” she continues apologetically, “b-but you probably shouldn’t use any of the herbs you find around here either.”
Herbs? Leon pulls out the paltry handful of crushed plants he’s collected while running through the station, brows furrowed in confusion as he tries to follow her line of logic. Grace was worried about the water, worried enough to radio in and warn them not to drink it. Claire’s brother had been worried enough to buy cases of bottled water months ago and warn Claire to stop drinking from the tap. And herbs were plants, and plants need — “Water,” he breathes, eyes wide with horror. “The water they were using — it was probably contaminated. The virus is —”
“— i-in the plants, yeah, I think so” Grace finishes. “I, I don’t know for certain — I don’t really know h-how it’s transmitted or how long it, uh, lasts in o-other organisms, but…”
Claire pulls out her own stash of herbs with a conflicted expression. “But what are we going to do if we need them?” Leon’s mouth twists, but it’s a good question. They’ve been lucky so far, avoiding any serious injuries, but both of them know their luck can’t hold out forever.
The faint sounds of rummaging can be heard over the radio. “I h-have some med injectors left,” Grace tells them. “They’re safe. Uncontaminated. I, I’ve been trying t-to hang on to them j-just in case but…” She groans, more angry than Leon has ever heard her. “I should’ve — I should’ve known, I should’ve given them to you before, before everything went t-to shit, I’m so stupid —” There’s a distant bang, as though she’s kicked something heavy in frustration.
Leon’s heart flops anxiously in his chest. “You couldn’t have known,” he rushes to say, worried at the turn of her thoughts. He doesn’t like the way she’s clearly putting everything on her shoulders, even things that couldn’t possibly have been her fault. How could she have possibly figured out the source of the outbreak before any of this happened? It’s ridiculous for her to think she should’ve known this, and even more so to think poorly of herself because of it.
“I’m just glad you warned us as soon as you figured it out,” Claire adds. “I think… we should probably keep some herbs on us, just in case we run into serious trouble before you get to us, but we’ll hold off for as long as we can. We promise.” Though he knows Grace can’t see him, Leon nods firmly in agreement. Only using the tainted herbs if there’s no other option? That’s a promise he’s more than willing to keep.
Grace exhales, sounding as though a small weight has been lifted from her shoulders. “I can’t — I h-have to keep moving,” she says apologetically, “the Tyrant is — i-it’s relentless — better it focus on me t-than you, honestly, i-it doesn’t matter if I — uh, w-well, I just mean that, with the Requiem, i-it’s better if I —” The sound of splintering wood comes through the radio, accompanied by a beleaguered sigh. “Son of a bitch, I thought I had more time” she says, voice heavy with feeling. Leon’s heart leaps into his throat. Claire’s hand spasms uselessly around the grip of her revolver. “I, I’ll come through the s-same way you did i-if I can,” Grace says, and they can hear her breathing pick up as she starts to run, “but you just — keep moving, d-don’t wait for me. I’ll meet you, I promise.”
“Stay safe, Grace,” Leon pleads. “I can’t lose you. Not like Lt. Branagh.”
“I… I’ll meet you,” is all she says in reply before the radio goes silent. Though they wait for a few more hopeful seconds, there are no further transmissions.
Claire steps back. Leon straightens his back. Without any further discussion, they raise their flashlights and keep moving forward. If Grace is so set on buying them time to escape this Tyrant thing, they’d best not let her efforts go to waste.
Something scuttles behind the fallen locker — something small, blue, and human. Leon stops trying to push the locker back up, momentarily stunned. Was that — was that a child? “Hello? Is someone there?”
Claire quickly leans forward, carefully sweeping the beam of her flashlight to reveal a little girl crouched behind a stack of boxes, expensive-looking clothes smeared with dirt and grime. She’s panting quietly, eyes wide with fear as she stares at them. Leon immediately drops to his knees besides Claire to make himself smaller, trying to make his presence less threatening. “Hey,” Claire calls softly, and God he’s so grateful for her presence at this moment, “it’s okay, we’re not gonna hurt you. I promise.”
“Do you need help?” Leon asks, trying to gentle his voice to be more like Claire’s. He doesn’t think it works, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t at least try. Claire shuffles forward, slowly extending her hand. “You can grab her hand and we’ll help you get out of here.”
But the girl flinches away from Claire’s outstretched hand, retreating into the shadows as much as she can. “N-no… you… you need help,” she whispers, voice barely carrying. Leon’s heart sinks as he realises the girl’s eyes are trained on something over his shoulder. It’s not like Grace, whose eyes flickered across every object in her desperate attempt to not look him in the eye when they first met. No, the girl’s eyes are focused, tracking something. The little girl points past him with a trembling finger and his heart drops. “H-he’s right behind you.”
Leon and Claire turn around and find themselves face-to-face with a shambling monster — half human, half… something else, an indescribable thing that pulsates and oozes and stares with a large, bloodshot eye as it consumes the man it’s attached to. “Oh my God,” Leon breathes, quietly giving voice to the horror welling up inside him. “What the fuck is that thing?”
It lashes out with a mutilated hand, grabbing Leon by the front of his vest and throwing him against the metal walkway with a distorted roar. He lies there, stunned, all the breath knocked out of him by the assault. Beneath him, the walkway buckles and groans. The creature raises its arm once more, pulling Leon with it, but before it can slam him down once more, gunfire erupts above him. Claire fires again, and again, and again, mouth pulled tight in a fierce scowl as she advances fearlessly. With a furious snarl, the monster releases Leon to retreat slightly, writhing as new, uninjured flesh surges to heal the bullet wounds marring its body. “Leon, take the girl and run,” she commands, never taking her eyes off the creature as it howls with fury and pain. “I’ll meet up with you as soon as this thing is in the ground.”
He forces himself off the ground, ignoring the way his back screams at him. She’s protecting him, just like Grace did. “Claire, what —?”
“I can’t move that locker on my own,” she says calmly, “and that girl needs help more than I do.” Claire bravely takes her eyes off it for just a second to flash a confident smile at him over her shoulder. “I’m a big girl, Leon. I can fight my own battles. Go and protect the people you swore your oath to,” the creature howls, slamming a dented pipe against the buckling walkway in rage, “and I will protect the people I swore to protect.” The walkway dips alarmingly. Claire reloads her revolver. “GO!”
Leon dives for the part of the walkway nearest the lockers barricading the path towards the little girl just as the portion Claire and the monster stand on drops to the floor below. They disappear from sight, swallowed by the darkness below, but Leon can still make out the flash of Claire’s muzzle as she stands her ground and fights. First Grace, and now Claire — everyone he’s come to love over these awful, terrifying hours is slowly leaving him, staying behind so that he can carry on. He hates it. He hates it — the idea of being useless, of being someone who needs to be saved instead of doing the saving — but he loves them even so, these fierce, dauntless women who have chosen to fight with their backs against the wall for him.
He shoves the locker upright with a snarl of effort, sprinting into the room to scoop the little girl up in his arms. She cries out in surprise but wraps her arms around his neck, holding onto him with all the strength she has. “I-is that lady going to be okay?” she asks in a watery voice. The collar of his shirt grows damp.
He thinks about Claire, of the fire that burns inside her, the jacket she wears like a battle flag and the way she never fears or falters in the face of danger. “She’ll be just fine,” he assures her, gloved hand resting sturdy across the thin line of her back as he runs. “She’s too strong to be taken down, not even by a monster like that.”
He prays he’s not telling a lie.