A Trapped Wolf Will

Emily Berkhoff/Tundra of RE8 “fame”. Follows back from warwaited.

[unhalloweds]

The last time Chris had been to a place like this was back in 2002. Well over twenty years ago now, and damn, if that wasn’t something to huff a breath at. Even with the relation of the timing put into place, it was under the same pretenses– clearing up and fighting off a horde of infected that’d been let off their leashes by accident. These accidents wouldn’t fucking happen in the first place if these companies simply stopped the fucking production of this shit, but that simply wasn’t how the world worked. 

No, it was the combination of two things that kept it cyclic; money and power. Both items went hand in hand in a deal that would forever haunt the captain into the position that he’d been in, and he wouldn’t stop until one of those evils had been eliminated. In some sick sense, they were synonymous with each other. Having money meant having power, and having power meant having money in some way. Two variables that would continue to work within the same function, much to his detest.

Especially with the hands that they’d been grasped by. Power hungry corporations who wanted to try and play fucking God. 

It never really ended, did it? Would it? These were thoughts that would linger until his death.

Now was about focusing on the task at hand while keeping the relay of his own memories and thoughts at bay. On one hand, it was relieving to be able to assess his surroundings with the affluence of past records drifting themselves to the forefront of his mind. Given the circumstances of a singular head trauma he’d suffered years ago, it still had a proceeding influence on the way his retention conducted itself. In essence– he didn’t always trust his recollections. 

The steady whirring of their aircraft was something simple to fixate on, the lowly mechanical hum that vibrated beneath combatted footwear as the captain stood near the release bay. The targeted facility was only a few miles from their drop location; Chris wanted to take a cautious approach to the situation and use the advantage of the canopy that encompassed the ground beneath them. The steady engine of the aircraft wasn’t silent by any means, but this would give them some time and ground to cover while scouting the perimeter for anything that’d been potentially discarded or left. 

“Zone’s all clear, preparing for a clean land.”

The information crackled within his ear, acting as a clear shock to his system as if the wording had initiated the autonomic response within his body; a hand that swept over the body of his rifle as if it hadn’t checked it at least five times in the last ten minutes out of habit, a firm crack to the axis of his neck as he’d tilted his head before peering toward the rest of his crew.

“Remember the drill. We should have a clear path from this angle going in. Once we break the tree line, it’s all men at the doors.” 

Each voice stacked itself in response with an echoed affirmative, a sound that eventually fell off into silence once they’d landed and finally departed from the ship’s hold. 

The terrain was stiff– the feeling that crawled along his spine when he knew that the air was tainted, broken by the atrocity that’d flooded the populous. It was a tangible atmosphere even through the compact grip of the visor settled against his features, one that had his nose curling with traces of disgust as he and Lobo treaded the pathing with caution. The brace of his hands were positioned at either end of his weapon, the leftmost extension curled under to bear the weight while his other settled deftly against the trigger– an anticipatory curl of his index finger while his opposing arm swept across the scenery. 

Within the thicket surrounding them, Charlie and Rolando took to opposing sides, not far from the main pathway with Chris and John. Dion remained on their craft, for the sole purpose of keeping a main point of communication and lookout. 

“All clear so far on this side.” An all good to his left, signaled by Charlie. A statement that’d been echoed for their right side only a few moments later, as well. 

It’d been only seconds after the clearance that Chris heard a distinct crackle not far before them in distance. The steady tracking of boots halted in tandem as he’d released the grip of his weapon to bring his palm up in a halt toward his immediate partner. 

After a pause with no movement following the sound, Chris shot a glance toward John, “Stay here, watch the perimeter.”

Another crackle sounded itself from the source, while Chris steadied his rifle toward the density of the shrubbery that contained whatever it was; with steady steps, he rounded the scene and stopped in his tracks at the sight he’d been met with.

Blood– a thick trail of it leading in the opposing direction of their advancement, while the culprit of its tracking lay a husk against the trunk of a large tree. This was a violence he’d seen far too many times, the raw, savage shredding of limbs. Who was this, and were they operating with someone? Chris took another step toward the body, a knee cracking under the pressure of his frame as he dipped himself down to examine the corpse. 

Looks like 1-3 is down.

It was nothing but a crackle of static, loud and disproportionate to the lack of life his eyes had fallen on. If anything, it answered one of his questions– all he’d been able to make out were the trail ends of each sentence. That voice, however…

“All clear, Captain?” 

Chris peered up, shaking his head from behind the shrub. “Unknown operator downed over here. Not clear on what took him out, but we’re not alone.” Before moving to push himself back up, he’d shifted forward to rip the radio from the corpse’s torso. Another echo of his bones grumbled under the full stance of his weight as he collected himself upwards once more, motioning a hand for John to join him. 

“Stick to the plan. Continue toward the facility, but keep your eyes up. Night Howl, have there been any changes on your end?” Chris held the radio out toward John as he spoke, motioning with his head to keep moving along the path. 

“Nothing this way, sir. I’ll be preparing to lift off on your check at the door, I can do another scan of the outside area while I’m up.” 

“Copy, keep me updated. Let’s keep moving.” Though, it was with far more discretion laced in each step now that there’d been a sighting of a lost soldier. The few words he’d picked up from the radio interception paced through his mind; game left to play, 1-3 is down. Whoever they were about to cross paths with didn’t seem to give much mind to their own men, and that worried Chris– not to mention the chill of the voice on the giving end. Who was that, and why did they sound so familiar?

[crucialelement]

"Hatchet! All callsigns this net, wake the fuck up. Got multiple IR signatures moving on the main doors, definitely not WDs. Things might be about to get seriously hot, and if we're getting third-partied by Blue Umbrella there are going to be some fat bonuses in the future of anybody who manages to clear the perimeter. Hatchet 1-1, 2-1, stay on target and keep your heads. You guys are professionals, remember that. I'm retasking the drone to try and determine who we're being moved on by. If they break too far into the perimeter, I'll have Tehktehk introduce himself. Dealer out."

A kilometre and a half due north of the facility, Emily leans into the toughbook's screen as if proximity to the pixels will somehow clear up the image. Thermal imaging has many benefits, not least of which the ease Emily has in picking out the silhouettes of men moving through canopy and undergrowth, but it makes it almost impossible to determine features or identifying markings.

The drone, a personally-requisitioned quadrotor she'd picked for its relatively quiet propulsion and battery life, is more than capable of holding steady in the light, humid Peruvian breeze. With gentle pressure on the stick, it descends towards the group, and as they pass under a flickering floodlight no doubt activated automatically when containment protocols failed, she switches from infrared to regular, bog-standard 3x zoom.

That clears some things up. Unfortunately.

Nobody hears the intel operative suck air through her teeth, but everyone (Chris included) gets an earful of her response to the newfound information.

"Break, break, Dealer sending traffic. All Hatchet Squad members, be advised. I have a positive lock on the third party entering via the south-eastern entrance. It's not Blue Umbrella - we've got Hound Wolf Squad rocking up on us. I say again, Chris Redfield is in play. Grab anything that looks valuable and withdraw to the X, we're done here."

[crucialelement]

@unhalloweds

Planning for the unexpected is a necessary part of the job. Most of the time, that means things like larger-than-projected enemy density, inclement weather, operators having to deal with the question marks and ambiguity of warfare. Occasionally, it means getting third-partied by a group that isn't supposed to be there in the first place, and if that weren't bad enough, it's a third party Emily knows.

These contractors aren't Guild, which means they're a little less reliable than the coworkers she's used to. Fortunately they're still well on track to do what they came here for, with a minimum of diversions... though, that might well be about to change.

As Chris approaches the fallen merc, clearly torn to shreds by something - a Licker, maybe? - the radio on the body's chest crackles with a familiar voice. "Hatchet 1-3, still with us? Hatchet 1-3..."

A few seconds of silence.

"Looks like 1-3 is down. Hatchet, regroup and button up, we've still got some game left to play. I have Nighthawk on standby, keep checking those corners and notify me if anything in the AO changes."

[unhalloweds]

If there’d been one thing he could find a graceful reprieve in, it was the swallow of the rest of Emily’s thoughts. A tangible vehemence that filtered through her first accusation; it wasn’t entirely off, but Chris wasn’t that fucking dense. 

He just didn’t appreciate being yelled at, regardless of the fucking context. They were adults, a civil conversation wasn’t that hard to find. Well, it shouldn’t have been that hard to come by, but if you were one Emily Berkhoff, then those parameters may have been different. 

Regardless, Chris wasn’t there for it. 

The flex of his brows slanted upward, once in shock at her utterance before ultimately levelling themselves as she’d found her own composure. A breath, one he’d matched within the cave of his own chest to quell the silent simmer of his own frustration. It wasn’t silent, though. The moment they entered the Winters’s home, the tension and shift in the air became palpable within the grasp of his palms. It was off-script, a speed run of everything they’d planned and learned in the months leading to their trail of Megamycete. 

He doesn’t need a review of what their objective was; the objective was clear back in 2017. The root of the issue, the sole proprietor to all things that ran through the Mold. “I’m aware of what the mission objective was, Emily.” It was spoken in a low tone, as if a threat could pack itself verbally. It felt condescending, a low hit to his own reputation and command, which he felt by now was more refined and balanced where it could be. 

The Winters family simply became a wrench in his design; the organic composition of who he was and how he structured himself. Logically, Chris knew that the heart of the problem was the solution and their primary goal, on top of everything. At the end of the day, their objective and some still took place— they’d still succeeded regardless. The latter half of the argument was unequivocally nonnegotiable in his eyes.

I don’t think you understand the logistical implications of the actions you took.

Did he consider the scope of the downfall from the retreat of the main objective in the beginning? No. With a firm hand he could admit to that; being in the clear with a mind that’d been more fresh than one that had to adjust to the moment and combat the threat to the family, Chris could now easily see where some misalignments would prove themselves unfavorable in this conduct.

“There was never anything that would’ve stopped Ethan.” Chris was already six feet into the hole of eating himself up over the outcome. It wasn’t preferred, it wasn’t the one he was hoping for even with a step off the rails of their initial plan. He couldn’t continue with the prior mapping of their objective knowing that Mia was a fake, and that Rose and Ethan could potentially be accessory to more of Miranda’s unrelenting lack of remorse. “If we hadn’t stepped in when we did, who knows what would’ve happened to that family. Miranda was a vital piece to the Mold and any research on it– removing both targets, the Megamycete and her all in one confirm with certainty that there shouldn’t be any more activity with the subject. The order of operations became compromised when Miranda became Mia. The family was my obligation after the events of the Dulvey incident.” 

On paper, they weren’t solely his devoir; Chris felt as though he’d owed them after the events of Dulvey. More or less, he felt as though he owed more of a chance to Ethan for his position in the situation; a simple civilian who had no business poking his nose where it didn’t belong, but Chris couldn’t turn away from the fact that he understood why he was there. The love, care, and devotion bridled within one man was enough to pull his wife out of the fucking Mold infested swamp. That, and paired with Mia’s cooperation with the BSAA to retain any form of life beyond a prison, there was more than enough reason to keep tabs on them. Multiple. 

Between the stale intensity that curled itself between both operatives, Chris followed the progression of Emily’s form in his direction, counteracting the suggestion he’d given with both hands placed upon the table. 

I spent four months in the Romanian wilderness, evading BOWs and infiltrating extremely hostile territory. 

The captain wasn’t oblivious to this information, and the passage of it felt more like a pitied fucking guilt trip than it needed to. He didn’t take his team for granted– he never took his teams for granted, especially one that he’d pried together himself. These operatives were skilled above and beyond any normal scoring, that’d been the sole reason why he’d recruited the people that he had– he didn’t need Emily throwing that information in his face as though they’d walked them into a total failure. It wasn’t an absolute success, that much was underlined with a stark clarity, but it’d been to date one of the best results he’d had on an operation. 

His teeth grit themselves within the clasp of his jaw, a tension that bubbled itself through the muscles that wrapped themselves over bone. The flare of his nostrils prefaced the retort of his tongue, slow and steadying despite the small hiccup in his own breathing. It rounded itself in raw irritation. “And I appreciate what you did, don’t stand there and talk to me as if I’m not thankful for the time that you, all of you, have put into this with me. But you need to understand that things won’t play themselves out to the fine print that you put down. What we assess is as close to an estimate of our surroundings, as it’s assumed they will change and adapt even with us on the ground. That’s the basis of any battle.” Another assumption that he’d made about the woman, apparently wrong in its positioning. “I need your trust in me as your captain when it comes to making snap decisions. They’re as logistically inclined as I can get them to be, even on the field.”

Well. Most of the time. Chris led with his heart, his gut, over factual data most times. Not every answer felt like the correct one, even if his instincts told him otherwise.

The silent, jaw clenching atmosphere forced him to mirror the position of her tone; both arms brought themselves over his chest as he’d followed each incensed syllable fall from her lips, a precision that echoed itself in the work that she’d done for this operation. Emily was nothing short of collection, astute, proficient. She was seeking proficiency in a field where more often than not, the best ending was typically less than. The competence, in his opinion, confounded itself in one's attitude to displace and acclimate where it’d been necessary.

“We were going to run a course with the BSAA whether we’d planned for it or not. They were the ones, alongside Blue Umbrella, to have this information in the first place. They’ve been tracking the mycete since Louisiana, and no shit their trail would end up here. The Megamycete needed to be destroyed, and I didn’t have a firm belief that the BSAA was going to fulfill that duty.”

Especially not after he’d seen their own usage of BOWs after everything.

“If you want my honesty, I don’t have a full disclosure plan on what to do when it comes to keeping low from their eyes. They may know someone else was there, but you’d just said it yourself, they don’t know who. If my own experience has taught me anything, it’s that even covert groups such as our own don’t stay hidden for too long. Not with the dealings that we have a hand in, if we want results. There’s only so much that we can do when it comes to eliminating a BOW without it being a widescale turn of events for others to notice. That village was infested, there were little survivors left after Miranda turned it into her own playground."

A huff fell from his lips.

“Hardware can be replaced. Lives can’t. And don’t– I know we still lost one in the grand scheme of it all. But that’s one over how many others that could’ve been harmed if the village wasn’t blown. That was the only way to get rid of it to its entirety– you know this. And if you remember, we saved Rose and Mia.”

The downfall, whether to his knowledge or not, of who he was as a person, and a squad captain.

Both palms tucked under the cross of his arms had tightened under the flex of his muscles from the obscene grate of her vocals with her final inquiry. 

Chris drew in another breath, this one more forceful than the last as he released the hold of his chest, bringing his palms down to match and mirror Emily’s position over the table. 

“You joined this team to help. Stay clear of soiled water, and do something good without any infraction of potential systematic tampering. The goal of the BSAA is to protect the innocent. Keep the innocent alive and safe. That’s a value I carry into this squad– that was why I helped create the BSAA in the first place. If that’s something that you can’t align yourself with, maybe I hand-picked the wrong person for this team, and maybe you’ve misunderstood what we represent.” His own tone was low, a dangerous exaltation of composure and malice, while his eyes stayed trained upon her own with each word.

[crucialelement]

It's like a switch is flipped. Emily's brows rise, and she leans back towards upright, something in Chris' response having given her genuine, serious pause. Those blue eyes divert from his face - she's thinking about something. Running the numbers, like she does so often. Whatever it is... nothing is voiced for a few seconds. Then, she softly clears her throat.

"...maybe you're right. No, you're right." Her voice picks up confidence between words, and the spook's posture comes all the way upright. Back straight, shoulders set, expression calm - and a little rueful. "I apologize for losing my cool. It was a difficult situation for anyone to be in and I suppose I was out of line for wanting a perfect outcome in a field where they generally don't exist."

A short breath through her nose, a light sigh. She looks around the command tent.

"I have some cleanup to do around here, obviously. If there was anybody in the area they would definitely have heard the blast, and it's going to be awkward leaving anything behind here for someone else to pick through. Nothing to be done about what was left in the AO, so... we'll leave it behind, and hope that the crater dissuades any would-be opportunists."

Emily inclines her chin. Meets Chris' eye again, tone having gone from seething to apologetic. "I'll make sure everything we need is properly stowed, and... once we've gotten clear, and we've figured out what we're going to tell customs, plans can be made for what comes after this."

Hesitation.

"And... Chris, I don't... blame you for what ended up happening to Ethan. At the end of the day it was his own call, and like you said, trying to stop him would have been a loser's game. All told, the death toll for this operation was... remarkably low. You did a good job."

[unhalloweds]

ᴄᴏɴꜰɪᴅᴇɴᴛɪᴀʟ ᴅᴏᴄᴜᴍᴇɴᴛꜱ. . .

@crucialelement with “I signed on to take care of this problem thoroughly and quietly, not execute a man’s wife in front of him, abduct his infant daughter, and then declare fucking war on a NATO-backed NGO!” (from crucialelement, for chris!)

Plans change. 

It was a constant part of their job – his job – and adaptability to that was quintessential. In truth, it wasn’t the exact way he’d wanted things to go; if he’d had it his way, Ethan wouldn’t have been around for their invasion of the home to capture Mia and save Rose. But– the world didn’t always fucking work that way. If there’d been anything that he’d learned in his years of doing the same shit, it was that even the basic outline of a simple plan barely managed to stay cohesive through the entirety of the job. That, and time was of the essence. 

He expected Emily to understand this, though her frustration wasn’t lost on him. It was risky– they saw what that risk involved firsthand. 

“Don’t yell at me.” It’s eerily calm, collected, in comparison to the purse of his features, the ruffle of brows that had only creased as she furthered her tirade against him. “We can’t predict how shit like this will turn out, and when we can’t confirm that the situation has remained the same, you need to adapt. You need to work with the moment. I feel like of all people, you should understand that. There is never a time where dealing with this bullshit will have a straightforward path.”

Hell, that was obvious. That was what made their job as daunting as it was, as fucking horrifying and uneasy as it’d been; there was never certainty in anything. Chris could only work with the tools and information he had at that moment. 

“We didn’t declare fucking war on anything. We got rid of a goddamn bioweapon. The semantics of it aren’t for you to worry about.” A low blow, all in all. “If you need to get some air, go walk it off. You don’t come and yell at me like this about it.” 

[crucialelement]

“You think the problem here is the volume at which I’m-“

Emily stops. Breathes. When she restarts the thought, it’s with a dull, clinical professionalism that’s clearly been dug up from prior days. Talking to desk workers who don’t especially understand the ins and outs of clandestine work. Apparently, that now includes him. The first word out of her mouth, though, has a barely perceptible sharpness to it.

“Sir. Our primary objective was always the Megamycete. I had previously been working under the assumption that while eliminating Miranda would have been preferable, it would effectively have been gravy.” After all, while the mother of Lycans would still have had her research, it wouldn’t have amounted to much with no ability to create more Cadou.

Unfortunately, the spook’s commanding officer hadn’t seen it that way. She meets his eye. The tension’s slowly entering her voice again, but at least its volume isn’t rising like it had been previously.

“I don’t think you understand the logistical implications of the actions you took, sir.”

They’ve rounded from her misgivings about the situation itself. Those, while still present, have already been voiced. Now, Emily turns her attention to him. The man, the myth, the survivor. The guy who just can’t seem to keep a team alive. She’s starting to understand why.

“I had steady visual lock on Miranda for most of the engagement with Ethan. To review the facts: this op was, technically, a success. I balk at the fact that we had to employ a suicide bomber to do it, but frankly that was Ethan’s choice more than anything.” Ethan being there in the first place, of course, was fully preventable, but that’s being set aside for now.

She does not walk it off. She steps closer, resting her knuckles on the folding table between them to stare up at Redfield.

“Because of the adaptation you decided to employ, we were forced to shift our timescale so much that I wasn’t able to retrieve any of the equipment we took in. Even dismissing the death toll, which is notable, you went over my head as your operational strategist for a seat-of-your-pants hit job on a woman who, frankly, I’m pretty sure could have killed all of us in that house if she’d felt like it.”

A breath. Professional. Bilious, but calm. “My understanding was that you wanted me here to make sure that we didn’t need to adapt. I spent four months in the Romanian wilderness, evading BOWs and infiltrating extremely hostile territory, to get enough information to make what we did surgical. You wanted me for that skillset.”

And, finally, that most unpleasant of circumstances. The presence of the BSAA. She has to admit that they probably would have shown anyway, but the way it happened was still hardly what Emily had hoped for.

“As for whether or not we’re at war. I am uncertain what your tactical assessment would be of how things went between us and the BSAA, but from where I’m sitting? The best we could get, the lottery winner outcome, is that they now know somebody was there other than them that knew about the Mycete but doesn’t know who it was. What’s more likely is that we were acquired, but not engaged, which means that if we ever see them again, they’ll know who we are.”

The fist resting on the table is trembling. She can’t help the tone of her voice, but at the VERY least, she’s following the instruction not to yell at him.

“We are out tens of thousands of dollars in hardware that we don’t have external funding to replace. We had to sit in an observational capacity and watch Ethan Winters blow through months of my planning and my setup trying to rescue a baby that we kidnapped to keep out of the hands of a woman who got her anyway. He’s dead now. This all happened because, despite having hired me into your mercenary outfit, because we are mercenaries, you chose not to trust my advice.”

Emily delivers her final question through gritted teeth. “So respectfully, sir, what the fuck am I still doing here aside from shooting what you tell me to shoot.”

[sangelune]

   “aye…”  he  shifts,  looking  a  little  put  out.  “bae  that  ain't  as  funny,  now  is  it?” 

[crucialelement]

The quadnods lift to regard him, and though the smile isn't visible past the expensive hardware and economical balaclava, it's audible.

"Seems to me measuring out what's funny when talking about the afterlife's a matter of taste."

A pause.

"...it was a good joke."

[sangelune]

   “ye  ken  -  the  fact  there's  a  stairway  to  heaven  and  a  highway  to  hell…  says  a  lot  aboot  expected  traffic  numbers,  aye?” 

[crucialelement]

"Sure. Or maybe it's about the expended effort required to reach the destination. Hell's probably got a bus service... Heaven makes you get there on your own."

[crucialelement]

My worst RP experience was trying to stay friends with someone over the course of a year, being invited to a collaborative writing server with them, and then finding out that they’d been talking shit about me in it for months.

And then leaving the server, being coaxed back by them, and rejoining to see them in the midst of deleting all the shit they’d been talking about me for leaving.

And then getting banned from the server anyway after three days because I talked too much. To this DAY I don’t especially like being in servers for friend groups I’m only provisionally part of, and I’ve taken a lot of steps to be less… I dunno. Intrusive?

[rppromptarchive]

Reblog this and put a headcanon about your muse and the muse of the person you reblogged from in the tags :) (Even if they've never met, give a hypothetical)

[crucialelement]

Email subject: Combat First Aid Inservice

Copying this over from my BSAA email, I would also like to run a refresher for the guild, please let me know when available.

Mandatory For All Field Agents

Good morning,

Due to recent events, as well as the length of time since our last inservice, a mandatory combat medicine intervene will be held over the next week. Please attend a session as you see fit with your schedule, all sessions will be held at 0900 at the medical bays of HQ.

Thank you,

Rebecca Chambers, MD-PhD, NRP-C

BSAA Medical Branch

From: [email protected]

Subject: re: Combat First Aid Inservice

Good idea. Guild ops generally fine about self-service. Have been very appreciative of my backchannel connections for medical supplies. Will see about having old man make some schedule adjustments to make this happen.

RTP: if you know anybody who needs to offload meds or field care equipment, let them know the Guild pays on time and in full. Don't know if you have any involvement in the "secondary market" but never hurts to have options.

Dealer

[novelresilience]

“I’ll talk to some of the captains and the rest of the medical providers about organizing an inservice training. It’s been sometime since we have held one, a refresher is never a bad idea. We need to make sure operatives have their medical kits fully stocked as well. I know Jill resorted to duck tape because she ran out of supplies.”

[crucialelement]

A low hum and a dry chuckle. Emily gestures with the butter knife she's currently using to make a sandwich, shaking her head in at least somewhat faux-reproach.

"That's what happens. People get too into the "bare necessities" mindset and end up packing for the good-case scenario instead of the bad one. Way I see it is... yeah, extra kit slows you down, but not as much as an open wound will."

[novelresilience]

@crucialelement replied

“We do, but at this rate I don’t trust these few will properly sanitize the area first and I’d rather not have to keep administering IV antibiotics. They’ve all been through combat medicine courses and should know to properly bandage wounds and use tape to keep gauze, not skin, in place.”

Should is the key word.

[crucialelement]

"Baby steps, I guess. I'm not gonna tell you your business... but it seems like you might be due for a couple of retests. Speaking as a... completely impartial outside consultant on the matter. And all that."

She knows she wouldn't mess around with the possibility of having to deal with an infected wound in the field.

[crucialelement]

"Look, go with what you got, I get it, but if I see her pouring the gunpowder out of a shotgun shell with a match in her free hand I'm gonna tackle her."

[coffeebrownn]

i drew the whole wolf hound squad

[crucialelement]

Nicknames for Emily?

Definitely calls her "Em". She'd also probably drop "hon" on her too. Emmy doesn't quite fit Emily, so Em it is. There's also the anonymous terms of "My Source" and "An Anonymous Informant".

I think as they keep talking she probably adds nicknames until she gets got in 2018. Shame. Hope Em catches the funeral.

Emily is frankly more all right with the nondenominational nicknames than with foreshortenings of her actual name - she prefers to stay anonymous wherever possible, and that includes in physical space. She doesn't mind Em.

Unfortunately, Emily doesn't make the funeral. After going to ground she moves to Europe, and, concerned that the BSAA will be watching the event due to the fact that Alyssa was one of the primary contributors on the organized hit piece, doesn't fly back out.

[egoiudico]

@crucialelement

'You have been causing quite a stir.' Thick, green tendrils snake towards a body on the ground, searching for something, before the tips of the three tendrils open in unison, revealing rows of what appear to be its teeth, plunging themselves into the back of the body's neck. The corpse is still for a moment longer, before jerking awake and standing upright, struggling and robotic, but still holding onto the gun in its arms. 'Huh.'

The newly resurrected BSAA agent is now on some kind of a patrol, if it can be called that. It stumbles, and struggles to maintain itself upright on occasion at first, but as time ticks away, the tendrils seem to gain better control of their new toy, and the body's motions could almost be mistaken for those of a human.

'That is new.' Climbing higher onto the ruins of the building he has been using as his observation point, he sees better into the collapsed pit, somewhat recognising the garish cyan tiles of what used to be Raccoon City's community pool. Water has long since stopped pouring through the exposed pipes, but it would have lasted long enough to give the new growths a chance. The collapsed ground practically formed a perfect spot for the resilient plants infected with a t-strain, to thrive in.

Rainwater would pour into the collapse and stand there for some time, remaining zombies would likely shamble into the pit on occasion, and at some point, the mutated plant had grown and adapted enough to drag them in, judging by the amount of human and animal bones collected at the bottom of the pit.

The base of the plant is giant. It extends into the dark abyss that goes far deeper beyond the collapse. It is a mess of dozens upon dozens of thick vines intertwined together, with smaller ones separating from the corpus and searching for nourishment, nearby.

The bodies stay attached to the tendrils, as the plant feeds on them; they serve as its security, while it slowly strips them of flesh and blood, leaving them as crumbling bones.

A knife cuts through a slick black growth that emerges from an ever-unhealing wound on his arms, and he lets it drop into the pit, watching the fresh security guard aimlessly shoot at the perceived threat, and once it is deemed to be non-hostile, one of the green tendrils examines it, plunging its teeth into it and devouring it without trouble.

'Hm. Did not even choke.'

Wherever its roots lie, he should take a closer look. However, it would be a fool's errand to descend into the unknown alone. After all, why should he put what modest equipment he has, at the moment, to use, when Chris' toy soldiers are all over the place? "You there." He turns towards an unassuming pile of rubble, not far from the concrete beam he has perched himself upon. "Are you going to make a move?"

"or are you content watching your comrades be drafted to their new posts?"

[crucialelement]

"Not my comrades... and even if they were, they're dead, so they're not my problem."

Later on she'll be kicking herself for having been so flippant. It's a brazen answer borne of a complete lack of having expected to be seen. Zombies seek prey based on three things, by her estimation: sight, sound, and smell. To evade them, as many of the three as possible have to be stymied. Sound is the simplest if most tedious of the three: step lightly, move carefully, don't shout, don't shoot.

Smell is probably beyond her at the moment short of killing something already dead and smearing its guts on herself, which would have given her more obvious and immediate problems than the prospect of being acquired by a passing BOW. Still - best aim for two out of three.

Fortunately, being who she is and knowing what she does, Emily had a couple ideas on how to evade notice on that front, as well; so, when the mound of rubble and refuse Albert addresses comes up to a kneeling crouch, it looks like the floor itself has risen to speak with him. A shroud of long since dried-out newspaper, grey-tan tarps smothered in the dust of a city's remains, sewn onto thick, breathable webbing to form a ghillie suit of garbage.

Not quite enough to trick a studious observer wondering why a pile of trash has conveniently gathered itself overlooking a main thoroughfare with sightlines down into the desiccated park to the south and up a wreck-choked road to the north.

More than enough for a zombie.

Now that she's no longer lying on top of it, it's a lot easier to see the compact, suppressed personal defence weapon she's carrying, as well.

Cold blue eyes regard him from behind a pair of slightly tinted ballistic goggles, and the agent continues, occasionally glancing over towards the mostly-emptied pool to make sure their voices aren't carrying enough for the plant-ridden former NGO members to take notice and investigate.

"You ought to see somebody about that arm."

[crucialelement]

@marchandmodeste

This brings back memories. Not for her, specifically, this is a part of the job Emily’s only existed rarely in. She’s heard tons, though. Places like these exist in the dead zone between action and consequence, the necessary staging ground of building a body of evidence before you know what exactly you’re trying to dig up.

Maybe it’s the introspective tilt to her thoughts that have her not realizing the Duke is there until he speaks, and resultantly just barely not drawing on him before letting out a scoff mixing embarrassment and reproach. “Jesus, Duke, I almost shot you in the face.”

Again.

The button is fastened once again on the agent’s hip holster, and she straightens up from where she’d nearly dropped into a crouch.

“…I’d say I’m happy to see you, but all of a sudden I’m worried about what kind of forensic investigation requires the presence of one of my more prolific arms dealers.”

[lifewasagift]

The machinery beneath the cabinets continued its slow advance.

Not fast.

Not panicked.

Not the desperate acceleration of a trap springing shut.

Purposeful.

As though the room itself had already decided where this story ended and was simply waiting for everyone else to catch up.

One row of red lights became two.

Then three.

The glowing indicators crawled steadily toward the furnace.

A chain.

A procession.

An execution carried out with bureaucratic patience.

The speaker remained silent throughout.

Long enough that it almost seemed as though Emily's words had been ignored.

Then static crackled.

"You believe responsibility is measured by outcomes."

John's voice was calm.

Matter-of-fact.

The tone of a man continuing a conversation rather than winning an argument.

"You found a way to preserve the records."

A pause.

"You found a way to preserve yourself."

Another.

"You found a way to preserve everyone."

The machinery continued moving.

The cabinets shuddered slightly as the tracks beneath them engaged.

"And because you found a solution, you've convinced yourself that no decision was made."

The speaker hissed softly.

"You keep describing this as though the responsibility was given to you when you entered the room."

For the first time, there was the faintest edge to his voice.

Not anger.

Disagreement.

"It wasn't."

The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead.

The furnace growled in the distance.

"The responsibility began the moment you decided what kind of person you were going to be."

A cabinet lurched forward half an inch.

Metal scraped against metal.

A reminder.

A countdown separate from the timer.

"You think this room is testing your ability to save these people."

The microphone crackled.

"It isn't."

Silence.

Then:

"It's testing what you're willing to sacrifice once saving everyone stops being an option."

The connection clicked off.

The room fell silent once more.

Except this time, beneath the grinding of the machinery, another sound emerged.

A telephone.

Somewhere deeper within the warehouse.

Ringing.

[crucialelement]

This is why she shouldn't have engaged with him. The dialectics are impossible to interface with in any real way. This is some kind of "karmic" punishment for being her, but the method of doing so seems to be to hit her with conflicting reports until she loses her mind. Fortunately, being a federal agent and someone who's spent much time in meetings, Emily is well and familiar with "woolgathering mode".

She stops listening.

The fact of the matter is that if a system demands that you place limitations on yourself to work within it, your first action should always be divesting yourself from the system. Two options were given. Take the key and save herself, or refuse the key and die a slow death of starvation if she didn't symbolically cast herself into the flames just to speed things up.

Nice dichotomy, asshole. What lies outside of it?

It's in the space between following rules and flouting them that you save lives. When she'd been a fed in an official capacity, it'd been harder to see that. Yeah, undercover work lent itself to finding oblique angles to get solutions from, but it was still within firm boundaries. Nothing could be done that was too questionable. At least... officially.

You don't really start getting things done until you acknowledge the true breadth of options.

But, she's not going to be able to save every file unless she figures out a way to take the cabinets themselves off the track. In this, her methodology becomes somewhat more clear. She knows which one the murderer is - if for no other reason than the placement of the key. It's pulled from the papers as she passes by it, snapping the tripwire that was meant to get this party started in the first place. The other cabinets move faster, now, but there are only a couple left.

Emily quickly reads a couple sentences from the third-to-last, grabs two of what seem like the most important files, and lets the rest disappear into the fire.

There's a phone ringing somewhere. God, this feels familiar. Maybe if she could concentrate and just...

No.

This asshole is going to get to explain himself when this all wraps up, and she'd prefer if it happened after his house of horrors was done with.

"Coming."

Emily unlocks the chain on the door and steps out, leaving the papers behind. There'll be time to get them later.