A/n's: So. Yes. Long time, no see. (In a manner of speaking.) I know many of you (okay, all of you who have me on Author Alert) are awaiting the Devil's sequel and are disappointed that this is not it. I understand. Trust me. But! I can tell you that Chapter 1 is finished! All it needs is to go through my Super Awesome Beta. So, it's coming. Soon. Ish.
In the meantime enjoy – this. I've been toying the idea of a HUNK piece ever since the ORC media campaign started releases their fun little tidbits (which included the HUNK Psych Report) and after much thought and reading The Unholy Trio's The Serpent – this – was born. That said, this is heavily influenced by Serpent and specifically Trio author sad little tiger (thank you reading it and for not being offended by my unworthy attempt at your flawless writing style – also, for the cracktastic chats; I need(ed) those). It's not a part of Serpent in any way, nor is it meant to be (I would never, please don't be mad Unholy Trio). It's just…the feeling. (Does that make sense?) Whatever, moving on.
Warnings: Some gore. Some sexual references.
Atropos
"…I am still in the dark about most of his background – his family, friends (I'm almost certain HUNK would see the whole concept of 'friends' as laughable) or even relationships (the name Bella seems to have some resonance with him although I'm yet to ascertain what the relationship is exactly) are a closed door."
-Umbrella Corporation Confidential Psychology Reports, Subject: Hunk, Page 11
"Belladonna, n. In Italian a beautiful lady; in English a deadly poison. A striking example of the essential identity of the two tongues."
-Ambrose Bierce
~.~
"In top news today, the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance is reporting an end to their long search for two of their top wanted: former Umbrella C.E.O Ozwell E. Spencer and former Umbrella employee Albert Wesker, both of whom were believed to have played pivotal roles in the tragic destruction of Raccoon City. In a press conference held early this morning, head of the BSAA's European Branch Quint Cetcham revealed that a late night raid of the late C.E.O.'s private estate led to this long-awaited closure to the Umbrella chapter in the ongoing struggle against bio-terrorism."
The pretty reporter disappeared, the news program shifting instead to a clip from the afore-mentioned conference. Cetcham, greyer and sporting a few more lines than he recalled the last time he'd seen him, was standing behind a podium branded with the BSAA logo, microphones from every major network around the globe angled into his face.
The soldier spoke of long-awaited success, perseverance in the face of adversity, pride in the brave founding BSAA operatives Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield who had worked so long and sacrificed so much to see the end of bio-terrorism a reality, and of regret and sadness….
"It is the regret of the BSAA as a whole that we could not bring home the body of our own; that we could not bring closure to her friends and family, but, above all, Jill Valentine was a fierce fighter in the war on bio-terrorism. She would not want us to linger over her death, but instead take joy in the success of her sacrifice and that the world is that much safer for her actions…."
His head tipped as Cetcham carried on, speaking then of commendations, honors, for the dead. His eyes drifted to the left, watching the man standing stiff and straight at Cetcham's side.
Chris Redfield. Sole survivor.
Sole survivor.
He replayed the phrase in his head. Testing it. Tasting it. Studying his reaction.
What was that? That…feeling. It had been so long…he'd never considered….
He couldn't be sure.
He studied Redfield's vacant face, the empty eyes, and caught a flash of himself in the screen's reflection.
Vacant face. Empty eyes.
Sole survivor.
~.~
Life carried on. As it was want to do.
The sun outside his bedroom window rose and set; the tide so close behind his back door ebbed and flowed. He breathed, he ate, he slept.
He worked.
The phones continued to ring. The public one, the one that belong to the man, and the private one, the one that belonged to the solider.
The secret one, the one for the shadow, remained silent.
Mocked him.
Angry, he hid it away in a shoe-box with other useless mementoes and hid the lot beneath the floor of his closet.
~.~
He rarely dreamed. If at ever.
That had always bothered those suits the most. The doctors with their pads and pens, scribbling away as they poked and prodded at him, seeking a reaction. Needing something to tell Umbrella.
He preferred it that way. Preferred the bland and empty dark.
Especially now.
The alternative was her. As he remembered her – alive, grinning her shark's smile, riddling the latest from inside Spencer's palace into his ear (I can't do it all for you, what would be the fun in that?) – and as how he imagined Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine had found her – broken, bloody, quiet. Dead.
A shark without fins. Drowning.
Choking on the blood of the fallible heart his not-brother had ripped from her chest.
~.~
He'd tried to warn her.
Before the end.
That stuck with him.
He had tried. And he had failed.
"A first time for everything," the slippery Ms. Wong shrugged before they parted ways, as she pulled her dress up over her bruised hips, as she tied the long, whip-like sash over the smudges at her throat.
She hadn't been what he wanted. But she was, as ever, willing.
And she liked it rough.
That made it easier. Easier to close his eyes and pretend.
A first time for everything.
~.~
What had the boy done? Nothing. Not really. Not in the grand scheme.
His only mistake had been trying to pick the wrong pocket.
Had been having blonde hair. Had been having blue eyes.
It pleased him to close his fingers around the young man's throat. To choke him to the edge and them coax him back, grant him a moment to beg, to apologize, before he buried the blade in his chest.
Before he cut out the still beating heart.
~.~
There were rumors. Whispers.
Chris Redfield was making waves. Disenchanting the BSAA with their tragic hero at his endless claims of monsters come back from the dead.
Men did strange things in the face of grief.
He set Ms. Wong to the chase and waited for her to bring him the truth.
~.~
Ring-ring.
It came out of the blue. Unexpected. Unforeseen.
Impossible.
Ring-ring.
He stared at the closet door. Frozen. A living statue.
It continued to bleat. Unfazed. Unconcerned by the fact that it could not be.
(Aerodynamically speaking, the bumble-bee shouldn't be able to fly. But see, the trick is, the bumble-bee doesn't know this, so it goes on flying anyway.)
Ring-ring.
His tell-tale heart, waiting beneath the floorboards.
Screaming.
~.~
It called to him for days. Morning, noon, the dead of night. Weekdays and weekends. Over and over. And then, as suddenly as it had started…it stopped.
Silence.
Complete and all-consuming.
That, somehow, was even worse.
That was what broke him.
He tore into the closet, the door slamming back and banging on its hinges. He ripped at the floor, throwing the piece of carpeted floorboards away thoughtlessly, it dug into the wall, scraping at the simple plaster, gouging a hole.
The box shook, trophies, prizes, rattling noisily.
The phone came to life in his hand.
Over a dozen missed calls.
One message.
"I dug so deep, I came out the other side."
~.~
He wanted to shake her – beat her – for what she had done to him.
He wanted to take her – bury himself inside her – until neither of them could remember.
But he did neither and instead sat across from her, tense and angry, desperate and aching, as she smiled (gleaming white teeth) and tapped the edge of his plate with her chopsticks.
"Come on, then. It'll get cold."
She'd ordered an appetizer, some sauce-heavy vegetable slop that he had no interest in.
He wanted to skip to the main course.
"I thought you were dead."
Her head tipped, amused."Ye of little faith. Even the almighty thirteen can't kill something that's not there."
"You did listen."
"Of course." She smiled again. All charm. "I listen to everything you say."
"What took you so long, things have been….busy. I could have used you."
She nibbled at a carrot, snorting. "And I've been playing dead. I think my hardship trumps yours."
His curled fists loosened slowly. Carefully. He half-expected to hear the joints creak. "Do you know?"
"That he's alive?" She arched a brow, popped a lump of cabbage into her mouth. "Of course." She chewed, looking at him curiously. "Do you know where he is?"
"Not yet." He leaned back, inclining in his head. "But I believe I know where he's played his cards. Tricell - they've been making some interesting moves as of late."
She nodded. Smiled again. "I'm not the only one that's been digging. Someone's been scratching around, turning over the old graves."
"Where?"
She leaned back, eyes pulling away to greet the server that approached. Dressed in white, spotted with blood and grease, a knife was tucked into his belt, a snake writhed in his hands.
"Ah, dinner."
As they watched, the live-snake was beheaded, the fangs still dripping as the skull hit the table. The skin was peeled, exposing the pink muscled flesh, and then, with a flick of the knife, the heart was produced. Still beating. Still futilely pumping.
The server dropped it in a glass, presented it to her with a bow.
After he'd retreated, she presented it to him in turn, the little organ still shivering and seizing. "Halfsies?"
~.~
That's how he would remember her later.
That was the image that came to mind when he bent her over the desk in her hotel room and tasted copper on her lips.
That was what he'd think of when he roused himself in the middle of the night and found her gone.
That was the last thing he'd see when his not-brother's Uroborous came for him.
His Belladonna, smiling her shark grin, as she offered him the serpent's heart.