Jill doesn't think she's ever been so uncomfortable in her entire life. She can't seem to stop the nervous bounce of her knee and she looks over at the clock on the wall. It's hard to believe that only three minutes have passed since she last checked, and she looks back at the man in front of her and forces a polite smile.

"I'll tell you what," the portly man says, "The S.T.A.R.S. boys sure are lucky to have you coming on board."

There's something extremely unsettling about the look in his beady eyes. Jill averts her eyes from his and glances down at his mahogany desk, focusing on the gold-plated nameplate that's polished to proud perfection. Brian Irons, Chief of Police and resident creep, it seems. Great.

"Oh." Jill coughs and shifts her hips to find a more comfortable position in the stiff chair. "I'm flattered, sir."

Irons lets out a loud guffaw, one that makes her ears hurt and her skin crawl. She doesn't know how this obnoxious man managed to acquire his title, but she supposes she'll find out in due time. Jill is, after all, a newly hired member of the Raccoon City Police Department.

"The pleasure is all ours, my dear," he says, eyes unashamedly roaming down the front of her body, "It'll be nice to have something to look at around here. I know the boys will appreciate it."

Jill feels like she's going to vomit, but she bites her tongue and remains quiet. She reminds herself that S.T.A.R.S. will look great on her resume and that blowing it on her first day could very well be the worst mistake of her professional career. Having been in the military, Jill knows what it's like to be a woman in a man's world. Being on the receiving end of crude commentary isn't new to her, but Jill admits that she's never had to endure such treatment from a superior before.

"Brian." A bored voice drolls from behind her. "If you are finished assaulting my new recruit, I'd like to take her to the office."

She twists in her chair to look over her shoulder at the man who has interrupted them. He stands tall in the doorway, clad in shades of black and blue with his arms crossed over his chest in an intimidating manner as he cooly regards them from behind dark shades. Jill isn't sure who he is, but she's beyond appreciative of his intrusion.

Irons coughs loudly and clears his throat in an awkward manner. His demeanor shifts almost instantly and his voice grows quiet. Seeing the man squirm brings her a little satisfaction after having endured his perverse commentary.

"Ah," he says, "Jill, this is Captain Albert Wesker of S.T.A.R.S. Alpha Team. You'll be reporting directly to him."

Jill smiles. Wesker doesn't.

"Greetings." He tersely says. "Come with me."

She glances back at Irons and he nods his head slightly, head held low and eyes fixed on some insignificant point on the lacquered surface of his desk. It's as if he fears the other man and Jill finds herself curious about the dynamics of her new workplace.

"Thank you for your time, Chief." She lies as she rises from the chair, wiping her nervous sweat-soaked palms off on the front of her pants as she turns to face the Captain.

Wesker sharply turns on a heel and exits the office without any formal goodbye to Irons. Jill scurries after him in an attempt to catch up to him due to his wide stride.

"Thank you." She says in a hushed tone as they move briskly down the hallway.

"Disregard Irons." He sharply says. "The man is an absolute buffoon."

The comment catches her off guard. Jill isn't sure what to think about her Captain insulting their boss on the first day, but she can't say that it isn't undeserved based on her prior encounter with the man. She elects to say nothing in response and quietly follows him to the lower level of the station. As they make their way down the set of cement stairs, Wesker pauses at the landing and turns to face her.

"Welcome to Alpha Team." He says in the most unenthusiastic congratulation she has ever received. "Once you have your badge, I will introduce you to the team."

He gestures towards a door at the end of the hallway and Jill attempts to hide her nervousness with another smile. Something tells her she's making a mistake, but she pushes it aside and makes her way down the hall anyway because Jill Valentine doesn't fear anything.

At least...not yet.

"At this rate, it feels like we'll never solve this case."

Kevin's leaning back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest in frustration as he glares at the fuzzy image on the television screen. Chris looks away from his desk to peer up at it and wrinkles his nose at the sight of Irons standing at a podium in preparation to give a half-assed speech.

"We'll solve it eventually." Barry says in return as he smiles warmly at Kevin. "Keep your chin up."

Chris appreciates Barry's optimism, but it isn't deserved. Four citizens of Raccoon City have gone missing within the span of two weeks and they haven't been able to produce a single lead on what the hell is going on. As he listens to Irons offer empty platitudes to concerned citizens, Chris can't help but laugh coldly.

"Listen to this fucker." He points at the television with an accusatory finger. "Motherfucker has no shame in lying to the public."

Joseph loudly tears open a bag of chips, eyes glued to the screen as he pops a handful of them into his mouth. Irons grins and assures that S.T.A.R.S. has made great progress in catching the culprit responsible for the sudden string of missing persons.

"Seriously?" He incredulously asks through a mouthful of chips. "We're nowhere close to solving this!"

Kevin snorts, shaking his head as he says, "What do you expect? He'll do anything to save face."

In his attempt to listen to both conversations, Chris thinks he's misheard Irons.

"Did I hear that right?" He angrily asks. "Did that dipfuck seriously just suggest that he's helping with this case?"

"It seems that way." Barry responds, the neutrality in his voice wavering to let some of his disappointment shine through.

Chris hates a lot of things, but he struggles to discern whether he hates Wesker or Irons more. It's a close competition, but he thinks the incompetence of the Chief of Police nets just a little more disdain. He doesn't think the man has done any police work in the entirety of his life and he's deeply offended by his claim. In fact, Chris doesn't think the asshole has ever stepped foot in the S.T.A.R.S. office.

"He's just trying to reassure the public."

The sound of Brad's voice is enough to piss him off, but hearing him defend Irons nearly sends him into a fit of rage. Chris laughs bitterly in response as he glares at Brad from across the room.

"You've got to be kidding me." Chris manages to grit out. "You think that's alright? To stand up there and lie to everyone?"

"W-Well," Brad defends, "It's better than inciting panic."

Barry loudly clears his throat and Chris knows it's an unspoken attempt to persuade him to keep his mouth shut, but something about the look on Brad's stupid fucking face makes him even more furious.

"Oh yeah?" Chris asks. "You'd rather be lied to by the Chief of Police and have him sacrifice your safety for his own pride in lieu of the truth?"

Brad says nothing and it manages to fuel his anger even further. Chris doesn't know why he's so fucking mad, but he knows he's about to take it out on Vickers and doesn't feel even the slightest bit sorry about it because his incompetence warrants it.

"Now I know why Irons hired you." Chris spats. "You'll suck him off any chance you get."

The room falls silent as Joseph hastily shuts off the television.

"Keep your fantasies to yourself, Redfield."

Chris knows that monotone voice like the back of his own hand. Of fucking course Wesker shows up just in time to save Vickers because the chickenshit sure as hell doesn't have the capacity to defend himself. Chris quickly pivots in his chair to face Wesker and his stomach feels like it drops when he sees an unfamiliar figure in the doorway.

He doesn't know who the hell is standing beside Wesker, but she's wearing this dark blue beret that has the S.T.A.R.S. emblem embroidered on it and it throws him off because he knows he's never seen her before. If the soft edges of her face are any indication of her age, she's too young to have any sort of high ranking status and the judgmental look she's giving him suggests that she heard what he said.

Chris opens his mouth in preparation to fire off a snarky retort, but Wesker speaks before he has a chance.

"Alpha." He addresses the room as he languidly gestures towards the woman with a gloved hand. "This is Jill Valentine. She will be joining us."

When she gives them a nervous smile, Chris realizes she's nothing more than some whelp who's still wet behind the ears. He turns back to his desk and flips open the file that he's been neglecting for the last fifteen minutes because he isn't the slightest bit interested in a welcoming party.

"Redfield."

The way Wesker says his name makes his skin crawl. He doesn't bother to look at Wesker and merely grunts in response to acknowledge him.

"Show Valentine the ropes."

Chris whirls around in his chair so quickly that it almost makes him dizzy. Wesker has already disappeared from the room in his infuriatingly stealthy way, leaving Jill behind to awkwardly stand in the doorway with a deer-in-the-headlights expression on her face that makes her look far too young to have a gun strapped to her hip.

"Fuck." He grumbles and returns to his desk.

He pretends he's reading the report, but he's so damn mad that he can't comprehend any of the words he's skimming over. It almost feels like the world is out to get him today and he doesn't have the patience to take some new kid under his wing.

"Did you know we were hiring?" Joseph quietly asks and Kevin shakes his head in response.

Chris runs a hand over his face in frustration and leans back in his chair, holding his eyes closed as he attempts to focus on anything but what's going on around him. He doesn't get far in his half-assed attempt at mediation because his nose is suddenly filled with the scent of something floral and he cracks open an eye to find that Jill's now sitting beside him. If she thinks he has any intention of following Wesker's order, she's sadly mistaken.

"So," he begins to ask in an almost accusatory manner, "Did Irons hire you?"

She nods and Joseph breaks into a fit of laughter.

"Of course he did," he manages between laughs, "The man's a damn pervert!"

Jill seems offended by his reaction but Chris doesn't care to find out why. He doesn't pay her any mind, a strategy that he hopes will persuade her to find someone else to shadow.

"Jill Valentine, huh?" Joseph asks. "I'm Joseph. Joseph Frost. I do all the tech shit."

The bubbly tone in Joseph's voice is annoying him too. He points at Kevin, who smirks in return.

"This is Kevin Ryman," Joseph continues, "He shoots shit pretty well. Oh, and this is Barry Burton. He's like Alpha's dad."

Barry laughs good-naturedly and gives Jill a small wave as Joseph continues his introductions.

"Brad Vickers is our pilot."

"N-Nice to meet you." Brad stammers and Chris holds in his laugh because he's pretty sure this is the closest Vickers has ever been to a woman.

"And the charming dude beside you is Chris Redfield." He sarcastically says. "He shoots stuff better than Ryman and pisses Captain off for a living."

Chris grunts once again in response because he really doesn't have anything pleasant to say.

"So," Joseph says after a few moments of quiet, "Are you from Raccoon?"

Jill tells him no. Chris doesn't really care where she's from.

"You served?" Joseph continues his interrogation.

"Army." Jill tells him. "1st SFOD-D."

"Holy shit." Kevin lets out a low whistle. "That's some serious shit."

Chris would be lying if he said he wasn't impressed. Delta Force was a group of counterterrorist shit kickers and he'd heard plenty of horror stories about the gruesome training from failed recruits.

"Sorry for what I said earlier," Joseph says, "About Irons. I mean, he's a pervert, but I get why he hired you now."

Jill laughs and Chris feels something warm bloom in his chest. He hates it, but he hates the onslaught of questions she gets even more. Chris permits them to ask a few stupid questions—how many terrorists have you killed, have you tortured anyone, did you defuse bombs and shit—before he loses his cool.

"Alright." He sharply says as he rises to his feet, catching them all by surprise. "Let's go, Valentine."

She follows him without question and, as they make their way down the hall, Jill doesn't say anything at all.

Chris decides he likes that about her because peace and quiet is hard to find in a hellhole like the RPD.

No matter how long she stares at it, it still doesn't make sense. Jill squints at the bronze statue as though her scrutiny will somehow make everything come to light, but she can't do enough mental gymnastics to justify the presence of a unicorn statue in a police department.

"Don't think too hard." Chris advises with an amused smirk. "Irons is fucking weird. It doesn't go any deeper than that."

Jill steps back from the statue and gives it one last look.

"This building used to be an art museum." He shrugs. "Irons has shit taste and kept some of it intact. I mean, hell, the guy has dead animals in the back of his office."

"Wait, what?" Jill asks with surprise, though it isn't too much of a stretch to imagine. He could have told her that Irons had kidnapped girls tied up in the back of his office and she wouldn't have been particularly surprised.

"Not literally." Chris rolls his eyes as he pushes open the next door. "Taxidermy or whatever."

The library is incredibly grandiose for being a part of a police station. She pauses in the doorway, looking up at the intricate design on the ceiling and marveling at the height of the shelves before saying, "Taxidermy is still pretty weird."

Chris gives her a look that she doesn't know how to interpret. Jill brushes it off as best she can, but she isn't sure what to think about him. He's not a particularly sociable guy, rough around the edges and inarguably standoffish, and his stature doesn't do him any favors. Chris is built solid and wide with broad shoulders and a sturdy chest that could be intimidating in the right context. She wouldn't be surprised if he'd had his fair share of fights in the past given his rotten attitude.

Jill tries not to take it personally because he doesn't seem to discriminate when it comes to his sharp approach. As she's observing the massive goddess statue that sits in the center of the lobby, she can feel curious eyes on her, but she tries to ignore it. She's new to the precinct and Raccoon isn't a particularly large city, so her sudden presence is probably jarring to some. In fact, Chris takes more offense to it than she does.

"What? Haven't you seen a woman before?" He barks at one of the cadets passing by. "Get back to work."

The young man looks horrified and she smiles awkwardly at him before he scurries away. Chris is leaning against the bannister nearby with his arms crossed and a sour expression on his face. Jill doesn't understand why he's so grumpy.

"It's not that big of a deal," she tells him, "I'm new. It's to be expected."

Chris clicks his tongue in annoyance.

"It's not because you're new." He insists. "The kid nearly walked into a wall because he was so fixated on your ass."

She supposes that she should be offended by his crass nature, but it's almost refreshing in a strange way. Jill doesn't have to force herself to put on a pretty smile around Chris Redfield because he doesn't appear to give a fuck about manners or professionalism.

"I can take care of myself." Jill informs him because she doesn't want him to think she's the type who needs a man to stick up for her. On second thought, she doesn't know why she cares what he thinks.

Chris looks like he's about to say something, but something starts to audibly vibrate, and he tears the beeper off his waistband.

"A body washed up the river." He tells her as he studies the text rolling across the screen. "Let's go."

She's surprised, but she doesn't make that known. Jill didn't anticipate being invited to a crime scene so soon, but she has to get her feet wet eventually and she's always been the type to rip a bandage off to get it over with.

The ride is quiet aside from the low hum of the engine. Surprisingly, Chris is the one to break the silence at the third red light.

"We're working on a few missing persons cases right now." He tells her. "Sounds like we might have found one of them."

He says it so nonchalantly that she wonders if this is a common occurrence in Raccoon City.

"How long has this been going on?"

"Two weeks."

"How many people are missing?"

"Five."

"Men and women?"

"Yes."

"How old?"

His jaw visibly tightens and he gives her a pointed look.

"How about I just give you the files when we get back so you don't have to ask all these stupid questions?"

Jill laughs sardonically. She doesn't understand what the hell is wrong with this guy.

"Sorry for trying to do the job you can't."

It flies out of her mouth so swiftly that she doesn't get a chance to think about it. She feels guilty as she watches him tighten his grip on the steering wheel to such a degree that his knuckles turn white. Jill doesn't know what she can say to make it better, so she chooses not to say anything at all and punishes herself with the uncomfortable silence that hovers around them.

The crime scene isn't hard to find thanks to the flashing blue lights that filter through the thicket of trees that line the river. The air smells earthy and wet when she steps out of the car and her boots sink slightly into the moist mud beneath them. Jill looks up at the grey sky and flinches when an errant raindrop lands in her eye.

"You coming?" Chris asks, already several feet ahead of her.

"Yeah."

The ground grows softer as they move closer to the river and she takes care not to slip and fall. A white tarp is laid out beside the riverbank, but the body is obscured from view by the officers standing nearby. She's aware of the attention that's directed towards her, but she calmly follows Chris in a way that she hopes suggests that she's meant to be there.

"What's up, Branagh?" He asks one of the officers and the man gives him a nod before looking her in the eyes.

"Hey," he greets with a cordial smile, "Haven't seen you around before."

Jill can hardly believe someone in Raccoon City knows basic manners. She offers her hand and smiles in return.

"Jill Valentine."

He accepts her handshake and introduces himself as Lieutenant Marvin Branagh.

"Right," Chris interrupts, "About the body."

Marvin sighs heavily and wears a sorrowful expression.

"Young woman, caucasian, probably in her early twenties. It's, uh, pretty brutal. Haven't identified her yet, but they're working on it."

He steps aside and Chris motions for her to follow. As they approach, the stench of decay becomes apparent and grows more pungent with each step they take. Jill breathes shallowly, trying to avoid inhaling through her nose to avoid the smell and keep from vomiting. It's ripe and sour with an underlying hint of disgusting sweetness that comes with the invasion of bacteria.

Despite her best efforts, she thinks she might vomit when they come to a stop because Jill has never seen anything like this before. The body is bloated from being left in the water for so long, stark white skin puffed up and pulled taut from all the swelling it's enduring. The woman's face is swollen and discolored in shades of purple and red, pale blonde hair gathered in a tangled up mess along one side of her head.

Her body is covered in deep lacerations and areas in which large chunks of flesh are missing. Whole pieces of muscle appear to have been ripped away, revealing bits of the yellowed bone that lay hidden beneath. She thinks they look like bite marks, like some type of animal had gotten to the body, and she winces at the tendons that openly dangle from a particularly deep wound in her neck.

Jill inhales sharply and holds her breath as a wave of nausea comes over her. Her stomach churns and she feels bile burn the back of her throat, but she swallows it as best she can. The last thing she needs is to vomit in front of Chris at a fucking crime scene. She clenches her eyes closed and breathes in slowly through her nose before letting the breath out of her mouth.

"Hey."

Chris is crouched beside the body and looks back at her from over his shoulder as he says, "You can wait in the car if you need to."

She thinks she's starting to understand Chris's language and she thinks what he really wants to say is just get out of my way and let me do my job.

"I'm fine." She lies. "Thanks though."

Chris doesn't push it and Jill lets him carry out his investigation without asking any stupid questions.

When they return to the office, they're met with a barrage of questions. Joseph's spitting them out a thousand times a minute and Chris has no trouble keeping up with them. Jill assumes this is a common occurrence. Joseph seems like the type to gossip.

"What do you think, Jill?"

She doesn't expect the question.

"What?"

"I mean what do you think about it? Like...what do you think happened?" Joseph clarifies as he plops himself down on the edge of her desk.

"Uh…" She thrums her fingers against the surface of her desk. "It looks like she was eaten or something."

Both Joseph and Kevin laugh and she feels embarrassed. Jill doesn't know much about interpreting wounds, but she thinks she knows a bite when she sees one.

"It does."

When Chris chimes in, the men fall silent. Barry looks up from his report and Brad looks mortified.

"Eaten?" Joseph repeats. "Like...by an animal?"

"Don't know," he responds, "I've never seen anything like it."

"Fuck." Kevin breaks the ominous silence that follows. "One of ours?"

Chris shrugs.

"Could be. They haven't identified her yet."

She tries to ignore the unsettling feeling that overcomes them as she starts to work through the stack of files Chris has unceremoniously dumped on her desk. Jill doesn't find much in the information he's presented her with. Five missing people, two men and three women aged twenty-two to fifty-seven, with absolutely nothing in common with one another as far as she can tell. If the time frame in which they'd disappeared hadn't been so narrow, Jill wouldn't have assumed any type of connection between the disappearances.

Jill's so immersed in her reading that she doesn't notice Chris is talking to her until he gives her shoulder a shake.

"Time to go." He says, gesturing to the clock that reads 1800.

"Oh shit," she smiles sheepishly, "I lost track of time."

Chris studies her with that look she can't quite discern the meaning of.

"Yeah," he pauses and looks down at the keys he's holding in his hand, "I'm out. See you tomorrow."

As he's strolling out the door, he pauses.

"Valentine."

His dark eyes meet hers.

"Welcome to the team."

Chris gives her a half-wave as he leaves the office and Jill thinks he might be the biggest mystery of them all.

He knows he needs to chill the fuck out. Chris tells himself to leave his frustration at the office, but he can't seem to get the day's events out of his head. His commute home is entertained with thoughts about the cases, about how incompetent Irons is, and how much he can't fucking stand Wesker and his arrogance. He's still annoyed about the way Wesker dumped Jill on him as some twisted form of punishment and it makes him think about her too.

Chris doesn't know what to think about Jill Valentine. At first, he decides that she's infuriating, but he admits that her reaction to him isn't undeserved. He's an asshole—he knows this—and he's been a special kind of asshole today. Regardless, he can't shake the way she dished it back out at him with so much confidence because he doesn't know anyone with the guts to do that besides Claire.

As he trudges his way up the stairs, he tries to persuade himself to relax. There's no reason to think about work anymore. He can't solve anything at home and he deserves to find some reprieve. There's nothing to be mad about here, no stupid fucking Brad Vickers or dipshit Brian Irons to rile him up with their incompetence.

Or so he thought.

He had forgotten about Claire until he could hear her music blaring from the hallway. Chris can't recall how many times he's told her how much he hates her music, but he knows it has been a fucking lot, and the fact that she's blasting it at an ear-piercing decibel annoys the shit out of him. He fumbles with his keys and pushes open the door, unceremoniously kicking off his boots before rounding the corner.

Chris sees the open beer bottle on the kitchen counter before he sees her. Claire has her back to him as she stirs something that's sizzling on the stovetop and he reaches around her to pull the plug of the stereo out of the wall socket, granting himself much needed silence. She's cursing at him as she turns to him and he leans against the counter with a cross expression on his face.

"What the hell, Chris?" She wrinkles her nose at him. "Welcome home. It's nice to see you too."

He gestures towards the bottle of beer with a nod of his head.

"You're fucking eighteen. Why the hell are you drinking?"

Claire seems confused by the question. She turns off the burner and begins to scrape her stir fry into a bowl as she aggressively says, "You never cared before. Why the hell is it a problem now?"

"Because you're eighteen, Claire. It's illegal."

She doesn't seem impressed by his answer. Claire clicks her tongue in annoyance.

"Right," she says, "I forgot that you're the perfect representation of lawful good."

This is the last thing he needs right now.

"I'm not doing this with you today." He grumbles as he pours the contents of the bottle into the sink. "If you're living under my roof, you're not gonna drink."

"Didn't realize you were my dad."

It feels like a slap in the face. Chris sure as hell isn't their father, but he managed to fend for himself and raise his bratty sister, so it ought to count for something. At the very least, a modicum of respect on her part would be nice.

"Dammit Claire," he hisses, "I'm doing my fucking best, alright?"

She rolls her eyes as she makes her way out of the kitchen.

"Well, maybe try not being such a dick all the fucking time." She advises around a mouthful of vegetables. "Might do you some good."

The force with which she slams the door to her bedroom closed makes the walls rattle and her words echo through his head. Yeah, maybe he could try not being such a dick all the fucking time, but maybe everyone could stop pissing him the fuck off too. Chris really is trying his fucking best and he thinks he ought to be cut a little slack by his own damn sister.

He doesn't pursue her because he knows it'll do more harm than good. Claire's feisty attitude is exacerbated by the hormones of teenagehood and it makes a terrible concoction when mixed with Redfield blood. He decides to apologize in the best way he knows how—making his presence as nonexistent as possible by leaving the apartment and heading to the bar.

Chris isn't surprised when he finds Ryman there. It's not uncommon for them to run into one another on the nights that follow particularly bad days and it has become some unspoken form of catharsis for the both of them. Chris is already halfway through his first drink when Kevin decides to speak up.

"What's with you today?" He calmly asks. "You're hella uptight."

Chris shrugs because he doesn't really know what's up with him today. He's no stranger to the struggle of anger management, but he knows he's been particularly dickish today.

"I dunno." He confesses. "Shit keeps pissing me off."

Kevin laughs humorlessly and suggests, "Maybe all the shit at work is getting to you."

He knows what he means. Maybe the missing persons are getting to you. Maybe the murder has you riled up.

"Maybe," he muses, "But Wesker pissed me the fuck off too."

This time, when he laughs, it's earnest.

"What else is new?" Kevin rhetorically asks. "When doesn't Wesker get on your nerves?"

It's a valid point.

"Yeah, well, this time he dumped Jill on me. I'm not a fucking babysitter."

Kevin narrows his eyes at him, gives him a pointed look.

"She's not a fucking kid, Chris. I don't know much about her, but she seems qualified enough."

He thinks about what Jill said to him earlier, about how she was only trying to do the job that he can't.

"How the hell am I supposed to teach her how to do the job when I don't even know how the fuck to do it myself?"

Chris recognizes the look Kevin gets on his face. He's about to drop some bullshit sage wisdom on him that's going to piss him off because it's too painfully accurate.

"You think you might be projecting your hate for Wesker onto Jill?" He brutally asks. "She didn't do anything wrong. Don't use her as your scapegoat."

He feels like punching something because of course Kevin's right. Kevin's always right.

Fuck, he thinks, I really am an asshole.

Jill thinks she would be hard pressed to remember a time in which she's ever been this tired. Each time she blinks, she fears that her body might betray her and greedily pull her into the realm of unconsciousness for much needed rest. She blames the weight of her eyelids on the meager two hours of sleep she managed to net the night before; two hours of sleep that were anything but consecutive.

She watches Joseph prance around the office with more energy than she thinks she's ever had in the entirety of her life. It's only a quarter to six in the morning and he's already spouting off the theories he formulated overnight.

"So Jill," he says in a singsong voice, "Your dead girl. You think a bear ate her?"

Jill shrugs. She hasn't the faintest clue what a bear mauling looks like, but she assumes it might look a lot like the corpse that kept her up all night.

"Maybe she got killed up in Arklay." He tells her. "The river brought her body down to the city."

"Arklay?" Jill asks not because she's curious, but because she feels compelled to entertain him.

"The mountains," he states as though she should know, "You know, with the forest and shit. Hikers love that."

Jill nods. Fuck, she's tired.

"Or maybe…" Joseph begins his next proposal with a shit-eating grin that leads her to believe something is up. "Maybe she got eaten by a sasquatch."

Jill waits for him to laugh, but he doesn't. Maybe there's a punchline coming.

"Well?" He asks. "What do you think?"

"You're not serious?" She looks around the room and Kevin starts to laugh.

"He's serious," Kevin tells her, "Frost has been trying to prove that Arklay is rife with sasquatch."

"It is." Joseph insists. "I've heard some strange shit up in the mountains late at night."

"You sound like my damn teenage sister."

Jill recognizes the deep rumble of Chris's voice. She isn't surprised that he's late.

"Lay off the horror movies, Frost." He advises as he drops his bag on his desk with an audible thunk.

Joseph purses his lips as though he's taken offense. Jill thinks he probably has because Chris has a knack for hurting feelings.

"Fine," Joseph concedes, "But you'll like my next theory."

Chris sets a paper coffee cup on Jill's desk and she stares at it like she's never seen one before.

"Oh yeah?" He asks, encouraging Joseph to continue.

Jill doesn't understand what just happened. Did Chris Redfield bring her a cup of coffee?

"Yeah, maybe Captain did it." Joseph snickers. "I bet he eats people."

Chris snorts. Kevin's shoulders shake with his restrained laughter. Brad looks mortified. Barry didn't seem to hear.

"Wouldn't surprise me." Chris says as he looks over at Jill.

Jill still doesn't understand why Chris set a cup of coffee on her desk.

"It's coffee." He tells her in a low tone. "I'm not poisoning you."

Jill meets his gaze, but she doesn't know what to say.

"Figured you might need it." Chris casually says as he begins to tap on his mouse to wake his computer from its sleep state. "Yesterday couldn't have been easy for you."

She gives the cup one last skeptical look because, from where she's sitting, it seems a hell of a lot like an apology and she never would have pegged Chris Redfield as the kind of man to apologize.

This fic is a rewrite of my very first attempt at fanfiction, One Red Thread. I've been overwhelmed with Valenfeels lately and I feel like this ship deserves so much better than what I've produced in ORT. I have learned a lot in my year I've spent in the fanfic community and I want to do Valenfield the justice it deserves. This plot isn't going to be a carbon copy of ORTs, but some things may seem similar to you if you read ORT. ORT readers, I promise this won't bore you.

I've taken a few liberties with the canon. It was intentional. I know it isn't following the lore to a T. Please bear with me.

A massive thanks goes out to cyanCaddy because this fic wouldn't exist without her. She makes me a better writer and fixes all of my terrible plots. Thanks for all that you do.