Ghost Stories
Mar. 5th, 2012 01:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
inkribbonTitle: Ghost Stories
Fandom: Resident Evil
Characters: Jill Valentine, Chris Redfield, Rebecca Chambers, Enrico Marini
Genre: AU, Supernatural, Horror
Warning: Gore, Death, Violence
Spoilers: Slight Zero/Remake? It's pretty AU from that point on.
Summary: Bravo Team is dead, but not quite gone.
The trick, Jill had discovered, to dealing with ghosts was not to startle them. Some ghosts were more… coherent, for lack of a better term, than others. They were more than the echoes, endlessly going about the tasks they’d done in life, or the mimes whose only existence consisted of reenacting the way they'd died. They were aware and more importantly, functional. She’d found out the hard way, that it was best not to startle or offend them. Most often, they spooked and faded away, the stress of dealing with their loss of their life too much for them to handle. Of course, if it had been easy to handle, they probably wouldn’t have been hanging around as ghosts in the first place.
Rarely though, instead of sadness at a sudden reminder of their state, they got angry. (Later, after one such encounter, she’d watched the movie Poltergeist, and yeah, they’d gotten at least part of it right.) Those encounters tended to end badly, and she had no desire to go up against an angry remnant in the confines of the Raccoon PD morgue. Too many things that could become airborne at a thought and not enough room to maneuver.
Not that she thought Rebecca would be violent, the girl had been a talented, and more importantly, gentle medic, but a gruesome death often complicated matters. It was best to be cautious.
From her position behind Chris, Jill could watch Rebecca without openly staring. The medic’s ghost sat on the coroner’s desk, her back against the wall. One leg dangled off the desk’s edge, the other was tucked underneath her. Her palms lay flat on the desk, but her fingers drummed idly. If she concentrated, Jill could hear the rhythm of her fingers over the men’s voices. The ghost looked so mundane, so bored. Like she was sitting and waiting for a bus, not standing guard over her remains. There was a solidness to her presence that was unnerving. She was clearly tracking the three people in the room. If it weren’t for the battered corpse in front of the gathered STARS members, well, Jill might have had her doubts.
It was just one more deviation in a case that was already beyond pear-shaped.
{missing scene}
“Coen won’t get away with this,” Jill said, as if adding on to Enrico’s comment.
Rebecca’s voice was clear, as it rang out into the room. “It wasn’t him.”
She had expected the girl to answer; she hadn’t expected Chris or Enrico to hear her.
Enrico spun, bumping up against the gurney. His mouth twitched, but the words failed to leave his throat and he snapped his jaws shut so hard his teeth clicked.
Chris was handling it a bit better, the set of his shoulders was tense, but he seemed uninclined to deny what he saw. “Gh-, ah, they’re not usually so forthcoming, are they?” he asked, his voice pitched to Jill, but his eyes never leaving Rebecca’s face. At least he’d paid attention when Jill spoke about dealing with spooks. They didn’t like to be reminded of what they’d lost. Enrico shot a look between the two of them and opened his mouth to speak. Jill gave a small shake of her head; this was not the time for explanations.
“It wasn’t him,” she repeated, sliding off the desk. She stalked over to the gurney that held her mortal remains. “Billy didn’t do it. I wasn’t shot.”
“Kiddo, we have the coroner’s report,” Chris began, looking to Jill for cues on how to proceed. “We have a gun with his fingerprints and the matching bullet that came from your…” he trailed off, not wanting to remind her she was dead.
Her eyes narrowed and her voice was harsh as she spoke gain, “I wasn’t shot.” As she hissed those words, Jill noticed a spattering of red across the white of the medic’s vest. Spatters that were growing and spreading, dripping down from her neck and the horrible slash that stretched and gaped across her throat. There was so much blood now, her vest slick with it, so saturated it continued to drip down, tracing wet trails that glistened against the green of her pants. Red was painted on her arms, her fingers. Jill could almost feel it squish in the fabric of her gloves, as if it were she and not Rebecca who’d made an obviously vain attempt to staunch the flow.
Jill could smell it now, cloying and saturating the air, but not thick enough to cover the acrid tang of something, hot and heavy and just plain wrong at her back, the thing that had done this as she slid to her knees, gasping and choking, while the edges of her vision grew blurry and she toppled to the ground, crashing into the ornate bowl below her and darkness took everything else away.
When she came to, she was curled on the floor, and there was the sensation of cool fingers examining her face. Jill opened her eyes to meet Rebecca’s, who dropped her gaze apologetically. “You saw,” the girl said.
Jill nodded, reaching up to squeeze Rebecca’s cool, dead, fingers. “Yeah,” she said, eyes closing briefly as the sensations surged back. “I saw.” She resisted the urge to message her own throat, make sure that no knife wound adorned it. “They slit your throat.” Her words were a whisper. That shouldn’t have happened. Not Rebecca’s murder, especially not Jill’s experience of it. There were too many impossibilities and contradictions in this, she didn’t know where to start to try and figure it out. Every question brought out more questions and no hint of where to look for answers. It left a sour taste in her mouth. This was her area of specialty. She hadn’t been this far out of her league in a long time. Not since the breakdown in Delta Force that had been the indicator of her ability to perceive spirits.
She was pale as Rebecca helped her to stand- yet another impossibility. Strong emotions fueled a ghost’s powers, but Rebecca just looked subdued and sad. She was visible, audible, and had substance. Gooseflesh prickled along the back of Jill’s neck. Old things had this sort of power. Bravo Team had been wiped out not five days ago. That was another sobering thought. They had retrieved all of the bodies, so why were there no signs of any other Bravos lingering around?
Jill gripped the medic’s arm, in what she hoped was a comforting squeeze. Chris was right behind her, his hand a steady weight on her shoulder as soon as Rebecca stepped back. His hand was warm and she could feel his thumb as it traced circles against her shoulder pads. “Scared the hell out of us there, Jill,” he murmured. “And then, poof, you were on the floor and she was standing over you. I couldn’t see her before that.”
“So she was stabbed. But then, if she wasn’t shot, who is this?” Enrico refused to look up from the gurney, or acknowledge or Rebecca’s presence in the room. Rebecca wilted visibly, but didn’t say anything, retreating back to sit on the coroner’s desk. However unkind it may have been, Jill knew Enrico was a God-fearing man. This brush with the supernatural was probably more than he knew how to handle.
Fandom: Resident Evil
Characters: Jill Valentine, Chris Redfield, Rebecca Chambers, Enrico Marini
Genre: AU, Supernatural, Horror
Warning: Gore, Death, Violence
Spoilers: Slight Zero/Remake? It's pretty AU from that point on.
Summary: Bravo Team is dead, but not quite gone.
The trick, Jill had discovered, to dealing with ghosts was not to startle them. Some ghosts were more… coherent, for lack of a better term, than others. They were more than the echoes, endlessly going about the tasks they’d done in life, or the mimes whose only existence consisted of reenacting the way they'd died. They were aware and more importantly, functional. She’d found out the hard way, that it was best not to startle or offend them. Most often, they spooked and faded away, the stress of dealing with their loss of their life too much for them to handle. Of course, if it had been easy to handle, they probably wouldn’t have been hanging around as ghosts in the first place.
Rarely though, instead of sadness at a sudden reminder of their state, they got angry. (Later, after one such encounter, she’d watched the movie Poltergeist, and yeah, they’d gotten at least part of it right.) Those encounters tended to end badly, and she had no desire to go up against an angry remnant in the confines of the Raccoon PD morgue. Too many things that could become airborne at a thought and not enough room to maneuver.
Not that she thought Rebecca would be violent, the girl had been a talented, and more importantly, gentle medic, but a gruesome death often complicated matters. It was best to be cautious.
From her position behind Chris, Jill could watch Rebecca without openly staring. The medic’s ghost sat on the coroner’s desk, her back against the wall. One leg dangled off the desk’s edge, the other was tucked underneath her. Her palms lay flat on the desk, but her fingers drummed idly. If she concentrated, Jill could hear the rhythm of her fingers over the men’s voices. The ghost looked so mundane, so bored. Like she was sitting and waiting for a bus, not standing guard over her remains. There was a solidness to her presence that was unnerving. She was clearly tracking the three people in the room. If it weren’t for the battered corpse in front of the gathered STARS members, well, Jill might have had her doubts.
It was just one more deviation in a case that was already beyond pear-shaped.
{missing scene}
“Coen won’t get away with this,” Jill said, as if adding on to Enrico’s comment.
Rebecca’s voice was clear, as it rang out into the room. “It wasn’t him.”
She had expected the girl to answer; she hadn’t expected Chris or Enrico to hear her.
Enrico spun, bumping up against the gurney. His mouth twitched, but the words failed to leave his throat and he snapped his jaws shut so hard his teeth clicked.
Chris was handling it a bit better, the set of his shoulders was tense, but he seemed uninclined to deny what he saw. “Gh-, ah, they’re not usually so forthcoming, are they?” he asked, his voice pitched to Jill, but his eyes never leaving Rebecca’s face. At least he’d paid attention when Jill spoke about dealing with spooks. They didn’t like to be reminded of what they’d lost. Enrico shot a look between the two of them and opened his mouth to speak. Jill gave a small shake of her head; this was not the time for explanations.
“It wasn’t him,” she repeated, sliding off the desk. She stalked over to the gurney that held her mortal remains. “Billy didn’t do it. I wasn’t shot.”
“Kiddo, we have the coroner’s report,” Chris began, looking to Jill for cues on how to proceed. “We have a gun with his fingerprints and the matching bullet that came from your…” he trailed off, not wanting to remind her she was dead.
Her eyes narrowed and her voice was harsh as she spoke gain, “I wasn’t shot.” As she hissed those words, Jill noticed a spattering of red across the white of the medic’s vest. Spatters that were growing and spreading, dripping down from her neck and the horrible slash that stretched and gaped across her throat. There was so much blood now, her vest slick with it, so saturated it continued to drip down, tracing wet trails that glistened against the green of her pants. Red was painted on her arms, her fingers. Jill could almost feel it squish in the fabric of her gloves, as if it were she and not Rebecca who’d made an obviously vain attempt to staunch the flow.
Jill could smell it now, cloying and saturating the air, but not thick enough to cover the acrid tang of something, hot and heavy and just plain wrong at her back, the thing that had done this as she slid to her knees, gasping and choking, while the edges of her vision grew blurry and she toppled to the ground, crashing into the ornate bowl below her and darkness took everything else away.
When she came to, she was curled on the floor, and there was the sensation of cool fingers examining her face. Jill opened her eyes to meet Rebecca’s, who dropped her gaze apologetically. “You saw,” the girl said.
Jill nodded, reaching up to squeeze Rebecca’s cool, dead, fingers. “Yeah,” she said, eyes closing briefly as the sensations surged back. “I saw.” She resisted the urge to message her own throat, make sure that no knife wound adorned it. “They slit your throat.” Her words were a whisper. That shouldn’t have happened. Not Rebecca’s murder, especially not Jill’s experience of it. There were too many impossibilities and contradictions in this, she didn’t know where to start to try and figure it out. Every question brought out more questions and no hint of where to look for answers. It left a sour taste in her mouth. This was her area of specialty. She hadn’t been this far out of her league in a long time. Not since the breakdown in Delta Force that had been the indicator of her ability to perceive spirits.
She was pale as Rebecca helped her to stand- yet another impossibility. Strong emotions fueled a ghost’s powers, but Rebecca just looked subdued and sad. She was visible, audible, and had substance. Gooseflesh prickled along the back of Jill’s neck. Old things had this sort of power. Bravo Team had been wiped out not five days ago. That was another sobering thought. They had retrieved all of the bodies, so why were there no signs of any other Bravos lingering around?
Jill gripped the medic’s arm, in what she hoped was a comforting squeeze. Chris was right behind her, his hand a steady weight on her shoulder as soon as Rebecca stepped back. His hand was warm and she could feel his thumb as it traced circles against her shoulder pads. “Scared the hell out of us there, Jill,” he murmured. “And then, poof, you were on the floor and she was standing over you. I couldn’t see her before that.”
“So she was stabbed. But then, if she wasn’t shot, who is this?” Enrico refused to look up from the gurney, or acknowledge or Rebecca’s presence in the room. Rebecca wilted visibly, but didn’t say anything, retreating back to sit on the coroner’s desk. However unkind it may have been, Jill knew Enrico was a God-fearing man. This brush with the supernatural was probably more than he knew how to handle.