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Chris was not adjusting the best to the whole being a father thing. But like hell he’s gonna just stand by as Wesker treats his kids like tools. Kids made with his dna as well.
This entire situation was fucked. Wesker was more obsessed with him than he’d thought. And after his revival from a fiery death that obsession once formed as respect and hatred shifted into some twisted love. Love that was only aided in delusion by Wesker’s previous decision to use Chris’ dna in his bioweapon test tube babies. Originally it was for “more genetic stability than a clone as well as clearly good traits to pass on”, but now the bioterrorist speaks about it as if they had settled down to have children together. Not the reality of the situation of it having to do with his weird eugenics ideas about his genes and kidnapping him twenty years later.
Most of these kids were adults, he really shouldn’t give a fuck. After all he’s a firm believer family is about love shared not blood shared. Them being genetically his shouldn’t matter to him they’re fucked up monsters just like their father. Crazy ass kids attached to their crazy ass dad’s heels like eager to please puppies. Not standing in the way of his experiments on him. Not minding he’s a captive in their hell lab of a home.
But they’re Redfields.
No no they aren’t they’re Weskers and they aren’t-
“Chris? Are you sure he didn’t hurt you? I know what those treatments are like.” A voice laced with concern snaps him out of his spiral. The knitted brows of the young woman show a real emotion he’s not seen from her.
“What do you mean?” He didn’t know what part to process first, the fact she seemed to care if he was hurt. The question if this head over heels version of her father had hurt him like it was expected. The implication that it was obvious because he’d hurt her during treatment.
He’d hurt her during treatment.
“What did he do to you?!” It isn’t the best reaction to raise his voice. To lurch up from his slumped sitting position and lean towards her. But the anger that washes over him at the realisation can’t be well contained.
She flinches.
Dear god she flinches.
“Nothing! I just know the viruses they hurt… even in little doses like that the changes they make aren’t easy. And if it doesn’t take well or take completely it keeps hurting. But you’re lucky, he made the strands special to be accepted by you so everything should take. Everything should take, I promise.” Her smile is nervous. She doesn’t understand his outburst from the looks of it. Fear that she's upset him written all over her face.
This is the one constantly glued to him at Wesker’s order. Powers of hallucination and sedation for when he started fighting back. Named Medusa no doubt for needing to make eye contact to connect to your brain, however that worked. He has fought her. He has hurt her. What a fucking hypocrit he is so enraged at the idea Wesker has hurt her when he’s put in a few bullets, probably broken somethings.
No what the fuck is he saying?! No he was fighting against a bioterrorist who’s keeping him trapped and docile with mind powers. On the other hand there’s a potential additional type of child abuse, on top of the blatant abuse the experiments were. He can be absolutely livid about what’s been done to their poor kids their whole childhood and still defend himself now.
“Chris?”
“I’m sorry Medusa. I didn’t mean to-“ he sighs and runs a hand over his face. “What about you, did it take?”
Suddenly the softer version he’d gotten a glimpse of disappeared back into the neutral expression and closed off body language. “Of course it took. I’m alive and look human. That should be easy for you to guess.”
“You know you can talk to me right? All this big talk from your father and siblings for me to be part of the family? Wouldn’t you wanna talk to your father?” He needs to know. If she’s suffering from those experiments still they might all be.
“My father?” She leans back and crosses her arms behind her head. “That’s a low blow Redfield. You might be able to manipulate dad by feeding into whatever phycosexual thing he has going on with you, but you are not prying a damn thing out of me you can use. That’s why I’m responsible for watching your sorry ass.”
“Fine, you wanna cut the shit? It’s not information I’m ‘going to use’ or something. You just implied before that Wesker hurts you, or at least used to consistently. Then brought up how the virues can cause you pain forever if they don’t react well. I’m sitting here trying to ask you how bad you've been abused Medusa. I’m asking if you’re constantly in pain because of what he did to you. I want to know because you don’t seem like a bad kid, and it’s awful what’s happened to you.”
She stays frozen in the kicked back pose, expression unreadable.
“I know. I don’t want to talk about it. I was trying to be nice, it's not that deep.” She swings back forward standing up and sitting on the couch beside him. What seems like an oddly timed hug makes sense the moment he hears the hushed voice in his ear. “You are not my father, asshole. You don’t get to know family business.”
Just in time for her pulling away the door opens, Wesker walking in. “Oh good look at the two of you getting closer. How are my darlings doing?”
Medusa stands up and walks towards both him and the door. “Oh he’s not feeling well after treatment but I’m sure some quality time with his husband will help. If you don’t mind while you’re here to watch him I have some things to finish.”
“Of course I remember you didn’t react well to T-Veronica either. I’ll call you when you’re once again needed.” He doesn’t question her at all, too thrilled at his delusions of a happy little family and of course the excuse to creepily coddle an all but trapped Chris.
As Medusa leaves the room behind Wesker’s view she tosses back a teasing smirk at Chris for pushing the idea of affection into her father’s mind.
Scratch all that worry. She’s a bitch.
***
Chris for the first time since being here is alone. He hasn’t been trusted to not be watched. Despite not making an escape attempt in over a month. Medusa simply never showed up after Wesker left the more living oriented part of the facility to do… whatever he does in the labs. He took the liberty to wander. He didn’t have the clearance to make it anywhere near escape without cutting off someone’s finger for prints and poking lions in the centre of their den doesn’t sound intelligent.
He hears something from the other side of one of the doors. Leaning in at first lends nothing, then the sound of soft crying.
It’s not his problem he doesn’t even know which one is behind this door. Backing up however makes him notice something far more concerning than crying, blood on the door handle. A few small drops he hadn’t noticed on the ground in front of the door.
He turns the handle to see if it’s locked and the door lets him slowly push it open. Knowing this family, one of these kids could be torturing someone in there. It’s dark inside and a figure sits hunched on the floor clinging to a bottle he can’t see the details of.
“Ever heard of knocking?” The strained voice of Medusa answers.
“I saw blood.”
“Yeah it’s mine.” She answers like that changes the situation.
He turns on the light expecting to see her with notable cuts or a busted lip, maybe a busted nose. Got into a fight with another sibling or maybe the BSAA discovered the place finally.
There is a massive stab wound in her side. The bottle being clung to is healing fluid. The floor is covered in blood.
“Medusa!” Without thinking he rushes to her checking over the wound immediately going into emergency mode. Looking over the damage rolling up her shirt some to see her side riddled with jagged holes. He shouldn’t care if she dies, that's his captor.
That’s his kid.
“Leave me alone, I'll be fine, it'll heal… I think.” She’s clearly struggling to stay awake. Eyes closed and words beginning to slur.
He doesn’t answer, easily snatching the healing fluid from her hand. It’s unopened, she hadn’t got the chance to use it yet. Either she just entered the room or this super powered person was feeling so weak she couldn’t open a child safe bottle. Pouring it on the wound did seem to help. Washing off the blood and grime from the wound at least and letting him see the rapid healing.
Rapid was a strong word. Healing fast enough to see but it would still take hours to close and with a wound like this she didn’t have hours to spare. “You got first aid in here?”
“Cabinet under… under the bookshelf.” A quiet, woozy answer.
The bandages aren’t perfect but they’re slowing down the blood loss. Medusa doesn’t seem conscious anymore.
Chris takes a breath at seemingly having stabilised her a little and pulls her close, picking her up as gently as he can. He thinks something that were he rational right now would usually scare him.
He’s gotta get her to Wesker. There’s much better medical assistance to be found in the lab. Chris moves as fast as he can without moving her too much to the large sealed double doors and places Medusa’s hand on the pad to read for clearance. As the doors open he tries his best to path through where he gets taken for experiments.
“WESKER!” He yells out into the lab hoping it reaches him as the blood begins to seep through the bandages and onto his arms.
Before he makes it to the end of the hall he sees Wesker approaching. “How did you- Chris what is this? What did you do?!”
Wesker immediately takes Medusa out of his arms when he meets him. Chris lets him. “I didn’t do anything! I found her like this… she’s not going to heal fast enough she’s already lost a lot of blood by the time I found her-“
Wesker wordlessly carries her to a room he hasn’t seen but it does remind him more of an ER room than most of the rooms he’s had to be in in this lab. He works without acknowledging him and Chris stays quiet. Simply watching as Medusa gets the wounds more properly treated and IVs connected to her veins. He’s not sure how long it takes. But he just stays there and watches.
“You made the right decision. Despite being one of my most competent children she’s physically much weaker than all of her siblings. She very well could have died by the end of the day had you not brought her to me.” Chris hates that he’s become familiar enough with him that he can see the subtle pensiveness in his expression.
“Is she going to be alright?”
“Now yes. She’ll be fine in a few days. I can only suspect she was trying to check on the failed experiments again. She usually keeps them docile.”
It hangs heavily in the air. Chris after unlocking the lab with her hand could have made an attempt to escape. He could have successfully escaped. God knows after all these years he has the stealth ability to make his way to an exit and the combat ability if he got caught. And it hadn’t even crossed his mind after those doors opened. This kid was dying.
His kid was dying.
No no he did it because it was the right thing to do. These kids have grown up manipulated and abused, they can be saved. He can’t just let one die.
“You made the right decision my love.” Wesker walks over and kisses his temple. He doesn’t need to say what he’s talking about.
Chris feels numb.