Resident Evil: End of Days

Agony

"What the hell were you thinking, Chris?!"

"I'm sorry! I didn't expect him to pass out like that!"

"Oh sure, like a man with nothing but brawn can't use a little brain to think about how he'd react!"

"I didn't mean to!"

"You two are loud..." I complain as I find myself coming to. Damn they're loud. I didn't think I was able to hear them after being unconscious for...how long now?

"Sorry Leon..."

"Sorry..."

I sit back up, and Rebecca lends me a hand.

"Are you okay?" she asks.

"...feels like my world is spinning..." I answer. She gives me some water to drink, and I swallow it down as quickly as I can. I come to realize how thirsty I am after I down more than about three glasses, then when I finish and set it at my lap, the two are watching me carefully.

I hate the awkward feeling that settles into the room. I ask, "...what?"

They don't answer me, but I have a feeling they have questions.

"Leon..." Rebecca asks, "...how in the world are you even alive? When Chris and I found you on the roof of a car, you must have been dead for, I don't know, ten, maybe fifteen minutes?"

"Well maybe less," Chris interjects, "Because when we found him at least he had a pulse going."

"That doesn't answer the question," Rebecca states, "Because there's no way he should have survived that fall, and even further on the roof of a car!"

...why are these two fighting?

"I don't know," I finally answer. "All I know is that I'm alive, but my memories are about shot through..."

The two fall quiet and watch me.

"...All I remember is...just fighting," I explain, "I remember faces, I remember constantly feeling like I'm in combat of sorts, and I don't remember anything else save your names."

"...do you remember yours?" Chris asks me.

I watch him for a moment. I frown and take a moment to think. Who am I?

My head still hurts, but I find my rummaging through my memories uneventful. I shake my head and look at them. I answer, "...I...I don't think I do..."

Chris looks perturbed, and Rebecca looks super concerned. She then states to Chris, "It's possible he could be suffering from amnesia from the fall." She turns to me. "The fact that you remember ours is good enough. We'll go from there."

She grabs her computer, a little red laptop, and types away on the keyboard. She pulls up a file on the screen, but she's stunned to see something. She looks at me, then at Chris. She swallows, hard.

"...looks like the DSO heard what happened to you," She states.

Chris frowns, and even I ask, "What? Who's the DSO?"

Rebecca explains, "The DSO is the Division of Security Operations. An anti-bioterrorism agency by the government of the States. You were one of the founding members after the President created it.

The president....

His face flashes in my head for a moment. His smile, his kind eyes...he was someone close to me once...but then I...

I shake my head, but Rebecca is not done: "The DSO heard what's happened at New York City...and from the news media...I think they may have put you as..."

"As what?" Chris asks. I feel a pit in my stomach. Even I don't have to remember what that feeling is. 

Dread...

"Killed in Action?" I ask tentatively.

Rebecca looks at me. She then slowly nods her head.

I sit for a moment and let the news sink in.

Dead...killed in action...

I should be dead. I know that now.

Something heavier sinks on my shoulders, not quite like dread, but something sadder...darker...

Depression...

I should be dead. I shouldn't even be alive only to find my memory almost completely gone and with two faces I remember...

I sit back, and Chris and Rebecca watch me.

"...why...?" I suddenly ask.

Chris looks at me, as does Rebecca. They look at one another, then back at me.

"Why what?" Chris asks.

"I'm...supposed to be dead aren't I?" I find myself asking. "I should be. I know I should be! Yet here I am wide awake and I can barely remember everything of my life! Why am I alive?!"

I don't know whether it's the pain in my chest that feels like a blade cutting into my heart, or the tightness and suffocation that grasps my lungs. I don't know what comes over me. But all I know was that I was breaking inside. 

I feel hands grab at my shoulders, but I can't stop feeling this empty pain spearing into me. 

How?! Why?! Why am I alive?! When the whole world thought I was dead I sit here breathing air, being alive! Yet I don't remember a damn thing!

A howl wrings itself free out of my throat. I feel my world spin as the hospital is torn with nothing but my pain, my agony. Chris holds onto me, and Rebecca can only watch on, but nothing, no one, can comprehend the pain I feel now.

Nothingness...