Resident Evil Series Fan Fiction ❯ A Deadly Mistake ❯ Enter Billy Coen ( Chapter 3 )

Disclaimer: Alright. As you all may very well know already, I do not own the Resident Evil/Biohazard franchise or any of its characters. Those rights belong to Capcom. Also, I have only been able to play Resident Evil 0 and 4, but have done rather thorough research on all the characters' backgrounds and history to make sure I didn't screw up somewhere, but if I do have something that conflicts with the canon of the series, please email me and let me know and I'll have it fixed. Just please don't flame me over it; it's not that big of a deal.

 

So, without further ado, I bring you...

 

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Resident Evil: A Deadly Mistake

 

Chapter 3 - Enter Bill Coen

 

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Agh... Owww...

 

My head was throbbing. My body was cold. I was lying on some sort of equally cold hard surface... Jesus my head hurt, especially in the back. What had happened...?

 

I slowly came to, my vision kind of blurry as I sat up and tried to look around, holding myself up and supporting my weight on my right arm. The ground felt like ice on my fingertips; even the gloved part of my hand couldn't help but feel the chill. I rubbed the back of my head with my opposite hand, feeling a welt there as I tried to remember what had happened to me...

 

“So, you're up? `Bout time.”

 

Suddenly it hit me. The mission, the plane... “You!” He was still blurry but I could tell it was him and just how far away he was. I didn't hesitate to scoot back, though I backed myself up against a wall. My adrenaline was pumping as my heart raced, not taking time to analyze the situation more than `get the hell out'.

 

“Relax, pretty boy. Don't go get your panties in a bundle.” Yeah, it was he same guy as before, the pilot, “Marino”. I recognized his voice now, and I could finally make out his features. He had ditched the aviators and Marines cap by now, letting his smooth, jet black hair fall freely in a close-to-mullet form around his head. He also lost the denim shirt, leaving only a darkly shaded wife-beater clinging tightly to his shoulders and revealing the long, elaborate black tattoo that spread along his entire left arm down to his watch. His eyes were cold and distant, yet they didn't show any sign of threat, at least not for now. Besides, he had let me live for however long he had me knocked out, so what did I have to lose? I relaxed. I still had my eyes peeled, though.

 

“So who are you, really?” I kept up my tough guy persona I could use from time to time. He wasn't buying it; he simply laughed.

 

“I already told you that. The name's Billy.” It was then that I noticed that bastard had my wallet in his hand.

 

“Marino? Nah, I'm guessing you're Coen, the convict sentenced to death almost seven years ago.” I stayed where I was currently sitting. I didn't want to make any sudden movements and change his mood; I still had no idea what to expect from this guy.

 

“Your guess is correct,” he answered, still fiddling with my wallet. “You secret service guys are sooo smart.”

 

“What do you want from me?” I decided to jump to the next question, still wanting more information before I did anything else. It was becoming obvious he wasn't aiming to harm me yet- or he just wasn't too intelligent of a criminal- as he was kind enough to leave me with both my pistol and my knife.

 

“Me? Eh, I want nothing from you. You can walk right out of here if you want, but I know you won't. You're too curious.” He didn't have the aura of some mastermind like others I had encountered before. He just, plain and simple, didn't seem to care.

 

“Well, curiosity killed the cat, and I don't plan on dying anytime soon.”

 

“So you're a cat then?” A dead silence followed. I didn't know how to answer, and he didn't seem to be joking. Then he laughed, finally ending the silence. “Chill out, man. You're too serious. You were more fun back in the limo.”

 

I gave what little impression of a laugh I could in return. He wouldn't be laughing if he had the same headache I had right now. “Cat or not, I guess you're right. I am curious. If you want nothing from me, then why did you have to give me the lump on my head?”

 

“Boss's orders.” Before I could get my next question out he flipped me my wallet. “I was actually hired to kill you. It was the only way I could get here.”

 

“Oh, lovely. More people after my head. Who's your boss?” I checked in my wallet to make sure all the cash, cards and ID were in there. He made sure I knew they were.

 

“Don't worry, I didn't steal anything, I just wanted to know who you were. I saw the R.P.D. badge in there. Now I know why they sent you on this mission.” It was true that Raccoon City was no longer more than a heaping pile of radioactive rubble, but I still had my badge on me for memory's sake. Apparently, though, he knew something about the happenings in Raccoon City before it was destroyed. I assumed it had something to do with Miss Chambers, or perhaps he had been through it himself. “To answer your question, though, my boss was Hayden, the head of the CIA.”

 

“What?” I stopped right in the middle of sliding my wallet back into my back pocket, holding it there halfway in as I tried to register what he just said. “The CIA?”

 

“Yup,” was his sole response.

 

“So, this whole mission was a fluke...” I couldn't believe it. President Graham set me up. He sent me on this `mission' that might not even really exist only to be killed. Of course, I expected the deadly mission part that most likely involve me dying, but hiring a killer?

 

“Not exactly.” I looked back towards Billy again, urging him to continue. “I know all about your affair with a certain Miss Ashley Graham. That's not what this is about. Hayden thought that you shouldn't have been sent on this mission in the first place, that you knew too much. First he disagreed with the President's orders to send in a nearby SWAT team, but then he was even more pissed off that he sent you in by yourself again. Hayden's got a grudge against you for stealing the glory when you brought Ashley back. That's CIA territory, and it would've taken them weeks, maybe months to get her back. You brought her back in less than a week.”

 

“Okay, so he's jealous and decides to kill me off without the President's knowledge, meanwhile the President doesn't even care whether I live or die in the first place. Where am I going to go when all of this is over?” I was cornered. People wanted me dead on all sides. I didn't even have a home to go to now...

 

“Honestly? I don't care. I'm here for personal reasons.”

 

“It's about Rebecca, isn't it?” I asked as I slowly stood up, stretching out a little.

 

“You're a keen one alright,” he said sarcastically. “When I returned to Rebecca's house after the FBI scare, I found that she wasn't there. I waited for awhile- five whole days, in fact- and she never came home. Her cell phone was there, so I had no way of getting in touch with her either. I had no clue where she was, and my only lead was the FBI, since they had barged into her house a week before. But, as you saw in your description of me, I'm a wanted man, I can't just walk into an FBI office and demand to know where Rebecca is.”

 

“Wait a second,” I said, trying to catch up. “If your first lead was the FBI, how did you get involved with the CIA?” I didn't care how he knew Rebecca or how the entire thing got started, but I was completely baffled as to how he could speak to the head of the CIA if he was wanted for the massacre of twenty-three people.

 

He groaned and leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms out and then folding them behind his head. “I never talked to the FBI. I was actually packing up for that suicide mission when Rebecca's home phone rang. At first I didn't answer it, but they persisted, calling seven times straight. I finally picked up, and it was a CIA agent telling me they knew where Rebecca was if I was willing to do them a favor.”

 

“How did they find out where she was?” I asked, still curious as I walked around the room of the shack we were in. Through a ramshackle window I could see outside was blanketed in snow and darkened by a ceiling of gray clouds. Not quite the same beautiful day we had in D.C.

 

“Hell if I know. I didn't ask that much, I just did as they told. I figured that if they knew where I was, they wouldn't bother to trick me just to kill me; they could do that on their own power. So I went to the meeting place he described and they took me straight to the CIA h.q. so I could talk to the big man himself.”

 

“And your mission was to kill me?”

 

“You got it. Get rid of you, and save Rebecca on my own. If I survived, they would allow me to live in piece with her and my status as officially deceased would be upheld. It's not the greatest deal but it was the best they would give me, I didn't have too many other choices.” He looked down at the floor for awhile, as if pondering something important, most likely about the part of killing me. If he failed to do that, would they let him live in peace?

 

“So... looks like we've got the same goal now.” That broke his daze. He looked back up at me with a questioning gaze. “We've got to infiltrate that building and survive it. We can team up in order to save Rebecca, I'll find out the info I need and then we'll get the hell out of there. Once we get back to D.C., I'll bring your case straight to the President, and I'm sure he'll make sure your end of the bargain is upheld, even if I'm not dead. He and Hayden have a bit of a rivalry going, so he'll want to show him up more than he'll care about your seven-year-old sentence.”

 

Billy looked back at the ground, crouched over with his elbows on his knees and twiddling his thumbs slowly. “Heh, team up,” he said with a chuckle.

 

“What?”

 

“Nothing. Just reminded me of something, that's all.” He looked back up at me with a confident smirk on his face, then stood upright and held out his hand. “Rebecca comes before your mission, deal?”

 

I stuck out my hand to firmly grab his, though I found out through his rock solid grip that he was definitely as strong as he looked. “Deal. I'm used to these search and rescue things more than reconnaissance anyway.” As we finished shaking hands, he began walking towards the doorway of the small shack, opening it and revealing the two white snowmobiles Hunnigan had promised us.

 

“Well, let's not waste anymore time,” he said, leaving the door open for me. I walked out behind him, seeing that the camouflage and our bags were already set out separately on each snowmobile- he knew I was going to say yes all along. Of course, I didn't have too much of a choice, as this was pretty much my mission already, but I began to wonder just who was playing me. Who did I have to fear most? The President? Hayden? Billy? Wekser? My mind began to play out every scenario it could think of, and every single person was a possibility. I was beginning to think that no matter whether I came out of this facility alive or not, I was a dead man anyway. I could probably say the same for Billy; someone would eventually double-cross him for sure. We were both cornered by higher powers wanting us dead, and we had to accept what they were willing to give, if anything at all. I laughed softly to myself at how similar our situations seemed to be, even though our backgrounds seemed so much different. I had a feeling I was going to like this Billy guy after all.

 

We put on the white pants, coats, and helmets, which proved to be quite warm, thank God. The chill wasn't life-threatening, but it was definitely pretty damn cold. Billy hopped onto his snowmobile and I followed, each of us starting it and waiting for it to get warm.

 

“You ready, Kennedy?” he shouted over the revving of our engines.

 

I kindly gestured to him. “Your lead, Coen.”

 

And with that, we left on our seventy mile journey, both of us unsure of what was to come. We had absolutely no idea what we were getting ourselves into...

 

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