Chapter 53: Terse Reunion

Claire was a mess. Outwardly, she looked calm and composed but inwardly, she was the total opposite. Rick, her ex, the one guy she couldn’t forget after nearly seven years was standing a few feet away in front of her.

Gone was the young man a bit taller than she was, with a cute and a bit handsome face with a leaned and muscled body. In was the man. Absolutely gorgeous with broad shoulders, a foot taller than she was and dressed with a skin tight T-shirt displaying muscles so well chiseled that they could have been sculpted.

On one hand, Claire was more than very happy for him to be here. With Rick present, she knew their chances of all getting out of here alive shot up drastically and were perhaps greater than the odds of being infected or dying.

On the other hand, she didn’t want him to be here. When she had broken up with him all those years ago, she thought she could move on. She had been dead wrong and was still in love with him to this day. And while she thought of him many, many times during or after a date, her work gave her plenty of opportunity to not think about him.

Now that he was not just a foreign thought but real, in the flesh, her heart began to thunder in her chest. Especially since he was even more handsome than before. On top of that, he had just saved her life and proceeded to fight like a god of war, having chosen to descend into the mortal realm. It was a miracle her knees weren’t shaking from how hot watching Rick kill all those zombies had been. That reminded her of that time in Nest when he killed two lickers in a flash while saving her life.

“Hm… Leon, Claire, a kid… It’s like Raccoon City all over again. It’s just missing the fat corrupt bas—” Rick stopped when he saw Senator Davis. He looked him up and down then closed his eyes and sighed. “God, why do you hate me so much?” he muttered in defeat.

Claire couldn’t help herself and snorted but quickly schooled her features.

“It’s good to see you, Rick.” Leon walked forward and they exchanged a handshake. “Although I wonder what you’re doing here? The BSAA has not been authorized to intervene. The rangers are in charge.”

Rick grunted. “I'm technically not here as a BSAA agent. At least not for the outbreak. I was on my way home actually. That was until a plane went right through the Terminal. Barely got away in time but the structural damage locked me in the West Wing of the Airport. Been trying to find a way out ever since.”

He walked toward Claire, whose heart beat even faster, grabbed the handle of the fire axe and pulled it up. The zombie came with it and he shook it off with so much strength that at the first swing the zombie separated from the weapon.

Claire finally got herself under control. “Wait, you’ve been fighting zombies for the past four hours?”

“No,” Rick gave her a shake of the head and walked away. “I’ve been avoiding them as much as I could while looking for an exit that wouldn’t allow them to leave. I've been going in circles trying to lure them away so I could lock them up with one of those then get away.” He picked up a makeshift explosive from the bag on his back that Claired hadn’t noticed. “But one idiot fired a machine gun and attracted them all.” He glared murderously at the rangers with said weapons in hand. It was obvious who the responsible was with the sheepish look one had on their face. “What’s the plan?”

“Go through the lobby and get out.” Leon replied immediately.

Rick sighed again. “I guess I’ll take the lead then.”

“With what? An axe and fire hose?” The Senator chimed in condescendingly. He hadn’t liked the comment Rick made about him.

Only then Claire realized that Rick had dispatched a dozen zombies by cracking their head with the metal part of a hose.

“That’s more than enough. He killed half a dozen undead with a pencil once.” Leon retorted.

That surprised Rick. “Oh? How do you know about that?”

Claire stayed silent but wanted very much to know about that and the story. She knew first hand how resourceful Rick could be. The night they spent together in Raccoon City, their experience on Rockfort Island and at the Umbrella’s Antarctica base had allowed her to witness it many times.

Leon shrugged. “Some of your missions had been declassified. Mostly redacted but the way you dealt with B.O.W. is studied thoroughly in some circles.”

Rick wasn’t pleased to know about that. If some of his missions were available for any government agent to read then his secret regarding his abilities may very well be exposed. That was quite a threat he would have to deal with soon.

He took the lead. Axe firmly in hand while spinning in the other the hose. Because of the latter they were giving him a wide breadth. Not like anyone wanted to take points instead of him.

“Who’s that guy, really?”

Claire gave a side glance at the female ranger who was asking Leon. She’d like to know too. She hadn’t heard anything about Rick since their separation at their return to the United States back in late December of 98. To be truthful, she hadn’t wanted to know about what he was up to. Of course she knew he had been recruited for a Black Ops team for five years to avoid jail but beyond that was a mystery.

To learn he was part of the BSAA had been quite the shock. Her own older brother had founded the organization and never told her about it. Not like she expected him to suddenly blurt it out like a hair in the soup but at least in passing during a conversation. Chris and Rick were well acquainted after all and she had history with him.

‘To be fair, I probably wouldn’t have listened.’

Breaking up with Rick had been for the best. Claire still believed it to this day despite how much it hurt her to do so. The less she knew about him, the better.

Leon’s answer was composed as always. “He’s the foremost expert in viral outbreak in the world. If he gives you advice or orders you to do something, you better listen, it may save your life.”

“But he’s like… twenty or something.”

“He’s a survivor of Raccoon city too.” Claire chimed in. “And he was seventeen.” She didn’t like Rick’s skills to be doubted. It felt wrong to her, even though she didn’t know why.

“Not even his first outbreak.” Leon added.

“Damn.” The woman muttered.

“You done putting me on a pedestal?” Rick's voice came from the front. He didn’t even bother turning around to face them when he spoke with a flat and non-chalant tone. “‘Cause your voices echo and it’s giving up our location.”

‘Still a jerk.’ Claire thought as everyone shut up.

They continued down a corridor without encountering any undead. It opened to the balcony of the West Terminal where the plane had crashed. From Rick’s perspective it was a miracle that the plane hadn’t exploded on impact.

“Alright,” He whispered loud enough for people to hear him. “We’re going on top of the plane to slide down. Be careful there might be more of them inside of it.”

Leon used the flashlight under his gun to have a look at the ground and there were a lot of zombies wandering aimlessly. The space available was so big, however, that moving around them to get out wouldn’t be that difficult.

“Got a knife on you?” Rick asked him while looking at the zombies.

“Nope.”

Rick thought about a plan of action for a moment then sighed. He turned around and tossed his bag at Claire. “There are two grenades left and three molotovs. Use a lighter to ignite them. You have five seconds before the latter explodes.” He cracked his neck and jumped down below.

The loud thud he made when he landed wasn’t missed by the undead and he heard moans, grunts and movements from inside the plane. He shared the information with Leon with a few hand signs and moved forward towards the zombies out in the open, attracted by the sound he made.

The first that came in striking distance was decapitated by a swing of the axe, the next got its leg shopped off and fell to the ground where its head was turned to paste by a stomp of Rick’s foot. It was when he killed his fifth one that gunfire began to echo from behind him. Moving to his sixth, he heard people getting down from the second floor in a hurry and more gunfire, followed by two successive explosions.

‘Claire must have blocked some entry point,’ he thought to himself.

He trusted her to act as she saw fit. To make the right decision for everyone’s survival. If she had used the grenades, making even more noise than simple gunshots then it meant she had no choice. He had no doubt about that.

From the corner of his eyes, as he down his tenth undead, he saw the Senator running away on his own. The man had needed help to move up until now for a sprained ankle and now he was running without difficulty for his life.

Rick knew the man wouldn’t risk his life like this without insurance. That was the kind of person politicians were. They didn’t move if it was risky for them so they used others instead. Either as a proxy or a diversion. Turning his head to have a look, he saw what he had done.

Claire was surrounded by zombies while standing protectively next to the little girl she had been taking care of. Away from the rest of the group. Stomping down his rage at the Senator for using a young child as bait to get away, Rick threw his axe Right onto the nearest undead about to attack Claire. The weapon hit the back so hard that the bio-weapon fell on its face. Claire didn’t hesitate for a second, she grabbed the handle, pulled out the axe and swung it down to sever the neck of her attacker.

Now with Claire armed, Rick felt reassured as he dodged a grab. He paid no more attention to his ex, knowing she’d had everything in hand, and began using his hose like a slungshot. When Captain Walker had told him Queen would teach him how to use one, he had given her a flat look. He didn’t need anyone to know how to use a slingshot.

Queen had laughed and corrected him on how a slungshot was a different weapon than a slingshot by simply swinging it at him and nearly taking his head off in the process. In the end it has been quite difficult to learn but very useful. With every building having a fire hose, he just needed to find one to be armed.

Of course it only worked at maximum usefulness when the space available was quite wide. In a narrow corridor, he couldn’t spin the hose as freely and was limited by forward and backward movement. Here? In an airport terminal? Rick could easily use it at full strength.

More and more undead were coming into the terminal but it was alright, everyone was almost out and began to retreat. Rick covered for everyone and was the last one to leave through the entrance door, Claire throwing the last molotov she had had right behind him to slow down his pursuers.

Rangers were at the ready. Assault rifles against a shoulder, they were aiming at any stragglers that would try to get out of the airport. Rick hoped they had been briefed about shooting the B.O.W. in the head as he was directed by a soldier toward the quarantine camp, his eyes searching for Claire.