The icy wind whipped across the cliffs of Rockfort Island, a relentless cut of salt and cold that felt like a personal affront. Chris Redfield’s gloves scraped against the weathered stone, his muscles burning with the strain of the climb. Each handhold was a victory, every upward pull fueled by a single, desperate thought: Claire.

It felt like a lifetime ago that he, Jill, Barry, and Rebecca had escaped the Spencer Mansion, the screams and the sight of Wesker’s betrayal seared into his memory. The sterile white of Raccoon General Hospital had been a brief, hollow respite. The real fight had begun the moment they’d tried to report the truth, only to be met by the smug dismissal in Chief Irons' eyes. The shutdown of S.T.A.R.S. had been a calculated blow, a corporate muzzle tightened by a corrupt cop.

The memory was a raw, open wound. He’d played the part of the hot-headed, disgraced cop to perfection. Shoving Elran against a locker had been easy; the rage was real, just misdirected for show. It had been a bitter pill to swallow, leaving Jill to face the fallout while he and Barry planned their move on Umbrella’s European headquarters. A necessary ruse to slip the leash Irons had placed on him.

Then came the email from Leon S. Kennedy. A name he knew only through Claire’s frantic messages after the Raccoon City disaster. Claire… captured… Rockfort Island. The words had rewired his entire existence in an instant. The G-Virus, the European headquarters, the grand conspiracy—it all dissolved into background noise. Europe could wait. Umbrella could wait. Claire couldn't.

Pulling himself over the final ledge, Chris crouched low, his breath misting in the frigid air. The compound below was a portrait of chaos. Distant alarms blared a dissonant rhythm against the roar of the wind, and spirals of black smoke coiled into the bruised twilight sky. The smell of smoke and decay hung thick and heavy—the sickeningly familiar signature of a T-Virus outbreak.

He moved like a wraith through the periphery, his training a second skin. Every shadow was an ally, every piece of debris a potential shield. His eyes scanned the patrol routes, now littered with the shambling forms of the infected and the static, unmoving shapes of uniformed bodies. He slipped past a burning jeep and rounded a collapsed wall, the flicker of a small, defiant flame catching his eye.

Tucked into a small alcove was a weary man, his security uniform torn and stained with blood. He sat hunched over a meager campfire, his breathing shallow but steady. He wasn’t infected, but he looked like a man who had stared into the abyss and was still waiting for it to stare back. This wasn’t an enemy; this was a survivor. This was a source.

Slowly, deliberately, Chris stepped out from the shadows. He made no sudden movements, keeping his hands visible. The man flinched, his eyes wide with a mixture of fear and exhaustion. Chris unclipped his handgun from its thigh holster, but instead of aiming, he secured it firmly in place, a clear gesture of non-aggression. He lowered himself to a crouch on the other side of the fire, the small flames dancing between them, a fragile truce in a world of monsters. He let the silence hang for a moment, letting the man see that he was just a man, not another nightmare.

"I'm looking for a young woman, around her early twenties with brown hair. Have you seen her?"