[TWD x Resident Evil] — Chapter 538 - A Specific Identity Granted by the Spacetime Fusion?

The helicopter rotors chopped through the air in a steady, rhythmic thud.

Chris Redfield sat by the window, his gaze fixed on the terrain below.

The flight path had veered away from the Arklay Mountains, angling toward an abandoned highway in northern Georgia.

Word that Rebekah was alive had gone through the cabin like a pressure valve releasing. The tension bled out of everyone's shoulders.

"Brad, keep a sharp eye on that navigation."

Chris raised his voice over the rotor noise.

"Relax. I could find it blindfolded."

Brad kept his eyes on the green glow of the instrument panel.

Jill Valentine laid her tactical rifle across her knees and pulled her seatbelt snug. She stared out at the endless, empty wilderness below.

"Rebekah's got some serious luck. Out of contact that long, and she's still breathing."

"That said — she told us to steer clear of Wesker. We need to get our story straight before we land."

"Forget the politics. She's alive. That's all that matters." Chris leaned back against the cabin wall and exhaled slowly.

"Speaking of which — you remember that odd business back at the department?"

Jill turned her head.

"Right before the squad expanded. The system flagged us a trainee officer for assignment."

Chris gestured vaguely.

"Sharp photo in the file. Perfect scores across the board. Name was Leon."

"I remember him." Jill nodded.

"Never showed up. Just ghosted us entirely."

"Exactly. I dug around afterward — turns out he went off to be a prison guard."

"Georgia Correctional Facility." Chris curled his lip. "A perfectly good SWAT slot, and he goes off to babysit hardened convicts. I genuinely don't understand how these new kids think."

"You think he got his head filled up by too many gangster movies?"

Jill shrugged. "That was his call."

"Either way, the world being what it is now, nowhere around here is safe except Fort Benning. Hope he made it."

"The Georgia Correctional Facility isn't that far off our current flight path, actually."

"Once we pick up Rebekah, on the return leg," Chris set his rifle muzzle-down and settled it against the seat. "I wouldn't mind swinging past. See if that prison's still standing."

---

At the abandoned highway junction, the scene was quiet.

A fertilizer plant, shut down long before the world ended. The rusted tin roof panels shuddered and clanged in the wind.

Leon stood beside a dust-caked forklift, a cigarette held loosely between two fingers, the black tactical pullover making him look like a shadow that hadn't bothered to move.

Rebekah was a few paces off, swallowed inside an oversized coat, hands stuffed in her pockets. Every so often she glanced up at the sky.

Wide open sightlines in every direction. A good spot for a meet.

"Are they going to come?" She kicked at a piece of gravel with the toe of her shoe.

"They'll come." Leon rolled the cigarette slowly between his fingers. "Probably already in the air."

Then the sound arrived, a low, growing roar bleeding through from behind the cloud cover.

There they were.

The wind hit hard as the helicopter descended, kicking up dirt and dead leaves in swirling sheets. The landing gear pressed down onto cracked asphalt with a heavy thump.

The cabin door banged open. Chris Redfield dropped out first, boots hitting the ground in one clean motion.

Jill Valentine landed right behind him.

Both had their guns up, sweeping the area with practiced calm, and then they saw Rebekah's face. The muzzles came down.

"Rebekah!" Chris crossed the distance in a few long strides.

Rebekah moved to meet him, eyes already going red at the edges.

"You're okay. You're okay." Chris gripped her shoulder and looked her over, a quick, thorough check. All limbs present. No obvious damage.

Jill stepped in and pulled her into a hug.

The reunion settled. And then, almost without thinking, both of their gazes shifted to the man still leaning against the forklift.

Straight-backed. Still. The black tactical gear traced the outline of something built for violence. No weapon visible anywhere on him, and somehow that made it worse. There was a weight to the way he stood, the particular ease of a man who'd come out the other side of things most people didn't survive.

Chris studied his face.

A few seconds passed. His eyes went wide.

He knew that face.

Harder than the file photo. Colder around the edges. But the bone structure, the features, identical.

"Leon?"

The name came out before he could stop it.

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