Chapter Text
Uncle Albert would always tell the best stories about his grand adventures that you guessed most of was half-told by the looks your mother would give him halfway through, you’d only see him three times a year. Once during Christmas, another time during thanksgiving, and lastly your birthday where he would give you something dumb like a bag of marbles because he has no idea what to give a child. However, you enjoy everything he gives you, always taking good care of it and even boating about it at school, no matter how many of your friends didn’t care. He was like the drunk uncle that only came to family functions to drink and tell stories of his youth, however he was only in his thirties.
Your mother had no idea why you drifted towards him more than her, your parent. She didn’t like Uncle Wesker and always used a sour or flat tone when she talked with him or about him, the talks were never anything nice and you wondered what happened to make her resent him so much. Albert never seemed to notice and if he did, he had never mentioned it to you or anybody else that you knew.
You called him when you were upset and Albert had dropped everything to listen to you rant about every unfairness in the world, although he may not have understood all of it completely or at all. All he cared about is that you felt better. However, he had no idea how to care for a child, so most of his advice meant nothing at all; he loved you enough to try though, which is what counts. Albert, unfortunately, was raised in a lab with hundreds of other children for the W-Project. Your mother, [NOT SET], was also a test subject of the W-Project but was a failure. She had gone through all of the symptoms but never showed superhuman traits. So eventually she was let go, found your father, he was deployed in Raccoon City for the summer, they were married quickly and had you. He died in combat when you were a child, you didn’t remember him much, just the glimmer of his eyes. Albert wasn’t that lucky, he showed perfect superhuman abilities. Him and your uncle Alex worked at Umbrella corp. until he had passed away as well.
You knew none of the superhuman abilities or the W-Project. Your mother never told you out of fear and trauma she had experienced and she wanted to keep you away from all that. She had told your uncle Albert in private to never speak of his abilities either or he would end up having zero contact with her child. He was angry but complied.
Albert Wesker didn't know what love is, he had no parental figures to teach him how to love. Although he felt it, he called it “fascination to the utmost degree.” Which your mother hated, she thought that it sounded demeaning and she’d told him many times that it sounded like he’s telling her child that he was a test subject. Though, you never had a problem with it. It was like a jumbled way of him telling you that he loved you.
Every family member has their secrets. You always suspected that uncle Wesker’s glasses had something to do with his. He never took off the black shades even at night, when you were younger, maybe seven or eight, you tried to tackle him and take them off. Albert dodged last second, causing an accident like you needing to get stitches that one time; you had gone to jump from the steps in front of your house and onto your uncle when he had stepped away at the last second, leaving you to land on a sharp stone. Your mother was furious but you were happy that you got a gnarly scar on your eyebrow.
Albert had waited till the next time he saw you to apologize, your mother had let her wrath rain down on her brother unbeknownst to you. He had explained to her it was only reflex and he never meant to intentionally hurt his nephew. However, your mother still threatened him, which infuriated Albert. His cold anger had frozen the room as he listened silently to his sister-by-lab growl warnings at him and chewed him out over and over.
After the argument, Albert had let you crawl over him. You remember him smelling faintly of leather, and deodorant; it was a cozy scent and you remember falling asleep to him telling stories multiple times. He did still keep you away from the glasses, gently took your hands off of them when you grabbed or just shook you off gently when you kept at it. You slowly learned that some secrets are left secrets for a reason.
Your mother never let you go to Umbrella with Wesker when he had invited you, always had reacted to it with anger and exasperation. You had never understood why. When you asked her she gave you a chilly look with her green eyes, you never asked about it again. It was a pharmaceutical company, not some kind of testing facility.
The very first time you had heard uncle Wesker be angry was on your tenth birthday, he had gotten an important call and stepped out to take it. The rest of your family, your father’s side, were too busy talking to really notice you slip away to listen. He was speaking urgently of something that started with a U, his usual pleasant semi-deep voice was gritty as he hissed into the mic. You had expected the call to go on for longer, but Albert unexpectedly hung up and spun around before you could hide. Uncle Wesker’s expression switched from shock to almost pure rage in just a few seconds. His mouth turned up in a grimace and you could almost feel his eyes pierce into you like knives touching your skin. You turned and ran to your mother, Albert followed closely behind, his rage billowed off him in invisible clouds. Your mother immediately saw what was happening and stood up, family members watched as Albert raised his voice at you for the very first time. Your mother moved in between the two of you as you had cried. Your mother was too furious for words, just letting her silence talk for itself. Finally, uncle Wesker got the memo and left, slamming the door viciously behind him.
You waited an impatient week to call him. Your mother was standing nearby to monitor what was happening. He didn’t answer immediately, almost like he was contemplating on answering; it wasn’t a great feeling, it had made you feel like you fucked up more than you meant to. On the fifth ring, he picked up, sounding weary. You held back tears as you profusely apologized to him for eavesdropping and begged for his forgiveness, your mother shook her head at this, Albert eventually sighed and hung up.
Feeling broken, you set the phone back up on its base and headed to your room. Your favorite person in the world hadn’t forgiven you for a mistake and at that age, it felt like the end of the world. Not even your mother could console your hurting, no matter how many hugs and reassuring words she gave.
Late into the night, you woke up to hear your mother’s raised voice on the phone, saying that you didn't know any better and explaining how depressed you were, even though she hadn’t ever liked him, she told him that you loved him more than any father figure and ignoring you would break you.
You scurried back to your room as she hung up. You hugged one of your pillows, teary eyed once again. You couldn’t get his anger out of your head, you understood you did something wrong by listening to his conversation but you had never anticipated the rage that came with it. You had just managed to fall asleep when you heard the front door open, followed by heavy boots hitting the linoleum. The sound echoed throughout your mind, waking up your half-asleep mind like someone had flipped a light switch.
Your mother was up first, inevitably sensing something was amiss in her household. She made eye contact with you as she passed your door, shotgun in hand. Almost immediately, you heard her audibly say something and sigh angrily. You heard the muffled voices of the mystery person and your mother. Eventually, you heard her agree to something.
Suddenly, uncle Wesker’s silhouette blocked the hallway light into your room and you could swear that you saw two faint glowing red orbs behind those shades of his. Your uncle stepped inside of your room, turning on your light, literally blinding you for a second. He looked disheveled and you asked if he was okay, forgetting you had just gotten yelled at by him the day before. He let a small smile crack through his stone-faced mask and knelt down on one knee. You hugged him, uncle Wesker took a few moments before hugging you back. He never got hugs from anybody but you, so that moment had been special for him, though he would never tell anybody.
Your mother told you once that Uncle Wesker once had a wife and a son. When his son was only three, his wife left him an unknown reason, your father’s side of the family had started the rumor that she was cheating on him; you suspected it was only to bug your uncle. Though, it never visibly did.
You had thought it was sad, uncle Wesker never deserved the hurt he had been through. You didn’t realize until after he was gone that he thought of you as his own. This was proven when you turned seventeen. A few months in, you started to get aggressive. Your entire personality changed, you were angry and emotionally unstable. Your mother had absolutely no idea what to do, you would go from fine to destroying dishes and furniture in under minutes. You would get splitting migraines and extreme muscle cramps. The final straw for your mother was right before you almost went absolutely batshit crazy, you were much taller than her now, almost 6ft which was both unnatural for both sides of your family. Before you could lose control, your eyes felt like they exploded in your skull and you fell to the ground in pain. The pain was so great that you passed out.