Resident Evil: The Sitcom (RE8 Sitcom Au)

Part 4:

Ethen watched them in the rear view mirror as they eagerly buckled in either side of Rose. She'd stopped wailing at this point. A goggle eyed look of curiosity plastered across her chubby face, she looked up the new passengers, mumbling in baby language. Blonde up-front next to Ethen, giving him the squished, closed-mouth white-person-smile.

Ethen turned unto the road that led deeper into the maze of houses. "Where am I taking you?"

"Oh no, you're gonna want to head uphill." Said the one with jet-black hair.

The car moaned to a halt. Ethen turned around in his seat, "You're kidding me..."

"Wish we were!" piped Danny, "Guess you really don't need the address, huh?" 

"If you kids are bullshitting me you're getting left on the side of the road." Ethen knew it was a hollow threat. They all did. He couldn't hold any malice against three dropouts underdressed for  the weather. Even if they were trying to pull something, the mansion on the hill's lights were on. They wouldn't freeze to death at the least.

Danny continued, "it's really not as cool once you're inside. The basement is unfinished and we've been begging mom for a pool for-EVER."

"Who's we?" 

Hair Dye and Danny continued to bicker as Ethen traced the spiraling switchbacks to Manor Dimitrescu. With all the fuss of housing arrangements, moving in, getting Rose settled, and taking his own bearings, he hadn't had enough brain space to process the historical oddities this town possessed. Disused mines were common enough in rural America, but a manor that held more resemblance to a castle than any kind of modern home was something else. 

Pulling up to the massive wrought iron gates, Blonde cranked down the window and waved at a mounted security camera. The car inched forward as the pneumatic gates swung back silently.

Ethen turned around to face the girls again, "Alright, time to go." 

"Thank you, Mr. Winters!"

"Yeah thanks, Mr. Winters."

"Thank you."

Ethen gripped the wheel as the girls slammed the doors behind them and watched as they padded through the snow to the manor's double doors. 

"Weird kids, huh?"

Rose babbled in response.

"Exactly. Time to go home, huh?"

As he shifted, something deep within the bowls of the elderly car clunked ominously. 

"Uh oh..."

Rose kicked her legs and babbled. Ethen tried shifting back to D, but the stick stopped halfway and something expensive and mechanical crunched.

"Fuck...don't repeat that I don't want that being your first word." 

He slumped back in his seat, pulling out the keys and looking up at the house straight out of a period drama, windows warm and inviting, promising all a near-frostbitten man could desire. Ethen let out his breath, "Time to meet the neighbors..."