In Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, the Bakers were a normal, isolated family living on a ranch in Dulvey, Louisiana. Jack and Marguerite ran the property, their son Lucas was already a bit of a loner with a mean streak while their daughter Zoe seemed to want a normal life outside the family business.
Their lives changed forever on October 10, 2014, when Jack pulled a survivor out of a shipwreck near their home. The survivor’s name was Mia Winters. Not long after rescuing Mia, Jack found a second survivor; a bioweapon in the form of a little girl named Eveline.
As soon as Eveline was inside the Baker house, she used her Mold-based powers to infect the whole family. Jack and Marguerite were turned into her obedient, worshipping parents almost immediately. Zoe ran to the trailer out of fear only to be knocked unconscious by Eveline. The most Eveline could do was force Zoe not to leave the property or else the Mold would kill her. But she could never force Zoe into being her puppet like she did with her parents.
Lucas is a different story. He wasn’t living at the house full time by this point, but once The Connections (the shady organization behind Eveline’s creation) got word that their bioweapon had resurfaced, they reached out to him directly. By early 2015 they were supplying him with a serum that suppressed Eveline’s mental hold on him. While his parents were puppets and his sister was a prisoner, Lucas was a guy who chose to go along with all of it because it worked out for him.
Zoe kept a piece of herself despite having zero control over her situation. Lucas kept a piece of himself because he found a way to profit from the situation.
Lucas Sealed His Own Fate
Lucas spent almost three years playing along with Eveline while secretly working for The Connections.
- He helped experiment on the mold, which led to the creation of the WM series of Molded.
- He used his sister and the rest of the family’s suffering as cover for his own research.
- By June 2017 he’d been made lead researcher.
- He killed the other scientists working under him so he could have full control.
Around this same time, Blue Umbrella had picked up on Lucas contacting The Connections and brought in Chris Redfield to help track him down. In the Not a Hero DLC Chris chases Lucas, survives Lucas strapping a bomb to his chest, and setting a room on fire. When Chris finally catches him, Lucas transforms into a hulking mold monster. Chris kills him for good, destroying the data Lucas was trying to sell off in the process.
Zoe Tries to Save Everyone
Zoe’s arc runs the opposite direction. Trapped on the property and unable to leave without the mold killing her, she spent years secretly calling people who’d wandered onto the Baker land, trying to steer them toward safety and finding a cure. She guides Ethan Winters through most of the game when he shows up looking for Mia. She helps him track down the pieces needed to make a cure serum, while her family is actively hunting both of them.
But… there’s only enough serum for one person. Ethan uses it on Mia and promises to send help for Zoe. She stays behind, wanders into the swamp, and gets calcified by Eveline’s mold. She’s frozen in place for weeks.
End of Zoe continues from here. Her uncle Joe, who’s been living off the grid nearby, finds her still breathing but calcified. There is a drawn-out fight to get her a full dose of the cure while a horrifically mutated Jack keeps trying to stop them. Joe eventually kills Jack, and cures Zoe when Umbrella’s team, led by Chris, arrives. Ethan calls Zoe afterward to keep his promise.
Later, we find out Zoe went into quarantine, got a new identity, and started working as a rookie reporter in New Orleans. She never stopped digging into what happened to her family, and eventually tracked down information about The Connections. Mia sent her a letter about the birth of her daughter, Rosemary.
The Mirror Effect
Zoe and Lucas are basically a case study in how the same trauma can push people in opposite directions.
- Both kept some independence their infected parents lost entirely.
- Both had access to a way out through the serum or through The Connections.
- Zoe used her position to protect strangers who wandered into her family’s nightmare.
- Lucas used his position to protect and advance himself, at the cost of other people’s lives.
Lucas dies alone in a mine, hunted down after years of betrayal, with nothing left to show for it. Zoe survives, gets her life back, and spends her free time trying to help the people she couldn’t save sooner.
