Alfred Ashford: the Mad Commander of Rockfort Island in Code: Veronica

Alfred Ashford is the commander of Umbrella's base on Rockfort Island and the first villain Claire Redfield meets in Resident Evil Code: Veronica. He's vain, cruel and losing his grip, and he shares the island with what looks like his twin sister, Alexia. She isn't there. The "Alexia" stalking the Ashford residence is Alfred himself. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

The Ashford twins#

The Ashfords were one of Umbrella's founding families. Alfred boasts about it to Claire the first time they meet: his grandfather, he says, was one of the original founders of Umbrella. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

By the time of the twins' birth, the family's standing had slipped, and their father Alexander set out to bring back the family's greatest mind by recreating Veronica Ashford from her DNA. The project gave him twins. Alexia was everything he'd wanted. Alfred was a by-product, never her equal, and he worshipped her. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

Alfred's diary, found in the Antarctic base, shows how the family came apart. In 1983 he worked out how to open a sealed room in the facility using the three Ashford jewels, and inside found the secret of how he and Alexia had been born. He writes that he hated his father, that they had been made to cover up Alexander's failure, and that with Alexia beside him he had nothing to fear. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

The twins then used Alexander as the first human test of Alexia's new t-Veronica virus. It failed. He became an uncontrollable monster, and they chained him in an underground cell. Alexia decided to take the virus herself and sleep for fifteen years while it settled. Alfred's last entry is that she was going to sleep trusting him, and that now he alone could protect her. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

Rockfort Island#

Fifteen years later Alfred was the commander of Rockfort, an Umbrella base with a prison camp and a training facility, and he ran it with cruelty. Prisoners were tortured and executed, and the files around the island make his reputation clear. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

Away from his men, he lived in a private residence across the valley, and he was never quite alone there. Claire overhears him in conversation with "Alexia", who tells him to stay focused because the enemy is only a little girl. Alfred apologises and promises to restore the Ashford name and make her its master. It's a two-person scene with one person in it. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

Hunting Claire#

Claire had been caught raiding an Umbrella lab in Paris and shipped to Rockfort just before commandos attacked it and the t-Virus spread. Alfred decided the two things were connected. Catching her in his scope in the residence hall, he accused her of letting herself be captured so she could lead her people to the base. Claire had no idea what he was talking about, and she mocked him for commanding such a backwater post. He told her she was a rat in a cage and promised to keep her entertained before he got rid of her. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

From then on he and "Alexia" played with Claire and Steve Burnside, sniping at them and setting traps. The pretence fell apart in Alfred's bedroom, where Claire and Steve chased a blonde woman and were jumped by Alfred, dressed as her. Claire realised there had never been an Alexia on the island at all, and Steve asked whether he really thought he was two people. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

Alfred answered by setting the island's facilities to self-destruct, releasing a Tyrant to finish off survivors and escaping in a Harrier. When Claire and Steve got away in a cargo plane, he took over its autopilot and sent them to Umbrella's base in Antarctica. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

How Alfred dies#

The Antarctic base was already overrun when they arrived, because planes from Rockfort had carried the outbreak there. Alfred caught Claire again with his rifle and told her to think again if she believed she was safe. Steve shot him. Alfred fell to the floor below, and when he tried to get up, the floor beneath him broke away. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

He wasn't finished. As Claire and Steve ran for a snow vehicle, the dying Alfred dragged himself to the cryogenics lab, swore he wouldn't forget Claire, and started the thaw. His last words were for Alexia, finally awake. Moments later her tentacles overturned the snow vehicle and dragged Claire and Steve back inside. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)

Alexia wasn't grateful. The Darkside Chronicles, which retells the game's story, has her complain that her brother couldn't even wake her on time, then add: "But, I've released him of all his responsibilities." The original leaves him dying as she wakes; the retelling suggests she finished him off. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica; Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles)

Alexia's own fate, and Chris Redfield's fight with her, are on her page and in the Code: Veronica story guide. (Resident Evil Code: Veronica)