Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

To tell you the truth, I even thought about ending it - several times, actually - with just a quick bullet to the head. But I didn't give up.

The violence of the nightmare had Leon lurching awake on the floor of some shithole shack in the middle of rural Spain, his clothes still soaked and making him shiver, his body aching like he’d been hit by either a truck or some god forsaken water monster that wanted to swallow him whole. The irony wasn’t lost on Leon, nor was the gravity of the situation as he caught sight of his own blood still staining the leather of his left-hand glove.

After everything— all of the hell he’d survived, all of the pain, the abuse and trauma. After all of that, he was going to die here, on what should have been a simple rescue op, thousands of miles away from Sherry, surrounded by cultist freaks that claimed he had the same blood. No way to fight it, no weak point to shoot, not villain to topple down and beat. After everything Leon had been through, some bullshit disease or whatever was going to be what killed him, and that—

Really fucking pissed him off.

After fucking everything and it was his own body that quit on him? Why couldn’t it have done that years ago, back when he’d been a kid? Why couldn’t his body have given up before he’d been shoved into this bullshit world of B.O.W.s? Why come this far only to quit now?

He scowled and used some of that anger welling in his chest that never really went away to give himself the energy to peal himself off the floor and stand on shaky legs. Dying or not, he had shit to do. It wasn’t like he hadn’t lived every day expecting to end up a corpse. Maybe, if he was lucky, one of these cultists would actually get an axe in his skull before the disease got him. Even though Leon didn’t want one of these assholes to have the pleasure of killing him, whatever was in his body seemed painful, and dying slowly seemed like the worse way to go.

Leon’s communicator crackled with static, telling him Hannigan was trying to reach him. Leon didn’t know what to think about the serious woman with the red rimmed glasses. He figured he’d been given a handler because the President wanted to keep tabs on Leon after the Krauser incident two years ago, when the special ops soldier had gone missing after being discharged for his injuries and Leon had ended up being the last person to see him alive. It probably seemed suspicious for Leon to have been seeking out the man despite only having known him for a single op, but— that had been one hell of an op in its own way.

The matching blade Leon had burned a hole in his mind and he knew that somewhere out there, Krauser had the other to the set. Call him sentimental, but Leon was pretty tired of being abandoned so flippantly. He clung to what little he had left. The communicator sounded again and Leon scowled at himself for thinking so much before pulling it from his waist pocket— relieved to find it wasn’t waterlogged beyond use— and answered.

“Leon, it’s been six hours since our last transmission,” came Hannigan’s voice, human and almost a relief to hear. Leon had underestimated how jarring this assignment would be. “I was starting to get worried.”

“Don’t you mean lonely?” Leon teased before he could think twice. Flirting was basically the healthiest way he could handle his pounding heart rate from that nightmare he’d woken up from. What had it even been? There had been something in his veins, something that made his eyes red like a monster. God, should he even tell her? If Hannigan was his handler because Leon’s abilities were in question, maybe it was a bad idea to instill anymore doubt with him possibly having contracted a deadly disease. Bare minimum at best, don’t mention the blood. “Anyway, I— started to feel dizzy. Then I guess I must have lost consciousness.”

“Lost consciousness?” Hannigan repeated with a twist to her brow. “Maybe that has some connection to what the village chief was talking about…?”

Leon grimaced, hoping she was wrong. “Hmph. Can’t say. But I’m alright now.” Fucking hardly. “I’m gonna continue my mission.”

“Leon—”

He tucked the communicator away before she could finish and told himself that as long as he got Ashley Graham home safe, a few white lies about his wellbeing wouldn’t matter.

It was raining outside, the heavy drops hammering on the roof above his head and dulling his auditory senses. He’d be able to afford some stealth with this rain, but it also meant the cultists of Los Illuminados would have any easier time sneaking up on him as well. Leon searched the small shack quickly, finding a letter that didn’t have a name beneath the words scribbled. Leon could only assume it was from that Luis Sera, the flirting Spaniard that had said he was an ex-cop. Judging by the note, Leon wouldn’t put his money on finding a Luis Sera in the local law enforcement system. He seemed to know a lot about what was going on, like where Ashley would be and what was needed to find her, some fucker called “El Gigante,” which wasn’t hard to figure out the meaning of, and even what was making Leon so sick. Luis thought he couldn’t help Leon. Did that mean it was truly fatal?

Leon steeled his jaw and resolved not to think about it. “God bless,” Luis had wrote to him. “If I could help you, I would.” Something about the man made Leon nervous simply because he knew he wasn’t being told the full story. And if there was one thing Leon hated the most, it was having important details hidden from him out of some bullshit need to protect him. Like keeping Leon in the dark had ever saved him before. He searched the last of the shack and found some handgun ammo and left it at that, ducking out into the heavy rain with a grimace. He had a feeling he was going to miss being dry by the end of tonight. He wished he still had his jacket, wished he could get warm. Being cold was basically the worst thing for him these days. It didn’t help that he’d wasted six fucking hours and the sun was down.

Leon huffed and told himself he could call himself a piece of shit later. For now, he followed the path that led between some shorter cliff sides, eyes warily up in case the cultists decided to drop another boulder on him. The superhuman strength they were showing, coupled with heightened pain tolerance against being shot, had him worrying that this really was another B.O.W. shit fest he was getting himself into. The T-virus just wouldn’t leave him alone.

There was a shout ahead, Castilian and useless for Leon. He brought up the Samurai Edge “Rot” and held it at eye level, inwardly betting on how many shots to the face it would take to put this old man down, when—

The man’s head burst open, holy shit, his entire skull just cracked and blew apart, tentacles whipping wildly from his neck, the man still walking forward like he was somehow alive. The squirming mass of flesh reached for Leon and Leon almost couldn’t move for a moment by how absolutely disgusted he was. “Guess it’s fucking something,” he muttered to himself before sending three slugs into what had once been the man’s face and cursing when it did next to nothing. He had a shotgun and a rifle across his back, but limited ammo for both and no idea if it would even work. The thing stumbled closer, arms outstretched along with the hungry tentacles. Leon didn’t have a lot of time to think this through. If it was a shot to the head that took out the T-Virus, he was sure a shot to the head extended beyond just Umbrella’s shit. And Umbrella was supposed to be gone, the newly-instated BSAA had ensured that with the Umbrella trials, so what the fuck was this?

Leon could find answers later. Spray was good for how close this thing was getting, but Leon wanted to decimate the thing before it could get its hands on him. He brought the rifle around, prayed that the .223 caliber bullet would be enough to stop it. Lining the sights of a rifle so close had Leon terrified of missing. The tentacles were so close that the force of their writhing disturbed Leon’s hair. He let out a breath and pulled the trigger, beyond relieved when the eldritch horror was shredded and the body of what had once been a man dropped to the ground, actually lifeless this time.

Then there was a shout from beyond, further down the chasm, another cultist advancing. Leon moved the sights of the rifle smoothly and shot that fucker as well, but as the bullet tore through the skull, the same thing as what had happened to the first happened again. The cranium busted open, tentacles and something like a scorpion’s tale bursting from the mess of flesh and bone, sharp brambles and claws swiping out at Leon like it wanted to make sushi out of him. Leon grimaced, really not liking the looks of the situation he was falling into headfirst, and put another bullet into the mass. At least the rifle was looking like a reliable way to take these things down. The second man dropped to the ground, head gone, dead as he deserved to be. Leon forced himself to breathe easy and moved on.

“Oh god dammit.”

It really did look like the customary B.O.W. shit, puzzles and mazes included. From what he could tell, this was some complicated shipping station, goods and supplies being sent downriver in crates and to be collected here. That, or people really like the aesthetic of a good bridge system next to a waterfall. Leon grimaced as he surveyed the area and found no hostiles, just annoying steps. The way he needed to go was behind the waterfall, the bruising strength of the waterfall itself acting as a gate. There seemed to be a dam above the waterfall itself with pulley systems leading from levers that Leon could reach, but really, how was this efficient?

As he moved across the rickety walkways to reach the levers, he wondered just why the fuck someone would put this much effort into getting beneath a waterfall. There was something important, sure, but what if time was of the essence? Kind of like how it was now. As Leon got both the levers and fought down the annoyance that was burning in his chest, he reminded himself to have a word with whoever was behind this hell and find out just where they got off on making shit complicated.

The water dropping down from the cliff slowed and came to a stop, opening the way for Leon— and a bunch of cultists running out from the cave, pitchforks and axes included, all of them heading for Leon in a funnel on the walkway. As Leon whipped out the shotgun and sent them all into the waters below, he fought down the paranoia of not having someone at his back.

He’d been struggling with the anxiety of that since the beginning of this op, to be fair, after his police escort had been pushed off a cliff by these insane people. After being brought into USSTRATCOM, Leon had forced himself to accept the idea of being alone for a lot of his operations from now on. He was a sole operative with a certain level of experience and training that made him a solo act, simply to cut back on risk and cost, and to centralize reward. If Leon failed and ended up dead as could be, then they’d find someone else, maybe reach out to BSAA, maybe get someone better. As long as they sent people in one at a time, there wasn’t much to lose.

Still.

Leon— didn’t like being alone. He knew how to do it, he was used to it by now, but the previous knowledge of knowing what it was like to have someone at his back or at his front that he could rely on made it hard to be comfortable with the cards he’d been dealt today. He’d do it alone, he had to do it alone, but he wished he had someone with him. Maybe if Krauser had stuck around, or maybe Chris—

A crack of thunder tore Leon from the unpleasant memories and he suddenly became aware that he was surrounded by bodies and running water, the cave opening waiting expectantly for him, the darkness reaching for him like it knew Leon already had plenty of that emptiness inside of him. Come inside and be accepted, it’s all doom and gloom until the day he dies. Leon grimaced and went into the cave, just glad to be out of the rain for the moment.

According to Luis Sera, heading this way was supposed to help him find something that would get him to the church, to Ashley Graham, the poor girl that was probably scared out of her mind. It occurred to Leon that she may have contracted the same disease Leon had. He prayed that wasn’t the case. He wasn’t a doctor and was already resigning himself to succumb to the blood that was filling his lungs. If he had to handle a dying President’s daughter on top of a new B.O.W. and his own impending death, he really would be out of his skillset.

The cave was more of a tunnel, maybe a mine, manmade and littered with candles that set a hilariously overdramatic mood. The end of the tunnel brought him to some fucking complicated door that had a round insignia atop it, the messed up cross that Leon was sure was connected to the cult. As he took it from the door and the door swung up, Leon radioed Hannigan, figuring she could give him something.

“I’ve obtained an object that resembles the cult group’s insignia,” he told Hannigan once her stern face appeared on the screen.

“Wonderful, Leon,” she replied with an edge of sarcasm that had Leon feeling a little tired. What would it take for one of these government assholes to realize Leon was human and doing his fucking best, jesus christ. “Head back to the church. Ashley’s safety is our immediate priority.”

She ended the transmission and Leon felt like he’d been slapped. Did she really think he didn’t know that? Why would he have told her about the insignia if he didn’t think it would lead to Ashley somehow? Leon scowled and put away the communicator, deciding he wouldn’t look to her for anything more than necessary from now on. He grit his teeth and went through the passage the door had given him, wanting to punch someone when he saw the boat at the end of a dock. “Isn’t one water monster enough per op?” he asked no one, mainly himself, just wanting god to know that Leon was tired of his shit. He dropped into the boat and hated the fog that was limiting his sight in front of him, hating the feeling of heading into the unknown blind. He was grateful as hell when the ride proved to be short and he jumped onto another dock a ways down this cavern river.

Leon held Rot up as he looked around corners of this waterside shack, distantly thinking this place needed a doleful banjo tune to complete the vibe he was getting. There was blue light from around a wall. Leon whipped around the edge and aimed his sights on—

Oh great, this guy.

“Got something that might interest ya!” the man announced in his vaguely-Australian accent. Leon would give anything to see the man’s face, the purple bandana with the cuts of white through it guarding more than just what this man looked like. For all Leon knew, the most human thing about him could be the eyes. And with the way this village was turning out to be, it wouldn’t surprise Leon to discover this man was as much a weapon as the things he sold, rather than a person. Still— he had a really good selection on him from what Leon had seen.

Leon ran a hand through his wet hair as he approached this— stall that the strange man was behind, blue flames burning hot, the man holding open his coat. Leon looked him over and decided he was going to give the guy a name. Leon liked to think he was pretty good at naming things— Matilda, Matchelangelo, Rot— and settled on Fish. “Fuck it, Shit Happens.” The man was obviously just as fucked up as the rest of the townspeople, and Leon was pretty sure he’d seen his eyes glow a telling red once, but he couldn’t give a crap if he was dealing with the enemy. Fish had guns and ammo and upgrades and Leon needed all of the above.

“You got any dry clothes back there?" he asked Fish, pulling on one of his disarmingly boyish smiles. “If these psychos don’t kill me, the pneumonia will.”

Fish might have grinned beneath the bandana, might not have, Leon didn’t know. “Unfortunately, I tend to deal with the nastier side of the business. Extending your life beyond a way to defend yourself with bullets isn’t my forte.”

“Can’t blame a guy for trying.” Leon looked at the back of the stalls, saw the weapons and ammo and bizarre myriad of local items that he honestly couldn’t give a shit about. “You still got the TMP lying around?”

Fish ducked low, reaching into his overcoat, and then whipped the gun out from where it had been hidden with a flourish, raising the weapon to the ceiling like it was a holy relic. “The Steyr TMP,” the man said in his gravelly voice. “Taking custom nine-by-nineteen Parabellum. Stock and M68 Aimpoint sight available for purchase as well. I take it you have a few people you want to take out quickly, eh? Firing from the hip will get a good spray and pray result, but the stock will allow more securing firing and better aim. Regardless, this beauty is the best for when you want the job done fast and fatally.”

Leon liked this guy’s style. He pulled out the amount for the asking price— distantly wondering when he’d become cool with corpse robbing— and held the TMP with a sort of relief. He loved his Samurai Edge, don’t get him wrong, and the rifle and shotgun were his saving grace, but the satisfaction of an automatic, quick fire weapon was irreplaceable. “You’ve always done me right, Fish,” Leon told the merchant, who cocked his head but didn’t comment on the name. “Maybe I’ll see you again.”

Fish cackled. “Way out’s back there and up the ladder. And, well— I can’t exactly give too much away, but I’d feel bad if I didn’t at least warn ya.” As Fish leaned in to stage whisper conspiratorially, Leon felt the dread settle in despite not even knowing what was coming. “They’ve got their big ace in the hole waiting for ya, if you know what I mean. You took out Del Lago and they’re right pissed ‘bout that. They don’t intend for ya to make it out of this next arena in one piece. But you— you move like a man who knows how to handle this special case of monster. When in doubt…”

Fish trailed off, so Leon finished the sentence. “Aim for the head.”

“Blind ‘em or bash their skull in.” Fish leaned back and held his arms out and up at the ceiling. “You’ll make it out in one piece, Saddler willing. Good luck, kid. Use that gun well.”

Leon forgot himself and told Fish, “Luck’s never saved me,” before leaving, climbing that ladder, climbing stairs, turning through an arch and realizing that Fish had been right. This was a god damn arena.

A large area about the size of a competitive swimming pool caged in by walls made of shaved tree limbs, impossible to scale, with the back of the arena a sheer cliff face and huge, iron doors settled between jagged rock. It wasn’t raining anymore, but it was still cold, and his instincts were telling him to find somewhere to hide, maybe those odd little shacks that were— boarded up and would take too long to break into, jesus christ, there was nowhere to hide. As he walked calmly towards the center, hating how tall the manmade walls were and how easily someone could be scoping down at him, the gates that he was filing away for escape suddenly dropped shut, locking Leon in. He whipped around, knowing he’d walked right into this, couldn’t blame anyone but his own stupid self, but—

The huge iron doors in the cliff were opened slowly, metal screaming a protest. Villagers backed out, a good ten of them, all men, all of them yanking on thick rope to try and pull something from the darkness. Leon took a step back as the men yanked hard and shouted amongst each other in Castilian, the desperation and fear in their voices making him just as afraid, because whatever they were scared of was something he should be terrified of. Lightning flashed as a roar came from behind the doors, and the rope was torn from the hands of the villagers. The ground shook with what matched the tandem of footsteps, and the villagers stood in frozen horror as something approached.

Leon heard one village choke out, “Mierda,” before a fist bigger than a person slammed through the iron doors, and a monster the size of a three story house burst out, throwing the doors aside as it threw its arms back and bellowed at the sky. It looked like a troll of some sorts, definitely humanoid despite its terrifying height and strength. Its skin was an ugly gray and stretched across its body like leather, like its skeleton and muscles had grown too quickly for the skin to handle, flesh torn and pulling in an effort to keep everything inside like it was designed to do. As Leon stumbled back further and watched the huge thing barrel into the villagers to crush and throw around their bodies like the giant was a toddler and the people were its least favorite toys, “Mierda” didn’t even seem to come close to covering how bad of a situation this was. Leon was so caught up in the carnage before him, the screams of men dying in droves, that he almost didn’t see the fist swinging his way.

Almost.

Leon cartwheeled back, the fist missing him narrowly enough for Leon to deny himself any satisfaction for the successful dodge. The creature— El Gigante— peered down at Leon with red, furious eyes, seemingly able to understand that Leon wasn’t like the rest of the canon fodder that had been laid out for it. And that only seemed to piss it off. El Gigante roared its fury down at Leon, enraged that its plaything wasn’t going to cooperate, and lifted a huge leg to bring down on Leon’s head, intending to squash him like an ant. Leon rolled out of the way, skidding through the dirt, still feeling a little numb to what he was facing. What the fuck was this virus? How did it make something like this? It seemed like more an Umbrella level concoction than Los Illuminados, though the size and strength and stupidity weren’t meshing well together. These people had made a bumbling idiot that could kill with one hand and couldn’t be controlled. It was inefficient and unmarketable. It wasn’t cost effective. It wasn’t useful.

It wasn’t a Tyrant.

Leon pulled the TMP from his waist and fired at the eyes of El Gigante, knowing that taking out the eyes of the beast would be his best bet. Stupid, angry, and blind was the easiest giant to fell. He fired bullet after bullet into the ugly face of this beast, feeling a sick kind of satisfaction when it cried out in pain and swiped uselessly at the air. Leon kept moving, kept falling back and getting space so those arms never quite reached him. The gun vibrated solidly in his grip, an endless rain of death into the skull. El Gigante screamed and brought its hands to its eyes as red blood gushed from the sockets, telling Leon that this thing really had once been human. As the giant stumbled and went down on one knee, Leon kept the TMP up, watching carefully, waiting for a moment to keep going, when—

A disgusting parasite of flesh and writhing muscle broke through the top of El Gigante’s spine and thrashed uselessly in the air, like a worm breaching the soil and realizing it was going to drown in the rain. It had clawed legs and a gaping mouth, looking like a centipede or something that Leon would only ever see in his nightmares.

It also looked like an easy target.

Leon didn’t hesitate, knowing a weak point when he saw it. He tore his knife from its sheath and sprinted to El Gigante, leaping up the thing’s side to balance atop its huge back and slash at the flaw of the monster, his blade gleaming as lightning flashed. The sickening mass almost seemed to scream with El Gigante, blood falling from it as well. Whatever was inside El Gigante that had turned a human into this monstrosity was its own Achille’s Heel. El Gigante moved beneath Leon’s feet, and he leaped from its back before it could throw him, rolling as he hit the ground and coming up with the TMP again, bullets slamming back into that ugly face and making El Gigante roar in agony again. Leon almost thought he had this fight won.

Then a crack of lightning that was far too close shook Leon’s focus, and as his stance wavered, El Gigante saw the opportunity and took it, snatching Leon up in its huge fist and lifting Leon into the air, holding Leon up like he was some prize El Gigante had won. The giant leered up at him, like it was deciding if it wanted to kill Leon outright or have some fun before he crushed Leon in his grip. Leon tried to wiggle his arm out, tried to get his knife back in his grip and cut a tendon, but El Gigante squeezed and Leon tasted blood, tasted that disease, tasted himself dying as his bones scraped together and his lungs were constricted. He kicked uselessly, instincts insisting that he wanted to live even as he stopped struggling, darkness encroaching, oh god he really was fucking dying, he needed to get out, needed to run, needed to hide, he needed help, Chris, where are you—

There was a howl, a snarl, and suddenly Leon was dropping nearly twenty feet, hitting the dirt hard, his body protesting being alive for how much everything hurt. But the adrenaline crashed into Leon the very next second and he scrambled to his feet, looking up and seeing—

The dog from before, the dog he’d released from the trap, the fucking dog had leaped onto El Gigante and dug its teeth into the writhing weak point, and now the dog was at the other end of the arena, barking wildly, keeping El Gigante’s attention on him so Leon could get his shit together and fucking kill this thing.

Leon wiped the blood from his lips and stood tall, firing the TMP at the top of the spine, the quivering flesh that was on display for Leon, thanks to the efforts of the faithful companion he’d never expected to find. As the TMP ran dry, Leon brought out the rifle, moving steadily around the arena, slugging in each round with a grim expression, the pain in his body keeping him steady. El Gigante screamed with each shot, but every time it tried to turn and face Leon, the dog would pounce and get its teeth in that gray flesh, wresting El Gigante’s attention. El Gigante began to slow, his roars becoming weak moans, the flaw in its design thrashing weakly. The dog finally bounded to Leon’s side, howling ferociously to the thunderous sky as Leon took one last aim at the giant’s spine and heaving a breath as it finally— fucking finally— went down, crashing into the dirt with a weight that shook the ground beneath Leon’s feet.

As the gates opened back up around him, on some sort of trigger release, Leon breathed a sigh of relief and turned to find the dog, but— the dog was gone.

Fine.

Leon refused to let himself be hurt by the absence of the animal, telling himself he should be used to no one and nothing sticking around him longer than was necessary. He should just be grateful the mutt had shown up to save his ass. Who cared if the dog left? It was t Leon’s responsibility and he had a job to do. Some dog didn’t fucking matter.

Except— Leon had always wanted a dog as a kid. A loyal companion that would keep him safe, jowls ready to sink into the flesh of the people Leon feared. Leon knew it wasn’t feasible or practical to get a dog with the way his life was now, but that dog had cared about him to an extent, and he had so few people who cared, why couldn’t he have one good thing—

Focus, Kennedy.

Leon had to get back to the church, he was pretty sure the insignia he’d picked up was his key to getting inside. He booked it out of the arena, moving across the scaffolding that made his stomach drop. Leon wasn’t afraid of heights, but his faith in the engineering of these people wasn’t exactly sound either. The graveyard was just ahead and Leon heard a howl, wondered if it was the dog, wondered if he hadn’t been abandoned by yet another companion, until—

Out of the rain that was falling steadily again, Leon saw glowing red eyes watching him from hunched forms.

Well, infected animals it was.

Leon told himself he didn’t feel like shit as he brought the rifle around again and took out the wolves from a safe distance, not wanting to meet his end ironically in a graveyard just because he was attached to a mutt that had decided Leon was worth the risk of its own life. Still— each yelp from each dog he put down was like a knife in his own chest. He reminded himself why he was doing this and why he shouldn’t care. Ashley Graham was his top priority. President Graham expected results from Leon, not feelings or regret. Get the girl and get out.

Leon killed all of the dogs and didn’t look at the bodies.

He strode to the church door and pushed the insignia into the hole, letting himself feel good about something when he heard a mechanism inside turn over and the door unlock itself.

The church was as gaudy and over-the-top as Leon had suspected it would be. Stone walls and flooring and a peaked ceiling, a few pews facing an alter, red satin decorating the walls with the insignia plastered everywhere his eyes landed. There was an iron gate to the right but he saw no way of opening it. Chandeliers hung from the ceiling and framed a stained glass fixture at the far end of the church, three circles of erratically combined primary colors that framed yet another insignia of the Los Iluminados cult.

“Talk about a god complex,” Leon muttered to himself as he moved down the aisle to check out the alter, finding that symbol again in the form of wrought iron, wondering if it was from a specific religion of this region. There were candles spaced out around him, giving an ominous glow to the already-foreboding church. “Never did like organized religion,”he grumbled before finding a way to the upper level of the church, seeing no other way to move forward than up when the iron gates were shut. He found a ladder and climbed up, noticing an odd mechanism across the gap of the church. The walkway of the second level didn’t seem to reach all the way around, but—

Leon took a running jump and landed on the huge chandelier, letting momentum swing the contraption and jumped again, landing gracefully on the other side. He approached the mechanism, saw that it was some sort of puzzle of the light, shards of red, green, and blue that he needed to line up with the ugly “art” of the stained glass beyond. A few twists and the lights were matching up and joining together, the insignia in the center shining brightly before the sound of the gate opening below blessed Leon’s ears. He was about to head back down when he saw a smaller door on this level, brown and rusted. Leon frowned and pulled up Rot, resting his hand on the doorknob and taking a moment to breathe before slowly pushing the door open and moving inside.

In front of him, a figure darted past, blonde hair trailing behind a girl, behind—

“Ashley,” Leon said, eyes going wide as he lowered his gun.

The president’s daughter held up a huge plank of wood, surprisingly Leon with her fight, and yelled, “Don’t come!”before throwing the thing a him.

“Hey!” Leon snapped as he easily stepped out of the way of the projectile. “Take it easy!” He moved towards her, wondering if he would have to tie the squirrelly girl down when she ran from him again, crouching in a corner, shouting for him to get away.

“Calm down,” Leon ordered, holding his arms out at his sides to show there was nothing on him before putting Rot away. “Everything’s going to be just fine.” He went to where she was curled up on the ground, her young face turned away with eyes screwed shut like she thought if she couldn’t see him, he couldn’t see her. “My name’s Leon,” he told her. “I’m under the president’s order to rescue you.”

Her eyes flew open. “What?” She shot up quickly, looking to him with hope. “My father?”

“That’s right,” Leon affirmed with a small smile, wanting her to like him, wanting her to trust him and know he meant her no harm. “And I have to get you out of here. Now come with me.” She stood with him and Leon thanked whoever was up there that she at least knew how to listen to instructions. He led her back to the door and pulled out his communicator, buzzing Hannigan.

“It’s Leon,” he told the grainy image. “I’ve succeeded in extricating my subject.”

“Good work, Leon,” she said. “I’ll send a chopper over right away.”

“Where’s the extraction point?”

“There’s another trail that you can take to get out of the village. The chopper will pick you up beyond there.”

Leon grimaced, not liking the vague answer. “Got it,”he said regardless. “I’m on my way.” He ended the transmission and looked to Ashley, who was watching him with her huge eyes. “That was my handler,” he told her, feeling like it would be best to use transparency, really let her trust him because she felt she could rather than just because she had to. “We’re heading out of the village to a helicopter that’ll pick us up and take us back to civilization. From there, it’s an eight hour flight and then you’re home again, safe and sound.”

Ashley nodded and smiled shakily back. “First thing I’m gonna do is get a cheeseburger and nap for days.”

“That’s the spirit,” Leon said, glad she was able to think about the future so positively. Los Illuminados may have taken her from her home, but they hadn’t taken her strong will. “I’m gonna need you to listen to me,” he then told her. “If I tell you to wait or follow or hide, you do so immediately. We’re not dealing with regular run-of-the-mill terrorists here. These people aren’t human anymore. I know what I’m doing— I’ve seen things like this before. If we’re gonna make it out of here alive, I need you to trust me and do as I say right when I say it.”

“Okay,” Ashley said with a firm nod. “I— I trust you, Leon.”

Leon returned the nod before leading her out of that dark room and back into the main church, dropping down the ladder and— ”shit!”— barely catching Ashley as she immediately jumped down right after him. “Couldn’t have climbed down?” he asked, holding her weight easily. The girl was stick thin and probably hadn’t been given a good meal in a while, just like him.

“It’s faster if I jump,” she told him like he was stupid for not realizing the same. She slid out of Leon’s grip and dusted off her skirt. “I’m not that heavy!”

Leon didn’t know this girl well enough to fight fire with fire. He just moved past her while tampering down a smirk at her childishness and went for the main doors of the church, intending to get them both out of here without delay. He was at the aisle, Ashley right behind, feeling pretty optimistic, when a deep, almost sensual voice filled the room and had Leon stopping in his tracks.

“I’ll take the girl,” said a man in a sweeping purple cloak and a Lovecraft-esque staff of bone, twisting flesh and, writhing eyeballs, standing beside the alter.

Leon scowled, honestly tired of these Halloween costumed freaks. “Who are you?” he demanded, putting an arm back to keep Ashley behind him.

“If you must know,” the man drawled as he faced Leon, letting him see the golden Los Illuminados cult insignia that was hanging from his neck. “My name is Osman Saddler.” He stared down at Leon with dead eyes, his wrinkled face revolting in a way that reminded Leon of evil people, of decayed bodies still walking, of Birkin when his body had succumbed to his own virus. “The master of this fine religious… community.”

Fuck this creep.

“What do you want?”

“To demonstrate to the whole world our astounding power, of course,” Saddler replied like it was obvious. “No longer will the United States think that they can police the world forever. So we kidnapped the President’s daughter in order to give her our power.” Ashley whimpered and took a step behind Leon, who faced Saddler fully, his body between this psychopath and his charge. “And then.. send her back.”

Ashley took a step back and whispered, “No.”When Leon looked back to her, he saw she was holding her hand to her pulse below her jaw. “Leon,” she said. “I think they shot something into my neck!”

Leon rounded on Saddler with rage, gritting out, “What did you do to her?”

Saddler stepped down from the alter. “We just planted her a little… gift.”He grinned wide, the awful split of his lips making Leon skin crawl. “Oh, there’s going to be one hell of a party when she returns home to her loving father!”He threw his head back and laughed sharply to the ceiling, then snapped his gaze back down with a terse, “But— before that. I thought I might bargain with the president for some donations. Believe it or not, it takes quite a lot of money to keep this church up and running.”

Leon snorted a laugh, knowing psychos like this man better than himself. “Faith in money will lead you nowhere, Saddler,” he said, thinking of Umbrella and all the other monsters that had ruined countless lives and their own futures just for the prospect of a profit.

Saddler ignored him. “Oh, I believe I forgot to tell you that we gave you the same gift, American.”

Leon—

The disease.

“When I was unconscious,” he said to himself, sliding the pieces together. He wasn’t sick— he was infected.

Oh god, he was infected.

“Oh, I truly hope you like our small but special contribution,” Saddler purred, forcing Leon to look to him again, shelving away the idea of being infected and how it made Leon feel cold all over. “When the eggs hatch, you will become my puppet. Involuntarily, you will do as I say. I will have total control over your mind. Don’t you think this is a revolutionary way to promulgate one’s faith?”

Leon swallowed past the lump in his throat to snap, “Sounds more like an alien invasion if you ask me!” Invasion of the Body Snatchers, kicking and screaming. His neck itched, a phantom pain he knew was part of his overloading nerves, the knowledge of something being in his body, a foreign entity, a parasite. He wanted to take Krauser’s knife to his own flesh and cut it out. Oh god, he was going to die to this, surviving infection in Raccoon and South America had been useless, he was going to die at the hands of this sick freak—

The church doors behind them burst open, men in black robes with crossbows aiming their sights down at him and Ashley. Saddler smirked. Leon saw the intent. He grabbed Ashley’s hand and yanked her after him, running to the window, knowing escape was their only option. There was a twang, and the flaming arrows barely missed Ashley, the scorch of heat not helping the invasive cold in Leon’s bones. He pulled Ashley forward almost violently and they crashed through the church window in unison, glass shattering and sparkling around them like drops of water before clattering to the ground along with him and Ashley. Leon rolled with his landing, but Ashley slammed into the stone hard.

“You okay?” Leon asked, going to her side immediately, helping the girl to her feet.

The rain drenched her unapologetically as she looked to him and asked, “Leon, what’s going to happen to us?”

“Don’t worry,” Leon said with a confidence he didn’t feel. “We got into this mess— we can get out of it. For now, we have to run.”

He led her through the rain, away from the church and down a new path, hopefully the one Hannigan had been talking about. Cult fuckers got in his way, nasty men and women that he put down with ruthless shots to the head, relieved when Ashley didn’t ask about his unrepentant murder of the locals. She only stayed right behind him and ducked low when he had to kick a fucker’s head in, needing to save bullets.

As he fought through the madness, his thoughts became a turmoil of panic and fury, part of him sickened by the inhuman Schadenfreudiger that was Lord Saddler, another part trembling with the fear of death, of succumbing to the very thing that was turning the villagers of this place into insane murders that burned people at stakes and pinned their women to the walls like art, and the last part—

The last part thought of a man, a man Leon told himself he hated.

He didn’t let that last part of himself come to the surface very often and definitely not for long. Leon grit his teeth and shot an infected woman through the eye, putting her down for good and pretending her face was someone else. Then he shoved himself back into his mission like he always did and lied to himself, saying that once he made it home, he’d take Sherry to dinner.

The lie fell a little more flat than normal this time.

The path led to a small stone structure that had an opening in the floor, which then led down into a tunnel below. “Let’s get out of this bad weather,” he told Ashley before dropping down first and—

Blue flames.

Thank god.

“Told you we’d meet again,” Leon said to Fish as Ashley joined him down here. The merchant laughed but didn’t respond, not even looking at Ashley. He obviously didn’t care about the same things as those around him. If he was infected with whatever was inside these people, then why wasn’t he succumbing to the same mind-controlling effects Saddler boasted to have? “You’re a weird one,” Leon said with no bite as the merchant whipped back his coat and let Leon survey the goods.

Oh fuck yeah.

“What do you want for the Mauser C96?”

Fish cackled again. “Seeing as you’re my favorite customer, I’ll be offering you a hell of a bargain today.”

“Thanks,” Leon said as he handed over the funds and let the Mauser rest comfortably in his grip. “That TMP was great, but ammo for that thing is impossible to find. Who uses customs for a thing like that?”

“People in places like you can’t afford to be picky,” Fish reminded him. “Just count yourself lucky I’ve got such an easy way around this place. And by the by, you should know— player three is entering the game.”

Leon frowned. “Who?”

“Don’t really know myself,” Fish admitted. “But rumor has it there’s another fighter such as yourself that’s sticking their nose into places they don’t belong. Not sure whose side they’re on yet, but I guess we’ll figure that out only when they want us to, yeah? It ain’t like we’ve got much of a choice but to accept the lumps we’re given and praise our generous god.”

“I don’t do subjugation,” Leon replied bitterly. “Whoever it is better not get in my way. I’m getting out of this place with Ashley, and that's final.”

“Something tells me her rescue was all part of the plan,” Fish said slowly. “And I’m not talking about your plan.”

It made sense. Saddler had said they had intended to send Ashley back, but there really wasn’t anything else Leon could do. Maybe back in the states they’d find a way to save her from whatever was in her body. Leon wasn’t a genius biochemist like Rebecca who could create a vaccine from banana peals and positive thoughts. He wasn’t a doctor. He couldn’t do anything for her except get her to people who could give her a fighting chance. They wouldn’t put down the president’s daughter, but Leon— well, Leon had already resigned himself to a future as a lab rat if the infection didn’t kill him first. Leon was expendable. He was as good as dead whether he succeeded or not.

“My plan is the one that matters because my plan is the one that’s gonna work,” Leon said stubbornly, not missing the red flash of Fish’s eyes. He didn’t care if he was coming off as a stubborn kid, he wasn’t about to let the President’s daughter be turned into some terrorist time bomb just for the sake of getting revenge on an entire country. One innocent kid shouldn’t be held responsible for the acts of many, in Leon’s opinion, and everyone should be held accountable for the slightest involvement. Pretty preachy, but it was the only thing that made sense to him anymore. “I’m not gonna say I’ll see you again, Fish, because I’m trying to be a little more optimistic about these things. And hey— piece of advice?” When Fish cocked his head and waited, Leon lowered his voice and told him, “Get the hell out of this place while you still can.”

Fish paused. Then he threw his head back and laughed. “There’s not many places for me to go, Leon!” he bellowed, and Leon wondered when he’d told this guy his name. “Sorry, kid, business is booming as long as you’re around. After that, then who knows? But all that normal shit, all that society— that ain’t meant for someone like myself anymore. Don’t worry about an old man like me.”

Leon scowled. “So you’re giving up?”

“I’m accepting the hand I’ve been dealt,” Fish replied with a shrug. “Something I’m sure you’re very used to in your own way.” When Leon’s scowl morphed into a grim line of understanding, Fish waved him off. “Go tuck your tail and run while ya can. I have a feeling I won’t be seeing the last of ya.” He looked to Ashley and tipped the brim of an invisible hat. “Safe travels, my dear.” Then Fish swept his coat back around his person and Leon took that as the cue, taking Ashley by the crook of her elbow to beckon her along.

The mines continued, Leon moving around the corners with extra care now that he was so close to this whole thing being over. Most car accidents happened within five miles of home, right? Most fuck ups reared their ugly heads right at the end of a fight, when heads were lagging and focus was shot in the prospect of going home. Leon couldn’t afford to mess things up here, not when he was so close. The tunnel brought them up a ladder and into the small room of the secret passage, Leon relieved to be in familiar territory. But as he crept silently from the small room, back into the town square of the village, back into the pouring rain, the relief died away when a man shouted their arrival, the Castilian still foreign, but familiar in its own way too. “Stay behind me,” he told Ashley before bringing up the new gun and grinning at the muzzle flash, the satisfying kick, the scream as the man went down. Leon kept the sights up, wary for anyone else coming, but he could barely see through the fog that had overcome the village and swallowed up the fires themselves.

He kept his steps light and slow, sticking to the buildings, eyes darting around, painfully alert. Ashley was a heavy presence at his back, and everyone one of her clumsy steps had Leon’s heart racing with terrible what-ifs and dangerous ideas. Why couldn’t she be any quieter? Why did she have those stupid boots on? Why couldn’t she just—

Leon shook himself just barely, told himself that she was just a kid and he wasn’t being fair. It didn’t matter if she was shit at stealth— it was Leon’s job to make sure her inexperience didn’t get her killed.

“Follow me,” he whispered as they slinked through the village, keeping out of sight of anything. There were moving torches, but Leon was sure that they could get past these assholes without raising anymore hell. He didn’t want Ashley in the middle of a firefight— neither of them were bullet proof. “The path is… that way.” If Leon ever made it back to the states, he was going to have a discussion with his handler about her vagueness. Leon could handle coordinates, he could handle landmarks, but just saying the path was somewhere? There were so many fucking paths.

“Guess the only way to go is the way I haven’t been,” Leon whispered to himself as he looked between a set of houses he’d never bothered to explore and headed in that direction, crouching low to avoid anyone seeing them through a window. Ashley followed suit, murmuring something, asking a question, so Leon put up a hand, silently ordering her to shut up.

There was a whisper of cloth in front of them, a woman stalking past with her teeth barred like a dog, holding a torch above her head, searching for them. Leon pressed his back to the wall and put an arm back to make sure Ashley did the same, pinning her to the wood. His own pulse was pounding in his ears as the woman stalked past them, blind in the fog like they nearly were, her eyes sweeping across but never landing on them. She passed and Leon let out a gust of air, getting back up and puling Ashley along. They reached a tall gate, infuriatingly locked, and Leon really didn’t want to double back for a key, but they didn’t have much of a choice. He was about to turn and tell Ashley the bad news when she strode forward and looked to Leon expectantly.

“If you boost me up, I can probably open it from the other side,” she told him, and—

Fucking alright, he could do that. Leon braced himself on the gate itself, down on his knees, not making a sound as Ashely climbed atop his back, onto his shoulders, and he stood. Maybe she did weigh a little more than he’d expected, but he could take it. The weight disappears seconds later, and he heard Ashley drop down at the other side. The sound of metal and wood and then Ashley saying, “I opened it, Leon!”

“Atta girl,” he whispered, hoping she didn’t hear because she probably didn’t want to be patronized, but what a fucking trooper. He was reminded distantly of Sherry, of the bravery she’d shown those two weeks on the run with him, before they’d been taken in and separated. Sherry had always kept her chin up and always listened to him and always, always offered to help. And even then, those weren’t the moments that stuck out to Leon.

What he remembered the most vividly was one night in some random motel room in the middle of an autumn thunderstorm, when Sherry had told him how she’d always wanted to take dancing classes. Leon had found a radio station with something slow playing and had placed the little girl on his toes to lead her slowly around the room, showing her the steps he barely knew himself and promising he’d get her real lessons one day. But instead of saying that he better keep the promise, she’d pushed her small face into his stomach, pulled her hands from his to wrap her arms around his waist, and told him “Thank you” in a tiny whisper that still rang in his ears today.

“Leon?”

Leon broke from the memory and pushed through the gate, giving Ashley a thumbs up because he suddenly didn’t trust his own voice. He kept them both moving, running from the village and the things Leon couldn’t escape.

A huge bridge swung before them over a deep chasm, sturdily made but still not a comfort to have to cross. As Leon went first just to ensure that if the ropes gave way, he’d be the one to make the drop, his communicator buzzed. Leon answered with half his attention on Hannigan, mainly focused on not losing his foot and plummeting to his death.

“Leon— I have some bad news.”

God—

“I’d rather not hear it,” Leon mumbled as he watched at where he foot his feet but not looking any further between the planks of wood that showed him the fatal drop below.

“Well, I’m afraid I have to tell you anyway.” At least she sounded sorry for it. “We’ve lost contact with the chopper. Someone must have shot it down, though we can’t determine who.”

Leon tore his eyes from his feet for a second, had to look up at the sky, a horrible pain shooting through his chest. Those soldiers— those men. They’d only been doing their fucking jobs, they’d only been trying to help Ashley, and they’d been shot down like birds in the sky during hunting season. Leon blinked furiously at the emotions warring for attention inside of him, the ache of the loss meeting the fear of the infection in his blood and the anxiety of how in the hell he was going to get Ashley home.

“Great,” Leon choked out after he’d gotten a handle on himself.

“We’re prepping another chopper for you,” Hannigan rushed on to say, not even sparing a moment for the fallen soldiers. “Meanwhile, I want you to head towards the extraction point.”

Now that, Leon could do. “Got it,” he said before ending the transmission, crossing the bridge completely and waving for Ashley to join him. She made it across the bridge with a lot more confidence than him, probably figuring that if Leon hadn’t broken the thing, then neither could she. “That was Hannigan,” he told Ashley before she could ask, her eyes on Leon’s hand as he tucked the communicator away again. “The chopper got shot down.”

Ashley’s brow knit with concern. “Are the men okay?”

Leon—

He blinked twice, slowly working through her question, a little stunned by the worry in her voice. He almost wished he could lie and tell her that the men were fine, they’d be evac’d, they’d be taken to a hospital, but—

“They’re gone,” he told her gently, letting the pain he was still feeling from the loss show in his voice so at least she would know she wasn’t alone in her mourning. “They— it was quick.” At least, Leon hoped it had been. “We’re getting another one, but I have a— a bad feeling.” And he had pretty good luck with his bad feelings.

As they stepped onto solid ground again, the bad feeling proved to be pretty timely— there was a cry in the air, that fucking Castilian, and the glow of fire from both directions that they had, from ahead, and from the bridge. Ashley gasped and inched closer to him, clinging to his arm. “What’re we gonna do, Leon?” she whimpered.

“Hate to say it, but we’re sandwiched alright,” Leon griped, looking around for somewhere to hide. A lone cabin was in the center of the two mobs that were closing in on them. It wasn’t ideal, but it was the house or a swan dive. “In that cabin!” he ordered sharply, running to the metal door and kicking it open, checking the area, finding no one, the yanking Ashley inside and shutting the door with his back. There were hooks to hold something to bar the door shut, but—

“Leon!”

The male voice had Leon looking up in time to catch the plank of wood being thrown for him. He slid it into the hooks and effectively barred the door shut.

Luis Sera walked out from a far corner and and smiled enigmatically at him. “Small world, eh?” Leon grinned a little, relived to have what few allies he did in this fight. Luis strode forward, casual despite the threat of death, and looked keenly to Ashley. “And… I see that the president has equipped his daughter with ballistics.”

Leon stifled a laugh as Ashley made a noise of sharp indignation. “How rude!” she snapped. “And I don’t believe there’s any relevance with my figure and my standing! Who are you?!”

As Leon rounded the room, checking windows and exits and entrances, Luis chuckled and held his hands up in surrender. “Excuse me, your highness,” he drawled. “Perhaps the young lady might want to introduce herself first before asking someone his name.”

“Name’s Ashley Graham,” Ashley grumbled. “The President’s daughter?”She said the last part like she thought everyone should know who she was by name alone. Tough luck, Ashley, not everyone follows the United States with vapid adoration. Leon personally couldn’t have named the First Lady of the last president if he tried, let alone the children.

Luis looked over his shoulder to Leon, asking slowly, “Is she… well, you know.”

Leon wasn’t sure what he was asking about— infection, trustworthiness, usefulness— but: “Don’t worry. She’s cool.”

“Eh, never mind,” Luis sighed. “To be honest, the feminine figure can be arresting, but there’s nothing like the solid stance of a strong man.” His eyes dragged back to Leon and raked up and down. Leon just arched a brow, a little surprised at this turn of events, but not actually surprised at all. He knew what he looked like. “Anyways,” Luis said as he crossed his arms over his chest again and moved towards the tiny kitchen that was near the door once he saw Leon wasn’t going to react. “There’s supposed to be some kind of obvious symptom before you turn into one of them anyway.”

Ashley suddenly gasped, pointing to one of the windows. “Look!”

Between the planks barring the window shut, the glow of fire could be seen. The mob was approaching, a lot murmur of violent insanity reaching Leon’s ears. God, there were so many of them, more than Leon could guess at. “Ashley, upstairs!” The girl ran off as Leon and Luis went to stand at the window, Luis pulling out a Mauser of his own. Their eyes met and something painful struck a chord in Leon’s chest, the twin heartbeat of two men facing down death and promising to look after the other, even if neither said it out loud.

Leon swallowed past the lump in his throat. “It’s game time,” Luis said. Leon prayed he wouldn’t have to see this man die.

The mob burst through seconds later, tearing through the door and the planks like they were made of paper. Luis and Leon went back to back, heading for the stairs, gaining the high ground and—

It felt like a slaughterhouse.

Just villager after villager climbing the stairs into a funnel of death, put down by the steady shots from Luis and Leon, an endless cacophony of bullets, each shot making Leon jump harder and harder. There was no way for these people to reach them, they had no fighting chance, this was inhumane, this was putting down cattle and Leon was a mass murderer. Luis was steady beside him, his shoulder pressed to Leon’s, the warmth of his living body being the only thing keep Leon sane as he slugged his bullets into human faces that he told himself were false. The villages were infected and they wanted him dead, he had to put them down, he had a mission, he needed to survive, but did he deserve to? Did he deserve life anymore than these people? He was infected, he was a dead man walking, how could he take so many lives when his was already over, he should die quietly, he shouldn’t be killing with reckless abandon, he was a monster.

Each bullet that left Leon’s gun felt like another reason for his death, each life he took making his worth less and less. What if these people could be helped? What if there was a cure? What if Leon was truly the monster here? The gun was jerking in his hands and his arms were numb, his eyes seeing nothing but the spray of red blood, moans ringing in his ears, decayed skin and empty irises, a giant in a black coat that smelled like cigarettes, a warmth beside him, a voice in his ear, hands holding him close and telling him—

“Leon!”

Leon crashed back into reality and became dully aware of the click of his empty gun each time he pulled the trigger, a steady beat of nothing, a damning blow to his credibility as a soldier if he couldn’t keep his wits about him in a fight. Leon was just lucky everything was dead. The corpses piled in front of them—

“Leon,” Luis repeated gently, watching him with concern. “Are you alright?”

Leon opened his mouth to lie and say he was fine, but blood came out instead of words, and Leon buckled over, coughing into his glove, tasting iron in the back of his throat. Hands went to his shoulders and pushed him up, a soothing accent telling him to straighten out so his lungs could catch up. Luis pressed Leon against the wall at the top of the stairs, holding him up. Leon shook in the man’s grip as the blood kept coming, drowning him, and he hoped he wasn’t getting any of it on Luis’s rather expensive looking clothes. The coughing fit finally subsided and Leon slumped, head lolling back against the wall behind him.

“That didn’t sound good, friend.”

Luis’s voice was a low murmur and very, very close. Leon opened his eyes and saw the other man was near enough to kiss, just a tilt of his head would push their lips together. Leon’s instincts were telling him to do it because what else did he have to lose? Then his brain got the better of him, responding to the internal question with a lot. His last night with Krauser, when he’d been pulled apart and left that way, naked and trembling in the sheets, reeling from dying only moments before. Leon wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice. “I’m fine,” he said, standing on his own and refusing to let Luis see another moment of weakness. But— “I don’t know— I’m sorry. For losing it back there. You should’ve been able to rely on me.”

Luis shook his head. “Guess I should swallow down my ego and admit you made most of the killing shots. Where’d you learn to shoot like that?”

“Raccoon City,” Leon replied thoughtlessly.

“Ah,” Luis hummed. “The tragic backstory from before. I’d love to hear it in full, one day.”

That last time Leon had told someone that story, they’d used him up and left him at the roadside to shrivel into nothing. “Sure,” he told Luis anyways. “I’ll buy you a beer.”

“None of that American piss, right?” Luis grinned, and Leon tried to return the smile. “C’mon, camarada. What do we do now?”

Leon looked up to the second level where Ashley was standing, young eyes so full of fright. Apparently Leon was the one in charge, even over Sera. That was fine. He could handle it. “The bridge I crossed to get here is out,” Leon said, thinking aloud. “So I guess we have no choice but to keep moving.”

Luis was quiet. Then, “I forgot something.” He tucked his gun away and headed for the door. “You guys go on ahead.”

That—

What?

“Luis,” Leon called out, following him, but the man was already gone, heading into the rain in the other direction. Leon— did not let that hurt either. The connection of fighting for his life at Luis’s side was gone. He needed to stop getting so attached so fucking easily before it killed him. Leon glanced over the cabin one last time since they were about to leave and— saw a note.

Leon snatched it up, reading it over quickly. Americans, Ganados, El Gigante again, a man’s sight opening the gate that would get them out of the village. He had a name for the villagers and a clue as to what was coming and where to go. It seemed like these people really were willing to give it all to keep Ashley from leaving, and they definitely wanted him dead now, same blood or not. He grimaced and crumbled up the note. “They’re not giving up,” he told Ashley. “We gotta move fast. If we can beat them to wherever this gate is, maybe we won’t have to deal with the worst of it.”

“Lead the way, Leon,” she replied, watching him carefully. Leon wondered if she’d seen his little— loss of self. Hopefully not, considering seeing someone at that low of a point would definitely breed distrust. Jesus Christ, why couldn’t he have just kept it together a second longer? The villagers— Ganados. The Ganados were trying to kill him, he’d had no choice but to kill them because he wasn’t allowed to die until Ashley was safe. He shouldn’t have lost himself like that. Leon was just doing his fucking job.

“Let’s move,” Leon ordered. They both ducked back out into the rain, Ashley making a small noise of protest at the cold. If the world could just cut them some fucking slack, Leon would greatly appreciate it. He led Ashley down the path opposite of the bridge they’d crossed, found some odd mechanism that allowed him to unlock either a left or right door. Leon grimaced, glanced back to Ashley, wished he wasn’t flying blind. He almost wanted to ask her opinion, but— Leon turned the level and opened the door on the right. According to the note, this was the side that would give him another Gigante to kill. It would be safer to face one monster rather than a horde of Ganados with Ashley at his side.

The wooden door opened into a huge chasm that made Leon mourn the ecosystem of this part of the country. All of these mines and manmade gouges in the rocks, like fatal wounds in the surface of the earth. He wondered if even managing to find a map would help him navigate this place— so much had changed in such a short amount of time thanks to this godforsaken cult that Leon was sure this place was no longer recognizable by any cartographer.

“This doesn’t seem safe,” Ashley said. “What if there’s—”

A roar drowned out the rest of her question, and Leon fought the urge to stomp like a child as El Gigante’s evil twin or what the fuck ever dropped down from the cliff face, twice as mad and three times as ugly. Ashley shrieked, nearly falling on her butt as the ground shook beneath the weight of El Gigante.

“You’re looking to join your brother?” Leon asked, still shaky and not himself from what had happened in the cabin. He needed this fight over quick so he could get Ashley out of here and fall apart peacefully behind a locked door. His grip on Rot was clammy and he searched the area for anything that could cut this short, anything he could use, any—

Leon had the gun up and firing before he even knew what he was firing at, but his instincts had never let him down before. The planks of wood that had kept the boulder at the top of the left cliff from falling were blown into splinters by his bullets, and boulder itself teetering forward and dropping atop El Gigante, crushing the skull and snapping the spine with a dull sound. El Gigante hit the dirt before Leon could even feel the rush of adrenaline for the fight.

“Oh,” Ashley said, cutting herself off mid-scream. “That— was cool.”

“Always look around for things that can be used in your environment,” Leon told her as he took Ashley by the hand and pulled her along, feet slapping in the mud. “Whether it be a can of flammable chemicals or a chandelier to drop on their heads or even calculating a dive off a roof. There’s always more than one option to get something done, even when it comes down to surviving.”

“You should give me a gun.”

“Yeah, that’s— not happening.”

Ashley shrugged as they jogged. “It’s an option.”

Leon was way too strung out to deal with this level of sass from a blond that wasn’t himself.

The way out of the chasm led up towards a tall gate that had to be the gate in reference from the note. Leon grimaced, wondering just where the hell he was supposed to find the Big Cheese’s sight, and how he was supposed to use it. There didn’t seem to be a retinal scan of any kind considering how low-tech this place was. There was the metalwork of a man or woman’s face, he honestly couldn’t tell, with light shining from an eye socket, but he had no idea what that could mean. Should he find the dude and cut off his head, offering it to the face here that looked a little like Medusa? Leon wasn’t sure. Regardless, “Hide here,” he ordered to Ashley. There was only one other way to go from here, a pathway that led down to a barn in the middle of barren land. Leon had done this enough to know exactly what he was about to walk into. “Don’t come out unless it’s for me. If I’m not back within thirty minutes, assume I’m dead.”

“W-what?” Ashley’s voice shook and Leon felt sorry for her again. “Wait, you can’t die! There’s no way I’ll make it without you!”

“Then I guess I better not mess this up, huh?” Leon sent her a grin that he hoped she didn’t realize was fake before jerking his head to a pile of crates and old supplies. “I mean it— hide. I need to handle some shit or else neither of us are getting out of here.”

She looked ready to stomp her feet. “At least give me a gun.”

Leon arched his brow. Then he slid out Krauser’s knife and held it out to her. “Don’t you put a scratch on that,” he threatened.

“Shouldn’t you be worried about me, not the knife?”

Leon didn’t answer her, only jerked his head towards the cargo and then sets his sights on the barn, knowing she’d listen to him one way or the other. As he approached the structure, Leon quickly went through everything he knew about the village elder or bodyguard or priest or whatever he was.

Bitores Mendez, a scary motherfucker with huge hands and heterochromia, strong enough to lift Leon in the air like he weighed nothing, with no weakness to melee combat that Leon could tell. His gut was telling Leon he was about to face down that terrifying man and put an end to their confrontations that always ended with Leon worse off. The last time Leon should have died, if it weren’t for the woman in red who had landed a precious shot that had saved Leon’s life. And Leon didn’t know who that had been either, though his brain was insisting he did, even if it couldn’t give him her name. Leon wasn’t really in the habit of making friends these days. There wasn’t anyone that came to mind that would also be in a place like this wearing a dress like that, except—

No way. She’d plummeted to her death back in Raccoon City six years ago. It was just a coincidence.

Leon shook the thought from his head even as his gut told him not to let it go. The dead coming back to life was the least impossible scenario in his life. Wesker had made an untimely return from the dead, something that the BSAA was dealing with. Why couldn’t she?

Leon approached the barn cautiously, pushing open the huge doors and cringing at the squeak of rusted hinges. Whatever was in here would hear him coming despite his best efforts. The interior of the barn was less cattle and more stockpile. Boxes and equipment and machinery, useless things that just created blind spots. There was a ladder at the far end that led up to a second level and the high beams above supporting the height of the barn. Leon saw nothing, no hostiles, not much else except clutter. He ran over his ammo— five shots for the rifle, eight for the shotgun, seven for the Mauser, three for Rot— and kept his eyes pealed for movement. The more he saw nothing, the more anxious he became.

Then he felt it.

Hot breath on his neck, possibly human, possibly animal, definitely hostile.

Leon didn’t want to turn around.

Eyes up, Kennedy.

Leon whirled around and brought the Mauser up to Mendez’s chest, but the hand closing around his wrist and the other going around his throat and hoisting him into the air cut all sensible thought from Leon, the struggle to breathe being the only thing left. Below, Mendez growled, eyeing Leon like he was a fish in a tank. Leon struggled helplessly, his eyes rolling into the back of his head, his trachea too abused to be able to take this much longer.

Mendez sneered. Then he threw Leon like a ragdoll, Leon’s back colliding with a high beam, his head smacking the wood before he dropped back to the floor, stunned. As Leon struggled to get back to his feat, Mendez turned to the barn door and twisted the steel handles into a pretzel, locking Leon in with this lunatic. Mendez turned back to him, stalking closer as Leon struggled to sit upright, something wrong with his head. Mendez stood above him, tall and terrifying, looking everything like the Tyrant for a split second that shot ice cold clarity through Leon in the form of fear.

The fist Mendez swung at Leon came slowly enough for Leon to dodge. He pushed off from the ground and rolled away, looking around for anything he could use, because brute force wasn’t going to work. A red barrel caught his eye and he knocked it over with a swift kick, praying the liquid that sloshed to the ground from the overturned barrel was flammable. It pooled at Mendez’s feet, the man staring down like he didn’t understand. Then he looked up at Leon with another growl as Leon brought up the Mauser and aimed for the man’s feet. “Hasta Luego,” he quipped, before firing one of seven bullets and rejoicing inwardly when the pool burst into flames that spread to the barrel, the thing combusting in a flash of heat and sound, Leon narrowly avoiding the explosion as he threw himself across the barn floor.

As the shrapnel fell around him and the shockwave died, Leon looked up from where he’d been shielding his head on the ground and saw—

Of course it wouldn’t be that easy. Mendez had seen better days.

Probably ten feet tall at this point, all spine, all disgusting. It was as if the parasite inside of him had grown too big for the body, splitting Mendez’s torso in half like a demented slinky dog, the top half wobbling in the air with claws from the human arms and insect legs of flesh sprouting from the back, the legs moving shakily like a child learning to use them for the first time. Terrifying and unlike anything Leon had seen. For a second, he was so shocked by the monstrosity in front of him that he forgot he was supposed to be fighting for his life. Then fire licked the exposed skin of his arms and he realized just how bad this was. A semi-indestructible monster and no way out of a burning building.

He should have left Ashley a gun.

Mendez yowled to the ceiling and strode forward, eyes pinning Leon to the spot as he forced himself to think this through. What he was gleaming from this B.O.W., what he knew about the infection, where Leon had been injected himself— all of it was the spine. And this guy, fucking Mendez? He was now more than fifty-percent spine and an easy target. He was slow, his balance was atrocious, he was vicious but calculating and more intelligent than the others, which meant he could recognize patterns, which meant he could be tricked. And his reach was so high— all Leon had to do was stay low, cross the sides of the barn, fire everything he had into the towering spinal column, and wait for the entire thing to snap in half.

Leon dug in his boots and unslung the shotgun from over his back. Eight shots. More than enough.

Mendez was nearly on top of him, swinging low with those pincers cutting down for Leon’s head. He dropped onto his ass and fired straight up, relishing the pain cry that came from taking a shotgun blast to the face. From beneath, Leon rolled out from Mendez’s reach and rounded him, firing three more shots into the spine and listening to the screams it made, almost like it was its own separate creature. Definitely a parasite, then, and a large one, selective brainwashing because Mendez could speak for himself while other infected couldn’t. Leon wondered which strain was inside of him.

His thoughts damned him— Mendez swooped low, teetering, and one of those claws narrowly missed slicing open Leon’s chest. He fell back entirely, sprinting to the other end of the burning barn, pulling out the rifle to slam the high caliber bullets into the mess. Mendez stalked forward slowly, growing angry as Leon stayed out of his reach, this infection being more of a hinderance than a help. Mendez almost seemed pissed that Leon wasn’t cowering in fear. Pissed that Leon wasn’t begging for his life in the face of a monster.

Leon smirked bitterly to himself and fired bullet four from the rifle into Mendez’s spine. If only this asshole knew that Leon had seen far worse. Mendez lurched forward like a circus act, bringing himself in for a .223 caliber bullet right between the eyes. The rifle was spent, but Mendez was shrieking, holding his claws to his face and writhing. Leon pulled out the shotgun again and fired the last of the slugs into the spine, his hands shaking with adrenaline as the parasite was torn away and—

The spine snapped.

The lower half, the legs, they kept stumbling, walking towards Leon. He made a noise of disgust and kicked the legs back, watching them fall useless to the ground, the foot twitching with the last throes of life. The triumph Leon felt was short-lived when he looked up and saw Mendez’s awful pincer legs slamming into the high beams, wood splintering as the fucker refused to die and began to swing from the rafters like a demented trapeze act from hell itself. “You gotta be kidding me,” Leon whispered, before whipping out the Mauser and firing almost wildly as Mendez launched himself at Leon, miles faster without those legs holding him to the ground.

Mendez landed atop Leon, pinning him to the ground, close enough to the growing fire for Leon to feel pain from the heat, his body telling him he’d die if he got any closer. Mendez cackled and those claws swiped for Leon’s chest again. The kick of the Mauser and the burst of blood of Mendez’s hand gave Leon the time to bring his knee to his ear and slam the bottom of his boot into Mendez’s face, throwing the monster back. Leon scrambled away, his blood roaring in his ears, the firing growing, spreading, he didn’t have room to stay away and Mendez was too fast. Four bullets left in the Mauser, he spun on his heel, saw Mendez was still too close, and kept with the spine, aiming for the parasite that was keeping this man alive.

The parasite shrieked louder, loud enough for Leon to worry he’d go deaf if he managed to survive this at all. Little writhing tendrils came from the parasite along the spinal column, tendrils that were whipping about with what could be pain. Mendez’s face was screwed up with agony, eyes still burning with rage, but blood pouring from his mouth.

Leon probably wasn’t any better off. Mendez swung for him again, dropping down from the rafters. Leon hit the dirt and rolled right into the encroaching flames, the fire singing the hair from his arms. He kept going, finding an untouched spot, slapping away the flames and trying not to panic as Mendez leaped for him again. Leon spent the last four shots of the Mauser with Mendez high in the air above him, leering down like a Leon like a spider enjoying the death rattle of a fly caught in its web. Leon was trapped at all sides, flames consuming everything, only three bullets left. For a split second, everything froze, everything was quiet, only the crackle of the burning building and Leon’s heaving breath. Leon and Mendez held eye contact. The parasite was struggling weakly. This was going to be the last moment on earth for one of them.

Mendez smiled like the devil and dropped down. Leon whipped out his last gun and fired the final three shots into the spine. Dead weight hit Leon, throwing him to the ground, Mendez blessedly lifeless atop him. Leon gagged at the blood and guts that covered him as he shoved Mendez off of himself and just—

Leon just laid on the ground, surrounded by fire.

That had been too close. It was always too close, but that had been too close. He had no back up and no plan B, he had the president’s daughter relying on him and all he could do was survive by the skin of his teeth. Leon could have died. He should have died. That had been too close.

He brought Rot to his chest and clutched the gun tight, holding it against his heart, letting the weight of the gun comfort him and soothe away the spiking rush of fight or flight, wishing Chris were still around so Leon could thank him for saving his life once more.

Matilda, his old gun, had a mag capacity of twelve bullets.

Rot, Chris’s Samurai Edge, had a capacity of fifteen.

That three bullet difference was the only thing that had saved Leon’s life.

“I’m okay,” Leon whispered to the flames surrounding. “Chris, I’m okay.”

He was going insane.

Leon looked to Mendez’s body and saw that one of the eyes— the red one, the inhuman one— had slid out from the man’s skull. It was perfectly rounded and reflecting the firelight in a way Leon knew a normal eyeball couldn’t. Leon reached out and picked it up, not surprised to find it was made of glass.

“For only before my sight will the gate open.”

“Your clues suck,” Leon told the eyeball. “All that money from the president and you couldn’t afford a better script.” Leon forced himself to his feet, ignoring the ache that pervaded every part of his body. “Ashley,” he whispered to himself, reminding himself of his assignment. She was waiting for him, still hiding, she could probably see the barn burning from where she was. She probably thought he was dead. She probably thought she was going to die too.

Leon grimaced and slid Rot into its holster at his side, inwardly disgusted with himself for that moment of weakness, for thanking Chris like Chris would actually care. Leon was just sending unwanted gratitude to a ghost. He let the bitter thought clear the last of the adrenaline as he scanned the barn quickly, looking for a way out. His eyes landed on the hole in the wall that had been knocked out by burning lumber falling from the ceiling. The flames surged again and Leon held his arms over his face protectively, wondering if the carbon dioxide poisoning rather than the infection. He also wondered if he was going to turn into something as horrifying as Mendez.

Bursting out into the cool night, Leon shivered without his jacket before jogging back up to the gate. He approached it slowly, alert for any enemy that could have approached, relieved when he saw nothing. “Ashley?” he called out gently, looking to the pile of cargo that she should be behind. “It’s Leon. Are you alright?”

There was a pause, too long, sending dread through Leon. Then a tiny noise, a little whimper, and: “Leon?”

Oh thank fuck.

“It’s me,” Leon assured her. “I got it. We need to go.”

Ashley crawled out from between two large boxes, standing on shaky legs with wide eyes when she saw Leon and the state he was in. “It’s not my blood,” he promised her. “We’ve got one less problem to worry about.”

“Are you hurt?”

Her concern was nice, but they had other things to worry about. “I’m fine, we need to get moving.” Something told Leon that Lord Saddler wouldn’t be happy about losing one of his more expensive toys. Whatever had been in Mendez was different than the rest of the villagers. That, and the fact that Leon had next to nothing to his name in the way of ammo. He hoped he’d scrounge up something along the way or run into Fish. “Can I get that knife back?”

Ashley seemed reluctant to hand it over, but Leon knew that this was their only line of defense at this point, and it’d be of better use in his hands than hers. He made himself find the same comfort in the grip of the handle as he’d found with Rot in his hand, even though the reach of Krauser’s knife fell short. He told himself it was because he preferred bullets to blades. Long range, keep the fucking teeth as far away as he could. That was all it was.

Leon strode to the gate, holding up the eye into the column of light that bled from the empty socket of the face in the center. The light died and an electronic beep answered him. Well shit, it was a retinal scanner. The gates swung open and—

“Is that a fucking castle?” Leon asked before he could think better about watching his words. In all honestly, Leon liked to think he’d seen a lot, but as a born-and-raised American, castles weren’t necessarily commonplace for him. Even back in South America, the structures had been manors and mansions, not stone castles from fairytales. This castle was huge, surrounded by a moat with a single drawbridge leading in, a larger landmass at the other side, waves crashing at the rock of the small island the castle was atop. The stone was light and the entire place seemed cold despite the few torches Leon could see. It looked like the furthest thing from welcoming.

“Is that the only way to go?” Ashley asked, huddled close behind Leon like she was scared he’d move ahead too quickly for her to follow. He really shouldn’t have left the girl behind with only a knife, what had he been thinking? Even though he definitely would have died against Mendez without the extra bullets, at least she wouldn’t be so clingy like she was now.

“I’ll bet there’s some other way,” Leon assured her, reluctant to go into that puzzle fest as well. A castle meant corridors and closed off spaces and dead ends, a maze Leon didn’t have a map to. He wasn’t about to drag Ashley into that kind of shit if he could help it.

They moved up the trail together, Leon hearing nothing and hating it. The path seemed to go beyond the castle, rounding away and down a hill, leading further from the village, thank fuck. “That’s our way out,” he told Ashley with a grin. “Then we’re back to civilization and those cheeseburgers you like so much.”

Ashley was going to smile back, Leon could tell, but the her expression died into one of horror, pointing over Leon’s shoulder, down the path that they were planning to take. “Leon…”

Leon didn’t want to turn around again. Especially when he was seeing the approaching mob behind Ashley from the way they’d come. He wasn’t sure how it could get worse until he turned and saw a second mob coming down from their escape. Flames and pitchforks and machetes, all held high, red eyes burning into them. They couldn’t escape down either path, but the castle drawbridge would be too heavy for Leon and Ashley alone, they weren’t going to be able to cut off the horde, this was—

“Over here!”

The shout was gruff and stopping Leon’s heart even as his instincts buckled down and followed the order before Leon knew what was happening. The voice had come from across the castle bridge, which was the exact opposite of what Leon had wanted to do, and yet his feet were carrying him across without his control. Ashley was running beside him, their steps heavy on the wood. As they crossed the bridge, it started to lift, the downward slope of where the bridge was split in half to rise up making Leon’s footsteps hurried and clumsy.

“Get the other crank!”

Leon’s body followed the second order without his permission as well, Leon and Ashley both darting to the crank and spinning it as quickly as they could. The voice commanding Leon’s body was to the right, at the other crank, but Leon couldn’t look. He couldn’t investigate. His chest was pounding and his hands were starting to shake.

Don’t look, Leon.

The bridge stopped lifting with a clunk and a huge hand wrapped around Leon’s shoulder, dragging him into the castle with a sharp, “Come on!” Leon kept his eyes on the ground. Leon didn’t listen to the voice. He didn’t think about the face that was attached, didn’t think about the hands on him, the warmth of an embrace, the gentle request to touch, Leon didn’t think about it because he couldn’t, this wasn’t real, this wasn’t—

“Who are you?” Ashley asked, her voice wild with panic as they slowed in the corridor that led into the front courtyard of the castle.

Leon held his breath.

Then—

“I’m Chris Redfield.”

— Leon looked up.

Chris had barely changed.

His eyes were colder and there were more lines to his face, hardened tracks of frown lines that made him seem older than the four years he had on Leon. He was in a tight fitting, laurel green uniform with the BSAA globe on his right shoulder and a a holster strap across his chest, hugging his pectorals tight enough to squeeze the muscles. The gun in his hand was Heckler & Koch MP5A3, and it rested so comfortably in his grip that Leon could tell he knew the weapon better than most, but Leon didn’t miss the familiar H&K VP70M hanging from the holster on Chris’s waist. He looked—

Good.

“I was sent in by USSTRATCOM when Agent Kennedy went dark with his handler a few hours before,” Chris told Ashley, that voice, so strong and confident and reassuring, having the same affect on the girl that it had had on Leon years ago back in Raccoon City, when Chris had looked him in the eye and promised to keep him safe. “I’m here to help.”

Chris turned to Leon and his gaze softened. “How are you holding up, Leon?”

Leon’s heart was pounding in his chest.

“Peachy,” Leon said.

Then he pulled Rot up, held Chris’s own gun to Chris’s face, and pulled the trigger.