Work Text:
They couldn't keep going at this pace, but they also couldn't afford to stop. It was a problem that Leon was well-acquainted with by this point in his life, though it was a lesson that he wished he'd never had to have learned at all. Not for the first time, the similarities between this mission and Raccoon City raced through his mind, and the irony of it all ate at him. Sure, he had more training and experience now than he ever could have hoped to have had back then, but this was such an unnatural thing for a person to have to grow accustomed to. Even if he lived to see this kind of scenario play out five hundred times over (and dear God, he hoped that wasn't the case), he wasn't sure if he would ever completely feel ready for it.
Letting out a heavy breath, he opened his eyes and tilted his head forward, away from its resting place against the wall. One hour. That was all that he was going to allow himself to rest, and even that seemed like too long. The air still stunk of blood, fire, and gunpowder, and every little sound that came from outside the cabin walls made his stomach lurch and his heart skip a beat. Really, with how high-strung he was, this break was more for Ashley's benefit, not his. With the chopper having been shot down and no news on the next ETA or extraction point, it seemed almost cruel to keep dragging her around aimlessly without rest.
With that thought in mind, Leon glanced over at his blonde-haired companion, who was curled up against him and using his shoulder as a pillow. From this angle, he couldn't see her face, and if he let his mind wander far enough away, it was so easy to see Sherry when he looked down.
Though, thoughts like that weren't productive, and Leon knew that if he stayed here like this, it was only going to get worse. As much as he didn't want to disturb Ashley, who'd finally gotten some sort of restless peace and comfort, he had to get up and get some air. At the very least, there was no guilt in the prospect of waking her — he knew from the way that she was breathing that she wasn't asleep. Gingerly, he placed a hand on her shoulder and jostled her away from him just slightly, in the hopes that she would catch on and sit up on her own. She did, leaning back and looking up at him with tired, vacant eyes that were utterly unreadable to him.
"What's wrong?" she asked, sounding concerned.
"Don't worry about it," he answered back. "I'm just gonna go take a look around and make sure the area's clear. You stay here. I'll be right back."
She didn't look at all happy about the proposal; a faint striking of fear flashed behind her brown eyes, but she made no effort to move or protest. She simply nodded once in understanding and curled in on herself in order to hug her knees to her chest. The sight of it made Leon's heart sink, but he assured himself that she would be fine. Ashley was one hell of a lot tougher than even she gave herself credit for.
"Alright," she said with only mild confidence. "Be careful."
He nodded at her once in confirmation and then headed down the stairs and out of the cabin. The night air was warm and still heavy from an earlier rainshower, and the scent of death and blood had followed him outside. It lingered around the cabin walls, but the further he walked from them, the less he noticed. It was strange how calm and still things were after the near-literal bloodbath that'd just occurred not fifteen minutes earlier. Other than the sound of his boots softly squishing in the mud, only the normal sounds of nighttime remained — crickets chirping and leaves rustling in the trees when a light breeze blew past.
Off in the treeline, sudden movement caught his eye. Leon reached down and turned on the tactical light strapped to his belt before carefully pulling his pistol from its holster. That movement — whatever it was — was followed up by short, curt swearing in Spanish, not at all dissimilar to the way the villagers around here seemed to talk to themselves. Leon felt himself tense as he aimed his weapon at the source and headed towards it slowly. Eventually, the figure of a man came into view.
"Whoa — hey! Easy!"
The voice was familiar. Leon wrinkled his brow in confusion and stepped up a little bit further in order to get a better look at his target. There, not twenty feet ahead of him, a familiar face was caught in the beam of his belt lamp.
"Luis?"
The man had his hands in the air as though meaning to surrender, but he dropped them just as quickly when he saw Leon lower his weapon. Puzzled, Leon re-holstered his gun and gave Luis a once-over. The other man had been so quick to make his exit earlier, and yet here he was so close to where he'd left them. What the hell was he still doing out here?
"Guilty as charged," the Spaniard finally answered him.
"What are you —" Leon started, though he stopped himself when he noted the blood staining Luis's pants at the knee.
If that blood was his — and it likely was — it wasn't a minor wound. Luis seemed to be favoring his other leg as he stood, and the stain encircled his knee completely, in addition to being at least four inches thick. Leon hadn't noticed it earlier in the cabin, but it was impossible to miss now. As silence fell between them, Luis seemed to notice the way that he was being stared at. He tried his hardest to appear impassive about it, but it was immediately clear just how much he was struggling and how badly it hurt.
"Just a minor scratch, amigo," he said.
"Seems like it," Leon returned sarcastically.
Though Luis looked like he wanted to argue the matter, he refrained. Leon wordlessly made the point clear that this wasn't open for discussion as he closed the gap between them, reaching behind himself in order to unzip the pouch that rested at the small of his back. There was a whole slew of goodies and gadgets in there, but most importantly was the fact that that was where he kept his medical supplies. He took a knee where Luis couldn't, and his first step was to use his knife in order to cut away the fabric of the other man's pants. He had to get a better view of what he was dealing with before he could treat it.
"Quite a compromising position to take out in public like this," Luis remarked, amusement clear in his voice. "Maybe we should try going out for dinner first?"
Leon looked up at him with a flat expression. Sure, he was kind of kneeling on the ground in front of him, eye-level with his crotch, but… Really? Well, two could play at this game.
"Don't get cocky," he warned.
Luis barked out a laugh at the pun. "Not one to mix business with pleasure, I take it?"
"I try to avoid it when I can," Leon replied.
That was another lesson he'd had to learn the hard way, back in Raccoon City. Memories and images of Ada flashed in his mind, and a strange mixture of frustration and embarrassment over what had happened — over what he'd let happen — bubbled up inside of him. Deep down, he didn't regret at all what he'd done for her, and he knew that he'd do it again if the situation arose. Still, with the vague intel that she was not only still alive but working with Wesker now, he wasn't sure how to feel about it anymore, or even her in general.
But this wasn't the time or the place to be worrying about it, and he knew it. He could see the gash on Luis's leg easily now; it wasn't particularly deep, but it was long and positioned in a nasty spot. It dug in right above his knee cap, threatening to cut into the joint itself. It was going to be a pain in the ass to patch it up there, but as long as he was able to clean it and get it dry, it should probably be alright.
"Looks like they got you pretty good," he commented.
"Ah," Luis scoffed, dismissing the idea with a wave of his hand. "I'll live to see another day."
"Maybe," Leon said, "but, you keep shambling around like you're an extra in the Thriller video… I almost shot you once already."
Luis tched in response and looked like he was about to return a comeback to that, but Leon cut him off before he got the chance to.
"That aside," he went on, "I took a shot in the shoulder back in Raccoon City. You'd be surprised how much it can slow you down."
"Acting in the line of duty, Officer?" Luis asked. There was a slight lilt in his voice when he spoke the title, and Leon honestly wasn't sure how to take it.
"Yeah," he said. "Something like that."
"Well, we all make mistakes."
Leon paused in what he was doing. The wound in Luis's leg was mostly cleaned by now — all he had to do was keep pressure on it while he bandaged it up — but something about the way the other man had said that bothered him. There seemed to be a lot of things in general that the Spaniard was keeping from him, and this was just another to add to the list.
"Sounds pretty personal," he said. "Speaking from experience?"
Luis gave him a tight-lipped smile. "Something like that."
The recitation of his own words back at him wasn't lost on Leon, but he let it go for now. He simply finished what he was doing as silence took over, awkward and weight as it was, as he tightly wrapped a bandage around the injury. Mistakes… just how many had he made in his relatively short life so far? How many more would he make before this mission alone was over? He didn't want to think about it.
When he was finally finished playing the role of nursemaid, he rose to his feet and tucked his supplies back into his pouch.
"You gonna be okay to walk on that thing now?" he asked.
To test it out, Luis put a little bit of weight on his bad leg. He flinched slightly, but he at least didn't immediately go back to favoring the other leg.
"Could be worse," he answered.
"Yeah."
There was a bit of a pause between them then, broken only when Luis dared to take another step forward.
"Oh," he said, as though suddenly remembering something. "For your troubles."
Leon knit his brow together in confusion and was about to reassure him that, no, really, he didn't need any sort of compensation — but the words died in his throat and his breath left his lungs when he felt Luis's hand at the back of his neck and his lips pressed against his own. It happened so suddenly that he wasn't able to react properly — and, quite frankly, even with warning, he wasn't sure he'd know how. All of the combat and emergency training in the world couldn't have prepared him for this particular scenario. It was chaste and fleeting, only lasting for a few seconds at most. When it was over, and the other man pulled away, Leon's head was spinning so fast that he wasn't even sure if he'd kissed him back.
"Better go check on the girl, cowboy," Luis said with a gentle pat to Leon's cheek.
And with that, he turned and disappeared off into the trees, leaving Leon winded, dumbfounded, and second-guessing his whole role in this mission as he wondered what the hell he'd really gotten himself into.