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“Leon! Leon—!”
“Wh—“ Leon shot upright, dragging in ragged breaths. There’s a young woman sitting across from him, unarmed wide-eyed and — it’s Ashley. It’s Ashley and they’re in Spain and they need to keep moving.
“You should’ve woken me.”
Ashely only smiles at him, a small miserable thing,”I figured we’d both be better off if you rested a bit.”
Leon grunts but doesn’t argue with her. She’s not wrong of course, but they’d also both be better off getting the fuck out of here as soon as possible.
“You were… you asking for someone.”
“What?”
She bites her lip and glances away for a moment, clearly debating something with herself Sometimes she’s so sincere in everything she does that it hurts. It’s been so long he’s been around someone so guileless. She looks back at him. “You kept muttering ‘Claire’.”
Leon doesn’t process the words at first, then feels a sick rush of something run through him. Had he really…?
“Is she… is she your girlfriend?” Leon would’ve laughed at the question if he didn’t feel like throwing up. It must show on his face, because Ashley winces and opens her mouth to speak, probably to apologize. He stops her before she can.
“No.” Is all he says as he rises to his feet, his muscles screaming at the abuse. The pain is for once a welcome distraction.
Ashley takes the hint and drops it.
“You said her name again.”
“What?”
“Claire.”
Leon says nothing, only pivots on his heel and kept moving forward. He doesn’t remember saying it. But also doesn’t remember a lot of the past five minutes after he got thrown into a wall. Just add it to the fucking list.
“You’re going to see her again, I’m sure.”
Leon stops in his tracks. The words were said so softly, but so damn earnestly —
“She’s just a friend. I haven’t seen her in a while.” He can give her that much.
“Why?”
Because I’m being blackmailed into getting myself killed for the US government to protect a kid just like you. And if she knew, if Claire knew—she’d—
“Been busy.”
“You or her?”
“Is this really the time?” He snaps, then immediately feels guilty as shame overtakes Ashley’s features. She was probably just looking for a distraction, looking for anything but this hell, didn’t know yet she’d never truly escape —
He sighs.
“It’s my fault. I’m not the best at keeping in touch with people.”
Ashley accepts the olive branch graciously and hums in response, glancing down at her feet. She knocks her shoes against the rocky ground, dislodging dirt and substances Leon doesn’t want to look to closely at.
“Once we get out of here, you should give her a call.”
He huffs, if only it were that easy. “I don’t even have her number.”
At that Ashley actually laughs, almost startling him.
“You’re a super spy sent to save the President’s daughter and you can’t get a girl’s number?”
He gapes for a moment before scoffing, “Not a super spy. And I can a girl’s number just fine, thanks .”
“But you can’t get hers.”
“It’s just been a while.”
“How long?”
He doesn’t want to do the math. “Years.”
“But you still reach for her when you wake up.”
He freezes.
“Sorry — sorry, it’s none of my business—“
“You’re right, it isn’t,” he says tightly and picks up the pace. He heard the clatter of her footsteps on the wet stone behind him. They move forward.
Being infected by some freaky ancient Spanish hive mind insect has a way of bringing honesty out of a guy. That, and Leon would say anything at this point to wipe that look of despair off Ashely’s face.
“Her name is Claire Redfield, and I would’ve died in Raccoon City without her.”
Ashley looks so shocked it’s almost comical, and then she brightens. There’s no other way to describe it. It dislodges some of the pressure that had been building in his chest.
He can tell Ashley doesn’t even know where to start first, and braces for the question that he will be asked for the rest of his life—
“She saved you?” Or not. Guess she already knows about RC.
“Yeah.”
“She must be pre-etty cool then, if she’s the one that saved my savior.”
The words were said with just the right balance of sincerity and cheek to make him groan and wring a laugh out of her. Her teeth flash white in the torchlight, eyes going half lidded with glee. She’s the cat that caught the canary alright.
“If you don’t go after her, Leon, maybe I will.”
“You really want to threaten your ‘savior’?” Leon grumbles, bemused by the direction this conversation had taken. But Ashley only smiled and reaches out a hand to gently squeeze his own. She ducks forward and meets his eyes.
“Something tells me you’ll get me out of here regardless.”
He can’t help but smile back.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, I guess.”
“Are you scared?” Ashley asks out of the relative blue considering it’d been at least a solid five minutes since they’d been attacked, which was a goddamn miracle.
“Would it make you feel better or worse if I said yes?” Because the answer is definitely yes.
“No — I mean, I mean about Claire. Is that why you haven’t talked to her?”
Scared? “…what’s there to be scared of?”
“Rejection?”
He snorts. “Ashley—“
“Or something else?”
“Ashley — “ he swallows, rubs his eyes and then curses at the sting. Probably has fucking plagas guts in them now. Can he get any more infected? Probably not, at this rate. He sighs. Infection as a metaphor, huh?
“How do you feel, knowing that even if I get us out of here, I’ll be back in this soon enough?”
Ashely’s eyes go wide, lips part. He regrets his words instantly. It was stupid to say that much, to give that all away. She looks very lost and very young in that moment. “Leon…”
“This is my job, Ashley. It’s — it’s my life. I’m never going to get out of it.”
“Oh.” Great, he’s made her fucking cry. There’s an indescribable ache in his chest.
“Why? Why won’t you leave?” Ashley says through gritted teeth, kicking some vegetation. At least she learned not to make any noise when taking her emotions out on the landscape.
“Because I can’t. And I — she got out, Ashley. It’s been years and I’m still here. I won’t… I’d never want her near any of this ever again.”
“You misogynistic pig!”
“What?” Leon squawks, barely dodging a swing from Ashely’s bruised knuckles.
“Let her decide that! You don’t get to decide that!”
“How does that make me—“
“How do you think she feels? Did you even say goodbye? Does she even know you’re alive? If you die out here, she’ll never know that you love her!”
Distantly, Leon knows exactly what Ashley is doing. She’s latching onto to something she thinks she can actually fix in this purgatory, directly her anger and helplessness at the nearest safe target. He knows this, he knows this is just a trauma response, he shouldn’t engage, but—
“Then she’ll be better off.”
They don’t speak of Claire again.
…Not until after the parasites are removed.
At least Luis was good for something. But considering he was behind it all in the first place, Leon still has the man marked down in the red. And it’s not like that’ll ever change, considering he’s dead.
It was excruciating, listening to Ashley scream her lungs out in pain, and being able to do nothing but pray to a god that doesn’t exist that whatever this is would work. When the worst of it passes and she’s just lying there, breath ragged and eyes still glazed over in pain, he speaks.
“Do you believe in love at first sight?”
Ashley’s eyes loll in his direction and she manages to shake her head.
“Huh. Would’ve taken you for the romantic type.”
She manages to twitch her lips up in the shadow of a smile.
“What about love at second sight?”
That’s met with a weak laugh.
“I’m taking that as a yes.”
“Is that what… is that what it was…?” The words are soft and hoarse, but Leon is taking it as progress over her being nonverbal.
“Maybe. Well, not sight, really, but…”
She laughs then, stronger and with a smile that stays bright for more than a few seconds.
“Leon, what are you…”
“Claire,” he says softly. “We met outside of Raccoon City, but got split up heading to the police station.”
“And when you met again?”
“She hit on me.”
Ashley’s surprised laugh turns into a cough but she waves Leon off, her smile now a grin. She moves to sit up, enraptured with his story. Thank God it worked.
“She hit on you? In the middle of—of all of that?”
“Yeah. Like we were at a bar during ladies night. She even—she even leaned up against the gate that was between us. It was so—I was so,” he couldn’t help but laugh himself then, remembering the absurdity of the whole situation. Who the hell was this girl? Why did just seeing her smile make it feel like everything would be alright?
“You really love her, huh?”
Leon nods, suddenly unable to find the words. He doesn’t need to though, as Ashley tumbled out of the chair and wraps him up in a hug. He squeezes her gently before bringing them both to their feet.
“Let’s get out of here.”