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Life was different now.
For the both of them.
T-00 had a name now. His name was Ty. It was something special and unique. Not because it was a strange and rarely used name among humans but because his special human had given it to him. Ty cherished it just as he cherished his special human for all the kindness he had shown during the outbreak in Raccoon City.
He and Leon had not gotten off on an easy foot at first. Leon was afraid of Ty, and rightfully so. He did not hold that against the young officer. While Ty had a duty to fulfill, something about Leon had taken his interest and given him feelings that had been previously numbed by the cocktail of drugs the scientists of Umbrella had flooded into his system. It suppressed many things. Sensations of pain for one. Feelings of anger, fear, regret, compassion.
Leon sparked something inside of Ty. His determination to live. His fear, while natural and much like all the others Ty had been sent to kill without remorse or hesitation, had caused him to pause. The young officer was fragile beneath the Tyrant's grasp. He flinched away, he whimpered, he pleaded for mercy, and those wide terrified blue eyes bore into Ty when he first snatched the officer up by the straps of his bullet proof vest. He was afraid. He trembled like a scared rabbit in a specimen cage.
He looked a lot like the ones Ty had witnessed in passing. Their bodies broken under the fists of scientific advancement just like his own once had been. While his memories were few and fuzzy, and he had no recollection of his life before he woke up in the large specimen tanks under the subject specification of T-00, there was something inside of him that still persisted. Something vaguely human.
Leon made it quiver and writhe, and eventually he nurtured it back to life where it had started to shrivel beneath the cold calculated commands of the scientists. He felt what compassion without judgment was like for the first time. Leon treated him like a person and not an object or a weapon. All Ty did was let him go. He tested the proverbial waters to see what would happen after being begged for mercy.
While the others had immediately shot at him, thrown flashes in front of him and fled, Leon did none of these things. When Ty slowly, and gently sat him down to rest on his own feet, Leon stared up at him in shock. The stunned silence continued for several long heartbeats as the nervous officer did little else but stare like one of those terrified little bunnies that thought not moving would secure their survival. Ty truly couldn't help himself. He had always wanted to pet one of them, to feel the softness of their fur, and to understand what such a small fragile creature felt like. With Leon, he gave into that impulse. He brushed his fingers across the top of the rookie officer’s hair and was satisfied with the feeling of its softness beneath his calloused fingertips. They tickled between his fingers where the skin wasn't as leathery or hardened from the brutality of combat simulations and the hardened mutation of his cells.
He was soft just like Ty imagined the rabbits were, and Leon melted beneath his touch with an endearing noise of confused appreciation. He may have flinched at first but once he realized Ty intended him no harm, he came around to the touch. He associated Ty with something good and that made the little fleeting spark of humanity inside of the Tyrant burn a little brighter, and grow a little warmer.
It was because of Leon that he strayed from his programming. It wasn't easy. The drug cocktail could only numb the sharp throbbing impulses of pain that came from denying the commands in his brain for so long. He persevered because Leon was worth the experience of that pain. He was something Ty wanted to keep and protect, just like those frightened little rabbits Umbrella tortured so carelessly.
His whim was repaid with much more than Ty could have ever anticipated. Leon gave him a name. As they scoured the bowels of the NEST together, they came across Dr. Annette Birkin, and Leon implored her for aid. Not for himself, freshly wounded as he was, but for Ty. He pleaded for his freedom. For his humanity and the preservation of what little remained inside of him. While Dr. Birkin had been incredulous and detached regarding Leon's requests, she eventually humored the officer with warnings of danger and threats of an out of control B.O.W .
Leon didn't care. He didn't care what danger Ty may pose to himself.
“The sliver of a chance for him to feel human again and regain that freedom is worth the risk as far as I'm concerned.” Leon stood resolute. To Ty’s shock, she eventually listened. Perhaps he misjudged her, and her morbid curiosity on whether it was even possible. She made it possible using the notes of the late Dr. Albert Wesker and his studies into the first Tyrant lifeform. The failed predecessor. A ruthless creature that killed its own creator.
Dr. Birkin shared these facts with Leon, testing both his loyalty and his resolve on the matter. Leon didn't care. He couldn't be swayed.
“Ty is different.” Leon insisted.
An incredulous laugh broke, nervous and amused, from her throat. “You gave him a name?” She shook her head as her fingers worked tirelessly across the keyboard in front of her. “He is not like some stray dog you can feed once and gain its loyalty for life, Officer Kennedy.”
“No, Ty isn't some dog. He is a person who deserves to have the life that was stolen from him.” Leon insisted coldly in return, his sharp eyes turned harshly towards the woman. His soft little Bunny wasn't easily cowed by her claims or her intellectual presence that she tried to lord over him. This night had hardened Leon very quickly. Ty feared the damage it was doing to the small fragile man, not just the physical scars it was leaving across his body but the deeper ones. Would it break Leon just like it broke so many before?
“To live that life, he needs a name first. A proper name like a person should have.” Leon continued. “He needs an identity not an identifier. ”
Dr. Birkin only laughed in return. She had nothing more to say on the matter. Her only focus was on work after that, and before long she was making remote adjustments and preparing an injector gun with a serum she synthesized right in front of the both of them. She didn't clear with Leon once again if he was serious on the matter. Her spare glance back at the officer had proven as much, when Leon's determined gaze never wavered. He stared at her expectantly and she conceded.
Ty let her inject him. What happened next was hazy. He recalls bits and pieces of the events that followed. The sound of alarm systems and Leon calling his name. Everything was fuzzy and disoriented for the longest time as Ty barreled on ahead at Leon's insistence. His feet were uncoordinated and every muscle in his brutish body ached.
He recalled Dr. Birkin’s warnings of untested and side effects . He assumed these were the result of that. He fought the violently mutated infected that threatened his Bunny, and crushed their bodies with a protective rage that flowed through his veins. He struck out at the machinery that cracked and fell into their path, dislodging it so that Leon may get through as they hastily evacuated from the crumbling facility. Red blaring warnings were issued from an automated system as Leon urged Ty to keep moving with the stubborn hand that held tight to the Tyrant's arm. He never let go. Leon never left his side. He held onto Ty like he was the only source of Ty’s strength in that very moment, and ensured they made it out of there together.
They weren't alone in the end.
Leon's compassion had shown beyond Ty, when they reunited with two other small humans that his Bunny cared for. They too were small, fragile and scared, and Leon stood before them to protect them. They trusted him. They cared for him. His Bunny was stronger with them, and Ty felt the unprecedented urge to protect all of them.
He tried.
But their lives had changed after that day. Or, he would be more correct to state, they never stopped changing after that day.
Umbrella wasn't the only one who had been watching from afar. While Ty had protected Leon throughout the city during the chaos of monsters and mutations, out in the real world beyond that reality, it was Leon's turn to protect Ty from the cruelty and disgust of humans.
Their life was different. The organization that took the four of them into custody made a deal with Leon. Ty would get to live and they could stay together, but it was Leon's turn to give up his freedom.
Leon agreed.
Leon agreed because he was different from other humans. He did not throw away the lives of others as carelessly as Umbrella did. He valued every single one. Even that of a Tyrant's. He let them shackle him into this new cage of servitude. While Leon still looked human, and had many of the normal human facilities to cater to, he now lived a life similar to Ty’s old one. He was only allowed out of their proverbial cage they shared together when serving a purpose and only that.
Their cage looked like a home. It was made to accommodate someone of Ty’s large size from the modifications of the furniture to the adjustments in table height. Leon had no issue with climbing up on everything like a spider monkey if it meant Ty could live in comfort. In fact, he made a fun game out of it some days, as he clambered up into the tall bar stool to reach the counter level where Ty stood to prepare lunch. Aside from the heavy duty security locks on the doors and windows, their home was comfortable. Whatever they requested would be met.
Leon worked hard to ensure that would happen. But with each passing day, Ty feared his Bunny was losing his own spark. The nightmares haunted him. Leon never wanted to talk about it, but Ty could see the loss of light in Leon's eyes. The way he had to salvage what little was left of himself after a mission just to give Ty a warm smile and a greeting when he returned home.
The way he cried some days, curled up in Ty’s arms when it was all too much for his little Bunny to handle. Leon gave up his humanity so that Ty could have his. He gave up his freedom so Ty could keep his life. He served so that Ty never had to ever again.
Leon gave up everything, so that Ty could have a name.
A name that represents love, and the sacrifices that it was always willing to make.
Ty loved Leon, and Leon showed that every single day with the hard choices he had to make so they could stay together. How can one person repay a love like that?
They shared this new life together. The world beyond Raccoon City wasn't perfect, and it wasn't prepared for a love like theirs. It wasn't prepared for what truly selfless sacrifice meant, and what the real meaning of humanity was. It didn't understand the power of a name and the life it sparked with it.
It didn't understand, and it never would, because Leon was out there for both their sakes, and the sake of the world, to ensure Raccoon City never happened again.
To make sure more people like Ty never have to suffer a life without a name.