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As Ada advances on Annette's retreat, Ada's shots hit metal. She stops as the thick metal door closes. As tempting as it is to get another shot off to slow Annette Birkin down, Ada doesn't want to risk the ricochet.
"I didn't expect that from a scientist!" Ada snaps, thoroughly annoyed.
She should have expected that. Nothing in this city is making sense or going as well as she had hoped. It's a stupid mistake that could have gotten her killed. But it didn't, so she's free to continue on as soon as she finds another path around. Annette can't escape that easily.
Groaning. Right, Leon. Who covered for her. Nice of him, considering he's got the ballistic vest. Maybe she should drop the air of confidence she has been going for and find one; she hadn't been expecting there to be many people left who were able to shoot at her. Who would shoot at a cop? But of course, Annette Birkin would. Annette would not hesitate. Not now.
Leon is gasping in that winded way that says he had the air knocked out of him from his vest catching a round. Better than being shot without one. He's a rookie, he's probably never been shot at before. The sound he makes is another groan. Ada turns, thinking Leon is going to complain about how it feels to get shot with a vest on because that is never a pleasant experience.
He is behind her, on the floor where she left him when he didn't start shooting at Annette and instead did the heroic— but stupid—thing of diving for her instead of providing suppressive fire. Rookie behavior. His hand is on his shoulder. He is rolling to his side in pain. Not where the Kevlar part of the vest would have protected. Blood on the floor. Meaning the vest didn't stop something.
"Leon!" After glancing around to make sure no one is sneaking up on them, Ada grabs his collar and his good arm and drags him back around the corner for some cover. He already leaves a streak of red across the ground. The body Annette lit on fire crackles. It's a horrific smell. This whole city smells of rot.
Leon groans again. The tips of his fingers are bloody. That's serious, damn it. Ada rips off her scarf, bundles it up, and passes it off so he has something more meaningful to apply pressure with instead of only his palm.
"That hurts," Leon complains with his hand pressed obediently into the wound. That's not his arm, that's his shoulder. He's been shot shot, damn it. Damn it, Leon!
"It's about to hurt worse," Ada says as she scans over him, looking for other spots of blood, other wounds. He isn't curled around any other source of pain, but that doesn't necessarily mean he hasn't been shot multiple times. His vest should be rated to stop the caliber of rounds Annette fired, but still, Ada checks vital areas first, feeling with her hands, raking with her fingers to catch on any holes or tears that belie another wound.
Leon takes a hitching, shallow breath. "Gee, thanks."
"Stop talking, Leon." She glances up, sharp, to make sure he's still keeping pressure on it. He is. Good boy. She presses on his clavicle while patting down his core again to make sure she hasn't missed anything. Based on how Leon doesn't arch or contract in pain, it's not broken or fractured. He's not in as much pain as much as he should be. Adrenaline. Blood is soaking into her scarf quickly, and she does not like that. It is also creeping out to his shoulder, past the seam of the uniform sleeve, turning the navy color black.
After Ada disconnects the radio from his shoulder and tears off the torso velcro straps, Leon tries to help her get his vest off. When he moves his left arm, the agony he must be in spikes; Leon's hand falls away from where it is holding the scarf to the wound. Blood rushes up. Arterial for sure, with that speed of response. Damn it, Leon!
She doesn't have time for this— instead of Annette getting farther away, the seconds track how much blood Leon is losing. In strong pulses, not drips.
Ada doesn't get up. If she gets up, she will lose her only ally within the city. Annette can wait. Leon can't.
"Just— lie still. Stay calm." Ada rips off the rest of the vest's Velcro after taking over applying pressure with her palm. Her gloves are too thick to feel the heat of the blood right away, but she can imagine the hot wetness of body temperature blood leaking out easily.
"Easy," Leon says with all his grating sarcasm, as if he doesn't have to suck in a breath to get that out.
She moves them so she can flip the vest off of him. Her scarf is way too wet, damn it. Another visual scan of his front. No extra holes in his RPD uniform shirt. Only one stain of blood on this side. A large, quick-spreading bloodstain. The placement of the round is damn unlucky; it missed the body armor and clipped the edge of it. She guides Leon's hand to apply pressure again so she can check the rest of him.
Ada leverages Leon up, ignoring his hissing, hitching breaths. The amount of blood under him is not reassuring. She slides the back half of his vest out of the way and is greeted with another patch of blood on his upper back, more medial than the hole on his front but not by much. Ada pulls off her glove before feeling into Leon's armpit, not wanting to lift his arm to visually check if she doesn't need to at this moment, not wanting to cause any unnecessary movement. Sweaty, but no red on her hands. No blood there yet. No other bullet holes on his core. It's a through-and-through based on what she felt for a few seconds. Her concern is the subclavian artery. Does she have enough bandages for this?
"How bad?" Leon asks.
The noise Leon makes when she lowers him back to the ground is a hitching cry— scapula damage She has been lucky to avoid that particular injury, but that hasn't stopped her from inflicting it upon others. She needs gravity on her side— at the very least, not working against him.
Ada keeps her face as neutral as possible like she has been doing so well for most of the night. "You're shot."
"Yeah," Leon manages to say between clenched teeth, the muscle in his jaw jumping, not matching his teasing tone. "Ouch."
His breathing is shallower than he was prior to being shot. She feels down each arm after pulling off his elbow pads, each leg— clear— and watches the blood creep past Leon's palm with his pulse despite the pressure. Not a full spray, but she needs to move.
She can't tourniquet this wound; it's on a junction. This is a 'stabilize and get to a hospital' type of injury, which is not an option. Not here. She needs to see what she is looking for. The hallway is too dim. Leon's flashlight is on his hip. She sets it on its end after turning it on, aiming it at the ceiling. That's better.
"What's the prognosis, doc? Am I gonna die?" Leon asks, breathless from pain. He still doesn't have bubbles in his blood or foam in his airways, so there is not currently obvious lung involvement. At least it's not that on top of everything else.
Ada does not honor that poor attempt at a joke with a response. Leon is bleeding too much for her to be comfortable, but she will not say that to him. She doesn't need a rookie freaking out on her over his first major injury. Leon has been appreciatively helpful so far, unusually resilient for the situation and his training, but everyone has their breaking points. She wouldn't necessarily blame him for having his limit be the pain and stress of getting shot among the whole situation here in Raccoon City.
Leon's first aid kit is on his belt. She unhooks it.
"Not much in there," Leon says, apologetic, as if it's not his life that is at risk.
"Of course there isn't," Ada snaps. "You couldn't—"
She stops herself. There will be time for that later. This is a dangerous wound— could be fatal— and she has almost no supplies at the caliber to really help, even with her knowledge. Her own medical kit is tiny, tucked away in the inner pocket of her coat. Ada knows exactly what she has. There is a growing puddle under his shoulder while his front is turning wetter and wetter. A gunshot wound is gonna blow through almost all of her supplies.
"I'm gonna need to pack this wound," Ada tells him. "It's going to hurt."
Ada checks Leon's face for a response, but either he doesn't fully comprehend how much this is going to hurt, or he has hit a limit on how much he cares. She needs him cooperative— but more importantly, quiet— because to try and save his life, he needs to not make it easy for anyone to find them, living or un-living.
"I don't… I don't think I have anything," Leon says finally. "For pain."
"You're lucky I'm prepared." Not GSW-through-the-shoulder prepared, exactly, but better prepared than him.
As she pulls out her supplies and lays out Leon's scavenged med kit next to her, Ada finds herself glancing up and behind to make sure they aren't going to be ambushed while vulnerable. "Leon, let me know if anyone's coming."
"Huh?" Leon is distracted. Shock, either the psychological type or the physical type. He's got a reason for both.
"Watch out for enemies."
He barely nods, but he obediently tilts his head to look past her. The smell in the air is foul from the body burning. And Leon's lovely dip in the sewers. If she weren't feeling so charitable, she would comment on it, but it is not the time for that. What a horrible situation.
That puddle of blood is growing; Leon isn't applying adequate pressure on his own. He needs help with that. Ada moves his hand away and plants her knee square over the wound and her balled-up scarf. She needs to compress both sides. Her body weight will do far more than his hand.
Leon tries to arch off the ground; the noise he makes is guttural. He clearly loses a few seconds of consciousness from it. It is not ideal, but it's better than him screaming and drawing attention to them that way.
Pain medication sooner rather than later, okay. Ada pops open her mint container that holds the pills she packed. She picks up a round white one. Leon's hand has switched to gripping her knee as he comes back, squeezing tight. He probably doesn't realize he's doing it, based on how he grits his teeth in a good effort to trap his whining, ragged breaths in his throat.
"Leon, this goes between your cheek and your teeth. Do not swallow it."
He gives her a tiny nod, blinking blearily up at her, unfocused.
"What are you going to do with this when I put it in your mouth?" Ada asks.
"Swallow it," he mumbles.
"No, do not swallow it." Damn, he's not capable of paying close attention. She taps the corner of his jaw, where his molars are. "You put it right there, in your cheek."
He tries blinking some more to refocus himself.
"Like a chipmunk, hamster. Something." If he eats this whole thing at once, no need to worry about patching him up. He won't be breathing enough to live, not with dropping blood pressure.
"Oh," Leon says. "Don't eat."
"Don't chew either." She says, even more sternly to make her point clear. "Open."
"What—"
"Shut up."
Leon's mouth snaps shut, but he remembers what Ada is trying to do before she can sigh. He reopens his mouth so she can shove the pill where it needs to go because at this point, she doesn't trust him to do it. Hopefully, it'll keep him from screaming when she tries to get a handle on this bleeding.
"That medication works fast, about thirty seconds," she says after about half that time. "You feel better?"
Leon's stiff, subtle nod is enough. Perfect. Placebo will carry him until it kicks in for real.
Her remaining glove comes off in favor of nitrile ones. What is on her gloves and hands right now is not something she wants to think about. Leon is covered in sewer grime and surely plenty of pathogens, but that's not something she can fix. She's not a doctor.
She, at least, has bandages treated to assist with clotting. Not much, but that's the part that will go into his shoulder first. Leon's bandages are the normal kind. Ada almost wants to ask if he has been wasting the hemostatic ones, but that's not a mistake she can undo. Sterile bandages are what she— what Leon— needs.
Leon's eyes are closed, his teeth are bared. He is not looking for enemies at all, but she wrote that off beyond his current capacity. That was mostly to keep him mentally occupied.
Still, someone needs to do it. Ada glances up to make sure no one is sneaking up on them— damn that fire, she wishes it would go out. The crackling of it is distracting between Leon's groaning as he tries to breathe through the pain. He is unconcerned with the idea of someone or something approaching.
"You need to stay still." Ada knows he knows this, but it's hard to remember that with so that pain. "You're bleeding from your back, too, and I need to maintain pressure."
Leon tries to listen, fighting to catch his gasping, guttural groans into something quieter. Her knee isn't yet wet, so there is some hope. Some. Leon is paler than he was, and says nothing in response other than trying to breathe. It is not helped by her putting her weight onto his chest right after being shot, but that bleeding has to stop. His breathing is still not wet, and he isn't coughing, so this is not the absolute worst outcome.
"You've had first aid training, right?" Ada asks, just for the sake of distraction, as she rips open the first packet of gauze.
Another nod. Still conscious. She doesn't need him conscious for this, but unconsciousness would tell her that he has lost a lot of blood volume already— not that she can do anything about it if he gets to that point. He's dead weight if he goes unconscious from blood loss.
Ada winds up a ball of the hemostatic gauze. Without any more warning, she stops kneeling on his chest to apply pressure and peels off the now-soaked scarf. The cotton fibers try to resist being removed, clinging to the wetness. Under the stench of the sewer and cooking flesh, the coppery tang of blood erupts without a barrier. She knows roughly where the subclavian artery is. The goal is to pack bandages into the cavity to pin the damaged— or severed— artery to something in order to pinch it shut. Which starts with taking the ball of gauze and pushing it as far down as she can into Leon's shoulder.
Leon's choked gasp and involuntary jerk tell her that the pain is almost more than what his body can handle right now, too. His exhale is strained, and his next breath is hardly one. Totally fine, that's better than nothing, as he tenses and remains locked up as she continues to feed inches of gauze into his shoulder, reaching as deep as she can, working blind because the hole isn't that big, but it's deep because it's all the way through him—
It's still pretty dim, and there is blood everywhere. There is blood everywhere.
"Can you move your fingers on your left hand?" Ada asks. She does not bother to turn and look because it really does not matter right now.
Leon grinds his jaw, looking nauseous for a second. "Y-yeah."
Something good.
Back to wound packing. Every few inches pushed in, Ada glances up to make sure no one is coming in. She was moving quickly, but when this roll runs out with no sign of any progress being made, Ada picks up her pace. Keeping her fingers pressing into the wound, she ties the tail to a fresh roll. Leon's blood smears across the waterproof packaging and puts the first stains on the new bandage that is about to be soaked. It feels as if there is still a gaping hole with no progress made.
More gauze, yet nothing seems to change. She packs in each direction, North, East, South, West, pressing deep the whole time. Her fingers aren't long enough to reach. Maybe that is the issue?
Hell, she surely isn't pushing gauze past his ribs into his rib cage, is she?
She glances around to make sure they are still alone. "Leon, you have to tell me if it's getting harder to breathe."
"….been hard t' breathe… the whole time," Leon mutters.
Ada pauses on instinct, but makes herself continue. "Has it gotten worse?"
Leon doesn't bother answering. His breathing is shallower than it was.
She resists the urge to lash out in any way but verbally, even taking a half-second to keep herself from snapping more than necessary. "Leon, I could be pushing bandages into your damn lung, I absolutely need an answer."
"… no..?"
Fuck. Ada needs his clothes off. Everything is in the way.
She probably isn't collapsing his lung, but she isn't confident anymore, and Leon isn't helping. Taking a pause from packing, Ada stuffs her fingers hard into the wound so she can yank open his uniform shirt with a free hand. A few buttons pop.
"Lemme," Leon says before she yanks again, so she can go back to packing. He fumbles with it, but he manages to undo the top button while she works. The uniform shirt is now easy to move out of the way once she's ready, but he still has the long sleeve shirt under it. Leon can't take it off himself.
"I need to see your chest. Keep pressure on it." She takes his hand and guides his thumb into it. Leon jolts in a way he hasn't really been doing while she has been packing. It must be different feeling inside of himself with his own hand.
"Ada," Leon says, breathless.
"You need to apply pressure, as hard as you can, while I get your shirt off."
An eye temporarily drags open to peer at her. His hand shifts— she slaps her hand back to his, pushing his thumb back in. Damn, he's not really in a state to follow instructions that well. That is on her.
"Work with me here," Ada says, coaxing him. "Just a minute."
"Okay." Leon grits his teeth, grinding, but his hand stays.
"Do you feel like you have to cough?"
"No," Leon says, and takes a deeper breath to prove it— he tries to take a deeper breath. It stutters, and he wheezes. But he is right, he still does not cough. Hemothorax is not within her capabilities to treat. It really isn't— a gunshot wound isn't something she should be treating on her own, either, in theory. They don't have time for theory.
Leon's med kid has small shears. She cuts through the long-sleeved shirt, pretending that the large stain of blood around his shoulder is what she expected. Leon is still bleeding. That grim realization is hopefully not on her face, but even if it was, Leon's eyes would have to be open to see that.
If it wouldn't leave Leon with no shirt at all in a hostile area, she would cut it entirely off him and have no thoughts about it. But sourcing a shirt from someone who is not infected would be difficult and they don't have the time. Ada isn't sure he has the time to be fucking around, either, but it is what it is.
She does almost all the work for Leon because he is not capable of doing it. And, she would prefer him to focus all his waning energy on making sure he doesn't bleed out like it appears he is valiantly trying to do. Shit. Getting the uniform shirt off his non-injured shoulder is easy. She cuts the long sleeve from neck to wrist on both sides so it can be peeled away the same way as his ineffective body armor. The other arm is trickier. She helps Leon keep pressure on the ball of gauze stuffed into the wound as she eases his uniform shirt off his other shoulder. By 'helping', Ada means she takes over because Leon's shoulder does not appreciate being made to move; he goes limp again after making a noise like she's doing something more damaging to him than gingerly maneuvering his arm.
All taking his shirt off does for her is show his bloody skin. No injuries she missed are revealed— considering the circumstances, is pretty impressive. Leon is very fit, which is what has helped him make it this far. She uses the scraps of his undershirt, sweaty but less filthy than his shirt, to wipe up some of the blood out of her way. With one hand, Ada feels along his ribs, starting from the bottom. All normal until she gets really close to the wound. It grinds. Leon twitches with pain.
"Ow," he says, shallow and weak.
"Noted." This is going to be a damn exercise. "I think it's time to pack the other side."
"Cool," Leon huffs out.
"Feel free to pass out," Ada says when Leon's groan escapes his attempt to muffle it as she tries to roll him. That scapula injury is no fun.
"Ada," Leon gasps on the bottom of a punched-out exhale. "Forget about me… just go… stop her before she gets away."
Funny that he thinks now is the time she should bail on him. That she would waste her effort and supplies to do a half-assed job. No, that was a decision she had made the moment she dragged him off.
"I got it. Worry about yourself." Ada does not wait for a response, already balling up the start of a new bandage. She shoves it in without warning. Leon jolts as if she stabbed him— it's probably similar, fingers entering an existing wound. He only coils tighter, starting to squirm, as she continues with the same amount of force she was applying with the front half.
"Ouch, ow— that's—"
"Better than bleeding out."
"Ada, fuck!"
"Stop staying conscious. I got it. I'll handle it," she says, perhaps too harshly. She forces herself to gentle her tone. He's a rookie cop. He hasn't even had a first normal day of work yet. It's his first serious injury. "Take a break, Leon."
The wound seems smaller on this side, but Ada isn't so sure that it is not wishful thinking on her part. She can feel the ball of gauze from the other side as she packs, which means that she is finally making progress on this damn hole through him. His muscle mass is good for his age, but that makes it harder to dig deep. Ada thinks about the anatomy of the shoulder, feeling better about the shot missing his lung. Hopefully, bullet and bone fragments missed his lung, too. That scapula, though… It's in pieces. When she shifts Leon, who is trying to curl too far away from her, she swears she can hear the grinding of bone through her fingers.
Leon's cry of pain is a softer whimper. He is sagging as hot blood leaks around her blue-gloved, red-stained fingers. That is a lot of blood. The faster this goes, the better. Another pack of gauze tied off. A worried glance at his front to make sure she isn't shoving out the gauze on that side. Damn. It would be great to have another pair of hands helping. Leon's left arm keeps jerking, twitching, bicep contracting, fingers spreading and catching on his thigh. Not paralyzed.
Out of hemostatic gauze, onto the regular stuff. Ada hopes regular is fine now. At least the hole is not so cavernous. It is hot. Leon's breathing pattern is interrupted whenever she has to push on the wound— which is often, to make sure she is packing appropriately— and makes what must be fragments of his scapula slide and catch on each other. She was not kidding about encouraging him to pass out; it'll save him a few minutes of pain.
Finally, she reaches skin. She applies trauma pads to both sides of his torso and squeezes. That is what overloads Leon's brain. His guttural, loud groan trails off as his nerves light up enough to earn him a brief respite from the pain of unconsciousness. He goes limp— truly limp— which makes it a bit more difficult to keep him positioned so she can apply pressure evenly to both sides of his shoulder. What a mess.
Now that she has time to look, that is a lot of blood on the floor. The concrete down here is porous, unfinished, and it was soaking in while she worked. That does not bode well for Leon's condition or prognosis. Her scarf, soaked. Her knee, wet. His shirt sleeves are equally dark, and however much blood the multiple packages of gauze soaked up within his own shoulder. Leon really should have a surgeon put his shoulder back together sooner rather than later. He is pale, shivering, breathing quick and shallow, even while unconscious.
Compensated shock for now. She adjusts so she can use her thigh to brace Leon's back so she can feel his pulse at his throat, exposed by his limp head lolling on his neck. Her fingers smear blood on his neck, but there isn't anything she can do about that right now. She counts against her watch for only about fifteen seconds because she has better things to do with her time. About one twenty. Not at all ideal.
She returns to squeezing his shoulder between her hands, trauma pads applying additional pressure. Let this be enough to stop the bleeding. He can't survive if the wound doesn't clot.
She glances around, considering their location. Can he survive getting out of this place? Even if he didn't do a single strenuous thing between now and then? And to where? How? When?
Ada does not have time to babysit him. She can't drag him around. Not in this state. She thinks about the one thing she has yet to pull out. It is tucked at her waist, hidden away.
The injection. Given to her by her employer, described as useful for emergencies, which included severe injury. The answers she got back then were vague in a bio-technical proprietary way, but after running around this damn city...
She does not take it out because Leon needs the pressure she is applying. It is not time yet to check if he is bleeding through the trauma pads— if he is bleeding through, she does not have much else she can do. She does not trust herself to reach back into his shoulder and figure out what she missed. At most, she can try to stuff more bandages or strips of his shirt into the hole. If it's that bad…
Maybe he is dead anyway.
The injection might be a way to clean up a liability. Unless it actually works.
Something has to work, right? The technology is worth the price to hire her. That is why she is here. Surely Annette Birkin wouldn't still be here, risking everything in this doomed city, if the science wasn't actually worth it. Not among this clusterfuck.
Scientists can be pretty narrowly focused on what they deem appropriate, but most of them seem to have a basic sense of self-preservation so that they can continue their work. As long as the danger is obvious— and the danger can't get more obvious than this.
Leon's eyes flutter.
"Still with me?" Ada asks, maintaining pressure. She keeps looking at Leon's nose and mouth, as if she could do anything to stop him from drowning in blood if that is what is happening. But despite his shallow breathing, he is still breathing. The shallowness is probably due to broken bones limiting his ability to inhale. And, likely, his body trying to adjust for the blood loss and general trauma of being shot.
"Leon, how are you doing?" Ada asks, louder.
Nothing significant. His eyes try to open, but he is exhausted. Very pale. Very, very pale.
There really isn't much more she can do for him. She also can't stay here to monitor him forever. Leon is right; she can't let Birkin get away. For a multitude of reasons, but especially because she doesn't get paid if she doesn't deliver what was asked.
Helping a rookie cop on his first— very unlucky— day is not going to put money in her account. As helpful as he has been.
As good of a cop as he maybe could have been.
Ada puts Leon back on the ground and removes her hands from applying pressure. So far, the trauma pads look okay. Leon's soaked undershirt can make some decent bandages once she cuts some strips, avoiding the worst of the blood concentrated around the shoulder. It is a lost cause to worry about infection chances, considering the state he is in, but she does not want to make him worse if she can help it.
Wrapping up his shoulder is a lot easier than packing it. His breathing is labored, which means she can hear it as well as feel his chest expand and the stutter on the inhale. It is unlucky. Well, jumping like that was plain stupid. She didn't ask him to cover her. If he had the energy for it, Ada would yell at him.
Or not. He probably wouldn't be fazed. He really is the good little Boy Scout. Hopefully he makes it.
After wrapping his arm, Ada focuses on getting him warm. Blood loss is going to make him prone to hypothermia, which is bad for the clotting factor. Leon stirs a little more when she eases his left arm back into his uniform shirt, but not like she wants.
Ada pats his cheek. "Leon?"
Wordless, directionless noise. There is an attempt to open his soft blue eyes, but Leon fails at keeping them open or even focusing on anything.
That's not reassuring.
She glances around again, in case she missed something. It will be chilly without her coat, but Leon needs it more than she does. He can keep it. She walks the short hall, scanning for— she isn't sure what. This isn't a hospital. There aren't friendly people down here. The only friendly person is Leon, and look what that earned him.
Oh, a warmer spot. Slightly. Must be some kind of heating utility pipe. Good enough— better than what she had a minute ago. Shame the body burned out, otherwise Ada would put him closer to that. Ada checks the other areas nearby to be thorough, but there isn't really a better spot. Of course Leon had to get shot in the sewers. One way this could be worse is if it were in the actual sewage. He smells bad enough for it already.
"You're going to make me drag you?" Ada asks Leon, who is curled up in the recovery position on his uninjured side. She straps the ballistic vest back on, which prompts another brief attempt at rousing him. If she wasn't paying attention, she might have believed that Leon was attempting a word or two. But she is fully focused on him, helping him brace that arm so she will not jostle it, and his best attempt is a slurred mumble of protest at the pain of being moved.
She feels his forehead as if she could do anything about it. If she could even discern anything from that. His blood pressure is what she is really worried about, and she can't even test that. Ada knows she would not like what the reading would be.
As Leon is coaxed back into the recovery position, as Ada tucks her coat over him as a makeshift blanket, as she starts shifting items from her coat pockets into her other pockets, that injection ends up rolling into her hand.
It is a capped auto injector, like an EpiPen. No branding on it, but that same orange-down, blue-to-sky color scheme. Supposed to help with serious injury. Highly promised to save her life.
A life.
It could be anything. Hopefully something more interesting than adrenaline, but unfortunately, it did not come with an active ingredients list. Crouched over Leon, with the body of an infected person burning out, after Annette Birkin shot at them over her work… this injection is probably not something most people have access to. Maybe most people wouldn't want access to it. Maybe not until they're dying.
Ada flips it between her fingers once, again. Nothing anywhere on it to say anything at all, which she already knew because she inspected it as closely as she could when it was provided to her. It is interesting. Perhaps the most interesting item around, other than what she has been hired to retrieve. Yet, it does not give her the warm and fuzzy feelings inside.
She was planning on keeping it for herself, even if she didn't end up needing it for her own injuries. Using it on Leon means losing out on both opportunities. Murphy's law. Annette isn't going to go down without a fight, but Ada was expecting that. Mostly.
The reason Leon was shot is because she didn't expect it well enough to not tear around a blind corner and be smart. Maybe if Leon hadn't covered her, she would have been the one shot.
Ada puts her fingers on Leon's neck, where smeared blood has dried from the last time she did. She doesn't bother counting for long once she realizes how fast Leon's heart is racing.
Damn it.
The situation calls for it. Popping the cap off, she shifts to reach his thigh, and checks to make sure there is no armor or any equipment under the spot she plans to inject. It is easy.
Count to ten, withdraw, and recap. Leon does not even twitch. Very anticlimactic.
Ada tucks the empty syringe back into her medical kit. She splits most of their meager resources down the middle and repacks Leon's, too. Both of their kits are dangerously empty. She returns his flashlight, checks his ammo, and decides she will be nice and adds a few rounds from her supply into his current mag so it is full again. He probably isn't familiar with his service weapon to tell if a magazine is three rounds heavier, but maybe he is. Leon has surprised her with his competence.
He is shivering under her coat. That is as much as she can do for him.
Just to be thorough, she tries to rouse him again. "Leon? Are you awake?"
She pats his head, then his cheek, avoiding his shoulder. Again, nothing meaningful. His eyes attempt to flutter open, but that injection hasn't worked any miracles yet. She could try to rouse him more firmly, but she doesn't see the use, really. What is waking him up going to do for her? It won't do anything for Leon.
Ada takes out her radio as she paces to the end of the other hall, checking again to check on the situation. These infected people don't seem to open doors, and Annette had that one locked with steel. Of places to pass out, this is better than most.
"How helpful is this injection?" she asks when the radio connects.
"Use it." The voice of her employer is hidden with a voice modifier, making it deep and mechanical.
Not specific, but neither was she. "How's it for blood loss?"
"What's your situation?"
Ada takes a breath like she heard Leon do, shaky and hitching, just to sell it a bit. "Got shot, thigh. More blood than I'm comfortable with."
"Use it," comes the voice, insistent only in repetition, not tone. "That's not an issue."
Ada counts in her head, takes another breath, then a hissed-out sigh. "Am I supposed to feel anything? I don't—"
"Give it a few minutes."
Ada heads back to Leon to study him. "To fix this completely?"
"To start having a noticeable impact."
That's quite vague, considering they should hopefully believe she has used it already. It would not reassure her if she was really in this situation— not that it does a whole lot for her now, either. "What is it supposed to do?"
"It accelerates the healing process."
"That's handy." She is no town idiot. What, specifically, is it supposed to do? But her questions aren't being answered. She is not paid to ask questions, usually.
"How do you feel now?"
It has not been a few minutes yet. "I got a tourniquet. Can't feel—"
"Take it off."
Ada pauses like that kind of instruction would cause her to if she was really in this situation.
"It needs to circulate."
That's a crazy instruction to give about a GSW with blood loss. Does her employer not understand? "I got a—"
"It'll work." The confidence is certainly something. It would reassure her, but she has been in Raccoon City for too long and has seen firsthand the hubris of science.
Ada takes another shaky breath. "Okay."
Never let anyone say she's not a good actor. Another reference to how Leon groaned through gritted teeth, and hissed out air sells it quite well, if she says so herself.
"Better?"
Ada pauses. She peeks at Leon. He doesn't look any… oh, his breathing is steadier.
"Oh, that's helpful." She does not have to fake that relief; she just lets a little through, more than she would allow for almost all situations.
"How does it look?"
"I have it wrapped up, too. Is it safe to take that off?" If it really works that fast, then Leon should be—
"No, it won't be completely healed, but it should be helped well enough to continue. Enough to not bleed out."
Not bleeding out is great. Ada looks at her hand resting lightly on Leon's injured shoulder, where there are blood stains from everything, where his sleeve is missing from his uniform shirt, and his long-sleeved shirt is no more.
"Is there anything I should avoid taking?" she asks.
"Don't take another one."
"I only had the one."
They know that. The silence lets her extrapolate that there could be similar injections in The Nest. She'll pass. The Nest is the source of this whole situation.
The fact that Leon won't wake up as a zombie is not something she was one hundred percent confident about. It is good that she used it on him; she checks his pulse, taking the proper time to count out a full minute against her watch, and gets a number she likes way better.
Checking under the bandage would settle her curiosity, but she doesn't have time for that. She has work to do. Not entirely confident that she is not leaving behind a corpse— animated or otherwise, Ada stands up and reports she is in pursuit of Annette Birkin.