Work Text:
Victor’s mottled skin is taunt under the desk light. He shifts as he moves, and the veins underneath manage to bulge and pump in a way which isn’t human. The giant of a man opens his mouth and the row of yellowed teeth break into view. His lips split, cracking as they do, and Victor forms a smile as he cranes his head upward to his entire height. A giant frame of a man which borders on a monster.
‘Don’t you want to see what’s under the hood?’ He says and flicks a long finger against the metallic helmet apparatus. Grace recoils at the small ting of the metal and feels her legs turn to glue, feels the breath escape her lungs and the ability for flight or fight disappear.
He approaches slowly, a manic grin breaking into laughter at intervals as worn-down nails reach out for her. She attempts to push her hands up, attempts to force her legs to move, but she can’t stop as Victor Gideon lurches for her.
Grace bolts up in the bed. The air rushes back from her nightmare and floods her lungs in panicked pants. It’s constant, a rhythmic in and out which is drowning her ability to think. She feels the sweat pool against her bare skin and every sense is heightened all at once. The smell of Leon’s cologne almost grounds her but she’s spiralling. Her sense of reality shifts as the shadows in the corner of the room trip like vertigo and the images of the infected of the care home come back all at once. An imagined licker climbs the ceiling and that’s when she starts to pull on her hair.
That’s also when Leon holds her wrists gently. ‘Hey, Grace, you’re okay.’ His voice is deep, husky from the early morning light which dapples into her room. She can feel its warmth creep in but the image of Zeno, and his ability to shift around bullets has her mind swerving again. Deeper into an uncontrollable panic.
‘I can’t do it again!’ She says, ‘I don’t want to go back! Please.’
‘Grace,’—Leon’s voice is soft against her, still deep but as if it’s tone is deigned only for her ears— ‘You’re safe, you’re at home.’
She’s sure she can hear a growl somewhere, the muttering of infected nurses and doctors deep in the bowels of the care home. The breaths are still as quick now but do little to pump oxygen in her body because she’s going dizzy from all of the imagined threats around her.
‘I’m here, I’m not going to let you get hurt.’
Leon’s admission of presence breaks the spell slightly. Enough that she’s actually focusing on the details of her room. The plain walls she’s yet to decorate since moving in, the collection of clothes which have been strewn over the carpeted floor from her night with Leon. She focuses on him again, Leon.
He’s holding her against him now and the solidness of his chest is awe-inspiring. She’s seen male models in less shape than her boyfriend. The chest hairs rest against her cheek and she leans all of her weight against him. He’s strong, kind of stupidly-so, and doesn’t move an inch.
‘You’re okay,’ he says again, this time punctuating it with a kiss on her forehead. It’s slow, pressed against her like she’s the most precious thing in the world. She leans closer to him, and this time he moves. His forearms prop him up and she’s clinging to him. Desperate to feel his heartbeat.
It’s not real. She’s escaped Racoon City. Emily is safe. Elpis was the cure. They’d won.
’S-Sorry—.’
‘—Don’t apologise,’ he says firmly, ‘there’s nothing to apologise for. You’re safe with me, Grace.’
‘Thank you,’ she murmurs against him. He presses another kiss against her forehead and they lay there, his hand stroking her hair, until she fell back to sleep.