Chapter Text
Ada Wong always knew she wasn’t meant for a happy life.
Growing up an orphan being tossed from side to side can make any child doubt their chances of growing up at all. With no father and mother to account for, the girl that became Ada grew up with no perspective, as orphan girls usually do.
The girl carried sadness in her name given by the orphanage caretakers since she was too little to remember her own. Wen Xi, they called her.
The gentle regret.
She supposed it made sense. Her parents probably wanted a son because sons carry on the legacy while girls are given away to become something else. Girls are disposable.
Wen Xi learned to adapt, though. She knew adoption was out of the cards for her so there was only one way to survive until adulthood.
Skills.
She became a formidable thief by the age of eleven, mastering the silent steps and the innocent expression if ever caught. With the money, the girl bought herself pencils and paper, drawing being her only respite in such a lonely life.
Until one day she stole from the wrong person.
The man appeared frail and weak but twisted her arm in one swooping motion the second she reached his back pocket.
“You're fast but lack finesse”, the man had told her, lowering his glasses to take a good look at her. “Your hand must weigh like a feather for it to work”.
The girl did what any thief would. She ran.
Two weeks later, she met the man again in the same spot. It was raining lightly but the man carried a cane instead of an umbrella.
“Any luck in your business?” He sat by her side but the girl didn't feel frightened like with other men.
The stranger was old like the director of the orphanage but kind, he appeared weak but was strong and quick. It was puzzling how someone could have such odd extremes.
“It's not payment day”, she shrugged off.
“A shit day for us both then”, he reached for his pocket, taking out some coins and placing them in her hand. “I think this covers your day, huh?”
“Why?”
The man smiled. “You remind me of someone”.
Day after day, the stranger sat with her on the sidewalk for twenty minutes to chat about their day and every day the girl looked forward to the next time until the final time.
She was twelve years old when the stranger walked into the orphanage and asked a question.
“Would you like to be my heir?”
“A heir?” Not a daughter, she thought. Something else.
He knelt to her level. “I can teach you all I know. I can give you a life beyond these walls”.
“Why now?”
“I'm at my life's end, dear girl. I want to do something good for once”.
A heir was better than a lonely child so she accepted without knowing that her whole existence was about to change.
The girl had no idea that the kind stranger was a dangerous man, forged in death and violence. Mr. Yen, he asked to be called. Not father, he would never be her father but her benefactor.
The man didn't lie about that, he taught the girl everything he knew. Martial arts, weapons, thievery and, most important, the art of lying.
At the age of seventeen, the girl was a skilled manipulator but the tears she shed for her benefactor's death were real. Above everything, he gave her a home, a purpose, a future.
After laying him down on his final resting place, the girl kept her promise to continue his work. Ella, Sophia, Charlie, Liv. So many names and backstories she wore like clothing as a mercenary but none of them ever fit her properly.
Until Ada.
Ada Wong was a brilliant researcher, very much in love with her boyfriend. John was a good man - as good as someone working for Umbrella could be - that told her to go back to Chicago and wait for him there.
It was the perfect cover. She would get all the information she needed and would soon put Ada Wong to rest alongside her other passing identities. An easy job.
Coming back to Raccoon City wasn't in her plans but her duplicitous employer knew so much more than her at that point and Ada agreed. The mission was simple: steal a virus sample and get out as quickly as she could.
A zombie infested town wasn't what she expected nor was the man she met there.
Leon S. Kennedy was an idealist rookie cop. He was quick to trust and protect someone even at the cost of his own life. He could've left when he saw the monsters but he chose to stay and try to look for survivors.
Ada had never met someone so selfless before.
In her line of work, trust was a foreign concept. To trust someone was like jumping out of a plane without a parachute. It'd get you killed.
Leon was different. He was kind and funny and gentle, the type of man she had only read about. When Ada met him, she tried her hardest to get away from him, as much as she learned to live with all the death that surrounded her life, she didn't want his death in her conscience.
Leon fought back, though. His need to help and protect was stronger than his fear and Ada was foolish enough to accept his help.
Mr. Yen always said that mercenaries were weapons crafted to accomplish their missions, no matter who was in the way.
Feelings are meant for the living. We're as good as dead, he used to say after a hard training session.
Ada thought she was past feeling anything at all but, somehow, she felt… something. Kinship, connection, love? She had no idea when it started, if it was when he took a bullet for her or when he rescued her but somewhere in between, much to her despair, she felt something.
She only realized the magnitude of her feelings when her mask fell and Leon looked at her with disappointment and hurt in his eyes.
He was in her way. She should've killed him.
When he lowered his weapon and she lowered hers, Ada entertained the idea of leaving that place by Leon's side, of walking away together to God knows where.
The bullet that pierced her shoulder brought her back to reality and as Leon gripped her hand tight and begged her to not let go, Ada thought back to her childhood realization.
She wasn’t meant for a happy life.
She was ghost.
Leon would go on without her to have the happy life he deserved. Their paths would never cross again.
When she fell, Ada didn't accept death. She was a survivor and better yet, she was skilled. When her grapple gun finally managed to stick to something solid, Ada had already hit her body pretty hard against the falling debris. Nevertheless, she persisted. One or two broken ribs were nothing in the bigger picture.
“Ada, come in”, Wesker’s voice came on the radio after Ada dealt with a long hallway full of spiders. The radio must have been on range again.
“I’m here”.
“Raccoon City will be destroyed come October 1st. I assume you have the G-Virus?”
“Annette managed to destroy the G sample but I have a tissue sample from Birkin's G-mutation”, Ada quickly explained, thanking herself for thinking so far ahead.
She knew there would be no way out without a sample to bring to Wesker. The ethics of spywork.
“It'll do”, Wesker said after a long pause. “There's a helicopter waiting for you for extraction. Just reach a higher building and you'll see it”.
Waiting for her was a stretch. The thing was hovering around as monsters crawled from every corner of the city. Dawn was almost there and with it, Raccoon City's destruction.
Despite the pain, Ada ran as fast as she could, grappling onto the container the helicopter carried. She was saved. The mission was over.
Still, she felt that phantom ache as she watched the town disappear from her view. She took almost the whole night to get to high ground due to her injuries, Leon should've escaped by now.
The bullet wound on her shoulder was a puffy red reminder of how close she came to death because she faltered to do her job. Leon was a liability, he actively put himself in her way and she still couldn't do it and thinking back now, Ada wouldn't change a thing.
Leon deserved a good life. She hoped he'd get it.
“You did good, Ada”, Wesker said, examining the tissue sample.
Two days had passed since she escaped Raccoon City, her ribs ached every time she took a breath but she made it in time for the delivery.
“Happy to help”, she simply said, trying not to appear nervous. “Do you have any more assignments for me?”
“Not yet. You're free to do your job”, he turned away in his chair, apparently ending their conversation.
Ada didn't mind. Whatever Wesker was, she wanted to stay as far away as possible from him.
“Next time you do a mission for us”, Ada stopped in her tracks and turned back. “Try not to get distracted by pretty boys. The Organization doesn’t take traitors lightly”.
For the first time in a long time, she felt unsure. How could he know? Did he have access to the cameras at NEST or did he hire someone else to take her out in case of failure?
Ada breathed deeply and showed no sign of trepidation. She couldn't allow herself to be vulnerable in front of Wesker.
“Goodbye, Wesker”.
“These are Ada's scars, not mine”, she mumbled as she traced the scratches on her arms and torso.
The sample was delivered. The payment was good. Her mission was done.
She could put Ada Wong to rest.
And yet, she couldn’t and she didn't know why. Maybe all the death and lies and betrayal left a mark in her soul. Maybe because for the first time since she started this job, she didn't feel like a ghost but alive. Maybe because she felt something for a kind man.
Either way, Ada stayed and she kept on working.
In her idle time, she managed to get a hold of Leon's whereabouts and discovered he'd been recruited into STRATCOM, a U.S. military force that deals with bioterrorism cases, amongst other things.
She hoped the military wouldn't break Leon's spirit.
Life went on. Wesker didn't contact her much which meant she could work outside the Organization for a while. Her clientele was vast thanks to her benefactor and it's from a bunch of recommendations she met Derek Simmons.
It was simple at first, complete a few missions for her new employer and his “family”. Ada didn't ask questions, she got the job done and the payment was good enough for Simmons to become a recurrent client but everything changed one day.
Simmons had contacted her about a new job and sent her the address. Ada was surprised when she arrived at a very fancy restaurant, their meetings were always held at his office for confidentiality.
She marched in regardless. The restaurant was empty, except for Simmons and his security. Two men guarding the door and another two far behind him.
“Ms. Wong, I'm glad you could make it in such short notice”, Simmons offered her a seat as he adjusted his suit.
“I heard you had something for me”, as soon as she sat, a waiter came in to pour wine in their glasses.
“I hope you like lobster. I've been craving sea food for a while now”, he said as another waiter brought the plates.
“I was under the impression you're under a time constraint, Mr. Simmons”, Ada pressed, politely.
“Please, call me Derek”, he tried to give her a charming smile but all it did was make Ada cringe.
Oh no.
She knew where this was going. Simmons was interested in her, not her work.
She dealt with plenty of guys like this ever since she became a mercenary but it never stopped making her sick. Simmons was worse, though. He was a high ranking U.S. government official, she would've to be careful and play her cards right to leave unscathed.
So, Ada played the part.
“Of course, Derek”, Ada didn't flinch when Simmons smiled as if he had won some imaginary trophy and she didn't flinch later in the dinner when he touched her hand.
Derek Simmons was a needy, weak man who needed to believe he had control over her so Ada indulged him. She laughed at his jokes and she smiled at his compliments because weak men with power were dangerous when they felt slighted. Especially by women.
Ada wanted to vomit when he kissed her but she held off until she reached her hotel, emptying the entire dinner in the toilet.
She felt dirty and used but, above all, angry. Over the next month, Ada made her mission to discover whatever skeletons Simmons kept in his closet. Anything to give her a good reason not to work with him anymore.
When she discovered he had a part in destroying Raccoon City, Ada felt worse than before but she had something. She drafted a note explaining her reasons for ending their partnership, changed her phone number and left the U.S.
If she was lucky, Ada would never see Derek Simmons again.
Over the years, her work relationship with Wesker began to deteriorate. He didn't trust her and the feeling was mutual, still he sent her to retrieve a sample from some researcher in Spain.
Ada had no idea what she was getting into or even who she would meet there.
Despite her orders and Wesker breathing down her neck, Ada helped Leon where she could. He would never know, but she would always look out for him like he did for her.
Despite his bitterness and distance, she could see through the cracks of his armor. He hadn't changed, even after all those years Leon was still the same kind and gentle man she met, ready to risk his life for a stranger.
Even if he tried his hardest to appear unaffected with his wisecracking jokes, she knew him.
In those brief hours together, Ada felt that spark again, the one she refused to name and when they parted, sadness overcame her but that was their lives. Brief encounters and passing glances was all that it could be between them.
However brief their reunion was, it brought back all the feelings Ada had long kept locked away in the darkest corner of her mind.
She was doing a terrible job of being a mercenary. She shouldn't care about him or the girl or what Wesker planned to do with the sample but all those years ago, Leon had made an impression on her. Ada couldn't help but care.
There goes my reputation, she thought as she put a gun against the helicopter pilot’s head.
Wesker wouldn't go near that sample if she could help it.
The next years passed in hiding. Wesker was pissed about her betrayal, she was certainly out of the Organization at that point and the sample had been destroyed long ago. Ada had no choice but to lay low.
She stayed in Greece for two years, just living an ordinary life in the house her benefactor left for her. It was a peaceful existence, Ada sometimes wondered what it would be like to truly settle down and not feel like a ghost in her own story.
But what would that be for her? All she knew was to kill and lie for a living, there's no happy ending for someone like that. The only way for a mercenary to leave that life was through death.
A few smaller jobs came through and Ada accepted, all far away from Wesker and Simmons. Her life was beginning to feel normal again when she met Leon S. Kennedy for the first time since Spain.
Leon looked good in a way she had never seen him, clean in a dark blue suit, his dark blonde hair shining under the lights. The sensible thing would be to stay away from him but Ada was never cautious when it came to how she felt about him.
When Leon acted cold and distant, Ada was taken aback by it but she didn't let it show. She's just happy to see him well.
It was a stroke of fate for them both to be after the same thing and better yet that Leon agreed to work with her, despite his bitterness about Spain.
Something akin to sadness flared in her heart. Leon couldn't trust and Ada couldn't be trusted.
Is that really the never ending cycle of their relationship?
What relationship?, she scolded herself. One night and a kiss eleven years ago shouldn't mean so much to her but Leon didn't know that something within Ada changed that night, he didn't know he broke into her armor and carved a place in her heart.
He'd never know.
“Mr. Kennedy, care to clue us in on your beautiful dance partner?” That dreaded voice brought Ada to a halt, her mind working all the ways she could leave the building as fast as possible.
Derek Simmons was a senator now and looked at her like a hawk stalking his prey. The thought that he'd be there had never crossed her mind.
Shit.
Ada smiled politely, giving her fake alias for the mission. Simmons smiled back, clearly enjoying the charade. When Simmons asked for a dance and Leon backed off, Ada died a little inside. She couldn't blame him, he had no idea what the Senator was up to.
“I wasn't aware you knew agent Kennedy, Rin”, he drew out the name on his lips, his eyes studying her face, waiting for a reaction that never came.
“Our paths crossed one or two times”, she simply said, giving no room for any interpretation besides a work relation at best.
Still, his grip on her tightened. “I see”, he replied and for a while they kept dancing, all to maintain their game of pretend. “You should stop by my office, there's something I need to show you”.
“I already have prior engagements”.
The music was finally coming to an end when Simmons leered at her. “I'd judge best not to cross me, my love”.
The endearment made her skin crawl as the song ended and he backed away into the crowd.
Ada took a deep breath and headed for the alley. Meeting Simmons in Tokyo of all places wasn’t in her plans but she'd store all the bad feelings and memories away and get to work.
Getting kidnapped alongside Leon only to discover her mission was a trap set up by Wesker wasn’t in her plans either. He was still hunting her and he'd never stop unless he was dead, just like Simmons.
Tired and angry didn't begin to cover how Ada felt and Leon's distrust didn't help matters. After killing the kidnappers and patching Leon up, Ada had reached her limit.
Shouting at Leon and then kissing him wasn’t her proudest moment but it certainly was an unforgettable night.
It was infuriating how he made her feel. Leon shifted Ada's world off its axis in ‘98 and nothing had ever been the same since.
Eleven years removed from their first kiss, they had their first night together and Ada had fallen back into the bottomless pit people call love.
She couldn’t say it was love, though. Neither of them could because to say was to acknowledge that this wasn't just a fling so they kept the charade and it worked.
Every couple of months, they got together. Sometimes they just spent the day in a different city, meeting new places when their schedules aligned, other times it was weekends or even a full week if they're lucky enough to just bask in each other’s presence.
It was good and almost easy to just forget their jobs and all the horror that surrounded them. Ada wasn’t a spy and Leon wasn’t an agent when they were together, they could just be but like all things, reality comes knocking on their door.
They met in the field again in the middle of a civil war. Ada wasn’t a stranger to anonymous contracts and when she discovered the mission was to stop a bioweapons' project from picking up speed, she promptly accepted. The world didn't need any more Tyrants.
Leon was there and he took it all in good fun because that was one of the rules: no job interference, unless there's a high chance of death of each other or innocents.
The mission was mostly a success but there was something about the contract and the handler's refusal to say who it was that made her uneasy. A few days later and after a lot of dead ends, she discovered that Simmons was the one who hired her.
He was playing with her. Ada would make sure the next time would be the last time.
Ada needed to feel safe so she did the most unsensible thing of all, she went to see Leon. It was risky since she was on the BSAA hit list for impersonating as one of them but she missed him and his terrible jokes.
With Leon, Ada felt alive and the weekend they spent together in Washington is one she'd remember forever but even then, the cracks started to show.
Leon had friends, family and a full life. When she met his cousin and her kids and saw the way Leon was with them, it was like a bucket of ice cold water dropped all over her.
What was she doing there?
The question kept pounding in her head throughout the night and, despite Leon's insistence he didn't want what she couldn’t provide, she didn't believe him.
Leon deserved better than her.
After that night, they didn't talk at all but that was their normal. Leon went back to his life and Ada went back to hers.
In a year and a half, Ada almost convinced herself she'd made the right call. She hadn't seen Leon in all of that time, he could've met someone already.
Someone who would stay and make him happy and he'd love this someone as much as he once thought he loved her. The thought made her stomach clench every time.
Simmons contacted her again, showing his face this time, offering Ada the perfect opportunity to find and kill him. What she found in that submarine, however, was far worse and deranged than she could ever imagine.
To have a man so obsessed about a rejection that he cloned the object of his desires was crazy enough but the once Carla Radames stole the one thing Ada had. Herself.
Simmons, with the help of Carla herself, had mutated her into an exact copy of Ada when all the other experiments failed. Twelve thousand lives lost for a man's ego.
All because she didn't want him.
Simmons went further, killing the President of the U.S. and unleashing bio-attack after bio-attack and in the middle of all of that was Leon. There they were again, fighting monsters in infected cities but this time Ada knew this was happening because of her.
Simmons was obsessed with her to the point of lunacy and Carla lost her mind in the process. If only she had come to Ada first, they could've killed the bastard together but Carla Radames was beyond saving the moment she put innocent people in danger.
Ada still had nightmares about her and everything that followed. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw infinite copies of herself, ready to tear her skin out.
Derek Simmons was gone, at least. Leon had helped her at the end like he always did and Ada left like she always did but this time was different. Carla had smeared her name, she would need to disappear and Leon couldn't follow her. There's too much death in her wake, she didn't want to put him in danger.
The world moved on with assassins on her trail and a very stubborn man trying to find her. In the months that followed, Ada had lost count of how many mercenaries Neo Umbrella sent after her; the new scars on her body were the only thing left to tell the story.
She was so tired of it all. Tired of the lies, death and the endless game of pretend she'd been playing her whole life but she wasn’t a quitter. Survival was in her blood and she'd come out of the other side in one piece.
The aching stab wound at her side disagreed with her assessment.
Maybe she should leave Ada Wong behind but Leon S. Kennedy had found her and even after everything that went down, he still looked at her with fondness and that word she couldn’t think of.
Ada was so tired of pretending that Leon didn't mean the world to her that she just fell into his arms when he hugged her.
Affection was something foreign to Ada. As an orphan, it was a rare thing; as an adopted heiress, accomplishments were the currency for praise and as a mercenary affection could not exist.
Lust. Passion. Desire. Those were the coins to trade for information and an accomplished mission but Leon cared for her in the way he cradled her head, in the gentle touch when he treated her wounds, in his patience to stay the whole night awake because she had a fever.
How could she not love him?
So when Leon broke all the rules and said everything they never dared to say, Ada felt relieved.
The secret that wasn't so secret was out. They loved each other. They had loved each other for fifteen years and the weight of that confession had been lifted off of them.
Leon deserves better, it's all Ada could think as Leon pleaded for them to just run away together. He deserved to have a home to return to, someone that could stay.
Maybe you could be that someone, that traitorous, reckless inner voice whispered back.
You just have to want it too.
Ada wanted to. For God's sake, she longed for it. She didn't know when that want started or how someone who always thought to be so incapable of love ended up in such a loving relationship.
She loved Leon. She had loved him for so long that the answer to his proposal could only be one. Hours later, they left for Greece, the only place she ever called home. There was so much she wanted to show and share with Leon but they had time. Their future was set up, they'd enjoy the weeks they had together until Leon had to go to work, Leon would hand in his resignation letter and Ada would become Lily permanently.
It was almost easy to picture.
Much like Leon's situation, Ada became a mercenary out of duty and obligation. To step away from all of that had always been an impossibility until that day.
Of course that fantasy couldn't last.
The day after Christmas was spent like any other day: making out in bed and just holding each other like two lovesick teenagers. Ada would never get tired of just being by Leon's side after so many years apart but they had to get up and start to prepare everything to leave in two days.
Leon headed to the kitchen and Ada went to check her mail.
Ada's mail box in Mykonos was the only address she could receive anything besides her ever changing phone number, the mail from all of her safe houses rerouted to the same place for safety so that day she went outside to check just like any other day.
Letters from the lawyers, greeting cards from old clients, requests, the usual stuff but an unmarked envelope called her attention.
Inside there were pictures, almost twenty photos of Leon and her. It was taken from afar but it was clearly them holding hands while they walked by the shops, at the beach, even in Madrid.
Ada's blood ran cold.
Someone was unto them. Someone out there knew of their relation to one another and planned to use it.
She searched the bottom of the envelope and found a crumpled letter, digitally typed.
We know of your little secret. End it before this lands on somebody's FBI desk come January.
The letter ended with typed coordinates at the bottom of the page. A meeting, not everything was lost.
Ada breathed deeply, trying to contain her trembling body. They'd never let her leave unscathed, she'd be bound to that life forever and Leon… She could still save Leon.
She just had to break his heart first.
That was what it amounted to in the end and Ada would always choose his safety over her own happiness even if Leon hated her by the end.
He will hate me, it's all she could think as she made her way back inside. She had to abandon him, to walk back on her word, on the promise they made. He'd never forgive her.
The need to protect him trumped the heartbreak she was feeling. If those pictures ended up in the wrong hands, Leon would be hunted by his own people. The U.S. government didn't take lightly to conspiracy with an enemy spy.
Leon could feel she was different the moment she went back inside, he knew her so well by now. Ada put on a smile and blamed the weather as she ate the last meal Leon would ever prepare for her.
Sitting under the blankets by the balcony, Ada tried her hardest not to cry. That night was all she had of the Leon who looked at her with love and care in his eyes. Come tomorrow, the Leon she’d encounter next, if their paths crossed again, wouldn't be this man.
Wen Xi. Ada Wong. Lily Wren.
She was never meant for a happy life.
“I'm going to miss being here with you”, she couldn’t help but say, the knot in her throat growing bigger.
“We'll have plenty of time to come back later”, Leon sounded so hopeful. Ada just closed her eyes as he caressed her head.
I'm so sorry.
Leon held her tight that night like he had a feeling she would disappear come morning. Ada held on to him just as hard, letting the silent tears stain her pillow through the waken night.
“I love you”, she whispered in the dead of night, watching Leon's peaceful sleep.
Even if we never meet again, I hope one day you can forgive me, Ada thought but didn't say. She couldn't risk waking Leon up.
She left before dawn broke, getting her suitcases to their rented car without looking back. If she did, she'd crumble.
Leon would be better off in the long run, she told herself until she almost believed. He had friends and family to rely on and he would be safe from her mess.
As the years passed, their story would turn into just a fond memory instead of that breathtaking pain. That one time an U.S. agent fell in love with a heartless mercenary.
She wouldn't cry, Ada kept reminding herself. Sadness could turn into fuel for anger and vengeance and in that moment, she was ready to tear to shreds the person who sent those coordinates.
She had an idea based on the location. It was time to go back to the Organization.
Ada stepped into the building with practiced ease. The coordinates led her to Romania where her old associates held an office in the heart of Bucharest. She'd walked through those halls before, a lifetime ago it seemed.
It was the kind of place designed to make people feel small before they even stepped inside but Ada walked through the halls without slowing, heels echoing sharply against the polished floors, her reflection flickering in the dark glass panels like a ghost returning to haunt its own grave.
By the time she reached the door to the office, the guards were already stepping aside. They knew who she was, promptly opening the door to let her pass through.
Irina was waiting. After all those years, she hadn't changed.
She stood by the window, hands clasped behind her back, red hair pulled tight with not a strand out of place. She didn’t turn when Ada entered.
After years of working for the Organization, Ada learned not to ask many questions and Irina was one of them. Irina had been her handler on many occasions when Wesker was unavailable to boss her around but unlike Wesker, she wasn’t a fighter which made her threat all the more infuriating.
“Ada,” she greeted, as if welcoming back an employee from vacation. “Right on time.”
Ada didn’t return the pleasantry. “Blackmail is a cheap tactic coming from you, Irina”.
Irina smiled. Despite being ten years older than Ada, Irina sported only a few wrinkles in her face much like a porcelain doll, cold and impassive.
Her deceitful smile just made Ada's blood boil.
“How else would I get your attention?” She shrugged off. “And see? Here you are”.
“Cut the act,” Ada replied, her tone flat. “What do you want?”
“Straight to business,” she sat back in the chair behind the desk. “I missed that about you.”
Ada didn’t move further into the room. “Answer the question”.
Irina tilted her head, studying her. Always assessing and calculating.
“You look tired, Ada,” Irina said, instead. “Running gets exhausting after a while, doesn’t it?”
Ada’s jaw tightened, but her voice stayed even. “You're mistaking me for someone that values your life, Irina”.
“But you value Leon’s life. Isn't that why you're here?” Irina's eyes were locked on her, waiting for a fraction of a reaction from Ada. Anything to indicate how to exploit her weaknesses.
“I'm here because I don't like being followed”, it's what she settled on, an impartial assessment.
“We monitored an asset,” Irina corrected.
“I wasn’t your asset.”
Irina’s gaze sharpened. “You were and you still are. You just forgot.”
Irina studied her and Ada knew at that moment that her deflection tactics weren't going to work on her.
“All those reports, all those years.” A faint, almost amused smirk spread to her lips. “The great Ada Wong, undone by sentiment.”
Ada’s hand moved before the thought fully formed in her mind, grabbing the gun strapped to her holster to aim at Irina's head.
Silence stretched between them. Irina didn’t flinch. If anything, she looked pleased.
“There she is,” she said. “I was starting to think you’d gone soft.”
Ada’s grip tightened. “You think this is a game?”
“No,” Irina replied. “This is leverage.”
She gestured lightly towards the desk, opening an envelope with the same photos she had sent to Ada “These photos are insurance. You understand how this works.”
Of course she did.
Ada’s mind was already moving, mapping exits, contingencies, timelines. How many copies existed, who took it, who else knew.
Ada lowered her gun. “You send them and you lose your leverage.”
“I don't know. I think destroying the DSO's golden boy's reputation could be really fun”. Irina teased.
There it was, Ada though. She could save him.
“You don’t want him,” Ada said. “He’s not the asset. I am.”
“Clever girl”, Irina cheered in the fakest way possible.
“Why? Wesker made it really clear I was out when he was hunting me down”.
“Wesker was a fool that traded us for TRICELL. I want you back because this is where you belong. Call it mutual benefit,” Irina continued. “You get to keep your secret. We get our best operative.”
“And if I refuse?”
Irina’s gaze hardened, just a fraction.
“Then the next envelope doesn’t come to you,” she said. “It goes to the people who would love to know why one of their agents has been… fraternizing with a wanted spy.”
“You come back,” Irina continued. “You take assignments when we call. No disappearing acts. No interference.” She pauses to look at Ada. “And no more distractions.”
Ada’s eyes hardened, trying her best to appear detached. “And in return?”
“The photos stay buried,” Irina offered. “All copies and records? Gone.”
That was how she could save Leon. Selling her loyalty to the Organization seemed like a reasonable price to pay for Leon's life.
Her eyes wandered back to the photos. All those moments of peace and happiness that slipped through her fingers like quicksand mere days ago. A life she was never meant to live.
“You expect me to trust you?” Ada questioned.
Irina crossed her arms, serious this time. “I expect you to understand the alternative.”
Ada let out a slow breath. She had known, the moment she saw that envelope, how this would end but maybe she could still have some control over it.
“Leave him out of this”, Ada stated. “You don’t watch him. You don’t even think about using him again.”
She'd shown her hand, Ada knew that. It was written across her face how much she cared for Leon but Irina already had the proof of her attachment towards him. The least she could do was make sure he was protected.
Irina contemplated for a moment before nodding. “Agreed. As long as his path doesn't cross ours, he'll be out of the equation”.
Ada held her gaze, looking for a fault in her expression. Promises between killers didn’t mean much but this was almost a pact of civility, an invisible contract chaining her to an enemy she couldn’t quite see the scope of yet.
She was never meant for the life Leon had envisioned for them but Ada Wong was a survivor. She'd regain their trust, how long it'd take, and her vengeance would be swift, especially towards the red headed woman in front of her.
“Alright. When do I start?”