Part Four:

An End without End...Amen.

A final fucking.

A path to redemption.

A dance in the deep, dark, dangerous sea.

The Pandora- 2013

The rain was still falling when they took her. She barely set a foot on the deck before she was placed into custody. They weren't gentle. They beat the shit out of her for her betrayals.

Sadly, Ada had known that was coming. She'd sat in her loft and said goodbye to the life she'd cultivated from regret and determination. She'd never return to it. Her days in the dark were over. She was ready, and had been for some time, to give up the shadows for the sunlight.

She knew that future came at the expensive of a sacrifice. She was about to find out how big of one.

Tied to the chair, her face swollen and bleeding, she watched the man ready a needle. They'd hit her first with sodium pentathol as if they'd needed to extract secrets from her. She was an open book, she confessed, and she did it in her own way - with flair.

"I burned everything I had to the ground eight days ago."

One of them struck her again in the swollen left side of her face. She felt the cheekbone fracture, but that was ok. She'd lived through worse. Spitting blood, she laughed, "You think beating me will bring it back? It's gone. I'd gathered every last fucking virus you've made...and I made damn sure the replications went down in flames."

Annoyed, the man above her sneered, "You ungrateful bitch...all this time, all this opportunity...and you turn it into a game for your own freedom. Burning those samples bought you a grave, you stupid whore, not your freedom."

Ada laughed again, teeth bathed in blood, "The end game was always destruction, you insipid simpleton. I wanted them all...so I could watch them all burn. Now you have nothing but what's on this ship. You have no back up plan, no secret lab...I've torched those, I've taken from you, you've paid me to rob you blind. What I gave you...most of it was false, most of it was fake...I took the real samples for myself and fucked you standing with your own arrogance."

He hit her again. She laughed, face throbbing, "Yeah, betrayal hurts, baby. I know it does. You better kill me, you stupid bastard, or I'll burn this ship next."

The knife in his hand rammed into her ribs. She gasped, eyes flaring with pain, and he twisted it as he kept it buried inside of her. She jerked in pain, voice high and breathy, "...you always were a lousy lay, Burton. Even your killing is as passive aggressive as your fucking was."

Barry Burton rose to his full height and turned to his partner. "I told you women aren't with the time it takes to get your dick wet in one. I told you...and yet here we are. What now?"

The silver haired man in question tilted his head at her. She smiled back and he remarked, "You surprise me, Ms. Wong. I thought we were on the same page about betrayal. Apparently, I was right to have waited here for you to attempt your final coup. Sadly for you, it's the last one you'll ever stage."

Ada grinned, "Many have tried, Glenn...and now have succeeded. Ask Albert Wesker what it means to betray me."

Barry snorted, "He was always a simpleton. He kept thinking he had the upper hand in Raccoon. I played that idiot like a game of Texas Hold 'Em."

Ada laughed in return, "Sure you did. You're a real mastermind, Burton. You tricked everybody, huh? Nobody ever suspected you of being a real bastard...well...besides your own daughter."

He'd looked mollified and preening before she'd delivered that parting shot. Now he looked pissed and over it. He hit her, open handed and insulting, and made her breath catch with the pain. After a moment, Glenn Arias tilted his head,

The alarms signaled and suggested they were no longer alone.

Amused, he wondered, "You bring your pet to play, Ada?"

She smiled snidely, "I brought your weapon to kill you, Arias. You and that fool Simmons trying to build an empire and use a man like that as a puppet. He's here now to make sure you see how grateful he is for all the time and training invested in him. He's here to finish the fucking job you paid me to do."

Arias said nothing. Burton cursed, "Kennedy. Second level lab area. He's got a fuckin flamethrower. He's torching everything."

Ada kept on smiling, "He's not the most delicate man, but he gets the job done. Like me, he knows when fire needs to purify."

Arais instructed, "Set loose the B.O.W.S. He might be good, but he's only one man. Get them down there to finish him off. In fact..." He turned to hit the intercom and invited, "Mr. Kennedy...a rare moment of reckoning is upon you. I have here your patron of lost causes, Ms. Wong. She's...well there's no way to put this delicately...she's dying. Slowly. She's been stabbed, I'm afraid, in somewhere vital. She might have a half an hour before she bleeds out...can you find her? Or will you let her die while you waste your time laying waste to her own playground?"

After a pause of sound, he added, "Yes. She was once my best, you see...sadly, she seems to have left her drive in her cunt. You must be the best in the world in more ways than one, I'm afraid, as she's willing to die for it. Tick tock, Mr. Kennedy. The choice is yours. It's the last one you'll ever get."

He signed off and instructed, "The escape pod, Burton, now."

As they passed her, Ada mused, "Leaving the party early, Glenn? You always were a premature evacuator."

He simply paused, lowered his mouth, and kissed the top of her head, "Rest in pieces, Ms. Wong. You were always my favorite. A shame you're nothing but a stupid bitch under all that potential."

Ada shivered in her seat as the blood loss and the pain made her light headed. She heard their footsteps retreat and heard the crackle of Leon's voice on the intercom. "Ada!? Can you hear me!? I'm on my way! Stay alive!"

Ada whispered, "...stupid, wonderful boy scout...finish the fucking job and forget me."

The cool hands on her face brought her awake with a small gasp. He looked so pale crouched in front of her. She felt her numb lips move and remark, "...long time, no see."

Leon shook his head and told her, "It's deep...if I pull it out-"

Ada shook her head to stop him, "It's ok. I knew that. I knew it when he stabbed me. It's tampenading the wood right now...the second you pull it, I'll bleed out."

Leon looked so distraught that she wanted to soothe him. So, she tried, "...It doesn't hurt."

That sounded conciliatory, right?

He shook his head and warned her, "...we have minutes here, Ada...maybe less. There's too many. They opened every cage and drained every tank. This place is crawling with nasties. I don't know how to get you out and protect you."

Touched, she tilted her head, "...there's no getting me out, Leon. You know that. You knew it the second he taunted you. I'm dead. It's time for you to finish this fucking thing and me with it."

He rose and turned and her heart...her heart...her heart. It stopped, because he was sliced from hip to tit across his chest. The vest he wore was trash. The damage was done. He was bleeding so badly it had puddled with her blood on the floor. His blood was on her knees where it dripped. His blood, her blood, their blood..it was bad. It was the worst they'd ever been.

She whispered, "...what did you do?"

He shrugged and returned, "...it doesn't hurt."

She couldn't stop the smile.

He told her, "I can still fight, but I don't know for how long. Tell me how to end it...you knew I'd come. You were waiting...they all were, but they thought I'd fail. They thought I'd quit. I made a fucking vow to scrub the world of Umbrella...I'm here to finish that...help me."

Ada shivered and tugged on her hands, "Cut me loose...hurry."

He did, helping her rise with a gasp as the knife embedded further into her damn rib cage. She used his support to guide them both toward the door that wasn't currently trying to rip off the hinges with monsters attempting to kill them. He leaned her against the console there and she informed him, "Arias was trying to escape...there's no telling what he took with him."

Leon returned, "It wouldn't be much. I sabotaged his chopper before I came below deck. The only way he's getting off is by life boat. The lab was the first stop, it's toast. Anything he's taking with him was in his possession before I arrived."

Ada gave him a look of pride, "...good boy."

"Don't patronize me, Ada...just finish it."

She keyed in a code and told him, "Classic Umbrella, right? Self destruct sequence."

"Is there any other way?"

The alarm blared, the door jerked hard, and he warned her, "...stay behind me."

Touched, she almost cooed at him for the last time when the door burst open and the world went hot with battle. She grabbed his spare piece to stand beside him, the monsters came boiling through and she shouted, "Follow me! NOW!"

They backed up, they moved as fast as two dying people could, and she took him further inward until they came upon the ship's captains quarters. She slammed the door, sealed it, and gasped, "...the combination will be butterfly, bee, and buffalo."

There was a small device against the wall. Leon turned it, putting in the combination, "Do I want to know?"

She leaned heavily on the wall and murmured, "...three ways to fight...float like a butterfly..."

"...sting like a bee...stampede like a buffalo...got it." He glanced at her as the wall shimmered open and revealed a single escape pod. It was equipped for one person - Arias no doubt - in the event of complete saturation.

Ada told him, "Get in it, go...you have a chance to save yourself. Do the right thing and take it."

He started toward her. She backed up and gasped, head swimming with pain, "...dammit, Leon, I mean it. It's done. What I wanted from you? It's finished. It finished here...I made sure you'd find the clue. I made sure you'd come. I've been using you, always using you, for this...to finish this for me...the dying part sucks...but I was always prepared for the possibility. I knew I'd have to be here, in peril, to get you to fight your hardest. I played you...but you can still win...let me die the hero here...let me go down with the ship and run..."

They stared at each other until he remarked, "...I've always known, Ada. You think I ever believed you cared about me?"

Her heart hurt as she shook her head, "I always cared, Leon...I just didn't care enough."

Jesus.

He backed up. She nodded, "Yeah. Exactly. Go. Please? Go."

The door shivered with assault behind her. She grabbed for the big gun on the desk and hefted it against her side. Leon glanced at the pod and back at her face. Ada gestured with her head, "...go. Go now, while you can. Let me do at least this for you. At least this one thing. Please."

He hesitated. "You gonna shoot me if I don't?"

"...yes."

He laughed sharply, "...then do it...but I don't think you can."

The door creaked and gave up and he started to grab for her to probably throw her in the pod. She shot him from three feet away for it. It hit him in the shoulder and spun him around. He went to the floor on his hands and knees and she shouted, "Fool! Why can't you just let me die!? You fucking boy scout!"

His vision wavered. He crawled, bleeding all over the floor. He gave up and went down on his face, grunting, "...always the hero, right? Even when the person you're trying to save is the bad guy."

Ada crouched beside him, face collapsed in lines of regret, "I was never the bad guy...I just wasn't the good one either. You stupid...wonderful...incredible fool."

She hit him in the back of the head with her gun and the world went dark while the door burst open behind them and filled the dark with all the things he'd once promised to destroy.

The last sound he heard was the gunfire of the woman who'd shot him, and now rose above him to defend him.

Maybe she hadn't given him love, but she'd given him something to fight for. Somehow, he'd always trusted her. Somehow, he'd always followed her.

And yet she'd had him all along...and he? He could never quite catch her.

Of course, you could never really catch a butterfly.

And the sound of her wings chased him down toward the only peace he'd ever known.

Part of him had always known she would be the death of him.

So you see, dear readers, there's no way to hold the thing that eludes you. Sometimes it's just the thing that tempts you to your own darkness. Sometimes it's the thing that offers you redemption.

Sometimes it hurts you to heal you.

Sometimes it hurts you to hold you.

Sometimes it hurts you to help you.

For our hero and his greatest weakness, it might have ended in a bloody battle at the bottom of the sea...or...?

It might have ended just like this...

The sound of the ocean was heavy in his head.

The rush and whoosh of waves worked into his dreams and became part of his ears while he lingered in the lull of it.

The first moment he realized he wasn't dead, he could smell fire. With a gasp, he sat up on the bed and grabbed for his gun. His hand closed over nothing, his other grabbed the throat of the person above him, and he threw them into the wall beside him.

There was a grunt from his attacker, a gasp, and he pinned them to the bed beneath him.

Ada.

Ada.

"...Ada?!"

It was...and it wasn't.

The thick inky dark curls surrounded her back and hips. The face was still porcelain, still perfect, still purely beautiful like a white tiger or an exotic bird. It was Ada Wong, but the rest of her wasn't.

She was tanned and soft somehow. The dress she wore wasn't red, it was white and loose. It flowed in the hot breeze through the open window. The hut where he found them smelled of beach and beautiful salty sea air.

Beneath him, with his hand on her throat, the long haired Ada Wong mused, "...going to finish the job then?"

Leon shivered, feeling alert with adrenaline and alive with questions, "...we didn't die?"

She laughed, softly, and shook her head, "The escape pod got us to the surface, but nowhere else. I managed to secure enough of the door to make a damn raft."

He blinked down at her, "...you paddle row us here?"

She laughed again, "It wasn't far. The location of the Pandora was adjacent to a chain of islands that are sparsely inhabited. This one is called Kismet."

His eyes flickered, "...you fucking with me?"

She tilted her head, "Your hand is around my throat...do I look like I'd fuck with you?"

His gaze trailed down her body to her breasts in that loose dress. They were perfectly imprinted. He could almost see her nipples. He had the urge to shift his chest and feel them brush against him.

Amused, he shook his head, "...how long?"

Ada smiled gently, "You've been in and out for about three weeks."

He furrowed his brows, "...your hair..."

She smiled again. Her hands lifted and skimmed up his back. He tensed, looking at her like he expected her to strike and sever his jugular. She understood the impulse, after all, she'd shot him the last time he'd seen her. It was, of course, for his own good, but it turned out she knew if she stuffed him in that pod, he'd never survive once he hit the surface.

So...she'd climbed in with him.

At the surface, she just had to keep them afloat until help had come. It wasn't long. She had helped strewn over the islands waiting for her return. They'd set them up in a hut and she'd kept to tending Leon herself.

Her hand skimmed the bundle of scars over his left ribs and she murmured, "This nearly killed you...and then? You...did that thing you do...you started healing in a way you shouldn't. You survived the fever and the infection...why?"

He laughed and shook his head with ire, "Who knows? You know. We both do. I haven't been just a rookie in a dirty city in a long, long, long time."

Ada nodded and stroked her hand over his lower spine. She dipped her fingers against the curve of it and touched the top of his ass. He arched a brow and she mused, "...you healed these quickly after that..but you're scarred."

Leon shrugged, "Who cares? It's no a beauty contest. What does the world think?"

Her mouth twitched, "...that you died being a hero. What else? Your government disavowed you. You're considered killed in action. In fact, you're a bit of a traitor in the right circles. You disobeyed orders after all.

He tensed and demanded, "Is it over? Did it work?"

Ada nodded, "It's gone...and long gone. There's nothing left of Pandora's Box but a memory now."

His hand squeezed on her throat. "You used me."

She nodded.

"You lied to me."

She nodded again.

His lip curled up, "Anything you tell me the truth?"

She nodded and he demanded, "What? Name one damn thing that's the truth."

And she said, "I cared enough about you to risk everything."

He snorted. She gave him sad eyes and added, "Ask me anything you want. We're both dead now, Leon. We're both dead to the world. So, ask me. It's over for me. I've done what I needed. I've destroyed those who spent a life time trying to own me...ask."

So, he did, "...who are you?"

He barely breathed as answered, "I'll tell you a story about a girl who became a liar (*1). Fong Ling's parents died shortly after her birth, leaving herself and her brother as orphans. Adopted by the state, she was raised to become an intelligence agent. When the state became suspicious of her brother's potential counter-revolutionary role as a pro-democracy activist, she was ordered to arrest him. Never questioning the actions of her superiors, she did so, allowing him to be executed by the state on the very same day. Over time, Fong Ling grew a reputation for her unquestionable loyalties, and effectively became a poster child for the ministry's hunt for spies and counter-revolutionary members. She was the perfect weapon...bred and born to be a loyal machine."

When he simply stared, she went on. "When the former Umbrella Corporation researcher-turned-terrorist Morpheus D. Duvall, having gained possession of stolen t-Virus samples, threatened the American and Chinese governments that he would launch missiles containing the virus at major cities in their respective countries if he didn't get $5 Billion, Ling, being the MSS' best agent, was dispatched to Morpheus' ship, the Spencer Rain, in order to stop him. Her American counterpart was Bruce McGivern, a covert agent working for the anti-Umbrella pursuit team, a subsidiary of the US-STRATCOM."

Leon went so still that she finally added, "You knew him?"

He shook his head, "...of him. I knew of him...he died on duty."

She nodded, eyes soft, "Fong Ling came to care for him. When she lost him, she knew she'd been betrayed by her own organization. Umbrella had created a mastermind of a million small moles within their inner sanctum. She decided it was time to get revenge for the family she'd lost and life she'd given up to serve masters who made monsters."

The look on his face made her say gently, "...you understand now why I chose you."

He said nothing.

So, she told him, "We share a lot of things in common, Leon. Only you never went too far to find answers. You never became the thing you'd started out fighting. I began to believe in each I.D. I created for myself. I began to form different personalities and different feelings. I was the perfect chameleon. The day I walked into Raccoon City, I was Ada Wong."

She studied his face, "I've been Ada Wong ever since."

They stared at each other until Leon rolled away from her. She lay on the bed, watching him find his feet and pace naked in the hut. She doubted the day would come that she didn't enjoy the show.

Annoyed, he spat, "Why not just tell me all this? Why wait all this time...why tell me now?"

She leaned on her elbow and remarked, "There's nothing left for me to avenge. It's over. It's done. Wesker murdered my family and he's dead. The viruses that plagued my village are gone. The world doesn't need saving anymore...you took care of that. It's just you here...and me...and I want you to know me."

He froze. He arched both brows and she invited, "Yes. Know me. I'm not simple, Leon. I was never easy. The game is over, if you want it to be. I will try to be as open as I wanted to be that moment on the bridge when you taunted me to shoot you...and I knew I couldn't."

He growled, "You shot me on the ship."

"...yes...to save you. I'd do it again, if I had to."

He paced. He shook his head. He looked so angry, "...so what now? You want me to just...call you Fong? Or whatever?"

...I can be whatever name you want. I've been Ada Wong since three days before Raccoon City. I can be her for you. I have been more Ada than I was ever really Fong."

He shook his head. He inhaled sharply, "...I don't know who the hell you are."

She smiled sadly, "No, but you never did. What's changed now? There's no danger. There's no drama. There's just us...what do you want, Leon? Finally...what do you want?"

He whipped around to face her, "The truth - did you ever love me?"

So, she gave the truth, "...no."

He laughed with anger and she added, "But I wanted to."

He paused now, head tilted, and she clarified, "I want to now. I want you." She touched a hand to her chest and urged, "I want to be with you. I haven't wanted that since Bruce. I haven't wanted that, like this, ever in my whole life. I don't know what that means. I don't know what you want...but you can take all the time you need to decide."

He left the hut stark naked.

Her eyes flickered shut.

He didn't say no. He didn't say yes either. He was so angry. She couldn't blame him. She'd used him, manipulated him, shot him, and essentially left him dead to the rest of the world. She was a fraud, a liar, a many faced medusa whose look turned him to stone and forced him to spend a life time trying to catch her.

She thought of Bruce and his smile. They'd had a handful of moments together then. It was never the same. This...Leon...he was something she didn't expect to want. She didn't want to want him. That was the whole issue of what they were doing here.

She'd never intended to care about him.

Love?

She wasn't sure she was capable of it in the way he was, but it was the first time she wanted to try.

After a moment, he emerged into the hut once more. Ada sat up on the bed and he snapped, "What's for dinner? I'm starving."

Her mouth twitched. She pushed her hair back behind her ears and mused, "...fish. What else?"

Leon turned away and warned her, "I don't know how long I'll be able to live with this...but I spent a life time trying to know you, Ada...what's a few more days?"

He left the hut.

Ada closed her eyes.

A few days.

A life time.

It all came down to whether or not she could get a hero to fall in love with a woman and let go of a butterfly.