Warnings: no beta, OOCness, English is not my first language, inconsistent tenses, i am very bad at prepositions, some curse words, some alcohol-drinking, suggestive themes/scenes
Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended.
A/N: i thought i was gonna have a few days to edit this but Life Things came up so i edited this just once in the speed of light. i really should have edited this instead of playing stardew valley all day
February 3, 2021: Minor edits were made
I.
1998
Perhaps Leon couldn't be blamed. Maybe it was his fault, but this was the very reason he specifically asked to be assigned to Raccoon City—because of the mystery surrounding the rising body count in the Arklay Mountains. He became a cop because he wanted to help people—to serve and protect. And for that reason, he couldn't stay in his hometown.
He couldn't stay with his girlfriend.
A week before he was scheduled to start his first day as police officer, he got a call to stay away. It confused him, wondering what the hell happened and why no specific details were given, but he wasn't going to give up on his lifelong dream of helping people just because of a vague and bewildering phone call. His cop instincts, although still underdeveloped, told him that there was more to the situation than met the eye.
He and his girlfriend decided to make their soon-to-be long-distance relationship work. She couldn't leave their hometown because that was where she worked, and she couldn't just drop everything because her boyfriend got assigned to a dodgy Midwestern city. She kept telling Leon that she had a bad feeling about the whole situation, and Leon agreed, but that was all the more reason to find out what was happening.
Before Leon formally began his life a cop, he asked his girlfriend on a road trip to Raccoon City. It would be just them, his trusty Jeep, and the open road for days, spending what precious time they have left together. It would take months again before they would see each other, and nightly phone calls could only do so much to stave off the longing.
They checked in at a motel a day away from Raccoon City. They could have driven still, arriving at the city in the early evening, but his girlfriend insisted on taking a break. Leon agreed. Once they arrive at Raccoon, they would have to separate. He had no qualms prolonging their time together.
His girlfriend grew increasingly anxious, so when a couple of other people on a road trip asked them to attend a party, Leon dragged his girlfriend with him, intent on making her feel better. And it made her feel better for a while, until her anxiety returned and she begged Leon to stay.
"I know I've said this a million times before," she said, "but I really don't feel good about this. Leon, you have to stay. If not for me, then for your safety. Please. Stay."
What would Leon choose—his ladylove or his duty? The safety of his hometown or uncovering the truth behind those mysterious murders? His potential future with this beautiful woman or his childhood dream of becoming a cop?
The temptation to stay with her was strong, but Leon's sense of duty and justice was stronger.
Leon decided to go to Raccoon anyway.
His decision must have been reflected on his face, because his girlfriend said, "You're not going to stay, are you?" She smiled bitterly and shook her head, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. "It's probably going to be dangerous."
"I know. And that's why I have to go."
She nodded. She looked like she wanted to say more, to scream at him, but in the end she just sighed, her shoulders slumping. "I'm worried for you, but it would be out of character for you to stay."
"We could make this work—"
"No, we couldn't." Her words were resolute. "This is who you are, Leon. You love helping people. It's one of the reasons why I fell in love you. You wouldn't be able to sit still if you knew something was going on."
He held her by her arms, imploring her to meet his eyes. "I—"
"You're really not going to stay?" Stay in our hometown? Stay with me? Stay where I can see you're safe?
Leon took a deep breath and stepped away from her. His girlfriend nodded in understanding, and tears streamed down her face. She gave him a watery smile and said in a small voice, "Please take care, Leon."
He watched her walk away.
For some reason, he didn't get the urge to chase her back.
That night, after he drank himself to oblivion, Leon dragged his ass back to their motel room and passed out. When he woke up, the sun had already set and he had the mother of all hangovers. He looked around their room and noticed that his girlfriend and her things were already gone.
He found a note on the bedside table.
Leon, it said, you can still stay. You can still come home and stay away from trouble. In the meantime, I've hitched a ride back home. Please give me a call if you ever come back. I love you.
Still hungover, Leon got dressed in his uniform and drove to Raccoon City—just him, his trusty Jeep, and the open road. He didn't know what awaited him, if it really was as bad as his instincts told him, but he had to find out. He must.
(He would never get to call his ex-girlfriend, or see her again.)
II.
2005
Leon felt her presence before he felt her finger jab into his back.
"Not surprised?" she said, noting his lack of reaction.
Leon rolled his eyes. "I'm a trained government agent, Ashley. I knew you were there before I even heard you."
Ashley pouted. "You're no fun."
He smirked. "How many times have you tried that same trick on me over the past year?"
"Doesn't hurt to try," she said in a sing-song voice as she stepped beside him. "So…"
Leon took a quick glance at her before returning to surveilling the surroundings; being a part of the security detail of the president's daughter required constant vigilance. The area around the university gates was filled with merrymaking people, and Leon caught conversations about parties and mixers. He was reminded of his Academy days, but those days were long since gone. "So what?"
"My finals is over.…"
"And?"
She stepped in front of him, obscuring his vision. He scrunched his face, making Ashley giggle. She stepped aside, making him see the world ahead of him once more. "There's gonna be a party, and the girls at Phi Theta were wondering if I could bring that cute guy from my security detail."
Leon looked at his wristwatch. Ashley's SUV was a bit later than usual. "Which cute guy were they talking about?"
Ashley groaned. "You know who I'm talking about, Leon. Do you know how many of my sisters asked about you?"
Leon snorted. "Hope you told them only good things."
His earpiece crackled. "Sorry we're a bit late," Ashley's driver, a Secret Service agent, said. "Had a minor problem with the engine, but I'm on my way there."
"Copy that," Leon answered, then he turned to Ashley and said, "Your SUV's on the way."
"So?" said Ashley. "What say you?"
"As much as I would love to hang out with beautiful sorority ladies, I'm still on duty."
"You can swing by later when you're off duty. Won't you come and stay? It'd be fun."
He spared her a glance before looking at the horizon. "I'm sure it'll be, but I'll have to decline."
From his peripheral vision, Leon saw Ashley cross her arms. "When was the last time you had fun?"
"I—"
"Watching a movie while drinking beer on your couch doesn't count."
Leon closed his mouth. When was the last time he had fun? But it didn't matter now. He was going to have fun later.
Ashley sighed. "Leon, as much as I love getting to see you practically every day, you need to have a social life. The first person on your speed dial is Hunnigan, for Christ's sake."
What was wrong about having his handler on his speed dial? Shouldn't he let a colleague know if something bad happened to him so someone could report to their boss?
Ashley shook her head. He spotted her SUV coming nearer.
"But I guess you'll be having your own fun later, huh?" she said, her tone implying something.
He narrowed his eyebrows. "What do you mean?"
She gave him a suggestive grin. "You're going to see someone, aren't you?"
Leon stopped his eyes from widening comically. What did Ashley know about him and that someone? "What?"
She chuckled. "Don't try to fool me, Leon. You're wearing that perfume."
Leon looked puzzled. "What about my perfume?"
"Oh, please," she said with a roll of her eyes. "I noticed that when you wear that perfume, you're a bit…different. Like there's a metaphorical bounce on your step."
Ah, fuck it. Leon slipped up. He was going to have to change perfumes and change his perfume habit. "It's just perfume, Ashley." Her SUV pulled up to the side and he opened the door for her.
"No it's not," she said as she stepped inside, Leon following. Half of her security detail followed them inside, while the other half rode in another SUV behind. "It's your I'm-going-on-a-date perfume."
Leon already talked way too much about his personal life within the earshot of the Secret Service. Who he dated was a subject of interest for his employers; he was a government agent working closely with the First Family. Of course they were going to do background checks on the people he came to contact with. One of them could be a spy.
If they only knew.
(He hoped to God they wouldn't.)
To protect the person Ashley was not-so-subtly alluding to, he decided to bend the truth a little bit. "What's wrong about trying to find a date? Do men not wear perfume when going to a pub?"
Ashley grinned. "I knew it! You're going out! Oh, look at you, drinking in a pub instead of on you couch. I'm so proud of you."
"Don't patronise me," he said fondly. She answered with a snicker.
Leon may not have spent that night in the company of beautiful sorority girls, but he spent it in the company of one beautiful woman in red.
He wouldn't trade her for any other person in the world.
III.
2010
The moment he saw Claire, Leon engulfed her in the biggest hug he could manage. Their jobs kept them both busy and rarely afforded them the luxury of maintaining a flourishing social life, what with travelling around the world eradicating B.O.W. threats and helping their victims. His friend's hug warmed him against the cold December evening air, and before they could freeze further outside, they stepped inside the café, Leon intending to make the most out of his rare holiday.
He insisted on paying for their dinner despite Claire's protests, and once their food arrived, Claire immediately launched on a story about her latest project as a TerraSave member—a project that she could discuss in public, of course.
"And what about you?" Claire asked as she finished off her dinner. She moved on to her dessert and added, "Any exploits you can risk talking about in a café?"
There haven't been a lot of major B.O.W. attacks in the recent years—but that didn't mean that illegal manufacturing of these creatures didn't happen—except for the 2009 Kijuju incident where Albert Wesker had reportedly been killed by Claire's older brother. It was considered a success for people and organisations fighting against bioterrorism, although the war was far from over. There was also that incident in Philosophy University, which Leon and Chris talked about in e-mail.
Leon continuously heard rumours about new viruses being developed, and he had been continuously deployed to investigate these rumours, which, thankfully, turned out to be mostly unfounded.
One rumour sent him to a small seaside town in Iceland where he ran into a certain lady who usually wore red. He determined the rumour to be harmless, and before he returned home to the US, he and his lady friend holed up in a cabin and had a night that Leon would remember in the years to come by.
"Nothing that I can talk about in public. Sorry," Leon said. He sipped his wine and then continued, "I heard that TerraSave visited the BSAA North American branch."
Claire threw her head back in laughter. "Oh boy.…" she said, wiping the tears of mirth away from her eyes. "I was surrounded by hunky men left and right." She sighed dreamily. "Too bad they were all asking for dirt on my brother."
Leon laughed at the thought. His friend Claire, an attractive young woman, surrounded by men expertly trained in combat and weaponry and who didn't usually get to interact with the ladies. She was the little sister of their captain—a captain they all loved and respected. Of course they would want dirt on him.
"And what did you say?"
"Oh, you know, just some foolhardy things Chris did in his youth. The boys lapped it up like babies eating lollipop. They must have never seen Chris act silly, but I grew up with him. And they want photos." Claire chuckled. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say they were going to make a scrapbook about their big and scary captain being not so big and scary."
Leon took another sip of his wine. "I'd love to see that." He imagined that Chris must have been a vastly different man before this B.O.W. shit all began. Leon knew he himself was a different man back then.
His work phone chirped. It revealed a message from Hunnigan telling him to get his earpiece on and report to the headquarters as soon as he can.
"What's wrong?" Claire asked. He must have looked defeated.
"Work," Leon said, his shoulders sagging. "I'm on a holiday. Why are they calling me for work?"
"You could stay," she said. "God knows you've been working nonstop."
Leon scrubbed his face with his hands and then groaned. "It's like they don't have other agents besides me."
"Then stay," she said firmly. Leon had a nagging suspicion that it was the tone she used when her brother was being reckless.
He shook his head, his face apologetic. "Claire, you know how much I would love to spend time with you—"
"But you have a job to do." She smiled sadly then said, "You're just like Chris. I know that even though you would rather stay here than get your holiday interrupted, your work is also important. You're saving people's lives."
"You're saving lives too. You're doing good work, Claire."
She smiled, this time a genuine one. "I know. And I'm proud of what we've done and what we're doing. Now, do you have to immediately go, or can we finish eating our dessert?"
Well, Hunnigan did say as soon as you can, not immediately. Leon would go as soon as he finished his dessert.
IV.
2013
Being a government agent didn't always mean going out into the field. Sometimes, it meant poring over mountains of paper, looking for clues, evidence, leads, or anything that might help in their investigation. Like what he was doing now, reading case files from several years ago and cross-referencing them with a medical journal Dr Rebecca Chambers had written.
It was almost seven in the evening and he had an appointment at eight.
This wouldn't do.
Leon took a nearby empty box and placed all the files he had been perusing into it. He filled four boxes, but he could only carry two home; he would have to read the other documents at a later date.
He was on his way to the elevator when he saw Helena still hunched over her desk.
"I want orange chicken and a large soda," she said without looking at him; her eyes were glued on the files she was reading. "And a KitKat bar, please. Thanks."
"Helena," he said, "I'm not going down for takeaway. I'm going home."
This finally got Helena's attention.
Her eyes travelled from the boxes in his hands to his face. Her eyebrows knitted and she said, "You're not doing overtime?"
Helena couldn't be blamed for not believing him. In the five months since she had joined the DSO, she and Leon, and sometimes the other agents too, stayed at the office way past the end of their shifts reading document after document. The FOS offered invaluable support in accessing the digital archives, but for the physical archives, it was up to the agents to find what they were looking for.
Leon was usually the one who went down and grabbed food for the agents. Sometimes, when there were a lot of them doing overtime, another agent, usually Helena or Sherry, would accompany him to carry all the food. This time, it was just him and Helena in the office. They were both assigned to this mission, and were once again officially partners four months after the Lanshiang attacks. Whenever they had to look through the physical archives, it was almost a given that they were going to be spending the night in the office.
Except for two times. Helena had been there too to witness him leaving the office at six in the evening despite the plethora of papers he had to read. And those times, Leon went to meet a certain someone.
"I'm not," Leon replied. "I'm going home. So you can either come downstairs with me to buy your food or stay here and work. Or you can take your work home." They could always take their work home, but it was just so much more convenient to work in the office.
Helena groaned. "I'd rather not take work home, thanks." She grabbed her coat, wallet, and ID card, then followed Leon to the lift. "You just wanted to have me carry one of those boxes for you."
Leon grinned. He handed her one of the boxes and said, "You got me."
Helena rolled her eyes but took the box.
She pressed the down button, and while waiting for the lift to arrive, she said, "So. You're not staying at the office, huh?"
"I'm not."
"This is probably the third time I've seen you leave early."
"Hm."
"The first two times, you were also in a hurry to leave."
Leon looked askance at her. "What are you trying to say, Helena?"
She shrugged. "You're really not going to stay?"
"I already told you I'm not."
The lift arrived and they stepped inside. Helena jabbed the button for the ground floor before saying in a teasing tone, "You're going on a date, aren't you?"
"What?" What made her think that?
She affected a pensive look. "You know, the first two times you left early were kind of weird."
"How come?"
"Both of those times, like tonight, you're dressed nicely. No more leather jackets and utility boots—this time, it's time for a button-down and some dress shoes."
So he wanted to look nice for someone. Sue him.
"Are you gonna be seeing her?" Her tone was conversational, but Leon got the strange impression that she was walking on eggshells with the topic she just broached. They have never talked about her since Lanshiang. Leon didn't ask Helena to keep her out of his report—he wouldn't dare do that—but she did it anyway, said it was a thank-you to Leon for helping to bring her sister justice. There would be a lot to pay if someone found out that they omitted a crucial piece of information in their reports, but so far, no one questioned the credibility of what they have submitted.
He contemplated their situation. He and Helena, once again in a lift talking about her. Thankfully there was no raging B.O.W. mutation outside.
The lift reached the ground floor. They stepped outside, and before they parted ways, he said, "I'll tell her you said hi."
Helena gave him a knowing smile.
V.
2014
"That barista has been giving you the evil eye since we walked in here," Sherry whispered to him.
Leon looked up from his phone and saw the barista scowling at him before going back to take orders. Leon snorted. "I used to date her best friend."
They moved up the queue and Sherry said, "And? What happened? Why is she glaring at you?"
He turned his attention back to his phone. Emails to answers, reports to monitor, news to keep his eyes on…There were a lot of unwritten duties that came with being a DSO agent. "Guess her best friend still hates me."
Sherry snickered and took her wallet out of her pocket. "Why? What did you do this time?"
Leon looked incredulously at her. "Why are you assuming that it's my fault?"
Sherry rolled her eyes. "Please, Leon. I've known you since I was a kid, and it's always the girls who dump you."
"That's not true," he replied.
"Why are you being so defensive?" she answered, amused.
"I'll have you know that I've had mutual break-ups."
"Did you ever a dump a girl before?"
Did he?
His silence made Sherry chuckle. "You were always too busy with work."
The customers in front of them left, and it was their turn to order. The barista was looking dirty at Leon but she pasted on a polite smile for Sherry.
"Good morning! What can I get for you today?" the barista said.
"A medium rooibos tea for me and a small red eye coffee for him," Sherry answered as she took her card out of her wallet. "And can I please have one of those red velvet muffins?"
"Sure thing," the barista said, punching in their order. "Anything else?"
"Helena just texted," said Leon. "She wants a medium latte and a," he scrunched his face as he read Helena's text, "'chewy chunky chocolate chip cookie.'"
The barista, looking unimpressed, punched the extra order in without looking at Leon. She asked Sherry, "Will that be all?"
"Yes, that's all, thank you," Sherry replied, giving her card to the barista. "Oh, the latte and cookie are to go, but the rest are for here."
"Got it," the barista said as she handed Sherry her card back. She gave her a wireless buzzer then added, "Please proceed to the claiming counter when that buzzes."
"Thanks," Sherry said before going, Leon following her.
Leon could still feel the barista glaring at him.
He and Sherry found a vacant table, and while waiting for their order, Sherry hissed, "She's still glaring at you. Leon, what in the world did you do to her best friend?"
"Stop sounding so scandalised."
"Maybe I'll stop if you start spilling the deets."
Leon groaned. "Fine. I was supposed to have dinner with her best friend but I cancelled three times in a row because of work. So when we finally got the time to have dinner, I bought her to this fancy place downtown, but I got a call. I told her to have dinner without me and put everything on my tab. There. It's not as bad as you think."
Sherry grimaced. "Well, you did cancel three times in a row, and by the time you two actually had dinner, you still had to leave early."
"I paid for everything. And she ordered at least half the menu."
"That's because she was most likely angry at you." Sherry shook her head. "It wasn't the dinner she wanted, it was your company."
"That's still not a good reason for her best friend to give me the stink eye two years after I got dumped."
"I don't know, Leon. You drop everything when work comes, but sometimes you'd get this message on your personal phone and you'll get this tiny smile on your face and you'll hurry out of the office."
Leon narrowed his eyes. "…What are you saying, Sherry?"
She looked at him. "All I'm saying is, I've known you since I was a kid. I've seen so many women break up with you, but I noticed that your girlfriends never contacted you through your personal phone. And when someone does contact you through it, your whole face just lights up."
Leon remained silent.
"Leon, you're like a father and an older brother to me, and I don't want to pry in your personal life, but maybe you should stop dating around if your heart is already spoken for."
He looked away from her, his eyes staring at nothing and everything beyond the coffee shop's glass windows.
"Don't you think your past girlfriends knew that your heart was always somewhere else? Maybe that's why the barista's best friend is still angry at you after all these years. Maybe she realised that you liked someone else and was wondering if she was a rebound or something."
He didn't get a chance to reply. The wireless buzzer buzzed, and Sherry took their orders from the claiming counter. When she returned, she handed Leon his coffee.
"It's so nice to finally have a decent tea away from my work desk and the pantry," Sherry said, inhaling the scent of her tea. She sighed happily. "And tea made from real tea leaves too, none of those tea bags we have at the pantry."
Leon leaned back in his seat and let his coffee cool on the table. Just then, his and Sherry's work phones buzzed.
"What is it this time?" Sherry asked as she took her phone out of her pocket.
Leon read the text. "I gotta go."
"Leon. It's not urgent. It says we can go any time."
"Ah. Better get this over quickly, I suppose."
Sherry levelled him with a look. "Stay, Leon. You've been hunched on your workstation for the past four days."
In other times, he would have stayed. He really needed a break away from the office. But somehow, he couldn't stand to be with Sherry at the moment, not when her words still hung in the air.
He stood up and grabbed his coffee and Helena's latte and cookie. "I'll take this back to Helena. You just sit there and enjoy your tea."
"This is why you always get dumped," Sherry said, exasperation filling her voice.
Leon patted her head. "See you later, Sherry."
He exited the café, trying to get Sherry's words out of his head.
i.
2015
Leon pulled Ada closer to him. Her bare back rested against his bare chest, their legs entangled together. Rain streamed down the window, the weak morning light penetrating through downfall of the rain, and the gentle drip-drop of raindrops echoed through the cabin's ceiling. It was cold, but with Ada lying in his arms and a heated blanket cocooning them, it was the warmest, cosiest place in the world.
He watched the rain slide against the window like a waterfall. He didn't know what time it was; he existed in the plane between sleep and wakefulness. All he could register was the cold air, the sound of the rain, and her warm body next to his. He could smell her shampoo, and her skin was soft and smooth and radiated heavenly warmth.
He wouldn't mind waking up like this every day.
He pressed a kiss to her shoulder, and then another one behind her ear. He felt her stir, and then he mumbled, voice soft from sleep, "Maybe you should move in with me."
He felt her shoulder shake with quiet laughter. "A spy and government agent living under the same roof, huh?" Her voice was barely above a whisper, but it was too alert for this time of the day. Leon wondered how long she had been awake, if she was content just lying in his arms. "That would make for an interesting sitcom."
Leon felt his eyes drooping. "What if we bought a house instead?"
She shifted until she was facing him. She gently poked him on the nose, saying, "Go back to sleep, Leon."
He thought about living in a house with her. In another life, they would have been celebrating their tenth wedding anniversary in their suburban home. Instead, in this life, they met up in secret in Ada's cabin somewhere deep in the Swiss Alps.
He must have spoken out loud because Ada was giving him that face which said Oh, Leon in fond exasperation.
"We wouldn't have met if there was no virus outbreak." Her hands brushed the hair away from his face. "What makes you think that we would have met in another life?"
He closed his eyes and let her fingers caress his cheek. "I would have met you, one way or another. I know I would."
"Didn't know you believed in fate and destiny."
"I don't. I didn't." Sleep was slurring his voice. "Not until I met you."
He didn't see her reaction—his eyes were steadily drooping—but he heard her say, "I'm more of a free will rather than determinism kind of girl, but that's a nice sentiment."
His eyes finally closed, but he still managed to say, "Will you stay? Will you still be here when I wake up?"
She pressed a soft and quick kiss to his lips. "Why don't you go to sleep and find out?"
When Leon woke up, the midday sun was already streaming through the windows. The rain had long since stopped, but he could still feel a tiny chill in the air despite the heater. His mind was awake and alert, and he grabbed his discarded clothes from the floor—although his shirt was missing—intending on answering his grumbling stomach.
He padded into the kitchen and smelled Zürcher geschnetzeltes and rösti. He saw Ada, dressed in his missing shirt, fiddling with the coffee maker. She smiled when she saw him.
"Good afternoon, handsome," she said, handing him a coffee mug. "Hungry?"
She was still there. She stayed.
Leon bit his lip so he wouldn't have to smile too widely. He accepted the coffee mug and replied, "Starving."
He knew right then and there that his heart would always belong to this woman.
A/N: dear capcom before i die i want to see ada booping leon thank you
(or let them get their happily ever after for christ's sake)