Resident Evil: Hallelujah

Chapter Five: Moonlight Overthrew You

"Run away with me," her voice is soft as the sun sets, telling Leon that she isn't asleep, not even a little bit.

He looks down at her as she rests her head on his chest, closing her eyes in time with his breathing as her red hair circles his body, "I have things I need to take care of."

She runs a hand across his chest and really grabs his attention when she pinches one of his nipples, "I know that, dumbass. Afterwards. Let's just vanish from it all. The D.S.O. will be fine without you… TerraSave won't fall apart as long as Barry can keep Moira under control. The world doesn't need us to sacrifice anything else."

"It's not the world that's asking, Claire," he looks down at her as her head cranes up to look at him. "It's the people. Stepping out of the darkness opens a spot for an innocent to fall in."

Claire growls a bit at his statement, "Look at what the people have cost us, Leon. People asked Ada to steal something, people asked you to stop her, and I got paralyzed for it. Fuck the people."

"You don't mean that," he knows she doesn't, Claire isn't that kind of person.

She chose the way of the healer, to be what he and her brother can't be in this world: human. He was broken down and put back together as a weapon, her brother dedicated himself to being the spear, and it's tough to see a happy end to that. His mind has drifted to it a lot since he was dismissed from that Congressional Hearing on Bioterror: the happy ending. He's technically free, after stopping Ada that is, free to do what he wants, when he wants, where he wants, and to who he wants. His left hand reaches up and starts trailing the exposed skin of Claire's back as he thinks long and hard about that last one, but even more so the last bit the woman in his arms just said.

"I'm sorry, Claire," she blinks and silently asks him to explain, "sorry for what happened to you. No, that's not right. I'm sorry for what I allowed to happen to you."

She shrugs, her eyes telling the truth that shrug doesn't, but the redhead just asks it, "You had her dead to rights. What did she have that made you hesitate?"

"Information on Simmons' Family. She's been dangling that carrot in front of me since Simmons painted the floor red with his blood. I've been getting bits and pieces from her, 'rewards' for my good work, like the fucking dog I am…" He sighs heavily, letting the silence calm him down before he continues.

"I should've shot her, without hesitation, but the thought of being so close to answers to so many questions… I could've explained to your brother why Simmons worked with the B.S.A.A. to ensure his team was the one to go into Edonia, why his team was sacrificed, and even give him a face to punch in retaliation. I could've had answers as to who else signed off on the death of Tall Oaks…"

Her hand reaches up to stroke his face, dangling a bit on a jagged scar under his left ear, "You don't need to say anymore…"

"No, it needs to be said, this demon needs to be cleansed," he drops his head back onto the pillow. "I chose ghosts of answers over someone who was important to me. I chose answers for the dead over hope for the living… I chose vengeance over faith…"

"If this," she smacks his chest, "leads to another 'I'm so broken' ramble, I'm going to start drinking…"

Leon shakes his head and drops his hand over hers, "Nah, we both know I'm broken, but I think losing my job, my freedom, has done a lot of good in helping put the pieces back together. I'm starting to feel like Leon again. I spent so long as the Executioner, the Government Weapon, as," he sighs, "Leon S. Kennedy, I kind of forgot what it feels like to be human, to be real."

A laugh grabs her attention, "This is the first time in a long time I've actually felt an orgasm. It's been years of 'wham, bam, thank you ma'am, and time for a smoke'."

"Gee," he feels her thinking about all the times they were together, "glad those times were so good…"

It's light teasing, he knows this, but it does make him feel a bit of regret. Leon has been horrible to Claire all these years, shit it's almost thirty years now that they've been playing this game of theirs. Games, he needs to stop referring to his life as games. Mistake after mistake has been made in the name of a game, and Claire, as she is now, with him, is not a mistake, not a game anymore. His mind flashes back to that night after they escaped Raccoon City, cramped into that twin bed together while Sherry slept like she'd never wake up on the opposite bed. Leon thought a lot about what was to come for them after surviving Raccoon City.

Getting Sherry somewhere safe was priority one, exposing Umbrella was second, and helping Claire find her brother was goal number three. Through Sherry's stirring from nightmares and Claire's own snoring, which she still denies, Leon couldn't stop the thought of family. Claire and Sherry, they became family to him during the escape from Raccoon City, and he couldn't imagine his life without them, until he was forced to be without them both. His blood still boils thinking about how Sherry was left under the guardianship of a man who was plotting to overthrow the government and start his own Kentucky Fried World Order. Adam promised him she'd be well taken care of, a man he came to respect lied to him like it was nothing.

Claire apparently senses this shift in the tone of his body and she pulls herself up to eye-level with him, "Stop that."

"What?" He looks at her, trying his best to not give anything away, but he knows he has always been an open book to her.

"Stop thinking the world is a mess, that people lied to you, that there was something different you could've done," clearly she just lobbed a bunch of canned answers at him, but she's right, which just causes him to sigh and wrap an arm around her to pull her closer.

A thought crosses his mind and he feels the draw to act on it, "What about you?"

"What about me, hotshot?" Her left arm drapes across his stomach.

He locks gazes with her and asks bluntly, "Your brother and I have our darknesses, Jill has her own demons. What are yours?"

"Mr. Kennedy," he cringes, "are you actually asking me what would drive me to drink? That's a bit private, wouldn't you say?"

He shrugs and runs his fingers down her back, "After what we just did, nope, I don't agree. Tell me your dark secrets, Claire."

"Well, let's start from the top… I abandon anything and anyone for my brother at the drop of a hat. Because I still see him as the only thing I have in this world. That leads into problem two, where everyone I fall in love with, or even seem interested in dies, so I keep myself closed off, always scared to open up," she taps his chest in time with her sentences. "Um, that's ab-oh, yeah, I deep down believe that Sherry hates me for abandoning her and you after Raccoon City. So, yeah, that's me."

Silence, all he can offer her is silence, but he knows she deserves more. She kind of nailed his issue with her on the first try: her unshakable support of her brother. Bleeding, possibly infected, and tired as all hell was how she left him that day. Thinking back on what he said, it was a bit rough, but he knew deep down that if he did show anger, make her feel like they didn't need her, that she would actually go. Making her stay, telling her the truth: that he needed her, would've done more harm than good in the long run. That's a goddamn lie and he knows it, which forces him to grit his teeth a bit in anger at himself.

"What?" She looks at him and doesn't fall for the dismissal as he shakes his head. "Nope, I heard you almost crack a tooth, what's wrong?"

Silence, all he wants to offer her is silence, but she does deserve more, "Would you have stayed?"

"What?"

Leon finally completely turns onto his side, letting her shift onto his outstretched arm, "That day outside Raccoon. If I asked you to stay, would you have?"

"That's an unfair question to ask in hindsight, Leon," he notices that her skin turns cold with her answer, this is an old wound they are apparently going to just have to rip the bandaid off of.

He takes her face in his gaze and smirks a little, "Yeah, it is. Just like how it's unfair for us to blame each other in hindsight. That doesn't cut you loose from answering my question, though."

"Would I have stayed if you asked?" There's a long pause. "I'm not sure, honestly. I wanted to stay… You were injured, Sherry was traumatized… God, Leon, I left you with a traumatized little girl. I'm such a piece of shit…"

He arches an eyebrow at her outburst, did she not realize that's what she did? Tears sting the corners of her eyes and he reaches up to wipe them away, dragging her gaze up to his own. She smiles weakly as he nods at her, the two of them enjoying the raw moment, the honest moment, the one true moment they have needed since that bastard of a night in Raccoon City. Leon admits to himself that even he's on the verge of tears as the redhead in his arms, the one he's put through so much shit, realizes they have both made grave mistakes.

"Whatever we've done to each other, whatever we've been to each other, we are," he sighs heavily, "absolute pieces of shit when it comes to Sherry."

A laugh grabs his attention, "Please, through all the bad things we did when it came to her, I think she came out all right. She's making a pretty good name for herself. So as badly as we stumbled when it came to getting her out and keeping her safe, I think we did good, Leon."

"I think now's a good time to just kind of toss the past away," he stops and corrects himself, "the past's pains away. Start anew."

"Oh? What kind of pains are you wanting to toss away?" He can see sleep starting to take over her face and he smiles.

Leon slowly tilts his head so it's resting against Claire's and he finishes his thought, "All of it. What we did, didn't do, should've done… In regards to us, to Sherry, everything."

"You," she yawns softly, eliciting a soft chuckle from Leon, "charmer… We'll talk about it more in the morning…"

He nods and adjusts his position so Claire can sleep against him comfortably. I've made far more mistakes than you, I'm the only one who has truly done unforgivable things, but here we are, forgiving each other for things I did, that I'm responsible for. I really don't deserve you. I don't think I deserve anyone...

Those are the last thoughts he has as sleep suddenly finds him…

11

"Leon! Pick up the damn phone!" Hunnigan's voice suddenly blasts through the satellite phone resting on the table a few feet from them.

Leon's hand instinctively shoots for the phone, but it's picked up already and the voice of an angel answers, "Ingrid! So sorry, we overslept! What's so important?"

Leon watches and frowns as Claire's face shifts through several different emotions before settling on one of shock before she calls out, "I'm sorry, can you repeat that?"

"Shots were fired outside the target location. Chicago PD is on the scene, seems like it's turned into a hostage situation of some kind. Turn on the news and take a look," Leon doesn't even wait for her to finish as he quickly types in the web address for a cable news network.

Hunnigan is right, hostage situation in Chicago, local Police are on the scene and is that, "FBI is there? When did this start?"

"Last night," oh, that's what she was trying to call about.

Claire looks at Leon before gripping the phone tighter, "Ingrid, he needs a way there, now."

"Already have a driver on the way there to pick him up and take him to a local airport where there's… Something there to get him to Chicago in time to do something," he nods and quickly starts building a bag to take with him as he works to toss on a shirt, some pants, and a pair of boots.

Leon looks down at the empty pair of holsters and quickly gazes at Claire, "Do I get my guns now?"

A box is dropped on the table and his fingers work to quickly open them, revealing a rather impressive-looking handgun and his customary magnum, "I know the magnum, but what's this?"

The handgun is pulled from the foam packing and turned to be inspected, with Claire smiling a bit to answer, "I talked to Barry about some things and he came up with this. It's a readily modifiable firearm. Currently chambered in .45 but it can be loaded as low as 9mm all the way up to .50AE like your magnum. It's equipped with a three round burst, so it'll stop anything that comes at you."

"Barry names everything, so what did he call this beauty?" His eyes reflect in the polished chrome of the slide.

Hunnigan actually answers that question, "It's called the Katana. It's soon to be standard armament for anyone dealing with a potential biohazard incident. This is the only working model we have right now, so try not to lose this one."

Claire drops a small box of magazines next to the case and helps load them into his bag after thanking Hunnigan and hanging up the call, "So, you're really doing this, huh?"

"Yeah," Leon says nothing else for a bit as they fill the bag and zip it shut. "It needs to be done."

She scoffs and starts typing away on the keyboard, a clearly useless measure just meant to distract her from something, "Right. You have to go in there. Why can't we just drop a satellite on that building and be done with this nightmare cloaked in red?"

"She did all of this for a reason. This game that's been going on since Raccoon City, she's always had me one step behind. I finally feel like I'm ahead of her and I'm going to use that to finally put a stop to her," he notices her eye roll behind her glasses and he sighs.

The bag is slung over his shoulder and he squats down next to her, dropping one hand onto her thigh and the other onto her arm, "Claire, no one knows her like I do. She's my mistake and I need to be the one to correct it. ….What?"

Her small dry laugh is the loudest sound he's ever heard, "What if I let you press the button to drop the satellite? Then it will be you who did it, so you corrected it."

Leon runs a hand over his head, forgetting for a second that he doesn't have hair anymore, and sighs heavily, "I get it, I do. I don't want to go, Red. I have to-"

Claire's hand has darted up to his face and is wrapped over his mouth, her eyes bursting to life for probably the first time ever between them, "Shut the fuck up. Chris can go. He can punch that spying bitch into the next fucking eon… You don't need to go. You don't have to go. There's a million options for us to play with that doesn't end with her claws in you again. If you leave, you are choosing this. Mistakes fade with time if you let them, so why won't you let them die, Leon!?"

His eyes close slowly and he tries to hang his head, but her hand is still tight on his face.

Claire's voice catches in her throat as she continues, "I've suffered enough because you were forced to go here or go there, and she'd just so happen to be there… There's no forcing this time. There's no gun to your back, no boss handing down orders, and absolutely no reason why you need to be there for the end."

He isn't even sure that she's going to let him answer, if she even wants an answer from him, but the hand slowly drops from his face, cupping his chin before slowly returning to the armrest, "When did your Raccoon City nightmare end, Claire?"

There's an incredibly long pause, only broken up by the tight sobs of someone trying to hide their crying, "The moment you and Sherry returned to me after China. I thought you were dead, I thought she was missing somewhere in the mountains… Chris was still battling amnesia, so I had no one…"

He tries to say something, but she shakes her head and tightens her grip on the foam of her armrests as Claire looks up at him, "You told me to go, to find Chris… I can't do that, I can't be that strong, Leon… I want you to stay. I need you to stay…"

"Claire, I…" For someone known for being able to chat about anything with anyone, Leon finally finds himself at a loss for words.

She growls a bit before turning the entire wheelchair toward him, "Leon, I'm begging you not to go! I am asking you to stay with me! Nothing before matters anymore! Our mistakes, our failures, none of it!"

The tears are flowing full force down her face and he reaches up to brush them away, but her hands swat his away, "Do you even realize what I experienced here since I rolled into the door after they dropped you off?"

No, he doesn't, he's been so lost in trying to figure out Ada's game, "I finally got to see that rookie I met in Raccoon City. The one who shielded me from my own nightmares for two days after the city was nuked into oblivion! Ada took you away from me during Raccoon City, but she finally freed you from all of it, she made you free of the government, the bosses, the fighting, she made you free to return to me!"

"Claire, I'm sorry it took all of this to get us to the point where we should've been twenty years ago…" He swallows, finding even that simple action the most difficult thing in the world right now. "It has always been you, I see it clear as day now. Even through the drunken nights and hungover mornings, I knew it was you. At my worst you were there, always. Let me finish this, let me go out there and close the book on my Raccoon Nightmare. I'm strong enough now to do that, and I will be stronger than that with you with me…"

Leon taps the laptop, "Not in person, but in my head. Guiding me, keeping me at my best, being my badass biker guardian angel."

A car horn honks outside, his ride is here, "One final mission… I chose to drive into Raccoon City with you that night. Ever since then, I haven't been able to make a choice for myself… Now that I'm able to, finally able to make a decision for myself, I'm happy that you are here with me once more."

He steps toward the door, placing a hand on the doorframe as he pushes the door open, but her voice stops him, "You're coming back to me, right Rookie?"

Leon turns his head slowly over his shoulder and locks gazes with the redhead behind him one more time, offering a small smile and a wink, "This isn't how our story ends, Red, you know that."

He steps out into the morning light and the door closes on Claire, leaving her in darkness once more.

End