2. Leon

He would have been lying if he said he hadn't been annoyed by the sudden interruption of his current assignment, but orders were orders. He had arrived early at TerraSave NA HQ, but he didn't miss the chance to stop by a flower shop on his way there. He knew nothing about orchids, but he picked a bright pinkish one.

"So you are the orchid boy."

Leon turned around only to meet Dr. Hiwamura's curious look. The woman stood behind him, with her arms crossed.

"I was wondering who was the devoted one who kept bringing those exotic flowers."

The Japanese woman moved to his side and stood in front of the Memorial Wall. She scanned the pictures on the wall and ceremoniously lit three incense sticks.

"Most of the boys here keep bringing more traditional bouquets. Claire would have certainly been annoyed, but you, Mr. Kennedy, know your deal."

"Claire told me she liked orchids." He admitted, "That was probably the last "normal" talk we had…"

"Oh, she did. She named all of her procedures after orchids after all. However, she just said it was practical, and she liked those names better than numbers. What a shy woman."

Leon let out a soft chuckle.

"Sounds like her. She wouldn't admit she picked the names because she liked them. Now that's all that we have left from her."

"You sound regretful."

Regretful? Perhaps he was. It was cliché, but it was the truth, that one didn't know what one was missing until it was gone. Maybe he should have called her more often, just for chatting and not only when there was a job in the way. He should have visited her now and then, but he knew better. There was no point thinking of that sort of thing now. It would be one of many things he'll regret, but Claire was gone, and regret wouldn't fix it.

"Perhaps…" he sighed.

"Claire would punch some sense of you if she saw that look on your face."

He had to admit she would. He could almost picture the redhead's glare as she complained about him being hard on himself and needing to let loose.

"She probably would…"

"We all miss her, so it is all right. "Hiwamura said, patting his shoulder, "it's rare to see you around this early. Don't you have some secret mission to do?"

"I had...but my mission was interrupted by an urgent call summoning me here."

"You, too, huh? I got the same call, it seems. I wonder what it is about."

"Your guess is as good as mine." Leon replied, shaking his head, "but I guess we are bound to find out soon."

"I've got the feeling that it is bioterrorism-related."

Leon snorted. Had it ever been otherwise?

The pair entered the meeting room, and Leon was surprised to see his direct superior, Renard Hopkins, talking to the other two men. One of them he only knew by name, the current head chief of BSAA: Edward Adams; the second man, he didn't recognize him, but he seemed like an executive of some kind.

"Ah, Leon. Welcome. "Renard said, shaking his hand, "Forgive me for interrupting your current mission, but I am sure you'll soon understand the priorities."

Leon shook the man's hand formally and nodded.

"I am sure that interruption is justified, sir."

"It is. Let me introduce these gentlemen. Edward Adams, chief and commander of BSAA North America Branch, and Ian Wentworth, current acting chief of TerraSave North America."

Leon shook the hands of both men with a nod. Current acting chief, so that man was the one who was replacing Claire.

"Acting chief?" Leon asked, looking at Wentworth.

The man gave him a sad look and nodded.

"Everyone is still mourning," he said, "announcing a permanent replacement would be a hard hit for those that loved Claire. Myself included."

That made some sense, Leon thought. The name was just a title; the role was the same one way or another.

"This is the first time we meet in person, right, Mr. Kennedy?" chief Adams said, "Though I've heard much about you. Please take a seat. We will start the briefing as soon as my men arrive."

Leon nodded and sat on the chair next to Dr. Hiwamura. There was a big window behind him, and there was a nice view of the far mountains that he almost found relaxing.

"Claire used to sit here…" Hiwamura's voice took him out of his thoughts. The woman was staring at him, but her attention wasn't on him. She was thinking back to some fond memory.

"Sometimes, she would come here and sit in front of this window for hours," the Japanese sighed, "She was always thinking of something, but never said what. She could be a difficult person. I always told her that keeping things to herself wasn't healthy."

"Did she...had problems?"

"Who doesn't? We all do, but that woman. She saw so much death and suffering, but she always kept the smile up because she knew someone had to, even in the hardest times. Her loss is like losing the moral support that TerraSave had. I heard the other regions are mourning her, too."

"Claire always knew how to touch people's hearts…" he admitted.

"Did she get yours, too?" Hiwamura asked casually; the question took Leon by surprise.

Had she? It was not a lie that he had kept Claire in a special place since the beginning, but he never thought much about it. Leon never got the chance to answer that question since, at that same moment, the rest of the summoned made their entrance. First had been Barry, the old ex-S.T.A.R walked grumpily to a seat and sat down without many words; not too long after, Chris and Jill arrived. As soon as the pair had taken their seats, chief Adams began talking.

The case didn't seem out of the ordinary, and Leon was wondering why he had been urgently called and reassigned to it when he flipped the last page of the folder. His heart skipped a beat as he saw the picture attached to it.

"Claire…" he muttered.

It was her, he was sure. Her face might have been covered in bruises and injuries, but he could never miss her face and the burgundy locks that fell over it. The hair was shorter than he remembered, though. Leon was suddenly hit by a mix of anxiety, confusion, and excitement. He had to put a lot of effort into not throwing up the table and demanding an explanation; instead, the agent breathed and read the notes on the page. She had been severely injured, and for what he read, she was in a pretty critical condition. Could this be here? Could it be his Claire? He couldn't help but doubt. He knew that Neo-Umbrella was capable of creating clones; he had seen one himself after all. If they could make a copy of Ada, what was stopping them from doing something similar with Claire?

However, when he'd heard Hiwamura's explanation about Claire's condition and how it could help to identify her, he wasn't sure whether he was glad or mad. Claire had been infected for two years with a special strain of the t-virus. Even if it was inactive, something like that was a heavy burden to keep, and yet she'd kept it quiet. How many things had she kept quiet about? If this woman were indeed Claire, he'd have a word about that later.

When the meeting ended, he could read the uncertainty mixed with hope in the atmosphere. Chris had said nothing. The man had exchanged looks with him and then left with Jill and Barry almost immediately; Dr. Hiwamura also excused herself; she had things that required packing and activities that needed to reschedule.

As he was left alone in the corridor, he felt a pat on his back, and he found Hopkins standing a couple of steps behind him.

"I believe you now see what I meant by priorities."

"Sir?"

"There is a high chance that this woman is Ms. Redfield. Now then, why would a presumed dead person appear after eight months thousands of miles away from the place she disappeared and in that condition? I doubt there's casualty involved."

"You believe she escaped from somewhere, don't you?"

"We have no proof of that yet, and she has yet to wake up, but I won't deny you. I suspect it is like that. It is speculation, but I don't want to take a chance. If our guesses are right, there's no doubt that her captors are most likely interested in retrieving her or silencing for good. I could have assigned any of our agents to this case, but I think you are the one who should be doing it."

"I understand…"

This time. I won't fail, Leon thought as he walked away.

Leon wasn't fond of airplanes. He had pretty bad experiences with them in the past. There was nothing more troublesome than being stuck in the air in case of an attack. The trip to Wales had been a quiet one since the travelers were all busy with their thoughts, and he was no exception. By the time they had reached their destination, the sun had long gone down, but they were taken immediately to see Claire anyway. None of them felt like waiting, after all. They were received by her doctor, a ginger headed woman named Abigail Nolan. She was the one who had to recognize Claire. She had met the younger Redfield as one of the TerraSave operatives in Europe, sometime before Claire had gotten promoted.

"We have put her into isolation." Dr. Nolan explained as she led them to the intensive care unit, "her injuries were highly infected due to the exposure to the seawater. She's quite delicate at the moment, but she's been reacting well to antibiotics."

As the nurse kept speaking about Claire's health status, they watched her weakened figure in the bed from the other side of the crystal. It was then that Leon realized how bad her condition was; she had thinned even more than the last time he had seen her, and she was pale.

"I understand. Can I take a look at the results from the blood tests you performed?" Dr. Hiwamura asked.

"Of course, that should be no problem. I'll show you as soon as the results are ready."

"Has she been unconscious all this time?" Chris asked.

"Yes, unfortunately. She arrived in really bad shape. It was much of a miracle that she survived. If she'd been found a day later, she might have not made it."

"Any idea of what happened to her?" Leon inquired.

"I am afraid not. We will have to wait until she wakes up and tells us herself."

"That will certainly take some time." Hiwamura muttered, " Her condition is worse than I expected, but judging by the infection rate, she wasn't in the sea that long. The injuries must have been acquired on dry land, so I guess that she fell off or jumped in an escape attempt."

"Or she was pushed…." Chris muttered.

"Yes. Either way, she received quite a beating before she was into the water. That's a given."

"There are old scars on her body as well. We were wondering if she was being tortured, wherever she was…"

"Maybe, but Claire had her collection of scars anyway."

"We guessed that as well, but the tissue is particularly thin and typical from recent scars, so they can't be that old. There's a big one in her left shoulder…."

Leon felt cold. He knew the story behind that scar. That day, the day in which she had "died", the B.O.W had pierced her shoulder. The long sharp claw had struck her left shoulder, nailing her against the wall; the image still haunted his dreams some nights.

"The wound was well treated, so wherever she came from, they've got good doctors."

"Yeah, we can worry about that later." Barry shrugged.

"Dr. Nolan!" a nurse came to them in a rush.

"What's wrong, Diana?"

"Ms. Redfield…she's awake."