Penumbra:
Shadows Collide
IV:
Confessions
Summer - 2014
Witch Haven Island, off the coast of Massachusetts
Jill stood watching the water on the craggy rocks below. The damn safe house was the oddest thing she'd ever seen. It was accessed through a fucking tree stump that took you down and into a tunnel. You transversed the tunnel and came up on a jutting piece of land off the main island. The fact that it existed, like a James Bond special hideaway, proved that something worse than she'd even thought was happening in Witch Haven.
The cottage itself was secured in the endless forest on the chunk of broken-off island. To get to it, an average person would need a boat or helicopter out and then rappel down. At first, she'd been surprised they didn't just flee the island together, but hiding under their noses in plain sight was actually wiser. This way, Leon could still observe what was happening on the mainland, but no one would assume they were close by.
The forest backed to the cliffs, and you could smell the salt and the sea air, hear the cry of gulls, and know you were sequestered like the Swiss Family Robinson on your own chunk of paradise or your own self-enforced seclusion. Either way, it was beautiful. Leon switched from badass agent to knowledgeable survivalist when they arrived, proving it wasn't his first rodeo with being in hiding post-mission.
He tucked the motorcycle after they emerged from the tree trunk route behind the cottage and covered it with leaves and branches to obscure it from aerial view. The cottage itself was more of a hut, covered in the same foliage, looking from the air like a cluster of trees instead of a habitat. If you could even glimpse it through the dense foliage of the surrounding forest, you'd just assume it was a glade. There was nothing on this chunk but mountainous terrain and trees, no shops, no people, no humanity at all. No one would live here. There wasn't any reason to.
Unihabitated was the best way to hide out.
Leon came back daily from his excursions with rabbits or other various animals for eating. He was as good with a bow as he was with a blade or a gun. Effortless. He cooked and cleaned them like a man who knew what he was doing. There were enough dried goods in the hut to keep them fed for months. They'd been here for a week now and were getting along just fine. There'd been spare clothing in the cabin, nothing fancy but functional and clean. You could bathe out back under the bucket-based well water system when you were dirty or head down to the water, and let the salt cleanse you as you waded in the ocean. There was toothpaste and soap. There were dog-eared books stacked in a corner for entertainment and an old crank-style phonograph with records for listening to music. There was a generator for electricity if they really needed it and enough gas to keep it going for a while.
She'd existed in Africa under Wesker with less. It was rustic here, but it was safe and clean. She wasn't a woman who bitched about surviving.
He sat now at the small two-seater table, cleaning the crossbow.
Jill glanced away from her view outside of the window to look at him.
He was shirtless, his bare chest glistened from a recent shower as his arms bunched nicely with each movement. The fine sprinkling of hair over his pecs and trailing down his taunt stomach was just enough to add texture to all that supple skin. She'd cut his hair for him that first night they'd arrived, snipping away the singed ends and leaving him looking less like a rockstar and more like a mortal.
It was still long enough that he kept tucking it behind his ears as he worked.
After the third time, Jill came toward him and, stepping behind him in the chair, scooped his hair back from his face to secure it with a hair tie. Amused, Leon glanced at her, "You give me a man bun?"
Jill's mouth twitched. "Just helping you. Why not just let me cut the whole mop off?"
He tilted his head, his face somehow even more handsome without all the hair to hide it. "Why?"
"You don't need it," she declared and moved into the living area to scan the records they had, "it's just another shield to hide behind."
Leon paused, watching her. "You don't know me well enough to make that kind of remark."
Jill shrugged. "Don't I? I dyed my hair dark and chopped it off the second I was back on dry land after Wesker. I did it to prove I'm still me. I'm guessing you hold onto that same hairstyle to prove you're still you - the cop who'd once promised he'd serve and protect. We always use our hair and change it in order to prove something."
Leon considered her as she selected a record and set it on the phonograph. "...fuck."
Jill tossed him a look, "What?"
"...nothing," he chuckled, "I don't like being that transparent, I guess. I don't know if I was actively meaning to do that, but you're kinda right. It's the one damn thing I can control, I guess."
Jill nodded. "You betcha. Same for me, and trying like hell to pretend I'm still the same person."
Leon studied her. "Aren't you?"
She cast a look at him and laughed. "Ha...no. Not even close."
He kept on looking at her. "You look the same to me. Like..not even an extra wrinkle."
Jill set the needle down on the record, and Vivaldi's Four Seasons filled the cabin as she told him. "The T-Virus retarded the aging process."
He sat for a moment, just looking at her. And then, he whistled low and laughed. "Look at you, the fountain of youth in the flesh. Forever...what...twenty-three?"
Jill rolled her eyes. "Yeah, it's really awesome. Everyone else will age and die, and I'll still be here, preserved like a mummy - never able to escape the mortal coil."
Leon pursed his lips. "Most women would pay their entire life savings for that."
Jill gave him a cool look. "Sure, and all I had to trade for it was any hope for a normal life. Totally worth it, man," she affected a rich woman's crusty accent, "who needs Beverly Hills when you can live forever?"
Leon started cleaning the bow again. "Hmm. Are you sure you're not aging at all?"
Jill shook her head. "Nothing. I woke up in that tank and underwent so much testing. Wesker was impressed that I wasn't preserved just by the activation of the T-Virus to save my life but by the initial infection. Apparently, once you've got it, you've got it forever. Like herpes."
Leon smirked, "Eternal STDS."
"Yippee," Jill muttered with a tone of resentment, "Lucky me."
He paused, watching her. The music swirled around her, and still, she stood apart from it. Quietly, he admonished, "You are lucky, Jill."
She tossed a look at him filled with reproach. "Please."
"You are," he affirmed, "you lived. You made it back. You're a little bitter and kinda bitchy, but you're here. Maybe there's something to be said for that."
Feeling chastised, Jill held his eyes. "You trying to shame me?"
He chuckled. "Not entirely. But I'm trying to get you to realize I've been there - lost, hopeless, wishing like hell there was another option. Alone. Lonely for it, and put there by my own choices. What happened to you wasn't your fault, Jill, but what happens now? It is. Don't make my mistakes, don't ostracize yourself by choice."
Jill flicked her eyes over his face. "Why are you alone?"
Curious, Leon tilted his head. "Why?"
"Yeah, why?" She moved her head back and forth like a dog, "Objectively, you're attractive. You're a little bit of a clown, but girls like that. You sit there with more muscles than Superman and fight like him too. You could have a wife and a couple of tater tots. Why don't you?"
Leon set the bow down on the table and leaned back in the chair. "That's easy enough."
"Is it?"
"Sure," he shrugged, "You love something, you can lose it. I don't like to lose. So, instead...I set myself away from anything I might risk."
Jill laughed sarcastically, "So...a coward at the core."
Leon smirked. "Seems that way. But it's my choice. What about you? You could give this up and do the same. Marry, make a life. Why are you still here?"
Jill shrugged. "Why else? Atonement. After that, it's a promise I made to myself that I'd never stop, ever, until it was done."
Leon made a hmm sound. Jill narrowed her eyes, "What?"
"That's part of it," he announced, "but not all of it. What's the rest?"
Jill shifted where she stood. "Nothing is the rest. That's it."
"Hmm," he murmured again and made her narrow her eyes further, "you're a liar, but it's ok. We've got time. You'll tell me the rest eventually."
Jill rolled her eyes.
"If I had to guess," Leon stated conversationally, "I'd say it because you think you don't deserve to be happy."
Jill turned her back on him to leaf through books and said nothing. Leon chuckled lightly. "Yeah. Ouch. Hit that on the head, huh?"
She said nothing.
Lips pursed, Leon teased, "I could make you happy if you want. Right now."
Jill gave him a droll look over her shoulder. "You ain't that fucking charming, Kennedy. But keep trying."
Leon winked. He chuckled and went back to the bow. He didn't press. And he did seem to flirt almost absently, like a defense mechanism to lighten the mood. She had no doubt if she said yes and jumped on his lap, he'd likely freeze like a deer in the headlights with shock. He hit, but he never expected women to hit back. She was betting he'd shit his pants if she did.
Or maybe she was wrong. Maybe he'd throw her down on that table and mount her like a prize pony if she did. God knew it would take her mind off this shitty set of circumstances.
Curious about it, Jill turned toward him and decided to test it. He was skimming oil over the bow joints when she leaned over his shoulder and eyed the work he was doing. It put her face aside his, cheeks aligned, as she commented, "That's good and clean, I think."
Leon remarked quietly, "Too dirty, and it'll jam. Gotta find that sweet spot."
Jill turned her face a little until her eyes met his, but he was staring pretty hard at the bow as his hands worked. She said softly, "Hmm. I like a little dirt on my weapons, keep them lubed up and ready. Your sweet spot should be a little...dirty."
His Adam's apple bobbed in his throat, and his face remained passive, but that quick swallow told her everything she needed to know. She was right. He flirted, but it was almost reactionary, and it wasn't, it seemed, meant to be reciprocated. He was nervous with her this close when they weren't in combat or survival mode.
She was half tempted to push it to watch him scurry back like a scared rabbit, but she'd made her point. No reason to make things tense. She rose from leaning over his shoulder and left him to clean the bow with a quiet, "I'm gonna head down to the water and wash off."
"Cool," His voice was a little hoarse, making her mouth twitch with humor, "Keep to the shadows and shallows."
"Aye, aye, captain, " Jill teased, "remember to hit that sweet spot while I'm gone."
The second the door closed, Leon laid the bow on the table and blew out a hard breath. He laughed, shaking his head. Jesus, he needed to get laid. He was sitting here imagining her sitting on his face while he found her sweet spot. Ill-timed, which summed up most of his romantic interests, and totally unintentional on her part. She wasn't even close to trying to flirt with him.
Mostly, she seemed to tolerate him. They got along fine, but he got along with everyone for the most part. He was congenial and cordial and good at reading people. He usually knew which buttons to press to get what he wanted from them. Objectively, Jill was attractive, as she'd said about him. But that wasn't enough to really get his interest.
Beautiful women were a dime a dozen. He could throw a quarter in a street and hit three with one toss. It didn't mean he wanted to do more than look at them like artwork in a museum. He flirted, but that was almost second nature, he did it to charm and persuade them. It got him what he wanted.
It was harmless.
Touching Jill Valentine wouldn't be harmless. Hell, she didn't even call him Leon unless she was surprised. It was always Kennedy. That didn't put them on terms for dating. Fucking maybe, but he wasn't looking for that either.
She definitely wasn't.
He set aside the bow and opened his laptop. The battery was getting low, so he'd have to charge it off the generator soon, but it booted up and found the satellite uplink he needed to view the report he was working on. He didn't want to focus on Jill and fucking. If he did, he'd get all hot and bothered and have to run into the woods to beat off like a horny teenager.
Instead, he set about trying to connect the dots between the lab and the missing scientist. So far, he wasn't among the dead, which was saying something. Which meant the contact was still in the wind. Finding him was paramount to figuring out what had been happening in that lab. The connections between Arias and that mess were tenuous at best and needed more solid links.
The breeding angle was alarming but not surprising. He'd always assumed someone, somewhere, would be trying it. Nothing like making killer babies from birth. The grotesque abuse of power was pretty typical of bad guys. Jill's horror at it said she was still naive enough to believe there should be a line for how fucking evil you could be.
Leon had learned years ago that drawing lines for bad guys was a waste of time. Villains loved to just erase them and do whatever they wanted. Trying to fit evil into a box was a fruitless endeavor - it didn't give a damn about rules.
Leon rose from the chair and moved over the clean the wound on his back. It was harder than it should have been. One, he wasn't Gumby or Professor Gadget, so his arms didn't like the angles, and all the yoga in the world wouldn't make him double-jointed. And two -doctoring yourself sucked when it was in a mostly unreachable location.
Leon trying to reach his lower back with his jeans hanging so low on his hips that they were almost falling off when the door to the cabin opened, and Jill admonished, "Here. Before you rip it open reaching. Be still."
He did as she commanded and held still while she went about cleaning his back with iodine. Quietly, she queried, "How is it?"
"Itchy," Leon decided as her fingers trailed over his hip with the cotton ball, "how's it looking?"
"Ok, actually. A little irritated, puffy, but healing nicely - quickly," she eyed him as she brushed the cotton ball above his butt cheek, "do I need to speculate on the why?"
Leon snorted. "No. I think you get it."
Jill nodded. "How long?"
"Spain," he answered as she worked, "Plagas didn't stick around after the removal, but the effects did."
"Hmm," Jill skimmed the cotton ball up his spine, and his skin popped with goosebumps, "regret it?"
"Hard to when I get a cold that lasts half a day and fucks off," Leon glanced down at her where she worked behind his shoulder blade, "or when I get chucked across a goddamn square sideways into a column and don't even break a bone."
Jill sighed. "Any adverse effects?"
He considered that. After a moment, he answered, "Rage."
Surprised, Jill stopped cleaning to lean over his shoulder to look at him. "In what way?"
"Before, I was broody...after...I was pissed," he eyed her face next to his, "and I couldn't shut it off the same way. It lingered. It festered like a wound. And when it hit, something...activated in me, I guess. It surges through me, and I can punch a fucking door and not break my hand."
Quietly, Jill asked, "Can you punch a hole through that door?"
He held her eyes, "Depends."
"On?"
"The amount of rage and the thickness of the door. But can I kick it down? Yep. Even most metal doors with enough incentive."
Jill scanned his face. "How about monsters?"
He glanced at her mouth and back at her eyes. "..yes."
"Chris would be so fucking jealous," she laughed lightly, "All his muscles, and he can't fist fight a goddamn tyrant. I'm guessing you can."
"Don't know about that," Leon returned with a snort, "but so long as it doesn't gut me, I can sure as fuck try."
"You been gravely wounded since Spain?"
He felt her hand lying flat on his back as she leaned around him to see his face. His mouth turned up at one corner. "Not so far. But not for lack of trying."
"Badly?"
Gruffly, he answered, "I'm still here, so not that goddamn badly."
She tilted her head. "They said you died in Tall Oaks."
He laughed. "Lies. Rhetoric to throw them off my scent. But the thing about that...I was submerged in water with some goddamn monster for...half an hour? I'm a good swimmer, but even Michael-fucking-Phelps wouldn't be able to be under that goddamn long. It sucked. I coughed up a ton of water...but then I just...kept swimming."
Jill nodded. She admitted, "Under the P-30, I was stabbed in the stomach by a fucking sword. They twisted it. They tried to gut me. I should have died on the spot. I ripped it out and killed them with it...but...when I woke up on the cot in the lab, I was healed."
Leon held her eyes. Understanding passed between them as she murmured, "...freaks, right?"
His mouth turned up in a smile. "All the best people are."
Jill shook her head. "How can you be so goddamn congenial about it?"
The smile stayed on his face but didn't reach his eyes. "Better than the alternative, Jill."
"Which is?"
"Giving up. I won't do it. I can't," he avowed, "until I'm done."
"When are you done?"
"When they are."
"Who's they?"
Leon's smile turned into a flash of wolfish teeth. "All the ones who think they have the right to kill without discrimination, to murder in the name of science, to destroy for the sake of success."
Jill tilted her head, "You can't fight them all."
"Maybe not," he winked, "but I can damn well keep trying."
He was still smiling as she shook her head and confessed, "I don't get you at all."
Leon chuckled. "Yes, you do. Maybe that's what's so confusing. You get me, you just don't want to."
He was pretty insightful for a noble clown. Jill let her fingers slide down the fresh bandage on his back and murmured, "All done."
Leon tilted his head, "Yeah? How's it look, Doc?"
Jill skimmed her eyes over his muscled back and those hips with the tops of that pert ass peeking from his jeans and muttered, "...you'll live."
"They all you, The Surgeon, ya know." He teased and watched her roll her eyes.
"I heard that," she snorted, "Stupid nicknames. Who comes up with this shit?"
"I'm not sure," Leon joked just to make her roll her eyes again, "but they could have at least called me something more flattering...like...Big Long Dong."
Her eyes held his with a measure of sarcasm. "Why not Big Dumb Douche?"
He chuckled and shrugged. "Maybe the cutting-out hearts part of the name doesn't suit you, but the slicing tongue and healing hands do. I appreciate this, Doc."
She waved her hand in the air to dismiss him.
She stepped away while he chuckled. He watched her move to the phonograph while he buttoned his fly. "Thanks."
Jill shrugged, and Leon urged, "I mean it, Jill. I don't know if I'd have bled out without you there."
She shrugged again. "Probably not, but let's not pretend I saved your life. Dead you weren't any help to me."
Leon snorted. "I might have been lame, anyway, if I would have been able to stop the bleeding. You made sure that didn't happen. So, I'm in your debt."
Jill rolled her eyes. "Forget it."
"Why do you do that?"
She glanced over her shoulder, "Do what?"
"Blow it off, reject it."
"I don't need your thanks, Kennedy. So, keep it."
He eyed her and stated, "Leon."
"What?" She turned to look at him.
"Leon. That's my name. It's Leon. You know that. You said it in surprise in the sewer. Why not just call me by my name?"
Jill laughed with frustration. "Does it matter?"
"It doesn't," he crossed his arms over his chest, "and it does. It's another distancing thing. I get it. I do it, too. But I'm curious what happens if you stop doing it."
"I won't, so it doesn't matter." She tucked her hands in the back pockets of her shorts, "we're not friends, Kennedy. We're barely even acquaintances. We're in this together at the moment, but it won't last. When the time comes, I'll go my way, you'll go yours. Why bother to get any closer?"
Leon actually rolled his eyes and scoffed. "Whatever helps you sleep at night, princess. Keep that shield up. No skin off my ass."
He turned to the kitchen to hunt up some food. Jill considered him. He pulled a pot from the cabinet and took some rice from the top shelf. Curious, she inquired, "Why are you offended?"
Leon scoffed again. "Am I?"
"Yes," Jill decreed and smirked, "I can't figure out why you care if I like you."
"Do I?"
She laughed lightly. "You do. But why? I'm one person. Who gives a shit what I think?"
Leon paused and glanced at her. He gave her a pitying look that made her shift on her feet. "Is that really what you feel? That no one should give a shit what you think?"
Jill turned away to study the books again. "I'm not worth trying to impress, Kennedy. So, waste those charms on some girl that will coo and flirt and fall for you. I'm not looking for any new friends."
Leon laughed with a touch of annoyance. "I wasn't aware I was trying to charm you, Jill, but it's good to know where I stand, I guess."
She said nothing, eyeing the books on the shelf with a flicker of regret. She wasn't trying to push him away, not really. But she didn't want him close either. If she let him close, he'd see the wide empty pity of emptiness inside her where only the goddamn anger dwelled. She was so fucking mad. Mad, at the years she'd lost, at the things she'd done, at the world for letting her do it, at Chris for failing upward in her absence. At coming back and finding nothing had changed, nothing was better, it was all worse - so much worse- and it wasn't even a struggle, it was a loss. They'd lost while she'd been gone.
They'd lost.
And she'd spent the last few years since she'd come back trying like hell to fix it.
She'd gone out a window to save him, and Chris had fucking failed in her absence. She'd died and changed nothing. Here she was, still on the losing end of an already lost battle, a pointless peon pushing herself closer to the cliff with the rest of them - still resisting, still denying, and unable to accept it wasn't going to change. They couldn't win. They wouldn't win. It was impossible.
She glanced over her shoulder at the man in the kitchen. He didn't see it was impossible. He didn't see it that way. He just kept on fighting. His urge to change the world for those who couldn't was so fucking noble. It would get him killed. It was fruitless.
Right?
He shifted and started boiling water. He moved stiffly like a man who'd taken a fucking scythe to the back to protect someone else. He'd almost blown himself up trying to spare the world what was in that lab. She'd heard he'd been circling the drain not long ago, lost, looking for answers.
What had changed? Why was he back and pushing harder than ever? Quietly, Jill urged, "Can we do this?"
Leon didn't look at her. "Do what?"
"Can we win? With the world against us...can we win?"
He stopped. He turned to face her. And he said, "Maybe not. But if we give up, then we've already lost."
Jill took two steps, stopped, took two more, and stopped. Leon glanced at her feet and back at her face. "It's ok," he gruffed, "it's alright to move forward, Jill. Keep moving forward. That's all you can do."
She covered her mouth with her hand. She had to stop this. She had to stop the overwhelming urge to talk to him. It burned in her throat like vomit, verbal diarrhea trying to come up and regurgitate all her fears and worries on him until he collapsed under the weight of it. He hadn't known her before. He didn't care who she was then. He saw her now, here, at this moment - a woman with regret like a cloak around her and with emptiness covered in rage in her heart. She tried to ape being who she'd been. She tried so hard. But it was all lies - smoke and mirrors, a fractured face in the busted glass looking back at her, judging her.
Like she judged herself.
But not him.
He didn't judge.
She wanted to feel some of that hope he still carried in his heart like a tiny flame, flickering, seeking oxygen to keep burning and burst into a wildfire that consumed the world.
She wanted to feel it.
She just didn't know how.
Her voice came out before she could stop it. "I don't know how."
Something on his face echoed with understanding. Not pity, no, but sheer and simple empathy. He looked her in the eye and said, "You just do it. One goddamn step at a time. And if you end up two steps back, you keep on trying."
"Did you?"
Her voice was so small. But the question so large. So important. Maybe the most important one she'd ever asked of another.
Leon nodded and returned, "I'm still here. I'm still fighting. So...sometimes that's as good as it gets."
Jill nodded rapidly in response. She inhaled slowly and centered herself, she closed her eyes to do it. When she opened them, both shades of blue held until he offered in a husky tone, "Hungry?"
And she nodded again with a tremulous smile. "Sure. And you know what?"
"What's that?"
"I could use that fucking drink."
His eyes flickered. His mouth twitched. And he returned in a sheepish tone, "Backpack, middle pouch."
She turned. She went to the backpack and opened it, and found a small bottle of whiskey tucked into the folds. She eyed him as she rose, and he confessed, "I gave up a spare magazine for that guy."
Jill laughed roughly. "Wise man."
"Or a stupid one, dealers choice." He turned back to the stove. She moved to get two mugs from the cabinet. It wasn't much, it was just a drink, but it was something more than she'd shared with anyone else in years.
It probably meant nothing...or it might have meant more than he'd ever know. Either way, it was the start of something new for her. And maybe that was how she took that one step forward.
