Alas, only a snippet due to guidelines. I fucking HATE how puritan everything is. That's a rant for another time, though.
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He was being watched. Those staring eyes were like nails scraping across his skin. Under it. Digging deep and unyielding as Leon Kennedy walked across the metal floor.
No. Not like nails. Knives.
Leon threw himself forward but not fast enough. Pain flashed through his cheek as he rolled into a crouch. An echoing pain blazed in his chest, rippled down his spine, but Leon couldn’t look away from the threat in front of him to acknowledge it. Leon just wiped away the blood on his cheek and flicked it off his hand. It wasn’t much but he swore he heard the droplets land, swore he heard his blood drip off the knife in front of him and land on the metal floor.
You’re dead, Leon wanted to say as Jack Krauser smiled at him. All the while, Leon’s blood dripped off Jack’s knife. You’re dead and gone, Jack.
“The dead never stay dead, Leon,” Krauser rumbled. He raised the knife and Leon could only watch, frozen. The feeling of being watched lingered as Krauser brought his knife to his mouth. “You should know better by now.”
No. No, this isn’t what happened. Krauser, Jack, don’t --
Krauser dragged his tongue over the knife, cleaning it. Leon’s blood painted his lips red. Leon’s heart pounded in his chest. It felt too big, slamming against his ribs and making his lungs and spine ache with each frantic thud. Like it was trying to get out.
Jack, Leon tried to say, but instead he stood, holding out his own knife. Blood shone on it. He couldn’t remember when he used it. I’m sorry.
Except he had no reason to be sorry. Krauser betrayed Leon. Krauser dragged Ashley into this mess.
Ashley was safe. Krauser was dead.
Around Leon, those unseen eyes burned into Leon’s skin. Krauser began to pace like a tiger in a cage, and helpless, Leon moved, too, matching Krauser step for step. Blood gleamed on Leon’s blade. Krauser’s knife shone wetly in the dim light, slick with Krauser’s saliva, with Leon’s blood still bright on the sharp edge of it.
“You should know by now that I’ll always come back, comrade.” Krauser’s voice was a low purr, wrapping around them both.
They were moving. Fighting. Knives flashing, blood splashing. Krauser’s knife against Leon’s throat and he blinked and they were in bed again, naked, Krauser between Leon’s thighs and his knife a wicked thrill and another blink and Leon was moving before Krauser could cut his throat. They moved lightly, gracefully, dancing as they made each other bleed.
Leon cut Krauser’s chest and Krauser only threw his head back and laughed. There was blood on his teeth and his scars twisted his face and for a moment Krauser’s skin melted away, leaving only bone and jagged scar tissue and Krauser’s laughing, bloody mouth.
No. No. This isn’t how any of this went. No. Please.
Leon’s chest burned. A scream burned in his throat, trapped, as Krauser moved again and pulled Leon back into their dance.
They were being watched. Leon could see them now, out of the corner of his eye, as he dodged Krauser’s blade and struck back with his own. Dark, cloaked figures surrounding them, sick voyeurs in this twisted play. Leon knew he needed to focus on Krauser, on Krauser’s knife, but those figures with their unyielding stares seemed to press down on him. Leon couldn’t breathe.
He was distracted. Everything was moving too fast, there was too much going on, too many eyes and the pain was growing in his chest and then he was on his back, Krauser snug between his thighs, Krauser’s knife at his throat.
No, no. Ashley. I need to save Ashley, I need to…
“It was always going to be this way, Leon.” Instead of killing Leon, Krauser pressed closer, his hard cock pressing against Leon. Once, this would have aroused Leon like little else. Now he flinched away. Krauser only followed. All around them, the dark figures watched. Tentacles began to slither out from the cloaks. “There’s no escaping destiny.”
Ada -- But there was no crack of a gun, no familiar woman in red. Just agony in Leon’s chest and Krauser leaning forward, his tongue touching the still bleeding cut on Leon’s cheek.
Pain seared through Leon’s cheek, and he yelped and jerked. Krauser and the dark figures fell away but there was still someone on him, holding him down. Leon was about to break his captor’s nose when the man called out, “Leon!”
Piers. Leon tried to speak but his breath caught painfully in his throat. He began to choke and cough, chest burning like he had been sprinting for miles. Immediately Piers was there, wrapping an arm around Leon’s shoulders and dragging him into a sitting position. Piers whispered to him all the while, words Leon couldn’t make out over his own coughing and ragged breaths, but it was all right: Piers’s voice was familiar, soothing, something far from the madness of Spain, and bit by bit, the shadows fell away.
He was home. In their bed. He came home still feeling shitty from his last mission and Piers suggested he take a nap and --
Krauser and Spain were waiting for him there like they hadn’t in years. Leon shuddered, coughing once more before he collapsed against Piers. Fuck.
It wasn’t 2004. It was 2016, Ashley was safe, Krauser was dead, and love wasn’t a knife to the throat anymore: it was calloused hands touching his face and a scarred mouth pressing kisses against his scarred cheek and waking from a nap to the smell of lasagna. Piers was still whispering against his skin, assuring Leon that it was just a dream. He was fine. He was home.
Leon cleared his throat and grimaced at the ache. Jesus Christ, he hoped he hadn’t been screaming in his sleep. “Lasagna?” he croaked.