three times, and almost thirty years to go through
ONE; 1998
There are worlds where you two never meet, and every single one of them has a sun shining, lakes that miss the people that used to swim there, and movie theaters with popcorn kernels cemented into their foundations like it had always been a part of the construction. All of those worlds, you imagine she is thinking about, those things with rose-colored glasses. If nostalgia had a color, you imagine it would be Claire's favorite.
The motel room has green wallpaper from the eighties still up, and a fan that still works as background noise as you hunch in the bathtub that's probably seen about as much blood in its lifetime as you were tracking in. Shot in the shoulder between the time you parted ways and the time you reconnected. She calls it insane and you cracked a joke that it's just your luck while she tried to change bandaging for you. She kisses you. The second kiss you've gotten this week from two very different women.
In those other worlds where Raccoon City never happened, you didn't think you'd be staying up more than the girls. You wouldn't be sitting just outside the motel room on a bench, shivering because you know you were bitten and nothing happened yet.
The hours pass, and you're still in this world, you're still not dead. You're still not in the motel room.
"Hey."
You snap out of what feels like an hours long doze on a bench.
"You okay?"
"Better now. Sorry. Just thinking."
"What about?"
Claire sits next to you and you sigh, saying nothing, but leaning to greet her with a small kiss to her cheek. She seems pensive like she's seeing through your smokescreen.
"I'm glad I met you," you say, in this world.
TWO; 2004
There are digital cameras that take better pictures than the instant flash ones, but come December, you still don't own a digital camera, just a half used Kodak with a worn out casing from about five years ago. Still, you bring it along with you when you go to visit on New Years Eve.
It's a triumph you're alive at all. A few new, impressive scars later, and a lot of new concerns, you find that when she opens her hotel door, you suddenly are you again. She smiles, already cracked into the celebratory ciders in her private solo party and handing one to you. Maybe there is a god, because it's apple flavored and you have a feeling you'll be mixing drinks to pass the time with good company.
You offer your lame little camera, still having five years worth of memories sleeping inside the film roll if you're lucky, and she laughs. You're a nerd, you know that?
"Yeah, did you know–" she pushes your shoulder before you finish the statement and you box with her for the first few feet in the door.
"Come on, it's for your photo album."
Maybe with enough pictures Claire would stop thinking about the elsewhere, where it's perfect, and see the present? At least, that's your private, more complicated thought.
You take a sip of your cider a few minutes to midnight, and aim the camera at the two of you. You both look tired for the first shot. You kiss her in the second one, leaving a boozy mark on her cheek. She's laughing in the picture.
THREE; 2009
Snap another picture, you think, not knowing what to feel at first, months later as you watch the ghost, Jill Valentine, walk through a house like she was haunting it. Her posture's different and sensitive, like a scarred hound to the fox hunt. When she approaches you, standing next to Claire, she gives each of you a suspicious look before you're the one that says it, quietly:
"Snap a picture, Valentine."
You don't want to start the hunt. She snorts, and Claire laughs, just as nervous to see if Jill will fade away before the end of the night. She doesn't. You have a few beers together between Claire, Chris, you, and Jill, and for a while, you pretend you're fine around a bonfire while every single one of your waits for something to lurch out of the shadows.
Claire sheds a couple when you both crash back at the hotel room you booked for the occasion of witnessing a resurrection. Nothing dies down here. You take her hand while she's straining to recover from the happy-sad tears and spin her under your arm for some momentum. Sometimes you get small victories, and this is one of them. You collect Claire for a kiss that feels like good memories.
She pulls you in for a second, third, fourth, and you feel like an anchor to the present being dragged over the rocks, losing your grip.
post 4 effects of plaga for him are actually pretty extensive. If you look at any of the villagers or militant ganado if they've been dismembered, there are networks of worms throughout their bodies. That happened to him.
Those didn't go away with the targeted radiation treatment. They just became auxiliary systems and kept growing for him. His system's filled with worm-like appendages. His bones are wrapped through with worms, his spines so wormy and worms poke out of the pores in his bones.
Leon was meant to transform in 24 hours. This is a fast process and he was at the tail end of that process come sunrise off the island. Obviously the more mature these parasites get, the more they are going to intertwine into essential body systems.
His taste buds are completely different after Spain, preferences too. He can stomach pretty much anything at all, but he's not actually put off by foul smells. His favorite foods changed, and for a while taste was muted for him. He's gravitated towards a lot more pungent, spicy, or richer flavors to compensate for everything tasting too "plain" to him.
Adding on to that he's extremely sensitive to air changes, and ground based vibration. He's a terror in the dark, and can see well in it. He has no qualms about absorbing shock damage with his spine because his spinal column is a solid padding of worms and he can just do that. He does it over and over in various canon installments.
I'm sure leon was an absolute ass to neil and firmly grit his teeth around the guy until he couldn't, landing him in trouble with Claire. And then neil turned out to be a dickhead.
"obviously i want a copy, one of us needs to frame this stuff," and claire has a slight hunch it's gonna be her ... and the overstuffed apartment she's ended up with throughout the years. comfortable and cozy, its walls barely have any space anymore from all the pictures she's decided needed framing. maybe she's the one who likes to walk down memory lane after all. "would you believe me if i told you i still have the disposable camera film somewhere?" wouldn't know where anymore, but would be nice to accidentally find it again after all this time. "you can come clean my stuff too if you're up to," she's just joking, but god her place could use being ridden of all the useless stuff that piled up.
question prompts a snort, and truly it's all she would need to say on her part. confessions are for carefree people, claire on the other hand jas always gone though something much worse. "no thanks, i'll spare us both." deep down more herself than leon, but the point still stands. but what he says next brings pause regardless, so she puts her phone far away just about - camera facing the ceiling as she pretends to busy herself for a moment. "but yeah, it was nice. best day i had that year," her roommate wouldn't agree with her but alas. "we should go to more concerts actually, before everybody fucking dies in a global outbreak or something."
"I'll send it to you tomorrow after I make a copy."
He had a pretty good recollection of that concert in particular. They both were sad, and nervous in a crowded room, and thinking the other shoe was going to drop then and there. And then the feeling passed and it was gone because they were talking song lyrics and singing along to the music. When he said it was a good night, he really should've said it was also the best night of that year for him, too.
"– Sure. Room service to the rescue. Would give me something to do, anyways, while Hunnigan does what she does best. Are you going to be able to throw anything out at all, though?"
Probably not. Not that he'd make her choose between memories or the modern convenience of a clean house.
"I went to a Sabaton concert last year, and the opening bands were great. If they tour again in the states we can go. I know there's a couple music fests going on too, but, that's not really my scene anymore. Used to be a long time ago."
He huffed, and collected his phone to move through his own space. He didn't hang pictures up, didn't display certificates. His place was quiet, and functional. The touches of decorations were vinyls on the walls, and some extra lights among the furniture.
"Don't speak it into existence. Hey, with Elpis that shouldn't be a problem anymore, though. Might've finally held up my promise to scrub this virus from the face of the Earth. At least, for now."
