Together: A Dark Romance Duet || Leon Kennedy x Female Reader

Chapter 13: FMC

I'm running—but I don't know where I'm going.

My shoes slap against the stones, aggravating my blisters and igniting the pain shooting up my legs from overexertion. But the pain—the exhaustion—is distant as if existing in someone else's body. I've pushed my body to its limit in the past twenty-four hours but I'm still going, willing my legs to run faster. Away, away, away—I need to get away; from him, from his place, from what I did.

Leon's face flashes in my mind—the pain in his eyes he hides so well, the shock parting his lips as he grips the knife I try to stab him with—playing on a permanent loop until the tears burn hotter. I run until my body screams to stop, lost in a labyrinth of my thoughts, fears, and confusion. Tears blur my vision, and the moonlit night, leafy hedges, cobblestones, and torches appear as a murky watercolor painting. I don't care where I'm going, as long as I can't hurt him again.

My steps slow as I attempt to catch my breath; the weight of my bones feels like I'm underwater as I clutch my chest. I can't seem to steady my breathing as panic takes over, the fear that my body won't be my own again. That feeling—one minute I was coughing from the tickle in my throat—the next I was so dizzy, my vision going in and out before I collapsed. When I opened my eyes again, the voice speaking was mine but... I had no control over the words. My thoughts weren't my own; they told me to hurt Leon. My body locked up, my nerves buzzing and tingling as if an outside presence forced every cell to obey its will. Visions of stabbing Leon flickered in my mind then: proofs of slicing his throat to ribbons, the thoughts fervent. I wanted it to happen.

The memory sits like poison in my stomach, and I stop, palms gripping my knees before heaving, watching tendrils of saliva drip from my mouth, my empty stomach bringing up nothing but bile.

And then, when hurting him wasn't enough, I thought of the next best thing: hurting myself. I would slice my own throat, and see how he likes it. But that wasn't me; those thoughts weren't my own, and a part of me that was still conscious while I was controlled begged me to stop, to push the repulsive thoughts away. And then, as quick as it happened, it was over; my nerves settled, my muscles loosened, thoughts mine again. But it was too late. Leon already looked at me like I was a monster. The pain was already inflicted. The look I likely gave him earlier mirrored on his own face.

I saw him as a monster, too, after he killed so brutally with his hands, so unfeeling in his ferocity. Guilt adds to the cauldron of emotions stewing within me.

The sight of him breaking that cult member's nose and shooting him in the face terrified me, but more than anything, it made me so incredibly sad. Leon is a killer—a weapon built for the government by my father. My father forced Leon to become an agent, and he made him into a killer. A person so callous, so numb to brutality—and yet I'd scared him. He looked at me like I was something he never wanted to see again.

I righten, leaning against the castiron bars that stand between the hedges, serving as a window into another section of this maze. I don't know where I am—maybe in the courtyard? I look up to the sky, the twinkling of stars catching my eye. Out here, there's no light pollution, so the sky gleams and glistens, bejeweled with stars and distant planets. In another life, I wouldn't be here, wouldn't know this place even existed. In another life, I might be home, cramming in a study session, or rolling over on top of a stranger I'd just met, drunk or high, but blissfully ignorant to all the bad in the world, my past traumas a distant delusion. But in this life, I'm here, lost in my escape, nearly killing the man who's saved me. And living the horrors I endured as a child all over again.

Fuck. I contemplate, observing the neatly-trimmed hedges. I'm stuck in a literal maze.

I push off the iron bars and start walking, aimlessly, of course. With Leon, it feels like he always knows where to go, like every instinct he follows is always right. He could lead me blind in the darkness, and I would willingly follow. Now, I only have my own wits—and they're undoubtedly not as good as Leon's.