#final chapter!!

8 Years Later...

A slender young woman glances out the window from her well-decorated bedroom, her pixie-length, sunny-colored hair glistens in the light from the setting sun. She sighs wistfully, stroking the soft fur of the dog that laid down sleepily next to her.

The young woman in question is Sherry Birkin, once the little girl who was one of the few survivors of the disaster in Raccoon City, along with her adoptive parents and a few others.

She could hear the occasional roar of laughter and conversation from Claire and Leon, along with Jill and Chris, who were visiting from a few states over to celebrate her high school graduation. 

That's when it dawned on her. Sherry only had just a few months left with her family before she'd be on her way to attend university on the West Coast.

It wasn't like she was dreading going to college, if that were the case, she probably wouldn't be going at all. However, eight years had gone by faster than anticipated, so much so that it was almost time for her to say goodbye for a while.

Sherry sighed once again and leaned her head against the window, watching the summer sun go down. She couldn't just believe the amount of time that had passed, but the events that occurred during that time.

The beginning of it all, for starters, was a bit of a blur nowadays. She obviously remembered everything, especially the horrible, horrible things that a 10-year-old could obviously never forget, but Sherry tended to wonder what her life would be like without Claire and Leon, or if they hadn't stayed together. 

The events that followed after went quite smoothly. Claire and Leon eventually managed to get jobs, even though Claire made the decision to drop out of college (which Chris wasn't totally on board with at first), and about a year and a half later, they finally saved enough money to rent an apartment for the three of them. One that was far, far away from where they had come from. As for Sherry, she was enrolled in a cheap private school so she could finish her basic education, and the rest was history

However, those first three months after the disaster were the most memorable to her. The amount of time in which the trio had grown as a family the most. She'll never forget how happy she was during those months. The most happy she'd been in probably her whole life. Despite the fact that she remembered missing her parents frequently, and still does even to this day, Claire and Leon had given her more in that time than her real parents had in the first ten years of her life.

Just thinking about these memories brought tears to Sherry's eyes. She was about to let herself cry before she heard a sudden knock at her door.

"Come in!", she called out, wiping tears away.

A familiar figure slipped through the doorframe. Leon.

"Hey, kiddo, everything alright? You left in a hurry down there...", he spoke with a tinge of concern in his voice, which had deepened slightly in eight years time.

"Oh, uh, yeah!", she replied.

"Just needed a little space, that's all"

He nodded, "Ah, I see. A bit loud down there, wasn't it?"

"Sure", she lied.

Leon wasn't buying it, however, "No, really. What's on your mind?"

Sherry sighed, "Sometimes I forget how stubborn and persistent you can be sometimes"

"You know me", He laughs out loud.

"Well...", she began.

"I'm just...reflecting, I guess"

"On what?", Leon's head tilts similarly to a curious puppy.

"This is gonna sound weird, but...Just my life so far. Especially these past few years."

Leon glanced down at the floor, "It's really been that long, huh?"

"Yeah, time really does fly"

"You can say that again! You're almost as tall as Claire. When we first met you, you were half her size", He noted, nudging her side.

Sherry laughs, then silence fills the room before she speaks again.

"Y'know, I had a weird dream the other night"

"Oh yeah? What about?"

"That we got separated after Raccoon City. I got taken from you, and then you became some burnt-out government agent"

"Sounds miserable", Leon scoffed amusedly.

"Yeah, you rescued the president's daughter from a village in Europe and everything"

"Huh. That's oddly specific", he added.

"Yeah, it was really realistic. Like it could have happened"

Leon was silent for a moment, probably a little freaked out by the realness of the dream.

"Well, I assure you, you have nothing to worry about, Sherry", he ruffled his hand through her short, blonde hair.

He then looks at her and smiles, "I'm really proud of you, y'know?"

"Because I graduated today?"

"Not just that. You've managed to persevere against all odds these past few years. Out of all of us, I believe you were the strongest"

Sherry shook her head in disbelief, "Oh, Leon, that's not tru-"

"It is true! Look at you now! You've got nothing to lose!"

"I DON'T EVEN HAVE A GREEN!!"

A loud yell sounded from downstairs. The two chuckled in unison.

"Why don't we head back down? Sounds like Chris is losing at cards again", Leon suggested, reaching his hand out towards her.

"Sure, Why don't we"

With that, she nodded and took his hand, heading downstairs to join the others in the fun.

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*BONUS*

"Leon, can I ask you something?", Claire inquires as the two walked down the street shortly after Chris and Jill left for the night to go back to their hotel.

"Hm?"

"Would you ever want to settle down?", Claire blushes.

He laughs, "What do you mean, like have babies??"

Claire rolls her eyes playfully, "I mean, yes...but also y'know...getting married and stuff.

Leon shakes his head, "Why are you bringing this up, Claire?"

"Well...since Sherry is gonna be on her own soon, maybe nows that time, if you know what I mean...?"

Leon pauses in his steps and looks over at Claire.

"I think I'd like that"

He can see Claire's gentle smile through the almost comforting darkness of the early summer night.

"Me too"

Marius puts down his tea. He’s in no mood to drink anything right now. “Did you ever stop caring for him?”

“No,” says Joséphine with a private smile. “He’s just that sort of man.”

Marius nods before looking up. “I’m sorry I didn’t visit. The way he and I left things … I didn’t know if I would be welcome. And after the divorce, I was even less certain.”

“It’s quite understandable.” She picks up the fan from her lap and opens it with a flick of her wrist. “You are forgiven now so long as you visit. It’s rather lonely: not many want to visit a woman in such a state as I.”

“I’d be happy to,” Marius assures her before looking out the window. “Do you think he’ll win?”

“If it were anyone else? No. Our dear Popo?” Her eyes grow distant. “It’s impossible to say.”

They sit in silence another minute, listening to the rain patter against the window.

“I don’t think it will matter.”

One of Joséphine’s dark eyebrows arches. “And why is that?”

“He lost sight of why he is doing all of this. He’s simply reached too far, antagonized too many, and has no sense of purpose to it all anymore.” Marius pauses, eyebrows furrowed before he shakes his head. “There was a time he cared for the state of France; now, all he cares for is his reputation.”

Joséphine’s eyes narrow over her fan, and she hums. “I see why he likes you.”

It’s Marius’s turn to be surprised. “What do you mean?”

She stretches leisurely over her chaise longue. “Oh, all of those years ago. Year four, 1795, whatever we’re calling it anymore. I see why he was drawn to you, and I see why he still cares so deeply for you.”

Marius’s eyebrows draw together. “I … spoke with him before he became well-known?”

“Oh please,” she says, “Napoléon was unimpressed with almost everyone he met those days — and they with him. Tell me, do you know my name?”

“Um.” He thinks. “de Beauharnais, no?”

“Rose,” she tells him. “Everyone called me Rose — everyone except Napoléon.”

Marius feels his face flush three different colors. “Oh, I — beg your pardon, I didn’t mean —”

She laughs. “It’s fine, it’s no bother at all: that’s just the kind of man Napoléon is. And, to be perfectly frank, I didn’t care for him for years after we married.”

The concept is utterly unthinkable to Marius.

“You wonder why I married him if I did not like him — I can see it in your face.”

He wonders how she could not have been enamored with Napoléon on-sight; after all, Marius had only met him a handful of days before she. “I suppose marriage is often a practice of convenience rather than love,” he says slowly.

“Precisely.” She rearranges her legs on the longue, skirts bustling as she does. “I found him repulsive, really. Appearance aside, he was arrogant and standoffish, and he gave the distinct impression at all times of having something to prove.” Perhaps in response to Marius’s expression (‘appearance aside’?), she leans forward on one arm. “It’s very unattractive.”

Marius shakes his head. “Then why would —”

“You stand for something, my dear boy. Has he ever told you about his father? Corsican lawyer who whored himself out to the French and admired her aristocracy?”

“Yes, some.”

“A spineless man,” says Joséphine dismissively. “And in a world with privileged nobility on one side and sycophantic grovelers on the other, I’m sure a young man with opinions and backbone — one who admired him, no less — was a breath of fresh air.” She looks derisively out the window. “This Bourbon Restoration business certainly has separated those who stand from those who slither.”

“What changed?”

“Hm?” Another one of Joséphine’s calculating eyebrows arches. It might have scared Marius once, but after twenty years, there’s something almost comforting about her judgment.

“To make you love him.”

“Ah.” She untwists herself, laying back on the longue and resuming her fanning as though she’d never stopped. “Well, I suppose he stopped having anything to prove, now, didn’t he? He took the opportunities he was given and made something of himself. He remained just as proud, but now people had a reason to want to talk with him. It’s no longer amusing to read aloud adoring love notes from the battlefield when they are written by someone of repute and renown.”

Marius wants to feel angry on Napoléon’s behalf, and maybe he should, but he can’t find it in himself to be. “I see.”

“No you don’t,” Joséphine tells him. She sounds almost bored. “That’s all right. What matters, is that you and I may be the only ones who truly know him — the only people in this whole world. Have you ever thought about that?”

He hasn’t.

“Not even his mother, not even himself: us alone. We alone see through the propaganda and the bold speeches; we alone know who he was before the prestige and the airs; we alone are the ones to whom he has bared his soul.”

“We … alone.” Marius at Joséphine’s ethereal form. “What happens when we’re both gone?”

“The same thing that happens to all great men, my dear,” she says, swiveling her head toward him. “History is written by the victors. Oh, they will try to erase him, they will try to paint him as an evil tyrant — and who knows? By the end, perhaps that was true.

“Nevertheless, what he created in his life will stand: his bridges and channels and museums and codes will stand. The art he commissioned, the missives he created, the research and records he funded. The precedent he set for the people living under his rule will live on, and the citizens of France will never again be satisfied living under a monarch.”

“Never again,” Marius repeats softly, closing his eyes. “I miss the man he was before.”

He hears her fan click shut, and the cold pressure of her hand rests over his as she says, “I know you do.”

“Will I see him again, do you think?” He looks back up at her, but Joséphine is looking out the window once more, expression at last openly somber.