Trapped within the disintegrating steel of a high-tech skyscraper, elite operatives Leon S. Kennedy and Y/N face a descent into a mechanical purgatory where every floor is a death trap. As the buildingâs thermal core ticks toward a catastrophic purge, the professional barriers between them shatter, forcing a raw, visceral confession in the face of certain death.
â°â⤠Insert favourite Leon
â°â⤠special agent characters
â°â⤠one shot, long story
The wind at five thousand feet didnât just howl; it screamed, a jagged, freezing wall of air that tore at the edges of the stealth transportâs open bay door. Below, the Saito Glass Tower pierced the low-hanging Tokyo clouds like a blackened needle. The city around it was a chaotic smear of neon pink and electric blue, but the tower itself was a dead zoneâa 120-story vertical graveyard of shattered glass and flickering emergency lights.
Y/N stood at the very precipice of the jump, her boots locked to the vibrating metal floor. She was draped in high-threat tactical gear, her tenacious frame coiled like a spring. She checked the weight of her primary: a heavy-duty tactical shotgun with a drum magazine and a custom-weighted breaching hammer strapped to her back. It was simple, brutal, and perfect for turning reinforced doorsâand monstersâinto scrap metal.
"Visual on the LZ," Y/N rasped into the comms. The rain lashed against her visor, blurring the world into a kaleidoscope of grey and silver.
"Copy that. Wind shear is hitting forty knots. Itâs going to be a rough drop."
The voice in her ear was a low, grounding vibrato that made the small hairs on her neck stand up. Leon stepped up beside her, his shoulder brushing hersâa deliberate, solid heat in the freezing altitude. He didn't look at the city; he looked at her. His blonde hair was dampened by the mist, falling over his eyes in that signature, careless sweep that sheâd spent far too many late nights memorizing.
He was checking the action on his own setup: a high-caliber suppressed handgun for precision, and a compact, rapid-fire submachine gun slung over his chest for when things got loud. He looked every bit the formidable operative the files raved about, but to Y/N, he was the man who had stayed up until 3:00 AM helping her recalibrate her gear because he "couldn't sleep."
"The thermal purge triggers in sixty minutes," Leon said, stepping into her personal space until the chest plates of their vests clinked together. The proximity was a physical weight, thick with a month's worth of unsaid words. "Once we hit that roof, the building's internal AI enters hard lockdown. No extraction. No radio. Just a straight shot down to the basement before the whole block turns into a crater."
"Scared, Kennedy?" Y/N smirked, her gaze dropping to the way his gloved fingers tightened around the grip of his weapon.
Leon reached out, his hand snagging the back of her neck. It wasn't a tactical grab; it was possessive, pulling her forehead toward his in a silent, high-stakes "check-in." The heat of his breath hit her face through the mesh of her mask, smelling of bitter coffee and the sharp, metallic tang of adrenaline.
"Not as long as you're the one clearing the way," he whispered, his thumb grazing the sensitive skin just above her collar. His blue eyes were dark, burning with a fervent, quiet intensity. "Don't get cocky down there. I need you in one piece."
"You just don't want to do the paperwork if I'm gone," she countered, her hand finding the center of his chest, feeling the heavy, steady pound of his heart through the Kevlar.
"I don't want to do anything if you're gone," Leon growled, his voice dropping into that sultry, heated territory that made her pulse spike. "Now, letâs go make a mess."
They didn't wait for a green light. They stepped into the void together.
The fall was a blur of gravity and static. They plummeted through the cloud layer, the glass skin of the skyscraper rushing up like a tidal wave. They hit the reinforced skylight of the 120th-floor penthouse in a synchronized explosion of crystalline shards. Y/N hit the floor in a low, heavy roll, her shotgun barking in rhythmic, thunderous booms. Every shot sent a wave of "Fast-Strain" Infected flying backward, the raw power of the slugs clearing a path through the twitching, predatory shadows.
Leon was a shadow at her six, his submachine gun spitting lead in meticulous, lethal bursts. He moved with a surgical grace, picking off targets over her shoulder before they could even reach for her. He didn't have to look to know where she was moving; they were two halves of a single, violent machine.
"Clear!" Y/N shouted, spinning in a circle, her shotgun smoking in the damp air.
Leon didn't answer with words. He lunged forward, grabbing the front of her vest and hauling her behind the cover of a massive, black-granite kitchen island just as a heavy machine-gun nest on the mezzanine opened fire. The shards of the countertop exploded above their heads like hail.
They were chest-to-chest in the cramped space, the air between them smelling of gunpowder, leather, and raw survival. Leonâs arm was hooked over her shoulder, his body shielding hers by instinct.
"Nice entrance," Leon panted, his chest heaving against her own. His gaze dropped to her lips for a fraction of a second, his pupils blown wide with the rush of the fight. "But that shotgun is going to leave us both deaf if you keep firing it in here."
"You love it," she whispered, her hand moving to his belt, snagging a fresh magazine and sliding it into his weapon for him without breaking eye contact.
"I do," Leon admitted, a menacing, dangerous smirk finally breaking through his professional mask. He leaned in, his lips brushing the shell of her ear as the gunfire overhead roared. "But save some of that energy for the basement. We've got a lot of floors left to burn."
The roar of the machine gun from the mezzanine was relentless, chewing through the granite island and spitting stone shards like shrapnel. Leonâs grip on her shoulder tightened, his body a solid, protective weight pressing her down into the debris. For a heartbeat, the world was just the thunder of gunfire and the heat of himâthe way his leather holster creaked against her vest and the sharp, focused look in his eyes as he calculated their next move.
"On three," Leon leaned in, his voice barely a whisper against the chaos, vibrating through her. "Iâll draw their fire. You take the hammer to that support pillar on the left. Bring the balcony down."
"Leon, thatâs a suicide run," she countered, her hand tightening on the handle of the breaching hammer strapped to her back.
"Not if you're fast," he smirked, a steely glint in his gaze. "And we both know youâre the fastest thing in this building."
He didn't wait. He rolled out from behind the island, his submachine gun barking in precise, distracting bursts. The gunners on the mezzanine pivoted, their fire tracking him as he dove behind a fallen marble statue.
Y/N didn't hesitate. She surged forward, her boots skidding on the blood-slicked floor. She felt the wind of a bullet graze her shoulder, but she didn't flinch. She reached the pillar in three explosive strides, unsheathing the heavy, blackened head of the hammer. With a primal shout, she swung, the sheer force of her momentum behind the strike.
The reinforced concrete groaned, spider-webbing under the impact. She swung again, the vibration rattling her teeth, and the entire mezzanine began to tilt. The gunners screamed as the floor fell out from under them, a ton of stone and steel collapsing into a heap of dust and twisted metal.
Silence fell, heavy and suffocating, broken only by the hiss of a ruptured pipe.
"You okay?" Leonâs voice cut through the dust. He was already moving toward her, his movements fluid and urgent. He grabbed her arm, turning her slightly to check for wounds, his touch lingering on her shoulder where the fabric was torn.
"Just a scratch, Kennedy," she panted, her chest heaving as she wiped a smear of dust from her cheek. She looked up at him, her eyes burning with the high of the adrenaline. "Youâre late on the backup."
Leonâs jaw tightened, his gaze dropping to her mouth before snapping back to her eyes. The air between them was suddenly combustible, thick with the realization that they were still aliveâand that they were entirely alone in a building designed to kill them.
"Iâm right where I need to be," he murmured, his hand sliding from her arm to the back of her neck, pulling her just an inch closer.
The buildingâs AI chimed, a cold, mechanical voice echoing through the ruins. âFloor 120 compromised. Initiating lockdown of secondary sectors. Thermal purge in 48 minutes.â
"We need to move," Leon said, though he didn't pull away immediately. He let his thumb graze the line of her jawâa clandestine promise of what would happen once the guns were quiet. "The elevators are dead. Weâre taking the service stairs."
They moved as one, a synchronized dance of lethal intent. They reached the heavy steel door of the stairwell, Y/N using the hammer to blast the hinges off with a single, deafening strike.
As they stepped into the darkness of the stairwell, the door hissing shut behind them, the real hunt began. 119 floors to go, and the shadows were already starting to move.
The service stairwell was a vertical tomb of concrete and flickering fluorescent hum. The air was colder here, damp with the smell of stagnant water and the metallic tang of old oil. As they descended, the rhythmic thud-clack of their boots on the metal grating was the only sound, a steady, hypnotic heartbeat in the silence.
They reached the landing for Floor 112, but the heavy steel door was buckled outward, as if something incredibly powerful had tried to punch its way through from the other side.
"Wait," Leon whispered, his hand instantly finding the small of Y/Nâs back, pulling her into the shadow of the concrete pillar.
He didn't have to say it. Y/N felt the shift in the airâa low, rhythmic undulation of sound. It wasn't breathing; it was the wet, sliding noise of something moving through the flooded maintenance pipes behind the walls.
"The drainage system for the rooftop pool must have burst," Y/N murmured, her fingers tightening around the grip of her shotgun. "The whole sector is submerged."
"And theyâre in the water," Leon added, his voice a low-frequency vibration that she felt more than heard. He stepped closer, his chest pressing against her shoulder as he peered through the crack in the door. "Fast-Strain hunters. They don't just run anymore; they swim."
He turned back to her, the dim, flickering light catching the resolute line of his jaw. The space on the landing was cramped, forcing them into a proximity that felt more dangerous than the monsters behind the door. Leonâs gaze dropped to her throat, watching the steady, rapid beat of her pulse before meeting her eyes with a look of smoldering intensity.
"I go in first to bait them into the open," he said, his voice dropping an octave. "You hit the emergency release on the ceiling. If we can drop the electrified grate, we fry the whole floor."
"Leon, if that grate drops while you're in the waterâ"
"I won't be," he interrupted, his hand sliding up from her back to cup the side of her neck. His thumb traced the line of her ear, a clandestine touch that sent a jolt of heat through her tactical layers. "Iâm trusting you to catch me before I hit the surface. You haven't missed a save yet."
The trust was a physical weight, palpable and heavy. Y/N reached up, her gloved hand covering his, pressing his palm firmly against her skin.
"On my signal," she rasped.
Leon kicked the door open.
The maintenance level was a nightmare of waist-deep, murky water and hissing steam pipes. The moment his boots hit the surface, the water erupted. Four sleek, sinuous shadows tore through the dark, their movements a blur of predatory speed. Leon retreated toward the ledge, his submachine gun spitting fire, the muzzle flashes illuminating the jagged teeth and pale, translucent skin of the hunters.
"Now!" Leon shouted, his voice echoing off the damp concrete as he lunged for the overhead pipe.
Y/N swung the breaching hammer with every ounce of her formidable strength, smashing the emergency release lever. The heavy, copper-lined grate groaned and began its descent, sparks showering the room like a waterfall of gold.
Leon leaped, his fingers catching the edge of the pipe just as the water below him surged. A hunter lunged, its jaws snapping inches from his boots, but Y/N was already there. She dropped the hammer, reaching out with both hands to grab the front of Leonâs vest, her muscles straining as she hauled his solid weight upward, pulling him onto the dry concrete ledge just as the grate hit the water.
A deafening crack-snap of electricity filled the room. The water turned into a blinding blue arc of power, the hunters thrashing and shrieking before falling still, sinking into the dark depths.
The silence that followed was thick with ozone and the ragged sound of their breathing. Y/N was still holding onto Leonâs vest, her face inches from his, her chest heaving with the effort.
Leon didn't pull away. He stayed in her space, his hands coming up to rest on her waist, his fingers digging into the reinforced fabric. His hair was damp, plastered to his forehead, and his eyes were fervent, searching hers with a raw, desperate hunger that had finally outrun the mission.
"Told you," he panted, his forehead resting against hers. "Perfect timing."
"Don't make me do that again, Kennedy," she whispered, her hands sliding up to his shoulders, feeling the hard-earned muscle beneath the gear.
"No promises," Leon murmured. He tilted his head, his lips a mere breath away from hers, the tension between them finally hitting the ignition point.
The building groaned againâa deep, structural shudder from below. The thermal purge was getting closer, but for a single, electrifying second on that damp concrete ledge, the world outside the Saito Tower didn't exist. There was only the heat of the water, the smell of burnt ozone, and the man who was finally, truly looking at her.
"We have forty minutes," Leon whispered against her lips. "Let's make them count.â
Youâre right. A kiss right now is an exit valve for all that pressureâwe need to keep the lid on until the steam is screaming to get out. Letâs dial it back to that agonizing, electric near-miss where the air between them is thick enough to choke on, but neither of them breaks the professional line. Not yet.
Chapter 1: The Ignition Point (Continued)
The landing on Floor 112 felt like a pressurized chamber, the air so thick with ozone and unspent adrenaline that it was hard to draw a full breath. Leonâs hands remained anchored to her waist for a heartbeat too long, his fingers digging into the tactical fabric as if anchoring himself to the only solid thing in a world currently falling apart.
"Forty minutes," Y/N repeated, her voice a low, resonant vibration. She didn't pull back. Instead, she leaned into him, the cold metal of her shotgunâs barrel pressing against his thigh, the heat of their bodies clashing through the layers of Kevlar and sweat.
Leonâs gaze darkened, his pupils blown wide, reflecting the flickering blue sparks still dancing on the waterâs surface below. He wasn't looking at the exit. He was tracing the line of her mouth, his jaw set in a relentless line of restraint. He looked like a man starving, standing in front of a feast he wasn't allowed to touch.
"The stairs are compromised," he murmured, his breath ghosting over her lips, so close she could feel the catch in his throat. "The explosion in the mezzanine warped the frame. We have to go through the ventilation shafts to hit the express elevator in the core."
He didn't move to lead the way. He stayed exactly where he was, his chest heaving against hers in a syncopated rhythm. Slowly, almost tentatively, his right hand slid from her waist, trailing up the curve of her ribs until his palm cupped her cheek. His thumb, rough from the grip of a thousand handguns, brushed over her cheekbone with a devastating tenderness that felt more dangerous than a blade.
"You almost lost me back there," he whispered, his voice dropping into a raw, visceral register.
"I told you," Y/N rasped, her hand coming up to lock around his wrist, her grip unyielding. "I don't miss a save, Leon. Not with you."
The air between them was suddenly combustible. Leon tilted his head, his gaze dropping to her lips, and for a second, the "Agent" mask shattered completely. He leaned in, his nose brushing against hers, his eyes fluttering shut as he inhaled the scent of herâgunpowder, rain, and something uniquely her.
Y/Nâs breath hitched. She could feel the magnetic pull of him, the sheer, fervent weight of his desire. Her fingers tightened on his wrist, pulling him a fraction closer, her lips parted, waiting for the impact.
But then, the building groanedâa deep, metallic shriek of stressed steel from the floors below. The floor beneath them shuddered, and Leon snapped his eyes open, the professional ice slamming back into place with a jarring finality.
He didn't kiss her. Instead, he pressed his forehead against hers for a single, agonizing second, his pulse thudding against her palm where she held his wrist.
"If we don't move now," he panted, his voice tight with the effort of pulling away, "we aren't making it to the basement."
"Then let's finish this," Y/N whispered, her eyes burning with a formidable light, though her heart was still racing from the near-miss. She reached down, snagged her shotgun, and racked the slide with a heavy, mechanical clack. "I have plans for you once weâre off this rock, Kennedy. Donât make me wait."
Leon let out a dark, menacing chuckle, his hand sliding from her cheek to the back of her head, giving her a brief, firm squeeze before he turned toward the vent.
"I've never been good at waiting," he murmured, his voice laced with a sultry promise that promised a reckoning later.
He reached for the vent cover above them, his muscles rippling as he tore the metal grate from the wall like it was made of paper. He boosted her up, his hand lingering on her hipâa clandestine touch that felt like a brandâbefore she disappeared into the dark shaft.
As Y/N hauled herself into the narrow, metal tunnel, she could hear him right behind her. The unrivaled tension followed them into the dark, a silent, screaming thing that was only getting louder with every floor they descended.
The service tunnel spat them out onto a narrow maintenance catwalk suspended above the Central Server Hub. It was a dizzying, hollow cathedral of glass and electricity. Towering data banks stretched toward the ceiling like frozen monoliths, pulsing with a rhythmic, ghostly blue light that flickered across the rain-slicked walls.
Below, the "Fast-Strain" hunters weren't just prowling; they were a frantic, obsessive swarm, their pale limbs clicking against the glass as they scaled the servers with insect-like agility.
"Hold," Leon whispered, his fingers snagging the tactical loop at the back of her vest.
He didn't pull her back; he anchored her. Y/N felt the heat of his palm through the reinforced fabric, a subterranean current of tension that had nothing to do with the monsters below. She froze, her boots silent on the metal grating, watching a hunter lunge across the gap just ten feet below them.
"The floor is rigged," Leon grunted, his voice a low, velvety rasp that vibrated in the small space between them. He leaned over her shoulder, his chest pressing against her backâa heavy, commanding weight. He pointed to the rows of blue neon floor tiles. "Pressure-sensitive. Step on a seam, and the automated turrets will turn this room into a blender."
He turned her toward him in the cramped shadows of the catwalk. His face was inches from hers, his blue eyes dark and unfathomable in the flickering light.
"Weâre going to have to leapfrog," he said, his gaze dropping to her lips before snapping back to her eyes with a resolute intensity. "Iâll take the high-tension cables. You take the suspended server racks. We meet at the terminal balcony."
He grabbed a heavy rappelling line from his pack, his movements surgical and swift. As he looped the cord around a support beam, his knuckles grazed the curve of her waistâa hushed, fleeting contact that made her skin prickle beneath her gear. He leaned in, his breath hot against her ear, smelling of bitter coffee and cold rain.
"On my signal, you vault. Iâll provide overwatch. Iâve got your back, always."
"If you let me fall, Kennedy, Iâm haunting you for life," she whispered, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird.
"Iâm never letting you go," he promised, the words carrying a gravelly, bone-deep sincerity that felt like a vow.
Leon surged out into the open chasm first, catching a swinging power conduit with athletic precision. He braced his boots against a steel pillar, his muscles bunching beneath his tactical vest as he took the strain of the line.
Y/N didn't hesitate. She launched herself from the catwalk, a stunning blur of motion. She soared through the blue neon haze, her shotgun barking in mid-air. Each blast was a thunderous roar, kicking her back as she obliterated hunters mid-leap. Above her, Leon was her steadying forceâhis eyes tracking her every move, his own sidearm spitting lead with unfailing accuracy to clear her landing zone.
The connection between them was a physical wire nowâa bond of absolute trust forged in the dark.
She slammed onto the far terminal balcony, skidding across the metal. Leon released his cable and leaped after her, catching the edge of a rotating cooling fan and swinging himself over the railing with a rugged, fluid grace.
He landed beside her, the impact rattling the floor. He didn't look at the computer screen. He grabbed the front of her tactical vest, hauling her toward him until their visors clinked. His breathing was ragged, fervent, his pulse visible in the frantic beat of his jugular.
"You're a goddamn nightmare," he panted, a wicked, lopsided smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.
"And you're the one who keeps following me into them," she countered, her hands locking onto his forearms, feeling the feverish heat of his skin through his gloves.
They stood there on the precipice, eighty feet above a sea of monsters, draped in the blue glow of a dying building. Leon leaned in, his nose brushing hers, the yearning between them so oppressive it felt like a physical weight. He didn't break the lineânot yetâbut his thumb traced the line of her jaw with a smoldering focus that promised a total surrender once the mission was over.
The terminal chirpedâa cold, persistent intrusion. âThermal Core accessible. Final override required. 15 minutes to Purge.â
Leon closed his eyes, a gut-wrenching groan escaping his throat as he pressed his forehead against hers. The professional barrier was screaming, ready to shatter into a thousand pieces.
"Fifteen minutes," he whispered against her skin, his voice thick with agonizing restraint. "Let's break this core, and then Iâm holding you to every promise we haven't made yet."
"Iâm counting on it, Leon," she rasped.
They turned to the console together, their movements harmonious and lethalâtwo shadows against the neon light of the end.
The mechanical hum of the override sequence was the only thing standing between them and the inferno. As the progress bar on the screen crawled forward, the blue light of the hub began to shift, bleeding into a menacing crimson as the buildingâs emergency systems registered the impending meltdown.
Leon didnât step away from the console. Instead, he reached out, his hand sliding over the cold metal surface to find hers. He didnât interlace their fingers; he simply pressed his palm flat against the back of her gloves, a weighty and wordless anchor. It wasn't a gesture of comfort, but one of absolute recognitionâa silent pact that whatever came next, they were moving as a single, unbreakable unit.
"The bulkhead below the core is going to cycle in sixty seconds," Leon rasped, his voice dropping into a hollowed-out register that skipped right past the mission and hit something much deeper. "Once weâre in that chamber, thereâs no way back up. We either fix the cooling rods or we go down with the tower."
He turned to her then. He didn't lean in for a tired clichĂŠ or look at her with the rehearsed intensity of a soldier. He simply looked at her with a shattering honesty, his thumb tracing the jagged line of a scar on the wrist of her gloves. It was a map of their shared history, a visceral testimony to every time they had bled in the same dirt.
"Iâm tired of being the only two left standing," he admitted, the words escaping him like a long-held breath. "Next time, I want to be the reason we're sitting down. Somewhere quiet. Somewhere the air doesn't taste like copper."
The admission was monumental. It wasn't a promise of a drink or a fleeting night; it was a surrender to the idea of a future they had both been too afraid to name. Y/N didn't look away. She reached up, her palm flat against his chest, feeling the metronomic thud of his heartâa rhythm that matched her own with uncanny precision.
"The world isn't going to give us quiet, Leon," she whispered, her voice unyielding. "Weâre going to have to take it. Starting with this basement."
Leonâs jaw tightened, a ferocious light igniting in his eyes. He didn't need to touch her to show his devotion; the way he looked at herâas if she were the only fixed point in a collapsing universeâwas suffocating in its weight.
âOverride complete. Sub-level access granted.â
The floor beneath them groaned, and the heavy blast door at the end of the balcony began to hiss open, venting a cloud of scorching steam. The heat from the core was already rising, a stifling wall of air that tasted of ozone and impending fire.
Leon let go of her hand, but the phantom pressure of his grip remainedâa permanent brand. He grabbed his submachine gun, checking the chamber with a mechanical finality, his movements now fueled by a savage new purpose.
"Stay on my six," he commanded, though it sounded more like a plea. "We hit the cooling rods, we trigger the manual purge, and we get out. Together."
Y/N gripped the handle of her shotgun, her fingers sliding firmly against the inner lining of her gloves, the fabric still holding the heat of his touch.
They stepped into the steam together, two indomitable shadows disappearing into the red glow of the end. They weren't fighting for the mission anymore; they were fighting for the silence they were finally going to steal from the world.
The descent from the hub to the sub-levels was a plunge into an industrial furnace. The air shimmered with a stifling haze, the crimson emergency lights overhead reflecting off the slick, oil-coated walls of the stairwell.
"Floor 5," Leon grunted, his voice straining against the mechanical roar of the cooling turbines below. He checked the holographic display on his wrist, the blue light flickering against his sweat-dampened skin. "The core is on Sub-Level 3. Thatâs eight more floors of vertical hell before we hit the trigger."
The building let out a concussive groan, the sound of structural steel twisting under the heat. The "Fast-Strain" hunters weren't just following them anymore; they were a relentless tide, their screeching echoing up from the darkness below.
"Eight floors," Y/N repeated, her grip tightening on the heated metal railing. She could feel the vibration of the turbines through the soles of her boots, a thrumming reminder of the countdown. "And then the extraction lift at the very bottom?"
"Exactly," Leon said, stepping onto the landing of Floor 4. He stopped, not to catch his breath, but to turn and find her in the flickering shadows.
He didn't reach for her hand this time. Instead, he reached out and adjusted the strap of the heavy breaching hammer on her back, his fingers lingering on the buckle. It was a profoundly quiet gestureâa momentary, sturdy reassurance in a world that was literally melting around them. He looked at her, his blue eyes holding a harrowing clarity that stripped away any remaining pretense of the mission.
"Once we hit that core, the lift is the only way out. If we miss that window, we're the first thing to burn," he whispered, his voice a velvety shadow of its usual authority.
"Then don't miss," she rasped, her hand coming up to cover his where it rested on her shoulder. The contact through the fabric of her gloves was a searing reminder of the life they were fighting to keep.
Leonâs jaw tightened, a savage resolve settling over his features. He didn't pull away immediately; he leaned into her space, his presence an all-consuming weight. For a heartbeat, the roaring turbines and the screeching monsters faded into a hollowed-out silence.
"I have no intention of missing," he murmured, his gaze locking onto hers with an unyielding promise.
He turned back to the stairs, his movements now a predatory blur of efficiency. They descended past Floor 3, the heat rising to an oppressive degree that made every breath a struggle. The hunters were closer now, their pale limbs visible in the red glow of the floor below.
They hit the heavy blast door for Floor 1, the last barrier before the sub-levels. Leon didn't wait for a keycard; he nodded to Y/N.
She swung the hammer with an indomitable force, the metal shriek of the door hinges echoing through the core. They burst onto the final maintenance level, the air thick with steam and the metallic tang of impending disaster.
"Seven floors down," Leon shouted over the noise, his submachine gun already spitting lead into the shadows. "One more to the core. Let's move!"
They were a single, harmonious force now, two shadows carving a path through the end of the world. Sub-Level 3 was waiting, and with it, the silence they had promised each other.
The transition into Sub-Level 3 was a descent into a mechanical purgatory. Molten copper dripped from overhead conduits like glowing amber resin, hissing as it struck the ankle-deep flood of oily coolant covering the deck plates.
"The core is right behind that pressure seal," Leonâs voice was a jagged rasp, barely audible over the catastrophic groan of the shifting foundations.
They hit the final landing. The Thermal Core sat in the center of the cavernous chamber, a massive, spherical beast of reinforced tungsten, pulsing with a malevolent violet light.
"Iâll prime the cooling rods," Leon shouted, his silhouette a dark, resolute anchor against the blinding white steam. "Hold the emergency venting valve!"
Y/N lunged for the manual wheel, her muscles screaming as she fought the immense back-pressure. She watched Leon, a blur of calculated motion, as he wrestled with the interface at the primary console.
Above him, the ceiling gave its final, structural surrender. A jagged, four-inch-thick structural support rod, sheared clean by the thermal expansion, tore loose from its moorings. It plummeted through the steam like a rusted harpoon, aimed squarely for the center of Leonâs back.
The scream was a primordial reflex. She didn't calculate the distance; she simply launched herself across the slick grating, her body a desperate, tenacious shield. She collided with him, her momentum sending him skidding across the deck plates, clear of the shadow of the falling steel.
Then came the sickening, metallic crunch.
The rod didn't just hit the floor. It drove through her torso with the weight of the entire building behind it, the rusted point erupting from her back and anchoring itself six inches deep into the steel deck.
Leon scrambled to his feet, his breath catching in a stifled sob of pure shock. "Y/N?"
The "Agent" mask didn't just slip; it shattered. He lunged toward her, his boots sliding in the pooling, viscous crimson that was rapidly staining the floor. He fell to his knees, his hands trembling with a harrowing helplessness.
"No... no, no, no," he whispered, the words tumbling out in a frantic, staccato rhythm. "Y/N, look at me! Don't you dare close your eyes!"
She couldn't answer at first, her head falling back against the cold machinery. Leon gripped her shoulders, his forehead pressing against hers as he began to shake. "Hey, stay with me! That's an order! I can get you out. I'll cut the rod, I'llâ"
Y/Nâs hand rose, shaking, searching for the familiar weight of his tactical vest, but her strength failed. Her arm fell limp, hitting the metal grating with a hollow thud. A thick, persistent gush of blood escaped her lips, staining her chin and dripping onto his hands. She choked, the copper taste of death filling her throat, but she forced her eyes to stay open, locking onto his with a devastating clarity.
"Leon..." she rasped, the word bubbling through the blood. She didn't look afraid; she looked finished, her expression smoothed by a terrifying, absolute acceptance. "Stop. Look at the... timer."
"I don't care about the timer!" he roared, his voice breaking into a sob as he gathered her face in his hands, his thumbs desperately wiping at the crimson on her cheeks. "I'm not leaving you!"
"You have to," she whispered, a small, faint smile ghosting over her bloodied lips. She coughed, a violent shudder wracking her pinned frame. She reached for one last breath, her eyes brimming with a shattering tenderness as she looked at the man she had followed into every hell the world had to offer. "I love you... Leon."
The confession hung in the humid, metallic air, more resonant than the alarms. It was the first and last time she would say it, and the sound of it seemed to break what was left of his composure.
"No, don't you do that! Don't you say that now!"
"Go find... that quiet," she breathed, her voice a mere ethereal shadow. Her head lolled to the side, her gaze fixing on the flickering violet glow of the core as the light in her eyes began to dim into a vacant grey.
The warning siren for the purge was no longer a sound; it was a concussive physical force, vibrating through the very marrow of Leonâs bones.
âPurge Initialized. 10 seconds to total vaporization.â
When she whispered those wordsââI love you, Leonââthe world didn't stop. It shattered. The "Agent" who calculated risks and followed protocols died in that instant. What remained was a man possessed by a ferocious, singular madness.
"No," Leon rasped, his voice shifting from a plea to a savage growl. "You don't get to say that and leave. You don't get to quit on me!"
He didn't look at the timer. He didn't look at the extraction lift. Instead, he braced his heavy tactical boots against the cooling tank, his muscles bunching and screaming beneath his gear. He wrapped his arms around the rusted support rod, his knuckles white, his face contorted in a visceral mask of agony.
"Leon... stop..." Y/N choked out, a fresh spray of crimson painting her lips.
"Shut up!" he roared, his veins bulging in his neck. With a Herculean heave that defied every law of physics and fatigue, he wrenched the rod. The metal shriekedâa high-pitched, agonizing wail of protesting steelâas he forced the anchored tip out of the deck plating.
The rod gave way with a jarring snap. Y/N collapsed forward, her weight falling entirely into his arms. Leon didn't hesitate. He didn't check the wound; he couldn't. He scooped her up, cradling her against his chest as the rod remained transfixed through her, the jagged ends scraping against the narrow walls of the corridor.
The floor beneath them began to buckle, the steel plates curling like burnt paper. The Core flared into an incandescent, blinding violet.
Leon turned and sprinted. Every step was a battle against the suffocating heat and the dead weight of the woman he refused to lose. He hit the extraction lift just as the doors began their final, automated cycle. He threw his shoulder into the gap, forcing the heavy metal panels back with a primordial strength fueled by pure, unadulterated terror.
He tumbled inside, shielding her body with his own as the lift slammed shut.
A cataclysmic roar shook the shaft. The lift lurched upward, propelled by the shockwave of the thermal purge below. The lights inside the car flickered and died, leaving them in a stifled, pitch-black silence, save for the ragged, wet sound of Y/Nâs breathing.
Leon collapsed onto the floor of the lift, pulling her onto his lap. He didn't care about the mission. He didn't care about the tower. He reached up, his shaking hands cupping her face, his thumbs desperately searching for a pulse in the dark.
"Y/N? Y/N, look at me!" he gasped, his voice breaking into a shattered sob. "I've got you. I've got you, dammit. Don't you dare leave me now."
She didn't answer. Her head rolled against his shoulder, her skin deathly cold despite the furnace they had just escaped. The only response was the steady, haunting drip of blood onto the lift floor.
"Please," Leon whispered into the crown of her head, his tears disappearing into her matted hair. "Please, just stay."
The lift continued its relentless ascent toward the surface, a lone metal coffin rising out of the inferno, carrying a man who had saved the girl but was now terrified he had only kept a ghost.
The extraction lift didnât open to a sterile medical team or a fleet of ambulances. It groaned open onto the same windswept, desolate rooftop where the mission had begun hoursâor lifetimesâago. The blacked-out transport chopper was already there, its rotors cutting through the ash-choked air with a deafening, rhythmic thrum that felt like a heartbeat.
The pilot didn't jump out with a gurney. He stayed in the cockpit, his face a pale mask of shock behind the flight visor as Leon stumbled onto the helipad. Leon was a ghastly sight, his tactical gear shredded and soaked in a dark, viscous crimson that wasn't his own.
"Leon! What the hell happenedâis sheâ?"
"Fly!" Leon roared, his voice tearing through the turbine noise with a primordial desperation.
He didn't wait for help. He scrambled into the bay of the chopper, cradling Y/N against his chest. There were no paramedics hereâonly a basic field kit bolted to the bulkhead and a single tank of oxygen. Leon kicked the door shut, the metal clanging with a hollowed-out finality.
As the chopper banked sharply away from the collapsing Saito Tower, Leon was forced to be her surgeon. In the flickering, dim red light of the cabin, he knelt over her, his hands slick and trembling as he jammed a pressurized gauze pack around the base of the rod. He held the oxygen mask to her face with a ferocious, white-knuckled grip, his own breath hitching in a stifled sob every time the chopper hit turbulence.
"Don't you dare," he hissed into her ear, his forehead pressed against hers as the world blurred into a chaotic rush of wind and shadow. "Stay with me, Y/N. Breathe. Just one more. Do it for me."
The facility was a ghostâa high-security medical wing buried beneath a nondescript corporate facade in D.C. Here, the air didn't smell of decay; it was filtered, chilled, and pressurized. The equipment was bleeding-edge, a symphony of soft, expensive hums and high-resolution monitors that tracked every microscopic shift in Y/Nâs cellular recovery.
Leon sat in the shadows of the private suite, the harsh, clinical light overhead catching the sharp, exhausted angles of his face. He looked like a man who had survived the end of the world only to realize he was the only one left in it. His hair, usually swept back with a soldierâs precision, was overgrown and lank, falling over his eyes. He hadn't bothered to shave; a rough, golden-brown stubble covered his jaw, making him look olderâhollowed out. He wore a dark tactical sweater, the sleeves pushed up to reveal forearms corded with tension, his skin pale from a month of artificial light.
He was a relic of the field, a weapon of the state sitting in a room meant for healing, and the contradiction was suffocating.
He reached out, his handâscarred from years of combat and the recent, visceral heat of the towerâfinding hers. He didn't just hold it; he anchored himself to it, his thumb tracing the delicate line of her wrist where the IV entered the skin.
"The doctors say your neural pathways are remapping," he whispered, his voice a low, velvety rasp that sounded like it hadn't been used for anything but prayer in weeks. "They use a lot of big words to say they don't know when youâre coming back."
He leaned back, his gaze fixed on the ceiling, a wistful, broken smile ghosting over his lips as the silence of the room pulled a memory from the dark.
"I was thinking about that night in the rain," he murmured, his voice softening into a fond, private register. "Not the acid rain from the mission. That time in Spain, after the village. We were holed up in that barn, smelling of wet hay and gunpowder. You were trying to patch a hole in my jacket with a fishing line you found."
He let out a short, stifled huff of a laugh, the sound heavy with a shattered warmth.
"You were swearing in three different languages because the needle kept slipping. I told you to just leave it, that I didn't care about a hole in a uniform. And you looked at meâyou had that indomitable spark in your eyesâand you said, 'If weâre going to die in this godforsaken place, Kennedy, youâre going to do it looking like a professional.'"
He squeezed her hand, his fingers trembling slightly.
"I still have that jacket. I never took the stitches out. They're messy and uneven, and theyâre the most beautiful thing I own."
He leaned forward, resting his forehead against the cool metal of the bed rail, his voice dropping to a fervent plea.
"You remember that balcony in Venice? The one we weren't supposed to be on? We watched the sun come up over the water, and for ten minutes, we forgot we were targets. You fell asleep on my shoulder, and I didn't move for three hours because I was terrified Iâd wake you up and the world would start screaming again."
He looked at her then, his blue eyes bloodshot and brimming with a searing, desperate love.
"You said you loved me, Y/N. You said it while you were bleeding out in my arms. You don't get to say that and then leave me with a ghost of a memory about a barn and a crooked stitch. We have a thousand more to make. I'm holding you to it."
He bowed his head, his shoulders shaking with a visceral sob he finally couldn't suppress. The room fell into that heavy, high-tech silence once more.
Then, beneath his palm, something happened.
It wasn't a breath. It wasn't a sigh. It was a hushed, microscopic movementâa sudden, sharp twitch of her index finger against his thumb.
Leon froze, his heart slamming against his ribs with a concussive force. He didn't move, didn't breathe, his eyes wide and electric with a terrifying hope as he waited for it to happen again.
"Y/N?" he breathed, his voice a shattering thread of light in the dark.
Beneath the sterile sheets, her hand moved againâa slow, tenacious curl of her fingers toward his.
The clinical perfection of the room shattered the moment the heart monitorâs steady rhythm skipped, jumping into a frantic, staccato gallop.
Leon was on his feet before the alarm could even trigger. He didnât call for the nurses; his world had narrowed down to the slight, spasmodic curl of Y/Nâs fingers around his own. He watched, his breath hitching in a jagged line of hope, as the heavy stillness of her face began to fracture. Her eyelids flutteredâa tenacious, rhythmic struggle against the chemical fog of the sedatives.
"Y/N," he rasped, his voice a visceral plea. "Come on. Open your eyes. Thatâs an order."
The doctors swarmed in thenâa blur of white lab coats and high-resolution tablets. They spoke in rapid-fire bursts of "neurological responsiveness" and "titrating the propofol," but Leon didn't move. He stood like a monolithic anchor at her bedside, his hand a crushing, protective weight over hers.
Hours bled into a singular, harrowing point of focus. The ventilator was dialed back, the mechanical hiss replaced by the raw, audible sound of her own lungs reclaiming the air.
Her eyes openedâslowly, painfullyârevealing irises that were cloudy and disoriented, but undeniably there. She blinked against the harsh LED overheads, her gaze drifting aimlessly until it collided with Leon.
He looked wrecked. The "Legend" was gone, replaced by a man with hollowed-out eyes and a month's worth of grief etched into the stubble on his jaw. He looked like heâd been dragged through the Saito Tower all over again.
Y/Nâs throat hitched. She tried to speak, but her vocal cords were like rusted wires. Leon leaned in, his ear inches from her lips, his pulse a concussive roar in his chest.
"Leon..." she croaked, the word a fragile, bloodless shadow.
"I'm here," he whispered, his eyes brimming with a raw, unshielded light. "I'm right here. Don't try to move, justâ"
She coughed, a small, wrenched sound, and then her gaze sharpened. A flicker of that old, indomitable spark returned to her eyes, dancing through the haze of the meds. She looked at his overgrown hair, his haggard face, and the desperate way he was clutching her hand.
"Kennedy..." she panted, her voice gaining a witty, sandpaper edge. "You look... like hell. Did you... finally decide to stop... being a professional?"
Leon let out a sound that was half-laugh, half-sobâa shattering release of the tension heâd carried for four weeks. He pressed his forehead against the back of her hand, his shoulders shaking with a visceral relief.
"I missed you too," he managed to choke out.
"And Leon?" she whispered, her fingers giving his a weak, playful squeeze.
He looked up, his blue eyes searching hers.
"If this is... your way of getting out of... buying me that drink in Tokyo... it was a bit... dramatic, don't you think?"
Leonâs smile was lopsided and broken, but it was the most genuine thing sheâd ever seen. He leaned over, pressing a lingering, hallowed kiss to her brow, the scent of her skin finally replacing the smell of the hospital.
"I'll buy you the whole city," he promised, his voice thick with a smoldering, eternal devotion. "Just stay awake to see it with me."
Y/N let out a long, contented sigh, her eyes drifting shut not in a coma, but in the first real sleep sheâd had in years.
The monitors continued their steady, harmonious hum, but the silence in the room was different now. It wasn't the silence of a grave or a mission; it was the quiet they had promised each otherâthe one they had finally, defiantly stolen from the world.
