The Ada/Leon fic I keep mentioning! I finally found my edited hardcopy shoved in my school binder.

Title: Progression
Rating: R (implied sex)
Disclaimer/Notes: Resident Evil, Ada, and Leon belong to Capcom; I just play with them with no intent to profit. Many thanks to moonything and ariseishirou for editing skills. As it's sort of relevant, the title of this was almost 'The Stories We Say', a line from Vienna Teng's "Eric's Song".
Summary: The building of a relationship.


Their relationship was one of stolen moments: snatches of time where, for a short while, they could pretend they weren't on different sides of an escalating conflict. She always came to him - his one attempt at tracking her down, after Spain, had lead to nothing but dead ends. Sometimes she would simply show up where he was - on the street, in a bar somewhere. Sometimes it would be a phone call, always from a different number. More often that not, though, it was an untraceable e-mail, or a simple card in the mail, with a date, time, and address on it. The cards were always sealed with lipstick kisses.

They very deliberately never spoke of work. Their paths crossed sometimes, occasionally even with the same goals in mind, depending on who Ada was working for at the time, but Leon couldn't keep track of her allegiances, and didn't really care to. At first, this tacit silence made their meetings a little awkward. Leon was uncertain how much he could trust her - his job taught him not to, and he had crossed him before, and Ada didn't volunteer much on her own, silent secrecy her trade. Eventually, though, Leon realized that they couldn't continue like this. He had so few people who he could talk to, particularly who knew anything of his past, and she was one of them.

So their talk turned to that - little bits and pieces of their separate histories, carefully devoid of certain specifics, still not quite trusting. He told her how is mother always sent him the most awful sweaters for Christmas, that he only ever wore on his infrequent visits home. She told him about a trip she took to Italy when she was sixteen, and of walking the streets of Rome.

She first kissed him six months after Spain. They were outside a restaurant in New York, after having a rather nice dinner at the government's expense. Seeing the surprise on his face as she pulled away, Ada laughed and said she was tired of waiting for him to make the first move. After that, things began to change between them. After their next meeting, a month later in London, he kissed her and invited her to his hotel room, hoping his voice didn't betray the pounding of his heart. She smiled and accepted, saying that she was glad he was finally showing some initiative. She was beautiful naked, and he wanted to stay up all night simply admiring her, but he fell asleep one arm draped around her waist. When he woke up the next morning, she was gone, leaving a pot of coffee and a note saying she'd see him around - sealed with a lipstick kiss.

As their relationship became more intimate, their stories did as well. More honest. He told her how he had a crush on the popular boy in his class in tenth grade, something he had never shared with anyone before. In her hotel room one night, she showed him the butterfly tattoo on her lower back that she had done after Raccoon City. A reminder, she said. It was the closest she ever came to admitting that day had changed her, too.

A year and a half after Spain, he finally brought her back to his apartment in the suburbs of DC. It was small, and sparsely furnished - he spent more time away from it than not, lately - but it was better than a hotel room. He awoke alone, as usual, but to the sound of someone going through his things in another room. He instinctively grabbed the knife on the top shelf of his nightstand - this wouldn't be the first time someone broke in looking for him or the government files they supposed he kept there - and pulled on a pair of pants before slipping out the door. The source of the noise was quickly uncovered, and he let out a sigh of relief and relaxed. It was Ada, going through his kitchen cabinets. Her attention turned to him, and she caught sight of the knife in his hand and raised an eyebrow. "Bit paranoid, are we?"

He gave her a little half-grin. "Well, when you sleep with dangerous women..." He went back to his bedroom to put the knife back and grab a shirt. Ada called down the hallway, "Where's your frying pan?"
"Left of the stove, underneath."
She gave him a smile when he returned to the kitchen. "Hope you like eggs."
He took a seat at the table. "Eggs are fine... I usually just have cereal or something."
He was still a little dazed - this was not how things went. She was always gone in the morning, flitting in and out of his life like the butterflies that were her trademark. But not this morning, it seemed. His curiosity finally got the better of him. "No work today?"
She grinned at she grabbed two plates from a cabinet. "Nothing that can't wait until later." He nodded, not knowing exactly what to say. They led separate lives, each with their own stories, but for this single moment, those lives were one.