trans_9 | Rest and Relaxation.... and a whole lot of aggrivation [Closed]

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Rest and Relaxation.... and a whole lot of aggrivation [Closed]

Leon's day had been long, though ultimately productive. He managed to scratch a number of things off his list, and only two items of consequence remained. Those being Sherry's surgery, and spelunking through W&P, trying to relocate the Main Armory.

He also needed to take a break.

But when he got back to the Precinct, he didn't head straight to his room and crash, which is probably what he should've done. Instead he went to Claire's room and knocked on her door. He needed to talk to her, and he figured he could hide out with her for a little while. He knew she'd run interference for him if he asked her to... plus about two-thirds of the ship thought they screwing each other anyway dear god did he wish, so if they were locked in a room together, odds are people would be reluctant to bother them.

"Hey, Claire, open up. It's me."

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Claire was settled comfortably in her room, curled up with the book pad that she'd gotten Sherry to check out of the Media Library for her when Leon knocked on the door.

"It's open!" she called to the door, sitting up and putting the book aside.

He walked in, giving her a smile as he did. It was kind of ironic, she got shot several days ago, but he was the one who looked like shit. Still. Then again, she had been resting, while he had been putting himself through the ringer lately.

"Not interrupting, am I?"

He starting unstrapping his holsters, which was his relative equivalent of taking his boots off. People don't realize how much his guns weigh anyway. But, yes, he did plan on staying a while.

"Just passing time," Claire replied, smiling a little. She was doing her best to "take it easy" although that was mostly aided by the fact that whenever she didn't take it easy her stomach started hurting. A recovering bullet wound wasn't quite as easy to ignore as most of her past injuries had been.

"Did you get everything you needed to done?" She imagined for the most part yes, otherwise he wouldn't be shedding off all the hardware.

Physically, he wasn't all that tired, but mentally, he was exhausted. He had to think about how to answer that.

"I got everything done that I could do today. And anything else will have to wait until after Sherry's surgery." Claire looked comfortable, and Leon simply plopped down next to her and made himself comfortable. "And if the rest of this ship can manage to not go completely nuts in the next few days, I might be able to get some rest."

She smirked while he settled down next to her, sinking a little lower in the cushions herself and folding her hands over her stomach. She angled her head so she could look over at him, giving him an amused look at the idea of the ship not going completely nuts.

"Here's hoping," she replied, rolling her head away and looking up at the ceiling then. "So what did Doctor Sera have to say?" She said his name with a little sarcasm, carefully enunciating the words like she didn't quite believe them. Which, really, she didn't. Leon may trust the guy but he didn't exactly look to her like the type of guy who actually finished college.

At the rate they were going, everyone was likely to kill each other before anything else had the chance to kill them first.

"A few things," he responded. He stretched a little as he got himself comfortable. "Sherry's body is naturally producing anti-bodies that are keeping the G-virus in check. Luis wanted to know if he could keep a small sample of Sherry's blood to study it, hoping to reverse engineer a vaccine from it, or to possibly use it as a treatment to help Steve, since G and T-Veronica are distant cousins.

"He also wanted to know if he could poke at the G-virus once it was removed from Sherry. I made it clear that if he didn't destroy it the moment it was safely out of Sherry, I would."

Claire exhaled a little in relief at the knowledge that Sherry's body was actively fighting the virus. The possibility of being able to find a cure for Steve's condition with the help of Sherry's antibodies also gave her the ghost of hope. She felt awful that Steve had to suffer the way he did, and she wasn't going to give up on him just because things initially seemed fairly hopeless.

She nodded slowly, before looking back at Leon. "Good. The less infection we've got running around, the better." And honestly, the T-Veronica was the picture of stability compared to the G-Virus. Claire did not ever want to face what she and Leon had had to in Raccoon that night. Or again in the WilPharma facility, for that matter.

"You got that right." He may not have yet succeeded in scrubbing the viruses off the face of the earth, but if he could scrub them off the ship, he'll take it.

He looked over at Claire, his brows creasing for a moment.

"Are you all right?"

Her brow furrowed briefly, confused at the question.

"Yeah?" she replied, hesitantly. "Why do you ask?" She didn't think she was giving off anything that suggested she wasn't okay, but sometimes Leon was better at reading her than she herself was.

"Because ever since finding out about Sherry's souvenir from Raccoon City, you really haven't said much about." Which was very unredfieldian.

"I don't mind doing all the heavy lifting on this, and you're still recovering anyway, but--" the quiet was bothering him. He was a little concerned.

"Are you okay?"

"Oh." Oh. Claire didn't respond immediately beyond that, a slight frown playing across her face while she absorbed that and thought back. She had been a little quiet.

"It's a lot, all at once, I guess," she sighed, shaking her head a little and looking down at nothing in particular. "I put too much faith in the vaccine, I guess. This blind-sided me. First Steve, now Sherry, and you were-" she cut herself off, frowning again and looking up at him. "No matter how far we think we've come, these viruses still find ways of hurting us."

He looked at her warmly, and he honestly understood how she felt. He reached over and brushed some of her hair out of her face so he could see her better. Her hair had gotten long... how long had they really been here?

"I know," he told her. "It's like it never goes away..." Half the time it felt like he was taking one step forward, but three steps back. Ex-Umbrella employees turned black market brokers had the viruses spread faster than the authorities could keep up with. Though the T-vaccine was starting to shift the balance back into their favor.

"Sherry's going to be fine," he assured her. "You got her the vaccine in time to stop that thing in her from growing and doing any damage to her. And soon, it'll be safely removed, and destroyed, and we can finally put that to rest.

"The parasite is completely gone from me. And if some of the big brains can stop bragging about how smart they are for about fifteen minutes, and put their knowledge to good use, they can probably come up with a way to help Steve.

"These things may have still found a way to hurt us, but they can't beat us. We're both too stubborn to ever let that happen."

Her eyes flickered away from his face when he brushed her hair back, although she looked back a second later, reaching up so she could catch his hand with hers.

She didn't say anything for a moment, absorbing what he said, before she nodded, a slight smile tugging at the corners of her lips.

"I know," she finally replied, glancing away from him again. "I have to worry, though. It's one of the things I'm best at." Or worst at, depending on how you looked at it. Her concern for those around her had more than once led her directly into trouble.

He didn't mind if Claire wanted to hold on to him for a bit, so he didn't pull his hand away. Still holding on, though, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. Both to comfort her, and to make himself more comfortable. not to mention quietly give her permission to use him as her new pillow.

"Just don't go getting yourself infected with anything because you're feeling all left out," he teased.

Claire responded easily to him wrapping his arm around her, not really reading much into the fact that it was so comforting for her to shift so she was leaning more against him than the couch. She was a very physical person, after all. It was perfectly normal to take comfort in the proximity of a close friend.

"Hey, I got shot," she responded to his teasing, smirking a little and patting her stomach above the bullet wound. "As far as I'm concerned that makes us square. Infection I will happily do without."

~~Now why on earth would Luis ever think they were doing each other?~~

"Sounds good to me." Leon was used to Claire physically expressing herself. Normally by hitting him, though, so this was a nice chance of pace.

"How long until you're back at 100%?"

Edited 2009-10-02 00:53 (UTC)

She hummed softly in response, tilting her head a little and considering his question for a moment.

"Another week or so. It'll probably be a little longer before I'm able to do anything crazy, but it's getting easier to move." She still had to gear herself up for leaning over to pick something up off the ground, and too much walking made her start to ache, but it was getting better.

Leon made a noise of not-quite disapproval as he looked up at the ceiling. He was mulling that bit of information over, and comparing it to the timeline for the break to the bridge. It would be close, though she'd be much closer to 100% that she is now.

"Alright. Because in a few weeks, something very, very big is about to happen."

Claire frowned at that, angling her head so she could look at him again.

"What do you mean?" She was hoping this wouldn't lead to more stupid infighting. She hadn't really been that involved in it in the first place, but it wasn't that difficult to formulate opinions on what a waste of time it was fighting amongst each other.

Leon let out a breath. This wasn't a bad thing, but it was a big thing.

"For a while now, there's been people poking through parts of the ship, trying to figure out how to get to the rest of it. We figured out quickly on that whoever is in charge of the ship rewired Stacy and her internal defenses to trap up in this section. And we're a couple of weeks away from finally breaking out.

"According to Stacy, the people in charge of the ship don't know we're out and about yet. But once we break out, they'll know... and God only know what'll happen next." He didn't but from his tone, he did not expect it to be good at all.

She stared at him, her eyebrows arched.

"Oh. Is that all?" She really hadn't had any idea what to expect, but this was certainly not on the list of things she'd have figured on.

His expression probably gave away the answer for him.

"Nope. We're on a clock here."

Of course. Claire frowned again, canting her head to the side.

"If they don't know we're awake, why are we on a clock?" They usually were, of course. From one life-threatening situation to the next, there was always an inevitable countdown.

"Inside Escherville, a part of the city that's blocked off, there's a series of gravitational disturbances in there. A few hours ago, the big brains finally figured out what was going on in there." He had to pause and think for a minute, because while Leon was a smart guy, physics was not his field.

"I... honestly didn't even understand half the technical aspects of it, but the Quantum Physics for Dummies™ version of it is that the gravity wells were designed to keep something caged in there. But whatever is in there is starting to push through, the gravity wells are starting to destabilize and break down, and in about two-three months, the fluctuations will be big enough to possibly destroy the ship, provided whatever is in there doesn't bust out and kill us all first."

Yay.

"Right now, our only options are to try and stabilize the mess somehow, or take control of the ship and force Stacy to jettison that part of the city. We're going with option number two since that seems like our best bet."

FML.

She wasn't totally sure how much of that she actually followed, and it showed on her face briefly, but she did understand the core concept. Something Bad was coming. Claire sighed and closed her eyes, leaning her head back.

"Awesome," she reached up and rubbed her eyes with her free hand, shaking her head a little.

"I guess it's a bigger timeframe than we're used to."

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