Remember To Forget
I think at this point the retelling of RE 6 has been done in abundance but I never did it, hence this drabble.
He had been told Chris didn’t remember anything. “I think I’d remember a hot piece like yourself.” To hear Chris refer to him as a hot piece was wild.
Leon was almost regretting being sent in on the assignment. He had been assigned to guard detail for the President for so long that, after assuring the detail taking over for him was competent, he leapt at the chance to get out of the US and breathe.
“If you did, you’d realize that is not something you’d call me.” Leon tipped the whiskey glass back and swallowed down its contents. “Ever.”
Whether or not he’d like for Chris to call him that was irrelevant; Chris didn’t know who he was at that particular moment and Leon wasn’t going to pretend Chris felt that way when he was himself . He stared at the man he’d been tasked to bring back, a man the BSAA didn’t want to trigger by sending in his squad unless they absolutely had to. I’ve met him once, was Leon’s response, but he went anyway, following intel to the bar he’d heard Chris had practically been living at.
“Then losing my memory was the best damn thing for me, especially right now.” Chris had been looking him over since the conversation had been initiated, if Leon was being honest but at that moment? If Chris could have devoured him with his gaze, he would have.
Chris hadn’t shaved in at least a month and his appearance was far from the clean cut soldier he tended to present himself as. Leon couldn’t even say his disheveled appearance or the fact that he smelled like he bathed in alcohol before heading to the bar was a turn off. That said more about his own tastes than it did Chris’, didn’t it?
“And the minute you get your memory back, you will regret having those thoughts.” He wasn’t drunk, not yet, but Leon was already regretting having the thoughts he was having about a man who didn’t remember who he was, let alone who Leon was to him… which was nothing. Claire’s friend, fellow survivor of Raccoon City; that’s who Leon was.
Chris didn’t even blink. “Well you could fuck me, and see if that jogs my memory.” His eyes never left Leon’s as he took another drink. “Unless you really aren’t invested in bringing me back in like my alleged superiors want.”
“Aha.” More a statement than an actual laugh, more a deflection than an admission of desire, Leon leaned back in his chair and did his best not to lick his lips. “Even if I thought that was a good idea, you are too drunk to honestly consent to that.”
Chris tipped the bottle of whiskey against Leon’s glass and filled it up. “Then you get drunk with me,” he offered as a faulty compromise. “Then we both can make stupid choices.”
“A man who’s still too sober for his own good, trying to make a deal like that.” The glass lifted in Leon’s hand and tilted against his lips.
Chris offered a lazy half smile. “Your room or mine?”
*
No one drunk off their ass could ravage another person so expertly. Skilled fingers made short work of buttons and zippers on pants Calloused palms smoothed Leon’s shirt up and over his head. He knew being a functional alcoholic was possible - ask him how he knew - but Chris was making him feel like he had a lot more to learn about the title if he wanted to be the reigning DSO ‘ drunk at work and no one can tell’ champ. Either that or Chris wasn’t as drunk as he was pretending.
“I better not find out later-” Leon tried to speak but the mouth back on his silenced further protest. He didn’t want to find out later that Chris was faking being drunk because that meant he went along with this game willingly, because he wanted to fuck him. The affair was only okay if it meant nothing.
The neon sign just outside the window illuminated Chris’ face when he pulled back. “Stop thinking,” he whispered, words spoken against Leon’s jaw and brushed against the shell of Leon’s ear.
All Leon could do was nod; every one of his senses were being overloaded by a man he wasn’t sure was even drunk.
Chris told him to stop thinking but all Leon could do was think, think about the real reasons why he jumped at the chance to come try to save someone he only met once . Obligation to Claire, obligation to the country, or was it because meeting Chris Redfield one time had the man on his brain more times than he cared to admit? Ultimately, he wanted to know how those rough work worn hands felt against his skin, against each and every scar his own line of work had given him. As Chris’ fingers mapped along a healed over bullet wound on his shoulder, he could confirm it felt amazing.
“This your first?” The strength that Chris expended to hoist Leon up on the bare topped dresser was impressive, him sliding between Leon’s parted thighs even more so. “With a guy?”
Leon answered by hoisting a leg up so that his hand could make contact with the pockets and slap a packet of lube against his chest. “No.”
Every inch closer Chris pressed against him was almost too much, and the sight of him tearing into a packet of lube with his teeth was even more so. “Always prepared or were you hoping it’d go this way?”
Like the good little whore he’d been told he was on more occasions than he cared to count, he answered with more of a moan than he wanted to. “Always prepared.” Words breathed out when slicked fingers slipped inside him. “Not complaining that it’s going this way, though.”
“Are we enemies?” Chris’ words were hushed against Leon’s skin as he worked him open with a gentleness that was what Leon expected from the boy scout, but not from the amnesiac rough around the edges man he’d found at the bar. “Battle buddies? Wingmen? Am I dick deep in pussy when I’m not out saving the world instead of between these perfect fucking thighs?”
“None of the above, s’far as I know.” Leon shook his head, then let it fall back against the wall. “If you ever thought about me like this, you kept that shit to yourself.”
Chris slowly withdrew his fingers. “I don’t guess amnesia stops the body’s natural desires.” The space wasn’t left empty for long, just long enough to slick up his cock and gently press inside. “If my old memories come back and erase this, remind me I said that shit about being between your thighs.”
Leon bit down on his bottom lip until Chris’ mouth offered assistance in muffling his unwanted noises. One of two things was going to happen. Getting off inside his tight ass was going to jog his memory or he was never going to remember this shit happened thanks to alcohol and Leon was never going to bring it up. His nails sunk into Chris’ back, both out of response to the pace picking up and also to the thought of giving any of it up.
If there was ever a moment Leon wished was at the bottom of every bottle he crawled into, it was that one. He wanted every empty bottle of whiskey to lead to Chris Redfield being between his thighs, every last drop following every last orgasm the man could wrench out of his body by simply tilting his hips just right as he thrust deep inside.
“The me you know is an idiot.” He wanted the amnesiac Chris to sit down with real Chris and make fucking a normal part of their daily routine.
Leon wanted to declare the Leon that Chris currently knew was the bigger idiot, getting tipsy enough to fuck without a second thought, but he was too busy thanking that same idiot for disregarding the moral implications of the scenario. He just held on tighter, met Chris’ thrusts with his own, and let the world spiral away…
*
Leon was gone before morning. “Look he doesn’t remember me enough to click anything into place for him, okay?” He wasn’t comfortable leaving his post with the President for long and he was definitely running from the case of feelings and emotions he caught with those warm arms curled around him in the middle of the night. “You can probably send the BSAA team in and it would work better.”
“ He didn’t even remember you from the Terrasave party?”
He spoke softly as he crossed the airport towards his departing flight home. “I did what I could but he definitely did not remember me. He didn’t remember you either, Claire.”
“He’s an asshole like that, I guess.”
“All it proves is that we all spend too much time doing our jobs and not enough time being with the people we care about.” Leon sucked at pep talks and cheering people up. Claire knew this. The fact that she was still sitting on the phone pretending he had some magical phrase to make it all better was telling of how upset she was. “Tell BSAA he’s probably softened enough to take whatever intervention they have planned.”
“You make it sound like you fucked him into complacency.”
“A spy never tells his tactics and trade secrets.” He was glad the phone didn’t convey the blush he knew was spreading across his cheeks. “I have to board, Claire. Send the BSAA in. He’ll come around-”
“I want a big party, a real party, when whatever the hell this mess is gets cleared up.”
“Whatever you want,” he promised. Always the needs of others, never his own. His own needs would’ve had him saying to hell with the President and staying until Chris came around. His own needs would’ve insisted Chris come back with him and they’d sort the amnesia out later.
Claire wanted a party. The President wanted his topman back on the job. Whatever Leon wanted was irrelevant.
*
“So Ada’s not dead.”
Leon had been doing his best to avoid Chris as much as possible since the missions got entwined. “No… she’s definitely not dead.” Now the man was blocking his escape from the med tent he’d just been checked out in. “I’m sorry about Piers.”
Chris nodded and took a step closer, but didn’t quite crowd Leon's space. “He was a good soldier who deserved better,” was all he said on the matter, quietly and solemnly.
“We all deserve better.” Leon stared at the table and his hands flat against it, anything so he didn’t have to look at Chris.
“I was going to retire after this mission,” Chris confessed, crossing his arms over his chest as he spoke on a subject he wasn’t sure Leon cared about. “I remembered a guy I ran into when my head was a mess that I wanted to hunt down. He had the most perfect thighs-”
Leon definitely couldn’t look at him after that omission. “I’m supposed to say it was a mistake and that we were drunk and apologize, right?” His breath caught in his throat as Chris crossed the distance between them. “If you’re asking about Ada-”
Chris’ hand was so gentle as it tugged Leon’s chin in his direction so he was forced to give him eye contact. “Only if you and Ada are an item and you were off having drunk affairs instead of actively giving in to something you wanted.”
“Ada is complicated but I wasn’t running from her that night.” Leon’s eyes slowly shut as he leaned into Chris’ touch. “You’re going to a joint operation after this, hm?”
“I’ll be gone long enough for us both to think about where we might go from here.”
“When do you leave?”
“Twelve hours.”
Leon’s hand slid down Chris’ chest, fingers left to hook around belt loops. “Twelve hours is a long time.” His other hand slipped into his pants pocket and pulled out a key card for his booked hotel for the night. “Plenty of time to shower and decompress from one of the longest goddamn missions on record, if you want my professional opinion.”
“Your opinion is the only one I want to hear right now.” He sealed the deal with a kiss, long and deep, his own hand wrapping possessively around Leon’s hand and the keycard that promised one night of bliss before it all went to shit again for both of them.
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"I heard you got yourself into another mess that needs cleaning up."
While she did love her husband quite dearly, and she was relieved to see him, Padmé was also tired, hungry and much dirtier than she ever liked to be. A diplomatic mission gone wrong had left her, Captain Typho and Versé stranded on the outskirts of Takodana's capital city.
One of the many outlaws who made the planet their refuge must have drained her gleaming silver cruiser of its fuel while they were attempting negotiations. They couldn't take off and did not have enough credits on hand for a refueling of that magnitude. To make matters worse, the negotiations had dissolved into chaos between the three factions warring for control of the city. She was persona non grata at the moment, and the only place they'd been able to secure lodgings was the grimiest hotel she'd ever seen.
While mobs and bouts of violence erupted in the streets of the city center, they were holed up here, waiting for a Republic Cruiser to come and assist them.
So when @jedimessiah strode into her tiny hotel room with a smirking grin on his face and teasing in his tone, she gave him a pointed look. "Not now, Anakin, please." With a sigh, she crossed the room to him and held out her hands to take both of his. Versé and Typho were both out, trying to scrounge up something to eat, which meant they were alone for now. "I am very glad your cruiser was the closest to my distress call, though. You're certainly a sight for sore eyes." She squeezed his hands in greeting and then slid her arms around his waist in a tight embrace.
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The apologists for Putin's Russia – both Trumpsters and tankies – say that Ukraine must "negotiate" an end of Putin's illegal invasion.
Those folks are either oblivious to Russia's recent history of negotiations or are intentionally ignoring that history for political reasons.
In the years leading up to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, diplomats lost their authority, their role reduced to echoing the Kremlin's aggressive rhetoric.
BBC Russian asks former diplomats, as well as ex-Kremlin and White House insiders, how Russian diplomacy broke down.
This was four month's before the invasion.
In October 2021, US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland went to a meeting at the Russian foreign ministry in Moscow. The man across the table was Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, who Ms Nuland had known for decades and always got along with.
Mr Rybakov's American counterparts saw him as a practical, calm negotiator - someone they could talk to even as the two countries' relationship frayed.
This time, things were different.
Mr Ryabkov read Moscow's official position from a piece of paper and resisted Ms Nuland's attempts to start a discussion. Ms Nuland was shocked, according to two people who discussed the incident with her.
She described Mr Ryabkov and one of his colleagues as "robots with papers", the people said (the State Department declined to comment on the incident).
And outside the negotiating room, Russian diplomats were using increasingly undiplomatic language.
"We spit on Western sanctions."
"Let me speak. Otherwise, you will really hear what Russian Grad missiles are capable of."
"Morons" - preceded by an expletive.
These are all quotes from people in positions of authority at the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in recent years.
If you are thinking that this doesn't sound like serious negotiating, you are entirely correct.
This attitude didn't begin in 2021, it's been ongoing since at least 2007.
The first signal that a new Cold War was beginning came in 2007 with a speech Mr Putin made to the Munich Security Conference.
In a 30-minute diatribe, he accused Western countries of attempting to build a unipolar world. Russia's diplomats followed his lead. A year later, when Russia invaded Georgia, Moscow's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reportedly swore at his UK counterpart, David Miliband, asking: "Who are you to lecture me?"
Western officials still thought it was worth trying to work with Russia. In 2009, Mr Lavrov and the then-US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pressed a giant red "reset button" in relations, and the two countries seemed to be building co-operation - especially on security issues.
But it soon became obvious to US officials that their Russian counterparts were simply parroting Mr Putin's growing anti-Western views, says Ben Rhodes, deputy national security advisor to former US President Barack Obama.
Mr Rhodes recalls President Obama having breakfast with Mr Putin in 2009, accompanied by a folk orchestra. He says Mr Putin was more interested in presenting his view of the world than discussing co-operation and that the Russian leader blamed Mr Obama's predecessor, George W Bush, for betraying Russia.
As the Arab Spring, the US involvement in Libya, and the Russian street protests unfolded in 2011 and 2012, Mr Putin decided that diplomacy wouldn't get him anywhere, Mr Rhodes says.
"On certain issues - Ukraine in particular - I did not get the sense that [diplomats] had much influence at all," says Mr Rhodes.
The arrival of Maria Zakharova as spokesperson for Russia's Foreign Ministry in 2015 signaled another deterioration in diplomacy.
[W]ith Ms Zakharova's arrival, foreign ministry briefings became a spectacle. Ms Zakharova often yelled at reporters who asked her difficult questions and responded to criticism from other countries with insults.
Her diplomatic colleagues were going the same way. Mr [Boris] Bondarev, who used to work for Moscow's mission to the UN in Geneva, recalls one meeting where Russia blocked all proposed initiatives, prompting colleagues from Switzerland to complain.
"We said to them: 'Well, what's the problem? We are a great power, and you are just Switzerland!'
"That's [Russian] diplomacy for you," he says.
Getting back to the eve of the invasion. (emphasis added)
Mr Bondarev recalls a dinner in Geneva in January 2022 when Mr Ryabkov, from the foreign ministry, met US officials. US First Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman hoped to avert the invasion of Ukraine through 11th-hour negotiations.
"It was awful," says Mr Bondarev. "The Americans were like, 'Let's negotiate.' And instead Ryabkov starts shouting, 'We need Ukraine! We won't go anywhere without Ukraine! Take all your stuff and go back to the 1997 [Nato] borders!' Sherman is an iron lady, but I think even her jaw dropped at this.
"[Ryabkov] was always very polite and really nice to talk to. And now he's banging his fist on the table and talking nonsense."
The war hasn't changed things.
Ukrainian authorities complain that Russia is once again offering ultimatums instead of compromises, such as demanding that Ukraine accepts the annexation of occupied territories. Kyiv has no intention to negotiate under such conditions, and its Western allies publicly support this decision.
Russia seems set on relying on its military machine, intelligence services and geo-economic power for influence - rather than diplomacy.
Some people won't like hearing this, but the only way to end this war is militarily.
Judy Dempsey is a nonresident senior fellow at Carnegie Europe and editor in chief of Strategic Europe. At Carnegie Europe she writes:
Negotiations can only begin if Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky is in a strong enough position to set the terms. Those terms are not just about restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity. They are about ensuring that Russia does not attack or threaten Kyiv again. An end to the war is about ending Russia’s imperial ambitions in this part of Europe.
[ ... ]
It is not enough for leaders and defense ministers to say ad nauseam that they will support Ukraine “for as long as it takes” or that Ukraine must win. How is that going to happen if the country is not provided with the essential military equipment? And if there are mutterings in some Europeans capitals and in Washington that the Ukrainian offensive has not been quick enough or effective enough, the reason is that Ukraine lacks the military support to achieve it.
[ ... ]
The war is a test for Europe in particular and the West in general. It is about security, conviction, and trying to uphold values based on the pursuit of democracy. Ultimately, that’s what the Ukrainians are fighting for.
A fudged compromise will damage the West and appease—indeed embolden—Russia and its supporters.
Exactly. This is not just an unprovoked war against Ukraine, it's a war against the West and liberal democratic values.
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