#like the mutual obsession and mystery is very much part of it yknow

[starmagnets]

sometimes i think what if there was an au where kinar and shilipha were able to meet under normal circumstances and yknow. possibly fall in love but then i remember that that wouldn’t be nearly as fascinating nor as funny as what they have going on in the main universe and then i return to writing them being fucked up and weird about it

[sapphire-weapon]

My personal take on this whole aeon debate, as a non-shipper is that their relationship is just so unhealthy and I feel like his character deserves a little bit of peace in his life. Ada cannot give him that, and as much as I think she could be a great character - her character was born just from an idea of a James bond-esque sexy untrustworthy spy and....that's it. She hasn't been developed further because it would ruin the mystery.

I imagine Leon flourishing with an honest and capable partner in his life to support him. Maybe as he's estranged from his family (or whatever happened there) yknow if he's not on a mission during Christmas then he could go with her to visit her family, then the soft inner-leon could start peeking out. Or something.

I just don't know what there is to support aeon as a ship bar chemistry. I get the vibe some aeon stans thrive on toxicity. Ada is not nice. Sure she's got a soft spot for him.... But he ended up in a mental spiral because of her.

I'm nervous for separate ways. Capcom has really set up for him parting ways with Ada but I'm not sure I trust them to follow through.

Just my thoughts!

So, there's a lot going on here in this ask.

I don't like looking at ships from the perspective of "What does this character deserve to have happen?" because that's not how reality works, and it's not how storytelling should work, either. There's nothing in the universe that states that if you put X amount of work in or you suffer for Y amount, you will/should get a certain specific outcome.

What Leon deserves? Is the consequences of his actions, whatever they might be.

OG Leon does deserve Ada, because he keeps making the same dumbass fucking mistakes that keep him attached to her. If he can't let her go -- if he can't allow himself to mature emotionally past age 21 in 1998 -- then he deserves the misery and discomfort that it causes him. His horrifying, manic mental breakdown at the end of RE6 when she gets shot is earned. He did that to himself. No one else did it to him -- no one forced him to keep sticking his hand in the fire. RE4make proved that Leon can still care about Ada without becoming obsessive to the point of a horrible downward spiral that culminates in him becoming a functional alcoholic. OG Leon refuses that reality, though, and he reaps what he sows.

Is that what's best for him as a person, in order for him to live his best life? HELL no. But those are two different things. Leon gets/got what he deserved, and what he deserved wasn't what's best.

Don't be nervous for Separate Ways. Leon's role in the story of RE4make is over. Leon and Ashley are done. Separate Ways will deal with Ada, Luis, Krauser, and Wesker. If Ada is still romance-coded towards Leon in Separate Ways, then that would actually be really fucking interesting, because what Remake will have actually done is switch their roles around. Now it'll be Ada's turn to get attached to Leon in a hugely unhealthy way, and she'll get what she deserves for it, same as he did in OG. (This was also kind of foreshadowed already a little bit, with Wesker saying "don't come crying to me if you get bit.")

Personally? I get the appeal of toxic/mutually destructive ships. There is something very cathartic about them, especially if you're a self-destructive person yourself or you've just been through a bad breakup or whatever the case may be. I don't ship Joseph/Kidman in TEW or Tseng/Aeris in FF7 because I want a happily ever after. I ship them because they can never be together, realistically -- it's a dream born from a wish that will never manifest in reality, and I find the pain and longing and the "if only" that comes from that -- from the state of being so close to a person but never actually ever being allowed to touch them -- to be very cathartic.

Aeon is a similar kind of ship in concept, except Aeon goes one step further, and Ada and Leon do actually touch each other, and it just makes everything so much fucking worse. And there is an appeal to that kind of thing. I get it. I do, really, I do. The only reason why I don't ship them is because I think it's written poorly and executed even worse and it fucks up Ada's entire character and screws her over in terms of her contributions to the overall plot of RE.

But the issue from the fandom perspective is that that's not how the vast majority of Aeon shippers actually view/treat them, and that's where my disconnect with the whole thing comes from, personally. I don't understand how someone looks at Leon and Ada and thinks of retirements for them that are happily ever afters, or has fucking family/children headcanons for them??? THAT'S ANTITHETICAL TO THE NATURE OF THE SHIP I seriously don't fucking understand Aeon fandom in the slightest, and that's why I say that it's very likely just a case of a bunch of people self-inserting onto Ada really fucking hard because they want to suck Leon's cock (which, I get it! I'd suck it, too, holy shit I'd suck that man dry).

So like.

Would Leon flourish with a supportive partner? Yes, absolutely. Is that what he deserves? Not necessarily.

I would argue that Remake Leon deserves that, which is why the romance with Ashley has already been set up. But OG Leon? He's on his fuckin own. He had so many opportunities over the years to grow the fuck up, and he never did. And that's on him.