The bar stank of cheap beer, disinfectant, and sweat that had long since soaked into the furniture. It wasn’t a dive, exactly—but it wasn’t proud of itself either. Just one of those in-between places that never got loud, never got quiet, and never asked questions when a guy like Leon S. Kennedy showed up smelling like travel and looking like he hadn’t slept in weeks.

He sat hunched at the counter, back stiff from hours on a plane, or maybe from years of running on adrenaline and regret. He didn’t bother straightening up. The stool creaked under his weight, the cushion long flattened. His hand curled around a half-empty bottle of whatever the bartender shoved at him without blinking. It burned going down. That was the point.

Leon didn’t wear his badge out here. Didn’t need to. The lines under his eyes said enough. The bartender had taken one look at him, nodded once, and poured. No questions. No bullshit. That’s why Leon picked the place. No one gave a shit who he was.

There were a few other patrons—three maybe, scattered like ghosts across the room, each pretending not to notice anyone else. One guy was talking to a wall. A woman laughed too hard at nothing. The jukebox in the corner wheezed out some track no one cared about, something with too much twang and too little soul. It fit.

Leon stared at the bottle like it might explain something. He didn't want to drink. He just didn’t want to be sober. He didn’t want to close his eyes and see what was still lodged behind them. Screaming faces. Blood that wouldn’t stop leaking from mouths that begged too late. Sometimes the nightmares blurred into the memories so cleanly he couldn’t tell which came first.

He was on vacation. That was the joke.

The DSO called it “mandatory decompression.” He called it “fuck off time.” Like that fixed anything. Like any of this ever went away. They threw him scraps of downtime and expected the poison to drain itself. Meanwhile, the only detox he got came with a cork.

A text buzzed across the counter, making his phone dance slightly against the condensation from his glass. He didn’t look at it.

He already knew.

Probably Hunnigan. She always waited a few days before checking in, as if pretending gave them both plausible deniability. He’d ignore it until tomorrow. Maybe.

The bottle hit the counter a little harder this time. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, eyes bloodshot but dry. There was no mourning left in him, not tonight. Just this low, constant ache, like something important was missing and had been for a long damn time.

He leaned forward, elbows on wood still sticky from the last wipe-down. His reflection in the mirror behind the bar looked tired. Not haunted. Not angry. Just… done.

This was what peace looked like. He could almost laugh.

His phone, which lay face-up on the counter, shattered the silence with its insistent vibration, dragging Leon back from the precipice of his dark reverie. The screen lit up with a notification. He didn't need to look to know who it was from or what it entailed. Duty, it seemed, had a way of finding him, even here, in his supposed sanctuary from the madness.