Chapter Text
The train rumbled along its tracks, and Leon Kennedy sat staring out the window as the misty woods rolled by. Eight hours on the train, and Leon was starting to get tired. He was supposed to stay awake for all of it, but he had been up for over 24 hours now, and there was no sign that there was any danger upcoming. Besides, everyone else on the train around him was sleeping as well. With a bit of a sinking feeling in his gut, Leon closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.
…And his eyes shot open. It was the train, but…something felt off. A chill ran down Leon’s spine as he shot up to his feet, pulling his combat knife from the folds of his leather jacket and crouching slightly as he walked. All the other passengers were still sleeping, but he wouldn’t be shocked if one of them suddenly lurched up and attacked.
Footsteps. A girl in red shoes and a dress quickly ran past. His attention snapped to her, but she quickly disappeared through the door up ahead. “Hey! Wait up!” Leon sprinted after her, shoving the door open, but she had already disappeared by the time he got in. “Shit. Okay.” He tucked his knife away, not wanting to scare the girl off if he ran into her again. Maybe she would have some information on what was going on.
Leon continued down the eerily quiet hallway for several long moments, taking note of the pitch black atmosphere outside. It didn’t even seem like a dark nighttime, but more like someone had painted black over the windows. “Shit…how long was I out?” Leon mumbled to himself as he finally made it to the end of the train. Where the exit to the train should have been, there was instead a massive looming square of darkness that seemed to be inviting Leon inside.
“Well…I don’t see how this could be a bad idea.” Leon said, stepping inside. It seemed to be some sort of impossible corridor, and he clicked on his flashlight to reveal falling apart wooden walls and floor, planks interwoven over the darkness. Were he anyone else, he might have been scared. But he had been through worse. Even still, it was the slightest bit unnerving as the hallway ended and he came out into the hulking rectangular room.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING? GET BACK TO WORK!” A nasally voice came screeching from the darkness, and Leon drew his knife as the creature approached. “I’VE BEEN LOOKING ALL OVER FOR YOU! WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING? WE ARE A THOUSAND CUBES BEHIND SCHEDULE!”
“Why don’t you make them yourself?” Leon pointed his knife at the man, and he bellowed in laughter as he lifted his kassara overhead. “Jesus, it’s a mess in here. “ He looked around at the room, noting the boxes of cubes spilled all over and the numerous stains on the walls and floors. “You need to get a janitor in here.”
The man’s eyes narrowed, and he swung the kassara at Leon. He ducked sideways, and kicked the man in the chest. He stumbled back, growling. “THAT’S MY JOB, YOU MANGY BASTARD! I HAVE TO CLEAN UP AFTER YOU DISOBEDIENT SHITS!” He swiped at Leon again, and he ducked again as the blade sailed harmlessly over his head. He brought his elbow up, hitting the janitor in the chin.
Leon raised up his knife, pointing it at the janitor’s throat. “Let’s make a mess then.” He stepped forwards, and the janitor swung his blade downwards. Leon caught the slash on his knife’s blade, shoving him backwards and slashing him across the chest. He brought the knife up to his face, but the man’s stump arm whacked him in the nose and sent him stumbling back. Something cracked where he’d been hit, but there wasn’t time to worry about that just yet.
“STUPID HUMAN! I’M NOT SCARED OF YOU! I WILL PEEL THE FLESH FROM YOUR CORPSE!” The man’s eyes bulged in his rotting skull, and Leon grinned as he wiped the blood from his nose, readying his knife one last time.
“Tell me something I haven’t heard before.” He rushed in, and the janitor jabbed with his kassara. The knife blade met the swing, and a shower of sparks flew out as the janitor readied another swipe. They traded blows a few more times before Leon overpowered him, and his hand was sent reeling back as Leon swung again at the man’s palm. The blade was sent flying from his hand, embedding itself straight down in the floor.
The janitor screeched in anger as Leon stabbed him twice in the chest, a yellowish blood gushing out from the wounds. He slashed the man across the neck, and the blood sprayed him like he had just turned on a sprinkler. Taking a deep breath, Leon stepped back as the blood spurted out of the wound and the janitor fell…forwards and grabbed him by the shoulders.
“What the…” Leon gasped as the janitor wrapped his stump arm around Leon’s neck and gripped his face with the free one. Leon’s knife clattered to the ground, and the janitor yanked him backwards to stop him from picking it up. Blood leaked from the man’s palm as he started to squeeze, intending to crush Leon’s skull in his hand. Grunting, Leon brought up his elbow and jammed it into the janitor’s nose. He grunted, but didn’t react too much, so he did it again--much harder this time. He staggered back, and Leon whipped around to face him.
The man howled in anger, lifting his hands up. “I WILL LICK THE BLOOD FROM YOUR THROAT!” Leon somersaulted forwards, going through the man’s legs, and coming up behind him. He wrapped his arms around the man’s chest, lifting him overhead. “I WILL FLAY YOU ALIVE!” Holding the man overhead, he brought him down in a suplex straight onto the kassara’s handle.
“I WILL--”
Crrrraack.
The man’s screaming threats were suddenly cut off as his head hit the blade. The blunt end cracked his skull open in a spray of blood and viscera, and Leon quickly followed up with a roundhouse kick to the chest that knocked his body over--as well as tearing the blade from his skull with one last surge of blood.
“Sorry, but you’ll have to clean this one up yourself.” Leon picked his knife back up, wiping the blade on his jacket, and then tucked it into its sheathe. His eyes drifted over to the doorway on the opposite end of the room, and then landed on the kassara’s bloodstained handle. He considered it for a moment, but ultimately left it behind as he exited the room…and everything shifted around him.
An intense, painful ringing. Tables stretching higher than he could see, and golden figures sitting in them that sat so tall their heads were lost in the suffocating darkness. Leon stumbled forwards, clutching his head in pain, as the ringing grew louder and louder and…stopped. Just when he thought his eardrums might burst, everything fell silent.
The darkness had been crushing before, but the intense moonlight that washed over him might have been worse. Visions flashed--a hulking tyrant with several heads, bloodstained head to toe, blonde hair torn into an unrecognizable mess--and then ceased. Leon looked up to see everything around him had changed. He stood at the top of a circular platform that was stretched up into the sky, with the moon shockingly close. What really got his attention, however, was the strange feathered man who stood opposite him.
Leon drew his knife, but the man raised a hand up to stop him. As the man began to speak, Leon averted his eyes to avoid the now-exposed rotting torso and bare legs. “I pulled you out of that place to give you a warning from my master. You were not supposed to be here. As a gesture of goodwill, my master has mended your wounds.”
“Goodwill? What do you want from me?” Leon demanded, taking a step closer. If he didn’t know better, he could’ve sworn that a nervous expression flashed across his face.
“We can be sociable. I am Per’kele--a humble servant of the moon god Rher. I’d say I am pleased to make your acquaintance--but that is quite far from the truth. You are an irregularity. An outsider. You were not supposed to be here, Kennedy.”
“Aw, you know me. How sweet.” He took another step towards Per’kele, knife pointed at his heart. “You still haven’t answered my question. What do you want from me? I don’t imagine someone like you handing out pleasantries without expecting anything in return.”
“What do I want from you? That is quite simple. I want you gone. You have the potential to disrupt the festival that I have so carefully cultivated for my master. His rules dictate fourteen, and now we have an extra tagalong. This cannot stand. So I offer you an out. For you alone, the fog will bend. The veil will lift, and you may leave us behind. Return to your other work, and the festival can go on. This is a very rare gift. I suggest you do not squander it.”
Leon paused for a moment, pondering the offer. “So…there’s some shady shit going on, and you know I’ll ruin it. And you expect me to just leave? Yeah, I bet you’d like that. Fat chance I stand by and let you do whatever it is you have planned for these people.” He marched towards Per’kele, knife gripped firmly in hand. “If you do know me so well, then you should have known I would do everything I can to save these people.”
Per’kele sighed, a look of irritation flashing across his face. “Very well, then. Have it your way. The pale moonlight awaits you.” Leon was within striking distance now, but as he lunged with his knife, everything went white around him as the world disappeared.
Leon lurched up with a gasp. The train had come to a stop in the middle of the woods, and judging by the light--though the thick mist made it difficult to tell for sure--it was likely early morning. What the hell had just happened? Whatever it was, the train had since been emptied out. Groaning, Leon got up to his feet and did a double check to see that the train was truly empty. Spotting nothing irregular, he made his way into the next train car.
Leon opened the door, walking forwards, and…his heart skipped a beat. Embedded in the floor was the janitor’s kassara, drenched in blood. Thankfully, though, it was free of its owner. Leon tapped the knife’s sheathe to confirm its presence, then made his way past it and over to the train’s exit. As a plus, the door was back to its normal door-looking self.
Leon gripped the door’s handle, giving one last look the kassara stabbed into the floor’s planks. Had nobody else noticed it? How did it even get there? Leon had a lot of questions…but he figured that none of them would get answered within this train car.
“Freaky…”
With that, he turned the handle and opened the door to the dawn of the festival’s first day.