Who: Revy & Leon What: Revy interrupts the detective's moping time with takeout When: This weekend Where: Police station Rating/Warnings: Language, some potentially triggery criminal activity mentions Status: Complete!
All work, little play - the drowning in ‘paperwork’ that Leon had claimed to be doing better not have been about the Brit that wasn’t technically his girlfriend. As a general rule, Revy let people do whatever the fuck they wanted and minded her own business, but there were exceptions every now and again. Henry’s spontaneous mention of a girlfriend that prompted investigation and making sure he wasn’t jumping head first into a tragic mistake, but the blonde was alright and as long as she didn’t make her friend’s life a fucking travesty, go at it, kids.
Leon usually told her things, was the issue. It was sort of weird that he hadn’t said anything. Dwelling on it didn’t seem like something she’d do, but part of her was and it was an uncomfortable itch that wouldn’t go the hell away. She’d been meaning to see how he was doing over the ‘I got dumped news,’ except he was one elusive fucker lately.
From texts he’d alluded to being at the station, so she stopped by. With food, alright? Chinese takeout, something detrimental to the cholesterol and greasy, with fried rice and pork egg rolls, and spicy chicken. It was getting late. Knowing the idiot cop he probably didn’t realize the time or that food was even a necessary thing, or was ignoring his stomach for the sake of the job.
After asking a couple officers (who looked a little intrigued by the somewhat rugged, tattooed woman questioning Leon’s whereabouts), Revy was directed over to his desk. Her presence was made clear when she dropped a brown bag in front of him that smelled fucking delicious.
“Hungry?”
Peggy breaking Leon’s heart was definitely part of the reason that he was working so much, and it was the reason he gave whenever one of his colleagues asked who had pissed in his Cheerios. It was an easy answer. ‘The girl I’ve been seeing got a new boyfriend.’ Short, sweet, and it stopped any other questions which is exactly what Leon wanted because he liked to keep his work life and his personal life separate. Or, at least, he liked to keep his personal life out of his work life. The reverse wasn’t strictly true. And it stopped him from thinking about the other things that he didn’t want to think about, which was kind of the whole point. Things like the fact that he was beginning to suspect that everyone was right and that he might have had a bit of a thing for D. Dream Leon had managed to avoid that train of thought for the last ten years, but in the waking world Leon was hard pressed to think of any other reasons he would have cut off contact with every single person he knew in LA, including Chris, so he could become a homeless vagabond who searched the world for a decade for one man who kept running away from him.
Things like the fact that he was needing to work very, very hard to keep Revy from infiltrating his thoughts.
It was working well so far. He woke up, he went to work, he worked until he was too exhausted to think, and then he went home, and a few beer, and slept.
Eating was something he tended to forget about when he was working himself like this. He ate when he realized he couldn’t follow a train of thought to its conclusion because his stomach got in the way, or when someone brought in doughnuts or takeout for the department, but he hadn’t even noticed he was hungry until something that smelled like it a bit of heaven dropped in front of him. His mouth immediately started watering and his stomach let out a growl. He didn’t immediately look up from his crime scene photos though. He assumed it was Logan or someone else who was making sure he was nourished, and was about to absently thank them until Revy spoke.
His head whipped up from the file fast enough that he could have given himself whiplash. “What the fuck are you doing here?” Leon asked, a little louder than he probably should have, but sounding more surprised than displeased. For half a moment he was worried she’d managed to get herself arrested and he’d have to bail her out, but his brain quickly caught up with him and realized that she wouldn’t have been bringing him Chinese food if that was the case.
“Will you shut the fuck up,” came the mercenary’s growl, because it wasn’t that necessary to pipe up that loud. There was a chair in front of his desk she’d gotten comfortable in, and she tore open the paper bag to start pulling out the contents within. “You’ve been being a little bitch and anti-social and balls deep in your work. I figured the only way I’d get to see you is if I brought you something to eat.”
It wasn’t much of a big deal, friends did this all the time, didn’t they? And they were friends, even if they went about things unconventionally and she figured he didn’t want to flaunt an ex-felon around his cop buddies. If he watched his fucking mouth, then she’d do him the favor of behaving.
That was… actually kind of sweet, actually. Touched, Leon suppressed a smile, his eyes crinkling and his lips curving downward even though it was obvious they wanted to do the opposite. “Yeah, well, things have been crazy lately,” Leon said, reaching for a container of takeout and a pair of chopsticks. “I've got this twenty-year old kid who was found by his roommate a couple days ago. Who the fuck doesn't have a pet nowadays?” Maybe it was cheating, but between his ability to talk to pets and Liv’s murder-solving psychic powers, Leon really hadn't had to do much legwork recently. Not that he was complaining, or had even asked for Liv’s help on this case. Having something to focus all his brainpower on was nice.
He broke apart his chopsticks, then clutched them both in his fist and plunged them into the spicy chicken like an ineffective shovel. “I was fucking starved though. Thanks, Revy,” he said, inexplicably managing to get some chicken on said chopsticks and shoving it into his mouth.
Yeah, with the way he was shoveling food into that big ol’ fucking mouth of his, she could tell food really hadn’t been a priority - guess after almost a year of friendship, she actually knew the dumbass better than she thought. Revy went for the pork eggrolls first, and peeled back the plastic lid of the sweet n’ sour sauce to dip it in. “In most retarded rom-coms women either don’t eat enough after a breakup or drown themselves in icecream,” she snorted. “I figured you were the former.”
She had almost, almost brought a six-pack of Heineken into the building until she realized he’d probably get into some deep shit for drinking on the job. “Anyway, so, what, your Dr. Dolittle powers help with a case?”
“You calling me a woman?” Leon asked around a mouthful of chicken. He swallowed. “Anyway, it has nothing to do with the breakup.” It had a little to do with the breakup, but that was still something that felt, well, weird to talk about with Revy. “It’s just… work.”
He shook his head, more than happy to move away from that topic. He dropped his voice, even though most of the cops who’d originally turned to stare at the strange tattooed woman bringing Leon dinner had already turned back to their own conversations. “And you’re damn right I do,” he said, an excited fervor to his hushed voice. “Suspect murders someone in front of Fido or Flounder thinking ‘hey, what the hell’s this fucking fish going to say’ and blam. I’ve got an eye witness all ready to go. I mean, not one I can use in court, but it sure makes finding evidence easier when someone saw the whole thing happen right in front of them.”
“You’ve been a woman - twice - and experienced about twenty percent of our fucking plight. Get over it,” she grumbled, pointing her own set of sticks at him menacingly. But she pried open the white cardbox box of fried rice and took a stab at it. “But congratu-fucking-lations on realizing the perks of your super power, Orcot. You’re one of the freaks you get so judgy about.”
Revy snickered. All in the spirit of playful banter, right? With curse words and raised voices sometimes. “I’ll keep your tricks a secret, though. Start clearing more cases like that, they’ll promote you up the chain, huh?”
After a couple of attempts, Leon managed to skewer a pork roll on the ends of his chopsticks. “You don’t have to say it so loud,” Leon muttered, though no one was close enough to hear about Leon’s adventures with a bra. “I’m not-” Leon started, but even he couldn’t finish the sentence. He could get a little judgey about things sometimes. “Yeah, I guess I got one of those freak flags I could fly if I wanted to. I’m angling more for a raise than a promotion though. Any higher means I’m stuck with bullshit manager duties. No thanks. I’ve got enough trouble managing myself.” Sergeant Leon Orcot had a nice ring to it, maybe, though it didn’t sound nearly as nice to his ears as Detective Leon Orcot.
“You’re a hot mess sometimes,” Revy told him, a rough chuckle following. Right now she was stirring the meat with the sauce - the shit was all uneven, no one liked unevenly sauced meat. “But I think you wouldn’t be a total fuck up if you were handled more responsibilities. You’re a fucking asshole every now and again but in the end, they could use someone like you.”
Leon had good intentions overall, and didn’t let his morality waver. Even if it could have them class here and there, it was a good trait to have all things considered - more people in the police force needed to be like that.
Leon rubbed his nose with his index finger in an attempt to hide the pleased, if not vaguely embarrassed, smile that appeared on his face. “You think so?” Leon asked. The smile was a little less bashful when he leaned back in his chair, hands behind his head. “Sergeant Leon Orcot. You don’t think it sounds lame?”
“Don’t let your cock inflate in pride,” she grumbled around a bite of General Tso’s chicken, and waited until things were properly chewed and swallowed before she spoke again - otherwise, that’s fucking rude. “And no, it doesn’t. You always striked me as the guy that was in this to help out, not for the money. But do whatever the hell makes you happy, even if it pays like shit.”
Maybe it was something she needed to embrace too, considering the criminal life paid well. But she also did it for the risk, the rush of adrenaline, the lust for blood and a bunch of other fucked up reasons that proved she was fucked in the head. Revy clung to it all like a lifeline, never thinking she was allowed any sort of life beyond it. Now? Well, she wasn’t dead. Or in prison anymore.
And she had friends. Legitimate people she’d take a bullet for. Editing scenes where people take it up the ass regularly wasn’t a career she wanted to have for the rest of the life, but it was a start. Maybe she’d find something she actually liked doing, eventually.
Life was too short to worry about swallowing your food before talking. “You don’t become a cop if you’re in it for the money,” Leon said, talking around a mouthful of rice. He frowned thoughtfully, and swallowed. “I mean, unless you’re becoming a cop just so you can turn dirty. I don’t think most dirty cops join the force with that in mind though.” That was something that came later, when people realized that no matter what they did it wouldn’t matter. When people realized that if their neck was going to be on the line anyway, then they might as well get good money for it.
“Dirty cops make a fucking killer,” Revy commented, quietly, so his colleagues wouldn’t hear. And ‘quiet’ wasn’t exactly always in her nature, but fuck, she could at least be considerate and not glean him unwanted attention. “I knew one. Nice guy. You wouldn’t think he’d be the type - I mean, he still did his job on a regular basis. He’d get paid to look the other way when business was handled, or for mishandling evidence.”
It’s not like she was indulging a major secret - all this was years ago, in Chinatown, and fuck if she knew whether or not he was still alive, retired or got caught and thrown in the slammer. “I think the job jaded him too much. Too much shit to clean up back home, but he did what he could to try and help the gutter rats out at least.” Unlike some she encountered, but what the fuck ever.
“You’re not helping the ‘gutter rats’ if keep letting criminals come around,” Leon muttered, more out of habit than with any real conviction behind his words. All that did was let them come around and turn more kids to the life of crime. But then, people would probably just do that anyway. It was human nature to be a greedy and selfish.
“It’s more complicated than that,” she rolled her eyes - because it was a fact, there was no one magical bandaid to fix everything. “Not every kid on the street turned out like me. Some got saved, I guess, if you call being thrown into the system a happily ever after.” Others died too early, too young. Facts of life. “You kinda end up learning nothing’s ever black and white.”
Fuck. Depressing topic. Revy shook her head, changing the subject. “Anyway, the point I wanted to make in coming here was to hurry the hell up and get over yourself. Otherwise I’m going to do the couch exchange with someone else and replace you.”
Leon wasn’t going to argue with Revy about it. There was a time when he’d say it really was that simple, that taking criminals off the street did nothing but protect the kids they might have preyed upon. But Leon was realizing that nothing was really that simple. Besides, Revy had lived through it. She likely had more of an idea about what things were really like out there than the kid of a cop who’d lived in relative comfort all his life. So instead, he sat in solemn silence and chewed on her words.
“Oh please, like you know anyone who has a couch half as comfortable as mine,” he snorted.
“I might know one or two,” she casually informed, pointing a chopstick at him. Henry or Trevelyan would probably allow her to bleed all over their couch if necessary, but no one would play nurse in Bug’s Bunny boxers like this particular fuckwad. “Yours might be my favorite, though. It’s probably got the imprint of my body in it right now.”
Revy called dibs.
Stuffed already, she covered up her leftovers and stuffed them into the paper bag. “You gonna get off work soon, or are you going to keep moping the fuck around? I got beer in my car if you’re ready to check out.”
Well, if that didn’t make Leon feel all warm and fuzzy. “Yeah, it ruined my butt groove,” Leon grumbled, despite the fact that he was pretty sure he’d never made a butt groove on his couch.
He leaned back in his chair and looked at his computer. He was nice and full now, and now that he wasn’t going to either be thinking of hunger or needing to leave to pick up something, he could probably get some more work done. But the desire just wasn’t there anymore. Especially not with the idea of a couple of beer waiting for him. “Yeah, I think I’ll punch the clock. I should’ve gone home three hours ago anyway,” he said. “Lead the way, Revy.”