Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Segador Flashback: Concrete Operations

Tuesday May 22, 2029: 5:22 p.m. - one of the Staples Center parking lots, downtown Los Angeles, California

The sky above them is a hazy pink dusted with blue at the edges, soft paintbrush clouds, gilded a rosy bronze at the western edge.  There are squatty buildings around them, on the nearby streets, stout little things compared to the skyscrapers up just a few blocks.  All around them are people, moving in loud, happy chatter, wearing shades of purple and yellow and gold and white, lots of bright colors that dance and move in between the parked cars, but he -

He is up high.

He is tall like this, sitting on his father’s shoulders.

Gabriel is taller than anyone here.

Almost tall enough to reach the clouds.

He is five - almost six, that’s important - and he is tall like this.

“Alright, Gabrielito,” comes the easy, breezy voice beneath him, and Gabriel drums his fingers on his father’s head, fingers tapping through short, dark curls. In response, Eddie Reyes jumps slightly, hoisting his shoulders even higher, causing Gabriel to squeak and giggle and his mother, Isabella Reyes, to give a tense sigh behind them.

“It’s quiz time, Gabrielito,” Eddie says as they join the crowd of people moving to the big, rounded building, lit up with purple and yellow lights.  His father shifts around a car a little as he asks teasingly, “Who are we rooting for tonight, mijo?”

“The Lakers!” Gabriel answers, pat-pat-patting at his father’s short, brown hair, so curly.  On the left side of his father, ten-year-old Rafael groans, “Don’t give him such an easy question.  Even Maria could answer that.”

“Nuh-uh!” Gabriel pouts down at his half-brother, who flicks a twisted sneer back at him.  The five-year-old slumps a little on his dad’s head, grumbling, “Maria is just a baby.  She doesn’t know nothing.”

“Anything,” his seven-year-old sister Veronica corrects him on the other side of their father.  Gabriel pouts down at her next, as she smirks, “Gabo doesn’t know much - can’t even read right.”

“Can too -” Gabriel starts to protest but Isabella titters behind them, “You kids behave.  And don’t tease your brother.”

“I wasn’t teasing him, Mamá,” Veronica wisecracks, her dark curls bouncing with each prouncy step as she skips along beside her father-younger-brother hybrid tall person, “I was teaching him!”

“You can’t teach me nothing because you don’t know anything either,” Gabriel snaps right back, squirming slightly, trying to reach down to whamp at her, but Eddie jumps a bit again, chiding him a little more sternly, “Gabo, be nice.”

“I can read,” Gabriel mutters sourly, plopping his chin on his dad’s head, curls poofing up around him slightly.  The five-year-old adds softly, “The letters look a li’l funny.”

“I know, Gabo, I know,” Eddie says sympathetically, patting at his right leg before his father swings his voice back into pre-game mode, “But you got the question right!  That means you get another question!”

Rafael groans slightly in that way that he does sometimes, when things seem to annoy him for no good reason, but Gabriel focuses on his father, who asks him clearly, “So who are the Lakers playing today?”

“Um...another purple team,” Gabriel starts to answer, but Veronica giggles at his half-response and the five-year-old sends her another squinty glare.  His sister taunts, “He doesn’t know, he doesn’t know!”

“I do too!” Gabriel yells, “I don’t remember!  I know it!”

“C’mon, Gabito,” Eddie says as they start to really get closer to the arena, to where the crowds start to grow dense and muddled around them.  But Gabriel stays up high, stays above everyone.  Eddie’s left hand locks around his ankle a little more firmly as his father’s right hand points to a hanging banner in black, silver, and purple, asking, “What does that say there?”

“Um…” Gabriel hums, staring up at it.  There’s a long, weird word at the top and he doesn’t like how it looks, it looks funny to him, but there’s a shorter, bolder word saying -

“Um...Ki-ings,” Gabriel says slowly, sounding out each letter, before affirming in a stronger, more confident tone, “Kings!”

“¿Qué es ‘Kings’ en español?” Eddie asks his second son, and Gabriel lifts his arms up as he cheers, “Reyes!”

But then the five-year-old stops, frowning as he murmurs, “Papá, why don’t we root for them?”

“We can’t root for them, Gabrielito - they’re trying to beat the Lakers in the playoffs,” Eddie explains, as if the words make sense.  Gabriel scowls a little more, saying, “But they’re Kings, and we’re kings -”

“You can’t root for a team just based on the name,” Rafael mutters sourly as they shuffle towards the entrance of the arena with the crowd.  His brother huffs, “Besides, the Kings are a shitty team -”

“Language!” Isabella snaps at him sharply, causing the one-year-old Maria to shift and squirm, crying slightly in her arms.  Isabella coos at the child, before murmuring sternly to her step-son, “Rafael Miguel Reyes, how many times do I have to tell you to mind your manners?”

“Everyone swears at school, Mom,” Rafael rebukes tartly but Eddie rumbles at him with a touch more verve to his usually kind voice, “Are we at school right now?”

“...No,” Rafael sighs, and Eddie states with a certain finality, “Then you will listen to your mother.”

Rafael makes a face that Gabriel doesn’t really understand, but Eddie’s voice quickly draws his attention as his father says, “Gabo, we can’t root for the Kings because the Lakers are our team.  And besides -”

Eddie leans his head back, causing Gabriel to stare down at him solemnly, as his father beams an upside-down smile, all bright and bold even as the slowly-setting sun causes his already deep, rich-toned face to be cast in growing shadows and gilded, rose light:

“There’s another Kings team here in L.A. - I’ll take you to one of their games, okay?”

“Hmmm,” Gabriel hums, before grinning right back, “Okay, Papá!”

---------

Sharpshooter: Ideation

Wednesday, May 22, 2058: 10:35 a.m. - Strike-Commander Morrison’s personal office, Watchpoint: Geneva

Just do it.

Jesse fidgets with the watch on his right wrist - it’s still a li’l too slack, still a li’l too loose, still a size too big - but he refuses to take it off.  First real Christmas gift in years that wasn’t a gun, or a set of ammo, or a new tattoo that he hadn’t really wanted, or a case of cheapass beer when Terry “forgot.”  He still feels a li’l uncomfortable with everything - with the new, clean clothes, and the boots and pants that actually fit, and the ability to get food from any fridge in the Watchpoint - any Watchpoint - and the happy, cheerful jokes and the easy laughter.  

The eighteen-year-old is outside of Jack’s office - the smaller one, not the “big new one” they’re trying to stick him in, now that everyone is in the process of reorganizing the Commanders and “shifting the hierarchy around,” or so the official UN people say.  Jack keeps saying the “smaller, old SIC one still works perfectly fine,” that he doesn’t need a big fancy office “with a view to die for” or anything else, but Gabriel keeps joking that Jack “needs a bigger room to stick all the medals and awards in,” needs a bigger office to “contain all his goals and objectives and dreams” (“because Jack tends to dream too big,” Gabriel had added to Jesse with a knowing smirk before a folded paper airline with the words “Ur ass is too big” scrawled on it hit the boss peg in the beanie, causing Gabriel to laugh that bold, radiant laugh and Jesse to bury his face in his hands, embarrassed over the dumb commanders’ dumb, awkward flirting, the dumb idiots).

Just remembering the moment causes Jesse to grumble under his breath, makin’ him regret even coming out to this hallway with his dumb, stupid idea, and his dumb, stupid hope, and his dumb, stupid hat and why is everything dumb and stupid, so stupid, this is a real dumbass idea o’ yers, boy -

His hands pull at his face, at the short, choppy scruff of his goatee, at the small scab where he’d nicked himself with his razor this morning, when he’d been mullin’ over the dumb, stupid idea, and had felt smart, so smart, so brilliant, it had seemed like a stroke o’ genius until he’d bolted his dead ass down the hallway to this very door and realized -

He didn’t have

A damn clue

On how to make this idea work.

Pops will know what to do, just do it, just tell him, a small, fragile, slang-twanged voice whispers to him in the back of his head, urging him to press the button on the bright blue door and just open up and step into the office and just tell Jack his dumb, stupid idea, because Jack is great at making dumb, stupid ideas seem amazing and wonderful and not dumb or stupid at all -

Don’ be ridiculous.

Jesse freezes, his right hand hovering over the door button, as a cold, chilled, hard-edged voice drawls at him from his still uncomfortable core.

A voice like steel, solid and strong but bitter, sharp as icicles, sharp as a shock of fusion to raw skin -

What kinda dumbass thinks Gabriel fucking Reyes - ex-commander of Overwatch, greatest military hero of yer lifetime - would want a dumbass gift like that from you, o’ all people? The voice rolls through Jesse’s head like a quiet, freezing storm, broken not with ragged lightning or harsh thunder, but instead with a steady, frustratingly even pace that moves like a sinister flood through the desert.

He don’ need this paltry present from you, boy - you owe him yer weight in blood and bullets, ain’t no gift gonna level that debt.

That… Jesse thinks, summin’ up his courage as he tries to push back against the voice of quiet, sweeping storms and broken promises and bad blood, That ain’t what this is for!  This is...just ta thank him!  Fer being nice!

Boy, he don’ need nice from you - the deadlocked part of Jesse’s soul begins to chide him, roiling into a burn when -

Something solid and cotton-y slams into Jesse’s face.

“Oomph,” both Jesse and the solid person huff, and Jesse briefly sees nothing but grey fabric and a slightly blonde-stubbled chin before strong hands grip at his shoulders and wrassle them apart, that deep, ocean-tide voice calling out with shock, “Jesse??”

“Oh, uh, hey, Pops,” Jesse stammers, still slightly stunned by Jack as the new Strike-Commander manages to push them apart a li’l, straightening Jesse’ slackened form.  Jack’s bright, if confused face swims into view, those bold, blue eyes searching over Jesse’s face - technically only a few inches shorter than the supersoldier himself (“if you’d just stand up a little straighter,” Jesse can practically hear Gabriel chide him as Jack chuckles in the background) - with utter concern and a little bit of dismay.

“You okay, kid?” Jack asks, a slightly crooked smile gracing that Steve Rogers face, as he chuckles, “Sorry, I really didn’t see you there - I’m on my way to talk to Reinhardt about this mission in Australia and - Jesse, what’s wrong?”

In an instant

Jack has seen through Jesse’s facade

No matter how much he tries to deadlock his face

Seems like Jack and Gabriel can read him like an open book -

“Jesse, son, are you okay?” Jack asks again, his smile sliding off his face and Jesse scowls briefly before -

Stupid stupid stupid stupid, you can’t make the new Strike-Commander worry like that, ya fresh kinda dumbass, Jesse snarls at himself, He don’ got time for yer bullshit, ya can’t just drop this shit on him -

Jesse beams a big, wide, flashy smile, saying out as smooth as he can, “Ah, yeah, sorry, viejo, just had a thought, ain’t nothing important though -”

“Oh,” Jack grins back, stepping aside to gesture to his office, “I’m not in a rush, Jesse - c’mon in, I’ll listen -”

“Ah, nah,” Jesse says, shoving his hands in his pockets, scuffing the toe of a boot at the floor as he tries to smile back, “It really ain’t worth yer time, Commander -”

“Well, sure it is, Jesse,” Jack replies, giving him one of the most genuine, warm smiles Jesse thinks anyone’s ever turned towards him.  The commander tilts his head a li’l, chuckling, “I always like hearing what you have to say, kid.”

Oh no, Jesse thinks, feeling despair sink into the pit of his stomach.

Oh no, I trust him -

“It’s a dumb gift idea.”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

But Jack is hardly fazed by Jesse’s apparent shock and lack of tact - there’s a calm, firm hand on Jesse’s back, patting him reassuringly as Jack takes a step back into his office, saying cheerfully, “A gift for who?  Angela?”

“What - no, what, why,” Jesse states, giving Jack a quizzical, yet deadpan stare, and the commander shrugs, chuckling, “Just thought I’d take a guess - wait.”

Jack’s face deepens into a concerned and slightly skeptical scowl as he mutters, “It’s not a gift for Torbjörn, is it?  I’m still mad he got you that BAMF belt buckle for Christmas.”

“...What’s wrong with the belt buckle,” Jesse asks, squinting at Jack real hard as he steps into the office, pouting slightly as he squares up against the commander, muttering tartly, “Ain’t nothin’ wrong with a li’l flair, Pops.”

“There’s ‘flair’ and then there’s ‘poor taste,’ Jesse,” Jack retorts, snapping the button on the door to slide it shut.  The commander sighs as he returns to his desk, plopping himself in the chair behind the monitors and holo-projections of his computer, “The assistant to the Commander of Blackwatch should try to look a little more presentable -”

“Papito wears a hoodie, Pops,” Jesse grumbles, tossing himself into one of the guest chairs across the desk, folding his arms as he adds with a slow, sugar contemplation, “And a beanie.”

“Look, I’ve never been able to control how Gabe dresses,” Jack admits, shrugging slightly, before he points at Jesse with a smirk, “But I’d hate for you to pick up on his bad habits.”

“Trust me,” Jesse chuckles, before gesturing at his chest and legs, saying smugly, “The unfashionable boss ain’t responsible for this avante garde freshness.”

Jack gives him a long, thousand-yard look before muttering, “So about this gift.”

Oh.

Right.

That.

“I, uh,” Jesse starts and stops, starts and stops, fidgeting with the watch on his wrist - he doesn’t want to say that he hates it, he’s just a li’l uncomfortable with it, is all, he just hasn’t grown into it yet, he -

“Do you need that adjusted?” Jack asks suddenly, and Jesse startles back into the moment, stammering, “¿Qué?”

“The watch?  I told Gabriel it was too big for you, he just kept saying that you’d grow into it,” Jack says, smiling faintly, and Jesse feels that same warm squeezing feeling around his chest that he’d felt when -

Two days before Christmas, 2057

“Giving you this a little early, okay, chico?” Gabriel says with a slight smirk, placing the small, cleanly-wrapped box on the coffee table.  The commander leans back into the old couch, settling against Jack’s arm slung around his shoulders as the then-Second-in-commander adds on, “We wanted to give you this when you passed the GED but the last month has been really busy.”

“Aw, shoot, y’all didn’t hafta get me nothing,” Jesse mutters, picking up the present, eyeing it a touch suspiciously.  It’s a reeeeeeal small box, too small to be a gun, could be some sort of ammo case or somethin’, some sort o’ new weapon or tool -

“What,” Gabriel states, quirking an eyebrow at Jesse as he continues, “We sure as shit were gonna get you something, kid.  You did good on those tests.”

Oh.

“We’re just sorry we couldn’t also get you a real Christmas gift in time,” Jack chuckles, but Jesse notices how Gabriel’s right hand slips up to squeeze at Jack’s right, hanging off his shoulder.  Jack grins brightly, “We’re thinking a trip to Disneyland with Mei and Fareeha might make up for that?”

“What,” Jesse half-asks, half-states, looking between them, the present feeling surprisingly, unbearably light in his hands.  They’re in one of the small side rooms of the Reyes house - Gabriel’s childhood home, still owned by his parents - a surprisingly wide bungalow in central Los Angeles, decorated with good, delicious smells and bright, cheerful lights wafting through the house.  There’s pleasant chatter from the kitchen just down the hall, a mix of English and Spanish being shared by far too many happy people in far too small a room, but the Reyes’s had welcomed Jesse with open arms and wide smiles and titterings of “Gabo, why aren’t you feeding him properly?  Look at how skinny he is!” just a few days ago when the two commanders and their ramblin’, cowboy protege had rolled into town.

“...You don’...” Jesse starts and stops, starts and stops, searching between smug, gilded-bronze eyes and bright, open blue ones, shifting back and forth between Gabriel’s knowing smirk and Jack’s happy grin, and the eighteen-year-old had felt an utter loss for words to describe what he was feeling, a strange warm feeling snaking around his chest and -

“You don’ hafta - I don’ need ta see Disneyland - I’m eighteen, I dun need ta -” Jesse stammers, but Gabriel just beams that shit-eating grin wider, his light-dark eyes twinkling with mischief as he mutters, “You should open the gift before you hurt yourself, kid.”

Jesse continues to look between them, before he shifts his gaze to the li’l box in his hands, so clean and nice and comfortable and -

Gingerly, he picks at the tape on one of the sides, prying it open carefully and cautiously before Gabriel chuckles, “It ain’t made of glass, Jesse - you can tear into it -”

“But the paper is real pretty.”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

The sound of silence is all that answers him.

That ain’t normal, the steel-cut voice in his head reminds him, You ain’t being normal.

Jesse glances up in horror, realizing he must’ve made a mistake when -

There are mirrored looks of bittersweet happiness on the two commanders’ faces, Gabriel slumping his mouth against his left hand contemplatively, his right hand lifted still, fingers entwined with Jack’s right.  Jack’s left hand is curled into a fist, pressed against his mouth, but his eyes are misted with a strange haze and -

“I, uh…” Jesse stutters, not sure what to do with this emotion swelling in his heart, “I ain’t got a present in a long time.  Not a real one, like all wrapped pretty like this.  Uh…”

“Just - just open it,” Gabriel barks out hoarsely, his voice cracking a little, but Jesse notices how his right hand squeezes Jack’s again.  Jesse looks back at the li’l box in his hands, before prying off the rest of the tape and easing the box out of the paper and -

He stares hard at the logo, before muttering, “...Axiom?  Ain’t they expensive?”

“You don’t even know what it is yet,” Jack laughs lightly, his deep voice rumbling a little, “And you’re already judging it?”

“No, ain’t judging, just...y’all didn’t hafta spend this,” Jesse murmurs, cracking the box open with a scowl and -

He freezes.

Time freezes.

Which is a slight irony, because the watch inside the box is sleek and slick, a soft square with rounded edges, a smooth holo-screen face projecting a slim digital clock, but as Jesse looks at it, the screen shifts to a more standard datapad interface, only in miniature.

Jesse swallows his heart.

“An Axiom datawatch,” Jack says happily as Gabriel adds with a clear smirk to his words, “Cause you’re real bad at telling time and so we can call you when you inevitably get lost at Disneyland tomorrow.”

“It’s…” Jesse starts.  And stops.  Starts.  And -

“It’s not ammo,” he whispers, staring at it with a slow, syrupy reverence, his hands are shaking a li’l, the most expensive things he’s ever held are Peacekeeper and several packs of cocaine and disabled fusion cores, stuffed into bundles on his body as he demanded money from whatever distributor Deadlock had negotiated with -

This is the most expensive thing he’s ever held -

And it’s not the watch.

It’s a strange, warm, comfortable feeling of richness settling in around his heart as

“The fuck - why would we give you ammo?” Gabriel asks with utter confusion in his voice - drifting across Jesse’s consciousness like the Christmas lights everywhere - as Jack laughs as bright as the good, delicious smells in the house, “We wanted to give you a nice gift for passing the GEDs!”

“Good job on your tests, kid,” Gabriel adds with a sunshiny grin and Jack is beaming too and -

“Gabe also keeps saying that you’d lose your datapad if ‘it isn’t strapped to your wrist,’” Jack continues, chuckling at the faint humor of his partner ghosting in the words.  Jesse blinks a few times, remembering where he is, glancing at the watch on his wrist, the clock interface flashing at him briefly as he grounds himself on the time.

10:38 a.m.

“But we can get the strap adjusted,” Jack offers, grinning that sideways smile again, “Or we can just get Torb to drill an extra hole in the leather, give you another size to refit it to.”

“Nah, it’s...it’s good, Pops, really,” Jesse replies, shifting it against his wrist slightly before -

10:39 a.m.

He lets the time ground him.

Just do it.

He won’t get mad.

He’ll listen to you.

Jesse heaves a heavy, expensive sigh, before sitting up a li’l straighter, a li’l taller as he squares his gaze against Jack’s, saying as confidently as he can muster:

“I wanna...I wanna get Gabriel a gift fer Father’s Day.”

A look of amazed, wowed shock blooms openly on Jack’s face before the commander murmurs, “Wasn’t expecting that one, that’s for sure.  You don’t have to get him anything, Jesse - your savings are for you -”

“I...I know that, Jack,” Jesse replies, and shit, he shouldn’t’ve cut the commander off like that, what’s wrong with him, why does he keep doing that -

But Jack just folds his hands on his desk and gives Jesse a patient, understanding smile, saying calmly, “If you promise me it won’t be too expensive, I’ll help you get a gift for Gabriel.”

Jesse freezes, flinching slightly at the conditions and clauses in the sentence, wondering if he can get around that first part because -

The strange, warm, comfortable feeling of richness lingers around his heart and wrist -

It’s the most expensive thing he’s ever held -

“...I mean,” Jesse starts and Jack frowns slightly, asking slowly, “Jesse, that money is for your future -”

“In case ya fergot, Pops, I work here,” Jesse grumbles and Jack outright scowls, his voice dipping low into that eternal ‘I’m not your father, but I will go parental on your ass’ tone that Strike Commander John Morrison seems to be capable of channeling at the drop of a hat:

“I have never forgotten that you work here, Jesse - if anything, I am incapable of forgetting that we’ve been putting an eighteen-year-old’s life on the line for Overwatch and Blackwatch.”

Jesse starts to say something.  Stops.  Feels that strange, warm, comfortable feeling slip through his ribs again as Jack leans back in his chair, grumbling mainly to himself, “But when Gabriel and Ana are set on something - especially set on something together - they’re impossible to deal with.  I’d like nothing more than to send you to college, but when all three of you insist you can work here -”

“I belong here,” Jesse retorts sharply, mirroring Jack’s motion as he folds his arms across his chest, snapping, “I ain’t goin’ nowhere -”

“That’s not what I mean, Jesse, and you know it,” Jack states, with a touch of sharpness to his tone, “Gabriel and I would never force you to leave, but college is important -”

“Ain’t so important in the post-apocalypse, Pops,” Jesse retorts with a smug smirk, and Jack rubs a hand to his forehead, growling slightly, “I just want you to have the ability to choose your industry, Jesse - what if you really like working with computers?  Or writing articles?”

“I chose my industry at fourteen.”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

Jack turns his ocean-tide gaze - soft at the edges with the sunlight drifting in behind him - and there, there is that bittersweet look that he’d had, two days before Christmas, when Jesse had mentioned how pretty the wrapping paper was and -

“I belong here,” Jesse says again, only not so harshly, not so defensively, a more even, level, comfortable tone to his words.  There’s a squeezing warmth around his heart as he murmurs slowly, in syrupy words, “I ain’t good at much, Pops - I really only got one natural gift and that’s putting bullets in people so I might as well do it in service o’ the people who keep me outta jail.”

“That’s not true.”

Jesse glowers a little at Jack but Jack -

Jack just smiles a soft, bittersweet happiness and Jesse starts and stops.  Starts and stops.

“You’re gifted at many things, Jesse,” Jack says kindly, warmly, comfortably, “You passed your GEDs even though you only studied for them for two months.  You helped Angela improve her English.  You taught Mei how to aim her endothermic blaster more evenly, which is something that not even Ana could do.  You’re the only person Fareeha really trusts, and getting a twelve-year-old to believe in you is a much bigger deal than you think.  You get Mirembe to laugh when no one else can and Mina keeps saying you’re a big help around here.”

Jesse tries to ground himself on the time but -

“You’re very good at understanding tactics - Gabriel and Ana have nothing but good things to say about you there.  And you pick up languages really quickly - I keep telling you that you’d get Italian and French really fast if you try,” Jack continues, before grinning widely, brightly, like water reflecting sunlight, the rays of the sun behind him catching him in a backlit glow as he beams:

“We’re all very proud of you, Jesse, for everything you do - Gabriel and I especially.”

Jesse chokes a li’l on the words caught in his throat.  

Jack returns to sitting up straight in his chair, pulling himself back to his desk as he smiles kindly, “I just want you to know that we’re proud of you for all that you do, not just helping Gabriel on missions.  You do a lot of good around here, Jesse, and if you ever want to try another division, Gabriel and I will be happy to help you switch -”

“Shotguns.”

The word is out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

Jack frowns a li’l, before quirking an eyebrow and Jesse stammers out, “I wanna get Gabriel better shotguns.”

Real dumbass idea, real stupid, dumbass idea -

“Why do you want to do that?” Jack asks calmly, looking at him with a patient steady gaze, folding his hands on the desk as he tilts his head slightly, adding, “Gabriel’s SEP shotguns are still working just fine -”

“He’s burnin’ ‘em out.”

Jack scowls and Jesse feels his heart hammerin’ in his chest, and he swallows a gulp of anxious fear as he fidgets with his watch, trying his hardest to sum up his courage and -

“Gabriel’s shotguns burn out frequently,” Jack says, as he reaches down and pulls out his datapad, tapping a code into the lock screen before opening a file system.  The commander continues, “We have replaced parts of the shotguns rather frequently, especially the barrels - we replace them when the plasma pulse shots begin to warp the tungsten.  Torb has him slotted for regular maintenance, but you think we should move that up?”

Jesse chews on his fear a li’l, trying to warm it into a comfortable mush in his spirit as he murmurs, a li’l hesitantly:

“Nah, not maintenance - new guns entirely.”

Jack looks up from his datapad and raises an eyebrow, asking with a slight hum to his words, “New guns entirely?  Why’s that?”

Just do it.

Just tell him.

Jesse drums slightly on the watch, feeling the fear settle low, but the warm, comfortable, expensive feeling rises to the top and -

“Tungsten’s a fine metal, ‘bout as good as ya need fer cold plasma,” Jesse murmurs slowly, thinking back on the different plasma and fusion guns he’s handled, the parts he’s worked on, fixing up old SEP-era Crisis guns that Deadlock had managed to get a hold of.  Jesse frowns, adding, “Tungsten’s still gonna get warped by the cold plasma, but all rifles get worn down, so it’s par fer the course.”

He stares hard into the grains of time, eyes unfocusing a li’l, seeing the rare SEP plasma-slag shotgun the gang had managed to get just before the Overwatch Strike raid, and the cowboy mutters low, “The problem with the shotguns ain’t the tungsten specifically, but the FRAG-21 shots.  SEP was purely experimental, yeah?”

Jack sits up a little straighter, folds his hands on the desk, watches Jesse with a keen, blue-sky focus, answering lowly, “That’s right.  None of the weapons were meant to survive the Crisis, as far as I know.  The Army and CIA tried their hardest to round them up after the war ended, but obviously that went about as well as any other CIA-clean-up mission.  Deadlock was the biggest network trading the SEP guns, but there were others, all across America and Mexico.  If Gabriel’s hypothesis is correct, they may have jumped the ocean too.”

“Yeah, but what y’all are missin’ is that ain’t no one wanna buy the SEP guns fer using,” Jesse states, folding his arms across his chest, “They just wanna buy ‘em to take ‘em apart and remodel a next gen o’ the guns.  The actual guns themselves are way too dangerous.”

Jack frowns as he thinks it over, drumming his fingers on the desk, and Jesse takes the still but interested silence as his cue to continue, saying:

“Early Crisis guns like that require a lotta maintenance, far too much fer what they’re actually worth.  Why buy an illegal SEP plasma gun made o’ warped tungsten ‘n badly insulated steel ‘n fiberglass when ya can get same quality shot with a newer Volskaya gravity gun or a WM custom plasma gun?”

Jack watches him quietly, calmly, as Jesse nods slightly, saying, “Every post-Crisis plasma gun is gettin’ made o’ tantalum carbide or hafnium carbide or even a tantalum-hafnium-carbide combo.  Putting a coatin’ of the ceramic fiberglass inside barrels, on the hammer, and on the pistons prevents the plasma from warping the underlying tantalum-tungsten structures too badly.  Extends both the life o’ the parts and the gun as a whole.”

Jack nods along a little, before murmuring, “But adding even a few coatings is going to change some of the gun’s proportions and fit.”

“Right,” Jesse agrees, “And yer gonna need to overhaul the hammer and pistons too - maybe even remake the gun with a fiberglass-coated shell on the inside.  Helps regulate the overall side effects of the plasma thermolysis from the FRAG-21 shots on the whole gun.”

Jack stares at him long and steady for a moment before breaking into a deep grin, asking, “You want to make the SEP Plasma-Slag Shotguns 2.0?”

“...In theory,” Jesse mutters before he grins back, “But I was kinda hopin’ ta give ‘em a better name.  Somethin’ a li’l more fittin’”

“I’m a little concerned with your ideas on that,” Jack starts to say dryly, but

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself:

“The Hellfire Shotguns.”

Jack immediately stops, his eyes growing wide and Jesse fears he’s done it, he’s crossed a line this time, the name’s real stupid, real dumb, real dumbass -

Jack suddenly throws his head back and lets out a low, rumbling, thunderstorm laugh:

“Holy shit, Jesse - you’re gonna feed right into Gabriel’s ego with that kinda attitude!”

Jesse breathes a long, heavy sigh, sputtering, “So it’s alright??”

“Alright??  It’s a brilliant idea!” Jack beams at him, as bright as light reflecting off water, and his smile seems to shimmer and shine as he rises, grinning at his self-styled son as he says, “C’mon - let’s get you to Torb’s workshop.  He’s gonna get a massive kick out of this!”

---------

Soldado Flashback: Formal Operations

Tuesday, February 18, 2037: 3:43 p.m. - the Morrison household, a few miles south of Bloomington, Indiana

Jack breathes a long, heavy sigh as he enters the stiff warmth of the house, the feeling familiar and yet slightly stifling all at once.  The air outside had been a strange mix of crisply cool - chilled as all winters are - but oddly muggy, strangely humid, largely due to the thick grey clouds overhead and the snow-slush melting into muddy puddles all across the fields south of Bloomington.  The snow doesn’t seem to want to stick this year, sloughing off into little rivulets of water and ice during daylight hours before the temperature drop of the night refreezes everything.  Once a week, another quick storm seems to blow through, recoating everything, causing the process to start all over again.

Makes Jack feel a little strange - an unsettling halfness, as though the world does not fully want to engage in winter, but isn’t ready for spring.

An uncanny time of the year.

An odd part of life.

His birthday.

Worst gift I got today was an extra hour of math homework, the eleven-year-old grumbles to himself, adjusting his backpack on his shoulder as he slips his snow-slush-damp boots onto the shoe shelf by the door (he’d tugged them off on the porch outside, as his mother always wanted them to do - “don’t track dirt in the house”).  Jack takes several steps in through the hall, heading to the staircase just slightly off-set as he calls out, “Mom, we’re home!”

“She’s prolly out at the Lopez’s,” Peter says, entering the house behind him.  His fourteen-year-old brother also drops his boots by the shoe shelf, muttering hoarsely, “Dad said yesterday they were having some problems in their greenhouse.”

“Oh right,” Jack murmurs, mainly to himself - don’t be disappointed, a voice chides him, You know saving the lettuce is important.  Jack sighs again, another heavy, slow roll of his lungs that feels slightly like suffocating but that’s -

That’s just how things are.

Jack starts up the stairs, fingers tracing up the worn bannister, skipping the third step that squeaks too loud.  The Morrison house is a surprisingly narrow thing - tall like them, three stories at kinda odd intervals, built of oak that’s at least a hundred years old now, white coat of paint on the walls, a half-and-half blend of light and dark, old and new, winter and spring.  It had housed three or four generations of them, or something like that, grown through the decades with little room add-ons and a full garage-barn off to the side, to the point where even though it wasn’t nearly as massive as some of the other homesteads out in the rural farming community, it still felt

Entirely too big

On days like today.

It always felt too empty on his birthday.

But that’s what he gets for being born on a school day - his friends had given him candy at lunch and a snowball fight during recess where they had shouted and play-fought until their lungs had burned, but the best gift had been when Tom and José had given him their rare Pokemon - a retro Deoxys and Mew - named “birthday” and “HAPPY” which had shown up in his PokeMail inbox out of order, causing Jack to snort and laugh and spit an M&M halfway across the cafeteria as his friends had howled with laughter -

But here, in the house that is entirely too big for a family of four so rarely home together

Those feelings linger like the snow slush

Not sure if they should be something tangible or run off into watery mush.

Jack heads to his left, turning into the bedroom hallway, trudging to his room at the far end.  Even with the white walls, the murky sky casts long, drawn shadows across everything, so that even flicking on the lights barely penetrates the strange, unraveling feeling of being constrained.  Jack enters his bedroom, slugging his backpack by his desk and slumping into the chair.  The windows in his room face south, which he likes in the summer because they catch the sunlight all day, from the dim, pastel dawn to the east to the oil-painted hues of the sunset in the west, when all he can see is stalks of corn growing and a sky that floods with color and sunlight and stormclouds.

But in winter, everything is duller, everything darker, coated in half-light, half-darkness, half-snow, half-slush, chilled yet muggy.

On days like today

Days where the house feels entirely too big

Days where he feels a little claustrophobic

Days like every birthday he’s ever experienced

He wishes he could be somewhere where the sun always shines

And the moon is always bright in blue-velvet night skies.

Jack taps at the power button on his datapad, sorting through his homework in his head, deciding which one he wants to do first, when a shadow appears in his doorway.  The boy glances up to see Peter, blue eyes deceptively bright in the half-shadows, blonde hair unruly under the rumpled beanie, giving Jack the same sly, crooked grin that both brothers share as he mutters, “Heard you had a shit birthday.”

“It...could’ve been worse,” Jack admits, swiveling his chair towards Peter, and the younger boy grins, “Got some event-only Pokemon from Tom and José, so that was cool -”

“Neeeeerd,” Peter groans and Jack makes a tart face before sneering, “I don’t deserve this today, Peter -”

“Privileges of being the older brother to a nerdy little one,” Peter says smugly, before lightly tossing something to Jack, who jumps slightly as he catches it.  Peter grins, “I get to treat you like shit any time of the year, Jack - don’t matter what day it is.”

“I think that just makes you a bad brother,” Jack mutters, turning the object over in his hands.  It’s a badly wrapped present of some sort, a weirdly long, angular plastic thing, and the younger boy frowns briefly before lifting his head and looking at his smug brother with awe.

“...You got me something?” Jack asks, slightly shocked and confused because he doesn’t really remember the last time Peter actually got him something, something real, something tangible.  Peter chuckles a little, “Someone has to get you something that’s actually cool for once.  Who better than me?”

“I can think of a lot of people cooler than you,” Jack retorts, prying the paper open, and Peter grumbles, “Looks like this is the last cool thing I get you, you li’l shit.”

Jack pulls the paper away, staring for a long, half-moment before -

“What,” the younger brother half-states, half-asks, turning the long pocket knife - wrapped in safety-plastic, the slim metal catching in the half-light - over and over, his blue eyes tracing the slick blade, the wiry handle, the belt clip on the side.  Jack looks up, eyes large and round with wonder as Peter beams at him - that trademark Morrison smile - laughing brightly:

“Happy birthday, Jack.”

“How did you even buy this??” Jack asks, half-excited, half-nervous, half-happy, a thrill of the unknown, hemmed with grey clouds and thunderstorms, edged with steel-tips and gilded sunlight - there’s a sense of adventure, an uncanny feeling of walking the boundary of small dangers.  Peter smirks, folding his arms across his chest as he leans against the doorframe, “One of my older friends helped me get it. I know it’s kinda cheap but it’s all you’re gonna get this year -”

“You really got me a knife??” Jack stammers, swiveling around to open a desk drawer and pull out some scissors to hack away at the safety plastic.  Peter scowls a little bit, muttering, “You gotta be careful with it, okay?  Don’t show it at school, of course.  And definitely don’t show Mom.  Not for awhile.”

“I’m not stupid, Peter,” Jack says tartly, but his face immediately returns to a smile, he’s grinning, he can’t stop, it feels so stupid to get this worked up over something that probably only cost Peter’s shitty allowance, but still, it’s real, it’s tangible, it’s -

It catches small slivers of sunlight, light that Jack can’t even quite see with his eyes, light that makes the steel dance like water.

Jack grins up at Peter, knife in safety plastic in his left hand, scissors ready to shred the plastic to get to his gift in his right.  The younger boy - so often out of place, so often out of sorts these days, so often caught in half-and-half - smiles brightly as he says:

“Thank you!”

Peter chuckles back, almost mirroring his bright smile as he replies:

“Don’t ever say I’m not a cool brother.”

---------

Sharpshooter: Blueprint

Wednesday, May 22, 2058: 1:14 p.m. - the Blackwatch hall of Watchpoint: Geneva

Jesse bolts down the slick steel hallways, moving as fast as his legs will carry him, bursting at the seams with excitement.  Several agents and support techies yelp and launch themselves out of his way, and at one point he’s pretty sure he blurs past Ana, who shouts after him, “JESSE MCCREE, SLOW THE HELL DOWN -”

In heavy contrast, he definitely blurs past Reinhardt, whose booming laughter is all that echoes after him, calling out, “GO, JESSE, GO!”

Jesse skids slightly, clutching at his hat as he skitters to a stop in front of the mostly non-descript door, slamming the button that slips it open as he hollers, “BOSS -”

“What did I tell you about manners, kid?” Gabriel grumbles, looking up from a monitor to glower at Jesse as the eighteen-year-old leaps and skips into the new Blackwatch Commander office.  The commander himself is tapping something furiously on a holo-projector screen, sliding windows and tabs around, mumbling something about “why does Zhou never organize her files right” as Jesse throws himself in the guest chair, grinning smugly until his boss looks up again, scowling outright.

“Get that Cheshire Cat smirk outta here - what do you want?” Gabriel asks suspiciously before adding, “And why the hell aren’t you working?  We got a ton of stuff to move still - look at this disaster Mei left us in her classifieds.  And I don’t even wanna think about how bad Rein’s look right now -”

“Wanna help me make a gift for Jack for Father’s Day?”

The words out of Jesse’s mouth make Gabriel dead stop.

Jesse’s grin gets even wider as Gabriel slowly leans back in his chair, resting a hand against his mouth as he shifts - it’s evident from the intensely hazy focus in his light brown eyes that he’s contemplating Jesse’s question quite seriously, the thought obviously churning in his head before -

“What kinda gift?” Gabriel asks, turning back towards Jesse and at this, the self-style cowboy suddenly frowns, admitting, “Uh...I was kinda hoping you would have some ideas.”

“...Really,” Gabriel mutters, looking unimpressed, “You come bursting into my office - not even knocking like common courtesy dictates - plaster that shit-eatin’ grin on your face, propose an idea, and that’s it?”

“Yeah, that’s bout as far as I got,” Jesse nods confidently and Gabriel sighs openly, muttering, “Dios dame paciencia - you gotta at least try, boy -”

“I was thinking like - what if we made him a new heavy pulse rifle?” Jesse offers, thinking it would make a great parallel to the shotguns he’s workin’ on fer Gabriel and -

“Are you outta your mind?” Gabriel asks, gawking slightly, “You want to make him a new heavy pulse rifle??  For Father’s Day??  Do you have any idea how much time and money that’s gonna cost?  Not to mention needing Torbjörn’s help on all that.  And the heavy pulse rifle was just serviced last month -”

“...Oh,” Jesse mumbles lamely, feelin’ his bubble burst, feelin’ like he’s a right dumbass for just assumin’ Gabriel would be on board with making Jack a new gun, stupid, so dumb, so -

“Jack doesn’t like big showy gifts,” Gabriel continues, softening slightly at the edges of his voice, his face relaxing back into contemplation and Jesse eases back a bit too, watching as his boss taps a finger across his lips.  Gabriel almost always scowls when he’s thinkin’ hard, contemplatin’ ideas ‘n strategies ‘n plans, so Jesse can tell he ain’t mad, just focusin’ in on Jack, frowning deeply as he murmurs, “Jack’s great in the limelight - I think you know that now, after all that promotion stuff - but he hates being rewarded with gifts that are all talk and no walk.  He even got real fidgety about the Strike-Commander coat, because he thought it was something really expensive and designer-made until I told him that I made it for him.  Giving him a new heavy pulse rifle as a gift?  He’d treat that like spun sugar on missions.”

But then Gabriel gives Jesse a smirk, saying smugly, “Though it’d be real funny seeing him try to treat that gun nice.  He tends to use it like a battering ram a lot.  Likes to knock people over the head with it.”

“Hmm...ain’t that true,” Jesse adds unhelpfully, but he hadn’t fully thought about it like that, though it made a ton of sense now that Gabriel had said it.  Gabriel had always been the more...grandiose of the two commanders - Gabriel was fireworks and big, bright sunshine smiles, but Jack was a storm concealed in fluffy clouds, a churchbell voice hidden in sly smirks.

They’re kinda like their guns, Jesse thinks, nodding to himself, Gabriel got that showy, boom factor, but he got a lot o’ smoke ‘n mirrors - he got that wasteland killer vibe.  Jack got the bigger gun, but it shoots smaller, but goes fer longer, got that secret plasma railgun that looks more sci-fi than post-apocalypse.

“Um, what about a sidearm?” Jesse suggests, because all he really knows is guns and everything about them, but Gabriel huffs slightly, muttering, “Nah.  Jack carries that standard pistol with him just in case, but I’ve only seen him use it once since he got the heavy pulse rifle.”

“Uhhh, what about a new look?” Jesse adds and Gabriel gives him a confused stare, quirking an eyebrow and pouting slightly until Jesse elaborates, “He ain’t the most - uh - ‘fashion-forward’ dude in the world, papito.”

“Look at you,” Gabriel chuckles mischievously, “Sitting there in your cowboy boots and that ridiculous hat and that dumb belt buckle - I’ll never forgive Torb for getting that for you - judging Jack Morrison, highest ranking military commander in the world, for being a normal man.”

“He’s missin’ that badass factor,” Jesse says, shrugging slightly and Gabriel laughs, eyes crinkling at the corners, “Oh chico, you ain’t seen Jack Morrison in action if you think he’s not a badass.  ...But I will admit he lacks some...aesthetic.”

“See?  Let’s make him a new jacket or something,” Jesse says excited and Gabriel pouts, scowling again, “Ain’t no way I’m gonna be able to make something in time for Father’s Day.  And I don’t trust your sewing skills for shit, kid.”

“Rude, I can sew,” Jesse protests, which gets Gabriel to give him a deadpan stare until the sharpshooter admits, “...Kinda?”

“...Moving on,” Gabriel sighs, rubbing at his forehead, “Jack still probably would get all weird about that.  Best I can do is get him gifts on his birthday and Christmas.  He’s the kind of guy who prefers a good trip somewhere than an actual object - and if you do get him something real, he prefers it to be...how should I say this - something meaningful?”

“Ain’t every present meaningful?” the cowboy mumbles, mulling it over and his boss shrugs, saying, “You’d think so, right?  But he like...doesn’t appreciate trinkets, or paltry things, no matter how big or small.  He’s got some...weird issues about gifts.  I’ve tried to treat him to like nice gifts - a good pair of gloves, new boots, a new barbecue or whatever - and he’ll insist on returning them.  Yet you get him his favorite brand of socks and he gets all sappy about it.”

“Huh,” Jesse says, mullin’ it over as Gabriel continues, eyes slightly glazed over as he recounts, “Jack loves pictures.  Like, real hard copies of things.  Posters too.  But if you were to just get him a generic poster of, for example, Route 66, he wouldn’t care much.  But if you took some sorta aesthetic picture of Deadlock Gorge yourself?  He’d eat that up.”

“...I ain’t goin’ back there,” Jesse mumbles darkly and Gabriel suddenly snaps back to attention, saying quietly, “Oh - oh nah, kid, I didn’t mean it like that.  Just that...well, if you gave him some meaningful pictures you took yourself, he’d love it.  But it’s that sort of thing.  Jack…”

Gabriel pauses, scowling over his words, obviously digging deep to find the right ones, before he says with a slow, gentle roll to his voice, like sunshine warmin’ water:

“Jack likes it when the gifts you give him mean something to you too.  When it shows you put heart and soul into it.”

Jesse pouts now too, scowling over the words.  He’d meant to give a meaningful gift, of course, he wasn’t that selfish, he thought anyways, but he hadn’t...quite thought about it like that, hadn’t really thought about what giving gifts meant to Jack instead of Gabriel.  He twists the watch around his wrist a li’l, thinks a li’l, wondering how much of the watch was Jack’s odd but glimmery sense of meaningfulness and how much of it was Gabriel’s strong but gilded idea of purposefulness.

Wonderin’ if there was a real difference there, or if the two men had been so entwined that only they could figure out the boundaries between them -

Or if they were so entwined that they didn’t really want to.

Odd kinda thing, being that together, Jesse thinks, thoughts shifting back a li’l, back to Pa and Mamá working on parts of a then-brand new hover car together, sorting through the pieces, talking in quiet, even tones about how they could improve it, build something better, about where they would take it when they had the time, Pa’s voice thick with the brush of an Irish accent, Mamá’s laugh high like the bells and turquoise she sometimes wore, like the rhythm of the Tewa and Spanish she used to sing to him when he was real li’l -

1:20 p.m.

Jesse grounds himself on the time on the watch.

Focus, kid, he reminds himself, steeled with that voice that’s sometimes a touch too cold even for his own mind, Present for Jack. You can do this.

“Think he’d like it if I get him a fancy French press or sumthin’?” Jesse asks, only half-joking, but it gets a chuckle from Gabriel, who mutters, “I’d say he’d actually probably like that, except that Jack’s impatient as all hell with his coffee - he won’t have the emotional constraint to run a French press in the mornings.”

“What about a watch?  Like what y’all got me?” Jesse offers and Gabriel nods but sighs at the same time, “It’s a good idea, but unfortunately, kid, Jack hates wearing things on his hands and wrists - he’s always afraid the heavy pulse rifle will misfire and shock him.  Doesn’t matter how much of that specialized kevlar he’s got on, he gets burned often enough that the only metal things he wears directly on his skin are dog tags.”

Jesse hums a li’l, thinking to himself, until Gabriel, eyes a little bit unfocused, quietly murmurs:

“...You could make him a really nice pocket knife.”

“Oh!” Jesse says, perking up, grinning wildly, “That’s a good idea, boss, would you help me on it - what’s wrong?”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he knows it.

Gabriel’s scowl has faded into something more...bittersweet, more sorrowful, a little lost, a new sort of tender emotion that Jesse ain’t seen on someone’s face in a long time.  His boss’ eyes - normally bright with a liquid gold quickness - look somber and slower, like melting quick sand into glass.  Gabriel breathes a long, heavy sigh, before turning his chair to square up more against the desk, folding his hands rather formally on it as he says with a gentle strength:

“Jack’s current pocket knife...means a lot to him.  It isn’t worth much, not in real monetary value, and it’s old as hell at this point.  I think the blade’s pretty dulled too - couldn’t cut for shit the last time I saw it.”

“So it was a gift, huh?” Jesse chuckles weakly, trying to smile, trying to be cheerful, trying to fight off a strange, warm, comfortable feeling around his heart, “Ya said it means a lot ta him, so it must’ve been a gift -”

“Yeah,” Gabriel smiles back faintly, “It was a gift to him from his brother, Peter.  Gotta be like twenty years old now.”

“...Jesus,” Jesse mutters, scowling slightly, “It’s that important?  And...wait, Jack has a brother?”

That bittersweet smile is back on Gabriel’s face and -

“Jack had a brother.”

Jesse feels a strange, unnamed emotion sink into the pit of his stomach.  Gabriel grimaces a li’l, murmuring slow like syrup, “I never met Peter.  He died when Jack was sixteen.  Got drunk and then got high on too much meth and OD’ed.”

Gabriel looks Jesse dead in the eye and states with a quiet, soft, yet strong tone:

“Jack is the one who found him on the couch.”

Jesse freezes.

Time grinds to a halt.

Gabriel inhale-exhales, breathes another long, heavy sigh as he explains as kindly as he can, “I’m not trying to scare you, kid.  But there’s no other gift that will ever be as meaningful to Jack as a pocket knife you put your time and effort into, put a little heart and soul and hard work into -”

“I can’t do that.”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

But the fear, the anxiety, the grind of time unraveling around him sinks around his heart and the dense, weighted, comfortable warmth hangs heavy around his wrist, it’s the most expensive thing he’s ever held, if he drops it it’ll break and shatter and no one will ever want him for family again -

“Jesse.  Jesse, look at me.”

Jesse suffocates on air, but he forces himself to look at Gabriel, who gives him a patient, soft smile, murmuring, “Jesse, you’re okay, kid.  You’re gonna be alright.”

“I can’t do that ta him, I can’t replace that, nothin’ can replace that -” Jesse stammers, struggling under the weight, he could never fix somethin’ like that, Jesse’s only good at one thing, only good at putting people into pain, putting people into the earth, just like he watched them bury his Mamá and then his Pa at fourteen, just like he watched the dealer who tried to short-change him fall dead in the dust, a bullet from his revolver in the man’s head, Jesse’s only got one thing that he’s worth at all and that’s being a misbegotten son to Death Himself -

Everything he touches breaks and shatters and -

Time itself breaks and shatters when he touches it.

“Jesse, you aren’t replacing the knife,” Gabriel’s voice is calm and cool, yet warm like gentle sunshine, and Jesse tries to ground himself on the sound of it.  There’s a black gloved hand reaching out across the desk and -

Jesse’s hand is gripping it before he can stop himself.

He squeezes Gabriel’s hand, the watch on his wrist flashing a clockface briefly, as Gabriel gently says, “You aren’t replacing the knife, okay?  You’re just giving him a new one.  I just want you to know what the original knife means to Jack, okay?  All you’re gonna do is give him a gift from your heart, okay?  Show him your gratitude for how he’s helped you, right?”

“...Yeah,” Jesse murmurs, slowly pulling himself from the fear hanging around his neck, “Yeah, just...just wanna give him something meaningful.”

“He’ll appreciate it, Jesse, I promise.  I’ll help you with the design.  Torb will help you make it.  You just put some of that clever genius of yours into it, and I know Jack will love it.  Does that work?”

Gabriel’s voice is soothing, as soothing as soft bells of silver and beads carved of turquoise and sweet, clear laughter, as soothing as the rumble of a motorcycle engine and faint brushstrokes of Irish, as soothing as a serape made of thick cotton and heavy dye.

Jesse grounds himself on the feeling of the earth below his feet and the hand that pats his gently.

Jesse grounds himself on knowing there are two people in the earth below and the skies above who will help him.

Jesse grounds himself on knowing there are two other people who will stand beside a son of Death Himself and guide him

With patient smiles and smug smirks and deep, church bell laughter and bright, bold sunshine jokes

Out of a deadlocked heart

And into a world that needs more heroes

Heroes who are not just soldiers and commanders, rifles and shotguns

But who are watches that are meaningful and purposeful, and emotions that are worth their weight in gold.

Heroes he once jokingly called Pops and Papito

But names that have stuck deeper than he ever meant, names that are worth their weight in gold, names that are meaningful and purposeful.

“Yeah...yeah, that’ll work,” Jesse murmurs, before grinning as bright as the Southwestern sun at Gabriel, who smiles back kindly.  And the self-styled son chuckles back:

“Thanks, Papito.”

----------

Segador|Soldado & Sharpshooter Flashback: Deadlocked

Saturday, February 10, 2057: 11:02 a.m. - Overwatch Strike Team temporary base, on the western side of Deadlock Gorge by the Panorama Diner

This is a platinum-certified disaster.

Is the dry, wisecracking thought that runs through Gabriel’s head as he assesses the pile of pitiful, paltryass people sitting handcuffed and hard-scuffed in front of him.  A lot of them are moaning and groaning, some of them slumped over on their sides, lolling about like crabs knocked over, all of them decked out in patched-up biker leathers and skulls framed by wings and chains.  Deadset in front of Gabriel sits a hefty bulldozer of a man, covered in tattoos across his dusty, tanned skin, but with a neatly-trimmed beard and several zigzags clipped into his short-shaved hair.

Nothing beats the cold-rolled, steel-cut look of pure hatred that graces his face though.

Despite the fact that he could very well be dishonorably discharged from Overwatch with this platinum-coated bullshit of a fuck up, Gabriel smirks down at him, squatting into a crouch in front of the man.  Beside Gabriel, Ana tenses a little, murmuring warningly, “Don’t start anything, Gabriel -”

“You’re a real piece of shit,” the man - Terry Hernandez, leader of the main branch of the Deadlock Gang - snarls at Gabriel’s face, but the Overwatch Strike-Commander just grins back, leveling his star-dusted gaze at the broken pick-up truck of a human being.  Gabriel chuckles darkly, “That sharpshooter of yours really deadeyed this mission of mine, but at least I get the satisfaction of putting your smarmy ass in a cage for life.”

Ana sighs loudly, murmuring something in Arabic to herself before she turns and strides away, calling out orders to other agents in the Strike Team.  Terry’s dark gaze never leaves Gabriel’s and the gangbanger growls, “I hope you choke on a chode and die.”

“Eloquent,” Gabriel grins back, rising again before he gives Terry the widest shit-eating smirk he’s ever managed, taunting back:

“But Jack’s dick isn’t a chode and I ain’t choked on it yet.”

Terry and several other Deadlock members gawk slightly, but Gabriel turns on his heel and follows Ana back out to the cluster of temporary tents, gesturing to Mirembe as he orders, “When the truck comes, put them away.  I never want to see them again.”

“Yessir,” she says, snapping a quick salute.  Her fellow agents follow suit before they spread out and start prodding the arrested Deadlock members to stand.

Gabriel pauses for a moment, looking out at the chaos before him.

The Overwatch Strike Team has set up their post-mission base on the western side of the Deadlock Gorge, over by some old diner, just before the road turns north into the Caja del Rio plateau proper.  Even with this time of day during this time of year, the sun rises high, casting down hard light and dry, chilled light for mid-winter.  There are several make-shift tents set up, with groups of agents moving the crates of confiscated weapons, drugs, and supplies, taking tallies and recording the lot.  Gabriel recognizes several of Jack’s medically-trained agents rushing about with first aid cases, many of them gesturing frantically to one tent in particular.

Gabriel sighs darkly, before his eyes drift to a more...separated, isolated tent closer to the diner.

Outside the isolated tent, Ana is approaching Reinhardt, who is shaking his head emphatically. The lieutenant hangs her head, rubbing at her forehead, and Gabriel can sense her headache from here.  Under the crisp New Mexican winter sunlight, they’re both blue, so blue, in their new “standardized” Overwatch uniforms, as bright as the sharp New Mexican sky above them -

As bright as Jack’s furious, storm-studded eyes had been only moments ago

When the mission had ended

In what almost all of them would agree was “nearly an utter disaster.”

Time to kiss Overwatch goodbye, Gabriel thinks, forcing himself to walk towards the medical tent.  He grimaces a little as he steps up to it, hesitating a moment before -

Jack practically rips the tent flap open

And nearly barrels straight into Gabriel.

“Joder, pinche pendejos, I’m going to fucking - HOLY SHIT,” Jack seethes for a moment until Gabriel’s stunned, wide-eyed face almost collides with his, and both the Strike-Commander and SIC stumble back a half-step, Gabriel reaching out instinctively to grab at Jack’s shoulders and stabilize him.  Jack takes a half-second to reorient himself, before scowling as he mutters, “Gabe.  Let go of me.”

“Jack, you need to calm down -” Gabriel starts to say but Jack just tears his left shoulder from Gabriel’s hand fiercely, snapping, “I need to calm down??  Eight agents are critically injured, Gabriel - one is going to die if we do not get her to a hospital now -”

“The airlift is set to arrive in a minute, Jack,” Gabriel says as calmly and as soothingly as he can, squeezing Jack’s right arm lightly but the SIC scowls darkly, growling, “The U.N. is going to demand answers for this, Commander Reyes, so I suggest you start trying to get them -”

“Are you ordering me to do something, Captain?” Gabriel asks, dropping his tone into the danger zone, a fierce glare flitting onto his normally charming features, and Jack -

Jack inhale-exhales

One-two

Inhale-exhales

Three-four

Before saying coldly, “It was a suggestion, sir.”

Gabriel stares hard at his partner, and Jack glares right back, star-dusted eyes with flakes of red and gold and amber melting fusion fires against sea-shimmering eyes of roiling, thunderous storms, before Gabriel eases back, muttering hoarsely, “Well, I suggest you take the next minute to cool your head, soldier.”

And then he leans in, whispering a little more tenderly, a little more kindly, in a voice that almost immediately soothes the edge and the fury in Jack:

“I need us to be together on this one, okay?  Please?  I need you to be my better half today, please?”

The words, the plea in Gabriel’s voice, the faintest touch of his soft, short beard hairs, the bittersweet, gentle ache between them - a mix of soft sorrow, uneasy recognition of how royally screwed they are, and their now fifteen years of long, entrenched shared history (friendship and loyalty and honesty and humor and love and blurred senses of self) - sweetens the blow in Jack’s heart, causing the SIC to sigh against his anger, his bitter, broken rage, to relent to a smoother, cooler feeling.

But still

Jack cannot trust his words not to betray him.

Inhale-exhale.

Jack nods one-two, a sharp, quick motion, but his feelings are already eased by Gabriel’s mere presence, by Gabriel’s gentle words, and there’s a quick squeeze of Gabriel’s left hand around Jack’s right, before the Strike-Commander turns and heads off towards the isolated containment tent.  Jack lingers by the tent door, feeling the sunlight seeping down, somehow hard and cold, yet there are beams of a lighter, warmer sort, touching his face like a sweet caress before -

“Ahem.”

Jack jolts slightly, twisting to his left, where Singh stands, looking mildly embarrassed to have witnessed such a personal moment and Jack feels faint blood rush to his cheeks.  Singh taps at his datapad, murmuring, “Captain, the airlift is just north, on the other side of the road tunnel.  They are ready for Mina’s evac.”

“Ah, very well.  Are we ready to move her?” Jack asks, heading back into the tent and striding over to Mina’s cot, where the heavily injured agent is strapped in, her normally vibrant dark skin looking horrifically pale and wan, her breath puffing against the oxygen mask.  Despite the three biotic vials strapped to her arms, the bandage around her neck is still a bloody, uncomfortably deep red, and behind her eyelids, her eyes shift and move wildly.

“She is as ready as she will be, Captain,” Aiden says solemnly, and Jack nods to the other agents, taking his place at the handle by her right foot.  The agents form up, readying their grips, and their captain states, “Lift on three.  One...two...three!”

Gabriel glances behind him as Jack and three of his medical operatives haul the injured agent out of the med tent, stepping in sync as they head north to the road tunnel.  The commander heaves another sigh as he watches them go, his gaze lingering on Mina’s ashen face, but he scowls to himself and continues towards Ana and Reinhardt.

The lieutenant and second lieutenant both look at their commander, Ana putting on her steady frown and Reinhardt looking nervously worried - if Gabriel’s face wasn’t making both expressions simultaneously, he’d probably chuckle at their almost exaggerated looks.

But the platinum-certified disaster called for controlled nerves and even thoughts.

“...How bad is it?” Gabriel asks them as he approaches, gaze flicking to the tent and back.  Ana and Reinhardt glance at each other nervously, before the first lieutenant mutters in a low whispers, “Birth record confirms he’s seventeen - he’ll be eighteen in three months.”

Well, shit.

“The U.N. will treat him fair,” Gabriel says solemnly, “The organization is about as anti-child prosecution as they come -”

“Ze FBI es already trying to claim jurisdiction,” Reinhardt says, in a tone that is shockingly, startlingly still for the massive Crusader.  Ana nods, adding, “Even if we put him on an international trial, the United States will still pressure for a life sentence, bare minimum.  They haven’t done the full ballistics yet, but he matches the description for the enforcer who shot the covert DEA agents a month ago.”

Well, double shit.

“Zhey will try to charge him on zhat, even if you let him go,” Reinhardt concludes, as Gabriel accepts the datapad from Ana, looking at the files the lieutenants have already managed to pull together in just a few short minutes.  Both lieutenants look grim as Ana sighs heavily, “It’s extremely likely he’s killed people, Gabriel.  An aim and eye like that?  The misses are a choice, to say the least.”

“You think maybe we could use that?” Gabriel asks, flicking over the virtual copy of the birth certificate, a Santa Fe Crisis record of the “McCormick” family being checked in at an emergency shelter, medical records of shots and vaccinations, a school suspension form, photos from the DEA and FBI investigations of Deadlock arms trades.

“I doubt it,” Ana says, rubbing at her forehead again, “It’s not the kind of argument that would really hold up in court.  And it could easily be twisted against him - if he’s the one who shot five people in Juarez, then that was just as much of a choice.”

Well, triple shit.

“...So what you’re saying is he’s talented,” Gabriel jokes dryly and Ana shoots a bitter glare at him, chiding, “Gabriel, now is not the time for your humor -”

“I can only cope with so much, Ana,” Gabriel replies lowly, “Let me make at least one.”

“We are looking at another Basket Ogress situation,” Reinhardt says slowly, and Gabriel flicks his gaze up at his second lieutenant, muttering dryly, “No, they’re completely different.”

“A child in lifetime imprisonment?  Ostensibly for a life situation beyond their control?” Ana states darkly, her gaze fierce and furious, “They’re extremely similar.”

“No,” Gabriel mutters as he starts towards the door flap of the isolation tent, adding quietly:

“Basket Ogress was incapable of making a decision of her own free will.”

The Strike-Commander of Overwatch opens the tent and enters, followed by his two lieutenants, although Reinhardt has to duck slightly to enter.

The sunlight manages to be strong enough to filter in through the off-white plastic sheeting, so the inside feels like a contained starburst, bright and creamy-white, about as unintimidating as an interrogation tent could ever be.  There are only two seats, both unfoldable stool things, short and awkward, designed more for the med tent than whatever this platinum-certified bullshit of a situation is.

Sitting on one of them

Coated in red sandstone dust and asphalt grime

His bright orange bandana and dirty white t-shirt splattered in blood that’s dripping from his own nose and a large cut on his cheek

His weedy, dark brown hair looking ragged and untamed, as if no one has properly cut it in eight months

But most of all

His eyes dark and sunk with hazy shadows the sunlight cannot break through

Is a stringy, lean-cut, tanned teenager, hands cuffed behind his back, cracking his neck slightly, before he lolls his head back towards them, a smugass grin gracing his bruised and battered face, dark eyes keen and sharp in the filtered light as he taunts:

“Looks like we got a new sheriff in town.”

“Sorry, chico, but I’m actually quite old at this,” Gabriel snorts, seating himself on the other stool.  He raises an eyebrow as he assess the smug kid in front of him, casting a sharp, skeptical look over him.  Gabriel remarks slowly, “But I will admit this is my first time arresting a child.”

“Is that why I’m sittin’ in here all on my lonesome while the rest o’ my posse is gettin’ herded up?” the boy asks coolly, but there’s a slight sneer to his lip that Gabriel does not miss.  The Strike-Commander scowls darkly, saying with a touch of ice to his tone:

“No, you’re here alone because you shot and critically injured six of my agents.”

“Ooooh, that’s a full round right there,” Jesse chuckles, but there’s a vicious vividness to his eyes as he adds with a snide cruelness, “I was worried I missed one.”

Ana makes a sharp, angry noise behind Gabriel, and Reinhardt lets out a low, growling rumble, but Gabriel snaps at them, “If you two are going to rattle like that, then make like a snake and get out of here.”

“Those are some big guard dogs ya got there,” Jesse grins, and Gabriel flicks a furious, liquid sunflared gaze at the kid, snapping, “Keep running your mouth and you’ll see how they bite.”

“Oh, I ain’t too worried,” Jesse snickers, his gaze turning quicksilver as he shoots off:

“I’ve put down plenty o’ big dogs in my day -”

Gabriel can feel Ana and Reinhardt tense behind him and his own hackles rise as he snaps, “You li’l shit -”

“God dammit, Gabe, I thought you said you wanted to be together on this.”

All four people in the tent freeze as the door flap bursts open

And a fucking hurricane of a captain enters.

Gabriel turns a wide-eyed, gawking stare at Jack, who glowers over all of them before making a deadpan expression at Ana, asking, “Really, Ana?  You just let him waltz in here and just start this shit without me?”

Jesse ogles at the fucking Captain America knock-off who has entered the interrogation tent, just as tall and as broad as Commander Papito over there, only dressed in star-spangle bright blue like the other two, several biotic fields hanging from a belt around his waist.  Mr. Blonde-haired, Blue-eyed turns that storm-studded gaze towards him, making a strange, assessing expression before -

Jack suddenly strides to Jesse and drops to a knee besides the cuffed teenager, peering straight at his face and -

“Qué chingados,” Jesse stammers, skidding a little, nearly falling off the seat as Steve Rogers squints hard at him and suddenly there’s a steady left hand bracing his back and pushing him back upright on the seat, a calmer right hand tilting Jesse’s head and -

“The fuck are ya doin’?” Jesse demands, practically hissing, wiggling and squirming to try and get away, but Jack just huffs sourly, “I’m checking to see if your nose is broken - hold still, you limp string bean.”

Gabriel chokes on a laugh as Ana snorts and Reinhardt coughs a short, hoarse bark.

“‘Limp string bean??’” Jesse stammers, still struggling to get away from those steadying hands and intensely laser-focused blue eyes, but the captain sighs angrily, “Sit up straight, you chicken nugget, otherwise these stitches are gonna hurt worse than they have to -”

“Whoa, hey, what stitches, what,” Jesse states as Jack reaches for a pouch clipped to his back.  The medic-soldier undoes the snaps, pulling out a wipe as he grumbles, “Can’t believe you just left him here with all this dirt in his goddamn cut, Gabi -”

“‘Gabi??’” Jesse snorts until the wipe is shoved unceremoniously under his nose and across his blood-splattered lips, causing the teenager to sputter and cough as Gabriel mutters dryly, “I did have like twenty other arrestees to deal with, Juan.”

“And you decided to neglect the most important one - how many times do I have to tell you to sit still, you damp french fry,” Jack starts to address his commander before growling another low, absurd warning to the teenager in front of him.  Jack drops the wipe on the ground as his hand dives to the medkit for another and he scrubs that one across the cut on Jesse’s cheek as the boy howls, “Joder, pendejo!  That fuckin’ stings, ya asshole -”

“Oh, so you just want it to get infected??  Do you want to rot to death in jail from gangrene on your cheek?” Jack argues right back before snapping a hand out to Gabriel, demanding, “Cuff key.”

“Uh...Ana has them...but he’s not free to go -” Gabriel starts to say, glancing at Ana who shrugs slightly but Jack just sighs darkly, “I know that.  I need to reset his shoulder.”

“...Wait, what,” Gabriel states as Ana asks, “His shoulder is dislocated?”

“And you all just left him here, in pain, with a bloody nose and a popped joint from when our agents tackled him to the fucking pavement,” Jack explains, clearly upset with everyone in the tent, including himself.  He gestures to Ana emphatically, snapping, “Key.”

The first lieutenant makes a skeptical pout, but leans over and drops the key in his palm.  Jack reaches around Jesse, who is still gasping, “What the fuck is happening -”

Jack pulls the cuffs off and Jesse’s left arm falls rather uselessly to his side.  Suddenly, the medic-soldier looks the boy dead in the eye and states dryly, “Grit those teeth, kid.”

“What are you - OH FUCK,” Jesse hollers as Jack wedges his right hand up against Jesse’s arm, just below the shoulder joint and pushes in forcefully, snapping the aching joint back in place.  Jesse’s arm throbs as needles of pain ribbon through his arm, all the way down to his fingertips, but he barely gets a second to breathe before there’s a sharp sting in his right arm -

“MAKE HIM STOP,” Jesse wheezes at the Overwatch Strike-Commander, who is grinning like this is the funniest shit he’s ever seen, when suddenly the sharp stinging transforms into a flood of sweet relief, soothing calm brushing across Jesse’s stiff, throbbing cut on his cheek, through his dull, stuffed, cracked nose, into his sore, achy shoulder joint, and across the multiple bruises and cuts around his body.  

“...Bi-biotic fluid?” Jesse gasps, looking at the utterly bizarre man beside him, as he shuffles through the medkit.  The man nods slightly, but his gaze is laser-focused on the contents of the kit, even as he mutters, “And nanobots.  Your nose wasn’t broken but it was definitely tweaked - and all that cocaine you’ve been snorting hasn’t helped it at all.”

“What,” Gabriel demands, but Jack ignores him, addressing Jesse with, “But you’re young, and while most of your ethmoid is probably pretty fucked, we can at least save the integrity of the outer bone and cartilage with some light nanobot therapy.  In time, the remaining parts should recover nicely and save that face of yours from looking too ugly.”

“Are you giving him a goddamn prescription,” Gabriel half-states, half-asks, half-gawks and Reinhardt mutters, “Jack, you are not a doctor -”

“I’m sorry, who is the only remotely-trained medical officer in this tent?” Jack asks and only silence answers him.  Jesse glances back at the Strike-Commander who just kinda...half-nods, looking like he’s conceding the point to the man called Jack.  Jack sighs, “That’s what I thought,” before giving Jesse a devilish, knowing smirk, and then refocusing his gaze on the medkit.

“Is this a joke?” Jesse asks the air and only the woman - Ana, he remembers - responds quietly, “I was wondering the same thing.”

“I never tell jokes,” Jack wisecracks sarcastically which gets -

Which gets Gabriel to double over in a strange snort-wheeze-gurgle laughter.

The sound is surprisingly warm, like bubbling sunshine, but all Jesse can do is gawk utterly as the thirty-three year-old Gabriel Reyes - Strike-Commander of Overwatch, ruthless killer of Omnic Central Cores, capturer of multiple God Programs, hero of humankind, one of the last living American supersoldiers, a man solidly 6 feet tall and 200 pounds of muscle - almost falls out of his tinyass plastic seat, snorting and coughing a hacking giggle, his whole body shaking with laughter, dark cotton beanie askew.  Behind him, Ana, the woman with the beautiful tanned skin and slick dark hair, blue Overwatch coat and swirling Horus tattoo, pinches at her forehead as she groans loudly, “Jack, you need to be stopped.”

Beside her, the hulking giant of a man, long blonde hair and intense blue eyes, crisp beard and royal Crusader armor - Reinhardt Wilhelm in the flesh and rockets - tilts his head back and roars with laughter, causing the whole tent and Jesse’s bones to rattle and shake.

Next to him, the blonde medical captain, who could only be the other Overwatch American supersoldier Jack Morrison, gives Jesse a mischievous grin before his hands reappear from the medkit with -

“No no no nononono needles no,” Jesse immediately starts stammering as he sees the pre-prepped stitches kit in Jack’s hands, sliding as far as he can on the plastic seat.  Jack stops, scowling a little, but there’s a softness to his expression, and Jesse is suddenly keenly aware of the silence in the tent.  He glances to Gabriel, who -

Jesse thinks time stops.

There’s a strange expression on the Strike-Commander’s face - a deeply still affect that cuts across his gilded gaze, eyes looking long and bittersweet, mouth turned to a faint, sad smile, a small set of wrinkles curling around his eyelids and -

Jesse hasn’t seen an expression like that since Pa, lying on his deathbed, surrounded by tubes and monitors and beeping machines, held Jesse’s hand and apologized, apologized, whispered how sorry he and Mamá were for leavin’ him alone, how they both loved Jesse so, so much -

Jack sees his opportunity as Jesse stills, dark eyes looking lost, before Jack’s left hand dives under Jesse’s chin and grips it fiercely -

“NO NO STOP NO -” Jesse hollers, trying to break free, but Jack murmurs calmly, “If you sit still, it will be easy.  I have numbing shots if you want one -”

“Jack, go easy on him.”

Jesse stops squirming and Jack glances up towards Gabriel, who still has that soft, bittersweet expression on his face.  The Strike-Commander asks his captain, “Can’t you use steristrips or the bio-protein seal instead?”

“...I could, but I’m worried he’ll rip those open or get them wet,” Jack says, but he looks back at Jesse’s face, assessing the deep cut calmly.  The boy squirms again, uncomfortable under the resolved gaze, but Jack finally sighs, “Well, I can try them.  If they fail, we can return to the stitches.”

Jesse breathes a long, heavy sigh of relief as Jack releases his chin and drops the stitches packet into the medkit, his hands returning instead with a roll of tape and some scissors.  Jack frowns, muttering, “Look straight ahead, kid.”

Jesse pouts a bit, but turns his head forward, looking at Gabriel, trying not to get too hung up on the strange, awkward warmth wrapping around his heart, but it’s hard when steady, calm hands are placing slim strips of biotic tape over his wound and those eyes - like raw, amber sunshine - are watching him with a reserved sort of gentleness -

He’s still just a kid, Gabriel thinks, watching as Jack quietly and carefully places the strips across the cut on Jesse’s face, but he also notes how Jesse sits awfully still, how the boy pouts slightly with the intensity of his concentration to not move, how his fingers flex and relax, flex and relax with tension.

And then

Gabriel asks the only question he knows he needs to:

“...Why did you pull your shots?”

The atmosphere in the sun-drenched tent shifts immediately.

Jesse freezes.

Time unravels.

Jack’s hands on his cheek pause their steady, watchface movements.

The boy - only seventeen, only a child, covered in dust and blood and scratches and bruises, holsterin’ an aim deadlier than any Gabriel’s ever seen, carrying a weight heavier than any child should ever carry, living a life he has no business livin’ -

The boy - a sharpshooter in name and deed - stares Gabriel dead in the eye and states darkly:

“...I didn’t pull ‘em.”

And Jesse -

He doesn’t expect it

But Gabriel smirks and snorts in laughter, saying, “If you’re the one who killed five people in that arms trade that went sideways in Juarez, then you sure as shit pulled your shots today.”

Jesse gawks slightly, causing Gabriel to tap something on the datapad in his hand.  He flips the device around so that it faces Jesse, and taps another button, starting the video.

Jesse remembers.

The deal had been an easy one - some ex-rurales fighters in Mexico wanted some more guns, were complainin’ that Portero wasn’t “defending them rightly” from banditos in the outer regions of Mexico, complainin’ that Portero was only interested in keepin’ Mexico City and all the fat cat politicians safe in the Post-Crisis.  So Deadlock had made the trade easy…

‘Cept when they got down there, it had all been a trap by the Mexican and American governments.

Jesse watches the video, shot from a secret body cam on one of the undercover agents.  He watches as shouts escalate between the agents and the Deadlock members.  He watches as guns are drawn, insults exchanged, and -

He watches as five perfect shots - clear and hard and high like the sun at perfect noon - ring out through the warehouse in the video.

And before the dead agent wearing the camera falls dead -

He watches as his own figure appears in the background, behind the other Deadlock members, spinning the revolver before he pops the cylinder open and starts slotting in more of the tungsten cold plasma bullets.

“So let me ask you again, kid.”

The voice of the Strike-Commander isn’t hard, it isn’t edgy, it isn’t cold-cutting or angry raw.

It is

Surprisingly kind and clear, surprisingly patient

As if he is simply trying to understand

One gunslinger to another -

“Why did you pull your shots today?”

All four adults watch him closely, and Jesse thinks a hard, ugly feeling settles around his neck like a sinking weight -

“Obviously he admires us.”

Jesse thinks something in his mind shatters and breaks.  He flicks his gaze to Jack, who is grinning like the Cheshire Cat that caught Alice in a conundrum, and the captain chuckles in clear Spanish, “¿Aún un bandito todavía puede admirar a los héroes? (tn: even a bandit still can admire the heroes?)”

“I do not admire you!” Jesse stammers, the hard, ugly feeling dispersing for one of shock and disbelief because how can these adults - heroes of the world, heroes of humankind, heroes who crushed the apocalypse itself how - how can these heroes act this ridiculous -

Suddenly, there’s a warm, sunshiny chuckle from Gabriel, and Jesse whips his head towards the Strike-Commander as he says teasingly, “Yeah, he doesn’t admire you, Jack - clearly, he admires the badassery of my dual shotguns.”

Jesse feels his lip curl in horror and dismay before he can stop himself, snapping, “Joder, pendejo, I never said that -”

“Ahem,” Reinhardt interrupts, placing a hand on his massive chestplate as he states heroically, “Clearly, zhees clever young man admires ze pure boldness of my rockets -”

“What the hell,” Jesse says, his voice cracking as he glances between the three men before pointing a finger at Ana on the side, “The only one here with the sick no-scope skills is her, pinche pendejos.”

There’s still, stunned silence in the tent, until Ana grins wryly at him, saying dryly, “I changed my mind - I like him.”

“Ana, no, wait -” Gabriel starts to say, but Jack just nods slowly, murmuring, “That’s fair.”

“Jack, wait, not you too -” the Strike-Commander struggles to get his team under control, but Reinhardt protests loudly, “It es not fair - I cannot do headshots.”

“Put a scope on your hammer,” Ana chuckles, to which Reinhardt mutters contemplatively, “...Do you think zhat would work?”

“Worth a shot?” Jack says as Gabriel groans, burying his head in his hands as he mumbles, “Dios dame paciencia.”

“You ever wanna learn to shoot a rifle, kid?” Ana asks Jesse, who is still gawking because how in the Devil’s Hellhole did these people manage to save the world, did Torbjörn do all the actual work, how do they even function right what -

“I - I know how ta shoot a rifle!” Jesse half-shouts, half-stammers, and Ana’s dark eyes light up with a bright glitter as she murmurs, “Oooh, even better, we’re halfway there -”

“What about shotguns?” Gabriel asks curiously, lifting his head from his hands and Jesse scowls darkly, saying dryly, “I know how ta shoot a shotgun, but I’m not insane enough ta do it like ya do -”

“Ahhh, but what about a rocket hammer?” Reinhardt says sagaciously, as if he just caught Jesse in a trap.  Jesse gives him a disbelieving, deadpan squint as he mutters, “I - how in the hell you gonna shoot a hammer?”

“Oh ho, looks like I have some teaching to do!” Reinhardt replies proudly and Jesse is pretty sure time has unraveled into a pile of thread on the cracked earth below his feet.  The cowboy gawks, looking openly between all of them, before -

The words are out of his mouth before he can stop himself:

“How in the Devil’s rodeo did y’all stop the goddamn robot apocalypse like this??”

There’s another shocked, still silence, until -

There’s a cold, stingy spray blasting Jesse in the right side of his face -

“HOLY SAINTED CRACKER WHAT,” Jesse shouts as Jack ‘liberally’ sprays the bio-protein sealant over the cut and the strips, effectively gluing it closed with a special medical seal that will be integrated into the new scab.  The captain drops the canister back in the medkit, chuckling lowly, “We got lucky, I guess.”

“Ain’t no such thing as luck,” Gabriel starts to say on autopilot, and all three of the others chant back in tri-stereo sound:

“Just good genetics.”

Jesse just gawks but Gabriel makes an unamused, dead expression that reeks of “I need a long vacation.”  The Strike-Commander gives Jesse a blank, “can you believe this shit” look and Jesse -

The chuckle is out of his mouth before he can stop himself.

“Do you see what I gotta put up with?” Gabriel asks the kid with a sly smirk, which gets Ana to lightly whap him across the beanie.  Reinhardt strikes a pose, putting his fists on his hips as he laughs brightly, “We won ze Crisis because we are ze bravest!”

“No, we won the Crisis because we out-played them,” Ana corrects him, but it’s -

It’s Jack who grins wide, saying with a low rumble of snark:

“No, we won because we have those sick, no-scope skills.”

There’s stunned, still silence in the sun-filtered tent until -

Jesse bursts into laughter.

The sound that escapes the kid’s mouth is bright, like the sun at high noon, a loud, happy snort-giggle thing that bubbles like a spring cracking through baked desert clay earth.  This time, the boy actually slips off his seat, sliding sideways as he cracks up, light breaking through his bruised seams, hiccupping slightly as he thuds onto the ground, and all four adults watch him in awed quiet as he rolls slightly on the ground before -

“I’m gonna die in jail, ain’t I?”

The giggles and snorts and hiccups turn into a sort of pained, ugly feeling, hysterics slipping around his neck like a sinking weight, and Jesse feels a sharp ache shoot up his stiff, throbbing arm, feels his cheek sting with every laughing, cracking sob, and all his bravado breaks and shatters, crumbling into dust, and he thinks -

Mamá, Pa, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I fucked up, I knew I was fuckin’ up but -

Terry had told him he was the deadest shot the gang leader had ever seen, Terry had told him he could make good money for his Pa’s cancer treatment, just by escortin’ the drug mules, Terry had told him he cleaned the guns real good, Terry had told him he could handle whatever weapons he wanted, Terry had told him he was the only person the gang leader trusted with his new, pulse revolver - custom-made with hafnium-carbide coatings on the parts - and -

There’s only a cold cell or a bullet with yer name on it at the end of the sunset.

He ain’t been around adults like this since his parents died and -

The world is hard and ugly and cold like the winter sun at high noon, all dust and cement and rotting buildings, slick Crisis guns and broken Crisis veterans and new rocket motorcycles and stacks of cocaine and boxes of rocket launchers -

“Why didn’t y’all just fuckin’ shoot me and be done with it?”

He wishes they had just shot him instead of tacklin’ him, instead of cuffin’ him, instead of sittin’ him here and dressin’ his wounds and makin’ him laugh again -

The boy buries his head in his hand and curls up around himself, letting the hard, ugly feeling dig him a hole in the cracked, dried earth and -

Jack watches as Ana covers her mouth in horror, squeezing her eyes shut.  Reinhardt looks physically ill, his blue eyes watering at the edges.  But Gabriel -

Gabriel shifts to his feet, takes two steps forward, and crouches by Jesse curled up around himself.

Jesse feels the presence get closer - it isn’t hard-edged or angry raw, but

It is surprisingly kind and clear, surprisingly patient

Surprisingly gentle.

“...I was aimin’ fer her shoulder,” the boy half-explains, half-whimpers to the man crouching beside him, pulling his knees closer as he whispers, “I didn’t mean ta hit her neck.”

“I can’t aim for shit,” Gabriel’s voice is stern but warm, like a softer sunshine, “So if you want advice about how your intentional miss missed its intention, you’re gonna have to talk to Ana or Jack about that.”

Jesse snorts, but Gabriel Reyes - Strike-Commander of Overwatch, ruthless killer of Omnic Central Cores, capturer of multiple God Programs, hero of humankind, one of the last living American supersoldiers, a man solidly 6 feet tall and 200 pounds of muscle - says quietly:

“And it don’t mean shit if you say all that to me, kid - Mina is the one you need to apologize to.”

Jesse freezes.

Time reravels.

He lifts his head, eyes searching that scarred face, beard dusty from the mission today, beanie askew, but eyes like liquid gold melting with a bold, bright warmth.  There’s a sound to Jesse’s right, and he glances up as Jack seats himself on the plastic stool thing, blue eyes mischievous and glinting, like when the river in the gorge catches the sunlight just right, a slightly crooked smirk on his face as the captain chuckles, “Don’t worry - Mina is about the nicest person on the team.  And she really likes pastries, so if you get her a box of something that’s good quality, she’ll forgive you in a heartbeat.  Even better - if you can make something from scratch, she’ll even show you how to use our new plasma rifles.”

“I...huh?” Jesse asks because his words, his mind, usually quicksilver and cold plasma bullets, are failing him on every front, crumbling to dust and ash, cracking like the broken, heat-warped pavement of Route 66 running through the gorge -

“I can teach you how to make buñuelos,” Gabriel offers, scowling a little as he concentrates, and Jesse thinks his mind is runnin’ on empty at this point.  The Strike-Commander adds slowly, “I also know how to make mi abuela’s torrijas, if you wanna learn about those.”

Up on the seat, the captain shrugs, muttering, “All I got is crepes.  And cornbread.”

“I know how to make Umm Ali,” Ana suggests, with Reinhardt chiming in, “I can make berliners!”

Jesse openly stares at the faces around him, murmuring, “Are y’all insane?”

“Listen, kid, do you wanna learn how to make desserts to apologize to Mina, or do you want to rot in jail?” Gabriel asks, but he’s got a vivid, vibrant smirk on his face and a quick glint to his eyes. Jesse frowns, mullin’ it over before he asks cautiously:

“...This...ain’t a trick?”

“The only trick here is that any of us think we can bake,” Jack retorts dryly, which gets Gabriel to shoot him a snarky glare as he grumbles, “I can bake -”

“Buy the store-made desserts,” Jack mouths to Jesse, and Gabriel snaps, “I saw that, asshole.”

“I’m only good at shootin’ people.”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

All four adults look at him solemnly, but Jesse -

He has to say it, he has to tell them, they have to know what they’re bargainin’ for, he can’t do nothin’ right ‘cept bury people in the earth, put his Mamá and Pa in the ground, put shady drug dealers and gang-traitors and DEA agents into coffins, sling a revolver and let the glare of the sun break people’s skulls with a bullet in them -

“Look, you’ll never know if you’re good at baking until you try.”

Jesse turns to Gabriel, who grins at him, adding, “I always thought I was shit at things until I tried them.”

“And then he found out he was God’s gift in everything except aiming,” Jack chuckles wryly, which gets Gabriel to reach out and smack at Jack’s leg.  Jack laughs, saying brightly, “Also he snores.”

“John Michael Morrison, I do not want to hear you complaining about snoring,” Gabriel snaps tartly, which only gets Jack to laugh harder, smirking a wide shit-eating grin at Jesse and -

“But why?”

Jesse doesn’t understand - the words slip from him, as honest as the cracked earth and broken asphalt, dry as the sun - he doesn’t understand why they would want someone like him, someone who’s only done wrong, who got lost in the gorge, who got deadlocked into killin’ and -

“Because you still have the potential to discover what you’re truly gifted at.”

Gabriel’s smile is as honest as the cracked earth and broken asphalt, as warm as the sun.

And then the Strike-Commander smirks smugly:

“And we need more contestants for Top Chef Overwatch Edition.”

Chapter Text

I am a question to the world

Not an answer to be heard

Or a moment that's held in your arms

And what do you think you'd ever say?

I won't listen anyway

You don't know me

And I'll never be what you want me to be

And what do you think you'd understand?

I'm boy - no, I'm a man

You can't take me

And throw me away

And how can you learn what's never shown?

Yeah, you stand here on your own

They don't know me

'Cause I'm not here

---------

Sharpshooter: This life’s never uneventful

February 10, 2057: 11:54 a.m. - Landing strip at Watchpoint: Grand Mesa, Colorado, United States

McCree.

Jesse rolls the name around in his head one more time, as the transport ship stills in the air and slowly begins its descent.  He’s strapped in like the rest of them, feeling a little uncomfortable in the massive snow jacket they’ve stuck him in (“why the hell I gotta put this on?” he’d asked back in Deadlock, and Gabriel had given him a wry smirk before chuckling, “Just you wait, Jon Snow.”), but more than that is the name.

His new name.

It had been a strange group collaboration - of all the people in the interrogation tent, it had been Ana to suggest “bending the law” to make Jesse Gabriel’s “brand new intern and assistant,” because - and Jesse’s memory quotes - “the U.N. will flay you alive for putting a seventeen-year-old to work in a military organization, Gabriel Santiago Reyes.”

But it was Jack who had quietly mentioned that “the entirety of the United States government will come down on us for making a drug-runner - however young - Gabriel’s brand new intern and assistant.”

“Perhaps we can...fudge a few letters on his name?” Reinhardt had mentioned, which had caused Jesse to scowl darkly, sayin’ tartly, “I ain’t changing shit.”

All he carried from his parents were his Mamá’s turquoise teardrop pendant, his Pa’s Celtic knot cross, a few silver bells, and his name.

“You’re going to have to,” Gabriel had said as Jack had started tapping away at the datapad.  The Strike-Commander had looked at the boy, muttering with a sort of bittersweet resignation, “I know it’s rough, kid, but there’s no way the FBI or CIA would overlook a ‘Jesse McCormick’ - wanted for shooting their agents - magically showing up in Overwatch’s agent list.”

“Ain’t y’all supposed ta be above them?” Jesse had asked curiously, which had gotten Gabriel to grimace as Jack had grumbled darkly, “The politics involved in getting Overwatch to actually operate are a goddamn nightmare.  And Commander Reyes and I are...not exactly best friends with the CIA or Army at this point.”

“Jack and Ana are basically the only ones who know how it works,” Gabriel had chuckled, which had prompted Reinhardt to laugh boldly, “It all goes right over my head!”

“...Well, ain’t that an impressively tall order,” Jesse had drawled dryly, and almost immediately swallowed his tongue as he’d processed the words, screaming, Shit shit shit, dumbass, don’t be a smartass ta these people -

But Gabriel had bursted into more of that wheezing, heady giggle, and Jack had let out a low, deep, gruff rumble, his shoulders shaking, followed by Reinhardt nearly knocking the tent over as his roar of a laugh had exploded into sound, as the lion-hearted knight hollered, “I like him already!”  Ana had smiled bright as she had chuckled and -

The warm, strangely comfortable feeling around his heart had softened the blow.

“Finished most of the paperwork,” Jack says, causing Jesse to glance to his left.  The captain is also strapped in, but tapping away at the datapad still, and even with the faint glare on the screen, Jesse can see a fake New Mexico ID, a “reworked” birth certificate, a redone marriage license -

His stomach swoops low, as low as the transport ship is dropping, but Jack just glances down at him, giving him a cheerful smile as he explains, “You’re my cousin’s son now, okay?”

“Uh...sure,” Jesse mumbles, not entirely sure what he’s feeling, besides rather grimy, dusty, and dried-bloody in a transport ship that’s far too nice and too warm and too comfortable for his concrete asphalt existence -

But Jack gives him a reassuring nod, saying slowly, “I know it’s going to be difficult, Jesse, but you’re going to be okay.”

“I...I know that,” Jesse grumbles, still feeling all sorts of...well, out of sorts, but -

“I dunno about ‘okay,’” Gabriel’s voice suddenly says from Jesse’s right.  The boy tilts his head towards the Strike-Commander, who smirks smugly, “Overwatch is basically held together by paperclips and strings.  We’re just barely above ‘functional,’ let alone ‘okay.’”

“Eres un cabrón,” Jack snorts, leaning across Jesse to hold the datapad out to Gabriel.  The captain gestures with it, saying, “Sign the main employee application page and initial everything else.”

“I know you know how to fake my signature,” Gabriel mutters, taking the datapad.  Jesse watches with slight awe as the Strike-Commander starts scribbling out a curly scrawl with his left index finger - still gloved - as Jack chuckles, “I’ve already broken about three hundred international and American laws in the last half-hour, Gabe - the least you can do is sign off on them.”

There’s a rumbling thud as the ship lands, a soft shake as the engine shuts off, and the pilot speaks over the intercomm:

“We have arrived at Watchpoint: Grand Mesa.”

“Time to listen to Torb complain about all the work we’ve given him,” Gabriel snorts, unbuckling his straps.  Jesse quickly follows suit, fumbling slightly with the lock, and as he and the other twenty agents onboard rise, Gabriel gives him a sly smirk, asking, “Ready to see beyond the wall, Jon Snow?”

“Uh, yeah, that’s not my name, jefe -” Jesse starts to say, which gets a wry hack of a laugh from Jack, who also stands and stretches a little when -

The drop door on their left cracks open.

The first thing Jesse feels is a blast of bitter, icy air, and he flinches against the incoming cold.  Jack hardly seems fazed - he merely adjusts the thick jacket beneath his armor a little - but Jesse notes that even Gabriel shivers slightly, drawing up the hood of his sweatshirt over his beanie, tugging his gloves a li’l higher.  

Surprisingly, it is Jack who leads the way out, as the captain gives another low, liquid laugh, muttering dryly, “Y’all are so weak,” followed by Gabriel who retorts lowly, “Sorry that not all of us were born in a frozen hellscape, Juan,” as he stomps his way out of the cargo bay, and Jesse stumbles after them, blinking against the brightness as he steps outside.

And then, as Jesse’s eyes readjust to the silvery glare of the winter light -

His jaw drops slack a li’l.

They’re on a flat, paved runway, stretching for long miles across a flat top plateau.  There are tens, maybe hundreds of other transport ships around them, and tens, maybe hundreds of bright, royal-blue Overwatch agents rushing about, moving supplies, directing ship traffic, performing maintenance on vehicles - Jesse notices how many are moving large, wheeled crates with the Deadlock logos stamped on the sides to a section of the runway.  To the east, a massive, state-of-the-art, semi-brutalist industrial building rises, stark silvery-whites and more crisp-cut-blues, wide windows and coated concrete, heavy and dense against the blue-gunmetal clouded skies.

And everywhere -

Through cleared off parts of the runway -

Is snow.

Sugary white, glittering raw under whatever chilled, stark sunlight manages to break through the winter clouds.  It lies strewn across the flat topped mountain, and as Jesse shifts his gaze southward he -

He freezes.

...Well, not literally, but ya know, figuratively.

The world horizons out before him.

It is nothing but breaking whites of the snow, unhemmed greens and blacks of the pine trees, and soft, silver blues of the skies and clouds.

There’s a presence by Jesse’s left shoulder, and the boy murmurs with a subdued sort of happiness, “...It’s real pretty.”

“Isn’t it?” Gabriel asks back, and Jesse can hear the smug cheer in his voice as the commander asks, “Although I’m glad me and Ana aren’t alone in our snow-weakness now.”

Jesse tilts his head up towards Gabriel’s grin, giving him a long, deadpan stare before -

“...Y’all know it snows in Santa Fe, right?”

The words are out of his mouth before he can stop himself.

Gabriel’s smirk slides into a look of horrified shock, and Jesse grins, snorting, “Y’all just came through between the snowstorms.  Last big one had mostly melted off.  Deadlock was six inches under only two days ago.”

“...¿Qué chingados?  Are you shitting me?” Gabriel asks with dry dismay and Jesse gives him a shit-eating grin-shrug combo, chuckling, “Sorry, comandante papito, Santa Fe gets several inches of snow each year.  High desert ‘n all that.”

Gabriel gives him a strange, quizzical look, muttering, “I’ve seen high desert before and - wait, what did you call me?”

Oh, cheese whiz on a cracker.

Time to play dumb.

“What,” Jesse states, mirroring Gabriel’s confused stare for a long minute, until the Strike-Commander squints at him, asking dryly, “The hell you playin’ at -”

“REYES.”

The voice that cuts across the thin, chilled air carries a ton of molten, raging authority that makes Gabriel go slightly rigid as a new look of mixed terror-shock flitters onto his face, and Jesse peeks around him to see -

There’s a young woman with bright, pearly skin and large, honey-warm eyes behind thick glasses, eyelids curving into graceful, cheerful angles at the corners, dark, slick hair pinned up into a loose bun - she gives Jesse a big, happy grin before -

Something short and small and angry whaps the back of Gabriel’s left knee and the Strike-Commander roars something indistinct as his leg gives out beneath him and he falls -

“What the smegging hell did ya DO out there??” comes the same sharp, drawling-accented voice and Jesse glances down to the short, stout blonde man - his thick beard floofing at odd angles in the sharp air - as he retracts his cyborg left arm from the back of Gabriel’s leg, blue eyes squinting hard beneath thick, bushy, furrowed eyebrows.

Joder.

Torbjörn Lindholm in the flesh and robot arm.

Jesse gawks with utter awe as the master weaponsmith - arguably the greatest weapons engineer in the world - folds his arms across his broad chest as the Strike-Commander shakes, rising again as he mutters, “Why do you always go for my weak points?”

“Because ya deserve it, ya bloody loon!” Torbjörn growls, and as Gabriel turns to face him, the engineer gestures to the growing stockpile of confiscated Deadlock arms, grumbling, “What the hell am I supposed ta do with all that!”

“...Count it?  Destroy it?” Gabriel suggests, grinning wryly but Torbjörn points a sharp finger at him, “I know ya, Gabriel Reyes, and don’t think I’m not aware that five percent of that damn pile is gonna go missin’ before the end of the day.”

“We’re trying to go legit on this one, Lindholm,” Gabriel states, also folding his arms as he assesses the engineer, adding bluntly, “I’ll even help with the paperwork if you want.”

“You mean hinder me with yer nagging,” Torbjörn mutters, before scowling as he adds, “Wait...why are we trying to tally all this legitimately?”

“Jack and I already spent our karma currency breaking the bank on this one,” Gabriel grins, tilting a thumb towards Jesse.  Torbjörn finally looks up at Jesse, who continues to gawk awkwardly as the engineer sizes him up.  The woman behind him continues to give Jesse that sunny, cheerful smile, even throwing in a small wave as Gabriel says with a softer tone:

“Torb, Mei, this is Jesse, my uh… new intern.”

“...Intern, eh?” Torbjörn says suspiciously, still assessing Jesse, even as Mei grins mischievously, giggling, “Hello!  I take it you’re the best weapon in the pile, huh?”

“Zhou Mei-ling, don’t be rude,” Gabriel chides her, but flashes another shit-eating smirk as he continues, “He’s Jack’s ‘second cousin,’ or something.”

“What a convincing statement, 大哥 (tn: dage, brother),” Mei chuckles as Torbjörn huffs, “And ya just conveniently found him in Deadlock Gorge, didja?”

“Nah, we totally swung by Santa Fe and picked him up there,” Gabriel smirks, before elbowing Jesse lightly as he says, “C’mon, kid, at least say something -”

“Yer Torbjörn Lindholm.”

The words are out of his mouth before Jesse can stop himself.

Torbjörn flicks a confused gaze to Gabriel, who shrugs, but Jesse suddenly bursts into a wide, massive grin, the words starting to fall out of his mouth as he nearly trips over his tongue:

“You invented the Lindholm IFF-auto-tracking system and redesigned the SST Laboratories Siege Automaton E54 Gatling gun ta make it compatible with the Bastion sentry mode!  And you redeveloped the new Overwatch auto-pulse rifles ta work with stabilized lower temp cold plasma shots but still carry the aim of standard bullet rifles!”

The three Overwatch members openly gape at Jesse’s visible excitement, all stunned in slightly different ways - Torbjörn utterly astounded, wide eyes and mouth forming a tiny, perfect O shape, Mei’s face scrunched into an honest, perplexed, stiff smile, and Gabriel -

Gabriel looks brightly - if widely - impressed, eyebrows raised, eyelids blinking a few times, but the faintest traces of a smile there -

“Like I said,” Gabriel chuckles with a vicious, smug cheer to his words, “My new intern, Jesse McCree.”

“I’ll be damned,” Torbjörn wheezes, a massive, bold grin breaking out on his face as he takes a step towards Jesse.  The engineer mutters with his eyelids crinkling from joy, “Ya did it.  Ya found the greatest human being in the world, Reyes.  Bless yer damn stubborn ass.”

“I thought your wife was the greatest human being in the world, Lindholm,” Gabriel chuckles as Torbjörn holds out his right hand to Jesse, who takes it reverently.  But Torbjörn squeeze his and shakes furiously, stammering out to Gabriel, “Oh, uh, yer right - sorry, uh - Jesse, was it? - sorry, Jesse, but yer the second greatest human being in the world.”

“That’s perfectly a-okay, sir,” Jesse grins back even as Torbjörn releases his hand, the engineer sighing contently, “Can’t convince ya ta come work fer the engineering division?”

“Wait, are you already trying to steal the intern I’ve had for like...thirty minutes?” Gabriel asks with genuine shock and Torbjörn rolls his shoulders in a casual shrug, saying exaggeratedly, “Oh, no, Reyes, absolutely not.”  But he leans a little closer to Jesse, muttering, “Listen - we get ta test the prototypes before they go out -”

“Stop trying to sweet talk him!” Gabriel snaps, but there’s a smirk on his face and a chuckle to his words.  But Mei pushes the two men aside to open her arms wide and -

Jesse freezes

As she wraps them around him.

Time stops.

He doesn’t…

He doesn’t remember the last time someone hugged him.

“你好 (tn: nihao, hello),” Mei says to him warmly, as she pulls back from the embrace to pat his shoulders, smiling as bright as the sun as she adds, “Welcome to Overwatch, Jesse!”

There’s that strange, warm, comfortable rich feeling again -

“Ah, um, thanks,” Jesse mumbles, is he blushing, god damn, he hopes he’s not blushing, there’s a low, snorting chuckle from Gabriel next to him.  Jesse shoots him the fiercest glare he can manage, but it feels weak even to him, and Gabriel just smirks that shit-eating grin again before turning to Torbjörn and saying, “Jesse here can help you with itemizing the confiscated arms - he’s real familiar with this kinda stuff.”

“Ya don’t gotta speak in yer tragic code ta me, Gabriel,” Torbjörn snorts, giving them a wave as he turns and stomps off, back towards the weapons crates.  The engineer calls back to them, “Once yer all situated, send him ta my workshop and we’ll get started on it.”

The three of them watch him go, like in the silence after a sudden, heavy storm, until Gabriel finally asks, “...Wait, Mei, why are you here?  Aren’t you supposed to be in Siberia?”

“Oh, I am here to have Torbjörn work on my blaster,” Mei says cheerfully, but she sighs, “In theory, everything should work, but I am having trouble stabilizing the temperature in a sub-freezing state.”

“Ah, yeah, Torb should know how to handle that, I guess,” Gabriel mutters, shuffling slightly.  He nods towards the building and sets off that direction, Mei and Jesse trailing a half-step behind him as he adds, “We really need to work on hiring for your division -”

“Jack and I were going through some applications last week,” Mei says cheerfully, but Jesse - only a half-foot shorter than Gabriel and struggling to keep up with him - is shocked that the tiny researcher is keeping pace with the six-foot-tall commander.  Mei sighs, “But really, we need to fix the Medical Division first, Gabriel.”

“Yeah, I’m aware,” Gabriel says back with his own heavy sigh as they continue to stride across the runway.  The Strike-Commander scowls, murmuring with a warmly gentle conviction, “Jack is trying to handle way too much.  He’s hardly adequately trained to be a field medic, let alone deal with the equivalency of Post-Crisis WHO.”

“How -” Jesse stammers, and Gabriel glances at him, scowling a little before slowing his pace a smidge.  The cowboy does not fail to notice the change in step, but he tries to be casual about it as he continues, “How did he end up in charge o’ it if he ain’t a medic?”

Gabriel and Mei give him a long contemplative look until Gabriel breathes slowly, “It...just happened.  Overwatch literally grew exponentially in size within the first year of the Post-Crisis.  Jack ended up as the division leader of three divisions because he basically created them on his own to manage our incoming staff.”

Jesse frowns a li’l as he mutters, “But...ain’t you in charge o’ everything?”

“Shit, yeah I am, don’t remind me,” Gabriel half-huffs, half-chuckles, but as his eyes slide from Jesse face to the surrounding runway, Jesse notices how the lightheartedness in the warmth of his golden gaze vanishes, how the look grows long and wan, how his shoulders tense and then sag.

How Mei gently pats his right forearm as she too looks out over the airstrip.

“Well…” Gabriel says slowly, his voice sounds distant and a touch green-hued, like chipped jade, “That’s if I don’t get court-martialled for this one.”

“Wha -” Jesse starts to say, looking at him with ugly horror, when a terse, jet-sliced voice cuts through them, saying with cobalt tension, “Káa Gabriel.”

The trio turn around to see -

There is a young girl, no more than twelve or thirteen, her skin a rich, gilded bronze, eyes dark like smokey wine obsidian, black hair sleek and sharp-cut, several strands entwined with gold and shell beads, pouting at them slightly.  Her eyes give a small, narrowing squint at Jesse as Gabriel looks at her in surprise, asking, “Fareeha?  What are you doing here?”

“Hadáa let me come visit when we heard أم (tn: ‘um, mother) would be here,” the girl, Fareeha, explains but -

“What’sa kid doin’ here?”

The words are outta Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

The three of them, including Fareeha, look at him in shock until Fareeha scrunches her face into a pout, saying sarcastically, “I dunno - what are you doing here?”

Jesse makes a pinched frown in response as Gabriel snorts and Mei giggles.  A vicious, mischievous smirk flicks on Fareeha’s face and she pulls her hands from her parka pockets to cross her arms.  Jesse scowls a li’l as Gabriel gestures to him, saying, “Fareeha, this is Jesse McCree - he’s gonna start working for Overwatch as my intern.”

Fareeha gives him a real skeptical, deadpan stare, muttering dryly, “...An intern?  Really?”

“That’s what we decided on,” Gabriel chuckles, before gesturing to her as he says to Jesse, “Jesse, this is Fareeha Amari.”

Jesse freezes, his eyes growing rather wide as Fareeha’s shit-eating smirk just grows more mischievous as she grins, “Don’t let the name intimidate you, intern.”

At that, Jesse squints a li’l, making a suspicious scowl as he retorts, “The only things that intimidate me are a bad cup o’ coffee ‘n lizards without their tails.”

Fareeha’s smirk dips into a disbelieving gape, mouth hanging open a li’l, torn between confusion and dismay, as Mei giggles again and Gabriel snorts, asking, “Why the lizards?”

“Clearly, y’all ain’t ever try to fight a lizard without its tail,” Jesse snorts in feigned derision, shrugging a li’l, “They’re summa the meanest bastards on earth -”

“LANGUAGE -”

Is all that Jesse hears before his right ear is suddenly pinched by long, lean, gloved fingers -

“Ow ow ow ow -” Jesse hisses as Ana’s face - darkened with a visible, tart glare - peaks around his shoulder.  Ana points another finger in his face, muttering gruffly, “If I catch you sayin’ that shit again, you’re going to run laps.”

“...Wait what,” Jesse stammers as Fareeha and Mei laugh openly.  Gabriel is as useless as ever as he flashes a bright, vivid grin over the situation, and as Ana releases his ear, Jesse hears the clank-clank-clanking of metal plating on plating.  Fareeha beams up at her mother, saying cheerfully, “مرحبا، الأم (tn: marhaba, al'umi, hi mom).”

“Fareeha, what are you doing here?” Ana asks, accepting her daughter’s embrace as Reinhardt clatters in behind them.  In stark contrast from only a moment ago, Fareeha is all smiles as she repeats, “Hadáa let me come for a few days!  That’s okay, right?  Is that okay?”

Ana makes a strange, slightly inscrutable face as she contemplates it, murmuring slowly, “...Well, I suppose so -”

“KLEINE!” Reinhardt booms over them all, and Jesse feels a shock from the sheer force of his voice rumble his bones.  Gabriel gives a less smug, softer smile as Fareeha practically bounces up to the massive Crusader as he takes a knee, bending to hug her as she rattles out, “Rein, Rein, did you charge anyone today??  Where’s your hammer??  I heard there were rocket launchers -”

“Of course he charged,” Ana snorts, folding her arms as she pouts, “He nearly charged himself right off the cliff into the gorge three, maybe four times -”

“COOL,” Fareeha exclaims as Reinhardt grins widely at the girl, saying, “Ah, yes, Kleine, eef only you had been zhere!  I almost flew -”

“Alright now, don’t exaggerate that bad,” Gabriel mutters as Mei snickers, “Flying rocket armor!”

Reinhardt opens his mouth to say something else but -

“Gabriel Reyes.”

The voice that cuts through the chilled air is feminine with a touch of a deeper accent - Nigerian? Jesse thinks as the other members of the li’l group all immediately freeze at the sheer power in it.  It rings out not like the blast of a shotgun, nor the burst of a rifle, but -

But the ringing bang of a gavel.

There is a broad - if terse - authority to it, to her - Jesse glances towards the building, eyes immediately drawn to how agents and staff members stop in their paths or jump out of the way of the short woman striding towards them.  Her skin is dark, as beautiful as soil enriched by a summer rain, deep and clear against the starker backgrounds of snow and sky, but her eyes burn with a vibrant intensity as she makes her way towards them, short, springy black curls bouncing with each step.  She wears a blue jumpsuit and coat similar to Ana’s, and somehow, despite her short stature, she is rapidly outpacing Jack, who is rushing to keep up with her, calling out, “Gabrielle - Gabrielle, wait -”

Holy shit.

Under-Secretary-General Gabrielle Adawe in the flesh.

A hard, fearful, sorrowful scowl shifts on Gabriel’s face as he turns to face her, raising his hands in an almost placating gesture as he murmurs with a slow, sugary softness to his words:

“Gabrielle, I can explain -”

“You better start explaining,” Gabrielle snaps at him, striding right up into his personal space as she points a finger into his face.  Gabrielle’s glare radiates a controlled intensity as she mutters, “Eight agents, Gabriel - eight.  How could you let eight agents get sniped like that??”

“They weren’t...sniped, per se,” Gabriel starts to explain, but Gabrielle glowers at him, muttering harshly, “Do not give me your sass today, Gabriel - neither I nor the council will be interested in hearing it -”

“I mean it, Gabrielle,” Gabriel says, with a slightly growing desperation to his tone as he struggles to explain, “They were all shot within fractions of a second of each other, by a revolver.  Well...six of them were, anyways.”

Gabrielle’s expression of righteous fury does not change, not exactly, but the atmosphere around the group shifts a li’l, from storming rage to a crackling confusion.

“...What,” Gabrielle half-asks, half-demands, and Gabriel shrugs with his hands still slightly raised, giving her an awkward, slightly befuddled smile as he half-chuckles, half-croaks, “I ain’t lyin’ -”

“As I was trying to explain,” Jack huffs as he joins the group, folding his arms across his chest as he makes a face of mixed pain-exhaustion, muttering, “Gabriel did not send multiple agents into repeated sniper fire, Gabrielle - six of our agents were shot almost simultaneously by a skilled deadeye marksman.  We had tried to anticipate such an attack based on the evidence in the Juarez footage, but he got behind the squad and disabled them almost immediately.”

“We thought we had all the routes mapped out,” Gabriel adds, as Gabrielle flickers her gaze between the Strike-Commander, Jack, Ana, and Reinhardt.  The latter two are also watching quietly, although Reinhardt is murmuring, “I was trying to choke off ze main road…”  Ana pats him on the arm, sighing, “It was also my fault - I was not looking at the side route when I needed to be -”

“I didn’t take the side route.”

The words are out of Jesse’s mouth before he can stop himself.

All of them - including Mei and Fareeha, their gazes wide with growing horror - turn to look at him, and Jesse feels a chill crawl up his spine like the shuddering shaking of a rattler.  Their reactions are all a touch different, a touch unique - Ana with a look of shifting, soft surprised sorrow, Reinhardt with a grim, deeply-scowled pout, Gabrielle’s fierce glare transforming into one of aghast dismay as she processes him, but -

Jack looks at him with a worried, concerned frown, sighing as a flash of rainstorm-soft pain glimmers across his gaze.

Gabriel glances at him with a tired, bittersweet smokiness to his gold-brown eyes, looking tarnished at the edges, as if weary from the weight of the world and the heaviness of Jesse’s words.

Time unravels.

Jesse chokes on air.

“I didn’t - I mean - I was posted in Zed’s shop - I never took the side route -” Jesse stammers, struggling between breathing and explainin’, tryin’ his damnedest to do both and failin’ on both fronts instead, his fingers tense and relax, he don’ feel right without the revolver at his hip, but it’s gone, they took it from him, he dunno where it went -

He needs something to ground himself but he ain’t got it, he ain’t got it, he’s free-fallin’ into the gorge below his feet -

“You??” Gabrielle asks, gasping as she takes a half-step towards him, eyes roaming over his lean, slightly-shaking frame.  Jesse ain’t entirely sure how her loyalties play into this weirdass telenovela of an organization, but she clearly holds the respect of two supersoldiers, the world’s best sniper, and the last Crusader, so she ain’t only formidable in title, but in actuality too -

“You are the marksman??” Gabrielle half-asks, half-demands, and Jesse - he’s strugglin’ to breathe, he’s strugglin’ to stay afloat in the icy river - Jesse nods, mutterin’, “I was - I was just tryin’ ta disable them, ma’am - just tryin’ ta remove ‘em from the fight -”

“Hernandez basically left him as a sacrificial fighter - left him to take on two whole squads and a sniper by himself,” Gabriel explains, but there’s a cold-cut, steel-rolled edge to his tone, a dripping sunlit venom to his words as his face contorts to a vicious sneer, grumbling, “Pinche pendejo - if I see him again, I’m going to have something worse for him than a prison sentence -”

“Can you stop making these incriminating statements where everyone can hear them?” Jack sighs exasperatedly, but Gabriel just gives the captain a skeptical glance, murmuring, “I know you feel the same way, Jack.”

“...Well, sure, I do, but this isn’t the time or the place,” Jack retorts, but Jesse notices how the captain holds a hand out to the commander.  After a fraction of a second, Gabriel drops his left hand and takes it, squeezing it gently before they let go -

“How old are you?” Gabrielle asks Jesse, peering up at his bruised, battered, bio-protein-and-steristipped face, and the gunslinger chokes out, “I uh - I’m eighteen in three months, ma’am -”

“Oh my god, you are a child,” Gabrielle whispers in utter horror, and slightly behind her, next to Gabriel, Mei claps a gloved hand to her mouth, her warm eyes wide in shock and sorrow.  Just to his right, holding Reinhardt’s hand that is much too large for hers, Fareeha gives him an assessing, calculating look, but there’s a touch of curiosity and sadness there too -

“I - I’m practically an adult,” Jesse starts to snap but then he stops.

Starts and stops.

When Gabrielle suddenly steps into his space, those dark, kind eyes looking over his face intensely, lingering over the deep cut and the welling bruises.  Jesse almost takes a half step back but the Under-Secretary-General murmurs quietly, “Oh child, I am sorry - I am so sorry.  You said you were trying to slow the squad?”

“Ye-yeah,” Jesse says, as she gives him a breaking smile.  The boy whispers in cracking tones, “I just - I was just told ta stop ‘em, ya know?  Tryin’ ta buy time -”

But ya can never buy time.

Time unravels and reravels on its own terms.

Time slows for no one, not for his parents, dead in the earth, not for his own cold, deadlock heart, buried in the earth with them, not for his own cold, calm hands on a revolver, all he was good at, all he was worth, all he was worthy of.

Time was bought ‘n sold in crates with winged skulls and chains stamped on ‘em, bought ‘n sold in bars and motels in packs of white powder, bought ‘n sold in bike shops with parts hanging like on the walls like bits o’ dried meat.

Time was the river cutting down sandstone, eons and eons, as Jesse stood at the edge, contemplatin’ the drop, noon sun hard and cold and ugly in the winter -

There are arms around him.

Warm and patient and gentle, like the earth after a wonderful rainstorm, and Jesse feels himself cracking like heat-warped asphalt and tungsten.  She is shorter than him, smaller than him, but her hug is like a breath of fresh storm-soaked air, water to a dry, parched soul and -

His second hug in nearly three years.

In an overwhelming span of only a few minutes.

This ain’t fair, Jesse thinks to Time, far-reaching and cold-cut, as he struggles to retain control as Gabrielle breaks off the embrace.  The boy thinks to the gorge made of eternity, muttering to the years and minutes unraveling in his hands like spinning the cylinder of a revolver, Ya can’t just drop this on me like this.  This ain’t fair.  I ain’t deservin’.

“I see now,” Gabrielle hums slightly as Jack takes a step forward, saying slowly, “He’s my second cousin, Gabrielle.”

“Sure he is, Jack,” Gabrielle chuckles, turning to face the captain who holds out the datapad to her.  Jack laughs back, “He’s going to be Gabriel’s intern.  Will you clear him for work?”

She stares at his face for a long, unraveling moment before murmuring, “This could get us all court-martialed.”

“That’s why I wanted you to know before you signed the papers - it’s best we all know what we would end up in prison for,” Jack smirks wryly, and Gabriel rolls his eyes at the captain’s antics.  Gabrielle heaves a long breath, before taking the datapad from his hands and scribbling out a signature with a gloved fingertip as she whispers gently, “Absolutely no frontlines for three months.  No classified information.  No weapons-testing.”

“Gonna be hard to convince Torb on the last one,” Gabriel grins, but Gabrielle turns to Jesse, pointing a finger at him as she instructs, “You will learn from every division leader, including Captain Morrison, Lieutenant Amari, Lieutenant Wilhelm, Chief Engineer Lindholm, and Environmental Director Zhou.”

“What,” Jesse states as Gabriel mutters, “¿Qué?  Gabrielle, he doesn’t have that kinda experience -”

“You will make an effort,” Gabrielle continues to explain to Jesse, her gaze warm and gentle but also sharp and focused, “You will consider working for other divisions.  You will put in the effort and work expected of our agents, and that includes understanding every major current division in Overwatch.  I will not have you limit your prospects to the Strike-Team.  Is that clear?”

“Gabrielle, please, be reasonable,” Ana says, but Gabrielle turns that sharp stare to the sniper, muttering, “I know you, Ana Amari, and I know exactly what you hope to teach him.  But you will show him what it means to be Overwatch’s structural organization officer before you show him your sniper rifles.”

“...Understood, madame,” Ana murmurs, and Gabrielle glances at the other members, saying with stern authority, “The rest of you will do the same.  And you will tell Torb that the intern is not allowed to handle prototype weapons unless he is made a permanent agent.”

Mei raises her hand, asking with a sly smile, “Gabrielle, the endothermic blaster is a scientific tool.”  Gabrielle gives Mei a deadpan stare as the scientist giggles a little before Gabriel nudges her in the ribs.  Gabrielle sighs, saying coolly, “Zhou Mei-ling, if you freeze another laboratory, I will have Torb reclassify that thing as a weapon.”

“The last time was an accident,” Mei replies with a mischievous grin, getting Gabriel to snort as Jack shakes his head behind Gabrielle’s back, but the captain has a crooked smile on his face.  Gabrielle scowls, before she grumbles to Gabriel and Jack, “I hope you two are prepared to defend this mission before the Security Council.”

Gabriel makes a disgusted, ugly face as Jack rolls his shoulders, murmuring, “Can’t be worse than doing the PR after Gabe’s statements on Australia.”

“Oh, just watch me,” Gabriel cracks dryly, which gets Jack to lightly knock a fist against the commander’s shoulder, growling, “Stop making my job harder, pendejo.”

“I know you like the challenge, Jack,” Gabriel grins, and Jesse can hear the eye-roll in Ana’s words as she whispers, “And they’re back at it again.”

“Zhey can never be stopped for very long,” Reinhardt mutters back, as quietly as Jesse has ever heard him, a soft chuckle to his words.  Unaware of the side conversation occurring between the lieutenants, Gabrielle throws her hands in the air, jokingly reprimanding the Strike-Commander and Strike-Captain, “Enough.  I must be on a ship to New York now.  Which one of you is coming with me?”

“I’m going, I’m going,” Jack sighs, ruffling at his hair a little.  He leans over and gives Gabriel a quick kiss on the cheek, whispering something to him that gets the commander to smirk.  Jack has a big grin on his face when he pulls away, before addressing Mei, “Don’t give Gabe and Torb too much trouble, 妹妹 (tn: meimei, sister).”

“I would not dream of it,” Mei smiles back, but Jesse don’t trust that mischief in her voice.  Jack glances at Fareeha, reminding her, “I hope you’re ready for a Pokemon rematch when I get back.”

“I’ve been training a special team just to beat you,” Fareeha beams and Jesse thinks something is slipping in and falling in his brain when -

Jack gives him a gentle, serene smile, chuckling happily as he says:

“Remember, Jesse - store-bought is perfectly okay and preferable to burnt buñuelos.”

“You asshole,” Gabriel hisses, but there’s a massive grin on the commander’s face as he presses quick, tickling fingers into Jack’s sides.  Jack gives a low, rumbling laugh before darting away and following Gabrielle to another transport ship, leaving the aftermath of a storm in his wake.

Yup.

Jesse’s mind is definitely broken as all hell.

The little group watches him go until Gabriel grins at the boy, saying with a smirk:

“Let’s go get you set up.”

---------

And I want a moment to be real

Want to touch things I don't feel

Wanna hold on and feel I belong

And how can the world want me to change

They're the ones that stay the same

They don't know me

'Cause I'm not here

---------

Soldado: Homemade

February 11, 2057: 10:12 a.m. - in the main conference room of Watchpoint: Grand Mesa

“It isn’t goddamn fair.”

The meeting has only been going for twelve minutes and already Jack has a slow-growing headache.

He’d only been back from the U.N. Headquarters in New York for a few hours at best - his meeting with the Security Council had lasted nearly sixteen hours yesterday, the ambassadors and President running endless questions around Gabrielle and himself for what felt like an eternity.  When the Council was finally placated - not “satisfied,” these days they were hardly ever satisfied with answers about Gabriel’s missions, no matter how much sugar he and Gabrielle tried to coat them in - they’d let him go, very gruffly stating that they were “expecting him back later in the week for further inquiries.”  

Jack could very easily have slept in the dedicated Overwatch Strike-Commander’s office there - lord knows he’s done it hundreds of times at this point - or even caught a Metro-North train to their house in Sleepy Hollow, but by that point, all he’d wanted was to feel Gabriel’s strong, warm arms around him and the murmuring of sweet, sugar-coated Spanish in sonorous darkness and comfy blankets.

So he’d forced himself back on a transport ship to Grand Mesa, stumbled into the Watchpoint in the semi-darkness, and hauled himself to bed in their shared quarters -

And dropped himself into Gabriel’s welcoming, loving embrace

His commander whispering his name affectionately against Jack’s hair.

Jack’d only slept for a few hours, but after yesterday, it had felt like an eternity of solid comfort and sweet, snoring lullabies.

It had felt like coming home.

And then the morning had come

And the tone of everything had shifted.

He wouldn’t say “reluctantly,” but certainly with a heavy, weighted sigh and a roll of their shoulders, he and Gabriel had assembled the Strike Team members who had been on the mission yesterday, including Ana and Reinhardt, and settled the twenty-three members - minus Mina - into the conference room.  The atmosphere had been palpably tense as Jack had started with the same sort of opening statements he’d made before the Security Council yesterday, only with a touch more personality and a strong dosage of patience and -

“Why the hell is that kid still here?”

Things had fallen apart almost immediately.

Within twelve minutes, it had become abundantly clear that the team was torn into a few groups: the two extremes, one side wanting Jesse in jail, the other side perfectly content with him “being remade into a productive Overwatch agent,” which both Gabriel and Jack had glared at, Gabriel reminding everyone that “productivity” was not any sort of merit that the organization cared about, which had resulted in a long, heated argument about “the nature of work, personal worth, and rehabilitation,” which had then resulted in another long, heated argument about if a young deadeye marksman-née-drug runner could ever truly be “redeemed,” which had resulted in a third long, heated argument about why Jesse was even in Overwatch if a juvenile “detention center” was where he belonged.  There were a few other groups: some that wanted to help Jesse, but wanted him to be placed in a “non-combatant” division like Engineering, where he couldn’t hurt anyone; another that said he should never be left unattended, that he should be forced to shadow an agent at all times; another that complained bitterly that he didn’t “deserve” the room in the Commanders’ quarters of the Watchpoint -

“It isn’t goddamn fair -”

And that is when Jack sinks his head into his hands, inhaling-exhaling, one-two, three-four, as the voices being to rise again.  Beside Jack, at the “true head” of the long ovalular table, Gabriel leans back into his chair, the disgust evident on his face, folding his arms, an impatient finger tap-tap-tapping at a bicep.

He’s only a few minutes from kicking them all out, Jack thinks to himself, knowing all too well the short length of Gabriel’s fuse for circular arguments.  On the other side of Gabriel, Jack can see Ana’s right eyelid twitch slightly, her cybernetic eye adjusting on different members’ faces as she scans the room, her face also pinched into a frustrated sneer.  And on the other side of her, Reinhardt rubs at his eyes with his mass hands, his blonde ponytail looking limp and frazzled, his beard sticking out at odd angles from where he’s been tugging on it.

“Jesse’s life hasn’t been fair -” Gabriel starts to say, but Julio cuts him off, snapping bitterly, “None of our lives have been fair, comandante!  We all grew up in the Crisis too, but we had to work hard to get here and he - what?  He shoots six of our own agents and somehow gets rewarded with an ‘internship‘?  How is that justice??”

“And I keep saying,” Singh jumps in, grumbling loudly as he points at Julio, “It is not about justice - this is a humanitarian issue!  A young boy was put in a horrific position and Overwatch has an opportunity to change that.”

“The justice comes from righting the wrongs in his life,” Mirembe adds, giving Singh a firm nod, her bright hair bouncing with the motion.  She too looks at Julio, stating clearly, “Jesse is a perfect moment for Overwatch to prove that it practices what it preaches - how can we say we have all these ideals if we cannot help even one child make a better life for himself?”

“Yet we jeopardize our ideals if we do this the wrong way,” Kimiko insists, sighing as she too sits back in her chair, her dark hair swaying as she shakes her head, “Breaking our own laws to help him only makes us hypocrites!  How can we expect the world to trust Overwatch if we bend our own morals the moment a single problem comes to us?”

“Jesse is a human being, not a problem,” Jack says tersely, and the group falls back into angry, bitter silence.  The Strike-Captain sits up a little more, scowling fiercely as he mutters in low, dense rumbles, struggling to maintain his patience, “We understand all your frustrations with the situation, but Overwatch was not founded on strict principles - hypocrisy lies at the heart of our organization.  Need I remind you all that we exist solely because we had to fight, kill, and destroy humanity’s own sentient inventions?”

The younger Strike Team agents look sullen at that, and Jack feels a sliver of guilty self-depreciation at his frustration with them, but there’s a reassuring pat on his right thigh.  He glances to Gabriel, whose expression has softened slightly, and Jack slips his right hand down to wrap it around Gabriel’s left, holding it tightly.

They’ve always had to make the bitter, hard, difficult arguments.

They’ve always had to justify the existence of their organization - not on the United Nations’ ethics and conventions, not on the Crisis that fueled the necessity of their work, not even on their own skills or motivations or hopes or objectives -

But on the complexities of their hearts and souls.

On the complexities of waging war against war, dealing death against death, stopping destruction with destruction - with hard photon shield barriers and enemy-identifying turrets and long, lean sniper rifles -

With pulse rifles blasting bursts of lightning and biotic fields radiating liquid life -

With shotguns filled with plasma-slag, hot enough to melt Bastion armor in a matter of seconds.

“We are a military organization that is trying to become a humanitarian organization,” Jack continues, feeling more reassured by Gabriel’s hand in his, by the keen, sharp nods of Ana’s head at his words, by the way Reinhardt eases his hands away from his face.  The Strike-Captain sighs, saying with a growing, steadier patience, “We are not perfect.  We have never been perfect.  We only developed our first non-militarized division last year.  For all our efforts to transform Overwatch from a militia strike force, we have seemingly done very little.

“But at our core,” Jack continues, feeling the words roll like a slow, summer storm in his chest, feeling steadier by Gabriel’s touch, solid and tangible and grounding, “We are a military organization.  The world may call us heroes, but we must never forget that we are actually all soldiers, every one of us in this room.”

The younger Strike Team members still, thinking over his words and Jack finds a quiet, calm, beating strength as Gabriel nods at him in his peripherals.  Jack sighs heavily, one-two, before murmuring with as much gentle patience as he can find in the swell of his soul:

“Jesse is not a crucible for Overwatch to prove itself on.  As many of you keep saying, that’s not fair - not to him, but also not to you, nor us, nor the United Nations, nor the world.  It is not hopeful, nor honorable, nor courageous, nor just to pin the weight of our worth on his shoulders.  As we move forward, it is not our choice regarding him that will define us, but our choice regarding ourselves that will.”

Jack glances at their faces, looks each one of them in the eye, shifting his gaze across the room, feeling them contemplate his words -

He trusts them

100%.

He trusts them to give this matter the thought and consideration it deserves.

He trusts them to give Jesse the thought and consideration he deserves.

“We must be willing to ask ourselves what the worth of a single human being is for this organization.  We must must be willing to ask ourselves what lengths we will go to help them, what morals and ethics are worth keeping the face of their life, and which ones are worth discarding.  We must be willing to ask ourselves if we are doing this for ourselves, for our principles, for our sense of duty...or for that one individual,” Jack states, as Reinhardt nods appreciatively and Ana’s gaze grows more contemplative.

“Overwatch is worth nothing if we do not recognize that everyone deserves a second chance.”

The room turns to Gabriel, who inhale-exhales deeply - Jack can tell he’s soothing whatever frustrations he has, dumping water on the lit fuse of his impatience - before he jumps back into his words:

“Overwatch as a unit and an ideal is worthless.  Nothing makes it real and valuable except the individuals composing it.  That’s all history is: a series of small, individual decisions and reactions building into a long sequence of connections and consequences.  Groups, organizations, nations, even entire ephemeral concepts like philosophies and disciplines - these all fall to individuals creating history, to individuals creating change.  Idealism is bullshit and basing ourselves and our actions on them will result in all of us crashing and burning.”

But Jack smiles at him, squeezing his hand beneath the table, and Gabriel smiles back faintly, kindly, as the Strike-Captain completes his partner’s thoughts, adding water to his heart and soul’s sunshine:

“But still, we must try.”

The team looks solemnly yet strongly resolved as Gabriel grins:

“Exactly.  Our focus is all we have.  So we need to ask ourselves: what are we focused on here - compromising an organization that was never perfect to begin with, or deciding as individuals to help another deserve a chance to make his own decisions in life?”

The group falls back into slow, simmering silence, each person rolling the words around in their heads and hearts when -

The door cracks open, and they all glance up

At Mina who is beaming brightly, boldly at them.

She still looks a little wan, but her deep, rich skin is regaining its usual vitality, the bronzy tone tinted softly gold under the white lights of the conference room.  There’s a thick bandage around her neck still, but it looks far fresher than when Jack last saw her yesterday morning, and her dark eyes have their usual vivaciousness to them, glinting like playful obsidian as she slips into the room, grinning at them as she says with a wave:

“سلام (tn: salam, hello).”

Jack breathes a sigh of relief as the other members react, many of them shouting, “Mina!” happily, Mirembe standing to offer the revitalized agent a hug.  A smile flitters on Ana’s face as Reinhardt booms, “Welcome back, Mina!”

Gabriel smirks, “We’re glad you’re back, Agent Ahmadi.”

Mina smiles right back, laughing loudly, “Thanks, everyone!  And look what I brought - fresh-made bamieh!”  She swings the door open wider and -

The room falls into a tense, hard silence as it opens to Jesse standing there, scowling slightly, struggling to balance a huge bowl of the Persian fried donuts in his hands.

What timing, Jack thinks dryly as he watches the pile wobble a little in the new intern’s hands, and Jesse shimmies to keep the bamieh upright.  There are quick, electric looks between team members around the room as Mina chuckles, “Do not mind the shapes - Jesse did his best.  And some of them might be a little extra crunchy because we left a batch in the fryer just a little too long -”

“Mina, you…” Kimiko says hesitantly, sharing a look with Julio, who scowls.  Kimiko continues, looking uncertain as she asks, “You are not mad?”

“...Mad about what?” Mina replies, genuinely confused as Jesse shuffles into the room, struggling with the huge bowl.  But the recovering Strike agent just giggles, “I mean, I cannot be mad about the shapes - no one makes the stars right on the first try, but Jesse got better at it!  He’s a quick learner.”  But then she flashes a lightning smirk at the new intern, wisecracking, “But he did drop a few on the way here.”

“More like twenty o’ ‘em,” Jesse grumbles, slowly working his way up to the table, a look of heavy, focused concentration on his still bruised face.  Some of the agents scoot their chairs out of the way as he moseys up to the edge, steadying one part of the bowl on it before he slowly slides it forward.

“Ha!  I guess that is true,” Mina laughs brightly, knocking a fist lightly against Jesse’s shoulder as the cowboy stands back, looking immensely relieved at having delivered his payload to the destination.  But Mina does give the group around the table an apologetic shrug as she grins, “I was being a little mean and making him carry everything.”

“Aw, sweet pepper jack!” Jesse snaps, jolting some of the agents near him with the forcefulness of his words.  He glances at Mina with a small pout, muttering, “We fergot the plates ‘n napkins.”

“Oh man, you’re right,” she murmurs, but replies with yet another charming smile as she encourages him, “Well, hop to it, cowboy!  They’re better when they’re hot.”

“...Makin’ me run all the way back ta the kitchen,” Jesse grumbles, turning to the door and she laughs again, chiding him, “You were the one who said you’d help me out today, so get a move on, kiddo!”

Jesse bolts back out the door, and the group can hear the squeak-squeak-squeak of his sneakers on the tiled floor, until they fade off into the maze of the Watchpoint’s hallways and -

“...Did you put him up to this?” Jack whispers to Gabriel, who looks just as shocked as the rest of them.  The Strike-Commander shakes his head, chuckling in a low murmur to his partner, “I barely showed him around the Watchpoint yesterday - hell, I don’t think we even reached the hospital ward -”

“You picked a good intern, Commander.”

Eyes flit back up to Mina, who is looking at the doorway with a faint smile on her face as she murmurs warmly, “Shame we had to meet under such terrible circumstances, and he is a little clumsy, but he is very kind - he was waiting for me when I was discharged this morning.  Offered to help me out for as long as I wanted.”

She grins at the commanders, radiant under the white lights as she laughs:

“Sorry that I stole your intern on his first day!”

Several agents have buried their heads in their hands, and Kimiko has a bittersweet look on her face.  Julio looks miserable, until he reaches for a bamieh, popping one in his mouth with a loud crunch, before he half-coughs, half-chokes:

“It isn’t goddamn fair that you decided to be friends with him without us, Mina.”

Mina laughs, the sound radiating throughout the room as she knocks a fist lightly against Julio’s shoulder.  Beside Jack, Gabriel heaves a soft sigh, relaxing as more people reach for the bamieh.

Beneath the table, Jack squeezes his hand around Gabriel’s, and Gabriel’s shifts to entwine their fingers together.

They’ve always had to make the bitter, hard, difficult decisions.

But this is not one of them.

---------

And you see the things they never see
All you wanted, I could be
Now you know me, and I'm not afraid

And I wanna tell you who I am
Can you help me be a man?
They can't break me
As long as I know who I am

And I want a moment to be real,
Wanna touch things I don't feel,
Wanna hold on and feel I belong.
And how can the world want me to change?
They’re the ones that stay the same.
They can’t see me,
But I’m still here.

---------

Segador Flashback: Withdrawal

September 29, 2035: 1:44 a.m. - The Reyes Solís household, Los Angeles, California

Gabriel wakes to the sound of echoey, hollow vomiting.

It takes his eyes a second to adjust to the night shadows that cover the room.  It’s not really darkness, not in truth, not when there’s so much light pollution everywhere: tarnished, burnished glows from streetlamps filtering in through the blinds covering the windows, the blink-blink-blink of lights from the computer tower on the desk in the corner, small bits of reflection that seep in from sources unknown.  Everything exists in a shadow that only mimics the night, soft filters of grey over everything.  He lies there for a still second, not wanting to move, listening to the distant rumble of cars and street noise and the nearer, closer sound of his half-brother puking his guts into the toilet just adjacent to their shared room.

Gabriel flicks a lazy, mostly-asleep glance to the empty bed on his right, before forcing himself to flop over and check his phone on his bedside table.

1:44 a.m.

If he had more coherence, he would actually formulate the thought that this was extraordinarily typical of Rafael, getting shitfaced on a school night only a few weeks into the new school year, but Gabriel’s twelve-year-old brain is struggling with the mere fact of being awake at this moment.

Still, he forces himself to sit up, sliding his bare feet out from beneath the cozy, comfortable sheets to hit the creaky wood floor.  He slumps down, snagging a dark sweatshirt from the ground and shrugging it on - he’s not cold, he just likes the feeling of the soft cotton on his skin - and draws the hood, covering his short, buzzed hair.  Gabriel rises, semi-stumbling, semi-shuffling across the cluttered room - entirely too small for a seventeen- and twelve-year-old pair of brothers - reaching the door to the bathroom.

He twists the knob.

He knows it’s not locked.

Gabriel opens it, squinting against the half-lights turned on in the small, Jack and Jill bathroom, whitewashed walls stained slightly from the difficulty of ventilating the old house.  Here, the vomiting noises - full-on gagging and choking - finally reach their full volume, and once his eyes adjust a little better, he can see Rafael curled around the toilet in the corner, still dressed in the jeans, t-shirt, and sneakers he’d worn to whatever party he’d slipped off to hours ago.

Gabriel sighs, shuffling to the brothers’ sink, grabbing Rafael’s glass and filling it with water from the faucet.  He sleepily meanders to the toilet, kicking lightly at one of Rafael’s feet as he mutters hoarsely, “Agua.”

Rafael gives another heaving gag, chucking whatever the fuck him and his dumbass friends had been eating before they had decided it was an exciting prospect to get drunk as all hell into the toilet water, sick splashing sounds rewarding Gabriel’s ears.  Gabriel makes a slight, ugly face, mostly at the horrific smell, as his brother lifts his head, squinting at the younger one.

Gabriel holds out the cup with a slightly more insistent gesture, grumbling, “Bebe.”  Rafael looks vaguely and drunkenly suspicious, before he weakly lifts a limp hand and grabs the glass, half-slurping the water, half-sloshing it over himself.  Gabriel twists and slumps down, seating himself against the porcelain base of the standing shower as Rafael drinks obnoxiously.

“...Thanks, Gabito,” Rafael croaks as he finishes the glass and Gabriel lolls his head, sighing, “Is this really that fun?”

“...No,” Rafael answers honestly, before his light-dark eyes grow wide and he turns to lean his head back over the toilet bowl.  Gabriel makes another face of disgust as the sounds of splashing ring in his ears, and Rafael lifts his head back up, groaning, “No, it fucking sucks.”

“So why do you do it?” Gabriel asks, genuinely curious while also wanting to crawl back in bed and forget that these kinds of nights even happen, forget that this bullshit even exists.

Rafael sits for a moment, his face cast in half-light, half-shadows, the dim rumble of cars and street noises filling the air between them, until the seventeen-year-old murmurs:

“Because what else is there to do?”

--- (February 13, 2057: 2:28 a.m. - Strike-Commander bedroom, Watchpoint: Grand Mesa) ---

Gabriel wakes to the sound of echoey, hollow vomiting.

It takes his eyes a second to adjust to the velvety, nightfallen darkness of the room, seeped in shades of blues and blacks, a gentle, almost soothing calmness that it took him years to get used to.  There are still small pinpricks of light around their room - the datapad sitting on his bedside table, the glow of the heavy pulse rifle’s safety lights, sitting partially disassembled on Jack’s desk in another corner of the room, their twin blueglass comms devices sitting beside it, the soft orange glows lighting the emergency paths to the window and the door, the same orange glow framing the light switch and the door-lock button on the other side of the rather large bedroom.

A perk of being the Overwatch Strike-Commander and Strike-Captain.

Despite being February in Grand Mesa, it’s warm enough in the room, but Gabriel will be the first to admit that a lot of the cozy, comfortable heat comes from Jack, who is snoring lightly on Gabriel’s chest, a pale, scarred arm that’s wrapped around Gabriel’s torso peaking out from under the blankets and covers.  Jack’s thick, broad body is pressed up against his, their legs entwined beneath the sheets, and Gabriel takes a half-second to relish in his partner’s warmth.  Jack’s blonde hair is fluffed at awkward angles, blocking much of Gabriel’s view of the room, his head rising and falling with Gabriel’s rhythmic breathing.  Gabriel takes a second to lift his right arm and run his fingers through Jack’s gold-blonde hair, and his partner stirs at the touch, shifting slightly as his deep, sleep-addled voice cracks slightly, “Gabe...what’s wrong?”

“Jesse’s throwing up in the bathroom again,” Gabriel murmurs, as Jack nuzzles into his hand, humming a little before he groans, “Swell.”

“You can stay in bed,” Gabriel replies, shifting a little to kiss the top of Jack’s head before pulling himself out from under his partner.  Jack sighs, stretching as Gabriel sits up, and the captain yawns, “No, I’ll get up - just give me a second.”

Gabriel chuckles before bending down and grabbing a sweatshirt off the floor, slipping it on and zipping it up.  The hard, high-traffic carpet floor is rough to his feet, but he shuffles forward anyways, adjusting his sweatpants a little.  He slaps the door-lock button, stumbling into the more brightly-lit hallway once it slides open.

Most of the Watchpoints are set up fairly similarly, although Grand Mesa is one of the “older” ones, having been claimed from an old forest ranger station by the U.N. during the Crisis.  It had been partially-reconstructed and expanded on in the Post-Crisis, mainly to make room for the one-thousand-plus new agents and staff members that had been hired in the wake of Overwatch’s popularity and public recognition.  This area housed the main lounge, meeting, and bedrooms, with attachments for the more standardized “barrack” halls just a little ways off.  

Some of the younger agents had grumbled three days ago when Jesse had arrived and promptly been given a special, small bedroom close to the commanders’ rooms, adjacent to Mei’s room, but both Gabriel and Jack had known, almost without talking about it

That Jesse was going to need a little special consideration

Especially in his first week as Gabriel’s “intern.”

...Mainly because of the withdrawals.

Did he overeat again? Gabriel wonders, still half-asleep, although he can already feel the synthetic drugs from SEP kicking in and increasing his alertness, turning his thoughts over, Or was it another nightmare?  

It was abundantly clear that Jesse was not used to having free access to the fridge and cupboards in the main kitchen.  He continued to ask Gabriel and Jack if he would get in trouble for taking something to eat, with the answer continuing to be, “Take what you want, but we’re counting the alcohol.”

Within hours, when the first signs of the cocaine withdrawals had kicked in, Jesse had already overeaten from his agitated appetite and wildly-swinging moods.

Gabriel shuffles to the shared bathroom, opening the door to the fuller sounds of the kid vomiting echoing through the industrial walls.  The Strike-Commander sighs to himself, heading to the closed stall and knocking on it.  There’s a brief pause in the coughing and gasping noises and -

“Go the fuck away.”

Excellent.  One of those moods.

“Don’t make me kick the stall door in,” Gabriel grumbles, folding his arms and tapping a finger, glancing at the broken stall next to this one, adding lowly, “Like yesterday.”

Another still, silent moment and then -

There’s shuffling as the kid rises, and then the clattering of the lock on the stall door, and then -

The door swings open, Jesse’s face appearing a second later.

Gabriel’s heart goes out to him.

Jesse looks positively miserable, deep-set shadows sunken beneath his eyes, his scruffy facial hair looking ragged and run, his sandstone skin looking pale, even under the bright lights of the bathroom.  But worst of all is the strange, hazy glaze over his dark eyes, and the boy shudders as a chill sweeps through him, wrapping his arms around himself, the Overwatch sweatpants and jacket looking far, far too big on him.

The kid lifts a hand, using his orange bandana wrapped around his wrist to wipe at a small sliver of grime in the corner of his mouth.  He gives Gabriel a deep, ugly, outright deadly glare before he whispers:

“Ya shoulda shot me.”

And then he curls in on himself as another anxiety tremor shakes through him.

Gabriel sighs, wrapping an arm around Jesse’ shoulders, placing a steady hand on his right arm as he tugs him out of the stall, muttering tiredly, “Yeah, yeah, let’s have this pity party somewhere comfortable, at least.”

He’s had enough of spending nights caring for others on tiled bathroom floors.

“I ain’t slept right in three days,” Jesse groans, still shivering a little as Gabriel guides the stumbling seventeen-year-old to the door.  The kid half-chokes, “And now I’m ruinin’ yer sleep and stupid, so fuckin’ stupid, I’m a fuckin’ dumbass -”

“Every seventeen-year-old is a dumbass,” Gabriel replies, leading them down the hall, past Ana’s bedroom, past his own, to the main lounge room, the most open part of the Watchpoint outside of the workshops and labs.  Everything out here is cast in similar, tarnished lighting - low orange glows in the blue velvet nightfall darkness - only out here

There are massive bay windows open to the sweeping vista of sharp-cut white snow and shimmering, frozen stars

Hanging heavy in the blue darkness.  

There are several couches arranged into three-sides of a square, a massive tv monitor on the fourth side.  Cups and mugs, papers and someone’s datapad lie about on the coffee table in the center, one of Mei’s spare throw blankets sitting rumpled in a corner of a couch, a massive, oversized stein left neglected on one of the side tables.  There’s easy access to the kitchen off to the side, because it seemed like none of the original Overwatch members liked doors, so the two rooms flow together into one giant sitting-eating-hanging-out room, smaller tables and chairs dotted around the couches.

There’s a low, soft white light on in the partially-visible kitchen, and the sound of gentle clattering of dishes, water running, and a low, storm voice humming something indistinct in the muffled, blue-darkness night.

Jesse shivers again - the openness of the room and the large windows make it much, much colder than in the hallways and bedrooms - and Gabriel leads the kid around to one of the couches.  He taps Jesse’s shoulder and the kid flumps himself into the cushions, muttering something hoarsely in a language Gabriel doesn’t know.  The Strike-Commander grabs Mei’s blanket from the other couch, throwing it at Jesse, who grumbles something before adjusting himself and wrapping the blanket around his shoulders, curling his feet up on the couch.

Gabriel reaches for the remote on the table, turning the television on and immediately tapping down the volume as Atlas News flicks on.  He switches it around, opening up the streaming service, as Jack’s voice rumbles in low, dulcet tones:

“What’re we gonna watch tonight?”

“You liked The Dollars Trilogy the other day, right?” Gabriel asks Jesse, who gives a half-hearted miserable shrug as an answer.

Typical teenager.

“Solid answer, chico,” Gabriel replies tartly, flipping through the Western films and shows on the service.  Jack shuffles past him, setting a bottle of water and a steaming mug of something that smells like coffee in front of Jesse, who grunts darkly, “Y’all should just go back ta sleep.”

“Yeah, that’s not happening, especially if you’re gonna get wired on adrenaline and overeat again,” Gabriel sighs.  Jack slides himself on the couch beside Jesse, suggesting, “What about Westworld?  Or the Dark Tower?”

“Oh, Westworld is a good idea,” Gabriel agrees, flipping over to it, rambling appreciatively, “Still the best use of ‘Paint It Black’ and ‘Black Hole Sun’ in media -”

“The fuck is ‘Paint It Black?’”

Are the hoarse, cracking words out of Jesse’s mouth.

Jack snorts as Gabriel turns to look at the boy over his shoulder, gawking in utter horror as he gasps, “You don’t know ‘Paint It Black??’  What sort of weirdass timewarp did Deadlock have you living it?”

Jesse rolls his shoulders again, before leaning down and grabbing the water bottle and twisting the cap open.  Jack yawns apathetically, “Gabriel, not all of us know music that’s like eighty years old.”

“‘Paint It Black’ is a classic, Jack -” Gabriel starts to argue but his partner just waves a hand slightly, leaning out on his other elbow as he mutters, “Just start the show, Gabe.”

The Strike-Commander scowls, but starts Season 1 before tossing the remote back on the coffee table and throwing himself on the couch between Jack and Jesse.  Jack shifts a little before settling himself against Gabriel’s shoulder, and Gabriel props up the pillow between him and Jesse.  The boy glares at the motion, adamantly refusing to lean against it, but Gabriel knows that if the last two nights are any indicator, Jesse will eventually relax, as the withdrawal symptoms are dulled by the distraction of whatever they’re watching, and maybe even fall into a half-sleeping haze.

“What,” Jesse mutters with a barely noticeable inquisitiveness to his tone as the HBO logo shifts to the strange, stark plastic figures of the intro.  The boy looks briefly confused, mumbling hoarsely, “...I thought this show was ‘bout cowboys in the West.”

“Well, you’re not entirely wrong,” Gabriel says with a chuckle as Jack snuggles against him a little more, adding in that low, sleep-addled voice, “It’s about robot cowboys.  Well.  Mainly a robot cowgirl.”

“...So ya mean it ain’t real?” Jesse grumbles which gets Jack to snort affectionately against Gabriel’s shoulder as Gabriel states dryly, “What.  Jesse.  It’s a show.  About robots living in a fake Wild West world.  None of it’s real.”

“What,” Jesse states right back, scowling skeptically at Gabriel before the boy adds, “Robots are real.”

“...Okay, well again, you’re not wrong,” Gabriel says, as Jack snort-giggles against his neck and shoulder and arm.  Gabriel shifts slightly, letting Jack lean more against his chest as he wraps his arm around Jack’s shoulders, explaining to Jesse, “But robots like this didn’t exist back when the show was made.  This is all fake.”

“...Oh yeah,” Jesse says, before sighing with an ornery teenage disappointment to his tone, “I keep fergettin’ yer that old.”

Gabriel makes a scowling pout as Jack’s whole body shakes with low, sleepy snort-laughter.  Gabriel roughly rubs his right hand through Jack’s hair, but his captain is still giggling, murmuring, “You’re old, Gabe -”

“Uh, excuse both of you, I wasn’t born when this show came out,” Gabriel starts to protest, but he’s smirking down at Jack who grins up lazily and roguishly at him.  But then -

Jesse’s voice cuts like dry ice across cracking earth and warped asphalt:

“Oh, so yer just a sci-fi nerd instead.”

Gabriel outright glares at the air as Jack practically sobs with laughter, wheezing slightly as he semi-squirms around.  Gabriel playfully rubs at his already unruly blonde hair harder, which only makes Jack squirm a little bit more -

“Alright, so while it’s true I like sci-fi, I’m a goddamn industrial, art nouveau goth nerd, so get your shit right,” Gabriel states, but he’s grinning too, especially as Jesse twists to give him a shocked, sputtering look and Jack continues to heave wheezing, shaking sobs against him.

“And also this isn’t just sci-fi -” Gabriel starts to continue, but Jesse cuts him off, saying with more exaggerated gestures to the screen, “It’s got robots in it, comandante papito - it’s a sci-fi!”

“It still has strong Western themes!” Gabriel insists, to which Jack mumbles with soft hiccups, “The robots wearing old timey clothes does not automatically make it have ‘Western themes,’ Gabe.  And all the music references are classic rock.”

The Strike-Commander huffs at that, but the dense, sullen atmosphere has slowly started dissipating, so Gabriel tolerates them, even if they are incorrect about the themes of the show.  Jesse sighs sullenly, “So there ain’t no real skill in this show.”

“I’m sorry - did you think Eastwood was actually shooting things in the other movies?” Gabriel asks, but he’s cut off by Jack chuckling in a low, sleep-addled voice, “They all got aimbots.” 

“...Okay, first of all, Jack, you are the last person I want to hear complaining about aimbots,” Gabriel states dryly, which only gets Jack to snicker, the small shakes of laughter rolling through Gabriel.  The commander sighs, saying to Jesse, “I’m sorry to tell you, kid, but Hollywood isn’t real.  It’s all movie -”

But he deadstops as he catches a quick glimpse of the faint smirk on Jesse’s face before the boy turns away and hacks into a cough.

“You li’l honey-mustard sonuva gun-” Gabriel starts to say to him, but Jack sighs deeply, contentedly, slipping an arm around Gabriel’s torso as he shifts against him more, murmuring, “Shhh, Gabe - we’re already like five minutes in.”

“You two were the ones startin’ the thematic discourse, not me,” Gabriel chuckles at his captain, causing Jack to tilt his head and place a warm, if sleepy kiss on the underside of Gabriel’s jaw.

Gabriel can feel the soft, if sleepy smile on Jack’s lips in the moment -

“Aw, shit, are you two old nerds gonna be embarrassin’ the whole time?” Jesse mutters with an ornery pout before he flashes a mischievous, smug smirk at Gabriel, saying tauntingly, “This sci-fi has a very important Western vibe to it, and if y’all are gonna be embarrasin’, y’all are really gonna bring the mood down.”

“You horrific pendejito,” Gabriel starts to swear as Jack chuckles, “Ain’t a good day unless we’ve managed to embarrass you at least once.”

Which just gets Jesse to half-grumble, half-laugh again:

“I changed my mind - can I go ta jail instead?”

--------- 

Segador Flashback: In-Fighter

November 13, 2038: 4:37 p.m. - The Reyes Solís household, Los Angeles California

He’s incredibly lost in the Sacred Forest temple when there’s a knock at his bedroom door.

Gabriel scowls, feeling his intense focus slip - he’s been trying to get to a certain door for what feels like half an hour, but the dungeon’s “gimmick” of rewinding time at certain control rooms is running circles around his head.  He knows he need to get a small key in the next room over, but he can’t seem to find the right route there, even rewinding time to different points, causing the trees to grow and shrink, shrink and grow.

He’s slumped on his bed, playing on the large monitor projecting from the desk, trying to ignore the irritating hum of the heater, old and boringly patient, shaded in half-light, half-shadows.  He’s annoyed with everything - with how messy his room is, but he can’t be assed to pick things up, with how he can hear the low mumbles of his family members in the other rooms, with how the light seems to grow shorter and shorter and shorter each day, but he can’t be assed to hit the overhead light switch -

With how empty and barren Rafael’s bed is next to his, ever since Rafael got his DUI -

With how cramped and ugly and bitter everything feels and is -

With how fucking miserable school has been -

Gabriel sneers at nothing, at the rage in his own head and the frustration in his heart, at the mere thought of school.

Miserable pieces of shit, he thinks bitterly, before he realized he’s been going the wrong fucking way again and nearly throws the controller in utter rage.

His increasingly miserable, terse frustration is absolutely not helping, he knows, but he’s just so angry -

“Busy,” the sixteen-year-old grunts, as he looks at the damn temple map for what feels like the thousandth time.

“Can I come in, mijo?”

The voice is slightly muffled through the door, but Gabriel recognizes the soft, steady roll of the words as his uncle Raúl, a bit gruffer than his brother Eddie, but still carrying the same sort of control, steady cool that the older Reyes brothers share.  Gabriel’s eyebrows furrow, he’s hacking away but -

“Are you going to lecture me?” Gabriel snaps, his bitterness seeping into every word, and he closes the map before throwing Link at yet another set of vines to climb.  Raúl sighs through the old wood of the door, saying, “No, I just have a question.”

He’s going to fucking lecture me, Gabriel thinks viciously, but he grumbles anyways, “Do whatever you want, I don’t care.”

Link continues to climb - why the fuck is this temple such a pain in the ass - as the door creaks open.  Gabriel patently ignores Raúl as his presence moves into the room, his uncle seating himself on the edge of Gabriel’s bed just adjacent to the teenager.  After a long moment of climbing, Gabriel finally glances at him, scowling darkly.

Raúl looks much like his older brother - Gabriel’s father - except that at this point in the older Reyes’ lives, he’s fitter: more lean tension in some places and heftier muscle in others.  His deep, rich skin is almost always bruised in various places, and Gabriel feels his own aching bruises on his face and ribs burn a little at the similarities.  Unlike Eddie Reyes, who keeps his hair close-cropped, Raúl shaves it all off, his skin tensing taut over the full angles and curves of his head as he pout-frowns a little, watching Gabriel dodge a wall-clinging monster only to take a quick hit from a spinning projectile.

“...You just kinda took that one, huh?” Raúl asks with an unimpressed tone and Gabriel sighs viciously, “If that was your question, that was stupid as shit.”

Raúl makes a duly appreciative face, nodding as he mutters, “Well, you’re not wrong about that…”  Silence lapses between them as Gabriel finally gets Link to the next floor up, heading back into another rewind room, until Raúl finally says slowly:

“Heard you got suspended for fighting.”

“I knew you were going to lecture me,” Gabriel sighs, snapping the quick sequence of buttons to rewinding the temple’s time halfway - gotta double back to that one room and drop in, I guess - but Raúl just mutters with a sort of patient tiredness, “I’m not here to lecture you, Gabrielito -”

“Don’t call me that,” Gabriel growls lowly, heading back on another route as he adds furiously, “And don’t lie to me -”

“Lo prometo, I am not here to lecture you,” Raúl says, but then he chuckles dryly, “Eddie says he already did that.  Although he said that Isabella did most of it.”

“Fuck yeah she did,” Gabriel says darkly, rolling his eyes as he sneers, “She’s so scared I’m gonna turn out like Rafael, but fuck that.  Why would I ever want to be like him?”

The bed next to his has been empty for years.

He doesn’t remember the last time he really had a brother.

He doesn’t remember when exactly he lost him: which night listening to Rafael throw up in the bathroom was the breaking point; which day that Rafael ransacked his stuff, telling Gabriel he’ll pay him back for that twenty, was the one where Gabriel gave up; which week where Rafael didn’t come home at all, and when he finally did, he reeked of stale alcohol and yelled at their father, was the one where Gabriel felt his own bitterness creep a little deeper into his soul -

Because what was the point of it all?

Because what else was there to do?

He doesn’t want to be like Rafael.

But what else was there?

School was miserable, he was never certain if he was too smart for it or too stupid, felt like every other teacher picked on him, hated his guts, wanted to see him fail, asked questions in confusing and needlessly complicated ways.  Only history remained interesting, but his patience and focus in even that struggled to stay afloat, as the lectures grew longer, more painful, more agonizing to listen to.

What was the point of it all?

An endless cycle of people deciding to screw each other over and suffer the horrific consequences.

Why should he try to do any differently?

What could one individual hope to ever accomplish in the constant battle against forces much larger than themselves?

He doesn’t want to be like Rafael

But he’s beginning to see how getting drunk and fighting everyone could be mind-numbingly appealing.

Raúl nods slowly, as if assessing Gabriel’s words carefully, until he mutters with a wisecrack to his voice:

“That’s true - Rafael was always shit at fighting right.”

Gabriel pauses his mind mid-angry, bitter thoughts, before turning and giving his uncle a confused, skeptical stare, stating, “What.”

Raúl shrugs, but there’s a sly smirk on his face as he continues, “I’m not here to lecture you, Gabrielito.  When I was your age, I fought pretty much everything that came at me.  Wasn’t even good at it.  Lost a tooth or two in a few real bad ones.”

Gabriel snorts in disbelief, but Raúl grins at him, insisting, “Verdad, it’s all true.  Ask your dad sometime - he always thought I was being a real fucking dumbass for it.”

“Yeah, that sounds like him,” Gabriel admits, sighing as he realizes he went the wrong way again.  Raúl just chuckles, “Eddie was even worse than me though.”

“No mames!” Gabriel says, but there’s a slight laugh of disbelief to his words.  Raúl shrugs again, but there’s a glimmer of mischief to his eyes as he says, “Mira, my brother could be - and still can be - a real piece of shit when he wants to.”

“This is the weirdest lecture ever,” Gabriel grins back sarcastically, and Raúl rolls his eyes, knocking a fist against Gabriel’s shoulder as he mutters, “C’mon, Gabrielito, I really am not trying to lecture you here.”

“Then what is your question?” Gabriel asks, before he -

He suddenly realizes the key chest is right there, in the next room -

“It took me years, but eventually I wised up,” Raúl says, watching as Link rushes to the next room and opens the chest for the small key.  His uncle sighs with a slow contentment, explaining, “Eventually learned there was a way to fight stupid and a way to fight smart, ya know?  And you wanna know what the difference is?”

“Not fighting at all,” I bet, Gabriel thinks dryly, but asks to humor him, “I dunno, tío - what is it?”

“It’s knowing how to actually throw a fucking punch.”

Gabriel nearly drops the controller in shock, whipping his head to give Raúl a wide-eyed, gawking stare.  Raúl grins at him with a knowing smirk, saying tauntingly, “Did you think I was gonna tell you to stop fighting?”

“...No,” Gabriel lies defensively, but Raúl laughs, saying brightly, “Gabriel, sometimes all there is to do is fight.  Sometimes, a fight is even knowing when to be patient and hold your blows.  But always, a fight is about out-playing your opponent.  A good fight is only 10% skill and 90% tactics, but you can’t know the 90% if you don’t try to learn that 10% to start with.”

“...You really aren’t gonna tell me to stop?” Gabriel asks cautiously, certain this is some sort of weird trick to get him to confess his increasing anger and bitterness, but Raúl continues to grin at him, chuckling, “Lo prometo, I would never tell you to stop, Gabrielito.  I want you to learn how to fight smarter.”

“...That’s really it?” Gabriel mutters, and Raúl smirks, finally asking his question:

“Wanna come down to my boxing gym and learn how to throw a few punches the smart way?”

Gabriel glances back at the screen, staring at the small key in the inventory, thinking over the temple’s design and his progress.

There’s going to be some dumb mini-boss behind that locked door.

He’s not in the mood to fight that right now.

So Gabriel hits the save button, shrugging his shoulders as he relents:

“Got nothing else to do.”

---------

Sharpshooter: One-Two Punch

April 19, 2057: 11:27 a.m. - the gym at Watchpoint: Montreal

“Jab.  Jab.  Cross.  Jab.  Hook.  Upper cut.  Cross.  Jab.  Jab.”

Gabriel’s words tattoo out a steady beat-beat-beat, a rhythm Jesse grounds his weary, fading mind on.  They’ve been at this for maybe an hour or so now, with Jesse working through punch after punch into Gabriel’s punching mitts.  Every so often, Gabriel switches on him, throwing out a few light swipes that Jesse has to block, bob, or slip, and then the commander retreats back into his ready stance, issuing out the different punches as a flow, a rhyme upon rolling fists encased in tape and padding and plastic leather.

His hands are sore and his arms ache, but the stream of Gabriel’s words pushes Jesse onwards, sharpening his dulling mind into a single point of focus, black and red punching mitts held up in front of him, just a little below eye level, and the boy throws and throws and throws, tense and loose, tense and loose, like the spring of a revolver, load-trigger-load-trigger -

There’s a shifting presence behind Jesse - he can hear a soft creak to the padded mats of the sparring section of the gym as surprisingly light footfalls make their way over to them.  There are other people in the massive Watchpoint gym: lifting weights, running on treadmills, doing stretches, some even practicing different forms of sparring against each other, just a few mats over from where the Strike-Commander and his intern are practicing.  The gym is almost too scenic: the massive bay windows open to the low, green trees of Heron Island and the blue rush of rapids of the St. Lawrence River around them, and then out to Montreal beyond, dense houses and chunked out neighborhoods that had managed to survive the Crisis.

Jesse’s ‘bout two months into this Overwatch “internship,” but every time he gets the inklin’ that he’s got the swing of things, something changes up on him, shiftin’ to another gear he hadn’t fully realized existed in the Overwatch machine.  All he knows is that the three main North American Watchpoints were just the tip o’ the iceberg - Montreal was considered by damn near everyone to be the hub of “structural” Overwatch (as if that made some sorta sense to them).  It was the closest one to New York City, only a quick 30 minute ship flight to the U.N. Headquarters there, got a lot of U.N. officials flittin’ in and out real fast and easy.  Accordin’ to Ana, it’s the Watchpoint Gabriel and Jack spend the majority of their time in, jumping around between the base, the U.N. Headquarters, and some sorta house somewhere in New York.

He’s ‘bout a month, month-and-a-half into this boxin’ thing.

It’d begun with Gabriel waking him up on one of the Strike-Commander’s “leave days” at about seven in the mornin’ ‘bout a week after the withdrawals had eased off, draggin’ the kid outta his nice, warm bed to the colder Grand Mesa gym.  Gabriel had shown the half-asleep Jesse a few quick punches, jabs and crosses, and then basically thrown him nose to the grind.

“Why do I gotta do this?” Jesse had half-asked, half-mumbled, rubbing sleep from his eyes.  He’d spent the majority of that week shuddering through the withdrawal shakes and counting guns with Torbjörn, running around doing a few menial tasks for Mina and a few other Strike Team members, rapidly learning life as the Overwatch Strike-Commander’s intern was almost absurdly domestic.  

“I don’t care if you’re the fastest gunslinger in the West, chico - every agent learns to throw at least one or two punches,” Gabriel had said to the yawning boy, before snapping at him and gesturing for one of Jesse’s hands.  As rough, calloused fingers had applied tape around his hands, Gabriel had murmured with an odd sort of contemplative cool:

“The Crisis taught everyone that a good plasma gun was all anyone ever needed to make a stand and fight, but that’s far from true.  Weapons change as easily and as rapidly as technology, but nothing will change the necessity of knowing basic tactics in a one-on-one or two-on-one situation.  You can never outrun the arms race, but you can learn to outsmart a gun.”

“Why’d you ever wanna outsmart a gun?  Gun’s always gonna be faster,” Jesse had grumbled, but Gabriel had just chuckled with a sly sort of smirk, saying, “As Torb says, weapon’s only a tool, and a tool is only as good as the wielder.  After all -”

And Gabriel - Strike-Commander of Overwatch, ruthless killer of Omnic Central Cores, capturer of multiple God Programs, hero of humankind, one of the last living American supersoldiers, a man solidly 6 feet tall and 200 pounds of muscle - had tilted that wry, shit-eating grin at Jesse and stated with a bold, almost vicious vivaciousness:

“We managed to outsmart sentient, living robot guns, didn’t we?”

Now, few things render Jesse’s quicksilver wit speechless, but at 7 am, gettin’ a low, warm lecture on the very premise of war and fightin’ - that

That had left him a li’l speechless.

So they’d been practicing twice a week ever since.

He won’t deny - he ain’t nearly as great at boxin’ as he is with a gun (any gun).  Jesse’d always thought he was quick with his hands, loading-trigger-reloading lightning fast, fannin’ hammers and drawin’ deadeye shots faster than damn near everyone.  But there was...somethin’ about fighting hand-to-hand that made his mind turn in different ways, ways he wasn’t quite used to.  And Gabriel hadn’t stopped at boxin’ - they had jumped into stuff like karate and judo, often training alongside Ana and Fareeha when the younger Amari was around, learning a strange sort of fence-sparring with Reinhardt, experimenting with sanshou with Mei when the scientist popped up, and some sort of odd...sapper routine with Torbjörn, a “martial art” that - far as Jesse could tell - was something the Swedish engineer had invented for himself.

But the part that Jesse had found the most fascinatin’ was watching Gabriel and Jack spar together.

With or without guns.

It was like watching a dance, a tango, a swing - a flurry of steps and jabs, grapples and throws, kicks and blocks.  Gabriel was the in-fighter, pushing to get up close, invade Jack’s space, work to hit hard, fast blows packed with power, a style that was intimately adapted to his shotguns and vice-versa.  Jack, meanwhile, favored more of an out-fighter style, using quick, lithe footwork to try and keep some distance, rushing in with slick jabs and crosses before stepping back out.  Gabriel used his shotguns as an extension of his hits, an extension of himself, solid power for short ranges, but Jack used his rifle almost like a multi-tool - it could be a shield, a battering ram, a club, a surprisingly tactical flexibility in ways Jesse hadn’t even thought of.

Watching them spar with their practice guns - rubber bullets and paintball shells - was like somethin’ outta an action flick or video game, only there was an electric sensation that could pulse through the air around them, as if they were lost in a liquid atmosphere only they could swim through - Gabriel’s gilded eyes molten like sunbursts, Jack’s seastorm gaze rolling like a hurricane.

They delighted in each other - fighting or loving, loving or fighting.

Or perhaps, both together, one in the same.

They delighted in simply being together.

“You two are still at it, huh?”

Jack sidles up to Jesse’s peripherals, as Gabriel drawls out a few more punches, saying steadily:

“Jab.  Jab.  Upper cut.  Hook.  Jab.  Cross.  And jab.  Rest.”

Jesse flits out the last set of throws before dropping his arms and heaving a heavy, weighted sigh.  Gabriel tugs off his punching mitts as Jack steps up to Jesse, smirking with a knowing smile.  The boy pouts at him a li’l before holding up his hands, and Jack pulls the boxing gloves off them.  Jesse stretches and flexes his fingers, rubbing at his sore knuckles as he mutters to Jack, “Been a long mornin’, Cap.”

“Routine is the only way you’ll learn,” Gabriel reminds him, bending to one of the several water bottles by his feet.  He tosses it to his intern, and Jesse cracks the cap, raising the rim to his lips.  He drinks greedily as Jack chuckles wryly, “Well, you can also learn in trial by fire like we did, Gabe.”

“I am not putting anyone through any dumbass SEP experiment simulations,” Gabriel cracks back, but there’s a slight grin on his face as he drinks from his own bottle.  Jack just shrugs, saying teasingly, “You’re the boss.”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t remind me,” Gabriel grumbles, but Jesse don’ miss the slight grimace on his face at the words and -

“Commander.”

The three of them glance at Singh, who is carrying a datapad.  The Strike Team agent nods at Jesse and Jack, before turning his attention back to Gabriel, saying, “Sir, I have a few things to discuss with you before my squad leaves for Geneva, if you don’t mind.”

“Aw, shit, right, sorry, Singh - slipped my mind this morning,” Gabriel says apologetically, stepping up to the agent.  The two of them bow their heads over the datapad, Singh starting to tap at something on the screen.  Jesse and Jack contemplate them for a moment, until Jesse mutters softly:

“Why’s he so insistent on this sparrin’ thing?”

The boy glances up at the captain, who looks down at him with a murky, summer storm gaze, before he turns that rolling blue gaze back towards his commander and partner.  Jack hums a li’l as Jesse continues, “I ain’t great at it, Cap.  Anyone can see that plain as day.  Guns are all I’m good at, maybe doing a few rolls or jukes or sidesteps.  But damn, even Fareeha can out-spar me, and she’s just twelve.  I dun mind practicin’ a few times a week, but ain’t it better if I like...lift weights or run laps or somethin’?  Spend this time learnin’ with different guns?”

Jack listens patiently to Jesse’s words, even as his gaze continues to linger on Gabriel’s form.  The captain asks the boy quietly, “Is it wearing on you?  If it’s not enjoyable or educational, I’m sure Gabriel would be willing to teach you something different -”

“Ah, nah, it ain’t that,” Jesse stammers, worryin’ he said the wrong thing, so he clarifies a li’l, “Nah, I ain’t bored or nothin’.  Just thinkin’ that...well, wouldn’t it be better for me to do somethin’ I’m good at?”

Jack glances at him, assessing him with an odd, watery look and Jesse feels that strange, unfamiliar warm feeling of richness settle around his heart again and -

Dumbass, the cold, steel-rolled voice ripples through him, You ain’t shit.  You ain’t nothin’ special to no one.  These people pity the shit outta you.  All yer good for is aimin’ that deadeye on a target.

But then

There is a low, storm-seeped voice speaking with a slow, deep tenderness -

Jack’s voice -

As the captain says gently:

“Boxing...changed Gabriel’s life.”

Jesse flicks his gaze up at Jack, who is watching Gabriel with a sweet, clear intensity.  Jack folds his arms, his rolling voice speaking with a calm, yet focused strength as he continues, “Gabriel...wasn’t doing well in high school.  He says he was on a strange downward trajectory - his words, mind you.  When he got suspended for fighting, well...his parents weren’t pleased.”

Jack shifts slightly, nodding as he looks at Jesse, saying with a faint smile, “Gabriel says his uncle came to him and, instead of lecturing him on why fighting was bad, simply asked him to come try boxing, learn how to throw a few punches ‘the smart way.’”

Jesse scowls, making a small pout as he assesses Jack’s words, looking at Gabriel’s broad, cut back with skepticism.  The boy murmurs, “...Kinda hard ta swallow that he wasn’t just...born like that.”

Jack lets out a raspy, throaty chuckle, getting Gabriel and Singh to look up at them.  The captain waves them off, and - after a quick suspicious squint from Gabriel - the two of them return to focusing on the datapad.  Jack, meanwhile, grins at Jesse, saying jokingly, “Remind me to find you some pictures of us at West Point - you oughta see him before he had the beard.”

“What - nah, he came outta the womb with that, right?” Jesse jokes back, which gets Jack to beam at him, smile crinkling his eyes as the captain laughs, “Certainly feels like it.  Almost everyone is shocked to find out there was a time before Gabriel had his signature style.”

Jack settles back slightly, tilting that cool, storm-blue gaze onto his partner, saying with a liquid warmth, “Gabriel says that learning how to fight reshaped him, made him something new, unlocked a potential he never knew he had.  He’s not that great a boxer either, if you can believe it - I sparred with him well before we were ever given a supersoldier injection, and there were plenty of times my scrawny punches were able to knock him on his ass.  Still, he easily outsmarted and outplayed me maybe nine times outta ten.”

Jesse nods with an appreciative pout, muttering, “Sounds ‘bout what I’d expect.”

Jack starts to say, “Yeah -” but he dead-stops, shooting a quirked, dry look at Jesse as he asks, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“...Don’ worry too hard on it, Cap,” Jesse grins.  Jack gives him a long, deadpan look before saying slowly, “...Whatever you say, kid.  Anyways, the point is...learning how to fight put Gabriel on a new trajectory.  Got him disciplined, got him to focus in school, got him to volunteer and help other kids, the works.  But more than anything else…”

Jack pauses, and Jesse watches how his face shifts through a myriad of emotions: a li’l awe, a sunshiny warmth, an intense scowl, a concentrating pout, before settling on a soft, open smile as he says:

“More than anything else...learning how to fight opened Gabriel’s mind.  Made him a warrior and a general and a strategist at his core.  He wouldn’t be here today - hell, Overwatch itself wouldn’t be here today if he’d never learned that.”

“...Are you sayin’ the robot apocalypse woulda won if Gabriel Reyes had never tried boxing?” Jesse asks with skepticism, and Jack grins, chuckling, “Certainly seems like it, doesn’t it?  Gabriel always likes to say how every small decision adds up to history itself - guess he’s a pretty damn good example of that himself.”

“Hmm,” Jesse hums, contemplating Jack’s words, and the captain laughs, “In fact, I met Gabriel when he cross-punched a real asshole of a cadet who was picking on me on our second day of Beast training.”

Jesse gives Jack a look of mixed horror and awe as Jack shrugs, murmuring, “It’s true.  Life’s just whimsical like that.”

“No such thing as whimsy.”

Jesse and Jack look up as Gabriel rejoins them, a faint scowl on the commander’s face.  It shifts lightning-quick to a slight smirk as he grins, “I punched Max Jones because he was a li’l shit and he deserved it.  Whim had nothing to do with it.”

“You say that, but I was the one who had to talk us out of getting in serious trouble,” Jack teases right back.  Gabriel rolls his eyes, before smirking at Jesse, saying, “Don’t let Jack fool you - he likes to underplay his role in all this shit.  Did he mention that he was the one who convinced me to join the Enhancement Program?”

“What,” Jesse half-states, half-asks, half-demands, turning to gawk at Jack.  The captain shrugs again, muttering dryly, “It’s not that big a deal.”  But Jesse sees how he ruffles at his hair with modest embarrassment, a faint blush rising to his cheeks.  Jesse turns a grin to Gabriel, saying slyly, “Ya don’ say - how exactly does that bit o’ history go?”

Gabriel smirks viciously, saying mischievously, “Well, kid, let me start by saying there’s definitely a right way and a very, very wrong way to ask someone out -”

Which gets Jack to groan as he sinks his head in his hands.

---------

They can’t tell me who to be,
‘Cause I’m not what they see.
Yeah, the world is still sleepin’,
While I keep on dreamin’ for me.
And their words are just whispers
And lies that I’ll never believe.

---------

Soldado Flashback: Alone

October 2, 2041: 5:37 p.m. - The Morrison household, south of Bloomington, Indiana

Jack sighs heavily, his breath long and hollow yet somehow weighted with a strange worth.  

Coming home after cross-country practice always feels this way.

He loves the freedom of running, loves the feeling of sprinting, then pacing, then jogging, then pacing again, back into a sprint, counting steps and meters and feet.  He loves the wind across his skin and the sunshine in his hair, running perfect laps around the high school, feeling like he could escape, feeling like he could flee this strange, wilting oppression, a suffocation that feels like when the corn doesn’t grow quite right, an eerie sensation of standing alone in the vastness.

But when he runs

When he runs

The world opens up before him.

The sky unfolds in the summer - bright, endless blues - and the trees hue into red and gold and amber in the fall.  The roads are rolling and wide, routes to elsewhere, routes to a place he does not know, but a place that calls to him, whispering in tilting, smug teases through the sunbeams:

“Come chase me, come chase me, run run run -”

As he races the sunlight into oil-painted colors of the sunset, blood red dripping into rose pink, burnished gold into bronze-flaked orange, honey amber into velvety purple.

The sun stays in the sky fewer and fewer hours, but still he chases it, chases it to wherever it goes, to a place he does not yet know -

But here

In the house where darkness clings to white-washed walls and creaking oak boards, tall and narrow and far, far too small for his awkward growth spurts and quick feet, surrounded by the corn stalks that are dried and dying, by the pumpkin patches with their clinging vines and creeping tendrils, by the apple trees swelling with red and gold and amber tinted fruits, engulfed in a slowly sweeping ache of emptiness

Here

Jack heaves a long, lonesome sigh.

Here

There are only clinging shadows that hide the hues of the autumn sun.

The good thing is that on weekends, his mother makes pies and cornbread, the smell of sweet, melting butter and baking apple and sugar-spiced cinnamon wafting through the house, clinging to the oil-darkened wood, giving it a cosier, welcoming feel on slow Saturday mornings, the autumn sun greeting Jack through his southeastern window, teasing him with soft, crisp sunbeams.  He’ll hear a baseball or football game in muffled announcer voices through the walls and wood, his father’s stern, low voice rumbling alongside until his mother laughs at something ridiculous.  He’ll hammer out his homework as fast as he can and then jump into a video game, or on track meet days, he’ll rise early, well before the sunrise, hop in a car with his friends and head to the competition.

On those days, he gets to watch the sunrise, slow and serene, soft shades of wine reds and lace pinks, pale golds and sweet oranges, crystalline ambers and bursting lilacs, grow and hem and haw in the east.

But here

On days after tasting the sweet tang of freedom in the crisp autumn air and spiced sunbeams

Jack hates coming home to an empty, stark house.

So much fucking homework to do, he sighs to himself, tucking his running cleats onto the shoe rack.  Jack hefts his backpack and gym bag a little higher, heading down the first floor hallway to the main living room and kitchen area - large, open rooms that let in the last of the dying sunlight through their south-facing windows.  He dumps his bags onto the floor by the kitchen table, before entering the actual kitchen proper.  Marianne Morrison maintains it as well as she can, but time wears on the edges of it: the tile of the counters is cracked and chipped in many small places, the cream-yellow paint faded into a strange off-tan instead, the wooden floorboards oddly stained in weird spots from food and smoke and oils over the decades.  

Jack opens the fridge, reaching for the milk when his exhausted, overrun mind finally clues in that the tv in the next room is producing soft, murmuring chatter sounds.  The sixteen-year-old pauses, scowling slightly as he listens, his hands grabbing the gallon.  He closes the door and shuffles over to the cup and mug cupboard, calling out in slow, low tones - his voice never seems to stop cracking these days - “Peter?  Is that you?”

Only the muffled sounds of the television program reach his ears.

Jack snorts, pouring himself a tall glass of milk.  As he chugs the cold, chilled silky liquid, he shifts his eyes to the electronic clock on the microwave...and frowns.  Jack sets the cup back down, scowling deeply now as he grumbles out, “Peter, you have a shift at six, right?  What are you doing here?”

Still nothing but some sort of news anchor reading off a report about traffic.

Jack outright glares now, moving to rinse his cup off in the sink.  He sets it to the side, where he can grab it again for dinner in an hour and a half, and returns the gallon to the fridge.  After that, rather than settle in and turn out the first half of his homework as he usually does, Jack strides right past the table, around the half-wall into the living room and -

Lo and behold, Peter’s limp, relaxed body is sprawled across the couch, the tv still on the 5 o’clock news, several beer bottles sitting on the coffee table, along with -

“Is that a fucking pipe?” Jack snarls, storming right up to the couch, his blue eyes lasering down on the clear glass pipe, the bowl end singed slightly at the edges, lighter still sitting beside it.  Jack feels a bitter, hateful, heartbreaking fury rise in his chest and he whips around, snapping viciously, “Peter, what the actual fuck - I knew you were up to shady shit, but Jesus fucking Christ, what the fuck -”

The words die a vicious, contorted death in Jack’s throat as he turns to the couch.

The only sounds are the distant, murky words of the new anchor, drifting out to him like he’s underwater as -

“Traffic is still backed up on Highway 37 south - we’re getting reports that there’s an accident in the right lane just past the I-69 exchange -”

Peter’s limp, relaxed body is lying sprawled across the couch, the tv still on the 5 o’clock news, several beer bottles and a semi-charred pipe sitting on the coffee table.

The sunlight that drifts in through the south-facing windows is dying, the light is long and drawn, dipping behind trees in the distance.

The corn maze outside is dying, the dried stalks are turning to rot as chilled air stills and stagnates around it.

Peter’s gold-blonde hair is still fluffed at awkward angles, that cowlick that both brothers share still sticking up at a 90 degree angle, refusing to lie flat, just as Jack’s never does.

The house is tall and narrow and oppressive, suffocating Jack’s thoughts as the air settles in his chest and the words die a horrific, agonized death in his throat.

“There’s slowdown on West Bloomfield Road heading east into downtown -”

Peter’s eyes are half-lidded, a small peek of blue beneath long, drawn shadows that cling to his eyelids, that swallow the hollows of his eyes.

The air stills and stagnates in the room.

The sunlight dies to the edges of the horizon, leaving only gasping, choking sunbeams in the filtered windows.

The tv continues to drone on with a strange hum and whine that needles in Jack’s brain.

“Looking at the weather tomorrow, we’re going to see some more cooldown - 

Peter’s chest is not moving.

“...Peter?”

All that answers him

Is the sound of the weatherman saying in a false, cheerful tone:

“But on the weekend we should have more sunshine, just in time to start taking the kids out to the pumpkin patches!”

And then Jack is rushing to him, and there’s sound - a sound cracking and breaking at the edges - bursting through the still, stagnating air and -

“PETER -”

Jack is on his knees next to him, grabbing at his body, shaking him hard, pulling at his face, words are ripping from his throat in low, aching sobs, his mind is submerged, the sun is dying, the house is tall and narrow and oppressive, there’s nothing here but shadows and a news anchor rambling on with fake happiness in the background and -

“Peter, Peter, wake up, c’mon, look at me, PETER -”

Jack is running.

Jack is running back to the kitchen table, his socks skidding and slipping on the decades-old hardwood, nearly falling as he scrambles for his backpack, digging for his cell phone, his thoughts are running running running, bleeding through his mind as he -

9-1-1 or Mom, 9-1-1 or Mom, fuck fuck fuck, Peter shit, fuck, Mom -

His fingers are already tapping Marianne’s cell phone contact listing -

Shit no wait 9-1-1 -

“Jack?”

Marianne’s soothing if confused voice hits him like a wave, and he’s choking on still, stagnant air as the words claw up his throat, coughing and cracking, “Mom, Mom, Mom - Peter, oh fuck Mom, Peter -”

“Jack?  Jack, what’s wrong?  Jack, you need to calm down -”

Jack is looking back in the living room, looking at the limp body, only -

The gold-blonde hair is gone.

Jack stops breathing.

There are tufts of unruly, dark brown hair sticking out at odd angles, and the hand lying off the side of the couch has an orange bandana wrapped around the wrist and -

Jack is suffocating -

--- (May 17, 2057: 2:35 a.m. - The Reyes-Morrison household, Sleepy Hollow, New York) --- 

He’s choking on air as he thrashes, clawing at sheets threatening to suffocate him, his eyes open to only darkness, only blue nightfallen darkness, and he’s gasping for breath as he rises and he’s alone, he’s alone, he’s alone -

“Jack!”

There are strong, firm hands gripping at his shoulders, holding him calmly in place, rooting him to uneasy stillness before they slowly yet steadily slip around his chest and Jack takes several more heaving breaths as he feels warm, smooth skin press against his shuddering back -

“I’m here, Jack, I’m here - you’re okay.”

Jack’s right hand is gripping at his wrist, digging fingertips into the back of his right hand, trying to convince himself he’s real, he’s here, he’s real, they’re not there, not at that house, all alone, they’re here, they’re here -

“Shhh, breathe with me, Jack - c’mon, just like in SEP -”

Jack feels his chest against his back, breathing in a steady, slow, controlled rhythm, as that sweet, sleep-addled sunshine voice calls out to him, low and dulcet against the side of his head, pressing gentle lips to the spot just behind his left ear -

“In on one -”

Jack inhales -

“Out on two -”

Jack exhales -

“In on three -”

 Jack inhales -

“Out on four -”

Jack exhales -

Gabriel continues to count, low and slow and sweet, anchoring him to the moment, steadying him to their bed, murmuring to him in the blue nightfallen darkness.  There’s a slightly cloying heat - the edges of summer brushing up against them - in the air, and the tangle of sheets around their legs, but Jack eases himself back out of the distorted memory, the twisted nightmare, Gabriel continuing to press lips and the soft curling hairs of a beard against the left side of his head until -

“I’m - I’m okay, Gabe.”

The words shake and rattle out of his mouth, and they feel like a lie, even to Jack, but he means them, he knows he’s okay, he knows they’re okay - he feels Gabriel relax a little at the words, but Gabriel’s hands continue to rub small, soothing circles over his chest, right over his pounding heart.  Jack shifts slightly, twisting to the left to look at him - Gabriel is giving him a soft, bittersweet smile, but his eyes continue to scowl with low, dark worry -

Here

He’s here.

Here

He’s home.

Jack wraps his arms around him, leaning into Gabriel, feeling his soft, gentle strength steady him as Gabriel hugs back, whispering with a breaking sweetness, “Bastion?”

Jack shakes his head before burying his forehead in the crest of Gabriel’s left shoulder, in the crook of his neck as he breathes out:

“Peter.”

The only answer is Gabriel pressing his hands gently but firmly against Jack’s back -

“And then Jesse.”

Gabriel stops.

Jack shakes slightly, the image of that lean body - tufts of awkward brown hair sticking up at odd angles, that orange bandana bright, so bright, so vivid - flashing through his eyes and -

“Oh, Jack - it’s okay, Jack, he’s okay -”

Gabriel is whispering the soothing, summery words against the left side of Jack’s head, pressing a sweet, breaking kiss there, rubbing at his back, but Jack shudders, the words falling out of his mouth like broken rocks:

“I can’t do it again, Gabe, I can’t, I can’t -”

“He’s okay, Jack, he’s clean, he’s going to be just fine, okay?” Gabriel says to him, shifting back slightly.  Gabriel’s right hand slips under Jack’s chin, and he’s tilting Jack’s face towards his - Jack’s eyes trace over that perfect face, deep, rich skin with slight scars, soft, curling beard framing the faint smile on his lips, those gold-smoky eyes looking at him with such gentle care and concern.

“I promise, things will be just fine, okay?” Gabriel murmurs, caressing the side of Jack’s face, adding sweetly, “I’m here, I’ll always be here - we got this, okay?  We can do this together.”

Jack is

Jack is nodding slowly, letting Gabriel’s words sink into the depths of his soul, letting Gabriel’s hands soothe his shivers, letting Gabriel’s love hold him strong against the achy, bitter memories of a still and stagnating living room, the tv still on, several beer bottles and a pipe on the coffee table -

“COMIN’ IN -”

Is all that answers them in the silence.

“What,” is all Gabriel has a chance to say before

The door to their master bedroom is suddenly and violently kicked down.

“JESUS CHRIST,” Gabriel is shouting as the door blasts off its hinges, and Jack is jumping back a half-foot in the bed, still holding onto Gabriel - a tall, lean figure burst in through the doorway, hefting a baseball bat in a wide, unwieldy stance, his pajama pants and loose t-shirt hanging awkwardly off his frame, his head darting around as he twists his gaze every damn direction, hollering in a breaking voice:

“COME OUT HERE AND FIGHT ME, YOU PUMPKIN FUCK -”

“JESSE WHAT THE FUCK,” Gabriel is yelling back, and Jesse twirls around to whip his wild eyes at the two men pressed up against the headboard of the bed, the boy shouting loud, “I heard yellin’ in here - y’all okay??  Imma fight that fuckin’ ghost, I swear to God, ‘n Jesus ‘n all the saints ‘n Chivas -”

“Jesse, for the last fucking time - this house is not haunted,” Gabriel snaps at him, but Jesse just points an accusatory finger at Gabriel, growling back, “Y’all live in motherfuckin’ Sleepy Hollow - this house is haunted as shit -”

“We live in motherfucking Sleepy Hollow because living in motherfucking Sleepy Hollow is metal as fuck,” Gabriel retorts, pointing right back at him as he gapes, “You fucking kicked in our goddamn door -”

“CAUSE I GOTTA HELP YOU FIGHT THE GHOST,” Jesse yells, as if repeating his point indicates the necessity of breaking down their door in the middle of the night, wielding only a baseball bat in pajama pants with little cacti on them -

“You idiotic, pinche pendejo -” Gabriel starts to say, his thoughts clearly unraveling to the point of being incoherent in both English and Spanish but -

Both Gabriel and Jesse stop -

As Jack wheezes with laughter.

Jack practically sobs, rocking himself slightly as the low, rumbling, thunderous sound breaks through his lips - he buries his head in his hands, attempting to muffle the noise, but it’s already too late - the hiccups take him and he’s practically choking on air as the laughter burns away his fear -

“Dios mío, Jack, are you shittin’ me,” Gabriel half-asks, half-states, before wrapping his arms around him, strong and sweet, soft and serene despite the absurdity of the situation, running calming fingers through Jack’s hair as Jack laughs out:

“Holy shit, Jesse - joder - I cannot fucking believe -”

“Ya know,” Jesse grumbles, slumping the bat on his shoulder as he scowls in the semi-darkness, “I was really worried about y’all, but here ya are, laughin’ at me -”

“Because you broke down our fucking door,” Gabriel shouts at him and Jesse retorts right back, “Only way I was gonna get a drop on him, papito!”

Jack just continues to sob with laughter into his palms.

---------

And I want a moment to be real,
Wanna touch things I don't feel,
Wanna hold on and feel I belong.
And how can they say I never change?
They’re the ones that stay the same.
I’m the one now,
‘Cause I’m still here.

I’m the one,
‘Cause I’m still here.
I’m still here.
I’m still here.
I’m still here.

Chapter Text

Smartest in the room, you're the last to speak,
No one ever questions anything you say.
I know you had dreams that you traded in -
I've always thought you're a bigger man for that.
Cause you were passing dreams to someone else.

---------

Soldado Flashback: Lone

August 24, 2057: 7:34 p.m. - Central lounge area, Watchpoint: Santa Monica, California

“Fareeha.”

Ana’s voice is calm, but hemmed with a lining of sternness as it rings out over the group.  They’re all sitting in the central lounge room of Watchpoint: Santa Monica - like all the other Watchpoints, the lounge room features massive windows on the north side, opening up to the sweeping, steep slopes of the Santa Monica mountains, scrub brushes and patchy grasses bending and swaying in the drifting canyon winds.  The world is hewn in rusty browns and grey greens that wave and roll beneath a seaglass sky, jagged like the edges of a serrated knife made of bone and sandstone, chaparral and coastal sage.

Here, now

The sun sets slow as honeyed rain to the western edges of the sky, painting the horizon in low clouds of yearning, singsong oranges and dusky, gilded rose pinks and gentle, blushing violets, tinted in blue shadows where the night laces in and the stars begin to dust the world.  At Gabriel’s request, the Watchpoint had been uniquely designed - built partially into the side of a mountain running southwest towards the Pacific, it dives in and out of the cliff side, almost more underground than out, covered in sandstone and dusty topsoil, permitting the coastal scrub to grow and cling to the exposed roofs and walls of the building, their leaves framing the windows to the world bathed in dying light.

There was little denial that this was Gabriel’s favorite Watchpoint - if anything, he favored it too openly, often doing his best to spend both as much working and free time here as he could.  Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was also the favorite of many of the agents from around the Mediterranean - as much as they loved Geneva, many (aka Ana) complained that the Swiss Base was too cold and too secluded, set too deep in the Jura Mountains to feel like Southern Europe.  

More surprising was how much Mei - the world’s foremost leading climatologist, renowned mountain climber, and… uh, “adventurous” blizzard enthusiast - absolutely loved Watchpoint: Santa Monica, though she often rambled of the technicalities of its design, how they could develop further Watchpoints similarly, meshing nature and science and technology into harmony -

How she was already modeling the up-and-coming Watchpoint: Gibraltar on the same principle.

And perhaps the most surprising of all

Was that Jack also loved this Watchpoint.

Gabriel would be the one person to laugh and say that was far from surprising - Gabriel would say Jack had always loved a world far more ruggedly beautiful, far more stardusted, steel-cut than most would think of him based on appearance alone.  Gabriel would say that, underneath the poised, polite commander there was a sly, swift soldier, and underneath the sly, swift soldier there was an idealistic, wanderlusted adventurer lost in the journey of a job that he was actually good at.

Jack would say that Gabriel was, as per usual, 100% correct.

The frustrating part of Watchpoint: Santa Monica was that there was almost never any work that required Jack to be out here - ever since he started being the one to actually interface with the U.N. due to their very clear, very bitter frustrations with Gabriel (newsreels still played his “The Australian Liberation Front was in the right” clip every few weeks when current topics grew dull and boring and safe), Jack had hardly been to any of the Watchpoints other than jumping back and forth between Montreal and Geneva, with a brief stint in Grand Mesa to help in the Deadlock mission.

So when the U.N. had approved the creation of an Overwatch documentary, Jack had hopped on his chance - and also the first transport ship to the Santa Monica base, where his friends, family, and his heart and soul and sunshine were spending the end of the season.  And despite the atmosphere of a lazy, charmed Santa Monica summer, there was still real work to be done out here, with Watchpoint: Santa Monica acting as a major hub for Mei’s small Sciences Division investigating the warming Pacific Coast and San Andreas fault, and for Gabriel’s Strike Division investigating the remnants of Deadlock’s California and Arizona branches and their connections into Mexico.

So many of them are both working and relaxing as they mill about the lounge area - Reinhardt and Torbjörn are at one of the tables, blueprints and holo-projectors spread out, looking over Torbjörn’s new designs for smaller, more...manageable photon barriers for “not freakishly tall people” (Torb’s words) that the team is considering producing for some of the Strike agents, speaking in surprisingly low tones as Reinhardt points out possible modifications.  Mei is at a different table in a corner to their left, talking so quietly in Mandarin that Jack only catches snippets of her discussion, as she goes over instructions and data with her team members stationed in the Siberian outpost.  Across from Gabriel and Jack, sitting with her unique sort of tensed relaxation, Ana peers through several reports in Arabic, prepping for her meeting with the Arab League in a few days, her dark eyes deep with concentration.  On the couch between them, Jesse and Fareeha laze about, both of them focusing on the holo-projector before them, tapping furiously at gamepads in their hands as little karts zip around a track.

Jack sighs with sweet, syrupy contentment, flipping to the next page of Mei’s report that he’s editing, leaning a bit further on Gabriel’s right shoulder.  His commander and partner is tapping at his datapad, Gabriel’s dusky, sunset voice sighing with wan, tired exasperation, “Portero keeps hounding me to meet with him…”

“Tell him you’ll meet with him when you’re done cleaning up Deadlock,” Jack mumbles back, highlighting a section that he needs to ask Mei some clarification about, when Ana’s voice again cuts through the air filled with karts honking and fingers tapping:

“Fareeha - have you packed yet?”

“Huh?” Fareeha hums, obviously not paying attention as her eyes focus in on the holo-projector, and Jesse mutters low, “Don’cha blue shell me, Fareeha -”

“Justice is gonna rain down on you,” Fareeha giggles menacingly as the two continue to tap frantically at the buttons -

“Fareeha,” Ana states, the verve in her voice growing stronger as she sets her report down, eyes shifting with a deeper glower towards her daughter.  Fareeha, meanwhile, scowls, but her gaze never leaves the holo-projector, snapping slightly, “Yeah yeah, أم (um), I got it -”

“Fareeha, you leave tomorrow morning -” Ana starts to say with more sharpness in her tone, getting Gabriel to flick a keen glance between the mother and daughter as Jack lowers his papers.  Fareeha pouts with a slight sneer, saying sourly, “I know, أم, I can pack tonight.”

There’s a stiff, sullen silence that fills the room, the small, tinny sounds of karts zooming and coins clicking - even Mei has stopped talking and Reinhardt and Torbjörn are sending small, awkward glances towards the couches.  Jesse shoots Jack a nervous look, but Jack just nods to him slowly, before the boy’s gaze flicks to Gabriel, who is pressing a fist to his mouth, his eyebrows deep in a scowl.

This...song and dance between mother and daughter has started occurring with greater frequency, with only Reinhardt seemingly capable of mediating them.

“I don’t see why I need to leave so soon anyways - school doesn’t start until next week,” Fareeha complains - the tapping of her fingers has turned less frantic and more furious as she mutters, “I should be allowed to stay here.”

“Your father wants to make sure you’re ready and have all your books -” Ana says, inhaling heavily as she folds her arms across her chest - Jack knows her well enough to know that she’s attempting to calm down, attempting to control her breathing, attempting to steer down her rising emotions, but Jack also knows Fareeha well enough to know that the fuse has only just been lit.

Fareeha makes an angry, frustrated gesture, slamming the pause button on the game - Jesse ogles awkwardly, his own hands sliding a little slack around his controller.  Fareeha’s fingers snap to a holo-keyboard, pulling up a shopping website, and she starts scrolling through books, muttering hoarsely, “I don’t need to go home to get those - look -” she selects several books from her school list, dropping them in the shopping cart, smirking smugly at her mother, “Easy.  Pretty much done.”

Ana gives her a dark, fierce stare, gaze as penetrating as an eagle’s, and the two of them scowl at each other in the tense, sunsetting silence until -

“And how many of those books that you just bought were you supposed to have read this summer?”

Ana’s voice cuts through the room like the bang of a sniper rifle across a broken battlefield.

Jack notices how Fareeha’s eyes go slightly wide, before they narrow again and the girl mutters sourly, “...I read two of them -”

“Fareeha,” Ana states in her best, strict mothering voice, but Jack can hear the frustration rising in it again - he shifts his gaze to Gabriel, who glances down at him, and they share a concerned look as Fareeha shrugs a little too casually, “I’m a fast reader, I can read the third one easy -”

“Fareeha, your education is not a joke,” Ana says, her eyebrows furrowing deeply, her dark eyes sharpening their gaze on her daughter, raising a hand to gesture in the air emphatically as she adds, “You’re entering secondary school and the homework level is going to increase on you -”

“Oh my god,” Fareeha groans with exasperation, also folding her arms as she throws herself back against the couch cushions, bitter pout open and evident on her face.  Ana just continues with the same determination the sniper applies to everything in her life:

“If you are serious about pursuing engineering in university, then you need to recognize the discipline that will take -”

“God, أم, who cares, it’s eighth grade, no one takes it seriously -” Fareeha says with a roll of her eyes, which gets Ana to frown darkly, saying tensely, “Fareeha -”

“I mean, I could go to school anywhere - it’s all the same,” Fareeha sighs, lolling her head.  There’s a long pause as everyone in the room knows exactly what she’s going to say next.

“I don’t get why you won’t let me go to school in Montreal,” the girl - daughter of the sun and moon, her strong, graceful features torn with a bittersweet frustration - says with an obvious, irritated ache to her words.  Fareeha sighs with a slow, almost mournful tone, “Then I could stay at the Watchpoint.”

“I do not always stay there, Fareeha - you know this.  And your father wants you to continue your secondary education on Haida Gwaii where he can help you -” Ana starts to say, but Fareeha snaps, shooting a furious glare at her mother as she mutters, “Why does he always get to make the decisions?  Why don’t you get to decide?”

But Ana’s next words slice the bitter, tense sunset of the room like claws rending fabric:

“I do get to decide, Fareeha - and I agree with Michael that the best place for you to learn is with him.”

“But it’s so boring,” Fareeha starts to groan and Ana jabs at her with a sharp, “Fareeha -”

Jesse gives Jack and Gabriel another terrified, bewildered look, obviously very uncomfortable with being in between the mother and daughter, his shoulders tense and hunched, his fingers squeezing around the controller.  Fareeha glowers again, starting with a harsh, wistful edge, “I’d rather live with you and Reinhardt -”

“Fareeha, you know how much we move around - it is not stable enough for you,” Ana intones, which gets Fareeha to pout back, “Stability - who cares about stability?  Jesse and Mei live with Overwatch -”

Jesse jolts at his name, raising his hands defensively as he stammers, “Whoa, hey, uh -” but Ana cuts him off, interrupting his awkward fumbling with a clear, stern, “Jesse and Mei work for Overwatch, Fareeha -”

“Then I could work for Overwatch too!  I can do paperwork -” Fareeha jumps in eagerly, sitting up a little higher on the couch, very clearly attempting to weedle the argument in the direction she wants.  Gabriel buries his face in his left hand, sighing with heavy exhaustion, as Jack entwines his fingers among Gabriel’s right, squeezing his hand gently.  A fraction of a second later, Gabriel squeezes back, but -

“Absolutely not.”

Ana’s words are dark and furious like a solar flare, burning down and bursting through the room with heated, vivid intensity, strong like a shock wave, ringing out with the power of sun eagles and -

“But why not,” Fareeha half-demands, half-pleads, also rising slightly, leaning forward to snap her hands to her knees.  Ana sits up straight, the poised posture she takes when she has to discipline an agent for mucking around, her dark eyes glinting like obsidian knives as she states with imposing, deep fury - riddled with a softer undertone of bittersweet concern:

“This is not summer camp, Fareeha - this is a military organization.  We are soldiers -”

“I know that.”

Fareeha’s voice jets through them all like a hot needle that stings and burns and aches.

Behind Ana, Reinhardt sinks his head into his massive hands, rubbing at his face - he is, as ever, Ana’s stalwart companion, often being a calm, steady guiding voice when her own passions and frustrations reach a boiling point, but he cannot help her here.  All of the Strike-Team has heard their discussions over Fareeha’s education, over her living situation, over her dreams and aspirations of joining Overwatch through walls and doors and -

All of the Strike-Team knows Reinhardt agrees with Ana.

Overwatch may be Fareeha’s family: Overwatch has seen her grow and rise like a falcon through the skies, Overwatch has cared for her greater than they have cared for any other objective, for any other mission, Overwatch has treated her like the greatest goal they could ever carry -

But the Watchpoints are not Fareeha’s home.

Everyone in Overwatch knows this…

Except for Fareeha.

“I know that -”

Or so they had thought.

The girl grips at her knees, her dark, furious gaze is roiling with thunderclouds verging on rainstorms, her voice chipping at the edges as she mutters in hoarse, breaking tones:

“I’ve always known that!  You won the war, the Crisis is over, the world is safe -”

“The world is not safe.”

Ana’s hard, stone-cut voice breaks through the building stormy atmosphere, and the lieutenant stares down at her daughter, saying with the dryness of the desert, “We run military missions every day - we are planning one here in Los Angeles for this week.  This is not a place for a child to live -”

“I am not a child!” Fareeha protests, gesturing to Jesse who jumps as the girl says, “Jesse was fourteen when he joined Deadlock -”

“Whoa, hey, I ain’t the best example -” Jesse starts to jump in, but Fareeha continues, her expression torn between being bitterly furious and sweetly sorrowful as she practically whines, “I am fine living here - I know how to shoot a gun - you taught me how to shoot a gun, أم!”

“I did it because I wanted you to know how to defend yourself, child -” Ana retorts, but her own tone is on the edge of falling part, struggling between keeping her composure and the very obvious desire to fall apart and confess her weighted struggle to her daughter.  The sniper sighs heavily, “The world is not yet safe, it is not yet stable -”

“I don’t want either of those things - I want to help -” Fareeha half-grumbles, half-sobs, her expression looking broken and falling, like someone has clipped her wings and Ana makes a bitter, pained face, replying with fierce, bittersweet fury:

“You do not know anything about the things you think you want!  This is not a game, Fareeha -”

“And you -”

Fareeha is on her feet, staring down at her mother, dark brown eyes shifting like a thunderstorm, black clouds and silvery lightning bolts, rain heavy and ready to pour -

“You don’t know anything about me!” Fareeha states, her words surging out of her in broken, jagged pieces as she hurls her controller to the carpet, half-shouting, half-cracking:

“You haven’t even tried!”

The girl turns like a whirlwind and whips around the edge of the couch, storming out of the lounge room and into the hallway to the rest of the Watchpoint, slamming the door to the commanders’ quarters as she leaves.

There is a moment of stunned, lightning-struck silence that suffocates them -

And then

Without warning

Jesse is leaping up over the back of the couch, hurling himself to the hallway, shouting hoarsely, “Fareeha!  Fareeha, wait -”  His voice grows muffled as the door shuts behind him, but they can hear his sneakers squeaking down the tiled hallways.

After that

Without warning

Ana buries her head in her hands, her shoulders shaking, her voice shuddering as she murmurs in broken, ugly whispers, “Every time -  every time, I say the wrong things -”

Gabriel heaves a sigh, squeezing Jack’s hand again as Jack shifts upright, saying as gently as he can, “You can’t hide these things from her, Ana - she’s going to learn about Overwatch sometime -”

“I can’t tell her, Jack -” Ana sobs and there’s a surprisingly calm, quiet shadow that slips over her as Reinhardt comes to stand behind her.  He places a large, soothing hand on her back as the sniper gasps, “She’s not ready to know - she’s still so young -”

“Children find out one way or another,” Gabriel says, but even his usually cool, resolute voice is cracking at the seams, “She already knows we’ve killed Omnics and people alike, but only you can be the one to tell her the truth about it all -”

“I know, Gabriel,” Ana mumbles through her fingers, rubbing at her eyes, whispering darkly, “I just - I fear that if I tell her, I will tell her wrong - that she will only want to be part of this all the more.”

There’s an eye-of-the-storm silence until Ana murmurs with a bittersweet ache:

“She sees us all as heroes.”

The group shares a heavily weighted, bullet-hole-laden, blood-spilled sigh.

And Ana sobs:

“How can I possibly shatter that dream for her?”

The heartbreak in her voice is like a bullet to Jack’s chest, and he finds his hand squeezing Gabriel’s again, Gabriel’s fingers squeezing back as Reinhardt strokes Ana’s hair.  The Crusader is murmuring something quietly, gently in German, just barely above a whisper, but it seems to slowly soothe Ana’s tremors.  There’s a shuffling noise and Jack manages to tear his gaze away, up to his right shoulder, where Mei is standing, looking sorrowful as she asks, “Should I try talking to her, Ana?”

“I can go too,” Gabriel says, shifting to rise, but Jack pats his right arm, giving Gabriel’s hand one last press as he says, “We shouldn’t overwhelm her - and I don’t know where they went.”  The captain rises alongside his commander, and Jack says to both Gabriel and Mei, as Torb also comes to stand by the coffee table:

“We should spread out.  Some of the agents probably saw them.  But whoever finds her should...just listen.  If anyone else comes, we should probably just turn back.”

“Right,” Torb says gruffly, and Jack can see him dab briefly at the corners of his eyes, the engineer adding, “We shouldn’t crowd her.”  Gabriel nods, and the small group makes their way around the couch and to the hallway.  They wind past their bedrooms, out into another lounge room - this one is the main one of the Watchpoint, the windows open to the north and the west, the sky slipping into a deepening purple.  Some of the agents look up at them, as Jack asks, “Has anyone seen Fareeha?  And Jesse?”

“They came through about a minute ago,” Mirembe says, looking up from her datapad, “But Fareeha...did not appear to be in the mood to talk.  Jesse went after her.”

“They went that way,” Singh adds, pointing to the hallway that winds east, deeper into the Watchpoint.  Jack sighs as Gabriel says, “Thanks, everyone.  Alright gang, time to split up - if we’re lucky, we’ll get a hilarious chase montage.”

“...I don’t get it,” Mei admits which gets a chuckle from Torbjörn as they enter into the central artery hallway.  Jack gestures to them, saying, “Good luck, everyone.”  He heads off to the right, towards the south-southwest as the others turn down different hallways.  

The Watchpoints always seem to be immense mazes, and Jack’s shit at directions.  It had taken him years just to get used to Grand Mesa when it was only five or six main rooms with a mess of hallways bridging them.  Here, he’s in the main laboratory and research rooms - there are plants and soil samples sitting around, waiting to be organized, bottles of seawater with labels on the glass and dye in the liquids.  Due to the late hour, very few people are actually working - though he does spot a member or two of Mei’s environmental team through the windows into the labs.  The Astronomy team in particular is just setting up for their “day,” many of them pulling up star charts and tapping complex equations into their computers.  The head Astronomer is speaking to someone on a holo-projector, and -

Jack frowns in confusion, watching as a small, young gorilla peeks its head up at the bottom of the screen.  The scientist on the projector laughs, pulling the ape away -

Horizon Lunar Colony? Jack thinks, I thought we weren’t schedule to talk until tomorrow -

But his thoughts stop

Because through the window on the other side, outside, towards the southwest

He can see Fareeha’s head tilting, her dark hair swaying slightly in the night breeze settling in.

Oh shit, Jack panics slightly, twisting his head, trying to remember how to get out to that patio.  He darts forward and takes another hallway right, and another until -

He sighs slightly, seeing the doorway to the outer, southwestern patio - still open to let the cool breeze in to help ventilate the often stuffy semi-underground building - and strides towards it when -

“Listen, I know it ain’t easy -”

Jack pauses

Because Jesse’s frame has also come into view, sitting to Fareeha’s left.

This outer hallway spans this particular curve of a mountainside, facing out towards the canyon stretching down to the Pacific.  It is almost entirely massive panes of clear glass, the steel beams supporting the slightly angled windows covered in mini-terracing for the plants - Jack’s view of the two of them is unencumbered.  He slides himself under the shadow of a steel beam, slipping as close to the doorway as he can, listening with a careful ear -

“That’s what I don’t get, Jesse,” Fareeha’s voice drifts in, and there are slight sniffles in between her shaking words, “It could be easy.  I don’t get why she makes it so difficult.”

Jack hears Jesse give a heavy sigh, and he peeks out through the nearest angled window - the two of them are leaning against the safety railing, Fareeha standing on the lowest bar, hanging partially over the side, her hair shifting in the breeze.  Jesse is next to her, also hanging slightly off the side, but he’s far taller than her at this point, and his lean is more to get himself closer to her level than to actually support himself.

They’re stark against the backdrop of rough-hewn hills and stars starting to spill through the velvet twilight.  There’s just enough of the slow-burning sunlight to cast them into hazy highlights of gold and pink, and just a deep enough night to throw the rest of their features into soft violet shadows.

They look like they stand on the edge of the world

Where the stardusted sky descends to meet the jagged bones of the earth.

Jack watches

And he listens.

“...No parent makes it easy,” Jesse says real slow, with a soft, sugary syrup to his Southwestern accent.  Jack can see him shift slightly as the cowboy’s gaze drifts across the horizon, and Jesse murmurs gently, “In a weird way...a good parent ain’t s’pposed ta make it easy.”

“...What,” Fareeha half-asks, half-states in disbelief, muttering, “That’s not true.”

“Nah, see ‘cause...look, if a parent makes it too easy, that means they ain’t doin’ their job right,” Jesse drawls, and Jack watches from his peripherals as the cowboy reaches into this pocket and pulls out -

Jack’s eyebrows twitch into a deep, irate scowl as he watches Jesse slip the cigarette carton from his pant pocket, watches in bitter frustration as Jesse’s right hand also slips a lighter into view and -

Go easy on him, Jack.

Gabriel’s words ring through his heart and Jack sighs, trying to relax, trying to remember that Jesse has put far worse into his lungs, trying to remind himself that as long as he does it outside, away from others, then that’s as good of behavior as Jack can hope for.

Jesse slides a cigarette between his lips, stuffing the pack back in his pocket as he mumbles, “Look, sib - ‘bout this age, ya start realizin’ that...no parent is perfect.”  Fareeha doesn’t respond as Jesse flicks the lighter to the end of the cigarette, breathing a few times to get the heat of the flame to catch.  As the end burns, he inhales, dropping the lighter back into his pocket that Jack can’t see, and exhales a small puff of silvery-grey smoke, tinted faintly pink in the slow twilight.

“But ya also start realizin’ that a good parent wants what’s best fer their kid,” Jesse says, before taking another draw from the cigarette.  Fareeha twists her head slightly, watching him keenly as Jesse blows the smoke away from her, to his left, before leaning back in, saying in that silver-lining drawl with a slow-burning sugar stub:

“...Means a helluva lot more ta have a good parent than any kinda perfect parent.”

Jack thinks the air in his lungs catch.

Fareeha still holds him in quiet contemplation, as Jesse runs a hand through his wind-swept hair, sighing softly, “Yer Ma just wants what’s best fer you - same with yer Hadáa.  And Reinhardt.  They just wanna do right by ya.”

“...I guess so,” Fareeha grumbles, and Jack watches her flick at her beaded braids as a soft, broken fondness for Jesse rumbles in his chest.

Has it really only been six months?

“I think it’s real cool that they wanna teach you all this stuff, ya know?  Yer Hadáa just wants you ta know where you come from, what yer heritage is like,” Jesse says, again, slow and understanding, sympathetic and sweet.  The cowboy once again takes a puff of the cigarette, before pulling away and saying with the smoky exhale, “I think that’s cool.  So many of our communities didn’t survive the Crisis.  But the Haida did, and ya get a chance to learn about that.”

Neither Fareeha nor Jack knows how to handle that.

Jesse never talks about himself.

...Has it really only been six months?

“ ...I only gotta see Tesuque like...once or twice - I dunno, my memory’s blurry - before the Crisis.  Mamá took me there - gotta see her cousins,” Jesse starts to say, leaning back to tap some simmering ash onto the concrete patio, before he resumes relaxing against the railing, rambling slightly, “Lots of pretty stuff, lots of cool pueblos but...I wish I could remember more, I guess.”

“...Oh Jesse,” Fareeha mutters, and there’s a soft crack to her words, “I’m...I’m sorry -”

“Oh nah, ya don’ gotta feel bad fer me, sib,” Jesse says quickly, rubbing at the back of his neck with his right hand, adding apologetically, “I ain’t trying ta bring the vibe down, ya know?   People will recover - we’re resilient after all, strong.  Just wish I...got to see it more, ya know…”

Jack crosses his left arm over his chest, his right hand rubbing at the sting in his eyes when -

“Hey, Jack, did you -”

Jack quickly holds up a finger to his lips as Gabriel appears around the southern curve of the outer hallway.  His partner stills, a confused frown gracing those regal, rich features, but as his honey-gold earth eyes slip past Jack, they widen in realization as they spot Jesse and Fareeha outside.  Gabriel slows his heavy footfalls, siddling up closer to Jack as -

“...Wish I got to see her more too.  ...And Pa.”

Jesse’s words are loud enough to hear, but soft enough to shatter Jack’s heart.

Gabriel freezes, his expression wide in bittersweet horror as he clues into what’s going on, his mouth gaping slightly as he stares at Jack, who his covering his own mouth as his chest heaves slightly.

There’s a long, twilight-stardusted moment as no one dares to move, and seemingly only Jesse dares to breathe, inhaling another draw from his cigarette and exhaling slowly, until Fareeha asks, barely above a whisper:

“...Are you lonely?”

Gabriel continues to give Jack a terrified stare, and Jack feels like his shaking, shuddering soul is dragging claws down the inside of his lungs because -

Because they both know

They had made an easy decision six months ago

But they never knew

If it had been easy for Jesse too.

Gabriel is starting to shake his head, holding out his hand to Jack, trying to urge Jack back - Jack fights the urge to stay rooted to the spot, reaching out and taking Gabriel’s hand to let his commander lead him back to where ignorance is bliss and -

“...Used ta be.  A lot.  They ain’t ever tell you that you can be surrounded by people and still feel alone.”  Jesse’s words cut through the air not like a knife, nor like a bullet, but like

Like lacy, delicate cigarette smoke, softly curling, quickly dissipating.

If they blink, they’ll miss the words fading into the dying rays of the pink sunlight and the stardust that begins to flake and glitter in the growing darkness.

As Gabriel’s gaze locks on Jesse’s back, Jack twists slightly, shifting his own eyes back over his left shoulder, watching the cowboy and the girl who are mere feet and panes of glass from the commanders in the hallway -

And yet they seem a whole world away.

Jesse exhales, saying with a slow, steadily sorrowful simmer, “Felt like that with the gang a lot.  But what else was I gonna do?  Where else was I gonna go?  They relied on me, fed me, gave me a job.”

“...Was it scary?” Fareeha asks quietly, her dark gaze intent on him.  Jesse scratches at his head, moving his left arm back to tap more ash off the cigarette, muttering with a dark, whiskey-sharp drawl, “Sure as shit was, ‘specially in the beginnin’.  But ya...ya just get used to it.  The fear.  Being scared.  Being lonely.  But that was okay.”

Gabriel’s fingers tighten around Jack’s at the words, and the two of them turn horror-stricken, heartbreaking glances at each other as -

Jesse’s words are as soft as a knife in the ribs:

“Death was gonna take me when he wanted.  He was gonna put me in the ground with Mamá and Pa when the time was right.”

Gabriel looks like someone has physically stabbed him - his expression is openly vulnerable, those gilded eyes wide with utter sorrow, and Jack feels his heart snap in his chest at the expression, Gabriel should never look like that, Gabriel should never look that broken and hurt, so hurt -

Jesse continues, as soft as the twilight that sweeps over them all:

“And then I wouldn’t be lonely anymore.”

Jack crumbles.

He can’t fully breathe.

He lets Gabriel pull him into a tight hug, wraps his arms around Gabriel’s warm, sweetly strong chest, digs his fingertips into fistfuls of Gabriel’s shirt as Gabriel’s own fingers slide through Jack’s hair, as his others are rubbing the back of Jack’s neck intensely.  Jack buries his head against Gabriel’s neck as Gabriel’s chest heaves in Jack’s arms, fighting the current inside him, as Gabriel presses his lips to the side of Jack’s head, saying in a low rasp, “C’mon, Jack - I got you, c’mon -”

“...But he didn’t do that.”

And for the first time since Jack’s been listening

Jesse’s voice cracks.

There are tears in his words, like a slow thunderstorm breaking open over a dry desert, rain beginning to patter on the dusty earth and warped asphalt.  There’s a rattle and a shake to Jesse’s words, and a soft gasp from Fareeha, who is murmuring, “Aw, Jesse, no - it’s okay -”

“He didn’t do that, Fareeha - he didn’t do that.  I was ready ta go and he -”

Gabriel holds Jack tighter as the desert flood begins to rise around them and -

“He took me in instead.”

Everything stops.

Time unravels.

Jesse’s words break like a shattered watchface.

Gabriel stills in Jack’s arms, and there’s a soft, awe-filled “what” from Gabriel’s lips as Jack lifts his head, disbelieving as -

“...I was mad at first.  Didn’t want ta like him much,” Jesse sniffles a little, coughing on smoke slightly.  They hear him shuffle as he struggles with his thoughts, saying slowly, with a gut-wrenching, knife-twisting coil to his words, “Wasn’t kind ta him.  Wasn’t kind ta any of them.  But the thing about people like them…is that time don’t matter.  Time ain’t fair.  They could be patient with all the time in the world.”

Jack stares out to the windows to the south, but he’s not seeing the rough landscape beyond, the falling night - he’s feeling Gabriel tense in his arms, feeling Gabriel’s breath catch as Jesse’s words shift through them, feeling Gabriel choke slightly -

Jack pulls back, moving his hands back, looking at the weak haze in Gabriel’s gaze, soft as stardust, right as rain.  Jack rubs his thumbs along Gabriel’s high cheekbones, stamping out the slow tears as he whispers:

“You did good, Gabe -”

Behind them, outside, a world away, Jesse heaves a shaky, relieving sigh, saying with the lightness of smoke:

“...They’re good, hermanita.  They ain’t perfect, but they’re good.”

And

For the first time since Jack started listening

There’s a grin to Jesse’s words:

“And I ain’t lonely no more.”

There’s a long pause broken by Gabriel’s quiet sniffling and Jack’s humming murmurs, until Fareeha whispers in a shaking voice, “...She...she could die any time, Jesse.”

Jack chokes on his own words as Gabriel’s eyes go wide again.  Jesse is quiet, though, listening patiently as Fareeha says with the rippling of water, “I’ve read about her.  She thinks I don’t know, but I’ve read all the reports, I’ve seen all the documentaries.  I know everything Gabriel had them do - everything he still has them do.  Um is the only sniper of her kind: she is good at everything, she can fight close-range, she’s shot Bastions at point-blank.”

Fareeha’s voice shakes and shivers as she murmurs:

“Every time I leave...I wonder if it’s the last time I’ll see her.  Or Rein.  Or the others.”

Jesse’s voice is warm and soothing and gentle, like a blanket he wraps around her shoulders, “You can’t let the fear rule ya, Fareeha.  They can die in a car accident tomorrow, there could be an earthquake that swallows this Watchpoint whole.  Mei’s blaster could explode ‘n freeze us all ta death.”

That gets a soft “ahaha, Jesse, what the fuck” chuckle from her, but Jesse just grins back, saying slow yet sure, “Point is, Death?  He’s everywhere.  He’ll take ‘em whenever.  But all ya can do is live ‘n laugh in spite o’ that.  Ain’t much else worth doin’, really.”

Jesse draws a long inhale on his cigarette, before exhaling slow and sure:

“Death ‘n Time?  They ain’t fair.  They ain’t kind.  But ya can’t let them deadlock ya.  Sometimes, they still the wind beneath yer wings...but then ya just gotta walk.  Ain’t much ya can do in that kinda situation.”

And then Jesse laughs broadly, “But a good education sure helps!”

It’s followed a second later by a frustrated, but giggling shout of “JESSE!” and the sounds of Fareeha whumping him in the shoulder, but Jesse just continues to laugh that jangling, silver bell laughter.  Gabriel buries his head in Jack’s shoulder, as a slow-bursting idea moves through Jack’s head -

General educational development -

“C’mon,” Jesse says to Fareeha distantly as the two of them start to walk north on the outer patio, “I’ll help ya pack, okay?”

“Oh god, no, you’re not allowed in my room,” Fareeha retorts back which gets Jesse to shout an appalled, “WHAT - WHY.”

As their shouts and playful bickering gets quieter and farther off, like the dying rays of the sunset, Gabriel murmurs into Jack’s shoulder, “...I was...so worried.  That we did wrong by him.”

“...Me too,” Jack says back, hugging Gabriel tighter, but there’s a smile on his face as he presses his lips to the side of Gabriel’s head, saying gently, “But we helped give him the opportunity of a lifetime.”

“And what’s that?” Gabriel asks with a low, chuckling snort, “A second chance?”

“The chance to gain the respect of a thirteen-year-old,” Jack teases, “Because that’s one of the rarest phenomena in the world.”

“Dammit, Jack,” Gabriel laugh-wheezes against Jack’s shoulder and Jack grins as bold and as bright as the sunset in Gabriel’s arms.

---------

Who knew you'd do everything right?
Who knew you'd do everything right?

So right.

---------

Sharpshooter: Hellfire

May 26, 2058: 2:08 p.m. (Jesse’s lunch break) - Torbjörn’s workshop in the Engineering Department, Watchpoint: Geneva

“I still think we oughta coat all the parts in a layer of the hafnium-carbide fiberglass,” Jesse mutters, scowling as he leans away from the data-drawing table Torb is letting him use.  Somewhere behind him, the chief engineer stops clinking things together to retort loudly, “And I keep tellin’ ya, we ain’t got that kinda stockpile lyin’ around here.  Damn U.N. hasn’t given me a real budget in years, not since the Crisis, and whatever I do get goes straight ta buildin’ all these damn supercomputers for the Watchpoints.  Ain’t no...bloody art ta the craft these days, boy.”

They’re sitting in Torbjörn’s personal drawing “room” of the Engineering Department in Geneva - Jesse’s been impressed with every Engineering Department in every Watchpoint he’s seen, but this one is clearly the cream of the crop.  Torbjörn’s unique brand of aesthetic is stamped onto everything, every piece of technical equipment placed precisely perfect and perfectly precise.  Everything has a lovingly crafted combination of sleek, modern chic - all touchscreen glass and holo-projectors and white-polished steel - mixed with touches of rustic, natural elements - light, reddish-tinted hardwood and grey granite and even bits of pale clay.  There are at least three drawing and drafting tables - each one the right mix of smart screenglass with a digital drawing and blueprinting interface alongside darkened, steel metal and that red wood, each one adjusted to a slightly different height in a different part of the room - “Ta catch the light at the right times o’ day,” Torbjörn has explained with a huff, but when Jesse had responded that the idea was brilliant, Torbjörn had just blushed with moderate embarrassment.  Also spaced out are several computers and datapad stations, sitting next to brand new, state-of-the-art 3D printers.

And on two sides, there are massive windows open to the valley of nestled, centuries-old farmsteads and small, marble-cut towns, dotting along the western edges of Lake Geneva, a swirled royal-steel beneath the clouds.  The Watchpoint is technically cut into the eastern slopes of the Jura Mountains, a little ways northeast of Geneva itself and west of Nyon, but close enough that the United Nations had named it after one of its more famous “city headquarters.”  Putting it outside of the city had allowed for the organization to install a major transport ship hub, so while many agents considered Montreal the center of the political aspects of the organization, Geneva was considered its heart, beating out missions and squads and flights like blood.

Putting it on the side of a fucking Swiss mountain just made it look badass.

Jesse sighs again, his eyes drifting to the windows to his left, eyes wandering over the small towns, the li’l plots of farmland, and the distant haze of Lake Geneva, his right index finger tapping aimlessly at the smartscreen part of the drafting table.  Almost everything in Torbjörn’s workshop is adjusted to his height, or contains steps to reach some of the “tall people tables” (as he called them, but to everyone taller than 5 feet they were just standard heights), and the windows have this nifty small paneling on them to control the amount of light entering the room for “when his headaches get overwhelmin’” - Jesse just thinks they’re slick as fuck blinds.  The cowboy hears the chief engineer shuffle lightly behind him, tapping his little screen stylus on a different drafting table, working on cleaning up the second round of drafting blueprints of Gabriel’s updated shotguns.

It had turned out that overhauling the SEP plasma-slag guns was not just a “great gift idea,” but almost certainly a greater necessity than him, Torb, and Jack had all thought.  Once they had started tearing apart the original designs, they had found a number of structural improvements they could make on it - everything from coating the most heat-”bearing” parts in hafnium-carbide, to reworking some of the riskier parts of the API blowback mechanism, to altering some of the proportions of the FRAG-21 shots to decrease the risk of backfire.

Redesigning parts of the plasma-slag shotguns had been...almost easy, in a strange way.  Between Jesse and Torbjörn, there was enough knowledge and conceptual innovation to hit all the main points and build from there.  Course, Torb had wanted to add some of his...avant garde aesthetic to the guns, which was where Jack had been essential - both Jack and Jesse had shot down that idea.

Well...Jack a little moreso than Jesse.

“What’s wrong with paintin’ flamin’ skulls ‘n angels on them?” Torbjörn had growled a little, to which Jack had just given a deadpan stare before saying with a long, heavy sigh, “They’re not a motorcycle, Torb.”

“Don’t matter,” the engineer had retorted, “Flames are always badass.”

“I mean…” Jesse had started to say until Jack had turned that deadpan, dry stare at him, causing the cowboy to shrug as he added with a sly smirk, “The angels are a touch excessive buuuut...”

“Don’t encourage him,” Jack had muttered sourly, as Torbjörn had grinned, saying, “What about devils instead?”

“Ravens,” Jesse had bantered back, causing Jack to drop his forehead against his hand while also causing Torbjörn to laugh back, “A guitar!”

“Can we please just stick to like...Hollywood art deco meets industrial goth?” Jack had said, lifting his head from his hand before his own face had puckered into a deep scowling pout as he grumbled, “I cannot believe I just fucking said that.”

“Please tell me ya recorded that,” Jesse had said, turning eagerly to Torbjörn, but the engineer had just sighed, apologizing, “Sorry, boy - I got a lot of tech in here, but I’m not recordin’ at all times.”

“Damn,” Jesse had sworn as Jack had chuckled, “Nice try, you two, but you’ll never have proof I ever said that - Gabe will never believe you.”

So the three of them had taken to collaborating, drafting up the body of the gun with a heavy frame somehow composed of sleek, angular curves and burnishing brushstroke lines, like painting steel with wire threads.  Jack had also suggested keeping a surprisingly natural element to it - light, undyed leather for the grips - which the other two had immediately agreed with.

So in this strange triadic way

The most expensive of the “two gifts”

Had been the easier one to figure out.

It was really just finalizing the details and then producing them in the manufacturing section of the department that was the long, painstaking part - not including the assembling, testing, modifying, retesting, and remodifying stages.

But those were easy enough to Jesse’s gunslingin’ mind and hands.  Somethin’ real rote and soothing about putting a gun together and makin’ all the pieces fit right.  Somethin’ about making art outta the craft.

But the hard part was startin’ with the art.

Torb’s right, Jesse thinks, looking back at the blank template of the pocket knife on the screen, tapping his fingers over the materials list in Torb’s database again, huffing internally, Ain’t no damn art ta the craft no more, and I guess I’m just another worthless craftsman pretendin’ ta be an artist like all the rest o’ them.

Gabriel had told him not to worry, Gabriel had told him to take his time and just pick the things Jesse liked, but the thing was...there was almost too much ta take in.  The list of materials in Torb’s database was immediately overwhelming: almost every kind of wood, stone, metal, lacquer, ceramic, and plastic known to humankind sat in there, practically taunting him with the sheer number of choices.  When Torb had first shown Jesse the program four days ago, the cowboy had gawked at the list, stammerin’ out, “Do...do ya actually have real sapphires and gold here??”

“Well, not a ton,” Torbjörn had replied with an incredibly casual shrug to his shoulders, “But if ya need more fer whatever reason...well,” the engineer had added with a dark, wicked grin, “I know where ta get some.  Ya just gotta be prepared ta pay the price.”

Jesse had gaped at him, but Gabriel, leaning behind Jesse next to the drafting table, had just snorted, “Jesus, Lindholm, don’t scare him.  He just knows a few wholesalers, kid - it’s nothing illegal or the U.N. would kill us all.  And don’t put sapphires in the knife - Jack would kill us all for spending that kinda money.”

So Jesse had jumped on it - he really had tried to.  He’d started by tapping through the wood, looking over the ironwood of his old home, the redwood of California, the tulip poplar (he’d giggled over “tulipwood”) of Indiana.  He’d look through gems and stones, lingering over turquoise and obsidian, before forcing himself to look at things like crystals and what not.  He’d skimmed over silver, paused at the gold, made himself consider bronze and copper instead.

He had never had qualms about money before - he’d never really...spent money before, not like this, not more than whatever he needed to buy on a weekly or daily basis.  

The watch on his wrist hangs extremely light, the burden of cushioned air sliding around his arm.

But the feeling of warm, comfortable richness settles deep around his heart.

Jesse has no qualms about spending what money he’s saved over the past year, being paid for effectively running errands and managing files and inventorying weapons and supplies.  He has no need for it - all he’d ever bought before this was food and cigarettes, alcohol and new bandanas when he needed them.

But now

Now the two of them give that stuff to him.

For free.

Free food.  Free bed.  Free roof over his head.  Free clothes that fit.  Free medicine when he gets sick.  Free jackets when he gets cold.  Free socks when he wears holes in the old ones.  Free shampoo and soap.  

Jesse fidgets with the watch, hanging unbearably light around his wrist.

Free time.

Free trips to places he never thought he’d see - Los Angeles, New York City, Geneva, London, Seattle, Siberia, Gibraltar, Giza, Dorado.  He’s stood on mountaintops, the snow blooming out around him like fallen stardust.  He’s stood beneath millennia-old pyramids, marveling at stone and sand and sky.  He’s stood on the edge of the world, watching endless water beneath an endless sunset.

Jesse taps through the materials list again.

Free smiles.

Free chuckles on warm and cold evenings, when the nights were long and the withdrawals burned his mind.  Free jokes in transport ships between Watchpoints, strapped in tight.  Free smirks over how strong Jack made the coffee, tasting like black oil steeped with utter bitterness.  Free laughter when Jesse had made a right fool of himself, rolling across the gym floor, spilling bullets everywhere as he’d struggled to “master the ancient gunslinger art o’ reloadin’ like a real badass.”  

Jesse practically smashes his head against the drawing table in frustration.

Freedom.

Instead of a cold cell with photon barriers blocking the doors and people giving him ugly, twisted stares, they’d given him a free, warm, comfortable home, filled with the richness of heart and soul.

“...I’m stuck, Torb,” Jesse whines a li’l, slumping his chin against his left palm, smooshing his face in sideways, and he hears the chief engineer chuckle kindly, murmuring, “It’s hard work, innit?  Making a craft inta an art is never easy.  But that’s why we do it.”

Jesse twists around slightly, looking at Torbjörn’s back as the engineer taps at the screenglass part of his own drawing table.  Torbjörn just sighs slowly, saying gently, “It’s...right hypocritical of me - I know it - but everything I make here, everything I’ve made since the Crisis...it’s all been a labor o’ love.  The world will never thank us for it, pojke, but the right people?  The right people will understand.  The right people will appreciate what we do here.”

“...Pretty sure it’s the ‘labor o’ love’ part I’m stuck on,” Jesse mumbles, which just gets Torbjörn to chuckle, “That cannot be the problem, pojke - every gift is inherently a labor o’ love.”

Jesse thinks of being handed a brand new revolver that someone told him was “a gift.”

He trusts Torbjörn in a lot of things, but that statement about every gift rings wrong in his heart.

He’s about to retort, lifting his right hand to gesture his point when -

2:12 p.m.

The clock on the datawatch flashes briefly and Jesse pauses.

It is the most expensive thing he’s ever worn that was a genuine, “labor o’ love” gift.

Free time.

It is the most warm, comfortable feeling of richness that he’s ever been gifted.

Jesse stops.

He grounds himself on the time.

“I can’t figure out what ta do fer Jack’s knife.”

The words are out of his mouth before Jesse can stop himself.

Torb shifts at them, turning around in his tall chair to give the cowboy a thoughtful, contemplative look.  The engineer tugs at part of his floofy beard, before he opens his mouth and -

“You two being gremlins over here?”

The voice that speaks is high on glib and much too rambunctiously happy to be Torbjörn’s, and both cowboy and engineer glance to the door off to the side of the room where -

Fareeha is poking a bright if slightly smug grin in through the crack.

“Feh,” Torbjörn scoffs, waving his cyborg hand at her, “Mycket snack och lite verkstad (tn: lots of talk and no workshop).”

Fareeha gives him a dry look as she enters the room, mumbling, “Yeah, I don’t know what that means, Káa Torb.”  She’s wearing a bright blue Overwatch shirt paired with a small set of the padded leggings her mother typically wears, grinning at them as she strides over, the beads and shells in her braids chiming with each step.  Jesse gives her a raised eyebrow as she hugs Torbjörn, asking her, “Whatcha doin’ here, Fareeha?  Kinda a long way from the island.”

“It’s summer break, Jesse,” Fareeha says with a mischievious smile, her dark eyes glimmering as she faces him.  She grabs a nearby stool and drags it over to his drafting table, hopping up and seating herself next to him as she explains, “You get to spend alllll summer with me.”

“It ain’t even June - what kinda summer break is that??” Jesse stammers as she chuckles, peering over his shoulder at the smartscreen section of the table.  Her eyebrows furrow as she mutters, “What’cha makin’?”

“Hmm,” Jesse hums, before grinning at her as he asks, “Can ya keep a secret?”

Fareeha gives him a dull stare before saying, “Jesse, I can keep a secret better than you.  Remember when you started talking about Mei’s Christmas present...when she was in the room with us?”

Jesse’s grin slides right off his face as he mutters, “Oh...yeah, uh...so this -” he taps at the smartscreen, bringing up the template for the pocket knife.  Fareeha’s eyes go wide as she looks over it and Jesse finishes his sentence:

“- Is Jack’s Father’s Day gift.”

“Oooh, Gabriel said you were working on something secret out here when I saw him in the hallway,” Fareeha says with excitement.  Jesse scoots over for her, and she leans in a little more, tapping at some of the different material layers he’s put on it.  But as she goes through them, she scowls a li’l, asking quietly, “What’re you stuck on?”

“Ya can tell, huh?” Jesse chuckles.  Fareeha gives him a knowing glance before saying, “You can’t tell me you’re seriously considering making a pocket knife handle out of limestone.”

“...I thought it looked kinda cool?” Jesse offers her, but his voice sounds shaky enough to himself, and Torbjörn’s low, raspy guffaw perfectly pairs with Fareeha’s deadpan skepticism.  After a long moment, Fareeha finally sighs, turning her intense focus back on the screen, asking him, “So what’re your actual ideas?”

Jesse pauses, chewing on his thoughts a li’l before he murmurs low, “Well...I really wanna use some turquoise…but do ya think that’s selfish?”

“Selfish?” Fareeha asks him curiously as she taps the turquoise selection on the materials list.  The handle of the knife lights up with the bright seaglass-blue stone, speckled with brown lines.  The program automatically makes a sort of tiled, checkered pattern on the handle, each stone cut out into rough, rounded squares, making the handle a beautiful ocean hue, but it’s a tad overwhelmin’ to look at.

“Why do you think it’s selfish?” Fareeha says, tapping around, adding bits and stripes of wood to parts of the handle.  Jesse mulls it over, thinkin’ long ‘n low before he sighs, “Because...ya know… just ‘cause I think it’s pretty don’ mean Jack does.”

Fareeha once again gives him that trademark, disbelieving, sarcastic stare before she asks, “Have you met Jack?”

“...Huh?” Jesse stammers and Fareeha lolls her head, saying exasperatedly, “He’s literally the color blue personified, Jesse.”

Jesse makes a flat, voided expression as Torbjörn once again laughs heartily behind her, snorting as the cowboy casts a judgmental eye over the sheer amount of blue Fareeha is wearing.  Jesse exhales heavily, breathing out, “Alright, pot, ain’t no need ta be calling the kettle blue now.”

Fareeha giggles a little at that, before she flicks through more of the list, clicking and unclicking different metals as she says, “Okay...so you’re gonna use some turquoise.  What else?”

Jesse lets the sigh roll through him like a low-hangin’ thundercloud, easing into a summer storm.  He scratches a little at the scruff on his cheek, watching idly as Fareeha continues to tab through some of the different options, before humming softly, “I was wonderin’ if I should use like...a wood or somethin’.  Like, some redwood on there would look real good, ya know?”

But then he sighs again, this one heavy and weighted with indecision, as he taps at another app on the smartscreen, explaining, “But then I started overthinkin’.”

The other app opens up, showing a picture of several people standing on a winding ridgeline, scrub brush and short grasses waving around them as they look out over the sprawling mass of low, squatty buildings oceaning out before them, the skyscrapers and highrises of central Los Angeles rising like an island in the distance.  The sky above them is turquoise blue chiseled with soft, sweeping clouds of white sewn with grey, stitched together with silvery linings.  The sunlight dapples the picture, casting small flakes of gold across it and -

“Oh!” Fareeha grins with excitement, tapping at the picture to zoom in a little as she exclaims, “That’s when we went to that park, right?  The day after Christmas?”

“Griffith Park, yeah,” Jesse confirms, reaching over and hitting the manzanita selection in the wood list.  A rich, silky red wood appears on parts of the knife, and Fareeha’s eyes light up as she oohs over it.  Jesse flicks a finger over the picture, sliding to the next one, which shows Fareeha, Mei, Jack, and Gabriel striking ridiculous poses on the ridgeline - grins extra bright under the sunlight, a few other hikers gawking at them in the sides of the photos.  Fareeha giggles a little and Jesse smirks as he slides to the next one, which features Fareeha, Mei, and Jack making the “crouched prayer hands pose” around Gabriel, who is shrugging at the camera with an awkward, cheesy grin, even as the others attempt “serious faces” (but Jesse can see the edges of a smile on Mei’s lips and a coy smirk tugging at Jack’s).

“Ahahaha, he tried so hard not to do the shrug,” Fareeha smiles as Jesse slides to the next one, another scenery shot of the unruly mass of the city beneath the blue-storm December sky.  Jesse slides the app again, flicking to shots of the Hollywood sign, then to another of them on the hike back down, then another of Fareeha and Mei posing with peace signs in the back of Gabriel’s car as they drove back into the city.

“You took a lot of pictures,” Fareeha says with soft awe, getting Jesse to chuckle, “Well, yeah, sib - I had ta make sure the datawatch was workin’ right.”

They fall quiet again as Jesse flicks through more of the pictures: shots of them at lunch, eating sushi as Jesse had struggled with the chopsticks; a semi-selfie shot of Mei showing him how to use them, as Gabriel shakes his head in disappointment in the background; a picture of Jack fake-sparring with Fareeha over the last tempura shrimp, whipping their chopsticks at each other in blurry pinching movements; yet another image of Fareeha, Mei, and Jack doing the prayer hands crouch beside graffiti scrawled on a wall that reads “Gabriel Reyes is King” in swirly lettering, a stylized beanie sitting on the G and a crown atop the K; a shot of Gabriel pressing his hands together, right up against his lips, eyebrows furrowed into a deep scowl - Jesse can still hear the “Pinche pendejos” that had followed that moment.

There’s a picture of Fareeha and Mei striking “fierce” poses by a large poster of Reinhardt, his long blonde hair fluttering dramatically; a photo of Jack pretending to swoon by another large Overwatch poster of Gabriel, dressed in his then-Strike-Commander outfit, the actual Gabriel once again watching from the sideline with a look of wan, disbelieving deadpan on his face, but there’s the barest hint of a smirk behind his fist in front of his mouth, the crinkle of his faint wrinkles around his eyes; a picture of Fareeha by a poster of Ana, the twelve-year-old tugging at her shirt, showing off the Overwatch logo proudly.

Jesse pauses slightly

Because the next one is a selfie of him, taken slightly up at an angle, the camera of the watch strapped to his wrist tilted down at him.  He’s crouching by some graffiti, his left hand raised at the elbow, fingers making a peace sign next to his face.

“Fuck Deadlock,” reads the graffiti in a messy scrawl.

Almost directly beneath it -

Peeking out from his rolled up sleeve -

Is the winged skull tattoo on his forearm.

“Heehee,” Fareeha giggles next to him, before grinning up at him, laughing, “This is a great portrait, Jesse.”

Jesse grins back at her, saying with a smug happiness, “Why, thanks, sib - I was really struck by such a passionate sense o’ inspiration.”  He taps at the crafting app, adding a smooth leather to the handle, small strips of brown among the blue stones and the red woods.

“Gee, I wonder why,” Fareeha snorts, swiping to the next picture of the group at Veterans’ Park at Redondo Beach, strolling along the rounded memorial spaces in the ground, the black triangles rising up at a slight angle.  The next shot is the group paused at the newest addition, another, fifth circle, featuring more, black marble plaques -

Only in the center of them, where the flag stands in the other -

Is a small statue of Gabriel.

Jesse remembers how he’d almost snorted - the actual Gabriel Reyes had towered over the figure - but had stopped himself at how Gabriel’s eyes had grown distant and almost empty as they lingered over the plaques ever so slightly, how Jack had leaned against him ever so slightly, how the then-Strike-Commander’s shoulders had fallen ever so slightly -

How, in the picture Jesse had managed to quickly snap

Jack’s hand had brushed against Gabriel’s ever so slightly.

Jesse leans over and taps the materials list on the crafting app, selecting the black marble - the dark, shimmering material looks stark and deep, surrounded by the sea-blue of the turquoise, the red wood of the manzanita, the gritty brown of the leather.  Fareeha scowls slightly, murmuring gently, “This knife is looking really overdone, Jesse.”

“That’s why I need help, Fareeha,” Jesse retorts, snapping to the next picture - the group is on Redondo Beach here, Fareeha and Mei running across the pale, fine sand with excitement, Gabriel and Jack walking after them, but there are smiles on the commanders’ faces.  The next shot is one of the ocean, endless blue upon blue upon blue, the sun steadily starting to sink across the western sky, painting out with a slower, gilded edge to some of the clouds.

An image of Fareeha and Mei, their shoes and socks slung limp in the sand, their pants rolled up, rushing through the chilled water, the shrieks of laughter and excitement clear on their faces.

A photo of the ocean, still a silky, velvet blue at the edges, the sun slipping in the horizon, the light rippling out colors like water dropped into oil paints, fluid and yet viscous on the canvas of the sky - bronze pinks and rose golds brushing like soft stardust on the underside of clouds, evening out into gradients of burnished, tarnished sunbeams, stretched long under the depth of winter, even in southern California.

In the foreground

Stark against the brilliant colors of the sun melding with the sea

Is Jack’s silhouette.

His stance is firm, but not rigid, standing tall and strong, yet there is a calm, liquid tranquility about him - the edges of his shadows blur and shimmer with the effect of the water around him, the reflected light of melting golds and singing pink rippling at his boundaries.  From the angle Jesse took the shot at, just a slip of his face can be seen: bathed in that fading, gilded light, his gaze is as blended with the sunset as the ocean beneath it, eyes painted with the clouds of sunlit water and stardusted nightfall drifting in.

“I swear,” Gabriel had said, right after Jesse had snapped the picture, and the cowboy had glanced up at the commander.  Gabriel had also been lit in that hazy, drifting light, his face tinted gold and bronze in the regal glow, his gaze soft and serene like falling stars, a knowing, fond smirk on his face as he had watched Jack, his voice steeped in all the colors of the sunset as he had joked wryly:

“Sometimes I think Jack loves the ocean more than me.”

They stop at this image, sharing a long, meaningful look at it, until Fareeha murmurs with a faint chuckle, “Why haven’t you given this one to PR yet?”

“Ha,” Jesse laughs hoarsely, muttering with a slow, rich, syrup warmth in his words, “I’m givin’ this one ta the boss.”

“You should save it,” Fareeha smirks, flashing a wicked, smug grin at him, “For when you fail a mission.  Give it to him to soften the blow.”

“Man, you ain’t even in Overwatch yet, and yer already thinkin’ of ways ta bribe the bosses?” Jesse whistles, which gets a distant chuckle from Torbjörn.  But Fareeha is still staring at the image, her gaze drifting slightly, before she mutters a single word:

“Abalone -”

And then -

“Hey, Torb.”

Twin looks of shock pass on Jesse and Fareeha’s faces - and then they immediately scramble to close all the apps on the drawing table, as Jack slips into the room, heading right up to Torbjörn’s desk as he says, “We’re coming up on the end of the fiscal year here - have you done all your budgets - oh, Fareeha!”

Fareeha whips around in the stool, half-sliding off, spreading her arms wide and blocking the last app closing on the desk, and Jesse can hear her voice crack out, “Heeeeeey, Káa Jack - what’s shakin’?”

“...Uh, not much,” Jack says uncertainly, looking at her a li’l skeptically, and then a li’l quizzically as he tilts his head, asking, “When did you get here?  Does Ana know you’ve arrived?”

“Psssh, you don’t have to worry about that, Jack,” Fareeha says, gesturing at him with a wide flick of her hand.  Jack squints at her slightly, still stopped mid-step, before his gaze flickers to Jesse who is leaning his left elbow casually on the drawing table, smiling brightly at Jack.  The Strike-Commander scowls slightly, before saying in that deep, rumbling tone, “What kinda nonsense are you two up to?”

“Us??” Jesse stammers, tryin’ his damnedest to act rightfully appalled, “Nonsense??  Why we’d never -”

“Alright, I don’t mind whatever shenanigans you’re fixin’ up,” Jack mutters, turning back towards Torbjörn’s drawing table again, where the engineer is watching their shitshow of a performance with a big, smug grin plastered on his face, bushy eyebrows raised high.  Just as they’re about to breathe a sigh of relief, Jack whips back around, pointing at them with the edge of his datapad, saying sternly:

“Just don’t blow up the Watchpoint, okay?  This shit’s expensive.”

“...Did yer budgets tell ya that?” Jesse half-chuckles, half-sputters, and Jack sighs, making a scrunched face as he mutters, “You’re damn right they did.  I can’t believe our numbers for this year.  Peacetime Overwatch is simultaneously getting more money and budget cuts.”  The Strike-Commander grumbles to himself a li’l, shifting his attention back to Torbjörn, who gives the kids one last smug smirk, before he swivels back around, focusing on Jack’s datapad.

Jesse exhales a long breath as Fareeha clutches dramatically at her chest before whipping back around to face Jesse.  She reaches up and opens the browser app on the drawing table, typing in the word “abalone” into the search bar, hitting enter as fast as she can.  Jesse makes a skeptical face - he don’t know much about the creature, just that it’s some kinda shellfish -

Jesse freezes.

Time unravels.

Just a li’l.

Fareeha taps to the images section - there are pictures of massive, rough shells filled with a slimey, slug-like creature, little gooey hairs and spikes sticking out of the holes and edges.  There are pictures of people holding them, pictures of them cracked open and lying there looking like weird, runny eggs, pictures of pod things that look like the weird, runny eggs sitting in sacs on barbecues.

But in between those pictures

Are the shells.

The inner shells.

They shine and shimmer in silky, velvet blues, touched with soft white undertones, bronze pinks and rose golds ribboning throughout them, like oil dropped into water paints, the reflection of the slow, simmering sunset on the ocean’s horizon captured in layers of lacquer polish, stained with the gilded stardust of evening falling into the water.

Jesse looks up at Fareeha in awe, who grins and reaches beneath her shirt to tug out a small, pendant of a stylized raven, inlaid with fragments of abalone shell.  Jesse looks at it thoughtfully, admiring the shine and the glimmer, how the shell ripples like water in jeweled form, before -

An image of cracked earth and warped asphalt.

A soft, crooked smile in a face spun from gold sunlight.

A man standing at the edge of the world, as the light dies before him, falling into the ocean, on the verge of being made the highest-ranking military commander in the world.

A picture of sea-glass blue turquoise, rippled with light, inlaid with water in jeweled form.

Jesse freezes.

Time reravels.

Just a li’l.

Jesse grins back at Fareeha, giving her a quick thumbs up as he bookmarks the page on abalone.

“That’s gonna be all of it fer now,” Torbjörn says as Jesse closes the browser app.  The cowboy looks up at the engineer and commander as Torbjörn twists himself in his seat, huffing slightly, “Didja need something else, Strike-Accountant?”

“Haha, very funny, Torb,” Jack laughs dryly, his eyes hollow until a quick smirk snaps on his face and he turns a knowing grin to Jesse, saying slowly, “Unless you two have some new details on Gabriel’s guns you’d like to share with me?”

Fareeha whips her head back around, staring at Jesse with obvious excitement, her eyes gleaming with bright mischief as she demands, “What!”  Jesse gives her a wry grin, slidin’ off the stool as he moseys over to Torbjörn’s drawing table, saying with a fake sigh, “Well, I guess I could show y’all what we’ve been doin’.”

“Are you making new shotguns??” Fareeha asks, bouncing up to the table beside him as Torbjörn flicks the screen over to the crafting app.  As he closes his current program on a new supercomputer, Jesse smiles at Fareeha, replying, “They’re gonna be Gabriel’s Father’s Day gift - don’ tell him, okay?”

“Please, Jesse, I’m great at keeping secrets,” Fareeha retorts with a chuckle, pulling out her phone to tap at something.  As the program loads the file for the new shotguns, Jesse’s watch blinks, and a new message appears.  He glances at it:

[Fareeha.Amari]: holy shit

[Fareeha.Amari]: you play a dangerous game, dáa

Jesse grins, tapping back on the small, holo-keyboard that appears:

[Jesse.McCree]: the best way to play is to show only half your hand and make them think they saw through ya

Jesse sends the message as there’s the telltale jingle-jangling of the crafting program launching and then -

There’s a stunned “oooooh” from Fareeha and a soft, deep “oh wow” from Jack as the new Hellfire shotgun model loads, fully rendered in 3D at this point - it is a deep, obsidian-flaked black in the shell, with an eerie opaqueness that seems almost transparent but instead shifts into further folds of metallic shadows under the program’s lighting, the color surprisingly serene in its sense of self-security, as if confident in the density of its existence.  The black shimmers and ebbs into slipping shades of silver-grey, looking almost stonelike or galvanized in their texture where the hafnium carbide coating shows through.  The barrells and the magazine are encased in the almost-creamy ceramic glass - they gleam like raw, snow-laden sunshine in the program.  As Torbjörn twists the model with a tap of his finger, the pistol grip handle slides into view, showing the soft, leather padding Jesse had decided on, pale like silk spun of spiderwebs.

Torb gives Jesse a shit-eatin’ grin as he rumbles, “Take it away, pojke.”

Jesse smirks back, before he leans over, tapping at some of the different parts as he launches into his explanation:

“Well, ta start with, we ain’t got enough pure hafnium carbide ta coat the entire thing, so we had ta make a few compromises - the important parts all got the hafnium carbide fiberglass on ‘em, but this outer shell is a few layers.”

Jesse taps the shell casing of the shotgun apart, opening up the different pieces.  He twists the piece around, showing the three blended layers, as he continues, “We went fer a tantalum-hafnium-carbide inner layer here, ta help keep the casin’ from warpin’ too bad, which’ll extend the life o’ it a lot more.  The central layer here is tantalum tungsten, just to lighten the cost o’ the guns, and then we got a black oxide layering there just ta give it some character.”

“Ha, Gabriel will appreciate that,” Jack snorts, his chuckle a low, throaty rumble which gets Jesse to sigh back, “We all know he’d just paint it black if we didn’t do this.”

“An unfortunately accurate observation,” Jack sighs, as Jesse reattaches the casing to the rest of the gun, zooming in on the ports on the side of the outer shell and the barrel.  The cowboy hums a li’l as he says, “I know we debated ‘n argued ‘bout this ferever, but Torb ‘n I really think the integrated flat rib ventilation will look and last the best here.  The shotguns get so much pressure goin’ through them that not encasing ‘em in the shell means the dispersal o’ the pressure will end up in the receiver ‘n loadin’ port - I know they look real bulky, Jack, but we had ta keep this here.”

“No, it looks a lot better than I thought it would,” Jack admits, leaning in to move the shotgun model around, pointing to layers of metal at the top part of the outer shell that swoop and cut low beneath the stylized sights.  The commander grins as he sees them, saying, “I was worried you wanted to make the whole thing into a boxy shape, but this is much better, much cleaner - and Gabe will love these raised rib sights.  Does the whole outer shell move with the blowback?”

“Yeah,” Jesse replies, zooming out and tapping the animation feature.  The shotgun model ripples into life, blasting out a rendering of the FRAG-21 shot: the whole gun shudders, the outer shell sliding back as the magazine pumps and loads the next virtual FRAG-21.  Even as it loads, the gun bursts with the second one contained in the lower auxiliary barrel, and the whole shell casing rocks back again, auto-loading the fourth and final cartridge into the receiver.

Fareeha gasps again, her eyes lit with a bright fire as she taps the animation function again, watching the gun fire-reload-fire-reload as Torb sits back, folding his arms across his chest smugly as he smirks up at Jack, sayin’, “I told ya it’d be a work o’ art.”

“I never doubted you for a second, Torb,” Jack laughs, patting the engineer on the shoulder as he chuckles, “You’re basically an artist at this point - maybe we should convert this room into a gallery?”

“Ya wouldn’t dare,” Torbjörn growls at the taunt, and Jack just smirks at him, his blue eyes alive with liquid lightning flashing through them as he says, “Just try me, Lindholm - see what happens the next time you’re the last person to give me your budget.  Anyways,” the commander sighs more gently, grabbing his datapad again as he beams at Jesse, “You did a great job, kid.  Gabe’s gonna love them, I’m certain.”

Jesse smiles back at him, his grin wide and pearly as he laughs back:

“Thanks, Pops!”

---------

You showed me how to find the things I love,
And never stop because I'm growing up.

If you want to tell me all your secrets let's go back to the beginning -
A lifetime of stories I've been collecting, and I promise I've been listening.

---------

Sharpshooter Flashback: El Rey

August 26, 2057: 6:24 p.m. - Commanders’ lounge area, Watchpoint: Santa Monica

“Alright, we’re pretty much done,” Ana says, taking a step back to look at the food spread across the table.  Jesse comes to stand beside her, also assessing the plates of spatzle pasta, cooked potatoes, and sauerkraut before his eyes linger over the massive pots of Gaisburger Marsch balanced precariously on the hot plates in the center of the table.  The scent of simmering beef, soaking in onions, garlic cloves, and bay leaves, enriches the air and makes Jesse’s mouth water - Reinhardt’s been slow-cooking the beef shank for several hours at this point, stepping into the kitchen every half hour or so to check on it before returning to helping Torbjörn draft new armor designs.  About an hour ago, the Crusader had taken up his station in the kitchen to finish cooking the rest - roasting the vegetables and boiling the potatoes and firing the onions - with Ana and Jesse and eventually Mei joining in to help.  

Even at six months in, Jesse is still slightly bewildered that the “commanders” of Overwatch actually take the time to cook for themselves and each other at least once or twice a week - usually whenever the majority of them are stationed at the same Watchpoint together.  Even more bewilderin’ is the fact that at least once or twice a month, the commanders make dinner for everyone living in whatever Watchpoint they’re all at for that day - sometimes upwards to a hundred, two-hundred agents, scientists, medics, and staff members.

All of ‘em eating Gabriel’s adobada pork or Ana’s molokhiya soup or Torbjörn’s köttbullar meatballs.

It had been a real sight, the first time Jesse had seen it - been a damn real mess too, helping out to make enough food for over one-hundred people, spending hours working over hot dishes, rushing about, trying to move at a fast but even pace.  But fewer things had made Jesse appreciate the beauty of hard work - genuine, honest work - than helping cook for the entire team, watching the Division Leaders stand back and admire an entire Watchpoint eat and chatter and savor the meal.

And admittedly, it had been a...small relief to go back to cooking for just seven or eight people (dependin’ on if Fareeha was there to join them).

“I still can’t believe y’all actually do this,” Jesse mumbles, which gets Ana to give him a surprised look.  Jesse shrugs before gesturin’ to the table, adding on, “The food.  Cookin’.  Makin’ dinner together.”

“Ahaha,” Ana chuckles, turning her gaze back to the table as Mei reappears from the kitchen area, carrying several plates.  The sniper lieutenant smiles tenderly, saying gently, “Old habits die hard, I guess - we always made our own meals when it was just the five of us.  There was no one else, no base staff, no medics, no engineers - just us.”

As Reinhardt enters the dining nook - humming something to himself as he places another plate of fried onions down - Ana’s gaze gets a li’l distant, turnin’ real glassy as she murmurs:

“When you face down death every day, you quickly discover how...grateful you are, for food and for family.”

Jesse pauses too, lettin’ his own gaze linger a moment on the table, weighted with the richness of food and the wealth of the warm, comfortable feeling settlin’ around his heart.  Ana tilts her eyes back to him, smiling as she says softly, “But you know that, don’t you?”

“Hmm,” Jesse hums, rubblin’ a hand through his hair bashfully as he mutters, “Well...I do these days.  Ain’t been seein’ much o’ death recently, though.”

“As it should be,” Ana states firmly.  Torbjörn shuffles in from the main lounge room, pulling out a chair and sliding himself in it as Mei sets a plate in front of him.  Ana glances at the clock on the wall, saying contemplatively, “I should probably message Gabriel and Jack - let them know dinner is ready.”

“Aw, shoot - they got their phones off fer some meetin’ or something’.  I can go get them,” Jesse replies, heading for the hallway back to the central part of the Watchpoint.  He ambles out, workin’ his way down the mazelike halls and corridors, over to where the main offices are.  He’s headin’ straight up to Gabriel’s door when -

“How??  How??”

Gabriel’s voice, though muffled through the door, still comes across with its full indignation and fury.

Jesse freezes.

Time unravels.

“Petty ass...spiteful...cowards,” Jack’s voice comes through - there’s less volume, but his words carry an edge as sharp as an obsidian knife.  Jesse stares at the door in hollow horror - he needs to knock, he should just knock, he should just end this before it starts -

“An ‘immediate meeting with the Strike-Commander?’  In New York tomorrow?” Gabriel snaps, and Jesse can hear the bitterness in his voice as the Strike-Commander rages, “How can they pull this on me the day before the mission?  How can they pulls this on us?  On the team??”

“...Gabe…” Jack seems to breathe, as if trying to channel his patience more for himself than for Gabriel.  Jesse can hear heavy footfalls of weighted combat boots - he can practically see Gabriel pacing back and forth as he growls, “It’s one thing to reprimand me for the dumb shit I said about Australia but this??  This is unprofessional and borderline unethical.”

There’s more footsteps and then a thump and the creak of a padded chair as Gabriel sits down - there’s more shuffling sounds as Jack murmurs gently, “...Gabe, please - let me go instead -”

“You know they won’t want that,” Gabriel sighs, his inhale-exhale is deep and long and weighted with the pressure crushing his shoulders.  There’s the creak of the chair again and then, Gabriel’s voice, sounding drained and utterly exhausted and -

“...Why do I try, Jack?”

Utterly heartbroken.

Jesse finds himself rooted to the spot as Gabriel’s voice chips and cracks at the edges, murmuring with a deep, painful heartache, “Why do I fight for this organization if it won’t fight for me?”  Jack is silent, but Jesse can hear more soft shuffling - gentle, sore noises that somehow seem to ring out like shots being fired.

“Blocked by our own parent organization at every turn, berated by idealistic ambassadors who have never even held a gun, let alone stared one down…” Gabriel sighs, and Jesse can see him burying his head in his hands, as if trying to fight off the overwhelming feeling of weighted, dense existence.  The Strike-Commander continues, saying in low, gutted tones, “...All we do is clean up the mess left by the god damn near-apocalypse and for what?  For people who hate me to tell me that I didn’t do it right?”

Jack still doesn’t respond directly, but Jesse knows - oh, Jesse knows - that Jack is a patient listener, preferring to still his own thoughts to give others the space they need.  And in that space, Gabriel mutters hoarsely:
“...I risk all of our lives every day for people in a shiny, safe building in New York City who turn around and tell me that my strategies and tactics and methods are not in-line with what the United Nations stands for?  They tell me to take down whole crime empires and drug networks and arms trades with a shoestring budget and a handful of paperclips.”

Jesse has never heard them talk like this before.

He’s known, of course, that it must happen - exactly like this, behind closed doors, in quiet, intensely personal moments where they are alone, just the two of them.  He ain’t ever questioned how they felt about Overwatch, or their roles in it - he’d…

He’d just assumed they were content with them.

There’s a brief pause, before Gabriel murmurs coldly, bitterly, “...No casualties in my entire time leading this organization and yet somehow that’s not good enough.”

Another long, weighted inhale-exhale before Gabriel breathes out with an honest, knife-cutting sorrow:

“...I’m not good enough.”

“That is not true -” Jack’s reaction is immediate, almost volatile, as if Gabriel had just punched him in the gut or insulted his favorite pair of socks, but Gabriel fires back just as quickly, “It is true, Jack.  Good enough to prevent the apocalypse from happening, but not good enough to deal with everything that comes after.”

“...Gabriel -” Jack starts to say, but Jesse can hear the chair shifting again as Gabriel’s voice cracks with a strange bitter, sorrowful frustration, carryin’ a weight Jesse ain’t ever heard before:

“We all know it, Jack. I’m a hero in war and a monster in peace.  And that’s not good enough for them.  For Overwatch.  For us.”

“Gabriel, you know this isn’t true,” Jack replies with an earnest, almost pleading edge to his tone, a touch of horror to his sugar-smoked voice, “You were made for this.  And this was made for you.  You built this.  You built all of this from nothing.”

Now it is Gabriel’s turn for silence as Jack says with an ardent, slowly thunderous roll, like an ocean tide comin’ in, like the clouds turning dark, as he mutters with a conviction of the unshakeable, “In ten years you have made Overwatch a genuine force for good in the world.  Perhaps the only genuine force for good in the world.”

There’s more soft shuffling, the sound of the chair creaking, a long sort of breath - the faintest exhales, as Jack breathes with utter reverence and a sort of open candor Jesse don’ think he’s ever heard anyone speak with ever before.

Not like this.

“You are worth far, far more than this world deserves,” Jack’s voice rings out with the strength of bells and the softness of a gentle whisper, “You are far, far better than what this world deserves.”

There’s a pause as the words sink like stones cast into sunlit water.

“...I’ll never get over how you can say that with a straight face,” Gabriel chuckles weakly, but the joke sounds hollow even to Jesse.  It does not daunt Jack in the slightest, as Jack replies with that same intense verve, “...Because I mean it.  Every word.”

“...I know,” Gabriel sighs back, but there’s a smile to his tone, “That’s the insane part.”

Jesse’s hand is still comically frozen over the door, and as the pause lingers, he finally gets enough of a grip to try and move it -

“...Gabe -”

“No.”

“...Aw, c’mon -” Jack starts to whine, but Gabriel cuts him off again, grumbling, “I know that look in your eye.  No.”

“It will be so easy -” Jack urges him, and for a second Jesse thinks he really does not want to listen to this next part of the conversation but -

“I will never let you run covert ops missions,” Gabriel states with a solid, stern finality to his words, “Especially when I have to be on the other side of the damn country on the same day.”

The conversation takes a hard right turn onto the offramp to incomprehensibility that loses Jesse.

Jack’s silence is stiff and arguably...obstinate, but Gabriel just sighs, a surprisingly patient sound that echoes with a deep tenderness, “I won’t let you take that kind of risk - physical or political.  You could be tried for it -”

“We need a black ops division - you know we do,” Jack insists, jumping in, battin’ hard, and Jesse -

His eyes grow wide as he finally clues in on what they’re discussing.

This is not the way he expected this conversation to go, but he is absolutely, 110% not supposed to be hearing this.

Jesse ain’t done a lot of research on this, and with the robot apocalypse most of the “rules” of the “old world” had gone the way of the dodo - largely thanks to the United Nations creating Overwatch in an unprecedented powerplay to stop the spread of the Crisis - but it was quietly agreed upon that the United Nations did not engage in any sort of secret or covert intelligence gathering or analysis, nor that it dared to act upon that information in a non-public manner.

But Jesse ain’t stupid, and neither were the rest of the Overwatch agents.

Everyone working for the United Nations knew that covert intelligence gatherin’ happened - it had happened Pre-Crisis and it had happened Post-Crisis.

What no one wanted to say, what no one discussed in polite company -

Was the question of if Overwatch was conducting it.

And if they were acting on it.

O’ course they are, Jesse realizes with a sudden start, They got access ta FBI and CIA information.  Who knows what else they’re tapped inta.

“Of course I know that we need a black ops division,” Gabriel says back, but his voice still wavers on cautionary, “But the U.N. would never fucking approve -”

“You don’t need the U.N.’s approval,” Jack states firmly, still retaining that edge of his earlier conviction, “The Strike-Commander has the ability to approve the creation of any Division they wish -”

“And I don’t,” Gabriel retorts immediately, his own tone taking on a sharp strictness, but it is underlined with a touch of velvety softness, “Not for this.  Not for you.”

Jack’s non-answer is palpable, but Gabriel continues, increasing the tenderness in his voice as he murmurs, “I’d rather run black ops myself than let you risk yourself.  You’re too valuable, Jack.  To Overwatch.  To our family.  To me.”

There is some more shuffling sounds, and then Gabriel’s words are strong yet soft, sweet yet steady:

“You’re the one actually keeping this organization together on shoestrings and paperclips.  It’s like some sort of witchcraft really, I have no clue how you do it.  You’re the only person capable of persuading the Security Council to do anything.”

“...Gabriel…” Jack mutters, and the chair creaks again as Gabriel chuckles dryly, “And you’re my foundation - I would’ve cracked years ago without you.  I am all I can be because of you.”

There’s a pained, weary silence and a soft sigh, until Gabriel murmurs with ripples of unending warmth in his voice:

“We all know I’m not good enough to lead in peace.  But you are.  You’re more than good enough - you were made for this.”

Jesse feels a strange emotion settle in his throat - it’s not constricting or hard, but a shuddering sigh of something unknown.  

He has not heard people talk like this since Pa sat by Mamá’s hospital bed, whispering to her, one hand stroking through her hair, the other squeezing her limp hand -

“I won’t let you risk yourself on some drug dealer’s bullet in a shadyass black ops mission,” Gabriel says, the sunshine fierce in his voice, “Not for this organization, and not for me.  I can’t let you burn for this.”

“...God dammit,” Jack swears playfully, but there’s an almost pained cut to his tone, “I really thought I could convince you this time.”

“You’d have a better chance of convincing me to wear Torb’s beard as a wig,” Gabriel retorts, which gets Jack to laugh loudly -

And gets Jesse to snort in chuckling disbelief by the door.

The shocked silence that follows is deafening.

Oh shit, Jesse realizes a second too late, as there is suddenly heavy footfalls storming right towards the door and -

It slides open to reveal Gabriel glowering down at him fiercely.  Jesse immediately flinches back at the look, a motion Gabriel notices, as he blinks once but immediately relaxes his stance and gaze, lowering his shoulders, scowl softening at the edges.  But his tone is still strict and rather taut as he states, “Eavesdropping is rude, Jesse.”

“I uh - I ain’t heard nothin’ worth repeatin’,” Jesse mutters apologetically as Jack appears by Gabriel’s shoulder, looking at Jesse with an unreadable contemplative expression.  Jesse scuffs a toe on the tile, mumbling slowly, “Just was gonna tell ya that dinner was ready but...didn’t feel right to interrupt.”

“So you stood there and listened instead,” Gabriel says dryly, which causes Jesse to shrug, rolling his shoulders loosely as he mutters, “I...It wasn’t right, I know that...but I didn’t know ya felt that way ‘bout bein’ Strike-Commander.”

Gabriel heaves a long, slow sigh, saying with utter exhaustion in his voice, “It’s...not exactly a secret.”

“Look,” Jesse offers, the warm, comfortable feeling full and rich in his chest, “I know I ain’t worth much, but I can help out more!  Do more paperwork or somethin’?”

“‘Not worth much?’” Jack asks curiously and Jesse freezes, because fuck, he’s said the wrong thing, he’s done it now, he’s pushed them to admit that he ain’t worth shit -

“Jesse,” Jack says calmly, with a patient if slightly wan smile on his face, “You already do a lot for us.”

...What.

“Probably too much,” Gabriel admits, making a pouting, frustrated face at his own words.  He rubs an impatient hand over his scalp as Jack pats at his shoulder, but Gabriel just sighs again, saying a li’l awkwardly:

“Look, Jesse, we weren’t gonna ask you this with the mission this week, but Jack and I have been talking about it and...we think it might be good for you to take the GED.”

...What.

“...What,” Jesse states, eyes darting between Gabriel’s deep-thinking scowl and Jack’s chuckling, wry smile.  Jack grins at him, saying through his tiredness, “We think it could help you, you know?  Give you a solid foundation to stand on.  The stronger record we build here for you, the better your future will be.”

“And it never hurts to have another ace in your hand,” Gabriel says, nodding along with Jack, but Jack just chuckles, “Unless you’re playing Crazy Eights or Speed or something.”

Gabriel makes a deadpan expression, staring off into space slightly before he snaps to it, muttering sarcastically, “Could you like, not undermine my metaphors when I’m trying to convince an eighteen-year-old to take the GEDs?”

“What am I gonna need them tests fer?” Jesse asks suspiciously - he don’ mind takin’ ‘em, but he don’ wanna do it if they’re just gonna get rid o’ him…

“What was it…” Gabriel mutters, before giving Jesse the widest shit-eating grin he’s ever seen on the Commander, saying with a wicked playfulness:

“Because Death and Time aren’t fair?”

Jesse’s face scrunches into a horrified scowl as -

“But a good education sure helps,” Jack smirks and Jesse gives him furious, shocked gawks before he stammers:

“Y’all just - ya heard - eavesdroppin’ is RUDE.”

Gabriel howls that wheezy laughter as Jack’s whole face lights up with a low, raspy rumble.

---------

Days turn to pages in a diary, and all we'll have left is a memory.
If I could leave a memory like you then…

Then who knew you'd do everything right?
Who knew you'd do everything right?

Everything right,

Everything right.

Chapter Text

Segador Flashback: Paint It Black

January 10, 2058: 11:54 a.m. - Ecopoint: Siberia, on the edge of the Buor-Khaya Gulf, south of Tiksi, Russia

“So?” Gabriel asks Ana, leaning back in his chair as he folds his arms across his chest, grinning smugly, “Whatcha think?”

Ana frowns slightly in concentration, hitting a few buttons on the massive keyboard in front of them, tabbing through the statistics and readouts on one half of the huge monitors.  They’re sitting in the observation room in the Ecopoint: Siberia training area - glass windows facing outwards over the main sections of the practice range - along with Jack (to Gabriel’s left) and Mei (on Ana’s right).  Though they have the room sealed off as well as they can, the chill, frigid Arctic air still seeps in through the minute leaks and cracks in the dense thermal walls.  Gabriel and Ana are as bundled as they basically can be, wearing multiple layers on all parts of their bodies, including their heads - both captains have pulled their hoods up over their headgear, Gabriel’s over his beanie and Ana’s over her thick beret.  Jack, meanwhile, continues to look completely unfazed in the standard winter jacket given to normal Overwatch agents in normal cold-winter places like Montreal and Geneva, and has even managed to push up the sleeves to his elbows, which Gabriel just knows the charming, rugged jackass is doing to show off both his tolerance to the January Siberian weather and his impressive arms.

And sitting in a league of her own special levels of insane is Mei, who has pulled off her sweatshirt and is hanging around in just a slick blue tank top, watching the video feeds of the different cameras located around the training area with intense interest, her dark gaze following Jesse’s frame intently as he darts around corners and hallways.

Ana sighs, making that trademark pout the Amaris are known for, before she slowly rolls out her words in a thoughtful, deliberate manner:

“...There is no denying it - he is remarkably good at every weapon we’ve told him to try.  His aim is almost superhuman - if he ever chooses to go for cybernetics, he could be lethal in every shot.  And he absolutely has all the makings of being a truly great, truly legendary sniper.”

But Ana frowns, before muttering with heavy, weighted frustration, “But he has no...art in it.”

“I’m sorry,” Gabriel replies with a low threat to the undercurrent of his voice, “Did you want the eighteen-year-old to make an ‘art’ of killing?”

“You know that’s not what she meant, Gabe,” Jack chides him with a raspy rumble.  The newly “cross-laterally-promoted” “Special Operations Division” commander whips his chair around to face his “newly promoted” Strike-Commander, giving Jack a skeptical squint.  Jack glances back at him with a raised eyebrow before sighing, “C’mon, Gabe - none of us want to run these tests, but as long as Jesse insists on staying with Overwatch, we have to do this.  Don’t mince Ana’s words when you know what she meant.”

Gabriel exhales slowly, shifting his eyes back to the video feed as Jesse snipes down a few more of the training bots from the third story platform.  The kid’s hands move almost mechanically - pull the trigger, eject the cartridge and reload the shot, shift his sights over in miniscule motions, pull the trigger, eject the cartridge and repeat until all the bots in the open ground area are pieces on the floor.

Eventually Jesse rises, adjusting his puffy, bright orange snow jacket and beanie, drawlin’ out, “Ain’t I done yet?”

“Looks like that should be it,” Ana sighs, reaching for the comms button, but Gabriel shakes his head, muttering, “Not yet.”

He leans forward, pressing the comms button, saying over the speakers, “We got one more for you.  Return to the set up room.”

“Yessir,” Jesse says back to the frigid air, heading back down the winding tower stairs.  Ana gives Gabriel a skeptical look, asking, “We had something else to test him on?”

“We’ve done the standard pulse rifle, the sniper rifle, Torbjörn’s turrets, Mei’s endothermic blaster, the standard pistol - what else is there?” Jack says curiously, and Gabriel gives a wry grin, chuckling, “It’s a surprise.”

“...Gabriel Reyes, if it’s one of your shotguns -” Ana begins to chide him, but Gabriel just sighs, adjusting his hood a little as he mutters, “Please, Ana, I’m not that strict.  And I’m well aware the only other people who can handle the plasma-slag shotguns are Jack and Reinhardt.”  His gaze drifts back to Jesse, who is making his way into the main practice equipment room - the new “agent” shivers a little as he enters the large, warm staging area, pulling the safety on the sniper rifle, unclipping the scope, and emptying the magazine. There are few other agents in the room, mostly adjusting their own weapons and gear, and Jesse shuffles to a corner where he gingerly sets the sniper rifle in its case, speaking into the comms device on his ear, “Should I clean it now or -”

“It can wait,” Gabriel replies back, as he switches to a slightly clearer view of Jesse in the set up room.  The new black ops commander sits a little higher in his seat, which causes Jack to give him a skeptical glance, but the new Strike-Commander refocuses on the screens as Jesse moves towards the last gun case by the others the commanders had set out for him -

“...I don’t recognize that one,” Ana says hesitantly, as Mei leans in closer, squinting at the screen.  But on his left, Gabriel hears Jack give a soft, almost awed exhale, murmuring, “Is that…”

Gabriel smirks, before tapping the button on his comms device again, saying to Jesse with a smug, self-satisfied tone:

“We had to hand over the others, but Torb and I...found a few rules to bend for this one for you, kid.”

Jesse gives a disbelieving deadpan glance to the camera set in the wall above him, but his thumbs click the latches and he eases the lid open skeptically -

Jesse freezes.

Gabriel grins.

After a fraction of a second, Jesse lifts his awe-struck, starry-eyed gaze to the camera, mouth open slightly as he mumbles in slight reverence, “I can - this is - are ya sure??”

“...Torb and I were waiting for you to pass probation and get hired on before we let you handle it again,” Gabriel chuckles, settling back in his seat, satisfied with the reaction his “gift” managed to pull.  And then he nods, mainly to himself, as he adds, “It also took us awhile to figure out the special caliber of the bullets because it’s such a unique custom build, but Lindholm has a gift for these things, that’s for sure.”

On the screen

Jesse’s whole face lights up with utter joy.

It’s a bittersweet thing, seeing someone get that happy over a weapon

But Gabriel supposes no one else in the room is much different.

Next to him, Jack chuckles lowly, muttering with a deeply impressed tone that can always make Gabriel melt a little, “That was slick of you two, Gabe -”

As Jesse dives back into the weapons case, before his hands reappear from behind the lid

His fingers already spinning the barrel of the revolver.

The noise that comes from Ana could probably be described as a groan, but the one that comes from Mei is something like a “Yipee!”.  Jack snort-chuckles again as Jesse clips the spare bullets case to his belt and then bolts for the door again, almost skipping as he hurdles back to the practice range.  Ana gives Gabriel a disapproving headshake, complete with hands on her hips and that trademark Amari scowl, and Gabriel’s only retort is to lift his hands and shrug, giving her a massive shit-eating grin as he does it.

Mei, meanwhile, is happily tabbing through the different camera angles, laughing brightly, “I always wanted to see a cowboy with a real six-shooter!”

On the screen, Jesse is darting up the central support-sniper tower, taking the stairs two at a time, which gets Jack to press a finger to his own comms device, chiding him, “Trigger discipline and gun safety, Jesse.”

“Got it, Commandad,” Jesse half-snarks, half-laughs back, as he hits the second-story landing -

And then disappears from view.

Gabriel and Mei both scowl about the same time, with the scientist muttering, “Oh shoot, which camera is that…”  Gabriel taps at his own controls, fiddling with the different angles as Ana mutters with some confusion, “Isn’t that camera out?”

“I have been telling the maintenance crew to double-check them,” Mei sighs, rubbing a hand at her forehead, “We have been working on making sure they are adapted to the cold, but a bad storm can knock most of them out.  They must have missed this one.”

“...That’s unfortunate,” Jack says with some mild exhaustion in his voice, and Gabriel feels a little crestfallen himself, tapping at his comms, “Hey, Jesse, pull back to a different spot - we can’t see you -”

“I’m right here.”

There’s a fraction of a second of confusion, until Gabriel looks up, past the screens in front of him, to the windows open to the practice range behind all the screens, the others quickly following suit.  Jesse is up on the second-story walkway directly across from where they’re sitting.  He looks slightly awkward - the puffy winter jacket is a little too large on him, and the black Overwatch beanie causes his hair to tuff out beneath it at odd angles.  His breath pops with small huffs of heat in the frigid air around him, but the new agent gives them a bright, mischievous grin from across the central area of the range, gesturing with a waving flick of the revolver in his right hand.

“Oh!” Mei says happily, clapping her hands, “We get front-row seats!”

But Ana scowls, muttering, “Aren’t there about five or six bots below us?  Isn’t he being a little ambitious?”

But Gabriel just smirks, folding his arms and settling back in his seat as Jesse refocuses on the central area of the practice range below them, drawling out in a raspy, hoarse voice as he spins the revolver in his hand, “Time?”

Jack quirks an eyebrow, but glances at the clock on the data-collecting screen, replying coolly, “It’s 11:59 a.m. -”

“Can I get a countdown?” Jesse asks - his gaze is still smugly loose, but his eyes have started darting around, flicking between each bot that zigs and zags across the ground floor.  Jack hums contemplatively, muttering, “How much time do you need?”

“Any,” Jesse responds, his hand stilling the revolver, “Just need some time ta ground me.”

“Alright,” Jack nods, glancing at the clock - 11:59:53 a.m.  As the second shifts to 4, Jack starts counting, “Five…”

Jesse relaxes his right arm, lowering the hand with the revolver.

“Four...”

Jesse shuts his eyes.

“Three…”

The others watch, mesmerized as the “cowboy” takes a deep breath.

“Two…”

His whole body tenses.

“One…”

Jesse opens his eyes.

Even from across the way, Gabriel can see that there’s something different about him this time - Jesse normally carries himself with a steady, syrupy, slow ease, a mask that shifts like sand and sandstone across his face, wrapping himself in a blanket of ease and easiness and easygoing calm.

But here

Now

There is a liquid, quicksilver spark across Jesse’s dark, gunsmoke gaze - his whole body seems to radiate the tension of a pressured coil, wound tight like the tick-tick-ticking of an alarm clock, or like the trigger of a gun just as the finger begins to pull back.  Everything about his presence is both still and yet somehow in motion, like time itself dilating down into fractions of fractions of fractions -

In a fraction of a second

Ana sits up more in her seat, her own dark, hawklike eyes zeroing in

Mei’s gaze goes a little wide in awe

Jack’s face slips into a slightly concentrating scowl

Gabriel grins

And Jesse lifts his left hand.

There’s a fraction of a second of nothingness and then Jesse shouts out:

“DRAW!”

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG

The gunshots ring out so lightning fast, so speed-of-light quick that their sounds ripple and ribbon together into a single stream of concussive blasts -

There’s a fraction of a second of nothingness

And then all six bots on the ground floor collapse, their heads sparking and zapping with small streaks of electricity.  

Jesse gives them a massive, highly smug, highly self-satisfied grin as he spins the still-smoking revolver, somehow clicking open the barrel and dumping the shells, before slotting in the magnetized clip with ease.  With a quick flick of his right wrist, the barrel snaps closed, and the sharpshooter laughs with a rambunctious hoarse yell:

“How’s that fer some Will Kane action??”

The group in the overwatching survey room sits in still, stunned silence for a fraction of a second until

Gabriel bursts into coarse, wheezing laughter.

Next to him, Ana frowns, covering her mouth, but Gabriel can see the intense, vicious smirk behind her gloved hand, the gleam of pride in her eyes.  Beyond her, Mei cheers and claps, laughing brightly as she shouts into the comms, “Jesse, that was a-mei-zing!”

To his left, Jack knocks a playful, happy fist against Gabriel’s shoulder.  Gabriel gives him a huge, smug grin, which Jack reflects back with a wry, crooked smile, confident and teasing all at once.  Through the comms, Jesse laughs loudly, “Could someone call the undertaker, cause I got their number!”

“How’s that for art, Ana?” Gabriel teases her with a wry smile.  The legendary sniper rolls her eyes at him, but chuckles all the same, “You and Lindholm set me up - how am I supposed to turn down training him now?”

“That’s your problem, not mine,” Gabriel says with a smug lilt back.  Ana shakes her head in humorous disbelief, but as her gaze refixes on Jesse - now scampering around the rest of the practice range, almost overjoyed to be firing off his revolver at the bots - she replies with deliberate, contemplative slowness:

“...He still practices with a rifle.”

The other three look at her in awed surprise - Gabriel with his eyes wide, Jack quirking an eyebrow as he leans in, looking past Gabriel, Mei with a knowing, mischievous grin.  Ana’s dark, focused gaze continues to linger on the sharpshooter’s form on the screens, murmuring with fierce determination, “And I expect him to practice with our current standard sniper rifle.  And if Torb says he needs to learn more combat engineering, then that’s also part of it.”

She folds her arms, tapping her right index finger across her left bicep, but she finally grins, saying confidently, “If he agrees to these things, then I’ll let him practice with the revolver.”  But then she glances at Gabriel, asking with mild confusion, “What division did he decide on?”

Gabriel scowls, before exhaling heavily, “...We haven’t talked about it.”

Her tapping finger stops, and Ana gives him a long, pointed stare before half-stating, half-muttering, “What.”

Gabriel twists his face into a critical glare, saying with a hesitant yet slightly defensive tone, “Listen, we just had this whole ‘lateral promotion’ thing four days ago - I need way more time to sort all this shit out -”

“Oh, don’t act like you and Jack haven’t been plotting this ‘Special Operations Division’ for months, if not years,” Ana snaps with exasperation, and in his peripherals, Gabriel sees Jack give a slow, rather distant nod of kinda-sorta assent.  The sniper turns back towards the screens, huffing, “As if you don’t already have like twenty subdivisions planned out.”

“It’s more like nine or ten -” Gabriel starts to say, but all three of them give him even more pointed stares - Ana somehow both smug and disappointed, Mei still mischievous as ever, and Jack’s usual dry deadpan expression.

Gabriel makes a face of mild disappointment with himself, before saying gruffly, “So uh, anyways, I still need to assess who I want to offer to pull in from the Strike-Team and the rest of Overwatch.  Jesse technically just barely qualifies with his GEDs and his nearly, uh, ‘year-long tenure,’ but I’d…”

He pauses, watching as the self-proclaimed cowboy rolls across a landing -

And completely spills bullets everywhere.

Mei bursts into a massive laughing fit, the sound of her voice happy and bubbly and thrilled, the climatologist practically slumping against the console of the massive desk they’re all sitting at.  Ana lolls her head, a look of “are you shitting me” gracing her elegant features with deep existential exhaustion.  Jack buries his head in his hands, sighing in a low, deep exhale of slow, suffering patience.  Gabriel is mostly unfazed, but he titters dryly, “...I’d really like to see how he’s looking in a month or two after some, uh, ‘guidance’ from our best shooter.”

Jesse rises, and though they can’t hear him, they can sense the mutters and unique curses he’s so fond of, before the sharpshooter whips around to the nearest camera, pressing a finger to the device in his ear as he protests, “Y’AINT SEE SHIT.”

“...I can’t help him with that,” Ana says with an empty tone, and Gabriel retorts with a low snort, “Nobody can help him with that.”  He leans in, pressing his comms button, saying with a loud, taunting tone, “Idris Elba ain’t gonna be impressed with that, kid.”

“It’s called practice, boss!” Jesse snaps back, before whipping out the revolver and gunning down another bot.  The young agent adds wryly, “Ain’t that why this is a practice range?”

“There’s ‘practice’ and then there’s ‘poor taste,’” Gabriel chuckles through the comms, which gets Jack to mutter slyly, “Not that you know the difference -”

“I’m not the one wearing that belt buckle -” Gabriel starts to retort, still holding the comms button, but Jesse half-sobs, half-yells, “Y’ALL LEAVE MY BELT BUCKLE OUTTA THIS.”

---------

Sharpshooter: Knife to a Gunfight

June 8, 2058: 1:37 p.m. - Torbjörn’s workshop in the Engineering Department in Watchpoint: Geneva

He’s leaning over one of the tables, inspecting each piece of the finalized version of the new Hellfire shotguns, glancing back at the blueprints scattered around him before he snaps some of the pieces together.

Sucks real bad that I ain’t gonna be able ta test them, Jesse thinks, clicking a few more pieces together.  Only person who could really test them would be Jack, whenever he manages to scrape time out of his busy Strike-Commander schedule to throw down a few hours in the practice range without Gabriel noticing and no one else (like a giant German Crusader supersoldier) spilling the beans.  They have just a week left before Father’s Day, and Jesse’s anxious to get the testing of the new plasma-slag shotguns out of the way so he and Torb can confirm the finalized construction, for both the physical products and the finalized digital models.

“How’re they lookin’?”

Jesse glances up as Torbjörn shuffles into the room, tapping at his datapad, several blueprint sheets rolled up under his mechanical arm.  The Chief Engineer plops the rolls on top of a set of drawers, then pads his way to Jesse’s table, as Jesse sighs, “They’re lookin’ alright - no misprints like last week.  Pieces are fittin’ tagether just right.”

“Still can’t believe I put in the wrong alloys inta the machine last week,” Torbjörn grumbles, stepping up on a stool beside Jesse to look over the scattered shotgun parts across the table’s surface.  The engineer picks up the main frame of the pistol grip Jesse has started to assemble, nodding appreciatively as he murmurs, “This’ll look real nice with the leather grips, pojke.”

“Thanks, Torb,” Jesse mutters, giving him a worn smile.  It’s been difficult cramming the gift-making processes into his spare free time - the rest of his days are spent running through Gabriel’s exhausting Special Forces and Reconnaissance training and Ana’s weapons handling practices.  Jesse always knew he had a real talent for workin’ with guns, but now he feels like he could break down, clean, reassemble, shoot, reload, and shoot again with every gun model in Overwatch’s inventory -

Half-asleep

With his eyes closed.

...Maybe even with one hand tied behind his back.

That part might be tricky though.

Torbjörn’s look is long and rather somber, before he mutters with a rough kindness to his words, “Are you sleeping alright, kid?”

“...Oh, my sleepin’ is right as a ripe peach,” Jesse chuckles, but he rubs at his right eye with the back of his hand, avoiding touching too much with his actual fingers that have been all over the molded gun parts.  Torbjörn looks skeptical, that patented look of Lindholm disbelief plastered on his face until Jesse admits, “Just...maybe not gettin’ enough o’ it, ya know?”

“Humph, you tell Reyes and Amari ta slow down on that trainin’ o’ theirs,” Torbjörn huffs, shaking his head gruffly, “They shouldn’t be in such a rush ta put a young agent like yerself on the field so fast.”

Jesse pouts a little, because in his genuine opinion, Gabriel and Ana have actually been slow and hesitant to field him as an agent, dodging his questions of when they’ll give him his first real field mission with statements like, “Well, Ana and I think your rifle handling could use a little more fine-tuning” and “Your flashbang and grenade aiming is still off.”

He can’t deny that they ain’t...entirely wrong, but Jesse can hear the slow deliberateness in their words.

“Are ya preventin’ them from fieldin’ me?” Jesse had half-asked, half-snapped at Jack last week on one of his lunch breaks.  The Overwatch Strike-Commander had looked at him in open surprise, before tilting his head and asking with even-keeled confusion, “Am I...doing what now?”

“Why’re the boss ‘n the captain holdin’ me back?” Jesse had continued, trying to maintain a strong demeanor, but feeling it steadily slip in the face of Jack’s truly bewildered presence.  When he’d finally figured it out, Jack had given him an apologetic, patient smile, chuckling, “Ah, I see - no, Jesse, I have nothing to do with how Gabe and Ana are handling your training.  I trust them to know when you’re field-ready.”

Jesse had scowled, feelin’ a little guilty that he’d...kinda assumed Jack had been involved in “extending” his training period, but Jack had just looked him over with a level, assessing gaze before saying calmly, “...From the reports I have read, I think you’re doing remarkably well.”

“...Ya don’ need ta pity me, sir,” Jesse had sighed, frustrated mainly with himself for takin’ time outta Jack’s day to bother him with his worries.  But Jack had just grinned, chuckling, “It’s not pity, Jesse - I admire you for sticking with it.  Don’t forget - I’ve been ‘training’ with Gabriel for nearly sixteen years now.”

Jesse’s eyes had grown wide at that, as Jack had laughed brightly, “I know better than anyone here what going through the ‘Reyes Commando Camp’ program is like!”

They had spent the rest of that lunch exchanging “Reyes Commando Camp” horror stories until Gabriel had popped his head into Jack’s office, scowling fiercely at their mischievous grins before asking what they wanted to for lunch.

Just from remembering some of Jack’s “And then Commander Reyes told me not to be such a weak noodle” stories, Jesse grins slyly at Torbjörn, saying wryly, “Guess they just wanna make me inta the best agent possible.”

Torbjörn snorts in derision and dry humor at that, retorting with a cracking rumbling, “Their smug senses o’ hubris have sure rubbed off on ya, pojke.  Here - lemme work on this and ya go work on that knife o’ yers.”

Jesse relents, letting Torbjörn take over the table.  He scuffs his way over to the design desk he’s been using, switching the thing on as the clattering and clanking of pieces being worked together begin behind him -

“Hey, Torb - is Jesse down here?”

Jesse’s eyes flash wide with utter terror as Gabriel steps into the main part of the workroom, glancing around.  Jesse whips his wild-eyed stare at Torbjörn, who just gives him a knowing smirk and a reassuring wink, before facing the Special Operations Division Commander with a casual statement of, “He’s right here, Reyes.”

“Cool, thanks, Torb,” Gabriel says, before giving Jesse a bright, cheerful grin, “Working on Jack’s gift even on your lunch break?”

“I uh,” Jesse mutters, briefly flicking a look to Torbjörn, but the engineer just bends back over the shotguns… but Jesse notices how he slips a few pieces - the distinctive barrel and the pistol grip - off the table and into a jacket pocket.  Gabriel turns his head to give a small, quizzical look at the engineer’s table, but returns his calm if concerned focus to Jesse, saying skeptically, “You shouldn’t push yourself too hard, kid.  I know the training has been stressful.”

“Oh, uh - it ain’t been...too bad,” Jesse stammers, as the model of the knife appears on the smartscreen in the corner of his peripherals.  Gabriel looks at it, at first just a casual flick of his gaze, but then his eyes go wide in utter surprise as he murmurs, “Oh holy shit -”

“Is that a good ‘holy shit’ or a bad one?” Jesse asks hesitantly as Gabriel approaches the drafting desk, his attention still fixated on the knife model.  He leans over, peering at it before his face breaks out into a wide, radiant, proud grin, “Absolutely a good one, muchacho - holy shit, this is incredible, Jesse.”

Jesse’s words die in his throat.

The rich, warm, expensive feeling around his heart grows softer yet firmer, like a silver-bell lullaby in words he only half-remembers and a rough but loving hand on his shoulder.

“Jack’s going to be floored,” Gabriel continues, tapping at the knife model, spinning it a little in the design program’s free space.  He pauses, muttering contemplatively, “...Turquoise...abalone...and copper?”

“...Bronze,” Jesse manages to crack out hoarsely, barely managing to lift his hand to the materials menu.  He flicks through it to the list, adding with a little more steadiness to his voice, “I wanted ta use gold but reckoned it was too expensive fer this.”

“Hmm, good call - the gold would be a little distracting, and the turquoise and abalone really stand out on their own,” Gabriel agrees, nodding appreciatively.  Jesse smiles faintly, admitting, “Lot of my earlier ideas were, uh - a li’l overdone, as Fareeha said.  She’s the one who gave me the idea o’ the abalone.”

“It’s times like these when I’m glad she’s got Michael’s sense of judgment, and not Ana or Rein’s,” Gabriel chuckles, “Ana would’ve gone for gold and sapphires, and Rein…”

“He’d’ve put a damn rocket on it,” Torb mutters with a loving sarcasm.  It gets Gabriel to glance back at him, snorting, “That or a lion head… What’re you working on?”

Jesse freezes but -

“Nunya,” Torbjörn retorts blandly.  Gabriel makes a sour, unimpressed scowl, the deadpan silence filling the workspace, until Torbjörn lifts his head, grinning mischievously at the commander, taunting him, “...Well?”

“...No,” Gabriel states dryly.  Torbjörn pouts slightly, rumbling with a small whine, “Aw, c’mon, Gabriel - humor me fer once in yer life, will ya?”

“I humor you a lot more than you give me credit for,” Gabriel sighs, before grinning back at Jesse, “Knife looks great, Jesse - you’re crafting it this week?”

“Yeah, uh, I got the blade all pressed out this weekend,” Jesse nods, spinning the knife model on his own, still smiling faintly, “It’s just settin’ the pieces in the handle’s frame and lettin’ it set in the lacquer.”

“Shouldn’t take too long, right?” Gabriel smirks at him confidently, and Jesse chuckles, “Nah, it ain’t gonna be too hard -”

“So you can take a break and let me treat you to lunch in Nyon,” Gabriel grins, his smile wide like the Cheshire Cat and Jesse -

Aw shit.

He’s been caught.

“...Are ya sure?” Jesse mutters quietly, spinning the knife model with more hesitation now.  He frowns, pouting a little as he chews over his words, “...Ain’t it supposed ta be work before play?”

“Pojke, ya’ve been workin’ hard,” Torbjörn suddenly says with a gruff, impatient kindness in his voice.  Commander and protégé both look at him, as the engineer glances up at them, flicking his head towards the door as he mutters, “Get on outta here and go get a damn gelato or somethin’.”

“...Plus I need an excuse to get out of the office and going out and getting lunch is as good as I’m gonna find,” Gabriel admits with a wry laugh, which gets Jesse to scowl but half-smirk at the same time, muttering, “Shoulda known you were just lookin’ fer an angle.”

“Ah, but it’s a good one,” Torbjörn agrees, before turning and hopping off his stool.  Gabriel frowns in confusion as he watches the engineer head towards the door, before he asks Torbjörn, “...Where the hell are you going?”

Torbjörn looks at him in mock confusion, before laughing, “Yer treating us ta lunch, right?”

“Oh, hell no, I’m not treating you, Lindholm,” Gabriel rumbles, striding his way over to Torbjörn, Jesse scuffing along after him.  Gabriel glowers down at Torbjörn with a sly smirk, asking, “And aren’t you working on something?”

Torbjörn looks Gabriel straight in the eye and says with dead seriousness:

“Isn’t nunya business what I’m workin’ on, Reyes.”

Gabriel looks destroyed.

His face shifts from the teasing smile to utterly floored shock as Jesse sputters and wheezes next to him, hacking a laugh and a lung against his fist.  Torbjörn gives Gabriel the widest, smuggest, shit-eating-est grin Jesse’s ever seen on him.

“Yer treatin’ me ta lunch fer that one!” Torb laughs loudly, turning to head to the door as Gabriel grumbles something in mixed English-Spanish under his breath.  Jesse giggles to himself and follows them out.

---------

Segador Flashback: ...And the Gunslinger followed

Monday, February 11, 2058: 8:45 a.m. - Gabriel’s new Special Operations Division office, Watchpoint: Geneva

“Ya wanted ta see me, boss?”

Gabriel looks up past his holo-projectors and takes a second to reorient himself.  Jesse is standing in the doorway of his “new” Special Operations Division Commander office.  It’s been a little over a month since he was “shifted” to running the new covert and black operations division, but he’s still working on getting the majority of the “department” squared away.  After intensive consultations with Jack and Torbjörn (which were really like… 80% Jack helping him figure out what types of subdivisions the Special Operations Section of Overwatch would require to function, what potential agents he could request to transfer, how quickly they could start field and recon operations, which targets across the globe were the highest priority, the works - and then 20% Torbjörn rambling about how ‘James Bond spy tech isn’t possible, Reyes.’) Gabriel finally has the main structural aspects of the division down, but he’s just barely started assessing agents and possible new recruits for the tasks of running them.

“Shit, is it 8:45 already?” Gabriel mutters, looking at the clock on the holo-projector as Jesse heads in, the door sliding shut behind him.  The sharpshooter slides himself into the seat on the other side of Gabriel’s desk, smirking at him with a wide, cheesy grin, “Losin’ yer touch, ya sod?”

Gabriel feels his face twist into a look of unimpressed dryness.

“...It’s S-O-D, Jesse,” he mutters with a deep sigh, but Jesse just chuckles, “Yeeeeeah, ain’t no one callin’ it that, boss.  This is why ya need a snappier name - like Sodwatch.”

“...That’s something, alright,” Gabriel retorts, his usual wit struggling this early in the morning on a Monday.  Jesse, however, is undaunted, offering up, “Underwatch?” unhelpfully.

Gabriel gives him a deadpan stare.

“Y’aint feelin’ that one, huh?” Jesse mutters, scowling to himself.  His whole face scrunches up as he thinks it over, throwing out, “It’s like, uh - a stealthy division, right?  Recon ‘n covert cover-up stuff?”

“...You make it sound so glamorous,” Gabriel says with empty affect.  Jesse grins wryly, saying cheerfully, “I been learnin’ them persuasive argument skills from Jack, but listen - Coverwatch.”

“...That one’s kinda clever,” Gabriel admits, nodding slightly, making an appreciative pout.  Jesse frowns though, saying mainly to himself, “It’s...missin’ somethin’.  Missin’ that...edge -”

“Oh shit, no, please don’t -” Gabriel starts to protest, but Jesse snaps his fingers, pointing at him, saying with a bright gleam to his dark eyes, “Edgewatch.”

“...No,” Gabriel states.  Jesse pouts, thinking hard again, saying slowly, “Night’s Watch?”

“...That’s...copyrighted?” Gabriel replies with some confusion.  Jesse just sighs with heavy-handed exasperation, “Ya killin’ me, jefe - work with me here -”

“I - there’s nothing to work with,” Gabriel half-gawks, half-snaps in disbelief, looking at the clock again and shit, has it already been three minutes since Jesse sat down.  Gabriel shakes his head slightly, trying to get his thoughts back on track as he says, “Look, chico, I actually had real shit to talk to you about -”

“Helpin’ ya think up a better name is the real shit, boss,” Jesse retorts, causing Gabriel to shut his eyelids and press a soothing, pressuring hand over the top half of his face.

It’s calm and cool and peaceful in the darkness -

“Ops-watch,” Jesse drawls unhelpfully and Gabriel exhales slowly.

“Stealthwatch,” the young agent continues, adding with a wry chuckle, “Jack calls it ‘Reywatch’ - he says it’s a joke on yer name and somethin’ called, uh, ‘Baywatch?’”

That goddamn jackass, Gabriel thinks lovingly, as the joke gets a dumb, hoarse laugh from him all the same.  He drops his hand, shaking his head appreciatively over the name, but a keener part of his mind sees his opening, asking with an ease that surprises even him, “How have you liked training with Jack?”

Jesse pout-frowns, muttering contemplatively, “Like, shootin’ trainin’ or the like ‘be the assistant ta the Strike-Commander’ trainin’?”

“Both,” Gabriel says, and Jesse mulls it over, his dark eyes growing slightly distant as he seems to chew on his words, turning them over and over until he says quietly, almost respectfully:

“It’s been...real eye-openin’.”

“How so?” Gabriel encourages him, saving some of his work tabs as he closes his remaining programs on the holo-screens.  Jesse scowls again, thinkin’ hard, but he has a more relaxed tone as he says, “When you were Strike-Commander, it was a lot more...organizin’?  Like tactics?  And missions?  And it ain’t that Jack ain’t doin’ that - but I guess a lot of those missions are coming ta ol’ Spywatch over here - but Jack’s...real focused on the politics?  And the science stuff?  And the medical stuff?”

“Not surprising,” Gabriel agrees, leaning back in his chair, satisfied to finally have Jesse focusing on the actual topic he wanted to address.  The Special Operations commander nods slowly, appreciatively as he murmurs fondly, “Jack’s got a stronger vision for Overwatch than I did.  I bet you saw a wider variety of Strike-Commander duties with him, huh?”

“...Well, I wasn’t gonna say it, but since ya did it, not me… Yeah,” Jesse admits, fiddling with his watch a little.  The cowboy frowns, but murmurs with some surprise touched with awe in his voice, “...He’s a real good speaker, ain’t he?  Real good with them pretty, ten dollar words but they ain’t too pretentious or nothing… He says ‘em all so natural-like.”

“Jack was always better at more…” Gabriel says, but pauses as he thinks over the words, before deciding on, “Passionate rhetoric, though I’d like to think my brand has a better aesthetic to it.”

Jesse gives him a long, disbelieving look until Gabriel scowls, muttering, “What.  It does.”

“Yer ‘brand’ is like half 60-year-old pop culture references that no one but Jack gets, and like half metaphors about death and taxes that get way outta control,” Jesse explains dryly, but Gabriel frowns deeply, rumbling, “Cute coming from the kid with a BAMF belt buckle and swear words like ‘butter my bacon burgers.’”

“Whatchu got against bacon burgers?” Jesse asks suspiciously, getting Gabriel to sigh heavily, “Nothing, kid - being the Strike-Commander is a pretty complex role, huh?”

“...Ain’t a job I’d want,” Jesse says slowly, before adding in a low, cool tone, “Can kinda see why ya didn’t want it neither.”

Gabriel stares at him for a moment, but replies genuinely, “Jack’s a better logistician than me.  And a better people-person.”  Jesse snorts a little at that, chuckling, “Ya don’ say.”

But the kid’s gaze grows a little distant again, scowling slightly as he murmurs, “...He’s suited for it, though.  I didn’t…”

Jesse pauses, as if swallowing his words with a gulp of hesitation, but Gabriel just nods, saying patiently, “Go on.”

“...I didn’t really know why ya...why ya wanted ta give it up until I helped him on stuff,” Jesse says with a soft uncertainty, but his voice increases with a steadier resolve as he continues, “We all...we all got told you were like, the best leader o’ the Crisis, ya know?  Didn’t make sense that ya couldn’t handle a few politicians.”

Gabriel raises a curious eyebrow as Jesse adds contemplatively, “But now that I’ve seen him work it...it makes sense.  Yer a strategist, a tactician, and he’s…”

“...A commander?” Gabriel offers with a wry chuckle.  Jesse looks modestly embarrassed, stammering out, “It’s not that ya ain’t!  Yer just...different -”

“The terms you’re looking for are ‘wartime and peacetime leaders,’” Gabriel explains to him with a low but casual confidence.  Jesse watches him as Gabriel taps a thoughtful finger against his lips, choosing his next words carefully as he murmurs:

“The hardest thing the Crisis disrupted was the flow of history.  Prior to World War II, using the terms ‘wartime’ and ‘peacetime’ had more...established boundaries, and the leaders they were applied to were the ones who fell into - well - those who operated during war or peace.  But World War II changed many things - industry, economies, histories, ideologies…”

Jesse watches him with a thoughtful gaze, and Gabriel frowns, saying slowly, “The nature of war and peace changed after the second global war.  The longest wartime president to date was the very same one who helped bring the American economy out of one of its worst recessions, and also helped craft government-mandated healthcare.”

Jesse outright blanches at that, his eyebrows scrunching as he thinks it over.  Gabriel chuckles, saying with some tenderness, “We might see the world as being ‘Before the Crisis’ and ‘After the Crisis,’ but as much as the Crisis disrupted history, it shall continue to change it too.  Jack can be both a commander and a humanitarian, a soldier and a medic, just as war and peace can unfortunately coexist.”

Jesse chews his lip slightly, before muttering, “‘N you can be both a tactician and a brand-manager, huh?”

Gabriel freezes

And then tilts his head back and breaks with laughter.

“Mierda, you little shit,” Gabriel wheezes, going to wipe a tear from the corner of his eye.  Jesse gives him a huge, mischievous, shit-eating grin as he adds, “Though I guess they’re basically the same thing, ain’t they?”

“The kid with the ugly BAMF belt buckle needs to step off, thanks,” Gabriel snorts, struggling to catch his breath.  He heaves a heavy exhale, trying to regain his control, muttering hoarsely, “What we’ve gained in the aftermath of the Crisis is the realization that there are just as many types of leaders as there are heroes.  Being unconventional is what won us the war…”

And then Gabriel gives him a victorious, knowing smirk, saying with a low, obsidian smokiness:

“And being unconventional is what will help Overwatch maintain peace.”

Jesse says nothing, but Gabriel sees a liquid, quicksilver look pass through his dark eyes.  The commander turns to his right-hand holo-projector, asking, “Do you know who was the first non-Strike-Team division leader to be brought on?”

Jesse thinks it over, before saying, “Uh...It wasn’t Sandoval in medical?”

“No,” Gabriel states with a wry grin, “It was Mei.”

The confusion is apparent in the way Jesse stops and stares, mutterin’ low, “What.”

“Shocking, right?” Gabriel says, opening up a file on Mei and moving it to the holo-set between them so that Jesse can see it.  The commander nods appreciatively, explaining, “Hiring her was Jack’s idea - he saw a paper on her climatology projects and immediately requested that we bring her on.”

“...Bringin’ a blizzard-chaser ta a U.N. peace-keepin’ organization is, uh,” Jesse says, picking over his words with some confusion, “...Real unconventional, I’ll say.”

“That they both are,” Gabriel admits, glancing up at Jesse as he grins with a gentle mischief, “The Environmental Division training wasn’t your strongest suit, huh?”

“...Look, aight, I grew up in a high desert,” Jesse protests, getting Gabriel to chuckle throatily.  The cowboy gestures emphatically, “Ya can take me ta these places, but I ain’t ever gonna particularly enjoy hikin’ through rainforests or testin’ out Mei’s crazyass storm machine on a mountainside.”

“...Sure as shit was funny, though,” Gabriel smirks at him, and Jesse gives him an unimpressed pout-glare-scowl thing.  Gabriel taps another file open, flicking it to the center holo-projector, laughing brightly, “Made for a great picture on the Overwatch website last month.”

The file opens up to a screenshot of the front page of Overwatch’s public webpage, with a central picture of Jesse in that bright orange-and-grey puffy Overwatch snow jacket, black-and-circle-logo beanie wedged tightly on his head, looking rather miserable as he scowl-concentrates on an electronic data-gatherer in one hand, and an endothermic blaster in the other.  The snow falls in thick flurries around him, faintly blue in the Siberian half-day of winter, and the caption reads:

“Overwatch Environmental Division agents collect data on potential permafrost restoration techniques in Northern Russia.”

Behind the screenshot, Jesse buries his head in his hands, mutterin’ with muffled words, “This is my claim ta fame.  Greatest sharpshooter in the biggest anarchy gang, now best known fer takin’ temps in that uglyass beanie.”

“Man, what is your issue today?” Gabriel half-states, half-snaps, self-consciously adjusting his own beanie as Jesse lifts his head, giving him a blank look.  The commander sighs, folding his arms across his chest, coughing slightly, “...Moving on - Mei said you still did a good job, though the math was a little above you.”

“...I dropped outta high school at fourteen - no shit the math was above my head,” Jesse grumbles, sitting back up, but slouching back into the seat.  He pouts, adding on, “And every time I said, ‘Well at least it ain’t rocket science,’ I’d then get Reinhardt explainin’ the different physics equations needed ta make the damn rocket hammer work and then Mei would jump in sayin’ that the fusion science behind the rocket hammer and the goddamn pulse rifles were unstable as fuck and that would set Torb off - it was a mess.”

“...Yeah, first rule of Overwatch,” Gabriel cautions him, “You listen to what Ana Amari says.  Second rule of Overwatch - never compare anything to rocket science.”

“Woulda been real peachy of ya ta tell me like, six months ago,” Jesse mutters.  Gabriel grins, asking knowingly, “I take it you aren’t volunteering to be tribute to Reinhardt’s new shield program, huh?”

“...I dunno what that means, and I don’ need an explanation,” Jesse says, adding the second part on hastily as Gabriel opens his mouth to talk about some hungry games and memes.  The sharpshooter shakes his head, snorting, “That shield o’ Rein’s is terrifyin’ - and he ‘n Torb think they’re actually gonna get people ta try them out?”

“Smaller, more manageable deployable shields for Overwatch agents has been something we’ve been discussing since our very first year,” Gabriel says, grinning, “Not everyone can be a seven-foot-tall, rocket-powered, German supersoldier, after all.”

“Right, but won’t they need the armor ta generate the energy ta power the shield?” Jesse says, fiddling with his watch again, “Ain’t like we got fusion generators small enough ta put in an arm guard.  Even the Heavy Pulse Rifle’s superconductor needs basically the gun’s entire casin’ ta house it.  Photon Barriers are cool ‘n all, but ain’t worth the cost o’ production when a reinforced riot shield will handle most guns alright.”

“...You say that as someone who hasn’t faced a Bastion Gatling gun,” Gabriel murmurs gently, but with a touch of strictness.  Jesse quiets up, and the Crisis-veteran continues in the same patient, but serious tone, “Conventional shields were the first thing to fail in the Crisis - everything from a personal riot shield to armored tanks and vehicles - that kinda entrenched, brutal ‘war of attrition’ hadn’t been seen by U.S. forces since Vietnam.  A regenerating shield - even one that requires temperature cooldowns - is perhaps the thing that kept the Strike-Team alive, arguably only second to the biotic field.”

“...It’s also kinda suicidal,” Jesse counters.  Gabriel quirks an eyebrow at him, but the young agent remains undaunted, inhaling-exhaling nervously, but saying all the same, “I...I have only the highest respect fer Reinhardt, but the Crusader armor is part o’ the deal with the Photon Barrier.  Ya either need the equivalent armor for standard agents, or ya need a quick form o’ cover when that barrier shatters.”

“...Neither one is impossible,” Gabriel replies calmly, coolly, but Jesse just frowns, muttering, “Nah, they ain’t, but it don’t ring right ta me.”

“...This is why I said Overwatch will require unconventional means to maintain both itself and the peace it helped create,” Gabriel says in a low, pointed murmur, but Jesse just kinda steamrolls over it, saying loudly, “Well, sure, but I mean - Torbjörn can only do so much, ya know?”

Gabriel thinks something in his mind snaps a little.

He stares at Jesse for a long moment, until the agent finally notices, asking, “What.”

“...I say the word ‘unconventional,’ and Torbjörn is the first person to come to mind?” Gabriel asks dryly.  Jesse just rolls his shoulders, saying, “He invented the Lindholm IFF-Tracking system - he’s about as unconventional as it comes in terms o’ combat engineering.”

“Yeah?” Gabriel asks with a slightly smug grin, “And who do you think proposed the idea?”

Jesse pauses mid-shoulder-roll, his eyes going wide as he finally pieces it together.

He shoots his gawking, awed stare at Gabriel, who outright smirks at him, teasing him with quiet brashness and sarcasm:

“Oh, you took the ‘being unconventional won the war’ thing as - what was it - a metaphor about death and taxes that got outta control, huh?”

“You?” Jesse states with disbelief, “You suggested the tracker?”

Gabriel taps open another file, moving the window between him and Jesse, spinning it so that Jesse can see it as he explains, “I scan all my old notebooks in.  Jack and Torb keep trying to get me to go paperless, but there’s something about handwriting notes that makes them flow faster.”

Jesse squints at the scanned lined-paper image, looking hard at the untidy, awkward scrawl, muttering tartly, “...You write like shit.”

“Jesus, what the hell did you eat for breakfast today?” Gabriel asks with a mixture of humor and offense.  Jesse grins with a dark, mischievous twinkle to his eye, saying, “I had a full bowl o’ sassafras this mornin’.  Alright now - uh, ‘a tactical pattern-recognition program fer turret auto-aimin’ on hostiles?’”

“IFF-auto-tracking had come a long way by the time of the Crisis, but it still wasn’t enough,” Gabriel explains, “And none of us were willing to trust any coding not written by Torb himself.  Because of this, his turrets originally had to be manually-operated.”

“...Jesus, that musta been a helluva time,” Jesse whistles, and Gabriel nods, saying, “We made do, but Torbjörn was often at risk, or required his own defensive shield.”

And then

Gabriel frowns

His eyes growing distant, thinking back on that hard first year of the Strike Team as he says just above a broken, hurt whisper:

“...The shield wasn’t enough twice - first for his arm, and then for his eye…  There was a third time, but we…”

The gunfire, the sounds of turrets exploding, Torbjörn’s hoarse, cracking screams over the comms, Reinhardt rocketing back to where they had left him to defend the alley -

Gabriel blinks, inhales, exhales, refocuses, sets his gaze back on Jesse in the present.  The kid looks concerned, but Gabriel mutters dryly, “...Well, there’s a reason we let Reinhardt keep the rocket on his back.”

The concerned look doesn’t fully leave Jesse’s gaze, but he settles back in his chair a little more as Gabriel sighs, “Simple patterns were easy, but still required some sort of confirmation-input.  But when I had that idea, it felt...so straight-forward.  A series of pattern-checks that would flow from one to the next.  Torbjörn had a far more concrete version of it, and it took...an absurd amount of testing to ensure it was safe, but it’s now the securest, safest auto-tracker in the world.  Every piece of tactical gear comes with some version of it -”

And then a tired but snarky grin breaks on Gabriel’s face as he says, “Though it doesn’t guarantee good aim.”

Jesse snorts, but then asks quietly, “...Is that what’s in Ana’s eye?”

“...There are a few programs in Ana’s eye,” Gabriel admits, “The Lindholm Tracker is one of them, but it’s considerably different than the ones in the regular tactical eye pieces because hers is wired to her brain.”

Jesse looks a little more solemn by the grim topic of conversation, but Gabriel eases up, relaxing into relief as he chuckles loosely, “Look, kid, this ain’t something you need to worry about - Ana’s eye is a remnant of her time in the Egyptian army, just like the rocket in Rein’s armor, or the...stuff in Jack and myself.”

But Jesse still doesn’t respond, so Gabriel takes his chance, saying with quiet yet fierce resolution:

“...War and peace have been one in the same for many of us for a long time now, Jesse - history shows they’ll always be more intertwined than we ever want them to be, but ‘keeping the peace’ means being unconventional about the times we are humanitarians, doctors, scientists, engineers, logisticians...and the times when we are soldiers, commanders, and tacticians.”

Jesse still just sits.

Stares.

Watches.

His face is unreadable, his gaze is deep, dark - Gabriel’s experienced enough in psychops to sense the contemplation in him, but the young man - a thinker wrapped in an agent wrapped in a gunslinger wrapped in a cowboy wrapped in a bandana - is skilled enough to keep his cards close to his chest.

So Gabriel relents first, sighing with a faint, almost bittersweet smile:

“Look, Jesse, all I wanted to do right now is talk to you about your options within Overwatch - Jack, Ana, and Rein are all eager and ready to include you on the Strike Team, but I know Torb is putting up one...loud argument about getting you into the Engineering Division -”

“You haven’t asked me about my last trainer.”

Gabriel freezes.

The thick drawling Southwestern accent - warm like a wood fire, smooth like honey, steady as a winding road - is gone

Replaced with a voice as hard-edged and cold-sweeping as a high desert under chilled winter sunlight.

Jesse continues to give him that steady, unreadable stare, but slowly - like cold molasses struggling to pour - a knowing smile spreads across his face as he laughs with a hard sound:

“You haven’t spent much time in Santa Fe, have you?  We don’t actually talk like that.”

Small chills rise on the back of Gabriel’s neck.

“...You’ve been putting on a fake accent for a year?” Gabriel asks, stunned, but Jesse just casually rolls his shoulders again, shrugging as his “normal” tones seems to flip back on like a switch, “Ain’t fake - it’s like switchin’ a language, es muy natural, hombre.”

“...But why?” Gabriel half-asks, half-reels.  Jesse shrugs again, explaining, “Got some o’ it from ma Pa, some o’ it’s a bit o’ Spanish influence -”

But then he gives a bright, roguish grin, saying smugly, “Lots o’ it’s just charm, though - you don’ get ta be the best arms dealer in the Southwest without lots o’ charm.”

Gabriel just

Watches

As Jesse shrugs again, his eyes alight with a strange burn as he almost giggles, “People trust you so much more when you’re sixteen with a cute Southwestern accent.  Makes it easy to forget the sixteen-year-old is overcharging you for your case of pulse rifles.  If you really don’t pay attention, he can even con you into buying an ugly old SEP heavy pulse rifle for twice the actual market price.”

“Has it all been a lie?”

The words are out of Gabriel’s mouth before he can stop them.
Jesse stops.

Stares.

Watches.

And then says quietly, “Ain’t none o’ it was a lie.”

The young gambler looks at the watch on his wrist as he murmurs with almost soul-crushing tenderness, “...Ain’t no part o’ me is a lie.”  And then Jesse lifts his head, smiling with a bittersweet happiness:

“Just that my brand has a charmin’ aesthetic ta it.”

Gabriel freezes

And then buries his head in his hands and sobs with laughter.

There’s the sound of soft, bubbly snorting and wheezing too, as Jesse joins in.  Gabriel lifts his head, wiping away a few more tears - when did those get there - as he heaves, “I could send you to a maximum-security prison right now, you little asshole -”

“Yer not the kind o’ man ta do that.”

Gabriel’s breath catches ragged in his chest, his heart feels bruised and beaten, but Jesse just gives him what is a genuine, authentic smile - perhaps the first he’s ever given him in the full year they’ve known each other - and says with broad, bold warmth, “You saw the potential in a broken, ruined arms dealer and a drug runner and a dumbass sharpshooter - you saw a whole potential life for him when he saw nothing but the drop into the gorge.  You saw a kid who just needed a helping hand when everyone else saw a criminal.”

And then Jesse’s smile twists a little, as he says in a teasing lilt, “Even if that part ain’t a lie.”

Gabriel plops his head on his fist, leaning his elbow on the desk, watching the young brand-manager with mild amusement as Jesse continues, “Sure, Jack’s a master at his craft, ‘n Mei’s a real genius at stuff that goes whoosh over my head.  Ana’s got that killer aim ‘n Rein’s got...um...a killer taste in music.  ‘N Torb is kinda legendary in armaments - I ain’t even gonna lie over that one, meetin’ him’s probably still the highlight o’ my life.”

Gabriel snorts with amusement, but Jesse says slow but sure - more sure than Gabriel’s ever heard him in the last year:

“But you?  Yer a puzzle I felt like I could never put all ‘em pieces together fer.  It was like every time I thought I got ya down, there was ‘nother piece I was missin’.  Sparrin’ was brutal ‘n hard ‘n kinda rough, ain’t no lie, ‘n then ya actually made me learn how ta cook which was like real outta left field, ‘n then ya asked me ta take the damn GED which was kinda when I gave up tryin’ ta figure ya out.”

Jesse shakes his head, muttering with increasing confusion and excitement, “Ya talk like a damn military history professor mixed with a goddamn surfer dude mixed with the worst sports commentator of all time, but ya ain’t pretentious or preachy ‘bout it, yer just...an aesthetic, like ya said, but it’s who ya are.  It’s insane, because everything about ya feels shady as all hell, but it’s all real and that’s about as inspiring as Gospel itself.”

“I’m glad someone besides Jack and those other four Goonies finally appreciates it,” Gabriel chuckles, before adding more hesitantly, “...Why did you tell me the truth?”

Jesse freezes.

Gabriel’s gaze does not waver, watching him closely, as the young man fidgets in his seat, twists the watch on his wrist, tugs at his bandana a little, before sighing heavily, the words stumbling out of him like a man blinded by the sun:

“...Because...even though you act like that, even though that’s all real, you’re...dedicated to your own morality above all else.  Just like the others, you really believe in hope, honor, courage, justice - everything that should be bullshit - but you...you have a more...personal take on all of them.  You see them differently.  You feel them differently.  And it’s not that the others are less genuine, or that it’s less of a reality to them but…”

Jesse looks at him

And in those dark, dust and concrete eyes

Gabriel sees a crack

Where light and water have seeped into the shadows

And have caused something to grow in the deep, rich soil underneath.

A seed that had been buried six feet under, alongside chips of turquoise and silver bells and an Irish accent.

And Jesse grins a crooked, patched up smile, laughing:

“Ya ain’t hidin’ no cards under yer beanie!”

Gabriel cracks - he snorts, heaving out the laugh as an exhale, inhaling the relief, muttering wryly, “Is that the charm?”

“Somethin’ like that,” Jesse says, leaning back in his chair.  He adds appreciatively, “When ya add the colors as lights, ya get white, but when ya mix ‘em as paint, ya get black… That’s the only part o’ Freshman science I remember,” he grins bashfully.

“...Close enough,” Gabriel says with a smirk.  Jesse smiles back, saying softly, “Guess I… guess I grew on the idea o’ being okay with a fresh start - being okay with mixin’ my colors - because you...you were perfectly fine mixin’ yer colors.  You still saw the depths o’ them, and so did the others.  Overwatch is whatever paint ya want it ta be and it still has integrity.”

And then Jesse nods firmly:

“Still has potential.”

Gabriel watches him for a moment, before saying quietly, “...I take it your assessment of my training is over?”

“...Yeah, I think that’s pretty much it,” Jesse begins to say, but Gabriel flashes a vicious, victorious grin at him, chuckling with a smoky rumble to his voice:

“Good, because I did actually have a card in my sleeve.”

Jesse freezes

As Gabriel taps open another file on his projectors, sliding it in front of Jesse.

Jesse’s eyes go wide

As Gabriel teases him:

“...Did you think I asked Jack to make your ‘new surname’ ‘McCree’ purely as a coincidence?”

The file is a birth certificate for a boy - born to a Joel and Camila - born just under 19 years ago

Named Jesse MacCrae.

Jesse flicks his wide, slightly-horrified, slightly-awed gaze to Gabriel’s smug face as Gabriel says, “It was real smart of Deadlock to give you a fake i.d. in the event the cops or FBI busted the gang - could help you keep your arms dealing to a pretend name while keeping your real name hidden.  But Jack and I have had fake civilian i.d.’s for like five years now, so I know how this game works, kid.  You think I’d walk my team into a god damn weapons-hoarding anarchy gang in a death gorge without at least attempting some sort of intel recon?”

“...You had agents on us,” Jesse breathes, “For how long?”

“...Mmm, first two got in maybe a year before the crackdown, the others trickled in after,” Gabriel says, tapping through a few more files, opening a picture of seventeen-year-old Jesse watching an incoming shipment of pulse rifles in the dim lighting of the Deadlock warehouse.  Gabriel chuckles, “They somehow missed your deadeye aim, but I knew everything else from your mother’s middle name to how much money you made on a single pulse rifle - was real interesting watching your prices slowly creep up over that year, by the way, very clever, real subtle - to the fact that you were barely eating near the end.”

Jesse flinches, looks away, looks guilty.

But Gabriel is not embarrassed or upset or disappointed.

He just says calmly, patiently, “But you’re eating now.  And no one actually died in the crackdown because you pulled your shots.  Your colors have more depth than you give them credit for, Jesse - I meant everything I said then, everything I said this past year, and everything I’m saying now.  You’re skilled in shooting, interpreting, analyzing, assessing, talking, ‘charming,’ as you called it - but you’re still a little rough around the edges.”

Jesse looks back at him - gaze slightly distrustful, but there’s no depth to it, not like there was a year ago.  This is superficial, smoke and mirrors, dust and concrete, but Gabriel can still see that small seed growing in the cracks.  He grins, saying honestly, “You should know that around me, nothing is coincidence - there are only the larger connections that we must work hard to find and perceive, and then determine the best course of action for handling.  That’s what unconventional overwatching and unconventional peacekeeping are.”

Gabriel smiles

Because with a little more light and water

The seed that sprouted in the broken concrete of Jesse’s mind could grow and flourish into something true.

Something timeless.

There’s a pause and then Jesse asks in a soft, slightly nervous, slightly hopeful whisper:

“You’ll let me stay?”

“You struggle with the math required to help deal with the permafrost, and you won’t actually use a sniper rifle, despite Ana’s pretty ridiculous efforts to convince you,” Gabriel says, leaning over and pulling open a desk drawer.  He reaches for the box inside, adding loudly, “You aren’t jumping at the bit to try out the new photon shields, and even though you’re passionate about it, you continue to turn down working in the Engineering Division.”

Gabriel sits back upright, setting the box on his desk.  Jesse frowns in confusion more than anything else, eyeing the slick, deep, rich wood, and Gabriel just smirks, saying, “So that leaves two options really - the Strike-Team, or the Special Operations Division.”

Jesse’s face grows more contemplative, before he murmurs, “Kinda feels unfair, bein’ put on the spot like this.”

“Neither Jack nor I will be upset with what you pick,” Gabriel replies, giving Jesse his brand-managed shrug as he smirks, “You should already know we talk about everything well in advance before we decide on something.  We figured this choice was best left up to you.”

Jesse pauses.

Stares.

Glances at his watch.

And then looks back up, smiling as he answers:

“Ya still got any tricks left ta teach me?”

Gabriel gives him a mischievous grin back, chuckling, “I’ve got a few.  Here,” he adds, sliding the box across the desk towards Jesse.  Jesse shifts forward, looks at it curiously, as Gabriel says, “I thought you might like a spare.”

Jesse cracks open the box and his eyes go wide again.  He looks up at Gabriel, gawking, then looks back down in awe, picking up the massive, brand new experimental revolver.  It’s a lot of hard angles and heavy add-ons, with an attached flashlight, a laser sight, a lethal spur at the base of the grip.

And it is covered in a deep, dark-oxidized layer of black steel.

“Torb and I made it,” Gabriel says as Jesse turns it over with a look of wonder and awe.  The commander folds his arms, sitting back in the chair as he teases his “new” assistant, “Never hurts to have a back up, and this one has a few attachments on it -”

“It’s so -” Jesse starts to say, stopping to catch his breath, his eyes lighting up with that quicksilver gleam again, and Gabriel smirks, waiting for the -

“It’s so fuckin’ awkward, I love it,” Jesse babbles, a massive, cackling grin breaking out on his face.  Gabriel feels something inside him snap as he mutters, “What.”

“Did you fuse this thing with a shotgun, this looks ridiculous,” Jesse howls, nearly bursting into tears as he flicks on the laser sights.  Gabriel stares at him with the deadest expression, and Jesse rubs at his watering eyes, chortling, “It’s so dark and menacing too!”

“...Well, yeah, we had to paint it black,” Gabriel retorts dryly, adding with a grin, “A black revolver for black ops, obviously.”

“This logic is seamless, holy shit, qué carajos,” Jesse snorts-chokes-wheezes, his hands already working to flick the barrel open and assess the pieces.  The Special Operations agent grins up at his commander, offering weakly, “Does that make us ‘Blackwatch’ or somethin’?”

“If you call it that, you’re going back to the Environmental Division,” Gabriel mutters, giving Jesse a skeptical squint.  Jesse just beams back at him, singing in a taunting tone, “I see Over-watch and I want it painted black -”

“I’m calling Zhou right now,” Gabriel says, tapping open the comms program on the computer, but Jesse just taunts, “No Strike Teams anymore, I want them to turn black -”

“Dammit, McCree,” Gabriel half-grumbles, half-laughs, but Jesse just persists with the worst (best) variation on the Rolling Stones’ classic with:

“I see the Torbs walk by, dressed in their blueass clothes - I hafta turn my head until my darkness goes!”

Gabriel buries his head in his hands, sobbing with laughter -

---------

McCree: a surname of Gaelic Scottish and later Irish origin, it derives from the Gaelic given name "MacRaith," meaning, "son of grace," "son of fortune," or "son of the king."  It has a number of alternate variations, including MacCrae, MacCraith, MacCrath, MacCraw, McCray, etc.  The family motto is "Fortitudine," meaning "with fortitude."

---------

Sharpshooter: The (Crafts)man With No Name

June 13, 2058: 1:30 p.m. - Torbjörn’s workshop in the Engineering Division, Watchpoint: Geneva

Jesse squints, his focused gaze keeping his hand smooth and steady as he places another tiny piece of abalone into the small metal casing of the knife handle.  As he clinks the fragment against a piece of turquoise, the shell catches a glint of the light, causing the watery nacre to shimmer and shiver like rays of the sun across the surface of the ocean.  He sighs heavily, settling back on the stool, cracking his neck where he can feel the ache from straining over the table starting to seize up, and he rubs a soothing hand over the spot.  He glances at the watch on his wrist, then takes a moment to set down the tiny tweezers and pliers, putting his arms in the air and stretching out his tense limbs.

“How do ya do this all day?” Jesse groans to Torb, feeling the blood surge a little as his sore limbs shake off cramps.  It’s been tough enough dealing with the Special Operations and Sniper training, but then to come sit down in the workshop and scrunch himself up into a tense, focused ball of concentration causes all his muscles to ache and stiffen up.  On the other side of the room, Torb glances up at him from where he’s hunched over another worktable, finalizing the last parts of Gabriel’s shotguns.  They had managed to get some test-fire time in the other day, with Jack doing unnervingly well using them...although the testing period had rapidly deteriorated from “they’re firing fine - little heavy on the kickback” and “the weight feels slightly off in this one” to Jack running around, playfully shouting in a lightly-serious voice, “The reckoning draws near,” and “That was a tactical error,” and “It’s in the refrigerator!” as Jesse and Torbjörn basically rolled around in their seats in the monitoring room, wiping tears from their eyes.

Torbjörn chuckles with a faint gleam to his eyes, saying with a low hum, “Well, kid, I take a lot o’ walks and I’m sure ta stretch a lot.  And then I usually spend an hour or two sparrin’ with Reinhardt or Gabriel.”

“What,” Jesse states, utterly shocked, his eyes growing wide, “How come I ain’t ever seen that?”

“They’re easily embarrassed and usually give up after I win a few rounds,” Torb snickers, running a hand through his beard as he grins smugly, “That’s the problem with people with too much pride, pojke - it is by far the easiest thing ta lose.”

“...Duly noted,” Jesse mutters dryly, but thinks softly to himself, Not that I’ve got much pride to begin with.  He looks back down at the knife, his gaze flicking to the shards of turquoise and fragments of shell sitting in neat little piles by his tweezers.

He knows the knife will look beautiful.

He knows it will be art.

He knows Gabriel and Fareeha and Torbjörn all think Jack will like it.

It isn’t what he knows that gives him some fear, as if winding the clock too fast, as if moving the time forward too quickly -

It’s what he senses ain’t quite fair.

Jesse looks back up, staring long at the black shotguns on Torb’s table, his gaze unfocusing, fiddling with the watch on his wrist as he says quietly, “...Feels unfair.”

Torb looks back up at him, adjusting the cyber eyepiece over his right eyesocket, his left eye scowling a little as he sizes up Jesse, asking, “What feels unfair?”

Jesse frowns, feeling his nervousness bite at him stingingly, but he manages to mutter, “Makin’...makin’ one brand new, high power shotguns and the other...a pocket knife.  Seems real unequal.”  Torbjörn stares at him for a moment, his gaze softening slightly before he says gently, “Ya wanna know what the greatest weapon I ever made was?”

“Ya mean it ain’t the Bastion Gatlin’ gun?”

The words slip from Jesse’s mouth instinctively, but he finds that -

Shockingly -

He’s not embarrassed or nervous or concerned about them, about how they’ll be received, about makin’ a fool of himself or anyone else.

The moment feels like the warmest, richest weight, settling around his heart like the most expensive gift he’s ever been given.

Torbjörn snorts, muttering tartly, “Pheh, don’ insult me, son.”  Jesse gives him a grin, mischievous grin, asking slyly, “It ain’t the Titan?”

“Alright now, what did I just say?” Torbjörn says, but there’s no bite behind the bark in his voice, all fierce, ruffled feathers but little more than a slightly irritated wet hen.  Jesse sighs playfully, asking him easily, “Alright, alright, what was it?”

Torbjörn pauses dramatically, before he gives Jesse a devilish flash of a smirk, saying smugly, “It was a paperclip shooter I made fer my brother when I was ten years old.”

Jesse thinks his mind splinters like shot glass.

“...What,” he says, his “accent” slipping slightly, and Torb just chuckles wryly, “And then I made one fer myself - best weapons I ever made.”  The engineer turns his attention back to the shotguns, grabbing his small welder with his mechanical hand, but Jesse can feel his focus is still on the young gunslinger, because Torbjörn then says, “...Ya can’t judge the value o’ a weapon on size or scope alone, kid.  Each weapon made has got more to it than that.”

Jesse watches him quietly, contemplatively, as Torbjörn lists off calmly, “Practical value, effectiveness, range, purpose.  Sure, these are important - but art?  Personal meaning?  Effort?  Time?  Thought and consideration?  These are more important.”

Jesse’s eyes drift back down to the piece of abalone shell and raw turquoise, like shards of the ocean and cuts of the sky on his table and he -

Time resumes its sense of normalcy.

He shifts forward again, as Torbjörn says in a firm but kind tone, gruff but understanding, “Creating a good weapon is the same as giving a good gift - it’s not about what the creator or giver wants, but what the wielder or receiver feels.”

Jesse picks up the tweezers again and -

With deadeye focus -

Places another tiny piece of abalone - water and light made into a gilded, oil-painted seashell - into the metal plating of the knife hilt.

---------

Segador|Soldado and Sharpshooter: Gifted

Father’s Day - Sunday, June 16, 2058: 2014 hours - Commanders’ lounge in Watchpoint: Geneva

“I’m gonna puke.”

As he struggles to get the words out, Jesse flops himself unceremoniously onto one of the couches, sprawling out as his stomach seems to swell.  He doesn’t know how exactly they managed it, but dinner this weekend had somehow been a bigger affair than Christmas or New Year’s or Lunar New Year, as they had stuffed the five OG Strike Team members (Gabriel, Jack, Ana, Reinhardt, Torbjörn), Mei, Fareeha, Torbjörn’s wife Helena, Helena’s niece Angela, the Lindholm’s three kids, and himself at the table for a massive Father’s Day dinner.  Earlier in the day, when prep in the all-too-small kitchen area had begun, Jesse had meandered in from sleepin’ in way too late (as Gabriel had sternly reminded him), he’d been surprised not to see Gabriel or Reinhardt or even Ana orderin’ people about -

But Jack himself.

“...What the actually deadass donkey are ya wearin’?” Jesse had gawked, thinkin’ he was prolly still asleep - one too many rounds o’ playin’ Fareeha at fightin’ ‘n racin’ games, apparently - because it sure as shit felt like some crazyass withdrawal fever dream.  Jack had looked up from checking the marinade on three or four massive slabs of baby back ribs, blinked at Jesse in open surprise, and then looking back down at his brightass blue apron (“raise the steaks” embroidered lovingly on it).  And then he’d looked back up at the sharpshooter and rumbled, “...An apron?”

“That I made for him, so watch your mouth,” Gabriel had snapped, peeking his head out from behind the refrigerator door.  Jesse had continued to gawk as the Blackwatch commander - dressed in his standard grey t-shirt and some gym shorts - had hauled out what looked to be about twenty ears of unshucked corn, piling them onto the counter by the trash bin.  Jesse flicked his gaze between the two commanders, before mumblin’, “And we, uh...we just ain’t gonna talk ‘bout that shirt, huh?”

“...What’s wrong with the shirt?” Jack had asked with deep, almost genuine hurt, but Jesse had just stared at the bright, bold red knock-off Hawaiian print with utter disdain, mutterin’ lowly, “...I ain’t know where ta begin, sir.”

“You can begin by cleaning this corn,” Gabriel had zinged right back, pointing at Jesse, and then the corn, and then the trash can, as if the pantomime would help Jesse understand what he meant by cleaning corn.  Jesse had given one last, skeptical look to Jack, and then shuffled into the room, as Fareeha and some tiny blonde-haired child - uh, Maja, he had remembered - bolted in behind him.  Fareeha had mockingly saluted the Strike-Commander, saying teasingly, “Strike-Grillmaster, Lieutenant Wilhelm wants you at the ‘que, sir!”

“Hahaha, thanks, Captain Amari,” Jack had joked back, before handing her a massive plate of mouthwatering steaks, asking slyly, “Think you can help me carry some of these plates out?”

“I will guard this payload with my life!” Fareeha had laughed, before she’d hauled the giant plate out.  Jack had handed off a smaller plate of hot dogs to Maja, who’d skipped off after Fareeha.  Then, lifting the tray with the ribs, Jack had headed for the door leading to the outdoor patio, calling out to Gabriel, “Can you get me more barbeque sauce, Gabe?”

“Didn’t you use it all?” Gabriel had snorted, pulling a sack of potatoes out of the group pantry, but Jack had hollered back, “No, there should still be some left!”

“...Where?” Gabriel had practically shouted, and as the door started to swing shut behind him, Jack had yelled back:

“It’s in the refrigerator!”

“...Of course it is,” Gabriel had chuckled to himself, setting the potatoes in the space Jack had cleared off.  As he’d gone to the fridge, and Jesse had begun prying the first set of leaves off the first ear of corn, the sharpshooter had asked his boss skeptically, “...Why in desperation did ya make him that apron?”

“To keep stains off that ridiculous shirt,” Gabriel had laughed openly.

Despite the horrific struggle of trying not to judge the Strike-Commander too hard, Jesse had to admit that Jack had proven to be a surprisingly effective cook, running the grill with the same easy scheduling and control that he’d poured into running Overwatch, letting Gabriel and Ana manage the side dishes (Jesse felt like he’d spent way too long making potato salad, but Gabriel had been just as relentless on getting him to dice spuds as he was training him for covert operations).  There had been something wonderfully breezy about the afternoon, making food and aimlessly chattering, catching up with Angie on her coursework at Oxford (‘bout 95% of it went right over Jesse’s head), chasing Torb’s kids around until he’d damn-near collapsed, listening to Jack sing happily to himself when Gabriel had brought out his guitar at one point, laughing as Ana and Reinhardt had swirled around happily to the songs.

As the sun had shifted to the west, they’d loaded up the patio table with all the food - steaks and ribs and hot dogs, corn on the cob and potato salad, at least three watermelons cut into grabbable slices, bowlful of rice and beans, a side of coleslaw and about a million glasses of ice tea and lemonade and beer.

‘Bout as stereotypically backyard barbeque as it could get

Only they were sittin’ on the side of a mountain overlookin’ Lake Geneva.

And through the sounds of pleasant conversation and cheerful laughter and Reinhardt’s hard guffaws and Gabriel’s sly jokes and Mei’s happy teasing -

Jesse coulda sworn he’d heard the sound of small, silver bells, the tinkling of turquoise pieces in the wind -

Coulda sworn he’d felt a large, reassurin’ hand on his shoulder at one point -

But when he’d glanced up

No one had been there.

There had only been the clear, blue sky, the edges of the east tinting the faintest rays of purple and grey.

Jesse had smiled to the breeze tousling his hair, touched a hand to the Celtic knot and turquoise pendant around his neck, beneath the orange bandana, and turned his attention back to the conversation around the table.

Clean up had looked like a real ordeal, but with so many people it had gone surprisingly quickly, with the group making some sort of weird dishwashin’ assembly line.  As the amount of dirty dishes had dwindled, and the amount of clean dishes had grown, the group had dispersed to the lounge area proper, with Jesse throwing himself on a couch as he’d finally felt the weight of all he’d eaten settle into his stomach.

“I warned you not to eat too much,” Mei giggles at him as she flops herself down beside him.  Jack lets himself sink into the couch on the other side of the coffee table, sighing with relief as he realizes his work is finally done.  There’s a familiar, warm chuckle by his right ear, and as Jack cracks an eye, tilting his head upwards, he feels Gabriel press a smirking kiss to the top of his head, murmuring, “You did good today, Strike-Grillmaster.”

“Hmm, whatever you say,” Jack teases him back with a low rumble as Gabriel rounds the armrest of the couch and slings himself in beside Jack.  Jack opens up his right arm, letting Gabriel slide in and lean comfortably against him, his weight at once welcoming and appreciated.  Across from them, they watch as Fareeha leans over the top of the couch over Jesse’s head, laughing brightly, “How many ribs did you eat?”

“...I stopped keepin’ track after...five,” Jesse groans, dragging his hands down his face, before he mutters, “Angie, yer gonna be a doc, right?  You got anything fer an upset stomach?”

“Nothing but sympathy, Jesse,” Angela Ziegler teases him back, but she too sighs with uncomfortableness, murmuring, “...Maybe zhat third steak was a bad idea…”

“...Wait, what steak?” Jesse demands in shock, as Fareeha cackles, “Oh my god, not you too!”

“Alright, keep the noise levels down, kids,” Ana chides them, sliding into an armchair.  Reinhardt heaves himself in next to her, sighing with contentment as he takes another long sip from his stein, laughing loudly, “Now zhis is good beer, Jack!”

“...Rein, what did I just say?” Ana mutters, shaking her head, but they can all see the smile on her face.  The Crusader waves nonchalantly, murmuring, “Eh, do as I zay, not as I do!”

“Jesse.”

Jesse flicks his gaze to Torb, who has seated himself next to his wife in the last couch.  The engineer nods to the slick, steel case beneath the giant tv screen, saying quietly, “...Don’t you have something ya need ta do, kid?”

“That’s right,” Gabriel hums wryly, as Jack chuckles, “I’ve heard there are a few surprises left for today?  Although I’m not sure anything can top seeing Mei eat ten ribs in a row.”

“Hey now, they were delicious!” Mei says to him, but there’s laughter in her voice.  Jesse groans as he flops and flips himself around, slinking deeper into the couch as he mutters, “But that involves gettin’ up, Torb!”

“All that craftsmanship, and yer just gonna let a few bratwurst knock you out,” Torb growls, as Helena laughs lightly, reminding him, “Not every sausage es a bratwurst, dear.”

“Finally, someone else understands!” Reinhardt cheers, waving his stein in her direction, and Helena waves her hand, saying, “Ze distinction between ze wursts es a dying art, sadly.”

“They’re just hot dogs, dang,” Jesse retorts, forcing himself up off the couch, shuffling his way to the case sitting beside a few other boxes.  Gabriel scowls as he watches him, the food and beer making his thoughts a little more sluggish as he realizes, ...That case is way too big to be for a single knife…

“...Wait,” Gabriel says just as slowly, sitting up a little more as Jesse grabs the case.  Jack smirks - he’s ready to finally see Gabriel’s face at the reveal.  Ana and Rein both sit up more as well, with Reinhardt saying loudly, “Oooooh, a gift!  What es it?”

“Hey now, I ain’t gonna spoil it this close ta the givin’,” Jesse drawls, ambling over to where Gabriel is sitting.  Gabriel’s face scrunches in a mixture of utter confusion and dismay, the shock starting to rouse his senses again as he flicks his gaze from Mei’s sly smirk to Fareeha’s grin to Torb’s victorious scowl, to -

He turns towards Jack, his eyes wide as he takes in that bright, bold, crooked smile on Jack’s face as Jack says cheerfully, “You’re so difficult to surprise, but man, the look on your face when we manage to pull something off -”

“Mierda!” Gabriel shouts, whipping his head back around to Jesse as his agent places the case in his lap.  Jesse gives him a sheepish, twisted smile as he laughs:

“Gracias, Comandante - por todo.”

Gabriel just gawks.

He opens his mouth to say something, shuts it, opens it, finds that his words are utterly ruined.  He stares down at the case, completely speechless, before he manages to grit out:

“...You actual little shit, Jesse.”

“Hey!” Ana snaps at him as Rein mutters sadly, “Zhat es very rude to say, Gabriel!”  But the protests around the room start to die down as Jesse begins to snicker loudly, a wide, shit-eating grin spreading on his face, borderline malicious in its mischievousness.  Jack scowl-smirks at the look, but Gabriel continues to laugh-seethe, “I cannot believe you had the gall to pull this off -”

“...What’s going on?” Angela asks with some confusion, but then -

There’s the sound of strangled laughter from the other couch -

And they all turn to Torbjörn, who is puffing up bright red under his giggles.

Gabriel looks overjoyously betrayed, as he shouts, “LINDHOLM, YOU TRAITOR!”

“...Wait,” Jack says, as he suddenly gets it but -

When he’s turned his gaze back to Jesse, the cowboy is holding out a small, wood box towards him, grinning with a wicked happiness as he says,

“Thank you, Commander - for everything.”

Jack freezes

Before he uncertainly reaches out and takes the box, twisting his own wide-eyed gaze at Gabriel, who smirks at him, teasing him dryly, “...Man, the look on your face, huh?”

“What’s happening?” Ana asks, and Jesse explains happily, “I asked Jack to help me make a present for Gabriel...and then I asked Gabriel to help me make a present for Jack.”

“Oh, zhat es genius!” Reinhardt exclaims, as Gabriel shakes his head in impressed disbelief, muttering, “Holy shit, I can’t believe you pulled that off, Jesse.”  Jack continues to stare at the box in his hands in shock, before he feels an elbow nudge him gently in the ribs.  He whips his eyes to Gabriel, who grins at him, saying, “Open on three?”

“...You’re the boss,” Jack cracks hoarsely, which gets Mei and Fareeha to giggle conspiratorially.  Gabriel flicks a nod to Jesse, who glances at his watch, counting down:

“...One...two...THREE!”

Gabriel unlocks the lid on the case, easing it open as Jack pulls the top off the box.

Both men freeze.

Jesse watches as Gabriel’s eyes trace over the shotguns, his dark gaze moving with a quicksilver light as he flicks over the cut barrels, the white-leather grips, the bulky yet slick sights.  He carefully lifts one from the case, getting a sharp, admiring gasp from Ana, who is at his side almost immediately.  Gabriel twists it in the light, admiring the way the black coating is somehow both deep and shimmery, looking like soft obsidian or velvet metal.  The Blackwatch commander breathes out reverentially, “...Oh holy shit -” and Jesse turns his attention to Jack.

Jack isn’t sure he can fully breathe.

The gift before him

Is beautiful.

The knife glints just faintly in the soft light of the setting sun, the dull glow catching on the small shards of tranquil turquoise and pearly seashell in the glittery bronze casing.  The chips of stone and fragments of abalone are just uncrafted enough to carry a natural, unadorned beauty, but somehow just shaped enough to give the sensation of freeflowing water melded into the handle, the bronze looking like ripples of light across the surface.

Jack presses a shaking hand to his mouth, his words dried up and evaporated in his mind.  Next to him, Gabriel glances at him, a weak, but overwhelmed smile on his face and a brilliant, radiant glimmer to his eyes.

They know.

They both know.

There is a soft, patient understanding between them.

Gabriel grins as he asks Jack with knowing, gently playful slyness, “You tested them?”

Jack nods, before asking with a voice fraying into breaking joy, “...Whose idea?”

“...Mine,” Gabriel says quietly, but there’s faint laughter as he says, “But the design was Jesse’s.”

“Aww, shoot, I mean, the abalone was Fareeha’s idea,” Jesse starts to say, but Jack quietly sets the box on the coffee table, rising from the couch without saying a word.  Jesse jolts a little as he steps towards him, mumbling, “Uh...Jack - shit, I knew this was a bad -”

Jack hugs him.

Jesse freezes.

There’s a soft clap and giggle from Mei, a snort from Fareeha, a “d’awww” from Angela, and a loud, sappy “I love good surprises!” from Reinhardt.  There’s faint swearing in Spanish, and then another set of arms wraps around them as Gabriel chokes out gruffly, “I can’t believe we’re doing this group hug cheesy shit.”

“Quick, get a camera,” Mei laughs, and Gabriel snaps, “Zhou Mei-ling, don’t you dare -!” but the words die in his throat -

As one thinner, slightly scrawnier arm wraps around him

And the other around Jack.

Gabriel feels Jack adjust slightly, also putting an arm around his shoulders as he murmurs with fierce, steady joy:

“Thank you, Jesse.”

Both men think they maybe - maybe - hear a small sniffle, and then Gabriel laughs as bright as the sun:

“Gracias, mijo.”

They stay like that

As the rich, expensive feeling of wealth settles over them

Like the greatest gift of all.

There’s the click of someone’s phone camera and Gabriel whispers loudly, “I will destroy that phone, Fareeha Amari.”

“It was Reinhardt, but nice try, Káa Gabriel,” Fareeha chortles as Reinhardt wheezes voluminously, “I am framing zhees one!”

The commanders pull away, Jack grinning widely as he ruffles a hand through his hair embarrassedly, and Gabriel twists to give Reinhardt a deep scowl, muttering, “...Send me a copy, Rein.”

“Understood!” Reinhardt hums happily as Ana asks with a slight thrill to her words, “Did you design these too, Jesse?”

“...Aw, I mean,” Jesse stammers, and all of them pretend not to notice as he quickly scrubs the bandana around his left wrist at his eyes.  He blinks once, twice, and then looks cheerfully casual as he grins at Ana, explainin’, “It was really just updatin’ the SEP shotguns, but Torb ‘n I had ta change all the alloy compositions.  These ones should last a lot longer, though they’ll still burn out kinda fast fer shotguns.”

“...I thought they looked too good for Torb’s design,” Gabriel teases him, which gets the engineer to huff, “Now what’s that supposed ta mean, Reyes?  I almost put flames on it fer ya!”

“...Wait, they could’ve had flames on them?” Gabriel asks with slight awe, causing Jack to elbow him playfully as he snorts, “I told Jesse to design them sleek for you, and this is how my thirteen years of love are repaid.”

“...But flames, Jack,” Gabriel protests weakly.  Jack shakes his head, pulling Gabriel in for another hug as he mutters, “Jesse, don’t you have one more gift to give someone?”

“Oh yeah!” Jesse says with a snap of his fingers as Gabriel chuckles loudly, “I was hoping someone would remember.”

“Another gift?” Mei asks curiously as Fareeha grins, “Man, Jesse, you overachiever!”

“Well, I didn’t participate in this one,” Torbjörn huffs with a grin, but then Helena laughs airly, saying:

“But I did, Liebe.”

“...What,” Torb starts to state, when Jack and Gabriel step aside to let Jesse move around the table, carrying another box.  This one is a smaller than the weapons case, but larger than the knife case, and Jesse carefully places it on Torb’s lap as Gabriel snorts, “Trust me, Lindholm - I wanted Jesse to repay you for that belt buckle with one that said ‘Salty Ass Motherfu -’”

“GABRIEL REYES,” Ana snaps at him loudly, her voice cutting over the last few syllables, but that doesn’t stop Mei, Fareeha, Angela, and Reinhardt from all giggling like schoolkids hearing a dirty word for the first time.  Jack laughs, finishing up Gabriel’s statement with a...less obscene remark, “Jesse practically begged us to help him on this one - believe me, I was with Gabriel on the belt buckle thing.”

Torbjörn just stares openly at the cardboard box before him, turning his gaze to Helena who smiles patiently at him, and then up to Jesse, who laughs:

“Tack för allt, Torb!”

Torb’s single blue eye wavers slightly, and with a loud cough-snort-wheeze that sounds like a desperate attempt to cover a sniffle, he pulls the lid off and -

Torbjörn freezes.

“...Yer always talkin’ ‘bout workin’ on yer chopper again,” Jesse says happily, as Torbjörn lifts the black leather vest from the box, turning it over and over.  The sharpshooter grins, “I figure this summer Jack ‘n I can help ya fix it up again!  And now, you’ll have a real Deadlock vest ta show it off!”

“I had to call Helena to get your measurements,” Gabriel snorts, as Jack sighs, “And...okay, no, you don’t want to know what I had to do to find an authentic Deadlock leather jacket.”

“...You did what,” Ana asks tersely and Jack mutters, “Rules were...technically bent, not broken -”

Torbjörn lifts a large, watery blue eye to Jesse’s face, as the cowboy smiles brightly, saying happily:

“Just remember, Torb - you were always my first hero!”

“...Wait, what,” Gabriel says, just barely catching the sound of Jesse’s words over Ana and Jack’s playful bickering.

Torbjörn smiles back, laughing gruffly:

“Know any good stops on Route 66, pojke?  I’ve always wanted ta go.”