moonshadows: (Reaper)
[personal profile] moonshadows

“What do you want, Sombra?”

Reaper didn’t look up from the pad he was working on, but nevertheless he knew the hacker was perched on the corner of his desk, and smirking.

“You asked me to keep an eye on your fossil…”

Jack Morrison had been holed up in an abandoned Overwatch safehouse in a nearby suburb. Reaper let the ‘your fossil’ comment slide. “And?”

“And he’s been doing some housework. Dusting, sweeping, things like that.”

“Good. I want to keep him there. Send-”

“But I decided to keep an ear on him, as well.”

As much as Reaper desperately wanted to know what Jack had been saying, he kept his voice bored. “And?”

“Did you know he sings when he goes to bed?”

Reaper was fairly certain he had never heard Jack sing in the thirty-some years they’d known each other. “He what?

“Sings. Or tries to,” she corrects herself. “His voice is crap.”

Now Reaper gave her the satisfaction of looking up. “And what, exactly, does he try to sing?”

Sombra shrugged. “Eh, some old Disney thing about remembering someone.”

“Remember me?”

The urgency in his voice made her eyes narrow. “Si, that one.”

“I’m about to head out,” Gabriel said from the doorway. “Should be back in a few days.”

Jack glanced up from his paperwork and nodded. “Alright. Good luck.”

Gabriel grinned and sang, “Remember me…”

“Gabe, no.”

“…though I have to say goodbye, remember me…”

“You do this every time-”

“…don’t let it make you cry!”

“You’re going to Greece, not Antarctica.”

“For even though I’m far away, I hold you in my heart-”

“Reyes, I swear to god-”

“I sing a secret song to you each night we are apart.”

Jack covered his face with both hands. “Gabe…just go. I’ll see you when you get back.”

Still grinning, Gabriel swept a melodramatic bow and sauntered down the hall, the words ‘remember me’ floating back to the Strike-Commander.

Jack missed him.

“Send him a package. Address it to Jürgen Müller.”

He had her attention now; she opened a screen in the air and typed on it. “Okay. What you want me to send him?”

“Flower bulbs. At least two dozen, I don’t care what kind, and a tool of some kind to plant them with.”

“And that’s going to keep him there?” she asked, skepticism thick in her voice.

“He’ll plant them. Then he’ll start looking at the rest of the yard.” Reaper pulled up the safehouse’s cameras and checked the outside views. “Once the bulbs have been delivered, send him a pair of good hedge clippers and a straw hat. And have an ID made up for Jürgen Müller. Send that to him third, with a recent picture of him, and make up some kind of official-looking form saying it’s his replacement card.”

“He gonna need money, papi.”

“Stop that,” he growled. “I’m not your father, your pimp, or your boss.”

She shrugged. “You giving the orders. I gotta respect my elders, right? Anyway, I was thinking if he lost his ID card, he probably lost his wallet and that means he lost his bank card. So. How much you want me give him?”

Reaper let her snark slide. “Good thinking. Send him a wallet, too. He’ll check the balance on the account first, and if it’s too much, he won’t touch it. He’ll suspect that it’s a honeypot, and he’ll already be suspicious because the ID has his picture on it. Put in seventy-six hundred. Then add another seven-sixty every two weeks.”

Sombra snorted. “That’s not subtle at all.”

“I’m not going for subtle. I want him to know that someone knows who he is.”

“And you think that’s not going to make him more suspicious?”

Behind the mask, Reaper grinned. “Let me worry about that. You just keep me up to date on his actions.”

With another shrug, Sombra hopped down from his desk. “Fine…papi.”

===

The bulbs arrived; Jack planted them. And, as Reaper suspected, he got a mild sunburn on the top of his head where his hair used to protect him. The hedge clippers and hat arrived; Jack tossed a long-sleeved button-up over his t-shirt and spent several afternoons wrestling the hedges back under control, to the appreciation of a few neighbors. When the cards arrived, Reaper watched with bated breath. Jack turned them over and over in his hands for a long minute, then examined every corner of the room until he’d located one of the cameras. Facing the camera directly, he slipped the cards into his new wallet and put the wallet in his pocket.

Reaper clicked ‘buy now’ on the copy of Jack’s favorite book – signed hardback, just like he’d been so proud of and probably missed terribly – and also the bottle of excellent whiskey. It was supposed to rain pretty heavily in a few days. Perfect weather for curling up with a book and a drink. Sombra was right in that Jack was now more suspicious, but very few people had known the title of his favorite book and fewer still would bother to track down and shell out for a signed copy. In two days, Jack would know who his benefactor was.

There were some cans of paint in the basement, and Jack spent two days washing and touching up all the doorframes in the safehouse. When the whiskey was delivered, Jack was confused. When the book was delivered, he sat in the easy chair and stared at it for a long moment. Finally, he opened the cover and saw the author’s signature. Reaper watched as Jack hugged the book to his chest, tears in his eyes.

The rain came early, pattering down as the sun set. Jack curled up in the easy chair with a glass of whiskey and his favorite book and read, looking utterly content.

===

“Okay, so it’s been two months and it doesn’t look like he’s going anywhere,” Sombra said from the other chair, her feet on Reaper’s desk. “He’s painted the kitchen and the bedroom, he has plenty of clothes, the yard looks great and he’s got a little vegetable garden in the back. He knows there’s cameras in the safehouse, and he still sings that dumb song at night.”

“It’s not dumb,” Reaper growled. “He’s sending a message.”

Sombra rolled her eyes. “What, that he wants to be remembered?”

“I used to sing that song to him every time I went out on a mission. Did it to be a pain in his ass.”

Purple eyes widened, and Sombra’s mouth split into a gleeful grin. “Awwww, he misses you, papi! You should go talk to him.”

“No.” The denial was immediate and automatic.

“But he misses you!”

“No.” Because, of course, missing someone wasn’t the same as forgiving them.

Sombra huffed. “Do something nice for him, then.”

“I did.”

“What, that musty boring old book?”

“He’s a fossil, remember? He loved that book.”

“Awww, papi, that’s adorable.” She smirked at him. “You should still go talk to him.”

Although that was exactly what Reaper wanted to do, the fear of rejection made him growl out, “No.”

===

“Ey, papi!”

Reaper growled. “I told you not to call me that.”

Sombra rolled her eyes. “So shoot me or deal with it. Anyway, thought you might want to watch the news. You know, since your boyfriend’s on.”

“He is not my-”

“And he’s talking about you.”

All the fury drained out of Reaper, leaving only intensity. “What’s he saying?”

Sombra gestured the nearest screen to life, watching in smug silence as Reaper turned to it. The press had ambushed Jack Morrison on the front porch of the suburban home he’d been holed up in under a false identity, and now he was telling them earnestly how he’d witnessed Gabriel Reyes shooting the traitors who had set the explosives, how he remembered Reyes throwing himself in front of him as one of them went off and that he woke up safe in a small ship.

“He said he was protecting me,” the former hero said quietly, “and I firmly believe that he did save my life.”

One of the reporters asked about the massacre at the UN, and Reaper went utterly still.

“I felt like Overwatch was being strangled by the council’s decrees and regulations,” Jack said sadly. “The UN's red tape had bound Overwatch so tightly that it was both useless and helpless. Do I condone the loss of life that day? Of course not. But I can’t deny that the council had grown corrupt, enriching the powerful rather than protecting the weak, and their replacements have done a much better job of serving the many rather than the few, so I see it as a mixed blessing. Like a forest fire, he cleared out the old and rotting and paved the way for new, healthy growth.”

“I want a recording of the entire thing,” Reaper growled. There was no doubt in his mind that Sombra was the one who’d leaked Jack’s identity and location to the press, now that the Petras Act had been repealed, or that she did it to get Jack’s feelings towards Gabriel Reyes out where Reaper could hear them. He didn’t care.

“You got it, papi. And it’s none of my business, but I think you should talk to him.”

“You’re right. It is none of your business.”

“Just saying, it sure sounds like he’s not angry at you. At the very least, he deserves a chance to tell you off to your face, if that’s what he’s gonna do.”

Enough, Sombra.”

The edge in his voice had the hacker shrugging in mock innocence. “I’m just saying.”

Reaper left the room as a river of smoke.

=

She was right, of course. Not that he would give her the satisfaction of admitting it. He watched the entire impromptu press conference over and over, analyzing every word, every gesture. It sounded promising, but Jack had always been good at making an audience hear what he wanted them to. He could tell you to go fuck yourself and you’d take it as a compliment. But Jack did deserve the chance to tell him off to his face with how long Reaper had been avoiding him. The safehouse was…closer than he wanted Jack knowing it was, and Jack generally needed at least half an hour and coffee before he could really get the obfuscation going. A morning visit, then.

The next morning, half an hour before Jack usually woke up, Reaper misted into the kitchen and started the coffee maker. Fear coursed through his veins as he waited. Whether Jack was angry or not, this would be a full confession, he’d decided. There was an excellent chance that he’d lose whatever esteem the man may still have held for him, but he had to do it.

Sleepy, shuffling footsteps made his heart pound like nothing had since the Omnic Crisis, and the sight of Jack squinting at the overhead light made Reaper’s mouth dry and his palms sweaty. When Reaper’s presence registered to Jack’s bleary mind, he froze and for a long minute they just stared at each other.

“I put the coffee on for you,” Reaper said awkwardly.

Jack nodded in silent thanks and poured himself a mug, staring into it a long time before sipping cautiously. Reaper’s nerves were still shrilling alarm when Jack took a second sip and quietly said, “You were wrong.”

Fuck. Was that a blanket statement of condemnation, or something else? Reaper swallowed and spared half a thought to be grateful that he hadn’t eaten anything, because right now he felt like it might not stay there.

“About what?” he asked in an equally quiet voice.

Jack raised his eyes to meet the mask. “I don't regret finding out who you are.”

What? No. Jack, no, he was- he didn’t deserve-

…but he wanted. He wanted so very badly to believe this was true.

The mask and armor faded out, leaving Gabriel in a hoodie and jeans and feeling more exposed than if he’d been peeled open for an autopsy. For another long minute they were frozen, staring at each other. Then, slowly, Jack put the coffee mug on the counter and stepped forward and Reaper – no, not Reaper, Gabriel – stepped forward to meet him and then they were hugging, slapping backs and pounding shoulders and it felt so good, like the last five or seven years had never happened. When they separated, Jack grabbed his coffee and waved them both to the couch in the living room.

“I will admit,” Jack said, “I was pretty upset initially when I found out. I had time to think things over, though, and Angela told me about the moles…”

Gabriel grimaced. “Moira did a damn good job of trying to kill me. If it hadn’t been for the nanites, she would have succeeded, but I was able to pull myself back together. I’d hoped if I killed the moles, I could prevent the explosion, but…” He sighed.

“You did what you could.”

“I saved you,” Gabriel said quietly, the words firm and emphatic. “That’s what matters most. But the shit she injected me with…my cells went necrotic. The nanites need living cells to build living cells. Eating people kept me partly alive, at least briefly. As long as any part of that poison remained in my system, it was a holding measure.” He took a deep breath. “In all the carnage of taking over Talon and wiping out the people who didn’t want to go in the new direction, I was able to take in enough live cells to finally flush it all out.”

Jack sipped his coffee. “Nanites, huh?”

“Yeah. My group in SEP, we got a bunch of nonessential organs turned into nanite hives. It didn’t go so well for the other guys, so your group got juiced instead. And then in the Omnic Crisis, I got infected with omnic nanites, which were worlds better. Especially after the Omnium basically gave me admin rights.”

“So...about all the times I got better after you bandaged my wounds or made me something to drink...”

Gabriel winced. “I was giving you a dose of my nanites, yes. Just enough to take care of whatever was going on without being able to establish a colony.”

“And you did that by jerking off.”

“Nonessential organs, remember? My balls are nanite hives.” He grinned. “Remember that time I destroyed the lock and you asked where I kept the acid?”

Jack nearly inhaled coffee at the mental image of Gabriel masturbating furiously onto a giant lock, and put the mug down until the storm of laughter had passed.

“...so anyway that's why I said I couldn't be in a relationship with anyone.” Gabriel held his breath, waiting for Jack’s reaction.

“So the time you were sick and almost died...?”

“That was when the SEP nanites and the omnic nanites duked it out, yeah.”

They fell silent, both of them remembering Jack’s frantic confession.

“....so,” Jack said slowly. “....how many nanites are in your saliva?”

Gabriel stared at him. “You want to kiss me.”

“Yup.”

“You're sure.”

“Yup.”

No. Impossible. “I killed people and ate them in front of you, Jack.”

Jack arched one eyebrow. “And you saved my life by masturbating. Your point?”

Gabriel sputtered, feeling like he was losing cohesion, spitting out parts of words while trying to keep up with the whirl of thoughts and emotions he was feeling. Then Jack’s lips were on his, kissing, and Gabriel grabbed the sides of Jack’s face and kissed back before crumpling against the other man and sobbing into the fabric of his pajamas.

Jack hugged Gabriel to his chest. “I’ve wanted to do that for so long. I love you, Gabe.”

“Don’t,” Gabriel whispered, stomach churning. “Don’t say that. I don’t deserve – I’m a monster, Jack. I died a monster. Let me stay dead.”

He could almost see Jack’s frown. “But you kissed back.”

“I love you,” Gabriel said in a strangled whisper. “But I can’t…I can’t go past second base.”

Jack hugged him tighter. “I’m fine with that, babe.”

“No. Don’t call me that. Too much like…I’m a monster. Let me stay dead.”

“You don’t want to be called by name,” Jack murmured. “Can I call you sweetheart? Or darling? Honeybun?”

Despite the tears, Gabriel laughed. “You’re a sap, Jack.”

“I know,” Jack said, kissing the top of Gabriel’s head. “But I’m a sap who loves you, sweetie.”

Warmth bloomed in Gabriel’s heart, painful and bright. “I don’t deserve it.” He whispered the words like a prayer.

Jack forced his head up and kissed him, soft and gentle, before pressing his lips to Gabriel’s cheeks and forehead. The warmth – love – flooded Gabriel and drove every other thought out of his mind. This – this affection, this acceptance, this physical contact – he wanted this. Nothing else mattered. He wrapped his arms around Jack’s torso and pressed his face into Jack’s chest, weeping until all that was left was the shudder in every breath.

“Feeling better, sweetie?”

Gabriel sniffled a bit. “Yeah. Sorry about-”

“Don’t,” Jack said firmly. “You’ve been there for me every time I needed you. I love you. I’d rather be able to hold you and let you cry than have you be alone.”

“I don’t deserve it.”

“Sweetie?” Jack urged him up and looked him in the eyes. “I don’t give a fuck what you think you deserve. I understand why you chose to abstain from relationships and respect your reasons, but damn it, I love you and I want as much as I can get. I want to go to bed with you in my arms and wake you up with kisses. I want to cuddle and watch movies together. I want to just talk to you about how your day went. I want random hugs and casual kisses, I want to feel like a giddy teenager because you dropped in for no reason, I want to smile at you and see you smile back. I want to hold you when you’ve had a bad day and trash-talk whoever made it bad. I miss you,” he finished plaintively, making Gabriel’s breath catch.

Jack was genuinely unhappy about the distance that had been between them. Gabriel never could stand to see Jack unhappy.

“I’m a fucking mess, Jack. That’s not a denial,” he added quickly. “It’s a warning. I’ve been on emotional lockdown for so long that I have no idea how good I’ll be at anything when I’m not keeping you at arm’s length. But I’ll try,” he said softly.

Jack pulled Gabriel back against his chest. “That’s all I ask, sweetie.”

Gabriel relaxed into the warmth of Jack’s embrace, feeling like he should run away but wanting to stay there forever.

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