STTA 6: Road trip

[moonshadows]

He followed Ana through the streets of Cairo, wanting to feel happier about the fact that she really was alive, but his thoughts kept circling around to the moment she’d ripped Reaper’s mask off and recoiled.

He did this to me, Ana.

The worst part, he thought sourly, is that he didn’t even know what he was being blamed for. Maybe Reaper was just doing the ‘evil madman ranting’ thing. Heaven knew half of the things he’d said in that fight didn’t make sense. I know your every move before you even think it? If that were the case, they wouldn’t have had nearly so many arguments and it wouldn’t have been such a shock when-

He cut that thought off sharply, forcing away the memory of shocked hurt on his husband’s face that day.

The safehouse was more comfortable than its decrepit exterior suggested it would be. He stripped off jacket and visor with a sigh while Ana put the kettle on, gloves and gear following until he could relax into a chair and stretch. His injured side felt completely healed, but thinking about it, he hadn’t noticed much damage to his jacket when he’d taken it off. Why hadn’t Reaper gone for the kill?

“Tea?”

Ana’s voice jerked him back into the present. “Thank you,” he said, hands out to accept the teacup and saucer being offered to him.

Ana sat with a teacup of her own, but mid-sip she paused. “Jack,” she said in a strained voice, “what happened between you and Gabriel?”

The question ripped away all pretense that he wasn’t Jack Morrison, and that the man behind Reaper’s mask wasn’t his husband.

They left me to suffer. What had happened to Gabriel after he’d left Jack’s office? He’d heard shouting, gunfire, had run through smoky and chaotic corridors shooting and being shot at, but he hadn’t found Gabriel before explosions had forced him to seek cover and hide from both the smoke and the invaders – or traitors – trying to kill anyone who moved.

“Jack?”

He put his teacup down, noting idly that his hands were shaking. “Why do you ask?”

It was a dodge, and he knew it. Furthermore, Ana knew it because she was giving him the Look Of Disapproval that can only be managed by a disappointed mother.

“I ask,” she said sharply, “because even disregarding the things Gabriel said, you’re not wearing your wedding ring.”

He winced.

“What happened, Jack? Between you and Gabriel. In Zurich. The base was destroyed. Overwatch was disbanded. Your husband is working for Talon, and you’re wandering around as a vigilante with an empty ring finger.” She crossed her arms, lips pressed into a thin line. “And that’s not even addressing what happened to Gabriel’s face. Start talking, Jack. Tell me everything.”

He wanted to ask what she’d seen under Reaper’s mask, but that would have to wait. She wouldn’t be dissuaded until she’d gotten answers.

“More of the same,” he muttered, not meeting her eyes. Eye. Shame gnawed at him. McCree’s semi-accusation that he’d been Gabriel’s confidant because Gabriel hadn’t been able to confide in Jack came back to him, guilt stirring in his belly because when things had gotten rough between him and Gabriel and he couldn’t confide in his husband, he’d confided in Ana.

“Explain to me how the conflict between doing what should be done and doing what was allowed led to this.”

He’d rather take a knife to the chest, but he didn’t have that option right now unless he did it himself – and he had no doubts that Ana would disarm him before he could do anything.

“Gabriel…authorized some sketchy missions. Claimed afterwards that he hadn’t given the orders. But only to some of them; he owned up to the others with no rhyme or reason.” Jack kept his gaze in his teacup, not wanting to see whatever expression Ana was wearing. “Wanted to do some pretty invasive background checks. I couldn’t sign off on that – the UN would have had my head for it.”

The memory of an unfamiliar woman in Blackwatch gear came back to him. The way she’d looked at him with cold disdain, the glint of the knife, the churning in his gut as the life drained from her eyes.

“One of his agents tried to kill me. He claimed he didn’t know who she was. Pressed for approval to violate every agent’s privacy in ways that would have stained Overwatch’s reputation permanently.” He closed his eyes, seeing Gabriel’s, wounded chocolate and despair as the ring flew- “I…may have over-reacted in the heat of the moment. Said things I didn’t mean.”

But once out of his mouth, there had been no way to take them back…

“I threw my ring at him and told him to get out. That’s the last time I saw him as Gabriel Reyes.” And also the last time he’d seen his ring. It was probably buried under the rubble in Zurich, right next to his heart, sandwiched between his integrity and his sense of self-worth.

“Meaning you saw him as Reaper,” Ana said evenly.

I’m just going to beat you to hell and back.

But why?

Because I want to.

“We’ve crossed paths,” Jack muttered.

“And you’re sure it was him?”

That startled him into opening his eyes to frown at her in confusion. “Jesse McCree called him Dad.”

Ana frowned back at him. “Jesse is part of Talon as well?”

“Sure seems to be.”

“Something about this does not seem right,” she declared grimly. “We are working with an incomplete picture. What happened to Gabriel after he left your office? He has become…” She broke off, gaze averted. “What I saw beneath his mask…was no longer human. He turned to smoke. And he said…”

“He did this to me,” Jack quoted, his voice an angry growl. “But I didn’t. Yeah, I shot him, but it just grazed his arm.”

Ana scowled. “You shot him?”

“I said it only grazed his arm! He was fine!”

Her eyebrow arched in eloquent skepticism, and he swallowed the rest of his protest. The expression on Gabriel’s face taunted him again from memory, causing guilt to churn in his gut once more. Gabriel hadn’t been fine.

Jack had broken his heart.

---

After discussing things late into the night – and searching archived news footage of the aftermath - they decided to find Angela Ziegler and have a chat with her about Gabriel. No one should have been able to survive a clear headshot like that, but they couldn’t deny that somehow, Gabriel had. So they were driving from Egypt to Switzerland, alternating who was behind the wheel and who napped in the back seat.

He’d started thinking of Reaper as Gabriel again, with all the emotional baggage that carried, and he wasn’t sure he liked it. In fact, he was torn as to which was less pleasant: having spent years thinking that his husband was dead with his last words to him being get out, or knowing that his husband was alive but some sort of smoke monster who enjoyed causing him pain, and it was arguably his fault.

He didn’t kill you, whispered the treacherous part of his brain. He might still care.

Jack wished vehemently that he could drown that part with alcohol, as he’d done so often in the past, but it was his turn to drive and he doubted Ana would let him, anyway.

He couldn’t deny that, in hindsight, Gabriel had been right. There had been something fishy going on. The exposés and scandals that had come to light in the aftermath had been…he couldn’t, wouldn’t believe that his husband would ever approve of anything like that – except that some of them, he had. And if Jack couldn’t tell the two categories apart, then there was no way the rest of the world would believe the orders hadn’t come from Gabriel. But at the same time, Jack’s hands had been tied with red tape. He couldn’t investigate potentially imaginary security breaches without solid proof; they weren’t in a world-wide war for survival anymore, and Overwatch couldn’t just do as it pleased. They had to play by the rules, toe the line, or the governments of the world would strangle them in red tape and take away everything they’d granted.

Well, take away more than they already had. Jack sighed and signaled a lane change, passing a delivery truck of some sort. Gabriel had been right; the game had been rigged against them, but what could they do? And yes, maybe Jack hadn’t handled things the best way. Would he do it differently if he had a second chance? He didn’t know. And it didn’t matter, because barring a bizarre chronal engine accident, there was no way to go back in time to get that second chance.

Why was Gabriel working with Talon, anyway? The thought nagged at him as he sat in line behind a slow freight truck on a one-lane stretch. At first, he’d defaulted to assuming that Gabe had been working with the invaders/traitors the whole time, but Jesse’s assertions (and Reaper repeatedly not killing him) cast that into doubt.

They left me to become this thing.

Jack growled under his breath. No doubt Reaper was gunning for the governments that had been the source of all the tension between them. On the one hand, he couldn’t blame the man. The idea of raging against the machine, consequences be damned, was very tempting. But on the other hand, that was some short-sighted Star Wars rebellion bullshit because taking down the entire government without having a better one to put in place just meant that the regular people suffered until something worse sprang up to fill the void.

How long had Gabriel been working for Talon? That was an excellent question, as well. Although, if he were being honest with himself, what he really wanted to know was how long it had taken Gabriel to recover from his broken heart. Or if he had recovered at all. It hurt to think about what feelings Gabe might still have, but he couldn’t stop. He just kept prodding at it masochistically, like a loose tooth. It was dumb, it was his own fault, and he wasn’t sure what made him angrier at himself: that he’d done it in the first place, or that after years of coming to terms with the consequences of his actions, he still hoped that some day, the rift between them would be repaired and he could have his husband back…despite the physical violence, and in spite of the fact that the warmest sentiment Gabriel had expressed was a reluctance to kill him.

Was he an asshole for wanting a second chance? Would he be more of an asshole if he didn’t? Could he even ask for a second chance, and if he did, would Gabe listen?

“Stop there.”

Ana’s voice shattered the internal back-and-forth, nearly causing him to swerve off the road as he slowed and pulled into the parking lot of a roadside diner. He parked, turned off the car, and slumped in his seat to breathe deeply and slow his racing heart.

“I did not mean to startle you,” Ana said in gentle apology. “Heavy thoughts?”

“Just thinking about Gabriel,” he answered.

She squeezed his shoulder. “Heavy thoughts indeed. Let us have dinner first. Afterwards, if you are not yet ready to sleep, we can discuss him.”

Jack wondered if McCree had performed a similar duty for his father.

“Deal.”

---

“Was I wrong?” he asked from the back seat, stretched out with his jacket folded into a pillow between his head and the window.

“No,” Ana said firmly. “As I told you many times, there was no right or wrong. Only a series of lesser evils.”

“But he was right. There were intruders or traitors, and he clearly wasn’t in on it. What else was he right about?”

“Jack…” Ana glanced at the rear view mirror, but it wasn’t angled in such a way that she could see his face. “If you acted in accordance with your heart, according to the best information you had at the time, then put it out of your mind. You cannot change the past. Do you have any reason to believe that Gabriel served as a masked mercenary before what happened in Zurich?”

The change of subject made him frown. “Of course not. Why do you ask?”

“Because Reaper has participated in various conflicts across the globe for at least the last two decades,” she answered grimly. “And if it was not Gabriel…”

“Then who was it, and what happened to him? Did he retire? Was he killed? Why did Gabriel take up the mantle?”

“And who else knows that the man under the mask is no longer the original?”

Immediately, Jack’s heart leaped to the possibility that Gabe had joined Talon as an undercover mission, seeking an opportunity to burn the organization down from within. He told it sternly to knock that off; he would not entertain false hope one way or the other.

“I’m going to sleep,” he announced. “Wake me when we get there.”

He closed his eyes, but sleep evaded him. Thoughts of Gabriel – of begging the man’s forgiveness, of being either welcomed into his arms or spurned and berated – circled until resolutely, he chased them all away and focused on the sound of the engine. It was close enough to the many, many times he’d caught a few extra winks on the way to or from somewhere as Strike-Commander, and he drifted into a deep and dreamless slumber.

What felt like moments later, he jerked awake to discover that Ana was ordering breakfast from a McDonald’s drive-thru.

“Coffee,” he croaked. “Black. Three sugars. Two sausage McMuffins.”

By the time she’d paid and collected food, he was awake enough to realize he needed to pee. They parked off to the side and took turns going inside to use the restroom, and Jack offered to drive but Ana pointed out dryly that she was still more awake than he was. They sat and ate for a few minutes, and then Ana guided them back out into traffic.

“My information says Angela is in her private residence,” she said. “We will be there shortly. Have you…” She glanced at him. “That is…does she know that you survived?”

“I haven’t made contact with anyone,” he said shortly. “You. McCree. Reaper.”

“You and Gabriel are the only ones who know I am alive,” she offered quietly. “I am afraid this will not be an entirely comfortable visit for any of us.”

Angela’s private residence wasn’t far from the city, a shining high-tech chalet nestled in a patch of woods. They followed the path around to the back and parked, exchanged a grim glance, and climbed out of the car to approach the back door. Ana pressed the doorbell button, and a moment later the intercom lit up.

“Who is it?” Angela asked crisply, just shy of a demand.

“Just a couple of old ghosts,” Jack answered.

Moments later the door opened and they were being hugged, dragged inside, and hugged again before the younger woman pulled away to wipe her eyes on her sleeve.

“You are alive,” she breathed. “I am so happy you both survived. But what brings you to my home after all this time?”

Jack looked away.

“We were hoping you could tell us about where Jesse has gone, and what happened to Gabriel,” Ana said slowly.

The joy on Angela’s face died. “They were here, but I have not seen Jesse in years. He didn’t stay long, not after…”

Alarm stirred somewhere under Jack’s heart. “After what?”

“Perhaps I should just show you. He sustained several gunshot wounds in the fighting, and I injected him with a strain of nanites I had been experimenting with. You saw the footage of our escape?” she asked as she led them through the house. “By the time we arrived here, both the sniper’s shot as well as the other wounds he sustained had begun to repair themselves. I have a small medical facility here, of course, and I kept him there for monitoring as he healed. But within a few days…”

They passed what looked like the door to said facility, continuing down the hall to a second, nearly identical door.

“…after what happened…I decided to build a new one rather than repairing it.”

Angela pushed the door open and gestured them in. The room was dingy, damaged by smoke and fire, and the door to the bathroom had been utterly destroyed by someone battering it down with a blunt object.

“He managed to find chemicals to use as accelerants.” The doctor’s voice was barely louder than a whisper. “Jesse said he asked for a cigar just before…”

Her words trailed off as Jack stepped into the bathroom, but he wouldn’t have been able to hear them anyway. The metal bathtub was warped and almost melted in places, and a dull roar filled his ears as he looked at it.

He did this. He did this. This was what Gabriel blamed him for, why Ana had recoiled from his face. With his body hosting a nanite swarm that could keep a bullet to the head from killing him, Gabriel had decided that the only way out was to make sure he had no body… but it hadn’t worked. His fault, his fault, he’d told Gabriel that the man he’d married was dead, and Gabriel…Gabriel had…

Jack lunged for the soot-stained toilet. Coffee, black with three sugars and two sausage McMuffins joined an immeasurable quantity of guilt in being violently expelled. He was dimly aware of hands on his back, his shoulders, offering him tissues and a cup of water. He rinsed, spat, wiped his face, and sat back on his heels to breathe deeply and try not to cry while someone flushed the mess away.

“I am so sorry,” Angela was saying. “I know something had happened between the two of you, and I thought…at least you were together, but…”

“We’re together in hell,” Jack croaked, not looking at her. “He didn’t die.”

“Mein Gott,” Angela breathed. “To have survived that…but…”

Ana grimaced. “He lives, but his body…I would guess the nanites could not reconstruct him from ash, because he can dissolve and re-form at will, and his face…is not a face,” she finished delicately.

Angela leaned against one charred wall, pale and trembling, as Jack stood up. “I did this to him,” she said shakily.

“No. I did this to him,” he countered. “I’m the one who drove him to that.”

“But I am the reason he is now trapped in a mockery of life,” she snapped. “Perhaps you bear the responsibility of repairing the emotional damage, but it is on me to repair his body!”

“Can you?” Ana asked quietly. “Can Gabriel be returned to flesh?”

Angela’s lips thinned to a grim line. “I will find a way,” she promised. “I owe him that much.”