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Being in an organisation like Overwatch doesn't award you with a lot of free time. Sure, it awards you with a fancy healthcare scheme and what might as well be immunity from the law, but that doesn't mean a lot when you're stuck in the base on someone else's terms 24/7.
Obviously people travel for missions, but the teams are lucky if they get a couple of hours to explore between transport drop offs and pick ups, or before they're required to head back to their home for the night. A lot of travel, and very little of it being for pleasure.
Knowing how precious her free time was, Mei made sure to make the most out of the odd hour she got here and there during her research trips. The memories were precious ones, her journal becoming more of a memory book than a research tool. McCree on the other hand, well, Blackwatch missions required a great deal of secrecy and that often meant very quick in and out operations. No fancy hotel reservation for the night, no team lunch at a renowned restaurant to celebrate a successful mission. Even their transport was often plain and windowless, minus the cockpit of course - sometimes McCree was lucky to get even a small glance of the rolling dunes surrounding Anubis or the cherry blossoms in Japan.
The initial recall came and went very quickly and the missions began to slowly roll in again. It was the same old game for Overwatch veterans like Lena and Angela, however Jesse was suddenly being exposed to sights that he'd never seen before. The look of pure elation on his face was enough to throw the scientist sat next to him into a mess of figuring out why exactly he was so happy.
“I don't understand… surely you'll have seen these places on past missions? We’re in an area of Russia that I know you've visited on a mission before because I was the one to give you the mission brief.”
The joy radiating from McCree only grew in strength as he took in Mei’s adorable curiosity, a slight chuckle getting caught in his throat as he opened his mouth to explain.
“You see, darlin’, I've been to a lot of places, not I've not really been to a lot of places. Most Blackwatch missions back in the day required us to get to the target location, do whatever dirty work Overwatch was too good to do, then get out and call the transport in as soon as we could. We couldn't really risk being found on the scene, Blackwatch was largely unknown to the public for a long time, it's not like they'd see us and know they were safe like they would if our logos happened to be orange instead of red.”
A sigh escaped McCree’s lips as he once again turned to face the window, his eyes practically sparkling as a whole new landscape seemed to develop below the cloud line as the transport continued to descend.
“I'd say the closest I got to an actual vacation was the time that Reyes sent me to London in the middle of the omnic uprising over here. I guess I did get to make my way around London and see some sights, but the sights don't really have the same kind of impact on you when they're all smashed up and covered in lone robot parts.”
It was right there and then that Mei had an idea, an idea that she was determined to put into action as soon as they got back to the base.
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It took some determination, her best puppy dog eyes, a heartfelt explanation and a lot of peanut butter to get her plan into action. Unsurprisingly, Winston wasn't prepared to let someone into the Blackwatch mission archives with little to no explanation, former Overwatch agent or not. Luckily for Mei, Winston was a big softie at heart, a big softie who wanted nothing more than to see his friends happy, and that’s how Mei found herself in the old Overwatch archive room that was expertly hidden within Winston’s lab at the painful hour of three in the morning.
She’d left a note on her bedside table for Jesse explaining that she’d been called down to the lab to help Winston with an urgent matter, the perfect cover-up for her plan as the formerly mentioned scientist stood guard by the lab doors. Mei doubted that Jesse would come to check, once he was asleep he was out like a light and it was like trying to move a baby elephant if he had to go somewhere. That aside, they’d built up enough trust between each other over the years that there was no reason why he wouldn’t believe the note she’d left behind.
The archive room was dusty, that was the first thing that Mei had noticed. Winston had explained that he had spent a great deal of time digitally archiving everything several years prior, however it was annoyingly in the part of Athena’s database that was still recovering after Reaper infiltrated the watchpoint. The files were too delicate to mess around with, and so Mei found herself holding her scarf to her mouth to prevent inhaling a four year dead disease while narrowly avoiding knocking over the precariously stacked piles of boxes that seemed to litter the room.
Winston was a good scientist, but he wasn’t good at cleaning up, that was for certain.
Upon reaching the section of the room holding the Blackwatch archives, Mei couldn’t help but thank her lucky stars that McCree was a part of the main strike team. Blackwatch did a lot of missions, more so than Overwatch did, however a lot of them were two or three people teams that were in and out of a place within a couple of hours, almost as if they were never there at all. Due to McCree’s rank within the division he only ever went on the bigger missions that warranted full reports. The missions that were thankfully filed in one separate large box. Someone out there was looking after Mei today.
The list of places that her boyfriend had visited in his youth for a matter of hours amazed her. She’d known that the list would be long, but this? This was something else. Fifty one cities across thirty seven countries in that box alone. Mei knew that there had to have been more from the undocumented, somewhat shady missions that Commander Reyes took to sending Jesse on, but she wasn’t about to go through a box of Commander Reyes’ personal notes. Despite how little she’d had to do with the man during her time working for Overwatch, going through his notes felt like the ultimate invasion of privacy.
Mei let out a large yawn as she pushed herself up off the floor of the archive room, extensive list of cities in hand, before reaching into her pocket to pull out her phone. When had it reached six thirty in the morning? What she really needed right now was a mug bug of tea before she crawled back into bed next to the human heater she called her boyfriend, but time was of the essence and Mei had some flights to book.
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It was exactly two weeks later at eight in the morning that Mei’s plan started to take shape.
“Wake up sleepyhead…”
“Jus’ five more minutes, snowflake…”
“Hmmm, I guess you’re not that excited for my surprise as you said you were last night then, that’s a shame, I’ll have to go find Hana and see if she wants to come with me instead.”
The smug tone of Mei’s voice was enough to prompt Jesse to finally roll over in bed to face her. His hair looked like a bird had taken nest in it and he could barely keep his eyes open, but it was a start.
“I said up, not awake. Get moving Jesse, you have twenty minutes to meet me at the front entrance to the base!” Mei let out a small giggle as she left the room, leaving an awake but slightly dazed Jesse behind to catch up with her. She knew he’d make it to the front of the base on time, the man had a knack for being able to pull himself together in a matter of minutes when he needed to.
A quick stop off at Angela’s room on her way down to the entrance of the base to grab the suitcases she’d prepared the afternoon before when she said she was going to do the laundry, followed by a pit stop in the cafeteria to obtain a quick makeshift breakfast and Mei was ready to go. As the elevator doors opened at the front of the watchpoint, the door opened to reveal Jesse already waiting for her, completely oblivious to what was going on but willing to go along with it anyway.
“Suitcases, huh? Now I understand yer urgency.”
“Hmmm, you still have to wait fifteen minutes until we reach the airport for your real surprise.”
Mei brushed past him ushered him outside to where Lena was waiting in one of the cars for them.
“Hurry up, loves! The plane won’t wait for you!”
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Aside from Lena’s occasional roadrage (which could barely even classify as such, given that a cheery Brit with a cockney accent was one of the least threatening things in the world), the trip to the airport was uneventful. Mei had to stop Jesse from using his phone a few times, the man trying to outsmart her and go onto the airport website to find out which flights were departing that morning. Jesse seemed to forget that he was dating an actual genius who would have considered that possibility in advance.
“Well, we’re here. You finally gonna tell me where we’re going?”
“We’re going to a few places, actually, starting with Munich in Germany.”
Jesse looked puzzled for a moment before he caught sight of the piece of paper that Mei was waving in her hand. Giggling at his expression, Mei handed him the sheet, her giggling evolving into full-on laughter at how wide his eyes got upon scanning the names.
“These are all places that I visited on Blackwatch missions…”
“Yep! And this time you’re going to actually visit them rather than avoid the authorities for a couple of hours in them.”
“How did you manage this?”
“Well, Overwatch isn’t officially back together and Winston is a sucker for romance apparently, so I was able to pull a few strings and get us some time off, the organisation’s credit card in my pocket to cover hotel and food expenses included.”
“Mei, this is amazing, thank you so much, sugarplum.”
Before she knew what was happening, Mei was being swept into Jesse’s arms and off the floor, the spinning adding to the dramatics that her boyfriend was known for. Setting her gently back on the group, Jesse pressed a quick kiss to the centre of Mei’s forehead before grabbing her hand in one of his, his suitcase firmly grasped in the other.
“Some on, sweetpea! That plane won’t wait for us!”
Yeah, Mei thought to herself, this was the best idea that she’d had in a long time.