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Jack was aware his apartment looked a little like a conspiracy theorist’s headquarters. News articles and pictures pinned to a corkboard on the wall, files stacked high on the desk, hard light screens nearly always open- he had work to do almost constantly.
Keeping tabs on Reaper and Talon while still working on uncovering the buried secrets of Overwatch wasn’t exactly simple work, after all. And someone had to do it.
Jack leant against the desk, checking over the most recent reports of Reaper’s activity- it seemed Talon had him on some sort of break-and-enter spree. Sometimes there was theft involved, sometimes just intimidation. But either way, he and his team had broken into a half-dozen facilities in as many weeks, and Jack still couldn’t figure out what they were really after.
“What revenge fantasy are they letting you play out this time, Gabriel? What does Talon serve to gain from this? What do you?”
Another minute or so of looking over the news clippings and open journals and Jack had to step back, sighing and rubbing his temples. There was nothing new to be gleaned from looking over articles he’d already read a thousand times.
Setting a kettle on the stove, Jack measured coffee grounds into a cone filter- he knew he wasn’t going to be sleeping tonight anyway, might as well down some coffee and at least try and be productive. Maybe Reaper would strike again, maybe the newly-reforming Overwatch would release some sort of statement. He’d be awake for it, just in case.
He settled in against the doorframe as he waited for the water to boil, posture slouching a bit. Jack could afford a little bit of comfort and relaxation in the safety of his own secret little hideout. Rented under a false name, all cash, with none of his neighbors knowing him.
As the kettle started to his, Jack felt a shiver down his spine, turning to look behind him into the living room. Though there was no one visible in the room, the soldier couldn’t shake the feeling that someone or something was watching him.
Walking into the kitchen, Jack made a show of pouring the hot water into the coffee filter and letting it steep, all the while grabbing his pistol from the counter and cocking back the safety. Whether it was just his paranoia talking or something bigger, he’d rather be prepared than caught off guard.
The wood of his floor creaked and Jack turned on a dime, gun drawn and finger on the trigger. There, standing in the doorway, stepping out of a flurry of smoke, was Reaper, mask secured over his face.
“That’s no way to welcome a guest. Where has your sense of hospitality gone, Soldier?”
“‘Guest’ implies you were invited. I don’t remember giving you a key to let yourself in. Or even my address, for that matter.”
Jack kept the gun leveled at Reaper’s mask, glaring at him through the glasses he wore in place of the visor when he wasn’t working. So much for relaxing or getting any work done- he’d have to be moving again immediately.
Well. Once he somehow convinced Reaper to leave.
“Hmm, no. I suppose you didn’t. But c’mon, Jackie. You didn’t really think I couldn’t find you, did you? Knowing who I am? And who I have working with me?”
Jack couldn’t see Reaper’s face, but he could hear the smile in that tone of voice- the same smile Gabriel had always given him when he couldn’t quite fit pieces together. The ‘you’re an idiot, Morrison’ smile. It made his teeth gnash in his mouth, having to imagine that expression under Reaper’s mask.
“Alright. Congratulations. You found my apartment in the middle of nowhere. Do you want a medal? A cup of coffee? A free escort to the front door?”
Reaper laughed, leaning up against the doorway just as Jack had been doing not so long ago, somehow managing to look menacing and nonchalant all in one simple motion.
God, how Jack hated him. God, how Jack hated loving him, somewhere deep in his chest.
“Coffee? Not if you’re still taking it black, Morrison. That shit’s always tasted nasty. Never knew how you drank it.”
“Then what the fuck do you want, Reaper? You wouldn’t go out of your way to break into my apartment just to fuck around. So spit it out, shoot me, or leave.”
“Patience never was one of your virtues, was it? You’d think age would have taught you that, at least,” Reaper sighed, clearly put-upon, and stepped further into the kitchen, not seeming the slightest bit wary of the gun still pointed towards him, “I’m here to talk about something.”
“Not interested. Get out,” the words slid out of his mouth like poison, teeth still gritted. Jack was backed up against the counter- there was nowhere further away from Gabriel for him to be, and that was all he wanted. Distance between himself and the other man. Before he did something stupid.
Reaper reached into his coat, other hand held up in a universal sign of non-violence. But Jack still braced for a shot, braced for impact, but nothing came. Instead, Reaper tossed a comm device across the table, “Don’t say no ‘til you know what I’m offering, Morrison.”
Gaze flickering between Reaper and the device, Jack let out a harsh sigh before reaching forward and picking it up. In order to unlock it, he had to set the gun down, but he kept it within his reach and out of Reaper’s, wary.
He scrolled through the communicator, brow furrowed. If all of this was real, it was Talon files. Finances, blueprints, mission plans. Jack looked back at Reaper with distrusting incredulity, setting the device down.
“I know I’m an idiot, but I’m not falling for that. You have no reason to give me Talon secrets- you work for them.”
“And why do you think I do that, Jack? Why do you think I started working with Talon to begin with? Rack your brain, I’m sure you’ll find something.”
“Would you fucking stop that? I get it. I’m an idiot. You’re infinitely smarter than me. I get it. I’ve known it for years. You can let it fucking rest, Reyes.”
“But it got you to call me by my name. That’s a victory, I’d say.”
Jack threw his hands up in frustration, groaning and leaning up against the table, looking into the blacked-out eyes of Reaper’s mask, “I asked already. What do you want, Reyes?”
“A chance to explain. And to make a proposition.”
Knowing full well that he would surely regret this later, Jack pulled a chair out from the kitchen table and sat down, gesturing to the chair opposite him with a glare, “Fine. Since you’re clearly not gonna leave. Talk.”
Reaper pulled the chair out and sat with a simple sort of elegance, but before he started speaking, he reached up to his face and detached the mask, hydraulic locks hissing as they released. He set the mask on the table, red eyes looking directly back at Jack.
A gasp escaped Jack before he could stop himself. He knew Gabriel’s face would be behind the mask, and he knew it would be scarred- Ana had told him that much from when she’d seen it that day outside Cairo, but seeing it for himself was something else entirely. He felt pain in his chest- guilt, concern, that ages-old love flaring up, and then anger when he remembered the scenario.
This wasn’t Gabriel Reyes, Commander of Blackwatch. This wasn’t his husband, and they weren’t sitting around the table after a long day of work. This was Reaper, here to offer him some deal that was more than likely a trick.
“I know. It’s not pretty. But I didn’t exactly get a say in how Doctor Scary rearranged my genes to bring me back from the dead.”
“Mm. Doesn’t matter. You didn’t come here to show me your new face. So get on with it.”
Gabriel- Reaper, Jack had to keep reminding himself. Gabriel was Reaper now- sighed and rolled his eyes, resting his head in the palm of his hand on the table, “You’re right. I already told you- I’m here to make you an offer. A business proposition. A… partnership, so to speak. Like… old days.”
Jack’s mouth opened into a sneer, a harsh, short laugh escaping him, “Like old times? That’s rich, coming from you. Or did you forget the whole ‘shooting me in the back and yelling about how I was a traitor and left you to die’ bit? Doesn’t seem like a good ‘old times’ to repeat, now does it?”
“Listen- Jackie, I’m serious. Listen. I. I didn’t mean any of that. Well. I did at the moment, but… I wasn’t in my right mind. I wasn’t myself. I’m… I’m not myself a lot,” Gabriel looked away at that admission, shame visible in his expression.
“.... What do you mean you weren’t yourself?”
Gabriel looked around as if expecting something to come out of the shadows in the corners of the room before leaning in closer across the table, voice dropped to a whisper. “Talon employs brainwashing and mental manipulation tactics. They make you believe things, make you remember things that didn’t even happen. Over and over and over until you don’t know who you are anymore, just who they want you to be.”
There was a chilling tone to Gabriel’s voice, sending a shiver down Jack’s spine, but he couldn’t take anything at face value these days. Suspicion covering his concern, he tilted his head in question, “And how are you not still brainwashed, then?”
“Sombra figured it out- she’s only tangentially involved with Talon’s operations. She hacked into their computer system and read my file, and Widowmaker’s. There was a strictly regimented schedule of ‘reconditioning’ appointments for the both of us. A little more digging told her exactly what those appointments were for. So the next time one came up, she hacked into the computer system that forces the images and sounds into my head and broke it.” Gabriel paused, taking a slow breath and running a hand back through his hair, “It took weeks. But little bits of my real memory started coming back. What actually happened that day, everything leading up to it, why I’d joined Talon after dying in the first place.”
“And why was that?” Jack couldn’t help himself- he had to interject, had to stop Gabriel from talking about being brainwashed. It was already hard enough to resist the impulse to get up and pull Gabriel into his arms, and he wasn’t sure he could take any more.
“To destroy them from the inside. Like I never could as part of Blackwatch. To get my proper vengeance for everything Talon took from me. From us.”
Jack held his breath for a moment, looking Gabriel dead in the eye, “How do I know you’re not lying to me right now, Reyes? How do I know this isn’t some elaborate trick?”
“I gave you all of the information I have, on one hard drive. I came here without my guns. I’ve had every opportunity to kill you and I haven’t taken it. I’m risking my own skin, Sombra’s, and Widowmaker’s for this. If that’s not enough for you to believe me, then I don’t know what is.”
Jack wanted to disbelieve him, to throw Reyes out or to storm out himself, but there was a desperation to Reaper’s posture, to the light in those crimson eyes. Between the two of them, Jack was by far the terrible liar, but he couldn’t see the slightest hint of a lie in Gabriel’s face- just a fear and a hope.
“.... Alright. Consider. Hypothetically. That I believed you. What do you need me for? You’re clearly resisting the conditioning, and you’ve got the world’s best hacker and sniper on your side. What could you need an old vigilante for?”
“... No one knows me as well as you do. No one… can bring me back from the edge as well as you can. That. That day in Cairo. That’s what started the cracks in my programming, what convinced Sombra to look deeper into it. I need that connection. I need to know there’s something out here for me- something real.”
“You know I’m an idiot, Gabriel. Give it to me simply- what do you want?”
“I want you to help me. I want you to help me get Sombra and Widowmaker out of Talon. I want you to help get me out of Talon… And when all of that’s done… I want a chance to apologize. To make proper amends.”
Jack shook his head, already waving that away, “Don’t apologize. If you’re telling the truth, you didn’t shoot me. Didn’t do anything to me. Talon did. And I can just add that to their list. As for everything else- even if you weren’t who you are, I would help you. It’s my sworn mission to take that organization down, and help those being held by it.”
A smile split Gabriel’s face, relief clear in his expression, “Thank you… thank you, Jackie. Please. Read over those files. You’ll need to know everything before we start. I’ll be in touch soon- I have to be heading out. If I’m gone too long, they’ll get suspicious.”
Gabriel was already reaching for his mask and standing, but Jack got up to follow him, stopping right next to him, “Wait. Gabe.”
“Oh. Right. You probably want something… more. In return? I can pay you. Or something?”
“No. I don’t want money. I don’t want anything in return… I just. Wanted. I wanted to say. I’m. I’m glad you’re back. I’m glad you found yourself. And we’re gonna get you out of there.”
Gabriel’s smile stretched into something warmer, gauntleted hand coming to rest on Jack’s shoulder, “Thank you, Jack. For agreeing to help. And for seeing me under all of the terrible things I’ve done.”
Quick as a wisp, Gabriel’s form faded into smoke, sliding out from under the cracks in the door, back the way he’d come.
Left alone in his sitting room, Jack leant up against the wall, part in shock, and part in sheer exhilaration at the whole situation. Hysterical laughter bubbled up from his chest, but it was caught in sobs soon enough.
“I love you, Gabriel. I love you. And I’m going to save you, if it’s the last thing I do.”