Chapter Text
McCree trudged through thick underbrush, cursing under his breath as thorns pricked against his bare arm. Looks like he’d be putting his first aid kit to good use already. He paused to squint deeply at his compass, then at his crumpled map. The only marked path was a single red line drawn from the drop off point to his lookout tower. He wiped away the sweat on his forehead, tucked his map away, and continued hiking up.
Less than two miles left to go.
(He thought of Venice with Reyes, who had slapped the back of McCree’s head playfully for complaining about the humidity. Said that McCree needed to learn to suck it up; he couldn’t just play around in the hot desert forever.
But here he stood in a national reserve in the fire season. Nice and dry, just like back home in Santa Fe.
Not like Gibraltar.)
The sun had already started setting, something that McCree was more than appreciative for even if the heat still lingered in the burnt orange sky. It was beautiful; McCree would give it that much. Towering pine trees carved out the winding dirt path up the grassy hill; crickets chirped their songs and long stalks of purple and yellow flowers swayed in the breeze. He suspected that within the hour, the moon would be more visible, too.
The full moon had just started waning.
The sky was a deep violet by the time all the foliage had cleared out to make room for the wooden lookout tower posted in the center of McCree’s map. He looked up from his map to see the tall, rickety structure with his own eyes. The paint was peeling along the stairs and spare wooden planks were scattered around the base. An outhouse stood only a few feet away.
Home sweet home. For the next three months, at least.
The four flights of stairs winding around the tower made McCree suddenly aware of the ache in his thigh muscles, but he just clenched his jaw, let out a resigned sigh, and trekked his way up.
He made haste to unlock his door and throw his heavy backpack in front of the door, rolling out his shoulders and relishing in the resulting pops. McCree took in the square shaped room: a sturdy oak wood chair and desk sat in front of the north facing window, a small cot was across the room from the desk, exactly three boxes of McCree’s possessions (clothes, Peacekeeper wrapped in bedsheets, a framed photo of him and Reyes) were tucked in front of the kitchenette, and in the center stood a table with a circular map mounted solidly in it.
McCree startled when the walkie talkie charging on his desk crackled to life.
“Hello,” a lightly accented, but clear, voice called out. “Jesse McCree, please call in if you have arrived.”
McCree briefly fumbled with the comm and searched for the correct button. He knew he found it when a satisfying hum of static rang out.
“Yes, ma’am, McCree reporting.”
“Ah! There you are! I have been calling in for you. I am Ana Amari, your boss for this fire season. I can be found in Shrike Tower. It is a good deal north of you, but it’s unlikely that you will ever need to come up here. I hope that finding your way to Deadeye Tower was not too painful.”
McCree stretched out his legs, leaning back as best he could in the uncomfortable wooden chair. “My apologies, Ms. Amari, I just now got here. Pleasure to meet ya. It was a long walk, but a mighty fine one, with the scenery and all.”
Amari chuckled and gave him a rundown of the area. Supply caches were scattered through his section of the reserve (the password, 1-2-3-4, was picked by her daughter when she was 9 years old), the object in the center of his room was an Osborne Firefinder, and the next closest human was an environmental scientist, not a lookout, named Mei who lived a few miles west. She wished him a good night and suggested that he hike around his lookout within the next week to improve his navigating skills once he had rested up.
He clicked the walkie talkie back into its charger. McCree pulled off his clothes, opting to sleep in boxer briefs rather than search for pajamas in his packed boxes, and slumped into the hard cot. He tossed the scratchy sheets to the foot of the bed knowing that they would only make him sweat even more. No reason to create more dirty laundry if he didn’t need to.
(It reminded McCree of the military cot he was issued when he first joined Blackwatch; the mattress was far too thin and firm to be comfortable, but his exhaustion-addled state made it feel like a bed fit for a king.
But McCree was 30 now, not 18, and he knew his back would beg to differ by the morning.)
McCree fell asleep faster than he had in years.
When he awoke again, it was to the soft chirping of crickets outside and pink light flooding over the white wood of his tower room. He grabbed his watch off his bedside table, knocking over an empty cup in the process. The bright red glow read 5:47. McCree closed his eyes again in an effort to get back to sleep, but his bladder insisted despite his meager three hours of sleep. He sat up, rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, and pulled on a shirt to make his way down to the outhouse. As soon as he opened the door, though, he stopped.
The sun was still out.
He slept for fifteen hours straight.
McCree groaned and turned back into the tower, not sure of what to do with the few remaining light hours. He winced when he sniffed the air. Better put that solar shower bag to use before doing anything else.
After a quick scrub down that made him feel more human, McCree pored through his map to find some nearby landmark to hike to, and he eventually decided on Aspen Lake only a quarter mile away. He managed to find the lake fairly easily by heading straight east from the tower since the trail leading to it was well travelled. McCree smiled wryly; it seemed that many of the lookouts before him had the same idea of taking a dip.
Pink flowers dotted the overgrown grass around the river, and the towering cliffs of rock and coniferous trees nearly imitated a sense of privacy. McCree strolled lazily around the barely tinted water to find a good place to drop in, but froze when he saw a figure tip its head above the water. Muscular arms raised above an equally toned back to run fingers through long, silky white hair. An intricate yellow tattoo swirled through the man’s left arm; his skin and tattoo seemed to glow in the golden light of the summer evening.
McCree knew he should reprimand him for swimming in the lake, despite his previous intentions to do the exact same thing, but the man carried himself with such dignity and confidence that McCree felt like he was in the wrong to interrupt him. Still, a job was a job. He walked towards the man and-
The man whipped his head around to face McCree with the prettiest glare he had ever seen (though McCree was distantly reminded of the appearance of an angry wet cat), but his eyes glowed the same golden color as his tattoo.
McCree didn’t think light could reflect like that.
His eyes pierced into McCree’s, rooting him to his spot on the damp grass. The other man dived deep into the water. McCree gaped, watching the shadow in the water move rapidly to the other side of the lake, only leaving ripples behind.
“You’re not in serious trouble!” McCree shouted after him after the man vaulted over a rock on the edge of the lake and onto the grass. “Hey! Just-”
The man sprinted off into the distance, completely nude. There wasn’t even a pile of clothes or a bag anywhere in sight. McCree wanted to appreciate his physique, but was so disoriented that he couldn’t even manage that. He just scratched his thick sideburns and headed back to his tower in a daze.
The uncomfortable bed offered no comfort that night, and neither did the loud cries of wolves from outside his lookout shelter. The entire night had been too bizarre. Who was that man? Why had his eyes looked like that? Were wolves even supposed to live here?
It wasn’t that late, so he opted to call Amari on his comm, ignoring the nagging voice in his head calling him childish for being so needy. Her voice crackled into voice immediately after.
“Oh, McCree? Is there an issue?”
(Reyes would’ve been a real hardass about it at first; would’ve asked what McCree was doing, acting so spooked just because of one handsome man.
Then he would’ve teased McCree for being so predictable in his type: intimidating and mysterious.
And then he would’ve told McCree to trust his gut. To hold onto his suspicion and watch his back.)
“Yeah, uh, I saw a fella takin’ a splash in Aspen Lake. I tried to tell him to get out, but he ran off real fast as soon as he saw me.” He chose to omit the details about his glowing eyes and seemingly inhuman escape speed.
Amari’s smile could be heard through her walkie talkie as she replied, “Oh, don’t worry. As long as he leaves and is afraid to come back, you’ve done your job well enough.”
McCree chuckled and hope Amari couldn’t hear the nervousness in it. She read the situation completely incorrectly; McCree was scared of him . “And, one more thing. Are wolves supposed to be around here?”
She laughed good naturedly, “No, dear, don’t worry about any wolves. Coyotes, maybe, but not wolves. Is that all, McCree?”
“Sure is. Thank you kindly, Ms. Amari. Sleep tight.”
“You too, dear. And please, call me Ana.”
McCree felt marginally better after the conversation, but he knew that the howling wasn’t a coyote; it was far too deep and mourning to be mistaken for the sharp, piercing howl of a coyote. He laid down uneasily and wished for sleep that didn’t come.
McCree managed to shove the memory aside by filling his days with writing and hiking and photography. And occasionally watching out for fires.
Normally watching for fires was uneventful, but today a gray column of smoke pierced through the yellow morning sky. McCree called Ana through his comm; the elder woman sighed and sounded more disappointed than angry about inconsiderate tourists setting campfires. She asked McCree to go check it out and make sure it wasn’t actually a forest fire.
He happily obliged; all this sitting around had him going stir crazy.
McCree was grateful that he found a better, more personalized and marked up map in one of the supply caches on an earlier hike, because it gave him an actual path to follow. It took him through a relatively simple downhill path to the west with only rocks to decorate the vast swathes of wild grass. The thick morning mist had McCree shivering and almost wishing he hadn’t complained so much about the heat, but he kept on moving to warm himself up.
He slowed to a stop when he heard faint rustling ahead of him. He moved carefully, quietly, to scope out what it was; its footsteps were pretty light, so he didn’t think it was an animal of prey, but he wanted to make sure first.
Then, a man came into view.
A very familiar man. Fully clothed, McCree noted, taking in the cream colored jinbei that fluttered ever so slightly in harmony with the leaves hanging above him. He approached McCree with a poised gait and head lifted high, providing him with a clear view of his face.
(And boy, McCree thought to himself, what a face he had.)
The man was undoubtedly the same one from a few nights ago: the silky white hair, in a high ponytail now, and sharp features of his face were hard to mistake. But his eyes were a soft, dark brown now, and though he wasn’t smiling at McCree, his face wasn’t twisted into a growl, either. An improvement, at least.
“Oh, hey, ain’t you that fella from the lake?” McCree asked in the most casual voice he could muster. Had he been imagining the glowing eyes?
The man raised a brow. “Yes, that would be me. I apologize for my… departure after our last meeting.”
He offered no explanation.
McCree just shrugged with one shoulder. “Don’t worry a thing about it. As long as you don’t do it again, it’s fine.” The man tilted his head down, his long hair nearly obscuring the amused crinkle of his eyes from McCree’s view, as if he was privy to some knowledge that McCree was not. McCree wouldn’t be surprised if he was.
“Right. I’m the fire lookout ‘round these parts. The name’s Jesse McCree.”
“Hanzo.”
No last name, either.
McCree sat down on a rock next to Hanzo, legs dangling off the edge of a ten foot drop, and pulled out a protein bar. “What brings you to these parts, Hanzo?”
“Would it not be a better question to ask why you are working out here?”
McCree knew a man avoiding the question when he saw it, and Hanzo wasn’t even trying to be subtle. He chuckled and swallowed a mouthful before responding, “Just saw an ad for it and decided why the hell not.”
“You have sudden urges to live in near total isolation for months at a time?”
“Hit the nail on the head, partner. Now lemme guess. You’re out here ‘cause…” McCree peered at Hanzo’s straight face. “You got three ex wives coming after you, and this is the best place you could think of to hide to.”
Hanzo barked out a sharp laugh, “Women are not quite to my liking.”
McCree raised his brows. There’s one thing they had in common. Then Hanzo spoke up again.
“I am a guardian spirit of this land.”
McCree looked at Hanzo with bewilderment, expecting a joke, but his face as serious as always. “Uh, what now?”
“I care for the earth and water of this land. I am not actually a human.”
McCree tried his damn best to look disappointed in Hanzo for trying to mess with him like that, but he had, quite frankly, seen stranger things in his life. Particularly every full moon. And maybe this meant he didn’t imagine Hanzo’s eyes glowing. But he still held onto his skepticism.
“Uh huh. Prove it, hotshot.”
“Very well. But first, pull your legs off that edge. I would not like to retrieve your corpse if you fall from shock.”
McCree snorted but obediently pulled up his legs and gestured grandly to the small patch of grass circled by the large stones they sat on. Hanzo stood in the center and shrugged off his clothes. McCree flustered briefly - Was this guy a hermit nudist? - but Hanzo held up a single hand as he tugged his top off.
“My clothes will rip,” He said ominously, and McCree waited.
A cloud of glowing dust thick enough to feel, like a nebula in all of its swirling colors, consumed Hanzo from his feet up and compressed his form. McCree was reminded of a phoenix rising from ash as the light faded away and left an animal’s silhouette in its place.
Where Hanzo had once stood, a wolf now towered up past McCree’s waist with thick white fur and yellow markings, the same as Hanzo’s tattoo, running down its back. His snout was jutted up smugly as if asking McCree to say he was lying again. His eyelids slid open languidly to reveal golden eyes and slit pupils that bored into McCree’s.
At least now McCree knew why he was butt naked last week.
Still, it raised more questions than it settled, so McCree asked the first one.
“You a werewolf?”
“Is it a full moon, ranger?” A voice asked sarcastically. But it wasn’t McCree’s voice, and the wolf didn’t make even the slightest move of his muzzle. He only shook his head in the negative.
“What? Did you just now say something?”
The wolf, Hanzo, tilted his head in confusion.
The voice spoke again. “ Odd. It normally takes longer for humans to start hearing things out here. His spirit seemed stronger than that.”
“Hey, I ain’t lost my marbles just yet,” McCree protested. Then he looked around hesitantly, because how was he hearing this voice? Hanzo stared at him blankly, and then blinked with a sudden epiphany.
“ You can hear me .”
McCree nodded, eyes fixated upon Hanzo’s unmoving snout.
“ I have never encountered such a situation. What a strange turn of events... Though not unappreciated. It is easier to communicate this way as opposed to barking mindlessly at you.”
McCree had an inkling to why this was possible, his lycanthropy didn’t exactly make him an ordinary man, but decided it wasn’t safe to say it to a complete stranger, guardian spirit or not. So he just pushed himself off the ground and brushed off his pants.
“Well, Mr. Hanzo, you’re welcome to join me in following that fire out there for my boss.” McCree tipped his hat to shield his eyes from the beaming sun. “Hell, you’d probably find it faster than I can with this here map, being a guardian and all.”
“Of course I can.”
McCree let Hanzo lead the way; the large wolf was obviously much better acquainted with the land. He marked up his map along the way, and Hanzo thankfully didn’t seem to mind the frequents break too much, using the downtime to lick at his paws and shake twigs out of his fur. McCree smiled absentmindedly at how doglike he was. He was snapped out of his daze by Hanzo suddenly sprinting forward.
“ A campfire.”
McCree jogged to where Hanzo stood, and true to his word, there was a circle of stones surrounding a dying ember of flames. No people, though. He chewed the inside of his cheek and pulled out his comm.
“Hey, Ana,” he said into the walkie talkie, “so it was just a campfire like you suspected, but whoever set it up got outta here before we could see who it was.”
“They didn’t just run off in fear again?” She said teasingly. Hanzo barked, literally, with laughter. McCree glared at Hanzo who now lounged lazily by the dead fire.
“Is that a coyote I hear, McCree? It sounds quite close by. Keep an eye out. Stomp out the fire and head home soon. Oh, and set up your rainwater harvesting tank. There may be a storm soon.”
He squinted up at the sky; it was bright as hell, pure white with all the clouds blocking out the fading sunlight, but he could tell that was going to change soon.
“Will do, ma’am. You take care now.”
Hanzo, it seemed, was content to laze on the grass with his head tucked between his paws. McCree nearly felt bad interrupting his silent reverie.
“You wanna grab your clothes outta my pack now?”
Hanzo stood up and walked silently and gently tugged at the pack with his teeth, so McCree took that as affirmation and set his clothes down on a on a log. Hanzo shifted into human form instantly and began dressing himself.
“Well, I’ll head out now, I’ll see you-”
“No,” Hanzo said as he fixed his clothes into place, “I will show you the scenic path back. It has been long since I have had any intelligent conversation.”
(McCree didn’t mention that Ana had just told him to hurry home and found himself trailing behind Hanzo once again on narrow trails. He told himself it was because of Hanzo’s authoritative tone, but he knew it was because he understood.
It had been a while for him, too.)
Hanzo didn’t lie, though; it sure was beautiful. Sand was kicked up into pink plumes of dust that floated lazily around the bottom of the trees surrounding their dirt path. Fireflies twinkled alongside the patches of evening light that made it through the clouds and trees.
When the rain started trickling down and thunder roared in the darkening sky, they made their way through a narrow valley with a small creek nestled between the mountains on either side. The rocks tilted inwards and offered some shelter from the rain that was rapidly building into a downpour. Hanzo rolled up his pants and held his zori sandals in one hand as he kicked through the shallowest part of the water.
Like a kid splashing in puddles, except this kid was a fully grown man with a dangerous amount of muscle on his body. McCree shook his head fondly.
“I prefer using my human form for these things,” Hanzo explained, gesturing to the water. “Skin dries faster than fur.”
“I hear ya, but is it really safe to be in the water like that?”
Hanzo hummed. “I am favored by lightning and thunder. I do not worry. You should be the concerned one.”
“Nah, I’ve been struck by lightning before when I was a kid. Don’t happen to the same man twice.”
“There was a lookout here, many years before you. He was struck by lightning seven times, twice in the very same summer here.”
McCree looked at Hanzo with alarm. Hanzo was staring at him intensely, but quirked a small smile upon seeing McCree’s expression.
“Oh, c’mon, Hanzo-”
“It is the truth. Though, if it provides any comfort, that was not what took his life.”
McCree waited only a moment before asking, “Well? What did? Don’t leave me in suspense for too long.”
“Ah,” Hanzo said with false innocence, his smile full of dark humor. “His wife murdered him in his sleep.”
“Well. Goddamn.”
“Indeed.”
They walked in comfortable silence. McCree grimaced when they left the valley and had to face the rain head on, but didn’t complain an ounce for the entire walk down to familiar territory. Then Hanzo turned to face him at the fork in the path they had encountered each other at earlier in the day. McCree was in awe at how handsome he managed to look with water dripping off his high cheekbones and the moonlight playing in his shadowy eyes. He looked as otherworldly as he said he was.
“I will depart here. I trust you can find your way back without my guidance?”
McCree laughed. “Sure, I ain’t that much of a damsel in distress.”
Hanzo nodded, and turned to his respective path. He didn’t stay on the path for very long, McCree noted as he watched him leave, and strayed off into the forested hills. Once Hanzo’s silhouette had faded into the woods, McCree made his way to Deadeye Tower, gazing up at the stars on the way. He set up the water tank that was installed next to the outhouse and headed up the stairs to his post. He frowned when he found bits of shattered glass on the steps and quickened his pace, a cold feeling quickly sinking in his gut.
The tower was completely trashed.
The window closest to the door was shattered; it looked like the vandal had broken the window to unlock the door from outside. His sheets were missing entirely, the photo of him and Reyes was tossed carelessly to the side of his desk, some food supplies had been taken out, and even his journal was flipped open to the most recent entry.
(It happened on one of those days where Jesse could feel every other day blending into each other like the melted wax at the bottom of one of his Ma’s prayer candles; every day was the exact same, meaningless shit. Go in, shoot, and get out. He wondered if anything was any different. If he still wasn’t a villain, just dressed in a different costume with a fancy Blackwatch logo and a pay raise.
“Keep a journal,” Reyes had said to him.
“What?” McCree snapped back. “I ain’t keeping some diary. Look, I still shoot just fine, and the - all them prescriptions and appointments are helping, most of the time.”
Reyes shrugged indifferently.
But the facade cracked, and he rubbed his face tiredly. He leaned back in his chair the way did when he was tired to his core.
He said, “Look, Jess, this isn’t about missions. I know you shoot fine, otherwise I would’ve left you in that busted up dropship in the Congo. This is about you. It’s not a miracle cure, but it’ll help. Don’t be a dumbass just because you’re stubborn. Take care of yourself.”
McCree was silent. His voice was more wet than he liked when he responded, “Still stupid as hell.”
But he bought one, a plain brown leather journal, and he gave it to Reyes when it was all filled out. Told him to never read a damn word. And then he bought another.)
McCree slammed the journal shut and tossed it back into the desk drawer where it belonged. He rummaged through brown packing boxes until he found his familiar red serape. It would have to do as a makeshift bed sheet.
He was dripping water all over the floor like a wet dog, but he didn’t even care. He radioed Ana who was graciously tolerant of his snappy attitude. Her assurances that the situation would be looked into didn’t soothe McCree’s irritation. He tossed and turned in his bed, eventually facing the open window where a gust of wind blew on his hot body. At least the tower roof tiling didn’t allow much rainwater to drip inside through the shattered window.
He drifted in and out of an uneasy sleep, wondering if Hanzo had any idea what could have caused all this.
So much for a summer away from trouble.