Chapter Text
The weeks following the Venice Incident shrouded all of Overwatch in quiet anxiety. That was how it became known, capital letters spoken with hushed dismay or loud frustration. The normally bright halls and cheerful voices and sounds of the busy Swiss headquarters took a turn for the darker and quieter. Tension coiled its way through the building and its inhabitants. The investigations and debriefings ranged from the highest points - Amari and Morrison, Lacroix and Reyes - down to the agents and even some of the supply techs and analysts. Who had known the depths of what Blackwatch was doing? Who knew what Reyes had been planning to do to Bartalotti, or who had suspected?
All of the agents on Reyes’ mission found themselves suspended, and it wasn’t long until one sacrifice was made. Dr. O’Deorain parted ways with Overwatch, terminated or offered an exquisite severance package depending on who was gossiping and how they felt about the geneticist. Few people were as happy to see her leave as Dr. Angela Ziegler.
“She was brilliant,” pointed out Shimada Genji one afternoon after the incident, sitting in a chair in her office. “She was an immense asset to your research team.” He jammed his hands into the pockets of the light sweatshirt he wore, needing something to occupy them. It covered much of the bulky cybernetic connections over his chest, and made him a little less eye-catching to most of the facility’s people. Angela nevertheless found him a pleasant distraction, despite the intimidating black and red color scheme, red eyes, and the tendency to be antisocial. He had interesting perspectives, new and different ones that she appreciated. Across her desk, Angela gave him an exasperated look and dipped her chin down, meeting his eyes with skepticism.
“She had the ethics of a viper,” the head of medical research replied sharply, “and the compassion of a scorpion.” As much as she liked spending time with him, he still had the ability to needle her, and often did. She didn’t know if it was intentional, or merely a side effect of the lifestyle he’d lived. Angela pulled up a holoprojection on her desk, iterations of DNA strands, using her fingers to gesture at it and zoom in on a segment. “Every time I read her reports I felt as if I needed to go into a decontamination shower or scrub myself down like I was entering surgery. All of it so slickly vicious, genetic manipulation that’s on par with...” She trailed off, snapping her mouth shut. “It’s horrific, is what it is. Reprehensible. Unethical doesn’t even begin to capture the scope of her machinations. You didn’t see the requests for research subjects she would file, Genji! It was as if nothing mattered to her, only getting what she wanted, only the next advancement, no matter the cost.”
He remained silent, arching an eyebrow, and pointedly looked down at his cybernetic limbs. He looked back at Angela, and the sudden anguished look on her face as she realized what she’d said - and who she’d said it to.
“Only getting what she wanted, no matter the cost, was so terrible?”
“You’re different,” she said firmly, regaining her composure. “Your brother tried to kill you. You wanted to walk again. And now you walk - you do so much more than walk. You’re such an amazing person, Genji. You can’t compare yourself to her.”
“I am less than she was. I am merely a weapon for Blackwatch. For Overwatch,” he countered, rising up off the chair. “And now I am suspended while they run their inquiry on Reyes and all of us who were part of that mess in Venice. I am a weapon that will go rusty with disuse while they,” and his organic hand gestured around them, as if to the offices down the hall where the commanders and captains worked, “decide what to do with me.”
“You aren’t Moira,” Angela responded, her eyes scanning the display, and then beyond it, distracted by her thoughts. “You aren’t looking for orphans, for homeless people, to experiment on. The offers she made me to look the other way, let alone to sanction her research…!” She trailed off, swiping at the three-dimensional display in front of her, and then gestured as if crumpling it up and throwing it away. The display vanished, leaving only the two of them.
“She was - is - a brilliant scientist,” Genji pointed out. “Her biotic orbs helped save my life, McCree’s life, Reyes’ life. More than once.”
“It doesn’t mean I have to like her, or what she’s done, or what she did to develop it. The ends do not justify the means!” She reached up and brushed loose hairs out of her face, adjusted her glasses slightly. “I just… I cannot condone what she does, how she does it. It goes against everything I was ever taught about medical ethics.”
He remained silent, and merely raised a brow.
“If you like her so much, Genji, why don’t you go join her wherever she’s gone now?” Angela dropped onto her own chair, sounding like a petulant preteen. Her chair rolled back towards the window, giving her a view of the courtyard below and the bright blue sky above, and she turned to look at the view. “Overwatch is better than Moira O’Deorain. You belong here, with us. Dismantling the Shimada - that will make the world a better place. Here, with us, where you can help people who can’t help themselves. Heal the pain from the Omnic Crisis, make this a world worth living. It’s a world worth fighting for. You can do it here, Genji, with Jack and Reinhardt and Torbjörn and Dr. Liao and me.”
She turned from the window to meet his eyes, but he was already gone.
When a week passed without seeing him, Angela cornered Reyes to find out where he’d gone. Due for systems checks, she said blithely, but the American didn’t seem inclined to believe it. He raised a skeptical eyebrow.
“If he checks in with me, I’ll tell him to get in touch with you.”
“Thank you, Gabe,” she replied. “He doesn’t take care of himself half as well as he ought to.”
Reyes raised an eyebrow. “As well as he ought to, or as well as you think he should? You’ve got some pretty high standards, Doc, and they’re hard to meet for most of us.”
“It’s not that unreasonable.” Angela crossed her arms. “Jesse won’t stop smoking no matter how much I ask, and I don’t care what they did to you and Jack in that super soldier program, you both push your bodies too much. Eventually something’s going to give, and I don’t want you hurting yourselves.”
“Some days I forget you’re twenty years my junior, the way you issue orders.”
“I am the Head of Medical Research for Overwatch,” the blonde said pointedly. “And it doesn’t matter how old I am when I’m right.”
“I can see why they made you head of surgery,” Reyes replied, amused. “You’ve got a surgeon’s god complex all right. If I see him, I’ll tell him you’re looking for him.”
It was another week before she saw Genji again in more than passing; any time she saw his too-recognizable figure, or the tail ends of the dangling neural cables, he was always heading the opposite direction from her. She had given up on Gabe actually passing along the message, doubting Genji would want to deal with her further. She was finishing up her work for the day, and a rap on the door shook her from her thoughts. She looked up to see the cyborg in her doorway, his right hand hanging almost awkwardly loose at his side.
“Can I help you, Genji?” Her voice sounded frosty even to her own ears, and she watched him closely. He seemed to want to back away, something in the set of his shoulders and the look on his face - what she could see around the faceplate, anyway - unsure of his welcome.
“I was wondering if you would take a look at my hand. It isn’t responding as well as I thought it should.”
“We’ll need to go into one of the exam rooms,” she answered, rising from her chair. “They have better lighting, and your systems are delicate. I’ll get the tools and meet you down there?”
“I can walk with you,” he offered carefully, flexing his organic hand. “We could even do it in the workshop-“
“Not with something as important as this,” Angela replied, taking the peace offering and making one of her own. She looked sidelong at him, lips bowing up in a gentle curve. “You can come along, then, and tell me what happened and what the symptoms are. I don’t want anything to get in there that oughtn’t be, but the more information I have, the quicker I can make the repair so you can get on with your night.”
“I wasn’t sure you’d still be here,” he admitted, falling into step beside her. His tone made her think he had hoped she wouldn’t be. “It’s a Friday night. Surely…?”
“I would be doing what? I don’t do bars much, you know that, and the late-night cafes and such aren’t of much interest. My other choice is going home to some half-dead plants and watching old movies and eating whatever I can feign as a meal from my refrigerator.” She let the smile flicker on her face again. “My work is my life. It’s a miracle I even make it home some nights.”
“I am surprised you don’t live on base.” His voice was soft as they walked down to the end of the hall, for her ears alone. She pressed the elevator button to bring them down to the level the cyberneticists worked on, where the complex tools for managing Genji’s mechanical body were housed.
“I’ve thought about it, but I like to have the opportunity to keep my private life, well, private. Yes, I know, half of Overwatch has known me since I was a teenager - but I’d like to at least pretend I have a life!”
“You know,” Genji pointed out, “I’ve never actually seen your apartment.”
“There isn’t much to see, but you’re welcome to come over some time if you’d like.” She paused, as if realizing what she’d said. “Unless you have an aversion to half-dead plants.”
“A doctor, unable to keep plants alive?”
“I far prefer things with a cardiovascular system, if you must know. Most of the time my patients can tell me what the problem is. Plants are… remarkably opaque when they’re unwell. Too much water, too little water, too much sun or not enough, the wrong soil…” She trailed off. Stop babbling. He isn’t here for this.
“We had a gardener who managed the flowers at Hanamura. I always loved the cherry trees, and the maple trees. Beautiful, but fleeting, and far stronger than they let on. I would always look at the blooms and the leaves and think about how delicate, how fleeting, they were. But the trees were always hardy, coming back more beautiful year after year, no matter how rough things had been before.” He looked at her. “There can be surprising strength behind delicate things, as long as you take are of them.”
“I wish I had a gardener. Only hardy, resilient plants for me,” she said. There might have been a drop in his shoulders, a sigh that escaped his mouth. Or maybe that was just one of the pieces of machinery that made up his body. They stepped out of the elevator and it was a few moment’s work to nip into one lab, pick up the tools, and return to the elevator.
Not long after, she settled down on a stool, Genji perching on an exam table in front of her. The exam room smelled like antiseptic and disinfectant, the lights intense and not at all flattering for either of them. She rolled the stool towards him, setting the equipment out on the exam table beside him. Their knees brushed against each other and she caught her breath, exhaling slowly. She carefully took his mechanical hand in hers, looking over it, and then froze.
“Are you - how do I say this without being mocked with innuendo.” She winked at him. “Are you fully loaded?”
He laughed once, briefly - it was a short sharp sound more akin to a bark. “There are no shuriken,” he said with a hint of a smile on his face; she could tell by the crinkles near his eyes.
“Excellent. I had a brief moment of fear that I would end up with three of them jamming into me when I checked this.” She chuckled, and professionally went over the hand in front of her with the tiny instruments required. She painstakingly checked the connections, adjusting screws and connectors, cleaning spaces and ensuring the mechanisms functioned properly. They spoke of inconsequential things, enough to keep the silence from being overwhelming but not enough to distract Angela from her work. His proximity was doing it anyway, and the maintenance took longer than it should have if any of the cyberneticists had done it. Knees touching, the occasional check for sensitivity between his organic hand and his mechanical one, his periodic attempts to elicit a laugh - all of it far too unprofessional, but far too pleasant, the rough edges between them wearing smooth and easy again.
When she finished, she cupped his hand in hers, perhaps a moment too long. She ran her fingers along the back of his hand, along the depressions for the shuriken mechanisms, the armored backs of the phalanges. He let his hand rest, pliable and easy, in her own, as she rotated it so it sat palm-upward. Angela ran her fingers along the palm, the underside of his fingers, the wrist, alternating firm and delicate brushes against the synthetic skin and the armored pieces.
“How does it feel?”
“Less painful,” he admitted bluntly, “and as if the nerve sensitivity has increased.” He didn’t move the hand for a few seconds, and then flexed the fingers and rotated it, brushing his own fingertips across the back of her hand.
“Good,” she replied, her voice catching. She cleared her throat. “Has it fixed the problem?”
“I think so. If I find it happens again, I will ask you to check on it.”
“Any more of these visits and I will have to keep this repair equipment in my office.” Angela pulled her hand away, hoping that he hadn’t seen the flush she was certain she felt high in her cheeks.
“You’ll have time to get it if you need it. Blackwatch has-“ Genji caught himself, looked down at his hand, then across to her face. “We have some work to do soon.”
“I see.” Her voice didn’t seem to change much, but he was certain he saw her jaw muscles tighten, her throat bob as she swallowed. “Should I do a more thorough check, then?”
“This was the only problem that needed your particular touch. I will come back when we return and you can make sure,” he offered her carefully, “everything is in working order. No problems.”
“You’d better,” she said to him, meeting his eyes and poking him once in the chest with a finger in a surprising motion. “I worry.”
“You don’t need to. I always make it back.” He grinned again. She could see it in his eyes, despite the faceplate.
“You are too stubborn not to.” She rose and put the tools away carefully in their box, brushing against him as she did. “That does explain why Jesse has been avoiding making plans with me this weekend. At least you’re being direct with me.” She blew out a breath with annoyance. “He’s just being secretive. He knows it’s endlessly frustrating. I think he likes annoying me, to be honest.”
“I probably should not have told you, but you deserve to know.” They both knew that he would be under strict orders not to say a word about the Blackwatch operation: she was head of medical research, not anything that ever dealt with Blackwatch, or active missions.
“And I appreciate it.” She closed the case and turned back to him. “I need to bring this back down, and-“
A soft chime interrupted them. Genji looked almost guilty as he reached into the pocket of his sweatshirt and pulled out his comm unit. His expression was hard to read as he looked at it, and slid it back into his pocket.
“Time to go.”
“Playing it a little close, weren’t you?” She raised an eyebrow, looking at him with studied neutrality, the corner of her mouth finally twitching into a frown she couldn’t hide. “Reyes wouldn’t be happy if you were late because you missed some maintenance before an operation. As minor as it was.”
“It was important, to be certain things were as they should be, before I left.” His words were careful, and he met her eyes as he slid off the exam table, red eyes burning brightly as they met hers. “I needed to be certain that there was nothing… out of place.”
“You’re in fine working order.” She deliberately misunderstood him as she lifted the case and opened the door. She heard his exhalation, the snort of annoyance behind the mask.
“When I return, perhaps you could show me those half-dead plants of yours?”
She looked at him incredulously over her shoulder and choked off a laugh. “Since you asked so nicely, how could I say no?” There was a glint in his eyes, a hint of that mischievous youth he’d been only a few years before, and she found it abruptly very difficult to remain as professional as she should be. “Should I make plans? How long will you be gone?”
“I don’t know,” he replied bluntly. “We are…” He caught himself, gaze flicking away from her. “We are going for the Shimada.”
“I know how much this means to you,” she said after a few moments of silence, unsure how she wanted to reply. She hated the violence, but knew how much this meant - this, of all things - meant to him. She would never understand his commitment to violence, to the eradication of what had been his family. Jealousy coursed through her for a moment at the fact that he even had kin, and she closed her eyes for a moment, forcing it all down. “May you find what you’re looking for.” She leaned up, impulsively, and kissed the side of his metal faceplate. “Good luck, Genji.”
She was proud she manage to keep an even pace as she fled down the hall. She didn’t look back once, her eyes squarely on the bright shining metal of the elevator doors as they opened to swallow her in her embarrassment. She considered it a pithy reward that the shining metal let her see Genji, still standing by the door to the exam room, reaching a hand up slowly towards his mask.