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Gibraltar’s mostly sheer cliff faces, rocky outcrops carved sharp one wave at a time over the course of a millennia or two. The view of the ocean from way up high is strikingly beautiful but not necessarily conducive to any sort of beach day for all the water around them. Turns out though, the eastern quadrant of the rock houses a nice, secret little beach, with sand and everything, and a steep but stable natural footpath leading down to it from the cliff. Well, maybe it isn’t a secret, exactly. But if Cole refrains from letting slip knowledge of its existence to the newer, more excitable recruits, in a bid to have a peaceful refuge of his own for just a bit longer, that’s between him and the beach.
When word finally does get around, though, it doesn't take long for the group to organize a team-wide beach day. Convincing Winston to give everyone a day off from practice and missions had been easy, the people-pleaser that he is. Or maybe Overwatch’s acting commander hadn’t needed any convincing at all, considering just how long it’d only been him and Athena on the rock; maybe he, too, could use a day at the beach with all his friends.
The path down the cliff face is uneven and hairpins sharply at various points, so the going is slow and careful, especially considering all of the food and equipment they’re hauling. As they descend under the late morning sun Cole regrets putting on flip flops rather than sturdier sandals with straps.
On the beach he selects a spot just slightly apart from the bustle of the team. As much as he likes his teammates on the whole, in his experience getting roped into their antics can get exhausting quick. It’s enjoyable enough just getting to sit back on the sidelines and watch them have their fun, get some reading done, and maybe manage a catnap under the shade of his umbrella.
After so many years on the run he had almost forgotten how restorative simply existing around other people can be. Already the team’s chatter settles over Cole’s consciousness like a balm. Jean-Baptiste, Angela, and Mei-ling are discussing the latest milestones in environmental recovery, Mei becoming more animated as she goes into detail about the stewardship practices of the indigenous populations of the northernmost reaches of North America. Genji has both arms wrapped affectionately around Baptiste’s back as they talk, wearing a serene expression that Cole would have never seen during their Blackwatch days.
Echo is entertaining Lena, Emily, and Lucio as she mimics each of them in turn. She seems genuinely happy getting to know everyone at the Watchpoint, watching and learning and expertly picking up each of their idiosyncrasies. She is just as remarkable as he remembers, and Cole’s heart pangs from all the parts of Mina Liao that still shine out from her.
Fareeha and Brigitte are busy setting up a volleyball net with Hana watching from the edges. Everyone knows Hana has no interest in physical sports even though she can smoke anyone on the team at any video game, including ones she’d never played before. She does however have an extremely obvious interest in Brigitte. Obvious to everyone except Brigitte, that is.
Reinhardt and Torbjorn amicably carry on with one of their arguments years in the making as they prepare the grill. Bastion is surrounded by colorful buckets shaped like castle walls and towers, trilling happily to themself or maybe to Ganymede as they ever-so-delicately fill a red parapet with sand. Some distance away, Cole can see Winston with Athena in her drone form next to him. Much like Cole is now, he takes in the sheer commotion of life around them, with an expression both joyful and verklempt. Yes. A beach day was a fine idea. Cole grants the acting commander his privacy by turning back to his things. He stabs the sand with the pole of his umbrella, lays out a beach towel, and settles down, crossing his legs as he pulls out the tablet he stuffed in his bag that morning.
He dons a pair of reading glasses without shame and manages to get through one whole article before a figure steps in front of him.
“Given your self-professed penchant for doing things the old fashioned way, I am surprised to see you reading from a tablet and not a real book.”
Cole glances up momentarily at the man currently silhouetted in the summer sun before glancing back down again.
“‘Least this way I can read anywhere I want without getting caught by a bounty hunter ‘cause my little red wagon full of penny dreadfuls was slowing me down.”
The archer only gives him a hm in response and Cole has to hide a smile. Hanzo’s made significant progress in the way of socializing over the past few months, but it’s clear that it’s taken a Herculean effort on his part. He’s gone from only ever showing his face at mandatory team meetings and fleeing like a bat outta hell from any situation that involved casual conversation—or worse, with no escape available, turning outright hostile—to now, standing on the beach in his dangerously low-slung board shorts, willingly surrounded by a gaggle of people who have proven to be endlessly patient with him and his difficulties.
In a way Cole empathizes, because it’s hard to bounce back from years of isolation, self-imposed or not. But at least Cole has his old gregarious nature and southern charm to dust off and put back on like an old coat; based on all he’s gleaned from talking to Genji and spending time with the man himself, Hanzo has never had the easiest go of it. Seeing the archer try so hard has endeared him to Cole in a way that’s a little annoying to admit, if only for how stubbornly Cole fought to stay angry with him at the start. These days though, Cole’s forced to contend with the realization that not only does he like Hanzo on a basic human level, Cole might just like him a little too much.
Hanzo clears his throat.
“May I sit with you?”
Despite his earlier desire for space, Cole pats the sand to his right. “Pop a squat.”
Hanzo gives his thanks and lays out a towel before stretching flat. Cole actively does not let his gaze roam all that sun-bronzed skin and keeps dispassionate eyes firmly on his tablet. A couple minutes of silence pass between them in which Cole might have had to read and re-read the same paragraph more than once to regain focus, though eventually he manages to tap over to the next page.
“What are you reading? One of those penny dreadfuls you mentioned?”
Cole’s eyes flick to the side briefly to see that Hanzo’s head is turned fully towards him, like he’d already been looking.
“Ah, well, no actually. It’s uh, I’m reading the news.”
Hanzo responds with his standard hum and gives Cole a few seconds before speaking again.
“I didn’t take you for someone who reads the news, considering that you—that Overwatch is so often featured there, and usually not favorably. I would think you’d be sick of it.”
Cole scratches at his beard, debating momentarily on whether or not to tell the truth.
“You wouldn’t be wrong to think that, in all honesty. But uh—I’m not reading, y’know, global news or whatever. Not the real important stuff, anyway.”
Another glance in Hanzo’s direction shows he has a pensive look on his face. Which, Hanzo’s “pensive face” looks a hell of a lot like a glare, his eyes gone all sharp and intense and mouth downturned. Cole’s only recently started to recognize that face for what it is and not read it as bitchy like he first did.
“If it is not important, as you say, then why do you sit here reading it rather than joining in the festivities?”
“‘Cause it’s important to me.”
The pensive face intensifies, somehow, like Hanzo is trying desperately to figure him out and nothing he sees makes any sense. Cole scrubs his facial hair again, suddenly self-conscious, and decides to throw him a bone.
“Sometimes I read the local news from where I grew up. Place called Sante Fe. It’s all mostly, well, stuff about highschool football games, restaurants opening and closing. Wildlife sightings. People dying, having babies, going off to college. Political beef. Et cetera. Nothing terribly exciting, but, it can be uh, it can be nice. Helps with the homesickness, y’know?”
The next pause is longer than the others, and Cole doesn’t dare look at his companion’s face again. He waits for the noncommittal hm or even to be mocked for his sentimentality.
Instead, quietly:
“... Yes. Yes, I do know.”
Cole curses the sudden leap of his own heart and says nothing more, and they both settle into a silence that is neither awkward nor comfortable, but somewhere precarious between the two, like one wrong move will tip the balance one way or the other.
Then a shriek rings out and both men tense as if they’d forgotten they weren’t the only two on the beach. Cole looks up to see Brigitte carrying a terribly pleased Hana piggyback style, running full tilt across the dunes, chasing after Fareeha who’s carrying Lucio and maintaining a steady lead. Lena cheers from the sidelines next to Echo, who is perfectly emulating her body language as she gestures wildly, and Lena doesn’t seem to notice but Emily is nearly doubled over trying to hold in her laughter. Cole can’t help his smile. At least the interruption manages to end whatever spell had kept him tongue-tied moments ago.
“Last time someone carried me like that, I must’ve been, what, ten years old? A little before I hit my first growth spurt. After that I got real tall, real fast.”
Hanzo accepts the subject change, if only to use the opportunity to say something absolutely batshit.
“I could carry you.”
Cole manages not to sputter, but it’s a near thing. “Could you now?”
“Easily.”
“I got a good few inches on you, partner.”
“Inconsequential. I am very strong.” And then he has the gall to point at one of his exposed biceps as if Cole had never noticed them of his own accord.
Cole eyes Hanzo’s thick arms and shoulders, his solid torso, knowing with absolute certainty that the archer could lift him if he tried. But some impish part of him can’t help but poke the bear.
“Hm… Not quite sure I believe you.”
Hanzo bristles and Cole tamps down the impossible affection swelling in his chest. “There is no doubt that I could carry you, despite your ludicrously long legs.”
Bare, hairy legs stretch out fully on the towel now. “Pay attention to my legs much, do you?”
“I just—I was referencing your height! You may have a good few inches on me but I could perform squats with both your and my body weight combined.”
Well. Cole never could let well enough alone. He sets aside the tablet that long ago went dark and turns full body to face his companion. Then:
“Prove it.”
Just to see the fire light Hanzo’s eyes.
“On your feet, Cassidy.”
Hanzo has already started light warm-up exercises by the time Cole stands and indelicately brushes the sand off his own ass and thighs. The shit gets everywhere, towel or no. “Should we move somewhere there’s solid ground, or...?”
Hanzo drops into a set of lunges. “I will do it here.”
Shrugging, Cole takes off his reading glasses to set them safely with his things, not wanting them smashed should they both pitch forward and land face first in the sand. When he goes to remove his hat, though, a hand stops him, and despite the stern set to Hanzo’s mouth the crinkle of crow’s feet at his eyes give him away.
“The hat stays on, cowboy.”
Cole startles out a laugh as he replaces the hat.
Apparently finished with his warm-ups, Hanzo lowers into a crouch. “I will lift you in a variation of the fireman’s carry. Lie across my shoulders length-wise and I will grip you by your arm and thigh to keep you stable.” Up to this point, with all his focus on their teasing back-and-forths, Cole had treated what they were about to do as purely hypothetical. Now he’s starting to feel a little ridiculous, and the full realization of what he brought upon himself dawns only when the rest of the team catch on that something is happening and become curious.
“What’s all this then?”
Lena and Emily wander over, leaving Fareeha and Brigitte starfished on the ground, catching their breath. Lucio and Hana are crouched over them both and fanning them with their hands. Inexplicably, Echo also starfishes, her luminous face turned up to the impassive blue sky, unblinking. Cole wonders what she sees.
“I am about to prove a point to Agent Cassidy.”
“And what point would that be, brother?” Cole almost yelps when Genji’s voice sounds directly behind him. How long had he been standing there?
“You will see. Cassidy! Come.”
Cole groans, feels a damning blush rise as he complies. “How should I…?”
Hanzo gestures wordlessly for Cole to give him his good hand. Cole does so. His brain stutters when the callouses on the other man’s fingers drag against his own before his arm is taken and he is guided to drape across Hanzo’s shoulders.
“I am about to take hold of your leg.”
“Alrighty.”
As promised, one powerful arm comes up behind his knee to wrap octopus-like around his thigh and pulls. De-stabilized, his full weight rests on Hanzo’s shoulders, though one loose foot still brushes the ground with Hanzo still crouched.
“I will now stand. Are you ready?”
Cole swallows. “Yessir.”
And so they rise together.
More of the team has gathered around them at this point to take in the spectacle, and with nowhere else to look Cole turns his eyes up to the sky and sees only his hubris reflected back at him. Hanzo reaches full height and pauses briefly before he dips down again, as slow and controlled as can be, and Cole’s face burns in a way that has nothing to do with the sun. Every inch of bare skin in contact with Hanzo’s is tacky with sweat and sunscreen and there are stray grains of sand caught between them. It should be uncomfortable; would be if anyone thought to ask.
Distantly, Cole is damn impressed not only by his friend’s strength, but also by his ability to maintain perfectly straight posture—the duo don’t wobble even slightly—and on sand no less. As it is, the man beneath him grunts when they rise together again, and the only thought at the forefront of Cole’s mind is of Hanzo lifting his bulk in an entirely different context.
Just five repetitions feel like a hundred before Hanzo crouches one final time and tips Cole until his feet hit the ground. He barely registers the sound of cheers. Somehow his hat managed to stay secure on his head, but it's only then Cole realizes that at some point during his internal crisis he had lost a flip flop—just one. But he doesn’t have to bother reaching for where it rests innocently on the sand, because Hanzo scoops it up as he straightens and shoves it into Cole’s hands.
His face is ruddy with exertion, or sun, and he won’t look Cole in the eye. Some of their teammates move to pat Hanzo on the back but he’s got that look about him that he used to wear all the time, another one of those severe faces that most people read as angry, and the others seem to think better of it and retract their hands. But Cole must have gotten better at reading him because all Cole sees is something very much like self-consciousness, the warning sign of a man about to fall back on an old habit:
running away.
“Next time do not test me so, Agent Cassidy. Now, if you will all—excuse me.”
And with that, Hanzo turns on his heel and marches straight for the ocean, the crowd parting for him like the Red Sea parting for Moses. He keeps pace even as he hits the water, as it rises to calf level, then hip level, even still as he’s forced into a breaststroke against the oncoming waves. Soon all that can be seen of him from shore is a dot on the horizon.
Everyone stares after Hanzo for a few beats until Baptiste breaks the awkward silence.
“What’s up with him?”
Genji slings one arm across his partner’s waist, lets out a sigh as the onlookers disperse. “I suppose my brother lives there now.”
Eventually only Cole stays to track the black speck that is Hanzo, still flushed from chest to hairline, flip flop held absently in his hands despite the continued burning of one foot on hot sand.