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The burn of whiskey gives Jack something to look forward to each night. He pours a second measure into his cup and sinks into a chair, wincing at his still tender ribs. Once upon a time, his armor would have made that a mere annoyance, injecting him with pain killers at just the right dose to keep him functioning. Now, he swallows a handful of something that might be ibuprofen, or might be something stronger.
Blowing out a breath, Jack picks up the burner datapad that he bought two hours ago. News feeds scroll across the screen, pulling up the keywords that he had asked the device to find. In another life, dozens of intelligence techs would have written programs to do what he wanted. Now, he is fumbling through as best as he can. Jack has learned a lot in the past six year, but it’s not enough. He always comes up empty handed.
Lifting the whiskey to his lips, Jack drains the glass and dabs at the sweat on his forehead. It’s too hot for October, even at night. Trees should be bursting into color as evenings were filled with bonfires and lazy football weekends. But, like everything else, those are a thing of the past. Jack gave them up when he put on the mask, or when he put on the Strike Commander uniform for the first time, perhaps. If he’d known how things would end, Jack would have done everything different.
Jack drags out the notebook that he carries everywhere he goes. He doesn’t keep the datapads longer than a day at the most. If nothing else, Overwatch taught him how to avoid capture. His fingers walk over the familiar pages, noting the splotches from alcohol or coffee depending on the hour. His chaotic musings are in disarray, making no sense to anyone but him. He pauses on a page of a rough pencil sketch of the assassin who tried to kill him.
Reaper looks nothing like the man from Jack’s past, but he supposes that’s fair enough. He doesn’t look much like the golden boy of Overwatch anymore either, not since the explosion. If Jack closes his eyes, he can feel the heat and fear of that day coursing through him. He watches the smoke curl around Reaper as the building starts to crumble and hears the familiar cry of his name tangled in a stranger’s throat.
Jack needs to know what happened that day. None of the news reports convinced him that Gabe died in the explosion, but he’s been damn near impossible to track ever since. Scraps of stories are pasted in the notebook, questions and threads running across the page to find some commonality that will lead him to Reaper. Overwatch might be gone, but Jack still has a job to do. He’s going to find out why Gabe betrayed them, then he’s going to kill him. Once the object of his obsession is destroyed, Jack might be able to rest, might.
Familiar practice leads Jack to clean the stolen pulse rifle beside him; the movement steadies his nerves. The trembling leaves his hands a little more as he reassembles each part. Jack could do this in his sleep if he needed to. Exhaustion and alcohol have done their work, lulling him toward the unconsciousness that passes for rest these days. He’s stowing his notes when the datapad pings. Jack picks it up and skims the article.
Hakim is getting reckless with his operations in Cairo, revealing himself more and more over the past month. But, this time is different. Jack followed Reaper’s trail here. Nursing the rest of his drink, he considers the information at hand. Hakim changes his tactics when Reaper supposedly enters the country. It’s a coincidence that Jack can’t ignore. Knocking back the rest of his whiskey, he turns off the datapad. Tomorrow, one way or another, Jack will have his answer.