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No matter how much you try to bury your past, some things just won’t stay dead.
At least, that’s what Soldier 76 finds himself thinking as he returns to his quarters and takes a moment to finally catch his breath. Mere hours earlier, he hadn’t been sure he would have survived that night. It wasn’t that danger was unfamiliar to him after Overwatch had fallen. Soldier 76 had risked his life countless times since he’d left behind his life as Jack Morrison. He’d fought everything from thieves, criminal gangs, and murderers.
He could have never expected that Gabriel Reyes would join that list.
Of course, Reaper, as he called himself now, was no longer the Gabriel Reyes that had helped found Overwatch and had been Jack Morrison’s best friend. But while Soldier 76 may have tried to suppress his memories, Jack never forgot. Jack still recognized Reyes’ signature stance before rushing into battle. The feint chuckle when he landed a critical hit, though Reaper’s was far more bone-chilling. Most revealing, however, was the slight hesitation when he approached Soldier 76, a second gained that may have saved the retired commander’s life and allowed him to retreat.
Sighing, Soldier 76 collapses into his bed and shuts his eyes. If he was hoping for a happy reunion, it would never come. He turns his head to look at a frame on his bedside table, a picture he had never been able to dispose of. A grinning Gabriel Reyes, one arm on his hip and the other firmly around a bashful Jack Morrison. A happy moment from a time where friendships were strong, positions meant nothing, and the world was a whole lot less complicated.
Before Talon.
If you’d asked him before, Soldier 76 would have said without a moment’s hesitation that Reyes was responsible for his own downfall. But knowing now that Talon had Reaper on their side, he is no longer so sure. How long had they been able to use him? Reyes had died long ago, but perhaps he had been lost even before the explosion that the world believed had claimed their lives?
As he focuses in on his former friend’s face, Soldier 76 finds himself unable to remember the last time he had heard Reyes genuinely laugh. Maybe Jack should have found that strange, when the man had always been smiling in his presence before.
He’s searching through his memories now, flipping through the pages wildly, with a sinking feeling in his stomach. He thinks of the man Reyes used to be and what he became over the years. It had never been an overnight change, and perhaps if Jack had noticed these little things back then…
The gradual but definite shift from calling him pet names like “country boy” or “goldilocks” to just “Jack.” Then, one day, it was just “Morrison.” Every now and then, Reyes had started skipping meetings. Maybe that didn’t mean anything, but then again, he’d never missed one before. Team gatherings where one seat was now permanently, noticeably empty.
Soldier 76 leaves his room, his bed no longer comfortable and his mind never more restless.
As he walks around, he sees Angela up ahead, entering what was surely Fareeha’s room. He thinks back to when he was lucky enough to fall asleep in Reyes’ arms and wake up to find himself still there. To nights where he came home to Gabriel already passed out but woke up to an empty bed. Or coming home early to an empty place and finding Gabriel on the couch instead the next morning. Soon enough, they no longer shared a room together.
A laugh interrupts his thoughts. He looks around for the source and finds some familiar faces up ahead in the mess hall. McCree and Genji are sitting together, laughter still etched on their faces. The cowboy has one arm slung around the ninja’s shoulders, the other busy with a bottle of beer. Hanzo is sitting across from them, looking irritated but clearly enjoying himself.
A decade ago, that might have been himself, Gabriel, and Ana. Reyes loved to joke, badly, and he was all the more endearing for it. Soldier 76 looks at the arm still around Genji and keeps walking. He recalls that Reyes had a warm touch, but it had been several years since he’d last even held the man’s hand. How had Jack not noticed it sooner, when in the past he could count on Reyes’ reassuring grasp being on his shoulder before doubt could even form in his mind?
He’d attributed it all to envy at the time. It was the most reasonable explanation, and the easiest one, too, at that. Gabriel Reyes coveted power, he had decided, and lashed back when he couldn’t acquire it. So, Jack led himself to believe that Reyes must not have been as sincere of a person as he seemed, despite the fact that it screamed against everything he had ever known. Even after Amélie Lacroix had been taken from them and forcefully turned into a Talon agent, Jack never stopped to consider there was more to Gabriel’s downward spiral.
Gabriel Reyes was Jack Morrison’s best friend and partner. He reassured him when things went wrong, boosted his confidence when he was distressed, and always gave him his full support. Jack could have never become Strike Commander without him. And yet, when Gabriel needed his help the most, when he was the one in need of support and comfort, Jack failed to deliver. Instead, he gave him suspicion when Reyes needed encouraging, distance when he needed love, ignorance when he needed a companion.
By the time Overwatch was nearing its end, Reyes was no longer his lover or even a friend. He’d become a total stranger, and Jack had let that happen.
Soldier 76’s thoughts drift back to his encounter earlier that night with Reaper, a ghost of a man he had once, no, still loved, and his heart grows heavy.
I could have saved you.