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“Brother, wait!” Genji shouts as he tries to catch up with Hanzo, but he’s fast and elusive. Where is Angela when he needs her?
Hanzo either doesn’t hear him or ignores him as he rushes into the infirmary, almost slipping on the floor in his hurry. Genji can see the way he stiffens up, muscles locked up in his back, hands clenching as his brother sees the man lying in the bed.
It’s so odd to see McCree like that. Cords of machines hang around him, needles stuck into his skin here and there, the sensors of the cardiac monitor are put on to his chest. The only parts that can be seen of his face are his closed eyes; his relaxed jaw and nose are hidden behind an oxygen mask, which fogs over each time Jesse exhales. His head is covered in white bandage, a stark contrast from his dark skin and hair.
He looks… calm. Still, like the man never is, even when he’s sleeping. It chills Genji to the bone.
“Jesse,” Hanzo chokes out the name, like there is an invisible block in his throat, locking up his air-ways. “Oh, no…”
Genji carefully steps beside him, head bowed down and posture low, as if he was approaching a wild, terrified animal. He doesn’t try to touch Hanzo; he’d lash out, he knows it from experience. He looks up from him to the bed. The rush of guilt, sorrow and concern doesn’t surprise him. Jesse is his best friend, a second brother, whom he loves with all his being. What terrifies him the most is what Hanzo might feel and do. Genji can’t imagine how much he must be hurting right now, and this anxiety builds in him, because Genji knows how to deal with emotions, he learnt it, but Hanzo doesn’t.
Hanzo’s shoulder shakes, eyes mirroring the anguish he’s going through, but he doesn’t cry. Genji wants to grab hold of him and shake him. But he doesn’t. He watches, as he takes a tentative step towards the bed, slow and unsure, like he would be fleeing the room any second. Then his knees buckle, and Genji has to move quickly to catch him before he simultaneously collapses to the floor.
Hanzo’s voice is hoarse, tongue thick from the simple words. “Otouto, I… paper. I need paper.” He swallows, hard, a small wounded sound escaping him. “Please.”
Genji nods solemnly. He won’t deny this from his brother. If that’s what he needs to maintain hope and peace of mind, he will grant him everything he asks. He helps him up into a chair pulled next to the hospital bed. He only hears hushed whispers and the beeping of the machines Jesse is hooked up to.
There is a small desk dragged into the infirmary. Two huge stack of square paper are towering in its left side. Hanzo is sitting there with straight back, hands moving fast as he folds a blank paper in his hands. His face shows utter concentration, the kind in which a man can lose himself in.
That’s how Genji finds him each day, folding paper just a foot away from McCree, always near, but never touching. He doesn’t even look at him, as his focus is solely on the paper in his hands, folding edge to edge, precisely, so that it is perfect in every sense.
Genji puts a cup of tea and a plate of small snacks next to him. He knows that when Hanzo gets like this, he won’t break his concentration even for basic needs like eating or sleeping. Peanuts and dried fruits usually do the trick; they are fast to eat, and Hanzo would unconsciously pick them up if he was hungry.
Sleep is another issue. Genji can already see the the dark circles under his brother’s eyes. It’s been only a few days, but if his tendency of depriving himself from rest continues, he’ll drop unconscious within days.
He has to be patient, he reminds himself. His brother won’t listen, but maybe he’ll calm down to think clearly if he gives him space.
He doesn’t. Hanzo folds and folds, paper after paper, like a machine. His hair is unkept, his ribbon laid carefully at the end of McCree’s bed. His fingers shake and the circles under his eyes gone from shades to bruises.
Genji thinks it’s time to put an end to this madness. He carefully lays a hand on Hanzo’s bare shoulder. He can see beads of sweat glistening on the skin, and though he can’t feel his temperature, he wonders if Hanzo developed a fever.
“Brother,” he calls him in their mother-tongue. One of his metallic hands comes down to engulf Hanzo’s own. “Please, stop. You are hurting yourself. I can’t…” His words trail off, as Hanzo whips his head up, startled, as if he hadn’t realized Genji stood beside him for minutes, hours every day. His eyes are frantic, a little too wide. He doesn’t blink as he stares up at him, eyes roaming over his faceplate. Genji takes it off, so he can look him in the eye, face to face.
“Genji?” His voice breaks on the name. He sounds like he hadn’t used his voice for days, which is likely the case. “I… When?” He shakes his head, and even as he tries to find the words, his other hand searches for paper. Genji notices that his fingers are nicked with papercuts and the skin at the tip of his thumb is raw and dry. He hadn’t realized the extent of his brother’s insomnia, and now he’s watching him crumble apart. Hanzo grasps something, and he pulls it up in between their faces, gently showing it to his little brother. “See?” He asks. His eyes widen even more as if urging him to understand. “For Jesse. All of them. For him.”
Genji slowly takes it away from him, holding it as if it were treasure. His jaw wobbles, and he can feel his eyes moisten from tears. They slowly make their way down on his cheek, as he dips his head, and brings the origami carefully to his chest.
Hanzo babbles on, his sleep-deprived mind not registering, that he is basically incoherent, nor Genji’s sudden change of mood. “He’ll like it, I know, I know. Right, brother? “He rushes out the words without a dam to control them.” He will call them pretty and precious. He liked birds, likes birds, he told me. He’ll… he’ll wake up. He will, and then…
Genji engulfs him in a firm hug, tears silently slipping into Hanzo’s hair, as he holds onto him. Hanzo’s stuttering is cut off, and he makes an unsure sound, not comprehending what’s happening around him. Genji shushes him, rocking them from side to side as he’s whispering nothings into his brother’s ear. “It will be alright, shh, shh, he will wake up.”
Hanzo’s hands twitch on his back, nails scraping the metal as they dig into it. “Need to make them perfect.” He mumbles. Genji can feel his body finally uncoil, muscles letting go of the painful tension they were forced to lock inside. He stays like that, until Hanzo’s breathing finally, finally evens out, hands falling limp next to him, his breathing evening out.
Genji picks him up carefully. Hanzo doesn’t budge; the utter exhaustion crashing down on him is pulling him deep into sleep. He moves Hanzo to the bed next to McCree’s, because he knows that his brother will subconsciously search for the ever present beeping of the machines and Jesse’s breathing.
He puts the origami back on the table. The crane stares up at him from among its brethren, blank and stern, beak held up proudly. Genji shakes his head. How could it be that he never noticed them? They are so many. On the desk, the small table next to McCree, floor and shelves. Everywhere. All of them folded with care, the maker of them always thinking about the same wish.
The cranes stare, and Genji can hear them whisper wake up, wake up.
He remembers similar paper birds from when he was young and broke his ribs in an accident. They were smaller, the folds more unsure and the paper slightly crinkled, but the maker of them were the same, who stayed up all night so he could create. They had another mantra: get better, heal.
Hanzo made a thousand cranes for him. He’ll do a million, if it means that his lover will open his eyes.
Hanzo sleeps for twenty hours. When he wakes, Genji immediately steers him towards the showers against Hanzo’s loud protests, and doesn’t let him out until he’s squeaky clean. His face is clouded when he appears in fresh clothes, lips pursed as he storms back to the infirmary to continue his work.
Angela is already there, checking over the machines, rehooking some bags and swapping bandages. She’s humming, as he treats the man, her actions precise and professional. To Genji’s surprise he finds Lúció and Morrison in the room too, standing to the side. They greet him quietly, and Genji waves back. When Angela finishes, she gestures the men forward, who grab the bed, and unlock the wheels on it.
“What are you doing?” Hanzo asks, standing up hurriedly; Genji flinches as his chair scrapes the floor. Angela instantly takes action and steps between them, eyes gentle and palms up towards him, to sooth the ruffled brother.
“We will relocate him into a bigger room. The team wants to stay with him too, and I deemed their request safe, until they are clean.” She cocks her head to the side. “I hope you are alright with this.”
Hanzo immediately deflates, shoulders slumping from emotions. He casts his eyes to the floor, shame running across his features. “Yes, I… it’s alright. I’m sorry I indirectly kept them away from Je… from him.” He swallows.
Genji touches his back, careful to only apply minimum pressure. “Let’s collect your things.”
Genji’s sitting in the corner, keeping a lookout from there. His brother folds and folds. The room is filled with light chatter, but he doesn’t pay them much attention. There are cranes aligned in front of him, white and blank.
He almost jumps, when Mei approaches him. “What are you doing, Shimada-san?” Her face is curious, as she pushes her glasses back on the bridge of her nose. She examines the desk with care, and slaps her hands together in delight. “I didn’t know you could fold origami. I used to make them… oh.” Her voice dies down as she recognizes the paper cranes. Pure sadness radiates from her, the shy smile always tugging at her lips vanishing without a trace. She rubs her hands together nervously. “I’m sorry,” she says softly. “I didn’t mean to interrupt you.”
Hanzo inhales, eyes only leaving the paper to take a glance at Mei, then they shift back. “It is alright.” He says. Genji thinks that that’s it, his brother will clam up again, but he’s positively surprised by Hanzo when he asks hesitantly: “Would you like to fold with me?”
Mei nods enthusiastically, slightly bouncing on her feet. Hanzo pulls his chair aside to make room for her, and she takes a seat gratefully. She gently plucks up a paper, and fast and precisely folds a crane. It’s slightly different from Hanzo’s, her technique being different, but still looks great next to the others.
Genji watches them, as he moves to take a seat next to Jesse’s bed. He takes his hand in his, running circles on Jesse’s skin. My brother may get better in company, he observes thoughtfully, but it will be short-lived, if you don’t wake up.
Only the steady beeping answers.
There are bad days, Genji realizes, when one morning he witnesses his brother tear one of the cranes apart in an angry fit. He’s baring his teeth at the remnants, like it personally caused their current predicament.
He doesn’t know how to react to that. “Hanzo?”
“It’s not perfect,” he snarls, as he creases the paper into a ball. He throws it across the room carelessly, not even looking where it lands, as he starts to inspect each and every bird, picking out the ones which he deems faulty. A fold not perfectly in place, beak slightly crinkled, wings unbalanced, all grave mistakes, and the cranes pay with their lives.
Genji rushes to his brother, getting a hold of his wrists, but Hanzo is livid with anger, sight blinded by the red mist which descended on it. He yanks them away, and pushes at Genji, one palm and one fist. He stumbles back, blocking, more in the defense of Hanzo. He split his knuckles on his armour, and the blood seeping from the injury smears across it, painting red streaks on it, as Hanzo advances.
“Stand down, Hanzo!” He knows he’s shouting, and he can hear the others’ footsteps running towards them, and he needs to act fast. “Brother, it’s me. Come on,” he blocks a clumsy punch aimed towards his face, and sweeps Hanzo’s legs out from under him. He grabs both of his hands, and pins them to the small of Hanzo’s back, as he turns him onto his stomach. “Stop this madness! Jesse won’t come back if you lose your mind.” He blanches, realizing, what he just said, but the words have their effect.
At the name Hanzo lets out a strangled cry, small and helpless. His muscles slacken, and he tries to pull his knees to his chest. Genji slowly releases him, and Hanzo instantly wraps his arms over his knees, rocking himself to and fro, like a child afraid of the world. Genji cannot watch this. Even though he’s here, he feels so helpless, it eats at him. He wants to help, God how he wants to, but Hanzo pushes him away, and it’s tearing through him.
“Brother,” he whispers. He slowly wraps his arms around him from behind, expecting Hanzo to flinch and flee, to lash out and attack him again. Instead he turns and buries his face between the plates covering his neck. It’s as if the dam keeping his emotions locked up finally released; Hanzo sobs. His hands clasp the back of Genji’s shoulders as he pulls himself towards him, clinging and choking up self-deprecation like venom.
“I should have been there,” he says. “Why him, it could have been me. It could have been me, Genji, why couldn’t it be me? He doesn’t deserve this, he never would. Good man, such a good man. Why, whywhywhy?”
“I love him,” he sobs out, and Genji is crying along with him, breathing shortened to quick gasps. “I love him so much, it hurts.”
Genji doesn’t look up to see whoever stood in the door leave. They wouldn’t understand this. His brother needs him, they need each other. They won’t interfere.
Days go by, and McCree doesn’t respond. After his breakdown Hanzo now makes time each day to whisper nothings into the skin of Jesse’s hand. He holds it so gingerly, like he fears he’d break it accidentally. It’s painful to look at, and Genji usually leaves the room, to make them privacy.
He can see Hanzo becoming more unraveled each day. He’s skittish, the calm façade slowly breaking into pieces to show the desperate man under it with guilt in his eyes, and apologies on his lips. With each day he goes without sleep, he’s slowly destroying himself. He refuses medical help, when Angela offers, and due to her oath, he can’t force him to take antidepressants or sleeping pills, no matter how much she wants to shove down panacea in his throat.
“I don’t know where I finished,” Hanzo says softly, after minutes of hesitant pause. Genji watched him from afar, as he lifted his hand several times, only to drop it the next second. He seems lost, an expression Genji never associated with his brother. His fingers come up to catch any drop of tear that might slip past his eyelids.
Satya looks up from where she’s sitting, reading something from his tablet. She examines the cranes on the floor, the desk, piling on another chair. “Eight hundred and sixty-four,” she announces.
Hanzo shoots her a disbelieving glance. “How could you count them so fast?”
She makes a vague gesture with her hand. ”There are some merits to having eidetic memory and OCD.”
Hanzo dips his head deeply. “Thank you.” His soft words are charged with emotion. Satya smiles at him, small and barely there, but meaning the same thing. We are here for you.
Lena and Hana make it their small project to tie the completed cranes to the ceiling, after they ask Hanzo for his permission.
“So they can watch over him,” Hana tells Hanzo uncharacteristically reserved and quiet. Genji smiles, as his brother swallows, and nods.
Soon the whole ceiling is covered by origami. They are dangling on red strings, some of them white and untouched, others coloured or patterned, which were made by Mei or other agents. Genji himself created a small army of them, with light green paper; he decorated them with feathers. It’s a feat to look at them, and Genji has to swallow his emotions, less they overwhelm him.
Jesse would have liked the sight of it.
No, he corrects himself, he will like them. Because he’s going to wake up. He looks at Hanzo, doggedly sitting next to the sleeping man, forehead pressed to the back of Jesse’s hand, softly murmuring a mantra into the pulse point of it. He has to.
He can’t lose both of them at the same time. They are his everything. He won’t lose them.
Angela doesn’t meet their eyes, when she tells them that they should consider letting him go.
“It’s been a month now.” Her voice is feather soft, quiet and sad. Her lips tremble for a second, and she has to breathe through her nose, before she can face them. Her eyes shine with watery sorrow, an overflowing pool of blue. Tears slip down her cheeks, before she can stop them. “It’d take a miracle for him to wake up at this point. I… I’ve tried everything I could, but he’s...” her voice breaks. She shakes her head, her arms coming up to wrap around herself. “He’s not responding.”
Genji can hear Hanzo’s breath hitch, and he himself feels his heart constrict. His jaw clenches, and he bows his head. His faceplate catches his running tears, but his breath sounds static-like through the voice modulators. He can’t believe it, it can’t be over like that. His gaze roams around the room, decorated with a sea of cranes. Fareeha stands next to McCree, her hands clapped on her mouth as she weeps over her adopted brother. It’s not fair, it’s…
“No.” Hanzo’s voice is so hoarse, so quiet, that Genji wouldn’t have caught it if he weren’t standing right next to him, sides pressed together to comfort each other. “No,” he says louder, and his eyes take on a manic glint. “No, no, nono, no!”
Genji catches him by the waist just in time to catch his screaming brother before he can surge forward. “Liar!“ His fingers curl into fists, saliva spatting out of his mouth, his face contorted into a snarl not unlike a rabid dog’s. His face is red with anger and the white of his eyes glint madly. Genji never seen him like this, and he’s scared for Angela, scared for Hanzo, for Jesse, this is all not fucking fair.” You are a miracle worker. You lie, you lie. You can fix him, you can. You saved Genji, he’s alive. Please! Make him wake up, I can’t…” His strength fades with his rage as he suddenly pleads, his knees buckling to sink to the floor. His voice borders hysteric. “I can’t live without him. Jesse. Wake him up, I beg of you.”
Angela’s knees hit the floor, as she herself collapses. She can’t look away from the man breaking in front of her apart. The sight is like witnessing a car crash, a catastrophe, and she can’t turn away. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I can’t, I did everything, I can’t…”
Fareeha steps behind her to slowly pull her up, shushing her in the process. Hanzo stares dully on the floor, breathing so shallow and uneven, like he’s on the verge of a panic attack. Genji shakes him to goad him to look up at him, control his breathing, or speak, anything, but he doesn’t respond. His fingers curl into his brother’s hakama, slick metal on peacock-blue cotton, and Genji pulls him, until he’s turned towards him. The embrace is a broken thing; gentle and soft as Genji guides Hanzo’s head to lay on his shoulder, one hand drawing patterns on his back, while the other stabilizes them.
It takes more time for Hanzo to come to himself with an audible gasp, than Genji would have liked. He immediately pulls away, scrambling to his feet, as wobbly as a newborn deer. He sits down on the chair next to Jesse and pulls himself as close to him, as he physically can. “Can you give us a moment?” he asks Genji quietly, as if he never has had a hysterical fit, and Genji’s heart breaks all the more.
The door closes behind him softly like the last exhale of a dying man.
The alarm sounds two hours later, and Genji’s world spins around him.
“Agent Hanzo requires immediate medical aid in the infirmary,” Athena announces.
Genji sprints as fast as he can, Hanzo’s words taking on an actual, horrifying meaning in his head. I can’t live without him. Genji wants to scream, to tear everything in his path and bring Jesse back to them, to Hanzo, to set everything right. I can’t live without him, he cried. But who will think about him?
Would you really leave me behind after everything we went through, Anija?
He corners the infirmary, busting the door open with a metal shoulder, when it wouldn’t open by the handle.
Blue. Everything so blue, it drowns out any other colour.
His brother is lying next to Jesse on a spare bed, left arm extended through the small gap between the two of them. His hand has a firm hold on Jesse’s slack fingers. Blue energy emerges from Hanzo’s bare skin, arching from it like electricity. The paper birds burn with bright blue glow from the sheer heat of it. Soot descends on the two men. Hanzo is barely conscious, slitted eyes turned towards Jesse, seeing only Jesse. He’s wheezing, breathing reduced to short gasps, as the blue flows from him, to cover McCree’s bare hand and slither into him through the pores.
Hanzo is using the dragons to accelerate Jesse’s healing, Genji realizes, meanwhile taking away Hanzo’s energy. He can already see Hanzo’s lips turning a darker shade, his tattoo burning the surrounding flesh, small cuts opening on his body, as the moisture evaporates from his skin, cracking it like the Sun would crack the desert soil.
This will save Jesse, but if Hanzo won’t stop in time, he is going to die.
Genji rushes towards them, but is stopped by an invincible wall. It keeps him away from the ritual taking place, rendering him useless. He hits the wall with a fist. “Brother,” he shouts as loud as he can over the crackling energy. “Don’t do this. Stop it! Hanzo! Stop this!”
Angela and Lúció fall into the room a second later.
“What the hell is going on?” Lúció cries.
Genji doesn’t acknowledge them, too wrapped up in his own mind to closely pay attention to them. He grabs for his sword, but it’s not on his back, as he left it behind in his haste. He can feel his dragon perk up in the back of his mind, green observing its kin, licking and tasting the molecules between them. It rumbles in distaste, and Genji doesn’t fight it, as it emerges from him without calling, green mixing with the blue. It lets out an ungodly howl, as it shutters through the barrier. Genji feels his inside twisting and turning, lungs suffocatingly constricting and he falls on the ground. His dragon dances around the double helix of Hanzo’s blue dragons, touching into its flow here and there. It stabilizes the energy to flow as one main stream, directing the wandering strands back.
Genji has never seen anything like this before. He thought the dragons solely existed to kill, to attack, but… They’re…
Defending, he hears his dragon say in an ancient tongue Genji can’t imitate to speak, but he can understand anyway. The weak, the brave, the mighty. Healing.
Genji’s dragon joins the blue twins, twisting into a chaotic swirl of energy, green and blue like the ocean. It’s too intense, and for long seconds Genji can’t breathe from the strain of it. The dragons make a final double loop in the air, before…
Everything seems to stop. The cackling dies down with a loud pop, green and blue slithering back to their masters. It’s quiet, medical machines burnt out, but for the harsh breathing of him and Hanzo. It feels like he was doused in ice then fire, then ice again. His skin is both tight and too loose; it feels like it might fall off his bones.
He hears the footsteps of people, and the next thing he knows, he’s lying on his back, faceplate replaced by a medical mask. The free flow of oxygen is a balm on his strained lungs.
He hears a sudden crash, and for a second he panics, because when he turns his head he can only see his unconscious brother, but not Jesse. Then a shaggy head emerges from behind the bed, clearly disorientated and not at all there, but Jesse, oh Lord, Jesse has awakened.
“Wha’s happ’ed?” he slurs badly. He turns his clouded eyes towards the ceiling as Fareeha and Lúció hastily help him up the bed, babbling from happiness and disbelief. He doesn’t seem to notice them though, as a lazy smile curls his lips upward. “Pretty birds,” he mumbles dazed, and promptly passes out.
It hurts to laugh, but the joy bubbling up Genji’s chest is real, unbelievable, too huge to contain. He laughs and laughs, till he wheezes, because God, Jesse is awake and he is himself, they saved him, he and Hanzo, and he’s so happy.
In the end, everything will be alright.