Chapter 4 - Opposites Attract, or a Study in Similarities
Colonel Gérard Lacroix returned from, as he put it "playing tech support for people who don't read manuals." He looked forward to escaping the heat, avoiding any more sand, and enjoying the company of his wife. Assuming he could get her out of that greenhouse, anyway.
"For some reason, not only are the stylized lilies selling, but chrysanthemums are also flying off the shelves" she'd said.
"Maybe you were right about this" replied Gérard. He'd initially believed Amélie's request for cultural funding strange, even silly, but it seemed to be having a motivating effect on the nearby populace.
The pair walked through the large greenhouse. Amélie stopped in confusion at a large space cleared for a plant she'd heard of, but not seen.
"Vishkar's people dropped this by" explained the Colonel. "They were trying to show goodwill before the City of Paris rejected their proposed redevelopment contract. Some lady named 'Symmetra' brought it to the regional Overwatch command here."
She made a mental note to warn the children to be careful around the Himalayan giant lily.
"It is supposed to bloom soon, but that's relative" said her husband. "Four to seven years."
"Oh really? Since when do you pay attention to anything about plants?" she teased. "Last I checked, you said if I keep talking to them, I'll turn into one and you'll have to water me too!"
"I, uhh… I looked it up" he confessed. Seeing a muddy copy of InsideWatch: Your Guide to the World's Greatest Heroes open on a shelf, he gave as good as he got. "So you do read that magazine you always say is only useful as scrap paper for covering plants in the winter! Ha!"
Truth be told, though their hobbies and lines of work were almost completely opposite one another, it made for very similar people in other ways. Of course, they hardly knew it upon first meeting. Amélie Labelle was a museum conservator whose only involvement with Overwatch had been filing claims against them after one of their high-tech aircraft crashed into the entryway to her building. Thankfully, very little of value was damaged or lost, "but it's the principle" she'd insisted, "that this place be made whole again."
The fact that Overwatch agents then proceeded to blow up the downed aircraft, causing more damage, made her even angrier.
"I'm sorry, miss. This vehicle's technology cannot be allowed to fall into the hands of Talon!"
Whoever this person was, he seemed to already have his mind elsewhere.
"Listen here" (she looked down at his namebadge, "G. Lacroix," before getting in his face) "mister Lacroix. You are either going to authorize repairs or direct me to someone who will. It's bad enough that the governments of the world obsessively fund Overwatch while everything else goes to ruin. The least you could do is pretend to care!"
Gérard recoiled as if slapped. He'd never encountered anybody this insistent on what he explained was Restoration Protocol 37—that, at least on paper, Overwatch assumed some financial burden should its operations cause "unacceptable" damage to uninvolved civilian property.
"So I fill out these three forms. Hand one to you, send one to Overwatch itself, and keep the last for my own records?"
The Colonel hoped that would be the last he'd see of this feisty Amélie woman. She'd barged into his office the moment it opened to the public the day after she'd received Restoration Protocol 37 forms, absolutely demanding to see him. He awkwardly handed her a pot of lilies he'd purchased out of his own pocket. Even if Overwatch itself played fast and loose, he could, as she accused him of, "pretend to care."
She stared, then glared at him.
"And I suppose your agents have been digging up information on me, finding ways to buy me off?" she pouted.
"I'm sorry, miss, I didn't mean…"
"Lilies are my favorite flower" she replied. "Unless it was just dumb luck…"
How a grizzled Colonel on a government salary could win the affections of a knockout woman ten years his junior with whom he had profound philosophical disagreements was a secret the couple never told, other than saying "it was a long dance." As much as their worldviews differed, each remained fiercely devoted to their causes without creating conflict between themselves.
The greenhouse required a wholesale career change, resulting in Amélie handing in a resignation letter so she could tend to her plants full-time. Her off-budget kindness stretched their resources still further, but if Gérard ever noticed anything funny in the finances, he never brought it up.
The next morning, Amélie found a pack of five brand-new, official YOURwatch action figures on the greenhouse counter, including the very-rare Hovering Mercy.