Still staring at the back of his eyelids , the sunrise was beginning to warm Jamison's face. A bit of dry mouth reminded him he had hit the piss the night before.

Not enough to be hungover, at least.

Content to lie there in the sand just a little longer, he recapped the previous night's activities. He suddenly remembered he had kissed Cookie, and his eyes snapped open.

Looking around, he didn't see her anywhere. Realizing he was stiff from his poor sleeping arrangements, he pushed himself up and strapped the tire back on. After only a few laborious steps towards the ocean for a morning slash, he recalled Cookie mentioning a bathroom and decided to head that way instead.

As he neared the facility, he could faintly hear running water through the crashing waves. Groggily evacuating his bladder, he was oblivious that the sound was Cookie until he heard singing swell from the other side of the wall:

"Myyy heeeart should be well-schooled

'Cause I've been fooled in the past…"

He looked up at the top of the stall, noticing steam coming over where the wall didn't quite reach the ceiling. Finished with his business, he lingered in admiration of her crooning.

"And still I faaall in love too easily

I fall in love too fast

I fall in love too terribly hard

For love to ever laaast."

Overthinking the candid moment he was eavesdropping on, he absent-mindedly flushed the toilet, and the heartfelt vocals turned to screeching. Once he realized what he'd done, he was filled with remorse. "I didn't mean to –"

"Junkrat?!"

"Please, don't stop on my account."

There was a pause. "That was the end of the song," she replied flatly, feeling several shades of vulnerable from being caught singing in the nude.

He moved closer to the barely adequate barrier standing between them, placing a hand against it. "Can we talk?"

"Right now?!"

Her perceived absurdity of his request went ignored. "I feel like last night needs to be addressed."

"How's that?"

"I just want to apologize if I made you uncomfortable or gave you the wrong idea." The hand he wasn't leaning on gestured with his speaking despite her not being able to see. "It was just a friendly kiss, that's all. I didn't even use any tongue…"

"What kiss?" she interrupted in a mild panic, thinking of McCree.

"Wait. Did I dream that?"

"Oh, right!" she exclaimed as the recollection hit her. "No, that happened. We were just drunk, though."

"I wasn't that off my face," he mused.

"It didn't mean anything. You said so yourself. Already forgotten, okay?"

His eyebrow involuntarily cocked. "Just like that?"

"Just like that."

He took a step back away from the wall standing between them as the revelation that it really had meant nothing sank in. "That's a little disappointing," he murmured under his breath.

"Did you say something?" Liz called to him, but she didn't get a reply. "Jamison?" Still nothing. She cut the water off and listened intently for any indication that he was still there. With a towel wrapped around her, she opened the shower stall and peeked her head out. "Junkrat?" Deciding he was gone, she went for her clothes. On top was the roll of gauze he left there for her to rebandage her own legs. She took the gauze in her hand, staring down at it. For a brief moment, she considered that maybe she had hurt his feelings by downplaying the kiss.

He had also shared a bed with her like it was nothing and just walked in on her in the shower to have a conversation. That's just the kind of person he was, oblivious to personal space.

She began wrapping her legs.

Nah, it didn't mean anything to either one of us.


He tried not to let the perceived rejection get to him as he strolled back to the truck. After all, he hadn't intentionally sought after her to begin with. So why did he feel so bad, anyhow?

In search of the answer, the highlights of their conversation the night before rolled through his head, and without realizing it, he was humming the song she had been singing.

"Were you humming?"

The booming interrogatory from his bodyguard snapped him out of it. "Was I?"

"Where's the Sheila?"

"Hmm? Oh she's taking a shower," he said with a careless gesture behind him.

Roadhog just shook his head as the gangly junker came to a stop beside him. "You didn't."

"Did what?"

He just growled.

"Did what?!" Jamison repeated aggressively.

"You really going to pretend this time that you don't know what I'm saying?"

"Nothing happened!" he snapped in defense, suddenly acknowledging his meaning. "When have you ever known me to root the help?"

"You were humming, for fuck's sake."

"I hum all the time."

No response.

"You think you're so funny!" He snatched the bike keys out of Mako's pocket.

"No one's laughing."

"I am," he asserted as he moved past him to the truck's back door, driving his point home with a forced laugh. "The whole thing's just hysterical." He came back with a pack of cigarettes. Tossing the keys at Mako and hitting him in the back, he plopped down beside him and lit one.

Mako ignored his temper tantrum and remained silent despite his partner's frequent leers in his direction.

"It was just a kiss! It didn't mean anything!" he blurted out halfway through his smoke. "She forgot about it already. Literally."

Mako face-palmed. "Goddammit."

"Stop judging me!"

"She's going to ruin everything!"

"No, she's not! Everything is still going according to plan."

"She's coming this way," he grumbled. "Why don't you shut up for once."

"Gladly! Not like I wanna talk to you!"

"I thought you wanted me to be better conversation."

He angrily thumped his cigarette aside and pouted. "Now, who won't shut up?"

When Liz was close enough, she tossed the gauze to him. "Thanks."

Junkrat's eyes, level with her knees, skimmed over the job she had done on her legs. "No worries," he replied automatically in a deflated tone.

"So," she continued, going for her own cigarettes. "I'm one of you now, yeah?"

"Yeah," Roadhog answered with a bite, turning towards Junkrat.

Liz could almost see the glare on his face through the mask. She wasn't sure if it was because she was getting better at reading him the way Junkrat could or if he had intentionally made it as obvious as possible. "Are you two ever going to let me in on your agenda?"

"What's there to know?" Junkrat declared.

"All of it! Why are we in Mexico? Why are we trying to find Sombra? Is your 'treasure' even real or is it just some McGuffin device?"

"Who said it was a device?" he retorted, not catching her meaning.

"Is it… here?" she asked cautiously.

"I don't really approve of this line of questioning." It was the most serious she had ever seen him be.

"Fine, don't tell me, but tell me something. I've been pretty much in the dark this whole time, and if you have really accepted me as part of… whatever this is, I deserve to know."

Junkrat's eyes rolled up and to the side in thought. "Okay, what do you already know about Sombra?"

She shrugged. "She's in a gang. She deals in illicit activities," she said in callback to the last time she tried to get information out of them.

"Yeah, ha ha. Do you know what gang?"

"Not the Deadlock Gang," she said with absolute confidence.

He leaned forward and lowered his tone as if the very words would summon them. "Los Muertos."

"So she would most likely be here in Mexico," she concluded.

Junkrat leaned back once again. "Not likely, mate. She's been really 'busy' here lately, if you know what I mean."

Liz gave him a look of skepticism. "Then why are we here?"

"Los Muertos," he replied matter-of-factly.

"I don't follow."

He beckoned her closer with a finger. Dissatisfied with her hesitance, he grabbed hold of her shorts and yanked her down to the sand with him and Roadhog. "As a 'fan' of ours, I'm sure you know about the Dorado heist."

"Naturally," she responded, forgetting that lie had already been exposed.

His eyes darted up at her briefly as a smirk formed on his face. "Came in through the museum, blasted through a wall adjacent to the vault. Got all the gold we could carry. We had it aaall worked out perfectly and were gone so fast, we never even saw any policia… or Los Muertos."

"So why are you back here if you already robbed the bank?"

"You're asking the wrong questions, mate. What you should be asking is why we're back knowing that we're on Los Muertos' bad side."

"Yeah, and the police."

"¡A la mierda con la policía!"

Liz blinked in disbelief at his use of a Spanish phrase.

"We got the gang's attention once with that robbery, and the idea is if they get wind that we're back, word will get to Sombra. And instead of us tracking her down, she comes to us!"

A layer of concern joined the one of shock she was already wearing. "But that's not… What if they just kill us first?"

Junkrat smiled. "They won't"

"Okay, for the sake of argument, let's say they aren't going to kill us. How do you plan on getting their attention?"

"Who's to say we haven't already? We haven't really been on our best behavior since we got here."

"So, what then, are we just going to sit on this beach until Sombra shows up?"

"Nah, that won't work. If we stay too quiet, they may think we have already left, and it won't be worth Sombra's time to come back from… wherever. We have to stir up some more shit." He began rifling through his pockets. "…Even bigger shit."

She shook her head. "Why didn't you stick around after the heist last time you were here and wait for her then?"

"The agenda was different back then," he replied distractedly. "Had something else cooking." He stopped digging around and pulled out a folded up napkin, handing it over.

Having not unfolded it yet, she immediately recognized the napkin from her diner. "This… Was this your plan before you picked me up?"

"Mmm, sorta," Junkrat squeaked as Roadhog rocked a palm back and forth in agreeance. "We hadn't quite finished working out the details at the time. It doesn't matter now. Are you in or not?"

"Fuck, in for a penny, in for a pound." She unfolded the plans and began looking over the surprisingly legible scribbles from a man of his madness. "Let's do this."


"Tonight's breaking news, the junkers have been spotted in Mexico again…"

"Esta noche, en las noticias a las 11, parece que 'los junkers' han regresado. El metraje de la cámara de seguridad mostró que una mujer estaba con ellos…"

"…This time, with a female accomplice known as 'The Cook'…"

"…La Cocinera…"

"News reports from Mexico say they were out to do much more damage this time, reducing an entire LumériCo plant to nothing but rubble..."

"... una tarea difícil de lograr ..."

"…leaving large amounts of the city of Dorado without power. At this time, we can't say for certain what their motives were…"

"…Con razones desconocidas. Los testigos recuerdan su testimonio del evento, diciendo que había una ..."

"…A 'big bada-boom'…"

"I still don't get you, Cookie." Junkrat casually rambled on as they continued to rig the base of the LumériCo plant with explosives in almost total darkness. "At first, I thought you were just sucking up to us at the diner to save your own ass. Totally understandable, I can respect that. We gave you plenty of opportunities after that to leave, though, and you didn't take 'em."

Liz grabbed another spool of wire from Junkrat's bag and flitted back to work. She found the whole situation nerve-wracking enough without his out-loud speculating and just wanted to get done as fast as possible.

"And then when you rode off on our chopper back in the States, I thought for sure we'd never see you again. But you came back and saved us."

"Ok, maybe I was trying to save my own ass at first." The distraction of decorating the building's basement with bombs like it was Christmas garland was making more truth come out of her than she intended. "And maybe this whole job right now is giving me more anxiety than I have ever experienced in my entire life."

Junkrat laughed. "Is it?"

She breathed easy, noticing her uncalculated prattles derailed his original line of questioning. "I know it's the middle of the night, so there shouldn't be anyone inside this building, but..."

"But what?"

"I only have a feeble grasp on how much damage this is going to do, and I still feel like this is overkill, like we're going to wipe out half the town and the people in it."

"Eh heh heh, that's precious! You do know you don't actually care about that, right?"

"Uh, yeah. I do."

"No, you don't, mate."

"I'm telling you, I do. Someone's going to get hurt."

"I hear what you're saying but… Ok, you know how dogs don't really know words?"

"What?!" She glared at him. "Are you calling me a dog?"

"No, no, not at all!" He back-pedaled. "Just, try to keep up. Dogs don't know words. They can learn a few commands and stuff, but most of the time, they aren't listening to the actual words. They're listening to the tone."

"Uh huh."

His words stalled as he tried to carefully collect his thoughts, but his hands never quit working at the explosives. "Okay. So. You can call a dog an ugly, stupid piece of shit, and tell him you're gonna slit his throat, but if you say it all sweet and happy, he'll waaag and smiiile and wiggle. Conversely, you can tell him you love him, but if you yell it? He'll either tuck tail or attack, depending on the dog." He snickered to himself in recollection of some unshared memory. "Trust me, I know from experience."

"Which one of us is the dog in this analogy?"

"Hmm…. Me? I guess?"

"What's your point?"

"I've heard everything you've been saying about casualties and collateral damage and all that junk –"

"'All that junk.' Yeah, you've really been listening."

"I have! But what I'm telling ya is I know you don't mean it because of your tone. I hear what you're really saying and reading your body language, and I can tell you don't believe any of that stuff yourself."

Wanting a cigarette she couldn't have at the moment, she unwittingly scratched at her metal arm. "So you're calling me a liar?"

"Takes one to know one, mate."

"Oh, fuck you!"

"Yeah, yeah, fuck me, but I just showed you you're not fooling me. The thing is I don't really think it's me you want to convince."

Her hands waved sarcastically. "Ooh, look at you! You figured me out, and the twist is I'm lying to myself! Good one, Freud."

"Actually, that's not what I'm saying either. I think you're just trying to be someone you're not."

"And why would I do that?"

"I dunno," he replied automatically, much more focused on his work than this conversation. "Probably for that Jesse bloke."

Liz dropped what she was doing. "Fuck you."

"Fuck me, again? I must really be hitting a nerve, hahahaha."

Bitter, she resumed her job. "Oh, well, you're a kindred liar, too, so let me see if I can figure out who you're trying to impress with your body count. Hmm…"

"It's not that I enjoy killing a bunch of people. I'm either in it for the fireworks or the money. I'm not that hard to figure out, Cookie." He momentarily glanced up to watch her deftly snip away at the extra length of wires, despite her dominant hand being freshly replaced. Flipping her knife shut, she tossed it in her palm a coupled times just for flair, and he smirked. "See there? I like you much better when you're just being yourself."

"How's that?"

"Don't take this the wrong way, Cookie, but that's gotta be the sexiest use of a knife I've ever seen."

"Of course you would think that." His comment made her forget why she was angry. "And here I thought you were gonna tease me about its size."

"It is bloody small."

She came over to where he was and leaned over him as his fingers worked furiously at the detonator.

"You still got it handy?"

"Yeah?"

He pulled a wire taut. "Give this a slice for me, eh?"

She cut where he indicated and spun her knife around idly. "What would you do without me?"

"Perish," he joked as he secured the severed end. After a couple moments, he could feel her focus lift from the detonator to his face. Instinctively, he returned her gaze. They stared at each other in uncomfortable silence for a moment before he squeaked, "What?"

With no preamble, she closed in and gave him a quick peck on the lips, leaving him confused.

"What was that for?!"

Grinning, she stood. "Friendly kiss. No tongue."

Junkrat shook it off and finished setting up the blasting cap. "C'mon, let's go."

Emerging into an alleyway through the tiny basement window, Roadhog was already there waiting for them in the freshly retuned food truck idling quiet as a whisper. He had spent the past few days modifying the engine while Liz and Junkrat were getting materials together for the plan, and Junkrat had even finished it off with a new paint job - a toothy yellow smiley face with X's for eyes.

"How many?" Roadhog asked him.

"Seven."

Liz looked to Junkrat as the truck pulled off. "Seven what?"

"City blocks."

Her eyes widened as she caught on. "Is the blast really going to reach that far?"

"Nah, I added a few blocks for good measure."

Exactly seven city blocks away atop a hill with a good vantage point of the city, Roadhog turned the truck around and put it in park. Junkrat was already giggling before he even had the detonator in hand. "Ready?"

Roadhog nodded, and Liz pushed the shades from her head down over her eyes. "Guess so."

His fingers twitched with excitement, hovering over the blinking red button. "3…2…" More giggles. "…1…"

Liz's body tensed in anticipation as his thumb pushed down on the button, but nothing happened.

With an eyebrow cocked, Junkrat examined the detonator. He shook it a couple times. "1…" He pushed it in again. Still nothing. "Where's the kaboom?!" He repeatedly punched the button in. "There's supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom!"

Liz slowly pulled her shades off. "What happened?"

"Hog, take us back!" Junkrat demanded.

This time, the truck took off at break-neck speed.

As they neared the plant, Junkrat opened the passenger door and the wind whipped his golden hair wildly around his face. He grabbed onto the door frame and held up four fingers on his other hand.

Roadhog grunted. "Four?"

Junkrat's brow lowered. "Four," he echoed in a menacing tone just before he hopped out of the still-moving vehicle.

Liz shot Roadhog a look of concern. "We're not going to wait for him?"

"No, he said four." With that, he pushed the pedal to the floor.

Jamison scrambled back to the same narrow window they had used before and shimmied down into the basement, all the while cursing under his breath. He was positive Cookie had made a mistake, because when it came to kabooms, he doesn't come a gutser. No, not Jamison Fawkes.

His fingers slid down every wire they had draped along the walls of that room, the slick plastic coating gently gliding across the skin of his thumb and forefinger. It was sensual to him like tracing the figure of a lover, and all went smooth as silk, much to his surprise. He examined some of the connections more closely, but still found nothing wrong. At last, he returned to the most important part – the blasting cap. Finding it poorly attached to the remote detonation device, a gasp escaped his lips. "It wasn't Cookie."

As he went to work properly securing it, he thought back to the moment he placed it, the distractions he faced. He could have already cracked a fat watching Cookie getting flustered with him and bending over all those bombs, but then she came at him with that unwarranted peck. What was she trying to pull?

Filled with determination, he was going to make damn sure this thing would blow this time. "This goes in here, that goes in there…"

Still elbow deep in the on the fly modifications, the door swung open, and he found himself at the business end of two pistols wielded by security guards. "¡No te muevas!"

He put his hands up with a knowing grin.

"¿Dónde está la chica de la cámara de seguridad?"

"Don't shoot, amigo." With his hands still level with his head, he wiggled a finger down at the tangle of wires in his lap. "Explosivo."

The guards froze in fear. One of them hesitantly reached for the radio at his belt, mumbling a lot of Spanish words into it that Jamison didn't know.

He slowly rose to his feet and began backing towards the window.

"¡No te muevas! ¡No te muevas o dispararé!"

"You should really leave." He made the walking away gesture with two fingers as legs. "Vamanos or whatever. Grande bomba. Big badda boom."

The terror grew in one of the guard's eyes, and he suddenly dropped his gun, taking off up the stairs like a lightning bolt. His partner watched him disappear from over his shoulder, never taking his gun off Jamison. When he turned back, realization lit up on his face. "Eres ese junker que explotó en el banco."

Jamison's grin widened as he motioned with both hands to the door. In an intimidating whisper, he hissed, "Go."

The other guard holstered his pistol, raising his fists. "¡No!"

Jamison burst into laughter. "Really?! Alright, ya cunt, let's do this!" He stood perfectly still as the guard came at him. At the very last second, he slid his peg leg in front of him, tripping his assailant. He hit the ground with a groan, immediately reaching for the junker's peg, but Jamison delicately hopped out of his reach, getting closer to the window. As the guard pushed himself to his feet, Jamison sucker punched him in the face one good time with all he had. Stomping one foot on the guard's groin he gave himself a boost up to the window. The guard weakly grabbed for the his legs, but missed.

Once outside, Jamison took off running down the alleyway. Behind him came the flopping echoes of footsteps as the stubborn guard continued to pursue him. "Persistent!" he shouted to his stalker. "I love it!"

"¡Boca de pedo!"

Coming to a dead end, Jamison skid to a clumsy stop and turned to face the guard. The guard slowed to a halt several feet away. With a satisfied chuckle, he pointed the gun at him once again as he whipped out some cuffs.

"Not today," Junkrat said, raising the remote detonator. "You'll always remember this as the day you almost caught Jamison 'Junkrat' Fawkes!"

"¿Qué?"

"Dammit," he griped to himself. "Can't believe I wasted that zinger on this guy."

While he was still lamenting the loss of his joke, the guard suddenly fired a "warning" shot at him, grazing his shoulder.

Jamison jerked back from the blast and grabbed his wound, doubling over in pain. "Ah, fuck me dead!"

The guard laughed heartily. "Te dije que no te movieras…"

He growled, positioning his finger over the trigger. "You think that's funny? Get a load ah this!" He pushed in the button and the entire sky momentarily lit up like it was day as the LumériCo building quaked and crumbled in on itself so massively, it looked like slow motion. All of the streetlights and light pouring out from inside homes and residences went black in a wave of darkness spreading outward from the plant until the only visible illumination came from the explosion's flames towering up into the heavens in a grand, surrealistic display, and Jamison gleefully got to watch the whole thing from above as the blast sent him flying backwards across the city.

Only fools don't look back at their own explosion.