Tracer was getting bored. Sitting in the Mantis, waiting for the others return, was bad enough. She felt pushed to the side, ignored, unwanted. But to make matters worse she was having to babysit. Hanzo Shimada, son of the general, heir of the Dragon, the oh-so-important hostage they had captured in Japan…

And for what? She didn't understand his value. Perhaps there was some ulterior motive that only Widowmaker knew about, but as far as Tracer could see he was useless. They had gone to Japan to try and rescue Genji. How had they managed to bring back his brother instead?

She'd already taken off his gag. If she was to sit alone here she would be doing it with company. Boredom was one thing. Silence was another.

'You knew my brother.' Hanzo said.

Tracer was playing with her guns, twisting them over and around her fingers, pretending she was ready for action when in fact she was more ready for a nap.

'Very well. Probably better than you.'

Hanzo shrugged as well as he could with hands tied. 'Probably.'

He had not made any pleas or bargains. Nor had he attacked her verbally, made threats, or tried to escape. In fact if one thing could be said about Hanzo it was that he faced his current situation with dignity and honour. In a way she had expected no less. And yet, in another way, Genji had been so different. Where had these brothers parted ways? At what point in their lives had they chosen such different paths, become such different men?

'Do you know what your comrades plan to do with me?' Hanzo asked.

'No.' She figured honesty was the best policy. Hanzo was not her enemy, specifically. He just happened to be the enemy of someone she was currently working with. Although she did not like him either. His family drama with Genji might have been personal, but last time Tracer had seen him Hanzo had been beating Genji to a pulp.

'Then I suppose I shall just wait my fate.' Hanzo bowed his head. He was either meditating or praying, it was hard to tell which. Tracer watched him absently.

She explored the Mantis. It was a nice ship, with a few pokey rooms. The cockpit had over a dozen glowing screens, each depicting various parts of the ship either through cameras of analysis relays. The main space had a few tables and chairs, as well as a basketball hoop which had been hung up over the first aid kits. She amused herself by throwing a few hoops, and cheered when she got it in.

At some point Hanzo must have stopped praying. He was watching her with something like amusement.

'You are having fun?'

'Not really. This is pretty fuckin' boring.'

The archer cocked his head to one side. 'You're English, aren't you?'

Initially Tracer had tried to hide her accent. She had also tried to hide her name. Genji had done the same. They had not known if they would find enemies or spies in the USA, but it was worth the precaution, or so they had thought at the time. Now it hardly mattered.

'Sure am. Name's Tracer. We're in England now, actually.'

This, finally, warranted a reaction from the Japanese warrior. 'We're in England? Why!'

At this convenient time Tracer flickered in the air and reappeared where she had been standing several moments ago. Hanzo's eyes widened even further as he followed her movements through the air. She started to respond, then it happened again, and she dashed forward again.

'What is that?' Hanzo asked.

'Something happened to me when I was brought back to life… It's like I'm living on borrowed time, and the universe hasn't quite managed to rectify the problem yet. I don't understand why, so don't ask me. All I know is that other people have been brought back to life as well, and they haven't faced these problems.'

'But…' Hanzo didn't know what to say. 'But what is that?'

'Well, it seems I can jump back and forth in time. Sometimes I can control it, but usually not. That's why we're in England. We're looking for someone who can help us find someone who can help.'

Hanzo raised an eyebrow. 'Sounds convoluted.'

'It is, a bit. But I think the others are…'

Tracer never finished her sentence. The side of the Mantis shook as something bumped against it – something that was either very big, very heavy, or very angry. She exchanged a glance with Hanzo, who shrugged unhelpfully, then moved to the window to look outside…

There were dead rising. Dozens of them. Men and women, all armed and dangerous. They must have been left behind by the others when they attacked King's Row. Tracer felt her pace quicken. This was not good. They would surround the Mantis and tear it apart unless she could stop them, but she could hardly do all that alone.

'Fuck!' She swore loudly. She hated the way the dead never stayed dead anymore. Ever since the Fallout something had happened. Something bad. The barriers between life and death and time were not as strong as they should have been, and sometimes it seemed like she was the only one dealing with the consequences.

'What is it?' Hanzo asked.

'Dead. Lots of them.'

Hanzo frowned. 'New dead? Don't tell me Widowmaker and her team just left them lying around! In Japan we have spaces for the people who are about to die, so that we can quarantine them and…'

'Shut up!' Tracer screamed at him. There was no time to discuss proper ways of dealing with corpses. She needed to find a solution, and fast.

She opened the main door of the ship and stepped outside. The first few dead were already within reaching distance. She sprayed with her pulse pistols, dropping the closest ones to her, then leapt forward and killed two more. One of the dead raised his gun and started firing in her direction. It was pure luck that she flickered backwards in time and avoided the bullets. The dead adapted his aim and Tracer was forced to find cover behind the wing of the Mantis.

The dead rarely used weapons. They lacked the coordination to pull it off effectively. Maybe they knew that, maybe not, but the fact was most didn't even try, with the exception of a few simple weapons like clubs or axes. But guns was very rare. She wasn't worried, exactly. She doubted she would be hit at this distance. But the dead were getting closer, and without someone to watch her back it would make it very difficult to fight off the horde. What she needed was someone like Widowmaker to pick off the targets at a distance, thin out the crowd…

She turned back to the Mantis. Damn it. This was not what she wanted, but she was lacking much of a choice. She had someone like Widowmaker. She needed to make use of him. He might escape afterwards – she doubted she had the strength to stop him – but the fact was she didn't really care. He was Widowmaker's prisoner, not hers. She hated him for what he'd done to Genji, but that would have to wait.

She darted back into the ship where Hanzo was sitting, still tied up, now looking a little more anxious.

'I didn't hear much shooting. Have you killed them all, again?'

'Not exactly. There's too many for me to fight alone. I don't want to do this, but…' She leaned over and untied him in a few swift movements. He retrieved his bow and quiver from a locker on the wall and tested the string.

'Perfect.' He said. 'Let's go.'

As it was, she soon realised she had left it too late. The dead were surrounding the Mantis. She darted out, killed a few, and darted back inside. Hanzo picked off the one with the gun. But another of them picked it up, then a few more of them started collecting abandoned weapons from the floor. They were truly trapped inside the cathedral now. Trapped inside the Mantis, really.

'I'm going out again.' Tracer told her companion. 'Cover me.'

Hanzo fired again, and again. The dead fell. But those that did not take shots to the head often stood back up again and closed in.

Tracer flickered forward through time, then again. She drew them away from the Mantis, creating some space, then danced around the shambling undead, her pulse pistols firing constantly. A few fell, a few more closed in. She felt one lash at her arm – he tore through skin and muscle. Blood splattered upwards, outwards, spraying horrifically…

She flickered backwards. Time reverted, and to her surprise the wound on her arm healed as well. She had not expected that to happen. Perhaps this unpredictable curse was more helpful than she had first realised.

'They're all around us!' Hanzo called. 'Stand back!'

He picked an arrow from his quiver, this time one with a different coloured tip. He pulled the bowstring back and fired it into the mass of enemies. It split apart as it hit the ground, throwing fragments in all directions, taking half a dozen of the undead down in a single blow.

It wasn't enough. There were still more, and they were already on the ramp of the Mantis. They would soon be inside. There was nowhere left to run.

'Shut the door!' Hanzo called.

Tracer had thought of that, but the door did not respond to her command. She'd thought of trying to fly the ship out of the cathedral to safety, but that wasn't working either. Whether the Mantis required a key or a password she didn't know, but it didn't matter. She had neither.

'I can't!' She took a few steps back, firing as she moved. But the heavy press of bodies was too thick, too heavy. The dead she killed again were pushed forward like shields and behind them came a wave of closely advancing zombies. Hanzo was firing as fast as he could but his arrows seemed to be doing little but making pincushions of his foes.

'Then we are in grave trouble.' Hanzo was also stepping backwards now. The undead were filling the Mantis, pressing up towards the cockpit. Tracer emptied yet another clip into their mass, and took the head off one of the enemies.

She needed time, just a few seconds to think. There must be another way out of this death trap, she just couldn't see it yet. A few seconds distraction would be…

The fire extinguisher hanging by the door glinted red. She took aim and fired. The rapid expelling air whooshed from the small container and it was thrown upwards into the air, knocking first one, then two undead in the skull. A cloud of the smoky product filled the main cabin of the ship and the zombie-figures slowed their advance, confused and disorientated.

It had given Tracer the moment she needed.

She turned back to the cockpit. She couldn't use the ship itself, but there must be something, some kind of weapon. If not, this was the last minute she would spend on earth.

Hanzo turned to her as he fired his last arrow. 'I'm sorry, Tracer. It was an honour fighting with you.'

Tracer didn't even look at him. She was rummaging through every drawer and compartment she could find in the cockpit. A gun that Soldier 76 had left behind, or an explosive belonging to Junkrat, if there was anything at all that she could…

As soon as she spotted it she did not wait to tell Hanzo what she'd found. She simply picked it up, turned back to the undead, and called out to them.

'Looks like you need a time out!' She wasn't sure why that phrase came to mind, except of course that there was a play on the theme of time. The item gripped hard in her hand she prepared to dash forward through time, and crossed her fingers – hopefully this time it worked properly.

She flickered forwards once, right into the midst of the undead, then again, beyond them, outside the Mantis and into the main cathedral. Then once more time. Three forward dashes. She had just cleared the back of the pack of undead and now stood behind them, waving, drawing them out into the open.

They had taken the bait exactly as planned, not even staying to finish off Hanzo. They piled out of the Mantis in seconds, a huge throng of them gathering, reaching for her…

She tossed the pulse bomb into their midst and saw it stick itself to one of the walking dead. They stopped to look at it. She grinned. The odds of finding one of those in the Mantis had been slim, and yet Widowmaker was a soldier. Pulse bombs weren't used very often anymore, but only a few years ago they had been standard issue.

She flickered back in time, appearing where she had been standing only a few seconds ago, right beside Hanzo. He was a little pale, and very confused.

'What was that?' He asked.

'Bombs away.' She winked.

The Mantis shivered as the force of the blast rocked it, just a little, the gentle caress of a powerful bomb. Tracer did double check that the dead were all dead, but she hadn't needed to. That particular explosive was more than enough to clear the area.

She wondered if there were any more of them stashed aboard the ship…