Hi, guys!
I hope you guys enjoyed the last chapter and were surprised by the big reveal in the previous one.
As I said before, I have been trying to write more frequently for you guys, although school has started again and I'll be partly busy with homework, I will try to get new chapters out at least every three days.
I want to thank everyone who wrote reviews for me. Today, I was having a bad morning and school sucked, so I checked my reviews and saw one that really made my day. Thank you so much. I really do appreciate it.
Please enjoy chapter seven!
Chapter 7
I wake up the next morning in the men's quarters, my leg throbbing painfully. It's 6:00 AM and I'm the first up. I walk to the bathroom to brush my teeth and hair and, when I come out, McCree is out of bed, standing at the open closet.
"Morning, Jack," he says groggily.
"Hey, Jesse," I respond. I head to the closet to get ready. McCree fastens his belt, the buckle shining with the letters B.A.M.F.
"Just what in the hell happened to you yesterday?" he inquires. "You looked like you'd seen a ghost, spawning in the ship. What was that crap you said before you passed out?"
I remain quiet and pull a black shirt over my head.
"We don't keep no secrets on this team, so you better tell me wha-"
"Reyes, Jesse," I growl.
"Wait, are you talking about Gabriel Reyes?" McCree cries. "Are you out of your goddamn mind, boy? Gabriel Reyes is dead, long dead!"
Reinhardt stirs in his slumber, turning to face the wall.
"Keep it down, will you?" I hiss, not wanting to wake the sleeping giant and Swedish dwarf in the beds across the room.
"What do you mean, Jack?" says McCree, quieter now.
"Can we please just talk about this later?" I say.
"No secrets, Jack," he insists.
"Fine," I say, defeated. "But you can't tell Reinhardt, or anyone else. Jesse, you need to promise me you won't say a word."
"That's a promise. Now, what happened," asks McCree.
I look uneasily at Reinhardt, stirring in his sleep again, and grab McCree by the elbow to take him outside.
"What the-" begins McCree.
"Just keep walking, Jesse," I groan, pulling at his arm. "Listen. We can't talk in here. No one can know what I'm about to tell you."
He doesn't respond but stops resisting my pull and walks out into the hallway with me. He leans against the wall and gestures to me as if to say "Go on. Tell."
So I tell him everything as quickly as possible, starting with what happened after the Swiss Headquarters was blown up and ending with my fight with Ziegler. When I finish, he stares at me with solemn but shocked eyes.
"We've been fighting Reaper for almost a year, Jack. How could we have not known?" McCree says.
"No one told us," I respond.
"Did anyone besides Angela know the truth?"
"I have no idea," I reply.
All of a sudden, the door to our room opens and Reinhardt steps out in full armor and stretches his arms over his head, mouth agape with a yawn. He sees us in the hall and squints his eyes suspiciously.
"What are you doing out here?" he grunts, walking over to us. I hold my breath, my lungs squeezing in nervously.
"We both woke up early and went to play pool in the rec room," says McCree, covering for us. "Thanks," I mouth behind Reinhardt's back. McCree half-grins.
"Well, get ready for today," Reinhardt says. "We're going to Ilios."
"Sure," I say, and start to walk toward the door but stop to ask Reinhardt something. "Is anyone else up?" I ask.
"Angela's in the bathroom," he says. "And Tracer's awake, but she's getting dressed. Don't go in there."
"I won't," McCree and I assure in unison. We walk back down the hall to the quarters.
I go to the closet to finish getting dressed while McCree heads into the bathroom to get rid of his pungent morning breath. I see Mercy's yellow hair out of the corner of my eye, settled against a white tank top, but I don't go to say hello. I know that she probably hates me right now and I need to give her space. But then I remember what she said. When she told me she loves me. I don't know if that's true anymore. I shake my head, as if I'm shaking away the thought.
I take a pair of army pants off of a rack in the closet and pull them on over my still clean boxers. Then, I put my boots on. Lastly, I grab my prized leather jacket with the big, red 76 on the back off of the top shelf and put it on. I zip it up and I'm ready to go.
McCree leaves the bathroom and we walk to the kitchen together. I start to make coffee.
"Her eyes were all red," says McCree in a low voice from the counter.
"What? Who?" I ask, confused.
"Angela," he answers. "She was definitely crying."
"Shit, Jesse," I say, walking to the counter to wait for the coffee. "It's my fault. I never should have said what I said."
"I can't disagree with you on that, Jack," mutters McCree, and pushes his toast around on his plate with his finger.
"I fucked up," I say.
He nods in response. We sit in silence for a minute as I wait for my coffee to be done.
"You know, Jes," I start, "She said she loves me. She really meant that. How could I say that to her, how could I tell her that I couldn't trust her."
"Well, Jack...I don't know," says McCree. "Do you think you can trust her?"
Before I can answer, the door to the girls' room opens and Tracer walks out, with Mercy following close behind. Her eyes are red, rimmed with black. She stares down at the floor.
"Morning, ladies," McCree greets, pulling the brim of his hat slightly down in a polite gesture.
"Hey, Jesse," replies Tracer giddily.
"Hello, McCree," Mercy says quietly with a forced smile.
Tracer sits down across from me and Mercy sits next to her, looking anywhere but at me.
"Hi, Jack," greets Tracer.
"Hey," I answer. I get up to grab the coffee from the machine and get my #1 Dad mug from the cabinet. I pour some coffee and sit back down as Torbjörn walks out of our quarters.
"Hello," he says, jolly as usual. Greetings are exchanged and Torbjörn sits down at the end of the table, struggling to mount the barstool.
"So," he says to me. "What's the plan, Stan?"
"Alright," I begin. "We're attacking at Ilios today. It's King of the Hill, so both teams will be trying to get on the objective at the same time. I say we attack when they don't expect it. We need to plan ahead. We didn't do that last time, and I think that's what got us into trouble. We'll cut through a side passage and come out onto the bridge after they get to the point. We'll attack them while they're capping it. After that, all we need to do is fight them off. Since they don't have a healer, they won't have support. On the other hand, we will."
I glance at Mercy, unable to help myself and find her listening intently. That's good.
"They won't see it coming so they won't be ready when we attack. For the next round, we do the same thing, but we split up. We'll be at the lighthouse, so there are plenty of ways to get to the point. Hopefully, there won't be a third round, but if there is, we stick to our plan from the first round. We'll go behind the safe-house to the left of the point and emerge from there to attack. They might not see it coming because we had a different plan for the previous round. If we do this right, it shouldn't backfire. Are we clear?"
They all nod in unison. I get up and the team follows me to the air hangar. My leg hurts when I walk on it and I clench my teeth.
"I'll heal it when I get my staff," says Mercy, seeing my limp. I nod.
We get to the ship and grab our weapons from the rack. I put my tactical visor over my eyes, nose, and mouth. We walk into the ship and Mercy points her Caduceus staff at me. I feel a familiar warmth course through my veins and my leg instantly feels better.
"Thanks," I murmur.
I sit down in a seat in between McCree and Tracer. Torbjörn waddles up the stairs to input the location on the ship's monitor. He then comes back down and sits across from us, next to Mercy. He buckles his seatbelt and we take off. We ride mostly in silence except for McCree.
"Got a light, Jack?" asks McCree halfway through the ride. He holds a fat Rocky Patel in between his index and middle fingers.
"Sure," I say, pulling a neon green lighter from my jacket pocket. I flick it on, lighting the color-flecked end of the cigar. He puffs like a locomotive through the second half of the ride.
We arrive in Ilios in a little under five minutes and get out of the ship only to be blinded by sunlight. The courtyard is filled with an eerie silence and we form in a circle on the ancient stones. We do our team cheer to give the other team the chance the te to the point, as I planned. Torbjörn counts off and we fling our hands into the hot summer sky.
"Team!" we shout, then break up the circle.
We walk across cracked stone toward the bridge next to the point. The ground is worn in areas and weeds grow through most of the cracks in between the stone slabs. I feel the smoke from McCree's cigar, warm and dry on the back of my already sweating neck.
"Alright, everyone," I say quietly as I duck into the shade of at white, sun-dried mud shelter. "We need to be completely quiet here. We're close to the bridge and I think I can hear them on the point."
I listen closely and hear a high voice, Australian, from the point.
"It's a great day for some mayhem!" yells Junkrat distantly. He cackles, and the sound travels all the way up here, growing louder as we get closer to the bridge.
I can see the thin plank of wood, the bridge, from where I stand. I creep closer and wait, trying to pick up more voices.
"Where are they?" Zarya questions.
"I don't know," says another voice, possibly Mei, "but I'm getting tired of waiting."
"Wait no more," I taunt, keeping my voice low.
I look over my shoulder at McCree and nod my head forward, gesturing to go. He nods a yes and we run forward onto the wooden bridge, breaking into the sun with our guns at the ready.
I drop in first, surprising Junkrat, who has his back to me until my boots make a loud bang behind him. Junkrat swivels around and launches a bomb, which skims my right shoulder and flies away without pain. I shoot at his head getting in a critical hit, but he's already prepared his concussion mine, which he throws at my head, setting it off and making my ears ring for a few seconds. I start shooting again and my bullets scatter all over his thin, bare chest. He dies, falling backward onto tough stone. The rest of my team has jumped in now, with the exception of Torbjörn, who has built a turret on the bridge and is now upgrading it. Reinhardt fights next to me. He swings his hammer at Mei, bringing it down on her chest. She clutches her breasts and stumbles back. Regaining her posture, Mei closes her eyes and generates a cocoon of ice around her body to regain health. Reinhardt prepares to charge her into the wall when she breaks free. He charges just as the ice shatters around Mei in smaller chunks. He pins her to a wall, the immense force knocking her dead.
"I need healing," I cry.
"So do I," yells Mercy, rushing over to where I am.
I pull out my biotic field and slam it on the ground, creating a familiar yellow circle of light.
"Thanks," she sighs, looking at the ground.
"Who got you?" I ask, as yellow tendrils crawl warmly under my skin, closing my wounds.
"I didn't see them," Mercy replies.
"Widowmaker," we both claim at once.
"I'll go look for her," I suggest. "You should stay here; help out."
She nods as the yellow field surrounding us closes into its capsule. I pick it up and head off as Mercy heals McCree, who is being damaged by Symmetra's turrets as he shoots them one by one.
I run up the incline and turn the corner, hiding behind a thick pillar so that Widowmaker, who could be anywhere, can't find me. I then emerge and run on my tip-toes across the courtyard toward the battered ruins of a small square building. I can't see the roof from where I am now, and I assume Widowmaker could be up there with a perfect view of the battle raging below.
As I head into the dilapidated room, I notice that the only light source comes from a tiny rectangular window near the ceiling. It shines a dusty spotlight onto a complex tile mosaic, now coated in dirt. I head silently up the stairs, careful not to trip over one of many fist-sized rocks scattered on the steps. Once, I get to the top, I see the sunlight shining on a long, purple ponytail.
Widowmaker has her eye pressed to the scope of her rifle and I am able to sneak up on her with ease. Not wanting to risk death in another firefight, I simply aim my un at her head and pull a red trigger situated at the back of the weapon. Three helix rockets shoot out of the gun and collide with Widowmaker's purple ponytail. She collapses off of the roof and I find myself hoping that no one saw her death.
Like Widowmaker, I can see the entire battlefield from here. I watch McCree, having now destroyed all of Symmetra's turrets, battling Symmetra herself. He aims at her shoulder and shoots as she connects her weapon to his stomach, slowly draining his health. He shoots again and hits her head, killing her. Next to him, Reinhardt fights both Zarya and Reaper. Reaper gets a shot in at his helmet, but it doesn't do much damage, knocking Reinhardt back instead. Reinhardt prepares to charge and takes down Reaper, pinning him to the same wall he had previously killed Mei against. He now only has Zarya left to fight. She shoots him in the chest with a ball of light, weakening him greatly. Reinhardt pulls his hammer back, preparing for a fire-strike, but Zarya notices the warning sign, having faced this attack before. She yanks her gun back toward her chest, creating a shimmering pink-purple bubble around her body. Reinhardt's fire-strike hits her straight in the head, only strengthening her. She finishes him off, pointing her laser in his direction, and burning a hole through his chest. He falls down with a final groan.
At this sight, I rush down the stairs and out of the building to get to the objective before Mercy gets killed, too. McCree runs out behind the bridge, in need of healing, and Mercy follows. I slide down the smooth incline to the point again and aim at Zarya. However, Torbjörn is already doing the job for me. He bangs his hammer and laughs in a jolly way as his turret finishes the damage Reinhardt had already done.
"Great one, Torbjörn," I compliment.
"Thanks, Jack," he replies, and jumps down from the bridge. McCree and Mercy join us on the point and Tracer comes out from her defensive position in the courtyard and joins us. We capture the point in a few seconds and wait out the claim. Tracer laughs, slumping down on the point as we claim it.
"What's so funny?" asks McCree, stubbing out his cigar in one of the cracks in the ground.
He rubs it down into the revealed ground with the heel of his cowboy boot.
"Sitting up there," Tracer starts, "waiting for the fight to be over, or for someone to come and attack me; it felt like I was in a story and the author just forgot I was on the team. Honestly, I don't even remember walking to the bridge with you guys."
"That's...uhh...strange," says Torbjörn, eyeing Tracer from his spot on the ground with his eyebrows knit.
"Heh," says Tracer. "The author probably just wants to forget that they made that amateur mistake and move on with the story."
"Then let's move on," says Mercy.
I sit down next to Torbjörn and Mercy and McCree follow suit. I glance up at the hologram glowing in the middle of the objective and see that the number ninety percent shines white against a blue background. I wait for it as it crawls up to 100 percent, unaware that I'm softly humming an old song, almost forgotten; 'There's a blaze of light in every word, it doesn't matter which you heard, the holy or the broken Hallelujah," I hum as the hologram reaches ninety-nine, then 100 percent.
We all spawn a second later in the ship to join Reinhardt for the second, and hopefully last battle.