It was dark. That he knew.
He once again found himself waking up in darkness in a room illuminated in a green tint only to him. It was a different room this time. There were no windows, just bare white walls on a bed stacked with its back to one of them in the middle. About the room was a mess of medical apparatuses which nature Genji could only guess. It was everywhere. Small pieces of intricate, shining metal was sprawled across multiple table tops in the room, on the floor, used as papers weights to documents carelessly stacked on tables with a few stray pieces sitting forlorn on the floor.
He felt more at peace in this room than the one he first woke up in. The first room was clean, tidy, a vacuum which suffocated him. This one had evidence of people working and passing through, busy, a personality. He found the silence comforting. As though the world was in a perfect still, patiently waiting for him to wake up.
The cyborg looked to his right and found that he was not alone. In a brilliant gold that shone in his vision against the white and metal was the resting head of the good doctor. She was fast asleep. He was glad to see that someone had laid a blanket across her shoulders, serenely rising and falling. He allowed himself to stay this way for a while. The room was not, as he thought, filled in a perfect silence. If he listened very carefully, he could just barely make out the soft breathing of Angela, which seemed more evident the more he watched her.
In this moment, Genji did not think about what his was life before. He watched the sleeping face of his savior before him, and swore he would never forget it. War, he thought, bombs. Shelter. Metal walls. Home. Loss. War, bombs, planes…
He looked up at the white ceiling above him. Planes. Planes… planes?
Black bodies, like obsidian.
Genji slowly got up from the bed for the second time. His metal joints whirred. Taking great care to not wake Mercy, he carefully lifted her into it and tucked her in. When he tried to pull away, she sleepily grasped his lingering arm and pulled it closer.
"Vati," she said, smiling. A solitary tear rolled down her cheek.
He stroked her head very softly for a few moments. When she relaxed enough, he peeled his arm away from her and made for the door, taking care not to step on anything. Light flooded into the room and quickly disappeared as the cyborg silently opened and shut the door behind him.
The sky burned a deep crimson as the sun made its indolent descend over the sea. Genji paced briskly across closed doors and hallways, taken by a strong sense of déjà vu. His thoughts were a mess. He wasn't sure how much time had passed while he was incapacitated, and the exact sequence of events that led to this moment. However, he did know of what happened and the danger he saw, and worried for the people of the watch point.
This time around wandering the facility, Genji tried to open doors in hopes of finding someone to talk to. Anxiety gradually crept onto him the more doors he opened to find empty or locked. The block where he was held in seemed to be uninhabited.
After what felt like an eternity to the cyborg, he came upon a door not like the others vaguely labelled heavy machinery. He pushed the door open.
Complex structures of metal crammed into the small space gave Genji no concept of where it started and ended. The whole thing looked like a large metal dragon coiled into itself in hibernation. Just when he was about to close the door, something caught his eye.
In the far corner of the room, a clipboard was propped up against a peculiar looking metal stretcher which upon was tacked a picture of a very familiar looking face. Genji approached it and picked it up.
He remembered that this was how he looked like before he lost his memories. In this picture, the young version of himself was not wearing his robes and armor, but a regular white shirt. Again, he was smiling. A smile that did not reach his eyes. They looked unsettled.
The cyborg read on. On the clipboard there were details about his height, weight and gender, to name some of the few he understood. The more he skimmed through though, the more the information seemed to get more obfuscated.
"Subject descent, average body mass index…" he read aloud, flipping through the pages. "Arrived in critical condition. Survivability odds… ten percent. Successful operation. Artificial heart and most internal operating devices obsolete. Refer to chart B." He flipped to the end of the document. "Vision correcting visor. Enhanced vision and strength. Mental faculties unchanged. Stage one complete. Close accessed database: Project Regicide."
He put the clipboard down, confused. Project Regicide? Stage one? Deciding to leave the matter for later, he resumed his search.
A section opened up to a corridor which adjoined the building he was in to another in one of the stairwells, and sure enough, while he walked through it, he could see the cluster of structures which made up the west side of the facility through the windows. It was only a few minutes of aimless wandering until he finally found human life.
"…return home. The next shuttle out. This I promise." The voice was one Genji had never heard before, an authoritative tone on a husky voice.
"Just like that?" This voice, he recognized. It belonged to the girl who sat on the beach with him, and got dirt in her hair rolling on the ground. The two sat at a white plastic table across each other in a wide space peppered with other such tables, with stalls across the walls with its shutters closed. They sat under a dim row of lights which only lit up their section in the cafeteria, which seemed to be closed for the day.
"I thought you would be happy to hear this."
The cyborg could hear her hesitation. "I am. It's just that it's so sudden… everyone on the watch point, they did so much for me. How am I supposed to say goodbye?"
The blonde man smiled when he heard this. He closed his eyes and bowed his head, deep in thought.
"You think you'll never see them again." He raised his eyes. "That you will just go home and think of everything that's happened here as a bad dream."
"Not a bad dream," she mumbled.
A moment of silence passed between them before the man cleared his throat. "Lena Oxton, I'm officially offering you a positional directive, should you choose to accept it."
He continued under Lena's questioning gaze. "You will be granted four weeks of paid leave upon your departure of this watch point, then you will be required to report back here under your new position as the lead tester for weapons research and development. Under the supervision of Winston."
A smile slowly dawned upon her face, like a sun being freed from a veil of clouds.
"You will hold this position indefinitely, until such time when I personally see fit to relocate you for special weapons and tactics training for potential frontline work. Who knows? Maybe one day I will have you standing by my side on the field."
Without a word, the girl stood up from the table, straightened, and brought her arm up with her fingers resting on her brow. The man stood up in kind and returned the salute.
"Dismissed, pil—" He brought his arm down, dropping the salute. "Soldier," he corrected.
Lena stared at him for a moment, a strange expression on her face. She tackled his middle-section in a hug before sprinting for the door just as suddenly. Genji stayed in the shadows and let her pass. Her footsteps rang across the floors which eventually dissolved into silence.
The soldier sat back down at the table and sighed. "And you, whoever you are, how long are you planning to lurk out there?"
Genji stepped into the hall. "How did you know?"
"All that stuff they pumped into me can't be for nothing." He smirked. "You might want to try moving a little quieter next time. On the balls of your feet. How can I help you?"
The cyborg walked into the room, feeling unsure of himself. "The black planes I saw earlier… and everyone here, are they all al—Eeaaaah!"
For the second time that day, Genji found himself screaming in an embarrassing falsetto as something coiled around his throat and seized it tightly.
"So you're the robot guy I've heard so much about," came a baritone voice from behind him. "Nice to meet'cha."
Jack pinched his nose bridge. "McCree, he's not a threat. And if he so wills it, he could snap your arm like a twig."
The grip around Genji's neck relaxed. "I know, I read the reports too, even if you think I didn't. Just wanted to see how far I could push my luck." The stranger moved in front of him and gave him a good looking at. He whistled. "Damn. You look much more impressive in person. And you glow. What's up with that?"
"Anyway, Mister Shimada… Mister Shimada?"
Genji overcame his shock and stared blankly at the commander. "Who?"
He raised an eyebrow. "Genji Shimada, that's you, isn't it?"
Genji rapped his fist into an open palm. "Oh yes. Shimada. That is who I am. Indeed."
The two stared at each other, the bounty hunter glancing between them interchangeably. "I suppose it was no exaggeration then," he said, "the reports about his memory too."
"Anyway…" the soldier continued, "the planes you saw off the coast carried unmanned infantry drones, which managed to infiltrate the base. Winston and Miss Oxton managed to stall them long enough from getting further in before we showed up." He gestured to himself and McCree. "They were very brave and their lives were very much in danger, but they only sustained minor injuries. Of course, this wouldn't have been possible without you, Shimada." He nodded to him. "I heard about your warning. If it weren't for it, there's no doubt that the watch point would have been compromised, and the number of civilian causalities could only be left up to the imagination. So I formally thank you for your help. Your presence here was invaluable." The commander stood up and approached the cyborg, sticking out a hand. "I don't think I introduced myself. I'm Jack Morrison, strike commander of Overwatch."
Genji took his hand and shook it. "Overwatch?"
"Did they really tell you nothing?" groaned the commander.
"What's there to say?" McCree shrugged. "Defenders of peace and justice, response team for the Omnic Crisis, yada yada."
"Omnic… Omnic crisis…" Genji's head started to hurt.
"Shimada?"
Bright vivid images flashed against Genji's closed eyelids, disappearing as swiftly as they came. Pain hammered into his temples with each passing one. A man in a blue robe. A courtyard of pink-leafed trees. A sharp scent of incense and salt.
Genji found himself lower to the ground, being held up by something.
"I'm not going to lie, metal man," said a voice, thick with physical exertion, "you are not light. And I'm no spring chicken."
He found his balance and pushed himself up. "I apologize."
McCree puffed, hands on his knees. "Hey, don't mention it, partner."
The commander was watching Genji closely. "Did you remember something?"
"No, not exactly. Bright lights and colors. I cannot make sense of it." His body betrayed his emotions. Despite the dread and tension he felt, his arms and legs were cool and still, whirring as usual. At least he could still feel his heart, hammering against his chest. He took a moment to calm himself. "You thank me for being here, but where was I, when everything happened?"
Jack said nothing.
"Unaware. Asleep. While everyone was fighting."
He kept his silence.
The cyborg paused and bowed his head. "But even if I was not, what could I have done? I do not know how to fight. I even screamed, like a little girl, when I was grabbed from behind."
"The fault isn't yours," McCree said as indifferently as he could manage while flexing a bicep. "I'm just too good."
"And what are you going to do about it?" asked Jack.
The cyborg hesitated. "I want to learn… learn to fight. I want to know how to protect people." He thought about Mercy and Lena. And Winston too, I suppose.
The soldier smiled at him. "Good answer. Unfortunately, you can't do it here."
"Not here?"
"Not here," he confirmed. "Korea."