Archive of Our Own

The beginning of the end starts with claws digging in Jesse’s skin

He wakes up with a howl, hand flying up to grasp the broken skin on his left shoulder. Blood flows through his fingertips, it’s a deep wound and it drips down his arm and onto the sheets. Even in the darkness that is two in the morning, he can see the mark plan. Three jagged cuts run there, all in a line, and Jesse breathes in a short gasp.

Part of him hoped that memory from all those years ago was a dream. That the blood loss at the time had conjured phantoms of stories he’d heard as a child. Now, staring at the claw marks in his shoulder, he knows better.

Times almost up, cowboy. Time to repay your debts.

He reaches over for his bedside table to grab some tissues. While going to Angela about this is tempting, he knows he won’t be able to answer the questions she’ll ask. He walks over to his tiny bathroom, and pulls out the first aid kit he keeps behind the mirror.

Patching himself up isn’t an easy task. He has to put on his robotic arm to do the stitches and the disinfectant stings like a bitch when he wipes it over the cuts. By the time the whole thing is dealt with, the sink and part of the bathroom floor is splattered in droplets of blood. He crinkles his nose; he will have to bleach the place. People will ask questions about the wound of course, but he’s clever. He doubts everyone will buy his new flesh wound as some sort of training op gone wrong, but it’s a better idea than trying to explain the truth of the situation.

The truth of the situation, Jesse thinks. Isn’t that something. A truth right out of fiction. Jesse can almost picture the others faces now as he tries to explain it. He rehearses it to the mirror, trying to imagine his own reflection Ana, Fareeha or Hanzo.

“So, fifteen years ago, I might have sold my soul to the devil himself. Kinda was hoping I dreamed the whole thing. Guess not.” He takes a deep breath. “You won’t be too put out if I drop dead in a year, will ya?”

The Ana, Fareeha and Hanzo he sees in the mirror do indeed look “put out.” Jesse doubts that would be their actual reaction, experience with spirit dragons or not. Trying to sell someone on the idea of the devil is a bit of a stretch. He probably wouldn’t believe him. Might not ever, until Jesse drops dead when his debtor comes to collect.  

“Fuck,” Jesse hangs his head low, reaching up to grab his shoulder. He can feel the new wound burn there, like someone has lit it on fire. It’s not a natural sensation. He closes his eyes.

In the distance, he can hear howling.

Jesse is not a very religious man. He doesn’t believe in the devil, or angels above. His concept of an afterlife is more abstract than anything else, two sides of judgement that he’s never bother to inspect too closely. To Jesse, there’s right, and there’s wrong. A man’s sins are his own. If anyone is going to judge him, might as well be himself.

He knows what he met all those years ago could be called a devil. That’s what it’d be called in the stories, creatures that came from the crossroads looking to barter souls. Jesse doesn’t think the description fits.

Devils only made deals with those who weren’t already heading in his direction. Jesse doubts he’s received that honor even now.

The only person he almost tells about the deal is Gabe.

It’s when he’s twenty seven, fresh off of losing an arm under a pile of concrete. He remembers it painfully clear; the sound as the building shook under him, the crunch his arm made as the ceiling came tumbling down upon him, the world becoming less clear as agony took over. When Gabe dug him out, his was almost incoherent. To be fair, so was Gabe: he’d been expecting a corpse, not a living man.

“Gracias a Dios,” Gabe said when he found him. He’d reached down through the rubble and grabbed Jesse’s good hand, squeezing it tight. “Jesse, look at me. Look at me. You’re going to be alright. Just stay awake.”

Jesse remembers it as one of the few times on record that Gabe actually used his first name. The rest of the time it was “son” “kid” “ingrate” or “McCree.” Never Jesse.

Gabe said it again when the medics had to saw his arm free, less they leave him to the tide of omnics coming their way. That part Jesse remembers less. He’s thankful for it.

He doesn’t remember telling Gabe about the deal, not exactly. He remembers snippets of it, a hand in his, bits and pieces of the blabber that came out of his mouth. Gabe’s expression worsening as he kept talking of creatures of shadow and debts unpaid. To this day, he only can remember flashes of that emergency evac to the nearest hospital and what he said there.

“It’s gonna eat my soul boss.” Gabe staring at him as they load him onto a stretcher.

“I still got thirteen years left. This ain’t part of the deal.” A medic wrapping up what’s left of his arm while the ship takes off.

“Tell Genji it was worth it. Worth the trade. Every time for his fool ass.” Gabe yelling for someone to come and help as the world fades from sight.

When he wakes up, down an arm and in terrible pain, Gabe asks him about what he said. More like demands really, sitting there in a small shitty blue chair. Jesse almost tells him, out of it on pain meds. The room swirls around him as Gabe speaks next.

“You in trouble?” Gabe says, fingers laced together in his lap.

“Boss-”

“I mean it, McCree. Are you in trouble? Real trouble?” Jesse says nothing, feeling like he might vomit. “Mijo, I’m not asking to light a fire under you ass. If you’re in trouble, I’ll help. I mean it. Whatever mess you’ve got yourself in, I’ll get you out of it.”

Mijo. It’s a word Jesse knows, a word he’s heard Gabe call him before when he thinks Jesse isn’t listening. This is the first time Gabe’s said it to his face. His stomach churns as he pictures Gabe at the crossroads, feet planted in the dirt, a living shadow coming to greet him. Who would Gabe see striding up to him? The UN? Jack? Jesse himself? What would he offer it to let Jesse loose from a bargain made for another?

Jesse knows the answer. He would offer up himself, his soul onto the dining platter for the creature to feast on. And what creature would be able to resist that exchange, the soul of a war hero in exchange for a no good gang member trying to claw his way back to good?

Here’s what Jesse wants: to tell Gabe everything, for Gabe to save him. Here’s what Jesse cannot accept: any future where Gabe dies in his place.

Is it hypocritical, that he’s doing the same for Genji? Probably. Jesse doesn’t care. Instead he shakes his head and forces a smile.

“I’m not.” Gabe raises an eyebrow. “I’m serious.”

“McCree-”

“You really think a man yammering on about something eating his soul is entirely with it?” Gabe leans back at that. Jesse knows he has him: Gabe isn’t superstitious. “I was out of it boss. I ain’t in trouble. At least, not more than usual.”

Gabe believes him, which is a miracle in itself. It’s the first time he ever gets one over the boss. It won’t be the last. That honor goes to the time he told Gabe he’d be back tomorrow morning and left to live under the New Mexico sky.

Jesse runs his thumb over the claw marks in his shoulder and sighs. For all his efforts, he’s not sure he had any success at saving Gabe from anything. He thinks of Talon, the Reaper who haunts their mission and sighs.

He may have saved Gabe from selling his soul for his sake, but that didn’t mean he saved him from other demons who longed to get their claws into Gabriel Reyes.

Hanzo Shimada is no fool: something is wrong with Jesse McCree.

He’s acting strange, Hanzo thinks, favoring his other arm. He’s stopped talking to Hanzo as much getting distance where he can. While Hanzo would like to chalk it up to McCree gaining sense that Hanzo is poor company, he does it to others as well. Like he’s trying to separate himself from the group.

He asks around about it. No one has any idea, no explanation for the changed behavior. When he asks McCree himself he laughs it off, saying he’s imagining things.

Hanzo knows something is wrong. The fact McCree won’t tell him fills him with dread.

The wounds are what trouble him the most, how they have no reasonable explanation. McCree claims it’s a training op, but nothing in the training room matches the pattern on his shoulder. The fact McCree is constantly wrapping it as weeks come by isn’t reassuring either. There is no way for Hanzo to see the wound underneath. A wound that should have long healed.

“Do you need help?” He asks during a training session, where McCree grabs his shoulder and winces. He bites his lower lip and shakes his head.

“Nah. It’s only a sting.”

“A sting that should have long healed.”

“You noticed, huh?”

“I’ve been told I have sharp eyes.” McCree snorts at the joke before reloading Peacekeeper. Hanzo notices a slight tremor in his robotic hand.

“I keep picking at the damn thing,” McCree says. “Itchy. Know I shouldn’t but well-” He shrugs.

Another lie. Hanzo has known McCree for a long time now, since he joined Overwatch a few years ago. The man started out as an acquaintance at best, an old friend of his brothers, before turning into a training partner when he proved to have as decent aim as Hanzo himself. From there, they turned into drinking partners, then close friends.

They could have been something more. Hanzo knows this. It would have been easy. But McCree had never offered. And Hanzo has never had the nerve to offer himself, not with his past still lurking behind him as a constant shadow.

He is a brother killer, a mercenary, a killer. McCree has risen above his past while Hanzo is still dragged down by his own. It seems a terrible crime to reach out and drag McCree into the depths with him. Especially when the man has shown no interest in doing so besides a passing glance and a few conversations that could be defined as flirting.

“I see,” Hanzo says. He watches as McCree takes the next few shots, a few bullets landing an inch off the bullseye. It’s the worst he’s ever seen him shoot.

That, perhaps, is more concerning than everything else combined.

The demon starts appearing in his dreams with six months left.

It always starts as the cloud of smoke he remembers from the crossroads, something easily mistaken for smog. He usually is stuck watching it for a moment before it takes on a face. Sometimes it is people from his misspent youth, the little girl killed next door in an omnic attack, his mother with a light smile on her face, his deadlock partner who would have shot him in the back cradling a gun. Other times, it’s folks from Overwatch, past and present; Amelie Lacroix waving at him as she leans up against the crossroad’s only post. Gabe chuckling like he’s told one of his terrible jokes only a minute ago.

Tonight, it is neither of the two. Instead it is a teen boy who bleed out under his hands during his time on the run, blue eyes wide with fear. His white shirt is soaked crimson. When he spots McCree, he sways back and forth like a child does when bored.

“You always look sad to see me,” he says, voice cracking in the middle of his sentence. “It’s not very polite.”

“Given that you keep showin’ up to my dreams uninvited, I think I can forgo the hospitality.” McCree is used to this song and dance by now, any hope of normal dreams dwindling more and more as the days pass. He tucks his thumbs into the belt loops. “That’s a new face you got there.”

“Thought it’d mix it up.” The demon changes, shifts upon itself. McCree finds himself staring at Genji now, a Genji he never knew, a Genji he’s only seen in photos. His hair is bright green. The creature runs it’s hands through the short locks and pouts. “This hairstyle is magnificent. Shame he never got to keep it.”

McCree closes his eyes as the demon shifts again, knowing what will haunt him this time. He can smell burnt skin. It’s only once the creature speaks that he’s able to place if it’s turned into Gabriel or kept on the mask of Genji.

“You are absolutely no fun,” Genji’s voice calls, racked with pain. “The others scream when I pull this trick.”

McCree keeps his eyes shut. “ Maybe I’m made of stronger stuff than the others.”

“Oh I know that,” the smell of smoke is gone now, replaced by a scent that McCree associates with well brewed tea and a blue cloak in the wind. He feels Ana’s hand on his shoulder. When she speaks, her voice is a low hiss. “Your soul will be the best meal I’ve had in years.”

Her fingernails turn into claws and dig into his shoulder.

McCree wakes up screaming. The bandaged wound in his shoulder begins to bleed anew.

That’s when he notices Hanzo Shimada standing in his doorway, eyes staring wide at his new injury.

“What-”

“Get out.” McCree says, voice sharp as a knife. “Get out now.”

“How-”

“Leave!”

He does. McCree stares at the doorway where he stood and flops back on his bed.

He doesn’t bother to wrap his shoulder for a full fifteen minutes. The wound stains his pillows with blood.

As soon as he leaves McCree’s doorway, Hanzo heads to his own room, and shuts the door.

He knows what he saw, knows it despite McCree trying to keep him away. Phantom claws digging into the man’s shoulder, new marks being dug open. Something that should be impossible.

There is only two things he can think to consult.

He sits on the floor and closes his eyes. The dragons come soon enough, flaring to life in a smaller form above him. They look almost disturbed as they linger there, staring down at him. Hanzo takes a few moments to collect his thoughts before he asks his first question.

“What is it that I saw?”

“A scavenger,” they answer. “A creature who is always hungry, always starved. It has laid claim to him.”

Cryptic as usual, Hanzo thinks. He parses through what information he was given. “Like you?”

Both dragons recoil. “Not like us. How dare you compare-”

“I apologize. I phrased my question incorrectly.” He thinks of better terminology. “Is it a spirit?

“Some could call it that. It has other names. It is gluttonous. Opportunistic.”

“Opportunistic for what?”

“A chance to feed.”

Hanzo resists a shudder that that statement. He knows his own dragons and what they feast on. The appetites of spirits are rarely appeased by small trifles. “And what does it eat?”

“That freely given. It bargains. A man’s sight for wealth. A woman’s emotions for her beauty.”

Freely given. A deal. Hanzo frowns. McCree must know of what is haunting him then, must have brought it upon himself. But for what?  “What about McCree?”

The dragons slither in the air, almost lazy. “We do not know what he asked for, only what he offered.” Their tails start to fade. “The creature will feast upon his soul. His entire being.”

Hanzo is quiet for a long moment before he looks up.

“How do I kill it?”

“You sold your soul.”

He confronts him in the kitchen. Everyone else has cleared out, dinner long over, and Hanzo watches as McCree dries dishes with his good hand. He normally favors his other, but give the injuries Hanzo knows he’s hiding under his shirt, it makes sense he’d restrain from using that arm.

McCree turns to look at him, mouth half opened, but when he sees Hanzo, the expression fades from his face at once. Caught in his own bluff and he knows it. Instead, he sighs and leans back on the counter, putting the drying rag next to it.

“Where’d you get that tibet from?”

“I asked.”

“What, a little dragon told you?”

A flush must cross Hanzo’s face because McCree’s eyebrows extend into his hairline. Hanzo ignores the expression on his face and instead scowls.

“That is not the point. Did you sell your soul?

“Soul’s a strong word,” McCree says. “Little religious for my tastes. Lifeforce might be more fitting.”

“McCree, answer the question.”

McCree lets out a long breath. He looks at Hanzo and shrugs. “It looks like you already know the question to that one, partner.”

Hanzo stares at him for a long moment before he starts swearing. He switches languages, going from Japanese, to English, to a few other words he’s picked up from various countries. None seem to fit the situation. McCree just watches him curse, expression blank.

“You absolute fool,” Hanzo settles on after he’s done using every swear word he knows. “You made a deal with an ancient creature! Do you have any idea how idiotic that was?

“Seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“How could it possibly be a good idea!” A wry smile crosses McCree’s face. He knows something Hanzo doesn’t. Something important. Hanzo hates that. He takes a step forward, getting in McCree’s personal space. “What could possibly be worth your life?” He thinks for a moment and tilts his head. “Is it Deadeye? Is that what you traded it for?”

McCree’s face morphs into a scowl. He looks terribly offended. “Hey, Deadeye took work, I didn’t trade shit for it besides practice and time. You really think I’d sell for something that stupid?”

Hanzo feels somewhat guilty: it does sell McCree short to assume as such. The anger overrides it. “I would think you wouldn’t be stupid enough to do it in the first place!” McCree just stares at him, face unmoving. They are standing terribly close together now. It’s mildly uncomfortable. Anyone who would walk in would probably think themselves intruding. Hanzo can feel McCree’s breath on his face. He takes a step back, and lets out a deep breath. “How long do you have left.”

“Six months, give or take. October 17th is when the deal goes through. Had it on my calender for 15 years.”

It’s soon. Too soon.

You must undo this bargain.”

“No.” McCree’s voice is stern. Not the answer Hanzo was expecting in the slightest. He turns back to face the sink, and pulls dishes out. As he dries them off, his metal hand grips the rag tight enough to rip holes in the fabric. “Don’t think it can be undone anyway. Things been waiting 14 years for me to pay up. Doubt it’s going to let me go cus I ask real nice.”

“Then we kill it.”

“You gonna kill a thing like that? I’d like to see you try.”

“I can.” Hanzo is sure of it actually. “It is a type of spirit, something old. My arrows might not do it any damage, but my dragons are capable of feasting on any such creature.”

“You can’t know that.”

“I do.” Hanzo thinks to their conversation earlier. “A little dragon told me.”

McCree’s looks over his shoulder taking in Hanzo’s expression and snorts. He shakes his head and turns back to the dishes. “Well, you’re gonna have to tell that little dragon to leave it.”

There’s not better word for it; Hanzo gapes at him. Here he has offered McCree a way out, and he refuses it. “Leave it? You will die!”

“Gotta die sometime.”

“It will eat your soul!”

“I told you, I ain’t religious. I prefer lifeforce to be honest-”

“McCree-”

“I told you to leave it!” McCree’s grip on one of the dishes is so tight that the plate cracks. He swears and drops it in the sink. The sound of it shattering echoes throughout the tiny kitchen. He runs his hand down his face and turns around to look at Hanzo. “Look, I appreciate the thought. I really do. Love to take you up on it, to be honest. But I can’t. It ain’t worth it.”

Hanzo shakes his head. “What could possibly be worth your life?”

McCree smiles. “If you knew, you’d agree with me.” With that, he leaves the kitchen, the rest of the dishes still soaking in the sink. Hanzo walks up and looks down into the water. He fishes out the shards of the broken plate piece by piece.

McCree doesn’t desire death. This Hanzo knows. There must be something else here at play, something he’s missing. Something important. McCree did not sell his soul for Deadeye. He’s not the type to sell it for glory either. It has to be for something else.

How long did McCree say he had left? Six months or so. Hanzo calculates back. If he looks at some records, he can perhaps find what McCree’s life was like during that period. What he could have bargained for. And how to talk him into giving it up.

He throws the shards of the plate into the trash and heads for Winston’s office.

He looks into the records for answers.

The paper files Overwatch kept during the war are still in Winston’s office. Stealing them is child’s play and while Athena will probably report him, he knows he can get through them all before Winston catches up with him. Most of the files are blacked out, highly censored, but he works with what he can, narrowing it down to events in October. After an hour of searching, he finds a medical report from October 14th, a mission gone wrong with plenty of fatalities. There are a handful of injuries reported as well. Scratch marks on one Jesse MccRee from a fall. And some basic upkeep for-

Hanzo looks at the name there. Reads it again. Checks once more to be sure. His stomach drops.

No.

Genji opens his door when he knocks. Hanzo pushes the file into his hands.

“Do you remember this?”

“Nice to see you too, brother.”

“Do you remember this?”

Genji sighs and looks it over. He’s silent for a moment before he speaks.

“I wish I didn’t. It was a poor mission.”

“You were injured?”

“I don’t remember it, but yes. The doctors said I was covered in blood. McCree had to carry me back.” He tilts his head. “Why?

Hanzo resist the urge to scream. He knows the answer now, why McCree refused to let him break the deal, why he thought Hanzo would agree with his terms. McCree’s soul was not given up for Deadeye, nor for glorty, nor for pride.

It’s was given up for Genji’s life.

On the record, Genji Shimada is legally dead once, at the hands of his brother, the dragons he wielded, and the flames of the battlefield around them.

Off the record, Genji Shimada is legally dead twice, the second time in the arms of Jesse McCree with twenty new holes in his armor.

It’s a mission outside Dorado, a few miles away from the city proper, in a basin of sorts. Everything goes bad in Dorado, Jesse will realize later, when he’s old enough to see a pattern. One of the early joint ops between Overwatch and Blackwatch, it goes well enough at first. Jesse is a young thing, not still a boy, but not old enough to be called a full grown man. Genji is even younger, though the way he carries himself speaks of twice his own years.

They’re friends. Perhaps some of the only friends between the two departments. Both of them know what it’s like to grow in crime, both of them have been ripped from families who turned out to not give a flying fuck about what happened to them. There’s a shared authority between the two, an understanding no one else manages to approach. Some agents gossip that it’s romantic to pass the time. Rumors always sate boredom better than anything else.

They’re wrong of course. Genji is too angry for such pursuits, too wrapped up in his own rage and loathing to even consider indulging in some of the hobbies he used to enjoy. Jesse, on the other hands, looks in the mirror and sees nothing more than a criminal most days, a man worth throwing in a cell and leaving to rot. Neither is conducive for romance. And even if it was, they wouldn’t be interested. They’re brothers in arms, better brothers than the two ever had by blood.

Even without Morrison and Reyes there to guide them on, things go just as planned. The omnics infected with the God Program drop right on target. It’s almost perfect, the way the operation works out. Textbook really. Which should have been the first sign it would end up horribly wrong.

Later on, McCree thinks, he should have figured it out sooner. He was black ops after all, he knew how to trick a man. He should have noticed that the omnics they saw were less than predicted, that they were being lured into a choke point there. He doesn’t. Until he hears the beeping of Bastion units coming to life, he doesn’t suspect anything is wrong at all.

He’ll blame himself for that, years later. He’ll blame himself for a lot of things.

It’s a massacre not a battle. Both units flee, desperate to get to cover. They don’t have enough shields and soon enough, the omnics work to pick them off one by one rather than mowing down entire squadrons. Jesse stands his ground as long as he can, trying to fight back. He gets half a dozen units down before Genji tackles him. A roar of gunfire echoes over their heads.

“Tactical retreat,” Genji says. “Command said so.”

Jesse nods. Throws a flashbang over the bolder to stop the bastion unit waiting for them. Fans the hammer and relishes the sound of a unit powering down. Genji helps him to his feet.

“Let’s book it, partner.”

Retreats are better than a loss, though the UN might disagree. At least with a retreat, there’s more men to fight the next battle. Genji and Jesse run through the basin, dust kicking at their heels as the omnics follow in pursuit. They take a few out on the way, Genji reflecting back bullets, Jesse stunning and hitting weak spots. Later on, they’ll learn they took out the most on their way back than any other survivors.  

They’re halfway to the recon point when it all goes to hell. They jump over some boulders, and Genji helps Jesse scale down a small cliff face to safety. Bastion units can’t climb well, and when they make it to the bottom of the height, both are struggling to take a breath. Jesse has his hands on his knees, regretting his smoking habit for the first time in years. Genji’s shoulder is sparking.

“Hell,” Jesse gasps, leaning against a large rock. They’re safe for the meantime, the outcropping of rocks above keeping any Bastion units from opening fire. They’re more likely to divert their efforts finding those they can hit. “How many do you think we lost?”

“Do you want the answer to that question?” Genji sounds out of breath himself. Rare for the cyborg. Jesse shakes his head. He reaches up to straighten his hat and finds the brim frayed and covered in soot.

“Probably not.” He points Genji’s shoulder. “You okay?”

Genji looks, noticing the sparks. He tilts his head, something Jesse now knows to recognize as a frown, and slaps his hand over the sparking area once. It desists, letting out a hiss. “Clogged vent. It should be fine.”

“Should or will?”

“Jesse-”

“I’m just saying, if you’re gonna swoon on me, I want advanced notice. I’m not gonna miss my opportunity to catch a distressed damsel. Could reenact those old movies where the sheriff rides back into town with his partner in a bridal carry.”

“I am not a damsel.” Amusement tints Genji’s voice despite the circumstances. “And we have no horses.”

“I could tame a Bastion unit.” He looks out and starts walking forward. Genji follows, and soon enough they’re on an off beaten path, probably used by travelers before the war. A few yards away on an elevated plane is a crossroads, an old dusty sign marking the trail. “Reyes is gonna have my hide for this one.”

“I think he will simply be thankful your hide is in one piece.” They’re almost at the crossroads now. “Though Captain Amari may consider taking it for almost getting blown away back there.”

Jesse shudders, picturing a very angry Ana glaring down at him. “What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her-”

“You say that like you could-”

There’s the sound of gears whirling into place, systems gearing up to fire. Both men turn to take in the Bastion unit coming from their right, already in turret mode. How it managed to be this quiet is astonishing; it must be waiting out here. It’s main gun whirls. Jesse reaches to grab a flashbang only to find he’s out.

“Jesse-” He’s pushed to the side by Genji, the cyborg now standing in the line of fire. The first round of bullets he deflects with ease, but the second breaks through his defenses as he leaps forward to cut the unit in two. Jesse screams, hitting the open area of the unit with three rounds as Genji drops. The Bastion unit powers off, falling into scrap. Jesse only takes a minute to make sure it’s the only one before he runs to Genji.

Jesse’s seen people hit by Bastion fire before. It’s never pretty, ripping flesh apart, but with Genji, it’s even worse. Metal holes puncture his armor, blood and oil stain his Overwatch uniform. His breath comes as a rasp. When Jesse puts down the emergency biotic fields they both have on hand. Genji’s breathing barely improves. Jesse reaches for his com.

“Agent McCree to command. McCree to command. I need med evac right now!” There’s radio silence. Jesse grits his teeth. “It ain’t for me, you fucks, it’s for an Overwatch agent, you hear me? Someone you might actually give a fuck about keeping round.” Still nothing. “Don’t fucking ignore me, I swear to God-”

“Coms down-” Genji says. Jesse hauls him into his lap for better purchase and takes off his kerchief. He presses it to the still open wounds. It soaks the red cloth with oil in an instant. “The towers-”

“Don’t talk, you son of a bitch.” Jesse considers carrying him to the recon point, but he’d bleed out in minutes without the field. He’ll do the same if they stay here, but it’ll be slower. Jesse can’t decide which is worse.

Genji’s breath is a rattle. Jesse presses harder on his wounds. “Oh no, you don’t. I got this field up and wasted on your dumb ass. You ain’t dying on me.”

“No man can stop death-” Genji takes his time on each word. Jesse grits his teeth.

“Okay, save the proverbs for the hospital bed, where you can bore me in peace.” Jesse looks around for more omnics and seeing none, he decides to, for lack of a better word, “fuck it.” “I need help here! Anyone?”

“Jesse-” Genji starts. His hand comes up to claw at his faceplate. Jesse takes it off for him and regrets it at once when he sees not only the blood dribbling down Genji’s chin, but the look in his eyes. “I must thank-”

“Shut up.”

“Your friendship-”

“Shut up.”

“Better brother than-”

“I said shut up!” Jesse looks Genji straight in the eye. “Look, you ain’t dying here. You’re gonna live like the stubborn ass you are, and when we’re old and crotchety, we can have this heartfelt speech about our feelings and shit like normal people.”

Genji tilts his head at him. The moment looks to hurt from the pain that flashes his face. He awards Jesse with one of his award winning smiles minutes later. Back when Genji first joined Overwatch, he’d been afraid of showing smile, worried it would look grotusque with his new scars. Angela, Jesse, Lena and the others helped change that.

“I’m a weapon. I was never meant to live long.” His smile fades. “Better me, than you, Jesse McCree. Better me, than you.”

When he passes out, Jesse starts screaming anew.

“God fucking damn it!” He feels for Genji’s pulse. It’s still there, but terribly weak. “Wake up you asshole! It’s not better me than you! You don’t get to say that self loathing shit and die on me!” He looks around. “I need help! Look, anyone, help! Please!”

Genji’s blood begins to stain the sandy ground. The world slows, the bright lights of the sun above, seeming to grow brighter. The tall grass around them ceases to blow in the wind, stuck in mid wave. The creek a mile off stops flowing. Jesse looks up and finds a coyote staring at him. It’s a small thing, half starved from the ribs poking out of its sides and it looks at the scene in front of it with yellow eyes.

“I didn’t mean you!” His eyes sting. “There’s no meal for you ass, so you can get on out.” He looks down at Genji and shakes him. “Come on, wake up!”

“He’s dying.” Jesse looks up again. Where the coyote stood is now a girl, maybe seventeen at most, with pale skin, and hair red as a fox. It is only once Jesse sees the yellow eyes that it makes the connection. “He was right you know. No man can stop death.” It tilts its head, a smile appearing on it’s face. “But I can.”

Jesse is not a superstitious man, not really. He throws salt over his shoulder and he knocks on wood, but it’s been more out of habit than any true belief in the repercussions. He looks around him, noticing the unnatural stillness of the world. He turns back to the creature. “You some sort of omnic?”

The creature changes. There’s no better word for it. In one moment, it’s a girl, in the next, it’s an omnic, floating above the ground, pained with a design resembling a skeleton. “I am much older than any omnic.” It changes again, and Jesse finds himself staring at the mirror image of his mother years ago, before the war invaded his life and burnt it to the ground. The same strands of hair are loose in her bun.

Jesse looks around him. Crossroads. He knows this story, the tale of Robert Johnson. “You a devil?”  

“I’ve been called that. I wouldn’t say it’s accurate. But definitions won’t help you, anyway.” It points to Genji. Jesse can see the callous’ on its pointer finger, the same his mother had from baking in the kitchen.

Jesse looks down at Genji. Even with the world at pause, he looks even worse. His skin is an unnatural pale. The blood on his chin is drying.

“Whadda you want?”

The creature gives him the same look his mother did when he was only a child and did something foolish.  “I thought you knew this story.”

Jesse shudders. That he does.

“My soul.”

“Something like that.” The creature changes again. Jesse flinches as Fareeha looks back at him. She sits down in front of Jesse and Genji and looks down at the cyborg. “Your soul down the line. Not right now…” she sniffs the air, and squints. “Fifteen years sounds good. You’ll be ripe by then.” Jesse doesn’t even want to think of what it means by that. “In exchange-” it gestures to Genji. “He lives.”

Jesse stares. Fifteen years. It’s isn’t bad, all things considered. Blackwatch barely expects him to last ten. And for Genji-

Part of Jesse knows this is a bad idea, that this will only come back to bite him. The other part is too desperate to care.

“He lives all fifteen?” The creatures stares at him. “Our line of work ain’t exactly safe. I don’t want him biting it a month later.” It’s a realistic concern, not only for the work but considering Genji himself. The cyborg thinks himself expendable. Jesse isn’t going to barter for his life only for Genji to throw it away. He wouldn’t be able to take it.

“I can make sure he lives the fifteen,” the creature says, though it doesn’t sound happy about it. It holds up it’s hand, a mockery of the boy scout salute. “I pledge no mortal harm will come to him for those fifteen years.” It’s eye narrow. “But only if you take the deal.”

Jesse considers. Looks down at Genji. Here is the Shimada heir, who defied his own legacy, who looked at Jesse and saw something more than an ex-con. What does he deserve? An early death after saving a no good fool, and a funeral by those who call him friend and ally?

He looks at his own hands. Here is Jesse McCree, drop-out, ex-con, with enough blood on his hands to get him life in prison, a man the UN looks at as canon fodder and nothing more. What does he deserve? A long life at the expense of his closest friend, destined for an early unmarked grave that a handful of people will mourn over?  

The choice is easy.

“Yes.”

The creature reaches forward, changing form again. This time, Jesse looks into his own eyes as it digs its fingers into his shoulder. Nails turn into claws, claws dig against his skin, dig deep, create jagged cuts there. Cuts that will open again fifteen years later.

“Good choice.” The creature whispers before vanishing. The world speeds up again, the grass swaying as normal. Jesse clenches his shoulder, blood dripping through his fingers.

A gasp of breath from below draws his attention. Genji. Genji, who while still covered in blood is whole. No bullet holes remain. Not a sign of anything that went wrong.

Jesse doesn’t bother to think on matters any longer. He lifts Genji up and carries him all the way to the recon point. The doctors take him out of their hands, and lying comes easy when they ask about the blood. He blames the new marks in his shoulder to a tumble against some stones.

When Genji wakes, he remembers nothing after the Bastion unit shot him. Possibly the pain, possibly the work of the creature’s hands. Jesse doesn’t bother to look at it too closely. Instead he laughs as Genji speaks about the mission, ignoring the flaring pain in his shoulder.

“It looks like you got to carry me back like a damsel in distress after all,” Genji says, with a smirk. Jesse’s stomach drops. “Too bad you didn’t manage to tame a Bastion.”

When Jesse laughs next, it sounds hollow.

“You sold your soul for Genji.”

McCree stops in place from where he was folding his shirt. For a moment, he considers denying it, telling Hanzo he sold it for something else instead of the horrible truth. Like his ruggish good looks. Keep a lie up for longer, let Hanzo live in denial.

He knows better than to try. Hanzo’s tone isn’t a question, it’s only asking for confirmation. The cat is out of the bag. He sighs.

“See why I can’t go back on it now?” He tucks his shirt into a drawer and slides it shut, turning around. Hanzo is looking at him with wide eyes, mouth opened just slightly. Horrified. “I don’t think either of us want your brother to drop dead for my sake.”

Hanzo takes a step back. McCree realizes he was hoping McCree would deny it. McCree is sorry he couldn’t. “How’d you find out?”

“The records,” Hanzo rasps. “You wrote down every doctor you ever went to on a job except that one. It was out of place. And Genji said-”

“You didn’t tell him did you?” Hanzo shakes his head and McCree lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Oh thank, God.”

“He doesn’t know?”

“Not a clue.” He looks at Hanzo and glares something fierce. When he speaks, his voice is stern. “You don’t dare tell em’. He’s finally got some peace going on; I don’t need you throwing my mess into it.”

“It’s his right to know-”

“It would be if I thought he wouldn’t just try reverse it himself to save my fool ass.” Hanzo’s mouth shuts. He’s come to the same conclusion then. It’s the right one: Genji isn’t the type to accept a life traded for his own, especially the life of a good friend. He’d go to the devil himself to get such a deal undone. McCree softens his tone. “You know he would. I’m not inclined to give him the chance. Doubt you’re for it either.”

Hanzo walks in and sits down on the nearest chair. He looks like all the energy has been sucked out of him. McCree is half tempted to pull him close, even though he knows it won’t help. Hanzo can hear the howl of his time drawing nearer as well as McCree can with a touch. He looks down at his shoes and closes his eyes.

“How-”

McCree tells him. A mission in Dorado, where all Overwatch missions would go wrong. A hail of bullets through Genji as the man tried to protect him. McCree fleeing with them both as fast as his feet could take him. Genji bleeding out in the middle of a Crossroads, oil and blood turning the dirt black as McCree screamed at him to stay.

A cloud of black smoke behind him with the promise of a deal.

“It was an easy choice,” McCree says, shrugging. “He was the dream kid of Overwatch, best friend I ever had. And I thought I’d never make it past thirty with Blackwatch. Thought I caught a deal.” He leans back against his dresser. “I kinda did, I suppose. Got a good amount of time, all things considered. Met more than enough folks, saved a bunch of lives. Better going out saving someone than going out without. Make my life worth something.”

Hanzo stares at him for a long moment before getting up. In a moment, he’s in McCree’s face, snarling, teeth bared. Furious. “Your life has always been worth something, you fool!”

“But is it worth more than Genji?” It’s cruel but it does the trick. Hanzo’s rage vanishes in an instant. McCree gives into the urge to wrap his arms around him and pull him close. Hanzo clings back, head buried into his shoulder. “I’m sorry, that wasn’t fair.”

“None of this is fair.”

They stand there for fifteen minutes.

Both of them can hear the howling in the distance get closer.

Genji finds out.

McCree doesn’t know how. He probably figures about the deal from the signs McCree’s been giving off as the date gets closer and closer; he’s a smart guy. Maybe he talked to a little dragon of his own. He doesn’t know how he figures out what the deal was about though.

“What else could it be?” Genji snarls in his face when McCree asks. “What else could you ask for fifteen years ago? I know you, Jesse McCree. You would not make a bargain unless you thought it was worth your life. And to you, that’s anyone besides yourself.”

We have that in common, McCree thinks as Genji shakes him. After all, they’re in this mess because Genji decides to take a hail full of bullets meant for McCree. Makes sense McCree returns the favor.  

“Does Hanzo know?” McCree’s face must say it all and Genji turns away, swearing in Japanese, which is a sign he’s truly pissed. He spins back around to face McCree, and the way his hands are clenched tells him how furious he is. “And he didn’t tell me?”

“Wasn’t his secret to tell.” That doesn’t seem to satisfy Genji who throws up his hands. McCree reaches out to put his hand on his shoulder. “Look man, I made him promise not to tell you. Made him swear and everything.”

“Pah.” Genji kicks at the ground, quiet for a moment. He shakes off McCree’s hand a second later. It’s not reassuring. “If you break this deal, it will kill me, won’t it?”

Perceptive as ever, McCree thinks. He tries to lie anyway. “Nah-”

“No, it will.” Genji looks up at him and McCree can almost picture the scowl behind the faceplate. He half wishes Genji had it off so it’d be easier to read. “If it was not, you’d have no reason not to tell me. And my brother would have no reason not to break it himself, which he is clearly not doing since he has looked ill for the last month straight.” He stands up straighter. He’s made a decision. McCree already knows it’s not going to be one he’d like.  “Jesse you-”

“No.” McCree’s voice leaves room for no argument. “You ain’t dying. Sorry. Not happening.”  

“It is my life-”

“And I bought it from Satan himself around fifteen years back so as far as I’m concerned, I decide what you do with it. Which is living, by the way, in case you’re curious.” He’s half desperate to light up a cigar here inside, Angela’s regulations be damned. It’d help his nerves. And it’s not worth worrying about his lungs since he’ll be dead in half a year.

“Jesse-”

“I swear to God Genji, if you go to try and break it yourself, I’ll just do it again and add a clause that you can only listen to country music for the rest of your life.”

“This is not a joke-”

“No it ain’t.” He takes a step forward and puts his hand on McCree’s shoulder again. This time Genji does not shake him off, but the twitch Genji makes tells McCree it’s a near thing. “Look here. I made my choice once. I’d do it again. And again. I’m not gonna change my tune. I’ve made my peace with this.”

“And the rest.” McCree thinks of Fareha, Angela, Ana. Takes a deep breath.

“They’ll understand.”

“My brother?”

McCree’s brow furrows. Low blow there. It takes him a minute for formulate your answer.

“If you seriously think he’s gonna toss you aside after trying so long to get you back, you got another thing coming.” Genji is stock still. Surprised. McCree softens his tone. “He loves you, Genji. An absolute ass at showing it, but he ain’t gonna let you die again. Not for anyone. That includes me.”

He takes his hand off Genji’s shoulder and heads for the walkway to the bridge. He can get a smoke there, he knows. Might help the feeling that he’s about to shake out of his skin. He almost misses Genji’s response as he heads for the door.

“He loves you too.”

McCree stops. Smiles. It’s a sad thing.

“Yeah. He does. Doesn’t change who he should pick in the end. Or who he will.”

And with that he leaves. Genji left to watch his serape blow out behind him with every step.

Genji tries.

He doesn’t tell anyone, only because it doesn’t work. When Hanzo is out on a mission, and McCree is gone with him, he flees to the courtyard. No one knows to watch him. He exits the base, taking care not to set off the sensors. At his side is his katana, in case he needs an extra form of persuasion.

He’s been reading about American folklore as of late, about this creature McCree gave himself to for Genji’s sake. The accounts are numerous and varied, nothing near solid enough to give him a full profile, only the presence of a crossroads consistent. He asks his dragon about the creature, and what it tells him is limited. A spirit like himself but twisted and wrong. Greedy. Hungry. A consumer of souls, a granter of desires, a bargaineer on side of the road with deals no man would refuse.

Genji hopes his deal is enough to grant McCree reprieve.

He goes to the nearest crossroads, one out in the back woods. Someplace deserted, where sinister things liked to linger. It’s a small intersection, deep within the forests, and Genji is glad for his visor to help him see through the darkness. He leaves footprints in the dirt road.

In a piece of old American media which equated these creatures to Christian demons, a man had to bury a box with his photo and other items summon them. Genji does no such thing. Instead, he waits.

It comes soon enough, walking through the trees. Genji does not flinch as he sees an echo of his younger self in front of him, hair bright green, a smirk on his face he couldn’t only describe ax lecherous. It leans against a tree and brings up a pinkie finger to pick at it’s teeth.

“Shame,” it says. “And here I thought I might have another meal soon enough.”

“You will release McCree from his deal,” is what Genji says, reaching for his sword. He holds it up, end pointed at the creature. It doesn’t look intimidated. Old things such as it rarely are.

“And give up my hard won meal? I don’t think so. I’ve been waiting years to collect.”

“Take me in exchange, then.” The creature’s left eyebrow raises. Genji is struck how much it seems like looking at himself in a mirror all those years ago. “I have done the same as him, in many ways. I doubt my soul would not prove satisfying. And unlike McCree, I would offer it at once, rather than a few months down the line.”

“You think I’m not patient enough to wait?”

“I am sure of it.”

“Well, you’re right.” The creature’s face shifts, morphing in on itself. It is replaced with the visage of Morrison, a Morrison with washed out skin, and dead eyes. A walking corpse. “Sadly, I can’t take you up on that tempting offer. Contract clause.”

“Clause?”

The creature clicks it’s tongue. It’s strange, hearing the sound from Morrison’s mouth. “Your cowboy is no fool. He knew how common death is in your line of work. So much, his offer was very specific.” The creature shifts again, this time to take on the appearance of a younger McCree. There’s a cut on his cheek, his hat is missing, and his serape is gone. Genji realizes this is likely the spitting image of the man when he first made his bargain. “His life for mine. 15 years, you keep him alive. Same length as my deal. 15 years, he ain’t allowed to kick it as long as our deal stands. I ain’t taking any offer otherwise.” The demon looks at Genji and shrugs. “I would have said no, but well, souls that young tend to lack flavor. Not enough regret. And I assumed he’d mature in time to be something delectable.” It smiles, licking it’s lips. “I suppose I was right.”

Genji stares. This he also planned for, but he thought the rejection would be for a different reason, not a foolish clause. He is outwitted by a boy 15 years in the past. It’s infuriating. He draws back his sword. “I suppose I will have to settle this otherwise.”

When he calls on the dragon, he expects it to appear, to take the creature in front of him into its jaws and bite down. It does no such thing. He tries again. Nothing.

“You fool,” the creature says, shaking its head. “Did you think your spirit would help you kill me? I perish before the deal is up, and your life is forfeit. It knows that as well as I.”

Genji tries again. Nothing. Enraged, he charges for the creature, sword swinging forward. It embeds itself in the tree that the creature was leaning on. He lets out a howl.

There is no way out of this that he can control. He has no authority to save McCree. The man will die within two months, no matter what Genji does.

It’s unacceptable.

He heads back to the base, shaking. The gardens call to him. Waiting inside, floating a foot off the air, is Zenaytta. He tilts his head at his pupil.

It is only once Genji lets out a sob that he comes over to embrace him.

Two months before the deadline is due, Jesse McCree collapses in the middle of a mission.

It’s not from any visible wounds. Instead, it’s from a burning pain in his shoulder, deep and raw. It spreads throughout his body in seconds, washing him in flame, and he clenches it for purpose as he falls to the ground. Later, he learns he screamed the entire time the med-vacced him, like he was burning alive.

Angela does a check on him to try to figure out what’s wrong. She finds nothing, at least, nothing that gives a diagnosis. Only symptoms. Constant pain. Fatigue. Nightmares. Loss of Sleep. Loss of appetite. Nausea. When she asks him about the claw marks on his shoulder, it takes every clever bone in his body to try to figure out an excuse that she’ll buy.

He settles on a mission against Reaper he didn’t have the heart to report. She takes it.

He’s allowed back to his room, though on mandatory bed rest until he feels better. McCree knows no such thing will happen; he’s nearing the end of the line. People visit, Hana to play video games with him for two hours straight, Satya to charm lanterns on his ceiling she finds delightful to make, Fareeha to fuss over the scare he gave her on the mission earlier. Ana visits as well, though when she spots the wound on his shoulder, Jesse knows she doesn’t buy the Reaper tale for a moment. That will be trouble, he thinks. He tries not to dwell on it until she proves him right.

Genji does not visit, and Jesse did not expect him too. He has taken his lack of reversing the deal personally, a failure that weighs on him daily. Jesse is sure as the week passes, Genji will drop by to try to convince him to reverse the deal. He also knows that no amount of pleading will make him take it.

“You will have to tell them eventually,” Hanzo says, when it’s dark and he sneaks into Jesse’s room. Jesse wonders when they became this, confidents of sorts. Something he does not have guts to put into words with the ticking timer over his head. He wonders if Hanzo notices it too, has realized his polite refusals from earlier had more weight than “just not interested.” He hopes not; this situation does not need to be more complicated.

The look Hanzo gives him tells him otherwise.

“I know. I just don’t want them doing anything stupid. Base full of heroic types? Last thing we need is half the base marching out to save my ass.”

“You think they’ll attempt to make a deal in your place.”

“I’d put my money on it.” He looks at Hanzo. “Look, I’m not saying I’m so important that everyone in this base is willing to die to save my fool ass, but, half the people here got a complex about letting people die and ain’t afraid to get their asses in trouble for someone not worth their time.”

“You’re worth their time.” Hanzo’s voice grows harsh, almost serious. Jesse rolls his eyes.

“I’m worth some of their time. Cus of personal reasons and all that. But if you look at it tactically? Like Jack? They know not to waste their souls on an ass like me.”

“Why not?”

McCree feels like he’s made a critical error. It’s rather like the time he walked into a pile of cows manure with new shoes back when he first starting working for Deadlock. A fool’s mistake.  

“I don’t follow.”

“Why would your life not be worth their time?”

McCree is now sure Hanzo is missing the obvious. “I’m not talking self esteem nonsense. I’m talking practical. Let’s look at the skills ya’ll have to offer.” He lifts up his human hand, ticking them off. “Freezing people in place, reconfiguring enemy technology, actually being able to reverse time, summoning literal spirit dragons.” He lowers his hand back to the sheet. “I got unnatural good aim, and time spent in Black Ops. It’s a good resume, good enough to run around with you super-human folks. But it ain’t something you can’t replace if you went digging in any country’s Black Ops division.”

Hanzo is quiet for a long moment. He’s quiet a lot, though there’s a good quiet and a bad quiet. The good quiet is when he’s meditating, or relaxing, or shooting arrows, or enjoying others company. The bad quiet is when he’s turning over every mistake he’s made, every sin he’s committed, with a fine tooth comb to try to find another reason to hate himself in the morning. McCree isn’t sure which quiet this is. It looks like something else all together. Thoughtful, maybe.

“No black ops soldier would have your history with the team,” Hanzo says at last. “Nor your ability to lighten a room, or your horrendous sense of style. No black ops soldier would be so kind to offer to make dinner every week, nor would any black ops soldier talk to others with the intent to know them, rather than to build a profile.” He leans back in his chair, and looks Jesse over. Like he sees something there that Jesse is blind to. “No black ops soldier would look at a man who struck down his own brother as anything other than a threat. And he would be right in doing so.”

Jesse gapes. There’s compliments and then there’s this. He settles on discussing the one thing that doesn’t make his head spin. “You saying being nice to you was wrong?”

Hanzo shrugs. “No. I am not right to judge such things. Clearly.” A wry smile crosses his face before vanishing. “But it was different. And that proves you less than replaceable than, how did you put it-” He mocks Jesse’s accent in a manner that’s terribly over the top and somewhat practiced. “If you went digging in any country’s Black Ops division.”

Jesse lets that sink in.

“That’s mighty sweet of you to say.”

“It’s only the truth.”

“Doesn’t mean it ain’t sweet nonetheless.”

They sit there in silence, not saying a word for the better of two hours.

It’s a good quiet.

When Ana finds out, she is quiet for a long moment before she says anything.

“How do you summon it it?”

McCree sighs. He knows better than ask her how she put it together. Ana’s a smart woman: he doesn’t underestimate to put together a puzzle even when some of the pieces shouldn’t exist. He shuffles in his bed. For now, Angela has allowed him to stay in his room. He’s going to enjoy the comfort of his own bed before it is replaced with a hospital bed.

“I ain’t telling.”

“Jesse-”

“Why you wanna talk to it so bad? Think you can convince it to let me loose? Cus then Genji is a goner.” Ana stares at him, face stern. Jesse lets out a groan. He knew she’d be like this. “You’re gonna try to give it a better offer, aren’t you?”

“I’ve lived a long life-”

“You tell Fareeha that? Or did you plan on leaving a note to let her know you decided to be a big damn hero?” Ana winces. It’s a low blow, McCree knows. He doesn’t care.

“Fareeha will understand-”

“Fareeha will try to offer up herself instead.” Ana flinches. “She takes after you and you know it. She ain’t gonna take either of us going lying down. She’d rather throw herself into the fire than let someone take a hit.”

“She’ll listen to me.”

McCree snorts. “And she listened to you about keepin’ away from Overwatch? Cus then I missed a memo.”

Ana is quiet for a moment, glaring at him. “I forgot how sharp that mouth of yours can be.”

McCree smiles. “I learned from the best.”

“Gabriel was good at that.”

“He was, but I wasn’t takin’ about him.” A small smile appears on Ana’s face. “Don’t think I forgot about what you told the UN commander when he suggested to send Blackwatch on a sacrifice run. I learned seven new swear words that day.”

They reminisce some more. Ana doesn’t bring up his deal again. It’s not reassuring: McCree is enough of an Amari in spirit to know they are not so easily dismayed. She’ll find out a way to summon the thing, with or without his approval. He feels bad, when he asks Genji to make sure she doesn’t head towards the Crossroads herself.

When Genji is found knocked out with a sleep dart 24 hours later, along with Fareeha, he’s not surprised to read the note she left on Genji’s armor.

“I do not need a babysitter. And I am sorry.”

They send Reinhardt after here, along with Jack. They’re the most likely to be able to talk her out of it. If they get there in time at all.

McCree spends the next hour terrified the burning in his bones will vanish.  

Ana waits at the Crossroads for only ten minutes before the creature comes.

It doesn’t wear another’s face in front of her, not at first. Instead, it’s a walking shadow, the color of forest green, smoke billowing out with every step it takes. It looks at her for a long moment, appraising. Like she is a piece of meat.

For a moment, Ana thinks it will take her offer. That laying down her life will save the man she’s known since he was 17. A son in all but name. But instead it twitches, a full body shudder. The smoke vanishes, the creature gaining a face Ana has not seen in years with blonde hair, blue eyes. Overwatch’s poster boy.

“I wish I could say yes,” the creature says, and despite it being a creature, Ana is inclined to believe it. There’s too much of a pleading tone to its voice to not to. Like saying no is killing the beast with every moment that passes. “But touching you-” Fear flashes the face of Strike Commander Jack Morrison and it recoils. Another face appears as it shudders, a quick flash of the visabe of Gabriel Reyes. Ana’s heart twists to even glance at it. “No. I can’t.”

Ana shakes her head. She was sure this would work. She steps forward, reaching out for the monster, ready to drag it into agreeing. Playing tempation to the temptor. She gets her arm on its wrist before it changes again, purple veins under its skin. When she looks up into white eyes, her daughter stares back at her, an unearthly creature not alive nor dead. Blood dribbles down her chin. Ana can hear a death rattle with each breath.

Ana would like to believe herself too old for such tricks. But there are some things experience does not teach one to bare. She screams. Lets go.

The creatures vanishes. No amount of screaming lures it back.

That is how Reinhardt and Jack find her, howling at an empty clearing. She rages against them for a moment, furious at herself, at the world, but when Reinhardt wraps her into a tight hug, she quiets, unable to keep the anger up. She’s too old for it.

She’s too old for this bone setting grief too. But the world clearly has no intentions of letting her from from that anytime soon.

When she heads back to the base, Jesse and Fareeha are waiting for her outside the gates. Fareeha is helping hold the cowboy up, and she rages at her mother for being so stupid, so willing to throw her life away. Ana takes it. McCree on the other hand, says nothing, just giving her a soft smile.

She knows what he’s thinking. He happy it didn’t take the deal. Because that sets a precedent; the creature has no taste for a soul other than his own. He’s doomed to his fate. There is no saving him from this.

That doesn’t stop her from going back once or twice, to try to summon a creature who never appears.

That doesn’t stop Fareeha, Angela, Reinhardt, and Jack from trying as well, when they think no one is paying attention.

He gets worse.

As the last month begins, he’s soon unable to get out of bed, exhaustion weighing on him. The creature visits him in his dreams constantly, reminding him of nightmares, taking away any chance of a decent night’s sleep. McCree loses his appetite as the time dwindles down, and he begins to lose weight at a rapid pace. He becomes terribly pale. When October hits, Angela moves him to the med bay full time.

Everyone lives of the edge the first week of October, constantly discussing what can be done, what they have yet to try. Zenyatta suggests speaking to some scholars he knows, and Genji goes with him. When they come back empty handed, it’s a terrible blow. People visit the crossroads who have gone before, trying to tempt the creature out to chat, but it never comes. For a solid forty eight hours, Genji waits within the center to attempt to kill the thing once and for all. It never comes.

It knows better, Hanzo thinks, than to appear for his brother. To appear for those who have nothing it is interested in. He knows how to get there, though he has never been there himself. It takes everything he has not to visit in person to attempt to lure the creature out with new bait.

McCree’s wishes is why he stays.

The cowboy has many visitors as he wastes away. People are in his room constantly except for when he requests to be alone. Mei visits often, speaking about her research, something that McCree follows closely to Hanzo’s surprise. The Amari’s are in just as often, along with most of the old guard. Jack visits on one occasion and while Hanzo doesn’t know what he says, given the tears on McCree’s face, it must have been something important. A week before the deal is up, McCree’s fever spikes, and Angela works to keep it from killing him. When Hanzo comes in the same night to keep guard, Satya waiting there with a cup of tea. A small light projection of a dog is curled up near McCree’s feet, snoring softly. The cowboy is asleep as well, though he looks far more troubled.

“Would you like some?” Hanzo nods. Satya’s tea is exceptional and he takes a sip before he sits down.

“He doesn’t have long,” she says. Straight to the point. It is why Hanzo likes her; she is not one to mince words. She refuses to lie to someone like she was lied to for so long. It’s something Hanzo can respect.

“No, he does not.”

“Do you need anything?” She speaks hesitantly, unsure. Comfort is something she is less used to. Being raised like she was, Hanzo understands why. He can unfortunately also relate. The fact she is trying speaks to a bravery it took Hanzo a decade to achieve.

“I am not sure.”

Satya stares at him for a moment before she flicks her wrist. Another light projection appears, this time of a small wolf and it curls around Hanzo’s legs. The fur is clearly artificial, but the warmth it gives off is close to the real thing. It reminds Hanzo of the time he spent in the woods, occasionally taking care of abandoned pups. An old comfort.

“Thank you.”

Satya leaves an hour later, taking her leftover tea with her. She hesitates for a moment before squeezing Hanzo’s shoulder. He doesn’t shy away from the gesture. The projections she made fade an hour later, letting out a slow whine as they vanish.

Hanzo stares at McCree. Is this his life for the next few days, staring at a dying man, someone who showed him kindness when he did not deserve it? Someone he cares about far more than he’d like to admit? What will be his future? Another grave to visit once a year, another shrine to honor? Thanking a man who gave his brother life when he has only had the gall to take it?

It’s unfair. Terribly so. He hates it, itches to leave, to go to the crossroads himself. It is McCree’s shallow breathing that makes him stay.

McCree wakes up before midnight, mouth parted in a silent scream. A nightmare, easily recgonizable to anyone who has suffered from them. Hanzo tries to calm him down as he babbles.

“The deal didn’t go through, but it was still hungry-”

“McCree-”

“It ate everyone, everyone, I woke up and everyone was gone-”

“McCree-”

“It was chewing on Fareeha’s heart-”

“Jesse.” Hanzo squeezes his shoulder. It grabs the cowboy’s attention enough for him to look at him. His eyes are feverish. “Fareeha is fine. Everyone is fine.”

Jesse stares at him a long moment before the tension fades from his shoulders. The cause of exhaustion, not actually being relaxed. He falls back into his bed and Hanzo presses his hand to his forehead. His fever is high, not dangerously so, but he’s clearly not lucid.

“Thanks for staying with me-” McCree rasps.

“It is no trouble.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not nice.” He reaches up, as if to push his hair back, then lowers his hand. Must be too much effort. He looks to Hanzo. “You’re a good friend. More than that really, if things were different.”

Hanzo’s stomach twists. “McCree.”

Jesse too delirious to notice his discomfort. “I thought about it. More than I’d like to admit, really. Almost woudda asked, but figured it wasn’t fair since I was gonna croak soon. That’s only considering you’d say yes and all.”

Hanzo considers saying nothing. It might be easier that way for the both of them. McCree will not have to think about what he possibly could have had if things were different, Hanzo will not have to voice the thoughts he’s been ignoring. Instead, he says this.

“I would have said yes.”

McCree’s exhaustion is evident from how little he starts at that statement. “Really?”

“Yes. But only if the restaurant you’d offered was suitable.”

“Picky, ain’t we?”

“Perhaps.”

McCree lets out a tired laugh. “I can get that.” He smiles at Hanzo. “Too bad we can’t go now. I’m not fit to make it outta here. And I’m pretty sure my breath smells terrible.”

Hanzo forces a smile. It hurts. “You’re assuming a lot.”

“I wasn’t trying to suggest.” A flush colors McCree’s face. “Though it’d be nice-”

“It would?”

“It would. Is that such a surprise.”

“Are you asking?”

The words are out of Hanzo’s mouth before he can think them over. McCree stares.

“You don’t gotta take pity-”

“Are you asking?”

A beat of silence. Only the beeping of the machines can be heard. Then, with a raspy voice.

“Yeah. I am.”

There’s no point in overthinking it. McCree’s half delirious with fever, Hanzo feels like he’s being ripped apart by things previously unsaid. It’s a chaste thing, the kiss, a simple pressing of lips. McCree’s too tired to return in much. His skin is hot with fever. Hanzo smooths back his hair.

“Woudda been nice,” McCree says when they part. “To have that again. To take you out somewhere nice.” He drifts. “Don’t be too hard on yourself, when I’m gone. You’re better than you think.” He falls asleep.

Hanzo sits down in his chair again, hands balled into fists. Better than he thinks? Here he is, watching McCree die and doing nothing. How is that good? How is that right? How is any of this acceptable?

He thinks of the crossroads. Bartering with a creature with no name. What sort of thing would want a soul like his, twisted so, in comparison to the man before him? Who would?

McCree does, his mind supplies. And that thought is enough to put him into action.

Five minutes later, he is grabbing his bow from his room and leaving the base.

Hanzo heads for the crossroads after all are asleep.

Genji told him of his encounter with the creature, how he spoke to it and was refused. Ana did as well, rubbing her hand down her face, her shoulders shaking. For them, their stories were tales of failure, things they thought they should be punished for.

For Hanzo, they were instructions on how to try it himself.

The creature appears a full hour after he’s entered the crossroads. Hanzo has screamed himself hoarse for its attention, his voice now a rasp. It takes the form of Genji during their duel, and Hanzo feels his stomach churn. He expected it to appear like this from the other stories. That didn’t mean he was prepared to see the same face his brother had before he struck him down.

“Haven’t I heard a lot about you,” I creature says, limping forward. Blood trails down its arms, its face, everywhere a blade once cut Genji. “I thought you might actually honor his wish not to come at all.”

Hanzo lifts his chin. “If you have heard anything about me, you know I am not an honorable man.”

The demon takes another step forward. Hanzo realizes it is missing a portion of its ear. He may vomit. “Oh, I know” It stands up straight, and Hanzo closes his eyes as burns start to form across its external limbs. Memories of smoke in his nose, the realization of what he’d done, come back to him at once. How he killed his brother, then left him to burn out of shame.

“So are you here for a the same request as the others? Or do you wish to kill your brother again by striking me down?” The tone of Genji’s voice turns sing song. “It will hurt. He’ll receive the same injuries he had before the deal with struck. I believe he’ll die from drowning in his own blood.”

“The request.” Hanzo says through gritted teeth.

“And what have you to bargain?” Genji’s voice is gone. Hanzo opens his eyes to find a man of 18 years there, arms crossed, mouth turned in a slight pout. He killed him once, Hanzo thinks. The first kill he ever made.

“Myself.”

The creature looks at him for a moment before it bursts out laughing. It shifts as it cackles, from Doctor Zigler in a ridiculous witch costume, to a washed-out Morrison, to Genji at age six. It wheezes, clapping it’s knee and settles on McCree. Looking at the creature makes Hanzo realize how much weight the real McCree has lost as of late.

“That’s a good one.” The creature wipes at its eyes, letting out a huff of amusement. “Best one I’ve heard in centuries.” It stares him dead on, it’s mouth curling up into a harsh smile. “What makes you think I’d want the soul such as yours? Tainted with fratricide, and regret.”

Hanzo falters. He expected this but he wished-  “You didn’t wish for Amari’s soul. I thought you may want-”

“I didn’t wish for Amari’s soul, because as tempting as an offer it is, I’m rather tired of Overwatch knocking at my door for a reprieve. Take him, I get a meal. Take her, I become hunted.”

“You believe you would be hunted if you take him?”

“I am not scared of you. Or your brother. Or either Amari.” The creatures snarls. “There are things darker in this world than myself, Hanzo Shimada. I care not to tempt him. And while he is too far gone to care about your cowboy, he would eat me alive for laying a hand on Ana Amari.”

Hanzo wonders if it means who he thinks he does. The phantom of Gabriel Reyes fills his mind, followed by the phantom of what he has become. What the creature says about Ana Amari is true: Reaper may take offense to her being harmed. But Hanzo doubts he would not care about McCree either.

It doesn’t matter if he’s right or not. To see if the Reaper would avenge Jesse, Jesse must die. And that is unacceptable.

“You will not take my soul?”

The creature rolls it’s eyes. “I would rather take the souls of two certain outlaws as a prize.” It begins to vanish around the edges, like it’s blending back into the forest. Hanzo reaches for his bow. The dragons crackle on his skin.

“If you kill me,” the creature says, solidifying once more. “You kill Genji. Is that a mistake you’re willing to repeat?” Hanzo lowers his bow, arm twitching. The creature in front of him shifts again, its visage changing to his own, with grey skin and white eyes. Turning himself into the monster he has always known himself to be.

Hanzo closes his eyes. There is no solution here. He cannot kill his brother anew. He won’t. He will be forced to watch this creature eat McCree alive, watch feast upon a man who has shown him kindness and friendship. It is not fair.

The dragons mummer against his skin. Hanzo listens to what they whisper. His mouth turns down into a frown.

Are you sure? He asks.

It would be worth it, they reply.

“You would perish.”

“We are aware and would be born anew for the next generation.”

“Would it kill me?”

A beat of silence. “No. But it will not be pleasant.” Hanzo sees an image of them flash behinds his eyes at their bequest, a picture of another man with dragons in his skin howling in pain. He watches as his eyes roll back into his head, as he clenches his arm, shouts profanities into the sky. When the dragons leave, he gasps for air for what seems to be hours. Hanzo feels a taste of his pain, a sheer fire that burns across his entire torso and flinches. No, the dragons are right. It will not be pleasant. It would be the worst pain he’s ever felt.

There is more, they whisper. He sees the man walking, dragons gone. There’s a hollowness in his body, Hanzo feels, a man made more mortal with their absence. A loss that stretches, a silence in his mind that lingers. It is your decision in the end.

His brother, McCree or the dragons. A silence in his mind where the dragons have always lain, or a silence in the world around him. The choice is easy.

“Now that’s you’re done wasting my time-” Hanzo opens his eyes and looks at this mockery of himself in the eye.

“I have an offer.”

“I do not want your pathetic soul-”

“I have another offer. One better than the soul of Jesse McCree. And you should take care to listen less you want me here every night until he perishes.”

The creature crosses its arms. Leans back on one foot. Skeptical.

“What do you offer?”

Hanzo smiles.

In his dreams, Jesse turns and finds the creature waiting for him.

It’s in the form of Hanzo now, skin a pallid grey, horns growing out of his head, eyes white. It picks it’s teeth with a sharp claw on its pinkie and licks its lips.

“We’re square cowboy.” The words sound wrong in Hanzo’s voice. “I get my meal. You get your life. A good old happy ending.” It shakes its head and lets out a hiccup. “I hate them myself, but your lot is more trouble than it’s worth.”

The creature shifts. For a moment, Jesse can see what it really looks like, its true face. He finds it impossible to describe. The closest metaphor he’ll ever make is that it reminded him of a starving coyote, ribs showing plain, half starved. More pitiful than dangerous.

It fades. Jesse finds himself standing among blackness for a moment before the world around him shifts.

Jesse wakes on a gasp, pain in his limbs gone, fire free from his bones.

The second thing he does is scream.

Jesse almost tears off Genji’s door.

Angela tries to keep him in the med-bay, to see what has suddenly cured him, but Jesse wasn’t having any of it, sprinting out of his room as fast as he could. He gets there in record time, almost five minutes flat, and as he pulls at the doorknob his hand shakes.

Jesse isn’t dying. Jesse should be dying. No one was able to trade their soul for his. Which means- which means-

Genji should be bleeding out in a pool of his own blood when he opens his door. Rasping for air. Torn apart by bullets from a Bastion unit fifteen years dead.

Jesse is about to call Angela and kick open the door when Genji opens the door.

He’s wearing sweats and a loose t-shirt from Lúcio’s concerts, looking absolutely terrible. His faceplate is off, dark circles under his eyes. There are no bullet holes in his shirt, no blood and oil running down his frame, no sparking from his artificial limbs. He’s fine. Absolutely fine.

“How are you out of-” Genji doesn’t finish as Jesse pulls him into a hug, holding him tight. It’s a minute long embrace and Genji hugs back after a moment. When both men back off, they look each other over with relative confusion. Both are still standing. Both are fine. Which means-

“Athena,” Genji asks up to the ceiling. “Did anyone leave the base last night?”

There’s silence from the A.I.

“It’s a matter of safety.”

Another few seconds of silence before Athena speaks.

“Agent Hanzo left the base at one last night. He returned this morning.”

Both men glance at each other before booking it out of Genji’s doorway and down the hall to where Hanzo’s room is located.

Genji kicks open the door without knocking. Hanzo is in his bed, and for a horrible moment, Jesse thinks he isn’t breathing. He stirs after a moment, looking at both men, and his shakes his head. His hair is down and he’s still wearing a sweatshirt over his normal clothes.  

“I apologize,” he says. “I did not mean to fall asleep-”

He doesn’t finish. Genji practically tackles him, speaking rapid Japanese. Jesse can’t make out a word of it with how fast he’s talking, but he sounds panicked. He looks to be poking his brother for injuries, and Hanzo mutters something, swatting his hands away and pushing him back.

“I am fine,” he grumbles. He gets out of bed, and looks at Jesse. A smile crosses his face. “And so are you it seems.”

Jesse can’t smile back. He’s terrified. Genji hets back to his feet as well as Jesse steps forward.

“What did you do?”

“I made a deal.”

Jesse can’t breath. Despite months of feeling flames lick his back, despite every breath being a struggle only hours before, he feels like this might actually kill him, watching Hanzo be consumed by a deal Jesse made. He takes a step forward and shakes Hanzo’s shoulders.

“Brother-” Genji doesn’t finish as Hanzo holds up a hand.

“I could not let you die,” he says looking at Jesse. “And I could not let you die as well.” He shrugs. “It was the only acceptable outcome.”

Jesse stares. Genji takes a step back, leaning against the wall, almost for support. Jesse is sure his thoughts are going a mile a minute, as fast as he is on the battlefield. Jesse’s are much slower.

He made a deal.

He did it for you.

He’s going to die because of you.

“No. No, no no, no no-”  Jesse says, lacing his hands in his hair. He thinks of the nightmares that have consumed him for the last few months, the feeling of fire, of tasting nothing but ash. He doesn’t care if Hanzo thinks he deserves it; it’s not acceptable. “I thought I told you to leave it!”

“Jesse-” Hanzo starts. Jesse shakes his head. “Jesse, listen to me.”

“It was my burden to carry. Not yours!  Mine! I made that deal. I don’t care that you think it’s just deserts or something, or that it’s some mighty trade to make up for what you did.”  He lets go of his hair and instead grabs Hanzo’s shoulders. Shakes them. “There is no penance in dying, you hear me!”

“I didn’t not give it my life.”

Jesse stops. The words register in his brain for a moment, echoing. “Cuse’ me?”

“It did not want it,” Hanzo says, voice slow, calm. Genji sinks down onto the floor, though he looks as tense as a wire. “It thought me too tainted.” There’s a wry smile there, self-deprecating and full of loathing. “So I offered it something else.”

When Jesse speaks next, his voice is a whisper. “What did you give up!”

Hanzo says nothing, instead taking off his sweatshirt. There, where the tattoo once rested is bare skin. The dragons have dissipated, no evidence that they were there in the first place.

“They thought it a fair trade,” Hanzo says quietly. “I sent Morrison a message. He knows I will no longer have them during missions.” He looks up at McCree and smiles. “Hopefully, my good aim will be worthy enough to keep me within Overwatches ranks.”

Jesse reaches out his hands as if to touch the blank skin, than thinks better of it. He opens his mouth, then closes it. Genji is silent.

“It seemed only fair,” Hanzo says after a moment. “I have taken far too many lives with their power.” His gaze glances at Genji and he flinches. “Saving a life with them seemed fitting penance. Or at least, the best I can hope for.”

Everyone in the room is quiet. Jesse speaks first.

“You didn’t hafta do that,” he whispers. Hanzo doesn’t miss a beat in replying.

“Yes. Yes, I did.”

Months after the deal, Hanzo’s life is approaching something close to normal.

Losing the dragons is a blow. Morrison keeps him the team even with their loss, but Hanzo would be lying if he said his skills weren’t lesser. He doesn’t regret the deal, not in the slightest, but it does make things harder, skills he once relied on no longer in his reach. He adapts quickly enough, though he does earn a few scars for his trouble. It’s worth it.

Ana and some others look for the creature, despite Hanzo wanting them to leave it. They had good enough reason too, he supposes, with that kind of power at it’s fingertips, but he’d rather not confront it anytime soon. They have no luck in the matter. The creature never appears when they come to the Crossroads. Hanzo doubts it ever will: he has a feeling it’s done with Overwatch after the chaos of the last year.

Things settle, as they do. After what he did, some of the other agents have taken to at least greeting him. Ana perhaps shows the greatest change, offering to talk to him over tea, almost fretting the few times he’s almost been hurt. Somewhat like his own mother, when he was a young boy.

Genji and him talk more, afterwards. Inevitable really. It’s not easy work. They bicker frequently, and yelling matches can occasionally heard throughout the base. But they make progress. And that’s perhaps what matters.

McCree and him remain as they were. Friends, confidents, teammates. Hanzo sits with him under one of the largest trees on base when the sun hangs over the sky, talking little. McCree smokes. Hanzo enjoys the shade and thinks. Thinks how he could have been here alone if he did not give up his dragons. Thinks what it means that he was so willing to part with them for one man.

Hanzo has spent a year avoiding thinking about this and for what? To almost let an oppertunity to be happy pass him by. Months ago, he’d think it adapt, given what he’s done. As of recently, he’s started to think otherwise.

It is on this thought that he speaks, interrupting the comfortable silence.

“You kissed me.”

McCree sits up straight, dropping his cigar, his hat slumping forward. He reaches out to pat the grass to keep the cigar from lighting the grass and when he picks it up, he snuffs it out on his chest plate. Hanzo watches as he stares at him, his eyes growing wide. He does not remember, Hanzo realizes, not under the haze of hellfire and pain. Hanzo doesn’t blame him.

“I did what?”

“I believe you heard me.” McCree still gapes. It’s a good expression on him, the outright confusion. Many men are afraid of being seen so off guard. McCree is not one of those people. When it comes to those he trusts, he has no qualms about wearing his emotions plain. It’s part of the reason Hanzo likes him.

(Like is perhaps not a strong enough word. But it’s suitable at the moment.)

“It was when you were ill,” Hanzo waves his hand. “You were babbling. And then you asked for a kiss. I was inclined to give it.”

McCree closes his mouth, then tips down his hat. A flush covers his face, barely noticeable in the shade.

“Nice thing to do for a dying man.” He clears his throat. “Nice thing to do for a living one, too. If you’d like, that is.”

Hanzo smirks. That’s one way to put it. He turns so he’s facing McCree and tips up his hat. Looks at his face. He looks terribly embarrassed, but there’s a smile on his face, not the cocksure one, the real one. The one Hanzo would like to see more often.

There is no redemption in dying, Hanzo thinks. That is what McCree had told him, a long time ago. Hanzo has found his words sound. Dying did not repair the damage wrought on his brother; living did. Hard work, and discussions he’d rather not touch, conversations he grit and bared.

Perhaps, Hanzo thinks, there is no redemption in punishing oneself either.

“I was hoping on it.” Hanzo says, leaning in. The hat falls off as he tips up McCree’s chin and smiles into a kiss so different from the first.

This time, no creature of flame torments either of them.

EPILOGUE

He finds it in Dorado.

It’s smaller than he expects, when he finally corners it. Too weak to take on a human form, it whines as a coyote at his heels, desperate for reprieve. He’s been tracking it for months now, intercepting it’s deals, denying it a filling meal. It must be starving.

He’s delighted by the thought.

“Please,” it whines, clawing at the ground. “I let him go. He lived.”

“You didn’t plan on that.”

“Does it matter?” He fires a shotgun round next to it’s head. The full body shudder it gives off has it change its fur from red to black. It whines again. “I didn’t know he was important to you. I thought he was a pain in your ass now. If I’d known, I would have let him-”

He aims his other shotgun at the beast’s head. It digs its claws into the dirt, bends its head back. After a moment, it looks up at him with white eyes.

“I can take away your pain, you know. Make you who you used to be. Turn you back to the hero you once were.” The gun drops back to his side and the creatures takes a step forward. The coyote form vanishes, replaced by something else, the image of an ingrate dragged out from Deadlock Gorge years ago. “You’d just have to feed me some of your cut, that’s all. An easy deal really, nothing at all. The best I’ve ever offered.” It grins with a face that doesn’t belong to it. “What do you say boss?”

A taloned hand plunges through the creature’s chest as a reply. It gasps, choking on air it doesn’t need as he drags out it’s soul. The body of the creature fades away with its essence gone.

Reaper turns it over in his hands. A tiny white thing, barely a flame. Pathetic. He drops it in his mouth.

It tastes like ash.