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Angela doesn't know yet.
He's almost always right where she's concerned—he knows her typical habits and usual haunts. He knows when she wants to talk and when she wants to be left the hell alone. He knows when to push her and when to give her what she wants. He knows what stupid jokes will make her crack a smile even on her worst days, and he knows enough German to discern when she's yelling at him and when she's pleading with him.
He knows Angela Ziegler damn near as well as she'll let anyone know her—as close as he can be while still mindful of her social awkwardness (she was in college as a teenager and he's still convinced she doesn't actually know how to make friends), her shit sleep cycle (if the light's still on under the door of the infirmary after three AM, he'll barge in and start packing all her shit up until she finally surrenders and goes to bed), and her fierce devotion to strangers (he will never ever forget the day she told John Morrison to go to hell after he ordered her to pull out of a town that needed medical attention).
So yeah. He's pretty positive she has no idea.
But the face she makes when Morrison drops the bomb in their meeting is a pretty clear indicator too.
She blinks in surprise, and Reyes slides his gaze over to Morrison, smirking when he realizes the Commander is trying to hurry through this.
"A moment, Jack, if you please," she interrupts smoothly, forehead creased as she sits forward in her chair, frowning at him. "I am not sure I understand."
Reyes glances sideways to see Ana sitting coolly with a poker face next to Morrison, who is looking at everything in the room that isn't blonde and blue-eyed.
The Commander clears his throat. Repeats himself.
Angela's expression gets a dangerous edge as she sets her arms on the table, leaning forward, the harsh light of the meeting room casting shadows across her face.
"Come again?" Her voice couldn't be lighter. Her eyes couldn't be darker.
Reyes almost wants to laugh. Angela is smart as a whip—she doesn't need anything repeated.
"Blackwatch, Doctor," Morrison says, skirting her gaze by shuffling through blank note sheets. "Reyes is going to Blackwatch."
Angela looks torn between utter confusion and fierce hostility. Reyes settles back in his chair, smirking lightly to himself.
The good doctor doesn't often engage in confrontation—she claims it's because she's above childish arguments, but Reyes knows it's because she just doesn't care and will do what she wants regardless of what feathers she ruffles—but every once in a while she'll dig in her heels.
Because when Angela does fight—oh boy. She'll punch first and she'll punch hard.
Reyes didn't know there was a verbal equivalent to having his jugular ripped out until he went toe-to-toe with Overwatch's angel.
Apparently Morrison is thinking the same thing, because he pushes to his feet.
"If you have any further questions, Doctor—"
"I most certainly do."
"—you can ask me at a later date."
He doesn't even bother to gather up his documents, and instead moves away from the table, great coat snapping at his heels as he makes his exit—Ana right on his heels, expression expertly schooled.
The door shuts behind the two, leaving a very amused Reyes and a very offended Angela.
After a half-second of Angela staring at the door with her eyes wide and scandalized and her mouth hanging open—a visual Reyes will treasure—she shoves away from the table, jaw set.
"Do not get comfortable," she growls at him as she snatches up her papers. She looks up to fling him a severe look. "You and I will be speaking very soon."
And she sweeps from the room—her battered white coat much less grand than Jack's but her expression far fiercer—and Reyes just sits in the empty room for a moment before rising to his feet.
He gives himself about twenty minutes before she comes looking for him. He considers hiding out in McCree's room—she never goes there—but decided against it.
McCree would rat him out immediately, the bastard, and Angela had looked pretty pissed. She'd tear this base apart to find him.
So about a half-hour later—Reyes delights in the fact that he knows Jack is getting chewed the fuck out for a good chunk of that time—he isn't surprised when the door to his now-empty office is thrown open.
"What the fuck is Blackwatch?"
Her voice is low and fierce and Reyes can't remember the last time he heard her swear like that. She curses, sure, but it's usually under her breath in German as she hunts for a particular document on her overcrowded desk, or as she tries to stifle the bleeding on a wounded soldier, or occasionally when he mutters something rude to her about the visiting UN ambassador.
A quick, quiet, huan son or schise. But now she stands in the doorway of his office—well, what was his office, anyway—eyes fierce, lips pulled back in a small snarl.
He quirks his eyebrow. "You're gonna have to start listening in those meetings, Doc," he tells her lightly. "I'm not gonna be around to fill you in anymore."
A starkly scandalized looks crosses her face—he loves that her indignation is the only thing stronger than her anger—before she narrows her eyes and sets her jaw. He's not getting out of this one.
"For one thing," she begins, sweeping into the room that is no longer his office, shutting the door behind herself with a snap. "You have copied my notes from the past three meetings, thank you very much." She slams her hands on his desk, eyes narrowed and so bright with anger. "And for another thing—"
His lips twitch with amusement as he cuts her off. "Careful Doc," he cautions, because fuck, when's he gonna get the chance to tease her like this again? "Slammin' doors like that, eyes all intense, shouting, hitting furniture…" he flashes her a smirk that's all teeth. "People might get the wrong idea. Don't wanna ruin my reputation on my last day, do you?"
She pauses for a moment—angelic fury suspended with confusion—before she realizes exactly what he's insinuating and there's that steady blush he'd been gunning for.
She steps back, flushing darkly, pulling her lab coat tighter around herself like a reflex. Like he'd ever actually try anything. Like she wouldn't be able to shoot his damn hand off if he ever made a move she didn't agree with.
"Your reputation is already shit," she informs him, voice cold, and he just laughs.
"Probably," he agrees, grinning crookedly. "Guess that's why they're shippin' me out, huh?"
She deflates at this, eyes turning sad, forehead creasing with concern and shit, no that's not what he wanted dammit Reyes—
"It…it is not final…" she trails off, and that hopeful look in her eye makes him want to punch a wall. He wanted this to be light and teasing and casual, and now she's staring up at him like a fucking kicked dog. "Jack…he would never—"
"Wasn't Jack's choice, Ange," Reyes mutters, stuffing his hands in his pockets to keep them from wandering. "And yeah," he shrugs, looking pointedly at his empty office. "It's pretty damn final."
"But…but you are an agent of Overwatch." He'd laugh at the outrage in her voice but she's close enough to give him a quick cuff to the back of the head if she wanted to.
Reyes shrugs again. "Yeah, well. Now I'm not." He pulls his hands out of his pockets to spread them in a show of what can ya do?
Her eyes narrow like they had at Morrison during the meeting as she glares at him from across the desk.
"And you just…forgot to mention this?" she asks. Tone light but lined with steel. She's looking for a fight.
Reyes isn't going to give it to her. He reaches up to scratch idly at his hair, ruffling what he knows is some god-awful, untidy mess of dark curls that Ana sharply calls beanie hair. His hand freezes.
He's gonna miss that.
"I mean…yeah." Reyes drops his gaze to the empty desk she's resting her hands on, trying and failing to not remember when it'd been crowded with papers and forms and documents and a framed photo of him and Jack and Ana that Fareeha had given him for his birthday and he hadn't had the heart to dispose of.
Now it's empty. He idly wonders who will get it next.
Maybe he can put in a word for Angela. She's been working out of that dungeon of an infirmary for too long.
"Gabriel—" oh no here come the full names "—forgive me, but I really do not understand why I was the last person—"
"You weren't the last person to know about this, Doc," he mutters, cutting her off and earning a sharp look that he misses as he rubs his broad palms over his face. Fuck he's tired.
She arches an eyebrow. "McCree does not count," she informs him curtly. "Even if you had told him, he never listens."
He snorts into is hands.
"McCree does count," he counters, dropping his hands to give her a flat look. He shrugs. "Little shit's comin' with me."
This gives Angela pause. He watches with amusement as she tries to stuff her expression behind a calm, suave mask.
He sighs, dropping into the office chair and closing his eyes.
"Just go ahead and yell, Ange," he mutters, leaning his head back.
He doesn't even flinch when she slams her hands on the desk.
"What is happening?" she shouts. "What are you not telling me, Gabriel? You promised you would keep me informed—do you remember that? Hm? In Ilios? When the UN tried to curtail my medical—"
"I remember," Reyes murmurs, just to keep her from imploding.
"So then what is this?" she yells, and Reyes grits his teeth. Why did he think they'd be able to have a nice, simple goodbye?
Because you're a goddamn fucking sadist convinced nobody actually gives a shit about you.
"Ange," he tries to soothe. "You're shouting."
"Of course I am!" she flings back at him, and he cracks open an eye to see her leaning on his desk, eyes dagger-sharp, teeth bared. If she was in her Valkyrie suit, Reyes would be pretty concerned for himself.
As it stands, the worse she can do is kick the legs out from under his chair.
Or she could say she doesn't care and just leave.
Reyes stuffs that thought away.
"Why?" he asks simply, opening his eyes to stare her full in the face.
Angela hesitates for a half-second—he lives for those moments when he can catch the genius doctor off-guard—before her righteous anger seems to bow out, and her arms go limp on the desk, her entire bravado falling away.
"What do you mean why?" she asks, and oh Christ the hurt in her voice. Reyes wants to die when he hears it.
She looks down at him, the light gone from her vivid eyes, leaving them hollow and dim.
"Gabe…you are my friend and you are leaving—where are you even going? Why are you even going? What…" she trails off, gesturing uselessly with her hands, like even her body language doesn't know what to say.
"Why?" she whispers, and he grimaces because he can hear the pain in her voice—the raw fuckin' betrayal—and it absolutely wads him up inside—
He sighs deeply, sitting up in the chair, staring at the blank wall that once held a few maps and a whiteboard that more often than not featured doodles left for him by Fareeha and Jesse.
"Blackwatch is…new," he explains slowly. "Kind of. They're a shadow organization—an offshoot of Overwatch."
Angela frowns. "How closely related are the two?" she asks carefully.
He smirks slightly. He can see the gears turning in her head.
She's too damn smart for her own good.
"Not very," he says. "Nobody really knows Blackwatch is a thing."
"I gathered," she returns icily. He cracks a grin at that.
"Yeah well…" Reyes sighs, sitting forward to rest his elbows on his knees. "They're kind of a mess right now. Their last Commander never came back from a mission. She was what really kept the Blackwatch agents loyal to Overwatch."
Angela arches a brow. "So who are they loyal to now?"
"Still Overwatch," he assures her. "But it won't last. There's too much tension—a lot of the agents there got fucked over by Overwatch and they're pretty fuckin' bitter about it. Some are pissed they get treated like second-class citizens. Some are tired of living in Overwatch's shadow." He shrugs. "Take your pick—they ain't happy."
"So where do you come in?" Angela asks, shifting to settle on the edge of his desk, frowning at him. "You and McCree?"
Reyes smiles humorlessly to himself—where indeed?
"I'm the new Commander," he explains softly. "And I'm taking the damn stupid cowboy with me because I don't trust him and Jack to not kill each other."
Angela doesn't reply right away. She just sits quietly on the edge of his desk.
He glances away from the wall to take in her profile—head titled down in thought, tapping out rhythms against her thigh that he knows are little messages to herself, hair falling into her eyes—
He blows out a heavy sigh, looking away.
He's gonna miss Overwatch.
"I want to come."
Reyes actually does start this time, nearly falling out of the chair as he hasten to throw himself to his feet, face thunderous.
"You what?"
She looks up at him, head titled innocently to the side.
"Gabe," she tells him seriously. "You're shouting."
He can't even appreciate her shit impression of his accent—he's too busy staring at her.
"Absolutely not," he snaps. Oh please god yes. Please come. Please.
"Why not?" she demands, shifting around until she faces him full-on, sitting cross-legged on his desk.
"Because you are needed here." He tries not to shout. He also tries not to imagine Angela coming with him. Blackwatch could certainly use an angel.
She glares at him. "I am needed wherever people need help, Reyes," she points out. "If Blackwatch is that upset with Overwatch, what is a better show of good faith than sending someone like me?"
No. No no no no. She can't come. But fuck he wants her to so badly—
"Ange," he leans down to level himself with her. She quirks an unimpressed eyebrow. "Ange, you don't understand, Blackwatch is not like Overwatch—"
"Oh, truly?" she murmurs back, so blasé Reyes wants to punch himself in the face. "I had no idea."
"You do have no idea!" he shouts. "Dammit, Angela! Blackwatch—they're fucking bad okay? They're…it's…" he trails off, chest heaving.
She stares up at him expectantly.
She'd come. In a heartbeat. She'd follow him to the ends of the earth—until the end of his miserable life.
God, she'd make Blackwatch suck less.
She'd be brilliant, smart, capable—everything she is at Overwatch, but without the UN looking over her shoulder like a flock of fuckin' vultures. He could protect her at Blackwatch—use his title to keep prying eyes away from her research, get her experiments under tighter wraps, keep her hands clean.
She'd only have to answer to him—and since when has he been able to deny her anything?
He looks down at her.
Jack would fight them, but Ana would be on their side—Angela always gets what she wants in the end, anyway—she could come she could be there Reyes you fucking idiot just say yes—
"No."
Angela lifts an eyebrow. "No?"
"No," Reyes repeats, folding his arms across his chest. "You're not coming."
She looks unsurprised, which means she has at least twenty counterarguments stored away and is deciding which one to use first.
Fuck.
"Besides the obvious," she begins. "What are your reasons?"
"The obvious?" he demands. "What? You mean the fact that it's fucking dangerous and I won't be able to keep an eye on you all the time and that Blackwatch is full of a bunch of heavily armed, highly volatile agents?"
Her expression sours. "Dangerous is not an acceptable counterpoint. I have more bullet wounds than you."
"Yeah, because I'm better at not getting shot."
"No, because I took the fucking bullet for you, thank you very much."
He grits his teeth. She lifts her chin.
He wants to drop to his knees and beg her to come.
He curls his fingers into his arms, holding them tighter.
"Ange—"
"Unless you give me a reasonable answer, Reyes, I am going to pack my bags."
They stare at each other.
"I don't want you to." He spits the lie out through his teeth.
She isn't fazed. "Say it without choking and perhaps I will believe you."
"You can't—"
"Why? Why Reyes? Why are you so—?"
" Because you're too fucking good for Blackwatch!"
Angela actually leans away for the sheer force of his anger. Good.
"For fuck's sake, Angela! You think I'm getting some kind of promotion? You think this is a temporary thing?"
Angela eyes him. "I did not think it was temporary," she says carefully. "But I do not see how becoming a Commander—"
"The UN is trying to get rid of me," he snaps. "Overwatch wants to bury me."
Something in her expression shifts. He's found his mark.
The only thing Angela loves more than Reyes is the organization he brought her to.
"Reyes," she says quietly, eyebrows slanting down. "Reyes, what are you—?"
"Not true?" he demands. The knowledge that he's got her cornered—that he'll win—both emboldens and sickens him. It's a bizarre combination that makes his head spin as he steps closer, looming over her. Her expression darkens with dislike—she hates being crowded and intimidated, which he knows because he knows her and he wants her to come but she can't—
"Huh? You think I'm lying?" His voice is rough, aggressive. He's riling her now, and she's much worse at ignoring jabs. She gives him a frigid glance as she slips backwards off the desk.
"Mind yourself, Gabriel." Her words are cloaked in caution, eyes bright with a warning.
If he pushes this, he'll regret it.
He plunges on.
"I should have been Overwatch's Commander."
Angela's eyes flip wide, then narrow to slits.
"We have been over this, Reyes. We are past this—"
"You know it, Ana knows it—hell, Jack knows it. That's probably why he agreed to this."
"You said yourself that Jack had nothing to do—!"
"Do you really think if Jack wanted to keep me here I'd be leaving?" Reyes yells at her. "Huh? The Strike Commander of the most heroic team in the history of the fuckin' world. You don't think he could've put his foot down?"
Angela stares him down. "No," she replies lowly. "No I do not. Jack is your friend, Reyes. If he could have kept you here—"
"That's bullshit!" he flings at her.
"Hör auf," she whispers.
In the rare instances when Reyes flies off the handle and Angela remains grounded, this is always how it plays out—him yelling like the world is ending, and her speaking so softly he has to strain to hear her.
That's how it'd gone when Jack had been prompted in the first place, anyway.
"If Overwatch cared," he mutters, voice much softer, heavier. "If anyone here gave a shit, I wouldn't be going. That's just a fact, Ange."
"I care," she counters, flicking her gaze up to meet his. "But you never asked me."
"It's 'cause you care too much," he tells her, sighing and stuffing his hands in his pockets.
About me. About Overwatch. About everyone and everything but your goddamn self.
She just stares up at him, and he stares back, wondering how long it'll be until he sees those eyes again.
"If you want to leave," she says quietly. "Then leave."
He glares, anger flaring back at her haughty tone.
"It's not a want, Angela, weren't you listening—?"
"Then come with me. We will go to Jack, we will find a suitable replacement, and you will remain here." Her eyes flash, jaw flexing. "Where you belong."
A challenge, of course. Angela arches an eyebrow, and Reyes wants to laugh for ever thinking he had the upper hand in this situation.
She's gonna make him say it. It's the only way she'll let him go.
Fine then.
"I don't belong here. Not anymore. Probably not for a while." He lifts an eyebrow, stepping closer—her shoulder pressed against his chest—as he makes to step past her.
"Believed that one, didn'tcha Doc?"