almightythirst | Open Post

It is, for better or worse, home.

Here, he has places he can return to. Condos and apartments that are allowed renters while he's out, to maintain appearances. Safehouses in lower places, warehouses and lofts in the industrial district, should he need distance from the city proper. Such places are kept throughout the island, cultivated over decades of favors owed and lives spared.

He need only show his face in the lobby of one such apartment building for the wizened woman behind the desk to suddenly look up, adjust her glasses, and move to offer him a key. Jesse, she squints at for a moment, but no words are exchanged. Hanzo simply bows his head and leads the way to the elevator.

Not quite as fine as the condo everything had happened. That one, he doesn't know that he'll return to. If Jesse found it, someone else will. But this is still a place of comfort and luxury, as minimalist as it is. A far cry from the places they've been staying at thus far.

Jesse flashes the woman a quick smile, keeping his mouth shut despite being incredibly curious what she makes of him. Knowing Hanzo, there haven’t been many other guests. If any.

He lets out a low whistle when they enter the actual unit. It’s nice, if a bit bare for his tastes. Seems perfect for the elder vampire though: stylish without being ostentatious. Quite a bit like the man himself. Jesse laughs quietly at the thought as he walks to the window.

“Just how many of these places you got around here?”

He goes to move the curtain, but stops when he notices something on the window ledge inside. Huh. Must have blown in last time Hanzo was here and kept the window open for some air. The feather is small, brown and white, but Jesse couldn’t begin to guess at whichever bird it came from. He rolls the quill between his forefinger and thumb as he goes ahead and opens the curtain to peek out at the skyline.

"Enough to make movement and reconnaissance easier for us, while we are here," he replies, reaching with a passing hand to draw up a holo-screen, hovering over the table in the dining room. What information could be obtained from Talon could be kept here, threads connecting where they might.

One eyebrow lifts as he notices Jesse looking out the window. Then, his eyes stray to the small feather in his hand. It takes longer than he'll admit to for him to recognize it, but the moment he does? He quietly reaches for his bow on his back, snapping it open in a quick flick of his wrist.

"Jesse. Step back."

He hadn't left the window open.

If Jesse doesn't hear the bow snapping open, he for sure catches the tone of Hanzo’s voice. He steps back with a concerned glance in the elder vampire’s direction. The feather falls from his hand, already forgotten, as he reaches for Peacekeeper in its hidden holster.

The seconds tick by, but there isn’t any sign of movement from the window. Just Hanamura’s nightscape. Peaceful, most people would say.

Jesse doesn’t move, though his eyes dart from the window to Hanzo more than once. Despite the tense atmosphere, however, the window remains closed and the apartment remains quiet.

He still listens, despite the apparent still of the night. He waits, arrow in hand, as the seconds tick by. Nothing occurs, yet he still remains on edge for several moments before stepping closer to the window.

It should be impossible, someone finding this place. Much less getting inside to leave him a message. But that is undoubtedly what happened. When nothing else occurs, Hanzo lowers the bow, then drops to a knee to retrieve the fallen feather. He knows it. Of course he knows it, even after all this time. It is no coincidence.

The mask. The feather. Someone is using the spectre of his dead brother, and whoever it is has just made this mission even more intensely personal than it had been before.

To Jesse, it might look odd. Hanzo just crouched there, staring at the feather with an expression of cold fury, as though it had just made several unkind remarks about his parentage.

Jesse watches Hanzo closely, frown deepening as the silence stretches on. He’s seen Hanzo angry before, of course, and been the target of that anger more than once. He thought he’d known Hanzo’s ire pretty well. But never has he seen anything quite like the expression frozen on the man’s face now.

Obviously the feather isn’t just a feather. He should have known. It makes no sense for Hanzo to have left something so mundane behind him whenever he was here last. He’s far too meticulous for that. But what else the feather could mean is really beyond him.

Slowly, he kneels down, putting himself on eye-level with the other vampire. “Hanzo.”

He doesn’t reach out. That would mean loosening his grasp on Peacekeeper. But his voice does soften, crossing the distance his own hands don’t.

“Talk to me. What is it?”

"I do not leave things out of place. Every object in this room? I have accounted for. This was not here when I left."

Which means someone was here, or could very well still be here. That should be reason enough to be on edge. Nevermind the implications of this object, which was surely not chosen by accident. First they insult the clan. Now they come for him, personally. Perhaps it is a warning. If so, they've only accomplished the very opposite thing. Spite has kept him alive longer than most still walking the earth, and he is not going to abandon it now.

"The masked assailant causing trouble for my family...the mask he wears belonged to my brother. And this--"

Suddenly, his jaw snaps shut, and his gaze tears from the small feather towards Jesse. Jesse, who has gotten so very close in the last few weeks. Jesse, with his hand on Peacekeeper. Who had known a secret few would have been able to provide. And for one shameful moment his blood runs colder, and he goes unnaturally still.

No. It is coincidence only. It must be, surely. He would trust Jesse with his life, and that was no easily admitted thing.

Jesse frowns back, visibly concerned in a way that’s less worried now and more thoughtful. It takes a bit of doing to fill in the gaps, but he thinks he gets it-- and once he does, it’s all he can do not to let out an annoyed huff. Is it a Shimada thing? Are they all this roundabout when it comes to actually trying to communicate something?

But just knowing it might have been Genji isn’t too reassuring. The man is still a largely unknown entity, and there are plenty of other players in the game. It would be foolish to assume this doesn’t mean they’re in danger.

Especially now, when Hanzo has no idea who the man in the mask actually is. That thought, paired with Hanzo’s sudden stillness, has the furrow between his eyes deepening.

“You’re sayin’ this is related, and we might’ve missed a visit.” He can only assume Hanzo’s change in demeanor is something to do with that realization. Strange, though, how he’s watching Jesse so intently.

“We should do a sweep. See if they left anything else.”

For what it might be worth later, Jesse hates this. Being secretive, lying for the better good as he sees it: that’s old hat to him by now. But he takes no pleasure at all in having to do it with Hanzo.

Slowly, the elder vampire rose to his feet as well. The feather remained between his fingers, delicately held despite it's ominous warning.

Someone knew enough of Genji to call upon these old relics and signs. The imposter, whoever he or she might be, knew of him. More than any outsider would. But Jesse had known of him, brought him up and thrown him in his face when confronting him in Hanamura.

He'd put it out of mind, at the time. But now, suddenly, it becomes quite relevant.

"...who told you about my brother?"

It's more forward than he should be. If his sudden suspicion was correct, Jesse wouldn't tell him the truth. It would be wiser to hold the doubt close and watch. Listen. Wait for him to trip of his own accord, to provide something more substantial than his word alone.

And yet some part of him simply wants to look into his face and believe him. To crush the doubt under heel and never let it see sunrise. Let them focus on the task at hand and not this sudden, needling feeling that he's been had.

He’d known this was coming.

He just hadn’t expected it so soon.

Jesse could play dumb. He could lie. Maybe, if he was lucky, Hanzo might even believe it. But now that this is happening, despite the sinking feeling in his stomach, he feels something almost like relief. It’s all tangled up in a mess of dread, undeniably there.

Better now, perhaps, than later.

There’s a moment where Jesse doesn’t move either, body held in that same sort of unnatural stillness that Hanzo’s had been. The façade cracks when he closes his eyes, something not unlike a wince flashing across his features. But when he opens his eyes again, there’s no bland pall of denial. No fake shock.

“Gave my word I wouldn’t say.”

And by the way he admits that, despite the apologetic undertone, it’s clear he doesn’t plan on changing that.

He takes in every detail. The stillness of a deer when it knows the wolf has caught the scent...or perhaps that of the wolf itself, knowing its quarry now knows of its presence in the shadows. Every twitch, every movement and word that follows is taken in by those dark eyes, passed over and studied and analyzed to be certain of its meaning.

But it's no longer a clear picture, is it? He's let itself become muddied. That was a risk the moment he let himself--

For a time Hanzo says nothing at all. It's impossible to tell what he thinks of this, but from the careful lack of expression? It's likely not a good sign. Finally, he speaks again. Softly.

"You know who it is that we are hunting."

It's a question, but at the same time not. If the answer is any different, he'll be pleasantly surprised...but optimism has never been his strongest suite.

“I do.”

He answers without hesitation this time, voice steady and clear. This is the most he can do for Hanzo now: be honest with him and not drag this out any longer than it has to be. Hardly a comfort though, he knows, and not anything worth feeling even remotely good about.

He grits his teeth against the urge to reach out, or say something to try and push that familiar, deceptively neutral expression from Hanzo’s face. He knows it too well. It took him months to even realize it was a mask; almost a year, if they counted the time he spent hunting Hanzo before that.

But who would he really be benefitting if he did that? Hanzo, or himself?

Jesse lets out an unneeded breath and looks away, a bit of that humanity that stubbornly sticks with him rearing its head yet again.

“But I didn’t tell him we were coming. Haven’t had a way to get in touch with him since we met.” There and gone, like a ghost.

"And yet you were content to say nothing our entire journey here."

It's a good thing he doesn't reach for him. The movement would be poorly received, at best. Everything in him is rallying up in a cry of I knew it, I knew it, I knew it while he tries to maintain his composure in what at a surface-level look appears to be nothing short of betrayal.

But there's more to be learned, first. Not the name. Jesse had given his word, long before he felt any sense of obligation towards his sire. Even if his feelings had genuinely changed and this was not somehow a long game of ridiculous proportions -- not an option Hanzo entirely discounted, regardless -- a word given was a bond. It was a matter of honor, at that point.

Grudgingly, he can respect that.

"How did they find you?" His eyebrow raises quietly. "Another hunter?"

The first thing isn’t a question, so Jesse doesn’t answer, letting the statement speak for itself. Protesting would be a waste of everyone's time.

The next thing though, that he can address. And that Hanzo is even still asking questions at all, rather shooting him with an arrow or leaving is… well, not a good sign. But not a terrible one either.

“A hunter?” There’s a brief flash of a smile, very nearly without any humor at all. “In a way, yeah. He…” Gone is the featureless stillness with nothing to give away. Jesse is plainly weighing his options and either can’t—or won’t—pretend that he’s not debating how truthful to be.

“The first time I… first time bloodlust got the better of me. He kept things from bein’ worse than they were.”

People who hadn’t deserved to die had, and there was no taking that back. But it would have been bloodier without Genji’s intervention.

Jesse finally slips Peacekeeper back into its holster before turning back to Hanzo to face him fully. "I would've said somethin' before now if I thought he planned on hurtin' you." No doubts apparently that the masked assailant could hurt Hanzo. It's merely a matter of intent.

Now, that facade breaks.

Now, Hanzo's lip curls into half a sneer, a dismissive hiss between his teeth. Abruptly he turns away, the feather slipping into a previously unused pocket in one smooth movement.

"Do not."

He doesn't want to hear the reasons why, he doesn't want to be placated or reassured. And if Jesse tries, the veneer of calm is not going to last much longer. Every ounce of him is tense with the effort, and if he just...focuses on the task at hand? The relevant information?

He can refrain from letting loose some very ugly, very unkind words, and maintain some sense of decorum.

It’s impossible to keep up a matter-of-fact demeanor soon as Hanzo lets his own true feelings show. The sight of it, the sound—it tears into him.

He'd done this knowingly. It still didn't mean he wanted to see Hanzo hurting.

“Hanzo.” It’s his turn for his voice to slip into quiet, the sound of it raw around the edges despite the lack of volume. “Don’t what?”

He steps forward, of course. Puts his hand on Hanzo’s shoulder, grasp firm with the intent of trying to turn him around. Let Jesse look at him. Let him say… something, to try and explain himself. Even if it’s not an apology, and not the whole truth.

The moment that hand lands on him, Hanzo's flies upwards to smack it away in a swift deflection. No, he doesn't get to sound like the hurt party, here. He doesn't get to look sadly into his sire's eyes and work those devilish charms of his.

Hanzo's eyes are positively icy when they cut back towards the hunter. "You know what," he replies, his tone low in warning. Don't push, it says.

As though that's ever stopped McCree before.

If Jesse heeded common sense on a regular basis, he and Hanzo wouldn’t have ever even met. Given that, it should be no surprise when he doesn’t step back, even with the full force of those eyes on him. No surprise either as he seems to rally himself to continue on, determination plain to see despite the clear warning.

“If I knew, then I wouldn’t've asked.” He has no right to the hint of impatience in his tone, though it’s really a feeling bourne of anxiety. They’ve fought before. They were enemies before they were anything else. But even so, this particular kind of betrayal and animosity is uncharted territory between them. How this will go, how (if) the damage done can be repaired... it’s all unknown.

And Hanzo is correct. Jesse has no right. But if he was selfless, this entire situation wouldn't be happening.

"Do not tell me why you thought keeping this from me was somehow in my best interests," he replies in a snarl, shoulders squaring off as Jesse pushes. Because of course he does. And he can feel his patience with the entire exercise unraveling swiftly.

He never should have let his guard down, from the start. First Sombra. Selling secrets to his family. Now this. What else isn't he being told, for whatever reason Jesse can think to rationalize?

Like a fool, he'd trusted him. And while he's more angry with himself in the moment, that doesn't mean his tone is any less scathing.

"Leave. Me. Be."

Jesse doesn’t try to touch Hanzo again, hand hovering in the air between them before he lets it fall.

“Wasn’t going to.” Even if he’d like to, what is he going to say? The truth isn’t his to give, and Hanzo doesn’t need any more lies. He grimaces at the tone of the other man’s voice, glancing to the side once more only to force himself to look back and meet Hanzo head-on.

“I can’t explain it all right now anyway. I…” he stops, struggling to find the words. His silver tongue isn’t so good at saying the things that matter.

And as Jesse tries to speak, someone else watches from the nearby rooftop of another building, visible should anyone look with a keen eye. He’s been there for some time, in fact, crouched on the roof tiles, head cocked to one side in a way that might be thoughtful. Hard to tell with the mask covering his features.

If Hanzo had been more focused on Jesse, he might have missed the figure entirely. Jesse had a way of swallowing up his worldview, something he was both aware and wary of. Rather than let the anger boil over, he jerked his gaze away again, moving towards the window...

And then swiftly drawing his bow again.

This time there's no pause, pushing past the glass doors leading to the balcony and taking aim at the shadow there, face framed by that mask. That mask. No stranger had a right to it, and that anger that had been seething inside finally finds a place to focus.

It snaps. And his hand releases, sending the arrow piercing through the air, towards the figure there on the rooftop.

It happens so fast that any human watching might have blinked and missed it. Hanzo fires, and the masked man has his sword unsheathed almost simultaneously. In the time it takes the arrow to reach him from Hanzo’s position, the man dodges to the side and swings up with his blade. As he straightens up and stands, Hanzo’s arrow falls, now neatly cleaved into two pieces.

It had been completely unnecessary to cut the arrow in two. At best, it’s showing off. Worst, it’s an insult.

Jesse steps up behind Hanzo, the beginnings of a question dying on his lips as he stares at the familiar silhouette over his sire’s shoulder.

“Hanzo-” he starts, a hint of warning in his voice, just as the masked man raises a hand. The quick crook of his fingers is pretty difficult to misinterpret.

Come on.

Impossible.

The vampire feels his hackles raising. The warning barely slips past Jesse's lips before Hanzo is simply not there anymore, a shadow leaping through the night air towards the beckoning figure. The image of a ghost, taunting him. Whoever is wearing that mask will pay for coming here.

Swiftly, he reaches to ready another arrow, and before his feet find purchase on the roof he's fired another arrow for the bastard's throat. He's forgotten everything in that moment save seeing him bleed and fall. Everything except standing over his corpse and tearing that mask from his face.

He was unworthy. No one had the right, least of all this interloper.

Jesse swallows a sound of frustration as Hanzo leaps out into the night. It’s reckless, which is all the more frustrating given how careful Hanzo is the rest of the time. If this hadn’t been Genji, and if Jesse hadn’t been so sure that murdering his elder brother was a motive off the table, he’d go leaping out on his sire’s tail.

Instead, he heaves a heavy sigh and takes Peacekeeper out of its holster. Better to be prepared than not.

On the rooftop, the masked vigilante is dodging Hanzo’s last arrow with the fluidity and confidence of someone who might as well have been expecting that exact attack. His momentum sends him sliding back over the roof’s tile towards the ground- but at the last moment he jumps backwards into the open air, vanishing into smoke before he can even fall.

“You’re faster than you ever were, but just as predictable.”

The smoke manifests at Hanzo’s back, along with the sound of feet touching down just behind him.

For a moment he follows in pursuit, to the lip of the roof, only to realize seconds later that he's been had. Of course. This person, whoever they are, has been tormenting his family for months now, evading all efforts to corner and catch him. All while using techniques that should be so familiar.

Smoke. He should be picking out the scent of the components, tracing his movement. Listening for a heartbeat. But this sense of reason and composure has fled him, shredded in the sight of the facade in front of him.

It isn't Genji's face, but it's close enough. In pictures, it is one thing, but to see it as he turns around to face the thief, his senses are assailed with memory. It floods back to him, rage and guilt soaking through and dampening what should have been carefully honed instinct, and he pulls back on another arrow with gritted fangs, nocking it and setting it loose with inhuman speed.

"Do not speak as if you know me. Thief."

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