Tainted Ressurection

Untitled Part 1

Tainted Resurrection (Overwatch game fan fiction)

By Heather Killough-Walden

*****

The woman couldn't make up her mind. That's what it all came down to, he knew that. That was what did it. Her goddamned indecision... in those last few heartbeats, in that space between this option and that – between him and that other guy – that's what made the difference. She'd had two men on her mind. And in a most un-Mercy-like manner, as she'd had her hand pressed to Gabriel's chest, her eyes peering into his and the light of her magic surrounding them both, she'd realized something.

She'd realized that if Gabriel died, she would no longer have to choose. The torment would be over. The stolen glances, the gnawing desire, the love she unlawfully possessed for two men... it would all be over. Just like that. Because one of the men would be taken out of the picture.

He saw the thought flash across her beautiful gaze. He saw it. It was a literal darkness, a shadow passing through the blue of her eyes.

It was that realization, that evil, undeniable, and nasty truth, that made Gabriel what he was today. The darkness of that thought infused Mercy's magic. It tainted it, and in turn, it tainted him.

And Gabriel Reyes... became Reaper.

*****

"We have another one."

Angela Ziegler looked up from the map she'd been studying as a friend walked through the door of her study. Lena Oxton didn't usually "walk" through her door – she didn't normally "walk" anywhere. She usually ran. But something was slowing her down this time, and Angela had a feeling it had something to do with the same thing that was putting the frown on Lena's face, and the wrinkle of stress in her young forehead.

Lena stopped in front of the large table with the map and slid her hand into her jacket, extracting a small piece of paper with black lettering.

Angela knew what it said without even having to read it, and the fact that this was the second one of its kind made her heart sink into her guts. Lena held the note out for her, and Angela took it silently, gazing at it with a hopeless sense of dark destiny:

Beg for Mercy

It was scrolled in thick black ink that ran along the edges, a careless, cruel lettering that almost felt as if it had been carved with blades rather than with the tip of a pen.

"Where is he?" Angela asked. She wasn't referring to the person who'd left the note, but to the victim to whom the note had no doubt been attached.

"He's dead, Mercy," said Lena. "You know you can't help this one."

"Lena, where is he?" she repeated, her voice tight.

Lena stared at her in silence a moment, her lip twitching. Then she sighed heavily. "I knew you wouldn't back down. Come with me. Try to keep up."

So she did. She went with Lena. She had to use her staff to keep up with the girl. There was a reason her friends referred to Lena as "Tracer." She would be there one moment, and gone without a trace in the next. Moving so fast, she slipped through time – and even a little backwards. Just never enough to really, really matter. Like now.

Angela landed beside her friend and slowly moved toward the body. A point-blank shot to the chest had taken the young man out. The wound was deep and it was mean. It was what Angela called an ending shot because it ended a person. And there was one being in the world better at those particular shots than anyone.