Chapter Text
Everyone always wondered about McCree’s daemon.
He didn’t wonder one bit about it. Daisy was Daisy, and anyone who questioned why a rangy, dastardly, cowardly son of a gun like him had a daemon as elegant and pretty as a picture like her, well. They didn’t know much of anything at all.
She was just as ornery as he wasn’t, sharp as her claws and twice as likely to tussle. He loved her like anything. Even after she’d kept poking him awake the whole ride back, demanding to go over points she thought he could improve about his opening gambit for the payload.
“Who’s the new guy.” She asked Jesse curiously with a clatter of her beak, a high pitched rattling that sounded similar to someone rattling marbles very quickly in their hand. They’d barely stepped into the hangar, and she was already starting on some new perceived problem to be squirreled away.
The clacking of her beak spelled most things out for her- Curiosity, annoyance, delight. It was a sound that sent all of the lizards and rodents in Gibraltar running when they heard it, if they hadn’t been hunted down already.
The new guy in question was inspecting the Overwatch Shuttle, chin in hand, and speaking in low tones to Pharah. Low enough for the sound not to carry to McCree’s crummy ears, and definitely not enough for him to begin to guess who the ‘new guy’ was.
He was japanese, with sharp features and a gaze that was quick. Like Daisy’s herself. Predatory. Shorter, by a full foot next to little Fareeha in her full armor, despite the lift he must have gotten from what looked like sleek metal combat prosthesis. Classy looking things, that only kept from reflecting light with what looked like stealth matte paint.
“Howdy pardner. Fareeha.” Jesse tipped his hat to them as he approached, spurs jingling and drawing an incredulous look and a lifted eyebrow from the stranger. He was used to it. Didn’t hurt no one to draw a look, and he met the eyes daringly from under his hat, before turning and giving Fareeha a lazy grin, and a kiss on the hand. She’d been off duty for almost a month, and it sure did make his heart sing to see her agan. “And might I say my favorite lady and gentleman are looking mighty fine today.”
Fareeha didn’t even blush, quirking a smile and reaching up to pet Wadjet where he was looped in an elegant sprawl over the stabilizing wings of her pauldron and gorget. She’d clearly just come back from her first mission on duty, and was wrangling the various duties that had stacked up in her absence. “McCree. Back so soon? Or did Japan finally catch on to you and kick you over the border?”
“Nah, they ain’t tired a me quite yet. On the contrary, I have an open invitation to a ramen shop in Hanamura, and all I can drink beer.”
“Hanamura?” The stranger asked with a note of suspicious surprise. “And what were you doing there?”
“Seeing the sights, wandering. Shaking the dust off my boots before settling down for a whole new round of fighting the good fight.” This didn’t seem to satisfy the stranger, but McCree didn’t particularly care to elaborate on the shoot out and ensuing debacle with the police. “Name’s Jesse McCree. This is my little Daisy flower. Pleased to meet ya.”
“Charmed.” Daisy offered from down by their feet, weaving in and out easy and quick as a needle, never motionless. She inspected Hanzo’s shining metal feet with an upside down head, giving her own reflection the hairy eyeball.
Her feathers were dappled all over black and chocolate and white, with the little bright jewels of her eyes framed by elegant bare skin of red and blue. She was large, even for her species of roadrunner. A little over two feet from tip of her tail to the tip of her dagger-like beak. Her claws were impressive for such a small creature, and McCree had been awed and daunted both to see her attempt to get through tortoise shells with them. It was a close thing every time, before she gave up and dragged the poor things out from the inside.
“Likewise. My name is Hanzo. Shimada.” Ah. That complicated things. McCree didn’t flick his gaze to Fareeha, but only barely, keeping the easy grin on his face. He had the feeling this man picked up on everything, and he didn’t want to give him cause to be standoffish. He had to be here for a reason. A very good reason. “This is Hibiki.”
He gestured upwards, and McCree tilted his head back to look up where the carrier was suspended a good ten feet off the ground, to meet the glassy, curious yellow eyes of a hawk perched on the wing. She was large, with dark and cream barred under belly, and dark wings. She looked like a storybook drawing of a bird, all delicate eyes and feet, with such a busy black and white pattern and short beak.
She didn’t speak, but gave Daisy a matching look, the two sizing each other up.
“Hanzo here was offering his insight to urban flight for the shuttle. I’ve been speaking to Winston about making upgrades to make it easier to fly between buildings- In this day and age, the amounts of times we have to fight in inner cities is not small. And I cannot do it all myself.”
“Lena would be tickled pink.” Jesse observed, returning his attention to the two humans on the ground. “Lot of experience fighting in cities then?” He asked Hanzo.
It seemed to soothe some ruffled feathers to ask. “Mostly. Our type of prey are mostly to be found in places that they are not easily pried loose. It’s only tactical to be able to navigate any terrain. Not to mention, you can drop team’s closer between buildings if you added more horizontal thrust.”
“Take more engine power though. Might blow the coupling.”
Hanzo arched another eyebrow at him, and Jesse almost ducked his head in alarm as there was a soft flutter of wings, and Hibiki glided gently down to land on the man’s shoulder. The clothed one. His other was bare, images of two dragons stylistically twisting over the skin all the way down to the wrist, a hawk suspiciously similar to his daemon blazed across his chest and part of his collarbone. There was evidence of claws, old white scars where his daemon had landed too quickly or carelessly before; and McCree realized he should stop drooling over the man’s bare shoulder in a hurry before Fareeha noticed. He’d never hear the end of it again.
“Then improve the coupling.”
“And remove the whole right part of the chassis? That’d be a lot of work pardner. Might as well make a whole new shuttle. Have to realign the shafts, improve the thrusters, double the coupling at the least.” Jesse dug out a cigar from his belt, lighting it with a flick of his mechanical hand. “Not to mention the engine space and fuel lines for a whole new thruster set-”
“We have already discussed all of this.” Fareeha broke in, as Hanzo’s eyebrows went higher. “It is idle wondering. All arguments Hanzo has already offered. But it is worth pursuing. If anyone can do it, winston can.” She tapped a folder against her chin thoughtfully. “Independent thrusters may be an option, or magnetic shielding.”
“He’s been working on those damned ion engines. Might take up less room than the hydrogen engine if he can get it working.”
“He’s been working on it for two years.” Hissed Wadjet, disapprovingly. He didn’t like wasted time, and wasted efforts even less. Him and Daisy got along that way. “Perhaps if he took a break, he might be able to perform the renovations required-”
“You two aren’t Captain’s any longer.” Daisy cut in, with a tilt of her head and a gimlet stare. “Winston can do what he likes. Present him the options.”
Wadjet drew himself up, hood flaring affronted, but Fareeha simply laughed. Jesse grinned. “Yes. You are right of course, Daisy. Thank you,” She turned to include Hanzo, and Jesse remembered when she’d been cold and distant. Believing that was the only way she could get people to follow her, to be untouchable. “For your help. You have offered valuable insight, and it always helps to have a second opinion.”
She gave them each a short business-like nod, before gathering her folder and the array of photos spread over a nearby cargo crate, and started off toward the labs, boots surprisingly muffled against the steel floor of the shuttle bay and Wadjet murmuring indignantly into her ear the whole way out.
Hanzo stared after her, frowning. “She is as experienced as me in inner-city combat. That is a Helix security suit.”
McCree released a plume of smoke. “Yeah. But she’s been learning to work a crowd lately, our little Fareeha. Growing up fast.” Also getting the measure of their new agent’s abilities, if McCree wasn’t mistaken.
“You have known each other long then?”
“Yep. Since she was just a little thing. And I was littler than I am now.” Seventeen years old, with little Fareeha following him around the base and embarrassing the bejeesus out of him in front of the older agents. Always wanting to play games, or have him tell her a story.
It’d pleased him to an extent. Not that he’d ever let Reyes know. He’d never had siblings before, and she’d never had anyone close to her age to latch on to.
(She was 12, he was 17. He’d been older than that for a while though. You didn’t stay a kid for long when the crew you ran with expected you to kill two men a week, and three more on a Sunday. His daemon had settled the day after he’d joined Deadlock, deceptively small and a deadly terror to any other daemon that dared to trifle with her.)
“Hm.” Hanzo seemed pensive, staring after Pharah, before both his and his daemon’s gaze turned to Jesse. He didn’t flinch, but the join of his shoulder and mechanical arm prickled with awareness at the two yellow stares.
Daisy hid behind his legs, acting unconcerned while preening her wing feathers against his denim jeans.
“You are not what I expected.” Hanzo finally seemed to settle on, turning and giving the shuttle one last searching look, before starting towards where McCree knew the guest barracks were at. “I look forward to working with you.”
Jesse tapped ash out on the floor, making a note to clear out before the Commander caught him at it. “Likewise.”
“A real pleasure.” Daisy clacked drily, and Jesse nudged her warningly further behind his leg with his foot, drawing a sharp couple of pecks to his ankle that he could feel even through the thick leather of his boot.
He knew she was just a intrigued as he was.