Chapter Text
Jesse stood perfectly still; eyes and ears observing everything around him, every sway of the trees he watched, no sound being made wasn’t being missed. Nothing would get past him. He’s be trained to be patient, to take in any possible threats that could come his way and calculate a way to over come them and be triumphant.
That all washed away as his legs ached, his hat felt in the wrong place and his chest plate was too tight. ‘How long has it been now? When can I get food? Ugh, there better be something decent I can have. Screw Gabe for posting me in the back.’ Jesse was knocked from his collective calm with a wash of thoughts and irritations that seemed to be buzzing loudly within his head.
His first job working with his dad, Gabriel, private task force group and he was left to stand watch at a wall over looking a forest. Sure this job was in Japan, he’d got some free time and did some tourist stuff and this job he was based at a large estate house looking over a valley creating a spectacular view; apparently.
The last part would have been stunning to see if Jesse wasn’t placed at the back of the house, in the furthest corner in the garden, on the other side of the wall looking out into a forest. Gabe was defiantly taking this ‘I don’t want my only kid to get hurt on his first mission’ thing too seriously. It was a no risk mission too; moving some high tech equipment into the estate was apparently very dangerous to Gabriel.
Jesse huffed another sigh before swinging his arms at his side, humming some song he’d remembered from this morning and kicking a few stones around. This was going to be a long day.
“Jesse!” his comm snapped to life with Gabriel near yelling down it making Jesse slip slightly on a rock.
He regained himself before pressing a finger to his ear “Yeah boss?”.
“How’s you position?”
Jesse just snorted a quick laugh down the line “Well there a tree lookin’ a lil shifty. And I think a bird might be a spy.”
There was a loud audio sigh let out from Gabe’s side; Jesse could just picture him now pinching the bridge of his nose and shaking his head, normally done when Jesse said some random thing like that to wind the older man up.
“I know you’re not too pleased with your position but it’s better to have all sides covered than have any weak points.” He had a point but it didn’t make Jesse feel any better about it; no risk missions apparently needed to he heavily fortified then. “The tech is coming in now and be another half hour before its fully secure. Can you handle that Jesse or do you need me to get you your blanket and bottle?”
A growl from Jesse was his only response to Gabe who replied with a sharp ‘Good’ before leaving the comm line. Jesse picked a stone up quickly and sent it flying into the forest, his anger with it.
“Bah, ‘need yer blanket an bottle’, you need your dummy to stop spewing so much shit. Oh wait, that was a good one. Should’a said that.”
Another fifth-teen minutes passed with Jesse walking around the threshold of the forest, scratching his face, looking at the foreign plants and watching a few birds before a sound caught his attention. Schhwaf-thunk. Schhwaf-THUNK. It seemed to be coming not too far from where he stood at the forest beginning. He leaned in slightly trying to listen for the sound again. Schhwaf-THUNK. ‘Sounds like something being fired, an arrows maybe?’
Drawing his trustworthy Stetson down a bit and feeling for Peacekeeper at his side he advanced into the forest, ears leading him to the sound of arrows being fired. Trying to stay quite was hard when leaves and small sticks loved to announce his footsteps as he tried to move round bushes and fallen trees while desperately trying to see where the sound was coming from.
Sudden movement ahead had Jesse’s attention as he quickly jumped over some rocks before seating himself at the base of a rotting tree. Glancing round it Jesse spotted a young man drawing back his bow before firing an arrow at a tree sporting a painted target. It hit its mark dead centre.
Jesse wasn’t one for love at first sight but upon seeing this young man Jesse liked to think he was converted to believing in it. The man firing the arrows seemed to be too much in the zone to notice Jesse checking him out; from his long near black-blue hair to their taught posture as he drew back from his bow in one fare arm movement before firing it at another painted sign on a tree.
A warm buzzing feeling ballooned up in Jesse as he edged from his hiding position to spectate the man more as he gracefully moved around the trees, aiming for either painted targets or whatever invisible things he saw on other trees. Jesse kept pace with him as he stayed a few paces back, marvelling at his constant composed face and slight tensing of muscles beneath his loose white and blue clothing.
The man seemed to be in a world of his own as he carried on near flowing with his notching, aiming and firing an arrow, that Jesse became entranced by the whole retinue as he trailed helplessly after this stunning young man. His new found love didn’t help him spot the mans sudden change of direction as he spun round to face Jesse. Looks of alarm hit both their faces as Jesse stood seven meters from him in plain sight. No trees or bushes to hide the cowboy hat wearing Jesse as he stood frozen like a deer.
From that spilt second Jesse lost focus on what happening around him; as the man spun round aiming an arrow at Jesse, he drew it down to stop his loosening aim but a sudden yell of a name from the distance startled the archer causing him to release the arrow as he was lowering his hand. One second Jesse was staring face to face with his dream lover, the next searing pain shot up his body from his thigh.
A sharp yelp escaped his lips as he fell to his right, left thigh singing with stinging pain. He looked to his shot thigh to see that an actually arrow protruding from it like some sort of comical joke. A small amount of red began to bloom around the shot area, dying his jeans with it. ‘Cupid has literary just shot me’ was the only coherent thing he could think of at that moment of time as he ran his hands to the arrow to yank it out.
“No!” barked in rough English with a sooth Japanese accent trailing the word.
Jesse looked up to see the archer rush towards him, kneeling down beside him as he stopped Jesse from both pulling the arrow out but also lying down fully.
“The arrow went all the way through, see?” the man pointed to the head of the arrow sticking a good two inches out on the other side of his thigh.
“Woo-whee. Now aint that a sight. Good aim ya got there.” Was all Jesse could muster to say as nipping pain seemed to be screaming at him. He patted the blue sleeve of the archer, hand feeling toned muscle under it.
Looking around himself the archer picked up a decently thick stick, wiped it a bit and held it in front of Jesse’s face.
“Bite and hold still.” Were his only words.
“Ooh, role playin’ is it then? I tell you, I don’t normally do this till the third date but I could do it now if ya like darlin’?”
There were a roll of the eyes from the other man before shoving the stick into Jesse’s mouth to bite down; a faint blushing of pink dancing across the archers face before he looked back to his next move. Placing his hands on the shaft of the arrow going into Jesse’s thigh, he took a quick breath before suddenly snapping it in too. Quickly whipping out the remaining shaft from the other side.
Jesse slammed his teeth down onto the twig at such a force he thought it would snap as he did so. Eyes scrunching up as he felt a tear escape the walls of his eyes as he howled with the shocked of pain snap then dull slightly, he cracked open his eyes when he felt a tight binding wrap around his leg, closing the small wound tightly. The man had removed a sash from his waist and wrapped it around his shot thigh.
Falling back onto his elbows, Jesse spat out the stick as he looked to the man still kneeling beside him. Jesse couldn’t help but admire the sharp features of the man, his hair loose with a few stands clinging to his face, a nervous look placed in his dark brown eyes. At this time Jesse could say something coherent to the task that just happened like maybe a ‘thank you’ or ‘Did you really just shoot me?’ or even ‘Why are you out here?’. But what he got was something different.
“Gosh you’re pretty. What’s ya name hansom?”
The archers face lit a bight shade of red at the sudden comment, Jesse grinned at it as he admired the mans now sudden flustered face. “Hanzo. And sorry.” He gestured to the wrapped wound.
“Heh, hansom Hanzo. And it aint a sweat. I shoulda maybe alerted ya that I was close by instead a sneaking up.” Jesse removed his hat before running a hand though his mussed up locks “The name’s-”
“Jesse fucking Reyes-Morison MeCree! Where the hell are you?” roared Gabriel from back where Jesse’s post once was. Jesse’s head sunk down a little at the mentioning of his full name; big trouble normally came when that was yelled.
More distant yelling began in the opposite direction but words were yelled in Japanese with ‘Hanzo’ being thrown in every now or then. Hanzo looked round to the location of his name being yelled, a guilty look crossing his face as he looked back to Jesse.
“It is my brother. I have to go, will you be alright Jesse? I am again sorry.”
“I be fine, anyway, someone coming for me too.”
Hanzo got up, collecting his bow and quiver which he seemed to have dropped rather suddenly by some bushes, before darting of though the forest at speed, no sound coming from his foot steps. He glanced back a few times to see Jesse waving him off with a big grin. Jesse finally flopped backwards when Hanzo was long out of sight he pulled his hat over his face before grinning like a maniac, all the while he heard Gabriel thundering through the forest towards him.
“Jesse! Kid, kid! Are you alright?” Gabriel spotted Jesse lying on the ground, a thigh wrapped in a blue sash with blood staining the middle of it with his hat drawn over his face. A bolt of fear struck him as he thunked himself down beside Jesse’s head, quickly pulling off the trusty hat. Expecting a pained face he saw a crimson faced, grinning maniac smile on Jesse.
“I got shot by cupid!” he giggled brightly like some love sick child, throwing his arms up into the air as if to hug an invisible force.
Gabe stared down at his grinning man child before slamming his hat back down on Jesse’s face as Jesse began giggling in hysteria like so love sick fool, rolling around slightly.
“Jesus, you’re twenty years old Jesse, get some sort of grip so we can get you back and have you explain all-” he gestured out to Jesse who was still red, grinning and giggling.
Jesse’s giggling stopped as he removed his hat from his face, placing it atop his head in its rightful place before making grabbing hands at Gabe, puppy eyes activated.
“Help me up papi.” Grinned Jesse as he spoke in a childish voice, freighting extreme pained expression as well.
“Boy…” Gabe stopped himself, rolling his eyes instead before roughly grabbing Jesse’s chest plate and hauling him upwards. Before fully standing Jesse leaned down and grabbed the shaft holding the arrow head and tucked it into a pocket. Gabriel quipped an eyebrow up at him as he started helping the limping Jesse back to the estate.
“Lil memento of the day I met my true love.” He gushed as he limped beside Gabe who in turn rolled his eyes again at the statement.
“Fool. You have one hell of a lot of explaining to do.”
*-*-*
The medic Jesse saw was amazed at how well the arrow had been removed and wound bound tightly to let natural healing begin. He hadn’t lost any critical amount of blood and only tore a few muscle ligaments that would heal back in a few weeks time. He just needed to rest and no over the top physical activity.
Jesse explained everything to Gabriel about the meeting with the mysterious archer Hanzo and how he by accident shot him. Jesse emphasied the fact of how amazing this man was in both looks by archery as well.
The next day in the hotel Gabriel’s team where staying at, Gabe pushed Jesse back into the chair he was sitting in with a stern look plastered on his face.
“No niño, you’re staying put. It’s only a recon to make sure everything is in place back at the estate. We’ll be back in a few hours.”
Jesse yanked at Gabe’s sleeve making the man jerk down suddenly, he bit back a snarl as he looked to Jesse. “I just need to drop somethin’ off, I won’t take long. Please Gabe, Gabey, papi, papi Gabe, grumpy grumps, gabby Gabe, snore-a-lot?”
“Stop.”
“Let me come then beanie boy, scowl scout-”
Gabriel could hear snickering from the other side of the door, his team probably listening to all this. He really didn’t want his team start calling him any of the multitude of nicknames Jack and Jesse gave him. Gabe ground his teeth together as he pinched the bridge of his nose, this kid was going to be the death of him for sure.
“Fine, you can come but you’re staying in a car until it’s over.” Jesse beamed as he brought Gabe into a tight hug. Sighing in defeat of the hug he patted Jesse’s back for clearing his throat and putting back his commanding voice “Get moving then, we leave in five.”
*-*-*
Jesse sat in the back of one of the many range rovers used to ferry everyone to the estate. He didn’t care nor notice he was sat in the same location for well over an hour without him getting agitated by it. New record for him. His mind was too busy swimming with the thoughts of Hanzo to care about anything else.
When Gabe returned he help Jesse back round to the forest area he was at yesterday, leaning on Gabe every now or then as moving his thigh seemed to hurt. Happens when an arrow goes through it he supposed. Once at the forest area again he noticed that all the arrows that were once stuck in trees and targets were all gone though the target signs remained. With some looking around on the forest floor he found an arrow under some leaves.
Pulling a envelop from his coat he pinned it to one of the targets with the arrow. With a please nod he limped back over to Gabriel who waited for him a few paces back.
“You really think he’s going to come back here? I'm suspicious to know why he was so close to this estate.” Gabe drawled out as he looked to be on edge about the unknown reasons of Hanzo begin here. He carried on muttering under his breath about crime gangs and spies wanting intel on the tech they brought in yesterday.
Jesse ignored his muttering as he glanced around the forest area; his eye catching the sight of a crouching figure a fare distance to his side. Jesse just grinned was he limped on.
“Eeyup, and I can’t wait ta see him again.”