55. Meihem if you please
55. True Love’s Kiss
I love writing earnest dialogue for these two. It’s such a fun challenge.
----
They sat next to each other, Junkrat in an almost child-like cross-legged position, and Mei hugging one knee close to herself, watching as the factory burned in the distance.
“Snow Pea?”
“Mm?”
“You aren’t... mad at me, are you?”
“Um,” Mei adjusted her glasses slightly, “I’m... still processing.”
“I really didn’t mean to blow it up--” Junkrat started and Mei gave him an incredulous look, “I’m serious!”
“Jamison...” Mei started, trailing off.
“I know the mission was just to shut it down! And I tried! believe me, I did! Things just...” his voice dropped a little, “Escalated.”
Mei heard the creak of his prosthetic knuckles tightening with his grip on his ankle as he stared at the flaming factory.
“You really mean it, don’t you?” she said, quietly.
“‘Course I mean it,” Junkrat said quietly, “...I’m starting to get the feeling people only put me on missions because they need something obliterated.”
“It,” Mei chuckled, “Is sort of your thing.”
“Well yeah but... Jamison Fawkes is more than a one-trick pony, you believe that, right Frostee-Freez?”
“You have--er-- many admirable qualities!” Mei offered, not really sure what to say.
“Like what?” Junkrat said quietly.
Mei hesitated for a few seconds.
“I--I’m not asking you to butter me up or anything! I just---I really did try, this time,” Junkrat glanced off, rubbing the back of his neck, “Tried to be... an Overwatch agent, y’know? Like toaster-face grandpa or Death-From-Above, or the perky arsed can-opener.”
“Jack, Pharah, and Genji?” Mei quirked an eyebrow.
“Right! Them!” said Junkrat, “Everyone takes them all serious, but me...?” he trailed off a little, “I mean, I don’t blame them--things... get foggy for me, and they speed up and they slow down and then by the time I can make sense of anything, at least three things are on fire.” He huffed, “So... I guess they’re right to just... see me as shit-hitting-the-fan blow-it-all-to-hell guy but...it still... I mean I watch you and how much you care and it makes me want to...” he scoffed and shook his head, “You don’t need this. Just forget I said anyth--”
“You’re brilliant,” the words bubbled up out of Mei and Junkrat looked at her with genuine shock and incomprehension for a few seconds before Mei swallowed hard and looked up into his eyes. “You see things no one else sees, you--you take things in and you spin them around and you spit them out in a way that can turn any situation around--and when.. when nothing makes sense, when everything’s falling apart, the one person who seems to be able to push through it is you. You can just... “ she made a pressing together motion with her hands, her fingers crooked and clawing, “Condense everything and barrel forward.”
“Well.. yeah but... that’s all just instinct,” said Junkrat, looking back at the factory fire, “Like, any of the... agents who actually had their shit together in my situation... they’d do better shit! They’d like... create clean water with like... the-the hyperpornics!”
“Hydroponics.”
“Yeah, that! Y’know, something! They’re all that Overwatchy ‘better world’ shit.”
“But you know the world at its worst,” said Mei, “You grew up in the world at its worst. And you know how to survive it.”
“Well obviously,” said Junkrat, “We wouldn’t be talking, otherwise.”
Mei gave a short snort.
“But y’know you...” Junkrat looked at her and then trailed off, “You survived too. Except it wasn’t people blowing themselves to shit like with me... it was people being forgotten.... everything ending in the cold and the nothingness because people didn’t give a shit. And... and you pulled out. You built things and you pulled out! And... I want that. I want to be like that. The idea of being more than a scorch mark on this world--that--that I lived, and I struggled, and I tried, and I gave a shit.” He huffed. “That’s what terrifies me about you, Snowpuff! I didn’t give a shit about so much shit! And now I give so many shits about different shits and it drives me crazier than I was before!” his arm flung out in the direction of the burning factory, “Do you know how many chemical particulates that fire is throwing up into the air right now!? Do you know how many penguins that shit is probably killing!? I’m asking because I don’t, but I assume it’s at least several!”
“You... you read that paper I sent around about the aerial chemical particulates?” Mei said quietly.
“‘Course I did! I mean, I had to read like... five other stupid things to understand it, and I needed a dictionary for a bunch of stuff, and I fell asleep three times--But look, you’re not listening. The penguins--”
Mei tackled him in a kiss. She wasn’t sure if it was the shock of the gesture that made Junkrat more or less go limp or her own enthusiasm that made him smack against the ground with her force, but she didn’t care.
“Mm--!” his lanky leg and peg leg scrambled against the ground as she caught herself and broke away, inches from his face, her breath huffing against his mouth. He propped himself up on the elbow of his prosthetic arm, her weight still bearing on him, but he didn’t seem to notice. His eyes were staring at her, staring into her, searching, and at the same time there was a heartbreaking confusion in his expression.
“Uh...inhale too much smoke, there?” Junkrat said, a little dazed.
“M-maybe,” Mei said. She nearly moved to get off of him, but paused as she felt his organic hand tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
“...I... have also inhaled a lot of smoke,” Junkrat said slowly, “Probably.”
“...probably,” said Mei before letting herself collapse onto him, his head jerked up to meet her, his lips closing on hers and his body flinching tight in an embrace around her. Tight, and loving, and terrified and sweet. The white-knuckled instinct and affection of survivors who had just found supplies caches and would be damned before they let them go.
And all the while the factory burned in the distance.
