It is the anniversary of Overwatch's fall. Throughout the world, heroes are mourned. Including within newly recalled Overwatch itself.

Author note: There is a bit of gore/reference to PTSD. I took the idea of Mercy and Jack's early life from the author CorvidFeathers and their work "Unfinished", please give them a read when you can. That idea involves Mercy having a bit of a rough childhood, to say the least.

Today was a solemn day throughout the world. A day representing a loss of innocence, a loss of hope.

A loss of heroes.

In the years since the fall of Overwatch, its members had mourned in their own ways, often at the memorials which dotted the globe. Today, however, was the first anniversary of the fall since the group had been recalled. The group gathered, sharing stories in a mixture of melancholy and hope, remembering the fallen as they looked to the future. Subdued laughter and personal stories flowed between them, as the team's members drew strength from one another.

Except, Winston noted with a worried eye, Mercy. As the hours passed and the day drew to a close, he noticed how little the team's medic seemed to be interacting with others, content to sit alone save the briefest interruption when Tracer offered her a drink. The Pilot's worried glance to Winston when Mercy's favorite, a peach mimosa, was refused told him everything he needed to know. Absentmindedly complimenting Reinhardt on the exaggerated details of his story, Winston resolved to talk to her in private.

"Mercy."

"Winston." She replied, not looking up as he settled next to her as quietly as a hulking, genetically enhanced ape was able to settle. The hall was deserted now, and he keenly felt his deep voice in the silence.

"Is everything alright? You seem to be …oh".

In Mercy's hands was a crumpled picture of her and Jack.

For a long while, the two were silent. Winston wracked his brain for something to say to comfort the woman, who so rarely seemed fazed by anything.

"You must miss him terribly" he settled with, hoping for the best.

"Would it help to talk about it? Perhaps ….perhaps the happy memories could help."

Finally she looked up. Sad eyes peered up at him, and for a moment Winston feared he'd only made it worse.

"Yes, mein Freund… perhaps it would. Thank you. Today was harder than I expected." Looking down at the photo again, she breathed out a sad sigh.

"Did I ever tell you how we met?"

"No" Winston rumbled, eager to let her continue "but I knew you were friends before you joined Overwatch."

"We met when he saved my life. My parents were killed when the war came to Zurich. I was trapped in the rubble for two days. The last thing I saw of my childhood was their bodies as he carried me out of the ruined apartment. Jack disobeyed orders to find me. If it wasn't for him I wouldn't be here right now. I'd have died with my parents."

Angela drew still for a long while, tears at the corners of her eyes. When she began again, her voice was shaky, uneven.

"He stayed with me, stayed in my life for years after that. Things took a while to settle, took a while to rebuild. Jack was the closest thing I had to a father, even if Overwatch kept him busy. He was there when I was accepted into medical school, there when I published my first paper, performed my first surgery" Mercy's face warmed with a smile for a moment, before she trailed off, gazing at something far away.

Winston's eyes grew with concern, but she continued.

"I hadn't seen him for months. I'd been performing surgeries for years, I knew everything there was to know.

It was a kid. I don't know how old, I don't know where, but they'd… a mine. They'd… I still see their face some nights. Too much blood loss. I did everything I could. I did everything right, but there was just too much blood. The head Nurse kept telling me I did nothing wrong but I, I…

I lost them."

She stopped. The picture fell to the table as she stared at her hands, stared at the bodies only she could see. Winston had heard men die before, but Mercy's silence was more painful than anything he could imagine. All his years of study, all that science taught him left him without any words to offer her.

"I don't know how he found out. I don't know how he got there. But he was there for me, in the lobby. I cried, I begged, I pleaded him never to let me into a hospital again. He sat with me for hours as I fell to pieces like that."

Picking up the photo again, Mercy's gaze shifted to Jack's face.

"And then he helped me put the pieces back together. He told me stories he's never told anyone else. The first time he lost someone in combat, the time he learned to perform a blood transfusion in a foxhole, what it felt like to hold someone as they died. He told me no matter how many people you've lost, how many mistakes you've made, the only way to save more lives is to keep trying. He made me promise him I'd never give up on saving lives.

I'd always known he wanted me to join Overwatch, save the world with him. He'd mentioned all the good they'd done, all the help I could bring. It's funny, though. I worried that joining Overwatch would mean losing myself."

At last, she looked at Winston again with a sad smile.

"Instead it meant finding him."