Chapter Text
When he awoke, he had multiple things to process.
The first thing he noticed was the pain. It was strange. He felt completely numb, but at the same time everything ached. Secondly, even though his eyes were open, everything was dark. He felt cloth over his eyes. He panicked for a split second before he took a breath. A painful breath, one that drew his attention away from the possibility of abduction and back towards his surroundings through the burning in his throat and lungs.
He was lying down on a bed that was tilted upwards. He heard a soft, steady beeping to his left. His left wrist felt cool, and tingly. The room smelled of disinfectant, and the cough medicine he took as a child.
"Hospital..." he thought to himself. It hurt to think, as it hurt to breathe, he noted. "What could have happened?"
It took a few breaths before he began to recall his latest memories. He remembered a pair of sad, angry eyes. A splatter of blood. Sharp, burning pain. Another splatter of blood. His hands, desperately clutching his blade as he staggered to his feet. The eyes again, this time with a look of resignation, and sorrow. Yelling. Then a great flash of blue...
Then nothing.
The imagery confused him. Then it disturbed him. Then it enraged him. The eyes took a face. And the face took a figure. And the figure became vividly clear in his mind. Long, neat black hair. A cleanly shaven jaw. Garments of blue and grey. And a bow slung across his back.
"Hanzo..." he wheezed.
HANZO
He felt his face burn, and his heart turned violently in his chest. The soft, steady beeping to his left became louder, and quicker. His head pounded with every beat of the electronic noise.
HANZO
His breathing quickened with the beeping. More imagery flashed across his mind. His vision was blurred red, and he looked up from the ground towards a tall, stalwart figure, whose face was twisted in sadness and disgust.
"Brother!" he heard the memory exclaim in his native tongue. "Why have you forsaken me?" His hand stretched out towards the figure's face, before falling limp on the ground.
The figure turned before walking away. "You dishonor us, Genji," a deep tone replied. "You dishonor yourself, our late father, our clan! How can I forsake one who is without honor?"
"You speak of honor," his own voice choked. "Yet you cut down your own brother. Your family! Which of us has dishonored the other?" The figure turned back to him.
"Do not speak to me of values, you damned fool! You chose a path that would have brought our clan to ruin! I do not cut down my brother tonight. I cut down a cancer that threatens the future of the Shimada!"
The figure reached for the bow strapped on his back. It reached back once more to claim a bow from it's quiver. Genji's heart dropped as his brother notched the arrow against the bow string, as the arrow began to emanate a bright and fierce shade of blue.
"No..." Genji gasped. "Don't do this brother! Hanzo! Brother!".
His desperate cries fell on deaf ears.
The next thing he heard were voices as the memory faded to black. "What shall become of the body, master?" he heard someone say. There was a pause before a response from the deep tone.
"Give it to the sea. The waves will carry him to the river of death."
The memory ended there.
The beeping became louder and faster as he felt rage and sorrow bubble up within him.
His own brother. His only kin left in the world. Those eyes, those hands, mercilessly struck him down.
"Such betrayal. He didn't hesitate for a second," he thought as his anger seethed. "Such hatred." He wished to scream, but his throat burned. The beeping intensified. He wished to cry, but tears wouldn't come. His ears continued to pound. His left hand gripped the sheets of the bed.
Wait. Why only his left? Why didn't the right follow?
The beeping slowed and grew softer as he slowly raised his left arm, the weightlessness of his right side only then becoming apparent. Slowly, painfully, and nervously, he reached for his right shoulder. His thumb and index finger touched down on skin, but the remaining three fingers clung only to air.
His right arm had disappeared.
He panicked. The beeping resumed it's quickened pace as his breathing grew ragged and erratic. He clutched his shoulder, reaching for an arm. There was nothing. He felt more weightlessness. Below the waist, this time. He reached for his thighs, despite the pain. and ran his fingers across it. They felt bandaged muscle before falling off at the end of his groin. The same sensation repeated when he reached for the other leg. His mind raced, and everything stopped.
Fear overtook him, and he lost control.
He heard the beeping. He heard his scream. He felt his body painfully toss and turn on the increasingly uncomfortable mattress beneath him. He saw his brother, he saw blood, and he felt sadness. Sadness and bitterness that he had never felt before. Greater than any of the pain that was in his recently severed body. But another emotion overwhelmed him entirely.
Rage. Genji felt pure, raw, terrifying rage.
He heard doors slamming against a wall, and he heard frantic yelling and shuffling. He turned his head side to side, his neck aching. He wanted to see who the voices belonged to, but his vision gave him nothing but darkness. He felt surrounded, cornered. The walls of the world seemed to close in on him. He cried out in his native tongue, as the noises in his ears grew louder, and the pain in his mind and body overtook him. He could feel the desperation in his voice.
"HELP ME! SOMEONE! PLEASE! ANYONE! SAVE ME, PLEASE!"
The next thing he felt were a pair of soft, warm hands on his face. He heard a woman's voice in English.
"Please! Calm down! Listen! Breathe with me!"
He heard a deep inhale followed by a soft exhale. The beeping pounded in his head, and his body still ached and burned and itched, but he focused on the gentle breathing of whoever was in front of him. It reminded him of a meditation technique he was taught in his youth. To let his mind flow in one direction, like a river, and to visualize his breathing as the river's path. His panicked, ragged breath slowly divulged into slow, steady streams. In, and out. In, and out. In...and out. In...
And then, he was out.
Genji jolted awake. Upon regaining consciousness, he immediately took in a deep, sharp breath. He still couldn't see. The sudden movement startled someone, as he heard another sudden movement and a yelp of surprise. He heard footsteps approach him. He tensed, remembering Hanzo. The footsteps stopped when he tightened up, and another moment passed before he heard the same voice that sent him to sleep.
"Please, do not be afraid. I am here to help." Genji hadn't noticed the thick accent that accompanied the woman's voice before. German? Maybe. Another moment passed, but Genji's tension went unreleased. The woman spoke again.
"My name is Dr. Angela Ziegler. You are currently at the medical center of Overwatch's headquarters in Switzerland."
Genji's shock revealed itself through a quick, sharp inhale through his teeth. Overwatch? Switzerland? How had he made it so far from Hanamura? How had he survived? Why had Overwatch rescued him? How did they find him? Another moment passed before Dr. Ziegler continued.
"Our agents found you washed up on the shore near Shimada Castle in Hanamura. You were gravely injured, but alive. We immediately brought you to a medical facility before transferring you here, where I performed your surgery." She paused for breath. "Quite frankly, it's a miracle you're alive." She hesitated before sadness overtook her voice. "Although not quite in one piece."
Genji remained silent. There was too much to process. Overwatch, the famous global paramilitary force, had found him. Somehow, after his fight with Hanzo, he was alive. He was in Switzerland, and the woman telling him all of this was the doctor who had performed his surgery. His tenseness didn't waver, and his silence elicited the woman to continue.
"Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm not even sure if you understand me or not. Forgive my ignorance, but do you speak English?"
Genji's tension relaxed a little. She was a doctor. She had saved his life. He was safe. He laid back in his bed before nodding.
"Good," she said. "Everything happened so fast, we didn't get to run a background check, so I wasn't sure if you understood me or not. Although, you did seem to follow my breathing the other night."
Genji turned towards the voice. It still hurt to move, but he wanted to make sure he had her attention. He attempted to speak, but he choked on the burning sensation, and began coughing.
He heard movement, and a hand supported his back as his lurched forward into a fit of wheezing and hacking. "You shouldn't try to speak just yet," Dr. Ziegler said. "You are still weak, so try to save your energy." Another hand gently placed itself on his chest before gently guiding him back down to the mattress. Genji took a deep breath before attempting to speak again.
"Doctor..." he managed to say. His own voice shocked him. He hadn't noticed it in his carnal screams of panic, but his voice was hoarse, and worn out. He sounded fifty years beyond his age.
"Yes?" she responded, a hint of surprise in her voice. "What is it?"
"How long...has it been?" he asked. There was a short pause before she gave him a hesitant reply.
"We found you a week ago. You first woke up yesterday morning. It's the next evening now."
One week. One week since he was found by Overwatch. One week since his miraculous survival. One week since he had been thrown to the feet of death's door.
One week since he was betrayed and struck down by his only brother.
Genji's fury returned upon remembering Hanzo. His anger was redirected towards his body.
"How did I...become this way?" he asked her, his voice building in volume. "What did you do to me?"
The doctor hesitated again before answering him. "Your legs were torn to pieces. I have never seen such damage before in my medical career. I had no choice but to amputate them. And your arm..." the sadness in her voice intensified. "Your arm was already gone when we found you."
Genji's heart sank. Despite this, he moved on to his next question, speaking painfully once again.
"And...my eyes? Why...did you wrap...them?" Yet another pause of sadness and pity.
"Severely damaged as well. We had to remove them."
Another deafening silence overtook the room. Dr. Ziegler broke it.
"I'm sorry, but there was no other choice."
Genji felt his heart twist. He spoke again, his voice laced his anger,
"It would have been better...to leave me on the shore to die."
The doctor gasped before answering back. "How could you say that?" she exclaimed. "Is it not a miracle that you have survived? Don't you value your life?"
Genji's anger rose at the accusation. "I value a life where I can walk and see! I denounce one where I am stripped of my limbs and vision!"
Silence again. This time, he was the one to break it.
"I'm sorry...you did what you thought was right...but to subject me to this ...it is the same as killing me."
He heard a soft, deep breath before she responded. "I am sorry as well," she said. He heard what he thought was a sob before she left the room. "This must be a lot for you to process. I'll leave you alone for a little while." He heard footsteps, a door open, and then a door close.
He was alone. In silence. In pain. In anger.
There was too much to think about. Still too much to process. His life had been turned upside down in just a week. He was on the other side of the world, with Overwatch. He had nearly been killed by his only family. And he was without legs, without an arm, without vision.
But most of all, without honor. Left only with sadness and anger to accompany him in his pain.
He began to drift off after some time, remembering the doctor's voice. It had calmed him, saved him from his panic attack just the other night. Then, it had rebuked him for lacking the value in his own life.
"What life?" he thought as he slipped out of consciousness. "What kind of life is this death I've been given?"
He drifted into a dreamless sleep.
"Brother, why have you forsaken me?"