#genji headcanons

Winston: It's obvious that Winston loves peanut butter, which is fine in and of itself. I think he has a really bad habit of leaving empty pots around the Overwatch HQs, especially his room though. That, and making the worst combinations imaginable. Like peanut butter and spicy chips, or peanut butter and eggs, that sort of thing. He would convince everyone to try it, and feel rejected if they didn't. It's his worst habit but not necessarily a toxic one; otherwise he's a pretty sensible individual.

Lena Oxton / Tracer: Tracer's worst habit is definitely picking at her nails. She tends to do so as a self soothing action, but she doesn't know when to stop and it causes her to have scabs sometimes that Emily has to mend for her. It's something she's aware of but nothing helps to stop her from doing so; she's tried picking stones, those zit popping toys, everything. Nothing feels as good as picking her skin when she's anxious.

Mei-Ling Zhou / Mei: When Mei's in a low mood and is struggling mentally, she sometimes finds it hard to avoid not talking down herself, or viewing herself negatively. It seeps into the atmosphere in HQ, and it's something that she struggles to get herself out of. Once the bad thoughts start, she can't control them and struggles to do so, especially when they involve her survivor's guilt.

Genji Shimada / Genji: Genji used to have several bad habits he's learned to stop over the years, like playing games in his bed, eating unhealthy food too much, smoking probably at one point or another. But he still cant shake the bad habit of skipping training sometimes because he can't be bothered. If he's not in the mood, there's no way he's gonna be seen in the gym strength and ability training unless Brigitte drags him there.

Reinhardt Wilhelm / Reinhardt: Reinhardt has a tendency to overdramatise everything; from his speech to his stories. This applies too to his emotions, and he feels them too close to his heart as though his skin was made of paper. He struggles with his ability to regulate his emotions, and it's something he's aware of but views it as something positive, rather than negative. He wouldn't admit that it's his worst habit, but everyone around him would.

Brigitte Lindholm / Brigitte: Brigitte takes care of herself very well; she views the human body as a machine that needs rest, supplements, nutrition, etc. But her worst habit is remembering to drink when she's working on something or busy with a mission. The amount of times Angela has had to admit her for dehydration isn't even funny, and Reinhardt is always getting yelled at by Torbjorn for 'letting it happen to her'. It's one of those things where when Brigitte is focused on something, she forgets everything else going on.

Angela Ziegler / Mercy: Angela has a very bad problem with doomscrolling online. Once she starts, she cant stop even when she gets ads telling her to take a break. She doesn't necessarily enjoy it, and it keeps her up late into the night, but it's a distraction for her from everything going on in the world. Don't ask to see her app usage history; it'll entirely be instagram reels and tiktok with like 9hrs a day average usage.

Echo: Sometimes, Echo fails to match her responses to the mood of the situation. She tends to take a direct and neutral stance on everything, so her worst habit is that sometimes she comes off as though she's playing devil's advocate, when she isn't. She's just simply showing all aspects that the person she's talking to might not have considered. She's a very logical being, but the way in which she does this sometimes comes off negatively on other people.

Vivian Chase / Sojourn: With Vivian, I can imagine she has a bad habit of getting stuck in nostalgic loops. She likes to look back on the past, understand what happened and what went wrong, but if she lets herself do it too much or for too long, she lingers on her mistakes and it affects her mentally. Similarly to Mei, she feels survivors guilt and feels ashamed for the events in Canada that happened to her sister and niece years ago. Vivian loves a blast from the past, but struggles to regulate how far back to go and how much to think about it.

Lúcio Correia dos Santos / Lucio: Lucio has a very bad habit of staying up too late, working on music or plans for the next day, to the point where he misses sleep and is extremely groggy in the morning. It's something he gets distracted with and loses track of time with. It doesn't help either that he has time blindness and gets lost in the music.

Cole Cassidy / Cassidy: Smoking is his worst habit; everyone working in Overwatch will tell you that. He refuses to try vaping, and prefers cigars to anything else. His cough is disgusting at times, and he has nicotine rush every morning after his first cigar, which makes it hard for anyone to talk to him and get a response from him properly. It's something he has no intention of stopping, as he's here to live a good life not a long one, but everyone has an issue with it when he smokes around them because his favourite brand absolutely reeks.

Fareeha Amari / Pharah: Fareeha holds grudges too long; she struggles with forgiveness and moving forwards. She won't admit it, but it's something that affects her relationship to her family and previous friends. If she's wronged as well, it only takes that one moment for her to give up emotionally and mentally on that friendship. It's not rational, and she understands that, but it's something she views as another form of protection, like armour against people who could hurt her or abandon her.

Jean-Baptiste Augustin / Baptiste: Baptiste is a bad influence when it comes to drinking and has a bad habit of not knowing his own limit. To this day, he still wonders how he's the first one to be absolutely drunk when everyone else around him is barely tipsy (even after he's had 3 shots one after another of fireball on an empty stomach). He indulges in it too much and he doesn't know his own limit to drinking, so you can imagine Cole and Angela have had to comfort him while his head's in the toilet bowl.

Aleksandra Zaryanova / Zarya: Zarya has a tendency to give everyone grace and understanding, even when they don't deserve it. She gives people too many chances, and too many opportunities to use her. It's something she's working on, but she views the world in a more positive light than others and wants to keep the optimism she has for other people.

Hana Song / D.Va: Hana has been told for years she holds herself to too high standards with her work and efforts in Overwatch, and she works herself to the bone. It's something she doesn't view as wrong, but it impacts her body and mind SEVERELY. Angela and Brigitte have had several conversations about taking breaks and not pushing herself too hard with staying up late for work, skipping meals, exhausting herself on missions, etc. It's her worst habit and even she would agree, but she doesn't intend to change it when it gives her the results they need.

I’m going out on a limb and saying that this takes place after current canon, some years in the future. Mainly because I can’t see Genji getting rid of his cybernetic body until the conflict and his time serving Overwatch is well and truly done.

It’s a very big, life altering choice he makes for the sake of his own inner peace, something he thinks about extensively and consults both Zenyatta and Angela on. When he finally makes the decision, and gets the go ahead from medical professionals, Genji is very much ready to say goodbye to this body.

It’s a gradual, painstaking process. You’re at the forefront of the medical team which will be overseeing Genji’s transformation. Angela had recommended you herself, and Genji has often heard her speak highly of you; this bright eyed, brilliant medical graduate with a slightly overzealous eagerness to help those in need. 

You’re brought on board some years after the recall to specialise in helping out the veterans. Assisting Reinhardt with physical therapy. Fine tuning Sojourn’s prosthetics. You practically jump at the chance to assist with Genji’s case.

Genji finds your dedication... admirable. 

Admirable, and perhaps a little bit stupid. He knows that this is a big job to take on for someone so green, and privately he’s rather wary on whether or not you’ve got the stomach for it.

He’s a little bit tired and jaded at this point, and the man just wants to finally settle down for a life of peace, to properly reconcile with his brother and see where the remainder of his life takes him. Your enthusiasm is refreshing for him, though, and while he’s friendly but guarded, he can’t help but inevitably warm up to you the more time he spends in your presence.

The job demands late nights, extensive study and almost constant regular interaction with each other. Nightly visits become a thing, and it’s at these meet-ups that a sort of tentative bond begins to unfold between you:

It all starts with a text message from you; sent at some ridiculous hour when you’ve lost track of time, asking Genji if he’d be able to stop by to discuss his bloodwork results. Genji himself is a notorious night owl, but he’s a little baffled to see the message pop up on his holopad at 1:30AM. This is the hour for late night meditation, or secret rendezvous between lovers - not for medical appointments!

He worries that perhaps something might’ve flagged up seriously wrong in his bloodwork for you to be alerting him so early in the morning. Yet another slightly more ridiculous notion - that perhaps is him getting a little presumptuous - almost entertains the idea that this might be a booty call. Genji quickly puts that thought to bed. Whatever your intentions are, he decides to humour you, throwing on a hoodie and texting you back that he’ll be there right away. 

He enters to find you, a little ragged looking, empty cups of coffee and papers strewn around you at the table. You hardly even seem to notice him coming in, eyes framed with drowsy bags, still staunchly focused on the papers in front of you.

Genji clears his throat with a metallic sort of whirr, announcing himself. 

“Pulling an all nighter?” 

You flinch at the sound of his voice, startled, blinking like an owl. It takes you a split moment to shake yourself off, run a hand through your frazzled hair, and offer him a coffee-breath smile.

“Genji! You came.”

“I did,” Genji affirms, “although it’s a strange hour for a medical examination, I have to say.”

You merely stare at him in confusion for a moment, then let your gaze drift to the clock. Your eyes widen again in shock, smacking yourself on the forehead. Genji watches, bemused, as your expression appears to cycle between horror and embarrassment.

“Oh my God, is that the time? I’m so sorry, I’ve been so caught up I must’ve lost track - I didn’t even notice!”

“I thought it might’ve been an emergency,” Genji shrugs, “so I came anyway.” 

“Oh, no, not at all! Your bloodwork came back fine. I just thought I should follow up with it. I was, um... under the impression that it was much earlier in the day, was all,” you explain sheepishly. You dip your head reverently, and get back to profusely apologising. “God, I’m so sorry. I must have woken you up. Please, forgive me. Feel free to go on back to your room, we can reschedule this for another... more appropriate time.”

He chuckles, brushing off your concerns good-naturedly. Maybe he should feel a little annoyed, but instead, Genji just feels a smile itching at his mouth, and a spike of almost affectionate pity for you. In a swift, gentle breeze of movement, he pulls out the plastic waiting chair and seats himself politely at your side. 

“Do not worry. I am usually awake at this hour. I don’t settle down for the night till around 2AM. Might as well put it to good use, eh?”

 From then on, Genji makes it a habit to devote some of his late nights to visiting the medical ward; patiently undergoing tests or simply keeping you company as you arduously sift through your notes. He’ll bring you words of encouragement, food and beverages; fruit bowls from the cafeteria, a nice, cold bottle of water from the vending machine. He makes sure you’re not overworking yourself and scolds you when you’re spreading yourself too thin. 

Purely professional talk slowly but surely becomes personal. You chatter ranges from talking about your day, silly anecdotes, rememberings of times past, or abstract, sleep-deprived deep talks about the meaning of life and the universe.

It’s unavoidable for you, becoming close with Genji. Naturally, such an intimate procedure requires a particular closeness with the patient. Knowing him in every minute aspect: clued in on every bodily symptom, even the uncomfortable but necessary parts such as bowel movements or fluctuations in sex drive. 

Genji takes all this in relatively good stride. Lord knows the poor guy is used to it. He has a strange relationship with his body. Over the years, it’s been relentlessly poked and prodded, upgraded and altered, lorded and abhorred; and Genji has had to learn to live with inhabiting a weapon of a body that is not private, that does not and never will belong to him, really. 

Still, he finds himself getting a little bit flustered, sometimes, especially when questions or medical procedures entail intimate parts of his physiology. And it seems this is a likewise phenomenon for you. He watches your cheeks flush a deep red, avoiding his eye and apologising profusely for the invasion. And Genji realises, then, that he finds your sudden shyness exceptionally endearing. 

This is it; the first symptom of a larger, underlying problem. This is when he begins to suspect that his feelings for you have begun to take a turn from the professional to something a little more complicated.

Once upon a time, Genji Shimada had been a playboy, in all respects of the word. Neglecting his clan duties for frivolous things, he toted around a different girl on his arm every night and flirted with practically anything that moved. 

That had been a long time ago, of course, and he’s a much different man now. Age and hardship have tempered his unruly nature. But all of a sudden, with this newfound, rose-tinted attraction, he finds himself feeling and behaving like a teenage boy again. Some of the aspects of his younger self have been miraculously resurrected.

He can’t help himself - any chance he gets he’s firing cheeky, playful quips at you. Bringing you food to share or coffee on your lunch and tea breaks, offering you his arm on your casual afternoon strolls. It feels like a wonderful reward to coax a smile out of you, or see your face heat up with a flush of bashfulness. It’s even more exhilarating when you reciprocate his flirtatious banter.

The tension between you fast becomes unbearable. The meeting of eyes and physical touch tends to linger just a little too long; charged, intimate. In spare moments you accompany each other everywhere. People start to notice your closeness and begin to suspect. 

At dinner, Hanzo narrows his eyes and pointedly asks him what ‘the nature of his relationship with this doctor is,’, and Cassidy, eloquent as ever, outright asks Genji ‘’whether or not the two of you are screwin’ ’’, because he’s thinking of asking you out for a drink. “So you’d better hurry up and make a damn move, ole’ boy,” Cole nudges, teasingly, “-or somebody else will.”

NSFW

When the pair of you finally do acknowledge your attraction to eachother, it doesn’t take long for things to become physical.

Late night meetings in the medical office really do become midnight rendezvous. Genji will take you on the surface of your desk, passionate, frenzied and tender, with the utmost attentiveness to your pleasure. 

Singing praises into your skin, of how much he’s yearned for you these past months, lusted over you. Of how eternally grateful he is that you’d both wandered into eachother’s lives.