#secretsantawatch

Gabriel Reyes had been preparing for the annual Overwatch Christmas party ugly sweater contest since February. He had planned meticulously, labored away over knitting needles and wire cutters, even stooped to asking Genji for advice on lighting techniques.It wasn’t so much that Gabriel cared about winning, except that in actual point of fact he did care. Very much.

For three years running he’d been cheated out of the illustrious title and accompanying plastic trophy, purchased by Ana from the local dollar store. This year was his year to win, and nothing was going to stop him, especially not Torbjörn and his damn mechanical sweater with the robotic arms that served painfully strong eggnog.

Really, Gabriel thought, he was more than qualified for the prize. His mama had taught him how to use a sewing machine as a little boy (“I’ll be damned if any son of mine can’t hem a pair of pants on his own,” she used to say), and since then he’d always enjoyed making things. It was a far more pleasant thing to do with hands than firing a gun. Plus he had a - what was it Jack always said? – a flair for the dramatic.

A sharp rap sounded on Gabriel’s door, and a smooth, drawling voice called out, “You ‘bout ready for this shindig?”

“Tell Ana I’ll be there soon,” he growled back at McCree.

“Sure thing, boss.” A husky laugh, and then, “Need any help gettin’ dolled up?”

In truth, he probably did, but like hell was Gabriel letting Jesse McCree into his room to help him put on a damn sweater.

“I think I’ll manage.”

“If you say so,” McCree chuckled, and Gabriel heard the distinct sound of spurs strolling down the hallway toward the rec room.

Well, it was now or never; glorious victory or crushing defeat. The fate of the worlds hung in the balance here. Maybe Jack had a point about that dramatic thing.

After much tugging, swearing, and being poked by wires, Gabriel managed to get the thing on his body. It was itchy and uncomfortably heavy, but, as he gazed at himself in the smudged-up mirror, he had to admit, it was a monstrous sight to behold.

The sweater contained 207 individual lights (yes, Gabriel had counted...twice), all rigged to a complex electrical circuit that flashed them in a multicolored sequence to the tune of “Feliz Navidad”, which played from a tinny speaker hidden beneath the collar. McCree had suggested the song months ago, because he was an offensive, irreverent asshat, but Gabriel had secretly thought it was hilarious, and so had actually gone through with it.

In addition to the lights, the sweater was also covered in shiny green tinsel arranged in layers that were supposed to resemble an evergreen tree. Between the “needles”, Gabriel had sewn on tiny jingle bells that announced his presence from at least 30 feet away.

All in all it was a misery of human taste and design, and Gabriel couldn’t be prouder. It was almost enough to bring a tear to his eye. Almost. He was only able to hold back because the numerous lights created a feeling like a furnace engulfing his entire upper body.

Gabriel spent a good long while pondering the accompanying sombrero he’d made, trimmed with fur around the brim, but eventually he decided against it. He wasn’t trying to be some kind of racist caricature for chrissake. Meanwhile “Feliz Navidad” started over again for the fifth time. Compromises, he thought.

Gabriel stepped into the rec room, sweating buckets and with a shit-eating grin firmly installed on his face. McCree immediately choked on the s’more he had been gracelessly shoving into his mouth. Angela seemed torn between awe and disgust, which was exactly the reaction Gabriel had been aiming for. Ana laughed so hard Gabriel thought he saw cider come out of her nose, while little Fareeha, tucked against her mother’s hip, pointed at him and shouted, “Rainbow fireflies!”

Gabriel patted her sweetly on the head and slipped her a fistful of candy canes when Ana wasn’t looking.

The party had already been in full swing for an hour or two before Gabriel arrived, which meant that Torbjörn’s infamous eggnog had started to make its journey around the room. McCree was making flirtatious small talk, and Mercy, bless her drunken soul, was actually blushing and smiling in return. A few feet away, Tracer was not-so-stealthily filming the pair, fist firmly crammed into her mouth to keep herself from laughing out loud.

Elsewhere, Genji, who had reprogrammed the lights in is cybernetic suit to blink red and green, was dancing with Fareeha. The little girl’s feet didn’t even touch the floor as Genji swung her around, while Ana alternated between shouting for him to be more careful and taking a rapid string of pictures on her cell phone. Reinhardt leaned against the back wall of the room, looking for all the world like he’d downed an entire barrel of eggnog. He seemed to be laughing hysterically, though whether it was at Gabriel’s sweater, McCree’s flirting, Genji’s dancing, or his own messy drunkenness was anyone’s guess.

There was only one face missing, and sadly it was the face Gabriel most wanted to see. But he’d been expecting that. Gabriel had been watching the mission status list obsessively in his room the whole day. No one had reported in. It looked like he’d be spending another Christmas on his own this year.

“Ya made it!” Torbjörn roared, smacking Gabriel’s ass (it was the only body part he could properly reach) and shoving a glass of eggnog into his hand, “That’s quite the contraption you’ve put together.”

Gabriel smirked at the impressed lilt in Torbjörn’s voice.

“No mechanical arms this year?”

“Nah,” Torbjörn grimaced at his plain red sweater and shook his head, “Between that to-do in Austria and the other to-do in Colombia I didn’t have the time. Wouldn’t want to half ass it, you know?”

“Of course not,” Gabriel said in a voice that he hoped sounded reasonable and sympathetic.

“Looks like the trophy’s going home with you this year, Reyes.” Torbjörn gestured to the lopsided plastic trophy that sat on the drink table next to the un-spiked punch that nobody had touched.

Gabriel suspected it might be rude to agree out loud, but he downed his glass of eggnog and did it anyway.

Tradition dictated that the ugly sweater trophy be awarded precisely at 10 o’clock on Christmas Eve. Ana was the judge, as was tradition. As the night wore on, she made her way around the room, inspecting each potential candidate with scrutiny and precision.

“You look like a boiled lobster,” she told Gabriel when it was his turn.

Gabriel wiped rivulets of sweat from his forehead. “The lights are a bit...warm.”

Ana circled around him, taking in the sweater from every angle.

“All handmade, I assume?”

“Of course. What kind of man do you take me for?”

Ana snorted, but didn’t answer, which was probably in Gabriel’s best interest. She leaned in close so that she could hear the speaker over the din of the party.

“Feliz Navidad?” she asked, clearly disgusted.

Gabriel only shrugged. “McCree suggested it.”

Ana tugged on a few strands of tinsel and rang several of the jingle bells with a swipe of her wrist.

“I think I’ve seen enough,” she said cryptically.

“You don’t have to be all mysterious and vague,” Gabriel told her, “We both know I’m winning this year.”

Ana’s eyes narrowed like a hawk’s. “Don’t be so sure of yourself. The night isn’t over yet.”

“Please, Ana. It’s 9:50. I’ve got this in the bag.”

She arched a single, deadly eyebrow and whispered, “If you’re sure.”

It was 9:55, and Gabriel was going to win.

It was 9:57 and Gabriel was going to win.

It was 9:59 and Gabriel was going to win. And then Jack Morrison walked into the party, face covered in soot and mission debris and wearing the unholy elder god of Christmas sweaters.

For starters, it managed to be both oversized in the torso where it sagged and drooped across his stomach and comically small in the arms so that Jack’s biceps bulged outward every time he moved, and the bottom four inches of his wrists were exposed. Horizontal stripes of bright orange and purple encircled Jack’s body, and inside each stripe was a dancing conga line of tiny misshapen reindeers and penguins wearing Santa hats.

Gabriel looked upon it and legitimately shed a single tear for the sweater’s awesome might, and also for lost potential and everything that could have been. In some dark recess of his mind, he supposed that the tear might possibly have had something to do with seeing Jack again after almost 2 months, but that was a part he refused to acknowledge.

“Oh well,” Gabriel muttered fondly as Ana walked over to Jack, trophy in one hand and camera in the other, “There’s always next year.”

It was half past ten by the time Jack finished taking pictures and drinking celebratory shots of bourbon (Torbjörn had given up on the actual eggnog part of his eggnog). He shuffled awkwardly over to Gabriel, trophy in hand, looking like a smug, sorry son-of-a-bitch.

“Ana seems to think I stole this from you,” he said, swinging the trophy around one long finger.

Then he seemed to take in Gabriel’s sweater for the first time. He gave a low whistle and shook his head, mouth crooking into a grin.

“That is something alright. I can see why you were so excited about it this year.” Jack held the trophy out toward Gabriel. “Here. You deserve it.”

Gabriel bypassed the trophy and latched directly onto Jack’s bare wrist. He could feel the skin and hair under his fingers, warm and real.

“Good to see you,” he mumbled, gazing at Jack with a hot intensity, “You look good.”

Jack’s cheeks pinked and he ducked his head like the sweet little farm boy he was.

“No I don’t,” he protested, “I smell, I’m covered in who knows what, and this was the only holiday sweater in my closet that was clean.”

Gabriel was halfway through closing the gap for a kiss when Jack’s words registered in his mind.

“Hang on,” he said incredulously, “You mean to tell me that this sin against the name of God was ALREADY IN YOUR CLOSET?”

Jack nodded. “I’ve had it for years. I think I found it in a sale bin at Macy’s in the middle of April.”

And really all Gabriel could do was kiss him and his stupid, idiotic, hideous, perfect sweater.

A second later, Jack yelped like a puppy and jumped backwards, clutching his right hand to his chest.

“What’s wrong?” Gabriel asked, instantly worried, “You didn’t get hurt out in the field did you?”

“No,” Jack said, and he was laughing so he couldn’t be too bad off, “But I think I just burned my palm on your Christmas tree.”

Then his eyes took on a dangerous glint as he stepped closer and whispered in Gabriel’s ear, “We should probably get that thing off of you, don’t you agree?”

And for the second time that night, Gabriel did agree. Wholeheartedly.

It was well past midnight by the time Soldier 76 made it back to his rundown motel room, and therefore not technically Christmas anymore. His “stakeout” with Ana had been fruitless, as he’d expected. All they’d really managed to do was stroll down memory lane, and while some of the memories had been good (beyond good, even), the more recent ones brought only nightmares and pain. He didn’t know why he’d thought it was a good idea to go.

As he unstrapped his visor, something Ana had said filtered to the front of his mind.

“You think he’s out there somewhere, feeling like just as much of a sorry sack of shit as us?” she’d huffed.

“Yeah,” he had grunted back, “I do.”

Jack sank down onto the rickety bed with a groan and a curse. He’d wasted far too much time already thinking about what Gabriel Reyes, no, Reaper, did with himself. It was as fruitless as his little Christmas stakeout.

Jack rolled over onto his side, only to be met with the crinkling sound of paper under his elbow. He sat up. There in the center of his bed was a Christmas present. It was wrapped in plain red paper. Taped beneath the bow was a tag with two words printed on it: “For Jack”. The handwriting looked familiar.

Against his better judgement, Jack carefully unwrapped the gift. He didn’t know what Reyes was trying to do, sneaking into his room like some sort of Dark Lord Santa Claus and leaving him neatly wrapped presents like it was old times. It sent his mind reeling.

Underneath the paper was a white cardboard box. Inside the box, Jack found a sweater. It was puke green and depicted two snowmen fighting each other with candy cane baseball bats. It was without a doubt one of the ugliest things Jack had ever seen. Slowly, shakily he stood up and crossed over to the tiny closet in the corner of the room. With great care and delicacy, he placed the sweater on a hanger and put it on the rack.

Absentmindedly, Jack picked at the left sleeve, smoothing up and down the prickly wool with his thumb. Soft moonlight streamed in from the cracks in the blinds, giving the sweater a strange, glowing iridescence. It was too much for Jack’s exhausted brain to process.

“In the morning,” he muttered to himself and then went back to his bed.

In the morning he would decide what the sweater meant, and harder still, what he would do about it. For now, he would sleep.

He didn’t notice - wouldn’t notice until the morning - the empty spot on the dresser where a plastic trophy with the inscription “Ugliest Christmas Sweater in Overwatch” usually sat.