The sun was particularly hot today, beating mercilessly down upon everything, leaving nothing untouched. Every single exposed surface was hot as hell.

"Come on kid! We'll leave ya behind if ya can't keep up!" Gordo shouted as he dashed to his motorcycle. Jesse huffed and ensured the bag of cash was secure on his own before pushing the thing along for a moment, ignoring the searing pain that nearly left burns on his hands, even through his thin gloves, and ignoring the shouts of the gang until he heard equally angry shouting behind him. Some dicks in Overwatch uniforms. Great. Just what he needed.

Jesse grumbled and hopped up on his motorcycle and revved the thing up and burned rubber to follow after his gang, his relief at escape was short-lived when he heard the shots from the pulse rifle. He yelped and quickly swerved noting with dismay that his pursuers were following suit...on notably faster vehicles. The kid grit his teeth and drew his revolver as he steadied his bike and turned, taking aim to shoot out a wheel from under the blond douchebag who was gaining steadily. Jesse cursed, yanking the handlebars hard to avoid getting shot off his bike by a helix rocket, he nearly lost control of his bike and very nearly dropped his beloved revolver.

His gang had left him far behind, but, he thought, and rather smugly at that, that he had another guy's share as well. In addition to the money, they had stolen something of particular value, some element used in those new German exosuits or new weapon stuff, he wasn't sure, but all he cared about, was the money.

Poor, slow Gordo- though the Sparks that flew off his handlebar and at his face, made the boy think maybe he was the slow one at this particular moment.

Once he righted himself he quickly twisted and fired, with only a quick glance back. He was rewarded with a satisfying yelp and crash as his second pursuer went down, the bike going tumbling, kicking up the Utah dust as they went. Sweat dripped into his eyes, burning them, but he frantically wiped them away, swerving madly to avoid the volley of pulse rifle bolts as they hit the ground beside him.

God, he thought, if I ev-

Jesse never got to finish his thought as a lucky shot blew out his front tire and he went flying over the handlebars, screaming all the way.

His bike hurtled towards him as well, landing clean on his arm and sliding immediately after that. Between the weight of the thing and the sharp rocks beneath, the boy could feel it shredding his limb, but he was too dazed to scream and only offered the most pathetic squeak of his life.

The blond jerk came rumbling up on his vehicle, and hopped off, pulse rifle at the ready, pointed straight at his head. Jesse could only cough and wheeze and vainly try to reach his gun that was laying maybe two, three feet from his head, but he was damned, his arm pinned beneath the hot bike, slowly cooking under it.

The second dumbass came rolling up as well, and when standing, for some dumb reason, Jesse noticed he was taller…what the hell did that have to do with this?

"You gonna kill me, ya best do so." He snarled weakly, glaring daggers up at the men who stood over him. "Cause' ya don't and I'll make sure ya regret it."

"Jack." The taller man rumbled, crossing his arms. "This is barely a kid."

"I know this type too well, Reyes. He's too far gone, never amount to anything." The douche- Jack, he raised his rifle and with an eerie sort of coldness leveled it at Jesse's head.

The kid's skinny chest rose and fell frantically as he blinked the dust away. "Go on!" He snapped and spat at them.

Gabriel growled, "For fuck's sake, Jack!" Gabriel moved over to shove the gun away. "What the hell's wrong with you? I swear since-" he shook his head, dropping off into angry mutterings.

"We're gonna give this little puta a choice." He decided and carefully lifted the bike off of Jesse's arm. "And he's going to choose correctly." Gabriel's eyes widened when he saw the mangled, shattered mess of Jesse's arm and his gaze fell upon his young face. He couldn't have been more than eighteen, no less than fifteen...he was practically a child and here he was, premature scruff on his jaw, and a glint as hard as any old timer in a county prison in his eye. "Ah shit, kid…" he muttered and took off his jacket, quickly wrapping his arm up as best he could. Jesse grunted with the pain, that quickly gave way to agonized squeals of pain. "Jack, I need some pain meds."

Morrison growled but quickly measured the stuff out in a syringe from the bottle he retrieved from the bag on his bike. "I don't get why you're tryin' Gabe…" he growled and Reyes gave Jack a look.

"I get it, man. I do. You hate the Deadlock gang. But look...I can't believe I gotta spell this all out for you." He shook his head.

Jack scoffed, "I know exactly what he could be good for, but the fact of the matter is...if he'll cooperate- and if it's worth expending energy to get him to do so."

Gabriel sighed, watching the boy's face relax when he administered the morphine. "Fair enough, but listen. You won't have to be part of it. He'll be my…" Reyes trailed off momentarily. "Project." He decided and made sure the jacket was secure and scooped up the boy. "Lena should be along with the shuttle momentarily." He said and glanced to Jack, who refused to meet his own gaze.

"Let's just get him back to base." The commander huffed.