"O'Deorain."
Mmph.
"O'Deorain."
Moira stirred, blinking sleep from her gaze. Stiffness ran up through her body, pushing a groan out as she straightened in her chair.
"Good, you're awake. The Japan mission. Get to Ops, now."
Gan mhaith. "I'm coming, Gabriel."
"You're already ten minutes late—"
Moira ripped the comm out of her ear. Lord, it was giving her a headache. How could anyone handle Gabriel's voice drilling deep into their brain, first thing in the morning?
...Or at 11:41 am?
Urgh. Moira shuddered as she dragged herself to her feet, pressing her hand to her eyes. She swore she could feel her heartbeat pumping there as she stared into her eyelids. She tried focusing on that feeling, attempting to ignore the itchings of unpleasantness in the rest of her body. It was awful; the feeling of yesterday's clothing clinging to her skin, the slight itch of grease in her hair, the hint of drool on last night's paperwork she'd been so diligently studying…
It was unlike her. She'd let her passion for the potential, exciting new project get away from her.
Moira grabbed the necessary file, flicked through it just to ensure yes, this is the right one. The taste of morning breath made her shudder and in her momentary weakness she nearly grabbed last night's unfinished glass of whiskey. It was with utmost self-control that she managed to turn to her office door. Showing up half-asleep was one thing. Showing up tired and with alcohol on her breath was quite another.
She scoffed. Was she genuinely considering drinking at this hour, and while she was already late for a meeting? She really was tired.
Moira was out the door before she could run afoul of temptation. She ran a hand through her hair, tinkered with her tie; maybe they would have tea or coffee in the ops room to get her the rest of the way to human. As Moira slipped into the elevator, she shot a glance at the reflective steel; she had one button undone and one side of her shirt untucked. That dealt with, she seemed passably presentable.
She had the timing down perfectly; she was already mid-step as the doors were opening, striding past a frightened flock of newly-inducted white-collar Talon members. The fresh-faced youths parted like skittish pigeons, some staring after her in awe.
It was all she could do to keep from sneering until she'd left their view. It seemed she did act as a beacon of sorts, a candle these moths followed. It was amusing, to see the cultish following she had accrued in the underbelly of academia. It was like that time she'd had an undergrad show her a screenshot, brimming with excitement. An article on her, on the front page of r/transhumanism. When she'd been little, she'd spent hours upon hours devouring internet content like that; articles and forum debate over the oft-maligned subcultures of science and radical schools of thought.
There was a difference between ordinary people and the sort of person Moira had aspired to become. Ordinary people were sheep, even if they were intelligent ones; they flocked to causes, dedicating themselves to it and losing their identities, their very history, to the flood. They would never be remembered, never achieve something on their own; their very existences would go towards some collective achievement they may never even have comprehended.
Moira did not dedicate herself to a cause. Those involved in science tried to label her as part of one; they labelled her as everything from a transhumanist to a eugenicist. The fools. Moira was the world's most accomplished geneticist purely because this fleeting human existence of hers had no meaning aside from what she gave it. Her life would be defined by how much she could discover, accomplish and affect with it.
As Moira waved her ID over the scanner and strode through the door into the ops room, she wondered what her feisty, fiercely idealistic younger self would think of her now. Working for Talon. Dedicating herself to an 'ideal', losing herself as part of an organisation. Acknowledging the limit of one human being's possible achievements.
"Took you long enough."
The mask turned to her. Gabriel's voice was an inhuman growl; with every passing day he resembled the angel of death he had become more than the man he'd once been.
Rooms that Gabriel occupied always had a certain stench clinging to them. 'Stench' was perhaps a strong word, but to Moira it was pervasive enough—and obvious enough—to warrant it. There was a slight staleness to the air around him, as if he made the space around him constantly decay and remake itself just as he did.
"Spare me the commentary." Moira shut the door sharply behind her and made her way to a chair beside Gabriel's. No one else liked to sit beside him; Moira knew she wasn't the only one who could smell it. To others, it probably smelled like something ominous. Like carrion, or death. To Moira, it simply reminded her of a wonderful success, a trial with excellent results.
"You left your comm back in your room." Sombra blew a bubble of gum large enough to reach her nose. "Just letting you know."
Moira sighed, sitting. "Is there anything important you can actually tell me? For example, the current status of the mission? Or where the nearest source of tea and coffee is?"
Sombra smirked, swivelling her chair back and forth by pushing against the table with her feet. "Doomfist hasn't actually made contact with Hanzo Shimada yet, so you're not technically late. As for the coffee thing…" Sombra swung around, kicking off from the table. "Hey you, amiga, get the good doctor some tea or coffee. Whatever has the most caffeine."
The mousy secretary practically leapt to do Sombra's bidding, scuttling from the room like some kind of terrified crab. One of the hires from front businesses; Moira wondered if the girl had known what she was getting into when she signed off to one of the many decently successful, innocuous companies Talon had its claws in.
Sombra straightened with a sudden snap. "Oy, wait!"
The secretary froze at the door.
Sombra turned to Gabriel. "You want something to drink, mister smokey?"
Gabriel didn't dignify the hacker with an answer. He made an impatient huff of a sound that seemed to echo through his own body. It wasn't a true echo. The sounds just seemed hollow, as if the cells making them were dying midway through doing so.
Sombra swivelled her office chair over to face Moira, flapping her hand at the secretary to continue on her way. She wore the sort of grin Moira might have termed 'shit-eating' if she were in a crass mood. "You bought the files on unexplained cases, yeah? Can I peek?"
Moira rested her fingers on the file. With a flick of her wrist, she sent it streaking across the table and into the hacker's eager waiting arms.
"Gracias! This should keep me going through the boring bits." Sombra gave Moira a wink before the hacker delved into the papers.
The woman was such an information junkie. Moira huffed with laughter back before turning to the screen which broadcast a view from Doomfist's implants.
Hanzo Shimada. An unexplained case, along with his brother Genji. They stemmed from a family long rumoured to have strange powers, but only recently had their abilities become common knowledge. Defying all attempts at explanation, the brothers could summon spectral dragons.
"Hey, you worked with the brother, didn't you? Gen-jo, whatever."
Moira glanced over at Sombra. The hacker wasn't looking up, inflating another pink bubble until it popped.
"Genji. Yes."
"Why didn't you, you know, study him?"
Moira turned away from her, back to the screen feed. "My tenure in Blackwatch had not been long enough. The experimental program I carried out with Gabriel took so much time; I never got a chance."
Gabriel made his customary growling sound of acknowledgement. It was obvious that it had been carefully constructed in such a way as to establish that he was too cool to care, while still ensuring he came off as intimidating.
Moira leant back in her chair, allowing her amusement to draw a wry smile over her expression. She watched the feed with idle interest. "The closest I ever got to studying Genji Shimada was viewing those ridiculous documentaries they made on him in his playboy days. He used that miraculous capacity as little more than a party trick, and the so-called 'scientists' who worked on the research behind the documentary uncovered absolutely nothing of note."
"Ooh, someone's still salty they didn't get a go." Sombra waggled her eyebrows, her gaze briefly meeting Moira's.
Moira shrugged. "If all goes accordingly, I'll get my wish with the brother."
The feed almost gave Moira vertigo from watching it. Doomfist liked his entrances; he'd taken a helicopter ride to the top of one Talon-owned high-rise in Tokyo, before using the momentum from his punch to leap to the roof of another. The city at night was a light show of all colours; Doomfist would be difficult to spot so high up against a pitch-black sky with the lights to distract from him. He continued his high speed, high altitude leaping and jumping before he finally landed on the roof of the Shimada business offices. The building itself was so tall that Tokyo was briefly reduced to a brilliant, distant collection of twinkles and glints.
Doomfist lined himself up in front of the roof door. Without hesitation, he slammed his fist down on the lock. "I am in. Sombra; guide me to the head office."
"Certainly." Sombra leaned forward, picking the gum out of her mouth with one fingernail. She used her strange cybernetic nails on the other hand to bring up the building plan. "You want three floors down. You're in the stairwell; just follow it down for three."
Gabriel crossed his arms. "The great Doomfist, running down three flights of concrete stairs that can barely fit his massive gauntlet."
"I heard that, Reaper."
The clack of a saucer sent a jolt through Moira's brain; she hadn't even realised her eyelids were drooping. The sharp scent of coffee breathed life into her body. She refocused her attention, forcing her gaze at the screen.
When Doomfist came to the landing, Sombra made a sharp gesture with her fingertips. The blueprints came up in 3D plan view. "His office is the furthest to the left, right at the end of the hall. I have the camera feed up; go straight down on my signal. When you do, I'll cut the feeds."
"What distraction did you organise to clear the halls?" Moira asked, taking a sip. The hot liquid burned a holy cleansing fire down her throat—it was all Moira could do not to sigh in bliss.
Sombra smirked. "Office birthday party."
Moira choked midway through swallowing.
"... What? " Gabriel growled.
"I said there'd be cake!" Sombra protested. Her grin was manic. "The best part is no one will get the reference."
"What reference?" Moira raised an eyebrow.
"The cake is a lie," Sombra proffered. "It's from an ancient video game. It's a classic. Absolute masterpiece. You know… I should get you to play it. I think you'd like the main villain a lot—"
"Can we please remain on task, here?" Doomfist's voice was utterly even.
"Sure, sure." Sombra shrugged. "Just checking the cameras… No civilians left on the floor. Target is still on the street, being escorted to the building. Two security men outside the target's office; they have line of sight down the whole corridor, so they'll see you the instant you step out the door."
Doomfist paused. "Widowmaker. Update me."
The voice sent a rush of chills down Moira's spine.
"I am in position."
For a moment, the scientist wanted to protest. Her pet project couldn't be out there in the field, in active duty, she was a fragile, invaluable specimen—
The same feeling every time. Moira sighed, settling back in her seat. Widowmaker had been created to be a soldier. Moira was supposed to be happy that her precious experimental trial was performing her function so skilfully.
"Good." Doomfist settled into a stance, clenching his gauntlet "Sombra. Cut the cameras on this floor." .
Sombra hummed an aggressively bright tune, poking at her holographic playground. "And… Floor's all yours."
Doomfist was different to Gabriel in that he didn't immediately cause alarm. He opened the door slowly, not giving the enemies immediate visual or reason to be alarmed.
However, like Gabriel, it really didn't take long for him to go loud.
He darted into the corridor so quickly that the feed was briefly a blur. He followed that up with a leap that took him almost the full length of the corridor. He'd run to and punched out one of the security guards before Moira had even adjusted to his sudden speed. The second followed in short order.
"Dios mío, did you kill them?" Sombra wasn't even looking at the feed, studying her plans instead. "The earpieces are still on them. Crush them, make sure your conversation can't be bugged even by accident. Setsuna Shimada will probably have one on her too, so make sure you get rid of that as well."
Doomfist followed her instruction without complaint, picking the earpieces up and placing them in his comically-oversized gauntlet by comparison. He tucked the crushed pieces into one of the security guard's jackets.
"Sombra. The door."
Gabriel and Sombra shared a look. Sombra cackled with laughter. A flourish of her fingertips, and the swipe key on the door lit up green. "Not this time, mister smokey."
Doomfist grabbed one security guard in each hand, dragging them in. He flung them with a stark disregard against the side of the room, turning away so quickly that Moira didn't even have a chance to see their newly crumpled frames.
Setsuna Shimada barely had time to grab her weapon from its stand on her desk. Her sword was ripped from her hands by Doomfist's gauntlet and driven with vicious abandon into her gut.
The woman screamed in unintelligible Japanese. Blood spurted from her lips, streaming down her chin.
"You got my suit dirty. That is quite unfortunate; I had hoped to be at least somewhat presentable for my meeting." With his free hand, he brushed a speck of the stuff from his gauntlet.
Moira had seen death. Moira had caused death. But her killings were clean, leaving desiccated husks behind. Not a drop of blood in sight.
This was the opposite of clean.
Doomfist shoved. Hanzo Shimada's cousin slid down her own sword and dropped to the floor.
Doomfist ended her suffering with one brutal shove, spearing the sword into her throat.
Moira sipped her coffee with pursed lips as she watched Doomfist pluck the earpiece from the woman and crush it. The camera tracked him as he snapped the door shut. "Sombra, update me on the target's location and ETA."
Sombra flicked through camera feeds with all the care and physical flourish of someone scrolling through their commlink feed. Her nonchalant demeanour didn't appear at all affected by the bloodshed. She flicked one away before pouncing on it suddenly with one clawed finger, dragging it back with a chuckle. "Found you… Okay. He's entering the lift now. T-minus two minutes, whatever. Something like that."
Doomfist made himself welcome in Shimada's lavish office space. He examined every inch of it, from the floor-to-ceiling windows, the rich carpet, the book cases flush against the wall, the intricate antique weapons hanging on the wall. A bow, a single arrow, strange Japanese weapons from eras Moira couldn't even name. For good measure, Doomfist took the old bow from the wall and snapped it with the barest hint of effort.
Doomfist finished his inspection with a low hum of approval. He sat in the lavish blood-flicked office chair that Setsuna had sat in minutes before. Moira could imagine being there, seeing him; he sat with the sprawl of a dangerous big cat, relaxed and unassuming despite the obvious danger reeling off him. He leaned on the polished cherrywood desk, gauntlet fingers laced with those of his still-flesh hand.
"Araña, he's only got one in the elevator with him," Sombra chattered to Widowmaker. "The two Doomfist punched out were probably gonna be it. Our target's gonna make your job easier by trying to keep away from his little shadow, so you should have a comfortable distance between him and our target to make the shot."
Widowmaker's response was swift and simple. "Acknowledged."
They fell into a collective silence.
Ready and waiting.
The door opened. The archer entered, followed by the guard.
The archer froze.
"Greetings, Mr Shimada."
The security guard was halfway to whipping out his pistol before the glass window splintered apart. His body was floored as Widowmaker's bullet found its mark. The death appeared messy, but in a way it was neater. Unnecessary on the surface, but it was a useful precaution. It was practical in case the guard got in the way of a potential attack on Doomfist's part—and it also sent a message. A show of confidence. Control over the situation.
Hanzo Shimada was just a shadow of a man.
The grim archer's face was eternally morose. His expression hadn't changed. He had barely even twitched. By all appearances, none of what had just happened affected him at all.
The leader of Talon rose from his seat. Moira caught the edges of the gesture as Doomfist flicked blood and glass from his shoulder. "I am sure you know who I am. I am Akande Ogundimu, also known as Doomfist, leader of Talon. I have a proposal for you."
Moira found herself leaning forward. Her heart pounded against her ribcage, her lips dry with anticipation. Her laced fingers were slicked with nervous sweat, one hand warm and thrumming with the other chillingly numb against it. One word, and the possibilities opened up like a flock of birds spreading their wings and taking flight. One word of agreement and Moira would have an unexplained case, a man who could summon dragons, to investigate.
The archer was utterly still. Tension roiled off him, but he gave nothing away. No hint of movement or even emotion.
"I apologise for ruining your meeting with your family. You may have believed you actually had a hope of reconciliation." Doomfist's massive gauntlet gestured to the archer's former cousin, now corpse. "Our information, however, indicates that it was simply an elaborate trap to arrange your murder. We have the correspondence and network access to prove it."
Sombra grinned, twirling purple-tipped hair around her finger.
Finally, Hanzo Shimada spoke.
"What do you want?"
It was barely a question. The man spoke flatly. He gave nothing away except his own sense of conviction, his firm drive to betray nothing about himself.
Doomfist's tone was too straightforward for the words that came out next.
"Join Talon."
There was silence over the comms for so long that Sombra actually glanced to check they were still working.
"...I merit a personal visit from the leader of Talon himself, then." Hanzo shook his head. His voice was deeper than his brother's. There was a similar thread through them both; their voices held a rich, dark amusement which seemed to lament the ridiculousness of life around them in spite of their words. "I am not foolish enough to ignore why. You set up this detailed operation and committed at least two murders because you knew I would need the extra 'encouragement'."
Moira straightened. She was too aware of her heartbeat. Where was he going with this?
The man shifted slightly—not suddenly or in preparation to attack. The tautness simply drained out, leaving his shoulders drooping with faint resignation. "As even further 'encouragement', doubtless if I refuse these deaths will be smeared onto my name." Hanzo gazed past Doomfist, a slight mist over his expression—but Setsuna didn't hold his attention long. "You would not go to these lengths without a reason. You know as I do that I would have little to gain from such an arrangement."
"You speak too quickly. " Doomfist's voice was smooth and measured. It did nothing to allay Moira's anxieties. Moira felt her nails bite into her own palms as the Talon leader continued. "Talon would greatly appreciate the skills of one such as yourself. That would not go without reward. In return, we could restore your family's empire."
"But at what cost?" The archer's voice was dark. There was a hint of bitterness; the first hint of anything aside from the composed mask.
"Simply the cost of aiding us in our own goals." Doomfist's reply didn't miss a beat. "I am sure that we see eye to eye on much—"
"No." Hanzo's gaze settled beyond Doomfist again, on the blood that had been spilled on his behalf. "I will find my own path."
...No.
He couldn't say no.
Not after all this.
Moira stood, staring at the screen.
"Not even gonna mention the healthcare benefits?" Sombra muttered. "Vacation days? Retirement plan? Severance package? Just leaving it all down to the dramatic stuff? Sure, sure…"
Doomfist stepped forward. His physique and sheer presence was more than enough to intimidate any sane beholder. "You disappoint me, Hanzo. With Talon, you could truly fulfill your destiny."
The mask snapped completely. Hanzo glared, his eyes narrowed and spitting fire. "Find another errand boy, Akande."
The anger was visible just from the camera. The shift in its location, the quiet growl. Doomfist's gauntlet clenched. "One more chance."
Hanzo turned to his side, ignoring the raging beast which was about to be unleashed on him. From the wall mountings, he plucked an antique intricate arrow. He studied it with the composure and poise of someone who knew, with impossible confidence, that he wasn't about to die.
Doomfist held out his human hand, if you could call it 'human'—cybernetic augmentations glinted in the office's fluorescent lighting. "Think of everything you could accomplish. The heights you could reach. The greatness you could—"
Hanzo chuckled.
He… Chuckled.
"And I would have yet to achieve the one thing I truly desire." Hanzo turned back to Doomfist. The archer wasn't smiling.
Doomfist drew back his gauntlet.
The dragon roared.
"Ryū ga waga teki wo kurau!"
Light burst from the archer's left arm, so bright and alien the camera couldn't properly capture it. With an arcing throw, Hanzo sent the arrow darting through the air. The arrow would not have hurt Doomfist. It wouldn't even leave a scratch.
An inhuman, unnatural sound rumbled through the audio until it became a crackled, garbled mess. Briefly, the shape of it could be seen—before the camera feed disappeared into white.
Spectral dragons.
The camera feed became an utter blur as Doomfist threw himself to the side. The sheer presence of the dragons seemed to make everything shudder. The feed cracked, parts of it reduced to static, the audio was a mess. Sombra leapt to her feet. Gabriel started forward.
Moira simply stared.
The sound came back in the midst of Doomfist bellowing in anger. The twin dragons were like blue coils of shaped lightning, sparking and glowing with unbelievable energy as they carved a path through the air. Doomfist had to avert his gaze as they went pure white with sheer energy—Moira had to tear her eyes away from the camera feed, blinking out temporary blindness. Like she'd just stared at burning magnesium. Or the sun itself.
Beneath it, Doomfist roared.
Hanzo was gone. The office was in tatters. The glass was shattered from Widowmaker's shot.
And as the camera jerked and shifted, they could see it. Doomfist curled over his leg, roaring in agony, holding his left arm out and cradling it to his chest. His unholy matrimony of flesh and machinery. Something bloody, raw, and black like charcoal was left in its place.
"Dios mío ," Sombra breathed. "What did it do to him…?"
Gabriel's growl was one of pure rage. "I thought he could only do that when he shot an arrow! How the fuck could he do it by throwing one?! I'll end that fucking—"
Moira couldn't process his voice anymore. The scraping growl couldn't register on her senses; it was too much, when her mind was already overwhelmed.
The experiments and trials she'd spent hours, days devising. The theories she'd spawned and noted down. The possibilities she could have explored. The augmentations she could have made, the secrets of human existence she could have mined and plundered—!
The sound of a mug smashing burst against Moira's ears. It shocked her out of her own head, forcing her to blink the fog out of her eyes.
The screen was a blur as it followed Doomfist's egress. The audio feed was nothing but the chaotic mess of a dropship's white noise. Moira's right arm was shaking. Her fist was clenched so tightly she briefly worried her own nails would pierce her skin. The bitter snarl of coffee-smell stung Moira's nostrils, but beneath it there was another. A different brand of decay-stink from Gabriel's stained the room now; her own. The results of her own self-experimentation curled and snapped around her right hand like an angry beast, snapping at the bars of its cage and yowling to be unleashed.
She glanced down. Coffee dripped from the cup's remains, oozing over the edge of the table to drip down and form a puddle on the floor beside Moira's feet.
"Moira?" Gabriel's voice scraped against her ears. "What was that?"
"All the theorising." Moira barely felt the speech against her lips. She barely felt herself breathing. "All the research. All the notes I had on them. All the possibilities. Gone because you couldn't stop him from throwing an arrow."
"It's not like we knew he could do it," Sombra offered. "And he's still alive. There's still a chance we can take him—"
"No there isn't!"
Sombra recoiled, stumbling back. Her chest rose and fell like a frightened rabbit's, eyes wide.
Moira felt her jaw clench, her teeth grind against each other. "What do you think I've been doing the past weeks and months?! Research! On them! That man is a death seeker—do you think you could devise a reconditioning program which wouldn't lead to him committing suicide?! Hm? Hm?! "
Sombra's mouth opened, closed—
"No! No, you couldn't! Any such program devised relies on the simple human will to live as a failsafe. That shadow of a man has none! And if I cannot devise a single potentially viable scenario, then Lord knows that no one else—"
"Moira."
A hand reeking of necrosis grabbed Moira by the shoulder. A breath in and Gabriel's festering body would become fumes that she would inhale.
"You're making your own clothes decay."
Moira glanced down. Her brow furrowed. It took a moment to sink in before she cursed. The sleeve of her lab coat greyed and frayed, thin wisps of threads curling into next to nothing. The barest scraps which remained fell to the floor. Moira shook her hand out, forcing her fingers to splay apart. As her muscles relaxed, the necrotic wisps of purplish light faded with it. Her precise control over the beam was still too limited when she didn't have her suit on. It was such an intriguing problem, but it gnawed at her that she'd yet to find a solution.
She inhaled the death-stained air, then exhaled.
Silence hung in the room, pierced occasionally by the hollow sound of Moira's own breath.
"...I apologise for my outburst."
Gabriel shifted. His hand drew away from Moira's shoulder.
She gave him a curt nod in response. "I must return to my quarters. Inform me the instant Doomfist and Widowmaker return." Moira turned her gaze onto Sombra. "My file."
The hacker grinned, brandishing the pages with a wink. "My lady."
Moira plucked the file from her grasp with a single harsh tug. As she turned away, Moira let Sombra believe she hadn't noticed the trembling.
Moira's strides were long and carried her quickly back to the elevator, back to her office and quarters. Thank the Lord she hadn't drunk the whiskey earlier.
Now was a very good time for a drink.
A/N: This work was typo-checked by SilverWolfPup.