"Genji..."
"Hai..."
"McCree..."
"I hear ya."
Gabriel Reyes was crouched behind the blown out wall of what used to be a two-story apartment complex. The large chunks of rubble made for adequate cover and he was quite thankful that some of the roof was still intact. Judging by the dark clouds that overcast the sky, they were due with a bit of rain.
Adjusting the focus of his specialized binoculars, he scanned the horizon line for their target, "ETA was three minutes ago, either of you have eyes on the transport?"
The silence over the intercom was brief, the stoically metallic voice the man knew to belong to Genji was the first once again to answer.
"Negative."
"You'd think a buncha tin cans would know how to stay on a schedule "McCree's Southern drawl followed, cutting out a second later.
"Jesse?"
This time the momentary silence hung in the air as if the whole world took and held a single breath.
"We've got incoming, due south!" There was a hint of excitement in the other man's tone, "Looks like that intel was right on the money, huh Commander?"
"Alright, alright, cut the chatter and move in " Gabriel just shook his head, a slightly amused smile tugging at the corner of his dark mustache. Shifting and hopping down from his hiding perch, the aged soldier made his way in the direction that would put him in the path of the transport ship.
One of their own had been in the city of Oasis when the Omnics staged a rather short-lived siege on the technological wonder. While the city itself had sustained some damage, it was the surrounding area that had received the worst of it.
Having someone on the inside turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Humans were, for the most part, allowed to live their lives. If one could even call it that anymore. Perhaps allowed to survive was a better way to describe it. The ruling bodies, the Ministers, had for all intense and purposes, become recluse. Leaving most of the control in the hands of the Omnics. They were told a transport would be leaving the city and that anything being shipped out of Oasis had to be worth getting their hands on. If it meant being able to take their world back, Gabriel and his comrades didn't question it.
It didn't take long for Commander Reyes to locate the transport. It wasn't a very large ship, which in its own way was a good thing. If they were able to get their hands on an Omnic approved craft, it would make raids just a little easier. However, in this way of life, there was almost always a however, fate had other plans. Those plans came on the tail end of gunfire and their target's cockpit suddenly exploding. Slamming into the ground and skidding a good fifty feet before coming to a smoldering stop, the three men were for the moment, at a loss as to what to do now.
"What the hell happened?" Gabriel turned to see his two comrades standing nearby
"Don't know sir, there were light ground forces but Genji and I took care of them."
"They may have known we were coming and placed explosives on board," Genji's words were as calm as usual, and what he suggested was logical, "we should go."
Jesse McCree seemed to think otherwise, perhaps it was just old habits he was falling back on but he couldn't help but feel a bit curious as to what would make the Omnic's destroy one of their own ships. Perhaps there was something worth destroying on board, something worth stealing. Before he could chime in though, Gabriel gave the order he'd been hoping for.
"No, there could still be valuable information on that ship," he then started walking towards the wreckage, "or technology, remember why we came on this mission."
The disapproving noise that came from the cyborg ninja spoke volumes, but sheathing his sword, he followed none the less.
The ship was still smoldering by the time they reached it, lying at the end of a long trail of twisted metal and plexiglass. The ship itself was on its side, a slightly gaping hole torn into its underbelly with the hints of smoke leaking from it. There really wasn't much hope in salvaging the ship itself, but maybe there were parts they could use. The inside was about as bad as one could expect. There were large crates tipped over, some even appeared to be smoldering as well. Had they caught fire from the explosion? Or had they malfunctioned?
"What do you reckin' these are?" McCree studied one that didn't appear to be functioning, he tapped on the smooth surface looking for some kind of control panel to open it. Meanwhile, the other two were busy checking the rest of the ship.
"Hm, well I guess I'll just have to get creative." scanning the floor, Jesse found a broken pipe, probably from the cooling system...he really didn't know or care. Pipe in hand, he took a swing and nearly rattled his arm clean out of its socket. Whatever these things were made of, clearly hitting it wasn't the way to get inside.
The sound of the cowboy cursing could be heard by both Gabriel and Genji, they both just stared before shaking their heads. He was fine, whatever he was doing he could handle it while they went about their business. Which happened to be trying to locate the ships backup systems. It was fairly common in case of emergency or possible hijacking to have more than one hub where someone could gain access to the ships' computers. In this particular model, it was usually near the storage hull.
Smoke from the fire was thicker here and was spreading a bit faster than any of the men would have liked. So they had to be fast if they wanted to find whatever it was that made this ship so important.
"I think I found it." Genji motioned to what looked like a door no bigger than a kitchen cupboard.
"Nice work, now let's see what those Omnics were carrying." Gabriel pressed his hand against the pressurized panel, the click of it unlocking and revealing a small touchscreen and a finely organized series of wires.
Back in the storage hull, McCree found himself in a frustrating predicament. He still hadn't managed to open the crate. Hitting it with a pipe didn't work, kicking it, punching it, hell even shooting it didn't seem to work either. Whatever they were, they were clearly built to withstand brute force. So maybe he had to think more delicate like.
"Hm," he placed his hand flat against the smooth surface, it felt kind of silly but all of a sudden a holo-display appeared, "Bingo," that moment of triumph was only temporary, "Gods..." Jesse McCree had seen a good many things in his life, most of them pretty messed up. But as the holo-display appeared, it allowed him to see exactly what was in the crates.
An inferno, whatever was inside was very much ash. Nothing could get in, nothing could get out. The question of why those others were smoldering now made sense. They were already burnt out. Rushing over to one of the burnt out crates, he found that it was partly cracked open. It made sense now that he put all the pieces together. Now Jesse wasn't stupid, but when it came to all this crazy technology he really didn't see a need to try and understand it. He was old fashioned that way.
Gripping the edge, he pulled the crate open and jumped back, quickly blocking his mouth and nose with his arm, "Ah hell! Boss, you better get over here and see this!"
The other two were both staring at the screen, almost identical looks of realization and a hint of horror.
"Genji, I need you to download everything you can from here, I'm going to go see what Jesse found." Gabriel backed away to allow the other to get to work, there was a cold, hard stone in the pit of his stomach that told him he already knew what the cowboy had found.
Sure enough, when he found the other man standing next to one of the now open crates, his fears had been validated. They weren't crates, they were cryo-pods. Inside were people, or what was left of people. Judging by what was here, there were at least five...no, six.
"You don't think...they felt anything," McCree mumbled, "do you?"
"Check the others, there could be survivors." they both knew the likelihood of that was next to zero, and time really wasn't on their side. But they couldn't exactly leave before Genji finished his task.
They were no strangers to grim work, but what probably disturbed them the most was simply not knowing who these people were and why they were in this state. It's not as if they could identify them.
"Last one boss, come on this one is no different, they're all dead." McCree scowled as Genji emerged. He didn't seem visibly phased by the sight of the charred remains.
"We should go, more will surely come if they know this ship has gone down."
Gabriel looked between his two companions as they turned to start to leave. He took a step to follow but turned and opened the last pod. There was a hiss, it was still pressurized? The sound forced the other two to stop and turn as a not burnt up body fell out.
A woman, ornately dressed with fiery orange hair and a rather gaunt face. Perhaps this pod had malfunctioned, after all, she didn't look alive at all. Had she starved? Suffocated? She didn't look to be in any kind of distress.
Crouching down, Gabriel checked for a pulse.
"She's alive, but only just," Genji and McCree looked at each other, they both appeared apprehensive, and almost sensing this, Reyes grabbed the woman by an arm and hoisted her onto his back, "if she survives, she'll be able to tell us why her and the others were in those pods."
They didn't look the slightest bit convinced, they both had a bad feeling about this. The Omnic's surely already knew something had happened and would be on their tail soon. Was it wrong to want to leave her behind when the odds of her surviving long enough to provide possible information? It was a gamble just assuming she knew anything at all. However, when Gabriel Reyes decided on something, there was no talking him out of it. A quirk that got him into just as much trouble as it did him any good.
The two-mile treck back to their ship was surprisingly uneventful. Save for their newest addition becoming rather sick all down their commander's shoulder, forcing them to stop for an hour. They couldn't move until she was, for the most part, stabilized again. It took them about twice as long to get back, but they got back none the less. One of their many base camps resided in the mountains, it aided in hiding them form Omnic scanners and the occasional ground units were easy enough to pick off. The only drawback being it was just as hard for them to get resources.
Upon their return, Genji went with their tech people to give them the data he had collected. In the meantime, both Gabriel and McCree went to the med tent. McCree to see if he'd injured his arm worse than he wanted to admit, and Gabriel to drop off the mystery woman. He hadn't been all that surprised to find that she wasn't exactly very heavy. She was clearly malnourished, which suggested that maybe her pod had stopped working just long enough to allow her to start to starve. She was also tall...unexpectedly so.
The medic they had on hand was a young man, his name was Baptiste. A charming person, always a smile on his face and a joke ready to be said. Though there are some, Gabriel included, who feel that he really isn't actually joking. Regardless, he knows his job and does it well.
"Well, this isn't what I was expecting," he said upon seeing his comrades, "who is this woman?"
"Dunno, found her in a cryo-pod, only survivor...maybe." McCree answered offhandedly, "Doc can you take a look at my arm, I think I wrenched it pretty good."
"No doubt doing something unnecessary," Baptiste clapped back, "Alright, alright, let me take a look." he then motioned for Gabriel to set their new guest on one of the cots set up in their makeshift infirmary.
Doing as instructed, he couldn't help but study her one last time. Her breathing was labored now, when before it barely registered. It was almost as if she was learning to do so all over again. He was only slightly familiar with the concept of cryo-sleep, he'd read about some scientist who was working on it before the Omnic Crisis. It made sense that a place like Oasis would have possibly perfected it. Or had they? To result in five people dying and one knocking at death's door, could they really claim it to be a success? There were a lot of questions now and even fewer answers.
"Tell me the moment she regains consciousness," Gabriel looked towards the medic as he was twisting a yowling cowboy's arm around, "make sure she's stable enough for questioning."
Not really saying anything, but giving the older man a simple nod, Baptiste carried on checking McCree's range of motion, "You are fine, nothing is broken," he grinned, "Why don't you go soak in the hot springs, it will ease the soreness. Plus you need a bath."
Given a more or less clean bill of health, McCree sauntered off mumbling under his breath.
"Now, what is your story miss."