Sides of the Same Coin
Even before getting her chronal accelerator, running and Lena Oxton were synonyms.
In secondary school, she flew like the wind down the track, winning first place ribbons and gold medals. Some had said she'd be a contender for the Olympics.
And maybe she would have, had the Slipstream incident not occurred.
But all of that was in the past, and only the chase mattered.
Eight years ago I'd already be gone, Lena chided herself as she ducked around a corner. Her breath came in heaves, nearly blocking out the buzzing of her chronal accelerator.
"Bloody Petras." Her scowl came to a stark contrast to her normally cheerful demeanor. The task force had come in just as she and the others had finished up.
Lena, or Tracer as she was called in the field, had served as the distraction. Jesse McCree and the others had made it out, but Lena was stranded with a chronal accelerator that needed time to recharge.
"Spread out and cover the area!" shouted a commanding voice. Exclamations of understanding followed suit.
"Bollocks," came Lena's muttered response. She looked around wildly for anywhere she could hide. Keep moving, L.
The same voice from moments before emitted on an intercom across King's Row. "Attention, Tracer. King's Row is on lockdown, you have nowhere to run. Come out, surrender and we'll do you no harm."
I'm sure every person they've ever rounded up can attest to that, Lena thought with scorn. Petras had never grabbed anyone big, but some of the Overwatch associates from the old days had been rounded up.
The agent flipped her pistols to her hands. She ducked into a nearby store that's tenders had long since been evacuated by Overwatch.
Why didn't Petras see the good they did? When an Omnic went rogue, it wasn't Petras who arrived first. No, it was Overwatch.
Lena hid behind the counter just as the door opened. A woman's voice softly interrupted the calm, "I think I saw her go in this building. I'm going in to investigate."
Lena peeked her head around the corner just enough not to be seen. The woman who had walked in didn't seem like the Petras type. Her red hair was in a messy ponytail like she'd slept in late and had places to be.
The woman's footsteps clacked against the ground as she quickly examined the interior. No doubt sooner or later she'd check behind the counter.
Plink!
Lena looked down at her chest. Her chronal accelerator was back up.
Shit.
The Brit rolled aside as the Petras agent dove over the counter. Their eyes met just as Lena blinked away.
As she fled, the brunette heard the redhead yapping into her earpiece. But by time the agent had alerted the rest to her location, Lena was gone.
Lena groaned as she flopped down on one of the tires Winston used to sit. The scientist tinkered with some sort of contraption at his table.
"How did the mission go?" he asked without looking up. It was a formality. As the unofficial head of Overwatch, he knew every detail about the missions the agents went on.
"Dandy, until those Petras pricks showed up." Lena sat up in the tire, looking absurdly uncomfortable. "Did the rest of them get out fine?"
"McCree evacuated everyone," Winston confirmed.
"Whew!" Lena leaned back again. "Bloody Petras ruining everything. First they dump us, now they're hunting us down?"
"People were scared," Winston frowned, glancing up from his work. "You were there. They needed an action from the government to show them that things were being done. Unfortunately, that came at our expense."
"The Petras Act, outlawing any and all Overwatch activity," growled Lena. "What a bollocks idea. We were actually doing things."
"I miss the old days too, Lena," Winston said with a somber smile. "But we have to keep moving forward."
Images from the old Overwatch passed over her mind. Jack Morrison shaking her hand as she accepted the Slipstream project. Gabriel Reyes' grin when she put on her chronal accelerator. McCree laughing with her after a long mission.
She missed it.
Winston rolled his eyes, "Lena, you're done for the rest of the day. Go out, have some fun. Make a friend or two."
"Aw, but why would I need friends when I have you, big guy?" Lena blinked to friend's side and gave him a hug.
He laughed, "I'm serious. Take the rest of the day off. Go enjoy yourself."
"Yes, sir!"
Dressed in a black hoodie to mask her accelerator, Lena found herself in a bar.
It was the bar that she and McCree regularly went to. The two of them made great drinking buddies, lonely and free of other responsibility.
So when the bar tender set a shot in front of Lena without a word from her lips, Lena pretended she didn't have the characteristics of an alcoholic.
She was just fond of socializing. Nothing illicit about that.
The barman's hand had barely left the glass when Lena snatched it up. With a clack, it hit the counter again, empty. Lena shuddered.
"Rough night?" A female voice accompanied the woman who sat down adjacent to her.
"You could say that," Lena said. She turned to her new companion.
She did the same.
Their eyes met.
"Ah, shit."
The redheaded Petras agent.
Emily's day of work had finally ended.
Getting her ass handed to her by higher-ups was not how she liked ending a day. Tracer had escaped, but that wasn't solely her fault. Emily could not chase a woman that fast and expect to catch her.
Thus her decision to take her mind off things.
She sat down at the stool, mentally drained. With a light chuckle, she asked the equally exhausted woman next to her, "Rough night?"
"You could say that." Her voice was a layer of cheerful over broken.
Emily turned toward her fellow drinker.
"Ah, shit," Tracer said.
Every head in the bar turned as Emily's target leapt from the barstool…and collided with the floor. But Tracer's speed was a thing to marvel, and she got up and ran as if nothing happened.
Fuck! Emily followed suit. She didn't fall, mind you, but she damn near hit a patron entering the bar.
Tracer had several meters on her. Emily couldn't claim to know what went through her quarry's mind, but she expected that staying hidden was a priority.
After all, she was a criminal.
"Excuse me!" shouted Emily as she charged through the people on the street. Men and woman jumped out of her way to avoid being run over.
Emily was on a mission. She'd show the bigwigs she could do her job.
Tracer slinked into an alley, evidently sure Emily hadn't seen her. Hand on her gun, Emily slowed next to the alley.
With a surge she sprung out, and pointed the gun up, "Freeze!"
The young woman flung her hands up, surprised. "Guess you got me, love."
"You got away from me before, but not this time," Emily growled. Her other hand grabbed the handcuffs from her belt.
"Love, I don't think we're at that stage in our friendship yet." Tracer raised her eyebrows at the cuffs.
What did she…? Emily flushed, jabbing forward with her gun. "Shut it. I don't have time for a criminal like you."
"Criminal? I'm a hero," Tracer snapped, her cheer gone. "We were heroes…or at least we tried to be."
"Didn't try hard enough, it seems," Emily smirked.
Gritting her teeth, Tracer took a step forward. "I didn't see you or the rest of Petras saving those people from that rogue omnic. What does that make you?"
Emily blinked. "That's not my job."
"No, your job is to shut down the only people trying to make the world a better place." Venom spat from Tracer's mouth. "Congrats, love." She clapped her hands. "You're doing a good job of it. Next time something happens, we might not be there because of you. And that's on your head."
"You're a criminal," Emily repeated.
Tracer laughed. "If saving lives makes me a criminal, then I'll break every bloody law in this country."
Emily had no response. She held her gun tightly, staving off the tremors in her arm.
"A friend of mine once told me to never accept the world for what it is. And that I should see it for what it could be. You Petras pricks have accepted that this is as good as the world can get. And I'm bloody well tired of it."
The Petras agent barely reacted as Tracer blinked away.
The bags weighed heavy beneath Emily's eyes as the light of her computer tried to vitalize her.
If saving lives makes me a criminal, then I'll break every bloody law in this country.
The words wouldn't leave her alone.
Her fingertips lingered at the keyboard, revising the draft of her report from the night before. The words were in her mind, but her body refused to communicate them.
Emily found her mouse drifting towards a news icon on her computer. With a click, her screen changed.
ROGUE OMNIC TERRORIZES KING'S ROW
For reasons unknown, at 14:22 yesterday a Bastion unit began to wreak havoc in the middle of King's Row. The portion of the street was rather crowded, and the attack caused a mass panic.
First on the scene were former Overwatch agents Tracer and McCree. The two vigilantes subdued and deactivated the omnic. As the evacuation effort began, Petras showed up and the two heroes fled.
"Overwatch saved us tonight. They're heroes, and they always have been. Maybe things got out of hand before, but they're the ones who are doing right now," an anonymous source tells us. "Petras could take a leaf from their book."
Is Overwatch making a comeback? Click here to see what our lead writer had to say about it.
Emily felt her eyelids droop further. She closed the news tab.
"I'll wrap up here. You get back to the base, love."
"Alright, Lena. You sure you can handle it without me?" McCree's voice chattered in her ear.
"Don't worry."
"If you say so, partner."
It had been McCree's idea to check on the people from the Bastion attack, just to make sure they were safe. Thankfully, casualties had been kept to a minimum.
People thanking her for saving their lives reminded her of the old days. A ghost of a smile appeared on her face. Good times.
It dissipated when she turned a corner.
The same damn redhead.
Lena had her pulse pistols in her hands. She wouldn't be caught unaware this time.
The Petras woman bent down and set her gun on the ground.
What?
"You have no right to trust me, but I hope this is a gesture of good faith." Her voice quavered, like she fully expected Lena to fire.
I'm not a monster. I'm not Talon.
The woman exhaled, relieved. "I want to meet up with you sometime, just to talk. I have my phone number right here." She held out a piece of paper.
The feeling of intrigue crept up her spine. Lena stepped forward, holstering one pistol while keeping the other up. She snatched the piece of paper, and spared it a brief glance.
"No promises…Emily." She had pretty handwriting.
The Petras agent opened her mouth, but Lena had already blinked away.
Against McCree's, Winston's and her own better judgement, Lena arranged a meeting.
Emily had instantly agreed, which only served to make Lena more wary.
But she was Tracer, Overwatch agent extraordinaire. And that meant having a backup plan. McCree would be deeper in the bar, keeping watch.
Not like he's very inconspicuous.
Emily already had a table in the back, away from most attention. She'd dressed casually, just like Lena did. Of course, the brunette did it out of necessity.
Lena sat down, taking the seat that gave her an eye on the door, and McCree. He had a seat at the end of the bar.
"I want to apologize."
Those were not the words she expected.
"Come again, love?"
Emily took a breath. "I'm sorry about it all. I did some research, and that made me go out and ask around. I heard what the people had to say about you. I was wrong. You're no criminal."
"Go on, you have my attention." Lena bent forward, watching Emily carefully.
"I heard about the child you saved from the Bastion unit."
Lena barely recalled the young boy she'd tackled out of the way as the Bastion fired. She couldn't stop moving at risk of the omnic taking its eyes off her.
"I tried my best," shrugged Lena.
"The kid's mother would not stop talking. You were her hero."
"And that changed your mind?"
"One voice shouldn't be able to sway anyone. But every person out there has only good things to say about Overwatch. It makes me wonder…if Petras was a hasty decision."
That got Lena's attention. "And that's what prompted this meeting."
"I wanted to make amends for being wrong."
"It takes guts to admit you're wrong." Lena bit her lip. "I don't want this to sound wrong, but I don't trust you."
"That's underst—"
"Yet."
"Yet?"
"Yet," repeated Lena. "I think there's some good you can do in the world. I believe everyone can help out in some way. I just need to get to know you better."
Emily had a wider smile on her face now. She visibly relaxed.
She was so easy to read, Lena had no idea how she made it in with Petras. The girl couldn't have lied if she wanted to.
"Let's start by ordering some drinks, yeah?"
"Sounds like a plan, Tracer."
"Call me Lena, love."
Author Notes: Not as excited by how this turned out compared to my other LenaEmily oneshot. But I'm still satisfied. If you enjoyed this in any way, please go take a look at my other fic All Your Faults, All Your Successes.