Mission success. Broken, battered and bruised; but they are still alive unlike the unlucky many. Their fallen comrades will allow for the many others the grace of never having to experience the ache of their sacrifices. The life of a soldier, of a protector.
But when Fareeha's communicator buzzes in her still ringing ears, her heart drops. She's already given the higher ups a brief verbal report, an actual one to come when they reach headquarters. With no other reason, she knows this has to be something else.
Another, never enough.
Tariq and Saleh are strapped to their gurneys, safely stowed away in the belly of the medical transport. She glances at them once more, eyes lingering on their unconscious forms, before walking to the other end of the plane to take the call.
Calm to an untrained ear, but Fareeha has spent enough time working with the commander to know the sound of sweltering panic nipping at the heels of his words. Talon forces spotted 50 clicks south of her location, 3 transports; numbers unknown, motives unknown. Automated anti-aircraft defenses had been hacked and put offline, by the time the Egyptian fighters arrive the transports will have already reached the Heka International facility and still have plenty time to make their escape. .
Rampant A.I. in nearby cities have pulled away Helix's last two squads. Local police are dealing with the evacuation of civilians; not that they're trained for this sort of encounter anyways. Military en route but too far out.
Out of options, the commander is searching for solutions.
Fareeha should have blown the damned thing up.
Desperation; an ugly emotion that is the fire that burns under them, prompting both creative and foolish decisions. If it's Talon, then they have to be stopped no matter their motives, and if they seek to take control of Anubis…
She doesn't want to drag them into this, they've already served their time in hell and every wary soldier needs a moment of repose. But once more; out of options and out of time, Fareeha doesn't want to think about how much is at risk right now. If there is anyone qualified to save the day, it is Overwatch.
Not Overwatch, not anymore since the disbandment, but no one joins Overwatch without an already bleeding heart in their chest.
Lucio
Lena
Murcat
Friends.
Resources that should be used to their full potential. Nothing wasted, nothing left behind.
They're already in the city and already have the training of years in Overwatch with their own equipment and weapons. For now, they're the closest thing Fareeha has for reinforcements. An impromptu strike force, perhaps also the closest thing Fareeha will ever get to working with Overwatch. She will pretend, pretend to be as noble and courageous as them.
Talon threatens the lives of innocents and Fareeha will protect.
But who gets to determine innocence. There is no time for a jury and judge in the chaos of the battlefield.
They're all just doing their jobs.
"Alright what's the plan? Get in, kick some bloody arse and rescue Zandra, yeah? Yeah, sounds good to me, mate." Lena fidgets and paces, eyes burning with anger ever since Fareeha' briefing.
Their swift arrival left little time for Fareeha to formulate any sort of actual plan. The moment they came, the four of them had to duck into a doorway at the sound of jet engines above. Four against however many Talon had brought in three transports. Still no idea of a motive, no contact, nothing. It would seem that they will be flying in blind.
"Impossible " to most, "another day on the job" to Overwatch agents.
Lena is the only one who can easily fit and maneuver through the ventilation shafts Zandra's team of engineers had used to try reaching the controls rooms, and the only one light enough on her feet with the trump card of rewinding herself out of sticky situation; the best one fit for a little intel gathering.
Intel first, Zandra second.
Man or the mission. Fareeha needs to remind herself sometimes, and as much as she understands and as hypocritical as it is; she needs Lena to know. To promise that the mission will come first when so many lives are riding on them. If Talon has sent this many operatives in, they must have something big planned.
While Zandra may mean the world to Lena; there is just too much at stake.
The minutes tick by, the wait manifesting into deep aches in their shoulders and cold droplets of sweat that roll down the backs of their necks. They are forced to wait until they get something akin to a plan.
"They're planting bombs. " Lena's voice rings across their synced communicators, hushed with a slight metallic echo to it.
"How many and where?"
Dozens along the mainframe of Anubis, on the consoles in the control rooms Lena has passed, everything piece tech as far as she can tell. Is their plan to destroy the entire facility?
Why? It doesn't matter, not when it sounds like there is enough explosives to level the entire block.
They will be stopped.
Every moment Anubis is online, it is a threat to global security. Firewalls are bound to fail; an oversight, a snake, the slightest mistake. The gain is not worth the risk; it is a ticking time bomb, a prisoner waiting for the perfect moment to mount its escape at the expense of its captors and innocents caught in the crossfire.
They will be stopped.
Fareeha thinks fast, thinks brash with her feet in the shoes of her enemy. None of them are explosive experts, no, but if one cannot take away the flame or gasoline, perhaps they can take away the firewood. If they could render Anubis immune to their attacks, it may leave Talon scrambling for another plan and give them enough time until proper reinforcements arrive.
Zandra is the only one still alive who has the ability to reactivate the chronolock that would slip Anubis into it's own pocket of time; harmless and impervious to anything on this plane of existence.
And if anything, a last resort, dead Talon operatives can't push detonation buttons.
They hope it is not an automated bomb.
For now, it's as solid a plan as they can get.
Fareeha made a vow to protect the innocent, in this moment, that would be protecting Anubis to prevent the death of others. But is Anubis innocent?
Hardly
But it is her job, her duty, and if she lets Anubis fall then the deaths of half her squad would have been for naught. If it falls, then the deaths of Zandra's entire team, of every single soul caught in the crossfires and dead from their efforts of keeping it contained; all of them for nothing.
So she cannot let it fall, not after all of this. Fareeha protects the lives of innocents as well as their deaths.
So they fight through the pain and the fear of maybe this will be their last fight.
Until Fareeha, Murcat, and Lucio have fought their way over piles of bodies with Lucio's music helping them forget the bullets lodged in their flesh.
Until Lena has rescued Zandra from her vault and they've made it to a control room.
Until victory is in sight and there isn't a moment to spare but they manage to steal one anyways after clearing the chamber that Anubis overlooks.
"If this is the end-" Murcat gasps and gargles, a lung steadily filling with blood.
"It's not going to be." Lucio tries his best to sound so sure.
"But if it is,"
Fareeha feels as though she in intruding into something private but staying close is how they've survived for this long. She averts her eyes but cannot close her ears.
"Havā-tō dāram(I have your weather). Dead or alive, Lucio, I'll always be watching over you."
"And the same to you, Ardashir"
Jelously and relief; she cannot decide whether or not she wishes to feel the pain that the two do. Fareeha's ears perk through the sound enhancements of her helmet. Footsteps approaching, she turns sharply to the pair.
"Hostiles incoming!"
They hope it is the final wave, the final battle to defend their position until Zandra is able to reactivate the shields. It will be the final one, one way or another; they know they won't be able to survive anymore.
"We'll get through this." Lucio looks to Murcat, then to Fareeha
"Together."
Family; perhaps the closest Fareeha has ever felt to one.
"Together"
And they fight to the final moments with Fareeha hovering above, Murcat and Lucio digging their heels in. A deep vibration resonates throughout the massive chamber; a hum so intense that the firing pauses and all eyes shift to the blue haze quickly materializing over Anubis' surface.
The chronolock, Anubis has been secured.
Success.
The elation lasts for only a moment before the world rocks and tilts. Dust instantly fills the air and Fareeha's lungs, some heavy comes crashing into her back and she can feel her wings snap from the impact. All of it comes crashing down.
They must've detonated the bombs. There is so much ringing in her ears and throbbing in her head. Is she still alive?
Everything is reduced to rubble. Her face feels warm with the morning sun streaming in through the crumbling walls, her lungs sting with the acrid smell of ozone and burning electronics.
Move, she needs to move.
Chunks of cement roll off her body as she shifts and twists, desperately trying to retch her left arm from out the hole it's wedged into. Once her vision focuses, Fareeha nearly retches at the sight; her left arm lays pinned beneath a slab of concrete. It's little more than a crushed blue can with blood seeping out cracks in the metal. Her wrist rocket must have detonated upon impact.
A shadow falls over her, a moment of panic before she realizes it's the worried face of Murcat as he crouches over and tries to lift the rock from off her arm. Even together, it doesn't so much as budge. He is saying something; Fareeha can see his lips moving but there is no sound. She can feel warm blood trickling down the sides of her face.
Murcat's head jerks up as if in response to a call. Blurry figures peak from over the piles of rubble surrounding them. His hands go for the side arm strapped to his hip but before he even gets close his body locks up, jerking and twitching with the look of pure pain across his face.
Fareeha shouts, she can't even hear herself nor does she know what she is saying. Murcat's body collapses into a heap beside her, his eyes fluttering shut.
Too much pain to move, to much weight to lift, Fareeha can only watch as hands lift him up and carry him away. It's foolish, she knows, just desperate hope that maybe this is the Egyptian military, that maybe their saviors have arrived. She knows they're trigger happy in concerns with Overwatch, maybe they were just trying to protect her.
Hands go to work at pulling the debris off of her. Please, please, please.
An it's not; the horns of a "T" like fangs that sink into her heart, the coldness of dread spreading like venom through her veins. Somewhere in her barely conscious mind, she doesn't quite register who "Talon" is, all she can hear is the booming command that her mind gives to struggle against them.
But there is nowhere to retreat to, nothing she can do as the rest of her limbs are dug out but her arm still keeps her trapped. The gloved hands like the growing darkness around the edges of her vision that threaten to swallow her with every throb of her head.
A system check, the rack of rockets in her right shoulder is still operational.
Desperation; such an ugly emotion
Better dead than captured, better dead than whatever monster Talon is going to turn her into.
Mind, values, morals unaltered; only the whole story.
Monster
Fareeha protects, she will protect others from what she may become.
The world explodes with scorching heat once again.
A murky darkness, a cold that has no carrier ebbs in and out of her body but not through skin. It flows all around her, into her mouth and lungs bringing with it the taste of a stale breath but a breath nonetheless. Nerves tingle, wounds don't heal but they don't bleed either.
Fareeha's eyes snap open. Her body is swinging, encasing in some kind of sack. A body bag? Have they mistaken her for dead?
No, the bag is clear but the air in it is hazy with ink. An emblem above her head, the horns of a "T".
No, no, no!
There is no strength left in her to struggle, not that any part of her body responds to her panicked calls anyways. The scene of rubble passes by her eyes almost peacefully with no sound to be heard, nothing but the gentle swaying of her body as if in a hammock along the beach.
Better dead than captured.
She tried her best for the former.
Never enough.
Her eyelids grow heavy, all of her does; her chest, her heart, her soul weighed down with the grim acceptance of her situation. But Fareeha will fight, keep fighting until her heart stops beating and there are no more sacrifices she can make. She will survive whatever horrors they have planned for her and she will come out on the other side; the same guardian as she was before. Someone will come looking for her.
They bring her past the mainframe of Anubis; its massive form still standing tall enveloped in its own pocket of time.
Fareeha's Helix squad succeeded in their first mission of disabling it and then the four of them succeeded in defending it. Shouldn't it be pride in her chest and not this regret?
Why do the eyes of Anubis look down at her with such mirth and pity?
One should not defecate where they graze after all.
The first step is always the drafting of the foundation. To find out what they have to work with and against; the weak points, the points that they are to avoid and in this case, the morals that they want to play to. It's not entirely in her control, but it'd be a lie to say she doesn't heavily influence the regiment Talon will decide on.
Perhaps she will find herself another friend out of all this.
If you haven't figured this, it's a flashback to show the event that got Fareeha captured by talon.
A quick rundown now that I've straightened it, for those who care. This story is going to run parallel with At the Seams at these points. WARNING, major info drop and possible spoilers:
- This plot splits when it's Tracer's squad rather than Lucio's squad that gets called to the revolt. This leads to Lena getting her two fingers blow off instead of getting them blown off in England when confronting Murcat. This also leads to Lucio never getting his legs blown off and Murcat never getting captured by Beloved of Ma'at.
- Beloved of Ma'at become more aggressive in trying to capture someone from Overwatch since they weren't able to get Murcat or anyone from Lena's squad. At this time, Pharah in in the Egyptian military (not Helix) and what gets her caught in At the Seams is her commanders underestimate Beloved of Ma'at and only sends her squad in to foil on of their operations. This time in "Pity", since Beloved is so aggressive, commanders send multiple squads in and they deals with it properly w/o anyone getting captured.
- So Fareeha never needs to be rescued in the cellar, so she doesn't get close to Lena until later. Lena remains in Egypt with Zandra.
- Fareeha plays a huge part in actually taking down Ma'at and she retires from the service with honors, she actually has plans to return when Helix offers her a chance to try out their new battle suit: Raptora. Fareeha says yes cause it reminds her of birds.
- Zandra goes to the tech conference in Belarus where Ana gets sniped and Zandra's team of scientists are captured by Talon. They're still rescued but w/o Murcat in Talon's ranks, Zandra hold heavy disdain for Talon, and from that; Lenad Lucio and Murcat have heavier hatred towards Talon
- Helix Security works in tandem with Heka International, they beef up security and hire Fareeha on as full time guard. She likes it better than being told to run out and kill things, she would rather protect.
- Outside factors push Mondatta's speech to a later date, so Tracer doesn't confront Widow at that event. So her accelerator doesn't get fucked up and she doesn't go to Gibraltar to get it fixed.
- After disbandment, Lucio and Murcat get fucking married. They tour around world before returning to Egypt for Lena and Zandra's marriage when Anubis happens
- But back to Pharah, she becomes really good friends with Zandra and in suite Lena, Lucio, and Murcat. The original tension between Fareeha and Zandra spawned from Fareeha being interested in Lena and being a touch awkward in romance situations and Zandra being very protective, they just didn't get along very well. Without that in this timeline, the four of them often hang out together.
- So Anubis happens (what 'Anubis' means is the events that happen in Pharah's comic 'Mission Statement'), it plays out just like the comic and just like in "At the Seams" with Zandra getting stuck in the vault.
- But this time around, Talon comes in and thus forces Fareeha to do ditch effort and call in her Overwatch buddies in hopes of slowing talon down.
- of course they agree
- And thus sets up the stage for Lena to save Zandra from the vault, have them sneak and fight their way to a control room to reactivate the Chronolock that'll put Anubis into a bubble. At the same time, Pharah, Lucio, and Murcat are fighting ground level in that giant chamber with Anubis, trying to kill everyone they can so maybe they can brute force their way into stopping the bomb from going off. That and to draw attention away from Lena and Zandra.
- From there, Fareeha gets captured and taken in, Gabriel has had plenty of time to settle into his Reaper persona and into Talon, and thus "Pity" begins.
And that's how i bloody world build, Cheers mate
