"… mmander? Commander Morrison?"
Life is fragile.
Jack Morrison - 'your whimsical, military-industrial complex tax dollars at work' - is decidedly less so.
"… yeah." He grunts, fingers curling against the floor. The visor's fine - Jack specifically specced out something that could withstand a bomb blast because hey, odds. How he hasn't gone deaf as well as blind is beyond him - and he tries not to question that too much, in case some divine bean counter realizes they've missed a step. His head aches - everything aches - but Jack doesn't think he's lost much time or snapped any bones - not even his nose. He's still got all his skin on. Maybe he's starting to get the hang of this 'being exploded' thing.
Break out the party hats.
"'m still here, Athena."
He's not supposed to be. He's supposed to be dead and - if Jack can't get that part right - he should at least know better than to strike up a friendly chat with the goddamn Overwatch support AI.
You are the worst. Whatever this thing is that you've made up, that you think you're doing? You're the worst at it.
"… request access to your current location."
Yeah, that's not happening. Once Athena's got it, she'll have him for good. Jack's amazed she doesn't know already, by all rights she should have pinpointed him the second he reached out.
"I have to go."
It's cruel to cut the call, he knows it's cruel, but Jack's got other problems at the moment and he never should have called her in the first place. Kicking six years of anonymity right off the cliff for nothing, and it doesn't matter how good his reasons were or how there wasn't another choice, it was so goddamn stupid…
The cloud of dust and smoke is practically opaque, but as Jack drags himself up his visor starts picking through it for the important information - the blast radius of the explosion, channeled up and fanned out. If they'd been any less lucky it would have just collapsed the ceiling on them, but somehow everything's held. The dam's still in one piece, and it'll need some serious repairs but it's solid enough for now. He doubts the men who wanted it down thought they'd need to keep anything in reserve for a second try.
Which leaves him with the only other important detail in this - the Vishkar architech who'd saved them both in the first place. It seems that the world's seen fit to give her the usual hero's reward and she's slumped in a heap by the far wall, not moving.
Jack's limping a bit, cursing with the first few steps, but something approximating normal by the time he reaches her side. All the readings say she's alive and going to stay that way - steady pulse and even breathing, no fractures or internal injuries. A nasty blow to the head - there's blood in her hair, and her headset's not as durable as his visor - it's been snapped nearly in two. No sign of her weapon, and her prosthetic arm has taken a beating of its own, though it's hard to tell just how bad the damage is. His visor doesn't have the schematics, only approximations of the construction and estimates on the energy readings.
If Jack had his way, he wouldn't move her, just leave her for her friends to collect, but it can't be too good breathing all the crap in the air, and he has one of those fun feelings that the first people to come back here aren't going to be Vishkar, or real happy now that their plan has failed.
Hey, let's place bets. the voice of his common sense says, all annoyed resignation as he lifts the unconscious agent, moving toward where the visor says the exit is. How long do you think it'll take the Bastion turrets to show up?
The last really good day is a surprise.
Jack wishes he'd known it was coming. He would have… something. Something to make it stay, just a few moments more. The saying's not true - even when you know what you've got, it's still gone. It always goes.
It's one of those flare ups that happens now and then in a post-Crisis world - the new normal. A civil war in a tiny country that seems to roll right from one conflict to the next, but this time someone's brought in a batch of tech way past their pay grade. Maybe Crisis-era - there are still caches that get uncovered after all these years, like a mine popping up in a long-plowed farmer's field. Or some enterprising weapons dealer's feeling particularly inspired - a brand new version of all the old, bad ideas.
In any case, these Omnics aren't any more interested in listening to orders than their predecessors were. A few rights groups have raised complaints over the years, Omnics wanting to try to talk sense to their robotic brethren before the bullets start flying - but there's no legal standing for it, and few people are interested in giving the Omnics a start on a piecemeal army, no matter how good their intentions might be.
These particular machines have already wandered well past the border of the fight they were meant to win and are making themselves at home in an entirely new country. Contained if not stopped, for the moment, inside what looks like a long-abandoned mining and manufacturing zone - massive buildings with half-broken windows and catwalks along towers leading to nowhere.
Ana's already there with a team but it isn't until Jack arrives that he sees that Reyes and McCree are on the scene, along with a few other Overwatch agents and a fair contingent from the local authorities. He's finally hit that age where they all look too damned young, even as heavily armed as they are. Jack figures this must be show-and-tell, a training exercise to give the up-and-comers a taste of what the Crisis was like. Never forget is pretty much pointless - they can't forget what they never knew, when the Crisis now seems mostly like a springboard to greater glories, the reconstruction so successful it erased most of the horror of how it had come to be.
It's good, if they never have to fight the way you did. It's only a good thing.
McCree's front and center at the moment, talking through the plan. He's come into his own as one of the best agents on either side of the line. Level-headed in ugly situations, careful and precise underneath all the swagger - even gentle, when he has the opportunity. The way that Gabe - the way that Gabe /used/ to be, his skill with weapons not half as critical as the easy way he had with people. McCree knows how to finesse a bad scene, how to make allies fast and keep them loyal - and he's an incorrigible flirt even with Mercy - especially with Mercy, because it's always more fun to make her laugh when she's trying not to.
If it wouldn't be more torture than praise, or blow his Blackwatch cover all to hell, Jack would gladly stand McCree up in front of the UN and the world and tell them - this is what we do, this is why it matters. Jesse McCree deserved so much more out of life than what he'd known to aim for, and the world had been equally improved for giving him the opportunity to learn.
"We can take care of the close quarters on this one, boss." McCree says even now, a font of perpetual confidence. "These Omnics move pretty fast, and there's no bein' sure what kind of tech they've got up there, an'-"
"Oh, wow." Gabe chuckles. It sounds real. "Are you hearing this shit, Amari? I do believe McCree's offering to look out for us old folk, so we don't get hurt."
"Fighting Omnics is dangerous." Ana agrees blandly, the smile sparkling in her eyes as McCree deflates, a sheepish hand on the back of his neck.
"Boss, that's not at all what ah was trying ta…"
"Well, look who they let off the leash." Gabriel says, as Jack steps across the gravel lot, gazing up at the buildings beyond. One good blast might send them all toppling down, and he'd rather not put any more men in there than they have to.
"Sitrep?"
Jack's not going to lie - it hurts to watch McCree's smile evaporate whenever he comes into view, the younger man immediately tense and shuttered. McCree may be everyone else's friend, but he's never warmed up to Jack. Still edgy and nervous, like Commander Morrison's just waiting to hurt him somehow, the moment he lets his guard down. Jack figures he must remind the kid of some unforgiving authority figure in his past - drill sergeant stepfather or dickhead gym coach.
"It's just the way it is, cabron. You've got one of those…" Gabe laughs, after yet another night with yet another bar fight Jack doesn't know how he got dragged into. It's not like they can really hurt him, but he hadn't spoken the language well enough to even understand why he was being hit. "What's that word, Reinhardt?"
"Backpfeifengesicht. A face for punching." Reinhard says, with an apologetic look in Jack's direction. "… and no, he doesn't."
Maybe Jack does. It would explain a few things. He might apologize to McCree, if he thought it would do any good - but then, the other agents have all straightened up too, more nervous than they'd been a few moments ago.
"We've, ah… got maybe twenty-five or so, sir." McCree says. "Scattered throughout the buildings, settin' up a defensive perimeter. Semi-automatic, basic targeting capabilities an' high maneuverability. As far as we know, they never engaged on their way here, so they're still plenty topped up on ammunition. Any other surprises, they ain't sharin'."
"Old military protocols on 3-D printed chassis." Gabriel says. "Cheap way to fuck up a battlefield."
Or a city. The local soldiers look very uneasy.
Jack studies the blueprints. "Individually autonomous?"
"Yessir."
Which eliminates the possibility of Athena shutting them all down remotely. It's worked for them before, once or twice, although it raises the specter of the Crisis a bit too obviously to make much noise about it. Jack's tried to downplay her existence from the moment she 'arrived' at Overwatch - the AI may be uniquely powerful but she's also painfully vulnerable, and Jack's not about to let anyone make her their new Omnic boogeyman.
"Mind if I join in?" Jack says, unslinging his rifle.
"You even remember how to use that thing?" Gabriel drawls.
"You weren't complaining last night." Jack says flatly, mostly just to see McCree and a few others blink in surprise, because everyone knows Strike Commander Jack Morrison (TM) doesn't do things like spit or swear or exchange rounds of tired homoerotic banter and dick jokes. He waits, because there's a good chance Gabriel is going to tell him not to bother, that he doesn't need to be here and-
"… tu madre." Reyes mutters, and that's it, they're off. Ana quickly sets up the best choke points for whatever might get past them, although if Jack has anything to say about it McCree and his team are in for nothing worse than a very boring afternoon.
"Athena." Jack says, flicking his eyepiece. "Set up a camera feed for McCree's team on my view. Just in case we get in trouble."
That makes Gabriel snort - and the only thing left is a moment's glance in Jack's direction when they hit the door. The question of who's going to take the lead - until Jack steps back without comment. If they're going to show the young pups how it's done, it might as well be when they were at their very best.
So Gabriel goes out first, with Jack a few steps behind and Ana already looking for where she'll be taking all the most impressive shots. The next five hours of his life pass by in what could be five minutes, and he feels more alive than he's been in years and it's all just perfect.
Simple and easy and perfect, a near-silent assault with Reyes barely having to twitch a finger for Jack to know where he's going to go and how best to get him there. Gabriel moving fast and sure while Jack flanks each target, distracting them for the crucial moment - the two of them tag-teaming machine after machine while Ana's shots thwip by with immaculate precision - line 'em up, take 'em down.
It doesn't take more than dropping the first few to realize they're nothing special, Omnics for people who never fought real Omnics, never stepped into a core, and with no one to evacuate or other pressing urgency, there's nothing to do but enjoy it. Fighting alongside the two people who know him like no one else in the world knows him, all hunting like a pack of wolves against a more dangerous predator and Jack thinks there never really was anything more dangerous, was there? They stopped the Crisis, they neutralized the threat. Nothing in the world should have been able to stop them.
He wonders, later, if Gabe ever thought of taking him out then, just putting a few rounds in him where the cameras wouldn't see, or setting up an Omnic to do it for him. Why wait so long? Why bother with the show in Switzerland, when he'd had ample opportunity to gun down Jack on a mission or set it up to look like a suicide or any number of equally plausible ways of eliminating someone with a job as dangerous as his. Gabe was Blackwatch - it was literally his job to kill men like Jack and make it look like an accident.
Proving a point. Switzerland was proving a point.
Which makes no sense, but Jack hasn't run on pure reason for a long time. Instinct knows better, even if it doesn't know why.
The same way Jack's pretty sure the only thing waiting for him at the end of this is nothing he actually wants at all.
The Bastion turrets show up first. Two of them, just like he thought. A stroke of luck, that they're detached from their platforms or anything like AI control, welded onto the back of two heavily reinforced trucks instead. It looks intimidating, but they're heavy and unwieldy and hardly the most maneuverable pieces of equipment off-road. Good for an ambush, a direct assault on an unsuspecting enemy like they'd had against the guards, but even if he's lugging around the architech, Jack has a few thoughts on how to keep them at a distance.
The best hope is to escape without ever being seen, but Jack doubts they're going to get quite that lucky. The sound of engines revving carries through the trees, up to the little hidden niche in the hills that gives Jack a decent-enough perspective on everything immediately below, the visor running commentary on the occasional flicker of color in the green. Cars. Motorcycles. Men on foot - a small army out there, sweeping the area and pushing them away from the cities. The only thing in the other direction is untouched wilderness for at least a hundred miles. It helps that they don't know he's here - they think the agent's on her own. Jack's useless at the local dialect and the visor's not much better at cross-referencing most of the words, but 'find the woman' has repeated itself often enough to be understood.
If he asked, Athena might still have satellite coverage of the area, might even be able to give him a thermal sweep. Which, of course, is /exactly/ what Genji wants, for Jack to start talking to her again because she's so damned useful, because it's familiar. Doesn't feel so much like a lifetime ago, does it Strike Commander? Define irrevocable, pretend it's all lost and gone forever now that Overwatch is back and Athena's just waiting on his call.
Make plans and God laughs, right? Jack can take as many solemn vows he wants, keeps pretending he can hold to each in turn - be a hero, be a dead man, be a soldier - but it's all so much sand in the tide.
He thinks about it, what it would be like to go back, just to step through the door at Watchpoint Gibraltar and his fingertips go cold and numb and Jack can't breathe, he can't breathe…
The Vishkar agent lets out a soft groan, wincing as she slowly lifts herself up from the ground, where she'd been using his coat for what's not much of a pillow. Yes, she's the enemy, but she did save his life, even if Jack's pretty sure that was an unintended consequence. Whatever else might happen, concussions are the exact opposite of fun and he's not envying her for the rest of this trip.
"Try not to throw up on my jacket, if you can."
Maybe there's a non-threatening way to wake up being loomed over by a man in a full face mask carrying an assault rifle, but Jack doesn't know it. The best he can do is keep his guns holstered and all his expectations low.
Which is good, as the first thing she does is try to kneecap him with her damaged prosthetic.
"Ow."
Jack would warn her of the downside of sudden movements with a head injury, but she figures it out soon enough, the backward scramble away from him quickly devolving into graceless retching in the nearest bush.
"Easy." Jack holds her hair back because he can't think of a reason not to that isn't petty, but steps away the moment she recovers, glaring up at him - more suspicion and hostility than fear in her eyes, wincing as her hand reaches up to examine the wound. Jack can see the fingers on her robotic arm twitching slightly, obviously not the full range of motion she was hoping for and with none of that distinctive hard light flicker. Of course, she's probably lying, holding back and feigning helplessness. The visor takes note of the current output levels on her arm, set to ping an alarm if there's any change.
"You took a hard hit when the bomb went off." Jack pops the top off his water bottle, holding it out, and watches her tense up
"Just water." He takes a swig to prove it. "You can rinse your mouth out, at least." He holds it out again, and this time she cautiously accepts. She's sharp, even for an agent - she'd had the bomb marked and the solution ready in the time it would have taken most people to realize they might want to panic. It doesn't take her more than a glance to get her bearings - the trees, their position, the folded-up jacket a few inches from her hand.
"I know who you are. 'Soldier 76'." She says calmly. "An odd name for a terrorist."
He has a reputation already? Jack didn't think his little incursions onto Vishkar's territory had been all that interesting so far, but it seems they're just as legendarily anal-retentive as the rumors say. Jack wonders just how many interns they keep locked up in the basement, working to sift signal from the noise.
"It's meaningless to keep me." The agent says, her voice flat, disinterested - though the look in her eyes doesn't quite match. Indifferent stoicism in the face of an unavoidable fate, but Jack can see the fear there, the way her eyes keep flicking toward his gun. "I won't tell you anything, and Vishkar does not pay out for ransom demands."
"Good thing you're not a hostage, then." Jack says, casting his gaze back out to the valley below. The visor gives him a peripheral view as good as any head-on, watching her watch him.
"The timer was already… you tried to stop it." She frowns. "You're not on our side."
"God no, you're all assholes." Jack agrees. "But you stopped a whole bunch of other assholes from killing a few thousand people, so…"
By the way she's still frowning, he thinks that maybe she'd almost prefer the logical, bad ending over just shrugging and surviving. "That doesn't make any sense."
"Nope." Jack's a free agent now. He doesn't have to make sense, or explain himself to anyone, not even himself. He doesn't have to pretend this isn't stupid and entirely pointless - that he should have just left her behind. Vishkar would feel the loss of someone of her caliber, he's sure of that.
She isn't a good person, Jack. Protecting corporate assets doesn't make her a hero.
So he'll regret it tomorrow. Business as usual.
"Can you walk?"
Jack tries to keep a biotic emitter on him at all times because hey, odds. He'd cleaned out an Overwatch bunker years ago, a fresh batch of Mercy's top of the line as the best part of the haul, and they've kept him going so far. But using one of those now will take much more time than they have, and light up their position like a beacon to everyone and their well-armed cousin. Which is a problem, because it's obvious just getting to her feet is costing her most of her pride. The agent's limping badly, her leg threatening to buckle with every other step though she fiercely refuses to make a sound.
Lucky for them, Jack doesn't own a piece of equipment that's not set up to do at least double duty, and the harness for the rifle can be refitted to haul quite a few things in a pinch, including wounded comrades or wounded enemies.
"Right." He says, adjusting the straps. "It's not perfect, but it's what we've got." He can hear voices shouting to each other now, coming in their direction. "We need to move."
She frowns. "Where?"
He makes a vague gesture toward the nearest quiet patch of forest. "We try to get around them, make it back to civilization. Most likely, we'll have to punch through at a weak spot." Jack shrugs. "After that, I'm sure there's a safe place for your friends from Vishkar to come collect you, and you can all go back to making the world a little worse, one day at a time."
Which covers every part of the plan except the moment she's going to try to kill him, or at least incapacitate him for the rest of her team to deal with. The alarm he'd set is already pinging - maybe her omnic limb is self-repairing, or maybe she'd just reset some internal mechanism but it's gaining power by the moment. At least she's smart enough to leave betrayal for after the firefight. Probably.
She frowns, readying some argument about his plans or his dismissal of Vishkar, but she never gets the chance. Jack hears the familiar, soft whirr as three drones clear the treetops, one heading straight for them. He's surprised it took them this long. Jack raises his rifle, exhaling slow and easy as the world replaces itself with targeting reticules and simple solutions.
