Watchpoint Gibraltar, Iberian Peninsula, Europe
Adrian closed his door behind him as he walked out of his room, he'd managed to finish overcoming the tech barrier between his world and this one, as soon as he'd gotten back from the bar last night, he'd spent all night working tirelessly to finally finish it. Hopefully the data that could be taken from his pod's internal system could be useful in expediting his trip home, at this point he'd take whatever he could get. When he'd alerted Athena, she'd requested he go to Winston's lab immediately, the reason he knew without being told. There had been an almost morbid curiosity with his world when he told them that he has visual data to back up his reality, Winston in particular had been the most interested in what he could infer from the future. So he was going to upload his visual data for all to see, though presumably it would only be the tight-knit group of the higher officials, the same ones that knew he wasn't from this world in the first place. Walking down the crew quarters hallway, he saw the young girl Hana walking down the hallway.
"Hey old man, where ya headed?"
"Oh you know pip-squeak, around." She gave an exaggerated pout. "Fine, I finally finished making an adaptable technology to be able to cross between the tech from our two worlds. Winston wants me to show him the visual data from my world that my helmet recorded." Holding up his helmet in his hands to emphasize the point.
"Oooh interesting. Mind if I tag along? I've wanted to know what the future looks like."
He stopped walking, "Listen kid, my world…it's not in a good place. Whatever utopian idealization you have in your head, you can just throw that out the window, forget it completely. I think it'd be best if you go skip out on this, go talk with your friends, do your homework, whatever kids your age do these days."
"I told you, I'm not a kid! I'm in Overwatch to fight the baddies, I can handle whatever you think is so bad. Besides if I don't see it now, I'll just find some other way to watch it."
He sighed, he doubted the latter since it was all stored on his helmet, but he also didn't want to risk her rifling through his shit to sate her childish desires.
"All right fine, I warned you, but if Winston gets on my ass about this, your out." She nodded and they walked in silence towards Winston's lab. Along the way, Adrian spied one woman he'd seen on his first day here, he almost didn't recognize her without her blue power armor, but the distinctive tattoo over her right eye was a dead giveaway.
"Hey pip-squeak, who's that?"
"Fareeha? She's the security chief here, goes out into the field too when the mission's dangerous enough. Why? Did she catch your eye?" Hana teased.
"Nah, we uhh… didn't have the greatest introduction. I bashed her face, pushed her over some railing, knocked her out, and stole her weapon, haven't seen her since then and I haven't been able to try and smooth things over with her."
"Geez old man, you sure know how to introduce yourself to a lady. No wonder you seem so sad and lonely."
"No mercy huh, going straight at the heart? Though just for future reference, I tend to be popular with the woman in my world. I never let them leave disappointed." He winked with a grin.
"Eugh gross! TMI old man." She stuck out her tongue in disgust, he laughed as they walked into a conference room in Winston's lab. The ape sighed when he saw Hana with him but said nothing, it seemed he understood the same thing as Adrian, she'd just get it some other way if not now. Looking around he saw his prediction was true, there were only a handful of key individuals, McCree, Genji, Dr. Ziegler, Oxton, Fareeha, the crotchety dwarf, and an absolute behemoth of a man he hadn't met yet. Hana broke off from him and went to Dr. Ziegler, he saw them animatedly chatting about something he couldn't hear.
The ape waddled up to the front of the room, "I appreciate all of you coming, the reason is that our newest addition to Overwatch has been able to bring forth the visual recordings he mentioned previously. Hopefully with this, we can not only gleam a greater understand of the world Mr. Kasporov comes from, but also how to better integrate him into the team and more effectively utilize his talents." With nothing to be said, Adrian walked up to the front of the room and laid his helmet upon the desk, he attached a series of cables to the back of his helmet that fell from the ceiling. Brining up his TACPAD, he selected a series of videos starting with the earliest one he had, moving his way through the crowd he found a set next to Dr. Ziegler and gave her a brief smile as he sat down.
It went dark around him as the lights around the room faded out, the glow from the screen encased everyone in a faint light. The first video started, it showcased a steel room lined with drop pods, as the camera turned it showcased dozens of other dressed in a similar armor to Adrian's, though most had small stylistic deviations to their armor to make them unique.
Winston spoke up, "So these are the other ODSTs then? When does this take place in the timeline of your war?"
"About the middle so far, it started in 2531 and when I came here it was 2552. The bottom right marks the date as 2543, so at this point humanity has already been losing for a while."
Adrian decided to leave out that this was also one of his first missions as an ODST, he remembered it clearly. The absolute hellscape of it all, they landed just outside a city though it could hardly be called that anymore, the entire place was practically leveled, any plans they had after landing meant nothing in the chaos of it all. In the video, a loud blaring blasted through the speakers, the entire screen flashed red with the alarm as ODSTs jumped into their pods. The camera entered the closest one, as Adrian looked around in the pod the camera emphasized had tight the drop pod truly was. In the drop pod a weathered face came over the screens, it was Major Hansberg, "The ground forces have already engaged the Covenant and frankly they're getting the absolute shit kicked out of them. As you know we don't leave men behind, especially not to be so utterly slaughtered by those hinge-heads. Now, there's only one question left, how are we ODSTs going to leave this massive rust-bucket?"
All at once an echoing chant resounded through the entirety of the ship, "FEET FIRST INTO HELL." There was the sound of hatches being released immediately before the camera shook with the jolt of the drop pod falling, as the camera regained focus it stared clear out into the void of space. The sight drew gasps from almost everyone in the room, through the glass were dozens of bulky, black ships in orbit, in white lettering UNSC was printed across their hulls while dozens among dozens of drop pods soared through space. In the distance, contrasting against the darkness of space stood sleek ships of virtuous white, the ships were unleashing a barrage of weapons fire upon the planet. The planet itself was brutalized beyond any recognition, the surface seemed covered in fire and ruins, the closer to the ground the drop pods fell, the clearer the devastation on the planet became.
"Remember men, we need to push to the outskirts of the city and form a line to hold the Covenant back. Once formed, the 4th armored battalion can come from the East and clear out these covvie fucks."
The camera shook as the drop pod landed with a crashing bang, the door on the drop pod immediately blasted off to reveal the city…or what was left of it. The city in question was little more than piles of rubble a few stories tall, what had once been a city of half a million people had become totally obliterated over a year of constant conflict. Adrian jumped out of his pod as weapons fire went off around him, the ground was barren due to the constant fighting leaving only a layer of corpses and dust. The camera panned around to show marines and ODSTs dropping dead like flies, a marine next to him was blown apart as series of needles ran up his chest. There was more gasping in the room as they saw just how easily the Covenant weaponry tore through the marine's armor. Adrian fired at vague outlines in the distance marked by his IFF indicator; Seraphs and Longswords were dogfighting overhead, a Seraph crashed in the background in volatile explosion. It seemed impossibly hectic as Adrian continued to move up with the ODSTs, more continuing to fall to the unseen aliens. An ODST directly in front of the camera went down with a horrible scream as a beam rifle tore the man's leg off, Adrian tried to drag the man out of fire but didn't make it far as another beam ripped open the man's chest. The brutal scene continued for several minutes, a slow progression marked with countless deaths, eventually the first of the Covenant made themselves known to Overwatch. Grunts and Jackals marked the first wave of defense, the camera showed as they were swiftly put down by Adrian and the other ODSTs, any of the surviving covvies were executed with a brutality unseen by the member of Overwatch.
Angela leaned over, whispering to him, "Is that…allowed? I know that these Covenant are worse, but are there no laws about prisoners?"
Adrian snorted, "There are no rules in this war, it's rare for either side to take prisoners. Most of these soldiers of lost families, friends, loved ones, this brutality is how they get their revenge in their own way."
Through the smoky haze a bluish light could be seen through the smoke, to Angela is sounded like the crackling raw energy. The light disappeared briefly before an ear-splitting scream was heard, as the smoke cleared for the camera, Angela could see an baffling tall creature, it was at least eight to nine feet tall with maroon armor and blue lights decorating his ornamental head piece. It was wielding what could only be described as a sword of pure light and energy, said sword was currently piercing a poor marine through the abdomen. The multi-chinned creature hefted the impaled marine off the ground with a primordial roar, it then tossed the corpse towards the camera, towards Adrian.
"Jesus Christ it's a Zealot! Everyone focus fire on that fucking zealot, I don't want its own fucking mother to be able to recognize it when were done!" Someone yelled, the terror and anger in their voice was unlike anything she'd ever heard before, the whole video playing out in front of her was unlike anything she'd ever seen.
All at once every soldier in the area opened fire on the singular alien, the cacophony of weapons was absolutely deafening. At first it seemed like they're weapons weren't even harming it, the bullets bouncing off like rubber pellets, the Zealot rolled and sliced into the nearest marine, slicing the man in half with one smooth motion. When it stood back up, she noticed that something flashed over its entire body, turning to Adrian he briefly told her that the Covenant had developed energy shielding often fully covering the elites, such as the Zealot in the video, though after enough punishment their shields would break. Once the Zealot's shields had broken, the hail of bullets tore through it like paper, chunks of its body were breaking off its body, its sword wielding arm looked to be hanging on by barely a thread of muscle. It fell to the ground in a pathetic gory heap, the soldiers barely paid it any mind as they continued towards the city outskirts. It was hard for Angela to wrap her ahead around the idea that it took so much firepower to take down one soldier of the Covenant army. The struggle, the insanity, it had seemed endless, like there would be nothing at the end of this battle, anytime it seemed like progress was being made they'd hit another hurdle. After the Zealot came a squad of lower ranking elites followed by what Adrian had called Wraiths, their plasma rounds arching through the air until landing with hellish fury.
"We're not gonna be able to fucking make it with those defenses, we need to call in the armor NOW!"
It seemed that his wish was answered when the loudest bang Angela had ever heard thundered through the room, the camera turned to see a trio of massive, heavily armored tanks crested the mound of rubble, they began to lay down a line of heavy artillery, absolutely annihilating the wraiths lined up in front of the soldiers. The marines and ODSTs had finally secured the outskirts after what felt like the most grueling thirty minutes Angela had ever experienced. Though the most shocking part was the aftermath, entire squads had been lost, platoons were operating at half capacity, two large companies had been sent to take the outskirts and fourty percent of the force had been killed or wounded.
The camera showed the ODSTs intermixed with the marines, listening to the Captain outline their next moves, "Alright, we've suffered some casualties but we're doing far better than initially planned, that's because I've got the toughest god damn sons o' bitches under my command. Alright, check your ammo, prep your shit, we're moving on to group with 3rd Battalion." Everyone save Adrian was in disbelief, shocked at blunt acceptance of the casualties and the immediate moved to continue. The video continued, jumping around to various points across the war, exploring all aspects of Adrian's nine years as an ODST. From being deep behind enemy lines to assassinate a high-ranking officer, to extracting significant data from heavily controlled enemy territory, to putting down groups of insurrectionists, it showed all that was few and far between.
Winston was frankly overwhelmed, he'd never doubted Adrian's story, but only hearing the stories it was hard to place them in context to what he experienced. Actually seeing it was an entirely different experience, to be told humanity is facing extinction is wrenching, but to see the power with which the Covenant wield puts a heavy weight on one's shoulders. Most immediately applicable however was the versatility of the ODSTs, again he never doubted what Adrian said he did, but when an unknown variable pops into existence, into a team he's meticulously picked, he understandably erred on the side of caution. Though now with a decade's worth of footage, tactics, plans, first-hand experience, he truly felt that Adrian was suited for whatever job he was needed for. Winston hated to think like this, it made him feel as though he was taking advantage of Adrian's skillset, but he felt that out of anyone in Overwatch, Adrian would be the one to understand necessity. A light beeping on the console next to him caught his attention, Winston turned to and quickly skimmed through the files, his face hardened into a grim expression.
After hours of handpicked footage, the data had finally caught up to the invasion of Earth, for everyone in the room it had been a surreal experience to see and hear the reports, to see the one planet they'd known all their life being bombarded by Covenant forces. The visual feed had cut when Adrian entered the slip space rupture, leaving everyone with the final image of New Mombasa set ablaze. For Adrian it had been an unusual experience to relieve so much of his earlier life, though he'd also found himself laughing at his own inexperience early on. Turning he saw the Dr. Ziegler was a bit paler than usual, an odd look in her eyes, Hana was no longer next to her, he'd heard her leave not long after the first glassing took place.
"I uhmm – I apologize Adrian, I mean uhm Mr. Kasporov, but I need some time to…settle everything that I've seen." Adrian didn't blame her, decades into the war and it could still be hard to wrap his own head around everything that happened. Most everyone else was in the same boat as her, leaving without a word that he didn't get a few nods of understanding and sympathy from McCree and Genji. He was preparing himself to leave as well when Winston called him over, an odd sense of urgency underlying his words.
"Adrian, remember what we discussed earlier about the ruptures? Well I've been monitoring places where those ruptures happened but nothing was found…look here, a string of recent vanishings in the vicinity of where this rupture occurred. A rupture immediately followed by a series of disappearances; I don't think these people went missing…"
"They were murdered." Adrian finished.
Near the Southern Border of the Republic of Sakha, Russia
"Oh my lords, I know not how I have ended up in this forsaken land, my body and soul stained with the heretical existence of this world. My mind often wanders, questioning my purpose is this land so far from home, the reason that I have found myself here surviving among the filth of this frozen hellscape. Though I have come to the belief…that this is my test…I must believe there is a reason for this suffering, I have given my life to the Great Journey and for what I am rewarded? Or so…that is what I thought, but now I understand. I have come to find my purpose here, to prove myself worthy unto thou o' great prophets. I must cleanse this world of the profane, the heretical blemish that exists on this planet like a disease, I swear to you o great ones it shall be done, I shall rend their flesh from their bones with my hands when it is necessary. Fear not, for I have already begun."