Let's get ready to rumble! Adam vs McCree place your bets but first, we have to take a step backward in time.
Chapter V: Outcasts Part II
Another day, another train.
That's what his life had become, hopping from train to train, running from the authorities sure but there was more to it than that.
He was on the hunt.
Looking for someone who had probably gotten the worse hands after Overwatch had been shuttered.
He was going to find her, even if it took months, hell years before he bore any fruit.
But he had to admit, jumping on train number six had not gone as planned.
Firstly, he hadn't been told it was a Schnee DUST Weapons Transport.
Whatever, he'd dealt with worse, than the second snag in the plan had appeared over the rise.
Another band of robbers.
They'd launched off the cliffside like bat's out of hell, parts of their body glinting in the sun either denoting heavy augmentation or that they were Omnics.
"Well Jesse." he muttered to himself, as another explosion rocked the train, "This is one hell of a mess you've gotten yourself in."
He stalked forward, crouching low as he continued forward, heading toward danger as he always had. Though he was mentally kicking himself, and mentally swearing out the person who had set him on this venture.
"There are two trains, marked for transfer from Helix facilities to Atlas PMC." the gruff man had stated, his dull red eyes looking across his glass of whiskey at McCree.
He looked down at the holomap that had been slid in front of him.
"One heading from Juno down through the Forever Fall on it's way to Vancouver." Qrow continued, "The other is leaving the Californian Republic back to the main US, it'll be moving through the Territories, meaning Route 66."
"Meaning Deadlock," McCree muttered, looking up at the informant.
Qrow Branwen. He had an almost lazy air about him, but his eyes reminded him of Reyes, back before everything had gone to hell. Tired, with a harshness to them that could have cowed anyone with the right glare. This wasn't the first time they'd worked together, but a lot of bad blood had brought that to an end. Now, however, they were sitting down for drinks, and talking about something he'd thought was a pipe dream for quite a while now.
"I'm sure that won't be much of a problem." Qrow muttered, with a slight smirk, "Regardless the Wizard is convinced that what you are looking for is on one of those trains."
McCree felt the weight of the small chip he carried in his pocket, "Why is helping me with this? Why are you?"
"I'm helping because it's my job." Qrow stated, "He's helping because he knows you got the call and he agrees with the message."
"There's always a catch." McCree had fired off, glaring across the table.
"You're right, he's going to want your help in hunting something down." Qrow had agreed.
McCree had gone silent for a while, staring down at the map.
"What's the time frame?" he'd finally asked.
"The train in California leaves in two weeks." Qrow stated, "The one from Juno left yesterday, it'll be in the Forever Fall in four days."
He'd been out the door before another word had been said, which hindsight was now showing him had been a terrible idea.
Passing into the next car, he paused taking in the car about him. Several large containers sat in the middle, while a series of lockers ran along both sides. A computer terminal sat near the other end, which he immediately headed towards.
With the sounds of gunfire and explosions growing increasingly louder, he figured any of the train's personnel were definitely occupied, meaning watching for cameras wasn't necessary.
Still, he had to be quick about this, the attackers could be headed this way at any moment, and people were likely in danger.
He tapped away at the computer, bringing up the cargo manifest. Rapidly scanning the listed items nothing stood out. He slipped a small purple disk out of a pouch on his belt and slapped it onto the console. A vibrant purple image of a Mexican Sugar Skull appeared on screen for a moment, the screen flashing briefly before the manifest reappeared, showing all of its black-listed cargo.
He'd found the disk in his bags alongside a note that had read, "For when you are in a tight spot cowboy." after a miserable New Year's drinking himself into a stupor in a bar south of the border.
He mentally thanked his unexpected helper once more and quickly scanned down the full manifest.
It was immediately evident what he was looking for wasn't onboard the train, but the list of heavy ordnance caught him by disgusted surprise.
Titan-Grade EMP Grenades.
Titanium Tipped Tracer Rounds.
Rust Bombs.
Weaponry made solely for the destruction and killing of Omnics, much of which had been deemed unlawful by the Geneva Convention following the end of the War, yet here Schnee was, building and selling the heavy heat.
Clicking away at the keyboard, several panels opened up along the wall of the train car, revealing the offending weaponry.
As McCree turned around, he heard the sound of metal feet hitting the floor and whirled, a bullet barking free of one of his hand cannons and punching clean through the charging drones head before it could take another step. Its body careened to the floor and scraped slowly to a halt, as several others revealed themselves from within the cargo.
McCree gritted his teeth, rolling under a calculated swing, his other pistol coming up, and firing a shot clean through the drone's knee sending it stumbling.
Flipping that gun into the air, he slid down onto one knee, skidding past two of the drones. He fanned the hammer of his main hand cannon, six bullets firing up the torso of the drone until the gun finally kicked up into its head. As that one teetered backward, he surged to his feet, his robotic arm coming up and landing a devastating haymaker. He whirled, catching his other gun in hand and firing a shot, catching the drone in the back of the head and leaving it still.
He fired one last shot, firing into the top of the kneecapped drone's head, and followed that up by scanning the area for new attackers. Catching none in sight, he rapidly reloaded both guns and holstered the one in his off-hand.
He jumped over several crates, making his way to the open panels of the wall, as the biggest explosion yet shook the train.
He stared at the grenades and ammo containers for several seconds, before grabbing a set of pistol rounds marked with a lightning bolt, and snagging one of the grenades.
Snagging the hack-bot from the terminal he backed into the doorway, taking aim at a parcel of DUST rounds, marked with EXPLOSIVE, and paused.
His finger itched to pull the trigger, but that would mean drawing attention to his part of the train. He stood waiting for several moments, and as the first rumblings of another explosion further up the train caught his ears he fired.
The round detonated immediately, starting a chain reaction that promptly ripped a hole in the side of the train, sending the remaining arms cracking against the ground as the train roared onward.
Whirling around he raced forward, passing through several cars the shattered remains of drones lying all about him.
He skidded to a halt as the door in front of him opened. He rolled behind a set of stacked crates, peering around the corner, finally getting a look at the other train-hoppers.
He was surprised to see a pair of Fauns, both masked, one with curling metallic horns on the side of their head, the other with an arm that ended in a large mechanical claw.
They began rifling through the assembled weapon crates, the one with the claw speaking up.
"You think this will be a good place to put the charges?" she asked.
"Good a place as any." came a gruff, male reply.
"So, not here to steal the train, they're going to turn it into a speeding bomb." McCree thought to himself, "Are they planning on blowing it once they get off, or are they going to wait and detonate it the second it hits Vancouver?"
"Neither's good." he amended silently, drawing a cigar and his lighter from another one of his pouches.
He stood up and turned around the crates, lighting his cigar and bringing it to his mouth as he did so.
"Afternoon," he said in a mock friendly tone, catching the Fauns by surprise.
The woman whirled, her claw extending towards him while the man raised his rifle.
Moving quickly, McCree ripped a flashbang off his belt and tossed it directly at the man. He turned to not be blinded by the flash, and spun into the woman's embrace, his metallic elbow cracking her in the base of the jaw.
He then fired a shot from the hip, catching the man in the gut. He flinched forward, and McCree aimed a kick at his head. The woman grabbed McCree by the back of the neck and pulled him backward, air meeting the other man's feet instead of his steel-toed boots.
"Getting a little handsy there," he remarked, pistol-whipping her in the knee, and following it up with a left-handed punch that she fell into, worsening the blow. She careened backward, swinging at him with her clawed hand, he rolled out of the way shoulder checking the recovering hand as he did so.
He got to his feet, getting in his kick that time sending the man to the ground and then ducked a tossed crate as the woman charged towards him. He side-stepped bringing his knee up into her gut and followed that blow up with a viscous pistol-whip to the back of the head. She slumped forward, sprawled across her teammate, allowing McCree to finally take a full drag of his cigar.
Stepping off their unconscious forms, he passed through another train car and quickly noted the already set charge beeping menacingly in the center of the room.
Holstering his second gun, he knelt to disarm it when the sound of raised voices caught his attention.
He crept forward heading towards the wide-open door. He slid up to the wall, standing to his full height, and quickly began to switch out the bullets in his main hand cannon for the Schnee rounds.
"These people didn't do anything wrong!" a female voice cried, "Why should we take their lives, the only message that sends is that people should hate us!"
"They already hate us!" a growling male voice shouted back, "Humans, Omnics, we don't match either of their molds. We're just 'Broken Weapons', 'Warped Mistakes', monsters! So why not act the part.
McCree cautiously looked around the corner, taking in the argument. Nine or so Fauns stood about, watching the confrontation, between a younger woman with wide cat-like mechanical antenna atop her head and long black hair and an older man who stood nearly eight feet tall on his Bastion-like legs, with vibrant red hair and backward-facing metallic horns.
He was bearing down on her while another girl, masked with long reddish-brown hair, was reaching out towards the clearly distressed girl.
"This won't get you what you want!" the black-haired girl cried, looking around the group.
"What if I want this?" the man asked, pushing even closer in on her.
McCree noticed another Faun, even bigger than the one menacing the girl was beginning to push themselves to their feet, his mechanical spine taking up the background of the argument as McCree's eyes zeroed in.
"I can't-what happened to you." the girl choked out, "What happened to the person I fell in love with."
The man seemed to pause, "I got tired of hiding. Now darling, are you with us or against us?"
He pushed his face even closer to hers, the sneer on his face predatory and manipulative, and it was at that moment McCree opened fire.
His bullet cut a groove across the man's mask, punching forward to catch the massive Faun in the back, igniting in a burst of electricity that sent him to his knees.
The assembled Faun's whirled towards him as he stood into the open, his main gun pointed forward. He reached for his cigar and puffed a cloud of smoke into the air, a biting smile on his face.
"Sorry to interrupt, but I think I speak for the girl when I say you need to back the hell off," he stated, flicking his cigar aside and drawing his second gun seamlessly.
"Kill him!" the red-haired man roared. The assembled Fauns, excluding the black-haired girl, moved in on him.
"Ten, no eleven to one? Now, these are my kind of odds!" Jesse laughed, pulling back the hammer on each gun.
Twelve shots.
Time to make them count.
He shoulder checked the nearest Faun, pistol-whipping another as they tried to tackle him to the ground, flipping his off-hand into the air, he pulled a flashbang.
He tossed it at his feet and rolled backward, catching his gun and firing off two shots. One cracked a faun in the mechanical elbow, sending their arm skitting across the ground.
The other caught the leader in the chest, sending an arc of electricity running through his body.
The brown-haired girl lunged towards him, with a series of kicks. He ducked out of the way of several, hooking his foot behind her left and pulling she fell backward, and he caught her with his mechanical hand, the barrel of his gun pointed at the center of her forehead.
Time seemed to slow down, as he took in one that she was unarmed, and two how young she looked. His finger came off the trigger, and he looked up to see a red blade cutting towards his neck. Dropping her he dodged backward, feeling the blade nick his chin as he did so.
Ignoring the flash of pain, he unloaded another two shots, catching a heavily armored Faun in the forehead, electricity ripping across their body, but they'd live. The other was a kneecapper, sending the victim writhing as he caught a rare bit of flesh.
Eight shots left.
He rounded once more, and a metal fist collided into his back, sending him flying across the open-air car, almost falling off the train.
His off-hand gun fell free of his hand however and disappeared off the side of the train without a sound.
"Damn," McCree muttered.
Four shots.
He went to get to his feet and instead was dragged off them and into the air as the red-hair man held him aloft.
"An Overwatch castaway." the Faun remarked, sneering up at him, "How rare."
"A terrorist." McCree snarked back, "How common,"
"Terrorists, freedom fighters, revolutionary." the Faun rambled, squeezing McCree's neck tighter, "The Fauns will be called many things before we are given what we deserve."
"A cold jail cell in a high-security prison?" McCree mocked, as he slowly reached behind his back with his mechanical arm.
"We've been outcasts for too long." the man remarked, "That ends today."
"Adam, please." the black-haired girl said, taking a step towards him, only to wither under the absolute vicious glare the man sent her way.
"Enough Blake!" Adam yelled, "Fall in line!"
"You know," McCree interrupted, sparing the girl a glance, and kind smile, "I was an outcast too. Overwatch had this whole, spiel about it."
Adam turned back to him with a glare, "Your point?"
"My point is I was a criminal, but I never took the lives of innocent people in my hands and tried to play savior. I never planned to blow up a city!" McCree yelled.
Adam flinched, and McCree knew in that instant, his second guess for the charges had been more on point than he could have hoped.
Blake pulled her weapon in that instant, pointing it at Adam, who turned to look at her, betrayal written across his features.
"Put him down!" she ordered, "This is insane!"
She was looking around at the assembled Fauns, and McCree could see her world cracking, further and further as instead of siding with her, most of the Fauns slowly turned their weapons on her, all except the brown-haired girl, who was sitting up and staring at Blake.
Adam snarled and turned back to him, "You talk too much!"
He began to extend his arm to dump Jesse off the train, halting as McCree smirked.
"Actually, I think I talk just the right amount," McCree stated as he pulled out the active EMP grenade clenched in his robotic hand and held it before Adam's masked face as it detonated.
The effect was instant as a pulse of energy surrounded the both of them, Adam began to scream and shudder as the mechanisms throughout his body began to spark and short out. McCree felt his mechanical arm go limp at his side, and as he dropped to the ground he lifted his remaining gun.
Four bullets, time to make them count.
The world seemed to slow, as he lined up his shots.
Blake stared around in shock as the train car was consumed with madness, Adam was screaming and clutching at his chest as the EMP wreaked havoc on him while the cowboy dropped to the ground and turned.
He fired three times, so quickly her eyes couldn't even track it. There was a sound of a ricochet as the first bullet caught one of her former allies in the chest and sent them to the ground, pinging off the corner of a metallic crate to catch another in the knee.
The second shot passed through the shoulder of a large Faun with an underslung machine-gun in hand, grazed along the cheek of another, and now slowed caught the final grunt in the head with a metallic cracking sound as it shattered their mask and sent them careening backward, unconscious but bloody.
The third shot caught the rising Lieutenant in the lower jaw, electricity frying across their head as the metal dented inwards part of the mask shattering from the impact.
Blake darted forward, as Adam fought through the pain, his blade coming up to sink deeply into the cowboy's torso.
She tackled the man backward, a clone pushing them even further forward and taking Adam's blow. The landed on the back of the next car, still smoking from the spider-drone's attack.
Looking up she saw Ilia moving after them, a hand reaching towards her.
"Blake?" the other girl asked, so many questions and emotions flitting about her name, left unanswered as Adam menacingly stood to his full height.
In one quick motion, Blake severed the connection between the two trains. The change in momentum was immediate, as the severed cars slowed and she and her "rescuer" pulled away.
With a look of utter rage, Adam leaped after them, his blade extended.
Her weapon snapped backward, transforming as it did so and wrapped around the set charge that sat behind her. She pulled up and over her head, sending the explosive package careening towards the man she had loved for so long.
A gunshot rang out, and the charge detonated, consuming Adam in a burst of fire and smoke. He soared backward landing on the slowing car as the train pulled further away.
The cowboy lowered his gun, and fell backward, breathing out a sigh of relief as his mechanical arm began to twitch back to life.
Blake looked back at the rapidly disappearing train cars, Adam's rage-filled scream, and Ilia's shocked face the last things she heard and saw before the train whipped around a corner of the cliffside.
She closed her eyes, frustrated tears welling up in her eyes as she thought about her friend and whatever Adam had become, and turned to look up at the red-leaf choked sky.
"Thanks for the save uh…" the cowboy said, sitting up and moving to the edge of the train car, dangling his feet over the edge without a care in the world.
Blake looked down at him and was taken aback at the genuine friendliness and worry in his eyes as he looked up at her.
"Blake." she stated softly, "My name is Blake."
"Jesse McCree, at your service." the man responded with a joking smile, tipping his hat to her. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a cigar, which he promptly lit, "But I bet you knew that."
In hindsight, as the adrenaline and fear of the past several minutes began to disappear, she did.
"You really saved my hide back there." he remarked, holding up his gun with a smirk, "Only had one shot left."
"Why are you being so friendly?" she asked, cagily, "I'm a criminal. A terrorist, like Adam."
McCree shrugged noncommittedly, "What can I say, I'm a friendly guy and I don't really have a right to judge, I'm not exactly loved by the authorities at the moment either."
"And tell me if I'm wrong, but you were the only one trying to stop things from getting worse before I butted my way into that conversation," he said, puffing out a cloud of smoke that was ripped away by the racing wind around them.
"How'd you know we were going to be doing this?" she asked, glaring at him slightly, more annoyed than worried about his laidback attitude.
"I didn't." he returned, looking up at her, "I was here for my own reasons."
"What reasons?" she asked.
"I'm looking for someone." McCree stated, "Didn't find them, but destroying some illegal weaponry and saving a train from a fanatic isn't exactly a day wasted."
She sat down, joining him in his precarious position at the back of the train. A soft, awkward silence emerged and lasted for several moments before she spoke up.
"So what happens now?" she asked, "Are you going to turn me in?"
The older man rolled his eyes, "Well, as I said since I'm a wanted criminal that's not very likely at all now is it. This train stops in Vancouver, once we get there and manage to shake any authorities, we can go out separate ways."
Blake turned back, watching the red-leaves whirl and dance in the draft coming off the train.
"Unless of course, you wouldn't mind slumming it with a former agent of Overwatch for a while," McCree added, drawing her attention back to him.
"Why would I do that?" she asked, staring at him cautiously.
"The person who sent me looking for this train clued me into another, which likely has the person I'm looking for, she can take you to meet him." McCree stated, "It'd be safer than living on the run on your own, and well let's just say he's got a place for 'outcasts' like us."
Blake was quiet for several moments, staring at him, trying to parse how genuine he was being if she could trust him if she should trust him before finally speaking up, "Tell me more."
And Scene! Next time, we get to the final member of Team RWBY, and her introduction might be more than a little familiar for most Overwatch fans.
But there you have it, Blake and McCree are going to be bumming around the US together for a bit, not sure how many chapters I plan to write for that before I get to McCree finding his totally mysterious friend.
Ilia and Adam will return, with characters both expected, unexpected, and entirely new.
This has been VerBeeker, signing off!