"Jesus Christ." I whisper, looking over everyone. I had woken up early and, after a quick breakfast with the others, we decided to head to the hospital as requested. But I didn't expect all this.
Patients were overflowing the four story building, the smell of medicine, blood and cleaning products was enough to make me want to get out. But I couldn't, I was stuck watching. Like most buildings here the hospital was a big block made of cement. It was huge, compared to the rest of the town, and probably made recently due to the war. The first floor was completely open with no walls, more like the field of a stadium instead of a hospital floor, and laying on the floor on cots or rushing around were doctors and patients alike. I could hear the cries of pain or grief of the people.
"This war recently pasted the fifty-million death toll." Torbjorn murmured. "I guess this testifies to that."
"And the rest of the world is just standing by? Letting this happen?" I ask in disbelief. "No wonder the Russians dislike people outside of the war. We have no idea." Without saying anything the four of us began making our way to the patients, slowly separating. Torbjorn got stuck in a group of children with minor wounds, probably kept there because they had injured parents somewhere near, and was showing them how to build a few things, smiling and laughing as if nothing was wrong. Tracer was rushing around as always, saying inspiring things and smiling cheerfully at the most injured patients. I saw them smile back, sit up to see her. Talk to each other in something like disbelief as she passed. Mei was with the doctors, who were all clearly fatigued, and helping them by freezing certain wounds on some patients. They must've done this sort of thing before, when Overwatch had still been around, because the three agents seemed perfectly fine. But I could see that while some were happy others seemed mad, yelling certain things at them. Maybe because, as I had said, we were outsiders. We hadn't been through the horrors of this war. And me? I couldn't do anything. Just stay where I was and hope I don't interfere with the doctor's work.
Suddenly two men busted in through the door, yelling loudly over the noise of the injured. The first was carrying a young girl, my age maybe, and behind them another man was bringing in a boy that seemed a couple years younger. They ran and gently put them on some cots, yelling out. Probably for help. I looked around expecting to see doctors rush forward, but instead I saw other patients just grimace and try to console the two men. With a start I realized; there aren't enough doctors. Nobody can help those two. The men must've realized this because one started crying as the other spoke gently to the girl and boy. Pained but trying to remain strong.
"No…" I mumbled, clenching my fists. I don't where it came from but suddenly I felt more confident. In control. "Move out of the way!" I yell at the small group, running towards the two. "Move!" They make way and I run to the most serious injury, the girl. Her leg was completely shredded from the knee down and was bleeding at a scary rate. I observed it for a few seconds before reacting. "Someone get me a laser saw!"
"We no have." A woman said.
"Give me anything that can cut meat and bone! A sedative to!"
"T-there are no tools here…" The injured girl murmured, sniffling. "I'm going to die."
"No, you're not." I answer, turning to where Mei was. I call out to her and her face turns serious. She runs towards me and I point at the girl's leg. She freezes it and, much to my surprise, the girl sighs in relief. It must've numbed the pain. I grab my rifle, which Torbjorn had returned to me this morning, and raise it. "Look away…it won't be pretty." A few men react and hold her down, then one I assume is her father, grabs her hand and murmurs something to her. Without hesitation I slam the butt of my gun into her frozen leg and it breaks off in a few pieces. She screams, but I'm not done. "Torbjorn!" I turn and see he's already by my side, having seen what was going on. "I need you to cauterize the wound."
"Understood." He says grimly. "Hold her steady." He orders, and I join the other men holding her down. I murmur words of encouragement and watch as Torbjorn pours smelted iron over his gun, which didn't seem affected by it. He gives me a nod and I look back at the girl. She also gives me a slight nod. Torbjorn presses his weapon against her flesh and I swear I can smell cooked meat. She screams at the top of her lungs and struggles against us uselessly, but I see the outline of a smile as she slumps into unconsciousness, glad that this had happened. I had given her another chance at life.
"Puasiva." The girl's father said, smiling at me as tears ran down his cheeks. At least it was something like that, and I decide to take it as a thank you. But my work isn't done. I turn to the boy and grimace, noticing this will be much more difficult to fix. He has a wound on his stomach which is bleeding badly, the blood seeping through a makeshift bandage someone put on him. At closer inspection I realize he doesn't have a bullet in him, he has fragments of a bullet. That will make it much harder.
"Pincers. I need small pincers." I say. Torbjorn repeats what I say louder and a few of the Russians that understand English scramble around. One woman returns and gives me a pair of dirty nail-clippers. I sigh but take the, cleaning them as best as I can. I stick some cloth in the boys mouth and, with help from his father, tell him to bite that until I'm done. Mei does a short, quick blast on the wound to stop the bleeding somewhat and numb the flesh. Maybe it will help numb the pain, and on my order some men hold the boy down. He gulps but gives me a fearful nod. "Ok…I got this." I murmur to myself as I carefully pinch one fragment. He doesn't react, but the second I begin to pull it out he screams into the cloth and begins to struggle, forcing me to stop despite the men holding him. I feel a tap on my shoulder and turn to see Tracer looking at me with a serious face, she holds out a needle and I understand. She found a sedative. I take it and inject it into the boy, watching him slump and close his eyes. It's now or never. I clip the first fragment and carefully pull it out. I move to the second, and then make a careful incision and pull out a third which is deeper. It's careful meticulous work. I'm forced to do it slowly so I don't cut the boy, and I keep having to dry my hands because they're getting sweaty. But after twenty minutes I realize I'm done. All the fragments are gone. Torbjorn cauterizes the wound as he did with the girl before.
"Will they live?" One of the men asks me fearfully. I wipe my brow and stand up. Didn't these people realize how desperate I am? That I'm no doctor, I just reacted. That I myself couldn't be sure if I even did the right thing. I look over the crowd of people that has gathered and, somehow, I can tell why they're waiting for my answer. They look up to me in this moment, despite how desperate or inexperienced I may be, because I'm all they have right now. I'm their hope.
I give a small nod and then force a smile, yelping in surprise as he hugs me and says something in Russian. He yells out in relief and it's obvious he's announcing it the others. I've saved them. These two children will live. As the group settles down I look around and notice that everywhere I looked the patients were watching me. A few with smiles, others with respect, and the ones that had gotten mad at our sudden interference gave me slight nods. As if saying, yes, I am part of this now. One woman stands up, she has a broken arm and a bandaged head, but her voice rings out clear in the room and she must be a soldier because she salutes me. Soon enough half the room follows her example. I hear someone cough behind me and turn to see the commander and Zarya standing there. Zarya looked extremely surprised, and the commander seemed to be hiding a smile.
"I think it is time we go over those plans, yes?" The commander says, walking outside before we can answer. Zarya recovers herself and nods to the door. After a few moments we follow and as I look back I notice the hospital, which was such a depressing scene when I walked in, is now full of life. The doctors are rushing around as if they got an adrenaline shot and several patients with minor wounds are trying to help out as well, plenty of them smiling at the rest. And this makes me smile to.
"Feels good, right?" Torbjorn asks with a chuckle as we walk away. "Now you understand. This is why we were so important. This is what Overwatch is about!"
"This is why so many people put their faith in us." Tracer said, ruffling my hair. "You did fantastic in there."
"This is how it was before? You guys had to go through that more than once?" I asked.
"Countless times! Don't get me wrong, this isn't all that Overwatch was meant to be. But it might be the most important part. We're a beacon!"
"A beacon of hope." I murmur, to which Tracer nods and smiles.
"But how did you know what to do?" Mei asked me, her look showing newfound respect. "I never heard anything about you having medical training."
"I asked Mercy to teach me some things. We never practiced much surgery but…I remembered some things. Still, freezing and breaking a leg isn't something doctors would do. I just followed my gut."
We follow the two Russians to what I assume is their command center. For once the place doesn't look outdated. The building was small with four rooms and one floor, but it was entirely made of bomb resistant metal and inside had plenty of people on high tech computers, holo-panels and studying war maps. I looked at one board and saw that the Russians weren't as weak as they looked when I arrived. Somewhere near there were divisions of tanks and countless aircraft ready to help. But why hadn't they moved in already?
"In here." Zarya said, waving us into a room all the way in the back of the building. Once we were all in she closed the door and sealed it behind us. The commander sat at the head of the table, which was the only thing inside here. We took our seats around it.
"So what's the plan?" Torbjorn asked casually.
"And how do we help you?" Mei asked.
"Just a reminder. Everything and anything said and shown here is classified." The commander said. "We shouldn't even be working with you since it is illegal. But we must, in exchange for your help we will keep the fact that you have returned secret and you have the full support of Russia, as long as we can keep our relationship hidden of course. Zarya will go with you after this mission as well since the war will be over."
"Must be big, if this can stop the war." I said. "How come nobody's done this yet? Whatever it is."
"We need to get jet where jet can not go. Meaning, all our pilots get shot down before getting close enough to the target." Zarya explained.
"Wait, how about we start from zero. We agree to these terms and you can show us the actual battle plans." Tracer said. She and the commander had some sort of staring contest before he gave Zarya a nod. She pulled a small device out of her pocket and put it on the table. It flickered to life and displayed three big buildings.
"These are Omnium. Buildings designed to create Omnics." The commander said. "In the first Omnic crisis Overwatch, and other forces, deactivated the Omnium. But they automatically reactivated which is what started the second crisis here. So we need to destroy it. No deactivation. Nothing will be left of it to ever pose a threat to us ever again."
"The problem is," Zarya began. "getting in through the ground is impossible. We tried. We send men, tanks, robots, but Omnics have…ah, how do you say? Bunker, they have many bunkers firing at any ground troops we send."
"So you fly in, manage to get through the air defenses and drop some men. They get in and you're set." Tracer said.
"It is not that easy." The commander replied. "We tried aerial assault several times. Helicopters are too slow, and our jets can't get past the anti-air guns even with their speed."
"So how do you fix that?" Torbjorn asked.
"Here, here and here." Zarya said, pressing three parts of the map. Immediately the three locations zoomed in and it showed us several Bastion units around big gun emplacements. One gun swerved slowly and immediately fired plasma into the sky at an incredible rate. "These guns not only shoot down plane, they give infantry very good cover. How did Omnics build artillery so close to us? While they were working the gun emplacements other Omnics attacked, and the guns rained hell down on us. Luckily they are far enough to not hit the village directly, but they've made any type of advance impossible."
"So we take out the three emplacements, some fighters can slip in and bomb and the Omnium?" I asked, although I suspected it wouldn't be so easy. The commander confirmed my suspicious with the shake of his head.
"The heart of the factories are deep underground." Torbjorn explained. "So they could survive any sort of bombardment. We take out the guns, get some jets to drop in troops, infiltrate the factories and rig them to blow. It'll be dangerous, suicide to most."
"Which is where you four come in." The commander said. "We take out the guns, let you go inside. You have the skill we need for this mission. I'm confident you can get inside, make your way to the heart of the central factory and detonate it. As soon as that one is destroyed their will be a chain reaction, and the other factories will follow."
"That's still more dangerous than I'd like." Tracer said, intently studying the map. "Us four versus the entire enemy army?"
"Once the guns are down our jets will bomb the bunkers keeping our tanks at bay. Once those are gone we will send in ground troops. As soon as the ground troops enter combat you four, and me, will go in and destroy the Omnium." Zarya said. "This will be the final battle. It is our only hope of stopping the machines before they spread. But we must be quick, even with heavy armor and air support this is an Omnic stronghold. Our forces will have to retreat or we will lose too many lives."
"Well, don't forget about Talon." I said, earning everyone's attention. "They were manning those artillery emplacements we took out. So they must be working with the Omnics. Hell, they might have reactivated the Omnium to start this entire thing. I'm sure we'll find Talon presence there to."
"But why would they do this? What do they gain?" Zarya asked.
"I'm not sure…could be a distraction? Maybe they just want destruction? I mean they're also fighting in the US and they have no reason to be attacking random towns. Far as we know."
"If we find Talon soldiers we will capture some for interrogation." The commander said. "For now focus on ending the Omnic Crisis."
"Don't worry, sir. We did it before and we can do it again!" Tracer said with a smile.
"Aye, we can manage this." Torbjorn said.
"Indeed." Mei agreed.
"Ok, then let's go blow stuff up." I said with a wide smile, hearing an explosion outside. Then another, than a third. A few seconds later the alarms sounded indicated an aerial raid.
"Why did you say that?" Zarya complained as she opened the door and dashed out, grabbing her weapon.
"Go! Do what you can! I will make sure our defenses continue in place!" The commander said. Tracer zipped outside before any of us could react, I ran after her with Mei and Torbjorn behind me. As soon as I made it outside I could see things were not well. Several buildings were on fire, people were running around in panic and I as looked at the sky I saw Russian jets chasing Omnic aircraft. My eyes followed one jet that followed the Omnic a bit too far out, and immediately bolts of plasma torn through the jet and it burst into flames.
"So that's why we have to take those guns out. Great." I ran to the right where I had seen Zarya go and found her with Tracer, both behind cover. Down the street were three bastion units in turret form and they opened fire. Mei raised an ice wall in front of me and I dashed to Tracer. "What's the plan?"
"They've managed to get inside several parts of the town. Zarya says the men made a perimeter around the command center of a few blocks, but the fighting is everywhere. So we work we what we have!" Tracer turned around the corner and emptied her guns. "Push them back, and try to save the civilians." After that she blinked forward, jumping above the barrage of bullets and then blinking to a side. It was hard to tell but I think she was giggling. Her guns blazed and the three bastion units blew up. I aimed at a nearby rooftop and fired in bursts, taking down a few Omnics with rifles. Zarya was yelling something in Russian and firing purple plasma grenades from her gun. Torbjorn and Mei were no where to be seen, probably trying to help out somewhere else. I took a deep breath and ran forward into a house and, seeing three Omnics, immediately kicked one back and hitting the other with the butt of my gun, mowing the third down. A bastion unit crashed in through the wall firing and I immediately activated my shield, returning fire. He fell down, dead. But only after my shield was depleted and a few bullets pinged off my armor.
"Ok, so this thing can run out. Better remember to take cover." I said to myself as I ran out the hole in the wall, back into the street. Zarya and Tracer had already made it up the block by themselves and by the sound of it I assumed the Russian soldiers on the other streets were keeping pace. I cursed and crouched behind a broken column as bullets whizzed by my head. "Tracer I'm pinned!"
"Got your back, love!" She replied, blinking forward a few times and throwing a bomb before recalling herself back. The explosion was mixed with the sound of shattered metal and I turned the corner, firing on the few survivors. Once the shooting stopped Zarya yelled something in Russian, and a family of five peeked out the doorway and ran down the street. She exchanged some words with the five before they ran off in direction of the command center.
"Reinforcements. Fresh troops." Zarya announced. "They are moving in and clearing the town. Everyone already fighting is pushing to the front of the town, trying to drive them back. Will you join me at the front or stay here in the town?"
"Front." I immediately answered. Tracer nodded in agreement and the three of us began running down the streets, past other Russian soldiers and shooting at some of the stragglers. "I give you guy's credit, it's been less than an hour and the Omnics are already retreating."
"Something is wrong, the Omnics never retreat." Zarya replied. "Be wary, I fear they have made some sort of trap." There wasn't much more time to talk after that. We walked in between two houses and found ourselves out in the open after that. In front of me was an endless expanse of white snow, rubble and craters. I saw bullets fly through the plain and I could see the Russian soldiers in white camouflage fighting against the dark hued Omnics which were easily seen in middle of all that snow. We followed Zarya down the hill and into the plains with a group of soldiers, who were hiding inside a crater. She exchanged some words with the squad leader then turned to us. "The Omnic have stopped trying to advance, but they aren't letting up either. Bastion units have made a wall of sorts in middle of the plain and are raining bullets down on us."
"What's the plan?" Tracer asked.
"Boy goes in front, destroys some of the Bastions and makes a hole in their wall. We follow afterwards and give him cover as he goes."
"Are you crazy?! Even in my armor I'll get torn to shreds!" As if to prove my point one of the soldiers stood up, yelling loudly as he fired and a wall of bullets tore through his body. "See? I won't get close."
"Trust me, I always have plan." Zarya said. I turned to look at the soldiers and as another one fell a felt fear overcome me for the first time since the artillery came down on me. Fighting them with lots of cover was one thing, running towards them with people shooting uselessly behind me was another. I shook my head rapidly and backed up as an explosion sounded. "Go now!' Zarya yelled, but I only shook my head again. She spat something to me in Russian and went to the edge of the crater, firing grenades in a high arc. I turned to Tracer but she seemed disappointed. Let down. Without a word she went over to the crater and also began firing. Why did she give me that look? It was like Zarya's, in a way, very disapproving. Then it hit me. This wasn't just a battle, not in my case. It was a mission, a very important one at that. It was my first mission. This is where I proved if I could handle myself, if they could rely on me and go into the fray knowing I had their backs. Right now, I wasn't only fighting for the people of this town or even the country as a whole. I was fighting for my spot on the team.
"Training. Go over training. What did Reinhardt and Genji always tell me to do?" I whispered to myself. "Go over inventory. Ok, I have my gun, super pistol, pink knife, armor with the shield. The shield won't last long and even with this armor I'll get shredded. So I can't run out there. What else do I have? Think…think…" I closed my eyes and tried to go back to the day I left, when Winston was explaining the armor. A smile appeared on my lips. "Zarya! Tell your men to focus their fire on the right! If you can distract the Omnics I'll sneak in through the left!"
"How will you sneak behind them? There is no cover at all!" Zarya yelled back.
"Just trust me!" I gave her an encouraging nod and, reluctantly, she began announcing the orders through her comms. A few minutes later she gave me a nod and I stood up, turning invisible. "I have five minutes, so if I didn't open a hole in that time then assume the worst." I yelled.
Let me tell you, going through the middle of a battlefield with two armies on each side is the worst experience that can ever happen to you. At least normal soldiers are together when they do this, but me? I was alone. First there are the bullets and explosives, more than once I felt bullets ping off my armor and I barely managed to dodge the few grenades that came my way. Second of all, the bodies. Obviously the Russians couldn't afford to come out here and collect their dead, so the air was filled with a horrible stench and bodies in different stages of decompositions were lying here and there. This image just filled me with determination and I pressed forward.
"Are you close?" Zarya asked through comms.
"One more minute to get there. Two for me to reappear. Get ready to give me cover." I answered. Here we go. I took a deep breath and poured on speed, sprinting straight for the line of Bastion units and vaulting over them. When I turned around I saw a blue light on each one's back. A weak spot? I didn't ask them, instead emptying my magazine on the first. Five other Bastions turned my way as their friend blew up and I prayed the two minutes I had left of invisibility weren't up. They turned back around and continued firing at the Russians and, instead of firing my gun, I chose to be smarter. I went behind a Bastion and grabbed his sides, reappearing in that moment. The others spun to face me but I spun the robot in me hands with all my strength and they received a hail of bullets from their ally. Finally the Bastion unit I was holding realized its mistake and stopped so I fired in its weak spot and rolled away, fragments of metal pinging against my armor as it exploded. I could here the other Bastions that were on the other side whirring up to shoot me but someone tackled me down and several explosions sounded. When I looked up I saw Tracer above me, looking away and firing but having one knee on my chest, pinning me down. A Bastion came from her left and, having one hand on my rifle, I destroyed it.
"Thanks, love." We both said at the same time, smiling widely afterwards. I turned to where the other Bastions had been and saw that now only small craters remained with a pinkish hue. Zarya's grenade launcher. A moment later she appeared with a group of soldiers, who pressed on. Tracer got up and followed them, blinking ahead. I'd decided to lie on the ground for a few more seconds and catch my breath.
"Very good, boy." Zarya's voice said. I looked to my right and she was there, offering me her hand. No more disapproval. She was actually smiling. I took her hand and she pulled me up.
"My name is Alessandro, you know?" I said as I reloaded.
"I know…boy." She laughed heartily and together we ran back into the battle.