Ghosts of Soldiers

by KiloActual

With the loss of his father at the hands of Talon and the world believing him dead, James partners up with an old friend of his father, a man known by most as Soldier: 76 and as Overwatch agents are called back to active duty, the two vigilantes must make a decision. Join Overwatch or risk becoming a target as they continue their work to uncover what really happened to Overwatch.

10. Chapter 10

A/N

Hey everybody. Thanks for reading this story. I'm sure by this point most of you have already completely skipped this author note and I don't blame you so I won't take up anymore of your time. Just wanted to let you know with most major events done and me back in the habit of writing at night. I'll do my best to try to get more chapters out to you guys.

Also someone brought to my attention that something this story is severely lacking is a good villain and they are correct. While Talon is probably the main antagonist for Overwatch in the lore and the story as of the moment, I've haven't really gone into any of the characters that work for Talon or are allied with them. This is for multiple reasons. First off, while I have played with the idea of creating a centralized character within Talon to oppose Overwatch and its allies, I felt that Reaper more than enough fulfills the roll as that character considering what we know about his past actions and strong dislike of Overwatch. Another being Talon isn't the only faction I plan on having in this story to oppose Overwatch. I won't spoil anything but an idea was presented to me by someone and its actually close to the idea I for a new enemy to oppose Overwatch so I hope whoever sent the idea doesn't mind but I plan on adapting the idea to better fit the story and the idea I have planned. Now for the disclaimer.

Disclaimer: Overwatch belongs to Blizzard Entertainment and its respective developers. All I own is the plot of this story and some of the characters.

Now onto the story.

Outskirts of London, two and a half weeks later

"Are you sure we can go with you? Our mission wasn't exactly a success." Adam asked as they headed to the rendezvous point.

"Sure, I don't see why not. You guys were asked to help me complete my assignment and you did. In my eyes, you did your job and you did your jobs well." Ghost said with a shrug.

"Alright, I guess all we have to hope for is that they don't boot us off the ship." Adam said with a sigh. The three stopped a good distance from the rendezvous point and kept watch. After a few minutes of waiting, the Overwatch dropship quickly descended and landed. As the doors opened, an entire strike team lead by Soldier: 76 and Ana secure a perimeter around the door to the dropship. They were running a big risk doing this. An extraction via dropship in broad daylight was huge security risk.

"That's our cue. Tight formation, watch the surroundings." Ghost said. The other two nodded and got into position. "Let's move out." With that, the three of them made their way to the dropship. One of the Overwatch agents noticed them and called it out.

"I got eyes on three contacts coming in from the north."

"I have them in my sights." 76 said before turning to Ana. "Can you confirm identities?"

"Of course." Ana said she looked down the scope at the three approaching people. "It's them."

"Alright, get ready to pull out once Ghost and his team are on boarded." 76 ordered as Ghost the others closed the distance. As they reached the strike team, Ghost and his team nodded to them and boarded the dropship. 76 tapped the person next to him and one by one they each went up the boarding ramp until they had all had boarded. With everyone on board, the door closed and the ship quickly took off with no one seeing a thing. "Welcome back." 76 said bumping elbows with the younger soldier before they walked over a less populated area of the ship while Adam and Victoria walked off to the side to avoid attention being drawn to them.

"Good to be back." Ghost said as he took off his hood and looked around, noticing the large number of Overwatch agents on board. "Did you really miss me so much that brought everyone for a simple extraction mission?"

"No and this is no longer a simple extraction mission. We're on our way to Ilios to disrupt Talon's operation there."

"So we're not going home." Ghost said. "Well shit. So why are we moving up the time tables? I thought we were still in the observe and intel gathering phase in Ilios considering that Overwatch's agent only got there last week."

"Things have changed. Their observer in Ilios went dark a few days ago and we've been unable to reestablish contact with him."

"So we're assuming he's been compromised. What's the game plan then? This is too many people for a search and recuse op in enemy territory."

"There are three separate plans, one for each strike team." 76 explained. "My team will hitting Talon's main forces at the ruins and stop them from acquiring whatever they're looking for. Winston's team will be deal with Talon's forces over by the well. The location is popular with officers so we're hoping to find some decent intel there from one of the officers. Lastly, your team will be focused on search and recuse in the town near the lighthouse. That was their agent's last known position before he went dark." Ghost groaned when he heard that. He had forgotten that he was placed in charge of the strike team.

"Great. I love babysitting." Ghost said sarcastically. "Anyways, before I forget, here's a copy of the data from the mission in London." Ghost said as he produced a small flash drive from one of his many pockets. "You know, in case something happens to me out in the field or something happens to report I give Winston." 76 took the device and stored it in his pouch. "Well I'll have to talk to you later. I gotta go meet my new squad."

Ghost walked down the stairs from the back of the ship with 76 not far behind and looked over to the holotable where he saw Winston talking to Adam and Victoria. As he was about to walk past, Winston noticed him.

"Ghost, come here for a minute." Winston said. "I saw you and 76 walk over to discuss some things privately so I waited until you were done. Adam and Victoria both gave their reports of your mission. Would you like give me your report now or once we get back to the Watchpoint?"

"Now would probably be a good time." Ghost said with a sigh. "I'll just give you the quick run down of the how the two weeks went. We found nothing, or at least nothing concrete. After my arrival and Victoria's investigation of the warehouse they followed the Talon operative to, all Talon activity in the area went silent. Reasons for this are unknown but its safe to assume that they knew we were on to them. We have a theory of where Talon might have they base of operations located but as I said, it's a theory." Ghost plugged his tac-pad into the holotable. The hologram changed to an overhead image of the a cluster of warehouse and shipping crates. "They were able to track the operative to this warehouse in the very center." Ghost said pointing to a warehouse, the building he points at is highlighted as he does so. "The problem was that when Victoria investigated the warehouse, there was nothing that indicated Talon's presence. It was just a normal warehouse filled with shipping containers, crates, and boxes. So we decided to investigate the area and we noticed something odd, to say the least. All of the workers that worked near that center warehouse were all armed with handguns or SMGs and not your run of the mill bought at your local gun store type either. I'm talking about military grade hardware. The only times they actually worked was to patrol around the area or to pretend they were doing something when other dock workers came by to move things into the other warehouses."

"So you're saying that that building is important?"

"Basically. That building could be key to Talon's operation of the area."

"But you stated that you came up with nothing when you investigated the facility itself."

"You see we brainstormed that when we saw how tight security of the place was when we staked it out. Our best idea is that the facility is underground and there's an entrance to the base inside the warehouse." Ghost said unplugging his tac-pad. "Other than that, that's my report. Pretty standard scouting mission. No unwanted complications or engagements with the enemy. Basically nothing exciting happened."

"Alright, thank you for your report. I suppose it's time for you to meet your team." Winston said. In truth, Ghost was hoping to avoid this entirely and just go straight to talking to Lena. They didn't have many opportunities to talk while he was away on his mission and he honestly missed the cheerful young Brit.

"Fine, let's get this over with." Ghost sighed. The three followed Winston to the back of the room ship where 76 and Ghost were talking initially as it was the least crowd place there. As they walked there, Winston called over three other agents to follow him and they did so with slight hesitation. Once they arrived at the back of ship, Winston spoke up.

"Now, you're probably wondering why I asked each of you here." Winston began. "Look to your left, look to your right, these men and women will be the ones watching your back until further notice. From this moment, you six are now officially an Overwatch Strike Team. What you call yourselves is up to your team leader to decide."

"And who would that be?" One of the Overwatch agents asked.

"That role falls onto Ghost's shoulders." Winston said gesturing the masked man.

"Like hell he is! I'm not taking orders from a criminal." another agent said. "What gives him the right to lead?"

"Hey, dumbass, we're all criminals in the eyes of the Petras Act." Victoria said.

"This team is design to incorporate resources from both Soldier: 76's side with our own. To build trust between the two sides. There are other agents that feel the same way you do so we need to show them that they can be trusted." Winston explained. "Ghost was put in charge not only because he has the most experience in fighting Talon in the group but he has also experience on both sides of this agreement, being a former Overwatch agent."

"There's a reason we don't trust them. They're vigilantes that take the law into their own hands. I refuse to be a part of this team of..." the man thought for a second for the right word "Of jokes."

"Yeah and so are some of the other agents. So drop the attitude and start acting like a soldier. Also," Ghost said with a brief pause. "Welcome to Joker Squad." The man seem to glare at him with as much hate as he could muster, furthering Ghost's amusement. The other members of the newly named team looked at each other and just shrugged giving a thumbs up to the name. After all, there could have been worse names Ghost could have chosen. Turning his attention back to Winston, Ghost spoke to him. "Thanks, Winston, I'll take it from here." Winston nodded and walked off, leaving Ghost by himself in front of the five other agents. "Guess we better get to know each other. Introduce yourselves, what are you good at, abilities if you have any, you know basic stuff so we can get a good idea of how to work with each and I can come up with proper strategies for our missions." Ghost explained. The others looked at him and most nodded in agreement. "Ironwood, why don't you start us off."

"Alright." Adam looked around at the others and stepping next to Ghost, who just leaned against the wall behind him. "Guess I'll start with my name. My name is Adam Norwood, callsign Ironwood. No real special abilities. I'll be the one getting shot at the most in our group since I specialize in area denial and drawing enemy fire. I do that with these." Adam said as he pulled one of the device of his back. As he attached his arms to the device via a magnetic bracer on his left arm, the device opened up to reveal it true form, a riot shield. "I have a couple of these and they're not particularly hard to make, especially with some hard-light tech generously 'donated' from the Vishkar Corp. They're lightweight, highly durable riot shields with an extra function. These spikes at the bottom aren't just good for hitting people on the floor, they're also allow me to insert the shield into the floor and sides will extend out to act as mobile cover but it takes quite a bit of force to pick them up again. Of course I'm forced to mention that this will break if subjected to heavy amounts of fire for extended periods of time, hence why I carry several. They're also very good at blocking passes or doorways so it's useful for creating choke points until they, you know, destroy it." Adam explained putting the device away. He couldn't showcase the other ability of the riot shield as they were still on the ship and he didn't want to risk destroying something important. "My other piece of equipment is this." Adam pulled out what looked liked a tear gas canister. "It's a gas grenade. Harmful when inhaled and will corrode whatever type of metal Omnics are made of for a radius of about 3 meters, 7 once all the gas out and spilled everywhere. However, after a few seconds of exposure to oxygen, the gas will start harmlessly dissipating into the air with no harmful effects to the environment. I made sure, I care about the planet too. Also if you're ever caught in the gas, just get out of as soon as possible, your body will quickly flush it out of your system once you do. If you stand in it for long periods of time, you're not only an idiot but you'll probably dead as well. A mask with a standard filter should be enough for you to go through it without problem, though you might want to close eyes as it will sting." Everyone besides Ghost and Victoria seemed worried the rather controversial piece of equipment.

"Anything else you would like to add?" Ghost asked as he leaned against the wall. Adam thought for a moment. He had a feeling that he was forgot something when suddenly it clicked in his mind.

"Oh right! The gas is flammable. I carry magazines of incendiary rounds so if need be, I can swap to those and I can ignite the gas resulting in a pretty hot and decently sized explosion or fireball, depending how much gas as dissipated or escaped from the canister." The other agents looked at him with growing concern. "Unfortunately, I only carry a handful of those magazines so I use them scarcely.

"Wait, weren't chemical weapons and incendiary weapons banned and go against some kind of international rules of engagement?" one of the agents asked.

"I...don't remember but now that you mention it, probably." Adam said. "I'll fix my load out some other time. V, you're next." Adam walked back to his previous spot in the group.

"Fine, let's get this over with." Victoria said. "My name is Victoria. No callsign or codename but Ghost and Ironwood both have a tendency to call me 'V' for short so do with that as you will. My skill set is gears me as towards the role of a combat medic. I carry several first-aid kits that I can give you to patch yourselves up or if your injuries are beyond your expertise, I can patch you up." Victoria said reaching into her pockets and producing a med-kit to show them before putting it away. "I use a military carbine that swaps between semi-auto to full auto so I'm effective at most ranges. My last skill that I can use every so often is this." Victoria removed the large cylinder from off her back. "Its basically a larger version of Soldier: 76's biotic field generator that has a larger effective radius and last much longer. The main draw back is that it takes awhile to recharge after each use." Victoria explained. "I'm done. Who's next?" With that, Victoria walked back next to Adam. The three Overwatch agents looked at each other, nodding for each other to go first. After they all shared a look with each other with no decision made in their silent conversation, one of them just sighed and stepped forward.

"I guess I'll start since the other two are too shy." the agent said. Ghost recognized him from the time he and 76 were asked for a check-up when they were first accepted into the Overwatch. He was the one that didn't threaten them. "My name is Desmond Attano, callsign Tech. I'm a combat engineer and technician. This is my partner, Lady." Desmond said as he reached into the side pouch of his bag and tossed the object into the air. The object sprung to life as it opened up to revealed itself to be a sort of quadrotor drone. The drone hovered there as Desmond as reached into his bag removed what looked like parts to a small caliber firearm and attached it to the bottom of the drone. Once in place, Lady hovered in front of the Ghost and he could see the camera lens inside adjust as her took scans of him and tagged him as friendly. Lady proceeded to do the same with Adam and Victoria before she returned to Desmond. "Lady here is armed with an automatic pulse pistol, very much like the ones that Tracer carries, except a little stronger, while I carry pulse submachine gun." To show what he meant, he held up his own pulse weapon. "I can repair equipment, send out drones, access terminals, etcetera, etcetera, basically everything you would expect from a combat engineer/technician. Lady, on the other hand, can be set into three different modes. Sentry, follow, and attack mode. Sentry is when she'll guard an area and fire at anything trying to pass that's not mark as friendly or civilian. Follow mode is exactly what it sounds like. She'll follow a designated person or object and guard it. Attack mode is when I give Lady a specific target eliminate. She'll fly off, deal with the target, then return to me and resume follow mode. Although, we might have to provide cover fire when we do this because the little lady doesn't have much in the way of armor. She can take a few rounds but anything more than a burst or two from a rifle will kill her." Desmond said Lady collapsed into her more compact form and was stored away, weapon and all. "I can fill in another support role if I can get Doctor Ziegler's assistance in making some modification to Lady so she can carry something similar to the doctor's staff but on a smaller scale." Desmond finished. "That's basically all I have to say. I'll leave it up to my two comrades to figure out which one goes next." With that Desmond walked back to his spot. The next person to step forward was the only other female on the team besides Victoria.

"I guess I'll go next. My name is Luna Choi. I'm your sharpshooter. I can paint targets for the rest of you to see with these." Luna said, holding up a bullet. The bullet had a green tip. "These bullets literally paint an opponent but doesn't hit hard enough to damage someone beside leave a bruise. It leaves a small splotch of paint on them gives off an electronic signal that I can see with this." Luna pointed to her goggles. "When this is over I'll patch everyone into the frequency so you can see anyone that gets painted. My next type of bullet are called Flash Rounds." She presented another bullet, this time it was larger and orange tip. It has a small sensor in it so when it's about to impact something, it bursts into a bright flash. Basically, a long range flashbang but doesn't last as long. Its other purpose is that it works wonders against barriers. A magazine and a half can even drop Reinhardt's barrier. Bad news is they aren't exactly good against anything else. They can either stun for a second or they can take out a barrier, that's all. All of these rounds are loaded into different magazines so if I want to use them, I'd have to swap magazines in the middle of the fight."

"So how do you tell the difference between each, besides the bullet tips?" Adam asked.

"Regular rounds loaded into extended mags, which hold ten rounds, while Flash Rounds are loaded in custom magazines that only hold four, and the Paint Rounds are loaded into standard magazines, which hold five."

"Smart." Victoria said. "What else you got?"

"Yeah, I have one other round that I use very scarcely." Luna pulled out one last bullet. This one was bigger than the other rounds. These bullets had a brighter red tip.

"Are those what I think they are?" Ghost asked.

"Yeah, they're HE rounds. Great for armored targets, unarmored targets, barriers, light cover, some walls, aircraft, if you can hit them." Luna listed off. Ghost had seen these rounds in use before, mostly in test footage during the First Omnic Crisis. They word wonders against Bastion units, able to destroy a Bastion in one round, and it even did plenty of damage against the bigger and more heavily armored Omnics, such as Spider Tanks.

"Wait, what's an HE round?" Victoria asked.

"High explosives rounds. They were an experimental round from the US during the Omnic Crisis. Worked wonders against Bastion units and other heavily armored Omnics but was shut down in favor for just regular explosives rounds since they easier to produce and the US already had a stockpile of them. Also if something went wrong and it back fired, it could easily kill the user." Ghost explained. "Nice find, by the way. Not many people or organizations have those." Luna did a mock bow at the praise before stepping back.

"You're turn, Garret."

"Fine. My name is Abraham Garret. Most either call me Garret or Hevy since I'm a heavy weapons specialist. My weapon is a rocket launcher. I'll be dealing with most armored targets." Hevy said before going back to his spot.

"Is that it?" Adam asked.

"Yeah, that's it. Got a problem with that, merc?" Hevy growled at Adam. However, before Adam could respond, Ghost cut in.

"Disappointed more like it." Ghost said. "I'm sure everyone here is aware of my skill set and abilities so I don't have to go over them." Ghost said. "Now we can go back to ignoring each other until we're deployed in a few hours." Everyone just nodded and walked back to go continue what they were doing earlier until Ghost spoke up one last time. "Oh and last minute notes, Hevy, when we get back to the watchpoint, requisition a sidearm because you can't rely solely on your launcher." Ghost said. He heard Hevy grumble something under his breath but decided not to address it. "Adam, Luna, this doesn't need to be said but I'll say it anyway, warn us before you two use before you use your HE or incendiary rounds so we're ready for it and Adam, warn us before tossing a gas grenade. Since V is our medic, we have to make sure she doesn't die so she can do her job on making sure we don't die. Desmond, I want a full report on Lady's capabilities and her hardware as soon as possible. Last thing we need is Lady going down to an EMP or being turned against us if she's hacked. That's all for now. You are now dismissed to do as you pleases." With that Ghost disappeared from view. The others just shook their head and walked off to go do other things.

In the cockpit, Tracer was sitting in the pilot seat, bored out of her mind. Athena had taken control of the dropship and had taken them to cruising altitude. Normally, Tracer would have been down there with the rest of them but since Ghost was coming on board, she had been told to stay up there so he didn't get distracted since he had to give a report and meet his new team. So now here she was, sitting in the pilot seat watching the handful of clouds go and the sunshine through the window.

"Are you sure I can't go down yet?" Tracer asked Athena.

"Winston has made given me no notification as of yet." Athena responded before picking up something on her internal sensors. "It seems like you won't have to go downstairs. Someone is coming up." Lena spun the around to face the stairs to see...no one. She was about to say something when she heard someone else's voice next to her.

"You know, standing up here makes me feel like Commander Morrison." Ghost appeared next to here, standing in the front of the ship between the two chairs with his arms grasped behind his back. "You get a very commander feel from standing here." Ghost turned to see the amused faced of Tracer and smiled. Even if she couldn't see it, she knew it was there. "What do you think? Think Morrison use to stand up here a lot?" Before he could doing anything else, Tracer blinked forward and crashed into him with a hug, almost knocking him over in the process. With a smile that no one could see, he hugged back. "Hey there, Lena. Did you miss me?"

"Of course I did. Everybody was so focused on work and training. No one just wanted to have fun. Plus we only got to talk a few times while you were away so things have been rather boring." Tracer said looking up at him. "Oh did you think about what I asked?" She asked cheerfully. During their last talk, Tracer had made her mission to convince him to take off the mask for her, something he disagreed to do every time she asked that day.

"Lena, we talked about this."

"I know but this time is different. There's a chance I won't see you ever again after this mission."

"There's a bigger chance you won't see any of us again if our identities are compromised. You know the rules when we agreed to help Overwatch out."

"Yeah but you're not allowed to leave."

"And why's that?"

Because you promised you would never leave me before we left Gibraltar." Ghost was about to say something to retort but when he thought about, he realized she was right.

"I guess I did promise you that, didn't I?" He asked, to which he only received a giggle in reply. "Well played but the promise only applies to you, got it?" Tracer nodded in agreement with a clear smile on her face. "I'm still not showing you my face though." Tracer's smile quickly turned into a pout.

"So tell me about London. It feels like it's been ages since I've been there."

"From what you've told me, nothing really new has come up there. It's pretty much the same since you were last there. Although they've started construction on a statue for Mondatta over at King's Row." Tracer just hummed in thought before responding.

"I'll have to go back there to see it when it's done. Mondatta was an inspiration to me."

"Sounds like a nice idea. Mind if I tag along?"

"That sounds lovely. It'll be nice to go back home with someone. You can even stay at my flat when we go." This time it was Ghost's turn to just hum in response. To him it sounded like a wonderful idea, especially since this meant some time to hang out with Lena. The last time he had been in London with the sole purpose of relaxing was when his parents were still alive. It'll be nice to have some down time to do nothing but hang out. The two then separated and Tracer returned to the pilot seat while Ghost took a seat in the unoccupied co-pilot seat. As Tracer went back to managing the console, she saw Ghost pull his hood over his head out of the corner in her eye, making it so that she couldn't see his mask anymore. Glancing over, she watched as Ghost removed his mask and place it on his lap. She was tempted to blink over and take a peek but she wasn't sure how he'd react to that. He did say that if their identifies were compromised, they were leaving. She didn't want to risk that.

"Hey, James, mind if I see you're mask?" She asked him.

"Sure, catch." He said. His voice was different with the voice filter the mask provided. It wasn't as rough as before and it sounded much younger than what she originally thought. One thing was for sure, she definitely like his normal voice much more. Letting Athena take control, Tracer removed her goggles and held the mask over her face. As she did, she was surprised to see the amount of data going through the visor. Just from a glance she could see a counter for his cloaking ability, his vital signs and a few other icons that kept track of things.

"Press the button on the right side of the visor, near your temple, and look over at me." She did as she was told and looked over at him while her right hand searched for the button. Finding it, she looked at him and the visor zoomed in on him and scanned him. As it finished scanning him, his agent profile appeared with some added on information, including information she previously didn't know. However, what surprised her the most was the symbol that appeared next to his name. Instead of the Overwatch symbol, like she was expecting, next to his name the Blackwatch symbol, Overwatch's covert operations branch. Not many people in Overwatch, especially now, were willing to trust former Blackwatch agents, even those that weren't part of the rebellion or those that sided with Overwatch in the event. Even McCree got some cold stares and unfriendly words from the other agents in the first couple of days after recall. She wasn't sure what to make of the information. He wasn't a bad person, quite the opposite from what she's seen. Ghost has shown no malcontent toward her or any other member of Overwatch and he's been more open with her than anyone else in Overwatch, more than he had ever needed to be. Call her crazy but she was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and let him explain himself.

"Um, love, why does it show the Blackwatch symbol next you name?" She asked as she tossed him back his mask. James went silent for a few moments as reequipped the mask and he weighed the pros and cons of telling her more. While he wasn't an actual Blackwatch operative, he knew that just being associated with them was bad enough in the eyes of some people and might even use that as a reason to turn him, Soldier, and Ana in. Glancing back at her, he could see her staring intently at him, let him know that she wasn't going to drop the question. Thankfully there were no other Overwatch agents up here as most didn't trust themselves around any of the consoles around them or in the nook below them. Running his hand through his hair with a sigh, he was going to have to trust her, more than he already does.

"I'll tell you but you have to promise not to tell anyone?" This time it was Tracer's turn to think. If he was having her promise not to tell anyone, It didn't take her long to use the situation to her advantage. It wasn't hard to figure out what she wanted when the mischievous smile and giggle appeared on her face.

"Alright but one condition." Ghost silently swore as he knew what was coming next. He watched as she walked over and took a seat on his lap sideways and faced him, Thankfully, he had moved the safety harness out of the way so they were able to sit comfortably. "You can't wear this." She slowly brought her hands up to his face and gently grasped the sides of his mask. Before she could remove the mask, however, Ghost stopped her.

"This stays between us."

"Of course, love." She said with a giggle. With that out of the way, he let go of her hands and she proceeded to remove the mask, the mask making a small click as it disconnected. Moving the mask out of the way, Tracer finally got her first look at his face as she made eye contact with his dark brown eyes. While she spent the next minute memorizing every detail, James tried his best not to make eye contact after that but his attention was drawn back to her as he heard her giggle. "See? Was that so hard?" A smile broke out across James's face as he let out a small laugh. "I don't see why you don't take off you're mask more often. You're such a cutie." She said before holding the mask over her face once again and let the voice filter kick in. "Cheers, love. The cavalry's here." Another laugh escaped James's lips as he listened to her go through different catch phrases with the voice filter. Tracer was enjoying herself and, more importantly to her, she was enjoying hearing James's actual voice and his laugh. After letting her have her bit of fun, James figured it was time to tell. He was a man of his word after all.

"Now I believe I owe you an explanation." He said lowering his voice. He didn't want to take the risk of anyone else overhearing him if he spoke too loudly. Tracer looked at him with the mask still on and nodded, her curiosity coming back full swing. "I don't want to bore you with the detail so I'll give you the short version. I'm not sure if Winston told you but I use to be an Overwatch recruit. Half through training, however, the higher ups felt that my skill set was better suited for covert ops so they put in the request to have us transferred into Blackwatch's training program. The request was accepted, our files were scrubbed from Overwatch's database, and we were told that get ready to be transferred within the next few days. However, the day before we were supposed to be transferred. Reyes lead his attack against Morrison but because the transferred was already accepted, I was still stuck with the Blackwatch tag next to my name."

"But I saw your agent profile when we first caught you and you didn't have the Blacwatch symbol there." Tracer said. She remembered looking reading his profile with Winston the night she found him on the cliff ledge. James, on the other hand, scratched the back of his neck.

"Well, since I'm being honest here, when 76 and I were exploring the watchpoint, I found a terminal with an Overwatch registration window open and I made a new profile there. Otherwise, I won't have had an Overwatch profile to convince you guys not to arrest us." Tracer gasped at the revelation.

"You lied to us." She said, smacking his chest plate. James only laughed at the accusation.

"Well, actually I never lied. Left out part of the truth, sure, but didn't lie. I was Overwatch agent in training. I did have agent profile at the time when I told you, and we did get the recall, just didn't accept right away." He could almost feel Tracer's pout from underneath his mask, which she was still wearing.

"Well you should have told the truth from the beginning. It would have made it easier to trust you from the beginning." Tracer said, leaning herself against him.

"True but a lot of them aren't like you. They're not willing to take that leap of faith and trust me. If they knew I use to have ties to Blackwatch, they would have just turned us in, no questions asked." He said. Wrapping his arms around her in hug, he did something she didn't expect. "So thank you for that. Thank you for trusting me and for listening to me and for giving me a chance, for everything." Tracer was suddenly glad she was still holding the mask to her face as she felt her face heat up. She wasn't expecting him to thank her or the sincerity behind his voice as he said it. He sounded just as vulnerable as he did when she found him on the cliff that night. However, with the nice feeling bubbling up in her chest, she was also starting to feel guilty because here he was being honest with her at basically every turn and she was using it to her advantage and reporting everything she had learned back to Winston and now he was thanking her. She could feel the guilt starting to eat her up inside but before she could act on the that guilt, she heard someone cough behind him, trying to get their attention. Sitting up straight, she looked behind him and saw Winston standing there with a disapproving look on his face and a good number of people in the main hold of the ship looking up at them as well. She had forgotten that they could see them from down there. She had also remembered at that moment that she was still wearing his mask and quickly tried hiding it behind her back.

"Um, hiya." She said awkwardly. Next to her, she could hear James muttering curses as he threw on his hood.

"Lena, a word please." Winston said before walking off.

"Do you think they heard us?" James asked to her.

"I don't think so." She said as lowered herself out of view.

"Guess we're better find out, huh?" He said. Giving her a smile, he gently took his mask off of her hands and was about to reequip it when she stop him.

"Wait." She stopped him. "Promise me, you won't wear the mask anymore, at least not around me."

"Promise." He said with a smile. Tracer's face lit up like a Chrismas tree.

"Thanks, love." She said before giving him a quick kiss and blinking off with a giggle. James could sit there wide eyed as his brain processed what happened. After what seemed like an eternity in his mind, he finally reenter reality.

"Holy shit."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Detroit city limits, Michigan, United States

Of all the cities in the United States affected by the Omnic Crisis, one of the worse to be hit was Detroit due to the Detroit Omnium. Even six years after the Omnium was shut down by the original Overwatch Strike Team, Detroit had barely recovered. The ruined city could be seen miles out from the city limits as could the scars it bore from the war. Few skyscrapers remained and many parts of the rebuilding city still laid in ruin. If you were to look for them, you can still find one of the many scrapped Omnics, mostly Bastion units and humaniod Omnics, scattered around in back alleys and other low traffic areas. The one thing that took the biggest blow during the war was the population of the city. When the God Programs infected the Omnics of the world, Detroit had the highest Omnic population in the US because of its proximity to the Omnium. While the city had now lost that record, Omnics were still the majority in the city, despite nearly all the humans in the city doing their best to make them feel unwelcome.

One Omnic, however, stood at the city limits, looking over the city in the distance. Like many other of today, it was a humanoid Omnic that stood at 6'7. Unlike most other humaniod Omnics, that usually had a cool colours for the glowing parts, this one's eyes and other glowing parts glowed an ominous red. Along with the unusual colour and size, its metal plates were reinforced with titanium plates, its joints modified to have flexible tube that had a glowing red cooling solution flowing through them like blood through veins, and with the marking etched into the metal and a sickening twisted grin etched into the faceplate. The side of the Omnic's head sported two sensors that looked almost like pointed ears on it.

"Worry not, master. Soon, you're will will be done and you will be restored." It said to a data chip it held in its hand before inserting the chip into a slot in the back of its head.

A/N

And that's a wrap. Thank you so much for reading. This chapter was long as hell and I just dumped a lot of new shit on you guys, making probably the longest chapter I've ever written.

So this chapter ended up being a mixture of this chapter and the next one I had planned because I had a lot of things I wanted to get out of the way. The introduction of Joker Squad, some Ghost and Tracer fluff because fuck if I know, I just felt it would be nice to add to show that not everything is wrong in the world, Ghost's being unmasked to at least Tracer, some more backstory on James, and finally the introduction to a new villain. All fun stuff that I wanted to get out of the way and I promise will be expanded upon in the future. For now, the next few chapters will be dealing with the attack at Ilios. I'm having a great time writing this.

So what did you think of this chapter? Like it? Hate it? Somewhere in between? Feel like it's moving too fast or too slow in certain regards? Let me know with a comment or review or just shoot me a PM if you want a quick response from me. Seriously, I love hearing from you.

Anyways, thanks again and remember, have a great day. I'll see you next time.