Leigh Wynne trudged wearily up the dropship's ramp, joints aching painfully, sore and bleeding a little from multiple punctures in arm and hips. It was still cold out, undoubtedly so, but she didn't care, as she began unbuckling parts of her armor. The exoskeleton would require Winston's assistance to remove, but for now, she'd settle for taking the armor off. The Overwatch dropship had landed on one of the Russian Spetsnaz bases in the meltdowned Omnium's vicinity. Before her lay a dozen buildings, ranging from two hangars to a half dozen buildings that served as the barracks, mess hall, and command center. A tower sat between the two hangars, which were to her left, and there was a rather measly chainlink fence surrounding the entire compound. Directly in front of her lay the icy road out of this wasteland. Also directly in front of her, on the frozen but cleared 'helipad' similar to the one her dropship was currently on, stood the three remaining Russian mechs. Her own and two of the Russians had lost their mechs with the activation of the AI's defenses. Those pilots, a group of the Overwatch agents that were attacking from the other end (which had distracted the majority of the anti-personnel Bastion units inside the facility, while her own group distracted all of the anti-armor units), and a crowd of Spetsnaz and Russian military officials all stood in a group, talking to each other. The highest of officials- another political officer, but a general at that- was speaking to Commander Amari, likely debriefing her side of the battle. It was a surprisingly straightforward operation, as well- the blizzard gave them a massive advantage over the AI, who clearly wasn't expecting such a tactic.
The Spetsnaz had already confirmed her suspicions, though, when she was talking to them a few minutes earlier. The other AI-controlled Omniums had shored up defenses, small robots being seen traveling around the outer edge of the perimeter. The current theory was that they were either remote sensor nodes, that were being placed, or mines. Both seemed most likely. The same strategy wouldn't work twice.
On the bright side, they did destroy the most remote of Omniums. While that may seem somewhat backwards- shouldn't one focus on destroying the closest Omniums?- Wynne saw it as a sound strategy. By taking out the backline, of sorts, the Omniums remaining were effectively landlocked and trapped, there being no way for them to reach the sea, or use this area's resources. They were closer to other Russian military elements, meaning that any responses to those Omniums would be far faster.
Leigh Wynne pulled out a small wrench, sliding it into a slot on her side. After briefly fiddling with it, she finally caught on the knob. A moment later, she felt the armor around her chest loosen, letting her breath a little bit more (albeit, far more coldly). She repeated the action on the opposite side, and the armor automatically unhitched itself from each other, front and back pieces falling to the titanium-alloy dropship ramp. Reaching forward, she snatched it before it could slide to the ground, and tossed it inside the dropship. A moment later saw the second plate follow it. She also removed her upper leg/thigh armor, using a similar process. Those found their way to the main of the dropship as well.
Breathing a little easier with only her Overwatch jumpsuit and the exoskeleton's carbon nanotube jumpsuit (which was about thirteen times better than a kevlar jumpsuit, in terms of density, protection, and warmth) on, she stretched a bit, wincing at the sharp pains from the flechette penetrations. The armor only covered the exoskeleton, key areas, and assisted the nanotube jumpsuit's protection. By piercing the jumpsuit, one lost the strength and integrity of quite a bit of the jumpsuit, no longer being as environmentally protective. Even now, she was freezing. Glancing at her shoulder, she winced, seeing that she had lost enough blood to stain half of her arm and the entire area around the wound red. When she flexed her arm, a lance of pain stabbed through her. Relaxing it, she saw another few ounces of blood abruptly leak out.
Heaving herself off her feet, she turned to go inside the dropship, to its first aid kit, before something stopped her.
"Princeps Lylla," spoke a thick but recognizable Russian accent, "It appears you have brought your second Omnium to an end. I see my decision to request Overwatch aid was not in vain."
Turning her body just enough for her to glance over her shoulder at the visitor, she shrugged.
"Just doing my duty, sir. This Omnic Crisis needs to end."
"Agreed, Lylla. And please, no formalities. I know you prefer being called Lylla, and I prefer being called my name."
Lylla stared at the man for several long moments. She knew his name, she just hated acknowledging the man and his ego. No matter what he said, he still held notable control and influence over her.
"Aye, Alexei Volskaya. Many thanks for allowing us to use your prototypes. It functioned quite well up until it got shot."
The man's grin widened, despite the fact that he lost a multibillion dollar war machine.
"Ah, yes, things tend to go wrong when you get shot. Such as your arm, for example. Do you need assistance? I have a doctor with me that could patch it up in no time at all. A flechette wound, I understand it?"
Leigh impatiently waved him off, replying, "That won't be necessarily, Alexei. What else do you want?"
The man chuckled, "Straight to the point, as always. I was just looking into offering you-"
"No."
Alexei paused a moment, raising an eyebrow at her interruption.
"I wasn't trying to recruit you again. I would love to have you train our men, and maybe throw those political officers into a tiffy about you superseding their power- they really have too much of it for the military to be effective anymore- but you've made it clear about your intentions to the world, not just your friends."
Leigh didn't exactly count him a 'friend,' but she knew she wouldn't be able to convince the fifty-five-year-old prodigy otherwise. The aging, white-haired father of the 'Defender of the People" Katya Volskaya, the new face of Volskaya industries.
"No, I was offering you a… contract, of sorts. The Russian Federation will push for Overwatch to be reinstated, and for the Petras Act to be removed, and you will receive a dozen of our next stable combat mechanized infantry units."
"In exchange for?"
His smile twitched- he never liked someone not agreeing to his terms on the first pass.
"The mechs will have both the Overwatch and Volskaya industries logo, and you use them wherever possible. We'll even supply you a dropship to your specifications to carry them. And that you assist the Russian Federation against the Omnics wherever possible, of course."
That last part sounded more like it was tacked on, rather than a key point of the trade. Nonetheless, she sighed, and replied, "I am in agreement with your proposal, Alexei, but I am only a Captain. Talk to Ana-"
"I already have. She's agreed to go through with it if you are- which you just said." A victorious smile. Why was he so happy? He was effectively giving away billions of dollars for the promise of repeated assistance from people who would've already given it, and for advertising, really. He slunk off with escorts that appeared out of nowhere, as the rest of the Overwatch agents began returning to the dropship.
Inside, Angela forced her down onto the table and out of her exosuit, scolding her for not making it apparent earlier that she had been shot, repeatedly. Wynne followed her orders mutely, not particularly minding how much Angela grumbled about how Overwatch agents had an agenda to get themselves killed, or bled out, or quite a few other things. Wynne knew Angela's opinion- she thought of Overwatch to be a necessary evil, barely. Otherwise, she was glad that Overwatch was shut down. Wynne didn't agree, not in total, but then, everyone's entitled to their own beliefs.
Wynne refused to react as Angela wiped away the blood that had been soaking into her jumpsuit, sitting stolidly still as she poured some amount of antiseptic into all five of her puncture wounds, the worst getting a much larger dose than the others. Next, she unhooked the exosuit's nanite storage tank from her neck, and hooked in her staff. After a moment of pressing one of the staff's many buttons, she retracted its cable and instead hooked up Wynne's nanite-containing necklace, freshly refilled ever since she had replaced it- while nearly empty- with her exosuit, which contained its own battery of nanites. Satisfied that the wounds were clean and that the nanites would repair all the damage to her- Angela waited a moment to watch the cellular regeneration begin in her arm- Wynne was finally released. The punctures had stopped bleeding, but were nonetheless painful, considering Angela's lack of numbing agents. Nevermind that, Wynne thought, she was allowed to be back on her feet, "If you're careful," according to the good doctor.
Winston and most of the others were watching her. Wynne stared back at them, meeting their gazes.
"Omnium down, right Winston?"
"After that meltdown, and a reassuring airstrike to be safe, it's confirmed, Captain Wynne. The Omnium is out of business."
"Is the AI dead?"
"We don't currently know. We hope so, given the inability to broadcast anything at range, and that the entire facility was destroyed, but… we don't know for sure."
Leigh Wynne nodded, definitively.
"Nothing else we can do now but wait and see if the intelligence pops up again. Until then- well. That's your call, Winston."
"I guess so, Leigh. I've been informed that we'll be arriving at Gibraltar in three hours. If everything goes smoothly, we'll hopefully spend the next three weeks there before searching for a target. Good job everybody."