A/N: Set 5 years later. World's less messed up. Overwatch now legit and are celebrity heroes. Yeah. Don't take this one too seriously ok.
Fareeha kept her face buried in her hands, wishing the snickering would stop. The blush had burnt across her cheeks the moment Jack dropped the literal news on them. She peeked through her fingers at the screen in front of the briefing room, groaning again when she saw the stupid photo still displayed for everyone to see. It was of Fareeha and Hana walking through the streets of London, from the little vacation they took with a few others. The moment captured was just after Fareeha offered to buy the latest gaming rig for Hana's birthday. Hana, thoroughly overjoyed, flung her arms around the soldier and gave her a kiss on the cheek. An innocent, friendly peck. Captured by some stupid paparazzi's camera. Obviously, it had been blown out of proportion.
She was utterly mortified when Jack flashed the tabloid article on the screen. But Hana laughed so hard she almost knocked herself out on the table. Her reaction set off a chain of laughter that still had not subsided. Ten minutes passed, and they were still bent over in their chairs. Hana's hand slapped repeatedly against the table as she cackled breathlessly. She lifted her head to read the title out loud.
"Hana Song Dates Fellow Agent Fareeha Amari"
The Korean dissolved into another laughing fit. She locked her arms over her head as it rested on the table, shoulders shaking like she was a human earthquake.
"When were you going to tell me, Fareeha?" Angela said, grinning when Fareeha spun her chair around, gaping.
"Relax, babe," Hana managed to breathe through her cackles. She looked positively dizzy with humour, returning Fareeha's warning stare from across the table. "We'll straighten things out, easy. I can do it in a stream."
"Then do it!"
"Shouldn't we do it an official capacity first?" Lucio asked.
"Yes, I'll prepare a statement for the press," Jack replied. "Then Hana can follow up with a stream to confirm it."
"I have a question," Jesse spoke up. He shrugged his serape behind one shoulder, leaning both elbows on the briefing table. "If this can be resolved so easily, why'd you gather all of us here?"
The crowded room fell silent. Only the faint whirring of Bastion's gears could be heard as all eyes focused on Jack. Their leader stared back at Jesse with a straight face, before his gaze shifted to Ana, who sat near the head of the table. Ana smiled benignly, lifting her teacup for a sip. She made eye contact with her increasingly annoyed daughter, and winked.
That's it. This was how Fareeha would fall from grace. By murdering her own mother.
It did not take long for the Korean news to get wind of Hana's supposed 'scandal', and the media positively exploded. Worldwide. Reactions were divided. The first half of the masses expressed support for Hana and 'the bold expression of her sexuality and love'. Not to mention the increased interest in Fareeha, with more and more fan mail clogging her public inbox after a few days. Then the second half rose in objection, pointing out their age gap of 13 years, and denounced their non-existent relationship. So hate mail was introduced into her inbox as well, quantity growing until Fareeha gave up checking on it.
Hana seemed to be thriving on the attention – be it positive or negative. It gave her more site traffic and, to quote her exact words, she could now 'install a shower head that dispenses cash to bathe in'. There was a drastic increase in the number of viewers watching her combat streams. According to screenshots and saved clips, the chat room would go apeshit whenever Pharah entered the screen, with people typing 'OTP OTP OTP' over and over again. Despite the lack of Hana's confirmation, thousands latched onto their 'relationship' anyway. And Fareeha was getting more and more uneasy as the days passed.
Finally, about two weeks since the first tabloid article and nine days from their official statement, Hana was conducting a stream session to straighten things out.
"You ready, Captain?" Hana greeted her at the door, with a wide grin plastered on her face.
"Let's just get this over with," Fareeha groaned. She followed the young woman into her room, where two chairs were already set up in front of her computer. An assortment of snacks and drinks were neatly arranged around the table, out of the camera's field of view. Fareeha noted a few healthier choices like dried fruit and unsalted nuts, which were placed near her assigned seat. Well, points for consideration, I guess.
"Relax and look happier, habibti." Hana gave her a once over, taking in her standard-issue Overwatch jacket and t-shirt underneath. The Korean was wearing a V-neck tee from her online store, which had her signature bunny icon on the front. "You're really popular among the women, you know."
"I don't really care, ja-gi-ya."
Hana's chin recoiled into her neck. "You know I hate it when people say that, right? It's really cringe-y."
"Why do you think I did it?"
"Whatever. Just tone it down during the stream. We need to convince them we're not actually together."
"Sarang-hae, ja-gi-ya," Fareeha raised her voice to a fluttery pitch, grabbing Hana by her shoulders and placing exaggerated smooches on her head. Hana laughed and started slapping at her.
"Fuck off, you gross piece of shit." She finally pressed a palm to the front of Fareeha's face, pushing her unceremoniously away. "You're married, remember?"
"Just barely." Fareeha grinned, though her heart did a flip at Hana's reminder. She glanced down at the wedding band on her ring finger. It had been a year since she became Angela's wife, and the thought of it still made her weak in the knees.
"Jesus Christ," Hana said, shaking her head at Fareeha when she looked up. "Even when you're not together you still manage to be mushy. You're god-tier. Fucking god-tier."
Fareeha smirked. "Maybe you'd understand what we feel if you asked Vera out."
She reveled in the silent victory when Hana blushed and turned back to the screen. Overwatch had accepted a continuous stream of promising recruits since it regained its former glory. One of the recent recruits, an Italian engineer named Vera Carelli, soon became the object of Hana's affection. Fareeha noticed the Korean spending a lot of time with Vera, learning more about mechanics than she ever cared to when only Torbjörn was around. Vera obviously enjoyed her company, but the Italian's subtle suggestions were lost on the surprisingly dense mech pilot. The two would need an intervention soon.
"You think she likes me?" Hana asked, red fading from her cheeks.
"Of course. Even my mother can see it with her right eye."
"She doesn't have a right eye."
"Exactly."
"Oh." Hana bit her lip, bringing up the streaming software. She glanced over when Fareeha clapped a hand on her shoulder.
"Just go for it. What's the worst that could happen? Your pride gets wounded?" Fareeha said. "But think of all the good things if it goes well. You never know." She wiggled her fingers, showing Hana her wedding band.
"I'll…think about it," Hana acquiesced uncertainly. "But for now we have to make it clear I'm single, huh?"
"Let's go, then." Fareeha leaned in expectantly.
Hana gave her a last minute brief: stay cool, ignore haters and trolls, leave the talking to her, and enjoy it. It was…certainly an experience. Much more different than any interview she had ever done for news segments and conferences. This was obviously more casual and Hana, though she did tone it down, still cursed a little. Quite a few viewers lashed out at her when they confirmed they were not dating, and Hana's follower count dropped. Not too much, but Fareeha still felt a little bad. Hana did not seem to care though; she ploughed on and soon eased Fareeha into a comfortable routine of punting jibes and jokes at each other.
Then the door opened, and the two turned their heads to find Angela walking into the room. Fareeha was about to return her attention to the camera when Angela spoke out. Surprising, as they were familiar with Hana's number one rule: thou shalt not disturb the gamer during streams.
"Have you told them you're not dating?"
"Yeah. Why?" Hana asked.
Angela said nothing more. She strode over to Fareeha, whose eyes widened when Angela cupped her cheek, and enveloped her in a passionate kiss.
"Oh my fucking god," she heard Hana say behind her, but no move was made to part them.
Fareeha, despite tensing up when Angela's mouth met hers, found herself relaxing into the kiss. Angela's thumb caressed her cheek, and Fareeha held onto her wrist like an anchor. She gazed up at her wife when they parted, a little disoriented and in a state of disbelief. Angela had just kissed her in front of thousands of viewers, but Fareeha realised she did not care.
"Ah crap," Hana said, drawing the women's attention. "The chat server got overloaded."
Upon closer inspection, they saw the chat room had come to a standstill. At the bottom in grey font was: Server disconnected. Reconnecting…
But the true entertainment lay above the technical notice. Hana's viewers had gone berserk at their onscreen kiss, typing incoherent words and in some cases, just random letters slammed out by hysterical fingers. Hana announced a thirty minute break, and turned off the camera.
"We were doing just fine, Angie," Hana said, wearing a smile. "You didn't have to come in and steal my fans, you know."
"I just want everyone to know this one is mine." Angela hugged Fareeha's head to her chest. "Besides, it will be good for your follower count."
And it was. By the time Hana's stream went back on, Fareeha and Angela's kiss was already making its grand victory lap around the internet. Short clips and screenshots were shared endlessly. Hana's Twitter and Twitch follower count soared even higher, and suddenly the next hot power couple was the two Overwatch agents. Hana and Fareeha's 'scandal' not so much as faded into the background, but up and vanished like it never happened. The craze over them lasted for weeks until eventually, Angela stopped checking her inbox as well.
Then one day, they woke up to find #Pharmercy trending worldwide. An investigation into its source tracked it back to a mysterious Twitter account, with only one tweet to its name, created just the day the hashtag blew up. Its handle?
SniperQueenRa
"ja-gi-ya" = darling
"sarang-hae" = I love you