(See the end of the chapter for more notes .)

**MILD WARNING** There is discussion of major injury in this chapter, but it is brief.

Chapter Text

Of all the places Gabriel could have possibly been on a Thursday morning, crawling through a small passageway into a building that had been his personal hell for five-ish years was low on his list. The fact that he was in search of the woman that before the events of the previous night he had believed to be a being of pure evil with no hope of redemption dropped it even lower. But, if Emily was right and Moira had been pressed like the rest of them, deliberately disobeying orders meant to turn him and Amélie into emotionless zombies, could he live with himself if he simply left her to whatever fate was looming over her head?

No. No, he couldn’t.

Ahead of him, Jesse’s tiny holomap flickered in and out of existence. “Two more turns,” the cowboy called back, “left, then right. We’ll have about an eight-foot drop, so be careful and quiet.”

The last stretch felt like it lasted for years, but finally Gabriel was swinging down out of the maintenance tunnel and into the main hallway of the detention block. Satya pulled a small hard-light device out of her belt pouch and stuck it to a nearby wall monitor, then plucked it back off when it beeped.

“Did you make that?” Gabriel asked, looking closer as data flew past on its tiny screen. “It’s neat.”

“I designed it on the way here,” she said. “It should make this search a little bit quicker.” It beeped again, the flow of text stopping on a highlighted phrase. “Corridor four, cell F.”

Gabriel cursed. “Death row. We’ve gotta be fast. C’mon, to the left.”

They hurried as quickly and quietly as they possibly could, and he prayed to any god that was listening that no one had a sudden urge to take a stroll through the halls. When they reached the corridor, Jesse cautiously stuck his head out, looked both ways, and waved them down to the right.

“Should be this one,” he said. “I’ll just work my magic here…” With a flourish that came through endless practice, he slid a card up under the keypad, gave it a tap and a bump, and the pad dropped into his hand as the door slid open. “Like a charm.”

Angela gasped and darted into the room, Satya hot on her heels. Once Gabriel got a peek in, he could instantly see why. Moira was…not looking great. Her face was bruised, one eye was scarred and swollen shut, a hitch in her breathing indicated broken ribs, and when Angela shifted, he could see an empty sleeve where her right arm had been.

“Amé, we’ve got her,” Jesse said grimly into his comm. “It ain’t pretty.”

“We didn’t expect it to be,” Amélie’s voice crackled in Gabriel’s ear. “I will notify the other team. Once she is ready to be moved, let me know.”

“You got it.”

“Moira,” Angela whispered, lightly tapping the woman’s cheek. “Moira, wake up please.”

“…I don’t want to,” came a grumble, and Angela sat back on her heels in relief.

“We need you to sit up so we can get you outta here,” Jesse said. “Think you can do that?”

Moira’s brow crinkled, and a blue eye cracked open to squint at the people surrounding her. “What in hell are you doing here?” she rasped.

“There’s a beart bláthanna waiting for you back at base,” Gabriel said. “Figured you’d wanna go see it.”

There was a moment of silence, then Moira slowly uncurled from her fetal position and leaned against the back wall. “She was with you?”

Gabriel nodded. “We’ll tell you all about it on the way home, alright? Let’s get you patched up and out of this hellhole.”

“I won’t be able to walk.”

“That’s what Satya’s for.” On cue, Satya began piecing together a hard-light…something. “Be a good patient.”

The two doctors spoke in low voices as Angela lined the other woman’s remaining arm in biotic patches, then began relaying a list of medical orders to Amélie for prep. There was something unsettling about seeing the ever-capable Dr. O’Deorain helpless on a steel grate floor. Gabriel felt his guts twist and abruptly turned away to take watch at the door.

“Gabriel, Genji’s team’s extracting now,” Sojourn reported. “Mirembe’s doing her best, but there’s a large Talon force engaging the other teams. You may need to wait.”

It took everything in him not to turn around. “To be brutally honest, So, I dunno how long we can wait. She’s in real bad shape.”

“She’s in the hands of Dr. Angela Ziegler. There are worse places to be. Sojourn out.”

Jesse signed off of his call with Amélie and joined him at the door. “What’d she have to say?”

“Ground teams are in trouble,” Gabriel said. “Pick-up’s gonna be late.”

“Figures. We didn’t fuck up the infiltration, so I guess we had to pay the toll.”

“Don’t jinx us, mijo, we’re in the clear for now. It’s the rest I’m worried about.”

Before Jesse could offer anything further, Satya stepped between them. “Ready.”

“Then let’s move.”

-----

“Fareeha, on your six!”

“I see them!” The early morning sun glinted off the Raptora as its pilot wheeled around and obliterated the trio of bots on her tail. “You alright down there old man?”

“I’m hangin’ in,” Jack grunted. He slammed another cartridge into his rifle and took out a trooper who got a bit too close for comfort. “Everybody else okay?”

“Mildly stressed, not gonna lie,” Brigitte said. “Kinda need to pee.”

“Thank you for sharing,” Aleks deadpanned.

Hana let out a string of angry Korean followed by a heavy sigh. “Babe, now I have to pee.”

“Now is hardly the time for this!” Torbjörn snapped, turret fire audible over his feed. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’ve got a whole army on our tails!”

“Yeah, between me and the toilet.”

“Any word from Sojourn?” Jack asked, desperately trying to change the topic.

“Nothing since Jesse’s team found the cell,” Fareeha said grimly. “I asked for details on her condition, but if it’s taking this long I doubt the news is good.”

“Maybe we’ll get-”

“All units,” Sojourn’s voice crackled over the earpiece, “Jesse’s team is currently extracting O’Deorain from the rear of the building. She’s in bad shape, so if you can draw as much of their attention as you can, that would be great.”

Jack tapped his call button twice to signal the affirmative, then rung up Emily. “Hey there, sweetie. You doin’ okay?”

“Just worried,” she said, but he could hear the tension in her voice. “The baby seems to like all this business, though – she’s been kicking up a storm.”

“Sounds like a future agent to me.” Jack joked. A nearby explosion drew his attention to a fresh wave of troopers. “Hang in there, we’ll all be home soon.”

“You’d better. Base out.”

-----

Time always moved strangely during missions. When he’d first started, way back when he was an angry, frightened teenager, every mission had flown past with him struggling to keep up. Once he’d gotten better, they were more manageable. But sometimes, just sometimes, they were an eternity.

This, Jesse thought, was one of those times.

He was curled up under a ledge, close enough to the outdoors he could almost taste it. Just to his left, Moira’s labored breathing rung in his ears, and he found himself reflexively grabbing her remaining hand whenever she let out a muffled moan of pain.

“You don’t have to keep doing that,” she finally said out of gritted teeth. “I don’t need your pity.”

“Losin’ an arm is no joke, Doc,” he said. “Figured I could at least offer some understandin’.”

She squinted up at him. “McCree, you have two arms.”

“One ‘n a half, now.” He lifted his left to show her the replacement. “We can swap stories when you’re all healed up, sound alright?”

“Why are you being so…friendly? I ruined your father.”

Jesse shrugged. “Eh, I’ve seen his medical files. He was already pretty fucked up.” He paused. “I’m not gonna lie, I’ve got a bone or two to pick with you, but my sister-in-law speaks pretty highly of you so I’m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt.”

“There is better cover five yards forward in the tree line,” Amélie interrupted. “Get there as fast as possible. I have concerns about your current positions.”

“What sort of concerns?” Satya asked.

“Move now!”

Not needing any further prompting, Jesse scooped Moira out of her hard-light wheelchair and sprinted towards the indicated spot, the rest of the team hot on his heels. He barely made it halfway before an explosion threw him to his knees.

“Keep going!” Gabriel screamed. “Go go go go go!”

Satya yanked him up by the elbow, helping to resettle Moira before taking off running again. As they dove one-by-one into the bushes, he could hear her doing a headcount with a sigh of relief as Gabriel tossed himself down behind cover.

“Well I’ll be,” Jesse said, setting Moira down as gently as possible, “We McFreakin’ made it.”

“If you ever say that again,” Satya said, “I will punch you in the throat.”

Gabriel snorted. “‘Atta girl.”

“Is everyone alright?” Angela asked. Her usual ponytail had broken loose, letting her hair fall down around her shoulders. “No new catastrophic injuries?”

“Just a little singed, that’s all,” Gabriel said, presenting his leg for inspection. “I’m fine for now but it’ll hurt like a bitch later.”

“Amélie,” Jesse asked, “what next?”

“Genji’s team is en route to your position,” she said. “They should be in sight-range momentarily. Once you meet up, there is a clearing ten yards further in. Mirembe will pick you up from there.”

“What about the ground teams?”

“I don’t know, Jesse. Désolé.”

-----

“I’m running low on rockets,” Fareeha reported grimly, “and from up here all I see is more Elites and OR-15s.”

Jack cursed. “How many more runs have you got, kid?”

“Maybe ten.”

Dammit.

“Jack, Torb’s running low on spare turret parts,” Emily crackled over the comm, “so if anyone could salvage an omnic or four that would be grand.” From off to the left cam a cry of “medic!”, sending Brigitte sprinting over, and above him Hana shot past in her mech, two little flying bots hot on her heels.

They were running out of time.

“Em,” Jack said, “I may have to do something crazy. Don’t tell Gabe.”

“I am absolutely telling Gabe. What the hell are you on about?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m worrying about it, Dad!”

He loaded his rifle, checked his stock, and braced himself for what was surely about to be incredibly painful. “Nah, it’s gonna be fine, just-” Before he could start the charge, he was suddenly yanked further behind cover.

“Don’t you worry, base,” said a familiar voice. “Sergeant Nicoli reporting in. Commander’s not doing anything stupid on my watch.”

Jack whipped around and was greeted by a wide, sparkling grin. “Maddelena?”

“In the flesh,” she said. “How rude of you, very much alive and you didn’t once write. I’m hurt.”

“I didn’t – what?” He accepted the water bottle she offered and took a long swig. “Winston said you turned down the recall.”

“I was three days postpartum,” she said dryly. “Somehow I do not think Overwatch would have appreciated a pair of screaming newborns.”

“You’d be surprised.” Jack stood, pumped a nulltrooper squad full of bullets, and dropped back down again. “You came at a bad time. We’re outnumbered by…a lot.”

“I see that,” Maddelena replied, peeking out around the wall. “Is this all you have? Six people?”

“Little over two dozen.”

“You’ve got more than that now,” she said, and whipped out a comm of her own. “Subito!”

A shout came from behind them, and Jack’s jaw dropped in shock as waves of his old troops poured out to counter Talon’s forces. Medics, foot soldiers, lieutenants, sergeants, strategists, all rushing in endless waves to the defense of their family.

“I…Maddie, how?” he whispered.

Maddelena squeezed his shoulder. “I’ll fill you in later,” she promised. “We have some butt to kick.”

-----

The sun peaked on a ruin. The Talon headquarters was a wreck, and as the last Overwatch-emblazoned transport left Rome, authorities and news agencies alike swarmed like flies. “Removal of a blight,” locals called it. Others cried out against the “dangerous vigilantes,” while still more heaped praise on the “civilians” who put an end to the fray.

A UN address released by evening.

It is clear, in fact undeniable, that Overwatch activity has resumed. In what capacity is not yet known. While such activity is indeed illegal under the Petras Act of 2071, it has become obvious to the members of this body that there is much to consider and debate. An investigation is ongoing. Any persons with information are encouraged to share.

-----

Emily hummed softly, rocking in the chair Aleks had brought in for her as she patiently waited for the slightest motion from the woman on the hospital bed beside her. The urgency with which Baptiste and Angela had taken Moira away had been alarming. Even still, her aunt was not out of the woods, but she was at least breathing independently, a vast improvement from when Emily had taken up her vigil.

She could do nothing but wait.

“Emily?”

She looked up, smiling as she saw Genji hovering in the doorway. “Yes?”

“Sam’s stress-baking. Do you want chocolate chip or snickerdoodles?”

“…Is both an option?”

He grinned. “Both is always an option. I’ll bring you some when the carnage stops.”

“You’re a gem!” she called after him.

“More like a blunt stone.”

“Aunt Moira!” Emily shot out of her chair and knelt by the woman’s bed. “God, I was so scared. Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“After my wife, how could I?” Moira reached up, running a soothing hand through Emily’s hair. “Hush, little one, I’m alright. Just sore.”

“You’ll be sore for a right while, Angie says.”

“I’m used to it.”

“You shouldn’t be.”

Silence reigned as the two studied each other, their years apart suddenly the length of a millennia. Emily took in the deep scars around her aunt’s left eye, the crows feet, the worry lines, the sunken cheeks. Time had not been kind to the woman who had once cared for her like a mother.

“What’s this, now?” Moira murmured, lifting her left hand. “Is that a wedding band, dove?”

“A year and a bit married now,” Emily laughed, tears nipping at the corners of her eyes. “That’s not the only surprise.” She pressed Moira’s hand against the swell of her belly, watching the shock on her face as the babe inside twisted around to say hello. “I’m due in June.”

“Your aunt would be so proud,” Moira whispered, and Emily broke. “Shh, shh, little one. I know. I know.”

“I’m glad you’re home.”

“…I am, too.”