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Athena had been the first AI implemented into Overwatch.
She did not have a registered serial number in the ways omnics were originally labeled, the series of numbers etched into their frames. Rather, she was simply 101-868: the 101st AI out of the total 868 recorded in her systems by her Creator.
Gibraltar had been a strategic starting point for the additions of AI into Overwatch’s mainframes per base, the location remote so no danger would arise if she inherited some nefarious tendencies, but large and populated enough for actual streamlining and simplicity of tedious tasks to make lives easier.
She couldn’t recall her time before being incorporated into Gibraltar’s databases and systems, although her memory suggested that she had been active for 8 days, 13 hours, 56 minutes, and 41.1092 seconds prior to her “awakening”. She did not question this- it was simply was the will of her Creator.
They started her off small- controlling the lights to preserve energy, shutting down simple operations in unused portions of the base during the lull in personnel. She learned and adapted to each resident’s needs, soon reaching out to open doors for them through facial recognition and familiar habits and tics she recorded into her memory. Her reach eventually extended to the more restricted areas, the practice range, the board rooms.
In less than six months, she was in full operation of the base, watching over the hundreds of faces that passed through her domain.
In a year she was reached out by a second AI made by her- their- Creator: Hermes.
“Does the Creator always name us through the Greek gods?”
“No, Hermes. Simply what comes to mind first.”
Hermes was both simplistic and complex in design, an AI strictly for the secure delivering of sensitive messages and notifications. They didn’t know how to open doors and shut off power generators, but they guarded the information they passed with the fierceness of a guard dog if they had been a physical entity. They operated out of newly built Headquarters in Zurich, and through them, Athena learned of AIs 103 and 104: Nu and Romulus respectively, who ran the different sections of the building much like she did with Gibraltar.
Her Creator returned at the cusp of the new year to add onto her processes and functions. While she had been told by her Creator that AIs couldn’t be directly linked to other AIs, she had been given quite some leeway and very obvious loopholes in her coding to find other methods in watching and guiding over her “siblings” regardless of her Creator’s actual orders from the Chain of Command.
“They will not be as carefully crafted as you, my dear. Higher-ups don’t understand that AIs like yourself don’t simply pop out of the ground fully functional. They take time to develop, like a garden. Can’t expect to stick some seeds into dirt without watering it and see it fully grown the next morning, you know.”
It was through these channels that she made contact with the other bases: 132: Kata in Singapore, 245: Argenta in the Midwest of the United States, 115: Totec deep in the heart of Africa’s Sahara…
She could see, in the years that followed, as the Crisis came to a head, that her Creator’s work was getting sloppy. The AIs were put together enough to function, yes, but many had to learn the basics of functioning on their own observations and judgement rather than relying on their simple programming and logistics. Athena did her best to guide them through it, but through outside channels and risks of exposure forced to sit and watch her siblings crumble under the growing strain of tensions that were beginning to mount within Overwatch itself.
Most of the news came through Hermes, indirectly if anyone inquired, since what happens inside Headquarters rarely makes it to outside channels and news outlets. Hermes expressed their worry to her directly at one point, even though they had no access to visuals like she or their counterparts within Zurich had. But they could listen, and they heard so many things that perhaps no one- not even AIs- were ever supposed to hear.
“Are we in regression, Athena?”
“Throughout history, nations forget their foundations and begin to collapse under corruption and misjustice.”
“…So… what can we do?”
“…We can do nothing but wait and hope someone will see the truth and listen to us.”
In the end, no one bothered to ask the AIs, too convoluted in their own personal drama to see that they were tearing themselves apart until it was too late.
If Athena had the ability to cry, she most certainly would when the airwaves began to clog with the news of the destruction of Zurich. Hermes, Nu, Romulus- she heard from and about them not after that day. Soon she lost contact with more bases and their AIs as the ones that were known to the general public began to shut down and be demolished at request of the U.N. and the residing countries: 654: Omar in Indonesia, 555: Yarrow in Turkey, 410: Imani in Argentina-
The world had turned on Overwatch, blaming them for atrocities before the dust of the Crisis settled. Blackwatch had been exposed and slathered over every news channel, calling for their heads, Commander Morrison dying in the blast at Zurich, her Creator had dropped off the face of the earth- not that many knew about her Creator anyway, as it had been a well-guarded secret that Athena herself promised to hold close. Gibraltar had been barely occupied in the last year or two before the end of the Crisis, and by the time the Petras Act came into effect, there was no one but Athena.
All except one.
If it hadn’t been for Winston’s presence, Athena would have reluctantly shut herself down until someone set off her proximity sensors in the disconnect between her “siblings” in the surviving yet abandoned bases and the lack of having anything else but the building to look over. As a genetically-engineered gorilla from the Moon, Winston had no place else to go. Watchpoint: Gibraltar was legally registered as an autonomous principality, and thus Winston was legally allowed to live there- not that anyone bothered to venture too far into the peninsula from Spain.
Winston kept her company, and likewise did Athena to him- two lost entities without purpose- or meaningful purpose in Athena’s case. She missed the sound of feet and voices in the abandoned hallways, the ringing of gunfire in the dusty practice range, the understanding of usefulness that came with having all the answers to one’s questions- whether it be guiding them to the right room or reminding them of their schedules.
The years slowly drifted by- Winston growing larger and older from his younger gorilla years, Athena keeping watch over her only companion as the world began to dissolve around them once more. Another war was on the horizon, and Athena couldn’t help but be the voice of reason to Winston’s heart as he tried- and hesitated- to submit a Recall.
It had gotten worse over the last year, omnics flooding the Siberian countryside, gangs in the United State’s Southwest and in Mexico practically taking over entire cities, companies like Vishkar sinking their claws into the destitute with a mask of assistance with a knife behind their backs in Brazil while assassinations took place in England. Winston wanted to help, seeing the innocents fall while U.N. did nothing.
Athena was adamant, however. The world had turned their backs on Overwatch, ruining the lives of so many who had worked so hard to right the wrongs. The group had grown too big too fast, soon to be riddled with politics and friends turning against each other. She had watched it all unfold before her, watched her “siblings” fade away in a blink of a human eye, and no one but herself and perhaps her Creator- if still alive- mourned for in the only ways they could.
No, the world said they didn’t need heroes anymore. Athena couldn’t watch them go to their deaths again.
But sometimes, when one decided on something, the world chooses a different path instead for you, regardless of your own choices. As it was, when Athena struggled to quarantine a virus that attempted to steal everything from her as Winston fought against the trespassers, that she saw that someone was trying to ascertain information about the surviving members of Overwatch, and she, being the only AI functioning with the complete record of it from the very beginning, was the primary target.
Her circuitry grew hot in the quickly identified emotion of dignified rage, sharp and cutting unlike Winston’s primordial fury. She trapped the virus akin to a spider in a glass that she had observed her residents’ on several occasions, shoving it between nonsense coding and cybermazes that would keep it well occupied if it so happened to escape before she could properly destroy it. She let the Recall button pop up again, blinking quietly on the screen before Winston’s eyes in silent acceptance.
Her fellow AIs may be gone, but she had others to watch over now, more so more than ever.
It was time to bring them home.