Chapter Text
Amidst the preparation for yet another mission, Kay/O hears himself being approached as he runs general diagnostics on himself. He turns his head silently at the agent, wondering what they needed.
“Here.” They don't meet his faceplate with their eyes as they thrust their hand at him, dropping something into his palm.
“What's this?” Kay/O asks, inspecting it. It was a simple thread adorned by blue and purple beads with a miniscule plastic knife attached.
“...A charm, or a gun buddy if you will.” They explain. Kay/O doesn't miss the way they nervously wring their hands together, a habit of theirs he had picked up on.
Despite his pledge to everyone that he wouldn't harm the Radiants of this timeline, they were still nervous around him.
That's… fine.
They continue to talk when the Initiator doesn’t reply. “I was just making some of these for fun- had some extra time between missions. It doesn’t make any noise when you move, if you’re potentially worried about that.”
They stiffen up again when they stop talking. Kay/O stares at the charm, letting it roll around in his hand.
“Acknowledged.” Is his eventual response, followed by: “Thank you.”
Despite his head still directed at the charm, he doesn't miss the small, shy smile they give him. His mind replays the smile.
They exit with an awkward nod of their head, and he waits until they leave the room to carefully thread the charm through his vandal, turning the gun this way and that as it moves, the plastic knife bouncing with the motion.
A weird agent, that one. Constantly teetering between overly polite and terribly quiet when it came to him. But he had seen the familiarity they shared when it came to agents like Sage or Jett. He never missed the way their eyes never left him as he walked in or out of a room, or how they always seemed on guard around him…
In his timeline, he had never even see them, much less ever found out about their existence.
But again, it was fine. Regardless of what strange behavior they exhibited around him, it didn't get in the way of how they performed on missions and that's all that mattered.
He's lost in thought for moments more until he hears Brimstone comm him and several others. A sudden incursion that demands their action.
His strides are long and quick as he makes his way to the ship that's already prepared to take off, but pauses as Brimstone continues his rapid fire, last minute briefing.
“With Reyna?”
Brimstone could hear the imperceptible ounce of displeasure in Kay/O's voice.
“Yes.” His response is gruff. “I know you don't… get along with her, but this is a last minute emergency.” He prattled off a few other names of teammates, an objective, a location.
Despite the urgency of Brimstone’s voice, Kay/O adjusts his walking speed, and moves two percent slower. Regardless, he made it to the hangar, where several agents were already waiting for everyone to arrive.
“Well if it ain't Kay/O!” Phoenix's voice is chipper despite the situation. Kay/O didn't miss the jingle of a bracelet as Phoenix waved his hand, and his attention is zoned in on that instead of the man as he yaps about something or somesuch.
“Oh, bet you're wonderin’ about this ol’ thing?” Phoenix grins as he shakes his wrist. Kay/O's immediate response is to disagree because nothing about the Englishman sparks his interest- but the design is all too familiar.
“Our good pal has been handing them out since last week, haven't you-?” Phoenix calls out the agent by name, and drags them over, arm slinging over their shoulder as they mumble something back to him, slightly embarrassed. The charm on Phoenix’s wrist jingles again as he pulls them in closer, and Kay/O watches on with slight… annoyance?
Annoyance?
He runs another diagnostics, and finds nothing out of the ordinary. Must be the idea of working with Reyna tampering with his nerves.
“I just was giving one out to everyone to be nice,” Kay/O's attention is redirected to the agent wrestling off Phoenix's arm from their shoulder. “You don't have to bring attention to it.”
Phoenix continues to tease them for some time, and Kay/O's vocalizer turns on to snap at him to just back off , but then Reyna strides in with Gekko behind her, and his vocalizer clicks shut.
They all exchange greetings aboard the ship, settling in as it takes off. Kay/O tries not to watch Reyna and the agent quietly chat in the corner and is that a charm on her hip belt?-
The agent seems to quietly mumble something as their eyes drift upwards to look at Kay/O, then look elsewhere, hands twitching at their sides.
Reyna, after hearing whatever the agent had to say, stares at Kay/O with a blank face-
And then her lips curled upward into a knowing smile.
His fans kicked in as he gripped his vandal tighter. No, it wasn't a malicious sneer. She was just smiling at him. For some reason. His head swivels away, and the rest of his time is spent refreshing his programs. Gekko and Phoenix begin to arm wrestle.
What feels like an eternity later, the ship touches down.
Over the comms, Brimstone barks out orders immediately as the aircraft's doors swing open.
“Get in, the spike should be marked on your maps on potentially any one of these sites, get there as quickly as you can and watch out for-”
A grenade tossed right in front of everyone dismantles the entire synchronization in one fell swoop, and a continued series of grenades falling from the sky has everyone scattering like mice. Kay/O tries to stick together with at least one other agent, but a stray grenade renders him unable to do anything but find cover. Gekko’s yelling something about an ambush, Reyna’s spitting curses in spanish, Phoenix has already lit up a blaze wall, and the other agent-
“Ge- spike- sit-” The comms are nothing more than static, and Kay/O's processors work in overdrive to identify the trajectory of where the grenades are coming from and how far they're being launched and you need to zero point that area now-
-
They're lost. Sage insisted they were more than capable to help Valorant and their cause, and here they were, lost in a city that was about to explode to smithereens if they couldn't find the damn spike.
A countdown noise rings out, familiar and haunting. Their gut tightens in fear as they aim their guardian eye level, following the source of the beeps. The comms in their ear continue to spit nothing but hissed gibberish, and they silently worry for their teammates.
They would hate it if their last memories of Phoenix and Gekko was the most boring series of arm wrestles and thumb wars anyone had ever witnessed; and they would hate it if their last memory of Reyna was the way she teased them about their oh-so cute crush that was apparently evident to everyone- that was mortifying enough.
With a shake of their head, they pressed on through the labyrinth that was the city.
I hope he's okay.
They worried. Obviously he was more than capable, but anxiety drew at them.
Click!
They wince as a gun is drawn at their head from a rounded corner.
Agent
, says a mini Brimstone in their head,
always be sure to check your corners!
Thanks, Brim.
The agent looks up to see what individual would be responsible for their unfortunate death, and their eyes widen.
“Kay/O!” Their voice fills with relief. “I thought that was- well. Someone else about to shoot my brains out.”
-
Elsewhere, Brimstone sneezes. And then, a sudden thought comes to him, and he has a small realization.
“Aw, shit.” He says flatly. Bow drawn, Sova does not turn to Brimstone as he continues to scan ahead.
“What is it?” He asks.
“I forgot to brief the new agent on the alternates.”
Sova’s stance slackens a little as he breaks his gaze to look at Brimstone. “You are... serious?"
Brimstone sighs.