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”Torbjörn!”
Torbjörn looked up from the turret he had been disassembling, his back making a crunching noise as he straightened. In the doorway to his workshop was standing Overwatch's medic Angela Ziegler. She seemed agitated as she approached Torbjörn's desk. The reason for her discomfort, if Torbjörn were to guess, followed into the room few steps behind her. The Bastion unit, when upright, was more than 7 feet tall; a rather unnerving sight to be sure, even if this unit was in a rather poor condition.
Overwatch had located the Bastion unit wandering the wilderness about a month prior. All of the units should have been destroyed so this one caught their eyes. Torbjörn had not been very happy about Bastion being brought to the base, even if it was rusted all over and most of its battle programming gone. At the end of the day it was still a battle automaton. But Winston had wanted to know why it had activated suddenly and seemingly without a reason, and why it still worked after such a long time dormant, so in it was brought. It really didn't do much around the base, most of the people ignored it, except McCree who had affectionately dubbed it ”Little Guy” and mostly used it as a coaster.
Angela stopped in front of his desk. Bastion was left hovering behind her left shoulder.
”What's the matter?” Torbjörn asked, keeping his eyes on Bastion who was whirring quietly to itself.
”It's Bastion,” she answered, motioning at the unit behind her. ”It's been following me around.”
”Has it done anything else?”
”No, not yet anyway.”
”Hmm, well let's have a look.”
Torbjörn hopped down from his chair, taking his goggles off and leaving them on the table as he went to search for his equipment. Plugging Bastion to the computer wasn't hard. It had been very obedient since it had been found, if a little slow, until now at least. This new behavior must be something in its coding that Torbjörn had missed when he first went through it, or maybe it had adapted for some reason, as these battle automatons sometimes did; they were built to survive after all.
”When did you notice it following you?” Torbjörn asked. ”It didn't do this when we first brought it to the base. I would have noticed.”
”I think it was after Reinhardt and I used Bastion to test the new shield Winston has been developing for Reinhardt. Bastion shot at the shield, I was in the air, making sure nothing went wrong.”
”It's possible that it perceived it as a real battle situation, and that you were in need of protection.”
”But you said Bastion's battle coding is mostly gone,” Angela said.
”It is,” Torbjörn answered.
They fell into a silence, only broken by occasional curious beeps from Bastion. After 15 minutes of scrolling through the coding, Torbjörn gave up with a sigh.
”This unit's a mess. By all account's it shouldn't even be functioning right now, not to mention following anyone around.”
”So you can't fix it?”
”I can. If I wipe it and rewrite the code.”
Angela gave a look at Bastion, who noticing Angela's gaze chirped in a manner that could only be described as cheerful.
”Maybe that's a bit too... much,” Angela said.
”Not at all. If it can suddenly decide to do something like that, we can't know what else it decides to do next. And it is made for war.”
”We definitely shouldn't let it roam freely until this is is figured out, but I do want to know,” Angela said, and then suddenly added: ”Do you know when Zenyatta is coming back?”
”Zenyatta?” Tornjörn frowned. ”What do you want with him?”
”I thought maybe he could talk to it."
”Talk?” Torbjörn shook his head in disbelief. ”Bastion units are nothing like Zenyatta. It doesn't have the level of sentience Zenyatta has, it was made to kill and that's all. I don't know what Zenyatta could possibly get out of it.”
”It's worth a shot,” Angela said, and Torbjörn recognized that tone of voice. It meant that Angela had made her mind and nothing could sway her.
”Fine,” Torbjörn said with a sigh. ”Now let's get it somewhere where it won't bother you.”
- -
In the end they put Bastion outside, on one of the farther platforms in the watchpoint, which had a section of it fenced off, originally for storage purposes. Bastion seemed rather distraught at first, but did nothing aside from beeping and booping in protest. Angela tried to explain the situation to it, and she wasn't sure if she was being understood but after the talk Bastion went into its turret mode, and like that it stayed. Not even the seagulls, ever present in Gibraltar, flocking to the the warm metallic block made Bastion rouse.
Zenyatta returned few days later. Immediately Angela pulled him aside and explained the situation.
”Interesting,” was all that Zenyatta said.
”Will you talk to Bastion?” Angela asked.
”I shall try.”
The situation with the Bastion unit had gotten around the base as most things did, so practically everyone had gathered on the platform where Bastion was to see the solution unfold. They had decided to keep a little distance, not going into the fenced area. It seemed appropriate to give the two robots a little peace for their discussion, not that anyone would have been able to understand it anyway.
They watched in curiosity as Zenyatta entered the fenced area where Bastion still sat. Zenyatta's arrival caused the seagulls to fly of, screeching as they disappeared into the sky, leaving only the robots behind. After a while, Bastion unfolded itself into its massive standing height, which made Zenyatta look positively tiny in comparison. The discussion lasted maybe five minutes, and not a word or a beep of it reached the place where the others were standing. Finally Zenyatta, with Bastion following him, came up to the group.
”I have explained the situation to Bastion, and it won't follow you anymore, Angela,” Zenyatta said. ”It apologizes. It didn't realize it was being impudent.”
”Good,” Angela said. ”Thank you. Did it say why it was so keen on me?”
”It thought you were a bird,” Zenyatta said. Bastion chirped at Zenyatta. ”A beautiful bird,” Zenyatta corrected.
For a moment Angela's face showed nothing but confusion. Someone was laughing behind Angela, she was pretty sure it was McCree. Finally she asked:
”Excuse me, what?” Her face cracked into a confused smile at the last word.
”It saw you in your Valkyrie suit when we were practicing,” Reinhardt pointed out. ”I guess that confused it.”
”But why me being a bird warrants me being followed?”
”It likes birds,” Zenyatta said. Bastion beeped an agreement.
”It appears much more advanced than Bastion units should be,” Winston said. ”Perhaps it managed to develop a sentience of sorts in its time alone.”
”Remarkable, isn't it?” Zenyatta agreed.
”Very. If you two could come by my room, maybe we can figure out a way for Bastion to communicate with all of us without the need of a translator. I'm sure it has a lot of interesting things to say.”
Bastion made a long series of beeps. If one were to guess it sounded happy.
”Should we then get it into Overwatch as a proper agent, then?” Angela asked, smiling at Bastion.
”I don't see why not. Well, if it wants it, of course,” Winston said.
Bastion chirped.
”Yes,” Zenyatta translated. ”That would be nice.”
”We can start working on that as well. Follow me.”
Winston started leading Zenyatta and Bastion away. Bastion was chirruping to Zenyatta the whole way. No one had heard it quite so talkative yet, what a difference it seemed to have made in the robot to be able to communicate with someone.
”Glad that's dealt with,” Angela said. ”I wonder what kind of things Bastion likes to talk about.”
”If I were to guess, birds,” Reinhardt said.
There was a long silence as they contemplated this. Somewhere in the distance the seagulls of Gibraltar continued their chatter. Finally the silence was broken by McCree, who said:
”Someone should really have cleaned the bird poop off the little guy.”