Work Text:
An underacknowledged asset for a hacker to have is a steady hand. Steadiness equals fewer incorrect keystrokes and misclicks, and considering even a single one of either of those can spell capture or worse, the stability is deeply advantageous.
As Sombra makes her way back into her quarters after briefing Sigma on their next move, she can hardly believe she’s ever been able to send so much as a chain email.
She knows that this move is the only viable one. For years now, she has been confident in her ability to ensure Sigma’s safety. She has always had a healthy distance from Talon’s upper echelon, but it was through their procurement of the Dutch living weapon that she had to put faith in her own ability to circumvent them. She still remembers watching the soldiers usher him out of that facility and into the waiting Talon dropship. She remembers looking up at his face, into pale blue eyes that betrayed nothing beyond the mildest perturbance.
That was, of course, until his eyes met hers.
In the eyes of the astrophysicist was a flash of something confused, desperate, scared. She did all she could in that moment to reassure him with a glance. She’d done her research on this guy. He was a real academic type with a long list of accolades and a painfully abrupt cessation of them. International Space Station. Experiment gone awry. Contact with a black hole. Significantly compromised.
His first few weeks with Talon were as painful as they had expected. As he began to piece his fractured mind back together, Subject Sigma grew more unpredictable and volatile. Many of Talon’s soldiers refused to even stand guard outside of his room, let alone attempt to interact with him. It took about three seconds of considering what it would do to her psyche if semi-regular checkups with Moira were her only human interaction before Sombra decided she needed to do something.
Her visits were fleeting, at first, so as not to overwhelm him. They were full of little gestures, like bringing him a doughnut from the break room or asking how he took his tea. The first time she encountered him in a state of agitation, she held her ground as best she could. It was only when a hardback book flew across the room that she cloaked herself, and it stopped him in his tracks. It was as if a switch had been flipped, and his voice softened into something curious and impressed as he asked what allowed her to seem to disappear into thin air. As if that didn't pique Sombra's own interest, the fact that he was staring directly at her still cloaked form certainly did. Her voice came from nowhere, promising to tell him about her tech if he told her how he knew where exactly she was, even while hidden, and the rest had been history.
The two formed a friendship that seemed peculiar to just about everyone but the two of them, a friendship that Sombra hadn't realised had been so deeply important to her until right now. Until she was standing on the precipice of not seeing her viejito for a very long time, perhaps of never seeing him again. She had lost plenty of people like this before, and had adjusted to only seeing them through bandwidth and terminals and projected onto the insides of her eyelids. This impending loss, though, felt heavier. It felt almost reminiscent of a long suppressed fear and desperation she had felt in the wake of losing everything during the Omnic Crisis. In a way, she was doing now what she did then - she was making do with the skills she possessed, and saving the people she still could.
She would save Sigma.
No, she reminds herself, as she double checks that she has locked down her room before opening up a secure line.
She will let Sigma die here. But she can save Siebren. She has to.
While she waits for the confirmation that her contact has secured the chat on their end, Sombra’s eyes flick to a window that she’s kept open for the last few days. While she has no qualms keeping tabs on most of her coworkers, she has never spied too hard on Siebren’s digital footprint. Even before their friendship, it felt unfair to pry into the details of a man who was scarcely able to protect them.
Sombra hadn’t wanted to start tracking Siebren’s location, but a week ago, it became necessary. After not seeing him for the day, she had gone searching through the Talon facility until finally stumbling across him in a place that made her blood boil - Moira’s lab.
Siebren had been on an examination table, half-suited up, with bloodshot eyes and burst capillaries staining his pale cheeks with smatterings of crimson. She walked over to him and noticed bloodied knuckles, and when he let her turn his palms upwards without so much as batting an eye, she found what looked like burns. The skin was angry, blistering and red, and Sombra could just make out the ghost of a pentagon in the mess.
She was ready, there and then, to do everything she could to ruin the geneticist’s life. Moira O’Deorain would not know peace ever again once Sombra got her hands on her. She would take Siebren back to his quarters and then go and find her and –
A chill coursed through her at the realisation.
Moira had been in Oasis for days. She wouldn’t be back until tomorrow.
Sombra still returned Siebren to his quarters, resolving to find a medic and bring them back to patch him up under her watchful eye, but she had to check something first. She got back to her room as fast as she could, and immediately pulled up her trackers on Moira. Bile rose in her throat as she realised that she was hoping she’d lied. Sombra was desperate for Moira to have been hiding here on-base the whole time, to have snuck around under Akande and the rest of the council’s radar to perform some reprehensible experiment on the defenceless Siebren.
A map whirred and zoomed in across her holoscreen.
A dot flashed in Iraq.
Sombra’s fingers flew across her sightline to get the history of Moira’s movements over the prior days. All looked normal. It looked as if Moira was exactly where she said she would be.
That was monumentally bad news.
When Moira eventually did return, Sombra confronted her nevertheless. She still had a glimmer of visceral, morbid hope that Moira was pulling the wool over her eyes. Moira was the devil she knew. If Moira hadn’t done this to Siebren, then something bigger was moving in, and it was doing so fast. Genuine confusion crossed Moira’s features when Sombra brought her all of this information. That was bad enough, but when Sombra had marched the redhead to the still recovering Siebren’s quarters, something far worse happened.
If Sombra had blinked, she would have missed it. For a mere moment, concern flashed across Moira’s features. All that happened was that her mismatched eyes widened and her lips pressed into a thin line, but it was enough. With Moira’s split-second concern, Sombra’s mind was made up. She needed to get Siebren out of here, and she knew whose help she needed. She needed someone who knew what it was like to be utilised as a weapon in a game that had been rigged from the start.
The chat window chirps, and Sombra is immediately pulled from her thoughts.
> situation?
Sombra steels herself, sucks in a deep breath, and lets her eyes flicker back towards Siebren’s tracker on the holoscreen. He is pacing.
This will be one of the most difficult things that she and Siebren will have to do.
For Jack Morrison, she suspects it will just be another day.
> ready to move in 24.
Talon’s hubris would be its downfall, Jack was certain of it. While this pride may come before their ultimate fall, today it merely has to play into his hands for a few minutes. He has to wait for Sombra to slip out of the facility with the asset, take said asset and get the hell out of dodge.
The asset is, of course, an eight-foot-tall, floating astrophysicist with a dubious connection to reality and the ability to rip Jack apart with the power of gravity itself.
He’s been in tougher spots.
It’s a time of year when the base runs on skeleton staff, and both Doomfist and Moira are away from base, according to his intel. Under the cloak of night and using a few key hacks, Sombra can sneak Subject Sigma out of the facility and to a liaison point. Once she hands him over to Jack, his trackers disabled and most of his equipment left behind, they run. It’s as simple as that. There’s a small voice in the back of Jack’s head that says that it’s never as simple as that, but Sombra is determined. Jack isn’t sure that determination isn’t mostly desperation, but she’s been immovable on this. He hasn’t missed the thinly-veiled threats she’s made to stop assisting him through the investigation into Overwatch’s downfall if he doesn’t help her with this. He might hold firmer were he not intimately familiar with being moulded into a weapon beneath some higher power’s hands.
Sombra had also assured him that through a little overstatement of the Dutch weapon’s own determination to escape and some understatement of how easily his trackers could have been removed, their fingerprints could be largely wiped off of this heist. Plus, if Sombra’s suspicions and reasoning for getting this guy out of Talon were correct, they might not even come looking for him. Her theory is that Talon has much bigger aspirations nowadays. Experienced as he might be, the idea that a living weapon with the power of gravity at his fingertips is not even worth tracking anymore sends a shiver up Jack’s spine.
He waits at the liaison point for longer than he’d like. Sombra told him that she would meet him here because it was easier for her to get Sigma out than it was for Jack to get in, but he suspects that she also didn’t trust him not to do something rash on the inside. She was probably right not to.
Jack can’t help but let his mind wander as he waits. The immediate plan was set in stone, but the plan after getting Sigma out of here? That was still up to him. That was why Sombra had asked him to do this, after all.
From even a cursory glance over the information Sombra had sent him about the Dutch national, Jack knew he was not built for vigilante life. Everything in his file pre-accident screamed research and structure, jumping from institution to institution depending on who wanted him and where the research funding was. Post-accident, he’d grown less predictable, and needed that stability more than ever. He needed familiarity and gentleness, but also access to the sort of technology and support that could house a man like him with powers like his. One part of the astrophysicist’s resume stuck out to Jack like a sore thumb.
I completed a 12-month research residency on the Horizon Lunar Colony under the Lunar Ops team led by Dr. Harold Winston.
It didn’t take a rocket scientist to put the location and the name together, and it took the barest amount of digging to confirm the connection. Winston had sent out the recall that Jack had ignored, but by all accounts, the new Overwatch was going from strength to strength. Last he’d heard, they’d managed to convince Angela to join up again. Jack knew better than anyone that Overwatch was far from untouchable, but he also knew that Angela would not have returned to a sinking ship.
Overwatch wasn’t the perfect choice, but it was just about the only choice they had.
Before his brain can delve further into specifics, Jack spots a floating figure in the distance, approaching him slowly with one arm tucked around himself, the other hanging by his side. As he gets closer to Jack, a second figure seems to flicker into existence beside him. She is holding his hand. Jack closes the gap between them, pulse rifle ready in his hands as he scans the environment behind them through his visor. Nobody seems to be tailing them, but it can’t hurt to check in.
“All clear?” he asks, tapping his visor quickly as he drags his gaze back to reality, and back to two entirely grim expressions.
“Yes,” Sombra replies, her tone short and gravelly. She slips her hand out of Siebren’s, and Jack does her the courtesy of not mentioning it. The astrophysicist has not gotten the memo, as his pale eyes glance down at the absence and his chin wobbles, just a fraction. Sombra looks up at him, doing her best to push ease onto her features. “This is Jack, yeah? He’s gonna take you somewhere safe.”
Jack does his best not to baulk at the deployment of his government name. He supposes that there’s not much risk of this guy putting two and two together, not after everything. He does make the mental note that Sombra owes him severely as he gives a curt nod towards the hovering man.
“Best to do this quick, Sombra,” Jack finally adds. He’s seen scenarios like this before, and a Band-Aid approach is almost always the best one. At the statement, though, panic and fear and just the smallest sliver of anger flare behind Siebren’s eyes. Sombra’s the one that catches it, and she swallows down a lump as she looks back to him, patting him on the arm. Tears strangle her words despite her best efforts to prevent it.
“It’s all gonna be okay, viejito. I have to go, but you’re gonna be just fine. I trust Jack, remember?” she asks.
The query has Siebren harking immediately back to the conversation he and Olivia had just a day ago. He remembers it so clearly that it’s almost painful. He doesn't trust this man yet. He is gruff and seems short tempered, but if Olivia trusts him, then he will make himself trust Jack too. She told him that Jack could take him somewhere safer than the Talon base, somewhere he won't wake up regularly with no memory of the day before and blood caked under his fingernails.
Sometimes, those memories come back, as does the knowledge of how fiercely remembering can hurt. It hurts again now, too. He remembers it might be the last time he sees her.
Siebren reaches out for Olivia's hand. She gasps as the sudden movement.
"We’ve really gotta move," Jack insists, his voice still all gravelly brashness.
"Viejito," Olivia implores. She sounds sadder than Siebren has ever heard her. It suits, considering he feels sadder than he recalls feeling in a long time.
He doesn't quite know what to say. Olivia has shown him more kindness than just about anyone else on this planet. There is so much to say. There is no more time. Siebren stares earnestly at Olivia. His voice is small, and hoarse, but sure.
"I will always remember you.”
The words hit Olivia in the chest, hard. Her eyes flick to Jack’s, and though she swears she can see him falter just a little, his expression remains overall firm. She looks back at Siebren and squeezes his hand again.
“Te quiero mucho, old man,” she says, forcing a smirk with the last couple of words to hide just how much this all aches. “Now scram.”
Her hand squeezes his one last time, tightly and painfully briefly, before she pulls back and flickers out of sight before she can change her mind. Siebren lifts a hand into the nothingness, his fingers splaying out into the empty night air, trying to grasp for something that isn’t there anymore.
“... Ready to move out?” Jack chances. Siebren drops his hand to his side as he turns towards Jack. His gaze is vacant as he pauses for just a moment. It looks like he might say something. Like he might tell Jack the truth.
He decides against it with a tiny, hesitant nod.
Jack and Siebren make it to the safe house with little issue and in total silence. They won’t know if Sombra’s theory about nobody in Talon coming after the living weapon holds water until the daylight hours, but in the interim, they’re as safe as they can hope to be. The safe house is sparsely furnished with only meagre provisions, but it’s by far the most secure spot Jack has access to in the area.
“I’ve got some intel I need to check out,” Jack says, setting his rifle onto the kitchen counter as if it’s as normal an action as anything, as if it’s a set of keys or a work bag. He looks towards Siebren, who is standing silently by the door he had to duck through, eyes flicking around the austere living area. “You can sit, you know.”
“Sorry,” Siebren rasps, his voice gravelly from travelling in silence. Jack shakes his head as Siebren takes a tentative seat on the threadbare couch.
“No apologies necessary. I’ll just be in here,” Jack replies, gesturing to one of the doors off the main living area. Siebren gives another tight nod, his lips still pressed together in an anxious, downturned frown.
Jack lingers in the room for a moment. He has never been good at comfort, and he doesn’t expect the ability will miraculously manifest now. He is good at coming up with a plan, though, and despite the fact that he isn’t certain that leaving the astrophysicist alone is his most brilliant idea, there is work to be done. He ducks quietly into the spare bedroom of the house that doubled as his workstation, leaving Siebren with his own thoughts.
Siebren has placed himself on the couch by a window, glancing out at the still dark sky. His gaze settles, as it almost invariably does, on the Moon. It is full tonight, and it is the phase that makes the memories the most vivid, that makes his throat the tightest.
Siebren knows he has been saved tonight. He knows that neither Olivia nor Jack have much confidence in how much of this plan he has parsed, but he understands everything completely. He may not have been able to remember who had experimented on him the day Olivia found him in that lab - though he knew it had not been Dr. O’Deorain - but he did remember the way her expression hardened as she looked him over. Something changed for her that day. She didn’t think she could protect him anymore, and so she moved to save him.
Siebren can’t help but wonder if, had he been as brave as young Olivia, he could have saved Harold all those years ago.
Harold had also been kind and quick-witted, along with being one of the most gifted minds Siebren had ever had the privilege to be in the presence of. It was a rare combination, and one that Siebren often thinks that he relied too heavily on. He too long assumed that Harold’s scrupulous intentions and his genuine care for the specimens would shield him from the ethical queries raised by the work of the Simian Research Division. He overlooked the little mentions here and there in their correspondence, long after Siebren’s Horizon residency had been over, about the changing habits and dispositions of the gorillas. If there were risks, Siebren remembers thinking, Harold would be able to preempt them. He was the best in his field. He was brilliant.
That thought is one of the many regrets that Siebren remembers, that he carries with him in the present. It’s just one memory in the well of remorse that lives in his chest, that wraps around his brainstem, that permeates the marrow in his bones. He is a giant, floating liability and he will do whatever he can to atone, to make himself worthy of the breadth of kindness shown to him by Harold, by Olivia, and even now by Jack - even if the latter’s kindness is slightly rougher around the edges.
“Siebren.”
Siebren blinks before turning his head towards the source of his name, standing there visorless with his hands folded across his chest. He seems slightly less intimidating without the headgear. Still, the sharpness in his tone suggests that Siebren has missed him calling out for some time. This is one area where he struggles. Time gets away from him more easily these days.
“Yes?” Siebren asks. It’s only when Jack pauses, eyebrow dipping just a fraction that Siebren realises his eyes are wet. He sniffles briefly, swiping at his face with the heel of his hand. “Do you require something of me?”
Jack had been coming over to strategise about their next moves. He knew he could make contact with Angela, and having unearthed a handful of conference proceedings and seminar attendance lists which overlapped the Drs. Ziegler and de Kuiper, he wanted to see if Siebren remembered her. If he did, and if they’d known each other, then Jack was confident he could get her to help deliver Siebren to Overwatch. The problem was, that plan required tangling Angela into what was essentially a kidnapping plot with Talon potentially on its tail, though, which he wanted to avoid if possible.
It would take more time, though through safer means, to make anonymous contact with Winston, something that would possibly allow Siebren’s conveyance to Overwatch without having to involve anyone else directly into the process. It could look like a simple defection, a virtuous man returning to his senses and using his powers for good.
And then he’d come across Siebren crying, and those plans flew out the window.
“... Do you need anything?” Jack asks, plumbing his depths for as much Midwestern hospitality as he can muster. Siebren glances down at his lap, shaking his head small.
“No, no thank you,” he murmurs. Jack doesn’t believe him for a second, but he doesn’t want to pry too hard. Even if he had wanted to, a chirp sounds out from the spare bedroom. He’d been running some cross-checks on other Overwatch members to see if he could uncover any other connections Siebren might have had, and something must have turned up.
“I’ll be right back,” Jack remarks, turning on his heel to head back for his workstation. The search still seemed to be running, but in a window in the bottom corner of his screen, now in the foreground, a message had popped up in his encrypted chat.
> he takes black tea with milk and two sugars. put him by a window and ask him about any star. he’ll tell you about it.
> take care of him.
Jack can feel the earnestness bleeding through the text. It would usually amuse him to know that the usually unflappable Sombra was being forced to be genuine, but he’d seen her parting with Siebren. There was no amusement to be found there.
Silently, Jack pads out to the kitchen and takes an old, slightly dented kettle from the counter, filling it up before putting it on the stove. Siebren looks up at the sounds and movement, but says nothing as Jack takes two mugs from a cupboard. He keeps watching as Jack unearths an ancient looking tin of instant coffee and an almost empty box of teabags, and even manages the tiniest smile as Jack gives a tiny grunt of triumph before emerging from a drawer with a fistful of diner sugar packets.
Eventually, Jack walks over to Siebren with the two mugs now full and steaming. He offers one towards the astrophysicist.
“Black, two sugars.”
Siebren feels the little lump push into the back of his throat as a seemingly contradictory smile tugs at the corners of his lips.
The first time Olivia had ever made him tea, she misheard him. He’d come to enjoy the sweetness of the tea over the years, because Olivia had prided herself on remembering his preference, and there was no way on Earth he would correct her.
Even apart, her kindness persevered.
“Thank you,” Siebren says, taking the mug into both hands and letting the warmth seep into his palms and through his body.
Jack sits down on the opposite end of the couch, taking a swig of his coffee as he glances out the same window Siebren had been peering out of. It’s terrible practice, and he’ll shutter this window and all the others before they go to sleep, but he’s humouring some people right now.
“Hey, Doc?” Jack asks. Siebren gives a small hum of acknowledgement as he glances up, then out the window as he sees Jack pointing up at the sky. “What’s that real bright star next to the Moon?” Siebren gives a little chuckle as he adjusts himself on the couch.
“That’s not actually a star, though it does look like one,” he begins. “It’s actually Venus. It’s remarkably clear for this time of year, actually. There must not be very much light pollution in this a –”
Siebren catches Jack’s gaze, and his expression comes over all meek.
“I - I’m sure you don’t actually want to hear all about this, I apologise.”
Jack shakes his head, and it’s emphatic and earnest.
“It’s nice not to talk shop for a while,” he replies. “Tell me all about that not-a-star.”
Siebren knows that Jack likely hasn’t asked this off his own back. He also knows that their subsequent days together will not be filled with casual talk where he can wax lyrical about his astronomical knowledge. There is still a way to go until he is safe, and though he can scarcely believe he deserves it, he will pursue that safety to the best of his abilities. He will do it for Olivia, for Harold, for Jack. For anyone who has done him even as small a kindness as pointing to the skies and asking him to share his knowledge.
“Gladly,” says Siebren, with a smile.