Moonshadows (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
moonshadows) wrote2013-01-11 01:28 pm
moonshadows) wrote2013-01-11 01:28 pm
Breakthrough interlude
"He shot me," Reaper growls from inside the can, somehow managing to sound offended and insulted while also being furious. "After all I did for him, he wants me dead."
He's going to keep going like this the whole flight back if I let him. "Papi! He wasn't trying to kill you. He knows you don't die."
That only stops him for a second. "Then why did he shoot me?"
"To keep you from killing him," I point out, dry and scathing.
"By killing me."
"He was not trying to kill you!"
"What other reason is there for shooting me?"
"So he could run away!" Which he had, after emptying his gun into Reaper's chest. McCree'd tipped his stupid cowboy hat at me and beat it.
"After he'd killed me."
Ugh. "I'm not arguing this with you right now, Papi. Maybe when you're back to full. Just...take a nap and eat your dinner, okay?"
Reaper eddies in his can for a bit, then his biological signals drop to rest state.
I turn to the pilot. "Sorry about that, Jerome. He always so cranky when he been shot."
Jerome smothers a laugh. "Is he, uh..."
"He's asleep, yeah. It's okay, he can't hear you."
"You're a brave and terrifying woman, Miss Sombra," he says without turning around. "Believe me, I've seen him get shot plenty of times. Cranky isn't the word I'd use for it. You ever wonder why I don't have a co-pilot?"
Well, I had, but now all I can see is Reaper limping back as a stream of black smoke and sucking the bioelectricity and nutrients out of the co-pilot, sparing the pilot only so he could get back to base safely. I groan. "Papi, no. They never replaced him?"
Jerome utters a humorless little laugh. "I guess they didn't think it was worth giving him a handy snack."
"I'm so sorry you had to put up with him being cranky."
He shrugs. "Being the on-call pilot has its advantages. I don't get assigned anything else, and most of the time I get to sit around goofing off."
"But on the down side, you never get to go anywhere?"
"There is that," he admits. "I'd like to take a nice long vacation somewhere tropical sometime, sit around and watch the ladies in their swimsuits and drink something fruity with a ridiculous name like Malibu sunrise but..." Awkward shrug. "Sitting around base beats getting shot at."
"When I take over the world through hacking," I tell him solemnly, "I'll be sure you get assigned to a tropical beach with enough money to stay there as long as you like."
That makes him laugh. "I appreciate the thought, but really, just the fact that you have a can to keep him in until he's...full...makes my life a whole lot easier. Listening to you tell him off is just a bonus."
"Someone gotta do it," I joke. "Being an undying ragecloud of science gone wrong does not excuse bad manners."
Jerome makes a choking sound. "The first time I heard you call him by name I thought I was going to piss my pants or be slaughtered painfully for laughing. How did you find...?"
"Hacker," I remind him dryly. "And if you're smart, you'll forget you heard his name."
"Hey, give me some credit! I haven't survived this long by accident, you know."
"You have a point. But mine still stands: if he finds out you ever told anyone his name, he may kill you anyway."
There's silence for a few minutes before Jerome says, "Miss Sombra? If I do get assigned to a tropical beach, is it okay to admit that I know you?"
"Amigo, if that day comes, you can say that you know both of us."
"Uh...by 'us', do you mean you and Reaper, or...?"
I nudge the can with my foot, thinking about my eventual plans. "If you ever see him go by his name, you can use it. I leave it to your discretion."
Jerome gives it a few beats. "Thanks. I think."
===
"He shot me," is the first thing Reaper says when he wakes up and activates the vidscreen that lets him see and be seen.
Widow looks up from her corner chair while I roll my eyes from the couch. "Si, Papi, he shot you. A lot. He wanted you to stop shooting at him, so he shot you until you couldn't stand up and then he ran away. This not the first time he shot you, and you know that."
The wisps coming off the simulated image of his head look...sulky. Sullenly angry.
"Come on, Papi," I say in a more cajoling tone. "Why you really angry? Because you couldn't kill him?"
The wisps intensify.
"Do you really want to kill him, or do you maybe just want to punish him for turning his back on you?" It's not really a question, because this isn't the first time we've had this talk.
"...punish him," comes the reluctant answer.
"Killing him is not the way to do that," I remind him firmly. "He not like you. You kill him, he gonna stay dead and then you gonna be sad and angry at yourself."
For a second it looks like he's going to protest. Make a quip about Angela's involvement or try to deny that he would be sad if McCree died, but then he subsides again into quiet simulated wisping.
"Killing solves some problems," I say quietly, "but it doesn't bring old friends back. You gotta use words for that."
"They'd never listen," he grumbles.
Which means he does want to talk. Progress! "They listen to me. Something maybe about me not shooting at them," I tease. Reaper growls. "If I get you in a room with them, can you promise to use your words and not your guns?"
There's uncomfortable eddying and heavy simulated wisping for a long moment before he growls out, "Si."
I nudge the can to nudge his swarm into producing some endorphins. "Then that's what we gonna do some day. In the meantime, you keep shooting to miss and shooting armor and remember all the things you want to say to them that you can't say if they're dead. Write them down if you want. Write them letters about how angry you are, get it out of your system some."
"So you can steal the letters and deliver them behind my back?" he accuses, but it almost sounds like a request.
I boop the screen. "Maybe."
"Sombra..."
"Si, Papi?"
He sighs. "Whatever."
The screen closes and he eddies for a minute before settling into a rest state. I take a moment to empathize with Tia Ana, having to deal with him and Uncle Jack and McCree all at the same time back in the day. No wonder she took her sweet time coming back from presumed dead. Well, I amend as Widow goes back to staring at nothing, there were other reasons for that, too.
With that on my mind, I pull up half a dozen screens and resume working on a suggested process for undoing the physical changes Talon inflicted on Widow. But while I do that, I nudge her systems to open the oubliette and drop the block on my linksignal. She's had even less social interaction than Reaper, and she's going to need all the practice she can get at being around people. The pseudo-linkweb forms and slowly, she uncurls from her chair and drifts over to sit beside me on the couch. I give it a few minutes, prodding my screens and watching out of the corner of my eye, but eventually she pulls her legs up and leans against me.
The first time I turned the tables on Papi and covered him with a blanket while he was powered down on the couch, he woke up confused and tried unsuccessfully to be angry. The next time, he woke up to this little shadow curled up against his side under the blanket, and he didn't even try. It was a week later the first time Widow joined us - I came downstairs with the blanket to find she'd curled up in my spot, so I covered them both and then curled up beside Widow, my head on her shoulder. Now, Reaper makes sure to sit in the middle of the couch when he means to power down and he invariably wakes up with both of us leaning against him. I've spent so much time in pseudo-link with Widow that I consider her a linksister.
I hope she remembers me fondly when Angela undoes all the programming Talon inflicted on her.
He's going to keep going like this the whole flight back if I let him. "Papi! He wasn't trying to kill you. He knows you don't die."
That only stops him for a second. "Then why did he shoot me?"
"To keep you from killing him," I point out, dry and scathing.
"By killing me."
"He was not trying to kill you!"
"What other reason is there for shooting me?"
"So he could run away!" Which he had, after emptying his gun into Reaper's chest. McCree'd tipped his stupid cowboy hat at me and beat it.
"After he'd killed me."
Ugh. "I'm not arguing this with you right now, Papi. Maybe when you're back to full. Just...take a nap and eat your dinner, okay?"
Reaper eddies in his can for a bit, then his biological signals drop to rest state.
I turn to the pilot. "Sorry about that, Jerome. He always so cranky when he been shot."
Jerome smothers a laugh. "Is he, uh..."
"He's asleep, yeah. It's okay, he can't hear you."
"You're a brave and terrifying woman, Miss Sombra," he says without turning around. "Believe me, I've seen him get shot plenty of times. Cranky isn't the word I'd use for it. You ever wonder why I don't have a co-pilot?"
Well, I had, but now all I can see is Reaper limping back as a stream of black smoke and sucking the bioelectricity and nutrients out of the co-pilot, sparing the pilot only so he could get back to base safely. I groan. "Papi, no. They never replaced him?"
Jerome utters a humorless little laugh. "I guess they didn't think it was worth giving him a handy snack."
"I'm so sorry you had to put up with him being cranky."
He shrugs. "Being the on-call pilot has its advantages. I don't get assigned anything else, and most of the time I get to sit around goofing off."
"But on the down side, you never get to go anywhere?"
"There is that," he admits. "I'd like to take a nice long vacation somewhere tropical sometime, sit around and watch the ladies in their swimsuits and drink something fruity with a ridiculous name like Malibu sunrise but..." Awkward shrug. "Sitting around base beats getting shot at."
"When I take over the world through hacking," I tell him solemnly, "I'll be sure you get assigned to a tropical beach with enough money to stay there as long as you like."
That makes him laugh. "I appreciate the thought, but really, just the fact that you have a can to keep him in until he's...full...makes my life a whole lot easier. Listening to you tell him off is just a bonus."
"Someone gotta do it," I joke. "Being an undying ragecloud of science gone wrong does not excuse bad manners."
Jerome makes a choking sound. "The first time I heard you call him by name I thought I was going to piss my pants or be slaughtered painfully for laughing. How did you find...?"
"Hacker," I remind him dryly. "And if you're smart, you'll forget you heard his name."
"Hey, give me some credit! I haven't survived this long by accident, you know."
"You have a point. But mine still stands: if he finds out you ever told anyone his name, he may kill you anyway."
There's silence for a few minutes before Jerome says, "Miss Sombra? If I do get assigned to a tropical beach, is it okay to admit that I know you?"
"Amigo, if that day comes, you can say that you know both of us."
"Uh...by 'us', do you mean you and Reaper, or...?"
I nudge the can with my foot, thinking about my eventual plans. "If you ever see him go by his name, you can use it. I leave it to your discretion."
Jerome gives it a few beats. "Thanks. I think."
===
"He shot me," is the first thing Reaper says when he wakes up and activates the vidscreen that lets him see and be seen.
Widow looks up from her corner chair while I roll my eyes from the couch. "Si, Papi, he shot you. A lot. He wanted you to stop shooting at him, so he shot you until you couldn't stand up and then he ran away. This not the first time he shot you, and you know that."
The wisps coming off the simulated image of his head look...sulky. Sullenly angry.
"Come on, Papi," I say in a more cajoling tone. "Why you really angry? Because you couldn't kill him?"
The wisps intensify.
"Do you really want to kill him, or do you maybe just want to punish him for turning his back on you?" It's not really a question, because this isn't the first time we've had this talk.
"...punish him," comes the reluctant answer.
"Killing him is not the way to do that," I remind him firmly. "He not like you. You kill him, he gonna stay dead and then you gonna be sad and angry at yourself."
For a second it looks like he's going to protest. Make a quip about Angela's involvement or try to deny that he would be sad if McCree died, but then he subsides again into quiet simulated wisping.
"Killing solves some problems," I say quietly, "but it doesn't bring old friends back. You gotta use words for that."
"They'd never listen," he grumbles.
Which means he does want to talk. Progress! "They listen to me. Something maybe about me not shooting at them," I tease. Reaper growls. "If I get you in a room with them, can you promise to use your words and not your guns?"
There's uncomfortable eddying and heavy simulated wisping for a long moment before he growls out, "Si."
I nudge the can to nudge his swarm into producing some endorphins. "Then that's what we gonna do some day. In the meantime, you keep shooting to miss and shooting armor and remember all the things you want to say to them that you can't say if they're dead. Write them down if you want. Write them letters about how angry you are, get it out of your system some."
"So you can steal the letters and deliver them behind my back?" he accuses, but it almost sounds like a request.
I boop the screen. "Maybe."
"Sombra..."
"Si, Papi?"
He sighs. "Whatever."
The screen closes and he eddies for a minute before settling into a rest state. I take a moment to empathize with Tia Ana, having to deal with him and Uncle Jack and McCree all at the same time back in the day. No wonder she took her sweet time coming back from presumed dead. Well, I amend as Widow goes back to staring at nothing, there were other reasons for that, too.
With that on my mind, I pull up half a dozen screens and resume working on a suggested process for undoing the physical changes Talon inflicted on Widow. But while I do that, I nudge her systems to open the oubliette and drop the block on my linksignal. She's had even less social interaction than Reaper, and she's going to need all the practice she can get at being around people. The pseudo-linkweb forms and slowly, she uncurls from her chair and drifts over to sit beside me on the couch. I give it a few minutes, prodding my screens and watching out of the corner of my eye, but eventually she pulls her legs up and leans against me.
The first time I turned the tables on Papi and covered him with a blanket while he was powered down on the couch, he woke up confused and tried unsuccessfully to be angry. The next time, he woke up to this little shadow curled up against his side under the blanket, and he didn't even try. It was a week later the first time Widow joined us - I came downstairs with the blanket to find she'd curled up in my spot, so I covered them both and then curled up beside Widow, my head on her shoulder. Now, Reaper makes sure to sit in the middle of the couch when he means to power down and he invariably wakes up with both of us leaning against him. I've spent so much time in pseudo-link with Widow that I consider her a linksister.
I hope she remembers me fondly when Angela undoes all the programming Talon inflicted on her.