It was a stand off. Soldier 76, aiming down his sights, unwavering. Reaper, his claws digging cruelly into his young hostage's neck. Despite the situation, the death bringer merely stood and smirked under his skull mask, enveloped in husky shadows.
Suddenly, the soldier took a half step forward, perhaps about to make a move, but Reaper's clawed hands dug tighter into the girl's neck: he was using her as a human shield and they both knew it. They stood for a few seconds, both unsure of the other's next move before Reaper leaned forward a fraction.
'You can't kill what's already dead, Jack' he growled out, tilting his head a little as if to indicate himself, 'but your little girlfriend isn't dead yet'.
He shifted his claws against her neck as if to prove his point, and a trickle of blood ran down her neck. In response to the pain the girl tensed up and shivered, backing further into him to get away from his claws.
The soldier's hands clenched visibly. He said nothing, and although both of their masks made them appear emotionless, anyone who knew them closely would have felt the tense history that wrapped them both like a coroner's sheet; removing the air and leaving them both breathless.
In the end, neither made the first move as a second later a bullet tore through the edge of Soldier 76's arm, causing him to leap back to the cover of a burned out car on his right, hissing in pain as he tried to stem the bleeding.
Hoisting up his gun with his left hand, he fired blindly over the top of the car in the direction of the sniper: he should have known Widowmaker would be here. She was never far behind Reaper, and he swore at himself for missing the obvious.
He leapt up again from behind the car, firing in the direction of Widowmaker's rooftop spot to earn a second of respite from her scoped gaze, but as he turned to focus his sights on Reaper and his hostage, he caught only a glimpse of the shadow master disappearing into the alleyway behind him, the intimate darkness enveloping them both faster than his legs could take him to them.
The second before they disappeared, the girl locked her eyes with him - but as he stopped running, he saw no fear in her usually soft green eyes. Only pure, unadulterated determination. Stopping to a halt in the covered alley, he saw the last dusky bits of black shadow disappear, and he cursed again, this time louder.
'Pull yourself together, soldier' He muttered under his breath before once again leaping into a long legged run. Reaper may be beyond his reach right now, but that spider bitch certainly wasn't, and Jack Morrison sure as hell wasn't going to let her off easy.
As Reaper made his escape, he quickly put a hand against the now-struggling girl's forehead, sending out a shock and knocking her out cold. She slumped against him, prompting him to mock her.
'Much better' his voice echoed, low and gravelly as he shunted her up onto his shoulder, grunting slightly at her dead weight.
Calling on the darkness once more, he leaned into the black, curling mist and shadowstepped to the hallway of a dusky safehouse. Hesitating for a second, he dumped the girl on the floor unceremoniously, glaring at her. This had not been a part of his plan, but he appreciated her... Help in escaping Jack. She wore nothing more than plain jeans and a shirt that now crumpled against the floor; pitifully inappropriate for the freezing snow that coated the ground outside the house.
Striding forcefully away from her down the hallway, the man formerly known as Gabriel Reyes pushed a bedroom door open, hastily clearing it of all the contents and leaving it bare and dim, with nothing but a bed and access to the adjoining bathroom.
Stirred by the scraping noises being made from the nearby room, the girl started to wake, her hand snaking up to massage her bruised head and neck, pushing away her brown curls that were now wet and matted. Realising her situation, she sat bolt upright, her eyes wide like a trapped fox.
'Shit.'
Scrambling to her feet, she turned to the front door behind her, grasping the door handle and twisting it furiously. Suddenly, heavy footfalls sounded behind her and she gasped in fear and anger as the door failed to open. Determined to face literal Death straight on, she turned to look at the approaching man, pressing her back to the door.
'The hell do you want with me, Reaper?' She called out, forcing herself to squint in the dim light to focus on him.
In turn, she heard a deep, rumbling laugh as Reaper took another heavy step forward.
'My my, little girl, aren't we a fiery one?' He paused and she could feel him smirking under the mask.
'Jack... He must have his hands full with you, Girl.'
He spat out the last word viciously, and there was a slight undertone to his words, but before the girl could respond he shadowstepped forward to within an inch of her, grabbed both her arms tightly and shifted them both through the darkness into the room he had been clearing seconds before.
As they landed she stumbled and tripped on the corner of the bed, disoriented from the teleportation. As she fell to the floor, his rough, throaty voice resounded above her.
'Pathetic, Girl.' she heard Reaper say, his claws clicking against his shotguns, and she snapped.
'I'm not 'Girl'. I have a name.' She turned to glare at the man, anger replacing the fear that had paralysed her moments before.
'Really.' The masked man deadpanned, no emotion in his voice.
'It's Sienna.'
'I don't care' he said flatly, turning on his heels and striding out of the door, slamming it shut behind him.
The sound of a key in a lock clicked, and darkness flooded the room as the girl named Sienna dusted herself down and got up off the wooden floor. Not hearing footsteps leaving the outside of the door, she decided to have her own little victory.
'What a dick' she called out, just loud enough for a lone person loitering outside the door to hear.
The quick telltale 'whoosh' of Reaper's teleportation made a weak grin stretch across her face and she turned to survey her surroundings. The place was dark and dingy, the only light illuminating the room was a faint orange stream through the window from the setting sun. It wasn't as unpleasant as she expected, however.
'I might as well get comfy, it's gonna be a while until anyone comes to get me.' Sienna thought to herself, cautiously patting the bed in a testing motion.
Her hand sank in, and her brows raised in surprise. The thing was cushioned to within an inch of its life, and she hesitantly raised a knee to test the softness. When she sank even deeper in, the 20 year old couldn't help but smile despite her fear at the soft, warmth of the duvet as it billowed up around her. It was an unexpected change to the cold, unwelcoming floors that she had become accustomed to in the past year.
It was only since a month ago that she had found Jack again, not the dead man she thought he was, but alive and well. And he'd taken her in.
The though burst into her mind like a rocket. Jack! Her heartbeat rose dramatically again, and she pulled herself off the bed and stood; body trembling and the comfort of the bed long forgotten. The last thing she has seen was him being shot, and she had no way to tell if he was okay. Her face burned.
'Hell, he could even be dead for all I know' Sienna heard her weak voice out loud, and was disgusted at how powerless she was to Reaper's control.
Making up her mind, she looked up again at the walls keeping her prisoner.
'I have to at least do something' her voice echoed off the walls, rebounding back at her like a command.
Moving over to the window, the girl checked the clasps only to find them, like the front door, locked and with no way out. Even the chest of drawers had been completely emptied from top to bottom - but what interested Sienna were the claw marks at the bottom of the drawers. Those are Reaper's claws, she thought inwardly, he must have cleared this room in a hurry. So does that mean this is...
Her gaze shifted around the room once more, but examining everything in a different light. Was this Reaper's bedroom? His usual hideout from the regrouped Overwatch members?
Sienna had already figured out that his kidnapping of her hadn't been his original intention, but she didn't expect him to bring her to his own house, so to say.
'I guess it makes sense, where else would he keep a hostage?' her voice filled the silence, and her eyes finished their sweep of the room before turning to focus once more on the double bed that occupied over half of the room.
As she gazed meaninglessly, colourful memories rushed through her brain, clouding her vision with reminiscent nostalgia for the past. She'd known Jack before his supposed death, and although he'd told her about Gabriel once or twice she'd never met him. Even after the disbanding of Overwatch... He never seemed real, she thought, more like a fairy tale designed to scare little kids into being good. The ghost who wouldn't die. But now?
Well.
She paused her musing to walk round to the side of the bed. Now she'd had first hand experience with him,
'The fairy tale has turned into somewhat of a nightmare' she muttered darkly, her hand sliding up to finger the small puncture wound on her neck.
Regretting the decision immediately, she pulled her hand away as a slice of pain rippled through her skin. Just then, the final sliver of light that was streaming into the room was cut off as the sun sank lower into the horizon, and her head dropped at the dawning realisation of what really had occurred today.
Before now, it had all just felt like a hazy dream, with event after event occurring, adrenaline jolts after adrenaline jolts. It had finally caught up with her, and her body sagged at the weight of the strain it had been put through. At her muscle's protests, Sienna looked reluctantly at the bed.
Knowing it was used by the man - no, the thing - who had no qualms in hurting her made her baulk, and her face took on a pale shade of green. Even though the thought disgusted her, her legs shook with exhaustion and Sienna knew she was out of options. It was either sleep on the floor and leave herself unable to fight if necessary tomorrow, or...
Her sigh epitomised her internal struggle.
Now, here I am, about to sleep in the bed of my captor, and there ain't a thing I can do about it.
Taking a deep breath in, the girl steeled her nerves and pulled back the black duvet and crept nervously into the bed, no longer able to keep herself standing. But as the duvet shifted with her body, Sienna couldn't ignore the husky, earthen scent of Reaper that infiltrated her senses and filled her dreaming mind with sharp claws digging into her neck and endless, shadowy alleyways closing in on her.