The Geneva dome still reeked of ozone. The copper tang of burnt circuitry clung to the air vents, mingling with the faint smoke that curled from the Faraday cage where Anubis had been held just hours before. Delegates had shouted themselves hoarse, diplomats had stormed in and out of side chambers, but nothing yet had been settled.
Now, at last, the time had come.
Adawe stood from her chair at the heart of the council floor. The holo-table bathed her in pale light, displaying a fractured world. Dozens of nations pulsed red across the map, warning icons blinking where food had run out, where power grids had collapsed, where hospitals lay gutted and empty. Entire continents were bandaged in crisis.
Her voice rang across the chamber, sharp enough to cut through fatigue.
"The Omnic War has ended. But do not mistake the silence outside these walls for peace. What we inherit today is a shattered world. Nations starve. Cities crumble. The very trust between man and machine has been ground to dust. If we act as we always have, divided, fearful, clinging to our borders, humanity will not survive the winter. If we stand together, we may endure."
The delegates shifted in their seats. Some bowed their heads, others muttered in low voices, but no one interrupted. Adawe had the floor.
"By unanimous resolution of this council," she continued, "Overwatch is hereby charged not only with defending humanity, but with rebuilding it. They will deliver food where there is none. They will restore light where darkness has consumed entire nations. They will rebuild hospitals, cities, and fields. They will begin with the nations closest to collapse; those whose survival now hangs by a single thread."
Across the chamber, heads turned toward the scarlet icons on the map: Ethiopia, still reeling from the bombardments; Yemen, where grain reserves had burned; Venezuela, its power grid shattered.
Jack Morrison sat at the edge of the table, his hands clasped tightly in front of him. His expression was unreadable, though Shawn, watching from the shadows, saw the weight in his eyes. Reyes leaned beside him, jaw clenched, arms folded.
Adawe let the weight of her words settle before speaking again. "But reconstruction is not enough. We must also confront the truth of why this war began. Anubis rose because omnics were denied dignity. Too long, their existence was defined by chains, their choice stolen, their voices silenced. We gave them no future but servitude. We left them no path but rebellion."
Her eyes swept the room, meeting each leader's gaze in turn. "Across the world, the status of omnics will now be reconsidered. Some nations will grant them rights; the right to live, to work, to choose their own destinies. Others will not. That choice remains sovereign. But let this council be clear: the conversation will not be silenced again. The world has bled too deeply for that."
Murmurs broke across the chamber, swelling into arguments. Canada's Prime Minister leaned forward, nodding fiercely. Russia's representative scoffed, his voice dripping disdain as he muttered to those beside him. A German chancellor scribbled notes furiously on her pad.
Adawe's hand slammed against the table, cutting them short. "And there is one more decree," she said, her voice like iron. "The Omnic Crisis has proven beyond doubt the danger of unchecked artificial intelligence. From this moment forward, Overwatch is charged with the oversight of all autonomous constructs. Bastion units, Ravager frames, factories capable of birthing war machines, they will be dismantled, repurposed, or destroyed. No machine, no code, no program will rise unchecked again."
Silence fell like a hammer.
"Overwatch will rebuild the world," Adawe said, her final words echoing across the dome, "and it will guard against those who would plunge it back into war. That is our decree."
One by one, the council stood, sealing the resolution. Some stood tall in pride, others heavy with resignation. But all understood the truth: there was no other path forward.
The world had chosen its answer.
Cairo's Ruins
Far from Geneva's polished walls, the ruins of Cairo lay silent under the moon. The fortress of Anubis was a corpse sprawled across the desert, its jagged towers shattered, its steel bones broken and exposed to the sand. Fires smoldered in the distance, their light flickering like dying stars.
Among the wreckage moved a solitary figure. A Ravager, battered and scarred, his optics dimmed to a faint glow. He had been built for one purpose: to fight and to kill. But the voice that had commanded him was gone. The silence was his alone.
He carried another across his shoulder, a broken omnic, half a body draped in the remnants of a suit. His name was S3bastian, though he could no longer remember it. His power core sputtered faintly, his optics flickering weakly as he rasped static-laced words.
"Maybe you should have ignored me, " S3bastian croaked, sparks crackling across his frame. "Waste of time. Waste of effort."
The Ravager ignored him. His footsteps crunched through the sand and rubble, heavy but steady.
Hours passed before he set the omnic down atop a slab of broken concrete. Around them stretched the battlefield: fallen Bastions, shattered Ravagers, the remains of drones twisted and blackened by fire. The Ravager's optics swept the wreckage, calculating possibilities. His programming told him these were corpses. His chest told him they were kin.
He pushed the thought aside. He did not understand it. He simply knew what must be done.
Piece by piece, he scavenged what could be salvaged. An arm joint, torn from a fallen Ravager. A stabilizer coil, dented but functional, ripped from a Bastion's spine. Armor plating hammered into crude shapes, reshaped with his own heavy fists into something usable.
Each trip back, he worked in silence, fitting the pieces to S3bastian's broken frame. Sparks hissed. Wires snapped. Metal screamed against metal. Slowly, painfully, a patchwork body took form.
S3bastian stirred as power bled back into his circuits. His optics flickered faintly, then steadied. He flexed his new arm, joints creaking, and let out a ragged chuckle.
"I feel… taller. Heavier. Maybe even… distinguished. Tell me, am I handsome yet?"
The Ravager tilted his head. He said nothing. But something flickered inside him, something he had no word for.
Hope.
S3bastian's optics narrowed, dimming again before stabilizing. "What about you? What now? What's your grand plan?"
The Ravager looked toward the horizon, endless desert stretching beneath the moon. "I do not know. I was built to fight. Now the voice is gone. The war is gone. So I will walk. Until I find purpose."
The smaller omnic hummed thoughtfully, static crackling faintly in the air. "Well. You've got better direction than me. Can't remember what I was doing before you picked me up. Feels like I blinked, and the world fell apart. Suppose that means… I'm free. Or lost. Or both."
He reached for the ground, using his mismatched limbs to push himself upright. The joints whirred awkwardly, unsteady but alive. He limped forward a step, then another, until he stood beside the Ravager.
"Guess I'll tag along," S3bastian said with forced cheer. "Better than rusting alone. Besides, you look like you could use company."
The Ravager said nothing. But he started walking, his heavy footsteps carrying him into the night. S3bastian followed, patched and imperfect, but alive.
Together, they left the carcass of Cairo behind. Two machines without masters, walking into a future neither could yet see.
Back in Geneva
The council chamber emptied in waves of silk suits and military uniforms. Delegates whispered fiercely, aides rushed with datapads, generals muttered into radios. The great resolution had been made, but the aftershocks had only begun.
Shawn Rose lingered. His scars glowed faintly beneath his torn uniform, electricity restless under his skin. He had kept silent during the council, but the weight of Anubis' whisper gnawed at him like fire.
As the last diplomats departed, Shawn moved quickly, intercepting Jack Morrison, Gabriel Reyes, Ana Amari, Sojourn, and Torbjörn before they could leave the dome. He pulled them into a quiet alcove, far from prying ears.
"There's something you need to hear," Shawn said, his voice low but urgent.
The leaders studied him carefully. They had learned long ago that Shawn did not waste words.
"When they dragged Anubis away, he whispered to me," Shawn continued. "One word. Talon."
The name cut the air like a blade. Adawe remained stone faced. Reyes stiffened. Morrison's jaw tightened. Ana's eyes narrowed, sharp as a hawk's. To the rest, the name was unfamiliar.
"I'm guessing that's a bad thing." Torbjorn said.
"They're a group that operates within the shadows, controlling every deal within the underworld. There isn't anything that they don't handle from kidnappings to gambling."
"I was working a case dealing with a string of kidnappings when I just so happened on the name. The Chief of Police ordered me to stand down. I knew it went above even him, so they had to be some nasty pieces of work." Reyes explained.
Adawe glanced off, "The name hasn't been spoken out loud by anyone. There haven't been any confirmed cases of their workings, and no evidence to prove their existence yet. They were looking like a myth. But for you to know so much about their dealings, they have to exist."
"He never said it to the council," Shawn pressed. "Never out loud. And I think I know why. Because maybe.... maybe one of them was listening. Maybe one of them in that chamber already belongs to Talon."
The silence that followed was heavy, electric.
Sojourn broke it first, her voice a low murmur. "You're saying Anubis wasn't acting alone. That humans, a human organization, pushed him, maybe even gave him the idea of rebellion."
Shawn nodded. "He resisted every question until then. But he wasn't bluffing. I've seen enough liars to know the difference. Talon is real. They're the shadow pulling strings behind the war. And if they could reach Anubis, then they're already deeper than any of us want to believe."
Reyes swore under his breath. Morrison leaned forward, voice grim. "Then we investigate. Quietly. If Talon's inside these walls, we can't risk a public hunt. But if they're in the shadows, we'll drag them into the light."
Ana's expression was unreadable, but her voice was calm. "We heed the warning. We always have. And we move carefully. If Shawn is right, we can't afford to tip our hand."
The group fell into silence again, each of them weighing the implications. Overwatch had just been crowned the saviors of humanity, entrusted with rebuilding nations and regulating machines. But now, beneath the ash, a second war brewed, one not of steel, but of flesh and shadow.
Shawn looked at each of them in turn. "The war isn't over," he said quietly. "It's just changed shape."
The others nodded. They didn't need to debate. They had all seen too much to dismiss him.
As the leaders dispersed into the night, Shawn lingered, staring at the empty chamber where Anubis had been held. He thought of S3bastian. Oh, what he would give to see him one more time.