is this a real blog? hard to tell

There was no mistaking that obnoxious fauxhawk anywhere. Sarioğlu was as irritating as he was pretty, charming on the surface but about as deep as a puddle. There were a lot of people that the man once known as Gabriel Reyes disliked on sight, and Sarioğlu had been one of the most prominent, when he’d sauntered across the room and criticized a well-laid plan simply because it infringed upon a bit of downtime for the troops. Pathetic.

Reaper took a seat on the same side of the dropship as him, but as many seats down as was possible. With the mask he was now someone else, someone unrecognizable- but Sarioğlu loved “making new friends”. His only hope would be to disappear entirely, but the dropship was too small for that.

The door closed, the pilot mumbled something over the intercom, and soon they were in the air. 

The dropship bounced. Reaper waited for a “bit of turbulence, eh?” or a “I like my flights like I like my coffee,” to which Cassidy would humor with a “what, with cream and sugar?” and then the arguing would start, and Sarioğlu would put on that fake-suave tone that he must have thought made him dominate his conversations; and for the man once known as Gabriel Reyes, the flight would have felt like the longest on record. 

But no one spoke. And the dropship was empty except for the two of them.

Reaper allowed himself a glance in Sarioğlu’s direction. The man stared into the mirroring wall of seats across the way, as if he were about to invent some new lecture on the importance of seatbelts.

Sarioğlu. . . wasn’t wearing his seatbelt. 

Reaper studied the man’s face again. There were some differences- a pair of sensory implants at his temples, and the beard was a choice -but he never forgot a face. Sarioğlu would’ve mentioned an identical twin as often as he mentioned his perfect parents if he’d had one. Which meant there was only one person this could be. 

Which meant the cybernetics were new as well, including the juvenile LED decoration on his torso, that of a geometric red eye. Cybernetics with a dramatic flair were not unusual for this line of work. But this line of work was unusual for Sarioğlu. 

Who knew. Maybe a hit on a third-world data center was somehow clean enough to fit Sarioğlu’s delicate sensibilities. Or maybe Sarioğlu had finally stopped trying to be everyone’s knight in shining armor. That would be a welcome change of pace. 

Sarioğlu’s eyes hadn’t moved. He hadn’t glanced in Reaper’s direction once. 

Was he afraid? 

A laugh crept up Reaper’s throat, and he let it ring into the air around him. 

When Sarioğlu didn’t react, he said, “not going to say hello?” 

Sarioğlu’s head snapped towards him. Then he faced his torso at him. The eye decoration on his chest moved, scanning him up and down. 

“Stay out of the way, Gabriel Reyes.” Sarioğlu spoke. 

Reaper blinked, any satisfaction he’d felt wiped away by the full name ringing in his ears.

“You don’t know me.” He bluffed.

“You are more useful to me alive. Do not modify that statistic prematurely.” A metallic rumble entered Sarioğlu’s voice. 

Reaper managed a snarl. “And what would you plan on doing about it?”

Sarioğlu simply stared. His irises hadn’t moved once the entire conversation- but the eye on the screen flickered between Reaper’s weapons, then his mask. 

Then Sarioğlu turned away, and resumed staring at the empty seats across from him.

“I’m talking to you!” Reaper snapped. 

Sarioğlu didn’t reply. Didn’t even roll his eyes, or tsch through his teeth, or any other gesture to reinforce whatever spot on the pecking order he’d placed Reaper into. He didn’t even glance in his direction, as if ignoring an insect on the wall and nothing more. 

Emre fucking Sarioğlu, who’d cried all the way to Morrison whenever he deemed Blackwatch operations had overlooked a single civilian. 

This was not Emre Sarioğlu. 

Something wearing his skin, maybe. Parading around with his perfect little lips and manicured eyeliner and childish fauxhawk still, but each like an artifact that evolution had forgotten to erase. 

What the hell had happened to him? Reaper’s mind immediately went to cancer, or something similar- maybe Sarioğlu had sold himself to another O'Deorain-like type, allowed them to tear him apart for the chance of another few years. . . but what would be the point of that if he was no longer himself?

Reaper clenched his claws around his forearm. 

He should draw his shotguns and kill this imitation. But the though that he might actually be doing the old Sarioğlu a favor by pulling the trigger put a stop to that idea. 

He decided he wanted nothing to do with whatever terrible little corner of the world Sarioğlu had gotten himself into.