#transl0cating

Welcome!

You’ll be staying in House 129!

You’ll retain everything from your previous stay!

Enjoy your stay!

“Listen, you can’t just get bath bombs. You need bubble bars, too.”

Wow. Amazing that, whoever could have possibly thrown that, managed to get a whole note inside of it. Was it laminated?

finally arriving at his supposed place of rest was, for a lack of a better word, disappointing. of course, he hadn’t expected luxury. he wasn’t a fool, despite how some might have wished to have him seen. he was a stranger, a nobody amongst a sea of others. it was an unusual place to be, rooted at the bottom of a large food-chain, without COMMAND nor ORDER, but he was hardly a stranger to feeling powerless. it had been many years since the strain of the unknown and the unjust had flashed within his chest as an anxious infection, draining him of energy as he finally approached the apartment complex, but he was hardly able to do much about it, with a mere gun at his side which felt more akin to a child’s toy than something deadly & suitable for his needs.

despite having no true power in the form of a rank, something harshly reminded by the tag of NOBODY scrawled across his paperwork, he found that people still recognised a leader when they saw one, often darting aside as he strode, coat billowing black like a shadow behind him, their feet leaving the pavement so that he may walk by. it was always a rather natural trait, wasn’t it? to fear something on mere instinct alone. regardless, he stepped up to the complex with narrowing, cold eyes and a contempt within his gaze which would undoubtedly remain for a while, if the innards of the building were very much like the exterior.

riding the elevator, he marvelled at how simplistic the components were; a handful of buttons with lax security really. anybody could walk in and go wherever they wished, with no need for a pass to be swiped or a code to be input. how exposed, how reckless. was privacy no longer a right? why, even the lowest ranks of officers often had their own coded secrets, locked behind fingerprint-protected rooms. but this was without it all, so open & so incredibly vulnerable. the doors opened, but hux didn’t exit. wrong floor, currently. instead a stranger boarded, input their choice of floor and the doors swished closed once more. 

While she may be old, her memory stayed clear as day. She’d met this woman here before---that was for certain. But if it was any indication of her untimely departure and return, there was no telling of if she remembered her---or if she was even the same iteration. She’d heard whispers of the sort around the city of things like that happening, but she’d never gotten to experience it.

Now she had a chance.

She wouldn’t let her know she knew who she was, even vaguely. There was something off about her the last time they met anyway. Watching the other carefully, she noted when the woman dropped something, then gently went down to pick it up for her.

“I believe you dropped this,” she stated calmly, offering out the thumb drive to the other.

            “..Eh? what in tarnation’ just happened.” knitted brows and the rubbing of his beard with his gloved hand, Mccree stares at his phone. “Just a moment ago it said Jesse..” Did his phone glitch or something? The cowboy glances around, only having the faintest of ideas WHO could have fooled his eyes this way. “For the last time, the name ain’t JOEL.” Mechanical digits curl around the phone as he clicks it shut, brown hues eventually spotting the hacker from across the street. Hah! nice try. “You best remember that, SOMBRA.” His voice bellows, hurrying himself across the street before the light changes.

The state of the city ever since this sudden fear had begun to grip it had left the assassin in a state of heightened alertness. If others were suffering from unseen terror, Shalem was determined to not allow himself to be victim of whatever it must be, no doubt some sort of trick that the scientists decided to inflict upon the city for their sheer enjoyment.

Holding his rifle close to his body, Shalem carefully made his way through the city, even the most basic trip out leaving him what most people would consider to be overarmed for what could ultimately be nothing for him. But for Shalem, he felt that it was better to be safe than sorry.

A sudden noise down an alleyway caught the assassin’s attention, his eyes darting as he brought his rifle close to bear, prepared for the worst. Creeping forward, Shalem did his best to keep his breathing calm as he continued to hear someone or something shuffling about.

What an interesting predicament this was. To be pulled into an experiment run by some mediocre scientists... Maybe she could get along with them in the future. But for now, they’d disrespected her. She’d been given a hut to live in, and her powers were significantly cut back from what they were at home. Only three uses a day for her enhanced movement? Ridiculous. They must have thought so little of her.

Gritting her teeth, she stewed in her anger for a moment before something caught her eye---or rather, someone. Perfect. Perhaps she could use this to her advantage.

If she didn’t have an abode suited for a lab, maybe she did.

Making good use of one of the three times a day she could use it, she let herself ghost her way over to the other quickly, not caring if her sudden appearance in front of the other scared her.

“Sombra, my favorite hacker,” as if she knew any others.