Chronal Disassociation Ch. 67 (Patreon)

Lena was glad that this was all a simulation, if only because she didn’t have to worry about wasting the ammo of her pulse pistols. No matter what anyone said, those cartridges were a pain in the arse to carry around, especially with how fast they emptied when in a firefight. On any mission, she would need at least fifty reloads, and while yes, the accelerator on her chest could refill spent cartridges, they did so at an abysmally slow rate.

The same could be said about all of their training sessions. In order to simulate real world scenarios, her training weapons had the same drawback built in by Winston. It was grating to realize that at any point, if she lost track of them, Lena could very well be a sitting duck who would only be able to run around until her ammo refilled themselves.

With this simulator, that was all thrown out of the window, and Lena could fire without worry.

“Down!”

Hearing the German man yell, Lena didn’t hesitate to immediately drop to the ground. A massive swing of Reinhardt’s hammer took one, two, then four of the Programs in the chest, sending them flying. Lena didn’t stop shooting, her weapons taking the legs of another enemy that was stabbing forward with its sword. The now-downed Program was finished off by Winston’s jump pack, the exhaust from jumping enough to flatten it.

Even then, they barely made a dent in the wave of enemies.

Genji was swinging his sword as he dashed nimbly through the Enemy Programs. The big ones were usually his targets, as their bulk didn’t allow them to reach the cyborg as he vaulted over them. More than once, Lena had seen the morningstar-handed hulks fall over from a single, well aimed slash to the ‘neck’.

Sombra was completely invisible. Since the start of the battle, Lena hadn’t seen hide nor hair of the resident hacker. Though, the pilot had definitely seen her work, as a slowly growing horde of purple-lined Enemy Programs were now fighting their own. It seemed that the AI had taken into account Sombra’s abilities and allowed the Programs to be converted.

Lena was certain that the other woman was having the time of her life.

And to be fair? Lena was the same. Earlier, the entire bit with that Kiara AI had spooked her quite a bit. The idea that something as powerful as that had existed for long enough that Archer personally knew her? 

Frankly bloody insane.

The people watching had no idea of how long Archer had existed, assuming that he was around the same age as the younger members of the strike team. On the surface, she could get that. His white hair and her own preferences aside, Lena could objectively say that the man was way too handsome to be assumed as anything over thirty.

Nevermind Japanese. Who the hell looks at Archer and goes ‘yeah, this bloke’s Japanese’?

Anyway, the stream viewers were assuming that Kiara’s comments only meant that it was a couple of years before the red-clad man had joined Overwatch. That he maybe met her when she was still being built. Nothing too problematic, as AI was still definitely a branch of science that was actively being developed. 

Though anti-omnic rhetoric had extended to decrying such research, self-aware AI was still viewed in a fairly positive light.

Herself and the others on the strike team knew differently, however.

Archer was a Heroic Spirit that worked alongside the defunct Overwatch predecessor, Chaldea. That was the only place that Kiara could have met Archer at.

Which meant that the AI predated the Omnic Crisis.

The consequences of Archer not telling them of Kiara’s existence could be left for another time, though. Lena had a lot of steam to blow off, and a free shooting range with infinite ammunition with no real risk of injuries?

Lena wasn’t a fan of video games, but bloody hell if this was what it felt like for people who didn’t want to risk life and limb, she could understand why.

The fun had to stop eventually, though. A massive shadow fell over Lena, blocking out the artificial sun of the simulation.

She blinked away from a sword swing and looked up. The giant Enemy Program was impossible to ignore. Surprisingly, it was the least dangerous enemy for Lena and everyone else on the oil rig's platforms. Its focus was entirely on MEKA Squad, and even then, it wasn't fighting properly. More or less, it was swinging its arms wildly, as if trying to swat a particularly annoying set of mosquitos.

Yet, those swats were the source of a massive amount of turbulence for anything flying close to it. Case in point, the comms she could hear from the kids in the air.

“Stay in formation!” D.Mon called out as she used her mech’s green energy sword to try and carve a gouge on the Program. It didn’t work, her weapon bouncing off, causing the younger girl to swear in Korean (or at least, Lena assumed it was a swear).

“I’m trying!” D.Va, having been thrown off course by one of the gusts, angles herself to dive back into the fray. It doesn’t pan out, as MEKA had to again scatter from a deceptively fast fist. That Lena could keep up with all of the action going on proved that she had actually grown to have more spatial awareness than she had thought.

“Come onnnnn, guys!” Suddenly, Kiara’s voice echoed throughout the shared comms, making Lena pause her shooting. Only for a moment, before another of the Enemy Programs managed to dive beneath the shield that Reinhardt was projecting, “I even made it slightly easier, considering Archer’s here!”

“You call this easy, Kiki?!” Casino yelled, “In case you haven’t noticed, we don’t exactly have the firepower to take this down!”

“Oh don’t be so dramatic.” Lena could practically hear the rolling of eyes, “You should have this in the bag! Well, if Archer stops sandbagging so much.”

Well, she wasn’t wrong. But, considering what Archer was doing now, they might be already revealing a bit too much than he wanted.

Because Lena had heard the term ‘wheat before the scythe’ before, but it was only now that she truly understood just how literal that can be.

Back during the London Uprising, Lena had seen what he was capable of. Firing missile-like arrows from a distance, before engaging the Null Sector leader on his own. They were instances where Lena was far enough away that she could only really see the aftermath of everything. Even the way Archer had flattened a street, that one she didn’t really see how he did so. Only that he had done so.

Even against Mauga, Archer was basically held down by the fact that he couldn’t let the rest of the team get shot by a hail of bullets.

Like Lena, right now, there were no such complications. Not anymore.

Two swords, one black, one white. Held in each hand, Archer flew through any Programs that swarmed around him. 

Reinhardt needed the bulk of his hammer to smash a couple of Programs - Archer’s kick shattered five in one go. 

Genji’s magic dragon sword could cut five enemies with one swing - one of Archer’s swords would be flung forward like a buzzsaw, bisecting ten at a time. 

Lena’s pulse pistols could down three programs before reloading - Archer didn’t need to reload the ring of endlessly spawning swords that launched forward, each sword destroying its target entirely.

Where the strike team had been bunkering against a force of dozens at a time, Archer had already killed hundreds of the enemies already.

And Kiara implied that he was still holding back.

The mini-screen projected on her face showed just how disbelieving the viewers were.

[PewPew_Norepeat]: WTF WAS THAT KICK????[lagswithc]: bro is playing on a different physics engine[ceroCooldowns]: DID HE JUST SPAWN SWORDS OUT OF THIN AIR??? WHO THE HELL GAVE THIS GUY VISHKAR TECH???[Salt_Free_Gaming]: wait is he omnic? how is he doing that[Bookwyrm]: Overwatch holding out on us. who tf is this guy[Gwishin_Slayer]: EXPLOITER EXPLOITER HES HACKING THE SIM[matrixwasbad]: KIKI SAID HE'S HOLDING BACK????[JunkBall]: vishkar hardlight doesnt look like that[BobaKnight]: my bits are gone. he has 500 kills in two minutes.

Unfortunately, this caught the attention of not just the viewers.

“Archer!” D.Mon’s voice carried a bit of frustration, “As much as I am annoyed at Kiara-” The AI blew a raspberry, “Is she telling the truth?! Do you have some way to take this thing down?!”

“Hoh?” He was doing the annoying tone on purpose, Lena swears he was, “And here I thought this was supposed to be a training simulation for you guys. Though, in retrospect, I’m guessing you haven’t gotten up to this level yet.” 

“Yeah, more or less.” Kiara’s nonchalant tone was almost as annoying as Archer’s general voice, “Basically, the head honcho wanted the kids to get their shit kicked in-”

“Language!” Overlord uncharacteristically shouted, even as he dodged a headbutt from the giant, of all attacks.

“-cause they were getting too big in their britches. They thought that you guys wouldn’t be able to do anything to KP, so they could get a double whammy with shutting down MEKA’s popularity and making Overwatch look bad.”

“Politics?” Archer snorted with a tiny bit of sympathy.

“Ehhhh~” Lena imagined Kiara doing a so-so gesture as she continued, “Sort of? Try a mix of politics and global conspiracy.”

“Should you really be talking about this right now?” Reinhardt, of all people, cut into the conversation, “We are live, you know?”

“I mean, what are they gonna do? Shut me down? They do that and they prove what I’m saying is correct. Plus, I never signed an NDA~!” The mischievous sing-song of Kiara’s voice was terrifyingly cute. 

“You’re an AI, there’s-”

“ARCHER!” D.Va yelled out this time, “ANYTHING FOR THE BIG GUY?!”

Instead of answering, the Heroic Spirit created another weapon. This one, unlike the cleanly made swords that he had used earlier, was one that was made almost entirely of stone. It didn't even look like a sword. It was a massive, brutal slab of jagged gray rock, crudely carved into the shape of a giant axe. The thing was larger than Reinhardt. It had to weigh several tons.

And Lena could clearly see it, enough to describe it in its entirety, as Archer had swung it once. Hundreds of the programs were blown away, thrown into the digital sea. The pressure that was one Reinhardt and Winston’s shields immediately let up as the deck of the oil rig was cleared of any enemies.

That one swing carried enough strength that there was no way that it wasn’t noticed.

“Should you really be showing off Nine Lives? Who knows who’s watching, Archer~♡” 

Lena felt her chronal accelerator stutter against her chest. The sheer mass of the stone slab defied gravity. And Kiara just casually gave it a name on a global broadcast.

Nine Lives.

It sounded like a bloody video game ultimate. But the pressure in the air was way too real. The smell of crushed ozone and ancient, dry dirt completely masked the digital ocean breeze.

"That's kind of the point." Archer said. His voice was calm over the comms. Dead calm, "If anyone understands what I'm doing, then that just means that I got their attention. Better than a dead end in London."

He didn't bend his knees. He didn't brace his stance. He just lifted a jagged rock the size of a dropship over his shoulder like it was a cricket bat.

Out in the water, the giant Program finally noticed him. Its faceplate, the one with just a single eye on the right side, stared down at the tiny man in red. It raised a massive hand to swat the entire oil rig.

He swung the stone axe-sword.

Lena squeezed her eyes shut and clamped her hands over her ears. It didn't help. There was no boom. The air just cracked, creating a vacuum that sucked the breath right out of her lungs.

He swung once. Then twice, three times, four. It was physically impossible. Something that massive and brutal shouldn't move that fast. But Archer blurred. He delivered nine consecutive, overlapping strikes in the span of a single heartbeat. The swings fused into a blinding flash of raw force.

A shockwave tore across the open water. It pushed the simulated ocean back, carving a dry, perfectly straight canyon right through the sea.

The attack hit the giant dead center.

A second later, its entire torso blew out the back. Millions of blue pixels erupted into the sky like a heavy smoke cloud. The air pressure violently equalized. Wind rushed back in, throwing Lena clean off her feet. She hit the metal deck hard, sliding backward until she slammed into Reinhardt's heavy boots.

The giant collapsed. The massive body hit the water, sending a tidal wave crashing over the lower platforms of the rig.

Dead silence fell over the comms. Even the MEKA mechs hovering above them stopped moving.

Archer stood at the edge of the broken platform. He let go of the stone weapon. It dissolved back into thin air, leaving no trace behind. He dusted off his coat.

Lena groaned and pushed herself up. Her ears were ringing so badly she could barely hear him. She tapped the side of her visor to bring the stream chat back up. The text was scrolling so fast the system was struggling to render the words.

Even then, that wasn't the most shocking bit.

"No fucking way." D.Mon was the one that voiced their collective disbelief. The giant had fallen over, yes, but it didn't disappear like the other Programs. Instead, it somehow got back on its feet, the only blue pixels that shattered being from the armor platings as they fell off.

It had taken an impossible attack from Archer, and still lived to tell the tale.

And yet, the Heroic Spirit didn't even look fazed.

"Sorry about that, I tried to only aim for the armor, though I don't know if you got hurt from that. You alright?" Archer spoke, and it wasn't to any of them. Instead, it was to the giant itself.

“I’m alright, Mr. Archer.” The faceplate had shattered, and where before there was a giant Enemy Program, now there was the face of a giant girl, “It actually kind of tickled!”

Lena just stared. Saltwater from the displaced ocean rained down on the cracked metal deck, soaking right through her jacket. Her ears were still ringing from the vacuum snap of the stone sword.

She looked at the giant girl, who was currently rubbing her cheek like she had just been pinched. Then she looked at Archer.

He knew her. Of course he did. He knew Kiara, so why wouldn't he know the bloody skyscraper-sized boss monster?

"Then I'm guessing that we've completed the mission, haven't we?" 

"Yep!" The giant girl nodded enthusiastically, "Mother said I should only fight when I have my armor, so I think you guys win!"

Archer chuckled, "Sounds about right. Well, I'll talk to you later, if that's fine with you?"

"Mhm!" The pressure created from the giant's nods was immense. The girl turned to the floating MEKA Squad, who not so subtly got back into formation. Surprisingly, the giant only gave them a small, shy smile, "I had a really fun time playing with you guys. Do you think we can play again someday?"

There was a moment of silence, and for a moment, the smile on the giant’s face started to disappear. Almost like she was on the verge of crying. It only ended when King tapped on D.Mon’s mech, prompting the MEKA Squad lead to stutter out, “Y-Yeah, we had fun too. So…yeah?”

The gamer’s words were as lost as Lena was with what was happening, but that didn’t stop the giant’s smile from returning in full force, “Yay! Next time, I’m gonna be the best kaiju you’ve ever seen!” She yawned, “But I’m tired now, so I’m gonna go take a nap. It was nice meeting you again, Mr. Archer!”

"Same to you, Kingprotea. Have a good nap."

…