Chapter Text
Hav could remember many different experiences he'd had before Overwatch was disbanded. Countries, faces, galas, marks, and missions all over the world. He'd had quite a few roles too. Though he'd held his own as a striker on teams going in guns blazing, he'd found that where he truly shined was on infiltration missions.
He was glad to have moved on from the glittering cutthroat high society of his youth, but he was grateful for the instincts his upbringing lent him. When the missions had called for him to don finery and protect an asset or watch a target without drawing suspicion, he’d found a comfortable ease in completing these tasks amongst what wealth and high society remained in a post-Omnic world.
Of all the missions he remembered from his Overwatch days, though, the prince was the one that continued to come to mind years down the road.
It had been an unexpected night, with only vague intel that Talon had interest in this diplomatic function.
He hadn't known who their target was, but he'd kept his eye on a prince from one of the desert nations represented. He told himself it was because of the man's political importance and not because the way the cut of his traditional formal coat flattered his chest and shoulders. Therefore he praised his honed intelligence agent instincts rather than his... aesthetic taste for picking the right person to shadow when the bullets started flying and Hav had needed to tackle this Prince Nasheritand to the ground behind cover.
“Apologies, Your Highness,” he'd said, staying atop the prince in hopes of shielding from crossfire with his body. “A bit of unexpected excitement for the evening. Keep your head down, please.”
They'd spoken for a while after the incident had been taken care of, with Hav telling himself he was just making certain Prince Nash wasn't in shock after the attack. His excuses had gotten a bit flimsier when, later that week, he'd pulled Nash's file up late at night in Watchpoint: Gibraltar, and pored over the pictures and information within.
Still, Hav didn't cross paths with him again for the rest of Overwatch's days and as the world moved on, so did he. Six months after Overwatch's dissolution, Nash's country was invaded by a powerful neighbor. The prince disappeared in the chaos, presumed dead. Hav had no rational explanation for how difficult that news had been to hear.
Perhaps it was the persistent remembrance, though, that gave Hav a sense that something was off, years later, upon meeting a stranger at a party.
“Dalton Ikalior,” the man gave his name as, and Hav found there was an easy familiarity as they talked. Dalton spoke of his fiancée, Hav recited practiced lies about his history, but all throughout, there was a nagging sense in Hav that he'd done this before.
It was a familiar phrase that finally clicked the pieces into place, when Dalton mentioned something about “not making a good showing of himself.”
Nash, Hav's mind latched onto. Prince Nasheritand said that. That's who he reminds me of.
Once the thought was in, Hav couldn't let it go. Dalton didn't quite look the same as Nash, but there was some similarity there. Their speech patterns were similar, though Dalton had a different accent. Finally, the oddities became too much, and Hav, fearing he might be playing his hand, couldn't take it any longer.
“I'm sorry,” he said, forcing the words to sound casual, “but I have to ask. Have you ever heard the name Nasheritand?”
Dalton blinked in confusion, but as he opened his mouth to respond, he winced, obviously pained. Raising a hand to his head, he rubbed at his temple. “Apologies,” he said slowly, “I'm not sure what's come over me.”
Hav's blood froze in his veins. It can't be…
He reached a hand out, steadying the other man's shoulder. “Nash, is that you? God, what have they done to you?”
He'd heard whispers, rumors about Talon's capabilities, the kinds of experiments they'd started to run. Mental programming, memory alteration, code thoughts, sleeper agents.
Hav took hold of Dalton's arm, starting to pull him away. “Something's wrong, we need to get you out of here.” If Nash had been turned into a Talon plant, he likely wasn't here alone. They'd be watching him.
“Dalton?” A feminine voice rose above the ambient chatter around them as its owner wove her way through the crowd.
Saylin, Hav realized, noting the petite woman with auburn hair. The fiancée. Of course. She must be his handler.
She probably had backup, Hav knew, and he did not. Reluctantly, he relinquished Dalton's arm, forcing an easy, polite smile to his face. “You must be Saylin. Dalton was just telling me about you.”
She smiled back, handing the still-frowning Dalton a flute of champagne. As her eyes fell on Hav's face however, the barest twinge marred her expression. She was practiced in control, but he was practiced in ferreting out tics. She recognized him. Which probably meant she knew who he was. Who he had worked for.
Not good.
Thankfully, her subject's mental programming breakdown seemed to distract her. “Dalton,” she asked gently, “is everything alright?”
Dalton winced. “I'm sorry, I've got a horrible migraine all of a sudden. I think… I think I might need to lie down.”
A flash of hostility burned in Saylin's eyes as she looked toward Hav, pinpointing him as the source of the trouble. She couldn't call him out on it without breaking cover, though, which gave him some room to maneuver.
“We probably need to leave,” she said, giving Hav a false smile. “My apologies for our rudeness, Mister…?”
“Nil,” Hav lied immediately. He turned his eyes on Dalton, thoughts whirling. “I hope you start to feel better. It's a terrible thing to be out of sorts in one's own head.”
With a bow, he extracted himself from the conversation and immediately moved into a pattern of social evasion. If this Saylin had marked him, he could have Talon agents on him already, preparing to take him out before he could reach the door. If they knew he'd compromised their asset, mopping up him as the leak would be their top priority.
He wove through the crowds, intentionally breaking lines of sight and moving erratically, then slipped into the back rooms of the building, heading through the kitchens for an alley exit. When he broke through into the dirty street and saw no one directly behind him, he threw himself into a flat out sprint, putting as much distance between himself and that building as he could.
He didn't stop running until he was five blocks away. He ducked into a coffee shop, queueing up and blending into the patrons as he watched the street for pursuit out of the corner of his eye. When no Talon agents appeared, his mind turned to other concerns.
What do I do now?
The logical answer came first: do nothing. He wasn't an Overwatch agent anymore. Overwatch didn't even exist anymore. Yes, Talon was bad, but they were also very clearly and very specifically not his problem. Out of his hands. Out of jurisdiction . He didn't have the authority or resources to move against them.
Besides, what was Nash to him, really? A passing acquaintance on a mission. An old fixation that he'd let get out of hand and distract him. To the rest of the world, a dead man. Just another casualty while the world had fallen apart.
That “logical” part of him didn't keep precedence for long, however, as every moral fiber within Hav rebelled against the idea of standing aside. No one else even knew what had happened to Nash, and Talon was too careful to let anyone discover. It was a stroke of luck, a passing fortune that Hav himself had figured it out.
No one else would be coming to help Nash. No one else would free him from his captors if Hav didn't do something. Hav was his only hope.
Yes, he lacked the connections he'd once had, but he was far from helpless. He still had old contacts he could call in, there were ways something like this might be done.
As for lacking the authority? Damn authority. Jurisdiction could go to hell.
This was about doing what was right.
He picked up his latte from the counter and pulled out his phone. He had some calls to make.