Talking to Fish [Open - Multi-scene.]

"I think he was quite upset over you being kidnapped, this was right when they got back from Eichenwald;" he said with a sigh. "He'd looked pretty banged up, but Hush managed to talk him down out of it; He asked me to put together some kind of briefing on Ilios, and then he got together a team for it...didn't go to plan, Talon had some kind of...I dunno signal machine? Absolutely destroyed Jack's brain, and McCree got an Ax in the back, Junkrat's prosthetic got shattered, Lucio's personal diaries woof that kid is just a mess of emotional trauma."

He shook his head. "The only one who came out of that place without issue was Zenyatta, and I'm convinced he has already experience enlightenment and he only returned because he knew others needed to find a bit of it," he mused.

She sat and stared at him for a long moment in increasing disbelief, hand frozen near the side of her head. Finally she shook her head. "So you're telling me...that the two of them decided to take out their anger over Germany on each other...and then get back and..."

Another shake of her head. "Go off on some mission with about *half* of our team...which manages to incapacitate said *half* of our team for the foreseeable future...for what? What was in Ilios that we had to have or do that badly?" She demanded.

"And Jack..." She hesitated a little. "When you say...destroyed..."

Whiskey nodded and sighed. "Well to be honest it was good they went, we know what Talon was looking for in Ilios, and we know they found it and took it," he said with a bit of a frown. "It was important they went, a shame they couldn't stop them, Talon got a God AI; Hades specifically from my research." He frowned. "All these greek names...and angel names. Why do they keep coming up."

"So I wouldn't rule this a total failure, TAlon also revealed more of their cards, this signal generator only effected Jack, and there's only one thing that differentiates him from the rest of us, the super soldier program he was a part of, so now I can see if I can develop some way to keep him safe from that," Whiskey offered. "We know Zenyatta is a stone cold zen master and Lucio probably shouldn't be in the field..."

"Oh uhm he's comatose right now, good prognosis but we'll have to see," he replied. "He was just incapacitated. I may have over exaggerated."

She felt a wave of relief at the news that Jack's prognosis was, at least for the moment, good. For a moment she had feared she had lost one of her dearest and most trusted friends, and she wasn't sure she could have taken that at the moment.

She frowned, considering what he had told her for a long moment. "I have not yet met Zenyatta...or even all of our newest agents." She admitted. "I should take the time for that...I'm afraid I have to agree with you about Lucio however. He's a good person with a lot of talents, but I don't know that he has the right personality to do much field work...at least not the sort where active combat is likely to happen." She said, thinking back to the last time she'd seen him and Jamison in the field.

"Alright. So this AI...you understand all of this tech. What does that mean for them and for us if they have this? In your opinion, what needs to happen next, if they do in fact have this thing and it's working as intended?"

"He did lead a revolution though, maybe he's lost the stomach for it," mused the creature in the tank as he rested his hands on his belly. "I'm sure he could get used to it again, but he is a big shot DJ, can't imagine he'd go unnoticed forever." He laughed a bit. "Maybe he's got fans among Talon agents, wouldn't that be a riot?" He hummed. "Well if you ever need to be bored or at peace I suppose Zenyatta is quite good at both."

Whiskey sighed. "Oh nothing important, only means that they have the ability to override and take over any Omnic currently hooked up to an Omnium, and start a second crisis as the first one was started by just such an AI?" He replied with a tone that dripped with irony. "Honestly they should have tried to destroy the thing, but they were caught, the mission had been quite stealthy till everyone fell apart." He waved his hand around.

"What needs to happen next is we need to bring them down before they decide to take over the world or destroy it, I'm not sure what evil villain cliche they're going with."

"He might get used to it...or he might continue to fall apart and just...it's not right to do that to him, or to put others at risk if he can't..." She didn't finish the thought, shaking her head. These sorts of calls were difficult to have to consider. "And yes, there's also the fact that he is a well known personality."

"I'm going to go with the 'Lords over a Burning Graveyard' cliche at this point." She tried to pass it off with a bit of her normal humor but it fell flat. "Right now, honestly...you seem to know more about this than the rest of us do right now. If you have any suggestions..." She frowned, spreading her hands a little.

"Perhaps he just needs to get a stomach, should trial by fire him, these missions have been well and good but he's always had people around, drop him out in the mountains and have Hephaestus chase him around; he's too focused on other people surviving, it's distracting," Whiskey said with a shrug. "If others are in danger you have to refocus on yourself, in this moment what do /you/ have to do, not what do you have to do for /them/ but that's just my thoughts on the matter."

He tapped his chin. "A plan falls apart if it's pieces lose site of the task, and can't fulfill the role."

"My suggestion? Gut them, find the belly of the beast and slice it open. Then leave it's carcass for the world to find, and Overwatch disappears again; the less attention and glory that this little op takes, the more likely the right people will actually take up the open spot," he said as he shrugged. "But obviously we have to start that ball rolling. We will have to organize a more united front."

She considered his suggestions about Lucio. "It's not a terrible idea..." She slowly agreed. "You can't help others if you don't know how to help yourself. Most of us original agents went through worse things, both in Overwatch and in our respective military service before...although it has the habit of either making or breaking a person...and there are those that wouldn't take kindly to it if it breaks him." Jamison would never forgive her for one.

"Of course gut them, of course expose them. But *how*? We have to find them first! We have to figure out how to get to them first. That seems to be the biggest hitch in this whole plan...they crop up here or there but it never turns into anything more." She let out a long breath. "But no, you're right...first things first, we need to be better organized and on the same page before we can effectively do anything."

Whiskey shrugged. "I don't have the practically knowledge to know, I had a similar experience, what with going from being your average teenager to this..." He motioned vaguely to himself. "But if you can bend, then you do not break and sometimes being Bent is better than being Made; you can recover from bending." He hummed a little. "And take the position for as long as it's required, then when it's over you can break or right yourself, but I don't know how Lucio would fare either way. We aren't in a position where we can have people around just for fun."

"I know where they are, I haven't told anyone yet, if I let that out they'll be charging into a massacre," Whiskey said with a sigh. "I don't have all the answers past what they use as a base, I want to figure out this Gabriel riddle, find out who funds them, and figure out what the end game is for them. Then as you say we organize and we gut. Like a knife to a fish." He sighed. "But we ought to wait til everyone is in good health again."

"No, you're right. Everyone would want to rush in head-first and be mowed down in literally minutes. What Gabriel riddle? You mean something to do with Reyes?"

She started ticking things off on her fingers. "We need to get better organized. Need a better established chain of command. Need better sharing of information, of who knows what, is doing what, is going where. Need a unified front on what's worth chasing after...because we can't chase after every little thing, every call for help, any time anything happens. It divides our forces, burns our all too limited energy and resources."

A pause as she looked around. "And we probably should not stay here. They know we're here...we should be someplace more low-key, someplace not already tied to us...someplace harder to find us and pick us off."

"Hm, I wish it was to do with Reyes I've already got him figured out, no something else; the project seems like it was linked to George's predicament, some kind of super soldier project. All I've found is "Icarus" and then angel names, but a specific one keeps popping up as important. Gabriel, biblical mentions of the angel are strewn through encrypted file after encrypted file; I'm worried about it..." he said as he hummed. "Though it's just another wrench, Talon has a God AI, I've heard from a source that they had captured a Bastion unit, and...well long range sensors and satellites caught sight of a pod being dropped...I'm not sure what that means. A bastion unit would be awful, more would be even worse. Their Super Soldier neutralizer...honestly I think our first step is to defund them. I'm trying to find money sources...not going well." He sighed.

Whiskey nodded. "Yes, I agree, all information that isn't need to know is available to anyone if I've entered it in, and Jack fancies himself in command but Hush seems to be slipping around under his nose; maybe you should assert your role in the chain. This team could use a sensible head," he offered. "I am doing my best to narrow down leads to important things, but you are quite correct, some things are just not worth us going after. I feel the Los Muertos is one of those things, but off Hush goes after them."

The fish creature crinkled his brow. "Well...I would have offered my old campus if Hush hadn't compromised it, so obnoxious it was a great place. Well I know a few empty research labs, military bases and warehouses; there's also some farm steads and other abandoned buildings. There is also Watchpoint: Antarctica..." he offered.