It was then that a section of the wall was broken through, though it was hardly entirely notable considering the chaos. With Oscar being occupied by Bowser, Velvet had a moment to turn and observe the scene. Once the dust had settled, there stood a tall, muscle-bound man with a powerful gauntlet on one arm. Velvet's demonic arm twitched at the sight.
"Now who are you?" Velvet asked, taking a few steps toward the man.
"Came to crash the party? You don't look like one of these Coalition guards."
The man looked down at Velvet, before glancing around the area. It appeared she was the least of his worries.
"Not of the Coalition, and not of the prisoners, either. Just a man with a mission to accomplish... one better off done alone."
Velvet eyeed the man for a moment.
"Normally I'd find that refreshing," she said.
"But you know what? Something tells me you're just up to no good." She held out her demonic hand, as if it was a warning.
"It'd be in your best interest to stay as far away from me as possible."
"I have no interest in you, girl." He looked her over briefly.
"You're strong. I can tell just by looking at you... but your strength is wasted on me. But if you insist on fighting me over the guards trying to stop you, so be it. However I will give you this one final chance to walk away." Bringing his gauntlet up, he punched the palm of his free hand.
"Otherwise, whoever remains will have to scrape you off the wall."
Velvet smiled.
"I don't think I like your tone." She took another step forward.
"Scrape me off the wall, huh? Well, I can promise you there wouldn't even by anything left of you once I'm done. So how about... you don't act so cocky!"
Velvet then burst forward, coming up quickly upon the man. Instead of attacking him directly though, she hopped to the side mid-stride and slashed the air, causing an energy wave to ripple across the ground straight at the man.
"W-What is she doing?" Ludger asked amidst the fighting.
"Hm--!" The man was taken by surprise, but only momentarily. Grunting, he aimed at Velvet, using his gauntlet to propel him into the air via an uppercut. Whether or not she avoided it was of no consequence to him, as he himself readied his gauntlet and plummeted to the ground, creating a small tremor as his fist met the floor.
Velvet raised both her demonic arm and sword to block the uppercut, but the impact alone sent her into the air anyway. She watched as the man then slammed into the ground below her, his tremors threatening to engulf her. Velvet spun in the air and brought her own demonic fist against the ground and the two waves of energy exploded against each other.
Through the haze, Velvet smiled. She raised her arm back and it glowed with red energy. She cried out, striking forward with all her might to slam her arm against the man.
Even using his gauntlet to block, the man gritted his teeth, refusing to lose his footing. Even so, the force of the attack sent him sliding back into the wall, which he broke his guard to catch his breath a moment.
"Just a bit longer..." he muttered to himself, before charging forward, grabbing a large piece of the floor he and Velcet had broken in their respective attacks. Throwing it at the girl, he immediately picked up another, repeating the process as many times as he possibly could.
"What--?!"
Velvet slashed through the debris, destroying it, but the continued onslaught kept her pinned. She grit her teeth and continued to slash through every piece of debris the man tossed at her.
With the last piece of debris that came flying, the man made his move. From the dust came a barrage of tiny bullets, followed by him rushing forward, bringing his gauntlet back to hit Velvet with all he had.
A stray bullet caught Velvet's shoulder. She cried out in rage and lifted her demonic arm in an uppercut motion. Red energy swirled around her and exploded upward, creating a wall of energy between her and the man. With that, she jumped backward, panting.
The man grunted, the energy knocking him back to the other side of the room. As he slowly lurched to his feet, he readied for another attack... only to stop as he noticed something out of the corner of his eye.
All around the floor surrounding the group, a cloud of smoke spread forward, making its way towards the man. It began rising upwards rapidly, taking the form of a masked man who looked like the Grim Reaper himself.
"Doomfist..." The wraith ignored the others, his attention on the large man.
"I didn't expect you to be here."
The man called Doomfist smiled.
"As if I would allow one of the council to become a casualty of the Multiverse."
The wraith merely grunted in reply.
Doomfist rolled his arm, looking around their surroundings.
"Come then, Reaper. We should be going. This place doesn't look like it will last much longer. Unless..." He looked to Velvet.
"You would rather we continue our little sparring match?"
Velvet let out a sigh and lowered her sword.
"Hey, do what you want then," she said.
"I don't think we'll be crossing paths again."
Doomfist nodded.
"You fight well. But there is anger in your attacks... try not to let it consume you."
Velvet barked out a laugh at this but otherwise held her words.
"Are we done here?" Reaper asked, already at the hole in the wall.
"Of course. Let us be off." Doomfist hopped into the wall, Reaper following behind.
Ludger shook his head in wonder, but figured those two were now beyond the illusion. He only could wonder where they went from there...
***
"What a pity... I forgot to ask her name. Ah, well."
Though unseen, the illusion continued to play out, refusing to let the story end there. The two men continued to walk down the corridor, though one stopped momentarily.
"Doomfist." Reaper spoke, and the other stopped, though he didn't turn around.
"How did you know where to find me?"
"Well, considering you had gone rogue for whatever reason and got yourself captured, I had to do a little bit of investigating." Doomfist looked over his shoulder.
"Imagine my surprise as I learned about a Multiverse... and an entire organization fighting Multiversal threats under our noses!"
"... yes. Quite a shock, isn't it?" Reaper had the slightest bit of doubt in his voice at first, but quickly hid it.
Doomfist continued to speak, turning around to fully face the wraith.
"Even more surprising, though, is learning that YOU got caught up in it. And just why you got captured. Assassinating old Overwatch operatives who had run off to the Coalition? I must say, your ambition knows no bounds, does it?"
Reaper nodded.
"I make sure I see my missions through."
"Hm." Doomfist took a step forward, eyes narrowing.
"Tell me, Gabriel... does that include your mission to take over Talon and destroy our world?"
Reaper froze momentarily, but quickly tried to compose himself.
"Did those eight years in solitary mess you up that badly? I have no idea what you--"
"The Shareholders. The Cyberdemon. I saw the tapes, Gabriel. Moira and I looked into Vialli's computer files after dispatching him." Though he continued to speak as if this was a simple conversation between two colleagues, Doomfist's eyes had gone dark.
"It has taken quite a lot of work to salvage what we could of Talon after all you'd done. And even then, you still tried to take control, going rogue and attacking that little train... I wouldn't have minded letting you rot here, but we had other plans. After all, a man like you can't be trusted to rot."
Reaper's body gave away what the mask hid, shaking slightly as the horrific realization dawned on him.
"... this wasn't a rescue mission."
Doomfist shook his head.
"Indeed it wasn't. Now--" He stopped speaking as Reaper suddenly turned to smoke, fleeing as fast as he possibly could. He didn't get far. Doomfist tossed a net over the smoke, turning Reaper tangible the second it landed on him.
"What?!" He franrically struggled to get the thing off him, only getting himself more tangled up as Doomfist walked towards him.
"Oh, Gabriel..." He lifted both the man and the net together, pinning them to the wall.
"Face death with a little dignity, won't you? The Gabriel I knew as a proud Talon soldier would never have acted so pathetically."
"You don't understand!" The gravelly voice of Reaper was gone, leaving the hoarse voice of Gabriel Reyes.
"Akande, please. If I die without paying my debt..."
Doomfist shrugged.
"I suppose you'll get to find out what happens firsthand, won't you?" He raised his gauntlet.
"No--!"
CRACK.
One punch was all he needed. The net kept Gabriel's body tangible and mortal, allowing Doomfist to smash his ribcage, heart, and lungs with no problem. The corpse fell to the ground as Doomfist let it go, and he turned on a commlink in his ear.
"Moira? Do you copy?"
"I copy," a woman's voice replied on the other end.
"Did you find Reaper?"
"I did. Tragically, he had already been killed by the time I got there."
"What a pity." Her voice had no grief in it whatsoever.
"I suppose you'll be heading back?"
"You suppose correctly." He started walking off.
"By the way... that scientist of yours? His net works very well. We should give a few to Revan as a thank you."
"Indeed. He's a talented man. I was lucky to find him. I think he'll serve Talon well."
"You know... we DO have an opening on the council now..."
---
Collab done with
@Yun Lee