#im gonna get so many targeted ads for stuff like this now because i clicked on am Instagram ad

[mocha-gladiator]

it's tiny ok. look at it

You can let your little 3 inch dudes climb up to high places!!!

[themkultra]

im gonna make a social media that is like. what tumblr should have been. i want a connection of actual BLOGS with actual WRITING i want blogs that are like seriealized BOOKS n shit like stuff where you can share intellectual writing as well as random funny stories, or essays from school youre proud of, you can get writing advice there and also have debates with people who like the same stuff you do and there will be no fucking nazis or terfs because i would be on their asses so fast and also you could write like, reviews for shit around where u are cuz u can use geolocation to write with people who live around you and inspire community organization but theres no FUCKING targeted ads idc ill run this out of my own pocket so there wouldnt be any ads. if there are any ads there are gonna be so many fucking explicit rules to how you can integrate it. fuckers. ok basically you get 1 header image and then like, a “book” that when u click on it opens?!!!! and its like ur reading a fucking book but its someones writing talking abt the definitive ways to tell how ur food has finished cooking. anyway i have a vision this is incomprehensible now but this thing would be for people who love writing. random shit all the time. i personally would use my blook (blog + book) to write lyrics to trap beats

[mercyofficial]

out of the dark

summary: Sombra's two favorite things are making new friends and exposing corporate corruption, and today she intends to do both.

notes: inspired by this art by @greyopal! i love these two so much ahhhh, and im definitely gonna write more for them!

ao3 link

Her printer has to be the slowest in the world. She shelled out a thousand dollars for this machine and it’s been taking ten minutes to print like, seven files. Sombra always keeps a hard copy of her work until it’s finished. Then she burns it.

  Some people use paper shredders, but Sombra can’t stand the thought of leaving a trace. That eye is constantly in her head.

  The files are pulled up on her computer screen, glowing a dim blue. Risky (what if someone were looking through the window?), but she wants to admire her work. Vishkar may not be anywhere near as good at helping people as the public thinks they are, but they do have excellent computer security. Nothing is impenetrable, though, not to Sombra - especially not corporate corruption.

  Grabbing the ink-dampened paper, Sombra quickly flips through the pages, ensuring all had printed correctly. They’ll be locked inside a file cabinet (protected by three alarms and fourteen different kinds of computer-controlled encrypted locks) until she’s finished with them, and then she’ll burn everything in there and change the locks. Sombra never writes a password down, too risky. Besides, if I forgot one, I could probably hack into my own system, she thinks with amusement. Although that’s probably not a good thing, maybe she should beef up. Talon won’t be pleased if she asks more money for security - but she’s a valuable asset . So they’ll pay up. Always do. Maybe she should ask for a horse ranch, claim it’s vital to her work. Or seventy copies of the Linkin Park discography and hide them in Reaper’s room.

  Snickering at her own jokes, Sombra throws the files in the cabinet and shuts the door, which automatically locks. She doesn’t bother to grab any extra equipment on the way out the door to catch her flight. Her internal cyber-enhancements will suffice for this job - well, job isn’t exactly the right word. This is more of a personal project. She isn’t exactly expecting resistance, anyway.

  Will the files be enough to sink the company? Of course not. If (and probably when) she publishes them, they’ll be a PR disaster, but there’ll be a few firings and some monetary loss and some tearful, paid off citizens going on about how much Vishkar has done for their community and how they know they can learn from their mistakes, and ten days later the company will have three new major contracts.

  They are enough to make a new friend, though. And Sombra loves making new friends.

  ----------------

  She’s parked herself in a cyber cafe near Vishkar’s headquarters, in a corner, giving the security a once-over. She already has the blueprints, and in particular, the on-location apartment of her soon-to-be new friend. This was not going to be difficult. Nowadays, companies are so focused on keeping out hackers that they neglect physical security. With that in mind, her stolen translocating technology, invisibility camouflage, and, of course, laser gun, will practically guarantee her unlimited access to a building if she’s careful. And Sombra is always careful.

  Her target is Satya Vaswani, aka Symmetra (Symmetra, symmetry, subtle, much. Sombra spent a few minutes eye-rolling when she read that one.) A top Architech at Vishkar, and seems to truly believe her company is making the world a better place. Naive, but Sombra can’t be too annoyed with her. They’re quite alike, after all, if she thinks about it: impoverished with a difficult childhood, an aptitude for technology that got them out of the slums, and willing enough to commit crimes for their aims.

  That’s where it ends, though. Satya had been plucked from the streets by Vishkar and made their golden girl, but Sombra had joined gangs and fought everyone and everything tooth and nail for what she has now. Satya wants to improve the world. Sombra just wants to control it.

  Though, considering Vishkar’s methods and that Symmetra cooperated with them, they might be similar that way, as well. Although she did have to note, Symmetra went along. Who knows what Satya gets up to in her free time? Sombra can’t help but giggle. She doubts a secret rebellion. From what she’s read and seen of the girl, she seems like a rule-follower, regardless of what the rules were.

  These might change that, though , Sombra thinks, glancing down at the screen displaying the files she’d hacked directly from the CEO’s laptop a week or two ago.

  Sombra had thought about going after the CEO himself. The files she has won’t sink the company, but they’ll sink him , and she’s sure he’d do whatever she asked to keep himself afloat. But what Vishkar’s doing strikes something in Sombra, because they’re hurting those like she had been, orphans on streets who don’t have the talents she has to get themselves out. Sombra wants the men in charge of Vishkar in prison, at least, if she can’t get them dead. And they won’t be any help if they’re in prison or hell.

  But, in Satya’s case, Sombra seriously doubts she knows what’s really going on at Vishkar. Maybe she really should call it naivety, to not realize, but she has a feeling it isn’t - Satya seems like she really does just want to make the world a better place, and may be doing some unconscious selective noticing to accomplish it. Sombra can empathize with that. And not only does she want a new friend (the leading manipulator of hard light tech? a force ), but maybe she’s taking a small liking to Satya. And it would probably be better finding out your life’s work was nearly pointless because of corruption in private, rather than from national TV the next morning, with reporters hunting down every bit of contact information you have.

   It’s a weekend night, and the clubs are full as Sombra makes her way to the headquarters. The multitudes of people on the street make it easy to slip around to a back entrance, go invisible, and take out the security guy with a nerve strike to the neck. Touching her cybernetic fingers to the locks, programs she’s already tested on locks just like this one spring to life, slipping into the bugs and wires and feeding the codes back to her. She drops a translocator in a bush for safety and sneaks in, again going invisible just long enough to reach the nearest security camera. Within seconds, her custom applications have thrown a bug into the system that’ll feed the cameras endless ten-second loops. With luck, the person watching the security cameras will be like most corporate employees who watch security cameras - bored and playing the latest hot app instead of paying attention.

  If not, and she senses any alarm, she’s pretty sure she gave herself enough time to get to the security room and place a well-aimed laser blast at his chest before he notices her. Won’t kill him, but he won’t be happy. Which doesn’t matter to her, of course. Sombra doesn’t go out of her way to kill. As long as he’s out of her way, she doesn’t exactly care.

  Now Sombra really books it, dashing through the hallways using the blueprint she memorized, only occasionally pausing to confirm a direction or go invisible to let some politely-laughing businessmen carrying briefcases walk through. She decides to take the elevator, figuring her invisibility will last long enough to make the ride if someone gets on. Vishkar’s headquarters are gigantic , a sign of the company’s power, but luckily they aren’t exactly tall. Dashing into the hallway where the elevators are, she clicks the up button and slips in, consulting her blueprint once more before pressing 7.

  As it’s night, the headquarters aren’t busy, so Sombra isn’t bothered - and once she gets off at floor 7, there’s even less people. Even if she hadn’t already hacked into Satya’s calendar, Sombra seriously doubts that she wouldn’t find the Architech in her room. Satya didn’t give off a vibe of friendliness, and a look further back into her calendar, with events meticulously added and color-coded and lacking any color for “fun”, confirmed this.

  Sombra smiles slightly as she strolls along the hallway - there’s another similarity to her little list. She herself certainly isn’t against going out to a club and flirting with a girl or guy or two of each, but relationships of any kind are off the table. The whole “hacker on a one-woman crusade to take control of the world” sort of prevents that, and friends are just going to want stuff in the end. Her closest companions are probably frequent Talon mission mates Reaper and Widowmaker, and when the people you’re closest to are a literal wraith and a blue ballet-dancer-turned-assassin, you probably don’t have many friends.

  She gets to Satya’s door. It’s a simple, sleek white piece of work, computer controlled with some great security. Unless you’re Sombra, of course, in which case it takes a few touches and a click. It would have been even easier if she could have just ripped the passwords from Satya’s computer, but the other woman didn’t seem to write any passwords down, either. I wonder if she’s as paranoid as I am, ha. Sombra activates her invisibility and drops a translocator before entering the keycode and opening the door with a soft whoosh. She steps inside, and it closes behind her with nearly no sound.

  The room is stark, all white and pale blue with not much customization. It’s quite beautiful and modern, or at least Sombra thinks so. She doesn’t have as much time to explore as she would like, because apparently Satya also doesn’t believe in bedtime and is sitting on a ledge, next to her window. Presumably, she was enjoying the admittedly quite excellent view of the night sky before her door mysteriously opened, though she doesn’t seem to be panicking. Sombra takes her time, making sure the door has locked them in and all the alarms are disabled before plopping down on the cushion across from Satya and making herself visible.

  “Hola, amiga,” she chirps, resting her elbow against the window and giving her a bright smile. Satya looks unamused. Sombra had thought she was quite pretty from the television interviews she’d seen (and the secret selfies she may have examined when going through the contents of Satya’s phone), and the woman is even more beautiful up close, dark brown eyes giving Sombra a once-over before lifting back up to meet Sombra’s own.  

  “I would ask who you are, but I doubt you intend to tell me.”

  Sombra giggles. “Ooh, you’re astute! No, I don’t. I know who you are, though, Satya. Quite a name you’ve made for yourself at Vishkar, yes?”

  Satya frowns. “I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but I will not be bribed. Or undermine the company, so don’t even try.” Sombra notices something, in her right hand, presumably some device used to alarm someone who will make life far more irritating for Sombra. She leans over, quick as a flash, placing her hand over the other woman’s own and grinning right in her face.

  “Oh, I don’t need to get you to do it. They do enough of that themselves. I’m just interested in, oh….. informing you.”

  There’s a slight pause, and then she feels Satya’s fingers, slowly, one by one, remove themselves from the button. Sombra snatches it out of her hand, but Satya doesn’t react, except for her suspicious frown deepening as Sombra leans back.

  “I’m listening.”

  Sombra smiles. She’s played this game, a thousand times before. Steal incriminating files, sneak in, show them to the right person, and bam! A lovely, helpful new friend. Sombra may not have any close friends, but she certainly has a lot of them.

  Sombra slips off the cushion and walks over to the table, beckoning for Satya to join her. Warily, Satya gets up, quietly walking over a wooden chair and seating herself in it, expectantly.

  “Just wait a moment.” She pulls up her screen through her gloves, clicking through to her files as Satya watches. She looks slightly irritated, probably because much of Sombra’s equipment, from her invisibility to the screens she’s using right now, are quite blatantly stolen Vishkar hard-light technology (the translocator was from the talking gorilla, she hacked the blueprints of that chronal thing he made for the annoying Brit and quite ingeniously redesigned them, if she does say so herself). She seems about to say something, but just then Sombra finds the files she was looking for, pulling them up. “Look through them as you wish, I’m sure you know your way around this sort of screen.”

  Satya looks at her. Just for one second, and Sombra’s not sure what the other’s trying to read from her face before Satya turns back to the screen and tentatively touches a finger to it. She’s a fast reader, Sombra can tell from how quickly she’s flipping through them - files directly ripped from the company computers, newspaper reports and pictures put next to each other that line up in highly suspicious ways, reports of what the corporation has told Satya to do and what papers to get, but then the part she doubted Satya had known, added parts of what exactly the company intended to do with those files.

  It’s damning, and Sombra can see Satya’s life falling down around her pretty face.

  She gets to the last file, and Satya pauses, for another long second, eyes moving across the screen, before slowly removing her finger from it and dropping her head into her hands. One look had obviously been enough. Sombra jabs a finger at it, a “missing” financial report clearly showing the Vishkar executives spending money that was supposed to go to the Rio housing facilities on a luxury jet.

  “You see, Satya? Vishkar was lying to you all along.”

  Satya doesn’t move. Or speak. Or cry. Sombra is not actually sure she’s breathing.

  She’s quiet for a very long time.

  It makes Sombra nervous, being here for this long. It’s risky. Whenever Sombra goes to make new friends, they don’t shut down. They snark, they scowl, they plead, they try and act superior, and she loves it. But Satya is silent, processing what Sombra has shown her, and Sombra, for reasons unknown to even herself, decides to wait.

  Finally, as Sombra watches, Satya stands up and walks over to a counter where a blue bag is sitting. She reaches inside the bag, and takes out two things - an extremely official-looking Vishkar license and a cellphone. Calmly and without saying anything, she proceeds to drop the license on the floor and crush it with the heel of her boot. Sombra nearly jumps from loud cracking noise, as Satya methodically sweeps the pieces into a corner with said boot and picks up the cellphone.

  “Hello?” She sounds far more put together then Sombra thinks she would in this sort of situation. “Yes, it’s Satya. I thought I should inform you that I’m feeling very sick right now, so I won’t be able to attend tonight’s meeting…….No, no, it’s alright, I just need some more rest. Mm-hmm…...Thank you for your concern. Goodbye.”

  The cellphone drops on the counter, and Satya turns back around. Sombra looks at her.

  “You’re not going to tell them I’m here?”

  Satya’s hand tightens into a fist. She’s angry, Sombra realizes, not broken or whatever stupid trope one would usually expect. Angry enough that tears are beginning to leak from the sides of her eyes – not noticeably, but they’re there. Sombra thinks she looks very pretty crying, but also decides that this is not the time to mention so. “I trust you more than….than I trust them, at the moment.”

  Sombra stays quiet, as Satya walks over the the window. She’s pacing now, around the room. The files are still pulled up over the table, floating there, winking, purple little puzzle pieces that line up to make something terrible.

  “We were supposed to be doing good.” she mutters, each word clipped, teeth sounding clenched. She whirls around to face Sombra, turning her gaze on her. Sombra flinches involuntarily. She is not one easily scared, and Satya’s anger is not that outwardly expressed. But her eyes have a silent, terrifying intensity.

  “Why are you showing me these things?” she asks, boring holes in Sombra’s eyes with her own. “What do you want from me?” That’s another similarity, Sombra thinks, because from the tone in Satya’s voice she’s asked that question many times, albeit probably with a different tone of voice. Everyone always wants something from you, when you’re good.

  Sombra doesn’t smile, like she usually would. But business is business. “I’m publishing them, see. I dislike Vishkar as much as you probably do now - and you probably have more puzzle pieces than me. But these’ll get you thrown in prison too, most likely. All I want is a favor, every so often, if I need it, and then I’ll wipe your name and incriminating info from the files when I publish them.”

  Usually, when she makes these sort of offers, the person hesitates. She’s had people refuse or try to take her out then and there, thinking prison is better than being beholden to an (in their minds) insane hacker. Satya does not hesitate.

  “Fine.”

  Sombra raises an eyebrow at her. “Eager, are we?”

  “I want to make the world a better place. That is all. I cannot do so from in prison, but I can out of it, and for that I can afford a few favors to you - especially as you are the one opening my eyes to reality in the first place. I do not think you are a bad person, and I doubt you’ll ask me to do anything too terrible.”

 That deserves a slight laugh. “Oh, now there’s a first! You should hear what other people have called me in the past. So, you will leave?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, no need to give me contact information. I’m sure I can find you.” Satya doesn’t appear to find that amusing, sadly, already pulling out a laptop. Sombra closes her screens, standing there. She’s quite tempted to ask Satya what exactly she intends to do now. But it’s getting light, now, and she’s already been here far, far too long. She’s about to melt away into the shadows, but then Satya, still looking at her laptop screen, speaks.

  “What should I refer to you as?”

  “Pardon?”

  “If we’re going to be working together in some form, I would like to know what to call you.”

  Sombra shouldn’t tell her.

  “Sombra.” Then she vanishes.

  -------------------

  Sombra gets out of the building, no problem, as expected. But she can’t forget those eyes of Satya’s, so brightly intense even right after watching her world fall down around her. Though, to be fair, Sombra doubts the woman suspected nothing even before the files. She’s a smart one.

  She edits the online copy of the files on her plane ride home, the one set to be sent mysteriously to several top reporters with instructions to publish as soon as possible - as promised, taking out all references to Symmetra or Satya Vaswani. It’s not difficult, there’s not really that much. Just enough to be threatening.

 Her hard copy in the file cabinet, with the incriminating info, is what she spends four hours staring at. It’s irrational, she knows. Satya could be useful. She should keep her leverage.

  She can’t stop thinking about those eyes, though.

  All Sombra has ever wanted was control. But Satya…...Satya wants to do good, so, so badly. If someone ever got into this apartment…..

  She glances at her computer. She hacked Satya’s laptop, of course, and her recent browsing history is running through the screen. Satya must have opened two tabs before she went to sleep. One was a normal search for the word sombra. The other was a search, in a private, untraceable browser, for “overwatch recall”.

  Sombra burns the files.