Cole: So you want me t' babysit yer robot? Sounds easy enough.
Liao: She needs to learn human interaction to make her more helpful in the field, play games and talk to her, watching tv is also alright.
Cole: Gotcha, you can count on my doc.
*A few hours later*
Liao: *walks into the lounge* Cassidy, how is Echo doing? *sees Echo leaning on Cole's shoulder and smiling as they sit on the couch watching tv, Cole is beet red*
Cole: We watched a rom-com and she won't move...
Liao: *pulls out her phone* Gabe is going to love this.
Cole: DON'T YOU DARE!
---
*several years later*
Cole: *sitting in the lounge alone watching tv*
Echo: *comes in and sits next to him, she smiles and leans on his shoulder* Hope you don't mind.
Cole: *chuckles* Nah, go right ahead... I missed ya Echo... *leans against her in return*
Echo: I missed you too Cole...
Cole, zip-tied to a chair: "Hold up, now, I'm still lost. You said that Echo didn't get her moth duds until a couple weeks ago."
Moira, annoyed but willing to be a scientist for five more minutes: "That's correct, Mister Cassidy. Your point?"
Cole: "Then what happened in the 60s? You know, with the original Mothman? Was she just a forest spirit? Why did she need the new body to look like one now?"
Moira, with a deep sigh: "That was unrelated. The prevailing theory for the Mothman sightings centers around the Barn Owl, the sounds and reflective eyes off which have terrified less developed peoples for centuries. This moth business is all just a happy coincidence. There's nothing supernatural about it."
Echo, limbs removed while her torso floats in a weird electro prison: "I prefer the term 'inspiration.'"
Moira: "Quiet, you."
Moira: You know you're being remarkably calm for a situation that will most likely end with your body either in an acid vat or in an unmarked grave.
Cole: Honestly when you spend as much time with monster-hunting tomfoolery as I do, the whole 'there's a shadowy government organization that will very much kill you to keep its secrets' thing ends up bein' more vindicatin' than scary.
Moira: We're corporate, not government. We just hire a lot of assets from the armed forces and intelligence and have a lot of lobbyists protecting our interests.
Cole: Well now it's scarier!
Echo: Do I get an acid vat?
Moira: No dear, you get vivisected. Now please stop developing speech.
I read the original "Not a true member of Overwatch until you've had a [FORMER NAME OF PHENOMENON FOR HAVING A CRUSH ON THE COWBOY]" post, and now I think that Echo is running at 47 TeraColetastrophes a second.
Ahhhh that reminds me--I gotta change the name on "First Data!!!"
But yes, Echo adores Cole even though he has definitely scuffed and schmutzed up her pure white just-out-of-the-store chassis.
McEcho is a delight to write oh my gosh. McCree’s all like, “I don’t know a lot about robotics. Or artificial intelligence. Or computer science. Or coding. Or machine learning. But I’ll be damned if my folk didn’t raise a gentleman.”
Meanwhile Echo’s like: *Makes McCree laugh* (internally) “This is great. I’m going to get a good grade in human interaction. Something that’s both normal to want and possible to achieve.”
Pre-Fall fic idea for a slow day: Echo asks McCree to go on a date. Liao thinks it'll be a good learning experience for her.
“...I dunno about this...” McCree straightened the collar on his shirt. Why did he dress up for this? Why did Liao feverishly take notes on her tablet when she saw he dressed up for this?
“I think it’s a great opportunity,” said Liao, poking at her tablet.
“See the way you’re gettin’ all excited about it makes me feel like a guinea pig.”
“Echo likes you. She trusts you. This is a chance for her to rapidly expand her social interaction repertoire.”
“It’s still weird.”
“How is it weird?”
“Well... how does it work with the age thing?”
Liao snorted. “What?”
“I mean she just got the body! Don't that make it... y'know...”
“The frame is new, yes, but the bare bones of her coding are only a couple years younger than you,” Liao said breezily, “Her processing levels were miles beyond yours well before she even had a body.”
“Well, controlling said body actually has massive processing demands on its own, so you could say what could be recognized as her pelvic region hosts an 'auxiliary AI core'--"
"There's a brain in her ass?"
"Arguably, humans have a secondary brain in their colonic region--"
"There's a brain in my ass?!"
"We're getting off topic. There's a secondary AI core focused on mechanical coordination that is housed in her pelvic region, it was large enough to warrant certain design shifts to suit her center of gravity, and I wanted a friendly and appealing silhouette so --” Liao perked up, “So you noticed the hips?”
McCree’s face burned and he glanced off.
Liao rolled her eyes and smiled. “Jesse... if this goes really badly, I can just erase it from her memory.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“I’m only saying, the stakes aren’t that high,” said Liao, "I think it's cute that you're getting nervous."
"Nervous, hell! I just don't know what to make of it!"
"You've had plenty of perfectly pleasant conversations with her--"
"They weren't dates!"
"Did you just say yes because you didn't want to hurt her feelings?" the brightness and absolute lack of accusation in Liao's voice only unsettled McCree further.
"N-no..." McCree rubbed the back of his neck, "I--I wasn't really thinking. I guess... I assumed you'd think I'd wreck it or... or wreck her and you'd... write it out of her code..."
"Interesting..." Liao tapped her tablet stylus on her chin.
"I ain't that good with sciencey shit! Reyes brought me on to shoot things!" McCree shrugged a little helplessly, "And the way you talk about her, I don't know if she's a--a work in progress, or-or your kid so..."
"A little bit of both. This is where AI gets messy," said Liao with a smile, "You don't know if you're making something human... but you get to make something new."
McCree just stared at Liao for a few seconds, opened his mouth to say something, realized he had no idea what to say to that, and then closed his mouth.
"It's going to be wonderful," said Liao, gently putting a hand on the back of McCree's shoulder.
"Wait--Is there anything I should---?" McCree started but the door slid open and Liao more or less shoved him out into Zurich Headquarters' courtyard gardens. It was twilight, Friday night, and strings of fairy lights had been strung around the sycamores, magnolias, and plum trees that decorated the garden. A couple of brightly colored paper lanterns were strung along the lines of electric lights, giving the usual contemplative and monumental air of the garden a more warm and festive feeling. McCree scanned the garden, seeing a table set with candles and a small basket of bread about 15 feet ahead of him.
"Jesse?" McCree heard a familiar voice and swiveled on his heel to see... a glowing blue-white Dolly Parton circa 1974 in a daisy-patterned peach sundress.
"Whuh..." McCree's face scrunched up in confusion.
"Is this okay?" Dolly Parton spoke with Echo's voice and McCree visibly flinched again. "Oh you don't like it--" The glowing Dolly Parton pressed her fingers to her forehead. "Give me a moment! I can fix it!"
"Echo--?" McCree started, but holographic pixels spiraled around the not-Dolly Parton and reshaped her into.... Olivia Rai, her usual afro styled into the more-textured Gibson Girl hairstyle she sported in Six Gun Killer.
"What about this?" said Echo, "Is this all right?"
"I mean I like the movie but--" McCree started but the pixels whirled around Echo.
"Lee Byung-Hun, 2016, Magnificent Seven," said Echo. “My scans of your hormone levels showed an overwhelming positive reaction to him.” Again, this hologram form was still in the sundress.
Okay we really need to talk about the scanning thing, thought McCree, but he just stammered out, "They're all really nice, Echo, but you don't have to--" McCree rubbed the back of his neck, "I mean, I think we'll both be more comfortable if you're... you, y'know?"
"Me? But it's so..." 2016 Lee Byung-hun Echo twiddled her fingers nervously, "It's so..."
"It's the you I know," said McCree, shrugging, "I like it, Echo, really."
The hologram fell away from Echo in a shower of cubic pixels, revealing a partially holographic head on a heavily modified omnic frame. She was a patchwork between a handful of standard omnic parts and sleek parts whipped up on-site at this point. No wings. The sundress sagged a little off her metal frame.
"There you are," said McCree.
Echo smiled a little. "Sorry... the hologram capabilities were for optimal interfacing... so I thought..."
"I get it," said McCree with a smile, "I was a little nervous too."
"You were?!" said Echo, "But you're so... charming! And my scans of your antibodies revealed that it was very statistically likely you have had higher than average amounts of--"
"Hoookay! Moving on!" McCree said quickly.
"Moving on," said Echo, processing this.
There was the sound of a cybernetic throat being cleared and both McCree and Echo turned their heads to see Genji in a long-sleeved collared shirt, black vest, bow tie, and apron.
"Genji?" said McCree, suppressing a laugh in his voice.
"...not a word," said Genji.
"I know I got stuck as the waiter back in Venice but this is--"
"I said not a word!" said Genji, furiously. He drew in a steadying inhale. "Ma'am and sir. If I may direct you to your table."
"...oh this is rich--" McCree started.
"McCree, I know 37 ways of killing you in under 11 seconds, do not test me," said Genji.
"Uh huh," said McCree, "Show us the way, Garçon."
Genji muttered something under his breath in Japanese as he lead them to the table. McCree hurried over to Echo's side and pulled out her chair for her.
"Oh--Thank you!" said Echo, sitting down.
Genji rolled his eyes as McCree took his own seat. "Liao was able to negotiate with the headquarters chefs,” he said, setting glasses of water on the table, “You're getting chicken scallopini and asparagus."
"So there's not a menu--?" McCree started.
"You're getting chicken scallopini and asparagus," said Genji, with about as much murder as anyone could inject into the words 'Chicken scallopini and asparagus.'
"Okay," said McCree meekly as Genji walked off briskly.
"Er--don't mind him," said McCree as Genji walked off, "Blackwatch suspended... getting antsy, y'know."
"I don't," said Echo, equally pleasantly and blankly.
McCree cleared his throat and grabbed some bread from the basket between them, buttering it. "Well... You heard about the Venice incident, right?"
"I did not," said Echo, "I'm quarantined from most networked systems."
"Mm," McCree took a bite of his buttered bread, "Well... the long and short of it is, we fucked up."
"Not you!" said Echo on reflex.
"Well, not me, at first--but we had to follow through on the fuck-up if we were going to get out of it alive," said McCree with a shrug.
"I'm sure you did your best," said Echo, picking up a piece of bread. They both knew she couldn't eat, so instead, she seemed to be using it as something to do with her hands, breaking it off into bits.
"Eh, I don't think any of us were at our best," said McCree, "But... you do what you can, right?"
""Mm-hmm," Echo nodded, "Doctor Liao's been able to convince a handful of operatives to bring my AI processor on the orca with certain missions to observe, but my speech is disabled. Apparently it 'freaks people out.'" Echo glanced off resentfully.
"Not you?" said McCree.
Echo nodded. "And I know Morrison doesn't like me learning combat tactics."
"Echo, I can't think of anyone who loves humanity more than you," said McCree.
"Thank you, Jesse," said Echo. She was silent for a few beats. "And.... thank you for doing this. I--I don't know how you see me..."
"I'm still figuring that out too," said McCree, smiling a little, "But... I like to think I'm a good judge of character. And I'm proud to know you. And I'm proud that I mean enough to you to be here."
Echo's hologram face brightened, and she glanced off, a bit bashfully. "I--I can't even eat bread," she said quietly, smiling as she glanced down at the small pile of shredded bread bits on her plate.
"Psh. Bread. You can turn into whoever you want. Why worry about bread?" said McCree.
Echo snickered a little.
"...who's your favorite to turn into?" asked McCree, "I know you were turnin' into all that stuff earlier for me because of all the stuff we talked about and those dumb movies we watched--”
“I don’t think they’re dumb--”
“But... what about you? Is there a person you like turning into?"
Echo thought for a few seconds. "I would say...Figure skaters," she said thoughtfully.
"Figure skaters?" McCree repeated.
"Not any individual one, but I’ve been putting together a composite hologram of several of them," said Echo, "Skaters, they--they aren't ruled by the same physics as other humans. All that power, all that grace, all on a plane that does not have the same rules of speed or friction."
"Bet you'd be a hell of a dancer," said McCree, smiling.
"I like to think I'm learning," said Echo, with a slightly smug shrug.
"Chicken scallopini," a plate clanked unceremoniously in front of McCree and McCree flinched to attention to see Genji next to him.
"Jesus, man! A little warning next time!" said McCree.
"Ninja," said Genji flatly.
"What about her?" said McCree, pointing at Echo.
Genji looked at him like he was an idiot.
"Jesse, it's fine," said Echo. She waved her hands and a hologram of what appeared to be lobster thermidor glowed into existence in front of her.
"...she can take care of herself," said Genji, walking off, "Let me know if you need a refill on water."
"Don't mind him," McCree said again.
"I don't," said Echo, materializing a holographic fork into existence and taking a holographic bite of her holographic food.
McCree sectioned off bites of his own meal and took tentative bites and chews, but it was good. A faint 'Mm' fell out of him and he opened his eyes to see Echo closely observing him. He took another bite, not taking his eyes off of Echo this time. Echo seemed to do the same, imitating him. But it wasn't quite the same, he observed. There was a lot of Liao in her, the way she'd stuff food off to one cheek and slowly parse it out as long as she needed while she multitasked. He saw it in all the nights Liao had brought takeout to the lab. In this case, Echo perfectly adapted Liao's eating habits to McCree's.
McCree swallowed hard. "Do you ever uh... make food... make you happy?"
"What do you mean?" said Echo.
"Well, if you eat really good food, you go, like, 'mm' and stuff--if all the food is only stuff you come up with... how does that work?"
Echo thought for a few seconds. "I... never thought of food as stimulating the pleasure response. Mostly it just seemed necessary for interfacing. Does it stimulate a pleasure response?"
McCree tried not to focus too hard on the words 'Pleasure response.' "Well, it depends on the food," said McCree.
"Does your food stimulate a pleasure response?"
"I mean compared to the rest of the shit I've had this month? Definitely," said McCree with a shrug.
"I see," said Echo. She looked at her food for a few seconds. She took a bit of her own holographic meal and a deep, sensual "Mmnh," bloomed out of her, her shoulders bunching up and her head tilting back with the sensation.
McCree sharply inhaled, realized his mouth was full of chicken scallopini, and coughed and choked for nearly a minute.
Echo giggled. “I--I’m sorry, I’m still deciphering the appropriate forms of human pleasure.”
McCree found his face burning again and just gulped down some of his water.
“...that was an odd thing to say,” said Echo, glancing off.
“Nah, I’ve been told I’m old-fashioned a lot,” said McCree with a dismissive hand wave.
“Well, that’s why I like you,” said Echo, shyly.
McCree’s chews slowed.
“You... feel solid. I know I can trust you to... to tell me what you think... but.. also to be kind. I don’t know what other people want from me, but I know you just want another person. And... you’re very open in terms of what that person can be.”
“Well I can tell you you don’t need to be Dolly Parton to win me over,” said McCree with a shrug and another bite of his food.
Echo giggled again and McCree swallowed.
“I’m still not sure if I’m doing this right,” said Echo, smiling down at her own hologram food.
“Eh, you don’t really think of it in terms of ‘doing it right’--it’s mostly just about both of you having a good time. And trust me, you’re a better date than a lot that I’ve had,” said McCree with a snicker, “I just hope I’m doing it right too, y’know? It’s a lot of pressure, being anyone’s first date.”
“Oh!” Echo perked up, “I never thought of it that way....”
“Am I doing it right?” said McCree with a slight lopsided smile.
“Hmm...” Echo seemed to genuinely and very seriously ponder this.
“Oh come on, you’re making me nervous!” said McCree.
“Current assessments are... positive,” said Echo, “More data may be necessary to confirm any findings I’ve drawn thus far. We may have to do this again. An experiment is useless unless you can replicate its results”
“So... second date then?” said McCree, “That’s generally considered a good sign.”
“Oh! So I’m good at this!” said Echo.
“Sure are,” said McCree with a snicker.
Echo beamed.
“Think we might have to do something other than dinner next time, though. I think if we try to get Genji in a waiter outfit again, he may actually kill me.”
“I estimate by his hormone levels and body temperature that there is an 89% likelihood of that occurring, yes,” said Echo. They both laughed for a little bit, and as the giggles died down Echo tilted her head. “So... you’ve been on bad dates?”
“Oh, terrible dates--but I don’t want to bore you---”
“It could be very useful data!” said Echo with that same brightness Liao had shown when she saw McCree being nervous.
McCree rubbed his chin. “Well... there’s a couple funny stories....”
-----
McCree was humming when he arrived in the Blackwatch sector later that night, bobbing his head and shoulders a bit with his humming as he loosened his bolo tie and took off his hat.
“Sounds like someone had a good time,” Reyes was seated in front of Blackwatch’s main monitor, mindlessly leafing through some paperwork.
McCree barely interrupted his own humming with an “Mm-hmm” as he kept walking past.
“Reyes, you really must find a way to end Blackwatch’s suspension, or I fear he’ll romance one of the custodian’s vacuuming bots, next,” said Moira, leaning against the desk next to Reyes.
“Eh, if it means getting Genji in a bowtie again...” Reyes shrugged.
“You will never get me in a bowtie again,” Genji seethed from a shadowed corner.
“You asked for a mission--” Reyes started, but cut himself off as the three of them watched McCree continue to walk and hum down to his own quarters.
“...by god, I think he actually had a good time,” Reyes said quietly.
“Madness is setting in,” Moira mused.
“We need to get out in the field again,” Genji said, his voice tense.
“Or maybe you just need a date,” said Reyes shrugging. Reyes heard the audible click of the shuriken plate on Genji’s arm as Genji’s shoulders tensed up. “...or not.”
