Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

His mind is churning.

Underneath the mask, Cypher’s eyes are glued to the tablet, unable to look away. He wasn’t the first to get a dossier—that privilege belonged to Brimstone—but he had hoped against it all that the blackmailer wouldn’t have anything on him. That he would go unnoticed in this exposé. That he had covered his tracks well enough that they would never know his name, his face, his life.

But he’s staring at the words “Amir El Amari” on the tablet and something starts to feel tight in his chest.

The blackmailer does not have a picture of his real face, just a front view image of “Cypher”. This is good. Of all the things he has kept hidden, he works the hardest to make sure no one can put a name to his face. But it’s a small victory when the blackmailer knows the rest about him. They’ve visited his other hideouts in Morocco—this is certain, for Cypher had walked into his Casablanca hideout and found the dossier on the kitchen table. The blackmailer is right—he can no longer go back to the hideouts if they’ve been compromised. He makes a mental note to abandon them.

He makes another note to check future hideouts for bugs or taps. He checks every place thoroughly, but it clearly isn’t enough if someone is finding them. He makes another note to expand the scout of his hideouts to a three mile radius for any vantage points. Maybe this blackmailer is tailing him, just out of sight. Maybe it’s not just one blackmailer, but an entire team of intelligence specialists trying to bring him into the light. His head pounds. Maybe it’s someone from his past, coming back for revenge. To exact their justice onto him. He does not remember every individual he’s crossed. How can he when there are so many? He makes another note to revisit every mission or case he was involved with in the past ten years. It could be from before he joined the Valorant Protocol or from after. But he saw the threats that the blackmailer had made, so it has to be Protocol-related. He changes it back to five years. That doesn’t rule out the threat of this being someone from his past, though—maybe it’s someone from his past that he’s wronged that the Protocol has also slighted. He changes the note back to ten. All of this still doesn’t explain how the blackmailer knows so much about him. About his family. About Nora. About his daughter. Why do they know this? Were they involved in—?

Cypher’s knees suddenly give out. He barely catches himself by grabbing the back of a chair, his lungs straining and his eyes wild. The tablet clatters to the floor, and it’s the first time Cypher has looked away from its damning gaze on him. He checks his surroundings. Everything looks gray and fuzzy. It takes him way too long to realize that it’s because his vision is clouded with dark spots. He tries to inhale deeply to clear them, but his breath hitches.

He can tell he’s panicking in some corner of his brain, but that doesn’t help the panicking. With shaking hands, Cypher bends down to the floor and picks the tablet back up. There’s a crack in the screen right over his picture. For a second, he catches sight of himself—his real face—in the reflection. And then he blinks the dark spot away and he’s staring at his masked self.

Cypher doesn’t find the strength to get up from the floor. Instead, he laughs bitterly and turns the tablet face-down. He doesn’t know what he’ll do if he looks at it again. “Oh, you’re good. You’re very good at this.”

He is afraid.

~***~

Sova hears the doors to the entrance of the Protocol HQ open and turns to watch Cypher trail through them, back from his mission in Morocco. His eyes quickly flick to the tablet in the information broker’s hands. He recognizes the tablet and what it means, but it takes him a second to fully process what that means for the Protocol—and by extension, Cypher himself.

“Cypher,” Sova says, and the man stops. His head is angled towards the ground like it’s too difficult to look up at him. Sova knows the answer to his question, but he has to ask him. “Is that…?”

“Mine,” Cypher says, voice clipped. “Yes. I must report this to Brimstone, if you will excuse me.”

Sova frowns. “Do you know who did it? One of your rivals, perhaps—”

“No, it can’t be.” Cypher shakes his head a little too stiffly. “The information on this…dossier. It’s…impressive. Too impressive to be any of them.” His grip tightens on the tablet—Sova can only tell because he hears it creak under the pressure. “They must be a new player.”

He’s trying to hide his reactions, but Sova can see the torrent of emotions running through him. It scares him a little, because there are few times where Sova has seen the fearful, frantic side of him. God only knows how Cypher reacted when he first found his dossier.

Part of Sova wishes to know what’s on Cypher’s dossier—after all, the man has so many secrets to him that Sova doesn’t trust him the way Brimstone or Viper does. Sure, even they don’t have complete trust in him as a moral, standup person, but they place a great deal of faith in his skills. Sova always wonders when Cypher will finally decide the Protocol isn’t worth his time and just leave them to die, or when he’ll decide the price for all their information is better and give them up.

But to see the man this shaken up about his secrets being turned up…Sova doesn’t know what to make of it. He has never seen someone so undone by it that he's starting to feel there is something very, very personal to it, something that isn’t just a ledger of blood.

“Hey,” Sova finds himself saying. “We will find this blackmailer.”

He means it. Sova’s own dossier has been on his mind since he found it at a train station in Russia nearly a week ago. He understands that his past isn’t as hidden and that it’s easy for someone like Cypher to dig up, but the blackmailer referred to him missing a shot before. Obviously, he has missed many shots before—anyone learning archery is not perfect when they start. But he knew which instance they were referring to, and that had shaken him. Few people knew about the incident; it was something even Cypher couldn’t dig up in a record or a file. Someone like that who could uncover their ugliest secrets, their darkest pasts…for a man who values honesty, Sova does not like the idea of someone who is capable of sowing such chaos.

Cypher looks up at him, his mask betraying no emotion. When he speaks, there is that sharp conviction that Sova recognizes. “Oh, I know it.”

Chapter Text

The door to his loft apartment is left ajar. That’s his first sign that something is amiss.

He’s quick to pull out his Headhunter, his left hand reaching to slowly open the door. He steps in quietly, but as his foot passes the threshold he realizes it doesn’t look like a robbery at all. The living room is in meticulous order; no broken windows, no items strewn on the floor, no missing technology. It should make anyone feel relieved.

Somehow, this puts him more on edge.

He rounds his way into the kitchen, and his next sign is the coffee mug resting on his island counter. He can smell the waft of strong coffee, but more importantly, he can see the steam rising from the mug.

Someone was here recently. Or, Chamber thinks darkly, someone is still here.

The grip on his gun does not falter, even when he walks into his bedroom and finds the tablet on his bed. He is careful to leave it there while he does a methodical search throughout his apartment, double checking every corner or hiding space there is. When he is finally certain that the intruder has long left his home, he disassembles his gun into metallic bands and plops himself onto his bed. He pushes his glasses further up his nose and opens the tablet.

As he reads his callsign and name on the left of the screen, he finally recalls a recent memory of Raze in distress. About two days ago, Chamber had overheard a snippet of conversation between Raze and Sage—something about the girl finding a leak of her info. He had assumed nothing of it, mainly because it sounded like an isolated instance that seemed to be solely Raze’s fault. And since it had nothing to do with him, he paid it no mind.

He mutters a curse. Whoever is behind this dossier knows too much. He doesn’t mind that they’ve dug up his history with the French military and Kingdom—Cypher and Killjoy could find that on a database—but this last paragraph…

But no matter your intent - right or wrong - there will be judgment. If they call you “villain”...Can you live with that forever?

Chamber stands up and paces. Somehow, they know about what he’s done. Somehow. He thinks of all his time spent working around Fracture. Had he left any evidence? Surveillance footage, fingerprints, salvaged communication? Did Oran McEneff rat him out? No, it’s highly unlikely. So how? How can this person know? Chamber re-reads the tablet again and finds nothing insightful. How did this person get in his head? Even Cypher could not find traces of his…transgressions.

He shakes his head. It does not matter. For a threat this big, he has to keep his secrets. If this person manages to leak his secrets to the public—to the Protocol—all his efforts working towards his endgame will be wasted. No, Chamber realizes with a sinking feeling. It isn’t just about his goals. His leaker knows it, too.

They will ostracize him.

“When did I get so weak?” Chamber wonders quietly. He decides, then, that this leaker must go. Clearly this leaker is a bigger threat than he imagined, which means the Protocol will also be looking for them. If they move in to apprehend this entity, Chamber will have to get his way onto that task force.

The only problem he can think of is if he'll be unable to kill them before anyone can intervene.

~***~

Brimstone sighs and adjusts his hat. “Thank you for informing me about the dossier. It’s no surprise that more agents are receiving them—we’re working on finding this blackmailer before this escalates into the whole Protocol. What did you do with your dossier?”

Chamber notes Brimstone’s appearance—his slumped posture, his worn face, his tired eyes. He’s certain their leader has already received his own special tablet. Chamber raises his hands placatingly as he says, “I…broke it.”

“You broke it?” Brimstone asks.

“Yes. I shot it. Many times,” Chamber answers, faking an embarrassed chuckle. What he said was true. Before he returned to the Protocol, he had taken a walk, found a secluded place on the outskirts of Paris, threw the tablet onto the ground, and placed eight bullet holes into it with his Headhunter. Then he crushed it under his heel and threw it in a dumpster for good measure. He tried to convince himself it wasn’t too dramatic and that he wasn’t being ridiculous. He tries for a guilty smile. “I didn’t think you would need to see it!”

“Well…” Brimstone says, thinking intently, then relents. “We don’t. Any agent who comes across a leak is required to report it, but…they are allowed to keep what’s on it to themselves. You’re entitled to some privacy, after all.” His voice is heavy when he says that.

Chamber’s dossier is already destroyed, but he feels a sense of relief, nonetheless. It's a blessing that they won't be on his case for destroying his dossier. “How respectable for our leader to be so considerate! I will be sure to keep my eye out for any useful information on this ‘blackmailer’ of ours. So, if there is nothing else…”

“You’re free to go,” Brimstone says, wiping his eyes. Chamber nods curtly and stands up, making his way for the door.

Just before he opens the door, he finds his feet stopping. He doesn’t know why he’s doing it, but he calls back, “Oh, and Brimstone? ...Take care of yourself, mon ami.”

Even Brimstone is as surprised as Chamber. He has never heard the man sound so genuine.

Chapter Text

Control. The gift so many yearn to give you. The one thing you will never have.

Neon stares into the tablet with so much intensity that it might just crack under her gaze. She realizes her hands are shaking, but she’s too focused on trying not to let her tears slip onto the screen. If they did, she fears the blackmailer would somehow know that, too. They seem to know enough about her already.

They’re right, she thinks. She doesn’t have any control over herself or her power. Sage and Reyna did not freak out when they received their dossiers, so Neon should not, either. If she does, if she can’t push this to the back of her mind, if she can’t even think clearly after something so…so meaningless and small, how can she hope to ever put a lid on her Radiance?

She realizes she’s not just shaking, but vibrating. Her body is thrumming with a million volts of electricity, like a hive of angry bees trapped in a jar. Sparks crackle off her arms like tiny firecrackers. No, no, no, she thinks desperately. She can’t control it. She closes her eyes and tries to clear her mind, but it’s easier said than done. Months of training and meditation with Sage has shown little progress in that regard. More sparks fly in response, this time painful.

Just then, there’s a knock at her door. Her head jolts up, looking towards the door in a panic.

“Hello, Neon?” Chamber’s muffled voice floats through. She cringes. He always seems to pick the worst times to talk to her. “It's me, Chamber. I apologize for the interruption, but I must speak with you about the puls—”

“Not right now!” she forces herself to shout, and then twitches when her body sends another uncomfortable volt of electricity down her spine. “Agh!”

“Euh, Neon?” his voice calls. He sounds worried. She hates the thought of him pitying her, and in the haze of pain, her irritation manifests into a stray bolt of lightning. It flies off her hand and strikes the corner of her desk, singeing it. The blackmailer’s words swim across her vision: Control. The one thing you will never have. “Everything well there?”

Her eyes widen. “I’m…totally fine,” Neon grits out weakly. “J-Just leave me alone t-to handle this!”

“Oh? If there’s something wrong, I can go get Sage—” Chamber offers again, and this time Neon cannot suppress her emotions well enough. There is a powerful buzz in the air—the sound of bees finally smashing through their glass jar—and an explosion of electricity surges from her body in all directions. Sparks rain from her ceiling lights, her computer fizzles into a blue screen, her body seizes up with pain—but worst of all, the panel on her door crackles like a thousand flies are being zapped to death. She hears yelling from outside the door. And then a heavy thump.

She understands what has happened immediately. When the worst of her outburst is over, Neon sucks in a breath, sprinting for the door. “Chamber!”

She flings it open to find him curled up on the ground, twitching. His eyes are squeezed shut, his face scrunched in strained effort. Chamber’s hands are clenched into fists, but she can see him trying to open his fingers with little success. She stares in muted horror. Oh god. Why did he have to touch her door? Just how many volts traveled through it and electrocuted him?

It reminds her of their last interaction, before she quit K-SEC. Back then, their talk had ended sourly and Neon had given him a little shock when she shook his hand in mock friendliness. But it was never meant to be like this.

“I-I’m so sorry,” Neon says quickly. She reaches out to help him up, but freezes. She shouldn’t touch him. What if she’s still dangerous? What if she grabs his arm and accidentally stops his heart?

The one thing you will never have.

Neon recoils and clutches her hand back.

At her voice, Chamber opens his eyes to look at her. Something in his face twists into an anguished smile. “T-This is all very nostalgic, non?” He’s trying to be humorous about it, but Neon can’t find anything remotely funny about this, no matter how much he gets under her skin. Not like this.

“I didn’t mean to,” Neon cries. She watches him struggle to upright himself on the floor, his movements jerky. “I just…I just—”

“A m-misunderstanding. It’s no p-problem,” Chamber says. He shakes out his arms, probably in an attempt to release some tension, but when he uses his hand to push himself to standing height, his elbow gives out and he collapses back onto the floor in a heap. “Ugh.”

Neon hears footsteps treading down the hall, and suddenly Sage is outside her door, all concern and no fear. She isn’t in her usual battle uniform reserved for their missions, just a casual shirt and shorts. She hooks her arm under Chamber’s shoulder to help him stand. “What happened?”

“I didn’t mean to,” Neon pleads.

“It was nothing, truly,” Chamber says breezily, though from how heavily he’s relying on Sage’s arm, it’s plain to see that isn’t the case. “A-A minor shock.”

“I almost—” Neon chokes on her words. Sage nods sympathetically.

“It’s okay. Neon, please wait here,” she tells her. “I’ll take Chamber to medical. Can you walk?”

“Well enough,” he says tightly, casting a glance at Neon. He’s still trying to put up an easy front, and she hates him for it. Hates how obviously fake it is, hates how guilty it makes her feel. She finds her hand reaching out as if to grab something, but Sage maneuvers them both down the hall, and she is left alone.

Neon stands there in the doorway for at least five minutes, stunned into silence. Her mind is moving faster than her, racing with anxiety. Control, control, control. She lost control again and it almost killed someone on the team. She wouldn’t call Chamber her friend, but he’s still an ally and she wouldn’t seriously wish him harm—especially by her own hand. How could she let this happen? How can anyone trust her to have their back when one slip-up could get them hurt?

She remembers shedding tears, but they dry up by the time Sage returns alone.

“You should sit down,” Sage says gently. Neon nods numbly, and they move into her room, sitting next to each other on Neon’s bed. Sage says nothing about the busted lights or the singe mark on her desk, however conspicuous they are. She says nothing for a while, until Neon finds her voice again.

“I almost killed him,” she says, hollow.

“No,” Sage refutes immediately. “Chamber is still recovering from the shock, but it did not do any lethal damage to his organs. He’ll recover soon enough.”

“It was a lot of voltage,” Neon says adamantly. “I could’ve killed him.”

“You didn’t,” Sage says calmly. “You may have lost control for a moment, but you were able to keep your output low. This is proof of your training. You’re improving, even if you can’t see your progress.”

“It doesn’t feel like improvement,” Neon mutters. “It shouldn’t have happened. I shouldn’t have lost control. It feels like every time I take one step forward towards controlling my Radiance, I fall ten feet down. I lose every inch of progress I gain. And then someone always gets hurt.”

Sage’s eyes are full of sorrow. They trail over to the tablet on Neon’s bed, then slowly lift back to Neon’s face in complete understanding. “Your dossier.”

“The blackmailer’s right,” Neon says bitterly. She hands the tablet to Sage, refusing to meet her gaze. If she looks into her mentor’s eyes and finds her disappointment, it might just send her into a bigger spiral. “I’m not like dad or my mom, or you and Reyna. I don’t have control over my emotions or my power. I feel like I’m never going to…to get to where you all are.”

Sage purses her lips for a moment, deep in contemplation. Neon almost believes that Sage has nothing to say to her, that she can find no words in her for a case like Neon. Then, she says quietly, “I was not always like this, either. When I arrived at the monastery fifteen years ago, I was insecure. Prone to outbursts. Difficult to…reason with.”

Neon blinks. “Huh?” But she remembers hearing that Sage used to be a monk before she joined the Protocol. She wonders what could’ve happened to make Sage go from being a monk to one of the leaders of a covert organization. One thing sticks out, though. “Fifteen years? I thought First Light happened ten years ago.”

“This was before all of that,” Sage explains with a small smile. “Before Radianite. I lived in the monastery for five years without any Radiant power, working to bring balance to myself. It was demanding. It felt like a fruitless endeavor. Often, I thought the same thoughts as you: How will I ever be strong enough to control myself?”

“But…you found the answer,” Neon says. “How did you…do it?”

Sage locks eyes with her. She may have been in her civilian clothes, but her gaze never seemed to lack that steely resolve Neon had seen in the field. Unwavering, unrelenting. Unstoppable. “I persisted in spite of my doubts. Of course, I had many. I still do. But I acknowledged my fears and I let myself try again. And now I am here.” She thumbs over Neon’s dossier tablet and sets it on the desk, covering the mark. “What I mean to say is that growth is never linear, and it cannot be rushed. Many trees take decades to reach their full height; it took me fifteen years to get here, and I still have much room to grow. You will grow in time, too. Everyone must endure in order to grow.”

“I wish I could grow faster,” Neon says wistfully. “I feel like a tree stump.”

“I understand,” Sage agrees, amused. “I don’t blame you for feeling that way. But please…have a little patience for yourself. Everyday, I see your efforts to always try. You’re strong. I am proud of how far you’ve come since we have met.”

Neon’s heart clenches. “Thank you, Sage. For telling me about all of that. The monastery and you. I-I think it helped me.”

“I’m glad,” she responds. “Know that you can come to me about these things any time. I don’t mind at all.”

“Yeah. Thanks again.” Neon puts her hands in her laps, unsure of what she should do next. It surprises her how soothing Sage’s words were. Maybe it’s something she learned from her time at the monastery. Leadership really suits her.

In an attempt to lighten the mood, Neon asks suddenly, “So…your name is Ling?”

“This blackmailer should really keep their information to themselves,” Sage says with a huff. “And it’s still Sage to you.” But there’s a playful twinkle in them, which must mean she doesn’t actually mind. Not many people in the Protocol share it with each other—Neon can only think of Chamber and Viper’s names and she would never dare to address them by anything other than their callsigns. Sage must know her name now, too, if she skimmed over her dossier. It’s a nice thought. Like they are real people beyond their jobs who look out for each other. Like real friends.

“You got it,” Neon says, smiling. Then she remembers why they had this talk and sucks in a breath. “Um. I should go to medical and…apologize to Chamber. I feel really bad.”

“Of course,” says Sage, getting up from her bed. “He didn’t seem angry, so I’m sure he didn’t take it to heart. An apology would be wise, however. Take care, Neon.”

She leaves after that. Neon glances at the dossier on her table. It’s a haunting presence to keep in her room; just looking at it fills her stomach with dread. But she’s a little wiser than she was ten minutes ago. Neon scoops it up and tucks it deep within her desk drawer.

She heads out towards the medical wing. 

~***~

To her amazement, no one else is in medical besides Chamber—not even Raze who gets into accidents on a frequent basis. He’s lying on a hospital cot near the back of the room, barely partitioned off by a curtain. Sage must’ve healed him well because he’s not hooked up to any machines and it looks like he’s still wearing his suit. It calms Neon down a bit—she really didn’t fry him like she thought she might’ve.

Chamber must hear her approaching because he sits up to peer past the curtain. When he spots her, he smiles. She can’t tell if it’s fake.

“Ah, I see you’ve come to visit me,” he says lightly. “But I see you didn’t bring me flowers. I must say I’m a little disappointed.” 

Never mind. Neon wants to turn around and go back to her room. But guilt and regret keeps her in place. “I wanted to apologize to you again. For zapping you.”

“It is as I said: not a problem,” Chamber says, waving his arm. The motion looks stiff. “I recognize my mistake, I assure you. I was never one for handling… delicate situations anyway. And given our previous history, well…” He trails off.

“What?” Neon says, confused. Then realization hits her like a freight train. Does he think she shocked him on purpose to tell him to back off? “No—I never meant to hurt you at all. It was a total slip-up. You really didn’t deserve it this time.”

Chamber pauses for a good second, studying her. God, he’s so two-faced sometimes that she can never tell when he’s genuine or just putting up a facade of good intentions. She usually resigns to it being the latter, but it’s harder to tell lately what’s real about him and what’s not. His disbelief morphs into mirth. “This time?” he repeats, raising an eyebrow. “Well, I am glad to hear that it was completely an accident and not my fault. Euh…are you doing better now?”

“Yeah,” Neon says. “I’m good now. Um, thanks for checking on me anyway. Even if you ended up in here for it. Are…Are you okay as well?”

“Me? Oh, yes, I’m comfortable,” Chamber says. “Sage has healed whatever injuries there were—and there were not many, of course,” he adds quickly. “However, she insists that I stay overnight to rest up, let my body recover internally, and who am I to deny our healer's orders?”

Against everything she thinks about him, Neon is relieved to hear that. It’s like a weight off her chest. She nods. “Good.” With friendliness out of the way, she points to him accusingly. “Don’t tell anyone I apologized or…I’ll just zap you again.”

And she’s gone in a flash.

Chamber's lip twitches. “Ah. Of course.”

Chapter Text

Somedays, it’s hard to imagine her Radiance as something of a gift.

Since she was little, Jett had loved moving. She loved to run in the field outside her home, loved that feeling of aimlessness. There was nothing more free about being young and unhindered. Eventually, her eomeoni would call her back for dinner, but for those few hours, that field was like the whole world. It could never be too big for a child as small as her.

When she moved to Seoul, it was a different kind of freedom. The buildings were densely packed together, and there were much more people compared to the countryside, but she was on her own for once. She could choose where to go, what to do for the day, what she wanted to be. She loved the cold air that brushed her face when she went for her morning jogs. The world was smaller, more crammed in, but infinitely bigger.

She learned to move on when the restaurant was destroyed—it was hard, but she did it. Jett was always good at moving, so this was just another part of life to her. Her family did not understand why she was leaving Korea, why she would quit being a chef just because the restaurant got slammed by a terrible storm. But Jett knew they wouldn’t understand, so she gave her best excuses and slept on the flight.

Ever since Venice, however, being a wanderer has never felt so stifling.

In her heart, Jett had always known that however far she went, wherever she went, she would always be able to have a place to come home to. But her family and friends back home were ashamed to have known her, to have raised her. They closed their doors, turned away. Jett watched the entire world—her world—reject her. And she became a true wanderer, then, but she knew she would never be free.

The walls of HQ suffocate her, windless and confining. Every day she spends outside of HQ range is a threat to her safety and the existence of the Protocol. Brimstone says he understands and sometimes he even tries, but it doesn’t change her existence. She feels like a ghost, haunting the people around her.

Jett tells Brimstone she received the dossier—it’s the least she can do—and heads outside. She finds a small cliff over the shore and flings the dossier as far as she can, willing the wind to carry it into the horizon. It becomes smaller and smaller in her vision until it becomes a black dot, then nothing. What is one small thing compared to the vastness of the world?

Jett heads inside. She feels like a ghost, haunting the people around her. She's the passing breeze you feel for a second before it's gone. She’s a memory, she's a visage of destruction, she’s a hurricane, she’s a nomad.

But she will never outrun the world.