Monster In The Water
Aug. 30th, 2009 03:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shankieFirst of all, so I don't contaminate it with my nonsense, go read Cuanta Vida. I don't care if you've ever even heard of TF2 or the most amazing/hilarious viral videos any video game ever produced ever if you're reading this little journal of mine you like consecutive art. So of all the webcomics I've read, you should know only that and Goodbye Chains ever made me fangirl over them. Anyway, it's possible the Scout Heironymus made might have rubbed off a bit in this. Just so you know.
Back from reading those? Sweet! Let us continue, shall we?
Alright, so, I wrote this Team Fortress 2 fic. Yeah, I know, wtf am I doing dabbling in other fandoms when so much of the DC lays wasting away in un-updated-land? It wasn't my fault! It was the fault of a small number of people, but the only one I'll name is![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ugly_kitties because she's so awesome she did fanart. To see all of this image: if you have a Y!Gallery account, go here, but if you don't, theres a tf2chan /afanart/ thread that can also give you access.
The original post is also on tf2chan, where updates are very likely to occur way faster than here. I wasn't planning on updates, however... it seems there is a demand, so they'll happen.
Monster In The Water
Team Fortress 2: Tentaspy/Scout, Medic/Tentaspy
On both teams, the Spies have a short life expectancy; save one. A RED Scout with a danger fetish discovers why as he rails against his team’s reluctance to fight the BLUs and both sides grow wary of what lurks in the canals of the no man’s land at night.
"Where does that spook sleep, anyway?"
Those at the table shrugged, most handling their meal with suspicion; the speaker, a Scout, was stabbing a blackened edge with a fork. It always happened when everyone else was too busy to cook and they let Pyro have run of the rations.
"Ol' spy slept like a c'lized human being," the Engineer mumbled through his eggs; the burnt spots didn't seem to bother his healthy appetite as he shoveled away. "Always had the decency to eat with us, too."
Medic stood abruptly, smoothing his trousers with a brisk motion. "Some things are best left alone," he snapped.
The Scout that had initially posed the question eyed him narrowly. "Fuck's that supposed to mean?"
"Spy's trouble. That's what I mean, tiny! Best you leave it alone," Solider grumbled. "No good."
The veterans, the ones that had been living on the base for years nodded their assent. The Scout shrugged, Scouts never having been known for their attention span.
At night, it was hard to see anything threatening about BLU's base; it was a lot like RED's, an old factory that was gutted and refitted to fit barracks and their control room in the basement. He would know; nobody had been in the enemy base more than him. Especially now that their Spy was dead. Again. There was another Scout on the team, but he was slower, so he never went past the razor wire-topped fence at the edge of their territory. Other Scout shot people; it's what he did.
Scout kicked his heels on the wall, swinging his legs out a window just under Sniper's nest. "Good Sniper" as he always thought of him; he had a name, but everyone learned quick here that nobody was really interested in real names, so Scout just thought of him as the one that never tried to throw him off the battlements. The other one lived in a broken water tower just inside the high fence and never smiled. Come to think of it, he didn't know much of anything about any of them, not really. Did Other Scout have a horde of brothers back in Southie, too? It was just one of those things, being anonymous, made to keep Solider and Medic from killing each other over war stuff. And stuff.
Presently, Cockbag Sniper was headed toward the base; he only did that to visit Good Sniper, so it was a good time to jump back in the tower's stairwell and run back down to ground level in another direction, before he got there the hard way.
Engineer had spent most of the day working on the power, so they could have more of the flood lights on for longer, making the quick patrol run through the base was oddly bright. He thought it should have been comforting, but it just seemed to deepen the shadows and make the wall look that much more imposing. The sound of rats or things moving at night seemed to be missing, too.
"Wicked creepy tonight," he murmured into his headset, pausing in a shadowed doorway.
"Yeah," it replied, in Other Scout's voice. "Engie put plenty of sentries up, though, no sweat."
"Yeashure."
"Goin' to bed."
"Right."
Sleep was a good idea. The BLUs didn't make habit of attacking at night, anyway, but Scout was uneasy. BLU had more Scouts, at least one Spy (always the same one, it was best to just assume he was alive) and not even he could guess how many Snipers were on the other side of the canals.
He walked around the back of the base before deciding to turn in, too, juggling his bat in one hand. The motion stopped with the crunch of a footstep nearby.
Did BLU Spy find a way in?
"Hello?" He readied the bat in his palm, squeezing the handle to reassure himself. "Who's that?"
"Who ya think, mate?" Cockbag Sniper rounded the corner unhurriedly, his hands in the pockets of his skinny pants and his wide hat pulled down, shadowing his eyes. "Calm y'self."
"Whatever, Cockbag. Fuck are you doing here?"
"Don't answer to you, shorty." He reached up to scratch at one of his long brown sideburns, that always seemed to elongate his already long, thin face. "But as it happens, I felt like takin' a nice evening stroll."
Scout rested the bat on his shoulder, not entirely reassured by this. Cockbag Sniper wasn't ever that nice, just wandering around answering questions. "How do I know you aren't that bullshit BLU Spy?"
The Sniper shrugged. "Think a Spy would'a sidled up behind ya with a knife like." He might have been looking at Scout, but the hat made it hard to tell for sure. "Dangerous, bein' out here by yourself."
"I ain't no pussy, man. What are you trying to say?"
"Just an observation." He took off his hat to scratch his unkempt hair, smoothing it a little before he put it back on; just enough to show he definitely was looking Scout over.
"Whatever, creep, go pick up someone else in your rapevan." That was enough of those vibes; Scout took off toward the base to let Creepy McCockSniper look through windows or whatever he was really doing out there.
No matter what Scout tried to say about all of it, the Soldiers were completely against trying anything against the BLUs. "We ain't doing no damned good with no Intel!" they'd bark. Scout could get all the fuckin' intel they wanted, he'd say, but then Heavy and Demo would agree with Sergeant Barks-All-Day and that was the end of that. Without Heavy and Medic backing the Soldiers up, nothing much good would come from offense.
So Engineer and Demo would set up or check on their explody traps, Other Scout would run around in circles watching the perimeter, and the unseen Snipers did what they do best; sit around.
All a bunch of pansies.
Scouts were supposed to scout, not wait around with their thumbs up their asses, but that's exactly what he was doing, just playing with his bat and thinking about how much more fun it would be to dodge bullets.
The boredom drove him up into Good Sniper's nest again; this time, up into the cluttered space at the top Sniper called home. A little fridge, a coffee pot, and a hot plate were what passed for a kitchen on half a work bench; the other half was gun stuff and a big whetstone worn down in the middle. Good Sniper had a folding cot in the corner and perched in a plastic chair, gun over his knee, which was just where he was then, ignoring Scout's intrusion.
Cockbag Sniper was there, too, not ignoring it, glaring from the cot. "Fuck off, runt," he snarled.
"Cram it, creepfag. What happened to your good mood?"
Scout moved up behind Good Sniper's chair, looking over his thinning hair and out over the landscape of the abandoned industrial town. Bridges over canals split it in half, a series of borders to keep the companies apart before they got all up in arms, he supposed. Made sense; the Builder's League United built things, the Reliable Excavation Demolition blew shit up. Never could get along.
"Don't have good moods."
"Did last night. Whatever." He rolled his eyes as the Snipers exchanged an odd look.
"Wasn't to do with you if I did," Cockbag Sniper grumbled. "Annoying shit. Get the fuck out."
"Whatever cockass, see if I care."
He could hear Good Sniper saying "Don't have to be like that. Just a kid," as he jumped down the ladder.
Maybe Medic wasn't busy.
The clinic Medic had set up in the basement was adjacent to the locker room, where there were lots of guys needing stitching up, or lots of quiet, and that's how the crazy German liked it. A record player played scratchy opera music that Medic could be heard humming along with as soon as Scout got near, the empty walls echoing with it.
"Hey man, s'up?"
Scout strode in, and Medic opened his mouth to reply from his desk, adjusting his round glasses-- when the alarms went off.
The rooms erupted with sound as flashing lights began coloring the walls and floors with revolving red light.
Along with the siren, the feminine voice of the Announcer declared an attack; Scout felt giddy just thinking about bashing in some heads. Medic went for his healie gun and straightened his white coat as he followed Scout back topside.
"Strange they would come so late in the day," Medic mused.
"Yeah well, least they got off their pansy balls to stir it up." With that, Scout pulled his bat out of his satchel and took off, headlong, at the front gate.
The sentry guns were blasting bullets and rockets, and off to either side smaller doors exploded with Demo's sticky grenades, the dark Scotsman looking on in what could only be gleeful satisfaction as his grenade launcher fired.
That was the first wave going down; he didn't have to radio Other Scout to know he'd stick near Engie or Medic, but that wasn't this Scout's style. He leapt over the bodies of BLUs and put his head down and eyes up in a zig-zag run out toward the canals.
He dodged bullets, alright; the BLU's own pair of Heavy and Medic were coming straight up the middle, just behind shotgun and rocket launcher-wielding Soldiers that tried to get him, but didn't stop their advance when Scout ducked around them, using rubble and abandoned buildings as much as he could.
The hot, sharp feeling of a bullet grazing his arm, then his leg, didn't stop him; it just gave him the incentive to go faster.
In the back, he saw the weirdest thing; Cockbag Sniper just standing there on a bridge. That had to be BLU Spy. Other Scout and even a bunch of the others might be scared of this guy, but not Scout; he ran right for him, as he just... stood there. Sniper fire cut the ground around Scout, with pops and clouds of dust, the occasional arrow, but he was on Cockbag Sniper Mirage too quickly for them, leaping up to bring his bat down hard.
The blow off BLU Spy reverberated through Scout's bandaged hands, a loud Bonk! he echoed by yelling at the top of his lungs, a wail that felt so good… but the BLU Spy didn't go down alone.
Scout felt hands tangling in his shirt, pulling them both over the edge and into the canal, a sharp, ugly pain ripping through his back.
He felt himself hit the water, then things went black.
The BLU Spy knew the rest of his team wanted nothing to do with him, so he slipped easily into cloak to pass unseen to one of Medic's supply cabinets. He'd basic first aid and a few useful drugs on hand already, but the removal of a stout arrow’s shaft would require a bit more. The very thought of Medic made him shudder and think of cold laboratories full of leers and pain. He couldn't have the supplies in his pockets and be on his way fast enough.
At the edge of the sewer access in the basement, the lurking Pyro was there, perhaps able to see him through the cloak, perhaps not. It was difficult to tell what sort of person or creature looked out from behind the black lenses of the filter mask. Regardless, he kept a prudent distance until dropping through the un-grated sewer access in the back.
In the wet, familiar tunnels beneath the base, he let the cloak dissolve in a puff of smoke, the tension in his shoulders created by the presence of others dissipating without the need for a disguise. Lately he never seemed without cloak or façade, unable to simply stretch his limbs and pretend he was not a monster that needed them.
This was his place, away from all of that.
But tonight it was not empty. It would not do to be too comfortable.
A platform rose out of the water in one of the deeper spots, where the canals became sewers for the unused streets of whatever the town above was once called. There was a service door to tunnels, but it was rusted shut and doubtless the tunnels were collapsed; it kept him securely away from the others, in a place where he could keep what few things he wanted here, such as the pile of blankets in the corner he'd sleep in from time to time. At the moment, the blankets were spotted with blood, but the errant RED Scout was no longer there.
Spy deposited the medical supplies on the concrete, then sank back into the water, swimming along quietly so as not to scare the boy into acting rashly. There wasn't far he had to go; the smell of fresh blood led him along the narrow walkway over the water line, around a bend where the RED had collapsed.
The boy was slumped over the railing, as if he’d been trying to crawl along on his knees to escape before the blood loss grew too much. It was pooled beneath him, dripping down with years of condensation, rust and blue-green stains, but the Scout was still breathing.
He clucked at him, admonishing doubtless unheard, as he pulled himself out of the water and wrapped himself around the figure, carrying him back to the blankets, mindful of the arrow's shaft still sticking out of the shoulder.
"You do not have to run, petit, it will do you no good," he murmured.
The head of the arrow was nearly through the shoulder; he would have to push it through the rest of the way or risk tearing up his flesh in ways much more difficult to heal. He plucked up a case of syringes and filled one with anesthetic as he began cutting off the red shirt and lit a cigarette from the waterproof case.
"Fuckin'…wha?" The Scout was on his belly as he woke, attempting to twist his head up to see what was happening.
Spy firmly held him there and hurried up with swabbing a spot on his arm to make the injection. "You must be still, zee arrow. It is still there."
"Arrow..? Wait.. Spy?" He kept twisting up, unfocused blue-green eyes looking over and past Spy, a sheen of sweat on his too-pale face. The drugs took no time in their work, however, his eyelids becoming obviously heavy, until they couldn’t stay open at all. “Lemme go,” he slurred.
"You will sleep now," Spy simply stated, waiting until the body under his limbs went limp again.
As quickly as possible, he had the head through and broken, throwing the two lengths of the weapon into the water distastefully. Patching the Scout up was one thing, finding reason to do so quite another. He reasoned it may have to do with seeing how lonely the Scout became once he'd dispatched the RED Spy; there had been nothing personal about it. Other Spies were the only source of what few supplies he needed, besides food.
He had taken such pleasure in watching the man die. His limbs curled and twisted to think of it, the RED’s horror and disbelief as he was helpless to save himself, too frightened even to scream. Nevertheless, his hands were busy bandaging the angry wound; there was no desire to crush this one. Not much, anyway. He'd not expected to feel any guilt about it, disliked the feeling intensely, and yet he was here worrying himself over the source.
Scout woke very slowly; the kind of slowly where things seem unreal for a while. He was still hurting... from what? What happened?
Why was he wet?
The feeling of something curling around his legs like a snake made him jump, then froze from the stabbing agony through his shoulder, but his eyes flew open... to what had to be a hallucination.
BLU Spy... was that him? He just had an open shirt on, seemed to have just crawled out of the water and started putting his clothes back on. Idly, he noticed BLU Spy’s hair was pretty shaggy before the rest sank in. Was he on drugs? He didn't feel right, and Spy didn't have legs. Didn't have legs. He was just... holding himself up on these grayish blue what the fuck were those things tentacles and a few of them were wound around Scout idly.
"Fuckin' creature from the black lagoon, man, gonna eat me."
He went to get up and run, remembering something about waking up before, but Spy's twisty suction-cup not-legs moved for him, fast, wrapping around his arms and legs to push him back down.
Sick horror spread through Scout's body. "D-don't, don't eat me, man," he whispered.
"I will do no such thing," Spy calmly replied, a French accent on his lips. Like Real Spy always had. One of the tentacles reached out and plucked up a cigarette case, another aiding the limb in opening it and lighting one to bring to his lips; all while Spy kept his hands on Scout's chest. The things just kept moving, all windy muscle snakes, slippery and not good at all.
NOT GOOD.
Scout couldn't take his eyes off them.
"What the fuck, man, what the fucking fuck fuck?"
"You zound just like BLU Scouts," Spy drawled. "Such need for profanity."
Scout wasn't sure why, just then, the cigarette case got interesting. He'd seen Real Spy's, with the gadgets in it. This one just had a rubber seal on the edge. "You don't got a thing," he said, frowning at the tentacle setting the case aside. "For disguise?"
Spy's upper body moved back a little, his brow quirking.
"I don't need it."
He seemed torn between what his torso was doing, backing off, and the tentacles insisting on winding all over him to keep him there. Other things started registering. "You freakin'... patched me up?"
The Not-Spy shrugged and shook his hair out a bit. Through the open shirt, Scout could see how the body wasn't some Frankenstein deal, all these weird markings went up his belly, in other spots, too. What the fuck? Apparently the Spy wasn't big at Scout looking at him, he turned a little and went back to buttoning up the dingy white shirt.
"So, uh... I makin' it out of this crap alive or what?"
The Spy deftly put on his tie and grinned at him with a mouth full of pointed teeth. Like a friggin' shark.
Scout had to admit to himself he was wicked scared. The tentacles had let up some, but now they were moving all back over him, unhurriedly, like they were about to casually strangle him to death.
The dripping quiet and the sound of Spy's breath, his own frantic panting, it was all coming down around him as Spy moved back over him far more easily than something without legs should be able to. Gliding on them long things before they sank down over him, squeezing.
The toothy grin got in his face, Spy’s thin hands reaching down to cradle Scout’s head.
“Do you think you should, petit? ”
Scout’s right hand tried to reach out and grab his bat that he knew wasn’t even there, the tentacle around his arm tightening its grip in response. They all kept squeezing, until he was gasping for breath and felt his chest burning.
The Spy sneered, then just… let go.
Scout was bodily shoved off near the edge of the water, pain spiking through his back and the raw wound. He gripped the bandaged shoulder and grimaced, still frozen in fear.
Spy glided back near a rust streak on the concrete wall, flicking his cigarette off to one side. He muttered something in French, then snarled. “Get out if you can.”
So Scout got out.
He remembered this walkway now, a narrow lip with a metal railing that ran along the edge of the still water. Rounding a corner, he heard a “Splash” somewhere behind him and tried to run faster. Stumbling, dizzy with blood loss, he kept moving, blindly pushing forward.
“C’mon, c’mon, gotta be a way out, c’mon!”
The smell of cigarette smoke was following him, threatening to induce panic. The Spy-monster was playing with him, cat and mouse, he didn’t want to be food. The sound of his shoes hitting the concrete echoed menacingly.
Dizzy, dizzy. Seeing spots. He kept tripping and falling, lost track of where he was going.
“Don’t pass out, don’t pass out…”
He did.
Scout woke up to the sound of Medic’s violin and the smell of antiseptic. After a moment, he recognized the melody as the one on the record player, before.
“Doc?”
The music stopped abruptly, the wood body of the violin sounding as it was set down. Scout blinked in the bright lights, moreso when Medic’s penlight shone in his face.
“Good you are avake.”
“How’d I get here?”
The Medic shrugged, looking remarkably casual, for him; it had to be late at night, most of his uniform was missing, just red suspenders over an undershirt with those gray pants. “Herr Engineer found you this morning by the gates. Who bound your vounds? This I do not know. But they saved your life.”
“Spy.”
“Spy is dead,” he replied carefully, frowning a bit.
“No, no, not our Spy! It was their Spy! And he… he wasn’t human, man!” He began waving his hands around animatedly, sitting up quickly. “He had tentacles man, and fangs, and claws, I shit you not, I swear he was gonna eat me, but he bandaged the shoulders and ran me out of the sewers!”
Medic appeared dubious of the story. “There are no monsters in the sewers, it is only campfire story.”
“Not lyin’ man! I didn’t just see him, he talked to me and crap, kept smoking these gay little cigarettes and grinnin’ at me!”
Medic had nothing to say to that; he just looked back with a frown.
“It’s fuckin’ true!”
Medic shook his head, but it didn’t seem to be entirely in disbelief this time. “Go get rest.”
“Whatever.” He hopped off the table and grabbed his shoes and satchel, then headed out into the quiet base.
Scout did go straight to his room, finding it black-dark in most places along the way. His room was a tiny one that used to be a supply room; a lot of guys here slept out on the second floor’s wide open space, but he got this one from the old Demoman. They’d been friends, until a Pyro got him. The new Demo slept wherever he fell at night and seemed to like it that way, even when he wasn’t drinking. Usually in the chair of his cramped work shed out back, a long ashed-out butt in his hand. Scout’s room didn’t have much; the cot took up most of it, the rest was a footlocker and just enough floor space to avoid walking on it. He smiled at a wrinkled picture of his mum tacked by the door (a safe distance from the even more wrinkled pinup girl with the perfectly round ass) and collapsed on the green canvas.
Had that all.. really happened that way? Was the BLU Spy really a monster that lived in the sewers?
Did he really save his life?
What the hell was that shit about?
He reached up to scratch his chest, and couldn’t help but notice his tags were gone. Great. Monsters… and now… paperwork.
The cease-fire in the wake of the failed attempt on the REDs had their Medic busily filling out death certificates and requests for replacements, the Soldiers polishing their weapons until the metal threatened to wear down, and the Scouts scrapping with one another in the dirt as if this were a schoolyard instead of a warzone. Pyro and a Heavy lingered near the sewer access as much as the Snipers kept an eye on the no man’s land in between the bases,
Spy had spent most of his time with the REDs; this time as a Soldier, keeping his head down and doing what he did best, which was to observe. RED base had been abuzz with whispers about a monster in the water, which had their Engineer attacking sewer grates with a torch and heavy bars. Every unexplained death the REDs ever had became attributed to Spy; it was near enough to the truth.
He didn’t seek out anyone not another Spy… if they wandered too close to his place or lingered by the waters alone, however… it served them right.
By this logic, the Scout had a death wish. Spy caught sight of him squeezing out through a gap in the fence only a Scout could hope to fit through, trying his best at stealth to cut through the burned out shells that had once been inhabited buildings.
Spy cloaked and followed him straight to the canal bridge that had nearly killed the Scout before.
He seemed to be looking for something, glancing up at the BLU battlements now and then, scuffing the toe of his shoes in the dust here and there. Unsatisfied, he looked back over at BLU Base, then leapt into the water.
He must be looking for what he’d lost. Spy patted his breast pocket, then followed him down with a splash.
Being underwater, Scout looked about, but seemed to dismiss the sound, returning to scouring the sticks, dead leaves, and spent ammunition littering the concrete bottom. Unlike Spy, he was forced to surface for air frequently, always glancing about as he did, quick to return to his search. It was perplexing; Scout should be the last person to be nosing about here. He should be like the others, quivering behind their defenses.
Perhaps twenty minutes went by, Spy resting easily in the shadow underneath the entrance to his sewers. He was uncloaked now, but Scout hadn’t noticed him, until he began swimming ever closer… and did.
Scout started back, his hair whipping with the motion through the water, a few bubbles of air escaping his mouth, eyes wide as he stared at Spy through the silt and debris he’d stirred up.
Speed was the Scout’s forté on land, but not here. He could only struggle clumsily toward the surface, making it halfway before Spy had him in his arms, using his limbs to propel them into the sewers, out of earshot of anyone before he surfaced in the flickering lights of the tunnels. Scout kept struggling, but Spy kept his arms firmly pinned, keeping him from reaching the weapons in the satchel.
“You should know better than to tempt fate, mon petit garçon. ”
“Ain’t no fuckin’ waiter, freak!”
Spy couldn’t help but laugh, which quieted Scout somewhat, stiffening in his grip. Why had he even revealed his presence, let alone abduct him? The edges of his mind whispered, mockingly, how good it would feel to break his foul-mouthed spirit, only giving him death after he’d lost the will even to beg for it.
He tossed Scout’s body as far as he could throw him, landing in an awkward splash.
“What do you think you were doing in ze canal?”
Scout got up and sneered at him, tugging his black cap out of the satchel, squeezing water out of it before plopping it back on his head. “Avoiding paperwork and shit.”
“Quoi?”
“My stupid tags.” Scout backed up a few suspicious steps, his posture low and defensive, but he didn’t go for his weapons. “Fuck’s your problem?”
Spy curled his limbs. His problem? Scout didn’t seem to be afraid of him anymore, and he didn’t know how he felt about that. He’d gone soft.
“You won’t find zem,” Spy snapped, baring his teeth. “Get out.” He shoved past the Scout and half-swam through the water, thigh-high to the short RED, it being one of the higher tunnels that ran shallow without enough rain.
“No!” The metallic sound of the baseball bat slamming against the wall gave him pause, looking over his shoulder.
Scout seemed positively irate.
“I’m sick and fuckin’ tired of bein’ told get ‘get out’ or ‘bugger off’ or whatever, you know! Yeah, you’re all big and bad, but you don’t have to be such a freakin’ dick about it!”
Spy kept moving on. “Those stories your teammates tell of me? They are true. I will not be letting you go again.”
“Liar. Yer just all lonely and sad, squidfag.” Spy glanced over his shoulder again; Scout was holding his bat over his shoulder, a cocky grin on his face. “Got yer number, huh? You ain’t gonna eat me, just bluster hot air like I give a fuck.”
Clearly, Spy was failing at inspiring fear in this one. It was irritating. Scouts were always irritating, profane and ignorant. He lit a cigarette and decided to ignore the continuing spew of insults that followed him, and continued to follow him.
There was something clearly fuckin’ wrong in the head about Spy.
Whatever, so he killed people! That’s what everyone was here to do! Maybe yeah, they should be putting a little more effort into killing each other but BLU Spies hadn’t kept him from running to get what he wanted in the past, so whatever, that’s what mattered.
Scout liked danger. He craved danger. That’s why he signed up to work for RED in the first place, he wasn’t like the other pansies, happy to relax behind their big wall and flash sentries. Teammates? Boring. Sitting around? Boring as fuck. Spy? Not boring.
Spy chain-smoked his way through the tunnels, unfamiliar ones, then glided up onto a dry platform in an open space full of columns and ladders up to rusty doors; it was here he flicked his butt into the water and addressed Scout again.
“You want to follow me into BLUs?”
“Well.. no?”
He had a screwed-up look that reminded him of an evil lunch-lady they always thought made the soup with people-bits.
Then Spy went all… rigid. Now he was obviously scared as shit. He pointed one of the ladders that led up above and hissed, “Get up zere, now, idiot.”
“Why…?”
“Do not argue petit! ” he whispered harshly.
Scout decided whatever bug got into Spy’s non-existent pants wasn’t worth bitching about, so he hauled ass up the obviously unused rungs and crouched at the top, hidden in a shadow. Below, Spy’s hands shook visibly as he lit another cig and waited around, still as he seemed to shake off whatever was wrong with him.
It wasn’t long before Scout could hear a pair of heavy boots on the concrete and off-key whistling. The source came into sight pretty quick; BLU Medic, older than his own, with a feral grin like his own never got. Cold and mean.
“Tut tut, my creature, have you been avoidink me?”
“Why should I do zat?” Scout could only see the back of Spy’s blue balaclava, but assumed he was glaring like he seemed to do a lot.
BLU Medic set down his healie-gun against the wall, unhurriedly, then casually adjusted the waist of his buttoned white coat. “Vy did you bring the Scout back to their base?”
Spy shrugged. “He is ‘armless.”
The Medic sighed and shook his head disapprovingly. “I ignore when you leave our Spies in nasty piles, I ignore when you think you are too good to bring us intelligence, but I will not ignore when you decide to do as you please in aiding our enemy.” He walked up to Spy and touched his face with the thick rubber gloved hand, a remarkably possessive gesture. “You are forgetting yourself.”
In a flash of steel, Spy drew his butterfly knife out of his jacket and slashed it at the Medic, a line of red growing across his chest. Scout silently cheered. Spy tossed the knife to get a more solid grip, then went for a bite to the jugular…
The Medic barked some German word, and the knife clattered to the ground.
Spy sank down on the concrete beside it, his tentacles all pulling against his body, black gloves flat on the floor, his head down.
“Must I always remind you? You are my creature, you cannot help but do as I say. Such things should be behind us, ja?” He smiled wickedly, just as ominously as Spy’s fangs ever were. “Dumme Sache. ”
Spy’s hands gripped into fists, but he didn’t otherwise move as Medic knelt in front of him and plucked away the cigarette, then pulled off the balaclava, revealing hair the same color as his, without the gray edges. He muttered something else in German and Spy’s tentacles began squirming like they had a mind of their own, his hands grabbed his own hair down over his face as his body bent into itself. Pain? No… in a moment, he moaned, loudly, echoing everywhere, like Medic was fucking him right there on the dirty floor.
Medic patted Spy’s back and leered at him, chuckling to himself. “To think I have an American to thank for teaching me such things to keep you in line.” He reached for his belt and unclipped it with one hand, stroking up Spy’s spine.
Scout squeezed back against the wall and shut his eyes, hands over his ears.
He still heard terrible things. Medic chuckled and grunted and moaned German things, and the Spy… was quiet, until he wasn’t. Spy made this sound so loud and inhuman Scout opened his eyes, just for a second, long enough to make out the Medic using those tentacles like handles and Spy still hiding his face in his hands, grinding against the concrete.
Then it stopped. Scout had his hands over his eyes, and kept them there, but he could hear Medic getting dressed and walking away, then the scraping sound of him picking up his gun.
“I trust it vill not happen again,” Medic chuckled, then said something else in German before it went completely quiet.
It was a while before Scout dared to look; he still wasn’t sure exactly what just happened, but it was bad. Spy just laid there for a moment, then two of his tentacles pushed him up to a sitting position, where he reached into his jacket to pull out the cigarette case. It must have been empty because he just closed it again with a sigh.
Then he just… sat there.
Scout really didn’t want to come down, but he had to eventually. Carefully, quietly, he descended the ladder and turned to run off… that would be the smart thing. Instead, he took a tentative step closer to the still figure, hands raised in trepidation.
“Um.. are you okay?”
The Spy whipped around and snarled, bringing himself up to his full height and lunged, his claws menacingly poised to strike.
Scout got the message and started running for his life.
That night, the Soldiers that went out to patrol just outside the wall never came back. Everyone in the base could hear them screaming for hours, but couldn’t see anything out in the darkness. They didn’t dare go out to look until morning, when Heavy and Medic found their remains in a burnt-out building nearby.
Nobody talked much for the next few days. The death certificates went back to HQ with a requisition for replacement tags for Scout.
“The enemy has captured our intelligence!”
The briefcase bounced against Scout’s back as he jumped up the stairs and made a hard right at the top, a Heavy’s bullets ringing in his ears as they were barely avoided to dart down a narrow hallway; a long way, but an unexpected one they might not have covered. He ran low through a doorway, skirting a conference table, a roll through the next door to avoid a Pyro’s blast. Instantly on his feet, he used a railing to help him race up the stairs faster, coming up into the wood walls of BLU base, where a pair of Scouts were already bearing down on him with shotguns.
Scout made a sharp left and made for the side door in a flat-out run, avoiding debris and clutter of the breakfast he’d interrupted. The door was a risk, he couldn’t see what was on the other side, but using his forward momentum to swing himself back right by grabbing the doorjamb, he avoided the oncoming grenades with a well-placed zig-zag.
The bridges would be covered by Snipers and Soldiers were advancing in the courtyard.
Scout grinned and kept running. He felt unstoppable.
Sniper fire rang from both sides, the BLU Scouts were still behind him, but the REDs were holding their line in front of him, his own Medic behind the Heavy, leading the way to deter them from chasing Scout much longer.
Just a few dodged rockets and he was over the canals, sailing past Engineer at the gate, not stopping until he made it inside the base and threw his hands up against a wall to abruptly halt his momentum there with a slam.
He turned a bit to lean against the wall and keep an eye outside in their own courtyard, but it didn’t look like the BLUs were prepared to make a full-on assault. One of the BLU Scouts had gotten past Heavy somehow, leaping over Engie’s sentry, but Other Scout’s pistol stopped him dead, landing hard and still in the dirt.
The sentry fell quiet, and Heavy’s gun grew close, louder, before the barrel slowed and stopped spinning just inside the gate.
Scout felt like he’d just had marathon sex with an entire cheerleading squad, panting, sweaty, tingly, and exhausted all over.
Other Scout jogged over with a big smile on his face, all freckles and pride as he smacked Scout on the back. “That was great man, can’t even believe you just did that!”
“Vat vere you thinking!” A displeased Medic charged through the door, slamming his gun into Heavy’s chest so he could properly wave his arms around angrily at Scout. “You do not even tell us you will be doing this thing, no varning for backup, just boom! You are gone. Unwissendes Kind, are you dense?” He strode over and smacked Scout up the side of his head, loudly, then tersely adjusted his round spectacles. He glared, then sighed and just rested his hand on Scout’s shoulder, briefly. “Gut verk,” he muttered, going to help the briefcase off his back. “Don’t do it again.”
Scout just grinned and shrugged. Medic worried too much. Besides, somebody had to lift the funk that had settled over the base, and what better way to do it than surprise victory?
Medic and Engie went downstairs with the intel, Heavy following along behind; he’d been close to Medic before, but now he didn’t let him out of his sight for anything. He scratched his bare scalp with his massive hand and plodded good-naturedly, unlikely to add much to the analysis, but it was doubtful either of the other two would ever begrudge his presence.
His teammates patted Scout on the back with congratulations, then he made a beeline for the locker room.
The tile and steel space was empty, except for him, flicking on the lights and stripping off his clothes in a trail along the floor he’d deal with later; sweat was dripping off him, tickling the crack of his ass, and he wanted that fixed ASAP.
He turned on the shower head and began snapping his fingers as it warmed up. “Yeah, you really got me now, oh yeah! You really got me goin’!” he sang to himself. “You got me so I don’t know what I’m doin’!”
“I’m flattered.”
Scout whirled around as he was shoved back into the shower stall with Cockbag Sniper’s hands on his shoulders. He opened his mouth to yell, but it was quickly covered up by gloved fingers.
“Shh, don’t be stupid, petit. ” It was still Sniper’s voice, but there wasn’t a trace of Australian in it anymore. Water from the shower was soaking them both, running out of the Sniper’s duster hat in little waterfalls, his eyes hidden behind shadow and the aviator glasses. He moved his hand away slowly, then began running his fingers down Scout’s cheek when he seemed certain there wouldn’t be screaming just then.
“Yer not Cockbag.”
“’Ow very observant.”
Scout became acutely aware of how wet and naked he was, and how touchy-feely Spy was. His brain went danger danger danger, but it was always the right button to push. What the fuck? Spy was weird and gross! He was prolly some crazed half-human cannibal thing with a thumb collection!
The appearance of the Sniper grinned lewdly, droplets of water falling off his stubbled chin. The hand on Scout’s cheek migrated down the side of his neck, over his chest. Scout couldn’t really see his eyes, but they had some kind of contact, anyway.
Now, Scout wasn’t into Sniper at all; not even the good one. He smelled funny and was just… a guy. But this wasn’t Sniper, and not really a guy, he was a thrill ride and excitement and danger danger danger. The high of the run hadn’t worn off and he felt good, good enough to fuck, so he didn’t fight back with where this was going, but he wasn’t some queer, so he didn’t get all moany, either.
Maybe he did get a little moany, just a little, when Spy-Sniper’s hand wrapped around his cock. It was just the hand that moved, both of them otherwise stock still under the continuing stream of water, Scout unwilling to take his eyes off him, warily looking for any warning this might go bad. But it didn’t.
Spy-Sniper’s fingers started to feel real good, until Scout’s hips were moving forward, just a little, with their motion. The fingers got slipperier as it got better, then faster, faster…
When Scout came, just for a second, he forgot to be wary and pressed into the warm, wet-clothed body. Just a second, before pulling back warily. Still in that moment of afterglow, he might have leaned into the gloved hand that stroked his hair once.
Spy-Sniper lifted his chin, frowned, then turned and walked away, poofing out of sight before the door unlocked, opened, and swung shut again. Just like that.
It occurred to him that there were a lot of times he’d seen Cockbag Sniper doing things he wouldn’t normally do. Just how much time did Spy spend here?
What the fuck?
Medic slapped the papers down on the rough wooden table they were all gathered around, then standing back from it with his arms crossed; as if the paper itself offended him he screwed up his face. “Die Builder’s are vorking to create übermenschlich thing.”
A Soldier gave him a look, likely wondering what Scout was, if Medic really thought that was a bad idea or not. Nobody was quite sure what he’d been doing in Germany before being hired by RED, but nobody was going to bring it up, either.
“Come again?” the Engineer asked politely.
“It is not as such, but they are vishing to build a varrior that is better than just a man. Experiments for years. Some bases have tests, they are such a base. Scout’s monster is from BLU laboratory; I do not know how they have done it, but zhiss is reports. How well he kills us, how easy he hides and travels in the vater.”
“Gotta kill the bloke,” Good Sniper said, a rare face down in the base. He picked up one of the sheets and began reading it suspiciously.
Scout gave him a sideways glance, but bit his tongue.
“And they send another in his place? Having venom and vings?”
Demo scoffed. “Lotta damned nonsense.”
“We do what we always gotta do, boys. Send the intel to Headquarters and wait for orders. Won’t do any good getting’ riled.” Engie stood as the calm voice of reason, spreading his hands out on the table. He adjusted his yellow hardhat and nodded. “’Till then, we sit tight.”
The others seemed to dislike the idea of doing nothing, but after all, Engie was right--Scout knew all too well that trying to take out the Spy wouldn’t be as easy as one of the Snipers getting in a good shot. It’d take a lot, a lot that would take time away from the standing orders. One by one, they all began to nod.
Scout wrinkled his nose at himself. He actually felt relieved. He didn’t want them to shoot Spy in the head, freak or not. Apparently Spy was here all the time, but they never found bodies inside the base. Outside the base was free game, they all knew that, they all came here knowing the risks.
That decided, Good Sniper left, presumably back to his nest, and Scout didn’t feel like sticking around, either, so he wandered out the front and into the dusty courtyard glowing with the brilliant yellow-pink sunset in the sky.
Unnoticed by the Soldier’s on guard, Cockbag Sniper ambled toward the front gate, turned to look at Scout, then shimmered into nothing.
“Hey!”
Scout broke into a run, reaching all around, trying to see where he’d gone; outside the gate was a patch of dirt with a strange, tangled trail, just a few feet he could follow, enough to send him into no man’s land.
Every few yards he caught sight of a bluish shimmer, that was always gone when he reached it.
“Fuck, queerface! Stop!” He yelled in frustration, still swatting out at nothing as he ran in random patterns after him.
He’d had enough; he pulled out his shotgun and held it at the last sighting’s general direction, firing a pair of explosive bursts of shrapnel into a decrepit fence, but no Spy. Scout reloaded. “I’ll keep friggin’ shooting at your squiddy ass!”
It then dawned on him where Spy was going; straight for the canal up ahead.
He fired into the air, then off to the side; he still didn’t really want to shoot him, but enough was enough. “Octofag! Where are you!?”
As Scout approached the concrete edge of the water, a blue shimmer grew less transparent, until the Spy was visible there. His clothes were a mess, the jacket missing somewhere, the blue waistcoat wrinkled over a dingy white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, but still a bit ragged. The balaclava had a hole in it, where his hair was poking out.
Scout lowered the gun to point at Spy accusingly. “Fuckin’ an runnin’ ain’t cool, man. Don’t care if you are a goddamn Spy.”
“Whatever happened, it was not, as you so eloquently say, ‘fucking’.” He pulled out the eternal cigarette case and plucked one out with one tentacle, lighting it with the other, before slipping it back in the pocket. “That was to see if I would be inclined.”
Scout watched the smooth bastard just slowly exhale as if it were the most natural thing in the world to jump other men in a locker room. Well… assuming he was really a man. He was pretty close. “And? Freak?”
The response was a wide, mocking grin, the cigarette’s filter pierced by the tips of his razor teeth. It was… Wicked. Evil. Venomous. Deadly. They faced off until he spit the butt out on the ground.
“I fuckin’ hate how you’re so hot,” Scout whispered, kinda surprised he actually said it out loud.
Scout dropped the shotgun and lunged, punching Spy square in the jaw, spitting in his face as the tentacles grabbed him and held him there.
Spy’s real arms grabbed onto his, keeping him from swinging anymore as he was drawn closer, until he could feel Spy’s breath on his skin. He smelled funny, but different than Sniper; Spy smelled like old leaves, smoke, and… him. Like nothing else. Spy was almost nuzzling up his neck, but not touching, just gently brushing his lips and teeth over his skin, and he must have figured out that right under the ear was one of Scout’s happy spots…
A little nip and Scout was definitely interested in finding out what Danger Monster’s idea of fucking was. He got all these questions in his head, like, “Have ya always been a freak?” “Why don’t you backstab that jerk Medic?” “Why am I still alive?”
Spy’s tentacles ripped all Scout’s clothes off at once and put talking off for later, if ever. It was terrifying how strong they were.
Scout groaned and pushed harder as one teased his cock a little, moving past it on the way to carefully pluck Scout’s hat off his head and throw it down.
They’d sunk down to the ground now, now occupied with slithering over every inch of Scout’s body instead of holding him up, some squeezing threateningly, others gentle as a caress, as if they all had a mind of their own. He tried to move out of their grip experimentally, tensing them all. They threw his arms over his head and swung him back against the ground.
It was as if Spy was just watching that part of himself do what it liked, propped up over Scout’s thighs.
“Stupid frog,” Scout snarled.
Spy responded by twisting the slender end of one tentacle around his cock, the very tip running over the head like a smooth finger.
“Psycho!” he gasped, bucking, a little to get them off, mostly to make it better. It was so good. “Fuckin’ die!”
At that, Spy moved himself forward, parallel over Scout’s body, arms propping himself up on either side as the appendages did their thing. “Mon petit cher, I do not think you meant zat.” Scout couldn’t tell before, but Spy was flushing, over what was visible of his face and the bare forearms, his chest warm with sweat through the shirt.
“Yer gonna make me the team fag. Fag.” He wanted to be a smartass but he felt the smile come off genuine.
Spy chuckled and arched down to nip more at Scout’s neck, then said into it, “You have not a clue what your teammates are always doing, no?”
“What?”
Scout’s body jumped at the tentacles parted his legs, one reaching between them and meaningfully against his ass.
“Zomezing like that,” he drawled, growing more difficult to understand as he breathed more heavily.
“I’m not a fucking fag,” Scout protested, weakly, shuddering at how good that felt, not pushing into him, just moving back and forth with the pace of the one on his cock. He didn’t have a clue it could feel like that. Didn’t have a clue exactly how Spy was getting off on this, either, but it was… nice.
Spy suddenly reached up and yanked off his balaclava, letting the lank brown hair shake loose, giving Scout another, better look at his face. The first time he’d seen it, he’d been way too freaked out to see Spy really wasn’t bad looking there; he had these nice cheekbones that made a nose that’d be stupid on someone else suit him.
Then the fucking guy lit up another cigarette, smoking it with the tentacles Scout wasn’t tangled in.
“Fucking fuck!”
The probing end pushing into his ass a little got more insistent, the one on his cock twisted faster and tighter, it was so good.
Scout heard himself moaning and begging like a wicked queer, but that wasn’t important.
Spy kissed him carefully, like he was worried he’d hurt his mouth, then shuddered all around him, wiggling and squirming; it might have been an accident, but the one tentacle pushed its way into Scout’s ass a little bit, burning good.
Scout came screaming about what a squidfag he was, only realizing he did it once the post-orgasm heat was starting to pass already, his cock happily twitching in the now-gentle grip. He caught his breath and they slowly pulled apart, Spy still puffing away.
“That was somethin’ alright,” Scout had to admit with a sigh.
One of the tentacles caressed Scout’s belly, where it was splashed with come, then brought it to Spy’s lips for him to lick lewdly.
“Perv. Wicked perv,” Scout accused.
Spy shrugged, then began taking his waistcoat, hanging it on a tentacle like a hook before hastily pulling off the white shirt and tossing it at Scout. “I believe you would not like going back naked?” He put the waistcoat back on and turned toward the water, obviously preparing to just take off.
“What the fuck, man? We fucked, so don’t just leave, fag!”
If it was possible for Spy to smile and not be terrifying, he did; or perhaps Scout’s perceptions were all wrong now. “You would like to cuddle, n’est-ce pas? ”
“No!” Scout felt stupid standing there in just Spy’s shirt and his baseball socks. “I dunno.”
Spy looked all… different without the mask on. He glided over with his head cocked curiously, an amused smirk on his lips. “Perhaps next time, mon petite chou. When we are not being watched.”
“Wha?”
Spy glanced up to the right, but instead of a real answer, just kissed him again, quickly and not so carefully as before, his sharp teeth nicking at Scout’s lips a little, but it was all… warm.
Balaclava in hand, Spy glided away then and dove into the canal, propelling himself rapidly out of sight in the dying light.
The team was going to have a field day with this.
His clothes were done for, just rags now, other than the black cap and headset; he put those back on, slung his satchel over his head, and couldn’t think of a single explanation he could give for walking back through the front gates like this. Shotgun in hand, just in case, he trudged back to the light of RED base.
Along the way, he looked in the general direction Spy had been, for a clue; there wasn’t anything over there but the broken water tower Cockbag Sniper used as a nest.
Once he got to the wall, he snuck in a gap along one side, hoping to avoid running into anyone; stealth wasn’t his thing, but he got lucky. If someone saw him going back to his room, he couldn’t tell.
He flopped back on his cot and smelled Spy all over him, fingering the cotton shirt a bit, wondering if it had belonged to anyone else first.
“I cannae believe this! Noeting at all?” Demo drunkenly slammed the orders on the table and stormed off with his bottle, grumbling to himself.
“Are ya really surprised by all that?”
They were all gathered around papers again; this time, orders from HQ. Orders that said, basically, they’d sent the information through the proper channels and the team wasn’t to do anything differently than they were already. Keep an eye on BLU, get what intel they could, don’t worry about boogeymen, everything was under control.
Again, Scout felt relief, but this time he didn’t feel guilty about it.
He stopped paying attention, then he wandered away, to see what Good Sniper was up to.
The smell of toast wafted down the ladder as Scout crawled up into the nest, where the two Snipers were eating what passed for dinner to them; not much. Good Sniper looked up and nodded at him, Cockbag Sniper cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck.
“What’s wrong with you?” Scout grumbled.
Good Sniper snorted. “Afraid you’ll sic your squiddy mate on ‘im for bein’ a right prick.”
Scout looked back and forth between them, suspiciously. “Fuck did you guys see?”
“Enough,” Cockbag Sniper muttered.
“Don’t tell me you said shit to nobody!” Scout stepped over and stuck his finger in his face, shaking it pointedly. “I won’t need help kickin’ yer ass if ya think..!”
Good Sniper put his hand on Scout’s shoulder and pulled him back gently. “Naw, kid. We both know when to keep mum.”
“Well… fine, then. But I ain’t a fag!”
He shrugged and didn’t seem to care one way or the other what Scout did with himself. Cockbag Sniper still looked nervous. It was kinda nice, not being constantly threatened.
“You ‘ungry?” Good Sniper gestured at their spread of toast, peanut butter, and tinned sardines.
“Nah.” He sat down in the windowsill, hanging out high over the ground below. Everything looked cheery in the sun, even BLU base didn’t seem all that threatening. “Can you guys do me a favor, though? It’ll be fun.”
Good Sniper grunted noncommittally.
“You ever get a shot at the BLU Medic, you take it.”
Back from reading those? Sweet! Let us continue, shall we?
Alright, so, I wrote this Team Fortress 2 fic. Yeah, I know, wtf am I doing dabbling in other fandoms when so much of the DC lays wasting away in un-updated-land? It wasn't my fault! It was the fault of a small number of people, but the only one I'll name is
ugly_kitties because she's so awesome she did fanart. To see all of this image: if you have a Y!Gallery account, go here, but if you don't, theres a tf2chan /afanart/ thread that can also give you access.The original post is also on tf2chan, where updates are very likely to occur way faster than here. I wasn't planning on updates, however... it seems there is a demand, so they'll happen.
Monster In The Water
Team Fortress 2: Tentaspy/Scout, Medic/Tentaspy
On both teams, the Spies have a short life expectancy; save one. A RED Scout with a danger fetish discovers why as he rails against his team’s reluctance to fight the BLUs and both sides grow wary of what lurks in the canals of the no man’s land at night.
- BLU Base –
"Where does that spook sleep, anyway?"
Those at the table shrugged, most handling their meal with suspicion; the speaker, a Scout, was stabbing a blackened edge with a fork. It always happened when everyone else was too busy to cook and they let Pyro have run of the rations.
"Ol' spy slept like a c'lized human being," the Engineer mumbled through his eggs; the burnt spots didn't seem to bother his healthy appetite as he shoveled away. "Always had the decency to eat with us, too."
Medic stood abruptly, smoothing his trousers with a brisk motion. "Some things are best left alone," he snapped.
The Scout that had initially posed the question eyed him narrowly. "Fuck's that supposed to mean?"
"Spy's trouble. That's what I mean, tiny! Best you leave it alone," Solider grumbled. "No good."
The veterans, the ones that had been living on the base for years nodded their assent. The Scout shrugged, Scouts never having been known for their attention span.
- RED Base -
At night, it was hard to see anything threatening about BLU's base; it was a lot like RED's, an old factory that was gutted and refitted to fit barracks and their control room in the basement. He would know; nobody had been in the enemy base more than him. Especially now that their Spy was dead. Again. There was another Scout on the team, but he was slower, so he never went past the razor wire-topped fence at the edge of their territory. Other Scout shot people; it's what he did.
Scout kicked his heels on the wall, swinging his legs out a window just under Sniper's nest. "Good Sniper" as he always thought of him; he had a name, but everyone learned quick here that nobody was really interested in real names, so Scout just thought of him as the one that never tried to throw him off the battlements. The other one lived in a broken water tower just inside the high fence and never smiled. Come to think of it, he didn't know much of anything about any of them, not really. Did Other Scout have a horde of brothers back in Southie, too? It was just one of those things, being anonymous, made to keep Solider and Medic from killing each other over war stuff. And stuff.
Presently, Cockbag Sniper was headed toward the base; he only did that to visit Good Sniper, so it was a good time to jump back in the tower's stairwell and run back down to ground level in another direction, before he got there the hard way.
Engineer had spent most of the day working on the power, so they could have more of the flood lights on for longer, making the quick patrol run through the base was oddly bright. He thought it should have been comforting, but it just seemed to deepen the shadows and make the wall look that much more imposing. The sound of rats or things moving at night seemed to be missing, too.
"Wicked creepy tonight," he murmured into his headset, pausing in a shadowed doorway.
"Yeah," it replied, in Other Scout's voice. "Engie put plenty of sentries up, though, no sweat."
"Yeashure."
"Goin' to bed."
"Right."
Sleep was a good idea. The BLUs didn't make habit of attacking at night, anyway, but Scout was uneasy. BLU had more Scouts, at least one Spy (always the same one, it was best to just assume he was alive) and not even he could guess how many Snipers were on the other side of the canals.
He walked around the back of the base before deciding to turn in, too, juggling his bat in one hand. The motion stopped with the crunch of a footstep nearby.
Did BLU Spy find a way in?
"Hello?" He readied the bat in his palm, squeezing the handle to reassure himself. "Who's that?"
"Who ya think, mate?" Cockbag Sniper rounded the corner unhurriedly, his hands in the pockets of his skinny pants and his wide hat pulled down, shadowing his eyes. "Calm y'self."
"Whatever, Cockbag. Fuck are you doing here?"
"Don't answer to you, shorty." He reached up to scratch at one of his long brown sideburns, that always seemed to elongate his already long, thin face. "But as it happens, I felt like takin' a nice evening stroll."
Scout rested the bat on his shoulder, not entirely reassured by this. Cockbag Sniper wasn't ever that nice, just wandering around answering questions. "How do I know you aren't that bullshit BLU Spy?"
The Sniper shrugged. "Think a Spy would'a sidled up behind ya with a knife like." He might have been looking at Scout, but the hat made it hard to tell for sure. "Dangerous, bein' out here by yourself."
"I ain't no pussy, man. What are you trying to say?"
"Just an observation." He took off his hat to scratch his unkempt hair, smoothing it a little before he put it back on; just enough to show he definitely was looking Scout over.
"Whatever, creep, go pick up someone else in your rapevan." That was enough of those vibes; Scout took off toward the base to let Creepy McCockSniper look through windows or whatever he was really doing out there.
- RED Base, One Week Later -
No matter what Scout tried to say about all of it, the Soldiers were completely against trying anything against the BLUs. "We ain't doing no damned good with no Intel!" they'd bark. Scout could get all the fuckin' intel they wanted, he'd say, but then Heavy and Demo would agree with Sergeant Barks-All-Day and that was the end of that. Without Heavy and Medic backing the Soldiers up, nothing much good would come from offense.
So Engineer and Demo would set up or check on their explody traps, Other Scout would run around in circles watching the perimeter, and the unseen Snipers did what they do best; sit around.
All a bunch of pansies.
Scouts were supposed to scout, not wait around with their thumbs up their asses, but that's exactly what he was doing, just playing with his bat and thinking about how much more fun it would be to dodge bullets.
The boredom drove him up into Good Sniper's nest again; this time, up into the cluttered space at the top Sniper called home. A little fridge, a coffee pot, and a hot plate were what passed for a kitchen on half a work bench; the other half was gun stuff and a big whetstone worn down in the middle. Good Sniper had a folding cot in the corner and perched in a plastic chair, gun over his knee, which was just where he was then, ignoring Scout's intrusion.
Cockbag Sniper was there, too, not ignoring it, glaring from the cot. "Fuck off, runt," he snarled.
"Cram it, creepfag. What happened to your good mood?"
Scout moved up behind Good Sniper's chair, looking over his thinning hair and out over the landscape of the abandoned industrial town. Bridges over canals split it in half, a series of borders to keep the companies apart before they got all up in arms, he supposed. Made sense; the Builder's League United built things, the Reliable Excavation Demolition blew shit up. Never could get along.
"Don't have good moods."
"Did last night. Whatever." He rolled his eyes as the Snipers exchanged an odd look.
"Wasn't to do with you if I did," Cockbag Sniper grumbled. "Annoying shit. Get the fuck out."
"Whatever cockass, see if I care."
He could hear Good Sniper saying "Don't have to be like that. Just a kid," as he jumped down the ladder.
Maybe Medic wasn't busy.
The clinic Medic had set up in the basement was adjacent to the locker room, where there were lots of guys needing stitching up, or lots of quiet, and that's how the crazy German liked it. A record player played scratchy opera music that Medic could be heard humming along with as soon as Scout got near, the empty walls echoing with it.
"Hey man, s'up?"
Scout strode in, and Medic opened his mouth to reply from his desk, adjusting his round glasses-- when the alarms went off.
The rooms erupted with sound as flashing lights began coloring the walls and floors with revolving red light.
Along with the siren, the feminine voice of the Announcer declared an attack; Scout felt giddy just thinking about bashing in some heads. Medic went for his healie gun and straightened his white coat as he followed Scout back topside.
"Strange they would come so late in the day," Medic mused.
"Yeah well, least they got off their pansy balls to stir it up." With that, Scout pulled his bat out of his satchel and took off, headlong, at the front gate.
The sentry guns were blasting bullets and rockets, and off to either side smaller doors exploded with Demo's sticky grenades, the dark Scotsman looking on in what could only be gleeful satisfaction as his grenade launcher fired.
That was the first wave going down; he didn't have to radio Other Scout to know he'd stick near Engie or Medic, but that wasn't this Scout's style. He leapt over the bodies of BLUs and put his head down and eyes up in a zig-zag run out toward the canals.
He dodged bullets, alright; the BLU's own pair of Heavy and Medic were coming straight up the middle, just behind shotgun and rocket launcher-wielding Soldiers that tried to get him, but didn't stop their advance when Scout ducked around them, using rubble and abandoned buildings as much as he could.
The hot, sharp feeling of a bullet grazing his arm, then his leg, didn't stop him; it just gave him the incentive to go faster.
In the back, he saw the weirdest thing; Cockbag Sniper just standing there on a bridge. That had to be BLU Spy. Other Scout and even a bunch of the others might be scared of this guy, but not Scout; he ran right for him, as he just... stood there. Sniper fire cut the ground around Scout, with pops and clouds of dust, the occasional arrow, but he was on Cockbag Sniper Mirage too quickly for them, leaping up to bring his bat down hard.
The blow off BLU Spy reverberated through Scout's bandaged hands, a loud Bonk! he echoed by yelling at the top of his lungs, a wail that felt so good… but the BLU Spy didn't go down alone.
Scout felt hands tangling in his shirt, pulling them both over the edge and into the canal, a sharp, ugly pain ripping through his back.
He felt himself hit the water, then things went black.
- BLU Base -
The BLU Spy knew the rest of his team wanted nothing to do with him, so he slipped easily into cloak to pass unseen to one of Medic's supply cabinets. He'd basic first aid and a few useful drugs on hand already, but the removal of a stout arrow’s shaft would require a bit more. The very thought of Medic made him shudder and think of cold laboratories full of leers and pain. He couldn't have the supplies in his pockets and be on his way fast enough.
At the edge of the sewer access in the basement, the lurking Pyro was there, perhaps able to see him through the cloak, perhaps not. It was difficult to tell what sort of person or creature looked out from behind the black lenses of the filter mask. Regardless, he kept a prudent distance until dropping through the un-grated sewer access in the back.
In the wet, familiar tunnels beneath the base, he let the cloak dissolve in a puff of smoke, the tension in his shoulders created by the presence of others dissipating without the need for a disguise. Lately he never seemed without cloak or façade, unable to simply stretch his limbs and pretend he was not a monster that needed them.
This was his place, away from all of that.
But tonight it was not empty. It would not do to be too comfortable.
A platform rose out of the water in one of the deeper spots, where the canals became sewers for the unused streets of whatever the town above was once called. There was a service door to tunnels, but it was rusted shut and doubtless the tunnels were collapsed; it kept him securely away from the others, in a place where he could keep what few things he wanted here, such as the pile of blankets in the corner he'd sleep in from time to time. At the moment, the blankets were spotted with blood, but the errant RED Scout was no longer there.
Spy deposited the medical supplies on the concrete, then sank back into the water, swimming along quietly so as not to scare the boy into acting rashly. There wasn't far he had to go; the smell of fresh blood led him along the narrow walkway over the water line, around a bend where the RED had collapsed.
The boy was slumped over the railing, as if he’d been trying to crawl along on his knees to escape before the blood loss grew too much. It was pooled beneath him, dripping down with years of condensation, rust and blue-green stains, but the Scout was still breathing.
He clucked at him, admonishing doubtless unheard, as he pulled himself out of the water and wrapped himself around the figure, carrying him back to the blankets, mindful of the arrow's shaft still sticking out of the shoulder.
"You do not have to run, petit, it will do you no good," he murmured.
The head of the arrow was nearly through the shoulder; he would have to push it through the rest of the way or risk tearing up his flesh in ways much more difficult to heal. He plucked up a case of syringes and filled one with anesthetic as he began cutting off the red shirt and lit a cigarette from the waterproof case.
"Fuckin'…wha?" The Scout was on his belly as he woke, attempting to twist his head up to see what was happening.
Spy firmly held him there and hurried up with swabbing a spot on his arm to make the injection. "You must be still, zee arrow. It is still there."
"Arrow..? Wait.. Spy?" He kept twisting up, unfocused blue-green eyes looking over and past Spy, a sheen of sweat on his too-pale face. The drugs took no time in their work, however, his eyelids becoming obviously heavy, until they couldn’t stay open at all. “Lemme go,” he slurred.
"You will sleep now," Spy simply stated, waiting until the body under his limbs went limp again.
As quickly as possible, he had the head through and broken, throwing the two lengths of the weapon into the water distastefully. Patching the Scout up was one thing, finding reason to do so quite another. He reasoned it may have to do with seeing how lonely the Scout became once he'd dispatched the RED Spy; there had been nothing personal about it. Other Spies were the only source of what few supplies he needed, besides food.
He had taken such pleasure in watching the man die. His limbs curled and twisted to think of it, the RED’s horror and disbelief as he was helpless to save himself, too frightened even to scream. Nevertheless, his hands were busy bandaging the angry wound; there was no desire to crush this one. Not much, anyway. He'd not expected to feel any guilt about it, disliked the feeling intensely, and yet he was here worrying himself over the source.
* * *
Scout woke very slowly; the kind of slowly where things seem unreal for a while. He was still hurting... from what? What happened?
Why was he wet?
The feeling of something curling around his legs like a snake made him jump, then froze from the stabbing agony through his shoulder, but his eyes flew open... to what had to be a hallucination.
BLU Spy... was that him? He just had an open shirt on, seemed to have just crawled out of the water and started putting his clothes back on. Idly, he noticed BLU Spy’s hair was pretty shaggy before the rest sank in. Was he on drugs? He didn't feel right, and Spy didn't have legs. Didn't have legs. He was just... holding himself up on these grayish blue what the fuck were those things tentacles and a few of them were wound around Scout idly.
"Fuckin' creature from the black lagoon, man, gonna eat me."
He went to get up and run, remembering something about waking up before, but Spy's twisty suction-cup not-legs moved for him, fast, wrapping around his arms and legs to push him back down.
Sick horror spread through Scout's body. "D-don't, don't eat me, man," he whispered.
"I will do no such thing," Spy calmly replied, a French accent on his lips. Like Real Spy always had. One of the tentacles reached out and plucked up a cigarette case, another aiding the limb in opening it and lighting one to bring to his lips; all while Spy kept his hands on Scout's chest. The things just kept moving, all windy muscle snakes, slippery and not good at all.
NOT GOOD.
Scout couldn't take his eyes off them.
"What the fuck, man, what the fucking fuck fuck?"
"You zound just like BLU Scouts," Spy drawled. "Such need for profanity."
Scout wasn't sure why, just then, the cigarette case got interesting. He'd seen Real Spy's, with the gadgets in it. This one just had a rubber seal on the edge. "You don't got a thing," he said, frowning at the tentacle setting the case aside. "For disguise?"
Spy's upper body moved back a little, his brow quirking.
"I don't need it."
He seemed torn between what his torso was doing, backing off, and the tentacles insisting on winding all over him to keep him there. Other things started registering. "You freakin'... patched me up?"
The Not-Spy shrugged and shook his hair out a bit. Through the open shirt, Scout could see how the body wasn't some Frankenstein deal, all these weird markings went up his belly, in other spots, too. What the fuck? Apparently the Spy wasn't big at Scout looking at him, he turned a little and went back to buttoning up the dingy white shirt.
"So, uh... I makin' it out of this crap alive or what?"
The Spy deftly put on his tie and grinned at him with a mouth full of pointed teeth. Like a friggin' shark.
Scout had to admit to himself he was wicked scared. The tentacles had let up some, but now they were moving all back over him, unhurriedly, like they were about to casually strangle him to death.
The dripping quiet and the sound of Spy's breath, his own frantic panting, it was all coming down around him as Spy moved back over him far more easily than something without legs should be able to. Gliding on them long things before they sank down over him, squeezing.
The toothy grin got in his face, Spy’s thin hands reaching down to cradle Scout’s head.
“Do you think you should, petit? ”
Scout’s right hand tried to reach out and grab his bat that he knew wasn’t even there, the tentacle around his arm tightening its grip in response. They all kept squeezing, until he was gasping for breath and felt his chest burning.
The Spy sneered, then just… let go.
Scout was bodily shoved off near the edge of the water, pain spiking through his back and the raw wound. He gripped the bandaged shoulder and grimaced, still frozen in fear.
Spy glided back near a rust streak on the concrete wall, flicking his cigarette off to one side. He muttered something in French, then snarled. “Get out if you can.”
So Scout got out.
He remembered this walkway now, a narrow lip with a metal railing that ran along the edge of the still water. Rounding a corner, he heard a “Splash” somewhere behind him and tried to run faster. Stumbling, dizzy with blood loss, he kept moving, blindly pushing forward.
“C’mon, c’mon, gotta be a way out, c’mon!”
The smell of cigarette smoke was following him, threatening to induce panic. The Spy-monster was playing with him, cat and mouse, he didn’t want to be food. The sound of his shoes hitting the concrete echoed menacingly.
Dizzy, dizzy. Seeing spots. He kept tripping and falling, lost track of where he was going.
“Don’t pass out, don’t pass out…”
He did.
- RED Base -
Scout woke up to the sound of Medic’s violin and the smell of antiseptic. After a moment, he recognized the melody as the one on the record player, before.
“Doc?”
The music stopped abruptly, the wood body of the violin sounding as it was set down. Scout blinked in the bright lights, moreso when Medic’s penlight shone in his face.
“Good you are avake.”
“How’d I get here?”
The Medic shrugged, looking remarkably casual, for him; it had to be late at night, most of his uniform was missing, just red suspenders over an undershirt with those gray pants. “Herr Engineer found you this morning by the gates. Who bound your vounds? This I do not know. But they saved your life.”
“Spy.”
“Spy is dead,” he replied carefully, frowning a bit.
“No, no, not our Spy! It was their Spy! And he… he wasn’t human, man!” He began waving his hands around animatedly, sitting up quickly. “He had tentacles man, and fangs, and claws, I shit you not, I swear he was gonna eat me, but he bandaged the shoulders and ran me out of the sewers!”
Medic appeared dubious of the story. “There are no monsters in the sewers, it is only campfire story.”
“Not lyin’ man! I didn’t just see him, he talked to me and crap, kept smoking these gay little cigarettes and grinnin’ at me!”
Medic had nothing to say to that; he just looked back with a frown.
“It’s fuckin’ true!”
Medic shook his head, but it didn’t seem to be entirely in disbelief this time. “Go get rest.”
“Whatever.” He hopped off the table and grabbed his shoes and satchel, then headed out into the quiet base.
Scout did go straight to his room, finding it black-dark in most places along the way. His room was a tiny one that used to be a supply room; a lot of guys here slept out on the second floor’s wide open space, but he got this one from the old Demoman. They’d been friends, until a Pyro got him. The new Demo slept wherever he fell at night and seemed to like it that way, even when he wasn’t drinking. Usually in the chair of his cramped work shed out back, a long ashed-out butt in his hand. Scout’s room didn’t have much; the cot took up most of it, the rest was a footlocker and just enough floor space to avoid walking on it. He smiled at a wrinkled picture of his mum tacked by the door (a safe distance from the even more wrinkled pinup girl with the perfectly round ass) and collapsed on the green canvas.
Had that all.. really happened that way? Was the BLU Spy really a monster that lived in the sewers?
Did he really save his life?
What the hell was that shit about?
He reached up to scratch his chest, and couldn’t help but notice his tags were gone. Great. Monsters… and now… paperwork.
- BLU Base -
The cease-fire in the wake of the failed attempt on the REDs had their Medic busily filling out death certificates and requests for replacements, the Soldiers polishing their weapons until the metal threatened to wear down, and the Scouts scrapping with one another in the dirt as if this were a schoolyard instead of a warzone. Pyro and a Heavy lingered near the sewer access as much as the Snipers kept an eye on the no man’s land in between the bases,
Spy had spent most of his time with the REDs; this time as a Soldier, keeping his head down and doing what he did best, which was to observe. RED base had been abuzz with whispers about a monster in the water, which had their Engineer attacking sewer grates with a torch and heavy bars. Every unexplained death the REDs ever had became attributed to Spy; it was near enough to the truth.
He didn’t seek out anyone not another Spy… if they wandered too close to his place or lingered by the waters alone, however… it served them right.
By this logic, the Scout had a death wish. Spy caught sight of him squeezing out through a gap in the fence only a Scout could hope to fit through, trying his best at stealth to cut through the burned out shells that had once been inhabited buildings.
Spy cloaked and followed him straight to the canal bridge that had nearly killed the Scout before.
He seemed to be looking for something, glancing up at the BLU battlements now and then, scuffing the toe of his shoes in the dust here and there. Unsatisfied, he looked back over at BLU Base, then leapt into the water.
He must be looking for what he’d lost. Spy patted his breast pocket, then followed him down with a splash.
Being underwater, Scout looked about, but seemed to dismiss the sound, returning to scouring the sticks, dead leaves, and spent ammunition littering the concrete bottom. Unlike Spy, he was forced to surface for air frequently, always glancing about as he did, quick to return to his search. It was perplexing; Scout should be the last person to be nosing about here. He should be like the others, quivering behind their defenses.
Perhaps twenty minutes went by, Spy resting easily in the shadow underneath the entrance to his sewers. He was uncloaked now, but Scout hadn’t noticed him, until he began swimming ever closer… and did.
Scout started back, his hair whipping with the motion through the water, a few bubbles of air escaping his mouth, eyes wide as he stared at Spy through the silt and debris he’d stirred up.
Speed was the Scout’s forté on land, but not here. He could only struggle clumsily toward the surface, making it halfway before Spy had him in his arms, using his limbs to propel them into the sewers, out of earshot of anyone before he surfaced in the flickering lights of the tunnels. Scout kept struggling, but Spy kept his arms firmly pinned, keeping him from reaching the weapons in the satchel.
“You should know better than to tempt fate, mon petit garçon. ”
“Ain’t no fuckin’ waiter, freak!”
Spy couldn’t help but laugh, which quieted Scout somewhat, stiffening in his grip. Why had he even revealed his presence, let alone abduct him? The edges of his mind whispered, mockingly, how good it would feel to break his foul-mouthed spirit, only giving him death after he’d lost the will even to beg for it.
He tossed Scout’s body as far as he could throw him, landing in an awkward splash.
“What do you think you were doing in ze canal?”
Scout got up and sneered at him, tugging his black cap out of the satchel, squeezing water out of it before plopping it back on his head. “Avoiding paperwork and shit.”
“Quoi?”
“My stupid tags.” Scout backed up a few suspicious steps, his posture low and defensive, but he didn’t go for his weapons. “Fuck’s your problem?”
Spy curled his limbs. His problem? Scout didn’t seem to be afraid of him anymore, and he didn’t know how he felt about that. He’d gone soft.
“You won’t find zem,” Spy snapped, baring his teeth. “Get out.” He shoved past the Scout and half-swam through the water, thigh-high to the short RED, it being one of the higher tunnels that ran shallow without enough rain.
“No!” The metallic sound of the baseball bat slamming against the wall gave him pause, looking over his shoulder.
Scout seemed positively irate.
“I’m sick and fuckin’ tired of bein’ told get ‘get out’ or ‘bugger off’ or whatever, you know! Yeah, you’re all big and bad, but you don’t have to be such a freakin’ dick about it!”
Spy kept moving on. “Those stories your teammates tell of me? They are true. I will not be letting you go again.”
“Liar. Yer just all lonely and sad, squidfag.” Spy glanced over his shoulder again; Scout was holding his bat over his shoulder, a cocky grin on his face. “Got yer number, huh? You ain’t gonna eat me, just bluster hot air like I give a fuck.”
Clearly, Spy was failing at inspiring fear in this one. It was irritating. Scouts were always irritating, profane and ignorant. He lit a cigarette and decided to ignore the continuing spew of insults that followed him, and continued to follow him.
* * *
There was something clearly fuckin’ wrong in the head about Spy.
Whatever, so he killed people! That’s what everyone was here to do! Maybe yeah, they should be putting a little more effort into killing each other but BLU Spies hadn’t kept him from running to get what he wanted in the past, so whatever, that’s what mattered.
Scout liked danger. He craved danger. That’s why he signed up to work for RED in the first place, he wasn’t like the other pansies, happy to relax behind their big wall and flash sentries. Teammates? Boring. Sitting around? Boring as fuck. Spy? Not boring.
Spy chain-smoked his way through the tunnels, unfamiliar ones, then glided up onto a dry platform in an open space full of columns and ladders up to rusty doors; it was here he flicked his butt into the water and addressed Scout again.
“You want to follow me into BLUs?”
“Well.. no?”
He had a screwed-up look that reminded him of an evil lunch-lady they always thought made the soup with people-bits.
Then Spy went all… rigid. Now he was obviously scared as shit. He pointed one of the ladders that led up above and hissed, “Get up zere, now, idiot.”
“Why…?”
“Do not argue petit! ” he whispered harshly.
Scout decided whatever bug got into Spy’s non-existent pants wasn’t worth bitching about, so he hauled ass up the obviously unused rungs and crouched at the top, hidden in a shadow. Below, Spy’s hands shook visibly as he lit another cig and waited around, still as he seemed to shake off whatever was wrong with him.
It wasn’t long before Scout could hear a pair of heavy boots on the concrete and off-key whistling. The source came into sight pretty quick; BLU Medic, older than his own, with a feral grin like his own never got. Cold and mean.
“Tut tut, my creature, have you been avoidink me?”
“Why should I do zat?” Scout could only see the back of Spy’s blue balaclava, but assumed he was glaring like he seemed to do a lot.
BLU Medic set down his healie-gun against the wall, unhurriedly, then casually adjusted the waist of his buttoned white coat. “Vy did you bring the Scout back to their base?”
Spy shrugged. “He is ‘armless.”
The Medic sighed and shook his head disapprovingly. “I ignore when you leave our Spies in nasty piles, I ignore when you think you are too good to bring us intelligence, but I will not ignore when you decide to do as you please in aiding our enemy.” He walked up to Spy and touched his face with the thick rubber gloved hand, a remarkably possessive gesture. “You are forgetting yourself.”
In a flash of steel, Spy drew his butterfly knife out of his jacket and slashed it at the Medic, a line of red growing across his chest. Scout silently cheered. Spy tossed the knife to get a more solid grip, then went for a bite to the jugular…
The Medic barked some German word, and the knife clattered to the ground.
Spy sank down on the concrete beside it, his tentacles all pulling against his body, black gloves flat on the floor, his head down.
“Must I always remind you? You are my creature, you cannot help but do as I say. Such things should be behind us, ja?” He smiled wickedly, just as ominously as Spy’s fangs ever were. “Dumme Sache. ”
Spy’s hands gripped into fists, but he didn’t otherwise move as Medic knelt in front of him and plucked away the cigarette, then pulled off the balaclava, revealing hair the same color as his, without the gray edges. He muttered something else in German and Spy’s tentacles began squirming like they had a mind of their own, his hands grabbed his own hair down over his face as his body bent into itself. Pain? No… in a moment, he moaned, loudly, echoing everywhere, like Medic was fucking him right there on the dirty floor.
Medic patted Spy’s back and leered at him, chuckling to himself. “To think I have an American to thank for teaching me such things to keep you in line.” He reached for his belt and unclipped it with one hand, stroking up Spy’s spine.
Scout squeezed back against the wall and shut his eyes, hands over his ears.
He still heard terrible things. Medic chuckled and grunted and moaned German things, and the Spy… was quiet, until he wasn’t. Spy made this sound so loud and inhuman Scout opened his eyes, just for a second, long enough to make out the Medic using those tentacles like handles and Spy still hiding his face in his hands, grinding against the concrete.
Then it stopped. Scout had his hands over his eyes, and kept them there, but he could hear Medic getting dressed and walking away, then the scraping sound of him picking up his gun.
“I trust it vill not happen again,” Medic chuckled, then said something else in German before it went completely quiet.
It was a while before Scout dared to look; he still wasn’t sure exactly what just happened, but it was bad. Spy just laid there for a moment, then two of his tentacles pushed him up to a sitting position, where he reached into his jacket to pull out the cigarette case. It must have been empty because he just closed it again with a sigh.
Then he just… sat there.
Scout really didn’t want to come down, but he had to eventually. Carefully, quietly, he descended the ladder and turned to run off… that would be the smart thing. Instead, he took a tentative step closer to the still figure, hands raised in trepidation.
“Um.. are you okay?”
The Spy whipped around and snarled, bringing himself up to his full height and lunged, his claws menacingly poised to strike.
Scout got the message and started running for his life.
- RED Base -
That night, the Soldiers that went out to patrol just outside the wall never came back. Everyone in the base could hear them screaming for hours, but couldn’t see anything out in the darkness. They didn’t dare go out to look until morning, when Heavy and Medic found their remains in a burnt-out building nearby.
Nobody talked much for the next few days. The death certificates went back to HQ with a requisition for replacement tags for Scout.
- BLU Base –
“The enemy has captured our intelligence!”
The briefcase bounced against Scout’s back as he jumped up the stairs and made a hard right at the top, a Heavy’s bullets ringing in his ears as they were barely avoided to dart down a narrow hallway; a long way, but an unexpected one they might not have covered. He ran low through a doorway, skirting a conference table, a roll through the next door to avoid a Pyro’s blast. Instantly on his feet, he used a railing to help him race up the stairs faster, coming up into the wood walls of BLU base, where a pair of Scouts were already bearing down on him with shotguns.
Scout made a sharp left and made for the side door in a flat-out run, avoiding debris and clutter of the breakfast he’d interrupted. The door was a risk, he couldn’t see what was on the other side, but using his forward momentum to swing himself back right by grabbing the doorjamb, he avoided the oncoming grenades with a well-placed zig-zag.
The bridges would be covered by Snipers and Soldiers were advancing in the courtyard.
Scout grinned and kept running. He felt unstoppable.
Sniper fire rang from both sides, the BLU Scouts were still behind him, but the REDs were holding their line in front of him, his own Medic behind the Heavy, leading the way to deter them from chasing Scout much longer.
Just a few dodged rockets and he was over the canals, sailing past Engineer at the gate, not stopping until he made it inside the base and threw his hands up against a wall to abruptly halt his momentum there with a slam.
He turned a bit to lean against the wall and keep an eye outside in their own courtyard, but it didn’t look like the BLUs were prepared to make a full-on assault. One of the BLU Scouts had gotten past Heavy somehow, leaping over Engie’s sentry, but Other Scout’s pistol stopped him dead, landing hard and still in the dirt.
The sentry fell quiet, and Heavy’s gun grew close, louder, before the barrel slowed and stopped spinning just inside the gate.
Scout felt like he’d just had marathon sex with an entire cheerleading squad, panting, sweaty, tingly, and exhausted all over.
Other Scout jogged over with a big smile on his face, all freckles and pride as he smacked Scout on the back. “That was great man, can’t even believe you just did that!”
“Vat vere you thinking!” A displeased Medic charged through the door, slamming his gun into Heavy’s chest so he could properly wave his arms around angrily at Scout. “You do not even tell us you will be doing this thing, no varning for backup, just boom! You are gone. Unwissendes Kind, are you dense?” He strode over and smacked Scout up the side of his head, loudly, then tersely adjusted his round spectacles. He glared, then sighed and just rested his hand on Scout’s shoulder, briefly. “Gut verk,” he muttered, going to help the briefcase off his back. “Don’t do it again.”
Scout just grinned and shrugged. Medic worried too much. Besides, somebody had to lift the funk that had settled over the base, and what better way to do it than surprise victory?
Medic and Engie went downstairs with the intel, Heavy following along behind; he’d been close to Medic before, but now he didn’t let him out of his sight for anything. He scratched his bare scalp with his massive hand and plodded good-naturedly, unlikely to add much to the analysis, but it was doubtful either of the other two would ever begrudge his presence.
His teammates patted Scout on the back with congratulations, then he made a beeline for the locker room.
The tile and steel space was empty, except for him, flicking on the lights and stripping off his clothes in a trail along the floor he’d deal with later; sweat was dripping off him, tickling the crack of his ass, and he wanted that fixed ASAP.
He turned on the shower head and began snapping his fingers as it warmed up. “Yeah, you really got me now, oh yeah! You really got me goin’!” he sang to himself. “You got me so I don’t know what I’m doin’!”
“I’m flattered.”
Scout whirled around as he was shoved back into the shower stall with Cockbag Sniper’s hands on his shoulders. He opened his mouth to yell, but it was quickly covered up by gloved fingers.
“Shh, don’t be stupid, petit. ” It was still Sniper’s voice, but there wasn’t a trace of Australian in it anymore. Water from the shower was soaking them both, running out of the Sniper’s duster hat in little waterfalls, his eyes hidden behind shadow and the aviator glasses. He moved his hand away slowly, then began running his fingers down Scout’s cheek when he seemed certain there wouldn’t be screaming just then.
“Yer not Cockbag.”
“’Ow very observant.”
Scout became acutely aware of how wet and naked he was, and how touchy-feely Spy was. His brain went danger danger danger, but it was always the right button to push. What the fuck? Spy was weird and gross! He was prolly some crazed half-human cannibal thing with a thumb collection!
The appearance of the Sniper grinned lewdly, droplets of water falling off his stubbled chin. The hand on Scout’s cheek migrated down the side of his neck, over his chest. Scout couldn’t really see his eyes, but they had some kind of contact, anyway.
Now, Scout wasn’t into Sniper at all; not even the good one. He smelled funny and was just… a guy. But this wasn’t Sniper, and not really a guy, he was a thrill ride and excitement and danger danger danger. The high of the run hadn’t worn off and he felt good, good enough to fuck, so he didn’t fight back with where this was going, but he wasn’t some queer, so he didn’t get all moany, either.
Maybe he did get a little moany, just a little, when Spy-Sniper’s hand wrapped around his cock. It was just the hand that moved, both of them otherwise stock still under the continuing stream of water, Scout unwilling to take his eyes off him, warily looking for any warning this might go bad. But it didn’t.
Spy-Sniper’s fingers started to feel real good, until Scout’s hips were moving forward, just a little, with their motion. The fingers got slipperier as it got better, then faster, faster…
When Scout came, just for a second, he forgot to be wary and pressed into the warm, wet-clothed body. Just a second, before pulling back warily. Still in that moment of afterglow, he might have leaned into the gloved hand that stroked his hair once.
Spy-Sniper lifted his chin, frowned, then turned and walked away, poofing out of sight before the door unlocked, opened, and swung shut again. Just like that.
It occurred to him that there were a lot of times he’d seen Cockbag Sniper doing things he wouldn’t normally do. Just how much time did Spy spend here?
What the fuck?
* * *
Medic slapped the papers down on the rough wooden table they were all gathered around, then standing back from it with his arms crossed; as if the paper itself offended him he screwed up his face. “Die Builder’s are vorking to create übermenschlich thing.”
A Soldier gave him a look, likely wondering what Scout was, if Medic really thought that was a bad idea or not. Nobody was quite sure what he’d been doing in Germany before being hired by RED, but nobody was going to bring it up, either.
“Come again?” the Engineer asked politely.
“It is not as such, but they are vishing to build a varrior that is better than just a man. Experiments for years. Some bases have tests, they are such a base. Scout’s monster is from BLU laboratory; I do not know how they have done it, but zhiss is reports. How well he kills us, how easy he hides and travels in the vater.”
“Gotta kill the bloke,” Good Sniper said, a rare face down in the base. He picked up one of the sheets and began reading it suspiciously.
Scout gave him a sideways glance, but bit his tongue.
“And they send another in his place? Having venom and vings?”
Demo scoffed. “Lotta damned nonsense.”
“We do what we always gotta do, boys. Send the intel to Headquarters and wait for orders. Won’t do any good getting’ riled.” Engie stood as the calm voice of reason, spreading his hands out on the table. He adjusted his yellow hardhat and nodded. “’Till then, we sit tight.”
The others seemed to dislike the idea of doing nothing, but after all, Engie was right--Scout knew all too well that trying to take out the Spy wouldn’t be as easy as one of the Snipers getting in a good shot. It’d take a lot, a lot that would take time away from the standing orders. One by one, they all began to nod.
Scout wrinkled his nose at himself. He actually felt relieved. He didn’t want them to shoot Spy in the head, freak or not. Apparently Spy was here all the time, but they never found bodies inside the base. Outside the base was free game, they all knew that, they all came here knowing the risks.
That decided, Good Sniper left, presumably back to his nest, and Scout didn’t feel like sticking around, either, so he wandered out the front and into the dusty courtyard glowing with the brilliant yellow-pink sunset in the sky.
Unnoticed by the Soldier’s on guard, Cockbag Sniper ambled toward the front gate, turned to look at Scout, then shimmered into nothing.
“Hey!”
Scout broke into a run, reaching all around, trying to see where he’d gone; outside the gate was a patch of dirt with a strange, tangled trail, just a few feet he could follow, enough to send him into no man’s land.
Every few yards he caught sight of a bluish shimmer, that was always gone when he reached it.
“Fuck, queerface! Stop!” He yelled in frustration, still swatting out at nothing as he ran in random patterns after him.
He’d had enough; he pulled out his shotgun and held it at the last sighting’s general direction, firing a pair of explosive bursts of shrapnel into a decrepit fence, but no Spy. Scout reloaded. “I’ll keep friggin’ shooting at your squiddy ass!”
It then dawned on him where Spy was going; straight for the canal up ahead.
He fired into the air, then off to the side; he still didn’t really want to shoot him, but enough was enough. “Octofag! Where are you!?”
As Scout approached the concrete edge of the water, a blue shimmer grew less transparent, until the Spy was visible there. His clothes were a mess, the jacket missing somewhere, the blue waistcoat wrinkled over a dingy white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, but still a bit ragged. The balaclava had a hole in it, where his hair was poking out.
Scout lowered the gun to point at Spy accusingly. “Fuckin’ an runnin’ ain’t cool, man. Don’t care if you are a goddamn Spy.”
“Whatever happened, it was not, as you so eloquently say, ‘fucking’.” He pulled out the eternal cigarette case and plucked one out with one tentacle, lighting it with the other, before slipping it back in the pocket. “That was to see if I would be inclined.”
Scout watched the smooth bastard just slowly exhale as if it were the most natural thing in the world to jump other men in a locker room. Well… assuming he was really a man. He was pretty close. “And? Freak?”
The response was a wide, mocking grin, the cigarette’s filter pierced by the tips of his razor teeth. It was… Wicked. Evil. Venomous. Deadly. They faced off until he spit the butt out on the ground.
“I fuckin’ hate how you’re so hot,” Scout whispered, kinda surprised he actually said it out loud.
Scout dropped the shotgun and lunged, punching Spy square in the jaw, spitting in his face as the tentacles grabbed him and held him there.
Spy’s real arms grabbed onto his, keeping him from swinging anymore as he was drawn closer, until he could feel Spy’s breath on his skin. He smelled funny, but different than Sniper; Spy smelled like old leaves, smoke, and… him. Like nothing else. Spy was almost nuzzling up his neck, but not touching, just gently brushing his lips and teeth over his skin, and he must have figured out that right under the ear was one of Scout’s happy spots…
A little nip and Scout was definitely interested in finding out what Danger Monster’s idea of fucking was. He got all these questions in his head, like, “Have ya always been a freak?” “Why don’t you backstab that jerk Medic?” “Why am I still alive?”
Spy’s tentacles ripped all Scout’s clothes off at once and put talking off for later, if ever. It was terrifying how strong they were.
Scout groaned and pushed harder as one teased his cock a little, moving past it on the way to carefully pluck Scout’s hat off his head and throw it down.
They’d sunk down to the ground now, now occupied with slithering over every inch of Scout’s body instead of holding him up, some squeezing threateningly, others gentle as a caress, as if they all had a mind of their own. He tried to move out of their grip experimentally, tensing them all. They threw his arms over his head and swung him back against the ground.
It was as if Spy was just watching that part of himself do what it liked, propped up over Scout’s thighs.
“Stupid frog,” Scout snarled.
Spy responded by twisting the slender end of one tentacle around his cock, the very tip running over the head like a smooth finger.
“Psycho!” he gasped, bucking, a little to get them off, mostly to make it better. It was so good. “Fuckin’ die!”
At that, Spy moved himself forward, parallel over Scout’s body, arms propping himself up on either side as the appendages did their thing. “Mon petit cher, I do not think you meant zat.” Scout couldn’t tell before, but Spy was flushing, over what was visible of his face and the bare forearms, his chest warm with sweat through the shirt.
“Yer gonna make me the team fag. Fag.” He wanted to be a smartass but he felt the smile come off genuine.
Spy chuckled and arched down to nip more at Scout’s neck, then said into it, “You have not a clue what your teammates are always doing, no?”
“What?”
Scout’s body jumped at the tentacles parted his legs, one reaching between them and meaningfully against his ass.
“Zomezing like that,” he drawled, growing more difficult to understand as he breathed more heavily.
“I’m not a fucking fag,” Scout protested, weakly, shuddering at how good that felt, not pushing into him, just moving back and forth with the pace of the one on his cock. He didn’t have a clue it could feel like that. Didn’t have a clue exactly how Spy was getting off on this, either, but it was… nice.
Spy suddenly reached up and yanked off his balaclava, letting the lank brown hair shake loose, giving Scout another, better look at his face. The first time he’d seen it, he’d been way too freaked out to see Spy really wasn’t bad looking there; he had these nice cheekbones that made a nose that’d be stupid on someone else suit him.
Then the fucking guy lit up another cigarette, smoking it with the tentacles Scout wasn’t tangled in.
“Fucking fuck!”
The probing end pushing into his ass a little got more insistent, the one on his cock twisted faster and tighter, it was so good.
Scout heard himself moaning and begging like a wicked queer, but that wasn’t important.
Spy kissed him carefully, like he was worried he’d hurt his mouth, then shuddered all around him, wiggling and squirming; it might have been an accident, but the one tentacle pushed its way into Scout’s ass a little bit, burning good.
Scout came screaming about what a squidfag he was, only realizing he did it once the post-orgasm heat was starting to pass already, his cock happily twitching in the now-gentle grip. He caught his breath and they slowly pulled apart, Spy still puffing away.
“That was somethin’ alright,” Scout had to admit with a sigh.
One of the tentacles caressed Scout’s belly, where it was splashed with come, then brought it to Spy’s lips for him to lick lewdly.
“Perv. Wicked perv,” Scout accused.
Spy shrugged, then began taking his waistcoat, hanging it on a tentacle like a hook before hastily pulling off the white shirt and tossing it at Scout. “I believe you would not like going back naked?” He put the waistcoat back on and turned toward the water, obviously preparing to just take off.
“What the fuck, man? We fucked, so don’t just leave, fag!”
If it was possible for Spy to smile and not be terrifying, he did; or perhaps Scout’s perceptions were all wrong now. “You would like to cuddle, n’est-ce pas? ”
“No!” Scout felt stupid standing there in just Spy’s shirt and his baseball socks. “I dunno.”
Spy looked all… different without the mask on. He glided over with his head cocked curiously, an amused smirk on his lips. “Perhaps next time, mon petite chou. When we are not being watched.”
“Wha?”
Spy glanced up to the right, but instead of a real answer, just kissed him again, quickly and not so carefully as before, his sharp teeth nicking at Scout’s lips a little, but it was all… warm.
Balaclava in hand, Spy glided away then and dove into the canal, propelling himself rapidly out of sight in the dying light.
The team was going to have a field day with this.
His clothes were done for, just rags now, other than the black cap and headset; he put those back on, slung his satchel over his head, and couldn’t think of a single explanation he could give for walking back through the front gates like this. Shotgun in hand, just in case, he trudged back to the light of RED base.
Along the way, he looked in the general direction Spy had been, for a clue; there wasn’t anything over there but the broken water tower Cockbag Sniper used as a nest.
Once he got to the wall, he snuck in a gap along one side, hoping to avoid running into anyone; stealth wasn’t his thing, but he got lucky. If someone saw him going back to his room, he couldn’t tell.
He flopped back on his cot and smelled Spy all over him, fingering the cotton shirt a bit, wondering if it had belonged to anyone else first.
* * *
“I cannae believe this! Noeting at all?” Demo drunkenly slammed the orders on the table and stormed off with his bottle, grumbling to himself.
“Are ya really surprised by all that?”
They were all gathered around papers again; this time, orders from HQ. Orders that said, basically, they’d sent the information through the proper channels and the team wasn’t to do anything differently than they were already. Keep an eye on BLU, get what intel they could, don’t worry about boogeymen, everything was under control.
Again, Scout felt relief, but this time he didn’t feel guilty about it.
He stopped paying attention, then he wandered away, to see what Good Sniper was up to.
The smell of toast wafted down the ladder as Scout crawled up into the nest, where the two Snipers were eating what passed for dinner to them; not much. Good Sniper looked up and nodded at him, Cockbag Sniper cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck.
“What’s wrong with you?” Scout grumbled.
Good Sniper snorted. “Afraid you’ll sic your squiddy mate on ‘im for bein’ a right prick.”
Scout looked back and forth between them, suspiciously. “Fuck did you guys see?”
“Enough,” Cockbag Sniper muttered.
“Don’t tell me you said shit to nobody!” Scout stepped over and stuck his finger in his face, shaking it pointedly. “I won’t need help kickin’ yer ass if ya think..!”
Good Sniper put his hand on Scout’s shoulder and pulled him back gently. “Naw, kid. We both know when to keep mum.”
“Well… fine, then. But I ain’t a fag!”
He shrugged and didn’t seem to care one way or the other what Scout did with himself. Cockbag Sniper still looked nervous. It was kinda nice, not being constantly threatened.
“You ‘ungry?” Good Sniper gestured at their spread of toast, peanut butter, and tinned sardines.
“Nah.” He sat down in the windowsill, hanging out high over the ground below. Everything looked cheery in the sun, even BLU base didn’t seem all that threatening. “Can you guys do me a favor, though? It’ll be fun.”
Good Sniper grunted noncommittally.
“You ever get a shot at the BLU Medic, you take it.”
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on 2009-08-30 02:54 pm (UTC)You know how I feel about this fic. :D :D :D
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on 2009-08-30 06:33 pm (UTC)(I love how I really have no idea what that means, I really do.)
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on 2009-08-30 06:24 pm (UTC)THANK YOU FOR THE LINK <33
*reads fic as well*
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on 2009-08-30 06:31 pm (UTC)...you are very brave for delving into this fic. XD
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on 2009-08-31 11:14 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-08-31 11:16 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-10-10 04:39 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-10-22 03:59 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-10-23 01:10 am (UTC)