Day 1: Morning
Within his first moments of consciousness, the Scout extended his arm. His hand bumped against a pane of glass merely inches away from his nose. His eyes adjusted to the light, and past the glass he stared up at an unfamiliar ceiling. Somewhere outside, a high-pitched alarm pounded his ears. Scout tried putting his arms out to his sides, but only managed to slam them against black walls which were crammed against his body. Jolted by adrenaline, the Scout beat against the glass in an increasingly violent succession, unable to sit up at all. Realizing his hands would not be enough, he made an effort to squirm his legs around - to no avail; they were nearly useless.
Heart racing, sweat forming, body quivering, the Scout watched with no small joy as the glass roof of his coffin began to lift off to its side. In his own mind, he had earned his freedom from his claustrophobic prison by beating it until it could no longer take any punishment. Scout banged the side of his head while sitting upright, belting out a victorious war cry that reverberated in the space around him. His elation would fade in a matter of seconds, however, as he began to absorb his surroundings. Dread came down on him again like a sledgehammer when he looked face to face with the Engineer beside him.
And then the Heavy. And then the Sniper. And then the rest of the team - all wearing nothing but boxer shorts, and all sitting inside strange gray pods positioned in a perfect line against a wall that Scout had never seen before in his life, and judging by the others' expressions, that they had never seen before. One pod was empty. The mercenaries turned at the sound of a zipper: the Pyro leaned against a doorframe, having put on his whole getup. Even from under his mask, it was clear that Pyro was quite ecstatic to see his teammates waking up, giving them all an innocent wave.
No one knew what to say besides mumblings of 'What?' and 'What the Hell?.' Like deer caught in headlights, they were frozen, passively drinking in their surroundings. Unlike the high-tech pods all covered in a modern sheen, everything around them looked used, plain, and draped in earthly tones. As far as anyone could tell, they'd all been dumped into a military installation more like Area 51 than the base in Teufort. Several of each of the class' uniforms hung in racks in an almost hidden corner of the room. Sunlight peeked through dirt-covered windows.
Once feeling had returned to his legs, Scout came to his senses and wasted no time in crawling out of his pod, groping his hands at the frigid concrete floor,
"Ok, do any of you know what the hell's goin' on?" he groaned, "Cause I sure don't." His fellow mercenaries began exiting their pods and fought against their own weighed down legs.
"I jus' went to sleep in my bed like normal..." Engie replied, "And then I woke up here with y'all!" He shook his head. Scout had rarely seen him before without his goggles over his eyes, and noticed the unease in them. The Soldier sprang out of his pod and stood up at attention. He said to them gravely,
"Men, I'm afraid to have to break it to you, but there can only be one explanation for this: the Commies have taken over the whole operation and brought us to the Motherland." His eyes glistened with fervent defiance. "They say a man ain't whipped 'till he quits, and we'll never give them the satisfaction-"
"Impossible!" Heavy butt into his speech, "Our training was well-guarded secret, the Soviet Union could not know!" The Soldier turned to the Russian as if he were going to accuse him of treachery, yet somehow held his tongue. Meanwhile, the Spy (who was wearing his mask despite being only in boxer shorts otherwise) set his gaze to a timer set into his and everyone else's tube that had counted down to zero.
"To whoever put us here, it was of upmost importance that we were not awake for the journey from the base."
"Oh, really?" Scout sniped. The Spy shot him a glare, and then gestured back at the timer,
"We were put to sleep for 24 hours or less," he noted, causing Scout to shoot back,
"Thank you, Spy. For a second there I thought we might'a woken up in the future or somethin'!" The Spy grit his teeth, but said nothing more. The mercs all managed to stand up and began trudging towards the racks with stiff backs and jellied legs, save for one hungover Demoman who was still finding his bearings on the floor. The Soldier turned on one leg and went back to pick up the Scot, warning him not to fall behind on the battlefield.
Scout stood by and observed his teammates while they put on their uniforms, and in particular studied their faces which, for the most part, read nothing more than simple annoyance at the situation. It confounded him. The only thing keeping Scout from breaking out into a panic was his desire to not make a fool of himself in front of the others. How were they not freaking out right now? If any of them were, they were damn good at hiding it. Before today, Scout would've struggled to say that being around a team mostly comprised of freaks, idiots, and maniacs would be any comforting, but right now?
A thought popped into his head: Had this sort of thing happened to all of them before except himself? Somehow, it seemed like a frightening possibility. He tuned back in to the others' conversations; the Sniper had been saying,
"I'll give whoever done this exactly 5 seconds to squeal before I put my foot up their asses." The Medic put on his spectacles, and added enthusiastically,
"Nein! Ve should use my medical tools instead..." Scout was about to ask the doctor where he'd get his equipment in a place like this before he caught sight of a whole workshop that had been concealed by the racks. Firearms and melee weapons of all kinds hung from nails on a white wall while toolboxes and medical kits sat on the floor along with an assortment of cardboard boxes with unknown contents. The weapons weren't even all generic - many of them were tailor-made for specific classes (Heavy's beloved minigun, Sasha, was bound to be somewhere in there).
After all the men were suited up, there was only one way to go: forward. With Heavy boldly taking the lead, Team Fortress departed from the room where they awakened. Everything past this wing would be unfamiliar territory. As they went into the corridor the mercs were bottlenecked into walking in a straight line, each step so deliberate they were tiptoed. Scout found himself at the back of the line behind Pyro, who was spurned by Demoman after he tried to clutch his back.
They came to a stop at a fork leading to three possible entrances. Without a word they kept going straight. As they passed by the openings to the left and right, Scout took a few seconds to look into each room. To the left was a sterile-looking kitchen holding a fridge and stacks upon stacks of canned goods. To the right, a decent-sized bathroom hurt Scout's eyes to peek at with its bright lights. Heavy and the rest of the guys' bulk prevented Scout from seeing where they were going.
When they were at last able to spread out in this new wing, the largest one by a wide margin, Scout couldn't believe what he was seeing - it was like they ended up going inside a completely different building; compared to the other rooms, this place was downright cozy, being decked out with a sofa, a few couches, a couple of chairs, a little fireplace, a full bookshelf, and a carpeted floor... Sure, it looked like someone lazily threw a bunch of furniture into a warehouse, but Scout could appreciate the gesture.
Still dumbfounded, the team were again at a loss for words. Finally, Scout asked quietly,
"Is this our new base?" The others made uncertain noises,
"I was under the impression that we were to stay at the base in Teufort for a long while," Spy stated. "We trained there, we lived there..." he trailed off, and his eyes darted back and forth between his teammates. The Spy scratched his chin; he seemed to be coming to some sort of conclusion. He strode past each of the mercs and pointed a finger at them, "Gentlemen, I need you all to use your brain matter and remember what happened before you went to sleep."
Scout immediately jumped in,
"Oh, oh! I was comin' back from the can and I saw Ms. Pauling walking around outside!" the mention of the elusive Administrator's assistant intrigued the mercenaries.
"Did she say anything to you? Did you notice anything strange about her?"
"Uh, no." Scout answered honestly, "But I remember I was like: 'Wow, she looks good today.'" 7 and a half pairs of eyes bore into him. He would've bolted out of there if it weren't for his locked feet. Team Fortress collectively decided to forget what they just heard, and Spy went back to pressing the others to recall past events, but soon it was clear no man saw anything out of the ordinary during their last day at the base.
"Well, that was illuminating," the Frenchman sighed. The men turned their heads to a door with a window at the far end of the room. Engie took a few cautious steps towards the door,
"Might as well see what's outside," he said. With the rest of the team crowded right behind him, the Engineer gripped the handle and pulled the door open. The sun's light was blinding, the only sounds were gentle wind and footsteps against dry dirt. Now the mysterious settlement could be viewed from the outside, though the appearance of the building itself wielded no answers. Several of the mercs took a few steps around the empty space to make sure what they were looking at was real. Scout knew one thing for sure: he was seeing a whole lot of nothing.