I have been out of the writing game for a while now. I write and usually it sits in a pile of documents that has never seen the light of day.
In the end these documents stay as a general start to an idea either featuring OCs or OOC cast that I feel people won't like, this and the next few documents I post though were done as a request by a reviewer. My story "End of The Line" was written in response to the comic "Zarya's Uncle" by FDD or Felle on Tumblr (if you want to find it search Zarya's uncle Overwatch comic. Its all in black and white). This comic is written as a flashback Zarya has while visiting the grave of her Uncle The Heavy from Team Fortress 2, and the story is The Heavy's side of this comic. And this thing took off.
When I say take off I mean this thing really went big with fans of Team Fortress and Overwatch both and I people kept asking me to continue it… but I didn't feel right continuing a story I had no right to continue. But then finnstar contacted me asking that I wrote oneshots for the other mercs and it wasn't for their sides of the story just one shots about them… but I thought I'd be nice.
And now we start into the story… we start at the Sydney Airport in Australia late 1960s.
The airport was cold and calm compared to the people rushing to and fro within it. Men and women dressed in sharp suits all too engrossed in their own goings on to notice the scruffy hunched man strolling through their midst. His boots were dusty and had strange looking reddish brown stains adorning their heels and toes, his jacket sleeves rolled up to the arms and teeth both human and animal in appearance adorned a few strings hanging from the pocket buttons. His hat was battered and worn but one side stayed straight standing straight up against the wear of time while the other had flopped to hang along the rest of the brim, glasses covered his eyes heavily shaded rather than his usual yellow tinted spectacles and a bandanna was pulled down 'round his neck and a long heavily engraved leather tube was slung over his shoulder covered in shapings of beautiful animals and landscapes telling a thousand tales.
The hot air rushed freely into the airport as the man stepped from the airport, a welcome feeling compared to the artificial cold he'd felt in the airport… no this was truly what Australia was; a hot unrelenting dry land where only the tough survived and the weak died. Sniper was home.
Hitching a ride with an older gentleman who was returning from dropping off family at the airport was easy enough and as he climbed into the truck bed he looked around the airport and city recalling his home from long ago to the front of his mind and how things had changed. Old dusty paved streets and small but still bustling towns had evolved in the many years he'd been gone into large metal and steel empires with machines and buildings reigning high over the rest of the city overlooking the entirety of the country.
As they passed through sniper elected simply to pull down his hat and drift off letting the warm sun overhead and the lull of the truck take him to sleep.
It was peaceful in the outback and as sniper and the old gentleman trundled along the road heading to his home things seemed to be going well. Perfect.
The airport's cold air did not penetrate the heavy coat of the clothed figure strolling with purpose through the airport, their form hidden and a heavy metal briefcase in hand their clothing clean and new almost like it'd been bought days before. Stepping from the airport into the hot air the figure flagged down a taxi and ordered it to take them off to a little plantation out in the shrub, an odd place for a figure such as them.
As Sniper hopped out the back he offered the old man some bills which the man kindly took in return for the trip and as he pulled away Sniper turned to look at the plantation that was his home. No longer a true working plantation his few horses were minded by a stable hand he'd brought on before his departure for Team Fortress Industries' position and the old watcher's post still stood to the right of the large house looking as homely as he remembered.
Stepping through the gates Sniper walked past the stables and waved at the stablehand finally swapping to his usual glasses before stepping into the house. Dust did not greet him, instead the hint of lavender fabric soap and wood polish did. The house was clean and sparkling unlike the dusty building he had expected after this many years away, maybe that stable hand had more use in her than he thought.
Entering the large bedroom he'd claimed upon purchasing the property sniper found everything the way he'd left it. His blades hanging on the wall all six of them in good condition, better than the three had had taken with him. He'd have to reshape and work on those before he'd use them again, the only reason he kept using them during the wars was respawn the miraculous thing that it was would return the edge to its sharpened state every time he died so anything he struck that chipped or dulled the blade was negated when he died. Handy considering how often he struck something that damaged them.
His rifles still hung on their spots, an old breach loading long rifle he'd found with the house worn but still working. A relic of times long gone. And his first rifle his father had help him make; a crude handle and stock cut from the trees behind his family home and barrel and scope from scrap metal that was deemed thick enough to support the small 22 caliber load he'd been allowed to shoot.
Opening the leather case he withdrew his rifle, worn though it was from the years its blood wood stock that he'd had for years still held strong now engraved and carved as it was from hours and days spent doing nothing at all but cleaning his weapons the stock and foregrip were covered in intricate designs styled after his homeland to remind him of it. The metal was shined and clean, a trick soldier had taught him about gun oil had helped remove any of the small rust spots that had collected after the first few months on the field something he wasn't used to in Australia as the rifle had never had to handle the humidity of the American south. The old scope had long since been replaced though for a slightly newer and advanced scope, a gift from the Spy on their parting; thermal vision for night-time work and a smaller form factor helped bring the size of the rifle down while keeping the old scope's view distance.
Setting the rifle onto the rack he only barely noticed that bot head hanging from the strap; a token of the bot wars they'd fought that he'd strapped to the rifle just to further stick it to their creator Gray Mann. Setting down on the bed sniper slipped from his jacket, sat his hat and glasses on the nightstand, kicked off his boots and rolled over to sleep a truly restful sleep surrounded by the sounds of his home.
And here's the beginning of the story before the end. This might seem a little confusing but I'm writing these chapters in a semi broken fashion to better explain the story. In short this tale is not at it's end for the sniper, not yet at least.