A/N: This story contains small references to my other fic, Falling, but it's not necessary to read that to understand what's going on in this one. The first song Engineer plays is fictional, the other is an old Swedish song called "Vem kan segla".

The ball hit the dry ground with a soft thump after travelling quite a long distance through the air. It had just been hit by a bat for the fifteenth time that evening. Soon, a young man would pick it up and hit it again. And he did. The ball flew through the air again, and the blue-shirted boy came running after it as fast as he could. They were alone, the boy and the ball, alone on a big, dry field outside a big, industrial building.

The boy was a Scout. Not just a Scout, actually, for the team he was on, he was just Scout. He would be identical with the Scout on the opposite team, if it weren't for the scar on his left cheek. It was quite late, the sun had set a long time ago, but Scout did not stop hitting and running after the ball.

It was a nice game, it was fun, and it was training both his running and his batting. Those things were his most important abilities, as well as his infamous double-jumping technique, which he preferred to keep secret. He tried to run as fast as he could after hitting the ball, making him wheeze for air after a short time, but he didn't stop. He was pushing himself to his limits and beyond.

If you watched Scout closely, you'd see that he was clearly waiting for someone. Now and then he looked impatiently at one particular door, which led into the hospital part of the base. Now and then he mumbled something like "what's taking him so long?".

For just a couple of hours ago, he'd been out fighting in a mission for the first time in quite a long time, after an accident that caused him to break several bones in his body. After killing for the first time, he'd really started to enjoy missions, especially since they didn't really die, instead, they got placed back in the point where they'd started the mission, the spawn point. This process was called respawning, a quite uncomfortable experience, sometimes even very painful. This process was also the reason the BLU Scout was out playing ball this late.

He was waiting for someone. Someone who was more than a friend to him, someone most people would have called him Scout's boyfriend, but he still hadn't quite accepted the fact that he was, well, bisexual, so he tried to avoid using that word. Besides, they'd kept it a secret, him and Sniper, that they were more or less a couple, as it was a pretty weird relationship, and none of them wanted the others to know they were gay.

Stunning blue eyes were carefully observing everything under a grey caps. Scout had learned to be careful with his surroundings, as you'd never know when a RED mercenary popped out and killed you. Respawning outside missions was a very difficult process for some reason, it usually took very long, and left the newly spawned person extremely tired. You didn't want to get killed when you were out alone like this.

Hands wrapped in bondages picked up the hard baseball. It was covered in dust. The boy's ears was top focusing, taking in every little sound around him, from the grasshoppers playing, to the wind gently blowing a couple dry leaves over the ground.

It was a beautiful night, the stars were shining bright, and the moon was full and bigger than Scout had ever seen. He sat down in the middle of the field and gazed up at the night sky. This was highly unlike him, he wasn't the kind of person who used to watch the stars, but they were so bright and clear, making him feel so tiny. He wished he had Sniper here now, telling him stories and tales about the stars and the moon, but it was okay to be here alone, too.

Engrossed in the stars, Scout almost didn't hear the sound of footsteps approaching him. But he did, and in one swift motion, he stood up and hit the ball as hard as he could in the direction of the noise.

"Ow!" The voice was familiar to Scout, he only knew about two men with a Texan accent like this. It was highly unlikely that the owner of the voice was RED, as the Engineers didn't use to sneak up on people like this when trying to kill them.

"Whoops, sorry, dude." Scout ran over to the Texan and picked up the ball he'd batted at him. "Thought'cha were somebody else."

"Still all 'shoot first, ask later'?"

"Yeah, you never know when some RED chucklehead decides to show up."

They walked to one of the walls of the concrete building together and sat down. Scout loved the fresh night air, he soon started to love the stars and the moon, too, the entire night got a special place in his heart. In the corner of his eye, he saw the hardhat ready his guitar.

Soon, beautiful, soft tones were filling the night, filling Scout with a warm feeling of peace. When he looked up at the starry sky, he was just a boy from Boston again, not a man who spent his time killing other people. He shivered as Engineer started singing. It was a song he'd never heard before, a song about travelling far, far away from everybody he'd loved, and returning back again after fighting in a gruesome war, just to see that everything had changed, though nothing had changed. It was he who was different from before he'd left.

The moon shone brightly down at the two mercenaries, who were sitting into the grey, textureless building. The oldest playing a beautiful song, youngest of them struggling to keep his tears in. He failed. They sparkled in the moonlight as they ran down his face, which was facing up at the white moon. He dropped his ball, which rolled a couple of feet away from them.

Engineer stopped playing as he noticed the boy next to him was crying silently.

"No," Scout whispered. "Continue."

And Engineer continued. It'd been such a long time since Scout had let his tears out, he preferred to not let anybody see them, but right now, it felt so right, the song was amazing, the setting was so peaceful and he missed Sniper so much, even though they'd just be parted for some hours.

"What's takin' so long," he mumbled to himself, wiping his nose with the back of his hand.

"I don't know," Engineer replied without stopping playing. "May be some problems with the respawn system. It have been a bit laggy lately."

Scout looked terrified at him. "What do you mean, 'problems'?"

"Nothin' dangerous, as far as I know, it jus' takes a bit longer to respawn." Then he added: "I think."

"You think? Wha- what if he doesn't come back?" He tried to imagine Sniper being dead for good, but it was impossible, even in his wildest fantasies, that was impossible. He shook his head in denial. "No."

"Now, you listen here, boy," the Texan said calmly. "He'll be back. I promise. You jus' go to bed, and when you wake up, he'll be there."

Too upset to notice that Engineer had implied he knew about the relationship, Scout just said: "You sure?"

"I am."

If anybody had told Scout six weeks ago that he would be sitting under the stars, waiting for his boyfriend to return, crying to the guitar playing to Engineer, he'd laughed like it was some sort of crazy story. He had changed, just like the man in Engineer's song. Yawning widely, he looked at the guitar player.

"That's a fantastic song."

Engineer nodded. "Thanks," he said. "I've written it myself."

Scout was impressed. Not only could this guy play guitar like nobody else, he also wrote songs. A thought struck him out of nowhere.

"This song," he asked, "is it... About you?"

"Yep," the other man replied.

They'd all been hired as mercenaries to fight in this war, but instead of armies, they were just teams of nine. Nine highly different people, who got more and more inseparable as time went. Their pay was good, Scout had been defrauded in the start, though, not getting as much money as he should, but Sniper had helped him fix that.

But even though they were just hired, even though they weren't really killing, even though this was just a stupid battle over some land and things, the war changed them. It does things with a guy to shoot people almost every day, as well as it does things with you to get shot, blasted to pieces, burned and beat up almost every day.

He wondered if he'd changed so much that home wasn't home for him anymore. Then the RED Spy showed up in his mind, his Ma's lover. Home wouldn't be home as long as that guy existed. Home wouldn't be home before he forgave his mother for what she'd done.

A soft wind stroke Scout's chin as he took of his hat. He felt like having it off for a change, as there was no bright sun he needed to cover his eyes from. They sat in silence for some time, just watching the stars, before Engineer finally said something.

"You should go to bed. It've been a tiresome day."

"But Snipes..."

"He'll come, just have patience."

"Okay. I'll go if you play me another song."

Engineer did so. The blue-shirted boy felt his heart ache as the Texan sung a new song, this time about parting.

Who can sail without the wind?
Who can row without oars?
Who can part from his friend
Without shedding tears?

The words made him miss Sniper even more, all he wanted to do was to lie in his arms, safe from the outside world.

I can sail without the wind,
I can row without oars,
But I cannot part from my friend
Without shedding tears.

"Why does beautiful songs have to be so sad?" It was hard for him to talk, as he had a painful lump in his throat.

The Engineer didn't respond to this, instead, he stood up and reached a sitting Scout a gloved hand. Scout took it, and got pulled up to a standing position.

"Goodnight, Scout," Engineer said, clapped the boy's shoulder and started to walk towards one of the many doors into the base.

"G'night, hardhat," Scout replied after him. "Oh, and I'd appreciate if ya didn't tell anybody 'bout this."

"No worries."

The boy in the blue shirt picked up the dusty baseball from the dry ground. As he was walking towards the van he'd shared with Sniper the past month, he looked up at the moon, who was watching over everybody. She probably knew where Sniper was right now, as she saw everything. As Scout approached the van, he looked up at her for the last time that night and asked her to do something before closing the door and going to bed.

"Please make sure he's safe."