Badlands was a generally calm place for the BLU Sniper. During the day a round of fighting would start near around 7:30 and end in a couple hours, depending on how long it took for one of the teams to capture a point. Despite the caution and stress most of his teammates had to utilize on the battlefield, sniping was generally a calmer sort of job; even when his post was spotted and he needed to move. Dying was usually quick and painless, most commonly he was either headshot or blown to smithereens, only to be respawned seconds later. The RED Sniper was keen to keeping him on his toes, yet despite that, they seemed on generally at the same skill levels. The Spy didn't usually go out of his way to kill him unless he really started wracking in kills. Even then, the Sniper always had the Razorback.
Today was one of those good days. Well, actually, the last couple days had been pretty nice. He'd gotten the most kills out of both teams four days in a row already, and now looked right on his way to a fifth. He let a small chuckle escape between his lips as he got a bull's eye on an enemy scout. Right in between the eyes. "Bloody fast, wanka, but not fast enough," He mused more to himself than anything, watching the battlefield half-attentively. The match was nearly over, and he really had no need to get any more kills. He watched through his scope, at the farthest point. Most of his team was crowded around it, excluding Spy and Scout. The two never seemed to stay put for long.
Sniper tapped his lower lip with his fingers, thinking. He almost never moved at all, and yet his two favored chums were all over the place. Each of their demeanors was drastically different, although they still got along generally well. They balanced each other in a way, he supposed.
The Sniper was wrenched from his thoughts by a distinct, blaring voice. The match was over.
"BLU victory! Return to your respective bases- the respawn machines will shut down in five minutes." A woman called over the intercom in a slightly disgusted voice. The sniper snorted.
"Of course." The admin never seemed happy, despite various outcomes, and the sniper had decided that she was just a bitter old hag. The sniper stood, lowering his gun, and way almost immediately was met by a buzzing in his ears. The Razorback hummed irrelatively, and the sniper whipped around, unsheathing his machete. "Ah, bloody spooks. Come to your lungs carved out, wanka?" He hissed, gazing around the cramped space of his nest. The back covering continued to vibrate, sending a shiver up his spine.
A few seconds of silence enveloped the room, sans the buzzing. Suddenly the Sniper's throat prickled with the feel of cold metal, and a hand grasped around his wrist. The spook had perched himself in the wide frame of the window. "Mon chere, I assure you, I'm not ze one zhat's going to 'ave anything carved today." The voice was full of spite, and he recognized the vocal of the RED Spy. Not that he would have expected anyone else. His fist instinct was to jerk away, but that would merely open the opportunity of slitting his throat himself. So, he decided to humor his captor.
"What do you mean by that?" He spat, dropping his weapon as the knife on his flesh pressed a bit harder.
"You will see, mon chere… Patience."
"Yo, Spook. You seen Snipes?" The BLU Scout ran up behind the team's Spy, a bloody bat slung over his shoulder. As the Spy glanced back, he gave the bat a disapproving grimace before replying.
"No, mon ami. I'm sure 'e's merely returning from 'is post." He muttered, lighting up a cigarette. Scout made sure to cough overdramatically as the smoke began to swirl away from the Spy, who rolled his eyes in return.
"I," he coughed, "don't think," again, "I've seen him," Cough, hack, hack, hack. "All da-"
"Stop zhat. If you'd like, we can go check to see if 'e's still at 'is post," He frowned, half leering at the boy.
"Fine. God." He muttered a bit, crossing his arms across his chest and huffing dramatically. The hissy attitude quickly evaporated as the Scout suddenly had an /amazing/ idea. "Yo, Spook, I've got a deal for ya."
The Spy snorted a bit. The Scout was always making deals with the Spy. It was a bit annoying, but even more so when he bargained something he knew the Spy would want, like the extra daggers he had found on the Red Spy's corpse, or a Hershey bar. How the Scout had figured out that he liked chocolate, the world may never know. "Very well. What is it?"
"I'll race ya to the ladder. You win, you get the pack of M&Ms I found in the pantry, I win, I get to use you watch for the rest of today." His eyes glimmered excitedly. Spy always kept the troublesome teenager away from his gadgets.
"Hm, how about this," The Spy bargained, a small purr coming to his voice at the offering of chocolate. "We both know you're faster than me. Therefore, you should have to run backwards."
Scout snorted, considering for a moment "Wuss! Fine. Don't expect to win, though. I'm the best there is."
Spy smiled a bit. "Naturally."
And they were off.
The Red Spy suddenly swung his foot under the Sniper's legs, careful to withdraw his knife; causing the man to fall to the floor. He was able to catch himself, but his knees still hit the wooden boards painfully. Before he could stand or even go for his machete, the metal was back at his neck, and Sniper's breath caught in his throat as graceful fingers unbuckled his belt, easily whisking it out of the loops of his pants. "Your hands, mon ami?" It was a question, but it only had one answer. As he brought his hands up behind his back, the bushman mentally kicked himself for not paying more attention to check for spies.
The Spy bound his hands tightly, and released the knife from the Sniper's neck. He let out a grunt of satisfaction, an walked around to face the Sniper, who was sneering at the spook from behind his aviators.
"You know, mon ami, you really made it too easy this time…" The Spy's head tilted ever so slightly, as if in thought.
"Expect to he headshot a couple times next match, bloody Spook." He spat in response.
"Hon hon hon~, but mon chere, this /will/ be your last match." The Spy's look of slight confusion and thoughtfulness melted into a devious smile, and Sniper's blood suddenly felt cold. Or maybe that was the effect of cut circulation in his hands. "'Aven't you wondered why I didn't bother killing you yet?" He knealt down to the Sniper's level. "I'm waiting. Let's just say zhat your friends on BLU will need a new sniper by the end of the day…" The slender man lifted the Sniper's chin with his pointer finger, forcing him to make eye contact from behind his glasses. "Let's 'ave some fun while it lasts, 'owever, no?" And with that he drew the butterfly knife for a second time.
Sniper could feel the butterfly knife run into his flesh, tracing lines over his skin as he clenched his jaw down tightly. The Sniper now knew all too well what the Red Spy had meant. He was literally /carving/ into the sniper. He started along his left forearm, making lines across and vertical, digging the blade into the muscle. Blood seeped out. He felt like screaming in pain as his nerves raged, but all he could manage were the constant swears and insults spewing at the Spy. The red member had pushed him back out of his kneeling position and against the wall.
"What a filthy mouth you have, jarman." Sniper wanted to move, to shove the man away, to slaughter him. The further the Spy dug in to rip more muscle and skin however, the more blood dripped out, and the weaker he felt. The figure was quietly smiling. Not a crazed one, but a casual smug smile, as if he had won a game of cards. He ripped through the vest and shirt to continue his art, and the sniper's eyes fell to his arm. The muscle was ripped up, lines scaling the whole length. If felt as if it was on fire, burning endlessly with pain.
Twitching his arm sent even more incredible agony though it, and his breath caught in his throat. The pain was spreading, the fire, he could say. It was going up his shoulder and across his chest, careful to avoid the main arteries, for now. His eyes fluttered closed, and he could see the lines in his mind's eye- imagine them. He wasn't much of a creative man, but the pain, it was so /vivid./ The lines were moving up, now, to a vertical. It spread to his neck, but the cuts weren't as deep, recognizing that it was more vulnerable. The pain still screamed in his mind, though. His throat tightened.
"Mon chere, no need to look so /stressed./ the fin part comes next…" The voice purred into his ear. The Sniper flinched away. Most of his shirt was drenched with blood, and he was starting to feel cold.
"Spawn is now off!" The intercom blared outside. How had that only been five minutes? He wondered. It had felt like forever…
"It's about time, wi?" The voice purred again, an edge of excitement within the French accent. The knife ran up his neck, following the curve under his chin. It fell slightly out of rhythm underneath as the sniper swallowed nervously, but nevertheless stayed true. It was soon going up his chin, over his lip, past his nose, all the way up to his aviators. It stopped there, and the spy bided his time, tracking where the aviators covered, around his cheeks and the side of his head, and up onto his forehead. From there the cuts began to get deeper, and he whimpered a bit as horizontal lines began to fill the left side of his face.
Finally the knife fell away from the sniper's face, and he opened his eyes wearily. The Spy was looking him over with satisfaction, like an artist would observe a job well done. He leaned forward. "Hm… Still missing something, no?" He gazed into the gradient of the aviators, and plucked them from the Australian's face. "Time for the finale." They locked eyes for a second, even with his vision and mind going fuzzy with blood loss; he could sight the spy's grin. "Now, mon ami, which eye do you snipe with? No need to answer, I already know." As the Spy began to close in, Sniper visibly flinched, lifting his good hand to attempt to defend himself. However, he could not seem to stop it from shaking, and the Spy easily moved it away.
"N-no… Please…" He begged as the spy flashed him a smile. "Don't…"
"My apologies mon ami." A bloody liar, and he knew it. The Spy wanted this, to hear him beg, to see him suffer. He plucked the aviators off Sniper's face, revealing his eyes, between blue and green, like his Red counterpart's. "Hold still, now." Spy purred, holding the left eye open with his gloved index finger and thumb.
He screamed, slightly craning his neck back. It was not voluntary; the pain instantly triggered it. The sharp edge pierced through his cornea, and the fluids seeped out onto his face. He continued to howl as the knife explored into his scull, or so it felt, carving. He began to fall unconscious. "Not much pain tolerance built up, hm? You can't go yet, mon chere." He was now trying to carefully scrape the remains of the eye out of the Sniper's skull, despite the blood and mystery liquids pouring out. The other eye was also releasing liquid, but to the Spy's amusement, it was made of tears. The Sniper let out a strangled sob, but managed to choke the rest down, biting his lip as the Spy finished up. His vision was blurred, and the now empty socket burned with the vigor of ten times the rest of the wounds. A few more sobs escaped and blood poured out. He definitely felt light-headed, yet the pain blocked out almost everything else.
"Mon ami, it's done," The voice cooed, then urging him to open his eyes. He did so, the feeling of clammy sweat and stick blood coming along with it, including the increased burning as the now empty socket met open air. The Spy was holding his eye in his hand. He could tell despite the blurry vision. It was mangled, and if the Spy had just brought it to him without knowing anything else of it, he wouldn't have guessed it was an eye. They spy's gloves were saturated red with his blood. "Now, it's finally the end for you. I have grown bored with this game." The butterfly knife was a glimmering smear in his vision. The sniper's eye fluttered shut. "Bonjour et au revoir, vous-"
"Yo! Spook!" A Bostonian accent cut off the Frenchman as the clank of shoes on ladder came into ears detection. The spy moved away a bit, shifting his position. The floor creaked as he stood, and the sniper's choked a bit as he tried to suppress another sob and failed. "Woah, holy shit, man! What the fuck did you do?"
"It seems I have gotten blood on my suit…" The Spy muttered a bit, more to himself than anything else. Sniper heard the sudden click of a revolver, and a gunshot echoed through the post. Someone cried out, but the voice was deeper, not that of the Scout at all. If his mind would have been working on full blood supply, the events would have clicked, but instead he was starting to shiver, mind going foggy. He was pretty sure he would pass out soon. "Unfortunately for you, our team's Scout has never called me Spook, specifically because I told him not to." He growled.
A bullet had planted itself in the imposture's thigh, causing him to stumble and lower to one knee. The Blu spy stared at his counterpart with livid, piercing eyes. He noted somewhere not to refer to the Red spy as 'Spook,' then directed his thoughts to other matters. He didn't get a good look at the sniper, given that the Spy was standing directly in front of his view, but he and the Scout had both heard the pained yelling. For now he had to keep the Red Spy busy.
"Throw your weapons out," The Red Spy directed, nodding to outside the post's door. In response his counterpart tossed his gun, knife, disguise kit, and sapper off the edge, wincing as he heard the clacks on the ladder and packed earth. "The watch, too." He scowled, but undid the watch and threw it over his shoulder. The Red Spy gave an approving nod, a smug smile on his face. "My lucky day, I get to kill two birds with a single stone." He took a step towards the immobile spy, but was abruptly stopped.
"Hey, chucklenuts, not so fast." The Spy looked over his shoulder to see the Blu Scout hanging on the windowsill, his Force-O-Nature in hand, pointed at the Red Spy. "Weapon down, fuckface." He spat. The Blu Spy pulled an extra revolver from his suit, and cocked it at the Red Spy.
The Red Spy looked from the Spy to the Scout, scowled, and dropped the revolver, which the Blu Spy quickly collected, standing up carefully.
The Red Spy and Blu Scout locked eyes for a split second. "Get outta' here, rat." The Blu Spy move out of the doorway, and his counterpart quickly made his leave, the scowl never leaving his face.
Scout jumped in the window, and immediately jumped back into the wall at the sight of the Sniper. "Holy shit!" His voice cracked into a high pitch.
The Spy's eyebrows rose in shock for a second, looking over the countless cuts and wounds, and then the eye, which was seeping blood. He truly hoped that it wasn't… uhg, he didn't even want to imagine it. "Mon Dieu…" He kneeled at the Sniper's side, clear concern on his face as he looked more loosely at the eye. The Sniper's breath was shaky, and his skin was incredibly pale and clammy. He was out cold. Spy hesitantly opened the lid of the eye, and Sniper jerked away, his breath hitching. Spy's hand came away with blood. The eye was gone. He muttered a curse under his breath.
Scout had since recovered, taking the other side of the man. He touched the Australian's arm, finding it alarmingly cold. Scout pressed himself against the man, trying to keep his body temperature up. "Oh God, oh God, oh God," He moaned out of slight panic. "Respawn's not on, and look how fucked up he is!" His blue eyes were wide.
Spy slung Sniper's arm over his own shoulder, holding the other man around the waist. "Stand up, Scout." The boy did so, and the Spy then took over, moving into position to carry the bushman bridal style. "We need to hurry- Go get ze medic, I'll go as quickly as I can to meet you two." Scout nodded, his eyes still holding a glint of fear as he slid down the ladder rather than using it properly.
Spy had difficulty carrying the Sniper with the new wound planted in his leg, and every few steps would stumble as it gave away. He growled under his breath. The jarman's breathing was even shallower than before, and sounded wispy. Spy turned around cautiously, carefully planting his good leg onto the first bar, and lowering himself down, simultaneously carrying the man on his forearms and using his hands to stay on the ladder. The process was brooding with every step on the bad leg, and his arms were burning under the weight of his comrade- his figure was not made for lifting things, but to be limber and lightweight. The sudden change wasn't working out well.
He made it down the metal contraption after about two minutes of cursing how high up they were, being sure to press himself close to the Sniper's body. Despite the warm day, he was looking body temperature quickly. Spy continued to limp towards the base, paying careful attention to the Sniper's breathing. "Almost zhere, mon ami."
On the horizon, two Blu figures sprinted towards them, one holding several med kits, the other a gun-like contraption.