THE END OF TF2: Part 1, in which an announcement is made.

The alarm almost went unheard, struggling as it did over the frantic booms and whooshes of the battlefield.

Almost.

"ATTENTION, COMBATENTS" said the cool female voice.

Then a pause. The voice didn't seem to know quite what it was doing.

Heat radiated in waves off the tin roofs of Dustbowl (pop. 1402 and falling.) A few faces (lightly dusted, or covered in blood) turned to the speakers.

"A SHORT MESSAGE FOLLOWS."

What followed, however, was not a message. As sounds began to flow beguilingly from the speaker, the mercenaries, one by one, stopped fighting, more out of amazement than anything else. A red Demoman, lifting his eye patch quizzically, more or less summed up the feelings of the field.

"Music?" he said.

Indeed, soft babbling music was flowing from the speakers dotted around the battlefield, bringing to mind (in its antiseptic pleasantness), thousands of doctors' waiting rooms long-forgotten, and the ghosts of elevators past.

"I remember music..." said a BLU spy. He paused briefly in the act of raising the knife, and kicked the foot of the inattentive RED sniper he'd been about to perforate.

"Eh. Connard. Music." he said.

The sniper spun, terror melting to anger melting to frank disbelief. Then he too heard the music.

"What in the bloody hell...?"

He approached the edge of the platform, and stared down at the masses below him. Two scouts, hands at each others throats, had stopped and had joined the gathering crowd at the foot of the telephone pole, staring at the speakers. RED flipped his earpiece away inquisitively. ("Wassa'?")

(Away on a hillside, a medic, lost in dreams of the old Operamrheinhaus in Duisburg, tapped his foot appreciatively to the measured, orderly calm of one of the meister's finest works. "Ahh..." he said, "Bach...")

One last hollow clang rang out; odd counterpoint to the fine, measured rhythm of the music. The last engineer sheepishly put his wrench down. "Sorry," he said to the unhearing crowd. And joined them.

It only took a second for some one to draw a conclusion in the eerie, still silence created by the sudden surcease of combat. "Phone music." said one Heavy flatly. His Medic, used to deciphering cryptic Russian in far worse conditions, still had to raise an eyebrow.

"Hein?" he said.

"Phone music. Vhen they make you vait on zeh phone." said the Heavy sullenly.

The heavy's voice was booming enough to carry his words to others in the crowd, leaving whispers spreading like ripples in the wake of a dropped pebble.

"He's right, you know..."

"...stalling tactic-"

"hate it when they do that-"

"hold..."

"...hold"

"We've been out on hold." concluded the Medic.

"Da. Phone music." rumbled the Heavy.

The music ceased, with an abrupt scratch that suggested the wanton abuse of a helpless record player. (At least three engineers- obviously connoisseurs of the finer music systems- winced in unison.) Sounds of scuffling came over the mic.

"ATTENTION COMBATENTS", said the voice.

Wind howled over the scrubby grasslands. There was a pause.

"CEASE FIRE." said the voice.

Hardly necessary. In an entirely unprecedented situation, the whole place was motionless and silent. (Well, not strictly true- one RED scout cracked a crit-o-cola, took a swig and passed it wordlessly to his BLU counterpart, also staring in mute astonishment at the speakers.)

"HEAR THIS:" said the voice. "AS OF 19:45 TODAY, ALL ENEMY AND COUNTER-ENEMY ACTION WILL CEASE. REPEAT: AS OF 19:45 TODAY, ALL COMBAT ON BOTH SIDES WILL CEASE. ALL CLASSES ARE TO GIVE UP THOSE WEAPONS THAT DO NOT BELONG TO THEM UPON RETURN TO BASE. ALL PERSONNEL THAT ARE STILL ALIVE WILL BE PROVIDED WITH RETURN TRANSPORT EQUAL TO THAT USED IN ARRIVAL. AND WE'LL TRY TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT BACKLOG OF PAYCHECKS. THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME, GENTLEMEN, BUT THE WAR IS OVER. I REPEAT: THE WAR HAS BEEN WON."

Then a harsh screech as the mic was cut.

A pause...

And then an almost instinctive drawing apart between the teams, and a great inrush of breath. "Waitwaitwaitwaitwait!" said a RED Scout, bat already defensively drawn. "What time is it?" "Eight O'clock", said the astonished spy who had been preparing to dig a blade in his ribs. "Ja," said a BLU medic, snapping shut a pocket watch with an authoritative click, "Or a little after."

...

Reader, can anyone describe the chaos that followed? To say "dancing in the streets" is an understatement. To say "noise fit to shake the walls of Jericho" is an understatement. To say "multiple cases of sweaty make-outs" is an understatement indeed. The place shook. The place bounced. One Demoman took an overenthusiastic swig from his bottle and nearly had his other eye out. Scoutsplosions dotted the landscape. (In a private corner many miles from the main square, A RED sniper sheepishly muttered a long-pent-up confession to a BLU spy and was rewarded with a double handful of flying-leap Spah and a nicotine kiss you could strip paint with.)

And when the noise died down, there was the healthy chatter of schoolchildren released for summer holidays, and a movement- as one- as a chanting, dancing, singing whole- to the bases, to prepare -finally- for the long ride home.

The music they were listening to could well be Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 6, which I have heard through more phone systems than I ever would have voluntarily. I personally find Bach too fussy, though- Pachebel's canon in D works better (but it works better *everywhere*, amirite? Ooooooh, Bach-burn!)