Previous:
Our quiet little moment was interrupted by a knock at the door. Both of our heads snapped to the sound, and I could see Pyro shuffling his way toward me. I handed him his things back, he wrapped them back in the cloth quickly and placed it back in its rightful location in the case. He shoved the case back under the safety of his bed. Another knock came from the door.
"Hey Pyro, have you seen the Spy by any chance? The Female one." The Engineer said talking against the wooden door. Pyro looked at me, his notion asking if he should open the door. I nodded and he turned the knob open having the door creak forward.
"PHM HPM!" He said. He positioned his body as if he was really saying "TA DA!" I was still sitting down in the middle of the floor looking up at the country man.
"Ah there you are. I was wondering if ya' wanted to help out me and Sniper with some of the mechanical fixtures under one of the vehicles, but it seems that you're already busy... coloring?" My eyes shifted over to Pyro but he was already lifting me up from the ground and pushing me out the room. I turned around to say something but he already waved for me to go and closed the door. I turned to look at Engineer.
"Well, I don't know what all that was about but you wanna help?" A jolly personality, great.
"..." I nodded smiling, accepting the request. "Haha, great to hear. Follow me." He started walking and I followed behind him. I took one last glance back looking at the front of Pyro's closed door. I smiled a bit feeling good about digging a little deeper into the mind of the 'oh so monstrous' Pyro.
Continuation:
~{:Chapter 10-Helping out:}~
Engineer lead me out the back door of the base to enter the outside world. Even though it was still pretty early in the morning I could instantly feel the heat radiate off the ground. I rolled up the sleeves of my shirt and put my leather gloves in my back pocket. The rays of the sun fell down like daggers against my skin. My mask didn't help either, I felt like my head was being choked by the tight material, but I dealt with it. 'Jesus, how did Spy manage to breathe with this mask on, let alone in this heat.' I didn't understand, I honestly just wanted to rip the mask off. 'Control... Control...' I thought to myself.
"Damn, I swear it gets hotter and hotter each year." He said wiping his forehead with a dirty piece of cloth. "Just a little farther and then we can get to work." He looked back assuring me that I wouldn't have to walk much farther in the devils heat. I nodded looking around the dusted location. To my far right it didn't seem like much, just a path to nowhere, but to my right I could just see the tip of enemy base. It was pretty far away, but just a little to close for my comfort. I continued to walk behind the country man until we came upon a small little building. Maybe a garage?
"Here we are. It doesn't necessarily have air conditioning, but it's definitely cooler." He held the door open for me. I walked inside the, larger than average, garage seeing a few lights and a few cars, even a motorcycle. Each vehicle seemed to fit some of the mercenaries personalities. The farthest away was an old looking ambulance fitting for the Medic, a decent looking motorcycle for the Soldier, a pale light red truck that sat in the middle of the room for Engineer, and another car that was hidden under a car cover. I thought that maybe it was the Spy's but I wasn't 100% sure. I disregarded the Snipers van, because well it's always outside.
"Oi, you brought the sheila along." said the Australian. I turned my gaze to him and saw him sitting in one of the roller chairs by the working desk. It looked like the garage was Engineer's own workshop. It had all kinds of contraptions just for cars. A toolbox was left on the working desk along with car parts, blueprints, and oiled stained rags.
"Yeah, thought maybe she could help us with some of the more smaller spaced tasks." I watched Engineer walk toward his working space and grab a few tools.
"Seems about right." The Sniper said approaching the Engineers truck. I stood watching the Sniper open up the hood of the truck. He looked back at the country man and waited for him to give him instructions. "So whot's exactly wrong with your truck, mate?"
"The battery needs to be replaced, the wheels need to be rotated, oil needs to be changed, and the serpentine belt needs to be replaced as well."
"Alright, seems loike we got our work cut out for us. Where do ya' wanna start first?" Both of our eyes turned to the Engineer. He grabbed his car jack and stands, along with a few other tools to help unscrew the lug nuts on the tire. During the process of fixing up his truck, I'm pretty sure I became an expert on car mechanics in about 4 hours.
"We'll start with the wheels first, then move on to the oil, the serpentine belt, and then progress to the car battery." His goggles reflected off the light as he spoke. I nodded just agreeing to his words, not understanding a single word he just said at the time. In fact, I'm pretty sure I zoned out at the point where he said start. I saw the Engineer begin to place the car jack under the sides of the car while Sniper slid the car stands under all the wheels. I felt a little useless standing there doing nothing, but watched them do all the work so far. They stood back up taking a step back looking to see if the two side tires were even.
"Have any experience working with cars?" Engie said looking back at me. I shook my head no and shrugged. I remembered my dad talking about teaching me the basics of a car, but he never got around to showing me. I noticed the Engineer smile and watched his face light up with joy. "Well I'd be happy to show you a few things if you'd like." A small smile spread across my face. I was pretty excited to be doing hands on work, and being a help for the work.
"I'll take that as a yes." He gave my back a quick pat and went back over to his truck. His hand gestured for me to come over, I approached preparing to learn a little bit about mechanics.
We both bend down and look closer at the tires. He points to the tire of the wheel and begins his little lecture of what we're going to be doing. "We're going to be starting off rotating the tires. Essentially we are going to be taking off the tires and changing the position so that the tread wear can be evenly worn. Now the reason why you would even bother to rotate your tires is because the front tires and back tires wear differently. You have to think of weight distribution, more weight is going to be in the front than the back. Same goes for the sides of the car. The front right side of the car is more likely to be worn down than the front left wheel of the car. That's why you have to rotate your tires, otherwise you're going to have uneven tread wear." He patted the tires and stood back up. "You still with me?" I instantly nod understanding what was going on so far. I watched him grab his tool kit and bend down to the first tire. "The thing you have to know about rotating your tires is that there's a specific pattern you gotta follow. You either got Directional tires or Non-Directional tires. The type I got are Directional so we're just gonna take these babies and move them to the rear and move the back tires to the front." He gestured over to the tire we were at and then toward the back. 'Seems simple' I thought.
"Now we're just gonna unscrew all the lug nuts-which are these little screw lookin' things here-and take..." A loud crash echoed from behind us, our head instantly turning.
"Golly Slim you look like a deer in the headlights, ya' almost gave me a heart attack." Sniper was sitting in a chair by the working desk and propped his legs on the weak wood, causing it to topple over."
"Moi bad... But nooo, please, continue with your little lecture on cars to the sheila. Wouldn't want to interrupt that. I'll just be sittin' here... doing nothing..." Sarcasm poured out the Snipers mouth.
"Well since you're doing nothing. I need you to get the other side done while I show her how to do this side." Engineer didn't have to speak anymore, fore the Sniper was already out of the chair and grabbing the extra supplies to work to switch the tires. He focused his attention back on me and continued where he left off.
"So you're going to take them while I unscrew them with this lug nut wrench." He paused to take out the large bolts connected to the hub cap that he called lug nuts. He gave them to me one by one, I soon collected them all from the one tire. He took off the tires and placed on it's side on the ground. Moving onto the rear tire, Engie repeated the process as I did the same. This time he took the rear tire and placed it where, originally, the front tires was. The same destiny went for the front tire, now replaced as the back tire.
"Alright Spa come here, you wanna try putting back on the lug nuts? It's simple, I just want you to twist them back on like this." He demonstrated by taking one of the lug nuts from my hand and placing the bolt to it's rightful place. He looked at me and gestured his head for me to try, Engie took a step back to give me room. I placed all of the lug nuts beside me in a pile and took one spinning it around the screw until my strength couldn't spin it any further, repeated the process until they were all full. I looked over toward Engineer seeing him already put the new rear tire on in it's place. I scooted over to the side and did the same to the tire until it was complete. The Mechanical Engineer made his way behind me to the front tire and started tightening up the lug nuts. I noticed he went in a star motion when tightening the bolts to the car. I bent down to watch him and he told me what he was doing. The information was quite useful and interesting. He handed me the wrench and I looked at him with a 'what are you doing' facial expression.
"I want you to try it for yourself. Just go in the pattern that I did. All you gotta do are tighten up the back tires." I nodded and moved myself toward the back fitting the wrench onto the bolt. I went into the same pattern and motion, mimicking what he'd done.
"There ya' go, now you're learnin'." He encouraged.
I heard the sound of footsteps come from the other side of the truck, soon migrating over to my side. I didn't bother to look, knowing that it was Sniper who'd probably finished with the two tires. As my suspicions were right the Australians accent appeared.
"The two tires are finished, how's the sheila doin'?"
"She's doing great."
"Better than what the spook would do?"
The Engineer shook his head and chuckled. "He wouldn't even get his knees on the dirty floor." They both laughed, but I ignored them focusing on the task at hand. Once they all seemed to be tightened I sat my bottom on the heels on my feet and exhaled deeply. It was starting to get a little hot, even in the shaded garage, my mask and uniform did not help. I looked up at the two and noticed Engie with a white tank on with his pants rolled up halfway. His yellow helmet was also missing from his head, I got a good glance with what was underneath-sorta. There wasn't any hair, just a shiny bald head. Although, he still had his goggles on over his eyes. Some sweat glistened on the side of his face, while Sniper looked unphased. I wiped the back of my neck and stood up to take off the under armour revealing the black tank underneath.
"Want some water?" Engineer offered. I looked at him and nodded starting to get frustrated with the mask attached to my face. It felt like heat was radiating from the mask giving no insulation. 'uhhh... forget it. I'm going to lose my mind!' So what I did was take off the mask and wrapped my hair in a ponytail. I sat the constricting material beside me making sure I didn't lose it. I watched the gazes of both of the mercs stare in a little bit of disbelief. Engineer gave me a water bottle still holding the face that Sniper reflected back. I stared back with a 'What?' expression. I mean really, did I do something wrong? It's not like they've never seen me with my mask off, they saw me the first day I came here. What's so different from that day?
A small laugh came from the lanky man. "Haha, you are definitely not like the spook that's for sure mate." He shook his head grinning and took a sip of the water Engineer got for him.
I looked confused at the two. '...wait don't tell me Spy hasn't took off his mask?...' I thought.
"Oi, whot's that face for? Wait.. You do know right?" His glance shifted over to Engie who looked back at Sniper and shrugged.
"You sure got some moxie in ya' kid."
Moxie? what?
"Oi haven't seen the spook without his mask off in years. Oi don't even remember if he actually ever did take off his mask... Well at least not in front of the team." Sniper said taking a break to take a drink.
"Slims right, spa always kept his mask on. I just assumed, you bein' a spa and all, you would do the same. Guess ya' just proved me wrong." Engie gave out a small chuckle and patted the middle of my back. I turned fully around and sat down leaning my back against the wheel of the truck.
"Ey, stretch, what time is it?"
Sniper check the watch on his hand saying it was almost time for lunch. Engineer nodded and looked down at me. "Ready to learn how to change the oil?" Both of their eyes on mine. I stood up and dusted off my bottom before following over to the front of the car with Sniper and Engie. They lifted up the hood, I snaked my way between them to get a better look.
"You see this?" The mechanic asked pointed to the Engine.
I nodded a 'yes'. "Good this is the engine."
'well noooooooooo, I may be uneducated when it comes to cars but I know what an engine looks like.' Of course, I didn't have the will to say it to his face.
"Now if you come down here." He shifted himself toward the side of the car and slid himself partially underneath the car. I followed behind him, but on the other side of the vehicle. "The oil drain plug is located beneath the engine block near the crankshaft, right here." He pointed to another part of truck that looked like a knob. Seemed to be located easy enough.
"Sniper mind handin' me the 3/8" ratchet, extensions and oil pan."
"On it." I watched Sniper go through the toolbox and working desk to search for whatever Engineer just said. His feet could be seen from underneath the car walking all over the place, until he came behind Engie. "Here ya' go." He slid of the tools under the vehicle.
Engineer pulled the supplies over to the front where it sat in the middle of us. "Alright Sniper I'm gonna need you to twist off the oil cap off up there."
"Already did." Sniper replied back.
The country man's eyes-uh goggles-focused back on me. "Takes this." He handed me the wrench looking thing-what did he call it? A ratchet? Well he gave me it and pointed to the drain plug. "You're gonna take that ratchet and attach it to the plug and twist it off." I was more flexible when it came for my turn to do something. Thankfully being kind of weak and small I could stretch myself underneath the car quicker and easier. Immediately I placed the wrench on the bolt and started turning the ratchet. His hands jumped grabbing my arm causing me to stop and look alarmed.
"WHOA WHOA.. haha, hold on there partner. I gotta place the oil pan underneath before you start doing any of that. Unless you want to be covered in black lookin' oil."
I let go, feeling slightly embarrassed, and waited until he placed the pan to catch all the old used oil.
"Now you can go ahead and do it."
Once he gave me the okay I started to continue where I left off. I quickly took off the plug seeing the black oil come rushing out of it's holding cell. It looked disgusting, all thick and black. It reminded me of runny tar. YUCK! We both watched the black liquid goop fall into the container until it started to slow down.
"Aright you can twist the cap back on and then Slim will start pouring in the new oil. I did what I was told twisting back on the cap and tightening it back up with the ratchet wrench thingy. I slid back from underneath the truck and walked back to the front to monitor what Sniper was doing. Engie had gotten the bad oil from under the car and placed it beside one of garbage cans, he then walked back over to where me and Sniper were. I noticed that the Aussie was placing a white shaped funnel into the tube where the oil is suppose to go. He grabbed a jug of the oil and started to slowly pour in what was necessary. When he finished, he twisted back on the cap as Engie then took the oil dipstick to check the oil level. A smile appeared on his face, making me assume that we had successfully changed it correctly.
"How's it look?" asked the Australian as he took a oil stained towel to wipe off the residue remains from his hands.
"She's lookin' mighty fine."
"Good work mate." The Sniper congratulated. I felt a little warmth in my mind and stomach from all the attention and applause. It felt good, it felt like I was actually contributing to part of the team. It may have not seemed like it at the time, but I suppose that's I really needed. Time. Surely things would just be better later on in the months. Once I actually knew everyone and some of the BLU team as well. A small low level growl echoed in the area. Me and Sniper shifted our gaze to the country man.
"Guess this means it's time for a lunch break." He said holding the area where the growl came from.
"Yeah I'd say so."
They both walked over to the Engineers working desk and cleaned up there hands a bit. I joined after they were finished.
"I'll be right back, I'll go get us our lunch alright guys? My treat, especially for our new recruit yeah?" The southern man said already approaching the garage doors to the outside.
"Really? Thanks mate, remember no mayo on the sandwich."
The man paused before walking outside, he turned back as if he was offended of something. "What?"
"I'm tryin' to lay off all the fatty stuff, I'm starting to loose my Sniper figure." Said the man himself, holding a part of his little bulging belly. In all honestly he didn't seem to be gaining too much weight. Besides the small gut that seemed to be there, it wasn't anything too serious... Not like the Heavy... But he's just big boned I guess.
I could sense the Engineer rolling his eyes underneath the glare of his goggles. "Psh... So ya' want extra mayo.. Got it." He left closing the doors shut. Sniper groaned but then laughed at the thought. He started to find chairs for all of us to sit in, but there was only two. I found an old tire and grabbed that and shoved it near the middle, where Sniper had gathered the chairs. He opened back up the garage doors to let in some more light. The heat of the day rushed inside making goosebumps spread across my arms.
"There we go." Sniper placed both of his hands on his hips and breathed in slowly giving out a deep breath. He stood there for a while. I watched how peaceful he looked just standing there soaking in the sun. He looked like he was in another world, apart from the war, apart from all the stress and chaos. I gave a small smile as I carefully watched him. I saw his shoulders relax and his back slouch a little, yup it was obvious. The climate didn't even bother him a bit, he was a natural with this kind of threatening heat. He snapped back to his reality and turned around to seeing me stare at him. He waved his hand at my face to break me out of my observations.
"Oi, you back on earth? Or are you in another world?"
I blinked a few times and then stared back at him. I nodded and let out a small breath sitting back into the whole of the tire. I relaxed and placed my hands behind my head looking up toward the ceiling. I heard the footsteps of the sharpshooter shift toward one of the chairs, the squeaking gave it away. I enjoyed the short minute of silence before I looked back toward the outside.
"Hey.. You did a nice job with the oil and tires."
I looked at the Sniper and smiled.
"Oi remember the first time oi had to learn to do all that. Oi was a stubborn kid, still am... Except I'm not much of a kid anymore." I smile and chuckled. My smile seemed contagious as he tried to hold back a grin. His gaze looked out the door gazing upon the scenery out in the distance continuing to talk. "My dad would try to keep my attention on trucks and cars, but I found my fascination in animals more appealing. But he forced me into it anyways. I learned how to do all these things that I never really thought were important at the time. Once me van started to get old she started to fall apart, oi fixed her up and was thankful for listening to me dad about how to fix up all the problems."
I kept my eyes to what he was looking at. I could see the wave of heat move just a few feet above the ground, dancing on the hot surface. "Don't get me wrong oi still have a passion for animals. I actually took me van and rode toward the outback and survived there ever since I went to be out on my own. Self taught myself to use a gun, then upgraded to a sniper's rifle. Kept that sheila with me everywhere oi went."
His words began to make sense with his personality. He acted like an animal, not the one in the sense of loosing control and attacking anything and everything, but in a sense of instinct and character. He was tough and acted on survival instincts, he seemed to be precise, accurate, calm, and collected. Attributes of being a Sniper.
"W-What...was it like?"
His attention snapped to me. I kept looking straight too scared of looking at his expression. I took another chance of talking. It seemed easier with the Spy and Pyro, but this time I felt like I had crashed into a pile of rocks.
"Australia? It was alright... Depends where you are oi guess, being in the outback can really take a lot out of ya'. Oi didn't mind it though, it was nice and quiet. Just gotta make sure you watch your back, otherwise you'll be dead." I looked at him seeing his eyes already looking toward me. I couldn't get a read on the man, he was hiding something behind those blue eyes of his. But I didn't pry, not yet.
There was a small silence that divided between us. I couldn't tell if it was good or not, but it was interjected as he spoke different words that caught me off guard.
"Thanks mate, for trusting me."
'Where did that come from...' "Huh?" I said.
"Oi haven't heard you talk ever since you got here. Thought that you were mute or something, but guess I'm wrong about that." He gave a friendly laugh and continued. "Oi just appreciate ya' trusting me is all. It's kind of hard find that when you're in this bloody war for 20 or so years. You remind me of some of the animals in Australia."
I didn't give any sign of expression. 20 years?... How long had this war been going on. I know that we were fighting for the greater good, but I guess I didn't stop and think to what we were fighting for. What is this 'greater good'. I was pulled out of my thoughts as Sniper began to speak again.
"You are timid and alert but once you get use to everything and everyone you start to branch out. Seeing how you spoke to me makes me feel like you trust me. But then again oi could just be blabbering nonsense and give you the impression of a creepy bloke." He shrugged and took a drink of his water.
"No.. I think you're fine. Although I'm a little creeped out about the fact you sort of figured me out." I gave a weak smile.
"Yeah... I get the impression that everyone's an animal, you just have to figure out what species they are."
I gave thought to it. I didn't really take Sniper as one of the wise guys in the team, but I guess you can never judge a book by it's cover. Just on time Engineer walked in with our lunch and passed everyone's around. We all enjoyed our food and I listened to Engineer and Sniper talk together about the trucks' next fix. I didn't understand some of their technical talk, but I didn't mind the chatter. I enjoyed their company and just listening to them talk back and forth. I studied their expressions. Engineer was someone you could trust, along with Sniper. Engineer was really open, he talked about his past life down in Texas. He seemed really well educated with his PhD and all. The Engineer is smart, kind, and a great problem solver. Sniper was open too, but I could sense that he was leaving something else out. The Sniper looked sympathetic-to an extent-he's smart, a survivor, he was tactical with his resources.
CRASH! *SHATTER SOUNDS*
I ducked from my position and looked up seeing Engineer and Sniper immediately stand up. "You think it's another ambush?" I heard the Sniper say.
"Not sure." I could sense the worry in their voices and eyes.
I dove over to the truck and quickly grabbed my mask, took down my hair, placed it on moving all of the annoying pieces of hair from sticking out. I saw some movement in the corner of my eye and looked toward the moving object. It rolled toward the tire I was sitting in and bumped into it. I picked up the object getting a better look at it.
"You gotta be bloody kidding me." I looked at Sniper seeing him look at the object I was holding in my hands. Soon enough Engie was looking in the same direction. His face fell and looked angry. He snatched the object from my hand and stomped toward the entrance of the garage.
"Ah told them not to play near the base or garage!"
I got up from where I was sitting and looked out the window. In the distance I could hear a couple of swears from a man and woman. They seemed to be arguing as they got closer to the building, while Sniper and I followed our way behind Engineer.
"What did I tell you two about playing baseball around the base and garage! You shattered another window." His voice was raised and intimidating.
"Look it wasn't my fault, she's the one who hit it." The Scout blamed.
"Pft, at least I don't hit like a sissy." replied back the FemScout.
"Just stop playing around the base and we won't have a problem alright?" Engineer seemed his calm his voice down as he sighed heavily at the two.
"Got it hard hat!" The female chirped.
"Is that understood Scout."
"Yeah... Yeah I understand, can I have my ball back now?"
He gave Scout his ball back and watched him begin to walk off. Scout stopped to look back at his companion. "You comin' with or what?"
"Yeah I'll meet you back there I just wanna talk to them real quick." FemScout wavered Scout off, only to be left with his eyes rolling.
I watched rest her bat on her right shoulder and look at me. "Hey new girl, you wanna play ball with us. We need anotha' person to play the game we wanna try out." She was chewing a piece of bubble gum in her mouth. I looked at Engie and Sniper.
"Yeah go ahead..." The man next to me gave me a little push forward and I looked back at him, he winked at me. "Don't worry about it partner me and Sniper can finish up the rest, go have fun with the two... Oh and make sure that they don't get into anymore trouble will ya?"
The FemScout looked annoyed at the Engineer and then at me. "Are you comin' or not."
I walked toward her and joined her as she gave out a little smirk and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. I didn't look back but I could already tell they walked back in to finish up what we began. I noticed the female sniff the air and then trail it back to me. "You smell that? Smells like... some kinda oil or somethin'. Jeez what did they make you do, bathe in a tub of motor oil or some shit? Whatever I don't care. Hey you ever play ball? I'm amazing at it! Did I ever tell you the time that... bla bla bla bla...blahblabla..." Her mind changed from one subject to the other, not committing to one thing except for herself. It was going to be a long day with the two.
"Hey! You like chicken?"
To be continued...
She's had her small moment with Spy, spent her morning hanging out with Pyro, and committed the afternoon to helping Engie with his truck. Even had her time with Sniper, but now it's time to play some ball with the two chatter boxes. Time to hang out and get to know the Scouts.
Thank you for the favourites (or favorites however you prefer to spell it), reviews, and follows! They really make me smile, making my day 10x better. See you in the next chapter.