AN – All right... So a temporary lack of Internet caused me to be more motivated to write as I couldn't access a document I needed for school from Google Docs (I seriously love that thing). But for those of you reading this, that just means an extra chapter today! I hope you enjoy it!
The Pyro flung herself around the corner as the enemy Demoman lobbed a few grenades her way. Reiner said something quietly to her and pointed to the corner of the ramp where she had just come from, but she couldn't hear him clearly. However, John turned back up the ramp and aimed his rocket for the same place. Guessing what he said, she pointed her flamethrower back towards the corner and waited.
And the BLU jumped around the bend.
Instinctively, the Pyro squeezed the trigger and sent the man running, but not before John got a good shot from one of his rockets.
"Rous, rous!" the Medic yelled and they ran down the ramp. Down in the room below, they encountered the BLU Heavy, spinning his minigun, and upon seeing them, unleashed hell. The team scrambled. John and Reiner darted back into the ramp while the Pyro daringly leapt for the hallway to the intelligence room. When the bullets paused, Lucía peered around the corner, only for the Heavy to rev up his gun again and fire. But as the bullets started flying at her, John shot a rocket at the BLU and got his attention.
The Heavy was too far for her to charge him, so she just did the smart thing and headed for the intelligence. Pulling the door open, she ran for the desk across the room and started to sling it over her shoulder when she heard a thump behind her. She dropped the briefcase and wheeled around, seeing the Spy behind her, one hand holding the door handle, the other holding his butterfly knife. He instantly straightened up, eyes wide, and pushed on the door only for it to hold fast against him.
"Ht hs hyu (It is you)!" she said. Then she got mad. So he really didn't care about them anymore!
The Pyro charged him and he darted out of the way, seeking the windows overlooking the interior base below for help. "I honestly assure you zhat I did not plan on you seeing me!" he cried, dashing past the Pyro when she got behind him.
"Hr, rhhllh (Oh, really)?" she snapped.
The Spy jumped over the desk, but Lucía cut him off. They paused for a moment, trying to judge what the other would do. The roar of the Heavy's minigun echoed faintly into the room. In a swift motion, the Spy swapped knife hands and withdrew his revolver. And when he pointed the gun at her, she was furious to have been in this situation in the first place. Way to trust a Spy... she thought seconds before he pulled the trigger.
The bullet whizzed over her head.
Hardly believing it, the Pyro looked over her body to be sure she didn't just hear wrong. He missed! Despite the shock, she advanced on him, gripping her flamethrower tighter.
"Wait, stop! Can we just talk now?" he pleaded. "You didn't even notice what I did!" With a quick point behind her, he tried to show her what he was talking about.
But she would have none of it. Lucía simply backed him into a corner, the pilot light of her flamethrower inches from his chest. When he tossed his weapons to the side, however, and pointed behind her again, she slowly turned her head back, suspicious of his motives. And to her interest, a black box dangled by a wire from the opposite corner of the room, a gaping hole burned through it. A security camera.
Looking back at him, she saw his eyes pleading for her to listen. And so she turned the weapon off to the left and took a step back.
He took a breath and relaxed his posture. Outside, explosions rocked the base and gunfire was very clear now. Pulling up her mask over her mouth, she said, "What do you want, then?"
"Just to be clear, I was not trying to kill you. Zhe door is stuck and my intention was to avoid you. But zhen you saw me and tried to kill me, and it-"
"Glad to know it just looked like you were going to kill me, then..." she replied sharply.
"Well, I guess I really need to say... I'm sorry."
There was a quick moment where he hoped she would say something, but she remained silent. "You got so mad at me, and I should have known how important your information was to you, and I really shouldn't have followed you down zhere in zhe first place..." he continued. "I'm just so used to going and finding zhese zhings out on my own, so I just had to be a... idiot and do it anyways. But I'm really sorry."
Lucía was quiet for a moment. "I-I'm sorry," she blurted out. Lucía wanted to slap herself, but it was too late to take it back. Instead, she voiced what she knew was true. "I'm sorry, too... I shouldn't have been so hard on you about it..." Her voice was slow and her words precise as she spoke. "I can't forgive you, but maybe if you stopped trying to be a BLU, I might."
"Trying? I am BLU."
"And how many people have you killed since you joined?"
"You... don't leave yourself open to backstabs very often!" he retorted, but really just played along.
The Pyro smirked, inwardly smiling at the turn of the conversation. Their words were quickly over, however, when someone tried to open the door. The pair jumped and started gathering everything together. As the Spy backed into a far corner while holding his wrist up, she quickly said, "You can't really stay with these guys, can you?"
"I can't change in the middle of a battle..." he replied and rested his fingers around the rim of the watch face.
She pulled her mask back down and started pulling the briefcase's strap over her shoulder again. As the people outside struggled to get in, the Pyro was relieved to hear John yell through the door, "Stand back, maggot, 'nless you wanna get blown to smithereens!" She obeyed, obviously, and watched as the door blasted into the room, a faint cloaking sound catching her ears just after the explosion. The smoke dispersed and the Pyro trotted out of the room, glad to remain unscathed that time. Lucía was curious as to what the Spy would do for the remainder of the day, but she just hoped it didn't involve any more stupid mistakes.
"Ugh! God! Look at this bruise, man!" Vince complained as he pointed to a dark purple rectangle across his left shoulder. From the looks of it, it was from an enemy Scout's bat.
"Quit yer whinin', maggot! When I got my arm ripped off in an explosion I didn't complain! Rather, I fought twice as hard to show those damn Nazis what weaklings they are!"
Everyone turned to look at him to judge the truth of his story. John being quite battle-scarred already, it was impossible to tell. "If yer arm got ripped off, how's it ya still got one then?" Wayne asked.
"I stitched it back on soon as I killed everyone," John scoffed, acting like it was nothing.
Reiner made a face, horribly confused, but didn't bother questioning him to avoid any more ridiculous stories.
As the Pyro looked around at all of her teammates, she found one missing. "Hrs rniwrn shrn thr Sph (Has anyone seen the Spy)?"
"Why, I don't reckon I seen him at all today..." Wayne said.
She looked around for a clue from her teammates, but they mostly shook their heads. Instead, she picked up her flamethrower and stepped outside. At her post beside the door, Lucía looked back and forth down the hallway, growing paranoid about who might show up. Inside, the guys quietly muttered amongst themselves, but gradually let go of their fears and were kidding around again.
When one of the showers started up, Lucía was startled by a man suddenly appearing some ways down the hall. She took her stance and slowly turned the weapon towards him. He stopped and held his hands up, his arms back in red again, and gave her a crooked smile, almost masking his worry. "It's me...!" he assured her. "Don't worry, Lucía..." The Spy muttered her name.
Leaning back against the wall behind her, she relaxed some and watched as he limped forward. The Pyro couldn't help but perk up again and start to pick herself up off the wall to help him, but he stopped her. "No no. I'm fine. I'll explain later... For now, I just got into a bad fight before zhe day was done..."
Lucía grudgingly let him go inside, but not before taking note of the big tear in his right pants leg and the darker red staining the area. She gripped her flamethrower tighter to keep from helping him. And as he disappeared inside, receiving relieved welcomes and surprised worry, she couldn't help but smile a little.
The Spy had waited outside the locker room for the Pyro to finish her business. He said he would explain and that was no lie. Reiner had disappointedly bandaged him up, hoping to have stitched him up instead. He knew better than that, however. So when she strolled out of the locker room, he walked with her to the roof-access stairwell. Lucía was quiet at his side, keeping her hands in the pockets of her cargo pants. He kept his hands to himself, too.
At the top of the stairs, however, Lucía pulled her mask over her hand and raked her glistening black hair out of its hair tie and let it fall down around her shoulders.
The man looked away and scoffed quietly at himself. Shaking his thoughts away, he opened the door for her and let her pass.
"So, how'd you really get hurt?" she asked as soon as the door closed.
The Spy chuckled and shook his head. "Ah... I had to go back to zhe BLU base to change, right? So, when I tried to sneak back over here, zhe BLU Spy naturally caught me on my way out. Suffice to say, he was not happy with my decision to come back."
"You got into a fight?"
"I really had it coming."
"You kinda did."
"Anyways," he continued. "He didn't want me coming over here and telling you all everyzhing I know, so we got at it and I... underestimated how good he was..."
She frowned at this.
"I'll be fine. Maybe enough so zhat I can play out with my real team again?"
She smiled.
It contagiously swept across his face, too. "You can't stay mad at me, can you?"
Fighting the smile now, she said, "This is about you, now, and how stupid you were to try and join up with them, anyways!"
"Well I'm not going to stick around waiting for you to set me on fire zhe first chance you get, especially when I sleep in zhe same room as you."
"Yeah, too bad we can't exactly catch our teammates on fire..." she said, a dark smile crossing her face momentarily.
The Spy chuckled.
"By the way, what the hell kind of idiot did you get for a stand-in?"
The sudden comment startled him and his confidence faltered. "Wh-what?"
"You couldn't get someone who actually knew a thing or two about the way you acted around here?" Lucía put a hand against her forehead and sighed. "Don't you ever try and go back over there, okay? Next time, I won't hesitate to pull the trigger."
A smirk slowly crept back across his face. "Yet you only say zhis so zhat you don't have to go to zhe trouble of getting me back..."
The woman tensed up at the remark and fought to reply. "N-no way. It'd just be annoying to have to get rid of such a bad teammate."
They stared at each other.
"Zhat was a terrible come-back."
"I know..." she dropped her head, laughing silently at how bad it was.
He smiled and waved her over. "Come on, let's go get somezhing to eat."
She gave him a smug look, but joined him as he went back downstairs, allowing him to rest his arm over her shoulder again. They continued talking, catching up on the few things the man had missed that was of interest. And the more they talked, the more the Spy felt guilty about not telling her the real truth. In fact, there were now three different stories for what happened to his leg: the one his teammates knew, the one Lucía knew, and the one that the BLUs and him knew. And frankly, the Spy wouldn't dare think of telling anyone else the truth, mostly because he barely believed what the BLU Spy had done to get him that gash. It was unsettling to think about. In order to make his story believable, the BLU had done what he could and enjoyed it.
But the Spy didn't want to think about that, and so he kept what the man had proposed to himself, hoping to banish the thoughts from his mind and enjoy his time with Lucía.