Notes: Thank you all so much once for being patient and sticking with me, and special thanks to Sov for beta-ing this chapter, and to diananock and kilgamesh for their help!

Warning in this Chapter For: blood, graphic violence, death, injury, medical unpleasantness

In respawn, squeeze eyes shut. Focus on breathing. Inhale, ignore the phantom twinge as lungs expand, try to forget the drowning pressure on your chest. Exhale. The next breath can't come fast enough. You hold the air in your lungs, savor the relief, exhale, take a new breath.

Alive.

You open your eyes, revel in the clear vision of the door and the dirt and the sky beyond.

Whole.

You have to get to the battle, but the thought of leaving this space wraps an icy hand of terror around your heart. Grit your teeth. Draw your weapons, grip unsteady, fingers trembling. It's over, you tell yourself. This life is brand new.

The team will be missing their Specialist. Of course, you'll probably have to explain where you were, that you did not actually spend the last-how long has it been? Ten minutes? Twenty?-being sick on the floor. Then again, you're not sure if the truth is less embarrassing.

You stride to the door, slowly, each step solid, though all you want to do is stay, curl up in the corner and nurse the terrified chill in your chest until it melts away.

A shadow wavers and solidifies just outside. You tense, halt mid-step. He wears red, but you find yourself baring your teeth. You are not a fool.

The Spy spreads his hands, and moves no further. "I understand. Ask me a question, Specialist."

A sigh hisses through gritted teeth. What could you ask that no one could simply dig up? That could not have been seen or overheard? So many things about you have been recorded, and… "Two nights ago," you say, "Scout had an issue at dinner."

The corner of his mouth sneaks upward in amusement. "He was angry at a situation similar to the one I just found myself in. The difference is, I was completely incapable of healing you."

You feel your shoulders slump in relief-you're in a brand-new body, but you feel exhausted. "Thank you for that, by the way."

"Think nothing of it." He averts his gaze, adjusts leather gloves. "I would hope you'd have done the same."

"Of course, Spy."

"Mm." He glances back toward the field. "Heavy needs support at the third point. Fetch your earpiece, and I'll tail you there."

You're unlikely to forget that piece of equipment again. You fetch it and hurry out to the field where Spy still stands, shifting his weight anxiously, eyes everywhere.

"Go. I'll follow." He cloaks as you heft your shield and move for the corner. You want to thank him for offering to accompany you. You'd like to tell him you don't need it.

But you do.

You really do, and you can't find the words to admit it.

It's a straight shot from the corner of the storage shed to the third point. You click into the comm system, ignoring the turning of your stomach at the thought of the verbal abuse and rightful mockery you're sure to face. You're really not in the mood for it anymore.

"I see Heavy and Engineer on point three-is there any danger of sniper fire if I move in?"

["Should be clear, Sheila. I've got eyes on you."]

Even so, you make the run as fast as your boots can carry you, folding your shield down to be as streamlined as possible. Debris from an earlier scuffle is shuffled under your feet-splinters of old wood, bullet casings, shrapnel gleaming sharp on the sand.

Your chest stabs with phantom pain each time you draw a breath of hot, dusty air. You try to narrow your focus down into your boots, one-two, one-two, heels pressing into the dirt and sand, crunching, kicking up clouds.

CRACK.

Fuck-

You stumble, cover behind a stray crate. Paint flakes off the faded Mann Co. logo. Splinters catch on your coat. Gunshot. Well, of course it was a gunshot; this is a battlefield. What it should not have done was startle you into hiding. You lift your head, peek overtop the crate.

Empty sand. Abandoned sheds. Dry wood.

But the shot had been close, hadn't it? There would be no need for cover otherwise, not when you're holding a shield, now would there?

["You're clear to move now, Specialist."]

A puff of relieved breath escapes your lips as you rise and repeat your running rhythm. "Thanks." There had been something, then. You don't look like a frightened rabbit that once nearly ended up on the dinner table, forever flinching at nothing. That's the last thing you need. Better to endure teasing at the hands of a hangover than admitting to…

You'd call it torture, but that might be too strong a word. And it was your own damn fault, anyway. Torture lasted longer, hurt more. The goal wasn't death. What the BLU spy had done was… painful retaliation.

So you take the deepest breath of air you can, until your lungs are burning, full to bursting with effort, and release it in a slow hiss through your teeth. Because you can. Because every cell in your body leaps at each breath of ready oxygen.

You run for the point.

"Specialist!" Heavy waves an arm in greeting, hefting his minigun in one hand-for even the briefest of moments, it's an impressive feat. Your joints twinge with sympathy.

You return his grin as you leap onto the platform. "What are we looking at?" You hope they launch into a discussion on tactics and the lay of the field. By the time they finish, you'll be getting shot at, and no one will remember to ask where you've been.

"At least two in respawn," says Engie, tightening a bolt with his wrench.

"Scout and Soldier," Heavy adds.

"I'll have the sentry finished up here by the time the point's ours, and y'all can get a move on to finish the round up."

Crack.

["Enemy sniper down."]

"Make that three in respawn. I'd worry about the BLU Medic 'n Heavy, but I've got a feelin' they're waiting for us out at the final point."

It certainly seems like them. Where your pair seems to relish the charge, BLU enjoys…

Waiting. Blood. Screams where no one could hear. Ribbons and ribbons and ribbons running red flesh-

A large hand pressing on your shoulder. "Is very hot in sun," rumbles Heavy.

You suck a sharp breath through your nose. "It is." It is. There's a glare on your head, sweat trickling down from your scalp, a burn on your cheeks. You avoid Heavy's gaze, though you're grateful. You just… can't take the empathy you know you'll find. You're working. You can get a grip on your own mind.

If you can't do something so simple, then what are you doing here, hm?

Dishonorable discharge.

"Which of ours are in respawn?"

Engineer clicks his headset. "Sniper, team check?"

["Eyes on you, Medic, Pyro-back from respawn-an' Spook's out there somewhere."]

"Thank ya kindly." He switches the set off. "We-"

KRRRBSSSSS-

"Getdown!"

-BOOM!

Your shield snaps to full just as you're knocked off your feet. The ground trembles, sand scattered across the point, creeping into your uniform, grating on skin.

Your ears are ringing. You wish those telephone-bells weren't so familiar now.

"I thought you said the Soldier was in respawn!" That's what you want to say. Your mouth is moving. You think you're saying it. But you can't hear it, which means no one else can, either.

Damn, you hate explosions.

The ground shudders again, and you're tempted to lie still, but you squint through the dust hovering in clouds over your position. Red light gleams on the particles, casting eerie columns through the destruction. There are two dark shapes approximately where you left your teammates. Under your hands, the ground is humming. The sentry? If you're lucky. The teammate-shaped shadows aren't moving, but you try not to dwell on that. It's no good to lie here.

You push yourself slowly to your knees, shield first, trousers and boots scraping sand over metal.

There's a blinding flash. Ringing, ringing, cotton in your ears. Somehow, you've tumbled further back, your shield half across your shoulder-blades, arm bent at an aching angle, face pricked with sand on sun-heated steel.

If muscles could groan, those in your arm would be protesting loudly as you shift your shoulder and elbow. Your arm moves, albeit slowly. You think you're intact, though your face burns and your ears ring and a shooting pain races up your spine. You have all your limbs, and that's a blessing.

But you need to move, you need to find some way to retaliate, now. Now, before the Soldier comes charging up with a bladed spade and a mind for disembowelment.

You've certainly had enough of being defenseless today, thank you very much.

Sand cuts into your cheek as you shift your head, try to ascertain your position. No one in sight. But-a machine-the sentry, so close! It appears to be trembling, perhaps an indication that it's running after all, but even if that isn't true, it would provide a little more cover, some distance…

You brace your arms on the ground and slide your body ahead. Buttons scratch on the point. You draw the Lancaster from its holster on your thigh, and you find you catch less on the ground with each shuffle. Where the Gyrojet has gone, you have no time to worry now.

The ringing in your ears gives the illusion of eerie quiet, muffled silence enveloping your head.

You wrap your body partway around the back of the sentry and look into the dissipating dust. The humming of the sentry reverberates through your whole body now. It's comforting, even if the security is merely an illusion.

The shield is unwieldy here, and you consider shaking it off, but-no, not yet.. You fold the bottom up instead and clasp your Lancaster in both hands, pointing into slanted rays of sunlight, squinting at little more than dark shapes. They move slowly. You draw a sharp breath; the scent of gunpowder and copper coats your nose. You grit your teeth.

Sound filters back into your ears. A shuffling gait. A mechanical hum. Your own rasping breath, too loud between metal and kevlar.

Sunlight gleams on the double-barrell of a shotgun.

CRACK!

You squeeze the trigger again.

CRACK!

You must have hit something, you must have, if only because the bullets are so damn big-

The barrel comes up, and you bury your face in the crook of your arm, squeeze again.

BANG!

CRACK!

Your ears are ringing, but you can hardly hear it over the searing burn that flares along your back. You raise your eyes to see the Soldier raising that damnable trench shovel. The sun gleams on polished iron, arms raised, blue coat pulls across a barrel chest-suddenly ripped to ribbons. Red tears though blue, shredding coat, skin, bone. A mouth opens in a cry you cannot hear. Blood spatters like rain across sand and steel until the body can no more remain upright and crumples in a bloodied heap.

You draw a shuddering breath and let your head fall upon your shield arm, let your pistol clatter onto the point.

Fucking hell.

"...so long. Specialist. Specialist?"

You lift your head, but the voice is coming from behind. You can hear the hum and the rattle of the sentry again.

A little huff of relief over your shoulder. "Thank God," Engineer says, and you see his boots and then knees materialize beside you as he hunkers down, a white box in his hands. "I'll get ya patched up right quick."

"Thanks." You'd really like a bottle of water.

"Can ya help me get your coat off?" You can hear a frown in his voice. "Or will I need to cut it off?"

Your brow furrows and you brace your elbows under your chest and push-to an onslaught of stabbing, burning needles coursing through your back. You grunt, hiss, drop onto the newly won point. "Cut it," you hiss, clamping down on the involuntary heave of your stomach. It'll be cooler without the coat, anyway. Between the steel under your stomach and the beating sun, you're sweltering-apparently you haven't lost enough blood to chill your veins just yet.

"Alright, just relax a minute. Keep an eye out front."

You wish you didn't have to, but you prop your head up and look out across the field. Heavy is nowhere to be seen, which likely means he's on his way through respawn. There isn't the slightest breeze to cut the stifling heat or stir a single grain of sand. The field is still, eerily so, like a color photograph left in the sun, a little too hazy, a little too yellow.

Your jaw clenches when you hear the rip of fabric, feel your coat peeled away in two, pushed aside to dangle from each arm. You imagine you can feel stray fibers pulling on ragged skin, but that seems unlikely.

"Now, this is gonna sting…"

Before you can ask what, exactly, is going to sting, you're hissing and clutching at the point with both hands, alcohol or iodine pouring across your back, soaking into the remains of your coat and shirt.

"Now I've gotta dig some of this buckshot outta here, so…" He passes you his bandana, red and damp with what is probably sweat. "You, uh, may wanna bite down on that."

You really hope it isn't sweat. "Respawn will clean it up for you," you argue. Really, is there anything wrong with slapping a bandage on it when, in all likelihood, you'll be dead in the next ten minutes, anyway?

"I'd like ya to be able to function until then, ma'am. And if Medic catches up before you die, I don't think having half a pound of metal sealed into your back for the rest of the match is a good idea. Now-I'll do my darnedest to be quick."

Whatever smart comment might have come to your lips is gone with the handkerchief you've stuffed into your mouth to muffle a reflexive scream. Holy hell, shit, and damn, you wish Medic was here. Fuck. If there's one thing you can say about Engie, it's that he finds what he is looking for and moves on quickly, his touch precise. But you can't say he's in any way delicate.

Your jaw clamps down on the bitter bandana. Poke, wiggle, yank, poke, wiggle, yank through the flesh of your back, stinging and burning and squeeze your eyes shut and wonder if maybe Engineer would be gentler with a circuit board. Fuck, if there was ever a time the doctor to show up with his medigun-

"Done."

You huff a muffled sigh of relief.

"Now…" More alcohol splashes across your back, and your forehead hits the point with a solid thump, imprinting several grains of sand across your brow. "...sorry. If ya can make it to your knees, I'll wrap you up and you can be on your way."

You spit the hanky out. It had definitely been covered in sweat. "Thanks." Slowly, you brace your arms, ignore the sharp pull and burn across your back, and push yourself to your knees. You chance a glance back at Engineer, but he's only beginning to unravel the bandages.

"Pull your shirt up a little, an' arms out," he says.

You do your best, arms slouching even as you grit your teeth to force down the pain, and Engie doesn't complain, only pushes bloody material up and aside where it falls too low, and winds the bandage around your torso. It brings a steady, creeping burn, bright and tingling. Every too-harsh tug stabs reflexive nausea through your stomach. You squeeze your eyes shut against it. The sun burns through your eyelids, turning your little world red.

But this is no different from the way your waking world is painted now, this red. So many things… scarlet, crimson, burgundy. Blood, yours-theirs. Power is red. Victory. Friends are red. A still-beating heart. And pain-pain is red. This pain as it spikes through muscles, skin, and sinew with each turn of calloused hands. You hiss through your teeth and crack an eye open to check his progress.

Only two wraps. You're a whole mess of pain that keeps getting tighter and the bandages haven't even covered your breasts.

You never would have thought that you've been spoiled by a doctor, and certainly not one that takes obvious, gleeful delight in his work. But you have. You have been spoiled by the medic and his quick-fix marvels.

Fuck, you don't even feel weird about wishing for a physician undoubtedly out of his mind. You just want the pain to stop.

But it won't, and it doesn't, not even when Engineer ties off the bandage and gently pulls your ragged shirts down over the wrapped wound.

"Thanks." You keep your breaths shallow to avoid pulling the bandages tighter across the mess of your back. It doesn't help.

You'll probably never consider using a medikit again. No medigun? No deal. Slight nausea and tingling is a step up from… this. Well-provided death isn't dealt with seizing, stabbing, blood free-flowing, splutter stop-stop-

You shut your eyes, open them again. Breathe. Hot pain across your shoulders, gone from your chest.

The engineer is still speaking. Perhaps he has not noticed. "...but we'll be alright." He squeezes your forearm. "Now, you get on to the next point. Medic might be around by the time ya get there. I've got this position covered."

"Sure," you say when you can find your tongue. "Thanks again."

He nods, tips the brim of that yellow hardhat in a way that would be endearing if you could find a way to focus on something besides the throbbing pain that echoes every beat of your heart. "Be careful, now." He bends down to scoop up your fallen gear, and you might be more grateful for that than the bandages.

The Lancaster goes into its holster first, more slowly than you care to admit, and then you hesitate, hands hovering over the shield and Gyrojet. You're not sure you can even lift your shield without tearing whatever sorry clots your body is trying to manufacture. So, you take it first, in both hands. Stifle a grunt. What normally feels so light is clawing angry fingernails from your shoulders to your spine. It goes on your belt, too, and Engie, bless him, does not comment.

The last thing in your hands is the Gyrojet pistol, and that works fine for you. Maintain distance, fuck a couple of BLU bastards over on the way to the next point, and hopefully catch up to Medic on the way. Good plan. Fine plan. ...okay plan.

It's either this or wallow in regret over the past twelve hours.

Fuck it-you can manage both.