The shock settled, the last three REDs left coughing as dust filtered in through the pile of stone behind them. With the light from the basement's fluorescent blubs extinguished, the tunnel was now black as sin, and Scout leaned over his knees just to hold on to something.

"I think, gah…" Demo hacked, "I think I saw some cables before things went dark. Hold on."

Scout heard the sound of shuffling in the tunnel behind him, but didn't bother to move, not until there was an electric whir and light poured back into their cave. It illuminated Demo, who was standing next to a great yellow box with a pair of floodlights at the top.

"There," he said. "Even the bastards who built these tunnels needed to see."

As the generator mumbled to life, the survivors were hit with a wall of white fluorescent uniformity. It didn't do any favors for Scout's eyes, already watering from the soot.

"How do we get back up?" Soldier asked of the rubble now blocking their exit, mystified.

"Only thing I know is 'not that way'," Demo supplied. "Not looking forward to finding out where the other end goes either, but who knows. Maybe it'll come back to the surface." Now it was his turn to lean on his knees. "Shite. Down to three already. Some war this is."

That was enough for Scout to straighten his spine as it suddenly grew very, very cold. "We're not- nobody's dead yet."

Scout didn't like the look Demo gave him, the beleaguered sort of stare he gave Soldier when he was too tired to tell him not to do something. Patronizing, that was the word. He was being patronized at, and it made him want to kick something.

"Nobody's dead yet," he repeated. "We haven't even checked , that's- that's some habeas corpus shit."

"Scout," Demo said, still dead, still tired. "We heard it come from the workshop. If that's the ignition point of an explosion big enough to topple the whole base, they wouldn't have survived the initial blast."

"…You said we'd go back." His voice sounded empty, small in the cave around him. Like the tunnel itself was retracting its walls away from him.

"Well I had to tell you something, didn't I?"

Demo almost made it the whole way through that sentence without averting his gaze, but choked at the last second, looking away from the Scout who was still blinking furiously. Good. Good, he shouldn't be allowed to look at anything defiantly, not with the shit he's spewing, not when-

"Fuck you," Scout said. "Fuck you." And a feeling rushed up to him, biting him sharply in every scrape the falling debris had given him in the escape.

"Scout…"

"No fuck you, I didn't need you to fucking trick me I should have-" The rushing thing swung again. He left Engie. He left with barely any fight, just a 'come on you little bitch' and he was out of there, all too happy to leave. To leave again. Oh fuck he could have gotten down there, helped Engineer get out-

He turned on his heel, and began marching into the recesses of the tunnel.

The other mercs milled behind him, which was just fine by Scout. He wasn't slowing down, and if they wanted to wait until some other miraculous explosion opened the other way back up, they could be his guest.

His power walk lasted him only until Soldier caught up, which wasn't nearly long enough. "Don't worry Scout," he claimed with perfect certainty. "We'll find Engie."

"You think?" Scout side-eyed him.

"Of course!" Soldier exclaimed happily. "What the hell does Demo know? I bet he doesn't even know what habeas corpus is!"

Truth be told Scout wasn't sure he knew what habeas corpus was either. He had a vague memory of helping Louis slide a dead guy into the Charles and him telling Scout that it meant that they couldn't charge you with murder if they didn't have a body to prove that the person you murdered was dead. It seemed a reasonable enough explanation at the time, and Scout wasn't really at an age when he was questioning his brothers about shit yet.

Scout blinked blearily at Soldier. "You're a lawyer, right?"

"Affirmative!" Soldier said brightly.

"So then, you know what habeas corpus means, right?"

"I do!" And that turned out to be the end of that conversation.

Scout let Soldier talk about nothing for a bit, about proper trench—as Soldier had dubbed the winding tunnels—construction, about what they'd do to those conniving BLUs for blowing up their base, about how they'd all be reunited shortly and then they'd get down to ass-kicking. The Demoman at least had the good sense to stay farther back, following the two at a distance like a shadow of death. Scout kept picking paths that slanted up, Soldier kept chattering away. They must have been getting closer. Up only goes one way.

Past the half hour mark started to blur. It might have been even two hours, his sense of time distorting with only the jump of manually turning on floodlights to shake some direction into him.

But eventually the smell of fresh air brushed against his nose, and Scout broke into a run. Finally, with Soldier close on his heels, they burst into the dry desert with relief.

Dawn was just beginning to break above the badlands. Everything was tinted in blue, a creepy half-light that made the ruins of RED base an analogous shadow. And what a ruin it was. The giant satellite that had been the second capture was now the centerpiece of destruction, lying on its side with its dish bent. The base, already partially underground, had caved in on itself to make a crater in the earth. The opening to the tunnel lay across the battlefield from it, giving them the full view.

"Shit…" Demo said as he crested the cave's mouth.

Scout was already scrambling down the slope, rocks slipping under his cleats. That got Soldier after him, and soon they were all running to the place that had so briefly been their home.

Scout stopped as he reached the outskirts, orienting himself, laying over a mental map of where everything was in the base as compared to this disaster area. He began to walk. Back in the trenches he thought he would have been calling out Engie's name, screaming until he was hoarse, but now that he was actually here the base had suddenly become hallowed in his absence, a place that would devour him if he shook the precarious rubble with his voice.

Each foot forward took twice as long as it should have, the rubble impossible to climb in some places, demanding other ways around. Demo said something about it was unsafe to be walking on ground that still might collapse into the floors below, but Scout ignored him and Soldier just shrugged. He lost track of them after that.

"Engie…" he said to no one but the waiting destruction. "Please be alright man, please…"

He found the Quad, the four biggest hallways coming together into a large arch. The arch itself was still intact, and it was the only thing. Scout wandered until he found Engineer's workshop.

He dug until his hands were bleeding.

"Scout," Demo said eventually, because of course he was back, of course he had found him again.

"Shut up." Scout pulled up the remains of a bed frame.

"Scout," Demo said softly. "There's something you should come see."

Scout didn't want to look, or to listen, or even to think. But the way Demo said it meant that there was a choice of coming, and the non-choice of not. He followed after the Demoman, past the arch once again, and arrived near the lab.

There was a clearing, where bits of rubble had fallen to either side and left a square tile of floor blank. Something red in the center reflected but no longer glowed. The final capture point. Scout still had enough life in him to feel it trickle away when he saw what had been laid in this small sanctuary between the jutting teeth of razored stone. There were two mounds, covered in what looked like the plastic curtains torn from the infirmary. Around them, like a fairy circle, bits of rubble weighed them down. The early morning wind was already trying to shake them loose.

The mounds were distinctly human shaped.

"Who…" Scout managed before his voice cracked.

Demo shook his head. "Haven't checked yet."

Scout understood. He didn't want to know either. As long as they were covered there was the unknown, the knowledge that since it might not be someone, it wasn't anyone.

A small avalanche of rocks heralded Soldier's appearance. He took one look at the bodies, one look at Demo, and came to stand next to Scout. He put a hand on his shoulder.

Scout stirred at the touch. "Yeah," he whispered. "I know."

Scout, shaking, stepped near the head of one of the bodies. His fingers curled around a rock, pulling one then more, just enough off the curtain to lift a corner.

Medic.

"Jesus," Demo said, looking down at Medic's face.

All the glass had been smashed out of his spectacles, yet someone had placed them back over his face anyways, small and unusually delicate. Nothing like he had been in life. He looked like…well, like a building had fallen on him.

" Dammit ." And Soldier's voice was so uncharacteristically thick that Scout for once actually remembered, oh. Oh yeah. Other people have people they don't want to lose too.

Soldier and Medic were close. Had been close, Scout already corrected himself, friends or something, or maybe just one of those things he would never understand since it came about when a Medic had a favored pocket.

"Sorry Soldier," he said and knew it was insufficient, but it was all he had.

"…Thanks, son."

And then there was one more body.

"Do you want me to do it?" Soldier asked, again so weird, so twisted-broken in a way Scout hadn't heard before and had never wanted to. Scout shook his head.

He reached forward, same ritual, same white rock, same curtain.

Someone had taken off Engineer's helmet. It was on his chest, right above his folded hands, each one carefully placed so that you couldn't even tell one of them wasn't real. His face was battered, but not beyond recognition, eyes closed and goggles missing. He always hated sleeping. Had some sort of personal vendetta against it, but now that had finally caught up with him.

Engie had wanted to keep peace with the BLUs, wanted to so damn bad. And they killed him for it. They killed him, and it wasn't right, and Scout hadn't gone back for him and he'd called him a coward-

"Scout?" Soldier was shaking his shoulder. "Scout?"

"Leave him be, mate," came Demo's voice. "He needs some time."

And god Scout still hated Demo, but he was grateful for that.

There was a far off, arbitrary conversation while Scout sat there, staring at Engie. Eventually he had found himself holding the dead man's hand, fingers curling around synthetic skin, digits that no longer had the ability to operate under their own power. He pressed his forehead against the fingers. He wanted to press his lips against the knuckles but the thought of what Engie would think of that haunted him.

The desire to touch him was suddenly strangled by repulsion, by absolute despair that this was not Engie. That Engie was barbeque and a sweet voice over his guitar and nights and the fire-pit and not this dead… thing . Scout got shakily to his feet.

"I need to walk," he said to no one or maybe to his teammates. Without waiting for a response, walk he did.

He climbed over mounds of overturned base, the barest memories of habitation now churned up and exposed like roots. Those posters that always seemed to be about nonsense, a landline that wasn't connected to the wall and never had been—he went through it all, trying to get as far away from that cleared out place as he could.

And in his haste, ran into the business end of the BLU Pyro's flamethrower.


It had taken the splinter of BLU hours to make their way through the canyon, having taken the passage from the warehouse and finding it blocked by an avalanche. They'd gone the long way around, splitting as they arrived at the remains of RED base and each taking a cardinal direction.

Pyro's alarm rang clear across the ruins, and Soldier and Engie arrived at nearly the same time.

There was the RED Scout, furious and unarmed, sitting on the ground where it looked like Pyro had bowled him over, but that was not what caught Soldier's attention. Two more REDs appeared at the sound of the altercation, blinking in the sunrise, framed by the sheer blankness of the radar dish behind them. Soldier took one look at the startled Demoman, let out a scream of rage, and charged.

Demo obviously wasn't expecting it. Soldier hadn't really been expecting it either. One moment he was standing beside the Engineer and the next there was a blankness that rage couldn't even describe, a reflex that even monsters don't have ingrained so deeply into them. Soldier had killed this man a dozen different ways, but this was always the easiest, when he got the jump, when the Demoman never saw him coming. When he didn't think.

Soldier threw him against a piece of jutting concrete with his entire weight, and by the strangled cry and the soft crack he got in reply, he'd put enough force on the shoulder to dislocate it. Demo retaliated blindly, free arm swinging around to knock Soldier in the side of the head, more of a wallop than an actual punch. Soldier barely felt it. He dragged the Demoman by the front of the shirt and brought them wrestling to the ground, only failing to get in a punch of his own because a knee came up and jabbed in his gut.

The pair fell. Demo felt so…light. As Soldier landed on top of him, hands still tangled in his shirt, he realized the RED was missing his distinctive armor, instead sporting a plain t-shirt and sleep pants, no Kevlar to protect him. Without it, he wasn't much of anything at all really, even as recognition now burned in his eye as he looked at Soldier. Just a man who looked like he hadn't been getting enough sleep (or too much drink.) As Soldier brought his fist up, he thought he could almost recognize this man. Could almost see the resemblance to someone he used to get drinks with and watch basketball. Could remember the Voice saying please proceed to kill all members of the opposing team as in compliance with previous mission details .

A shotgun blast cracked the air.

Soldier stopped mid-punch, one he hadn't even been sure he could throw, and looked over his shoulder. Engineer had his gun pointed skyward, pure loathing on his face as he glared eyelessly at the scene before him. "That is enough ."

The RED Soldier, who Soldier had barely registered, stood dumbstruck in the middle of the fighting. He looked to his right (Scout's hands gripped around the muzzle of a weapon that could start belching out skin-melting flame at any moment) then to his left (his BLU counterpart beating the life out of the Demoman) and then back to Engie. He made a motion between Engie and himself, "Should we, uh, be…?"

"No!" Engineer snapped. "No, no one is fighting anyone. Pyro back up, Soldier- Soldier put him down! God dang it I told you about this."

"I…" Soldier looked down at the man pinned beneath him, his disorientation fading.

"Soldier, let him go. He's unarmed."

The combined weight of the launcher and the Soldier himself made it nearly impossible to throw him off, but Demo still tried, attempting to get leverage under his elbow. Soldier looked down at him, at the bag under his eye and the way his beanie was slightly askew, and the wave of detestation that usually rose at the sight of him was tainted by something else.

"Your lucky day, princess," Soldier said, letting him go. Demo curled a syllable in the back of his throat and spat.

The glob of spit hit Soldier at corner of his eye, an impressive feat considering the vertical trajectory of the shot.

"Finally," Engie said as Soldier got to his feet. "Maybe now we can get some answers. This might be the first chance our two teams have actually gotten to talk since this whole thing started."

"Incorrect!" The RED Soldier said merrily. "Our Spy and your Spy have been talking a lot."

Engineer's intake was sharp enough for Soldier to hear, but not enough that any of the REDs noticed the hitch. "…Where is our Spy?" he probed, realizing there was no reason to beat around the bush.

"Not here," Demo said icily as he gathered himself up, gesturing vaguely around the wastes.

Having resolved their struggle with the Scout, Pyro had circled around the back of the REDs, cutting off their escape. They hunched, inquisitively, like a wolf not sure if the thing they were looking at was prey or not.

"Then where?" Soldier had never heard Engie lose patience, but he knew that dark edge in the low tones of his voice.

"How should we know?" Demo growled right back. "We came through, we found some bodies, that's it."

"If you wanted him back, you shouldn't have dropped a building on him," Scout spat as he watched Pyro warily. His back was to his teammates, making all of them look quite cornered as they had consciously or not began to drift toward each other.

"This?" Soldier scoffed in absence of Engineer's reply. "We didn't do this, son. We just got here, and if we had blow up your stupid base, we'd be the cleanup crew, coming through and blasting every last one of your heads off."

Scout just glared. Demo also glared. Everyone was in a very glaring mood today, except the RED Soldier who looked around thoughtfully. Soldier had never had a conversation with his RED counterpart, but after six years of fighting together he'd gotten the impression there wasn't much between those ears.

"So," Soldier pressed after another elongated silence. "Any of you maggots have something helpful to add?" His disdain was aimed at Demo, but it was the RED Soldier who responded.

"He might be with RED team," he mused. Every eye turned on him, and he shrugged. "We know there were survivors, and those survivors found un-survivors, but the BLU wasn't with the other bodies. So either he left through the trenches like we did, or someone at RED let him out."

Everyone looked at everyone else, until finally Engie stated, "Well, that's as good a lead as any. Should probably start looking for them then." Then he paused, considering. "Though I think you boys better come with us."

Soldier crowed, "What in God's name are you talking about?" at the same Scout said, "No way in hell, asswipe."

"Why?" Demo asked with a contemptuous slouch. "If you're going to shoot the rest of the REDs, you've already bloody won. What are we going to do to you? At the very least let us run for it."

Engie shook his head. "Won't do you any good. There's at least three of TF's snipers watching the perimeter of the canyon, maybe more."

The memory of the gunfire, Scout's body dropping, hitting the dirt chest first as they had all waited for the next execution to occur. The little green dots. The bullets with money inside. It sprung sharp in Soldier's mind, along with all the other prickly details he had been suppressing. If he was right about the robots then he was wrong about other things, had made mistakes, the doubts that had been rooting in his mind for the last five years were now taking shape because he couldn't be right about two things. He didn't like the way Demo was standing, a hand touching his limp arm, so defeated as he looked at the BLUs before him.

"If whoever did send this thing down comes back," Engineer went on, "you'll be a lot safer with us than on your own. That is, unless you think you can clear that thing off your armory." He jerked a thumb at the satellite dish."

"Engineer," Soldier muttered. "This strategy is unsound." He didn't want Demo coming with. All of the sudden, he wanted to be as far as possible from anybody wearing a red shirt.

"Relax Soldier," Engie assured. "Better we know where they are. Plus, I want them in case we end up needing to make an exchange for Spy."

"More like you need us as meat shields," Scout said darkly, apparently close enough to hear their conversation.

Engineer shrugged.

"Fine," Soldier huffed. He did not like this. He did not like this one bit. "Isn't much to go on though. This place is miles long, how are we supposed to find a couple of REDs in all this space?"

"I might be able to help with that," Pyro spoke up, the first time they'd spoken since they'd stumbled upon the REDS.

"What was that Py?" Engie said, more out of shock than misunderstanding.

"I said I know where we can go."

Pyro nonchalantly made their way around the huddled REDs, though their feigned casualness was betrayed by the flamethrower trained on them all the while. The Scout watched warily, but the other two didn't react to the loss of their guard.

"We can go where?" Engie demanded in a hushed voice.

Pyro shifted uncomfortably. "Well, if we want to know where RED is…all the cameras are back on."

"And?" Soldier said. "How does that help us?"

"Uh, well. I know where they all go."

"What?" Engie's voice rose, and the REDs turned to look at them. "You know where the cameras go and only now are you telling us?"

"It's been a long time! " Pyro raised their hands defensively. " I found it when I went to go see the Administrator, and I didn't even think about it until those guys mentioned the trenches."

"God dammit Pyro…" Engie pinched the bridge of his nose. "Do you know how useful that could have been if you'd told us right after we'd gotten the announcement?"

Soldier wasn't surprised. Pyro wasn't the most put-together person at the best of times, and Soldier himself knew what it was like to have a shoddy memory that only seemed to work when it was incredibly inconvenient. He asked, "Can you take us there?"

Pyro nodded their head.

Soldier puffed up his chest. Time to get this rescue mission over as fast as possible. He stepped up toward the staring REDs and said, "Okay ladies, pack it up. We're going on a road trip."