Chapter 2: A Whole New World
Night had fallen on the palace, as it was, indeed, a palace. The pale man had revealed himself to be Emperor of the Land of the Rising Sun, and they had conquered the world with the help of technological advancement with the use of a plant called the Black Lotus, called such because when it was used as a power source, it would often belch black smoke.
From what Spy could gather, the Iron-clad Samurai surrounding the emperor at all times were using minimalist machinery like manual hydraulics to power their folded-steel armor. Outside of the palace, Samurai clad in steam-powered armor protected the emperor, to keep from choking the palace with fumes. The emperor indeed had armies at his command, but he was at war with a far-off nation that harnessed electricity to fight. It seemed like they were at a standstill, and couldn't spare the Motherland any reinforcements. This did not make the emperor defenseless by any means.
Which made his conversation with Engineer even worse, even though night had fallen and everyone else had left the antechamber.
"...No."
"Not forwards in time."
"Not backwards either", Spy reaffirmed for the third time. "They have advanced mechanics and machinery that Japan wouldn't have had then and sure as hell doesn't have now. But this is their pre-war system of government, imperial to the core. But it couldn't have been our pre-war Japan, because they are expansionist enough to travel to... what should be England, I think, in a bid to conquer it. Ours was certainly expansionist, but they never made it out of the Pacific."
"And you're certain this isn't the future?"
"No, not a chance. They are using guns similar to muskets big as a man, albeit with a radically different propellant system... and huge sword-like bayonets... and outside of the emperor's bodyguards, they are using bamboo to craft their armor, and steamboats, and old cannons, and horses, and swords, do I need to go on?"
Dell wiped his face with his hands again, setting them on his hips as he studied the ground at his feet.
"So, it's a parallel universe", Engineer confirmed.
"I think so, yes", Spy agreed.
Dell continued to study the ground at his feet.
"I won't tell 'em nothing", he finally said.
Spy nodded, saying, "I won't tell them either."
Dell nodded, continuing to study the ground.
"I can't make this portal two-way", he informed Spy, "so here's how we're going to have to play it..."
Near the edge of the room, Soldier stopped listening in and began to nod off under his bushido helmet. He had heard more than enough; guns as big as a man, with bayonets the size of swords! He closed his eyes with a smile.
...
In Scout's cell, a roll of paper slapped down on the ground next to him, startling him. He had been trying to wiggle the loose bar more. Now he was trying not to brick his shorts. Looking up revealed Spy.
"Damn, man", Scout scolded, "warn me next time!"
"No", Spy said with a smirk. "Look at this."
Scout wanted to be cool for a moment, and tell him to go sniff drain pipes, but curiosity got the better of him. He flipped them open, and was surprised to see blueprints for a machine of some kind.
"Wait, let me guess", Scout said, tapping the side of his head with a finger, "it's a nothing-burger. This is a machine that either won't do anything, or it's the blueprints for that portal I went through to get here!"
Spy looked almost surprised by that. But, instead of an affirmation, he shook his head and sighed.
"No, Scout, it's a life-extension machine."
"WHAT?! Why would we give them something like this?!"
"We're not giving it to them, Scout. Think about it; how long would it take you to build something like this? Not to mention it doesn't have any of that precious Australium to run it, so even if you did finish it, they could never truly use it."
Scout was a bit confused by that line of thinking, but he supposed that you couldn't always pull a fast one while pulling a fast one.
"Engineer will be here in weeks. You could maybe build this machine in a few years if you had a dedicated team. Don't worry about the 'how', and just focus on the 'when'. Keep up appearances until backup arrives."
"Pssh", Scout said, turning his head to face the wall.
"Don't do that", Spy scolded, "you look like a spoiled brat."
"Go sniff drainpipes", Scout told him.
Spy shook his head, and put his cloak back up.
...
Mikhail put a bite in his sandwich, grabbed a cooler, two beer bottles, and closed the fridge. He sauntered back into the common room, where the shimmering portal still hauntingly stood, giving off a dim but illuminating light. Before him, the Spy materialized, stuck on the other side of the mirror-like portal. Heavy passed him the cooler.
"I put this together for you, so you do not have to steal anyone's food." Mikhail smirked. "No escargot, but I am sure you will like what I packed for you. Is only for few days, so you will come back for more soon."
"I don't typically drink beer", the Spy said hesitantly, as he took the bottles.
"They are for the boy", Mikhail informed him. "He has earned them."
Spy looked at the beer, seeming to consider it.
"Fine", he said finally, "but I'm not giving them to him all at once. He'd get drunk and do something stupid."
"On two beers", Mikhail questioned. "Oh, right, he is American. Can't hold liquor."
"Right. The food was very thoughtful of you. I was beginning to worry that I would have to go into town disguised as a samurai. My Japanese is rusty, though I still remember tennoheika banzai well."
"Is nothing", Mikhail told him. "Be safe. I do not wish to forfeit money for 'unexplainable accident'."
"I will do my best to survive. Take care my friend. Oh, wait, where is Dell?"
Mikhail shrugged.
"The last time I saw him, he said he had some 'preparations' to make", Mikhail explained. "He shut himself in that shed out there, and he hasn't been back since."
"If you see him, tell him I need some more ammo. I would kill for a dispenser."
With that, Spy vanished. Heavy went back to the fridge. He hoped that Spy would be pleasantly surprised with everything in the cooler. For now, he had a sandwich to finish.
...
Spy had to admit, he was pleasantly surprised by what Mikhail had made for him. Half a salmon, cooked to flaky perfection, crusted with sea salt, dashed with pepper, and sprinkled with lemon juice; grilled potato wedges, and cooked asparagus. The man cooked like a champion. In another life, he would have been a master chef and opened a chain of restaurants.
What surprised him even more was the ten speed loaders and two boxes of fifty rounds of .41 each.
"That man is so thoughtful", Spy thought out loud absentmindedly, as he put the speed loaders in his suit jacket.
For the rest, he found a good place to stash it in several vases around the palace. It wouldn't do to have it all discovered at once. As for the food...
Since it was nighttime, he felt comfortable eating with his cloak down. It had been only about a day since they had walked through the portal, but it already felt like too long. Spy wasn't exactly a stranger to surviving in unknown lands, where every map was wrong and every citizen an enemy, but of all the terrible situations, this most definitely took the cake. Outside of Hell, he had never been in a parallel universe before, and after his recent excursion into one, he was certain that he would never volunteer to step foot in another.
Unless, of course, Scout walked into it.
He had made a promise to the boy's mother, after all.
…
The first time he was told about the overall situation, Tavish had been just barely beginning to sober up. He had been reaching for his next bottle, intent on suffering his colleagues a little longer, only for his bottle to be snatched by Heavy. From behind, Medic had injected him with a Saline IV, which sobered him up far quicker than he wanted, but without the hammering hangover. At first, he had been mildly annoyed, reaching for his grenade launcher to solve the situation, but upon being told that it had been rather quiet for the past three days, he immediately realized that Scout was missing.
For the duration of this crisis, he was going to keep it sober, or, as sober as he could keep it. He was more than likely going to have to invade a parallel universe, and he needed to keep his wits at least somewhat about him. That being said, it wasn't like he could just stop all together. His Scottish witch doctor had told him that at this rate, that would be a death sentence.
As he quietly nursed a beer, the other side of his lips firmly grasping a cigarillo, he went through the tumultuous process of mixing petroleum jelly and various other ingredients into plastic explosive, a compound that was far more combustive and destructive than the regular pipe bombs he normally used. He only mixed up these special bombs when things got serious, and when a parallel universe was involved, you better believe it was serious. Finishing each bomb off with a double-fuse, one timed and the other impact, he set them quietly aside in his cardboard box of bombs.
He didn't make them often because they took so damn long to make. In the time it took to make one of the specialized bombs, he could have five regular pipe bombs ready to rock. But now that a general cease-fire had been called, primarily due to Heavy's intervention with Miss Pauling, Tavish had all the time in the world to mess around as he wanted. In fact, he was finally going to make those chloroform bombs he always told himself he would. Now, a double-stage capsule would be needed to aerosolize the-
Wait a minute.
Rushing to cap off the last bomb in his hand, he trotted quickly out of his chemistry room, looking around wildly. When he finally spotted Heavy in his room, lifting hundred-pound dumbbells in each hand, he rushed up to him, shouting.
"Heavy, say, Heavy, lad!"
"What is problem? Five… Six…"
"What exactly did ya tell Miss Pauling?"
"I said Scout is missing, and we must find him. Nine… Ten…"
"Good on ya. What if she comes here ta find him herself?"
"Twel- oh, chyort", Heavy cursed, dropping his dumbbells. "We need to call meeting and plan next course of action, I have forgotten!"
"What if that purple bitch actually sees us working for once?! We'll be screwed for all time!"
"You are right", Heavy agreed, making powerful strides towards the base's intercom. "I can hear her already; Heavy, why you not lift weights all of time? Demo, why you not make most powerful bombs for all situations? Engineer, why you not make new machines to invade parallel universe so we can get rich?"
"I'll go hide the bombs I've got", Demoman offered. "My batch of plastic is already expended, I've just gotta lick the bowl clean."
"I will rally base", Heavy told him. "We must tell Spy that machine will likely be shut down."
"He's not gonna like that", Demoman muttered with a shake of his head.
"No, he won't", Heavy agreed. "But is only way."
"I'll get on it", Demoman said, peeling off to go put away his plastic explosive set.
…
With everyone grouped together in the round table, minus Dell, who wouldn't answer his door, Mikhail laid it all out for them; they had to stop what they were doing, and pretend to be lazy again. More than likely, Miss Pauling was on her way to inspect the situation, and she was not going to be pleased to see what they could actually do when they put their backs and minds to it.
Pyro raised its hand.
The room went silent, as Pyro rarely asked questions.
"Yes", Mikhail said cautiously.
Pyro mumbled something that Tavish couldn't understand. Oddly enough, when he was drunk, he could understand the thing like an angel singing in Gaelic, but when he was as close to sober as he was, it was nearly impossible to tell what was on the abomination's mind. Fortunately, Mikhail had a PhD in Russian literature, and since most of that was mumbling, screeching, and drunken nonsense, Mikhail could understand the Pyro just fine.
"Yes", Mikhail confirmed sadly, "we must shut down machine in common room. I have paged Spy about it."
Soldier stood up, looking very angry, and now fully clothed in bushido armor.
Before he could say anything, however, Dell pushed open the door from the common room.
"Heavy's right", Dell said in a downtrodden voice. "We've gotta shut 'er down. I just spoke to Spy face-to-face, and gave him everything I could. It's not an easy decision, but it's the right one. Now, I need to take some measurements for all of you-"
"HOW COULD YOU", Soldier roared.
Everyone turned a shocked expression towards the psychopath, noting that he had his hand on his katana.
"We have just discovered the secret 64th state of these united states, Japan, and now you want to throw away such a discovery?!"
"Soldier", Dell said in a confused tone, "what are you on about?"
"I'm talking about guns the size of a man, with bayonets the size of swords, who ride into battle on the backs of thoroughbred American stallions! It's enough to make a patriotic man weep! And you would give this all up for idealic working conditions?! That's communism, through and through!"
"Soldier", Medic said in an exasperated tone, "what the hell are you talking about?"
"It appears you are all possessed by the spiritual manifestations of communist ghosts", he explained. "I will sing our national anthem to counteract! We are living in Amerika! Amerika! It's voon-der-bar!"
"Heavy", Dell said, "There should be a Floppy Drive under the keyboard area of the machine. Push it in and retrieve it so we can save our data for the next machine."
"You can't destroy it", Soldier cried out, drawing his katana, "I won't let you!"
He charged at Engineer with a warcry, bringing his sword down on his head. Engineer caught the blade with his left hand, and grabbed Soldier's throat with his right. He forced him to the ground with a grunt, shouting, "Heavy, go!"
Mikhail, despite his size, flew past the two wrestling men, and ran straight for the machine. Soldier, seeing this, punched Dell in the face, sending him reeling back. Soldier scrambled up, running past Heavy.
"Jane, no", Tavish shouted, as Soldier dove through the portal head-first.
The crew was silent, shocked by Soldier's behavior, and by the implications of what just happened.
And then the worst possible thing happened.
There was a knock at the door.
…
Another one came flying through the large mirror. The young emperor threw his hands up, uttering a cry, as the figure landed at his feet. Spy could now clearly see that it was Soldier, clad head to toe in bushido armor.
He wanted to roll his eyes, smack his head, and say 'oh no' all at once, but it was physically impossible. He had to keep his cloak up. He had just barely managed to do it a minute ago, and he had been nearly found out. He put a hand on the hilt of his revolver, ready to save the insane moron.
Soldier got to his feet, and kneeled before the emperor, sheathing his katana.
"Governor of Japan", Soldier declared, "64th of these united states; I am your humble servant."
The emperor peaked out from behind his arms, looking at him, puzzled.
"I bring with me secret knowledge in the ways of Sun Tzu."
"Who?"
Soldier looked surprised.
"Why, only the greatest fighter there ever was", Soldier exclaimed. "I'd say he knows a little more about fighting that any of us do, because he invented it, and then he perfected it so that no living man would best him in the ring of honor!"
Now Spy REALLY wanted to slap his forehead.
The emperor narrowed his eyes.
"How would I not have known of this man?"
"Well, that's obvious", Soldier explained. "You're a Governor, not a General. Only the best Generals, as Sun Tzu himself says, knows of his ways. He who knows them not shall surely lose."
"Well then", the emperor said with a smirk. "My generals have been losing in a strange new land against a strange new people. If you are so wise, then surely you will know what they are doing wrong."
"Easy", Soldier said without missing a beat. "Sun Tzu says, 'if fighting is sure to result in victory, then you must fight'! And since I am a man well educated in Sun Tzu's secret arts, my ways are sure to result in victory! Therefore, under my leadership, we must fight!"
The emperor seemed impressed by this.
"Then I believe I may have just found myself a new Head General!"
If he truly believed all of that, Spy thought, then he must be a bigger idiot than Soldier.
Right then, the portal faded out of existence, as if it had never been there at all. Spy's stomach sank. This time, he was well and truly alone.
