"This is ridiculous." Spy put out his cigarette on the war table, a small black dot marring the surface. "Every minute we spend bickering is one we are not using to plot our next course of action."
"By 'course of action', you mean 'plan of attack'," Engineer grit out. "Don't mince words Spy, and ain't no one attacking anything until we're all in agreement."
The RED war room was in upheaval, the commotion boiling over not just between Engineer and Spy, but nearly every other mercenary trying to get a word in edgewise. The only mercy on the Demoman's ears was that they had at least agreed to move the team-wide argument out of the spawn room and back in to base.
"It seems we're all talking past each other here, lads," Demo tried to mediate.
"I just don't know what he thinks he's going to accomplish," Engie scoffed. He leveled a look at Spy. "He's tellin' it like he's already figured what we'll decide, and anyone actually trying to have a discussion is a distraction."
"That is what you're doing," Spy said, but Engie ignored him.
"The fact is, not everyone here wants to sign up for a darn suicide mission." Engineer motioned out to where Soldier was shouting out Scout and Sniper. "You think you're going to get anything done with only half the team at your back?"
"More than half," Spy said slyly.
"Pyro changes her vote more times per minute than there are fleas on a dog." Engie folded his arms. "Don't count."
"Ah! After so many years you finally admit that the Pyro's input is worse than useless."
"I didn't say that, I-"
But Spy waved him off. "And there is no reason this has to be a suicide mission. Certainly the new mission parameters we have been given are not unlike Arena Mode, no? We focus on taking out the enemy Medic, and the rest will fall like a stack of cards."
"Wow," Demo grumbled. "Shoot the Medic. Never thought of that one before." He pinched the bridge of his nose, really wishing he had a drink.
"Engineer and Demoman offer no better plan," Heavy put in. "Sit here? Do nothing? Is coward's doing."
"Exactly!" Spy motioned emphatically to Heavy. "By God, it's like you all haven't spent the last six years of your life killing people for money!"
By chance, Heavy was positioned near equidistant from the two strongest proponents of either side, a location that made him look deceptively neutral as he stood on the short end of the table. They hadn't yet gravitated their physical potions to match with their ideological ones, but Demo figured it was only a matter of time. Scout was already edging away from Soldier, as though sticking himself to the Engineer's side would mitigate the stream of jabber shot his way. Maybe next time they stepped in this room, the sides would be all the clearer, a divide rupturing them right down the middle.
Engie ground his teeth. "I ain't no coward, son. You can bet your ass on that."
"And yet you would have us sit here and twiddle our thumbs, waiting for some sort of revelation while BLU mounts their own attack," Spy said.
"Better doing nothing than falling into a damn trap," Engineer said. "And yeah I've been a mercenary for six years, and lived a helluva dangerous life before that, but it ain't about the danger . It's about having the rules change right out from under you. I seriously can't be the only one who thinks there's something wrong here?"
"No no, Engie's right man," Scout said, clearly having been looking for the opportunity to cut in. "Like, no respawn? That was the whole point getting us to sign on! She can't just…do that, right?"
"Perhaps I should phrase it this way," Spy mused. "Have we not grown complacent? Has respawn notdampened our skills, disrupted our ability to evaluate risk? If we were to be dropped back into our respective professions at this very moment, I have no doubts that we would all be dead within the month. And if I were to create some final test—say, a penultimate evaluation of a mercenary's skill before deciding if I would use them again—I would make sure they were still able to properly function in the real world."
Scout's brow furrowed. "A test you're saying?"
Engineer watched a line of doubt worry Scout's face, and grunted in disgust. "Don't go filling his head with that crap, Spy."
"I merely offered an argument I thought he might find persuasive." Spy had already begun to light another cigarette. "It was you who wanted a discussion , wasn't it?"
"There will be time for all this namby-pamby negotiation crap after we win!" Soldier, having apparently freed Sniper from his iron grip, slammed a fist down on the table. "Without their magic machine as a damn crutch, we will turn every BLU into paste!"
"That thing's just as much a crutch for us as it is for them," Engie snapped. "Listen son, if we go to war, people will die. And not just a couple of BLUs, because even if we weren't as evenly matched as we are, there is no way on God's green Earth we could make it out without casualties on our side. When a man goes to war, he has to make that consideration, and that will make him less eager to do so." He stopped to glare at Spy. "Unless that man plans on having others die in his place."
The friction between them hung heavy, electrifying the Engineer's thick goggles boring holes in Spy, who wasn't taking kindly to having the accusation of coward turned back on him. No one said a thing, not even Soldier whose protests had been squashed into a singular line on his mouth. The tension could have set the whole base on fire if Demo hadn't interrupted.
"Engie's right about one thing," he pointed out. "They haven't attacked us yet. Most likely they're having a similar conversation over at BLU, and probably aren't all agreeing either. If they were, we'd hear them coming over the hills by now."
"That is merely a technicality," Spy waved away, his eyes still locked firmly on the Engineer. "One I would not like to leave up to chance. Suppose we give them the benefit of the doubt and they use it to their advantage? We will wake with our throats slit and a BLU victory on the board. The final one."
Silence rang resounding around the room. Maybe it was Demo's imagination, but the stakes had finally begun to settle, that no matter their differences of opinion they might all be dead come tomorrow. That he might have to kill a man, for real, for the first time in quite a while left Demo swirling a thumb around his now empty scrumpy bottle.
"Even so," Engineer finally broke the spell, "The ceasefire is the only thing we have right now. We don't agree on much, but Spy's right: this is the time we got to plan. There are too many variables, and until we know exactly what we're working with, there's no way to escape this hellhole."
"So glad after all that, we settle on 'agree to disagree'," Spy said drily.
Engie glared, but didn't have a fitting enough retort to hand out.
"Great!" Demo clapped his hands together, overly cheery. "Glad that's settled. How about some lunch, eh? All this going at each other's throats has got me famished."
Engie was the first to break eye contact. One by one, mercs began to peel off, retreating to their own respective corners of the ring, Heavy speaking to Medic in a subdued voice as they headed down into the medbay. It didn't escape Demo's noticed that every pair breaking off had something starkly in common with each other.
When he was the lone man in the tired war room that had never seen more use than it had today, Demo sighed. Well. If today might be his last, he might as well head up to his room and crack into his emergency supplies.
Several miles away, BLU base was similarly wracked by indecision. Dis-similarly, it was doused in a cold unease, most of its occupants finding it difficult to voice how utterly screwed they all were.
"But why now?" Scout was demanding of the room, and therefore, no one in particular. "It's been what? Six years that we've been doin' this? And only now has that bitch decided she wants to shove us into this Most Dangerous Game crap. Like, if she didn't want to pay us anymore she could have just fired us."
"Jesus Scout, if you don't got anything new to add just be quiet." The Engineer pinched the bridge of his nose, looking over the map in the center of the room fruitlessly. "Have you even read The Most Dangerous Game ?"
Scout lifted his head from where he'd hung it over the couch armrest. "I've seen the movie."
"Scout may have a point." Spy, having watched the lurid silence hang over BLU for what must be close to three hours now, finally voiced the thought.
Engie shot him a familiar incredulous look, one he knew even with the goggles. "You're backing Scout? Is there an eclipse or something?"
"Shocking, I know." Spy stepped closer to the table, drawing the room's attention. "But he is right that many things here do not add up. Initially we all believed what the announcement implied: that this is our final assignment. However, there is nothing in our contracts that refers to a team-wide removal of respawn. Can you imagine that the Administrator, or whoever authorized this decision, has any intention of paying us after betraying us so thoroughly? No, I think it is safe to say that we are no longer in the employment of BLU, or under jurisdiction of TF Industries."
The room hovered in an agitated silence, soaking in the news.
Engie drummed his fingers on the table. "Alright. 'Suppose you're right. But we still don't know why ."
"Come now, think through this," Spy said. "We have nine minds here, some of them above middle-school level intelligence." A hey! could be heard from the couch. "If we go through this logically, we may better understand what is expected to happen to us, instead of just blindly trusting our dear Administrator."
From the couch opposite Scout's, Demo appeared to accept Spy's mental exercise. "So they don't plan on paying us. But they expect us tae kill RED with no other motivation besides they might kill us first?"
"Pretty bloody stupid considering," Sniper agreed. "I mean we're mercenaries! Everything we do is for the check."
"No," said Heavy suddenly. "This is wrong order." The whole room, save Spy, looked at him with surprise. "They do not want to have us killed and then not pay us. They no longer want to hire us, so they have us killed."
"My thought process precisely," Spy agreed.
"They want a massacre." This surprised even more members of BLU, since Soldier had not spoken a single word all day. He had remained at the back of the room, arms folded over, face stone hard.
"Yes," Spy said. "I believe that both RED and BLU have come to an agreement, brokered through the Administrator. They expect both teams to be eliminated, or at least reduced to such small numbers—say, one or two survivors—that can be easily managed. Now the question of why they're doing this, I only have the faintest. I suppose-"
"I'll tell you why," Soldier continued. "Because we are fulfilling what we were placed on this Earth to DO, maggot! Eighteen men, fighting to the death for the sheer thrill of battle? What could be more motivating than that?"
"Soldier," Spy said, puffing gently on his cigarette. "Do shut up."
Soldier snarled, but did not spit off any more of his insane drivel. No one rose to his defense, either, not even Engineer who seemed to go out of his way to humor the man. If anyone needed a clearer picture of Soldier's relation to the team they would only have to glance at the ring of bodies turned subtly away from the Soldier's stake of wall.
"So," Medic asked, leaning elbows on knees. "Might this merely be sadism on BLU's part? I am sure seeing us fight to the death will be most entertaining."
Spy waved his hand away. "I had considered that. Although entertainment may be one motive, I find it more likely that we have become a liability in some way. Perhaps we know too much about respawn? Or base locations, or even about Pauling and the other staff-"
" Um, Spy? "
Spy looked down to where Pyro was pulling at his sleeve. No one had noticed the gas-masked mercenary's attempts to get their attention until now, and they mimicked Spy as his eyes followed the Pyro's finger. Above the war room, the solitary camera had blinked on.
"-Or perhaps I ruled out the sadistic nature of our former employers too soon."
Immediately, the whole room began muttering, the mood having gone from cautious trepidation to submerged in a bucket of ice water.
"At least they don't pick up sound," Demo said, trying to find some sort of silver lining.
No one was pacified by this. Barely anyone made a move without looking up at the camera above them, the red light blinking menacingly every other second. The mercenaries had gotten used to cameras inside the bases being switched off, or at least the pretense of it. Personally, Spy thought they might have been transmitting anyways, even without the outward indication of their 'on' lights, but if that had been the case they were making no move to hide it now.
The idea that someone was watching their every move had once again become unnerving. Especially now since they knew she wanted them dead.
"Okay, freaking fine, the cams are back on. Big whoop." Scout sat up, chewing on the inside of his cheek with defiance in his eyes. "For all we know this whole thing is one big ass bluff. How do we even know for sure that respawn is off in the first place?"
Medic raised an eyebrow. "Is that something you would want to test, Scout?"
Scout kicked the toe of his cleat at the ground. "Well, no , but-"
"I see no reason why they would lie about such a thing," Spy reasoned. "But that does raise the issue: if they really wanted us dead, why not disable respawn and not tell us?"
BLU team all shared a weary glance. Something deeper was going on below the surface here, but they were like lab rats: unable to see the whole maze.
"Jeeze, fine. Let's say they're telling the truth about that," Scout continued. "But there was a bunch of other stuff they could be lying about. Like, all she said was trying to leave isn't allowed or whatever, but other than that what's stopping us? How would she even kill us if we left anyways, hire some more mercenaries she also can't afford?"
"What are you saying?" Engie asked with irritation. "You think it's a good idea to just try walking out?"
Scout got to his feet. "Sure. Why not? I ain't afraid of a bunch of cameras, and it's better than sitting around and waiting for RED to start this freaking thing. If I run into a freaking electric fence and start foaming at the mouth or whatever, at least we'll know."
Spy felt his heart rate increase, even as the room spilled into more heated arguments. It was not a good idea, to which most everyone agreed, but that was not why a shawl of doom had settled itself over Spy's shoulders as he watched Scout showboat. He had forgotten what it was like to carry actual risk. He was no longer accustomed to having to worry about people.
Unsurprisingly, after he got it in his head, no one could talk Scout out of it, and after almost an hour of back and forth they watched Scout grab his weapons and strut out of base. Every mercenary followed after, some more enthusiastically than others, but all did share the same question as Scout: what exactly was stopping them? To leave the power plant sunk deep into the earth, BLU team gathered in the rickety lift meant to take them out of the gorge. It shuddered, perhaps not meant to contain all nine mercenaries at once, but after only a brief hesitation it made good on its promise to carry them skyward, its rattling joined by the nervous mumbling of its occupants.
As it swayed upwards, Spy looked sideways at Scout as he had somehow found his way next to him in the shuffle. The Scout was re-checking his scattergun, looking for ammo and snapping it closed again, cocky wrinkle in his forehead like he barely had a worry in the world. Something edged its way out of Spy's throat.
"Scout," he said before he could think better of it. Scout's brow lifted, as did his chin, and he fixed Spy with a look off-guard enough that it didn't reek of his usual skeptical dismissal. The words trying to escape Spy died. "Do try to make this fast. The sun at the top of the canyon is unbearable."
"Tch," Scout scoffed, and went back to patting down his weapons.
The lift finally came to a stop, snapping into its station with a pained screech. As they filed out, Spy squinted, just able to see down to the dirt road around whose bend they'd parked the cars, the supposed destination.
Scout looked at it too. There may have been a slight look of hesitation on his face, but then his jaw set. He walked forward. They kept waiting for something. Some invisible barrier. Respawn to initiate that kill switch Medic had always flung conspiracies about. BLU held its breath, perched on the edge of the cliff leaning in the shadow of the lift as the sun went down behind them, glinting off distant windows and blazing the sky pink. Scout was halfway to the cars when he looked over his shoulder, grin on his face, mouth open to say something snarky-
When three near instantaneous cracks shook the canyon.
The battle hardened mercenaries reacted instantly, falling to the dirt as the familiar sound of sniper fire reverberated through the air and into their nervous systems. Spy went to his knees, hands reflexively protecting the back of his neck, but his head snapped around as he tried desperately to determine where the shots had come from. Instead he saw Sniper, the man still standing even as the men around him dropped for cover, eyes wide as he looked to where everyone's focus had been locked a moment ago.
Spy followed his eyes. Scout lay on the ground, halfway between the lift and the cars, unmoving.
The loudspeakers crackled to life, playing a new message that echoed through Hydro and all the way to RED base. "A reminder that attempting to leave the mission area is prohibited. BLU has received a penalty."
Spy's blood froze in his veins. Before anyone could do anything, let alone him, Soldier reached up and grabbed the front of Sniper's shirt, dragging him to the ground. "Do you still want your brain between your ears, maggot? Battle positions!"
Eight mercenaries huddled on the ground, in the middle of a dead zone with hills lurking to their sides and a several hundred foot drop at their backs, did not feel like a battle position. It felt like being the fish in the proverbial barrel. They waited in silence, for more sniper fire, for another announcement, but neither one came. Slowly, cautiously, Spy unfurled himself, looking again at Scout to see if by some miracle anything had changed.
It had not. Scout was still on his side, motionless, his hat on the ground next to his head. The only difference was now there was a small pool of red underneath him.
"Fuck…" someone whispered. It sounded like Demoman.
When no more death rained from the crags, the rest of the mercenaries slowly got to their feet.
"Well then," Medic said as he cleaned off a bit of dust that had gotten on his glasses. "So that is the price for disobeying the new rules."
No one said anything to that. Demo's eye was fixed, muttering little bloody idiot to himself, barely audible, and Pyro was mumbling something so fast into Engie's ear that Spy couldn't make it out.
Spy rubbed his face with his hands, and found them to be shaking. Uncertainty fizzled in his blood and he found he did not know what to make of the body in the distance. Certainly he had seen corpses before. Had seen this particular corpse before, many times actually, but that did not stop the feeling of loss washing over him. And no one else was willing to take the lead, it seemed.
"Well then," he said with a false confidence he hoped made it to his voice. "We should get down to safety. Obviously we need to reevaluate how to handle our current imprisonment-"
"That's it?" Sniper snapped, turning on Spy. "We're just going to leave him out there?"
"What else is there to do?" Spy felt whatever semblance of patience he'd mustered up already beginning to thin. "Would you like to get shot as well? Or perhaps you have one of those faulty grapple guns lying around, hm?"
"Go sneak out there," Sniper demanded, pointing one long, accusing finger at the deadzone that now cradled Scout's body. "That's what you're bloody good for, isn't it?"
Spy narrowed his eyes. Normally he was good at ignoring the Sniper. Normally his heart wasn't shaking apart his resolve as the protective barrier of shock wore off. Now was not normal and he glared, "Might I remind you that my equipment is provided by TF Industries. They know how the watches work. They are simple to counter and see through, and the only reason it has worked for the past six years is because they have explicitly prohibited either side from developing countermeasures, and you want me to walk into crossfire with nothing but this ?" He brought his wristwatch up to Sniper's face. "For him ?" He pointed his own finger out at Scout. "He is dead Sniper, there is nothing we can do for him now."
It was saying it aloud that finally made it sink in. Pyro growled, or at least that's what the noises coming from their mask seemed to be, and began to stalk the length of invisible barrier separating them from Scout, pacing like a tiger in a cage. As Sniper's shoulders slouched, Spy felt his own heart sink as taking it out on Sniper hadn't made him feel any better. They had let this happen. All of them had. Any one of them could have stopped Scout-
"We can't just leave him," Sniper repeated, and this time he was pleading.
Engie came to put a hand on his shoulder. "We gotta, Stretch. We gotta get out of here."
"No," Spy said suddenly, surprising both men. "No, Sniper is right. I should retrieve him."
"But," Sniper blinked, "didn't you just say your watch-?"
"I will simply go as I am." Spy did not know why those words were coming out of his mouth, but he did not back down from them. "Mortuary Affairs are protected under the Geneva Conventions, no? Perhaps we will be allowed this."
"Per-" Engie choked, disbelieving. " Perhaps? Spy you saw what just happened, you saw what they did to him."
"Still." Spy readied himself, fixing his tie as he turned toward the cars once again. He was stopped as Engie abandoned Sniper and gripped his arm instead.
"Spy," he commanded. "Do not go out there. Do you hear me?"
Now there was a familiar look. But, as always, Spy was notoriously bad at following Engineer's commands. Gently, he removed the hand around his sleeve, tugging at the wrist until his apologetic look pierced the Engineer's goggles.
"Spy," Engie tried one last time. Spy only shook his head.
No one else tried to stop him. Demo went to comfort the agitated Pyro, but the rest of the mercenaries just stood there, waiting, watching as he took a step forward with his hands raised in surrender. It felt like part of his brain had been shut down; he didn't even register this as a risk anymore, only as the purest and most simple, must be done .
A green dot appeared at Spy's feet. He took a step forward. The dot moved as well, but across the ground, not onto his body.
His lungs hurt as he moved like that, one step at a time, fearful that at any moment he would make some imperceptible faux pas and the laser would flicker to his forehead and he'd think no more. Slowly, he edged closer. He took great care to keep his hands up, that he was making no attempts to run, even though a cramp in his shoulder began to thrum part way there. Scout was in sight.
And he was very, very dead.
Part of Spy had been hoping. If he could just bring Scout back, Medic was known to do wonders but…No. There was a neat bullet hole through his head of course, but there was also one in his shoulder, and another through the stomach. There would be no return for Scout. Spy lifted him under the arms and pulled.
The dead were always heavier. That was his professional opinion, as he had a lot of practice hiding bodies both living and dead in closets and clothes hampers, and for some reason he found that those who he had eliminated lethally were always more difficult to hide or stash or dump than those that would wake in the morning with a terrible headache. If his mother were still alive, she would have told him it was the spirit of guilt weighing him down. She had been right about quite a lot of those sorts of things.
Spy was right about only one thing: the sun had become unbearable.
When he had finally hauled Scout back to the waiting onlookers, sweaty and covered in a thick layer of dirt, Pyro had calmed down enough to rush forward and shake Scout's shoulder. Spy held him towards Medic's waiting medibeam, but it was as Spy had thought: the bullet holes did not mend. There was no life to stitch back together.
"We go?" Heavy asked the silent company.
"I suppose we must." Spy slid Scout's head off his lap. He didn't remember putting it there.
But when he made a move to lift his body again, Heavy stopped him. "Nyet, Heavy will carry."
An argument rose on Spy's lips, but the ten minutes it'd taken to drag Scout's corpse across the ground had left an ache in his arms and a shortness in his breath. He closed his mouth, and nodded. "Thank you."
So that was how they returned to their base, descending back in that shaking lift, one less.