Note: I'm really sorry this took so long, writers block is a nasty thing.

"Woods… Wake up…" was all he could hear in his sleep. It sounded so far away, like someone was yelling to him from a distance. Then a small pressure and some slight shaking caused him to open his eyes groggily. He sat up slightly.

"Hmm?" he asked, rubbing his left eye. It took a second or two for his eyes to adjust, but once they did, he could clearly see Daryl, who was completely dressed for battle. Woods looked over at Kurt, who was still sleeping soundly.

"It's 10:00. The battle starts at 12:45." Daryl explained.

"Battle?" Woods started, rubbing one eye, "I thought it was only training."

"Well, we train for a while, then get ready for another while, then we go into battle."

Woods looked at him for another moment before he walked over to Kurt.

"Kurt… Hey, Kurt, you need to wake up." Daryl said quietly, as not to surprise the sleeping German. Daryl did the same thing he did to Woods to Kurt. He gently placed his hand on Kurt's arm and shook a little. That seemed to do the trick, because he woke up almost immediately.

Having done his job, Daryl returned to his own room and let the two younger men wake up on their own. Woods groggily stood up, almost losing his balance a little, but not falling over. He slowly reached into one of his bags and pulled out a fresh T-shirt and shorts. After putting them on, he looked over at Kurt, who was just starting to sit up. He must've fallen back asleep after Daryl left he thought.

"Vhat zhe…" he started, looking around the room for a moment before his eyes rested on Woods. He looked a bit confused for a moment, and he looked around again.

"Ugh… Vhat time is it?"

"10:00"

"10:00?" Kurt asked with a yawn "It feels more like 4:00 in zhe morning."

After that, he stood up, wobbling a little. He groped around on a desk for his glasses, unable to find them, he motioned to take a step forwards. Before he could though, he was stopped by a voice.

"Hey don't!"

"Vhy not?" Kurt asked, looking more of slightly above Woods's head than actually looking at him. Though he could only make out faint outlines without his glasses, he could tell Woods had gotten up and walked over to him. Then he took a knee and picked something off of the ground, and then stood back up.

"You would've broke these." he said. He saw Woods reach out a hand with an object in it. He took the object to feel the familiar shape of his glasses. He put them on and was able to see much much clearer.

"Oh. Danke."

"Well, we should probably get ready. Training starts soon, and we certainly don't want to be late on our first day."

After the two got completely ready, they headed out the door to the backyard of the RED base., which was where they trained for the days of battle ahead.

"Come on men! You gotta move, NOW!" Terence yelled as his teammates sped through the course. It was a bit challenging, considering they had to do these complicates tasks while dodging BB gun bullets. If you get hit, you're out.

Woods clambered and crawled up the steep hill as quickly as he could, along with Randall and Max. The fire was pretty heavy about where they were, and it wasn't long before Max was hit in the arm. He let out a yelp and rolled down the hill, almost running into Woods on the way down.

Randall looked down at Woods with his serious face on. "Don't get hit, mate! It's just us now!"

Woods tried to reply clearly, but he'd put his Pyro suit on, so the optical mask really blurred what he was saying.

"What!?" Randall yelled back to him.

Woods removed the filter from the mask "I'll try not too, but we need to keep moving!"

"Oh. Well then let's get bloody going!"

The two continued to strenuous climb until finally reaching the top. By now, their muscles were aching, and their hearts were beating rapidly. But, it was all worth it to try and see the others climb up the hill. The hill was so steep, it might as well have been at a ninety degree angle.

It was a little funny watching them struggle to get up the hill, but it was satisfying seeing them make it up there with a little help. Once that was done, they took a long break. Kurt was first to start the conversation.

"So, how long have you all been here?" he asked.

"Well, we're all pretty much new." Terence answered

"Yeah, but some of us are newer than others. I think the first one here was Vitaly." Daryl cut in

"Da. I got here about three weeks ago." Vitaly confirmed

"The other team got here around the same time we did." Randall commented

That, for some reason, made Kurt feel a little better. At least he and Woods, and the rest of his team weren't complete amateurs who had no idea what they were doing.

"They've gotten pretty good at fightin' since we've started. But, then again, we all have." Duncan added, not seeming to look forward to the upcoming battle. They all talked for a little while longer before moving on to the next thing, which was much, much, MUCH simpler than climbing up that steep hill.

The only thing they had to do to pass this, was run around the base, and avoid Mason, who would be playing as the enemies. They received their weapons and tools along the way, and were taught a little bit about how they worked.

Once there, everyone got into position. Mason began counting down.

10… 9…

"Do you zhink ve'll make it?" Kurt asked Woods

8… 7…

"Probably, if we hurry." Woods replied

6… 5

"Good luck."

4… 3…

"You too."

2… 1!

Mason fired a blank into the air and cloaked with invisibility as his team ran. Max and Kurt sped ahead of the group while Terence lagged behind along with Vitaly. Woods, Randall, Duncan, and Daryl stayed mostly in the center. Upon reaching the end of the hallway everyone split up into random groups.

They continued running down the hallway and make a few more turns before Woods stopped with the group he was in. They ran forward for a few more steps before getting the hint that Woods wanted them to stop.

Once everyone was stopped, he looked at the people in his group. Duncan and Randall. For a minute, that seemed like all that would come until Terence turned the corner. He looked a little relieved to see them, from the half of his face they could see.

"Okay, good," he thought out loud "A little group. Mind if I join?"

"No, not at all." Woods replied.

The group of four wandered aimlessly around the base, into seemingly isolated areas, and the basement. Now they were on their way to the top level of the base. There were a lot of stairs, and it took a while, but they were almost there.

That was when Woods noticed there was something wrong with Terence. He started to look really shaky and tired, and he moved slowly, and he was panting. Not like small panting, like he just got done sprinting for ten yards, this was more of that 'just-got-done-sprinting-a-marathon' panting. It scared Woods, because Terence was just fine beforehand.

Woods walked down the last set of stairs he'd climbed up and took a look at his teams Soldier.

"Terence?" he asked, a tint of worry in his voice.

"Don't get upset, son," Terence started "It's fine, I'll be okay."

"It doesn't look like it. What is it?"

Terence didn't seem very comfortable with that question. He just gave Woods an angry look, and that was all that was needed to get his point across.

"Okay, I'm sorry, I won't ask that again. Do you need any help?"

"No, I'm fine." Terence said reassuringly. Woods wanted to go back upstairs, but his caring nature told him to stay with Terence until he got the strength to climb up this last set of stairs. It took him a few minutes, but he got the strength to move forward, but he did move pretty slowly. Woods stayed close to him incase he fell, or did something he wasn't supposed too.

At one point Randall climbed down the stairs to help. Duncan must've noticed too, because he took a few steps down to their level as well.

"Terence, ya gotta tell us when ya start feelin' weak." Duncan scolded. He didn't sound harsh, but his voice still had that scolding tone to it.

"I know, I'm sorry. I just… thought I could-"

"Terence, lad. Ya gotta stop straining yerself, yer condition is only gonna get worse. It's bad enough for it how hard ya fight in battle, but this is gettin' ridiculous. Ya need to start tellin' us. I'm not snappin' at ya like this to make ya feel bad, but ya need to tell us, lad."

Terence looked at the ground for a minute before nodding and saying 'Okay.'

The little group helped Terence the rest of the way up the stairs.

(Setting Change)

"AHH-HA!" Daryl shouted as a rubber knife was 'stabbed' into his chest. He smirked "Oh! You got me!"

Mason looked back at his friend, returning the small smile. "Good try. Maybe next time, you should focus on what's in front of you instead of looking back to see if I was gaining on you or not."

"Yeah," Daryl started, placing his hand on the back of his hardhat "I guess I just get paranoid like that." Daryl then moved his hand from his hardhat to his forehead, mostly to soothe his painful and throbbing headache. "Am I bleedin'?"

"Not that I could see, but you did hit your head pretty hard there. You would've seen that wall if you'd been looking ahead. " Mason replied.

Daryl felt a warm liquid run down his face between his eyes. He brought his hand away to see a red liquid staining his fingertips.

"Uh-Oh," he started, sounding a bit alarmed. "Umm, Time out for a sec." Daryl requested. He then stood up and leaned against a wall.

"Kurt?" asked into the next room. Kurt looked back at him, looking a bit unsure.

"Uhh," he began, lifting up his hard hat as to expose the wound "Help?"

Kurt walked over and examined the wound for a moment before using his Medigun to heal the man in just a few seconds. Once that was done, Daryl no-longer felt that throbbing headache, and there was absolutely no evidence of the cut even being there.

"Thanks, Kurt." he said with a smile. Kurt opened his mouth to say something back, but that was when Mason called on a continuation of what they were doing before. Kurt immediately ran out of the room, followed by Vitaly and Max.

Max eventually sped ahead of Kurt, but he didn't mind too much. He only had one thing on his mind right now. Getting out of Mason's sight. He ran with his friends for another 30 seconds before they came to a door.

"Oh, good, we're going outside!" Max yelled back sarcastically. Once they reached the door, they swung it open as quickly as possible and ran out. It felt nice, getting the cold air in their lungs, It almost energized Kurt. Kurt had loved going outside as a child, outside was his, as one would say, element.

He saw a building he could run into, and he went for it. He was almost to the entrance before he heard Mason yell: "Kurt! No!"

He flipped himself around towards the sound of Mason's voice, too see the Spy running in his direction.

"Vhat!?" Kurt questioned. Not even a half a second after that, something heavy collided with the back of his skull. Whatever it was, it didn't knock him out, but it stunned him. The same thing then impacted his spine, rather painfully, and then the blows continued, one hitting him in the ribs hard enough to break one or two. It took nearly all of his strength not to scream.

Fortunately for him, the attack was over in seconds. Something much bigger tackled whoever was attacking him away. He then felt himself being lead away from there, while Vitaly started yelling, and from the sound of it, beating someone.

Whoever was leading him stopped, then took his Medigun and healed him, making the pain leave instantly. Kurt looked around for another moment or so before Vitaly walked back, fists dripping blood. Kurt didn't know whether it was Vitalys own blood, or the blood of whoever attacked him. He didn't care though, at least it was over.

"Freakin' Blus!" Max growled. "It's not even noon yet, and they're already trying to kill us!"

Woods's and Kurts group met back at the respawn room. Kurt immediately took a seat on one of the benches, looking quite troubled. Woods looked at Kurt for moment before approaching him.

"Are you okay?" he asked "You look upset."

Kurt looked up at Woods for a quick second before looking back down and replying "S-Someone attacked me."

"What?" Woods asked, voice raised slightly. Woods took a seat next to his friend before placing a hand on his shoulder lightly.

"Kurt, when did this happen?" he asked

"About 20 minutes ago…"

" I'm sorry to hear that. Are you okay?"

" I am now."

Just before Woods could reply, the announcer said over the intercom. "Mission begins in 60 seconds!"

Whatever else people needed to get done, they hurried up and got it done, then got into formation. They exchanged almost eager glances, like they were excited about the battle. Max laughed a little bit as the announcer said that mission would begin in five seconds.

"This is gonna be AWESOME!" Max shouted.

"BEGIN!"