Author notes: Shortest chapter we've had for a while. Things are building up slowly, some of the Engineer's traps are brought into light and the whole thing probably causes more questions than it answers. I apologise if this seems to be lacking in quality, I was unsure of how best to write this chapter and combat is not exactly my forte.

Chapter 9: Warmup

BLU team respawned, rage and disbelief visible on their features for a brief moment before they moved, dashing out of the respawn room. The Scout, Sniper and Spy headed towards the battlements, the runner leaping onto the bridge and sprinting to the enemy base, the masked man dropping down silently and fading from view and the marksman stood at the ready. The Sniper knew he wasn't much help indoors and with the enemy in their base it was best to wait until the bugger either got to their intel or tried to make a quick escape. Then he'd be ready, a precision shot would be dealt and this whole mess would be over.

A little chuckle at that thought before he looked down his scope to the RED battlements where the Scout had run to. It felt so strange, not having the other Sniper there to duel with, not hearing their gunshots crack and boom over the battlefield. A sudden high-pitched scream erupted from the enemy base, sounding suspiciously like their Scout. He lowered his rifle in confusion for a moment, but that moment was all he had as the familiar boom of a sniper rifle sounded and he was dead.

The Heavy, Medic and Soldier ran towards the spiralling slope that led to their intel, whilst the Demoman, Engineer and Pyro instead headed to their right from respawn, into the ramp room. The sound of an alerted sentry, the Russian's grunt of pain, the whirring of his minigun and a rocket from the Soldier. The mini-sentry was destroyed and the trio headed downstairs, the Medic alternating between the two men as the American charged on ahead of the lagging Heavy. In his earlier days with the team, he had focused mostly on healing the Russian giant, arguing that the Heavy was the most logical choice to overheal, to Übercharge and to use as a human shield. Later on he had...other reason to wish to stay close to the man, but he'd pushed his earlier mistakes aside and recognised the value of latching onto his other teammates when needed. And with a mostly unknown threat, the value of keeping both men at top health became all that more important.

The mini-sentry had never been intended to do serious damage, only to delay anyone choosing to take the same route the Engineer had and it had played its part well. "The enemy has taken our intelligence!" The Announcer screeched over the loudspeakers as the RED strapped the briefcase to the LFD on his back. A beep and small notification in his goggles told him of the loss of the mini-sentry, meaning he couldn't escape the way he came into the basement. The Texan instead ran to the stairs leading to the ramp room, where the other BLUs lay in wait.

The BLU Engineer, heard the announcement just as he'd managed to get a level two sentry up and a level one dispenser, his nest positioned in the top corner to fire at anyone who left via the stairs or came in via the ramp room. The Pyro was at a loss as to what to do with no Spy to set aflame and not wanting to lead an attack when the enemy was still in the base. So the pyromaniac merely waited by the buildings, flamethrower at the ready. The Demoman had finished placing stickybombs around the entrance to the stairs, ready to detonate.

The sound of footsteps charging up the stairs before slowing and pausing for a moment. The beeping of the BLU sentry as their Engineer stood at the ready, wrench held in the Gunslinger. The Pyro looked on expectantly, finger twitching by the trigger. A grunt and the RED Engineer darted forward, covered in smoke as the stickybombs were detonated. In a blur of moment obscured by the dust and shrapnel, he rolled and leapt down, tossing something towards the sentry even as its bullets rocked his body.

A spinning motion and his left arm was up, deflecting the bullets with only a slight grunt of pain as he stood his ground, body trembling under the assault. The Pyro leapt down after him, landing in front of the Texan, spitting fire with a muffled cry. Even as the first flames licked at the RED, setting him alight and contorting his face into one of rage and pain, his right hand swung up into position, Vengeance in its grip. The briefest moment to steady himself, both against the knockback caused by the sentry and the recoil that was about to rip through his body.

The grenade he had thrown into the Engineer's nest went unnoticed in the heat of battle, the short fuse running out at the very moment he pulled the trigger of Vengeance. Twin explosions, one of fire and scrap metal, the other of thunder and blood, the remains raining down onto the ground as the smoke cleared. The RED demon glowed for a moment, the flames vanishing. Shrapnel had caused a small cut in his strong jaw but the bleeding quickly ceased and the wound vanished. Bathed in the healing aura, he put his shotgun away for a moment, turning around at the sound of the Demoman's battle cry as the Scotsman leapt from above, Eyelander in both hands as he brought the haunted sword down in an overhand chop.

The RED leapt back just in time to avoid the blow, the cyclops already lifting the blade once more and charging, this time with a horizontal slash. The steel of the sword met the reinforced metal of the Engineer's hand, both men sweating from the exertion as the two struggled for dominance. So intent on this struggle was the BLU that he didn't notice his foe's other hand reaching for the blade on his back until it was too late. A thrust and the resistance faded, the Demoman's remaining eye wide and staring as the Eyelander fell from his hand. The RED gripped the weapon embedded in the Scotsman's chest with both hands and pulled, again taking the time to flick the blood off before he sheathed the sword once more.

The Spy was cautious in entering the RED base, uncertain of what to expect. He took slow steps, pausing every so often so that the Cloak and Dagger didn't run out. Upon entering the front of the base he'd found sentries placed in addition to strange machines that lay near them. He crept towards one, about to put on a disguise, to uncloak and lay waste to the machines with his sappers when something suddenly shivered in his spine. He looked up to see a familiar jar falling from the ceiling. He opened his mouth to curse and found himself drenched in urine, his cloak failing and his eyes widening as his foul words were choked back down his throat with the unspeakable fluid that washed over him. Before this had truly registered in his mind any further, two sentries locked onto his now visible form and fired, unleashing hell in the form of bullets and rockets onto the Frenchman.

The group of BLUs still alive at this point, the Heavy, Medic and Soldier, quickly realised that their enemy had gone the other way to escape and laid waste to their teammates defending the ramp room, as the bloody carnage that lay before them testified. Knowing that even with the Engineer slowed down and possibly wounded he was still ahead of them and faster on his feet, they nonetheless ran through the ground floor of their base towards the exit regardless. The Medic kept an eye on his ever-rising Übercharge meter, trying to fight down the feeling of unease that crept into his mind as they approached the exit. So preoccupied were the trio that none of them noticed the small figure in the shadows suddenly flicker into appearance, silently extending itself to full height and soundlessly ending the doctor's life.

The two men didn't notice the German's body falling onto the ground, a knife embedded in his spine, so intent were they on getting to the RED base. They thought nothing of the sudden stop in healing, the two men running side by side merely thinking that the Medic had turning the Medigun to the other. The Soldier was normally faster than the Heavy but had slowed down his pace to make the job for the German easier and to keep the three together. It was only when a gunshot fired and the Heavy fell behind him, a hole through his skull, that the American noticed he was alone.

"Heavy! Doc? MAGGOTS! I need someone here on the double, that's an order!"

His voice quickly shifted from shock and pain to his usual confidence. He wasn't sure what had happened to his two allies but BLU would regroup and attack together, ensuring that that damn Texan didn't escape alive. But his confidence faded, standing there in the open as silence greeted him. Just as he was about to move on and attack by himself, rocket launcher at the ready, he heard the unmistakeable sound of a decloak.

"Spy! Glad you had the guts in you to make it, unlike those other-"

The Soldier was unable to finish his comments about the Frenchman showing different traits than normal and the cowardice of his team, for his eyes had rolled to the back of his head, his helmet had fallen off and he'd collapsed, a knife still fresh with the blood of another buried into his back.

Within the RED base, the Engineer carefully made his way through the trapped base. Whilst the sentries wouldn't fire at him, and several of his traps that relied on motion sensing were overridden by a transmitter hidden in his helmet when he was nearby, many traps would still activate if he made a wrong move. He'd memorised his placements and thus knew where to avoid stepping, when to duck under an invisible tripwire and so on. As such, whilst his movements weren't slow by any means, it was certainly a lesser pace than he'd set in getting here. He'd received reports from his machines and drones of the deaths of the BLU Scout, Sniper, Spy, Medic, Heavy and Soldier.

The Scout had been able to avoid sentry fire using a can of Bonk only to be punctured by a spike trap and then exploded with rockets when the Bonk wore off. The Spy had triggered one of the countless Jarate traps the Sniper had suggested setting up and promptly been torn apart by dual sentry fire. The Sniper and Heavy had been expertly exterminated through a certain...long-range defence of the base, whilst the Medic and Soldier had been taken care of by one of his more devious ideas.

Some of the team would have respawned again by this time and BLU would probably get themselves into a strong offensive formation to charge again, to unleash the furious attacking strength they were known for. Whilst the RED grinned at the thought of their offensive attempt, and the carnage that would ensure, he knew that each time they died they would learn more. They would be able to eventually make progress into the base, they may even discover the cause of some of their stranger deaths or even how to best confront the Engineer himself. With each death he bought more time for himself, time to run, time to heal, to reload Vengeance, to cool down his chaingun, to give commands to his drones.

But now, as he entered his base's basement, turned round the corners and carefully placed the briefcase on the table alongside RED's intel...

Right now he could taste the sweetness of victory, the first point of the battle his. He had a long way yet to go but right now this small success filled him with hope. Hope that he could somehow pull this off. Hope that he could win. Hope that he could do his team proud.

Hope that...no, he'd think about that more if and only if he won here. His other plans would have to wait until BLU's defeat. He still had work to do. With that thought in mind he turned to leave the intel room, barely noticing the Announcer abandoning her normal tone and cackling with glee.

"You have secured the enemy intelligence."

This was just the beginning. BLU had yet to see what he could really do, yet to comprehend what they faced and what this was really all part of. What he'd learned by reading the intel and what the Spy had left behind for him, his own suspicions and thoughts...

One way or another...

He'd bring the light to the world, he'd reveal the truth with the fire and lightning surging through his blood! He'd show BLU...the Administrator...those idiot Mann brothers who started this feud...even that insane Australian, Saxton Hale...

The world would see, the world would know. The secret war would be no more, this Engineer was just warming up!

Author notes: Yeah, so we're still not seeing too much combat and BLU still have to take things up a notch from the look of things. The Engineer is only directly responsible for three deaths this time, but if you still think he's overpowered then keep in mind that yes, despite all his upgrades and his burning spirit, so far he's been using his brain throughout his battles.
In Chapter 8 he used the element of surprise and unleashed two overdrives: one for his chaingun and one in his boots, to wipe out BLU. In this Chapter he did kill the enemy Engineer, a level two sentry, Demoman and the Pyro but he did so swiftly whilst the detonation of the stickybombs caused reduced visibility, chaos and confusion. The grenade he left behind was enough to destroy the sentry, kill the Engineer and likely wound the Demoman, who was close to his own detonation as it was anyway. He sustained damage from the sentry, and dealt with each BLU one at a time rather than having their combined might upon him. Had the Demoman not been wounded when he attacked, he could have possibly overpowered Engie with the Eyelander.