Author's notes: A bit shorter than some previous chapters and once again I find myself leaving on an evil cliffhanger. Ah well, no helping it. I've checked over and fixed a few errors and tried to clean-up some of the paragraph/space destroying uploading this seems to cause but apologies if I missed anything. Trying out using #'s to mark out anywhere which would have a large gap if the site stopped eating them.
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Chapter 20: Life and Death

Demon and Beast, their fates now inescapably interlinked, stand alone before the full brunt of the heavy heart of the heavens themselves. Both with their own motivations, their own drive, their own burning spirits that pushes them to the impossible. Two mortal souls who dare to defy the gods, who reject their fates, who dare to look death in the eyes and laugh.

A crimson demon enraged by the senselessness of war, blood stains soaked into his mind, unwilling to lose what little he has left...

A savage beast the world could not tame, death being his trade and conflict his life, sent here solely to tear apart his prey...

The pair launched themselves at each other, wind rippling away as they both pulled their hands back, clenched into fists of steel and seeming to halt time itself as they were forced to meet. Reinforced metal met hard flesh and the world trembled, a crater blown into the ground before their feet, an explosion of wind and dust blown away as they struggled.

Fist had met fist in perfect unison, arms trembling to overpower the other, Isaac's teeth clenched together as he matched Hale's strength as best he could. The Australian had the grace to be surprised that someone was able to meet his fist and hold him in place...but the surprise was fleeting, and soon replaced with a snarl. The pair added power to their struggle for but a moment more before both pushed on the other and leapt back, sliding to a halt as they kicked the dirt into the air again.

There was no pause before they leapt forward again, the Beast's muscles tensing and unleashing their power as he sailed through the air, the Demon's thrusters burning with hellish fury as he sprung upwards to meet his foe. There was a crack of almighty thunder, a spark of electricity surging through the very air they breathed as the pair flew past each other and landed with an almighty crunch.

Hale briefly glanced down at his abdomen where Vengeance had struck, noting the damage caused with a mixture of delight and respect. Isaac nursed his own chest for a moment, the glancing blow of the Australian barely scraping him and yet it had certainly left its mark upon the armoured Texan.

Twisting around, the Engineer growled as his left arm transformed back into the chaingun, the growl becoming a roar as he unleashed fiery pain into the Mann Co CEO. Beneath those forever-dark goggles his eyes narrowed as the bullets impacted flesh, the hot ammunition creating steam in its wake as it pierced through the rain, the spinning barrel of his weapon illuminating the nearby land as surely as the lightning strikes on the horizon.

Saxton took the blow in his stride, swivelling his body as the bullets hit one side, moving his legs as he did so. With his rotation aided by the knockback of the bullets, he suddenly shot one foot forwards across the ground with full force, kicking up a maelstrom of dirt and stone towards the former RED. His prey, visibility impaired temporarily and raising both arms to protect his face from the shrapnel, not given the time to transform the chaingun back, did not see the Australian bound into the air again, both arms raised above his head, ready to bury him into the ground forever.

But it did not come to pass. Isaac jumped back at the last moment, arm transforming back and both hands cradled Vengeance once more, fire burning in his blood even as Hale crashed down before him, the blow missing and striking the earth, shaking the very ground at their feet before cracking it apart, a zig-zag line of destruction running past the Engineer, who rolled to the side before the crack could reach him. The Beast raised his head, turning to face the Demon, the latter raising himself and bringing his weapon. The heavens intervened with fury of its own, sharp bolts of lightning narrowly missing the pair as the Beast adopted a ready stance and the Demon unleashed the charged shells of revenge once more.

There was no one to witness this battle of furious killing intent, this clash of wills, the savagery of human spirit as the land shuddered and broke apart beneath them piece by piece. There was no one to feel the sharp rushes of wind, the cold embrace of the falling rain, to see the very carrier of life itself be carelessly splashed onto the barren earth. There was no one for miles...except for two other men and their fallen comrades in a desperate battle of their own.
A battle against time. A battle against odds. A battle against death.

###

Dell and Nils did their best to ignore the sounds of the distant battle, audible even from this distance; the pair shaking as their eyes darted to and fro, searching. The former BLU Engineer had setup a circle of level three dispensers and had taken over from the Medic in steering the recently repaired motorised trailer, the latter now using his eyesight and memory of the previous battle to locate the rest of their team. Both hoped with all their might that they weren't too late.

But alas, the task was not an easy load for them to carry, for all their hope they knew their chances were slim. The flashes of lightning that were now so frequent it almost seemed as if some deity was doing so on purpose both helped and hindered them, the light helpful for noticing any dark shapes on the ground, but it was also blinding. And with the danger they faced, they needed their vision to pierce the darkness and chaos to survive.

The barren landscape was a deathtrap of craters and flaming wreckage. This area had hardly been a smooth ride even before Team Fortress had made their presence known on the nearby train tracks, but with the addition of countless flaming husks of downed aircraft, additional debris and shrapnel, the near-misses of lightning strikes and the cold rain pooling in places...

Needless to say, their desperately racing ride was a bumpy one, not exactly helped by the small earthquakes undoubtedly caused by the battle between Saxton and Isaac. Dell tried to push that thought away from his mind but instead his grip on the controls tightened, his gaze cold and hard. He gulped and felt his heart beat harder still as his ears strained to hear the otherworldly cries of pain and roars in the distance.

He felt an incredible pain weigh down upon his soul at the thought of his fellow Engineer. The man had already lost so much, had fought against impossible odds, found it in his heart to forgive the former members of BLU and now, gave them one last shot at escape, knowing full well that there may not be anything left of him for them to come back for. Still, as much as he felt the urge to shut his eyes and offer a silent prayer for the other Texan, he instead found himself slowing the vehicle to a halt, the Medic leaping out before it had even stopped, dashing for the prone form of their Soldier.

Dell was about to chase after the doctor before something caught his eye. Noticing the scattered weapons and seeing that the Medic was lost in his work, checking Jane's vitals, he brought the equipment back to the vehicle before lending Nils a hand at carefully placing the unconscious man near a dispenser. He watched silently as Nils trained his medigun on the American, his thoughts returning to Isaac, his mind instead displaying the Crimson Demon who had torn through BLU like they were nothing, the man who had stared unblinkingly at the possibility of Death without fear.

###

Isaac stumbled and fell down to one knee, still attempting to fire the overheating chaingun at the broad form of the man who stood before him so casually. A warning appeared on his goggles and with a whir and an angry frown, he deactivated the weapon before he damaged it, his mechanical arm cradling his battered right. Looking up with that smouldering fury, the Engineer made his decision even as Hale strolled up towards him, chuckling.

The battle had been going well at first, he'd been able to deal some degree of damage to the savage Australian and it seemed that Hale's own incredible rage that had driven him to unleash such fury against his team had died down. With the rage drained he'd been able to land even more attacks that should have been enough to destroy any other man.

But Saxton Hale was no other man and soon Isaac had found himself knocked to the ground or into the air more and more. Even the glancing blows or mere scrapes caused him to erupt into pain and now it was clear that even with the healing of the Level Four Dispenser and his own resolve, his body couldn't take much more. The few direct hits Hale had managed to land on him had completely punched through his armour, broken bones, and likely done some serious internal damage too.

The Australian looked down at the sight before him, the Texan coughing blood onto the waterlogged dirt. The CEO of Mann Co, for all his own wounds, smiled, laughing his booming laugh that could be heard for miles around. The rain ran down his muscles, dancing on countless burns and bruises, wiping what little blood of his own was still on his skin away.

"I haven't had a fight this good in ages, but in the end, you picked a fight with the wrong man. Those other hippies on your team are all dead or fleeing like the little girls they are..."

The glare Isaac shot at Hale could have cut through steel at the mention of his teammates but all it did was make the savage brute laugh once more before he picked up the Engineer by his head, helmet and all. They both stared for a moment before the Australian brought his captive audience far too close to his face, a toothy grin all too visible at this distance.

"Now...it's just you, me and my bare hands."

To the Beast's surprise, the Demon in his grasp laughed a horribly eerie laugh that seemed to echo all around him before matching his grin with a hellish smirk of his own.

"Let's do this Texas style!"

And with no more warning beyond that, he unleashed Death into the world once more.

###

A lone vehicle trundled to a bumpy stop, the two conscious occupants leaping out and running as they avoided the puddles, which in this light could have been water or blood, skidding to a sad stop by the mess of a body on the ground. Silently, the duo nodded sombrely, the shorter figure gently laying the body out on his back as the taller man leaned down, listening. A sad shake of the head and the shorter one bowed his head, the rain beating down on his back and masking the tears that flowed so freely down his face, past his goggles and to the drenched world below.

A gasp caused him to lift his head, his companion listening to the body once more. Their gazes met and with a slow nod they carefully carried their comrade to the modified trailer, placing him softly on the ground as beams of healing light, both from several nearby dispensers and the nozzle of the Life Sparker medigun.

"How are they all, doc?"

The Medic paused in answering the Engineer, trying to think of how to best answer as he left his beam trailed on the battered body of the Scout. Nils eventually decided on simply giving the blunt and honest truth, his colleague had seen enough to already guess, it didn't take a crazy doctor to tell that times were dark.

"...zhey are all just barely alive, at least for the moment. For some, that even the slightest spark still flows through zheir bodies is in itself a miracle, testament to their fight against the reaper himself, my hard-hatted friend."

The pair looked on in silence at the collected bodies of their teammates lying in the circle of dispensers, many chests moving with only the shallowest of breaths and others not seeming to move at all. The rain itself seemed to decrease in intensity to acknowledge these fallen warriors, the thunder that had rolled overhead holding its tongue, the heavens showing their own recognition for the mercenaries. The silence continued, with even the sounds of battle from afar having ceased.

Each mercenary was stubbornly clinging onto life with all their might, but even the healing rays of the technology at hand and the expertise of the Medic had their limits.

The Soldier had suffered a severe blow to the head and had several ribs shattered, amongst other damages, making him one of the least wounded of the team. With a little more time he'd likely regain consciousness and likely insist on fighting despite his injuries.

The Demoman had internal bleeding that had since been stopped by the healing rays and had extreme damage caused to his spine. He'd managed to avoid too much damage to his nervous system but there was a possibility of waking up paralysed, and were he in a mere hospital rather than in the Medic's care, he may stay that way.

Analysis of the Pyro was difficult, as Nils was wary of the enigmatic mercenary's requests not to have the suit or mask removed. In the past, he had always abided by this as best he could and he tried to do the same here, making only several small incisions into the suit to access the skin. The firebug appeared to be having some of the worst difficulties in breathing and was strangely cold beneath the suit.

The Heavy, for all his ability to normally shrug off injuries, had his legs broken and his skull cracked open. The large tear in his forehead had since been healed and the Russian had lost a lot of blood, but was otherwise relatively unharmed. The extent of damage to his brain from the ferocious stomping was yet to be determined, however.

The Spy had his own knife embedded in his chest, the weapon narrowly missing his heart, but one of his lungs had been punctured and had been filling with blood. He too appeared to have taken a blow to the head, albeit a much lesser one. The Frenchman's heart was nonetheless beating rather pathetically, his suit stained with blood.

It was strange how the Sniper's hands had been crushed around his pistols, the bones clearly broken and his arms bent the wrong way. Hard breathing suggested that he'd fallen unconscious from being strangled, and countless bruises and broken ribs hinted at the punishment Hale had given his fellow Australian.

But it was the still form of the Scout that drew the most attention. Recovered last, the boy had almost been marked as dead before the slightest pulse of his heart had been detected, weakly struggling. With help from the Engineer, the boy had started breathing once more, but even with this, it was doubtful the runner would survive.

He'd been in a bloody crumpled mess, his muscles torn, countless bones broken and his limbs sprawled out in directions they shouldn't. The Scout had been reduced to little more than a tattered ragdoll that had yet to realise it was dead.

Nils noted that his mind had taken on a cold edge, addressing the men by their class and considering their chances and his options in a detached manner. In the beginning of the war he had taken few chances with his own life, often abandoning his teammates to their death when times were hard. As he'd grown closer to his team, he still found that sometimes, for victory, it was better to abandon his patients, preserve his Über and then strike back later.

Still, putting a price on their lives, even with Respawn in place, was not something he enjoyed. Looking at them now, he knew that some lives could be saved now if he ignored the others and he asked Dell to leave this place at full haste. That would mean leaving several members of the team behind to die so that he could not be distracted by their bodies as he worked, and that a certain ex-RED would be sacrificed too.

Catching Dell's eye, they both looked out at the silent landscape, the lack of noise between Hale and Isaac speaking volumes as they bowed their heads and considered their options. The Engineer repeatedly opened his mouth to speak only to shut it again, unsure of what to say. He knew what had to be done, the turmoil that tore through the Medic beneath that cold exterior. As much as it pained him, logically, leaving those least likely to survive behind and focusing their full efforts on those likely to survive made sense, as did getting the hell out of here.

Knowing this, he bit his lip as Nils shut his eyes, frowned and then opened them again, examining the medigun firmly in his grasp.

"Mein Gott...what I must do..."

"Doc, are you really gonna...?"

"...Herr Conagher, I am prepared to do whatever it takes."

Praying to the heavens, Nils armed the Life Sparker, glancing down at the excess charge he had built up, pushing the experimental new medigun well beyond 100% Übercharge stored. Knowing full well that this decision may doom them all, that it could easily malfunction, that the charge may not be enough to save them when spread out over every last fallen comrade, that there would be nothing left afterwards...

The Medic closed his eyes and activated the Life Sparker Übercharge at 999%...

###

And so it was at that in that instant that the clouds parted. The rain ceased to fall, the thunder faded away; the heavens split and cast down rays of light on two parts of the Earth, bathing the mortals in the power of the Sun once more.

And so it was at that instant that Death came, summoned by the calls of a man with no equal against a Beast of fury and destruction. The Demon captured the fury of both divine judgement and hellfire alike, moulding them to his own purposes and absorbing their combined might into the burning steel power of his soul.

And so it was at that instant that Life came, urged into existence by a man who'd made the hard choice of who to save and who to leave so many times before, and could no longer bear the pain. The Medic threw caution and reason to the wind, not caring for himself as he became the conduit of the power of his team's desperate struggle.

Twin forces of Destruction and Revival, unified in their hope for a better world, of freedom, of saving those people that justified their existence, those people who were all they had, those people who they'd gladly die to save. Infinite passion and fury given shape and form, forged in the flames of fate and war, embedded in the souls of mortals who would dare to challenge the gods, who would dare to change the world, who would dare to tame the forces of Life and Death as their own.