Who would've thought, I actually bothered to rewrite those poor early chapters.


Interdimensional RED-Coded Contract

Breaking the Blood Stained Ice


The first thing they saw wasn't one of Hale's mining towns, but rather a thick forest.

Bright green trees surrounded them, with a dirty path coming through it. The orange sky implied it was afternoon, which was another anomaly in itself. The mercs teleported at early noon, they should still have time before nightfall. And yet they didn't.

The mercenaries started walking and looking around, a few of them frowning in confusion. Medic, Spy and Scout quickly checked if they have all their limbs attached to themselves; they all did. Sniper looked around for any sign of wildlife, however there weren't any. No birds nor anything else within sight. The plants were unknown to him too.

Engineer tried to figure out what went wrong. He remembered checking the map and the coordinates multiple times, so he couldn't simply have typed something wrong. It also couldn't be that the teleporter was losing accuracy at greater distances. He already tested the teleporter at Bigrock and it was successful, and the distance between Bigrock and Decoy was much greater than between Decoy and Coal Town.

...And also there weren't any forests near Decoy nor Coal Town. Engineer scratched his head, he genuinely had no idea why the teleporter malfunctioned. Could this be the fault of the planets moving around the sun? No, the testing inside Bigrock were successful.

Did he miscalculate and screwed up? Not possible. He, Medic and even Miss Pauling checked his notes multiple times.

A case of sabotage? Unlikely, there was only his team and Miss Pauling present. Half of them wouldn't know how to operate the terminal, others feared Miss Pauling's reprimand.

Aliens?

...Actually possible. He and his team did stop their invasion after all. Maybe they held a grudge against them and this was their revenge?

Whatever the reason was, this was a big screw up. And failure this big meant that the Administrator will have his head once she get her hands on him, no matter how good his excuse was.

While Engineer busied his mind trying to work out the reason for them being here, Spy walked to his Australian teammate. As much as he would hate to admit it, Sniper has the most experience as a bushman.

"Do you know where we are?" The french ashed.

"Nah, this ain't Australia…" Sniper shook his head. Before Spy came to him, he was calculating how much sunlight they had left. It didn't look good. "Aw piss. We have just a bloody hour before nightfall…" And it was starting to get chilly too. They would need to start a fire - Pyro would handle it. There weren't many clouds in the sky, so rain was unlikely. No signs of civilization besides the dirt path... Well the trees looks sturdy enough, maybe with some help he could climb them…

Spy summarized their situation quite nicely.

"Ugh, merde…"

...His cigarette also ran out.

No one mentioned to Engineer that his teleporter failed, they all had better things to do. He and Medic started with the number one priority; setting up an Emergency Re;Spawn System. Luckily they had all of their supplies here, which meant they had a portable version of the Re;Spawn System. It was much slower than the normal version, and was able to revive only one person at the time, but it was better than nothing.

While the 'Eggheads' of the Team were working on keeping all of them alive and safe, Scout took this moment to take a can of Crit-a-Cola, and silently laugh at Spy as he tried to lift Sniper onto the tree. Once the Australian got onto the branch, he started climbing up. The bostonian placed down his drink and took one of Sniper's rifles.

The one he grabbed was a modernistic rifle, with a long barrel and a laser sight placed on top of the scope. Its name was the Classic.

"Yo! Heads up!" Scout shouted, throwing the rifle at Sniper. His teammate caught it without much effort.

"Thanks, mate!" Sniper secured the rifle onto his back and began climbing higher. He climbed so high that the fall would kill a normal person, or at least heavily injure him. However in his case the Nano-Machines would absorb most of the fall damage, reducing it to a mere bruise. Assuming someone like him would even fall.

While the Sniper scanned the area and figure out where they are, Spy and Scout waited for the results, one more relaxed than the other.

Demoman went to the forest to gather some wood and stones for the campfire, and Pyro followed after him. After getting quite far away from the camp, Demo and Pyro encountered the first sign of wildlife.

They never saw anything like that before though.

The creature in front of them looked like its body was made out of blue gel, with raccoon-like ears and a tail that looked somewhat 'normal'. It had black button eyes, a brown nose and a circular tan muzzle.

...That there was no normal animal.

Instead of walking like a normal living being, it jumped. It had no legs nor any other appendages, yet somehow it hopped around the forest with no care in the world. Demo scratched his head, not sure what to do with… this.

They approached it and it suddenly stopped and faced them. It stared at Pyro and Pyro stared back, Pyro rotated its head to the right, and that thing did the same. Pyro rotated its head to the left, and the animal followed the suit.

Finally it made its first move, lunging at Pyro's mask.

Without missing a beat Pyro calmly gripped its slimy body and threw it at the ground. Then before it could recover, Pyro stomped it with its foot and held it down, laughing as it did so. The creature didn't like that. It wriggled, emitted some noises and tried to break free, but Pyro didn't let it.

Demoman wasn't quite sure what to do, they teleported to some unknown place and after venturing a little off the roads they were met with… this. Not even Merasmus could think of this creature. However he knew who may know about that thing; their Medic. He was the smart one and knew about lots of animals. He would recognize that animal they found.

Demo motioned Pyro to stop, it did and it looked at him curiously. The merc rubbed his hands together, trying to figure out how he could take it with him. He didn't have any boxes to put it in, and he also needed to move the wood back to the camp.

...Then he decided to just screw it and take it with his bare hands.


Getting out of the Gamindustri Graveyard was harder than getting in…

"Phew… Virtua Forest… At last…" IF panted and fell to her knees, exhaustion preventing her from moving one step further.

Compa was even worse off than IF, and she wasn't even carrying Nepgear. "Iffy… let's rest… here." The nurse took one last step and fell onto the ground, too tired to move.

"You two have been moving since you rescued Nepgear." Histoire chimed in. "You're in Planeptune now, you're safe. You've well earned your rest."

"Let's… get Gear… home first." Those were IF's last words before she collapsed as well, leaving Nepgear lying on her back. "...Ugh."

"Make sure you drink a lot of water." Histoire said.

They rested for half an hour, eating and drinking away whatever was left from their supplies. Nepgear was still unconscious, which caused Compa and IF to worry. A person shouldn't be out for so long. They feared there was something wrong with her but they can't do anything yet, they needed to get her to Planeptune first.

"So what's our plan?" IF asked.

"With a CPU, even if it's just Nepgear, gathering shares will become much easier. I'm sure 3 years of captivity will have had a negative effect on her so our first course of action is to have Nepgear recover her strength, train her, and gather as many shares as we can along the way." Histoire said.

"Alright, fair enough." IF nodded.

"Would the ASIC retaliate somehow? We did just steal their captive." Compa asked.

"They will certainly be looking for her, which means we must do our best to keep Nepgear safe." Histoire said. "Under no circumstances are we to let Nepgear fall into their hands again." If they did then all of that effort they put during these past 3 years will turn to dust, and they will be even worse off than before.

"Then it's better if we get a move on, now. C'mon Compa!"

The Nurse whined a little as IF stood up, signaling the end of their break. Nonetheless Compa took Nepgear's body and carried her on her back. IF took the lead and guided her through the forest, alert for any monsters about to attack them.

Fortunately for them the monsters weren't too strong nor numerous. Just a few Dogoos that hopped too close, earning a stab or a slash with IF's Katars. Every engagement ended as quickly as it began.

But the low level monsters didn't mean they could take it easy. While they were already at Virtua Forest they still had a long road to travel, and the sun was about to fall too. If they don't hurry then they won't arrive to Planeptune before nightfall.

"Incoming!"

A shout, made by neither Compa nor IF. The Guild agent cursed and dragged her friend behind a tree. It was a bad time for the ASIC to catch them, they were in no condition to fight, there were only two of them, and they had an unconscious Nepgear to worry about.

IF really, really hoped she was wrong and that wasn't an ASIC squad.

"Waaah! W-what are we gonna do?" Yelped Compa, resting Nepgear against the tree. IF didn't answer her as she listened closely - she couldn't hear any more voices but there was definitely a group of people standing in their way. She heard metal hitting metal, some beeping noises and… a blender? It sounded like a blender.

"ASIC? Here? But I received no information of anyone coming into here." Histoire said, her eyes wide.

"I dunno, but we can't fight them. It's just the two of us, we have Nepgear to protect and there's a lot of them." The brunette looked around the area. There were only trees in sight, and they wouldn't provide much cover, and they were already spotted so these guys know where they are. They could be already closing in.

She and Compa jumped as they heard an explosion from where the strangers were.

"Yikes! What was that!?" Compa jumped, IF leaned out of cover so she could see what happened. What she saw was a flying silhouette of a person, carrying some long object in his hand. The sun was behind him so the details escaped IF, but she saw him flying towards them at a quick pace.

"Screaming Eagles!"


"Men! These are the facts as I understand them."

Soldier turned towards his team, his arms crossed behind him. Despite him trying to get everyone's attention, the rest of the mercenaries ignored him.

Heavy and Scout ate some lunch, with the former being a second away from snapping the latter's neck.

Medic and Engie finished setting up the E.R.S.S., which stood for Emergency Re:Spawn System. And now the German doctor was in the middle of figuring out why his self-aware beauty mark (a bread monster he kept in a jar) was so aggressive. It kept trying to break free and was biting the glass.

Sniper carefully scanned the area, while Engineer was reading maps and figuring out where they were. Somewhere behind him there was a Dispenser and Teleporter slowly building themselves up.

"One! We're in an unknown place and we don't know where we are." Soldier raised his index finger. "Two! Demoman and Pyro have gone AWOL!"

"They went to gather wood for fire." Scout interrupted.

"Got anything else funny to say, funny man?"

"…" Scout said nothing, going back to eating his lunch.

"That's what I thought. We need to find those two and beat the crap out of them!"

It was at this moment when Demoman ran into the camp, screaming at the top of his lungs. "Medic! Look what me and Pyro found!" He raised the living blue goop for everyone else to see.

"Umm... the hell?" Scout blinked.

"Kill it! Kill it before it lay eggs!" Soldier took a step back and pointed his finger… at Demoman instead of the creature he carried. Medic took the creature out of Demoman's hands and observed it with great fascination.

"...I have never seen a creature even closely similar to zhis. Fascinating." The german mumbled. He gave the creature a gentle squeeze and watched how its body reacted to pressure.

"Mmph mprh, huddah mmrph drghya!" Pyro grabbbed its Flame Thrower and aimed at the creature in Medic's hands. Said creature was too focused on the bread monster inside the jar to react to anything that happened around it.

The bread monster was now pressing its entire body against the glass, trying whatever it could to get its teeth on the blue creature. This behavior was noticed by Medic, and a metaphorical light bulb lit up above him.

He slowly moved the creature left and right, and the bread monster turned to keep its front pointed at it. That was enough to confirm Medic's theory about the bread monster's sudden aggression.

"Incoming!"

Sniper's sudden yell alerted Medic and everyone else. The merc threw the creature away and it landed onto the glass jar, pushing it away and shattering it, which released the beast inside. The spooked creature hopped back into the forest, with the bread monster biting hard into its top.

In the future that Bread Monster will live on by killing and feeding on creatures like these. It will scare away all travelers who were unlucky enough to cross it, creating various rumors and myths. It will mentally scar a small girl who would never be able to eat bread without getting flashbacks of that fateful confrontation ever again. It will finally meet its demise at the hands of the very same girl, who would have just embarked on her own adventure.

But that is a story for another time.


Soldier took his rocket launcher and aimed it at his feet. He pressed the trigger and the explosion carried him high into the sky. From there he could see the enemies Sniper warned his team about. He strafed towards them and braced for landing.

Behind him, Sniper was sighing. Those girls he saw probably weren't a threat but… old habits. He shook his head at the team and warned them about a potential false alarm, now they just needed to get Soldier before he does something wholly unnecessary.

Soldier landed in front of IF and Compa and spun to face them, aiming his weapon at their face. Then he recoiled as he wasn't met with a robot but rather two women staring at him with their eyes wide. "C-Civilians?!" He asked.

IF recovered from the shock and sent a roundhouse kick at Soldier. To her surprise he blocked it with his left forearm, like it was nothing. Then he swept her feet and sent her onto the ground. IF rolled away while Compa charged with her syringe. The merc blocked the stab with his rocket launcher and countered with a punch to the nurse's belly. Compa clutched her stomach and fell, unable to fight more…

Soldier pointed his weapon at IF. "You want more, maggot?!" He snapped at her. "Surrender now and you'll not be harmed!"

IF brandished her Katars and bent her legs in exchange. "Leave us alone!" She yelled angrily.

Then someone else spoke from behind her, and before she could move away they grabbed her forearms and restrained her. "Okay, okay. Enough, Soldier." Spy said as he decloaked.

"I apologize for my teammate's rash behaviour. Will the madame be still struggling, or can we just talk this out?" The french merc asked as he continued to grip her forearms, right under her elbows. Her blades prevented him from grabbing her wrist, but if she continued to fight he had his own blade hidden in his sleeve.

"I repeat, surrender now woman, or it's your funeral!" The american shouted, Spy sent him a dull look.

Compa dropped her syringe and raised her hands with teary eyes. Soldier nodded and wordlessly kicked the syringe away from her. Scout and Medic joined in as well, turning IF's bad situation into worse.

"IF, it's over…" Histoire said with finality. They were this close from rescuing a CPU, only to be foiled at the last step.

IF sighed in defeat, unstrapping her Katars. The moment she did so Spy released her and pulled out his Disguise Kit. He grabbed a new cigarette and snapped a picture of both IF and Compa, while also getting their voice samples for his new disguises. He got all of the information he needed without their realizing.

"So what are you doing here?" IF's eyes narrowed as she glared at Spy, who was casually smoking.

"Actually, nothing. We just had an accident and were figuring out where we are." Spy answered truthfully. You could almost see a golden halo above his head, but IF didn't buy it. She checked how Compa was faring.

Medic was now treating Soldier's post-landing wounds while keeping a watchful eye on IF's friend, who watched his Medi-gun's work with sparkling eyes. The nurse was standing near Nepgear, and keeping herself between the mercs and the unconscious CPU. Compa and Medic were talking rather calmly, with her asking questions and him answering them.

This actually made IF feel little better. Maybe this was just a misunderstanding… but one look at their weapons made her wary. One of them had a shotgun, the other had a rocket launcher. One wrong word and they would be as good as dead.

"Do you think I'll believe it?" IF said.

"No. But I will just leave it as that." Spy retorted. IF decided it was better to drop this topic.

"So…" She started "Will you let us go?" She asked hopefully, Histoire who's now quietly listening in also perked up. Scout looked at Spy who shrugged.

"Yes, but first I want to ask some question." He answered, and IF gulped.

"Yeah, like will you come on a date with-mmph!" Scout tried to say but he Spy covered his face with his hand, effectively silencing him.

"Not the time or place, Scout…" He pushed him aside while Scout yelled another 'Go to hell, Spy!'. Histoire made a mental note of their codenames to search, and IF got slightly red at the sudden invitation.

"Ahem" Spy cleared his throat. "First of all, where are we?" He asked calmly.

IF held back a sarcastic remark. It wasn't the right time or person after all…

"Virtua Forest, over an hour from Planeptune." IF simply answered while Spy searched her face for any signs of lying. To his surprise, he found nothing.

"Virtua Forest? Planeptune? What?" Scout silently muttered, but loud enough for Spy and IF to hear. This intrigued IF, but she kept her mouth shut. He was holding a shotgun in his hand. It was safer to just answer their questions and hope they'll be let go. Histoire however made notes about his confusion about the locations.

"Another question, where is this 'Planeptune' you speak of." Spy asked.

"That way, right behind that hill." IF pointed her thumb at the direction from where the Mercenaries came from. Spy noted another truthful answer, and hid his confusion about the foreign names of the forest and city.

"Hey, do you know what is the blue freakin' slimy thing that jumps around and make weird noises?" Scout asked. Spy's eye twitched in annoyance, but then realized that this was actually a good question…

IF frowned, growing more and more confused by these questions and their lack of knowledge. "...You mean the Dogoos? They're pretty common here."

Scout mouthed 'Dogoo' over and over as if testing the new language. He nodded to her and scratched his chin.

"Now for the last thing." Spy spoke, making eye contact with IF. He suddenly smiled and IF's got chills running through her back.

"I see, that you, and your blonde friend are tired, and your pink-haired friend is unconscious." He motioned to the Nepgear. "So how about a deal…"

"A what?" IF said.

"A deal." Spy repeated. "Simple, we'll let you go and escort you. And you'll lead us to the nearest city."


The girls followed the mercs to their camp. Scout and Medic took the rear while Spy and Soldier were up in front, IF carried Nepgear and she didn't let anyone else but her friend touch her.

Soldier motioned the group to halt and began communicating with Sniper, using hand gestures instead words. The australian nodded as he received a message to tell Engie to disable the Sentry Guns - they will have guests after all. They wouldn't want to kill them.

Meanwhile IF started chatting with Compa.

"How are you?" IF whispered to her.

"I feel good now! Doctor was kind enough to heal me after the deal!" She whispered back with smile.

"Really? You took quite a punch, you're not sore or anything?" IF raised an eyebrow.

"Nah, their Medic have this weird pipe-gun that heals wounds in seconds, it even healed this mister's legs and made him emit some weird red crosses." Compa pointed at Soldier with sparkling eyes. IF frowned.

"A device capable of healing wounds in seconds? Not even Planeptune has technology like that." Histoire's eyes widened.

"I wonder how he flew like that…" IF muttered.

"He shot a rocket under his feet, it exploded and sent him to us."

IF stopped from shock. "That explosion was him basically shooting himself?!"

"Mhm." Compa nodded. "It's bad that he hurt himself but Mr. Medic already treated him, he'll be alright!"

IF's and Histoire's minds were still focused on the fact he had shot himself with an explosive to pay attention though. If that was the truth then he shouldn't even be alive, or at least not be completely fine. Instead he was in perfect fighting condition even before his teammates caught up. "H-How!? I don't believe this!"

Scout snickered at IF's attempt to comprehend rocket jumping. She shot the merc a glare and he laughed even harder.

"So, how long were you camping here?" The brunette asked, if only to bring the conversation to some more… normal topic. One that would not be so hard to understand.

"Dunno, half an hour, maybe, possibly… most likely?" He scratched his ear. IF half expected him to not answer at all…

"I must ask you, how did you get here? I received no reports of a highly armed group of people even going near Planeptune." Histoire asked through the N-Gear.

"Accidents do happen, madame…?" Spy stopped for Histoire to introduce herself.

"Histoire, I am the Oracle of Planeptune… Mr. Spy am I right?" Spy nodded. "I fail to see how an accident can lead to a heavily armed group to pass undetected to a forest near the most advanced city in Gamindustri… Are you perhaps working with ASIC?" Histoire finally decided to bring the cat out of the bag. Compa and IF suddenly tensed at the sight of all mercenaries around them looking at each other, confusion in their eyes but the girls didn't see it.

"ASIC? Never heard of it." Spy answered after a tense moment of silence. Which made the girls grow very confused…

"Really?"

"Ja, we aren't actually from around here, Fräulein." Medic shrugged.

"Huh?" Compa and IF spoke in union.

"Nevermind, we're here." Said Spy.

The camp set up by the mercenaries started to grow a bit bigger. Initially they planned to leave tomorrow morning due to the sun going down, but with IF's guidance they may do it even today. The camp had all the basic needs the mercenaries needed. Dispensers and Resupply Lockers distributed ammo and medicine as needed, Sentry Guns (disabled for now) provided security and a two-way teleporter would allow them to pack it all up quickly once they get into the city.

Compa and IF became worried at the sight of the red turret with two multi-barreled machine guns, and another turret with the same weaponry but with a rocket launcher attached on top of it…

"Half an hour, huh?" Compa sweatdropped.

"AT-TEEENNN-TION!" Yelled Soldier, causing the girls to flinch at the volume of his voice and Heavy, Demo, Sniper (who already got onto the ground) and Pyro to look at him while Engineer was busy upgrading his teleporter.

"Men! We have been tasked to escort these civilians back to civilization! Gear up! We're leaving once Medic checks the injured! Dismissed!"

Soldier motioned to IF and Medic to follow him, while the mercenaries braced themselves to depart. Soldier and Medic took some wooden crates and placed them in a row so IF could put Nepgear on them. Medic then proceeded to check on her injuries while Compa volunteered to help, he saw no reason to decline.

Meanwhile, Scout and Spy distributed the information they had gathered from IF. The common reaction was 'Oh great, weird stuff was happening again.' Now to add to the long list of weird stuff they've seen during the Gravel War, they were now in some unknown location with never-before-seen wildlife.

After several minutes IF came in to check on Nepgear while Compa and Medic finished checking on her injuries.

"How's she?" IF asked, while sitting besides Nepgear.

"Luckily it was nothing serious, she just needs to rest." Compa answered, and sat down next to IF.

"Oh thank goddess…" IF and Histoire muttered in unison.

"They're actually really nice, right?" Compa muttered.

"Erm… jury's still out." IF responded. They just met them, they didn't really know what would happen once they lead them to Planeptune. IF observed a giant of a man run maintenance on a minigun. Heavily armed barely applied to them, they could take on an army with all of their weapons.

...Getting them to Planeptune would be a bad idea, but it was either that or getting shot back there.

Out of boredom, IF looked at the wooden crates under Nepgear and she saw an interesting detail on them, a company's logo from a company IF has never heard about.

Mann Co.

We sell products and get in fights

"Never heard of them…" Quietly muttered IF, however Compa picked it up and asked.

"Never heard of what?"

"Mann Co." IF pointed at the logo on crate. She pulled her cellphone and took a picture of it to search it later.

"Should I ask them about it?" Compa asked.

"Nah, thank you. I will look into it myself."

Soon all the mercenaries were ready to move out, Sentry Guns have been reactivated but they were still manually controlled by Engineer's Wrangler until the girls left their range. Histoire felt better now that they had such a heavily armed group of people to escort Nepgear back and that she didn't need medical attention…

But this was only good for them in the short-term. Once they reach Planeptune, no one could know what would happen. A group this armed would be almost impossible to stop with what they have now. Histoire needed to make a plan, fast.


The path leading through the Virtua Forest was an easy one and it was Compa's turn to carry Nepgear, which allowed IF to rest a little. However she couldn't shake the nervousness that was crawling through her. All around her were men who could kill them at any moment, in gruesome manner at that. One carried a flame thrower, the other carried a minigun, another person had an unhealthy amount of explosives on him.

They were getting attacked by monsters, now even more frequently than before. But before any of them could get close they took a bullet to the head from Sniper or an explosive from Soldier or Demo. IF couldn't even get a good look at the monsters before they was killed.

Their protection was… solid. As if they were doing this their entire life.

After twenty minutes they reached a hill, which finally allowed the mercs to gaze their eyes upon Planeptune. They were left speechless.

Planeptune was a futuristic city, filled with towering skyscrapers and rounded N-shaped building structures. The most awe-inspiring construction in Planeptune was its Basilicom, the Neptower, a large tower which was visible everywhere from within the city. It towered over everything else and it was much higher than anything the mercs have seen in their life.

"My! God!" Spy muttered, unable to hide his amazement.

"For the first time in my life, I'm at a loss for words." Scout's jaw went loose.

"...Mother of god." Muttered Soldier.

"Oh, now would ya look at that!" Demoman's jaw went loose.

"Not bad!" Sniper whispered.

"It's beautiful." Engie whistled.

"Hmm. Is big." Heavy hmm'ed.

"It's beautiful." Medic gasped.

"Welcome to Planeptune, the region of purple progress and the most advanced nation in Gamindustri!" Histoire announced proudly.

There wasn't a city like this on Earth, the mercenaries knew that for absolute certain. And yet they all could see it with their own eyes. The only place which could match them would be Australia, and Sniper would know immediately if they were teleported there.

His gaze shifted from the enormous city onto a river that blocked their passage. There was a bridge they could use and a couple of buildings behind it, but something was… odd. The merc raised the Classic and peered through its scope.

He saw people standing watch on the bridge, armed with guns. "I see people on the bridge, armed."

"What? Armed?!" IF exclaimed.

"A checkpoint?" Spy asked the Guild agent.

"N-No, there shouldn't be anyone there." No one was there when she and Compa crossed it last time. Who could possibly be there-

"...ASIC."

ASIC was hoping to intercept them. They gathered troops where IF and Compa would have to cross and wanted to capture them there. There weren't more bridges leading to Planeptune too, just that one. They knew that sooner or later IF and Compa will pass through here, with Nepgear.

They… they would have to fight their way through.


In a location unknown to most there was a room filled with countless screens, showing video feeds from around the world. Only one person was there to watch, sitting on a large chair and smoking a cigarette.

The Administrator watched how her aide returned to the base, and was on her way to meet her. She also had a few screens showing what Gray Mann and his army were doing. The fool never realized that with her connections she managed to get couple of cameras into his headquarters. She knew everything he was about to do, while he wasn't even aware of that fact.

Miss Pauling was in front of her doors, she opened them and stepped inside. The Administrator didn't bother to turn around to face her, merely watching her from the screens.

"Report."

"Well, umm. The mercenaries have already moved to Coal Town via the new teleporter which Engineer constructed." Miss Pauling reported.

Instead of answering verbally, the Administrator pressed a few keys on her keyboard. Then all of the screens changed to show video feeds from Coal Town. They could see the wooden city-yet-to-be untouched by the war, the desert surrounding it and the Carrier Tank heading close to it. However no one was there to defend it. No matter on which screen Miss Pauling focused, she couldn't find a single mercenary setting up the defense.

"Those mercenaries aren't there, Miss Pauling."

And now both of them wanted to know where they were.


Interdimensional RED-Coded Contract

Breaking the Blood Stained Ice


Welp, I finally got some time to rewrite those early chapters. Hopefully now they're easier to read than before.

Responses:

BreadNotDead – Too much info? Oops… I felt like I needed to explain a fair share of TF2 mechanics but I guess I went too far, gonna try harder next time.

Thaqif – Well there you have your chapter m8, I hope you enjoyed it. However I can't promise a frequent updates till I finish my previous fanfiction... Which is quite far from being finished…