Monsters Below - Chapter IX

Chapter 9
Plan

  "So, Grete." Scout started off, grunting a little from the box he was holding. "Why do you hate me so much?"

  The blonde woman looked up from the opposite side of the box, her expression devoid of emotion as usual. "I don't hate you. You're just annoying." She responded simply.

  "Gee, that's very reassuring…"

  "Let's just move this and we can get back soon. I think Crawler was going to make Gyūdon Donburi tonight… Or was Naga going to make Ropa Vieja? I can never remember who's cooking when..."

  The Bostonian couldn't help but smile at that. It had been about three days since he first came to the Black Team and he learned all the little habits everyone had. But he always felt that the Danish woman was pretty interesting. She only talked in proper sentences to people she trusted or liked, which explained her irritating habit when he first met her. She also said that she was the eldest of four siblings and she has a back problem that most likely stemmed from her large breasts (He could never ask; that would NOT end well). But she was still not someone you would ever mess with. A certain incident involving comments from Vincent and Mike were testament to that.

  "Anyway, do you know what the hell this box is for?" Scout looked at the object that he and Grete held. He had been in the unofficial Rec Room (Which merely consisted of a few chairs, a bookcase and record player) when Christian Brutal Sniper came in and told him and the Danish woman to do something for him.

  Namely carry a large box to the RED sewers and leave it there.

  Why was that? What did this thing even have?

  Unfortunately, Grete's response didn't help ease the mystery. "I am not sure. I was never told, nor have I even looked into it." Her tone was showing mild annoyance. "Well, it could be something that ignites when this thing's open. So, if it happens to be mustard gas, I'd rather not take the risk. Haven't you heard of 'common sense'?"

  Scout rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I feel SO loved by you."

  The woman cracked a tiny smirk that only lasted about a second. "Do you have any other enlightening questions or statements, young man?" She asked. "I'm guessing the next one will be about my measurements."

  "N-No! No, I-I wasn't ever going to ask that!" Scout felt his cheeks flare red. "Well… Mine is a lot more serious and uh… if you don't wanna answer, than fine, don't answer."

  "And what is your question?"

  "Well, I was made aware that… uh… you have a problem with your hearing." He started off, watching Grete's body language in hopes of picking up on what she was thinking. "So… do you have something to help with that? I mean, you don't look like you have anything, so I was wondering if you actually do have something to—"

  "Yes, I do."

  The Danish woman's answer was quick and caught the younger off guard. She let out a small 'hmph' and raised a hand to her hair and brushed it out of the way, exposing her right ear. She turned her head away so Scout could get a better look.

  Wrapped around her ear was a small pale device, nearly matching her skin. The Bostonian recognised it as a hearing aid; he remembered a kid named Sidney who had to wear that sort of thing. Hell, his great-aunt Bea had them too! Grete let her hair fall back into place and went back to holding the box. "It's not the best, but it's the best we're going to get." She said. "I'd prefer to have one that couldn't be seen at all."

  The Bostonian nodded. "It's not that bad. I mean, you'd turn that into high fashion!" He responded, trying to recall some of his flattery 'skills' from his days back home. "I mean it. You're f**king sexy and nothing, NOTHING, could look bad on you."

  However, the Danish woman looked unimpressed. "Firstly, you don't have to use words like that, I can tell you're trying to make me feel better and it's not exactly working." She rolled her visible eye. "And second, should we get back to what we were doing? I'm sure Christian Brutal Sniper would appreciate it if we did some work."

  "Oh, right. Sorry."

~*~

  "Oh great, still no Medic!?"

  Pyro only nodded, words muffled by her gasmask. But most of them knew that she was trying to say 'I'm afraid so'. The firebug had told them the other day that the Medic had gone to look for Scout after she and Sniper failed to find the young man. But in the process, Medic vanished as well. As such, even though she said that she had been told to carry one, Pyro asked some of the others if they could look for him.

  No such luck.

  "Well, he said that if he didn't come back, we should carry on and that Heavy would take his place." Sniper commented with his arms folded across his chest. "Or at least that's what Pyro told me."

  "And you trust what this thing says because…?" Spy waved his hand in a way that said 'please elaborate'.

  "'Cause he's more trustworthy than you'll ever be, you poncy snake."

  A muffled 'Ooh, burn!' sounded from Pyro, which was followed by a quick chuckle. The others (Sans Spy of course) had a quiet laugh at the statement. But the brief mirth was swiftly replaced with the initial dark concern.

  "So, we all know what we're doing." Sniper turned to the others. "I know this is getting very irritating for all of us, but we should at least look for Medic one last time. Who knows? We may finally find him."

  "I will look again." Heavy immediately declared. "Doctor will come home. He'll be safe." It was definitely no secret that the large Russian was very fond of the older yet smaller German, but his words at that very moment seemed more emotional and determined than usual.

  "He may be a quack, but he's an ally!" Soldier barked. Rather strangely, he had seemed to have softened up about the Medic when he disappeared. "NO MAN GETS LEFT BEHIND!"

  "Alright then, we'll look one more time." The Aussie signalled for the others to get going and they left the room, ready to find their teammate. "If you find anything, let someone else know!" He was about to go as well, only for Pyro to grab his arm.

  He looked at the masked firebug and he could tell that she wanted to say something. Pyro pulled off the gasmask. "Can I talk to you in private? Please?" she asked.

  Sniper quirked an eyebrow, but quietly nodded nonetheless.

~*~

  "Are you even listening Phil?"

  Philip nodded as he looked at his companion, his hands spelling out 'Of course I am Naga. Stop calling me Phil though. It's either Philip or Stitch'.

  Dario rolled his eyes as they moved along. "C'mon! You know that I hate being called Naga, so it's Dario or nothing!" The serpentine man moaned. "So again, what d'you think of the new kid? Is he really going to be worth keeping?"

  'He hasn't done anything stupid yet, so he's not too bad.' The Engineer made a small noise, the stitches on his lips blocking the sound from leaving. With that, he turned away and continued on what the two were initially doing.

  Since the Medic they captured refused to give any details on Respawn, Christian Brutal Sniper sent out the mute Engineer to go find it. Of course, Dario volunteered to help as well, even though he couldn't supply an intelligent answer to explain why.

  But it seemed that 'he might need some help' seemed enough to get his way.

  Well, besides CBS responding with 'Yeah, what the f**k ever'.

  The Spaniard slithered alongside his companion and smiled again. "You do know I like you right? And I mean a lot?" he asked, moving dangerously close to the other's ear.

  The Engineer rolled his eyes and his hands danced again. 'Look, I am already fully aware how you feel about me, but I'm straight you idiot.' His eyes showed how serious he was about it. 'I am not against your preferences, but you should stop trying to flirt with me.'

  Dario's face fell. "Oh… if you say so, but I'm still quiet determined." He explained further. "I've always been… stubborn when there's something or SOMEONE I want. I thought that three years living in the same place together would be enough to—"

   Philip's hand shot out and caught the serpentine man in the chest, stopping him from moving. He pulled away and slowly spelled out 'Do you hear that?'

  The other paused and tilted his head. "Just about… my hearing isn't superhuman like yours." He smirked at the roll of the eyes. "Sounds like whirring."

  The Engineer nodded his head to the hallway in front of them, walking off with Dario in pursuit. His hearing did actually get worse when he… became the way he was and as such, he used his sense of touch as compensation. But nonetheless, he joined his companion in tracking down the sound, slithering around corners that Philip went around and looking at the walls on either side of them, hoping to single down where the sound was…

  The grey-eyes man held his hand out again, forcing the golden-eyed man to halt in his tracks. They both turned to their left and saw a door and that faint whirring sound could be heard from behind it. Philip grabbed the handle and tried to open it, only for him to start rattling it harshly. Locked.

  Dario snickered. "Well since my venom isn't corrosive, does that mean we're going to have to bust it down?" He asked with jest.

  The Engineer quickly flipped off the other before stepping back a little. He took in a breath through his nose and kicked at the door. He grumbled and raised his leg, striking the metal again with all the strength he had. He kept on kicking the door until it finally gave way, lock shattering in the process.

  Philip and Dario went into the room and what they saw in front of them made their eyes widen.

  A huge metal pillar flashed with blue and red, thick black cables running from its base and across the floor like rivers. But what was interesting was that sitting in front of it was a console with various flashing lights and keys, the green glass screen coming to life with the Mann Co. logo spinning.

  The Engineer walked over to the console and pressed some keys, forcing the logo to leave and some files to pop up. The Serpentine man slithered over and peeked over his companion's shoulder. He smiled, exposing his fangs as he saw the document that was opened. "I think we just, as you Americans say, hit the jackpot."

  Philip nodded as they read the file, which was titled 'MANN CO. RESPAWN TECHNOLOGIES'…

~*~

  Sniper sat quietly across from Pyro, who had abandoned her asbestos suit and favoured a red shirt and black jeans. He took a quick moment to look over her physique; she fairly average-sized but had an extra bit of fat that padded her stomach, hips and thighs. She chewed slowly on a cupcake with vanilla icing, offering a plate full of the sweets to the Australian, who declined with a shake of the head.

  "So… what did you want to talk about?" He ventured. The woman hadn't told him why she wanted to talk to him in private.

  She swallowed. "Well, I wanted to ask you something first." She responded, leaning forward. "You didn't tell anyone about my gender, did you?"

  "Of course not. I guessed that since you didn't tell anyone about it, you didn't want anyone to find out." He crossed his legs and leaned back. "So no, I haven't told a soul."

  Pyro smiled, a small giggle leaving her lips. "Thanks for that. If you had told someone, I would have circumcised you with my axe." She laughed louder at Sniper's shocked expression. "Sorry… I wouldn't really do that to you. I mean, you seem a nice guy. Why do we never talk?"

  The Aussie shrugged. "Don't know. Guess I'm too busy shooting people in the head and you're busy setting Spies on fire."

  "Yeah… that makes sense. Well, we should get started then." Pyro put the cupcake down and gestured to the walls of her room. "So, I'm sure you can guess what I'm interested in."

  Sniper looked around the room and it was fairly obvious what she meant. The red walls were littered with posters for different movies; he could see '2001: A Space Odyssey', 'Darby O'Gill and the Little People', 'The Court Jester', 'Carry On Screaming!', 'All Quiet on the Western Front' (Which he recalled the Soldier using as an insult), 'Dr Strangelove' and 'La Dolce Vita', among others. There were also pages that were obviously cut out of fashion magazines and a small radio sat on a cluttered desk – which was playing 'Mrs Robinson' by Simon and Garfunkel – next to a black skirt and a bright red hat with yellow flowers. "I'm guessing cinema and fashion."

  "Yeah. I'm not the sort of person to WEAR fashion, but I like designing it you know?" She looked over at her teammate as she grabbed the cupcake again and took another bite. "So, I sometimes make some clothes for some friends I have back home."

  "So the clothes over there are for them, right?" The Aussie nodded his head towards the desk.

  "Uh-huh. I don't like wearing clothing that's considered women's clothing, but I sometimes have to make like some skirts and dresses for some of them, especially this twit Jane." She looked over as well. "But as for the hat, that was a present. I called it 'Madame Dixie', but now I'm not sure why. Maybe the desert did my head in."

  Sniper made a small 'hmm' in response. "Am I right in guessing you're from London?" He had listened to Pyro talk and he recognised the accent as being Cockney easily; he had spent a few weeks in England on an assignment and he had to endure people asking where he was from in the process.

  His companion nodded. "I'm from the East End, to be a little more specific." She leaned forward again. "It's f**king nuts sometimes over there. Actually, one time when I was out with my Mum, we saw the bloody Kray Twins!"

  The other's eyes widened. "Are you kidding? What happened!?"

  "Well, nothing bad. But it was still really weird." The firebug sat up straight and looked at the other with a dead serious expression. "So, we had both gone out so we could visit my grandparents and then when we were walking down the street, it goes really quiet. We looked and walking down the street was the Kray twins. We moved to the side and my Mum told me to not make any eye contact and that I should keep quiet. She never trusted 'em and I think she must have been screaming 'I bloody knew it' when they were arrested a few months ago."

  "So they didn't threaten you or anything?"

  "No, but when they passed by us, I got to thinking. They did horrible things, but they still managed to become celebrities and got to hang out with people like Barbara Windsor and Frank Sinatra. So I thought what was it like to be that way? To be nearly untouchable?" She sighed, her eyes moving to the floor. "I guess maybe I started doing what I was doing 'cause of that. Well, along with a bully I knew dying in a house fire… courtesy of me." A dark smirk worked its way to her lips.

  Sniper nodded, understanding where she was going with that. "Anyway… sorry to interrupt, but I'm assuming you were gonna tell me about the whole film thing."

  "OH RIGHT!" Pyro suddenly shouted, her head darting back up. "Well… that was another thing; films sort of acted as a sort of… refuge from my life. I mean, pretty much everyone knows you have issues with your parents. So that's a similarity we can have between the two of us."

  "True. So anything you like in particular Pyro?"

  "Call me Dylan. And I'll call you… What is your name anyway?"

  The Aussie made a small noise. It was true that he hadn't told anyone else what his name was. But he liked this woman enough to trust her with that. "Jack." He stated. "My name's Jack."

  Dylan smiled in response. The song on the radio changed over to 'White Rabbit' by Jefferson Airplane, the vocals prompting the Pyro to chuckle a little. "Really like this one!"

~*~

  "Bobby?"

  Scout turned his head as he sat on his bed, finding Zawisza standing in the doorway. The Medic looked serious and was fiddling with the goggles that were hanging around his neck. Judging by the expression on his face, he had something he wanted to say. The man walked into the room and perched at the end of the younger's bed, the mattress dipping from his added weight. "I wasn't interrupting anything, was I?" The Medic asked with his voice quiet and serious. When he received a shake of the head in response, he gave a weak smile. "That's good."

  Scout tilted his head a little. "What is it? Is there something wrong?"

  "No, no. It's not that. I just wanted to talk to you about something." He turned to face the younger. "Well, you were right. I have been very dishonest with you. You wanted to know about us, but I always tried to sidestep the topic and make sure that you wouldn't know… but, I was wrong to do so."

  "Huh? So you're gonna tell me now?" The Bostonian was confused by this. It was true that whenever he tried to ask Zawisza about the team or himself, he was always given the response 'I'll tell you later' or some variation. "Why now? Any reason you finally decided to?"

  "I felt terrible for keeping things from you and I felt that you weren't ready yet for us… for what happened." His voice dropped, lowered as if he were speaking of a horrible disgusting secret. "But you are ready now… so I'll show you this one thing."

  With those words, he raised a hand to his clean white eye patch and slowly slid the item off. It landed silently on the bed covers and Scout gasped.

  For where Zawisza's right eyes should have been, the skin was pulled away and held there with tiny, haphazard stitches and allowing tiny flashes of muscle and skin to peek through. But what was attention-grabbing for the Bostonian, was that the settled in the socket was a pale blue and didn't seem to be focused, looking straight ahead. "I suppose you understand why I'm called 'Gaze' now?"

  Scout trembled a little. "Uh… H… How did…? What ha…?" He stumbled over his words, unable to form a clear sentence as he found himself captivated and horrified by what he was seeing.

  "Well a few years ago, I was the RED Medic and during a battle here, I was caught in an explosion caused by an enemy Soldier." He explained, picking up the eye patch again. "I could only stagger into the sewers of my base but it was very poor timing since, well, the match ended. So I only had a small amount of time left before I'd be dead."

  "But what about your… um…" The Bostonian gestured to the elder man's eye.

  "Yes, I was lying there and when I thought things couldn't get any worse, I heard something behind me. It was an enemy Spy and he was going to kill me." Zawisza put the eye patch back on and covered his eye once more. "I panicked and lashed out; eventually I took his knife and killed him. But that still left me with my already serious predicament. But since I always had a bizarre habit of carrying basic medical supplies with me, even though the technology of the Medigun rendered them useless. I tried to sew my wounds back together as quickly as I could and even though it would never even work, I still wanted a pair of eyes…"

  The younger's eyes widened. "Does that mean that you… cut out the Spy's eye?"

  The Polish man nodded. "I was careful, even though I knew I wouldn't be able to see out through it. Shortly after I had done that, I blacked out from pain and blood loss. And when I woke up… Nathan and Jean-Yves had found me and I joined the Black Team."

  Scout wasn't sure how to respond to what he had just been told. Maybe that's why Zawisza didn't say a word about it? Was it that it was such a painful experience for him that he couldn't tell him about it? Was this a way of showing that he trusted the younger with this information? "I'm sorry… I had no idea. I guess I should've known man, I mean, f**k…"

  "It is not your fault. I initially felt you wouldn't understand… But you've become such a part in the team that I thought you should at least know." The Medic grabbed hold of Scout's hand and rubbed the back of it with his thumb. "If anyone's going to be sorry, it should be me."

  "Don't be. I mean, I was trying to get you to tell me stuff that you probably really didn't want to." Scout gently squeezed the other's hand. "But I'm still wondering. Why are you staying down here? Why don't any of you go up to… the surface?"

   Zawisza remained quiet, but sighed with a forlorn expression. "How could we? Everyone on the surface would react with both fear and hatred if they were to see us. Even for those who look relatively normal, this war has shattered their thoughts. We're not human anymore. We're all… monsters."

  Scout tried to say something, but the slamming of a door interrupted. The two of them looked up and saw Vincent, his axe in hand. "Okay, I'm not interrupting any possible gay sex here, am I? No? DON'T CARE!" He shouted, looking manic as usual. "SO GET OFF YOUR ASSES AND C'MON! WE GOT A MEETING, SO MOVE!" With that he bolted down the hallway and left the two behind.

  Scout and Zawisza sat there for a second before quickly getting up and joining the red-headed Pyro.

~*~

  "A box?"

  Demoman nodded as he and Soldier placed the white container onto the Rec Room table as the rest of the team gathered round. "Dallas and I—"

  "You're supposed to call me SOLDIER, MAGGOT!" The psychotic patriot barked.

  "Right… Soldier and I were down in the sewers when I thought I heard someone else talking. But when we went to look, there was nothing there. We saw this box and took it back here. Haven't even looked in it yet." The Scotsman looked at the others with his single eye. "Could be anything, but it's like that paradox with the cat…"

  Everyone was surprised to say the least; if someone were to speak of that sort of the thing, the Demoman was probably the last person they would think of.

  "You mean Schrödinger's cat?" Engineer suggested, wincing a little as he held his stomach. Even though the others had told him to get some more rest, the Texan was persistent in wanting to get up and moving, so the others eventually (and hesitantly) let him.

  "Exactly!" Demoman responded, smiling at the other. "Thanks mate."

  "What does little cat have to do with box?" Heavy asked, scratching his bald head in confusion.

  "It was a thought experiment that stated the idea of a cat in a box. If there was a poisonous gas in the box that killed the cat, we wouldn't know until we looked at it. So until observed, the cat is both alive AND dead." Spy explained, snubbing out a cigarette into the almost filled ashtray. "So in short, it could be anything until we actually look."

  Pyro mumbled something, which sounded a lot like 'Just open it up and look!'

  Sniper walked over to the table. "Let me do it. If it turns out to be a trap then it ain't real loss if I get hurt." He stated, standing before the box and he flexed his fingers, prepping himself for what could happen. He looked over the container and frowned when he could find no indication of what was inside. The Aussie grabbed hold of the lid and pulled it off…

  …Only to immediately regret it.

  For lying in the box, staring blankly at the seven mercenaries, was their Medic.

  Or rather, what was left of him. Both of his arms were gone, as well as having no legs, looking as if someone or something had halved him at the waist. The skin was pale and on his chest were two things; a black line of stitching and a message written in dark red…

  'RAGNAROK'S COMING. BE PREPARED'

~*~

  Scout sat nestled in between Dario and Cassie, the rest of the Black Team gathered around the large round table. He could taste the anticipation and tension in the air as he waited for whatever their leader was going to say. Just what exactly was this about?

  As if reading his mind, the Christian Brutal Sniper stood from his place and a dark hush fell over the group. "Fellow members of the Black Team… I have gathered you all here…" He began. "As we are all already aware, the RED Medic had failed to give us any useful information concerning the Respawn system. But…" He turned his head to Dario and Philip, a smirk forming. "Naga and Stitch had gone to search for it… and they found it."

  A quiet set of mutters rose up, most of them carrying disbelief. "So they found the damn machine?" Mike asked first, obviously unbelieving in what had just been said. "F*king ay! After all this goddamn time…"

  The Bostonian could only listen in on everyone's chatter. He knew that questions about Respawn had been asked when the Medic had been captured, but he didn't know why it was so important to these guys.

  CBS smirked even wider. "Well, since we know exactly WHERE the machines responsible are, we can finally get the show on the road. We can finally fight. We can finally get vengeance!" His voice took on a darker and more authoritative tone, like a mad dictator. "We can commence 'Operation: Ragnarok'."

  Scout was confused, but before he could ask what the madman meant, Cassie leaned in close to his ear. "He'll explain it d*ck wad." She hissed quietly.

  The Sniper continued. "As you know, the Christian Pure Spy and I have been down here for the past seven years, left for dead by our enemies and teammates. But over that time-span, we have gained and lost allies and you today are going to be here to witness our revenge." He clenched his fist until his knuckles became white. "They'll pay for what they've done to us. They'll pay for every scar and disfigurement. They'll pay for turning us into freaks of f**king nature!"

  "Tonight, we will rise up and make them regret making us the way we are now. And when the sun rises… Red and BLU will be NO MORE!" He screamed, drawing cruel smiles from most of those gathered around the table. "And when they lie dying at our feet, they will ask themselves the same question; 'Who are the true monsters?' and just before death takes over, they'll realize that we are not the monsters… THEY ARE."

  The Bostonian was panicking to himself as he felt the bloodlust fill up the room, more and more tension building up as CBS kept on with his speech. "Now… WHO was it that took away our legs and replaced them with an animal's flesh?"

  "It was them!" Dario and Mike shouted in unison.

  "WHO was it that Took away your sight, your voice and your hearing!?"

  "It was THEM!" Fausto and Grete shouted, while Yayoi made a loud aggressive hiss and Philip raised a clenched fist.

  "And… WHO WAS IT. THAT LEFT US HERE TO ROT AND DIE!?"

  "IT WAS THEM!" Everyone stood and screamed, some voices filled with anger and sadness, while others were filled with a mad joy.

  "Come! Let us prepare! It's time for WAR! It's time for BLOOD! It's time for VENGEANCE!" CBS screamed, preparing to finish off his speech. "For revenge is a dish best served… NOW!"

  He cackled madly, while Scout sat with cold dread pouring through his veins…

Next Chapter:
Preparation