Isolated (Red vs Blue)

14: Blue With Envy

14: Blue With Envy

Present Day: Somewhere on the Edge of Colonized Space

"You do know this is stupid, right?" Grif asked for what had to be the twentieth time. "All we're doing is humoring Sarge's senile delusions; it's unhealthy, honestly."

Simmons sighed. He was getting irritated with his teammate already, and they'd just left Red Base. "Look, if we didn't go now, we were gonna have to listen to Sarge complain for the rest of the day. And quite frankly, I'm getting tired of listening to him talk to himself while he walks around. Going to spy on the Blues was the lesser of two evils."

The orange clad soldier stopped walking. "Hold on. You're telling me you'd rather go deal with a giant killer robot than listen to Sarge monologue to himself? That was the better option for you?!"

"Okay, when you put it that way, it sounds like an awful idea." Simmons turned and looked at his teammate. "Whether we like it or not, we've already committed to going and spying on the Blues. The way I see it, we go watch them for a bit, make sure they're not up to anything, then head home. Simple as that."

"You do realize we have to accomplish all of that while avoiding being spotted by the walking death machine, right?" Grif asked. "Argue with me all you want, Simmons. I'm never gonna think this was a good idea."

The maroon armored soldier sighed. "Would you just quit complaining so we can get going? We're making this drag on longer than it really needs to."

"Fine. But the next time Sarge comes up with an insane idea, it's all on you, buddy," Grif informed him.

"Whatever. Let's just go," Simmons muttered.

The two soldiers began walking again, making their way across the canyon. As they got closer to Blue Base, a loud boom caused them to run for cover. Within seconds the sound of Tucker yelling at Caboose could be heard; whatever just happened was clearly the blue clad soldier's fault. Somehow, that came as no surprise to Simmons. Whenever anything went wrong at Blue Base, most times it was because of something Caboose did. How he hadn't gotten himself — or anyone besides Church — killed, Simmons would never know.

As the two Reds neared Blue Base, they began moving more cautiously. The Mantis was outside with the two Blue soldiers; the droid appeared to be scanning the area for intruders. When the robot began turning in their direction, Simmons quickly grabbed Grif and pulled him behind a large boulder. The two of them stayed completely still and silent for what seemed like an eternity — neither one of them was willing to check and see if the Mantis had looked away.

Simmons looked over at his teammate and found Grif just staring at him. He stared back for a moment and watched as the other soldier brought his hands up. Grif was challenging him to rock, paper, scissors.

"You can't be serious right now," Simmons whispered.

"I never joke when it comes to rock, paper, scissors. Loser has to check for the robot. We'll go best two out of three," Grif whispered back.

The maroon clad soldier sighed as he brought his hands up. "I can't believe I'm actually going along with this."

"It's the only way we're gonna settle this and you know it," his teammate said in a hushed tone.

The two soldiers went through the three rounds of rock, paper, scissors rather quickly — Grif came out victorious. Simmons couldn't understand how someone who normally didn't put much effort into anything could win practically every time they played. It was like the other soldier had some sort of sixth sense when it came to competing to get out of doing something.