Who's a Spy? (Team Fortress 2 - Scout) - HIATUS

Wrong Move

I had awoken to the dreadful smell of smoke and burnt cheese. The rain of two days ago had given way for a nice and still morning. Still enough and quiet enough, as my room was as far away from the bulk of the noise of the team. Though, not as far enough as it was from that smell. 

Outside was fairly nice; the sun was beaming through the window and from the bushes far ahead from where I was on my bed, there was no wind. No wind, no rain, no movement... just us. The team. In the middle of nowhere. Kind of depressing if you ask me. I rested my hand on my forehead and slid it slowly below my nose. At least there were quite a bit of us to keep each other company, or at the same time annoy ourselves to death. I rolled my head to the side to face my nightstand and focused on the clock.

2:32 PM. Great.

Should've known that stupid chocolate milk medicine thing was ridiculous. 

A knock echoed through the door, and three seconds later, even without my say so, the doorknob turned and the door was opened to reveal Scout. His arms were crossed, and he was leaning beside the door frame while glaring straight at me. I was frozen on the bed giving him the most lifeless stare with a tilted head. This morning was already moving too fast for me, and I had no idea of anything really. I slowly blinked at him. We stayed at this for what seemed to be ten minutes. His hat was covering his eyes then, and I was still as dead as ever. He finally lifted his head and asked, "You comin' or what?" 

"To what?" I began to stretch and rubbed my eyes. For the love of all that was right and true, I secretly hoped it had nothing to do with getting out of bed. I may have had my game in the beginning, but this bed was a sanctuary for me and I did not want to leave it. Its creaks were music to my ears at this point. 

Scout uncrossed his arms and sprung back up, "To breakfast." 

"Breakfast?" My spine bolted upwards and I found myself looking at the wall beside me for answers. "Is my clock broken? Did I even hear you right?"

"Did I stutter? I ain't gonna repeat it again," Scout licked his teeth. As he began to turn around, he pulled out a soda can from his pocket and popped it open. "See ya downstairs, Rudolph." He then left without closing the door, and I heard his footsteps echo in the hallway, "Stupid overalls. Team bondin' my ass." followed by a few consecutive sips before I couldn't hear a thing. I gave myself a five-minute snooze time. 

When I quickly stood up from rest it must've been too fast of a wake. My head was pounding and my vision was dark for a few seconds. I could not move without the help of a bed frame. My eyes shortly regained their strength and I gazed at my reflection from the mirror across from me and frowned. I did not look like Rudolph. WIth a final back stretch I headed for the door and on to breakfast.

"Look alive, maggots!" The Soldier had called right before he opened the door for me as if he knew I was behind it. Light instantly flooded my eyes of the early afternoon with today's breakfast. Or should I say, late morning. Eggs and cheese greeted my vision before anything else, and here the smell was as daunting as ever. 

"Ava not dead, WAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" and the Russian picked up my plate of eggs and cheese and chucked it straight at me. It was coming my way, and I closed my eyes. 

I didn't get hit nor was there a shatter to the wall. Had something stopped it? "Learn to catch, doofus." I glanced behind me and towering above was Scout, with my plate on the tips of his fingers. Almost like a waiter from a restaurant. It was hard to absorb this situation and I awkwardly blinked at him some more. "Take it, I got my own breakfast ta eat," he said. So I stood up  and received my plate from his hands. 

"Thanks," I muttered and took a seat. The rest of the team was fairly tired; had they all awoken at the same time, too? My excuse was a good one, but there was no way these people had something that kept them up all night. I looked around the table. "Where's Pyro?"

"Rat exterminatin'; no better need for a fire than that," Dell turned around and flicked his newspaper to straighten it up. I was surprised. There was no way there could be news about anything near these grounds. I squinted at them and gave it a closer look. I was right, it wasn't news. All it was was just a catalog of different weapons of the weirdest names and descriptions. Mann Co. Catalog, it read. "Whooooowe, would ya look at that!" he whistled with every page turn. 

Suddenly there was the loudest boom from outside. The ground shook, and we all looked at each other as we felt the vibrations from the ground. "No betta need for a fire, you said?" Scout scooped his plate up and slid the last few bits of his egg into his mouth. 

"Fire! Fire! Fire!!!" Medic pointed towards the window, kicked back his chair and ran out of the door. The rest of us hastily followed suit and began running towards the source.

There were a few flames glowing not too far from our base on a fairly flat plane where the grass was already dead anyway. When we got there, Mundy pumped out buckets of water for us and we all took part in cleaning the mess. 

"Now where's da flame wick?" Scout dumped his empty bucket beside me and tightly crossed his arms. 

"No idea," I scanned the area. Besides a tool shed filled with hay, there were only boxes and crates freckled around this area. None of which the Pyro could have taken retreat to. 

"Once I get my hands on the stupid thing I will-" I shoved my bucket into his chest and stifled a guilty grin. I went off to go look. 

"Ava!!!!! Where is Pyro?" the Heavy crouched beside me. "Heavy is small ladybug. Is Pyro's favorite animal." 

"Won't you stand up?" I hesitantly scratched my neck. Heavy widely smiled and shook his head, "Pyro will catch Heavy. Heavy is ladybug." 

"...Alright then, I guess. Follow me."

Together we scouted from a nearby hill, opened and closed boxes, and lingered over a few crates. None of our efforts were really successful. We couldn't find anything, or even a piece of the Pyro's clothing. Either something was up, or the Pyro had escaped. 

"Heavy smell soiled baby diaper." he leaned upwards towards me, "Is you?" 

I shoved my hands to his face and stifled back. Sniffing the air, I really didn't smell anything besides burnt grounds. The rest of the team was kind of farther away from us. What exactly did he mean by soiled diapers? I glimpsed back at him, and his same, widely-smiling expression met me again.

All of a sudden, I noticed that Mundy was frantically waving his arms around at me. "LOOK OUT! YOU'D BEST KEEP DOWN!" he yelled.

"INCOMING!" Roared the soldier. 

And suddenly I ducked beside a box just moments before the impact. The ground rumbled, and a formidable smell filled the air. Almost eerily accurate of Heavy's description. I stumbled up, ears ringing, and turned my head in different directions as a dense cloud of smoke covered everything in the area.

"Heavy!" I shouted, "Scout! Everyone!!" My feet carried me around as I coughed through the mess, gripping the collar of my shirt to my nose. Near me was an odd clearing. It was like the smoke had hidden everything except for that spot. I inched closer to it, my eyes watering and feeling as itchy as ever. When I reached it, oddly and hauntingly enough, I was right. All around this clear, un-touched spot was a ring of smoke that resembled a sort-of barrier. 

What was even more mysterious was why. Even in this hot and windless weather I felt a cold sweat and a chill at my spine. It felt so unreal, so fake that I had to repeatedly blink my eyes. On the ground in front of me there was the most strange message scorched into the ground by a flame.

'Wrong move,' it read. 

Something hard hit my head.

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Apologies to those still reading this series! I had a really hard time with this chapter and I deleted different versions of it countless times over the past months.