13My Little Fortress: RED Team in Equestria
Chapter 1: Engi's New Machine
"Attention, combatants! The second scheduled match of the day will commence shortly. Good luck; and please try to put on a better show than earlier today; that was simply dreadful."
"Hrph, 'Luck' she says," Soldier said gruffly as he glanced at the intercom inside the RED team's spawn room at Goldrush.
"Well, we'll certainly need it after 'zis morning," Spy said as he walked up to his teammate with a cigarette in his hand, as usual.
"Speak for yourself, Frenchie," Soldier replied. "I don't believe in luck; I believe in skill; and what happened earlier was the worst display of skill I've ever seen in my lifetime."
"You say zat every time we lose," Spy stated, taking a puff from his cigarette. "Although I admit, our losing streak as of late is getting rather...ridiculous." Soldier just narrowed his eyes and headed to his locker, Spy trailing behind him. "However, I hear Engineer is working on a new device for us to use against BLU; I have not seen it yet, but I am...optimistic."
"He'd better be," Soldier said, grabbing his weapons. "Or else I might have to knock some sense into this team...literally." Spy shook his head and retrieved his own weapons.
The first match of the day earlier that morning was a CTF event at 2Fort, in which RED had its rear ends handed to them. They were lucky to have even captured the intelligence once, let along three times total. They hadn't had a break since Memorial Day (a holiday that the two team's foreign members didn't quite understand since it was an American holiday, but still respected it none the less), and it was now almost towards the end of June. Their losing streak was shorter than that time span, but it had still been a good two weeks since their last victory. Their next 'real' break wouldn't be until the 4th of July, and all RED could hope for was that after the week was over, their employers gave them some time to rest; knowing their employers, however, that wasn't likely to happen.
Once armed, Spy and Soldier made their way outside of the base to join the rest of the team in preparing for another assault. The two glanced at their teammates littered loosely across their part of the map; Pyro was trying to light a rock on fire, Demoman was prepping his grenades while drinking his signature scrumpy, Heavy was polishing Sascha, Medic was building up an Ubercharge, and Sniper was testing his aim with his Huntsman. Also, both Scout and Engineer were nowhere to be seen.
"Well, whatever Engineer's working on, it seems he doesn't want any of us bothering him," Spy remarked.
"Well he'd better hurry up and get his Canadian ass over here before the match starts," Soldier remarked as he armed his rocket launcher. Spy scowled inwardly at the Soldier's stereotyping, wishing he'd use those words less often, if at all.
To be honest, Spy couldn't stand most of his associates; to him, Scout was a blabbermouth, Soldier was too offensive, Pyro was a mumbling lunatic, Demoman was a drunken fool, Engineer relied on machines to do his fighting for him, and Sniper was too much of a loner. He only got along with Heavy and Medic, although he respected all his teammates none the less.
"One minute until Mission start," the announcer said over the intercom, which shook Spy from the thought. He muttered a quick "here we go" under his breath before arming his knife and readying his disguise kit for the next match.
-x-x-x-x-x-x-
"Dang it," Engineer cursed to himself upon hearing the countdown over the intercom.
"Ah, there ya are," Scout said from behind him, making the Engineer jump slightly and actually aim his pistol at Scout, who held his hands up defensively.
"Don't scare me like that, Son," Engineer said, breathing slowly to steady himself. "What're y'all doin' back here, anyways?"
"Doin' my job, what else," Scout said, stating the obvious. "Also, looking fer you; the other guys were wondering' where you'd gotten to."
"Well, I kinda hid from them on purpose," Engineer replied. "I don't trust them at all around this thing; especially Pyro or Demoman."
"Oh, that the new gizmo you've been working on," Scout asked, trying to peek over Engineer's shoulder to get a glance. Engineer held Scout down, saying: "Yes, but you can't see it yet; it's a surprise. Plus, how do I know you ain't a Spah?"
"Go ahead and shoot me, then," Scout said. Engineer knew a Spy would never say that, so he could rule that out. "Can ya at least tell me what it does?"
"All right, fine, if it'll shut your lip," Engineer said, standing up and beginning to pack his invention into a toolbox. "It's a more powerful teleporter; ya know how the one I got now can only fit one person at a time? Well, I'm fixin' it up so that the whole team can use it at once! That way, we can ambush BLU easily and maybe get us a win today."
"Is it done yet," Scout asked impatiently as the two walked back towards their spawn point.
"No, I still have to make a few more tweaks to it," Engineer said. "Also, it takes a really long time for the teleportation process to finish with the new equations I've programmed into it, so we're very vulnerable to attacks. There's not much I can really do about the speed, but I did put in a protective field that will stop bullets while the teleporter does its work."
"How long will it take to get it ready," Scout asked.
"Not too long, about a half hour or so."
"Well, why don't you just go and work on it behind the spawn room and we'll give ya some cover till ya fix it," Scout proposed.
"If y'all can hold em off that long, that sure, by all means, do it," Engineer replied. "I'll give ya guys some assistance when I can, but don't expect me up there on the front lines."
"No prob," Scout said as they reached the RED team's spawn, Engineer putting his toolbox down right into a little alcove beside the building.
"30 seconds," The announcer buzzed in.
"Well, let's hope this works," Engineer said, arming his PDA and getting ready to drop a Dispenser as Scout informed the rest of the team of the plan.
"I think ve're more zen capable of zat," Medic replied after scout finished.
"Heavy thinks plan is excellent," Heavy stated. "Little baby BLU team will not get past Me and Sascha."
"We'll hold 'em off best we can, laddie," Demoman chimed in with another swig of his bottle.
"Ten seconds," the announcer said over the intercom, beginning the countdown.
"Alright, here we go," Scout mumbled under his breath, the team ready to begin the match.
"Five! Four! Three! Two! One! Begin," the administrator counted down, the team rushing ahead to the first capture point to set up their defenses. Engineer put down a spare teleporter entrance at the spawn and the exit inside the building covering the point. He put a sentry near a somewhat-visible alcove in the same area, as well as a dispenser. "That's all you'll see from me," Engi called, rushing back to his work spot.
"Hold steady," Soldier ordered as the team hid right at the first capture point. Spy peaked out the open window as he saw BLU team approaching, lead by BLU heavy in front of the cart with BLU Medic closely behind and BLU Scout slightly in front. BLU Soldier was standing on top of the cart, BLU Demo also standing behind him. BLU Pyro marched behind the cart, BLU Sniper behind him, and BLU Engineer on one side of the cart with his toolbox in hand. BLU Spy wasn't anywhere to be seen, so the team had to expect a possible disguised Spy trying to hide among them.
"Get ready, lads," Demoman whispered, Medic readying his ubercharge as BLU team neared the capture point. Once BLU had reached the point and begun the capture, Medic threw on his ubercharge as RED hopped down from their hiding spots and attacked. They easily disposed of the BLUs, reversing the progress on the point so that the cart would push backwards.
"Vell, ve stopped ze initial push, but now ve must defend against zeir counter-attack," Medic said.
"Let's hope we can keep em held off till Engi gets his thing up and runnin'," Scout mused.
"Look sharp, boys, here they come again," Soldier called out, the team getting ready to defend once again. Unfortunately, the BLU's had been able to force RED back to defending their base, causing a standstill that lasted for almost the entire match.
RED had eventually given themselves a little breathing room with just under a minute remaining on the game clock, and coincidentally, Engineer had finally finished his new device and was ready to try it out while there were no BLUs around.
"Guess it's now or never," Engineer muttered to himself before grabbing his teleporter and placing it in position. "Hey, boys, I'm good to go!"
"All right," Scout said as the rest of RED ran over to Engineer's teleporter.
"What's the big deal," Soldier asked mockingly. "It looks just like your old model!"
"Patience, Yankee," Engineer replied as the teleporter started up. "Just so y'all know, I've fixed this thing up to be able to teleport all of us at once, instead of one at a time like the old model. The new calculations I've put into this will cause it to start up a little slower, but it shouldn't take too long before we're right in front of BLU's spawn and ready to take 'em out and get us a win today!"
"Well, vat are ve waiting for, zen," Medic asked, the team nodding in agreement as they all assembled in a circular formation under the teleporter.
"Wait, mate, don't we need an exit too," Sniper asked.
"This model doesn't need one," Engineer replied. "I've already pre-set the coordinates to take us right in front of the spawn room for BLU. Now hang on!"
Engineer then pressed a button on his PDA that caused the teleporter to start to rotate and spur to life, a protective field forming over RED team as the teleporter charged itself up to teleport the new load.
"I suddenly have bad feeling about dis," Heavy said.
"The field we're in will keep us safe from bullet fire," Engineer said confidently.
"I dunnae, lad, I'm getting that same feeling abut now," Demoman said as the teleporter approached full charge.
Pyro, meanwhile, seemed to have eyes like a hawk, because out of the corner of his eye, he swore he saw something sliding on the ground towards them; it looked rectangular in shape, and seemed to be sparking slightly. "MMMPH!" Pyro shouted, pointing at the ground. RED looked in the direction Pyro was pointing, and saw what was undoubtedly a sapper sliding towards them. Before they could do anything, the sapper had attached itself to the teleporter and had begun draining the energy from the device.
"Dagnabit," the Engineer cursed, taking his wrench and attempting to detach the sapper.
"I wouldn't do zat if I were you," Spy said, grabbing Engineer's arm slightly. "Zat sapper is carrying a much larger electrical charge than normal; you could do serious damage to yourself or to your machine if you tried to smack it."
"So, we're just gonna stand here and let this thing get sapped, then," Scout asked. Engineer just put his hands to his face in anger.
"Not so 'high and mighty' now, are you, RED," BLU spy said as he decloaked in front of them. Engineer just stared angrily at BLU Spy as he laughed under his breath, flicking his now-used up cigarette onto the ground. "I've known what you've been up to since you started planning zis little stunt; I just wanted to see it in action before I brought all your hopes crashing down! Ahaha!"
"And this is why I hate Spies," Engineer said as BLU Spy began walking off.
"Um, Engineer," Heavy asked. "If sapper is hurting teleporter, den why is it still working?"
The RED team raised an eyebrow at Heavy's comment, but were aghast when they saw that the teleporter was indeed still working; and be the looks of things, was still trying to teleport them away.
"Hah! Hear that? In your face, creep," Scout taunted. "We're still gonna show up and kick your sorry sneeky behind inta next Tuesday!"
"Hold your horses, son, something ain't right," Engineer said, reading the coordinates on his PDA. "This thing's goin' all haywire on me; I'm getting coordinates I've never even seen before!"
"Well...can you get us back on track," Scout replied.
"I can't control this thing anymore, son," Engineer said, frantically pressing the buttons on his PDA in an attempt to shut the machine down. "Wherever it sends us is where it sends us. Hopefully, we won't be too far off..." Engineer was cut off when the teleporter began pulsing, reaching its final sequence. RED began to feel the teleportation effects, which were stronger than usual.
"Here we go," Scout said as the teleporter started to spark madly. BLU Spy suddenly began to feel uneasy at the amount of energy coming off the thing, and ran away to a safe distance.
"Brace Yourselves, lads," Demoman announced as the rest of BLU now arrived on the scene as the game clock had hit just ten seconds left in the match. BLU then saw what was happening and ducked behind cover as well.
"Hang on, Y'all," Engineer called out as a sudden flash of light appeared, a loud 'WHOOM' being heard soon afterwards, followed by the RED team disappearing and some more residual sparking before the teleporter cooled back down and stopped rotating.
"Da hell was that," BLU scout asked as he and the rest of BLU emerged from their hiding places.
"I don't know," BLU Engineer said. "But I gotta take a look at this," he said, running over to the teleporter and beginning to dismantle it.
"Does dis mean we don't get to push cart anymore," BLU heavy asked.
"Attention, combatants," the administrator said, having seen the whole thing play out over live surveillance. "Due to this...sudden development, the rest of the matches for the day are canceled while we investigate the situation. You are dismissed."
"There's your answer," BLU Sniper mumbled to his teammate as the rest of the team looked on, dumbfounded as to what has just taken place.
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"Thanks again, Zecora," Twilight Sparkle called to her Zebra friend after exiting her hut. "I'll make sure Spike gets this medicine right away!"
"Just do what I said with my brew, and in 2 weeks little Spike will be good as new," Zecora rhymed with a wave, Twilight waving a hoof in return as she walked away from Zecora's hut.
"Finally, I might be able to do some actual studying for once," Twilight mused as she began the trek back to Ponyville from her location in the everfree forest. Just then, a loud rumble erupted from behind, startling Twilight and causing her to spin around and witness a strange flash of light come from deep within the forest. A large gust of wind whooshed by rapidly, fraying Twilight's mane considerably. A quick shake of her head returned it to normal.
"What was THAT," Twilight asked herself as the wind and the light died down. "Well whatever it was, it looked like it came from...somewhere near the old castle ruins. I should probably go investigate; but, I can always do that later. I should get this medicine to Spike before he burns down the library. I just hope it holds off until then..."
So, there's Chapter 1. A little short, but the next one should be a lot longer.