Chapter 2: Mann vs. Giant

Unknown, unknown, 5:00 am

Location: Unknown

The land, full of green lush life as far as the eye could see, was at peace. Birds were singing, the trees swayed in tune with the wind and the grass reflected the early morning sunlight. It was like the world of men was asleep and undisturbed the world of life.

A herd of deer were grazing by a river, enjoying their meal in peace and quiet. All was well until the wind fell absolutely flat, the trees stopped dancing and the birds panicked and flew away. The deer noticed this sudden change in the atmosphere and buck their heads in the direction in which they heard electricity crackling. A small crimson red orb hovered just a few inches was above the ground, glowing with golden arcs of lightning wrapped around it. Suddenly the orb shot a bolt of electricity by the deer.

Following his instincts, the herd leader ran in the opposite direction with the rest of the deer in tow. The orb began to grow bigger than before and the surrounding grass and trees misfortunate enough to stand in its path burst into flames as the heat and electricity of the orb engulfed them. The orb grew to twenty metres in circumference before it stopped expanding. The electricity bolts sizzled and crackled before crates, barrels and all manner of objects flew out of the orb with a crash; including barrels of nuclear waste. The orb continued to spew debris from its core for several minutes before it gave a violent roar. Distorted screams echoed from the orb as a large shadow formed within it. The FED-UP truck, now the RED-Services Truck flew out of the orb at an astonishing speed before crashing to the ground, kicking up a giant storm of dust. Bodies that held onto the truck were flung from it, most of them scattered to the ground at random. The truck came to a halt with its whole body leaning to the side, then with a loud moan, the truck tipped and smashed onto its passenger side.

With a monumentally bright red flash and a thundering clap, the orb disappeared, leaving the Nine Mercs forever in an unknown land.

The REDs laid where they landed, undisturbed, the only sign of movement a spinning wheel of the truck. Suddenly one of the bodies moved.

"Agh! My head! My beautiful head! Agh, it feels like it got shot by a Sniper" Scout moaned as he came too.

He rolled around for a bit, constantly rubbing his head to dull the pain raging in his cranium. Once the pain died down a bit, he took note of his surroundings. 'What in hell?' he saw that the ground below him was burnt to a crisp, but only a few feet away the grass was perfectly green and untouched. 'Grass?' he thought in confusion, grumbling to himself as he continued surveying the area. He heard the slight sound of splashing water to his left, discovering they had landed next to a clear meandering river. Further beyond the burnt circle and river were plains of green that stretched as far as the eye could see; small groups of trees and mountain ranges in the distance broke up the endless void of green.

The land was lush, vibrant and alive; adjectives not commonly used when describing the Badlands. The sky was light blue with scattered grey clouds lingering through the air as if they served no purpose but to be seen. His body felt like jelly and he felt numb as he slowly rose from the ground. Grumbling with every move, he stood at full height, his legs curving awkwardly at the movement. Scout looked around slowly, stopping when he found a familiar yellow hard-hat wearing man. Scout stumbled over to Engineer, careful not to land face first in the ground like his friend. The young man hovered over Engineer, ready to give condolences to the lifeless body. Scout lifted his left leg and gently brought it down on Engineer's back.

"Way to go Engie!" Scout said, shaking his head in sadness and remembrance of his fallen comrade.

A groan came from under Scout's foot as Engineer came back to life. He was sluggish and weak but still managed to pull the weight of his head to look up at Scout. "Huh…We're alive?" he spoke groggily, "Did it work? Did it shut down?" Engineer asked in a husky voice as he adjusted his goggles.

"Ah… what do you think hard-hat? Does it look like we've shut it down?" Scout's angered domineer disappeared when he realised that the Australium Teleporter and its crazy vortex was nowhere to be seen, "well…we kinda' did" Scout sheepishly responded as he continued to walk around trying to get the feeling back in his legs.

From behind them came the sound of clothes rustling together as well as a yawn. The culprit behind the yawn was none other than Heavy, who rubbed the sleep from his eyes. "Ga, Heavy had weird dream. Dream was about Heavy and little babies being pulled into bigger version of Engineer's Teleporter. And Teleporter was gold". If Heavy wasn't awake now, the sight before him certainty did the trick.

Strewn before him were the crates and other objects that occupied the space around the REDs' base, as well as the truck that Heavy had held onto for dear life as he was dragged into the Teleporter. "…I don't think it was a dream after all".

A loud bang was heard from the truck. The door to the cockpit had been kicked open and out fell Medic, who landed on the ground with a hard thud. He recovered from the fall quickly before adjusting his glasses. He surveyed his surroundings in this new foreign land. "Ooh! Where are we?" Medic asked, taking note of the surrounding fauna and flora.

Splash

The Team simultaneously turned their heads towards the movement in the river to find Sniper crouching and dipping his fingers into the water of the river. He proceeded to scoop a handful of cool water and splashed his face; anything to get the groggy feeling out of his head. "Bloody Hell. What the blazes just happened?!" Sniper snapped his head toward Engineer with a face of ire.

"My zhoughts exactly! I zhinks ze teleporter malfunctioned- uhn' maybe ze sample of Australium was too volatile or unstable?" Medic theorised through murmurs.

"So, the tele broke….and… we're where?" Sniper asked, looking at the beautiful scenery surrounding him.

"I zhink we are teleported away. Somewhere wizin the upper-most norzern hemisphere judging by ze trees: ze sequoia uhn' ze Coastal Redwood" Medic enthusiastically determined as he pointed towards a group of trees.

As he was about to continue his explanation and possible hypothesis of exactly where they were, he was hit in the back of the head with a boot. "AAAAAAAAGGGGHHHHH! I DON'T CARE ABOUT THAT! YOU TREE HUGGER!" Soldier ran towards Medic, grabbed him by the hair and continued to scream in Medic's face, "WE ARE STRANDED IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, AND YOU WANT TO LOOK AT TREES! WE CAN BE ANYWHERE! WE CAN BE IN AUSTRALIA! EUROPE! CHINA! RUSSIA! OR WORST….Canada" Soldier skittishly looked side to side, as if searching for find someone hidden somewhere around them.

A loud belch, worthy of pleasing the greatest of drunks, came abruptly for behind them. Such a burp belonged to one sloshed Demoman, grumbling something unintelligible before downing another swig of his Scrumpy. "Calm down you 'Hick' stereotypical 'Hick' 'Merica man!" Demoman struggled to speak as the alcoholic weight of the scrumpy was seriously affecting him. That or the effects of the teleporter was still influencing him.

While Demo tired to recollect what pieces of his mind that were still left, the group's attention was brought towards their capsized truck, where muffled meremers came from it.

The Pyro sluggishly walked out of the rolled trailer, covering his eyes as the harsh glare from the morning sun hit him. Having taken a moment to adjust, Pyro looked around at his surroundings and began to fire off questions at a rapid pace. Said questions were aimed at Scout, who responded to each, "Yes, Yes, No, Maybe, I don't know, I wish we were and yes- figuratively speaking- Pink is not a good look on you. Clashes with the red and all" Scout answered.

Pyro gave a positive hum, glad that at least one of his answers were satisfactory. He took a mental note to get rid of anything pink from his closet when he gets home.

"I am glad we are having zis little heart-to-heart moment-" finally showing himself, Spy stepped out of the trailer and walked to the group "- but as you can see all around us, we are not in our base".

Spy walked towards Engineer, not looking pleased at all. "We are instead in ze middle of nowhere, in a different biome and far, far away from our base. So, Engineer…" Spy placed both handson Engineer's shoulders, "WHAT ZE HELL HAPPENED TO THE TELEPORTER!?"

Spy's scream silenced the world around them and brought everyone's attention towards the two. Engineer was shaken by the scream and tried to remove Spy's crushing grip from his shoulders. "Hey-hey-hey! Calm down there! You're overacting a bit here Spy".

"Oh! My apologies! I'm so sorry for 'overacting', it wasn't as if I ALMOST DIED SEVERAL MINUTES AGO!"

Spy then threw Engineer away from him, grumbling and taking deep breaths to calm himself. He inhaled and exhaled for a few seconds for digging through his suit for his supply of cigarettes.

While Spy started to smoke himself into an early grave, Medic stepped up beside the disorientated Engineer. "Listen, I know all of you are….stressed and bewildered by our predicament, but I zhinks it is best zhat we don't harm our only means of going back hom-"

"AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

A roar from Soldier interrupted Medic yet again, and instead of going for Medic, he tackled Engineer to the ground instead.

"You betrayed us! You Commie motherfucker!" Soldier drew his Market Gardener, a foldable shovel with a pine-wood handle and green head, bringing the edge of the spade to Engineer's neck. "You teleported us straight into the hands of our enemy!".

"Soldier! We're in the middle of bloody nowhere! How did he teleport us to the bloody enemy?!" Demo's attempt at defusing the situation fell on deaf ears as Soldier continued to threaten Engineer.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't lop off your tiny, bold head and wear it as a new hat!"

Engineer struggled against Soldier's strength and wheezed out an answer, "Because I'm the only one who can get us outta here".

Soldier's angered demeanour changed to that of confusion. The tiny gears in his head working and mauling over Engineer's words. "…ok, give me TWO reasons why I shouldn't!'"

Soldier was silenced as Heavy's massive fist closed over his head and lifted him up into the air, causing Soldier to release Engineer. "You are stupid, tiny little Soldier!"

Soldier's muffled response of "put me down and face me like a man" and "I'll break every single bone in your body" was accompanied by him thrashing his arms and feet around trying to connect with Heavy. Heavy grumbled and threw Soldier over his shoulder, launching him into the nearby river. Heavy then bent over to pick up Engineer, who by now was wishing he had died during the teleporter accident. After helping Engineer regain his footing, Heavy stood back and let Medic come over. "You can get us back, right?" Medic asked in an aggressive tone.

Engineer nervously gulped. "O-of course! You lot don't think that I wouldn't come up with a back-up plan if-"

Medic shoved Engineer's signature red toolbox towards him, the box appearing in Medic's hands seemingly out of nowhere and ordered "Start building".

Dumbfounded, Engineer nodded and started to build a regular teleporter. With a few swings and twists of his wrench and the use of screws, nuts, bolts and hydraulics, the teleporter was set up. Engineer waited for the teleporter to activate and connect to the exit-port. He waited…...and waited…...and waited a few more minutes.

"…...Ah…. Egghead? Ain't the teleporter meant to be glowin' round about now?" Scout asked.

In his mind, Engineer was asking himself the same question. Engineer quickly scanned through the Constriction PDA, scrolling through a long list of inactive teleporters.

Teleporter #47 (Wardrobe): offline

Teleporter #48 (Workshop): offline

Teleporter #49 (Hospital): offline

He continued to scroll through the list until he found what he was looking for:

Teleporter #100 (Global-Range): offline

This was really concerning. Worrying even. The Global-Range Teleporter was a structure that allowed Engineer to teleport to any place in the world. He designed it as an easily accessible escape route in case of an emergency, like pissing off the wrong people and hiding for a bit. All he had to do was set up a teleporter, punch in the frequency of the Global-Range Teleporter and jump into the active teleporter. Simple. Except the Exit Port was offline.

Engineer gulped nervously, a hand scratching the back of his head in confusion and worry. There were three possibilities why the teleporter wasn't working. One; the exit teleporter was broken or destroyed. Two; the entry teleporter, the one he just placed and built, was broken. Three; he prayed that this wasn't the case, but they might be beyond the range of the exit-port. The only way for them to be out of range is for them to be off-world.

Engineer wiped the sweat from his brow, before turning to his inpatient team. Engineer swallowed nervously, "We might have a problem boys".

By the way half of them were scowling at him, they were probably not going to like the news he was going to present. "We are- um… we might be…stuck here…for the foreseeable future".

Click

Engineer jumped as wet Soldier, having recently emerged from the river, pulled his Panic Attack off of his belt and pumped it, "I told you boys he was working for the enemy! He's an enemy Spy!"

Before Heavy, Medic or any other Mercenary could come to Engineer's defence, Engineer stepped forward and spoke; seemingly oblivious to the loaded shotgun aimed at his chest. "I can't get us home because…" Engineer bit his cheek and considered his next words carefully, "the exit teleporter might be broken".

It was the only logical and realistic possibility of why the teleporter was offline but coming out of his mouth it sounded like a poor excuse a six-year-old would make to their parent to get out of trouble. It seemed he was right, as Soldier wasn't swayed in the slightest. "Oh! Really? How coincidental. Come on Spy, at least learn to lie like a commie"

"It's the truth Soldier!"

"Zhen how could it be broken?" Spy quickly jumped in, expecting Engineer to elaborate his answer.

"I built the exit teleporter in a shed behind the complex. It…. is possible that the disruption from the experiment might have damaged it".

It was a possible scenario, not probable, but possible. During the experiment, the Australium Teleporter was growing in size and force, almost bringing down the whole garage. The whole complex too was nearly swallowed up by the Australium-fuelled portal, it was possible that the exit teleporter was caught by it. It wasn't a sound hypothesis given that the portal that spat them out was nowhere to be found, nor the ruins of their base, but it was possible.

Soldier glanced down at the floor, deep in thought, before shooting his sights back up to Engineer. "So there's no way for you to get us home?"

"…It looks that way, yeah"

Spy gave a frustrated sigh and walked over to Soldier. He reached out grasped the shotgun but didn't move it, only doing it so he can grab Soldier's attention. "I zhink he is telling ze truth, my friend. Put ze gun down. He is our Engineer after all. He is ze one who got us here, but he is ze only one who can get us out of here"

It took a moment of silence, and hard thinking on the part of Soldier, but in the end he lowered the weapon down. He let out a gruffed huff, "Fine, but if he's a backstabbing Spy, don't come crying to me"

"Trust me Soldier, zou are ze last person I want to see before I die" Spy joked.

That seemed to liven up the mood a bit, with a few Mercs chuckling and Engineer realising a breath he didn't know he had. "So, what do we do now?" Heavy was quick to stop the chuckling with his question.

Silence fell upon the group, each member thinking of possible ways of returning home.

"Actually, I might have kinda' well, lied" the voice of Engineer shook everyone from their thoughts and drew their attention.

Engineer elaborated further. "I can get us home, but it may take a while, a few months perhaps, and a little bit of border crossing". Before the group had a chance to catch on to what Engineer was implying, he turned away and gestured to the capsized truck, a quarter of which was buried in the ground. "I'll fix this here truck and we'll go on a little…. unplanned road-trip, try to find the nearest town and get the general location of where we are and where we need to go".

"Aye, I agree with the lil' Toymaker. Dis' ar' only way back home ladies" Demo threw his support behind Engineer.

The others agreed as well, seeing it was the only option available to the group. With that, their plan for going home was set in motion.

Sniper clapped his hands to garner everyone's attention. "Alright wankers, we might be here for a while and I want a layout of the land as well as a camp set up" Sniper looked over at Demoman, Scout and the completely soaked Soldier. "I want you knuckle-heads to go South into the forest and collect firewood" Sniper pointed in the direction that the three Mercs guessed was South. He moved over to Medic and Pyro, "you two are coming with me, we're going North to find food. Once you all get to a good distance, split up but make sure you have each other and the camp in view".

The four Mercs begrudgingly followed Sniper's orders, with Demo, Scout and Soldier walking towards the tree-line and Sniper, Medic and Pyro proceeding into the vast field of grass, weapons on hand as they ventured forth. The remaining RED members, Heavy, Engineer and Spy, went straight to work digging out and repairing their only means of transport.

"Well Engineer? What is ze verdict?"

An hour had passed, and thanks to Heavy's efforts, the truck was uprooted, and Engineer had started on the repairs.

The other Mercs returned from their expeditions, none of them finding any notable landmarks or towns. Though they all successfully retrieved everything necessary to set up their camp. Soldier, Scout and Demoman had collected the firewood, although at the cost of the entire forest being blown up, curtesy by one drunken Scotsman. Medic, Sniper and Pyro brought back three deer and several rabbits, with only half of the field being engulfed in flames.

One might find their venture disastrous for the surrounding environment, but to the REDs, it was just 'minimal' collateral damage.

Demo was busy cooking the stags and hares on the fire, surrounded by the other Mercs while Spy, Sniper, Engineer and Scout were grouped around the hood of the truck. Engineer stroked his chin as he looked under the hood. "Well, it ain't totalled if that's what y'all are wondering".

"Baldy, this thing is on the verge of totalled" Scout butted in. "Look pals', the crankshaft is warped, the sparkplug leads are hanging on by a thread and the fan belt is snapped, but I replaced that with my belt!" His sentence finished with his pants falling to the ground right in front of the group.

Turning away from the embarrassing display, Engineer reached in the hood and pried off a dented cylinder. He gave it a look over and turned back to his team, "besides all that, the gas cylinders are a lil' bit dented, but a quick buff or two should fix it". Engineer glanced at the rest of the engine, "the rest though… I might be able to whip some things back into shape. Ain't gonna run like it used to though".

"Yeah, it ain't. I'm guessin' it got at least two an' a half miles before it goes ass-up" Scout chimed in while trying to keep his pants up.

Spy digested the information with a hum and gave a small nod to Engineer and Scout. "Alright, I'll inform ze ozers. Sniper is there anywhere you suggest we should go?".

Sniper looked up from his compass and pointed to the river beside them. "We follow the river downstream. We might run into a town or something" Sniper responded before he looked back down at his compass, looking perplexed.

"Somezing wrong?" Spy stepped closer to Sniper.

Sniper nodded and showed his compass, "Look".

Spy was handed the compass and with a quick glance found nothing wrong with it. It looked like an ordinary compass. Sniper must have seen Spy's look of confusion as he moved forward and tapped on the glass, just above the North symbol "North is that way, right?".

"Yes".

"Now, where's the damn sun rising from".

Spy looked left towards the rising sun and then looked back at the compass. He repeated this several times then it clicked; the sun was rising from the west, not the east. "What ze hell?"

Sniper snatched the compass back from Spy and continued to look at it, puzzled. "I know mate. Either goin' through that telie' broke my compass or we're far away from home"

Spy recoiled at Sniper's statement, giving the sharp-shooter a confused look. "What do you mean by zat last part?"

Sniper gave a careless shrug in response. "I don't know mate. But think about it; we've literally been to hell and we've been on an asteroid too, so being stranded in a place where the sun rises from the west isn't too far fetched"

Spy rubbed his temples, "Great, just great. First Engineer's teleporter, then being stranded here and now zer is a possibility zat…. we're on anozer world" Spy mumbled with distaste, partly because of how ridiculous he sounded.

Spy turned away from Sniper and paced around the camp, digesting the information and planning accordingly. As he did, he prayed that the compass incident was the last of the surprises for today.

While Spy and Sniper were talking, Engineer waved to the rest of the REDs over by the fire. "HEY! Pyro! I need you to come here and help us" Engineer received an annoyed grumble as an affirmative.

As he waited for Pyro, Engineer conversed with Scout. "Ya' know boy? I never knew you could work around a car"

Scout hummed in amusement as he worked on tightening a screw. "Yeah, one of my older brothers ran a chop-shop. You know, the ones where he screws someone over, takes the car, breaks it down and the lot?"

"Yeah boy, I know the ones"

"Anyway, my brother would drag me around his joint, showing me the ropes and stuff. He did it with all my brothers and sisters." Scout looked off into the distance, reminiscing over a pleasant memory. "Heh, I didn't know if he wanted to bond with us or if he wanted one of us to inherit the place if something happened to him"

Seeing a distant and sad expression on Scout's face, Engineer wondered if he should press further. Before he could bite the bullet and satisfy his curiosity, Pyro arrived with a chirped hum.

"Oh! Pyro, just the man I need. Hit these cylinders back into shape" Engineer asked as he threw a heavily dented cylinder to Pyro.

Pyro caught the cylinder and nodded. He placed the cylinder on the ground and readied to hit it with a… dilapidated hoe in his hands. Engineer went back to hitting the cylinder back in place, but it wasn't long until he stopped and stared in confusion at the object in Pyro's hand. "Pyro? Where in the hell did you get that?"

Indeed, Pyro was holding a hoe, rusted and covered with a thin layer of dirt and moss. Last time he checked, Pyro never wielded hoes nor were there any in the RED's base garage. Pyro tapped on the hoe in question, a few muffled words came out as he looked at it.

"Yeah, yeah I know it's a hoe Pyro. I asked you where you found it" Engineer pressed further.

Pyro responded with yet more muffled responses while gesturing to the hills across the river.

"WHAT IN THE?! AND YOU DIDN'T TELL US!"

Engineer's sudden yelling caught everyone by surprise, so much so that they all leapt off their seats and rushed towards the truck and Engineer. "Bloody Nora! What the hell's goin' on here?!" Sniper demanded as everyone else arrived behind him.

Engineer looked at Pyro with a gobbed-smacked expression before turning to the assembled group. "Pyro just said there was a farm beyond them hills over there"

"WHAT?!"

The REDs stared in shock towards the hills past the river. To think that civilisation was just a few kilometres away and Pyro didn't tell them.

"Flame-head! Why the hell didn't you tell us?" Scout demanded.

"We've been bloody shitn' an' prancing about in the woods here for an hour now, an' you decided to bloody tell us NOW, THAT THERE WERE PEOPLE OVER THOSE BLOODY HILLS!" Demo growled as he jabbed a finger into Pyro's chest.

Before Pyro could answer, Medic arrived between them. "Stop grilling him Idioten! We need to go over there now!" Medic then sprinted off towards the hills while yelling to the group "Come on Kameraden! We can get some help!"

The Mercs quickly chased after Medic. Reaching him first, Scout couldn't help but laugh as he and Medic skipped across a series of rocks in the river to reach the other side. "Goddammit Medic. You might want to slow down a bit! I don't think tonnes-of-fun can keep up!".

Medic hummed in amusement. Yes, his favourite test subject was lagging behind, screaming 'Slow down babies' as he tried to catch up. After a few minutes of running across a barren field, the Mercs scaled to the top of the hill. True to Pyro's word, there was a farm just below the hill and the Mercs could see a barn, a house and stables, but the place looked abandoned and rundown. Half of the barn was gone, the house had overgrown vegetation along its walls, the wooden pillars on the stables were suffering from wood-rot and a majority of the wooden fence surrounding the property had fallen apart and was coated in moss and weeds.

Disappointment weighed heavily on the mercenary group. They were hoping to find someone who could at least tell them where they were, where the nearest town or city is and if they have any spare parts they could use for their truck. Alas, it was not meant to be. The Mercs voiced their displeasure through curses and head shakes. Heavy was more upset than the rest of the group, mainly because he ran all this way for nothing.

Soldier hummed in thought, stroking his chin and looking over at the small farm. "Well men, after looking over this place, I say it seems abandoned" Soldier gave his report.

Half of the team rolled their eyes. "Zhank you Captain Obvious" Spy responded.

Soldier looked at the masked Merc with searing hatred. "Don't you dare call me that turncoat's name ever again" he growled.

Spy nervously nodded, tugging at his collar to alleviate some mental stress. Beside him, Scout lightly hit Pyro's shoulder. "Yo Pyro, why the hell didn't you tell us this place was abandoned?"

Pyro defended himself with a series of panicked hums and grunts which caused Scout to roll his eyes. "Right-right, because we didn't ask" Scout shrugged Pyro's excuse off and turned to the rest of the group.

"So fellas! What now?"

Demo was the first to respond by angling his head down toward the farm. "Aye, I think we should look around. See what we can find"

The group agreed to the drunkard and trekked down towards the farm. They reached the base of the hill and hit a dirt road. Patches of weeds littered the road and the surrounding grass crept further and further towards the centre; a clear sign that this road had been unused for a long time. 'Well, at least we found a road' Engineer thought with relief that they had a sense of direction.

As the RED Team walked through the front gate of the farm, Medic looked around in confusion, "Zhere are zhe power lines?"

Intrigued by Medic's statement, the others also looked around and noticed there were no powerlines nor phone lines. "Somethin' ain't right" Sniper spat out with a grumble.

"You're tellin' me" Engineer responded.

It's 1970 after all and every single house across the world has access to power via powerlines. The exception being Australia, where they have mastered the art of channelling powerlines underground.

The lack of powerlines lingered on their minds as they continued to walk through the property. When they arrived at a broken entrance gate surrounding the main house, they were greeted with a point of interest; a wagon with a broken wheel laying just before the gate, full to the brim with ruined clothes and other household items. "Alright. Medic and Demo, you two go check out ze stables. Scout and Soldier, check ze barn. Engineer, Pyro and Sniper, search zat wagon. Heavy, you and I are going to search ze house" Spy organised the group.

Without any objection, Spy set off towards the ruined house with Heavy in tow. The rest of the group splintered off into their designated groups and headed towards their objective. "If you find anyzing interesting, come get us" Spy yelled to the group.

His team gave their affirmatives and moved on to search the farm's buildings.

The farmhouse was a one-storey built of thick wood and stone bricks which were stacked at the corners to give the house much needed support. Vegetation grew rampant, weeds and ivy crawled through the rotten gaps in the wooden walls and through the broken windows. The place looked to be on the verge of collapse. That is why Heavy and Spy were treading lightly as they stepped onto the porch. Walking across the creaking porch, Heavy passed several bits of broken outdoor furniture and came across a sign nailed to the wall beside the front door. He yanked it off the wall and examined it. "What is it Heavy?" Spy questioned as he peered over Heavy's shoulder.

Heavy responded with a shrug, the wooden sign was engraved in what seemed to be a form of Chinese or Japanese. Heavy gave the sign to Spy, who read the engraving while stroking his chin and humming. "It seems to be katakana. Asian characters. But zey're-" Spy flipped the sign "-Upside down?" Spy was puzzled, why would someone post a sign upside-down? The image of Soldier, Scout and Demoman flashed in his mind.

"What does weird sign say?" Heavy asked, bringing Spy out of his thoughts.

"It reads 'Frost-Borrow Farms'"

"No address?"

"No"

Spy dropped the sign on the ground and turned towards the front door. Both he and Heavy opened the broken and rotten door, its creaky cries echoed through the ghost-house before a loud snap silenced it. The door had decayed to the point where simply moving it caused it to break off its hinges and slammed into the floor, starting a disastrous domino effect.

The door smashed through the wooden flooring with relative ease. The remaining wooden floor around the crater splintered and broke, along with the support beams underneath. The rest of the flooring broke as well, spreading through the house. Without the flooring, the walls and wooden pillars that held the roof of the house joined the flooring as rubble. Finally, the roof shattered into pieces before collapsing atop of everything. A thick fog of dust, dirt and smog kicked up and hung over the air for several minutes. Both Spy and Heavy, who were standing mere millimetres from the crash, were engulfed by the thick cloud. They entered coughing fits and tried their best to shake away the foul air. By the time the dust settled, the house was completely wreaked. All that remained was the porch that the two Mercs were standing on.

"Everything alright out there!" the voice of Demo called out to the two.

"Yes, Heavy and Spy are all good. Just house falling!" Heavy shouted back

"Ok laddies!"

Demo retreated back into the stables, leaving Heavy and Spy to stand before the wrecked house. Spy grumbled and shook his head disappointment. "Well, some much for searching the house" Spy mumbled before turning around.

"Come on Heavy, let us help with ze wagon"

Heavy followed closely behind, but not before picking up the sign Spy had dropped earlier.

"Dear mother of God/Holy Crap!" both Soldier and Scout shouted at the sight that greeted them.

They had just entered the barn's front doors and already they found something noteworthy. The entire back section of the barn was destroyed. From the roof to the rafters and wooden beams, all of it was wrecked and scattered all over the barn floors, leaving it open to the elements. "How the fuck did we miss this from outside?" Soldier dumbfoundingly asked, taken back by the carnage.

"I guess we couldn't see it from the front" Soldier correctly guessed.

It looked like the whole exposed barn had been hit with several of his rockets and several of Demoman's special 'Boom Shakalaka' bombs. Scout and Soldier continued to search around the barn, coming across several gardening tools like pitch-folks and shovels but found nothing of true value to the group.

Crash!

Their search was interrupted by a loud crash from outside. They ran through the exposed barn and outside to see a giant cloud of dust and soot from where the house was. Once the dust settled, Scout and Soldier could see the figures of Heavy and Spy standing on the porch, stunned at the wreckage in front of them. "Everything alright out there!?" Scout and Soldier saw Demo came out of the stables to investigate the noise.

"Yes, Heavy and Spy are all good. Just house falling!" Heavy shouted back.

"Ok laddies!"

"Everything all good?" Medic, who appeared from the stables, asked Demo.

"Aye. Just the house falling"

"Ooh, that's good. I thought they were in actual danger" Medic hummed in amusement.

"Yo! Medic! Demo! Did you find anything?" Scout yelled at the duo.

"We found nothin' mate. Just empty pens and dry horse shite'" Demo answered.

"You two on ze ozer hand…" Medic's eyes slowly loomed over the ruined half of the barn.

"Yeah, looked like somethin' 'really' bad happened. Maybe somethin' blew up?" Scout racked his brain for any possibilities.

"Aye, somethin' didn't blow up" Demo "It's more like somethin'…crashed through it"

"Crashed through it? Demo, you an't sober, are you?" Scout asked with mild scepticism at Demo's claims.

Drunk Demo is incoherent enough, but Sober Demo is truly intelligible. Sober Demo is like someone who is drunk should act like. Spouting jumbled words and doing regrettable actions. Scout still had the nightmares about Sober Demo's plans to stop his liver from leaving him, involving several cases of Skrumpey, bleach and two baboons. Scout actually felt sorry for those carnivorous creatures.

Demo, hearing Scout question his logic, looked at Scout with a fit of fiery anger in his eye. "Aye! I know my explosions laddie! And when I say no explosion did that, I mean no explosion did that!" Demo yelled right at Scout's face.

Demo roughly shoved Scout towards the old wreckage of the barn. "Look down there laddie? See any soot, ash or any'ting that might ov' caused an explosion? No? What about any gas tanks or pipes? No?! THEN THERE WEREN'T ANY!" Seeing Scout's clear panic and confusion, Demo elaborated. "An explosion from the inside would've flung the wood 'outside' of the barn, not collapse it 'inside'. Not to mention the fires that would've turned the barn into ashes"

"Da, he's right. Ze real question is…what caused it?" Medic hung the question in the air, hoping that someone or something would answer it.

"Men, I found the answer" Soldier pointed to the ground by the other side of the barn, the sight of which caused the other three Mercs to gasp in surprise.

Meanwhile, the three other Mercs positioned at the wagon were searching through the weather-torn wagon, rummaging through the chest of clothes, household items and rotten food. Pyro giggled as he pressed a light yellow sundress with flower patterns sown onto its helm against his figure. So far, their search hadn't turned up anything interesting, other than a book Engineer found with a bunch of children clothes. "That's nice Pyro but we need help sortin' through this stuff" Engineer demanded Pyro, who in turn huffed and crossed his arms, also trying to do a mocking imitation of Engineer in spite.

"Yeah well suck it up, mate. I don't want to do this stuff either but everyone else wants to know why this shit-hole is abandoned" Sniper too grumbled in disdain as he moved on to the next chest.

It was around about this time when Spy and Heavy made it to the wagon after the house had fallen. Spy walked up to the trio while Heavy stood back. "You lot seem to have found some interesting stuff" Spy sarcastically gabbed at the three Mercs at the piles of clothes before them.

Engineer stood up and faced the Spy. "Heh, yeah. Only if you find clothes and jewellery interestin'" Engineer sarcasticly jested, "but hey, at least we didn't crash the wagon into a million pieces tryin' to search for things" Engineer replied with an equally sarcastic tone.

Spy, however, didn't find the quip amusing, instead, he responded with a scowl. He took out a cigarette harshly out of his cigarette case and put it in his mouth. "Did you find anyzing of actual importance?"

"We did find this" Engineer showed a book to Spy. "But it's all written in some garble'. Whoever wrote this must've had a few screws loose to make up their own crazy language".

Spy took the book from Engineer's hands and traced his hand over the hard leather cover. It was old, the leather was sun-bleached, torn and flaking in a few places. He carefully opened the book, and to his surprise, was filled with the same upside-down katakana text. 'Ok, zis is getting weird'.

He flipped the book around, much to the other Mercs' confusion, and skimmed through a few pages and read through them. "Zis is a journal. A little girls diary" Spy told this group.

"Wait. You can read that crap?" Engineer asked bewilderly, surprised by Spy discovery.

"Yes. It's upside-down katakana, Japanese syllabary" Spy informed the Mercs.

"We saw the same words on a sign nailed to the front of the house" Heavy showed the rest of the group the sign in his hands.

Engineer gulped nervously, not happy about discovering another bizarre thing. Ever since they arrived, all the Mercs had a growing suspicion that something was wrong about this place. Engineer chalked it up as the effects of the Australium Teleporter. However, there were just too many things out of the ordinary to be the case. First was his Global Teleporter being offline, second the sun rising from the West, and now the third was a bizarre language, that was actually an upside-down version of an existing one, that was being used by this farm. Engineer had a growing suspicion that the Teleport might have sent them somewhere far-far away.

Spy continued to search through the book, occasionally letting out a hum of amusement on a page or two. "' Heh', ze little girl is Kat Frost. She goes to school at ze town of Windshelm. She has over several crushes and hates how her little brozer's cries…" Spy flipped through a few more pages. "It seems each chapter is from a different month or year" he flipped through some more, only to stop midway through a page.

His eyes immediately widened, and the cigarette almost fell out of his open mouth. He re-read it again, then quickly moved forward several more pages before jumping back to the page he was stunned on. He scowled as the pages before them, as if he was trying to turn the book into flames with the power of his mind. Slowly though, his scowl turned into one of puzzlement. "I found a date" Spy simply announced, though his tone showed he wasn't so sure about it.

Questionable muffles came from Pyro, obviously asking what the date was. "The date from this page is March ze sevenz, eight-hundred and zirty-five" Spy responded grimly.

All of the Mercs stared at Spy with dumbfounded expressions. "Wait Mate! Eight-hundred and thirty-five?! That ain't true, right? It ain't spelt wrong?" Sniper sceptically asked Spy.

Spy showed the group a line of intelligible text atop the page. He did the same over and over again on the new pages, the Mercs noticing how each new line of writing was less sloppy and became sharper and clearer. "Each page afterwards references a date, all of zem referencing ze same months we use but a different year" Spy clarified.

Engineer interrupted Spy with a laugh, "' Ha-ha', So? That lil' girly must've been six or eight-years-old. You lot know how youngers are like at that age. They can barely count past one-hundred"

"Mmh' funny zat. Because in a few pages before, she had her eighth birth on the year eight hundred and thirty-eight. Given zat ze last page says-" Spy flipped towards the last written page and read out the date "-Eight-hundred and forty-five, it is safe to say zat she's at least fifz-teen. A suitable age to know what date it is, no?" Spy rebuttal Engineer's claims.

"So? We might have happened to stumble upon a family of nut-jobs living in the nowhere"

"But in ze dairy, zere is a town nearby zat the family visits frequently! Friends and extended family as well!"

"BUT WHAT IF THEY-"

"SHUT UP YOU BLOODY TOSSERS!" Sniper interrupted the ensuing verbal fight between the two.

After his outburst, Sniper let out an exhausted breath and rubbed his templates. "Say it IS the year eight-hundred and whatever, wouldn't the people around here be banging rocks together and trying to discover fire, not building wooden houses and working on sophisticated agriculture?"

For the umpteenth time today, a question was asked with no one to answer it. It was driving the Merceries mad.

"Everyone!"

The Mercs by the wagon turned towards the barn across the driveway, where the rest of their team were venturing beyond the fence line that ran beside the barn. Medic was waving at them from said fence line. "We found somezing! Come quick!"

The five Mercs abandoned the wagon and started to walk towards the rest of the group. All but Engineer, who stood still and stared at the nearby Well in question. Sniper noticed this, stopping in his tracks and joined the Engineer. "What'cha' starin' at mate?" Sniper asked.

Instead of responding, Engineer moved forward towards the Well. Sniper followed closely behind. When the two arrived, Engineer started to investigate. He traced his hands around the wood-rotten supports that held the small, broken roof above the Well. "An old fashioned Well" he stated to himself.

Engineer found that the lift of the Well and its bucket were gone, broken off from the supports. Curiously, he stared down into the black, murky abyss of the Well, smelling the moist and foul air that escaped it. Fishing around his belt, Engineer managed to find a flashlight among his tools. He switched it on and pointed it down the Well. The two mournfully gasped at the sight before them; they found the farm owners.

Four sets of human skeletons floating lazily in the murky waters below, a bucket, several metres of rope and withered clothes, much like the ones they had found in the wagon, were floating alongside the bones. While Engineer hadn't seen a lot of human skeletons in his life, he knew that three of those skulls were considerably smaller than an average adult head. 'Damn' Engineer thought, disturb a small bit by the scene before him.

"Hmm, the rope must've snapped when one of them tried to climb out. They starved to death" Sniper grimly concluded.

Of all the painful ways to die, starvation is the worse. It's a feeling akin to knives being stabbed into your stomach over and over again, the agony of not being able to move and the helpless situation as you lay there waiting for death.

Turning off his flashlight, Engineer gave a polite nod to the Well and whispered a prayer. "I pray to Christ al' mighty that he'll take care of yal'"

Sniper did the same, take his hat off, placing it against his chest and bowing his head.

They were all cutthroat mercenaries that would happily kill for money, but they all weren't soulless bastards that disrespect tortured souls. Well, some of them were at least…

The two of them walked away from the Well and towards their remaining group. Engineer and Sniper conversed about their recent findings. "Ok, we found the farm's owners but why did they all go down that Well? Why the hell were they in a rush to get out of here?"

"Why the bloody hell were they using a wagon?"

Engineer gave him a shrug of his shoulders. "Don't know. This might be an Amish farm or something"

"Last time I checked mate, the Amish used English and German to communicate. Not bloody upside-down Japanese"

Sniper had a good point, even Engineer didn't have an answer to that. "More importantly though, why hadn't anyone else besides us found them yet?"

It was obvious that there had to be at least some form of town or settlement somewhere. The farm seemed to be growing wheat crops, the same ones Pyro had burnt down, but they were wildly untamed and hadn't had a harvest in some time. There weren't any animal pens beside the stables. So, the family had to be getting their food and supplies at some town or another farm. Not to mention from what Spy read to them, the girl who owned the journal had friends in the nearby town, so one of them had to question why they weren't around and came to investigate. The question is why hadn't someone else found the place yet. "Maybe the whole area is abandoned? They had their wagon all setup to leave so there must have been a large evacuation. That just leaves the god-damn question of what they were running from?"

"Whatever they were running from must've chased them into the Well it seems"

"That still doesn't answer what they were running from" Sniper frustratingly grumbled.

"It could've been robbers, wild animals, an invading army or a storm. Heck, it could've been an invading army of robbers and wild animals in a storm for all I care"

"Still doesn't answer it"

"Ah! To Hell with it! The more we find out about this godforsaken place; the more questions keep comin'" Engineer complained, throwing his hands up in the air to emphasize his frustration.

The two stepped over a part of the broken fence and were close to the rest of their group. Engineer was too distracted thinking about his and Sniper's recent conversation that he didn't notice the ditch in the ground. He tripped over and landed face-first into the ground with a loud thud. Sniper quickly kneeled and helped Engie off the ground. "Com'on mate! Up a' get! Ya' good?" Sniper asked as he dusted the dirt and grim off Engineer.

"Gah! Thanks partner, I tripped over that-"

Engineer's voice died in his throat as he reeled back in surprise. Sniper glanced down to where Engineer was staring flabbergasted and he too almost jumped back in shock. It seemed Engineer didn't fall over any old ditch, instead, it was-

"A giant footprint?"

Both men stared in astonished awe at the sheer size of the massive footprint. It had to be least one-and-half metres in width, three metres in length and fifty centimetres deep. "Bloody Nora, how the fuck did we miss that?" Sniper questioned.

"Fächer! I see you found the footprints!" Medic waved at the two and signalled them to come to him and the rest of the REDs.

The two men ran towards them, wanting to find any answers Medic might have about the footprints. A pit formed within Sniper's gut, one filled with dread and fear about said answers. "I have a feeling we're about to figure out why the folks were in the Well" he mumbled out as the two arrived.

The group had surrounded something embedded a few centimetres in the ground. Soldier and Pyro both were digging around it, uplifting it from its resting place. Upon closer inspection, Sniper and Engineer found it to be skeleton dressed in male farmer clothes; messing everything from its stomach downwards.

With the skeleton was unearthed, Medic started to examine it.

"So, this is where you found the hoe Pyro?" Spy asked Pyro.

Pyro answered with a nod and a tap on the skeleton's skull. Spy took a drag from the cigarette in his mouth and exhaled on the skeleton. "Anything interesting in the Well?" Spy questioned Sniper and Engineer.

"Yeah, four other skeletons. One adult and three children" Sniper answered with an emotionless tone.

Everyone downcast their eyes and shifted on the spot at the grim news. "Zis is interesting" while Medic on the other hand practically gleamed with excitement.

"A family who communicated with a bizarre language had been dead for a while, trying to escape from something that ultimately leads to their deaths" Medic kneed beside the Spy and started examining the skeleton before them.

Scout paled as he looked behind him. "It an't got somethin' to do with the footprints, right?"

Medic didn't respond, instead, he moved the skeleton around. Lightly touching his cracked ribs and snapped spine. Heavy peered over his shoulder and looked over the skeleton. He lingered on the missing half, "…So, little baby farmer was cut it half" he gruffly concluded.

"No, zat's ze zing, he wasn't cut in half" All eyes were on Medic as he studied the body. "Well, he wasn't exactly cut in half. Crushed would be more accurate. See ze bone fragments" Medic pointed to the broken and crumbled remains of the rib-cage. "A blade, assuming it zere as sharp as an operating scalpel, wouldn't have had zis much breakage of ze bone. Something blunt, like a hammer or a crusher, would've done ze trick" Medic let out a court giggle which he muffled with his hand "Hmm! I bet he died a painful death!" Medic laughed in amusement.

Medic quickly jumped upwards, startling the REDs by his quick actions. He then started to pace back and forth in front of the REDs. "Let's see. He was crushed in half, died a painful death, was working when ze incident occurred unh/or was protecting his family from whatever was attacking zem" Medic continued to walk back and forth, dripping mumbles and the occasional German.

This continued for several minutes before his walking came to complete halt, as did his stream of nonsense, with a sharp inhale. Slowly, the inquisitive demeanour from before disappeared as fear and terror settled in. It unnerved everyone seeing Medic scared. A noticeable gulp came from Medic, his face now pale as a ghost, and with a dry throat spoke his final verdict. "I…...believe- given the evidence-…. that-" Medic slowly turned towards the ruined homestead, most notably the barn.

All the Mercs looked back towards the barn, all of them wide-eyed and sweating, noticing the giant foot-prints from before. Their throats went dry and their eyes widen as they followed the tracks, which lead straight to where they were standing. Everyone looked towards each other with dread. "- He was eaten" Medic mournfully concluded.

It wasn't normal for the RED Team or anyone employed under Team Fortress to be frightened. They faced death daily, avoiding rockets and gunfire all while capturing a control point, stealing intelligence or pushing a bomb rigged to blow at any minute. They have hardened to the core thanks to their past, and the ridicules contracts and missions the Administrator and Miss Pauling set for them. The only thing that any of them feared was Pyro. Even Pyro feared Pyro.

Yet now, trapped in unknown territory with no way home, stranded with a broken truck as their only means of transportation, limited food and ammunition, and now they figured out there is a giant in the area that has a hankering for human flesh; it's safe to say that they were a little scared. All but one of them that is.

"Com'on you pansies! What are you lot? Girl-scouts!" Soldier yelled at the group. "Afraid of a little giant gonna come and bite your balls off! Oh! Don't worry. By the way you're all cowering right now, I don't think it you've got any balls!" Soldier pointed to himself. "If that giant shows it's cowardly behind, rest assured that I'll blow its brains out, steal its golden goose and make sure that goose craps as may golden eggs as possible on that giant's corpse!" with that, Soldier stormed off back towards the hill they came over. "Now! If you will excuse me, I am going to get my weapon just to do that!"

As Soldier stormed off back to their camp, the rest of the Mercs stood there stunned at the recent devolvement and how vulgar Soldier described his method to kill the giant. Pyro was the first one to come out of the collective stun, which he then lightly tapped Heavy on the shoulder to ask him a question with a series of nervous muffles.

Heavy replied back with a gruff. "I do not think it is still here, but I do not want to hang around to find out if it is"

"He is right. We need to get out of here as fast as we can" Medic proclaimed in panic.

"First things first. We're completely defenceless out here" Sniper started to explain, "We've currently set up camp in the middle of a field, exposed from all sides" Sniper looked towards the Engineer and Demoman, "We can't move so we need to bunker down and build some defences".

"Aye, me and the Toymaker will place som' defences" Demo gave an evil grin the group as he fished through his belt, "Nothing beats a one crossed wire, one wayward pinch of potassium chlorate, one-"

"Save the lecture for the giant please!" Spy demined, realising how ridiculous it sounded when it came out

"I'll keep workin' on the truck" Scout volunteered himself for the task.

"Right, everyone else. Grab your weapons and get ready to face some BIG mean mother-hubber" With the conclusion of Engineer's orders, the RED Team rushed forward towards their camp.

The RED Team had successfully scaled atop the hill, making sure no one was too far behind and were about to make their descent to their camp. They were just at the foot of the hill and were about to make the final stretch before Demoman fell and held his head in pain. "AAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! MY HEAD! STOP IT!" Demo screamed his lungs out as he fell to the ground.

The rest of the RED Team were both confused and terrified at the state Demo just entered in. He was thrusting about, kicking his legs and digging his fingers into his face. Luckily for Demo, Pyro leapt at him and pried his fingers away from his face. "AAAAAAAAAAARHHHHHHHHH! STOP IT! LIVER! I'm SORRY! I WON"T DRINK WATER AGAIN! AAAAARRRRRRRRRRRHHHHHHHHHH!" Demo cried out as he continued to spasm.

The other Mercs rushed to join Pyro in subduing Demo but were blocked by Medic who held his arms out. "STOP ya' Idioten! He's having a seizure! Leave him! Pyro get off of him! He's-" Medic's words fell flat at the sight of Demo's face.

Through Demo's eye was sealed shut by the searing agony coursing through him, Medic and the others could see a bright green glow behind his eyepatch and small flicks of fire escaping through it. "was zum Teufel…" Medic whispered in awe and fear.

There is clearly something supernatural afoot. Seeing this was far out of his medical expertise, Medic carefully walked back as Demo continued to thrush about. "Zis is no seizure…".

"MERACMUS!" Demo screamed out the accursed magician's name out of pained rage. "YOU BLEDIN' MAGICIAN! STOP USIN' YA' BLOODY CURSED MAGIC AND FACE ME!"

Demo thrashed about, until he froze on the ground, his hands digging in the ground and feet firmly planted. "No…Dis'…isn't…".

Demo, fighting through the searing pain, saw something through the green flames of his eye; even though it was closed. Nestled inside the magical fire was a small ball of crackling golden and sky-blue lightning, active and swirling with energy. Demo wanted to let loose a chorus of curses as he thought it was the Australium Teleporter come to hunt him. He held his tongue, however, as the ball grew in size and intensity. The light the ball brought had illuminated other smaller dots of lights around it. Soon the entirety of Demo's fiery vision was filled with little lights surrounding the massive ball of energy, like the sun on a starry background. He was briefly taken away by the sight of it all before the massive ball exploded.

Arcs of its electric arms stretched far and wide across Demo's vision. The arcs bounced off of every little dot before colliding back into itself. Through the arcs came forth crimson blood. Demo watched in wonder and terror as the lightning turned blood twisted into itself before forming a person before his very eyes. Bones, nerves and muscles all knitted together to create a person, but it wasn't human. It looked like a woman, with its blonde hair and feminine features but it didn't have skin, leaving its lean muscles and cartilages exposed to the elements. Its hands didn't even have any muscles to speak of, just bone. It looked…horrorifing.

Demo watched in stunned horror as the thing that was just born in front of his eye start to move. What terrorised him, even more, was when its blues eyes opened. It's icy cold eyes then stared directly at him, right into his one good eye and deep into his soul, before its body too exploded in a violent flash of light, blinding Demo.

The Mercs standing before Demo too witness something supernatural. They were taken aback by the sky suddenly darkening and a golden flash of lightning strike somewhere in the distance over the hills. "Bloody Nora!" Sniper voiced everyone's surprise, watching at the lightning stayed in view.

The lightning continued to violently shake and pelt the ground beneath it for a few seconds before it finally disappeared, the natural sunlight returning to the world. As quick as the lightning struck, so did Demo's pain fade away. Slowly and sluggishly, Demoman rose from the ground; still shaken by the agony he just endured mere seconds ago. Medic was quick to press him back into sitting down. "Easy zere Demo. Take it easy".

Demo weakly slapped Medic's hand away and grumbled, "I'm fine Doc'. It's just…" Demo gazed downwards and seemed to be lost in thought.

While Medic tended to a tired Demo, the rest of the group were speculating over the supernatural event that they just witness. Some of them like Spy, Sniper and Heavy simmered in silence, racking their brains for any answers but turning up with none. More vocal Mercs like Scout, Pyro and Engineer, spoke their thoughts aloud. "Holy freakin' Hell! Did you guys see that shit?!" Scout pointed in the direction where the bolt had struck, while he leapt up and down.

"Yeah boy. Darn" Engineer was speechless at the event that just happened.

"What was that?" Heavy questioned, his eyes lingering off at the distance.

Pyro responded with a cluelessness hum.

"Magic" Everyone turned to Demo as he continued, "It had ta' be…. Or som'thin' powerful. Oh…boy', me head felt like I drunk some bottom-shelf shite" Demo held his head in his hands, trying his best to drown out the headache that was forming.

"Rest Demo, zere is nozing to worry about. Everzing is-"

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

Silence fell over the Mercs' world. The wind had died and the sounds coming from the animals had vanished. All the Mercs could hear was their rising heartbeats and panicked breaths. Resuming all motor functions, the group searched frantically around the place for the source of the roar. From their place atop the hill, Engineer, Sniper and Heavy scanned over the endless plains and hills. Where ever that roar came from, it originated beyond a large forest several kilometres up North. The same place where the gold strike of lightning had struck. "What the Hell was that!?" Scout shouted in shock and fear.

"I, unfortunately, zink that was the…giant" Spy fearfully declare, still wanting to believe that the giant didn't exist.

Surprisingly, Heavy, the least likely person to counsel the group, took control of the situation and yelled at the REDs. "BABIES! Don't panic! It is very far away"

"Very far away me arse Gravy-Train! It sounded like it was right bloody next ta' me!" Demo, his sluggishness fading away, argued with Heavy.

"Do not panic" Heavy advised, "It is far away but that does not mean it can come over here soon! We need to hurry with repairs, so we can leave" Heavy explained. "Engineer, leave Sentry! You fix the truck! Everyone else, get weapons from the truck and get ready to kill Giant!"

Following Heavy's orders, the entire RED Team, minus Solider who was already at the truck and equipped with his weapons, rushed towards their encampment. Medic and Demo were far behind the group, as Demo was still struggling to stand.

Scout had skipped across the river with careful grace, landing gracefully on the shore, and was the first one to reach into their camp. By the time he had arrived at the truck, the other RED Mercs were only just beginning to cross the river.

Scout leapt into the trailer, running pass Solider and picking his weapons on the ground. He strapped the Sandman, a wooden bat with a logo reading "The Sandman" engraved on the side, to his pants, pocketed a Bonk! Atomic Punch energy drink, "Cherry Fission" flavour, and his main weapon, The Force-A-Nature, a sawn-off hunting shotgun.

After checking his weapons and loading his gun, he leapt out of the trailer and stood beside Soldier. Soldier was resting on his rocket launcher and searching for the Giant in the distance. "Oie! Soldier! You ready!?" Scout asked, a mix of excitement and fear echoing from his voice.

Soldier gave a wicked grin to Scout and gave a loud laugh. "HA! Ready to blast that Giant's ass back up the beanstalk!" Soldier brought his rocket launcher to bear and, with Scout in tow, rushed towards a rock outcropping, perfect defensive cover.

"You know, I've never killed a giant before" Scout chuckled out, trying his best to quell the growing fear within him.

"There's a first time for everything son"

By this time, the rest of the REDs had crossed the river and were approaching the truck.

Boom

"Holy crap!" Scout leapt from the spot the vibration that shot through him.

Every RED Member froze on the spot, entirely confused about what they felt.

Boom

Another shock rocked them on the spot. Everyone on the RED Team paled as they glanced at what was left of the forest Demoman and Soldier blew up prior to setting up their camp.

Boom

Further within the remaining group of trees, sounds of branches snapping and trees falling echoed through them. They saw the tops of some trees shake violently before sinking within the massive foliage. Panic and fear shot through them. "Oh bloody Hell! It's behind us!" Demo screamed, and with Medic's help, quicken their pace towards their camp to get their weapons.

'How ze hell is it behind us!' Spy fearfully thought the roar of the Giant came from the North, not the South.

The group resumed sprinting towards the truck. Once they arrived, they began to load their weapons. Pyro bought his Phlogistinator to bare, strapped his Thermal Thruster onto his back and blasted out of the trailer and into the air.

Pyro hovered within the air, scanning the remaining forest in search for the giant. Once he found evidence of the giant, he let out a yelp in horror as the giant was only a few metres away from them, knocking over trees and stomping its way to the group. Below Pyro, Heavy picked up his minigun as he rushed past Demo, who was struggling to load grenades into his Iron Bomber. Spy, already having his weapons on him, waited for his team besides Engineer, who was quickly shifting through tools and equipment to repair the truck. Sniper rushed out of the trailer and bolted into the nearby field, hoping to put as much distance between him and the giant, loading his rifle as he did.

The Mercs ready for combat, all of them rushing to face the vibrations. The ground shook and quivered in a steady rhythm, the same one that could be associated with something walking.

Boom

…

…

Boom

…

…

Boom

…

…

Boom

"MEN! Spread out! Find cover and prepare to fire!" Soldier ordered this group.

They did as he said, seeing it the most sensible thing to do at the moment. Heavy, Scout, Pyro and Soldier took to the fields while the Engineer stayed by the truck to quickly work on repairs- and just encase, set-up a Sentry and Dispenser. Medic, Spy and Demo stayed close to the truck with Medic quickly setting his Medigun on Demo, wanting to give him a quick healing boost before the battle, meanwhile, the Spy was crouching beside the truck with his iron-sights aimed at the distant rumbling. He doubted that his revolver could do any harm to the Giant. Further away, breach upon a lone tree in the middle of a field was Sniper, scoping in on the battlefield.

By the time their setup was complete, the trees line split opened. Broken foliage and splintered wood exploded out from the fallen trees as a horrific intruder pushed and stepped through them.

The overgrown bipedal monstrosity strode out through its ruined path with long, powerful strides. Its body was an enigma of confusion and deformity. Its legs were disorganised; the feet and calves were all proportional, but the thighs were fat and wonky; cleverly designed to fit its beer-belly gut. The chest of the beast looked almost caved in, its rips piercing through its skin. The arms of the creature were long and lanky, reaching to its ankles. Its face though…. was more disturbing out of anything else. Its face was the true meaning of horror and fear. It looked human, could almost pull it off if it weren't for its body and its revolting smile. The head of the monster surpasses that of its body could handle. Its brown hair was flat and overgrown, full of tree branches and shrubbery. Its ears too small to even see nor even clarify as ears to begin with. Its nose completely non-existent, just two holes. Its mouth was permanently pulled to an ear-to-ear smile. Its teeth were serrated bone daggers that could peel the flesh on a man with ease. Its eyes belonged on a corpse. Its eyes never showed any form of emotion nor life in it. It was a dead being. It was a monstrosity. It isn't human.

The giant had revealed itself.

Soldier cocked his rocket-launcher towards the giant's grinning face and roared to the monstrosity "Listen here, Tubby! You will surrender to us! Take us to your Golden Goose! And I will personally make sure tha-" None of the Mercs prepared for the giant to bolt straight at them in the span of a millisecond, nor for it to dive straight at Soldier with its hideous mouth wide open.

Soldier and the ground under him were engulfed into the giant's maw as it came crashing down. The violent landing uprooted a lot of the ground and launched it into the air. The vibrations and debris tossed everyone off of their feet, all of them diving or crawling for any cover.

"Oh-shit-Oh-shit-Oh-shit-Oh-shit-Oh-shit-Oh-shit!" Scout repeated as fear took hold of him.

He couldn't see anything through the thick cloud of dirt that hung in the air. He quickly leapt up and ran in the opposite direction of where the Giant landed. "Guys! Where the Hell is everyone!? Guys?!" Scout continued to cry out to his remaining team.

Since he couldn't see anything three feet in front of him, he tripped over a large hulking form. He tumbled forward and landed face-first into the ground. "Ow! What the-"

"SSSHHHHH! Quite!" the unmistakable voice of Heavy loudly whispered to the fallen Scout.

Flooded with relief, Scout rolled over and hugged the big brute, rubbing his tear-stained face on Heavy's cheek. "Oh my god! Heavy! I found you! I-"

"Stop crying. You will attract giant. And you are staining Heavy's pants"

Scout immediately withdrew from Heavy's 'head', spitting and gagging as he rolled off his stomach besides Heavy. "Oh Crap! Heavy! What the hell are we gonna do!? That this just jumped and…ATE SOLDIER!" Scout was silenced when Heavy hit him straight in the gut.

"You need to stay quiet!" Heavy hissed through his teeth.

Heavy looked around, trying to find where the giant was, unfortunately, he couldn't see it through the thick cloud of dirt, nor could he feel the vibrations the giant made when it moved. It could be possible that the giant couldn't see them through the cloud, but he didn't rule out the possibility that it might be able to smell them.

Heavy roughly tapped Scout, who was trying not to throw-up from Heavy's previous hit. "Listen. Giant does not know where we are. We need to attack it right now. We have the element of surprise"

"Right…how exactly are we gonna do that big-guy?" Scout crocked out through coughing, struggling to take a breath.

BOOM!

A giant, ominous shadow loomed over them and the thick cloud of dust parted to give way to a pair of disgusting, naked legs.

The Giant was hovering over them with its hideous disproportionate body. Its face was completely mangled and broken from its brutal landing. Its eyes popped from their sockets and dangled by the ocular nerve, which pulsed with a sickly noise. Its skin ripped, bleeding profusely and showing bleeding muscle. It's lower jaw stretched all the way down to its collarbone, so it can fit the ridicule amounts of earth within its mouth. It gave a sickening crunch came from it as it forced itself to swallow the rocks. Its mangled hands pushed the earth down its throat, its neck stretching to fit the massive amount.

Seeing the Giant do something so suicidal, the two Mercs had hoped that the Giant was aiming to kill itself in the most brutal way possible. They hoped that they didn't have to face such a creature from the deepest spawns of Hell. Yet this didn't happen.

Powerful bursts of steam came from its wounds before the unthinkable happened; its wounds started to mend themselves. The cuts and broken bone around its body moved and warped back into shape. Its eyes reeled back into their sockets, the exposed muscle was covered with new skin and its shattered bones mended together. Seconds passed, and its body returned to the same form the RED Team first saw it, minus its bulging gut that was filled with earth and the corpse of Soldier.

It lets a throaty gurgle, sounding satisfied, and cast its soulless eyes down towards the two prone Mercs. Heavy, the most sensible out of the two, stayed prone and hoped the beast would lose interest in them and walk away. Scout, the least sensible one, choose instead to leap to his feet and run away from the Giant.

Heavy panicked and was about to yell at Scout to get down but the words died within his throat as the Giant stepped forward and planted a heavy foot mere centimetres beside him. The Giant monster took another step over the prone man and rushed after Scout. Heavy a least took solace to the fact that the giant lost interest in him, even if it was at the cost of Scout's safety.

Scout, on the other hand, was sweating bullets and screaming his head off as the Giant was gaining on him. He tried his best not to trip over from the quakes the Giant's footsteps caused. He was aiming to run into the remaining forest and, hopefully, find a way to lose the Giant and possibly a place to hide.

His hopes were dashed away as quick as he could run as the Giant's meaty hands closed around him and lifted him into the air. Within the confines of the Giant's hand, Scout was screaming his head off while he flailed his legs about as if he still thought he was running. "OHGODOHGOD OHGODOHGODOHGODOHGODOHGODOHGODOHGODOHGOD I'M GONNA DIE!" Scout cried as tears flooded out from his eyes.

He continued to scream until he felt the fingers wrapped around his head slowly pry away. Scout stopped screaming, instead of tears of horror came tears of joy. Somehow, maybe with his superior strength or his team, he was saved from the clutches of the giant.

A vein of hope that forged inside him was quickly destroyed however as the fingers opened to show the open mouth of the Giant. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Scout screamed even louder than before.

He was trying everything to escape: biting the fingers, begging to the Giant, cursing the Giant with every swear word that would make a nun faint, to kicking the fingers that trapped him, but all options came to no avail. He wasn't strong enough the prying the oily fingers from him- yet who could have the strength and power to face a fifth-teen meter giant?

Heavy did!

"ARRRRGGGHHH!" Heavy let out a monstrous roar, one to put fear into the hearts of men and mentally scar children, as he charged at the giant's feet.

Rushing in as fast as he could, Heavy shoulder bashed the Giant's heel, bring forth a sickening crunch, crumbling the Achilles-tendon within and splitting open the heel. The Giant let out a pained roar, stumbling around trying to gain its footing again. Heavy wouldn't let it happen, grabbing the broken foot and lifting it with all his power. "YYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Heavy screamed in agony as the Giant's blood sprayed onto him.

Evident by the steam admitting from the Giant's blood, the crimson liquid was boiling hot and turning Heavy's skin into a deep shade of red. Fighting through the heated blood, Heavy threw the Giant's foot into the air. The Giant had lost its balance, tipping over to its left and crashing into the ground. In the process of falling, it had released Scout from its deathly grip. "OH CRAP! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Scout screamed as he was thrown into the air.

Gravity took hold of Scout and he was approaching the ground fast. Luckily for the young Boston boy, his feet were the first things to touch the ground and the Long-Fall Loafers absorbed the kinetic impact of his landing. Scout, unfortunately, lost his footing as the momentum from his fall still influenced him. "Oh! Ah! Crap! Dah!" he grunted as he rolled across the ground.

Once Scout had landed, the Giant crashed into the ground, unearthing chunks of rock and uprooting nearby trees. Heavy almost fell from the ensuing quake of its fall. More dust flew into the air, obscuring the two Mercs' vision for a short while. Scout leapt back onto his feet and rushed back to Heavy.

Once he had made it to the giant Russian, Scout dived into his sore arms and embraced him with tears of joy. "HEAVY! BIG MAN! YOU SAVE ME! THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU" Scout cried as he buried his tear and snot covered face into Heavy's chest.

Heavy merely grumbled in disdain and roughly pushed Scout away, which caused him to wince in pain. Toppling a Giant weighing in at about six or more tonnes did a number on his old bones. He doubted he could do something like that again unless he wanted to break every bone in his arms. "Stop your crying baby. Get guns. Now, Let's finish this"

Heavy rushed back to pick up his weapon from the ground while Scout wide his face with his sleeve and prepared his Force-A-Nature. Heavy brought the minigun up and started to spin its barrels, just in time for the Giant to rise off the ground and turn to face the Mercs with its ear-to-ear smile.

BBBBBBBBBBBBRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG

Heavy and Scout fired a relentless volley of twelve-millimetre bullets and standard pellets into the Giant's face. Skin, organs and bone splintered, exploded and scattered as the ammunition pierced its flesh. Blood sprayed from the beast's open wounds and impact craters. Despite being pelted by deadly ammunition, the giant tried to attack the two Mercs with its giant arms. Heavy and Scout both saw the appendage coming for them, causing them to halt their fire and dive out the way.

The massive arm swiped over them, missing them by a hair's length. Before the Giant could go for another swipe, explosions ripped its legs apart. The Giant once again violently crashed into the ground. Past the explosive flames that danced across the Giant's dismembered legs, Demoman stood with his Quickiebomb Launcher in his hands. "Ya' know what t'ya say? De bigger t'ya ar', 'hic' de…. ah…. BIGGER DEH'RE ARSE….eh?"

Recovering from his stumble, Demoman swapped his Quickiebomb with his Ironbomber and charged at the Giant with a hesitant Medic in tow. "I don't zink zis is a good idea!"

Loud muffled screams of glee echoed above them along with the violent roar of fire. Sawing over Medic with his Thermal Thruster, Pyro cheered and nose-dived straight at the Giant.

Flying close enough to the Giant, Pyro set the monster's head ablaze. He had successfully lit the Giant's hair and surrounding skin on fire before he was forced to land as to not overheat his pack.

Despite the RED Team's combined assault, the Giant wasn't affected by the loss of its limbs, the open wounds or the fact its head was on fire. It's focus never wavered as it relentlessly attacked the REDs. Its fingers dug into the ground and it kicked its bloody stumps to drag itself closer to the Mercs. Heavy and Scout, the closest ones to the Giant, retreated while firing their weapons. Demoman fired his pipe-bombs to cover the two Mercs but it had little effect to the Giant.

BANG!

The Giant's right eye exploded in a mass of blood and optical fluid, causing the Giant to halt its pursuit to grab its eye socket in pain. Just as fast as its right eye had been destroyed, its other eye too exploded in a violent display of gore after another bang.

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

The Giant held its face in agony as blood and steam escaped in between its fingers. The RED Team turned to the source of the gunshots, which came from none other their friendly camper Sniper, who waved at them off into the distance. "TAKE THAT YOU GIANT FATASS!" Sniper yelled out in sadistic glee.

Using the Giant's sudden blindness to their advantage, the Mercs spread out around the disabled beast and started to pelt it with volleys of explosives and bullets. Heavy fired at the beast's arms and chest, hoping to immobilise it further while Demo and Scout fired at random. Sniper was trying to find any weak points. Although despite Sniper's use of high-calibre rounds, his efforts were doing little to affect the battle. He was doing little more than taking pot-shots at the Giant.

Pyro, once his Thermal Thruster had cooled down, leapt in to join them; dosing the Giant's head and hands in flames. The fire ate through the hair and flesh of the Giant, melting it away like wax from a candle. The Giant's healing ability was trying its best to cover the now exposed skull with a thick layer of muscle. Try as it might, the plasma flames of the Phlogistinator were too powerful for the new skin and muscle to combat. Instead, they added more fuel to the fire.

By the RED's truck, Spy watched on in fright at the battle just a scant few meters away from him. Seeing the Giant take that much damage from the Mercs' combined efforts reminded Spy of an Über-Charged BLU. Highly dangerous, indescribable and completely unstoppable. Spy let out a nervous gulp as the Giant removed its hands from its face, the skin from its hands peeling off and oozing onto its skinless face with a sickening sound. Its eye-sockets held partially formed eyes, bubbling and popping like cracked eggs cooking. It was a truly horrifying sight to behold, but it wasn't as horrifying as the Giant ignoring the obvious pain it was in and continuing to strike at his team with its bony hands. It seemed that no matter how much ammunition they put in that thing, it just kept crawling towards them with hunger in its eyes. Spy felt a ping of dread within himself, debating and wondering whether or not they can kill the Giant.

The battle continued to drag on, with Pyro crying in shock as he narrowly dodged the flaying arms of the Giant.

Once again Pyro's pack overheated, forcing him to land a few metres away from the fight. The fight itself was slowing to a crawl. The Giant had a majority of its body mass gone, only a few ligaments, bones and organs remained. The RED Team laying siege to the monstrosity were panicking as their ammunition was declining at an alarming rate and the Giant was still alive from their brutal onslaught. "It's not going down!" Medic cried, running back and further between teammates to heal them.

"We bloody know nurse! Just shoot it everywhere! It's got to have a bloody weakness somewhere!" Demo yelled out to his group.

Heavy stopped firing for a moment, "We have not aimed for its back! Let us try-"

"LOOK OUT!" Scout cried out.

Heavy, who had focused his attention on informing Demo, failed to notice the Giant had leapt forward, outstretching its mangled hands at blinding speeds and reached for him. All he could do was throw his Sasha out of harm's way and brace as the hand snatched and lifted him off the ground. "Ahhh!" Heavy cried out.

"HEAVY!" all the Mercs screamed as the Giant brought heavy up to its face, opening its massive maw and throwing the Heavy inside.

CRUNCH

A sickening, bone-shattering crunch echoed from the jaws of the Giant, along with a river of blood. Fortunately for the RED Team, the blood nor the crunching sound didn't belong to their Heavy Weapons Guy, but the Giant itself. "AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH" Heavy let out a pained roar as he was wedged between the jaws of the Giant.

He had the upper set of teeth on his shoulders while he planted his feet on the lower set. Heavy's hands gripped onto the teeth above him, and with his immense arm and leg strength, pushed the jaws upwards. The teeth and jawbones fractured and broke fighting against the Heavy's power, blood rushing from the cracked teeth and wounds from the splintered bones. The Giant tried its best to crush the Heavy, but it wasn't a match for the Russian's strength.

While Heavy was fighting the jaws of the Giant, the rest of the Mercs unloaded their weapons into the beast, hoping to free Heavy.

The Giant tried to use its hands to push the Heavy in its mouth but luckily Sniper severed its shoulder tendons and Demo made quick work of its arms; reducing its limbs to mere meat clinging to a bit of shattered bone and stringed cartilage. Heavy was still snared within the mouth and he was losing strength fast. "AAARRGGHHH! Hurry…up!" He moaned in pain.

Panicking about their ally's ensuing death, the Mercs threw coordination out the window and opted to fire blindly at the Giant in hopes of rescuing Heavy. "COME ON! GO DOWN ALREADY!" Scout yelled in anger, taking shots at both its ass and crotch.

"DIE! DIE! DIE!" Medic chanted over and over again, leaving his medical duties and stabbing the Giant's sides with his Ubersaw.

"MPH!" Pyro cried as he charged the Giant, firing his weapons at its head.

"DIE YOU BLOOD'E SOD!" Demo cried as he fired his pipe-bombs at the back of the Giant's head to save Heavy.

The sets of pipe bombs sailed through the air, meeting their targets with a fiery explosion. One bomb exploded at the back of its skull, another on its back and a third blown upon its right shoulder.

Demo only had one bomb left. Seeing their blight against the Giant had wavered thin, Demo cried out in rage, not caring where he was aiming as he fired his last pipe-bomb at the giant. This bomb sawed through the air, miraculously dodging fire, bullets and thick chunks of flesh, and strike directly at the nape of its neck.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG/ RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Both Demo and the Giant let out a roar, Demo's was filled with pained agony and the Giant's own was one of pained relief.

Demo felt something on the same vein as being shocked by lightning from the ensuing explosion. His preferable vision darkened and tunnel vision took over. His only focus was the Giant's neck, which glowed brightly with arches of golden lighting from the spray of blood, gore and fire. Before Demo could question why this was happening to him, the lightning had fizzled away, and his vision returned to him.

The cloud of smoke and fire was soon dispersed into steam and blended in with the day sky. The Giant itself looked shell-shock, its twisted face contorted into several emotions; all of them ranging from pain, agony, and surprisingly, relief. The steam pouring from its damaged eyes stopped flowing and the hot condensation from its breath halted. Heavy let out a groan of relief and surprise as the crushing force of the Giant's mouth stopped. Much like a tree that has been cut through and on the verge of falling, the Titan creaked and groaned as it slowly tumbled forward. The REDs closest to the Giant cried in surprise and leapt out of the way as to avoid the wave of debris from the Giant crashing into the ground with a thunderous sound and a quake of the earth.

All was still within the grassy plains, no animal cried nor were there any sighted for miles around. All there was were eight Mercenaries, who stood onto their shaky feet, and a lifeless, decomposing body of a Giant.

The REDs had surrounded the body of the Giant. The skin of the Giant now started to bubble and ooze, its tone slowly turning into a sickening colour of mixed murky brown and cloudy grey. Walking beside the decomposing monster, Demo collapsed onto his back with a grunt, exhausted from the fighting. "We did it laddies…we killed the beast"

Exhausted as well, some of the REDs sat down onto the grass and tried to catch their breath. Hearing rapid footsteps closing in on them, the Mercs turned to see Spy and Sniper running to them. Once they arrived at the decaying corpse, they were breathless and flabbergasted. "Bloody Nora! What happened? How did it die?" Sniper asked, scanning the body to see if he could find where the killing blow was struck.

Scout immediately leapt onto his feet and with a shit-eating grin responded to Sniper's question, "Well, I don't mean to brag and all but, you know, I aimed for the back and the Giant was like 'Whoa!' and 'Roar' and-"

"You did no such thing" the declaring voice of Heavy yelled at Scout from atop the Giant. "I saw you running out of ammo for your puny gun. You did not kill it"

Before Scout could rebut Heavy's claims, Demo quickly intervened "I hit it at the back of the neck. I hit it around the nape" Demo pointed to his own nape to show the Mercs.

The REDs were completely dumbfounded at the news. All of the explosives, fire and bullets that were pelted into its vital organs did nothing to stop the monster but a single pipe-bomb that stuck its neck did the trick? "Is drunken-baby sure-"

"AYE! I'm sure! I felt it die" Demo angrily declared.

"How can you feel it dyi-"

Slush

The Mercs froze, focusing on the small sound coming from the Giant. Some feared it was still alive. They aimed their weapons at the body and waited for it to show signs of moving.

Slush Slush

The sound was heard again but the Giant didn't move it all. Now that they were focusing on the sound, however, did they realise that it sounded like something was…moving? Something slushing and crawling through flesh?

"Wait….you guys hear tha-"

BOOM!

The belly of the decaying Giant exploded, throwing Heavy into the air, along with thick chunks of flesh and stone all over the place. The Mercs threw their hands up to defend themselves from the rain of gore and rock. "Holy Shit! What the hell was that?!" Scout exclaimed.

Unfortunately, due to his low visibility, Scout couldn't see the Heavy's falling from above him nor could he hear him screaming as his ear-drums were ringing from the explosion. Heavy landed on Scout with a loud crash, almost braking the poor Bostonian's bones in the process. "Gah! WHO DID THAT?!" Heavy thundered in anger, ignoring the wheezing he heard below him.

Once the dust and a thin mist of blood had settled, the same sounds of mushing, naked flesh came from the open stomach of the Giant. A burst of steam ruptured as a human hand punched from the darkened flesh. The RED Team was speechless. "Oh my God" Demo gasped and quickly climbed up the Giant.

Grabbing the exposed hand and yanking it upwards, Demo pulled a naked and extremely reddened Soldier from the Giant's flesh. "Men…. I do not think the Giant is open for negotiation"

Everyone roared and cheered for the survival of Soldier, but none were as loud as Demo. "SOLDIER BOY! YOU SURVIVED! YOU BLOODY PANTLESS LUNATIC!" Demoman almost hugged Soldier but stopped himself as he realised his friend's clothing state.

Everyone else was berating the American Patriot with questions, asking about his wellbeing, how he survived in the Giant's stomach and most importantly, "Aye'…Soldier? What happened to ya' clothes laddie?" Demo asked.

Soldier gave a hum of amusement and leapt off the Giant, not caring about the fact he was mentally scarring his teammates with his indecency. "Don't worry men! I am alright. I used the old saying, 'when on fire, stop, drop, and roll'. It saved my life countless times"

The REDs grumbled and shook their heads at Soldier's ludicrous answer. "Where in that saying includes taking your clothes off? And you weren't on fire!" Scout exclaimed with a wheeze, still recovering from Heavy's landing.

Soldier crossed the distance between him and Scout in less than half-a-second, and got right in his personal space, much to Scout's horror. A naked and first degree burnt man getting so close to you that your noises almost touched would cause any man to become frozen in terror. "Well, I felt like I was burning alive Private Twinkle-toes!" Soldier, using his brutish strength, holstered Scout into the air by the collar of his shirt. "Why don't I shove you into a Giant the next time we see one?! Let's see if you can survive being drowned in a pool of boiling acid! Let's see if you can take your pants off while being tumbled around in said pool of boiling acid! Let's see if you can claw your way out!"

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

"Oh! Just in time…"

Fear once again took hold of the RED Team, except for Soldier, who was avidly searching for the source of the roar, "Here Giant-Giant. I got a tasty snack for ya'" Soldier called out in a sweet voice while shaking Scout back and forth.

"Zis isn't ze time for playing around Soldier" Spy ordered.

The Mercs all collectively recognised the roar was the one from before the Giant had appeared, only this time it was louder. Which only meant it was closer.

Boom-Boom

Boom-Boom

A heavy sense of Déjà Vu fell over the group like a ton of bricks as the same footsteps of the Giant echoed and vibrated from the ruined forest. Except for this time, there was more than one set. "Dear God" Spy voiced everyone's fear, watching on as the forest's trees fell like a row of dominos against a supposed hoard of Giants.

Boom-Boom

Boom-Boom

The footsteps kept getting louder and louder, faster and faster! All of them closing in on the stranded team.

VROOM!

Just as quickly as fear had taken them, relief filled the REDs as the RED's Service Truck roared to life. The truck's cockpit door flew open and the oiled stained face of Engineer appeared from it. "GET YOUR ASSES IN HERE NOW!"

Not wanting to waste any more time, the REDs quickly picked their weapons up and rushed to the truck. While they ran, the Giant's kin had burst through the forest. Twelve Giants, ranging from different heights from three meters to fifth teen meters with a different variety of deformities, charged at the group of retreating humans. Engineer stared back in horror, "OH HELL!" Engineer retreated into the cockpit, slamming the door shut as he did.

Engineer had quickly put the truck in gear and slammed on the accelerator, gaining enough speed for his Team to jump on and for him to floor it as soon as they were on. First to jump on the open trailer was of cause Scout, followed by his remaining team. The only one still outside the truck was Heavy, who was struggling to catch up with the trailer.

All of the RED Team members in the trailer called to Heavy, yelling at him to hurry up while a few like Demo, Sniper and Scout held onto anything attached to the trailer and lean out to grab him. "COME ON FATASS! RUN!" Scout cried out.

If it was a different time and scenario, Heavy would have glared at Scout for such an insult, but right now his main concern was his and Sasha's safety. If he didn't make it into the trailer soon, he would be eaten, Sasha would be smashed to pieces and the giants would surely reach his team. He couldn't allow any of those to happen.

Heavy's breath was incredibly laboured, and his teeth gritted together. All his adrenaline had gone, all of it used with his battle with the first Giant. The strain of both tipping the first Giant and stopping it from eating him was taking its toll. His legs were in utter pain and a felt like they were on fire with each step he took. It felt as though his feet were about to be snapped in two. All of this combined resulted in him losing traction and slowing down.

All of his teammates paled as Heavy drew further away from them and the Giants were closing the distance at an alarming rate. "VERDAMMTE HÖLLE!" Medic curse at the sight.

He ran to the back of the trailer, picking up Sniper's discarded SMG and priming it. He aimed the weapon towards the right side of the back wall and fired.

Meanwhile, in the cockpit, Engineer screamed and almost crashed the truck as Medic's bullets made short work of the passenger seat and the metal of the back cabin. Medic fired in a circular motion, using the bullets to carve a messy hole out of the metal. Happy with the circular hole he made, Medic stopped firing and screamed at the dishevelled Engineer. "Dummkopf! Slow down ze truck! Ze Heavy's falling back!" Medic ordered.

Engineer, however, didn't comply with Medic's demands, keeping the truck at the same speed. "I can't do that! If he doesn't get in here in the next minute, we'll all be Giant chow!" Engineer explained to Medic, who in turn had a look of horror.

"You…You mean you're gonna…. you're not gonna slow down?! You're not going to even try un' save him?!"

"There ain't nothing I can do! If he can't make it…" Engineer went silent, nervously looking elsewhere.

Medic waited for him, almost daring him, to finish his sentence but it seems Engineer had the common sense the keep his mouth shut to the only man who could save his life in a medical emergency. Unfortunately, Engineer was still headstrong about his discussion as his foot didn't leave the petal.

"Engineer…You can't leave him behind

Before Engineer could make his decision, disaster struck the poor Heavy. "HEAVY!" All of the Mercs screamed in horror as one of the Giants, a ten-meter tall feminine looking beast, charged at him with the speed of a fighter jet.

The distance in between it and the REDs was crossed in an instant and Giant was right on top of Heavy. Heavy cranked his neck upwards and paled as the disturbing smile that all the Giant's had looked down at him. He knew he should stop running, stand and fight the Giant tooth and nail if it meant there was a chance Sasha and his team could escape. He was about to enact this plan, waiting for the Giant to scoop him up and eat him.

However, fate seemed to be on the side of RED today. To the surprise of all the REDs, another Giant had sprinted ahead of the horde and dived in the air, not aiming at them but its fellow Giant that was about to catch Heavy.

Seeing an opportune moment, Engineer hit the brakes of the Truck. The truck slowed down to an almost complete stop so Heavy can get onboard. Now able to close the distance, Heavy did a mad dash to the open trailer and into the helping hands of his team. It took the combined efforts of the stronger group members to left Heavy and his weapon onboard. "HE'S IN! GO! GO! GO!" Medic screamed out loud.

Engineer harshly slammed on the accelerator and the truck roared as it sped up. Despite going through rugged and unpaved terrain, the truck managed to clock at eighty kilometres per hour, outrunning the tumbled Giants and putting a few good metres between them.

Silence fell over the group as they started off in the distance of the open trailer, watching as their campground/battleground slowly disappearing off into the distance. Their pursuers had managed to untangle themselves from their bile and started to chase them again. Unfortunately for the Giants, their little quarry was faster than them and was several metres away from them, "Heh-heh" Heavy let out a pained laugh of relief.

The other Mercs followed suit, each one laughing as they rode off their adrenaline high and the sweet feeling of relief flood through their system. "I can't fucking believe it!' Scout gave an exhausted whizz.

A few of them were panting and gasping for air, recovering from their harrowing escape. "Well, Gentlemen" Spy quickly interutped their laughing fits, "I zink it is safe to say we are the first men in history to kill a giant! No?" Everyone responded with a cheer.

Laugher was shared between the group and pats on the backs for congratulations. Demo rummaged around his pockets and managed to grab hold of one of the many flasks he had on him. "Who wants a drink ah'?" Demo took a swing and passed it around to the agreeing Mercs, all of them celebrating their victory.

It was a pyrrhic victory though, all they won was their limbs and lives, and the proudful thought of slaying a giant, but at the cost of several cases of ammunition. Now wasn't the time to worry however, now was the time for reprieve and recovery.

While the team were recovering in the trailer, Engineer looked through the hole that Medic shot out with a smile prevalent on his face as his team was safe and sound. That small smile disappeared however when the snarling face of Medic interrupted his view. Medic glared at Engineer with such malicious and violence that scared the poor Engineer back into driving the vehicle.

Medic's heated glare lingered on the back of Engineer for several more seconds before breaking away. He moved back into the trailer and into his group. His anger almost reached the boiling point after Engineer's unwillingness to slow down the truck for a valuable teammate. For what? Several others? None of them was as valuable to him than Heavy.

Not only was he a good shield and a willing test subject, but he was also a true friend. The others understood that Medic was a valuable member to their team but they all knew about the twisted experiments Medic loved to do in his free time. They naturally tried to avoid him of course, but their line of work meant they were always in need of medical attention. They only limited their relationship with Medic to a doctor/patient. Medic wouldn't have it any other way, but he would make an exception for Heavy.

He was a man who didn't care about his inhumane tests or his violent nature. Instead, he would offer his ear to the Medic's woes. Though he didn't understand half of what Medic would spout, Heavy would still hum in the agreement or add in his two cents. Medic always found his responses adorable, like an ape trying to understand common words. In battle, their relationship is further defined as one of brothers. Heavy would, literally and figuratively, take a bullet for Medic. Several high calibre bullets and explosive ordnance to be precise. Medic would, in turn, heal Heavy and bring him back to his feet. They were an unstoppable team, a duo that could turn the tides with any battle.

If Medic were to lose Heavy… it would have been like he lost half of himself. He truly wouldn't know what to do anymore.

That's why he felt such hatred for Engineer, a man who would risk the life of his most beloved friend and subject, just for the chance to save the other subjects. His anger subsided however when he walked towards a winded and fatigue Heavy. All that was left was a bitter taste residing deep down within himself. Where all his emotions besides sadistic glee should be.

Medic stood over the weakened Heavy and started to look over him, checking his limbs and searching for anything injuries. "Mein…, you need more exercise my freund. If you were any slower, you would've been a lovely meal for zose brutes" Medic exclaimed with a creepy gleeful tone.

"Hehe, you are funny doctor" Heavy weakly laughed at Medic, having gotten used to his creepy tones. The others, however, weren't so use to it, half of them shifting in their seats and looking away from the doctor. "Still, Heavy is glad that Giants decided to attack each other" he hummed.

This perked everyone's interest. It seemed through their relief and excitement that they forgot about the wired occurrence that itinerantly saved Heavy's life. "Yeah-yeah! What the Hell was even up with that?" Scout questioned.

"Aye! Maybe they were fightin' each other to have the first taste your fat ass!" Demo barked in laughed as did the others.

The whole entire team were laughing at the joke, meanwhile heavy simmered in anger. "Ha. Ha. Very funny. You know what else would be funny-" Heavy leant forward and glared at his team, "braking your fingers one at a time"

"Whoa-whoa-whoa! Geez Heavs, you need to know how to take a joke" Scout quickly tried to simmer down Heavy's anger.

Heavy grunted at Scout, "I would joke about you, but you are already one"

"OOOHHH!" Laughter roared from all of the members except Scout, who pitifully tried to mumble a comeback.

"OH! OH! OH! That was good man!" Demo voiced his laughter and amusement.

"A-a-anyway, why the hell did the Giant do that?" Scout tried to move the subject back to the Giant who 'saved' Heavy.

"Does it matter men?! We won! We killed a Giant and ran away to fight another day" Soldier interrupted Scout and leap out towards the open trailer door. "MARK MY WORDS, YOU DISGUSTING NUDISTS! I WILL KILL YOU ALL! PREPARE YOURSELVES FOR THE MIGHT OF THE UNITED! STATES! OF! AMERICA!" Soldier screamed out into the great, wide world.

Spy came up behind the naked lunatic and pat his shoulder, "Good-good. Now, let us get you into some clothes" Spy then turned back to the whole group, "While the rest of us get some rest. We're gonna stop in a bit and try to make sense of where we are" Spy declared their plans; all of the members taking rejoice at the chance to rest and recharge.

As the REDs prepared to rest, Spy curiously pulled the diary they found from the Foist-Borrow farm and read the last page, the one that had the messiest handwriting out of all of it. After reading through the entry for the first time, Spy's eyes widen. "Solider? Are you alright?" Solider stopped putting on a random pair of pants to ask Spy.

"I will be fine as soon as you find some clothes" Spy grumbled out trying to avoid looking down. "And no, that is not why I am…surprised. Zis last entry in the diary has me…. worried" Spy pointed to the page.

This caught everyone attention, everyone looking intensely at the masked man. Pyro murmured a question, as well as leaning in with curiosity beaming from his soulless lenses.

Spy swallowed and dreadfully reread the final entry to his team. "A rider from the local Garrison came to our house, being dreadful news:"

The Titans have come. The Titans have breached Wall Maria. By the Wall Goddesses, Sheena, Rose and Maria,

I pray that you save us all.