Living Darkness

by vildtiger

Acts made of Love

Note: This happens the day after the last chapter.
The fansong's "Nightmare Night" belongs to WoodenToaster and Mic The Microphone.

**Ponyville**

The residents of the town are enjoying the spooky festivities, many of them stop in whatever they are doing when they hear music and a subtle light show coming from the large stage, curious, a lot of the foals run over to check, closely followed by the adults. Many ponies gather around the stage where a dark brown and bit strange looking young stallion stand in the mist made by a nearby machine built by Engineer. Scout raises slowly his head, having a smirk that he's up to no good, he turns his head to Pinkie Pie who appears right beside him and is for once dressed to look scary. She is dressed to look like a witch and has a single fake spider attached to her hat. The two nods to one another and that's the queue for Vinyl Scratch; she replaces the soft piano music with a more rock styled melody, the whole stage lights up and follows the music's beat. Those few from the crowd there were still talking stop and have their full attention on the show, some of the foals seek cover behind their parent of the sudden change of scenery.
Scout smirks down to the crowd, steers with spreads out wings and Pinkie Pie really sets the mood when she throws down some of Zecora's magical powder that surrounds the stage in a scary purple mist. "Yeah, watchu know 'bout Nightmare Night son?" Scout calls down to the crowd and jumps down from the stage. "Welcome Fillies and Gentlecolts; No reason to scream.
Your favorite Princess is back; She's walkin' up on the scene"

Luna appears out from the smoke, watching the scared children in a stoic manner.
"She has been stuck on the moon but that's no reason to fret
She's not a Nightmare no more so buckle down and get set"
Scout walks among the crowd, showing his canine teeth in his grin.

"She's comin gracin' her subjects; She ain't leavin' no choice
She's gonna blow you all back with her Equestrian voice"
A lightning strike outside town, startling the children to seek cover behind their parents. Scout approaches one of the nearby foals.

"So cover all of your fears and stow away all your fright
The Lunar Princess is back to bring the Nightmares tonight

Pinkie Pie walks out from the green smoke on the stage, her head down and the witch hat hiding most of her face, she looks up and shows she has the same evil grin her partner has. She nods to Vinyl Scratch and the unicorn shoots a beam at her throat, changing her voice to suit better this show. Pinkie walks up right up beside Luna.

"She's living in the past
So you won't last
Without the proper care"

Luna disappears in the smoke
"With a royal farewell
And an animate spell
You won't have long to prepare"
She appears as Nightmare Moon right on top of the scene, scaring pretty much everyone in the crowd.
Vinyl Scratch plays her remix as the foals are running in fear around the area, some of the adults did also take the run for it when the special effects in form of ghosts start to fly around the ominously standing Luna.

Out from seemly nowhere, Scout appears right behind the freaked out Cutiemark Crusaders.

"Now little fillies this is Nightmare Night
Your ruler Nightmare Moon is back;
To come and fill you with fright
So Hurry"

The three girls and single boy jump away but do not run, allowing him to sing down to them.

"Now get your goodies and fill up all your bags
And go and leave a candy offering for that big ol' hag
Get running"

Another lightning strike and the three girls grab their bags and takes the run for it, Logan hides behind his amused father.

"And pray above that she's not coming back
To come and take away your soul and eat you up for a snack"

Luna horns light up and the ghosts disappear.

"So run away and go hide just keep your head out of sight
The darkness is rising again cause this is Nightmare Night"

And the alicorn of the night disappears in a flash of light, in her place stands Pinkie.

"She's living in the past
So you won't last
Without the proper care"

Luna as Nightmare Moon appears on the stage, her wings spread out and her dark magical hair surrounds her like dark clouds.

"With a royal farewell
And an animate spell"

Luna flies up in the air, right so her siloette appears before the full moon.

" You won't have long to prepare"

She lands again on the stage, right before Scout and Pinkie Pie, both standing as if they are ready to fight her, they do a small pretend fight, ending with Luna winning and she lets out a rather good evil laugher before Vinyl Scratch turns off all the light, obscuring them from the crowd. On purpose, they leave the stage dark for a while and when the lights get on again, the three stay on the stage, smiling normally- Pinkie joyfully down to the crowd. Takes the watching ponies a moment, then they burst out in applause.

While Luna is talking to the thrilled children, Spy, still disguised as Scout exchanges a look with Pinkie, she beams, which he returns with a nod before he draws away from the crowd now that his job is done.

Pinkie Pie is quite happy they did the show and made everyone happy, only regret she hadn't done it with her partner but does cheer herself up there is always next year.

**Human world**

Halloween for the Fortress mercs always seems like they do battle while whacky things happen, this year they are however not fighting against a pissed off wizard or a hoard of robots, this time they are up against a more normal army that is quite set on eliminating them.
So far all the UUSR got from picking a fight with the mercs is them losing men and the somewhat immortal mercs to get annoyed as this army of the UUSR had chosen to change tactic by bombing the whole place and send more of those acid birds at them.

The Vanguard Pyro, determent to catch and investigate one of the birds in order to give them a better fighting chance against their poison that causes such an extreme rotting effect. Getting his hands on one is rather easy, but grabbing it without losing his hands is another story. So learning how this corrosive acid of the birds' works has been going slow as he has been forced to kill them and touching one is a no go. Can't even touch the darn thing with tools for that their acid eats that up too.
He has however discovered the birds are extremely sensitive to fire, so he and the Fortress Pyro have been the offensive line every time the Zhenniao comes at them.

Since there aren't any ceasefire against this army, the mercs have been forced to do battle one shifts, Demo's time of battle is over and he gets replaced with Vanguard's demo while he gets something to eat and sleep. The sound of battle makes the latter hard, so the remaining medic has to give them all pills that will knock them out for a few hours.
After has put down the Eyelander, Demo grabs something to eat and a bottle of beer, not his choice of drink but that fucking army is trying to starve them out. Not working though, Black Spy has been able to smuggle food into the base but only enough to keep them going, and this kind of cheap beer is all the spy can bring.
"Wish these morons soon would get the hint and bugger off." Demo grumbles. Fighting the army was fun the first week but now it's just getting tedious as the army refuses to get in close after a fun stunt involving him, Vanguard Demo and Pyro lighting their tank like a bonfire, and without their big gun, the army keeps shooting them behind a protective wall they made not long ago, sending in those stupid acid birds and have set up a machine pistol line, making it impossible to get in close without been torn to shreds.
Drinking some of the beer, he remarks to Eyelander. "I had brawls funnier than this." and that's saying a lot.

Eyelander would've shrugged if it could, it's not bored yet even if it hasn't been used in battle for a while now. "At least there's entertainment in here." It remarks, then remembers its current owner cannot see it. "Oh, I forgot you can't see what's going on in the realm of between."

This catches Demo's interest. "What's going on there?"

"One hell of a sweet battle about life and death." Eyelander replies and must say it's impressed that this dead guy refuses to give up on his personal life. Won't stop the personal hell to give him one big ass-kicking; would've been easier if this guy just went and possessed something or chose to haunt the place instead of trying return to his body. It's a stubborn one alright.

Demo wonders if this person his ghost sword can see happens to be the doc? "Is it Medic?"
Vanguard medic did mention that Medic is showing signs of awareness but keeps falling back into the deep coma, so all Vanguard medic can do is keep him alive and hope Medic will soon wake up for real.

"The hell if I know." Eyelander replies. "You alive people all look the same to me. All I need is knowing where that sweet head of yours is so I can chop it off and add it to the collection." It cackles gleefully at the mere thought of taking someone's head off with a clean swing.

"How the bloody hell do you know who I am, then?" Demo wonders out loud as the sword clearly knows the difference between him and the other mercs and Eyelander replies with a hint of annoyance. "Have been in your possession for so long, you have absorbed part of my spirit. Do you think your eye glow is only for show?"
Demo shrugs, must admit he never did much thought about it other: "I thought it was you possessing me."

"Of course, I'm possessing you moron!" The sword snaps irritated back. "But you for some fucking reason is resistance against my powers! It's fucking annoying!"

Demo blinks at this, he wasn't aware he has resistance against Eyelander's powers and before he can ask though, the sword answers his question with its complaining. "It's like you have sold a part of yourself in exchange for this resistance… as if it wasn't bad enough you coat me in that irritating aura of truth." Welp, at least one good thing came out from that sentient magic book did to him. It seems that bombinomicon gave him a weak link to it and thus allowing him some resistance to other dark powers. That does come in handy. "You can thank a book called bombinomicon for that." He remarks to the sword.

"I will thank it by slicing it to pieces."

Demo chuckles roll his eye at the sword remark and return back to his dinner, does look up when Vanguard's pyro walks past him with the heavy, it seems their shift is over too. He watches them and is curious what kind of game they are doing, more so what they are talking about. He decides to socialize a bit with them and asks Rune. "What you two chatting about?"

Rune jumps startled, he's still high on adrenaline from the battle they have just left. Turning he smiles weakly to the fortress Demoman. "Oh, didn't see you there. Well, Wei here was explaining that the acid birds— Zhenniao: they are birds of Japanese legend and supposedly their poison has been used throughout history to assassinate important people." The Demoman blinks in surprise of this, like him, surprised that the legend of the bird is real. "Yeah, it's quite scary to think about such a creature is real. Makes one wonder: are other legends true too? The War Women- or the Sirens are part of a Greek legend, their song can sway any man who hears it." Rune explains.

Does makes Tavish wonder what else is out there, he wouldn't mind to find the Loch Ness Monster and claim he's the one who blew it up. What about dragons? Oh, wait, Ignis said they do not exist, if they did the alicorn would've returned to Equestria a long time ago.
His train of thoughts gets interrupted from Wei speaking, he didn't understand what the Vanguard heavy said though. Fortunately, Rune can and translates. "Wei asks if you would be interested in learning the game we are playing?"
Tavish shrugs. "Why the hell not?" Who knows, he might enjoy it and it will kill the boredom. He takes a seat and allows the two explain to him how the game is played.

Meanwhile, inside the infirmary, Tristan is happy he can for once work as one person now he got his own soul split issue settled. And the Fortress medic's immune system is recovering, although it's going agonizingly slow. A common cold can still kill the man but he can at least now go back and forward without worrying a single bacteria will finish him off.
He does a quick checkup on Josef and sighs as he once again has to give the man another dose of calmative in his drop. It is good the German is showing sign of awareness such as dreams. If those dreams were good, which they aren't. The man is dealing with sincere night terrors, probably from the war, Sophia is dealing with something similar so he's not that surprised. At least this will help Josef get proper sleep and not delay the recovery. With that done, he leaves the German to rest.

Outside, Scout dodges the waves of bullets fired at them by their enemy and much to his annoyance, he does not have a weapon that can return the favor but that should soon change. Leaping over the wall keeping Cowboy safe, he lands beside the male engineer. "How's the teleporter going?"
Smirking Cowboy shows him the large teleporter he has been building, one big enough to bring the whole team and even a nice sized bomb right behind the enemy line. "A few more hours and bye-bye army." Cowboy says.
Jack smirks in return. "Good, at that time, Kreel should have put the other teleporter near the—"

"I wouldn't count on that if I were you." A distorted voice speaks right above them.

"What?!" Jack snaps his head up, eyes meeting a mass of black smoke, form hard to make out, all he is sure of is the glowing white eyes. Before he can aim his pistol at it, the smoke creature leaps from the wall and easily catches him in a choke hold, he gags but tries to get free from its iron grip but all it does it letting the darkness of unconscious approach him quicker.

"Scout!" Cowboy calls horrified that not only a being that should only belong to one's nightmares has caught their team leader but currently chocking the life out from him. Fearing using a gun will compromise Jack's life, Cowboy instead grabs the closet melee weapon which is his wrench and swings it at the monster. It jumps away from the attack but does let go of Jack. The creature dissolves for a moment as it gets onto one of the crates, then it takes form as a sort of equine. It is small, head and tail look to be on fire or maybe it's just the smoke effect it has going but on its forehead is what he presumes is a branch sticking out. Cowboy stares confused at this form the monster decided to take, it doesn't even look scary. "Is that suppose to scare me?" He asks the creature and pulls out a revolver he built.
The creature laughs. "Fear is not what we want from you. Cowboy eyes wide in horror, fearing what it might be hinting at, no, that's impossible, it can't be able to make him summon the flames of rage.
But he has no wish in finding out and shoots at the creature, but his shots don't even seem to hurt this thing one bit. It laughs again, and ready itself. "My turn.

**Ten minutes later.**

"Nice try, you might figure it out someday." Rune laughs when the Fortress demo finally calls quit after have lost the game several times. He does not blame the man, this game is tricky to get the hang of but is quite fun when one does.
He turns to Wei. "Right?" But his smile fades from the deep frown his friend has. "Wei?" and follow Wei's gaze. Francis is standing at the door, that's partly a surprise as his shift isn't over, what's straight out startling is that Francis's arms and shoulders are on fire. What made their male engineer angry? "Francis?" He calls fearfully over to the man, he would've walked over to hear what got Francis all upset but an arm from Wei stops him.

"/Something is not right./" Wei tells his small friend, he can't explain it, but he always got this sixth sense about danger and right now Francis is setting off all the red flags.
His instincts are proven correct once again when Francis, without warning slams his hands onto the ground and a wall of fire races over the floor and the walls. Barely the flames have disappeared before the ceiling begins to fall down, Wei is quick to action, he crushes his crystal and grabs the two others. Thanks to his increased sense of danger and find a safe path, he can dodge the falling ceiling and pull the two others out from danger, only let's go when they are safe in what should've been Jack's sleeping quarters.
He quickly scans Rune for wounds, when sure his small partner is alright, he turns his gaze to Francis. The man is heading to this place's respawn and infirmary is located. His increased danger instincts do tell him where the man is going. "/He is heading to the infirmary./" Rune gasps and tells him horrified. "/Even if he had his powers; Tristan doesn't stand a chance against Francis!/" He nods in agreement, in fact when Francis first decides to go on the attack… no one can stop him. The man might not appear like it but Francis is incredibly dangerous when he first goes on the attack.

Inside the infirmary, Tristan swiftly gets up from his chair of the sound of destruction. He fears the enemy has managed to get past the others- he can't let them get the respawn! He grabs his crossbow and runs to the door, does stop when a Francis on fire is blocking his way. "Cowboy? What's going on?" He demands the man. "Where's the… wait" He realizes Francis shouldn't be on fire, he has used both his power gems!
Tristan aims his crossbow at the man. "Who are you?! What have you done to the real Cowboy?!" He demands but all he gets is a laugher and what he thinks is an imposter tells him.

"You cannot stop it." The shadow that possessed Cowboy speaks through the man before it lets him back in control, by its power, Cowboy has become blind of this amplified rage. He does not see a friend before him, only a man who dared to harm his child. Cowboy lets out a roar and charges at the man and the flames not only forces the man to let go of his weapon but fall on his knees of the rage Cowboy feels from constantly seeing that small body on the floor, bathed in her own blood.
The man tries to do one desperate attack, but even in his blind rage; Cowboy remembers his own special training and with the strength from having done hard work most of his life, he deflects the attack and hit the arm hard enough to break it. The man yelps in pain but he's not done with his daughter's murder, far from it. Grabbing the lasso, he straps it around the man's neck and stomps on it, forcing the soldier to the floor. He watches the man gag for air several seconds. Then, through the rage the Shadow Pony amplifies in him, he sees Tristan, slowly suffocating by his hand. Francis wants to stop, he has no wish in harming his comrade but the Shadow Pony has too strong of a hold on him so all he can do for the medic is give him the mercy of a quick death. With a single hard pull, the neck snaps and the man falls limp to the floor.
By the dark whispers of the shadow pony inside his head, Cowboy walks into the infirmary, right to where the second man he wanted to kill lies.
Part of him remembers there is not really a need to murder the German, the man proved his worth by saving his wife and Rune life, but that part of his thoughts are easily whisked away by the dark being controlling him. Unlike Tristan who he cares about, Cowboy does not care enough about the German to find a cause to put up a fight against the Shadow Pony.
He destroys the plastic wall that protects Josef against bacterias, through the burning plastic, he approaches the completely defenseless man.
He grabs Josef around the throat and lifts the man up from the bed, stands like this for a moment, watching almost curiously the seemly sleeping man.
"So much power once, now reduced to a sampling husk. Killing you will be considered mercy." Cowboy speaks, partly himself and partly the Shadow Pony holding him hostage.
Slowly Josef opens his eyes, they are unfocused and the chance he's not aware of the situation is great. Cowboy tighten the grip around the throat, and the doctor didn't react but before the air gets completely blocked, Cowboy's grip loosens and he gasps both in surprise and pain from the scalpel now embedded into his neck.

A small smirk crawls on Medic's face, and although he cannot see who the attacker is, he knows he got them good. The attacker lets go of his throat and he drops back onto the bed, the time has greatly weakened his body, so if this does not kill the attacker then he's done for it as he used practically all his strength on that single strike. The attacker staggers back and the scalpel leaves the neck, by the sound of how the man is struggling to breathe it looks like he got the air pipe. Now he really would like to know where his glasses are, he does wonder how fast before the body suffocate from a ruined windpipe, sadly all he can do is listen to the attacker struggling to keep breathing and staggers to stay on his feet.
Must give the man credit though, even without air, the attacker tries to finish the job, from how the man is standing it looks like he has a gun. Now he really would like to move.

Letting out a battle scream, Demo charges at Cowboy who is not on fire anymore from that fine deep cut over his throat. He is not sure who gave it to him, only he has to save the doc as he does not want to test if respawn now works on him nor face Heavy's anger that he didn't protect their team healer. He swings Eyelander and the man's head flies off in a nice arc, dropping to the floor right beside his feet and after a second of delay, the headless body drops to the floor as well; soaking it in the man's blood.
Demo watches the dead engineer for a moment, then turns his gaze to where Medic lies. He's quite surprised to see the doc's eyes are open, not aiming at him though. "You awake doc?" He asks.
Slowly Medic nods, his mouth open and closes a few times as if he's having trouble to speak, then with a very croaked voice; the German asks "Wh…Where are… are my… glasses?" Demo stares dumbfounded at him for several seconds, then he burst out laughing.
Of all questions; that was his first, typical Medic.
Still laughing, Demo walks past the burned plastic wall and checks the table standing beside doc's bed. "Nice see you didn't kick the bucket, doc." He says to Medic. "Seriously thought you were a goner." He finds the spectacle and hands them to Medic, the German puts them on and stares almost emptily at the body of Cowboy, after a moment of silence. Medic speaks. "…Why… Why did….he…?"
Before he can finish the sentence the whole place gets blasted with a siren coming from the respawn room. Demo jumps startled and runs over to the door, calling out for the female engineer who has just run past. "Ey, what's going on?!"

Engie stops and tells the Fortress Demoman the situation. "The respawn power is being reverted— all of them are and I can't stop it!" She shouts back the noise of the sirens.

What the hell? He has never heard of that happen, "Where is the power going?!" He calls back and does hope Cowboy will be able to respawn. He really does not want to get on Kreel's bad side.
Much to his relief, Francis leaves the respawn room, he looks quite beaten up but alive. "To the alpha respawn." Francis explains and turns off the alarm, he then strokes his fingers over his neck. "Not sure why though— how's your medic doing?" He suddenly asks.
"Alive." Demo replies simply.
Cowboy nods and turns to the respawn room, calling inside. "I think I sat the decontamination wall on fire, is that a problem?" and the Vanguard medic appears, he looks grumpier than usual. "I wouldn't have set it up if he hadn't needed it. Let's hope no one with bacteria filled hands has touched him."
Demo feels quite awkward about that remark and Tristan must've noticed it as the doctor sighs. "Wonderful…" and leaves to check on Medic.

"Status report!" Scout commands and runs over to the two engineers. Engie is the one who explains the situation. "For some reason, the alpha respawn is drawing all the power from the others around the world, including this one." and both turn to the nearest computer showing the data of the respawn. The report of the one they have here is losing power has started to glitch out and after a few seconds, new words appear.
'Alpha respawn shield: 96%'
Jack stares in horror at the sign, the alpha respawn is protecting itself but it's only a matter of time before it runs out of power. They can't risk that.
He activates the intercom to the whole base. "The alpha respawn is under attack! Return to base and gear up!" He commands them and follows his own command by running over and grab his gear. Right as he reaches out for his scattergun, he notices that his shadow against the wall but it should be on the floor… Scout stares when his wall shadow suddenly 'turns' to him and smiles, he jumps away right that second and dodges a humanoid— thing leap out from the wall and this black smoke with white glowing eyes lands on all four before him. The shape is different but there's no doubt this is the same thing that knocked him out outside. Scout aims his gun at this freaky thing but he never pulls the trigger for right there it has turned fully human, side blown up, face bloodied from shrapnel yet still he recognizes the face. Scout stares in horror at the face of his closet friend, one he watched die on the beach of Omaha, he knows this is not Pete, he knows this is just a trick but he… he can't shoot. The trigger of terror of being on that living hell of a beach again has him frozen up. 'Pete' ruined face twist unnaturally and once again a black being, the monster jumps at him. Jack is too traumatized to fight back this time, he doesn't even hear Engie's voice cry for him.

"Get away from him!" Demo roars and swings the orange glowing Eyelander and the humanoid Shadow Pony, the creature jerks away from Jack and saves the Vanguard scout from being possessed. The shadow creature jumps onto the wall, now looking more like a freaky animal. It twists its head unnaturally and with a wide grin, it leaps at him. So quick and hard that it managed to knock Eyelander out from his hand and he is so happy he wears the silver necklace of the element, probably the only thing saving him from experience a possession which he hears is excruciatingly painful. He punches the shadow being in what he thinks is the face, grabs Eyelander and right at it moves to jump at him again, he jags the sword into it and hard into the floor, skewing it in place. The shadowy human sneers and hisses like a ferociously animal, trying to get free but the power of the element is keeping it in place.
Demo glares down to the trapped Shadow Pony and is more than surprised that he succeed in trapping it.

The others run into the supply room, all stop in the scene of Chio comforting a deeply traumatized Jack and not far off, Tavish pushing his orange glowing sword into a thing that looks like a black ghost. That until it decides to take a more human form.
Heavy eyes wide in recognition of the form the Shadow Pony took, it's the form of a past Sniper. One he fought against and remembers was the one who had the habit of shooting one in the legs or stomach, his way to slow one down and preferred letting others do the kill for him.

"W-What is that?" Amadi asks, freaked out of what that thing did right before their eyes. Now it looks like some a man with a sword plunged through his stomach. His fellow Demoman answers his question. "It's a Shadow Pony. They are like the devil himself." the 'Shadow Pony' smirks in response to that. Amadi is not a fearful man, but that thing scares him. "Can you- can you kill it?"

Tavish eyes the trapped thing, other than being trapped, it does not look that bothered by having a sword through its gut. He does try to see if he can put enough power of the element through Eyelander and kill the thing.
The Shadow Pony looks up to him. "You don't have the full power to banish me. Your connection to the power is fading."
"What the bloody hell are you blabbering on about?" Demo demands.

"The destruction of the machine and the connection is broken." The man speaks, eyeing the orange glowing sword. "and the force of Honesty will no longer trap me."

So he can force it to speak the truth, that might give them answers as it's clear this is the Shadow Ponies doing. "How many of you is there at the alpha respawn?"

"I am the only one in this realm, thrown by one who thought he was the Conduit. Thought banishment would save his realm but all it did was cause trouble for yours."

At least it did give some information, even if it was obscure as shit. Then to his horror, the Shadow Pony says still with that smug look on its face.

"Harmony calls for your aid, but that will be so unfair. Even the odds, a wizard of Night and a blind, death by the sword of Truth. If their lives are not worth your prolonged youth, go forth and leave them to die in despair."

"You bloody motherfucking devil— leave my mom out from this!" Tavish roars down to it but before he can try and cut its head off, the shadow pony somehow gets free and he gets flung into the others.
The disguised Shadow Pony grabs Eyelander and the orange glow fades. It stares in a strange wonder at the sword, then smirks. "Ah, a spectral of a once strong warrior, forced to live as a mere tool for the living. Sword of a Long Dead, cut the ties to the man thinking he's your master, serve us and you will be paired up with a worthy warrior."
Demo feels very offended by this, does this shadow devil think he's not worthy of Eyelander's might? He and the ghost inside the sword have been fighting side by side for so long now, can even say they have become friends. But… he knows how much Eyelander loves to chop people's head off and more than once has proven not to really care about his mother. "Eyelander, don't do it!" He calls for the sword, desperately hoping Eyelander hold just a tiny bit of loyalty to him.

Eyelander is quiet for a painfully long time, the offer this being made is really tempting, it admits that but… never going to say it out loud, but it has come to like Tavish, they have been through a lot of good killing sprees and has an understanding it rarely got from its wielders. "I may be malicious but no fucking way I'll help with that!" It replies the dark being. "He might be a drunkard and too soft at some points but I belong to this guy. I won't help you." and really wish it has hands or legs right now as it does not like what this dark being says. "Oh you will help us; after a few improvements." It has no choice than to be taken by this being.

So much of this Halloween being boring, but he would take boring over the threat of his mother's life any day. Demo jumps on his feet, take his weapons and quickly runs off to reach his home.
"Demo!" Heavy calls for him. Demo only stops to say this to the big guy. "You'll have to take care of the respawn without me!" Before he starts running again. He does not expect the remaining of his team to give up the ability to respawn for his old mother and Merasmus safety. Jane might've gone with him, he is friends with the crazy wizard but he's not here so Demo is alone on this.

For a few seconds no one moves, then Garry's voice cuts through the silence. "Gear up people." and team Vanguard does.

Pyro shift on her feet, not sure what to do.

Heavy eyes her, quietly agreeing that he too is not sure if he should leave Demo behind for the sake of respawn. Yes, protecting respawn is really important and they might need all the firepower they can use, but Heavy also knows the feeling of wanting to keep his family safe. Pyro looks up to him, he might not be able to see her eyes or face because of the gas mask but the sense she is asking him for what they should do is very transparent. He lets out a sigh, well it seems everyone but him sees him as the team leader, so he might as well act like one. "We will not go." He speaks to the other team.
Jack, who has recovered from his encounter with the Shadow Pony eyes him perplexed. "We are going to need all the firepower we can get."

Heavy knows that but leaving that Shadow Pony to roam around is a really bad idea too. "You protect respawn. We kill shadow man. He big threat."

Jack opens his mouth to argue but Francis speaks before he can. "I shot that thing several times and it didn't do squat. Do you have any weapon that can hurt it?" Now that Francis said it, he realizes that none of their weapons could harm that thing, except Tavish sword.

Mikhail nods. "Yes, we have weapons for shadow man." The Russian nods to Pyro and she trots over to get their weapons, He then turns back to Jack. "You defend respawn." Jack nods slowly and knowing they will need the firepower, Heavy tells Ignis. "You help them." The alicorn simply nods, quite a surprise really, he thought Ignis wouldn't obey a mere man like him. Not going to question it though. Heavy grabs his own weapons and trots over to get Medic.

"Mikhail!" Jack calls after the big Russian, the man stops and has a look of surprise when Jack tells him. "Keep the radio code, in case we need another team-up in the future." Mikhail hesitates, then nods and after have told their pyro something, he walks down to get their team medic.

Garry smiles weakly and he grabs his weapon, glad that even with everything, the two teams separate on good terms with one another.

"Josef." Heavy calls softly as he removes the monitors from the German, he wasn't really expecting a reaction, so he got quite the surprise when Josef opens his eyes and slowly turns around to him. "What's going on?" He asks hoarsely. Heavy stares a few seconds, to then breaks it with a smile and hugs him, carefully though. "Thought I lost you…" He whispers and so glad he did not have to bring a comatose man with them. "We leave, Demoman need us." Josef simply nods and lets Heavy pick him up. On the way out, Josef speaks in his weakened voice. "…Not ready… to die just yet…" Heavy eyes him, a first a bit confused, then he smiles in a joy that Josef has found a reason to live. "Good, not ready let go either." He replies as he carries the doctor outside and is glad Pyro managed to stop Demo from driving off alone.

"Thanks, mate." Demo thanks Heavy. From what Pyro told him, the big guy was the one who chose to help him instead of protecting the alpha respawn. Heavy simply nods, helps Medic inside Sniper's camper. "You know way?" He asks and Demo replies. "Ay." He knows this area enough to know where he should go and what route they should take to avoid that stupid army.

"You drive." Heavy simply says and jumps into the back as well, at first he lets Josef walk but it soon gets clear the doctor does not have the strength for it, so he gently grab Josef and lifts him over to the small couch built inside the camper. He sits down beside him and wraps his arm over him. He notices Josef tense up from this move, about to ask if he's in pain but forgets all about it when Miss Pauling voice suddenly asks. "Room for one more?" and she takes a seat on the couch before them.
On reflex Heavy removes his arm from Medic, he tenses up but his voice does not show it as he asks her. "Why come?" and notices it is only one of the Miss Paulings. "Where is other you?"

"She's staying behind, thought it would be best." and she admits sheepishly, mostly because she did not want to pick another catfight with her other. "And well… I've gotten used to you guys." Sure team Vanguard wouldn't mind having her around and she knows they will take good care of her other, until the day she figures out what makes her attack herself but she thinks she prefers Fortress and their crazy shenanigans over Vanguards careful but deadly strategy. She does notice Heavy is tense and it's pretty clear why but here she has good news to him. "You're not the first couple I have dealt with in Mann Co, you two have however been the only ones that used your relationship in the war." Medic struggles to sit up straight and he remarks grinning to her. "…All is fair… in love and war… frauline.." This makes Heavy chuckles, which sounds like rumbling of thunder. Miss Pauling laughs softly too. "That we can agree on— uh guys." She stops herself in a surprise of what her eyes caught on Sniper bunk bed. "We have a store away."

Heavy turns around and blinks when his eyes meet a white hare lying on the bed, the same one they saw in Poland when he noticed the collar around its neck as the hare gets on its feet.
Miss Pauling gets up and reaches out for the hare, noticing the same collar and asks his thoughts. "Hey, isn't this the hare from Warsaw?" She picks up the tame hare and carries it over to the table where the animal takes another nap, completely unfazed by them staring dumbfounded at it.
"It is." Heavy replies and do wonder how the animal got here, but it's not like the hare can answer him.

Author's Note:

man this is a long one, and sorry it took this long but it has been really busy for me.

if anyone either wants to make a drawing or have suggestions for me to make one, feel free to either.

Comments

[Hexan Tronic]

Another good chapter. I'm thinking that channeling their elements through the projectile weapons might work on the Shadows, thought I could be wrong.