A short story

[Iggy]

A TFC Story.
Written by Iggy(Ignorant Florist)

I showed up ahead of time, as I usually do. The match still had a while before starting. I found my locker, pulled out the hard hat and started changing clothes. I looked at my trusty spanner, noted some new dents on it, and decided it would soon be time for a new one. Perhapse once this match was over…if I lived through it.

Ihmhi, Cybergunn, Craan, and several others I didn’t recognize came in joking and laughing. I glanced at the roster, and saw Damit and Mexican Sniper on the opposing team. Damit is like me, a basement dweller when on Defense. He likes to hide in the same places that I do. We make a good pair when we are on the same team.

The others started changing, and I left them be. I was dressed in my freshly made uniform, my rail gun holstered at my side, my super-shotgun slung over my back. I went into the resupply room, got armour, grenades, and enough metal and ammo to build my Sentry. 2fort, as it’s commonly called, is fairly easy to defend, but the defense must be set up quickly. Or else the enemy teams scouts and medics can cause havoc and disrupt the whole team. If that happens, we are in for a long night.

The other guys came in and gathered supplies. I listened to their banter for a moment, then began my mental prep for the match. One of the guys I didn’t recognize was wearing the enemies colours. Spy. I hope he was good at it, most spies don’t last long around here. He looked young, but you can’t equate age with experience. Lots of young guys do well, and have lots of experience.

Thirty more seconds, and the match starts. I stood by the door, a scout, two medics, the spy, and a HW waiting with me. The HW was massive. I had never seen this guy before, but the chain-gun looked like a toy in his hands. He wore a name tag that read, “Goliath”. Nice name.

The door opened, and we rushed out. I ran toward the elevator since it was faster than the spiral. As I reached it, I heard the “whoomp” of a concussion, or “conc” grenade. I turned to look behind me, and felt a needle in my chest. An enemy medic had gotten through FAST, and just gave me a dose of poison. I froze. He ran past me, and dropped down the elevator shaft. Within 10 seconds, I heard the inevitable announcement, “The Enemy Team Has Your Flag” over the intercom. The pain was horrible, but I started building my SG at the top of our elevator. Once it was assembled, I dropped down the elevator shaft, and the platform rose to meet me. As it reached it’s pinnacle, I heard that familiar “whoomp” again and then a splat. The platform dropped back to the bottom where I saw the medic laying on the ground. His head tilted at a bizarre angle that told me he would not be getting back up. The flag was leaning against the wall where it was dropped.

I ran into the basement resupply, and re-up’d my health and ammo. I was still hurting, the infection was spreading…but I had to get that sentry up. I took the elevator back to the top and upgraded the thing. Before I could drop back down, a team mate, a medic, came into the room and gave me an anti-dote to the poison. I thanked him, repaired his armour, and went back for more supplies.

I had finished the sentry, and began patrolling the basement. Our flag returned to it’s starting position in the flag room, and I helped another engineer set up his sentry. He told me his name was “Xeon”. I could hear our Offense guys communicating. Cybergunn was reporting sniper positions, and Craan was running their flag out like a madman. We had already scored 3 caps.

Since that first medic, none of the enemy team had gotten into our basement. It was getting a little boring down here, but that was ok. Boring meant an easy night.

I heard footsteps coming down the long hallway. Xeon and I turned and saw one of our medics enter the room. Xeon walked over to him to fix his armour. The medic pulled out a knife and with a single shot to the heart, put Xeon on the floor, his overalls turning a darker red than ever intended. Xeon’s SG gave off a sound that indicated target lock. It began to fire it’s twin cannons at the enemy spy. The spy was riddled with bullets while being shoved backwards by the impact of the volley. The spy attempted to throw a grenade, but it landed at his feet.

I hit my mic button, “Xeon is down! Need a medic to our flag room, NOW!! Beware of enemy spies!!”

I was stunned by this sudden appearance of an enemy in our flag room. For the first time in my career, I was getting nervous. Xeon was no noobie, nor was I. Yet that spy fooled us both. Being distracted like this could be fatal. Goliath strode into the room, grinning like an idiot in a toy store. He spun his gun up a little, but didn’t fire. He stood next to our flag.

“Kamen”, the medic who had healed me earlier, ran into the room and got to work on Xeon. It didn’t look good, but Kamen looked like he knew what he was doing. I checked the status of my sentry, and noticed it was getting low on ammo. I ran to the resupply, then went to the elevator.

As I stepped on the platform, it began to rise. I heard the familiar tinkling of a grenade bouncing on the floor and the sound of a nail-gun’s rapid fire. My SG was taking damage, and lots of it. As the elevator reached the top, the SG exploded. I felt shrapnel tear through my body and the force of the explosion sent me back into the wall, and I fell down the shaft. I don’t remember landing.

I came back to consciousness…Kamen and another medic were standing over me. I recognized my old friend, Cybergunn. He looked relieved to see me still breathing.

They told me that Xeon didn’t make it. We had won the match, 60 - 10. At ten points per cap, we did well. Several of the new guys didn’t survive the match, including that spy I noticed at the beginning of the match.

Most of the regulars made it through the match, but I heard later that several guys I had known on the other team, didn’t make it either.

This is a brutal “game” we play….but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Team Fortress isn’t just a game….it’s a way of life.

[skuLL]

You call this short? come on!


Anyway, it was pretty nice (:

[Iggy]

Heh, considering I wrote it in 15 minutes....yeah, I'd consider it short. lol

Glad you liked it Skull! I hope everyone else does.

[nodnarb]

Originally Posted by Iggy

Heh, considering I wrote it in 15 minutes....yeah, I'd consider it short. lol

Glad you liked it Skull! I hope everyone else does.

I just read it, and it was pretty good, good job!

[SkynYrd]

sweet.. I've always wondered how TFC would be portrayed in a movie, given the respawn and such.

and YES, I have had a dream before where I was in a real TFC match. Funniest thing though was that the other guys were people from school who didnt even play TFC. I felt like such a fucking nerd when I woke up...

[Ihmhi]

You think this is good? You should see his book!

But yeah, I just visited Iggy yesterday... gotta say, out of all of the stuff of his that I have read, this is some of the best.

Edit: New user title!

[TheWetMule]

I haven't read many books, nor many stories, only the few that grip my attention and you sir, had all of my attention throughout that, I loved it.

[lobo]

I liked it!

[Iggy]

Thanks guys! I'm really glad everyone(so far) has liked it. I'll have to post some of my other short stories...or, more accurately, make them available for download. I wrote a crossover story between the original 1978 Battlestar Galactica and Star Trek: Next Generation that went over very well. I have been working on a sequel for a long time...but life has managed to put that on hold.

Thanks for the plug, IHMHI! That reminds me, though...I need to check ebay and see if anyone wants a copy. (I have 13 signed copies left).

I need to step up my search for "My Teenage Daughter Wants to Get Married"....a story I wrote in college, which earned me the only A in the class for that assignment. You guys will ROTFLOL at that one.

[Deadly Furby]

I'm preparing Part III in my Fortress series. Here's my last best seller in the trilogy:
A Fortress Forever Tale (Part II)

[Iggy]

^^^ That's great! Let me know when the next one is done!

[zSilver_Fox]

Well written... just not in the style I like. I'm not a fan of first-person accounts written in that kind of manner. However, it's good stuff.

[StatisticZ]

Nice story.. Hate playing with Mexican Sniper and some others on D2F tho =/. Mexican Sniper is kind of a hyprocrite. He'll launch himself onto the battlements with a nade, and snipe people exiting sniper respawn hiding in the corner of the door, but if you do it it's a kick lol.