Oh, yesyesyes, this is so cute and sweet, I love it, I can't even tell you how much. :3 Hope you update soon so I can lavish you with more love and admiration! X3

(Now go, Medic, run and find your man, and have many mushy keeses.)

oh god what the fuck. did not know this was going to turn into gay erotica.

>>16
It's tf2chan. Everything ends up gay erotica. If you aren't interested in it then just do what I do and skim over that part.

My gosh, is this my first love bump? Ooo, I'm all a-quiver. Thanks for all the love, guys!

>>16 HAH, SUCKS TO BE YOU! You know, the third chapter did have a warning on it, so lern 2 be reading?

Next chapter is written, now in long process of editing. Expect it by the end of the week. Maybe.

Djfhdsjdkd so awesome. I can't wait for more!

Poor Medic, with his neurotic pets. They remind me of mine-- I can picture my cat tripping over something and landing in pickled eyeballs.

Oh wow. I love everything about this. Especially the melodrama. I'm giggling in anticipation about how Medic will handle Spy finding out.


All Medic needs is an evil twin and this will be my new favorite soap opera.

>>20
Medic's birds may or may not be based on my cats...

>>21
Medic evil twin I PROMISE I WILL MAKE THIS HAPPEN

-------


The kitchen was empty when Medic passed through, which was disappointing because he’d been rather hoping he hadn’t missed lunch. A proper meal would have to wait, though; there were more pressing matters to which to attend. Undeterred, he grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and headed to the common room, where he found Pyro curled up behind a comic book and Scout on the floor glued to the television, in their usual arrangement.

“Oh hey, the Doc’s back!” Scout rolled over onto his back in lieu of actually bothering to get up. “How ya doin’?”

“Better zan you if you don’t take off zose muddy boots before Soldier sees you,” Medic said with a wicked grin, prodding the offending footwear with his toe as he passed. “It took me two hours to scrub ze bloodstains out last time, don’t make me do it again. Hello, Pyro.” Pyro gave a cheery thumbs-up from the armchair. “Do you know vere Heavy is?”

“Ain’t he with you? He didn’t come to lunch, we assumed you guys were talkin’ about, I dunno, guns and books and comin’ from weird places and crap like that. Musta been pretty interesting, ain’t like him to miss food.”

“No. No, it’s not-” Medic was interrupted by an explosion of laughter from the television. “Are you vatching Bevitched?”

“They’re re-runs. Ain’t nothin’ else on,” Scout complained, turning back over. “Freakin’ stupid anyway. How come no-one notices she’s always twitchin’ her nose and then weird crap happens. I mean, if my girl’s nose was all twitchy ‘n’ stuff I’d take her to a doctor ‘cause that ain’t right, man, y’know what I mean...”

As Scout continued to detail, at great length and volume, all of Bewitched’s shortcomings, Medic escaped out into the corridor. After a pause to consider his next move he headed in the direction of the sleeping quarters, nibbling at the apple.

He was about half-way there when the Spy appeared out of thin air in a cloud of blue smoke and grabbed his arm. It was a testament to the solid steel nerves he had developed working for BLU that Medic only choked on the apple very briefly.

“Intel room,” said Spy conspiratorially over Medic’s coughing, not letting go of the doctor’s arm.

“V-vat?”

“Go to ‘im, docteur.”

“Vat are you talking about?” Medic straightened up, having won the tense battle with the piece of fruit and looking only slightly the worse for wear.

“Ze intel room. Go to ‘im,” Spy repeated, and there was a flash of something strange in his usually unreadable eyes – pity? “Go, before it is too late.” Then he was gone in another cloud of smoke, leaving Medic puzzled, and then extremely worried. Who was ‘he’? Could he have been talking about Heavy? It was well-known that Spy considered it his prerogative to poke his nose into other people’s business; naturally, he claimed that it was his job to know. Could he have seen them in the infirmary? If he had, did he intend to pass on this knowledge? Despite his insistence that he was a Proper Gentleman, it would not be surprising for Spy to engage in blackmail, even of his own teammates, but Medic was no stranger to extortion and that expression hadn’t been one of a man about to name a price. What did it mean?

“Ve vill discuss zis later, Spy!” Medic declared to the apparently empty air, and then, because he felt he ought to make it sound a little more threatening, “I know vhere you sleep!” That sounded weak even to him, but it would have to do. The Hypothesis was burning at the back of his skull, like an itch he couldn’t scratch, and he needed an answer, not more distractions. He turned on his heel and headed for the intelligence room.

His route took him past the corridor to the old Respawn room. Rumour around the base had it that the machinery in that room had once been able to pick the dead right off the battlefield and bring them back to life in a matter of seconds. This was probably nonsense, though. If it were true, it would be a marvel of science, but Medic had never known the machine to work and the only person who claimed to have witnessed it was Soldier, whose testimony was questionable at best. Engineer had once tried to get it running, but after spending two weeks in amongst the tubes and valves he had declared that he couldn’t find a durn’d thing wrong with it, and appeals to BLU headquarters for advice had come back with the same two-word order: ‘Don’t die.’ So they’d locked the door and done as they were told.

The intelligence room was only a little way past Respawn, but the walk seemed to last a lifetime. Finally, Medic stopped outside the door, lifted his hand to the keypad and paused. What was he going to say? He hadn’t really done this before, but he was pretty sure that you weren’t supposed to start with ‘Hello, I’m madly in love with you, I don’t suppose the feeling is mutual?’. This was going to require some subtlety, and he’d never been very good at subtle. He took a deep breath, punched in the code and opened the door.

Heavy was sat at the desk behind a mountain of books, and looked up as Medic entered with an expression rather like a child caught with his hand in the biscuit barrel.

“Doktor! Er...” Heavy set about frantically closing all the various books spread across the desktop; most of them looked to be in Russian but the largest one was a Russian-English dictionary absolutely bristling with bookmarks. “You are better, da?” One over-enthusiastically slammed cover sent several sheets of densely handwritten and liberally annotated Cyrillic sliding to the floor. Heavy muttered something that sounded like a curse.

“I’m... fine, sank you.” Medic tried to sound casual and didn’t do very well. “Vat are you doing?”

“Nothing,” said Heavy a little too quickly, standing up. “Is... is nothing, doktor.” His face, however, said otherwise. Starting to regret this course of action but now fully committed, Medic fell back on a classic.

“Ve need to talk.”

Heavy bit his lip and looked pained. “Da, Doktor,” he said meekly.

There was a terrible, awkward silence. There was so much that Medic wanted to say, but where could he even begin? He couldn’t possibly start to explain all the wonderful feelings, the strange thoughts and the unspeakable desires bubbling and seething under his skin like the concoctions in his second-year biochemistry labs. He cleared his throat and beat a coward’s retreat. “You first?”

Heavy sighed. “I... I cannot. Is too difficult, too much. I cannot find right words. T’ings are different in English,” he said mournfully. “T’ings mean different t’ings. Is too much—ugh, what is phrase?— too much room for mistakes.”

Medic’s eyes widened. “Zat’s... zat’s vat you’re doing here, isn’t it?” he asked, almost to himself, looking around at the books and paper with a new wonder. “Searching for vords.”

“I am sorry, Doktor,” Heavy said, frowning at a point somewhere above Medic’s shoulder.

In the glass retort of Medic’s heart, the solution of emotions began to turn the horrible brown colour which meant throwing the whole damn mess down the sink and trying again, and this time it was going to take more than turning up the gas to salvage the situation.

“Zen don’t use vords,” said Medic’s mouth suddenly, without the consent of his brain, and the frown slid off Heavy’s face as slowly and surely as the sunrise. He took a couple of cautious steps towards Medic, as though the doctor was some small animal that might take fright if he moved too suddenly, and lifted one finger equally slowly to the large yellow-brown streak across Medic’s cheek.

“What happened?”

“Archimedes happened,” said Medic, by way of explanation, grateful to finally have something to say. “It’s iodine. I hope it vill come off eventually.”

Heavy smiled knowingly. “Is trouble, dat one. Is not your colour,” he added with a wink.

Medic felt he should congratulate his friend on a truly masterful change of topic, but Heavy’s fingers seemed reluctant to leave his face. As he thought this, those same fingers slid down his cheek and along his jaw-line to gently cradle his face, and the worrisome mixture deep inside him sublimed into a beautiful vapour the colour of the eyes now holding his own. This was it, he realised dizzily. The time for subtlety was long past, now Heavy was standing right there stroking Medic’s cheek with his thumb and looking at him like that with those terrible, beautiful eyes and it was now or never because if Medic didn’t get it out right now he was going to explode.

“Heavy, I l-“

“ATTENTION! WE ARE UNDER ATTACK!” The intercom interjected with its usual charm and the beautiful vapour combusted violently, showering glass everywhere.

“I VAS TALKING!” Medic screamed at the air. He had been so close! Five more seconds, that was all he needed! “No, no, zis is not happening!”

“Quiet, Doktor.” And, of course, Heavy was infuriatingly un-rattled, although there was a unusually intense edge to his voice now as he grabbed Medic’s shoulders hard enough to bruise. “You get medigun, meet me outside. We will talk later.”

“Promise?” Medic asked desperately as he removed Heavy’s hands, and was it just him or did Heavy hold the contact just a fraction of a second longer than necessary?

“Promise.”

“Fine. I vill hold you to zat!” Medic called over his shoulder as he took off at a run for the infirmary, cursing under his breath all the way. Some unfortunate RED was going to suffer dearly for this.

...I hate you. And I'll hate you even more if you don't update soon!

OMFG Evil twins! Yes!

Is Spy a possible HeavyMedic fangirl? Thats the vibe I got from him.

I love reading the first chapter and seeing how it got here. It's so different. Did you have an idea in mind or are you just kinda wingin it?

Anyways, I enjoy this derpy romance and the characters trying to make it serious. Tis amusing.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

Call me silly and melodramatic, but I really like the use of that type of interuption in stories. Unless it actually kills someone or happens a million times.

Have a sniffing suspicion that heavy might die, that promise thing oh lawds.

I love every single syllable of this fic. Your attention to little details is so precious.
And Heavy with a bookmarked dictionary is absolutely the best thing ever. He reminds me of myself, many years ago, trying to master this language.
...although I didn't have a pretty Medic to confess my undying love and devotion to.

>>26
NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO!
Make it work
deathfics are not happy
nononononononono
if heavy dies, I might... just... just... make a comment that says "this is sad and I don't like it"

I hope the Heavy doesn't die :c Oh god oh god.

I really enjoy this! Almost every fic has the Medic completely steely and collected, it's really fun to see him kind of flustered.

All my love for Heavy's bookmarks and his desire to learn English for his doctor, as well as the doctor himself and trying to get the right words out at the wrong time. The Announcer is a terrible cockblocker.

You write wonderfully and you have my full attention for whenever you update next.

I'm popping my chan cherry just to say this: please, I beg you, KILL NO ONE. Out of all the fics I've read in the past few weeks, this is one of my dearest favorites. I love, love, LOVE this Medic and Heavy, and you will break my heart forever if they don't have a happy ending.

Please, please let them live. I love this fic so much, I don't want it to hurt me...!

I make no comment on the eventual fates of anyone involved here, but in response to >>24 yes, I am winging it utterly and have no idea where we're going.

(Captcha: 1796, pstifin. 18th century AU? And tiffin, you say? What a good idea, Captcha!)

*holds head in hands* Oh god, I didn't even think it was *possible* you might kill someone until the other people started to beg you not to do it. Now I'm scared D:

But I still love this story so muuuuuuch, I can't even say it right. Eagerly looking forward to the next update, love!

I say kill heavy. Your first post show you can write intense scenes magically.

HURRY THE FUCK UP AND UPDATE

35 Calm yourself and be patient.

>>35
THE NEXT CHAPTER IS WRITTEN. NEEDS EDITING. SO MANY WORDS.

>>36
I really don't mind in the slightest. It's been a while since someone actually cared what I was writing.

I hope this delivers. I also hope I never have to write a fight scene ever again. I think I shall be scarred for life.

=====

Exactly four minutes and forty-three seconds later, Medic peered cautiously around the frame of the base’s main entrance and took stock of the battlefield. The sound of gunfire reached his ears, but from this position, he couldn’t see any of what was happening. In front of the base the land flattened out before sinking, and the edge of the plateau was marked with jagged rocks that gave an approximation of cover. The brunt of the RED attack would come up from the west, where the land sloped downwards towards the grey shape of one of the mysterious control points; BLU had the advantage of higher ground at present, but if they wanted to push down to the point they’d be wide open to artillery and sniper fire.

To the left of the field, Sniper had found a gap between two rocks wide enough for a scope and was scanning the field, and to the right was Heavy, crouched behind a particularly large outcropping with his minigun in hand. He looked back and caught sight of Medic, and gestured him over. Medic nodded in acknowledgement, took a deep breath and made a break for the rocks immediately in front of him; he fetched up against the stone beside Engineer and the beginnings of a dispenser.

“Afternoon, Doc!” said Engineer cheerily, given the dispenser a solid whack, and Medic marvelled at his ability to keep up such a light-hearted disposition in the middle of battle. “Feelin’ better?”

“Yes, sank you. How are ve doing?”

“Dunno, everything’s happening right down the hill. Haven’t heard a thing-“ Engineer’s reply was immediately invalidated as a blue shape came flying over the rocks and landed on its back in front of them with the crunch of vertebrae.

“Awright! Doc! Hardhat!”

“Dangit, Scout!” Engineer scolded as Medic locked the medigun beam on the prone Scout with a sigh. “Now, what’s happenin’ up front?”

Scout picked himself up and brushed off red dust. “Thanks, Doc. Right, me ‘n’ Solly ‘n’ Pyro’ve got ‘em on the run, but ya gotta haul this-“ He punctuated his sentence with a kick to the dispenser. “-down there or we’re gonna be screwed. ‘kay?”

“Sure thing, partner,” Engineer agreed and Scout took off back down the hill, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like “...freakin’ REDs makin’ me miss my freakin’ show...”. Medic stuck his head quickly over the rock.

“About a hundred yards down, on ze right?” he suggested. There, what remained of some sort of wooden hut rose out of the dust. Engineer took a quick look to confirm.

“Looks good, but ah’m gonna need some cover fire.”

“Heavy and I vill handle zat,” said Medic. He checked that the coast was clear, then dashed across the gap to where Heavy was waiting, ducking to avoid being brained by a stray shell.

“Engineer needs cover?” Heavy asked. Medic nodded.

“On my mark...” Medic peered around the rock, one hand in the air to signal to Engineer. Beside him, Heavy set Sasha spinning. “RED Pyro at eleven, Soldier has engaged... no, Soldier’s falling back... GO!”

With a roar, Heavy swung around the rock, barrels blazing, with Medic close on his tail. Further down the slope, Soldier was staggering towards them swiping at the sleeve of his jacket, which was on fire, and turning every so often to unload his shotgun frantically in the direction of the RED Pyro. The Pyro in question was only giving chase on average, instead skipping backwards and forwards just out of shotgun range. When he caught sight of the incoming BLUs, however, he changed tactics, swinging out in a wide arc across and down the slope, flamethrower at the ready and always just a little ahead of Heavy’s fire. The BLUs pushed down and down, Engineer dragging the half-built dispenser, and a hundred yards turned out to be really quite a long way. They’d almost reached the cover of the hut when the Pyro obviously decided he was bored with this game and started advancing, throwing a lance of flame out in front of him but still moving too fast for Sasha’s bullets to do any harm. Heavy snarled in frustration, Medic took a cautious few steps backwards, medigun still trained on Heavy, and then suddenly the RED jerked violently, dropping the flamethrower as his right arm became useless. Heavy took the opportunity to empty lead into him at four bullets a second. Medic looked back over his shoulder and caught the flash of sunlight off Sniper’s scope, and threw him a distant salute. Behind him, Engineer began setting up the dispenser just inside what was once the door of the hut, allowing Medic a brief moment to reassess the battle. Most of the action was happening further down the slope, where their Pyro and Demo were pinned down by the RED Soldier and his Medic. It looked like they were needed quite badly-

“MEDIC!”

Medic looked around hurriedly for the source of the cry and quickly spotted Soldier, half-hidden behind an old oil tank, bleeding profusely from a wound in his side.

“Push forvard, zey need help down zere,” he instructed Heavy. “I’m going back for Soldier.”

“What? No-“ Heavy caught Medic’s wrist as he turned to go. “Doktor, please.”

“Vas?”

Heavy’s eyes were wide and pleading, and Medic trembled, although he couldn’t be sure why. “I can’t do dis without you. I... I need you, Doktor.”

Medic’s heart leapt. He was needed. No-one had ever needed him. To be absolutely necessary to another’s survival--the very thought was both wonderful and terrifying. He wanted so badly to tell Heavy he needed him too, that he couldn’t imagine managing to exist without him. But this was a battlefield and he could see Engineer out of the corner of his eye giving them a very strange look, so he kept it to himself, for now.

“I vill be quick,” he reassured Heavy. “Trust me.”

Heavy let go of his arm reluctantly. “Always,” he said quietly, but his eyes betrayed his unease.

Medic gave him an apologetic pat on the arm and headed back for Soldier, closing the last five metres at a run to avoid a pair of badly-aimed grenades from RED’s Demoman. Soldier grunted a thank-you when Medic turned the medigun on him, and he must have been in a pretty bad state because he didn’t even have anything scathing to say about Medic’s injury the day before. It was when Medic was picking bits of Soldier’s jacket out of the burn down his arm, so it would heal properly, that he saw the light. It was tiny, just a little red dot on a red desert, but the terror that gripped him was crushing. Instinctively he flattened himself against the meagre cover, pulling Soldier back with him.

“RED Sniper!” he yelled, at the exact instant that he heard Heavy’s gun spinning up. “Oh Gott,no!” Suddenly unconcerned for his own safety, he leaned out around the canister, knuckles white under his gloves, in time to see the RED Demo fleeing from Sasha’s fury, Engineer crouched behind the now-operational dispenser, and there! At the window of the dilapidated building to the left of the point, a flash of red and the glint of a scope.

He didn’t hear the shot, so far away. He didn’t feel the jolt of impact, and he didn’t see the expression on Heavy’s face. He didn’t hear the answering crack from up the slope, or see the RED Sniper crumple. All he heard was the sound of a 150-kg minigun hitting the ground.

He barely even heard himself screaming, though the sound clawed its way up his throat like a wild animal, leaving gaping emptiness behind. How could it end like this? He had to get to him, had to help, there was always a chance... He lunged forward and was brought crashing to the ground as Soldier grabbed the back of his coat

“Stand down, private!” Soldier ordered, reeling Medic back in. “There’s nothing you can do!”

“Bastard!” Medic spat as he struggled uselessly. “Let me go or I svear I vill kill you!”

“I said, stand down!” One shoulder-wrenching movement had Medic’s arms locked behind his back. “That’s an order!”

Medic fought back like a wet cat, but Soldier’s grip was like iron, and Medic cursed and spat and accomplished exactly nothing. It was all his fault, he realised. Once again, he had failed himself, had failed his team... but this time, Heavy had paid for his incompetence.

And he hadn’t told him. Oh, he’d been so confident, so sure, talking to his pets safe in his lab, but when Heavy had stood in front of him, he couldn’t do it. Not only was he a failure, he was a coward, too, and so Heavy had died not knowing that Medic would have followed him through Hell itself.

Medic stopped struggling then. There was no point any more. He felt Soldier relax the death grip on his arms, but what difference did it make? He couldn’t move; his heart felt like a lead weight in his chest, pinning him in place He couldn’t go on like this, broken and empty. He couldn’t even cry. This was beyond crying. He remembered Spy’s words, whispered urgently to him like they were the most important thing in the world. ‘Go to him.... before it’s too late. ’ But he hadn’t, and now it was too late, and it would always be too late.

Then, quietly and without any fuss or bother, Heavy’s body vanished.

Hush stretched out across the battlefield. Medic stared dumbly at the spot where Heavy’s body had been, but his brain wouldn’t work, couldn’t understand. Then the silence was broken by Soldier, who arrived with unprecedented speed at an impossible conclusion.

“Respawn!”

Medic had never run so fast in his life. It was a fool’s hope, a ridiculous notion, but Medic clutched at that hope like a drowning man. He tore up the hill and back through the base, ignoring Soldier’s shouts to get back there and do his goddamn duty. He was gasping for breath by the time he skidded past the corridor to Respawn and had to double back, and then spent the longest twenty seconds of his life trying to get the rusted-up lock to co-operate, because it couldn’t end like this. Finally he wrenched the door open (and how it screamed on the rusty hinges!) to reveal a flurry of years-old dust, the previously lifeless tubes and dials of the Respawn machine clicking and whirring like some mechanical creature, and in the middle of it all the Heavy, coughing and dazed but so very wonderfully alive.

If Medic hadn’t been clinging to the door for dear life, he would probably have fallen over in relief. He pulled himself together and rushed to help Heavy to his feet, partly out of concern, but mostly because he just had to touch him, to make sure he was real, alive, and not some sign that Medic was finally going crazy. But no, here was his friend, looking dazed and slightly baffled but living and breathing despite everything, and Medic hugged him desperately, as if he were the only solid thing in the world.

“Doktor?” Heavy groaned, rubbing at a spot just above his left temple, as if trying to chase away a headache. Gently but firmly he removed Medic’s clinging arms, looking confused. “What... what happened? Where is dis?”

What could Medic say? Should he tell Heavy he just caught a bullet in his skull? Would Heavy even believe him if he did? Perhaps it would be better to lie; he could say Heavy was knocked out, perhaps... but no. Heavy was smart, he would figure it out sooner or later, would know Medic had lied, and that thought was just too terrible to contemplate. Medic steeled himself.

“You... died.”

“Oh.” And then, “Okay.”

“Vat?!” This was not the reaction Medic had been expecting. “Zat is all you can say? You vere dead!”

“Maybe, maybe. But now I am not,” said Heavy gently, hands resting on Medic’s shoulders. “And you are here. So all is good, yes?”

“Vell, I suppose so...”

“Good!” Heavy clapped him heartily on the shoulder. “Now, we see how battle is going, and worry about not being dead later.”

As Heavy spoke, the whirring of machinery changed tone. There was a squeaking sound like someone letting the air out of a balloon, which got louder and louder until it ended in an anti-climactic phut and the Scout materialised in the middle of the room, about three feet off the floor.

THUMP.

“Ow...”

“Mein Gott... ” Medic hauled the disoriented Scout up and subjected him to the same once-over he’d given Heavy. “Vat happened?”

“Dunno, man. Okay, so, their Demo-dick is yellin’ at me and I’m hoppin’ around all like, ‘POW POW POW’ at him but he keeps callin’ my ma a whore and I’m like, shut up, doucheface, my ma ain’t no freakin’ whore and even if she were you couldn’t afford her ‘cause she’d be one of them real classy whores that have, like, huge mansions and fancy parties and crap and-“

“Scout, please.”

“Sorry, Doc. Anyway, so then he gets this creepy grin like what my bros used t’ get when they’d put worms in my food and they were waitin’ for me to eat it and then there’s something behind me and it hurts, right here-“ Scout contorted himself to point right between his shoulder-blades. “And suddenly it’s really freakin’ cold and then I’m here. What the hell, Doc?”

“Sounds like Spy,” said Heavy. “So Scout died too, and now isn’t dead.”

“What the hell, man? You sayin’ I died? No offence, pally, but I think I might-a noticed.”

“Don’t be silly,” Medic chided, now peering into Scout’s ear. “How vould you know? Zat is vat dying is.”

“I dunno! And leave off, Doc. I feel fine. Gotta get back out there and bust some RED heads!” Scout paused for a moment, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet and looking lost. “...where the hell’s my bat?”

As if in answer, there was another drawn-out squeak and Sasha appeared in the middle of the room, falling to the ground with an almighty thud.

“Awright!” Scout said as Heavy scooped the gun off the floor like a lost child. “C’mon, c’mon...” He held his hands out expectantly. More squeaking later, a battered baseball bat phut-ed into existence above his head and obeyed the laws of physics with a crack. “OW!

Medic sighed wearily and engaged the medigun as Scout readied his newly-returned bat. “Ve should move out.”

“Yeah!” Not needing any further prompting, Scout sped off, leaving Heavy and Medic to trail rather more slowly and less enthusiastically after him.

Outside, the battle raged on much as it had been doing for some time now. After explaining to a gobsmacked Sniper that yes, Heavy had come back to life (or “respawned”, as Soldier put it) Medic pointed out that the first thing they needed to ascertain was whether RED had a functioning Respawn system. This proved to be remarkably easy, since as soon as Medic stuck his head out of cover to survey the field there was a sudden stabbing pain between his eyes and he found himself flat on his back in the middle of the amazing machine.

“Oh,” he said. That seemed to cover everything.

So RED had a Respawn too, and the playing field was levelled. With each side having a constantly regenerating team, the only advantages left were situational. It would take a while to adjust tactics to accommodate Respawn, but in the meantime, BLU held the higher ground, and the push down to the point was only a matter of time. A quick team consultation (which took place across several respawn cycles, for maximum annoyance) decided that the best strategy was a method of attrition. Engineer dragged a set of disused teleporters out of Storage and set up the entrance just outside the spawn point. The other end started off behind the rocks at the edge of the plateau, and was later dragged down the slope as they pushed the enemy back slowly but surely.

The sun was slinking low across the western sky when Medic and Heavy found themselves ten sticky-bomb-strewn metres from the point and staring down a maniacally grinning Demoman.

“Come oon, lads!” the RED taunted, cackling madly. “Give us a goo!”

Medic glanced frantically down at the Ubercharge meter. Ninty-five percent! So close, but he needed a few more precious seconds-

“HEY, CHUCKLEHEAD! Time to take back what you said ‘bout my Ma!”

Distracted, the RED glanced behind and was rewarded for his foolishness with a bat to the face and a stream of abuse from Scout. The RED levelled his grenade launcher at the kid and-

One hundred percent! Excess energy crackled up Medic’s arms like lightning as he engaged the charge. Heavy roared and advanced over the field of sticky-bombs, blasting the RED off the point in a stream of lead. Medic felt metal under his boots, a thud as Scout landed on the point beside them and the draining feeling as the charge wore off, and then it was over in seconds.

“VICTORY!”

Well, that went better than expected.

Yay respawn! Great story as always

Wow. I always wondered how the Team first reacted to the concept of respawn. Solly was the only one who had ever said it existed before, how is everyone going to adapt? And the action scene was great! I love Scout and his mouth!

Moar.

Why are you an anon? I just want to kiss you for such a great story. My god how did I not notice this until now? I'm hooked and can't wait for the new update!

>>42
Fear, mostly. But so far I haven't been run out of town for terrible writing so I might grab a name at some point.

Thanks for all the comments, guys! I really appreciate them!

Oh my god I love this story so much. I really really do.

I demand more, Good sir.

one of them real classy whores that have, like, huge mansions and fancy parties and crap I love scout.

This would have been up sooner but then I remembered about >>21.
I apologise in advance for Spy's accent.

-----

After scraping the rest of the team off the desert and mending an variety of bullet holes, broken bones and bruised egos, Medic insisted on seeing everyone for a full physical exam, in the hopes of understanding a bit more about the mysterious workings of Respawn. Scout was first in line, partly because Medic wanted him out of the way, but mostly because when the doctor had announced his plan, someone had whined loudly, “Aww geeze, doc, tonight’s Batman night!”, and Medic was feeling vengeful.

At the beginning of the examination, Medic made the tragic mistake of thanking Scout for his excellently-timed diversion of the RED Demoman, and so spent the next twenty minutes examining and meticulously recording every injury and every scar and comparing his observations to his existing notes, while Scout waxed lyrical on his “awesome skills, I mean, man, did you see his face?!”. He repeated this process, minus the gloating, with each successive team member, supervised by an assortment of his birds who seemed to think his medical procedures were some sort of entertainment arranged for their benefit. At about eight o’clock it occurred to him that he had never managed to get
any lunch and he reluctantly emerged from the infirmary to eat with the rest of the team.
Dinner was usually an animated occasion, and the events of the day had provided plenty of new talking material. Indeed, when Medic arrived on the scene unfashionably late, Spy and Engineer were already engaged in a heated debate that was bordering on the metaphysical.

“Now, look here, Spah,” Engineer was saying, sounding frustrated. “Ah must be the same person that ah was before Respawn. Ah still got all mah memories and what-have-you.”

“But ‘ow do you know zey are yours?” Spy punctuated his point with a vicious stab of his fork. “Consider zis: I saw you take a scattergun shot to ze face, and yet ‘ere you are, with your face still attached. Your body disappeared from one place and reappeared in anozzer, mended. Are you sure it’s ze same body? And if it is not ze same body, ‘ow do you know zat ze memories it contains are ze same memories you ‘ad this morning?”

There was a long pause as Engineer contemplated this new problem, and eventually he conceded defeat with a sigh. “Dangit, Spah, ah don’t know.”

“Exactly my point, dear labourer,” said Spy with no small amount of smugness.

“Ah never did hold with this philosophical stuff,” Engineer grumbled. “Ah mean, for all ah know, ah’m still dead.”

(“Bloody crap afterlife, then,” muttered Sniper from down the table.)

“Ah,” said Spy. “Now, zat is a different question entirely. The answer is zat you cannot know! You ‘ave no way of comparing!”

“So der is no question! Is meaningless,” Heavy interjected. Spy looked taken-aback.

“What do you mean?”

“You say I do not know if I am still dead,” Heavy explained. “But I feel alive. So if feeling dead is the same as feeling alive, what is difference? Does not matter. Is just different words for same thing.”

Spy sniffed haughtily. “What a naïve way of thinking.”

“Actually, I sink it’s razzer deep,” said Medic, sitting down, and that put a stop to that argument before it could develop further.

The examinations continued after dinner. Medic deliberately left Heavy until last, for fear of... something. He wasn’t quite sure what, but he was sure it would be interesting finding out. He was, however, beginning to regret that decision; every time he so much as thought about Heavy, even in passing, there would be this strange fluttery feeling in his chest and he would find himself staring off into the distance with all kinds of thoughts running through his head. After the third time Engineer, full of concern, asked him if he was all right, he was forced to admit to himself that he had a problem. Thankfully, by that point, there was only one team member left between him and the answers he sought. Unfortunately, that person was Spy.

Medic was usually fairly relaxed and talkative in the safety of the infirmary– at least, when he wasn’t being gabbed over incessantly by Scout. But the instant Spy walked in the room, Medic’s end of the conversation was reduced to the bare minimum necessary to carry out his job. Any attempt by Spy to engage him was met with stony silence, and after a while Spy was silent too. In fact, Medic had almost finished when Spy spoke again.

“You think I am going to blackmail you.” It was not a question.

“You vould not be ze first.” Medic’s response was clipped and to the point.

“I know.”

“Oh? And vhat else do you presume to know?”

“About you? Much.” There was none of Spy’s usual arrogance in the remark. “I know ze names of your parents, ze street you grew up on, your first school. Ze reports from your medical school tutors are interesting reading. And zen, zere is zis...” He leaned over withdrew a folded photograph from the pocket of his jacket, now draped over a chair. He flattened it and tossed it onto the table. Medic stared.

It was a portrait of a family, stiff and formal and unrealistic. The man was tall, dark-haired and imposing, with a strong jaw-line and angular features set in a mask of disapproval. Beside him was a woman, blond curls and high cheekbones suggesting past beauty but now drawn and tired, as though after a prolonged illness. But the most striking in the photo were the pair of young boys, identical from the thick-rimmed glasses to the starched cuffs of their uniforms and matching bored expressions.

“Vhere did you get zis?” Medic demanded, rounding on Spy.

“I ‘ave my contacts,” Spy replied coolly. “You ‘ave not spoken to your brozzer in twenty-five years. Why is zis?”

Medic fell back, a little calmer, and picked up the photograph with trembling hands.

“Ve did not see eye-to-eye,” he said quietly.

“You both attended ze same med school, yes?”

“It vas my fazzer’s grand scheme,” Medic said with a tinge of bitterness. “He vanted both of us to become doctors. But my brozzer didn’t care for my fazzer’s plan. He dropped out after two years.”

“Why?”

“Because he is a monster,” said Medic bluntly, putting the photograph back down.

Spy took a moment before replying.

“Zere are some who might say ze same about all of us,” he said carefully.

“Zey have not met my brozzer. It vas never about ze science, for him. He did not vish to learn. He only vished to destroy. And... he held opinions zat I happened to disagree vis razzer strongly.”

“’ow old were you when ‘e was blackmailing you?” Spy said suddenly.

“Fifteen.”

“Could ‘e prove it?”

“Of course not. But zey did not need proof! Zey merely required a suggestion, and I vas a child and terrified. If my parents had even suspected... I saw no ozzer option.” Medic gave a humourless smirk. “Of course, if it had happened now, I vould probably have shot him.”

“Are you threatening me, Docteur?”

“Zat depends. Can you keep a secret?”

A tense silence descended, during which Medic picked up the magnifying glass and the steel ruler to look over Spy’s upper arms, and held for a long while, until Spy sighed.

“I would like to tell you a story, Docteur. If I may.”

“If you must.”

“When I was a younger man, in France, I... I ‘ad a friend. For ze sake of ze story, let us call ‘im Jacques. Once, in a bar in Avignon, ‘e met a lady. She was beautiful, as French women are, and clever, too. Zey spoke only briefly zat day; ‘e did not even know ‘er name. But ‘e did not forget ‘er. Now, Jacques travelled all over ze world, for ‘is business. Many months later, in Italy, ‘e sees a woman. Ze ‘air is different, ze clothes, but ‘e knows ‘er face. It turns out, she is in ze same business as ‘e. Zey see much of each other for ze next few weeks, until zeir work requires zat zey go zeir separate ways.”

Spy’s tone grew soft, almost melancholy. Despite everything, Medic found himself listening raptly.

“‘e does not see ‘er zen for almost a year, but ‘e thinks of ‘er constantly. Eagerly, ‘e awaits ze day ‘e sees ‘er again, and ‘e realises that ‘e loves ‘er. It is a shock, per’aps. ‘is business leaves little room for relationships. Never ze less, ‘e loves ‘er more zan ‘e ever thought possible. But ‘ow can ‘e tell ‘er? ‘e ‘as no way of contacting ‘er. So ‘e waits, and ‘e waits. Finally, zeir paths cross, in a tiny village in ze Swiss Alps. What are ze odds, ‘e thinks! Per’aps it was meant to be. But she is distracted. ‘er work has become... difficult. She fears she will fail, and so she cannot stay with ‘im. ‘e asks for one last night, before she moves on. ‘e thinks to tell ‘er of ‘is love. But when ze moment arrives, ‘e cannot say it. ‘e fears ‘er rejection, ‘er scorn. Ze moment passes, and ‘is lady leaves.”

Medic put the glass and the ruler down quietly. He had a horrible suspicion he knew where this was going.

“For many months, ‘e searches for ‘er. ‘e uses every contact, every network that ‘e knows. It is almost two years since zeir first meeting when ‘e locates ‘er employer. And it is two years and a day when ‘e finds ze report of ‘er death, three days after ‘e last saw ‘er.”

Spy’s words hung in the air like smog, thick and choking, and Medic couldn’t find anything to say.

“I do not intend to blackmail you,” said Spy finally. “Nor will I reveal what I know to my superiors. You ‘ave my word. Now, are we finished ‘ere?”

“Vat? I, er... yes, I suppose ve are.”

“Merci, Docteur.” Spy buttoned his shirt and jacket in silence while Medic stared unseeing at the photograph still on the table. He didn’t say anything until Spy was halfway to the door.

“I’m sorry.” That didn’t even begin to cover it, but Spy nodded anyway.

“You ‘ave been given a second chance, Docteur,” he said. “Do not make the same mistake I did.”

Medic waited until after Spy had left before replying.

“I von’t. I svear.”

Awwww!

May I say how refreshing it is to see Spy being...well, nice? So many times is he the 'bad guy', blackmailing his fellow team mates. No, this was so delightfully heart warming, and I'm glad to see something different, Spy portrayed in a positive light! So thank you, I thought that was great.
I only hate how you made that cliffhanger, waiting for the conversation with heavy. Can't wait for more!

I like the way spy is written here. To often spy is portreyed as a jerk so I'm glad to see a nicer spy for once. Any way I love this story and am probably never going to stop obsessing over it.

Bit of an oxymoron but this is one of the most original fanfics I have ever read. And it revolves around MedicHeavy nonetheless.

It'll suck when this story is over

But it's not, and that's the problem. Craving for more.

Fear not, anons! I am working diligently on the next chapter, although it may well be the last as I'm not really sure how to take it from here and I have at least one other story waiting in the wings.
Thanks for reading, guys! Your comments are delicious ambrosia to me.

I just read through this whole thing, and it is BEAUTIFUL. Such a wonderful story. I cannot even find the proper words to express how amazing this is. It's just.. lovely.
I was terrified, for a bit there, that our poor Heavy was going to die. I cannot handle death fics, so I am a thousand times over grateful that respawn is up and running.
Either way, this is absolutely beautiful. Please, continue. I shall await your updates with bated breath.

Alright, guys, this is the last real chapter, although expect a short epilogue in the near future, and possibly some one-shots.
Contains gay, fluff and violins, not necessarily in that order.

=====

It was well after dark when Heavy entered the infirmary. Although he had arrived when the doctor had asked, Medic was nowhere to be seen, and the room was unsettlingly quiet. He spent a few minutes wandering around and peering at things, but Medic kept most of the truly fascinating equipment and specimens in his private lab, so that avenue of entertainment was pretty barren, and still no doctor was forthcoming. A knock on the door of the lab elicited no response, so he looked in, mostly out of interest. To his surprise, Medic was at his desk, shuffling furiously through a pile of papers with a pen between his teeth.

“Vun moment, bitte,” he said without looking up, slightly muffled by the pen and sounding tired but cheerful.

“Okay.” Heavy looked around the room, and amongst the anatomical diagrams, complicated machinery and specimen jars, several pairs of beady eyes stared curiously back. Heavy had always been fond of birds, and Medic’s flock tolerated him rather better than they did the rest of the team. He held his hand out as non-threateningly as possible to the nearest bird, which considered it critically and then presented its head to be stroked.

“Zere!” Medic announced triumphantly, placing the now tidied stack on the desk with a satisfied nod. He looked up at Heavy with a grin on his face – and stopped, agape. Heavy turned his attention from the bird, which was now stretching its wings and cooing happily, just in time to see the pen fall comically out of the doctor’s mouth as he stared.

“Hypatia! Vatever are you doing?”

The wood-pigeon in question immediately took off down to the other end of the room, upsetting the teetering piles of books on which she was sat, and perched on a cupboard, straightening her feathers as if nothing had happened.

“Doktor! You scared her!” Heavy said accusingly. Medic gave a short, incredulous laugh.

“Scared? If I had tried zat, I vould be picking up my fingers from ze floor now.” He shook his head in astonishment. “Birds...”

“So, you want to examine, da? Should I take off shirt?” Later, Heavy would admit that the lascivious grin had probably not been a necessary addition to the already suggestive question, but in the meantime it was worth it to see the doctor blush to the tips of his ears.

“No, no, sank you,” spluttered Medic, before composing himself and clearing his throat. “Zat is, I believe ze data I have is sufficient. Ze results have been quite fascinating!”

“What do you find?” While Heavy was indeed curious, now that the battle was done, as to what the Respawn machinery actually did, he was mostly asking because of how wonderfully excited Medic became when he was explaining his beloved Science. From the way the doctor’s eyes lit up now, Heavy knew he would not be disappointed.

“Vell, ze first sing I did was to compare injuries received today vis scars visible on ze skin as of zis evening. For instance, ve met Scout in Respawn after he had been stabbed by ze RED Spy, but zere is no visible scarring from ze injury. Conversely, Scout also sustained several bullet vounds near ze end of ze battle but did not die. I healed zese aftervards, and zey all left scars, as expected for vounds healed vis ze medigun.”

“Respawn heals wounds?” Heavy suggested. “Better than medigun?”

“Ah, now,” said Medic, one finger in the air. “Zat is vat I sought at first, and ze data from ze rest of ze team supports zis. But vhile examining Scout I discovered somesing else. He had a cut on his elbow zat he sustained vhile ze medigun vas not vorking, so it vas still not healed when ve vent into battle today. Zis cut vas vun zat I healed after ze battle! So, alzough I healed Scout many times today, zis cut reopened every time he respawned!” Elbows on the table, he spread his fingers in front of him in the universal pose of enthusiasts everywhere. “So, zis is my theory. Ze machine records ze state of each subject at ze beginning of battle, like a photograph. Zen, vhen ze subject dies, ze machine reconstructs zem according to zat record. Hence, ze lack of scarring, since ze subject is returned to a state vhere ze wounds did not occur.”

Heavy was impressed. “Is good theory,” he said as he picked up the things Hypatia had scattered across the floor. To his surprise, it was mostly books of sheet music. “What is dis? You play instrument?”

Medic looked just very slightly embarrassed. “Ze violin, yes. A little.”

“You did not tell me,” said Heavy, a little reproachfully, thumbing through the stack. The music seemed to consist mostly of Mozart and Beethoven, with a smattering of Bach and some other composers he didn’t recognise, although he was pleased to note a recurrence of Tchaikovsky. Behind the desk, Medic shrugged.

“You did not ask. And unlike Scout, I do not assume zat ze rest of ze team shares my taste in music.”

“Still, did not say...” Heavy had discovered an interesting change in the music, starting about two-thirds of the way down the pile. The austere covers of the classical scores gave way to bright colours and illustrations, and the names of composers disappeared, replaced by the word ‘Traditional’ and variations thereof. “Dis is not Mozart,” he said with a faint smile, and now Medic definitely looked embarrassed.

“Yes, vell,” he said awkwardly. “Like many sings in my childhood, ze violin vas my fazzer’s idea, and I did not have much say in it. He said I needed to be ‘more cultured’. I vas allowed to study German composers and little else, but classical music bored me, and ze brief forays I vas granted into ze Russian Romantics vere a definite improvement but all too rare. Traditional music is fascinating, zough, and razzer more fun to play, I have found. Of course, my fazzer vould never let me play it – he said it vas ‘common’ – but sankfully it has been many years since he vas in a position to dictate my musical direction.”

“So, is folk music?” Heavy asked, selecting a piece at random and flicking through. It seemed to involve a lot of drinking, a certain amount of smut and a bit of dying, which sounded like folk music. “Is German?”

Medic shook his head. “Zere is not very much German folk arranged for ze violin, and accordion music sounds silly on it. Vhat you have zere is mostly English, Scottish and Irish, vis a little Finnish, a couple of Hungarian dances, and I sink zere is a Russian drinking song in zere somevhere.”

Sure enough, a bit further down the pile was a sudden burst of Cyrillic. Heavy chuckled. “I t’ink I know dis one. Is very rude!”
“All ze best vuns are,” Medic agreed with a laugh.

“Is true. Ah, perhaps...” Heavy paused, unsure how Medic would react to his next request. After all, there was still the matter of the doctor’s unfinished sentence, although Heavy dared hope that he knew how it was supposed to end. Still, he could wait until Medic was ready to finish it – he’d waited this long, after all, and that had been without even a spark of hope – and meanwhile it couldn’t hurt to ask. “I do not know other songs. Perhaps you could play one?”

“Vhat, now? I really should file zese reports...”

“Please?” Heavy effected the most imploring face he could manage. It would probably have worked better on someone less naturally intimidating. “You work always so much, should have time to relax.”

Medic sighed in defeat and stood up. “Fine. Go on, choose vun. But just ze vun, mind.”

Heavy selected a promising-looking piece, then watched, mystified, as Medic wheeled Sigmund the skeleton over from his corner. As he did so, a very small bird emerged from the skull and peered sleepily around.

“Oh, excuse me, Ada,” Medic said to the bird, which gave him a withering look and retreated back inside Sigmund’s cranial cavity. “Archimedes broke my music stand some veeks ago,” he explained. “Since zen, I have had to... improvise. It is amazing vhat a little vire will do.” And with that he bent Sigmund’s arms up at the elbows and propped the sheet music up on the skeleton’s forearms. “Ah, ‘Betsy Bell and Mary Gray’. Zis is a good vun.” He dragged over his desk chair and stood on it to reach a case at the very top of a set of cupboards. “It is about two Scottish vomen who die of ze plague.” He said this with more relish than might be considered normal. “It is, of course, terribly sad.”

Heavy watched silently as Medic brought out the violin. Now, he was the last person qualified to pass judgement on getting overly sentimental about inanimate objects, but there was something very serious, almost reverential in the way Medic held the instrument, the care with which he rosined the bow and plucked at the strings until he was satisfied with the tuning. Of all places, he kept it on the highest shelf in the room. Heavy wondered briefly if it had been a gift.

“Now,” said Medic mock-seriously as he tucked the violin under his chin and wagged the bow in Heavy’s direction. “You must not judge me too severely; zis is quite a tricky piece in places.”

As soon as Medic drew the bow across the strings for the first time, Heavy knew it had been a good idea to ask. It began stiffly, but as he played, Medic relaxed visibly and the music flowed smoother in response. It was indeed sad, full of discord and harsh, lamenting notes, but far more interesting was the doctor himself: how his eyebrows rose as the music slowed and fell as it sped up, and how at some point he began silently mouthing the lyrics. Particularly endearing was the intense expression as the piece navigated a particularly intricate middle section, and the odd wrong note was well worth the cross little frown it produced. By the time Medic pulled the last heartrending wail from the violin he was grinning widely.

“Vell, zat vas fun!” he declared. “Shall ve have anozzer? Somesing happier, I sink.”

“Dis one?” Heavy passed over a piece that seemed to consist almost entirely of semiquavers. Medic beamed.

“Ah, zat’s more like it. Zis vun is an Irish reel. Or, razzer, two reels, back-to-back. Zey are meant to be music for dancing, but I sink half ze fun is in seeing how fast it is possible to play zem.”

It was a definite improvement over the first tune; the melody bounced and rolled on its way with the unstoppable momentum of a freight train. Medic’s foot tapped along to the tempo, getting gradually faster and faster as he got a handle on the tune. There was barely a pause between the two halves as he barrelled on, and it was all too soon when he wrought the last note with a flourish and demanded a drink and another tune, in that order. So Heavy was sent to search the fridge for some of the beer the doctor vaguely remembered putting in there several days earlier, while he sorted through the pile of sheet music. Eventually Heavy returned with a spare chair and two bottles of Blue Streak, which Medic opened on Sigmund’s teeth.

“Do you always keep beer next to kidneys?” Heavy asked with a grin. Medic feigned exasperation behind the bottle of beer.

“Vhy must people alvays complain about vhere I keep sings? Ve shall see who is complaining vhen somevun needs a new kidney, hmm? Now, zis next vun is from a small village in Cornvall in south-vest England...”

The words first appeared in Heavy’s head as Medic took up his violin again, although they were vague and unsure. As the doctor continued to blaze his way through his substantial collection of folk music, the words took shape. They had become more insistent when Medic had to pause in the middle of one of the promised Hungarian dances to find his book on music theory, muttering about idiots putting turns in-between notes, instead of on the note like a civilised person. By the time the words had solidified into sentences, Medic had found a trio of reels even more fiendish than the previous pair and was attacking them ferociously, eyes glinting maniacally behind his glasses as he pushed the pace faster and faster. Grin splitting his face and sweat shining on his forehead, he looked magnificent. He finished the piece in one last flurry, panting slightly, and Heavy couldn’t wait any longer. He grabbed Medic’s hand, still holding the bow, and pulled him down to kneel on the floor, now at eye-level.

“Doktor,” he said, and was surprised at the hoarseness in his own voice. “I have found words.”

Medic put the violin down, very carefully, and laid the bow next to it with equal care. Only then did he put his other hand on Heavy’s.

“Tell me.”

Heavy’s pulse roared in his ears. He had never considered himself a coward – he faced danger every day, had stared down the barrels of more guns than he cared to count – but right now, in a lab deep in a fortified base with the doctor’s hands in his, he felt more terrified than he ever had on any battlefield.

“Doktor,” he said again, and he couldn’t imagine how Medic could possibly hear him over the hammering of his heart. He took a deep breath, but all that did was make him feel light-headed on top of everything else. All the while, Medic stared up at him with wide, beseeching eyes.

“Tell me,” he repeated.

“I t’ink we do dis part already,” Heavy rasped, and Medic chuckled. A little reassured, Heavy took his courage in both hands. “It is... it is like Ubercharge,” he started. “When we fight – when you use charge – I am bulletproof. Nothing can hurt me. I can do anything. Except... except it is all the time. Because of you, Doktor. You make me invincible.”

A bashful smile slid over Medic’s face, then vanished abruptly as he frowned.

“If I say vhat I vant to say, vhat I need so say... somesing terrible vill happen. Ze universe is acting out some dreadful vendetta against me.”

“Now, Doktor, is not fair. I tell feelings, you must do also, da?” Heavy chuckled. “What is worst that coul-mmph-mrrph!” The rest of the sentence was smothered as Medic clapped a hand over his mouth.

“Don’t you dare!” he hissed, eyes alight. “I have been trying all day to tell you zat I love you, zat I need you like I need breazing, and I von’t have you spoiling zat now!” He stopped, gasping for air, and Heavy could almost see the cogs turning as his brain raced to catch up with what his mouth had just said. “Oh. ...oh, Scheisse.”

And Heavy couldn’t stop himself from bursting into laughter, with Medic kneeling there looking embarrassed and confused and angry all at the same time. The doctor glowered, but though he put serious effort into keeping a straight face, Heavy’s mirth was infectious, and it wasn’t long before the icy facade dissolved into hysterical giggles. Once they were both laughing it was scarcely any effort at all for Heavy to slip his arms under Medic’s and hoist him onto his lap. There was a tremendous feeling of... of right-ness about the way Medic relaxed in his embrace, the way his arms slid around Heavy’s shoulders as he snorted inelegantly into his collarbone. It had been a long time since Heavy had actually, properly held someone – or, at least, someone who didn’t have six rotary barrels and a battery. It was almost a surprise how warm another body could be.

“Zis is ridiculous,” Medic said eventually, once he managed to regain control of his breathing. “We are ridiculous!”

“A little,” agreed Heavy with a smirk. “But is good thing, I t’ink. Is more fun dat way.”

“But ever so stressful. Let me try zis again.” Medic sat back and took Heavy’s head in his hands. “I love you, Heavy. It defies reason and logic but I do. And I must know, please. I cannot live viz myself if I don’t know.”

Heavy had spent many long hours plumbing the depths of his dictionary, and had been unimpressed with so much of what he had found there. ‘Love’ was a terrible word, as short and perfunctory and dismissive as it was. There was no way that one single, brief syllable could hope to contain even a fraction of what he was feeling, and he’d searched desperately for a better option. Naturally, Russian would be his first choice, but Medic understood so little that, even though he might guess the meaning, the emotion would be lost completely. He’d considered confessing in German, not least because ‘Liebe’ was a vast improvement on ‘love’, but as soon as he thought that he’d realised that, whatever he said, he would pronounce it all wrong and that was a disaster waiting to happen. English had too many words – that was the problem – all subtly different in meaning and connotation. He’d been about to give up when, right at the bottom on the pile of books, he’d found a thesaurus. And there it was, right in the definition. It must have been Latin originally, probably via French. It was short, it was accurate and it rolled off the tongue as well as any Russian endearment.

It was perfect.

Ever so gently, he pulled Medic forward until their foreheads were touching and met the doctor’s eyes over his glasses. “I adore you, Doktor.”
“Vell, sank God for zat!” said Medic with relief, and kissed him fiercely.

Or possibly, Heavy reflected as he wound his fingers into Medic’s hair, the actual words weren’t that important after all.

-----

“Vell, zat vas fun,” said Medic breathlessly, some time later. “I sink zere could be some interesting research potential here.”

“Should repeat experiment,” Heavy mumbled sleepily. “For better results.”

“Good plan. Perhaps I should start writing zis down...”

===============

BONUS:
A very nice recording of "Betsy Bell and Mary Gray", featuring Peter Knight doing terrible things to his fiddle.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPjqQ_61CkM

If I smile any harder, my head's gonna split in half. I squee'd so loud when I saw that this had been updated.

Captcha: Influenza...please god that's not foreshadowing...

“Vell, zat vas fun,” said Medic breathlessly, some time later. “I sink zere could be some interesting research potential here.”
Not only is that hilarious, I completely plan on saying it next time I get someone into bed.

>>57
Next time on Wacky Things Happening To Medic: Medic gets the 'flu, Heavy attempts to fill in for the Doc. Hijinks ensue.
(I might actually write that...)

>>58
Marty thinks I'm funny?! Oh gosh, I'm all a-flutter. I think we would all like to be updated as to how that turns out!

>>59

You realize that we're going to hold you to this, now.

Captcha: Symptoms

Hey! Anon from the request thread here, and I'm digging this hivemind going on, especially with someone who wrote this. It's great.

Seconding good Anon #60 for sure.

Captcha: shiptrs may (may what?)

And finally, a very quick epilogue. Thanks to everyone who has read and commented, it's been a pleasure to write for you. Hopefully, we'll meet again soon. I have great plans, oh yes.
TTFN.

=======

“...and I was just walkin’ through the base, as ye do,” Demo grumbled at breakfast the next day. “and I swear tae God I heard someone playin’ ‘Th’ Bonny Black Hare’! At midnight! Did me head in, it did.”

“Reckon you’re hearing things, mate,” said Sniper authoritatively over his fried egg, ignoring the face Demo pulled at him.

“As much as I ‘ate to agree wiz ze filzy bushman, ‘e is right,” said Spy, and looked straight at Medic. The doctor, usually organised and punctual in the mornings, had arrived to breakfast late, looking very slightly dishevelled but grinning madly, and had promptly helped himself to at least twice as much as he normally ate. The fact that Heavy had arrived exactly five minutes later had not escaped Spy’s notice either, nor had the interesting bruise just peeking from under the collar of Medic’s shirt that Spy was positive had not been there the previous evening. “You are clearly mistaken. I was about ze base until well past midnight and I ‘eard no music.” Across the table, Medic caught his eye and nodded quickly. Spy stood, fingers reaching automatically for his cigarette case. “I am glad you took my advice, Docteur. Gentlemen, I shall see you later.”

“What’s Spooky mean by that?” Sniper asked when Spy had left. “What advice?”

“Oh, it vas nozzing much,” said Medic, waving a hand dismissively. “Just some vise vords I should have heeded a long time ago.”

“Oh,” said Sniper, obviously hoping for something more interesting. Then Soldier returned from his morning run, trailing Scout like a duckling, and began his customary pre-battle berating of the troops, complete with shouting and menacing wielding of a riding crop. As expected, this annoyed Demo, nursing his permanent hang-over, into shouting back. As the table descended into the usual morning brawl, Heavy’s hand found Medic’s under the table. And despite everything, the world kept turning, just as it always had.

All things considered, it could have been a lot worse.

DAS ENDE

Awwww. What a lovely ending!

Captcha: Stable

Even captcha agrees!

Now this is what a romantic comedy is supposed to look like! I don't even want to ask for a sequel or a prequel because this just seems so perfect to stand on its own. Not that you couldn't continue writing stories, however... WINK WINK.