Author's Note: In the spirit of A-kon and the fact that my friends and I will be doing Team Fortress 2 for our cosplays, I wrote this. It is a little…childish, I know, but it is written in fun and not something serious or anything. I'm going to post it here just so others might enjoy it. The TF2 characters are meant to be a cross between the actually game characters and my friends and I. So with that in mind and to add some fun, I guess, to this, let us play the guessing game? Rules: From now to next Thursday (April 25) people can reply to this chapter with guesses to which class each group member represents. Get them ALL right and on Friday next week (April 26th) through Steam I will give you an item that you may choice from the list below. Please add your Steam username to the post so I can trade with you. This is just a fun game. List of Group Members: BlindZombie DoD Howeller Lechery Riska Shy Vile List of Items: Milkman, Shortstop, Holy Mackerel Sergeant’s Drill Hat, Black Box, Half-Zatoichi Pyromancer’s Mask, Backburner, Sharpened Volcano Fragment Travis DeGroot Experience, Scottish Resistance, Scotsman’s Skullcutter Security Shades, Natascha, Warrior’s Spirit Western Wear, Widowmaker, Jag Physician’s Procedure Mask, Kritzkrieg, Ubersaw Villain’s Veil, Hitman’s Heatmaker, Tribalman’s Shiv Detective Noir, Ambassador, Spycicle Chapter One: The Idea It was a Friday night which meant weekly geek fest through video chat for Pyro and Sniper. The two ex-mercenaries had bonded through a shared love of comic books during the down time they had when they were working for Builders League United. As the months and years passed, their bond grew and they started sharing more and more likes and hobbies, gaining themselves a true friend in each other. Their friendship had even lasted long after the retirement of BLU. Pyro, the youngest on the team after Scout, had a love for comics that hadn’t been shaken through growing up. The firebug’s favorite was Beast Boy since he was such a freak in his world but his team, the Teen Titans, had accepted him anyway. The mercenary wished for the same acceptance from her own team, and society in general. Many a night after battle while she sat alone eating dinner, the fire-starter would read through the comics and grow warm with the dream of one day being accepted and being able to be herself with the others without the nasty comments and looks that she knew she would get. The Sniper, on the other hand, was forced to give up many of his beloved interests and hobbies as he grew up in his parent’s home; one of those being comic books. When younger he was a fan of Captain Marvel who could grow up and be an adult but still be a child in heart, something Sniper wished for. He wanted to grow up and move away while never having to change himself but that wasn’t possible and he lost himself along the way to become what his parents wanted. So when Sniper had walked into the empty BLU kitchen one morning a few months after the team was formed to find a forgotten comic book on the table, his childhood memories resurfaced. The sharpshooter spent the rest of that day before and after battle looking for the owner until he finally found the worried Pyro looking for her comic. They started to chat about the comic, since Sniper had read it during the battle when he had been unneeded and had a lack of any targets to take out, and slowly talked about other superheroes they were fans of and their friendship was started. After that, every Friday night became the Pyro and Sniper’s weekly geek fest. And after the whole forced retirement of most of the BLU team they had to go through when Gray Mann walked on screen, their tradition continued even overseas. Pyro was now living in a New Jersey prison after she'd tried to board a plane with a gas mask on and a suitcase full of lighters. It didn’t help her case when she got into a fight with the security guards when they got too hands-y with her while body-tackling her to the ground. Sniper, on the other hand, moved back to Australia and lived with his family again. He had grown to love the feeling of having the BLU team constantly there and when he and the RED Sniper were told that they would be useless against the new robotic enemies, BLU Sniper went home hoping for the same family feeling he felt while with his team. That feeling was still missing. Most of the other BLUs also went home to restart their lives. BLU Scout went back home to Boston to take care of his mother and start training to get into a Major League Baseball team. His mother came first, though. Solider decided to officially join the military and started a boot camp. Boot camp being him yelling at himself in a mirror about what he learned from reading the Art of War. It is a known fact that Soldier can’t read. The Engineer also went home to his Texas ranch to find his family waiting for him with open arms. He was happy there working on the farm even though he lacked the inspiration to start building any new mechanical wonders. But, unlike the others, Heavy and Spy didn’t return home and instead found themselves working together within the Italian Mob. They were roommates and partners, breaking fingers and obtaining protection money from grateful businesses. Medic, unlike all the others, was allowed to stay fighting against the robots Gray Mann had made since the RED Medic had died from a heart attack after a meeting the BLU Medic one night away from the battlements. The story is still very unclear there, but the BLU Medic replaced the RED in the fight against robotic foes since all that mattered was that there was a Medic on the front lines. Overall, the BLU team was moving on but missing their lives beforehand when it was death and chaos instead of normality and peace. "God, I awfully miss our team," Sniper mumbled, staring at the blank video feed in front of him since Pyro never turned on the video or audio on their side of the chat. They only ever typed back on the Australian-created video chat system, Scaipah. The two of them were now conversing, yet again, about their glory days on BLU. ‘Same here.’ "Mmmm. Maybe we should do a reunion. It has been about forever since we've all seen each other." 'It's only been 3 years.' "FOREVER! My God! I wonder what everyone is doing! Where would it be held at? Oh! When should it be?" Sniper was beyond excited to maybe, finally, be able to be with his family again, a place where he would feel he belonged. 'Why not your house?' "You are joking." 'No. Really." "No." '….' "No." 'Fine…. Uh… I don't know.' "Yeah…," Sniper sighed, glancing around his van in thought. There was his bed: useless. The small dresser: not helping. The tiny fridge: a waste of… his eyes focused on a post card that the Engineer sent him two Christmases ago. A snapshot of the Dallas' skyline was framed on the front and Sniper grinned in satisfaction. "Dallas, Texas. That is close enough to Engie where he wouldn't mind leaving for a weekend away from his family and ranch to come get piss poor drunk. It would make him more likely to go if it was close," the sharpshooter explained before groaning. "But I don't know if we can even do this! I mean none of us should be allowed in public settings. We'll a hazard to people." '!' "What?" 'A-kon!' "A what now?" 'A-kon! Please oh please can we go there?! I've always wanted to go! Please!' "Sorry, mate, but I don't know what that is." 'I'll get you a link!' 'www.a-kon.com' Sniper clicked on the link, confused, and started to skim through the website. "Uhh. An anime convention? I don't understand." 'It would be great! There, we wouldn't look any different from other people since everyone dresses up in costumes!' "That's weird." 'You're weird! And A-kon would be perfect! People wouldn't notice us and we could hang out and do something interesting like cosplay chess or going to panels!' "I'm not weird." 'You piss in jars.' "ONCE! And the jarate I use… used was actually chemical-based and had no piss in it…. I just liked watching Spy squirm." 'Really?' "Yes." 'You're still weird! Now PLEASE! Can we go?' "…Sure, why not? You'll tell the others, though. Everyone likes you." 'YES! OMG YESSS! We are going to A-kon!'
This is dumb. This is really, really dumb, and it doesn't belong here. Get this mess outta my face.
This is amazing! Cat Bountry: Thank you for being a douche!
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No, cat is right. This is stupid. this is a fanfic about sniper going to an anime convention sniper. at. an. anime. convention.
I think what Cat Bountry is trying to say, in her very minimal and uncouth manner, is that this isn't exactly TF2Chan material. It seems that this is a story centered around a group of people as a kind of inside joke--that's fine to do on Tumblr or the like, but on TF2chan you're kind of excluding a very large group of people who won't understand why this is funny and just be confused. I, for once, have no idea who any of you are and wouldn't be able to participate in the 'guessing game' you have planned. That being said, your characterization is waaay off. I get that you said you're basing characters off of your friends, but: >>'"FOREVER! My God! I wonder what everyone is doing! Where would it be held at? Oh! When should it be?" Sniper was beyond excited...' I just don't see how this is Sniper? He sounds more like a teenage girl. And as I said before, maybe it's funny to you as kind of an inside joke, but to the rest of us it just seems like poor characterization. And as for Pyro, I'm always incredibly skeptical of anyone who writes Pyro is anything other to a mumbling enigma in a suit, because chances are it will only be a self-insert. Your Pyro is heading down that road, fast. I've also always been one for sticking to time period accuracy--while TF2 is set in an alternate universe with teleporters, it's also still the 1960's, where the closest thing to cellphones is an enormous thing the size of a radio, and people still use snail mail. While this being an alternate universe does allow you some freedoms, your parody of Skype seems anachronistic and out of place. My first few points are more preference things than anything else and are easily debatable, but my biggest issue is just generally sloppy writing. You have several lines of back-and-forth dialogue without peppering in any descriptive writing. I don't really get a sense of anyone's emotions or thoughts or daily life, because it seems you found it sufficient to vomit that all out in the first few paragraphs in order to dedicate the rest to "LOL OMG ANIME XD" dialogue. It reads like Baby's First Script. Long story short this doesn't seem like a story that should be posted on TF2Chan. Might be better if you kept it on your Deviantart or your Tumblr to share with your friends, who will understand it and find it funny.
6 Yeah, this. 3 What I would not give to be able to respond to posts on the writing boards with pictures.
Alright. I see that you all are having problems here so I am sorry for posting it. Go ahead and delete it or whatever but thank you all.
>>9 We're not trying to discourage you from writing. It's just that this isn't the kind of writing we're comfortable with having on the board. If you came back with a more concise plot, where characters were doing something they actually would do canonically, we'd all be more than willing to see what you had to offer and provide due feedback. It's just that this is more of an inside joke than it is a story.