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dxppercxdxver · 2 years ago

Text

in which medic returns from sick leave and is suspicious of the fate of his interim replacement (this is a fic i wrote purely because i and @chiropteracupola thought it would be extremely funny)

contracts being as they were with tf industries, vacations weren't so much requested as they were foisted upon oneself after grievous injury. in medic's unfortunate case, a sudden and nasty bout of pneumonia the medigun simply wasn't cut out to handle had whacked him upside the head one otherwise average week in july, and after passing out from the exertion—drenched in sweat beneath his coat, genuinely slick with the stuff—on the battlefield, a menacingly plain envelope stamped with the seal of the administrator landed itself on his desk, requesting in a way that was really demanding that he make himself scarce until he was fit for duty again.

medic had no argument, and packed his bags as soon as he was able to pry his burning face off the cool metal table.

he had been gone for longer than he wanted. what he had anticipated to be a few days' absence at most stretched into almost a month, bedridden and aching in a cheap hostel a few towns over (teufort, obviously, was hardly an option, what with the entire infrastructure operating almost exclusively on flagrant osha violations and the townspeople's penchant for hangings). it was hardly the most ideal of circumstances, but he recovered all the same, slowly but surely, chomping at the bit to return to the dustbowl and his most loyal patients. medic hoped his teammates missed him; he liked to think he provided a valuable service to RED and that the men around him agreed. after all, his skills were unparalleled. the poor fellows must have been miserable without him.

the day he was set to return to the quarry, he phoned ahead to miss pauling's private number he'd stolen from one of spy's personnel files to let her know he was coming—ignoring her sputtering disbelief in the process—and threw his belongings into a small deerskin suitcase, saluting the hostel owner with his fingers crossed behind his back.

during his unintended sick leave, little had changed. of course, it had only been a month or so, but after residing in the quarry almost four years with no interruption, a month felt like an eternity. he half expected the place to be burned to the ground, and to see it still standing was some sort of miracle, to be sure. straightening his back, medic buttoned his coat and strode inside.

miss pauling was there to greet him at the door, smile the widest he'd ever seen it. just beyond the foyer, the rest of the team stood in perfect alignment, similarly amiable expressions on their faces. while medic was glad to be appreciated, such behavior was wildly unsettling from a group of men whose primary off-shift occupation was ignoring each other or shouting. even sniper was looking at him with a strange fondness.

with a hesitant wave, medic greeted them quietly. "hello?"

"medic, hi!" miss pauling cried, rushing forward. "so glad to see you, can i take your bag? to your lab, right?"

"i— okay." in but an instant, medic's suitcase was snatched out of his hand and miss pauling was marching him down the corridor toward the medbay, gleeful demeanor never wavering. her knuckles were nearly white around the handle. their teammates followed like a silent parade, a welcoming entourage medic was beginning to grow incredibly suspicious of.

"quite the reception here today," he said lightly, peering through the cracked doors that lined the hall. "is everything alright?"

"yeah, 'course, everything's good, why would you even say something like that?" scout piped up from behind him, gesticulating wildly. "we're all super here, doc, absolutely nothin' to see, i can tell ya that."

so something was absolutely wrong.

trying to lighten the mood, medic did his best to crack a joke. "did someone die while i was gone?"

rather pointedly, no one responded. miss pauling simply looped her arm under his elbow and steered him off toward the lab, flinging the door open for him like an enthusiastic chauffeur.

medic was delighted to see that, even with an interim replacement having taken up residence in his quarters, the medbay was just as he had left it, in all its chaotic organization that really only he could understand properly. piles of papers were strewn about on every available surface, his pens tossed into a cup on his desk, and archimedes fluttered down from his rafter perch to settle upon his shoulder.

idly scratching at his beloved bird's chest, medic looked around the office, noting one unusual item out of place.

a metal carrying case sat upon one of the stacks of documents like a paperweight, clean and shining under the fluorescent light. medic was certain this case was not his, and pointed at it with a questioning cock of the head.

"go on, open it," miss pauling said, and the others nodded in vigorous agreement.

he approached the case with some level of consternation, bordering on dread. it was a high quality thing, with well-oiled hinges and a nicely sprung lock. simple etchings decorated the lid, with faint initials scrawled into the center. under the glare, medic couldn't quite make them out, but he reached for the clasp all the same.

inside, pristine medical tools reflected his illness-haggard face back at him; scalpels, syringes, a small saw, scissors, and pins of all sizes were arrayed on a deep red velvet backing, beautiful as any he had ever seen. the blades were sharpened to a wicked edge, and medic could only imagine the ease with which they would cut through skin and tissue and... whatever else he needed them to cut through.

they were lovely, and presumably worth a small fortune, and absolutely, fantastically out of place.

turning to his team, medic fought with equally strong emotions of gratitude and confusion.

"what... how... where did you get these?"

"happy birthday, fella," sniper said, by way of what he probably meant to be an explanation that didn't actually answer anything at all.

medic frowned. "my birthday isn't for several months."

"yeah, well, we just wanted to let ya know how much we appreciated ya. for all the work you do. cutting us open, sticking birds in our chests—" as he spoke, scout counted off items on his bandaged fingers, and medic noted a faint spattering of blood on the gauze, "—and really just bein' an all around pal."

"...really."

"yup!" miss pauling interjected, sidling over to the rest of the team. "really, you've just been such an excellent addition to RED's roster, we wanted to show you how much you meant to us and the administrator."

pursing his lips, medic gently shooed archimedes from his shoulder, closing the lid of the case. "i... see. and you are sure everything is fine?"

"fine and dandy." from near the back of the small hoard crowding his doorway, engineer piped up with a double thumbs-up for emphasis. "right as rain, and all that."

"of course." medic paused, considering the oddly untouched state of his office. "how was my replacement?"

"oh, him? he was— he was good," miss pauling said a little too loudly, waving her hand in what was almost certainly meant to be a dismissive gesture that instead nearly succeeded in clocking pyro across the jaw. "a real gentleman, that one, barely made any trouble for us. and, just, like. reeeeally good at medicine." the grin that stretched across her face was so full of perfectly white teeth medic swore he would go blind.

everything about this situation was suspect, medic knew this, but he also wasn't sure how to get to the bottom of it without discovering more than he actually wanted to know. so instead, he flashed a smile of his own, flashing a loose wave.

"well. thank you all for this gift," he said, eyeing the case warily, "and this... warm return, but i really must get to unpacking. science to be done, and all of that."

"sure, sure, gotcha." ushering everyone out of the room, miss pauling was nodding so hard medic half thought her head was liable to snap off. "great having you back, medic. love ya."

and with that, the team was gone, and medic was left alone.

the first thing he did was inspect the contents of his desk. much of it was just how he remembered it, but hidden amongst his stacks of medical histories and experimental notes, he found a fabric binder stuffed to the brim with papers. the binder, much like the case, was definitely not his, and...

was that blood?

the corner of the binder, though the cloth was a deep green to begin with, was suspiciously darker, soaked through with something that smelled vaguely of copper. upon opening it, the papers contained within boasted the same smears of blood. large passages of text were haphazardly blocked out with what appeared to be a permanent marker. as he flipped through, medic marveled at the thoroughness of the covering up; he could make out very little, aside from the barely-there presence of a name typed up on a page of letterhead.

plucking the page out of its place, medic held it up against the case, tipping it away from the bulbs.

g.h. was etched into the case, and the paper, where it was legible, read "gre—" before it dissolved into inky blood.

well, medic thought, gingerly placing the letterhead into his trashcan, that answered a great many questions.

all that was left was to find where the carnage ended.

medic peeked through the glass in the lab's door, ensuring the halls were empty, before slinking across the tile floor to the one of the rooms they had passed on the way in.

it was a storage room that frequently doubled as a secondary site for engineer's less than high priority experiments, and droplets of blood were clearly visible on the linoleum just outside. when he pushed the door inward, yet more appeared, in streams and smears across the floor. medic followed the trail with his eyes, all the way up to a monstrous machine the size of a small bus. silver and aluminum and copper twinkled in the darkness, lit only where the light from the hall bypassed medic's silhouette and touched the metal. the plating gleamed, obviously freshly cleaned.

as medic examined the nature of the contraption, his gaze was drawn to all manner of pistons and conveyor belts and rotating drums covered in vicious looking spikes. it was, all in all, designed to kill a person extremely efficiently and impersonally, which meant it could only have been engineer's work.

the dissonance between the gore-streaked floor and the spotless machinery was almost poetic, medic supposed.

"ah well. auf wiedersehn," he murmured, resting a gloved hand on one of the plates with an air of solemnity, before exiting the storeroom and pulling the door closed behind him. whoever his replacement was, it was obvious he was lost to the ages now.

but hey, at least he got some sweet new medical equipment out of the deal.

#in which medic discovers his team has fucking mangled a man #inspired by me and em going 'hey what if doctor gregory house was medic's interim replacement and the team ripped him apart'#based of course on the results of the sawbones-showdown poll #so basically. this is what happens when medic discovers his team has fucking murdered gregory house #this is not meant to be taken at All seriously #team murder! gregory house is also there! fuck him! get in the contraption!!#anyway. hope you like this emothy shjshjs #radio free junebug #do i maintag this #honestly why not #team fortress 2 #medic #captain's logbook

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