#quickstudy

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After four long hours of battle, and round after round of humiliating RED Team losses, the klaxon wailed and hailed the end of the work day for the poor fellows down in Teufort, New Mexico. The BLUs marched out with high heads and gloating smiles, and retreated to their locker rooms to count out bet money and crack open some beers. The REDs trudged through blood-clotted sand puddles to their lockers and scraped their heels in the door frame, with uniforms lousy, torn, and sweat-soaked beyond the good of washing. No blistering smiles, or cheerful banter, and not really much noise at all save for the slamming-open of the locker doors and the clatter of guns, hats, and accoutrements to the benches and the floors.

It was an ugly series of rounds, and an uglier loss overall, made worse with some faulty equipment (Scout’s headset had been acting up the whole day, Sniper’s best scope had a scratch), bad calls, and plum poor luck. Not a man in that room was happy, but none more pure and pissed than the good Engineer Dell Conagher.

He stomped his path to his standing locker and ripped the door near off of its hinges, and hurled his favored pipe wrench into the wall with a cantankerous CLANG.

“Dammit!” The man bellowed, tearing the canary-yellow hardhat from his head and throwing that to the concrete as he bitched. “God-dammit! We had them bastards on the goddamned ropes!”

It was true. Their losing rounds had been consecutive, frustrating, and downright embarrassing at times, but they hadn’t all been hopeless. The midpoint of round 10 had given RED a crucial break in the BLU’s push for the second point. RED Heavy begot a dead BLU Heavy, RED Sniper begot a dead BLU Soldier, and a pissy RED Medic begot a dead (and grossly dismembered) BLU Demoman. With that much space to breathe, and that much time for the Engineer to rush-upgrade his ballistic turret, they could’ve held that point much, much longer.

But that damn BLU Spy, and his damn BLU sapper. That solid hold they'd had fell apart about as hard and as fast as Engie’s turret had when he turned his back at the wrong time.

“Damn Spies…” Engie muttered through his clenched jaw. He was grinding his teeth together so tightly one could imagine he was trying to make corn flour in his molars. “I’m so damn mad I could spit.”

It wasn’t an often sight for the other 8 men to see the Engineer so hot. He was American, a people who could be known for their flaming tempers, and he was a Texan to boot, but Engie was cool-headed at the worst of times and could even be downright tranquil at the best. Never one to holler, shout, or scream at his fellow teammates in anger even in the thick of a losing battle, even if any one of them was being an obvious flaming idiot. He was a quick-witted, level-headed, stoic sentry of a man. That’s likely why his anger wasn’t much like a firecracker, but more of a pressure cooker left to stew for too-little too-long.

He radiated anger like heat, and one could hear his developing migraine beating a pissed-off rhythm in his skull from down a long hallway. It was the kind of slow, rough, abrasive anger that killed people for breathing too loud too close.

The last time he'd gotten all up-in-arms like he looked right then, the team had elected to ignore the bellows and crashes coming under the base from his workshop, only realizing the extent of the damage when they'd found a mangled experiment tossed out by the dumpster, scorched and twisted beyond recognition or repair.

So, lest he be compelled to show the rest of the boys what his old pipe wrench was good for beyond sentries and dispensers, it was silently agreed among the rest of the RED men that the best course of action would be to stay out of the Engineer’s way when he was stewing. 

The sticking point of a silent agreement, however, was that it wasn’t much good for a man who was as tone-deaf and emotionally unobservant as a fart in a funeral. The good RED Scout happened to be one of those sorts of men.

When Engie’s tight-lipped curses became mutters and huffs, Scout, who had been undoing his hand wraps, looked up and said, “Hey, Eng."

Shoulders tensed and hands stilled across the room, though Scout didn’t seem to catch any of that. Engie inhaled and bit out, “What, Scout?”

“Whaddayou call a mix between an elephant and a rhino?”

Immediately, the other REDs shuffled away from the scene, doing what they could to get cleaned up and get out of there before the pot boiled over. Scout was annoying; everyone knew this. He could try the patience of a saint. He seemed to know intrinsically the buttons of everyone he met and exactly how to push them. They’d seen him send people from zero to pissed in a few short sentences. None of them thought he’d be stupid enough to try and antagonize the Engineer, though. Not even Pyro played with that much fire.

Engie shook his head, then dragged his hands real slow down his face. “What?”

Scout chuffed, snorted back at him, “‘El-if-I-know!”, then hunkered over in choked off giggles that turned into the loudest sound in the room.

Engie didn’t chuckle, didn’t hardly smile, just pushed his lips together and started shucking his toolbelt to put it away.

When Scout collected himself he started on his left hand wrap, glanced mischievously over his shoulder, and said again, ”I got another one”

“Lad.”

That was Demo on the bench across from Scout a little ways away. He fought to catch Scout’s eye and, when he did, shook his head very slowly to warn him off.

Scout shrugged, like he was saying, ‘What?’.

Demo shook his head again and nudged it in the direction of the Engineer, trying to draw attention to his drawn-up shoulders and the steam practically coming out of his ears.

Scout just looked between him and Engie, he did it a few times, then shrugged again. ‘What?’

While Demo tried to come up with the most intelligent way to go about getting Scout to see what was right in front of his damn eyes, Scout went back to Engie.

“Whaddayou call a cop that’s asleep in a bed?” Scout got the last of his wraps off, and he turned a little further in his seat on the bench. “Huh?”

Everyone in the room had their eyes on Engie- Scout in mischief, the others anxiously. Engie worked his goggles off his face and rubbed his real hand over the indents they left under his eyes. He sniffed, then said, “What?”

The stupid smile on Scout’s face grew ten sizes. He managed to hiccup, “an undercover officer,” before losing himself in laughter once more and hunching over, just short of collapsing in his giggles.

He didn’t hear Engie sigh, didn’t see him shake his head tightly, or flex his jaw, but the others did. They glanced amongst themselves with obvious trepidation, obvious to all but two.

“Scout, lad.” Demo scooted further down his bench. “Read the room.”

“What?” Scout responded when his laughter calmed down. “Fuck you, that was a good one. Not my fault he don’t have a sense’a humor.”

Demo shook his head, then turned back to unlacing his boots. “Your funeral, laddie.”

Scout just scoffed at that. He fixed his hat on his head, and took his headset off and tossed it in his open locker, seeming not to care if it broke. He was getting a new one before the next match. 

“Wait.” He suddenly perked up and turned his head back over his shoulder. “Hey, Eng.”

Engie pinched the ridge of his nose.

“Engie! Hey!” said Scout. 

Demo leaned back over, about to hiss at him to shut his trap, but Engie grumbled before he could. “What, Scout?”

“This is the last one, I swear.”

“Damnit, Scout-” Engie mumbled.

 “C’mon, last one.”

When Engie said not a word, Scout persisted.

“Whaddayou call a solider whose survived mustard gas and pepper spray?”

Soldier’s head popped up, but Pyro was quick to wrap a hand over Soldier’s mouth and pull him back down before he started shouting in the tense atmosphere.

Scout scooched back and nudged Engie with his elbow. “Huh? Whaddayou call ‘em?”

Engie’s gloved hand tightened on the door of his locker. A creak was heard coming from it, and Engie was slowly and surely forcing five finger-sized divots into the metal where he gripped it.

A painful silence came and went before he responded, “What, Scout?”

Scout muffled a snort, and took just a second to compose himself, then answered.

“A seasoned veteran.”

Scout’s giggling started up again. Engie breathed in deeply. His eyes closed, and the Gunslinger tightened its grip like a pneumatic clamp. Then he exhaled.

As he did, though, his shoulders started shaking, and his door-grip faltered. The tight lines of his face loosened like uncoiled wires, and his breath…

He was laughing.

The rest of the REDs watched in shock when Engie threw his head back and released a bark of laughter that shattered the tension in the air like glass.

Scout whooped and hollered when he heard it, and leapt up from the bench and threw his arm over Engies shoulder with his other fist raised in victory. They were both laughing harder than that stupid joke called for, but they cackled and chortled like it was easier than breathing. Engie’s face was turning redder and redder, and soon he was bending over to lean on his knees while Scout leaned right on him.

“I knew it! I fuckin’ knew I’d get you!” Scout howled. “I fuckin’ told you!”

Engie shook his head and rubbed his hands down his face for the last time, but they came away to reveal a shameful, resigned, yet bright smile on his face. He leaned right back up against Scout when he straightened out and jabbed him in the ribs to get him to lay off.

“Aw, hell, boy,” He said through light chuckles. “Those were damn awful. Damn awful. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

“Hey, look who's talkin’, chuckles,” Scout said right back. “That one wasn’t even a good one!”

“You’re damn right about that.” The laughter had begun to calm, but the vestiges of it remained on both of their faces. 

Engie slammed the door of his locker shut (not minding the handprint-shaped divot that kept it from closing properly) and Scout kicked the door of his to do the same. They made identical clangs. Engie sauntered towards the door of the locker room with both hands in his back pockets, and Scout sidled up next to him and started to go on about how he ‘couldn’t believe that stupid soldier joke was the one that made him crack’.

Engie chuckled and nodded along, but stopped them both when he sniffed and Scrunched his face up.

“What?” Scout asked.

“Christ alive, boy.” Engie huffed hard through his nostrils like he was trying to blow to smell out. “You need a shower worse than I do. That’s sayin’ somethin’.”

Scout shoved his shoulder. “Hey, fuck you. I’m starving, dude. Food first.”

 “Not a snowball’s chance in Teufort I'm lettin’ you be near me smellin’ like that, roadrunner.” Engie shook his head, and nudged him back with his own shoulder. “I’ll tell you what: You shower, I’ll cook. That way you won’t kill everyone in this base and we won’t have to put up with your bitchin’.

“Fine. Whatever.” Then Scout nudged him right back, and they found themselves in a tiny shoving match where they kept pushing back and forth with their shoulders. “Breakfast for dinner?”

The remaining six REDs watched in silence as they left the room, joyful and tame. It was only when they were gone, hearing Engie’s voice echo down the hall saying something about sausage gravy, that any of them spoke up.

"The hell was that?" Sniper muttered.

“‘m I jus’ drunk off my ass…” Demo ventured, and dropped his foot off the bench to lean on his knees and stare down the empty doorway like everyone else. “Or did any of you lads see what I just seen?” 

“If you mean the fact that Scout had attempted to annoy our Engineer, yet we’re not currently picking his remains off the floor,” Spy responded, his smoldering cigarette hanging from his lips. “Then yes. We all did.”

Medic and Heavy, who had been standing near each other through the whole exchange, glanced at each other, at the empty doorway, and back again.

“I see…” Medic murmured, mostly to himself. “Very interesting.”

No one asked him what he was thinking. Most every man in that room was thinking the same thing.

“They will tell us when ready,” Heavy said, sagely, and turned to close his locker door. 

That was a good enough answer for the rest of them, too.

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Thank you so much for reading!! I didn't really edit this so if you notice any glaring issues feel free to point them out. Still debating whether or not I wanna publish this on ao3 but I probably will so don't panic if you see it there too

The engiescout in this was not intended to be overt. I wanted to stay close to the spirit of the og textpost and make it seem like maybe Scout and Engie themselves don't really realize their own connection and everyone else sees it before they do, but I also didn't wanna make it too subtle.