A Worm in the Gulch (Worm/Red vs. Blue)

I'm sure some of us are waiting with baited breathe for Armsmaster to suddenly appear, be rude and nasty to all of Red and Blue team, only to get shot in the ass and Taylor quit seriously exclaiming, "Tucker did it!"
 
Caboose: Taylor. Taylor. Taylor... are you doing okay?

Taylor: Ummmm. *slowly losing her mind* Yeah, just wondering if pigs are going to start flying.

Caboose: She's doing okay.
 
Tex is technically an AI right like I barely remember RvB stuff but what happened to her when she came back again?

Honestly would like for Taylor to have an AI and it being Tex
 
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Quick heads up, guys. My head's feeling like total shit, the painkillers make me feel like I went ten rounds with the Undertaker, and my computer's acting up. Next chapter is gonna be a while.
 
#7 - Learning Curve (AKA Taylor Sees Pigs Flying)
#7: Learning Curve
(AKA Taylor Sees Pigs Flying)


"So, let me get this straight," I started slowly, trying my hardest to remain calm. "Caboose really did accidentally kill you because Sheila's friendly fire setting was off. And you came back as a ghost."

"Yep," Church said with a pop.

"And your ex-girlfriend was some badass supersoldier with an artificial intelligence that made her an absolute bitch."

"Actually, Tex is a natural bitch," Tucker chimed in. "Her A.I. just made her an even bigger bitch. You sure know how to pick 'em, huh Church?"

"Up yours, cocksucker."

"And to try and stall your girlfriend from leaving so you could find a way to get the A.I. out of her head, you possessed the robot on Red Team, who for some reason they programmed to only speak in Spanish."

"Uh-huh!" Caboose nodded. "It took a while for him to learn English again."

"At least we turned off his Spanish settings!" Tucker groaned. "God, that was freaking annoying."

CLICK. "No está completamente apagado, pendejo."

Tucker and I stared at Church with varying reactions. The former sighed. "I'll go get the Spanish-to-English dictionary."

"Moving on," I bit out with growing annoyance at the sheer absurdity of what was going on. "That pink-armored girl from the Red Team destroyed Sheila and killed Texas, so you've been in control of…Lopez's body this whole time."

"Yeah, that about sums it up," Church said. "Honestly, as far as bodies go, it's kinda swanky. Don't get tired or anything."

"But you still can't aim for shit!" Tucker snickered. The cyan-colored jackass flipped him the bird in response.

I stared at Church a minute longer before sighing, ignoring the fact I wore a helmet and facepalmed. "You guys can't be serious. You really expect me to believe that you turned into a ghost and possessed a robot body."

"What's so hard to believe about that?"

"Everything!" I threw my hands up exasperatedly. "Ghosts don't exist!"

Honestly, it sounded outlandish, and with everything I've seen up to this point, I was half-convinced they were on crack. I wouldn't be surprised if they were. I was also willing to chalk it up to parahuman bullshit; maybe Church had superpowers that allowed him to possess people or machinery, but failed to realize it.

"Yeah, well, you're looking at a ghost," Church huffed. "Not my problem if you don't believe me." He looked to the side and glowered in the direction of Red Base. "What is my problem is the Reds. We gotta get Sheila back online."

"How?" Tucker asked. "Tex is dead, and you're possessing the only guy who can fix her."

"What if you tried using the Reds' mecha buddy to help?" Caboose asked. Church and Tucker both stared at him incredulously.

I wanted to get back to the topic of Church supposedly being a ghost, but for now, that could wait. As much as I hate to admit it, he had a point. The Reds hadn't attacked in the month I've been here up until now, so something must have changed. Thankfully none of them seemed to realize I was with them, though I was still concerned. Sarge didn't seem to be the most…understanding.

"Caboose has a good point," I said thoughtfully, ignoring the disbelieving looks they were sending me. "Lopez is supposed to be a robot, right? So, maybe it knows how to fix machinery? Like a maintenance routine or something."

"…you know, they've got a point," Tucker said quietly.

Church slowly nodded. "Yeah, they kinda do."

"And it was Caboose's idea."

"…yeah, it was."

Tucker was silent for a moment. He and Church stared at each other for a few seconds and—

THWACK!

"OW! Motherfucker! What the hell was that for, jackass?!"

"Aren't you supposed to hit somebody to make sure you're not dreaming?"

"You're supposed to hit yourself, numbnuts!"

I moaned miserably.



The next few hours or so was a…unique learning experience, to say the least. Church took mine and Caboose's idea to heart and tried to see if Lopez had some kind of maintenance routine installed in him. I was still wholly unconvinced of Church being a ghost, but I was willing to concede that he was somehow possessing a robot. Alternate universe or no, I was willing to bet that Church was a parahuman. Earth Aleph had them, so why not here?

Church's efforts turned out to be mixed. While he failed to find any sort of routine or program in Lopez, he and Tucker did discover some kind of switch. The switch did nothing other than cause Church to belt out an obnoxiously loud beeping noise. It was tolerable for a few minutes, but after the fifteen minute mark, Tucker and I lost our patience. We managed to get the beeping noise to stop by tearing out the wires sticking out of Church's body, but it had an unfortunate side effect.

"Well, this is just fucking great!" Church yelled angrily. "What the hell am I supposed to do about this?!"

"Calm down you big baby," Tucker dismissed his friend's anger. "It's not like you use your legs all that much anyway."

In hindsight, ripping out the wires all at once was a bad idea. The end result was not as bad as I was expecting, though. So far the only problem we had was Church losing all motor functions in his legs.

"It could be worse," I offered my two cents. "You could, you know, not be moving at all."

"Fuck, it would have been an improvement if you ask me."

"Tucker, I will ram my sniper rifle up your goddamn ass if you don't fix this," Church glowered. "Seriously, the hell are we gonna do if the Reds come by while I'm like this?! And where the hell is Caboose?!"

"I have him bringing a tool kit up here," I said. "At the very least, I can see if we can't fix the wires."

Tucker suddenly looked panicked. "Wait, you mean he's coming up with stuff right now?"

"Yeah," I nodded before frowning. "Why? What's—"

I heard a crash behind me. Something whizzed past me and buried itself in Church's shoulder, causing him to swear so colorfully and violently I think Skidmark would be impressed.

"Tucker did it!" Caboose yelped.

"I'm standing right here, you idiot!" Tucker snapped.

I blinked, looking at Caboose one moment and Church the next before sighing, walking over to the Blue Team leader and yanking out the screwdriver somehow lodged in Lopez's chasis.

"I take it this has happened before?" I asked despite knowing the answer.

"There's a reason why we haven't let him anywhere near Sheila with any tools," Church bit out, trying very hard not to scream or curse out of frustration.

I shook my head and looked at the tools scattered across the floor. "Okay," I said with trepidation as I made a call from my helmet. Nifty little feature, though it took some getting used to. "Let's see how badly we screw this up."

By the time I collected the tools and beckoned Tucker to help me, Vic was on the line.



"So, what's the plan here?" Grif asked as he, Simmons, and Doc walked towards Blue Base. "What makes you think the Blues will take back the hostage?"

"Because he's a medic?" Simmons shrugged. "Either way, I speak for all of us when I say he's way too dangerous to have at Outpost Number 1."

And wasn't that an understatement? Within five hours of becoming their hostage, Doc had somehow managed to get kidnapped by their runaway jeep after the Blues somehow managed to crack the passcode to operate it remotely. And after that, he proceeded to ram Sarge into the side of Red Base at least twice after the Blues lost control over the vehicle somehow. Despite his status as a medic, he could do very little for Sarge other than tell him to rub some aloe vera on his stomach.

Worst medical advice ever. Of all time.

"If we're lucky, they've got no idea how crappy he is," Simmons continued. "By the way, Grif…"

"Mmyeah, what's up?"

"Did you notice Blue Team has a fourth member now?"

"Wow, Simmons. Congratulations. You finally learned how to count," Grif mocked lightly.

Simmons punched him in the shoulder. "Shut up, idiot. I'm being serious here. What if that soldier is actually Lopez? What if Sarge was right and they did manage to reprogram him?"

"If that's the case, then maybe they remodeled him."

"How do you figure?"

"Well, unless I'm going to crazy, and believe me, I'm pretty sure we're well past that point since we got to this fucking place, I distinctly remember Lopez having more muscle."

"Why would they remodel Lopez, then? Camouflage?"

"What are you guys talking about?" Doc asked curiously, butting in on their conversation.

Although annoyed with the quack medic, Grif answered nonetheless. "Long story short, we think the Blues might have taken Sarge's robot and reprogrammed him."

"All the more reason to get Lopez back as soon as possible!" Simmons stressed. "He's the only one who knows how to repair the Warthog—"

"You mean the Puma."

"—shut up, Grif!" the maroon soldier chided before continuing. "Lopez is the only one who cam repair the Warthog. I wouldn't be surprised if they reprogrammed him to fix their tank."

"Which one's Lopez?" Doc asked curiously.

"The light blue one," Grif answered. "The other light blue one. The teal guy, what's his name again? Tucker or something?"

Doc was confused. "I thought you said Lopez is a guy?"

"He is," Simmons nodded. He paused, then looked up at the sky thoughtfully. "Or, well, I think so? Sarge says he's male, but who knows?"

"Huh, then the Blues must've changed his settings or something, because last I remember, that soldier was a girl."

Grif stopped in his tracks as did Simmons. The latter, ever so slowly, looked over his shoulder. "…what did you just say?"

"My scanner read she's female and organic, so unless Lopez is secretly a cyborg or something, that soldier's not the one you're looking for."

Grif felt a cold dread settle over him. "There's no way," Simmons said quickly, shaking his head in denial. "The Blues were shooting at her when we first met. Why would she…" He gasped in horror. "Y-you don't think they tortured and brainwashed her, do you?!"

"…Simmons," Grif sighed. "That has got to be the dumbest fucking thing I've ever heard, and exactly the stupid crap Sarge would say." If anything, it was more likely the leader of the Blues, the cyan jackass who couldn't shoot for shit, forcibly recruited her to help even the numbers. She didn't shoot at all during the assault earlier.

Of course, it was equally as possible she joined out of preservation. She was just a civvie who got the bad end of the stick, after all. Virtually stuck in a place she knew nothing about. Torn away from home.

Grif found himself thinking about Kakaina, the little brat. She would be out of college and into the workforce by now. When was the last time they talked, now that he thought about it? Maybe he could send her a letter or something. See how she and their mom was doing.

…on second thought, that sounded like way too much work. Maybe a call would do.

"But…"

"Look, we'll find out soon enough," Grif groaned. Blue Base was coming into view. "Why don't we go see if its her. Worse case, it's that Freelancer bitch back from the dead."

At the thought of that black-armored terror somehow coming back for more, the two soldiers shuddered in horror. Grif felt his balls ache in pain. He had no idea what he did to earn the Freelancer's ire, but she seemed quite intent on ensuring he was never going to have kids for a long time, if ever.

A few minutes later, they arrived at Blue Base. "Hey!" Simmons called out. "We gotta talk—what the hell are you guys doing?!"



Sorry about the wait. Between feeling like shit and my head taking a beating, I was in the process of changing rooms with my sister. It's still a work in progress at the moment, but so far so good.

At any rate, I'll probs keep going until I finish the events of Season 2. After that, I'll be shifting focus again. I'll be updating Invincible Girl from Another World and Of Crystal Shards and Dust [Royal Revisions] with Daemon of Wrath, and maybe update Demon Slayer: Grimm Chronicles if I can ever muster the will to dip my feet back into it. My enthusiasm for that fanfic has dwindled for a while. Once those have been updated some, I'll focus on Phantom, which is in dire need of substantial updates…aaaaaand lucky for me, my enthusiasm for Persona 5 will be invigorated by then. Why? Because Persona 5 Royal is coming to Xbox, PC, and Switch. What a time to be alive.

Anyways, updates will be slow going for a while, so please be patient.

Cheers, everyone.
 
Obbligatory shill about my book here. By now you know the drill. If your interested, check out Chase Ryder and the City of Lost Memories on Amazon. If not, no worries.

Also, pay the change in avatar and title no mind. Currently on a Cyberpunk kick thanks to Edgerunners reinvigorating my interest in the game and reminding me I've yet to finish the Streetkid and Corpo lifepaths.
 
Grif felt his balls ache in pain. He had no idea what he did to earn the Freelancer's ire, but she seemed quite intent on ensuring he was never going to have kids for a long time, if ever.
I'd say it was for being the kind of person he is, but that's an argument that could be made for everyone in that dirt hole. Including Tex.
 
#8 - Reunion (AKA Taylor Meets the Reds. Again.)
#8: Reunion
(AKA Taylor Meets the Reds. Again.)


Simmons' incredulous shout was not without merit, thinking back on it. I mean, really, how else would you react to seeing three soldiers gathered around a fourth soldier, all staring and fiddling with his lower half?

"Who the hell?" Church tried to look over his shoulder and see who was talking, only to curse when he realized his lower half wouldn't move with him. "Tucker, who's that?"

"The Reds," Tucker said simply.

"What?! Caboose, why didn't you say anything?!"

I get the feeling I was going to sigh a lot while I was here. "Because you wouldn't let him, you idiot."

"W-whatever! One of you turn me around!"

"What do you guys want?!" Tucker called out. "We're, uh, kind of the middle of something here!"

"No shit, we can tell." I got the distinct impression Grif was rolling his eyes under his helmet. "Are you guys seriously this desperate?"

"Fuck you! At least you have a girl that you can actually bang!" He paused, then turned to me. "Uh, no offense, kid. I mean, don't get me wrong, your cute and all, but I'd rather not go to jail for touching a girl ten years younger than me, you know?"

I waved a hand in dismissal. "Don't worry about it." It took me a second to realize what he just said. "Wait, did you just—"

"What the hell are you talking about?" Simmons asked out of genuine confusion.

"Oh, they mean the pink lady who blew up Sheila!" Caboose chimed in helpfully. His voice turned dark a second later. "She'll be the first to die."

"You mean Donut?"

…please tell me that's an alias and not their actual name.

"Donut." Church said. "The pink chick who blew up our tank and killed my ex is named Donut. Wow. I don't know whether to be impressed or laugh my ass off."

"For the record, Donut is a guy," Grif corrected. "A really touchy-feely, sensitive guy, but trust me, they're a guy."

"Okay, fine, the pink chick is actually a pink guy!" Church huffed. "So, what do you assholes want?"

"How about you turn around and actually talk to us face-to-face?"

"Uh…"

"He's shy!" Caboose told them.

"What are you guys back here for anyway?" Tucker asked. "We already surrendered and gave you the medic, didn't we?"

"Uh, yeah, about that…" Grif sighed. "We want to give him back!"

That made me confused. For about ten seconds. DuFresne admitted he wasn't a proper medic, because I refuse to believe that 'making you comfortable as you die' was the only job you had.

"Uh, hello?" Vic said from my helmet's earpiece. "Everything okay over there, dude?"

"Sorry, Vic. I'll call you again. Something just came up. Thanks for finding that manual, though." It was a shot in the dark for the most part, hoping Command would somehow have a manual for repairing robots. To my surprise, Vic managed to find one. Surprisingly comprehensive, if maybe a little nonsensical at times.

Vic chuckled. "No problemo, dude. Feel free to call again anytime."

"What?" Tucker was confused. "He's a prisoner. You can't just give prisoners back!"

"Yeah, we, uh, don't want him anymore. Got another prisoner?"

"Nope!" Church said. "Fresh out! You take what you get, Red! Now beat it!"

"Wanna say that to my face, punk?" Grif challenged, raising his gun just a little higher. Church was silent. The orange-armored man grunted smugly. "Yeah, that's what I thought. Bitch."

Evidently, that was the one thing Church wouldn't let slide. "Private Hebert," he bit out. "Shoot them."

"Can't. Not officially part of the Blue Army, remember?"

At the foot of the base, the red-armored soldiers sputtered. "Wait, Taylor?!" Simmons called out in shock. "That's really you up there?! Y-you're with the Blues?"

"Not willingly!" I called out. "This jackass shanghaied me and said Command would find me a way back home. Been here a month, and still no word!"

"I coulda told you they're incompetent," Tucker said. "They sent us Caboose."

"Hey, what's that supposed to mean?" Caboose asked. I swore he was pouting under that helmet.

"What do you think it means, moron?"

"…wooow," Grif said after getting over his shock. "You know, I thought you guys were doing alright after losing your big scary freelancer chick, but you must be really desperate if you roped in a civvie of all people."

"Up yours, Red! At least I didn't aim a shotgun in her first when I first met her!"

"WE never shot at her!" Simmons shot back.

Tucker growled. "That was because of fucking Caboose and his damn trigger finger!"

"Tucker did it!"

"Okay, you know what? That's it." Finally reaching the breaking point, Tucker leaped at Caboose and knocked him off Blue Base. The sounds of a struggle and cries of pain, mostly Tucker's by the sounds of it, followed afterwards as dust flew about everywhere.

Church and I sighed in unison.

"Do you ever feel like you just wanna burn down the whole fucking world?" the sniper asked me.

"Ever second of every minute of every day since I got here and the world stopped making sense."

The Reds eventually up and left. DuFresne did try to return on his own, but Church wasn't having it. I protested, of course. As…questionable as his 'profession' was, I wanted to believe he had some level of medical expertise that might help me. That, and that scanner thing could prove useful later down the line. Unfortunately, my objections were ignored.

I called Vic back and resumed progress on getting Church's legs to work. It was going well…at first. I made the mistake of taking a break and asking Caboose to make small talk with Church, my way of getting vengeance on him. When I got back, Church's groin area was a mess of wires, Tucker was laughing his ass off, and Caboose was sulking.

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" Church roared with such intensity I swore the air shook. "HOW?! How can you fuck this up?!"

"Oh, for—what happened now?!" I asked.

"C-Caboose thought he saw a loose wire, so-so he tried to shove it back in," Tucker wheezed between laughs. "T-then he tried yanking it, and everything just… Whoo! Oh, man. Oooooh, I needed that."

"I-I was just trying to help…" Caboose moped.

I let my helmet fall into my hands. I shouldn't be surprised by this, I really shouldn't, but here we are. God I fucking hate this place.



"What?!"

Simmons winced, his CO's shout somehow ringing across Blood Gulch.

Learning Taylor was indeed part of the Blues was something a sore spot for him. It shouldn't have mattered since they only met once, but he couldn't forget the look in her eyes. Scared, frightened, terrified out of her mind. Not to mention the state of her clothes. Whoever dumped her in the canyon really wanted her gone badly, if not dead. Worst of all, she was just a kid. Barely even in high school assuming he was not mistaken.

Despite his…problems…with women in general, Simmons was wholly willing to put those problems aside. He wanted to help her in any way he could.

…well, he supposed it could be worse. She seemed fine, at least.

"You mean to tell me the Blues forcibly recruited that civilian from last month?!" Sarge bellowed. "Those darn, dirty, backstabbing Blues…! Monsters! All of them!"

"Backstabbing?" Grif muttered. "How is that backstabbing? That'd actually mean we were working with them at some point, right?"

"Wait, you mean there's a civilian here in Blood Gulch?" Why was Donut so—oh, right, duh, he was guarding the base when Sarge took them to the cliffs for recon. "Like the girl you guys found a couple weeks ago?"

"Same girl, actually," Grif said. "Said her name was Taylor. Blues must really be scraping the bottom of the barrel if they recruited a civvie."

"Grif…"

"Yeah, I know, okay? But seriously, what're we supposed to do?" Simmons' partner asked pointedly. "It's not like we're gonna just load up and—"

Sarge pumped his shotgun. "Saddle up, boys! We're going on a rescue mission!"

"—going on a rescue mission and… wait, huh?" Grif and Simmons did a double-take and stared at Sarge in shock. "What? Sarge, are you nuts?!"

"Of course not! Don't you see, Grif? They've brainwashed the poor girl! Right now, they got her doing manual field labor! Sprucing up the place! Maintaining equipment! But what if she starts learning how to use guns?! Training her to be an assassin?! As a member of the glorious Red Army, it's our civic duty to save that poor girl from the clutches of the cerulean devils!"

"Uh-huh…"

Simmons grimaced under his helmet. "Um, sir, as good as that sounds… You do remember you aimed a shotgun in her face when we first met and accused her of being a spy, right? I don't think Taylor would appreciate a rescue mission from the people who aimed a gun at her face."

"You mean Sarge," Grif pointed out. "We actually tried to talk to her like civilized people."

"Simmons," Sarge grunted. "Remind to tell you to poison Grif's next meal."

"Consider it done, sir!" Ever one to butter up his superior in the hopes of acknowledgement (and more), Simmons saluted.

"Gee, thanks for reminding me you're still a kissass, Simmons."

"At least I won't be shitting out blood for the next week, cockbite."

"Can the pillow talk, you two!" Sarge ordered. "Grif, you and Donut stay here! Simmons, load up the turret! It's time to commence Operation Red Saves The Day!"



I tried. I tried very, very hard not to scream in frustration or punch something. Despite what TV and novels tell you, they don't work. Trust me, I've tried. Sophia disabused me of all those notions.

"Look, can't you just come with me?" I pleaded for the umpteenth time. "I promise, I'm not going to do anything to you. I just want to fix your legs."

"¿Por qué debería escuchar un azul sucio?" Lopez said.

To give a brief recap, I was taking a break and talking to Vic about the next tests for my medical license when Caboose mentioned Church should de-possess his body so Lopez could possibly fix himself, and then fix Sheila. It sounded like a good plan, and it would have given me a chance to determine for myself what in the hell Church was. Unfortunately, I came back just in time to see Church—or more specifically Lopez making a getaway, with Blue team none the wiser.

I naturally chased after him and tried to talk to the robot. Key word "tried"; I don't know if he was designed that way or if Church messed with his internal settings or Caboose did something, but for some reason, Lopez only spoke in Spanish.

"…translation, Vic?" I sighed.

The spokesperson of Blue Command chuckled awkwardly. "Sorry, dude. Don't know a lick of Spanish."

"D-don't you people have a translating system, or-or google translate or something?"

"We, uh, don't have that. Or at least I don't. And nobody's used google for, like, eight or nine centuries, dude."

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me…"

Perfect. Fan-fucking-tastic. How incompetent do you have to be to not have a translator or something?! You people have POWER ARMOR for fuck's sake! Futuristic tech that'd make Tinkers green with envy! How do you not have something as basic as translators?!

Lopez stared at me oddly. "Eres... una persona muy enfadada."

"Taylor, duck!"

Tucker's shout brought out from my rage-induced thoughts. I saw a flashing glint atop Blue Base and—shit! I threw myself to the ground, just in time for a sniper round to fly past me and Lopez. The robot cried out in alarm and ran away.

"Tucker!" I cried into the radio. "The hell was that for?!"

"Sorry 'bout that," he apologized. "But we've got a plan! We're gonna try and push the guy towards the teleporter!"

"The what?" Teleporter? Okay, this just reinforced my point. Advanced tech, and still no translators!

"Just trust us! Small green-looking thing north of the base! Can't miss it!"

"Can you just explain for…" The radio feed cut out.

I tried. I tried really hard. I took a deep shuddering breathe and…



"Uh, sir?" Simmons called out nervously from the turret seat. "W-what was that?"

"That, Simmons, was the sound of a girl screaming in pain and agony! Time to double-time it, otherwise we'll be too late!"



From his command station, Vic listened to every word being screamed out in Taylor Hebert's helmet. Due to the rules of Sufficient Velocity, and even Fanfiction.net, what Taylor said into the radio cannot be transcribed here. Not that it mattered, since Vic's station was automatically equipped with a BLEEP censor in case of Agent South.

"Huh," he said simply. "Looks like Agent South's no longer the most foul-mouthed chick this side of space."



And another new chapter! A bit later than I intended, though.

Nothing new to say here, other than trying my best to make slight changes than just "Taylor lives through Blood Gulch Chronicles".

Also, google translate for Lopez all the way.
 
So. How long until Tay just beats the shit out of everyone in Blood Gultch? She seems pissed off enough at this point.
 
One of these days, we'll get a fic or omake, where Skitter and Panecea get into a curse-off during the bank robbery. An power interaction will cause the air to go blue and by the time it's over everyone will look like over-dyed blueberries. And the two girls will still be trading barbs with each other to the point even Armsmaster won't charge in to the fight.
 
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