There was the first coffee.

Then there was the second. It was a bit strong, so he had to add a bit of creamer

There was a third, which was possibly the best brew Sniper had made to date. He even said so himself.

And there were many more after that. Eventually, popping by Sniper's nest became a daily occurrence. And from a daily occurrence, it turned into an hourly one. Pretty soon, Pyro was there almost as often as Sniper was.

Er, when they weren't on the battlefield. Well, even then, Pyro spent a lot of time Spy-checking around Sniper's roost and generally running back and forth to check on his friend.
Sniper did his part, of course. He always kept an extra eye out for Pyro when he saw him running out into open ground. It was kind of amusing the first time, watching Pyro jump in surprise at sudden explosion of blood bursting in front of him as Sniper took down the cloaked Spy he'd had his sights on earlier. Pyro had looked around frantically, trying to find the source of the bullet. Sniper grinned, both out of mirth and the wonderfully warm feeling in his stomach that came from watching out for his friend.

Soon, RED realized that being around the BLU Pyro was equivalent to a death sentence considering how every one of their members that had gotten a bit too close to Pyro was quickly reduced to a bloody red mist. BLU, pushing aside any preconceptions between Pyro and his apparent guardian, quickly learned to take advantage of this. Pyro became used to Scout and Spy dragging him along across open areas to get into the RED base.

In short, the friendship between Pyro and Sniper was growing very close. How could it not? They had a great many things in common and their shared ineptitude with dealing with general society brought them closer together and helped them relate to each other. One couldn't really judge the other for being awkward or stumbling in speech because, well, they were just as awkward themselves.

And they learned things about each other that were positively intriguing.

Pyro was, for example, incredibly taken by Sniper's tendency to care for… sick animals, and his penchant with critters in the first place.

Animals were generally quite scarce at their base in the Badlands. Still, there was always the occasional straggler, a wayward animal who had gotten hopelessly lost within the man-made walls. Birds were more common, but there was a bit of history behind stranger animals appearing within the base. Sniper once claimed that he had a pet lizard named Godzilla that lived in his nest. Pyro didn't believe it until he saw Sniper feeding bits of ham from dinner to a gila monster one night. It was funny because the gila monster wasn't particularly large, and therefore, didn't quite own up to the name "Godzilla." At least, that's what Pyro had thought with amusement before Sniper accidentally got bitten as he was pushing bits of meat into the lizard's mouth. When the puncture wounds from "Godzilla's" bite turned some nasty shades of red, both Sniper and Pyro wondered if maybe the name was fitting after all.

All the animals that came by Sniper's nest would leave eventually. Most, like in the case of Godzilla, would merely disappear one day, and neither Sniper nor Pyro would think too much of it. Others had to be chased away because as much as Sniper enjoyed the company of the furry and feathered, he knew keeping them around would be a liability.

They understand, Pyro reassured Sniper whenever the Aussie went all quiet and mopey after chasing out his temporary pets.
Once, Sniper and Pyro heard news of the RED team owning a chicken coop. The rumor was confirmed when Sniper and Pyro were summoned by their Scout to come look at the baby chickens, they’re really cute! And they were to the extent that the entire team was too preoccupied with the baby chickens to really mind their base.

Needless to say, RED team won that day. If anything, BLU was satisfied with the crestfallen look on the RED Scout’s face when he realized that his little chicken had capped the point in place of him. It was rather hilarious and they were still too enamored with the little chicken to really be too bitter about anything.

After that, things went back to normal. The incident with the baby chickens slowly faded into obscurity for most of the BLU team

Most, but not all.

After that fateful day, Sniper was… In love, one could say. Those baby chickens were incredibly cute and after that day, Sniper was fully enamored with the idea of having a little baby bird of his very own. He kept it to himself, of course, so no one on his team (not even Pyro) knew about his quirky longing to have a pet bird.

One day, that wish came true, but not quite in the way he was anticipating.

Sniper woke up one day to Pyro bursting into his room, frantically hudda-hudda-huddaing something indecipherable, but obviously urgent. Wondering what the bloody hell was going on, but still too dazed to really sit down and organize his thoughts, Sniper stumbled after Pyro into the hall while clumsily trying to get dressed. By the time they got to their apparent destination, the best he had done was pull on one pant leg and put his foot in the other.

Pyro was dancing anxiously about… something. Something that Sniper soon realized was a very faint sort of…

Peeping?

He squinted down at the thing Pyro was pointing at. He wasn’t quite sure what it was at first, but as the sleep from his eyes slowly dissipated, the image became a little clearer and a little more recognizable.

It was a baby bird.

But not just any baby bird.

It was an…ugly baby bird.

Sniper immediately felt guilty for thinking this as it became more apparent that the bird was in considerable pain indicative of its feeble peeps and labored movement.

He looked at Pyro expectantly, who sidled away, apparently far too squeamish to pick up the bird with his gloved hands.

“No, you ninny, your gloves. Lemme borrow ‘em.”

Relief washed through Pyro as unlike Sniper, he generally didn’t like handling animals, much less half-dead ones with smatterings of blood on them. He quickly slipped off his heavy rubber gloves and handed them to Sniper. The marksman took note of Pyro’s pale, surprisingly graceful hands before turning his attention to the bird.

It was an eagle or hawk, of sorts. Sure, it was soft and downy, but unlike the beady eyes or small, yellow beak of a baby chick, it had these huge, keen eyes that seemed to permanently wear a fierce scowl. Its beak was yellow, sure, but wickedly curved and almost stretched into a haughty sort of sneer. Patches of darker, more developed feathers dotted its primarily downy body which, when it was sitting, hid a pair of nastily sharp talons.

It was a baby bird, but… Sniper somehow felt that he had been tricked. Whoever it was that turned the wheels of time and oversaw all the activity and occurrences of mortals had a nasty sense of humor, sending him this to grant his wish of having a pet baby bird. He sighed at this quirk of fate before appraising the condition of what was probably going to be his new pet.

He guessed that it had been in a particularly unfortunate bout with some other animal based on the wound on its side. It needed attention and as long as it got some, it would probably be okay. The wound would just have to be cleaned and dressed, and the bird would probably need rest and food before it could try to return to the wild which, in this case, would be incredibly risky considering that it appeared to have just recently grown out of the altricial stage and was still not particularly accustomed to flying around and surviving yet. It would probably have to stick around for 10 or more weeks because it’d need someone or something around to watch over it during its development.

Sniper had a habit of speaking his thoughts aloud, so Pyro got a nice little explanation on the current and future state of the bird. He nodded slowly to show his understanding.

“…And in any case, we’d best get this little bugger down to Medic’s office to get some supplies. Blow me if I’m bloody paranoid, but I can’t say I’d trust the Doctor with this fellow.”

“Wdd duh wdduguh ‘d ee adduh.”

“Yeah, I know, mate, but… Well, we’d still need a few things from Medic’s place regardless, even if it isn’t for Tobi’s wounds.”

“’Odi?”

Sniper blushed slightly.

“Y-Yeah, I’ve named ‘im already. Just go with it, all right?”

Pyro shrugged. He wondered in the back of his mind if Sniper had been planning or anticipating something like this, considering how ready he was with the bird's name, but decided that it wasn't a particularly important detail to linger on.
Sniper pulled off his half-worn pant to use as a sort of nest for the baby raptor and immediately headed off towards Medic's office at a brisk trot. Pyro stared after him for a while, apparently much more aware of the man's half-naked state (Sniper was, after all, still wearing his boxers and undershirt) and wasn't quite sure what to think.

"Pyro, mate, hurry up. 'Less you've got somethin' else to do?"

Pyro shook his head and hudda-hudda-hudda'd a flustered response before running after Sniper, hand rubbing the back of his masked head with consternation.


The two (three?) fortunately made it to Medic's office without running into anyone. According to the clock, they still had a lot of time to spare before the mission was supposed to start (Pyro was normally an early riser and upon finding the bird, consequently woke up Sniper).

Sniper gingerly set the bird down on Medic's desk and proceeded to rummage around for supplies.

"Splints…gauze… some of that smelly stuff, ointment, right…"

Pyro, having spent more time in Medic's office than Sniper had, procured the items as Sniper listed them off. He had a pretty good idea of where Medic kept all his supplies, but it had still been a while since he had been in the office (thanks to Sniper) and Medic was bound to have moved a few things around. Still, he had a better idea of where things were than the marksman and eventually found everything he was looking for far before Sniper had any idea of where to look

Arms full of medical supplies (and a bag of beef jerky. Maybe it had been confiscated from Soldier or Scout), Pyro tapped Sniper on the shoulder. The Aussie whipped around to the cold touch of Pyro's non-gloved fingers.

"WOAH--- Oh. Oh! Excellent, that's perfect. Thanks, mate!"

Sniper looked at the supplies in Pyro's arms and at the bird, eyes narrowing as he decided his next course of action.

"Hey, d'you mind if we do somethin' for Tobi right now? He isn't in a really good state and…"

From behind his mask, Pyro winced, anticipating Sniper's eagerness to help the injured animal. And as much as Pyro understood and sort of shared that urgency, he believed there were more…pressing matters to be addressed.

Namely Sniper's manner of dress and, more mortifying, the possible discovery of it by the others.

"Huh…Ha 'ood phehh 'o phoo eh phwoo…"

"Eh? Why's that?"

Pyro's shoulders sagged with exasperation. He motioned awkwardly towards Sniper, hoping very much that the man would get a clue so he wouldn't have to unmask and articulate his problem.

“What? It doesn’t bother me, mate. Really.”

Pyro let out a muffled, frustrated wail that was translated into a very intimidating, angry noise by his mask. Sniper’s eyes widened in surprise and even Tobi slowed his incessant peeps to stare at Pyro with interest. The firestarter caught himself and, apparently quite taken aback by his own voice, mumbled some feeble apologies. Fortunately, Sniper got the idea.

“Oh you… OH. Well, coulda just told me, mate. Right, let’s head back to the room. Tobi seems like a right hardy fellow anyway.”

A sigh of relief hissed out of Pyro’s mask. He nodded cheerfully, rearranged the items in his arms and followed Sniper out.

…Only to drop them all at the sound of /Sniper/ letting loose a raucous noise of his own. His was tinged with shock and fear, and glancing over his shoulder, Pyro quickly realized why.

Medic had returned to his office.
--------------

:'u OH NOES, MEDIC RETURNED!

Much d'aww in this story. I hope this isn't the end.

there better be more of this hiding somewhere :[

I need like a dozen more chapters of this.

Doctor Who?

Oh man ;-;

Oh god this is adorable and delightful! More please, and soon!

want more -_-'

Wanna come by my place sometime? dirty thoughts...but i giggled none the less
honestly, i am pleasantly surprised by how much i like this, please continue :D

Even though it having been said before, i must ask for more.