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“Space. The final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Her five year mission...” the television says. It's a stormy Friday night, and Pyro is alone in the common area watching Star Trek, wearing an ensemble consisting of a one-piece flannel pajama garment and their gasmask.
They're not alone for long.
“Hey, Py. Mind if I watch with you?” Pyro shakes their head and budges up on the couch, letting Engie sit next to them. For once he's helmetless and goggleless, his robotic hand ungloved. Pajamas. “Couldn't sleep with this thunder. It's loud as all hell.”
“Mmhrrm,” Pyro agrees. They've had to crank the volume on the TV just to hear it over the noise from outside.
The two of them watch in relative silence, only the sound of the thunder cutting through.
“Yo, what's going on in here? It's loud as shit.”
“Evenin', Scout,” says Engineer. “Couldn't sleep either?”
“Not with this thunder and you two blasting Pyro's geek show,” he says. “No offense, man.”
“Nrrn trrkrrn.”
“You want to watch?”
Scout takes the last spot on the couch. “Yeah, for a bit, I guess.”
A few more minutes.
“Oi, what's everybody doing up?” Sniper asks, walking in soaking wet.
“Thunder,” says Engie, not looking up from the screen.
“Why are you wet?” Scout asks.
Sniper rolls his eyes and wipes the lenses of his glasses. “It's raining, you blighter. And hard, too. Came in to try sleeping in here instead of the van and it's like I jumped in a billabong.”
“What's a billabong?”
“It's like a pond.”
“Then why don't you just say 'pond'?”
“I said it's like a pond, not that it is one.”
“Shh!” hisses Pyro, trying to watch television.
Sniper stalks off to get a towel. To everyone's surprise, he comes back a few minutes later, looking a bit ruffled from the drying-off process. He pulls a chair next to the couch and stretches out, hands folded.
Heavy is the next one to wander in, inevitably tailed by a sleepy Medic. “Everyone else still awake?”
“Thunder,” say Engie and Scout.
“Strr Trrk,” says Pyro.
The two of them nod their understanding and leave, only to come back a few minutes later, each holding half a Sandvich. “We watch with you?” Heavy asks.
“You can,” Medic says. “I'm eating this and going back to sleep.”
“Ah, come on, doc, sit with us for a bit,” Engie says.
Heavy takes a seat on the floor and pats the spot next to him, intimating that Medic should sit down.
“I'm not sitting on the fl--aaaack!” Heavy grabs Medic by the wrist and drags him down. His Sandvich nearly becomes collateral damage.
“Is good,” Heavy says, eating his Sandvich. Medic stares daggers at him, chewing slowly.
A particularly loud crack of thunder resounds through the base. A distant shout gets louder and louder until:
“Men! We are under attack! Grab your weapons!” Soldier is wearing a helmet with his pajamas and holding his shovel.
“Dude, no one's attacking us, chill out.”
“I distinctly heard cannonfire, private! That dastardly other team has gotten heavy artillery!”
“That was thunder, Soldier,” says Medic.
“Oh,” Soldier says, and flops down next to him. “What are we doing, then?”
“Couldn't sleep, so everyone's watching Star Trek with Pyro.”
“Rrnd rrvrryrrne krrps trrkrrng!” Pyro huffs, crossing their arms.
“Sorry, Py, we'll try to be quiet,” Engie says, drawing a hand across his mouth in approximation of a zipper.
Soldier hears someone address Kirk as “Captain” and asks, “Is this about the space marines?”
“Sort of?” Engie says. “I think it's like, the space navy, except they try not to shoot people.”
“Which is dumb,” Scout interjects. “This show would be way cooler if they blew more stuff up.”
“Speaking of blowing stuff up, should someone get Demo? And Spy? Everyone else is here; seems wrong not to get the other two.”
“Who says I am not here, mon ami?” Spy says, uncloaking himself in a lean next to Engineer's head.
“Jesus, how long have you been there?”
“A while,” says Spy, non-committally. He perches on the armrest of the couch. In contrast to everyone else's pajamas and other sleepwear, he's still in his suit.
“I'm going to go wake up Demo,” Engie says. Spy steals his spot when he gets up.
“Shh!” Pyro hisses again, leaning towards the screen.
“Yo, we should make some popcorn or something,” Scout says.
Pyro puts a gloved hand over his mouth. “Shh.”
“Well, Demo's so deep asleep he may as well be in a coma,” Engie says, coming back. “Dammit, Spy!”
Spy just grins up at him and continues to relax in Engie's abandoned seat. He takes Spy's old spot on the armrest.
At precisely 10:43, a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder knock out the power to the base.
“Dark in here,” says Heavy, after a moment.
Scout snorts. “No shit.”
A flicker of light comes from Pyro's end of the couch, where they're holding a lighter. “Brr rrght brrck,” they say. They return with an armful of candles, which they put around the room and light.
“Good idea, Pyro,” says Medic. Then, quieter, “why am I not surprised they had all those?”
The thunder's still rolling and the lightning's still lighting up the room, and it's unlikely that anyone will be returning to sleep any time soon. But without the television and with little light, the team is at a loss for what to do instead.
“Oh, man, I have the best idea,” Scout says, suddenly, standing up. Now he leaves, and Engineer takes his spot on the couch.
When Scout comes back, he's holding what must be every blanket, sheet, comforter, and quilt in the base. He drops them on Spy's lap, inexplicably.
“What are we to do with these?” he asks from under the stack.
“Blanket fort.”
“Blanket fort,” Spy repeats, blankly.
“Blanket fort! Come on, it'll be fun. My brothers and I used to do this all the time when we were kids. We'll have to make it bigger than those ones, but we've got enough blankets and furniture.”
“Rr'm rrn,” says Pyro.
“I will build this fort with you!” says Soldier.
“Will help too,” says Heavy.
“I'll get the fire extinguisher,” sighs Medic.
Engie caves after a clasped-handed plea from Pyro, and Sniper after about three pokes in the arm from Scout. Spy is the only one to outright refuse.
“No. No, I will not. I have acquiesed to far too many silly demands from all of you. No. I am going to bed.”
“Fine, be lame,” says Scout, shrugging as he throws a blanket over two chairs Sniper and Pyro brought from the kitchen.
In the end, the fort turns out spacious and comfortable, probably because Engineer oversaw its planning. All seven of them fit inside easily, even Heavy, and they're not even perilously close to all the candles. Medic keeps the fire extinguisher inside anyway.
“Hang on, we just need one more thing,” Scout says, scrambling back outside and finding a piece of paper.
“'No Spies Allowed'?” Heavy reads over his shoulder. Scout tapes his new sign to the outside of the fort.
“Always a good policy,” Sniper says, lying down in a corner.
“Now that little fort is done, what do we do?” Heavy asks, looking around.
“You just like, hang out in it,” Scout answers. “Or we could play Truth or Dare or something.”
Sniper snorts. “That's for girls' slumber parties.”
“You're for girls' slumber parties,” Scout retorts. “C'mon, do you just want to sit around and do nothing?”
Everyone sighs long-sufferingly, but arrange themselves in a circle anyway.
“I'll go first,” Sniper says. “Scout, truth or dare?”
Surprisingly, Scout picks Truth.
“What boy do you have a crush on?” Sniper asks, smirking. Scout whips a pillow at him.
“I think it's Sniper,” says Medic in a stage whisper, and it sets everyone to laughing, except Scout.
Someone lifts the entry flap. “Oi, what's this?”
“Demo! Come in, mate, we're just talking about Scout's secret love for me.”
“Scout's in love with you?”
“No!”
“He's in denial.”
“Classic repression,” says Medic. He gets a pillow to the face too.
“Before I forget,” Demo says, crawling inside and taking a seat in the circle, “why is Spy sulking outside?”
“He's what?”
Everyone immediately leaps for the doorflap. True to Demo's word, Spy is sitting on the floor outside, right under the “No Spies Allowed” sign.
“You're such a dweeb,” Scout says, taking down the sign and letting Spy inside.
Everyone sleeps in the fort that night, dozing off on each other's shoulders and generally getting into each other's personal space. They lose the next day's match by a wide margin because everyone's too tired and sore to fight properly, but for once no one complains about it.