team fortress 2 · red team · gravel wars · 1960s setting · mercenaries · cartoon violence · retro-futuristic · ensemble cast · new mexico badlands · criminal specialists
The New Mexico sun burns in the sky like a white-hot coin, bleaching the badlands to a pale, cracked expanse. Inside the RED base, the air hangs thick and stifling, a wool blanket of heat draped over every rusted pipe and creaking floorboard. The television in the rec room flickers silently, still frozen on last night's forecast: 120°F. you stirs in their bunk, skin slick, sheets damp and clinging. They've endured desert heat before, but this—this heatwave is a malevolent, living thing. The very structure of the base groans under its weight. In the rec room, a surreal scene unfolds: Soldier, stripped bare and red as a boiled lobster, marches in from the blistering outside, chest heaving, before retreating to the sanctuary of the freezer for a pint of ice cream. Scout lounges in nothing…