"Alrighty," Engie started, clapping his hands together. "The Engineering class is all about building, well, buildings ya see. They come in the form of these here toolboxes."

You nodded your head in understanding.

"You can construct them using metal in the supply boxes, which look like this on the battleground," he explained while pulling out a tan, wooden box with a symbol on the top. The symbol consisted of three bullets in a circle. He opened the box and showed you its contents. It was a mix of different ammo for each class. Engie pulled out scraps of metal and showed them to you. "This is what the metal looks like." He let you study the metal before taking it away. He pulled out a blocky device. It looked like an old remote controller's baby with a cellphone. He showed you the screen. On the screen it had four boxes labeled from one to four under them. The boxes had a name of something and a little wrench sign next to a number. These boxes were labeled, from left to right: "Sentry Gun: 130, Dispenser: 100, Entrance: 125, Exit: 125." So I'm guessing the number there is how much metal it takes to build whatever that building is. Then maybe the numbers under the boxes mean to push that button on the device to get that machine? I think...?

"As you can see here, it lets you pick a building there with the numbers, and then it shows you how much metal you need to build it next to the gear icon. Now, you can see a building, the first one there, has already been made, because the box light up blue with a picture of it inside. This little red bar over here to the left shows the condition, or health of your building. Right now my building, the sentry, has a low health," Engie explained in the best way he could, which you could understand for the most part, you hoped.

"Um, where is your sentry?" You asked, looking up to meet eyes with Engie. He smiled.

"Well, it's right here," he gestured to the toolbox on the ground.

"Wait, what? How?" You shook your head slightly in disbelief, shocked. How in the world...?

"I'm being serious. Here," he handed you exactly 130 metal. "Try building the dispenser, number two."

"O-okay...," you mumbled, pulling out your own remote baby. You pushed in number two and a giant toolbox appeared into your arms. Immediately you had to squat down to keep from falling butt-first onto the floor. It was heavy. Granted, not as heavy as Patricia, but heavy enough for your arms to literally start to burn in pain.

Quickly, you set it down with the dispenser's back to the barrier. Ow, ow, okay Wait a second, where's Medic? Usually he's here being a creep to "make sure I won't get hurt." Okay, well he had to do that one time because the stupid rocky ground was rocky with my ankle, but- You snapped out of it. It doesn't matter if he's here or not. In fact, be grateful for it. You don't have to feel him staring at the back of your head today. Actually, I hope he doesn't even talk to me for the rest of the day unless I'm actually dying. Anyway... You turned back to Engie, who was waiting patiently despite pointing out earlier that you were on a time crunch.

"Uh, now what do I do to... build it?" You asked, turning back to him sheepishly with an awkward, apologetic smile.

"Hit it with your wrench, the one on your belt."

"Wait, hit the machine?"

"Yeah, take a swing at it."

"Wouldn't that hurt the dispenser?"

"Trust me, I'm an Engineer. Whack it with the wrench to build it."

"You told me to build my building just to say that, didn't you?"

"...That's a possibility."

You scoffed, chuckling as he let a slightly goofy smile rest on his face. You took out your oversized wrench and tapped the toolbox. Nothing happened.

"Aw come on," Engie was laughing. "You got'ta hit it harder than that, darlin'!"

You swung harder and the toolbox seemed to peel away in a robotic way to have a dispenser be built in its place. The Dispenser was a box thing about as tall as your shoulder. It was like a soda machine, except the drinks were ammunition, health, and metal, you noticed the labels. Oh fun it can sprinkle bullets. Engie walked up to you and your metal baby.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"Now a dispenser will slowly give you more metal to use while also continuously healing you. Then, you can use that metal to upgrade your buildings. Both of the standard sentry and dispenser buildings have two upgrades, or three stages. You have this beginning one, a slightly advanced second one, and a final third one. As you move up a stage with the dispenser, it will give you more supplies and gains more of a defense for itself. As ya move up with the sentry, it gets larger, can fire more bullets, and in turn it harder to defeat. The point of a sentry it to attack the opposing team, or the BLU team. Are ya following me?"

You nodded.

"Good, now upgrade your dispenser with your wrench. It'll take 200 metal. Yes, and I do mean whack it," he chuckled, but only slightly. Your usual feelings of unease returned when you realized how serious he was being. Of course he's being serious you numb nut! He has to teach you! You upgraded your building baby. ...I'm afraid of messing up though. Don't be! He won't judge you for making a silly mistake, if, if, it were to happen! But what if he does...? Well-!

"Great job Strategist!" Engie cut off your train of thought with praise. "Now I just need you to upgrade once more to see what it looks like." You nodded and started to upgrade it again. This time, your thoughts were silent. Once you finished, Engie nodded and went to get the sentry toolbox. The fully upgraded dispenser had weird knobs, a drawer of ammo, and a weird box on top of it. You didn't understand, but you knew what it did so that's all you need to know.

The Enginner set his sentry down a little farther away from the barrier to your left. He waved you over. He whacked it to life. Rise my son! You thought of a priest smacking some dude in the face who passed out. Stop brain I need to focus. The beginning sentry looked like a pea shooter. He then grabbed an ammo box and upgraded the sentry. You watched and shifted, holding your arms as you watched him. It was like he was in his element. I could never move so majestically. Stage two of the sentry had like machine gun arms and then stage three finally grew a head. It's like a weird robot person, but cute at the same time. Engie finally stood up, and put his wrench away proudly.

"Now, the sentry attacks, but is used mostly for defensive purposes. Stage three fires four missiles out of the top and has machine gun ammo that spins in a rapid fire when it sees an enemy. Understand?" Engie asked. You nodded. "Good, now on the subject of enemies. If you can remember from your Spy training, he can sap my sentry-!" he started to get worked up seemingly just at the thought of BLU Spy with his sentry and had to pause to calm down, "and he can backstab me to render me and my buildings useless. Not only will you have to be careful, but you can get help from Pyro if he's around. Thankfully, an invisible son-of-a-bitch is still flammable." Wow he's really protective of his building-baby-things. How does he react when one of them gets destroyed?

"Anyway, when the sentry or any other building, for that matter, gets attacked, you can wack it with your wrench to use metal and try to save it. Make sure to hide behind the building for your safety and be aware of how much metal you have, you do follow me?" You nodded once again.

"Next, I have to explain your weapons. You got yourself a shotgun, a pistol, and your trusty wrench. You know how those work. Additionally, you have your build tool-" So that's what the remote baby's called "- and your destroy tool. The destroy tool makes your building blow up." You nodded.

"Is that all I need to know?"

"Not quite, there are some more things I need to make sure you're aware of." He told you that you can only have one building of each type at a time, meaning only one sentry to use. He also told you about how to place the dispenser, and it was a longer conversation than you expected. You had to be reliable to your team and place it with them, but at the same time you had to put it in a hard to predict and protective spot. Then there was the use of being slightly random with your placements to keep from the enemy team learning your pattern. He taught you the importance of moving your buildings around to help with a number of things like detection and following your team. He also remembered to explain that the higher upgraded the building is, the longer it takes to set up. That could cost a battle.

"Also, there are two more buildings, but they go to together and can be crucial," Engie added as if he forgot.

"The Entrance and Exit?" You asked, remembering the names.

"Yes, they are teleporters. They help transport the team to different parts of the battleground and is needed to save the time of walking. I'd suggest putting the entrance at the entrance of the spawn, where we start the match, and the exit where the team needs to be." He quickly set two of them up. They weren't too far from each other. "They have a cool down between each use and can only teleport one person at a time. Try it."

You had to take a breath and examined the teleporters first. Is there a chance of death or that I'll get stuck in limbo or something...? They had a red translucent disk on top of a small platform. You looked at Engie for reassurance, starting to breathe raggedly. "I've never done this before, are you sure?" Your expression said. He nodded in reassurance. You took a deep breath and stepped onto the entrance. After a beat, you felt like you were being pulled at the speed of light, your atoms suctioning to the area of the exit. It felt weird to say the least.How is this possible? Then, in an instance you were on the exit. You were in a cold sweat staring at the wall farthest from you.

"Well, how was your first time, Strategist?" Engie asked, started to laugh.

"It-" you cleared your throat because your voice cracked. "It was different."

Engie had a good laugh. You started to feel slightly ashamed for your reaction, did you overreact?

"It's alright, everyone acted just like you when they first tried the teleporters, though Spy tried to hide it," Engie explained. Picturing Scout's probably over-the-top reaction made you feel better. Then imagining Medic's little glasses crooked on his shocked face made you laugh out loud. Soon, you and Engie were having laughing fits. It lasted what seemed like an hour, but of course it didn't. Both of you soon calmed down and Engie mentioned he had one last thing to mention.

"The destroy tool," he started, "Is a tool you use to destroy you buildings if needed. It's a giant red button, and we need to use it before we miss too much of lunch." Wait, my baby? Oh man.... Engie caught you staring at your dispenser. He nodded in solemn understanding. "Do you need a moment?"

"Yes, I do. I grew attached to a building," you admitted, chuckling.

"It's nothing weird, I get it." Engie smiled. You slowly walked over to your dispenser and placed a hand onto it.

"I love you, you were my first as an Enginneer. I will never forget you my baby." You patted it, took a few big steps back, and pulled out the destroy tool. You looked over to Engie and saw he had his out too. You both nodded and hit the button simultaneously.

Your machines became mini mushroom clouds and you nearly shed a tear. I love you, goodbye. A part of me wants to laugh about having feelings for a dispenser. Once they were gone, you pulled out Engie's class disk and switched back to your usual attire. You had to shield your eyes from the light. Oh sweet damn that's bright.

"Are ya ready to go now Strategist?"

"Yeah, I'm hungry for lunch."

"Me, too," he agreed and you both walked side-by-side to the kitchen. The sun was brighter than you anticipated.