5:30 am marked the end of her graveyard shift on campus and the end of the night from hell. Anya took great enjoyment out of kicking off her boots and slamming the door to the apartment behind her, ignoring the black boots that sat on the mat, thanking whatever or whoever floated up in the clouds that her roommates were out of her hair. Lexa was staying with Clark and Octavia had taken Raven out to a B&B for the long weekend.
The rest of Anya's uniform ended up flung haphazardly across the living room leaving a nice trail to her bedroom.
"Stupid fucking freshman." Whoever decided it was a good idea to schedule the first week of classes before the Labour Day long weekend needed to be institutionalized. Her night had been one long shit show of fuckery; Three fist fights, six streakers, one almost arson and enough booze confiscated from underage idiots to keep her stocked until well into her 30's and that was excluding the piss poor excuse for alcohol that was 'wine coolers'.
No one was safe when Anya fucking Woods was on duty.
It was almost enough for Anya to call it quits, almost being the key word. Frankly there was nothing better than the look on a freshman's face when she showed up and threatened to start ramming bottles where they don't belong. Almost made it worth working the nights she didn't have early morning classes.
Anya decided to revel in the amusement later, when she was fed and dressed in something that wasn't stiff Polyester. Right now she needed a shower to wash off the stench of shattered party dreams and totally-not-obvious weed off.
Dropping her dirty clothes in the ever growing pile of laundry behind her door and grabbing a fresh tank top and a "borrowed" pair of Lexa's basketball shorts Anya makes her way to the most holy of places; The Shower.
Now that she was alone she could take the longest and hottest shower she could physically handle without being interrupted her sister or cousin banging on the door and yelling about being late or no hot water. Not that it ever lasted long, they either learned to shower the night before or get up before the blonde, especially after one particular incident that started with a hungover Anya not wanting to be disturbed and ended with Octavia's head in danger of getting crushed with the bathroom door. Lexa liked to casually show off the claw marks in the door frame to new friends and still swore that the frame was warped.
Setting her new clothes down on the toilet seat Anya opened the opaque shower door and swung the temperature handle as far left as she could until the bathroom; waiting a few minutes until the room was filled with glorious steam before stepping in.
The water was beyond heavenly, blistering and was sure to leave her skin a nice shade of lobster red. She stood under the scalding water for a good ten minutes, enjoying the heat that seemed to melt the ache in her back and legs, before actually washing herself.
One of the upsides to living in an apartment full of girls was the extended selection of bath products that inevitably took over the shower and under the sink. Everything Octavia owned had some kind of outdoorsy or fruit smell that was almost sickening, Lexa had the bare minimum of smells, opting for either plain 'Shower fresh' or 'Unscented' options, everything you'd expect an 80 year old woman to own.
With the exception of a few things that either belonged to Clark or that Clark noticed her girlfriend liked and bought for her, usually vanilla. Still bland but in Lexa's world it was the equivalent of introducing yourself to your crush on Monday and getting married by dinner time Tuesday.
Still, choices were important and although Anya was fond of her butternut body wash she liked to mix it up, deciding on Octavia's new black cherry body wash and squeezing an overzealous amount on her purple shower puff and lathering up. Which proved to be a wonderful choice, the smell of cherries gave the impression of being at the spa without all the hassle of strange people touching you.
Topped with a dollop of Lexa's new vanilla shampoo Anya was on top of world and smelled like a pampered princess. An intimidating, fierce, and pampered princess at that.
She only got out of the Sacred Shower when the water started to cool and the handle wouldn't turn any further without snapping off in her pruned hands.
The only thing missing from this now glorious day was breakfast. Now, Anya was by no means a 5 star chef but she could the basic which was more than she could say for Lexa, who on a regular basis set off the smoke detector by subtly trying to kill them all with what she passed off as "food". Too many pots and pans had to be thrown out after no amount of elbow grease managed to remove whatever Lexa had cemented to its surface. The dead are gone. The living are FUCKING HUNGRY! And Lexa was banned from so much as making coffee without supervision.
Anya stood in the fridge, door wide open, in her borrowed pajamas trying to decide on breakfast Her options were a little limited; fruit, yogurt, eggs or the cavity inducing cereals that Raven insisted on buying and leaving for when she spent the night.
Fuck it. She had survived one of the worst nights of the year, after St. Patricks day, last day of midterms, finals and really any long weekend or power outage that people could use as an excuse to get shit faced, she deserved an omelet and toast for breakfast; afternoon classes be damned.
The blonde had all the necessary ingredients pulled from the fridge and scattered them across the counter tops; eggs, peppers, mushrooms, cilantro and cheese. Pulling a knife and cutting board from the drawer she set to making the best damned omelet anyone had ever eaten, head bobbing to the stylings of Bruce Springsteen streaming from the iPod dock on the window ledge.
Anya stopped her chopping to admire her handy work, pan heating up eggs whisked and ready to go and all off the veggies were chopped into neat little piles. "I should have my own god damn cooking show."
"You should, but you should rethink the 6:30am schedule."
The knife flew from Anya's hand and into the window, effectively taking out the IPod dock and a couple of Lexa's decorative candles, sending everything clattering into the sink.
"JESUS FUCKING CHRIST!" Anya shrieked, whipping around and coming face to face with her assailant; a woman stood in the entrance to her kitchen wearing blue plaid pajama bottoms and a blue baggy tank top, blue lines winding their way over shoulders and up their neck, red hair handing messily around sun kissed shoulders, left side shaved. The woman was staring at Anya with sleepy blue eyes, holding Lexa's favourite Wolverine mug in one hand.
Despite the sleepy exterior, and the fact that Anya was miles closer to all the sharp utensils, the blondes mind went into overdrive over the stranger in her home. Had she locked the door before her shift? HAD LEXA OR OCTAVIA?! Because now there was a crazy squatter, in her kitchen, holding HER SISTERS MUG!
Rather than wait for a reply from her sleepy guest or for the inevitable strangling that would lead to the police finding her corpse in the harbour a la Dexter she did the only logical thing; grabbed the wooden cutting board in both hands and launched into full scale assault mode, upper cutting the woman in the jaw sending tiny bits of pepper and mushroom sailing across the kitchen floor and sticking to the walls.
The blow sent the mystery squatter to the ground in a heap, mug upending on the tiled floor and shattering, sending what Anya could only assume was drugged tea or coffee splashing over the tiled floor and cupboards.
It was mayhem. Not only was her breakfast ruined by an intruder but now Anya had to replace the cutting board that cracked in half on impact with the redheads jaw and chin, the pieces dangling in her hands as she surveyed the scene; triumphant grin on her face.
Not even graduated Criminology and already taking down would be assailants. They should just give her the stupid degree now and save everyone the two hour ceremony.
"Wait…how did you get in?" Grabbing her phone Anya decided against calling the police or an ambulance for that matter, instead she dialed Lexa's number. Someone was going to pay for this, and remake her breakfast.
Sun streamed through the slatted blinds that covered Clarke's bedroom window, falling directly on the blondes face.
"Mmmmph!" She tried to reposition the blankets to cover her face from the offending light; it was way to god damn early to be awake. Unfortunately for Clarke, her girlfriend was a blanket hog. Turning over to look at the still sleeping brunette Clarke can hardly distinguish where the blankets end and Lexa begins, having rolled around in her sleep and successfully created a human burrito.
"Lexaaaa!" Clarke whines sleepily and tries to tug the blankets away from her girlfriends unrelenting grip.
"Shuuuush go back to sleep Clarke." Was the reply Clarke got, muffled by the mountain of blankets that had encased her girlfriend and accepted her as one of their own.
"I swear if you don't fork over the blankets I'll withhold sex for the rest of your life!"
Mount Blanket stirred slowly until Lexa's head appeared by the pillows, pout evident on her lips. "But Clarke."
It was moments like these that made Clarke forget that Lexa was the gym slaying, Law student, bad ass that she led people to believe she was. Like her sister Lexa's glare could melt steel and probably kill in the right conditions. Unlike her sister Lexa was less prone to violent outbursts, instead choosing to brood. But behind closed doors she was a bigger softie than Clarke; prone to napping on the couch when she got home before the blonde.
"No buts-!" Before Clark could berate Lexa again for stealing all the blankets the brunette's phone went off, The Imperial March theme blaring from the speaker as Anya's name flashed on the screen. Clarke does a quick time check before answering the phone.
"Anya, what the hell?! It's not even 7!"
"Why are you answering Lexa's phone, Clarke?"
"Because I doubt Lexa could get out of her cocoon if she tried. What do you want?" At the mention of her name, Lexa poked her head out from her blanket fort to watch her girlfriend. In an effort to calm the blonde down from her early morning wakeup call she squirms closer, sprawling across Clarks lap in an effort to share.
"Wake her up and get both of your assess here now! We have a situation and my little sister has some explaining to do. No funny business, do not pass go. Get dressed. If you're not here in the next half hour I'll drag you both here in whatever state you happen to be in when I get there. Got it? Oh, and call Octavia, and tell her the same." The unmistakable sound of tape being pulled from the roll coming from the other end of the line.
Clarke can barely make out the muffled noises in the background over Anya's frantic and angry yelling, she had put the call on speaker so Lexa could listen in from her fort before the call cut out.
"Should I be worried?" Lexa had freed her arms from the blanket cocoon and was pushing herself up into a sitting position.
"It's Anya, what do you think? Get up, may as well see what she's done now." Clarke pressed a kiss to Lexa's temple and climbed out of the bed to get ready. If she knew anything about Anya it was that she always made good on her threats.
It was hard, but Clarke managed to get herself and Lexa to the building where the brunette shared an apartment with Octavia and her, clearly unstable, sister.
The pair met Octavia and Raven in the parking lot. Both women hadn't even bothered getting dressed; Octavia was fuming in the driver's seat in while Raven snored loudly against the passenger seat window.
"This had better be fucking good." Octavia opened the door to greet Clark and Lexa, clad in her pajamas and slippers, slamming it behind her and causing Raven to jump awake.
How she and Raven had managed to make the trip over the highway and back to Polis in half an hour was troubling and Clarke didn't want to imagine how fast Octavia had been driving.
Raven managed to pull herself from the car, walking around to wrap her arms around Octavia's middle, head settled on the shorter woman's shoulder.
"It's early!" Raven whined, trying to block out the light with Octavia's neck.
"I know baby." The short woman said quietly, stroking her girlfriend's hair. "I'm gone for one night. ONE! And she's gone postal."
Deciding to get it over with before a rage fueled Anya went on the rampage, Octavia and Clarke pull their sleepy significant others in to the building and up the elevator to the 5th floor.
Approaching the door Clarke and Octavia share a look; they can hear Anya yelling from inside the apartment.
"What the fuck?" It's a wonder to Clarke how the other tenants in the building haven't complained about the noise or how Anya hasn't gotten evicted yet. Best answer was that someone tried to voice their disdain for the blondes frequent yelling matches at her roommates, roommates significant others, or t.v show characters. Chances are it didn't end well for the complainer.
Octavia is the first to react, rolling her eyes and pushing the door to the apartment open, dragging Raven in behind her who bee lined for the couch and Lexa's emergency t.v blanket, promptly falling back to sleep. Clarke follows suit, hauling Lexa into the apartment and bumping into Octavia's back.
"Anya, what the actual fuck?" Octavia's arms are crossed over her chest, probably the least afraid of the older woman out of the four of them, three counting all conscious persons.
The woman in question was stood in the middle of the room, just outside the kitchen entrance, having changed into her camo paintball gear complete with "war paint".
If years of tailing her and Lincoln on dates or outings with friends was any indication that Anya was a few colours short of a rainbow, this certainly proved it.
"Anya...if you woke us up to play paintball I'm disowning you." Lexa was mostly awake and doing her best to be intimidating by glaring at her sister despite the mess her hair was in and the mascara still caked on her eyes making her look like a dishevelled racoon.
"Sweet sweet sister, I didn't bring you all here for paintball." Anya's arms were behind her back, pacing the room like an army General. "Each of you left the premises yesterday evening correct?"
"Uh huh." Hard as she might Lexa's eyes rolled in their sockets.
"What's your point Cheeks McGee?" Octavia's socked foot tapped against the hardwood floor anything but patiently.
"Did you both remember to lock the door?"
"Fucks sake Anya! You know we did!" Since their first day in the apartment Anya made it her goal to make sure that the door was always locked and that both sister and cousin had their keys. Mostly for safety but also so Anya wouldn't have to get out of bed or off the couch to let them in. She had taken to minding the door whenever one of them left and chasing them down the hall way as retaliation for not locking the door.
"I see." Spinning on her heels Anya stalks into the kitchen, the sound of chair legs scraping off the floor soon follows. Less than a minute later Anya's butt appears in the doorway to the kitchen followed soon after by the rest of her person, dragging a chair into the living room.
Clarke's eyebrows shoot up to her hairline, Lexa simply brings the palm of her hand to her forehead and groans, and Raven's soft snores float from her place on the couch
"Anya are you fucking insane?!" Octavia strides over to Anya's captive.
Still in their pajamas Anya's intruder is soundly attached to the kitchen chair; green camo coloured duct tape secures the assailants limbs down to the arms and legs of the chair and for extra measure Anya has duct tape wrapped around their torso and the back to the chair and to top it off, a cloth shopping bag covers their face.
"Seems as though one of you is lying." Anya circles her captive like a hyena and rips the shopping bag off their head. "Because I was nearly killed this morning by a psychopath." Lexa's Beats headphones cover the redheads ears, attached to Anya's now dry IPod with the volume up to deafening levels, Spice Girls 'Stop' could faintly heard by everyone in attendance. Octavia's pink eye mask covers the redheads own eyes, face set in an amused closed lip grin despite the facecloth stuffed in her mouth, fingers tapping out the beat on the arms of the chair.
"You're joking? Please be joking. This might be kidnapping." Lexa can barely look at the scene, opting to peek through her fingers instead.
"Definitely assault at least." Octavia peers at Anya's 'prisoner', blood dribbling from closed lips.
"How do I put up with either of you, especially without coffee?" Clarke makes her way into the kitchen. Most of the carnage has been picked up but Clarke can't help but wonder how peppers ended up plastered to the cupboards or why there was a glass of milk left on the counter. "Anya, do you want me to put this in the fridge?" Not bothering to even ask about the new wall décor.
"No thank you Clarke. There's valuable evidence in that cup. If fingerprinting turns up nothing we can check dental records."
"Dental?! ANYA are there teeth in this cup? WHAT DID YOU DO?" Clarke has the cup in her hand, holding it in front of the other woman's face.
"Just one, it fell out." Anya shrugs, as if this shouldn't be new information.
"Better question, how?" Octavia's nose wrinkles at the sight of the tooth cup.
"We need a new cutting board." Another shrug.
"YOU HIT HER WITH THE CUTTING BOARD!?" Lexa throws her arms up in frustration. "I give up. This is ridiculous, even for you." She sinks into the armchair next to Raven.
"I was almost killed Lexa!" Lexa only groans, burying her face in a throw pillow.
"Have you even talked to her?" Clarke, the voice of reason amongst the Woods women, steps forward to pull the facecloth from the redhead's mouth, pulling the sleep mask down and plucking the headphones from her ears. "Are you alright?"
"Oh yeah, Peachy. This is exactly how I wanted to spend my Friday. Could you ask Warrior Princess to leave my face mostly identifiable so my family can pick out my body?"
"You broke into MY house you little rat!" Not to mention ruined a perfectly good breakfast.
Octavia has a firm grip around Anya's midsection to keep the older woman from throttling the redhead.
"Is it really breaking and entering if I have a key?" Four heads swivel to look at the redhead.
"You have a key?" Octavia has let go of Anya and has the woman by the shoulders, shaking furiously. "Where did you get it?!"
"Uh...Raven gave it to me?" The three Woods women spun their heads to where Raven was still sleeping. Clarke was sure at least one of them had whip lash.
Surprisingly it was Lexa who reacted to the new information, deciding to pummel Raven with the throw pillow in her hands.
"WHY" the pillow made solid contact with Ravens heads.
"DID YOU" Thump and stomach.
"GIVE A STRANGER" Thump legs.
"YOUR KEYS!?" by the last swing Raven was wide awake and wrestling the pillow from a furious, sleep deprived Lexa, lashing out at Lexa's stomach with her good leg until Clarke pulled her girlfriend away by the back of her shirt.
"Lexa! Babe, go get some tea and relax will you?" Clark gently nudges the fuming brunette out of Ravens line of fire and towards the kitchen.
"ANYA! What happened to my mug?!" Lexa reappears in the doorway, cradling the remains of the Wolverine Mug in her arms.
"Casualty of war Lexa. The rat did it." Anya, quick on the draw, was fast to throw the redhead to the wolves.
"You could have let me put it down first. You know, before you beaned me in the head with your breakfast? I could be concussed." Blue eyes glared up at Anya.
"You'll be lucky to walk away from this with just a concussion!" And so the shaking resumed.
"Wait…I did what?" Ravens head popped over the back of the couch and took in the scene, Octavia had gone back to shaking the trapped woman by the shoulders while Anya had begun the interrogation.
"Hey Raven." The redhead seemed mildly un-phased by the shake-down she was currently experiencing, head and hair swaying back and forth with each shake from the tiny but mighty Octavia.
"Anya…Killick taped to your chair?"
"Who?" The older blonde looked perplexed at the question, eyes darting between Raven and the ginger that was starting to look and feel like a piñata.
"Raven, how do you know her?" Octavia relinquished her vice grip on the redhead's shoulders and sat with her girlfriend. "And why did you give her a key?"
"Jesus O, remember a few weeks ago I mentioned staying with my aunt Luna and her daughter when my mom pissed off on one of her benders? Well she transferred universities to go here and needed a place to crash for a couple of nights until her place was ready. You said it was okay for her to stay here! You even asked Anya and Lexa." Aunt Luna wasn't exactly Raven's aunt in the biological sense but a good friend of her father's before his passing and had earned the little of Aunt after years of taking little Raven on family outings and generally being more family than her own mother.
"She most certainly did not." Anya's arms were crossed over her chest, Lexa followed suit.
"Oh…Right. Well, I may have asked when you two were face and eyes into Grey's Anatomy." It was a little known secret that the Woods sisters held a soft spot for the doctors at Grey-Sloan Memorial Hospital, enforcing a no talk/text/move policy when a new episode aired. On more than one occasion Octavia, Raven and Clarke had been subjected to radio silence from the pair during a particularly good and tear jerking episode. Frankly neither of them had been the same since the plane crash.
"There's your problem right there." Clarke was the first to point out the major flaw in Octavia's otherwise brilliant plan. Anything that wasn't Grey's related during the episode was considered white noise and immediately filtered out.
"You waited to ask when Grey's was on?!" Both sisters converged on Octavia, starting a three way argument over the legitimacy of Octavia asking permission and almost ending in a brawl in the living room when a high pitched whistle brought the three to a stand-still. Anya with a fist full of Octavia's shirt, other arm cocked back and ready to fire, Octavia had one hand on Anya's face trying to push her away the other was bunched in Lexa's hair, who was trying to keep the two separated from each other.
Clarke and Raven had conceded to staying out of the whole mess, making themselves comfy on the couch under Lexa's emergency blanket, quite happy to let the other three duke it out.
All eyes fell on Killick, trying to scoot her chair out from behind the family brawl. "Yeah, hi. Listen, I enjoy a little bondage as much as the next but I'd like to go to the dentist at some point today. I don't overly like the idea of looking like a hockey player. Nice to meet you all. Cheekbones, you're driving, get stepping." The end of the declaration was punctuated by the scooting of the kitchen chair and it's occupant towards the door.
Once they managed to detangle themselves it took the siblings and Octavia half an hour to pull the tape from around Killick's legs and chest. Her arms were a whole other story.
"Jesus fuck, you useless bunch of fucking muppets! Who puts duct tape on bare skin?!" And other variations flew from Killick's mouth with each pull of the tape from her bare arms and the inevitable arm hair that was attached.
"She's very colourful." Clarke mused from the couch beside Raven, sketchbook in hand in an effort to capture the moment.
Raven hardly looked up from the end of the couch, painting Clarke's toenails. "Very."
"Will you shut up?! It'll go faster if we just rip it off!"
"Good idea Octavia, I'd sure love to have the top 4 layers of my skin pulled off. I was going to wait until my next spa day but who has the time." Anya had to admire the redhead's snark, moving back as a foot shot out to clip Octavia in the shins, not even attempting to hide her laughter.
"Don't you start!" The same foot swung and caught Anya in the knee cap. "This is your fault. You better be god damned sure that you're going to make this up to me."
"She has a point Anya." Poor Lexa was stuck trying to peel the tape off the redheads left arm as carefully as she could.
"You. I like you. Consider yourself off my shitlist."
"Thank you." Lexa turned to smirk at her sister and cousin.
"And what about my cutting board?!" Anya's hand came up fast to meet the back of Lexa's head with a sound thwak, wiping the smirk off her face.
"I have to sit through a god damned root canal and you're worried about a cutting board?! You hit me with it! You know what, take me to dinner and consider yourself forgiven for the tooth and probably concussion."
"Seriously, you want dinner?"
"I think it's the least you can do. And I want fancy, McDicks won't get you out of this." Killick's head turned eerily slow to focus on Anya, grinning dangerously. "Woo me Woods."