Like most of their prank wars, this one started off small enough. Misha had overheard Jennifer, a PA, asking about the alpaca reference in the French Mistake. "Jared loves alpacas," he told her . "They're his favorite animal."
"Really?" Jennifer asked.
"It's almost a fetish," Misha agreed. After he was finished shooting, he went back to the trailer, photo-shopped a picture of Jared with an alpaca and started showing it around set. It took a few days and more than a little encouragement, but eventually the pay off came.
"Hey Jared, how's your alpaca?" Steve in lighting called out as he was adjusting the shadow on Jared's face.
Jared grimaced. "Haha," he retorted. "That will never get old."
Misha patted Jared on the arm in fake sympathy. "Where did the alpaca thing come from anyway?"
Jared shrugged. "Sera's imagination, I suppose," he said.
The next comment came when Misha, Jared and Jensen were standing in line for lunch, this time from Alicia in make-up. "Why do you have alpacas?" she asked. "Are they really the greenest animal?"
"I have no idea," Jared replied. "I just want to knit myself a sweater."
"You're going to need more than one alpaca," Misha retorted.
Alicia laughed. "You'll need at least a half dozen," she agreed as she continued on her way to the back of the line. Jensen let out a laugh which received an answering shove from Jared before he turned, eyebrows raised and locked eyes with Misha. Misha grinned.
As comments from around the set became more frequent, Jared's confoundment over the alpaca fascination grew. "What I don't understand is why now," Misha overheard Jared saying to Jensen. "We filmed that damn episode months ago."
Jensen cocked his head. "You don't understand why now?" he asked. "Really?" Jared shrugged. "Excuse me a minute." Misha quickly returned his eyes to the script he was holding and pretended to be reading as Jensen approached. "Jared doesn't understand why everyone is suddenly obsessing about his relationship with alpacas," Jensen informed him. The look he gave Misha let him know that he was well aware of what was going on.
"Is that so?" Misha asked. "I find the whole thing unfathomable myself."
"You want to go ahead and give him a clue-by-four and officially kick off this prank war?" Jensen replied without missing a beat. "I'm tired of the foreplay."
That afternoon, Misha got to set a little early and taped the photo-shopped picture to a gun Jared would be using in a scene later that day. He wasn't in that particular scene so he stayed out of the way, once again pretending to be memorizing lines in his chair as he waited to be called on-set. In reality, he was watching out of the corner of his eye, waiting. For whatever reason, Jared seemed a little distracted and he missed a few lines here or there resulting in a lot of stops and re-starts of the scene. Misha could barely contain his anticipation as he waited for them to finally get to the point where Sam pulled out the gun. When at last the moment arrived he gave up all pretense of reading his script and stood up to watch as he waited for Jared to put two and two together. As it turned out, he had to wait a few moments longer as Jared didn't immediately notice what was on the gun and continued with his dialogue. A loud laugh from someone on set finally drew his attention. "What?" he asked, stopping and turning to face Jensen. "That was the right line wasn't-" Jared cut off as he noticed the picture taped to the gun. The realization dawning on his face was like watching the sun rise over the horizon and Misha couldn't contain his laugh at the sight. Jared turned to Jensen who was already looking pointedly in Misha's direction.
Misha grinned and gave Jared a little wave when their eyes met. "You seem distracted today," Misha deadpanned, flipping a few pages and pretending to study his script. "Do you need your line?"
"Haha," Jared mock-laughed. "I suppose you're responsible for this, then?" Misha's eyes were all innocence.
"Finally," Jensen mumbled, earning himself another shove from Jared who was now grinning widely.
"Okay then. Challenge accepted. You're going to regret starting this," Jared promised. "I'm going to bring you to your knees and make you beg for mercy."
"I look forward to it," Misha said. His mind was already racing with ideas and possible countermeasures to anything that Jared might throw at him. Work was about to become a lot more interesting.
A cheer went up from the crew as Phil called out, "Okay, okay. Enough you two. Can we get back to work now?"
Wagering had immediately begun on how Jared was going to respond. Sebastian won when Jared started texting Misha inappropriate pictures of people with alpacas. Loud grumbling among the crew that he had insider knowledge was largely silenced when Jensen pointed out that Jared always texts people inappropriate pictures and really, they should have known. The gauntlet had nonetheless been thrown down. Misha, enormous texting bill in hand and images of alpaca otherkin seared into his head thanks to Jared's texts, spent the next several days plotting his revenge. He finally settled on mounting an alpaca head on the wall of Jared's trailer.
"Where did you manage to find a taxidermied alpaca head?" and a raised eyebrow were Jensen's only response when Misha informed him of the stunt.
"eBay," Misha replied.
"Of course." Jensen muttered. Truth be told, he was extremely proud of himself for the score. His goal was always to catch Jared as off-guard as possible. There were a hundred different ways he could hit but most of them, while probably effective, were also predictable. His goal was to make moves that Jared hadn't seen coming.
Jared's reaction had been less than Misha had hoped, however. ""It's kind of cute," he said as he stood with Misha and Jensen in the doorway of his trailer inspecting it. "I think I'll keep it." He'd bought some Christmas lights and a pair of sunglasses and decorated it, then loudly wondered what he should name it. The cast and crew once again started a pool to guess the name that Jared would decide on. "Dmitri" now greeted Misha with a leer every time he was forced to go into Jared's trailer for one reason or another.
"Sebastian won again?" Misha asked incredulously when he overheard Jensen asking Jared if he'd said anything to him about what names he was considering.
"Yes," Jensen said. "I wonder how he knew that?" Jared's shrug and blank expression matched Misha's own.
A few weeks later, Misha was being serenaded loudly and off-key by someone dressed up as an alpaca right before he was supposed to shoot a particularly emotional scene. He was admiring the sheer creativity of sending an alpaca-gram when he heard Sebastian's unmistakable voice exclaim loudly, "I told you a live alpaca was too predictable for our boys!" As he pondered how Sebastian could possibly have known what Jared was planning—he certainly hadn't thought of it and most of the crew had put their money on a live alpaca being tied near or released inside of Misha's trailer—Jared walked over to him.
"I think it's time we called a ceasefire," Jared said. "Meet me in my trailer after your scene to discuss the terms?"
"Cease fire?" Jensen asked as they walked off set later that day. "That doesn't sound like Jared."
"I know," Misha responded, loosening Castiel's tie and slipping it over his head. He handed the tie and Castiel's trench to the PA who had come up beside them.
Jensen shrugged out of Dean's jacket and handed it off. "Thank you," he said and then turned his attention back to Misha. "What are you going to do?" Jensen asked.
"I was hoping you'd come with me," Misha said. It wasn't that he was scared to meet Jared alone in his trailer. He just had dinner plans tonight and he didn't really want to miss them because Jared had somehow tricked him and locked him inside the trailer with "Dmitri". He figured that was probably going to be Jared's next prank since stranding him onset was a favorite ploy and it was significantly less likely to happen if Jensen were with him.
Jensen laughed. "Oh, no way. Even if Dani wasn't flying into town tonight, you couldn't pay me enough to walk into whatever Jared's got planned. You two can leave me right out of the middle of this, thanks."
"Jensen, can we get you over here for a make-up touch up?" Alicia shouted from the make-up trailer.
"Be right there!" Jensen responded. He turned and patted Misha on the shoulder. "Best of luck tonight. You might want to have a back-up plan to get home. If Jared can work an alpaca theme into stranding you on set, he'll do it."
"I know," Misha agreed. "I've had a back-up ride on call since I started this."
"Then you can bet Jared knows about it," Jensen advised. "Make sure your back-up plan has a back-up plan."
Misha was ready for pretty much anything when he showed up at Jared's trailer that evening except what occurred—absolutely nothing. Jared opened the trailer, shushed the dogs and invited him inside. Feeling slightly wary, he came inside and settled into a chair in the sitting area. Jared's huge TV was tuned to the Discovery Channel—the dogs like it, he explained—and Misha found himself being drawn into a documentary on the plight of African elephants. Jared offered him a beer and Misha was about to accept until it occurred to him that it was entirely plausible that his drink might be spiked with some sort of eau de alpaca. "I think I'll pass," Misha said, eyeing the bottle suspiciously.
Jared barked a laugh. "I didn't fill it with alpaca piss, I swear," he said. "If it makes you feel any better, here. Have mine." He held the bottle from which he had just taken a drink toward Misha, who accepted, and leaned back on the couch, his long legs stretching out on the ottoman in front of him. "So you may have noticed that our new friend Sebastian seems to be doing quite well in the cast and crew pool for this little prank war that you and I have going on."
Misha took a drink of his beer. "Indeed I have," Misha agreed. "It strikes me as a bit suspicious. You're not talking to him about what you're planning?"
"I'm not," Jared concurred. "I don't even tell Jensen because he may inadvertently tip you off. It's much more fun to catch you off guard."
"I'm never off-guard when you're around," Misha countered, taking another sip of beer. It was the truth. He was at that very moment looking around the trailer for a hint of whatever it was Jared had planned for him.
Jared laughed. "Fair enough. But that doesn't change the fact that he's pretty smug about the fact that he's winning."
"A little too smug," Misha replied. "I've heard the cast grumbling just a bit about him needing to be brought down to size."
"My thoughts exactly," Jared agreed. "It's about time he's initiated into the Supernatural family don't you think?"
"I do." Misha took another sip of his beer then set it down and turned to look at Jared. "So what do you want to do about it?" Jared's grin widened as he sat forward and began sharing his plan. When he finished, Misha smiled. "Okay," he said. "I'm in. Should be easy enough to get the crew in on it too, since they're the ones who have been losing to him."
Misha had just finished up his final scene of the night and was retrieving his cell and car keys from the PA that he now paid handily to guard them from Jared while he was filming when it rang. He glanced down and saw "Sebroche" as the caller ID. With a grin, he gave the thumbs up sign to Jared who in turn motioned to the crew. "This is Misha," Misha answered. "Really? That's… um. Interesting. Have you tried calling costume? Maybe they took your—oh. No one's answering? Well I'm not sure what you want me to do. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Yeah, I think I probably do. I'll be right over, okay?" Misha turned to the crowd that had assembled around him. "That was Sebastian," he announced, motioning for them to follow as he turned to walk toward the trailer that had been designated for Sebastian when he was onset. When they arrived, Misha took out the bullhorn that had been hidden by the trailer this morning. "It seems that someone has snuck into Sebastian's trailer and taken his clothes while he was in the shower," Misha informed the small crowd. "He would like for me to help him out by bringing him some spare clothing. Unfortunately, I didn't bring anything today other than what I'm wearing home."
"What about costume?" someone shouted.
"It appears that they are not answering their phone at the moment."
"Probably because they're all out here!" came another yell. A laugh rippled through the group.
Jared held up a hand and Misha handed him the bullhorn. "Fortunately," he said, "Misha and I were just discussing what to do if this exact situation were to occur, and we have a plan."
A loud cheer erupted from the audience as Sebastian opened the door and peeked around. "What's going on out here?" he asked.
"We've come to help with your dilemma," Jared informed him. Sebastian's eyes widened as realization dawned on him.
"Indeed," Misha said, taking the bullhorn back from Jared. "As you may know, alpaca fleece makes a great yarn for knitting practically anything you might like to knit. Hats. Scarves. Clothing…"
He returned the bullhorn to Jared who continued addressing the crowd. "And as it so happens, there is an alpaca farm not too far from where we're filming today and they offered to lend us an alpaca today on the off chance that… well, someone might have their clothes removed from their trailer today."
"This little prank war of yours is between the two of you," Sebastian said. "I'd appreciate it if you leave me out of it."
"I beg to differ," Misha responded. "How many twitter followers did you gain by tweeting about the pranks?"
"All in fun I assure you," Sebastian said, holding up his hands placatingly. His tone was more than a little pleading. "You know how much the fans love to hear stories from the set!"
"Exactly," Jared said. "You knew live-tweeting our pranks would bring the fans."
"You know what gets me? Your ability to predict what prank we would pull next was uncanny," Misha recalled. "I mean, the text messaging might have been luck…"
"I'll admit that one wasn't particularly original," Jared conceded. "Though it is a classic and Misha's reaction was hilarious."
"I still have nightmares about the damn things," Misha admitted with an exaggerated shudder. The crowd laughed. He then returned his attention to Sebastian. "And I might even give you being able to guess that Jared would go with some variation of my name for that damn alpaca head, though the odds of you correctly guessing Dmitri are pretty low. But come on, Sebastian. There's no way you could have known that Jared was going to have me serenaded by a singing alpaca-gram."
"This is ridiculous," Sebastian said. "How could I have known?"
"A question for the ages," Misha said.
"Or for the credit card company," Jared retorted. "Seems I had an inquiry about 'unusual charges' on my account around the time I placed my alpaca-gram order. Regardless, our crew here pointed out that you have not yet been properly initiated into the Supernatural family. And Misha and I decided that we needed to, well… Rectify the situation, so to speak. And since you were such a great supporter of our alpaca war, we decided the best way to address this oversight was to bring you in on it." The crowd cheered. Sebastian's expression had switched from his initial shock to annoyance and now to amusement as he realized that he wasn't going to be able to talk his way out of being an unwilling participant in Jared's and Misha's prank.
"Right," Misha replied. "So, we are here to offer you two choices. One—you may shear the alpaca currently tied behind your trailer, spin some yarn and knit clothing to wear home tonight…" The crowd cheered at this idea.
"Or," Jared said, "you can donate the money that you won in the cast and crew pool to a charity of the crew's choosing and we will return your clothing to you."
Sebastian looked first at Jared, then at Misha and finally his gaze swept over the crowd in front of him. After a moment, he raised his hands in mock defeat. "Okay, okay," he said. "I can see I'm outmatched here. I was going to donate the money anyway." He took the bullhorn from Misha and addressed the crowd. "I will make a donation in the Supernatural crews' name to Random Acts," he announced.
The crowd cheered. "Now," he said to Jared and Misha, "Can I please have my clothing back?"
"By all means," Misha said as the clothes were passed up from the back. "Nobody needs to see any more of you than we already have."