Two years later…
"Please, Briareos, this is all I've never asked you for anything, but please do this for me."
"Christine, I really don't think she'll…" he started. He was sitting in the lounge trying to finish his paperwork when his teammate had come to him with her request.
"Oh, come on, Deunan would do anything for you!" she said, resisting the urge to slap him in the back of the head. "And I really want her to be my bridesmaid, but I'm not having her walk up the aisle in a tux."
"She wouldn't likely wear a tux," Briareos said with a chuckle at the thought. He pushed the paperwork aside with a sigh. "But, honestly, I don't think I can convince her to wear that," he said, pointing to a lacy, lilac-colored dress with a hint of distain.
"It's what all the bridesmaids are wearing though," she said, looking at the dress, searching for what Deunan and Briareos found wrong with the frock.
"I'll try," he said finally, shaking his head a little as he glanced at the dress again. "I can't promise anything, though."
"Consider it my wedding present," she said with a smile as she laid the light purple dress on the bed beside him, and started to walk out the lounge.
"Oh, don't worry I will," he called after her with a crooked grin. She turned and giggled at him, waving as she went through the door.
Deunan was at the range. Briareos had been trying to teach her to shoot Akimbo, but so far the lessons had done little to improve her skill at firing dual weapons. He had lent her his PSS pistols to get the hang of the style. She marveled at their lack of kick as she fired it with her left hand. After several miserable rounds with both weapons, she'd given up, deciding it may get easier if she could just accustom herself to firing with her left hand.
Briareos stood back a bit, watching her as she fired another couple rounds. She didn't realize he was back there, waiting her to finish and trying to think of some way he could manage to convince her to wear that awful dress. Two years may have done a bit to make Deunan look more like a girl physically, but she still insisted on wearing boys' clothes and cropping her hair shorter than many of the male members of the team. If it was at all possible, he thought, it made her increasingly apparent crush on him even more embarrassing. In the last two years, she'd sabotaged the few dates that he had had, but when he confronted her about that she just rolled her eyes and said she was only having a little fun.
When she finally laid down his guns with a sigh and removed the earmuffs he went up to her. "You know your improvements are going to be slow coming if you don't get over you're hang-ups and use both pistols at the same time," he said. She turned around quickly, a bit startled by his voice. "I lent you both of them so you would practice with both of them," he said, shaking his head a little.
"I did at first," she said defensively. "But it doesn't help," she handed him the pistols back. "I'm better with just one anyway."
"So you're quitting?" he asked with a raised eyebrow, pushing her hands holding the pistols back. "That's not like you."
"Look, when I only have to worry about one weapon I'm a great shot, better than most of the guys here. So I don't see why you're so worried," she grumbled as she put his pistols into her shoulder holsters.
"I could still out-shoot you," he said matter-of-factly. "And if I can, you can bet there are others out there who can as well. You say you want to be on SWAT when you get older, well then, you'd better not just settle for what you can do. You've got to push yourself beyond that."
"I bet I could out-shoot you," she said boldly, "if we both had only one weapon."
A revelation dawned on Briareos. Here was way to finally satisfy Christine's request and bring the little imp down a few notches at the same time. He chuckled, "Okay, we'll see about that. Want to put a wager on that bet?"
"What did you have in mind?" she asked with a rough attempt at a suggestive grin.
Briareos cringed a bit inwardly. "If I win, you have to wear the dress Christine wants you to for the wedding," he said.
"What that hideous purple get up!?" she asked with horror.
He bit back a laugh, secretly agreeing with her opinion of the outfit, but not letting it on. "It's an honor that she wants you to be in her wedding. She's your friend, it's the least you could do for her," he said, trying to make valid arguments for wearing such an unattractive dress.
"And if I win?" she asked, with a bit of fury showing up in her eyes as she placed a hand on her hip.
"If you win… You choose," he said with a grin. She'd never win. She was a good shot, better than most, as she'd said, but he was still her superior in that area.
"If I win," she said putting her forefinger on her lips as she thought. "I get to dress you up… in whatever I want to," she added the last part with a threatening tone in her voice.
"Okay, when?" he asked with a chuckle, humoring her delusion a bit.
"To the wedding, of course," she said evilly.
"No! No way!" he answered, truly put off by the idea. "If I know you, you'll have me looking like some cross-dresser."
"Well, it'd only be fair," she said with a shrug.
"No!" he answered with finality. "I'm no cross-dressing at a wedding."
"Okay, fine, you big wuss!" she said, wrinkling her nose as she stuck her tongue out at him. "If I win, I get to dress you in whatever I want, and you have to wear it to supper, in the mess hall, this Friday night."
"Sounds fair," he said with a grin. "So who'll we get to judge the competition, Christine?"
"No, she'd be wanting me to lose," she snorted.
"Okay, how about Verund."
"You're friend. Also, on your side," she said rolling her eyes.
"I think he'd find the idea of you dressing me up amusing enough to be biased in your favor," he said honestly. "I'd say we get both of them, unless your afraid you can't make a clean enough win of it." His eyes glint; he knew she couldn't resist that sort of challenge.
"Fine," she said. "I'll beat you even if you do have the judge is routing for you," she answered, taking out one of the pistols and reloading it.
Briareos laughed and turned to leave, calling over his shoulder, "Wait there, I'll be back with a judge in a bit."
Several minutes past, and Briareos came back with Verund, Christine, and Carl. Deunan was sitting up on the barricade in front of the range, and laughed when they approached. "A judge, huh?" she teased, sarcastically.
"And miss this?" Briareos chuckled. "Your dad was there when I told Verund."
"Had to see how you hold up against a real professional," he said, a hint of pride in her present in his voice, even though Deunan didn't pick it up.
She shrugged. "Let's get this started. Moving targets?"
"Of course," Briareos said. "Best of six."
Deunan nodded and took her place. She went to the line first, and Christine started up the program. Targets popped up front the base of the range, and slide across the base of it. She made all six shots, and from what she could see, they were very well placed shots. She smiled smugly; Briareos was going to lament this bet.
He wasn't afraid, though, as they gathered her targets and set his up. He took his place at the barricade and when the targets began to move he made all six of his shots as well. He turned and winked at her with a cocky grin. She couldn't beat that, even if she had made all her shots.
A few moments later, the three judges had finished examining the targets and turned to the two opponents. Carl was stoic, but Verund and Christine looked like they were both about to die of repressed laughter. Carl looked between the two of them shaking his head a little. "Looks like you tied," he said with a faint smile, he was proud of his girl.
Deunan grinned wickedly as she looked at Briareos. "Rematch?"
"No," Carl said blandly. "Believe it are not, young lady, there are those of us around here with better things to do than amuse the two of you idiots."
Verund and Christine snickered. "You both lose," Verund said, trying his best to regain his composure.
"NO!" Briareos and Deunan said in unison and disbelief.
"Sorry, kids, that's the way it goes," Carl said, with a faint smile at their shock. "By the way, the whole base most likely knows about this little bet by now, and will likely all now the results in a few hours, so if either of you don't want to be considered a coward, I'd suggest holding up your ends of the bet." He almost laughed at the horrified expression that fell on both their faces.
That Friday night Briareos entered the mess hall to find more than the normal amount of people there. All of them burst out laughing as he walked in wearing, not only a tight, short, hot pink tube dress, but also purple alligator skin heels; black, fishnet pantyhose; a string of faux pearls; a set of gold bangle bracelets and a flower tucked over his right ear. To complete the ludicrous outfit, he was also wearing a very ruffled, short, pink apron with the words "Sexy Mama" written across the waist of it in large, rind stoned letters. It had two holes cut out at the chest, where a naughty housewife's breasts would have been exposed. He smiled sarcastically as the cameras flashed, playing up his role with gusto to make a brave face of it. On his way to the food line, a new recruit had the gall to call out, "Hey there, sexy mama! You planning to serve up something good!"
"Extra PT tomorrow morning!" Briareos called out in his best rendition of a hooker's voice. "You can bet your sweet ass on that!" The room burst into another peal of laughter.
After he'd got his supper and sat down by Verund and Carl he grumbled, "I swear to God, the two of you are just about the most evil sons of bitches I've ever met. What were you two thinking, letting her buy this get up?"
"It was worth every cent," Carl said with a chuckle, as he cut his pork chops.
"Definitely," Verund managed to say, as he gasped for air between laughs. "The apron makes it, though."
"A good find," Carl said, nodding the compliment to Verund, who'd found the thing at an adult novelty shop that he'd gone into on Deunan's demand to find something to further embarrass him. The flat look on Briareos' face was a sure sign that it had worked well.
Deunan stood in the back of the church, fidgeting in her heels as she waited for the doors to open. She turned back, smiling at Christine, who looked like a princess in her billowing white gown. Even Deunan envied her beauty. She hated to admit it, but this whole wedding thing was pretty appealing. Part of her looked forward to the day that she would be a bride, have the white dress, and all the pomp and circumstance surrounding a wedding.
The doors opened, and Deunan's heart froze. Everyone was staring at her. She smiled shyly as she clung to her escort's arm for support and made her way as gracefully as she could up the aisle. About halfway down the aisle she caught Briareos' eyes, and he smiled at her, giving her a secretive thumbs up. She smiled more naturally, even though she blushed bright red.
The blush wasn't lost on Briareos, and had she not already past him; she would have seen that he had a faint tint to his cheeks as well. The dress, that had looked so horrible on the hanger, looked very stunning on Deunan, though he felt like a horrible pervert even admitting it to himself. It was the first time he'd seen her actually wear a dress, and this one, with it's tight waist, low-cut neckline, and open back showed off all her newly acquired curves. He shook his head a bit. He shouldn't be thinking of her like that. Christ, she was almost ten years younger than him!
At the reception following the ceremony, after all the pictures had been taken and the first dances had been danced, Deunan tucked out of the crowd for a bit. When she emerged from the back rooms of the reception hall she was wearing a pair of jeans and a boys' dress shirt. She went up to Briareos and plopped herself down on a chair next to him. "God, my feet are frickin' killing me!" she said, rubbing at the side of her sneaker.
"You changed," he said, his voice with a combination of disappointment and relief.
"The deal was for the wedding," she grumbled. "You didn't say anything about the reception."
He laughed a little. "Fair enough, kid," he said, but he resisted the urge to ruffle her hair. Somehow it was hard to still see her as the same impish child he'd seen her as earlier that day.
"So did I look as stupid as I felt?" she asked, as she leaned her chair back.
"Not quite," he teased, bracing himself as she let the chair crash back onto four legs and punched him hard in the arm.
Six years later…
Briareos gave a happy sigh as he got to the door of the apartment he and Deunan shared. It had been a long mission, and he had missed being at home. He was a little let down, though, when he entered the apartment, and found that the whole place was dark. He had called Deunan when he'd gotten back to HQ, but apparently she'd decided to go to sleep anyway. He was tired, himself, although he had hoped that she would have been awake to at least welcome him home.
As he rounded the corner to go to the bedroom, though, he picked up her scent and strange heat signatures from the kitchen. He could smell faint smoke, but it was only slightly stronger than the normal smoky smell that hung in their kitchen, so mercifully he knew she hadn't tried cooking him anything.
His ear sensors tilted back in joy and surprise, though, when he opened the door to the kitchen and found it lit only by several candles. Deunan was perched up on the kitchen counter, a glass of chardonnay in one hand, wearing nothing but a ruffled pink apron that said "Sexy Mama" and a seductive smile.