Chapter 9 – let's play!
Edward's POV
Jasper had planned just about everything whilst Rose had fussed over her nails. I had silently searched the supplies tent and filled up some hot water bottles to save Jasper time. He had been tying long sticks together in a platform arrangement. Rose didn't yet know what she would have to do with it yet, and the outlook didn't look good.
Once I'd filled my 77th water bomb, almost all pink, it was surprising Alice hadn't taken them herself actually; but it was here I decide to tell Rose her job, "Rose? If you're not too busy fussing over your hair, I think you should get ready for your job."
"Seriously Edward, not everyone can read minds, no one told me anything," she said in an annoyed tone.
"No, but I think it's pretty obvious there's stuff you could be helping with." Rose hated to be the dumb one.
"What? You want help, tying balloons too hard for you Edward?"
"No, but I think Jasper might want to test how heavy you are," I muttered, knowing she would hear me. I listened to her figuring it out, what? Jasper? Where is he, oh, he's over there. What the hell does he think we're doing? We're playing wars not sticks... wait... how does that involve me?
"You. Can. Not. be. Serious." she said dryly eyeing Jasper's throat.
"Don't worry, I don't think you need to test it," Jasper said merrily, ignoring Rose's temper, "if you could help me tie some canvas over to hold the balloons in it would be much appreciated though."
"Jasper, if you are thinking of getting me to sit on there, waving it ten feet in the air and getting me to drop bombs over the edge you must be crazy." Now Rose mentioned it, it did look a little unstable, but not that bad. It stood straight at seven feet without anyone carrying it; Jasper was tying white canvas over the wooden oblong frame at the top.
"Don't worry Rosalie, Jasper and I won't let you fall. And even if you did you wouldn't hurt yourself. Vampire, remember?" I teased her.
Rose didn't look convinced, "We could climb that high in the trees."
"Rose, we'll have to track them down too." said Jasper, collecting some other items and placing them all in a couple of packs: tins of paint, eggs, bags of sticky fluff, but nothing that could actually hurt Bella, "If Edward does anything to you at all I won't let him forget it." he promised.
Jasper chucked me a pack and Rose grudgingly climbed up onto his brilliant war stand. We set out to attack our loved ones.
***
Emmett's POV
Alice set up the most amazing camp ever. She, it seemed, had already thought through where everything should go and instructed me and Bella exactly where to put them. She was too busy tying the largest sheet we had across a couple of trees and painting B.A.B.E. in big letters, it stood for better (than the rest is) Alice, Bella (and) Emmett. When Bella suggested the name, they burst out laughing like I was missing something funny about it. I think it's an OK name but a little far out, shouldn't it be B.T.T.R.I.A.B.A.E? Maybe that was what they were laughing at, but I don't think it's very funny.
Once we had put up a ring of tents and shelters in the clearing, (I had very cleverly thought to use the same spot as we had sat in earlier when we declared war in) Alice got us moving on to preparing for the attack.
"Em, will you fix up the power supply in the Jeep so Bella can boil up some water and plug the CD player in." she asked me sweetly, "And Bella, in the glove compartment there should be a CD called Songs Edward Really Hates, if you could put that on."
"What, but if they're that bad then..." Bella asked wondering what level of self sacrifice she would have to put into the day for just a little bit of revenge.
"Don't worry, you might quite like them actually, it's hard to tell with all that paint on your face," said Alice looking into the future, "Edward just has some very funny reactions to that song."
I remembered last time we played war games as Alice instructed us, obviously it had been when Carlisle and Esme were out, I think Esme had been a primary school teacher at the time. The situation hadn't been quite the same though. I remember my winning move that fateful last day in Pittsburgh .
"EMMETT!" Alice sang, "That is an excellent plan, and I think I have just the right accompanying plan to go with it."
"Erm, Alice, what's that?" I asked.
"Never mind, get over here Bella." she whispered...
***
Edward's POV
We found them eventually. It seemed we couldn't follow the Jeep's trail easily but Emmett, Alice and Bella had set up camp in precisely the same spot they had been mooching around in this morning. They couldn't have made it easier, Jasper thought to himself.
We had our attack planned: we would prop Rose up in front of their camp, she had the balloons in a sling round her middle and could fend for herself, I had the eggs, a particular favourite of Bella's and Jasper had the fluff, this would drive Alice crazy, I could imagine her screaming in rage at the state of her hair. We all had a pot of paint, we had all wanted one in our partner's least favourite colour and it was honestly inevitable that the paint throwing would be most fun.
As we rounded the corner to their camp Rose threw half a tin of barbie pink unthinkingly. Then we all stopped. Alice and Bella were sitting in the middle of the clearing, there was a CD player but it wasn't on, I can smell my rap, I thought dreadingly, there were buckets of paint sitting near the girls but they remained untouched, a kettle had boiled and water pistols lay on the ground next to it, but they weren't filled, I could hear Jasper thank his lucky stars that they were empty, the temperature difference between our skin and boiling water makes it ten time as painful for us than a human, although it doesn't actually burn us, the last unused object in the clearing, and probably the one I was most thankful it was unused, was the pile of tofu, yuck. It smelt gross, it had been bought for Bella, but she found it even grosser.
I couldn't read Alice's mind to see if this was all a set up because she was repeatedly playing a sad song in her mind, I certainly couldn't hear Emmett.
Bella sniffed dramatically, and Rose jumped off her tower down to Alice and Bella, "What is it sweetie, what has he done to you?"
Bella seemed reluctant to answer but Alice answered willingly enough, "He complained, about my uniform. And went to be on a team on his own. We didn't think we could do it on our own."
I noticed three things simultaneously, one – I think... I think Alice is enjoying this, Jasper thought, huh, never really thought she would enjoy war games, maybe we should try it sometime when she forgives me... I tuned out here, despite listening intently to the first part of Jasper's discovery. Second thing I noticed was a chuckle about 200 metres away; and the final thing I noticed was Rosalie's face: priceless.
"Alice, I'll kick his ass for you... wait..." she said, "IS THAT MY NEW SHIRT YOU'VE GOT ROUND YOUR HEAD?"
Rose didn't seem to care that their team was two vampire's short and had one klutzie girl in replacement but she was ready to tear their heads off.
Jasper moaned loudly and jumped forward to restrain Rose, "Sorry Alice," he muttered, knowing Alice was happy to have him back, "we'll all help you to kick Emmett's butt if you like."
The poor girls in the middle of the clearing suddenly had flashes of evil grins across their faces but they quickly turned them back to sweet smiles, "Would you?" Bella whispered, "He went that way," she pointed to the direction of the laugh.
Before I could tell Rose or Jasper what I'd worked out they had agreed and I was being dragged along with them. The trees whizzed past us at vampire speed. Suddenly a home made mud-bicarb-and-special-ingredient bomb dropped out from one of the trees and another vampire shape sprinted back the way we had came.
Before we knew what had hit us we were covered in the stuff.
"Ew," Rose groaned, "My hair."
Despite my sticky situation I couldn't help laughing with Emmett, Alice and Bella who were walking back our way. Emmett held out a sticky hand to us,
"Fine, you win," said Jasper, "but this time Mom mustn't find out why there's a new clearing in the trees." We probably could have stayed in Pittsburgh if it wasn't for that fatefully slip up on Emmett's behalf...
We climbed back into the Jeep together with all the salvageable remains of our bases and rode back the house in quiet peace.
***
Bella's POV
The others came out of the war just fine but I had a blotched red face.
Emmett couldn't stop laughing as I itched my face in front of the TV. Rose's single paint splat had triggered an allergic reaction and Emmett told me I would be blushing for the rest of the day for my bad war crimes.
"Let's watch a film . That's what I want to do, what's on the war channel?" he asked.
We all groaned, "OK, OK, come on Rose... that's what I want to do..."
"Sorry," I suddenly said, I felt really bad about the day, "we all spoilt your day Emmett. You can have next Friday too if it makes it any better."
"No way little sister!" he grinned, "you guys played the best war game ever!"
I was too stunned to speak. I wondered if Edward's day tomorrow could possibly hold as many surprises...
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