Chapter 120.
"Boys! Get your butts up here!"
Abandoning his task of lining up conditioner bottles in order of size, Gordon stuffed his feet into his boat shoes, clicked his tongue at Celery, and answered his grandmother's rallying call. Unbeknownst to him, he'd just inadvertently been saved from a particularly grisly encounter involving John and his blood-soaked toes. Indeed, the redhead had been in the process of charting a course for his younger brother's hut, intent on retaking his shampoo by force if absolutely necessary, but had been delayed by a particularly treacherous section of pebbly beach and was now dragging what remained of his battered feet up to the kitchen where Sally was waiting for them all, a letter in hand.
"There you are!" the Tracy matriarch exclaimed, barely noticing as John staggered to the freezer, retrieved a bag of ice, and promptly dumped the contents over what remained of his shoeless feet, "Where have you all been? I missed you at breakfast."
Gordon smiled awkwardly, suddenly aware that the fruit bowl was empty, "Hey, Grandma! What's up?"
"Oh, just a little bit of exciting news, that's all," Sally crooned, her eyes glimmering behind her glasses as Alan, Scott, and Virgil arrived, "Aha, there you boys are! I was just about to come down and fetch you. Why you decided to sleep in those ridiculous huts last night is beyond me. The one underneath Three's silo has a nest of young kea chicks in. Poor Brains nearly lost an eye the last time he went down there to check the tide gauge."
Four pairs of eyes surreptitiously flicked towards Virgil, who'd claimed the hut underneath Three's silo in the name of Thunderbird Two not twenty-four hours ago. His face was sporting several nasty looking scratches, and John swore he could see a bald patch on the back of the engineer's head where the hair looked suspiciously like it had been pecked off.
"Anyway, big news!" Sally continued enthusiastically, "Your third cousin twice removed is getting married next week. The invitation got held up by a port delay at Wellington, but I've already RSVP'd and said that we'll be there."
Scott shared a baffled look with Virgil over the top of Alan's head, "I never even knew we had a third cousin, let alone one who's been removed three times."
"What's her name?" Virgil queried.
"Cousin Bluebell of course!" Sally replied, her tone suggesting that the boys should have already known this, "From your mother's side of the family, remember? You and she used to play together all the time when you were young, Scott."
"We did?"
"And Virgil, you had your first ever sleepover at her house."
"I did?"
"Oh John, remember how desperate you were to join your school's astronomy club, but you didn't want to go to the meetings on your own? Bluebell signed up with you so that you'd have company, remember?"
"She did?"
"You probably don't remember much of her, Gordon, but her father worked as a paediatrician on the hospital ward where you were born. Said you were the loudest baby he'd ever heard."
"He did?"
"It's a shame you never got to know her as well as your brothers, Alan," Sally sighed, oblivious to the irony of her opening statement, "But I'm sure you'll hit it off no problem at the reception. You met her briefly at a family reunion when you were a few months old, but we had to leave early when you projectile vomited out your nose."
"I…? She…? We…-what?"
Scott visibly shuddered. That particular incident had showcased the very worst of what the human body was capable of. He still had one or two nightmares a year that featured it.
"Sweet little Bluebell, all grown up," Sally whispered, raising her glasses to dab at her rapidly watering eyes, "It seems like only five minutes ago you were all babies. Pretty soon, you'll all be married with children of your own, and the cycle will begin again. How time flies."
Scott's expression of bafflement evolved into one of outright horror. He considered himself pretty mature for a man in his early thirties, but some of his brothers were walking disasters. John couldn't even keep a fake plant alive, and Gordon, though an attentive dog owner, had been out-and-out neglectful on the few occasions where he'd been tasked with looking after Alan.
"When and where is this wedding due to take place?" John asked, already devising a list of fake emergency calls he could bribe EOS into making, "One of us is going to have to stay behind on monitor duty. I volunteer."
"Kayo's already offered," Sally countered, "She never knew Bluebell, so said there's no point in her attending. Personally, I'm inclined to agree with her. After that little security hiccup with the Hood, I'm reluctant to leave the island with just MAX and Brains in charge again."
John felt his jaw click as he watched his list of fake emergency calls disappear down the toilet in his mind's eye. He'd been particularly proud of the one involving a ventilation chute, a trapped engineer, and a rogue squirrel.
"And a week tomorrow at a lodge near Monarch Lake," Sally added, remembering John's original question, "It's a gorgeous venue just a few miles out of Granby. We'll fly into Denver and then hire a couple of cars to get us there. A night's accommodation in a nearby hotel is included for all of us, so we don't have to worry about finding somewhere to stay during high season."
Scott felt his heart sink through the floor. While he was definitely one of the more sociable members of his group of five, weddings didn't fall under his definition of a 'good night out', namely because you couldn't do what you wanted, when you wanted. The last wedding he'd been to had been a disaster. He'd spent the whole day throwing fake compliments at the bride, exchanging innuendo-laden jokes with the groom, fending off an army of single bridesmaids, socialising with complete strangers who kept asking what his occupation was, and guarding the buffet table with his life after Gordon had learnt that it was an all-you-could-eat one.
Sally could hear her shoulder devil cackling as she swept her gaze over the despondent faces in front of her, "You're all welcome to bring plus-ones along, however you'll have to contact Bluebell to arrange that yourself, as I only RSVP'd for the seven of us. It's a self-catering wedding, so I've offered to make a red velvet cake as our gift. Homemade things are always the nicest, plus I happen to know that she and her partner don't drink alcohol."
Virgil felt himself recoil at the words 'homemade' and 'cake'. The last time their grandmother had made something that resembled a cake and forced them to eat it, Gordon had ended up re-writing his will. Next to him, Scott twitched at the realisation that they were all still as single as a bunch of dollar bills.
As usual, it was John who noticed the crucial detail that everyone else overlooked.
"Seven?" he repeated, counting on his fingers, "But there are only five of us. Six including you."
"Seven," Sally confirmed, smiling over her shoulder as she helped herself to some of Kayo's leftover coffee, "Mr Harris has very kindly agreed to be my plus-one. He's in Tasmania helping with some agricultural burning at the moment, but has agreed to meet us at Auckland airport when we catch our flight. He's already asked to be seated next to you during the wedding breakfast, Virgil."
Scott felt himself lose an ally as Virgil promptly forgot about everything and let out what could only be described as a dumb giggle.
"What hotel are we staying in? And is breakfast included?" Gordon asked, his priorities clear as he pulled his phone out and contemplated asking if Celery could be his plus-one.
"The Spirit Haven Lodge," Sally replied, "I asked EOS to run a quick search and she said that the views are stunning."
John felt betrayal engulf him and made a mental note to pour tea over EOS's central processor when he was back up in Five.
"Online reviews look decent," Alan mused, placing his own phone on the floor as he bent to re-tie his shoelace, "Someone called in_jail_out_soon recently gave it five stars for both cleanliness and customer service."
"HairyPoppins said that there's plenty of parking and a fully equipped on-site gymnasium," Scott added, clearly pleased, "And there's a soundproof nightclub in the basement."
"RedMonkeyButt says there's twenty-four-hour room service and complimentary organic cotton dressing gowns in every room," Gordon gushed, scrolling for all he was worth, "Oh! Here's a real gem. Apparently, there's also unicorn steak on the menu."
John quirked a disbelieving brow and pulled up the profile for the user Gordon had just quoted, his nimble fingers flying as he scanned the person's activity log and review history.
"Oh, that's bullshit of the finest quality," Scott wheezed, hiccupping as he tried to get his laughter under control, "Are Pixie Dust Martinis on there as well?"
Gordon snorted and continued scrolling, reaching down to pet Celery and barely noticing when he patted Alan on the head instead.
"Holy smokes," John muttered, his expression incredulous, "All joking aside, do you want to hear the review that person left when they visited the Tomb of Tutankhamun last year?"
Five heads, including Sally's, nodded expectantly.
"They gave it one star because, apparently, it 'smelt like someone had died in there.'"
-x-
8 days later…
Scott hated airports.
They were loud, overcrowded, and poorly designed in his opinion. Being frisked by a stranger, having his bag ripped open and searched for the world to see, and waiting while his passport was squinted at by an arrogant border officer were additional inconveniences that only served to compound his hatred further.
Navigating through all of the above with four brothers in tow was nothing short of unspeakable.
He wistfully cast his mind to his grandmother, who'd received a call from Kip six days ago informing her that his status with The United States Major Incidence Division meant that he got thirty thousand miles of complimentary business class flights per year as part of his long-term service package. Since he wasn't much of a traveller, he still had all of his annual quota to use and had offered to upgrade Sally's ticket for the entire trip.
They wouldn't be showing their passports to rude airport security.
They wouldn't be waiting in any mile-long queues.
They wouldn't be listening to the wails of disgruntled children as their ears popped during take-off and landing.
Scott was bitter about the entire setup, but knew there was nothing he could do about it. He refused to divulge his connection to International Rescue in the hope of bagging a freebie, and definitely wasn't forking out for five business class tickets from his own pocket. To add insult to injury, there were no Fireflash flights scheduled for the rest of the day either, meaning that they'd have to suffer in subsonic hell for seventeen hours.
"Are we buying food beforehand, or settling for whatever muck they feed us on the plane?" Virgil asked, trying desperately to arrange his hair so that it looked more like it did in his passport photo.
"Gordon's gone to grab us a Sharer Box from Burger King," Scott replied, checking the departures board for their flight number, "Except I have doubts over whether he'll actually be sharing any of it with us. The box he's ordered is so big he's having to check it in as extra baggage."
Alan masked the snort of laughter bubbling up his diaphragm with a cough.
"Send him our gate number and tell him to meet us there," John instructed, subconsciously sucking in his gut when a snotty-nosed child wandered too close, "I'll ping him our exact coordinates so that he doesn't get lost and end up on the wrong flight."
Virgil shrugged offhandedly, seemingly unconcerned for his wingman, "He'd find us eventually. His pigeon's instinct would kick in, just like it always does whenever Two's nav system fails."
"Speak of the devil," Scott muttered, inclining his head towards the Bureau De Change. Virgil and John followed their brother's gaze and were rewarded with the sight of their aquatic brother staggering towards them, his arms laden with boxes of food.
"I wasn't sure what we all wanted," Gordon panted, his legs the only visible part of his body as he drew level with Alan and waited for his brother to relieve him of some of the weight he was carrying, "So I ordered everything."
"A smart decision," John praised, safe in the knowledge that it was Scott's credit card that would be bearing the brunt of the three-figure bill Gordon had probably racked up, "Did you get mine with extra pickles?"
"Extra pickles, extra mayo, extra bacon, extra cheese," Gordon recited, "Extra everything you could wish for in there, bro."
John nodded in obvious satisfaction. After helping Gordon transfer his load onto a stable surface, he began popping the lids of the burger boxes to see which was which.
"I feel like a grimy grease bucket already," Scott muttered, accepting his chicken burger and wordlessly retrieving a can of travel deodorant from the rucksack Alan had been tasked with carrying, "Why do commercial airports and airplanes always make you feel so dirty? I call dibs on the bathroom as soon as we check into wherever the hell it is that we're staying."
"You're bunking with me, bro," Gordon announced, his eyes twinkling with mischief, "John needs his own room with hypoallergenic bedding, and Alan says he took one for the team when he quarantined with me after our jaunt to Europa. I know you love your showers, but I checked and our room just has a tub. Fancy sharing a bath?"
Alan and Virgil both shorted into their milkshakes, while John sent a mental prayer of thanks to his allergies for saving him from such an undignified fate.
"I didn't mean that in a weird way or anything," Gordon clarified, spying the horror on Scott's face.
"Dare I ask how you meant it?"
"In more of a 'two flatmates trying to conserve hot water' kind of way."