The Bellas go on a scavenger hunt around town, in the name of "team building and bonding time." It wouldn't be the Bellas though, without a bit of craziness.
A few weeks after the Bellas raided the Treblemaker's house looking for the keys to unlock Beca and Chloe, the girls decided they wanted to go on another scavenger hunt. Everyone was excited and Aubrey was always game for team-building, quality Bellas bonding time.
First, the Bellas begrudgingly established some ground rules, per General Posen's insistence. For the picture tasks, every member of the group must pose with the listed item and have a picture taken, to prove they actually did it. They could ask someone to take the photo for them, but in case they couldn't find someone, each team would be given a selfie stick to help fulfill this task. Photos with multiple tasks being completed at the same time, were acceptable. For example, if they needed to find a person with pink hair and also an umbrella, a photo of a person with pink hair holding an umbrella was fine. If it's an object that they were supposed to bring back, the Bellas could only take things that they either already owned, could easily return or replace if they couldn't. If it was something they were not able to easily pick up and carry by themselves, or public property it was off limits.
The girls would both start and finish at the Bellas house. Everyone was expected to be back at the house by the time the 2 ½ hours were up. If one person in the group was not back in time, their whole team would be disqualified. The first team to arrive back with all 20 tasks completed wins the scavenger hunt. If at the end of the time limit, nobody finished all of the tasks, the team that properly completed the most would win.
The Bellas decided that whichever group won, would be able to skip their mandatory cardio practice, so everyone was very highly motivated to win. They could use the Internet as a resource for information, their phone's GPS for navigation, and get help from strangers, but they couldn't text their friends or get anyone else they knew, to do anything for them.
On the off chance that any groups were caught cheating, they would be eliminated, and have extra cardio to do, so it was a good incentive to not fail. Fat Amy was quick to point out that her participation in the campus wide scavenger hunt should be considered cardio anyway, but Aubrey largely ignored her pleas.
Once the ground rules were explained, it was time to make the list. This time though, instead of everyone searching for one thing (the keys to the handcuffs), they decided to work together to make the most outlandish list possible. Each of the 9 Bellas each wrote 3 things down, and put them in a box.
Everything was considered fair game, although there were some limits that were put in place. Anything suggested came with the knowledge that it could be vetoed. Nothing illegal or anything that required breaking in anywhere, and absolutely no nudity. One would think that was common sense, but when it comes to the Bellas, sometimes explicitly stated boundaries are necessary.
Once everyone finished writing their ideas down, Aubrey who liked to be in charge, took all of the Bella's suggestions, threw out repeats and bad ideas and finally came up with a typed list of 20 things, compiled from all the crazy concepts that the girls came up with. Aubrey printed off the list and handed it out to the groups.
The Photos List:
Take a picture with a dog
Take a picture of a team member in a shopping cart
Take a picture outside Stanley's
Take a picture next to the Bellas trophy case
Take a picture with a guy wearing a Hawaiian shirt
Take a picture with a pineapple
Take a picture on a motorcycle
Take a picture with a pink flamingo
Take a picture with a garden gnome
Take a picture with the Barden Knight Statue's sword
The List of Things to Collect:
Collect a copy of a biology textbook
Collect a fortune from a fortune cookie
Collect a copy of an old school picture or yearbook
Collect an essay with an F grade
Collect a pen or pencil with the school logo on it
Collect a parking ticket
Collect a Barden University athletic jersey
Collect an old coffee cup
Collect a movie ticket stub
Collect the left shoe of 2 different pairs of shoes
After receiving their lists, the girls divided themselves up into 3 teams. Cynthia Rose, Fat Amy and Stacie were in one group, and Jessica, Ashley and Lily were in the second group. Much to Beca's dismay, that left Aubrey, Chloe and Beca as the third group. The girls were given 2 ½ hours to complete as many of the tasks on the list as possible.
Within the group of three, the Bellas each then designated a navigator, a collector and a photographer. The navigator's job would be to get them to each destination, the collector would keep track of the objects, and the photographer would use the selfie stick to take the pictures to show the Bellas when they all regrouped at the end. Throughout the night, if the members wanted, they could switch positions, but everyone had to participate.
A timer for 5 minutes was set, to give each group time to make a plan of action, and suddenly the living room was filled with excited buzz and chatter for the fun filled night ahead.
"Babe, we are totes gonna rock this," Chloe stated confidently, as she looked over the list.
"Assuming Aubrey lets me do anything, it's a possibility," Beca replied, looking less than enthused about being on the same team as the devil incarnate, who had disappeared into the kitchen as soon as she found out who all was in her group.
"Oh, stop. You're just as valuable as any other member of this team," Chloe encouraged.
"If I'm even still on the team by the end of the night," Beca stated bluntly. "Aubrey just went into the kitchen, probably to grab a knife to kill me with."
"Stop. You're being dramatic, Beca," chided Chloe.
Beca scoffed lightly and said, "There's 3 of us. You two have been best friends for years, and we all know she likes you way more than me. Haven't you ever heard of third wheeling?"
"We may be best friends, but I'm not dating Aubrey. I'm dating you, which should tell you right there, that if anyone is going to be third wheeling on this scavenger hunt, it won't be you."
As Chloe continued to present her argument, Aubrey returned from the kitchen with a cooking timer. "Ok ladies," she said, addressing Beca and Chloe. "Here's what's going to happen. We have 150 minutes to find and complete 20 tasks. That leaves us 7 minutes for each task, plus 10 minutes to come back to the Bellas house by 8pm before the timer is up. I think—."
"Can you just shut up and let it be fun, for once?" Beca interrupted rudely.
Aubrey, to her credit, did nothing physical to the brunette, but if looks could kill, they'd be down a team member, and Chloe would not have a girlfriend anymore.
Chloe, forever playing peacemaker, tried to come up with a great idea that would hopefully appease both her best friend and her girlfriend. "How about we start scouring our rooms and the Bellas house for easy items, then go and get the location photos for the majority of the time. While we're out on location, we can just grab any other items we find along the way."
"That's not the worst idea in the world," Aubrey said, still a bit peeved at Beca, but liking Chloe's suggestion.
"Yeah. I like that Chlo. Great job," Beca complimented. "Knew I kept you around for a reason…"
"Oh? Is the sex not enough of a reason?" Chloe teased, knowing full well they hadn't reached that step yet, but loving the effects it left on her tiny girlfriends face.
"Well, I uh… You see… Umm…" Beca began to sputter, flushing the color of a lobster. "You can't just go around saying shit like that Chloe!" she concluded firmly, after stuttering a bit more.
Aubrey, looking a bit pale with a tint of green, just took a deep breath and said, "I don't care, or even want to know what you do or don't do in bed with the Hobbit, so long as I don't have to hear it or hear about it ever again. Can we please just focus on our strategy instead of the raging toners you have for each other?"
For once, Beca agreed with Aubrey. "Yes, lets," she said hurriedly. "I know I have a bunch of ticket stubs from different things Jesse has dragged me to. Just last week, Jesse dragged me to go see La La Land. Apparently we HAD to go on it's limited theater release date because it's 'cinematic gold'. You know, he's hoping the soundtrack will win a couple Oscars for Best Original Score, and Best Original Song, and why do I know that or care…?" Beca trailed off, placing her head in hands and shaking her head as she quietly groaned.
"Okay, moving on," Chloe said, placing a gentle hand on her girlfriend's shoulder. "Beca has the ticket stub. I know I have at least 5 essays with an F grade from Russian Lit, so that will be no problem. I'll have to check the closet and see if I still have any of Mike's jerseys in there…"
As Chloe got lost in her mental visualization tour of their upstairs closet, Aubrey interjected, "I have an old molecular biology textbook at the apartment, which is close to Stanley's. We can swing by there on the way. And I have a bunch of pens in my bag. Let me go check and see if any of them have a school logo on them." With that, the blonde rushed out of the room and over to the door.
"You've got a bunch of shoes, Chlo, can we grab 2 of those?" Beca asked turning to face her girlfriend as Aubrey left.
"Sure. And I know you've got a bunch of old coffee cups on the floor of your car, what with the amount of coffee you drink and doing coffee runs for your co-workers at Residual Heat," Chloe continued, "because I always have to toss them in the back seat when I ride in the car with you…"
Beca just glared at Chloe, and resumed looking down their list for things to check off. "I'm pretty sure I've also got a parking ticket from Residual Heat because Dax was being an airhead of a dick and forgot to plug the parking meter when we went on our lunch break. I don't know if I kept it or not though…"
"You didn't… Luckily for you, I did. It was in the trash, but I saw it when I accidentally threw something away, and I picked it out. By the way, you owe me $35 for that parking meter violation," Chloe chided.
"What?" Beca exclaimed, "Do not…"
"Yes you do, Rebeca," Chloe insisted, "You're lucky I paid it when I did because if it had been after 14 days, the ticket jumps to $70." Beca stared at her girlfriend in disbelief that Chloe had memorized the cost to park on the streets of Atlanta.
"And if you STILL didn't get it paid after 45 days, it's $95," Chloe continued on, oblivious to the fact that her girlfriend had long since tuned out her ramblings, and was now wondering how many other random facts Chloe knew.
At this point in time, Aubrey had returned with her bag and was rifling through it, pulling out various items in her quest for a pen with the school logo. Beca was just about to cut Chloe off of her spewing various snippets of information, when a high pitched shriek did it for her. "Found one!" Aubrey exclaimed triumphantly, holding a pen with the in the air.
"Chloe, Hobbit, did you gather your items yet? Or did you spend all of this time just talking? We're running out of time," Aubrey said.
Beca and Chloe exchanged a look, and Beca replied, "Calm your tits Posen, it's only been like, 10 minutes."
"Exactly!" stressed Aubrey, "I only allotted 7 minutes per item."
"Bree, it's okay," soothed Chloe, "We haven't collected the items yet, but we were figuring what all we had in our rooms, and are on our way right now. RIGHT BECA?"
"Umm. Errr. Yes. Yes we are," said Beca, not super convincingly, yet immediately agreeing with Chloe lest she have to sleep on the floor that night.
"We've got like, 6 of the items so far, 8 once you grab your bio textbook and if I find one of Mike's jerseys in the closet," Chloe informed proudly, catching the blonde up to speed. "That's like at least ½ an hours worth of work, so we're okay."
"Well, you should go get it all now, so we can leave. What do we have left to collect? I can look for some or see if I have any at my apartment when we go get my biology book." Aubrey said sharply. It seemed to Beca, like she was trying to refuse to look impressed, but she did let a small smile form on her face before quickly disguising it.
"We are doing so aca-awesome that there's not much left. Just a fortune from a fortune cookie and an old school picture. It can be a yearbook too," Chloe said proudly. "It's mostly just traveling to different places and taking pictures now!"
When Aubrey found nothing negative to say to that, she said, "Good job Chloe!" When Chloe gave her a pointed state, she sighed reluctantly and said, "You too, I guess," glancing briefly in Beca's direction.
When Chloe then turned to look at Beca, giving her a non-verbal prompt, Beca responded, "Thanks. Or whatever," as she turned to go upstairs, not liking how she was being forced to be amicable with her least favorite person.
Chloe quickly followed, with Aubrey bring up the rear. Once they were in the "Bechloe Bedroom" as the Bellas so fondly named it, Chloe and Beca got right to work, scouring their room for all the objects on the list. Beca actually began to get excited for the evening. Beca was a more sedentary person by nature, but she was also slightly competitive. Plus, she kind of wanted to impress Chloe, and make her happy, so if that meant getting along with Aubrey for the evening, she'd at least try. Maybe.
Chloe's muffled words came from somewhere in the back of the closet. "EyIfundit!" The ginger emerged, face almost as red as her hair, which was slightly mussed from being surrounded by all the clothes hanging up in the closet. She was holding an athletic jersey in one hand, and grinning proudly. In her other hand, she clutched 2 left shoes.
"Hey Becs, how are you coming along with finding all of your things?" Chloe asked Beca, slightly out of breath from her hunt.
"Good! I found the parking ticket you left on my desk. and guess what else I found?" Beca responded, standing near her desk chair.
"What?" Chloe exclaimed excitedly, bouncing over to her tiny girlfriend, and wrapping her arms around her, resting her head on the shorter (by only 2 inches Chloe) girl's shoulders.
"A fortune that was pinned to my bulletin board, from one of the Chinese places Jesse ordered food from for one of our movie nights!"
It was a well known fact that Beca Mitchell HATED movies. She hated Bella Bonding Movie nights, but tolerated them because she got to snuggle with Chloe. But she almost always detested her moviecations with Jesse. Some, she would admit, weren't the worst, but Beca could think of many more things she'd rather be doing than listening to Jesse talk through the whole damn thing. The only way to placate the small brunette was to feed her, and feed her frequently. Chloe always kept some sort of snack in her purse for this exact reason. A hangry Beca was not a Beca most people wanted to be around.
Aubrey snorted. "YOU keep fortunes from fortune cookies? That's so stupid."
Chloe shot her best friend a glare that said 'be nice or else' and took a closer look at the small scrap of paper that Beca was holding. It only had 2 words on it. "No way." Chloe burst out laughing, and Beca smirked at Aubrey, as she added, "On the back, it teaches you the Chinese word for 'broccoli."
"Way to go baby!" Chloe said proudly, giving Beca a quick kiss on the lips as a reward.
"That is such a Beca fortune…" Aubrey said, as she groaned at the minor display of PDA. "Okay. Good job. Can we go now?"
"Yep!" Chloe said cheerfully, throwing all of their items in a small bag, and grabbing Beca's hand. "You're driving Bree," she added.
"As if I'd ever let the alt-girl drive my car," Aubrey muttered under her breath.
After arriving at Aubrey's apartment, the blonde scurried in to grab her textbook with a sharp, "Touch anything and you die" directed towards the brunette. Chloe flopped down on the couch and started reading a magazine that was left on the coffee table, while Beca took the time to look around the tiny apartment. Even though as a grad student, Aubrey had an apartment off campus, she still hung around at the Bellas house most of the time anyway. She even had a room there.
Because of this, Beca had never actually been to Aubrey's apartment before, and decided that while it was simple, it was admittedly quite tastefully decorated.
Beca had walked around the small living room twice, when she noticed something off.
"Chlo?" she asked.
"Yeah babe?" replied Chloe, looking up at Beca over the top of her magazine.
"Why doesn't Aubrey have any pictures of her family up? All she has is pictures of the two of you, and group photos with the Bellas. Even I'M in some of these, and she hates me."
"Beca," Chloe said. "We've been over this. Bree doesn't hate you. At least not anymore. She just doesn't do feelings very easily. Kind of like you," she added as an afterthought. "Except, while you mostly pretend like you don't care, and shut everyone out; Aubrey tells you exactly what she feels, and basically makes you not want to get close enough to have to be shut out in the first place."
"But… WHY?" Beca continued. "She's always talking about her father and his weird sayings."
"Well. For one, Bree's dad's teaching methods are actually why she's so uptight in the first place. But besides her dad, have you ever heard Aubrey talk about the rest of her family?"
"No. I make it a goal to never listen to her," Beca joked. She quickly sobered up at Chloe's expression, which made Beca pause for a moment. After a beat, Beca slowly said, "I guess not."
"That's because the rest of her family doesn't talk to her anymore. They basically disowned her after she decided to go to grad school, instead of get married to one of sons of one of her mother's friends in CWA."
"What? That's a lie," Beca said, scoffing at the absurd notion.
"Not a lie," Chloe said. "The Posens are well rooted in OLD South Carolina values and they're super big with the whole 'women don't need to be career people, if they marry and have kids' shit."
"How ridiculous. So, they basically said because Aubrey went to grad school instead of getting married, she's not in their family anymore? I thought her mom was a lawyer? Talk about a double standard…"
"Well, her mother also got married and had a kid straight out of high school and then Aubrey 4 years later once she finished her undergrad. She didn't go to law school or take the bar exam until after Aubrey and her sister were in school themselves."
"Aubrey has a sister?!" Beca said, eyes bulging slightly.
"Yeah, her name is Sarah," Chloe said. "They honestly could be twins the way the look so much alike."
"There's TWO Posens I have to watch out for?"
"Well, her sister got married, so Sarah's a 'Newlin' now and not a 'Posen', but yeah. I guess you better be on your best behavior."
"Oh god. Please kill me now," Beca dramatically flopped over the back of the couch so she could sit down next to her girlfriend.
"You're fine, you big baby," Chloe said. "But ever since Sarah got married and even more now that she's pregnant, Aubrey has kind of been cast aside," she said sadly.
"How come I didn't know any of this?" Beca demanded.
"Do you want the whole world knowing about your family problems?" Chloe shot back.
"No…" Beca said. "But I guess her behavior does make a bit more sense now."
"Yeah. She just wants her family, especially her father, to see she can still be successful without a husband and a baby."
"Maybe I'll be a bit nicer to her," Beca mused quietly, thinking about her own issues with her father, and not realizing that Chloe could hear her.
Chloe, to her credit, didn't say anything to Beca, but just kissed her softly and smiled at her.
"What was that for?" Beca said, as they broke apart.
"Just cause," Chloe said, heart swelling at Beca's inadvertent admission of sympathy. Beca grinned, and pulled Chloe in a bit closer.
Just then, Aubrey returned, clutching her biology text book and a frame. "Can you two keep it in your pants for once in your lives?" she said exasperatedly.
Beca, surprising everyone, ignored Aubrey's words, and was instead focused on her arms. "What's in the frame?"
"It's my senior year school photo!" Aubrey said, smiling down at it. "I figured we could use it as our last collected item. But if anything happens to it, I'll rip your vocal cords out."
Beca so very desperately wanted to say, "I thought the wolves were supposed to do that, not you" but refrained for the second time in less than a minute.
"You look nice in that picture, Posen," Beca said instead, and headed to the door, not liking how it felt having to rein in her snarky retorts.
Aubrey seemed stunned at Beca's out-of-character behavior and glanced at Chloe looking like she didn't exactly know what to do. Chloe returned it with a shrug, so Aubrey choose to follow Chloe to the door after the confusing alt-girl.
Once the three girls had piled back into Aubrey's car, there was an awkward silence, finally broken by Chloe, updating the group with the status of the items they have found so far for their scavenger hunt. "We found all of the things on our 'collect' list! Now we've only got to find 10 things to take a picture with!"
"Let's swing by campus, since we're so close," Beca suggested helpfully, now thoroughly invested in the scavenger hunt. "That way we can get the picture with the sword from the Barden knight statue and the Bella's trophy case near the auditorium in the Rialto center."
Beca was one of the types of people who wasn't competitive until she was, and then once she was hooked, anything and anyone in her way must move or die.
"Yeah," Aubrey agreed, looking surprised at Beca's actually useful input, "and then we can go to the Target over in the Edgewood Retail District, since it's the closest one to campus. They will most likely have a lot of, if not all of the things on the list!"
"Aca-awesome! Let's go!" Chloe squealed, as Aubrey put the car in reverse to head over to the Rialto.
When they arrived at the Rialto, the girls quickly scurried over to the wall where all of the Barden fine and performing arts trophy cases were located. On the way, they ran into another group goofing off in front of the Bellas case. Stacie was currently posing very provocatively in front of the trophy case while Cynthia Rose pretended to snap photos as if on a red carpet accompanied by Fat Amy's loud commentary that you could hear all the way down the hall way.
Aubrey, thankfully, did NOT vomit, but she looked quite distraught over the fact that the honorable Bellas trophies were being subjected to the likes of Stacie, Fat Amy and CR.
"Keep it in your pants maybe," Beca said to Stacie, announcing their presence. "Can you like, move so we can take a quick photo?" she requested.
"Hey Becs!" purred Stacie, her voice dripping with sex appeal. "Wanna join?"
Flushing, Beca muttered, "Chloe would kill me, so no."
Chloe laughed and said, "Maybe next time we'll both join."
Beca raised her eyebrows at that comment, but ignored it. "Yeah, I'm gonna go with not. But right now, we need our photo."
Chloe took a slightly politer approach and asked, "May we please interrupt and get a picture? I promise we'll be quick. We'll be in and out so fast, you won't even notice."
"You can continue your Playboy shoot after we leave," Beca teased.
"Okay," Cynthia Rose said, standing up from her crouched position, where she had been taking photos of Stacie, as if Stacie was a model or Cynthia Rose was a paparazzi. "My legs could use a break."
"And I could use a snack," interjected Fat Amy. "I'll be right back guys," she said, as she headed over to the vending machine at the end of the hall.
"How many do you have so far?" inquired Stacie, in her normal voice.
"We've gotten a lot, but still have quite a ways to go," snapped Aubrey, irritated that this conversation was taking up so much time. "If you move, we'll have even more."
"Ok, calm down General," said Stacie with her hands up defensively. "It was just a question."
"Okay, Beca, do you want to take the photo?" Aubrey asked, looking exasperated at Stacie's antics.
"Who even is in charge of the photos?" Beca asked randomly.
"I don't know. We are all kind of working together on everything," Chloe said, "except the driving. That's all Bree. So how about we rotate taking the photos too!"
"Sounds good to me," Beca said, taking the selfie stick.
Beca quickly snapped a photo of the trio next to the trophy case, all victoriously pointing to the trophy and holding up their index finger to show 'number 1'.
"Ok, we're leaving now, good luck girls," Chloe said, "but not too much!"
As they were leaving, they ran into Amy returning from the vending machine, arms loaded down with snacks. Seeing all the food in the Australian's possession, Beca's stomach growled as she moaned out loud. "Dude… I'm hungry."
"Here captain," Fat Amy said, tossing Beca a bag of ranch Doritos. "I don't like this flavor."
"Thanks," said Beca, catching the bag. "But why did you get them if you don't like them?" she asked curiously.
"The one I wanted was behind it," Fat Amy grumbled. "Stupid wankers can't properly stock and sort out the machines…"
"Oh. Okay, well, see you back at the house soon!" said Chloe, noticing the annoyed look on Aubrey's face and wanting to get back on schedule.
"Bye DJ, ginger, general," Amy said, nodding to each of the girls, and headed back down the hall.
As Fat Amy's figure retreated down the hall stopping every so often to pick up a fallen snack from her overloaded hands, Aubrey turned to Beca and Chloe and said, "Let's go to the statue in the quad quickly, and then we can go to Target."
Beca and Chloe both agreed with that, and so they started the short walk from the Rialto over to the student union, where a big bronze statue of the school mascot was located. Once there, Beca couldn't help but pretend like she was getting impaled on the sword, as Chloe snapped the groups photo.
"Whoo hoo!" Chloe squealed, as she looked at the photo. "We're over halfway done! Let's head to Target!"
When the girls arrived at the store, Beca quickly turned to Chloe and said, "hand me your purse. We're not here to shop this time."
Chloe pouted, but Beca stayed true. "Don't give me that face. You know you can't leave Target without spending at least $50."
Reluctantly, Chloe handed over her bag, but not before sighing loudly.
"I'll let you push the cart," Beca placated, "as long as you don't actually put anything IN it to buy."
"Can I push you in it?" Chloe said, eyes lighting up in amusement, as she remembered that one of the photo ops was to take a picture of a team member in a shopping cart.
"Only because I love you," Beca said, as she turned to climb into one of the giant red shopping carts near the front of the store.
Beca struggled for a bit, before Chloe gently picked her up and placed her in the main compartment of the cart. When Beca opened her mouth indignantly, Chloe quickly said, "While I'm sure you could do it on your own, I don't think you'd appreciate everyone who is currently staring at us, so let's just go."
Noticing that they were indeed blocking the entrance to the building, so they quickly wheeled the cart a few feet over to the Starbucks, where Aubrey got out the selfie stick.
"Aubrey, do you want to take this one, since Chloe's pushing me, and I'm in the cart?" Beca asked.
"Okay," Aubrey said, still pleasantly surprised with how easily she was getting along with Beca when she wasn't constantly fighting her for control.
Aubrey got out the selfie stick, and framed the picture, getting the 3 girls, the whole cart, and part of the Starbucks sign in the background. "Say 'Bellas' on 3… 1, 2, 3!"
"Bellas!" Chloe and Beca said, albeit the later one said it much less enthusiastically. However, once they looked at the photo, they all liked it, and discovered that Aubrey even captured Beca even giving a small smile, mostly because Beca was thinking about how happy Chloe seemed in that moment.
As they wandered the aisles, the spotted a statue of Bullseye, the bull terrier mascot of the store. The dog was on a bench, with enough room for a person to sit by the dog, and was surrounded by a giant photo frame with the hashtag #TargetDog written across it in big bold red letters.
"Does this count as a dog?" Beca asked Aubrey, wanting to know if they could cross it off their list.
"I'm going to use my creative license on this one, and say yes. Everything can be up to the groups interpretation and I think it's fine," Aubrey said firmly.
"Awww," Chloe said, slightly heartbroken that there would be no live dog for her to be able to cuddle and pet in order to accomplish the task.
"Perfect. I'm wearing my favorite black skinny jeans, and I don't want them to get dirty and get fur on them from a real animal," said Beca, as the girls all gathered around the statue. "Click" went the camera and just like that, the girls had completed another one.
"Six left!" said Beca, standing on her tiptoes looking over Chloe's shoulder at the list. "All we have to get is Stanleys, a dude wearing a Hawaiian shirt, a pineapple, a motorcycle, a pink flamingo and a garden gnome!"
"Well, lets head to the seasonal aisle, and see what they've got," Aubrey said.
"We can check out the market on the way there, and swing by the home and gardening center on the way out," added Chloe. "And of course the dollar section."
"Why the dollar section? Chlo, I told you, NO shopping," Beca reminded.
"Sometimes they have random shit there, and it could be on our list," Chloe defended. "They also have stuff on the ends of the aisles too, so make sure you're checking for that too!"
"Damn Chlo, do you have a map of the whole layout of Target permanently engraved in your brain or something?" Beca inquired, slightly impressed at Chloe's efficiency.
"No. I just come here a lot."
"Obviously."
"Okay, if we're headed towards the market, we have to turn right," said Aubrey, as she looked at the signs on the ceiling and pointed over in the direction to the food.
Chloe quickly swung the cart around, and Beca let out a very unusual high pitched squeal at the sudden movement. The girls set off towards the produce section, and Beca shouted, "Hey! I see a pineapple!"
When they reached the bin with the pineapples in it, Beca couldn't resist plucking out one of the sharp green leaves from the top, and poking her girlfriend in the arm with the spike, eliciting a yelp from the readhead.
"Would you two cut it out? We need to hurry. It's already 7:15, we're not done, and we still have to drive to Stanley's AND back to the Bellas house by 8!
"Chillax, dude," Beca said, handing Chloe the selfie stick, "we're doing fine."
Chloe took the picture, and they headed off to the home and garden center. On the way, they passed the music and entertainment displays, and had Beca not been in a cart, she would've been there until the store closed.
"Chloe, let me out!" Beca demanded, shifting in the cart so she could watch them roll farther and farther away from the electronics.
"No," Chloe said. "We're not here to buy anything, remember?" she added teasingly.
"But I wasn't going to buy anything. I just wanna look."
As Beca and Chloe argued, Aubrey, turned around exasperatedly and said, "Hobbbit, if you get out of this cart, you won't be participating in the rest of this hunt and so help me you will get extra cardio." Aubrey had her serious face on, so Beca reluctantly turned around and slouched down in the cart.
Satisfied, Aubrey turned away and began making her way down the aisle, as Beca flipped her off.
"I saw that," she said.
"Whaaa?" Beca was puzzled. "Does she have eyes in the back of her head or something?" she asked Chloe in a whisper.
"No," Chloe said, "She just knew you'd do something like that. You're kind of predictable sometimes."
"I am not," Beca retorted. "What am I gonna do next? Huh?"
"Don't be mad, it's cute."
"I'm not cute, I'm -" Beca began.
"A badass," Chloe finished. "Yes, baby, we know."
"That doesn't mean anything," Beca said, as they arrived next to Aubrey, who was looking over their selection of garden gnomes.
"Here, Beca," Aubrey said, handing her a giant gnome with a frown on his face. "This one looks just like you."
"Watch it Posen," Beca snapped, looking around the display for a different gnome. "Or that one is gonna be you." Beca pointed to a gnome that was cut in half, meant to lay on the ground looking like they were burrowed in the ground.
Chloe sighed, knowing the unofficial truce wouldn't last long, but pleasantly surprised at how long it actually did. Interrupting the two, Chloe asked, "Can we just take a picture and go? We still have some things to find."
"Oh right," Aubrey said, getting the selfie stick out. "Everyone look at me."
With that, the girls decided it would be best to move on to the rest of the items, so they could make it back to the Bellas house on time.
"Beside Stanley's, these last few are going to be hard to find…" Chloe said, consulting their mostly crossed off list.
"I have no idea where we're going to find a flamingo without going to the zoo. Or a guy in a Hawaiian shirt and a motorcycle. Maybe in the parking lot at Stanley's?" she mused aloud.
Chloe lead the group over to the cart return, and help Beca get out of the cart. Just as they were turning to leave, Beca spotted something pink out of the corner of her eye. She mentally cursed herself as she saw where it was located.
"STOP!" she yelled. "We gotta go to the dollar section."
"Beca, I thought you didn't want to go to the dollar section," Chloe said, a bit confused.
Ignoring her, Beca kept walking towards a bin. "Look," she said.
Inside the wire bin, were a dozen or so inflatable flamingos surrounded by beach balls, ducks, frogs and other random shapes. Beca assumed they were designed to be blown up for a child's swimming pool or a bath, but it works.
"Hey Posen," she said, "Creative license?"
"I suppose," Aubrey replied, secretly glad that Beca had found it.
The girls all crowded around the mini flamingo, and took a picture.
"Let's roll Bellas!" Chloe said, and once again, they headed out to the car.
When they arrived at 7:45 to Stanley's, they were saddened to see that they had just missed the dinner rush. The main parking lot was empty, save for about 10 or so cars in the side lot, that looked like they all belonged to employees. However, they got their picture outside of the building, and decided that they needed to head to the Bellas house, so they would make it in time. Each of them were hoping that none of the other girls were able to get a picture with a guy wearing a Hawaiian shirt or on a motorcycle, because aside from those two, the trio had found everything else on the list.
The girls got to the house at 7:50, and they found Jessica, Ashley and Lily already sitting on the couches in the living room. At 7:59, of course, Cynthia Rose and Stacie came bursting through the doorway, and about a minute later, right at 8pm, Fat Amy strolled in behind them.
"Damn it," Cynthia Rose said, "We're last."
"Hey," defended Stacie glaring at Amy. "At least we got here. I wasn't so sure we'd even survive at some points."
"Yeah. We made it, and that's all you should care about," Fat Amy responded cheekily. "Besides, we did have fun, yeah?" she asked, with a grin on her face, looking at her teammates.
From the look that Stacie and Cynthia Rose exchanged, the rest of the room could tell that Fat Amy's definition of fun was much different than everyone else's.
"Okay girls," Aubrey said. "It's time to compare lists!"
Jessica, Ashley and Lily procured their slightly worn out looking list. Only a few things were crossed off and they were mostly all items on the "collect" part of the list.
"We didn't get very many," Ashley began, "Since Lily ran off somewhere about 15 minutes in to the scavenger hunt, so we couldn't do any group photos, until she joined us again. Which was at the very end of the hunt time."
"We didn't ask any questions, and spent most of our time trying to find Lily instead of finding the things, but gave up and collected a couple of objects just so we'd have something. We only got back like, about 5 or 10 minutes before you arrived," finished Jessica.
When Aubrey heard that they had barely been beaten, she turned to glare at Beca, as if it were her fault they weren't the first ones back.
"Hey," Beca defended, with her hands up, "It's not my fault you drive like a Grandma. Speed limits are mostly guidelines anyways. I could've gotten us here way faster."
"My father is a police officer. He would be so disappointed if I got a ticket."
"OOOH Posen. Just wait til your father hears about this," Beca teased in a British accent.
"Shut up Mitchell. Chloe, control your girlfriend please," Aubrey responded.
To everyone's surprise, based off the reactions Stacie and Cynthia Rose had to Fat Amy's comments, they completed the same number of items as Beca, Chloe and Aubrey even though they were different things, and with less pictures.
It was especially surprising to Beca, Chloe and Aubrey because they had seen the team at work first hand and they were in slight disbelief at how proficient Amy could be when she was threatened with any sort of physical activity.
Stacie, surprisingly being the cleverest out of the bunch, managed to fit 2 or even 3 of the things on checklist, in one picture. The two items that Fat Amy, Cynthia Rose and Stacie didn't get were a pen or pencil with the school logo on it and an essay with the F letter grade.
They didn't get the first one, because Stacie uses glittery gel pens for her papers, while Cynthia Rose and Fat Amy had both pens and pencils but not with the school logo on it.
Over the years, Fat Amy had collected many items with the school logo on it. She got most of it at the back to school fair where different local businesses and various clubs and organizations on campus handed out free promotional goodies.
Fat Amy never bothered to pick up any pens or pencils while attending them though, because she always just borrowed -stole-them from someone near her or off a random empty desk that someone had left behind.
However, the second one was slightly surprising to the rest of the group. While the Bellas knew that Cynthia Rose was decent at school, and Fat Amy never turned in essays in the first place, they were slightly shocked to find out that Stacie had never received a grade lower than an A minus.
The girls all knew Stacie was super smart, but they all secretly wondered if Stacie's physical appearance also played a small part in adding to her already highly proficient intellectual abilities.
The pictures were hilarious to look at, mostly because of Fat Amy's shenanigans, but Stacie had a few good ones in there too. She was posing sexily in an oversized Barden Athletics jersey and basically pretending to be giving the Barden Knight's sword a blow job.
The girls had also found quite a bit of the items, thanks to Cynthia Rose's penchant for being a pack rat border lining on becoming a hoarder.
However, the girls all decided that Aubrey, Chloe and Beca won, and as Aubrey and Chloe cheered and hopped around in a circle holding hands, Beca stood stoically, pretending not to care and maintain her badass image.
That was, until Chloe pulled her close and swung her tiny girlfriend around in a circle, planting a big kiss on her lips as soon as she was back on the ground.
It was only when Beca saw how all the girls were genuinely happy for the winners, and commenting on how fun it was even though they had lost, and the look on Chloe's face that she caved in and truly started to enjoy the win.
Once everyone had settled down a bit, Aubrey cleared her throat and stood up to speak, looking at all the Bellas scattered throughout the living room.
"Even though some of you had a less traditional approach to this bonding activity, I am pleased at your effort. The rule said whoever lost had to do cardio. Jessica, Ashley, Lilly—you didn't get very many activities checked off, but you were the first ones back, which counts for something. Stacie, Fat Amy, and Cynthia Rose tied with my group, and used less photos to do it, but they came in after we arrived. That being said, no one has to do any cardio."
"Thank the Aca-Gods and doughnuts!" proclaimed Fat Amy, dramatically sinking to her knees and throwing her hands up to the sky in praise.
"Honestly, I'm just glad you didn't do anything that got you arrested," Aubrey replied, looking slightly amused at the Australian currently kissing the floor.
"Well…." began Fat Amy, as Stacie and Cynthia Rose shared another glance.
"I don't wanna hear about it, or ever find out about it later" Aubrey said cutting Fat Amy off, as she turned and walked away. "Don't make me add back your cardio," she threatened, looking back over her shoulder.
"Everything was fine and nothing was even border line," Amy responded quickly, making gestures to both Cynthia Rose and Stacie to stay quiet.
After everyone had mostly cleared the area, Beca and Chloe were left in the living room, cuddled up on the sofa, exhausted from their busy evening.
"Whew! That was absolutely nuts!" exclaimed Chloe looking at Beca with her bright blue eyes sparkling, clearly still feeling her adrenaline rush from winning.
"It was alright I guess. I'm just glad we didn't lose. Posen would've been insufferable."
"Thank you for making an effort tonight, it means a lot to me," Chloe said softly, kissing Beca softly.
"ARE YOU FOR SERIOUS? DO YOU TWO EVER STOP?" Aubrey said, as she walked past the living room, to head upstairs.
"Dixie Chicks serious," Beca retorted with a smirk.
Aubrey just groaned, and stomped up the stairs.
"Beca. I thought you were going to try and be nicer to her," Chloe said sighing.
"Keyword: try to be nicer," Beca reiterated. "Every new skill requires a lot of practice."
"Okay, I'll give you that. Rome wasn't built in a day," Chloe relented.
"Are you insinuating I can't do it?"
"You said it yourself."
"I said it'd take time, not that it wouldn't happen," Beca corrected.
"Really?"
"Yeah. She's your best friend. Even if we never become best friends, I can try and at least get to the point of tolerating her."
"Awww. That's so sweet," Chloe cooed, grabbing Beca's face and smushing it up.
"Get off me. I'm not cute I'm—"
"Badass. I know. You're the most caring badass I know."
"Oh just shut up and kiss me," Beca demanded blushing again.
"Gladly," Chloe replied, leaning in and kissing her again.