Chapter 6 – Rude Awakenings

"Vaughn?" Sydney asked as she turned over in bed.

"Mmhmm?" Was his groggy response.

"Are you asleep?"

"Not anymore, no."

"Sorry, forget it. Go back to sleep."

Vaughn rubbed his face and rolled towards Sydney. "What is it?"

She looked pensive for a moment. "Do you think my Dad's been acting strange lately?"

"Strange in what sense?"

"In an 'I'm hiding something' sense."

Vaughn thought for a moment. "I know what you mean. He and Sloane have been in a lot of unexplained private meetings."

"Yeah. I wonder what they're up to."

"That's an excellent question. However, I doubt we'll know anything until they want to tell us."

"And that'll be about five minutes after we've figured it out and are really pissed off."

"Syd, don't worry about it. It may not even affect us."

"You're probably right." She sounded resigned.

Vaughn shifted around in bed until her head was on his shoulder, and she was curled up against his side. Gently, he smoothed her hair. "He's your dad, Syd. And he loves you very much, whether or not his actions convey that." He sighed and looked at the clock. "Now go to sleep. We have a good three hours before Weiss gets bored and wakes us up. Or, you know, if you don't feel like sleep, I'm sure we could come up with something else to do." He raised an eyebrow suggestively.

"I'm not that tired." She grinned as she rolled on top of Vaughn.

He leaned up and kissed her, slowly, languorously. "So this is why you woke me up." He gripped her hips and flipped her onto her back, hands wandering and discarding unnecessary pieces of clothing.

Sydney laughed as his mouth worked its way down her throat. "Yeah, that was the plan."

"Sydney . . ." Vaughn wheedled low in her ear. "Syd . . ." He shook her gently, and she rolled over in bed. "It's time to get up." Her response was to snuggle down deeper under the duvet, and pull the pillow over her head. Vaughn sighed. "Come on Syd. It's a gorgeous day out, and Weiss and Nadia want to go to the beach. We have the whole weekend off."

"Mmphh." Sydney attempted to push him away.

"All right, that's it. I'm breaking out the big guns." He rolled on top of her, pinning her to the bed. "Last chance for mercy." She ignored him. "Alright." Then he began to tickle her mercilessly. That woke her up.

"Vaughn! Get off me! Go away!" She started to laugh and scream. " I want sleep!" She grabbed a pillow to try and fight him off. In response her grabbed the pillow in one hand and her wrists in the other.

"Give up?" Vaughn asked breathlessly.

"Will you let go of me?"

"Will you get up?"

"Fine." Sydney grumbled. Vaughn kissed her gently and rolled off of her.

"Morning sunshine." He smiled at her, head propped up on his elbow.

"I'm getting dressed. When I get to the kitchen, there had better be coffee waiting for me."

"It's a deal." Vaughn got off the bed and walked to the door. "Syd?"

"What?" She asked shortly.

"You're beautiful."

"You're annoying."

Vaughn closed the door behind him, smiling. "What a woman."

Fifteen minutes later, Sydney walked into the kitchen, showered, dressed, and in a considerably better mood. "Good morning."

Nadia, was sitting at the counter, still in her pyjamas. She looked at her sister grumpily. Between an attempted kidnapping and other stuff, I got four hours sleep last night." She glared at Weiss, sitting innocently at the table with Vaughn. "There is nothing good about this morning."

"I thought you wanted to get up and go to the beach." Sydney shot her sister a confused look as she took a sip of coffee. "That's why I dragged myself out of bed."

"Interesting." She swiveled in her chair to look at Weiss. "I was told you and Vaughn wanted to go to the beach."

"Really." Said Sydney, turning to look at her boyfriend. "I'm fascinated."

Vaughn held his hands up defensively, while Weiss studiously avoided everybody's eyes. "Weiss said that he and Nadia wanted to go to the beach."

"Eric?" Nadia asked sweetly. "Did you say that?"

Weiss mumbled something incoherent in response.

"Pardon, Eric? What did you say?"

"I said that I might have inadvertently implied something along those lines." He smiled boyishly at his friends and girlfriend. "As we're up, we may as well go to the beach."

Sydney and Nadia glanced at each other. "Fine." Nadia finally said. "But only because its a beautiful day, and I have nothing better to do."

"Agreed." Sydney said. "But if something like this ever happens again, we will tell our fathers. And you won't like what happens next."

Weiss nodded vigorously, smiling with excitement.

Vaughn heaved himself up from his chair. "Lets go get our stuff together." He headed in the direction of his and Sydney's bedroom.

Sydney followed closely behind. Nadia gave her boyfriend one last glare before walking to the bathroom and slamming the door.

"I love weekends." Weiss sighed happily.