The brain demands plot sacrifices once again and I am only a servant to appease it.
Real life quest time.
"Wait, wait, wait. Quatre...all five of you are WHERE?"
Hilde tried to not snicker, she really did...but the dumbfounded, sheer "what-the-actual-fuck-are-you-kidding-me-right-now" look on Relena's face, mixed with the incredulous disbelief in her voice was just too funny. Sure, she'd probably join in with whatever the response was going to be after the diplomat hung up the phone, but for now she could just listen in to one side of the current conversation and let her amusement take her away.
"Quatre, please repeat that one more time...and by that, I mean, please say something completely different." Relena said, one hand pressed to her forehead as if she were trying to either force her brain to accept what it was that she was hearing, or trying to ease away a tension headache brought on by the degree of sheer insanity that came about when five of the six loves of her life were left unsupervised for any length of time that let their boredom and curiosity take over and run wild.
She loved them dearly, but sometimes the insanity just blew her mind.
"No...no. Hilde and I will come to you. Please keep everyone from going anywhere else." Relena dropped her hand to pull out her second cellphone, that pretty much existed just as a PDA at this point, and quickly scrolled through her calendar. "We'll see you as soon as possible. Yes, I'll call when we get there. I love all five of you, so please don't do anything that could cause any kind of incident that I can't explain away as a cultural misunderstanding."
Relena hung up the call and shook her head. "Hilde...do you happen to know anyone who could fly us to the French Alps?"
"...Sure. I know a few guys." Hilde said only to blink as she ran that sentence back through her brain. "What are our boys doing in the French Alps?"
"Questing." Was all that Relena said as she turned and headed up the stairs to pack a bag for herself and one for Hilde, while the former-freedom fighter in question decided that it might just be in her best interest to let discretion play the better part of valor and focus on getting that plane ride ASAP.
She'd know the whole story soon enough.
=Spongebob-style title card: One Flight Later=
"Thanks for the lift." Hilde said with a grin to their pilot after she and Relena had disembarked the mostly-unmarked plane with their bags in hand. The bearded man merely laughed in response as he waved a hand at them. "After how you saved my bacon in the war? Anytime, Hilde."
"Aww, no big. After all, what's laying down suppression fire with an automatic rifle for three hours straight between friends?" Hilde waved cheerfully alongside of Relena's more sedate goodbye wave, before both headed off of the runway towards the parking lot where another of Hilde's "friends" had pre-emptively left them a "rental car". After a second, Relena looked over, pulling her suitcase behind her while she adjusted the collar of her coat with her free hand. "Three hours of suppression fire with an automatic rifle?"
"Yeah. Long story, not pretty...but talk about riding the lightning." Hilde said as she shifted her own suitcase from one hand to the other so that she could begin to feel around the car to find the key. "It had an automatic feeder so, you know...at least it didn't go out of control, but still, I felt that the next day."
"Hmm...you know, now I have the weirdest desire to shoot an automatic rifle just for curiosity's sake." Was all that Relena said as Hilde located the hiding spot for the key to the car and popped the locks. Once both suitcases were secured in the backseat, and both ladies had taken their respective seats in front, Hilde turned the ignition and sped off not unlike they had just stolen something important and were trying to outrun a certain fictional inspector who was the definition of perseverance.
=Spongebob-style title card: One Drive Later=
Pulling up the the discreet chalet at the end of a barely cleared path, all just barely a safe distance away from the mountainside, wasn't exactly the weirdest thing for either of them...though it might be helping this entire weekend rise a smidge higher on both ladies' lists of "weird days of my life". It was nowhere near their respective top spots, not even their Top 10, but it was rising.
Of course, Trowa standing on the porch of the chalet waiting for them, bundled up in a bright neon-yellow and lime-green parka, with a multi-blue scarf, did raise it a little higher since neither of them were sure that they had ever seen him wear such bright colors outside of his clown outfit.
Hilde glanced over as the sometimes-clown came down the steps to get them. "You know...we could..."
"Yes, we could...but we really should not." Was all Relena said as she opened her door and stepped out of the car, Hilde following suit shortly after. Trowa nodded to the pair and went for the backseat to remove their suitcases, only for the diplomat to raise a hand to stop him. "Trowa, how bad is it inside?"
"No one is dead or dying." Was all that the brunette said, giving a small shrug of his shoulders before he pulled the suitcases out of the backseat. "Wufei is finding new and increasingly creative ways to tell us that all of us, except for Quatre, are the worst sort of idiots. I am certain that, if we weren't all in a relationship, that he would kill us."
"That all sounds normal at least." Hilde said with a sigh as she closed the door behind Trowa. "Is anyone injured?"
Trowa just stared at both of the girls a moment, before "The word "duh" would be appropriate here."
"You've been hanging around Duo too much." Came Hilde's laugh as she looped an arm with one of the brunette's own just as Relena moved to do the same at Trowa's other arm. Trowa tilted his head to one side, seemingly in thought on the subject. "We do spend a lot of time together complaining about Heero's inability to take care of himself."
As they walked up the stairs, Relena could only wonder (with only a tiny amount of dread really) why exactly the boys had gone "questing", how bad were everyone's respective injuries, would there be an international incident that she would need to talk away, and exactly how badly was Une going to blow an artery over all five of the former pilots using their weekend-off to jet off to another country in what was most likely a fairly illegally and undocumented entry into said-other country.
Though, considering that Hilde and herself had also technically entered the country illegally and without any real documentation, well...it wasn't like any of them would tell Une anything about this after all. They liked being able to hear.
After wiping their shoes on the sturdy mat outside, Hilde opened the door and Trowa walked both inside where there was a roaring fire in the fireplace, Heero laid up on a couch with his left arm in a makeshift-sling bound to his body and his left foot resting on a pillow on the armrest of the couch, Duo offering himself to almighty Cthulhu if the Old One would descend upon the world to rescue him from having to have his right arm splinted and bandaged by Quatre who was dutifully ignoring the long-haired ex-pilot's antics in favor of getting the job done as quickly as possible...and Wufei shouting in either Mandarin or Cantonese (and really, the girls decided, that they needed to learn which one at this rate) at both of the couch-ridden guys some things that were probably a mix of a lecture and insulting both on many, many levels.
Trowa set the girls' suitcases aside as Relena shut the door behind them, before he helped the pair to remove their coats. Hilde sighed softly. "Okay...who wants to explain this "quest"?"
At the sound of her voice, Wufei snapped his jaw shut mid-rant while Duo froze completely in place (finally granting a certain blond the reprieve that he needed to finish treating the brunette's arm) and Heero's eyes snapped open as if he had been in the process of dozing off due to being far too used to the rants and general craziness to pay attention. Silence reigned over the room, broken only by the crackling of the fire and barley-audible sounds of Quatre's speedy medic-work, before Wufei cleared his throat in an attempt to regain his composure. "It is, er, was..."
"You normally don't stutter, Wufei. Out with it. I'm sure Hilde and I committed at least one crime to get here as quickly as we could." Relena said with a small shake of her head as Trowa hung up their coats alongside of his own and those of the other four ex-pilots. Wufei pressed a hand to his forehead. "Fair enough."
"One of my sisters gave me a book on flower language that she thought that we would find interesting for either the wedding or for if you might want to incorporate such things into our Dungeons and Dragons game." Quatre chimed in as he finally finished with Duo's arm. "I let everyone read it and...well."
"Duo read about a flower called edelweiss." Heero answered from his position on the couch, staring straight ahead as if he were being interrogated. "Specifically the flower's meaning and how, in folklore, retrieving the flower for a loved one was a sign of dedication and devotion."
"Then we all came here to try to find it for both of you." Wufei finally said, glancing off to the side at the fireplace, embarrassed, in retrospect, at just how quickly he had agreed to this madness once Duo and, oddly, Quatre had proposed the idea to all of them.
Relena and Hilde blinked, processing the admissions...before both looked at one another. Could they really be mad about this when it honestly sounded a mix of cute and romantic that all five of the boys had leapt on this idea of trying to find a flower as a sign of love?
Well...
"And how exactly did all of you get here? Furthermore, how did Heero and Duo get injured?" Relena asked, moving across the room to sit on the armrest near Heero's head while Hilde flopped down on the large couch that Duo was being treated on and Trowa walked over to sit down in one of the armchairs next to the couch. Wufei sighed heavily and rested a hand on the back of the couch a certain former assassin/mercenary/"living weapon" was taking up residence on. "In answer to the first, Winner apparently owns a small passenger plane and Barton flew us here."
Somehow...those two things really did make too much sense.
"As for the second part..." Wufei said as he looked over at Relena. "...none of us are experienced alpine climbers and SOMEONE-"
All eyes slid over in Duo's general direction as the long-haired ex-pilot let out an indignant shout of "It was an accident!"
"-decided to play around while we were climbing, fell and potentially cracked the bones in his forearm, and pulled Yuy and Barton down with him leading to Yuy's twisted ankle and formerly dislocated shoulder, and Barton's bruised ribs and mild concussion...speaking of which, Barton what were you thinking getting out of that chair and going outside to start with?!"
"Someone needed to be outside to greet them." Trowa said as if what he were saying were an absolute truth that could not be argued with...and that only pushed Wufei to growl out something potentially disparaging under his breath in another language. Quatre gave the two girls a helpless look. "I swear, if I had known this would have happened, I wouldn't have shown them the book."
"Quatre, I love you...but you neglected to tell me that you were one of the two who originally concocted this idea." Relena deadpanned, raising a brow at the blond who turned bright red in response to being called out, however gently it was, for his "selective misinformation". The diplomat sighed softly and reached down to thread her fingers through her boyfriend's hair. "Well...all's well that ends well, I suppose. I'll tell Une that we took a week-long vacation so everyone can recover."
"You can do that?" Duo chimed in, leaning towards Relena...only to practically chest-plant on Hilde's lap...though he didn't complain when his girlfriend began gently stroking a hand over his sore back and threading her fingers through his bangs. The diplomat shook her head in amusement as the brunette pretty much melted into a blissed-out puddle. "I can. It will take some fast-talking and smoothing things over with certain people, mainly my administrative assistant, as well as trying to deal with Une, but it should be doable...on the condition that none of you are going on the mountains again."
"The flower-" Heero started only for Hilde to chime in, her expression going completely serious to match the one that had now formed on Relena's face. "No. We don't need anything like that, guys. While the gesture is sweet, we both know that you guys already love us like we love you and that's more than enough. Besides, and this is pretty important, you all could have gotten hurt a lot more seriously...and that isn't even counting any crimes committed or that could be committed. So...let's just enjoy a vacation, alright?"
After a moment of silence, all five said "Agreed."
"Good." Relena said as she petted her boyfriend's hair, while a certain Chinese ex-pilot rested his forearms on the back of the couch...and Heero's eyes slid closed to sleep. Wufei glanced up. "I'll see what I can cook for dinner."
"I'll help." Quatre said as he put aside the repacked first-aid kit and stood up. He leaned over to place a kiss to his boyfriend's cheek before following the other into the chalet's kitchen, leaving the others to rest up.
After all...it had been quite weekend.
I personally think edelweiss is a really pretty flower, and I think flower language is kinda cool to read.