Work Text:
“Shit.”
Phoenix can clearly tell that Fanboy’s in trouble. His usually upbeat tone has been getting more and more worried over the past few minutes.
“You alright?” she calls out, smiling as if she already knows the answer.
Fanboy swears again – whether at her or the situation, though, is unclear. “No, Phoenix, I’m not. I’m very much not alright.”
“Need any help?”
“Fuck no – for all I know you’re going to stab me in the back, Phoenix! I don’t trust you.”
“Guys,” Payback sighs. “It’s Monopoly .”
The night over at Bob’s hadn’t really been anyone’s idea, but more a collection of coincidences that led to a heated game of Monopoly and plans for a movie after.
Phoenix often comes over to his just to hang out, except this time she’d brought Rooster over for no obvious reason. Hangman usually follows Rooster most places just in case an opportunity to annoy him arises, and someone must have mentioned something to Fanboy, because he’d turned up an hour later bringing a selection of movies, ten bags of popcorn and a very reluctant Payback, insisting on a group movie night – apparently something that he used to do with his old squadron.
Halfway through their starting game of Monopoly, Harvard, Yale and some others had turned up. Most of them seem content to watch and laugh at Rooster’s insistence on collecting all the greens, but Halo’s teamed up with Phoenix and they already preside over all of the pinks and oranges, with several houses on each. Coyote had arrived barely minutes after Hangman with no clear reason why, but he’s brought along fizzy drinks so he’s very much welcome.
Bob’s not even sure when Mav had turned up, but he’s here too now, apparently, commenting on his godson’s terrible finance skills – something that’s just making Rooster even more reckless. He’s somehow managed to land himself in jail three times in four rounds.
Phoenix rolls – a five and a two, skipping over Hangman’s meticulously collected reds and ending up on the only remaining yellow. Bob’s got the other two, but doesn’t even bother to argue as she takes out two hundreds, a fifty and a ten. Fritz, who’s taken charge of the bank, exchanges them for the property card.
It’s Fanboy’s turn next. He’d just landed on one of the pinks, but this roll puts him just one square short of free parking – on the most expensive orange.
Phoenix grins and holds out her hand. “Rent.”
It’s 600. Fanboy has 73, and everyone saw him steal those 3 from Payback ten minutes ago.
“Alright,” he says, “alright, uh, I’ll give you – let’s see – Mayfair?”
Phoenix takes the deal and starts building houses on her now completed set of blues; everyone else is out within ten minutes.
“Bob?” Rooster asks while Halo and Phoenix are packing up, still talking about their victory. “Why do you have British Monopoly?”
Bob shrugs. “No clue.”
Everyone – with the obvious exceptions of Halo and Phoenix – seems pretty relieved when the game ends and they can start picking out a movie.
Of course, that’s where another problem arises. Coyote is refusing to watch Shrek, the Toy Story DVD doesn’t actually work, and Fritz, Omaha and Yale are yelling at Harvard for having the audacity to suggest a horror movie.
All of Fanboy’s provided DVDs have been laid out on the floor in some sort of display formation, which is most definitely a tripping hazard given that Bob and Rooster have excused themselves from the movie debate in order to ferry bowls of crisps and popcorn between the kitchen and Bob’s living room.
“Look,” Hangman – somehow the voice of reason – says, hands up in a placating gesture, “how about a vote? Then it’s all fair, nobody can argue about it.”
If there’s one thing that’s pretty clear, it’s that everyone very much can argue about it, but that’s more of an unspoken fact than something that actually needs to be voiced.
The vote ends up in a three-way tie for the top movie. At Bob’s last count, there were thirteen of them in his house; there are fourteen total votes. He’s unsure whether someone voted twice or if there’s another person who turned up at some point unnoticed.
Regardless, voting is deemed useless. So much for democracy.
Despite what seems like every possible debate over the choice of movie, the problem is actually very easily solved by Mav picking a DVD at random, inserting it into the player and then barking “Sit!” at everyone
They’re all in the military, after all. Raised voices giving commands override some part of their brains; everyone is seated – in some fashion or another – within moments.
Rooster, Hangman and Coyote end up on the sofa with Bob and Phoenix on the arms. The armchair, by a non-verbal agreement, is left open for Mav, and everyone else ends up scattered on the floor. Bob’s pretty sure that Halo’s hoarding his decorative cushions and has only given one to Omaha and none to the others, but he’s deciding to stay out of it.
The atmosphere of his living room is certainly a lot different to how it was not even ten minutes ago. Now, it’s silent save for the actual movie and Fanboy searching for the bits of popcorn that he’d dropped when trying to throw them in his mouth.
It’s How to Train Your Dragon, they’ve all discovered – and really, what’s not to like?
Harvard does make a couple of comments about how “technically, the dragons would have been unable to support their own weight with their wings”, but Fritz reminds him that “it’s a movie about dragons, not your advanced physics class” and he quietens down.
So, putting aside the initial, well, difficulties , Bob would say that he’s having a great time. He’s curled up almost onto the headrest of the sofa, head only inches above Hangman’s. It does mean that he’s watching the movie almost sideways but hey, he’s comfortable. Trust Phoenix, to his right on the other arm, to have perfect balance and be able to just stay there for two hours straight.
Bob rolls his eyes at her. She’s too interested in the film to notice or care.
Fanboy seems to have fallen asleep, simply going by the fact that he’s actually sitting still for once, but Bob’s pretty sure that everyone else is awake. For now, at least - they’re barely forty minutes into the movie.
“Who’s that?” Hangman whispers to Rooster at one point, barely audible over the talking on the TV.
“Who, him?” Hangman nods. “Uh, that’s Snotlout. He’s Hiccup’s cousin, I’m pretty sure. Haven’t read the books in years.”
“There are books?”
“So many books,” Rooster confirms. “I’ll try and dig them out for you, they’re really good.”
“Oh. Thanks.”
“No problem.”
Bob smiles.
By the hour and a quarter mark, so many people are asleep that Bob figures he’s not going to get his living room back until the late morning at the earliest.
It’s not a problem, he’s got blankets, he just finds it funny that a group of trained aviators can operate at a high altitude under enormous pressure but not stay awake for a movie that’s barely over ninety minutes long. He’s just lucky that none of them have to be on base for the next day.
Bob decides to just focus on watching the rest of the movie before he sorts anything out; the ending’s always been his favourite and he doesn’t want to miss it.
Across the sofa, he can see Phoenix lean in to watch as well, so she’s definitely awake, at least. Between them, Coyote’s head is resting on Hangman’s shoulder. Bob’s not sure what Rooster’s doing, but he’s either asleep or keeping very still.
The room is dead silent – either out of respect for this truly cinematic masterpiece or because nobody’s awake enough to talk – as the dragons fly across the screen. Bob watches it like it’s the first time he’s ever seen the film. He loves it.
He only really snaps out of it when the credits start rolling. Somebody turned the lights off ages ago, and he doesn’t really want to wake anyone up by turning them back on so he works as quietly can using his phone’s torch to pick up stray bowls of popcorn and half-empty cups.
Phoenix, once he’s told her where he keeps them, grabs a pile of blankets and puts them on the floor in case people wake up cold. Payback helps him with the clean up. Everyone else stays asleep.
When they’re all done, Bob turns to the other two. “I’ve got a guest room,” he says, “but there’s only one bed, sorry. If I’d known what would happen I would have been prepared.”
“No problem,” Payback says. “I’ll stay down here, Phoenix can take it.”
“Really? I’m happy to sleep on the floor here–”
Payback cuts her off. “Take the bed, Phoenix.”
“Alright. Thanks.”
“No problem,” Payback replies, already setting out his own space on the floor next to Fanboy and stealing one of Halo’s cushions. She’s fallen asleep on at least three of them.
Bob shows Phoenix to his guest room. It’s not the biggest in the world, but he’s managed to fit a nice bed and desk in there. He keeps meaning to rent the house out for when he’s on deployment, but somehow he’s never sorted it out so the room’s barely furnished past that. Still, it will do more than well for just one night.
Phoenix looks like she’ll happily sleep anywhere, anyway. Bob would bet that downstairs, Payback is asleep already.
“Night, Phoenix,” he calls as he makes his way to his own room.
“Night,” she replies.
The house is quiet.
Bob wakes up the next morning to an immaculate living room, dirty dishes cleaned and put away in the correct places, and a note on the table that reads Thanks , with a smiley face, in Fritz’s handwriting.