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An involuntary soft laugh escapes Grace at the sight of her girlfriend’s disgruntled expression through the mirror. Even through all the makeup, which she generously supposes she is probably used to, she can clearly see the flare of annoyance and subtle hostility, from under the messy brown curls falling over the sides of her face.
“What are you smiling about?” the brunette asks in an annoyed tone. But it carries no bite, and Grace smiles even more at the way her arms are crossed in front of the tattered and torn white Victorian style wedding dress she enhanced with some old lace curtains.
“I was just thinking about how much it means to me that you are coming.” Grace easily replies, her voice thick with honey, deftly pulling on the Brazilian’s heartstrings, prompting her to sigh heavily. The shorter woman quickly adjusts the ‘ridiculous’ blonde wig on her head and puts the night vision goggles she borrowed from the armory on top, then turns away from the mirror and saunters over to Taina, untangling her arms, grabbing her hands in hers and pressing only a small peck to her lips to not ruin her face paint. It’s clear that the other woman tries to maintain a stern luck, but Grace can see the corners of her mouth tugging upwards, even if she’s fighting it, followed by another soft sigh.
“Are you aware I’m basically wearing only some tape under this?” the Korean establishes, pointedly looking down at the mostly white and gray catsuit, that really doesn’t leave much to imagination. When the brunette’s eyes follow her gaze follows her, catching a quick glance at the sight, she giggles, a suggestive expression on her face, then tears herself away, and throws quickly throws over the ‘armor’ made from laced with epoxy and painted cardboard, leaving the taller woman blinking owlishly at the sight of her rear, before she faintly shakes her head, muttering something in Portuguese. “Cuidado com o que você deseja.”
About half an hour later, they reach the mess. Obviously the military base isn’t really decorated all that much, but at least the entrance is adorned with carved pumpkins, colorful lights and some skeleton props.
“Are you ready?” Grace asks tentatively, and detaches herself from Taina’s side, now holding her gaze facing her. “There are a lot of people in there. If you want to bail we still can.” She adds, dangling their hands together in between them.
“It’s fine.” The Brazilian says softly.
Before Grace can say something else, they are interrupted by a cheerful Woohooooo sounding from behind them. The Brazilian frowns at the sound, but Grace has already recognized the voice and quickly spins around, a happy grin forming on her face. When Taina turns around too, she is greeted by the sight of Valkyrie in a not really sexy nun outfit. Her face painted completely white, just liker hers, dark circles drawn around her eyes. The Brazilians blinks, taking in the sight, but her attention is quickly caught by Grace vividly colliding with the woman next to the blonde, the two, much more elaborately costumed, women performing some sort of victory dance, before detaching themselves from each other.
Ela’s hair is colored in a bright white and bound into a small ponytail in the back of her head, that gives her a somewhat unfamiliar look. She is clad in some sort of medieval leather outfit; Pants, gloves, boots, and a corset adorned with gems over a simple white shirt. A large scare is drawn on the left side of her face.
“The hair looks even better than I thought!” Grace complements, all around eyeing the costume.
“Right? I’m actually thinking about keeping it that way!” her Polish friend gives back.
“Not if I got a say in that.” Valkyrie deadpans, but both of them pointedly ignore her, only giggling at each other.
“Seems you have been overruled.” Taina says with a knowing smile; The blonde hums fondly and shoots her a smile too. “You’ve been overruled a lot, eh?” she replies a moment later, and the Brazilian’s expression drops, but then she only hums acknowledging too. “More than you’d think.”
“Are we on first-name basis yet?” the blond suddenly asks. “I’m Meghan!”
“Taina.” the Brazilian replies without hesitation. “But you might as well call me Caveira this evening.” she adds, gesturing at painted her face, prompting the American to let out a short but honest laugh.
“Lets go inside!” Grace appears between them, pulling Ela behind her by her hand, both of them visually enthusiastic about getting inside. Taina and Meghan just shrug at each other, both slightly less psyched, and follow them inside.
After making their way through the hallway and into the venue, they are greeted by a good portion of the support stuff and all the operators not on call already there. Grace can feel the tall brunettes grip tighten around her hand, prompting her to bump shoulders with her and pulling her close. The Brazilian wants to take in the sight for a bit, bracing herself for getting into the fray, but before she manages to take a look around, she is snapped from her train of thought, be a pretty loud and kind of slurred. “Excuse me!”
The four of them turn, and are met with the strange sight of their redheaded leader, basically stumbling through their small group, holding a number of plastic cups filled with something above her head. Ash has her hair done into a fabulous vintage wave and large curly horns on top of her head, probably fixed in place with a lot of hair gel, and wears a black and white dot dress, accompanied by bright red high heels. Before they can say anything, the redhead has passed through, and settles at a large table nearby, where sexy fireman Jordan and sexy fireman Jack are engaged in an arm wrestling contest, cheered on by a bunch of American staffers.
Suddenly Grace gets up on her toes and bursts into a cheery wave, before pulling Taina along, towards where the Brazilian makes out a bunch of their Russian friends sitting at another of the large tables. For a second Meghan and Ela look undecided, but don’t get a say in it, because Grace quickly turns around, grabs Ela’s hand too and pulls her along, while the later simply doesn’t let go of the American woman’s hand, giving her no choice but to follow them too.
When they reach the table they are greeted by the Russian operators, without exception glad in Russian World War Two uniforms; The only difference being their head wear; Maxim sports a normal officer cap, while Timur and Lera wear a classical side cap and Shuhrat the helmet of a shock trooper, that looks like it's made form actual metal, prompting Taina to wonder what exactly she expected from the bunch of them, even for a second considering the possibility there might be an actual PPSch hidden under the table. Meghan looks a little bit out of place, for the otherwise stern and determined woman eyeing the group uncharacteristically hesitant. Following their friends approach, Maxim immediately gets off his seat to greet them warmly. There is a second of tension, when he eyes their new arrivals, but it’s broken by the loud bellowing voice of Alex, who scoops Ela and Meghan up as he comes in between them from behind, pushing them towards the table, telling them in very cheerful Russian that there is no reason to be shy.
Taina supposes there are worse ways to get drunk then watching Timur and Lera downing shot after shot, the both of them getting increasingly handsy with their respective partners in the process. The Brazilian and the blonde American are getting along pretty well, and even manage to spend a good portion of the evening having a rather rich conversation with Maxim, when ever he manages to reign in the younger Russian’s advances, always, albeit with a roguish smile, citing public decency. After all their relationships are not really public knowledge, so to speak, even though he knows Ash knows and doesn’t really care as long as there are no problems. Disregarding what’s policy. So Grace and Ela get to spend the better part of the evening gossiping about the other operators’ costumes and laughing at the older members of the team engaging in some alcohol fulled increasingly stupid contests, which ultimately end with Blackbeard carrying a visibly agitated, and screaming and kicking Ying around over his head, after Lesion dared him to.
Later in the evening, when everybody is pretty much minding their own business, and most if not all of the operators at least tipsy – Grace and Ela are huddled together on their side of the table, repeatedly looking at the brunette and the blonde, whispering and giggling. – Maxim takes a moment to take an admiring look around; Most of the groups are in some shape or form mixed, people of different nationalities, upbringings and personalities partying or just hanging out together; Remembering of what it really is he admires at the whole Rainbow thing the most, and how thankful he is they for the time they spend together, even if it’s celebrating the excesses of American capitalism, disguised as some sort of Irish celebration. At a table on the far side of the room, away from most of the people, in one of the darkest corners of the room, Eliza is sitting in Jordan’s lap, her arms on his shoulders and around his neck. The pair of them alternating between making out and sharing enamored looks, clearly unaware of their surroundings, and obviously inconsiderate of peoples opinions.
He takes a moment to quietly admire the thought, that the otherwise always uptight and hardworking woman might enjoy at least some happiness. He doesn’t let his gaze linger, intend on not intruding on their togetherness, but then his eyes fall on a group of staffers sitting a few meters away the pair who are obviously also aware of what’s going on, and seem to have all sorts of opinions about what is going on, to put it mildly. He really doesn’t want to make a fuzz about. But it scratches that spot in his mind; The spot reserved for bullies and assholes; And he would be nothing but a hypocrite if he didn’t act on it. So he gets up and slowly makes his way over to the offending table, carefully watching them. As he comes closer, he is able to hear the things they are saying, and they are not very kind by any standard. Especially talking about someone who has been holding her hand over them all, more than anybody, except for him and Jordan, know.
The tall Russian doesn’t really give a fuck about their role, position or gender, and simply builds himself up next them in his usual very casual manner, always intent of giving people an opportunity to right their wrongs, or at least cease what they are doing.
“Excuse me, ladies.” He greets them in a very polite tone. His English is flawless, but laced with faint hostility. The group only looks at him, some of them humming, grudgingly acknowledging his presence.
“Is there something you want to tell the Commander?” He inquires ever politely but not failing to convey his intention.
“What about it?” one of them asks, vitriol seeping from her voice. Another two whisper something between them.
“I always knew she was a slut.” one of them, who is clearly very drunk suddenly snarls, giving the man a challenging look, visibly not intent on backing away from her statement. Maxim squints at her hostilely, tension building in his body. There is a deafening silence form around them. All of them expecting something to come of the exchange. Violence even. But then something changes in Maxim’s expression and he simply turns and walks away, his expression cold and outright hostile.
He calmly strides over to the makeshift dance floor, where the group of his friends are currently enjoying themselves, more or less inaptly jumping around and flailing their arms to a rendition of Fell in Love with a Girl, grabs Timur by his hand, and firmly pulls him with him, leading him over to the table. The younger man is unable to ask what that’s about over the loud music. And when he finally opens his mouth as they reach their destination, he doesn’t get to, as Maxim quickly quickly pulls him closer, over exaggeratedly puts his arm around his waist, whirls them around, and dips him into an intense kiss, even remaining like this for a few seconds, before quickly pulling Timur up again, shooting the women a self congratulatory look, laced with hostility, as he leads him away again.
“Not that I’m complaining; But what was that about?” The noticeably drunken man asks, his face filled with crimson, only amplified by the alcohol in his body. When he looks back over his shoulder the whole table is shooting them an incredulous and by the looks of it even more scandalized look.
“Oh, nothing.” Maxim replies simply.
Suddenly Maxim comes into view, intensely walking over to them, grabbing Timur by his hand and practically tearing him away from them, prompting Grace and Ela to look at each other questioningly. A moment later they see the two men kiss in front of one of the tables. After a whole evening of the tall Russian making a big show of not showing any physical affection, there is only one reasonable explanation for this, and Grace for a moment hesitantly eyes Taina, who is giving her a look that practically streams ‘Please don’t!”. But it’s too late, the Korean has made up her mind, so the tall brunette finds herself quickly pulled with her by her hand, and before the group of women can fathom what just happened they are treated to a maybe slightly drunk Nova getting on her tiptoes to stick her tongue down a banshee’s throat for almost a minute. The group quickly falls into indignant chatter, talking and whispering among themselves. But just as the pair is about to turn and leave a grinning and slightly wobbling Ciri bridal carries a seemingly undead nun into the scene, setting her down on the table. Then cups her face in her hands and proceeds with also exchanging bodily fluids, before gently leading her away by her hand again, the two of them exchanging overly amorous looks.
When the six of them return to their friends, they are greeting with incredulous looks, followed by a loud drunken laugh by Alex. “I don’t know what you were doing, but it sure didn’t miss its target.” he cackles, gesturing towards the women who are visibly disgruntled getting up and apparently prepare to leave as soon as possible, judging by intensity of their movements.
“Just helping out a friend.” Maxim smiles warmly. Eliza and Jordan are also gone. He really doesn’t want to know where. It’s non of his business anyway.