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The yard was packed with chairs and two tables.
One was already packed with plates and cups while the other table was packed with food, a big white cake standing in the middle.
The camera turned once again and this time you could see some people sitting on the chairs beside the cameraman who was, unsurprisingly, Wolfman once again. Beside him are sitting Hollywood, Merlin, and Bradley.
The camera sways once more showing Chipper standing together with Ice and Slider. The pilots have even managed to dress properly for the 'event' that is about to take place.
Iceman even looked nervous, playing with his tie while Slider pushes his hands away and fixes it once more.
"Oh! They grow up so fast!" Wolf says while wiping an imaginary tear away and Wood nudges him in the ribs, Merlin only chuckles.
"Ouch! What was that for?"
"Shush. Don't ruin the tape, okay? Ice and Mav probably wanna look at it in the future."
The blond man only huffs at his partner's antics and Merlin looks at them smiling. "You two are just like them, you realize that?"
"Us like them? No way! I'm not so submissive, ask Wood he must know!" Wolf laughs again and earns another nudge. "Oh my god, Wolf! Be quiet! There is a kid around!" Hollywood rubs his eyes, shakes his head with a smile on his lips, and takes the camera.
"I'll take that."
"Hey!"
"Let me rephrase that. You two can be even worse than them." Merlin added and turned back forward again.
Iceman was standing straight, Slider behind him laying a hand on his shoulder for comfort and in hopes that it would help his best friend relax a bit.
As the camera turns once again it catches Sunny this time throwing the rose petals, in a very extra fashion. Making everybody laugh. "You are doing a fabulous job, Sunny!" Merlin says and laughs.
The RIO finishes throwing petals and sits down beside Merlin, lifting the blond child onto his lap.
Not short after Mav comes out also in a suit and with Carole by his side. She is wearing a beautiful red floral dress, walking beside the small pilot with a big smile on her face.
As they arrive at the spot, she leaves Mav in front of Ice and stands behind him just like Slider does with Ice.
"Look at them! Point the camera properly, Wood! We need to capture this!"
"I am holding the camera properly. Don't shake me or I really won't get that on tape."
"Be quiet you two idiots." Sunny chimed in on their antics and the men were focused on the wedding again.
Just as Chipper took in a breath to begin the whole process, Ice broke him off.
"I prepared something before you start, Chipper."
The blond pilot slides his hand into his pocket and pulls out a letter.
"I...ehm..." He coughed nervously. "I just wanted to say something before we do the whole vow thing."
Iceman opens up the folded piece of paper and looks Maverick in the eyes, smiling before beginning his speech:
"Pete ˋMaverickˋ Mitchell,
you are insufferable, you drive me insane and you will probably turn my hair grey before I turn 40.
You steal my jackets and shirts, you never replace the toilet paper when it is empty, and you threw us all under the bus with Slider's curtains (yes I will never let you forget that)
You steal my food, my blanket, and all the space in the bed.
But I never wanna miss all of that ever again because I would just miss the empty dressers and fridges, I would miss the fight for the duvet at night and I would even miss stumbling over your shoes every time I come home and walk through the front door.
You changed me as a human, being able to enjoy the messy bed at morning, breaking stupid rules at work during the day, fighting over what movie to watch in the evening and acting as your personal weight blanket during the night.
You gave me a family I never knew I needed and you changed my unhealthy view of a too-lonely and quiet life alone.
If someone would have come to me a
a few years ago and told me that I would marry (even illegally) the biggest headache the Navy has ever seen, I would've laughed in their face but here I stand.
Here I stand with the Family we've made, in the backyard of our home, standing in front of god, standing in front of you, and telling you this.
And Hey I have to admit I really took some time here to write this.
But jokes aside.
Pete Mitchell, being able to stand here and tell you that I want to spend the rest of my days with you and telling you how much I love you could never be enough to tell you how much I love you and how much you mean to me.
You even managed to get on Slider's good side, which is very amazing because if not then we wouldn't be here now.
I wanna go for more years in the air with you, more years of having you as my wingman for life, more years of buzzing the tower and getting into trouble for it, more years of going to the O' Club and hearing you sing to 'You've Lost That Loving Feeling
I want more quiet evenings of just eating some Chinese and watching 'Airplane!' and I want more stupid polaroids you take every time I don't look.
I want you to meet my siblings and my niece and nephew, I want you to meet my Babushka and I want to share the most important places and memories with you.
I want all of that with you, only you.
This speech is longer than intended and longer than anyone probably wants to hear so I will end it with a simple
I love you."
Maverick's eyes were full of tears, only responding with a small 'I love you too' while Carole also seemed to struggle. She is smiling and shredding tears at the same time.
"Chipper could you maybe start the vows now so that I can kiss my husband?" Mav asks tearfully.
"Let's go Baby Goose. Give them the rings." Sunny said and helped the boy off his lap. Bradley who is also dressed in a shirt and cute little bow tie made his way to the two men and handed them the rings, looking very proud of himself while doing so.
"For you uncle Mav and you uncle Ice." He said and returned to Sundown's lap.
"Good job, kiddo."
"Okay," Chipper said and took another breath.
"I swear to god if Chipper passes out because he has to play priest, I won't be the one to drive him to the hospital and explain that story." Merlin whispered and the men chuckled in response.
"Look at the poor guy, he looks more nervous than Ice and Mav combined." Wolf laughed quietly.
"Okay, Ice please repeat after me." Chipper said, looking at Ice for a second before looking down at his own piece of paper he prepared for his role.
After he told Ice what to say, the blond pilot repeated it without hesitation.
"In the name of god, I, Thomas Aleksandr Kazansky, take you, Pete Duke Mitchell, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until death do us part."
And then it was Maverick's turn.
"In the name of god, I, Pete Duke Mitchell, take you, Thomas Aleksandr Kazansky, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until death do us part."
"You can kiss the groom now." Chipper ended his speech and watched as the men, already with their rings on their fingers kissed each other making it unofficially official. Ice held Mav's face in his hands and pressed his lips on his while Mav's arms were wrapped around Tom's neck.
Carole began to clap and cheer with the others doing it as well after a few seconds.
"Okay, what do we wanna do first? Your little wedding dance or can we eat some of the very good-looking cake, Sunny's sister made?" Slider asked and a fit of groans erupted.
"Way to ruin the moment yet again, Slider."
"What? I just wanted to know what we are doing next."
"Can we have the cake first?" Bradley asked, making big puppy eyes this time it was Iceman who, first, fell victim.
"Of course, Baby Goose.
Come on, Mav! Let's cut the cake."
And so they did, the two pilots grabbed the knife lying beside the cake and started to cut the first piece out.
Bradley was nibbling on his second piece of cake while the adults talked.
"This is a very successful wedding until now if you ask me."
Wolf said, his mouth full of the cake.
"Yeah but no one asked you, idiot," Wood replied and also told him to chew.
"Okay now get ready for your wedding dance. We all sat down together and looked at the different songs we could take and we decided on the song we all agreed on immediately without hesitation." Slider announced, Ice and Mav were getting ready, looking nervous about what was to come.
"Please let it be something good." Ice said and pulled Mav closer.
"Ready?" Carole asked and put the record in the player. The men nodded and the music started.
"Are that 'The Hooters?' " Mav asked and started to laugh.
"Yep. 'The Hooters, And We Danced' " Merlin said and they all started to chuckle.
"Oh god help me." Tom laughed as he began to shake his head.
"Come on, move already! The song plays!"
And so the two men began to dance.
She was a be-bop baby on a hard day's night.
She was hangin' on Johnny , he was holdin' on tight
I could feel her coming from a mile away.
There was no use talking, there was nothing to say
When the band began to play and play.
… And we danced like a wave on the ocean, romanced
We were liars in love and we danced
Swept away for a moment by chance
And we danced and danced danced.
***************************************************************
As the music fades out, Ice kisses Mav once again.
"Get a room!" ,Slider yells and gets two middle fingers in return.
"I start the grill." Hollywood then said and returned the camera to Wood.
While Hollywood made sure not to burn anything, the others sat down and began to talk, little Bradley beside them playing with his toy farm.
"Carole made some pics and we've got a tape full of your wedding, so don't worry.
You're memory album will be filled." Slider laughed and pointed at the other camera Carole brought along.
"Thank you, all of you. This means a lot to us and you made this special day so perfect." Ice began and Slider nudged him before he could continue.
"First of all, the night is still young and we haven't even eaten yet so don't thank us yet and we are a family of course we help you two with this.
So be quiet before we become emotional."
The table chuckled and Ice turned to his husband.
"Hey Mav. There is one last thing you need to promise me."
"Yeah?"
"Promise me to ride me just as much as your Kawasaki."
As Mav began to laugh and nod the others erupted into disgusted groans.
"I promise!"
"Weird. I don't feel so hungry anymore." ,Chipper exclaimed and the newlywed's giggled.
"To change topic." ,Carole began, "I or more like Merlin and I took care of your honeymoon.
You don't need to be back on base on tomorrow, we managed to get you free until wednesday.
And I looked into something that you two might like, I pinned it onto your fridge."
Mav grinned from one ear to the other: "Thank you, Carole. And you too Merlin! We will have a great time! I can for example work on my promise." The smaller pilot winked and the others groaned once more.
Suddenly Ice jumped up, went inside and came out with a box.
"This is my Babushka's wedding gift by the way."
Tom pulls a beautiful, golden menorah out of the black box and showed it to Mav.
"You told your grandmother?"
"Yeah? She doesn't care, she actually said she would love to meet you.
Sorry, she thought you were jewish."
Pete shook his head and placed the menorah on the table.
"Don't worry. I love it, it's beautiful.
You've got candles?"
Ice nods.
"Then let's light them up."
Tom nodded and smiled at his husband.
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"Their wedding was just like I expected it." Phoenix said and Rooster turned to her.
"How so?"
"Chaotic but beautiful. I didn't know about the admiral and Mav before but now I feel stupid for not noticing.
I mean look at them! They are so in love!"
Hangman begins to chuckle:" How did the Navy not notice them while DADT was established?"
"I mean if we didn't notice then I don't think the Navy did either." , Bob argued back and Hangman nodded.
"Touché."
Rooster takes a look at his watch:"They are gone for quite a while. I bet Dad dragged Pa into some store for his Kawasaki or something."
"We still have some tapes to work on." Payback chimed in and Rooster nodded.
"Well then let's continue.
Bob, what's next?"
"Awwww! Bradley's Birthday, June 27th 1988."
"Oh god."