Smiley and Sunshine

60.

"I call Emmy."

"I get Hayes," Glen quickly interjected, the obvious package deal with his sister. He pulled his bestie to huddle beside him on the other side of the small, rectangular alcove.

Opposite of their enemies, Emerson and Francis.

Dakota grunted, sidestepping to where the blonde babies stood.

Nobody objected to that.

They knew better.

"Peyton's on our team," Emerson declared next, reaching out and grabbing his sister-in-law's arm. He tugged her to team Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

Don't ask.

Peyton went willingly, stifling a laugh at the seriousness that marred the younger brothers' faces. Talk about being competitive.

It was just a game of laser tag, after all.

With Peyton accounted for, that left Austin and Colton as the lone rangers to be picked up. They had to each join a team to round out to a perfectly even number of 8 members.

Baker, expected though still unfortunate, had to miss out on all the Black Friday fun due to his demanding work hours. He had been covering more shifts than usual, sacrificing these good times so that he had a solid week off for all the Christmas shenanigans.

He was not about to miss the babies' first Christmas back home.

They had a tree to decorate, lights to put up outside, gingerbread houses to make. It was a popping time full of traditions that Smiley and Sunshine were about to be introduced to.

Laser tag was not part of the tradition, just a way to pass time. According to Glen's insistence, they were suppose to go paintballing as Austin supposedly promised a couple weeks ago. But alas, the eldest brother negotiated with the little brother and all his younger siblings who ganged up on him, which is how they ended up in the current situation.

Picking teams that no one would then go home and cry about.

Francesca.

Compared to paintball, Austin felt that laser tag was definitely the more laxed sport of the two, so the eldest brother wouldn't go all batshit worrying about keeping Hayes from getting hurt. Words from the mouth of Dakota, as his argument.

It would certainly have been hard to protect Hayes against her ruthlessly competitive brothers.

An impossible feat, alone.

But when both of the oldest brothers were present, that gave the young girl a fighting chance to come out unharmed. Especially when one of the brothers was SWAT and knew how to accurately send karma right back to whoever dared targeted Hayes with a paintball.

Austin's hand briefly covered his mouth, his finger brushing over his lips as he thought about this. He wasn't too convinced by the teams his siblings created. His gut was telling him that this setup wasn't going to work out.

Neither was Colton sold, who had his arms crossed over his chest. His eyes flicked to the clock bolted to the wall above that was continuing to count down to zero, before meeting Austin's eyes.

Both brothers already knew what was going to happen if they didn't intervene.

Dakota.

Austin dropped his hand to his waist as he shook his head. "Try again. You now have less than 7 minutes to decide on new teams. Better hurry up."

"Fair teams," Colton made sure to emphasize when Austin failed to.

"What's wrong with this?" Emerson asked, failing to see what the problem was. He glanced around the alcove, quietly assessing team Pew Pew's skills.