Big Time World Warriors

01 - Big Time Arrival

A black limousine sped through the Japanese countryside on the way to its vaunted destination, the famed Estate. The occupants of said vehicle, however, were far removed from the foreign dignitaries and business tycoons that would be expected to make such a journey.

In lieu of that rode a certain quartet of 16-year-old Minnesotan hockey players turned band mates that made up the famous boy-band Big Time Rush.

One of its members, James Diamond, obsessively stared at his pocket mirror, comb in hand ready to catch any imperfection in his brunette mullet. Unfortunately, one of the others was making focus impossible.

It wasn't Logan Mitchell, the smart one of the group, who had long since passed out to some sort of medical audiobook, or the group's leader, Kendall Knight, who was out as well cradling his favorite hockey stick as a young girl might do with a teddy bear.

It was none other than Carlos Garcia, looking bored out of his mind, pelting the side of his head with the wrappers of his favorite snack, Fruit Smackers.

This behavior was far from unusual for him, as even his own parents acknowledged that as sweet and sociable as he was, Carlos tended to act about half his age at the best of times.

In short bursts, the boys happily joined in on it. Contending with it for hours on end as a captive audience on a plane and limo was another thing entirely. Looking back, he couldn't blame the boys' irritable boss, Gustavo Rocque, and his assistant, Kelly Wainwright for taking a separate limo. Nor could he blame Kendall's mother (who was also their current legal guardian) Jennifer and her daughter Katie for going the same route, though he suspected that the latter really wanted a break from all four of the boys' antics.

After the fifth wrapper, James leveled a warning glare at the Hispanic boy, stopping him...for about two minutes before he started up again.

At the tenth, he looked with a small amount of jealousy at his friends, wishing he could join them in dreamland.

"Stop it," the pretty boy hissed instead.

He got a nonchalant shrug in response. "But I'm so bored..."

His mouth opened to scold Carlos for what seemed like the billionth time in recent memory and told him to find something else to do...except there really wasn't anything else to do here.

Instead, he would have to take a different approach. "Look. I'm sure there's gonna be lots of stuff to do at this big fancy mansion place we're going to, so would you please just-"

"DOGS!"

Two previously unconscious heads instantly popped up in the sound of their "master" Gustavo's infamous shouting. It was ironic that they were called that when he was the one usually doing the barking...

James was quick to shoot the awakened band mates with glares, to which he got back individualized apologetic looks when he put two and two together.

"NOW! THIS IS SINGLEHANDEDLY THE MOST IMPORTANT GIG OF ANY OF OUR LIFETIMES!"

Everyone in the limo cringed at the sheer volume of the voice. Even after all this time in the band, they never quite got used to that.

Gustavo would've carried on with his ranting, but thankfully, his much more reasonable assistant took control instead.

With a sigh, she began. "Let's get this over with so he doesn't have a heart attack. Performances aside, there's supposed to be a party tonight. Kendall, keep the other two and yourself from doing anything stupid."

Kendall exchanged looks with the ones she was referring to, Carlos and James, the former giving back a nervous smile.

"James, this isn't a contest to see who can collect the most girls' phone numbers."