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“What do we do, man?” Vince whimpered, brows pinching in anguish when he shifted and pulled a deflated balloon rat covered in puncture holes out from under his ass.

I looked around wildly, my gaze landing on a bucket of brightly coloured plastic balls, clearly stolen from a ball pit. Panting with adrenaline, I lunged forward to grab it, squeaking when a paintball sailed over the top of my head, narrowly missing me.

Some of the balls had been chewed on, the teeth marks visible, but we both plunged our hands in without hesitation and grabbed several.

“We just came to talk!” I shouted as we began pelting them back with plastic balls.

“All talk and no action makes Jake a dull boy!” one of them yelled back.

Vince gritted his teeth and loaded up on balls to chuck them forcefully over the couch, one after another in quick succession. “Stop—getting—sayings—wrong!” he yelled in frustration with each one he threw.

“I’ll stop when I’m fed,” Beans cried, which made Vince growl like a feral animal.

“God, you are the fucking worst,” he shouted, looking around wildly for something else to throw when we ran out of plastic balls.

My pulse leaped when I heard a click and the number of paintballs hitting the couch protecting us abruptly cut in half.

“Darn it,” Frank grumbled. “Out of paintnuts.”

“Who the fuck calls them paintnuts?” Vince shouted.

Then Beans stopped shooting as well. “Yeah, think I am too.”

“Truce,” I yelled immediately, my voice cracking.

There was a pause, before Frank suspiciously called, “Did you say Bruce?”

“I said truce!” I shouted. “Turn that fucking yodelling off so we can talk!”

I heard some grumbling until finally, the Alpine folk music stopped abruptly, leaving my ears ringing.

Exhaling a slow, slightly trembling breath, I tried to make my voice calmer and called, “We’re going to stand up. So we can talk. Like adults. Okay?”

“I don’t want to,” Vince whimpered.

“Put those sausages up first,” Frank called sternly.

Vince and I gave each other a blank look. “What?” I called.

“The hands! The hands, dingus! Put ’em up!”

Muttering under my breath, I lifted my hands until they poked out from behind the couch. When Vince didn’t move, I jabbed him with my elbow until he sighed and reluctantly did the same.

“Standing up now,” I called, my knees trembling wildly as I struggled to my feet. Vince slowly followed me up, and we cautiously moved out from behind the couch, which was now splattered in a ludicrous amount of green and yellow paint.

So were we.

“Okay.” I gave them both a nervous smile. “This… We got off on the wrong foot, huh? This doesn’t need to get any uglier than it already has.”

“We’ll see,” Frank said cautiously, narrowing his eyes at me. “Tell us why you’re here.”

“Oh wait, I think I have one more.” Beans casually aimed his paintball gun at Vince’s crotch and shot before any of us could react.

“Hnnnngh.” Vince doubled over, clutching his junk. After a few seconds of whimpering, he wheezed, “Got me right in the nuts.”

“We called a truce!” I snapped angrily. “Drop the fucking guns!”

“I really fucking hate you two,” Vince gasped, sucking in fast breaths as he rested his hands on his knees.