I took suggestions from two reviews I got, one recommend I write a multi-chapter story about something that wasn't murder. The other suggested I write about the Lancers on a ski trip. So you got both - a multi-chapter story about the Lancers on a ski-trip.

Like 'This is not Caddyshack', this story in set in canon and in Standard dimension. However, it's also set four years after the storyline of Arc-V, so most of the characters are eighteen or over. Also, for Sawatari's father, he didn't get a name in the original version, so I've borrowed his dub name Curio. He doesn't really appear though - it's just for the sake of having a name for him.

One last thing. I'm going on holiday soon (I'll be visiting all of you in the states so that'll be interesting) but it means I may not update much until I get back home in September, so this one's going to be slow to come out.

Now let the adventure begin!

To this day, Sawatari would maintain that it was entirely and utterly Reira's fault.

Well, maybe not entirely. Some of the blame had to go to Yuya, who was the first person to suggest that they all needed a break and then joined Serena in an all-out badgering mission against Reiji until the leader of Lancers 2.0 agreed to let them all have the week after New Years off.

In that case, it was partially Reiji's fault as well.

Gongenzaka wasn't exactly innocent either, as he was the one to bemoan the fact that they never got to spend quality time with their friends from other dimensions anymore now they were midway through high school, and had inspired the whole 'group holiday' thing.

Now he thought about it, he wasn't all that happy with Yuzu or Yugo either. After all, it was Yuzu who had mentioned a ski trip she'd taken with her father as a child to Yugo – who didn't know what skiing was and only had a vague idea what snow was – and Yugo had been completely taken with the idea and told everyone about it.

And then suddenly they were all fixated on going on a skiing trip for their so-called 'group holiday', but no one could agree on an affordable destination to accommodate so many people, so he guessed they could all shoulder part of the blame too.

Though if anybody asked, which they wouldn't but Sawatari always had an available excuse ready for battle, he was going to maintain this was all 100% Reira's fault. If only to cover up the fact that he had no one to blame for this but himself.

Well, maybe he could blame Reira a little bit. He was just so…sweet and endearing that Sawatari didn't want to disappoint him. Sawatari was an only child and didn't really associate with people significantly younger than him, and was therefore unaware of the mystical powers a nine-year-old boy could have at his disposal over an eighteen-year-old like Sawatari.

If it had just been a case of Reiji refusing to put up any funds towards the renting of a sizeable ski cabin ("My money goes towards vital research and aid to the people of four different dimensions. So no, you're not getting a penny to so much as use the ski lift from me") then Sawatari wouldn't be in this situation in the first place. It wasn't his problem if the lot of them couldn't figure out how to make a week of skiing happen. Personally, he preferred the beach over winter sports. But then of course Reira had to make that benign (at least, seeming) comment about how he'd never seen snow before as he'd grown up in the desert and was now living in Maiami City and, well, when he put it like that the small scrap of guilt that had survived Sawatari's formative years rose up and nearly strangled him.

And so, like a complete moron, he may have mentioned to the little boy that, actually, his mother had a ski cabin up in the mountains if Reira ever wanted to see snow. But Yuya overheard and somehow the information that the cabin was large enough to accommodate them all reasonably comfortably got out and there was no escape for there on out.

What a genius, I know.

Which had, of course, lead to him making this delightful phone call to a woman he'd all but forgotten about for the past eight years whilst four different people crowded around him with the looks of hungry wolves on their faces, clearly reading 'Do it or die'.

"Hello Mama. It's Shingo. Yes, Curio's son. I know, it's been a while. What, I can't call for no reason?"

The response he got to that question nearly made him slam the phone down into its holder again, but the ravenous wolf population had suddenly increased to six and he really didn't have a choice, did he?

So, with deep restraining breaths, he put his ear to the phone receiver again.

"No Mama. Actually, I was wondering if you were planning to use the lodge after New Years?"

It was thirty-four-hour drive from Maiami City to Sawatari's cabin split up over three days, and by the end of Day Three, Yuzu was debating the merits of lobotomy via plastic spoon.

It was agreed that a different person would drive every day. It had been previous decided at two drivers a day but by the end of Sawatari's stint at lunchtime of the first day, it was decided it was much more therapeutic to just get it all out the way with in one day. It kinda worked, since out of the eight people packed into the rented Land Rover, only three could drive. Yuzu had taken the second day, so now Yuya was guiding them the last few hundred miles.

The group had been making small talk pretty much since they set off, but the whole thing had mostly degenerated into the ramblings of Yugo. Yuzu was mostly glad he couldn't drive a car since her experiences on the back of his Duel Runner proved that he had road rage of the worst kind. However, by this point, part of her wished he had drove, because that would put an end to the endless rambling that could only be described as 'The musings of Yugo, his achievements in life and impact on society'. Rin had tried to stop him at first, but had eventually given up and zoned out as if he wasn't in the back seat next to her. Sora and Sawatari, sitting either side of Yuzu, had thrown in the towel as well, the former sucking on a mint to balance the three lollipops he'd consumed since they set off from the motel that morning and the latter all but asleep against the window, his head vibrating whenever the Land Rover slowed down. Yuzu was sorely tempted to reach around and slap Yugo into unconsciousness, but Reira had finally stopped fidgeting in her lap and she wasn't about to set him off again. So she bit her tongue and prayed they'd be there soon as Yugo moved on from telling them all about how awesome Jack Atlas was to his long-standing relationship with Rin (the third anniversary of their first kiss was coming up in three weeks, he told them eagerly for the fifth time).

Yuzu couldn't see Yuya in the driver's seat, but she just knew he was getting a headache.

"Sawatari" Gongenzaka called from the passenger seat, waking the aforementioned boy from his light sleep "We need to know whether to turn left or right at this junction."

Sawatari looked out the side window, then out the front window at their surroundings before declaring: "Er…left. It's right at the next turn off, then just go straight ahead. You can't miss it."

"Thanks Sawatari" Yuya spoke up for the first still since they set off (he required total concentration when he drove, especially when the ice had made the mountain roads very slippy) and shot a smile at Sawatari in the rear-view mirror.

"And you're absolutely sure we can all fit?" Yuzu asked Sawatari. It wasn't the first time she'd asked, but she was hyper aware of the fact that a car full of child soldiers, genocide survivors and one single father (Crow had agreed to ride in the second car since piling nine into one Land Rover was just asking for trouble, no matter how small Reira and Sora were) was hurdling up the highway a few hours behind them and if they got there only to discover the cabin was too small, well…

Yuzu didn't want to think about it.

Sawatari rolled in eyes. "For the last time, yes. Most people are going to have to share but I can hardly see that being a problem. When my parents bought the place, the idea was that they wanted to have a place outside of any city where they could entertain as many of their friends as possible. That's what they were like back then. Heck, they haven't exactly changed much, they just do it separately now."

Yuzu frowned, but he would know better than she would. "Alright, I trust you."

Sawatari scoffed. "No you don't. You've been straight up honest about that up until now; I'll give you that. Geez, I spent every winter here until I was ten – I think I know how many people can fit."

Conceding his point, Yuzu looked down at her phone, wondering if Ruri was going to text back before they arrived. Knowing that Reiji had too much work to leave his company for a week right after the Christmas holidays and Tsukikage and his brother couldn't make it (the first week of the new year was special to the Fuma clan, full of celebrations and festivals and the brothers couldn't possibly slip away to enjoy the holiday with them) the remaining eight should be arriving together in the second car. The only problem with that was, out of the eight of them, only Yuri could drive a manual like they'd hired (apparently automatics were favoured in Fusion, Synchro rarely used any cars at all and Xyz had only had a completed rode to drive a car on for the last few months). Which meant that, unless they felt like crashing, only Yuri had been driving since they set off three days ago. Despite this, Yuzu was pleasantly surprised to note only once had Ruri ever indicated via text something was going slightly wrong on the road, so maybe they would all arrive in one piece before dark.

Reira was sat in her lap, the seatbelt stretched over both of them, staring out of the window in excitement. Pine and spruce trees stood like a line of soldiers at the roadside with the peak of the mountain hunched, looming over their tips like a shrivelled grey woman against the metallic white sky. The mountains had afforded them a blanket of pearly white snow upon arrival – a fact that made Rin and Yugo thankful they'd decided not to travel via Duel Runner – reaching three feet deep in places off the road and dusting the trees with snow like icing sugar on a cake. The latest snowstorm was long ago enough that the roads up the mountain were clear, but not the private drive up to the Sawataris' property, so Yuya was driving at an excruciatingly slow pace so as not to slip right off the mountain, despite Sora's jibes and complaints that he was driving a Land Rover, Yuya, it's designed to do this!

They drove the last few miles in silence. Well, relative silence. Yugo was still going but after three days, his blabbing had become all but white noise to the seven others in the vehicle. Eventually, Yuya rounded the last corner and the Sawatari family's cabin became visible behind a bulge of pine trees.

Sora's mouth hinged open and his lollipop fell out and onto the car's carpet.

Halfway through a gush of words about how pretty Rin was, Yugo cut himself off with an exclamation of: "Holy shit!"

No one deemed it necessary to tell him off for swearing in front of a small child because his words were pretty much what they were all thinking.

At least 'lodge' or perhaps 'chalet' would've been a more accurate description than 'cabin'. To prevent them from driving off the edge of the cliff, Sawatari, the only one not in awe, directed Yuya along the drive, around the property to a parking space on the other side of the building where they could gape without putting themselves at risk.

It was large two-story building with multiple balconies on storey number two, made out of light-coloured wood with large windows, allowing the occupants to see up and down the mountainside. As they drove around the back and parked, it became apparent the back of the house was built into the slope of the mountainside, making it appear only one storey tall on that side.

It took some time for everyone to scrape their jaws off the floors off the floor of the car, so it was Sawatari who got out first and retrieved his suitcases from the trailer hitched to the back of the Land Rover. He found it a miracle they were still there. When Yuzu had been driving, he swore he'd seen several suitcases go flying into the air a couple of times, so their safe arrival he could only put down to Yuya's much smoother driving up the mountain.

Seeing Sawatari heading for the house, the seven others unfolded themselves from the Land Rover, the sound of joints creaking echoing through the air as they tried to recover after three days of almost solid driving. Gongenzaka was, by far, the worst affected, being unused to long stints sitting down in one position as he was the only one not used to traveling by car or Duel Runner. He all but hobbled from the car to the house, wading through the snow like a bowlegged duck. Sawatari had just unlocked the door when Yugo scampered in, yelling:

"The biggest bedroom's mine!"

Before Rin could pass Sawatari, he grabbed her elbow with a grimace on his face.

"Can you please try and keep him in line?" he pleaded "I know what he's like, but if he breaks something I'm going to have to apologise to my mama and I really don't want to do that."

His seriousness caught her off guard for a moment, but she relaxed into a smile anyway. "Of course, Sawatari. I have built up many methods to make Yugo behave himself over the years."

Sora covered his ears and gagged. "TMI! TMI!"

Now reassured, Sawatari's face broke into his usual cocky grin. "Well then, please followed the Neo New Sawatari Shingo to your room! I gave you the master bedroom, a suitable suite for the prettiest girl in the abode!"

"I could kill him" Yuzu muttered, watching Sawatari lead Rin and Yugo up the stairs, Yugo insisting he carry her suitcase as well as his with an exclamation of:

"Here, let me carry that! Don't stress yourselves! Sawatari, my man, what did you say about a fitting bedroom?"

"Murdering him in his own house?" Yuya commented jokingly "That's rather harsh."

"I'm more worried about them" Sora remarked glaring at the disappearing Yugo and Rin "I mean, how am I gonna sleep with those two going at it all night?"

"Don't talk slanderous!" Gongenzaka told him "I sure Yugo and Rin will be courteous of the other guests."

Sora snorted with disagreement. "Yeah right. Yugo's incapable of being quiet. There goes sleep for the next week."

Reira peeked out nervously from behind Yuzu before hurrying into a room off the main foyer. This encouraged Yuzu to also explore the rest of the ground floor.

The inside of the lodge was appropriate for a mountain getaway, all white maple-wood with moose and pine-themed decorations of the type one might expect of a mountain cabin. It wasn't extravagant, except in terms of sheer size, but it had clearly been designed and decorated with comfort in mind. Yuzu discovered upon a little looking around that the open floor plan contained a tidy kitchen, a sizable dining room and a large lounge room on the first floor. On the east wall was a large wood-burning fireplace that was surrounded by a well-matched assortment of cushy sofas and large stuffed chairs. Reira had curled up in the chair closest to the corner of the lodge with his teddy bear, affording him a perfect view of the whole ground floor with the exception of the foyer. The room also featured a large flat screen television and a pool table. The view out the window-wall was worthy of a National Geographic magazine.

Yuzu whistled low under her breath. This wasn't the kind of place a middle-class family could afford, especially not just as a seasonal getaway. Sawatari liked to talk about how well off his family – or at least, his father, he didn't talk about his mother much – was, but she had never imagined anything like this.

"He is certain all of us are going to fit upstairs, right?" Yuya had followed her, admiring the ground floor also "I mean, this doesn't seem like a large area for so many people to sleep in."

"Small bedrooms, maybe?" Yuzu suggested "I don't know – I trust him, for once. I don't think he'd drag all of us out here without being certain he could house us all."

"Hey, d'ya think that idiot already dished out who was having what room?" Sora poked his head into the room and asked.

"Sora, that idiot is our host" Yuzu reminded him with a stern look.

"I don't think so" Yuya remarked, scratching his head. "I mean, he said something about Yuzu and I sharing but-"

Sora's face broke into a grin and his head disappeared from the doorway. "Dibs on a single room!"

Sora's feet were heard pattering up the stairs. There was a pause before the sound of Gongenzaka's much heavier footsteps followed Sora's up the stairs.

Yuya laughed and even Reira giggled a bit.

Yuzu placed a hand to her forehead and sighed. "Boys."

It was dark by the time a second car rolled down the driveway of the Sawataris' property. Yuzu was surprised to see them. She expected them all to get arrested or – perhaps more likely – one of the group to snap and kill everyone else. The others had all settled into their own rooms (Sora had won and got a single room. It was agreed Gongenzaka would share with Crow and Kaito, and Reira with Serena. Yuya and Yuzu got one of the largest rooms to themselves whilst Sawatari was staying in his old bedroom) and had been pretty much sitting on their hands waiting for the car or phone call from the police.

In the past few hours, Yuzu had received a few texts from Ruri and one from Serena. Whilst the ones from Ruri were happy and normal and indicated everything was fine, it was the one from Serena that worried her, mentioning a dispute had broken out somewhere along the road. Therefore, everyone heaved a sigh of relief when the second car arrived without any signs of blood decorating the windows.

In the ensuing wait, they gathered in the lounge on the first floor and enjoyed each other's company while they waited. It had been too long since they'd all had a break together and it was refreshing to be able to relax and just hang out together like they had done when they were younger, before the war had changed their lives. Rin beat each and every one of them at pool, which put a self-satisfied swagger in her step for hours, put even more hearts in Yugo's eyes and put Sora in a foul mood. Once the group had officially thrown in the towel and admitted that nobody could beat her, even with Gongenzaka's eye for angles, Reira had broken out the collection of board games he'd brought with him and they all agreed to a rousing round of Snakes and Ladders. They put on Christmas carols in the background, even though it was now January, and with the light snow still falling outside visible through the window wall, it was altogether a festive gathering. Sawatari had even gotten coaxed into making cocoa like his mama had once showed him – the real stuff, not the powdered kind.

Late into the evening, with Reira, Rin and Yugo having already decided to go to bed, they all heard a second car round the property and Yuzu rushed to the door.

"You made it!" she cheered, hugging Ruri as she was the first to the door.

"It's so cold!" Ruri remarked, hugging Yuzu back enthusiastically. She wasn't dressed for the mountains in winter, but in cargo pants and a light t-shirt – something more suitable for travelling in a car with seven other people.

Scratch that – six other people.

Yuzu counted the number of people getting out of the second Land Rover and frowned. "They didn't kill Kaito, did they?"

"What? No!" Ruri laughed like the idea was absurd (it wasn't) "Kaito didn't turn up. It's sad, but we weren't surprised. He lives so far off the grid now, I bet he didn't even get your invitation. I sure he would've loved to come if he'd known."

"Oh thank god, it's over!" Serena proclaimed dramatically as she crossed the threshold.

"It couldn't have been that bad" Yuzu pointed out. No one appeared to have died, so it couldn't have been that traumatic.

"The hell it was!" Serena complained with a sour face "You weren't there!"

Serena could be dramatic, but not this dramatic, which caused Yuzu some concern. She became even more uneasy when Crow, Kurosaki and Yuto came in after her. All three looked like they'd had no sleep during the journey and appeared weighted down by more than just their bags.

"My dear Yuzu!" Dennis greeted her in heavily-accented English, shaking her hand so enthusiastically that Yuzu knew right then and there he was playing an angle. "Nice to see you! How are you?"

"Why are you like this?" Yuzu immediately asked "What did you do?"

She looked past him at Yuri, the last one to approach the house. He was noticeably hanging back, like he was reluctant to enter the warmth of the lodge, which made no sense considering how cold it was outside.

"What did you do to him?" Yuzu asked Dennis more pointedly.

Dennis stared at her in either mock-offense or real offense. "Yuzu! I can't believe you would make such unfounded allegations against me without-"

"Oh drop it already!" Serena rolled her eyes, cutting him off "We've all had enough of you!"

Kurosaki and Yuto's eyes quickly directed themselves to the floor. Even Crow, the peacemaker, shifted awkwardly.

"How bad was it?" Yuzu asked, now very alarmed.

"The trip was very pleasant" Ruri insisted, though she appeared to be alone in that thought "Really only except-"

"Hey, you're all here!" Sawatari emerged from the kitchen where he'd been stacking the dishwasher with cocoa mugs "Great! All your rooms should be ready, since Mama called the cleaners ahead of time. Everyone from Xyz is in the room on the right – there's a double bed and the sofa's a pull-out bed, so I'll let you fight over that. Crow, you're sharing with Gongenzaka. Yuri and Dennis have the room dead ahead from the stairs. Serena-"

Serena laughed awkwardly. "Yeah, that won't be happening."

Sawatari blinked at her. "I didn't say anything, did I?"

"What she means," everyone turned to look at Yuri, who'd made it through the door and was standing as far away from the group as possible with a sour look on his face "is that Dennis and I have had a disagreement and wish not to share a room."

The lodge went dead with silence (except for Sora, who was arm-wrestling Gongenzaka in the lounge and loosing with great sound effects). Yuri and Dennis pointedly looked in different directions.

"Except that" Ruri finished "They've been at it since they arrived in Standard."

"You had a disagreement?" Yuya made Yuzu jump when he spoke up from behind her without warning "Was it that bad? I mean, you two are so close."

"Stop talking" Yuri instructed him with clenched teeth "I can feel the waves of idiocy from over here."

Yuzu saw through the insult. Clearly Yuri's feelings were hurt, badly. The normally vibrant Dennis' stoic reaction to it all told her the same. Both had said something to wound the other greatly.

"Er…okay" Sawatari looked between Yuri and Dennis with uncertainty "I…Crow, would you mind-"

"I can share with Yuri" Serena offered, though she didn't sound particularly happy about it "Not like anyone else wants to put up with his ugly mug anyhow."

"That's great, but you were supposed to share with Reira" Sawatari told her, looking between the faces of the small army gathered in his foyer anxiously. Clearly he was worried the awkward tension in the air would cause one of the battle-hardened veterans to snap.

"I'll share with Reira" Crow said "I don't mind. I share a room with three kids at home. And Shinji."

"And Dennis can stay with Noburu" Yuya suggested "You don't mind, right Noburu?"

"Of course not" Gongenzaka called over, having apparently been able to follow the conversation all whilst pinning Sora's arm to the carpet as the younger boy squirmed so as not to admit defeat.

"Well that settles it then!" Yuya declared happily, ever the wannabe peacemaker.

"Ok" Sawatari seemed confused, but reassure enough that his head wasn't on the chopping board anymore. "Well, it's late. You all probably want to get some sleep."

Yuto and Kurosaki sagged with relief. They looked utterly exhausted. If Yuzu had to guess, they'd probably been sleeping in either the same room with or in the room next to Yuri and Dennis' when saying in the motels and the constant bickering had prevented them from getting a good night's sleep.

Quickly, everyone headed upstairs to try and sort out who got which room. Within a few minutes, everyone had settled down and was either unpacking or on their way to bed.

"Well that was dramatic" Yuzu commented as she and Yuya finished brushing their teeth "What sort of 'disagreement' could set them at each other's throats like that?"

"Who knows" Yuya shrugged "We managed to convince a group of war veterans from both sides of the same conflict to go on a ski holiday together – I don't think anyone was expecting complete peacefulness."

Yuzu snorted with a little eye roll. "They could at least try to get along."