Spartans Shouldn't Shop

{|style="width:100%; color:#FFF;" "Oh. My. God."
 * valign="top" style="padding:5px;"|

Jun's words were drowned out by the intense level of noise present in the mall. Emile glared at the flashy lights and the throngs of people with suspicion, probably gauging whether or not there were terrorists present. The smell of exotic food hung in the air and music blared from stereo speakers hidden in the walls. People of all races, shapes and sizes milled around, window-shopping and hanging out. It would be no great feat for the Spartans to blend in… as long as they didn't do anything out of the ordinary. "It's so… big…" Jun mumbled, tugging on Emile's arm.

"It's a mall, dummy," Emile growled, roughly shrugging him off. "It's supposed to be freakishly big and obnoxious."

"Like your face?" Jun retorted.

"Shut up," Emile hissed.

A group of teenagers passed by, chattering briskly in Hungarian, and Jorge perked up. "This won't be too bad," he suggested, but Emile just glowered at him. "Besides, the list is simple. And we've got all the credits we could wish for."

"Ah… so who's going to get what?" Jun asked, looking eagerly from Emile to Jorge. "We have a plan, right?"

"Well, you are the one who begged us to come here," Emile reasoned, shoving the list at the sniper, who looked horrified.

"Wha… hey, we're supposed to be a team, remember?" Jun protested. He looked around frantically for Jorge. "Hey, big man, you'll help me out, right? Uh, Jorge?" When he turned back to face Emile, the dark-skinned Spartan was gone as well, and even with his advanced scouting skills, he couldn't find them in the crowd.

"CURSE YOUUUUU…"

Some minutes later, Jun was walking through a department store, trying to find what Kat called "tinsel." He had no idea what tinsel was or what it looked like, so he kept scanning labels as he walked by, his enhanced vision serving him well.

He passed by a booth that was decked out with glass bottles. At first he thought maybe it was whiskey, but then he read the sign and figured out it was cologne. He was going to ignore it entirely, but then a perky blonde saleswoman saw him looking at the sign and made a beeline toward him, smiling broadly. She actually looked kind of scary, like she'd injected too much Botox lately. "Ah sir, care to sample our newest fragrance? We haven't had a customer in hours…"

"Um, no thank you, ma'am," Jun sputtered, backing away as the woman pulled a spray bottle full of amber liquid from her leather pouch. "No no no no NO—"

A cloud of mist hit him in the face. It would have probably smelled good at a distance, but it stung his nose and smelled horrible. It hit his eyes and he danced around growling, choking and hissing for several minutes, trying to get the accursed stuff off his face. When he opened his eyes they were red and every breath he took had a distinct smell to it. It even bothered his throat.

The woman was just standing there, smiling sweetly. "Would you like to try another—"

"NO!" Jun squawked, and walked away as fast as he could, mentally cursing his teammates for abandoning him to such abuse.


 * Elsewhere in the mall…

Emile studied the rack of knives on the wall. The interplanetary trade store was full of oddities that normally wouldn't be found anywhere else, including non-ballistic weaponry. His eyes roved over a particular knife that looked similar to his kukri but had ornate engravings all over the blade and red leather strips wrapped around the hilt.

He had no idea where Jorge was, and didn't care. Once he got bored he would hail the other two via chatter and find out how far Jun had gotten on the list. Until then, he was content to browse this store's selection of sharp and pointy objects.

After all, he reasoned, if his kukri ever broke, it made sense to keep another knife or two or three or four in reserve…


 * Back at the department store…

Jun was still fleeing from the crazy perfume lady when he ran into a brick wall. No, it wasn't quite a brick wall; it was Jorge. The smaller Spartan toppled over from the recoil and moaned, rubbing his eyes furiously and sneezing. "SAVE ME!" he wheezed.

"You smell funny," Jorge pointed out.

"We have to get out of here! There's a madwoman who's hellbent on spraying me in the face with—"

"Come to think of it, you smell terrible," Jorge mused, inching away from the sniper. "I hate to be rude, but please, stand downwind."

"Why did you leave me alone like that? I get nervous in crowds! That's why I'm a sniper! So I can have me-time 24/7!" Jun railed. "Emile's a douche, so his desertion is excusable, but I thought we were friends!"

"Well, er, it's just that…"

"Spit it out, or I promise, I WILL tell Kat what you said the first time you saw her!"

"Wha…? Hey, it's not my fault Spartan-II women are…differently shaped…"

"SPIT. IT."

Jorge sighed heavily. "Fine," he grunted, averting his eyes. "I'm trying to find a present for Dr. Halsey."

Jun just blinked a couple times, coughed again, and cleared his throat. "You mean… the Doctor Halsey? The mean and vindictive Dr. Halsey? The Dr. Halsey that threatened to use a rectal thermometer on me unless I gave her information during my last checkup…?" he said timidly.

"A what?"

"Never mind, it's just… um… dude, she probably doesn't even care. I'm not trying to be cruel or anything, she's just kinda… detached. In a creepy and evil way."

Jorge straightened and even looked a little upset. "Dr. Halsey," he said, as if the name was holy, "Has done more for me than perhaps anyone else. She's the closest thing to a mum I can recall. Therefore, I'm getting her something." He paused and mulled it over. "I just don't know what that is yet."

"Well, uh, good luck with that," Jun mustered, still disbelieving. "I'll, uh, keep doing what I was doing, then." He saw a familiar flash of blonde hair and a very loathsome spray bottle coming in their direction. "Um, sorrybutihavetogobye," he blurted, and almost jogged back into the main part of the mall.

"Odd," Jorge mused, continuing his quest for the perfect present.


 * At Noble Base...

"That is NOT a turkey!"

Rosenda pointed at the bird in question, seething, while Six raised both hands defensively. "Wha-at? I couldn't find any turkeys in a twenty-mile radius, so I just hauled off and shot one of these!"

"Holy…" Kat shook her head, amazed. "Well, Rosenda, at least you won't have to worry about quantity anymore, right? Ha ha!"

"Laugh all you want," Rosenda sulked, poking the dead Moa with the toe of her boot. "But for the record, you're both going to pluck the thing. And clean it."

"Hey, I'm the one who spent half a day hunting the thing…" Six protested.

"And I'm the one who'll be spending half a day preparing the monster!" Rosenda lamented. "I'm not even sure it'll fit in the oven!"

The three Spartan women stared down at the dead Moa, silently wondering what on earth they were going to do now. Then Kat's chatter rang and she answered it. "Noble-Two here," she said sharply, then cocked her head. "Yes sir." Then cocked her head even more. "Sir?" Then her eyes widened and she paled. "Eh… yes sir! Understood, sir." She hung up and turned to face the other two Nobles, one eyelid twitching slightly. "Get this bird cleaned up and fixed immediately," she breathed.

"Why? What's wrong?" Six asked.

"Holland. He's joining us for Christmas dinner," Kat said faintly, trying contain her disbelief.


 * At the mall…

Jorge was starting to become disheartened, because no matter how hard he looked, nothing stood out that would be a perfect gift for Dr. Halsey. He knew she wouldn't appreciate jewelry or anything like that, so that was a definite no. He wished he knew more about civilians so this wouldn't be such a bother. What do people get each other for Christmas? He thought worriedly, his hands thrust into his pockets as he walked through a surprisingly vacant section of the mall. The fact that people got out of his way like a tank was approaching never once crossed his mind.

He finally gave up and sat down on a bench, frustrated. He could come up with any battle maneuver on the spot but something as simple as this was a mind-boggler. It made no sense.

"Yo."

Emile sat down next to Noble Five, a paper bag tucked under one arm. "How's it goin'?" the assault specialist asked.

"Terrible. I can't think of what to get for Dr. Halsey."

Emile absorbed this and shook his head. "Are you serious?" he asked, then noticed Jorge's determined expression. "Uh-huh, you're serious," he guessed. "Tough luck, man."

"What have you got there?" Jorge asked, eyeing Emile's suspicious-looking paper bag.

Emile unrolled the bag and dumped out not one, not two, not three or four, but five custom-made hunting knives, not a one of them under twelve inches long. Jorge looked from the knives to Emile's priceless grin and back, and made a disparaging sound. "And what exactly do you plan to do with those?" he demanded, then thought better of it and added "Never mind, I suppose we'll all see soon enough." He was sure that plenty of Grunt and Elite skulls were doomed to be violated in the near future.

"There's something else in that bag," Jorge accused, his sharp eyes noticing something amiss.

"Uh, no there's not," Emile replied, but made no effort to prove Jorge wrong. He just stuffed the knives back in and rolled it up, then stuck it under his armpit.

Jorge could have sworn he saw something, but decided not to press the issue further. Besides, wrangling Emile and using brute force to pry the bag away from him was not something that belonged in a mall… or in any sort of civilized company, for that matter.

"Think Jun's about finished?" he asked, changing the subject.

Emile shook his head. "I don't know, but he better be gettin' close. I've had enough of this weirdo farm."

Presently Jorge and Emile decided that the mall was boring and they needed to get back to base. While Emile looked for Jun, Jorge went over to a small odds and ends shop, still resolute in his journey to find Dr. Halsey a gift. Emile went past every open store, checking for a taller-than-normal bald Asian guy. Finally he found him, standing in a long line of customers, loaded down with boxes and bags. Emile signaled him to hurry up. Jun freed one hand and signaled back that he needed more time. Emile signed "your mom" and Jun responded with the most well-known hand sign in all human space, the middle finger.

Oh, the joys of Spartan hand signals.