Christmas eve, the perfect time to get all those last minute presents. Or, in some cases, all those presents. Snow glinting on his furry coverings, the unlikely christmasophile saunters happily into the shopping center, rosy cheeks and serene smile in hand. Sidestepping casually he avoids being bowled over by happy happy children, screaming at each other in their endless joy. Reaching into a pocket, he draws out a handfull of change to drop into the carol singers basket while he scans the shops for likely candidates.
Follow the strobing lights and the generalized distraction and you'll find Penny.
Maybe.
The locals are getting hostile, jabbing items with senso-tags at security guards; waving receipts like white flags in front of them "I paid for this! I paid!" Little children screaming and crying because that's what little children do. Mothers and fathers with more bags of wrapping paper than actual gifts, with boxes, with ribbons and bows. Colors block out the patterns of the mood swing - gargantuan red bows there signal overwhelming feelings of helpless frustration, flashing gold lights in their centers. Gigantic wreaths and streamers of green keep the consumers moving into the stores and buying buying buying. Green goes in, green comes out.
There is chaos, and there is the furry island of calm, standing next to singers who gradually become more and more distraught as their small fence barrier is jostled. Flicking in and out of tune. Pobble begins to drift through the crowds, patient and zen. He stops, waits for openings and slips forward. Eyes scan for the least populated shops. Even masters have their limits on patience. He chuckles at something, shaking his head with a last glance towards the singers before they're lost in the heaving sea of frantic proles. He makes his way towards a flight of stairs, and stops next to it in a
small lull in the shifting tides. Reaching into a pocket, he pulls out a bright blue flip phone and idly taps in a number. Days like these, one needs a shopping partner. Or a mainline injection of coffee.
Of all the shopping malls in all the cities, Pobble had to pick this one to walk into. There's madness here; a fever pitch brought on hour-to-hour and minute-to-minute. Walking, talking holiday memes: Santa Claus is coming to town - anticipation, he knows when you're awake - paranoia, jingle bells - cashier noises. You Must Buy. Spend money, appease the seasonal gods. Spend money, everyone will thank you. Spend money, there's love for sale.
Penny is carefully extracting herself from a difficult situation down the doomed corridor. Burdened with bags, the flashing christmas lights in the men's store have become too much holiday for her. Doubled over, she sinks to the marble floor outside and pokes around her tied-on bag to make the ringtone stop. "What, I'm losing the fight. Oh god it's awful," she says into the phone.
" Most unlike you dear." states Senior Pobble into his phone. Nearby someone blurts out, "A blue phone! Where'd you get it. I want it. Hey, this guy has a blue phone."
At first ignoring the lanky shrill toned man, Pobble interjects as the creature-of-impulse reaches for his phone. Pobble puts a hand out, and pushes his bloody palm towards the monster. The sight of the wounded and oozing hand coming for his face is too much for the shattered mind of the last minute shopper, and the man looks about frantically while backing off. A new thing takes him, clutching at straws and he begins crying out again, "A coat, that man has a green coat! Hey, look!" and he runs off, to paw at random man's old green coat. A must have this christmas.
" Why are you so calm," Penny stays seated underfoot and out of sight with the phone pressed to her ear "Did someone just try to rip you off?" She sniffs and there's a rustle of paper-and-plastic bags "Everyone here's going crazy. I think I just got slashed" says this thing casually "I don't wanna look."
" You're here?"
In the background are the sounds of the Salvation Army Band. A group of four players and one nun with a bell. It's unending noise jangles nerves and keeps everyone far away, not tossing coins into the metal bucket. Find them and you'll find her.
" Of course." Pobble smirks, "God wishes he could be everywhere else but here. I think he's starting to forgive you." His voice is calm, controlled and continuing the pattern of the past week. The sounds of the chaos through the reciever attest to the fact that yes, he is in the same hell as you. "I'm at the bottom of some big stairs." Turning slowly, he looks about for a better landmark. "Think you can make it to the information booth?" That sounds like a plan, everyone is too busy to ask for information. Information erodes shopping time. Everyone knows that if they stop to ask for direction, the bargain that had their name on it will be bagged and taken.
" I can't. Go left and you'll see a dancing banana," a landmark if ever there was one. "I'm afraid."
Penny seems to not have moved an inch since putting the phone to her ear. People are walking around her now in and out of the store with the strobing lights.
" There's a guy in a bearsuit, fu.. Pobs?"
Pobble stops and twirls gracefully. Spotting said Bananna he smiles beautifically. "I see.. I'm not far away." Waiting for a space, in a manner not unlike a game of Frogger, he moves towards the victim. "Never fear, Dr. Steve is here."
Surely enough, he isn't far away. The connection goes dead, phone slipped back into pocket, and the furry chemist eclipses the strobes over the prone woman as he crouches down behind you and puts an arm over your shoulder.
Whispering into your ear he says quietly, "Be not afraid." A slight smear of blood graces the purple leather where his hand sets down before it moves, so that his fingers touch your cheek. Another hand reaches into his pocket once more.
But Pobble your hands,..." she cautions and fails to mention what big eyes he has (the better to see you with), what strange things in his hair (the better to hear you) and those things marks, those marks on his forehead (and never you mind about that). This is something that no shopper wants any part of, that no shopper wants to see. Perhaps they confused the color combinations - that red wasn't on her coat, it was on the wall behind her. It was in a poster, an advert on the wall. It wasn't in his hands. Penny must've mis-spoken, she must've seen wrong. She must be on drugs.
The hand emerges from pocket, holding something. What it is, lost in the shadows and blocked perspectives to any that would be watching the couple out of sight huddling at foot level.
" Shh.. You trust me right Pens?" he says looking into the woman's eyes with that zen smile. The hand fidgets at Penny's side, before gently pulling up her top just a minute ammount. Shielded in the crevase between them, and still with his fingers touching her face, Pobble eases a syringe into Penny's side. Silver serum out, syringe vanishes.
The chemist closes his eyes for a second, twitching almost imperceptibly before leaning in further to kiss Penny's forehead. "Happy christmas."
Penny looks upward past the Judas kiss; consider the ecstatic having a visions, collapsed then into a fit. The woman weeps; she must be crazy. The cellphone tumbles from her hand and gets kicked away by a thousand pairs of feet. A child notices but so, too, does his mother and tugs him away from them; from the trouble she knows them to be. The little boy still reaches for the phone, its color and size toy-like and attractive. A lost cause.
The security guard that was looking for Penny might find her now, bleeding from the side as she'd suspected when she slipped past him. Her blood moves quickly and spreads across the tiles.
The serenity has cracked on the furry man, and with a weary face he moves to stand, attempting to bring Penny up as he does so. A tear runs down his face as he begins the ardurous task of leading Penny towards the exits and out of (in to?) hell. He moves slower, his expression a Frappe of sorrow and a McFlurry of wearyness. Opening his coat he wraps it around Penny, big enough as it is. Glancing to her as he waits for an opening, he smiles. A very old, very tired smile. There are no words. Just a break in movement before they continue on out. The phone lost in the forest of feet, and the blood just another pitfall in the Temple of Doom, waiting for an unwary hurried automaton to come crashing down on its slick surface.