Excuse Me, Some Help Please? {open}

[Twilight Sparkle]

"Excuse me, could I have some help here, please?" Twilight asked, waving her arms. Several packages hovered about her, each glowing with her purple energy. Twilight had heard about Christmas, of course, and had noted its decided similarity to Hearth Warming Eve, so she was more than a little willing to participate. They needed some good holiday cheer about now, with everything being as dark and miserable as it had been lately. And everyone knew that one of the major steps in such a process was going out and getting presents for everyone.

It seemed as though everyone had the same idea though. Twilight couldn't remember seeing so many people in the mall at one time. It didn't help that they had recently finished cleaning up after the animal invasion of a few months ago, though apparently people were still finding hints of the incursion here and there. The mall was open and available now, and people had flooded in. Twilight couldn't swing a shopping bag without connecting with someone milling about. And she wasn't sure whether the painfully cheery Christmas music they piped in helped or hurt matters.

However, now she was certain that she found an actual mall employee, one working at the cheese and meat stand she currently stood next to. They had the requisite clothing on, and they certainly looked a good deal more knowledgeable about things. Twilight pushed her way toward the person as best she could, getting a few feet before remembering that most of her magic had, in fact, returned, or at least enough for her to teleport herself and her packages. Twilight did so, complete with bright flash of white light, and soon was standing in front of the person.

"Yes, you, could you help me locate a nice drink basket, Mis-- wait, I don't see a name tag..." Twilight frowned, looking all around, certain that the person in question just had to have a tag somewhere... right?

[Peter Pan]

Peter wasn't too sure what this whole Christmas thing was, but he was attracted to all the shiny things that it brought with it. There were thing people did where they brought pine trees inside and decorated them with lights and glitter and shiny things! Peter liked lights, glitter and shiny things, especially glitter, because you could throw it in the air and then everything around it would have glitter on it too, and nobody could remove it for days (or ever). And the food! The food that was around when this Christmas thing was session was great. There was an abundance of sweet things: cookies and chocolates, and this peculiar thing called peppermint. There was also hot chocolate, which was basically liquid goodness. Peter didn't know what the point of the all this festivity was, but he wasn't complaining.

So it was with great delight that he discovered that the mall had been made over for this whole Christmas deal. His first reaction was for his eyes to pop out of his head, but once he got over his initial shock, he ran, squealing in a high-pitched voice, into the glitter-sugar-wonderland. He stopped outside a toy store and grinned. You were never too old to play with toys; he certainly wasn't. He was about to rush inside and commence with the playing of the toys, when his nose distracted him. A food stand was nearby, and Peter was hungry, so he slunk behind the counter and helped himself to some of the greasiest cheese and hot dogs he had ever tasted. There was only one person on duty, and they were staring out blankly into the glitter-fest, and didn't notice Peter at all. When he had eaten his fill, he stood up and came face-to-face with a girl. She asked him for something called a drink basket, and said something about a nametag, but most importantly, she called him "miss".

"Hey, I'm not a girl!" He said, as if explaining something elementary to someone who knew better.    

[Twilight Sparkle]

"I didn't say you were," replied Twilight, keeping her voice level. She didn't recognize the young man, and he looked, well, young. Not really young, not like an infant or someone, but more like someone who was young, enjoyed being young, and reveled in the fact that they were young. Twilight had met people like that before, and she generally found she didn't like him. She swept her violet eyes over the boy, hesitating for a moment while she tried to figure out what was the best thing to say next.

"I was saying mister," she offered, locking eyes with him. Twilight tried a friendly smile, but the edges of stress gave her smiles just the slightest hint of malice to them; it just happened with poor Twilight. "Because I was trying to get your attention," she paused again. He hadn't said whether or not he worked there, and honestly, Twilight couldn't tell. It did make sense for someone young to be working at the mall for the holiday season, and the whole eternally youthful thing worked well with that.

"You wouldn't happen to work here, would you?" she asked, again scanning him with her eyes. "I was trying to find a drink basket for a friend of mine, and well, I figured it would be better to just ask someone who worked here instead of struggling through this crowd to find it myself." It made perfect sense to Twilight, and her smile became steadily more genuine as she went, till it was fully realized, if a little self-satisfied.

[Peter Pan]

“Sure you were…” Peter said, reproachfully. It was a clever save, though, he had to give her that. Had she really meant to call him a girl? Nah, she was telling the truth…or was she? Maybe she was calling him a girl because she wanted to get his attention? Yes! That was it! That made total sense. It was what he would have done. In fact, he was going to do that from now on: call people by the inappropriate gender salutations and pronouns to make them listen to him. “You a genius, Whatever-Your-Name-Is. You have my attention now!”

And he could work here, why couldn’t he have a job? The guy staring off into space certainly wasn’t doing his, if he’d overlooked a boy eating the greasy food and then carrying on a loud conversation with someone else. “As a matter of fact, I do work here! I appeared to have lost my tag in an unfortunate…boating accident. Yes, that’s it! You see, I was out in my boat when a crocodile rose out of the water and tried to eat me, but I jumped out of the way at the last second, and all he got was my name tag in his mouth.” None of it was true, except for maybe something far back in his repressed memory that may or may not have involved a crocodile, but regardless, it could not be said that Peter didn’t spin a good yarn, when he had to.

“As another matter of fact, I am a drink basket specialist!” In actuality, Peter had no idea what a drink basket was, never mind what a drink basket specialist did, but it sounded exciting. “And you are quite right—I know exactly where the drink baskets are. Follow me!” And with that, he grabbed her hand and made to lead her into the toy store.

[Twilight Sparkle]

"My name's Twilight Spark--" began Twilight, only to be interrupted by the seemingly endless flow of words that spilled from the boy's mouth. Twilight listened, her doubt increasing with each passing moment. That doubt manifested in Twilight's ever expressive face, as her eyebrows raised and gradually the "yeah right" expression took precedence over everything else on her pretty visage. This kid was either a phenomenal liar or an extremely incompetent one; Twilight couldn't quite figure out which.

"So did the crocodile manage to steal your name too?" she asked, not able to keep the sarcasm out of her tone. Her disbelief only continued as the boy prattled ever onward. Really, did he even pause for a breath? Twilight tried to slide in some more comments or at least something, but before she could really even manage that one snide question, the guy was dragging her deeper into the mall. Actually, he was moving her away from the specialty cart and toward what Twilight was pretty sure was the toy store.

"You do realize that's a toy store, right?" she asked, looking up at the marquee. "I know they played around with things after the whole animal attack thing, and there's the holidays and all, but I'm not really looking for a toy at the moment..." Twilight then realized that she still had the several other bags. She twisted her head backward, her violet braid snapping around her shoulder. Within a few moments, she had the bags snagged with unicorn magic and following them. Twilight couldn't help but smile cockily at that. Her magic was definitely back, well, almost completely.