It was a cool December day in Los Angeles California, twenty four year old California Highway Patrol motorcycle officer Logan Hanks sat on his motorcycle with his iPhone in his left hand, texting his best friend Officer Jerrad Gray.

"I'll be there soon ~Jerrad"

"Yeah sure ~Logan"

Logan wanted to throw his phone. Why was Jerrad always late!? It drove him crazy!

Soon his friend pulled up. "Sorry, I almost over slept," Jerrad apologized.

"No! You would do that?" Logan teased his best friend and partner as he looked over his shoulder to see if he could get into the traffic now to start heading to the station.

Jerrad laughed, and his face flushed with embarrassment at that joke. "Sorry…" he said playfully feeling ashamed.

Logan just laughed.

oOoOo

As soon as they got there they were greeted by Ponch. "Hey guys…bet you're surprised I'm here already."

"Actually yes I am," Logan replied.

"Well, Jon suggested that we just meet here at the station today instead of at our normal spot," Ponch started. "Soooo…somehow I ended up earlier than Jon," he added.

Logan and Jerrad just nodded then walked off to check their mail before briefing.

The California Highway Patrol building was buzzing with excitement as many officers were coming in at this time now. They all walked in like a school of fish, bunched together all going the same direction, knowing exactly where they were heading. The only difference between a school of fish and the bunch there was a school of fish was quiet! It seemed as if every single officer that had walked in was talking at the same time.

So it had gotten very loud, and all the talk was about Christmas shopping, and what everyone wanted or needed. It was getting closer and closer to that time, and they were all excited.

"Geeze do they need to talk that loud?" Logan asked leaning against the wall watching them.

"Hey, it's Christmas season…they are gonna be all excited about everything," Jon pointed out handing each of them a cup of hot coca.

"Well…I'm not going to join in on that…I'll get excited with you guys," Ponch said with a laugh.

The four of them laughed then walked into the briefing room to find seats.

The briefing room was even louder than the hall was, there were a few more people in there. Jerrad laid his head down on the table in front of him and tried to relax and ignore all the noise.

Logan just tuned it out by getting on Facebook, Ponch and Jon did the same. But soon all that came to an end, as Getraer entered the room. He had to clear his throat extra loud to get everyone's attention, then asked them all to take their seats so they could get on with briefing.

Briefing seemed to go on a little longer than normal, and a few people were getting anxious to leave. Getraer was finally finished with briefing, and dismissed.

oOoOo

The next day was their day off, so Logan, Jerrad, Ponch, and Jon all went to Westside Pavilion to go shopping.

"I've only been here once…and that was when I was a little kid and wanted to see Santa at the mall," Logan admitted as they got out of Jerrad's car.

"Mall Santa?" Ponch asked with a laugh. "I've got good memories of mall Santa," he added.

The four of them walked into the building together not sure where to start, neither one of them had been here recently. "Well I remember someone saying something about Hot Topic," Jon said.

"That's Anna's favorite store," Ponch replied talking about one of his twin daughters.

"Okay, well let's start there…" Jon said.

"I feel so weird going to the mall without the girls," Ponch said as they headed for Hot Topic.

Logan laughed. "Yeah, I bet it would feel a little strange…"

As they continued on their way, they chatted amongst themselves about random things. Then agreed that they didn't need to stick together the whole entire time, but if they did split up they had to keep in touch so that they could know when to meet up again and where to meet up.

As soon as they entered Hot Topic, Jon remembered why he never liked it. It was dark inside, and the music seemed to be a little loud. There was a lot of stuff around the room from all different kinds of fandoms, that Jon didn't know. He wasn't a very big fan of stores like this. Ponch and Logan on the other hand seemed pretty thrilled about it. Jerrad was a little in between on the unsure of whether he liked it or not. He'd never really been there before.

They began looking around, and Ponch was excited to find a lot of shirts, boots, socks, handbags, and a bunch of stuff with "The Nightmare Before Christmas" things all over it. A lot of Jack Skellington, of which he knew Ashlyn would be thrilled to get something like that so he picked up a few things, he noticed they were a bit pricey, so he made sure not to get too much.

While he was off doing that, Jerrad was looking at Pokémon t-shirts and hats. Knowing that his new girlfriend was a huge Pikachu fan he picked up a Pikachu hat to get for her.

Jon was looking around, but pretty much just following Logan. The things that Ponch was looking at were of no interest to Jon, so he was trying to find something else. Logan was just looking around at everything. He had always loved shopping here when he was a teenager. He hadn't found anything yet that he couldn't live without, and that everyone he was shopping for couldn't live without. He already had his Christmas list for everyone all made out and he wasn't seeing anything here, of which was a bummer to him…because he wanted to spend a little money here anyway.

"It's really hot in here," Jon said.

"Well yeah, it's Hot Topic," Ponch joked then laughed at his joke.

Jon didn't seem to find it as funny as Ponch did. But Logan and Jerrad also found it kinda funny.

"Here, let me buy this, then we can leave," Jerrad suggested to Jon.

"Okay sounds good, and we can let Logan and Ponch keep looking if they aren't ready to go yet," he replied.

Logan and Ponch both smiled at the thought of getting to stay longer, but they knew they should probably get going soon too. So Ponch got in line right behind Jerrad.

oOoOo

As it was drawing near the end of their shopping day, the men had many bags from all different places. They were pretty proud of their good work. But as they were leaving they over-heard a man complaining to another man about his store getting robbed for the fourth time that week.

"A lot of robberies have been going down here in this mall…all the same people too I bet," replied the older gentleman.

"Yeah, and they even tried to kill the mall Santa for getting in the way…and the police aren't doing a thing about it," complained the other man.

Ponch looked at the other three guys. "Did you guys hear that?" he asked.

"Yeah…but did you know anything about any robberies here?" Jon asked.

"No…not that I can think of…but then again they probably turned it over to LAPD…those guys get all the cases like this. We deserve something," Logan replied.

"I agree…but how do we tell them that?" Jerrad asked.

"I don't know, I'm sure Ponch would know…he's always got plans up his sleeve, right buddy?" Jon joked.

When he didn't receive a reply he was a bit concerned. "Ponch?" he asked then looked over his shoulder and noticed Ponch was gone.

"Where did he go off to now?" Jerrad asked. He and Jon both looked at each other. "And where the heck is Logan?"

Then both men spotted their missing friends…exactly where they should've looked before. "Oh I should've known…taking notes, and talking to the guys that were robbed…we must be officers," Jon said as he walked over.

He and Jerrad stood behind Logan and Ponch.

"Are those two also off duty CHP officers?" the one man asked.

"Yeppers, some of California's finest," Ponch replied while still writing down a few things that the man had said before.

"I didn't realize that we could call the California Highway Patrol for something like this. I thought you just stayed on the highway."

"Well…we get to do more than that. We've gone undercover a dozen times believe me," Ponch replied then looked at Jon.

"Yeah, we have. Sometimes we drive the LAPD nuts, but hey at least we can do our job too."

"LAPD isn't doing much about this whole robbery thing. We called them the first few times, but they still haven't caught the creeps."

Ponch, Logan, Jerrad, and Jon all looked at each other. "Well, sometimes it takes more than one try to catch a criminal. I know you hate to hear something like that, but we have to be truthful. We need to talk it over with our sergeant first, but would you be alright with us coming in for a few days undercover?" Ponch asked as he put his little notebook back in his pocket.

"I'm fine with that, as long as you tell me when you do. I'm the main man in charge of everything here so talk to me first before you come, here's my card," the man said handing them a card.

"Thanks, and don't worry we'll be in contact with you. We'll get these thieves behind bars."

"Thank you for your kindness, Officer Poncherello, I never realized how much I liked the CHP until just now," the man replied before they left.