Avery sighed as the Bio-Ship (she nearly had a stroke when she saw it at first) landed near the Happy Harbor Mall. She was the only one out of the group of five that was honestly not looking forward to shopping, but she went along with it nonetheless.
Karen, who was sitting next to the newcomer, laughed slightly, "Don't worry; we won't let you get mobbed by any mall-goers."
"Yes, because the power-walkers are the target of my concerns," Avery exited along with the others, keeping her thought at a whisper.
The second they stepped into the mall M'gann started on a barrage of questions, "What store do you want to go to first? What kind of style do you even like? What colors too?"
Avery looked on at the Martian with marginal concern. She could survive any physical trauma, but shopping seemed to fall somewhere in the category of 'this might kill you'. "Um, let us try that store first," She pointed to an appropriate looking store to their left. The sign above the door read Forever 19.
M'gann deflated a little, but agreed quickly.
The group quickly went into the store and started browsing through racks. M'gann was working on helping Avery since all of her own clothing was organic, and shopping for herself wouldn't quite work here. "Anything specific you want?" She asked the black haired girl.
"Long sleeves, preferably pants to skirts, and muted colors. Nothing bright or in the neon range, please," Avery was working on leafing through a rack of sweaters.
"Do you always wear long sleeves? Even in summer?" M'gann questioned hesitantly.
"Yes," came the clipped reply.
"Why?"
Avery hesitated for a moment, thinking about how long she had until she positively had to tell the Team. "You'll know soon enough."
M'gann took it in stride and continued searching through the racks.
Within a range of fifteen moments, Avery was weighed down with clothing to try on. The pile was a contribution from all the girls, so the tastes and styles varied slightly. Each of the girls, besides M'gann, had their own sets of clothing to try on. So when every one of the girls still in the changing rooms had a new set of clothing on they would all come out at the same time and share opinions.
All the girls went back into their changing rooms after another round of clothing roulette and began pulling on the new outfits for inspection. Avery dreaded the next item that was practically staring at her. It was a sleeveless dark blue dress made out of a shiny material. She put it on anyways, judging her reflection. Outside the door she heard small questions about if she was ready to step out or not. "Ready." She took a deep breath and stepped out with her left forearm hidden behind her back.
"Who picked this out?" Was her first question she voiced aloud.
Barbra smiled from across the small hallways separating the dressing rooms, "You're welcome, by the way."
Karen, Cassie, and M'gann looked over from the small debate they were having over if Cassie should get the shirt she was wearing or not.
"Whose heart are you intending to break in that?" Karen asked with a smile of her own.
"You're getting that," M'gann said as the final decree.
"What would I even wear it for?" Avery tried tugging the dress down to make it a little longer. It was right above her knees as is.
"A dance, a date, a party," Barbra listed off three of the most obvious possibilities.
Avery searched her mind for a verifiable reason to say no besides 'it will just collect dust in my closet'. She slumped her shoulders slightly. "Fine, I will get it."
The other girls grinned and went back for another outfit to try on.
They quickly finished after that and checked out. The look on the cashier's face was priceless at the amount of clothing they were buying. Let's just say the girls all got pretty great customer service for the next year because of that purchase.
The group moved on to multiple stores, buying quite a bit at each store. Everything ranged from jewelry to shirts to shoes. They even stopped in one beauty store to buy shampoo, conditioner, and soap for the obvious uses. M'gann even managed to sneak in some makeup for Avery's sake into that check-out, despite a certain someone's protests against makeup in general.
They were headed to the last store of the day when Avery suddenly stopped, staring at one store in particular; an art store. "Go on ahead," She waved the others off, "I have enough clothes and you would most likely get bored here."
Babs fished a communicator out of her jeans pocket and tossed it. "Call us when you're done and we'll meet you back here."
"Will do," Avery caught the device and raced into the store, despite being weighed down with bags.
"So she likes art," M'gann filed the information away, one of the only tidbits she's learned about the girl.
.:Back to Life:.
The girls all arrived back at the Cave with shopping bags galore.
Nightwing caught up with them trying to take the bags out of the Bio-Ship. "What did you do? Buy out the mall?"
"Something like that." Cassie shrugged as she unloaded more bags. Distinct piles as to whose was whose were starting to form.
"Wow," Nightwing let out a low whistle.
Barbra flicked her wrist and sent the credit card responsible for the shopping spree back at Nightwing. "Make sure to tell Bats we say thanks when you explain how much we spent."
The vigilante caught the card easily. "So you sack me with explaining everything. Great."
A/N: Hi there... Sorry this took a week but school has been kicking my butt. In the first week back I already had two projects, which is a major player in the slow update. But I got A's on both so I live to write another week. Also, on a random note, my headphones have been shocking me. Only the left earbud though. It's annoying. Not to mention they're fairly new, so it's concerning me about if they're broken already. Oh well. Have a nice day everyone.
I forgot to mention this earlier, but I got a beta for this story! I'm so happy. Creamtherabbit77 has beta-ed this chapter and the one before. So thank you's to my new beta (I love how official that sounds) for bothering to catch any of the mistakes I make.
Read. Enjoy. Review.