"Well you're going to be in charge of decorating the top of that."

"Hmm?" Vaseraga stepped back to look at the tree he'd been dutifully adjusting to the left, right, and other right for the last few minutes.

Once in the stand and upright, the fir he'd purchased for the base did tower above even his head. He hadn't quite realized...

"Oh."

"Yeah, but it probably needs to be that tall," Zeta said as she stepped closer. "Everyone is supposed to put an ornament on it this year, right?"

"Yeah."

Zeta frowned a moment later.

"Also, a little more left."

Ilsa looked at the assembled soldiers, most of whom were looking back at her with nervous gazes. Well, this was a surprise assembly and things had been quiet, so...

"Listen up, all of you! Your assignment is as follows: Locate and secure a meaningful decoration for the holy night tree in the main cafeteria and place it within the next seventy-two hours."

There was silence for a long moment, not even affirmation until Ilsa cleared her throat.

"That is all. Understood?"

"Understood!"

It wasn't the usual, but it was sorely needed.

Now she'd have to go find an ornament, too.

There were too many people in the market and it would only get worse if he waited, which meant that if Eustace was going to buy an ornament, he would have to do it right away.

But what? What would be 'meaningful'? Wouldn't any shiny bauble be fine? Neither Ilsa nor Ronan would say anything if he just bought the first thing he saw.

No, Ilsa would say something. It just wouldn't matter.

He quietly looked at the market stalls anyway, vowing to just pick something when...

There was a little carved dog in a little felt hat.

"That one."

"The cookies will be for eating while we're decorating, not actually decorating with," Beatrix explained as she scribbled down her shopping list.

"Yeah, that was a lot of mice and they weren't very festive." Zeta smiled anyway. It had been an exciting morning, if nothing else. But that wasn't something they needed to repeat.

"But I want to find an ornament that looks like gingerbread," Beatrix continued. "I'm not giving up on that."

Beatrix added a couple more things to her list. They'd need more than cookies, to start.

And she'd need to make her ornament a tiny little sword.

"This one," Cassius said as he picked up a ball of brightly-colored fabric flowers.

"That one?" Beatrix questioned. "How come?"

"When first presented with the concept of decorating a holy night tree, I asked why a plain fir was chosen, not a tree already in bloom," Cassius explained.

"Oh, I remember that!" Beatrix smiled. "That's a great choice."

"It's not very logical," Cassius admitted after he'd exchanged coins with the stall's clerk and put the ornament in his bag. "I understand the purpose of decorating the tree now and that firs don't bloom."

"Nah," Beatrix replied. "It makes perfect sense."

"Ugh. Meaningful." Zeta had walked through the market three times and looked at every festive stall and found nothing. She saw things that made her think of everyone else, but nothing that felt right for her.

It probably wasn't helping that Ilsa's squad had already come, raided, and gone.

Maybe she'd just do gingerbread, too, or a mouse or dog or something abstract that just looked cool. That'd probably work.

And then she saw familiar armor lurking just ahead.

"You too, huh?"

"Need to hang something at the top of that tree," Vaseraga explained.

Zeta nodded. "Let's find something together."