Gifting and Regifting
by Setcheti
Genre-Theme-Fandom: Mystery – Password – NCIS Los Angeles
Time Taken: December 27 to December 31 (got the challenge on the 27th, wrote it on the 31st)
Disclaimer: Don’t own NCIS Los Angeles or the named characters who belong to it.
Author’s Note: This was a practice story for the Short Story Challenge 2011 that’s happening in February. The Genre-Theme-Fandom combination came from Tex. I couldn’t remember some of the regifts and their years/recipients exactly, so I just went with what I did remember and fudged the rest.
“What are you doing?”
Sam didn’t jump. “I’m looking at Hetty’s Christmas list.”
His partner snorted. “Well, since you’re on her laptop, I didn’t figure you were looking at yours.” He glanced around, blue eyes wary. “If she sees you…”
“She’s not here – left thirty minutes ago on an errand that will take two hours. At least.” Sam waved a hand at him in a distracted come-hither motion. “Come take a look at this.”
Another snort. “I don’t want to die, thank you.” But Callen still came around the desk and looked over his shoulder. “It’s a gifts-received list.”
“It’s a re-gifting list,” Sam corrected with a point. “See? There’s the spice rack we gave her, listed under 2007 in green, and the T/F – To/From – column says Team. And then under this year it says Kensi in red.”
“And this year Kensi got the spice rack, okay.” Callen squinted at the list, tracking the gifts to the names with his eyes and then pointing at one. “There’s the sweater, it went to Nell.”
“Yeah, saw that. Can’t believe it would fit, that sweater was tiny. But it’s this one I don’t understand.” Sam traced a 2008 scarf to 2010 with his finger. “Deeks got the scarf.” He repeated the trace with the mouse pointer, and when it reached their newest team member’s name the arrow turned into a pointing finger. “His name’s a link to a different page, but if I click on it…”
Callen’s eyebrow went up. “Password protected.”
“Yeah. But there aren’t any other tabs down at the bottom.”
“So it’s either a hidden page or a separate document. Interesting. Tried to crack it?”
“It isn’t anything obvious.”
“With Hetty it wouldn’t be. Eric?” Sam gave him a look, and he smiled. “No, you’re right, he wouldn’t – on anyone else’s computer, but not Hetty’s. What did you try?”
Sam shrugged. “Giftlist, Christmas, everything else I could think of. I know she doesn’t use strings of gibberish like Eric always wants us to.”
“Regift?”
“Very funny. I even tried some tricks to get around it, but I keep getting that same damned popup every time. The worksheet is locked against anything except selecting, I can’t even copy and paste.”
“What did Deeks give Hetty, do you know?”
Sam shook his head. “I know he gave her something, but I wasn’t around when he did it.”
“Neither was I.” Callen looked thoughtfully at the password popup on the screen. “How much do you want to bet that his gift is listed at the other end of that link?”
“Sucker bet, since I know he gave her something and it’s not on this page,” Sam said.
“Are any other names linked?”
“I hadn’t checked that – yet.” Sam went back to the mouse, running the little arrow down the column of 2010 names until a pointing finger flickered over Nell’s name. “Maybe it’s because they’re both new?”
“Try ‘new employee’,” Callen told him. Sam tried that, and several variations of it as well, but none of them worked. He went back to the mouse and found more names linked: Eric’s and Nate’s. “Okay, now that just doesn’t make sense.”
“Maybe it does.” Callen was frowning. “Eric and Nate weren’t regifted.”
“So the other list is the actual gift list, and this is the regift list.”
“Nell and Deeks,” Sam pointed out.
“No.” Callen shook his head. “They’re new. The gifts were new to them, if we hadn’t said anything Deeks never would have known.” Something else occurred to him. “And he wasn’t upset even when we complained about it.”
Sam was suspicious of that. “So you think she was trying to teach us a lesson? You think he was in on it?”
“No, I think he really just didn’t care.” Callen thought for a minute, then his eyes widened and he took a step back, away from Sam and the chair. “Wait a minute, you came over here why?”
“I was looking for a pen that worked.”
“Uh huh. And Hetty had just left, right?”
“Yeah, she said as she was going out that she’d be back in a couple of hours, she had an errand to run.”
Callen cocked an eyebrow at him. “And she told you this why? As she just happened to be walking past your desk for no particular reason, going in the opposite direction of the parking garage?”
“Um, she saw me throw my pen because it ran out of ink in the middle of…” His partner’s sandy eyebrow went up a little higher, and Sam faltered as realization dawned. “Oh shit.” He got out of the chair and backed away from the desk himself. “It was a setup.”
“No shit. And you walked right into it without so much as a blink. She probably laughed her ass off all the way to wherever she was heading.”
“But why?”
Callen shrugged. “Maybe because we not only give her shitty Christmas presents that reflect the fact that we didn’t put any thought into them, but we complained about getting them back.”
“Hey, that was a really nice spice rack…!”
“Which you gave to someone who counts some of the finest chefs in the world among her personal friends and who, as far as I know, rarely cooks at home.” He gave the laptop a suspicious look, then took his partner’s arm and led him out of Hetty’s area and back to their desks. “Admit it, you were planning to give that to your wife. Wasn’t that the year she told you off for giving her the same kinds of ‘mommy presents’ that the kids usually picked out?”
Sam scowled at him but didn’t deny it – not that he needed to, since the blush was showing up even over his dark skin. “You were in on the sweater.”
“Yeah.” Callen dropped into his desk chair and stretched out his legs. “But I knew it was a shitty present when we picked it out – I just thought it was funny at the time, I wanted to see if she’d actually wear it.”
“Maybe we’ll get to see Nell actually wear it.”
“Wouldn’t be nearly as funny.” Callen stretched out a little more. “I do wonder what the password is, though.”
Sam had a sudden thought. “Maybe there’s not one.” He got back up and went back to Hetty’s desk. Clicking on Nell’s name, he smiled at the password screen and hit a single button on the keyboard; the new page popped right up, a hidden worksheet inside the workbook. “Nell gave her software,” he called over, making Callen sit bolt upright in his chair. “I think it’s an upgrade for something she already uses. Nate sent her tea and a handpainted porcelain cup.”
Callen came back over to the desk, but he didn’t go behind it again. “What about Deeks?”
“The cell is empty.” Sam frowned. “She didn’t write it down.”
Callen frowned too, and shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“Maybe not, but this does.” Sam sounded chagrined. “She gave Nell a ride to the airport so she wouldn’t have to take a cab – and she upgraded her ticket to first class.” He looked again, shook his head. “And she sent some sort of care package to the unit Nate is with. And Deeks…” He stopped, and a disquieted expression flickered across his face. To his partner’s surprise, he closed the workbook and then the laptop, stood up and went back to his desk without another word.
Callen trailed behind him, mystified. “What?”
“Nothing.” Sam straightened up his desk and pushed his chair in. “You were right, it was a setup. I just hit enter and it let me in. She was trying to teach us a lesson.”
“Did we learn it?”
Sam paused for a moment, then looked at him. “I’m gonna go home and apologize to my wife. I gave her gift cards this year because of what she said about the ‘mommy presents’, told her I didn’t know what to get her.” He turned and walked toward the parking garage. “I should have been paying attention to what she wasn’t saying; then I would have known.”
Callen stayed where he was, thinking. Hetty came back about half an hour later, and as she walked by he asked quietly, “What did Deeks give you?”
She stopped walking. “He’d been working on an…independent project, for several years I believe, but it unfortunately led to a place where LAPD wasn’t able to follow and he was told to forget all about it. He gave me his notes.”
He nodded. “What did you give him?” She looked at him, and he shook his head. “I know the scarf wasn’t it.”
She shrugged. “He seemed to like it. And I’m sure it came in very handy, as an accessory if not a necessity, when the choir showed up to take the children at the shelter caroling.” Her smile reappeared. “By the way, someone had my car detailed and they did an excellent job – they even got the undercarriage. Although I was a bit surprised, since the garage is secure and only someone who worked here could have gotten to it.”
Callen grinned crookedly and stood up. “I’ll look into it for you tomorrow. Right now, though, I’m going back home for the night. It’s always good to sleep in your own bed in your own house, you know?”
“Yes, I do know.” She continued walking to her desk. “Good evening then, Mr. Callen.”
He smiled and went in the opposite direction. “Merry Christmas, Hetty.”