Disclaimer: I own nothing.

'A Christmas Party'

It was Christmas Eve on the Enterprise, and due to the ships huge size, there was multiple parties happening simultaneously. Elena wandered between each of them, the cheerful spirits of the rest of the crew making it hard for her to brood over Christmas's long past- Christmas's spent with her family before their deaths… and Christmas's when she was human.

She could clearly recall spending each Christmas with Jeremy and Bonnie- who had finally gotten married a few years after Jeremy graduated high school- and their kids up until their deaths. The brunette vampire hadn't visited her nieces and nephews and their children much after that, but she did keep tabs on them. And long before that, Christmas's with her parents before everything went to hell. The memories were bittersweet, but she wouldn't trade them for anything in the world.

Except the chance to be human, a voice in the back of her head whispered.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a voice calling her name. "Elena!"

The brunette turned to see it was Bones. The CMO waved her over, and when she reached him she saw the rest of the Command Crew was there along with Chekov.

"Took you long enough to get here," Bones greeted.

"I was seeing what the other party's were like," she replied, dropping any formalities. She had known Bones and the Captain, Kirk, since the three of them were at the Academy together and considered them friends. Besides, none of the were on duty at the moment- it was another shift.

She took this moment to glance over the party the Command Crew was throwing. It wasn't that different from the others she'd been to looks wise, but something about it felt more homely, more like the Christmas's she longed for. She knew it was because she found a dysfunctional family of sorts in the crew standing around her. At least, she thought that was the only reason why.

Her gaze roamed over everyone until it settled on a familiar blonde head. She knew it was Kirk, just by the hair. She had subconsciously memorized him throughout the years- all because her first thought about him had been 'he's very good looking'. And he was- more so than any guys she had dated ever since her and Damon's relationship had ended.

He knew it too. The vampire had lost track of how many times she had seen him flirt with various girls at the Academy- and really didn't want to know how many of them he had one night stands with.

Kirk must have felt her staring at him, because a few seconds later he raised his head and looked at her. She smiled at him, which he returned and made his way over to her.

"So what do you think of your first Christmas in space?" He asked, reaching her.

"Unless I'm mistaken, this would also be your first Christmas in space," she replied teasingly. "It's… different."

"Yeah, you could say that," he said. "At least here no annoying relatives show up and ruin the day for you."

She laughed, though an old pain clenched her chest at his seemingly harmless comment. "True."

Suddenly a blaze of color outside a nearby window caught her attention. Startled, she looked and saw they had neared some sort of nebula. The sight of it took her breath away- it was brilliant show of red lights.

"If that isn't a coincidence- a red nebula on Christmas Eve- I don't know what is," Kirk remarked.

Elena nodded absentmindedly, focused intently on the spectacle in front of her. She'd seen nebula's before on her few previous journeys into space, but never one this close nor this beautiful.

Out of the corner of her eye, the brunette noticed two things: Kirk staring at her with an unusually soft smile on his face, and that a few members of the Command Crew were hurriedly doing something behind them. Almost in a mischief way, judging by the expression on Spock's face.

But she didn't think much of it—she'd quickly realized it's best not to question what anyone in the Command Crew did, among other things.

After staring at the nebula for a few more minutes, she turned away to join the rest of the party, with Kirk walking along beside her. She was surprised; she'd half-thought he would have rejoined the celebrations.

However, when they were a few feet away from the rest of the party members Elena found out what some of them had been secretly doing a few minutes ago. Uhura cleared her throat and motioned upward, causing both Elena and Kirk's gazes to land on a bit of mistletoe they conveniently happened to be standing under.

The brunette couldn't stop the heat that flushed her cheeks as she remembered the age-old tradition of being caught under the mistletoe with someone, and found herself glaring at the Command Crew. Never mind the fact a part of her was secretly excited about this, having realized awhile ago she had feelings for her friend that went beyond platonic.

She turned to see what Kirk's reaction to this was but was greeted by him leaning down to kiss her, which she found herself returning. Elena thought he was going to pull away after a few seconds, but he didn't, and she found she really didn't mind.

"If you two are done," Bones' voice burst through the bubble of their own little world, and they pulled apart, and Elena knew that at least her cheeks were a red bright enough to put the nebula outside to shame.

"Merry Christmas," Kirk said with a small smile, being the first to break the silence that enveloped them.

"Merry Christmas," she replied with her own small, slightly shaky smile.

It looked like this may be the best Christmas she'd had in a long while.

-ST/VD-

So…here's a belated Christmas gift I suppose. I'm working on my other stories but am unfortunately experiencing some minor writer's block for some, major for others so updates may still be awhile. In the mean time, I'm hoping to have my inspiration fully return by posting challenges in my forums and some oneshots/drabbles.

I've been thinking about doing a drabble/oneshot series involving various Doctor Who/Vampire Diaries crossover couples, and one that would be Hobbit/Harry Potter but solely focusing on a pairing of Fili/Luna…what do you guys think? These wouldn't be updated regularly—just to help with writer's block or when I get inspiration or have finally updated one of my multi-chapter stories. But neither would they necessarily be abandoned when updates take forever (like always with me it seems).