Chapter 2: Christmas Day 2185

Serena's eyes opened slowly when she suddenly saw an inpatiently waiting krogan starring at her. "Grunt...what-" she looked at her omni-tool and groaned. "It's 5 in the morning. What do you want?"

He growled a bit before speaking. "You said everybody has a Christmas story to tell. So I asked around for some human Christmas stories."

Serena suddenly had a bad feeling. "And?" she asked dreading what he'd say.

"I learned that humans tend to have a lot of sex on Christmas." He crossed his arms acrossed his chest. "Or they tend to kill a lot on Christmas. It depends on who you ask really."

"You asked everybody?" her left eyebrow raised doubtfully.

"Only those on the squad," he admitted with a shrug. "I find what they say is more important than others."

"And that's why you got those kinds of stories."

"I asked the Battlemaster and her mate."

"Yeah, she told me." Serena sighed. "Christmas isn't just about those things, you know that right?"

He glared at her. "I like those things though." He looked back towards her. "When do we open the presents?"

"When everybody is up," she admitted, hoping he'd leave so she could go back to sleep.

"Good. Then get up." He stood and left her laying on her bed.

Getting out of bed, still in her pj's, and followed Grunt down the hall to the Mess Hall where there was a bunch of commotion going on inside. Ann was leaning against Garrus who was drinking some sort of dextro coffee. When they saw her walk in Ann smirked and waved her over to them. As soon as she was close enough she spoke. "It seems somebody got Grunt very excited about his first Christmas and he refuses to let anybody go to bed until we open presents and eat a Christmas dinner."

"I'm not cooking until later though," she complained. Ann shrugged just as Serena heard an automated throat clear.

Upon turning around everybody began quieting down as Joker stood at the front of the room near the huge pile presents. It would seem that more had been added since Serena had gone to bed. "Everybody shut it!" Jack yelled at those who hadn't heard EDI, of course they shut up afterword. "Speak gimpy."

Joker rolled his eyes at her. "Okay, since Grunt won't let anybody go to bed until we open these gifts, or in most everybody's case, woke you up to unwrap gifts; I'm gonna do this as quickly as possible." he smiled. "So without any further words..." he picked up the first gift and handed it to Legion who threw it at Ann. "Shep your first."

As Ann opened her gift others began to do the same as Legion and Joker handed out presents. Within a half hour all the gifts had been handed out and everybody began opening them. From a new sniper rifle from Ann to Garrus to a new quarian suit to Tali from Anonymous Gifter, which everybody was guessing was Legion. Jacob got Miranda a new omni-tool with an omni-knife attachment. Thane got a new set of knives from Kelly, who got what was suppose to be a gag gift but took it as a real one. It was a STD checker with two boxes of condoms and two different dildos, which got quite a few snorts. She got that from Zaeed, who winked at her and got her to giggle. Ken got Gabby a heart necklace and she got him a new instrument for engineering.

Joker hobbled over to Serena and handed her a box. She opened it and smirked. It was a holo picture frame with their images on it from the club. Standing she walked over to the tree and picked up Joker's gift and handed him the box. Upon opening it up he smirked and took out one of two hats. Taking the old SR hat off he replaced it with a Christmas stocking. The second hat was an exact replica of the old SSV Normandy hat he used to wear. "Pick it up," she said pointing at the hat. Doing so he saw a tiny model ship of the SSV Normandy. "Thought you'd like that."

Looking up at her he smiled. "Love it."

It was then that everybody heard Grunt yell out in victory. "Shepard!" he yelled lifting up a brand new heavily modded shotgun. "Thank-you Battlemaster!" he laughed happily, which caused everybody to laugh and begin opening their other gifts.

By noontime, most of the night shift was in bed or heavily drinking coffee in order stay awake and hear a story or two from Zaeed or watching a vid from earth about Christmas. So by noon both Serena and Sergeant Gardner had brought out Christmas Lunch/Dinner. "Who cooked?" Garrus inquired as Ann took a bite of meat.

"Serena," she stated. "There's dextro food up there too."

It only took Tali and Garrus a second before they rush up to the buffet style dinner table. Serena handed Tali a specially made dinner plate that had been vacuum sealed as it cooked so nothing could get into the food and harm the quarian's immune system.

In the end both the Christmas dinner and the gifting had gone off without a hitch. While everybody was currently happy and full of glee, there was one person in the room who was dreading what tomorrow would bring. Ann Shepard had told Joker to begin the Reaper IFF testing tomorrow. She didn't know what would happen, but she wanted everybody to have one day of happiness before they ran into the suicide mission that would either kill them all or they'd save a lot of people.

Whether fate thought it would be funny to send a twist in the story that would be forever talked about for generations, nobody would know; but nobody would expect the twists and turns this story would take...nobody, not even fate. So for one day fate and her accomplices stayed quiet. They let the story that would be forever changed, stay in peace. If only for one day.

M-Angel: Well that it for the Christmas Special everybody. Have a Very Merry Christmas!

xoxoangii: Merry Christmas to you all!