#bram writes

           It was hard to call it snowfall.  Certainly the little flecks involved drops of water that had frozen high in the sky, only to drift down to the planet’s surface.  That fact was difficult to deny that, considering they fell all around her, but the redheaded girl sitting on a cardboard box in a back alley of a bustling city eyed them dubiously.  Each “flake” smacked against its final destination with its own cold, wet splat, scattering grey brown slush on impact.  She wrinkled her nose, then jumped as one managed to fall on the back of her neck.  Shivering, the young woman pulled her raggedly patched coat closer around herself. A deep breath slipped through her lips, bursting into the frigid air as a cloud of wispy white, quickly being pulled away in the wind.

           “Curt!  When was Finch supposed to meet us here, anyway?” She said abruptly, turning her scowl on a slightly younger boy sitting in one of the only dry spots in the alley. He jumped at her words, fumbling the cigarette, hissing as he caught it by the lit end and shoving his fingers in his mouth.

           “I told you,” he mumbled past his hand, “It’s Cut, not Curt.”  The girl raised an eyebrow, staring at the younger boy, his cheeks red from the cold.  A woolen cap shoved over his long, stringy brown hair, and carefully groomed peach fuzz covered his cheeks in a false approximation for a grizzled beard.

           “Right,” she said, rolling her eyes.  “Cut it is.  When’s he supposed to get here?”

           Cut sucked at his cigarette, turning a slight shade of green.  “Said sometime past nine,” he wheezed, barely managing not to cough.  The girl scowled and pulled back a sleeve to examine the time on a little plastic watch strapped to her wrist.  It was covered in pink designs and white, cartoonish flowers, but it was accurate.

           Cut eyed her.  “Dunno what you’re so fussed about.  He’ll be here when he gets here.  Finch always pull through, yanno.”

           “It’s half past, already,” the redhead said, sniffing and rubbing at her nose before scowling in the direction of the street.  Even as flushed as Cut’s cheeks were, chances were her own were an even brighter red considering her pale skin.  Sometimes the others would joke that her nose could rival even Rudolph’s, to which they usually got a punch in the ribs in return.

           “He’ll be here!” Cut insisted.  “Finch always pulls through!”

           “Damn right I do,” a voice called from the mouth of the alley.  Cut jumped again, and the redhead turned to find a young man, her own age, leaning against the brick wall theatrically.  He glanced up, flashing white teeth, his short, dark hair gelled to spike up at the fringe of his bangs in a waxy way, a lean leather jacket draped over his shoulders.  “Speak of the devil, and oh does he arrive.”

           “Finch!” Cut yelped happily, clambering to his feet, reminding the redhead of a young puppy greeting its owner.

           The girl rolled her eyes.  “Other people are supposed to say that, not you,” she said, scathingly.

           “Really?” Finch asked, sauntering forward, the smarmy grin still plastered on his face.  “Well guess I beat them to the draw, then.”

           “Also it’s not nearly as impressive when you’re half an hour late.”

           “Haven’t you heard, love? Bein’ late is fashionable now, innit?”

           The redhead was about to make a scathing retort, when she was interrupted by Cut exclaiming excitedly.  “Woah! Shep, you gotta lookit this!” He said, dropping the cigarette as he stared at something in Finch’s leather jacket. Shep leaned closer, and her eyes widened as she recognized the metallic handle.

           “Where’d you get THAT?”  She asked. Finch glanced at her warily, pulling the jacket over the object, then grinned again and held it open for her to see.

           “A magician never reveals his tricks.”

           Cut reached out to touch it.  “Is that a-“ He stammered to a halt as Finch jumped back, the pistol in his hand faster than Cut could blink, pointed directly at the younger boy’s forehead. “Karpov eight,” Cut finished, near breathless as he stared down the barrel of the gun.  Finch gave a shaky laugh and lifted the gun away, taking his finger off the trigger.

           “Course it is,” he said, holstering the weapon, his hands visibly shaking. He glanced at Shep, who stared daggers at him, before looking away once more.

           “Finch, I think we need to talk,” Shep said, but he waved her off.

           “Nawh, we cool.  It’s all cool.  Well? What are we waiting for?  I’ve got our mark, and we’ve wasted enough time as it is!”

           “Yeah…  True! We should get going!” Cut said, shaking off what had just happened and following after Finch.

           Shep watched the other two walk out of the alley, before sighing.  She stood and followed after them, pointedly ignoring the voice in her ear telling her it was a bad idea.

 ---------------

             “Honestly, I simply don’t understand how anyone can be this rude!” A salarian with green-brown skin complained.  A woolen cap had been shoved over his horns, and a large scarf wrapped around his neck, covering his chin.  He flipped open a bright gold fogwatch and glanced at it briefly before stowing it back in his thick coat.  “We waited an hour for our food, standing out in the cold no less, only to be told they were out of what we ordered?  I swear, it’s as if this entire planet is conspiring to make me miserable.”

           “Come now, Serkan,” his companion, a human man with dark skin and short cropped hair, said in a placating tone.  “It’s Christmas.  It’s unsurprising they may have run out of a few ingredients.  Especially considering how busy they were.  We’ll just stop by a street vendor and get something to eat there.”

           “Oh yes, Christmas.  Your human tradition of celebrating a religious figure by marketing savage holidays and dressing up old fat men in red suits.  I can certainly see the appeal,” Serkan said with a sneer.

           “It’s not unlike your own Betau, you know.  It’s a celebration of togetherness, along with the knowledge that winter is halfway over, and involves a tradition of exchanging gifts. The religious aspect is more for show.”

           Serkan waved his companion off.  “I’ve done my research, I know what it is.”

           “Well I’ve always found it nostalgic,” the human said, a wistful look in his eye.  “I was born here, you know.  I make a point of trying to come back at the end of every Earth year, at least for a little while, and enjoying the festive air.”

           The salarian flicked a flake of slush, tinged ashen brown by the polluted cloud cover, off of his shoulder.  “I wouldn’t quite describe it as such, myself,” he said, upper lip lifted at the side.

           The human gave his companion an exasperated look.  “What would you call it, then?”

           “Dank and dreary come to the forefront of my mind.  Which, I might add, is somewhat wasted on such thoughts!”

           “I imagine your planet is home to some of the most wonderful poets, Serkan,” the man replied, sarcastically.

           “As a matter of course, it is.  Artists of every pedigree, in fact!  Why, there was once an artist who calculated a system to generate the most aesthetically appealing patterns to the salarian eye!  The works of Kanlik Gofvin have always been highly sought after.  Why?”

           “Simply that the experience must be rapturous.”

           Serkan scowled.  “So many words in the English language that harken back to religious connotations. It hardly seems logical that so many of you humans seem so far removed from it,” he complained, as his companion rolled his eyes.

           “I hardly think religion is so foreign a concept to your own people, Serkan,” he said.  “What of that group that worships the crater goddess?”

           Serkan’s eyes boggled and he snorted.  “Those cultists?  Honestly, Anderson, sometimes I wonder at your ignorance.”

           Anderson held up his hands defensively.  “Sorry.  I simply remembered hearing about them in a passing conversation.  Still, you can’t tell me you don’t practice some form of belief.”

           “What need have I for beliefs when I have the ability to know?  I know that two plus two is four, and four times five is twenty.  I know that a stomach produces acidic liquids in order to break down foods into their more base nutrients, which are then taken in to fuel the body.  I know that an object in motion wants to stay in motion, and an object at rest wants to stay at rest.  And what I don’t know, I seek to learn about further, in order that I can make theories that can either be proven or disproven, furthering my knowledge.”

           “And what of your concept of reincarnation?  Don’t many of your species hold that in some regard?” Anderson asked, genuinely curious now. “I would expect that involves some form of belief.”

           Serkan shrugged.  “Perhaps by some definitions of the word, and certainly to many of my kind.  To me, however, it still comes back to knowledge. When I die, I will return to the earth of whatever place I happen to land on.  I shall decompose, fueling any organisms that happen to use my body as food. Through that, I become a part of them, and they will eventually become a part of something else, and so on and so forth,” the two of them stepped to the side to let a girl pushing a stroller past, the child inside gurgling happily.  A twinkle sparked in Serkan’s eye, and Anderson brought his hand to his mouth to cover a smile as the salarian continued.  “Eventually some part of the fuel I provided may move on to a sentient being as well!  And as such, I am reincarnated,” Serkan finished simply, shrugging as the two of them turned back to their walk.

           Something slammed into Anderson, and he blinked in surprise to find a young back stumble back, parcels scattering around him.

           “Sorry, sorry!” He cried, falling to his knees and frantically scooping up the boxes he had dropped.  “Oh no, oh no no!  I hope nothing broke.”

           “It’s alright, son,” Anderson said quickly, cutting off a snide remark he knew would be coming from Serkan and kneeling down to help gather the packages, wrapped in brightly colored paper.

           “Anderson, stop fooling around and leave the boy to clean up his own clumsy mistake,” Serkan said, annoyance in his tone.  “I’m cold enough as it is!”

           “It was my mistake as well, Serkan,” Anderson said, shooting the boy an apologetic wink, noting his ragged clothes and unshaven peach fuzz.  With the last parcel wrangled back into the boy’s grip, forming a tall tower that he could barely see around, the two straightened. “Try to keep an eye open in the future,” Anderson said, and the boy nodded, looking worriedly past him.

           “Thank you sir!  And Merry Christmas,” the boy said, hurrying past as Serkan rolled his eyes.

           “Merry Christmas,” Anderson called after him, before turning back to his salarian companion.  “You still have that tracking app on your phone, don’t you?”

           “Yes?” Serkan raised an eyebrow.

           “Good,” Anderson said, pulling out his own and tapping at the holo-screen. “I’ll need the code for it.”

 ---------------

             “What a haul!” Finch exclaimed, holding a credit chip in the air and examining it closely.  The three of them stood in the alley from before, going over the loot they’d managed to score off the man and salarian.  Cut sat back on his dry patch, sucking on a piece of hard candy and tapping at an older piece of cellular tech, while Shep stood to the side, examining a pile of other miscellaneous goods.

           “Man this guy has a sweet tooth,” she remarked, brushing aside empty wrappers, before lifting up a tangle of gold chained necklaces.  “And a thing for jewelry,” she glanced at Finch, who was chewing idly at the corner of the chip.  “I’m surprised you managed to grab all of that so quickly.”