Author's Note: This fic was written as part of the December Fic Swap on Aria's Afterlife. The prompt for this was, "The Normandy crew's first Christmas," submitted by JediShy'eJinn25. If you enjoyed it, drop by the Afterlife forum here on FFN!

"Hey, Chief?"

Ashley stopped, two steps away from the elevator, and turned back around. Mentally, she shelved the list of modifications and repairs she had to make to weapons and armor. "Need something, LT?"

Alenko motioned her over, frowning at the terminal in front of him. "You do know I have pretty much zero technical training, right?"

He just stared at her until she rounded the little railing and could see what was on the display. She leaned over his shoulder, skimming the site. "I wanted to know what you think about it, or if there's anyone else you think I should add to this list."

Straightening back up, Ashley looked down at him doubtfully. "You want to ask four aliens to join in for a Secret Santa as part of their first experience with humanity." She shook her head. "Or that the Commander is going to allow it."

"Why wouldn't he?" Kaidan replied. "I mean, despite the missions we've already done, it should help bring everyone closer together, especially getting them to interact a little more with the officers outside the combat squad."

She scrutinized the screen again. "If you've going to include the officers, then Adams should be on there too."

"Whoops." Turning back to the screen, he typed rapidly, another name-filled box adding into the stack. "So why don't you think it'll work?"

She hesitated, unsure how to put it into words. Despite the talk with Commander Shepard, when he'd seemed polite, even sympathetic with her religious views, the fact remained that most people, three decades and more after the First Contact War, viewed genuine religious belief as being about as valid as a flat earth or treatment with leeches. "Well, it's a human holiday, and not one even celebrated by all humans." She shrugged, crossing her arms over her chest. "I can't see Wrex getting into the spirit of decorating a tree, or Tali sitting down to a blended Christmas ham dinner."

Kaidan chuckled. "Maybe, but it's supposed to be a holiday about spending time with friends and family. Besides, with the way our hunt for Saren has been going, I'm sure everyone could use a little present, and we'll be stopping on Noveria the week before. Everyone can get in some last minute shopping while we're there."

She watched as he hit the submit button. "So, now what?"

"In the next couple minutes, everyone gets a message with the rules and who they're supposed to buy for. Barring any combat missions, we exchange gifts on Christmas." He smiled at her, causing her to roll her eyes. "Come on, chief, give it a chance."

"Sure, I'll participate," she called over her shoulder as she walked back to the elevator. "But if I like your gift better, I might steal it!" The elevator door closed on his confused expression. Poor guy has never had to deal with three siblings on Christmas morning, she thought. … what was the third thing I had to do this morning?

She stepped out of the elevator, absently bringing up her omni-tool as it dinged, and glancing at the message. "You have been entered in a Secret Santa for your group, SR-1 Normandy! Your chosen person is Urdnot Wrex. In the next twenty-seven days, purchase a suitable gift for him valued between fifty and one hundred credits, and prepare for your gift exchange on Christmas Morning!"

It took a severe effort of will not to glance over at the hulking krogan, but she managed to restrain the impulse until she reached her workbench, and could study him while pretending to search through one of her parts bins. The red-clad warrior was staring at his omni-tool, scratching the scarred side of his headplate in confusion.

Atop the Mako's cannon, she heard the turian making some kind of choking noise. Glancing over her shoulder at him, he gave her a look she couldn't decipher before closing his omni-tool and glancing towards the elevator. Well, I think that means he didn't draw my name. I hope.

In Medical, both Liara and Chakwas stopped their conversation about possible Prothean medical techniques as their omni-tools dinged. They both read the message, a smile sneaking across Chakwas' face. "What is this Christmas?" Liara asked. "And why do I have to buy a –"

"Stop right there," the doctor admonished. "It is, after all, a secret Santa."

"What is Santa? The extranet calls him a common human mythological figure, but I don't see how I am supposed to fulfill the part of an overweight, hirsute male," the asari continued. "Even with a false beard, I would hardly meet the visual expectation."

Once she had finished giggling, Chakwas put a hand on her shoulder, leading her over to the desk and the larger monitor. "Alright, I think it's time to give you a crash course in the human customs revolving gift giving."

On the bridge, Shepard stared bemusedly at his pilot, who had nearly collapsed in a giggling fit, before looking over to Pressly. "I don't understand him at all," the navigator complained. "You figure it out. I've got to figure out what the hell to buy."

"Are you going to be okay, Joker?" Shepard asked, leaning over the chair, not quite fast enough to read the name before the pilot blanked his display.

"Just fine," he wheezed out. "Just fine." One hand reached up to wipe away tears from his eyes. "Commander, this may prove to be the best Christmas I ever had."

Staring down at him, Shepard blinked several times before opening his mouth for a few seconds. Closing it again, he turned and walked away. What the heck do I get as a gift for a quarian? Reaching the CIC, he stepped up in front of the map, staring blankly at it. Hell, what's an appropriate gift for Christmas, anyway? We never celebrated it on Mindoir.

Somehow, he could tell this was going to be a nice headache feeding into all the difficulties surrounding the hunt for Saren. As he reached for the controls, an indication flashed for an incoming message from Fifth Fleet, which could only mean that Hackett had another problem. Kids on his lawn, or maybe his pizza delivery was more than thirty minutes late.

Tali frowned at her omni-tool, letting extranet searches run as she continued with the calibration of one of the thrust nozzles. She did feel a little smug, figuring that the other aliens were probably utterly lost, but she'd quickly tapped into a few general knowledge sites designed to help people learn about alien cultures. "No, you bosh'tet, that's too far," she chided the computer.

"Problem?" Adams said, approaching.

She shook her head, the human mannerism coming easy to her after just the few months of familiarity. "Just this thrust nozzle being difficult."

He glanced at her calculations and nodded. "Number five has always been a bit sticky, ever since we pulled out. Try dropping the sensitivity on the lateral." She dutifully tapped in commands, watching the performance change. "So, you understand the message?"

She switched displays, and he nodded. "I've found several sites that help explain human customs," she said. "But that doesn't help me figure out what to buy."

"Tell me about it," he groaned.

Four weeks later, the near-dozen of them gathered in the cargo bay. Being Christmas morning, and having just left Noveria feeling slightly upbeat, Shepard had declared a holiday routine on the ship, splitting up the normal shifts in halves and giving everyone an extra six hours off. Most of the crew off-duty were in the mess deck, setting up a screen to start a Blasto marathon.

"Now hold on," Shepard said, raising a hand. "Before this all gets started, just who had the idea of doing a secret Santa in the first place?" Everyone looked at Kaidan as he raised one hand with a sheepish grin. "And here I was expecting the whole idea to be Williams'." He glanced around. "So how do we start this? I nominate Alenko to go first."

"Alright sir. Well, I ended up drawing Garrus." Stepping forward, he handed a package to the turian, and they all watched as he carefully tore the sparkly snowflake paper away to reveal a lens cleaning kit. "For that antique scope on your rifle."

"Heh. It's served me pretty well so far, don't you think?" Setting it aside, Garrus picked up a large, skinny red bag with tissue paper sticking out the top, and handed it to Joker. "I'm sure you'll love this one," he said.

Smirking, Joker yanked the tissue paper away, drawing out a framed drawing of the Normandy. "Dang, where'd you get this?" he asked, fingertips tracing the lines of the ship.

"I know a few people on the Citadel who are good at that kind of thing. One of them owed me a favor. I tried to get you into a Hierarchy flight school first, of course – let you see how a real pilot flies." His mandibles spread in a grin as everyone chuckled, and Joker flipped him off.

"Alright. In that case, Commander, this one is yours," Joker said, reaching under his chair and pulling out a small box. Raising an eyebrow, Shepard carefully peeled back the adhesive on the dark green paper before sliding the box free. "Aw, come on, you're supposed to tear it up! Otherwise it's not really Christmas."

Shaking his head, Shepard opened the box and pulled out a polished crystal sphere. "What am I supposed to do with this, Joker?"

The pilot grinned wider, leaning back. "Got it off the extranet from a site that auctions off salvage. That came off a batarian 'trader' that was involved with Mindoir. Figured, if nothing else, you could hit a batarian with it."

Rolling his eyes, he set aside the fist-sized rock. "Tali, I got this for you." She plucked the envelope from his hand, opening it slowly and pulling out the piece of paper inside. "Like Garrus, I had some favors to pull. Your work on the Normandy has been exemplary, so if nothing else, you can be guaranteed a job in Alliance space now that you are officially an Alliance Engineering Journeyman."

Adams whistled softly, and Alenko nodded. "Those are not easy to get. Took me five years," he said.

"Thank you, Commander," she said, staring at the paper for several seconds before reverently folding it and putting it away. "I ended up getting Liara." The gift she pulled out from beneath her shotgun wasn't quite as pristinely wrapped as the rest, but Liara took it with grave solemnity.

Tearing the paper away almost as neatly as Shepard, she gasped. "My copy of The Prothean Enigma! I wondered where this went. But –"

"Look inside," Tali said. Opening the cover of the expensive, physical tome, Liara nearly dropped it. "I had to spoof a command-level signature," she confessed, glancing nervously at Shepard, "but after paying for the express shipping, I couldn't afford the autograph fee Matriarch Kusala normally charges."

Liara said nothing, just closing the cover and clutching the book to her chest for several moments. Still wordless, she reached down and picked up the box at her feet, handing it over to Doctor Chakwas.

"Now I'm especially glad I stopped you from blurting out that question," she said, taking the box and sliding off the ribbon holding the folded red paper in place. Both eyebrows rose slowly as she revealed a set of hand-carved Thessian wine glasses. "These are amazing, Liara."

"They've been gathering dust in a cabinet at home for as long as I've been alive," she said. "My … Benezia never liked them much, but I thought they were exquisite. This way, I know someone will use them."

Chakwas stepped forward, resting the hand not holding the box on Liara's shoulder. "When we're done here, I have a bottle of Thessian white that would go perfectly in these glasses." Smiling, she stepped back, nodding to Ashley. "I took the liberty of setting your gift on your bench, Chief."

Smiling back, Ashley walked over to the bench, retrieving the box and opening it. She drew out the piece of cloth inside, holding it up towards the group as she looked it over. "Nice," she said, holding it up against her body as she examined the underarmor suit. "This is the new one, with medigel tubes built in, right?"

"Exactly, which means you need to keep up on its maintenance, not that that seems to be a problem for you," Chakwas said.

"Thanks doc, I love it." Grinning, she turned back to her bench, pulling open one of the drawers. "Hey big guy, think fast!" Her arm shot forward as she tossed something towards the krogan, who (with a little biotic assist) managed to catch it.

Reading the text, he burst out laughing. "You had the quad to throw grenades at me?" Wrex held up the box, holding a trio of top-shelf incendiary grenades. "Now these are nice. I'll keep these until we finally catch that crazy turian."

"I can't believe you bought grenades, and then threw them at a krogan as a gift," Shepard said. "I am never going to forget this moment."

"See?" Joker said, giggling again. "Best Christmas ever."

"Alright, so who did Wrex get?" Garrus asked.

The krogan dug into his locker for a moment before handing a datapad to Pressly. "That doesn't exactly have a credit value, but I couldn't figure out what else to get you. It's all the krogan constellations. Had to use a star chart to figure them out, since you can't see the stars anymore thanks to the Shroud."

The navigator's jaw had dropped open as he thumbed through the datapad. "Wrex, I … thank you."

"Don't mention it. Ever," he rumbled.

"I guess that brings us back full circle, since there's only one person left," Shepard said.

Alenko smiled as he reached out, taking the small package from Pressly and tearing open the paper. Inside was a gift chit for an omni-tool store on the Citadel. "You can use that for an upgrade, or maybe get the part you need for that terminal, assuming there's actually anything wrong with it."

Liara glanced around at the group. "So, this is what a human holiday is like?"

All of the humans present, save for Chakwas, started laughing. "Well, this is what one human holiday is like," Joker said.

"It's my favorite one, at least," Ashley said. "It's supposed to be a time to get together with friends and family, exchange gifts, and reflect on the good times that have happened during the past cycle."

Glancing critically at his grenades, Wrex shook his head. "Good thing you're not krogan. They would have thrown them armed."

"Thanks for coming, everyone," Kaidan said, looking around more seriously. "I thought it was a good opportunity for us all to do something nice."

"It was a lovely effort, Alenko," Chakwas said. "Now, I intend to go upstairs and toast to our capture of Saren."

"Hear hear," Joker said. "Oof. Hey Garrus, can you carry this up to the cockpit? I don't want to drop it with my crutches."

"Sure, why not," Garrus said, picking up the frame. "Are you really going to hang it in the cockpit?"

"Well where else am I going to put it? My sleeping pod?" Talking among themselves, everyone but Wrex crowded into the elevator.

Alone in the cargo bay, the krogan pulled the grenades out of the box, staring at them for a moment before chuckling and shoving them into his locker. "Humans," he muttered.