Hey, look, there's also a COT Short Story Christmas themed contest! I think I'll enter! I think I'll write a 6 thousand word story. Great!

So yep, my story, despite the title, doesn't focus on Christmas too much... mostly at the beginning and end. But it's there! I took a lot of inspiration from various Sci Fi shows, but the two that were most influential were Firefly and Titan IE. I got the kind-of intergalactic government system from Firefly (although mine is less like the Alliance and more like the UN). And the big thing from Titan IE was just the idea that vibrant communities could live on space stations. And there were various other references (even a Bionicle one... I stole a line from Pohatu, although it wasn't too original so maybe it shouldn't count.) However, the big thing I thought up on my own was the aliens: that came from studying for my Biology class, and reading about these cool plant / bacteria symbiotes, so I decided to come up with one of my own.

The story ended up being quite long because I wanted to throw in a lot of actiony stuff with all the basic plots, leave room for some morals and character development, and have a good amount of witty dialogue. I thought it had a good flow to it, but so far the people I've asked to read it have refused to do so, so I don't have any other opinions on it. You know what you could do? You could read it and give me a quick review. I'd like that very much!

Story Topic can be found here. It is in COT, so I expect that when I wake up tomorrow, it'll be in three pages deep, so this one link may be the only way for people to get to it.

Anyway, that's all, thanks for reading!