(A/N: this is a Christmas chapter, and has no connection to the Canon story time-line)
Ahri yawned as she got off the bed in her and Grey's room. She got off the bed and started walking towards the bathroom to take a shower.
However, she froze when she passed by the window. The Nine Tailed Vastaya rubbed her eyes to clear them from sleep and then eagerly pressed her head on the window.
Outside the Institute, snow was falling in tiny flakes. A large smile covered Ahri's face as she immediately realized what that means.
Turning around towards the bed, Ahri screamed, "It's Snowdown!" just as she jumped on the bed. Suddenly, Grey sprung up, grabbed Ahri, and pinned her down with his hand on her throat. Ahri looked surprised before her usual teasing smile appeared. "Well, if you want to continue last night, I guess we can stay in bed for a while."
Grey blushed and let his lover go. "Ahri, why did you jump on the bed like that?" he asked.
"Because it's Snowdown!" Ahri cried out, only raising Grey's confusion. Before he can ask anymore questions, she got off the bed. "Come on! Let's go see the decorations that people must be preparing!"
Ahri ran out of the room. Entering the living room, she saw Silver sleeping on the coffee table of the couch. She immediately headed towards the door to Nidalee's room, and began knocking loudly.
"Nidalee! Wake up!" she yelled, still knocking on the door.
A loud growl was heard from the other side of the door. "Ahri, if you don't shut up, I swear that I'll literally shove my spear up your-"
"It's Snowdown!"
"Wait, what!?" whatever threat Nidalee wanted to say was immediately forgotten as Ahri informed her.
There was some shuffling around and Nidalee came out of her room. She still had bed-hair, and her clothes were a mess, but she didn't seem to care as she went to the window of the living room and saw the snow falling.
Nidalee screamed in joy, turned to Ahri, and hugged her, both of them laughing as they spun around. Silver woke up, looked at them, and tilted his head in confusion.
"Let's get ready quickly!" Ahri said as she and the Huntress stopped spinning. "We don't want to miss the decorations!"
"I'll get ready right now!" Nidalee said before running back into her room. Ahri did the same, passing by Grey, who was watching the whole time.
The Abyss Watcher kept getting more and more confused. He looked at Silver who was stretching. "I don't suppose you know what 'Snowdown' is, do you?"
Silver responded to the question just by tilting his head, showing that he was also confused by the situation. Grey chuckled and rubbed the little pup's head.
Time skip: (Brought to you by Chibi Ahri and Chibi Grey putting up Snowdown(Christmas) decorations.)
Grey was following Ahri and Nidalee who seemed pretty excited through the halls. "I can't believe we forgot Snowdown was coming," the fox Vastaya said.
"I know what you mean. How could we forget this?" Nidalee asked herself, shaking her head.
"Can you two please explain Snowdown to me?" both Ahri and Nidalee stopped and looked at Grey in shock.
"How can you not know Snowdown?!" both of them yelled out in shock.
"Probably because I'm not from Runeterra," he reminded them with a deadpan look.
Both his roommates blushed in embarrassment at remembering that. "Oh, right," Ahri scratched the back of her head while Nidalee cleared her throat. "Well, Snowdown is-"
"Why the f*ck is everyone so noisy today?" Tiara cut them off, walking towards them with an agitated look on her face. "I woke up with the sound of idiots running around," she groaned motioning to the summoners that were currently running around the halls.
"Yeah, why does everyone look so excited?" Brite asked, coming over with Solas at his side. "And did anyone see Aki today?"
Ahri shook her head. "No, I don't think so. And as for why everyone is excited, it's because it's Snowdown," she explained.
"What's Snowdown?" the three new arrivals all asked at the same time.
"Snowdown is a celebration," Ahri started explaining as she started walking, the others following her close by. "It's a time of happiness, joy, partying, forgetting grudges, and the most important part, presents!"
"Everyone, and I mean absolutely everyone loves Snowdown," Nidalee added, taking over the explanation. "All of Runeterra celebrities it. People just don't argue, get along, and party. Even animals don't hurt each other today."
"That's a little hard to believe," Solas commented. The idea that everyone on Runeterra would just forget their grudges all in one day seemed too good to be true.
Ahri looked at him with a smile. "Just look," she said opening the doors of the cafeteria... And the eyes of the four people from another world widen in shock.
The entire cafeteria was covered in blue, green, and red decorations. There were several pine-trees around, all covered in sparkling accessories. However, what was most shocking was the champions.
The champions of different regions were all celebrating together.
Darius and Garen were dancing together, kicking their legs up high with their arms around each other's shoulders.
Ivern and Maoki were having Lulu, Tristana, and Teemo put decorations up on them while standing on each other to reach the two tall nature champions.
Yasuo and Yone were playing music together for everyone, actually using cheerful music instead of their usual sad one.
Braum was setting on a large chair, wearing a red pointy hat and was apparently reading a story to the younger champions.
Morgana and Pantheon were at the area where the food is, apparently baking cookies and cakes for everyone, with both Diana and Leona helping them.
Zed and Shen were actually working together to help spread the decorations around. Zed's shadows clones were dealing with the trees, while Shen was turning on the lights of each one that was finished.
Jhin was making a big painting of a fire place with presents around it on the side with Firora actually helping him around.
"Wow, this is..." Grey started, but couldn't find the right word.
"Amazing?" Ahri suggested and her lover just nodded.
"I honestly did not think this place can get any weirder," Tiara commented, shaking her head.
"It's not weird, it's just Snowdown," Nidalee said before seeing Neeko wave towards her. "Well, I got to go see Neeko. I'll see you guys after the presents, okay?" with that, she walked away towards her friend.
"Presents? What presents?" Brite asked as he and the other turned to Ahri.
"Oh, right. You're supposed to share presents with people on this day. Only people you care about though, so you don't have to share with everyone," the Nine Tailed Vastayan explained.
"Shouldn't everyone be shopping then?" Grey asked, confused on why they were basically wasting time.
"We have plenty of time for that later," Ahri waved off his worries. "Snowdown has absolutely everything, and the shops are mostly opened for most of the day and are run by magical golems so nobody has to work to relax."
"Well, I still think we should get something," Grey suggested.
"Later, right now, let's go to the garden," Ahri grabbed Grey's arm and immediately began pulling him.
Solas followed the because he wanted to check on Storm in the snow. Brite looked at Tiara, and she just shrugged her shoulders, showing that she had nothing better to do so they followed them.
When they reached the garden, the usual green scenery was now white as it was all covered in snow. Tiny snow flakes would drop from the garden's open ceiling.
"Ah, I love the snow!" Ahri sighed happily, not bothered by the cold weather as she took a deep breath.
"Finally, something we agree on," Tiara commented as she walked to a pile of snow, turned around, and fell backwards until she landed on it.
"Wait, really?" Ahri couldn't stop her surprise from showing.
"Yup. The Boreal Valley always had snow falling in it. It feels just like home," the Dancer replied before looking at Ahri with a raised eyebrow from her spot on the ground. "And what about you? Why do you like it?"
"I was raised in a pack of ice foxes," Ahri answered with a shrug. "We traveled in the snow a lot, and I guess it grew on me."
Grey let Silver down and the pup immediately began jumping around in the snow. Solas went to find his dragon, which he did.
Storm was sitting on the side of the garden near one of the walls. It was laying down, taking deep breaths and letting out a large puff of steam every few seconds.
"I hope the cold isn't bothering you, old friend," Solas said as he rubbed the head of the dragon.
Storm groaned and slightly moved his wings, showing that he was using his thick feathers to cover himself from the cold.
"I suppose you'll be spending your time sleeping until it gets warmer?" the Dragon nodded at Solas' question. "Very well. I'll check on you when I can."
Meanwhile, Ahri was walking around, spinning in her place to look at all the falling snow. Grey was following her with a smile at her enthusiasm.
Ahri then saw a big pile of snow, she took a couple of step backs while Grey looked at her curiously. He was absolutely surprised when Ahri skipped a few times to towards the pile before suddenly jumping and diving head first into it.
Ahri used her feet to pull her upper body out, which was buried in the snow. When she came out, she had some snow on her head between her ears.
Ahri chuckled as she shook the snow off her head. "Ah, I missed this so much," she said before looking at Grey. "What about you? Did you have any celebrations in your world?"
The Abyss Watcher shook his head. "No, not really. The only anniversary we had in our entire world is the time for fire linking, and no one actually celebrated that," he answered.
"That sounds boring," Ahri commented. She then got a mischievous smile. "Hey, Grey, did you ever have a snowball fight?" her lover shook his head. She grabbed some snow, and started making a ball. "Well, first, you make a ball of snow like this, then you throw it... Like this!"
The Nine Tailed Vastayan suddenly threw her snowball at the Abyss Watcher, but he easily dodged it, having already seen through her plan.
"I kind of figured after you said 'fight' and started making a ball," Grey confessed as Ahri gave him a deadpan glare, angry that her little plan didn't work.
However, suddenly, Grey was hit by a snowball in the back of the head. "That's for throwing that snowball at me!" Tiara cried out from behind him.
Grey turned to look at his sister. "That wasn't me, that was-" he was stopped as another snowball struck the back of his head.
The Abyss Watcher looked back around with a deadpan look at Ahri, who innocently pointed at Silver, placing the blame on the wolf pup as it gave her a surprised look.
Grey smiled, knelt down, picked some snow, and threw at Ahri, who immediately moved out of the way from the strike.
"Ha! You'll have to do better than that to-" Ahri's gloating was stopped when a large snowball struck her in the back of the head.
"We got you!" the Nine Tailed Vastayan dug her head out of the snow and looked back to see Annie standing there with Tibbers at her side. She was wearing a winter coat and a large puffy hat.
Ahri gave a challenging mile. "Oh, you're going to get it now," she said as she picked up another snowball. Annie laughed as Tibbers picked her up and began running away. "Get back here!"
The Abyss Watcher just looked on from the side as Ahri began following the little girl, sat down on a pile of snow and just watched them. Silver walked towards him, shook off the snow off itself, and hid under his cape, obviously trying to avoid the cold.
Time Skip: (Brought to you by chibi Ahri and chibi Grey building a snowman.)
"I can't believe I lost that war," Ahri complained as she was getting the snow out of her hair. "You should have helped me," she said to Grey.
"That wouldn't have been fair for Annie, even if she had Tibbers with her," the Abyss Watcher replied.
They were currently all walking towards the exit of the Institute in order to go and buy presents. That's when Aki started approaching.
"Hey, everyone," the shy summoner greeted.
"Hey, Aki," Ahri returned the greeting. "where have you been all day?"
"We summoners need to finish all of our work before we can have our days off for Snowdown, so I was making sure I was done," Aki answered, also explaining why most summoners all seemed to be in a huge hurry most of the morning.
"We're going to buy presents, would you like to join us?" Brite asked.
"Sure," the shy summoner agreed as they all continued walking towards the exit and out of the Institute.
Once they made it to the bottom of the stairs, Ahri turned and looked at everyone. "Alright, let's split up."
"Why?" Tiara asked, confused on why they came together only to split up.
"Because the presents are meant to be a surprise," the four people from another world still looked confused. Ahri sighed, realizing she'll have to explain a lot more. "The presents are all covered in a special decoration that hides what they are. You're not supposed to open or find out what your presents are before midnight. It's... Tradition, I guess you can say."
"So, how many presents are we supposed to buy?" Solas asked.
The Nine Tailed Vastayan shrugged her shoulders. "As many as you want. You're supposed to give one to your most important people. No one actually expects anyone to get presents for everyone they know."
"So, we go, get presents, make sure they're a secret, and then what?" Brite asked.
"After that we'll meet up back in the Institute. There's a big feast tonight. We put the presents under one of the trees we saw in the dining hall. After the party is over and midnight comes, everyone gets to open their presents," Ahri explained in details.
"This tradition is weird," Tiara shook her head with a sigh. "Can't say I didn't see weirder though. Alright, so let's go get some presents."
With that, the group all entered the city before splitting off, each going into their own direction and started counting for the people they'll get presents for and what they would like.
Time skip: (brought to you by chibi Ahri and chibi Grey carrying a Christmas present together before chibi Silver suddenly popped out from the inside.)
A few hours later, when the sun began setting, the group met back together and were now walking up the stairs to the Institute. Each one of them was carrying a few bags.
"So, what is the point of the feast?" Grey decided to ask, believing there was a bigger meaning than just food.
"It's part of celebration. You have a nice meal and get to spend time with your friends and family," Ahri replied as they entered the Institute. "The feast begins after the sun sets, and it ends at midnight when we get to open the presents."
"So, just like that?" Tiara asked with a confused look. "All this friendship and happiness just disappears and everyone is at each other's throats again tomorrow?"
Ahri shrugged her shoulders. "Pretty much. Though, it will be more peaceful than normal for the next few days. Snowdown really leaves an impression on people."
"I like this tradition," Brite confessed. "It's so nice for people to just get along. Even if it's just for once."
They all entered the dining hall to see that the decorations were finished. Several other champions were preparing food with Pantheon and Morgana, while several others were preparing the tables.
Everyone decided to find a tree and put the presents there. All of the presents were covered in Snowdon themed wrapping paper.
It wasn't long after that when the sun finally set and the food began being delivered to the tables. Most champions sat down with others from their region, but some still sat down with others who weren't.
Ahri, after returning from setting up the presents, sat down with Aki, Brite and Solas, and was joined by Annie, who had a plate of cookies that Braum gave her.
"Hey, where's Grey and Tiara?" Ahri asked noticing the the siblings weren't either with them or setting up the presents.
"They needed to take care of something together," Brite replied, trying one of the cookies that Annie brought. "Don't worry. They'll come. Just give them a moment."
Ahri shrugged her shoulders, deciding to trust the Warrior of Sunlight since he knew them longer than she did, but she was still curious on what they were doing.
Meanwhile, Tiara was sitting on top of the stairs of the Institute, looking over the city as the lights shined brightly. The usual guards that stood at the door were gone for their Snowdown break.
"You don't get to see lights like these in our world," Grey commented as he walked up to her from behind before sitting beside her. He had two cups of steaming tea and he gave one to his sister.
The Dancer scoffed as she looked at her drink. "There was definitely cities covered in light, but those were all because they were burning," she said.
The Abyss Watcher nodded. "I know... I burned a few myself... This world is... Different. But, not the bad kind of different."
Tiara chuckled. "I can't argue with that," she replied as she took a sib of her warm drink.
They simply sat in silence, enjoying their drink while looking at the lights from the city. Tiny snowflakes would fall from the sky but both of them ignored that.
"Do you think he would have loved it here?" the Abyss Watcher asked.
"You mean Ghear?" Tiara scoffed and shook her head. "That senile old man would probably jump from his wheelchair dancing out of joy here... But he'd probably get bored fast."
Grey chuckled. "Yeah... I guess he would be bored without anything to hunt," he said before finishing his drink. "I'm glad you're here," he confessed.
"Yeah, I'm glad you're here too," Tiara admitted before standing up. "Come on, let's go back before all the food is gone. I wanna try some of this 'Snowdown' cakes Ahri has been so crazy about."
The Abyss Watcher chuckled and finished his own drink before standing up. He and his sister both went back inside the Institute and headed to the party at the dining hall.
When they got there, it seemed like people were already partying.
The entire place was lit by the decorations that were put up today. Each tree had an actual miniature star floating on top of it instead of a normal decorative one, courtesy of Aurelion Sol.
Solas was in an arm wrestling game with Aatrox, with many champions watching to see who would win. Varus and Rhaast were behind the Darkin Blade, cheering him while Brite and Leona were behind Solas.
Akali, Katarina, Talon, Draven, and a few other servants that throw blades were having a dart shooting competition, which Tiara went to join.
They weren't the only one with a game. In another part of the hall, Twisted Fate, Evelynn, Rakan, and Xayah were having a dancing competition, the first two in a team and the latter two in one.
There was also Blitzcranck and Oriana dancing, but they appeared to be doing it for fun. It was amusing and sweet to see Blitzcranck's rough movement somehow keeping up with Oriana's fluent one.
Gragas was giving out drinks. One of the surprising things to see was Nasus and Renekton, drinking together and laughing with hands around each other's shoulders, like the brothers they used to be so long ago.
Jinx and Vi were surprisingly playing together, Jinx was riding a miniature train with Vi riding with her, throwing glitter around on the trees.
Grey found Ahri with Silver sitting on her lap watching over what appeared to be an ice sculpture contest that was made up Jhin, Camille, Taliyah, and surprisingly Annie who was using her powers to make the sculpture.
"Oh, there you are," Ahri said as she saw Grey walk towards her. "Where have you been?"
"Just checking on something with Tiara," Grey replied as he sat down beside her.
Ahri just shrugged and decided to leave it at that, knowing that it was probably something between siblings.
The Nine Tailed Vastayan just leaned on the Abyss Watcher as they both looked over the sculptures being made. They were especially impressed by how accurate the one about Tibbers that Annie was making turned out to be.
Time Skip: (Brought to you by chibi Ahri and chibi Grey kissing under a mistletoe.)
It was now midnight, everyone was opening their presents and cries of joy filled the place.
Brite got two presents, one from Solas and one from Aki. The one from Solas was a new Warriors of Sunlight medallion. The one from Aki was a new cape that has the crest of the Warriors of Sunlight.
Aki got two presents two. One from Ahri and another from Brite. The one from Ahri was beautiful bracelet with a green gem in it. The one from Brite was a scarf with Snowdown themed patterns, one she wore wholeheartedly.
Tiara received a gift from Grey. It was a new veil for her helmet. Solas received a gift from Brite, which was saddle for storm.
Ahri received two gifts, one from Grey and another from Aki. The one from Aki was a new video game console. The one from Grey seemed to be a necklace, but the place where a gem would usually be is empty.
"It's for your gemstones," Grey said, seeing the confused look on his lover's face.
Ahri pulled out her gemstones, snapped them together, and put them on the necklace to see it made a perfect fit. She put the necklace on and gave the Abyss Watcher a kiss. "I love it. Now, your turn."
Grey opened his presents and looked at what he got. He had two gifts. The one from Tiara was a new chew toy for Silver, shaped like a bone, and the Abyss Watcher was obviously happy for his excited wolf pup, who immediately jumped to pick the toy with his teeth as soon as it was thrown at him.
He then opened the present from Ahri. It appeared to be an exact copy of his Abyss Watcher crest, only without the signs of old age. However, he then noticed a small button on the top.
Pressing on the button, the medallion opened to show something that made Grey smile. It was a picture of him and Ahri during the Blood Moon festival.
Grey kissed Ahri and hugged her tightly. "It's amazing. Thank you so much," he said in gratitude.
"Don't mention it," Ahri said returning the hug. "Happy Snowdown, Grey."
"Happy Snowdown, Ahri."
(A/N: Thank you for reading this. Please comment, review, and give me your thoughts on my story.)