Christmas Market

Christmas Market
(Oolong Tea: Two)
15 December 2016
Anchorage, AK, United States
Raleigh spins in a circle as Yancy sips his hot cocoa from a mug. The annual Alaskan Christmas Market is finally up in Anchorage and the lights are glowing. He breathes out the icy air with a happy sigh at the displays. Raleigh snags his hot cocoa from his brother and they drink together, leaning on each other with soft smiles. A slightly familiar face wanders by looking a little sad and more than a little lost. Raleigh nudges Yancy and points out the LOCCENT cadet.
"Wanna go keep him company?"
"Not like we have anything else to do, Rals." Yancy chuckles softly as Tendo stops in front of a stall with a look of nostalgia firmly in place. "Let's go say hello."
"Hey." Raleigh brushes against Tendo and the San Fran native jumps a little. "How's the head?"
"Much better. What is all of this?" Tendo asks, his body language more open than the man knows.
"A Christmas Market. Rals and I have been doing this since we were kids. Rals was wondering if maybe you'd like to see the good stuff instead of the tourist traps?" Yancy offers as Tendo glances at the tiny painting of the Golden Gate Bridge before Trespasser. He flicks his fingers at Raleigh and he nods as he steers Tendo away.
"Okay, first we gotta get you a good strong cup of either coffee or cocoa. You want coffee?" he asks as Yancy bargains for the miniature portrait.
"It's not that crap they that pretend is coffee, right?" Tendo's sharp enough to belong in LOCCENT, that's for sure.
"Trust me, this is the good stuff. Colombian and they get it from their daughter who lives in country," Raleigh reassures Tendo as he turns to the couple. “This one's a coffee buff,” he rattles off in rapid-fire Portuguese mixed with a bit of Colombian Spanish.
“Ah. We can help with that. How many packages?” The man assesses Tendo carefully but Raleigh knows that it's the wife who makes the deals.
"They asked how many packages you want. They're about yea big and that wide." Raleigh gestures with his hands to convey a decent sized package.
"I drink a lot in a day." The wife of the pair laughs as Raleigh translates and pulls out the thickest packages he's seen to date. "Wow."
"She says for a fellow coffee buff, you get half off. It's, uh, about thirty-five but she's willing to haggle."
"Twenty-eight."
"Thirty-two."
"Thirty and that's my final offer."
She grins and takes the money with a happy, toothless grin. The man silently hands Tendo a cup of coffee as they leave.
"Oh man. This is beautiful. So happy right now. Can I keep you, brother?"
"I'm willing to be friends." Raleigh laughs as he meets up with Yancy at the shooting booth. "You play?"
"In this weather? Nah. You go ahead." Tendo's shivering slightly even with the scalding coffee well in hand.
Raleigh digs around in his pocket, making a triumphant noise when he finds the green scarf. He wraps it around Tendo's neck, fluffs up the front to shield the man's face and asks, "Is that better?"
"Much. Now I know why you wear your scarves like that." Tendo answers after taking a sip of his coffee. "That is some damn good coffee, Becket."
"Raleigh or Rals. Yancy'll pretty much answer to just about everything including 'hey you.'"
"Rals, quit talking shit behind my back. Tryin' ta concentrate here," Yancy fires back as he steadies the tiny pellet gun. The shots are accurate since they've had a lot of practice over the years of rigged games. "Yes!"
"You've successfully shot three out of five. Which prize would you like?"
"That one." Yancy points out a Reckoner plushie that both brothers know is for Tendo. "Thanks."
"On a date?"
"Nope. My brother and a friend." Yancy rolls his eyes at the vendor and hands the plushie straight to Tendo.
The man looks down at it, looks at Yancy (who's already moved on to the next game) and then at Raleigh in confusion. "Does he do that a lot?"
"Yeah. You get used to it after a while. We're pretty affectionate but keep our hugs to a minimum unless you'd appreciate them," he hums as Yancy hands off his next prize to a tiny little girl who squeals in joy at the Tacit Ronin mini-plush.
"Oh. How often does he win?"
"You'd think the vendors would quit rigging the games because Yancy knows all the tricks, but they never do." Raleigh laughs as the next one is a Hardship action figure. That one gets handed off to a grumpy-looking teen who brightens a little at the figurine. "He does this every year."
"What, plays six-foot-tall Santa?"
"Yup."
"Huh. Guess you're more than pretty faces and pilot hopefuls." Tendo's raised eyebrow makes him laugh.
"Doesn't everyone have a mask?" he murmurs back as Yancy's collection of prizes continue to be handed off to complete strangers with a brilliant smile. Raleigh hasn't seen his brother like this since before their Mom died.
"Never thought about it that way, brother."
"If we showed the world we were as smart as a good third of the interns in the K-Sci division ... Well, heroes aren't meant to be really smart." Raleigh taps his head with a self-deprecating smile and accepts Yancy's hug while arranging himself to loop his arm around his brother's shoulder. «You feeling good, Yan?» he hums in French as he gently ruffles the back of Yancy's hair that's growing a little shaggier than his brother normally likes it.
"Yeah. It feels like maybe I can have fun even with Maman gone. Thanks for dragging me out here, Rals." Yancy smiles softly as he takes in the sight of Tendo looking at the lights with the Reckoner plushie pulled tight to his chest and the mug still steaming from the coffee.
"Don't have ta thank me Yan. I wanted to do it. Let's go take care of Choi, yeah?"
Category:Ficlet
Category:Pages in need of tags
Category:Tendo
Category:Yancy
Category:Raleigh
Category:Tendo (ficlet)
Category:Yancy (ficlet)
Category:Raleigh (ficlet)
Category:Oolong Tea
Category:Tea Lovers Association storyline