Today's Pic: A shot of lower Hala. As you can see, it's dark and mostly lit by electronic lighting since it's not on the surface of the planet.

---------------------------

  One Hala Day, Vers walked out of her apartment building and tripped and fell face first onto the pavement. Luckily, it wasn't too hard of a fall because the pavement was covered in a sturdy layer of...

"SNOW!!" shouted Vers. She grabbed some and tossed it into the air. "Must've fallen overnight."

She got up and started brushing herself off. She noticed that a small potted bush by the apartment complex's entrance had totally shriveled up and died. It was just a few twigs poking out of a bed of snow now.

"How sad," she commented.

Just then, someone came up behind her and said, "Your hedge needs trimming."

She turned around, already knowing who it was, of course. "Haha, very funny, Yon-Rogg. Did it take you all morning to think of that?"

"Well, considering it's only eight hours after midnight and I've been sleeping for seven of them, and I didn't know it would snow, AND I didn't think all the plants would die overnight...no," he replied. "I came up with it on the spot. I DO have a sense of humor, you know."

She smiled as she secretly did something behind her back. "Yeh, I know. It only really exists because of me, though."

"Don't take so much credit," he said, and turned around to admire the snow swept landscape of early morning upper Hala.

Then it happened...a snowball hit the back of his head.

He whipped around and glared at Vers, who was busy trying and failing to conceal her laughter. "Uhhh...oops. Hand slipped," she giggled.

"Right. It slipped. And that resulted in a snowball being formed and thrown at my head."

She looked around innocently. "Yeah."

He slowly turned away. "Well...in that case..." He turned back with an entire armload of snowballs. They apparently just magically materialized. "Prepare to die!!" he yelled and cannonballed Vers with them.

"YI!" she shouted and ran for cover. She blasted a hole in a large snowbank and dove through it. "You'll never take me alive!" she yelled. She began forming more ammo.

"We'll see!" he shouted back. He lobbed a snowball in a perfect arc and it hit Vers square on the top of her head.

"Oof!" she grumbled, dusting the snow off her hair. "I think I need to up my game."

She quickly assembled a snow catapult and loaded it with snow. Then she covered her ears and fired it. A wall of snow enveloped Yon-Rogg. She peeked over her wall and saw nothing but a ginormous pile of whiteness.

"Uh...Yon? Are you dead?" she cautiously stepped over the wall and approached the snow heap.

But all at once...the snow levitated into the air, lifted by Yon-Rogg's antigravity gauntlets.

"Uh-oh..." Vers said. "HIT THE DECK!"

She dove for cover as Yon-Rogg launched 200 pounds of snow at her. Just as it made contact, they heard a new voice enter the scene.

"Uh, Commander...why are you killing Vers?" It was Att-Lass.

Yon-Rogg stopped and his gauntlets powered down instantly. The remaining snow in the air fell lightly, almost as if was a natural snowfall.

"I'm not killing Vers. What are you talking about?" he asked matter-of-factly.

"Um, well, maybe my eyes are going bad, but I'm pretty sure I saw you pelting Vers with--"

Just then Vers busted out of the snow heap and tackled Att-Lass full on. They smashed into the snow blanket on the ground, and then Vers began to bury him. "Resistance is futile!" she declared.

Just then another voice came in. "Vers! Why are you killing Att-Lass?!" Now that was Minn-Erva.

Vers looked up, slowing down only slightly. "Because," she said. And then continued.

Yon-Rogg pinched the bridge of his nose. "Oi."

Minn-Erva just looked between the two people with a stupefied look on her face. "I...don't really want to know."

Just then a snowball hit her in the back of head. Her eyes widened. "VERS!!"

Yon-Rogg started glancing around, like maybe now was a good time to make his escape.

"I didn't do anything!!" Vers defended. "Can't you see I'm still burying Att-Lass?"

"H-help...meee..." came a muffled groan from under the snow. A bluer-than-normal hand rose shakily from it.

"STAY DOWN!!" yelled Vers and slapped more snow on top.

Minn-Erva was busy fuming, so much so that the snow on her head melted and her hair became wet.

Just then Korath walked up beside her. "I enjoy snow."

"OH REALLY, NO??" she growled.

"Yes. That is why I threw a snowball at you," he said.

Minn-Erva paused and slowly turned to him.

"Nice knowing ya," called Vers.

And so, Minn-Erva began throttling Korath while Vers buried Att-Lass and Yon-Rogg checked to see if the dead hedge needed watering.

"Oh, so Starforce was having a shindig and nobody thought to invite the old-timer?" asked Bron-Char, walking up.

"Believe me, Bron-Char, you're better off...not here," said Yon-Rogg, shouting to be heard over the sounds of battlefield carnage.

"Nonsense!" exclaimed Bron-Char. "I know how to throw down. Especially if it involves snow!" He scooped up a massive handful of snow and shaped it into a ball.

"Oh brother," mumbled Yon-Rogg. He started to back down the block.

"Did you page me?" asked his brother, suddenly there.

"No, I did not! Go away!" said Yon-Rogg.

"Yeesh, fine," said his brother and left.

Meanwhile, Bron-Char hurled his microwave-sized snowball with the force of an elephant's baseball pitch. (That's what Vers would have said, anyway.)

The snowball plowed into Vers and she flew ten feet, over Yon-Rogg's head, and smacked into the side of the apartment building. She stuck there for about ten seconds before falling off.

"Ow," she said.

Yon-Rogg bent over her. "Are you okay? You look a little white."

"I do, huh? I'm sure it doesn't have anything to do with the 50 pounds of SNOW I was just hit with."

He chuckled and pulled her to her feet. "Of course not. But I think I'm going to have to send you to the medbay to check for spinal fracturing."

"Oh, nah, I'm good," she said, then noticed a bone sticking out of her ribcage. She tucked it back in. "All fine!"

Yon-Rogg apparently did not think it was fine, however. He turned to go throttle Bron-Char; but a new snowball was already incoming.

"DUCK!" he shouted.

Instead of ducking, Vers sent a photon blast straight at the snowball. The snowball was too thick to be completely incinerated, so instead it went ricocheting straight up. It smashed into the balcony of someone's apartment and then concrete and deck chairs came raining down. Plaster settled like snow in Yon-Rogg's hair.

"Vers, would you just take it easy?" he chided.

"Sorry. It's fight or flight for me. But usually fight," she responded with a smile.

"Yes, and speaking of fighting..." Yon-Rogg looked over at the rest of Starforce.

Minn-Erva and Korath were chasing each other everywhere, trying to kill each other. Bron-Char was bulls-eyeing people with gigantic snowballs. Att-Lass was trying to hobble away, but every two seconds somebody knocked him on his face.

"I think it's time we put an end to this whole...thing," commented Vers.

"I couldn't agree more," said Yon-Rogg. He activated his antigrav gauntlets and lifted every person up by their ankles.

"HEY!! WE'RE KILLING EACH OTHER OVER HERE!" shouted Minn-Erva.

Vers tutted. "Is that any way to talk to your Commander, Minn?"

"YOU SHUT YOUR FACE!" yelled Minn-Erva. "THIS ISN'T FUNNY!"

"All right everyone, calm down," said Yon-Rogg. He placed them right side up again. "It's time for you all to stop quarreling and go home. Get some rest and warm up. Report to the Helion in, like, two hours."

Vers leaned over to Att-lass and said, "Wow. I think that's the first time I've heard him say 'like.'"

"What do you mean? I'm sure he says 'like' all the time. Like, he likes coffee," replied Att-Lass, looking confused.

"No no, I mean, the first time he's said 'like' in an uncertain way," clarified Vers.

"Uh-huh, and why does that matter?" asked Att-Lass, shivering and sniffling and wanting to go home.

"Hmm..." Vers tapped her chin. "I dunno."

"Vers! Att-Lass! Stop dawdling!" called Yon-Rogg. He and the rest of the team were already dispersing.

"But I live here!" exclaimed Vers. "And speaking of which, how come everybody randomly showed up at my apartment building today?"

"We may never know," shrugged Att-Lass.

THE END!