The Modern Nativity

The Shepherds

Jessie and Joel Shepherd were unlike most teenage siblings. Firstly, they were twins, a rare occurrence that accounts for three percent of births. Secondly, despite being seventeen-years-old, an age many expected them to find separate social groups and friends, they were as tight as ever.

The Shepherd twins kept their close bond by sharing mutual interests. To outsiders, it was always unclear if these interests were borne from compromise. Was Jessie really that into football or was it a way to drag Joel to pop concerts that a lad his age should detest? For every hour of Manchester City she watched with Joel, he spent four soaking in reality TV.

This naturally spawned another mutual pastime: social media.

Each show had multiple hashtags, these were like challenges to the Shepherds. To get on a trending hashtag, get a few retweets, was gold. They had a shared Twitter profile (naturally) and an Instagram feed. These now expanded beyond Big Brother, I'm a Celeb, The X Factor, Ex on the Beach, and a whole host of others. Hashtags were good for real life, too. Tonight was proving to be an eventful one.

Social discord proved more entertaining than the telly but the Shepherds were kind souls. They took little pleasure in the images they saw but found them gripping nonetheless. Fights had broken out in Manchester city centre, a few miles from where they lived. There was a general impression that people were being treated heavy handed.

Overcrowding, under policed, surprisingly unexpected: trouble was brewing.

Jessie was more taken by the human stories within these pictures. Men throwing bottles was a senseless act of frustration. But hidden beneath the headline grabber were the real stories.

The tag that was starting to do the rounds was: #TreatedLikeAnimals. One from a Metrolink stop in Prestwich showed a group herded off a tram. Apparently, none of them able to afford tickets.

The comments and replies were drawing parallels to Nazi Germany, to the irony of people without money being made to travel to get some but lacking the funds to do so.

Jessie noticed one person in the crowd that shone to her. A pregnant dark-haired woman clutching her belly protectively. She had a shawl over her head, no doubt a vain attempt to protect from the harsh cold, but it didn't hide her pretty features or the fear spread across them.

#TreatedLikeAnimals

It hung there in Jessie's mind. This was wrong. A woman in need would be out on the street tonight.

"Look at this, Joel," Jessie said to her brother.

"I know, mad innit," he said.

"No, not the crowd, this," she tapped on the screen. "That poor pregnant lady."

"It's terrible, Jess," he said. "But what can we do?"

"Make sure she's okay," Jessie replied.

"How can we do that?"

"Get this trending first," she said. "Someone will see it and be near that station. Google Maps the nearest hotels and guest houses."

"I'm on it," Joel said.

The Shepherds started their hunt for the woman in need.