Working Stiff

by Kevin J. Anderson

  McGoo and I drew our guns and stood next to Robin. The ten elves closing in didn’t look afraid of us at all. Too late, I realized that they were just a distraction.

  Two other hench-elves stood up from behind the conveyor belt and hurled snowballs at us—icy snowballs with rocks in the middle. Cheater snowballs. (I did say they were evil elves.) Their aim was supernaturally true, and with one hail of hard snowballs, they knocked the guns out of our hands.

  Then the hench-elves closed in, wielding icicle spears and candy-cane cattle prods. They overpowered us, shoved us to the factory floor, and used tough strands of satin ribbon to bind our wrists. We were going to have a black-and-blue Christmas. An evil elf even slapped a coordinating stick-on bow on each of us before they herded us toward the back of the factory.

  “Elfis is going to want to see you,” said one of the guards.

  “Oh, by gosh, by golly, that was on my Christmas wish list,” I said, which earned me a jab from one of the cattle prods. Since I’m a zombie, it takes a lot to shock me, but the experience was still unpleasant. I was more worried about McGoo and Robin, who could indeed be permanently damaged.

  Elfis was at a raised supervisor’s station near the warmth of the big furnace, sitting on a high director’s chair with a small worktable beside him. Black dust from the coal hoppers left a gritty film on everything, but somehow it didn’t affect his white sequined jacket or his blue suede shoes. He was perusing a rolled parchment filled with names—countless names, sorted into two columns, one marked N and the other one marked N. He muttered to himself as he used a large goose quill pen to check off names.

  “Naughty … yes, got that one. Naughty … yes. Naughty … we have a very high success rate.” Then he sneered at a line, crossed it out vigorously with the nib of his quill pen. “Somebody slipped up—this kid’s in the Nice column! People tend to notice when nice kids go missing.” A supervisor hench-elf scurried off to rectify the error.

  Elfis picked up a bullhorn and began shouting toward the factory floor. “Listen up, kiddies! I have plenty more applicants to choose from, so if you want to be promoted in my criminal organization, you’ve got to produce, produce, produce! Only the best can survive this boot camp—also known as the Holiday Season! If you work hard, you’ll be real henchmen by Easter.” Elfis then started to laugh. “We’re going to put that damned bunny out of business, too!”

  He slid his sunglasses up on the bridge of his narrow nose as his fiendish hench-elves pushed us forward. He seemed surprised to see us. “Mr. Chambeaux and friends—have you come to negotiate on Santa’s behalf again? Well, it’s too late. I’ve already got the holidays sewn up in a body bag, and now you’ll never stop me.”

  When all else fails, when things look grimmest, I like to state the obvious. It puts villains off guard and usually gets them talking—too much. “You said you didn’t have Santa’s list of Naughty and Nice. That was dishonest.”

  He held up a long finger. “No, that was misleading. I said I didn’t steal the list in order to earn brownie points or to make Santa look incompetent. I stole it strictly for my own purposes.” Elfis waved the parchment, showing us the long list of names. “It’s a recruitment tool, like a screening folder for job applicants. Santa already identified the naughty children for me, the ones suitable to become part of my operation.”

  “But you put them to work as slave labor,” Robin said.

  Elfis shrugged. “Well, they are naughty. Even criminals need to know the consequences of their actions. You do the crime, you pay the time. Community service for my community.”

  I struggled against the satin ribbons binding my wrists. It reminded me of my childhood, trying to snap the ribbons so I could open my presents. Now, as then, the ribbon had supernatural strength.

  Elfis leaned forward, opening both of his hands to warm them at the nearby furnace. The conveyor belt continued to clatter, dumping defective toys into it, plastic ones as well as metal. “It’s so nice to be warm for a change. And you three will be all toasty, too. I’m afraid I can’t allow my plans to be foiled—or tinseled. Into the furnace with them!”

  The hench-elves swept forward like a blizzard of evil. Even though I’m a zombie, I had no desire to be cremated. And speaking for my two human friends, I knew that neither Robin nor McGoo wanted to tour the interior of the furnace either. I had to get us out of there.

  Zombies, for all of our fragile bodies and flesh that’s prone to decay, have very strong teeth. Some zombies use them for ripping into flesh and bone; now I discovered that my teeth were excellent at cutting Christmas ribbon. I tore into my colorful satin bindings, snapped the ribbon—and I was free.

  But I couldn’t fight all those armed hench-elves. Thinking of only one thing that might save us, I jammed my hand into my jacket pocket and grabbed the loop attached to the emergency jingle bell.

  It wasn’t much of a jing-jing-jingle—but it was enough to summon Old Kris Kringle.

  The flames in the furnace brightened, then made a coughing sound. Black smoke swirled out, and with a whoosh of hot air Santa Claus slipped down the smokestack and made his dramatic entrance. The conveyor belt came to a screeching halt as the jolly guy in the magic red suit (which also proved to be non-flammable) emerged from the furnace like something out of The Lord of the Rings. He planted his gloved hands on his hips and bellowed, “Ho-ho-ho! Who’s been a naughty boy?”

  Elfis nearly jumped out of his skin and scrambled down from the director’s chair so rapidly that his sunglasses clattered on the floor. With the empty cloth sack over his shoulder, Santa stalked forward like an avenging angel—and not the type that goes on top of a Christmas tree. He spotted his lengthy rolled-up list on the worktable and seized it, holding it up like a baton. “You have gone too far, Elfis. And now you’d better cry, because Santa Claus is coming to get you.”

  The hench-elves were panicked. They dropped their candy-cane cattle prods and icicle spears and cowered. Their teeth chattered as if they had gone caroling naked on a cold winter’s night and no one was offering wassail, or even hot cocoa.

  Elfis tried to run, but Santa quickly caught up with him. I couldn’t believe how fast the old bearded guy could move, but he had to have a secret power if he could hit millions of households around the world in a single night.

  McGoo held up his bound wrists for me to bite the ribbons. Now that was showing a measure of trust! “Good plan, Shamble.”

  “I call it Santa ex-Machina.” I picked bright green satin out of my teeth, then turned to free Robin as well.

  Santa had cornered Elfis by the big coal hoppers, and the evil elf had no place to go. Santa didn’t need any help, but I was part of this, too—and I had a bone to pick with anybody who wanted to throw me and my friends into a furnace.

  Next to me, one of the cowering hench-elves still had a sack filled with the icy rock-filled snowballs. I grabbed one and hurled it with perfect aim, proving that not all zombies are disoriented and uncoordinated. My snowball shot struck the release latch on the coal hopper just above Elfis’s head. The trap dropped open, and Elfis looked up just in time to see a black avalanche dump down on him. He was buried under lumps of coal.

  Robin, McGoo, and I rushed over to Santa, who gazed with satisfaction at the mound in front of him. “Coal is what Elfis deserved … although I’d hoped he would turn his life around if given the chance. Such a disappointment.”

  “You knew Elfis beforehand?” I asked.

  Santa nodded. “He was one of my toy laborers, assigned to my workshop for community service, but he escaped, broke the rules of his North Pole parole. I was going to report him, but not until after the holiday season was over. It’s a busy time of the year, you know.”

  We heard a groan, then a stirring. We moved the coal blocks away to reveal an Elfis now entirely covered in black dust. He plucked in dismay at his ruined jacket. “I guess I won’t be having a white Christmas.”

  Santa unslung the sack from his shoulder, tugged it open,
and strode forward. “Here comes Santa Claus.”

  Elvis scrambled backward when he saw the yawning sack. “No, Santa! Please! No!”

  “Naughty children get what they deserve.” Santa snatched Elfis, stuffed him into the sack, and cinched the opening shut. The captive kept squirming, but could not get out. Santa tucked his rolled up Naughty and Nice list under one arm. “Thank you all. I’ll start checking these names, see who deserves to be sentenced to the North Pole for a few years.”

  “Sentenced to the North Pole?” Robin said.

  “Oh-ho-ho, this list doesn’t just show me who gets presents and who doesn’t. The naughtiest of the naughty have to help me spread holiday cheer. Parents write me, too, you know. ‘Dear Santa, please help me with my child who keeps acting out.’ We have a community-service program up at the Pole, where naughty children can learn good behavior by doing good works.” He had a twinkle in his eye. “There’s a long waiting list, but our success rate is remarkable.”

  “Except for Elfis,” I said.

  “Some nuts are harder to crack than others, but a few days of shoveling out the reindeer stables usually makes them a little more cooperative.”

  Moving with supernaturally swift footsteps, Santa stalked around the factory floor, grabbing the cowering hench-elves one by one and stuffing them into his sack, which was obviously much larger inside than it was on the outside. It needed to be. How else could it hold a world’s worth of toys?

  With the bulging, squirming load over his shoulder, he turned to Robin, McGoo, and me. “I’ll let you free the children.” He turned to the shackled waifs on the now-still production lines. “Ho-ho-ho! Have you all learned to be nice instead of naughty?”

  A chorus of the enslaved kids affirmed that they had indeed learned their lessons. Some, including Buddy, even volunteered to do community-service work up at the North Pole—after they recovered back home with their loving families.

  Santa went to the coal furnace, shifted his heavy sack. “I won’t forget you on Christmas morning, Mr. Chambeaux. Or you either, Ms. Deyer, or Officer McGoohan. And now, Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good”—he pushed down his black glove so he could double-check the time on his wristwatch—“a good night.” He tossed the squirming bag ahead of him into the mouth of the furnace, touched the side of his nose, and vanished up the smokestack.

  “Elfis has left the building,” I said. “But the kids are still here.”

  The three of us spent the better part of an hour freeing the natural and unnatural children from their shackles. When Robin unlocked his chains, Buddy Tannenbaum threw himself into her arms. “Thank you, thank you! Can you take me back to my Mom and Dad now?”

  “You’ll be home for Christmas,” I promised.

  For a lot of families, it would be a happy holiday season, except perhaps for those who had ordered their gifts from Elfis Industries and were expecting delivery by Christmas Eve Eve.…

  While McGoo called for backup to shut down the factory and secure the crime scene, Robin took down names and developed a plan to reunite the kids with their parents. I called the Tannenbaums directly, and Buddy’s parents rushed right down. It was a wonderful reunion, with the werewolf kid nuzzling his parents and promising he would be good.

  10

  It was Christmas morning in the Chambeaux & Deyer offices—and we found surprise gifts waiting for us, brightly wrapped in colorful paper with holly leaves and berries, wreaths, and little snowmen. Since we didn’t have a chimney, Santa could only have delivered the presents by breaking-and-entering, but I wasn’t going to press charges.

  “Looks like Santa was true to his promise,” I said.

  Grinning, Sheyenne brought the gifts into the conference room. “If you can’t trust Santa to keep a promise, who can you trust?”

  I hadn’t put anything on my wish list, but Santa Claus was supposed to know exactly what a person wanted or needed. I had to admit I was curious.

  “You first, Robin.” I nudged the thin, rectangular box with her name on it. As a lawyer, Robin tried to remain cool and businesslike, but I could see the sparkle in her brown eyes as she tugged the ribbon aside, and politely worked at the tape. When she couldn’t get it unwrapped, she used a letter opener to slash the paper with all the finesse of a well-practiced serial killer.

  Inside was a single yellow legal pad and a sharpened No. 2 pencil. Her excitement dimmed, though she remained smiling. “I can certainly use these. And not every lawyer gets to use a pencil and legal pad from Santa himself.”

  “There’s a note,” I pointed out.

  Robin pulled a slip of holly-fringed stationery from behind the second yellow sheet, skimmed the hand-written note, then read aloud as her smile grew. “’I don’t normally give magical gifts—I don’t want to establish a present precedent, but I am so grateful for your efforts. After checking my list and the footnotes I made throughout the year, Robin, I know that your work delights you more than anything else. This special legal pad will never run out of paper, and the enchanted pencil will take notes for you so you can have your hands and mind free to concentrate on your client. Ho-ho-ho, best, S.C.”

  Robin’s smile was wide. “I can’t wait to try it out!”

  Excited, Sheyenne picked up the box with her name on it. She used her poltergeist abilities to undo the bow, pull the ribbon aside, and then, giggling, ripped the wrapping paper to shreds. She opened the box to find an envelope inside—with both our names written on it.

  “It’s something the two of us can use, Beaux!” With luminous fingers, she opened the flap of the envelope to find an embossed, official-looking certificate inside. “Oh! An all-expense-paid romantic weekend for us at the cozy North Pole Winter Wonderland Bed and Breakfast! Off-season only, it says.”

  “Now that has definite possibilities,” I said, imagining a wonderful time away with my girlfriend. We would have to be creative to overcome the supernatural difficulties that precluded us from touching, but I was up to the challenge.

  “Open yours, Dan.” Robin handed me the very small box with my name on it.

  Judging by the size, I thought it might be a new pair of cufflinks or a tie clip, but who was I to doubt Santa’s wisdom or imagination? Zombie fingers are not the most adept at unwrapping small gift boxes, and Santa’s elves had used way too much tape, but I managed.

  I opened a hinged, velvet-covered box to reveal a small plastic cylinder labeled “Magic Lip Gloss. Use Sparingly.” I wasn’t disappointed so much as confused, not sure what Santa had been thinking. “Lip gloss?”

  Sheyenne made a delighted sound and snatched the tube out of the box. “I think it’s for me, Beaux—and that means it’s for you.” She popped off the cap, extended the lip gloss, and applied it to her widening smile. “A special film for my ghostly lips that might just allow a kiss.…”

  She leaned closer, but I told her to wait. “Just a minute, let’s do this right.” I slipped a hand into my jacket pocket and withdrew the wadded and prickly tumbleweed ball of the McMistletoe artificial substitute that Elfis had been trying to bring to market. I raised it up over my head. “This is supposed to be as good as mistletoe.”

  Robin was skeptical. “With all the quality that we’ve come to expect from Elfis Industries?”

  Sheyenne’s lips glistened invitingly from the magic lip gloss. Under the McMistletoe, she came very close, and her ectoplasmic lips brushed against mine. Yes, I definitely felt a warm tingle.

  “I think it works just fine,” she said.

  ***

  Locked Room

  1

  When a harpy tells you to do something, there’s no room for discussion.

  As a zombie private detective, as well as a regular customer at the Ghoul’s Diner, I had plenty of experience with Esther the harpy waitress. She had been a client of mine, seeking to get rid of a bad luck charm that a customer had left her as a tip for the awful service Esther usually provided (if “service” is a word that even applies in that situation.)


  Esther had a hawkish face, a raptorlike demeanor, and a vulturelike personality. Her curled iridescent feathers looked like straight razors that had been mangled in a mail-sorting machine. With her glittering eyes, she could shoot a sharp glare at anyone who looked at her the wrong way, and Esther considered almost any way “the wrong way.” Her mood swings were best measured on the Richter scale.

  Nevertheless, she was a client of Chambeaux & Deyer Investigations, and a paying one. In the Unnatural Quarter, where monsters tried to make quiet, normal lives for themselves, I’d had far worse cases before.

  Late this afternoon, Esther had called our offices demanding—because Esther was incapable of making a mere request—that my ghost girlfriend Sheyenne and I meet her out in the Greenlawn Cemetery for the grand opening of a very special new crypt.

  “It’s imperative that you’re both there,” Esther said in a voice that made fingernails on chalkboards sound like sweet music.

  As our office administrator, Sheyenne already knew about the case. “I’m surprised you want me along, too. Dan is our private investigator. I often help out on cases, but—”

  The harpy cut her off. “Stop arguing with me! I need a zombie and a ghost. Be there.”

  We’d had a quiet day wrapping up cases and waiting for new ones to walk through the door. Robin Deyer, my human lawyer partner, had left town to visit her parents for their anniversary celebration, so it was only Sheyenne and me in the offices. I wouldn’t normally leave the place unattended, but I had my phone and I didn’t expect this would take long.

  Besides, who was going to tell Esther she couldn’t have what she wanted?

  The Greenlawn Cemetery was a nice place, as far as cemeteries went, with well-tended lots, mid-range tombstones, and used crypts for rent or for sale. The flowers were replenished regularly, and a park and recreation area for new tenants had been added as part of an urban beautification project. After being killed during one of my cases as a human detective, I had been buried here, and then I clawed my way back out of the earth, cleaned myself up, put on a change of clothes, and got back to work. Yes, this place held fond memories.…