Steampunk Santa

by Marc Vun Kannon

  "No reindeer?" Indeed, Flarbignarg saw no reins, or even a place to attach them. "Then how do you plan to get it to the field?"

  "I plan to push it."

  "It looks heavy."

  "Appearances can be deceiving." Tom reached into his sleigh and pressed a button. When the thing started to make noise Flarbignarg backed away. "Worry not, it will not get much louder." Tom spun a hand-crank, and the volume did increase, but not by much. When the thing started to leak a cloud of some kind from underneath, Flarbignarg backed away more. "Come now, help me push." Flarbignarg could hardly bring himself to approach, until Tom stepped behind the craft and pushed with one hand.

  The sleigh moved!

  With only one elf to push, the craft slid forward, but since Tom was behind the thing, he could not see which way to go. Flar jumped in, forcing it to the side and towards the open door. It was as if the craft weighed nothing! He worked his way to one rear corner and Tom took the other and between them they maneuvered the sleigh out into the sunlight. "However did you manage it? What force lifts your sleigh?"

  Tom laughed. "I call it a Steam Engine."

  "It is marvelous," praised Flar. "But a bit noisy."

  Tom nodded. "A bit noisy, though. One cannot have everything."

  Including a conversation. The two friends pushed the craft out onto the field, and towards the waiting crowd of elves, grown much larger by the sound of the approaching entry. A space opened up and they steered towards it, but even when they ceased to push, the craft continued to float on, until a slight bump brought it to a complete halt. Tomparasil, surprised by the behavior of his sleigh and concerned he might have hit something accidentally, raced around the front to push the button.

  "Well, Tomparasil," said Santa in his jolly voice. He had a hand upon the front of the sleigh, no doubt the reason it stopped. "I should have known you would be behind this."

  All the elves laughed, even Tom. It was just…funny.

  "And you, Flarbignarg. On his side now, are you?"

  More laughter.

  "Well, no Santa," said Flarbignarg. "I was not even aware Tom planned to enter. I merely helped him push."

  "That is the Christmas spirit," praised Santa with his trademark laugh. "I shall be most interested to see it in operation. However, I think I shall start with Flarbignarg's entry."

  All eyes turned towards Flar's sleigh, a pretty little contrivance, very much in the classic style, except, he'd attached the reins to deer in harness, rather than horses, as they would have been in the human world. Santa walked about it, inspecting every detail down to the hand-painted trim. "Yes, yes, very good. Very much the thing." High marks for appearance. "Give us a demonstration, if you please, Flarbignarg."

  Flarbignarg climbed into the sleigh and clutched the reins tightly, looking small. "What shall I do, Santa?"

  Santa pointed. "Fly out to that shack, land, and then fly back again."

  Flarbignarg nodded and gave a slight flick to the reins, just enough to let the deer know to start. They led off, then veered to one side, riding in a circle. "He said fly to the shack, not ride around it," yelled Dinglefor.

  The lead deer stepped into the air, and all the deer after him. The sleigh followed, and all the watching elves gaped as Flarbignarg's sleigh completed the circle over their heads, turned, and touched down, not in front of the shack, but upon its very roof.

  "Oh, very good," laughed Santa in the silence. "I will not even need the ladder."

  Flarbignarg waited a few moments, about as long as it would take for Santa to descend the chimney and return, and then flicked the reins again. The deer took off and headed back to the watching crowd.

  One of Dinglefor's friends, hiding under the eaves of the house, brought a blowgun to his lips and shot a small pebble into the haunches of the lead deer. Poor Donner, for that was the name on his collar, did what any self-respecting reindeer would do and ran away, leading his entire team at great speed.

  The sleigh began to wobble as the air whistled around it. Then it tipped over and started to spin, the weight of the bottom not enough to keep it upright at high speed. Flarbignarg fell out onto the soft snow and counted himself lucky, as the sleigh smashed on the ground behind the returning deer. As he returned to the crowd, he could barely hear Santa over the sound of Dinglefor's laughter. "A fine takeoff, marvelous follow-through, but the finish was less than graceful. Dinglefor—" the other elf stopped laughing instantly "—your turn. At Flarbignarg's last speed, of course."

  Dinglefor's sleigh was a monster of a sleigh, larger in every respect than Flarbignarg's, and he looked even smaller than his rival in the seat. He flicked the reins, and the horses trotted off obediently. He also circled the shack, but much more widely, and the team much further along before the lead horse finally stepped into the air. He also circled the field, his craft wobbling but upright. When he went to land he halted in front of the shack, his sleigh much too large to fit on the roof. After a much longer wait, about as long as it would take Santa to deploy a ladder, mount to roof, and return, Dinglefor took off again, returning safely to the starting point.

  Some of the elves cheered.

  Santa made his notes; his scores neither very high, nor very low.

  All eyes returned to Tomparasil's creation, all burnished bronze and polished glass and steel. Without a word Tomparasil got into the seat and pressed the button. The elves expected the noise and did not back away, until Tom turned his hand crank much further than he had before. The cloud blew in gusts and the whole sleigh vibrated with a great force from underneath. Tom's sleigh lifted from the earth without moving forward in any direction at all. Only when he had gone over Santa's head did the sleigh begin to move forward, ever faster, in a straight line for the shack. It too settled on the roof, waited as Flar's had done, and then lifted off and floated back, settling gently into the very spot it had so recently vacated.

  "Well, certainly impressive, Tomparasil," said Santa into the stunned silence. "Although Christmas is supposed to be a silent night. With your craft the children in Cairo would hear me delivering toys to children in London, and know they would soon be next. Hmmm." He looked about, at all the elves watching him expectantly. "I have seen much, and I will need some time to deliberate. Let us all take a break. Cookies and eggnog in the workshop." The elves all cheered as he strode off. Dinglefor sneered in triumph, his friends taking care of the horses as he went to celebrate.

  Tomparasil and Flarbignarg stood alone.

  "How did you get your sleigh to go so fast without spinning?"

  Tom shrugged. "After you left that night, I tried the solution I had given you on my own sleigh, and found it still spun the faster it went, so I invented an Anti-Spinner to keep it upright."

  Flarbignarg sighed. "But not quiet. And now Dinglefor will win, and we shall be in the boiler room forever."

  Tom liked being in the boiler room. From his point of view it did not matter much who won the contest, except he liked Flarbignarg and he did not like Dinglefor. Flarbignarg did not want to be in the boiler room, and Tom did not think he would like the boiler room much either, with Flarbignarg in it, being unhappy.

  Tom found he much preferred to see his friend happy. "We cannot have that, can we? Come. I have an idea."

  Four

  Some time later, for what does time mean when there are cookies and eggnog to be had, Flarbignarg dashed into the workshop and straight up to Santa himself. Dinglefor smirked, as Flarbignarg made emphatic gestures, but the sneer disappeared from his face when Santa set down his glass of eggnog only half-finished, and followed the excited elf from the room. Other elves noticed as Dinglefor followed, and soon the entire troop once more stood out in the snow, in an empty field.

  "Okay, Flarbignarg. I'm waiting," said Santa in the voice of someone who can feel his eggnog getting warm.

  "Yes, Santa. Right away." He whistled.

  From the shed came Tomparasil with another sleigh, Flarbignarg's sleigh, restored and refurbished,
with just a few additional trimmings around the edges. Once again reindeer pulled it, but now with twice the number. The jingling of the harness bells rang loud in the otherwise silent field.

  Without any prompting, Tomparasil and Flarbignarg climbed into the seat together, but neither of them took the reins. "Donner," said Tomparasil loudly, "You know what to do."

  The reindeer nodded, and led off. Soon the team ran, circling the field as before. When they stepped into the air they did not turn to the shack, but started to run even faster, galloping through the sky faster even than Tom's own sleigh.

  After the final circle they came to the shack, still running, but they settled onto the shack's roof and stopped there. Every elf watching saw the puff of braking steam, but none heard it. After a short wait they took off again, but instead of heading back to Santa they ran off into the sky, and turned, galloping back over the crowd's heads at breakneck speeds. In the distance they turned and galloped back, lower and lower until they settled onto the snow again. Finally, the team came to a halt exactly where it had started.

  "Yes, yes! Much more the thing." Rubbing his hands, Santa circled the sleigh again.

  "But Santa," protested Dinglefor, "They cannot win. You already judged the entries."

  "I never said the judging had ended, did I, Dinglefor?" Santa snorted into the silence. "They combined their efforts, exactly as you did, eh, only with a much greater generosity of spirit. They deserve to win my little contest, and won it they have."

  He turned to the two elves, hands still clenched tight around the walls of the sleigh. They had not realized reindeer could go so fast.

  "However, the prize for the winner is to be Head Elf, and two elves cannot be head elf. Therefore, Flarbignarg, I am naming you to be Head Elf of my entire workshop."

  Flarbignarg touched his own chest. "Me? But…I do not understand. Why not Tomparasil? His Anti-Spinner device made my sleigh work properly, his steam brakes."

  Santa nodded. "That is true. But, in order for something to be a reward, it must be of value to the winner. Tomparasil does not want to be Head Elf, and so he is not. Instead, I am making him Head of Operations. His job will be to make it possible for us to produce enough toys for a world full of children." The elves cheered. So many toys!

  Tomparasil's face lit with joy. "I have so many notes, so many ideas…"

  Santa smiled benevolently. "I know you do. Tomorrow you will bring those notes and ideas to me. Tonight, well, I have work to do tonight."

  "Right," agreed Flarbignarg. He clapped his hands. "To work!" The elves scattered. Flarbignarg looked at his hands.

  "See?" said Santa, "It works." He hurried off to don his suit.

  Tomparasil and Flarbignarg sat alone in their sleigh.

  "Congratulations," offered Tom.

  Flar turned to him, still slightly stunned. "To you as well. Notes and ideas…?"

  "Little things," said Tom, climbing out of the sleigh. "Santa will need considerably more Handwavium to keep this sleigh in the air, and who knows what we will need at the new factory."

  Flar's head spun already. "New factory?" He also got out of the sleigh, and together the two heads of Santa's workshop took care of the reindeer, unharnessing them, feeding them, getting them ready for their first big night.

  "Of course, surely you do not think we can stay here. The human world becomes more intrusive every day. I am thinking the North Pole, lots of room, an excess of ice, and days of darkness to gather it. If I can simply figure out a way to build our new factory under the ice…"

  Flarbignarg put his foot down, bells jingling. "Tompara—Tom. Your job is not to build us a new workshop under the North Pole."

  "It is not?"

  "No. Your job, today, right now, is to figure out a way to use those Wind-Up Walkers of yours to help us move all the toys out to the sled. Get to it."

  Tomparasil grinned. "Yes, sir!"

  Tom scurried off, ideas blooming. All I need is some old scrap lumber, a box of paintbrushes, and some handwavium. If there is any left. To work!

  Epilogue

  Tomparasil and Flarbignarg stood side by side in the snow, watching Santa depart in their joint creation. As he vanished into the distance, streamers of fire arced from the ground, shot over the trees, and burst into bright stars against the darkness.

  "Oo, fireworks," said Tomparasil. "Nice touch."

  "Those are not fireworks," said Flarbignarg. "I guess Dinglefor and his cronies found Pargabrin's reindeer treats, which accidentally got left in the break room."

  "Ah." Tom paused, listening as several elves hit the ground noisily, complaining. "It is as Santa often says, naughty behavior always comes back to cause you trouble, in the end."

  Marc Vun Kannon was born in Bethpage, Long Island. After surviving his teen age years, he entered Hofstra University. Five years later, he exited with a BA in philosophy and a wife. He still has both, but the wife is more useful.

  After dabbling in fulfilling pursuits such as stock boy and gas station attendant, he found his spiritual home as a Tier One software support engineer for Bottomline Technologies. Still married to that wife, too.

  For diversion, along the way, he almost accumulated a PhD in philosophy and is currently working on his second BA in Computer Science. He feels that his real job is being a father to his three children, husband to his wife, and author to his books.

  He, and they, now reside in Wading River, Long Island, New York.

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