by Rachel Ford
Arath nodded. “Right. Okay, you got that key?”
Jack did. He fished it out, and they proceeded to the front door. Like Eben’s concrete block house, the door had been painted a dull, gun barrel gray color. The only bit of variety in the color scheme was a sign planted in the snow. It read in neat, blocky letters, “No trespassing. No soliciting. No greetings. No well-wishing. No holiday cheer. No human contact.” Then, in a far shakier hand, someone had scribbled in, “Violators are subject to being shot on sight.”
“Friendly chap, isn’t he?” Arath mused.
Jack shook his head as he fitted the key to the lock. It slipped in, and he heard the enchanted bone fingers working their magic. “I still don’t know why Krampus is bothering with him.”
The lock clicked, and he turned the handle. “Come on, Arath. All we have to do –”
He never finished the sentence. As soon as the door opened, a blast of something ripped through the air. It threw Jack a good five feet backward, and he landed heavily, registering catastrophic damage to – well, everywhere. His torso had been worst hit, but his face, his arms, his legs, even his hands and feet had all taken damage. “What the…” he gasped out.
An old man in a fraying nightshirt and night cap marched out, carrying a lantern in one hand and a blunderbuss in the other. “Thought you could pull one over on old Eben, eh? Friends of that Bob and Emily, I suppose. I saw you come out of their place. They always let that boy of theirs tromp about my yard, the little brat. Well, I can’t shoot a lad. But I can shoot you.”
Here, the old man cracked a wicked grin and once more brought the blunderbuss to bear on his prone victims. Arath moaned, and Jack said, “You’ve got it all wrong. We’re here –”
“Merry Christmas, boys.”
A flash of powder preceded a deadly blast of festive candy pieces. And Jack expired thinking, You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
They respawned at the edge of the yard, just after they crawled through the barbed wire – right before he put his foot on the caltrop.
They repeated the same process as before, but Jack jumped as the other man’s spell raced toward the snow in his vicinity. It froze just as he landed, which prevented him from being frozen into anything.
It did not, however, stop his feet from slipping out in different directions, and sending him sprawling onto the ice. Gritting his teeth, he picked himself up and half walked, half crawled toward the bunker.
Arath reached it first, as before. But Jack didn’t go to the front door this time. He went instead to a side door, which had a much shorter but similarly unwelcoming sign hung on it. This read, “Stay away or be shot.”
Jack fit the key to the lock and waited for the telltale click that told him he could open it. Then, he stepped as far to the side as he could. He wasn’t taking any chances. He wanted to protect himself just in case Old Eben had shifted positions and was waiting for him here.
Only when he felt it was safe to do so, did he turn the handle, shove the door, and retract his hand as fast as he could. Nothing happened. He heard no one, and no one came through the door. No one shot, or muttered, or cursed.
So Jack loosed a sigh of relief, fished out the enchanted coal, and walked into the doorway – right into a muzzle full of holiday candy, traveling at several hundred feet per second. It passed through Jack and into Arath before he had time to blink.
He died about one second later and spawned at the same point in Eben’s yard. He cursed, but then figured he’d learned something valuable: the game did move the old codger to whatever entrance the player decided to use.
So Jack changed up his strategy. He waited for Arath to freeze the snow as before, and he crawled his way toward the house. But he bypassed the doors this time. He went instead to one of the windows. Standing up beside it, he fished out the coal, prepped himself to run like the dickens, and chucked it through the old man’s window.
The game updated, telling him that Eben’s gift had been checked off his list. At the same time, a blast of candy ripped through the glass. He’d taken off already, and so had Arath. They were standing a little way from the window. Still, the shot spread, and a few peppermints and shards of ribbon candy tore into Jack. It wasn’t enough to knock him off his feet or slow him down, but it did drag his health meter down a notch.
He kept running. Arath did too, hooting and hollering at the old man. A door opened behind them, and a crotchety old voice shouted, “I’ll make an example of you for that young Tim.”
Now, of all times, Jack’s feet slid out from under him. He thought for a bleak moment that he would surely die yet again. But he’d been moving fast enough that he built up a good deal of momentum; and now it pushed him forward across the ice.
He hooted too as he covered the distance faster than he might have on his feet. Then, his pleasure turned to dismay, and he dug his heels down to try to slow himself. He was headed straight for the barbed wire.
He did manage to slow, but not to stop; and he went full into the fence. Eben screamed and cursed, and kept firing while Jack picked himself off the barbs. But the old man seemed hesitant to try his luck on the ice. Because of the distance and the blunderbuss’s spread, only a smattering of candy actually reached them. So Jack escaped with minimal damage.
They raced to the sleigh and threw themselves inside. The serpents took off at a breakneck speed, and Jack caught his breath as they circled the Vale. He had about two hours and thirty-five minutes left – and most of his list.
He considered for a long moment. Then, he picked Veck Way. He had six homes on that street, all fairly close, and all relatively simple assignments: swapping real presents with fake ones, spiking the Christmas punch, eating the Christmas cake, freeing the Christmas goose, and so on.
He made good time on those homes, tearing through his objectives with two hours and ten minutes to go. Indeed, Jack seemed to establish a kind of rhythm, now that no one was shooting at him. Even Arath fell easily into the pattern. They infiltrated, executed the objective, and absconded, cackling to each other at their cleverness.
They cleared house after house, street after street. They burned cakes to spoil feasts, swapped the addresses on holiday cards to break up lovers, and stole gifts to disappoint children. He took the Gingerbread Man’s icing, so he wouldn’t be able to dress himself – and so wouldn’t be fit to be seen in public the next day. He absconded with shopkeeper’s keys, and snipped the thread on which popcorn garlands had been strung, and so on and so forth. It was a night of absolute, wanton mischief.
Jack had a blast. He even worked out something of a system with the town’s grinches, adapted from his mishaps with Eben. Rather than landing the sleigh, he flew by each home and chucked the enchanted lump of coal through a window.
Granted, he had to dodge a few fireballs, another volley of candyshot, and more than a few angry curses. The evil old misers and wicked witches of the Vale, it seemed, didn’t sleep. But it was a decidedly good time, and, with ten minutes to spare, he leaped for a final time into his sleigh and rode into the night sky.
He checked his list. He was fairly confident he’d terrorized everyone he needed to terrorize and rewarded everyone he’d been tasked to reward. But he wanted to make certain.
And it was a good thing he did, too. Because one name remained on the list without a satisfying green checkmark: Pleasant Vale’s Abominable Snowman.
He stared at the list. “You’ve got to be kidding me. A yeti?” Then, though, he sighed, shook his head, and called to the serpents, “Hey, you know where the snowman lives?”
They hissed out a response that Jack didn’t understand. But the sound sent shivers up his back. The snakes changed direction, toward the edge of the town.
He nodded, assuming that their creepy noises had been confirmation that they did, indeed, know. Then, though, they passed over the town and headed for the mountains. “Wait,” he called, glancing at the clock – which was down to eight minutes and some odd seconds now. “The abominable snowm
an – I have to pay him a visit.”
The snakes hissed again, louder and more fiercely this time. And though Jack didn’t want to leave anything unfinished, something about that sound filled him with a kind of dread. He didn’t want to hear it again. So he sighed to himself and thought, Well, I got most of it done anyway. I made my objective.
Which was true. But Krampus’s sky snakes hadn’t been refusing to transport Jack. On the contrary, they took him exactly where he wanted to be: a small cave at the foot of the mountain, a little way from Pleasant Vale.
They landed in a patch of clear snow just outside the mouth of the cave. Jack stared into the dark aperture before him. “Is this the place?”
The serpents hissed again. Arath said, “You know what, boss? I might stay with the snakes after all this time. It’s been a long night. We probably shouldn’t leave them on their own too long.”
He scowled at the ranger. “You’re coming with me, you coward. If I had to put up with you earlier, you can sack up now.”
The ranger grumbled but followed Jack into the soft snow anyway. They walked a good fifteen paces, until they stood directly outside the cave. There was a sign here too. It read, “Welcome one, and welcome all.” Underneath it, a small script had been penciled in, “No angry mobs, please. No pitchforks permitted on the premise. Visitors most welcome.”
Jack glanced askew at the sign, then shook his head. “Let’s go.”
They marched into the darkness. It seemed to swallow them up, but then a light appeared on the horizon, dancing and orange. “There’s a fire up there,” Arath whispered. “The monster must be ahead.”
They walked on, still shrouded in darkness. All at once, a voice, almost childlike in its tones, said, “Oh my word, how delightful: wassailers. I thought they’d forgotten my place again this year.”
Arath yelped. So did Jack. “Who goes there?” the ranger yelled.
“Where are you?” Jack said.
“I’m right here,” the voice said, sounding low to the ground. “Welcome to my home, gentlemen. Can I get you anything? Cookies? Hot chocolate? Or, if you’ve missed your dinner, I’d be happy to whip something up. It’s the least I can do for you, with you coming all this way for me.”
Arath spun around, and Jack threw his gaze all over the floor. But he could see nothing at all. The darkness was too deep and too absolute. “Where are you?” he said again.
“Oh, I do beg your pardon. I forget that your kind cannot see as well as mine.” All at once, a light sprang up about two inches from the floor. Jack found himself looking at a tiny, furry ball of a creature. In his mind, the closest thing it resembled was a Star Trek tribble – one of those tiny, rapidly reproducing creatures that had been the bane of Captain Kirk, and the entire Klingon empire.
Indeed, as near as he could tell, the only difference between those small balls of fur and this creature was a hairy little arm that stretched out of the hirsute mass, carrying a tiny torch. “Welcome, welcome,” the voice said. “Oh, it is so good to see people again. It’s been almost fifty years, you know, since my last visitors. And they – well, they weren’t very nice. They came with torches and pitchforks, and threatened some very unpleasant things.
“But I’m babbling. I’m sorry. I’m just so excited to see people.”
It went on for a moment longer, and Jack realized with a measure of alarm that the voice was coming from the tribble-like creature. He wanted to ask how the hell the developers had ever come up with softball sized yetis. But he knew better than that, didn’t he? He had a sparkling unicorn that was somehow also one of the most elite warriors in the game in his party. This was Marshfield Studio. Crazy came with the territory. So much crazy, that he only half-jokingly suspected that the water supply might be laced with some kind of narcotic or hallucinogenic substances.
The little monster went on talking, saying how exceedingly glad it was to see carolers, and wondering if he presumed too much to request a particular song.
Arath had remained completely silent since the light sprang up. Jack realized, too late, just how uncharacteristic that was – when he screamed at the top of his lungs, seized the tiny yeti, and chucked him as hard and fast as he could, as if he was discarding something awful.
The torch clattered to the ground. The abominable snowman – or the tribble, as Jack saw it – flew through the air, squealing in terror, tumbling end over end. It landed heavily, crying, “Oh dear, that hurts terribly.”
Arath drew his sword, crying, “Die, you little freak.”
At the same time, Jack got a notification that the abominable snowman had been checked off the list. His objective in regards to the creature had been only ruin his day. Apparently, sending him sailing did the trick. So he reached out an arm to Arath. “We’re done. Let’s go.”
It wasn’t that Jack felt guilty, exactly. But he didn’t know that he could bring himself to harm, or to allow his follower to do any more harm, to such a sad and pathetic little creature.
Arath tried to shake free. “We must kill it, Jack. It’s an abomination.”
The yeti, meanwhile, got to its feet. At least, Jack assumed it had. He wasn’t entirely sure it had feet. But at any rate, it righted itself, saying, “Oh dear. You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Shouldn’t have done it?” Arath said. “You’re right. I should have done worse.”
Then, with a final shake, he freed himself from Jack’s restraining hand and charged for the creature. Jack ran after him, demanding that he desist.
And the yeti? Well, it did something that damned near gave Jack a heart attack. In the blink of an eye, it grew, and grew, and grew, until it stood about eight feet tall: a giant, oblong mass of fur.
Until it parted its jaws, revealing a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. “You really shouldn’t have done that,” it said, and charged them in turn.
Jack screamed and forgot all about Arath. He turned on his heel and ran harder and faster than he’d ever run before. He heard the ranger scream too and start to run. Then, somehow, the ranger caught up with him; and overtook him.
Now, Jack could feel the yeti’s icy breath on his heels. He could hear it rumbling with anger and betrayal. “I welcomed you into my home. You’re not carolers at all. You’re no better than the others. You must die as they died.”
Jack called on every reserve of strength he had and pushed himself like he’d never pushed. He burst out of the cave, and through the final steps, one after the other. Arath was already in the sleigh, his hands upon the reins, urging the beasts upward.
The snakes hissed in protest. Arath flicked the reins manically, up and down. “Go. Go, you stupid beasts. Go!”
Jack ran on. He had five paces left, then four, then three.
The sleigh sprang forward, the serpents finally giving in to Arath’s merciless commands. Jack would have cried for them to stop, but he saved his breath. Three strides had turned to eight and was expanding to ten. Still, he ran.
The sleigh lifted off, leaving him on the earth. Jack kept running. He had no other choice. Not with an angry, murderous tribble on his tail.
Then, to his eternal relief, the sleigh turned back around. He could hear Arath shouting at the serpents. “No, don’t go back. No, you’ll get us all killed, you stupid beasts.”
But the vehicle kept heading for him. The snakes hissed out something, and Jack – either because they planted the idea in his mind, or on his own – decided he should leap for it as it passed.
Which is exactly what he did, about a second and a half later. He jumped up, up, up, and seized the bottom runner. Arath screamed out, “You’re going to kill us, Jack. Let go.” The yeti, meanwhile, swiped out a monstrous paw, doing a tremendous fifty crushing damage to him.
But Jack held on. The sleigh lifted precariously, and Arath screamed bloody murder. But then he sidled over to the far edge, putting his weight opposite Jack’s, and the sleigh steadied.
Jack managed to wheeze out a, “Take us home. Take us b
ack to Krampus.” Then, he concentrated on clinging for dear life to the sleigh, while the world passed very, very far beneath him.
Chapter Eight
Jack tried a few times, but never succeeded in pulling himself up. So he spent a very cold and a very frightening trip back to Krampus’s lair holding for dear life to the sleigh runner.
Then came the mortifying realization that he would have to let go while still moving, and still in the air, lest he would be crushed to death on landing. So Jack watched their final descent with terror. He wanted to wait until they were as close to the ground as possible. But he was also quite keen on avoiding being crushed. So, all things considered, it was a delicate balance.
He erred on the side of caution, insomuch as being crushed went. He careened into the earth from a higher height than was probably necessary and took the damage inherent to the decision.
The Christmas demon was waiting for him in the yard with a host of lesser monsters. He laughed, a great, cheery laugh. “You are a man for entrances, aren’t you, Jack?”
Jack tried to laugh the comment off, even as his broken bones cracked and crackled underneath him.
Krampus went on. “News of your great feats already precedes you. Your infamy – our infamy – spreads with the rising sun.
“For you have gone far above and beyond the call of duty. You did what I asked, and then – well, your initiative is remarkable. Freezing the mayor’s entire house? I don’t even know how you did that. And burning all of Tiny Tim Cratchit’s gifts?”
The goat demon clapped his hands together in rapturous ecstasy. “You are a true gift to the forces of evil, Jack.”
This was, of course, all news to Jack himself – and not particularly welcome news at that. Like Krampus, he had no idea at all how he’d frozen the mayor’s house. He tried to recall his exit from that place, and whether he’d confirmed that the door latched behind him. But it was too many stops back. He couldn’t remember.
And then there was the Tiny Tim business. He recognized the name, of course: the poor little boy from Charles Dickens’s Christmas Carol. He hadn’t picked on a kid, much less a disabled one. He knew that.