Slay Bells

An Amelia City Story

Author’s Note- Ladies and gentlemen, we all know and love the modern classic stop-motion animated film, Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas”. It’s hands-down the perfect end-of-year film, with a built-in excuse to watch any time between the first of October and the 31st of December (I am one of those weirdos who will indulge in Christmas movies after Christmas and until the flip of the calendar page into the new year).

Back in 2013, I got the urge to do my own Silent Fright, as it were, and fortunately for me, I already had an ideal framework to do so. So, it may be a little early for old Kris Kringle to poke his fat ass onto the stage, particularly since we haven’t even yet gotten to my beloved Samhain, but I think it is fair to confess that I am simply anxious to share this tale with you fine folks.

And so, ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, allow me to present to you, “Slay Bells”, an Amelia City Story!

—

Slay Bells

          Around another blind corner he ran, staggering as he crashed into the side of a dumpster, sword scraping against the concrete. Blood ran down in thin streams from the small tooth punctures in his upper bicep, the frosty winter air seeming to run right through the tear in his coat and armor, plunging down into his body. He had expected trouble; this was Amelia City, after all.

          But the man in the red coat and pants with the white trim had not expected to have to cut down crawling man-spiders, only to have something resembling a giant, fanged toad latch onto his shoulder and bite down into his arm. Its teeth had parted the fine chain sleeve like the links were carved of cheese instead of forged steel. The reek of the thing assaulted him still as he ran, its shiny slime dripping down his coat, stinking of seaweed left to rot in the summer sun.

          He thought back, still seeking to escape the most recent pursuing nightmare, trying to remember when he'd decided on attempting this suicide mission. Tompkins, he thought. If he hadn't told me this area would become impenetrable to me next year, I'd have passed over it like so many times before.

          Clearing the alley, running down the sidewalk of a curiously empty street, the being known as Santa Claus found himself praying the reindeer were close by. Even as he heard the clacking claws of his pursuer, the jolly fat man remembered that night when he'd decided to come back to Amelia clearly. Tompkins saying-

          "You can't put it off forever, boss," said Tompkins, the seniormost foreman of the elves' workshops. "Ten years straight you've just dropped the toys from the sleigh, and kids ain't gettin' their presents. You have to go back this year and try to actually deliver some gifts."

          But the ever-jolly Santa Claus sat in his rocking chair, surveying the map before him with grim consternation. Standing on an artist's easel, the map was an aerial portrayal of Amelia City, a Midwestern metropolis which had, since its inception, given the happiest of faery creatures a distinct case of the willies.

          In 1894, Santa had experienced his very first run-in with the less pleasant citizenry of Amelia, a creature that looked like a cross between a giant hawk and a praying mantis. The beast had been waiting for him on a rooftop after he'd delivered a new doll for one little miss Julie Carver, a darling child who would be overjoyed to discover a new dolly under the tree.

          When he'd tossed the bag up onto the roof, Claus hadn't heard the usual nickering and braying of the reindeer. Taking this for a sign of trouble, he'd been cautious climbing up out of the magically widened chimney. That caution had saved his unaging life. He poked his head up over the lip of the chimney and immediately ducked when a razor-sharp forelimb swung out at him.

          His subsequent return down the chimney and crash through the Carvers' front door brought the reindeer from a neighboring roof. They hadn't stuck around for that thing to get at them, though now there were only seven reindeer; Comet had been slaughtered, his body parts tossed all over the Carvers' lawn.

          Santa had boarded the sleigh to get the hell out of there, but the winged beastie had given chase. Only by using the bow and arrow set little Tony Schuster was supposed to get did Santa save himself and his reindeer, nailing the creature through the forehead.

          He hadn't gone back for nearly twenty years. When he did, he went entirely unmolested. For seven years Santa was able to deliver toys personally to the homes of Amelia City, but then there was another incident in the eighth year.

          This pattern repeated itself, but during the years wherein he would not touch down, Claus had devised a system of strategically dropping presents down to front yards and porches while staying on the move, avoiding the shadowy nightmares calling Amelia City home.

          "Tompkins, I told you before, they don't all need presents from me," Santa said. This was true; so long as a good-sized group of children believed, he was okay. Otherwise, getting anywhere near Amelia County as a whole would sap him of all of his magic, and with the modern state of belief, he was already on short rations.

          "That's where you're wrong, boss," said the elf, puffing on a gingerbread-scented cigar. They were in Santa's route-planning room, a vast wooden chamber attached to the main workshop. Parchment maps of thousands of cities lined the walls of the tall, pillar-like room. A roaring fire in the brick fireplace kept the room persistently cozy, as Claus liked it.

          "What do you mean," asked Claus, turning his rounded, grandfatherly face towards his senior foreman. Tompkins, along with all of the elves, didn't look nearly as young and spritely as the cartoons might depict them. He looked like a little person in his late sixties, wild gray hair standing in a ring around his otherwise bald head. "And where is your hat?"

          "Fuck the hat, I'm too old for that nonsense," Tompkins groused. "Look, me and Sally have been checking the numbers and readings," he said, holding up an iPad. "If you don't put in a lot of personal time on the ground there this year, the whole area will be a dead zone to you come February. You can't afford too many more of them, Mr. Claus."

          Santa frowned, waving away a cloud of black gingerbread smoke from the cigar. "I know that, Tompkins, I do. It's just that, well, the place is completely evil! There are perhaps a dozen points of light in that whole county! Anything and everything else magical there is just wrong."

          "You said the same thing about them commies in Russia for a long time, and that didn't last forever, now did it?" 

          "It's not the same thing. Besides, there are still communists in the world, and they aren't all bad people."

          "Yeah, you're right. Most Marxism hit the bricks and shuffled over to China in concentration, but them bastards have never been our biggest supporters anyhow. No big loss, if you ask me. Who needs to deal wit' a bunch of slanty-eyed dopes who eat mostly rice and can't drive for crap, or pray to a fat guy who wears a dress?"

          "Your ethnic insensitivity can be very tiresome, Tompkins," Santa warned sternly.

          "At my age, one ceases to give a damn about being politically correct. Now, are you going to deliver to Amelia City or not?" The faery creature known as Santa Claus took his glasses off and peered at the map of Amelia City once again. The crackling of the fire echoed through the room, its glow suffusing the air with the weight of comfort. To leave this bosky glow and cheer in order to deliver presents was almost always a heart warming tradition. And in those years where he was attacked in Amelia City, the joy of giving to so many other children always outweighed the chill of remembering his ordeals there.

          He couldn't punish the children of Amelia again, he decided. They were not responsible for the horrors lurking just out of plain sight in their community. Claus rose from his rocking chair, tossing aside the white fur comforter he'd had draped over his lap and legs.

          "Tompkins, I'm going to deliver to Amelia City," he proclaimed. "And you're going to help me get ready."

**

          Claus hadn't visited this particular warehouse very often since the sixteenth century. Kids nowadays wanted Transformers and Barbies and laptops and cell phones. Littler kids wanted Play-Doh and Legos and Hot Wheels.

          Not many kids in the twenty-first century asked for short swords or battle axes or armor.

          "I would think a shotgun might be more appropriate from everything you've told us about the critters there," Tompkins said. The warehouse stood open before them, a low-ceilinged building smelling of weapon oil and hay. 

          "No, Tompkins, they are creatures of the olden dark, and modern weapons won't work as well as these," Claus said. He had on a green snowsuit and black rubber boots, his square spectacles peeking out between his thick beard and the hood of his suit. "Grab that cart," he said, pointing to a rusting metal roll cart off to one side of the doorway.

          Tompkins grabbed it and pedaled the squeaking cart behind him as Claus took an oil lantern down from its peg and lit it with a wave of one finger. "Any idea what you're going to grab?"

          "Not yet. You pulled the lads I want to touch up my selections?"

          "They're in the metal shop waiting," Tompkins replied, stopping to light another cigar. This one smelled like eggnog.

          "That smells delightful," Claus said with a smile.

          "That's the sweet smell of cancer of the mouth, Cringle. Can we hurry it up? This place gives me the willies." And so Claus led the way with the lamp held aloft. He first took a smooth-headed mace and put it on the cart. Next, a long but thin-bladed scimitar. Lastly he selected an old but solid iron cuirass, coupled with chain leggings and an open-faced helmet. On their way out, he tossed a pair of gauntlets on the cart, eliciting a reproachful grunt from Tompkins.

          "It's not that much more weight," he muttered.

          "This from the guy who can't tell that his wife's ass has gone from pleasantly round to Godzilla's binging days in five years," Tompkins retorted. "I'll get these to the boys and have them fixed up and made proper for ya. Just do me a favor and start a pot of coffee when you get to the house."

          Santa headed alone through the snowy drifts towards his house, a gentle smile creasing his mouth as he neared the quaint cottage he'd shared with Mrs. Claus for a millenia. He tromped up the wooden steps onto the porch, tamped the snow off of his boots, and stepped through the front door.

          "Mary, I'm home," he called out. The front door opened on a small mud room, which further opened on an immaculately kept kitchen. The strong scent of apple pie baking in the oven drifted to him, always a pleasant aroma. "Mary?"

          "Mind your boots, dear," she called back, stepping into the kitchen entryway. She had on a simple, voluminous powder blue house dress, a woman whose features all but screamed 'Happy Homemaking Grandma'. Her smile was enchanting to him still, even after a thousand years of wedlock. The woman had put on a little weight in the last two decades, yes, but she was his wonderful wife still.

          "Are there any cookies Mary?"

          "Just a dozen done so far," she said. Santa shucked off his boots and undid his coat, then unzipped the green snowsuit and stepped out of it, hanging it near the door. He entered the kitchen and breathed deeply of the pleasant scent of baking cookies. "They're on the counter, Chris."

          Santa, known alternately as Santa Claus or Chris Kringle, sauntered over to the cooling cookies on the counter, took a napkin and a treat, and sat down at a small round kitchen table across from his wife. He took a bite and moaned with pleasure. "Oh, Mary, this is splendid."

          "Thank you, dear. What took you so long to get home from the shop today? Problems on the production line?"

          "No, nothing like that."

          "Oh, thank God. I remember the trouble we had with those Tickle Me Elmos that wouldn't shut off. I could hear them all the way out here at the house. I remember Tompkins said he was close to hanging himself, they got so annoying."

          "Tompkins is, well, different," Santa said. He wiped crumbs from his beard and took the tall glass of milk Mary had poured him, drinking deep. "Ah, much better. Now Mary, I've got something to tell you, and I need you to stay calm."

          Mary Claus continued to smile, though concern radiated from her eyes and the new set of her shoulders. She reached across the table and let him take her hands in his. "What is it, dear? Did one of the reindeer die?"

          "No, Mary, but they might. I'm landing in Amelia City this year." Immediately her hands tightened, but Santa kept his easy, reassuring grip on them, not too strong, not too soft. "I have to. It's been ten years since the last time, and the children are losing their faith in me there. If I don't go, the entire region will become another dead zone."

          Mary Claus looked away, shaking her head sadly. "I hate that place, Chris. One of these years the things coming after you will kill you."

          "No they won't," Santa replied. "I'm going prepared this year, and I'm going four nights early. I'll use some of the old magic to keep the presents hidden from human view until Christmas morning."

          "Like you did for Los Angeles the year of the race riots?"

          "Just like that. Can you imagine if some black family woke up in the night to find a fat old white man breaking into their house? I'd have been shot dead. Now look, Tompkins has some of the lads in the metal shop preparing me some armor and weapons. If one of those demons or imps or whatever they are comes at me this time, I'll be ready for them. I'm not running this year."

          Mary Claus began to weep, and her eternal husband held her close, trying to comfort her.

**

          "Impressive isn't it," Tompkins said the following evening as the light faded in the sky outside of the metal shop. Claus stared, mouth agape, at the weapons and armor on their rack. His elves had done a magnificent job. The cuirass had been modified to more comfortably fit over his rotund frame, for starters. On the breast plate they had painted a crest of two candy canes crossed over a wreath. 

          The chain leggings gleamed in the bright arc sodium lights in the ceiling of the smallish metal shop. A pair of plate greaves had been added by the elves, the metal polished with a black lacquer to make them look like his own old leather boots.

          The gauntlets had been polished up, a ridged blade plate affixed to the upper knuckle cover, sterling silver. The open-faced helmet had been reinforced along the sides by a layer of tempered steel and painted red to match his hat. 

          "The armor will go on under your delivery outfit," Tompkins explained. "We've had Mindy and the other seamstresses working on the alterations to allow for it. You'll just look a little bulkier than you were last time you delivered there. Here," said Tompkins, handing the helmet up. Santa looked at it, turning it this way and that, and stopped to stare inside.

          "What's this?"

          "Internally mounted camera and earpiece, so you can stay in touch with me here and I can get a recording of what's there, see live what you're up against."

          "That's good thinking, Mr. Tompkins. You did a few Halloween Guard stints, didn't you?"

          "Yeah, helped deal with mostly angry ghosts and such, though I did run into goblins one year, and a werewolf once too. That was some scary shit right there."

          "Still, that makes you more qualified than most to help me this way." Santa reached out to the rack and took down the scimitar, giving it a few experimental twirls. Tompkins and the other four elves, all gruff-looking long-timers who might well have been the ones to make this stuff in the first place, gave him curious glances. "Martial arts training videos. We've been helping make them since the 60's," he said by way of explanation. He set the curved sword back on the rack and hefted the polished mace, enjoying the weight of it in his hand.

          He set it back and heaved a sigh. "I go next week Monday," he said. "Time delay enchantment on all of the presents once they're in place. Amelia City will be the first delivered to this year. I want Jiffy to have the reindeer prepped and ready at three that afternoon. I'll fly over and make landing in the woods just outside of Amelia County."

          "You'll have to wait a couple of hours for nightfall," said one of the metal working elves in a rumbly voice. "No telling how far is far enough outside to stay safe."

          "A calculated risk," said Santa, puffing out his chest. "One I'll have to take. Gentlemen, I thank you for your hard work. You four may take the rest of the season off once you've relayed my order to Jiffy."

          The four elves gave a small cheer to that and headed for the metal shop doors. Tompkins strode up to Claus, standing only just taller than the lovable faery's waist. He held a cigar up to Claus, who took it readily. 

          "Apple pie flavor," Tompkins said, striking a match and lighting his own, then offering the matchbook up to Claus.

          "Thank you," said Santa. They both blew out a thick cloud of smoke and tipped their stogies to one another. "To Christmas."

          "Cheers," said Tompkins.

**

          One week later, after saying many long and tearful farewells with Mary Claus, who feared for his life, Santa Claus stood in an empty reindeer stall with Tompkins, Jiffy, and three other elves helping him get into the armor and his delivery costume. The cuirass was the most awkward piece to put on, segmented as it was by a band of chain around mid-torso to allow for greater range of movement. This customization had been done by the metal workers, and Santa would be thankful for it later.

          Jiffy stood on a ladder, easing the helmet down over Santa's head. The jolly fat man had to reach up and tug his beard out from behind the chin and cheek guards, but it fit well overall. The pointed red cap went on over top, and he flexed his arms in their chain sleeves.

          The leggings, originally brigandine, had been replaced with tempered chain worn under his red pants. While replacing the leather of the armored leggings, one of the seamstresses had discovered that the metal plates between the leather backing and exterior layers had rusted through. 

          Still, Santa felt far better protected now, and paint had been applied to the gauntlets and greaves to camouflage his armoring. There was no similar way to hide the sheathed scimitar or mace sticking out of his wide leather belt, but that didn't matter. The sight of weapons wouldn't likely slow the dark denizens of Amelia any.

          Tompkins puffed away at his cigar and paced at the stall doorway. The reindeer had all been fitted with customized armor that Jiffy had constructed for them after the original Comet had been slain. Tipped spikes had been attached to their antlers, and their hoof shoes sharpened to knife-like proportions along their edges. 

          Santa fastened the last button on his coat and shook his head. "Well lads, I think I'm as ready as I can get. Anything else you want me to carry, Mr. Tompkins?"

          "Yeah, these," the elf grumbled, holding out a small purple pouch in which rested three fragmentation grenades. "You never know." Santa took them hesitantly, tying the pouch to his belt. "Okay, I'll be at that command table," Tompkins said, pointing to a long oak table in the stables upon which sat a laptop computer, a coffee pot, and several municipal maps of Amelia City. A high quality PC microphone stood on its base next to the laptop. "I'll be able to talk to you and you to me. Remember, you have to do at least half of the city to keep the belief strong enough."

          Santa nodded, heading for the enormous crimson sleigh, attached to the war-like reindeer by traces on the front. The bag of goodies wasn't as large as his normal bag, but this too was expected, considering the nature of this run.

          Santa Claus mounted the driver's bench and tapped the right side of his helmet. "Radio check," he said, tapping the helmet again.

          "Sounds good," he heard in the earpiece and behind him. There was a 'click' as Tompkins shut off the microphone. "We'll be pulling for you, Mr. Claus," he called out.

          "Ho ho ho," Santa said under his breath.

**

          The flight took a little longer than they had calculated, due to the weight of the reindeer's armor, but when he touched down in the woods a mile and a half from the border of Amelia county, Santa still had a little over an hour and a half to wait for the sun to set.

          By having left the North Pole, the magic that extended the night had already begun to take affect over the world. The reindeer were all lapping water from buckets Santa filled from a nearby stream, and the jolly fat man kept his right hand on the handle of his sword.

          In the gray late afternoon, the wind stirred the skeletal limbs of the trees around him, several dry branches rattling like dice against one another. The crisp, clean smell of recently fallen snow kept Santa alert to his surroundings, a factor he was thankful for on this December day. 

          As the sun dipped halfway down past the horizon, he took up the mostly emptied water buckets and tossed them back in a plain burlap gear bag kept in the front of the sleigh with him. 

          Movement in the woods brought Santa to a defensive swordsman's posture, scimitar clearing the sheath in a single fluid movement. For a fat man, he moved with a warrior's grace. Yet what he saw made him let out a deep sigh of embarrassment; it was just a deer passing through at a jog.

          "Don't get too jumpy," Tompkins said over the earpiece. "I didn't even see anything, so at least you know you're ready for whatever may come. Well, except for the smell if you should shit yourself at the first loud bang or barking dog."

          "Thank you for that, Mr. Tompkins. Are you enjoying this?"

          "Not really, but I have the advantage of being someplace safe. Sunset's lookin' like maybe ten, fifteen minutes off. You set?"

          "As best I can be." Santa tapped the helmet, cutting off the mic on his end. 

          "Okay, you're on the eastern border of the county. So, head west forty miles, and you'll be able to drop down into the first residential district you can hit up. Should take ten minutes to get there, tops. I'd get moving."

          And so Santa did, letting the reindeer lead as he drew out a computer tablet. "Little Bobby Corbin, you're right there," he said, pulling up an associated digital map of the city. The GPS put him at eleven minutes out. Eighteen kids lived in the apartment building with Bobby, twelve of them young enough to be on the list. "Huh, only one 'naughty', Leroy Arnold. Coal for you." He tapped the name and read the narrative cause for Leroy's naughty status. "Let your sister's kitty run away, eh? Well, it could be worse, I suppose. At least you didn't take a gun to school."

          The magical sleigh passed over the unseen line then, into the realm of Amelia.

**

          The landing was short and hard atop the snow-drenched rooftop, thanks to the bladed shoes of the reindeer. Santa grabbed the goody bag and a small brown block tool from the bench, then dismounted and walked up to Rudolph, whose nose was, for the moment, covered with a felt strip.

          Santa grabbed part of Rudolph's harness and pulled a cord down off of it, hooking it to the reindeer's left foreleg. "This is a snap-release, Rudolph. If there's trouble, Jiffy says to yank it twice rapidly, and it will release all of you from the traces. Got it?" The red-nosed reindeer of sing-along fame snorted and shook its head up and down. "Good."

          Santa stepped away through the snow, sensing all along that there were unfriendly eyes upon him. He tossed the brown brick down, which transformed with a pop into a chimney. He hefted up the small red bag onto his back, and jumped into the chimney.

          He floated quickly and silently down a false brick chute into the Corbin living room, a few feet away from a wonderfully appointed tree. He reached into the gift bag, sliding out four boxes for little Bobby and setting them back behind the tree. As soon as his hand left them, the packages disappeared. On Christmas morning, they would return to the world right where he'd left them.

          The adults would, invariably, build up false memories of having purchased these gifts themselves, or having gotten them from friends and family. The notion always brought Claus a laugh.

          A bite of an M&M-studded cookie on an end table, half a glass of milk, and back up the chimney he floated.

          The reindeer were all still standing placidly in place, shuffling their hooves now and again. The earpiece crackled. "Looks to be going good, Kringle," Tompkins said. Santa tapped the helmet.

          "Thus far, yes," he replied, looking around. He still felt as though something lurked just on the edge of his perception, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. "Heading back down for Suzy and Tyler Walker."

          He tapped the helmet and jumped down the false chimney again.

**

          Santa was starting to feel almost normal now, two apartment buildings completed and five single-family homes done. He landed the sleigh on a sixth rooftop, hopped out, and set up the speed release for Rudolph once again. His guard wasn't down, but he'd picked his pace back up to something close to his usual.

          This house actually had a chimney, he was glad to see, and he only needed to use a small burst of his magic to widen the chute. He jumped up, and began his descent down the chimney.

          The moment he landed and ducked out of the fireplace, Santa knew there was something wrong. He looked slowly around the darkened living room of the two-story Brownstone, his eyes already adjusted to the dark but unbelieving.

          There was nothing there. No tree, no decorations, and most puzzling, no furniture. There was no indication that anybody even lived in this house. What there was, however, painted on the plain white wall across from him, was the outline of a chair in ocean blue. Above this was painted a sigul of some sort, four hooked blue claws, joined along their tops by a thick black horizontal line.

          "What the hell is this," Tompkins rasped in Santa's earpiece. The jolly fat faery man shook his head and reached slowly for his scimitar. The symbol on the wall flashed alive with a lurid blue light, and Tompkins was yelling in his ear, "Get out! Get out of there now!"

          The blade cleared its sheath, and Claus took up a samurai's defensive stance. The light pulsed from the symbol, a hum vibrating the whole house coming from it. A vaguely familiar odor caught in Santa's nose, and as a final blinding flash forced him to take three steps back, planting his ass against the wall, he thought, campfire ashes. That's what it smells like.

          The light faded, and Claus let his eyes crack open. Seated now in a plush blue recliner across from him was a man wreathed in smoke. The newcomer wore a black-and-white checkerboard zoot suit, and had his legs crossed in a relaxed posture. But as the smoke cleared from around the man's upper body, Claus saw that he had the clawed, feathered hands and sharp-beaked head of a raven. The creature wore a blood red tie with the symbol from the wall embroidered on it. Santa quickly tapped the side of his helmet so Tompkins could hear.

          Daggers flashed in an impossible, toothy smile as the creature turned its head slightly to look at Santa. "Well, as I live and breath, if it isn't old Saint Nick," the creature called out in a boisterous, game-show-host voice. "Hey, I wanted to thank you for the puppy you got me a couple of years back," the raven-thing said. It snapped its fingers, and Santa saw a hideous, amorphous blob of bloody meat and broken bones go hobbling across the doorway to his left, leading into a hallway.

          "That wasn't a puppy," Tompkins rasped over the radio. "That thing looked like gonorrhea with teeth and feet!"

          "Poor thing doesn't realize that it shouldn't play fetch with its own little doggy intestines," the raven-thing continued, unperturbed by the unheard elf. "Then again, I suppose I shouldn't have dragged its guts out through its mouth to begin with. Say," the creature said, shooting to its feet from the chair, which immediately melted back into a vague outline against the wall. "You look tense, Kringle! Where's your famous holiday cheer? And aren't you early? It's only the twentieth!"

          The shock of seeing this apparition finally wore off, and Santa resumed his battle-ready stance. "What are you," he asked, his body alternately telling him to flee, stand still, and attack. Standing still seemed his best option for now.

          "Me," the raven asked, hugging its hands to itself in a 'what, me?' pose of surprise. "Allow me to introduce myself. I," the raven said, twirling its hand forward and planting its leg behind it to offer a grand, sweeping bow, "am known as Quoth."

          "Quoth, the raven," Santa muttered. "Cute."

          "Believe me, I wouldn't have chosen it myself," said Quoth matter-of-factly, standing upright. "But it's very fitting, considering the master’s, er, unique sense of humor," he said, shrugging his shoulders.

          "What do you want," Santa barked, taking a step forward, bringing the tip of the scimitar up half an inch. He could hear the bloody, mangled thing in the hallway squelching around wetly. The sound made his stomach lurch. 

          "Right to business, I like that in a man," Quoth said, pointing with both hands in a 'bang-bang' at Claus, flashing that toothy smile. "I'm here as a representative of my master's will, and I come bearing a message, as well as a bargain. Would you hear it?"

          "I would," said Santa.

          "I'll ask you to put that pig sticker away, then," said Quoth, still smiling. His tone, however, frosted the air as surely as if they stood outside in the snow and ice. The raven stood up straight and reached into his blazer. Tompkins began yelling at Santa to just hurry up and cut the freak down.

          "He looks like a used-car salesman from the seventh circle of Hell, Kringle! Cut him down and get the fuck out of there!" But Santa instead got cautiously to a normal stance and sheathed the scimitar. The raven brought a pair of white note cards out of its blazer's inner jacket with a feathery flourish.

          "Ahem, the message. 'Chris Kringle, incarnation of the Spirit of the Winter Solstice, it is wonderful that you've returned to Amelia! I was hoping you'd let me take one more shot at you! In all seriousness, there are two possible people you could be hearing this from, either Jago, or Quoth. If the former, expect him to be aggressive and make this little meeting very personal, if given the chance. If the latter, then you're in civilized but unpleasant hands, far closer to my own methods. In either event, I don't think I'll ever see you in my city again.'

          "Ahem," said Quoth, tossing the first card over his shoulder. It burst into flames and then dust in a flash. "Now, Mr. Kringle, the bargain." Quoth held up the second card. As he peered at it, Santa carefully slipped his left hand into the purple velvet pouch on his hip, grasping one of the grenades and drawing it out slowly. "'To the man known as Santa Claus, I hereby offer the following bargain. My minions throughout the region have been told to stay their hands against you until such time as you might meet with this servant of mine. Here is my offer; leave Amelia now, and forever more, and you will be allowed to fly away without harm. Neither I nor any of my servants will ever attempt to visit harm upon you if you do this.

          "'Your other option, of course, is to refuse, and risk my wrath. In all of the times you have been beset here, you have seen only a fraction of the horror I can have brought down on your head. Resist me and you will die, Kringle. Refuse my offer, and my servant will give you only a twenty count to try and escape with your miserable life.'"

          Quoth tossed this card over his shoulder, and like the first one, it disintegrated. Santa said, "Seems like an awful lot to fit on one card."

          "Enchanted ink, it scrolls as its read aloud," the raven said amiably. The claws on its hands visibly extended half an inch at his sides. "So, what is it to be, Kringle? Will you accept my master's generous terms?"

          Tompkins was, for a wonder, silent on his end as Santa took a single step toward the fireplace. His jaw was set, his left hand pressed close against his side. He cleared his throat. "Fuck you," he said flatly. As Quoth began to wave his hands in the air, streaks of blue energy trailing them, Claus pulled the pin and dropped the grenade.

          He was already floating up the chimney when he heard the raven shriek, "One-two-skip-a-few-twenty! You're dead, Kringle! No one defies me!" Santa came flying up out of the chimney onto the roof, were he saw the reindeer were already pelting in every direction, released by Rudolph. Swarming up over the sides of the house were dozens of child-sized black and yellow spiders, human faces locked in eternal screams on their backs, eyes and mouths agape.

          The grenade exploded, rocking the house. Claus lost his footing and began rolling toward the front of the Brownstone, crying out as he fell heavily into the snow. He landed atop one of the spider beasts, its blood splashing across his back in a foul black burst of ichor. 

          Repressing the urge to vomit, he drew out the scimitar and stood up, hacking away at four or five of the face-spiders. One of them swung a hooked leg at his torso, but the sharpened limb scraped uselessly off of the armor beneath his red coat.

          Swinging the sword wildly, he cleared a way through the spiders and began to run away, pouring a small amount of magic into his legs for speed. His powers were weak here, though. The sheer lack of belief in Amelia was working against him.

          Back up the street behind him, Claus heard a crash, followed by Quoth screaming, "Oh, you bastard! You fat son of a whore! We'll fix you! Just you wait and see!"

          Santa turned down a side street, his metal boots breaking clear through the ice on the sidewalks, an advantage the spiders didn't share. He was still running when, from a resident's garage along this lonely one-way street, three neon green toad creatures came bounding out toward him.

          Santa put on a fresh burst of speed, and Tompkins came on over the earpiece. "Kringle! You're heading deeper into the city! You've gotta turn around!" His voice sounded staticky and distant, broken.

          Santa did turn, but only to bend down and swing his blade downward from an overhead angle. The chain section around his gut saved him; if he had not been able to bend, one of the toads leaping for his head would have buried its teeth into his throat instead of being cut in half.

          Santa snap-rolled to the right, avoiding the other two toads. He was quickly back on his feet and running past them, once again heading deeper into Amelia City. 

          Relying on the sounds the beasts were making as they slapped against the pavement and the growls they let out each time they jumped, Santa evaded them long enough to dive through the bushes surrounding a residence and streak through the snowy yard onto an intersecting street. The gift bag, now slung over his torso like a military duffel bag, bounced on his back in rhythm to his clomping footfalls.

          He had a single location in mind now, and cursed himself for not thinking of it sooner. It occurred to him when Quoth was still reading him the bargain offer. Just over half of all the city's elementary school students all attended a single massive school on the east side of the city, Warner Elementary. If he could make it there, he could make his delivery in one stop and escape. The students' last day of school was the twenty-first, so he would have to remove the time-delay enchantment, but that could be done safely from the comfort of anywhere other than here.

          Lost in these thoughts, Santa started to cross the street, failing to check his surroundings. As a result, one of the neon toad creatures landed on his left shoulder, one rear leg pressed against his neck for balance. It bit down into his upper arm, teeth piercing the chain, flesh and meat in a hellish storm of pain.

          Santa screamed and dropped the sword for a moment, leaping up and onto his side, holding the beast in place. When he landed on its head, the toad let go, and Santa crushed it with his mace. He quickly put the mace back and grabbed the sword, running away once more. 

          As he neared an intersection that represented the first major metropolitan block of Amelia City, something shook the ground under his feet. Santa looked to his left, and what he saw there as he stood bleeding down his arm caused him to shamelessly loose his bladder in his pants.

          Standing six feet high from paw to shoulder, leathery bat-like wings standing upright from its back, an oversized German Shepherd with a sleek head stood glaring at him in the center of the street. A giant scorpion's stinger curled up over its hind end and wavered back and forth, dripping hissing green poison in several spots through the snow and concrete.

          Standing behind the demon dog was Quoth, leering at Santa despite the frayed, burned feathers standing in a fan on the left side of his avian head. His zoot suit was charred and shredded along that side, clearly the recipient of the majority of the grenade blast. The raven patted its pet beast on the flank under a wing.

          "Told you it was going to be bad, Kringle," Quoth said almost laughingly. "Sic 'im, boy!" He slapped the beast's side, eliciting a canine howl of rage from its throat.

          Santa began running for the nearest alley with every ounce of speed he could muster. The clack of the enormous beast's claws on the pavement as it began barreling after him sounded like thunder in his ears.

          The mouth of the alley ahead shimmered with a queer yellowish luminescence, and after Santa rounded the corner into said alley, he felt a blast of heat as flames burst against the corner of one of the buildings forming the narrow lane. 

          Tompkins was hollering in his ear again as Santa belted down the alley, barely keeping his footing. "Kringle, I just lost two of the reindeer's signals! I think Donner and Blitzen are down!"

          This didn't surprise Santa in the slightest. He made a turn in the alley and bounced off of a dumpster, and this, friends and neighbors, is where we entered this tale. Soon he was on the empty street, thinking back on that evening in the planning room, and his left hand was reaching for the second of his three grenades.

          He sheathed the sword while still on the run, pulled the pin, and as the canine beast loosed a series of barks behind him, he tossed the explosive back over his shoulder. When the blast came, there was an accompanying high-pitched whine. He stole a glance over his shoulder and saw that the beast was bloodied and torn open all along its underside.

          But it was getting back up to continue the hunt.

          Santa pulled out the mace and kept running, the Warner Elementary School now only two blocks away. The benighted, empty street began filling with drifting banks of fog, his vision becoming cut off two hundred yards down the road. There came again the scrape of claws behind him, the hellish heat of the creature's breath on the back of his neck.

          Santa planted his heavy metal boots on the pavement and spun around, loosing a war cry as his arc brought the head of the mace careening into the side of the beast's neck. Its eyes bulged in shock and pain, the snap of bones just audible under Santa's holler. The beast fell on its side, clawed feet lashing out as it toppled, shredding the fat man's pants but scraping without harm off of his chain leggings.

          The scorpion-like tail lashed forward in a final attack, but it missed Santa by a foot. Between the grenade and a crushing blow to the throat, the creature was dead.

          Santa, breath coming in heavy gasps, turned back toward Warner Elementary and stalked away on shaky, weary legs. He had survived Quoth's spiders, the toad beasts, and now this winged, canine monstrosity. With the mace clutched tight in his hand, he felt ready for anything.

          The fog, heavy and somehow warm against his skin as he passed through it, now cut his field of vision down to twenty feet or so in all directions. He moved with the caution of a faery tale child lost in the deep, dark woods. Faint snarls came from the shroud around him, and the earpiece in his helmet let out a shrieking warble, then fell silent.

          Santa took the tablet from inside of his partially shredded coat and pulled up the GPS map. What showed up sent ice through his veins. The little red dot showing his location stood in the middle of an empty gray field. Along the top of the display, the coordinates cycled backward and forward, blinking out and showing question marks every few seconds.

          More snarls as he dropped the tablet back into his coat, holding the mace in both hands. The school was faintly visible ahead on the right side of the street, and dozens of glowing pinpricks of light glowed around him. With a sound like a buzzing fly, something small and winged streaked out of the fog at him, a fanged stingray with gleaming metal hooks hanging from its underbelly.

          Two of the hooks raked clean through the cuirass over his right lower torso, blood spraying out in a fan on the ground. The stingray disappeared into the fog, and as Santa ceased stumbling, another winged canine charged forth, it's long snout parting as a cone of flames jetted out over the fat man's legs. It sideswiped him to the ground with its broad body, and the thrashing Claus kicked his burning legs up and down for a good ten seconds before getting up to his knees, the mace still clutched in his hands, agony lancing up and down his burned legs The pants were gone in smoking scraps as he tottered to his feet.

          A low groan escaped his throat as a familiar silhouette emerged from the fog. It was Quoth. The damage he'd suffered was gone, as if it had never been dealt. The feathers on his head looked slick, his eyes shining with an impish orange light.

          "No," Santa gasped, trying to stand upright. The gouge in his side flared painfully, the bleeding still slicking his side. "You, I hit you with a grenade. A fucking grenade!"

          "Yes you did, and it hurt quite a lot," said Quoth, clasping his hands behind his back and striding slowly forth. "But this is Amelia City, Claus. You never had a chance. Now," he said with that blade-filled smile, coming to a stop a few feet away. "I told you I would see you dead. If you drop the weapon and accept your fate, I will be merciful and make your end quick. Defy me, and your death will be a thing of unimaginable pain. A hundred servants of the unseen dark will tear you apart. Look around you and know that I am not lying."

          Santa slowly made a circle, peering out into the fog at the scores of tiny eye lights shining out at him. Halfway around he switched the mace to his right hand, his left hand stealing toward the purple pouch. 

          "Don't even think of pulling that last grenade," Quoth snarled. Something came whirling out of the fog, a greasy purple tentacle with suckers lined with teeth snatching the purple pouch and ripping it away into the unseen gray. Santa finished his circular turn, and found Quoth now standing on the edge of the fog encircling him. "I told you I would have been merciful," the raven said, shaking his head with his hand pinching his beak as if exasperated. "Have at him, boys and girls," he said, flapping his hand in Santa's direction.

          As a deluge of bladed, fanged, and otherwise unnatural nightmares sprang from the fog to tear at the now-wailing fat man, Quoth turned and picked up his newest Christmas decoration. It was a heavy black chestnut plaque with a reindeer head mounted to it, one with a nose that lit up. He smiled at it.

          "This will look great over my mantle," he said cheerily. "Whoops, still got a little blood there," he amended, licking his thumb and wiping around Rudolph's severed neck where it had been adhered to the plaque. "Well, merry Christmas, my delightful little friends," he called to the horde now feasting on the remains of Santa Claus.  "I would say God bless us, but I think we all know that isn't about to happen, eh?"

-Fin