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  Claus: Rise of the Miser

  Claus, Volume 5

  Tony Bertauski

  Published by DeadPixel Publications, 2017.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Title Page

  NETWORK

  DECEMBER 1ST

  CLAUS

  KANDI

  KANDI

  KANDI

  NETWORK

  CLAUS

  JESSICA

  KANDI

  KANDI

  KANDI

  CLAUS

  MISER

  TRIPLETS

  NETWORK

  KANDI

  KANDI

  KANDI

  KANDI

  MISER

  CLAUS

  TRIPLETS

  NETWORK

  DECEMBER 15TH

  KANDI

  KANDI

  KANDI

  MISER

  CLAUS

  MISER

  MISER

  KANDI

  NETWORK

  TRIPLETS

  DECEMBER 22ND

  KANDI

  KANDI

  CLAUS

  CLAUS

  CLAUS

  NETWORK

  KANDI

  MISER

  MISER

  KANDI

  CLAUS

  MISER

  KANDI

  MISER

  CLAUS

  KANDI

  NETWORK

  TONY BERTAUSKI

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  NETWORK

  It started with a letter.

  The boy who wrote it wasn’t much different than other little boys, full of hopes and dreams and puppy dog tails. He took a blank piece of paper and a pencil and, with his tongue between his teeth, wrote in very neat cursive.

  Dear Santa, it started. All letters to the North Pole start that way, sure. It’s what followed that made all the difference.

  Dear Santa, I hope you are warm. I will leave you a blanket when you stop by my house. I do not want anything for Christmas. Can you bring my mother something? And if it is not too much, could you maybe give me a ride on your sleigh? I understand if you can’t.

  Seriously, he wrote that. If I could cry, I would.

  How many seven-year-olds don’t want anything for Christmas except for their mom to be happy? I’ll tell you, none. That’s how many.

  He wrote that letter in looping cursive letters and sealed it in an envelope before taking it to his mom because he didn’t want her to read it. Not that he was embarrassed. He believed letters to Santa were like birthday wishes. If you told someone, they didn’t come true.

  Precious.

  Santa Claus, North Pole, he addressed it, because everyone knew where Santa lived. He gave it to his mom and she put a stamp on it. The next day, they took it to the post office. And that was it.

  Well, not entirely.

  His mom actually opened it before they mailed it. It wasn’t just her curiosity that got the best of her. He wouldn’t tell her what he wanted for Christmas, so you know what she was thinking.

  She ended up bawling.

  Of course, Santa didn’t wake him up when he stopped by on Christmas. There were no magic sleigh rides, but his mom did seem happier in the morning, so the boy got what he wanted. Minus the sleigh ride.

  I wasn’t around when all of this happened. In fact, I wasn’t anywhere. But I have a copy of the letter. I know what he did and what she did, the details of their memories, the way he sealed the envelope, how he tried to stay awake on Christmas Eve, and how his mother cried.

  But like any good iceberg, there’s way more to the story beneath the surface. It started with the letter, but it has a lot to do with a mother’s love.

  And a very fat man.

  DECEMBER 1ST

  Merry, merry!

  CLAUS

  1

  The fat man sat on the chimney.

  His belly full of jelly rested on his legs, with an ache in his back. Claus was getting old.

  He knew exactly how old he was but refused to ever say it. When the elven gathered around his birthday cake and asked how many candles were lit, he would say something like enough to light all the Christmas trees in the world or enough to guide my sleigh. Didn’t matter what he said, they laughed and cheered. They loved him.

  They loved everything.

  Born Nicholas Santa, he was now Santa Claus—a man no longer bound to the laws of human nature. Elven magic flowed through his veins. The story on how that came to be was long and convoluted. There were rumors of his existence and how he got to the North Pole, but no man or woman knew everything. There were shreds of truth in their songs and stories. They knew about the reindeer, but not all of them. They knew about his Christmas Eve trip, but not his practice run. They knew about the presents.

  But they really didn’t know everything.

  Two hundred was impossible for a human to live, but in elven years it was but a handful of snowflakes in a North Pole blizzard. A two-hundred-year-old elven was hardly a teenager. Despite the longevity, Claus’s back hurt. He should lose some weight, but he lived on the North Pole. The insulation was a necessity. Human limitations still held court in his body.

  Perhaps it’s time to end the practice run.

  For centuries, he’d taken the sleigh out on the first day of December. It was an abbreviated trip, a quick survey of the world. He would make a few stops, see how societies had changed, who was naughty and nice. Radio personalities always announced his approach on Christmas Eve, whether they saw his sleigh or not. But no one knew about the practice run.

  This year was no different.

  His body, however, reminded him it was two hundred years older and maybe these practice runs weren’t necessary. He could do the routes with his eyes closed. There were years he’d fallen asleep while crossing mountain ranges. The reindeer knew what to do, probably with their eyes closed, too.

  Maybe things ached because he hadn’t been paying attention to his posture, like Mrs. Claus told him every time he climbed into the sleigh.

  There was a loud snort.

  His sleigh was on a pitched roof, the golden rails buried in the frigid fluff. The house was built into a hilltop. In the summer, the grassy earth would cool the house below. In the winter, it insulated the rooms filled with cookies and candles, steaming cups of cider and hot chocolate. He could smell it through the chimney.

  So could the reindeer.

  His lead reindeer looked up. Ronin’s jaws worked side to side. His wide rack of antlers—the largest of any reindeer—spanned almost as wide as the roof. His most reliable and faithful reindeer was still missing from holiday lore. All of the other reindeer were accounted for by name and gender, but not the biggest and baddest of them all.

  No glowing noses in this bunch.

  Claus lifted a gloved hand. He needed another minute to rest his bones. Ronin buried his snout in the feedbag. This was their December fodder, a special blend for long hauls. It would allow them to inflate their helium bladders for the jumps ahead.

  Maybe Claus needed a special blend.

  The town below was nestled between two white-capped mountains. A blanket of snow rested in the valley. The scene was distorted through the timesnapper distortion field. Christmas lights were smudges of red and green and white. Outside the translucent bubble, time had nearly come to a stop. Snowflakes hung like crystal ornaments.

  Inside, time marched to its normal beat.

  No one could see him inside the timesnapper. He could circle the world before t
he second hand ticked on Big Ben. It was peaceful and quiet inside the bubble. Only the reindeer’s grinding molars disturbed the silent night. Occasionally, the harness bells jingled. This was still his favorite time of year.

  But it had been so much easier when he first started.

  The gifts were simpler back then and joy wasn’t as elusive. Technology complicated things. Humankind had almost caught up with elven technology. They were more of a danger to themselves than anything else. This concern grew larger every year. In the wrong hands, elven technology could change the world.

  A chorus of bells rang.

  The reindeer were restless. Time might be relative inside the timesnapper, but it was not endless. Santa stood up and stretched. He loosened the black belt around his waist. He’d already given up two notches since last Christmas. He would have to pace himself before Christmas arrived.

  The night of cookies and milk.

  The winter did not affect him like men in the normal world, but he could still feel the cold. At that moment, though, he wasn’t feeling the nip of winter at all. In fact, it was beginning to feel a bit warm.

  He wasn’t immune to illness. The year of 1970 was the Christmas that would never end. He had the flu. Despite the protests from Mrs. Claus, he mounted the sleigh at midnight. The world was counting on him. He took several naps inside the timesnapper, shivering with fever. He was beginning to feel hot.

  This didn’t feel like a fever, though.

  Water was trickling. Snow was melting from the roof and dripping from the shingles.

  The timesnapper has malfunctioned, he thought.

  Before he could turn, a great and wonderful sleepiness fell over him. Perhaps the flu was back. He reached for the chimney; then he felt the pitched roof on his back. He tingled all over.

  Then closed his eyes.

  The last thing he heard was the jingling of the reindeer’s harness bells in the distance.

  KANDI

  2

  Santa is a turd.

  The video had been posted last year at 7:03 a.m. by someone called bigheart<3. She was still in bed; her hair was matted on one side and frizzy on the other. In selfie mode, she closed her eyes like someone about to blow out birthday candles then let out a scream that could shatter a concrete wall. She continued screaming on her parents’ bed, aiming her phone at their faces.

  Her dad was not happy.

  She had to wait on the top step until everyone was ready. Her mom picked up her baby brother and bigheart<3 told her to hurry up. Her dad was red-eyed and grumpy. Maybe he was the Christmas type at one time.

  “All right,” he croaked.

  She took the stairs three at a time and raced for the giant Christmas tree. Lights blinked on the branches. A burly Santa Claus was posted on top with a shovel in one hand and a swollen bag in the other. The video bounced and swung around the room. Bigheart<3 turned the phone on herself again and closed her eyes, lips silently moving.

  Wishing for everything on her list.

  She plowed through a pile of presents that were not for her. Her momentum carried her into the lower branches. She made a lap around the tree. Her second lap was slower than the first. She stopped after the third. The phone was aimed at the floor.

  Pink-painted toes curled on the hardwood.

  “Where are they?” she said.

  The video froze. There were still two minutes left to watch but Kandi had already seen it a dozen times. It had three million views. After the knee-slide, she went into a cursing tirade with red-rimmed eyes and a snotty nose because she didn’t get what she wanted. She used big-time cuss words. Her dad told her to shut up.

  “Santa’s a turd!”

  Kandi scrolled through related brat videos. Most of them had big sparkly trees and mountains of presents. Her tree was in the corner. It was a fir she had cut down behind the house. Her dad had dragged it through the back door.

  There weren’t many ornaments on it, at least not the kind at the store. There was a box of those kinds of ornaments in the garage. Kandi knew exactly where it was. So did her dad. They didn’t get them out this year or the year before that.

  Sparkly pinecones were this year’s ornaments.

  “Did you feed your fish?” Her dad stepped into the room.

  She explained an autofeeder would keep Cris the Goldfish fed. “Did you pack sunblock?”

  “What?”

  “You can burn, you know.”

  He stared at her blankly. This was his look when she threw an unexpected thought at him and all of his well-organized, science-minded thoughts crumbled like a house of toothpicks. Her father of Indian descent was still brown after three years in Fairbanks, Alaska.

  “I won’t be outside much,” he said.

  This trip was strange and last second, but it was doubtful they would be inside the entire time. He always said money couldn’t buy happiness. He also said he didn’t plan on ever working again. But everyone had their price.

  And there were bills to pay.

  He unplugged the tree. Only half of the lights were working. Wrapping paper was still folded in neat squares beneath the branches.

  “Let’s go.”

  Kandi worked her way out of a pile of feather-stuffed comforters. She could see her breath. He had already turned the thermostat down. Nothing would freeze while they were gone, but barely. Cris the Goldfish had a tank heater to keep him from turning into a golden ice cube.

  Her suitcase had been packed since noon. She’d been waiting beneath three layers of blankets while her dad was on the phone. He was talking to someone on the computer. It was whoever had arranged this last-second trip. They were going somewhere warm, but he didn’t say where. Kandi pulled a stocking cap over her head. Anywhere was better than here.

  Santa’s not a turd.

  She stood at the front door while her dad went room to room. He always checked the house three times before they travelled. It had been a while since he’d had to do that.

  Halos hung around the Jeep’s fog lamps mounted above the snowplow. The Alaskan sun had already made its brief appearance. Kandi wrapped a wool scarf around her face and pulled the stocking cap over her brows. She still remembered when they’d moved to this icy land.

  Her boogers froze.

  She wasn’t built for life below zero. She had no fat on her bones. Her dad used to say she was skinny like her mother, that he would have to tie her down in a windstorm. He didn’t say anything about the cold.

  But her mother never lived in Alaska.

  ORANGE WIND SOCKS SWUNG on long poles.

  Kandi pressed her hand on the window. Gray snow crusted in the corners. Snowplows scrubbed paths around a sleek black plane. A dusting had already piled up against the tires. There was something strange about it. It was much smaller than a commercial airliner. The coating gleamed against the winter background.

  A girl had once brought a rock collection to school. Kandi’s favorite stone was obsidian. It was round and flat and shiny. The color was depthless, like it trapped light inside.

  The plane was that color.

  “Naren Anthony,” her dad said. “My daughter is Kandace. We’re booked on a private flight.”

  The attendant was a gruff man who looked like her school’s janitor. His mustache was a bristled broom that swept his lower lip. His ruddy cheeks matched the color of his nose. He squinted at her dad’s driver’s license. He glanced at Kandi.

  “She’s fifteen,” her dad said.

  The attendant put the driver’s license next to a computer. Despite his two-finger, caveman technique, he typed fast enough to do his job.

  “Where you going?” he asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know?”

  Her dad shook his head. “Is that a problem?”

  “No. Just a first.” He hit the return key like it owed him money. “Is that all your luggage?”

  Her dad rolled a pink bag next to three black ones. The attendant grunted with heavy eyes.
A few more minutes on the keyboard and he said, “Follow me.”

  He favored his right leg as he led them to a side door. Kandi’s dad held out his hand and she took it. She was old enough not to be holding her dad’s hand, but she’d only flown once in her life. It was to Fairbanks.

  It’s a carnival ride, her dad said. That’s all it is.

  Whenever they went to the fair, she rode the roller coaster and he went with her. He hated roller coasters. But he went with her every time.

  And held her hand.

  The attendant waved his ID. The side door buzzed. A long flight of hard steps led to a metal door. The wind whistled around it, and snow had piled up in the bottom corner where the seal was broken. The attendant’s breath steamed through the mustache.

  “Straight out,” he said.

  The attendant yanked it open. Kandi’s dad leaned into the weather. She buried her face into the crook of her elbow and closed her eyes. One step after another, she held the back of his coat and followed him into the cold bite of Alaska. Her toes were numb when he abruptly stopped.

  The thin sliver of exposed flesh around her eyes was stung by a thousand tiny pellets. Her dad pulled her toward the plane. She felt the weight of his presence urge her up a narrow staircase, heard the thumping of her suitcase on the metal edge of steps.

  Kandi imagined walking into the mouth of a dragon.

  Its breath was toasted and stuffy. It didn’t have a sulfur smell, but the walls were curved and black. The door closed behind them. The wind whistled at first. Then it was silent. Snow stuck to the front of her dad’s coat like he’d lost a fight with a snowblower.

  There were only a few seats inside the plane.

  They weren’t in rows, either, but rather in pairs on either side of a table. And they were padded and wide, the kind that would lean back if you pushed a button. There were couches, too, and a long table and a kitchenette. Then she realized what had bothered her when she saw it from the airport.

  There were no windows.

  “Hello?” her dad called. “Anyone in there?”