Honoring her word, Shida just took a moment longer to stretch her legs out while sitting down before swinging herself to her feet and getting a new set of clothes out of the sack in the process she was basically getting used to by now.
“You two really need to go out more,” she commented while pulling a new sack of fabric over her head to conceal er ‘feminine viles’. “Or, I don’t know, get yourself a hobby or something. Or a girlfriend. Boyfriend? I don’t care which, but y’all need something.”
“Hard to go out when your work life consists of nothing but breaking trademark and copyright laws with child-wished products. It was so much easier making wood horses, but noooooo the kids want a ‘Playbox420’ or a ‘streaming setup’. Shit is hard. You know how many classes on top of my work I had to pull just to keep up with the times!? Not everything can be made from snapping the fingers! And even when I do have spare time that isn’t just sleeping, the passion of roasting each other's chestnuts is just… gone… it’s a real problem.” Doodle ranted while still in the kitchen messing with the microwave.
“Ouch. Explains a lot about you though… As for me I’m literally ‘out’ more than I’m ‘in’, and my dating pool due to my age and… unusual good looks, is very small.” Zithra pointed out as he seemed to have walked around to meet with the elf in the kitchen.
“Oh boss! I’ve been workshoppin’ on a little something! How does this sound so far…ahem…” Doodle’s voiced shifted into that of a older smoothed tone that plagued the local radio,
“There's a story we've all heard, about a jolly old guy,
Who brings us presents, and flies across the sky,
But what if I told you, that Santa's now a cat,
An alien named Shida, with a furry red hat.
Shida the Santa, an alien in red
With presents for all, from her forklift sled
She didn't mean to take on this role
But she'll make the most of it, to spread holiday soul.”
Doodle cleared his voice again.
“I’m still not quite happy with the chorus yet, but I think it’s gonna be a real banger with the youth!” he chuckled.
Shida sighed.
“I’d much rather have songs written about me as a Captain of a starship than some jolly old saint,” she said, finally exhaling deeply as she began to pull and fit the clothes around her, which were of course as campy as always when provided by the sack. “Believe it or not, I still hope that this gig is only very temporary. I’ve not yet planned on making it to full-time employee. Also my sled has never been a forklift - it was a palette truck- and I’ve been using something else for a while now.”
She then glanced over at Zithra briefly.
“Also, living in the woods doesn’t count as ‘going out’ and you know it,” she gave back unsympathetically. “The other thing might be more of a problem, buuuuut I’m pretty sure there are humans out there who have a thing for being scared. I am basing this solely off the fact that there seem to be humans who have a thing for basically everything, but I’m reasonably sure that I’m right. Maybe you’re just not casting your net wide enough.”
“Forklift just sounds funnier…” Doodle admitted in a half-hearted pout,
Zithra poured out freshly brewed cheap coffee into a mug and sipped from the still steaming beverage.
“Hmmm… You’re not wrong.” he said with a recollecting grin, “But I donno… once was enough for me, and besides, over the years the governments of Earth have only been getting more and more capable of locking me in some cage in some secret facility somewhere. It’s not like I can walk around unnoticed with a trench coat, mask, sunglasses and hat. Everyone has a camera in their pocket now too so I have to be extra careful. Honestly the only thing in my favor these days is the notion of ‘It’s clearly CGI’. Heck, I even once saw a guy debunk a video someone snatched of me in Alaska. Good video, almost believed I was fake too. But… socializing outside of the internet is not really worth the risk to me.” he explained as he sat himself down, “Though I’ve gambled with ‘costumed’ holidays and events from time to time. But people get… touchy. All it takes is for some clueless jerk to cup a feel of my ears and… fudge, why do they always go for the ears first… but yeah… solitary hermit life for me.”
“Always with the ‘experimenting’,” Shida sighed again and smoothed out her clothes one final time. “I know uncontacted worlds are a drag, but seriously, is that always what comes to mind? I mean, humans had first contact when? Like thirty years ago? I doubt they went around cutting anyone open before that though…Although, now that I think about it, I think even Simone was worried about that for some reason. And she IS human…or, well, Terran, but second verse’s same as the first.”
She shook her head for a moment, as the entire thing with now three different sets of Earth to worry about began to hurt her head a bit.
“Santa could use a hot drink…” she mumbled to herself while trying to refocus.
Leaning back in his seat, Zithra extended his arm to grab the half filled glass pitcher of the remaining coffee.
“It tastes bad, but it’s hot.” he notified, “And to me it’s less about being ‘experimented on’ and more like causing a world wide panic. What am I supposed to say if they discovered me? ‘Oh yeah, my species is looking to subjugate yours in some undetermined time in the future but I’m cool, I just wanna hang in the woods and get high sometimes. Yeah I was sent here to spy on you, but don’t worry despite me being here since the sixties I have not nor have I any intention of ever contacting my people again’. Nah… I think I’m good.” he said before grabbing a spare mug for the feline as well.
“Want me to turn that into cocoa?” Doodle whispered to his boss, “Or at least a dirty Chai?”
Shida hissed through her teeth.
“Well, I was talking more about - oh nevermind,” she mumbled grumpily and just took the disgusting sludge to scarf it down somehow. While grimacing at the taste, she then glanced over at the Manarian again. “Alright, change of topic. Since you’re a living privacy violation, did you by chance hear if our lovebirds have figured themselves out in the meantime as I told them to?”
“Ouch.” Zithra muttered, “Well… I wouldn’t really call them ‘lovebirds’ after the discussion they had last night. They were up very late, but thankfully ended it on good terms. Seems they’ll figure out where they’ll go with their lives after all this nonsense is over. Before then, they’ve come to an understanding. Mary has a lot to consider and internally figure out. Lotta repressed stuff.” he answered before finishing his coffee, “Today’s going to be interesting, not sure where to start. Are we gonna try hunting down that crazy cop or are we gonna wait for them to come to us? I’m honestly not sure if I should be concerned or relieved that I heard nothing weird last night. No one stalked the place and almost no vehicles drove by. Either they don’t know we’re here -which I highly doubt-, or they’re avoiding us now because we keep kicking their behinds, or they’re waiting for something specific.”
Shida could only shrug, before flinching as she took another sip of the coffee - this one was much worse than even the slop she had in the diner, at least to her sensibilities.
“Well, I wouldn’t even know where to look. And since I didn’t fancy carrying around body parts, I’m also all out of dark magic to take the fight to Krampus for the time being, so…I don’t know. I guess we keep doing what we’ve been doing. Just more careful this time. With Mary broken out of the Christmas stuff…I don’t know, who’d be next? We got Dagon, the Sheriff, and even one of the crazier Lights. The parade is turned into an actual holiday one and…- wait, did they ever call Dagon’s assistant? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m not a huge fan and usually I wouldn’t care, but at this point even I’m starting to feel bad for her if she has to do all that by herself,” she began to explain before slipping off topic again as her still tired mind got distracted by every thought that came to her.
“Don’t think anyone did.” Zithra confirmed, “Though now that Dagon is no longer looking like he belongs in a B-horror movie and Mary is on the right track maybe they can actually fully contribute. I’d be worried about leaving them alone though, but honestly what more use could Krampus have with them at this point? From the sounds of it, Bell has taken up the role that Dagon was bound for. And the only big concern I have for Mary is that her mother is out there doing who-knows what.”
It was then that the sounds of the shower shut off. The sound of the door cracked open,
“Uhm… I’m coming out. Is the sack nearby? I’m going to need a clean change of clothes.” Chak asked.
“Just a sec,” Shida said, standing up with a slight groan and moving over to the bathroom while reaching her hand out to summon the sack to her hand, the magical cloth flying across the room to jump into it. “Comin’. Don’t freak out, there’s nothing there I haven’t seen at this point.”
“I know, I’m more concerned about the elf…” Chak replied.
Zithra eyes the pointy eared man incredulously.
“Geez… You people need to give me more credit… It’s not like I take peeks like some disturbed neighbor with binoculars and blacked out windows...” Doodle grumbled as he crossed his arms in a huff.
Chak opened the door a bit more once Shida drew close.
“Thank you. I should've thought about grabbing an outfit before rushing in here.” she sheepishly said to the feline.
Shida shrugged.
“I mean, I didn’t either. I just care less I guess,” she mumbled as she handed another set of needlessly tacky clothes to the disguised Cali. “Seriously though, these aren’t our actual bodies, so I feel like acting pious with ‘em would be a waste. Although I do very much get the urge not to give Doodle a free show, so I encourage that much.”
She glanced back at the elf mischievously, making it clear that she had heard and more importantly disregarded his little rant there.
“Exactly…” the Princess agreed as she stepped back and hurried to fit on her clothes for the day.
“Oh come on…” the elf moaned before lightly bonking his head against the fridge.
A moment of chuckling at Doodle’s expense went by, when suddenly the Princess’ muffled voice came out through the door again.
“Uuuuhm, Shida? I think you should take a look at this,” it said, and just a second later, the door opened a crack, and a dark hand holding a piece of paper emerged. “It stuck to the clothes.”
“Oh not again,” Shida mumbled and quickly took the note out of Chak’s hand before it could possibly catch on fire or anything else. Then, she quickly dropped it to the ground with the side that was written on facing up.
The fancy, curly handwriting very simply stated,
“Good Morning”, and it was the same one that had been on the note stuck to Zithra’s “Gift” the previous day. Although this time, there was a little heart written over the ‘i’ instead of a dot.
“Okay, I know this might still be Krampus messing with us, but honestly, this almost feels more creepy than that,” the feline mumbled and nudged the note with her foot, almost as if she was expecting it to come to life or something.
Poking her head out, Chak revealed that she was wearing a pink beanie with a snowflake pattern on it.
“Despite it being composed of tricks, I agree that this feels outside of its intention. I felt it. It has no actual malice or ‘evil’, just carrying out its idea of ‘consequence’. Maybe it’s from one of those people-copies or a servant like how Zithra was?” she posed.
Keeping her distance from it, Chak fully stepped out and looped around Shida and the note, keeping her eyes on it. But she also wanted to make sure the world didn’t suddenly go dark outside like in the diner. Peering out through the window she sighed, seeing the morning light still coming in.
“Or… maybe these gift notes are from someone else entirely? Someone actually nice? I mean, hearts usually mean good intentions…” Chak hoped, not fully investing herself in that idea. Her face then cringed at the aroma that remained from the earlier coffee, “Oh gross…”
Shida wondered about that for a second and her face scrunched up slightly as she thought. Then she very briefly remembered the just passed conversation about calling the assistant at work to give her an update. And the oddest thing occurred to her.
With a slow and suspicious yet casual demeanor, she began to turn towards the others, specifically focussing on Doodle as she brought out,
“Wait, does the Northpole…know? What happened, I mean. I’m sure they knew why Santa came here, but the plan wasn’t for him to bite it quite so soon, was it?”
“Nah, there was supposed to be this whole whirlwind adventure. They’re also expecting a kid to inherit the Santa title too. At least, that was the old man’s plan he shared with everybody.” Doodle responded with a comically large chocolate chip cookie in his hands.
Shida nodded.
“And is…is anyone keeping stock of the stuff we’re using here?” she then continued her questioning, now for the first time considering that the stuff she pulled out of the sack maybe didn’t just magically appear for her use, since someone could apparently attach things to it before she pulled them out.
“Well of course. What do you think the elves do all year? Not craft things to be placed in the sack? There’s a whole department headed by Ms. Claus herself that keeps records of what was put in the bag and what is taken out.” the elf replied with a shrug before gnawing at the cookie.
As it seemed that he was not quite catching on to what Shida was putting out here, she loudly cleared her throat.
“Uhm, Doodle?” she said, and waited for the elf to fully look at her. Then, when she had his attention, she didn’t speak anything else at first, instead just pulling the very stretch collar of her sweater all the way down so that the upper part of one of the cups from her underwear was revealed very visually. Leaving it for a few moments with the elf taking in the sight, she then added, “This came from the sack. And so did everything else Chak and I have been wearing for the past days. You…you seeing any problems with that?”
“Wowza Boss… uuuhmmm…” Doodle shook his head to focus, “If you’re worried that those were made for kids I’m happy to report that is indeed not the case. Ms. Claus puts in care packages for her Santa, and sometimes Santa disguised himself as someone who wasn’t just an old man without the red suit. And… okay now that’s actually starting to sound a bit creepy now that I say it out loud… but he seemed like an alright guy. Though… those clothes being so personalized to you two does raise a few questions… sack magic maybe? Or… the Claus family knows something I don’t? Or Ms. Claus knows what’s up and is somehow sending you those things? Her and Santa do share a magical connection after all. Would that mean there’s another ‘input’ for the sack at the North Pole!? My head’s starting to hurt…”
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Shida now let her collar snap up again while she scratched her temple.
“I think that much is basically confirmed, although personally, I thought maybe Ms. Claus figured the old creep was up to something, and sending me the skimpiest of clothes was her form of passive aggression…or, I don’t know, giving her approval? I’m not sure what relationship those two have. But even if he did disguise as young ladies sometimes, it should’ve raised eyebrows that there were two sets of clothes each morning, right? I mean,” she briefly pointed back and forth between her and Chak, her hand focusing on chest area specifically, “I don’t think either of these could be interpreted to be intended for ‘some kid’, even with a lot of good will…”
“They had a great business relationship, one of the best from my recollection. I may have been selected to be Santa’s helper this year, but I wasn’t so close to ‘em to really know if the bells were still jingling all the way. One day I’m working in my place in line, making a circuit board for some creepy talking doll toy like a good worker, and the next I’m pulled into her office and being told ‘For your hard work and dedication to the Christmas spirit you’ve been selected to accompany Santa on his final trip and see to the exchange of his magic to his successor’. I guess it’s a random lottery system because I set a few of those dolls on fire once or twice by mistake… and I slept with my supervisor… and his mother… not at the same time of course but it was really public. Not the act of course, but word spreads quickly in the North Pole you know. Believe it or not I once caused a snowman to come to life by giving it the wrong hat, which is not too abnormal up there, but all it did was peek into people’s windows at night singing Christmas carols in a weird scratchy voice. No one was hurt though, so I only got suspended for a week. So yeah, my selection was definitely random. Oh right, Ms. Claus… uhm… yeah I think it’s fair to assume she knows to some extent… but… if that were the case I’d think she’d send another elf or two to help out. Especially if she knows we’re butting heads with the Kram-kram itself… that’s some serious business to address…” Doodle pointed out as he seemed to have lost his appetite for the cookie.
“Yep,” Shida said and made an exaggerated popping sound with her lips as she spoke the ‘p’ of the word. Then, she picked the note up from the ground again and brought it over to everyone, holding it out for them to inspect. “Sooooo, what do we think? Passive aggression or open relationship? I guess it would help to know if she usually did the heart thing over the Is or not.”
She looked especially over at Chak, who seemed to almost intensely focus as she stared at the two brief words written on the note, almost like she was trying to build up a psychic connection to the letters in order to make them spill their secrets to the group.
The Princess blinked as she repeated the two simple words in her mind over and over again. She then grabbed Shida’s hand tightly as she decided to try something and wanted security in the moment. A minuscule speck of glowing red light briefly flicked in front of Chak’s face, it didn’t last long but as she repeated and read the words something indeed started to come to her.
Channeling the spirit that was connected through this note, Chak witnessed the words disappear and reconstitute as if being re-written. The voice reading the words in her mind shifted to another woman’s as ‘Good Morning’ was written out with the hearts being added after only a slight moment of hesitation.
“Oh…” Chak mumbled as she blinked again, “I think… she really likes being Ms. Claus…” she told the feline.
Shida cleared her throat at the news. She opened her mouth for a moment, but whatever comment she had died in her throat as she closed it again and shifted her face contemplatively. She glanced around a bit while she pondered.
Finally, she got ready to speak again.
“Should we, uh…” she began to ask, and her voice broke ever so slightly in amusement from the sheer awkwardness of it all, “Should we…break the bad news?”
“Probably…” Chak affirmed, “Though unless she’s been somehow constantly watching us, how do you propose we do that?” she asked.
“I volunteer to be a legal witness to the creation of a new Ms. Claus! That oughta give her the message as clear as day!” Doodle said as he raised his hand in solidarity, “I know, such a burden of a task… but I’ll do it if it means saving Christmas… or something.”
“Or… maybe you send her a note back through the sack?” Zithra posed with a shrug.
“Dude! Not cool!” Doodle hushed in a snap.
“Come on, there’s no way you thought that was going to work anyway,” Shida admonished the elf for a second but then looked at the sack contemplatively. “Sending something back would be the first idea. The question is…BUT HOW?”
She lifted her hand again, making the magic thing jet over into her grasp.
“So far it’s only worked one way and retrieved items I left somewhere for me. I don’t think there is a ‘send’ function,” she said while looking the sack over as if its exterior would somehow grant her any more insights into the matter.
“It’s the time of year for miracles boss… Uhm… well considering the circumstances of your feelings on the matter I haven’t said anything… buuuuut with a reindeer at your sleigh you’d be able to fly back to the North Pole lickity-split. They are like a magic key back into the winter pocket realm. Theoretically you could go there and tell her all about your secret passionate feelings for yours truly in person. But that would just be extra awkward… right? Sure it’s potentially a huge resource at your disposal, but you don’t want Chak here touching the sleigh. We really don’t have to consider it. Nope.”
Shida shook her head and lifted both her hands in a declining gesture.
“Okay, no. We have three, technically four species here that broke the laws of the universe and invented spaceflight,” she announced in loud defiance and brought her palms down onto the small table. “We can come up with something better than literally walking over to get into contact with someone.”
She then lifted her hand to her chin and rubbed it for a moment, her face wrinkling in concentration as she began to really think through her possibilities.
Then she glanced back down at the sack. And the thought. The clothes had fit her. The ear protection for Zithra had been purpose made. How she asked the sack for things had also made a difference in the past.
Her eyes narrowing a bit further, she brought the sack up to the table.
“Okay, listen to me very closely,” she said and began to experiment around. It took a bit of trial and error - and most likely caused a good bit of confusion on the other end of the connection - however eventually she came up with an idea that might work. It didn’t seem like talking to the sack got any direct messages through. Neither was there a point in asking for a specifically written note.
However, the final idea had come to her when she took a glance around the room, and her eyes had stuck to something colorful on the cooling unit that stood over there in the kitchen..
“Fridge Magnets!” she exclaimed in an epiphany. “I wish for fridge magnets. Specifically in that order: an S, A, N, T, A, S, D, E, A, D, N, E, W, S, A, N, T, A, H, E, R, E, N, E, E, D, T, O, T, A, L, K. In that order. Got it?”
Expectantly, she stared at the sack, figuring that anyone would need a second to process that, but sincerely hoping that something was going to happen.
“Love it when you talk crazy boss, but magnets aren’t magical. We know how they work-” Doodle started to say before the back gently spat out the magnets in that order as requested.
“That would be on their record…” Chak realized as the final magnet popped out, spilling out the macabre message in a disturbingly playfully disjointed way with the colorful letters.
Everyone joined in on staring at the bag, momentarily waiting for anything else to possibly happen. After a few minutes it seemed like the message was completely missed, but as Shida touched the sack to pick it up, a round, baseless snowglobe freely rolled forth from the rainbow magic. Chak was quick to grab it to prevent it from falling over the side of the table.
Holding up the glass globe that was filled with swirling sparkling snow powder, the Princess held it up for Shida to see.
“Well… this seems promising!” she said as she looked it over.
“Oh hey… we had one of those on the old sleigh! Santa used to send updates on his nightly flights! I think it exploded against my head when we crashed…” Doodle commented, “It’s like a facetime call thingie!”
Quickly, Shida snatched the thing out of Chak’s hand.
“Would you stop touching magic shit? You’re giving me a heart attack!” she half heartedly complained, before inspecting the item in her hand. “Facetime thingy, huh? You mean…like a phone? Alright, how do you…call? And who’s on the other end? Ms. Claus or some top-dog elf?”
“You honestly think they’d put something like that in my care? I never used the thing-” Doodle started to respond before the swirling powder within the globe compressed into the head of a figure.
Although there was no color to it other than sparkling white, the defined face of an older woman was apparent. Although she seemed to either hit a genetic-movie celebrity-lottery or had some top money work done. Clearly older, but carrying it very very well. Her hair was loosely tied back in a bun and she wore sharp librarian glasses.
“So, he went through with it then?” a clear feminine voice spoke out from the globe. Her tone was one of business, as if the news was long expected but there was still a hint of emotion behind her words.
“Well, kinda,” Shida replied after a moment of putting her gameface on. “Aaaand kinda not. I mean, I’m glad he was planning on biffing it anyway, makes this a whole lot easier to explain, but he kinda had a crash with his sleigh before he got to do whatever it is he wanted to do around here. And after he got im- I mean after he passed away, the magic decided to dump all this on me. So, uhm, I hope you’re not into too traditional values, because that ring on your finger might make things a bit more complicated between us for the moment otherwise.”
She leaned back slightly so she could get a better angle at the globe while trying to figure out how she should hold it to give the best picture of herself on the other side.
The older woman's eyes looked the new Santa up and down curiously.
“I won’t lie, this is far far less awkwardly complicated than his intended plan. A child? As Santa? Granted I intended to resign before the scheduled time, but…” her face repulsively shuddered at the thought, “That man was not very bright… Regardless, I can see that resigning won’t be a concern after all. From your decorum I can assume you are filled in on your role and responsibilities? Hopefully you patched up the sleigh and know how to keep the reindeer properly fed. How’s… the… uhm… the elf?”
“Only died twice under my care. Also, the Reindeer were turned into meat-pie by the impact…and I think we may have killed one more when it started working for the Krampus? Listen, a lot has happened, and I think we may have to get on the same page here about how things are going to continue to happen, because honestly, the whole role and responsibilities part is a bit against my tastes. I have a life to get back to once I can leave this rock again, and I don’t plan on coming back once a year to give out presents,” Shida replied in quick and mostly succinct terms. “I hope you’re sitting down, because this might take a while…”
-
“Well… this is all incredibly terribly bad…” Ms. Claus uttered as a hand appeared to press against her cheek, “Drastic measures are in order. I’ll be sending my top elves to aid you in countering Krampus’s servants. Surely you need to extend your reach to match theirs. Also considering the dire situation, your helper will be replaced with someone more qualified. It was a mistake sending him in the first place, and for that you have my apologies.” she said as she recovered.
“Well he did throw himself into the line of fire for me, so I appreciate that,” Shida gave back, by now less stiff than before and leaning over the table so she could support her head on her free hand. “And also, any more ‘qualified’ elf would probably not have supported me to the point he has, so there really is no need to apologize. Honestly, your ‘top elf’ probably wouldn’t even have made it through the first hour with me if I had to guess.”
She then straightened up slightly and looked at the older woman sharply.
“And all that aside, I am still much more interested in getting out of all this than I am in fighting against Krampus. I mean, no idea what his deal is, but I didn’t have any problems with the guy until he started randomly assaulting people. And I still have the fact that my friend’s mind might be enslaved by magic at any second to worry about, so forgive me if the idea of having a bunch of its other little slaves around might not be the top-billing idea in my head right now,” she firmly admonished her apparent ‘wife’. “I was told the one thing that would help was making her Ms. Claus instead. Still not a huge fan of that version either, to be honest, but maybe that motivates you to give me some more ideas.”
“Forgive me if I find the fact that the elf that once swung himself naked from the workshop chandelier while completely washed by eggnog would actually be a useful helper…” Ms. Claus said as she rolled her eyes before seeming to think on the more serious matter at hand, “Granted, the Ms. Claus route would be a quick fix to that unfortunate mishap… I can assure you that in my current position I am of invaluable help to you. This whole situation is all an unfortunate mishap… I’m not even sure how I feel about you stripping people of their Christmas spirit. Hmm… other than your demise, the only thing that could render you free from Santa’s duty is to do something unforgivable in the eyes of the magic it’s sourced from. Ending the existence of a dear friend, or committing an atrocity. Though that may incur completely different problems outside the morality of it.”
“But what about removing the spirit from this town? That must be very unforgivable, you know, in a way that doesn’t involve ending people.” Chak imputed, a bit disturbed by the woman’s nonchalance about the topic.
“But that would ruin Christmas, ending the Santa line altogether, causing this realm that I reside in to be… well I don’t know. But I’m keen to not find out.” Ms. Claus retorted before pinching at her brow, “A matter I wished to bring up, we recorded an absurd expulsion of pure magic from your sack last night.”
“Heh-heh!” Doodle sharply chuckled to Ms. Claus’s chagrin.
“Care… to explain what that in particular was about? Such a thing is highly unusual and suspect.” she finished.
Doodle’s eyes suddenly widened as he slowly dipped to hide under the table.
“Well, someone who's actually following the rules has decided to try and turn people into some form of magical horrors, so we had to break them in order to reverse that idiocy again,” Shida gave back bluntly and narrowed her eyes at Ms. Claus. “If you’ve got a problem with that, you can discuss it with your therapist.”
She then reached her hand down to pull Doodle back up from his pathetic cowering. Wasn’t he on about how ‘he was still an elf!’ just after he did it? A bit more backbone would be necessary to underline that message.
“I feel like we already talked about how I don’t care,” she continued. “And when it comes to getting rid of all this, I’m also still willing to take my chances with just leaving the planet as soon as I can. See how the magic likes a couple hundred of lightyears in distance to the people it wants to reach. But I’m not going to go around and end people willy-nilly.”
Her brows then furrowed a bit as she took in what had been said more closely.
“Wait…wait wait wait, why the heck is the entire line of Santa and the Christmas magic tied to the spirit of this one backwater heckhole? Shouldn’t there be an entire world to feed off of out there? How come Flakeville is the thing that’ll make it all end if I mess around here? Because, honestly, it begins to feel like it would just straight up make the world a better place if we did go that route. I hope you’ve got more convincing arguments than ‘you don’t want to’,” she gave back, realizing how ridiculous it was that this entire world changing magic bullhuey was apparently tied to this ten-thousand soul town in scenic nowhere.
“Because every Christmas a miracle must be performed to invigorate and replenish the spirit. Flakeville is the location where it must be done, because that is where the spirit chose. Questioning the spirit does nothing but stall all of our duties. As Santa, you are now the prime conduit for everything to be maintained. Maintaining what? The spirit, the essence of everyone’s hopes and dreams. Pure tangible magic that, if left undisturbed, grants miracles to those who need it most. To those who need to find happiness, to conquer the weight of reality, and to find one’s true purpose. Would you take all that away because you want no part? I’m sorry, but this is what it is. You are far from the first reluctant Santa, it’s actually quite common. And you won’t be the last when your time to pass the torch comes. Without the spirit, the world becomes darker, aimless, conflicting. This is what the spirit wants, so we will all abide. It’s that simple. What’s also simple is that rules exist for a reason. That elf committed one of the worst offenses to the spirit itself and by the end of this nonsense will face the consequences.”
Shida released a disbelieving breath.
“Oh, well if THAT’S the case,” she said about as sarcastic as one could, before unceremoniously dropping the snow globe down onto the table and leaning back, putting her feet up and crossing her hands behind her head as she looked up at the ceiling. Then, she glanced around. “Anyone want to order some real food? I’ve been thinking about trying pizza while I still have a human body, since so many of the omnivores seem to go crazy for it. Do you think we can order Pizza? Dagon’s probably hungry too after the day he’s had yesterday.”
She then looked at Chak specifically.
“You’ve had pizza right? You think the genuine stuff will be better than what you’re being served?” she asked completely nonchalantly.
“We’ll get through this, Shida.” the Princess spoke softly, “We promised each other we would. And pizza sounds lovely.”
Shida laughed.
“Of course we will,” she said enthusiastically. “I mean, what she said just made our job a whole lot easier after all. I think I can handle not performing a miracle.”
She snickered again, before turning her head in the direction of the bedroom, and adding,
“Anyone want to wake Dagon? Maybe he’ll need some help with getting the parade back on track. We’ve got a couple of days to kill.”
“On it.” Zithra nodded as he turned around and walked to the bedroom, knocking before letting himself in, “Wakey-bakey you two. Well no bakery but we’re getting some zaa.”
“Alright…” Dagon’s groaning voice rolled out, “Gonna need help getting up…”
Meanwhile Chak turned to Shida and gave her a light side hug.
“We still don’t know what the Krampus is planning. I can think of a few ways it may try to force you to act to do what the Spirit wants. Despite it being the opposing side to ‘Santa’, that doesn’t mean it desires to end the spirit. I don’t wish to drag the mood down, I just want you to be careful, okay?” Chak then firmly planted a kiss on the top of Shida’s head, “I heard the ‘meat-lovers’ pizza is really good.”
“I’m aware,” Shida whispered after reaching a hand up to subtly pull Chak’s ear a bit further down so she could talk right into it while being unheard by most others. “But I’m putting on a show for the old hag. I don’t think that thing stops working just because I’m not holding it.”
Then she let go of Chak and shifted her tone to a louder, casual one.
“Don’t worry about it,” she said, “Nothing we couldn’t handle.”
Doodle stared at the orb with shocked eyes before peeling them away to look at Shida, rubbing the back of his head with his hand before removing his hat, allowing his blond hair to breathe.
“Thanks for stickin’ up for me boss… I don’t that uhhh… no one’s done that for me before. I owe ya big time.” he said before reaching into his hat and pulling out a white and red striped dagger before setting it down in complete silence on the table and hopping off his chair, “Whelp! I’ll snatch Dagon’s phone and order us some big pizza pies! Compile what you all want cuz I ain’t calling back to correct the order!”
Feeling foolish that she didn’t clock into Shida’s ruse, Chak twitched to pick up the item Doodle left, but then immediately remembered just how Shida scolded her for touching potentially magic items.
“You’re right.” Chak said instead as stood straight, not sure what to do with herself at this moment, “Well like I said, meat-lovers sounds good, and Simone loves black olives on her pizza so I’d be very curious to know what that tastes like!”
“I’ll stick to as little extra as possible so I don’t muddle everything up,” Shida said, before turning around to where Doodle just ran off to. “And he shouldn’t thank me too soon. After all, I’m pretty sure that if we go through with this, he might also be affected by it, being made of magic and all that…”
Taking her legs off the table, Shida finally stood up, and then she nonchalantly scooped the glass orb up from the table. Momentarily, she disappeared into the bathroom with it, only to emerge a few seconds later without it in hand and moving back to the table to inspect the strange knife that Doodle had laid out for her there.
Although appearing as if made from hard candy, when Shida focused on it she felt a significant magical aura much like her own. The size was small, barely a steak knife in length, but something about it gave the indication that physically stabbing alone wasn’t the intended method of damage.