‘Twas the Night

by Robin Reed

It wasn't a fit night out for man or elf. But then it never is up here, where it gets so cold that even Frosty would freeze his snowballs off. The view from my office window was just darkness. Driving snow rattled against the pane, and the wind howled like a six year old who got nothing but socks for Christmas.

When I first got here I thought the view was spectacular. In the sunny season the fantastic ice formations and the reflections of sunlight through them are something to see. But it never changes, and after a few hundred years anything can become boring. I shook my head and sighed. I was a long way from the woodlands of my youth, where I had nothing on my mind but frolicking and scaring the occasional woodcutter.

I shouldn't have been staring out the window and thinking about times long gone. It was the busy season, and there was a lot of work to do. So I took a sip of coffee and turned back to the computer screen. There was a problem in inventory. A whole truckload of talking Barbies were missing. They had to be in the complex somewhere, but nobody could find them.

The intercom on my desk buzzed. I punched the button. “Yeah?”

“Rollo, you gotta get down to shipping. There's something strange.”

“Like what?”

“Just - you have to see for yourself.” The intercom clicked off. This was just great. As if I don't have enough to do as Head Elf, I get called to look at every little problem the idiots under me don't know how to handle. So I got up and went to see what had them spooked.

I took the elevator down to level eighteen. On the way, Blitzen crowded on and tried to tell me a joke about two rabbis and a horny Swedish masseuse. I shook my head. Blitzen was blitzed again. I could still hear him laughing after I got off, even though he'd never made it to the punch line.

Shipping was the largest single area in the complex. I remember when we actually made the toys. All of that factory area had been converted into shipping decades ago. Kids wanted stuff they saw on TV, so we had it shippedup from Mattel and Kenner and the rest. Not that those companies knew where it was going. There was a whole string of dummy corporations and fake shipping addresses to hide our trail. Wouldn't do for the world to have proof that Santa exists, not to mention his address. We'd be neck deep in reporters and other whackos if that happened.

Along the way I waved at Victor. He towered over the elves working around him. Victor was just about the tallest, ugliest human I had ever laid eyes on, but thank God for him. He could do the work of ten elves; fifteen when he was really cooking. He was lifting crates that normally had to be be hauled with a forklift. He saw me, waved and grinned. I found myself smiling also. There was just something likable about the big goof.

I found Deebo, the elf who'd called me on the intercom, and his crew standing around a forty foot container that they should have been unloading. “What is going on here?” I shouted. “Less than a week to C-Day and you morons are just standing here playing with your candy canes?”

“There's something weird in this shipment,” Deebo told me. “Something horrible.” He directed me over to a crate that was about three feet tall and six feet long, just about the right size and shape to hold a --

A dead body. I sucked in my breath. It was a real live dead human being. It must have been pretty fresh; there was no stink or anything, but there was no doubt he was dead. He was nicely dressed too, in what I guessed was a Brooks Brothers suit, and a natty green tie with red stripes. Very Christmasy.

It had been a long time since I'd seen a dead human, and I certainly hadn't expected one to show up in a shipment of Sing and Snore Ernies. Still, there was a lot of work to be done in the next few days and I didn't have time for this. I turned to Deebo. “Some funeral home must have put the wrong shipping label on this guy, but we don't have time to worry about it now. Just pack it back up and stow it somewhere, and I'll figure out what to do with it after Christmas.”

Deebo got his gang to bang the lid back on Mr. Lost Dead Guy, they heaved the whole package onto a forklift, which disappeared into the depths of the shipping area.

“Should we tell Santa?” Deebo asked me.

“You kidding? The Jolly Old has enough on his mind right now. It's my job to make sure little things like this don't bother him.” So maybe, looking back, telling Santa would have been a good idea. How was I supposed to know?

Things went pretty smoothly for the rest of the day. I even found the load of talking Barbies. It was right where it was supposed to be, but a junior shipping clerk had forgotten to write the location on the proper form, so we didn't know where that was.

The next time I heard any bad news, it was the next day. I was eating lunch with Bobbo, Santa's valet. He mentioned that the big guy had slept in real late that morning, and was kind of groggy even after he got up. That wasn't like him, at least this close to the big day. “I hope he'll be all right before Christmas Eve.” Bobbo sighed into his minestrone soup.

I slapped him on the back. “Come on, he's always all right. We haven't missed a delivery yet, and how many centuries have we been doing this?”

“I know, but I worry. There was that one time -- ”

“Nobody knows about that, Bobbo,” I said in a whisper, “so we don't need to be talking about it here in the cafeteria, OK?”

“OK.” I left Bobbo to do his worrying. I had other things to think about. But the next day he showed up at my office.

“You're worried.” I said.

“How did you know?”

“You're breathing. What is it this time?”

“I -- I could hardly wake Santa up this morning, and he didn't want any breakfast.” That was something. When a three hundred and fifty pound guy turns down food, you know he's sick. “You don't suppose it's like the other time -- ”

“No. Of course not.” I hoped to hell it wasn't like the other time. We barely survived that. “Look, just tell him we'll cover all his duties for today, and let him rest. He'll be fine tomorrow.” Bobbo nodded and left, but obviously he was still worried. So was I.

I called up the naughty and nice list on the computer. As if I didn't have enough to do, now I was covering for the boss.

I worked long into the night and fell into bed exhausted. I had only been asleep a couple of hours when someone started pounding on my door. I cursed and stumbled out of bed. The floor was cold, so I grabbed my slippers on the way to the door. I was trying to get one of the slippers on as I pulled the door open. I was knocked flat on my ass when the door was shoved all the way open and Bobbo burst into my room.

“Rollo, you have to come right now, it's an emergency -- ” Then he saw me. “Oh, I'm so sorry.” He helped me up. “Please come, oh please, something terrible...”

“Take a breath, Bobbo, tell me what's wrong.” Instead of telling me, he dragged me towards the elevators and didn't say another word until we reached Santa's apartment.

When Bobbo burst into Santa's bed chamber without even knocking, I knew it was serious. But I never expected to see what I saw when Bobbo threw back the blankets on the bed. There he was, the Jolly Old Elf, Saint Nicholas, Chris Kringle, Santa Claus, and he was as dead as a Christmas tree on the twenty-third of January.

I gasped. “Oh my God. Not again.”

“Just like the last time.” Bobbo said, rubbing his hands together frantically. “Just like that horrible year, when was it?”

“1918,” I said, staring at the big dead man in his red jammies. “The flu epidemic. Never thought it would take a guy who was supposed to be immortal.”

“What are we going to do what are we going to do what are we...”

I pulled the covers over Santa's cold face. “The same thing we did then. The world is full of fat old geezers with beards. We find one, we set him up as the new Santa.”

“But there's no time...” Bobbo was frantic. “We had a couple of weeks back then, now there's less than three days.”

I tried to think. “All right. I'll do the deliveries. I'll just tell the staff that Santa's sick, and I have to take over. Afterwards, we'll have plenty of time to get ready for next year.”

Bobbo tried to look reassured, but failed miserably.

The time came, the traditional time when the whole staff, their work done for the year, lines up to see Santa take off in the sleigh and start his long night of deliveries. The sleigh was all ready, the reindeer were hitched. Blitzen was sober. We had locked him in a room far from the eggnog and hot toddies that everyone indulged in as Christmas approached.

My speech was ready, and I had even practiced making it sound impromptu. At just the right moment, I was going to tell the crew that I would have to make the deliveries, no big deal, Santa just had a bad chest cold, he would be fine, yadda yadda yadda. When I could tell that everyone had begun to notice the delay, and elves were whispering to each other about why Santa was late, I climbed up on the sleigh and started to address them.

“My fellow elves,” I started, “I regret to say that for the first time in the long history of our organization, there will be a change in plan...”

“HO HO HO!” boomed out over the assembled crew. Everyone turned toward the door and there he was, big as life, dressed in full Christmas Eve gear. “Meeeeerry Christmas!” Santa had arrived.

I nearly fainted. He was dead...I saw him...He...it couldn't be. He strode up to the sleigh. “Excellent job as usual, everyone! This is going to be another Meeeeeerry Christmas!”

I backed away and let him take the reins of the sleigh. I couldn't speak. I jumped off the sleigh and it started to slide forward.

“On Dancer, On Prancer, and Comet and Vixen!” Santa boomed forth, and the whole unlikely arrangement of sleigh and reindeer took to the skies. It was about the three hundredth time I had seen it happen, and I was never as astonished as now.

The crowd of elves broke up amid much back-slapping and self-congratulation for a job well done, and most of them headed for the big Christmas Eve party. I found Bobbo, rooted to one spot and still staring at where the sleigh had vanished into the night.

“Bobbo.” I said.

“It can't be...” he breathed.

“I know it can't be, but it is. And I think I know someone who might have a clue what happened. Can you find Victor and ask him to come to my office?”

“Wha...?” Bobbo said.

“Victor. To my office. Tell him it's an emergency.”

“Sure, Rollo.” He tottered off. I ran to my office, closed the door, and waited. Victor was there in ten minutes. Victor was something of a puzzle to me, even after all the years he had been with us. I found him one day when I was out with a dogsled -- back then we used dogsleds -- on a run to get the mail. I'm talking a looong time ago; before Rudolph, before “Miracle on 34th Street”, even before “The Night Before Christmas.” Long time. Anyway, there was Victor, stumbling, nearly frozen, through the arctic wastes. Getting him home wasn't easy. He's three times taller than me.

When the big lug thawed out, he had one weird story to tell. He claimed that some young medical student had made him, from parts of dead bodies. Victor even named himself after his maker. I didn't believe a word of it for a long time, but he was a nice guy and a hard worker, so I let him stay. I had to credit his story now, though, because there he was, coming up on two centuries later, still kicking.

He had to bend nearly in half to get in the door of my office, but once in, he pulled up the special chair I keep there for him.

“What's up, Rollo?” he rumbled.

I told him the whole thing, from Santa feeling a little groggy one morning to feeling completely dead a couple days later, to coming out hale and hearty and going on his way less than half an hour ago.

“In the off-season, I know you study all kinds of weirdness, to try and understand your origins. I've seen you reading books I wouldn't even touch. What do you think of this?”

Victor put his hands together and thought for a bit. “You sure he wasn't just sick, and got better when you were busy getting ready for Christmas Eve?”

“I've seen dead,” I told him, “and I know dead. In fact, there was -- ” For the first time in a week, I thought of the corpse in the truckload of toys. “This has to be a coincidence, but something else odd happened recently...” As I told Victor about it, his expression grew more and more serious. Finally he shook his massive head.

“I have an idea, and you're not going to like it,” he said. “Where's the body from the shipment?”

That question was not easy to answer. I had to pull Deebo out of the party to ask where he had put the lost dead guy, and he really didn't want to come because he was dancing with this really cute lady elf named Breena, who everybody knows always ends up in the sack with someone after the Christmas Eve party, and Deebo really wanted to be the one this year.

“Geez, Rollo,' he said, “this better be important.”

“If it wasn't important,” I said, “I'd be dancing with Breena. Now spill, where did you stash the corpse?”

“I don't remember...we usually put stuff we don't need right away in storage level C, either warehouse five or six.”

“That's the best you can do? You didn't log it in the computer?”

“The inventory system doesn't have a category for human corpses.”

“All right, all right, go back to the party. Tell Breena I'll see her next year.”

Victor and I raced down to storage level C. On the way he finished telling me his theory. It was pretty far out, but no more so than Victor being put together in a lab. Besides, who am I to say that something doesn't exist? Humans don't believe that I exist.

We split up, Victor taking warehouse five and me taking six. I was climbing a stack of crates to inspect one that looked vaguely like the dead guy's box when Victor stuck his head in the door and said, “I think I found it.”

He'd found it all right. Right near the door of warehouse five. Still exactly the right size and shape to hold a corpse, but it didn't. It was empty. Victor and I stared down into the crate. “It was still nailed shut?” I asked.

“Tight as a drum.”

“I don't see a crowbar, how'd you get it open?” Victor just smiled and shrugged. Sometimes I forget how strong he is. “Just a minute,” I said. I bent over and felt the bottom of the box. It wasn't completely empty. The bottom was lined with about an inch of...dirt.

I looked up. “Does this mean what I think it means?”

“It has to.” Victor looked very unhappy. It meant that he was right. There was no doubting it now. Santa Claus was a vampire, and he was on his way to visit every household on Earth .

* * *

Twenty minutes later I was clinging for dear life to a Flexible Flyer, the closest thing I could find to a sleigh, and cruising at about 12,000 feet. I was cold and miserable, and Rudolph kept singing that idiotic song about himself. If he hadn't been the only reason we were able to stay up, I would have climbed on his back, torn off one of his antlers, and beaten him senseless with it.

The plan that Victor and I had come up with had seemed sensible at the time. I assigned Victor to find the former resident of the now-empty crate and try to make sure he didn't hurt anyone else. I ran to the reindeer stables because it was a clear, fog-free night out and I knew who I would find there.

“Rudolph!” I shouted. “I need your help!”

“Screw you, elf,” a voice came from the back.

I walked through the stables until I found him, lying on his side and morosely staring at nothing, that freaky nose of his casting a red glow on the wall.

“This is really important,” I said.

“Oh, sure, you need Rudolph when it's important . You need Rudolph and his bright shiny nose when it's foggy . But come a Christmas Eve that's bright and clear, and who gets left behind? ME, that's who.”

“I don't have time for this. I need you to fly me to catch up with Santa.” I didn't say so, but I knew why Rudolph didn't fly with the sleigh unless he was absolutely needed. The truth was, he was an unpleasant, miserable son of a bitch, if that phrase makes any sense applied to a reindeer. There was a good reason he was never allowed to play any reindeer games.

Rudolph looked suspicious. “Why?” he asked.

“He, uh, forgot something. Does it matter why? After we catch up you can fly with the rest of the team.”

So there we were, hurtling through space trying to catch up to a vampiric Santa Claus before he bit too many people. Trouble was, I didn't have much of a plan to defeat the Yuletide nosferatu. I was just an elf. He was...well, consider the possibilities if you combine the magic powers of Santa with the evil power of a vampire. I considered them and shuddered.

We headed for a house where Santa would arrive, if he kept to his usual schedule, about fifteen minutes after we did. I told Rudolph to hide in the back yard. There was no chimney, so I just employed the same trick Santa does to get into such houses. If you're wondering what that is, I can't tell you. It's a trade secret.

In the living room of the house, I looked around and tried to formulate a plan. There was your basic Christmas tree, and the dimwits in this family had left its lights on. An easy way to burn your house down. Of course, in the old days people had put candles on the trees. Dead tree, open flames. There was a sterling idea.

There were no presents under the tree. I was in time. The only way I was going to win this was to be sneaky. I pulled my belt knife (we elves always carry belt knives) and went to work.

I was hiding behind a Barcalounger when he came in. At first he seemed like Santa, just Santa, the Jolly Old Elf (though he wasn't really an elf; Clement Moore was just plain wrong on that count) who I had worked with most of my life. He even put presents under the tree and filled a couple of stockings hung by the radiator with care. My heart leapt and I dared to hope that the vampire's bite, by some miracle, or by the good magic that had made Santa the beloved figure that he was, had not had the usual effect.

I stepped out into the open. “Santa.” I said. The figure in the red outfit with the white trim turned, too fast, and hissed at me like any cheap vampire in a B-grade monster movie. In the colored glow from the Christmas tree I could see the fangs. His beard was soaked in a dark substance that could only have been blood from all the people in the other houses he had visited so far.

“Rollo,” it said. “What brings you here?”

“I know what's happened to you, Santa. I want to help you.”

“Ho...Ho...Ho....” This formerly jolly exclamation came out in sepulchral tones that I never expected to hear from Saint Nicholas.

I ran straight at him, and jumped. If I did it just right, he would...and he did. He batted me away, straight towards the Christmas tree. I fell into it, the sweet smell of pine engulfing me. The tree was knocked over. Glass decorations shattered. The plug for the lights pulled out of the socket and the room went from dark to darker. That was even better than I'd planned.

I didn't seem to be too damaged from the fall, so I stood, grabbed the trunk of the tree and hoisted it. Sharp edges of the bark dug into my hands. I grimaced as I tried to contain the pain. I braced the tree, crushing the pointy top into a corner of the room.

The thing that had been Santa Claus flew at me in a rage, but I was lucky on two points. One was that the tree stand fell away exactly as I had planned when I loosened the nuts and screws that held it to the tree. Two was that my opponent was not a very experienced vampire and didn't notice the sharpened end of the tree trunk.

The effect was astonishing. Upon skewering itself on the trunk of the Christmas tree, the thing let out a shrill screech that could have awakened the dead. An instant later, its whole body melted, like a cheesy special effect, until only a slightly moist spot in the carpet told the tale of what had happened in that house on that fateful Christmas Eve.

I gasped and realized I was lucky on one more point. The vampire's screech that could have awakened the dead had not awakened the family that lived there. They would come down in the morning to find a fallen tree, but would know nothing about the events of the night. I found their phone and made a call.

“North Pole. Victor speaking.”

“Rollo. Mission accomplished. How about you?”

“Still looking. What are we going to do with him if we find him? Bobbo suggested throwing him outside so the rising sun will kill him, until I reminded him the sun isn't going to rise until March.”

“Well, I have proof the traditional wooden stake works. Even if it's pine. But if you can, hold him. I want to ask him some questions. Besides, I have an interesting idea.” I hung up, then made another call.

* * *

The rest of the night I did the Santa thing. I found out why the old guy was always so wasted the morning after. Visiting every house in the world in one night is exhausting. I kept my promise to Rudolph and let him lead the team, and he whined and complained about everything the whole time.

Finally back at headquarters, I was greeted by Victor and Bobbo. Victor gave me the thumb's up as I landed the sleigh. Bobbo started undoing all the reindeer harnesses. “Where do you have him stashed?” I asked Victor.

“One of the cafeteria freezers. It's airtight. He'll never get out of there no matter what he can turn into. Oh, and your guest is here.”

“Great.” Tired as I was, I went towards the cafeteria to take care of this one last piece of business.

Victor and I greeted my old friend as we stood at the freezer door. “Pleased to meet you.” my friend said, shaking Victor's hand. Victor grinned his monstrous grin. “I've read all about you,” he said. “Never thought we'd meet. Shall we proceed?”

Victor opened the freezer door. The nattily dressed man with the red and green striped tie stepped out and brushed some ice off his lapels. “Quite bracing in there,” he said, and smiled. “Good for the pores.”

“All I want to know is, how did you end up here?” I asked.

He shrugged. “I didn't even know where ‘here' was until your enormous friend told me. All I knew was that there was only one decent meal in the whole place. You midgets -- ”

“Elves,” I said.

“ -- whatever, have blood that tastes like rotting orange peels that have been dipped in acid. And this fellow,” he indicated Victor, “well, there's some kind of dead smell around him.”

“So it was all just a shipping error after all.”

“I was trying to visit my aunt for the holidays. Lovely woman, my aunt. Very tasty.”

I looked at my friend, who I had asked to join us when I made my second phone call. He had a furious look in his eye. I nodded. It was time.

“Well,” I said to the vampire, “I've had enough killing for tonight. So just get out. It's cold out there, but you should be able to get back to civilization eventually.”

“You're just letting me go?” He didn't really believe it.

“Yup. I just want to introduce you to someone first. Vampire, this is an old friend of mine. His name's not important. He just really wanted to meet you.” My old friend stuck his hand out.

The vampire was suspicious, but then he shrugged. He may have thought he would make a meal of my friend before he left. He was definitely sure that none of us could stop him from leaving. So he reached out his right hand and clasped my friend's hand in a firm grip.

The shriek he gave out was three times as loud as the one the Santa vampire had let loose. His flesh melted from his bones. His bones melted also. In less time than it takes a three year old to tear open a present, he was gone.

I turned to my friend. “Thanks a lot. I really hated to bother you on your birthday.”

“It's all right.” He said. “Anything I can do for you, just ask.”

“You know, I really like your new look, without the beard.”

“It had been itching for two thousand years. Are we still on for poker next Wednesday?”

“You bet. See ya.” I waved as He ascended.

* * *

There isn't anything more to tell, really. I went back to my quarters. I got into bed, but I was too tired to sleep. I went to my office and sat in my chair and stared out of the window into blackness.

It was going to be a busy year. I had to find and train a new Santa. No vacation in Aruba this year. I sighed. I was a woodland elf in an icy wasteland, trusted with running an operation that no one believes really exists.

It wasn't a fit night out for man or elf. But then up here, it never is.

END