The Christmas Variant

Mrs. Claus leaned against the wheelbarrow to transfer some of the weight off her shoulders. She’d been suffering a 73-year-old back for over 800 years now and if not for modern advances in pain relief she didn’t think she’d still be on her feet. God knows being ageless isn’t the same as being immortal. Sure, it had its perks, but escaping pain and death weren’t on the list.

She opened her pill case and popped a peppermint CBD gummy into her mouth. Before closing it, she looked to the enormous meeting hall, then back at the case. She popped two more. It was going to be a long, lonely, laborious night.

Her heart skipped a beat as she thought of her little elvish friends: their boundless warmth, their fierce generosity, how loyal and innocent they’d remained throughout the centuries.

That was, until the last twenty-four hours.

Everything has gone wrong, Mrs. Claus lamented. And it’s up to us to put it right again — no matter what. If we fail…

Letting the thought go, she pulled a candy cigarette from her hair bun, ran it under her nose, then planted it between her lips. The sugar sent an immediate jolt through her system, giving her a little more strength to face what was about to happen. What they were about to do.

It especially hurt because she and the Big Guy owed their lives to the elves. Without them, the pair would’ve frozen solid that first night in the frigid north. There wouldn’t have been any spell of agelessness, any possibility of flying reindeer, nor any supernatural efficiency of a remote North Pole toy factory.

There wouldn’t be any Christmas.

Would Christmas happen this year? Yes, to some degree at least. If the Big Guy left within the next hour or so, he could still make it most of the way around the world before morning. Each additional second he was postponed meant a dozen children would wake up tomorrow to a giftless tree. Or worse, they’d wake up with only the junk their parents had purchased from the internet.

Even if she and the Big Guy could somehow pull off Christmas by themselves this year, how would they handle next year? Could they find more elves? There had to be more elves somewhere, didn’t there?

We must face one problem at a time, she told herself. First we take care of the virus, then we take care of Christmas.

Taking care of the virus meant that the population of their little village was about to drop from a few hundred to just two. She sighed, imagining how quiet the North Pole would soon become. No more pointy hats with their bells softly jingling. No more enchanted giggles lingering around every corner. After today, it’d just be the Big Guy and her, nose to the grindstone, trying to figure out how to produce gifts for a few billion children without their army of helpers.

It wasn’t fair how things had turned out. The elves deserved an early retirement full of spiced nuts, sweet dried apricots, and those candied apples they all seemed to adore. Instead, all they were getting was one last mug of hot cocoa before…

Mrs. Claus blinked away a tear as she eyed the great hall. How much harder it must be for the Big Guy. While she waited outside, nibbling a candy cig, he was inside, with them. Behind those great hall doors, he was pretending to kick off another successful Christmas with his team. He’d have to look them in the eyes, smile, raise his steamy mug — the only one in the room that didn’t contain the oleander poison she’d discreetly whipped up that afternoon — and send them, one by one, his oldest and dearest friends, into an eternal slumber.

The Big Guy guessed that most of the elves would gulp the cocoa down without a second thought. But he also figured there could be some reluctance from those whose infection had already taken root in their brain. For those who refused to drink the cocoa, he’d have to improvise. That’s why beneath his bright red robes, pressed firmly against his jolly fat belly, hung a pair of freshly-sharpened wood axes.

Please, Mrs Claus imagined whispering into each of their pointy little ears, please just drink the cocoa.

She took it as a good sign that things were still quiet inside. She’d been careful to keep the chains from clacking too loudly as she’d strung them across the big hall doors. There was a row of windows that ran along either side of the building, but they were too high for the elves to reach and this time of year they were all shuttered tightly against the arctic air. As unlikely as it was that anyone would escape, her job was to ensure that if anyone did manage to slip away from the Big Guy, they wouldn’t get too far.

Mrs. Claus knew he would deal with any resistance swiftly and decidedly, like someone putting down their injured and suffering pet rabbit with a shovel. She knew him and she knew what it would do to him, and it broke her heart.

She straightened up and felt the weight of the tank on her aching shoulders. The ignition switch was enabled. The flow valve was ready to be opened with the flick of a thumb. She gripped the firing nozzle with both hands to keep them from trembling.

She chomped on the candy cig, biting off a full inch, then began slowly grinding it between her teeth. If the Big Guy could do his part, she could do hers.

Even if the cocoa plan went smoothly, the rest of the night didn’t look too rosy. The Big Guy would have to hop into the sleigh and get to work right away, leaving her all alone to clean up the mess. In order to properly contain the infection, she’d first have to stack hundreds of tiny bodies — people she’d known and loved for centuries — into a hastily-built pyre just outside the village. While they burned, she’d have to begin decontaminating an entire village all by herself. If they ever ended up finding more elves the last thing they’d want is for them to get infected so this whole damn thing could start all over again.

She reminded herself they were doing it for the billions of fellow humans in the South who didn’t have elvish magic to make them immune to sickness and disease. Although elves have magically-enhanced immune symptoms, they can still fall ill from time to time. As she’d recently discovered, their elvish immune systems happen to be perfect incubators for aggressive viruses to evolve very quickly. When she thought about it, it was actually long overdue that a really nasty human virus would jump species like it had.

Humanity had already suffered one hell of a rough year with the original virus and they were just starting to get a handle on a vaccine. The economies and infrastructures of the world were hanging on by a thread. The last thing they needed was an elvish variant introduced back into their population. If that happened, humankind wouldn’t stand a chance.

She and the Big Guy figured the virus had infiltrated the North Pole on one of the millions of letters they received from children all around the world. She pictured little Bobby or Sarah accidentally sneezing onto their freshly decorated Christmas list, looking over their shoulder, then stuffing it into an envelope before anyone noticed.

By the time Mrs. Claus had discovered how serious the infection was, it was showing up in over 80% of the elvish blood samples. By the next day, Christmas Eve morning, nearly every elf in the village was suffering from fever and the virus’s calling card, a dark purple rash. As the day rolled on and the infection spread to their brains, they began exhibiting bizarre and aggressive behavior — completely unelvish in every way. By dinnertime, fights had started breaking out and a dozen elves had already fallen to violence or injury. It was far too late for strict hygiene, mandatory quarantines, or even selective culling. If left to play out by itself, the whole village would eventually destroy itself in one, last, psychotic explosion of violence.

She and the Big Guy had no other choice but to stop the mutated virus dead in its tracks, right here, right now — no matter what the cost.

A muffled burst of excitement erupted from inside the great hall. Mrs. Claus stood perfectly still. At first she thought it was laughter, but after a few seconds she realized it was the panicked, high-pitched gurgling of hundreds of elves choking on her poison.

They’ve had the cocoa, she thought, listening intently. Not knowing exactly how much oleander was needed to kill an elf, she’d made it very potent. Maybe they all drank some. Maybe there was no resistance. Then the Big Guy won’t have to resort to using his —

Her thought was interrupted by a loud crash from the other side of the big chained doors. Something large and heavy had smashed into them from inside. Then she heard the Big Guy bellow a battle cry from the old days, from back when he’d served as a Nordic tribal warrior, before they’d met the elves and become ageless and devoted their lives to Christmas.

There was more smashing of furniture and more angry, confused cries. Mrs. Claus could sometimes hear what he was roaring:

“Get over here!”

“You want to dance, little one?”

“The only way out is through me!”

He sounded utterly unleashed in a way he hadn’t been in almost a millennia.

Will he be able to come back from such a dark place? Mrs. Claus wondered. Will he ever again be that jolly old fat man I’d planned on spending eternity with? After everything he’s done tonight?

They should have just drank the cocoa, she thought.

Underneath and between the roar of the battle was the sound of a busy butcher shop. There was grunting and heavy chopping and the squishy crunchy sound of meat and bone being cleaved apart. Mrs. Claus heard tiny, manic cries for mercy, for help, for pity, and every time she heard the Big Guy grant their request with his ax.

Eventually, his battle cries were replaced by sporadic snorts and grunts. The old guy was nearly done with his gruesome task and had started pacing himself. As powerful as he was, he needed to reserve some of his strength for the long night ahead.

A rhythmic creaking caught Mrs. Claus’ attention. She followed the sound to the high windows that ran along the east side of the hall. The bottom half of an elf body was dangling through a broken window shutter, struggling to get its top half to come along for the ride. Mrs. Claus could see that it would succeed any moment, and that the poor, unlucky soul would be standing just ten feet away. That is, if it could still stand after a fall from that height.

Seconds later, as she’d predicted, the top half of the elf appeared, and together with the bottom half they fell from the window. Mrs. Claus tried her best to ignore the strange mix of jingling bells and breaking bones as the tiny figure slammed into the cold, hard earth. Instead of running to help — which she reminded herself she’d done a trillion times before and would have done under better circumstances — she braced herself and aimed the nozzle at the writhing bundle of green felt.

The elf saw her and tried darting away, only to collapse on two badly broken legs. It cried out in fear and agony, then, with the desperation of a wounded animal, began pulling its broken body through the snow with its hands.

Mrs. Claus recognized this elf right away. This was Grizelda Tonkins, the head pie maker at Tonkin’s Bakery. No one made a better strawberry rhubarb pie. She and Mrs. Claus had worked together just a few years ago on a special pie for the Big Guy’s 842nd birthday. He’d absolutely loved it and sent Grizelda a personal note of thanks.

She could see recognition in Grizelda’s eyes, too. The virus had surely burrowed deep into her brain by now, but behind her eyes there was still a trace of her old elf self. Mrs. Claus let the nozzle dip. The wounded elf started crawling faster.

Mrs. Claus chomped what was left of the candy cig, wiped away a tear, then lifted the nozzle toward the fleeing elf. She turned on the flow of gas, heard a quick, brief hiss, and watched as a tongue of flame leapt from the flamethrower’s nozzle directly onto the prized pie baker. Once the flames were clinging to their target, she turned off the flow. Poor Grizelda kept on crawling for a few seconds before fully succumbing to the blazing heat that engulfed her.

Mrs. Claus dropped to her knees and sobbed and gagged at the smell of badly burnt caramel coming from her old friend’s half-melted corpse.

Something inside the hall bashed into the two big doors and caused the chains to tighten.

“Sleigh!” she heard the Big Guy’s trembling voice call out. He didn’t sound well at all.

A fist slammed against the doors from the inside, followed by another command.

“Sleigh!” This time he almost moaned the words, as if nauseous and on the verge of vomiting.

She pulled the key from her pocket as she ran to the lock she’d used to bind the chains. A quick twist and the chains slackened.

The doors swung open. The Big Guy stumbled through, his beard and the white of his robes were soaked with so much blood so that he was red from nose to toes.

“Sleigh!” He called out like a dog howling to be let out to roam the night.

“Dear…are you alright?” Mrs. Claus reached out but he swatted her hand away.

“Fine! Sleigh!” he cried, pausing between each word as if it were painful to breathe. “Must. Go. Christmas. Sleigh!”

She tried to find that special sparkle in his eyes, but it was gone. He just stared out into the falling snow as if in a dream. Could she blame him? He’d just murdered a few hundred of his closest friends. And the clock was still ticking.

“It’s ready, waiting behind the stable. I’ve told the reindeer to auto-navigate, so no driving for you tonight, Just rest and gather your strength between delivery stops.”

He didn’t answer, he just gave her a wobbly nod and stumbled toward the stable.

As she watched him walk off to perform his most sacred duty, she resolved that when he got back she’d smother him with so much love and affection that he’d have no choice but to heal his decimated heart.

They’d be able to heal. Together.

She plopped the flamethrower in the snow, then rolled her wheelbarrow through the open doors of the great hall. The stench of spoiled marshmallows and rancid chocolate was almost too much to take, but she refused to give an ounce less than the Big Guy was giving.

She tied a handkerchief over her mouth, dropped to her knees, and started stacking dismembered elf parts into the wheelbarrow.

Being dead elves, they were as light as driftwood. She had no problem picking them up in bundles and tossing them in all at once. Each fragile little arm or leg was wrapped in colorful felt and ribbons of blood, almost like tiny little gifts. She imagined she was just cleaning up a mess of toys, not real body parts. These were just old, dirty doll parts. Just junk.

“Just junk,” she muttered, dropping another leg into the bin. “Not real. Just junk. Just dirty, old, cinnamon-scented…” She trailed off as her hand settled on something under a broken bench. When she pulled it out and held it to her face, her blood ran cold. It was a heart. Not the walnut-sized heart of an elf, but the heart of a much larger creature. The heart of a human.

Mrs. Claus shrieked at the top of her lungs and let it slip from her hands. When she recovered, she turned to the surrounding rubble and began pushing the top layer of broken furniture and dead elves away. Underneath she found more human organs: a stomach, two lungs, and a pile of intestinal tubing. Nearby she found a short elven dagger covered in blood with a tuft of red fur snagged on its blade.

She got to her feet and ran outside as fast as her old joints would take her, which wasn’t very fast at all. She crouched down to get the flamethrower straps over her shoulders and managed to tighten them without falling backward into the snow. With the nozzle at the ready, she stomped through the snow toward the stable.

To her relief, the sleigh was still parked where she’d left it. The Big Guy was fiddling with the reins, trying to call out to the reindeer to make them go.

She walked up directly behind the sleigh and pointed her nozzle at it. From behind, in the crisp, bright moonlight, it looked just like him. The blood on her hands — his blood, straight from his heart — reminded her that it couldn’t possibly be him. Whatever was up there fiddling with the reins was not her Big Guy.

That’s when her eyes found the huge bloody incision running from the collar of his big red jacket to his seat.

Mrs. Claus closed her eyes, held her breath, and turned on the valve.

There was no quick hiss of fuel and no flames spewed from the nozzle.

She tried again, this time with her eyes open. Still no flame.

A strange clicking noise came from the tip of the nozzle. The ignition spark had gone out when she’d dropped it in the snow. Adjusting her bifocals, she scanned the buttons along the side of the nozzle. She plunged her thumb into the button labeled IGNITION. There was a loud fssst, but no fire.

“No!” she cried, pushing the button again and again. “No, no, no, NO!”

She could sense the restlessness in the reindeer. On any normal Christmas Eve they’d have already been in the air for a few hours. She could tell they wanted nothing more than to go run across the frosty moonlit night. This was the one night they lived for. She knew that they didn’t actually need the Big Guy’s command in order to take off.

That’s why she wasn’t completely surprised when they finally gave up waiting and sped off down the runway, pulling the sleigh, and the Big Guy, behind them.

Everything slowed down for Mrs. Claus. She realized with dread how all the clues she’d missed were related. How he’d had so much difficulty walking. How strange his voice sounded. How the spark was missing from his eyes. The thing that burst through the hall doors may have looked like her husband on the outside, but it was something completely different on the inside.

As if to prove her right, the incision on the Big Guy’s backside spread open to reveal a trio of demented elf faces, each striped with that telltale purple rash and dripping with the blood of their former boss. One by one, they hissed, flipped her off, then disappeared back inside the corpse.

She realized that a gang of resistors had gotten him that elvish knives at some point during his rampage, probably while she was busy torching Grizelda. Once he was dead, they quickly ripped out most of his major organs and hid them beneath the mess. Then they’d climbed inside his hollowed out body and began controlling it from inside like a costume.

She snapped to just in time to watch the sleigh lift off the ground, circle back for a pass over the village rooftops, then shoot up and vanish into the clouds.

Mrs. Claus dropped the nozzle and the tank, then made her way into the stable.

When the elves were done infecting every inch of the globe, the sleigh would bring them right back to the North Pole. She needed to be far away from the village, or any village for that matter, if she planned to survive to see the new year.

She found Blitzen’s trough and pushed it aside. She cleared out the hay underneath to reveal a small rectangular hatch in the dirt. With the thumb of her mitten she entered three numbers into its combination lock and wrenched it open.

She pulled a backpack and a rifle from the space below the hatch, leaving the other rifle behind. She decided it wouldn’t offer an old lady like her much more time out there in the barren, icy wasteland than she already had, which was very little.

She grabbed it anyway and slung it over her other shoulder. Water wouldn’t be a problem and there were two weeks worth of rations in the pack. But after that, her survival would depend on hunting and fishing, neither of which she was very good at. Those had always been his hobbies, not hers. And besides, she never once imagined she’d have to survive anywhere without her Big Guy by her side.

Unable to cry or to feel much of anything anymore, Mrs. Claus emptied the rest of the CBD gummies into her mouth, pulled her backpack straps tight, then set off on foot into the Great White North.