Saturnalia (© E. Meeske)
Page 1 "You,
too, have looked upon the living dead."
Lawrence
Talbot, the Wolfman to Lou Costello, Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein
Santa
watched cheerily as his elves finished their yearly work, well aware that his
own almost interminable night of work was upon him. He smoked his meerschaum
pipe, the same magic that allowed his eternal mission preventing oral cancer
after so many centuries of indulgence. He was still in his white shirtsleeves,
his crimson cloak waiting by his sleigh for his annual mission. There
is a hierarchy in every bureaucracy. Santa’s top elf, Flibbet, approached him,
ready to present his underlings’ work as his own Herculean labors. "Everything
just about ready, chief," he advised. "Teufellieb in electronics is running a
little late as usual but we’re getting him to hand over the goods. It does
take a while though - especially considering how that department’s size has
grown." Santa
smiled and didn’t ask who Flibbet would advise as a replacement. Teufellieb
was getting old though, as elves eventually do, and even when human, his
perfectionism had partially cost his former country their war. "Do you want a
Wunderwaffe or a child’s toy rocket?" was his favorite quote,
surreptitiously repeated among the elves whenever he was running late.
N’win-N’win - only a decent engineer but an outstanding manager - would
probably take over next year. Such is the life of a corporation. "Excellent,
Flibbet. Make sure he knows I want him to expedite release. Tell N’win-N’win
privately I want her to see me and Mrs. Claus on the 29th for
lunch. I don’t want it emailed." Mrs. Claus had come on the scene, coffee and
scone in hand for her husband. She caught the drift and clucked neutrally.
Santa repressed the term Stepford wife as he had done for almost forty
years - he knew that their eternal marriage was as much a routine for her as
for him at this point, and bore her no malice. "Very
good, sir," Flibbet said. He pivoted and walked towards electronics and almost
bumped into Petrovkia, special assistant for Antiquities and Oddities. Flibbet
gave the disheveled oddball a perfunctory nod and walked off, not daring to
scowl in front of the big boss. Flibbet wasn’t alone; Mrs. Claus herself had
vacillated for about thirty years between complete avoidance and the maternal
approach with Petrovkia before the latter had won out. "Hello
dear," she said, "Would you like some coffee as well?" "No
thanks. Boss, it’s something - we found an old frozen Norse body trailing
towards Greenland. About a hundred miles out - gods know how he got this far
up." Santa
humored him. He always had to humor Antiquities and Oddities. "Well, that is
interesting. From their old colony that disappeared in the 1300s?" "1400s.
Exactly, sir. He’s from the time period." His eyes were glowing, although
Santa was damned if he could tell if it was from excitement over the find or if
there was something else he wanted to add. "That’s
more crazy than most things we see." Santa paused to allow himself a neutral
delivery. "Was there anything else?" "He
seems to be animate beneath the ice." Santa
spit up his coffee. Living for over a millennium in the Arctic teaches you
that once living things freeze, they don’t wake up again. Not at all. Mrs.
Claus cleaned his chin whiskers with a wet nap before he could shoo her away.
"He . . . Is he a candidate for elvification?" Petrovkia
thought for a moment, then waived his arms dramatically. "From what old clay
may a good elf spring? It is beyond my ken. The disappearance of the Norse
from Greenland was precipitated by the Little Ice Age, of course. Most went
back to Iceland - but the others? As far as we know starvation and plague-" Santa
looked at his watch, debated internally while Petrovkia babbled. "Let’s take a
look. Is uh, someone from Medical there?" "Dr.
Chow-chow, sir," the weird elf said, and almost dancing, he led his master
towards the specimen. [ Continue to page 2 ] |