The elves, who had worked for Santa Claus remained on-strike in what I was told was the fourth week. Four more weeks and it would be Christmas. There was barely enough time if everyone consented to double shifts to get all the toys made and inventoried and packed.



Santa wanted to continue to utilize his share of the magical energies generated by Earth’s children to continue his job, and to provide a new factory with greater efficiency due to steam-powered machines. The angels in charge of the storks had warned him of a baby boom coming in five years, and he wanted to be ready.



The elves wanted more pay; I’m not sure why, but I’m sympathetic to any worker wanting more money. Besides, denying them the right to strike verged perilously close to slavery. Even if it was in a good cause, getting toys to children, it still would not be right to frogmarch workers back to the plant.



But, I did not know what their contract specified. So, I should back off from “slavery” for now.



And there were the elven provocateurs armed with AK-47’s chasing away “scabs” who were evidently some form of Northern dwarf. And the harassment of the human workers who were trying to fill in (and not doing that good of a job.) got me irritated.



The human workers seemed to be mostly Santa loyalists which I could identify with. Who thinks of the elves that much? But the Big Guy did have a formidable temper even if the elves were wearing him down.



So I hiked through the snow past the Majestic movie theatre that played “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Miracle on Thirty-Fourth Street” opposite “Santa Clause” and “The Grinch”. The soda fountain across the street beckoned even though I had eaten less than an hour ago. In fact nearly every vista or store flowered with a charm that just begged me to come enjoy it. I almost broke down, and went into Werner’s Hardware Store to geek-out over the miniature steam engine railroad that ran in at least four loops around the interior of the store. Only a promise to myself that I would come back later to get a hot fudge sundae with whipped cream and nuts and a maraschino cherry at the soda fountain followed by a thorough study of the railroad got me free.



Past Victorian and Georgian houses, and a corral where Donner and Blitzen were getting there coats brushed by an adoring little girl, I came to this perfectly charming Tudor style union hall at the edge of town, or Christmasville. It bespoke the sturdy virtues of hard work and self-respect, and since it was elven, it had tulips of thirty-five shades of color flowering above the snow. Angry voices piped and squeaked from inside.



I stepped inside, and silence dripped away from me like a melting icicle until the whole room was chill and wet. The palpable unfriendliness bothered me a bit, but I’ve always been good at standing up to a crowd. So, I walked through the horde of two to two and a half foot tall elves, and up to the podium, and the speaker.



“Permission to adress the union, Chairman?”

I said this with a little bow, and he nodded. Boos were started and hushed.



“Let’s hear what the human has to say. We can always have the sergeant-at-arms throw him out if that’s the pleasure of this body.” The chairman quelled his crowd expertly, and I noted that I needed his support. If he did not like something then it likely would not happen. He was a smooth politician.



“I’m a verser.”



“We know what ya’ are, now why are ya’ here?”

A angry man rose to heckle me.



“Good question. I figure to make Christmas happen.”



“Well, it ain’t, not if the Big Man doesn’t get offen his plans, and offer us the pay raise we deserve. And you can’t make us.”



A chorus of jeers and shaken fists greeted the defiance with approval, and in the back, the four gun-toting elves slipped in.



“You know, I understand Santa’s point of view, and I understand the kids, and the human workers, but not yours.”



“You don’t have to, you just have to get us what we want.” The heckler stood back up.



I gritted my teeth, and the crowd smiled a bit in anticipation at making me their servant. They felt I had to be reasonable. I’d been reasonable; time to smile at them.



“I don’t work for you, bucko, and furthermore that sounds like a challenge to me. You don’t want to make an enemy of me.” I said this is in a soft almost whisper that carried to every corner of the room. I smiled at them, and the crowd grew still and nervous.



“Now could someone, please, explain.”



It developed that they wanted mindshare. Once upon a time, Santa Claus had at least one famous elf with him, and now he “hogged” the glory, and the resultant magic, and no one had heard their names in over a generation.



“We are shrinking, I tell you, shrinking out of existence.” A rather hysterical sort pronounced. I was not sure how seriously to take his rather doom and gloom attitude, but he did show their nightmares out in the daylight for which I was grateful.



“We won’t shrink. Cause we got the guns, and we got the power, and Santa is tired and ready to give in.” One of the troublemakers said brazenly as he strolled through the crowd towering above them with his gun in hand. When he got up to me, I was surprised to see he stood nealy five feet tall.



The crowd noted it too, and he crowed about it as proof of the rightness of his position.



“Ahem, there might be another reason.” I interupted the general chatter. The troublemaker gave me an unfriendly stare, and tilted his gun slightly my way.



“You might be transitioning to say an ogre.”



He roared in rage, and pointed the gun my way.



“Even if I am, its the only way to keep Santa from sending in thugs to beat us up.”



He had a point.



“Santa won’t do that.”



“Oh, yeah.” They laughed at me.



“That’s right, you come from a world where everyone thinks Santa is sweet. No one there gets a lump of coal and a whipping on Christmas Day.”



I breathed in and out not liking my next move.



“He won’t because, I won’t allow him. I won’t allow you four to keep your guns either. Hand them over.”



“Who do you think you are to tell us what we can’t do?” The heckler asked derisively.



“I, I am the Law. Now give me those guns, or face the consequences.”



They started to do so, and then they heard a tinkling of bells outside and a gust of wind shook the building.



The door slammed open. Santa Claus stood in the door.



“You dare?!? You would dictate to me what I can and cannot do in my own factory?”



“Yes, sir, I would and I will.”



He breathed in and I heard icy winds wail outside coming closer, so I reached inside for fire and built a ring of fire by will around me. It floated in air.



He stared at me, and my face grew cold and still as I glared back.



“Walk away, Santa Claus.” I ordered even though my arms trembled inside my sleeves. Spells and prayers for miracles, and pyrokinetic strikes competed in a swirling mess inside my mind for my next attack that would plunge me into all out war with one of the most beloved icons in human history.



Then he turned and closed the door. Shortly thereafter, we heard the tinkling of bells rise into the sky. Everyone in the room breathed at the same time.



The guns were handed to me with expressions ranging from awe to outright fear on their faces.



“Now, my advice, is that later today, when he is calmer, you send a deputation. Find out his problems, and see if you can solve them for him while making it possible for him to solve your problems. But that’s not my job. My job is to make sure there will be no more violence. No more snowballs with ice in them. And no more holding ’scabs’ at gunpoint.”



“But we can’t compete with the Northern Dwarves.”



“Really, you’re saying they are better than you are?”



“No, but …”



“Figure something out.” I returned the floor to the chairman who gave me a handshake, and I left to find a good place to destroy the guns. I found an altar to a forrest god, and left them there. When I turned back in the midst of the snowy woods to look at the guns, they were gone.



The next month was hectic, and there was a lot of ill temper, but things got better. The elves pointed out that if Santa had an elven rider along, then he would need less Timeslow Potion, and the time saved in construction could be used to catch up on toy-building.



They also pointed out that since this was the North Pole, an ice walled factory built by the local Inuit would be cheaper and faster than shipping brick from England, and with the appropriate spells which the elves were willing to learn in exchange for, oh, say, an increase in pay, the walls would not even melt next to steam engines.



In the end, everyone got more than they had expected.



The only problem was that Santa Claus would not speak to me. I had offended him.



Finally, I saw him lift off in his sleigh with a happy elf by his side, and the cheers of the townsfolk echoing into the sky. I watched from outside the town in the dark, but kindly forrests.



Then I saw, the sleigh dip down after it passed out of sight of town.



Santa landed across from me. His elf slept.



“Well, Tadeusz. Thank you very much. You did an excellent job. When I sent the request to Certain Parties for a verser to drop in and help out, I wasn’t sure what I would get, only that it would not be much worse than what I already had.”



“You’re not mad at me?” I said, near tears, like a little boy looking up at his father.



“Never was. Never was. There, there, lad.” He patted my arm. “It was needed for them to see you as independent. And for you to be actually independent.”



I understood.



“Oh, one more thing before you go.” He reached back into his sack, and then paused, and nudged the elf.



The elf awoke, and looked at me, and consulted a list.



“Tadeusz, verser, nice.” Then he pulled out a gift from the bag, and handed a paper and bow-tied present to me.



While I goggled at the wonderful wrapping, the shushing of runners on snow began and stopped, and I looked up to see the sleigh fly off.



“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.” I muttered in happy unison with Santa while I opened my gift. I saw an ultra-detailed and extremely miniature multi-loop model railroad complete with train and station, and little people who waved. The whole thing ran on puffs of steam.



I spent the next hour dabbling with it, until I looked up and saw my old road was gone, and a new path through the trees with all my stuff including the stuff I had bought at the Woolworth’s Five and Dime packed neatly by a tree that guarded the entrance to the path. Its branches lofted over the beginning of the path like an arch.



Time to leave.



Sadly, I took my stuff, and began to slowly walk down the path through the woods. Somewhere, I am not sure where, the woods became normal, and not infused with magic. I stood alone in a quiet wood on another world, and such was my feeling of let-down that I had to force myself to break out the mug, and start a fire, and make myself a cup of hot cocoa. The activity and the devastatingly good cocoa revived my spirits, but still I yearned to go back to Christmasville, and spend a thousand years there.



Rather depressed, I made camp, and decided to sleep it off. The last month had been a continuous stress and a high at the same time. I needed to recuperate. So I slept.



Tadeusz