FA+
Shop
371
Views
Views
0
Favorites
Favorites
Category
All / General Furry Art
Species Cervine (Other)
Size 270 x 270
File Size 138.7 kB
Report this content
More from fwbrown61-work
YOU'LL BELIEVE A REINDEER... -- Pg 4/5 Enhanced text
Date posted: Dec 27/2013
Page Four.
© 2010 Fred Brown
............................................................................................................................................
............................................................................................................................................
❱❱❱❱ NOTA BENE: This story is in an enhanced, better-readable font. It's designed to be read on
cyan background screens. Only. There's a second version that's readable
on dark screens.
It's here: YOU'LL BELIEVE A REINDEER... -- Standard text
Main account is here:
fwbrown61 (This sub is in the fwbrown61-work account)
Story icon credit to
shadoweon
............................................................................................................................................
|
| Page Links: ▪1▪ ▪2▪ ▪3▪ ▪4▪ ▪5▪
|
=============================================================================
"Ditto. Know for fact that reindeer are a Scandinavian animal but that's it for
me. What I was told, however, is that North Pole Inc. was a highly multinational
operation right from the get-go. The myth is almost mute about the elves, you'll
notice, which conveniently covers the fact that there are elves everywhere in the
world, hiding well out of sight of us humans. Which is the way they like it. And
certainly with the power and their own magic to keep it that way. There's a story
not told, and we're not gonna get to hear it either. But once Santa got things
going he went headhunting like mad. There's about 20,000 of them up there
now, although most are Germanic, and nearly 1,000 reindeer. The way they knew
the world was going to grow and change in the coming centuries meant the North
Pole had to grow even faster to keep up with the mission. And if that sounds like
they had some inside knowledge about how things would grow and change, well,
I just keep saying magic, don't I? Janie and I were starting to get a little sick of
hearing that word, to tell the truth. 'Nother way of saying you'll never
understand, chillun, and no point in trying to explain."
"The jolly 'ho ho ho' attitude starting to wear thin?"
"Wasn't the least in evidence. This was Santa in damage control mode, and
not in a good temper. Puffed on that pipe of his hot enough I was afraid he'd
torch the barn. Or his beard. But when he showed me the sleigh he got the point
across about Jillian well enough. Popped open a side cargo door into a vast space
that was stuffed, totally stuffed, with perfectly wrapped and tagged presents, all
under an automated cargo management system that'd make Fedex's jaw drop
off. The sleigh was bigger on the inside than the outside, meaning the magic was
playing some whomping tricks with time 'n space 'n reality. Maybe not even part
of this space at all, I'd guess."
"Say, Watson, a clue," the Sheriff said slowly. "As in, how and why nobody's
ever found anything but ice and snow and seal-munchin' polar bears on the top of
the world."
"Santa's ground troops, who conveniently come with their own camou kit.
Under the ice, the narwhals and seals in the North Pole Navy apparently have
great fun teasing nuclear subs. The North Pole's there but it's not, and no satellite
looking down'll ever see so much as a hoof print. What the NSA doesn't know
won't hurt 'em. But I digress. Remember, the point is to get a magic-dosed
present, a real present, into a kid's paws on Christmas morning. Sometimes
regardless of what the kid's parents came up with. And by George if they hadn't
figured out a way to do that; had been planning for it from the beginning. Made
perfect sense, really. Downright obvious, if technically a monster of a job. Mighta
even thought of the trick myself given the chance."
Smiling, Jim took a sloooow smoke timed to let that build-up make the
Sheriff start to fume a bit. "You don't say soon about that, Watson, I'll hit you with
my violin until you do," the Sheriff growled. "Doesn't bother me; I'll just ask
Santa to bring me another one."
"Janie and I about fell in the snow at how neat a trick: make a North Pole™
present, shiny with magic, that's an exact duplicate of a parent's present. Then
go out flying 'n breaking 'n entering on Christmas Eve. And replace the present!!"
Stunned, and this time really stunned, it was all the Sheriff could do to bring
his cigarette up in shaky fingers and take a shakier puff. "New slogan: whatever
remains, however unbelievable, is still freakin' unbelievable," he whispered. But
not so stunned that he couldn't consider the idea, as the stunning implications
came down like gentle snowflakes. Weighing ten tons apiece.
"But so what if it's unbelievable?" the Sheriff gulped. "It would work,
wouldn't it? Nobody sees or hears him anyway; never did. Christmas morning
comes up, it all looks the same as the night before. Kid gets present, parents
none the wiser, mission accomplished. Until next year. But that means..." He had
to hesitate; couldn't make that one big implication come out.
"That Santa and the elves know ahead of time what all the parents are going
put under all the trees," Jim said quietly, and took a smoke. "Far enough ahead
and in enough detail to be able to make duplicate presents. Very neat trick there,
you'll grant, given the amount of toy shopping that gets done just the week or so
before Christmas. Even neater when you recall that most parents don't know
what they're getting until the child gives them a clue. Then buys something a
little more practical. Lotta girls want ponies and a lotta boys want machine guns,
might be a few the other way around, but either way that will not do on
Christmas morning. But: no matter what, on Christmas morning there's Santa's
present. Now we're talking magic!! That I'm guessing gives them the power to
peek ahead into the future and do a little light surveillance."
"Precognition? Now you're kidding me. I know you're kidding me. You're not
kidding me."
"Nope. With some mind reading thrown in for good measure. We didn't get
to talk about this; thought about it much later and worked it out. My bet is it's
the reindeer who can do that, not the elves. What would an underground race
need with that kind of magic? But it'd be pretty useful, if not crucial, to a bunch
of reindeer who fly the way they do; better'n radar. Not that radar'd be anything
but tit-useless to them. You fly faster than lightspeed, you're gonna get there
before your radar ping does. That'll work real well. SMACK! Oh: a mountain."
The Sheriff chuckled. "You've been puttin' some of your science fiction
addiction to work on all this, haven't you?"
"Duh again. Does it show? Many good things about running a dairy farm, but
you do need to be able to cut the boredom from time to time. Cows aren't big on
scintillating conversation. Although if I let some male reindeer in here and drew
the blinds for a while, y'never know, that might change. Hmmm. What if...?
There's a bona fide SF thought for you. Since they likely knew everything about
who we were, I get the sneaky feeling that's some of the reason why they landed
here. Lots of other dairy farms around, right? But also lots of farmers who likely
would've gone bibble-bibble and fallen over and passed out. You read a lot of SF,
your tolerance for the unbelievable's a bit more robust. Both Janie and I got a
pretty good workout that night."
Then Jim scowled and took a fierce puff of smoke. "Or robust up to a point,"
he growled. "Me, I eventually hit the wall. Here they are, with apparently enough
power to turn the Sun on and off like an LED light bar if they wanted to, and they
can't get a baby reindeer back to the flippin' North Pole? Pull the other one, it's
not glued on as good. And yet that's about what it looked like. The sleigh flies out
loaded to the gunwales with Santa's presents. It comes back loaded as high with
the parent's presents. The elves recycle and reuse and remanufacture 'em into
next year's presents, mostly."
"That... does solve some supply line problems, doesn't it? Save for..."
"...The fact that for damnsure no way a baby reindeer's gonna fit into that
sleigh," Jim sighed. "Or if she could it's not likely she'd come out in one piece.
Well wait, what about sedate her, box her up with lots of padding like a present,
then slip her into the machinery with a 'Deliver to North Pole' sticker on the top?
She'd only be in there for a few hours."
"Um. Lemme guess: every idea you had, they shot it right down. You were
probably turning as red as the big guy's suit."
"Redder, I assure you. And nope, negative on the brilliant packaging idea
too. Asphyxia would turn her into a dead baby reindeer. Air's real low in there to
save mass. As well, Karen explained that when you fly at hyper-light speeds and
look at your clock, all you'll usually see are question marks. What time is for us
isn't for them on Christmas Eve. But it is a lot longer for them, subjectively nearly
a week. Baby reindeer need how much milk per day again? On the plus side, this
meant that getting delayed for a couple of hours to deliver Jillian wasn't really a
delay after all. Oh goodie, now that's cleared up. Now: whadda we do about
Jillian? Aside from standing around in the snow scratching our heads. And
antlers."
The Sheriff reached out to put out his cigarette; hadn't smoked much of it
anyway. "Well, suppose I don't have to deduce very much on that mystery since
she's been here for six months. And goes back next Christmas, does she? After
the elves modify the reins to take an extra reindeer, I assume."
"Correct. They'll pick her up on the last leg, then it's a straight shot to the
Pole. They'll be able to take it easy. Not how baby reindeer usually take their first
flight but she's getting coaching on the comp and practice in the barn, Janie
playing pint-sized air traffic controller. Much to the consternation of the pigeons.
Jillian's dead-set on getting good enough to take Janie for a ride. Oh yah, this is a
spiffy idea. Karen's not here to put all four hooves down. There will be spanking."
"Good luck. You've got a moving target there."
"Two of 'em. One's just capable of moving vertically."
Jim drew a last drag on his cigarette--hadn't smoked much of it for talking a
lot anyway--then butted out. "In the end, it all came down to Janie hugging onto
Jillian to keep her from zooming up up and away. Then she looked up at us and
said, well, we've sure got lots of milk around here. We could keep her until you
guys figure something out, right? And we all looked at her, then we looked at
each other, and had a classic Doh Moment--no pun--as we realized she was right.
Only other idea that occurred to me was go wake up a vet somewhere--bibble-
bibble-Whump-Thump!!--and see if there was room at the inn to board her for
while. But for a whole year? That sucks and blows at the same time. Here, it was
a lot more possible. Not easily so, I could see some problems with it--baby
reindeer don't file flight plans--but possible. So Santa and Karen and I talked it
over and struck deal."
"Security," the Sheriff said promptly. "Your top problem is security. That just
got a little hulled in tonight too. You might be fairly private out here but not
completely by a long stretch. And your two farmhands, Jake and Maureen? Nice
girl Maureen, but likes gossipin' more'n she likes pie. And she sure likes pie."
"We're faded on security, or at least I hope. Janie letting something slip is a
bit of a wild card. No such thing as perfect security, just security that's good
enough against trouble you don't want in. If that's elephant trouble you've got a
big job ahead of you. Me, I've always made sure this place is wired reasonable
sufficient against two-legged trouble. Couple of days later, two guys in a beat-up
truck came out, justa coupla beefy-looking farm workers, and made it a shitload
better. But for just a little short and a slight thing with the eyes you'd never know
'em. There's a lot more to these elves than we've been told. Then they dropped
the magic covering their ears and we sat around the kitchen table drinkin' coffee
and talkin' security. Which they are pretty damn good at, y'know? We're
monitored, at all times. Including now."
The Sheriff blinked. Then looked around, then up. "Ah. Right," he said to
thin air. "To be expected. From one big guy to another: my best regards. Please
note previous comments about keeping schtumpf about all this. A good German
word there, isn't it?"
Jim chuckled. "Think you might've been cleared in advance or you wouldn't
have seen Jillian the way you did. One line of defense: Jillian can 'freeze' herself,
or take a remote command to do it, so she seems like nothing so much as a
stuffed baby reindeer. Look at the neat plush toy Santa brought Janie. Isn't she
cute? Since Jillian's growin' like a weed this isn't gonna work so well soon. First
line of defense: system's supposed to let me know well ahead if anybody's
incoming so we can hide Jillian. Worst case scenario, the elves keeping tabs on us
can throw a spell at whoever it is and make them think they've just seen a brown
pigeon--if Jillian's in the air--or a brown calf. But that's a last-ditch tactic; takes
massively huge magic to tinker like that, so I was told. Only in emergency."
The Sheriff stared. "Magic," he whispered, at the implications of that. "Yeah.
I think I'm starting to agree with you. That word does start to get to you after a
while. To move out of SF country, there's fantasy stories and fairy tales and
children's bedtime stories and myths up to the library rafters that all talk sooo
authoritatively about magic. I ate up Tolkien 'n Potter like they were chocolate
when I was kid. Have we been misinformed here too? By just a little? About what
magic really is? So sure, a writer with a good imagination, drawing largely on
writers past with their good imaginations, can write about magic all day long.
Suuure he or she is gonna get it right. All together now, with feeling:
<PPHHBBTT!!> Wait, think I said that already. There's power here that just...
can't begin to be grasped."
"Welcome to my world over the past six months," Jim said dryly. "Jillian
floats up to mooch a snack from Janie at the kitchen table and I have to pinch
myself. Again. I'm runnin' out of places to pinch. Jillian's a great kid and Karen's
a great mom--on the comp monitor you can forget how big she is--and I'd be
lying if I said they're not part of the family now. Power as may be. Set that aside.
We helped out a mother and her child who were in a fix, and now here we are."
It filtered through. The Sheriff straightened up. "Hey! Wait a sec! If there are
elves in the world, meaning to say able to work in the world, how come the elves
didn't take her?"
Jim paused. Then slowly scratched his head. "Dunno," he said at last.
"Subject never came up that night. Which seems the obvious solution, now that I
think about it, and I haven't until now. Have to believe that if they could've, they
would've. But couldn't. So they didn't. Why couldn't? Dunno. How and why they
live underground rules out a baby reindeer living underground with 'em, would be
my first thought. And/or it's difficult for them to actually work in the world, above
ground? Except at the North Pole? Got an impression from the two guys who
came here. They seemed to be concentrating real hard the entire time. However
good they are at disguising as human, taking over an abandoned farm
somewhere and installing Jillian for the duration would be a lotta work even if
they were human. How much magic would it take on top of that? We're back to
dunno. I'm starting to get a little familiar with that word too. But that's about the
end of it, I think. You've got all the story I've got to tell here. Beyond that's just
trivia. Jillian's got a helluva sweet tooth for maple doughnuts, for example. Some
Canadian caribou in her, perhaps? Reindeer, caribou, almost the same thing."
"About maple doughnuts, so do I," the Sheriff said, then patted his stomach.
"Hope not too much so or she's not gonna fit into those reins."
"Or fly three feet. We keep the human food down to a minimum. Lotsa milk,
sweet silage, supplemented with some protein powder and vitamins. And some
leaves and bark. Little different from what the calves get; your basic herbivore
diet. No problem on a dairy farm. We run a quality restaurant here; five moos
from Michelin. Drop in any time."
"Uh huh. And just in time, they did," the Sheriff chuckled. "Wow. Just...
wow, on all of it. Let's see an army of SF and fantasy writers come up with
something as good; not possible. They just don't write Christmas stories like this
one anymore. And good luck on next Christmas. To top the one you just had, that
is. To heck with all the little girls who wanted a pony. Janie got a baby reindeer.
On loan, but still."
=============================================================================
Page 4
<<< PREV Pg 3 First Page Pg 5 NEXT >>>
Date posted: Dec 27/2013
Page Four.
© 2010 Fred Brown
............................................................................................................................................
............................................................................................................................................
❱❱❱❱ NOTA BENE: This story is in an enhanced, better-readable font. It's designed to be read on
cyan background screens. Only. There's a second version that's readable
on dark screens.
It's here: YOU'LL BELIEVE A REINDEER... -- Standard text
Main account is here:
fwbrown61 (This sub is in the fwbrown61-work account)Story icon credit to
shadoweon............................................................................................................................................
|
| Page Links: ▪1▪ ▪2▪ ▪3▪ ▪4▪ ▪5▪
|
=============================================================================
"Ditto. Know for fact that reindeer are a Scandinavian animal but that's it for
me. What I was told, however, is that North Pole Inc. was a highly multinational
operation right from the get-go. The myth is almost mute about the elves, you'll
notice, which conveniently covers the fact that there are elves everywhere in the
world, hiding well out of sight of us humans. Which is the way they like it. And
certainly with the power and their own magic to keep it that way. There's a story
not told, and we're not gonna get to hear it either. But once Santa got things
going he went headhunting like mad. There's about 20,000 of them up there
now, although most are Germanic, and nearly 1,000 reindeer. The way they knew
the world was going to grow and change in the coming centuries meant the North
Pole had to grow even faster to keep up with the mission. And if that sounds like
they had some inside knowledge about how things would grow and change, well,
I just keep saying magic, don't I? Janie and I were starting to get a little sick of
hearing that word, to tell the truth. 'Nother way of saying you'll never
understand, chillun, and no point in trying to explain."
"The jolly 'ho ho ho' attitude starting to wear thin?"
"Wasn't the least in evidence. This was Santa in damage control mode, and
not in a good temper. Puffed on that pipe of his hot enough I was afraid he'd
torch the barn. Or his beard. But when he showed me the sleigh he got the point
across about Jillian well enough. Popped open a side cargo door into a vast space
that was stuffed, totally stuffed, with perfectly wrapped and tagged presents, all
under an automated cargo management system that'd make Fedex's jaw drop
off. The sleigh was bigger on the inside than the outside, meaning the magic was
playing some whomping tricks with time 'n space 'n reality. Maybe not even part
of this space at all, I'd guess."
"Say, Watson, a clue," the Sheriff said slowly. "As in, how and why nobody's
ever found anything but ice and snow and seal-munchin' polar bears on the top of
the world."
"Santa's ground troops, who conveniently come with their own camou kit.
Under the ice, the narwhals and seals in the North Pole Navy apparently have
great fun teasing nuclear subs. The North Pole's there but it's not, and no satellite
looking down'll ever see so much as a hoof print. What the NSA doesn't know
won't hurt 'em. But I digress. Remember, the point is to get a magic-dosed
present, a real present, into a kid's paws on Christmas morning. Sometimes
regardless of what the kid's parents came up with. And by George if they hadn't
figured out a way to do that; had been planning for it from the beginning. Made
perfect sense, really. Downright obvious, if technically a monster of a job. Mighta
even thought of the trick myself given the chance."
Smiling, Jim took a sloooow smoke timed to let that build-up make the
Sheriff start to fume a bit. "You don't say soon about that, Watson, I'll hit you with
my violin until you do," the Sheriff growled. "Doesn't bother me; I'll just ask
Santa to bring me another one."
"Janie and I about fell in the snow at how neat a trick: make a North Pole™
present, shiny with magic, that's an exact duplicate of a parent's present. Then
go out flying 'n breaking 'n entering on Christmas Eve. And replace the present!!"
Stunned, and this time really stunned, it was all the Sheriff could do to bring
his cigarette up in shaky fingers and take a shakier puff. "New slogan: whatever
remains, however unbelievable, is still freakin' unbelievable," he whispered. But
not so stunned that he couldn't consider the idea, as the stunning implications
came down like gentle snowflakes. Weighing ten tons apiece.
"But so what if it's unbelievable?" the Sheriff gulped. "It would work,
wouldn't it? Nobody sees or hears him anyway; never did. Christmas morning
comes up, it all looks the same as the night before. Kid gets present, parents
none the wiser, mission accomplished. Until next year. But that means..." He had
to hesitate; couldn't make that one big implication come out.
"That Santa and the elves know ahead of time what all the parents are going
put under all the trees," Jim said quietly, and took a smoke. "Far enough ahead
and in enough detail to be able to make duplicate presents. Very neat trick there,
you'll grant, given the amount of toy shopping that gets done just the week or so
before Christmas. Even neater when you recall that most parents don't know
what they're getting until the child gives them a clue. Then buys something a
little more practical. Lotta girls want ponies and a lotta boys want machine guns,
might be a few the other way around, but either way that will not do on
Christmas morning. But: no matter what, on Christmas morning there's Santa's
present. Now we're talking magic!! That I'm guessing gives them the power to
peek ahead into the future and do a little light surveillance."
"Precognition? Now you're kidding me. I know you're kidding me. You're not
kidding me."
"Nope. With some mind reading thrown in for good measure. We didn't get
to talk about this; thought about it much later and worked it out. My bet is it's
the reindeer who can do that, not the elves. What would an underground race
need with that kind of magic? But it'd be pretty useful, if not crucial, to a bunch
of reindeer who fly the way they do; better'n radar. Not that radar'd be anything
but tit-useless to them. You fly faster than lightspeed, you're gonna get there
before your radar ping does. That'll work real well. SMACK! Oh: a mountain."
The Sheriff chuckled. "You've been puttin' some of your science fiction
addiction to work on all this, haven't you?"
"Duh again. Does it show? Many good things about running a dairy farm, but
you do need to be able to cut the boredom from time to time. Cows aren't big on
scintillating conversation. Although if I let some male reindeer in here and drew
the blinds for a while, y'never know, that might change. Hmmm. What if...?
There's a bona fide SF thought for you. Since they likely knew everything about
who we were, I get the sneaky feeling that's some of the reason why they landed
here. Lots of other dairy farms around, right? But also lots of farmers who likely
would've gone bibble-bibble and fallen over and passed out. You read a lot of SF,
your tolerance for the unbelievable's a bit more robust. Both Janie and I got a
pretty good workout that night."
Then Jim scowled and took a fierce puff of smoke. "Or robust up to a point,"
he growled. "Me, I eventually hit the wall. Here they are, with apparently enough
power to turn the Sun on and off like an LED light bar if they wanted to, and they
can't get a baby reindeer back to the flippin' North Pole? Pull the other one, it's
not glued on as good. And yet that's about what it looked like. The sleigh flies out
loaded to the gunwales with Santa's presents. It comes back loaded as high with
the parent's presents. The elves recycle and reuse and remanufacture 'em into
next year's presents, mostly."
"That... does solve some supply line problems, doesn't it? Save for..."
"...The fact that for damnsure no way a baby reindeer's gonna fit into that
sleigh," Jim sighed. "Or if she could it's not likely she'd come out in one piece.
Well wait, what about sedate her, box her up with lots of padding like a present,
then slip her into the machinery with a 'Deliver to North Pole' sticker on the top?
She'd only be in there for a few hours."
"Um. Lemme guess: every idea you had, they shot it right down. You were
probably turning as red as the big guy's suit."
"Redder, I assure you. And nope, negative on the brilliant packaging idea
too. Asphyxia would turn her into a dead baby reindeer. Air's real low in there to
save mass. As well, Karen explained that when you fly at hyper-light speeds and
look at your clock, all you'll usually see are question marks. What time is for us
isn't for them on Christmas Eve. But it is a lot longer for them, subjectively nearly
a week. Baby reindeer need how much milk per day again? On the plus side, this
meant that getting delayed for a couple of hours to deliver Jillian wasn't really a
delay after all. Oh goodie, now that's cleared up. Now: whadda we do about
Jillian? Aside from standing around in the snow scratching our heads. And
antlers."
The Sheriff reached out to put out his cigarette; hadn't smoked much of it
anyway. "Well, suppose I don't have to deduce very much on that mystery since
she's been here for six months. And goes back next Christmas, does she? After
the elves modify the reins to take an extra reindeer, I assume."
"Correct. They'll pick her up on the last leg, then it's a straight shot to the
Pole. They'll be able to take it easy. Not how baby reindeer usually take their first
flight but she's getting coaching on the comp and practice in the barn, Janie
playing pint-sized air traffic controller. Much to the consternation of the pigeons.
Jillian's dead-set on getting good enough to take Janie for a ride. Oh yah, this is a
spiffy idea. Karen's not here to put all four hooves down. There will be spanking."
"Good luck. You've got a moving target there."
"Two of 'em. One's just capable of moving vertically."
Jim drew a last drag on his cigarette--hadn't smoked much of it for talking a
lot anyway--then butted out. "In the end, it all came down to Janie hugging onto
Jillian to keep her from zooming up up and away. Then she looked up at us and
said, well, we've sure got lots of milk around here. We could keep her until you
guys figure something out, right? And we all looked at her, then we looked at
each other, and had a classic Doh Moment--no pun--as we realized she was right.
Only other idea that occurred to me was go wake up a vet somewhere--bibble-
bibble-Whump-Thump!!--and see if there was room at the inn to board her for
while. But for a whole year? That sucks and blows at the same time. Here, it was
a lot more possible. Not easily so, I could see some problems with it--baby
reindeer don't file flight plans--but possible. So Santa and Karen and I talked it
over and struck deal."
"Security," the Sheriff said promptly. "Your top problem is security. That just
got a little hulled in tonight too. You might be fairly private out here but not
completely by a long stretch. And your two farmhands, Jake and Maureen? Nice
girl Maureen, but likes gossipin' more'n she likes pie. And she sure likes pie."
"We're faded on security, or at least I hope. Janie letting something slip is a
bit of a wild card. No such thing as perfect security, just security that's good
enough against trouble you don't want in. If that's elephant trouble you've got a
big job ahead of you. Me, I've always made sure this place is wired reasonable
sufficient against two-legged trouble. Couple of days later, two guys in a beat-up
truck came out, justa coupla beefy-looking farm workers, and made it a shitload
better. But for just a little short and a slight thing with the eyes you'd never know
'em. There's a lot more to these elves than we've been told. Then they dropped
the magic covering their ears and we sat around the kitchen table drinkin' coffee
and talkin' security. Which they are pretty damn good at, y'know? We're
monitored, at all times. Including now."
The Sheriff blinked. Then looked around, then up. "Ah. Right," he said to
thin air. "To be expected. From one big guy to another: my best regards. Please
note previous comments about keeping schtumpf about all this. A good German
word there, isn't it?"
Jim chuckled. "Think you might've been cleared in advance or you wouldn't
have seen Jillian the way you did. One line of defense: Jillian can 'freeze' herself,
or take a remote command to do it, so she seems like nothing so much as a
stuffed baby reindeer. Look at the neat plush toy Santa brought Janie. Isn't she
cute? Since Jillian's growin' like a weed this isn't gonna work so well soon. First
line of defense: system's supposed to let me know well ahead if anybody's
incoming so we can hide Jillian. Worst case scenario, the elves keeping tabs on us
can throw a spell at whoever it is and make them think they've just seen a brown
pigeon--if Jillian's in the air--or a brown calf. But that's a last-ditch tactic; takes
massively huge magic to tinker like that, so I was told. Only in emergency."
The Sheriff stared. "Magic," he whispered, at the implications of that. "Yeah.
I think I'm starting to agree with you. That word does start to get to you after a
while. To move out of SF country, there's fantasy stories and fairy tales and
children's bedtime stories and myths up to the library rafters that all talk sooo
authoritatively about magic. I ate up Tolkien 'n Potter like they were chocolate
when I was kid. Have we been misinformed here too? By just a little? About what
magic really is? So sure, a writer with a good imagination, drawing largely on
writers past with their good imaginations, can write about magic all day long.
Suuure he or she is gonna get it right. All together now, with feeling:
<PPHHBBTT!!> Wait, think I said that already. There's power here that just...
can't begin to be grasped."
"Welcome to my world over the past six months," Jim said dryly. "Jillian
floats up to mooch a snack from Janie at the kitchen table and I have to pinch
myself. Again. I'm runnin' out of places to pinch. Jillian's a great kid and Karen's
a great mom--on the comp monitor you can forget how big she is--and I'd be
lying if I said they're not part of the family now. Power as may be. Set that aside.
We helped out a mother and her child who were in a fix, and now here we are."
It filtered through. The Sheriff straightened up. "Hey! Wait a sec! If there are
elves in the world, meaning to say able to work in the world, how come the elves
didn't take her?"
Jim paused. Then slowly scratched his head. "Dunno," he said at last.
"Subject never came up that night. Which seems the obvious solution, now that I
think about it, and I haven't until now. Have to believe that if they could've, they
would've. But couldn't. So they didn't. Why couldn't? Dunno. How and why they
live underground rules out a baby reindeer living underground with 'em, would be
my first thought. And/or it's difficult for them to actually work in the world, above
ground? Except at the North Pole? Got an impression from the two guys who
came here. They seemed to be concentrating real hard the entire time. However
good they are at disguising as human, taking over an abandoned farm
somewhere and installing Jillian for the duration would be a lotta work even if
they were human. How much magic would it take on top of that? We're back to
dunno. I'm starting to get a little familiar with that word too. But that's about the
end of it, I think. You've got all the story I've got to tell here. Beyond that's just
trivia. Jillian's got a helluva sweet tooth for maple doughnuts, for example. Some
Canadian caribou in her, perhaps? Reindeer, caribou, almost the same thing."
"About maple doughnuts, so do I," the Sheriff said, then patted his stomach.
"Hope not too much so or she's not gonna fit into those reins."
"Or fly three feet. We keep the human food down to a minimum. Lotsa milk,
sweet silage, supplemented with some protein powder and vitamins. And some
leaves and bark. Little different from what the calves get; your basic herbivore
diet. No problem on a dairy farm. We run a quality restaurant here; five moos
from Michelin. Drop in any time."
"Uh huh. And just in time, they did," the Sheriff chuckled. "Wow. Just...
wow, on all of it. Let's see an army of SF and fantasy writers come up with
something as good; not possible. They just don't write Christmas stories like this
one anymore. And good luck on next Christmas. To top the one you just had, that
is. To heck with all the little girls who wanted a pony. Janie got a baby reindeer.
On loan, but still."
=============================================================================
Page 4
<<< PREV Pg 3 First Page Pg 5 NEXT >>>
Category All / General Furry Art
Species Cervine (Other)
Size 270 x 270px
File Size 138.7 kB
Comments