Red Tidings We Bring: a Holiday Timeline

Preface: This timeline was originally posted on alternatehistory.com between the dates of November 27th and December 24th, 2015.

November 1988

“Mr. Claus?” asked Cornelius Candycane, as he knocked on jolly old Saint Nicholas’ door. “I have some rather urgent news for you.”

“Come in, Mr. Candycane,” responded Claus. “If it’s from you, it can’t wait.”

He opened the mahogany door and saw Claus at his desk, clacking away at a Commodore 64. “Yes?” he asked.

“Sir,” remarked his erstwhile colleague and foreign minister, “I have reports from our agents in several developed countries that we may be run out of business.”

Claus turned his head to Candycane. “What do you mean? Who would put us out of business?”

Candycane sighed with exasperation. “The Chinese. I don’t know how they’ve been doing it, but they’re making toys galore. They’re being bought by American families extremely high rates, and Europe reflects the same,” he said, worriedly. “We may become irrelevant with cheap Chinese-made toys. I trust you have been following what Deng has been doing?”

“Yes, yes I have. The economic liberalizations, the Special Economic Zones, everything. They’re letting in toy companies.” He scoffed. The corporations never did it as good as the North Pole did.

Candycane peered warily at his boss. “Sir?” he asked.

“Yes, Cornelius?”

“Do you think they have Mistletoe?” The apprehension filled the air.

“They just might,” responded Claus. The fear was real.

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November 1943

“Where is this headed off to?” asked the elf preparing the sleigh for takeoff. He strapped one of the reindeer’s reins onto the sleigh.

“Changde, in China,” responded the pilot. On his pilot’s coat was the name Moultrie Mistletoe. “Is everything good to go?”

“Your reindeer look a little hungry. You think you can make this run?”

“Certainly. It’s not that bad of a load.”

“Okay,” said the inspector. “I think you’re right. I’ll give the signal.”

The inspector ran off, and Mistletoe prepared for takeoff. He strapped down his goggles and cracked the whip. The reindeer grumbled, but he was ready nonetheless.

The reindeer began dashing along the runway. The North Pole flag flew on a flagpole, the last he would see it until he returned. On the sleigh’s wings was the roundel, snowflake and pine tree.

The cold pierced his face even behind the glass cockpit. He should be used to this, he thought, but it made the North Pole seem warm.

The cold of Siberia made it colder, but he flew on. He saw no other sleighs, no planes from the humans. Looking down, he occasionally saw a city, perhaps Yakutsk, perhaps Chita, perhaps Ulan-Ude.

Going by the stars he had to be in China by now, or at least Mongolia. Changde was in Hunan, well past the Soviet border. It was being highly contested between the Chinese and the Japanese; he was delivering a shipment to the Kuomintang to help them in this conflict. He knew it was of the utmost importance; he had ammunition and food in the sleigh.

He had no weapons; he was told that this was safe territory and that the Japanese Air Force would not be in range of his flight path. All was well; he thought he would succeed, and succeed he would.

It became very windy, blowing him to the east. He glanced at his watch. “Damned wind,” he muttered.

The wind kept moving him off course. He’d be a few hours late, but it would be no matter. C’est la guerre.

The wind made a hellish noise, billowing around the sleigh. Subtly, but audibly, a new noise made its way into his ears.

He glanced around the sleigh. Nothing, or so he thought.

The whirr he recently perceived intensified. His eyes darting around the cockpit, he saw a gigantic red dot zip by him. The reindeer whimpered in pain.

The whir came back. The big red dot, almost a red hole, flew by him once more. It was a scarlet maw, into Santa knew what.

Again, it came towards him, too quickly to figure out what it precisely was. As it zoomed away, there was a snap.

One of the reins had been cut, the reindeer veering off to his left and dragging the sleigh with him.

The red dot came back once more. A steady popping came at him. The sleigh began to shape.

The cockpit glass shattered. He grasped his head as to not be blinded. Shards cut into his hands.

He looked up back at the dot. It flew over him, revealing not one, but two dots, following each other. These two dots were on wings, and, he could see a propeller in front of them.

These were not disembodied dots. They were insignia on a Japanese fighter.

Before he could avert, the fighter once more dashed rightward, ripping off the other rein. The reindeer pranced off into the distance. He plummeted.

The fighter flew away, content its mission being accomplished. Moultrie lept from the plane and pulled his parachute cord, falling gently to the ground.

He landed on grass. He saw nobody. He lay down and slept.

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“Of course,” said Defense Minister Claudius Bellringer. “We had long suspected this,” he said, having stood up at the table to make his point.

“What evidence do we have?” asked Manius Tannenbaum, the Interior Minister. “Why do we want to anger the Chinese, of all people?”

“You see,” remarked Bellringer, “we need to protect our dominance. It is for the cause of peace, the cause of the Christmas spirit!” he proclaimed.

“Calm down, Mr. Bellringer,” chided Claus. “I understand your concern, but the Chinese, we are reasonably certain, did find Kuomintang documents about our existence and our role in the war. They could retaliate if we provoked them too much.”

“The People’s Republic of China is one of the most barbaric regimes ever known to mankind,” spat Bellringer. “Why should we care? If they are destroyed, the world will be better off.”

“We do not condone violence,” responded Claus. “We do it only if necessary.”

Claus turned his head from Bellringer. “Are there any records of stolen technology?” he asked his Minister of Records, Eustace Yulelog.

“I don’t suppose so,” responded Yulelog coyly, sitting with his hands put together not unlike a pyramid. “But I can check.”

“Perhaps I will do so myself,” responded Claus.

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Moultrie Mistletoe woke up from his sleep with a blunt pain in his right side. His eyes jolted open.

There was a small crowd of men looking down at him. They had guns.

“Who are you?” asked one of them.

“I’m not sure I’m allowed to tell you!” responded Mistletoe, in Chinese. “What do you want?” He knew how to speak Chinese; anyone who was being sent to China had to know the language; Santa’s own policy.

The guns were aimed at him. “There is a box of supplies that fell somewhere east of here! You can have it?”

“How do you know?”

“I’m a pilot!” he held up his broken flight goggles. “I was shot down by the Japanese!”

“Where were you going?” asked the commander, crossly.

“Changde!” he insisted. “I was going to help the Kuomintang!”

The leader looked pensive. “Men,” he ordered his troops, “the four of you should find these supplies.” They obeyed, and marched off. “The rest of you, take him back to Yan’an. This ought to be interesting.”

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“No, Mr. Claus, I’ve found nothing,” spat Mr. Jingeling, the keeper of the keys to the workshops, and by extension one of the premier record keepers in the North Pole. He wheezed.

“You’ve checked all the way back to World War II?”

“Yes! I’m certain!” he coughed out, phlegm making it a brutal, hacking utterance. “I’m telling you, Claus, Bellringer is right!” he snapped. “They have to have Mistletoe. It’s the only rational explanation.” He coughed again.

Jingeling glared into Claus’ eyes with the one eye he had working. The other eye, a glass eye, stared vapidly into space. The scar on his forehead was another testament to his injuries, as was the captured Nazi standard on the wall.

“I know you’re sour over Mistletoe,” said Claus calmly, trying not to set him off. “But I don’t want to risk an incident with the Chinese!”

“Incidents, incidents, incidents!” spat Jingeling. “I lost one of the best foremen I had ever seen when you drafted him and sent him out to China!” he wheezed, lung wounds causing him to cough once more.

“If you are certain, I suppose that leaves either their own ingenuity or indeed Mistletoe. I might just send a team down there to investigate.”

Jingeling stood up walked over to the other side of the room. On the wall was an old rifle from the time the North Pole was invaded by the Germans. He took it off of its display.

“I’m ready to settle accounts,” he remarked to Santa.

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The soldiers dragged Mistletoe into a cave and sat him on a chair, tying his arms behind the frame.

“Care to explain who, exactly, you are?” asked the interrogator, who had stepped out of the shadows. He wore a Zhongshan suit. “I can’t believe that you are her in wholly benevolent intentions.”

“I assure you, I am friendly,” insisted Mistletoe, worried. “I was here to assist your allies in Changde.”

“Allies? Oh, yes, the Kuomintang,” he spat. “Only out of convenience, but still on the side of China. The more important question is, of course, who do you work for?”

The interrogator drew a pistol. “I advise you answer.”

“You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Growing up, I never thought that China would fall into civil war, and that Communism would take hold. Clearly, that happened. Once more, care to tell me?”

“I work for the North Pole.”

The interrogator snickered. “What are you going to tell me next, that you’re an elf?”

“Look at my nose. Look at my ears. Those aren’t human, are they?”

The interrogator scanned him. “I guess you are right. Once more, the world surprises all of us.”

“As much as I did not expect to be here, in wherever this godforsaken cave is.”

“You’re in Yan’an, in Gansu Province,” said the interrogator plainly.

“You mean where the Communists have holed up?”

“Yes. Chairman Mao is somewhere not far from here.”

“Well, that explains the red stars here and there.” Mistletoe had seen them when entering the town.

“Now, what is your name?”

“Moultrie Mistletoe.”

“Good, good,” remarked the interrogator. “What is your occupation?”

“I’m a factory foreman. I make sure that the toys get made, and now the weapons. At least I did before I was drafted.”

“Why did they draft you?”

“Bureaucrats are more easily replaceable than manufacturing specialists, never mind that I know how to do all that factory stuff myself.”

“If that’s the case,” said the interrogator, “I think we have a use for you.”

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Moultrie Mistletoe had been kept in that cave for far too long. He was starving; he had not been fed since he was brought to the cave. That interrogator had left, and said that he would have important visitors.

"Mr. Mistletoe!" called out the voice of the interrogator, "you have guests!"

Many armed men entered the cave, and formed a semicircle behind him. In front of him came three men, all in Zhongshan suits.

"Is this the 'elf' you told us about?" asked the one in the center.

"Yes," said the interrogator, deferentially.

"Very well. Do you speak Chinese?" he asked.

"Yes, yes I do," responded the elf in that language. He had studied well; he could recognize a rural Hunanese accent.

"I am Mao Zedong, Chairman of the Communist Party of China. To my left is Lin Biao, and to my right is Deng Xiaoping; they are both important figures in the party as of now. Would you care to tell me why you have been sent down here?"

"As I said to this fellow here," he said, shifting his head towards the interrogator, "I was sent to bring supplies to the Kuomintang troops in Changde, to help them against the Japanese."

"And why are you in Yan'an?" asked Mao.

"I was shot down by the Japanese."

"Fu Tengfei here told us you were a factory foreman." The interrogator nodded. "Could you help us establish ourselves after this war is won?"

"I suppose I could, but why would I do that?" he asked.

The armed men around him raised their rifles and pointed them at him.

"I would imagine that you are reconsidering your answer," cautioned Fu.

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It was Christmas Eve; Santa was preparing to take off and bring his presents to the children of the world. It was cold, but it never wasn't at the North Pole; he was trudging back to his office for a final telephone conversation.

He had a bright red phone; above it was labelled 'MOSCOW.' He pressed the buttons and rang up the Soviet Ministry of Defense. He waited for the Minister to pick up.

"Dimitri Timofeyevich," said Claus to the Minister, "I will be passing over Siberia soon. Tell your air force and missile defense to let me through."

"Mr. Claus," said Dmitri Timfeyevich Yazov, the Soviet Defense Minister. "I thought you would have passed through by now. Where are you headed?"

"We are going to Beijing, after covering the eastern portion of your country and Mongolia; we'll get the rest of the Union not long afterwards."

"Whatever you say, Mr. Claus," said Yazov. "I will send the order to make sue you are not shot down. Anything else?"

"No, that will be all."

"Tell me, Mr. Claus," asked Yazov, "why China? You usually go to Europe first!"

"I have business in Beijing," replied Claus tersely.

"Our own dealings with the Chinese have been less than beneficial lately," responded Yazov. "I wish you the best of luck."

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"What do you think we should do with this 'elf,'" asked Mao Zedong, thinking hard about the current situation. It was certainly not normal, especially during this hellish war.

"Send him to the front," said Lin. "We need as many soldiers as we can. He can speak Chinese and he can carry a gun. What else?"

"No, have him make weapons," encouraged Deng. "He could help us after the war."

Their arguing was interminable. Mao just waited, pretending to care. It seemed like hours; it probably was hours.

"Have him stay here," interjected Mao, "and work on local reparations and weapons maintenance."

The two Party men nodded.

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"Be safe down there," said Santa Claus, beckoning back to the rear end of the sleigh. Mr. Jingeling was there, as were two others: Hornby Goodtiding and Watley Peppermint. Both of them were veterans of the Second World War and the invasion of the North Pole by the Germans; they both subsequently served on the Eastern Front. They knew what they were doing.

"As we'll ever be!" announced Jingeling. "Parachutes are ready."

"Guns?"

"Check!"

"Bullets?"

"Check!"

"Knowledge of Chinese?"

"Check!"

"Then go down there and find Mistletoe, or at least what's happened to him!" beckoned Claus. "I know you bastards can do it!" He laughed heartily.

"For Mistletoe," acclaimed Jingeling.

The three of them leapt out of the sleigh.

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The war was uneventful in Yan'an. Fu had been tasked by the upper echelons of the party to work on weapons, and that he did. Moultrie ate human food; it was more oily and less sweet than what he was used to, but he made it do.

They'd usually give him rifles or shotguns to do maintenance on, sometimes the occasional truck. He could do it all; he had learned during the early phases of the war. Everything else could be deduced from that.

The months, and then years went on. He had no word from the North Pole; he lad lost any faith that they were coming for him. He accepted Mao as his new master, Fu his new overseer.

The Japanese stopped being the enemy. The Kuomintang took their place, and the killing and the maintenance continued. The war had become natural to him; having been at work at the North Pole for so long, it was rather disturbing how quickly he had accustomed himself to it.

He fervently wished that the war would end.

He had withstood bombing runs from the Japanese during that phase of the war, and was afraid of being hit; his first cave had been almost levelled, and he wasn't sure how he survived.

"Moultrie!" barked Fu.

"Yes?" responded the elf.

"Here, grab this gun and get out to the front!" he barked.

There was no time to explain, Moultrie concluded.

Out there were men with the white sun on the blue roundel on their caps; the Kuomintang had arrived, and was coming close to taking Yan'an. That had to be the case; the didn't bring him out of his cave for petty reasons.

He hoisted up the rifle and shot at the Kuomintang soldiers. One bullet hit a chest, its owner falling to the ground. They noticed him, and chased him.

He ducked behind a building that had seen better days, hiding behind a wall that had been levelled by a bomb or artillery strike.

Fu was also doing battle, and losing. He retreated, looking Moultrie in the eye. Without saying anything, he darted off.

Moultrie prayed to whatever the hell governed this universe for deliverance. There truly were no atheists in foxholes.

"What an odd thing," remarked a voice in Chinese.

He looked up. Kuomintang soldiers.

How ironic, he thought; it was just like when he crash landed.

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China was foreign to Mr. Jingeling. The sloped roofs of the fancier buildings and the non-Latin characters made it seem downright alien.

They had landed in Tiananmen Square, the great square in the middle of Beijing. He saw several large, imposing buildings around him. This, to them, was something sacred.

"So what do you want to do, Jingeling?" asked Hornby, smoking a peppermint cigar.

"Get out of sight," he ordered. Hornby and Watley followed suit very quickly, sprinting across the square to an alleyway, which brought them into the city itself.

It looked different from the opulent promenades of Tiananmen Square; buildings were rectangular, with the common variants. This city was made to be lived in, not to be looked at.

They patrolled around quietly. "Where the hell are we supposed to look?" asked Watley. "Claus didn't say much."

"He's a politician, not a military elf. Yes, he machine gunned Hitler to death, but he's not a military elf like we are," snapped Jingeling. "Not an industry elf either."

They made sure to avoid people. They were quiet as they could be.

One person in particular noticed them. He was unarmed, and about the height of one of the elves. They ducked behind some crates, hoping he'd go away.

But he came towards them (or maybe it was a she; Jingeling couldn't tell). Closer and closer this intruder to their mission. He scanned the alleyway, and looked behind the crates.

They locked eyes. Jingeling clutched his gun.

This intruder was not human.

He had pointy ears and a pointed nose.

It was an elf in a Mao suit, in party regalia.

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The Mao-suited elf gave his fellow elves a skeptical look. "Why the hell are you here?" he asked in their own language, demonstrating a North Pole origin.

"Don't you remember me, Moultrie?" asked Jingeling. "It's Mr. Jingeling, the key keeper for the toy factory you worked at!"

"You didn't answer my question," responded Moultrie. "Why are you here?"

"To save you! We figured out that you were being held hostage here! Claus was able to figure out from all the new toys coming out of China!"

Moultrie looked at him blankly. "I want nothing more to do with Santa Claus." His voice did not waver.

There was a stunned silence. "Why?" asked Jingeling.

"You could have come for me during the Great Leap Forward. You could have come for me during the Cultural Revolution. And you didn't."

He began walking away. He pulled out a radio from his coat. He spoke into it in Chinese. "Send some policemen, will you? We have some ruffians in an alleyway." He rattled off location information.

"Shit!" spat Jingeling. "Watley, Hornby, follow my lead and stay armed. We need to get out of here, and quickly."

They all drew their guns and darted out into the larger streets, zigzagging through alleyways. They could hear sirens and vehicles coming closer and closer.

"One of you, get Claus on the radio," barked Jingeling, still running.

"On it!" yelled Watley. He took out his own long-range communicator. "Mr. Claus!" he pleaded. "We're being attacked by police! We don't know if we'll make it out!"

Claus jolted from his desk to the radio. "What happened? Have you found Moultrie?"

"Yes! He's in league with the Communists! He called the police on us!"

Watley could say little else; they were backed into another alleyway with police with weapons drawn.

One of them noticed the radio and shot it out of Watley's hands.

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The Kuomintang wasn't nearly as enterprising with Moultrie while he was in their captivity. He was in a cave, again, tied to a chair, again. Deja vu was in full effect.

It was a few days. There were guards that didn't talk to him.

One of those days, those guards were conveniently shot dead by Communist troops.

They freed him. He explained to them that he was with the Communists. Once with their commander, he was told that a certain high-ranking member of the Communist Party wanted to see him.

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Santa Claus was looking forward to not having to ride the sleigh in the bitter cold again; however, the loss of three agents in China was something that he had to act on personally.

"Where are you going?" asked Cornelius Candycane, perplexed as to why his superior was leaving.

"To save three elves in need," he said without elaborating.

"At least tell me where!" pleaded his secretary. "Do not leave us wondering if you disappear! There were enough scares during the Second World War!" he exclaimed.

"Beijing," said Claus, laconically.

There was a pause. "Have they gotten Jingeling?" asked Candycane.

"And Hornby, and Watley."

"I was afraid of this," said Candycane, exhaling as he did so. "I will remain charge while you are gone. Good luck."

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Moultrie was escorted behind Communist lines and onto a truck; where he was going, he did not know.

They gave him books; old Chinese literature, Communist political tracts, and other long and dull books that nevertheless took his mind off of the drudgery of travel.

He arrived at a camp, with a small shack. "Go in there. The Party leader that wanted to see you is in there."

He obeyed such an order and entered.

There sat a man at a desk, writing something, elegant Chinese characters requiring more patience than the written alphabetical language of the elves.

"Mr. Mistletoe?" asked this man. "It is an honor to meet you personally."

"And may I ask who you are?"

"You may recognize me from Yan'an," replied this man. "I am Deng Xiaoping. I was among the three Party officials that visited you in the cave in Yan'an, and was the one that had you become a mechanic for the war effort."

"Well then," responded Moultrie, "I suppose I owe you for that."

"You would be correct in assuming that we won't be sending you back to the North Pole anytime soon," said Deng coldly. "But, I am willing to have you kept from the worst of the war."

"Why?" asked Moultrie.

"I think someone of your stature from the North Pole could be useful to us. Mao and the others gave you little thought; they knew of North Pole participation in the war against the Japanese. I give you this offer, Mr. Mistletoe. Be a protégé of mine, and help the Party, or refuse, and die."

Moultrie nodded. "The choice is clear, or as clear as being at gunpoint can be," he said resignedly. "I'll help your party."

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The scars of the fighting in Sichuan no longer bothered Moultrie; he had learned soldiering from Deng's forces. Deng himself was both a politician and a military man. He no longer thought much of the North Pole; Moultrie even began thinking in Chinese.

Soon enough, the war was won. A new decade arrived, and Moultrie began to serve as an adjutant to Deng as the mayor of the city of Chongqing. Now, Deng had been relieved of that post.

"So what exactly is the purpose of this 'Communist Youth League?'" asked Moultrie to Deng while onboard the train to Beijing.

"Keeping the young from the thralls of capitalism," said Deng's erstwhile compatriot Hu Yaobang. "You see," said Hu, "we cannot let the Americans or the British take over China and rule us like they once did. We already had a century of humiliation. We do not need another."

"Of course," said Deng. "Always a good idea. Moultrie," he said in an almost fatherly manner, "do you want a higher position?"

Moultrie was honored. "Not now, no. I am currently fine with staying in Beijing with you."

"I am certain you have great potential," said Deng, sagely. "Great things lie in your future, and China's future."

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"Lao Deng!" called out Moultrie to Deng, afraid he had awoken the Paramount Leader of China.

"Yes?" asked Deng, fortunately awake.

"I am in urgent danger!" pleaded Moultrie. "Santa Claus is trying to bring me back to the Pole!"

"What?" asked Deng, ripped from his desk. "How?"

"Elf commandos were sent to try and kidnap me. I was able to get the People's Armed Police on them, but they may well be on the way!"

Deng sighed angrily. "I thought after forty years they would have forgotten about you!" he exclaimed. "I'll have the Air Force try to intercept him or anything else coming down from the Soviet Union."

"Very good. And I promise you, Lao Deng, that I will not go back to that bourgeoisie hellhole. I have been through too much to go back. China is my home."

Moultrie's eyes betrayed loss and regret.

"I can see the regret in your eyes, comrade," said Deng. "I doubt anything could have saved Lin Biao."

"I know you weren't the fondest of him," responded Moultrie. "But Mao was a madman."

"Well," said Deng. "There is a reason for '70% right, 30% wrong."

"And why we don't care about the color of the cat."

There was a silence. "Do you know how Hu Yaobang fares?" asked Moultrie.

"Ill. Only a few months, say the doctors."

"Will it matter?" asked Moultrie.


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Deng was in Beijing serving as whatever role Mao wanted him during these exciting times of industrialization; he and Moultrie had parted when the latter, having demonstrated his loyalty to Mao in multiple party conferences and plenums, he was put in charge of a factory in Zhengzhou, in Henan province. He was to be hidden from the world, but nevertheless he would be in charge of the decision making.

Acculturating himself to the Party culture was downright disconcerting to him; he was different. His skin was paler than theirs, his nose and ears pointier, about elbow's height on the average man. His accent in Chinese was bizarrely foreign, but intelligible. He nevertheless heard them taunting him in the background.

He spoke in favor of Deng, and more importantly Mao, lambasting the Japanese, the Kuomintang, the West, and the Soviet Union when the latter as convenient. They had struggled, initially, to give him a position; he was an industrial manager in a time when the country was focusing on its agricultural needs.

Nevertheless he endeared himself to Deng, to Hu, to Zhao Ziyang and Lin Biao and even to Mao himself, as well as some relation with Liu Shaoqi. "It doesn't matter where this elf is from," remarked Mao at one meting, "he is loyal and is willing to help China. Let him do so."

He had an office in the factory with a portrait of Mao, as was almost disturbingly common throughout the country. He had done bombing and supply runs over Europe back during the war; they reminded him of what it was like in Germany, or even the Soviet Union. The last part surprised him even if he knew it shouldn't.

The first day on the job, when the men from the rural areas came trudging into the factory, was something that Moultrie had been planning for months He had been inspecting the machinery designs and training the engineers and maintenance workers that kept them working. They were not at all dissimilar from what he had done on the North Pole.

The months went on, and the factory churned out goods. He would watch from a balcony, gazing upon the tractors that were being made for the vast agricultural projects that Mao demanded.

As months passed, however, the men seemed to get worse and worse at their jobs. They were weak, starving even. And yet, the quotas increased.

"What?" shrieked Moultrie to an aid. "With the starvation that he is causing, he wants double the production?" He crumpled up the paper and threw it in a wastebasket. "Ridiculous."

To get his mind away from such misery he went out to inspect the assembly lines once more, but the haggard, exhausted men did not do so.

One he saw was trembling, assembling engines for the tractors. Moultrie looked down upon him, pitying him but having to keep secrecy; his aids were under oath and penalty of death. He wished he could help this poor farmer, brought to the city for work and country.

He collapsed. It took a good three minutes for guards to take him to whatever hospital was closest.

"Perhaps Mao is wrong," he muttered to himself.

"I doubt it," responded the Chinese leader.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

He was over Mongolia; Santa Claus knew the stars here and was making his way down to Beijing. He didn't normally fly the sleighs much beyond Christmas Day; today was special.

It was lonely. Very lonely.

The wind came, and increased in magnitude, and the howling noise of the gushes of wind only made it worse.

Especially when the red paint on the white fighter made itself apparent.

He had not expected an aerial attack; he should have. He remembered what had brought him into the Second World War, being shot down over Manchester, and the brutality of combat.

He darted leftwards, still trying to maintain course to Beijing. The plane fired multiple missiles at him. He dodged and twirled around, the reindeer whimpering in fear.

He was hit. He bailed and pulled the ripcord he had embedded in his coat; he leapt out of the sleigh and fell to the surface.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Now look at what we have here!" exclaimed Moultrie, peering at the three elves tied to chairs. "Now I'm not the only elf to be tied to a chair in China!" he laughed.

"I don't get it, Moultrie," pleaded Jingeling, "what do these humans have to offer you that Claus did not?"

"Respect," he seethed, "value. Had you elves actually valued me you would have rescued me when I was at Yan'an," he spat. "But of course you have no idea what that is."

They were silent. "Who cares? The Party. China. Not you. Claus just assigned a new elf in my place. I was expendable. Replaceable. Not to these people."

"That's what happened to a lot of elves!" cried out Jingeling. "We thought you were another war dead!"

"To hell with that. You didn't see me die."

"Neither did we so many of those over Germany or Japan."

"Meaningless, meaningless." He gestured to the guards at the door. "Take them to the laogai. They won't ever leave."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"What does he mean by this?" raged Mao, to the assemble dignitaries of the Communist Party of China. "I thought he was loyal!"

There was an awkward silence in the hall atop Mount Lu. "Peng!" ranted Mao. "Peng dares defy the Party! I thought he was loyal in Korea! That, if anything, would have proven it!"

Moultrie sat in between Deng and Lin Biao, the latter clearly nervous and ill.

"In all likelihood," whispered Lin to Deng, over the comparatively diminutive Moultrie, "he might want to appoint me as the next Defense Minister." He shuddered.

"And why would you not wan such a prestigious position?" asked Moultrie.

"I am far too ill. I haven't the faintest idea what it may be but I simply could not handle the stress. He needs to pick someone else."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Moultrie had taken a liking to Lin Biao over the course of many meetings; sometimes they served on committees together. They bonded over tea and whatever else they had happened to eat when they met.

"What makes you so nervous?" asked Moultrie.

"I have been terribly ill since the end of the war," said Lin, nervously. "I cannot do this. I am not the man to do this at all."

"Do you have reservations about the position itself, or the politics of it, or what?" further enquired Moultrie. He really wanted to understand what was going through the mind of this general he had seen so much during the war, and now he seemed to be rejecting, not eagerly accepting, political power.

"I have suspicions that Mao is going too far," he admitted. "But in all honesty what can I do? Nothing. If I do object, I end up like Peng," he said morosely. "This is madness. I cannot truthfully say that this is what I anticipated when I was fighting for the Party against the Japanese and the Kuomintang."

"I hope that he relents," remarked Moultrie, somewhat stunned. Lin nodded in agreement.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

By 1966 Moultrie had risen up quite high in the ranks of the People's Republic; he was however kept secret from the people, as per his request. By then he had lost any loyalty to the North Pole and had committed fully to the cause of Communism in China. He did not want to be caught by a roaming elf scanning the airwaves, or even Santa Claus passing through on Christmas Eve.

He was now in his office in Beijing, having been promoted to several agricultural committees. He seemed as if h was practically Chinese born and raised, so influential he was, so knowledgeable in the culture.

Even if he had reservations about the Maoist program he kept that portrait of the paramount leader in his office. It was best to remain as if he were still loyal. Lin Biao was doing much the same, parroting Mao's words and being promoted for doing so, despite his private misgivings.

The door burst open, without the courtesy of a knock. There were several young men and women brandishing guns, pointing them all at him.

"You have been purged as a capitalist roader and for supporting the bourgeois plans of the traitor Deng Xiaoping," their leader said, in a Hebei accent.

"What? I did no such thing, and neither did Deng!" he said indignantly. "I am a proud Communist!"

"Shut your mouth!" said the leader. Two of the others rushed behind his chair and handcuffed him.

They dragged him off.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Lin Biao sat in his private quarters. If the Chairman were to figure out his own private opinions, he would have been sent away or shot.

He was acutely nervous. What the Chairman was doing to Deng, to Liu, and to the elf were simply beyond the pale. "He is destroying China," he winced.

And yet he would have to keep up the charade. He was ranked too highly to throw away his life in such a matter. The best he could do was remain quiet and strive for positive change.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The truck the brought him away in was cold and metallic. They hadn't the courtesy to provide him with reading materials. It seemed like several days; he fell asleep multiple times. They fed him at rest stops.

They unloaded him at a factory, by the looks of the signs in Xinjian County in Jiangxi. Why here, he couldn't say.

They sent him to work on massive assembly lines on iron beasts, the tractors that replaced the livestock of old.

He got odd looks from most of his coworkers. They were starving and mostly too tired for conversation. This was Mao's work, he thought to himself.

This was barbarism.

At least until he met one worker.

"Lao Deng?" he asked an older man.

"Moultrie!" he exclaimed. "I did not ever expect to see you again here!"

"I suppose this Revolution of theirs did not think this through," remarked the elf.

"Oh, I'm certain," said Deng.

"Lao Deng," said Moultrie, "I would like you to know that I stand with you until the end of this. You have done so much for me, and for your country, that I cannot help but admire you."

"Thank you, Moultrie," replied Deng, stoically.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The next four years were hard for Moultrie. He had to write a self-criticism by direction of Jiang Qing, Mao's wife, the leader of a gang of four Party higher ups that were fanatically devoted to the Chairman. To them, he was a deity.

He worked in that factory making tractors much as he had made toys during his time on the North Pole. The foreman barking orders was not like his own foreman elf, who would swap out for others periodically. Not unlike this one.

It was madness, he thought to himself, this "Cultural Revolution." What did those fanatics call him? "Capitalist Roader?" Ridiculous. He had spent so much time working on the theory, Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, and now Mao, that he could recite the Little Red Book from memory, or so he felt.

He deserved better than this.

"From each according to his ability!" called out the foreman, "and to each according to his need!" It was a bitter, mocking tone.

There were other party outcasts in this factory, as well as simple Jiangxi farmers who had come to work in the factories out of mandate and patriotism.

It had been several years after he had been thrown in this miserable factory. Now, he resolved, he had to leave. He had enough of the terrible food and condescending foremen.

It occurred to him that he had been one of said foremen on the North Pole. He swore to be no longer, or he told himself that, anyway.

A day ended, and most of the workers went to their homes not far from the factory. He did not see Lao Deng; the two of them had talked less and less, more so out of other obligations other than dislike. At one point he disappeared entirely. He hadn't returned.

He scampered out, making sure to avoid policemen or Red Guard, or that's what he thought those armed mobs were called.

He began walking northwards, hopefully towards Beijing. He was going there for one reason and one reason only. He knew that they might recognize him but he did not care. His only potential ally was Lin Biao, who would likely be in Beijing.

He walked the whole way. He scavenged plants and the occasional animal, keeping out of sight from the Chinese people in all totality. He went back to his War-era training to avoid the entire species. It came to him naturally.

After an eternity of walking, scavenging, and sleeping in bushes and ditches, he saw the industrial metropolis that was Beijing. He recognized the buildings and the general feel of the city. It felt like home, just about.

There was the occasional PLA man on the street, in full military uniform. He still had war training, and knocked one out in an alleyway. He took his uniform and his gun and went about the way to Tiananmen Square, where the offices were.

He entered one of them, nodding to any guard or PLA man he saw. He made his way through the meandering corridors to what he remembered as Lin's office. Lin's name was still on the door. He knocked.

Nothing. Lin was not there

He waited outside the door, waiting for him, or anyone else.

Some reasonably important looking person passed him by, someone he did not recognize. "Excuse me," he asked. "Do you know where Lin Biao is?"

"He's leaving for somewhere," responding this person, voice indicating a woman. The way the hair was clipped made it a little hard to tell; he had a hard time differentiating between the two human genders at times. "He's on a plane."

"Very well, then, thank you," he said, and walked away.

His only support, gone, to return when nobody knew. He wandered through the building, through Tiananmen, even, and thought about how he was to be inevitably purged. He began to regret.

No. He couldn't be. The Chinese had treated him better than anyone on the North Pole.

He was just sorrowful.

Now he just wandered, listening in on conversations. Mostly Party business, some personal matters, some other things. It was helpless.

"So are we certain about Lin?" asked one voice in a window. Moultrie paused.

"He is going to the Soviet Union. I have said this multiple times." The other voice was downright incensed.

"And you are sure he is to die?"

"Yes. He is a capitalist roader now."

This petrified him. He begun panicking but silently. What could he do? How could he save his only chance at salvation?

He looked at his coat. Military insignia. Maybe this could sneak into an army base. He knew the city like the back of his hand; he darted for a long time to find the nearest one.

He looked into the eyes of the guards. They let him in, recognizing a PLA uniform.

He scanned around for the way to an airfield, and found the landing strip. There were fighter planes in a row; he scrambled into one and attempted to figure out how it would take off.

He tinkered with it for a long time; he got out and rummaged for anything that could help. A manual, sure, but he couldn't understand the technical terminology.

He darted back into the cockpit with the manual in hand just in case. He flipped several switches. The plane lurched forward. He turned the steering wheel (or what served the purpose of a steering wheel; he had no idea what most of this stuff was called). He flicked with levers and glided down the runway.

The plane took off. He was relieved. He oriented himself northwards to find the plane with Lin in it.

He was over Mongolia. Nothing in site.

Eventually there was one plane, seemingly sputtering. He brought his own plane into view of the seats.

There he was. Lin Biao.

He fiddled with the radio, calling out "Lao Lin! Lao Lin! This is Moultrie Mistletoe! The Party is trying to assassinate you!"

Lin looked out at him perplexedly. There was nothing. They weren't picking up his radio signals.

"Lao Lin!" he cried out.

The plane sputtered again, and then lurched forward. The looks of the men and one woman on the plane were those of horror.

The plane fell to the ground, the sabotage consigning them to death.

Tears welled up in Moultrie's eyes. "No, you won't cry. Don't let them have that victory."

He turned the plane around and saw the explosion through the corner of his eye.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Moultrie was now getting used to long waits that lasted years; that was what happened after the war, that was what happened in the factory in Jiangxi, and that is what was happening here.

He was left stranded in forested mountains, once more scavenging for whatever he could find. Judging by when the plane ran out of fuel, he was somewhere in Hebei or Inner Mongolia. He waited a long time, eating what he could find.

Some ends of the year he saw Santa Claus flying over him en route to Hohhot or Shijiazhuang or even Beijing. He would look up at Rudolph's shining red nose, a red orb among the heavenly white spheres that were the glittering stars. He waited and hoped for better.

One day, after so long he forgot, he was awoken by some PLA men, looking down onto him and demanding he wake up. "Moultrie!" they cried out, shaking him.

"Who are you, and how do you know my name?" He expected the worst.

"I recognize you, and the Chairman of the Central Advisory Commission has been on the lookout for you for years now," said their white-bearded leader.

"Who are you, and who is the Chairman?" he asked worriedly. He was afraid it was some rabid member of the Gang of Four. At least, he said 'chairman,' so it wasn't Jiang Qing.

"My name is Fu Tengfei," said the old soldier, "and the Chairman is Deng Xiaoping."

Moultrie was shocked. "How? How did Deng get that high up?"

"He's a good politician, let us say," said Fu, smiling. "He wants you back in Beijing."

Once more, he rode a truck a long way, but not as long as he thought. He had good food and many books. "You were in the forests around Langyashan Mountain," said Fu, sitting next to him. "So close to Beijing; we were looking for you around Hohhot and Baotou at first."

"Well then my training succeeded," responded Moultrie.

In Beijing he was washed and given a new suit. It felt nice having clean clothing again. "The Chairman would like to see you immediately." They drove the elf to the Chairman's office.

"Lao Deng?" he asked, knocking on the door.

"Ah, yes, Xiao Moultrie!" said Deng, standing to greet him. "Welcome back to civilization! Why were you away?" he asked, eager to know more.

"Lin Biao. He didn't deserve that death. I was trying to save him."

Deng was quiet. "Don't tell a soul that you did that," he said with an air of urgency. "Even now, they don't like him."

Moultrie nodded. "I was afraid of that much. Is the Gang of Four in charge now?"

"Oh, no, certainly not. Indeed, there is something I want to show you about them." He began leaving. "Come with me," he said, rather briskly.

The two of them entered a car and were driven off. They entered the ornate building and walked into a large courtroom. They waited, and into the room were escorted three men and one woman.

"The Gang of Four," said Moultrie. "So are the being tried?"

"Treasonous," he said. "Tried to continue the madness of the Cultural Revolution."

He was kept out of site; the cameras never went to him, and he was made to sit far from Deng. There was a lot of yelling and a lot of agony.

"I was Chairman Mao's bitch. I bit whomever he asked me to bite," snarled Jiang, infuriated with the entire committee. She hurled insults at them, saying that they did not follow her deceased husband's will to every character.

Moultrie had no objection whatsoever to not following Mao.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Santa Claus took the pistol and the shotgun he had stowed in the sleigh out and began to scan his surroundings. He was in a lot, an urban area. He figured this was Beijing; looking at signs around the city, he believed that this was the case.

There was business everywhere, bustling and cutthroat. This didn't look like Communism, didn't look like Maoism at all. It look like pure, unadulterated capitalism.

He had familiarized himself with the Beijing city layout; looking at landmarks and street names, he was able to keep out of site and navigate to Tiananmen Square. He continued clutching the rifle.

Now, he saw the portrait of Mao on the Forbidden Palace looking stoically into the distance, as if he disapproved of something, probably capitalism. Now, it was domestic, rather than foreign, capitalism, or so it seemed. It would be only appropriate.

They said that they were not far from Tiananmen when they last talked to him. He wandered, looking for something, anything, that could help him.

He realized that he hadn't much of a plan.

He could hear the cars going, the soft lull of the engines heard in the distance.

As he wandered they got louder.

"Halt!" called out a voice in Chinese. Claus clenched his gun.

There were several tracked armored personnel carriers moving towards him; they were prepared.

"We have you surrounded! Don't try anything!" called out a voice on speaker.

Claus was outnumbered. He could tell. Doing anything else would be suicide.

He dropped his weapons and put his hands up.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Santa Claus was hauled off to a prison, he would guess in Hebei, where he was escorted handcuffed by two PLA men. It was cold, but his warm red and white fur coat protected him. The concrete floors and walls left him feeling downright chilled.

The guards paid his shivers no heed. They took the cold in stride.

"Claus!" cried out a voice in elvish. He jolted his head leftwards. The guards forced him back into position, but he saw for a brief moment three adjacent cells, holding Jingeling, Watley, and Hornby.

"I tried. I really did. They outnumbered me."

"I understand, Mr. Claus," said Jingeling resignedly. Hornby and Watley nodded in exasperated agreement.

The guards locked him in another cell a long way down the hall from them. He would wait there for a long time.

Days passed. He could see the dimmest specks of the three elves he had sent before, sitting there hoping for release. He had failed them.

He had failed the North Pole. He had failed Christmas.

He forced himself to sleep, to forget about all the regret, all the failure.

It was peaceful, the void, not having to think about anything. It was something that he cherished.

"Mr. Claus! Mr. Claus! Wake up!" yelled a taunting voice. He noted that it was in elvish.

He forced his eyes open, and saw through the bars an elf, of the kind you saw on the North Pole, but in a Mao suit with badges on it. "It's been a long time since you've laid your eyes on me," he spat, glaring at Claus with familiar eyes.

"Moultrie!" exclaimed Claus. "I don't know where to begin."

"Okay, I'll start us off," said Moultrie. "I'll have you know that you left me here. You forgot about me."

"I kept you in my thoughts, and hoped to whatever runs this universe that you were safe!" responded Claus.

"Well then why the hell did you not send a search party?" asked the member of the Communist Party. "Why did that never occur to you?"

"It did," said Claus, his voice declining in tone.

"So, you didn't forget," spat Moultrie, "you deliberately chose to leave me here. Once again, I beseech you, why?"

"Because I thought that doing so could create an international incident and perhaps start a war!"

"Bullshit," spat Moultrie once more, the spit landing on Claus' coat. "You were in contact with Chiang this whole time; I followed the local war coverage. You had every chance to take me back during the World War and the Civil War," he said, glaring at the high elf.

"Well then let us out and let me take you back!" roared Claus, jolting up and clutching the bars. "We can save you!"

"I don't need saving. The working class needs saving, not me, not you. And besides, I helped make a better China, free from Maoist excess. I am important here, make no mistake!"

"Why do you participate in such an evil regime? Why did you stand doing nothing while the Cultural Revolution ravaged the country?"

"I did! I treated my workers well! I tried to shield them from this monstrosity, not exacerbate it!"

"But you didn't do enough. Had you done more, this tragedy would not have happened. You were complacent, I can tell. And you let this country remain unfree and undemocratic!"

"And you were complacent in the firebombings of Dresden, the Japanese Internment, the Bengal Famines, the nuclear bombs!" he seethed, "in addition to every evil committed by the United States and Soviet Union
since! And this is a free country with People's Democracy, not like your bourgeois control of the state!"

"I've done what I could," said Santa, resignedly, sitting back down. "But I did something."

"To hell with you," scoffed Moultrie. "To hell with you!"

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

It was April now. The other elves had been in prison for months. They faded gradually out of Moultrie's mind, or the three of those that weren't Claus.

Those words, "but I did something," would not go away. It worried him. Was he too lax? Did he not stand up enough to Mao? And was Deng any better?

He remembered the starving workers. He remembered seeing Jiang Qing on trial. "I am justified," he said, trying to affirm himself.

"Lao Mistletoe," said an aid walking into the room. He looked at her. "Yes?"

"A message from Hu Yaobang."

That capitalist roader, he thought to himself. He took the paper from her and looked over it.

"Lao Mistletoe," said the message, "I have pleaded with everyone else and they will not listen. You are my last hope to Deng Xiaoping; he knows you, he saved you from the factory and the forest, and now he is your friend. You need to tell him that Wei Jingsheng is right. This country needs to democratize, and now. Remaining in the Maoist form will only slow Chinese modernization. We need full political and social rights for the Chinese people. You need to listen to them. You need to listen to Zhao Ziyang. You need to persuade Deng to relent. "

Moultrie breathed in. "Can I see him?" he asked the aide.

"My apologies, but he had a heart attack at a meeting and died in the hospital. He's dead."

The world seemed empty. "Very well," he said blankly, "that will be all."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The death of Hu Yaobang had left Moultrie deeply unsettled. Was he right? Should he tell Deng about Hu's letter?

Was what Santa Claus had said right? Was Deng any better than Mao? He remembered on the North Pole he was more or less free to do as he wished. Not so here; everything was kept in rigid step with the Party. He didn't inherently object to that. But he had seen and ordered his fair share of arrests.

As the day went on, there was more and more commotion outside his office window. Initially he ignored it. Why would he pay it heed? He had work to do, helping design the new economic policies, perhaps designate more special economic zones. He was particularly concerned with the toy factories; Deng had given him that responsibility. "We need to take down Santa Claus as a source of the world's toys, and make China the supreme," said Deng to him privately.

But the commotion became more and more profound. It annoyed him greatly. He looked outside his window.

Young people of both genders were filling Tiananmen Square. Listening to those uncomfortably loud chants, he could tell that their accents were not solely of the Beijing dialect. They were coming from all over China.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Do you think this rabble will ever amount to anything?" asked Moultrie, to Li Peng, the Premier.

"I doubt it. They are just disillusioned. Once they here some kind words from the Communist Party they'll return to their studies," he remarked, nonchalantly. "And the capitalist roaders among them will be sent to the laogai, as we always do."

It made Moultrie shudder. "Very well, Premier." But it was not well. Those words from Claus, "but you didn't do enough." He thought of the West, keeping Africa and Latin America down, decadent and corrupt. He thought of the Soviet Union, now hardly united. China was still in the right, he thought.

It was well.

Zhao Ziyang, an ally of Hu's, was giving his speech in memory of Hu Yaobang, who was lying in state. The East End of the palace was blocked off to prevent protestors from getting in.

"But, Premier," he whispered, "should we not be letting them in? After all, they are mourning the death of a Party member. It's patriotic."

"They are capitalist roaders. They do not need entrance; they are insincere."

"Their demands are completely compliant with what Hu was advocating," responded the elf.

"Nonsense. Capitalist roaders, all of them."

He could hear a commotion outside. There was the urge to check, to do something.

No.

China was on the right path. The Party was always right. Deng was always right.

As Zhao spoke, Moultrie dared look at the East Gate. Even blocked off, there were three students kneeling. A guard went to address them.

"We want to see Premier Li Peng," one of them said. They proffered a petition. They were ignored and not let in.


. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The days passed. The students did not leave. Their incessant activity, their chanting, their speechifying, their singing deeply irritated. They were calling for democracy and freedom. America had those things. Why didn't they go there so they could be slaves to the capitalists? They were capitalist roaders, after all.

Weren't they?

"You were complacent, I can tell." The words would not go away.

Should he support Zhao?

No. Zhao was a capitalist roader.

He had with him a copy of the People's Daily. On its front page was emblazoned a large headline:

"It is necessary to take a clear-cut stand against disturbances."

He read it, expecting Party talking points and getting Party talking points. Anti-establishment. Anti-Party. Anti-Communist. The usual.

And he could still hear the protestors, and Claus' words.

He called up Deng. "Lao Deng," he asked, "are you going to do anything about these protestors?"

"We will not budge," was the terse reply.


. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Lao Mistletoe," said his aid, "as you had requested to be informed, Zhao Ziyang has returned from North Korea."

Moultrie sighed. This was only going to get worse.

"And, sir," said the aid, "you are expected at a plenum in the Great Hall of the People."

He sighed even more. "Very well."

Without saying much else he left his office and entered the square. It was still packed with students. A lot of them had left, but there were still hundreds if not thousands.

"Excuse me, sir?" asked a student as he was making his way to the Congress.

He tensed. Humans who were not officials were not supposed to see him.

"Yes?" he responded laconically.

"I can tell by your uniform you are important. Not many young people wear the Mao suit."

He sighed. "I suppose you are correct. What do you want?"

"If you can, tell Deng Xiaoping or Li Peng or Chen Yun or any of the other eight elders to consider us. We do this for the good of China. We do this for the good of Communism. Democracy is necessary for an advanced country, just as much as the four modernizations that Deng has said. Please, tell them to reconsider."

Moultrie was stunned. He could do something, on this student's advice. Claus' words echoed in his mind again, "You were complacent. I could tell." Would he be complacent?

No. Complacency in goodness does not deserve that name.

Or did it?

The ideological war in his head was raging. "I will see what I can do," he said to this young woman.

"Thank you," she said, nodding and then departing.

He wondered why she didn't notice how he wasn't human. Probably didn't want to come off as antagonistic, and telling by his suit he was important, did not want to ruin a potential chance at influence.

He entered the large hall in the Congress, where all the various higher ups were meeting. There, Zhao Ziyang was giving an impassioned speech.

"After the Cultural Revolution, the people are losing faith in us. With these economic reforms, we look like hypocrites. We need to give the people faith in the Party and in the Republic!" Zhao insisted, passion flowing into his words.

He exhaled. "Would anyone else like to speak?" he said.

Moultrie once more tensed. Would he be complacent?

He rose. "I agree with General Secretary Zhao," he said, and sat down.

He had enough. He was too complacent, having overseen accidental deaths in his factory, and political repression. Zhao's words were stirring, but Claus' were too.

The hardliners, like Chen, Deng, and Li looked at him. "And of course, the foreign-born one of us is a capitalist roader."

"He speaks the truth," said Wen Jiabao, unrelated to Li Peng. "We need to restore the people's faith in us."

"We are in charge, they will obey us no matter what!" snapped Li Peng.

This yelling went on and on. The meeting adjourned; Moultrie didn't say anything.

He rushed to Zhao. "General Secretary Zhao?" he asked.

"Yes?"

"I would just like to say that your speech swayed me. I'm on the side of liberalization now. I stand with you."

He did not mention, however, that Claus was still in chains, and had pushed him that way.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The protests had gone on for weeks. There were hunger strikes. There were negotiations with the students that were going nowhere.

Here he was, walking to Tiananmen Square where the protestors were with Zhao Ziyang and Wen Jiabao. Here, Zhao would defy the party hardliners and Deng, and pressure them to liberalize.

It felt odd to him, and somewhat sad, but also vindicating. He had a purpose. He was no longer being complacent.

But he was also betraying the man that had given him a place in the Communist Party of China. Now, he was in charge and would likely jail him if he found out.

And he would find out.

"Thank you for coming," Zhao said to Wen and Moultrie.

"It is an honor," they both responded.

They assumed their position at the front of Tiananmen Square at the entrance to the Forbidden Palace.

The rabble stopped and listened, seeing the important persons assembled in front of them. Zhao was one of the few people that they liked among the Party. They were eager to listen.

He began his speech, somewhat trembling:

"Students, we came too late. We are sorry. You talk about us, criticize us, it is all necessary. The reason that I came here is not to ask for your forgiveness. What I want to say is that you are all getting weak, it has been seven days since you went on a hunger strike, you can't continue like this. As time goes on, your body will be damaged beyond repair, it could be very life-threatening. Now the most important thing is to end this strike. I know, your hunger strike is to hope that the Party and the government will give you a satisfying answer. I feel that our communication is open. Some of these problems can only be solved through certain procedures. For example, you have mentioned about the nature of the incident, the question of responsibility; I feel that those problems can be resolved eventually, we can reach a mutual agreement in the end. However, you should also know that the situation is very complicated, it is going to be a long process. You can't continue the hunger strike longer than seven days, and still insist on receiving a satisfying answer before ending the hunger strike.

You are still young, we are old, you must live healthy, and see the day when China accomplishes the four modernizations. You are not like us, we are already old, so we do not matter. It is not easy for this nation and your parents to support your college studies. Now you are all about 20, and about to sacrifice your lives so easily, students, couldn't you think rationally? Now the situation is very serious, you all know, the Party and the nation is very antsy, our society is very worried. Besides, Beijing is the capital, the situation is getting worse and worse everywhere, this cannot continue. Students, you all have good will, and are for the good of our nation, but if this situation continues, loses control, it will have serious consequences elsewhere.

In conclusion, I have only one wish. If you stop hunger strike, the government won't close the door for dialogue, never! The questions that you have raised, we can continue to discuss. Although it is a little slow, but we are reaching some agreement on some problems. Today I just want to see the students, and express our feelings. I hope students could think about this issues calmly. This thing can not be sorted out clearly under illogical situations. You all have that strength, you are young after all. We were also young before, we protested, laid our bodies on the rail tracks, we never thought about what will happen in the future at that time. Finally, I beg the students once again, think about the future calmly. There are many things that can be solved. I hope that you will all end the hunger strike soon, thank you."

The crowd erupted into cheers; some cried. Zhao remained stoic. Wen was smiling, so was Moultrie.

It was then Moultrie knew what he needed to do.

He ran back to his office and summoned an aid.

"Please, tell the prison guards to release Santa Claus and the others."

"Very well," said the aid. "Why?"

"They have been found innocent."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Santa Claus had become accustomed to living in a musty cell, content to never give happiness to the world’s children ever again. He could barely see Jingeling and Hornby and Watley in their other cells.

He had failed. Had he resisted, he would have been able to get them out of here. But he didn’t. He was weak.

He sat down after standing up from the angry delirium. He was getting too angry. He breathed heavily. He shouldn’t entertain such thoughts.

*click*

There was a guard at the cell door, opening the lock.

Claus looked at him incredulously.

“You have been released on Comrade Mistletoe’s orders,” he said laconically.

“So I’m free to go?” asked Claus, still not believing it.

“Yes,” said the guard, and walked away.

The first thing Claus did was to rush to the cells of the other elves. They were all freed as well.

“Jingeling!” exclaimed Claus. “Moultrie has had a change of heart!”

“That’s what we heard,” he said. “Now how do we get out of here?”

“Let’s find out,” responded Claus.

They scoured the prison. Soon enough, an alarm sounded. “I’m guessing this wasn’t with the consent of the Party,” quipped Hornby.

They some guards wander through an intersection of corridors perpendicularly from their path. Jingeling, Hornby, and Watley charged at them, knocking them out, and taking their weapons, three rifles.

“Let’s go. Claus, stay behind us.”

He did. They gallivanted throughout the complex, shooting at any guards that came near. Claus didn’t like it. He was supposed to be peaceful.

The last big war had gotten rid of that notion, however.
They went through each door, trying to find an exit. There was one room, however, with a radio.

“Let me at it!” commanded Claus. “I can contact the North Pole.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Cornelius Candycane was deeply worried. Claus had not called back in months, and he was doing the entire administration of the North Pole during his absence. It was exhausting, six hours of sleep or less on a daily basis for months at a time.

“Claus, please come back. I don’t give a damn if Moultrie is a turncoat, but we need you,” he said to himself, knowing that he couldn’t hear.

The radio in the room emitted a noise. Candycane scrambled to answer. “Hello?” he said.

“Candycane!” said the familiar voice. “This is Santa Claus!”

“Claus! What a pleasure t hear from you!”

“I’m trapped with the others, except Moultrie, in a Beijing prison. I need you to bust me out.” He gave Candycane a list of what locational information he knew. He had paid attention to the route the APCs had taken.

“Bellringer!” called out Candycane to the Defense Minister. “Get over here!”

In came rushing Claudius Bellringer. “What?”

“Claus has been found and he’s in a Beijing prison. We need to bust him out!”

“How?” he asked.

“I don’t know, you’re the military elf!” responded Candycane.

Bellringer calmed himself. “I’m assuming you don’t want us to bomb the entire city to smithereens?”

“Don’t give the Americans or the Russians any ideas,” responded Claus from the radio.

Bellringer sighed. “Very well,” he said. “you need to hold out there for more than a week. We need to get the munitions factories ready again. After that, we’ll break open the facility. You will then go to Tiananmen Square and blend in with the protesters, where we will send a rescue team.”

“Thank you,” said Claus. “I’m ending this transmission. We don’t want the Party listening in on us.”

“Godspeed,” said Candycane. Bellringer nodded his assent.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

“A week? More?” asked Jingeling. “Preposterous!”

“But it’s what we’ll have to do,” responded Claus, morosely.

Jingeling inhaled heavily. “Hornby, Watley, get whatever weapons you can. Kill whatever guards you find and take theirs, and hole up here.”

He turned to Claus. “I hope you know what you’re asking of us.”

He clenched his weapon and ran off. There was gunfire in the distance.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Moultrie couldn’t take it anymore. He had come to the realization that he had been serving a regime that was less than moral. Granted, the same could be said of the United States or the Soviet Union. But still. He couldn’t take it.

After giving the order to release Claus and the others, he left his office and went onto the mass of students at the square.

He found some important looking ones conferring together. “Are you their leaders?” he asked, not sure what to say.

“We are their council,” one of them said. “I can assume you are with the Party?”

He tensed. He ripped off his badges and threw off cap. “Not anymore. I can’t support them. Too much death, too much lying. I stand with you now.”

They nodded. He made his way into the crowd.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

*BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!*

“What the hell was that?” asked Hornby. The ground beneath them shook.

They were starving, eating whatever they could find in the prison. The soldiers kept coming, and they kept on being beaten by the commando elves that they had the misfortune of taking on.

They looked through a window. The fortified barrier to the prison, which had been guarded beyond any point that the elves could break, was now blown open. To the sky, a sleigh was flying away.

And then it was hit by fighter planes, falling limp to the ground.

“Let’s go!” exclaimed Jingeling.

“We have no time to waste,” replied Claus.

Jingeling threw him a rifle. “Much obliged,” responded Saint Nicholas.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

“To hell with them!” screamed Li Peng. “To hell with them!”

Deng Xiaoping too was furious. Qiao Shi and Yao Yilin were not pleased with the news either.

“They have broken out of prison, and with the help of that capitalist roader Mistletoe,” spat Li.

Chen Xitong, Mayor of Beijing, spoke up. “If you would allow me to speak, Chairman Deng, (who nodded), I would say that now is the time to use any means to remove capitalist roader students from the square.”

“Do it,” spat Li, “and have those elves dead.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Claus and the the others scrambled through the city to Tiananmen Square. They could see the commotion, and tried to remain out of site.

“When the hell are they coming?” asked Hornby.

“I don’t know, but we wait. Keep armed.”

“It’s not like they’re going to send the army, are they?”

“Who knows?” asked Jingeling.

The crowd surrounded them, running this way and that. They were hardly important to the mob.

They waited, hoping that this chaos would end and they would be saved. The havoc became punctuated with a slight popping, which became louder and louder, along with a deep growling in the distance.

Gunfire.

Soldiers were coming in onto the square, and were firing live.

Behind them were the tanks.

“No,” Santa whispered.

It was turning into a riot. There were stones thrown, and the occasional molotov cocktail. Obscenities were everywhere.

It was chaos.

“We need to get out of here,” said Jingeling.

“But the sleigh!” called Claus.

Jingeling sighed once more. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

The gunfire escalated. “Keep out of it and just wait!” ordered Claus.

“And yet you were the one to slam Moultrie for complacency,” responded Hornby, aiming his gun at one of the PLA troops.

He fired. So did Watley.

Looking at his comrades, Jingeling did the same, taking down a soldier atop a tank. They kept on firing.

Claus was dumbfounded. This was evil going on; if he told Moultrie he was being complacent, he had better not do the same.

He hated violence.

But he also hated slaughter.

He cocked his rifle and fired.

The gunshots seemed to be the protesters’ only support as they were mowed down by the PLA guns. The tanks lurched closer and closer, packing the protesters in even more.

There was a gust of wind from the sky. They looked up, and saw the sleigh with wailing sirens, yelling at the protesters to clear the way in their own language.

“It’s here!” called Watley.

“Get on! There is nothing more that we can do!” called Claus.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .


There they were. Santa Claus and the others. “Claus!” called out Moultrie. “Mr. Jingeling!”

He ran through the crowds, pushing several students out of the way. “It’s me, Moultrie!” he cried out.

They turned as they boarded the sleigh, which had its own weapons blazing. He sprinted to them, trying to make himself seen. “I’ve turned! You were right, Claus, you were right! I was wrong! I’m coming back with you!”

Claus tried to say something, but Moultrie couldn’t hear. He gestured to the former rogue, calling him on.

He ran and ran.

He heard a horrendous, guttural roar from behind. He jolted his head behind him.

One of the tanks was charging, machine guns blazing, right in Moultrie’s direction.

He ran. He sprinted to make it.

He ever so wanted to return to the North Pole, to familiar frigid wastes that were nevertheless his former home.

He wanted to make it.

He didn’t make it.