Note from Dr. ████████, dated 12/26/04:
Who the hell thought it would be a good idea to tell her about "Santa Claus" and then tell her that it was just a story?! Now we have another potential SCP to deal with, but we can't catch him because he is "magic".
- excerpt from SCP-239
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1
A thin naked old man stood in awe outside an inconspicuous farmhouse in the rural outskirts of Chicago. An inhuman grin stretched across his face as he admired the twinkling Christmas lights that the inhabitants had strung up around their home. Tonight, the Yule Man has come to bring Christmas to the good little boys and girls.
Dragging his sack full of putrid goodies behind him, the Yule Man trudged through the snow towards the house. He scaled up the walls, peeking through the windows at its sleeping inhabitants before making his way up to the chimney. Squeezing himself down the flue, the Yule Man effortlessly emerged from the fireplace – his limbs outstretched and crawling like a spider.
The room around him illuminated by the warm glow of the Christmas tree that stood in the corner. Stockings hung along the fireplace mantle under framed photographs of a loving family. In front of him on a small round table were a plate of cookies and a drink accompanied by a note that read 'for Santa' in bright red crayon.
The Yule Man, placed his sack down on the floor and inspected the offering on the table. He was a creature of ritual and tradition; he could not turn down such a generous gift. He devoured the plate of gingerbread men and reached for the glass to wash it down. He inspected the creamy brown liquid first, recognizing the scent of coffee and whiskey to be that of Irish cream. An uncommon choice, but not unwelcomed.
However, it wasn’t long after gulping it down did he started to feel sick. Something about that cream liqueur didn’t agree with him. He hadn’t sensed any substances in it that could have caused this sort of reaction.
“Do you like the gift we left for you?” an unseen voice asked. Before the Yule Man could turn to see who was speaking, he buckled over and began vomiting what seemed like buckets of Irish cream.
“The Foundation and I threw together a little something special for you this Christmas. Bailey’s Irish Cream, poured from the veins of a drunk in a Santa costume.”
The Yule Man, now on his hands and knees, writhed in pain as he felt his blood, saliva, bile, sweat, and even the vitreous humor in his eyes begin to transmute into Irish cream.
“I told you to stay out of the Chicago area, Yule Man.”
Before his vision became clouded, he finally managed to spot the source of the voice - a small surveillance camera and speaker hidden within the Christmas Tree.
“Kids here already have a St. Nick.”
He struggled as he slowly lifted his body up off the floor, Irish cream dripping from his orifices as he did. His face was twisted into an expression of unbridled rage. The Yule Man staggered towards the device that was speaking to him, reaching out his long spindly arm and pulling it off its fixture. He stared into the camera, scowling.
“NAUGHTY.”
He crushed the device in his hands, letting the pieces fall to the floor.
In a bunker beneath a defunct military base, an old military computer bank stares back at the now static screen reading 'SIGNAL LOST'. Sgt. Nick – or St. Nick as he’d come to be know – had orchestrated the entire operation with the help of the Foundation. Being nothing more than a literal ghost in a machine, there was little he could do physically about this monster.
Every year they would set a trap using an old Chicago Spirit safehouse with sleeping D-Class inside in the hopes of catching the Yule Man should he ever set foot anywhere near his city. Nick made a promise long ago that he'd look after Chicago and he wasn't going to let that monster lay a finger on a single child.
“Do you think it worked? Is that monster dead?” He asked.
Alexandra, an artificial intelligence conscript from the Foundation who had been watching alongside him, furrowed her virtual brow.
“I'm not sure…I think we only managed to piss it off.”
"Hm. Initiate phase two."
2
Stan Clane was making his rounds around the world delivering Christmas gifts to all those who celebrated the holiday – a number that was substantially grown over the years as the population expanded and the holiday became more and more secular.
Every day was Christmas for him. Literally. It was part of his sentence – to go back in time and play the role of Santa Claus. Using time-travel paratechnology, he could stretch the night out for as long as he needed to make his deliveries, making it appear like he was in hundreds of places at once. And once he was done, he would jump forward in time and do it all again for the following year.
For how long would he have to serve this sentence? Hopefully by the time he got back to his native time period he would be free, or until whatever bootstrap paradox he's got himself stuck in is finally fulfilled. He wasn't even sure what the current year was, but he knew it was at least somewhere in the early twenty-first century now.
After delivering to few million or so houses that night, he eventually made it to one in particular with a peculiar design. In hindsight, he should have been suspicious of the building in question - it had no chimney and only had one entrance. The lack of chimney was no issue, plenty of homes around the world didn't have one. Stan would simply make his way through another way. There were always other ways in. But this place only had one singular door serving as the home's only entrance and exit - an obvious health and safety violation. But alas, he shrugged it off. He had a job to do, and so he entered through the door and made his way to the Christmas Tree.
However, when went to open his sack to retrieve whatever gift was meant to be delivered here, all it produced was a small rectangular object and a note addressed to him. The note instructed him to unwrap the gift and slide it into the nameplate mount near the front door. He was perplexed by the bizarre instructions. Doing as it said, he made his way to a desk next to the front door where a nameplate mount sat alongside a plate of milk and cookies. He unwrapped the small rectangular gift and pulled out a plastic nameplate that read "Thaddeus Xyank, Ph.D / Chairperson: Temporal Anomalies Dept." Stan slid it into the mount and, satisfied with his work, grabbed a cookie and opened the door to leave.
Except, the door no longer opened to outside. Instead it lead into what looked like some sort of office. Sitting at the desk inside was a mustachioed gentleman reading over a folder of documents. Stan jumped back in surprise of the impossible sight that stood before him.
"Ah! Mr. Clane! About time!" Closing the folder, the man got up from the desk and made his way towards the door to greet Stan.
“Forgive me," the mustachioed gentleman asked, "might I borrow you for a moment?”
“Who are you? How do you know my name?” Stan said, shocked.
“My name’s Dr. Xyank. I’m from the SCP Foundation.” He explained, adjusting his glasses on his nose.
“You SCP guys again? Nuh-huh, I don’t want any more to do with you lot! You’re the whole reason I’m in this mess!”
“How would you like to get out of it then?" Dr. Xyank asked. This caused Stan to stop and pause for a moment before turning back to the face the man standing in the doorway.
"An early release. My department has been talking with the folks over at the Department of Chronology and we managed to work something out for you."
"You know the Department of Chronology?"
"Yes. They're a part of the Foundation too. At least, will be when they form in seventy years. My department deals with temporal anomalies - and is a bit of a temporal anomaly itself as a result."
"This all sounds too good to be true." Stan scoffed, "What's the catch?"
"There's something we need you to do for us." Dr. Xyank gestured toward the doorway he was standing in. "Please, come take a seat and I'll go over the details."
Stan thought about it for a moment before ultimately following Dr. Xyank into his office.
3
Santa Claus, or 'Der Weihnachtsmann' as the locals called him, was a narcissistic and misanthropic deity who resented his existence. He truly hated his job. It was tiring and no one ever appreciated his gifts. Sure, he often monkey-pawed them, but that's besides the fact. He would quit if he could, but his anomalous properties wouldn't let him. It wouldn't even let him take his costume off. He used to be so much more than what he was today - a personification of the winter. But over time he was changed as the beliefs from which he sprang shifted in the Noosphere. He hated to admit it, but he was scarcely a god at all any more.
"Ungrateful little snots." He thought to himself as he sat reading the letters that materialized around him.
Every year during the holiday season, millions of letters addressed to Santa begin manifesting in his vicinity, which in recent years has been in a standard humanoid containment cell at a Foundation site in Germany. Although tedious and exhausting, going through them all in time for Christmas was no problem. His anomalous properties made time. The world slowed down around him as he read through them, writing down who's been naughty and nice, along with their addresses - most importantly - their Christmas Wishes.
Finally, Christmas Eve came. The letters all read, his list all set, it was time for the Holly Night Event to begin. During this time, no cell could hold him and no MTF could stop him. Weihnachtsmann got up, tucking his scroll and fountain pen away in his coat, and proceeded to walk through the walls of his containment cell and down the halls of the site. There was nothing the mobile task force assigned to him could do to impede him. They could only track his movement and re-contain him after he had made his rounds. Walking out the facility and into an open snow-clad space, a reindeer-drawn sleigh appeared before him. As he approached the sleigh, a single letter suddenly materialized on its leather seat. He furrowed his brow and groaned.
"God damn it! Really?" He cursed.
Rolling his eyes, Weihnachtsmann snatched up the envelope and opened it. After a few moments, his annoyance faded. He paused as he briefly stared off into space, thinking about what he had just read. He folded up the letter and stuffed it into his jacket before climbing into his sleigh.
He found himself smiling for the first time in a long time. For once, he was the one getting a Christmas Wish.
The Foundation were no doubt panicking when they had lost track of him over Massachusetts. Given the true nature of the state, there shouldn't have been any stops for him to make anyway. However, this year there was.
Within the miserable city of Boston was a pocket dimension known as Wonder World!™ - a daliesque city under a sunless purple sky that served as the base of operations for the anomalous toymaker Dr. Wondertainment. Flying over the ridiculous suessian streets and infrastructure of the city, Weihnachtsmann soon arrived at the roof of Wonder Tower - a garish purple spire that dominated the skyline. He was unimpressed by it all and found the whole place insufferable.
Making his way down the what looked like a makeshift chimney clearly made for him, he entered the office of Holly Light. He was greeted by an oversized Christmas Tree that bent at the ceiling. Strewn across her ornate wooden desk and overlooking the whole of Wonder World!™ laid Holly Light herself.
"Santy Claus!" She giggled, kicking her feet in the air before leaping off her desk, "I've been awfully good this year! Did you bring me a present?”
"I've come for mine." he said, crossing his arms, "But I'm curious why you want it so bad. It's a miserable job."
"Wondertainment Enterprises has been looking to expand into the holiday market for a while now." she explained, "We've been competing with a market full of second-rate Santas - no offense."
Weihnachtsmann was offended. He grumphed at the notion of being called 'second rate'.
"Now don't be like that, you're a fine Santa! The real deal! I simply want to relieve you of your burden! To reward you for all your fine work! You could retire to someplace fit for a god other than a cramp little containment cell."
He liked the sound of that, to be honest. He opened up his bag and produced a handful of glittering dust.
"Fine. Let's do this."
Throwing the dust to the floor, the two of them were quickly enveloped by a golden cloud. In that moment, Wonder Tower shook - tremors could be felt rippling across all of Wonder World!™. Judy Papill, Holly's assistant, came storming into the office to see what had happened.
"Ma'am? Holly? Are you alright?"
As the glittery cloud of dust cleared, Judy found Holly seated in her chair behind her desk wearing a lavish red Santa suit and a great big smile across her face. There was no trace of her visitor anywhere in her office.
"I'm absolutely jolly."
| Santa Claus Procedures - Part 1 | Santa Claus Procedures - Part 2 »
