Great Ak, am I frosted!
If Fred were here, I guess he’d use video game terminology and say I was powered up, or leveled up, or whatever. That little trip into the Ice Age was just the thing to put the ice back in my freezer!
But, poor Pop! He went from one extreme to the other—tropical heat to freezing cold. I look at him in the elevator beside me. His skin is, for him, an unhealthy blue, and his teeth are chattering.
“We’ve got to get you some proper clothes.”
“I won’t argue with you there!” he says through chattering teeth.
“Hmmm,” I say, “Is there any way to get to a specific time and location? These buttons don’t seem to pinpoint any time period smaller than a century.”
“Yes, I’ve used this time-evator before,” Pop says. “Just press the century you want and merely concentrate on the exact time and place. The time-evator will take care of the rest.”
I press the button for the twentieth century and concentrate. The time-evator dings and the doors open to the bustling Thirty-fourth Street of mid-century Manhattan.
“Ho-ho-ho!” Santa laughs, his voice full of approval. “Macy’s department store, circa nineteen-forty-seven. Good call, son!”
“Wait here,” I say, “I don’t think anyone needs to see Santa Claus running around New York in his underwear.”
“Agreed.”
I go dim and exit the time-evator. I cross the street and enter Macy’s. It’s packed with humans shopping for Christmas presents. Holiday lights and decorations are everywhere and the music of Christmas carols floats softly through the air. I slip away from the masses to search the hidden areas behind the individual shops.
At last, I find what I’m looking for—a locker room with a Santa Claus costume hanging on every hook. I pick one out that looks like it would fit Pop and stuff it under my trench cloak. Then I head back toward the elevator.
I reach the street and see a small child in old, worn clothes staring at me, her mouth agape.
Sometimes, kids, the ones with pure hearts and pure eyes, can see me even when I’m dim.
There’s a woman—I’m guessing the child’s mother—rummaging in a trash can behind her. It melts even my cold heart. I walk over to the child, her eyes growing wider with every step I take. I put my finger to my lips, gesturing for her to be quiet.
I squat down in front of her and gesture for her to wait a moment. I take out the borealis from my cloak and the little girl gasps as it illuminates her face. I place it in her hands and then form a sparkling ice chain that I attach to it. The magic of the borealis should be enough to keep it intact permanently.
“From Santa,” I whisper, giving her a wink. She places the chain over her head and slips it around her neck. She cradles the borealis in her hands and then looks up at me, her tiny face full of love and gratitude. Without warning, she throws her arms around my neck and squeezes me in a tight hug. After a moment, I hug her back. I use my magic over cold to banish it from this child. Hugging me will be the last time she ever knows Winter’s harsh, bitter touch.
We separate and I motion for her to put the borealis down the front of her shirt.
“Secret and safe.” I whisper.
She gives an exaggerated nod of understanding.
“Merry Christmas,” she whispers.
“Merry Christmas,” I say as I rise.
I turn and walk back to the time-evator without giving the child another glance.
In the end, Frost is what Frost is, after all.
Pop is ecstatic to see the clothes I brought him and immediately starts putting them on.
“Good job, son! These are just about like those your mother sews for...Jack? Are you crying son?”
“Something was in my eye,” I say as I wipe away a frozen tear. “Let’s go.”
Pop presses the button for present day and we rocket up toward Father Time’s office. I make myself forget about the little girl and concentrate on what I plan to do when I get my hands on ol’ FT!
“Easy, son,” Pop says. “Save it, now.”
I glance around and see that there’s frost forming on the walls.
“He’s going down, Pop! For what he’s done, he’s going down!”
The door opens to Father Time’s office and every clock in the room goes off in alarm. Three feds I’ve never seen before are there waiting on us. They raise their wands and fire.
But I’m ready for them!
I throw up a shield of reflective ice and the spells go bouncing around the room. One even strikes its caster and he falls to the ground, stunned.
A quick wave of my hand and a blizzard-cold wind gallops across the room, freezing the other two feds where they stand.
I skate over the ice lain across the floor in the wake of my wind and grab the stunned fed by his sash, pulling his face up to mine.
“Where’s Father Time?” I demand.
He struggles unsuccessfully to speak. At last, he manages to raise an arm and point to the large crystal ball mounted on the wall among the clocks. Father Time is on it giving a press conference, Jasmine, Romeo, and Dee at his side.
“...Unfortunately,” Father Time’s image says from the TV, “Talbot’s accomplice, Jack Frost, met his end during an escape attempt.”
“The holly I did!” I shout. “Come on, Pop. We’ve got to get down there!”
We jog to the time-evator and go inside. I press the button for present day and concentrate on the lobby. The press room is also on the ground floor. We reach the lobby and then bolt into the press room just as Father Time announces his regret that it doesn’t appear there’s any chance of finding Santa Claus.
“I beg to differ!” Santa bellows.
Every head in the room turns and voices his name in surprise at seeing him. Cameras flash and he’s bombarded with a hundred questions. He ignores them all and shouts over the crowd.
“Father Time, you’ve been very naughty!”
“This man is an impostor!” Father Time shouts. “He’s with a known felon! Seize them!”
Jasmine and Romeo spring into the air. The crowd shrieks as they dive-bomb us. A wave of my hand sends them falling to the ground like the heavy blocks of ice that they now are.
Pop and I press our way forward through the crowd.
“It’s Father Time who is the criminal here!” I shout. “It was he who actually kidnapped Santa! Father Time said Santa was lost, but he was holding my pop hostage the whole time! Everything else is lies, just like him saying I was dead!”
“It this true?” the reporters Father Time ask in a hundred different variations. “How do you explain this?”
Pop and I press onward to the stage.
“He didn’t want to give up being Father Time. And the only way he could stay in office was to make sure Baby New Year never arrived! That’s why he needed to keep Santa from delivering presents. He wanted time to stand still! He wanted it to be Christmas Eve forever!”
The reporters bombard Father Time with questions until he loses it.
“Silence!” he screams as he waves his staff in a broad arc.
I erect a protective ice shield around Pop and myself just in time to prevent the time-dampening spell from washing over us. The rest of the crowd is not so lucky. They go as still as the victims in Old Man Winter’s palace, frozen in time.
Father Time grabs Dee by the neck and pulls her to him.
“Don’t follow,” he shouts, “or your little friend gets it!”
He ducks out of the room, dragging Dee along with him.
“Pop,” I say, “he’s got Dee!”
“I think I can lift this spell off these good folks, son. You go on. Get him! I’ll catch up.”
I nod and run out of the room after Father Time.