Ghost of Christmas Moose Excerpt

Little scene from a 7 page short story, one of these days I'll get to the much needed edit/rewrite.

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"Mmm, babe. You know it!" Tan purred as she wrapped her arm around me as the snow continued to fall. We turned around, looked back over our shoulders and gave the vanishing crazed rabid ninja one last look.

Lady Blue wildly swung her balled fist into the air as she continued to follow the crazy jerky moose. The angry kunoichi snarled, “I killed you before, I’ll kill you again!” as she raced into an opening. The skillful ninja lost track of the moose as the snow fell harder; Blue looked around and saw a snowman standing in the middle of nowhere.

She blinked her violet eyes as she saw the snowman smile at her; she shook her pretty little blue head that was quickly piling up with white puffs of gentle snow. He continued to smile as his stick arm motioned for her to come over.

Behind the snowman a stood an old fashion drive thru movie wall; it turned to black as Blue neared. An HD movie with state-of-the-art surround sound began to play; Blue saw a tiny sleigh with nine reindeer flying through the dark skies, a US Navy fighter with forward swept wings was escorting the sleigh as The Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s Sarajevo 24/7 began to ominously play. Suddenly she heard my desperate voice over a menacing tone, “Santa! Can you get Rudolph to turn off his nose?”

“Sorry lad, he can’t,” Santa replied just before my HUD (Heads Up Display) turned a deep crimson red.

“Missile warning, Missile warning,” a soft voice repeated over in my helmet as the words blinked on my HUD.

“Incoming!” I thundered and pulled my F/A-39 Crusader II into a sharp turn away from Santa; the nimble fighter belched flares and a chaff cloud as it raced away from Saint Nick. The QSAM (Quick-maneuvering Surface-to-Air Missile) locked onto my nimble fighter and streaked away from the Jolly Ol’ Elf and his reindeer.

“Doom must really be peeved at me,” I thought as I experienced chest crushing G-forces. I huffed and grunted as the deadly missile neared; my bird shrieked as she continued to turn tighter than her engineers designed her to. Cold air vortexes formed on her wings as she continued her conga dance with Doom’s bucket of coal.

The naughty missile started to sputter; it slowed down and drifted off course. It belched a couple puffs of smoke, seconds later it burped once more before plunging towards the Earth. I didn’t have time to celebrate; another one took its place.

My Crusader came around in front of Santa and the boys; a pleasant ringing tone was intermingled with the “Missile Warning,” that echoed in my helmet. It was so intermingled that I didn’t hear it at first, but when he heard it, it was sweet: My bird had locked onto the Eastern European defense site.

A sleeping AGM-88 Harm missile dropped from my weapon’s carousel; it awoke and blazed a fiery smoky path down to the earth. It gave the defense installation the kiss of death; it disappeared into a fiery fireball that could be seen for hundreds of miles in the cold air.

“ALL CLEAR SANTA!” I jubilantly shouted.

“Thank you Ryan,” a relieved Santa smiled, “By the way, you’ve never told me what you wanted for Christmas.”

A Gift Card Christmas Excerpt

This is "Part 2" of 1126 Tomcat Way

It was Christmas Eve’s Eve. I slept nice, but I awoke exhausted. The coughing and the codeine played tag team with me. My stomach growled loudly, “Okay, okay, I get the picture,” I groaned as I staggered out of bed. The phone rang as I walked into the kitchen. Brooke answered it. Her voice jumped several octaves, “HE’S WHAT?”

“Why wasn’t I notified?”

“Why is he being released so soon?!??”

“He demanded it?

“How long ago?”

“He’s waiting for me?” Brooke face palmed as she finished, “Oh…,I’ll be right there.” She put the phone down and took a deep calming breath. “They released my grandfather-” she stopped and shook her, “No. He released himself.”

I took a sip of Gatorade as she looked at me sternly, “No computer luv. I want you off of it. You’re supposed to be getting your rest. I’m serious luv. I’m going to call Ernie before I leave to go to the hospital and ask have him watch you while I’m away.” She paused for dramatic effect and finished, “I’ll have him put Susie Snowflake on the repeat cycle if you do.”

Pure unadulterated horror gripped my donut pumping heart. I had heard that song countless of times when I worked at a toy during my senior year of high school; worse, they played it on continuous rotation. That song would induce the most nauseating Yule Tide feeling. “You wouldn’t…”

“Susie Snowflake, Santa Baby, Paul McCartney’s rubbish song, The Italian Donkey, Sinatra’s J-I-N-G-L-E Bells, Christmas Shoes, Natalie Cole butchering her daddy’s Christmas song, Rod Stewart and Dolly Parton nauseating version of Baby it’s Cold, and lastly Bonnie Raitt’s Christmas ‘song’ all in nonstop rotation if you should go onto the computer.” “With such a generous offer, how can I refuse?”

My victorious wife haughtily smiled. Total silence ensued until I weakly attempted to change the subject in a sly way, “Don’t forget to pick up the turkey.”

She narrowed her eyes and pointed her slender index finger at me, “You’re changing the subject luv, it’s not going to work…, Ernie!”

“Reporting for duty Mrs. Wolf!” the elite elf appeared magically in an explosion of everything good about Christmas, including fruitcake. He snapped a rigid salute. This time the elf was dressed in typical North Pole attire, “Lieutenant Commander Wolf is under my watch!”

“Make sure he doesn’t log onto the computer or else…”

“Or else…” Ernie begrudgingly echoed as he held up a CD holding my worst Christmas nightmare. I could see the pain in his eyes as he continued, “Please Ryan…, don’t make me play this…, please. It’s bad enough to hear Arnie singing ‘We are Santa’s elves’ off key.”

My poor ears wouldn’t be able to withstand the earsplitting onslaught of that abominable collection of songs without triggering a Trigeminal Attack. I picked up a white hanky and waved it. “Good boy,” Brooke stated and left to pick up the Old Man. Multiple candy cane explosions happened, speakers and an ipod appeared. Ernie clicked a button and the Christmas list I made for my yearly flights with Santa played. I reclined in my chair and smiled.

We chatted about our little adventures we’ve had. I grabbed a digital photo album and turned it on; I showed the curious elf various photos taken from my multiple misadventures. Nothing happened until I brought up the photo from my first mission with Brooke.

Ernie’s little red hat with fluffy white trim suddenly stood straight up as he gazed at the photo. The fluffy snowball at the tip of his hat jingled out a melodious Christmas tune. “That’s Mrs. Wolf!?!”

“Yes, our first assignment together.”

“Oh wow, Ryan. She reminds me of this cute little commando elf,” Ernie’s professionalism began to slip as he started to stammer…, funny how love does that. “She’s, she’s, she was the blonde at the. I mean. Uh, yeah, she was.” The flustered elf stopped and shook his head. He took a deep calming breath, “She was the only blonde elf at the Pave Low.”

“I saw her. What’s her name?” I asked.

“Myrrh,” he replied, “It’s a nice Christmas name.”

“Yes, it is,” I said and then told a white lie that I hoped Santa would forgive me for. “She was looking at you too.”

“She was!” the blushing elf exclaimed and fumbled for words again. “Um, what do I do? I-I-I-I-I’ve never ever dated before.”

“It took me a while to learn this, but be you. Be genuine. Start off slow you know, like a cup of hot cocoa after work. The next time include cookies with that hot cocoa, make sure they’re chocolate or some sort of chocolate icing or stripes. It has to be chocolate.” Ernie shook his head and quickly scribbled notes as I continued, “Chocolate is one of the main weaknesses of women, that and roses too. If that all works, then try dinner and a movie and take it from there.”

During our conversation of the fairer sex, I put my head back on the recliner and promptly fell fast asleep. I didn’t awake until there arose such a clatter!