A Christmas Story

Mornings are always a time to be wary when dealing with Jay. A whole evening of at least two sleeps and no adventures makes him – eager to help anyone, and being given advice and ideas on the Internet adds a whole new level of mild terror. To everything.

Christmas morning is – that, but worse. Jay gave me a light saber for my birthday. Which is actually an entire compressed quasar ‘on vacation’ because the concept of a gift not being extra jaysome is lost on him. The wandering magician and I have spent the last three weeks mostly trying to stop some of the most absurd gifts from happening.

Jay is up when we enter the small shared living room of the hotel suite. There is a decorated Christmas tree that wasn’t there last night, and he’s bouncing happily from foot to foot.

“You have presents?” the wandering magician says mildly, but he’s between me and Jay. I doubt Jay notices: innocence is an armour almost breathtaking in scope at times.

“Uh-huh! I got you gifts,” Jay says with all the pride of an eleven year old from Outside the universe.

“I imagine you did. What did you get me?” the magician says, and I doubt Jay even notices the hint of wariness in the tone, or the slight way the magician tenses as though prepared to make wards.

“Well, I always win in snowball fights so this is for you, Honcho,” Jay says. Nothing happens that I can tell.

The magician blinks, stares at Jay with no expression at all. For a moment there’s just a magician, and then he smiles. “Ah. I see. An interesting gift.”

“Well, you kept noping alll the fun ones,” Jay says with a pout.

“Most people don’t get others dragons for Christmas, or offer nuclear launch codes. I’m not even going to wonder why you thought I’d want that as a present for me,” the magician says dryly.

“Or ask fictional characters for tails for a cat,” I add. I’ve had to deal with the Muffin Problem.

“Also not wondering about that. Your gift for Charlie?” he asks.

“Oh, that one was easy!”

Jay grins, and I feel something impact me through it. I have a god inside me. I can eat gods and energy, but this bypasses everything I am and every ward the magician has put about me over the years in a single moment.

“Jay. What did you do?” the wandering magician asks, and his voice has gone very quiet.

“Oh, I gave Charlie a gift of jaysome,” Jay says happily.

“You – put a piece of jaysome inside Charlie.”

“Uh-huh! Which is totally a gift and a good one too,” he says.

“Ah.” The magician looks at me, about to speak. Pauses. “And do I need to ask why every ward the hotel has and the ones I added last night all broke a moment ago?”

“I might have given gifts to other kids too. And parents. Also a very lonely family of mice and –.”

“Please stop any accidents from being oopses, Jay. As a present to my sanity.”

“But you have lots of that, Honcho!”

The wandering magician stares at Jay in wordless shock for a second.

“Jay. Go help,” I say firmly.

Jay was scared of me, when he first met me. That’s never changed, even if he’s far scarier than I could ever be. He vanishes. I look at the wandering magician. “It is Jay, Nathen.”

“I know. That he can see how sane we are is –.” He shakes his head. “He put a piece of himself inside you. Even I have no idea what that might do, not really.”

“And you?”

“A victory. I can beat him once, if I ever need to.”

“He expects you to invoke that in a snowball fight, doesn’t he?”

The magician smiles. “I imagine so.”

The smile doesn’t look quite right. I can hear distant shouts become muffles, and growls in other hotel rooms as Jay does bindings to fix some of the gifts he gave strangers. “What do you plan to use it for?”

“I don’t know. I know I’ll need to. Jay did more than he knows. But then again, he always does.”

I wince at the distant growls of what sounds like a dinosaur. “I imagine so. I got him a new phone, and games. You?”

“That he won’t be in trouble for anything done today.” The magician grins. “I plan to let him know that later, however.”

“That – might be wise.” I feel the hotel shake underfoot. I’ve had years of experience with Jay, and head to the window. Look down. “The hotel is walking.”

“Walking,” the magician repeats. Resigned.

“I imagine he asked what the hotel wanted for Christmas.”

The magician walks over, goes out onto the small balcony and looks over calmly. “He turned it into Baba Yaga’s hut, given that the feet look a bit like chicken feet. I hope you have the fae on speeddial to help cover what happens next.”

“The hotel is walking around. There are dinosaurs loose in it. And you’re worried about next?”

“Jay did a binding so the hotel has giant chicken feet. A Colonel Saunders seeking to make it into KFC can’t be far behind.”

I stare at the magician. I’d like to say he’s wrong. I have a terrible feeling he isn’t.

His stocking stuffer to us would be adventures, of course. Because it is Jay. I turn, look at the Christmas tree he found. Find myself staring at the lights on it.

There are Christmas tree lights everywhere. And I let Jay see Stranger Things.

“Oh no,” I whisper.

And that is when things begin to get weird.