Adventure Game Studio

Cut the paper to about 2 ½ width of the present.

There were two lines in front of her. There should have been two employees behind the desk, one for questions, one for the gift wrapping service. But she was alone.

Fold in one of the edges. Wrap the paper around the object, so that the folded-in edge stays on the outside.

She didn't mind. Her hands danced over the wrapping paper in a hypnotic pace.

In her skull, heavy metal droned out the seventh or eighth rendition of "Last Christmas, I gave you my heart..." since her shift started. People had to scream to be heard by her, but most didn't notice the tiny pods in her ears. They just thought the general noise of the mall dwarfed their words.

Secure with sellotape if necessary, avoid if possible.

She had long learned to grasp the gist of the requests and questions with just a word here and there.

"... jewelry..." - "Second floor, take a left after the escalator."

"... special... girlfriend..." - "Third floor, tucked in the corner behind the fountain – a bit out of the way, you know." She added a small wink to her usual smile.

"... flowers..." - "Ah, unfortunately, they closed about three month ago. You can try the department store next door, basement floor, I think."

Press down on the paper where it protrudes at the sides. Slowly move it towards the present until it is flat on the table and flat against the object. There should be paper triangles at the sides of the object now.

Despite her doing two jobs at once, the lines moved quickly. Both of them. The questions were easy and quickly answered, the gifts wrapped just as easily. Every now and then, mostly after she had answered a question, she looked up.

Spotting a cross around a neck she changed her cheerful "Happy Holidays!" to a just as sincere "Merry Christmas!" or occasionally a "Have a lovely Hanukkah!" when her customer wore a star of David. For her, it was no problem to jump through all manners of well wishes and each felt as genuine as the last.

The rest of the paper should end in either a flat side now or in a point. Either way, fold in this end to create a nice smooth edge. Now fold the sides towards the first folded in edge. Press close against the sides of the present. Secure all with sellotape again if necessary, avoid of possible.

Her next customer had chosen the wrong line. That she noticed, but she only commented it with a small smile. He had no present to wrap in his hands, but a question to ask on his lips.

"... knife... money..." - "For household wares you can try Peter's Pots and Pans or Culinary Cutlery both right here on the ground floor, just over there." She pointed lazily to her left.

The customer didn't rush off with a quickly murmured Thanks! as most people did, but kept standing in front of her.

For a moment, she looked up from the present of the last customer who still stood to the side waiting for his shopping. Then her fingers started to dance over the paper again.

Put the middle of a gift ribbon under the present. Cross the end in the back and turn the present around.

"... sharp ..." - "Unfortunately, sir, we do not offer a sharpening service here anymore. -"

She realized that he was not asking about a sharpening service the moment the words had left her mouth and her eyes fell on the knife he was brandishing. Her heart started to beat against her chest. But she didn't stop her train of thought. "- There might still be one on the Christmas Market outside, though."

"Now, listen here, girl, you'll give me -" the customer, who was not a customer, said angrily, but he didn't get to finish his sentence.

"No, you listen, boy," she interrupted in the same tone she used with her toddler. "I cannot help you and I have other customers. Other customers who actually know what line to use and who have actual questions to ask. And I don't have time for this, so just skip the temper tantrum, will you?"

She sighed, and pressed her eyelids together for a second before she pushed the present in her fingers over to the other customer. Then she called to the line: "Next, please!"

You should now look at the front of the present with two ends of the ribbon in your hands and one piece straight over the present. Knot the two ends together by first sliding one under the piece already there. Add a second knot to make sure.

With one last look at the rather sharp and long knife in his hands, the 'customer' was pushed away by the next stressed shopper. Confused, he stumbled towards the food court just a few steps away.

Put the edge of a pair of scissors, tilted, against the ribbon and your thumb. Pull with pressure to wrinkle the ribbon. Add our mall sticker on the front.

Maybe she was a little more aggressive with the last sticker when it was finally time for her lunch break. Her fingers had calluses from doing the same task over and over again all morning and several mornings before.

In the food court, there still sat a young scruffy looking man staring at a knife when she sat down on the next table over. She pulled a box with her lunch out of her bag and munched down on a piece of bell pepper.

"You know," she said silently but just loud enough for the man to hear, "when you try to rob someone, maybe don't do it when people are too busy even noticing. And for the love of god, try somewhere they actually have money. Gift wrapping is a free service, you know. There are signs everywhere."

The failed robber said nothing.

With a raised eyebrow, she put a couple of her pepper slices on a paper napkin and pulled them over to him, then she left.

    Hi, I'm Santa, and I want to tell you the story of the strangest Christmas I ever had:
    It was 2010, and the coldest winter on record.  I went and dragged out the old hooded robe I hadn't worn since I was but a folktale.  Out in the stable, I harnessed the reindeer, and we headed off into the blizzardy sky.
    I activated the time gaskets as we crossed the North Sea. Oh, yes, you might not know about that: I use a time-travel thingy my elves put together after the world's children grew too many for me to do my job in just one night.  I don't really know how it works; only that I push the handle to slow time to a crawl between deliveries.  It had come with some "warning" about especially freezing weather and how the "Temporium Fluid" stuff could become "non-Einsteinian" and branch off too many forks in the spacetim...
    ...and, over London, just as I passed Big Ben in an especially savage, white eddy, that's exactly what happened!  The handle flew out of my grip, and the sleigh shuddered... then went into a nosedive!  Time folded in a way I can't describe: I guess a sticky treacle swirl, spiraling into a quicksilver tunnel, is close enough.
    Big Ben strobed night-day-night-day, then disassembled itself top-down to its bare foundation, right when the time gaskets belched and I regained some control.  I pulled up sharp, just enough to narrowly clear the peaks of row after row of towering brick chimneystacks.  My eyes stung, and the reindeer bucked, as we flew through the acrid clouds of coal smoke. Then, BANG, we skimmed a rooftop and I flew from my seat, through the air and through an open window: tuck-roll-slide-stand!
    Before me, in the light of the fireplace, stood a knobbly old man in his night frock.  He looked at me in terror, seeing a tall figure in a coal-blackened hooded robe, smoke-raw eyes shining red, and stammered, "Y-you must b-be the third ghost?!" just as the reindeer-led chariot to his bleak future pulled up outside the window.

Matteo and Antonio had been working for the Interplanetary Relocations Co. for ten years. Remodelling and terraforming small planets for future tenants had never been a dream for either of them, but the pay was good and the market booming. Plus Gianfranco, the old man, as they used to call him, was a good employer, affable and generous. The kind of person with whom it is impossible not to get along.
The routine was always the same. They worked for three to four weeks, levelling mountains that were too high to be accessible, digging picturesque lakes and filling them with fish, planting a few groves here and there that always looked good in the brochures. Once they had finished their preparations, they organised a guided tour of the planet for its future inhabitants, taking care to hide from them the desert areas where they had thrown the remains of the mountains and the cheap seas with which they had filled half the planet. I mean, what did they expect from a few weeks' work? "Even God took seven days to create the world," the old man used to say. "And he certainly had better tools than we do."
It was hard, back-breaking work, yes, but it paid well, the boss was a good man, and Matteo and Antonio had become good friends over time. Of course, the two could not have been more different from each other. Antonio was a mule, whose main goal in life was to make ends meet. Matteo, on the other hand, was more ambitious. "If you follow me, you'll go places", he used to tell Antonio, a prophecy that never seemed to come true. Still, they could not complain, especially considering the job crisis that plagued society at that time.

Of course, it wasn't all roses.
In recent years, the old man had begun to lose his marbles, it was clear. Like that time he had sent them to Sciatto VI, to clean up an oil spill. Two horrendous weeks slogging through sludge, trying to suck out an 8-kilometre-deep oil stratum. Only to realise, when the job was done, that they had misread the Roman number and discovered that the clean-up had to be done at Sciatto IV instead. Not to mention dozens of complaints from the oil-drinking population of Sciatto VI, pissed off at the loss of their primary source of food.
In short, the situation had deteriorated to the extent that the old man had to take early retirement, much to the sadness of his two employees who were genuinely fond of him.
So now they were sitting in the office, a lump in their stomachs, waiting for something to happen. Antonio was chewing the caps of all the pens he could find, reducing them to shapeless lumps, while Matteo was biting his nails. The anxiety in the air was palpable.
"He's already late," Antonio said, nibbling on a Bic, eyes fixed on the wall clock. "Do you know him, this guy Gregorio?"
"Pah, I saw him once," Matteo replied, gnawing his thumb. "But he was just a kid."
"The old man never talked about his nephew," muttered Antonio. "There must be a reason."
"And to think the company is in his hands," Matteo said, switching to his index finger. "Let's hope for the best. I don't feel like looking for another job."

Gregorio, the new owner, came in slamming the door, three and a half hours late. Small, plump, with bad teeth and already bald despite his young age, he looked nothing like his uncle. Antonio, who had dozed off at his desk, jolted awake believing he was in a nightmare.
"Wake up!" croaked the newcomer. "We have a job to do, we are already late."
"I assume you are Gregorio, the nephew of the old m... of Gianfranco?" asked Matteo.
"Yes. And don't think you can walk over me just because I'm young, understand?"
Antonio held out his hand. "Nice to meet you, my name is..."
"I know who you are. I read my uncle's files," Gregorio said with plain disdain, his face a purple balloon. "And I also know he overpaid you, the old man. But things are going to change here, you can bet on that. Now get your tools ready, we've got a Class D Planet to sort out."
"But... what about the day's notice?" asked Matteo. The old man always gave them advance notice before starting a job.
"No more notices, overtime payments, scrounging holidays. The fun is over!" squealed Gregorio, picking up a Bic to mark the day's agenda. "The hell is wrong with these pens?"

The next month was a nightmare. Wages halved, work doubled, holidays cancelled. What it took them a fortnight to do with the old man, under the new management was done in a week.
Interplanetary Relocations Co. had never been the most honest of companies, it has to be said. The old man was no saint, and in his career he had ripped-off a few customers here and there, skimped on extras, and embellished the accounts a bit. But his nephew was a real bastard. Under his direction they had found themselves hiding deserts under a carpet of cheap grass a few centimetres thick, recycling polluted water bought at half price to fill lakes and rivers, passing off dangerous active volcanoes as pleasant hiking spots. True scams.

After the first week, Antonio was exhausted. By the second, he was ready for a nervous breakdown. Matteo, on the other hand, had withdrawn into himself and did not seem the same person.
"Gregorio... was he already such an asshole even as a kid?" asked Antonio to Matteo. They were sitting in the usual beat-up spaceship they had been using for ten years, in one of the rare breaks Gregorio gave them. "Not only does he rips off customers, but he treats us like crap with exploitative hours and wages!"
Matteo nodded. Lately, he spoke little and was always absorbed in who knows what thoughts. Antonio was beginning to worry.
"You always told me we would go places... but the only places we've ever been were deserted planets covered in garbage!"
Currently, they were working on a Trash Rock, one of the many asteroids used as a dumping ground by neighbouring planets. The situation, however, had become untenable: the piles of rubbish had reached such levels that someone had to be called in to clean up the muck, to pick up and throw the rubbish into the closest black hole. And who had been foolish enough to accept that job of dubious legality if not Gregorio, the new owner of Interplanetary Relocations Co.?
So Antonio and Matteo had been there for seven days moving mountains of garbage, just to uncover more endless piles of junk, while being entertained by Gregorio's shrill shouts over the communicator: "Come on, you loafers! Get a move on, you lazy bums, there's low gravity and no one believes you're struggling! Will you get a move on or do I have to do everything?!"
Gregorio had assumed the role of supervisor: he sat precariously on a pile of rubbish shouting orders, not helping one bit his two employees.
The idea of spending another week in the middle of nowhere, with no communication with the outside world, with the sole company of a shrieking lunatic and a man who seemed to have taken a vow of silence, up to his neck in rubbish, cleaning up who knows how many more tonnes of rubbish, gave Antonio the creeps. When he thought about it, he felt like he had a fever.
"Moreover, everyone knows that asteroids don't pay a damn thing! We're breaking our backs for nothing, eh Matteo? Matteo? Are you even listening to me?"
Matteo as usual said nothing, but as in response on the ship's communicator Gregorio's croaking voice rang out: "Are you done with your break, lazybones?"

They resumed their work. Antonio on the ground, Matteo operating the huge robotic crane they used to move loads. Gregorio, as always, sat on a pile of rubbish shouting ("he's in his natural environment", said Antonio to himself).
They were currently dismantling a sort of enormous slum made up of rusty metal sheet hovels, precariously held together by worn planks: you could get tetanus just looking at that stuff. How did all that junk even end there?
Antonio loaded a pile of metal sheets at the foot of the crane. It was exhausting, slow work, as each sheet had to be manually separated from the wood, according to Interplanetary Directive 396B on Material Recycling. Bloody tree-huggers, thought Antonio.
Matteo, from his glass cage at the top of the crane, operated the magnet of the mechanical arm, which sucked the metal mass as if it had no weight.

Antonio was stacking the next load of sheets when the communicator rang. "If it's that idiot Gregorio, I'm not answering." But one glance was enough to see that the boss had dozed off in his chair; Antonio pressed the answer button.
"Matteo? Look, if there are pieces of wood between the sheets, who cares, they'll separate them themselv..."
"Get back in the spaceship and wait for me there," Matteo's voice was imperative.
"Huh?"
"Do as I said, there's no time."

Antonio hurried back into the spaceship. There was something strange in Matteo's tone of voice. Perhaps he wanted to take advantage of Gregorio being asleep to take another break...? That was perfectly fine by him!
He had just sat on a bench to wait when he heard a hellish ruckus from outside. Antonio looked out of the main window in an attempt to understand what was going on, but it was impossible to see anything with all those piles of rubbish piled on the asteroid.
A few minutes later, Matteo arrived like a rocket and without a word started fiddling with the spaceship controls.
"Matteo, what the hell is going on? Why you are preparing the ship for take-off?"
"I'm sick and tired of it, I've decided to leave the asteroid."
"What about Gregorio?!"
"What about him?" said Matteo, as the ship was taking off vertically into space. "I have decided to leave him on the asteroid to... meditate on his actions."
"You didn't kill him, did you?!" Antonio was dumbfounded.
"No way. I only slowed him down by leaving a pile of metal sheets on the path to the ship. Once he clears the passage, he'll find enough food and water to survive a couple of months. Besides, he's got plenty of company, he's surrounded by his own kind: trash."
"You must be crazy... what if he calls for help? That would get us both arrested!"
"Call who? No one knows we're here. That's one of the cons of taking shady jobs." Matteo laughed, setting the course. "But don't worry, we'll come back here in a month, when he's mellowed out."
"What if he doesn't mellow out?!"
Matteo grinned like a shark. "Then, meet the new owner of Interplanetary Relocations Co. and his associate. I told you we would go places!"

There once was a man called McNabbit,
Who had a peculiar habit.
As his pants hit the floor,
Mum burst through the door:
"McNabbit! Let go of the rabbit!"

The bird in the little clock came out and peeped twice. David diligently put away his figurines, carefully leaving the brushes to soak in the stand he had designed so that the bristles wouldn't get bent out of place. A quick wipe left the station spotless, for David was as meticulous as he was fastidious. He turned to leave.

That's when he spotted it—a drop of paint on the floor. David furrowed his brow. It was unlike him to drop paint even on his work table. It must have dripped from under the lid as he was unscrewing the tube. A compulsive tick began to tug at the corner of his mouth.

He stooped to wipe up the paint, grumbling at his own sloppiness. At least the floor was warm to the touch, testament to the thoroughness of his insulation job. He put his ear to the floor to see if he could hear the water heater, but there was nothing but beautiful silence.

David moved on to the stamp station, a large desk near the north window where natural light would not interfere with his work. He adjusted the arm on the large magnifying glass and took out his tweezers. A large lot of Belgian colonials had finally arrived and he was eager to inspect their true condition.

Riiiiiiiiing!

David furrowed his brow. Grumbling to himself, he checked the front camera on his phone and saw a uniformed delivery person. He left the stamp station, took nine steps down the long hall, compulsively straightened the mat in front of the door, and then undid the six locking mechanisms.

"You're locked down tighter than a sail in a sea storm, ain't ya?" the delivery man joked. David noted 'Gus' on the man's name tag and thought it very much suited the aging and overweight man.

"Can't be too careful in these parts," David gave his stock answer, peering suspiciously past Gus. Most of the block had long been abandoned, the empty houses mostly burnt down by vagrant teens. Only blind old Mrs. Cowling's house still stood at the end of the street—the rest was reverting quickly to natural prairie. He eyed the white van across the street as out of place, but decided it must belong to the delivery company.

"Sign here," the Gus said, shoving a clipboard under David's nose. David took several moments to read through the standard delivery chit, just to ensure that none of the terms and conditions had been subtly tweaked, then signed. Gus took the opportunity to collect a dolly heavily laden with a large box from the walkway.

"It's heavy as all fuck, I'll tell you that," Gus complained. "What is resin coated poly-laminate, anyway?"

"It's used for preserving specimens," David said, unable to think up a convincing lie on the spot.

"Well, I don't see no garage. I assume you want it up in the house?"

David looked up and down the derelict street, but of course it was empty. He looked over the heavy box and decided he might pull a back muscle trying to move it himself.

"Just inside the door will be fine," he said reluctantly

Gus sweated and cursed as he lugged the heavy dolly up the front steps. He manhandled it up and over the threshold before tucking the box inside the front door. David compulsively straightened the front mat with his toe.

"What the fuck is that?!" Gus gasped, almost tripping over his own hand cart in an attempt to duck away from the specimen on the wall.

"Coyote," David replied, holding the door open for the man to leave.

"But it's, it's ..."

"It's perfectly preserved in resin coated poly-laminate," David explained as if to a child. "I have quite a collection of other local fauna in the basement, if you're interested ..."

"No thanks, bud," the delivery man said, straightening himself. "I've got a schedule to keep!"

David nodded, waving the man out. He had his own schedule to keep, but blathering on about it wasn't going to get him back to it. Gus left promptly, and David rebolted the doors.  He was just sitting down to the Belgian colonials again when the bird in the clock chirped three times.

David grumbled to himself. He carefully tidied the stamp station, making sure the arm of the magnifying glass was stowed at an 80 degree angle so as not to wear out the springs that held it in place. He moved on to the trading card station, a nook in the corner with a large monitor over the table that would display spot values. David had no new cards today, but he had a large back catalogue to reevaluate. He donned his white gloves, freshly pressed.

Riiiiiiiiing!

David furrowed his brow. The tick at the corner of his mouth had returned. He checked his phone and saw a young girl at the front door. Grumbling to himself, he left the trading card station and took nine steps down the long hall, compulsively straightened the mat in front of the door, and then undid the six locking mechanisms.

"Wanna buy a box of cookies, Mister?"

David forced himself to smile, more to draw the muscles tight so that his tick was hidden than out of any enthusiasm for overpriced cookies that tasted like cardboard. He noted the name 'Daisy' on the breast of the girl's uniform and thought it very much suited the blonde waif of a girl.

"How much are they?" he asked, peering suspiciously past Daisy. A frumpy woman next to a minivan on the street stood silent sentry, not doubt Daisy's mother. Beyond her a pair of crows argued vocally in the skeleton of a dead tree that used to stand outside the old Bonair house, but otherwise the street was vacant as always.

"Eight bucks a box," Daisy told him, dropping the cutesy schtick now that he'd expressed an interest.

"That's a lot for nine ounces of sugar," David grumbled.

Daisy turned on her heel. "MOM! The man is being mean!"

David furrowed his brow. "Fine. Fine. I'll take two. Keep the change."

Daisy smiled as she grabbed the cash from David's hand, then shrieked as she looked over his shoulder.

"Oh, that. It's just a preserved owl," he tried to explain, but of course by then it was too late. The girl had fled back to the van, and the mom had marched up the walkway to give him a piece of her mind. Be ashamed of himself this, isolated weirdo that—he'd heard it all before a million times. It was hard not to glance at his watch as the mother scolded and berated him. He tried to ask for his money back, but sliding a word in edgewise was like trying to park an RV at a Christmas market. In the end he just ended up closing the door in her face, bolting it shut against her tirade as he compulsively straightened the front mat. Some people just didn't appreciate the motivation to collect.

David eyed the woman on his phone as she banged and kicked at his door. His mother had once told him that if he made a face for too long it would stay that way, and he idly considered the red fury of the woman's expression. But at last her rage was spent, and she was stalking back down the walkway to her minivan.

David returned to the trading card station, sitting down just as the bird in the clock peeped four times. Grumbling, he shelved his trading cards and wiped the surface.

David left the trading card station, took nine steps down the long hallway and compulsively straightened the front mat. Four o'clock was time for his favourite hobby, taxidermy, but his latest technique required a lot of resin coated poly-laminate. David furrowed his brow, considering the easiest way to move the heavy roll down into the basement.

Riiiiiiiiing!

David took out his phone to look at the front door camera, even though it would have been faster to peek out the window next to the door. An immaculately dressed man in black stood on his front stoop, book cradled lovingly in his hands. David found it very hard to roll his eyes against the grain of his furrowed brow.

The front mat was compulsively straightened and the six locking mechanisms opened.

"Hello sir, I was wondering if you had a few moments to spare to hear the word of our Lord?" The glint of a metallic pin etched with the name 'Matthew' caught David's eye, and he could not help but think the name suited the earnest looking fellow.

"I know you are busy, sir, but we all must make time for the business of the Lord."

David peered suspiciously past the man, noting that the vacant street was entirely empty, with not even a parked car to mark Matthew's presence. "You didn't walk here through the derelict neighbourhood, did you?"

Matthew smiled wanly, pity in his eyes. "Since I've found the Lord, there is no longer fear in my heart. Perhaps you'd like to hear about the word, such that you can bask again in the light of his kingdom, free from fear?"

David looked up and down the empty street again. "There's a lot of crime here, despite most of the people having moved on."

"I've heard about the junkies and the spiked opioids, I've heard about the delinquents burning down the empty houses, and I've heard about the spate of disappearing vagrants. Let me tell you a secret son—none of that matters. Not when you've got the Lord on your side. Shall I read a passage of his word from the good book?"

David furrowed his brow, looking up to the sky. Dark clouds threatened rain, and a grim wind blew through the desolate neighbourhood. He had a sneaky suspicion that the Lord was very much not on his side, but the man seemed determined to try his luck.

"What does the Lord have to say about strange collections?" David asked.

"The good Lord takes in both the mighty and the meek. You might say he's a collector of sorts himself."

David nodded. "Well, you're going to get the Lord's good book wet reading out on the stoop. Come inside, won't you?

David stepped aside, idly fingering the mechanisms behind the door. The man came inside to stand on the front mat, and then disappeared into the floor.

David shut the door and quickly set the locks again. A chorus of screams echoed up from the basement, but those would soon be silenced now that he had his resin coated poly-laminate again. He cheerfully tipped the box down the chute, then closed the trap door, compulsively straightening the front mat.  It was four o'clock, and his collection beckoned.

I really enjoyed this story. The concept of terraforming done cheap - just like a lot of construction work in today's world - overworked employees, questionable business practices, a new boss throwing out all the more idealistic or at least reasonable practices in favour of profit. This is all very relatable, no matter the sci-fi setting. I found the ending a bit uninteresting. Matteo and Antonio just leave, there's no big showdown, there's not even a real critic (at that point) of the business practices (there's a lot before). I think I would prefer a more forceful confrontation here. Technically, Matteo and Antonio don't even tell Gregorio that they are dissatisfied (granted, he should be able / have already figured it out, but still. But overall, this is a very nice story.

LOL. Nice limerick, a bit risqué maybe. Honestly, there's not a lot to say here. It made me laugh.

Well, your character gave of serial killer vibes from the beginning, so I actually was a bit disappointed when it turns out he is. The retualistic planning of his day, the ocd, his hobby of taxedomy - people with these characteristics are so often presented as murderers in media that it gets boring and predictable. And still, to a certain degree, David is almost relatable: Who wouldn't get annoyed when you have a plan for the day and people ring your doorbell over and over again? While I didn't like the conclusion if the story, the way there was interesting enough.

lorenzo

An enjoyable story that fits well with the current Christmas atmosphere: shops filled with customers and overworked staff. I like the idea behind the story and I found the protagonist's character to be well-defined through her actions and interactions with people.

Santa and time travel, what a combination! A funny short story.

This one made me laugh, very funny!

The main character was described well and you can understand his frustrations at being constantly interrupted when working. The ending is a bit of a let-down: the guy who looks, acts, and has a hobby like a serial killer... is really a serial killer. ;)
Despite this, I enjoyed reading the story!

Sinitrena.

Stupot (I'm a sucker for limericks!)

This feels so much like the beginning of a Christmas movie! Santa stumbling through time, getting mixed up in a Dicken's story - and all the shenangians yet to follow. Really enjoyed it!

I usually don't read reviews before voting, but I happened to this time, and I can't get over how similar our two main characters are. Very process-oriented individuals, strong on procedures and indifferent to the agendas of others. Psycho-killer vibes, did you say?  ;)

I liked the story, especially the kindness at the end, although it is a bit of an indictment of our society that we are too busy even to deal with serious threats.

An interesting tie-in between Santa and Dicken's Christmas Carol. I liked the elf techno-lore, although the character of big S seems a bit flat. I agree with other reviewers that it this is just a snapshot of what would make for a fascinating larger story.

The internal company politics in your story are awesome. Old man Gianfranco was my favourite character, but perhaps I'm biased by my own favourite bosses of the past whose great contribution to the enterprise was benign neglect. I found the other characters a bit thin: why is Gregorio such prick? If Antonio is suffering so much, why does he never raise his issues with the boss? Why is Matteo so withdrawn towards the end, except for dramatic purposes? -it doesn't seem to suit his character who is otherwise deeply in cahoots with Antonio.

Top marks for the terraforming sci-fi elements. Matteo and Antonio must be truly massive creatures to pull off what they do!

A lot is left to the imagination in this, er, gripping tale. The real draw of the theme, I think, is what happens when the habit is interrupted, but you cut out just when things were getting interesting. I demand a ...climax.

It was hard to decide, but I think in the end Sinitrena wrote the best story based on the theme.