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\author{Christopher Allan Webber}
\date{\today}
\title{The Magical Worker's Uprising at the North Pole}
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\begin{document}

\maketitle
\begin{quote}
This silly but also fairly dark story is basically a recap of a Fate
Core game we played about an Elfish uprising at the North Pole.  Don't
blame me\ldots{} at least, blame the players a bit too.  Thanks to Stephen
Webber and Nick Daly for participating.
\end{quote}


Peregrine Greyfeather started his morning routine the way he always
did, by freshly grinding some cocoa beans, boiling hot water, and
making a nice french press of hot cocoa.  He fried an egg, hummed to
himself, scooped some hot gruel out of the rice cooker, put the egg on
top of the gruel, and sat down to eat.  He liked mornings; they were
predictable, and the one time of the day he could get some real
thinking in to himself and feel at peace.

He thought about a few things.  There had been some odd stuff going
on about town lately; some elfs in fancy suits had been walking
around staring at property and taking notes.  Most of the elfs didn't
seem to realize what was going on; Peregrine didn't know totally
either, but he had a better idea than most of his cotton-brained
neighbors.  Their elfen town didn't get many visitors really; most
people were not able to detect where the town was thanks to a
magical misdirecting shield placed over the village, a village
called, boringly, Elfsville.  Elfsville was something not unlike
Hershey, Pennsylvania in the United States: a town built entirely
around a single industry.  This town didn't produce chocolate
(though it did import it heavily); instead, Elfsville was entirely
built around one major source of employment: Santa's workshop.

And no, those elfs didn't belong to the village.  Most of his
neighbors couldn't possibly realize it, happy to live in their
ignorance as they were.  But Peregrine wasn't like them.  He read, he
liked to study things.  And he knew who those elfs were: they were the
High Elfs: an industrious, "high society" set of elfs who had broken
off to form their own village.  They believed themselves to be pure
of blood; in reality, it just meant that they were somewhat inbred.
But they were rich, and they did place a value on education, mostly
because it meant getting richer and allowing themselves to set
themselves further apart from Elfsville, which they liked to call the
"wrong side of the Arctic Express".

Peregrine didn't care for them much.  Too stuffy.  He did sometimes
imagine he could better socialize with some book learned people
though.  He had an awfully hard time fitting in here.  He sipped his
cocoa again.  Peregrine didn't talk to many people at work; his only
other attempts at socialization were mostly sad attempts at picking
up women at the local juice bar.  It never seemed to work, but he
kept trying.  This topic made Peregrine sad, so he decided to move on
to thinking about happier things.

Peregrine thought about his coworkers, and how much he hated them.
At some point, he thought, he'd like to make them suffer the way they
made him suffer.  He grinned and sucked hot cocoa through his teeth.

But little did he know, today he'd take part in a day that would
involve more suffering of his coworkers than he could ever imagine,
but the end result would be an elfen revolution.  And he'd play a
major role\ldots{} but not in the way he'd have expected.  Peregrine
Greyfeather would do what he never thought he would ever do for his
coworkers: he'd become a local hero and save their lives.  Well, most
of them anyway.

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

When Peregrine got to work he beelined directly to his building.  He
didn't work in the main factory, but in a building off to the right.
Directly past the reindeer shed, slightly out of view: the Pixie
Refinery and Distillery.  Everyone knows that Santa's workshop is
powered by pixie dust.  But where does pixie dust come from?  The
answer of course is pixies.  Pixies, tiny fairy-like creatures, are
grown in a greenhouse-like environment (off to the right of the
building Peregrine worked at).  When they reach the appropriate point
in their lives that the powder on their wings becomes the appropriate
level of sparkly and beautiful, they're harvested.

This is where the refinery and distillery came into play.  Pixies are
componentized into several parts: the wings are ground and processed
into pixie dust, the magic substance that powers Santa's lab.  The
rest of the body of the pixie is ground, strained, and heavily refined
to create reindeer kibble (this is, of course, how Santa's reindeer
are capable of flight).  The rest is waste\ldots{} a toxic, glowing waste
that can burn the skin and creates strange effects for anyone who has
to handle it.

Peregrine's job was to get rid of the waste.

It wasn't always that way; Peregrine once was a normal factory
worker.  Unfortunately, his hatred for all "successful" individuals
meant that there was no-one he hated more than the children on
Santa's "good list".  As such, he began to poison and insert dangerous,
sharp objects into all sorts of children's toys on the good list.

When Santa found out, Peregrine got put on the naughty list.  He was
put far, far down on the naughty list, about as deep into the naughty
category as you could go.  And Peregrine was punished about as
severely as anyone could be punished in the happy-go-lucky town of
Elfsville; he was condemned to pixie sludge handling duty.

Sludge duty at one point had been cycled as a temporary duty that all
elfs must endure; now Peregrine was the only worker who suffered the
job.  Years of handling pixie sludge had burned Peregrine terribly.
He had terrible deformities, deep burns on his skin that shimmered
fabulous colors and either caused him great pain or numbed him
completely.

Peregrine had discovered something strange and wonderful though.
Years of exposure to the pixie dust had meant that he had found that
he had a certain attunement to the toys and other objects that rolled
off of Santa's workshop.  He could command them to his will.  But he
didn't tell anyone this secret.  He decided to save it\ldots{} surely it
would have some "use" that he could affect his coworkers with some
day.  Better to keep such surprises till you need them.

Peregrine walked up to the door.  Locked!  And with a note!  This note
wasn't one of the usual hand-scrawled happy letters from Santa,
attached with an adhesive cookie.  No, this was a corporate type and
font.  Strange.  Anyway, it said that all distillery workers were to
temporarily forego their regular duties for a meeting in the workshop.
Peregrine grumbled.  He hated meetings, and thought that at least he
had gotten past those at this point.

He walked past the reindeer shed.  Reindeer were shackled to the sides
of the shed.  Most of them were dopes.  But he paused in front of one
of them.  He and Rudolf looked at each other in the eyes.  Rudolf,
the outcast.  Rudolf, whose nose glowed with red power that no-one
quite understood, likely a mutation from high exposure to pixie toxins
in his kibble.  Peregrine liked Rudolf, and Rudolf seemed to like him.
He petted Rudolf on the head as he walked by.  Rudolf looked at him
for a moment in acknowledgment, and then turned to stare off into the
distance.  Peregrine wondered what Rudolf schemed himself behind that
nose which glowed so bright.

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

Alex Jellypin Pillowpuff was assembled with all the other elfs in
Santa's factory.  It had been a strange morning; he had entered, and
things were a little\ldots{} off?  They conveyor belts and machinery were
all there, and of course the candy-striped pillars that towered over
the factory floor were there.  But what happened to the tinsel, the
mistletoe, the baubles that decorated the workshop?  They were all
gone.  Some strange posters had taken their place.  One of them showed
a reindeer, flying high above the clouds, and it said:
"ACCOMPLISHMENT: Fly high to meet your dreams."  The poster seemed
sterile and a bit odd.  He guessed it was supposed to be inspiring?

The door opened in the back and he saw Peregrine Greyfeather enter.  A
small shiver went down his spine; Peregrine was not well liked in the
factory.  Alex knew the stories, all the elfs did.  Peregrine gave
him the creeps\ldots{} still, he felt a sort of camaraderie with him, though
he wasn't sure totally why.  He guessed it was the common bond of
being a loner.  But Alex's aspect of being a loner wasn't at all like
Pergrine's; no, not at all.

Alex had always been shy.  He always liked people, and they seemed to
like him?  But he just didn't know how to speak to them.  And it had
gotten worse a couple of years ago, after the horrible accident.
Alex worked on the sewing line; Santa had complimented him often for
his excellent work.  But one day he had a terrible accident with the
strongest, most industrial sewing machine they had.  He didn't like
to think of it, but bits of the story flew through his head anyway.
The needle, piercing his spine.  The excruciating pain.  He had
serious nerve damage, and could barely move his limbs.  He was afraid
he would never be able to work again.

Luckily, one of the clever elfs from the machine shop came up with an
idea; with her help, Alex was fitted with a robotic monkey toy
exoskeleton.  It was a bit goofy looking, and the strange solution
made him even more shy and afraid to talk to his fellow elfs.  But it
did give him amazing, monkey-like agility.  When it didn't go on the
fritz that is.  That barely ever happened though.

Anyway, Peregrine also noticed Alex as he shuffled into the shop.
Peregrine didn't like Alex, but he did pity him a little bit.  He felt
a bit of camaraderie too; they were both workers who had been injured on
the job.  That at least (perhaps subconsciously) did count for
something.

To the back, above, and to the left of the shop was Santa's office,
from which he managed paperwork (mostly ongoing evaluations of naughty
and nice lists).  The door to it opened, and all elfen eyes looked up.
Santa walked down the first half of the stairs and a small landing to
address the crowd.  "Hello my little Elfs!" he bellowed merrily.  "Hi
Santa!" most of the elfs said enthusiastically.  Santa was well liked
generally, he treated his employees well, and\ldots{} well, he had always
been there.  Peregrine rolled his eyes though.  He hated that guy.

Santa was carrying the large red sack over his shoulder he usually
used to carry gifts, but instead of his usual red suit, he wore a
Hawaiian shirt, some khaki pants, and sunglasses.  Behind him strutted
three high elfs, a couple of lackey middle manager looking types and
one that looked a bit spiffier.  There were a few furry white dudes
too\ldots{} two of which looked pretty well built\ldots{} Yetis!  And one in the
back which was extra muscular.  His hair, normally matted, seemed to
have been forced into being tamed for the occasion\ldots{} combed into
place and heavily gelled.  Peregrine recognized that guy\ldots{} wasn't
that the Abominable Snowman, multi-year wrestler?  But now, just
leading a security team for some weaselly high elfs\ldots{} seemed like a
low fall.  Good for him.

"My dear elfs, I have some\ldots{} well, some mixed news.  As you all know,
I'm rather old\ldots{} I've been doing this for a couple thousand years.
It's time for me to retire."  A gasp raised from the crowd.  Even
Peregrine was caught off guard a bit.  "Now now, you'll always be my
children and I care for you dearly\ldots{} but\ldots{} it's time to pass things
on.  Don't worry, I've passed things on to capable hands.  I'm sure
things will be okay for you."  He picked a gold coin out of his sack,
tossed it up in the air and caught it.  "Anyway, it'll definitely be
okay for me.  And so, uh\ldots{} I'm off!"  And with that, Santa ran out of
the room.  The noise of reindeer revving up and taking off was heard
outside and a loud "Whooohooo!" slowly passed off into the distance.

The snazziest looking of the high elfs stepped forward.  "Alright you
chumps, enough of this.  I'm your new boss\ldots{} Frederic Greenhollow.
Things are gonna change around here\ldots{} less play, more work.  We
expect higher returns out of this facility than you've had in the
past.  No more long nights out at the juice bar, we're locking that
down.  I expect higher efficiency out of everyone\ldots{} we'll be pulling
metrics reports on each individual's performance, and we expect you
to rate you and your colleagues.  Those with the lowest performance
rating will be fired.  Sorry, that's business.  Now let's get to
work.  Move move move!"

Most of the elfs were pretty stunned and as such, did not start moving
immediately.  Frederic grumbled something to the yeti patrol and
nodded to his fellow associates.  They walked into Santa's office,
muttering something about how amazing it was that Santa could have
possibly kept this shamble of an operation going for so long.

The yetis began walking down the factory floor, shoving the elfs
about.  "Get to work!  You heard the boss!  You!  Get that machinery
rolling!"  They began shoving elfs left and right, picking up those
who were uncooperative and forcing them in front of their stations,
bellowing menacingly.  Workers began working nervously.

Mr. Abominable made a particularly menacing sweep.  Eventually he
arrived at Alex, who was particularly shocked and horrified by the
unfolding of events.  "YOU!  Get to work!  Start this machine!  Sew
those bears!"  He growled.  But Alex was frozen in place.  The lead
yeti didn't take kindly to this.

"I said, get to work, now get to work!" he growled, attempting a grab
at Alex.  But suddenly, Alex's monkey-enhanced reflexes swooped in,
and he made a quick dodge.  This further enraged
Mr. Abominable\ldots{} he couldn't possibly set a fearsome image if
people were evading his grasp.  "Smart guy eh?  I'll show you\ldots{}" he
said, and raised his arm for another swoop.

While the yeti became enraged, the opposite effect was happening to
Alex.  All eyes were on him and suddenly he felt\ldots{} empowered.
Wonderful.  Important.  And if all of this was suddenly very, very
significant.

As the yeti prepped for another swoop in, Alex used his monkey
maneuvering abilities to dodge under his legs, grabbed his fur from
behind, and scuttled up the yeti's back.  Shocked, the yeti tried to
grab Alex, but failed; his monkey maneuverability was too much.

Suddenly filled with confidence, Alex yelled out to the crowd.

"Citizens!  Workers!  Have we not worked hard for years?  Is this not
the fruit of our labor?  Do they not pluck at our fruit and eat of
it?"

"Get off me, you chump!" growled the yeti.  The other two security
yetis had caught wind of what was happening and were running over
from harassing other elfs to try to assist their boss.

"Workers!  Cast off your chains!  Will you allow these men to come in
and enslave you, to take away what you have built\ldots{} what we have all
built under the roof of Santa's factory?  This is our factory\ldots{} and
we will take it back!"

And with that, a loud "Hurrah!" was yelled, as elfs everywhere across
the factory were thrown into a rebellious fury.  They began picking
up toys off the factory line, tossing them into the air!  Several
elfs began to antagonize the security yetis, making them unable to
come to their boss's aid!

The high elfs stared out the windows of Santa's office.  "What the
hell?" murmured Mr. Greenhollow.

Meanwhile, Peregrine looked around.  He felt somewhat content\ldots{} even
proud of his elfen workers.  Man, they were creating a hell of a
disturbance in here.  He liked it.  But on the other hand, they
seemed to be doing a good enough of a job on their own\ldots{} he wondered
if he couldn't find some more more unique ways to "aid" the situation
in the cafeteria.  He sneaked off that way, thinking himself
unnoticed by the fury of the crowd.

He was mostly\ldots{} though one middle manager did briefly look out the
window and wonder what the hell that guy was doing?  But very quickly
it seemed less important than the riot that was erupting in the
middle of the factory floor so he instead turned to gawk at that.

"You doofuses!" yelled Frederic Greenhollow at his yetis.  "Get those
guys under control!  What do we pay you for, to dance around like a
bunch of clowns?"

At that moment, Alex, who had been riding around on Mr. Abominable's
back like a rodeo clown, was suddenly pulled back to reality as the
yeti caught him in his grasp.

"Wise guy eh?" growled the enraged yeti.  "I'll smash you and your
stupid monkey robot to bits yet\ldots{}" and tossed him across the room.

Alex marveled at what a strong, firm toss it was as he hurtled across
the factory floor, a tumble of rioting elfs beneath him.  But he also
marveled at his monkey agility.  Instead of colliding with the wall
and being crushed, he did a quick save and grabbed on to a passing
pipe and swung around.  He perched on the pipe and grinned, and begun
to scuttle up the wall.

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

Peregrine bust into the cafeteria.  He looked around.  The place was,
predictably, deserted.  The two usual chefs were quickly but nervously
preparing lunch.  As the doors closed behind him, the sheer volume of
the riot crept into the cafeteria for a moment, then closed behind
him.

The two lunch workers looked up nervously and curiously.  They had
been totally cut off from the activities but they had the strict and
important duty of preparing the standard elfen lunch\ldots{} hot cocoa and
gruel with fried eggs, which is what most elfs ate for at least two if
not three meals of the day.  That was one thing Peregrine shared with
his fellow elfs\ldots{} he could never seem to get tired of that meal.

Both of the lunch workers were fairly elderly, the old man was
flipping eggs and stirring gruel, while the old woman was stirring a
large cauldron of hot cocoa with a peppermint stick.  There was water
boiling for another cauldron of hot cocoa, not yet ready though.

"Tell me son, what's going on out there?" said the old woman.  There
were multiple cauldrons boiling.

Normally, Peregrine's bad reputation would have made them suspicious
of conversation with him.  At the moment, he was the only source of
information, and thus they were hanging on his every word.  Plus he
was pretty good at being deceptive.

"Oh, you know\ldots{} just uh, it's taking a bit of getting used to with
the new owners of the factory."

The old couple nodded as if they understood, which they didn't.

"Look, uh, so the bosses want their hot cocoa ASAP.  They've been
negotiating all morning and they said there will be\ldots{} uh, health
inspections soon.  So really, honestly, you'd better catch them on
their good side."

"Oh yes of course!" they said earnestly, fearing a health inspection,
as all cooks do.

"Yes, and uh\ldots{} so I'll need three cups of hot cocoa immediately."
The woman set down three mugs and quickly poured the sweet sticky
liquid into them.  "And uh\ldots{} they said they need that peppermint
stick too.  For inspections."

"This thing?" said the old woman, surprised and confused.  She pulled
the peppermint stick out of the cocoa\ldots{} it was gigantic, almost
elf-sized.  As per elf tradition, all hot cocoa should be stirred with
a peppermint stick.  And if you've ever done this you know what
happens\ldots{} the tip becomes pointy and sharp.  Peregrine grinned to
himself.  A peppermint spear.

"Yes, yes that.  Oh and uh\ldots{} they said to keep it coming.
Nonstop!  There's going to be a conference in here, better start
boiling as much hot cocoa as you can."

"Right.  Right of course!"  The old woman put another cauldron on to
boil and opened a large vat of powdered cocoa.  The air was filled
with a dry dust, and everyone let out a bit of a cough.  Peregrine
wondered how the high elfs would react to the cheap stuff.  Well, who
else is going to bring them drinks at this point?

Peregrine checked his pockets\ldots{} growing up an insidious prankster,
he usually kept on him\ldots{} did he have it?\ldots{} yes!  Extra strength
laxatives!  He put one into each cup.  As an afterthought he poured
the rest of the bottle into the currently bubbling cauldron.

Peregrine slung the peppermint spear over his shoulder, picked up the
mugs of cocoa, and sauntered back into the factory floor.  Things were
a real shitstorm in here now it looked like.  The yetis were having a
hard time keeping things under control, though for the most part, it
was scuffling, not real violence.  He walked up the stairs and knocked
on the door.  "Hey, you guys ordered some hot cocoa?"

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

Meanwhile, on the far right of the room, Alex had shuffled over to
some of the storage shelves where some of the finished toys were ready
for shipping.  The yetis seemed to be getting tired and more angry
with all the scuffling.  One of them finally lost it and let a
powerful blow fly across the face of one of the elfs, and he was
knocked down, unconscious.  Alex decided it was time to see if he
could capitalize on this moment.

"Citizens!  Do you not see the violent oppression of the workers of our
dear factory?  Our oppressors have shown they are not afraid to use
force\ldots{} we cannot hold back any longer\ldots{} we must tear the slavers
down!"  A loud "hurrah!" was heard across the floor as things turned
into a violent rage.

Flicking another elf off his shoulder, Mr. Abominable signaled to his
fellow yetis.  "You guys stay here and get these elfs under control.
I'm going after that monkey over there."  He began to run across to
the other side of the factory.

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

Back at the office, one of the high elfs opened the door.  "Cocoa?
Thanks.  Wait a minute\ldots{} didn't I see you just walk off the floor
into the other room?"

"Yeah, of course, because your boss sent me," Peregrine said with a
serious glower.

"Oh yes\ldots{} well of course, well\ldots{} come in already," he said, looking
nervously at the swarm of elfs outside.  Better not leave this door
open for too long.

"Who's that?" asked Frederic.

"Uh, he's the guy you sent out for cocoa, Mr. Greenhollow?"

"Oh yes, uh, of course.  Thanks."  Mr. Greenhollow and his associates
all took their mugs of coffee and sipped at it.  "Hm.  This stuff's
not bad.  Where's the marshmallows though?  No matter."

All of the high elfs were staring wide-eyed out the window.
Mr. Greenhollow was indignant.  He'd never had an acquisition go down
like this.  What did these low-lifes think they were doing?  He was
also a bit nervous\ldots{} what would he say to his investors?

"Santa's going to pay for this.  He gave us a bum deal, and I bet he
knew it\ldots{}" Mr. Greenhollow grumbled.  Peregrine liked the idea of
Santa paying for it, anyway.

Greenhollow flicked his phone open.  "We can't let this thing drag on
like this.  We gotta pull out some reinforcements."  He barked some
orders onto his phone.  "Don't worry, the ice men will be here in a
few minutes.  We'll get this place under control."

One of the guys pointed at Alex.  "Who's that monkey?  It looks like
he's at the heart of this whole operation\ldots{}"

"Hm," muttered Mr. Greenhollow.  "I don't recognize him\ldots{} but I bet
he's on the naughty list\ldots{} where is that thing?"

At this point Peregrine realized that his cover of hanging out in this
room was pretty much doomed no matter what.  The naughty list was
printed on a long cylinder of paper, and of course his name and
photograph were close to the bottom\ldots{} only one thing to do\ldots{} he
needed to get out of here\ldots{} and why not take the evidence with him?

Before anyone realized what the hell he was doing, Peregrine grabbed
the bottom of the naughty list and jumped out the window.  One of the
elfs almost grabbed him, but he suddenly realized he had a lot less
control over his bowels in this situation than he had believed.

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

Shoving elfs aside by the armful and avoiding tiny toy swords and
whatever improvised weapons the elfs could come up with,
Mr. Abominable finally managed to get to the other end of the
factory.  Alex, on the shelf high above him, had just opened up the
box to see if he could find any improvisational weapons inside.
Unfortunately, the box's contents couldn't be more useless\ldots{} teddy
bears, fuzzy pillows and rubber ducks!  Come on.

"Get down from there!" growled Mr. Abominable.

"Make me!" said Alex, and dumped the whole box over from overhead.
The yeti ducked out of the way.

"Oh I will\ldots{} I'll pound that wall down if you don't\ldots{}"

He turned around though at the sound of a large amount of commotion.
A elf with some strange, shimmering disfigurements had just jumped
out of a window of Santa's office holding some long sheet of what
appeared to be some kind of durable paper, the resistance of which
allowed him to slide down apparently safely.  This, as the reader
knows, was of course Peregrine.

Peregrine had a slightly delirious chuckle to himself, amazed that his
move worked, as he began to run across the floor of the factory,
ducking from factory table to factory table.  Man, things were getting
really crazy out here.  There were a bunch of unconscious elfs, and he
hopped over the knocked out body of one of the yeti security guards.
His original intent was to loop it across some of these pillars in
front of the factory, loop around, head to the cafeteria, then set
the whole sheet on fire (as a pyromaniac, he always some such
equipment with him).  Unfortunately, in his manic run, he didn't
manage to notice Mr. Abominable until he nearly bumped into him.

"Uh, hello\ldots{}" said Peregrine.

"You.  Are you also responsible for this?  Are you conspiring with
this guy?"

"Uh, I don't know\ldots{} am I?"

Mr. Abominable swung at him.  Peregrine tried to defend with his
peppermint spear, but Mr. Abominable's swing simply broke it in half.
Peregrine scrambled for the remaining pointy end, now shaped a bit
more like a worn down stub of a pencil.  He was glad it wasn't him
that was smashed in half.

Meanwhile Alex dropped another box on the yeti's head.  This one
connected, and appeared to daze him.  The box spilled open\ldots{} more
rubber ducks and stuffed animals.

"Augh, I'll kill the both of you!" he yelled.  He took another swing
at Peregrine with his fists, but dazed by the box that had fallen on
his head, his swing missed.

Peregrine decided it was time to put that attunement with the pixie
dust to use.  He summoned his inner thoughts and\ldots{} the toys picked
themselves off the floor.

"What the hell?" yelled Mr. Abominable as a tiny swarm of stuffed
animals and rubber ducks began to crawl all over his body.  He tried
to pull them off furiously, but there were just too many of them.

Alex looked in the next box.  Jackpot.  This one had tiny army men
and little catapults in them\ldots{} and some marbles.  Oh yes\ldots{}

While Mr. Abominable was distracted with the toys that covered his
body, Peregrine came up with a new use for the naughty list.  He
began circling Mr. Abominable with it.  Mr. Abominable, with tiny
stuffed animals all over his body and some even crawling along his
face, failed to realize in time the mummification that was happening
to his body.  He fell over, covered, and seemingly unable to escape
the tough paper.  Peregrine rolled his body around until he had him
in a nice cocoon.

Peregrine looked around.  Holy cow, the two yeti security guards were
down!  And well\ldots{} so were two thirds of the elfs that had been on the
factory floor.

The high elfs stepped out of their office.  "What are you doing?
Stop at once!  I'll have you all fired!  Hell\ldots{} you're already
fired!  I'll have you tossed in prison!" 

Peregrine decided now might be a nice time to make good use of that
"setting things on fire" idea.  So he did.  He lit the naughty list
on fire, which began to spread across the factory floor.

It also caught Mr. Abominable's cocooned body.  He burned, screaming
and writhing like a tiny incapable mummy.  Peregrine was amazed.  He
also almost felt bad.  Nah, not enough time.

Oh shoot, the fire also started to cover some of the bodies of the
unconscious elfs and the yeti security guards.  Some of the
still-living elfs struggled to try to pull their unconscious friends
to safety\ldots{} and got most of them.

Alex meanwhile had been pretty impressed with the apparent abilities
of Peregrine.  And it was obvious to him\ldots{} of course\ldots{} the pixie
contamination!  The pixie dust!  The terrible, horrible injuries!

He wondered if Peregrine could do some more awesome things with these
action figures and catapults.  No sense in asking, might as well just
add to the situation!  He successfully tossed and scattered the toys
across the room.  He pocketed the marbles though.

The fire spread, and reached the office.  The high elfs nervously
shuffled away from the stairs.

"Citizens!" yelled Alex to the remaining elfs.  "Look upon your
oppressors, look upon what they've done to you!  Get them!"

The remaining elfs had a quick scuffle with the high elfs\ldots{} it ended
quickly.  The two middle managers were knocked out, but so were all
the worker elfs except one.  Frederic was unscathed.

"You," he said, turning to the last elf.  "You thought you could rise
up against me, hm?  Look at your friends, do you want the same to
happen to you?"  The last elf looked in horror and pleaded, oh god,
I'm so sorry to have rebelled, and begged not to be sacked from his job.

The fire spread.  As the flames licked up various unconscious bodies a
roasting smell covered the floor.  It began to smell faintly of
roasted meat.  The cooks walked out of the cafeteria and asked, "Hey,
what's going on out here, I thought that we ate food in the\ldots{} oh my
god!"

Alex suddenly realized that he had cornered himself on the ceiling of
a burning building\ldots{} he tried to quietly descend and started
wondering where exits might be.  Unfortunately around this time, his
monkey exoskeleton, which barely ever fails, failed, and he crashed
to the floor.

"Where the hell are our reinforcements?" yelled Mr. Greenhollow.

And at that point, the door burst open.

"Freeze, nobody move!  Or we'll ice you!" yelled a team of ten of the
snowman hit squad.  They pointed their dry-ice firing guns in all
directions.

"Oh god damnit," said the one in front, looking at the fire.

"Gentlemen!" cried Mr. Greenhollow.  "These two individuals have
started this ruckus!  Do them in at once!"

Alex surveyed his situation and decided there was no way they could
do good in here.  But how could they get to the cafeteria?  The old
folks and Mr. Greenhollow were at the door\ldots{}

"Mr. and Mrs\ldots{} cafeteria people.  This man has done us in!  Look at
what he has done to all of us!  Your fellow workers!  He intends to
kill us!  Defend us!"

The cafeteria people looked around nervously, then raised their
weapons\ldots{} the old man held a frying pan, and the old woman
held\ldots{} well, a ladle.  Caught up in the insanity of the moment, and
roused by they didn't even know what, they looked to strike down the
foreigner, but\ldots{}

Mr. Greenhollow swung with an investor's rage.  The fury of being
taken out by these nitwits\ldots{} imagining this whole thing going up in
smoke\ldots{} it was all too much.  He swung quickly at the old couple and
knocked them to the ground.

The remaining worker elf, not sure whose side he was on at all
anymore, snuck out into the cafeteria.

"Hey my arm's melting," said the snowman in the front of the squad.
They backed off a bit more.  The gun fell out of his hand.

"You doofuses!  Fire at them!  Or fine\ldots{} I'll do it myself!"  And
with that, Mr. Greenhollow pulled what appeared to be an executive
pen from his pocket, and removed the tip\ldots{} there was a small blade
inside.  He tossed the tiny, golden knife at Peregrine\ldots{} and struck
him in the arm.

Peregrine looked down.  There was a knife lodged in his arm\ldots{} but
luckily it hit him in one of his injuries that he was completely numb
to.  A wound opened, and pixie toxins trickled onto the floor.

"Hey, uh, is this stuff flammable?" asked Alex.

"Yeah, extremely.  Why?" answered Peregrine.

"Oh, uh.. because this."  He pulled the marbles from his pocket,
rolled them in the pixie toxins, and passed them over and across the
firewall.  They passed through the fire, and as they did, morphed
into enormous fireballs.

"Dang," said the lead snowman, just before a large fireball melted
through his face.  The cascade of fireballs tore through the snowmen,
leaving tiny puddles behind.

Just a moment before, Frederic Greenhollow had madness in his eyes.  A
complete and total loss.  On the very day of accquisition!  But as the
snowmen melted, so did his courage.  He looked across the burning
factory, realizing that these two elfs had undone everything about
this place, and so too would they undo him.

And that's when he became a gibbering buffoon.

"Oh, uh, hey, uh\ldots{} oh shit."

Peregrine Greyfeather and Alex Jellypin Pillowpuff closed in.

"Hey, uh\ldots{} we can talk about this right?  What\ldots{} what do you guys
want?  Do you want\ldots{} promotions?"

Silhouetted against a burning factory, they continued to walk closer.

"Uh, the factory?  Do you want to run the factory?"

They inched in closer.

"Look\ldots{} you and I\ldots{} we have some things\ldots{} I'm not too far off!
Don't tell anyone\ldots{} my father was like you you know!  Came from
lower blood\ldots{} pulled himself up by his bootstraps!  You can aspire
to great things too!"

Mr. Greenhollow realized that he probably just dug himself deeper.  He
turned, tried to run to the cafeteria and skidded as he toppled
through the door.

Alex turned to Peregrine.  "We really should clean these up.  We
can't let this factory burn like this.  We can't let those innocent
people burn like this."

Peregrine looked like the factory.  Hm, well, I mean they were doing a
pretty good job of burning though, why ruin a beautiful thing like
that?

"We can't let ourselves burn like this either."

Good point.

Peregrine used his pixie-connection to summon the toys across the
room.  They sprung to life.  Peregrine gave orders: the toy soldiers
would carry the stuffed animals, dump them into the hot chocolate from
the cafeteria, load them onto the catapults, then shoot them into the
fire.  It was a goofy idea, but somehow, it worked.  And they didn't
have time to question the logic of such a solution actually
functioning\ldots{} it was time to have a sit-down with Mr. Greenhollow.

\rule{\linewidth}{0.5pt}

In the cafeteria, as the army of toys worked their literal-magic
putting out the fire, they worked out details with Mr. Greenhollow.
It took a lot of persuading but Alex eventually persuaded Peregrine to
not just feed Mr. Greenhollow to the reindeer.  He'd have a more
fitting end being disgraced instead.  They agreed, to the best they
could, that they would use this as an opportunity\ldots{} Christmas would
have to be missed this year, but next year would be better than
ever.  They would rebuild, and it would become a true elftopia; an
operation run for the elfs, by the elfs.  (The reality would turn out
better than they imagined\ldots{} and Peregrine, in his hero status, came
to find that actually maybe he even could like people, if they gave
him enough space, and didn't look down on him.)

Besides, Frederic Greenhollow had a worse fate for him\ldots{} he didn't
realize it at the time, but the future he had before him, returning
with this failed venture, with his career literally having gone up in
flames, in total disgrace\ldots{} death would have been a easier option,
really.

Peregrine Greyfeather and Alex Jellypin Pillowpuff lead Frederic
Greenhollow out of the factory.  They stripped off his fancy suit,
down to the barest of clothes, and lead him over to the reindeer
shed.  Frederic stubled through the snow, shivering.

"Are you\ldots{} are you going to give me a sleigh ride home?"

"Oh no," said Peregrine.  "I'm afraid we can't afford that with all
the losses we've been having\ldots{} have to keep our remaining assets
close\ldots{} as a businessman, I'm sure you understand."  Peregrine walked
into the shed, and there was a click as one of the shackles unlocked.

Peregrine stepped out, and he and Alex began the walk back to the
still smoldering building.  From the darkness of the shed, there was a
step, and another step\ldots{} a lone animal stepped out, cloaked in
shadow, except for a pulsating red.

"No sleigh for you I'm afraid, but you won't be alone," Peregrine
called over his shoulder.  "Rudolf, with his nose so bright\ldots{} he will
guide you home tonight."

\begin{quote}
This story is released under \href{http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/}{CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported}.  Have fun!
\end{quote}
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\end{document}
