Tiger Claus

The tiger poured the hot coffee form his pot into the Lyre City Zoo souvenir mug he had purchased on a previous visit there. The coffee swirled up a light tan color, it having mixed with the cream and sugar he had placed in the bottom of the cup. Smiling into the hot liquid, he sipped. Perfect. He collapsed onto his sofa, his mind awash once again with thoughts of the earlier year. It had been a busy year full of both happy and sad moments. He jumped up at the sudden thunking at the door. He scowled at the thing as whoever was there knocked again. Then he remembered he was suppose to be being cheery, struggled up a smile, and opened the door. No one was there.

Or so he thought, until he looked down. Two small humans stood there, in green elf outfits. Children, selling something for school or some club of theirs. Ah well, he was sure buying a box of cookies or whatever wouldn't hurt his figure much more. "Hello, how are you today?"

"Can we come inside?" One asked.

A reasonable question, given the snow upon the ground. He glanced around for the children's parents. His own mother would have been hot on his heels terrified at the concept of him entering a stranger's home when he was a child. Parents today. But his sense of hospitality won out over the fear he had he'd end up handcuffed being charged with child abduction and he let them in.

They entered, visibly relieved at the warmth. "May we have some coffee?" the two seemed quite jittery, as though coffee would be a bad idea. "Or tea. For the love of all things jolly, just not cocoa." The tiger's eyes widened as he looked over the green clad short people. Their proportions were all wrong for children. And the pointed ears...

"You're elves!"

"Faster than most get it." The woman elf smiled.

"But... but... you don't exist." The two elves simply stared at the five and a half foot tall bipedal talking tiger. "Point. Tea, then?"

Minutes later the three sat about his den sipping at their hot beverages. "My name is Jingles McGee, and this is my cohort Tinsel Smith." The male replied smiling. The two shifted about the couch. "We're here because the big man has decided to branch out."

"Branch out?"

"Well, the whole bribing children to be good all year has kind of hit an issue the past few years." Tinsel Smith looked solemnly down into her tea.

"There haven't been as many good kids?"

"Oh, there are still lots of good children."

"Here," Jingles held out an envelope, "look for yourself."

The tiger took it slowly, feeling guilty about reading some child's private correspondence with Santa Claus. But he proceeded at the urging of the elves.

Dear Santa:

I have been good all year long. I helped my mommy with her dishes, my daddy shovel the snow. I brushed my teeth everyday, cleaned my room, and made my bed. I even helped Jim with his science homework and Jim is mean to me.

I'd like an Xbox, a Playstation, a Wii, a Furby, an iPhone, and a DS. You don't have to get me everything, I don't want to be greedy. But any of those you can get me would be much appreciated.

I'll leave out cookies and milk and carrots for your Reindeer.

Love,

Mary Beth

The tiger didn't quite get the issue. "What's the issue?"

"Those are all name brand products! We can't make those!" Jingles shouted. "That would be copyright, trademark, patent, and Santa knows what else infringement. Nobody wants a handmade wooden train anymore! When we try to give one on 'its the thought that counts, well, let's just say that letter was from last year. Here's this year's letter."

Dear Santa

Fuck you. Two years ago I was as good as I possibly could fucking be, and you gave me this fucking piece of shit wooden train. I fucking hate you and your fucking elves and fucking reindeer. I'm going to be on my roof with my daddy's shotgun ready to blow you out of the sky and have venison for a decade if you come around here.

Fuck you,

Mary Beth.

"Wow. Kid's today," the tiger stared.

"Not just today, this letter was from a few years back." The tiger took the third envelope.

Dear Santa,

I'd really like a Deluxe Power Ranger's Megazord for Christmas. If you don't bring it, I'll boobytrap my yard with landmines and gernades next year when you come.

Love,

Tygacat Ebni

The tiger blushed through his fur, 'um, uh.'

"Brought that in case you got a bit too self-righteous,' Tinsel winked.

"Sorry."

"Don't worry about it. We only care about the last year, and you've been quite nice this year," Jingles smiled. "Anyway, Santa has been making plans to fight back, over the past few years he's sent elves to tech schools,... And this is the result: The S-Can!" The elf pulled from Santa knows where a large red cylinder with a gold pattern on the ends. "It has 8gigs of ram, 2 terabytes of hard memory, solid state core, plays games from disks, cartridges, and SD cards, and even makes cocoa! Over a hundred games have been developed from Grand Theft Sleigh to Toy Factory Tycoon!"

"Can we play it?" The tiger's eyes glistened.

"No, neither of us knows how to turn it on." Jingles dropped it to the floor. It broke in half and computer parts shattered on the floor. "It also breaks easy. Santa figures he can release structural integrity as a patch next year."

"Anyway," Tinsel interupted before the tiger could question that last sentence. "We are with the group of elves who kind of thought this whole electricity thing was just a fad. So, yeah, we've kind of been sitting on our hands for a while. But after talking with Santa, he had an idea. See, there are lots of adults out there who are nice, but they like a certain... kind of toy." The tiger's eyes widened. "We call it the nice but still naughty list." Tinsel pulled a massive scroll from, once again, only Santa knows where.

"And that's where you come in," Jingles took over. "See, the lot of us have started making the, uh, toys. But we need someone to deliver them. Santa himself doesn't want to do it for image reasons. So we were sent to find someone to do the delivery."

"You want me to deliver sex toys on Christmas Eve?"

"Yup!" they said in unison.

"But, why me."

"Well, we had compiled a large list of people who would potentially do the job, being they wouldn't likely object, were dependable, and weren't doing anything else on Christmas Eve. And yours was the only name and address we remembered after Jingles dropped the thing in the ocean," Tinsel scowled at the blushing male elf.

"That being said, you can try to debate it all you want but we all know you'll do it in the end. So you may as well just agree now and save us all time," Jingles sneered.

The tiger had wanted to argure, but already in his heart he knew the elves were right. "Okay."

"Sweet. Let's get to the sleigh!"

"Where?"

"On the roof, duh. Surprised you didn't hear it land." A few moments later the tiger stood on his small flat roof looking at a large red sleigh. "This will be yours," Tinsel beamed. Attached to the sleigh, however, were not the expected reindeer.

"Those..." the tiger began.

"We figured the most appropriate beast of burden for delivering sex toys to furries..."

"Would be sparkle dogs."

The large bright spotted hounds glittered in the sunlight. "At least we won't have need for a Rudolf."

"Nope."

"Now, let's get you in the sleigh. We need to get going. There's still a lot to do. You need to be briefed on ideal routes for traveling the full world in one night, safe chimney flue procedures, and proper jolly laughing technique."

"And you still need to check the list and check it twice."

The tiger sighed. "Okay" He thought, "but I'm not wearing red."

"We figured as much." The two elves leaned over the edge of the sleigh and pulled from it a large green velvet coat with white fluff down the middle and about the cuffs.

"Wow," the tiger tried it on, it felt better than any garment he'd ever worn. He sat in the sleigh and looked about, "Are there, seatbelts?"

"Nope."

He suddenly remembered his anxiety towards flying. "Um, perhaps I should get my..."

"No time. Up Up!" Jingles shouted.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!" the tiger screamed as the sleigh leapt into the air.