Don't Gift Your Other Self
By Paul Lewthwaite
The letters kept piling up, a snowdrift of envelopes, overspilling his letterbox. Santa groaned. Once they were a joy, but now? No doubt the little buggers used AI to write them.
I want the latest games console and a drone that can fire missiles and a toy car that’s as big as a real one…
What had happened to all the good children? The ones that used to ask for a model plane, or a baby doll that peed when you pressed its belly button?
They’d grown up to be replaced with avaricious little clones.
This year he’d show ‘em.
Package everything like the real thing, but inside each, their nightmares or darkest secrets, courtesy of a Krampus spell he’d bought last year.
So he programmed his gift machine with all the rotten bits of kids worldwide, and fed it a gloop of elf souls for good measure. Too many of the pompous, union-oriented little pricks, anyway. He winced as he cut a finger on a sharp edge; a drop of blood fell into the mix. No worries. He sucked the wound, humming a dirge.
A few hours later, his boxes were ready. Warm, flesh-covered parcels that fitted into the palm of his hand. With a little rub, they’d expand, assuming the gift-wrapped outward appearance of a present.
One stood out. Too red, reeking of rotten meat. He caressed it. It ballooned into a packaged top-tier sleigh. He ripped it open, then staggered back.
A withered likeness of himself rose from the tomb-like interior. Sharp ribs poked through threadbare clothes. Mottled skin stretched tight over its skull. A sparse, matted beard clung to bone. The dead-eyed thing lurched toward him, gaunt arms outstretched.
“Kids only pretend to believe in you,” it whispered, hands clasped around his throat. “Time to retire.”
Paul Lewthwaite lives in Scotland with his wife and a small, all-powerful feline companion. His stories have appeared at Crepuscular, 100-Foot Crow, Dark Moments and others.