Death, the Devil, and the Goldfish (32 page)

Celina pushed the PA SYS button on the phone and hit
play
on the computers CD player.

The Macarena was an amazingly popular Spanish dance craze that was quickly adopted by the rest of the world, and for a long period of time, no one could go to a wedding, night club, bar mitzvah, house party, disco, or birthday party without hearing its infectious beat. It consisted of a simple techno beat, with fast lyrics topped off with
Ehhhhh, Macarena
accompanied by a repetitive sort of line dance. Instructions for the dance were as follows:

One places his/her arms forward, palm down, right arm, then left arm.

Then the dancer turns his arms over so that the palms are up, first right, then left.

The dancer puts his hands on his shoulders, first right hand on left shoulder, then left on right.

Then the dancer puts his hands on the back of his head, again right, then left.

The dancer then places his arms on his hips, right hand on left hip, then left on right.

Then the dancer's hands go onto the respective hips or rear end, right then left.

The routine finishes with a pelvic rotation in time with the line,
Ehhhh, Macarena
!

Then the dancer jumps 90 degrees counter-clockwise and repeats the same motions throughout the entire song.

This world famous song pumped out of the loudspeakers in the corners of the warehouse, and with the gentle urging of Nigel's mind the elves began to dance.

"What is all this? I demand an answer." The Devil’s voice got louder. "Stop it all of you, stop it, I command you to stop!" screamed the Devil at the elves, who were all line dancing together.

"Plug it in, plug it in now!" He shouted at Itch and Big Ernie, who stood on either side of the Santa Claus.

They each plugged a wire into the Santa Claus' ears, which caused a loud electrical
crack.
The Santa Claus unit began to shake. Itch and Big Ernie ran as fast as possible back toward their side of the warehouse in order to get closer to the door, in case they had to make a quick getaway. Big Ernie didn't quite make it all the way there, as he tripped over a large black box that had a tiny clock on it.

Nigel smiled at Death, who nodded back. The plan was not an intricate one, by any means. At Nigel's insistence, Death had explained the rules of possession. If the possessor became dislodged from the body, it needed to find a host quickly. If the body the possessor had possessed died, then the possessor would die with it. The last request in Heinrich's letter to Nigel had troubled him for a while—
if you see any black cats, kick them as hard as possible
—until Death managed to clarify a few things. And so they formulated the plan: takeover the elves, thereby distracting the Devil; kick the cat to dislodge the Devil, who would then possess the Santa Claus unit.

Death had assured Nigel that he would handle the Devil from there, but wouldn't elaborate anymore than that.

Nigel had to keep looking at Death to keep from forgetting who he was, but so far it was all going according to plan.

The Devil grinned maniacally as the Santa Claus came to life in a shower of sparks and electricity.

2m 2s

Big Ernie rubbed his shin where he'd tripped over the box. Itch had returned to help the large man to his feet when he noticed the box that Big Ernie had tripped over. Itch's mind went from confusion, to fear, to blind panic in less time than it takes an albino to get a sunburn.

"It's a bomb," he whimpered.

1m48s

The Devil's plan was to have the large insipid ape called Big Ernie kick him as hard as possible in order to dislodge himself from the cat's body. His two apes looked panicked on the other side of the warehouse, and the Devil was running out of time. He turned to the elf closest to him who was dancing happily.

"You! Elf!"

The elf jumped to its left and carried on dancing.

"Listen to me!"

The elf put both hands out in front of him, and then crossed them over his chest while his little hips wiggled.

"Dammit all to hell," said the Devil, "someone kick me!"

1m27s

Nigel lined up the kick and took himself back to his secondary school days when he played forward for his school's soccer team. He wasn't exactly fond of abusing animals but the thought of telling the story of how he kicked the Devil was an amusing one. He took a few quick steps to where the Devil stood, then kicked him clear across the warehouse.

Somewhere in mid-air, the Devil's spirit separated from the cat and fell directly into the Santa Claus as the unit suddenly sat bolt upright. The cat that was once again just Fuzzbucket, and no longer possessed by Satan, wondered why it was flying through the air. It landed in Itch's arms as the two criminals turned and ran from the warehouse.

1m00s

Outside Majestic Technologies, a cab pulled up, and out hopped Chester, after paying a generous amount of money to Rupert, who had decided to call it a night. Chester was examining the damaged security gate when he was knocked over for the second time in the last hour as a large man and a small man carrying a cat collided with him.

0m31s

"I'm alive! I'm alive!" screamed the Devil's voice from the Santa Claus unit.

Nigel was back standing next to Death, observing the strange situation. Every elf happily danced to the Macarena, Santa Claus rose up on the table screaming that he was happy to be alive, and the Angel of Death stood next to Nigel.

"Okay," said Nigel, turning to Death, "what now?"

Death looked at his wrist as if there was a watch there, and smiled mischievously. "Time for me to go."

"What?" said Nigel.

Death placed a hand on Nigel's shoulder.

"It'll all be okay. But this part might hurt a little. Actually it's going to hurt a lot. See ya soon."

And with that, Death vanished in a flash of blinding light.

Gerald, upset that his friend had just vanished, ran out from his hiding place, closely followed by Celina, who had refused to sit idly in the office for any longer.

"What just happened?" shouted Celina to Nigel.

Nigel just looked at her as if someone had slapped him with a wet fish. The look of confusion was clear.

Eggnog was still busy acting as a power source to the computer, speakers, and the PA system when a new directive flung itself into his data processing unit. It was simple, straightforward, and Eggnog accomplished it in just under eleven seconds. It said,
hide in a filing cabinet
.

0m11s