The North Pole Challenge (Flea's Five Christmases, #1) (17 page)

             
“Whoa, that laser looks pretty cool,” Flea said. “Your job can’t be all that bad if you get to play with that thing.”

             
Flea knew that Minko didn’t like his job so he said this to make his new friend feel better about working down here. Unfortunately, his words had the opposite effect and Minko frowned. He walked across the room and pushed the power button on the machine, thus shutting off the laser. This also brought the conveyor belt to a total standstill.

             
“Actually, I get to use something a little less interesting than a laser,” Minko said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out two pens, one of which he handed over to Flea. “The laser-writer is my replacement whenever I’m not here.”

             
Minko rolled a pair of chairs over to the conveyor belt and turned on a television monitor located on the wall just in front of them. Flea didn’t think that working would be so bad if they could watch TV but it soon became apparent that there were no shows for them to watch. Instead, the name ‘Edward’ appeared on the screen. Minko picked up the first wrapped-present and located the blank card taped to it.

             
“The name on the screen corresponds to the name we write in the card,” Minko said, as he printed the name ‘Edward’ in much neater handwriting than Flea expected from him. “Just make sure your writing is legible or else there could be mix-ups during deliveries. Also, be sure to keep up. There are a lot of cards to write and if we go too slow, then the present tunnels can get clogged with packages.”

             
Flea nodded his head in understanding. He grabbed the first present and hurriedly wrote ‘Edward’, which he did on dozens of subsequent gifts as the name continued to stay on the monitor.

             
“As you’ll see, some kids are more spoiled than others,” Minko said.

             
Flea hurried to keep up with the never-ending supply of gifts. He struggled to stay concentrated on writing neatly and spelling names correctly while trying to find the tiny cards on some of the larger boxes. Minko was moving slower than usual and while he didn’t pester Flea to hurry, he whistled Christmas songs every time Flea started to fall behind. Flea barely worked for twenty minutes before his hand started to cramp and his writing suffered. Eventually, Flea pushed away from the conveyor belt and let Minko take over on his own, as the pudgy elf accomplished more by himself than when the two worked together.

             
“I don’t understand, if a machine can just write out all the cards, why waste your time doing this?” Flea asked while he massaged his hand.

             
Flea spoke mostly out of frustration and didn’t intend to sound so demeaning, but Minko became visibly upset.

             
“Because I’m an
elf
and I’m not allowed to build in the toy factory,” he said quietly. “So if writing names in cards is the only way I can contribute to Christmas, then that’s what I’ll do, even if I’m stuck down here for several
more
centuries.”

             
Several more centuries?
Flea wondered. He knew that Minko was older than Niko but the pudgy elf’s personality made him seem very young. Still, if Minko really had spent centuries down here, then Flea’s assumption of his age was way off.

             
“How old
are
you?” he asked, too curious to stop himself from asking such a personal question.

             
“I’m not
that
old, jeez,” Minko said. “In fact, I’m one of the youngest elves at the North Pole – not even a hundred years old yet. But I guess seventy years of being the worst elf in the North Pole isn’t very impressive.”

             
“Don’t worry, things will get better for you,” Flea said.

Flea sensed a deeper pain in his new friend and swore to himself that he would do everything possible to get Minko out of this hole in the ground. Flea didn’t quite know what else to say so he picked up his pen and rolled back over to the conveyor belt, where the two continued to work in silence.

-         -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -        -        -

              Filling out name cards was possibly the worst boredom Flea ever had to endure. The two worked and worked and worked and Flea quickly lost track of time as the presents continued to stream in and out of the tiny underground room. Fatigue began to seriously wear him down but he continued to fight through the pain for as long as he could. But once his work began to suffer, Flea could no longer work in silence and he asked how long they’d been writing.

             
“Only about ten hours,” Minko said, his voice still sounding somewhat downtrodden yet totally fresh, as though he’d only begun writing a few minutes earlier. “But if you’re too tired to continue, you should go back to the dorms and get some rest. Don’t worry, I can handle this on my own…it wouldn’t be the first time.”

             
Flea hated to abandon a job that wasn’t complete but knew there was just no way he could be much help anymore. He promised Minko that he would return after taking a quick nap. He trudged back to the surface and headed toward the elf dormitory, too tired to enjoy his surroundings. At one point, Flea spotted Niko heading toward Santa’s cabin at the back of the North Pole. Flea stopped and waited to see if Santa would emerge from the cabin but he didn’t. Instead, Niko walked through the front door. Flea wanted to go and introduce himself to Santa Claus – he wanted to see him in person and thank him for giving permission to be here – but was too tired to walk all the way over there. Besides, Flea thought twice about overstepping his boundaries so soon.

             
The North Pole was still mostly empty but once he reached the dorm’s huge lobby, he spotted a few elves riding the icy roller coaster. Flea stopped in front of the ‘hopwell’ but didn’t have the energy to bounce all the way up to his floor, especially since he didn’t know exactly which floor he was supposed to be on. Instead, he stumbled over to the canon elevator and climbed inside, despite how much he hated the insane ride he was about to take. He sat in the seat and pressed his palm against the hand plate, thus shooting himself through the air. Flea again feared that he would splat against the wall but he soared straight into an opening. He slid through the chute and didn’t wipe out nearly as bad as the first time.

             
He walked down the hallway and hopelessly tried to recognize the door to his room, though everything still looked exactly the same. He got about halfway down the hall before again realizing that he should have counted the doors, yet he was too tired to turn around and go back. Eventually, Flea became so desperate that he started opening doors at random. He stumbled into dozens of wrong rooms, nearly all of which were filled with the newest and coolest toys. Only one room was different, as it looked strangely like a museum dedicated to simple, old-fashioned toys, at least those that weren’t broken and littering the floor.

Fortunately, Flea didn’t have much time to think about the strange room because he opened the next door and finally found an empty room. He saw his old clothes lying on the floor and was so relieved that he crashed onto his bed. Within seconds, Flea was passed out, without having removed a single article of his elf outfit. His shoes
jingled
and
jangled
every time he rolled over in his sleep…

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Red-Robe

Flea awoke to a pounding on the door, the same pounding noise that Miss Mabel usually made to get him up in the morning for school. Flea was so tired that his eyes refused to budge, his mind begging him to drift back to sleep.

              “Just a few more minutes, Miss Mabel,” Flea muttered, though the pounding continued, increasing in intensity so that Flea almost expected the door to break in half. He suddenly remembered his vivid dream of the North Pole and his eyes snapped open. The brightly-colored walls of the big empty room made Flea quickly realize that this was no dream. He climbed out of bed and found that his cloth elf-shoes must have fallen off when he was sleeping. Flea tried to grab the door handle but he could hardly grip it because his hand was so cramped. When he opened the door, he saw Minko standing there, looking frantic.

             
“Thank Claus you’re here, I was starting to get worried,” Minko said. “I thought you might’ve tried to leave the North Pole after our card-writing party.”

             
“How long ago was that?” Flea wondered, as he rubbed his eyes and massaged his hand. He felt so tired that he was convinced his new friend had let him nap for only an hour or two. Minko rolled up his sleeve and looked down at his wrist, though he wore no watch.

             
“About twenty hours, give or take a few,” Minko said. “I got a
lot
of work done in that time.”

             
Flea was shocked that anyone could work so many hours in a row and still look as awake and energetic as Minko.

             
“But never mind that, you have to hurry up and come with me,” Minko said, grabbing Flea’s wrist and pulling him into the hallway. Flea stopped Minko and pointed to his feet.

             
“I need to put on some shoes and change my clothes,” he said, not wanting to take the risk of anyone else seeing him in this ridiculous outfit.

             
“Okay, you can get your shoes but there’s no time for you to change,” Minko said frantically. “We waited for you in the classroom for half an hour before Vork sent me to find you. I’m afraid he might postpone our lesson or cancel altogether if we don’t get back soon.”

             
This information instantly brought Flea to full alertness, as he felt terrible for causing yet another problem. He rushed into his room but bypassed the elf shoes for his usual beat-up sneakers.

             
“I’m sorry, I had no idea that we had class right now,” Flea said as he pulled on the sneakers over his high golden socks. “How did you find out about it?”

             
“Niko came and told me, I’m sure he went to the factory to let Rome know, too. He didn’t come here?”

             
“No, I’m starting to get the feeling like he’s trying to stop me from doing well here,” Flea complained. “I
really
don’t think he likes me and wants me kicked out of the North Pole.”

             
With his sneakers on, Flea removed the big green elf jacket and rolled up the sleeves to the white puffy shirt, hoping he looked a
little
more normal. He wanted to ditch his gloves, too, but knew the unpredictable gold ring made the gloves important. A part of Flea wanted to march over to the security building and ask Niko what his problem was but he knew he lacked the courage. Besides, he saw Minko bend over and pick up a tiny scrap of paper just inside the door.

             
“It looks like he
did
try to tell you,” Minko said. “At least sort of.”

             
Minko handed over the piece of paper, which was no larger than a gum wrapper. Flea squinted to read the single word written so small that he could hardly see:
CLASS
. Flea crumpled the scrap and angrily tossed it into the hallway. A burst of determination exploded within him and he never felt a greater urge to succeed than right now. He marched out of his room and down the hallway before he remembered to do something else. He returned to his door and ripped a long piece of cloth from his shirtsleeve.

             
“What are you doing?” Minko asked, clearly appalled to see Flea ruin such a ‘stylish’ shirt.

             
“I’m making sure I know which room is mine,” he said. He tied the piece of white cloth to his door handle.

             
Flea and Minko rushed down the hallway and slid down the spiraling ‘slidewell.’ The ride was much more enjoyable for Flea now that he knew to lay flat and keep his head down the whole way. Still, he rushed down yet again because of Niko. When they reached the lobby’s ground floor, Flea walked quickly in the direction of the exit when Minko asked him to stop. His friend looked apologetic and desperate at the same time, as Flea was about to learn another of his new friend’s very strange habits.