Cyberspace Santa
The story of a Santa Claus that is perhaps quite different from how you
know him…
Dedicated to Elizabeth Tucker
by Christopher Blair Tucker
Introduction
The story you are about to read takes place during the winter of 2010-2011. Bluetooth has long been on the market, and is now installed in virtually any new device bought. WebTV is widely used, Intel now makes 10-gigahertz processors, the X-Box 5 has recently been released, and lots more.
This story takes place in the North Pole. At first, it’s normal winter day for Santa—he’s gotten 10 new blackmail e-mails and the temperature is supposed to be about –64°. However, when he goes out for a ride in his luxury sleigh (made by Mercedes-Benz), he meets another man, who ends up being, well, let’s just say a bit of an annoyance…
If there’s a term in this book that you don’t understand, just look it up in the Glossary at the end of this book. Don’t worry if there are a ton of terms you don’t understand, though—for a lot of them, you have no reason to understand! This is because I actually made up a lot of phrases and words.
Enjoy!
-Christopher
Blair Tucker
Writer
Chapter I:
The Meeting…
It was a cold winter morning at the True North Pole, not the Magnetic North Pole. Mr. Santa Claus got up out of bed and started to get dressed for the day ahead. He turned on his TV-IS by simply saying “Activate TV-IS.”
“Good morning, Mr. Claus,” said a soothing voice. “The current time is 5:00AM, Greenwich Mean Time. What is your request?”
“Today’s weather,” grumbled Santa, still very tired.
“The current prediction for today’s weather in the North Pole area is partly cloudy. The average temperature prediction is -64° Fahrenheit. Please note that all weather information is generously provided by NBC. Would you like detailed forecasts or a five-day forecast?”
“First of all, stop saying ‘…all weather information is generously provided by NBC.’”
“I’m sorry—I can’t do that. It is in my permanent memory that I must give credit to the supplier of the information I give.”
Santa groaned. “Fine, fine, just tell me my new mail…” He was now done getting dressed.
“Three new messages in your Inbox, and four new messages in your Bulk Mail. Twenty-five more messages have been redirected upon arrival to Trash, all apparently blackmail sent by sc2@santamail.com.”
“Kick sc2 off the system!” Santa almost screamed his command, he was so mad. By this time he had received 3,950 blackmail messages from this mischievous user of Santa’s own free e-mail service.
“Are you sure you want to kick sc2 off your free e-mail system?” asked the TV-IS.
“YES! JUST KICK HIM OFF THE SYSTEM!!!” screamed Santa.
“Are you positive that you would like to delete the user sc2 from your own network of free e-mail?” the TV-IS asked again, perfectly calmly.
“YES!” screamed Santa. “YES! YES! YES!!!”
“Wouldn’t it be better to simply give him a warning, or disable some of the services he has access to, perhaps not let him use SantaMail Instant Messenger, or…”
“FINE! Just… punish… him… but… next… time… he… sends… me… or… anybody… else… blackmail… automatically… kick… him… of… my… e-mail… SYSTEM! Under… stand?” Santa said. He was breathing so hard that he could hardly get the words out of his mouth.
“I understand,” said the soothing voice, still soothing. Neither its tone of voice nor volume had changed throughout the whole conversation.
A beautiful sleigh zoomed over the ice. If you had gotten close to it, you would have seen a big Mercedes-Benz logo on the front, and on the back “SPECIAL REQUEST S-1000 HOVER SLEIGH”. Inside the red and green sleigh was none other than Santa Claus.
“Weeee-haaaaaaaa!” he screamed as the sleigh zoomed over a hill of ice. “Waaaaaaa-hoooooooo!” He drove the sleigh, which usually hovered about one foot off the ground, in five tight circles before going off towards a more hilly area.
Then something caught his eye. It was also zooming around, and looked slightly like a sleigh. Santa headed off towards it.
As he got closer, it became more evident that this object was a sleigh, quite like Santa’s. It was red and green, just like Santa’s sleigh. It hovered, like Santa’s sleigh. Why, if it hadn’t been for the slightly different aerodynamics of the other object, getting closer every nanosecond, from that distance it would have looked just like Santa Claus’ personal sleigh!
“Get me some readings on that object,” said Santa to his on-board TV-IS.
“Yes, Mr. Claus.” Santa was gaining on the other sleigh, even though it had apparently started to run away.
“That object, approximately 1.53 kilometers from us, is a BMW Special Request Z-50 Sports Sleigh. Inside is a man named Santa Claus, and according to his Internet Personal ID, he is the user, sc2, who is sending you blackmail,” said the same soothing voice as the first Santa’s bedroom-installed TV-IS used.
“What???” screamed the first Santa. “Fire at my command, and target that sleigh’s engines!”
“Yes, sir,” said the voice. It was much more obedient that its bedroom-installed cousin.
A large missile launcher came into view from under the floor of the first Santa’s sleigh. The other sleigh, apparently noticing, increased speed.
“Engage thrusters!” commanded the first Santa. His sleigh nearly doubled speed—it was now gaining rapidly on the other Santa’s sleigh.
“HA! You can try, but you’ll never escape!” said the first Santa. “ Fire the missile!”
A large missile shot out of its tube. It zoomed across the icy terrain towards its target. It hit. There was a small explosion on the left engine, and the sleigh started to trail heavy smoke, go in circles, and soon it was on the ground. The driver turned off the remaining engine and it skidded to a halt.
The first Santa’s sleigh came up next to the other one. “See you were having a little trouble there, sc2!”
The other Santa appeared out of the engine smoke. “Yeah, thanks to you!” he screamed.
“Hmm… sorry about that,” said the first Santa sarcastically. “Anyway, Santa Claus, my name is Santa Claus! What’s your middle name?”
“Christmas,” said the other Santa.
“Hmm… me too… why don’t I call you SCC?”
“Fine. Just tell me this: why did you have to take all the good domain and e-mail names? I mean, you have www.santaclaus.com, www.santaclaus.net, www.santaclaus.org, www.santa.com, www.santa.net, www.santa.org, www.santamail.com, www.santamail.net, www.santamail.org, www.christmas.com…” complained SCC.
“Because I am the Santa Claus who delivers gifts to all those girls and boys, I am the Santa Claus who goes ‘Ho ho ho’, and I am the Santa Claus who is admired by all those girls and boys” said Santa.
“Well I deliver gifts too! I also go ‘Ho ho ho’ and I’m admired by girls and boys! I also have better equipment than you do!” replied SCC.
“You do not have better equipment than I do! If you do, than how come I destroyed that engine?” Santa sent a secret message to his sleigh’s onboard TV-IS.
“This is just my tertiary sleigh!”
“Well, you soon won’t have a tertiary sleigh.”
“And why is that?”
Santa smiled. At that moment, SCC’s sleigh started to move! Around and around!
“Hey!” screamed SCC. A little HR Engine then shot out of Santa’s sleigh’s cargo bay and zoomed off towards the circling sleigh. With perfect timing, it attached to the bottom of the sleigh, which then stopped spinning and started to go off westward. It was programmed to later head towards one of Santa’s hangers, but not immediately so as to mislead followers.
“Well, I guess I’ll just summon one of my other sleighs,” said SCC. He smiled. Up came a smaller sleigh. SCC got in. When Santa was about to get in his own sleigh, it started moving like SCC’s had!
“Hey!” screamed Santa, but he was just acting. SCC zoomed out of sight—and earshot, and Santa quietly cackled. Santa summoned a very small sleigh, but still a Mercedes-Benz, and went back to his headquarters.
“Any new information from our spy yet?” asked Santa. It was the next day.
“Yes—it appears as if SCC is ordering a supercomputer to handle all operations. It will use five AMD Athelon 14.5 gigahertz processors,” said the TV-IS’s voice. Now, I think you’re beginning to realize why Santa was so happy that his sleigh had been stolen.
“Hmm… most likely more than a match for my current operation-handling supercomputer… let’s wait and see if this is true, but contact Intel and tell them to get some really really really fast chips ready,” said Santa.
Just then, a new e-mail arrived for him. “You have a new e-mail from scc@santamail.com. Would you like to read it?” announced the TV-IS’s soothing voice.
“Sounds like it’s from SCC. Read it to me.”
“‘From: scc@santamail.com To: santaclaus@santamail.com Subject: How about a competition
“‘I understand that you may be somewhat unhappy about how our meeting went the other day. However, I would like to ask you to join me in a two-man competition. The winner of the competition will be whoever has more and better equipment by Christmas Day. Whoever wins will be allowed to deliver all the presents to girls and boys uninterrupted on Christmas Eve, and the loser will have to give all of his equipment and facilities to the winner. There are no regulations except that no one may use any explosives or destructive devices. If they do, then the other person automatically wins.
“‘I hope you will join me. Write back soon.
“‘Not-that-sincerely, SCC’
“Would you like to reply to this message?” the soothing voice finally asked.
“Yes,” said Santa, “I most certainly do. By the way, save SCC’s new address under the nickname of ‘SCC’. For the first name, say Santa C. For the last name, say Claus.”
“Ready,” said that soothing voice.
“Write the following: Under the circumstances that there is no fine print and all the rules were stated in the same font size in the body of your last e-mail, and that if there are any new rules introduced by you during the competition I automatically win, I accept your invitation to join this competition.”
“That’s a run-on sentence, Mr. Claus. Would you like me to break it up into smaller sentences so your message can be more readable?”
“Yes. Write the following after a paragraph break: On a different subject, I would like to inform you that your sleigh was destroyed on its way to one of my hangers, but it was not at all my fault, so please do not hold it against me. TV-IS: done.”
“Your message will be sent after I add your signature. Would you like to do a spelling and grammar check before sending this message?” asked the TV-IS.
“Yes, automatically correct all spelling or grammar mistakes without any confirmation,” said Santa, “and let the race begin.”
Chapter II:
The Competition
“Yep, install it right there by the printer,” said Santa. Intel and Compaq officials were deciding where to install Santa’s new supercomputer. It would use 10 Intel Platinum-3 15.7 gigahertz processors, and it would be connected to a network of nearly 700 other Compaq computers. Using Bluetooth, an array of about 400 more wireless handheld computers would also be able to access network devices, such as the huge Hewlett-Packard printer that can be printing 400 documents or files at once. That would soon be going as well, replaced by one that can be printing 800 different documents or files at once, as well as being capable of printing on over 300 different kinds of paper.
The race had begun. SCC had replied to Santa’s e-mail, saying that there was no fine print. SCC also stated the official start date of the competition: 12:00AM December 5, 2010. The current time was 8:00PM December 5. Santa wasn’t going to waste any time—he already had new sleighs, printers, scanners, and more ordered.
Meanwhile, back at SCC’s headquarters, AMD and Dell officials were deciding where to put SCC’s new supercomputer. SCC left them to decide, and headed out to the area where Santa and SCC had first met in person in a large construction barge.
“I think I need another outpost out there,” he said happily as he zoomed across the ice. However, when he arrived, he saw another construction barge about half a kilometer away. “Get me some readings on that barge,” SCC asked his onboard computer.
“It appears as if it is commanded by Santa Claus,” said the less-than-pleasant voice that most construction barges’ onboard computers use. It started to drone on about the specifications of the barge, but SCC wasn’t listening. He was outraged that Santa had had the same idea.
“Well, I’ll just build a better outpost,” said SCC. However, he then saw Santa leave in a small sleigh—leaving the construction barge behind to do the work!
“Thanks for the idea, Santa,” SCC said. He then summoned a small sleigh and programmed his construction barge to build a huge outpost. He also gave the barge his credit card number so it could order materials.
The next day there were two large outposts within a kilometer of each other. At first sight SCC’s looked bigger, and so SCC thought that he had won that round. However, what he didn’t realize was that more than half of Santa’s outpost was underground. At Santa’s headquarters there was a new supercomputer and printer. At SCC’s headquarters there was a new supercomputer and three new sleighs. Both had ordered much more equipment to put in their new outposts.
Santa was online looking for more things when he noticed SCC was also online. He initiated a voice chat.
“Hi, SCC,” said Santa.
“What do you want?” growled SCC.
“Well, I just wanted to see how things were going,” Santa replied.
“Thing are great here. I just got a new Dell supercomputer with the most powerful AMD Athelon processors there are!” bragged SCC.
“AMD???” said Santa, obviously disgusted, “AMD stinks! Intel is so much better! I just got a new supercomputer with the most powerful Intel processors there are!”
“What, some little wimpy 8 gigahertz Pentium processor?” said SCC.
“No way! I got the best and the newest: the Platinum-3!” Santa bragged.
“AMD is so much better than Intel!” said SCC, trying to make a good comeback. After all, everybody likes the Platinum-3.
“Is not!” replied Santa.
“Is too!”
“Is not!”
“Is too!”
“Is not!”
“IS TOO!” screamed SCC.
“Is not,” Santa calmly replied.
“IS TOO!”
“Is not.”
“IS TOO!”
“Is not.”
“IS TOO!!!” screamed SCC. Because he didn’t hear any immediate reply from Santa, he clicked the “Cancel Voice Chat” button. However, just before he clicked and after it was too late to stop from clicking, he heard a quiet “Is not.”
The date was December 18, 2010. The competition was still going, and Santa’s spy was still undiscovered by SCC. Santa had made 25 more equipment and computer outposts, and SCC had made 30 more. However, because Santa’s outposts were slightly bigger, the two were pretty much tied.
Santa went out a new Mercedes-Benz sleigh—Special Request S-1800 Hover Sleigh—to survey locations for another bigger outpost. This sleigh had special equipment for detecting any intruders to the control computer, which is what SCC had broken into to steal Santa’s other sleigh. It also had ten missile launchers, although Santa would never use them on SCC during competition and risk losing, as well as five turbo-boosters that could boost the sleigh to speeds of over Mach II.
SCC was also out looking for outpost locations. SCC rounded a sharp bend around a large ice and rock mountain when he saw Santa speeding towards him! Air bags and parachutes popped out from all over the place! Two huge air bags inflated in the front of the sleigh to make any impact less severe, perhaps not even letting it touch the actual sleigh. Parachutes popped out the back to slow the sleigh, side-impact and front seat air bags popped out, and more air bags shot out the sides to lessen the risk of side-impact. The same thing happened on Santa’s sleigh, and the two got out.
“What the heck do you think you’re doing???” the two screamed in unison.
“Just looking for an outpost site!” they said, again in unison.
“Stop talking at the same time I do!” they both screamed, both at the same time and sounding disgusted.
“Well why don’t you stop talking?” they suggested, at the same time.
“Fine!” they said together and neither talked for a long time. They just stood there, waiting for the other person to start talking again. Santa got out his Tablet PC and wrote on the screen with a stylus: Okay—you talk now, and I won’t. He showed it to SCC. Fortunately, his idea worked.
“You could have completely destroyed my new sleigh!” SCC complained.
“It’s not my fault!” said Santa. “You were probably speeding!”
“How do you know that you weren’t speeding?”