FSE

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formerly SoFurry search engine

Snow pattered lightly onto the roof and against the house's many windows, windows that looked like photo-frames for the black, mysterious winter world beyond. Logs snapped and popped in the fireplace, sending little embers out to land harmlessly on the stone hearth every few moments. There was an imposing pine tree, decorated in Yule ornaments and trappings, a few feet away off to the corner; under it lie presents both horribly and impeccably wrapped, which was the only marking they needed for it to be known who they were from.

On the other side of the room there was a large log table, the kind you would find in a pioneer's cabin. On the table were all manner of the season's foodstuffs: the staple platter of turkey and ham, puddings, sweet potatoes and salad, cranberry sauce and sweet rolls. It was only a few days before Christmas, but this was the last chance the three friends gathered around the table would have to meet before the actual holiday. It was fairly clear who had brought what. If it came in a can, the lynx, if it was meat, the war-dog, and all of the other cooked trappings had been brought by the Siamese.

"Can you pass me the green beans, Sero?" The lynx was on her third helping of everything. She didn't eat much, but when she did, she ate a lot. It was kind of like a bear getting ready to hibernate. She was dressed in a big turtleneck sweater and some nice white skinny jeans, hiding most of her cream fur and mocha markings. Her dark red hair and piercing green eyes were clearly visible though, as were her gauges and neck tattoo. She had a little bit of cranberry sauce on her lip, which Sero saw, and he chuckled as he passed her the beans.

Sero was finishing up his seconds; he and the lynx had gone a little heavy on the wine and were both kind of giggly. The cat was wearing a Radiohead t-shirt under a suit jacket, with jeans underneath. He had let them know earlier that he'd gotten halfway to the door before realizing that he should probably have dressed up a bit, went back to his car, found the jacket inside and had swapped his hoodie out for that. His blue eyes peeked up at her through his blonde hair for a moment before he turned his mocha-colored head back to his plate and the task at hand; his tail flicked idly back and forth.

The third companion, the war-dog Kylus, rolled his eyes at his companions' mostly silent flirting. He was massive, taking up the other half of the room that wasn't being filled by the table, and also not requiring a chair to loom over his tray of food. He had had to show an enormous amount of restraint to share some of the meat he had brought and not devour it all by himself. The sweet potatoes he had politely asked for lie half-eaten on his tray as he eyed the ever-dwindling pile of shredded turkey and licked his lips loudly. His muscly, tree-trunk legs rippled a little as he tensed in concentration, before finally he couldn't take it anymore. As calmly as he could, his deep, guttural voice rumbled out, "Skye, can you give me some more of that turkey? Please?"

Skye grinned knowingly as she started to move the tray over to Kylus' place-setting. "Thanks for sharing with us-," she dropped the tray with a startled squeak. The canine growled, not understanding, before catching sight of her fearful eyes and turning to follow her gaze to the window. He didn't see anything. Sero hurried over as well.

"What was it kitty? There's nothing there."

The lynx visibly composed herself, "No, there was a- a face in the window, looking at me."

Kylus scoffed a bit, but his posture told them he was concerned. "You're just drunk, it's just the snow stuck to the glass."

Skye looked a bit offended, "Never in my life have I straight hallucinated from a couple glasses of wine, sweets-"

There was a loud thump from just outside the front door. All three of them jumped, and subconsciously the two felines moved a bit to be behind the dog. Kylus' hackles raised slightly and a growl of warning started to rumble up through his titan frame. "Stay here, I'll go look." He thudded powerfully across the hardwood floor and into the entryway, peering out into the frigid night for a long moment. His growl stopped and he turned back toward the two frightened cats in the dining room. "It's okay. There's something on the porch, but it looks like it's just a box. There's no one else out there."

Sero and Skye timidly inched toward the entryway and looked out the window that was situated on the same wall as the door, out to the porch. Through the quietly falling snow, they saw what looked like a package, wrapped in white paper and tied with a red bow, perfectly centered in the middle of the concrete patio. After a long moment, Sero piped up. "Should we go get it?"

Kylus replied, thoughtfully. "Yeah, I'll grab it. Get the door for me." The Siamese complied and pulled it open, allowing the massive creature to pad cautiously out onto the porch and gently grasp the box in his behemoth maw. He started to move back toward the house before his ears perked up and he peered sharply out through the fluffy flakes. Then, he shook his graying mane slightly in dismissal before finishing the trip back into the structure.

The three friends stood around the package for a few minutes, deliberating whether or not to open it. Finally, Skye spoke up, "Fuck it. This is already more entertaining than dominoes or Clue." She glanced over at Kylus. "No offense love, but last year was a travesty."

Kylus looked mildly embarrassed as he remembered getting so frustrated at his lack of opposable thumbs that he had spun on his heels to walk out, and had accidentally knocked all of the wine, all of the cards, and most of the tree ornaments over with his bulk. He silently cursed C. M. Coolidge for his portrayal of unattainable canine standards. "I agree. Go ahead and open it."

Slowly, the lynx undid the ribbon and tore through the paper, opening the box underneath with bated breath. Inside, there was a roll of old, dilapidated canvas. She pulled it out of the box and unrolled it over the table.

On the canvas was a map. Latitudes and longitudes and hand-scribbled notes were painstakingly scrawled all over it. The largest of these coordinates was in the top left corner; Sero noted it and pulled out his phone, tabbing over to Google.

"Alaska," he said, the surprise creeping into his voice. "It's up by Anchorage, a couple hours outside by sled it looks like. There aren't any roads."

"Yes, but _what's_a couple hours outside of Anchorage? What's this map for," Skye asked, clearly confused by the whole situation.

Kylus spoke up, "There's something else in the box, I think."

Skye looked back down into the box. Sure enough, there was a piece of parchment lying flat against the bottom. She pulled it out of the package and read it aloud. "It says, 'The spirit of Christmas is in danger. If you want to save Santa and discover the location of the trust he pulls all of his toy-making money from, follow the map.' What the hell?" She read it again. "So this entire thing is based on believing in Santy Claus. Clearly, we're being pranked." She dropped the letter back into the box and began to roll up the map, before Sero stopped her.

"Kitty, what if it's real though? That map looks pretty genuine, and what group of kids goes through the trouble to look up specific coordinates?"

Skye shrugged, "Really smart ones? I don't know." She looked up at the Siamese, "Are you seriously thinking about it? Really?"

Kylus rumbled from off to the side. "It could be fun. Alaska's basically frontier, tundra. I love it up there. Good hunting."

Sero nodded, "And honestly, if it is real, we have a really awesome Christmas, meet Santa, make some money. If not, we all get to see Alaska together. It's a win-win."

The lynx let out an exasperated sigh. "I can't believe I'm the voice of reason here. How would we even get up there? They're not gonna let Kylus on a plane."

The hulking canine chuckled. "If you can get there, I'll meet you at the airport in Anchorage. Like I said, I've been there before. It's no trouble getting back."

Skye looked from Kylus to Sero and back, then threw her paws up in defeat. "Fine! You win! I'll go pack I guess. But I still think it's a waste of time and we're just gonna be in the middle of nowhere freezing our asses off on Christmas." She disappeared into the bedroom momentarily before peeking back out into the dining room, grinning. "I'll try to have fun though."

________________________________

They reconnected with Kylus easily enough upon landing in Anchorage. The dog had told them to pack as lightly as they could, within reason. While most Alaskan excursions demanded excess food on the off-chance of getting caught in a blizzard, Kylus assured them that in that instance, plenty of food could be gathered for all of them through his hunting. In light of this, most of their gear they wore, with the exception of a medical kit and a tent. The gargantuan beast had agreed to carry them- mostly because he had absolutely loathed Skye's idea of hiring sled teams to get them out to the spot on the map. They lashed the small amount of luggage to Kylus' back and clambered aboard to perch together on his spine.

The coordinates were only a few hours outside of Anchorage, but with a bit of poor navigating between the two felines, the group got lost. Not terribly lost, but lost enough that they needed to get redirected. Luckily, they happened upon a group of friendly Eskimos that were able to get them back on the right track. By the time they reached their goal though, the Northern Lights were glimmering above them in the midst of the glittering, many starred firmament. The two passengers couldn't really enjoy it; the drop in temperature forcing them to grip each other and Kylus for dear life, distributing the heat from his furred, running form between them.

Their destination itself was several hundred feet of elevation above where they had started, on the slopes of a mountain. It was a narrow crevice in the rock, and before even letting the two smaller friends slide off his back, Kylus loosed a threatening snarl into it. The sound reverberated and echoed off the walls several times, and no brave predators answered the call or moved out toward them. Sero and Skye left their larger companion's back and undid the tent and med-kit, leaving the former outside the entrance and carrying the latter with them. Then, they switched their flashlights on and squeezed behind the dog to move through the space.

The crevice went on for what seemed like an eternity, the war-dog's shoulders barely making clearance. Finally though, the passage widened substantially, and continued to widen before coming to a bottleneck suddenly, capped off by a massive door.

The trio studied it for a moment. "It looks like the door to Gringotts," whispered Skye. "You think there's elves in there?"

Sero chuckled a bit, but his amazement was evident through his voice as well. "No, remember? Whoever sent us the box _captured_Santa. It wasn't _from_Santa. Plus, what happened to elves and Santa not being real?"

"Fuck it, we're talking cats," she retorted dryly. "And that." She gestured again at the door. "Kinda hard to deny that being something." She briskly strode up to the massive wooden gateway and tried the handle. "Locked."

Kylus looked annoyed, "What, really? After all that it's just locked?"

"Guess so. That's bullshit- wait, what's that?" Sero focused his flashlight off to the side of the door, where he'd glimpsed the glint of metal a moment before. "Looks like a key."

The dog growled a little. "That's pretty damn convenient. Let's be careful."

Sure enough, the key slid into the lock like butter, turning the mechanism with an echoing clack. The door creaked open.

The room beyond was circular and some of it well-lit, although the friends could see no light sources to speak of. In the middle of the illuminated area was a pedestal, and on that pedestal, an altar. And on that altar was a body, a body that appeared to belong to Santa Claus.

Kylus silently melted into the shadows, Sero pulled his climbing pick from his belt, and Skye retched before following his lead. They began to make their way cautiously into the chamber, Skye trembling a bit and Sero doing his best to comfort her with his levelheaded and confident strides. Inside, he too was anxious at what they would find further ahead. He noticed three vault doors in the darkened back wall of the space as they got closer and silently pointed them out to the lynx.

They covered their mouths and noses as they got closer to the body, mostly unrecognizable as anything aside from its attire. The signature red velvet suit and giant black belt wrapped around were sufficient identification. Still moving as quietly as she could, Skye slid the map from her pack and unrolled it a bit, looking for their next move.

They were suddenly not alone in the chamber. In the span of a blink there were five more, and they stepped from the shadows without a sound. Sero and Skye moved closer to each other and raised the climbing hooks in alarm.

They were aliens, the generic Area 51 aliens with triangular heads and massive, black, bulging eyes. They didn't move any further forward into the light, and they appeared to be unarmed.

Suddenly, the closest one spoke. "Ah, so you have come at last," it said, silkily. "You see Blah-nik? I told you they would not stay away. This planet's greed knows no bounds!"

The one called Blah-nik stepped forward. "Tell me, Children of Terra, truthfully. Did you come for your Saint Nicholas, or did you come for his wealth?"

Skye rolled her eyes and lowered her weapon. "Really? You have all these awesome story devices, and presumably space-ships and shit, and you're going to use them to preach out against commercialism? Family Guy, American Dad, South Park, The Simpsons, and like every D-list holiday movie ever want their material back."

Sero concurred. "Yeah, this is lame. I bet that's not even Santa."

"Yeah, it totally is," the first alien retorted defensively. "And your shit planet and all of its materialistic sinfulness killed him and sacrificed him on this altar!"

Sero snorted, before holding his nose and walking over to "Santa". "This is just some fat guy. His beard isn't even all white, it's gray, and Santa doesn't have a birthmark or eczema or whatever all over his face. Actually, hey..." He turned back, "Skye, this kind of looks like the Vietnam vet that stands out by Wal-Mart with the Salvation Army bucket and the bell." He prodded the body with his foot, and "Santa" groaned a little, still only mostly dead. "Wait, it is him! What the hell guys?"

The alien pulled a blaster from some nondescript place behind him and quickly shot the dying man a few more times. "No, it's Santa, and if he were alive, he'd think you were all very naughty for how you blemish what he stands for with your Black Friday and half-priced TV's and trampling small children to death in your rush for an Xbox."

"Hey! That was one time," Skye snapped. "And he wasn't even the lady's kid, he was a Korean baby she adopted. Those are like 10 bucks to replace if you keep the receipt." Sero looked over at her in a half-disgusted, not-really-sure-if-she-was-joking kind of way.

Suddenly, the vault doors burst open and a bunch of childrens' letter blocks, glued together into words like "greed", "selfishness", and "contempt", spilled out around the altar and into the rest of the room.

"Well shit, I guess we're really doing this bit," Sero sighed.

The alien continued, "Yes, this whole holiday and the time around it is part of our evil master plan to secretly influence the human race to be giving and caring and loving to everyone. Although our kind has attempted this for many millenia, we five are all that's left, and we will not rest until your institutions and corporations are all torn to the ground and a feeling of goodwill and cheer pervades every corner of this rock."

Skye scoffed and rolled her eyes. "So you're hippie, anarchist, extreme-pseudo terrorist aliens. Like Anonymous with more pot. Awesome."

Sero piped up. "Wait, did you say there's only five of you?"

"Well, yes, although I don't see wha-," The alien screeched out as Kylus finally revealed himself and leapt from the shadows, tearing the extraterrestrial's body in half with his powerful claws and spraying the room with luminescent green blood before clamping down on another with his powerful maw. The aliens, shocked, stay still.

The war-dog dropped the alien's body and licked his lips, before deeply growling, "Yeah, so I guess they're Christmas aliens because that guy's totally gingerbread when you put him in your mouth."

Skye's hackles rose, and she drooled a little. "I- _love_gingerbread." She unsheathed her claws.

Sero's tail flicked to and fro while he decided what to do. "Hmph. Munching sweet-tasting aliens should be less painful than letting them monologue, try to kill us when we don't get the message, and eventually continue killing random homelesses. Plus, this plot's weak."

In a matter of just a few seconds, mostly because of Kylus, they finished off the rest of the ET's, tasting them each; there was a candy cane one, an eggnog one, a pumpkin pie one, and an apple cider one. Amidst all of the carnage, they enjoyed a second Christmas feast. Skye dipped her fingers in the glowing blood and began to dance and play with her hands like she was gloving, before they all cuddled together, full, and sang Deck the Halls, just enjoying each other's company in the midst of all the pointlessness.

*-Merry Christmas you guys! You're beautiful people and I really look forward to a long, full friendship with- *

*-you both! Here's to a new year of growth, fresh experiences, and encouragement as we all stride- *

-confidently from one side of our journey to the other.-

With love, Skye Lysator