687. Chapter 687

After Secret Santa

Episode 5.09

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: Ho, ho, ho. I don't own Castle Rating. K Time: See above.

Although it was summer time and many people were on vacation and were enjoying themselves, he was hard at work in his office. Luckily, he was one of those people who loved his job. He heard a quick rap-rap-rap on his door. "Come on in." He said, jovially.

One of his associates came through the door, marched to his desk and crashed to attention. "Sir! Snord, Elf Third Class, 3175757, reporting as ordered, sir!"

Santa nodded. "Stand at ease, Snord. Once an elf is out of curly boot camp, we don't really stand on ceremony very much."

"Sir! Thank you, sir!" The elf bellowed.

Santa could see that Snord had relaxed a wee bit. "And what is it you wanted to tell me?"

"Sir! We have received a report from Snorri, Master Chief Elf, 4002589, Naughty or Nice Division, concerning a subject that you have…."

"Can you just cut to the chase, Snord?"

"Sir?" Snord looked confused.

"Just tell me briefly what happened."

Snord nodded, obviously mentally changing gears. "Sir, it's little Ricky Rodgers again."

"Him again?" Santa grimaced, then he sighed. "What is it this time?"

"He put a frog into Samantha Grant's lunch box. When Miss Grant opened her lunch, she screamed and ran, tearing her brand new dress. Mrs. Rodgers apologized and bought Miss Grant a new dress."

"Well, at least that worked out." Santa said.

"Not really, sir. Mrs. Rodgers had just lost her job and couldn't really afford it. It seems she was vaulted into an alternate universe and enslaved by a dragon."

Santa sat up. "What! How did that happen? I've told those dragons to keep away from my humans. Which one was it?"

Snord blushed and stared at a paper he had held behind his back. "Um, that was actually on a TV show she was on, the Adventures of Magic James. A children's show. Actually what happened to her was much worse. She was let go and she had to take a job as a secretary with the law firm of Dewey, Cheatum and Howe. You're familiar with them, I'm sure."

Santa pulled out a very large ledger and began writing. "While young Mister Rodgers deserves some punishment, I think having his mother work as a secretary is bad enough for the family. We'll call this one a push."

Snord nodded. "That's you, sir. Firm but fair. That's what we all say, down in the trenches, so to speak, sir. " What a pussy. Was what he thought.

Some summers later, there was another knock on Santa's door. "Come in."

"Snord, sir. I have another report."

"Who is it this time?"

Snord checked the notebook he always carried. "Little Katie Beckett."

Santa shook his head. "She always has been a difficult little girl. What now?"

"It's the big one, sir. Failure to Believe, a clear violation of Section VII of the Code. And she's been telling the other kids that you can't be real. She's explained that you'd have to go faster than the speed of light to bring presents to all the little kids around the world. She also mentions the impossibility of getting into Manhattan apartment buildings that have no chimneys and she doubts reindeer can fly. That one gave the boys at the airdrome a good laugh. Cupid does this really good impression of…." Snord realized he might be giving too much information.

Santa shook his head and grinned. "Those disbelievers. I remember one time Blitzen flew over one and pooped…." Santa stopped, deciding that was not a good tale to tell. Santa assumed a more serious expression and took down his ledger. "Luckily, those who don't believe are just punishing themselves. There's nothing I need to do."

More summers passed and Santa was still hard at work.

Snord stuck his head inside Santa's office. "Got a minute, Boss. I've got something you're going to want to see."

Santa pushed the report on the latest Naughty/Nice statistics away from himself. "What is it?"

"Rick Rodgers and his mother. But you'll like this one. A lot better than the cow thing."

Santa snorted. "That kid was lucky I only took away his date with that hottie."

Snord tapped the air beside him and a picture filled the air of a lovely red haired woman dancing in front of a young man.

"What's the music?"

"It's the Waltz of the Flowers, Boss. From Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. Mrs. Rodgers is putting on the whole ballet for Rick. Pretty good, I'd say."

Santa hummed along with the music and watched. "Very good."

"It gets even better." Snord said with a grin. "Look at the kid's Christmas spirit. Off the charts. This kid is really going to be something, Christmas-wise."

"Indeed he is."

More summers passed, but the North Pole remained as busy as ever.

Snord walked into Santa's office. "We got a problem, Big Guy."

Santa pointed to a comfortable leather chair by bus desk. "Take a load off and tell me about it."

Snord pulled a chart from the air and showed it to Santa. "It's Kate Beckett. Her mother was murdered on January 9th, 1999. Beckett quit her pre-law program at Stanford and became a cop to find her mom's killer. A good one as far as I can tell. She's become a homicide cop but has given up trying to find her mom's killer. She just never found any leads and gave up. It was going to drive her around the bend if she kept at it."

"Snord, that's terrible. But it's not really something in our jurisdiction. We reward the good kids and punish the bad. Although all we do for the bad kids is provide switches for their parents to spank them with, although hardly anyone does that any more. And the old lump of coal in the Christmas stocking shtick. We really can't do anything about a murder."

"Yeah, but take a look at her Christmas Spirit. I mean, we've seen some negative numbers before, but nothing like that. There must be something we can do about that."

Santa shrugged and grabbed his ledger. "I don't see anything we can do about it, but I'll make a note of it."

A few more summers passed.

"Hey, bossman!" Snord said, dropping into his favorite chair in front of Santa's desk. "Guess what I found?"

"Snordy! What've you got for me?"

"Remember Kate Beckett? The detective who's mom got killed. I think I found something that will help her out." Snord dropped two folders on Santa's desk.

Santa looked them over and smiled. "Snordy, you're a freakin' genius."

It was early Christmas morning in the Castle household. Christmas dinner had been eaten and the presents opened. Everyone had gone home or to bed except for Rick and Kate Castle, who sat in front of the fire, drinking glogg and cuddling.

"I can't believe how much I missed this over the years and how happy having Christmas back and all that goes with it means to me. And how much I owe you for doing all this to me. I do love you."

He kissed the top of her head. "I love you, too. But it wasn't me that brought Christmas back to you. It was the Universe. The Universe brought us together and everything else just flowed from that."

"The Universe? That's what you're calling it?"

"It is what it is."

"If you say so. Merry Christmas, Rick."

"Merry Christmas, Kate."

And far, far away at the North Pole two happy beings watched and smiled at each other.