Christmas Files

Alan Wilkinson

Description

The Christmas Files: Operation Snowstorm is a hugely entertaining comedy thriller that shows us Santa and his toymaking operation as we've never seen them before. The story centres around ruthless billionaire Luther Averus's plot to get rid of Santa and claim Christmas for himself. To further his evil ends he recruits a young elf and former thief called Genk Relbeck. Genk at first goes along with the plan but rebels when he realises the extent of Averus's wicked intentions. The action flits furiously back and forth between New York and the North Pole as Genk races against time to save the day. In the middle of it all is Santa, struggling to hold on to the spirit of Christmas as he faces the pressures of the modern world and a pushy marketing director who wants him to hit the chat show circuit.

Informations

• Publié par: Andrews UK
• Date de parution: 27 mai 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781849891714
• Langue: English

Extrait

Title Page
The Christmas Files:
Operation Snowstorm
By
Alan Wilkinson
Publisher Information
The Christmas Files: Operation Snowstorm
Published in 2010 by
Andrews UK Limited
www.andrewsuk.com
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published, and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
The characters and situations in this book may or may not be entirely imaginary and might bear no relation to any real person or actual happening.
Copyright © Alan Wilkinson
The right of Alan Wilkinson to be identified as author of this book has been asserted in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyrights Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Information
Fact
Santa Claus is a large, fat man with a bushy, white beard who lives in the North Pole. He works with a team of elves manufacturing and delivering children’s toys for Christmas. Nobody knows his exact age, but records suggest he is more than 1500 years old.
All details of elf customs and reindeer flight patterns are correct.



Prologue
New York Police HQ
8.20am, Christmas Day:
There were three things that really annoyed Detective Frank Zerman – parole violation, his Aunt Patti and being called into work on Christmas Day. Of these, being called into work on Christmas Day was the worst. By far! Still here he was clutching a yellow file in one hand and an extra-strong coffee in the other, with a mood that was deteriorating faster than leftover turkey.
He marched towards the interrogation room, kicking away balloons from the office party and slurping aggressively from a styrofoam cup. The coffee spilled over, leaving ugly brown blotches stained across his crumpled blue cotton shirt.
The reason he had been called in was because a suspect was proving particularly hard to question. Frank was known for getting results in interrogation, meaning he was always called upon for the more tricky cases. Sometimes he wished he wasn’t so good at his job.
Still with this case Frank found himself quite intrigued. The suspect, Genk Relbeck, had been captured after breaking into the vault of New York’s largest bank. But he’d set off the alarm intentionally without stealing anything and had then just waited for the cops to turn up.
It wasn’t the only strange thing that had happened that night either. Bizarre reports had been flooding in all night. That wasn’t unusual for Christmas though – the crackpots always came out at this time of year. Frank put it down to too much brandy in the Christmas pudding.
The interrogation room was located at the end of a dimly lit corridor. A picture of a highly decorated chief detective hung on the wall by the door. Frank reached for the handle and pushed the door open. What he saw inside stopped him dead in his tracks.
Genk Relbeck had light brown hair and blue eyes. He was dressed casually in jeans and a green T-shirt. He had a slim build and Frank would have guessed he was around 30 years of age if it wasn’t for one thing – he was only 3ft 7ins tall!
Now Frank had seen dwarves before – in fact he’d had one pull a gun on him once – and this guy was no dwarf. The condition that affected dwarves’ growth tended to mean their heads and arms were out of proportion to their bodies. That wasn’t the case here. This guy was a perfectly proportioned, fully-grown adult, who just happened to be very, very small. He also had remarkably pointy ears.
Frank slammed the door shut behind him and marched over to the table where the diminutive suspect was sitting. He pulled up a chair and sat down opposite.
“How you doing?” he drawled.
The diminutive safecracker smiled and pointed to a cup in front of him
“Fine,” he said, “but I think this coffee might be a breach of my civil rights.”
Frank smirked. They often started out like this – cocky, thinking they had the upper hand. It didn’t last long.
“Yeah, well sorry pal, but your civil rights flew out the door the second you broke into New York’s largest bank,” he sneered.
“I think my lawyer might disagree.”
Frank gave a dismissive snort. He had been going to start out easy on this one, but maybe it was time to get tough. He flicked the report open in front of him and jabbed a chubby finger at it.
“See what it says here,” he barked. “It says that according to our computers you don’t exist. And do you know what that means? It means if you don’t exist then nobody knows you’re here and nobody can prove that you’re here. So you can forget about getting a lawyer. It’s just you and me.”
“Aren’t I lucky,” Genk replied, completely unfazed.
Frank eyed Genk suspiciously. There was something very strange about him, other than his obvious lack of height. It was something that he couldn’t put his finger on but made him feel uneasy.
He might have to take a soft approach with this one, Frank thought. Often the small guys were the hardest to crack. They had more to prove. The big guys were used to getting everything their own way and often crumbled when someone challenged them. Frank could remember one guy in particular – six foot six, tattooed from head to toe and biceps bigger than Boston. It had taken two minutes to crack him and Frank had to call for his mum to stop him from crying.
“Genk’s an unusual name,” said Frank adopting a softer tone.
“Not where I’m from.”
“And where would that be?”
“The North Pole.”
“That’s a long way from here.”
“Yeah, well I love to travel,” replied Genk. “It broadens the mind.”
“And do you normally break into banks on your travels?”
“No, this is the first country I’ve done that in.”
“Well, I guess we should feel honoured,” Frank deadpanned.
“I suppose maybe you should.”
Frank leant back in his chair and drummed his fingers carelessly on one leg.
“So if you’re from the North Pole I guess you’re an Eskimo?”
“No, actually I’m an elf.”
Frank gave a sigh.
“Is that so?”
“Yes, it is.”
“And I suppose goblin friends of yours are going to come and rescue you.”
Genk let out a little chortle.
“Now you’re just being ridiculous.”
A dull pain was beginning to throb gently in Frank’s forehead. Normally it took hours for a suspect to give him a headache, but this guy seemed to be going for the record.
“Look buddy, I don’t think you have any idea of the trouble you’re in,” he said, his tone hardening. “You’ve been caught red-handed in the vault of the largest bank in New York City. That’s considered a pretty serious crime over here.”
“I’m not surprised,” replied Genk. “You really can’t let people get away with that sort of thing.”
Frank took a deep breath, counted to 10 and leant back over the table. He narrowed his gaze and tensed his jaw to give him a more formidable appearance. It was a trick he’d learned from watching lots of Clint Eastwood movies.
“You know I’m considered to be the best at this sort of thing,” he growled. “I find people tend to give me the answers that I’m looking for. Do you know why that is?”
The elf arched an eyebrow.
“Your winning personality?”
“No,” yelled Frank ferociously, sending his chair clattering to the ground as he leapt up, “because when I don’t get the answers I want I can get very, very nasty and you don’t want to see me getting nasty.”
Genk leaned in closely.
“Look,” he said, “I really want to tell you what you want. Really I do. I feel we’ve bonded. You seem like a nice guy, a touch highly strung perhaps, but a nice guy. I’m just not sure you’d believe me.”
“Why don’t you just give it a shot,” said Frank, pulling up his chair and sitting back down.
“Well, I’m not sure I know where to start.”
Frank took a deep breath and stared Genk straight in the eye.
“Try the beginning.”
Chapter 1
Main Conference Room, Sector 12, The Grotto
North Pole
GLOBAL ENTERPRISE AUTHORITY
Santa Claus
President Claus Manufacturing and Distribution
The Grotto
North Pole
Re: Christmas contract
Dear Mr Claus
I am writing to inform you that your Christmas contract is up for renewal. We will be monitoring your performance over the festive period and any failure to meet our standards will result in you no longer being allowed to deliver children’s gifts.
Have a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.
Albert Buntwistle
Director of Festive Operations
Santa looked up from the letter, his brow creased with concern. In front of him, sat at either side of a huge oak table, was his management team, each holding a copy of the letter.
Quite why Santa had a management team he was still unsure. Not so long ago it had just been him and a small band of elves making toys in the Grotto for him to deliver on Christmas Day. But things had changed so fast. Now kids wanted bigger, more complicated toys and lots more of them. Santa had had to move with the times.
The Grotto had gone from being a small workshop and storage room to a huge, sprawling network of connected buildings over 10 floors. There were now 25 different toy-making divisions for everything from action figures to computer games, a team of secretaries sorting through children’s requests – most of which now came by email – and seven enormous warehouses to store all the toys.
In total Santa now had more than a thousand employees carrying out more than a hundred different tasks. The only thing he still did himself was the actual delivering of the presents. That was just him, Rudolf and a sleigh sweeping through the night sky to leave gifts nestling under brightly lit Christmas trees. Santa lo