Epidemic Z: North Pole Edition

Everyone outside the North Pole thought Holly Sprig's department was made up by Hollywood. That wasn't strictly true, centuries past had seen some of Holly's darker creations haunt the holiday scene.

Yule Cat, aka Jule Cat prowled the villages and towns of Norway for a long time. Acting as fashion critic and naughtiness deterrent for all the children there. Nobody wants to be savagely mauled by a large feline because they wouldn't wear nice clothes to Christmas Dinner.

Krampus had been a strong, sentient project. He'd kept the German kiddies in check. Only problem? People complained that not only was he visiting on December 5th—a full twenty days ahead of Santa—but he also ate the naughty children.

After the Krampus fiasco, NPER, North Pole Elf Resources, had demanded that Holly lower the lethality of her projects. It was really discouraging.

Her whole life, Holly Sprig had hated the evil in the world. All caused by excessive naughtiness. From her point of view, bad acts were only stopped by a powerful deterrent. Otherwise people just didn't care. It was too bad the BWC had been enacted in the seventies. Now the elves couldn't send new creatures like Krampus and Jule Cat out into the world to make it a better place!

What if there were a way to influence people's behaviors using microbiology? Provided it was non lethal, had no other negative consequences, it'd work right? Human scientists had discovered myriad organisms that altered host behavior. Why couldn't Holly build a virus to make people be nice?

Holly went to work in her lab all night. Christmas was coming in twenty-eight days! She had to work on the virus as fast as she could. She gene spliced, cultivated and picked with care. Finally she needed to test it out. But how?

She looked over to where her research assistant, Twinkle Ice, was using a computer to IM on HolidaySpice, the social media app for elves around the world. He'd just finished typing out a string of emojis.

Holly strolled up behind Twinkle. "You just sent 'Water drop, egg plant, taco, cheese pizza' to somebody named Arwen225?!" She said. "Dude, thats sick. You know what those mean right?"

Twinkle about fell off his lab stool as he spun around to face his boss. "I was just...erm...is it bad if I say yes?" he asked. His face was bright red.

Holly was certain this made Twinkle the naughtiest elf she'd met. He'd be a perfect first test. "You shouldn't be using work time or lab resources for this. Well for now, I won't take action," she said. "I'll let you off with a warning but only if you help me test this new serum."

"What does it do?"
"It'll help you be your best self."
"And I just use this nasal spray?"
"Yep, just two puffs in each nostril."

Twinkle wasn't the deepest thinker and it was a good thing too. His apathy was just what Holly needed right now. He took the bottle out of Holly's hand and obediently inhaled the aerosolized virus.

"How do you feel?"
"Not much different...my nose just stings a little."
"You gonna IM at work anymore?"
"Nope."
"Good, let's call it a night. Go home and I'll take your vitals tomorrow."

The next morning, Twinkle wasn't at work. "Hey has Twinkle checked into the lab today?" Holly asked one of the security elves.

The guard shook his Smart Globe. Flakes whirled and a list of scanned elves appeared. "Nope, Twinkle Ice's last badge scan was last night at 2300."

It looked like the virus wasn't as effective as she hoped. Maybe she'd done something wrong? Holly's guilt gnawed at her. She needed to make sure Twinkle was okay.

Finally she arrived at 42 Candy Stick Lane. No lights shone inside Twinkle's gingerbread cabin. Holly decided to see if he was inside. She was met by a twisted scene.

A rancid, gamey smell filled the tiny room. Not even the ginger could overpower the odor. Christmas ornaments lay smashed everywhere and in the center of the room crouched a strange, rotting creature. Somehow skirting the boundaries of life and death.

Holly's eyes widened as she realized that the monster was wearing Twinkle's work badge and lab coat! It gave a wet menacing snarl as it stalked towards her. This wasn't good.

She hadn't noticed before but there were at least five other buildings on Candy Stick that looked like they'd been attacked. Gumdrops door knobs and splintered pretzel doors lay scattered between fragments of sugar glass. Blood smeared here and there told a gruesome tale. "Oh hell," Holly whispered. "Why do my projects always start eating things?"

She hopped back on her snow mobile. As she started the vehicle it backfired. The noise was met by more groans and grunts as infected elves lurched in Holly's direction. Oh she'd really screwed up this time!

The titanium runners kicked up bloody slush in the direction. The zombified elves hissed as it sprayed them. Steam rose up from their corrupted flesh as it fell from their bones. The closest zombie elf was entirely coated by back splash. It melted into a heap of slime.

It took everything Holly had to keep from barfing. Well, at least she knew there was a way to defeat them. She raced to the North Pole Armory.

"I need a few good elves and some snow ball cannons!" She demanded.

The personnel eyed her. Not for long though. Soon growling and shambling zombies appeared from side streets. "Oh, I don't have time to explain!"

She deftly formed a snow ball and hurled it towards the head of an undead. It merely wiped the remnants off and kept advancing. Were they suddenly immune to snow?

No wait, that couldn't happen this quickly. She'd forgotten a variable. All of the snow mobiles in the North Pole were powered by fairy dust. Was there enough of that to build a snow golem out of?

Holly cracked open her tank and began mixing together the dust and snow. She formed it into a pillar a little bigger than she was."Oh holy night!" She cried to finish the spell.

The snow golem crunched as it moved and began to fling magic snow balls at the zombies. It was a whirlwind of speed. Soon there were brownish red puddles of sludge everywhere.

"Wanna fill us in?" The security elf asked.

Holly bit the inside of her cheek before deciding to tell them. "Okay so, probably gonna loose my job but in thirty seconds or less. One of my projects, a virus to make people nice, went horribly wrong. And for lack of a better word, this contagious virus just created an apocalypse full of undead nastiness. Only magic and fairy dust seems to stop them."

A few radio calls and a magic sleigh bombardment later and the epidemic of zombies seemed finished. Holly felt awful about the loss of life but as long as she got to the serum and destroyed it, hopefully she wouldn't get put on the naughty list for life.