Here is another flash fiction story. Christmas in nature. Warm fuzzy. Not one of my favorites. I felt constricted by the 1000 word limit the contest I was doing it for had. But it’s up here now. Maybe I will whittle it down one day.

Nathan’s footsteps echoed through the hallway of the underground shelter. There was a spring to Nathan’s step today: it was Christmas day after all. It was the only holiday that he and his brother celebrated anymore–the only one they both remembered celebrating with their parents.

Nathan could see his breath as he made his way down the corridor. It was always very cold in the morning–the shelter’s heating system shut down at night to conserve energy.

Nathan poked his head into the control room. It looked as though all the machines were in order, quietly humming and beeping away. Just last week, he fixed the shelter’s distressed beacon, which had broke after the first six months in the shelter–back when Ms. Neumann was still alive. There had been something wrong with the shelter system’s clock; everything had been running off-synch and consequently nothing worked properly, the beacon included. Ms. Neumann had tried fixing it, but she was an English teacher and not much of an electrical engineer.

Nathan had studied the shelter’s computers for months before he even attempted to fix the Beacon. After six months of tinkering, he finally got it working again. Nathan figured he now knew as much about the shelter’s electrical systems as the people who built them. Not bad for a 14-year-old, he thought.

The green light on the beacon’s controls slowly flashed. One message every three seconds. 976 mega-hertz. 500 watts. 17200 times a day, the distress message would repeat: This is Shelter 509, inhabitants awaiting rescue, over.

Nathan was proud of his repair job, although he doubted the usefulness. No one was coming for them. On the stations radio a few dozen other distress beacons spoke out in the otherwise silence. No one was coming for them ether. It had been three years and judging from what Ms. Neumann had told them before she died, no one ever would. The war had destroyed everything on the surface. Anyone wealthy enough had left Earth in 2097. When the bombing started, those who remained didn’t even have time to react. It was only dumb luck that Ms. Neumann, Nathan and his brother were in the school’s shelter when it happened.

Nathan continued down the corridor, towards the main room. Though he wouldn’t let depressing thoughts like that ruin his Christmas.

At the end of the corridor the common room’s door was ajar. Guess Greg is up already. Better not have opened his present without me, Nathan thought as he pushed the door open.

The common room looked like all the other rooms in the shelter: cinderblock walls painted machine grey; poured concrete floor; banks of flickering LED tubes lighting the space. Two couches faced a large, half broken, computer monitor. In one corner sat the Christmas tree that Ms. Neumann had helped them make. It was made of old electrical wire twisted together to form a trunk and branches. Strips of notebook paper, now yellowed with age, were the tinsel. A star, made of cardboard wrapped in aluminum foil, toped the ramshackle tree. Two newsprint presents, sat under the tree.

In front of the tree stood Nathan’s younger brother, Greg

Greg’s arms were crossed in front of his chest. His pudgy brow was scrunched forward. He did not look happy.

“We can’t open the presents today,” Greg said. His plump belly protruded from under the top of his threadbare pajamas. Somehow he managed to retain his baby fat despite surviving on DOD rations for the past 3 years. Nathan could never understand this; the rations still made him slightly sick.

“What are you talking about?” Nathan replied.

“We can’t open presents today, it isn’t Christmas.” He stomped his foot with that last word. Despite Nathan’s best efforts, Greg still acted a bit like a 6-year-old. He was 9 now, but without other children to grow up with, he was slightly emotionally stunted.

“What would give you that notion?” Nathan said peevishly. His brother was starting to sap away his holiday joy.

“Last year was a leap year. That makes tomorrow Christmas.”

“That’s ridiculous, the computer compensates for leap years dummy.” Nathan never had the patients for Greg’s silly games.

“It didn’t,” Greg said, “check for yourself.”

“Fine.” Nathan trudged over to the common rooms computer and depressed the power button. The monitor fizzled to life. He accessed the calendar program. Leap years, where does he get off? he thought to himself.

The calendar program flashed onto the screen: TUESDAY DECEMBER 25th, 2109. Nathan navigated to February 2110. Twenty-eight days there. He flipped back to 2109. The same: 28 days in February. 2108, the same. And 2107. Nathan flipped the calendar backward and forward. Always the same: 28 days in February. It was true: the calendar did not show leap years. Just another sign of the hasty construction of the shelters, Nathan thought, and no one had planed living in them for three years. Yet here we are.

“See,” Greg said. “Christmas is really tomorrow.”

“Well,” Nathan sputtered. He didn’t know quite what to say. He was embarrassed for not seeing the mistake himself. Feebly he continued, “It doesn’t matter, this is the calendar we use and that’s that.”

“But Santa wont come.” Greg’s eyes were wide and wet.

Nathan considered telling Greg the truth about Santa right then and there. Last year, Greg had been so hopeful that Santa was on his way. He never came, but Greg was positive that he would be back this year.

Nathan looked at the tiny, faux Christmas tree. He was old enough to remember vividly the brightly colored trees from before the war. Those were real trees. They had that smell, that Christmas smell. This tree didn’t have that smell. Still, he had felt guilty salvaging some electrical wire from the tree to help repair the shelter’s beacon.

“Okay, Greg,” Nathan replied. He didn’t want to argue. Who am I to ruin the one Holiday they had left? Nathan thought. He could wait another day to open his gifts. “You’re right. We’ll celebrate Christmas tomorrow.” He smiled at his brother. Greg smiled back.

In the control room the radio receiver squawked to life. Both boy’s heads spun towards the hallway door. Without words they ran to the control room.

“This is a Mars based search and rescue, do you read us?”

Nathan could hardly believe what he was hearing.

“This is Shelter 509, requesting evacuation, over” Nathan said into the receivers hand piece, remembering the words his Ms. Neumann had taught him.

“Shelter 509, we have a rescue party inbound,” The voice said, cheerfully. “Your four year underground vacation is over.”

Nathan and Greg looked at each other.

“Did you say 4 years? Over,” Nathan said into the handset.

“Yes,” The voice on the other end paused, “Today is January 26th 2109. You have been down there over 4 years.”

Nathan slowly nodded his head. The shelter’s computer must have been loosing more time then he though. He looked at his brother. “So Greg, now can we open the presents?”

Greg smiled, sincerely, “Yes sir!”

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 14th, 2008 at 4:56 pm and is filed under Sci-Fi, writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.