A late birthday/early holiday present for Genesis of Giovana. :)

Um, so... this is a Christmas story written by an irreverent pagan with a sarcastic sense of humor. Don't be offended, please. ^^' Also, this is set in the same universe as my 'Father' story- because I'm unimaginative that way.

"Hey!" Salsa rushed down the stairs and skittered into the kitchen, waving her arms theatrically. "Hey, Frederic's asleep."

Jazz raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah– he's snoring an' everything! Can we get the tree out now?"

The man chuckled and set down the papers he'd been sorting through. "Sure. Go grab your coat."

"Yes! C'mon guys, we're gonna go pick out a—"

"I meant grab your coat quietly, Salsa," Jazz interrupted. "You're going to wake your father up again."

"Oh, yeah. Okay." She giggled and cleared her throat loudly before yelling in a whisper, "Come on, guys, we're gonna go pick out a Christmas tree!"

Jazz sighed as the redhead ran out of the room, smiling to himself. Her brand of enthusiasm was hard to find.

He stood up, tucking papers under his arm as he turned to make his way up the stairs. The door at the top of the landing was ajar, and Jazz poked his head inside as quietly as he could, stepping all the way in when he got no immediate response. "Frederic?"

There was a soft snore from the bed, and Jazz smiled. Frederic really was asleep. He grabbed his boots from their place by the closet and hurried back down the stairs just as the twins were coming out of their room, both dressed in heavy winter coats. Beat came around the corner a second later, hopping on one foot as he tried to pull on his shoes.

"Hey, are we really going to cut down a tree?"

"Of course we are!" Salsa exclaimed. "I said we were, didn't I?"

Jazz chuckled, slipping his gloves on as the children argued. "Be nice to each other, guys. It's the holidays."

March looked surprised. "It's a holiday?"

"Yep." He pushed open the front door and gestured for the kids go ahead of him, making sure to check the lock as he stepped outside. The last thing poor Frederic needed was an unwelcome visitor disrupting his nap. "We're going to celebrate Christmas this year."

"Christmas?"

Jazz shoved both his hands into his pockets and began leading them down the snow-covered walkway, his shoulders hunched against the wind. He really didn't like cold weather. "It's a holiday they celebrate in Poland, to mark the birth of a king."

"Like Prince Crescendo's dad?" Beat asked from behind him. "He's a king, right?"

"Well, yeah. And Crescendo will be, too, when it's time for him to take his father's throne."

"You mean when he dies," Salsa corrected.

Jazz rolled his eyes. "Yes, Salsa. When the prince's father dies, Crescendo will be crowned king. And when Crescendo dies, his son or daughter will be the next king or queen, and so on and so on until somebody revolts."

"But if all the kings start out as princes," March cut in, "how did they know to celebrate him being a king as soon as he was born?"

"Yeah!" her sister agreed. "An' how did they know this one was gonna be so special if there's a whole world just chock-full of kings?"

Jazz started to lead them off the path, deeper into the forest that hid the Andante Hideout so well. He really had no idea how Frederic kept up with the children's constant questioning. "An angel was said to have come down to earth when this king was born, and he told–"

"He?" March laughed slightly, and Salsa shook her head.

"I've never heard of a boy angel before."

"I didn't write the story, guys, I'm just telling it."

Beat made a dramatic shushing motion. "I want to hear the rest of the story!"

Jazz chuckled and took a left turn, following the sound of the almost-frozen river as he continued. "So the angel said that this poor child–"

"Wait, he's poor?" Beat interjected. "I thought he was a king!"

"Maybe he's not a king yet," March offered.

"But don't you have to be part of a royal family to get to be king?"

"Okay," Jazz threw his hands up in the air, "Forget the whole 'king' part. That wasn't really important. A little boy was born to a really poor family, and an angel came down to earth to tell all the people that this baby would save mankind."

"And 'elf-kind,' too, right?" the redhead demanded. Jazz sighed.

"Yes. And elf-kind, too."

Beat shook his head, looking thoughtful. "I don't think there are any elves in Frederic's world. So... I guess they wouldn't really need to be saved."

March wrapped a strand of hair around one finger and murmured, "If he was really going to save the world, wouldn't he have to save all of them?"

"I don't think he actually even did anything," Salsa argued. "Father's still alive."

Jazz stopped short, and managed to glance back at the three of them before he broke out laughing. "What, because Frederic is that evil? The world couldn't possibly have been saved as long as he's still alive?"

"That's not what I meant! I just..." Salsa trailed off and shrugged like she was suddenly uncomfortable.

"You just what?"

"I dunno. It's just, like, wouldn't all the good people be in heaven or something? If everybody got saved, he wouldn't be alive like everybody else."

March nodded. "And even if he was still alive, he wouldn't be so sick."

"Yeah."

Jazz sighed slightly and looked back and forth between them, wondering how on earth Frederic managed to answer these kinds of questions every day. "I guess maybe being saved doesn't always mean going to heaven."

"Maybe it means just being someplace better," Beat murmured.

"Maybe so."

"I think it's like what the priests at the church say," March said softly. "You don't really go to church to get into heaven; you go to church to get closer to whatever God you believe in."

Salsa rolled her eyes. "Okay, fine. So there's this weird holiday celebrating a poor king that's not really a king who's gonna save all the men and all the elves in the whole wide galaxy. Where does the tree come in and why are we just standin' around here talking about it?"

Jazz chuckled. "A little reverence here would go a long way, Salsa. This is sort of a big deal to your father."

"Did he tell you that?" Beat asked. "I've never even heard him talk about... what's it called again? Criss... Crissmass?"

Jazz turned again and started trudging down the snowy hill, checking over his shoulder to make sure the children were following. "He hasn't told me anything about it; I just found some of his papers when I was cleaning out the desk."

"You read his stuff?" Salsa sounded scandalized.

"He reads my stuff."

"Yeah, but that's different. Your stuff could get us all killed."

Jazz laughed again, careful not to trip over the fallen log in their path. "Don't worry so much, Salsa; the papers he doesn't want me to see he writes in Polish. I figured if it was in a language I could understand, it would be okay if I looked at it."

"Still, that's pretty sneaky of you. I don't think Frederic would be happy if he found out."

"He's going to find out as soon as we get home with this tree."

Beat blinked. "Are we actually going to take the tree all the way home with us?"

"That's part of the tradition. You're supposed to put an evergreen tree in your home and decorate it so everybody can see."

"That seems like a lot of work..."

Salsa stopped in her tracks at the mention of work, both hands on her hips. "Hey! You said we were just gonna make ornaments for it—you didn't say we'd have to carry it home!"

"How else did you think we were going to get it back to the house?" Jazz shook his head in exasperation, deciding it was worthless to try and argue. "I promise I won't make you do any heavy lifting, Salsa. All you three need to do is pick out a nice tree."

Beat still didn't sound too sure of their plan. "And we're going to put it in the house? Is it even gonna fit through the door?"

"Well, we're not going to choose a giant one. The doors are pretty big, but we do have criteria here."

"What's criteria mean?"

"The rules you have to follow."

"And we have rules, too?"

"Only three of them." Jazz held up three fingers, folding one down for each listed piece of 'criteria.' "It has to be a pine tree, it has to fit in the house, and you can't keep any of the animals we find living in it."

March started to argue—"It's really, really cold out here"—but Jazz shook his head.

"No! No more pets. If one of the Count's supporters wanted to find us, all they'd have to do is follow the giant line of stray cats lined up outside our house."

The children laughed nervously, knowing that Jazz had meant it as a joke... even if the idea was a little too scary to be amusing. Finally Beat cleared his throat. "You know, father isn't going to be asleep for very long."

March nodded. "That's true. Let's hurry and find a tree so he doesn't have to worry about us being gone."

"You just tell me when you find the right one."

Almost before the words were out of his mouth Salsa had rushed over to a giant fir tree and thrown her arms around it, exclaiming, "We should get this one!"

March frowned and tilted her head back to try and see the top tier of needles. "Salsa, I don't think that will fit in our house."

"Of course it will, silly. An' if it doesn't, we can just cut off a tiny bit and it'll be fine!"

Jazz shook his head, both hands still in his pockets. "I hate to break it to you, Salsa, but March is right. That tree might fit in Crescendo's house, but there's no way it would make it into ours."

"But it would look so awesome!"

"No one's arguing with you."

Salsa opened her mouth to protest, but Beat cut her off, pointing to another, much smaller tree. "How 'bout that one?"

Jazz surveyed it quietly. "I don't know... it still might be a little big."

"Oh, come on!" Salsa gestured backwards to where Beat was pointing, almost whacking him in the head in the process. "That puny thing won't even fit? We might as well just get a little tiny bush and put it on the kitchen table."

March rolled her eyes, smiling. "Well I think it's perfect."

"Alright then." Jazz pulled something metallic out a deep pocket in his vest and held it out, as though to judge how thick the tree was. Beat stared at the object, trying to identify it.

"It looks like a necklace."

Jazz laughed, and pressed the metal against the bark near the base. "Yeah—don't tell your father."

"What the heck is it?"

He dragged the chain back and forth against the bark, and Beat realized how sharp whatever must have been to cut through the tree trunk that way. "It's an... experiment. And for the record, it looks like a very successful experiment."

March frowned slightly. "You're going to be in trouble if Father ever finds out."

"That's why you shouldn't tell him." After a moment the tree fell backwards with a heavy thud, and Jazz straightened up. "Besides, there's no reason for him to be upset if it works, right?"

"Hey, aren't you supposed to say 'timber' or something before you just let the thing crush us all?" demanded Salsa, and this time it was Beat's turn to roll his eyes.

"I thought you just said it was puny, right? It wouldn't have even hurt you."

Jazz produced a length of rope from another pocket, and stooped down to tie it around the middle of the tree. "No one's getting crushed. I've cut down a million trees before; I know what I'm doing. Even the squirrel got out okay."

March's face lit up. "There was a squirrel?"

The redhead didn't give him a chance to answer. "Well, come on, then. We've got to get back even sooner now so I can find a place for all the ornaments I made."

Beat threw his hands up in exasperation, and Jazz just laughed and gestured forward. "Lead the way, then."

They turned back up the little-used path just as fresh, white snowflakes started to fall, Jazz dragging their new Christmas tree behind them. March sighed happily, glancing around at the bright icicles and gray sky. "It's beautiful out here."

"Next year maybe we can bring your father with us," Jazz murmured, and March smiled back at him.

"That would be really fun. Do you think we'll do this every year?"

"I don't see why not. There's lots of trees in the forest."

Beat slowed a little and fell in step with March. "That's a really weird tradition. Do you know why you put them in your house and stuff, Jazz? Or why you're supposed to decorate them?"

Even walking five feet ahead of them, Salsa was quick with a rebuttal of, "You decorate them so they look pretty. Duh."

"They could look pretty outside."

"Nuh-uh. Then they'd get all snowed over and nobody would see 'em."

"You could see them if–"

"I think it's symbolic," Jazz interrupted. "Evergreens are said to represent eternal life, because–"

"Evergreen trees die, too, though! Just like everything else." Jazz glanced at the red-haired elf trudging ahead of them and sighed.

This time it was March who answered the not-quite question: "They do die eventually, Salsa, but since they're still green in the wintertime doesn't it seem like they live forever? I mean, all the other plants and trees don't seem to be alive at all once it gets cold—even if they really are—but those ones are still really healthy even when there's lots of snow on the ground."

"Okay," Salsa conceded, "sure. But what does that have to do with the baby king who's gonna save the world?"

"Going to heaven is kind of like getting eternal life, isn't it?" asked Beat, stepping carefully around an overgrown tree root. Jazz shrugged.

"I guess–"

"Jazz wouldn't know," Salsa jumped in, once again ignoring the glare he gave her, "since he's not going to heaven."

"Salsa!" Beat hissed, kicking snow towards her.

"What? It's true."

"It doesn't matter—that was still really rude. You should apologize."

"What? I didn't do anything wrong!"

Jazz raised an eyebrow at her. "You don't think that telling someone they're going to hell counts as wrong?"

"I didn't say you were going to hell," she argued, pausing when she glanced back to see the look on Jazz's face. "Well... I didn't mean it that way."

"It was kind of implied there, little one." Salsa was so wrapped up in defending her logic that she didn't even notice the pet name, but Jazz saw March smiling out of the corner of his eye. Damn it. Frederic needed to stop rubbing off on him.

The redhead huffed loudly, although there was a humble sort of blush on her cheeks as she folded her arms. "Okay, fine. I'm sorry. Even though it's true."

"That was a terrible apology," Beat muttered, but Jazz pretended not to hear him.

"Thank you, Salsa. I appreciate the sentiment."

"So anyway, Jazz," March said, "what were you going to say?"

The man laughed and shook his head. "I don't even remember—something about heaven."

"How a pine tree is like living forever...?" she prompted, and Jazz laughed again.

"This is such a weird conversation. Okay, I was going to say that if being saved doesn't always mean going straight to heaven, maybe there's more to eternal life than just never dying."

Beat nodded slowly. "I guess I didn't ever think about it that way."

"What the heck is the point of living forever if you don't actually get to live forever?" Salsa shouted over her shoulder. March shrugged, although her sister couldn't see it.

"Getting saved and living forever sound like the same thing to me. Maybe being saved means that you know there will be a nice world for your children to grow up in, even after you've died."

Jazz smiled, turning his face up towards the softly falling snow. "I never thought of myself as saved before." Then he quickened his pace and pushed on ahead, the tree dragging a path behind him. "Come on, you three. Let's get home."

. . . . . . . . . .

Frederic woke to the sound of someone laughing downstairs, and he turned his face into the pillow, smiling. The white duvet around him was red with the light of the setting sun, and the house was warm, filled with the sounds of a crackling fire while outside the wind rattled the windowpanes. He would have been happy to lie there forever.

Of course, people with children didn't get that luxury very often, he mused, as Salsa started yelling. He couldn't even make out her words, although several other voices were quick to hush her. "Shut up."

"You're going to wake up Father!"

"Feel free to go outside and yell all you want, little one."

Frederic laughed to himself at the last comment, picturing Salsa standing outside in the snow and screaming to the heavens. Luckily they didn't have any neighbors...

He pushed himself upright, wincing a little with the effort. It was embarrassing how something as small as a cold could keep him off his feet for days, but he was truly blessed; there were always people around that were more than happy to help pull his weight, with little or no complaint.

He pulled a blanket off the bed and wrapped it around his shoulders, the fabric still warm from his own body heat, before setting off down the hallway. He could see the light of a fire burning in the room downstairs, and people were talking quietly above the sound of the wind, giggling as they spoke. "Do you think he'll be happy?"

"Of course he will, March—Frederic always loves anything you do for him."

"He'd better be. This was a lot of work."

Frederic crept down the staircase, still wondering what they were talking about, and stopped short halfway down. "Oh my goodness!"

It was almost comical the way all four of them looked up at once, and Jazz jumped to his feet. "You're supposed to be in bed."

Frederic didn't bother to point out that he had been in bed for the last three hours, and instead just took the hand that Jazz offered to help him down the stairs. He was too busy staring at the newly-made decorations that wreathed their front room.

"It's beautiful."

The fir tree stood proudly in a corner beside the door, covered in paper chains and strings of popcorn and cranberries. Here and there small candles were nestled in the branches, casting strange shadows on the ceiling and the floor. There was tinsel strung not only on the tree but over the door and hearth as well, and every branch was occupied with holding up an ornament—garlands of pine cones and cardinal feathers, snowflakes made of paper, portraits of all the different people in their family. Frederic felt his eyes burning with tears as he realized some of the ornaments were made with scraps the girls' dresses and the boys' coats, buckles and jewels and embroidery all shining in the light.

Jazz hugged Frederic carefully from behind, his arms wrapped around his shoulders as the children gathered at their feet. "Do you like it, Father?"

"Did we do a good job?"

"We didn't know what it was supposed to look like..."

"It's beautiful," Frederic repeated, his voice trembling as he finally managed to tear his eyes away. "Thank you. Thank you so much."

He knelt down and gathered all three of them into his arms, kissing each differently-colored head as he whispered, "I'm so lucky to have all of you here with me. Thank you so much, little ones. I love you so much."

Just then they heard the sound of the back door closing, and Polka's voice called, "Is anybody home?"

"We're in here," Jazz called back, and there was a flurry of returned kisses before the children ran off to meet their newest arrivals, calling I love you behind them.

Jazz pulled Frederic to his feet, wrapping his arms around him again. "So do you like it?"

"It is the most lovely Christmas tree I've ever had."

The swordsman chuckled. "Do you like it enough to forgive me for snooping through your stuff?"

"Even if I hated it, I would like it enough to forgive you, Jazz."

"That's good, because I have another surprise for you." He tilted his head to one side and Frederic followed the motion, blushing as he realized what Jazz was pointing to.

"Mistletoe."

"Mhm."

"We're not even standing under it."

"I know. We should fix that."

Frederic laughed out loud and leaned forward to press a soft kiss to Jazz's smiling lips. "Thank you."

Jazz returned the kiss. "Happy Christmas."

"It will be."