A rapid knocking on her door woke up Aqua, and in a half-asleep daze, she stumbled out of bed and opened the door. There in the doorway was Ventus, or Ven, the youngest apprentice. Aqua had a tendency to think of him as her younger brother. The spiky-haired blonde looked as if he had just seen a ghost, or worse.
"What's wrong?" She asked.
"I, uh... I kind of had a nightmare," the younger apprentice said, blushing as if he were slightly ashamed. "..Could I sleep here for the night?"
Aqua did blinked for a few seconds, and then smiled.
"Of course you can," She said. Terra had told her a while back that, in his opinion, she had a tendency to act like a motherly figure to the young blonde, and so was attempting to live up to that title. She quickly set up the extra mattress in her room, and climbed back into bed. Ven followed after, climbing into the guest bed. Aqua was just beginning to drift back off to sleep when she heard Ven say something.
"Aqua, I hate to ask, but um, could you tell me a story?" He asked softly, almost inaudibly. "It'd probably help me sleep faster."
"Sure," Aqua answered, and began thinking of a story to tell. It was pretty close to Christmas, so she decided to tell him a festive holiday story.
"A long time ago, in a place far away," Aqua began. "There lived a man named Terra Claus, who lived with his wife and many lively elves."
-A LONG TIME AGO, IN A PLACE FAR AWAY-
"Nice, nice, nice, naughty, nice," Terra Claus said, checking off names on his list. It was a tedious job, but he was used to it after all these years. He heard footsteps and looked up to see Emyd, one of the younger elves, running into his workshop.
"Mr. Claus, it's terrible!" He cried, looking as though he were ready to leave the Northern Land of Departure at a moment's notice.
"What's wrong?" Terra frowned.
"The entire workshop's been ransacked!" The young elf answered.
Terra slammed a palm to his face. He knew exactly who had done it. The culprit had been attempting to ruin this year's Christmas at any time he could. This had been the third time this month that something in his home had been messed up beyond current repair.
"I'll be on it in a moment," He said. "Could you go alert the other elves, Emyd?" Emyd nodded and ran out of the room.
"Aqua, could you come here for a moment?" Terra asked, calling for his wife.
"What happened?" Aqua Claus replied, exiting the kitchen.
"Could you do the list for a bit? I have some business to take care of," Terra answered, grabbing his coat and pulling it on.
"All right, I'll get Elenar to finish up dinner while I work on this," She said, already focused on the list.
Terra slightly cringed at the sound of this and walked out of the room. He wasn't sure why Aqua let the knife-obsessed elf fool around in the kitchen.
Terra Claus made the long trek up to Graveyard Hill, where the culprit usually spent his mornings. He grumbled swears and cursed the cold as he began to reach the peak of the hill, where the snow was knee-deep and extremely cold. When he reached the top, he rang the doorbell and waited. No response. He tried again. He heard footsteps and waited for the resident to open the door.
An old, bald man answered the door.
"Season's Greetings, Terra Claus," He said in a gravelly voice. "What brings you to Graveyard Hill?"
"I've come to see Vanitas, Xehanort. He messed up the Elves' Workshop." Terra answered with a glare. "That's the third time this month. I demand to see him."
"My apologies, you just missed him," the old man informed him.
"But how? There's only one way up... here…" Terra quickly remembered that the hill was covered in snow. His adversary had slid down the opposite side of the hill when he was on his way up here. "...You have got to be kidding me," Terra grumbled, running back down the pathway.
"Nice job," A voice said from behind Xehanort. "Good thing he's gullible. He should probably use his head more." A raven-haired teen stepped out from the hall, snowboard in tow. "Well, might as well go down to town." He finished, and snowboarded down the hill.
Terra arrived in town, gasping for breath and scanning the area for his target. He was nowhere to be seen. It took three minutes for Terra to realize what had actually happened. He'd been tricked. For the third time that month.
"Not. Again." Terra said, punctuating each word by banging his head against a tree.
A young, blonde-haired boy walked up to Terra, and pulled on his sleeve a few times.
"Are you okay, Mr. Claus?" He asked.
Terra looked at the child speaking to him. He had seen the boy hanging around the workshop from time to time, playing with some of the elves.
"I'm fine Ven." Terra answered, removing his head from the tree. In turn, a mountain of snow removed itself from the tree and landed hard on his head. Ven attempted to suppress a giggle, as Terra shook the large amount of snow from his head. "...Could today get any worse?" Terra yelled. And then he remembered. It could get worse. Christmas Eve was tomorrow, and the list and gifts were barely halfway done.
"...Oh crap." Terra muttered and ran back to the workshop, leaving the blonde boy to wonder what had gotten him so worked up.
Ven sat down on an old log and watched Terra get smaller and smaller in the distance.
"I hope he's okay," He mumbled. He turned around just in time to see Vanitas finish snowboarding down the hill. He grinned and ran over.
"Big brother!" He yelled. This made the other male jump and run off. Ven, stunned by how quickly his older brother had run off, stopped running and stood there, wondering why he had done so. The young blonde slowly walked back to the log where he had been sitting, and took a nap.
-MEANWHILE, AT TERRA'S WORKSHOP-
Terra quickly made it back to the workshop, and soon had the elves gathered for an emergency meeting.
"As you all know, the workshop has been almost destroyed a few times this month, in an attempt to get us to cancel Christmas." Terra began. "However, we won't be letting this happen. Lea, is the back-up workshop still okay?"
"Other than still being covered in glue from that… uh… 'incident' last year, yeah." Lea said. A few of the elves around him held back giggles at the memory of the event.
"Well, set it up," Terra replied. "Isa and Ienzo, I'm counting on you to help him. Is that clear?"
"Crystal clear!" The two elves chirped, and the trio ran down to the basement.
"On a side note," Terra continued. "I'm paying you all triple for this job. Be sure to work hard."
The elves' eyes seemed to light up with dollar signs as they ran downstairs to begin work. Terra, beginning to be tired, walked back to his workshop, where Aqua was waiting with a finished list and a plate of food. His stomach loudly growled as he caught a whiff, causing Aqua to lightly giggle.
"How did everything go?" She asked as he began stuffing his face.
"Not too well. They tricked me again," Terra replied, ashamed.
"Well, at least nothing will go wrong from here on out," Aqua told him with a smile.
"Yeah, hopefully," Terra muttered in a faintly pessimistic tone.
A loud elven scream interrupted Terra's peaceful dinner, and he ran down to the basement to investigate. He had finally made it in time to capture his adversary, as the black-haired teen now stood in front of a group of frightened elves.
"Don't tell him I'm here," Terra quietly mouthed to the elves, the sound of whirring machinery drowning out any slight noises he might've made.
"Terra's here to save us!" Emyd, yelled in glee, due to apparently being terrible at reading lips. This, in turn, caused Terra to bang his head against the wall, along with causing all the other elves to simultaneously smack their palms into their faces, similarly to how Terra had earlier. Ienzo hit Emyd on the head with a book he had been reading as punishment, as Vanitas turned around to face Terra.
"Tired of being messed with, I take it?" He said with a smirk.
"Oh trust me, I'm more than tired of it," Terra returned with a glare. "Don't you have anything better to do with your life than messing up Christmas?"
"Maybe, but this is just too fun. Especially with how easy it was to trick you each time you came up to Graveyard Hill to complain." Vanitas answered after a few seconds.
Terra was through with this. He summoned his weapon, a candy cane-striped, and charged at his enemy. The teen swiftly dodged and summoned his own weapon, a red and black Keyblade with gear-like aspects and two large, and sort of creepy, as Terra had once put it, green-blue eye-like orbs. A repetitive battle began, with Terra attacking every few seconds and his adversary blocking in response. This cycle continued for about five minutes, until Terra saw an opening and knocked the boy's weapon out of his hands. Vanitas was startled and cursed under his breath. Terra was about to land a blow when little Ven, with a few tears in his eyes, ran out and stood between the two older boys.
"V-Ven?" Terra said, startled, and quickly let his weapon disappear. "What's wrong?"
"J-just stop fighting!" He said between sobs, and then turned around to the boy who was his older brother. The black-haired teen looked away, not meeting Ven's teary eyes. "You don't have to do this you know," Ven began. "Christmas is supposed to be an important day for everyone, so... I don't get why you're doing this."
"None of your business," The teen snapped. He got up and walked to the doorway, and stepped out. "We'll settle this next year," He muttered, and left. The teen trekked up Graveyard Hill, muttering curses under his breath all the way up. He marched into his house, grabbed a mug of hot chocolate, and walked straight to his workshop to plan for next year's Christmas, completely ignoring the questions of the old man, due not wishing to tell him of his failure.
-TWO DAYS LATER-
Vanitas, barely awake, walked into the kitchen on the morning of Christmas Day.
"Something came for you this morning," Xehanort told him. "I put it on the counter."
He sleepily stumbled his way to the kitchen counter, and was filled with a mixture of surprise and slight disgust at what he saw waiting for him. It was a Christmas present, wrapped rather sloppy in bright green wrapping paper, with a card attached to it. He decided to read the card before deciding what to do with the gift.
"Merry Christmas, Vani!" The card read. "Hope you enjoy the gift. Your younger brother, Ventus."
He slightly blushed, took the gift, and ran down the stairs, as a mop of blonde looking through the window grinned and left.
-BACK IN AQUA'S BEDROOM-
"The end." Aqua said, finishing the story. She could hear Ven faintly snoring and smiled. She was glad to have been able to help him fall asleep, but as she began to drift off herself, the castle bells rang, signaling that it was time for a long day of training to begin. "...Really?" She yelled, covering her face with her pillow, and she would train with Ven and Terra under sleepless protest for the rest of the day.