Authors Note
Welcome back to the Ice Age world dear readers! This will be the Christmas Special, A Mammoth Christmas. But of course, I couldn't just do that one and leave it at that! So in addition to the movie special, I will include my own Christmas fanfic after this one. It will be in the same book, so no need to look elsewhere ?
A Mammoth Christmas will include all of the characters as they appear in the film and I will of course be including my OC, Sassy the wolf! (If you haven't read my other ice age stories I recommend doing so before reading these stories) And then my Christmas story will be set after Collision Course, so all of the characters will be based after Peaches and Jullian's wedding. Also, Sassy will be joined by her mate, Denali, (another OC of mine) and then Diego and Shira will have their three cubs that I added on at the end of Collision Course.
Disclaimer: All rights to Ice Age belong to Blue Sky Studios. Sassy, Denali, Rocky, Chase and Rose are my characters.
I hope everyone enjoys these stories as much as the other books! Have a very Merry Christmas and God bless you all this holiday season!
Sassy yawned as she walked through the snow covered forest with her best friend, Diego the saber tooth tiger. Anyone watching them would think they were insane. A wolf and a saber tooth? Friends? Not only friends but living with 2 mammoths, one baby mammoth, 2 crazy opossums and 1 stinky sloth. she sometimes questioned their own sanity. But she didn't question her family for the world. A scrat leaped out of the snow in front of them and went leaping after an acorn that was rolling away. Sassy looked up and saw Manny rolling his "Christmas rock" into the clearing.
"He's dragging that thing out again?" Diego asked.
"It would appear so." Sassy rolled her eyes and then smiled as she watched Peaches slide down the hill with her two uncles and engage in a rough house snow ball fight. She and Diego wandered closer just in time to see Manny pull Peaches off the rock cause she had kissed it and was stuck to the cold rock.
"Oh Christmas rock, oh Christmas rock! You're 30 tons of granite!" Manny sang out.
"You realize you're singing to a rock?" Diego questioned the male.
"It's a Christmas tradition. For the kids! Don't sabers have Christmas traditions?"
"Oh yeah! Every year my dad would bring home the biggest, fattest gazelle's and then we would all rip into their-,"
"Ahem!" Ellie halted Diego's words and tearing into a snow gazelle as a frightened Peaches trembled by her mother.
"O-our presents a-and then we'd play games with the gazelles and dance with them and not eat them. The end!" He grinned sheepishly and Sassy glared at the saber.
"Merry Christmas my mammals!" Sid the sloth exclaimed, sliding up and draping his arm around Diego's broad shoulders in a brotherly gesture. "Wow that's some crazy rock." He said, getting so close he breathed on the huge granite boulder.
"Step away from the stone." Manny ordered, picking him up and placing him back.
"Why?"
"Because you'll break it."
"Sid can't break a rock." Ellie defended jokingly.
"Don't tempt him." Sassy and Diego said in unison, full expressions on their maws.
"Uncle Sid, we need this so that Santa can find us tonight!" Peaches said, stepping in front of Sid and wrapping her little trunk around the rock protectively.
"What this?" She nodded. "Pfff you need something bigger, taller, sparklyier! Something with pizzazz! Um...a tree!" Sid said, gesturing to a tall pine in the middle of the clearing.
"A Christmas tree? Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?" Manny said.
"There's millions of trees out there Sid. How would anyone notice this one?" Diego asked.
"Well we could decorate it!" He clapped his paws together twice. "Crash! Eddie!" The two opossums giggled and the three set to work, gathering everything from earth worms to fish skeletons to live animals to stick, hang and impale on the branches. "And...viola!" Everyone ooohed and ahhhed at the decorated tree.
"It does look pretty good." Diego observed.
"I think it's a great idea." Sassy threw in, looking up at the sparkling tree. The brothers had just added icicles to the branches to make them glisten in the afternoon sunlight.
"Humph. It'll never catch on."
"It's beautiful!"
"Hmm...it needs a certain razzle dazzle on top. Something that says...Sid." He leaned back against a tree and a chunk of ice and snow stuck to his fur. He grunted and pulled away, only to have the ice stick to him in sort of a Star shape. He pulled it off his coat and climbed up the tree and placed it on top. "And just like that a tradition is born-whoa!" The tree tipped to the side with Sid's added weight and when he touched the ground and let go, the top went snapping back, sending the ice Star spiraling through the air, coming dangerously close to some mammals. Everyone ducked and screamed and it finally flew straight into Manny's Christmas rock and shattered. Everyone gasped. "Oh seriously what did you think was going to happen?" Sid asked casually, leaning against the rock. And just like that it cracked and crumbled into large pieces. "Oops." Sid slowly backed away from the now destroyed rock.
"Yup that says Sid all right." Diego drawled. Sassy braced for impact. She knew this was not going to end well, for anyone but most of all Sid. Manny picked up a chunk of the rock, looking at it forlornly as it crumbled in his trunk. He growled and turned to the sloth, slowly walking towards him. Sid blanched and backed up.
"Now now lets keep our heads. A-after all isn't it about the true spirit of Christmas?"
"You're about to be a Spirit of Christmas Sid!"
"Oh Manny! I'm so sorry!" Sid wailed, hugging Manny's trunk.
"You know what Sid, I'm the least of your worries!" Manny turned his trunk up, the sloth dangling upside down. "You gotta answer to Santa!"
"Santa?" Sid gulped. "You mean Santa Clause?" Manny dropped him, letting his sprawl flat on his stomach.
"He is never going to forgive this. You just got yourself on a...duh...Santa's Naughty List!" Manny finally said menacingly, hovering over Sid with a dark expression.
"Santa has a naughty list?" Peaches asked her father.
"Yeah, yeah and if you're not good, then he puts your name on it!"
"We're never good." Crash observed.
"Then why start now?" Eddie finished and kneed his brother in the gut.
"If your name is on it, you don't get Christmas." Manny said, glowering at Sid. Sid, Peaches and the twins gasped in horror. Manny walked away, leaving Sid to crumple to his knees and let out a long wail.
"Nooo! Why me! Besides the fact that it's my fault heh heh."
"The naughty list? Where'd you come up with that one?" Ellie asked.
"Relax. Sid's gullible but he's not that gullible. He knows this Santa stuff is just for kids."
"What!?" The two grown mammoths looked over in horror as they realized Peaches had overheard everything. "You don't believe in Santa?"
"Well I uh-,"
"Of Course he does! It's the magic of Christmas!" Ellie covered for her mate.
"If anyone deserves to be on the naughty list dad, it's you." Peaches huffed and stormed off.
"She sure told you."
"Well too bad. I'm a grown up, and grownups don't believe in the naughty list." A distinct wail from Sid begged to differ.
"Why am I on Santa's naughty list!?" He cried to Diego.
"My guess? He doesn't have a loser list." The Tiger snarked and moved away from the sloth, padding up after Sassy, who was walking through the woods nearby.
"That was harsh Diego." Sassy said sternly, glaring at him. Diego rolled his eyes and shrugged.
"We've called him worse."
"Correction. You and Manny have called him worse. I've never called him anything except stinky and an idiot and the idiot one was justified by the fact that he had stolen 3 dinosaur eggs." Diego opened his mouth to argue with her, but wisely snapped it shut again.
"So what do wolves do for Christmas?" Diego asked, changing the subject as they walked together. Sassy's ears drooped slightly at the ends but that was the only indication she gave that something was wrong. Until she spoke.
"I wouldn't know. My pack never had Christmas." Diego stopped, looking at the former alpha in disbelief.
"What? How is that possible? How can you not have Christmas?" Sassy shrugged.
"I was born in the spring and you already know I became alpha when I was only a little over half a year old. By the time winter came, my entire family was dead, and all I had was my pack. None of the elders of the pack ever told me about Christmas and for all I know they didn't even know what it was themselves." Sassy looked up at the blue sky, almost searching even though she knew what she sought wasn't visible yet. "We never had Christmas in the sense most mammals know it, but we did have something. Something not many would understand."
"Tell me." Diego urged. Sassy smiled, reminiscing on her pack and her memories of their winters.
"One night each year, the night that I now know is indeed, Christmas Eve, whether the moon was full, half or gone, the night was always clear, and the stars shown brighter than they ever had any other day of the year. But especially, one star in particular. The North Star. It always shown the biggest and the brightest. We didn't know why, but we were drawn to it and every year we went to the highest cliff nearby and the entire pack spent the night together under the star's glow. I considered following it one year, to see where it would take me. It just seemed to be calling to me. But, I couldn't just leave my pack like that." Sassy brought her head down and looked at Diego, who seemed almost too stunned to speak.
"I...um...gee I'm not sure why to say." He finally spoke. Sassy gave him a sad smile.
"It's alright Diego. No words are necessary." She nudged his head in a friendly gesture and kept walking to the clearing where Manny was trying to reassemble his Christmas rock. She and Diego laid down side by side and watched the mammoth work. Finally he looked at them.
"So? What do you think?" He asked. Sassy and Diego looked at the crumpled rock, the pieces propped up by sticks wedged in the cracks, looked at each other and then looked to Manny.
"Do you want the honest answer or the Christmas answer?" Sassy asked.
"Uh...Christmas answer?"
"It's gorgeous." Diego said, in the most heartfelt tone he could muster with how pitiful the rock looked. It shifted and the sticks snapped and the pieces fell in on each other once again.
"Manny!?" Ellie called in a tone that could only be one described as a distraught mother. "Have you seen Peaches? Sid, Crash and Eddie are missing too!"
"Last time I saw them they were trying to figure out how to get off Santa's naughty list." Diego put in, referring to right before he had joined Sassy in the woods. He had heard the 4 plotting but he hadn't put much attention to it. He now wished he had.
"What naughty list I made it up!"
"We need to find them fast. Diego, Sassy, can you pick up Sid's scent?" The two predators looked at each other in discomfort.
"We can but it makes my eyes burn." Diego said.
"Do it!" The two parents ordered harshly and Diego and Sassy flinched.
"Alright alright." They put their noses to the air and sniffed and then retracted sharply, wincing.
"Ugh got it." Diego lamented. Sassy did her best to ignore the foul odor and focused on the other scents.
"Wait...I got Peaches, Crash and Eddie too. They all go in the same direction so it's logical they all four went together." A thought dawned on her and she grimaced. "How much you want to bet they're going to the North Pole to find Santa and get off the naughty list?" Diego looked at her and so did Manny and Ellie.
"It's entirely possible." Diego said, knowing Sassy was probably right. She was always right. They set off through the snow after the rest of their wayward herd. Manny, Ellie, Diego and Sassy traveled all day following the scent of Sid, Peaches and the Twins. As they drew closer north, the wind grew fiercer and fall to pretty soon they were caught in a blizzard, the wind nipping at their coats and snow piling up on their backs. Sassy kept ahead, trying to hold onto the scents. The wind and snow made it very hard to track a scent even as strong as Sid's.
"Peaches! Peaches where are you!?" Manny called above the howl of the wind.
"Wait where's Diego?" Ellie asked. Sassy turned back toward them when she heard a muffled talking and saw her saber friend frozen in a snow cocoon. Manny gasped and hurried over.
"Diego! Diego are you alright buddy?" He tapped what he thought was the tigers head only to have the snow break off. Manny yelled but then Diego shook off the snow on his head and looked behind him.
"Glad you didn't kiss me?" He shook his fur out, dislodging the rest of the snow.
"Are you sure this is north?"
"I don't know I...I'm all turned around...wait tracks!"
"Uh Diego?" Ellie pointed behind them and through the snow they could make out a circle of prints. Diego sighed and walked around a bit.
"The geo-magnetic...whatever it's messing with my sense of direction."
"Oh that's just great! We're completely lost, my little girl is missing and...and...,"
"Manny! It's going to be fine, listen to me!" Ellie tried to reassure her mate.
"But how?
"Believe in the magic of Christmas!"
"That's silly!"
"Just try it!"
"It's not gonna work!"
"Do it for Peaches."
"Sigh* Ok. I believe." And just like that the snow cleared and the sun broke through the clouds.
"Manny look! The northern lights! North, get it!"
"Uhhh...that was just a coincidence right?"
"Who cares?! I'll take it let's go!" Sassy shook her head and followed Manny and Ellie. She didn't bother to tell them that she still had their daughters scent. Manny did need to believe more in magic.
Some time later, as dusk began to set in, a deep rumbling sound caught Sassy off guard. A snow ball flew out of nowhere and struck Manny in the back. They all turned to see a monstrous avalanche headed right for them. Sassy gasped.
"Run!" Ellie exclaimed but they didn't make it very far before they were swallowed by the torment of snow and swept away in its current. Sassy closed her eyes and held her breath as she waited for the wild ride to stop and prayed that it would before they suffocated. In a few moments, her prayers were answered and she stopped tumbling. She sill couldn't breathe though. She thrashed around and felt her back leg break through the wall of snow surrounding her and quickly thrust herself upward. Fresh cold air hit her and she inhaled deeply, gasping for breath. She heard a yell and looked over to see Sid crash into Diego.
"What the-Sid!?"
"Sid!" Sassy yelled charging up to them.
"Sid where's Peaches!?" Ellie asked urgently.
"Peaches!" Manny was already out of the snow and calling for his daughter. Everyone called and searched for her until a voice up above Sassy's head spoke.
"Over here!" A reindeer called, seemingly weightless in the air.
"Wait wait...the reindeer fly up here?" Diego asked.
"This one does, cuz." The reindeer said and flew off. Everyone hurried to Peaches and the two parents doted on their daughter for a moment.
"You...you are so grounded!" Manny said sternly.
"Sorry daddy." Peaches said meekly.
"I'm talking to Sid."
"Sorry daddy." Sid pipped up from behind his niece.
"Frolicking fruitcake!" All heads turned to see a very fat and angry Santa Clause stalking up to the herd. Sid gasped.
"It's Santa!"
"Just cause it's a fat guy doesn't make him Santa." Manny drawled.
"Hey I'm not fat! It's this suit it's very...poofy!" Santa defended.
"Where have I heard that one before." Sassy muttered.
"Manny it is Santa! And he's just as old and decrepit as I imagined he'd be and oh so jolly." Sid said joyously, poking the old man's round belly.
"Oh look at this mess! Everything's ruined! My toys, my sleigh! All my hard work!"
"Umm...would this be a good time to talk about getting off the naughty list?" Santa glared at Sid.
"Sid there's no such thing as the naughty list." Manny rolled his eyes.
"There is now Manfred. Thanks for the idea." Santa reached into his suit and pulled out a long piece of bark that rolled out onto the snow a good several feet.
"Hey how do you know my...name?" Manny looked down as his name appeared last on the naughty list. "Santa?" He looked at him in disbelief.
"Hey, what did we do?"
"Yeah?" Sassy joined Diego in questioning Santa. The angry man gestured around him. "Oh right. Destroying Christmas." The two predators looked at each other as Manny flipped out to his daughter about Santa being real.
"Is this how you imagined your first Christmas?" Sassy chuckled dryly.
"Nothing is ever as I imagine it in this herd.
"There's going to be a lot of disappointed kids tomorrow." Santa said sadly. Everyone bowed their heads in shame and sadness. Diego wacked Sid over the head.
"No. There's gotta be a way to fix this." Manny argued and started picking up trees.
"Dad it's impossible. There's only eight of us!"
"And 800 of them!" Manny gestured to the hundreds of minisloths that lived with Santa.
"Wait us? As in...us?" The head sloth asked.
"You never thought to give the old man a hand huh? Come on Peach! You taught me to believe!" Manny turned to his daughter and she smiled.
"Hit it!" She said to a sloth and his hit her with a stick. She glared at him. "Not me!" He grinned sheepishly and started banging on a drum.
"Why do I sense a song coming on?" Diego asked. Sassy grinned at him and the herd sprung into action.
Sid: Deck the halls with moss and rock weed!
Crash and Eddie: Fa la la la la! What a hall?
Sid: 'Tis the season-
Crash and Eddie: What's a season?
Sid: Fa la la la la! Just play along. I can fix this, Mister Santa!
Sloths: We can Fa la la along!
Sid: Give us laws a chance now letcha!
Head sloth: Too many laws are in this song
Peaches threw a wooden disk the head sloth held and Prancer, the flying reindeer caught it.
"Uh...I have no idea why I just did that."
"That's a toy! And that a toy!" Sid picked up an oddly curved piece of wood. "And that's no good for anything." He threw it back and it circled around and knocked him in the head. A minisloth picked it up and smiled.
Ellie: Sid has got the proper spirit.
Crash and Eddie: Fa la la la! Hey not too bad!
Sid: Beautiful!
Manny: Don't let Sid near it!
Sloths: Fa la la la la!
Peaches: Come on now dad!
Ellie: We can do it
Manny: If we hurry
Sid: Lend a claw
Diego: Lend a paw
Sassy: Everyone!
Crash and Eddie: Even if you're small and furry!
Peaches: Altogether we can get it done!
One of the sloths offered another a ball of twine. He looked at it weirdly.
"A ball of twine? Who's gonna want that?" He tossed it away and Diego caught it mid air.
"Woo hoo! Yeah baby!" He yelled as he rolled with the ball, batting it with his paw.
"Oh I have some serious blackmail with this." Sassy smirked at Sid. She looked over to where Manny and Ellie were hanging something over Sant's doorframe.
"What should I do with this?" Manny asked his mate. Ellie shrugged and Manny hung it. Sid jumped on him and kissed his trunk.
"Hey!"
"There's something about that mistletoe!"
"Stay away from me!" Sassy ran for cover.
Santa: This should go down in the anulls!
Sloths: Fa la la la la!
Sid: And we're not through!
Peaches: Peace and good will toward all mammals!
Crash: Oh you shouldn't have!
Eddie: Just for you
Diego and Sassy: Things were looking grim and tragic
Manny: But we all got busy and pulled it off!
Peaches: Now we found some Christmas magic!
Sid: All because of each and every sloth!
Diego: All because of each and every sloth?
Everyone: All because of each and every sloth!
"I can't believe it! The presents! The decorations! The sleigh!" Santa marveled at the herd's handy work.
"I can't believe we managed all of this." Sassy gazed around, just as in awe as Santa. Diego shook his head.
"It's amazing what this herd can accomplish. We never cease to amaze do we?" Sassy chuckled.
"No I guess we don't." They looked over and saw that Prancer was trying his hardest to get the huge sleigh and massive bad of toys off the ground but could budge it and inch.
"I can't believe it. I failed." Manny got in back and started pushing.
"This family doesn't give up that easy! Come on Prancer! You're the only flying reindeer we have! Unless you know ten others."
"You're right. I can't do this alone." Prancer got out of the harness and flew off, leaving Santa and the herd high and dry. Sassy sighed. She knew what was coming. Before long, the entire herd was strapped in, pulling the sleigh.
"Well we're traveled about 30 feet so far so at this rate we should make it around the world in about 8,000 years!" Sid said cheerfully. Everyone grumbled at the sloth.
"Bah humbug." Santa said gloomily.
"Hey guys!" Everyone looked up to see Prancer had returned. "Manny is right! Nothings impossible when you pull together! Meet my family! Dasher, Dancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzen." Within no time the entire reindeer family was strapped in and Manny stepped up.
"Thanks Prancer."
"I thought I was such a hotshot, but sometimes you need a little help."
"That's what this herd has taught me." Manny looked over to see Sid dangling mistletoe over Diego's head and making kissy noises. The saber growled and tackled the sloth as Sassy laughed heartily in the background. "Among other things."
"Now...lets do this." The reindeer pulled with all their might and got off to a trot and then a run and before anyone knew it the entire sleigh was off the ground and flying through the night sky.
"Hey Manfred! Good job!" Santa called and tossed something down to them. Manny caught it and the bark unfurled. The naughty list turned nice and so did everyone's names. Sid gasped and ran off with the list screaming.
"I got Christmas!" Sassy laughed and watched Santa fly off, feeling a surge of happiness and joy at witnessing such magic and being able to save Christmas with her family.
"Sassy look." Diego said, nodding with his head to the north sky. Sassy looked and gasped. There it was. The star that had always been there, every Christmas and that had brought her such comfort in her dark days. She smiled softly and looked at Diego.
"Merry Christmas Diego." He grinned back at her and they both looked at the presents that were dropped at their feet as Santa flew off and away, shouting "Ho Ho Ho! Merry Christmas!" all the way.
The end