Author: Enonyymi and Punainenpuolukka.
Warnings: Contains male/male.
Disclaimer: We do not own Tsubasa. All the characters mentioned within are property of CLAMP.
A/N (1): For all fans, a very important notice: Remember to read the Authors' Note at the end, it's really, really, really important! The most important of all our Authors' Notes!
"There's no fucking way that I'm putting that on!"
"Aww, why not, Kuro-chan?" Fay said and dangled the outfit in his hand. "Red is totally your color!"
"Whatever, I'm not dressing up as Santa Claus!" he roared. He'd have to be brainwashed before he could wear that stupid costume that the mage was holding.
"Think about the children and Mokona. They'd be so happy when they saw Santa in the evening... Especially Sakura-hime."
"..."
"So you'll do it? Good boy, Kuro-wanwan!" Fay patted Kurogane's head, which made the other even more annoyed. Kurogane grabbed Fay's arm and swung him further away.
"I'm not a damn dog!"
"Okay, you're not a doggie... But you will be Santa!" Fay laughed and twirled around.
"No, I won't!" Kurogane shouted and crossed his arms like a little kid.
"But you agreed already," Fay pouted at his lover. It was slightly hard for the ninja to argue when the other man had that look on his face.
"Please be Santa, Kuro-myu..." Fay whispered and leaned to place a little kiss on Kurogane's lips.
In the end he agreed to dress as Santa Claus.
That day the time flew quicklier than expected and it was already five o'clock. The gang gathered around the table to eat a magnificent banquet that had been done by Fay and the bakery's owner.
"Yumm, this looks so good!" Mokona cheered.
"It really does! Well done, Fay-san and baker-san," Syaoran praised the two cooks.
"Aww, thank you Syaoran-kun," Fay replied, while placing a plate in front of everyone. The bakery's owner smiled at the boy gently and whiped off some sweat from her forehead, since she had just finished doing some of their dessert, plum kissel.
The table was filled with traditional Christmas foods: a large, delicious Christmas ham with home-made mustard, potato-, swede- and carrot casserole. On the table was also some rice pudding and two bowls filled with almonds, nuts, raisins and all kinds of fruit. There was a big bottle of red wine and glögg with the food too and the rest of their dessert, gingerbread, chocolate and star-shaped Christmas tarts with plum marmelade filling.
"Whew, all done!" the bakery's owner sighed and patted Fay's shoulder. "You were a great help, Fay-san. Thank you."
"Oh no, you we're the kind helper here. We all should thank you, right?" Fay smiled and turned his head to the others, who sat around the table. Mokona, Sakura and Syaoran thanked the woman, but Kurogane just grunted and started exploring the wine bottle carefully.
"Right, Kuro-tan?" Fay asked with an even wider, goofier smile. Kurogane glanced at the woman, looking a bit annoyed, but then he bowed his head silently to her. Fay clapped his hands and turned his head to meet the woman's gaze again. "There. You've been a great help to us all."
She blushed slightly and started playing with her plaits, letting her head drop down, so that the others wouldn't see her red cheeks. "... Thank you."
She stepped forward to hug the blonde man, then proceeded to hug everyone else, even Kurogane, who accepted the hug, with a bit of reluctance and embarrassment though. Fay looked to Sakura and smiled gently.
"Sakura-chan, I think you should get the thing that we talked about earlier. Baker-san, do wait for a while before you leave," Fay said. The frail girl got up from the table, ran to the housekeeping room and came back with a little present in her hands. The owner got surprised and looked at the princess with a confusedly.
"This is... for me?" she asked and took the present from Sakura, who bobbed and wished merry Christmas to her. "Oh, you shouldn't have-"
"You've truly deserved it," Fay laughed and placed his hand on her shoulder, "we all wish that you have a merry Christmas."
"Thank you so much! I wish you a very merry Christmas as well!" she greeted them and smiled kindly. Then she turned around and gasped loudly when she saw the time. "Oh my, now I have to hurry back home before my mum burns our casseroles! Bye then!"
She rushed out of the door after thanking and waving to them.
"I think we should eat before the food gets cold," Syaoran suggested.
The group sat by the table and started to eat. The food was truly as delicious as it looked and they all ate as mush as they could. Mokona tried to steal some alcohol for itself, but Kurogane noticed that and snatched the bottle of wine away from the manju, which had to drink only limited amounts of glögg – so that the events of the third day wouldn't be repeated. They wouldn't need any drunkards tonight, especially those who tend to jump around the house, though when Kurogane wasn't looking, Fay managed to take many glasses of the wine. Everyone, except the ninja, talked about Christmas and what they had been doing in the passing days. They enjoyed the food and company very much, but soon they all had stuffed themselves full with the really scrumptious food. They sat by the table, but then Fay leaned to whisper into Kurogane's ear.
"Ah, Kuro-puu, don't you have something to do right now?" he gave a hint to the ninja and poked his arm, so that he would hurry up.
"Damn it, why the hell did I agree to this" the said man muttered and stomped out of the room. Fay stood up and started cleaning the table, which didn't last fairly long since the children helped him.
"Now, come along children, we should move into the living room," the blonde chimed to the rest of the group. Sakura and Syaoran followed him obediently into the room while Mokona had just hopped on Fay's shoulder to enjoy the free ride. Fay lit some candles before they all heard the doorbell ring.
"My, my. I wonder, who that might be?" the mage smiled slyly. He had to admit that Kurogane had absolutely perfect timing.
"It's Santa, it's Santa!" the manju cheered and started hopping around the livingroom excitedly and started laughing with Sakura, who was probably the most excited than anyone else. Fay opened the door slowly and true enough, it really was Santa Claus, but he looked quite bizarre: his skin was a bit too dark for a person, who lived in the north, he was very tall and not plump like he was usually described.
"You look good in that," Fay whispered in Santa's ear, when he passed him. Santa twitched slightly after that, but otherwise didn't seem to react at all.
"Oh, please sit down, you must be tired from carrying that big bag," Sakura said innocently, not noticing any weird things about the man. Syaoran on the other hand, suspected that something was going on, but stayed quiet so that the princess could enjoy this Christmas with no interruptions or trouble.
The man with the red clothes sat on the nearest chair and opened his bag. He took out some presents and shoved them to those that they were addressed to. Then he took out one more gift out of the bag and stared at it quite intently.
"That's probably Kuro-sama's present, but his not here now. You'll have to wait for him just little while," the blonde said smiling brightly to everyone, mostly to Santa. The children opened their present with lots of excitement. Syaoran got the huge archaeology book he had seen in the bookstore, Sakura got a beautiful deck of cards and a Kero-plushie, just like she had wished for. Mokona bounced around happily when it opened it's present: it had got a huge amount of different kind of sweets.
"Thank you so much for the present, Santa Claus-san!" Sakura said happily. "You must've gotten my letter!"
"Yes, he definitely got your letter! Right, Santa?" Fay said and looked at Santa, who nodded quickly without saying a word. For awhile, they all fussed around, talking to Santa, who didn't actually answer to any of the questions because Fay always started answering for him. Not that anyone minded anyway. Then the princess started to show signs of exhaustion. She tried to keep her big, green eyes open, but it didn't work very well. Fay had gone to sit in Santa's lap – only because the children had been too shy to sit in his lap – and talked to Sakura.
"You all can go to bed already. I'll stay here with Santa and wait for Kuro-daddy," he said while sitting comfortably on Santa Claus' lap. At least, the blonde thought it was comfortable. Santa didn't. The others thanked Santa and left upstairs, with Sakura being carried in Syaoran's lap because she was so tired from all the excitement today. When the two men were sure that they were alone, Santa opened his mouth:
"You can sit somewhere else," he grunted but the mage didn't move an inch, in stead he started shifting his position, making Santa even more uncomfortable and embarrassed.
"No, this is fine," the blonde smiled and lifted his hand to stroke Santa's fluffy beard. "You really were a good Santa, weren't you?"
Fay leaned closer to Santa's face and gave the red clothed man a soft, long kiss on the lips.
"Fay-san, what are you doing?" Sakura's voice came behind them. She was carrying a glass of water and beside her stood Syaoran, on whose shoulder Mokona was sitting with a really surprised look on it's cute little face.
"Fay-mommy kissed Santa!" the little manju said loudly. "Kuro-daddy is gonna be so mad!"
"Fay-san..." Sakura looked like she was about to start crying. Syaoran had placed his hand on her shoulder, trying to calm the princess down. This would be very hard to explain.
"Sakura-hime..." the boy said as he rubbed her shoulder gently.
"I-i just-" Fay started, but he was interrupted by the sudden ring of the doorbell.
"What could it be this time?" everyone except Kurogane rushed to the door as fast as they could. When the door was opened, there was nobody behind it, but a small present was left on the snowy stairs. Syaoran picked it up and opened it. Inside was one of Sakura's feathers.
"Did Santa Claus give us one more gift?" Mokona puzzled.
"But he couldn't have, he's in the living room," the princess replied. But when they arrived back in the room, there was only Kurogane, who wore his big, black coat, sitting on the couch with his present in his hand.
"When did you get here, Kurogane-san? Wasn't Santa sitting there?" the girl asked from the ninja, becoming even more confused.
"He was, but he just left," Kurogane said, "and it's late now, we should go to bed."
Absolutely no one disagreed with him.
"There. It seems that they've received our gift," someone looked at the Dimension travelers' house with big pair of binoculars. There was four figures among the snow; two women and two men. The smaller woman had long, brown plaits, which swung from side to side when she walked around and she was clothed in a red coat with white fur lining, just like the others. The second woman had shorter, fire red hair and she was nibbling a candy cane while she leaned on the red sleigh behind her. The first man had dark brown hair and big blue eyes, which observed the surroundings carefully and he was rubbing his nose cautiously, trying not to make it hurt any more than it already did. And for the last, but certainly not the least, was a very old man with a long, white beard. He was sitting on the sleigh and had a big, gentle smile on his slightly wrinkly face.
"How did you know that the feather belonged to that little girl, Santa?" The young man asked confusedly.
"Kyösti," the pigtailed woman called his name and started to bicker with him, "Santa's Santa! He knows everything that goes around Korvatunturi, it was just a mere coincidence that these people landed here just a few months after we'd found the feather."
"It was not a coincidence, my dear helpers," the older man replied wisely, but he was cut down by the younger man.
"You don't always have to shout at me, big sister," Kyösti replied shyly, "my life is hard enough even without your nasty comments."
The said sister gasped in surprise and was probably just getting started. "Very rough indeed! It's good that Kurogane-san punched the lights out of you coward, I sure hope that it was a wake-up call for you too! It's a shame that he only broke your nose!"
"Well that explains it! No wonder something looked different about Kyösti..." the red-headed woman took the half-eaten candy from her mouth, so she could join in the conversation. Kyösti looked shocked and lifted his hand cover his nose protectively.
"Minttu, you didn't even notice that my stoic nose was broken?! Oh, I'm just air for everyone else! Even my dear angel, my beautiful Lucia-san has forgotten all about me!"
"You idiot! You don't even know how much trouble you caused our guests! Besides, it was good that someone rejected you, damn stargazer!" the small woman continued and whacked Kyösti's head with a broom. "I shouldn't have let you enter, but you we're so infatuated with Fay-san that you almost trampled over your sister! I swear that when Santa's trip is over, you're going to get so punished."
Kyösti yelped and ran behind Minttu's back. "Minttu, help me! Nanna has gone crazy again!"
"Again?! What does that mean?" Nanna was just about to fling her broom at the two, but she was stopped by the low, kind voice that came behind her back.
"Now, now children, what have I told about fighting and especially on Christmas Eve?" he said and smiled at the three others, who seemed to calm down.
"Sorry, Santa," the two siblings apologized. The man gave them a slight nod, but then he grasped the reins, pointing the three to hop into the sleigh. They all climbed into it, and tried position themselves among the bags of presents. The elder man gave a low laugh and gave his reindeer the command to start running. Nanna took the little present from her pocket and held it against her chest.
"I wonder, will we ever see those people again?" she thought as her plaits swung around in the cold winter air. "I truly hope that they are safe on their journey..."
"I'm sure of that they'll be fine. They've got little Yuuko-chan on their side," Santa Claus noted, "now then, we've got a long night ahead of us, my little elves. It's truly going to be a busy Christmas night..."
A/N (2): Thank you all for reading the twentyfourth and the final chapter of the Tsubasa Advent Calendar! The last theme was 'Christmas Eve'! Remember to read all of this Authors' Note, we've got a very important thing to tell you!
Enonyymi: It's already Christmas Eve! Gosh, time sure runs fast. Hmm, our last comments, what to say... Well, I've truly enjoyed this project. Of course there was problems in making this too. Sometimes we disagreed about the plot, sometimes we didn't have time or the inspiration to write and sometimes we just did not have the energy to write anything.
Punainenpuolukka: Mostly in the last one. Some of you might wonder why they opened the presents already on Christmas Eve, but because it's a tradition in Finland, we wrote it that way. We don't have to wait as long as you others because of that. Haahaa.
Enonyymi: It's good to live in Finland! But yeah, we'd also like to thank all of our fans (roughly, there's about 40-50 of you, which is a lot!). You've been so kind and commented all through our writing process, making us very happy to be writing the Advent Calendar. For me, your comments were the thing that kept me going! It's a shame that we didn't get 100 comments, but now it doesn't really matter.
Punainenpuolukka: And for me, it was Enonyymi and you guys.
Enonyymi: Aww, thank you very much! I couldn't have survived in this without you too!
Although this was a fun project, I don't think we're going to do this kind of fanfiction any time soon... At least with these kind of time limits, occasionally they're a pain in the ass. But, I'm planning to do a few Kuro/Fay-fanfics, for example a bit angsty, romantic oneshot songfic, which is based on the Finnish song, "Päivänsäde ja menninkäinen" (in English, "The Ray of Light and the Spirit of the Night) and a 66- (or 69-)chaptered fanfic, "Voulez-vous coucher avec moi (ce soir)?" (it means "Do you want have sex with me (tonight)?"), which is gonna be M-rated. Tehee.
Punainenpuolukka: There's also something we must mention about the names of the three elves at the end (the elves were, of course, the bakery's owner, the man who kissed Fay and the shopkeeper of the candy store). The name Minttu means mint (we thought that it was a good name, since Minttu likes candy canes, which are usually peppermint flavored), Nanna means a food that tastes good, like sweets or desserts and that kind of stuff. Kyösti is a Finnish form of the name Gustav.
Enonyymi: Then there's the most important thing of all!
So, you all thought that this was the last chapter of our Advent Calendar... But that's not true! Ahaha! We've got a little surprise for all you fans: we've written a M-rated fanfic as a present for you guys! I'm going to post on as a separate story in the M-rated department, with the name "Fay's Only Wish (is Kurogane)"! Ahaha, sorry for pulling a CLAMP-move on you!
Well, you have your biggest thanks for reading the Tsubasa Advent Calendar and honestly, we can't thank you enough! With lots of hugs and kisses...
Punainenpuolukka and Enonyymi: We wish you a merry, KuroFay-filled, Christmas! May your Christmas be filled with tons of joy!