Alright, first thing we do is check your kits.
EDWARDS! Quit picking your nose and pull off that backpack! Dump it out! ON THE GROUND, NOW!
That’s better. Alright, let’s see. Yeah. Yeah, both your kits are good, although Edwards clearly didn’t pack this himself. Tell your mother to quit holding your hand, kid.
So, now that we’ve sorted your packs, let’s introduce you two to the glorious and manly pastime of Santa-hunting. Your dads learned it from me, and my dad taught theirs. Someday I’ll have to create one of you little miscreants and hope he takes after me or your kids’ll be in right shit. For now, do as I say and we’ll have bagged your families a saint for Christmas day’s dinner, which you will be taught to cook using my very own great-great-great-great-grandmother’s personal recipe, passed down in the family. So clear out your earholes and listen to me.
First lesson: aim high. You pukes aren’t done growing yet, but our target’s a big boy. Anything you don’t want him to step over? Shoulder-height minimum.
Seriously? “What if he bends over?” Edwards, never ask questions, they show everyone what a dumbass you are. Target has a gut like a bowlful of jelly; he hasn’t seen his toes in fifty years and he couldn’t bend down to count ‘em if his life depended on it. Which it will, if you’d stop ASKING QUESTIONS and start LISTENING.
Now put up this razor wire.
Good, that’s good. It’s shit work, but that’s better than anything you’ve done before. Make sure to tinsel it up properly, we want this to look legitimate. Camouflage is the name of our game.
“Won’t he notice it?” Edwards, what did I say about questions? And of course he’ll notice it, that’s the point. If he’s busy noticing it, he’s not paying attention to the floorboards. Now take out a jigsaw and get cutting. If we don’t have a pit trap leading to the basement in thirty minutes I’m cancelling your snack break.
Pratt, excellent work on your tinselling. Take a load off and survey the perimeter. Both of you meet me downstairs when you’re done.
See, this is where we have to get intricate. As you can tell, Edwards’s incompetent sawmanship has created a pitfall that drops NEXT to the furnace. If he could aim properly we could just open up the top of it and we’d be done – come back and skewer the fat bastard like fish in a barrel at sunup – but now we’ve got to get tricky.
No, Edwards, we couldn’t just incinerate him. You’re trying to be clever and it isn’t a good look on you; how the hell do you think the sonuvabitch gets through all those chimneys unsinged if he isn’t fireproof? Blades yes explosives maybe fire no way Jose. And you should’ve known this already if you’d read the goddamned handouts. Go upstairs, raid your mother’s cutlery, and come down with enough sharp objects to make a punji trap blush. We’re making a deadfall here, let’s put the accent on those first coupla syllables.
Pratt, you can start preparing these boards with duct tape and gorilla glue. There’s a lot of sharp shit to be set here. And have one of my smokes while you’re at it. You’ll need steady hands.
Now, can either of you tell me what we’re missing right now?
No, Edwards, advance warning for the household is NOT it. This is a booby trap, and if you go around telling folks it’s here YOU’RE the booby. Loose lips sink ships, and your family couldn’t keep a secret if I paid them to.
Hah, good guess Pratt – but no. Although some grenade bouquets aren’t a bad idea…pity, but we don’t have the budget for it. Maybe next year, eh?
Right, the real thing we’re missing is a backup plan. If he manages to dodge the pitfall the worst he’s going to get is maybe a cut or two from some razor wire – and although we COULD rub human feces on it to make sure he bites it sooner or later, we want a fresh kill, something we can find lying on the floor right here and cook on the day of. That’s why we’re going back upstairs to set up those spring-loaded scythe blades.
Right here will do. Right on the milk and cookies. Yes, that’ll do it. He’ll be confident by now. He’ll have dodged the tinsel, skirted the floorboards, and he’ll be pretty full of himself. Ready to refuel. Let that be your lesson, kids: you’re always at your most vulnerable when you’re eating.
So we rig this wire attached to his glass of milk. Pratt, you can attach the wire because I trust you with duct tape; Edwards, you can nail these scythe blades to this rake and then hold these giant springs coiled tight as I put the rest together. Hop to it.
I said hop, damnit. And quit straining and grunting like that Edwards; these only push a hundred pounds or so when fully coiled. Sit on it if your arms are that puny.
Well I don’t care if it hurts your butt, just do it! Whiner.
Now, we’re almost set. Just one last backup. Always have a second backup.
Third backups? Shut up Edwards, that’s nonsense.
No, no, this one’s simpler. Say he notices the giant blades or the wires and disarms them, gets his milk…that’s when he makes his mistake and drinks it.
Poison? No, no.
Saint Nick’s got a peanut allergy. Which is what I’ve been carrying around this Planters package for.
Now I’ll just grind this up real fine and pick up the glass of milAAAAAAAAAAAAGH
***
ADDENDUM: Grandmater Montgomery’s Famouse Saint Nicholass Recipiee
First ye will neede 1 sainte nichelis, striyke hime grate aboute ye braine-pain witt force an furie.
Tayke outte bellye-fattes an stuffe his gyutte with crane-barry preserves.
Roaste until saynt noe longyer bleedes, then cutte mightyily.
Sayve the testicules, fore they are greate aides in priapisms.
Serves 1 feaste.