Charles confronts the smokers

The Blue Deck Christmas Special 

Hello guys, welcome back to the Blue Deck Podcast. This is our very first Christmas special. For those of you joining us for the first time, an especially warm welcome to you, and merry Christmas one and all.

This show is being published as a standalone episode and as part of our regular ongoing series: The Blue Deck Podcast where we’re going through my novel, Into the Attic of the World, one chapter at a time. Well…I guess it’s a good time to introduce myself. I’m your host, Joseph Mazerac.

Today we’re going to have a quick discussion about the Real Saint Nicholas. That’s right, Santa Clause, Saint Nick, Father Christmas, Sinterklaas—whatever you call him, the legend started a surprisingly long time ago, with a real person called Saint Nicholas.

Before we get into that…Spoiler Alert! In this show, we’ll be talking about the history of our modern Christmas traditions, so, listener discretion advised. Parents, use your best judgment. Personally, I think it’s important to know the story of Saint Nicholas, and in my humble opinion, his story has a special kind of magic that’s at least is powerful as what kids normally believe about Santa Clause. More on that later.

The bulk of this show is based on the article, Yes, America, There is a Santa Clause, written by Pamela J. Adams. If you want to know more about Pamela or her articles, check out her website, TheFactsPaper.com. A link will be in the show notes. She also has letters about St. Patrick, St. Valentine, and many more. The one on St. Valentine is particularly interesting. Let’s just say…What’s he have to do with Valentine’s day, candy hearts, and affectionate greeting cards? Ummm… Not much, so definitely worth checking out if you want the inside scoop.

With that out of the way, let’s get to it. Let’s talk about Santa.

 

The Real Saint Nicholas

 

Nicholas was born to a wealthy couple less than 300 years after the resurrection of Christ. That’s about 1700 years ago. He lived in the ancient city of Patara, located in modern-day Turkey. However, young Nicholas was orphaned when an epidemic took his parents, and afterward, his uncle, the Bishop of Patara, raised him in the church.

Later, when he was a teenager, he traveled to the Holy Land. Experiencing where Jesus lived, died and rose again affected him greatly. Then, returning home by sea, a violent storm arose, jeopardizing the ship and all the passengers, but Nicholas prayed for protection, and the sea calmed. The ship and all on board were spared, and as a result, when Nicholas was sainted, he became the patron saint of sailors and voyagers.

That could be the end of his story. Certainly, it’s enough. But when we think of him today, we remember to call him “Saint” but have forgotten that he’s the saint of sailors. Instead, we think of stockings and presents. How did that happen, and why?

Well, as Nicholas grew into adulthood, he felt called by God to the ministry. Just as his Uncle was a bishop in Patara, he rose to bishop in the city of Myra, also in modern-day Turkey.

In those days, the Roman Emperor Diocletian was persecuted followers of Christ. In 303 AD he ordered all Christians to be captured and tortured before throwing them in jail. Because of this, Nicholas soon found himself imprisoned for his beliefs. Despite several beatings, his faith never faltered. In addition, he even defended other prisoners unjustly charged, strengthening to his legacy of humanity and justice.

Relief finally came when Emperor Constantine assumed power in 306 AD. Constantine was the first Roman Emperor to accept and spread Christianity. After taking power, he ordered the release of all Christian prisoners, including Nicholas, who returned to Myra.

Nicholas, an only son, had inherited his parents’ wealth after their death. An ardent follower of Christ, he used his money to buy gifts, food, and other items for the poor and needy.

The most famous story of Nicholas’ compassion involved a poor widower a

Previously in Chapter 20

It’s no ordinary bus that shows up in Doloptree. In fact, it’s more like a train. It has road tires, but it’s half a mile long with flexible accordion-joints between each bus section. When Charles and his companions board the bus-train, they find it full of children and teenagers…with one exception. Spying through a window into a bus car marked the Smoker’s Cabin, they find three men in mobster-style suits. Two of the men sit across a chess board from one another but the third sits alone, gazing out the window and shuffling a deck of playing cards onehanded. To Charles, this seems like the kind of shuffle only a magician could manage. What’s more, the man with the cards sports a showman’s mustache with elaborate curled horns to either side of his mouth.

Then, into the Smoker’s Cabin walks a woman—a beauty—in a sparkling silver-white dress and red high heal shoes. She says something to the magician, and when he gets up, he moves directly to the door Charles and his friends are hiding behind.

When the magician pulls open the door, telling the kids to take a hike, inexplicably, Ozzie refuses.

“It seems we’re at an impasse,” the magicians says.

“It seems we are,” Ozzie agrees.

To this, the woman in the room breaks out into cackles.

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The gas has run out on the sand buggy, and the kids have spent their second night in the desert, but setting off the following morning they find the town they’re looking for, Doloptree. As the captain said, Doloptree isn’t much of a town. In fact, it’s hardly more than a truck stop, and a strange truck stop at that: a combo gas station, restaurant, and post office…That’s not especially odd, but, for some reason, all the diesel pumps are stretched out in a line a half a mile long. Also, working in the joint, they find only a kid and two teenagers. The kid, who is a waiter in the restaurant, has had a run in with Castatine, in which he’s agreed to rob a store register in exchange for her casting a spell on him to make him a radar man…whatever that is. But, the trade was no good. After handing over the money, Castatine drugged him, making him fall asleep for the rest of the day. While he was passed out, she called someone on a payphone—no one good, we’re sure—then sabotaged the phone lines. Afterward, she split town on the train.

Speaking of trains, the next one will arrive in town in just a little while to take Captain Kid’s rescue party to their next stop, to Atsuma, the Great City. But whatever they find there, Charles has determined it will be his last stop before turning back for home. And he intends to take his friends with him. 

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In this episode, the brother of the Kybee leader, Billy Boy, with his face erupting in wards, soars, and patchy facial hair, tells stories to Charles and his friends. The first story is about a horse-thief from Charles’s world. “One-Eyed Joe” he is called, and the story concludes with someone looking for Joe’s brain in a jar. The second story is about a witch who turns an unfortunate boy into a murderous, rampaging elephant. But the third story is the one that matters.

Third, Billy Boy tells of Ayana, Queen of Hyadon, who enticed her bravest knight to go into the Red Realm. In the tale, as the queen and knight recline on her sofa, she explains the door to the secret world is concealed behind the mirror hanging at the entrance of her bathing den. At first, the knight, Sir Ronald, assumes she is teasing him, but when he examines the mirror, he discovers the hidden hinges. The mirror opens like a door, and, just as the queen promised, there stands a corridor of stone.

As the queen and knight stand at the tunnel, Ayana explains her plan, that Sir Ronald should enter the Red Realm and deliver to that land’s king a prized the queen has secured in a lockbox. Also, thirteen additional knights are to go with him.

In preparation to the quest, Ronald is given two noble weapons: one is the royal sword, and the other is a gun made by a wizard. If he succeeds in his mission, the queen promises anything he wants, including her own hand in marriage.

But that is a prize Sir Ronald will never collect because he and all his fellows are killed in the Red Realm.

At the end of the story, a pair of important details come to light. First, the treasure hidden in Ayana’s lockbox is the heart of her father. Second, that the Lord of the Red Realm can use royal blood to cast powerful spells, even to open doors to other worlds.

Learning this, Charles wonders if Castatine used the Patch Fairy’s blood to escape his world. Captain Kid says, probably not, but Charles isn’t convinced.

After the Kybee’s stories, Captain Kid leads his rescue party once more into the desert, but this time they are riding in one of the Kybees’ sand buggies. That evening, at one of their stops for gas, Charles finds an opportunity to speak to the captain privately. He wants to know why Captain Kid didn’t like the kybees.

“I mean,” he says, “they’re rough around the edges and a little strange, for sure. I think maybe radiation or something like the plague was turning Billy Boy’s face into road-pizza. But that wouldn’t make you dislike them. So, level with me.”

What the captain says next, Charles would never forget. “They’re werewolves.”

As soon as the words are out, Charles hears the distant howls. And then he remembers the Kybee flag, a cartoonish full moon against a field of deep-blue sky. The Kybees. The moon folk.

If Captain Kid hadn’t made them leave the picknick, the Kybees would’ve eaten them.

Here, feeling the pressure of near death, Charles again gets into an argument with his leader, this time, over the fact that Captain Kid isn’t admitting how much danger he’s put everyone in. Also, after being asked to fix a broken flashlight, he’s sulking over his mundane tasks as the team’s electro-technical officer.

So, that’s where we’re at, the Kybees behind and Dolloptree ahead.

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After Captain Kid introduces himself to the Kybees, the Kybee leader, a girl named Patricia, threatens the captain with a pistol. Also, when Captain Kid refuses to surrender his weapon, Patricia orders one of her scouts to take it from him—“And if he gives you any trouble,” she says, “cut his head off!” Yikes!

As the scout reaches over a shoulder for one of the machetes on his back, the captain fires his rifle, the bullet striking the ground between the Kybee boy’s feet. And he’s firing no ordinary bullets, oh no, they were made special by a U.S. Marshal. That doesn’t mean much to Charles, but it does to the Kybee leader.

Ultimately, a disastrous conflict is avoided when Patricia learns that Charles and his friends have come from the World Below. Also, they saw Castatine on their long trek across the desert.

In the end, Patricia offers Captain Kid a sand buggy to speed them on their way, but first, they will have a picnic. When the chapter ends, Patricia’s little brother, Billy Boy, is telling the group stories.

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Crossing the desert basin, Captain Kid leads Charles and his friends toward their encounter with the Kybees, also known as the “moon folk.” When the two groups meet, Charles finds the Kybees riding dune buggies and motorcycles. What will happen next? They’re about to find out, but at least one of the desert people has a gun and another has machetes on his back.

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Arriving at Salvation Mountain, what Charles and his friends find is not a mountain at all but an enormous construction of tree branches, tires, dismembered car doors, and hay bails heaped together and covered with clay. Everything is painted, even the ground, with kaleidoscopes of colors and messages of repentance and God’s enduring love. The artist responsible for the monument, “The Man of the Mountain,” welcomes the newcomers, referring to the captain as one of “the Seven” and to the other kids as “knights.”

As Charles, William, and Ozzie explore the mountain, Captain Kid and Dawn meet with the mountain-painter to discuss the comings and goings of travelers headed west to a place called Atsuma the Great City. Also, the distant sound of engines and a faraway cloud of trailing dust alerts them to the approach of people the mountain man calls “Kybees” or “moon folk.” Who are these people? Charles doesn’t know, but as they depart Salvation Mountain, the captain warns them to be ready to fight.

Finally, before following Captain Kid back into the desolation of the desert, Charles once again digs in his heels. Where are they going, how long will they be away from their world, and when will they get back home? Charles wants to know. Dawn, the recently instated Chief Officer, goes to Charles, asking him to come along, but even she cannot deny the sensibility of his protests. When Dawn presents Charles’s questions to Captain Kid, the captain offers one thin slice of hope: they will go to a town called Doloptree. There, they will phone the king of Atsuma and tell him of their quest and that the fugitive, Castatine, is headed for the Great City.

Perhaps after that, Charles and his friends can return to the World Below.

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In Chapter 14 Charles and his friends spend their first night in the desert of the strange new world. As Charles lays on the ground, watching Ozzie build a shelter with the door he’d recovered out of the sand, Dawn—the crew’s new Chief Officer—busies herself inventorying their supplies. In Charles’s backpack, she finds, among other things, a toy Yoda action figure and lists it in the inventory. Charles finds in his pocket the cap off a Coke bottle. After seeing her record the Yoda figure, he wonders if the bottle cap should be added to their supply list, but rejects the idea.

Overall, our friend, Charles, is feeling depressed, so far from his home and now he’s been demoted, too.

In the morning they set off in search of the mysterious place called Salvation Mountain, and what they find isn’t anything they expected. It is an enormous art project of desert wreckage, paint covering everything, even the ground. And on everything is painted messages of God’s love.

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After docking with the Upward Facing Door, Captain Kid leads the crew outside, where they climb up to the nose of the shuttle using a grappling hook. There, they come face-to-face with the door to another world. When Charles goes through, he finds a vast desert and a sign leading to a place called Salvation Mountain. 3.5 miles, thataway.

The rest of the kids climb up into the desert, but Ozzie closes the door in the sand sealing them away in the foreign world.

William digs with his hands, trying to uncover the passageway, but digging is no good. “There are rules,” the captain explains. William couldn’t dig to his world unless he was a wizard. Also, the captain reminds them, “We’re not looking for a way home. We’re looking for Castatine and the Patch Fairy.”

That may be true, but it doesn’t stop William and Charles from feeling trapped.

Charles gives voice to their doubts, and when it’s apparent he doesn’t trust their new leader, Captain Kid demotes him, making Dawn the new chief officer.

The chapter concludes with Captain Kid venturing out into the desert and Dawn left in charge of inventorying their supplies.

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