The Heist
A Mr. Jingles adventure · Illustrated story
By morning, Patch's time machine was quiet again.
Mr. Jingles wasn't.
He had spent half the night imagining the glowing ring, the blue light, and a door that might open onto a day he had never stopped remembering.
Now he sat at Patch's kitchen table, watching his new friend pour syrup over something that already appeared to be made entirely of sugar.
Patch's plate held waffles, marshmallows, candy corn, two frosted pastries, three cookies, and a small mountain of whipped cream. A peppermint balanced on top.
Jingles had one little gingerbread biscuit.
He looked from his biscuit to Patch's breakfast.
“Are you eating that,” he asked, “or building another machine?”
Patch placed a cherry on the whipped cream.
“Breakfast.”
“It has a roof.”
Patch took a bite.
Jingles smiled, then leaned forward.
“Tell me about this power source.”
Patch stopped chewing.
“The fusion core?”
“That. The thing that makes yesterday somewhere we can go.”
Patch set down his fork. He pulled a pencil from behind his upright ear and turned over an old shopping list.
At the top, beneath a reminder to buy more marshmallows, he drew a circle inside three larger circles.
“The nuclear fusion core is what powers Santa's sleigh,” he said. “A very small thing doing a very large job.”
“How small?”
“About the size of an orange.”
Jingles glanced at Patch's plate.
“Good. Something you haven't eaten.”
Patch ignored that.
“The first elf engineers built it after a star fell beyond the northern ice fields. They found a little piece still shining in the snow. It melted everything around it, but the light wouldn't go out.”
Jingles's ears tilted forward.
“They put a star in Santa's sleigh?”
“A piece of one. First they had to find a way to hold it.”
Patch shaded the three outer rings.
“They caught ribbons of the northern lights and froze them into crystal. Then they built these rings around the star-fragment. The rings keep its heat inside and let the power out a little at a time.”
He tapped the drawing.
“They called it the Starfall Core.”
For a moment, Jingles pictured a tiny sun turning inside a glass orange.
“That,” he said, “is considerably better than batteries.”
Patch's face brightened.
“It doesn't just move the sleigh. It powers the field around it—the part that lets Santa cross so much of the world in one night. My machine needs a field too. Different calculations. Same kind of power.”
He drew a line from the core to a small version of the machine.
“The wall breaker wakes the controls. The core would power the jump.”
Jingles looked at the line.
Then he looked at Patch.
“We need that.”
Patch's smile faded.
“We need to borrow that.”
“No.”
“That was quick.”
“Because it's impossible.”
Patch pushed the drawing between them.
“The replacement core is in the workshop vault, behind Santa's office. Locked doors. Guards. Santa.”
“I noticed you saved the scariest one for last.”
“Jingles.”
“You get us into the workshop,” Jingles said, resting his paw on the candy cane beside his chair. “I can get us into the safe.”
Patch folded his arms.
“You haven't even seen the safe.”
“Then we're both looking forward to something.”
Patch didn't laugh.
“And even if we could get it, we can't just steal it. That core is meant for this year's Christmas flight.”
“I thought you said it was a spare.”
“A replacement,” Patch said. “The old one is wearing out. They keep the new one locked away until the winter sleigh tests. Without it, Santa might not finish the deliveries.”
Jingles's grin slipped a little.
Patch looked down at the drawing.
“Some children would wake up with nothing.”
For a moment, the kitchen was quiet.
Jingles remembered two children turning away from an empty bakery counter.
He pulled the drawing closer.
“Then we bring it back.”
Patch looked up.
“Patch, Patch, Patch,” Jingles said, spreading his paws. “Nobody said steal. We borrow it for one night. Go back, find our parents, and come home.”
“You make that sound very simple.”
“It's a time machine.” Jingles leaned back, wearing the sort of grin that usually meant a locked door was about to have a difficult morning. “We have all the time in the world.”
Patch studied him.
Then he looked toward the room where the machine stood.
“I haven't tested a jump yet,” he said. “Having a machine doesn't mean we know how to get home.”
“We'll work that part out.”
“Before we leave.”
Jingles held his gaze.
“Before we leave,” he agreed.
Patch wasn't certain whether that was a promise or simply the next impossible thing on Jingles's list.
The kitchen clock chimed.
He sprang from his chair.
“Oh, snowflakes. I have to get ready for work.”
“You work at the place with the safe?”
“I repair toys. I don't rob offices.”
“Excellent qualifications.”
Patch pointed his fork at him.
“Don't plan anything.”
Jingles lifted his biscuit.
“I'm having breakfast.”
Patch disappeared down the hall.
Jingles waited until the bathroom door clicked shut.
Then he reached for the calendar.
It was tucked beneath a pile of drawings, with a crooked paper pumpkin clipped to the October page. The Halloween decoration boxes still waited beside the apartment door.
He moved his biscuit onto a clean saucer and spread the calendar across the table.
“When,” he murmured.
His paw travelled over the dates.
“Where.”
Through the wall came the hiss of running water.
“How.”
He flipped forward to November. Sleigh tests. Toy inspections. A large red circle around something called the Mandatory Ribbon Safety Review.
“That won't work.”
Another page.
December was packed with reminders. Bells. Deliveries. More inspections. Christmas Eve had three stars and the words DO NOT FORGET in Patch's handwriting.
“Nope. Not there.”
Jingles turned back.
October.
His paw stopped.
A little folded notice was tucked behind the page. He opened it.
WORKSHOP HALLOWEEN NIGHT.
Below the heading were drawings of pumpkins, a costume parade, and a grinning ghost.
Jingles read it once.
Then again, more slowly.
He glanced at the Halloween boxes.
Then at his own face reflected faintly in the kitchen window.
A wanted cat was rather difficult to hide.
A cat in a costume, on the other hand…
His eyes widened behind his sunglasses.
“Yes.”
He tapped the notice.
“Yes.”
The corners of his mouth lifted.
“Yes.”
From the bathroom, Patch began singing. He was giving an original little Christmas tune all the enthusiasm of an elf performing to a sold-out audience.
“Wrap it neat and tie it tight—
Christmas stars are shining bright—”
“That's it!” Jingles shouted.
He leapt from the chair, scattering two loose calendar pages, and raced down the hall.
“Halloween!”
He burst through the bathroom door.
“HALLOWEEN!”
Behind the shower curtain, Patch let out a shriek so high and sudden that Jingles's ears flattened.
A shampoo bottle thumped into the bath.
The curtain swelled outward as Patch caught it with one hand. For one breathless second, a wet pointed ear and a fistful of bubbles appeared over the top.
“JINGLES!”
Jingles stood very still.
Water dripped.
Patch pulled the curtain firmly back into place.
“Knock!”
Jingles looked at the open door.
“Yes. That would have been a useful first step.”
“What is wrong with you?”
“I've had an idea.”
“That,” Patch said, “is what I'm afraid of.”
Jingles held up the Halloween notice.
“Costumes. Crowds. A workshop full of people pretending to be somebody else.”
Silence behind the curtain.
Then Patch's hand appeared, palm up.
Jingles passed him the notice without stepping any closer.
There was a rustle of damp paper.
“Oh, no,” Patch said.
Jingles's grin returned.
“Oh, yes.”
He gave a low, theatrical Halloween chuckle.
From behind the curtain came one final, exhausted instruction.
“Out.”
Jingles backed into the hall and gently closed the door.
This time, he knocked.
“Better?”
“Much.”
Jingles leaned against the wall, looking toward the room with the silent machine.
They still needed a way in.
They still needed a way home.
But now they had a night.
And Mr. Jingles had always done his best work after dark.
To be continued.
