In the red dust dawn of Mars, long before the human explorers woke in their domes, the Christmas elves were already at work.
No one knew exactly when they had arrived. Some said they rode a comet’s tail like a glittering sled. Others believed they tunneled up from the planet’s ancient caverns. But the truth was simple: Santa had decided Mars needed Christmas, too.
Tikka, the smallest elf and the proud commander of the Martian Outpost Cheer Division, zipped across the sand in her hover-sleigh. It hummed softly as she surveyed the candy-cane solar towers gleaming in the thin light.
“Team!” she chirped into her comm. “We’re behind schedule. Those stockings won’t hang themselves!”
Her squad emerged from behind a dune—tiny figures in sparkling pressure suits, each suit fitted with a bubble helmet shaped like a snow globe. Inside, a gentle flurry drifted around their pointy ears.
Ludo was dragging a crate twice his size. “These Martian stockings are huge,” he complained. “Why do humans need so much space for presents?”
“Because Mars is lonely,” Tikka said. “And lonely places need bigger surprises.”
They scattered through the colonists' habitat like festive ghosts—clipping twinkling lights onto airlock handles, tucking gingerbread rations into pockets of EVA suits, and planting miniature crystal pines that glowed with captured starlight.
By the time the explorers awoke, the domes shimmered with a warmth no oxygen generator could make.
Dr. Ortiz stepped out first and gasped. “How…?”
A soft giggle echoed from somewhere near the rover garage. The humans searched, but found only a trail of tiny boot-prints in the dust, perfectly spaced, leading out toward the horizon—toward a place where daylight met the stars.
Tikka watched from atop a ridge as the first Christmas on Mars burst to life behind her. She hugged her snow-globe helmet close, her heart swelling.
“On to the next planet,” she whispered.
Her elves cheered, and the hover-sleigh shot into the rose-colored sky, leaving behind sparkling dust that settled like new-fallen snow.
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