Santa comes out on the darkness of Christmas Eve, climbs into his Sleigh and hums deep and low and points to the stars with one hand. You feel a numbing in your ears as the very air begins to vibrate! He throws his other hand forward and the sky explodes open into a fiery spiral! It becomes like all the colors of blue and green you could ever imagine swirling and then you realize- its your own Planet Earth arranging itself for him. Its colors grow brighter and it becomes massive filling the skies over the North Pole.

Santa's very own hohoho sound vibrates, and moves the rounded corners and slightly alters the Fold's points of destination as they finally settle to his satisfaction like a rounded carpet of human lights, the starry sky rounded above.

The reindeer don't actually fly like birds as you have been told. When the Fold opens they rise up with the Sleigh as a whole into the vacuum that leads to the sky.

As they rise, they reach a certain height before Santa roars out a decidedly NOT jolly HOHOHO. Then the reindeer stop rising and at Santa’s whip crack into the air their legs begin to move. Santa will call out their names: Slasher, Danzer, Prankster, Blitz, Fireball, Archer and Styx, and the lead- Ruedov. They are tied to the sleigh with harnesses to keep them evenly spaced but the bits in their mouths are for grunted commands to be sent to all the reindeer team by Ruedov himself. They hold these voluntarily. I was allowed to touch and feel these commands myself, although I did not know what they meant.

Hovering in the air the reindeer actually seem to grow in size- but I was told it’s really their internal fats and muscle flexing, expanding, filling with blood and oxygen. Their legs begin to pump the air like turbines and impressively in unison. Slowly at first, then faster and faster and the sound becomes deafening- a roaring WHROOOSH WHROOSH WHROOOSHHH and you feel the air rush past you, hot and cold, hot and cold! You observe their muscles ripple and bulge and the snorts are very loud! Santa holds them back until they are ready with the power for the momentum to cross into the Fold.

When they shoot off you better be strapped down because the jolt will throw you back so hard you crash into your seat and your restraints are the only thing to hold you in. The sleigh doesn't just take off into the Fold, it rockets into it! You feel like your face will peel off, you can’t breathe well, and into the colors and darkness you fly! Then suddenly the suffocating feeling ends and you are not being crushed back anymore but are in a smooth flight, the world crazily arranged around you and almost on top of you as it sails by.

The whip is not for the reindeer of course- the crack of the whip sends a lighting like bolt through the spiraling shape of the Fold and shows Santa again how wide the tunnel is by circling in sparks of light in the distance. The HOHOHO and the whip cracks’ lightning-like bolts seem to enhance and strengthen the Fold's tunnel.

Since it’s a natural occurrence Santa can never trust it to stay the same all the time like a tunnel built on a highway. So he is always calling out and cracking the whip to watch its size and fluctuations. If you are not ready for it the Fold is frightening because red flames still swirl in a distant circling haze like the aurora borealis and you can hardly take your eyes off such a lovely and terrible thing.

You see almost everything all at once like terraces on a mountainside. It's like being in a high altitude because you can't breathe normally like high up but here you feel currents of heat and cold fly by your face that are a little shocking. It can be disorienting but you look up at Santa and the dwarf who comes along that night and they do not even seem to notice it.

They travel from place to place at a seemingly normal speed. Up and down one rooftop and building and hut to another. On rare Christmas Eves throughout time Santa told me he has hitched baby reindeer behind the sleigh to ride the tunnel of the Fold and adjust their bodies for future pulling duty. The last reindeer to be hitched like this is the only story anyone outside this private world tells even though they have none of it right. When Santa once found himself speeding past a house he meant to stop for, he looked behind the sled and a young and already fierce Ruedov was PUSHING it onward!

When it’s over Santa and the reindeer have covered the world’s Christmas subscribers in 5 quick hours. Even that amount of time isn't needed I’m told, it’s just the measured safe time to be inside the Fold. It’s a very dizzying process for the uninitiated.

This is why the Northern Cargo train carries the runaway children home. The very few who sneak away into the sleigh are not very happy. Usually they pass out and wake up on the train back and don't remember much other than feeling very sick.

After the usual period of time the flaming barrier of the Fold heats up and will collapse upon itself. This is why the best way to travel the Fold is with non-fuel vehicles. The Fold is born of fire, so do not bring anything explosive into it! You see the Fold is at odds with the atmosphere and eventually it’s burned up. Since it’s like a tunnel none of the world is ever damaged- but if you are inside when it collapses, you will burn up with it. If you explode something in it- it will close upon you too.

Coming out of the Fold is also very dramatic. As the team soars back into "real" space and plummets through the air back at the Pole, they land on an icy runway- pushing their legs slightly forward like a water-skier and they slide. The reindeer and the sleigh create a storm of flying ice and melting snow. Like a hurricane the white clouds swirl and when they come to a stop they are steaming and quickly freeze again. They are then pure white and sparkling for a brief moment before the sleigh crews arrive to unload and unhook and smash the ice off. Santa roars out of his ice covering, always a scary sound, like a battle cry, and then gives out a hearty laugh. Even passengers get covered in an icy crust, so you spend a few moments peeling and shaking it off. It is now over. The reindeer turn and snort at Santa and he lifts his hand in salute.

An elegant black sleigh with tiny white lights arrives and speeds off into the snowy wastes and the reindeer race after it. This is Mz Clawz. She doesn't need to help Ruedov and the team find their way back to the cave of the herd but she does it anyway. She sees that they have food and care- her healing skills are superb. She will also disappear to be with them for births and deaths. She is their watcher and protector.

Santa will retire to his great room by the fire for a large delicious stein of stout. After this moment's rest he will sometimes dip into the bags of mail not Christmas related. Some children just write him nice letters all year ‘round and he chuckles over these long into the next day and night. When Mz Clawz arrives later, sometimes days later- they Tango!

Check out the previous parts of Happily Ever Over right here.