Speaker 1: Calarogu Shark Media, Hello, and welcome to Ghost Scary Stories.
This episode is titled The Mall Santa Massacre, Episode four,
The Night After Christmas.
Speaker 2: Christmas Eve morning and Last Stop Shop has evolved beyond
retail nightmares. The mall's architecture twists impossibly stores bleeding into
each other like a shopping center designed by Esher. On
Black Friday, cocaine outside police lights flash uselessly against windows
that have become one way mirrors into madness. They can't
get in, Kelly says, watching from our barricade in what
used to be hot topic before it merged with William's Sonoma.
The store won't let them, not until after the Christmas rush. Great.
I check my makeshift weapons. Candy cane sharpened to a point,
angel decoration powered by SPIKEE and glitter, and a price
gun that now shoots actual prices. Turns out retail tags
really can kill when properly motivated. Dave scans the cursed
ledger we found below his Moll security training, struggling with
eldritch retail knowledge. According to this, the original Santa Thing
maintained balance through structured sacrifice, naughty and nice taking and
giving but when they stopped the ritual, it went full
capitalist nightmare, Kelly finishes. Now it's all taking, no giving,
pure consumption. On the security monitors, we watch both Santa
entities stalking the transformed maul. The modern one still rides
its throne of twisted Mannikins, while the ancient horror commands
legions of vintage display figures. They're moving toward each other,
drawn by some terrible retail magnetism. When they merge, Susan whispers,
holding her daughter Amy close.
Speaker 1: What happens? Then?
Speaker 2: A scream echoes through the mall's warped corridors. Through the monitors,
We watch another survivor become inventory, their flesh turning to
plastic as Mannikins arrange them in an eternal display of
holiday horror. We need to end this, I say, before
Christmas morning, before they complete whatever this is. How Amy asks,
we can't even get out. Kelly holds up the angel decoration.
We know light hurts them, genuine giving disrupts their retail corruption.
Maybe the building shudders on the monitors. The two Santa
things meet in center court. Their forms begin to merge,
creating something that makes my eyes hurt and my credit
score cry time for the final markdown. The merged Santa
thing rises from Center Court like a retail demon's final form,
part modern plastic, part ancient wood, all hunger. Its multiple
faces speak in harmonized corruption. The shopping season reaches its peak,
time for final clearance of all human inventory. Look at this,
Dave points to the ledger. The original ritual required equal
parts greed and charity. The store fed on both. When
commercialism took over completely, it lost balance. Kelly finishes like
a shopping cart with a bad wheel, careening into the darkness.
Through the monitors, we watch Mannikins herding the last few
survivors towards Center Court. The displays have evolved human plastic
hybrids arranged in holiday scenes from Hell. A Christmas dinner
where the family is the meal, a gift exchange where
the presents wrap themselves in people. The old Santa needed
both naughty and nice lists, I realize, but modern retail
only cares about profit. So we what Amy asks? Show
it the true meaning of Christmas? Little heavy handed, isn't it?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: Kelly says her goth sensibility is merging with retail wisdom.
We show it the true meaning of balance. Shopping isn't
just taking real retail is an exchange. The building shakes again.
The merged Santa rises higher, its form a twisted Christmas
tree of mannekin parts and holiday horror through the PA system.
It's voice booms, No more exchanges, only final sales. The
store claims, all we need to get to Center Court.
I say, but how the Mannikins. I have an idea.
Kelly grins, pulling out her hot topic employee discount card.
But you're going to hate it. Why because she starts
gathering specific items from the merged stores around us. We're
going to have to become what we hate most. You
don't mean, Oh yes, she holds up a name tag.
We're going full retail worker on Christmas. Nothing is more
terrifying than that. Armed with employee name tags, price guns,
and the ancient ledger, we move through a mall that's
become retail's final evolution. Stores have merged into impossible departments.
Build a bear meets hot topic, creates goth teddy bears
that scream Victoria's Secret. Fused with radio shack offers lingerie
that glows in disturbing ways. Remember, Kelly whispers, We're not
just staff with seasonal employees, the most powerful and desperate
of retail workers. The merged Santa Thing looms above Center Court.
Its massive form a Christmas tree from retail hell Mannikin
parts and holiday decorations spiral around it like twisted garland.
At its base, the last survivors are being processed into
permanent display pieces. Welcome last minute shoppers. Its voices boom.
Everything must go, including your humanity now, Kelly shouts, raising
her angel decoration. It's light catches the Santa Thing's attention.
But we're not trying to hurt it, not yet. Instead,
we begin helping customers. Would you like to sign up
for our rewards program? I call out in my best
retail voice. The Mannikins pause, confused, we're having a buy
one get one's sale, Kelly announces, and yes, the coupon
is expired. The Santa Thing shrieks a sound like a
cash register having a stroke. No, no service, only consumption.
Ma'am that price is correct, I just checked. Dave gets
into it, his moll copp authority, merging with retail power.
Even Amy and Susan join in the other store. Has
it cheaper? They shout, we'd like to speak to the manager.
The Mannikins begin to malfunction court between their hunger and
their ingrained retail programming. Some start arranging displays automatically. Others
begin folding clothes that aren't there. Stop. The Santa Thing owls.
The store commands only consumption, but sir I step forward,
holding up the Ledger. Retail is an exchange. For every
Black Friday stampede, there's a Christmas Morning smile, for every
greedy grab, there's a genuine gift. The store needs both.
It always did. The merged Santa writhes, no only profit
only hunger. Kelly raises the angel higher, no return policy
on Christmas spirit, jollyboy. With our combined retail worker energy,
we begin the final ritual, not of pure greed or
pure giving, but of true commercial balance. The ancient Ledger
shows us the words, and we speak them together. The
customer is always right, but retail workers have souls too.
The Santa Thing's form begins to crack, Light pouring through
Mannikins freeze in place. As the balance reasserts itself, the
twisted Christmas tree of horror starts to implode. Price check
on divine retail intervention, Kelly shouts, The building shudders one
final time. The merged Santa thing screams in harmonized agony
as it's torn apart by the force of retail equilibrium,
light and dark, giving and taking, greed and charity, the
true spirit of shopping. Christmas morning breaks over a male
return to normal. Mostly the survivors emerge into sunlight, forever
changed by their glimpse into retail's dark heart. Think it's over,
Kelly asks, watching Mannikins return to their proper places, their
hunger satisfied by balance restored. Holiday retail is never over,
I say, But at least we made it through the
Christmas rush. The last Mannikin settles into place, its smile
now holding just a hint of well fed satisfaction. After
all retail goes on, the store must be fed, but
now perhaps it will remember to maintain its cosmic balance sheet. Hey,
Kelly nudges me, at least we got employee of the month.
Sometimes saving the world is just another day in retail,
And sometimes the true horror isn't what lurks in the store,
but the knowledge that the after Christmas sales are about
to begin.
Speaker 1: Ghost is a calorogus. Shark Media production, Written and hosted
by Alexander Ian McIntyre, Produced by Mark Francis. Executive producers
Mark Francis and John McDermott. Portions of this podcast may
have been created with the assistance of AI. This show,
along with hundreds of others from Calaroga Shark Media, is
available commercial free on any player hassel Free. Just look
for the link in the episode or show notes Caalaroga
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