David, Dan and the Christmas Tree

It was late on a December afternoon at VeVe HQ, and the office was mostly quiet.
Mostly.

“Left side is sagging,” Dan said, squinting up at the enormous Christmas tree in front of them.

“That’s because you put three generations of Batman on the same branch,” David replied, rearranging the Waynes. “Even Bruce needs some elbow room.”

The tree was ridiculous, in the best way. Instead of normal baubles, there were tiny golden statues, miniature comics, a T-Rex in a Santa hat, a little AT-AT, and a gang of mutant turtles dangling from a candy cane hook.

Getting it into the office had been a whole other saga. The tree was so big it wouldn’t fit through the doors, so Dan had spent a weekend “optimizing the process.” In Dan-speak, that meant building a rolling frame-and-pulley contraption by hand and swinging the tree in through the windows until it stood perfectly in the middle of the VeVe floor like it had always lived there.

Now David, in his orange jacket and a slightly crooked Santa hat, stepped back and took in the task ahead of them. Dan, hoodie sleeves shoved up, looked around at all the ornaments.

“This is what happens when you decorate a tree for collectors,” Dan muttered, carefully balancing a Felix ornament beside a tiny R2-D2.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” said David. He wiped his hands on his jacket and tilted his head. “Look at it. AT-ATs and Troopers, alongside Mermicornos and Marvel Mightys… it’s like the VeVe app exploded onto a tree.”

He wiped a tear from his eye.

“It’s beautiful.”

Nestled beside them sat a giant red sack of trinkets and ornaments, all carefully hunted down by David over the past year. Every convention, every meeting, every “quick stop” in some airport shop had ended with another little trinket for the tree.

Dan tugged the sack open. It rattled and jingled with the weight of all the tiny treasures inside.

He dug around, holding one ornament up to the light, then another, frowning like someone trying to choose between two Secret Rares.

“I see you didn’t pick up a Pokem—”

“Don’t start,” David said, shaking his head and rolling his eyes before Dan could finish.

Dan smirked, dropped a tiny mystery-ball-looking bauble back into the sack, and reached for the next ornament instead.

—

They worked in a festive frenzy for the rest of the afternoon, shifting ornaments, untangling lights, trying to convince a tiny samurai Darth Vader not to bow forward every time the branch moved.

Eventually, long after the sun had set, Dan plugged in the lights and the tree blinked to life. It was colorful and completely chaotic, like a digital showroom brought into the real world.

David smiled. “Not bad for a couple of collectors who started with a pile of toys, huh?”

“Not bad at all,” Dan said.

They stood side by side, looking up at their masterpiece.

Then David frowned.  

“…Wait,” he said. 

“Where’s the star?”

The very top of the tree was bare. No shining star, no glowing collectible, not even the VeVe logo.

Nothing.

David glanced at the table, then the ornament pile, then under the branches. “We don’t have a star,” he said, looking over at Dan. “Did you forget it?”

Dan pushed his hands into his hoodie pockets and turned in a slow circle. “I don’t forget the easy bits,” he muttered.

Something caught David’s eye behind a low cabinet—just a corner of blue paper, dusted with tinsel.

“Hold up,” he said.

He reached behind the cabinet and pulled out a small box wrapped in VeVe blue, tiny white logos scattered across it like snow. A tag dangled from a silver string.

To the Founders! Happy Holidays, from the VeVe Team. 

David raised an eyebrow, while Dan lifted a shrug, then tore into the paper together.

Inside were two ornaments: tiny versions of themselves. Mini David in a christmas sweater and Santa hat, mid-gesture. Mini Dan in a sweater, holding a tablet, eyebrows in a permanent expression of  “Soon™”.

“They digitised us,” David said. 

Dan rolled his ornament in his palm, the tiny tablet catching the tree lights. “We are never hearing the end of this.”

“Yeah,” David said, but he was smiling now. The kind that started in his eyes and took a second to reach his mouth.

He stepped closer to the tree, holding the tiny versions of them both.

“Middle?” he asked.

“Middle,” Dan agreed.

They hung the mini David and mini Dan on a branch just off-center, right where anyone walking into the office would see them, tucked in among AT-ATs, Troopers, Rabbids, Pixeez, and all the rest.

Dan gave his ornament a gentle tap so it swung, catching the light. “Reckon we might need a few more of these,” he said.

“For the office?” David asked.

Dan glanced at the tree, then past it, like he could see through the walls to the world outside. “Something like that,” he said. “I’ve got a list.”

David snorted. “Any details you can share with me?”

Dan just smiled. “Details…” He paused, then couldn’t help himself. “Soon™.”

They both laughed, the sound soft against the rustle of branches and the faint buzz of the lights.

Outside the window, snow began to fall, slow and steady. The tree shimmered in the glass: little glows of every brand, every drop and a pair of founders in a christmas tree.

David lifted an imaginary glass toward the tree. “To the VeVe family,” he said.

Dan bumped his shoulder lightly against David’s, eyes still on the ornaments.

—

Happy Holidays, VeVe fam, from all of us at VeVe.
Thanks for decorating this crazy tree with us.