There's no part II to this one, sadly. An abandoned fic, you might call it.

Still, it's a fun little escape and a Crimbo story to boot. Maybe we'll see more of these in the years to come?

Maybe I'll make my NaNo a huge Crimbo story.. hmm!

This is not in the standard AIL continuity, which means that any discrepancies with previous work are explained as such, and not by my laziness in not re-reading my work.

Konall Bearsmasher, the seal clubbing Norse berserker, stepped out of his yurt and took a breath of morning air. He had just finished his breakfast: five dozen eggs and a tankard of mead. It was then that a foul demon approached from behind.

The demon said, “I will devour your soul.”

“You had your breakfast already, Spaz.” Konall replied. Spaz was Konall’s pet ADD demon. The imp was unpredictable and childish at times, really all the time, but he was an expert at finding loot.

“So what’re we gonna do today, Konall? Huh? Huh? Huh?” the demon asked.

“We’re going to start by playing the Be Less Annoying Game.”

“I hate that game.”

It was then that an elf appeared in front of Konall. As the berserker unloaded a sampling of his known expletives, the elf looked around confused.

The seal clubber said, “By the hair of Sanjaya, what are you doing here?”

“I am here to ask for your help,” the elf replied.

“Let me guess, you want me to help some midget cast some ring into some volcano.”

“Very funny. No, Uncle Crimbo needs you to help save the holiday season.”

“There’s no such person as Uncle Crimbo; he’s a myth.”

“You mean you don’t believe in Uncle Crimbo,” said the elf, completely shocked.

“Nope. Haven’t in a long time. I did back when I was a kid. Then one Crimbo, I didn’t get any presents. ‘Maybe I’ll get them next year’ I thought. But I got no presents the next year, or the one after that, or the one after that.”

“Would this have happened during Crimbo of 1987?”

“That sounds about right, why?” asked Konall.

“In 1987 you raided the village of Whoville for all their Crimbo gifts.”

“I guess I did, sorta. But I taught them all about the value of Crimbo and how it’s not tied to material goods and all that nonsense. Plus my heart grew at least a size that day.”

“One point five sizes, but that was just from the exercise. It says here your capacity for love actually decreased…27%.”

“Okay, so I was naughty. Maybe I didn’t deserve any gifts that I hadn’t stolen, but I was pretty good the other years.”

“You mean the year you torched the seaside orphanage?”

“That orphanage attacked me first.”

The elf continued, “Or what about the year you raided the Knob Goblin Charity for Sick Children, War Veterans, and the Elderly? Perhaps you were ‘good’ the year of the ‘Weasels and Glue Incident.’”

“How was I supposed to know they’d get into the fireworks stand like they did. And the rain of raw sewage was not my fault. Plus, Mayor Fluffenmeister completely overreacted to the whole thing with the chickens. Wait a minute. How do you know all this stuff anyway?”

“Uncle has an excellent spy agency. How do you think he knows when you’ve been sleeping and when you’re awake. I have a sheet here that tells all the details of your life,” the elf said, holding a sheet of paper.

“Spaz, see that sheet? Do your thing.”

The demon responded by shooting a fireball at the paper. It burst into flames and disappeared in a puff of clandestineness.

“This,” sputtered the elf, “is why demons are on the naughty list.”

“Your mom’s on the naughty list,” the demon squeaked.

“What was that?”

“Look,” Konall said, “what do you want?”

“Uncle Crimbo, or just Uncle as we like to call him, is in need of your assistance. He went missing and we need you to find him.”

“I’m not too good with the sleuthing thing.”

“Let’s see how I should put this. It’s not -um- it’s not your brain we need; it’s your liver. We think he’s in a tavern somewhere,” the elf said.

“Drinking not thinking. Okay. Why haven’t your elfin spylets found him?”

“Have you seen how small we are? Our last operative started seeing pink elephants after only a single shot of eggnog. The one before him was wearing his tie as a headband after one sip of some sort of ‘Bejing Cocktail.’ Most of these bars have a two drink minimum.”

“So let’s say I believe in this guy, just for a second,” Konall said. “I help you find him, what do I get in return?”

“We still have a copy of our intelligence reports about all the naughty things you’ve done. Would you like that sort of thing spread around?”

“Hel yes,” the seal clubber said.*

“All right… Um, we’d offer to forgive any past, present, or future misdeeds and give you presents every Crimbo for the rest of your life.”

“Would you give me anything I could kill someone with?”

“No, I don’t think that’s in keeping with the holiday spirit?”

“How about stuff that’s really valuable?”

“We are on a limited budget and it is really the thought that counts.”

“Would you include the receipts?”

“Everything is factory direct. You cannot return it for money.”

“Well,” said Konall, “would you at least cover my expenses while I’m on this mission?”

“That’s fair.”

“Let’s get started then.”

“One thing before we begin. Do you know what day it is?”

“It’s the fifth of Petember.”

“It’s the night before Crimbo. If you fail to get Uncle back before the clock strikes twelve, we will not be paying you.”

“Stomach of Kobayashi.”**

“Watch your language.”

“Fine. I agree to your terms shrimp. Let’s go.”

“Okay then,” the elf said. And with that, he teleported himself, Konall, and Spaz to the first bar with a wave of his magical elf hands.

Konall said, “Did your little spy sheet mention my thoughts on magic users?”

The elf replied, “I seem to recall some vague mention that you did not like magic. Now please take your sword off my throat.”

“Wimp.”

“That is it. You are on your own. You will have to get yourself from tavern to tavern tonight.”

Konall walked into the first boozery. By coincidence, it was the one he was most familiar with: the Seal Clubbing Club. He walked inside and sat down at the bar.

“Whattya buyin’?” the bartender asked.

“I’ll have a Vodka and Death Stix, and make it extra heavy,” Konall replied.

“Coming right up.”

Konall looked around and soon spotted the person he was looking for. It was Jimmy the Weasel, a man who knew everything that went on in this bar. He knew because he spent all his time in said bar.

Konall asked him, “Do you know if Uncle Crimbo was in here recently?”

“I can’t say, though a few drinks might loosen my tongue,” Jimmy replied.

Author’s Note: Konall’s profanity is so advanced that he has on several occasions killed yetis just by swearing at them. In the spirit of Crimbo I have replaced his expletives with more soothing words.

Konall said, “Listen up you [happy] son of a [flower] if you don’t [merrily] tell me where that [puppy] Uncle Crimbo is I’ll put my [meadow] so far up your [merry-go-round] that you’ll be using your [snow globe] for a [sunshine].”

“All right, all right. Haven’t seen him. Hasn’t ever been here that I know.”

“Thanks.”

By now the bartender had reappeared with the Konall’s drink. The seal clubber paid the man, downed the cocktail in one drink, and exited the bar. He made a mental note of the money he spent so he could be reimbursed, not an easy feat considering that his mental notepad didn’t have many sheets.

“Where to next?” Spaz asked.

“I’m thinking the Discoteca de los Ladrones,” Konall replied.

“That’s where the disco bandits go right? Isn’t it a dance club?”

“Yeah, but they serve booze there. Besides, rumor has it that Uncle Crimbo is going through a latino boogey phase right now.”

The line outside the discotheque was pretty short, but there was a man at the front making sure only certain people got through. When it came to Konall the bouncer said, “I’m sorry sir, but you’re not groovy enough to enter.”

The seal clubber replied, “I hear you, but perhaps you’ll listen to reason.” He then punched the bouncer through the door and into a wall. Despite the man’s occupation, he failed to bounce.

Konall stepped into the building and onto the dance floor. The people there were doing a mixture of disco and salsa dancing, and were doing a fine job of it. Konall was doing his own variant called “not dancing at all.” He was also doing a fine job of it. The crowd seemed to be made up of disco bandits and people from bordertown.

It wasn’t long before the man felt the peculiar sensation of his wallet being removed from his pants. He turned around, faced the pickpocket behind him, and said, “I couldn’t help but noticing you touching my butt. And since you’re not a hot chick, I’m feeling pretty mad about the whole thing. Give me back my wallet and I might feel like letting you live.”

The would-be thief said, “I no take you wallet. Es some other theef.”

“I will take you life,” said Konall, poorly mimicking the man’s bordertown accent.

“Oh, es this wallet. My bad. Es a meestake.” The bandit held out the wallet.

“Spaz,” said Konall, “keep that thing safe.”

“Can do,” the demon replied.

As Spaz retrieved and carried the wallet, Konall noticed woman skulking in the shadows. Figuring he had time to spare, he eased over to her and offered to buy her a drink. Unfortunately, he was brought up in the Nordic tradition of wooing women which mostly involves using as much innuendo as possible.

The woman seemed miffed as she said, “Nunca voy a contigo. Eres un cerdo como Uncle Crimbo.”

“Um, no talko borderspeako. Wait, did you say ‘Uncle Crimbo’?”

From behind him came a voice. “Having trouble?”

Konall spun. “Dash, good to see you. Hey, you know borderspeak right? Could you help me. I need to know where Uncle Crimbo is, and I think she might know.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Dash said. <¿Sabes donde el Tio Crimbo es-”

The woman said, “Entiendo lo que el tonto esta diciendo, pero no voy a hablar con él. Puedo, pero yo no quiero hacerlo.”

“Uh,” Dash said, “She can understand Kinglish, but she can’t speak it for some reason.”

Konall asked the woman, “Have you seen Uncle Crimbo?”

The woman replied, “Tu madre es tan gorda como una ballena. Tu no has duchado en un año.”

Dash said, “She says she’s seen him.”

“That took a lot of words,” said Konall.

“It’s a very poetic language,” replied Dash.

“So, what happened?” said Konall

“Tu eres muy tonto. No puedes cepillarse los dientes sin instrucciones. ”

Dash began to interpret. “Uncle Crimbo came here, danced a bit, asked her out. She said no and he left for Club Banana.”

“All right,” said Konall, “we’ll head over there.”

 
*Hel is the Norse underworld, their version of Hell. That’s not a typo.

**Remember that Japanese dude that ate all the hotdogs? That’s Kobayashi.

Not surprisingly.. I like Dash's cameo. I think that was Cameron writing his lines, though I could be wrong.