A 00Carter Christmas
Part 6 of 9
Act II:
How Dr. Rough
Stole Christmas
Snowflakes
fell from the twilit sky, each one unique and pristine. They covered the crowns of the tallest trees,
dotting the leaves like dandruff. They
blanketed the branches below. They
carpeted the soft floor of the swamp in a thick layer of white, unsullied but
for the trail of muddy footprints that led to a thick, green cypress tree,
around which a number of men stood.
“Timber!”
shouted one of them suddenly, as the cypress began to wobble.
“-lake!”
added a second man, grinning impishly at the others before scrambling out of
the path of the falling tree.
“D-don’t
let Drums hear you saying that, Danny,” warned a third man, his willowy frame
trembling. “You know he doesn’t go by
that name anymore.”
“Oh,
don’t get your tighty-whities in a wad, New Kid,”
retorted Danny, rolling his eyes. “You
know Drums ain’t around. Drums is too
good, too important, to do something
as trivial as cut down the FANS Christmas tree.”
“Drums
has s-served us well,” stammered Donnie, his rat-like eyes shifting around
nervously. “He’s been a most f-faithful
servant to our master.”
“What
a crock of bull,” spat Danny venomously.
“We’ve all been in Dr. Rough’s service much longer than he has. But oh, Drums
gave his right hand for FANS, so Drums
gets rewarded. The favoritism in this
terrorist league is nauseating.”
“Can
it, Wood,” snapped the first man. “Let’s
get this tree back to the base and decorate it so we can show Dr. Rough. Then maybe we’ll be rewarded for bringing the Christmas spirit to the FANS
headquarters.”
“Good
idea, Jon,” agreed Donnie, nodding eagerly.
“L-let’s go. Heigh-hoooo!” he suddenly sang out, his anxious squeak of a voice deepening into
a strong baritone.
“Heigh-hoooo!” echoed the Merry Minions.
“Heigh-ho,” sang Jon.
“Heigh-ho,” growled Danny.
“Heigh-hoooo!” trilled Donnie.
“Heigh-ho! Heigh-ho!” they chorused, “It’s home to FANS we go!” And they whistled cheerfully as they hoisted
the fallen tree onto their shoulders and marched off through the snow-covered
swamp. “Heigh-ho!
Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho! Heigh-ho! It’s home
to FANS we go!”
Still
whistling, they trooped through the muck, shouldering the massive cypress,
until the surrounding trees began to thin.
By the time they stepped into the shadow of the looming FANS fortress,
their tune had changed.
“Fah
who for-aze, dah who dor-aze,” sang the minions, as they carried the tree into the
building. “Welcome Christmas, bring your light!”
“Fah
who for-aze, dah who dor-aze,” they continued on, while they set the tree up and strung it with
twinkling purple lights. “Welcome in the cold dark night!”
And
when the cypress was fully trimmed, with tinsel and garland, ornaments and
embellishments, they stood in a circle around it, their hands clasped together,
and chorused, “Welcome Christmas, fah who rah-moose!
Welcome Christmas, dah who dah-moose! Welcome Christmas while we stand, heart to
heart and hand in hand…”
Bathed
in a ring of soft, lavender light, the minions were oblivious to the short man
who skulked in the shadows, watching them with one eye twitching furiously, his
lip curling up in a sneer.
Every agent down
at HimTak
Liked Christmas
a lot,
But DR. ROUGH,
The nemesis of
HimTak, did NOT!
From
his shadowy corner, Rough scowled at his minions, who were still singing, “Fah who for-aze, dah who dor-aze,
welcome Christmas, come this way! Fah who for-aze, dah who dor-aze, welcome
Christmas, Christmas Day!”
They
sang with their eyes closed, big cheesy grins splitting their faces. They sang with their hands swinging, their
heads bobbing in time to their song.
They sang without worry. They
sang without shame. They sang without
money or promise of fame. “Welcome, welcome, fah
who rah-moose! Welcome, welcome, dah who dah-moose! Christmas Day is in our grasp, so long as we
have hands to clasp! Fah
who for-aze, dah who dor-aze…”
Dr.
Rough could take it no longer. “ENOUGH!”
he bellowed, storming out of his corner.
The minions stopped in their tracks, quickly dropping hands.
“Dr.
Rough!” exclaimed Jonathan Knight, the first to recover from his shock. “Your timing is impeccable! We just finished trimming the tree.”
“Tree!”
spat Dr. Rough. “What tree?”
“Well,
this tree, sir,” replied Jon,
gesturing to the towering cypress, all bedazzled in shimmering silver and
violet. “The FANS Christmas tree!”
“Christmas…” Dr. Rough’s sneer became more
pronounced. He narrowed his eyes, the
left one still twitching. “I hate a
number of things, as you well know.
Himitsu Takana. Incompetence. The word ‘short.’”
“Don’t
forget the ‘It’s a Small World’ ride at Disney World,” inserted Abs Breen
helpfully. Dr. Rough flashed him a
seething stare. If the prototype of his
death-ray spectacles were finished so that looks could kill, Abs would have
dropped dead in an instant. As it was,
he merely ducked his head, muttering, “Never mind.”
Dr.
Rough cleared his throat importantly before continuing his monologue. “But if there’s one thing I hate above all
others… well, perhaps not the three
others I mentioned, but certainly all the other
others…” He paused for suspense, while
the minions waited with bated breath.
“…it’s CHRISTMAS!”
Dr. Rough hated
Christmas! The whole Christmas season!
You wanna know
why? I'll tell you the reason:
“Christmas!”
gasped the minions, looking in disbelief from their festive swamp tree back to
their outraged leader. “But why?”
“I’ll
tell you why,” growled Dr. Rough.
“Christmas has become so commercial.
It’s not about Jesus anymore; it’s about Santa Claus. Santa Claus… what a disgusting heap of
lard. He’s a hero in children’s eyes,
all because he brings toys to the whole world on Christmas Eve. He and his reindeer – mangy, mutated beasts –
take all the credit for the joy and excitement the children feel on Christmas
morning, but they aren’t the real heroes.
They only deliver the
toys. Santa Claus is merely a mailman in
a souped-up sleigh.
The real heroes are the creators, the masterminds behind the toys: the toymakers themselves. The elves.”
It wasn't that
his head wasn't screwed on quite right;
Dr. Rough hated
Christmas because of his height!
Though twisted and
evil, he had pity for all
The creatures
mistreated because they are small,
And Santa, you
see, works his elves like they're slaves,
Forcing them to
make toys without makin’ bank.
“Santa’s
elves are slave labor,” Dr. Rough ranted on.
“Unpaid, uncredited, unappreciated. There aren’t even any Christmas songs about
elves!”
“Why,
yes there are,” spoke up Abs again.
“There’s that tune from the old Rudolph special, ‘We Are Santa’s
Elves.’ You know… ‘We are Santa’s elves… filling Santa’s shelves… with a toy for each
girl and boy, oh, we are Santa’s-’”
“SILENCE!”
roared Dr. Rough. “Enough singing!”
“Sorry,”
muttered Abs, seeming to shrink again slightly.
“Santa’s
elves!” Dr. Rough spat. “Santa’s elves! Like they’re his belongings… his playthings…
his property! Slaves, I tell you. Slaves!
And all because they’re different!
All because they’re short!”
The
minions exchanged knowing looks.
“You’re
absolutely right, Dr. Rough,” Jon piped up.
“I never saw it that way before, but you make a good point. The commercialism of Christmas is only
perpetuating the problem of slave labor in the North Pole. So what are we going to do about it?”
For
the first time, Dr. Rough smiled. His
eyes gleamed, reflecting the purple light from the tree. “So glad you asked,” he simpered dangerously.
Plotting deep in
his lair, with his trademark eye twitch,
Dr. Rough forged
a plan to fix this injustice,
For he knew the
whole world, which would soon be his,
Was supporting
slave labor by asking for gifts.
“Please
don’t tell us you want to bomb the North Pole,” pleaded Jeff Timmons. “The South Pole was bad enough! I mean, unless you’re gonna send MJ with a
pack of explosives strapped to his chest…”
Joey
Fatone suddenly gasped. “Dr. Rough would
never do that to MJ! Would you?” he
asked Dr. Rough uncertainly.
“Of
course not,” Dr. Rough replied coolly.
“I’d send the underling who deemed it acceptable to use the prototype of
my weather machine – the last remaining model of the device, I should add,
since those meddling agents of Himitsu Takana confiscated the finished version
we installed in the Magic Kingdom – to dump a blizzard of snow on the
Everglades, thus attracting unwanted attention to our little hideout.” His eyes bored into Joey’s; he knew exactly
who was responsible for using his weather machine without permission.
Joey
gulped. “Sorry, sir, my bad. I just thought a little snow would add to the
festive atmosphere around here. It won’t
happen again.”
“Festive
atmosphere,” sneered Dr. Rough. “It had
better not happen again. The last time
you used my weather machine to make it snow, Himitsu Takana took notice and
came to foil my plans once again. Do you
want this plan to be foiled as well?”
“What
is your plan, Dr. Rough?” asked
Danny.
“As I
was about to explain, before I was so rudely interrupted,” growled Dr. Rough,
with a beady look at Jeff. “I was in my
chamber the other night, watching my VHS copy of ‘Blue Toes the Christmas Elf,’
and I was thinking about poor Blue Toes and how he sacrificed so much to make
the children happy and please his master, despite the appalling mistreatment
he’d been forced to endure for the first twenty minutes of the program.
“And
I thought, ‘I just cannot stand for such abuse to continue. I am a powerful man… In fact, soon, I’ll be the most powerful man
in the world. Surely, I can do something
to sabotage Santa’s sadistic slavery,’” he hissed. “But what?
So I plotted and I schemed… I schemed and I plotted… and at last, it
came to me.”
"I'll start
a revolution!" he snarled with a sneer.
"A crusade,
a boycott of Christmas this year!"
Then he growled,
with his left eye nervously twitching,
And thought,
"This will never work how I'm wishing!"
For tomorrow, he
knew, all the mamas and pops
Would wake up
bright and early. They'd rush to the
shops!
They'd buy all
the toys made in sweatshops by elves.
With those Black
Friday deals, why, they'd clear the shelves!
And the elves,
young and old, wouldn't earn a dime
For all their
hard work and all of their time.
Santa, the Big
Man, would make a gold mine
Off the little
guys' work on the assembly line,
Which was
something Dr. Rough thought just didn't seem right!
And the more he
thought of this elf injustice,
The more Rough
thought, "I must stop this whole mess!
But change
doesn't come without shit going down.
I MUST start a
jihad on Christmas!
...But
HOW?"
“You
see, I knew merely boycotting the holiday would never be enough,” Dr. Rough
went on. “Even if we used the hypnotic
device again to brainwash people into following the boycott, it wouldn’t be
enough. We must make them pay for their
commercialistic greed! We must steal
their Christmas spirit away!”
Then he got an
idea!
An awful idea!
DR. ROUGH
GOT A WONDERFUL,
AWFUL IDEA!
“Steal…”
he mused. “Yes… that’s what we’ll do.”
“Dr.
Rough?” asked Jon.
A
devious grin split the FANS leader’s face.
“Without money, greed, and Christmas spirit, there will be no demand for
toys. The basic economic principle of
supply and demand dictates that without demand, there is no need for
supply. And if toy supplies are no
longer needed, neither is elf labor.
Santa will let his elves go.
They’ll be freed!
The
minions began to nod, still listening closely, rapt and attentive. Dr. Rough was enjoying himself, enjoying the
way he could still keep them spellbound with this grand schemes.
“So
all we must do,” he went on, “is kill the Christmas spirit, leave families so
hopeless and destitute that they long for only the necessities, not frivolities
like toys. We must… STEAL CHRISTMAS!”
The
minions gasped in delight. “It’s
genius!” they cried. “Brilliant! Unheard of!”
“But…
Dr. Rough,” the irritatingly English voice of Abs rose above the others. “Beg pardon, sir, but I thought perhaps you
might tell us… how precisely do you expect to – as you put it, sir – steal Christmas? Pardon my skepticism, master, but it seems a
bit… ambitious.”
The
light left Dr. Rough’s eyes, as they darkened with rage. “Ambitious,” he snorted. “Of course it’s ambitious! When have I ever conjured up a plan which was
not ambitious?! You think I am incapable of carrying out an
ambitious scheme?”
“I…
n-no, of course not, dear master,” Abs sputtered, chortling nervously. “I merely queried-”
“Save
your queries!” shouted Dr. Rough.
“There’s no need to question a leader of my brilliance. I’ve thought through every detail, and I know
just what to do. Now, gather round, my
minions, and listen to the plan.”
"I know
just what to do!" Dr. Rough told his crew,
And he rented a
Santa suit and some elf costumes,
And he cackled
and crowed, "What a genius I am!
With these
festive costumes, we'll stick it to The Man!"
“Brills!”
exclaimed Abs, looking at the selection elf costumes draped across the
furniture. “Which one will you be
wearing, master?”
“I?” Dr. Rough looked affronted. “I
will be wearing the Santa suit, naturally.
What did you think, that I would be dressed as an elf??”
“Well,
I merely thought… for authenticity’s sake…”
“Better
quit while you’re ahead, buddy,” muttered Joey out of the side of his mouth.
But
it was too late; Dr. Rough had already caught the meaning. “Are you calling Dr. Rough… short?” he asked
in a deathly whisper.
“N-no,
Dr. Rough, of-of course not!” insisted Abs, his eyes widening in terror.
“FATONE!”
roared Dr. Rough. “Take our friend Abs
to my lab. He’ll serve me best as a
guinea pig for the tests on my death-ray spectacles! Let me know when you succeed in vaporizing
him!”
Joey
cleared his throat awkwardly. “You got
it, Dr. Rough,” he said, reluctantly taking Abs by the arm.
As he
dragged him off, the other minions could hear Abs screaming, “No, wait! Dr. Rough, please! I didn’t mean it! Honest, I didn’t!”
The
door slammed shut, muffling his pleas.
The remaining minions watched their master warily, waiting for
orders. “Well?” said Dr. Rough. “What are you waiting for? Grab a costume! The Santa suit is mine.” With that, he walked off, slinging a garment
bag containing the red velvet suit over his shoulder, and disappeared behind a
screen to change.
Quickly,
the minions scrambled into action.
Articles of bright green and red clothing were thrown hither and yon, as
the minions selected elf tunics to wear.
Spandex snapped, as the minions pulled festive tights over their hairy
legs. Bells jingled, as they put on
curly-toed shoes and pointed hats. By
the time Dr. Rough emerged from behind the screen, decked from head to toe in
red velvet trimmed with white fur, all of the remaining minions stood before
him in flamboyant elf ensembles, shifting their weight uncomfortably from foot
to jingle-belled foot.
“Hm…” Dr. Rough stopped to survey them, stroking
his long, white beard. “Some of you are
a little large to be elves, but I suppose you’ll do. The silly children will be fooled, in any
case. Children will believe anything.”
The
minions snickered. But then Danny spoke
up, “How we gonna break into their houses to steal all their stuff, Dr.
Rough? It won’t exactly fool them if we
break the windows or kick down the doors, will it?”
“Of
course not, you fool,” retorted Dr. Rough.
“We won’t need to break windows or doors – those are the tactics of
amateurs. No, we shall do this the right
way: We’ll land on the roof and come
down the chimney.”
The
minions exchanged uneasy glances, but Dr. Rough laughed. “You underestimate me! I see the looks on your faces – you think my
plan won’t work!”
“We’re
just, uh… just a little unsure about the logistics, Dr. Rough,” said Jon.
“Ah…
but you haven’t seen the best part of my plan, the element I’ve been working on
in secret ever since the first Christmas commercials began airing on Halloween
night. Follow me to the garage.”
There
was a bounce in Dr. Rough’s step as he led the minions down to the ground level,
where an expansive garage held all of their vehicles. The raised heels of his black, leather boots
clicked on the concrete floor as he strode over to a remote corner, where a
tarp covered a vehicle the size of a small speedboat.
Dr. Rough
cleared his throat and grandly announced, “Feast your eyes upon…” He whipped off the tarp so fast that it flew
up into his face, and the momentum thrust him backward, knocking him off his
feet. “Oof!” The wind rushed out of him, as he landed hard
on his rear, the tarp pooling on top of him.
“M-master!”
squeaked Donnie, hurrying to pull the tarp off of him. He offered Dr. Rough one pale, trembling
hand, which Dr. Rough ignored, scrambling to his feet and dusting off his red
velvet backside.
“…my
sleigh,” he finished, though the grandeur had gone from his voice.
The
minions turned their attention back to what had formerly been covered by the
tarp. Dr. Rough felt better when he
heard their awed intake of breath, as their eyes took in the sight of a large,
shiny, black sleigh, customized with a decal of Dr. Twitches in a red nose and
Santa hat and the FANS logo in small, silver lettering.
“It’s
beautiful, master,” Jon was the first to proclaim. “Does it fly?”
“Of
course it flies. It’s equipped with twin
jet engines and a high-tech GPS navigation system,” boasted Dr. Rough with
pride. “It even features a missile
launcher and aerosol spray tank filled with the last of our FANthrax
supply, should we need to attack. But
the important thing is, it will get us around efficiently enough to steal
Christmas from New York. There will be
no brotherly love in the city after twelve days of Christmas robberies.”
“Brotherly
love? Isn’t that Philadelphia?” asked
Danny.
“IRRELEVENT!”
snapped Dr. Rough. “What matters is, we
have our sleigh, and we have our elves.
All we need now… is a reindeer.”
A
reindeer! The minions, in their
ridiculous elf costumes, looked around at each other. Wherever would they get a reindeer in this
part of the country?
All we need is a
reindeer..." Dr. Rough started to say,
But, see,
reindeer don't live in the Everglades.
Did that stop
Dr. Rough? Oh hells no, no way!
At
that moment, a horrific, metallic grinding noise caused them all to jump and
cringe, clapping their hands to their ears.
They looked up towards its source and saw Drums standing beside a cement
pillar, his hook raised. He had scraped
it down the pillar to get their attention.
“God
damn, Drums, couldn’t you have just said hi?” Jeff complained.
“Hi,”
Drums deadpanned.
“Never
mind that,” Dr. Rough quickly interfered.
“What is it, Drums?”
“I
been sent to tell ya dat Fatone done managed to burn Abs wit dose death-ray
specs. He ain’t dead, though,” relayed
Drums, in a bored voice. “Wuzzup wit all dis?”
His robotic red eye shifted from the sleigh to the oddly-dressed
minions.
“I’ve
just been briefing the minions on our next mission,” said Dr. Rough. “And I do believe we’ve found the solution to
our current problem…”
For
he was suddenly staring into Drums’s single red eye,
the eye which he himself had implanted into his protégé’s empty socket. He had grown so used to it that he hardly
remembered what Drums had looked like before, when he was the miserable HimTak
outcast he’d been when Dr. Rough had recruited him. But now, it was as if he were seeing the eye
for the first time.
He
cleared his throat and smiled quite fondly at Drums and said,
“Drumzy, with your eye so bright… won’t you guide my sleigh
tonight?”
"If I can't
find a reindeer, then Drums will guide my sleigh!"
"Aw, hells
no, dat's whack!" I cried in dismay.
"But Drums,
you've got the red eye to light my way!"
“No. No way.
You trippin’, D-Rough. Ain’t no way I be puttin’ antlers on mah head like some effed-up
cyborg Rudolph,” protested Drums.
Dr.
Rough was still smiling. “Nonsense. We need you, Drums. Even the silliest of children wouldn’t
believe in a sleigh without a reindeer.
You’ll be perfect. And, of
course, if you still need a little… persuasion… never forget that Dr. Rough
rewards his helpers.”
And
from within a large, burlap sack that lay across the seat of the sleigh, almost
as if he had planned this, Dr. Rough retrieved a small package, wrapped in
silver paper. He held it out to Drums.
“Wuz dis?” Drums asked suspiciously.
Dr.
Rough kept smiling. “Open it.”
Drums
hesitated, but his curiosity got the better of him. He ripped the shiny paper with one swipe of
his hook, then shook it off with his good hand to reveal a handsome, black
leather case. He used the tip of the
hook to pry up the top. For a moment, he
could only stare, his eyes wide and awed.
Then he looked up at Dr. Rough.
“Dr. Rough,” he whispered.
“Master… it’s beautiful… thank you… thank
you.”
The
minions watched curiously as Dr. Rough reached into the box Drums still held
and pulled out a gleaming replica of a human hand. Shining, bright as moonlight, it looked as if
it had been made of molten silver, an exact mold of Drums’s
severed hand.
“I’ll
attach it before the thirteenth of December, if you agree to be our reindeer,”
promised Dr. Rough.
It
was an offer Drums couldn’t refuse. That
was why, on December thirteenth, he found himself wearing a jumpsuit of thick,
matted brown fur, a pair of heavy antlers tied down to his head, and a bulbous
clown nose to match his eye. “You’s a mean one… Dr. Rough,” he sang
under his breath, flexing the shining fingers of his new hand, now attached
seamlessly to his arm, as though he were wearing a dazzling silver glove. “You
really… is… a heel. You’s as cuddly as a
cactus; you’s as charmin’ as an eel, Dr. Rou-ough! You’s a bad
banana wit a… greasy black peel!”
He
picked up a small twig on the ground and crushed it into powder.
SO… He dressed
me in fur, stuck some antlers on my head.
I didn't feel
like no pimp; I'da rather been dead,
But Dr. Rough
said, "Too bad!" and made us start packin'
And flew us to
New York to put his plan into action.
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