Last night, I dreamt that Captain lost my immortal soul in a card game, in an attempt to win "THE MOST DELICIOUS CANDY" from the Angel of Death. I don't know why I was so agreable in the dream and simply went to sit on death's table, accepting my fate. Perhaps, death is a preferable alternative to hanging out with Captain?

This morning I woke up to discover a chocolate in my pocket. There was a note on it stating "THANK YOU FOR YOUR PARTICIPATION". I made a huffing noise.

I heard sounds of digging and turned towards them. Green-tinted occulars emerged from one of the many bags sitting on my sled.

"SNIPPEEEEEeeeeeeeeee" Pilot whined.

"What do you want now?" I demanded.

"I PLOT UTTER DESTRUCTION OF YOUR PITIFUL ACCOMPLISHMENTS!" He outputted.

"What else is new?" I asked with a sigh. "Why do you persist in antagonizing me?"

"PLEASE SURRENDER THE SLED. I REQUIRE IT FOR SLEDDING OFF THE TALLEST GARBAGE PILE AROUND!" Pilot pointed at the bags.

"No." I answered.

"COME ON, I GET BONUS POINTS FOR DESTROYING YOUR STUFF!" Pilot waved his arms at me with focused determination, as if his statement was the utter metaphysical truth of the universe.

"And just who is giving out these points?" I queried. "Wait, don't tell me... it's Captain isn't it?"

"CAPTAIN DOESN'T PROVIDE MERE POINTS! CAPTAIN PROVIDES THE TRUTH, YOU BLIND WORMLING!" Pilot shouted in responce.

I turned and noticed something fluttering far off in the distance, behind Pilot. Across the frozen river, between two collapsed building ruins, a thing was moving. It was at last three stories tall and looked like a garantuan worm with numerous arms that flailed about randomly like pool noodes. The pool-noodle monstrocity sturred directionelessly, its many brilliant-blue eyes blinking rapidly. I winced and jumped off the sled.

"We'll discuss this later. Very sternly." I muttered, pulling the sled away from sight of the noodly thing.

. . .

After "a stern talking to" failed, I attached a cow-bell to the sled.

"Now," I thought, "it will jingle loudly if he tries to carry it off." Unfortunately, the ringing got rather annoying, I quickly found out.

I tried to take the bell off, but Captain had taken a liking to the ringing and attached two bells to it while I was sleeping. With each passing day the number of bells tied to the sled increased exponentially, no matter what I attempted. I tried cutting the bells off and throwing them away into a deep snow crevasse.

I tried burning them. I tried crushing them. Nothing worked. The number of bells grew with each destructive campaign of mine.

Where did they keep getting all of these G-damn bells from?

Pilot would vanish pretty often, so I assumed he was either wasting all his time scavenging the wasteland for bells or was building Captain another horribly disfigured shrine-statue.

Eventually I just gave up on fighting the bell-war and nearly right away Captain gave up on sticking more bells to the sled. Perhaps their whole plan was to mess with me.

Perhaps they ran out of bells, or maybe the sled had no more places to tie bells to.

I sincerely hope that I will not wake up one morning with the tip of my mask painted red with plastic deer horns super-glued to my head. Oh, who am I kidding, it's going to happen anyway. Captain is already calling me "TURDOLPH, THE GRUMPY-REINDEER".

During the time I've been pulling the sled, Captain has got into the habit of perverting Christmas songs, such as:

"The forests birthed a pine tree,

A gentle evergreen

It grew with photosynthesis,

Amidst the mountains serene.

The humans birthed a corporation,

The Good Directorate supreme

It grew with every human wish,

Fulfilling every dream.

A sentient air freshener,

Had sued the pine tree.

The gentile pine could not foresee,

Victory of the Machine.

They know when you're sleeping

They track when you're awake

DON’T BE a lawbreaking PINE, SNIPPY

And pay your fees for g-s sake!"

"You butt-er, watch out

Or you might just die

And butter your POUTINE,

I’M TELLIN YOU WHY:

Cus captainmas IS COMING TO TOWN!"

"Captain’s a busy wizard,

Fixing things everyday

A sextillion of things to do,

On this captainmas day!"

With Pilot chiming in:

"...and SNIPPY gets COAL IN HIS SHOE, BECAUSE HE IS NOT NICE!"

. . .

Distracted with shaking pieces of coal out of my boots, I failed to notice that Captain and Pilot had climbed a small ruined house nearby and were trying to shove our bags of canned foods down the chimney.

"WHAT ARE YOU TWO IDIOTS DOING?" I shouted at them.

"JUST THINK OF ALL THE LITTLE GOOD BOYS AND GIRLS!" Captain responded.

"YEAH, SNIPPY. YOU'RE SO INCONSIDERATE TO NEEDS OF THE CHILDREN!" Pilot flapped his arms rapidly, nearly falling off the icy roof.

"What? Children? Stop that RIGHT now!" I yelled.

"WHERE'S YOUR SPIRIT OF JOLLINESS?" inquired Captain, trying to shove a bag three sizes too big to fit down the chimney.

"YEAH! START CELEBRATING CAPTAINMAS AND BEING MERRY, OR ELSE!" Pilot shook his fist too vigorously this time and lost his balance, slipping and plummeting off the roof into the snow below.

I stared at his feet wiggling robustly back and forth from the snow-bank, sighed and went inside the house to collect our bags out of the fireplace. Inside the house I was met with a most eerie scene: a family of skeletons positioned on mold-eaten couches around a badly burned pointy branch that somewhat resembled a Christmas tree. The branch was covered in pieces of cut-out tinfoil stars and had a drawing of Captain's face on the top with angel wings.