Another Very Merry Muppet Family Christmas Story

[Fragglemuppet]

Well, maybe not all the Labrynth characters will miss out on the fun...

 

[superboober]

And here's #8:






“And we’re coming to you live here on Bear River for the First Annual Christmas Eve hockey game,” the announcer in the loud checkered tuxedo said over his microphone to a non-existent over-the-air audience, “I’m Lewis Kazagger with Luis Rodriguez on color commentary, and right now we’ve got an exciting match up here, right Luis?”

“You’ve got that right Lewis,” Luis agreed, “So far after two periods we’re still scoreless, and time’s now running out for anyone who wants to win. But of course, winning isn’t everything, as it’s the thrill of playing along that makes…”

“Hold that thought, Luis, right now we’ve got the blue team on a fast break into the red team’s neutral zone;” Lewis cut him off, “And Herry’s got a clear shot on goal now and…whoops, he’s upended from behind by Boppity, that’ll be another face-off.”

A low howl came from the multitude of viewers watching the game around the river—including the myriad of forest animals that had gathered along the fringes to watch—at this latest foul. Kermit, in fact, felt the need to storm down to the red team’s bench. “What do you guys think you’re doing?” he demanded at them, “We are not playing this game to win. You’re all acting like monsters making fouls like that.”

“Right on, frog,” Gloat and his teammates on the bench, all of them monsters, chuckled. Kermit shook his head. “I knew we should have drawn these teams up differently,” he said to himself as he trudged back to his seat.

On the ice, Gorgon Heap took a pass from Boppity and skated full steam into the blue team’s zone—only to be promptly intercepted by Emmett. The otter slalomed around red team defenders toward the neutral zone. “Catch Mr. Sinclair!” he shouted, passing the puck high in the air at Earl, who whacked it toward the red team’s goal with his tail. Unfortunately it sailed right into Mean Mama’s glove. Laughing, the monster tossed it back up the ice to Frazzle, who only got to the center line before having to slide to a stop. For Pepe was running across the middle of the river screaming at the top of his lungs, the Swedish Chef still right behind him with the meat cleaver. Everyone on the ice stopped and observed this strange event unfold. “Well, this is strange, Luis, it appears we’ve all but forgotten about the game here,” Kazagger told his associate.

“Well it’s not everyday you would see a shrimp chased by a chef across a river,” Luis rationalized, “Although on Sesame Street I suppose the probability would have…”

“I am NOT a shrimp, OK?” Pepe screamed back at them, “For the last time, I’m a king prawn, OK?”

“Back to the game, folks!” Kazagger called over the air to the players, who immediately went back to work at the game. “And with just two minutes to go, we’re going to need something drastic to break a scoreless tie,” he went on.

Down on the ice, Alan could agree with that sentiment. Almost fifty minutes of hard play was clearly wearing everyone down, himself included, and the fact the red team kept cheating was making the game less enjoyable. But for him, being able to play like this again brought back many good memories from when he was younger. And best yet, he could tell Zachary, who had played some hockey with his friends before they’d moved away, was starting to enjoy himself for once, even though he’d been loathe to admit it out loud during team huddles.

The puck came sliding his way unexpectedly. He pulled it in and jerked it aside so that Behemoth, who was lunging toward him, missed his intended check. “Zack, catch,” he called out, shooting the puck back to his son. Zachary caught it and fired it across the ice to Masterson the rat—who was leveled flat by the puck. “Oops,” the boy gulped, skating over and helping the rat up, “Guess I should have sent it through the air first in your case.”

“No problem,” Masterson took deep, calming breaths to keep from hyperventilating, “I suppose it would have been worse if it came down on top of me.”

“Back on defense, quick!” came frantic calls from the blue team’s cheering section as three monsters on the red team were now bearing down right on the blue’s goal. Fortunately for their case, the whistle blew just as Beautiful Day was winding up to take a shot. “That’s icing on the red team,” announced Gordon, who had volunteered to officiate.

“ICING?” Beautiful Day roared in his face, “I’ll show you icing!” He grabbed some loose ice chunks from the river and tossed them up in Gordon’s face. Gordon calmly blew the whistled again. “Five minutes for unsportsmanlike conduct on number seven red.” he proclaimed, escorting a frustrated Beautiful Day to the penalty box.

“And so now with just over a minute to play, the blue team has a one man advantage,” Kazagger announced to his non-existent listeners, “But can they crack a defense that’s allowed only two shots on goal all day? Can they even get a shot off before time runs out? Can they take a…?”

“And in the meantime, the blue team moves up the ice,” Luis got back on track with the commentary before Kazagger could completely get carried away, “Sal the monkey takes the puck, leaps into the air over the defender, passes it to Mr. Reiser, he’s got a chance, one man to get by…oh, too bad, he just got clotheslined.”

“Will you stop that!” Alan yelled at Boppity and Gorgon Heap, who’d unexpectedly come up from behind and wrapped a clothesline around him. They then skated off to each end of the river and attached the line to trees, while Gloat completed the insult by hanging laundry on the line. Alan squirmed to get loose, but he knew it would take some time. Time they no longer had. “And with thirty seconds to go, the blue team’s advantage is out of their hands for now,” Kazagger was saying, “Grover takes the puck now, breaks through the defense, passes it to Forgetful Jones…who just stands there! What is he doing?”

“Aw shucks!” Forgetful Jones lamented loud enough for everyone around to hear, “I forget what to do with the black thing!”

“SHOOT AT THE NET!” everyone around screamed at him, “AND WATCH OUT!”

The warning came a split second too late, as a steamroller driven by Frazzle flattened Forgetful. “I thought I’ve seen everything, folks,” Kazagger commented as the steamroller moved away, revealing a very long and very flat Forgetful lying on the ice, “But now the red team has made it clear they’re bent on flattening their opponents by any means necessary. Wait, wait just a minute folks, the puck’s loose with eight seconds to go, it’s drifting in Mr. Reiser’s direction…”

Alan wasn’t completely loose of the clothesline yet, but he could still do what he had in mind. Inching his stick out as far as it would go, he trapped the puck. “Zack!” he yelled out, “All yours!” He fired the puck up the ice as hard as he could. Zachary burst from the pack at full steam and took control. He was wide open as he skated hard towards the red net…

And was abruptly tripped up as a long thin object wrapped around his leg and pulled him down. Gordon’s whistle sound again over the river as the clock expired. “That’s tripping on the red team!” he demanded, pointing an accusing finger at Big V, whose tongue hung guiltily out, “Free shot on goal for the blue team!”

“And so it all comes down to this,” Kazagger announced breathlessly, “Can Zachary Reiser get the puck by the unstoppable Mean Mama and win the title? Can he show that he’s got the heart of a champion? Can…?”

“Can you please get a grip, Lewis?” Luis scolded him, “Like Kermit said, it’s only an amateur game. We’re not playing this for any championship.”

Back on the ice, Alan finally wrenched himself loose of the clothesline and ran over to help his son up. “You OK?” he asked him.

“I think so,” Zachary shook himself off. Gordon placed the puck on the painted line right in front of him. “Whenever you’re ready, go ahead,” he told him.

Zachary took a deep breath and stared at the net, where Mean Mama was hunkered down with a determined expression. “I’m not sure…” he started to say softly.

“Hey, if you make it, you make it, and if you don’t, you don’t,’ his father reassured him, “Either way I’m proud of you. You’ve done great so far in this game.”

“Mr. Reiser, I’m afraid you’ll have to step back now,” Gordon informed him, “We can’t have coaching.”

“Right,” Alan skated away. He watched with his fingers crossed as Zachary took several more deep breaths and skated toward the puck—having the stop briefly as the Chef once again came chasing Pepe across the ice in front of him—then took the puck and took an unexpected immediate shot at the net. Mean Mama dove toward it…

“IT GOES IN! IT GOES IN!” Kazagger shrieked loudly as if he was being attacked by fire ants, “I DON’T BELIEVE WHAT I JUST SAW! THIS IS THE MOST INCREDIBLE, THE MOST ASTOUNDING, THE CRAZIEST FINISH I EVER—DO YOU ALL BELIEVE IN MIRACLES, YES, YES, YES! RESIER DID IT! EVERYTHING IS GOOD IN THE WORLD TONIGHT!”

“Yeah, was there ever any real doubt that it would end like this?” Waldorf remarked from his seat next to the announcers.

“None at all,” Statler agreed, “Every single sports story ends with something exactly like this.”

“All that’s missing is the screen for all this to be on and an excessive admission charge for us to watch it,” Waldorf added.

“Will you guys tone down the sarcasm for once,” Kermit upbraided them, “The poor kid hasn’t had a reason to be happy in a long time. Don’t spoil it for him.”

The frog skipped down onto the ice, where everyone who had been watching were now hoisting Zachary up into the air for a victory lap around the ice. Kermit pushed his way gently through the crowd toward him. “Good shooting there, Zack,” he congratulated him, “Feels good, doesn’t it?”

“You bet, Kermit,” Zachary was now smiling warmly for once, “I think I’m glad we got stuck here.”

A still hyper Kazagger jumped through the excited throngs. “Zachary Reiser, you’ve just won the big game,” he shouted like the world was ending, “Now what are you going to do to cash in on your new-found fame?”

“We’re going to Disney World!” Fozzie yelled in delight before Zachary could answer, “When you wish upon a star, makes no…”

“Fozzie, please, no product placements,” Kermit told his friend, “This is fan fiction.”

“Well it was just a thought,” Fozzie shrugged, “Anyway, let’s celebrate!”

The victory procession moved triumphantly up the ice. Almost unnoticed by everyone, Alan skated happily along behind it. He was thrilled that his son had done so well. It had been so long since he’d been this happy…

“Aren’t we going to congratulate him too?” Christine skated up to him, followed by a thrilled Thog, whom she’d been skating with while the game was in progress.

“Oh, I think we’ll let Zachary have some time to enjoy the moment before we do that,” her father told her, “After all, he’s had us around to tell him how good he does all the time, but how often has he been able to have someone else tell him that lately?”

“Not much,” she agreed, “I’m glad for him too.”




“Well, it’s really been a good evening so far,” Bob remarked about a half hour later back inside the farmhouse. After the thrill of the hockey game, most of the guests were now milling about waiting for promised carol singing to start, “You were right, Big Bird, this is a good change from Christmas in the city.”


“Yeah, it’s almost perfect,” Big Bird said with a dreamy, content expression on his face, “The only thing that would make it better was if Mr. Looper were here to celebrate with us.”

“HOOPER!” everyone within earshot corrected him. “He’s right, though,” Susan agreed, “Mr. Hooper always livened up the holidays. Plus, I doubt I would know anything about Hanukah if I hadn’t met him.”

“Yes, I knew Harold Hooper very well myself,” Doc remarked, lighting the menorah and Advent wreath set up on the coffee table, “We were in the same home room every year until he dropped out of school in tenth grade after his father died. It was sad to see him go, but he had three sisters to support. Anyway, he would take flack from some of the bullies for celebrating Hanukkah sometimes, but I always stood by him; after all, without Hanukkah in the first place there would have been no Christmas. There were some times Sprocket and I would come into his store during December and get…Sprocket, what are you doing over there?”

The inventor abruptly rose up and stormed over to the table in the corner of the room, where Sprocket was playing poker with numerous other dogs. “Sprocket, you’d better not be using my money there!” he scolded his pet, “I barely have enough to pay the rent, and I still have to pay Mr. Reiser back, as you may know!”

“Calm yourself pal, we’re not playing for real money,” Elliot Shag told him, “It’s just with chips and only chips. Hit me three more chips there, Joe.”

Rover Joe reached into a bag of potato chips in the center of the table and extracted three chips, which he handed to Shag. Shag took a bite out of one and went back to his cards. “I’ve got a straight flush,” he announced, placing all his cards down.

“I’ve got a royal flush,” Baskerville laid out his cards as well.

“I’ve got a toilet flush,” came Rowlf’s voice from upstairs, followed by the sound of the toilet flushing. “Now that was a bit uncalled for,” Doc shook his head, “After all, this is supposed to be a family story.”

“I couldn’t help it,” Rowlf came down the stairs, “It was too good a joke to pass up. And no offense, but I don’t really think you’re that good at breaking the fourth wall yet.”

“Well thanks a lot pal,” Doc snorted. He leaned close to Sprocket and whispered, “Show business types; thirty years in the business and they think they know everything.”

Rowlf walked up on stage and took his place at his piano, on top of which Hoots was warming up his saxophone. “I guess we’re probably ready to start now,” he told Guy Smiley, who was standing next to it, give us the intro.”

“Right,” Smiley strolled out to the center of the stage. “Good evening one and all and welcome to tonight’s Christmas song jamboree!” he announced in a hyper, excited voice, “And now, for our first song tonight, please follow the lead of our guest pianist, my dear brother, the very talent Don Music!”

Lethargic applause greeted Don Music--wearing a reindeer sweater over his usual shirt and tie--as he replaced Rowlf at the piano for the moment. He tapped out a few opening notes. “Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way,” he sang, “Oh what fun it is to ride in a…in a…in a….oh it’s no use, I’ll never get this song right, never, never, never, never, never!”

He slammed his head hard off the keyboard repeatedly in frustration. “Someone call a doctor!” Waldorf called out.

“Yep, that has to hurt,” Statler said.

“Not for him, for me,” Waldorf corrected him, “I’m already feeling sick just watching this.”

“All right, maybe this wasn’t the best of opening acts,” Smiley had to concede as Rowlf tenderly led a still distraught Music off the stage, “Anyway, next on our program, Elmo has agreed to sing one of his favorite holiday songs; Elmo?”

“Thanks Guy,” Elmo walked up to the microphone, “Play it, Rowlf.”

Rowlf started the song. “Kickity-kick, ee-aw, ee-aw, it’s Dominic the Donkey,” Elmo sang with great gusto despite loud groans at his choice of song, “Kickity-kick, ee-aw, ee-aw…”

“Ah, shut up!” without warning, Ploobis staggered over and slugged Elmo hard off the stage, garnering more than a few claps all around the room. Kermit slid over to Smiley. “Uh, I don’t think the scheduled acts are working, Guy,” he told the host what Smiley probably already could guess, “Maybe you should do a solo piece; I don’t think anyone hates you.”

“Excuse me Kermit,” Sam, temporarily free of the Baby, strode up, “I might have the answer to this nonsense going on around us.”

“Be my guest,” Kermit gestured the eagle up on stage. “Ladies and gentlemen,” Sam addressed everyone, “As an entertaining counterbalance to the weirdness you’ve just been witnessing, I present for your listening pleasure the very talented Wayne and Wanda with an old Christmas favorite that’s guaranteed to delight young and old.”

More groans greeted Wayne and Wanda as they took their turn at the microphone. “O Christmas tree,” Wayne started to croon, “O Christmas tree, of all the trees most…”

He got no further, for it was at this moment that the tree unexpectedly fell over on top of him. Sam put a wing over his face and shook his head. “Why do they keep doing this to me?” he asked no one in particular.

“Um, anyone else wants to sing, anyone, anything?” a nervous Smiley asked the restless crowd, “Any acts at all?”

“How about I do my boomerang fish act?” Lew Zealand stepped forward, fish in hand.

“NO!” just about everyone in the room shouted at him.

“Oh Kermit,” Piggy stepped forward, a hopeful look on her face, “How about giving moi a chance to sing?”

“Well, no offense Piggy, but I don’t think we have a song on the bill that’ll really fit your style,” Kermit admitted, “And we don’t really have room for you in…”

“Kermit?”

“Yes Piggy?”

“MAKE ROOM!” she pushed her snout right into his face and raised a fist. Meekly, Kermit gestured for Smiley to give him the mike. “Here now the fabulous Miss Piggy to sing whatever she wants,” he said in a defeated voice. Piggy stepped grandly onto stage and struck an almost ludicrous diva pose. She pointed a finger at Rowlf to start the song. “IIIIIII don’t want a lot for Christmas,” she started to sing, “There is just one thing I need. I don’t care about the presents underneath the Christmas tree. I just want you for my own, more than you could ever know. Make my wish come true. All I want for Christmas isssssss…yoooouuuuuuuuu.”

Dr. Teeth started banging away on his keyboard like a man possessed. Every other musician on stage took the same cue and started playing away as if their lives depended on it, which in this case it just may have. “I don’t want a lot for Christmas, there is just one thing I need. I don’t care about the presents underneath the Christmas tree,” Piggy sang in a far more professional and enthusiastic manner than her predecessors, which had the effect of the audience actually getting into the song, “I don’t need to hang my stocking there upon the fireplace. Santa Claus won’t you make me happy with a toy on Christmas Day…”

“Something’s not right here,” Janice said out loud, apparently noticing an accelerated pace in the song. Piggy was in fact singing a little faster than Mariah Carey had, although still at a reasonable enough pace so that the song didn’t lose its tempo. “I just want you for my own,” she went on, “more than you could ever know. Make my wish come true. All I want for Christmas is you.”

“Too fast,” Rowlf was noticing the same excessive pacing. Piggy failed to slow up. “I won’t ask for much this Christmas, I won’t even wish for snow. I’m just going to keep on waiting underneath the mistletoe...”

“You’re not waiting for us, hamhock!” Floyd Pepper yelled in distaste, his voice drowned out by the music except for those already on stage, “You’re going to break our wills to play!”

“I’ll definitely break something, pal! HIIIIIIIIYAAAAAAA!” Piggy spun around and karate-chopped him senseless, leading to a high out-of-tune note as Floyd landed on top of his guitar. “…just want you here tonight, holding on to me so tight,” the pig continued, “What more can I do, all I want for Christmas is you.”

“Can’t we slow down?” Dr. Teeth complained, sweat pouring down his face as he pounded his keyboard hard to keep up with the breakneck pace. Piggy was too caught up in singing the song perfectly to back attention. “All the lights are shining so brightly everywhere,” she went on, “and the sound of children’s laughter fills the air…”

“And the sound of dog’s fingers going numb,” Rowlf howled, looking ready to collapse.

“And everyone is singing…” Piggy apparently didn’t hear him over the audience’s loud clapping in rhythm with the song.

“Santa won’t you bring me…” a dazed Floyd Pepper staggered to his feet and leaned toward Piggy.

“HIIIIYAAAAA!” Piggy chopped him down again. “OOOh, I don’t want a lot for Christmas, this is all I’m asking for,” she took a diving slide the length of the stage and lay on her back to sing the rest of the song, “I just want to see my froggie standing just outside me door…”

“Nice,” Kermit flinched and took a large step away from the stage.

“Oh I just want him for my own,” Piggy sang with increased gusto as the song reached its climax, “more than he could ever know, make my wish come true…”

“To just end this song!” Zoot was on the verge of collapse.

“All I want for Christmas is YOOOOOUUUUUUUUU!” Piggy squealed out the long last note. And then without warning, she launched herself at Kermit, kissing him madly. “Say you love me Kermie, say you love me!” she squealed. Kermit broke loose and climbed up the tree, which had been set back upright, as fast as he could. “Somebody get protective custody for me!” he cried out. The song finally ended, punctuated by everyone on stage falling to the floor, gasping for air. The audience gave a standing ovation. “Oh thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!” Piggy bowed crazily in all directions, “Oh you love me, you really love me! Let me do another one!”

“NO!” the Electric Mayhem recoiled at the prospect.

“Well, that was quite good, wasn’t it Kermit?” Gonzo asked the frog.

“Actually it was,” Kermit did agree with this,” Piggy does sing well, that much I know. Probably with that bad review she got from that last guy to read this story, she felt she had something to prove.” Shrugging he looked at Smiley’s list as he tentatively climbed back down to the floor. “OK, Bob, you and Scooter are next,” he said into the microphone once Piggy had dropped it and left the stage.

“And whatever you do, go nice and slow!” Zoot told Bob as he took the stage and leaned against Rowlf’s piano, “We can’t go on at that clip all night!”

“Don’t worry, I’ve got a nice slow on I think we’ll all enjoy,” Bob reassured him. Rowlf started the first few notes of this song. “The garment of life, be it tatter and torn,” Bob sang quite professionally, “the cloak of the soldier is withered and worn, but what child is this that was poverty-born, the peace of Christmas Day.”

“The branch that bears the bright holly,” Scooter joined in with him, “the dove that rests in yonder tree, the light that shines for all to see, the peace of Christmas Day.”

“The hope that has slumbered for two thousand years,” the gofer took the next verse on his own, “the promised that silenced a thousand fears, a faith that can hobble an ocean of tears, the peace of Christmas Day.”

“The branch that bears the bright holly,” everyone in the room, familiar with the song, joined this verse of the refrain, “The dove that rests in yonder tree, the light that shines for all to see, the peace of Christmas Day.”

“Add all the grief that people may bear,” Bob took the final verse as well, “total the strife, the troubles and care, put them in columns and leave them right there, the peace of Christmas Day.”

“The branch that bears the bright holly, the dove that rests in yonder tree, the light that shines for all to see, the peace of Christmas Day,” everyone finished off the song. Again, there was a standing ovation this time. “Very good Mr. McGrath, very good,” Smiley commended Bob as he walked away, “OK who’s next? Is that you, Kira? Come right on up.”

Kira took hold of the microphone as a low hum of keys came from Dr. Teeth. “If I cannot bring you comfort, then at least I bring you hope,” she sang in a voice that seemed to itself embody hope, “There is no gift more precious than the time we have been sold.”

“We must fight to keep our spirits,” Alice Otter joined in with her, “Count the blessings that are here. Let the bells ring out for Christmas at the closing of the year. Let the bells ring out for Christmas, at the closing…of…the…year.”

The entire extended band cranked into the song full blast. Once again everyone in the room was soon rocking back and forth in tune with the song. “If I cannot bring you comfort, than at least I bring you hope,” everybody who cared to sing along sang with Kira and Alice the second time around, “At the closing of the year…”

“You know, if this is what they do everywhere in Outer Space, I might just skip the Festival of the Bells and find one of these thing called a church,” Gobo told his fellow Fraggles atop the coffee table, “Robin says that’s where Silly Creatures go to sing on Christmas.”

“Don’t Gobo!” Boober warned him, “I’ve read some of the bear’s books while everyone was out on the river; churches are the perfect places for disease to spread! The entire Rock’ll end up sick once you get back, probably with something terrible like sufferosis!”

“There is no sufferosis, Boober,” Red rolled her eyes, “That was all just in your head, as usual.”

“Oh look the song’s over,” Mokey had noticed the duet coming to an end, to even more loud applause, “Come Wembley, we’re up next.”

“But Mokey, we haven’t rehearsed it yet,” Wembley protested as she took his head and took a flying leap from the coffee table to the stage.

“It’ll be no worse than some of the songs we’ve seen so far,” Mokey said, retching at the thought of one of the acts in particular, although she apparently decided not to reveal exactly which one. Smiley picked them both up and held them in front of the microphone. “Um, this isn’t really a Christmas song,” Mokey told the others before them, “But we feel it fits the Christmas spirit. Wembley, you start.”

Wembley waited until the Country Trio plucked off a few choice notes. “I had always thought the world was full of mystery,” he sang.

“I had seen so many faces that were strange,” Mokey added.

“And it sometimes seemed that each one was my enemy,” they sang together, “And I thought our fighting ways would never change.”

“But I learned to meet my brother and my enemy,” Mokey took the line.

“And I learned that we are none of us alone,” Wembley followed her this time before the two of them teamed up again for the final two lines of the verse: “For I found a friend who’s different and she cares for me, and we found a place to share and be our home.”

“We are the children of tomorrow,” the other Fraggles joined the two of them on stage, “Each one is different and the same. Help us to live here with our other, our brother, one in heart, one in hope, one in name.”

“Come on, you all know the lyrics, together!” Smiley waved at the audience with his free hand. Soon everyone in the room was singing along who did in fact know the lyrics were singing along (although Oscar, looking frustrated at all the happiness now going around, was merely lip-synching badly): “We are the children of tomorrow, each one is different and the same. Help us to live here with our other, our brother, one in heart, one in hope, one in name.” It was during the height of the song that Alan and Christine finally came in from the cold (followed by Thog, who was too big to get through the door), having continued skating together on the river with other guests who hadn’t quite been ready to inside once the hockey game was over. “Well, it looks like we missed out on a little bit of fun,” the big blue monster commented.

“I had fun out there, Thog,” Christine reassured him, “I like skating with you.”

“Ah, you guys all done out there?” Kermit came up to them, still swaying with the music, “I was just about to ask anyone who wanted to come into town with me to pick up more food to get ready after this song. Care to come along?”

“Um, sure, Kermit, as long as the weather holds out,” Alan told him.

“It should,” the frog said, “Latest reports say the most severe patch of snow won’t hit until about ten, so that’s plenty of time out and back.”

He walked off to inquire others if they wanted to go as well. “Not good for mommy,” Christine shook her head, “If it snows like that…”

“Don’t give up hope on mommy yet, pumpkin,” her father kissed her, squelching for the moment his own deep doubts about his wife’s ability to join them, “I’m sure something’ll pop up yet that’ll get her through. And in the meantime, we get to take a sleigh ride.”

He walked over to corner, where he was delighted to see Zachary singing along with several other children. “Care to come with us into town, Zack?” he asked him.

“Thanks Dad, but I think I’m happy here for now,” Zachary said, unable to suppress happiness at being with others his own age again, “”I’d like to get to know some of these kids more.”

“I have no problem with that,” Alan told him, “You just go meet them all. Again, great work out there on the ice. I’m quite proud of you.”

“And I’m glad you could be here with me, Dad,” Zachary hugged him.

“All right, enough sap!” Oscar cut in before things could get too warm, “This chapter’s gone on long enough; start the next one all ready!”

 

[superboober]

Here's Chapter 9, which I'd say is my favorite one if you'd ask me about it:




The Dumpee Garage tow truck slid to a stop outside its headquarters with the Dry Bandits’ truck hooked up to the back. George hopped out of the cab and trudged around to the back. “That’ll be five bucks,” he told them.

“For the whole thing?” Bo was amazed, “How do you stay in business by being that cheap?”

“As I told some customers I had earlier today, it’s my pre-Boxing Day discount,” George informed them, “Bruno, unhook them while I get the Dumpee Catalog for their perusal.”

There was a click as Bruno unhooked the vehicle from the tow truck. It was also at that moment that Larry’s mind clicked as well. “Wait just a second,” he mused, looking around at the garage and service station, “We were in here just this morning. There were those weirdoes in the bus that were here when we were; they were still here when we left.”

“And?” Bo gave him a quizzical look.

“And,” Larry rolled his eyes in disgust at his colleague’s thickness, “Somehow the diamond must have ended up with them! Can’t you even think on your own for once? Don’t answer that, please,” he added when he noticed Bo was going to, “Just be quiet and let me try to at least take a broad guess where the weirdoes might be now.”

“No need,” Chuck slid forward, a triumphant and cold smile on his face, “I know exactly where they are. They’re at my aunt’s. I know the way.”

“You sure?” Larry frowned.

“Chuck ain’t never wrong about nothing,” the Weasel informed his human associate, “Step on it; they may have found the diamond by now.”

“But it’s only a five dollar charge for towing; we can pay that!” Bo protested. Everyone ignored him as Larry turned the key in the ignition and threw the truck into reverse. He zoomedout of the parking lot just as George came trudging back out with the catalog. He observed his customers peel off into the growing night without paying. “You know something Bruno,” he confided in his associate, “I’ve just realized that if we waited until after our customers paid before unhooking them, we might actually have some who don’t leave without paying.”



“Now keep in mind, Big Bird, that the rules we have in the city apply for this trip,” Gordon informed the large canary inside the farmhouse’s doorway, “Stay close to everyone else and don’t talk to strangers.”


“Don’t worry about a thing, Gordon, I still know the rules by heart,” Big Bird told him. He took a few steps forward off the porch and was immediately hit by a snow slide from the overhang. Off to the side, Oscar snickered, not bothering to hide the broom handle he was holding. “I guess now you’re a real snowbird, huh?” he told the canary.

“OSCAR!” nearly a dozen people glared out the door at him. “What?” Oscar asked, “If you turkeys can have fun, so can I. Geez, can’t anyone handle a joke?”

He slammed the lid of his can back down and trudged off toward the back of the farmhouse. Big Bird shook the snow out of his feathers and walked over to the sleigh already hitched up in front of the house. “So, Christine, you ever been on a sleigh ride before?” he asked his new friend as he took his seat in the back of the sleigh.

“No,” Christine told him, “How about you?”

“Nope, it’s my first time too,” Big Bird said, “I just wonder why we’re using a one horse and one donkey open sleigh. It just doesn’t seem right.”

He looked ahead at Buster and Leroy, who were hitched up too the sleigh and fitted with strings of bells. “Because Fred called in sick earlier,” Leroy informed him, “and I can pull these things as good as any horse.”

“Ah, you still look like an *** to me,” a clearly drunk Scred staggered over toward the donkey. Leroy frowned heavily at the Gorch resident. “Don’t you have something better to do?” he asked him harshly. Scred stumbled away into the nearest snowdrifts, mumbling, “On Moishe, on Herschel, on Shlomo, it’s time for Hanukkah Harry…” Gonzo, who was passing by, shook his head as he slid into the sleigh’s front seat. “I swear that guy’s ruining the family appeal of this story,” he muttered.

“Well, at least we’ll be away from him for a little while, eh?” Gobo piped up from his perch on the back of the sleigh, “I hope these Outer Space stores, as you call them, have more radish bars; the ones we had for dinner were terrific.”

“I preferred the vegetables personally,” Robbie, now wearing an additional two winter coats, slid into place next to Big Bird, “Many dinosaurs don’t like them still, but I’ve found…”

“Hey look at that,” Big Bird pointed in amazement at the sight of Yoda and Cantus levitating in mid-air toward the sleigh. The two of them were engaged in a holographic chess match as they floated into place right behind Gobo. One of Cantus’s pieces stomped across the board and flattened what was apparently Yoda’s main piece. “Incredible,” the Jedi master mused, “Truly great at this you are for never having before it played.”

“It takes the skills of knowing everything and knowing nothing,” Cantus proclaimed, “How about another one?”

“Fine with me that is,” Yoda pressed a button that reset all the pieces in their original positions on the board. Alan, who walked by with a list-holding Fozzie, stared in wonder at the chessboard. “Now how do you manage to play something like that?” he asked the two mentors.

“Use your mind well you must,” Yoda informed him, “Anticipate what your opponent might do. Similar to what is done in this galaxy, heard have I.”

“Yeah, it’s not too much different, really,” Alan told him. He turned to Fozzie, who was getting into place in the driver’s seat. “Say Fozzie, are you sure we have enough money to cover all the food on that list? We are pretty broke, I told you earlier, so I can’t really help you.”

“No problem at all, I’m charging everything to my Bearican Express card,” Fozzie held up his credit card, “Don’t leave the cave without it.”

“Fozzie, what did I just say about product placement?” Kermit protested as he approached the sleigh, Robin in his arms.

“You didn’t say anything about fictional product placement,” Fozzie pointed out.

“Well it goes for all product placements!” the frog told him, slipping past Gonzo.

“Oh Kermit, please let me come too,” Piggy came running up, bobbing up and down wildly, “Please, please, please, please, please, please, please….”

“Do I have a choice?” Kermit asked her.

“No.”

“Then it’s fine by me,” he shrugged. Piggy pushed her way passed Gonzo. “Move it or lose your foot, weirdo!” she snapped at him when he initially resisted. She cuddled up against Kermit. “What an evening for a sleigh ride between the two of us,” she cooed happily, “There’s romance in the air, a…”

“Everyone here who’s going?” Fozzie called out loud before things could get too intimate between his passengers. No one else stepped forward. “OK boys, forward ho!” he called to Buster and Leroy, giving the reins a slight tug to get them started.

“And don’t forget the honey popsicles,” his mother called after him.

“I won’t, Ma,” Fozzie gave her a paw’s up as he turned the corner towards the highway. “I hope we have enough room here for all the food,” he remarked.

“Have it we should,” Yoda said, directing a spider-like holograph across the board. Although the sleigh was in full motion, he was still able to mentally keep Cantus and himself floating directing behind it while still working the chess game. Alan leaned over the back of the sled and observed their game. “You play this a lot where you come from?” he asked Yoda.

“A way to keep one’s self occupied in exile it is,” Yoda explained. His face fell. “Too little to celebrate in the galaxy there is now. Only holidays for the Emperor’s false achievements there are. A good change coming here to see real joy it is.”

“Well, I’m glad you can enjoy yourself,” the human said. Yoda studied him closely. “Many things trouble you,” he noted, “Many deep things. Explain them you will.”

“Um,” Alan glanced at Christine, who suddenly had a horrible coughing fit, “I guess I could, but can we talk in private?”

“Any private discussion between us will ultimately be a public one,” Cantus blurted out abruptly. Alan stared at the Fraggle in wonder. “Do you always confuse people when you speak, because I didn’t understand a word of that just now,” he told him.

“They are confused, but they also understand,” Cantus apparently knew what he was talking about. He directed a large lumbering board piece to kick a crab-like piece of Yoda’s off the board. Alan shook his head. “Well, it looks like I was wrong,” he told Christine, “Fraggles are by and large far from pessimistic.”

“Now where’d you ever hear that from?” Gobo asked him.

“That’s the basic rumor that went around when I was young,” the man told him, “We all believe Fraggles were lethargic pessimistic creatures.”

Gobo chuckled out loud. “It looks like Boober’s more popular than he realizes,” he commented. He looked up at the treetops flying by quickly overhead. “Strange,” he said out loud, “Uncle Matt always said these things were green.”

“That’s just in spring and summer,” Big Bird corrected him, “Boy I would love to come back here in summer, though. It must look beautiful with all the trees in full bloom. When you come from the city as I do, you learn to like the country more”

“I agree,” Robbie nodded, “It’s just too bad nature gets plowed up too much these days for business. If we could just set aside one acre of nature land a month, we could help keep enough oxygen in the air to prevent carbon dioxide overload in the atmosphere.”

“Well you know what they say, it’s not easy being green, right Kermit?” Fozzie nudged his friend. Kermit forced an uncomfortable smile. “He’s right though,” Robin glanced back at Robbie, “We need to be more active these days to protect the countryside. A couple of years ago they almost plowed up half the swamp for a series of outhouse emporiums; Uncle Kermit had to get a thousand and fifty-five signatures before they backed off. Don’t they understand we have homes too?”

“Apparently the Wesayso Corporation doesn’t,” Robbie sighed, “I’ve been telling Dad he should quit as an example, but he just won’t consider it. We could still make the same money if he were to do something like being, for example, an industrial plumbing investment counselor. Indoor plumbing’s still a growing business among dinosaurs, and if he took the…”

There was the blaring of a horn as they merged with the highway and almost ran into a snowplow. “Watch where you’re going, bear!” the driver yelled at Fozzie.

“Honk on this, pal!” Piggy shook a fist at him. “Snowplows,” she remarked to everyone, “They think they own the road.”




“So it’s at Grizzly Farm, huh?” Bitterman said over her cell phone to Larry, “Well, if you can get it without them putting up too much of a fight, please do; I’ve already had enough with delays.”


“Don’t worry Miss Bitterman, we should have everything under control within an hour,” Larry told her, “I’ll call you back when the cat’s in bag.”

“Whatever,” Bitterman hung up on him. She climbed out of her limousine, which was now parked in a diner lot, and trudged with a frustrated expression through several deep snowdrifts to where Hopper was standing under the diner’s awning. “They say they’ve got it under control; tell me why I don’t believe them,” she said.

“Not to worry miss, here comes my cavalry right now,” Hopper pointed across the parking lot. A strange bike-like sleigh wobbled into the lot, being pulled by a quartet of strange brownish creatures that moaned as they were whipped unmercifully by the hunched toad-like creature straddling the sleigh. Behind him came a beaten-up pickup truck. Each slowed to a halt by the limousine. “You called?” asked the toad-like creature, giving his drivers one last gratuitous whip each.

“Mr. Wander McMooch, so nice of you to drop by,” Hopper shook the newcomer’s hand—or flipper, or whatever it was, “We’ve got a new assignment for you tonight…ah and my good friend Farmer Sledge, glad you could come too.”

“So what’s the big scoop, Hopper?” Mordecai Sledge asked as he and his fellow farmer/robbers climbed out of their pickup, axes and blades in hand.

“Well, some people took something that belongs to us now,” the restaurateur informed them all, “We know where they are, we just need you gents to help the people we already have staking them out get it back.”

“And what’s in it for us?” Caleb Stiles asked, his eyebrows raised.

“Exactly one million dollars for each of you,” Bitterman withdrew her checkbook, “Plus stakes in our next business venture, which will gross at least that much.”

McMooch and the farmers whispered excitedly among themselves. “All right missy, you’ve got yourself a deal,” Sledge shook the businesswoman’s hand, “Where do we go?”

“Grizzly Farm, I’m sure you know where that is,” she told them.

“Indeed we do; come on boys, let’s saddle up!” Sledge waved his cohorts back into the truck. McMooch lingered a little longer. “If this involves real estate, can I have some prime shares?” he asked Bitterman and Hopper, “I’ve been hoping to get into real estate lately.”

“Absolutely,” Hopper said firmly, “Half our property rights go to you, my friend.”

“Half the property rights?” Bitterman elbowed Hopper as McMooch tore away on his sleigh over the howls of his slaves, “I thought we agreed we’d divide that up after…!”

“Hold that thought, here come the rest of our guinea pigs,” Hopper pointed across the lot. A large brownish giant in a grayish winter coat was towing a large enclosed rickshaw of sorts toward them. “Presenting their royal majesties, the king and queen of the universe!” he announced grandly once he’d stopped, breaking into an improvised trumpet fanfare. The slightly shorter purple giant that emerged from inside the carriage bopped him on the head to make him stop. “So what’s this all about?” he asked the two humans, “You said you had information about the whereabouts of the enemies of the Gorg Empire.”

“In fact, we just found out this evening, your majesty,” Bitterman suppressed a loud snicker, “The leaders of your enemies are meeting at Grizzly Farm not far from here. If you attack them now, you can crush them once and for all.”

“Wonderful!” Pa rubbed his hands in glee, “After all these years, we can finally bring peace to the Gorg Empire for good. How can I ever thank you for this?”

“Don’t,” Hopper told him, “Giving you the chance to rub them out is reward enough for us.”

“Dearest, sharpen Gorgonzola for me,” Pa told his wife in the carriage, “It’s going to be used to fell our foes tonight. Junior, pull out and make for this Grizzly Farm."

“Yes sir Daddy Sire,” Junior saluted him, “The king and queen are now departing for Grizzly Farm!” he announced out loud, “All loyal subject bow down before them!”

He took off sprinting with the carriage. “Junior, not until I got back in!” Pa yelled, running after his ride. Bitterman and Hopper exchanged glances. “I hope these friends of yours actually work,” she told him.

“If numbers don’t work, firepower will,” Hopper reassured her, “Let’s get a coffee; I’m thirsty.”





"...you see, this one day after all my legs had grown in, but before I lost my tail, I was just lounging on the bank of the swamp, enjoying myself," Kermit was relating to Alan a story he'd promised to tell, "And when I looked up there was suddenly a strange hole in the base of the big willow tree behind me that I knew hadn't been there before. I was curious enough to crawl inside and found myself in the most wonderful caverns I'd ever seen. I must have been too entranced with it, because I didn't hear anyone coming up behind me. The next thing I knew, I found myself surrounded by Fraggles."

"One of which was my Uncle Matt," Gobo informed the human, "Right about when he was my age. He'd tell me a story of a green visitor from Outer Space for years; I didn't believe it until last Christmas."

"I was frightened at first, I'll admit," Kermit went on, "But then one of them looked me over and announced if I was peaceful. When I told him yes, they invited my to this big singalong. I must have been there for hours singing along with every Fraggle in the Rock, it seemed, until I finally realized my parents were probably missing me by then. I was sad to go, and they were all sad to see me go, but I promised them I'd come back some day. I never saw the hole again, but I kept them in mind all the while when we all got famous. And so when Jim invited me on that Concorde flight to London to work out a show that could bring about world peace, I suggested to him to look for a Fraggle hole, and he'd find everything he needed to know."

"And a whole lot more, too," Cantus added, checking Yoda's apparent king.

"Well, that's really an interesting tale, Kermit," Alan nodded in acceptance, "Once we do get home, I'll check under all the furniture to see if we've got any, if you say they spring up anywhere at any time."

"Hey look, we made it to town!" Big Bird pointed eagerly around at the well-lit houses flying by them now.

“Ah, nothing like Christmas in a small town,” Fozzie remarked as the sleigh headed up the main street of town, “The lights, the carolers, the guys running around yelling at the top of their lungs.”


“Where?” Kermit looked around to see a disheveled main tearing down the road in from of them. “Merry Christmas!” he was screaming to all who cared to listen, “Merry Christmas Bedford Falls! Hello you old Building and…!”

He abruptly ran into a lamppost and was cut off. “Well, at least we’re getting some parody into this story,” Gonzo remarked.

“This is amazing,” Gobo pointed up at the Christmas lights strung everywhere, “Silly Creatures know how to harness Ditsies and use them to make light displays.”

“Not Ditsies,” Fozzie told him, “Some day we’ll have to go in depth with you Fraggles on electricity, right Kermit?”

“Perhaps,” Kermit stared absentmindedly at the winter wonderland around them. “I believe in miracles and I can tell you why,” he started singing again, “Once a year the street I live on sparkles like the sky.”

“All hung with lights for Christmas,” Robin joined in with him, “twinkling everywhere, the world turns bright for Christmas, and if that isn’t a true blue miracle, I don’t know what one is.”

“I believe in miracles, I know because I’ve seen,” Gonzo took the next verse, “Once a year, the place I walk is filled with trees of green.”

“And pine cones smell of Christmas,” Robbie, despite his normal celebration of Refrigerator Day, had caught on quickly, “Floating through the air to jingle bells of Christmas, and if that isn’t a true blue miracle, I don’t know what one is.”

“But the greatest wonder of them all,” everyone sang at once, “is not what’s happening around you, it’s the way you start to be. Yes, the greatest wonder of them all is how your heart is filled with love. You start to light up like a Christmas tree.”

“OK, stop here,” Fozzie directed Buster and Leroy, who ground to a halt in front of a downtown mall and backed up into a parking space. The bear dropped a quarter in the parking meter. “Hey, these must be those sidewalk creatures Uncle Matt wrote me about,” Gobo approached the meter, “Hey, merry Christmas, sidewalk creature!”

“Hey look in here,” Christine was at the window of the store. Everyone walked over to join her. “There it was, shining in absolute beauty,” a voice said softly from above, “The Red Ryder BB gun, the one thing I wanted more than anything for…”

“Uh, Ralphie, this is the ladies’ department,” Fozzie said to the sky, “And you’re not in this story.”

“Sorry,” the voice said.

“The store’s inside; follow me,” Kermit waved the others toward the door. “Feelings feel so wonderful, you have to let them show,” he continued singing.

“And maybe that’s why everyone begins to get a glow,” Fozzie waved at a nuclear power plant operator walking by who happened to be glowing with radiation.

“And with Christmas their hearts fill,” Yoda took the next verse, causing some heads to turn at his juxtaposition of the words, “spirit share they can.”

“That’s the best part of Christmas,” everyone finished the song as they reached the door, “And if that isn’t a true blue miracle, I don’t know what one is.”

The mall was still fairly crowded despite the fact it was after dark on Christmas Eve. Few of the customers, though, were bothering to watch the Cirque Du So Lame Mall Tour show currently going on at the center of the atrium, where four penguins were “calling” on cell phones next to three French chickens doing the can-can and two turtles with fake dove wings attached to their shells jumping up and down very slowly. They passed the Wesayso Jewelry Emporium, Wesayso Shoe House, Wesayso Pancake Shop, and the Twenty-Eighth National Wesayso Bank along the way, causing Robbie to shake his head sadly at the sight of such blatant corporate overload. Kermit stopped at the outside of a store with the marquee JENNY’S FASHION EMPORIUM. “I need to run in here for a minute,” he announced, “You guys go on to the store.”

“Can I come with you on this one, Kermit?” Christine asked him.

“Sure, if it’s OK with your dad,” Kermit looked up at Alan, who nodded his approval. The man hung behind as he watched her and the frog disappear into the store. “About her your troubles are, are they not?” Yoda inquired from behind him.

“Oh, uh, yeah, um, sit down,” Alan waved for him and Cantus to have a seat on a bench near the elephant fountain in the middle of the mall. He put his hands in his face. “I didn’t want to believe the test results on her,” he mused softly, “We have enough troubles as it is. To think that leukemia could be striking her down…my little girl…”

He broke down. “She’s just six,” he sobbed, “She’s too young to go out like this! Tell me, how could this happen?”

“Just as you say,” Cantus told him, “These things do just happen.”

“But it’s my fault!” Alan told him, “I didn’t take her to the hospital when she first started coughing. If they’d been able to diagnose it sooner…!”

“Your fault it is not,” Yoda put a hand on his shoulder, “Done everything for her you have. Now learn you must to let go when the time comes to do so.”

“How am I supposed to just let her go?” the human told the Jedi, “She and her brother are everything to me. I can’t just forget about her if she dies.”

“Forget her you shouldn’t,” Cantus advised him, “But to best hold on to her memory, you’ll have to let go.”

Alan stared in wonder at the Fraggle. “Has anyone ever told you just how formulaic your advice is?” he told him, “By your logic you would say, ‘If you want to turn left, you have to turn right,’ understand what I’m saying.”

“And that is the point,” Cantus remarked, “For if you do turn far enough right, you will be turning left.”

“Hold onto things irrationally you cannot,” Yoda told Alan, “Change all things do. Even stars burn out over millions of years. Forget you must not, but accept the change you must. But more troubles you, I sense. Someone else you care for.”

“My wife,” Alan told him, “We all miss her terribly. Truth is, I wasn’t terribly keen on her going out west to try and get us more money, but she insisted she wanted to help any way she could.” He sighed deeply. “It’s been so long since I’ve had a job,” he told them, “No one wants a high school dropout with no special skills anymore. It’s hard watching Christine and Zachary go around with nothing except the clothes on their back. You tell me, what good am I to that if I can’t even provide for them?”

“But they love you, and you love them; clear that much is,” Yoda pointed out, “Financial means matter not; truly a wealthy man you are.”

Alan jerked around in surprise at the Jedi’s assessment. “You really think so?” he asked him.

“We really know so,” Cantus nodded, “And don’t feel sorry about missing your wife. If you love her as you infer, she hasn’t really left you at all. But enough of this talk. The others will need assistance with the groceries.”

Inside the fashion store at that moment, Kermit approached the front desk and rang the service bell. A familiar young woman wearing red felt reindeer antlers came out of the back room. “Kermit, you made it,” she exclaimed at the sight of him, “I thought with the storm and all you wouldn’t come.”

“Well you know me, Jenny, I always try and be punctual,” Kermit said, “Do you still have it in stock?”

“Of course, I’ve had it locked up in the safe since December first,” Jenny told him, “Sarah,” she called to the teenager managing the back room, “Get Kermit’s present ready.”

“Can we talk while we’re waiting?” Christine whispered in Kermit’s ear.

“Certainly,” Kermit let the girl pull him into an empty aisle. “Kermit, I hear my daddy talking a lot with the doctors lately,” Christine told him softly, a frightened look on her face, “He tells me everything’s fine with me. I don’t fell all right, though. This cough keeps getting worse. And I’ve done some reading about leukemia, how it can kill you. I don’t want to die, Kermit, I don’t want to die!”

It was her turn to break down. Kermit put a flipper around her and pulled her close. “I know about your case,” he told her, “Your father told me when we were alone together earlier. I’m sorry it has to be like this. It’s probably hard to understand a lot in your position, but I’m telling you honestly, Christine, you’ll have to be brave about it. Go out with a smile, not fear.”

“Are you sure?” she asked him hesitantly.

“Trust me, I’ve had enough experience with death before to know you have to look at the positive,” Kermit said. He lowered his head. “Really, loss has followed me a lot,” he said slowly, “Half my brothers and sisters never made it beyond their tadpole years; the snakes and alligators in the swamp took care of that. My parents died about a year before we first went on the air; I’d give anything for them to have seen me when we were all at our height. Then there were those drunken speedboaters who ran over Robin’s parents; he’s never really recovered from that. And of course we all never got over losing…”

He couldn’t go on, but Christine knew what he was talking about. “You still miss him, don’t you?” she asked him.

“We all do,” Kermit nodded, “And we didn’t know anything was wrong until it was too late. I can still remember unpacking my things at the Polynesian Resort, waiting for the bus to take me to MGM Studios to sign some autographs when I got the call from Jane. I was on the first plane to New York I could get. I got to the hospital around four in the morning, but by then the doctors told me it was already too late. I at least got to say goodbye, though. Just before he went into his last coma, he looked up at me with sunken eyes and said, “I’m counting on you to take care of them all, Kermit. Make sure nothing happens to any of them.” I just sort of nodded and laid my head up against his beard. He never said anything again. The nurse asked me to leave ten minutes later so they could operate again. The next time I saw him was at the funeral.”

He sighed sadly at the memories of people long dead. “But over the years, I’ve learned that they’re not all really gone,” he told the girl, “Nobody ever really dies who you love. And you won’t either. You’ve got a lot of people loving you a lot, and that’s better than a lot of world leaders can say when their time comes.”

“But I’m still scared, Kermit,” Christine told him, “Who knows if there’s life after death? What if there’s nothing out there after I die?”

“You’ll just have to believe there’s a better place out there, Christine,” Kermit pulled her close again, “It’s all a leap of faith, but I think there’s life after death. That there’s a place where there’s no pain, no suffering, just love.”

For what seemed like the longest time, the two of them just stood there in the aisle embracing. “Um, am I interrupting something?” came Jenny’s voice from behind them.

“Uh, no, no, um, we were just having a little talk on life and death, Jenny,” Kermit told her, “I’d like you to meet Christine Reiser, her family’s staying with us at Fozzie’s mother’s; Christine, say hi to Jenny; she helped get us on Broadway.”

“Among other things,” came Piggy’s voice from behind them. She was glaring at Jenny with her hands on her hips. “Fancy seeing you here again, sweetheart,” the pig told the human roughly.

“Didn’t Kermit tell you, Piggy? I started my fashion business here,” Jenny informed her, apparently oblivious to Piggy’s discontent at her presence, “New York was too overcrowded for fashion designers.” She looked down at Kermit. “Say, you don’t mind if Sarah and I come out to Fozzie’s for a little while? Since we’re away from our families out here, being among familiar faces would be nice on Christmas Eve, if there’s no problems.”

“Yes, there would be problems!” Piggy glared at her. Kermit paid no attention. “Sure,” he told Jenny, “I don’t know how many rooms we’d have left; you may have to sleep in a barrel in the basement, but….”

A loud howl of frustration came from Piggy. She kicked at a rack of designer blouses and stalked off. “Is she all right?” Christine asked Kermit.

“Uh, I think so,” Kermit stared after Piggy as she shoved aside a derelict that approached her outside the store and extended his hand for money, “She’s just a little jealous, that’s all. Apparently she likes to keep me close at all times, if you know what I mean.”

“But here’s the present you asked for, Kermit,” Jenny handed him a carefully wrapped present, “We’ll be closing up in about a half hour anyway.”

“Good, we’ll be in the Wesayso Food Mart getting spare food for everyone,” Kermit said, “And from the length of our list, it’ll take us at least that long to get everything.”





“So let me get this straight,” Harvey asked Rugby under the tree, “You guys are a bunch of talking toys?”


“That’s right, Flat Tail,” Rugby told him proudly.

“And you only come to life when people aren’t looking?”

“Yeah, so?”

“What do you think, Clifford, do they have a case against Pixar for infringement?” Harvey asked the musician behind him.

“You know, I think they just might,” Clifford nodded, “I don’t know how easy making a case in court given the corporate…”

“Hey you cats, back on stage, we’ve got some more songs on the slate,” Floyd Pepper called from the stage. Harvey and Clifford shrugged and ambled off. Rugby stared in wonder at his fellow toys. “What’s a Pixar?” he asked them.

“Sounds like some kind of a giant fairy,” Belmont proposed.

“Hold still please,” Mokey informed him, “I’ve almost finished your picture.”

Belmont stopped rocking and struck a big smile for the Fraggle. She added a few more brush strokes to the paper she was holding and held it up for the horse to see. “There, how does that look?” she asked him.

“Luckily you’ve got my good side,” Belmont told her, “I took some damage on the other side when I was dropped…”

“Hey what about me?” Rugby protested, “Aren’t you going to draw one of me?”

“Can’t you wait?” Apple upbraided him, “She can only draw one of us at a time!”

“One side please, one side,” Red pushed Rugby aside before things could go any further. She took a leap and grabbed onto the bottom branch of the Christmas tree. “Ready Wembley?” she asked her friend as he grabbed onto the light strand nearby, “First to the top of the tree wins.”

“Ready,” Wembley nodded. He glanced up to the top of the tree, where Rizzo was precariously perched. “You ready up there, judge?” he called up.

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Rizzo called back down, clutching the star hard as it swayed dangerously under his weight, “Remember, no bumping or changing lanes or I’ll have to disqualify you. Now when I say go, you…no, not that go, another go!”

For both Fraggles had already taken off climbing at his last “go.” The two of them leaped from branch to branch up the tree. After about two minutes, Red reached the top first. “I win!” she exclaimed, raising her arms in victory—and accidentally backhanding Rizzo off the star. The rat fell head first into the floor, embedding his skull in a floorboard knothole. “Somebody get me out of here!” he screeched, kicking his legs frantically in the air.

“Relax, Rizzo,” Zachary, who was sitting nearby, pulled him out and dusted him off, “It’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big deal he says!” Rizzo shook his head, “You don’t have to worry, Zack; you’re not the fall guy for all these people.”

“Yep, and you just showed you’re a great fall guy—literally,” Statler told him from the couch. He and Waldorf laughed in triumph.

There was a trumpet and saxophone fanfare on stage as Smiley approached the microphone again. “Well ladies and gentlemen, it’s now time for our piñata contest!” the game show host announced excitedly, “The first one to successfully crack it will win a plate of cookies!"

"COOKIES!!!" exclaimed a familiar voice from the back of the den.

"Yes, Cookie Monster, a plate of Cookies!" Smiley assured him, "Sweetums, the piñata please!”

Sweetums lumbered into the room and attached the piñata to the ceiling. “Now a few minutes ago we drew numbers to see who would go first,” Smiley went on, “And our hockey hero Zachary gets first draw; Zachary come on up here!”

Loud applause accompanied Zachary to the middle of the room. He smiled in contentment as he put on the blindfold Sweetums handed him and took a hard swing at the piñata. He smacked it on the bottom, putting a moderate-sized dent in it. “Very good, very good,” Smiley commended him, “Grover, you’re up next.”

Grover flexed his fingers as he walked forward and put on the blindfold. Letting out a Samurai-style yell, he swung the bat…and conked Smiley on the head. “Sorry Guy,” he apologized once he’d removed the blindfold and saw what had happened.”

“No problem, Grover,” Smiley said, grimacing from the pain, “In show business you get used to this. OK Mr. Sinclair, you drew number three.”

Earl strode up to the piñata. He reared his arms back with the bat, took a mighty swing, and succeeded only in missing the piñata completely and falling flat on his face on the floor. “Someone close the window,” Ethyl snickered nearby, “We’ve got a terrible breeze in here.”

“All right,” Earl threw up his arms in disgust, “That’s it. For years you’ve been bringing me down over everything I do. Well, this time I’m making a stand.”

“Earl, please,” Fran tugged his collar urgently.

“No Fran, I have to say this!” her husband told her. Turning back to Ethyl, he shoved the bat into her hands and said, “You think you can do better than me, you hit that piñata. Go ahead, show me what you’ve got.”

“With pleasure,” Ethyl wheeled forward, raised the bat high, and smacked the piñata hard, causing a significant crack to open in the back. “Read it and weep, fat boy,” she told a thoroughly humiliated Earl.

“Herry Monster, it’s your turn now,” Smiley announced to him. Herry confidently ambled up and hit the piñata hard—so hard it fact that it broke loose from its string and sailed down the hall and out the window. Everyone ran to the window and watched the piñata continue going across the river and over the horizon. “Well, that piñata’s going to qualify for frequent flyer miles,” Ernie remarked as it disappeared from sight.

“Does this mean I win?” Herry was surprised at his own strength. It was at this moment that the doorbell rang unexpectedly, followed by the sounds of more people slipping on the icy patch. “Back so soon?” Emily mused, walking up to the door, “The roads must be better than they said they’d be.”

Upon opening the door, however, it was not Fozzie or anyone that had gone with him, but the Dry Bandits dressed in telegram deliverer outfits. They started tap dancing. “Oh, we’re you’re singing telegraph service,” they sang badly out of key, “And we’re here for you on Christmas Eve to deliver you a message you will like.”

“Oh, well, I didn’t call for a singing telegram,” Emily was confused.

“Uh, it’s free and on the house,” Larry said, “Can we come in to give it?”

“If you insist,” the elderly bear shrugged and let them inside. “This is the stupidest idea of yours yet!” Larry hissed to Bo. He placed the large sack he’d carried with him underneath the tree. Rugby put his ear up against it. “That’s strange,” he mused.

“What?” Balthasar hobbled over on his cane.

“There’s something breathing in here,” the tiger listened closely, “And it’s definitely not a toy.”

“It could be laundry that’s eager to be washed,” Boober proposed.

“Boober, laundry doesn’t breath like you and me,” Mokey reminded him, “Poor things, we’d better let them out before they suffocate in there.”

She drew the knot to the sack and threw open the flap. Dressed in ridiculous elf suits, the Riverbottom Gang stumbled out into the light. “Dumb Fraggle, you weren’t supposed to open us up yet!” the Weasel shouted, squinting hard against the light.

“What in the…?” Emily rushed over. “Charles!” she snapped upon seeing Chuck among the newcomers, “I thought I told you never to set foot in this house again!”

“Shut up auntie,” Chuck pushed her aside and stormed into the center of the room, “All right, give it to us!” he ordered.

“OK, but remember, you asked for it,” Oscar tossed a brick from his can at Chuck, sending the bear staggering once it connected with his forehead. Seeing that his plan had quickly unraveled, Larry drew a sawed-off shotgun and motioned for Bo to do the same. “All right, here’s our message, nobody move and nobody gets hurt!” he ordered.

“How dare you brandish those guns like that!” Maria yelled at him, “We have children in here!”

“Ah, children shmildren,” Larry snorted, “If they’re from the inner city, they’re used to guns by now. I said FREEZE!” he shouted at several Snerfs that had been inching toward the kitchen. Seeing his associates had also frozen in place he shouted, “Not you, you morons, them! Tear this place apart and find it!”



“Piggy?” Kermit stuck his head around the cereal aisle in the Wesayso Food Mart to see her hunched over the Lucky Charms shelf looking upset. He cautiously approached her. “Piggy, if this is about Jenny, let me just say…” he began.


“It’s more than that, Kermit,” Piggy said slowly, “I feel like I’m being marginalized in this story. I’m being shown in the worst light. It feels like the author doesn’t like me.”

“Well, Piggy, I don’t think it’s that the author doesn’t like you,” Kermit said encouragingly, “Maybe you’re just a little harder for him to write for that some of the rest of us. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“How can you say that?” she looked hard at him.

“Because this is fan fiction,” the frog explained, “It’s not supposed to be perfect. Certainly there are parts I’d change if I had the power to do so. And no matter how this story turns out, you’re still great to me.”

“You really mean it?” Piggy became unexpectedly hyper, “Oh Kermie thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you! You’ve made my holidays complete! Kissie kissie!”

“Uh, maybe later,” Kermit quickly backed away as she advanced toward him with lips puckered, “Anyway, Fozzie says he and the others have gotten pretty much everything we need, so we might as well go and check out. We’ll be good till…Yoda?”

He’d noticed out of the corner of his eye that the Jedi master had suddenly slumped downward in the juice aisle behind them. The frog ran up to him. “Yoda, what’s wrong?” he asked breathlessly.

“A great disturbance in the Force I feel,” Yoda said slowly, “Terrible something happened has.”

“Hey Kermit, it’s Telly on the phone,” Gonzo came running up with his cell phone in hand, “He says it’s an emergency.”

“Emergency?” Kermit frowned as he took the phone. “Telly, what’s going on?” he asked.

“Kermit!” Telly gasped desperately into the receiver from underneath the bed in Emily’s room, “They’re here! They’re tearing everything up!”

“It’s awful, it’s tragic, it’s even worse than death!” Boober added hysterically.

“Come back quick!” Rizzo chimed in as well, “Before they…oh no, not the…don’t…AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!”

And then the line went dead. “Hello?” a worried Kermit pressed several buttons, but got no response. He gulped nervously and ran forward toward the checkout, which for the holidays was now situated atop a large “snow mountain” platform near the door. “Fozzie, finish paying for those things and get back to the sleigh!” he called to the bear, who was pushing a cart with groceries piled up almost to the ceiling, “We’ve got a serious problem back at the farm!”

“I’d love to Kermit, but take a look at the line,” Fozzie pointed to the line ahead of him, which was at least thirty people long, “I think we’re going to be here a while.”

 

[The Count]

There's just such a huge wealth of stuff in here that makes me happy, sad, scared... You name it.

True Blue Miracle, yaey!
Yoda and Cantus playing holographic chess.
Going into town and meeting Jenny (TMTM) and Sarah (Labyrinth).
The piñata contest.
The deep talks between Alan and Christine and their respective audiences.
The little jokes about this being a fanfiction with Fozzie's credit card.
The race to the top of the tree.
The new henchmen for Hopper and Bitterman, though I'm a bit disappointed to see the Gorgs there among the villainish cast.
Kermit talking about Jim...
And then the Dry Bandits busting in on the party, we knew it had to happen eventually.

So great this is, post more soon shall you!

 

[superboober]

Presenting #10:





“Attention everyone, can I have your attention please?” the LAX public address announcer tried to say over the din of stranded flyers in the terminal, “Can I have your attention? Would you please pay attention…people, can we have…EVERYONE SHUT UP!” Once the terminal had gone silent, he said, “Due to an unexpected winter storm approaching Los Angeles, we will be shutting down the airport in ten minutes. All passengers not wishing to be stranded here for days on end should leave by then.”

Alicia jerked her head up from the prostrate position she’d been lying in for the last hour or so to see with shock that Los Angeles, of all places, had unexpectedly become a winter wonderland, with the snow coming down hard—so hard, in fact, that the runway could barely be seen at the moment. “Just my luck!” she groaned, slumping back down.

“Miss?” came a new voice. Bobo was standing over her in a security uniform, his own suitcase in hand, “Miss, you’ll have to get ready and leave, we’ll be shutting down soon, in case you didn’t hear.”

“I know,” she sighed sadly, “But I have nowhere to go. I’m flat broke; paying for this ticket back east used up the last of my funds, and I already checked out of the apartment complex. How did things come to this?”

“Who knows?” Bobo stared longing at the snow outside, “You never can control what happens in life. If I knew I’d get stuck in that trunk back in Maine I wouldn’t have…well, it’s a long story, and I guess you don’t want to hear it. Anyway, the bathrooms will still be open if you’ll be staying, but the coffee shop will be shuttered until Boxing Day, so you’ll have to look around for breakfast. Anyway, merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas,” Alicia told him glumly as he lumbered off. She closed her eyes and tried to think of happier times to get her through the misery of the present. It would take a miracle to be home for the holidays now, but what kind of miracle could come out of this?






“Come on, come on!” Gonzo tapped his foot impatiently back east. The line to the checkout had moved a grand total of about five feet in the last twenty minutes.


“Don’t tell me this is how things usually run with these checkouts as you call them,” Gobo asked the whatever from his perch with Robin atop Big Bird’s shoulder, “Because this is ridiculous.”

“Even unbearable,” Fozzie lamented, “But at least I think the cashier is just as impatient as us.”

He pointed up the fake mountain. At the top, a clearly stressed-looking Santa was ringing up an old woman’s groceries very rapidly. “Thank you for shopping with us, HOOOO HOOO HOOOO,” he said in rapid succession, tossing the goods into paper bags without any concern for their breakability, “And here’s your receipt, come back soon.” He leaned toward the elf next to him and muttered out loud, “Get her out of here, I’m not working a minute of overtime!”

The elf forcefully dragged the old woman to a plastic slide on the other side of the “mountain” and shoved her and the groceries down it. “Next, next, HOOOO HOOOO HOOOO!” the Santa half-bellowed to a young boy who was the next one in line with a box of cookies. This caused the boy to immediately start screaming in terror. “Oh, we’ve got a screamer here, get rid of him, HOOOO HOOO HOOOO!” the Santa grumbled to the elf, who tossed the boy down the slide without the cookies.

“You guys still waiting here?” Jenny and Sarah had arrived, their coats on and purses in hand, “I guess I should have mentioned there’d be only one guy on checkout duty tonight.”

“Well we’ve got bigger problems than that, Jenny,” Kermit informed her, “Something terrible’s gone on back at the farmhouse, and we’re stuck waiting when we could be helping.” He glanced at Yoda. “Couldn’t you do something to make them move faster, Master Yoda?” he asked him.

“Under the circumstances I cannot,” Yoda said, “Unnecessary infringement on their free will it would be; a Jedi does not take away another’s free will for personal gain.”

“Well whatever your moral stance is, it’s not moving this line at all!” Gonzo started shouting crazily, “If something terrible has happened to Camilla, I’ll never forgive myself!”

“Well we’re just as worried as you are, but there’s no need to get hysterical, Gonzo,” Kermit told him.

“I’M NOT HYSTERICAL!” Gonzo shrieked in the frog’s face. After a moment, he grumbled, “All right, I am hysterical! I’m hysterical, I’m hysterical, I’m…!”

“Keep your shirt on, weirdo, I’ll get this line going. MOVE IT, MOVE IT, MOVE IT!” Piggy plowed like a running back through the other customers, karate-chopping those who resisted down the stairs. Everyone followed her through the increasing gaps in the line until they’d reached the register. “That’s the Santa Claus that lives at the top of Outer Space?” Gobo frowned at the Saint Nick behind the counter, “Wait a minute, how can you be here if you’re supposed to be getting ready to fly around the world to deliver presents?”

“Hang on a second,” Big Bird snapped his wingtips, “Maybe THAT’S how he gets down the chimneys; Santa can bi-locate and be in two places at once!”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s great, bird, now can Santa have your groceries so I can get out of here?” the “Claus” grumbled at him.

Here you go, Mr. Santa,” Fozzie strained to push all the groceries toward him. Santa pressed the cash register buttons and swiped off Fozzie’s Bearican Express card. “Keep the change, bear,” he told him, oblivious to the fact that change wasn’t necessary, “Now beat it so I can get going too, HOOOO HOOOO HOOOO!”

The elf picked the bear up and started to toss him down the slide. “Wait, wait, wait!” Fozzie jammed his legs against the sides of the slide, “I forgot to buy honey Popsicles! I’ve got to go back and…!”

“You’ll rot your teeth out, bear,” the Santa told him, “Merry Christmas. HOOOO HOOO HOOOO!”

He stomped down on Fozzie’s head, sending him tumbling down the slide and out on the street. The others joined him in a heap in quick succession. “Boy, if that was his cheerful side, I’d hate to come by on his bad days,” the bear remarked.

“There no time to waste; to the Xmasmobile,” Kermit struck a heroic pose of sorts before leading the charge back to the sleigh, where Buster and Leroy were sound asleep and snoring. Everyone piled on board (except for Yoda and Cantus, who continued to hover by Force power off the rear bumper). Fozzie leaped into the driver’s seat. “Ride like the wind, Bullseye!” he yelled at Buster and Leroy before realizing, “Whoops, wrong story. No toys here.”

Neither the horse nor the donkey woke up. “Come on you guys, we’ve got a crisis at hand!” Fozzie pleaded, snapping the reins to no avail. “Oh, I knew we let them eat too much at dinner!” he lamented, “They always conk out when they eat too much. Now how will we get going?”

“Now that we’ve got the food, we’re going to have another snack when we get back,” Robin called out loud. In seconds Buster and Leroy snapped awake and took off running. “Works every time,” the small frog said with a smile.

“Wow, I would have never thought that would have done the trick,” Fozzie turned to congratulate him, “I think…”

“Watch the road, fuzzball!” Piggy yelled, pointing at a snowy figure that had trudged into the middle of the street. “And so Kermit and the others began racing back to the farmhouse,” he was saying out loud to no one in particular, “Not knowing what horrors would await them when they returned.”

“Move, move, move!” Fozzie waved his paw frantically at the snowman, but to no avail, as he was rather violently run over by the sled and crumpled into a million particles. “Hey, is that any way to treat Joe Snow, your narrator?” he called after them.

“How many times do we have to tell you?” Gonzo yelled back at him, “We don’t NEED a snowman narrator, you Burl Ives wannabe!”

“No, but I think we DO needs seatbelts!” Robbie clutched the back of the sleigh hard, looking uncomfortable with the high rate of speed they were going at, “Not even Mom gets this bad when my brother has to…hey what’s going on up there?”

Down the street, a familiar balding figure was flashing a big smile as he turned to face the camera set up on the sidewalk. “Hello again, I’m Michael Eisner, and welcome back to the first annual Michael Eisner Holiday Telethon for Starving Fortune 500 CEOs,” he told the viewing public, “Thanks to your generous donations over the last six hours, we’ve managed to raise,” he checked the tote board, “A dollar and seventeen cents for starving chief executives. Please keep those dollars rolling in, because even though Fortune 500 CEOs make tens of billions of dollars every year, that doesn’t mean you can’t help put food on their tables for Christmas, especially when the nasty bill collectors come looking for…”

“Look out Mike, bogey at nine o’clock!” shouted the camera operator. Eisner took one look at the sleigh barreling directly at him and took off run. “Remember folks!” he shouted into his lavaliere, somehow managing to stay ahead of Buster and Leroy, “It’s the little people like you who make the difference for rich people everywhere who hope….AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGHHH!”

His plea was cut off as he abruptly fell down an open manhole with a loud splash. “I never did like these kinds of telethons,” Robbie remarked as the sleigh roared on out of town and into the dark of the country, “All these guys are really doing is lining their own pockets with people’s money.”

“You don’t have to tell me, I actually worked with the guy,” Gonzo shook his head, “And believe me, he’s no Lew Lord or even Ronnie Crawford.”

“Ronnie Crawford?” Christine asked him.

“He produced their play on Broadway,” Jenny told her, “You didn’t get to see Manhattan Melodies?”

“We’ve never even been to New York,” Alan told her, “Since we’ve seen how good they are on television, though, I sure we would have loved it.”

“You should have been there opening night,” the young woman went on, “The lights were bright, the music was beautiful, and once we got Kermit out of his amnesia, we put on…”

“Please, I’d rather not talk about it now,” Alan held up his hand. Deep concern was etched across his face. “My son’s back at that farmhouse. He and Christine are my life; if they’ve harmed him…”

He found himself choking up again. “I know the feeling, Mr. Reiser,” Sarah patted him on the shoulder, “There was this one time I almost lost my baby brother and found that I didn’t want to be without him even though I’d always thought otherwise—you wouldn’t believe the whole story of it even if I told you.”

“I’d like to hear it,” Big Bird told her, “I always like a nice bedtime story.”

“Same here,” Gobo added. Jenny leaned toward him. “So you’re a Fraggle?” she asked him.

“Born and raised,” Gobo nodded in pride, “Ever hear of us?”

“Oh, I’ve heard of you, it’s just I never really took much stock in the stories,” the young woman admitted, “It just didn’t seem all that reasonable that there’d be millions of colorful little creatures running around under our feet.”

“Trust me, there are even more unreasonable things than that,” Sarah informed her employer, “I’ve had enough experience with other dimensions to know….”

“FOZZIE WATCH OUT!” Kermit’s warning cry ended the conversation. The sleigh was now driving straight toward a sign reading BRIDGE OUT: GO BACK UNLESS YOU’RE NUTS. “What is this doing here!” Robbie protested, “We didn’t pass by a broken bridge when we came in! Is this supposed to be here?”

“If the author thinks it adds drama, I guess so,” Robin told him.

“But what purpose does this serve even for plot purposes!” the dinosaur rants onward, “There’s no reason for us to have to go through trials like this just to get back to our loved ones!”

“Too late, we’re going to have to,” Fozzie snapped the reins. Buster and Leroy accelerated toward the broken span. The sleigh’s odometer quickly rose from SLOW to FAST to TOO FAST to YOU’RE CRAZY! as they hit the edge of the bridge and went airborne. Even though it was only a short bridge, no more than eight hundred feet from one end to the other, they had to strain to get to the opposite side for whatever reason and barely landed safely. “That was close!” the bear breathed a large sigh of relief. Then he noticed something out of the ordinary. “Hey, where’d the animals go?”

“Hey Foz, what are you doing up there?” came Buster’s voice form the back of the sleigh, where he and Leroy were now trailing behind and running hard just to avoid being dragged along.

“Hold still for a moment you will,” Yoda told him. A look of intense concentration crossed his face. The next thing anyone knew, the sleigh was levitating in the air, allowing the donkey and horse to charge forward back to their normal positions. Yoda returned the sleigh back to earth. “Never done my job is,” he asided to Cantus.

“Neither is this game,” Cantus was apparently the only one not fazed by their wild pace. He mentally directly his biggest piece to capture Yoda’s biggest piece.

“Whoa there!” Fozzie yanked on the reins, bringing Buster and Leroy to an abrupt halt in the middle of the road. Everyone watched as the Swedish Chef chased Pepe across the road. “Talk about your running gags,” Gonzo remarked, “How long has that been going on now? And what's that noise?”

Sam was now running up the road in front of them on his wings and talons, the Baby on his back. The infant dinosaur was slapping the eagle on the rump very hard and repeatedly. “Ride ‘em, buckin’ bronto!” it was shouting in gleeful malice.

“That does it!” Sam stopped and rose up on his talons, “You have driven me to wit’s end! It’s time I enforce corporal punishment!”

He seized the Baby and hurled it hard into a tree. “Again!” the infant shouted in delight. Sam staggered over to the sleigh. “Kermit, thank God you made it back!” he moaned, “Please, do me a favor, back up and run me over! This child has driven me to the edge of sanity! I can take no more of…!”

"Uh oh," Kermit had noticed the smoke ominously bellowing from the front window of the farmhouse, now visible up the road in front of them. Everyone quickly piled out of the sleigh and charged toward the building—everyone slipping on the icy patch again as they reached the porch. Everyone inside the farmhouse was lying on the floor, moaning in agony. Just about everything in the house had been overturned, and most of the presents had been either completely or partially torn up. “Are you guys OK?” the frog asked, running first to Doc Bullfrog and helping his uncle up, “Is anyone hurt? What did they set on fire?”

“Nothing!” snapped Charlene from inside the broom closet, where she was hunched over a small campfire on the rug, “I’ve got to do something to stay warm! What’s so wrong with that?”

“Well you know, Charlene, you had us all worried someone had been burned up!” Robbie scolded his sister, “Is staying warm really worth that?”

“Well at least no one seems to be hurt,” Fozzie said with a large sigh of relief.

“OH NO!” Gonzo shrieked, running into the kitchen, where a roasted chicken was sitting on the table. “Oh Camilla!” he howled, throwing himself about it, “They cooked you alive! I’m so sorry! I should have stayed and protected you!”

“Don’t rumple it up, I want to cook that tomorrow morning,” Emily staggered by, looking rather dazed, “Your chicken friend took refuge behind the couch.”

Gonzo turned slowly to see Camilla rise up from behind the sofa, perfectly intact. “Uh, I knew that,” the whatever said quickly.

“Sure you did,” Emily said with a tinge of sarcasm, “But I am glad you and the lizard got back here.”

“Frog,” Kermit corrected her, “Did you see who did this?”

“Of course I do,” Emily said with distaste in her voice, “It was my thieving nephew and his gang of hooligans, plus two other guys. But what they were after, I don’t know.”

“I think it might have been this,” Zachary called from the tree. He held up the half-unwrapped Baseball Diamond as his father rushed to him and embraced him. There were gasps of awe as everyone gathered around to look at it. “What is that wondrous thing?” Wembley asked.

“Let me take a look,” Sherlock Hemlock pushed his way forward and examined the diamond with his magnifying glass, “Egad, I’ve got it,” he proclaimed, “This is a large chunk of ice that has managed not to melt, certainly very valuable on the market.”

“No, it’s the fabulous Baseball Diamond,” Floyd Pepper picked it up, “I’d recognize this thing anywhere. But what’s it doing here, and who would want it this badly?”

Kermit sifted through the sea of wrapping paper around the Diamond. “Uh, guys, I think I know," he said, his expression going wide as he noticed something, "We’re dealing here with a foe who with his every appearance on television dumbs down the minds of everyone who watches him and tries to turn them into mindless zombies.”

“You mean we were attacked by Bob Saget?” Scooter asked.

“No, even worse than that,” Kermit told him. He held up a crumpled wrapping paper labeled DOC HOPPER’S FRENCH FRIED FROG LEGS, which brought about numerous loud gasps. “Him?” Grover was shocked, “What could he possibly want with that?”

“I don’t know, I do know his goons’ll be back,” Rowlf admitted, “They’d still be here if Doglion hadn’t scared them when they looked in the closet. They’d said they’d be back with more guns and men.”

“Then we’ve got make sure they don’t get the diamond,” Kermit mused, “It rightfully belongs to Lady Holliday. Now if Doc Hopper were sending goons after you to get it, who are you going to call?”

“Hopperbusters?” Fozzie proposed. Kermit groaned.

“But what can we do?” Telly asked nervously, “We’re not armed! And the phone lines are still down, so we can’t call the cops! We don’t have a chance to stop them!”

“Well then,” Kermit stood up on a chair to address everyone, “we’d better work on getting the phone lines back up and running. If they come before then, we'll try and keep them at bay so when the police come, they can catch them red-handed. Are there any questions?”

Ernie’s hand shot up. “What color are their hands now?” he asked. Kermit slapped a flipper to his face. “Rowlf, how soon ago did they leave?” he asked the dog.

“About fifteen minutes ago,” Rowlf said, “Given the shape of the roads, we probably have about twenty more minutes before they get back here.”

“Well then, we haven’t got a moment to lose,” Kermit announced, “Let’s find everything we can use to hold them off and get set up; it looks like from the damage they inflicted here we’ll have to work overtime on this. Who’s with me?”

Pretty much everyone raised their hands with at least some degree of confidence and bustled about to get anything that might be useful for non-lethal home defense. Among the chaos, Big Bird waddled over to Oscar, who was staring out the cracked back window. “Aren’t you going to help us too, Oscar?” he asked the grouch.

“Ordinarily not if your life depended on it,” Oscar told him, ”But when people like them attack me,” he pulled a metal army helmet out of his trash can and plunked it down on his head, “They ask for it. And nobody ruins the misery of Commando Grouch. Let’s go people!” he shouted rather rudely at the others, none of whom seemed to care, “We’ve got a lot of work to do here! Telly, go check the bathrooms for anything that might knock a guy senseless! Fraggles, go back down your hole and find as many of your friends you can! Hold it a minute,” he waved the Two-Headed Monster over to his can, “You go up to the roof and secure a way for us to get out of here in an emergency, and you go down the basement and look for more traps.”

The Two-Headed Monster started shouting at itself as it tried to obey both of Oscar’s directives and found itself running in different directions. Oscar sighed in relief. “Maybe I will like it here after all,” he said to himself.

 

[Fragglemuppet]

Yes, I too was a bit disappointed to see the gorgs as vilins. Also, what manner of creature were McMooch's drivers supposed to be
Great stuff, and I don't believe I said it before, but my favorite bit of the chapter before last was the hokey game. This is very ironic, because I truly hate most sports!

 

[superboober]

I may be able to put your minds at ease if I were to tell you that I never really intended while I was writing it for the Gorgs to be seen as villains; rather, as innocents tricked into an insidious scheme by less couth people. Given Pa's obsession with riding the Gorg Empire of Enemies of the Kingdom, it would seem logical to assume he'd jump at any possibility to get at them.

As for McMooch's latest slaves, it's entirely up to your own imagination to guess what they are. I like to leave some thing's open to the readers' imaginations.

 

[The Count]

Yeah... That'd work... Just that going by the latter episodes of FR, Junior finally took the crown, made peace between the Gorgs and Fraggles, and then flung the crown into the air... Before it landed somewhere in the frozen park Doc and Sprocket were exploring, just before they found the dented Gorg crown.
Rully liked the last chapter: Robin getting the horse and donkey to get up and go, Yoda floating the sleigh above the unabridged casm, and Oscar going into military mode to prep the farm house's barricade against the marching band of villains and innocently-duped associates.

Post more soon, please.

 

[superboober]

Here's the wild and crazy "Farmhouse Alone" Chapter 11:





“We shouldn’t have run like that,” the Weasel was still grumbling as the Dry Bandits’ truck inched slowly up the lane toward Grizzly Farm, a small convoy of their new hired associates right behind them “I had the diamond right in my hand when you dragged me out the door!”

“No problem,” Larry reassured him, “It was just a gut reaction. This time we know not to just panic if we see anything monstrous in the closet.”

They pulled up behind a snow bank that was out of sight of the front porch. Up on top of the roof, unseen by the would-be intruders, Homer Honker had already spotted them with binoculars. He turned down the stairs and honked his nose three times in a row. Down below, Emmett nodded at the signal. “They’re here, guys!” he shouted down the main stairs in turn, “Better get ready!”

There was a loud bustling as dozens of Muppets and humans ran about to their first stations. “Kermit, I think we’re throwing the whole story out the window here,” Scooter expressed his feelings to the frog as they positioned themselves by the front window, “If this is supposed to be a nice heartwarming story on helping a family learn to live, we can’t just go about slamming the bad guys like this.”

“Attention everyone,” came the voice of an all-too familiar voice over a megaphone, “This is your old friend Doc Hopper speaking. I hate to be impolite, but you all have thirty seconds to hand over the fabulous Baseball Diamond to us, or else we’ll be forced to do something like this to you.”

A spray of warning fire peppered the windows, forcing everyone down to the floor. “Or then again, maybe we can do this without ruining the story,” Scooter added.

“So what’s it going to be?” Hopper inquired, “The diamond or pain?”

Kermit held up a radio to his mouth. “All right Gonzo, send out the first wave,” he instructed the whatever, knowing full well that at this point there was no going back.

Outside, the thieves were reloading their weapons. “So what happens if they do give us the diamond anyway?” the Snake asked his bosses.

“Simple, we go in and shoot them all anyway,” Bitterman told him, “I’ve wanted their heads for years, and no bunch of…”

“Hey look up at that,” Bo pointed at the sky. A large flock of chickens was soaring over the farmhouse towards them, clucking out “Ride of the Valkyries.” “Go on, fly!” Gonzo cackled in delight from the upper bedroom window as they all flew by him, “Fly my pretties, fly! Now dive!”

The chickens dove toward the invading party. The next thing anyone knew, they were being hit with a barrage of egg bombs. They groaned and dove for cover. Pa Gorg took refuge behind an elm. “So, the Enemies want to play rough with us, do they?” he asked out loud to no one in particular, “Well, they’ll find that the Gorg Empire shows as little mercy to them as they show to us. CHHHAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGE!”

He charged toward the front door, waving his sword wildly…and promptly became the latest person to slip on the icy patch, landing with such a thud that the entire farmhouse shook on its foundation. “Careful of the icy patch!” everyone inside shouted.

Pa heaved himself up. “Got to be more careful,” he told himself. He stepped backwards and yelled “CHHHHHAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGE!” again. This time he took care to leap over the icy patch, but Dr. Teeth threw open the door before he could knock it down. Pa continued charging across the den, into the kitchen, out the back door—which Queen Peuta threw open for him—and across the river and over the snow hills, oblivious to the fact there was no longer anything in his path. Meanwhile, the egg barrage continued on his allies. Bo scrambled under a bush. “I think they’re more prepared than we thought, Larry!” he informed his partner.

“So tell me something I DON’T know!” Larry shouted at him, “Well have to sneak in around back. Go and take cover behind that snow bear over there and see what they've got in the rear.”

“Right,” Bo crawled out with his arms protecting his head. “You’ll protect me, right snow bear?” he told the cold figure before him. Then he frowned at it. “Wait a minute, you look a lot like…”

Without warning the seemingly inanimate snow bear sprung to life. “Happy birthday!” Fozzie shouted, producing a birthday cake from seemingly thin air and throwing it in Bo’s face. While the thief sputtered and wiped the cake out of his eyes, the bear threw open the storm cellar door and climbed down into the basement. “How’s it coming with the phone lines, guys?” he asked Ernie and Bert, who were examining the lines one at a time.

“We’re still working on it, but it’s going to take longer than we originally hoped,” Bert shook his head, “It's bad enough the lines were already messed up when we got here; they definitely did something to them too when they were down here”

“It would also help if we knew which lines were which, Fozzie” Rizzo remarked, completely tangled up in the phone lines, “You mother put too many down here. Take this one for example,” he held up a heavily frayed wire, “This one’s nearly shot. If this was used extensively…”

“Look at this plug,” Ernie noticed one lying on the floor, “Maybe if we just plug it back in...”

He pushed the plug into the nearest outlet. Immediately Rizzo, who was still holding the exposed part of the wire, was hit with a massive electricity surge. Smoke poured from the rat’s ears, and his eyes glowed with light as he let out a shriek and fell shaking to the floor. “Nope, wait, that’s not the phone line,” Ernie realized, “This goes to the refrigerator. My mistake.”

“T-T-T-That’s e-e-e-e-e-e-e-easssy f-f-f-f-f-for y-y-y-y-y-y-you t-t-t-t-t-t-t-o s-s-s-s-s-s-s-say!” Rizzo stammered, still vibrating.

Outside, the egg barrage stopped. Covered in yokes, Hopper hefted the megaphone again. “Go, go, break that door down and rip them apart for this!” he shouted at his henchmen.

“Let’s go boys!” Sledge shouted at his fellow farmers. They rushed the front door and started chopping it in with their axes. Within ninety seconds it was completely destroyed. Larry pushed his way past them. “Aha, the diamond!” he exclaimed, noticing it lying on the coffee table. He advanced toward it….

Only to have Sprocket grab it in his mouth at the last second. The dog flung it toward Robbie in the corner. Robbie dribbled it away from the advancing Dry Bandits and company as if it were a basketball—all while the Electric Mayhem played “Sweet Georgia Brown” in the corner—and passed it like a basketball to Charlie. The muskrat spun it on his finger and passed it between his legs to Herry. The monster assumed a pitcher’s stance. “Curveball over the plate!” he announced, tossing it up in the air.

“I GOT IT!” Bo jumped up on the couch and took a mighty swing at the diamond with the readily-available piñata bat…and absolutely walloped Larry in the face with it. “Uh oh,” he whimpered upon seeing what he’d done, “Sorry Larry, I didn’t…”

Growling in utter rage, Larry seized the bat off his partner and began walloping Bo right back. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine severe blows to the head, ah ha ha ha ha ha!” the Count counted them all, followed by the usual lightning storm.

“Hey, they’re getting away with the diamond!” the Pop-Eyed Catfish leaned out of his bucket and gestured with his fin at Yolanda the rat, who was carrying the diamond toward the fireplace. “Get back here with that, you rat!” Larry yelled, running after her. He scrambled up the chimney after her, only to find himself completely stuck about halfway up. Unable to move, he could only flail his arms toward Yolanda, who tossed the diamond off to several more rats waiting inside the chimney. “Bo, do somethin’ useful and get me outta here!” he screamed at his partner.

“I’m coming Larry!” Bo obediently ran over and peered up the chimney. “Where are you, Larry, I can’t see a thing,” he commented.

“Right up here, dufus!” Larry berated him. He groaned as the rats tossed the Baseball Diamond out the top of the chimney and scrambled out.

“I’ll have to get some light, Larry,” Bo dug out a cigarette lighter and started clicking it.

“Hey Bo, do you smell something?” Larry’s brow furled. There was a loud hissing sound clearly audible throughout the chimney. “It smells a lot like…”

And then he realized what was about to happen. “Bo, NNNNNOOOOOOOOOO!” he shrieked a few seconds too late as Bo ignited the lighter, triggering a massive gas explosion that sent the taller crook flying through wall and across into the barn, and sent Larry rocketing up the chimney in a massive fireball. “Well that’ll light up his life,” Waldorf remarked as he and Statler observed Larry’s fiery trajectory over the horizon from the front window.

“He should know these things always happen to hotheads,” Statler agreed. The two of them broke into hard mocking laughter.

The Riverbottom Gang rose up from behind the sofa, where they’d taken refuge from the blast. “They took it upstairs to the roof,” Chuck stated the obvious to his associates, “You go outside and cut them off, I’ll go up there and see if I can stop them.”

He ran hard up the stairs to the second floor, only to stop short at the top. For Fozzie had appeared wearing a familiar baker suit and false mustache. “Thirty-eight 50-pound barbells!” he announced grandly, holding up a set of plates with them on. He handed them to Chuck before his cousin could react. Chuck strained under the weight of the barbells and toppled backwards down the stairs, dropping barbells everywhere. “And that’s the song of 38!” sang almost seven dozen hidden voices from around the house.

There was a cracking of wood as Larry staggered back in over the broken door, his clothing in complete tatters from the blast. “No more Mr. Nice Guy!” he shouted, “So long, chump!”

He pointed his gun at Fozzie, who was without any cover on the stairs, but all of a sudden Cookie Monster popped out of nowhere and swallowed the gun. “You, you!” Larry sputtered at him, “That cost me fifty bucks off my Guns ‘R’ Us Discount Card!”

“Me need daily iron intake,” Cookie burped, “Part of new nutritional guidelines.”

“Here’s the iron intake for you!” McMooch aimed a bazooka at the monster—only to have it eaten up in a flash by Animal. “Tastes just like chicken,” the Electric Mayhem’s drummer commented, rubbing his stomach in content.

“GET THEM ALL!” Larry roared. He picked up a large jagged piece of wood and chased Cookie and Animal toward the kitchen, only to activate a tripwire as he went through the doorway that activated a set of blowguns set up above him that fired a set of darts into his rear. “OOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWW!” he shouted, hopping around in pain.

“Maybe he should take the point and leave now,” Statler remarked to Waldorf upon watching this latest predicament.

“I think he already gets the point,” Waldorf pointed at the darts in Larry’s rear, "But he should still leave; the story's going downhill faster than a skiier."

The two of them laughed hard again. Outside, Bitterman knocked hard on the door of the Gorg’s carriage. “You, Pinky,” she demanded to Ma, “You’re not doing anything. Climb up to that window and help break inside.”

“That’s not my job,” Ma protested, “As Queen of the Universe, I have certain…”

“DO IT!” Bitterman shrieked.

“Oh why do I let myself get talked into these things?” Ma grumbled but she still dutifully trudged over to a tree by the west side of the house and inched up it. It started groaning under her weight. “It looks like the bathroom’s unoccupied,” she called out loud once she was level with it.

“Well then, open up the window and outflank them!” Bitterman shouted impatiently.

Ma reached out for the windowsill and pushed the window open once she was dangling in place underneath it. But then Wembley appeared on the ledge. “Hey Gorg!” he shouted, and stuck out his tongue at Ma. Ma shrieked in terror at the sight of him and let go of the branch, falling to the ground with a colossal thud. “Ma, are you all right?” Junior ran up to her.

“Of course I am, Junior,” Ma brushed herself off, “Something broke my fall.”

“GET OFF ME YOU FAT OAF!” came Bitterman’s muffled voice from underneath the Gorg. The businesswoman squirmed out form underneath Ma and kicked her in the shin. “You’re useless!” she degraded the self-appointed Queen of the Universe.

“Hey, is that any way to talk to the Queen of the Universe?” Junior asked in his mother’s defense.

“Why are you just standing around here?” Bitterman demanded to him, “You get in there and help them get the diamond or else!”

Meanwhile, Bo stumbled back in through the hole in the wall he’d created during the earlier explosion, looking completely frazzled. No sooner had he set foot in the den again than Scooter suddenly appeared dressed as a director. “Well, I was wondering when you’d show up,” he berated a thoroughly confused Bo, “This commercial isn’t going to wait all day to be done. Come on and get in your position, we’re going to do this in one take.”

He dragged Bo into the exact center of the den. “Makeup please,” he called out.

“MAKEUP!” Animal sauntered up and threw a pan of makeup into Bo’s face. Scooter handed the stunned Bo a script. “Just read the part in yellow,” he informed him, “And the faster the better.”

He strolled behind a camera Janice was operating and announced, “Action!” Bo glanced down at the script. “I hate Wilkins Coffee,” he said in an absolutely flat line reading, “I would destroy every cup of it if I could.”

The door to the closet swung open. “Well destroy this,” announced Wilkins, aiming a large cannon at Bo. A loud explosion shook the room, and when the smoke subsided there was another Bo-shaped hole in the wall. “Cut, print it,” Scooter told Janice.

Upstairs, Bunsen and Doc were stirring a large mixture together in a vat. “Are you sure this is the right formula for the instant Unmeltable Ice?” the human asked.

“Absolutely,” Bunsen said confidently, “Beaker and I have perfected this inside Muppet Labs over the last week in the event just such an emergency as this would arise.”

“How incredibly convenient,” Doc mused, “Well, we might as well see if it works; I hear company coming.”

Mean Floyd was charging up the hall at them, ax raised. The two inventors dumped the vat’s contents onto the floor in front of the farmer. Mean Floyd immediately slipped on it and slid past them and out the window, where he flew out onto the middle of the river. He smashed through the ice with a loud splash. Seconds later he remerged, sopping wet. “Looks like you're all washed up, Gorg!” Red taunted him from the riverbank.

“I’m gonna get...!” Mean Floyd started to charge at her, but within seconds he’d frozen solid. Upstairsat the window, Bunsen and Doc exchanged high fives. “A most successful test,” the Muppet proclaimed, “Let us now see if we can get that tin roof sundae tosser to work as…careful there, Beaker.”

For Beaker had slipped on the patch of Unmeltable Ice and fallen sideways over the staircase railing, where he landed a cactus that had been set up for the bad guys. “MMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEPPPPPPP!” he shrieked in pain.

“Fresh meat!” Lardpork noticed the hapless lab assistant was open and vulnerable. He lunged toward him with his own ax…but failed to notice the sawed-through floorboards in his path. Lardpork fell through the floor into a large vat of…GLUE?” the farmer shouted, taking note that he was now covered from head to toe in it.

“That’s right, it’s a sticky situation for you,” remarked Oscar, who was positioned nearby wearing a handyman’s uniform. The grouch speared Lardpork on the end of his paperhanger and pushed him against the wall. “Three purple conkers playing with glue,” he sang out as he rolled wallpaper over the farmer/robber, “One got stuck up, and then there were two.”

“GET ME OUT OF HERE!” Lardpork shouted at the top of his lungs, straining without success to tear free from the wall.

The basement door slammed open. “There’s one,” the Weasel pointed at the grouch, “Let’s rip his head off!”

The entire Riverbottom Gang charged down the stairs, not noticing the jacks spread out all over the floor until it was too late. “OOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!” they shrieked, hopping around in pain. “Oh and by the way, I’ve got a little going away present for you guys too,” Oscar told them. He leaned around a support column and ordered, “Five tossed salads, Private Telly!”

“Yes Sir, Commando Grouch,” Telly yanked a rope that launched several catapults of salad at the Riverbottomers, who retreated hastily. Except for the Pop-Eyed Catfish, who was accidentally kicked out of his bucket by the Weasel. “Hey Chuck, guys, don’t leave me here!” he pleaded them to no avail, as they slammed the door shut on him. “Chuck!” he moaned, flopping out onto the floor and up the steps, “Water, quick!”

Upstairs, Larry pulled the last of the darts out of his rear. “All right, that’s it you filthy…!” he growled, storming back into the living room. Sam was now in his path. “You will cease and desist these actions of yours immediately, or face a consequence worse than death,” the eagle informed him.

“Oh, I’m really scared!” Larry taunted him.

“You should be,” Sam produced the Baby from behind his back and tossed it at Larry. “Not the Momma!” the infant dinosaur shouted, whacking Larry over the head with a heavy metal snow shovel.

“Stop it you miscreant!” Larry shouted, ramming his head into the wall several times in a desperate attempt to make the Baby stop. It was to no avail, however, for the Baby kept walloping away at him with ever more excited cries of, “Not the Momma, not the Momma, not the Momma, NOT THE MOMMA!”

Bo stumbled back in through the latest hole in the wall and noticed his partner’s latest predicament. “Don’t worry Larry, I’ll save you!” he shouted. He grabbed the Baby, hurled it to the ground and jumped up and down on top of it. “Again!” the Baby shouted in delight.

“Hey guys, look what we’ve got up here!” Gobo called down, cradling the diamond in his arms on the upper railing. A blast of gunfire from the Dry Bandits made him dive behind the diamond in safety. “Come on you guys!” Larry yelled at the salad-covered Riverbottom Gang as they trudged into the room, “There’s our payday!”

The six of them charged up the stairs at Gobo. “When we get through with all of ya, they ain’t gonna be able to…uh oh!” Bo’s dire threat fell silent early. For Fozzie-as-the-baker had reappeared again. “Sixty-three polished anvils!” he announced, shoving his platters with the anvils into Chuck’s arms again and once again causing him to fall down the stairs under the weight, this time taking his fellow gang members with him. “And that’s the song of 63!” everyone sang out.

“Sixty-three thousand dollars, that is!” Earl said gleefully. He was filming the thieves’ latest mishap with a video recorder. Fran walked up and tapped her husband on the shoulder. Earl Snead Sinclair, what do you think you’re doing?” she had to know.

“Well Fran, once Pangaea’s Most Painful Home Injuries sees the footage of this, we’re going to be rich, rich, rich!” Earl rubbed his hands excitedly. It was at that moment that a shotgun blast from Sledge destroyed the dinosaur’s camera. Earl burst into tears at the sight of his dream ruined. “I’m going to get me a dinosaur-skin coat!” Sledge threatened, taking aim at the Sinclairs…

Only to be distracted by a loud crashing noise as someone fell through the ceiling. “You will not harm these dinosaurs!” proclaimed Super Grover as he untangled himself from his cape, “I, Super Grover, will defeat you with ridiculous ease!”

“And how do you suppose to do that?” Sledge sneered.

“By the most surefire way of defeating villains there is; hopping up and down and saying ‘Wubba wubba,’ because it also sounds so nice to say. WUBBA, WUBBA, WUBBA, WUBBA, WUBBA, WUBBA, WUBBA, WUBBA!” Super Grover hopped around circles, apparently convinced beyond doubt that this ploy would work. Sledge laughed sadistically. “Killing you’ll be a blast!” he remarked.

“Did somebody say blast?” Crazy Harry jumped out from behind the sofa and pressed down on his plunger, blowing Sledge out the window. Junior ran through the hole he’d left, his club held high. “Oh, I know you Fwaggles are up to no good with this!” he shouted, waving it around, “I’m gonna smack everyone one of you around! Where are you Fwaggles?”

“They’re in the kitchen; hurry and you’ll catch them!” Jen called out. Junior lumbered toward it and opened the door. Immediately a chain of Fraggles swung down from above the frame and swung a watch back and forth in front of the Gorg's face. "You are getting very tired," the reddish one on the end said softly, "When you hear the music, you will lay down and sleep for the next twelve hours or so, give or take a minute or two."

Mokey climbed down to the edge of the chain. "Close your eyes, lay on down, let the dream world surround you..." she sang softly to an already droopy Junior, who immediately slid down to the floor and began snoring loudly--loud enough in fact to rattled the dishes in the sink and all the pictures on the wall. The Pop-Eyed Catfish, who had been flopping desperately across the floor toward the sink, took a moment to flop over to the Gorg. "Wake up, you idiot!" he screamed at him, his lips pursing from lack of water. Junior remained sound asleep. The Pop-Eyed Catfish rolled his eyes. "Good help is so hard to find these days," he muttered to himself as he turned back toward the sink.

Upstairs at that moment, Bo was shoving open doors on the second floor in a mad search for his assailants. “I know you’re all in here!” he yelled, ‘Come out and fight like real men!”

“They took the diamond out the bathroom window!” Wendell called from inside the shower.

“Thanks,” Bo told him. Then he ran into the bathroom and stupidly dove out the window, landing with a thud on top of Hopper. “Did they pass you with the diamond?” he asked his employer.

“Oh dear God,” Hopper growled, jumping to his feet and rummaging through his limo's trunk, “Must I do everything myself?”

Back inside, Larry and the Riverbottomers hauled themselves back up out of the anvils. “Now we’re going to kill each and every one of you until you die from it!” the short crook shouted, cocking his own gun again, “Let’s go get them!”

“Hang on, maybe we better think this over,” the Snake mused, but it was already too late. Large globs of tin roof sundaes flew at them from Doc and Bunsen’s tosser, sending them skidding onto a table in the hallway. Marvin Suggs popped up with a mallet. “And now, for your listening pleasure, ‘Deck the Halls!’” he announced grandly to no one. He started pounding out the tune on the villains’ heads to accompanying “ows!”

Up in the attic, Gobo rolled the diamond over to Kermit, who was now sitting with the rest of the humans (they had decided it would be better not to put the children in harm’s way). “Now what do we do with this thing?” he asked the frog.

“Leave it over on that trunk there,” Kermit instructed him, “ Ernie and Bert should have the phone lines up and running by now, so we can call the police and let them come catch them red-handed.”

“What color are their hands now?” the Fraggle asked.

“Bad news, Kermit,” came Bert’s voice crackling over the radio, “We’re going to need more time to get the phone lines back up.”

Kermit sighed. “Well, try and get it as best you can,” he told Bert, “Tell everyone down there to abandon the house; seeing how mad these guys are now, getting in their way would be dangerous. We’ll be leaving too.”

“Uh, not that I’m complaining,” the Storyteller called from the attic window, “But do you have a concrete way to get us down from here?” There’s no tree or wire here.”

Kermit ran over to him and looked down at the ground at least three stories below. “I knew I was forgetting something with this plan!” he groaned.

“All right you guys!” came Larry’s angry shout from below, “When we get up there, this is what’s gonna happen to each and every one of you!”

Machine gun fire strafed the attic floor. Everyone scrambled to be as close to the window—and away from the bullets—as possible. “Anyone get any idea, smart or insane?” Rowlf had to know.

“I’ve still got the paper towels,” Lew Zealand held them up. Kermit examined them. “What the heck,” he shrugged, “Women and children first. But we’ll need a distraction to buy us enough time.”

Below, Bo clambered up the stairs, the Pop-Eyed Catfish in his hand inside a drinking glass. “Where are they, Larry?” he yelled, “I’ve gonna break all their necks!”

“Well, at least somebody finally decides to be useful!” Larry berated him, “They’re up in the attic. You’re expendable; you and the fish go first.”

“Catfish,” the Pop-Eyed Catfish corrected him firmly, “You humans are too broad with your…”

“Oh no!” Chuck groaned, for Fozzie-as-the-baker was in their path yet again at the top of the attic steps. “One hundred and fifteen—gasp—rusty—ugh—anchors!” the would-be comedian strained hard to hold onto the trays of anchors. Unable to, he let the anchors cascade forward and clear the stairs of the bad guys. “And that’s the song of 115!” everyone in the attic sang out.

“Where are they getting all this stuff?” the Snake muttered weakly from under a pile of anchors.

“Like they said in the last story, they’re the good guys; they can find anything they need whenever they want it,” the Lizard pointed out.

“Yeah, well as the bad guys we’ve got unlimited firepower at any time!” Larry drew a set of heavy guns, “Let’s chop ‘em into little pieces!”

Upstairs, Fozzie slid a safe against the attic door and joined everyone slowly climbing out the window on the paper towels. Perhaps because they were indeed the good guys, the towels were holding up remarkably well under their combined weights. “I don’t think they’ll bother us for a while, Kermit,” he told the frog, “Shouldn’t we give the Reisers something to do? They’ve been pretty much marginalized for the last chapter and a half or so.”

More gunfire blasted the door. Larry jumped into sight with guns in both hands. "Say good night!" he snarled.

"Um...!!!" Fozzie quickly reached into the nearest box and extracted the body of Dead Tom. He held the pirate's corpse in front of everyone and let it absorb Larry's entire salvo. Once his guns clicked on empty, the bear tossed it toward him. "Another great convenience," he remarked.

“Never mind that now, Fozzie, just go!” Kermit pushed his friend out the window. It was only he and Piggy left in the attic now. “Well, Piggy, we did what we could,” he told her.

“Well, at least if this is the end, at least we’ll die together, Kermie,” Piggy told him.

“Indeed,” Kermit nodded, “And to be honest, Piggy, if we do get blown away, I am glad to be going out together with you.”

“Do you mean it?” Piggy’s face lit up with awe, “Oh Kermit, you…!”

The door was kicked in. “Uh, enough sentiment!” Kermit grabbed her hand and dove out the window with her. Seconds later the bad guys swarmed into the attic. “Surrender frog!” Larry bellowed.

"Look, Larry shot this guy!" the Lizard ran over to Dead Tom, "He killed him!"

"Moron, he's already been dead!" the Snake berated him.

“The diamond!” the Weasel ran over to it and cradled it lovingly in his arms, “Well, no need for us to hang around here anymore.”

“Oh yes we do,” Chuck scraped his claws against the wall, “We need blood.”

“Oh Charles, we’re down here,” Emily’s voice wafted up from outside, “And we’ll call the police on all of you.”

The bad guys ran to the window. “You ain’t getting’ away that easy!” Larry yelled down, “Come on Bo, we’re getting’ them!”

“I don’t know, Larry,” Bo whimpered at the distance to the ground. He hated heights. “Can’t we just go back downstairs?”

“And go through all that nonsense again? You might be that dumb, Bo, but I ain’t,” Larry chided him, “Now come on!”

Down below, Jenny yanked Kermit and Piggy out of the snow bank they’d landed in. “I think you still should have used the paper towels,” she told them.

“Hands!” Piggy slapped hers away.

“Did I miss anything?” Rizzo stuck his head out the basement window.

“Not really,” Gonzo informed him, “We just left them with the diamond; they’re still coming after us swearing eternal vengeance. No big deal.”

“Hey wait a minute, are those what I think they are?” Sarah asked Rizzo, pointing at a box next to them. Rizzo looked inside and shuddered. “Oh yeah, believe me,” he said meekly, Why?”

“I have an idea,” the teenager smiled.

Above them, Bo whimpered like a baby as he climbed out on the paper towels and started following Larry down toward the ground. “Shut it, Bo!” his partner yelled at him, “What’re ya, chicken?”

Bo whimpered louder, his eyes tightly shut. “Will you act your age?” the Snake derided him as the Riverbottomers followed him down on the paper towels, “You give us toughs a bad name!”

“Hang on a second,” the Pop-Eyed Catfish squinted down on the ground, “It looks like they’re doing something down there. In fact it sort of looks like they’ve got…OH NO!”

It was at that moment Piggy was striking a match. “So long suckers!” she called up toward the attic and held the flame to the paper towels. Within five seconds the fire burned up the entire length of the roll, leaving the bad guys suspended for the briefest of seconds in midair. Then they fell screaming at the top of their lungs three stories to the ground—landing on several mousetraps that had been set up. The snapping of the traps coupled with their screams of pain echoed all throughout the snowy hills. “Nice thinking,” Kermit hopped up in the air to pat Sarah on the back, “Effective but not sadistic. All right, let’s get out of here.”

Everyone turned…and found themselves facing a multiple-barreled rocket launcher. “Going somewhere, frog?” Hopper snickered, his finger firmly on the trigger, “Did you honestly think we wouldn’t come expecting you to try and run for it?”

“Uh, it doesn’t matter, Hopper,” Fozzie said quickly, “We’ve already called the cops, and everyone else has already left.”

“Move, move, move!” came the shouts as McMooch and the two remaining farmers pushed the rest of the party at rocket point toward them. “Well, it WAS a good plan,” Smiley asided to Kermit as they were all merged together and pushed back against the farmhouse. Bitterman strode over to where the Dry Bandits and Riverbottom Gang lay covered in mousetraps. “Well, tell me you at least got the diamond for all your trouble?” she demanded.

“Right here,” the Weasel handed it to her. Bitterman eyed it greedily. “Well, get over there and help shoot them all now,” she ordered them, “I want them all to suffer for this.”

“Happily,” Larry led the dazed and very upset thugs over to the group of Muppets and cocked his weapon. “Come on, Ms. Bitterman,” Kermit tried one last chance to talk reason into her and the others, “Think this over, would you really get anything from killing all of us? Ask yourself; do you really want to commit cold-blooded murder just for a hard lump of coal?”

“This, a lump of coal?” the businesswoman shoved the diamond in the frog’s face, “This is prestige, frog! This is saying I can control everyone! That’s what I’ve wanted, and that’s what I’m going to get!”

“What WE’RE going to get,” Hopper corrected her, “Stiff me and I take it all.”

“And you, Hopper,” Kermit upbraided his old foe, “Hiring these cutthroats to terrorize innocent women and children, dragging them into your schemes when they just wanted to enjoy Christmas Eve. It looks like I was wrong when I said I didn’t think you were a bad man.”

“There’s still one way out of this for you, frog,” Hopper informed him, “You agree this time to do my commercials, and they all walk out of here unharmed. If not, this’ll be a bloodbath like you can’t imagine.”

“And what makes you think you can play games with people’s lives like this, Hopper?” Kermit had to know.

“Because we’re still armed and you’re not,” the restaurateur mocked him, “So what’s less painful to you: thousands of frogs on crutches, as you say, or all your friends in pine boxes? You’ve got ten seconds to decide.”

Kermit’s head sagged as he thought over this dilemma. He looked upwards with tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry Jim,” he said softly, “I’m going to have to go back on my word.”

“Huh?” Hopper asked him.

“It’s no deal, Hopper,” Kermit put an arm around Robin, “I die with my friends. I can’t knowingly compromise my morals just to…”

“You know, you’re even more stupid than I thought, frog,” Bitterman derided him, “You and these idiotic weirdoes have got nothing right now. The Doc here just offered you your last chance at greatness, and you threw it away just like the fool your and your guardian angel Henson is. Your better days are long behind you, and you’ve got no future because nobody cares about you washed-up has-beens anymore. You’re nothing, zero, zip…”

“No they’re not!” came an upset shout from the back of the crowd, “It’s you guys who’re the nothings!”

“What?” Bitterman shoved the crowds aside. She bent down with a furious expression over Christine. “How dare you talk to me that way, you filthy urchin!” she shouted, “I own one of the world largest conglomerates! I’m one of the most powerful people on this planet!”

“And you’re still a loser!” Zachary added to his sister, “All you can care about is money! Kermit cares about others! He’s more powerful than you’ll ever be!”

“They’re absolutely right,” Alan strode up to Bitterman, looking enraged, “My children are a lot smarter than you, woman. These people know how to help those in need. They’ve done a heck of a lot for me tonight, more than you and your fat frog killer over there ever have. Because I know now that it never matters how much money you’ve got, it’s what’s inside that always matters most. You can kill us all if you want, but we’ll still be alive and well for anyone who wants to seek us out. Just like they already are to millions of people around the world. Just like Jim Henson still is. And before I finish this,” he slapped Bitterman hard across the face, “Don’t EVER insult my daughter like that again if you know what’s good for you!”

“Good, nice comeback for them,” Gonzo asided to Camilla, “That’s the good way to get them back into this story.”

Glaring at him, Bitterman stepped backwards toward her allies. “Kill them first!” she ordered.

“With deep pleasure,” Hopper and the others raised their shotguns at the Reisers…

 

[superboober]

Here's #12:





The guns fired, and the bullets came at Alan in slow motion…or was it because something was holding them back? He glanced over Hopper’s shoulders to see Yoda mentally holding the ammunition in midair. “Harm the innocents you will not!” the creature grunted defiantly.

“Oh really?” Bitterman snorted, “Well, let’s see just how much your magic tricks can handle. Full salvoes, everyone!”

All of the bad guys fired at once and repeatedly, leaving several dozen projectiles now suspended in midair. Yoda strained harder to hold them all back…

“Excuse me,” someone tapped McMooch on the shoulder just before he could fire off his bazooka for what might have been the final, fatal time. Before McMooch had even turned around, Cantus had picked him up and pile-driven him into the ground. The Minstrel then flipped through the air to the incredulousness of all watching and landed right on the Weasel’s shoulders. The Weasel grabbed a lead pipe conveniently lying nearby and swung at Cantus, but managed only to smack himself in the face. Cantus leaped off and started delivering combination blows to his foe’s chest that sent him reeling to the ground. He then ducked as the Lizard charged at him with a knife, then grabbed the reptile by the tail and swung him around over his head like a shot put. He let go, and the Lizard slammed hard into the side of the farmhouse. Hardly winded at all, Cantus turned to the rest of his group, whose mouths were all hanging open in shock. “Please forgive me,” he told them, “They made me lose my implacable calm.”

“And now it’s time I lost mine: HIIIIIIIIIIIYYYYAAAAAAAA!’ with a look of carnal rage plastered on her face, Piggy lunged forward. In quick fashion she karate-chopped both Sledge and Stiles senseless. “HIIIIIIIIITAAAAAAAAAEEE!” she roared, delivering a severe blow to Larry as he lunged forward with his hands in a strangling position. She followed it up with a kick to his face that sent him sprawling. She then kicked Bo as he swung a crowbar at her and started biting his arm. “HEEELLPP!” the crook screamed.

“Offa him!” Chuck grabbed Piggy’s hair and yanked her off Bo. Piggy turned very slowly toward him. If there’s one thing I hate it’s people who MESS WITH THE PERM!” she bellowed, “HIIIIIIIIIIIYAAAAA!”

Chuck became the latest victim of her karate chopping. Roaring, he swung his claws at her, but was forced to retreat as Piggy picked up the Snake and used it as a whip against Chuck, who after about ten whip-like blows finally keeled over with a stunned look on his face. “Gimme some aspirin while you’re out, Chuck,” moaned the thoroughly dazed Snake, “I’ve got a whopper of a headache just now.”

Piggy flung the Snake at the Pop-Eyed Catfish’s glass, sending the latter flying into the snow. “Hey, I’ve found Nemo,” Fozzie picked the fish up and shook a paw at it, “Nemo, you bad boy you, how dare you let yourself get caught by that dentist. I’ll have to punish you good.”

He started spanking the Pop-Eyed Catfish hard. Perhaps mercifully, it was at this point that the roar of police sirens filled the night air. No few than four dozen cruisers pulled up onto the front yard. “Everyone freeze!” several officers shouted at once as they ran forward, weapons drawn. “Thank God, we got the phone lines up,” Scooter breathed.

“What phone lines?” remarked the sergeant, “We got a load of disturbing the peace call from the neighbors for this house. What’s been going on here?”

“Oh thank God you’re here, officers,” Bitterman tried to sweet-talk to them, “They were just about to kill us before you got…”

‘Arrest us please!” Bo through himself into the lead sergeant’s arms, “I confess, we stole the Baseball Diamond, she’s got it in her coat pocket. Take us away! I love jail, I’ve never loved it more!”

“Shut up Bo!” Larry bellowed, kicking his partner, “Ever heard of the right to remain silent?”

“Don’t move, Hopper!” one of the officers shouted, holding his firearm on the restaurateur as he tried to sneak away in the confusion. “Max?” Hopper gasped at the sight of him, “What are you doing here?”

“Oh, I decided I needed to redeem myself for some mistakes I made,” Max had a more than satisfied look on his face as he pulled Hopper’s hands behind his back and handcuffed him, “You’re under arrest, Doc.”

“Max, how could you do this to me?” Hopper whined, “After everything I did for you?”

“Take this slime downtown,” Max hauled his former boss to several more officers standing by a cruiser. He approached the Muppets against the farmhouse. “Are any of you guys hurt?” he asked.

There was a clatter as all the bullets Yoda had been holding in midair clattered to the ground. The Jedi Master took several deep breaths to regain his composure. “Not at all, thankfully,” he breathed, “Only they who perpetrated this are. Should have known they should that those who try to hurt others only themselves hurt.”

“Take your hands off me, you fool, I’m worth a billion dollars!” Bitterman was screaming at the officer arresting her. “This is not over yet, frog!” she shouted at Kermit as she was dragged away, “I’ll get even with each and every one of you for this!”

“Ah, why bother?” the Weasel asked, “It’s all over; we’re going to get buried for this!”

“Well remember, if this makes the papers, we’re the Dry Bandits, got it?” Bo asked the cops, “D-R-I-E….”

“SHUT UP, BO!” everyone around him kicked him as they were all loaded into a cruiser. “Well, good riddance to bad rubbish, I say,” Emily commented as their foes were towed off into the night.

“Indeed,” Kermit nodded. He trudged through the snowdrifts toward the Reisers. I appreciate what you said a moment ago,” he told them, “That really does mean a lot to me and all of us.”

“Well I know now it’s true,” Alan told the frog, “We are wealthier than those creeps are. And you’ve given us all more tonight than we could have ever hoped for.”

Before the conversation could go any further, the snow began falling harder than ever. “Whoa boy,” the sergeant exclaimed, holding out his hand, “Here comes that last wave. They said this would be the worst batch of the storm. We’d best get out of here while we can.”

“Uh Sarge?” Max took out his gun and handed it to the sergeant, “Actually I’d like to stay here with these people. I know them from several years back, and I feel I owe them something. That is, if it’s OK with them,” he gave the Muppets a hopeful look.

“Sure it’s OK, but so you know you’ll probably have to sleep hung on a coat hook inside the basement door, since we’re out of room again,” Emily informed him. Max thought it over and shrugged. “Well, it’s better than having stale fruitcake with my mother-in-law,” he reasoned.

“Well then, why are we standing out here in this blizzard,” Kermit reasoned, ”We’ve still got a house to clean up and songs to sing, so let’s make our statements and finish celebrating the evening.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

A half hour later, as the storm now raged harder than ever, the house had been cleaned up miraculously to where it was almost as it had been before the home invasion had begun, right down to the spare front door that had somehow been available in the basement for them to set up (it had been a chore getting hte still sound asleep Junior out of the ktichen, but with the help of an equally convenient winch that had been readily avialble, the police had towed him out and given him and his family, once Pa had come charging back over the hills still bent on destroying the Enemies of the Kingdom, a free ride home, especially after Ma had convinced them they'd been duped into joining the attack). A brand new Christmas tree pushed down by Earl now stood in the corner with its lights glowing bright in the darkness of the den. Seemingly hundreds of special guests were now packed inside, all now listening to Susan singing on stage with several of the children. “Children carry through the street a brightly-painted star,” she was singing, “Angels gather ‘round the hearth strumming on guitars. Men of great renown and faith sing prayers on boulevards. It’s the night before Christmas…”

“But you don’t have to be an angel to sing harmony,” the children joined her for the next verse, “And you don’t have to be a child to love the mystery. And you don’t have to be a wise man on bended knee. The heart of this Christmas is in you and me.”

“Well Charlene, now are you glad you came?” Fran asked her daughter on the couch.

“I guess so, Mom,” Charlene shrugged, “I still wish it was a lot warmer than this, but…”

“But we still had to hear about it just one more time,” Robbie rolled his eyes, “It’s a shame Mr. Hess had to sleep through it all.”

He gestured at Roy, still snoring away soundly all these hours later. “YAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRR!” Scred popped up and screamed in the dinosaur’s ear. Roy remained sound asleep. “Incredible,” the alien mused, “What was the point of even bringing him here? Oh well, it’s his problem if he misses out on the fun.”

“And this is a nice change from the monotony of space,” Ploobis agreed, “For once I’m enjoying something.”

“Enjoying it as much as your time with Vazh in the broom closet during the hyperspace where you were rolling around on the floor and…?” Scred abruptly blurted out.

“SCRED!” Ploobis glared at his vassal, “It’s time you saw a phrenologist!”

“Phrenologist, your majesty?”

“The people who measure the bumps on your head!”

“But I don’t have any bumps on my head, your highness,” Scred pointed out. Ploobis seized the piñata bat and beat Scred over the head with it. “You do now!” he snarled.

While Scred howled in misery, there was wide applause as the song ended. “Thank you,” Susan made a courteous bow, “But that’s not all. Gordon’s got his own song for you all.”

Gordon approached Rowlf’s piano (which despite having been dropped on Junior’s head was remarkably intact). Rowlf started playing the song. “’Come,’ they told me, pa-rum-bum-bum-bum,” the human and dog sang together, “Our newborn king to see, pa-rum-bum-bum-bum. Our finest gifts we bring, pa-rum-bum-bum-bum. To set before the king, pa-rum-bum-bum-bum, rum-bum-bum-bum, rum-bum-bum-bum. So to honor him, pa-rum-bum-bum-bum. When we come.”

“Peace on Earth,” Gordon sang in a deep tenor while Rowlf continued with the regular Little Drummer Boy lyrics, “Can it be? Years from now, perhaps we’ll see. See the day of glory, see the day when men of goodwill live in peace, live in peace again. Peace on Earth; can it be?”

“Every child must be made aware,” the two of them sang together again, “Every child must be made to care. Care enough for his fellow man. To give all the love that he can.”

“I pray my wish will come true,” Gordon took the solo again, “For my child, and your child too. We’ll see the day of glory. See the day when men of goodwill live in peace live in peace again. Peace on Earth; can it be?” Rowlf played out the final few notes, then chimed in with Gordon on the final, “Can it be?”

“You know, this is really incongruous,” Waldorf asided to Statler, “Singing these innocent songs after having smashed the bad guys up.”

“Well, there is one piece of good news with all this,” Statler said.

“You just saved a ton on your car insurance by switching to Geico?” Waldorf inquired.

“No, the story’s almost over,” Statler told him.

Harvey was the next to take the stand. “And now folks, for your pleasure, the song that made us the biggest hit to ever play the Riverside Rest,” he announced, “Mrs. Otter?”

Alice took center stage. “We’re closer now than ever before,” she sang.

“How much alike we are; we may be long-lost brothers,” her son and his band added on backup.

“There’s love in our world and we’re showing it more,” Alice put a warm arm around Emmett as he sang “We even think the same; you know there may be others.” “Our world says, ‘Welcome Stranger;’ everybody’s a friend,” she started the refrain, book ended by “Everyone could use a friend.” “Favorite stories don’t end in our world.”

In his armchair, Doc Bullfrog rocked back and forth in content with the music. “Hiring them was the best choice I ever made,” he told his nephew and grandnephew.

“Yep, from that day on, life has been better along the river,” Kermit said, “There, now I’ve said it again just in case future generations don’t know.” He joined everyone else in the room (as well as the large monsters and penguins and forest animals still visible singing with them outside the window despite the brutally blowing snow) with the final verse: “When night looks sad upon you, go and watch a perfect sunrise. Love can open your eyes in our world.”

“Me next again, me, me!” Piggy eagerly jumped up on stage.

“Oh God, not again!” Floyd Pepper groaned.

“KNOCK IT OFF!” Piggy glared at him. She took hold of the microphone again. “Greeting cards have all been sent, the Christmas rush is through,” she crooned, “But I still have a wish to make, a special one for you. Merry Christmas darling. We’re apart, that’s true. But I can dream, and in my dreams I’m Christmasing with you. Holidays are joyful, there’s always something new. But every day’s a holiday when I’m here with you.”

“The lights on my tree,” Gonzo leaped up on stage and joined in, which for whatever reason Piggy did not object to, “I wish you could see, I wish it every day.”

“The log on the fire fills me with desire,” added Fozzie, “To see you and to say that I wish you merry Christmas…”

“Merry Christmas darling,” sang everyone in the room.

“Happy New Year too,” Piggy picked back up, “I’ve just one wish on this Christmas Eve, I wish I were with you.”

She leaped down and snuggled up against Kermit, who let her. The moment, the frog felt, was too good to ruin. “Merry Christmas, Piggy,” he told her.
“Merry Christmas Kermie,” Piggy leaned toward him again with lips puckered. Kermit quickly slid away from the kiss and crawled along the floor to where the children were listening to the music now. “You really don’t want her to kiss you, do you?” Zachary asked him.

“The thing is, Zack, if I let her do that, she’ll be whipped into a frenzy and go a lot further,” Kermit explained, “You have to be around her a long time to really understand.” He waved at the stage. “I’d like to do a special one next, Hoots,” he called to the owl, who flew over and dropped the microphone into his flipper. “This is a special one for you two,” he told the Reisers.

“Really?” Christine was impressed.

“Really,” Kermit nodded. He put both flippers around the two of them as the song began with a pipe solo from Cantus. “I don’t know if you believe in Christmas,” he sang, “Or if you’ve had presents underneath the Christmas tree. But if you believe in love, it will be more than enough for you to come and celebrate with me. For I have held the precious gift that love brings, even though I never saw a Christmas star. I know there is a light, I have felt it burn inside, and I have seen it shining from afar.”

“Christmas is a time to come together,” everyone in the room and outside the window sang, “A time to put all differences aside.”

“And I reach out my hand,” Kermit extended them to Alan behind him, “to the family of man, to share the joy I feel at Christmastime.”

He glanced up at the tree in its entire splendor. “For the truth that binds us all together,” he continued, “I would like to say a simple prayer. That at this special time you will have true peace of mind, and peace to last throughout the coming years.”

“I don’t think so, Kermit,” Zachary told him, “There’s just too much to worry about day-to-day.”

“True, there is, but just because there probably never will be complete happiness for any of us doesn’t mean we can’t still dream of it when we feel bad,” the frog said, “It does really help you feel better. And if you believe in love,” he started singing again, “that will be more than enough for peace to last throughout the coming years.”

“And peace on earth will last the coming years,” everyone finished the song with him. Strong applause greeted the end of this number. “Bravo, lizard,” Emily told him, “Truly the best one tonight.”

“FROG!” Kermit rolled his eyes. “Well, if we’re all through now…”

“Actually Kermit,” Alan raised his hand behind him, “I’d like to do one before we pack up for the night.”

“I thought you didn’t like singing Christmas songs?” Scooter inquired.

“That was earlier,” the man said, “I have a new outlook on the holidays now. And this is my way of saying thanks to you and everyone here for taking us in when we were lost—in more ways than one.”

He walked up on stage. “I’d like you to play…” he started to tell Cantus.

“Say no more,” Cantus started playing his magic pipe immediately. Alan was amazed how the Minstrel could have known his exact song, but that was now irrelevant. “The season is upon us now, the time for gifts and giving,” he sang, “And as the year draws to a close, I think about my living. The Christmastime when I was young, the magic and the wonder, but colors dull and candles dim, and dark my standing under. Oh little angels, shining light. You’ve set my soul to dreaming, you’ve given back my joy in life; you’ve filled me with new meaning.” After giving Cantus another pipe solo, he continued, “A savior king was born that day, a baby just like you, and as the magi came with gifts, I come with my gifts too. That peace on earth fills up your time, that brotherhood surrounds you. That you may know the warmth of love, and wrap it all around you. It’s just a wish, a dream I’m told, from days when I was young. Merry Christmas Christine and Zachary, merry Christmas everyone.”

“Merry Christmas Christine and Zachary,” finished everyone else, “Merry Christmas everyone.” There were visible tears of joy in the children’s eyes as the final notes flew from Cantus’s pipe. The song received an outright standing ovation from everyone. “Very impressive,” Cantus gave Alan a reassuring past on the shoulder, “As Yoda said, you are a wealthy man.”

“Well, it’s almost eleven now,” Emily glanced at the clock, “We’d better all get to bed if we want Santa to come drop stuff off for us.”

“All aboard for bed,” Seymour the elephant stuck his head out of the elevator door. Slowly groups of Muppets filed toward the elevator and a nice warm bed. In the meantime, the toys took their places under the tree, Yoda levitated into midair over the sofa, and the Fraggles walked into a large dollhouse that they’d agreed to spend the night in. Wembley immediately climbed out the window and onto the roof. “Wembley, what do you think you’re doing up there?” Gobo leaned out the window after him.

“I‘m going to meet this Santa firsthand,” Wembley declared, “If he’s everything people say he is, I think I’m going to get some good things.”

“OK, if you really want to,” Gobo shrugged, “But it’ll be a cold one out there once the fireplace dies out.”

He backed away but left the window open. Outside the forest animals could be seen retreating to the woods as the blizzard grew worse, and the large monsters and Snuffleupagus trudged toward the relative warmth of the barn. Soon the room was almost empty except for the dogs (now joined by Rowlf) continuing their poker game. With the band packed up for the night, Johnny Fiama took the stage alone and started crooning--off-kilter—“Winter Wonderland.” Alan grimaced at how bad the singer’s tune was, but at least being at the top of the hotel structure, they wouldn't be too badly disturbed by it . “Well,” he said, picking up his children from the floor, “What do you say we turn in before Santa gets here.”

“I’m still good for a while, Daddy,” Christine protested, but she was unable to suppress a loud yawn. He father picked he up gently and carried her toward the elevator. The Otters were in the car with them as Seymour threw the Up switch. “That was mighty fine singing there, sir,” Alice commended Alan, “And it was especially nice of you to dedicate it to all of us.”

“Well, like I said, you and the others did so much for us today,” Alan said, “I couldn’t think of any other way to repay you.”

“Say Ma, do you think they could get a place at the Riverside Rest with us?” Emmett asked her, “Kermit said they could use a steady job.”

“Well, they could, Emmett, although I don’t know how Doc Bullfrog’s payroll would hold out,” Alice mused, “Actually, there are other places I know that could use…”

There was a bump as the elevator lurched to an abrupt stop, sending everyone tumbling to the floor. “Whoops, forgot about that part,” Seymour shrugged, “But here’s your floor, anyway.”

He opened the door. Everyone crawled out, cringing at the sound of inordinately loud music blaring from the bathroom. Alan opened the door to see several more penguins throwing themselves in the air and marching around the tub while “Tubthumping” blared on a large Walkman. “We get knocked down,” they all were quacking, “But we get up again; they ain’t never gonna keep us down.” “Well, not everyone can be a great singer,” Emmett mused over the human’s shoulder.

“I guess not, “Alan shrugged. Then he noticed a familiar face standing in the doorway of what was apparently his own room for the night, frowning at the penguins’ loud antics. “Oh Mr. Crystal,” he called out to Doc, “I’ve been thinking, you don’t have to pay me back if you don’t really have the money.”
“Really?” Doc looked amazed, “After all those letters you kept sending me about how you were broke and…”

“If you’re in just as dire straits, there’d be no point in me making things worse for you,” Alan told him, “And besides it’s Christmas.”

“Well , that’s very nice of you,” Doc grinned, “As a matter of fact, the next invention Sprocket and I come up with that you’re interested in, just send in the receipt from the catalog and I’ll give it to you free of charge.”

“You really will?” Christine asked him as she and her brother came up alongside their father.

“Absolutely,” Doc said, “If I had customers nearly a good as you, I wouldn’t have…”

Alan grunted softly and made a gesturing motion with his finger. Doc took note of a package lying open partially under his bed—a package of a red fabric with white fur trimming plainly visible. “Oh, uh, Sprocket, could you check for rats under the bed?” he asked his dog innocently, “I thought I heard some of them squeaking just now.”

Sprocket nosed the package out of sight before either of the children could notice. “Well, best get off to sleep,” Doc said, pushing his door partially closed, “I don’t think we want to be awake when Santa gets here with the presents.”

“You have a good night’s sleep too, Mr. Crystal,” Alan waved good night to him.

“Yeah, I wonder what Santa’s bringing all of us?” Zachary mused as they continued down the hall to their own room.

“Oh, so now you believe in him again?” his father asked him.

“Well, now he seems a little more real, like he used to,” the boy admitted, “I guess I believe in a lot of things again now.”

“So do I,” Alan admitted himself, “And I know that Mom’s here with us even if she can’t make it in person,” he glanced at the window pounding against the room window, “She’ll always be with us as long as we love her. I know that much now.”

He pulled the Murphy bed down from the wall and helped his children up into it. “So did you have a good day all in all?” he asked them as he climbed in as well.

“Very much so,” Christine yawned again, “And I thought it was going to be a terrible day, but then it turned out to be…”

Suddenly, without warning, the bed sprung back up into the wall. “Oh, this is good,” Zachary remarked, “Now we can’t even turn out the light.”

There was a crashing sound as the light fell to the ground and shattered off. “Light’s off,” Alan commented, “Sleep well you two.”

He hugged them close as he closed his eyes, ready to enjoy the most restful sleep he’d had in a long time.