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“Oh hell naw. Trombley, get your ass over here right now!” Poke padded his white, furry, bear body over toward the Christmas tree and growled. “What did I tell you about not doing stupid fucking shit.”
“This ain’t me! I swear!” He stood stock still. Or his magically new and weirdly appropriate form went upright on its stock… because he was now a pop gun.
“It was the freakin’ egg nog, I’d put cash money on it.” Q-Tip clicked himself onto a Lego brick with wheels like he was jumping onto his humvee. He rolled over to gesture a C-shaped hand at Trombley.
Christeson who -- like Q-Tip, Garza, and Pappy (less one leg) -- was a yellow-headed dude, threw his plastic arms up in exasperation and solidarity with Q-Tip.
“Trombley, where’d you get it?”
“I dunno. Like, this corner store. They had brownies and blinking lights. It was festive. Smelled good, like cinnamon and firewood and shit.”
“Dawg, you are the least observant Recon Marine ever. Didn’t your dumb ass put two and two together?”
A squeak came from their six as Rudy’s rubber chicken body loped over. He put a wing around Trombley’s barrel. “It’s all good, brother. All of us could learn a little humility by embracing our new bodies. There is always a silver lining. Just learn to keep an eye open for the magic shops.”
“You fuckhead. Those ain’t no regular brownies. And that ain’t no regular egg nog.”
“Screwby.”
“Someone find Brad and the LT.”
*
“What the fuck?” Brad mumbled. He came to feeling stiff and laying face down on what felt like a giant sheet of paper.
“My thoughts exactly,” the paper said in Nate’s voice.
Brad leaned up to read the words he was plastered against. Alfalfa went to Blacksmith Fox’s shop. He had saved enough money for a new tractor and plenty of LSA. Alfalfa put the rest of the money in the bank to save for graduate school.
He turned his head a smooth 360 degrees to convey his opinion on this situation. “Goddamn magic again.”
Nate made a noise like clearing his throat. “Brad, while I’m often open to new things, for the time being do you mind moving your hand out of…”
Brad’s molded hand was planted in the crease between Nate’s pages. Hard to know what part translated to what in this massively fucked up AO.
“Nice outfit, Bradley,” Ray interrupted, voice weirdly tinny. And coming from a kids’ sing-along radio complete with microphone. “You look like G.I. Joe and surfer doll Ken had a bouncing baby boy toy. Or, you know, if you and the LT here had offspring.”
Nate’s pages fluttered. “Let’s go round up the rest of them and figure out how to unfuck this.”
It occurred to Brad as he looked down at his tropical print shirt and his desert camo pants (This is what a Marine has to do to get desert camo?) that Ken dolls had abbreviated anatomy. His painted on face did not convey the extent of his annoyance.
*
“Dude, but what if Mr. Potato Head was here?”
“No difference,” Garza laughed. He was picking through a pile of spare blocks and parts. “Hey, a helmet,” he said quietly.
“Fuck all this noise. Look at this shit. I’m white. I am a white goddamn polar bear.”
“Poke, that’s nothing but karma. Tell him Rudy. That’s karma motherfucker.”
Gunny nickered and swished his long, brown tail. “Listen up,” he called out, nodding to Nate when the attention came up front.
All of them were assembled at the edge of Poke’s Christmas tree with two notable exceptions.
“Where are Kocher and Patterson?”
Walt piped up, pushing one floppy, velveteen ear off his face.
“They went out to grab a couple of fifths of scotch and some cigars.”
*
It took Kocher five entire minutes to stop laughing enough to stand up straight. Patterson only took thirty seconds to get himself under control. Although for Patterson, that was saying something.
“I’ll call Doc,” Patterson said, wiping his undereyes free of tears.
Kocher snipped the end off a cigar and lit it with a flourish.
“Best fucking party ever,” he grinned around a mouthful of smoke. “Festive as shit.”
*
“You motherfuckers. It’s Christmas fucking Eve. I’ve got a bowl of oyster stew piping hot in front of me. Grandparents on the other side of the goddamn table. Meanwhile you’re here playing My Little Ponies. Fucking idiots.”
Doc broke out the big guns, so to speak. Colored smoke rolled everywhere from the jury-rigged gas bomb he planted in front of the tree. They were a bottle of scotch lighter when he stomped out the door, not even checking to make sure everyone had made the transformation back into living, breathing grunts.
Brad left two minutes later with one hand trailing down Nate’s spine and the other hand checking to make sure everything was intact.