Christmas Story 2005

Did you see the movie “A Christmas Story” again this year? The one where Ralphie was warned again and again that he would put his eye out, and darned if he didn’t think he had? Well, what if that story premise was written, say, in the style of military action books, or even bodice ripper? Here’s a try:


Chesney grimaced as the Land Rover jolted over yet another boulder. He had been tracking the Afghani warlord who had kidnapped Marissa Varda from the ladies room during their dinner at Les Chivalier in Kabul for days. Endless hours driving through the rough Afghan countryside, sleeping when exhaustion overcame him or at the villages where he squatted by the open fires, searching for hints of his prey. Now he sensed that he was close. The hair on his arms was standing, which always happened when action was near.
Parking the Land Rover, he checked his weapon to insure the action was working smoothly and a full magazine was inserted. He crawled over the rocks and looked down onto the campsite of the kidnappers. He saw two men on sentry duty, while another was watching Marissa as she tried to cook their breakfast in the firepit. He leopard-walked around the rugged ridge to the first sentry. Grabbing a handful of pebbles, he tossed them into the sentries lap. The man’s head jerked up in surprise as he looked wildly around for the source of the rocks. Chesney let his breath out with a sigh and gently squeezed the trigger, putting the sentries eye out. Quickly he got to his feet and walked nonchalantly toward the second sentry, hoping to be mistaken for the first guard. The sentry glanced at him, then did a double-take and looked harder. “Harzi?” he asked. A snap shot quickly put his eye out. As he fell, his AK-47 clattered to the ground and the third kidnapper leaped to his feet. “Freeze!” shouted Chesney. “I’ll put your eye out!” Babbling in Afghan, the kidnapper said “Take what you want, just don’t shoot”. “My lighter”, said Chesney. “Wha-what?” stuttered the thug. “My lighter!” Chesney shouted “she borrowed my lighter to have a quick smoke in the ladies room!” Reaching into his pocket, the kidnapper extended a trembling hand with a purple Bic lighter. “Here, mister, it’s yours” Taking the lighter, Chesney clicked it and a small flame erupted. “Good. It’s hard to get purple ones.” He turned and strode back to his Land Rover. Within minutes a dust trail was the only sign of his departure; a happy man. It was Christmas.

Bodice ripper:

Elena spun to escape the grasp of her attacker. As she moved toward the safety of the forest, Blaine’s grasping fingers closed on the sleeve of her blouse, ripping it from shoulder to elbow. The sight of her flesh inflamed him even more, and he shouted “get… you vixen!” as he leapt to tackle her. Scooping up a twig, she spun to her former lover and put his eye out. Screaming, he fell to the ground, clutching his head. Elena quickly moved to the berry-gathering bag she had dropped when attacked and removed a small penknife. Slicing Blaine’s right ear off, she smiled in delight as she lifted her dripping trophy into a Ziploc© bag she carried for times like this. Exaggerating the sway of her hips as she walked away, she left Blaine writing in the forest. It was Christmas.

For those of you sadly lacking in imagination (for anything not Italian, Holly) who snidely ask “Well, what did Blaine write in the forest, hmmm?” the following transcript is provided (yes, it was supposed to say ‘writhing’, not writing):

“That bitch put my eye out! Somebody call my publicist! I want a black eyepatch and maybe a tobacco and forest green one. Both with a teardrop diamond in the lower corner. This could be a book, hell a movie. Is no one listening to me!?!?” Since Blaine was writing this with a bloody twig on the forest floor in large letters (his eye had been recently put out), a group of Seattle environmental activists who also critique emails for common typo’s quickly filed a lawsuit for destruction of more than one half acre of pristine (well, not pristine there was blood all over. Horror!) forest land. Although they won the lawsuit, the rigidly conservative asshole judge only granted them critical rights to the upcoming movie, which used the bodice ripping scene as a trailer to entice millions of people to watch this overly violent piece of trash. Blaine went on to play James Bond in “84 Bond Movies Are Not Enough”. Everyone agreed it was the eyepatch that got him the part. He was so overjoyed with his film success that he had his other eye put out, which turned out to be a stupid career move.

The End


Copyright 2005 Sneezewhackle Inc.