Disclaimer: If I were ruler of the world, I would own David Krumholtz (JK!) and would not be broke and hungry. The Santa Clause copyrighted by Disney and Bernard is copyrighted by the Awesome Curly Hair Foundation….a.k.a. David.

NOTE: This is mostly written in third person omniscient, but will be labeled on first person thoughts.

After working magic, quite literally, on the lock, the door 'clicked' open and he immediately threw open the door and discovered the other elf on the floor. Curtis kneeled down and moved Bernard's curly bangs out of his face. It was then, when Curtis noticed the rapidly expanding dark bruise on Bernard's left side of his face, spread out from his hairline down to his cheekbone. There was even a small dry stream of blood above his eyebrow, where the skin broke apart.

***Bernard***

At the touch of Curtis's wavering fingers, Bernard's eyes flittered open. His left eyelid demanded to stay shut, detesting the presence of pain coursing through its skin. He looked at the floor, awaiting the lasting effects of the daze his mind held over his eyes. Then, he diverted his sight up to the person who revived him.

"Cur-Curtis!" he stammered, his head pounding increasingly stronger every second. The younger elf quickly covered Bernard's mouth and cautiously looked around the vacant office. Curtis leaned over Bernard and started untying the tinsel bonds that overlapped numerous times, all the while, crushing Bernard's chest. Then, he moved onto the lights tightly wrapped around Bernard's quickly paling wrists. He looked back over at Bernard's face, seeing Bernard wince at the rushing feeling of blood flowing back through his almost numb hands.

"Alright Bear," using the nickname Bernard hated, "I'm going to help you up and we're going to get out of here. But you have to be quiet, alright?" Curtis asked as he draped one of Bernard's over his shoulder. Bernard bit back a cry as he slowly was lifted to a low crouch, mostly leaning on top of Curtis. He shifted a little, so as his feet were more planted and sturdy under his body weight.

Curtis looked around the office and started edging towards the door. As they were a few steps away from the door, faux laugher was emitted from the other door with the sounds of heavy thuds, all getting closer and closer to the door. Curtis's head quickly shot to the direction of the incoming noises like a deer in a pair of headlights. A soft nudge in his ribs brought him out of his reverie. He looked over at Bernard who looked just as alarmed as he did.

"Curtis, go get Santa. Tell him about everything that going's on. Go get him; go get help," Bernard swung his arm off of Curtis's shoulder and crept over to the great desk, leaving Curtis in a state of shock.

"CURTIS! GO!" Bernard commanded as he sat down in the red velvet chair. He looked back at Curtis's confounded, then retreating figure, awaiting the big confrontation with Mr. Rubber.

The man in question slammed open the decorated office door with a hearty laugh, followed by his eerily smiling soldiers. Bernard quickly turned the chair around, grabbed the still steaming hot cocoa, and splashed it in the unexpectedly shocked Santa's face. He heard the other door softly close on the other side of the room. He looked back up at the piping red-faced rubber Santa, before the man started screaming obscenities and orders at the metal soldiers to capture Bernard, which in Bernard's state, wasn't very hard to do.

Bernard, once again, felt the heavy grasps of the two dimwitted soldiers on his already aching arms. Bernard looked up at the new Santa just in time to be slapped by a giant rubber hand, hard. A new wave of dizziness hit him as he turned his head down to the floor and closed his eyes, but not before he saw the bundle of discarded tinsel handed to Santa by a third soldier.

He felt the soldier to his left catch the tossed tinsel and start tying him back up with the other soldier. Bernard looked back at Santa, who was grinning insanely happy with a dark shadow overlapping his cheerful face. It was scary enough to give even Bernard nightmares.

When the soldiers seemed to be finished, Mr. Rubber gave another hearty laugh which gave Bernard shivers.

"Bernard, Bernard, Bernard. What am I gonna do with you? I can't have an elf that lies to all my other elves…right before Christmas!" he spat in Bernard's uninterested face, "And since I'm Santa, I have to do something about that. I can't exactly kill you,"

-Bernard's heart stopped, his lungs the same-

"…But I'll have to worry about you after my trip. We can't forget the children! They must be punished! Did you know every single child was bad this year? Even that Sally girl…" Bernard wasn't going to listen to that.

"Don't you even dare start talking about how bad the kids are, Fake Santa! You're one to be talking! You're not even the real Santa!" Bernard's rant was cut short by another eerie, full laugh and by a long piece of cloth jammed in his mouth. He tried to finish yelling, but the Santa just pulled the ends of the gag tighter and tied them behind Bernard's head.

Santa just smirked and harshly patted the side of Bernard's face, the bruised side of Bernard's face. With that, the two soldiers grabbed Bernard and dragged him back over the closet. The deposited him the same way as they did earlier, once again slamming the door and leaving him in darkness.

'And I didn't even have breakfast this morning,' he thought as a small rumble in his stomach announced itself.