A/N; Oh dear, this is a day late D: I hope you don't eat me.

I'm really sorry if the ending's rubbishy and filled with mistakes, I kinda rused through the last 2000 words this evening after revising (in my school we do January exams. Leads for fun Christmas holidays.)

Disclaimer; I don't own South Park, nor do I own Nightmare Before Christmas. I'm quite unlucky like that, really.

The figure approached him slowly and morbidly, one slow and heavy step after the other. The spirit was clouded and obscured with fog and cloaked in darkness. Craig shivered to himself, forcing his hands to stay in his pockets to keep him looking as calm as possible. It also kept him slightly warmer within the chilling atmosphere.

"K-Kenny? Is that you?" his voice sounded loud and rude, making him cringe as it cut though the dark with it's nasally tone, and he felt as though he was interrupting the phantom's sacred quiet.

He regretted calling out, having thought of the only permanently hooded person he knew. It was silly, Kenny had just left and now he felt as though he'd offended the spirit. Deep down he knew what it was that this cloaked spirit had to symbolise to him. The melancholic figure was a little more familiar to Craig than it should be to a seventeen-year-old teenage boy, but then he did live in the same village as Jesus. It wasn't so unheard of in South Park for Death to be spotted haunting his latest victim around the town.

Craig gulped as the spirit arrived before him, gliding to a chillingly smooth stop. "He-Hello," he said quietly, unsure of what else to do. Every ounce of anything within him was screaming at him to run and shrinking away and pulling back from the icy ghost, but the logic of his mind told him that wouldn't work. He kept his face down, terrified of what was in front of himself.

They stayed locked within the terrible silence for too many minutes to count, with Craig desperately trying to fight the dread crawling down his spine, taking over his body and freezing up his responses. The spirit couldn't speak- or if it could, it did it's very best not to-, he knew that, but he didn't know if he could quite bring himself to be the first to break the deafening lack of noise that thickened the air around them.

He forced himself to pull in a breath of the freezing silence suppressing the air around him and used the movement from that to force him to raise his eyes to look directly into the emptiness of the other's hood.

"You're the third spirit, of Christmas future," He stated. He didn't ask it as a question because he knew that the words he spoke were the answer.

His nasally voice interrupting and tearing through the eerie silence made him want to squirm, but the Spirit simply lifted the folds of cloth where his left arm could be, and gestured for the two of them to begin their journey.

Craig shuddered now, able to move, and walked in pace with the Spirit's gliding. He'd always found Scrooge rather whiny in this chapter- just the way he seemed to need to comment on everything and didn't understand that the Spirit would not reply really irked Craig. Craig intended to avoid sounding like that if he could help it.

They didn't seem to be walking back into South Park, it looked more as though the mist around them had thickened into the familiar buildings that Craig had grown up with and knew so well. His dread grew as they approached the cemetery. It couldn't be time for that yet, and surely it would be different for him than it had been for Scrooge? He wasn't entirely sure what the cemetery scene even symbolised as Scrooge should have known that someday he would die. But either way, Craig was fairly sure he was too young to die, and he already understood everything he had to earn here. He wouldn't die so soon, would he?

Instead of relief he felt numbness where the dread had been when they slowed completely to a stop next to the Goth kids. It was probably the only time he would be anything near glad to see them.

"No," the girl of their group drawled out with the smoke of her cigarette as she exhaled in a sigh. "I haven't heard all that much about it," she was leaning against the bench they mostly occupied, talking over her shoulder to the tall one, Ethan, who was sat, rigid, almost like a Victorian gentleman, on the bench. "Aside from what everyone else already knows."

"Hmm. I'm pretty sure Red went to class today to see if he could hear anything. We'll see what he says, I guess," It took Craig a few seconds of frowning to remember which one was 'Red', and that they weren't referring to the girl, Rebecca, that he'd grown up with. He remembered Dylan, the short one who dyed the top part of his hair red to hide his re-growth from the black dye. Red dye was vaguely cheaper than black- Craig would know- and so could be replenished more often than the black. Apparently this boy shared the nickname 'Red' with Rebecca amongst his friend. Craig was almost tempted to bet with the spirit that the Goth kids insisted that they had come up with the nickname first. A quick glance to his left at the ominous Ghost squashed all urges of being friendly.

The only other thing that Craig knew about Dylan was that He'd been held back to Craig's year, but, like the rest of his friends, was rarely, if ever, seen in class.

"No luck," Craig was the only one to jump a little when Dylan arrived, seemingly materialising from nowhere, as though he were a spirit himself. "They all know he's dead. Nobody knows why, how, they barely even know where it happened. Conformist idiots."

He slumped onto the bench with a scowl and crossed arms, leaning against Ethan and flicking a pale hand out moodily. Ethan raised an eyebrow but handed him the cigarette he'd just lit and pulled out a fresh one for himself from a little box hidden in the front pocket of his old coat.

He pulled in a deep breath of smoke as though he was breathing in life. "I swear, you guys are never making me go in for a full day ever again."

"That bad?" Henrietta drawled while turning to face them, leaning on her folded arms over the back of the bench, graceful in movement despite her weight. Craig thought it might have been down to the tears along the edges of her long clothes, and the various strands and straps that he couldn't see any point in hanging from her dress, but there was also something to the way she carried herself. It was a little like a dancing ballerina. A dead, dancing ballerina, of course.

Dylan sighed. "That asshole Garrison made us watch six episodes of three different, yet equally shitty soaps, and then compare them for plot development," Dylan sat up a little and waved his arms about, clearly impersonating Mr Garrison. "Or some bull like that. And apparently I had to put extra effort in, since I've 'been a little absent recently'. Conformist." He sat back with a huff, leaning his head back onto Ethan's shoulder and tilting his head up so he could blow smoke out to the night sky. Ethan simply regarded him with raised eyebrows, as though used to the routine of being all but sat on.

"Georgie," Henrietta spoke softly, acknowledging the fourth one as he, the youngest member of their group, joined them. He nodded to the other three without raising his eyes from the floor, moving and shuffling about like a little zombie. Dylan kicked him in the shin, and he pulled out his earplugs, spilling what sounded like loud white noise to Craig out for the rest to hear. Henrietta seemed to smile and motioned for Georgie to pass her on of the earphones that he was listening to as he sat on the ground by her feet.

"You hear anything from Broflovski's brother?"

He shook his head. "Only what we already know." His voice was very soft and gentle, almost unheard under the metallic music coming from the device in his pocket, but Craig still felt as weary of him as the others.

The group were quiet for a while after that, aside from the loud songs they all listened to. Craig had to admire how they stuck together and supported each other in their own, creepy little ways.

"Seems like he just collapsed then," Henrietta spoke with a sigh to her uncaring tone when the noise from the headphones ended. She handed them back to the kid, making it clear that she only really wanted to listen to that one song. They had important things to discuss after all, like deaths, and funerals. They weren't talking about Craig, were they?

Both Ethan and Dylan watched her move, with matching expressions of boredom. "Looks like. Heart attack, maybe? Or perhaps he was ill." Craig frowned. Was he in hospital?

Dylan sighed heavily. "Or maybe he was just so empty that he twisted up and withered away into nothing, and the adults don't know how to explain it to all of the little kids." He closed his eyes and Henrietta lips formed a twisted smile.

"What beautiful notion."

They stayed quiet for a while after that, and Craig eventually looked to the spirit, wondering if they would be moving on now. He was a little chilled to see that its head was inclined towards him. The thought that the Ghost was watching him with hidden eyes was a little more than sinister. They didn't move, so possibly there was more.

"Think we knew him well enough to go to the funeral?" Craig's stomach dropped. They couldn't be talking about him. Ethan laughed a little coldly at Dylan's question.

"Think anyone'll care if we're the only ones there?"

Dylan smirked a little. "Looks like we've got a funeral to attend, guys."

"Goodie," Henrietta hissed with sarcastic glee. She made the perfect portrait of a witch clapping her hands with the joy of a new evil plot.

Now the spirit moved, lifting its cloaked arm once more for them to continue their journey. Soon enough they lost sight of the teens to the eerie mist around them.

As they walked- or glided, in the Spirit's case- Craig tried to think who it could be that had died. He knew that as he was playing the part of Scrooge it was probably him, but his life wasn't a book, and he wasn't old enough to die. Looking at the Goths, it seemed like they were only a year or so into the future. Maybe his lesson would be someone he cared about dying? Tweek. His heart squeezed tightly and painfully as he thought of the blonde. It wouldn't shock anyone if Tweek suddenly collapsed due to the strain of…. Well, life. He stopped walking, and the Spirit turned back again to watch him stand still. He shook his head and started walking again, more to stop the phantom looking at him than anything else.

They mist swirled and thickened again, forming into more clear building-type shapes. The road was familiar; they were walking along the street outside of the school. They didn't stop, but Craig looked into the windows and spotted most of his English class looking as gloomy as the current weather. His seat was empty, he noticed, and the feeling of dread grew within him once more, but so were several others. Pip's seat was empty, and Damien's entire table seemed to be missing, and a few other people weren't there, but Craig didn't notice anymore than that because Tweek's seat was missing it's occupant, and then they'd passed the school and it was too late for him to look again. He bit his lip, a little scared. It was only a guess that Tweek was dead, but…. What if it was true?

They continued on through the streets in tense silence, with Craig's unease growing steadily with each step. The air was grey and dank , and people rushed about from place to place, desperate to get home where it was warm and they might feel a little more like it really was Christmas. Out here in the dim light the Christmas lights looked tacky and foolish. Craig wrapped his arms around himself in an attempt to stop the chill that was making him shake a little. He was glad when they began moving towards a particular, large building.

It looked very similar to a hospital and had the same clinical and sterile feel to it, only Craig found it a lot more depressing today than usual. He was confused as to where they were, they couldn't be in a hospital as the only hospital in or near South Park was Hell's pass, and it was a much larger building than this. Craig was fairly familiar with Hell's Pass, and this wasn't it.

They walked along an unending corridor, turning ever so often, and eventually moving slowly down some dark stairs. Craig gulped as they entered a room he knew all to well from films and TV shows. They were in the pathology unit of a morgue.

They moved past tables covered with white cloths covering them, a few where the cloth lay flat on the table but more often than not there was something hidden underneath, and Craig's arms tightened around himself, unsure whether to look or try and ignore the rest of the room.

He gulped once more as he saw a boy dressed all in orange. There was no cloth over him, clearly the doctors were waiting to see if he would just wake up and get up off of the trolley this time around. Craig shuddered at the idea of waking up in this place, surrounded by dead bodies on a regular basis, and his stomach lurched in pity for Kenny.

The spirit stopped moving, and Craig nearly walked into him, stopping himself from moving just in time. The idea of walking into this ghost made him feel as though someone had thrown a bucket of ice-cold water over him.

The phantom motioned with a swoosh of black cloth towards the body on the trolley they were stood by. Craig swallowed and took a deep breath. The phantom continued to point at the body.

Craig lifted his arm a little towards the nearest corner of white cloth, but stopped and left his hand hovering in the air. He trembled at the thought of seeing a dead body, let alone his own or the body of someone he knew. He slowly lowered his arm and shook his head.

"I- I can't," his eyes were the widest they'd ever been. The spirit moved his arm and pointed again. Craig shook his head. "No, I can't! There has to be some other way for you to show me? There was in the book."

The phantom turned his head a little, and fixed its nonexistent eyes onto Craig. He dug his fingernails into his arms, certain that he was about to be subject to some ungodly torture for having defied the way of the Spirits, and when the Ghost moved he squeezed his eyes shut. He blinked feeling a little silly, especially as the Phantom was merely moving the folds of material about where his head should be in a nodding gesture. He shook his head as he followed the ghost out of the unit, glad to leave.

As they left the building he looked up through the darkening mist and spotted a sign reading "Denver Mortuary." He shuddered again, and vowed never to go there again, until it was necessary.

There were less people about now, and many of them stopped in twos or threes to chat a little before rushing off into the cold again. Craig was able to catch fragments of their conversations as he passed, but he had to pull his hat off to free his ears.

"- Heard he could've had help if he'd just been with someone. His sister, or a friend-"

"Don't be silly, he didn't have any friends-"

"-Still I wonder what killed him?"

"They don't know yet, do they? Apparently he was found by the McCormicks-"

"After their lot had a say about the things he had with him of course-"

"-I always thought the McCormicks were very respectable for their position-"

"Oh they are, it's the other lot they live around that I'm worried about-"

Craig shook his head and pulled his hat back on, not wanting to hear anymore. It seemed this person had died alone, and not only that, they'd been robbed, too. They continued on and the mist thickened.

Craig finally found he fully recognised the streets he was walking along, this was the street that most people at his school lived on. He'd been here earlier with Kenny. He was too curious at this point to grumble about being taken into Stan's house again.

It was quiet. Not the confining, sharp quiet he'd been trapped in with the spirit. This was an open, chosen silence. Everyone in the room seemed to be feeling the same way, and they were almost companionable to each other for it.

"-The streets are lined with little creatures, laughing-" they followed sounds of music into the living room. They passed Stan and Kyle in the kitchen looking down and talking to Cartman and Wendy. Craig noted the Wendy gripping Cartman's hand. It was change to Stan's hand, and not a bad one either. "-Everybody seems so happy have I possibly gone daffy, what is this?" he was pleased he was still able to recognise the song.

The party of people he saw had definitely seen better days. In fact, they'd been in a better mood a few hours ago by his timescale. His eyes raked the group and quickly settle on Tweek, sat in almost the same place as the last time he'd seen him, half watching the film on screen. He immediately felt relief coursing through him, his lungs and stomach felt less constricted, and his muscles relaxed, though he hadn't realised he'd tensed them in the first place. He slowly moved closer to Tweek, trying to look subtle in front of the Phantom.

There was a knock on the door. Clyde, who was sat upside down, hanging off of the couch in his preferred way of seating, poked Token in the arm with his foot. Token paused the film, and they looked over to the doorway where Kenny walked in with Kyle, who was clearly developing a clingy side in whatever emotional plight it was affecting Craig's ex-friends, clutching at him. Token jumped up and Clyde tried to imitate his movements, but tumbled backwards off of the sofa. Tweek had sat up a little straighter.

"Oh shit, you're back already?" Clyde spoke from the floor. Kenny nodded.

"I have a few favours," Craig wondered if Kenny meant to look at him then "Look who I dragged out with me," he gestured over his shoulder with his thumb at a dark shadow following him.

The shadow lifted its head then, revealing itself as Damien. Craig was shocked by the hopeless look covering his face, his usual anger hidden behind it.

"Hey man," said Token, gently, as if comforting. Clyde nodded along with a bitten lip, clearly too scared of the antichrist to make a comment. There was quiet again after that.

"Did you…. See him?" Stan broke the silence and Kenny nodded slowly. Craig stepped slightly closer to the conversation, desperate to know who they were talking about. In the corner of his eye he could see Tweek trembling a little more so than usual.

"Yeah, I did." The look in Damien's eyes was almost painful, and he turn to glower at the floor, his breathing heavier than usual "he, uh…. He says hi," Kenny chuckled under his breath. "And um…. Well, he just wants us to move on, I s'pose. Especially you." Kenny turned to Damien and poked him in the stomach.

Craig tensed up, prepared to jump out of the way of the anti-christ's wrath in the way that he was practised from years of walking past the devil's son in corridors filled with unintelligent children who had yet to learn what would happen if they walk in Damien. But nothing happened. Damien just flicked his eyes up to Kenny's, filled with a sarcastic glare. He batted the others hand away, and moved to a corner and began to fill the surrounding area with a depressing darkness that Craig was unused to seeing around the other. Usually he made the air around himself teem with anger and hatred, if not just simple fear, but the energy for that seemed missing.

Craig pulled away from the miserable sight to the rustling coming from his left. Kenny was at the centre of the group, spreading messages from the mysterious person who held so much force over the sad atmosphere. The interest his friends held made him certain that they were definitely not discussing himself. He doubted that his death would affect people like this, as he was.

It was a stark contrast to the person the Goth kids had sat describing on their dark bench outside the cemetery. Had they been wrong? Or was it just their hatred for everything that breathed differently to themselves that lead them to see this person in such a way?

The rustling turned to shuffling, and Craig focused now on Tweek, who was fidgeting to himself, clearly trying to decide upon something. He jumped up at one point, then shrunk back into his place on the sofa. His eyes were trained on the floor, but he squeezed them shut tightly for a moment longer before jumping up again, looking decisive. Behind Tweek's semi-determined expression, Craig could quite clearly see a similar pain to Damien's loitering to the back of his eyes. This person's death had clearly hit him too, as much as the others, if not more.

Craig blinked, a little confused by the ache in his chest. Could it be that he seriously wanted to comfort Tweek? He considered the possibility that he might be looking forward to this death to give him the opportunity to help the other, and even just if he could be supportive of his friends. He slowed his thinking a little, unwilling to let himself get too emotional in front of Death.

He watched Tweek nervously skitter across the room, before being caught up by the elbow by Kenny, who seemed to be finished spreading the joy- misery would probably be a better description judging by the sombre attitude everyone, even Clyde, had now adopted- and wanted to say something to Tweek.

Craig stepped closer to the two of them, and in that time missed the start of this conversation, but managed to catch the general message. The spectre followed him, and Craig was fairly certain it wasn't because it wanted to hear the topic, which freaked him out a little.

"He's in Heaven?" Tweek spoke with a startled cry and Kenny stifled a laugh.

"I'm…. not sure if I should answer that. I might've had to get this out of Damien, or maybe he told me directly," Kenny shrugged. Craig got the feeling that Kenny didn't want Tweek to know what had happened to this person. Call him negative but it sounded like they were in hell. Maybe it was him, and Damien was just pissed off that he'd been stuck seeing Craig every time he visited his father.

Either way, Kenny didn't seem willing to reveal to Tweek what was happening to this person, did that mean this person meant something to Tweek?

So many questions. And a Ghost that refused to speak to him.

"Anyway, from what I've heard, he's sorry. And he misses you."

Tweek nodded, eyes still stuck to the floor. Kenny stood next to him for a second, before patting Tweek on the shoulder, and they both moved on.

Tweek's shoulders were tense, and he'd wrapped his arms around his body once he reached Damien.

"Um, hi," He said, tentatively. Damien sighed heavily.

"No, I'm not okay, no, I don't want to talk about it and yes it really, really sucks." Even Craig couldn't miss the hitch in Damien's voice on the second 'sorry'. "And thank you for being sorry. That makes me feel so much better."

Tweek blinked, looking a little like someone had pointed a gun at him. Well, a little more like 'insert person A here' had a gun pointed at them. Craig very much doubted that Tweek would be so calm if he had a gun pointed at him.

"Th-that's not why I'm here- I- I mean, I am- gah- sorry, but, I- I liked Pip…." Tweek trailed off, and Damien winced, clenching his fists with the look of someone who'd heard condolences far too many times.

Craig had to hold back the hand that wanted to swat his forehead as Tweek's words sunk in. Pip! He'd been sick, hadn't he? And obviously he was too nice for Hell, meaning Damien…. Would never see him again. Craig felt what had been left frozen in his heart melt and thaw with an icy chill as he realised Damien's full plight.

"Didn't we all," his voice was dry and emotionless. He wanted the conversation to be over so he could go back to brooding.

"B-but I didn't re-really wanna talk about th-that," The conversation was clearly making Tweek nervous from the amount of stuttering he was doing. Damien sighed.

"Oh, right. You're little friend. Yeah, he says hi." Damien pushed himself off of the wall, planning to leave. Tweek panicked a little and muttered what he'd been trying to say. Damien raised his eyebrows, and Craig, unseen, stepped closer to the two off them to hear what he was saying.

"What?"

"I said he's like Pip!" Tweek called out n a mad rush. He opened his eyes wide, looking at the reaction he'd been granted. Damien was stood in the same place, eyebrows raised in anticipation, as though poised, curious as to whether his next move would cause Tweek pain or not.

Craig knew he would attack Damien if he tried to hurt Tweek, be it an effective move or not.

"O-okay, so I guess I'm m-ngh-more like Pip than he is, bu-but I know how you feel. I- I think that's what I'm trying to s-say," Tweek trailed off, closing his eyes and pulling lightly at his hair. Damien leant against the wall once more.

"Kay."

"Mmm," Tweek squeaked.

That meant there were two dead then. Craig wondered if Tweek'd wanted to talk to Damien because he could trust the other to understand him.

"I didn't know you saw him that way," Damien spoke gruffly. Tweek jumped, but nodded. Damien laughed without humour. "Let him know when I next see him."

Tweek's eyes widened and a light blush covered his cheeks.

Craig could feel his pulse.

The shadow at the corner of his eyes shifted away. He turned his head to the spirit's back and gulped. It was headed for the door, and he felt a sense of ending from their movements as he followed.

"This is the last vision, isn't it?" there was no movement, but Craig knew anyway.

They stepped out, back into the cool air, and walked through and along grey streets. There was no one about to bother them, and if a person was there, they skimmed along the edge of the fog, hidden and out of site.

Craig didn't think about where they were going, the journey familiar and easy, he was busy considering the things he had seen. He only began to take in his surroundings when they reached his road, and it was there that he almost lost the spectre once more.

The shadow had stopped a few metres behind him, and now as he watched, it lifted its sleeve, slowly, gradually, to point to the cemetery. Craig shook his head, slowly as he was entrapt by the spectre's movement, but then quicker and quicker as he realised.

"No. No."

The ghost stood still, as if to force its point upon him.

"I live over there, why are you pointing there?" he spoke as though clueless of what would happen next. He wondered if it would annoy the Ghost, if it had feelings at all.

And still, the spectre stood, as tall and fierce as death.

"B-but I-" there was no use, he knew that. This spirit would have no reason to listen to him, and it wouldn't change his fate either way. He walked to the ghost, one reluctant step at a time, and followed it into the cemetery as he arrived to its side.

He must love it here, he thought sulkily, just to make himself feel better, but regretted it as soon as the ghost turned its eyeless hood towards him. He felt a chill run down his spine and spoke a silent apology.

The place had, over time, been squashed in and surrounded by houses as the ever-growing buildings of South Park demanded every inch of space they could pull up. He hoped that they would be stopping only at Pip's space, but also wondered about the second person, the one that Tweek had mentioned. Deep down he was denying to himself who it really was.

Everything here was overrun with clumps of grass hidden by the deep, undisturbed snow. It was a difficult terrain to cross, and Craig grew envious of the spirit's ability to glide.

The walls enclosing the area were falling apart, ruined by years of water melting and freezing at them, and every now and then there was a fresher patch, where snow hadn't quite been left to build up like the rest of the graves.

He could feel it was a few days after this ghost had first shown him the visions. The air was different, and the weather, too. Also, this person had been buried, if they were here to visit his grave, and the Goth children had been discussing how they would enjoy the funeral.

They stopped at a patch of disturbed snow, and Craig swallowed the lump of nerves building in his throat.

"Before I look," Craig's tone was gentle, more gentle than he'd ever let it be before, but he put that down to the fear of what he would see next "this…. Everything here. It's not what must happen, is it? Just what could happen, right?"

The spirit didn't even twitch.

"Nothing? Not even if I ask nicely? A nod would suffice. No? Okay then," he sighed and crouched down by the gravestone, its slight tilt making him wonder if someone had leant on it, or perhaps kicked it. The tilt meant that the latest snowfall had covered it with a light, thin layer, which had to be scraped at to reveal the name hidden.

His curiosity at being able to move the snow blanked the need to read the name right away. He waited until the name was completely cleared out, ignoring the familiarity of the curve to each letter, the name that he now had to read. Craig Tucker.

Craig Tucker.

He was empty as he read that. He had one year. He couldn't just have one year.

"No," he muttered "No, why would you show me this, why would you show me if it can't be helped?"

the spirit stood, stony as ever, and simply raised it arm, swapping once between the grave and himself. Craig had fallen back, onto the floor now, he didn't know when that had happened, but he looked up with wide, pitiful eyes, and begged.

He hadn't begged for anything, ever.

"Please, you can already see it, I'm different, I've changed. I want to change, I want to help, I want-" he caught himself, but then turned back to the spirit "I want to see Tweek."

The Ghost stayed, unmoving before him.

"And my mother and sister. Heck, I'll talk to my father. But I want to talk to Clyde, and Token, and Kenny, and everyone I know. Can't you see that? I want to see them, and talk to them, and let them have a good time, doesn't that count for anything?" he'd thought of something new now. he could help them, all of them, even Pip, with what he'd seen tonight.

The Spectre seemed to swell up a little, as though to take in a deep breath, and then shrunk and diminished, reducing into nothingness, drying up and twisting into the end of his bed.

He shot up and looked around at his plain, boring bedroom, and was pretty sure it was the clearest, warmest thing he'd ever seen.