The phone rang in the Frost residence. Both Jesper and Alva both rushed over and grabbed the phone, arguing over who will answer it. Finally, Jesper, who was holding a candelabra, won the battle and answered the phone.

"Hello?" He responded. "...Is my refrigerator running?...I suppose."

The person on the other line, who was none other than Angus standing in a telephone booth, shouted, "Well, you better go and catch it!" before he slammed the phone on the receiver, having up abruptly, leaving Jesper confused. Angus laughed out loud, ending the day with a prank call was just what he needed.

"That's a good one." He grinned. "That's rich."

Slash just gave him a blank look, seeming unamused. He didn't quite share the same ideals as his master.

"Let's go home." Angus finally said.

They came upon a large dumpster-based mechanism with Angus opening it's hatch. Slash was about to jump in first before his master stopped him.

"Ah-ah. Fleas before beauty. Thank you." jabbed Angus.

Slash grumbled and jumped down, letting Angus hop in first.

"Come on! Hurry up, slowpoke!"

The dog jumped up and slid down inside, his barks echoing. Angus slammed on a button and down they went, plummeting fast trough the pipe's system that lead up the top of Mt. Krumpit. This was his easy, though disgusting, way of getting back into his home on top of the mountain faster and it lead to the city dump outside his cave.

"There's got to be a better way!" screamed Angus as he and his dog slid through the large pipe like a waterslide. Through zig-zag and pinball-like patterns, they landed in the dump outside of where he lived. The two landed in a pile of junk and old stuff as they climbed out of the mess and panted.

"A car would've payed for itself by now!" Angus spat before he heard rumbling from the pipe. "Oh goodie. Another load's coming down."

A bunch of red trash bags were dumped from the tube and Angus grabbed one of them, laughing excitedly. Then he caught a nasty odor and cringed.

"Ugh! What is that stench!" He said with disgust and amazement. "It's fantastic!"

He looked at the bag to see it said "Hazardous Waste", just what he needed.

"Slash, grab a bag!" He said and stood up, carrying one of the bags and made his way back home with Slash behind him. "We'll come back for the rest. Of course, when I say "we", I mean "you". It's amazing what these Toons just throw away! Oh, well. One man's toxic slugs is another man's potpourri."

Slash barked questioningly.

"I don't know. It's some kind of soup."

That night in his room, Jack stood in his pajamas, standing next to a Christmas tree. He was currently on the house phone with Maria, exchanging his ordeal at the post office with her.

"¡Oh, Dios mío!" She cried on the other end with much distress. "I can't believe it?! You actually ran into...him?"

"I did indeed. It was pretty scary, to be honest." expressed Jack.

"Did he hurt you? Did he do anything horrible and traumatizing to you?!" Maria demanded, concerned for her dear friend's wellbeing and innocence.

"No, nothing like that." Jack chuckled. "Actually, he saved me."

"Saved you? From what?" His friend didn't sound too convinced.

"When I was stuck in that machine, he just pulled me out and just left." He explained as discreetly as he could, not wanting to mention to "gift-wrapping" experience.

"You know, you sound like you're embellishing that moment, like you saying that's some kind of hero." Maria dragged on, finding it quite hard to believe that the one who hated Christmas and the Toons of Toonville would do some valiant and nice for someone. "Let me remind you that he's a psychopath. He has heartlessly desecrated the very light and purity of the entire Christmas season with his unbridled hatred. There's no way that he'd do anything for anyone."

"I'm telling you, it's true. He left me to die, I wouldn't be talking to you right now." urged Jack almost pleadingly to get his friend to see reason. Maria was about to say something, but Jack overheard her mother shouting out to her in their native tongue in the background. Maria answered something back in Spanish to her mother, which Jack didn't quite understand.

"Listen, Jack, I gotta go now. I promised my mamá I would help her bake gingerbread men tonight. Adios!" said Maria before she immediately hung up.

After placing the phone back on the receiver with a heavy sigh, he went and sat down on the couch to think. He had a lot on his mind about everything. How Angus saved his life even though he's supposed to be bad and how Christmas nowadays is not like it used to be. The poor boy wasn't so sure anymore. All these people were always buying big and expensive toys and other items, putting up pretty lights and decorations, the list was endless. Jack eyed the glowing, decorated tree in front of him and sang his little heart out.

"Where are you, Christmas?
Why can't I find you?
Why have you gone away?

My world is changing.
I'm rearranging.
Does that mean Christmas changes too?

On his letter that he was attempting to write to Santa Claus, he wrote specifically word-for-word that he wasn't sure what he wanted for Christmas this year. It wasn't that he hated getting gifts for Christmas, but all of it felt like a chore at this point.

"Where are you, Christmas?
Do you remember?
The boy you used to know?

You and I were so carefree.
Now nothing's easy.
Did Christmas change or just me?"

He looked out his window at Mt. Krumpit in the distance, thinking about what Angus was doing now.

Upon opening the door, Angus stepped in from the cold with his dog and closed the door behind him. Then he flicked on a light and exhaled a huge tired sigh from his long day today down in town. He placed the disgusting, stinking bag on a catapult and pulled the lever, sending the bag flying through the air and smack into the face of Mayor Westergaard on a large poster about him being the next Cheermeister, a perfect bull's eye in his book.

"Ooh! Sweet!" Angus remarked with a smirk.

The bag had fallen through a pipe of some sort and into a whirring contraption. Angus took off his cloak and hung it on a rack of antlers.

"~Be ever so heinous. There's no place like home.~" He sung to himself and viewed his cavern home of machinery and such. It was certainly bigger on the inside than it was on the outside. He was living in a cave in a large mountain after all. Angus stood on a platform that slowly descended. The place was so huge on the inside that he needed a means to get from one place to another quicker.

"First floor: factory rejects." He replied. "Those Toons are hard to frazzle, Slash! But we did are worst and that's all that matters. At least I scared the wits out of that little boy at the post office. He'll be scarred for life if we're lucky."

He hopped off of the platform and went behind folding screens that resembled the door to his cave. He hummed to himself as he got dressed, but then, from looking at his shadow, he looked as if we was choking on something as he made sort of gagging noises. This isn't what it looks like. He slowly can out from behind the screens, wearing a black robe.

"Funny he didn't rat on us, though." He confirmed. "Must be afraid of reprisals."

He fired up a machine and placed a screen in front of his chest, which displayed an x-ray, revealing his small heart beating. He would always check it heart daily to make sure it still its miniature size.

"YES!" He shouted with victory. "DOWN TO A SIZE IN A HALF! And this time, I'll keep it off."

His face turned into a frown before he proceeded.

"Get the stick! Get the stick!" Angus riled up Slash and throw him an object, making Slash bark and run after it. Angus chuckled. "There's no stick. I'm smarter."

As Angus walked faster, he jumped right on his bed on his back, which shook bit on impact as it was held up with springs. He leaned toward his nightstand towards his phone and answering machine, not that was truly expecting any phone calls from anyone in particular.

"Any calls?" He asked, turning on his answering machine which said automatically, "You have no messages."

"Odd. Better check the outgoing." said Angus, who flipped on another switch.

"If you utter so much as one syllable, I WILL HUNT YOU DOWN AND GUT YOU LIKE A FISH! If you'd like to fax me, press the star key."

The message played Angus's voice who recorded it to make sure that if anyone tried to call him, they would hang up immediately and leave him alone. Satisfied, Angus merely shrugged his shoulders.

"Oh, well." He switch it off and jumped off his bed, hollering like madman while swinging on a grappling line and landing in a recliner chair. "That's more like it."

He sang a merry tune while removing his socks and tossing him behind him. The socks crawled away like insects. Angus picked up an empty beer bottle and bit off the top with his strong teeth and started to eat the shards of glass. Thankfully, the inside of him was indestructible and painless as his digestive system was anything but normal.

"Excellent year." He said, reading the label on the bottle and laid back to relax. "I tell you, Slash! I don't know why I ever leave this place. I have all the company I need right here."

Deciding to have some fun, he cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted out, "Hello!"

"Hello!"

"How are you?"

"How are you?"

"I asked you first!"

"I asked you first!"

"Oh, that's really mature saying exactly what I said!"

"Oh, that's really mature saying exactly what I said!"

Angus got annoyed by his echoes response, hoping that an answer would come back differently than he was says.

"I'm an idiot!" He shouted, intending to outsmart his echo.

"You're an idiot!"

This angered Angus as he fidgeted in his recliner, agitated. Then he whispered in a soft voice, "Alright, fine! I'm not talking to you anymore. In fact, I'm going to whisper so that by the time my voice reverberates off the walls and gets back to me, I won't be able to hear it!"

He waited until his echo repeated, "You're an idiot!"

Angus felt humiliated, being outsmarted by his own echo. He sighed and grabbed the bottle he was eating, smashed it into more shards and scarfed them down.

"Am I just eating because I'm bored?" He asked rhetorically.

He moved into a fetal position in his chair and sat quietly. He has been alone all these years with the exception of his dog keeping him company, even though he's too stubborn to see that. He first met Slash when he was just a pup. He was looking for food and shelter when Angus found him. Slash took a shine to Angus and always followed him, much to the latter's annoyance. Wherever Angus went, Slash went. But when the dog helped Angus out with his shenanigans, Angus adopted him and named him. It's just been those two ever since.