Preface: Hello, hello, hello! It's been quite some time, hasn't it? I decided to take an extended break because of school, but now that I have time to write again, I will focus my efforts into finishing Minecraft Maniacs: Light and Dark. But for now, enjoy this short story inspired by Element Animation's "Your Door Was Locked" - this one is set immediately after last year's holiday story, The Perfect Gift, and features a face we haven't seen in a while...
Holiday Heist
[Character Selected: Danny]
[Current World: Minecraftia]
[Current Location: Public World, Maniacs' House]
Christmas. That special time of year. The cold is coming, the fire is burning, the TV channels are running holiday specials, stuff's being baked in the kitchen…never gets old, does it? You probably heard of a holiday party we went to a few days beforehand with some of our friends from across the multiverse, but that wasn't all the excitement we experienced this year.
It all started on Christmas Eve. Spawny, Spawnette, and Pork Chop had all gone to bed, so Liam, Kevin, and I were putting presents down under our Christmas tree. As usual, all the chests in Minecraft had turned into gift boxes, but we decided to use shulker boxes instead to make transportation easier.
"Okay…this one's for me, from Kev," said Liam as he placed down another present. "Man, if only we could open these now."
"Don't get any ideas," Kevin responded. "Santa's still watching." He put down yet another present and wiped his forehead, looking at our work so far. "Besides, they'll all be here in the morning."
There was only one more left, a bright red shulker box with a present we had gotten just for the rabborgs. I did the honors of placing it down, and then we all stepped back to admire our work. The Christmas lights strung up, the snowflakes hung in item frames, and our bright tree with the presents all around gave off an atmosphere that was unmatched. "It might not be like the party we went to the other night," I said, "but I bet it's still gonna be a mighty fine holiday."
Just then, we heard a knock at the door. "Must be carolers," said Kevin as we walked up to open the door. Sure enough, standing right at our doorstep was a troupe of eight villagers, dressed in the warm blue clothes that was traditional of tundra biome inhabitants and holding red books. And in the middle was one wearing the traditional gray goggles of an armor that we would recognize anywhere.
"Merry Christmas," said our old friend Smith. "I'm here to spread cheer…and give a warning."
"Warning?" said Liam, confused. "What warning?"
"If you listen to our song, you will know," answered Smith. Then he cleared his throat and began singing. "I'll tell you a story about a man…there's no one else quite like him across the land…this man has lots of presents in his hands…" Then the rest of the villagers came in with, "...taking them from your house was his plan!"
You might not recognize the song, and if you don't, search up "Element Animation Your Door Was Locked" on YouTube. You won't regret it. But we did recognize the song, so we just watched and hummed along.
When the villagers finished, we applauded them. "Nice performance, Smith," I said, "but look, I know Santa isn't a good guy to the villagers, but there's no way he's gonna steal our presents."
"Maybe not," Smith admitted, "but just in case, we're gonna sing this song to everybody in your town."
"You sure? Christmas is tomorrow, and this might take you all night," Kevin pointed out.
"It's better to be safe than sorry," Smith responded. "And I'll be coming back tomorrow to be extra sure!"
"Whatever works for you, I guess," said Liam with a shrug. Then he remembered something. "Oh, that reminds me, we have something for you." He reached behind himself and pulled out a brown shulker box.
"Yay! My first ever present from a player!" said Smith, happily. "Yay!" his villager troupe repeated. Smith placed down the shulker box and opened it up, then pulled out the wooden sleigh inside. "Hooray! A sleigh! I can use this to try to catch Santa tomorrow!" he said, gratefully. "Hooray!" the troupe repeated again. "And I have something for you, too!" Smith added. He reached out and pulled out an ender chest with the glint of an enchantment.
"Ooo," I said, taking it. "What's the enchantment on this thing?"
"If you put something in it, it goes into every ender chest in the world!" explained Smith. "But you can only get that something if your own ender chest is empty," one of his troupe members added.
"Well, this'll make sharing things easier," I said. "Thanks, man,"
"You're welcome," said Smith. "Now, I must get going! I have a message to spread!"
"Happy holidays," said Kevin. We waved goodbye and then he shut the door. "Well, at least he appreciated our gift," he said.
"And ours might come in handy someday," said Liam. He stretched. "Well, what's our game plan tomorrow? I always have to wait for my parents to wake up a bit before opening presents."
"Same," I said, and Kevin nodded as well. "How about we log on while we're waiting and open the gifts here then?"
"Sounds like a plan," said Liam. "Now that that's settled, I'm logging off for the night."
"Me too," I agreed.
"You guys go ahead. I'm gonna keep working on something," said Kevin. He turned towards a command block in the corner of the room and pulled out a diamond pickaxe enchanted with Efficiency and a fishing rod. "I'm gonna try to recreate that cool pickaxe-fishing rod combo we used back in the Corruption."
"Man, that was crazy," I said, somewhat nostalgically. "Well, good luck on that. Merry Christmas!" Liam and I waved goodbye and logged off, leaving Kevin to his own devices.
[BGM: Carl Zittrer, Paul Zaza - Ralphie's Revenge & The "F" Word]
And then came Christmas morning. And boy, what a Christmas it was.
We all logged on at the same time. We heard snoring coming from upstairs, indicating that the rabborgs and Pork Chop were still asleep. And then we turned around, looked at the Christmas tree…and screamed so loud, it's a wonder the others didn't wake up. "The presents! They're gone!" shouted Liam, looking over the empty floor in confusion.
"And so is my command block!" shouted Kevin, looking in the corner. We all froze. "You don't think…"
"No, it can't be," I said, still not wanting to believe that a Santa villager really did rob us blind. "Let's check upstairs. Maybe they got naughty and opened the gifts early."
Sadly, that turned out to be a pipe dream, because when we slowly crept upstairs to check on our sleeping allies, the only presents there were the Christmas-themed chests. "So Smith was right all along," Kevin said grimly. "Santa robbed us."
Liam closed his eyes, thinking for a moment, then opened them again. "Maybe there's still a chance," he said. "Maybe we can catch Santa and get our presents back."
"It's worth a shot," I said. "But we can't let the rabborgs know."
"Agreed," said Kevin. Just then, we heard Spawny stirring. He was about to wake up any second now.
"Shoot, what do we do?" said Liam, panicking. Quickly, Kevin pulled out a music disc, ran to the jukebox in the corner, and put the disc inside. A lullaby version of the Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies played, and Spawny went back to sleep.
"There, that should give us an hour or so," said Kevin. "But what about the pig?" He pointed to Pork Chop, fast asleep on a small carpet just for him.
"You're right. He might be able to sniff out our culprit," I said. I walked over, knelt down, and gently shook Pork Chop to wake him up. The pig opened his eyes, stood up, and yawned and stretched. "Hey, boy. How would you like to save Christmas?"
Pork Chop gave a confused oink and decided to walk downstairs. Unsurprisingly, he squealed when he saw the lack of presents, but we quickly shushed him when he went to alert the rabborgs. "We can't let them find out," said Liam. "But do you think you can sniff out our perp?"
Pork Chop closed his eyes and sniffed the air. Then he pointed towards the doors and ran towards them. "Looks like he's still here after all!" I said, hope rising in me. We all ran outside towards the town square, and sure enough, near the fountain was a villager dressed in a red robe and hat, piling presents into a big sack that was just as red. Next to him was a sleigh that was similar to the one we gave Smith the night before, pulled by a normal villager with a bright, red nose akin to the most famous reindeer of all. "Freeze, you Father Christmas faker!" I shouted. Quickly, he grabbed the sack and hopped onto the sleigh, and the red-nosed villager took off before we could lay a finger on either of them.
"Bah!" said Liam, frustrated. "Humbug! There's no way we can catch them with that kind of villager-power!"
"Maybe not on our own," said Kevin. "Buuut…" He pointed to our left, and coming down the snowy street was another sleigh, pulled by six villagers. And riding the sleigh itself…
"Smith!" I shouted, happily. "You were right! Villager Santa is a thief!"
"There's still time to fix things!" Smith said. "Need a lift?"
"Do we!" said Liam. "Aaaand…" He eyed the ropes holding the sleigh-pulling villagers and then eyed Pork Chop.
"Oh, I see what you're thinking," I said, and Pork Chop gave a determined nod in agreement. Next thing we knew, we had all boarded the sleigh and Pork Chop was leading the sleigh-pullers. "His nose might not be red and shiny, but it can sniff like the best of them!"
"On Farmer, on Fisher, on Mason, on Cleric!" said Smith, just like the real jolly old elf himself. "On Butcher, on Fletcher, on Nitwit, on Pork Chop!" And then, we were off!
[BGM: Carl Zittrer, Paul Zaza - Jogging To School/Feet, Do Your Stuff!/Don't Look Back]
We caught up with the Santa villager just as he was robbing another house. "Drop the presents, 'Santa'!" shouted Liam, adding air quotes to the last word. One again, the Santa villager hastily hopped onto his sleigh with his sack, but this time, he took out something that caught Kevin's eye.
"My command block!" he shouted as the Santa villager activated it. Blue swirls appeared around the red-nosed villager, who then took off. "He used it to give his puller super-swiftness!" said Kevin.
"Well, we've got plenty of villager-power and a bit of pig-power!" said Smith. "Hi-ho!" The villagers and Pork Chop all began running after the Santa villager. With their combined might, we kept speeding up more and more, and in no time we had just about caught up with our thief.
Unfortunately, by then we had left the confines of our town and were out in the wilderness now. "Great. I don't recognize any of this," I said, watching the trees pass by.
"Well, he's still right there," said Kevin, "and I have just the thing to stop him." He pulled out a fishing rod, and attached to it was an enchanted diamond pickaxe. "I knew it was worth staying behind to finish this!" he said, winding up his pickaxe rod. When he cocked his hand out, the pickaxe went flying and landed on one of the snow-covered grass blocks before being reeled back in. With his speed, the red-nosed villager didn't trip, but he did slow down a bit.
"That worked! Keep it up!" said Liam. And so, as we continued to chase the Santa villager through the different twists and turns, Kevin kept casting his pickaxe rod, creating more and more one-block trenches to slow down the red-nosed villager.
Eventually, we found ourselves right in the middle of a straight-up tundra biome. On the bright side, we were extremely close to catching the Santa villager. Up ahead, Pork Chop was preparing to jump up and chomp down on the thief's head. "Finally," I said, excited. "Your holiday heist ends here!"
"Not so fast!" said the Santa villager. He pulled his stolen command block back out, and when it finished pulsing, we heard hissing sounds…right above us.
"TNT!" cried the sleigh pulling villagers. Three blocks of it, all falling towards us. They and Pork Chop quickly turned to the left and ran away from it, but unfortunately we didn't get far quick enough, because when they blew up, we all went flying. The villagers and Pork Chop became detached from their harness, and the sleigh itself came apart from under us.
We all landed on the snow. "Oof!" I grunted as I hit the ground. I picked my head up and looked around. "Everyone okay?" I said.
"As good as we can be," said Kevin, picking himself up. "But I think the sleigh is done for."
[BGM: Carl Zittrer, Paul Zaza - When Things Seem Hopeless...]
I sighed, despondently. "Yeah…" I walked over to Smith and helped him up. "Sorry about what happened."
Smith also gave a despondent sigh. "The first present I ever got from a player," he said, "and now it's gone." I patted his back, comforting him. "And now I don't think we can catch up with Santa."
I looked around. We really were in the middle of nowhere. That doesn't bode well for us making our way back home, I thought. Then a more positive way of thinking came to me. "But there's not really anywhere for him to hide," I pointed out. "Whaddya say? Wanna try to find him?"
Smith wiped away a tear. "Okay," he said. "But how?"
I looked over at Pork Chop. The pig was as mighty as ever, even in these frigid conditions. "Where'd he go, boy?" The pig sniffed the air for a bit, then began running. "Onward and upward!" I said, pointing at the pig.
[BGM: Carl Zittrer, Paul Zaza - Black Bart Bites The Dust]
We all began running as Pork Chop sniffed around, looking for the culprit. And eventually, we came across a house made of snow blocks. "Just like in the song," said Liam. "And there's no door, either, But we can always dig him out…" He cracked his knuckles and prepared to dig through the snow, but when his fist impacted, nothing happened. "Great. He put us in Adventure mode."
"Ah, did you forget the other way to get rid of snow?" said Smith. He and his villager troupe all pulled out torches and walked up to the house. With bated breath, we all watched as the torches did their work…only to reveal a wall of obsidian. "Oh. Well that dampens things a little."
Kevin pulled out his pickaxe-rod and we stared at it. "I have no clue if this is going to work," he admitted, "but it's better than nothing." With not a moment to spare, he wound up and cast the pickaxe rod. We all held our breaths as the pickaxe flew towards the obsidian wall…and gratefully sighed as the resulting block fell away.
Barely a moment later, we were barging into the house, cornering the Santa villager and his red-nosed accomplice. "Ho-ho-ho, this is the end of the road," I told the thief.
Quickly, Smith and his troupe detained the two culprits, holding onto them so that they couldn't break free. Kevin then grabbed his command block and used it to bring us back to Survival mode. "Say, Danny, you still have that enchanted ender chest?" he asked.
"You bet I do," I said, pulling out Smith's gift to us from my inventory. I set the magic chest down, and Liam and Kevin grabbed the red sack and dumped as many presents as they could inside. "Now we just have to alert everyone," I said.
"On it!" said Kevin. He walked back up to the command block and typed up a message:
"Attention all townsfolk: your presents have been stolen, but we have just recovered them and are beginning to distribute them back to you. Check your ender chests!"
We then spent the next five minutes or so making sure every present got to its rightful place, with the exception of our own - we put them in our inventories to put them back ourselves. When we were finished, Liam took the sack for himself. "So, what are we gonna do with these guys?" he asked, pointing at the Santa and red-nosed villagers.
"Oh, we will take care of them," said Smith, nodding. "You four head home and enjoy your Christmas!"
"You sure?" I asked, and Smith nodded again. "Well, if you're gonna make sure they get what's coming to them, you're gonna need proper transport." I eyed Liam, who nodded and placed down his tried and true crafting table. Four planks and two blocks of wool later, and Smith received his second present that a player ever gave him.
"Oh, thank you!" he said, triumphantly placing his new sleigh down. "But how will you get home?"
Liam tapped the command block. "We've got it covered!" he said. "Good luck, Smith! Happy holidays!"
[BGM: Carl Zittrer, Paul Zaza - Glorious, Beautiful Christmas]
"Happy holidays to you, too!" said the happy villager. And with that, Kevin typed in the teleport command that brought us and his command block back home. We then hastily put all the presents back under the tree just as Spawny and Spawnette walked down the stairs.
Spawny rubbed his eye. "(Why didn't you wake us up?)" he asked, still somewhat tired.
"Uhhh…" we all said at once. "We…needed more time to get ready!" said Kevin.
The rabborgs gave us a suspicious look, but shrugged. "(Oh, it is Christmas!)" said Spawnette. "(Let us not dwell on it!)"
"(You said it, sis!)" said Spawny, and the two excitedly ran to start opening their presents.
Relieved, we all sat down on the floor. "All's well that ends well, I guess," I said, wiping my forehead.
"And God bless us, everyone!" said Kevin, and we all chuckled. "Oh! Liam, here's that present you wanted to open last night."
"Ah, thanks, man," said Liam. Eagerly, he opened it up to find…"Netherite shovels! Enchanted with Efficiency!" And we ended our holiday adventure by jumping up and shouting "Yeah!" like one of those freeze-frame events.
If only we actually did freeze at that moment. But oh well. It's the holidays.
The End
Credits
Voices:
Willy Blanq - Liam
Neville Napoleon - Kevin
Alfred von Any - Danny
Dan Lloyd - Villagers
Dee Bradley Baker - Pork Chop
Damien Laquet - Spawny, Spawnette
Music:
Element Animation
Carl Zittrer
Paul Zaza
Additional Music:
Element Animation - Your Door Was Locked (Trailer and Credits Music)
Written by: Alfred von Any
Edits by: Jesus von Any
Postface: And that's all there is to it! Hope you all enjoyed and have a safe and happy holidays! Stay diamond, everyone, and I'll see you in the new year!
-Alfred
~Minecraft and everything related to it are properties of Mojang Studios and Xbox Game Studios. No copyright infringement with any of these companies nor financial gain was intended in the making of this story. Any resemblance to real-world people or events are either coincidental or done fictitiously.~
