Everyone was getting ready for the night.

"So remind me again," Grian said, "why are we going to look at Christmas lights on the first week of December, and not like, closer to Christmas?"

"Good question," George answered. "One of the very few perks of living in a hyper zealous town is that Christmas is always a big deal. Most people have already decorated their houses so whether we go tonight or in three weeks doesn't really matter."

"Plus I got my dad's truck tonight," Sapnap added as he dumped a pile of blankets on George.

"Hey!" Clay fussed at him while Tommy laughed his ass off at George untangling himself.

"AH what happened I missed it?" Tubbo slid back in the room and held up his mug. "I was making hot chocolate."

"oh yeah sure help yourself." A6d rolled his eyes.

Tommy jumped up. "Oh my god Tubbo can I have some?"

"Yeah sure- you take this one. I'll be right back," Tubbo disappeared back into the kitchen.

"don't use all the bag of marshmallows!" a6d called after him before shaking his head.

"Hey a6d where are your parents?" Wilbur asked.

A6d shrugged. "idk I didn't ask. probably a party or something. unlike me they actually have lives here in America and things to do on a Friday night."

"Oooooh that's rich. So I'm chopped liver?" Sapnap asked.

"chop- chopped liver what is that? I don't understand," a6d frowned.

"Nevermind." Sapnap rolled his eyes and sighed.

"Wilbur I thought you would wear something festive," Techno half-whined from his seat next to Wilbur.

"What do you mean? I am completely festive. Look, my beanie is red."

Wilbur titled his head into Techno's face to show him his beanie.

Techno leaned back. "Alright, alright, but you always wear that. It doesn't count as festive."

"It does when I wear a green sweater with it instead of a yellow one!" Wilbur argued.

"Wait that's green?" George asked.

"What if you wore like a Santa hat instead of that though?" Techno pleaded."Come on, I bet it would look great with that sweater."

"I am not taking this beanie off." Wilbur crossed his arms. "It's part of my whole look."

"Ok that's true but you could wear both?" Techno bargained.

"You want to just put a Santa hat on top of this?" Wilbur raised his eyebrows.

"Yes."

"Hey I have an extra pair of reindeer antlers." Fundy offered.

"Shut up, furry," Tommy chided, "those don't even look good on you. The fox suit was more fitting."

"Excuse you, I look adorable in these," Fundy replied in a very offended tone. "And you couldn't pull off a look like this so you're wearing that red sleeves shit and the dumb handkerchief around your neck."

"DUMB?! THIS IS NOT DUMB YOU LITTLE BITCH THIS IS A VERY SIGNATURE STYLE THAT YOU WISH YOU HAD! OH MY GOD YOU MAKE ME SICK ALL YOU WEAR IS DUMB BLACK HATS AND FOX SUITS AND YOU TRY TO MAKE FUN OF MY SENSE OF STYLE!"

Tommy paused to scoff.

"YOU DON'T EVEN COME CLOSE STUPID FURRY!"

"FOR THE LAST TIME I AM NOT A FURRY STFU!!!! AT LEAST I CAN GET IN THE HOLIDAY SPIRIT YOU LOOK LIKE A LOST COWBOY!"

"OH FUCK THAT! HOLIDAY SPIRIT?! I'LL SHOW YOU SOME GODDAMN HOLIDAY SPIRIT!!" Tommy snatched the spare reindeer antlers and stuck them on his head angrily. "I CAN PULL OFF ANYTHING YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

There was a moment of silence in which everyone took in the picture of angry little Tommy wearing decorative antlers with flashing lights on them.

"Oh my god, Tommy." Wilbur gaped. "You actually look adorable in those!"

"I am always adorable shut the fuck up. Everyone loves me because of how good-looking I am." Tommy put his hands on his hips proudly.

"How does it feel to be proved wrong arsehole?" He asked Fundy.

"You have a hot chocolate mustache, dipshit." Fundy answered smugly.

"OH FUCK YOU!" Tommy furiously wiped the hot chocolate stache off his face and sat down in a huff. He had evidently elected to keep wearing the antlers to prove his point about style.

Fundy happily took his win and left to go make his own hot chocolate.

Techno turned back to Wilbur. "So you'd wear a Santa hat if I found one?"

Wilbur nodded, "Yeah sure, like Tommy I also look adorable in everything."

"Damn right." Tommy muttered.

"Wait so why are you fine with it now?" Sapnap asked from the couch where he was sharing a blanket with a6d.

"Because if I have this under it then I still look good in case the first hat falls off," Wilbur answered.

"But your hair looks great even without a hat," Fundy said.

"Nah I like having a hat," Wilbur was firm in his decision.

"OK that's fine with me." Techno stood up. "French guy, do you have any Santa hats here?"

"upstairs closet," a6d gestured lazily.

"OOH OOH wait me too!" Grian jumped in. "Can you get one for me also?"

"Yeah me too," Mumbo said.

"YES ALSO ME. ME ALSO." Tubbo announced loudly, walking in the room trailing marshmallows behind him.

Then he looked around. "I don't really know what you're talking about, I just wanted to join in."

"I'm getting Sanata hats," Techno answered curtly. "Do you want one?"

"Nah, I have a little elf hat." Tubbo sat down with his mug of seemingly just marshmallows. "Oh wait. Where IS my hat? Goddammit it I must have left it in the kitchen."

Techno left on his urgent quest for Santa hats upstairs and Tubbo left momentarily to find his elf hat. Tommy took this opportunity to steal some of Tubbo's marshmallows.

He caught them staring. "What? He would give them to me if I asked, I'm just saving myself the trouble of asking."

Wilbur chucked to himself and Clay poked George under their shared blanket. "Why don't you share your marshmallows with me George? Sharing is caring."

"Aha so you can distract me and eat all of them? No, I'm only falling for that once." George tugged more of the blanket over himself, which started a fight between the two over who had more blanket space. It went on for several minutes.

"HEY HE'S RIGHT!" Sapnap burst out. "Sharing is caring."

A6d eyed him. "are you sure you're sober enough to drive us around on the back of the truck?"

"Sober?" Sapnap yawned. "Of course I'm sober. All I had was eggnog."

"what is even in eggnog?" a6d asked.

Sapnap leaned back on the couch and stretched out his arms. "Idk. Eggs."

"Isn't there alcoholic eggnog?" Grian asked suspiciously.

"Idk maybe." Sapnap was snuggling into the couch now.

A6d laughed a little and then glanced at Skeppy and trailed off.

"what's up Skeppy? you've been moping."

"I'm not moping," Skeppy said grumpily.

"No talk I angy," Sapnap muttered, falling asleep.

Clay started wheezing and a6d snorted.

"I FOUND MY HAT!!" Tubbo came sliding back into the room on his socks.

"Hey who ate my marshmallows?"

Everyone looked at Tommy, who said, "You had that much. I d- huh I don't know why you guys are all looking at me like I'm guilty because I AM NOT.

Um SKEPPY TELL US WHY YOU'RE UPSET-"

Skeppy rolled his eyes. "What are we waiting for guys? Why haven't we left already?"

A6d poked Sapnap, who was snoring, "because this idiot has the truck keys?"

Mumbo did a headcount. "Let's see, Fundy's in the kitchen, Techno's upstairs... Bad isn't here."

"Exactly," Skeppy nodded. Then he said half to himself, "he's never late for stuff. He was supposed to be here awhile ago."

"don't you normally drive him?" a6d asked.

Skeppy sighed. "Yeah obviously I wanted to do that, but he just got this new car so he said something about making it worth it for his parents and idk. His mom doesn't really like me, so maybe she got it for him so we wouldn't drive together anymore."

He mindlessly picked at a hole in the armchair.

Techno burst in triumphantly. "I FOUND THE HATS!"

He paused, "Did I interrupt something serious? I can just go back upstairs..."

Skeppy shook his head. "No, you're fine."

There was a slightly awkward moment of Techno distributing the Santa hats.

"look Skeppy," a6d said, "Bad probably just got lost on the way over here. he's only drived a few times before- fuck- driven- you know what I mean. you worry too much."

"Maybe you don't worry enough," Skeppy muttered.

"I'll worry when I think there is something to worry about," a6d said. "Bad being five minutes late is not a big deal I think." His voice softened. "relax Skeppy."

A6d's attempt didn't soothe Skeppy, however, and he stayed unusually grouchy and quiet.

Fundy broke the tension by complaining there were no marshmallows for his hot chocolate and pissing a6d off at Tommy and Tubbo for eating all of them, which they vehemently denied.

Amongst all this chaos Clay mentioned to George that they probably weren't going on the truck ride tonight since Sapnap was asleep. After which George suggested they sneak away to make some hot chocolate for themselves. Clay agreed and they shuffled out into the kitchen.

Wilbur nudged Techno. "Hey, hey Techno. Do you think they're going to look for some mistletoe?"

Techno made a face. "I don't know and I don't want to know what they're getting up to."

Wilbur and Techno then proceeded to have a completely mature discussion about which side of the hat the Santa bobble should fall on, with no loud arguing whatsoever.

Grian was saying something to Mumbo about how pleased he was that the Santa hat matched his red sweater and remarking that he should buy one for himself and Mumbo was meaningfully contributing in the form of offering to buy him one as an early Christmas present.

A6d had gotten tired of yelling about marshmallows so he decided to try and hack Sapnap's phone while he was asleep because he was bored. But he couldn't guess his password and eventually Fundy started a conversation with him.

Skeppy sighed and wondered about Bad.

Someone played Christmas music.

Tubbo and Tommy were swapping the hats and debating who looked better in what. Eventually Clay and George came back with their own cups of hot chocolate with marshmallows because apparently there was another bag in the pantry and they weren't running out of them.

The room was a pleasant kind of noisy, with gentle music and overlapping conversations, but it was missing something.

Skeppy didn't feel like it was the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.

He tried to call Bad, but he didn't pick up.

A few minutes later Skeppy's phone rang.

He scrambled to answer it and yelled at everyone to shut up. They did, and stopped the music so the lively room turned dead silent as they waited to hear from Bad.

All the blood drained out of Skeppy's face before he dropped the phone and bolted out the door.

Everyone else sat still in shock as the door swung back and forth and Skeppy's car screeched away at full speed.

Then there were a lot of "what the fuck just happened"s and "did I miss something"s, but a6d silently picked up the phone and held up a finger to hush the others.

Everyone gathered around.

Different emotions chased each other across Vin's face as he listened, but he said nothing.

The wait was agonizing.

He said a terse "thank you" and hung up, then turned to face the others.

"Bad was in a car accident and the ambulance is taking him to the hospital. but he's really hurt."

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