MCNW - Xmas Time

...Just a little something I whipped up for the holidays. Consider this my Christmas card to all of you...My watchers, my friends, the artists I admire...You all bring a lot of joy to me, & so I'm giving some back your way as well! Merry Xmas! ^_^

Actually, this is also my small contribution to ~loveshugah's "Make Characters Not War" project: [link] I don't know whether he meant for his "Chocola" template to resemble a Christmas tree or not, but it certainly worked out fine here!

Anyhow, believe it or not, I actually came up with a background story for this guy. Hey, I came up with a new character, & suddenly it sprang to mind. Think of it as my own contribution to the wide world of Christmas stories.

Anyhow, it all began about a week before Christmas, in my house...Fefcaine was on the couch, getting jacked up full of holiday cheer thanks to sugary sweets & Christmas specials. Just then, though, I came down the stairs, in a bit of angry mood. It seemed as though the Mimobot flash drive I had paid $80 for died after just three uses, & that I would have to mail it back & get it replaced, thus being unable to use it during my vacation (sadly, that part of the story wasn't made up).

So I told Fefcaine everything, then said that I was going outside to get some fresh air. Now Fefcaine, he didn't want to see me in a grumpy & sad mood...Especially around Christmas time!

And so, he did what any manic, gleeful, GIR-like robot would do in this situation: He went down to his secret laboratory where he worked on his hobby of reconstructing his favorite weapons from video games, & proceeded to mix up a dosage of Christmas spirit that he could give me. And by "Christmas spirit", I mean a mixture of crumbled-up gingerbread, melted-down candy canes, ground-up mistletoe, burnt-up ashes from old yule logs, & of course, an assortment of random chemicals.

After putting the mixture into his newly re-created version of the chemical thrower from BioShock (he wanted to see how good electric gel would work in real life), Fefcaine stepped out into the backyard where I went to clear my head. He lined up his shot, & just as he pulled the trigger, I had turned around & quickly jumped out of the way. Fefcaine's "spirit" instead flew right past me & right into - You guessed it - A lone fir tree.

I asked Fefcaine what the heck he was doing, & he sheepeishly explained why. Realizing that he only had good intentions in mind, I reassured him that no matter how difficult things got around these times, nothing could the diminish the amount of spirit & happiness that I would have when the big day rolled around. Fef cheered right up, & then we looked at the tree...Except for a bit of a mess, there was surprisingly nothing wrong with it. Through a bit puzzled a first, me & Fefcaine then walked into the house, both happy again.

The next morning I woke up to hear someone knocking on the door. I opened it up to find aan animated pine tree with a smiley face on it staring right at me.

I awoke out of my fainting spell to find Fefcaine talking with the tree, both of them excited. The tree, still new to this world, was asking about itself & how it had gotten here. Once Fefcaine started talking about Christmas spirit, the tree was wondering what this "Christmas" was. Still in a daze, I watched as Fefcaine, very excited at the idea of playing with a new friend (he gets like that a lot) took the tree out so that he could view various examples of Christmas firsthand.

So the two of them went sneaking around town, taking glimpses at every little Christmas decoration & tradition possible. There were the gift-wrapped presents, the Salvation Army Santas, the traditional holiday sweets, the lines of thrity or more shoppers lined up with only two people manning the registers...But what intrigued our tree friend most about Christmas, of course, were the Christmas trees.

The tree was curious about why several of his brothers were out there on display, all bright & shiny. Fefcaine then told three all that he knew about Christmas trees: About how people decorate them with festive elements, about how they place their beautifully-wrapped presents under them, & how everyone & their families gather around them, basking in the warmth & glow of the holiday season, & how they all make everyone happy.

As Fefcaine told him this, the tree cracked open the widest smile he had on so far, & as Fef said his last sentence, the tree suddenly blurted out that he wanted to be a Christmas tree. But not just any ordinary Christmas tree: He wanted to be a Christmas tree that everyone could enjoy. He said that he would begin travelling all over the land, stopping to plant himself for a bit so that people could look at him & be filled with Christmas spirit.

Fefcaine looked a tad confused, but then became ecstatic: He realized that this was exactly like a story from his favorite Christmas specials that he admired so very much. And thus he encouraged the tree to go & follow it's dream. But then, he had a question: How would the tree find new decorations?

The tree then said that it would find whatever made people happy, then find any items related to that, new or old, & decorate himself with them. And just as he was reaching his little arms up into his needles to demonstrate, the tree pulled out something: A piece of a wrapper from a Hershey's Bar, one that Fefcaine had been eating the night before. Apparently it had blown outside & got stuck to the tree. The two looked at the little wrapper piece, & saw only one part of a word intact: "Chocola".

And just like that, the tree, overjoyed, blurted out that he thought it was a beautiful-sounding word, & seeing it as a bit of a sign, adopted it as his own name.

And so, Chocola now travels the land, replanting himself for small parts of time in wherever he feels he needs to be. People are often confused as to how this tree magically appears & disappears nearby, decorated with several odd objects: Some old ornaments, a shiny candy bar wrapper or two, a freshly-picked flower, maybe even a strand of lights that had fallen off a truck. But everyone who looked at this magical tree agreed: It fills them full of Christmas spirit just looking at it.

And that made Chocola possibly the happiest damn Christmas tree ever created.



...CRIPES, was that long! Quite a huge description for a character that took me only half an hour to think up & about four hours tops to draw, huh? XD

Ahh, but I do enjoy this. Everything about Chocola - Thinking him up, drawing him, creating this story - Just filled me full of Christmas glee. I honestly even think this is my most favorite drawing that I've done...I mean, I ran out of time before I could create a better background, but eh. I'll fix that later.

Anyhow, I really hope you like this, feel free to comment, & I certainly wish all of you out there one very merry Xmas!!!

- Chocola (the character) is copyright =SlyDante
- Chocola (the template, project, etc.) is copyright ~loveshugah