VOTE - It was a fun story :o) and did a much quicker, better job of incorporating the words than mine did. Although I did notice your little jab at my "in for a penny, out for a sound" phrase :o) I thought the ad-campaign part was funny :o)
I liked these sentences the most:
Time is weird like that, with an ability to stretch or condense itself depending on the circumstances...
I pictured the scene, a group of barbarians just coming home from a weekend away raping and pillaging...
This sentence made me laugh: He may have been a secret agent, but that didn't mean he would be completely without brains, although a certain level of implied idiocy was to be expected.
There's nothing not to like in this story, I think it's fun, amusing and reads smoothly.