Comment 8 for bug 140786

This is what you're looking for:

            log_action_begin_msg "Saving console font and keymap for next boot"
            setupcon --save-only

From debian/keyboard-configuration.console-setup.init in this package: http://packages.ubuntu.com/oneiric/console-setup

This creates a cached keymap, like so:

. /etc/default/console-setup
. /etc/default/keyboard
ckbcomp $acm_option $rules_option -model "$XKBMODEL" \
                    "$XKBLAYOUT" "$XKBVARIANT" "$XKBOPTIONS" \
                    | gzip -9 2>/dev/null >/etc/console-setup/cached.kmap.gz

The cached keymap is used when starting the 'console-setup' service: (/etc/init/console-setup.conf)
loadkeys /etc/console-setup/cached.kmap.gz

Putting it all together:

. /etc/default/console-setup
. /etc/default/keyboard
ckbcomp $acm_option $rules_option -model "$XKBMODEL" \
                    "$XKBLAYOUT" "$XKBVARIANT" "$XKBOPTIONS" \
                    | sed -f /etc/kbd/remap \
                    | gzip -9 2>/dev/null >/etc/console-setup/cached.kmap.gz
loadkeys /etc/console-setup/cached.kmap.gz