South Park fic (or, I am not Deranged, I promise)
Title: From Hence, We Are None (Part 1/2) Or on AO3 in one document
Rating: light R (for violence and violence and disturbing violence. Oh, and naughty words)
Word Count: ~15000
Genre: action/adventure, angst, tragedy
Warnings: makes allusions to and mentions explicit violence and torture; character death(s) (a lot, a lot of character death, both minor and major), general mind-fuckery, and features deeply-disturbed!Butters. Seriously, don't read this fic if you're easily squicked by like, something silly. Like blood. Or Death.
Characters/Pairings: Craig/Tweek, Damian/Pip, pre-Kenny/Butters, Gregory, Christophe, Stan, Kyle, Butters, Professor Chaos, Cartman, Wendy, Token
Summary: Less of a “love story,” and more of a “detached tale of modern alienation.” Except, you know. With guns.
Disclaimer: South Park and all its related people, places, names and ideas are the property of Matt Parker, Trey Stone, Comedy Central, and probably tons of other people who are Most Decidedly Not Me. No money is being made off of this fan-work and no copy-right infringement is intended.
Notes: This is all chickienine ’s fault, because she asked me while I was recovering from the star trek big bang if I could write her a 10k fic in a month. And I, like a fool, said, “Psh! 10k? I can do that in my sleep!” Oh past-self, how I hate you. Based loosely on this video and contains really, really vague hints to the entire Rule of Rose video game in general (because those had been the parameters. Watch creepy video game intro and write creepyfic to go with it, more or less). If you haven’t played that game, for the love of all that is slash, DON’T. Highlight for sort-of spoilers:This fic is NOT for the faint of heart. I'm gonna tell you up front, DO NOT EXPECT A HAPPY, FLOWERY ENDING. You read the warnings, now read at your own risk.
"Who shall tempt with wand’ring feet, The dark unbottomed infinite abyss And through the palpable obscure find out His uncouth way, or spread his aery flight Upborne with indefatigable wings Over the vast abrupt?"
--Paradise Lost, Book II (404-410)
***
It’s about four-thirty in the afternoon when Craig’s phone buzzes in his pocket. He bites back both the panic and hope that bubble up in his gut as he takes out his phone and reads the message.
Carl’s Warehouse, it says, 30 min.
It’s from Kenny, Craig knows even if the number’s been blocked. He can only ever tell because even fucking Damian has his own cell now, and when Kenny gets a message straight from Butters-Chaos, it’s Chaos now, because that thing that’s taken up residence inside Butters’ brain is nothing like the kid Craig used to know-the number will always be blocked. Mostly, he tries not to think about the person Kenny had to kill to get that phone, or the type of guy Damian, Christophe and Chaos have turned him into that he doesn’t bat an eyelash at death anymore. But Craig’s not fooling anyone; when was the last time he himself cared if Cartman killed someone? The last time he cared about anyone other than himself and-
A cold gust of wind blows by suddenly and makes him shiver. He pulls his coat tighter around himself and sends a message to Tweek with fingers numb from the cold.
Can’t make it to Harbucks today. Spotted Cartman and Damian around my neighborhood earlier. I don’t think it’s safe.
Craig hates lying to Tweek. Before this whole mess started, Craig never spoke a single damn untruth to the guy, but now, well, the only way he can even maintain contact with Tweek is through this fucking subterfuge. He can’t believe he ever agreed to be the fucking mole; he should have just taken Kenny’s advice and kept his head down. It’s not fair, honestly; his allegiance was determined by Chaos being too damn smart for his own good, and it’s all over fucking nothing. Craig is tired of living in a state of constant paranoia; if he isn’t careful he’ll wind up just like-
His phone buzzes again, and Craig nearly jumps out of his skin.
“Shit,” he mumbles to himself, pulls out his phone again and lets out a breath of relief when he sees it’s just Tweek.
Shit! Tweek’s message says. Are you all right? They haven’t got you yet have they???
“They” have had Craig since the very beginning, he thinks to himself. But instead of telling Tweek that, he types out a Nah, I’m fine dude. Quit worrying so much, and hits send before he blurts out the truth to Tweek.
Stay safe, Craig, is the response he gets.
I love you.
Craig stares at his own message for almost five full minutes before he erases it.
You too, Tweek.
He hits send.
***
But really, it starts like this:
Chaos waits very patiently outside his hideout on an average, cold September night. Overhead it is cloudy, with dark, ominous clouds promising a deep frost for the morning. Chaos wraps his coat around himself to shield him from the chill as he waits. He suppresses a smirk as a distant rumbling shakes the damp earth around him. Only a sliver of the moon glimmers through the heavy cloud-cover, and what little light it does afford casts a pallid shadow over the dirt just outside his grimy hideout. There is a little pool of light, cast by the weak, flickering overhead lamp on his front porch, but beyond that oasis of light there is only darkness.
“What?” a cold, menacing voice calls suddenly from out of the shadows.
“Damian,” Chaos drawls calmly (a small, uncertain, wavering voice at the back of his mind starts at the sound of his own voice, insists that this is not what he sounds like, but Chaos ignores it, chooses instead to let his smirk spread leisurely over his face).
“Did you call?” Damian asks, taking a single step out of the shadows and waving his hand over the muck to their right, glistening halfheartedly inside the little inverted pentagram drawn into the dirt.
“Yes, I did,” Chaos answers, “I need your help.”
Damian is silent, his dark red eyes gleaming in the moonlight as he sticks his hands into his pockets and scowls.
“It’s Butters, right?”
“My name is Chaos,” he says, anger flaring bright and hot into his words. “Never call me anything else.”
Damian crooks an eyebrow at that, but nods his head just a fraction. As quick as the anger comes, it is gone in a flash, replaced by a calm buzzing in his mind.
“So what,” he says, “you’re aiming for like, standard world-domination? Or what?”
Damian grins, displaying rows of neatly pointed, gleaming teeth.
“I think so,” Chaos answers, crossing his arms and offering Damian a grin of his own. It is not the entire truth, precisely, but it will do for now.
“Right,” Damian says. He takes a step forward, obviously enjoying himself. “And why should I help you?”
“I’m glad you asked, Damian,” he says, smirking.
This is what he’s been waiting for. He pulls out a battered, slightly damn envelope from his pocket and throws it to Damian. It lands heavily at his feet, a single corner falling into the dark red mess indistinguishable in the darkness. Damian picks it up and opens it almost lazily, but his expression quickly darkens when he looks inside it. He tips the contents of the envelope out into his outstretched hand, eyes blazing with fury as he does so. Bundles of gauze, stained so dark that the blood almost looks purple in the night, tumble to the floor silently, and a single, bloodied finger falls into the palm of Damian’s hand.
“What the fuck is this?” he asks, and Chaos is pleased to hear an almost imperceptible waver of fear underneath his anger.
“Collateral,” Chaos answers. “See, I need your help. And I know someone else who could use your help too.” Chaos watches the way Damian’s fingers close around the dismembered finger in his hand, one by one, with something close to glee. “The way I see it,” Chaos continues pleasantly, “Pip is very comfortable where he is right now, more or less. He has plenty of ice for his hand and medics at his beck and call all around the clock.”
Damian scowls furiously at him, but still, he doesn’t say a word.
“He misses you,” Chaos says quietly, knowing that this is Damian’s breaking point. He’ll either agree to help Chaos now or kill him where he stands. “He’s been asking for you, you know.”
“Shut up,” Damian finally says, his voice shaking slightly. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. So just. Shut the fuck up.”
“I know that’s not a rabbit’s foot you’re holding,” Chaos answers. “And I know that if you don’t want to help me, Pip’s as good as dead.”
Damian is quiet for so long that Chaos has a single fleeting second of doubt, but then-
“Fine,” he says. “Fine. What did you have in mind?”
“That’s a very good question,” Chaos answers on the ghost of a smile. “Are you cold?”
Damian blinks.
“What?”
“Are you cold?” he repeats. “We’ve been outside for almost an hour. It’s very lucky that it hasn’t snowed yet, actually. But where are my manners? Would you like to come in? We can talk inside.”
Damian narrows his eyes suspiciously, but after a minute, sidesteps the mass of flesh and blood in the dirt and enters the dimly lit warehouse behind them. Chaos watches him go, pleased that Damian too, is predictably human. He thinks, for a moment, of the sweet irony he’s created; with Pip buried somewhere deep underground, protected by ancient enchantments as old as the Devil himself. Old spells designed to protect people from evil now being used to perpetuate Chaos’ own evil machinations.
“Thanks for all your help, Dougie,” Chaos tells the muck.
It was Dougie, after all, who suggested it, who carved the spells into the basement, ensuring that Damian could not set foot into it. Dougie himself who drew the inverted pentagram in the dirt, without an inkling that Chaos might need a human sacrifice for this.
“You’re a real pal.”
And then, laughing, Chaos follows Damian inside.
Chaos, after all, has a war to start.
***
It takes Craig nearly 20 minutes to get to Carl’s Warehouse, and when he finally gets there, it’s almost another ten to wander through the labyrinth of hallways and passages that Damian has added to the place since the very beginning. He’s lucky that he doesn’t get lost this time, actually, because when he finally falls into the designated meeting room, Kenny, Damian, Christophe, and Cartman are all sitting around, waiting for him.
“Took you long enough,” Kenny says, smiling brightly.
Craig tries and fails to smile back.
“I was on the other side of town.”
“Pussy-chasing, no doubt,” Christophe mumbles around his cigarette.
“Hey man, watch what you say about-”
“If I am wrong, correct me,” Christophe says, a threat clearly underlying the statement.
His shovel is sitting on the table behind him, a small puddle of dark red mud pooling under it. Craig scowls, but doesn’t rise to the bait. Christophe laughs at that, absently unwrapping a dirty scrap of material from his left forearm. A large gash is revealed as he does so, one that runs from his palm all the way up to his mid-bicep. Craig turns away when the first few drops of blood start to leak out of it.
“What is it this time?” he asks Damian irritably. “Do you want me to babysit fucking Cartman’s fatass while-”
“Hey shut up Craig,” Cartman says from where he’s sitting. “At least I’m not hung up on some paranoid fucking goody-two-shoes.”
“Fuck you Cartman,” Craig answers.
“We’ve taken the western coast,” Damian says, in that quiet voice that never fails to end an argument. Cartman makes a pleased humming noise that Damian ignores. “Cartman called it.”
“You’re seriously going to give Cartman all of the west coast?” Kenny asks.
Damian shrugs.
“When the east coast falls, Kenny, you’ll get full control over the area,” he answers. “That was the deal.”
Kenny sinks back into his seat, crossing his arms and muttering under his breath. Craig takes his customary seat next to Kenny and waits. They don’t have to wait long. Seconds later, Chaos appears with a flash of smoke, with his usual penchant for dramatics, in the center of the semicircle they’ve made.
“Report,” Chaos says, and even though he doesn’t so much as turn his head to Craig, he knows who Chaos is talking to.
“The Resistance is meeting again tomorrow night,” Craig says. “We’re supposed to meet at Stan’s, who’ll take us to wherever they’re meeting this time.”
The Resistance formed almost immediately after Chaos took control of most of Colorado; it’s what happens when you split a town like South Park straight down the middle like Chaos and Damian did. Craig isn’t sure if Chaos actually thinks the rag-tag team of their friends-former friends-are any actual threat, but he’s hoping that Chaos thinks them inconsequential. Tweek’s safety depends on it.
“I see,” Chaos says. A toothy grin slides its way up his mouth, distorting his face in a way Craig is sure Butters’ never could look. “Perfect. Cartman,” he adds sharply, and Craig is pleased to see even fucking Cartman starts slightly at the sound of his voice. “Go talk with Baal about your new acquisition.”
“Aw man, I hate that guy,” Cartman whines, but he heaves himself out of his chair anyway and shuffles out of the room.
Chaos waits until the door slams shut behind Cartman before he so much as moves again. He turns to Damian.
“You will go with Craig,” he says. “You will stay hidden. You will follow them. When you are sure every single member of The Resistance is there, you will kill them.” Damian nods lazily, looking immensely bored. Craig feels something cold slip into his stomach and nearly stops his fucking heart. Chaos turns to Craig, his icy stare boring into Craig. “You will not interfere.”
It takes everything Craig has in him, but eventually, he nods minutely.
“Leave Gregory for me,” Christophe says from his seat, hauling his shovel back over his shoulder and splattering mud everywhere.
Chaos scowls at him furiously, and after a minute of staring each other down, Chaos nods sharply.
“Do not be seen,” he says. Christophe nods, pulling a cigarette out of his pocket as he does so. “We’re done,” he adds after a second. “You have five minutes to get out of here.”
And with that, he disappears as suddenly as he appeared. Christophe and Damian leave almost immediately afterwards, both of them nodding to Kenny and Craig as they leave. Kenny sighs heavily from his seat but doesn’t move.
“Hey dude, you okay?” Craig manages to ask over the panic welling up inside of him.
“Nah,” Kenny answers, resting his elbows heavily on his knees. “He’s completely stopped acknowledging my presence now.”
“Who?” Craig asks, disbelieving. “Chaos? Dude, why do you even care? I can’t fucking stand it when he looks at me; it’s like he’s ripping thoughts right out of your mind.”
For a long time, Kenny doesn’t answer. Finally, he stands and heads out, motioning for Craig to follow him. They maneuver their way through the warehouse quickly with Kenny leading the way, and in less than two minutes, they’re standing out in the moonlight.
“Do you know why I didn’t join The Resistance?” Kenny asks suddenly.
Craig shakes his head.
“Because Damian and Christophe are your friends?”
“Stan and Kyle are my friends,” Kenny answers. “Were. No. I’m here because I know Butters is still in there somewhere. And one day, Chaos is gonna slip and release the fucking strangle-hold he’s got on Butters’ soul, and that happens, I’ll be right there, ready to shake some sense back into Butters and end this whole damn mess.”
“You’re a good friend, Kenny,” Craig finally says.
“Thanks dude,” he answers. “So, what are you gonna do about tomorrow?”
Craig stumbles slightly at that.
“What do you mean?” he asks suspiciously.
“Come on dude,” Kenny says as they round a corner and end up in front of Kenny’s house. “Even Chaos knows you only work with us to keep Tweek safe.”
“I don’t know,” he finally answers. “I have no fucking clue.”
When Craig leaves Kenny that night, he doesn't go home right away. He lingers around Stark's Pond, watching the way the moonlight sparkles across the heavy sheet of ice. There's not a cloud in the sky, and the moon is full tonight, so it's pretty bright out by the pond. He stares intently out into the distance, where piles of snow have settled haphazardly across the horizon, and really hates his life.
Kenny's right. Everyone knows he's only loyal to Chaos because it's the only way he could think of to keep Tweek safe. Tweek stays safe, and Craig is Chaos' spy. That was the deal. Surely, Chaos won't go back on their deal? He's got to know that if Tweek dies, Craig is out.
But then, if all of The Resistance is killed tomorrow night, Chaos won't need a spy anymore.
Fuck. All Craig wanted to do was keep Tweek alive, and now everything's gone to hell.
He doesn't sleep that night. Instead, he sits out by the pond until dawn finally breaks over the horizon, wondering if his life has ever been normal, remembering this time two years ago, when he'd convinced Tweek to come out to Stark's Pond to watch the sunrise and first realized he loved the spazz.
He's in over his head, and fuck. He doesn't know what to do.
Well, no, that's a lie. He knows exactly what he has to do; it's just that he doesn't know if he can. He knew, empirically, that some day he'd have to reveal himself as a traitor to Tweek; he just never expected the moment to come so soon. But it's less than 12 hours before he's supposed to meet up with Stan and those guys, where Damian and Christophe will both be hiding somewhere in the darkness, Damian with some supernatural aide and Christophe with that uncanny ability he has to disappear in plain sight. Craig is out of time, and he doesn't know what he's going to fucking do about it.
***
Butters doesn't understand why his mom and dad are so mad at him today. It's his sixteenth birthday, after all, and he's only just woken up. Surely he can't have done anything to warrant their screaming yet. Still, Butters is nearly shaking with nervousness as he clambers down the stairs. His dad is standing with his arms crossed, fury etched in every line of his face.
"Butters, you've got some serious explaining to do," his dad says ominously.
"I-I didn't mean to, Dad," Butters says automatically, even if he doesn't know what he's supposed to have done this time.
"Oh, you didn't mean to?" he asks. "You made your mother cry, Butters. Just what do you have to say about that?"
"Well, gee, I'm sorry, Dad-"
"Sorry won't cut it this time, Mister," he says. "I want you to march back up to your room and think about what you've done. You're not allowed out again for three days, at least!"
Butters turns on his tail and slowly climbs back up to his room. As he passes his parents' bedroom, he can hear a slight sniffling sound coming from the darkened room.
"Mom?" he asks, peeking into the room.
"Oh God, get out of here; get out of here!" she says hysterically, diving under the bed and sobbing.
"Mom, I don't understand," Butters tries, taking a step into the room.
"Don't come near me!" she screeches. "STEPHEN!"
Heavy footsteps thunder up the stairs, and Butters runs to his room and locks the door, trembling from head to foot. He doesn't understand; what had he done to make his mother so upset?
They hate you Butters, a cold voice says at the back of his mind.
"N-no they don't," Butters says, acutely aware of the strangeness of talking to the voices in his mind.
They couldn't care less about you, the voice continues. They treat you like trash. Is that all you are, Butters? Worthless garbage?
"I'm not garbage," Butters says into the quiet of his room.
Garbage, the voice says again. I can help you, Butters. Let me help you.
"I-I'm not supposed to talk to strangers," Butters says, the only thing he can think of to say.
I'm not a stranger Butters. You know me very well.
Butters closes his eyes and sinks to the floor, wrapping his arms around his knees as he does so.
"I’m not hearing you," Butters says, low, quiet. "I-I'm all alone in my room, and no one else is here, and I'm just talking to myself."
I can help you Butters, the voice says again, but gently this time. Don't you want to know why they hate you so much?
"I can't hear you," Butters says loudly. And then again, this time a whisper, "I can't hear you."
You can't ignore me Butters. It's not nice. Don't you recognize me?
"No," Butters finally answers. "But-you don't exist anyway."
I exist, Butters.
Butters tightens his grip on his knees, because he's starting to feel strange, far-away and unreal, like he's in danger of floating out of his body.
Do you want to see how real I am?
"No," Butters whispers, can't seem to make his vocal chords scream like he wants to. "Leave me alone."
I can't. You see, I need your help too, Butters. Maybe we can help each other?
Butters is getting sleepy. He drops his head to his knees and stifles a yawn. Vaguely, he thinks it's weird that he can't feel his body so much anymore.
"Who are you?" Butters asks on nothing more than a breath.
I am-
"Chaos," Chaos finishes, standing quickly and brushing off microscopic dust from the hem of his sleeve.
Without a sound, he unlocks his door and prowls out of his room, stopping just outside Linda and Stephen’s room, listening. Chaos has unfinished business to attend to. Linda’s voice floats out of the room, and Chaos bites back the manic grin at the memory of their last encounter. She has every right to be terrified.
“I don’t understand where we went wrong, Stephen,” she says with a quavering voice.
“Now, now, Linda, we mustn’t blame ourselves,” Stephen says, and oh, how Chaos hates that man’s voice. It’s slippery and disgusting and Chaos wants to rip Stephen’s throat from his body every time he speaks. “That boy is nothing but trouble.”
Chaos curbs the predatory rage that threatens to bubble up to the surface and instead creeps downstairs to the kitchen. Chaos is patient. He can wait. Less than five minutes later Stephen marches into the room, doesn't so much as glance towards the corner where Chaos is lounging around near the cabinets. That's how Chaos likes it best anyway. He is used to being ignored; it helps to sneak up on someone when they have no idea he even exists.
In a flash, Chaos has his favorite butcher knife pressed against Stephen's throat; the man makes a choked-off whining sound, but silences at the sharp press of the steel against his flesh. Chaos watches the first tiny pinpricks of blood slide down the man’s throat.
"You disgust me," Chaos whispers.
"B-Butters?" Stephen asks.
It's, perhaps, the wrong thing to say.
"My name," Chaos says, his grip tightening slightly on the butcher knife, "is Chaos."
With a single, brutal swipe, he cuts through this man's delicate throat, drops him to the floor and listens to his agonized, terrified, gurgling rasps of breath. Chaos sneers and watches, watches his disgusting, worthless body writhe on the floor, scrabble for purchase on the neat, spotless tiles around him until at last, the body stills.
"Pathetic," Chaos says.
There's spattered blood all along the far right wall now, and Stephen's body now lies limp in a dark puddle of his own blood. Chaos crouches down beside the body and lays his hand flat in the pool. It drips down his forearm as he watches, stains the crisp white shirt Butters had wanted to wear on his birthday.
"Happy birthday, Butters," he says, a smile curving the edges of his lips.
Butters wakes up with a strangled cry, shaking uncontrollably. He’s just had the most terrible dream of-
He hears his mother’s scream from downstairs and jumps up from his spot on the floor, nearly slipping in his haste. Luckily, he catches himself on his bedpost, but that’s when he notices that the cuffs of his button-down are stained with what looks terrifyingly like blood. Butters shivers and bolts out of his room, nearly drowning in his panic. He runs down the stairs almost in a dream, following the sound of his mother’s sobs to the kitchen, stops abruptly at the doorway. His mom is sobbing into her hands, kneeling beside his dad, who is facedown in a puddle of congealed blood. On the clean, polished tile is a message smeared lazily in his dad’s blood. Butters’ heart stops beating when he sees it.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BUTTERS.
Butters is sent to a therapist shortly afterwards. He goes quietly, meekly, even though he has no memory of-of doing that to his dad, or of the threat he’d apparently scrawled on his mother’s bathroom mirror the night before. But “Chaos,” it causes a shiver to run up Butters’ spine, makes him remember the chilly voice inside his own head, the bloodstains on his t-shirt after his terrible dream and thinks that maybe, maybe he is crazy. He doesn’t want to think about it, and his first few meetings with Doctor Escobar feel like complete wastes of time until-
Butters is a fool if he thinks he can get rid of Chaos. There is such arrogance in him, that he thinks he can survive without Chaos there to strike fear into the hearts of their enemies. Chaos will not be ignored, will not be stuffed into the ignominious recesses of that boy’s mind, not again; he will not. As long as Butters has breath in his body, he will never be rid of Chaos-
Doctor Escobar tells Butters that he has spoken with Chaos, and that’s when Butters really gets terrified. He is crazy, after all, and his mom is right in sending him to live with his grandparents on the other side of town. Butters can’t be trusted anymore.
Linda is a bitch. The message he’d scrawled on her bathroom mirror is as true today as it was the day he wrote it, a halting message in her disgusting fuscous lipstick. It doesn’t matter much to him if he kills her now or the next time he so deems to reappear; Chaos is patient.
There is a day, about four and a half months after his mom first sent him to therapy, where Dr. Escobar declares that Butters’ psychotic break has finally been fixed.
Chaos spoke with Jason Escobar at length about the medication he had meant to prescribe to Butters. It was a very productive conversation, in Chaos’ opinion. Chaos knows where Jason lives, where his children go to school, and all those drugs meant to keep Chaos at bay wouldn’t keep him away for long. He’d find a way out again, and he’d make sure Jason knew exactly how much Chaos hated being locked in a cage. Jason Escobar does not prescribe Butters any medication, and that’s the important part.
Butters doesn’t feel any different, but Dr. Escobar assures Butters that he isn’t supposed to feel any different. Butters hopes he’s right. He’s relieved, honestly, and even if his mom still refuses to let him move back into her house, Butters is…he’s happy. He’s not crazy anymore.
After all, Chaos can be patient.
***
So, Craig decides about halfway through the next day that he's not a fucking coward. He can do this. It won't be difficult at all, he keeps reminding himself, even after he meets up with Tweek and they walk to Stan's house. Wendy and Token are already there, and they wait around Stan's house for about ten minutes before Kyle finally shows up. There isn't a better time to tell them all they're about to be killed, but still, Craig stays quiet. Stan and Kyle are the only two Gregory ever trusts with the information on where their next meeting place is, and so soon they'll be split into two groups for the long trek.
God, Craig is a fucking coward.
Kyle, Token and Tweek leave first, and after about ten minutes Stan leads him and Wendy out into the night.
"Hey Stan," Craig says, hands stuffed into his pockets so neither of them can see the way he's trembling. "Can I talk to you?"
"Sure thing, dude," Stan says, sweeping his eyes over the dark alleyway they've slipped into. He’s got his right hand in his jacket pocket, and Craig isn’t naïve enough to think he isn’t gripping the handle of a gun tightly. "Is it about Tweek?"
"What? No," Craig says. Not really, anyway. "Why is it that whenever I have a problem, someone always assumes it's about Tweek?"
Stan laughs aloud at that; by their side Wendy smirks and rolls her eyes.
“No offense Craig, but you're not exactly subtle around him," Wendy says quietly.
"The only person who can't see how whipped he's got you is Tweek," Stan answers.
"Whatever," Craig says; he takes a deep, fortifying breath. He can do this. "But seriously dude. I-I need to talk to you."
"All right. What's up?"
Craig stops just before they hit the light of a nearby streetlight. He takes another deep breath but can't seem to find enough oxygen to make his words come out.
"Dude, calm the fuck down," Stan says. "You're not gonna have like, a panic attack over whatever this is, are you?"
Craig closes his eyes and counts slowly to five. Maybe he is about to have a panic attack. It’d be pretty damn fitting if he did.
"Here's the thing," Craig says weakly before he chickens out. "I'm a worthless fucking coward."
"Don't be so hard on yourself, Craig," Wendy says immediately, in a voice that's clearly meant to soothe him.
"Yeah dude, I'm sure if you just tell Tweek-"
"This isn't about Tweek," Craig says, finding his anger and holding onto it desperately. "Look. I'm sorry, okay? I'm so fucking sorry."
"Craig, what are you talking about?" Wendy's on her knees beside him now, and fuck, how did Craig not notice falling to the ground?
"In about ten minutes, Damian and Christophe will be at your fucking-headquarters or whatever. They've got orders from Chaos to kill every single one of you."
There’s a tense moment of silence after his proclamation.
"That's not funny, Craig," Stan says angrily. "What are you trying to pull-"
"I'm trying to tell you the truth," Craig says. "It’s me. I’m his fucking double agent, emissary, mole, spy. Whatever you want to call it. I've been telling Chaos all your plans to bring him down. Did you guys ever wonder why it felt like they were always one step ahead of The Resistance? It's because they were. It's my fault. Chaos told me that if I didn't-that he'd-and fuck dude. I had to keep Tweek safe."
It sounds so selfish when he says it out loud. He almost killed the seven people that had any chance of stopping Chaos, all because he's fucking hung up on his best friend.
Craig watches Stan's face change slowly from confusion to dawning horror. When Stan looks away into the darkness, he turns to Wendy, whose face is a complicated mix of betrayal and disgust.
"Fuck," Stan whispers. "How far away are they?"
"They were supposed to be following me," Craig says. "You guys have to go. If you're lucky, they won't have caught up with us yet."
Stan looks like he kind of wants to tear Craig apart for a second, but instead he beckons to Wendy, and together, they disappear into the darkness.
Craig doesn't move for what feels like forever; he still can't quite believe it. He's just out-ed himself as a spy, a traitor, and yet, he can't help but feel anything other than a profound relief swell somewhere in his chest. He doesn't have to pretend anymore, doesn't have to worry about slipping up, doesn't have to exist in a constant state of panic, looking over his shoulder, doesn't have to lie anymore. Tweek probably hates him now, but at least Craig's kept him alive for another day. If anything was worth probably dying at Damian’s hands, it’s that. Knowing that Tweek is still safe for a few more hours, at least.
"Are you kidding me?" Damian says suddenly.
Craig's pulled roughly to his feet, Damian’s grip like a brand across his arm; Christophe is watching the two of them from a few feet away, leaning against the nearby streetlight that's only just flickered out.
"Where'd they go?" Damian says.
"I don't know."
Damian's eyes blaze in the darkness; Craig can smell burnt wool, looks down at where Damian is still clutching him and sees that the hand on Craig's arm has burnt a hole through his jacket.
"Fucking bullshit," Damian says.
Christophe sighs. He takes a deep pull off his cigarette before he crushes it under his boot and pulls his shovel out from the holster on his back.
"You probably should have seen this coming," Craig says mildly, because he doesn't answer to these guys anymore, and that's pretty fucking amazing.
"This too," Christophe says, brings his shovel up and crashes it into the back of Craig's head.
Craig stumbles for a second, then the ground comes speeding up to meet him, and he's out cold.
When he comes to, it's pitch black. He's lying on his back on a wooden floor, and when he brings his hand up to rub against the side of his face, he can feel something heavy and wooden encasing him.
"You’ve got to be kidding me," Craig says to no one in particular.
When he tries to push off the lid of the box he's been stuffed into, it doesn't budge. Doesn't so much as creak with the effort, but a few pebbles do clink to the bottom of the box from the haphazardly shut top. That's when Craig starts to panic.
Those bastards fucking buried him alive.
***
Butters is getting worried. He’s developed a habit of blacking out at very inopportune moments; sometimes he’ll come-to where he blacked out, on the floor of his grandparent’s house or out by the bus stop, but others he’ll wake up in the middle of nowhere without a clue as to how he got there. This last time he woke up 34 miles outside of Beaverton, covered in motor oil and something that reeked of lighter fluid.
Kenny will know what to do. Butters is sure of it, because even when all the world’s gone to pieces, Kenny has always been able to keep under control. He’ll be able to help. But when he gets to Kenny’s house, he stands outside for nearly ten minutes, knocking on the front door (and later, the back, and after another five minutes passes, he even tries the window too), but no one answers.
“Kenny?” Butters calls out nervously. “It’s Butters. Are you home?”
There’s a loud crash from somewhere inside; Butters starts rubbing his knuckles together anxiously, hoping Kenny’s not gotten himself into trouble again. The front door opens a crack, just wide enough for one of Kenny’s bright blue eyes to peak through. Butters smiles nervously, clasps his hands behind his back to keep himself from fidgeting.
“Hey Kenny,” Butters says. “Can I come in?”
The door opens just a centimeter wider.
“Butters?” Kenny asks, almost incredulously, like he doubts Butters is really himself.
“Well, yeah, Kenny,” he answers. “Who did you think I was?”
Kenny is silent for a moment, before he suddenly bangs the door open and launches himself at Butters. The force of his hug nearly overbalances them, and Butters has to grab onto the rickety railing of Kenny’s front porch to keep from toppling over.
“It’s good to see you too, Kenny,” Butters says, just a little bemused.
“Dude, what the fuck happened to you last night?” Kenny asks, pulling away and smiling.
“Wh-what do you mean?”
Kenny must see something of the panic going on inside of Butters, because he frowns suddenly and leads them inside, where Butters almost immediately collapses onto Kenny’s old, worn sofa.
“You came by at like, three-thirty in the morning,” Kenny says uncertainly. He rubs the back of his neck, and it’s only then that Butters notices the ugly green bruise coloring the side of Kenny’s jaw. There’s an oozing gash all along his neck too, that goes on for so long that it disappears under the neck of his hoodie. “It was kinda freaky.”
“What did I do?”
Kenny shrugs with one shoulder.
“I don’t really know,” Kenny says, staring intently at a hole in his sneakers. “You weren’t really making a lot of sense. You said something about burning down an orphanage or something?”
Butters gets a sudden flash of memory at that: his hands tight around someone’s throat, buried up to his armpits in a vat of a black bubbling substance, the body of someone flailing madly while Butters’ laugh rings out, echoing in the empty room-
“Butters, are you all right?” Kenny asks, shaking him gently and pulling him out of the memory.
Butters takes a deep, shuddering breath, like he just emerged from a pool of cold water.
“I’m fine,” he says. He looks up into Kenny’s worried face, his eyes tracing over the jagged cut on his neck, the bruise darkening before his eyes. “What happened to you?”
Kenny blinks twice, runs his hand through his hair, and sighs.
“I knew right away you weren’t in control of your mental faculties, I guess,” Kenny says after a long pause. “So like, I don’t blame you or anything, but-”
“Kenny,” Butters says, feeling his eyes go round with shock. “You don’t mean-I didn’t-I didn’t do that to you, did I?”
“No, you didn’t,” Kenny says firmly, kneeling in front of Butters and taking both of his hands in his own. “You called yourself Chaos.”
Butters still has his aluminum foil mask from when his childhood stint as a super villain. He can’t quite believe that his old alter-ego, Professor Chaos, has resurfaced after all these years, can’t imagine himself putting on that mask and anyone actually taking him seriously. But Kenny looks terrified, his eyes snapping to the open door and back like he’s afraid Butters will suddenly snap on him.
“I think you must be mistaken, Kenny,” Butters says, trying and failing to stop the tremble in his voice. “P-professor Chaos is…he’s gone.”
“Chaos,” Kenny immediately appends, a visible shiver running up his spine. “His name is Chaos. You don’t-he doesn’t-like to be called anything else.”
And then he remembers, not a year ago, his therapy sessions with Dr. Escobar and Chaos and-everything. Kenny pulls off his parka, wincing as he does so, and on his old, yellowing tee-shirt are a series of dark red stains bleeding through the shirt. MY NAME IS CHAOS is scrawled plainly across the whole of Kenny’s torso, visible clearly through the shirt.
“Kenny,” Butters breathes, too horrified to say anything else.
Kenny smiles gently.
“Don’t freak, Butters, we’ll figure this out,” he says.
But Butters doesn’t want to listen. He can’t believe it; won’t believe it. Chaos is gone. Doctor Escobar and his mother and grandparents made sure of it months ago. Chaos is gone.
He turns tail and runs.
***
The important thing to remember, Craig tries to tell himself, is to not panic.
Right.
Because he’s been, holy shit, buried alive, and he could have been unconscious for fuck only knows how long, and he might run out of oxygen at any moment now and just. Fuck. The important thing is to not panic.
But if he had been on the verge of a panic attack earlier, trying to tell Stan and Wendy the exact shade of scumbag he was, he's sure as hell hyperventilating now. He can't fucking breathe, let alone scream. For a second he lets himself imagine suffocating to death, buried who-the-fuck knows how deep in some nameless place in the forest, his fucking grave unmarked and forgotten until the end of time.
It's nothing that he doesn't deserve anyway.
Craig beats his fists against the coffin's lid (coffin, he's in a fucking coffin; if he ever gets out of this he's going to kill those bastards), angry with himself, the entire situation, but mostly pissed at Chaos, who showed up one day in Butters' skin and decided to end the world in a fiery mass of death. He thumps his knee against the lid one last time, trying to reconcile himself with Death when-
Something thumps back.
He stills, wondering what the fuck might be happening. He doesn't let himself hope; obviously he's hallucinating. Because honestly, having to face his own death is bound to make Craig jump off the deep end, right?
But no. Now that he's not focusing on his own steady, shallow breathing, he can clearly hear someone above him. Someone cursing slightly and-and-
digging.
All the breath leaves Craig's body the second he hears a shovel scrape heavily against the wood encasing him. There's some muffled shuffling above him somewhere, and then with a beautiful creaking sound, the wooden lid is pulled away.
Christophe is standing over him, an unlit cigarette held in his mouth as he pushes the lid out of the way. Craig can see the half-moon shining brilliantly above them, and shit, Craig thinks it's one of the most beautiful things he's ever seen.
"Christophe, what-"
"Shut up," is the answer he gets as Christophe uses his shovel as leverage and jumps up and out of the hole. Craig thinks it looks almost nine feet deep. "Just get out before anyone sees us."
Craig doesn't need to be told twice. His body is still pumped with adrenaline, and he pulls himself out of his would-be grave easily. He's panting by the time he scrambles up to Christophe, who's by then lit his cigarette and smoked about half of it. It's started snowing around them, unsurprisingly, but Craig doesn't even feel the bite of winter on his skin (although he does wonder what happened to his jacket, come to think of it).
"Okay," Craig finally says, "I'm not complaining about you know, not dying or anything, but is there a reason why you just...um. Helped me? Because I'm pretty sure you were the one to you know, do the actual burying."
"Of course I tossed you in zat fucking stinkhole," Christophe says, like he's offended that someone somewhere wouldn't find him the perfect man for the job. "How do you think I knew where to find you?"
Craig decides that he's going to leave that alone, because yeah, Christophe knows at least six different ways to kill a person with nothing but a lighter and his bare hands. But he still doesn't really know why the fuck he's not currently dying a slow and horrible death underground.
"So," he starts, hesitant. He only just realizes that Christophe and himself have probably spoken about 10 words to each other since the start of their fucking acquaintance; no wonder he doesn't know what to say. "Um. Thanks, I guess." Christophe takes another pull off his cigarette in answer. "Is there any chance that you'll, I don't know, tell my why you just saved my life?"
"Zere is no time to explain," Christophe says, wiping the dirt and dusty snow out of his face. "Just go. Find Ze Resistance again before someone else finds you."
Craig can't help it then; he laughs.
"Are you kidding me dude?" he says, crossing his arms over his chest as the chill finally starts to hit him. For a second, he lets his bitterness creep into his voice. "They'll kill me just as quickly as Chaos would, if he caught sight of me."
"I do not think so," Christophe answers, dropping the still smoking butt of his cigarette into the dirt. His expression hardens suddenly, makes Craig feel like his skin is being slowly peeled away, so Christophe can examine him from the inside out. "Tell zose cocksucking pussies-tell Gregory..." He looks away suddenly, which actually terrifies Craig just a little bit. "Tell Gregory I'm not his fucking princess," Christophe says, kind of like he has to rip the words out of his soul.
And okay, Craig's not even going to ask about that shit. He’s a firm believer in not asking questions he almost certainly won’t like the answers to. Suddenly, Christophe's head jerks up again, his eyes narrowed as they sweep around the surrounding forest. "Go," he says quietly, and then again, just the tinniest bit more urgent, "go."
Craig doesn’t need to be told twice. He’s out of there within the span of a heartbeat, hardly daring to look back, running through the forest on autopilot, until the trees thin out around him. The road is only about half a mile away; he can see it twisting over the landscape, a dark river twisting its way through the snow around it. Craig sighs, wonders just how the fuck he let this become his life, and climbs down the hillside, following the road back to South Park.
His first instinct is to go find Tweek, make sure he’s not dead and rotting somewhere in the city, but even as he turns down the familiar roads to Tweek’s house, he stops himself. He’s lost the right to check up on Tweek. Besides, all of The Resistance probably wants him dead now, anyway. He thinks about going to Kenny next, and although he thinks Kenny might understand Craig’s decision-hopes, maybe, that this is what Kenny had wanted him to do in the first place-he can’t really be sure he won’t end up back underground if he puts his trust in Kenny.
Craig is a man without a fucking country.
It turns out that the decision is taken out of his hands, as seconds later he ends up face to face with Kyle and Gregory, both armed with sleek black guns, both currently aimed at Craig’s face. In a moment of utter, utter hysteria, Craig manages to crack a smile.
"Is that a gun in my face or are you two just happy to see me?"
Kyle looks like he's trying very hard not to smile too, but Gregory's face remains impassive, his aim unwavering as he watches Craig.
“You’ve got some fucking nerve, you know that, Craig?” Kyle says, the gun shaking slightly in his grip. “I don’t know whether to hear what you’ve got to say or shoot you where you stand.”
“The correct course of action, I think, would be the latter,” Gregory says, like he’s correcting Kyle’s grammar, and shit, he and Christophe deserve each other.
Craig holds up his hands automatically, scrambling forward so that they don’t broadcast this conversation across the entire neighborhood.
“Look,” he says quickly, remembering Christophe’s words and hoping like hell it isn’t some prank Christophe would find funny. “I’m sorry, ok? I know I shouldn’t even be showing my face around here anymore, but then Christophe said that-”
“You were talking to Christophe?” Kyle asks, disbelieving. “That’s not going to keep me from shooting you, dude.”
“No, I only talked to him because he dug me out of the grave he buried me in, and-”
“You were buried alive?”
“Yeah, sort of. But it was probably Christophe’s idea anyway,” Craig says quickly. “Damian probably would have just killed me on the spot instead.”
“So why are you trusting anything Christophe says?”
“Enough,” Gregory snaps, and for a second Craig is sure, sure Christophe is the one who barks the word at them. Gregory finally lets his arm drop minutely, so that the barrel of his gun is aimed somewhere around Craig’s feet instead of his face. “What did Christophe say?”
“He said,” Craig takes a deep breath, hoping he’s not about to get himself shot. “He said that he’s not your fucking princess.”
Kyle scoffs quietly, looking away with a smirk on his face. But Gregory, he frowns thoughtfully, lets his arms fall to the side and takes a step forward. But when he starts to take another step, he stops mid-movement, seeming to come to grips with himself. Instead, he turns on his heel and disappears around the street.
“Come on,” he calls out, and Kyle and Craig exchange a single bewildered look before they follow him.
Gregory takes them to a run-down building on the outskirts of town, less than an hour away from Carl's Warehouse. Craig's fists clench in the pockets of his jacket as he follows, eyes darting to Kyle every now and again. Kyle is staring down at the floor intently, eyes narrowed and lips pursed. Craig really doesn't want to know what he's thinking. Mostly, he's worried if that line of bullshit Christophe told him to say will actually keep him from getting killed tonight.
At this point, he's not sure if he cares all too much.
Gregory raps his knuckles against the front door three times, softly. It opens without a sound into a dark, deserted corridor. Gregory jerks his head to the left slightly, which Kyle takes as an instruction to move deeper into the house. Craig takes a few steps out of the cold; the door closes with a soft snap behind them.
There's a rustle of movement from the entranceway Kyle disappeared into, and when he follows Gregory into the room, he sees Kyle sitting stiffly on one of the couches, Stan, Token and Wendy seated around him. They all wear matching suspicious looks, Token clutching the handle of his switchblade menacingly. Craig swallows, and the sound echoes loudly around the dank room.
"What's he doing here?" Token finally asks, his eyes flashing with betrayal.
Craig supposes he's got the right to feel betrayed. After all, they were friends first.
"Are you looking to get killed tonight?" Stan asks quietly, his voice unnaturally cruel in the stillness of the room. "Cuz you're sure making it easy on us."
"Don't ask me," Craig says, because honestly, he really doesn't have any idea what he's doing here either.
Stan, Token, and Wendy all turn to Kyle, who shrugs helplessly and nods towards Gregory, who by then has crossed to the cold fireplace. He is silhouetted against the gleam of the brass grate, hands crossed behind his back, his shoulders a stiff, straight line. He says nothing for a moment.
"Christophe is with us," he finally says over his shoulder, not bothering to turn and face the rest of them.
"Just how do you figure that?" Wendy asks, the beginnings of a scowl darkening her features. "When he's been taking orders from Chaos since the very beginning?"
"Oh, don't fucking tell me," Kyle says suddenly. "That…that...bullshit Craig said about princesses actually means something to you?"
Gregory turns to them, at that. Just a sliver of moonlight falls across his face from where he's standing; it makes his eyes look cold and distant, gleaming like blocks of frozen steel. They bore into Craig, until he feels frozen to his spot, unable to move. Finally, after a second that feels like an eternity, Gregory sweeps his gaze over the others.
"Christophe is tired of playing," Gregory says, and it sounds like a statement he's gotten used to saying over the past few years. "If we have a plan, he'll stay out of our way."
Craig doesn't want to know how I'm not your princess translates into anything even remotely like a statement of surrender, but it's keeping Craig alive at this point, so he's not about to complain. There’s bound to be an interesting story behind it, and maybe one day when he’s not in danger of dying, he might ask one of them about it. If they all live past tonight, that is. Gregory turns back to Craig, eyes searching, like he can pull out Craig's secrets with nothing more than his stare.
"I need you to tell me how to get to Chaos," Gregory says slowly, like it's not the most insane thing he's said all night, like it's actually possible to find Chaos in the maze that used to be Carl's Warehouse.
"I don't know if I can," Craig says honestly. He looks down at his shoes. "I can take you to Carl's Warehouse; it's where we meet, and show you through the mess it's become, but I can't guarantee that you'll find him there."
Wendy makes a scoffing noise in the back of her throat; Craig looks up in time to see her and Token exchanging eye rolls. It's then that he realizes someone's missing from the scene.
"Where's Tweek?" he asks belatedly.
The room is silent with the unspoken answer, but Craig can hear it, plain as day, as if someone had shouted at him.
Tweek is gone.
Chaos knew. He knew Craig would act like he did, that had to be the only answer. This was just, what? Some sort of test that Craig failed? He hates Chaos suddenly, that he can understand people better than they themselves can, that he can formulate fucking, fucking convoluted bullshit for no fucking reason whatsoever-
"You'll take us tonight," Gregory says, determined. "You'll help us remain undetected. If everything goes as planned, by the end of the night we'll have both killed Chaos and rescued Tweek."
Craig nods, setting his jaw even as dread begins to pool in the pit of his stomach. Sometimes it feels like Chaos is fucking invincible, but underneath all the smoke-and-mirrors, all the magic tricks, he's just a kid hardly older than Craig himself.
They can do this.
(next)
Rating: light R (for violence and violence and disturbing violence. Oh, and naughty words)
Word Count: ~15000
Genre: action/adventure, angst, tragedy
Warnings: makes allusions to and mentions explicit violence and torture; character death(s) (a lot, a lot of character death, both minor and major), general mind-fuckery, and features deeply-disturbed!Butters. Seriously, don't read this fic if you're easily squicked by like, something silly. Like blood. Or Death.
Characters/Pairings: Craig/Tweek, Damian/Pip, pre-Kenny/Butters, Gregory, Christophe, Stan, Kyle, Butters, Professor Chaos, Cartman, Wendy, Token
Summary: Less of a “love story,” and more of a “detached tale of modern alienation.” Except, you know. With guns.
Disclaimer: South Park and all its related people, places, names and ideas are the property of Matt Parker, Trey Stone, Comedy Central, and probably tons of other people who are Most Decidedly Not Me. No money is being made off of this fan-work and no copy-right infringement is intended.
Notes: This is all chickienine ’s fault, because she asked me while I was recovering from the star trek big bang if I could write her a 10k fic in a month. And I, like a fool, said, “Psh! 10k? I can do that in my sleep!” Oh past-self, how I hate you. Based loosely on this video and contains really, really vague hints to the entire Rule of Rose video game in general (because those had been the parameters. Watch creepy video game intro and write creepyfic to go with it, more or less). If you haven’t played that game, for the love of all that is slash, DON’T. Highlight for sort-of spoilers:This fic is NOT for the faint of heart. I'm gonna tell you up front, DO NOT EXPECT A HAPPY, FLOWERY ENDING. You read the warnings, now read at your own risk.
"Who shall tempt with wand’ring feet, The dark unbottomed infinite abyss And through the palpable obscure find out His uncouth way, or spread his aery flight Upborne with indefatigable wings Over the vast abrupt?"
--Paradise Lost, Book II (404-410)
***
It’s about four-thirty in the afternoon when Craig’s phone buzzes in his pocket. He bites back both the panic and hope that bubble up in his gut as he takes out his phone and reads the message.
Carl’s Warehouse, it says, 30 min.
It’s from Kenny, Craig knows even if the number’s been blocked. He can only ever tell because even fucking Damian has his own cell now, and when Kenny gets a message straight from Butters-Chaos, it’s Chaos now, because that thing that’s taken up residence inside Butters’ brain is nothing like the kid Craig used to know-the number will always be blocked. Mostly, he tries not to think about the person Kenny had to kill to get that phone, or the type of guy Damian, Christophe and Chaos have turned him into that he doesn’t bat an eyelash at death anymore. But Craig’s not fooling anyone; when was the last time he himself cared if Cartman killed someone? The last time he cared about anyone other than himself and-
A cold gust of wind blows by suddenly and makes him shiver. He pulls his coat tighter around himself and sends a message to Tweek with fingers numb from the cold.
Can’t make it to Harbucks today. Spotted Cartman and Damian around my neighborhood earlier. I don’t think it’s safe.
Craig hates lying to Tweek. Before this whole mess started, Craig never spoke a single damn untruth to the guy, but now, well, the only way he can even maintain contact with Tweek is through this fucking subterfuge. He can’t believe he ever agreed to be the fucking mole; he should have just taken Kenny’s advice and kept his head down. It’s not fair, honestly; his allegiance was determined by Chaos being too damn smart for his own good, and it’s all over fucking nothing. Craig is tired of living in a state of constant paranoia; if he isn’t careful he’ll wind up just like-
His phone buzzes again, and Craig nearly jumps out of his skin.
“Shit,” he mumbles to himself, pulls out his phone again and lets out a breath of relief when he sees it’s just Tweek.
Shit! Tweek’s message says. Are you all right? They haven’t got you yet have they???
“They” have had Craig since the very beginning, he thinks to himself. But instead of telling Tweek that, he types out a Nah, I’m fine dude. Quit worrying so much, and hits send before he blurts out the truth to Tweek.
Stay safe, Craig, is the response he gets.
I love you.
Craig stares at his own message for almost five full minutes before he erases it.
You too, Tweek.
He hits send.
***
But really, it starts like this:
Chaos waits very patiently outside his hideout on an average, cold September night. Overhead it is cloudy, with dark, ominous clouds promising a deep frost for the morning. Chaos wraps his coat around himself to shield him from the chill as he waits. He suppresses a smirk as a distant rumbling shakes the damp earth around him. Only a sliver of the moon glimmers through the heavy cloud-cover, and what little light it does afford casts a pallid shadow over the dirt just outside his grimy hideout. There is a little pool of light, cast by the weak, flickering overhead lamp on his front porch, but beyond that oasis of light there is only darkness.
“What?” a cold, menacing voice calls suddenly from out of the shadows.
“Damian,” Chaos drawls calmly (a small, uncertain, wavering voice at the back of his mind starts at the sound of his own voice, insists that this is not what he sounds like, but Chaos ignores it, chooses instead to let his smirk spread leisurely over his face).
“Did you call?” Damian asks, taking a single step out of the shadows and waving his hand over the muck to their right, glistening halfheartedly inside the little inverted pentagram drawn into the dirt.
“Yes, I did,” Chaos answers, “I need your help.”
Damian is silent, his dark red eyes gleaming in the moonlight as he sticks his hands into his pockets and scowls.
“It’s Butters, right?”
“My name is Chaos,” he says, anger flaring bright and hot into his words. “Never call me anything else.”
Damian crooks an eyebrow at that, but nods his head just a fraction. As quick as the anger comes, it is gone in a flash, replaced by a calm buzzing in his mind.
“So what,” he says, “you’re aiming for like, standard world-domination? Or what?”
Damian grins, displaying rows of neatly pointed, gleaming teeth.
“I think so,” Chaos answers, crossing his arms and offering Damian a grin of his own. It is not the entire truth, precisely, but it will do for now.
“Right,” Damian says. He takes a step forward, obviously enjoying himself. “And why should I help you?”
“I’m glad you asked, Damian,” he says, smirking.
This is what he’s been waiting for. He pulls out a battered, slightly damn envelope from his pocket and throws it to Damian. It lands heavily at his feet, a single corner falling into the dark red mess indistinguishable in the darkness. Damian picks it up and opens it almost lazily, but his expression quickly darkens when he looks inside it. He tips the contents of the envelope out into his outstretched hand, eyes blazing with fury as he does so. Bundles of gauze, stained so dark that the blood almost looks purple in the night, tumble to the floor silently, and a single, bloodied finger falls into the palm of Damian’s hand.
“What the fuck is this?” he asks, and Chaos is pleased to hear an almost imperceptible waver of fear underneath his anger.
“Collateral,” Chaos answers. “See, I need your help. And I know someone else who could use your help too.” Chaos watches the way Damian’s fingers close around the dismembered finger in his hand, one by one, with something close to glee. “The way I see it,” Chaos continues pleasantly, “Pip is very comfortable where he is right now, more or less. He has plenty of ice for his hand and medics at his beck and call all around the clock.”
Damian scowls furiously at him, but still, he doesn’t say a word.
“He misses you,” Chaos says quietly, knowing that this is Damian’s breaking point. He’ll either agree to help Chaos now or kill him where he stands. “He’s been asking for you, you know.”
“Shut up,” Damian finally says, his voice shaking slightly. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. So just. Shut the fuck up.”
“I know that’s not a rabbit’s foot you’re holding,” Chaos answers. “And I know that if you don’t want to help me, Pip’s as good as dead.”
Damian is quiet for so long that Chaos has a single fleeting second of doubt, but then-
“Fine,” he says. “Fine. What did you have in mind?”
“That’s a very good question,” Chaos answers on the ghost of a smile. “Are you cold?”
Damian blinks.
“What?”
“Are you cold?” he repeats. “We’ve been outside for almost an hour. It’s very lucky that it hasn’t snowed yet, actually. But where are my manners? Would you like to come in? We can talk inside.”
Damian narrows his eyes suspiciously, but after a minute, sidesteps the mass of flesh and blood in the dirt and enters the dimly lit warehouse behind them. Chaos watches him go, pleased that Damian too, is predictably human. He thinks, for a moment, of the sweet irony he’s created; with Pip buried somewhere deep underground, protected by ancient enchantments as old as the Devil himself. Old spells designed to protect people from evil now being used to perpetuate Chaos’ own evil machinations.
“Thanks for all your help, Dougie,” Chaos tells the muck.
It was Dougie, after all, who suggested it, who carved the spells into the basement, ensuring that Damian could not set foot into it. Dougie himself who drew the inverted pentagram in the dirt, without an inkling that Chaos might need a human sacrifice for this.
“You’re a real pal.”
And then, laughing, Chaos follows Damian inside.
Chaos, after all, has a war to start.
***
It takes Craig nearly 20 minutes to get to Carl’s Warehouse, and when he finally gets there, it’s almost another ten to wander through the labyrinth of hallways and passages that Damian has added to the place since the very beginning. He’s lucky that he doesn’t get lost this time, actually, because when he finally falls into the designated meeting room, Kenny, Damian, Christophe, and Cartman are all sitting around, waiting for him.
“Took you long enough,” Kenny says, smiling brightly.
Craig tries and fails to smile back.
“I was on the other side of town.”
“Pussy-chasing, no doubt,” Christophe mumbles around his cigarette.
“Hey man, watch what you say about-”
“If I am wrong, correct me,” Christophe says, a threat clearly underlying the statement.
His shovel is sitting on the table behind him, a small puddle of dark red mud pooling under it. Craig scowls, but doesn’t rise to the bait. Christophe laughs at that, absently unwrapping a dirty scrap of material from his left forearm. A large gash is revealed as he does so, one that runs from his palm all the way up to his mid-bicep. Craig turns away when the first few drops of blood start to leak out of it.
“What is it this time?” he asks Damian irritably. “Do you want me to babysit fucking Cartman’s fatass while-”
“Hey shut up Craig,” Cartman says from where he’s sitting. “At least I’m not hung up on some paranoid fucking goody-two-shoes.”
“Fuck you Cartman,” Craig answers.
“We’ve taken the western coast,” Damian says, in that quiet voice that never fails to end an argument. Cartman makes a pleased humming noise that Damian ignores. “Cartman called it.”
“You’re seriously going to give Cartman all of the west coast?” Kenny asks.
Damian shrugs.
“When the east coast falls, Kenny, you’ll get full control over the area,” he answers. “That was the deal.”
Kenny sinks back into his seat, crossing his arms and muttering under his breath. Craig takes his customary seat next to Kenny and waits. They don’t have to wait long. Seconds later, Chaos appears with a flash of smoke, with his usual penchant for dramatics, in the center of the semicircle they’ve made.
“Report,” Chaos says, and even though he doesn’t so much as turn his head to Craig, he knows who Chaos is talking to.
“The Resistance is meeting again tomorrow night,” Craig says. “We’re supposed to meet at Stan’s, who’ll take us to wherever they’re meeting this time.”
The Resistance formed almost immediately after Chaos took control of most of Colorado; it’s what happens when you split a town like South Park straight down the middle like Chaos and Damian did. Craig isn’t sure if Chaos actually thinks the rag-tag team of their friends-former friends-are any actual threat, but he’s hoping that Chaos thinks them inconsequential. Tweek’s safety depends on it.
“I see,” Chaos says. A toothy grin slides its way up his mouth, distorting his face in a way Craig is sure Butters’ never could look. “Perfect. Cartman,” he adds sharply, and Craig is pleased to see even fucking Cartman starts slightly at the sound of his voice. “Go talk with Baal about your new acquisition.”
“Aw man, I hate that guy,” Cartman whines, but he heaves himself out of his chair anyway and shuffles out of the room.
Chaos waits until the door slams shut behind Cartman before he so much as moves again. He turns to Damian.
“You will go with Craig,” he says. “You will stay hidden. You will follow them. When you are sure every single member of The Resistance is there, you will kill them.” Damian nods lazily, looking immensely bored. Craig feels something cold slip into his stomach and nearly stops his fucking heart. Chaos turns to Craig, his icy stare boring into Craig. “You will not interfere.”
It takes everything Craig has in him, but eventually, he nods minutely.
“Leave Gregory for me,” Christophe says from his seat, hauling his shovel back over his shoulder and splattering mud everywhere.
Chaos scowls at him furiously, and after a minute of staring each other down, Chaos nods sharply.
“Do not be seen,” he says. Christophe nods, pulling a cigarette out of his pocket as he does so. “We’re done,” he adds after a second. “You have five minutes to get out of here.”
And with that, he disappears as suddenly as he appeared. Christophe and Damian leave almost immediately afterwards, both of them nodding to Kenny and Craig as they leave. Kenny sighs heavily from his seat but doesn’t move.
“Hey dude, you okay?” Craig manages to ask over the panic welling up inside of him.
“Nah,” Kenny answers, resting his elbows heavily on his knees. “He’s completely stopped acknowledging my presence now.”
“Who?” Craig asks, disbelieving. “Chaos? Dude, why do you even care? I can’t fucking stand it when he looks at me; it’s like he’s ripping thoughts right out of your mind.”
For a long time, Kenny doesn’t answer. Finally, he stands and heads out, motioning for Craig to follow him. They maneuver their way through the warehouse quickly with Kenny leading the way, and in less than two minutes, they’re standing out in the moonlight.
“Do you know why I didn’t join The Resistance?” Kenny asks suddenly.
Craig shakes his head.
“Because Damian and Christophe are your friends?”
“Stan and Kyle are my friends,” Kenny answers. “Were. No. I’m here because I know Butters is still in there somewhere. And one day, Chaos is gonna slip and release the fucking strangle-hold he’s got on Butters’ soul, and that happens, I’ll be right there, ready to shake some sense back into Butters and end this whole damn mess.”
“You’re a good friend, Kenny,” Craig finally says.
“Thanks dude,” he answers. “So, what are you gonna do about tomorrow?”
Craig stumbles slightly at that.
“What do you mean?” he asks suspiciously.
“Come on dude,” Kenny says as they round a corner and end up in front of Kenny’s house. “Even Chaos knows you only work with us to keep Tweek safe.”
“I don’t know,” he finally answers. “I have no fucking clue.”
When Craig leaves Kenny that night, he doesn't go home right away. He lingers around Stark's Pond, watching the way the moonlight sparkles across the heavy sheet of ice. There's not a cloud in the sky, and the moon is full tonight, so it's pretty bright out by the pond. He stares intently out into the distance, where piles of snow have settled haphazardly across the horizon, and really hates his life.
Kenny's right. Everyone knows he's only loyal to Chaos because it's the only way he could think of to keep Tweek safe. Tweek stays safe, and Craig is Chaos' spy. That was the deal. Surely, Chaos won't go back on their deal? He's got to know that if Tweek dies, Craig is out.
But then, if all of The Resistance is killed tomorrow night, Chaos won't need a spy anymore.
Fuck. All Craig wanted to do was keep Tweek alive, and now everything's gone to hell.
He doesn't sleep that night. Instead, he sits out by the pond until dawn finally breaks over the horizon, wondering if his life has ever been normal, remembering this time two years ago, when he'd convinced Tweek to come out to Stark's Pond to watch the sunrise and first realized he loved the spazz.
He's in over his head, and fuck. He doesn't know what to do.
Well, no, that's a lie. He knows exactly what he has to do; it's just that he doesn't know if he can. He knew, empirically, that some day he'd have to reveal himself as a traitor to Tweek; he just never expected the moment to come so soon. But it's less than 12 hours before he's supposed to meet up with Stan and those guys, where Damian and Christophe will both be hiding somewhere in the darkness, Damian with some supernatural aide and Christophe with that uncanny ability he has to disappear in plain sight. Craig is out of time, and he doesn't know what he's going to fucking do about it.
***
Butters doesn't understand why his mom and dad are so mad at him today. It's his sixteenth birthday, after all, and he's only just woken up. Surely he can't have done anything to warrant their screaming yet. Still, Butters is nearly shaking with nervousness as he clambers down the stairs. His dad is standing with his arms crossed, fury etched in every line of his face.
"Butters, you've got some serious explaining to do," his dad says ominously.
"I-I didn't mean to, Dad," Butters says automatically, even if he doesn't know what he's supposed to have done this time.
"Oh, you didn't mean to?" he asks. "You made your mother cry, Butters. Just what do you have to say about that?"
"Well, gee, I'm sorry, Dad-"
"Sorry won't cut it this time, Mister," he says. "I want you to march back up to your room and think about what you've done. You're not allowed out again for three days, at least!"
Butters turns on his tail and slowly climbs back up to his room. As he passes his parents' bedroom, he can hear a slight sniffling sound coming from the darkened room.
"Mom?" he asks, peeking into the room.
"Oh God, get out of here; get out of here!" she says hysterically, diving under the bed and sobbing.
"Mom, I don't understand," Butters tries, taking a step into the room.
"Don't come near me!" she screeches. "STEPHEN!"
Heavy footsteps thunder up the stairs, and Butters runs to his room and locks the door, trembling from head to foot. He doesn't understand; what had he done to make his mother so upset?
They hate you Butters, a cold voice says at the back of his mind.
"N-no they don't," Butters says, acutely aware of the strangeness of talking to the voices in his mind.
They couldn't care less about you, the voice continues. They treat you like trash. Is that all you are, Butters? Worthless garbage?
"I'm not garbage," Butters says into the quiet of his room.
Garbage, the voice says again. I can help you, Butters. Let me help you.
"I-I'm not supposed to talk to strangers," Butters says, the only thing he can think of to say.
I'm not a stranger Butters. You know me very well.
Butters closes his eyes and sinks to the floor, wrapping his arms around his knees as he does so.
"I’m not hearing you," Butters says, low, quiet. "I-I'm all alone in my room, and no one else is here, and I'm just talking to myself."
I can help you Butters, the voice says again, but gently this time. Don't you want to know why they hate you so much?
"I can't hear you," Butters says loudly. And then again, this time a whisper, "I can't hear you."
You can't ignore me Butters. It's not nice. Don't you recognize me?
"No," Butters finally answers. "But-you don't exist anyway."
I exist, Butters.
Butters tightens his grip on his knees, because he's starting to feel strange, far-away and unreal, like he's in danger of floating out of his body.
Do you want to see how real I am?
"No," Butters whispers, can't seem to make his vocal chords scream like he wants to. "Leave me alone."
I can't. You see, I need your help too, Butters. Maybe we can help each other?
Butters is getting sleepy. He drops his head to his knees and stifles a yawn. Vaguely, he thinks it's weird that he can't feel his body so much anymore.
"Who are you?" Butters asks on nothing more than a breath.
I am-
"Chaos," Chaos finishes, standing quickly and brushing off microscopic dust from the hem of his sleeve.
Without a sound, he unlocks his door and prowls out of his room, stopping just outside Linda and Stephen’s room, listening. Chaos has unfinished business to attend to. Linda’s voice floats out of the room, and Chaos bites back the manic grin at the memory of their last encounter. She has every right to be terrified.
“I don’t understand where we went wrong, Stephen,” she says with a quavering voice.
“Now, now, Linda, we mustn’t blame ourselves,” Stephen says, and oh, how Chaos hates that man’s voice. It’s slippery and disgusting and Chaos wants to rip Stephen’s throat from his body every time he speaks. “That boy is nothing but trouble.”
Chaos curbs the predatory rage that threatens to bubble up to the surface and instead creeps downstairs to the kitchen. Chaos is patient. He can wait. Less than five minutes later Stephen marches into the room, doesn't so much as glance towards the corner where Chaos is lounging around near the cabinets. That's how Chaos likes it best anyway. He is used to being ignored; it helps to sneak up on someone when they have no idea he even exists.
In a flash, Chaos has his favorite butcher knife pressed against Stephen's throat; the man makes a choked-off whining sound, but silences at the sharp press of the steel against his flesh. Chaos watches the first tiny pinpricks of blood slide down the man’s throat.
"You disgust me," Chaos whispers.
"B-Butters?" Stephen asks.
It's, perhaps, the wrong thing to say.
"My name," Chaos says, his grip tightening slightly on the butcher knife, "is Chaos."
With a single, brutal swipe, he cuts through this man's delicate throat, drops him to the floor and listens to his agonized, terrified, gurgling rasps of breath. Chaos sneers and watches, watches his disgusting, worthless body writhe on the floor, scrabble for purchase on the neat, spotless tiles around him until at last, the body stills.
"Pathetic," Chaos says.
There's spattered blood all along the far right wall now, and Stephen's body now lies limp in a dark puddle of his own blood. Chaos crouches down beside the body and lays his hand flat in the pool. It drips down his forearm as he watches, stains the crisp white shirt Butters had wanted to wear on his birthday.
"Happy birthday, Butters," he says, a smile curving the edges of his lips.
Butters wakes up with a strangled cry, shaking uncontrollably. He’s just had the most terrible dream of-
He hears his mother’s scream from downstairs and jumps up from his spot on the floor, nearly slipping in his haste. Luckily, he catches himself on his bedpost, but that’s when he notices that the cuffs of his button-down are stained with what looks terrifyingly like blood. Butters shivers and bolts out of his room, nearly drowning in his panic. He runs down the stairs almost in a dream, following the sound of his mother’s sobs to the kitchen, stops abruptly at the doorway. His mom is sobbing into her hands, kneeling beside his dad, who is facedown in a puddle of congealed blood. On the clean, polished tile is a message smeared lazily in his dad’s blood. Butters’ heart stops beating when he sees it.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BUTTERS.
Butters is sent to a therapist shortly afterwards. He goes quietly, meekly, even though he has no memory of-of doing that to his dad, or of the threat he’d apparently scrawled on his mother’s bathroom mirror the night before. But “Chaos,” it causes a shiver to run up Butters’ spine, makes him remember the chilly voice inside his own head, the bloodstains on his t-shirt after his terrible dream and thinks that maybe, maybe he is crazy. He doesn’t want to think about it, and his first few meetings with Doctor Escobar feel like complete wastes of time until-
Butters is a fool if he thinks he can get rid of Chaos. There is such arrogance in him, that he thinks he can survive without Chaos there to strike fear into the hearts of their enemies. Chaos will not be ignored, will not be stuffed into the ignominious recesses of that boy’s mind, not again; he will not. As long as Butters has breath in his body, he will never be rid of Chaos-
Doctor Escobar tells Butters that he has spoken with Chaos, and that’s when Butters really gets terrified. He is crazy, after all, and his mom is right in sending him to live with his grandparents on the other side of town. Butters can’t be trusted anymore.
Linda is a bitch. The message he’d scrawled on her bathroom mirror is as true today as it was the day he wrote it, a halting message in her disgusting fuscous lipstick. It doesn’t matter much to him if he kills her now or the next time he so deems to reappear; Chaos is patient.
There is a day, about four and a half months after his mom first sent him to therapy, where Dr. Escobar declares that Butters’ psychotic break has finally been fixed.
Chaos spoke with Jason Escobar at length about the medication he had meant to prescribe to Butters. It was a very productive conversation, in Chaos’ opinion. Chaos knows where Jason lives, where his children go to school, and all those drugs meant to keep Chaos at bay wouldn’t keep him away for long. He’d find a way out again, and he’d make sure Jason knew exactly how much Chaos hated being locked in a cage. Jason Escobar does not prescribe Butters any medication, and that’s the important part.
Butters doesn’t feel any different, but Dr. Escobar assures Butters that he isn’t supposed to feel any different. Butters hopes he’s right. He’s relieved, honestly, and even if his mom still refuses to let him move back into her house, Butters is…he’s happy. He’s not crazy anymore.
After all, Chaos can be patient.
***
So, Craig decides about halfway through the next day that he's not a fucking coward. He can do this. It won't be difficult at all, he keeps reminding himself, even after he meets up with Tweek and they walk to Stan's house. Wendy and Token are already there, and they wait around Stan's house for about ten minutes before Kyle finally shows up. There isn't a better time to tell them all they're about to be killed, but still, Craig stays quiet. Stan and Kyle are the only two Gregory ever trusts with the information on where their next meeting place is, and so soon they'll be split into two groups for the long trek.
God, Craig is a fucking coward.
Kyle, Token and Tweek leave first, and after about ten minutes Stan leads him and Wendy out into the night.
"Hey Stan," Craig says, hands stuffed into his pockets so neither of them can see the way he's trembling. "Can I talk to you?"
"Sure thing, dude," Stan says, sweeping his eyes over the dark alleyway they've slipped into. He’s got his right hand in his jacket pocket, and Craig isn’t naïve enough to think he isn’t gripping the handle of a gun tightly. "Is it about Tweek?"
"What? No," Craig says. Not really, anyway. "Why is it that whenever I have a problem, someone always assumes it's about Tweek?"
Stan laughs aloud at that; by their side Wendy smirks and rolls her eyes.
“No offense Craig, but you're not exactly subtle around him," Wendy says quietly.
"The only person who can't see how whipped he's got you is Tweek," Stan answers.
"Whatever," Craig says; he takes a deep, fortifying breath. He can do this. "But seriously dude. I-I need to talk to you."
"All right. What's up?"
Craig stops just before they hit the light of a nearby streetlight. He takes another deep breath but can't seem to find enough oxygen to make his words come out.
"Dude, calm the fuck down," Stan says. "You're not gonna have like, a panic attack over whatever this is, are you?"
Craig closes his eyes and counts slowly to five. Maybe he is about to have a panic attack. It’d be pretty damn fitting if he did.
"Here's the thing," Craig says weakly before he chickens out. "I'm a worthless fucking coward."
"Don't be so hard on yourself, Craig," Wendy says immediately, in a voice that's clearly meant to soothe him.
"Yeah dude, I'm sure if you just tell Tweek-"
"This isn't about Tweek," Craig says, finding his anger and holding onto it desperately. "Look. I'm sorry, okay? I'm so fucking sorry."
"Craig, what are you talking about?" Wendy's on her knees beside him now, and fuck, how did Craig not notice falling to the ground?
"In about ten minutes, Damian and Christophe will be at your fucking-headquarters or whatever. They've got orders from Chaos to kill every single one of you."
There’s a tense moment of silence after his proclamation.
"That's not funny, Craig," Stan says angrily. "What are you trying to pull-"
"I'm trying to tell you the truth," Craig says. "It’s me. I’m his fucking double agent, emissary, mole, spy. Whatever you want to call it. I've been telling Chaos all your plans to bring him down. Did you guys ever wonder why it felt like they were always one step ahead of The Resistance? It's because they were. It's my fault. Chaos told me that if I didn't-that he'd-and fuck dude. I had to keep Tweek safe."
It sounds so selfish when he says it out loud. He almost killed the seven people that had any chance of stopping Chaos, all because he's fucking hung up on his best friend.
Craig watches Stan's face change slowly from confusion to dawning horror. When Stan looks away into the darkness, he turns to Wendy, whose face is a complicated mix of betrayal and disgust.
"Fuck," Stan whispers. "How far away are they?"
"They were supposed to be following me," Craig says. "You guys have to go. If you're lucky, they won't have caught up with us yet."
Stan looks like he kind of wants to tear Craig apart for a second, but instead he beckons to Wendy, and together, they disappear into the darkness.
Craig doesn't move for what feels like forever; he still can't quite believe it. He's just out-ed himself as a spy, a traitor, and yet, he can't help but feel anything other than a profound relief swell somewhere in his chest. He doesn't have to pretend anymore, doesn't have to worry about slipping up, doesn't have to exist in a constant state of panic, looking over his shoulder, doesn't have to lie anymore. Tweek probably hates him now, but at least Craig's kept him alive for another day. If anything was worth probably dying at Damian’s hands, it’s that. Knowing that Tweek is still safe for a few more hours, at least.
"Are you kidding me?" Damian says suddenly.
Craig's pulled roughly to his feet, Damian’s grip like a brand across his arm; Christophe is watching the two of them from a few feet away, leaning against the nearby streetlight that's only just flickered out.
"Where'd they go?" Damian says.
"I don't know."
Damian's eyes blaze in the darkness; Craig can smell burnt wool, looks down at where Damian is still clutching him and sees that the hand on Craig's arm has burnt a hole through his jacket.
"Fucking bullshit," Damian says.
Christophe sighs. He takes a deep pull off his cigarette before he crushes it under his boot and pulls his shovel out from the holster on his back.
"You probably should have seen this coming," Craig says mildly, because he doesn't answer to these guys anymore, and that's pretty fucking amazing.
"This too," Christophe says, brings his shovel up and crashes it into the back of Craig's head.
Craig stumbles for a second, then the ground comes speeding up to meet him, and he's out cold.
When he comes to, it's pitch black. He's lying on his back on a wooden floor, and when he brings his hand up to rub against the side of his face, he can feel something heavy and wooden encasing him.
"You’ve got to be kidding me," Craig says to no one in particular.
When he tries to push off the lid of the box he's been stuffed into, it doesn't budge. Doesn't so much as creak with the effort, but a few pebbles do clink to the bottom of the box from the haphazardly shut top. That's when Craig starts to panic.
Those bastards fucking buried him alive.
***
Butters is getting worried. He’s developed a habit of blacking out at very inopportune moments; sometimes he’ll come-to where he blacked out, on the floor of his grandparent’s house or out by the bus stop, but others he’ll wake up in the middle of nowhere without a clue as to how he got there. This last time he woke up 34 miles outside of Beaverton, covered in motor oil and something that reeked of lighter fluid.
Kenny will know what to do. Butters is sure of it, because even when all the world’s gone to pieces, Kenny has always been able to keep under control. He’ll be able to help. But when he gets to Kenny’s house, he stands outside for nearly ten minutes, knocking on the front door (and later, the back, and after another five minutes passes, he even tries the window too), but no one answers.
“Kenny?” Butters calls out nervously. “It’s Butters. Are you home?”
There’s a loud crash from somewhere inside; Butters starts rubbing his knuckles together anxiously, hoping Kenny’s not gotten himself into trouble again. The front door opens a crack, just wide enough for one of Kenny’s bright blue eyes to peak through. Butters smiles nervously, clasps his hands behind his back to keep himself from fidgeting.
“Hey Kenny,” Butters says. “Can I come in?”
The door opens just a centimeter wider.
“Butters?” Kenny asks, almost incredulously, like he doubts Butters is really himself.
“Well, yeah, Kenny,” he answers. “Who did you think I was?”
Kenny is silent for a moment, before he suddenly bangs the door open and launches himself at Butters. The force of his hug nearly overbalances them, and Butters has to grab onto the rickety railing of Kenny’s front porch to keep from toppling over.
“It’s good to see you too, Kenny,” Butters says, just a little bemused.
“Dude, what the fuck happened to you last night?” Kenny asks, pulling away and smiling.
“Wh-what do you mean?”
Kenny must see something of the panic going on inside of Butters, because he frowns suddenly and leads them inside, where Butters almost immediately collapses onto Kenny’s old, worn sofa.
“You came by at like, three-thirty in the morning,” Kenny says uncertainly. He rubs the back of his neck, and it’s only then that Butters notices the ugly green bruise coloring the side of Kenny’s jaw. There’s an oozing gash all along his neck too, that goes on for so long that it disappears under the neck of his hoodie. “It was kinda freaky.”
“What did I do?”
Kenny shrugs with one shoulder.
“I don’t really know,” Kenny says, staring intently at a hole in his sneakers. “You weren’t really making a lot of sense. You said something about burning down an orphanage or something?”
Butters gets a sudden flash of memory at that: his hands tight around someone’s throat, buried up to his armpits in a vat of a black bubbling substance, the body of someone flailing madly while Butters’ laugh rings out, echoing in the empty room-
“Butters, are you all right?” Kenny asks, shaking him gently and pulling him out of the memory.
Butters takes a deep, shuddering breath, like he just emerged from a pool of cold water.
“I’m fine,” he says. He looks up into Kenny’s worried face, his eyes tracing over the jagged cut on his neck, the bruise darkening before his eyes. “What happened to you?”
Kenny blinks twice, runs his hand through his hair, and sighs.
“I knew right away you weren’t in control of your mental faculties, I guess,” Kenny says after a long pause. “So like, I don’t blame you or anything, but-”
“Kenny,” Butters says, feeling his eyes go round with shock. “You don’t mean-I didn’t-I didn’t do that to you, did I?”
“No, you didn’t,” Kenny says firmly, kneeling in front of Butters and taking both of his hands in his own. “You called yourself Chaos.”
Butters still has his aluminum foil mask from when his childhood stint as a super villain. He can’t quite believe that his old alter-ego, Professor Chaos, has resurfaced after all these years, can’t imagine himself putting on that mask and anyone actually taking him seriously. But Kenny looks terrified, his eyes snapping to the open door and back like he’s afraid Butters will suddenly snap on him.
“I think you must be mistaken, Kenny,” Butters says, trying and failing to stop the tremble in his voice. “P-professor Chaos is…he’s gone.”
“Chaos,” Kenny immediately appends, a visible shiver running up his spine. “His name is Chaos. You don’t-he doesn’t-like to be called anything else.”
And then he remembers, not a year ago, his therapy sessions with Dr. Escobar and Chaos and-everything. Kenny pulls off his parka, wincing as he does so, and on his old, yellowing tee-shirt are a series of dark red stains bleeding through the shirt. MY NAME IS CHAOS is scrawled plainly across the whole of Kenny’s torso, visible clearly through the shirt.
“Kenny,” Butters breathes, too horrified to say anything else.
Kenny smiles gently.
“Don’t freak, Butters, we’ll figure this out,” he says.
But Butters doesn’t want to listen. He can’t believe it; won’t believe it. Chaos is gone. Doctor Escobar and his mother and grandparents made sure of it months ago. Chaos is gone.
He turns tail and runs.
***
The important thing to remember, Craig tries to tell himself, is to not panic.
Right.
Because he’s been, holy shit, buried alive, and he could have been unconscious for fuck only knows how long, and he might run out of oxygen at any moment now and just. Fuck. The important thing is to not panic.
But if he had been on the verge of a panic attack earlier, trying to tell Stan and Wendy the exact shade of scumbag he was, he's sure as hell hyperventilating now. He can't fucking breathe, let alone scream. For a second he lets himself imagine suffocating to death, buried who-the-fuck knows how deep in some nameless place in the forest, his fucking grave unmarked and forgotten until the end of time.
It's nothing that he doesn't deserve anyway.
Craig beats his fists against the coffin's lid (coffin, he's in a fucking coffin; if he ever gets out of this he's going to kill those bastards), angry with himself, the entire situation, but mostly pissed at Chaos, who showed up one day in Butters' skin and decided to end the world in a fiery mass of death. He thumps his knee against the lid one last time, trying to reconcile himself with Death when-
Something thumps back.
He stills, wondering what the fuck might be happening. He doesn't let himself hope; obviously he's hallucinating. Because honestly, having to face his own death is bound to make Craig jump off the deep end, right?
But no. Now that he's not focusing on his own steady, shallow breathing, he can clearly hear someone above him. Someone cursing slightly and-and-
digging.
All the breath leaves Craig's body the second he hears a shovel scrape heavily against the wood encasing him. There's some muffled shuffling above him somewhere, and then with a beautiful creaking sound, the wooden lid is pulled away.
Christophe is standing over him, an unlit cigarette held in his mouth as he pushes the lid out of the way. Craig can see the half-moon shining brilliantly above them, and shit, Craig thinks it's one of the most beautiful things he's ever seen.
"Christophe, what-"
"Shut up," is the answer he gets as Christophe uses his shovel as leverage and jumps up and out of the hole. Craig thinks it looks almost nine feet deep. "Just get out before anyone sees us."
Craig doesn't need to be told twice. His body is still pumped with adrenaline, and he pulls himself out of his would-be grave easily. He's panting by the time he scrambles up to Christophe, who's by then lit his cigarette and smoked about half of it. It's started snowing around them, unsurprisingly, but Craig doesn't even feel the bite of winter on his skin (although he does wonder what happened to his jacket, come to think of it).
"Okay," Craig finally says, "I'm not complaining about you know, not dying or anything, but is there a reason why you just...um. Helped me? Because I'm pretty sure you were the one to you know, do the actual burying."
"Of course I tossed you in zat fucking stinkhole," Christophe says, like he's offended that someone somewhere wouldn't find him the perfect man for the job. "How do you think I knew where to find you?"
Craig decides that he's going to leave that alone, because yeah, Christophe knows at least six different ways to kill a person with nothing but a lighter and his bare hands. But he still doesn't really know why the fuck he's not currently dying a slow and horrible death underground.
"So," he starts, hesitant. He only just realizes that Christophe and himself have probably spoken about 10 words to each other since the start of their fucking acquaintance; no wonder he doesn't know what to say. "Um. Thanks, I guess." Christophe takes another pull off his cigarette in answer. "Is there any chance that you'll, I don't know, tell my why you just saved my life?"
"Zere is no time to explain," Christophe says, wiping the dirt and dusty snow out of his face. "Just go. Find Ze Resistance again before someone else finds you."
Craig can't help it then; he laughs.
"Are you kidding me dude?" he says, crossing his arms over his chest as the chill finally starts to hit him. For a second, he lets his bitterness creep into his voice. "They'll kill me just as quickly as Chaos would, if he caught sight of me."
"I do not think so," Christophe answers, dropping the still smoking butt of his cigarette into the dirt. His expression hardens suddenly, makes Craig feel like his skin is being slowly peeled away, so Christophe can examine him from the inside out. "Tell zose cocksucking pussies-tell Gregory..." He looks away suddenly, which actually terrifies Craig just a little bit. "Tell Gregory I'm not his fucking princess," Christophe says, kind of like he has to rip the words out of his soul.
And okay, Craig's not even going to ask about that shit. He’s a firm believer in not asking questions he almost certainly won’t like the answers to. Suddenly, Christophe's head jerks up again, his eyes narrowed as they sweep around the surrounding forest. "Go," he says quietly, and then again, just the tinniest bit more urgent, "go."
Craig doesn’t need to be told twice. He’s out of there within the span of a heartbeat, hardly daring to look back, running through the forest on autopilot, until the trees thin out around him. The road is only about half a mile away; he can see it twisting over the landscape, a dark river twisting its way through the snow around it. Craig sighs, wonders just how the fuck he let this become his life, and climbs down the hillside, following the road back to South Park.
His first instinct is to go find Tweek, make sure he’s not dead and rotting somewhere in the city, but even as he turns down the familiar roads to Tweek’s house, he stops himself. He’s lost the right to check up on Tweek. Besides, all of The Resistance probably wants him dead now, anyway. He thinks about going to Kenny next, and although he thinks Kenny might understand Craig’s decision-hopes, maybe, that this is what Kenny had wanted him to do in the first place-he can’t really be sure he won’t end up back underground if he puts his trust in Kenny.
Craig is a man without a fucking country.
It turns out that the decision is taken out of his hands, as seconds later he ends up face to face with Kyle and Gregory, both armed with sleek black guns, both currently aimed at Craig’s face. In a moment of utter, utter hysteria, Craig manages to crack a smile.
"Is that a gun in my face or are you two just happy to see me?"
Kyle looks like he's trying very hard not to smile too, but Gregory's face remains impassive, his aim unwavering as he watches Craig.
“You’ve got some fucking nerve, you know that, Craig?” Kyle says, the gun shaking slightly in his grip. “I don’t know whether to hear what you’ve got to say or shoot you where you stand.”
“The correct course of action, I think, would be the latter,” Gregory says, like he’s correcting Kyle’s grammar, and shit, he and Christophe deserve each other.
Craig holds up his hands automatically, scrambling forward so that they don’t broadcast this conversation across the entire neighborhood.
“Look,” he says quickly, remembering Christophe’s words and hoping like hell it isn’t some prank Christophe would find funny. “I’m sorry, ok? I know I shouldn’t even be showing my face around here anymore, but then Christophe said that-”
“You were talking to Christophe?” Kyle asks, disbelieving. “That’s not going to keep me from shooting you, dude.”
“No, I only talked to him because he dug me out of the grave he buried me in, and-”
“You were buried alive?”
“Yeah, sort of. But it was probably Christophe’s idea anyway,” Craig says quickly. “Damian probably would have just killed me on the spot instead.”
“So why are you trusting anything Christophe says?”
“Enough,” Gregory snaps, and for a second Craig is sure, sure Christophe is the one who barks the word at them. Gregory finally lets his arm drop minutely, so that the barrel of his gun is aimed somewhere around Craig’s feet instead of his face. “What did Christophe say?”
“He said,” Craig takes a deep breath, hoping he’s not about to get himself shot. “He said that he’s not your fucking princess.”
Kyle scoffs quietly, looking away with a smirk on his face. But Gregory, he frowns thoughtfully, lets his arms fall to the side and takes a step forward. But when he starts to take another step, he stops mid-movement, seeming to come to grips with himself. Instead, he turns on his heel and disappears around the street.
“Come on,” he calls out, and Kyle and Craig exchange a single bewildered look before they follow him.
Gregory takes them to a run-down building on the outskirts of town, less than an hour away from Carl's Warehouse. Craig's fists clench in the pockets of his jacket as he follows, eyes darting to Kyle every now and again. Kyle is staring down at the floor intently, eyes narrowed and lips pursed. Craig really doesn't want to know what he's thinking. Mostly, he's worried if that line of bullshit Christophe told him to say will actually keep him from getting killed tonight.
At this point, he's not sure if he cares all too much.
Gregory raps his knuckles against the front door three times, softly. It opens without a sound into a dark, deserted corridor. Gregory jerks his head to the left slightly, which Kyle takes as an instruction to move deeper into the house. Craig takes a few steps out of the cold; the door closes with a soft snap behind them.
There's a rustle of movement from the entranceway Kyle disappeared into, and when he follows Gregory into the room, he sees Kyle sitting stiffly on one of the couches, Stan, Token and Wendy seated around him. They all wear matching suspicious looks, Token clutching the handle of his switchblade menacingly. Craig swallows, and the sound echoes loudly around the dank room.
"What's he doing here?" Token finally asks, his eyes flashing with betrayal.
Craig supposes he's got the right to feel betrayed. After all, they were friends first.
"Are you looking to get killed tonight?" Stan asks quietly, his voice unnaturally cruel in the stillness of the room. "Cuz you're sure making it easy on us."
"Don't ask me," Craig says, because honestly, he really doesn't have any idea what he's doing here either.
Stan, Token, and Wendy all turn to Kyle, who shrugs helplessly and nods towards Gregory, who by then has crossed to the cold fireplace. He is silhouetted against the gleam of the brass grate, hands crossed behind his back, his shoulders a stiff, straight line. He says nothing for a moment.
"Christophe is with us," he finally says over his shoulder, not bothering to turn and face the rest of them.
"Just how do you figure that?" Wendy asks, the beginnings of a scowl darkening her features. "When he's been taking orders from Chaos since the very beginning?"
"Oh, don't fucking tell me," Kyle says suddenly. "That…that...bullshit Craig said about princesses actually means something to you?"
Gregory turns to them, at that. Just a sliver of moonlight falls across his face from where he's standing; it makes his eyes look cold and distant, gleaming like blocks of frozen steel. They bore into Craig, until he feels frozen to his spot, unable to move. Finally, after a second that feels like an eternity, Gregory sweeps his gaze over the others.
"Christophe is tired of playing," Gregory says, and it sounds like a statement he's gotten used to saying over the past few years. "If we have a plan, he'll stay out of our way."
Craig doesn't want to know how I'm not your princess translates into anything even remotely like a statement of surrender, but it's keeping Craig alive at this point, so he's not about to complain. There’s bound to be an interesting story behind it, and maybe one day when he’s not in danger of dying, he might ask one of them about it. If they all live past tonight, that is. Gregory turns back to Craig, eyes searching, like he can pull out Craig's secrets with nothing more than his stare.
"I need you to tell me how to get to Chaos," Gregory says slowly, like it's not the most insane thing he's said all night, like it's actually possible to find Chaos in the maze that used to be Carl's Warehouse.
"I don't know if I can," Craig says honestly. He looks down at his shoes. "I can take you to Carl's Warehouse; it's where we meet, and show you through the mess it's become, but I can't guarantee that you'll find him there."
Wendy makes a scoffing noise in the back of her throat; Craig looks up in time to see her and Token exchanging eye rolls. It's then that he realizes someone's missing from the scene.
"Where's Tweek?" he asks belatedly.
The room is silent with the unspoken answer, but Craig can hear it, plain as day, as if someone had shouted at him.
Tweek is gone.
Chaos knew. He knew Craig would act like he did, that had to be the only answer. This was just, what? Some sort of test that Craig failed? He hates Chaos suddenly, that he can understand people better than they themselves can, that he can formulate fucking, fucking convoluted bullshit for no fucking reason whatsoever-
"You'll take us tonight," Gregory says, determined. "You'll help us remain undetected. If everything goes as planned, by the end of the night we'll have both killed Chaos and rescued Tweek."
Craig nods, setting his jaw even as dread begins to pool in the pit of his stomach. Sometimes it feels like Chaos is fucking invincible, but underneath all the smoke-and-mirrors, all the magic tricks, he's just a kid hardly older than Craig himself.
They can do this.
(next)