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"Fuckin' hell, Shifty, the fuck happened to you?" Stan held his face in both hands, rough palms scratching softly against the carefully crafted plane of Shifty's cheeks, all the little tiny hairs and pores so intricately placed.
Shifty licked his upper lip, tasting the blood leaking out of his nose. It was ruby red and human - superficial damage to his exterior, nothing permanent. Most of the blood - the stuff dried dark on his sleeves and down his front, making the coarse fibers of his sweater stiff - was not his.
He knew that this knowledge would not calm Stan, however. "I dealt with a threat," Shifty said coolly, fondly remembering how easy the bones had snapped underneath his hands, how fragile and brittle. Logically, Shifty surmised that Stan would be the same. Bones just as easily bent and broken. Yet somehow he couldn't believe it. Stan's hands fluttered like moths around Shifty's face, two fingers pressed gently on the bloodied bridge of Shifty's nose, and they felt strong, sturdy. Plasmic.
Not like the boys at school, who'd unspooled so easily with just a few swipes. Soft underbellies, sliced open and spilt all along the linoleum floor. Shifty had done what he was supposed to, though. He'd cleaned up his mess, washed his hands. He knew how much it annoyed Stan and Ford to clean up after him, how often they reminded him to wash up after a meal or a day playing in the dirt.
"Well, yer nose isn't broken," Stan said grumpily, hand that had been prodding Shifty's face falling down.
"I could have told you that."
"Yeah, yeah," Stan waved him off, eyes and hands moving down to Shifty's sweater now. Fingers picked at the stiff, blood-matted fibers with a critical eye. "I don't think this is gonna wash out so good."
Shifty frowned at that, the human expression of upset - corners of the mouth moving down, eyebrows drawing up to a scrunched, displeased face. He'd liked this sweater.
Stan sighed deeply, a long exhale dragging out of his mouth. "Jesus. The fuck did you do? Who did you do this to?"
Uneasy, Shifty looked away. Stan might ask, but he didn't want the answer. Shifty knew it would only make him upset. He didn't want that. "If I tell you, you won't be able to look at me the same," he said, matter-of-fact and almost ashamed.
Stan frowned deeply. "Yeah, I don't like the sound of that."
Two hands moved between them - two sets of five things catching Shifty's. He'd accidentally given himself six fingers again, Shifty realized - he quickly moved them back to five. Six drew too much attention.
"Are you okay?" Stan asked, and if Shifty didn't know him so well, if he didn't spend every waking moment for years analyzing every minute detail of his brothers, he would be surprised at the intensity in Stan's eyes.
Shifty nodded. "Yes. I am fine." And it wasn't a lie.
This was how Stan cared - the fussing and the protecting. Stan was how Shifty learned how to protect, learned how important that was. Protect and care. Even at the cost of yourself. That was Stan's love, and Shifty had it learned and memorized.
A dark part of him was even pleased, beyond just the satisfaction of a job well done. He'd been waiting for a moment he'd get to preform this part.