Chapter Text
It was the last Saturday of spring break, and Stan was grounded.
The worst part of it all, really, was that it was for a boring reason. Stan wished he could say that this was the result of some misadventure, the kind of trouble he often got into as a kid, but no.
All that happened was his grades started slipping and his dad declared he was spending way too much time with his friends and not enough time studying. Which was true, probably, but Stan still called bullshit.
He knew for a fact that Randy Marsh had never cared about anyone’s grades, even his own children’s; Stan had just been unlucky enough that he’d been in a bad mood when he found out.
They’d argued for about half an hour before Randy took Stan’s car keys and banished him to his room. Stan, in retaliation, had turned his speaker up as loud as it would go, playing the loudest music he could think of.
Luckily, there was a loophole. Stan wasn’t technically banned from leaving the farm, he was just banned from driving. There was no rule saying he couldn’t get the bus. It was a shitty bus hardly ever even showed up, but Stan’s desire to get off that fucking farm was strong enough for him to put up with it.
He much preferred the weeks when he was at his mom’s house in town. He thought about just staying there full time, like Shelley had done when she was eighteen and no longer bound by the court inflicted custody schedule, but a part of him still felt bad thinking about his dad all alone out there with just the weed plants to keep him company.
When he was being a dick though, Stan seriously considered packing his bags and never looking back.
Today, thankfully, the bus had decided to behave and both picked Stan up and dropped him off on time; that was like a double rainbow. His friends were waiting for him when he got into town.
His friends and Kenny.
She smiled brightly when he stepped off the bus, her big, cheesing grin that, as corny as it sounded, made Stan understand what all the love songs were talking about. They were coming up on three years together, and he still wasn’t tired of that smile. He was pretty sure he never would be
"There he is," Kenny said, already reaching out to hug him. "Our prisoner."
Stan grinned and pulled her into his arms for a kiss. "Here I am."
"Ew, dude you’re all sweaty," Kenny snickered.
Stan winced. "Yeah. There’s no AC on the bus."
Kenny shrugged and kissed him again. "Doesn’t bother me."
"Oh for— Earth to the planet of the face suckers," Cartman snapped.
Stan looked over at him with a scowl that only deepened when Kenny took a step back, putting some distance between the two of them. "Fuck you, you’re just jealous cause no girl wants to kiss you."
Cartman scoffed. "Please I could get a way hotter chick than you, yours is just Kenny. She barely even counts!"
Kenny snickered and seemed unoffended. "I don’t think you could get any girl."
"Maybe if she was blind," Kyle suggested. "And deaf. And had no sense of smell."
Kenny placed a hand on Cartman’s shoulder. "I’m sure your Helen Keller is out there somewhere, dude."
Cartman shrugged her off. "Fuck you Kenny! And fuck you Kyle! I’ve been with loads of chicks!"
"Kenny’s been with more girls than you!" Kyle retorted.
"It’s true," Kenny said mildly. Then she patted Stan’s chest. "Left that life behind me though. He made an honest woman of me and all that."
"As if Stan would mind you making out with girls," Cartman snickered.
"I would actually," Stan protested.
"Yeah, cause he’s a gentleman," Kenny praised. She hooked her arm around Stan’s and gave his bicep a little squeeze. "And either way, I’m very satisfied."
"Oh gross," Kyle muttered. "I don’t wanna think about you two— Gross!"
Kenny stuck her tongue out. "Then don’t think about it, weirdo."
"I’m not."
"Don’t think about me and Stan and what we look like with our shirts off and how we—"
"Gross Kenny shut up!" Kyle snapped.
Stan made a face. "Yeah, gross."
Kenny smirked and shrugged. "That’s not what you were saying last time I was at your house."
Kyle actually shuddered. "Can we talk about literally anything else? And can we go do something?" he asked. "I don’t wanna just stand here all day."
"Relax, Kyle," Kenny dismissed, hooking one of her arms around Stan’s. "It’s not like we can be late to skip rocks."
"That’s the grand plan for the day?" Stan asked. "I got the bus just for that?"
"You wanted off that farm so bad you would’ve come down here to watch paint dry. Anyway, what else are we gonna do?"
Stan hummed, then sighed. "Good point."
South Park was one of those places that felt like it was stuck in time. Nothing changed, ever. The arcade and the pizza place had been fun enough when they were kids, but now adulthood was approaching and the whole town was a little bit lacking in entertainment.
Usually they'd spend their free time playing video games and smoking in Cartman’s basement, but last time they were there they’d seen a rat, and Kyle refused to go back until the problem was dealt with. Their other haunt was the farm, which was obviously not an option this time.
"I wanna make a bonfire," Cartman interjected.
Stan blinked. "A what?"
"It’s when you get a bunch of wood and shit and then you light it on fire."
"No I—"
"He knows what it is, fatass!" Kyle snapped. "He’s confused why the fuck you wanna make one."
"Uh, well, it’s cooler than Kenny’s dumbass rock skipping idea!"
"That was more, like, metaphorical or rhetorical or whatever," Kenny said weakly.
She went ignored. "How the fuck are we even gonna find enough wood to—"
"We are literally surrounded by trees Kyle!"
"Not too late to ditch them," Stan murmured, leaning closer to Kenny.
She smirked. "Don’t tempt me. Anyway I thought that was gross."
"You telling Kyle about it is gross," Stan corrected. He let his hand rest on her lower back, just above the waistband of her jeans. "Seriously. Is your place free?"
"Nah, Karen’s home and you know how thin those walls are. We’ll have to find someplace else."
Stan clicked his tongue. No car or farm either, which left them pretty flat out of options. "I guess bonfire it is, then."
And so the four of them headed down to Stark’s Pond. Stan ended up straying from Kenny slightly as she and Cartman pulled ahead, but he was content to watch her.
Her hair was loose today, cascading from her head to her lower back and swishing as she walked. It looked bright and gold in the sunlight. A couple summers ago, Stan started calling her Rapunzel, just because it made her laugh and want to kiss him.
He was lucky that he was a pretty good multitasker, and it was well within his capabilities to stare at Kenny and maintain a conversation with Kyle. This was one of the reasons their friendship hadn’t really suffered with the introduction of Stan and Kenny’s relationship however long ago.
That, and Kenny had always been pretty nonchalant when it came to relationship stuff. She got special treatment because Stan wanted her to, not because she demanded it; if she had it her way, she’d just be treated like one of the guys. And in many ways she was. She was just also Stan’s girl. Always would be, if she’d have him.
"You’re staring," Kyle said lightly.
"I’m aware," Stan replied.
Kenny must’ve overheard them because she cast a glance backwards and gestured at her ass, then waved a finger scoldingly with a smirk. Stan rolled his eyes and pointed forward, prompting her to watch where she was going again. Probably for the best; she could be pretty accident prone.
Kyle smiled and shook his head fondly. "You’re fucking lame, you know that right?"
"Don’t worry, I make sure to remind him!" Kenny called over her shoulder, and Stan just gestured in agreement.
Kenny told him, often and very bluntly, just how lame he was. Like he said, she wasn’t like a lot of girls. She found displays of affection gross, always more interested in physical rather than emotional intimacy. But Stan had a feeling she liked it, deep down. She must’ve, otherwise she would’ve dumped him by now.
That being said, he had made a conscious effort to tone down some of his more emotional tendencies, the kind of stuff that got him made fun of for being soft and gay as a kid, like how he cried at movies where dogs die and asked for his mom whenever he was hurt. It had been cute when he was a kid, but now he was grown up, even if he didn’t feel like it, and he had a feeling it was sort of pathetic now.
Besides, Kenny was the kind of girl who appreciated a level of stoicism. Aside from her dismissal of any of Stan’s attempts to treat her like a lady, he’d learnt that she’d rather die than talk about her own emotions. The cycle was always that she’d deny feeling anything other than fine, lash out when pushed, then inevitably break down crying when it all got too much. It wasn’t perfect, but Stan was good at managing her.
But being witness to what Kenny could endure, did make him realise that he didn’t have the same emotional resilience. Like he said, he was trying to work on it.
"Okay fat boy," Kenny said, once they arrived at Stark’s Pond. She stuck her hands in her pockets and tilted her head towards Cartman. "Wow us with your pyrotechnics."
"Uh… Yeah. Okay so we need wood, obviously, and I figure you’ve got a lighter, you know cause you live in a drug den."
"You have no idea how to build a fire, do you?" Kyle realised.
Kenny stared at him. "You’ve been talking about doing this for how long now, and you don’t even know how to do it?"
Cartman scowled. "Duh of course I do, I was just testing you!"
"Right," Kenny drawled. "Sure you were, dude."
"Ugh whatever Kenny, like you know anything about building a fucking fire."
"I do."
"Well yeah only cause you’re fucking poor and need one to stay warm," Cartman spluttered.
Kenny stared at him for a moment then just shook her head. "Whatever. Kyle let’s go look for some wood, you two find some dry twigs and leaves and shit. Kindling, you know?"
Stan made a small noise as Kenny started to leave, then made panicked eye contact with Kyle. At this point in their friendship, Stan was sure they could pretty much communicate psychically, and he was silently screaming at him to give him some alone time with his girl.
Kyle sighed heavily and made a face that communicated back to Stan that he owed him a favour. "Probably best Cartman sticks to small stuff. I bet his fat ass can’t lift anything actually substantial," he goaded.
"Fuck you Kyle! I can lift way more than a chick can, and I bet I can lift way more than you!" Cartman retorted, predictably.
"Bet you can’t."
"Bet I can! Come on, I’ll prove it!"
And with that he stormed into the woods, Kyle close behind. Kenny watched them leave then turned to Stan with a grin.
"Hey," she said, stepping towards him. "Alone at last."
Stan reached for her hands and interlinked their fingers. "Look at that."
Kenny grinned and waggled her eyebrows. "And we’re gonna look for kindling, huh?"
Stan opened his mouth but paused for a moment. "Is there an innuendo there?"
"I was hoping if I used the right tone one would sort of just, you know, emerge," she admitted. "But come on, we should actually look for some."
Stan sighed as she stepped back but nodded in agreement. "You probably know what we’re looking for better than me."
"You know I don’t actually regularly build fires, right?" Kenny said, tucking her hair behind her ears as she surveyed the ground. "I just, like, sort of know what to do. Read it somewhere once or something. You’re the one who’s always going camping with your uncle."
"Yeah but Jimbo and Ned weren’t really letting the nine year old build the fire."
"No, they just gave him a gun," Kenny said mildly.
Stan shrugged and started gathering a handful of small, dry sticks. It had been raining a lot lately which made the whole thing harder than he’d anticipated. That was pretty par for the course this time of year; it was a little too warm for snow, but South Park was doing its best anyway, resulting in lots of rain and sleet.
"You know I’m surprised Kyle didn’t make me go with him," Kenny commented after a moment. "Offering himself up for one on one time with Cartman isn’t like him."
"I think he was doing me a favour. He knows I’ve been missing you," Stan admitted.
Kenny laughed and turned to face him. "You saw me, like, last week. You really can’t go that long without me, huh?"
"Stop it, okay, you know that’s way longer than we usually go without seeing each other," Stan grumbled. "I mean between your work schedule and the stupid bus schedule… you know."
"I know," Kenny agreed softly. "But trust me, once school starts back up you’ll be sick of me always being around."
Stan smiled weakly. He was looking forward to seeing Kenny more, and getting sick of her wasn’t even a remote possibility, but the concept of school starting again made him feel slightly sick. They were so close to the end now, to being adults in the real world.
And he had no idea what he was doing.
He had an offer to play hockey at a pretty good school, but he’d deferred for a year. He told his parents and everyone else that he wanted to travel, see more of the country. That was true, he wanted to leave Colorado for something other than a dumb childhood adventure, but if he was being entirely honest…
He wasn’t sure if the hockey scholarship and the fancy school across the country was actually what he wanted, or just what he was supposed to want. It all seemed a little too perfect.
Well, except for one pretty big catch.
Kenny wouldn’t be there. She would be here, in South Park. She said she wasn’t bothered by it since she already had a job lined up, something her brother got her, fixing cars of all things. She seemed like she was looking forward to it, but Stan knew it was at least partly another of her many masks.
She told him once she wanted to be a scientist. She said it like it was dumb, just some stupid childhood dream she’d already given up on way before she should’ve. When Stan insisted she was smart enough, Kenny just laughed.
For a while, Stan had tried convincing her to apply for scholarships, especially ones for schools near his, and Kenny had just pointed out her admittedly spotty academic transcript. Then he’d changed tacts and tried convincing her to run away across the country with him, and she’d just laughed and kissed him and said it was cute how naive he could be. That was a nice way of saying she had a sister, and sometimes a brother and parents, to be responsible for, and Stan had no idea what that was like.
Both times Kenny had made valid points, so Stan had stopped trying to convince her. That didn’t mean he was any less upset about it, though.
Kenny kissed his cheek, pulling him out of his thoughts; he hadn’t even noticed her stepping closer, her sticks tucked beneath her arm. "You look very pensive," she said.
Stan sighed. "That’s a big word."
"For you, maybe. Me? I have a very broad vocabulary, and not all of it is swear words you know," Kenny replied lightly. She rubbed Stan’s cheek, probably removing the lip gloss she’d left behind; it was clear, always clear, but sticky. "What’s up?"
"It’s nothing," Stan dismissed. "Just thinking about emo gay shit."
Kenny hesitated for a moment, and busied herself with fiddling with the zipper for his jacket. "You just seem sad lately," she said eventually, meeting his gaze through her sandy lashes. "And I know I’m not, like, the most empathetic girl in the world but I am… you know, your girlfriend. You can talk to me if you are sad, you don’t have to hide stuff from me."
Stan smiled slightly and kissed her. "Kenz, I’m fine, promise. You don’t have to worry about me, okay?"
Kenny sighed through her nose, clearly not satisfied, but she nodded. "Okay."
"Come on," Stan said, holding out a hand to take her sticks for her. "I think we’ve got enough. Let’s go look for the others."
Kenny passed over her kindling then hooked her arm around his. "What are the chances one of them killed the other and we’re gonna have to help bury a body?"
Stan laughed. "Hey, we’re already building a fire. It wouldn’t be too hard."
Kenny snorted a laugh. "Cartman’s been on a bit of a weird pyro kick lately," she said. "At least it’s something different, I guess. Maybe me and him can set it up, and you and Kyle can go get some stuff to make s’mores or something. That would probably make it a little more fun."
"That’s not a bad idea," Stan agreed.
He wasn’t surprised. Kenny had an ability to save things, make them more fun, make them better. She just had a way about her, and it often made Stan wonder why she was wasting her time with a wet blanket like him. The rest of the time he was just grateful she decided he could use some of her magic too.
Kyle and Cartman had done surprisingly well at gathering wood, and Kenny proved to be pretty good at building a fire, despite her reiteration that she really hadn’t done this before. Stan and Kyle did as she suggested and went to the local store to get crackers, marshmallows and chocolate, and it turned into a very nice afternoon, all in all. When they said so, Cartman smugly and loudly made sure to remind everyone that this had been his idea.
Kenny sat close to Stan, quiet but he thought she seemed content. She was clearly thinking hard, but that wasn’t unusual for her; she spent most of her time in her own inner world.
Stan asked her what she was thinking about while walking her home, hand in hand.
"Oh you know," Kenny said vaguely. "Mostly just school stuff."
"Mostly?"
"Well I was also thinking a little bit about how my boyfriend’s pretty hot, but I didn’t wanna tell you that and make your head any bigger," Kenny sighed. "But you’ve pulled my leg now."
Stan huffed a laugh. "I’m flattered. And I’ll try to keep my head in check, but honestly… it’s pretty hard when a super hot girl is into me, you know?"
Kenny smiled slightly. "I bet."
Stan looked down and saw she still had that thoughtful look on her face, her bottom lip between her teeth and her eyebrows knitted together. He squeezed her hand.
"Seriously, what’s on your mind Kenz?"
"Why do you call me that? You know there’s no Z in my name," she deflected.
Stan sighed. "I don’t know, I guess I think it’s cute. Why are you avoiding the question?"
Kenny gnawed on her bottom lip. "Do you… ever wish that things would, like, change around here?"
Stan thought about it for a moment. "I like the way things are. Like I said, I’ve got a super hot girl who likes me, so I can’t complain much."
Kenny smiled faintly. "Right."
"I mean I guess things do kind of get… stuck here," Stan considered, seriously now his attempt to lighten the mood had failed. "But it’s what we know, you know? I don’t want anything to change too much."
"That makes sense," Kenny said quietly.
Something told Stan not to push any further, and they walked in silence for a few minutes more until they reached Kenny’s house.
She turned to face him with a small smile once they arrived. "I’d invite you in but I’ve got work in an hour anyway. Plus the place is more of a dump than usual."
Stan nodded. "It’s okay. Gotta go finish that homework, you know all those packets we got."
Kenny raised an eyebrow. "Finish or start?"
"Start," Stan admitted. "But I know you haven’t even looked at yours."
"Well I’m not the one going to college," Kenny dismissed. Stan’s smile faded slightly and Kenny’s turned into something soft and sympathetic. "Don’t get emo on me."
"I’m not," Stan denied, even if there was no point.
Kenny reached out to gently squeeze his arm. "You’ll be okay getting home, right?"
"Yeah, don’t worry about me," Stan said. "What’s the worst that could happen?"
Kenny didn’t look reassured. "Well now that you’ve said that, probably something really bad."
"Aw is someone worried about me?" Stan teased.
Kenny rolled her eyes. "Whatever. I actually hope you get lost and eaten by wolves."
Stan laughed and kissed her. "If you get a chance, call me later, okay? You can help me with my math."
Kenny’s smile returned and she nodded. "Okay. As long as you text me when you get home."
"Okay," Stan agreed.
He kissed Kenny again and watched her enter her house, then turned around and headed towards the bus stop. He pulled his headphones on to give him something to do other than observe the same streets he’d always known.
He understood Kenny’s concern of course; he was the same way whenever he couldn’t walk or drive her around town. South Park was familiar, but all of the actual adults who knew anything were always saying how dangerous it had gotten. Crime was up, violent crime in particular, and it wasn’t really safe to walk around alone after dark anymore. That being said, the sun was barely setting, so Stan figured he’d be just fine.
Unfortunately for him, however, he only got through half a song before his phone died. Even more unfortunately for him, he’d become way too reliant on ApplePay and no longer had any way to pay for the bus he was meant to be getting.
It was at times like these that he wished he was better at the whole divorced parents thing. He had one charger to his name, which he brought back and forth between his mom’s house in town and the farm, and obviously was currently at the farm. Plus his dad was already gonna be annoyed that Stan had loopholed his grounding, and that would be doubled if he found out Stan had stopped at his mom’s, even just to charge his phone. He didn’t want to deal with that at all.
He thought about what to do and the answer was pretty obvious.
"Well hello Stan!" Sheila said, when she answered the door. "I wasn’t expecting you today!"
"Hi Mrs B. My phone died, can I go borrow Kyle’s charger?" Stan asked.
He was ushered into the house and, after declining multiple offers to stay for dinner, headed up to Kyle’s room. He didn’t seem surprised to see Stan; this was the nature of their friendship at this point. He let Stan use his PlayStation to kill time while his phone charged, and they sat in silence while Kyle did some smart person AP whatever stuff.
"Have you spoken more to Kenny about, you know, next year?" Kyle asked after about half an hour of this. He’d probably gotten bored of his work and just wanted to push some buttons.
Stan sighed heavily. "I don’t wanna, Kyle, it sucks. It just bums me out."
"Do you ever talk about serious crap?" Kyle asked.
Stan made a face. "Duh. What else are we doing right now?"
"Okay. Do you talk about serious stuff with her?" Kyle pressed. "Like do you talk about serious stuff specifically with your girlfriend?”
"I don’t know. What serious stuff do I have going on?" Stan asked.
"Um maybe how you’re leaving town for a year and she isn’t?"
"We’ve got loads of time," Stan dismissed. "I’d rather, like, enjoy the next few months without worrying about it, you know?"
Kyle made a noise that Stan had to come to learn meant he was biting his tongue about something, which was unlike him to say the least. Stan didn’t respond though, mainly because he knew Kyle had a point and it was a talk they’d have to have soon, but every time he thought about it, he felt his heart break a little.
Kenny was enough to make him want to stay in South Park forever, but he knew she didn’t want that. She said once that she’d never forgive him if he didn’t leave and Stan had taken it to heart.
Stan stayed until his phone had a healthy fifty percent charge, before once again taking his leave. Kyle offered him a ride, but that would be breaking the no friends at the farm clause of his grounding so he’d politely resigned himself to the bus.
Stan didn’t realise how late it was until he stepped outside and saw it had gotten dark while he’d been at Kyle’s. As much as Stan wanted to pretend that didn’t unsettle him, it did a little.
Whatever. He’d be more worried if Kenny was with him, a pretty girl like her was definitely a prime target. That was probably just why she worried about him so much, but no one was gonna attack a random guy for no reason and it wasn’t like he’d done anything to piss anyone off lately.
Or at least no one with a gun or anything. He was pretty sure Craig Tucker wasn’t gonna jump him over their little rivalry.
Still, Stan decided to refrain from putting his headphones back on, at least until he got on the bus. A little vigilance never harmed anyone and time alone with his thoughts wouldn’t kill him.
Without any distraction though, he couldn’t help but think about what Kyle said. Maybe he was right, and they should talk about next year sooner rather than later. Stan knew what he wanted to say; that he’d love her even if they were hundreds of miles and a time zone apart. He didn’t know what Kenny would say though. He liked to think he knew her well, but her mind was a mystery to him at the best of times.
Plus she was a very… physical person. He wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t want to settle for at least a year of, effectively, celibacy. In fact, it would be worse if she stayed with him and denied herself just to protect his feelings.
Stan frowned and shook his head, trying to physically clear his mind. Kenny wasn’t like that. She was good and honest, and he had to have faith in that. If they were meant to be then they could survive anything, right?
He tried to focus on that thought and decided to cut through an alley by the park to make this journey quicker; the sooner he could drown his thoughts in music the better.
This particular alley was sketchier looking than he remembered. He never really came down here, South Park wasn’t usually the kind of place where there was any reason to get anywhere particularly fast. The walls were splattered with poor graffiti, mostly just slurs that were most likely written by wannabe edgy middle schoolers. Trash bags lined the alley, probably thrown over the wall by residents of surrounding houses; a few had been torn open by wild animals, and Stan’s footsteps startled a very big rat away from one.
He tried thinking of Kenny’s old possum, Mr Possy to calm his nerves. Even when he was a kid he thought it was cute how much she cared about that thing, even if she herself had admitted it was probably multiple possums she mistook for one.
The fond smile slid off of Stan’s face when he heard footsteps approaching behind him, followed by a shaky voice.
“Turn around slow!”
Stan swallowed and considered bolting, before realising that was probably really dumb. Instead he did as he was told and turned around slowly, coming face to face with a man with a gun.
For some reason, he looked about as scared as Stan felt. That didn’t exactly reassure Stan at all; the hand holding the gun was shaking, and he seemed three seconds away from accidentally squeezing the trigger.
“Empty your pockets,” the man said, his other hand flying to his mouth. He picked at his lip, wide eyes fixating on Stan.
"Dude I don’t even have my wallet," Stan said; his voice cracked in a particularly embarrassing way. He wished he had his wallet, then he wouldn’t have had to charge his phone, and he wouldn’t be in this situation.
"Well then— Then gimme your phone!" the mugger said, using his gun to point towards it in Stan’s hand.
“It’s like an iPhone 12, dude, you’re not gonna get much for it,” Stan rambled.
Bad idea. This just seemed to spook the man, set him off somehow. “Don’t fucking— Just drop it or I’ll take it!”
Stan weighed up the options. He had been shot before, that one time at school, and that wasn’t… the worst thing that had ever happened. Sure it hurt and sometimes that shoulder randomly ached, like when there was a freak rainstorm and shit, but he’d survived largely unscathed. The scar just gave him a pretty cool story if anything; Kenny said it was hot and half teasingly, half sincerely called him a hero even though he didn’t really do anything brave.
That being said, he wasn’t sure this guy was planning on leaving him alive unless he handed over his stupid phone. But he really didn’t want to do that. It was a stupid thought that popped into his head, but his dad would be so mad, and he’d be left stranded in town.
Before he could come to a definitive conclusion about whether another scar was something he could live with, a dark shadow passed over the alley.
“What the—”
Stan looked up, just in time to see something black dart out of the shadows and ram into the mugger, slamming him against the wall with enough force that a crack echoed off the graffitied walls.
Stan stumbled back, tripping on an untied shoelace and landing firmly on his ass. The man groaned in pain and said something that sounded like no please I’m sorry. It landed on deaf ears though, and his pleas were cut off when the shadow slammed the mugger’s head firmly against the ground, knocking him out cold.
Then the shadow rose, and Stan realised it was a person. Whoever it was, he was wearing a dark purple, almost black, outfit consisting of what looked like running gear and combat boots, paired with a black ski mask and a dark hooded cape.
He tilted his head towards Stan, who felt paralysed under his gaze. Who the fuck was this guy? He barely looked human, and Stan had never seen a real person move that fast, with such strength.
The stranger picked up the gun the mugger had discarded upon being accosted, fiddled with it for a moment, and tucked it somewhere in his cape. Then he pulled the mugger up, checking for a pulse before resting him in a seated position against the wall.
Then the stranger approached Stan, heavy combat boots splashing in the shallow puddle covering the ground before stopping right in front of him.
All Stan could think was that this was how he died, at the hands of some masked freak who moved like a bullet.
"Be not afraid." His voice sounded like he had glass in his throat, a gravelly and inhuman growl that sent a chill down Stan’s spine; still, he got the impression that the stranger was making an attempt at some sort of joke. "Are you okay?"
Stan swallowed and somehow found the courage to look up at the eyes boring straight into his soul. They were caked in eyeblack that paired with the hood and mask made him look almost faceless, but his irises were an impossible lavender colour.
This has to be a nightmare of some kind.
Stan opened his mouth but no words came out. He had a million thoughts swirling around in his head which were deafening when combined with the thumping of his heart.
The stranger crouched down, coming to Stan’s level. His hand twitched towards Stan but he flinched, slamming his head against the wall in the process.
"It’s okay," the stranger said softly, voice still a growl but strangely reassuring now. "I’m not gonna hurt you. Just tell me, did he hurt you?"
Stan shook his head and swallowed. "No I— Fuck dude! You just— And he— And I—"
"You’re in shock," the stranger said, still with that same gentle tone. "Just breathe. You’re safe now. I promise I won’t let anything hurt you."
It was a bold statement and yet, for some reason, Stan trusted him completely. Maybe it was that this stranger, whoever he was, had just knocked out someone twice his size, or maybe it was that for some reason his voice felt vaguely familiar. But whatever it was, Stan slowly felt his body relax slightly.
"Who the fuck are you?" Stan blurted out once his brain was… sort of working again.
The stranger scoffed and Stan wasn’t sure how, but he got the sense he was smiling. Maybe amused, or relieved Stan was okay and just an idiot. He held a hand out and took Stan’s in a strong grip, then pulled him to his feet.
"Seriously who are you?" Stan repeated.
He sighed. "I’m a friend."
"What do I call you though?" Stan pressed.
The stranger seemed to be surveying him, sizing him up. "Call me Mysterion," he said eventually. "Are you okay?"
Stan nodded. "Thanks to you."
Mysterion gestured vaguely. "You fell."
Stan felt his face heat up. "Yeah no, I’m fine just… an idiot."
"You shouldn’t have been out on your own, especially in this part of town," Mysterion lectured, as if to agree.
Stan swallowed. "Yeah well I— Yeah. I know, but I missed my bus. It’s not like this was my choice or anything."
Mysterion nodded. "In that case, I’ll take you home."
Stan blinked. "Oh— Oh no it’s a long way. My girlfriend lives in town, I can crash with her."
"Better not. You should be in your own bed tonight." Mysterion fiddled with one of his gloves idly and flexed his hand a couple times before looking up at Stan. "Where do you live?"
Stan jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "Like… way out on a farm, dude," he said weakly. "Hence the bus."
Mysterion waved a hand dismissively. "Follow me."
Stan wasn’t sure why he did. Yes the guy kind of saved his ass, but he was still a stranger. Emphasis on strange. But for some inexplicable reason, Stan trusted him.
So he followed, and let Mysterion lead him to a motorbike parked by a dumpster. It was painted purple, to match his costume.
"I’m guessing you’ve got a favourite colour," Stan said dryly.
Mysterion made a sound that might’ve been a laugh, and climbed onto the bike. "Get on. I’ll take you home."
Stan hesitated. "Is it safe?"
"Don’t worry," Mysterion said. "I won’t let anything happen to you."
And for some reason, Stan trusted him again. He climbed on, sliding down the seat until his chest touched Mysterion’s back. He was smaller than Stan, but he felt solid and strong.
"Hold on tight," he said, and Stan felt his growly voice in his chest.
He wrapped his arms around Mysterion’s waist and closed his eyes as he put the bike in drive. The world whipped away into a deafening blur, and all Stan could hear was the purring of the bike’s engine, and Mysterion’s controlled breathing. The wind was rushing through his hair and his body lurched with every turn, but he didn’t feel unsafe.
In fact, he was almost upset when they came to a halt, and Mysterion glanced at him over his shoulder. "I won’t go any closer. I don’t want anyone to see me, or to wake anyone up."
Stan glanced up at the soft yellow lights of the farmhouse up the road. "Thank you."
"You don’t have to thank me."
"Right… But I do. I mean I really do. You’ve done a lot for me tonight."
"You can rely on me," Mysterion promised. "Always. Have a good night, Stan."
It was only when Stan got to his bedroom and was struggling to fall asleep that he realised he’d never told Mysterion his name.