A/N: Greetings! Naturally my return from the Inactivity-land would be brought about by a new fandom. Here is my first South Park fic, an introspective narrative.

Credits goes to their original creators.


Sunset

Cezille07

The cold wind relentlessly blew upon the face of the earth, it seemed to Eric Cartman, who lay spread-eagle on his rooftop. The wind made no regard for the fact that it was supposedly the middle of summer, or the hottest hour of the afternoon. It was cold all over, cold inside, where his jacket couldn't keep him warm. Eric fixed his eyes on his zenith, wondering at the interplay of colors on the utterly confused skyline. Dusk was approaching fast, and the pale blue was slowly being overtaken by the fierce orange-red.

It made him think of Kyle and Stan, and sometimes Kenny when the hue was just right. It made him think, where on earth was his place among those three, if something as natural as the heavens disagreed with his intent to remain with them? It made him doubt—and he disliked doubting. What was he supposed to do with this sky?

The wind stung, and he closed his eyes. A sweet face filled the gap between sight and nothingness: a smiling Kyle, midway between laughter and speech. The bright eyes held no contempt, the words he spoke brought no hurt. In this vision, they were friends. Eric reached up skywards, half-desperate to touch that image, but only more cold kissed his gloved hands. He opened his eyes in disappointment.

Fiery red. The earth radiated Kyle's distant warmth; the wind carried his high voice. The sky brought his face back from memory. There was poetry in his mere existence, and Eric was the final period gracing those fragile words.

It wasn't his fault. It hardly had anything to do with him, save his proximity — and he used to think he hated proximity — until Kyle had needed precisely him, precisely his hateful tongue, the rough fists, the menacing eyes. Blood dripped from Kyle's mouth, and where tears were supposed to fall, more blood decorated there too. Kyle's preachy voice was reduced to whimpering: and as Eric was often drawn to this, he listened. He hated the explanation. Older students, for no apparent reason. His natural capacity for rage stirred up no less than three blocks of quiet houses in his search for Kyle's assailants. No one, and no one, was allowed to hurt Kyle; no one had the right to take that smile away and live. He didn't expect that there was not enough time for both rescue and revenge. He had made a mistake; it was poorly thought, inexcusable. Kyle had needed him, for once, and he had let him down. The corner where he left a weak, injured Kyle, now hid a cold, pale corpse. Never before had more sincere tears fallen from his face; and all regret, for unspoken friendship they would've had, poured out all the way to the red, red moon. Only now did he pick up his phone and dialed for a sane voice to come help him, help him, Kylewashurtpleasehurryplease! Stan would never forgive him.

Kenny had assured him gently that Kyle was happy in heaven, but Eric couldn't be sure. Eric wasn't happy here, certainly, and what right did other people have...

Sometimes, when he looked up at the sky, he liked to pretend there was a reason for their unforgiving colors. Why was red his first breath every morning, and red the sunset to his misery? Perhaps it was a little justice. An ending. At least there was room, sometimes, for Eric in the sky, and it rightfully suited him — a blood-red moon in the evening dark. A period. A close. Sometimes he liked to think Kyle looked at the big, chunk of rock encircling the earth and thought of him (maybe). Sometimes, their clashing reds, in the ceaseless play of fate, hung together in the sky: an early moon running to catch the fading sunset hue.