Author's note: The story continues...

Chapter 4

It's 7:30 PM and Cartman is walking home from the vet's office. He's looking down at his feet angrily, kicking stones along the sidewalk and muttering to himself.

"Dammit Mr. Kitty, where are you? What the hell is going on?" Just then he heard hurried footsteps running down the street toward him. He looked up to find Stan, Kyle and Kenny closing in on him.

"Cartman!" said Stan. "We have to talk to you!"

"Not right now you guys. I've got something I need to take care of." Cartman kept walking past the three of them. Stan, Kyle and Kenny turn around and watch him as he starts to walk away. Kyle called out after him:

"Mr. Kitty wasn't at the vet's office, was he?" Cartman stopped in his tracks.

"What?"

"We know what's going on, Cartman. We know who has Mr. Kitty." said Kenny. Cartman turned around to face them. His eyes and face was clenched tight in frustration, which quickly turned to anger. He opened his eyes and looked at them.

"If one of you assholes did somethi-"

"It wasn't us." said Kyle quickly.

"Then WHO!" demanded Cartman.

"Trent Boyett." said Stan. It took a second or two for this bit of information to hit Cartman. Once it did, the anger in Cartman's face instantaneously turned into terror and panic.

"Trent Boyett? He's out-"

"Again. Yeah." said Kenny.

"But why would he take-"

"We don't know. We just know that he's taken Ike, Wendy and Bebe too." said Kyle.

"He's taken them all to get revenge on us somehow. We just don't know where they are." explained Stan.

"Well, he wouldn't kidnap them just for shits and giggles. He's got to have some sort of plan, some reason behind it." said Cartman.

"It's obvious he's targeting us, but why doesn't he just come after us?" asked Kyle. They stood there and wondered for a second, when Kenny thought of something.

"Because he wants us to come after him." Stan, Kyle and Cartman all look at Kenny. "Think about it. He's taken those we care about the most as hostages, forcing us to go to him."

"...OK, but he wouldn't do that unless he told us where-" Stan was suddenly interrupted by an annoyingly loud cell phone ring:

Kyle's mom's a bitch, she's a big fat bitch, she's the biggest bitch in the whole wide world. She's a stupid bitch, if there ever...

"God dammit Cartman, is that still your fucking ringtone!?" screamed Kyle.

"Hehe, yeah." said Cartman. He answered his phone.

"What?...Butters calm down…Butters, calm…what?...yeah, they're here…what?...OK fine, we'll be there in a sec, just…wait Butters!" Cartman paused a second then hung up and put his phone away.

"Butters? What did he want?" asked Stan.

"How the hell should I know? He was talking so fast I could barely understand him." said Cartman.

"Does he want us to go over to his house or something?" said Kenny.

"Yeah, he didn't say why though." said Cartman.

"It sounded pretty urgent. Maybe we should go see what he wants." suggested Stan.

"Stan, haven't you forgotten a certain Trent Boyett predicament were in?" said Kyle.

"Yeah, but we can't do anything about it right now. Not until we figure out exactly where Trent is."

"Stan's right. Let's go see what Butters wants." said Kenny. The foursome then headed off toward Butters' house.

As they approached the front of Butters' house, the foursome didn't even get to his mailbox across the street before an almost Tweek-like Butters threw open the front door and started shouting.

"Fellas, FELLLLAAAAS!" Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman hurry their pace over to Butters' front door.

"Jesus Christ, Butters! What on earth has gotten into you?" asked Cartman.

"Come inside, I've got to show you something." Butters brought them inside to his living room. "You'll never guess who left me this videotape on my front step earlier." Butters held out the tape. The all saw the tape labeled: A Gift from a Friend. They looked at each other.

"Dude…" said Kenny.

"Here, you have to watch it." Butters went over to his TV, turned it on, put the tape in the VCR and pushed play. They could hardly believe their eyes, but at the same time knew that it was real.

They saw Wendy, Bebe and Ike up against a wall tied up and gagged. They were sitting on an old, dusty looking carpet. Next to them was a small animal cage containing a helpless and frightened Mr. Kitty. The camera, which most likely was on some sort of tripod, was about 10 feet away from them. It zoomed in and panned across all the victims' faces, starting with Mr. Kitty's. He let out a pitiful sounding meow before the camera moved on to Ike, who was visibly shaking in fear. He closed his eyes and turned his head away from the camera as it moved across Wendy's face. She was openly crying, and looked like she had been for a while. The camera then showed Bebe's face, which first showed an angry look directed at something next to the camera, then quickly changed as she looked into the camera with both pleading and desperation in her eyes. The camera zoomed back out to its original position while a voice came from somewhere behind it.

"They look frightened, don't they?" said Trent. The camera suddenly jerked toward him, showing his face. The guys all jumped when they saw Trent's face again. "Well, they have good reason to be." Trent continued. "You see, they don't know why I've kidnapped them. But you do. You know all too well. That's why I know you'll be coming here to get them alone. And if you're not here by midnight, they'll start dying." He faced the camera back toward them, then walked over behind them while pulling out his knife. "Who will be first? The beloved cat? The dear little brother? Or one of the lovely ladies?" A deranged look of malice came over Trent's face as he surveyed his choices, then it disappeared again as he looked back at the camera. "You have until midnight to get your pathetic, cowardly asses back here to where it all started, so it can finally end!" Trent then shut off the camera and the TV went black.

All five boys stood there frozen, and for a while no one said a word. They had to let the full magnitude of the situation sink in before they could react. Butters was the first to break the silence.

"What are you guys gonna do?"

"What do you mean, what are you guys gonna do? You're in this too Butters!" exclaimed Cartman.

"Oh no I'm not, if I get involved my parents will ground me!" said Butters.

"Well, dude, Trent gave you the tape. He must have done it for a reason." said Kenny.

"I don't know why he gave it to me, but he gave me my punishment 5 years ago. As far as I'm concerned we're even."

"Apparently not." said Cartman.

"Guys, we need to figure out what we're going to do about this." said Kyle. "What if we go to the police?"

"We can't do that." said Stan. "If we call the police, they'll figure out we've been lying for 10 years."

"Well, we can't just sit here! We have to tell someone!" said Kyle.

"No we don't. We just have to find him. That should be our first priority." said Stan.

"Oh sure, great." started Cartman sarcastically "Just find him, OK Stan, brilliant idea but, uh, where the hell do we start looking!? Huh? You do realize he could be anywhere, right? How do we search the entire town before midnight!"

"I don't know, but he has to be somewhere." replied Stan.

"Yeah, but where? He never told us where to find him." mentioned Kenny. Everyone became silent and started thinking of places he would possibly go with his hostages. After a few minutes, Butters had an epiphany.

"Wait a minute, he did tell us where he is." Everyone else looked up at him skeptically. Butters glanced over at the TV, then back at them. "Yeah, I know where he is!"