Nothing But The Rain

Chapter Ten: What A Wonderful World

By: Jondy Macmillan

-Kyle-

I climb out of Kenny's bed early in the morning. He's tangled up in his lone sheet, looking perfect, innocent; things I never would have associated with Kenny McCormick before the disease spread. Sex with him was a strange experience; violent and necessary. He knew every move I would make, it felt like, and I wondered. Am I so predictable?

I know it would be better if I stayed. I know he needs me to stay, to reaffirm his belief that life doesn't suck. That he can have one good thing left in this hellhole.

I can't be that one good thing.

It would be so simple to drop everything and stay tucked away in this corner of Main Street. To never leave, and to never have to think, or hurt, or know that the world's falling to shit around us.

To never remember everything we've lost.

All my staying would do would be to put Kenny in harm's way. That's what I tell myself as I walk out the back door.

Is it selfish for me to live my life this way? Yes. There is no other answer. I push people away, so they'll be safe, except it's a lie. I push them away because it's easier for me. I don't have to worry this way. I don't have to wonder if what I'm doing is wrong. I don't have to think that my life might just be worth staying alive for.

Stan was like that. Stan. Shit. There's another reason I can't stay. His face pops up fucking everywhere. On my neighbors, on my little brother…on Kenny, when I was balls deep inside him.

I'm a horrible person. I'm going straight to hell when I die, which might be sooner than I ever planned. At least it will be on my own terms.

Stan disagrees with the government. Logically, I know that. He just never had the willpower to fight. I made him into a soldier, and when I dropped him, he turncoated. It was his only option; what's a soldier to do without an army?

You can tell, though. Those TV press releases they put out, with him talking about the bombing; he still doesn't agree with them. There's a piece of the old Stan Marsh in there, but it's just tucked down so deeply inside, he can't fully access it anymore. I tried to protect him, dropping him like that, but all it did was leave him worse off. I told him he'd be better off dead than working with them, and I believe that. I just can't be the one to do the killing. That's the one thing I'll never be able to achieve, no matter how hard I try.

Sometimes I feel helpless. Like all I can do is curse at the sky. Walking home from Kenny's that's how I feel. I'm decaying away to nothing in this rotten apple city, and everything I do to stop it makes the degradation worse. If I stop, if I think, I'll see the faces of all those mindless drones who worked in Stan's shiny office building. I'll realize I'm not a revolutionary; I'm a killer.

It's all Their fault.

Maybe life wouldn't have been better without the damned plague and the City Governors.

Sure, there's the possibility that we could have grown up in plastic, cookie cutter lives. White picket fence-dog-two kids. Go to the 'rents house every Sunday. It could have been normal, and brilliant.

There's the same possibility that something even worse might have happened. This is South Park, after all.

So yeah, there's every indication that I should be thanking Them for giving me a chance to live a modest life, with my brother. I could drop this rebellion. I could settle for the Way Things Are.

I could become plastic, just like the rest of the county.

Only, if I did that, it'd be a risk. Once we become pliant to their will, like fattened calves, they could easily lead us to the slaughter. And there'd be no one, no one like me. I'm not saying that being willing to lay down your life for a cause is admirable. If anything, it's stupid. Life is a gift, and making a martyr of yourself may be a sort of gift to others, but it fucking sucks for the one doing it. As Cartman would have said, Jews don't like to give gifts anyway.

So why then? Why?

For my brother, and the life I should be leading with him. For Stan, and the love I let putrefy into something twisted. For Kenny, because I should have stayed and been that one good thing. And maybe for myself too. Maybe because deep inside, I'm an idealist and a romantic, and I need the world to be a better place. Maybe.

I go over the plan with them one last time. It's twice as dangerous as Christophe's mission. He was an unknown, a part of the Park County Underground. There was a reason they called him Ze Mole. Craig and Clyde aren't like that. They belong to the light. If I had an ounce of decency in me, I wouldn't let them go through with this.

I ogle them openly. They're so sickeningly wrapped up in each other, it's like they don't even realize I'm here at all. I'm an apparition; one they have no trouble ignoring. And I know better. There's no place for people like them in this town full of so many rules they're choking. It's only a matter of time before the Governors install anti-sodomy laws, and that will leave the two of them SOL. I'm doing them a favor, really. I'm making them a modern day Romeo and…Julio, or something.

"It's time," I say, and darkness falls like a hood around Craig's features.

"Bring the rain," Clyde answers with a nervous smile. They're both strapped and ready to go. Wendy's already in place, dressed like she belongs in some Roadside bar instead of City Hall. We've all said our goodbyes.

I should give them a speech. Encourage them. Tell them that this is the right thing to do.

Instead I walk away.

I'm taking Ike down to a study circle. It happens once a week. Normally I don't walk him, but considering what's going to go down today, I've decided he'll be better off with me by his side. Like I'm so frickin' tough. Ha.

Outside our house, Old Mrs. Perkins is watering her garden. She glances up when she hears our footfalls and waves a fond hello.

"You boys are lucky," she tells me, her kind smile hurting my eyes, "You still have each other."

Ike snorts and looks away. He wishes he didn't have me, I think. He wishes he had his old brother, the one who listened and obeyed, and never spoke without being spoken to first. The good son. The ideal sibling.

The one that died and was replaced with me.

I thank our neighbor and hustle Ike down the street, hissing for him to keep his head down today.

"Why?" he asks, and I don't know how to give him an answer that won't implicate him.

"Because you're lucky," I tell him, "And if you want to stay that way, do what I tell you."

He glares at me, and I can see the question in his ironic eyes. Are we lucky, really? Tell me, Kyle, he seems to be pleading. There's no right way to tell him that he'd probably be luckier if I was dead. I think he already knows, anyway.

I feel like I'm sucking on ice, frost forming in my words when I try to tell him goodbye. Before I can, sirens pierce the sky. Ike stares at me, long and hard, his expressive eyes asking how I knew.

Then he's off on a run, away from studying and being normal. He's going straight towards the center of town, towards City Hall. We can see the flames licking the clouds long before we see the actual building.

At last, Ike skids to a halt. The building's looming ahead of us. Only half of it is on fire. The other half is standing solid, and even the flames are in the process of being extinguished as I watch. They failed.

There's a dark blot on the front of the building. I peer closer.

There's Craig. He's an asshole. He's loud, obnoxious, and all too blunt. He's one of the greatest friends a guy can ask for; intensely loyal and completely invested.

He's dead.

Not only is he a corpse, but his body dangles like a pendulum, upside down. The ropes around his blackened, bloody feet are crusted with blood, but the rest of his body is pristine. White. Naked.

Until you see his neck. Blood drips, crimson and sluggish over the contours of his face, through his reddened black hair, to the concrete walkway.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

My baby brother makes a strangled sound.

I cover Ike's eyes with one hand, pulling him into my chest. My shirt is wet in seconds. I've never seen my little brother sob so hard, not even when our parents died. But it only lasts a few seconds, and then he's pulling away, like the tears never flooded out at all.

In some ways, he's a soldier too.

A/N: Agh. Almost didn't update this; one of my best friends read a chapter and he was like 'you wrote this? It's really dry'. Which I don't exactly agree with, because my idea of 'dry writing' is something impossible to get through and like a text book, but hey, color me insane. Point being, I can take concrit like a pro when it's from complete strangers, but my other best friend, bless her heart, has spoiled me rotten with compliments and bribery concerning my writing, so I fold like a deck of cards when criticism comes from personal relations.

I still can't figure out how to interpret that bit of critique, because the subject matter (gay SP boys) is also a matter of contention with him. So basically I had an artistic breakdown when it came to this whole story, and got about ye close to trashing it. However, I've decided to man up because so far you guys seem to like it (I think/hope) and I'm going to dismiss dumb best friend's words as jealousy on his part, because he hasn't been able to complete the third chapter of a story he's been working on for the past four years. Nyah. Yes, I'm five. Anyway, even if this isn't an example of my writing at its best, it's still a fic that I enjoy, and hopefully you guys do too. :sad face: