Sorry this took longer than I thought. You may have noticed that I've been side-tracked by other fic. Can't help it, I'm a ficslut.

Damien slowly removed the black cloak from Pip's fleshless shoulders and hung it calmly on the bedroom door. Pip silently awaited the backlash, the slew of angry slurs and condemnation that would eventually burst forth from him but all Damien managed was a wistful chuckle as he relaxed back into the pillows on his bed, smirking down his body at the English boy's bemused expression. "Cock's don't suck themselves, Pip."

"Oh, yes, of course," Pip stammered and clambered up the bed. "I'm sorry, dearest one."

"Am I?"

Pip stared at him, mouth hovering above the limp penis he had taken out at Damien's command. "I beg your pardon?"

"Am I really? Your dearest? You make it sound as though there are others almost as dear."

"That's ridiculous," Pip said with an affectionate smile that was swiftly wiped away when Damien grabbed a fistful of his hair and pushed his face into his thigh. He whimpered against the hot skin and feebly kissed it.

Damien threw him aside in disgust. "You don't deserve a fuck. Get out of my room."

To be cast away was a pain beyond what Pip could endure. He reached up to the bedpost and dragged himself to his feet sobbing as quietly as he could. Damien hated the sound of him crying. Pip croaked, "Will that be all, my love?" Receiving no reply, he fled to his room, hardly ever used because of his lifestyle. He seldom left Damien's bedroom, nor their home, and if he did he was escorted and would never dare wander from Damien's side.

Except recently.

He was being deliberately impertinent, he knew that – biting the hand that fed him like the ungrateful wretch he was. He should be happy. Damien had been his constant companion from the moment he arrived in Hell. Terrified and alone, dead at a mere nine years old, he'd stood at the gateway following the confused congregation of dead with his eyes. A huge red figure appeared before them cackling with glee at his new victims and that was what nudged his fear into flight. He had turned to run and found himself staring into flame-filled irises. An equally small and soft hand found his and led him away and he was never the same again.

He fell back onto his cold pillow and let the tears from his eyes stream down his temples and pool uncomfortably in his ears. Damien didn't deserve what he was about to do but he couldn't help his mind wandering to the two boys in their bed and how it might feel to join them. His back pressed against the rotund stomach of the loud one as his gentler lover guided his cock inside Pip, then accompanied it with his own. Would they rather he screamed 'yes' or 'no' in that instant? Weeped pathetically as they breached him beyond even his fantastical imagination. Begging for mercy yet begging for more.

Deftly stroking himself to completion, he gasped the only thing he ever said during his orgasms. The only name he promised to ever call, even if he defiled it by thinking of others.

"I can't believe I beat you! You sure you didn't let me win?"

"Honest Butters," Stan sighed at the gleefully dancing blond. "Maybe I'm just having an off-day. No offence. You did play really good."

Truthfully, Stan was distracted. When Kyle had arrived, he'd taken a few sneaky pictures of him on his phone, but nothing strange had turned up in them. Just when he was beginning to think Wendy had been right about her hair being the culprit of the perplexing distortion in the other images he realised Kyle hadn't been acting weird that morning. No odd side-glances or whispers. Stan had been extremely relieved. But then Kyle went running off a few minutes into the game and when he returned he was back to abnormal.

Stan took advantage whilst he walked back to the benches and took one last snap.

The light was back. And Kyle was clearly talking to it.

"Oh no! Fuck!" Butters bemoaned behind him as they walked back to the others. "This means I'm going to up against Kyle now."

"Get ready for a whupping, Honey-Bee," Kyle giggled.

"Don't call my fiancé cute names, you dick, that's MY job." Kenny shoved him onto the court. "But that's a great petname, can I use that?"

Kyle nodded and ruffled Butters' hair to the shorter boy's chagrin. "Take it easy on me, I'm feeling a bit tired."

"That's because I was fucking the sand out of your vagina all night," Cartman sniggered.

Kyle had already run off to his game with Butters, so the teasing went unnoticed. Stan sat in Kyle's place on the bench, tapping at his phone screen in agitation.

"You cool, Stan?" Kenny piped up in concern.

"Yeah just… going through some pictures." Stan put his phone away and wiped his face as if he hoped some of his confusion would be removed as easily as his sweat. He'd been watching too many movies was the problem. There was no way his weird theory could possibly be true. But this was South Park, and weird shit was the Soup Du Jour. He lifted his head when he heard Butter cry a shriek of annoyance. Kyle had raced past and made his first basket already.

"I'm a little worried about Kyle," Kenny said, nudging Stan with his knee.

Stan hadn't expected him to say anything like that, much less think it. "He seems a lot happier the past few days," he replied, acting casual.

"That's what worries me. They say that… I mean, when someone THAT depressed suddenly gets happy it's usually a bad sign."

"Bad sign?"

Kenny scuffed the back of his sneaker against the bench. "That they might have decided to end it all. They act happier because there's nothing to worry about anymore."

Stan felt his phone through his pocket. "Something tells me he's sticking around for a while."

"You know him best, I guess," Kenny muttered, dissatisfied with Stan's blasé attitude to his fears. This was Kyle after all. Stan should be the first in line to worry about Kyle. He usually was.

Cartman sat beside them, unseen, listening to their hushed anxieties. He had a lot tumbling around his mind too and Kenny wasn't helping matters. In fact Kenny was the biggest, most jagged thing that was currently creating painful dents in his head. Jack had said some interesting and disturbing things about him before Cartman had returned. Things Cartman wished he didn't know.

"There are several elements to the underworld, including full demons demon-blessed, half-demons, angels, angel-blessed…" Jack Tenorman paused in his speech and pinched the bridge of his nose when Cartman's hand shot up into the air again. "What is it, Eric?"

"Can I go to the bathroom?"

"For the final time, you're dead – you don't need to!"

Cartman slumped backwards over the rock he was using as a seat and melodramatically wailed. "But this is sooo boring. This is worse than skeeewwwl." He had little to no patience for learning about demonlore, though his deadbeat father insisted he should pay attention. He just wanted to get back to Kyle and do unspeakably naughty and messy things with him.

Jack sighed wistfully at the boy's lack of enthusiasm. "This is important. Don't you want revenge?"

"If I wanted that, you'd be first on the list. You're the dick that brought me back in the first place," Cartman sulked.

"Because it was safest, I already explained that. Kyle could have been erased. Fortunately you don't have to worry about that."

"Really? But Satan's been dangling that sword over my balls since day one."

"A cunning ruse of his."

"So a lie?"

"Basically."

"Fucking a-hole," Cartman scowled and flopped into a new position on the rock. There was just something about heated and compressed minerals formed into an irregular shape that was deeply uncomfortable. "Fine, I'll bite. Why can't I be erased?"

"When a demon engages in carnal pleasures-"

"Gross, I don't want to hear about how you banged my mom," Cartman whined and slapped his hands over his ears. "Just say it's genetic."

"That's not quite how it works. My physical body was still human. Eric, do you know anything about the term 'demon-blessed'?"

"Maybe," he murmured noncommittally. "No great detail though."

Jack clasped his hands behind his back, pacing as he delivered his lecture. "The devil, Damien, and full demons can transfer demonic traits to humans by entering them, more usually through sex, in either world."

"So you and Satan…?"

Jack halted briefly and anyone not paying attention would have hardly noticed the misstep. But Cartman did. He didn't pry any further.

Jack continued briskly, "Only full demons can do it though – they're those skeleton bastards flying about above us. Don't ask me how they have sex. I don't know and I don't want to know. The only thing demon-blessed can create through sex is half-demons. You'll be pleased to know that when I had sex with your mother, she wasn't blessed."

"Except with me," Cartman said proudly. He drew a circle in the rusted sand on the floor. "But let me just check something, I'm a half-demon right? So that means I can't pass it on? Kyle's safe?"

"Yes, your boyfriend is safe from being demon-blessed. At least by you."

"Ok thank fuck, because I already gave him AIDS once and he was pissed enough from that. He'd kill me all over again if I fucked up his soul." He changed the circle to a heart. "So me being a demon means I can't be erased?

Jack faltered again. "No, it's another aspect of your 'character' that elicits that result. You're a complicated soul, both figuratively and literally."

Cartman lifted his head from the floor. "Fuck does that mean?"

"Well if you'd let me explain without interrupting all the time…"

"But you started going on about demons and angels and other boring bullshit. What's that got to do with me?"

Jack crouched in front of him, whispering solicitously. "Eric… do you ever feel… torn? Evil incarnate one second, secret hero the next?"

Cartman looked away. Shrugged. This guy really had been watching him. He drew an arrow through the heart.

"Everyone has polarising aspects to their personality. You are a smorgasbord of characteristics. It's partly my fault of course, for being your father. But there's another to blame."

Cartman sat up at the name that fell from his father's lips.

Kenny.

Next Chapter:

So there it was; the cold hard fact that there was no deep underlying destiny. He and Kyle were purely an accident of circumstance. And so were Butters and Kenny.