Memory II

AN: Something I noticed quite a few times in a lot of Ed Edd n Eddy fics dealing with EdxKanker romance. It's often a tossup whether EdxMay happens first or EddxMarie. Eddy and Lee are usually last, often due to Eddy's stubbornness and bad attitude. Personally, I could see EddyxLee happening before EdxMay. Eddy has no problem talking back to them and is usually more eager to fight them, whereas Ed usually panics and runs away screaming. But whatever. Also, so much for this being the last chapter of the story! xD

[1]

"Plank…" came the weak voice. "I gotcha buddy."

The bruised hand weakly moved toward the cut and torn hunk of wood. Plank was lying with his face up. The wide-eyes had been erased. New eyes were drawn on them instead, narrow and angry.

Jonny was a mess on the ground. His Gourd costume was cut up and beat up. The squash helmet he'd been wearing broke after Ed punched him.

The kids surrounded him. All of them, the cul-de-sac kids and the Kankers. Ed was usually scared stiff by them, but there was no lovey-dovey stuff happening today. He wasn't smart but he knew that much.

Everyone was covered in squash juice and meat. Kevin's hat was torn. Nazz's hair had been destroyed again. Rolf had a broken leg and was walking around with the help of a shovel. His baby sister had a black-eye. Lee had burns on her arms. Eddy's arm was broke. Marie's hair was torn, and you could see the patch she wore over her bad eye. May was the only one who was able to get through the fight without being hurt in some way. Ed himself had a massive lump on his head. But Jimmy…

Jimmy was so badly hurt that Double D was tending to him, separated from the others. Everyone else stood in the middle of the cul-de-sac. Their neighborhood was in shambles. There were houses with broken windows, damaged doors. Ed's house had gotten an ice cream truck rammed through the front door. Double D's house didn't have a roof on it.

Jonny's hands almost reached Plank. Then Eddy snatched him away at the last second.

"Give him back!" Jonny cried. He couldn't really stand, but he tried. He stumbled toward Eddy, tried to get Plank back.

"Get off him!" Kevin shouted, and body checked Jonny to the ground.

Jonny bit his lip. "Damn it!"

"This whole Gourd thing was Plank's idea." Eddy said. "Right, Jonny?"

"What?"

"That's what you told us yesterday." Eddy said. His voice was so calm. Ed never heard him like this before. "When you were using that squash firing machine."

"Yeah?!" Jonny snapped. "So what?"

"And it was stupid Plank's idea to try and capture us." Sarah said.

"And wreck our houses." Kevin said.

"And make Rolf's friends your scapegoat for it, and have our parents give us their discipline for it." Rolf said.

"Seems like every time you're fucking up, it's because of Plank." Eddy said.

Jonny's eyes grew wide. He tried getting up again. "You leave him alone, you bully!"

"Forget the stupid fucking board!" Marie shouted, walking toward Jonny.

"Yeah!" Sarah shouted. "After what blimp head over here did to us, he's done."

The two of them grabbed Jonny, but he still had enough strength to break away. He tried running toward Eddy again. Kevin was still in the way. This time, he socked Jonny in the gut. He got the wind knocked out of him, and crumpled onto the floor.

"Please…" Jonny whimpered. "Don't hurt him."

"It's a stupid piece of wood, Jonny!" Sarah screamed. "He's not real!"

"Just like Rolf's Mr. Flip, the three-eyed beaver in the Rolf's closet when Rolf was little."

"That's not true!" Jonny yelled. "He's my best friend! He's a better fucking friend than any of you jerks! You beat me up in that park last year!"

"That's because you beat up our friends!" Kevin said.

"Yeah…good for you, Eddy." Jonny said. "You got these guys for friends. So let me tell you something about the friends you got now."

"Shut up, Jonny." Nazz said.

"When they need to keep somebody on the outside, that's when they're your friends."

Jonny slowly stood up.

"They'll invite you to a fake rich club. They'll invite you over for movies and video games. But that's just so they can make jokes about the dorks on the outside they didn't wanna invite."

Everyone was silent.

"They aren't your friends when you ask them out to a dance." Jonny said, glaring at Sarah. "Then they would rather dance with a frog…and then they beat you up for asking! They aren't your friends when just asking you to move your head out of the way when you're blocking their view. They would rather punch you in the back of the head and give you a concussion. They aren't your friends when someone rips out your radiator and uses your house as a sauna. Then they would rather just chat it up in the sauna while you're stuck in a tree."

"Jonny…" Nazz started.

"And they aren't you're friends when it comes to warning you about a mistake before you make it. They would rather beat the shit out of you after you do it and just leave you on the ground. Because it's really you're fault, you see? You should have known already because you're Charles Xavier! No, you're Randall Flagg!"

Jonny was stumbling toward Eddy again, who was backing away from him, scared. Jonny was laughing. He was crying. He was hysterical. "Well, how about it, Eddy?! Don't those friends sound like the best people in the world?!"

"Shut up!" Sarah slapped him to the ground. "I'm glad I didn't go to that dance with you, psycho! We beat up Eddy all the time! Do you see him trying to be a supervillain?"

"I kinda did do that once." Eddy said quietly.

Sarah ignored him. "Jimmy didn't beat you up at all, Fathead! The Kankers didn't beat you up either!"

Kevin turned to Eddy. "It ain't true, man."

"Okay, Kev."

"Jonny was our friend too."

"Okay, Kev. I believe you, man."

"Enough. Fucking. Talking!" Marie cried. "Are we going to beat up Squirrel Boy or not?!"

Before anyone could answer, Plank was snatched out of Eddy's hands.

"Give me that." May said.

"What are you doing?" Eddy said.

May ignored him and walked over to Jonny. "Here's Woody for you."

"His name is Plank, but thank you."

"What are you doing, May?" Marie asked.

"Double D ain't here."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Sarah asked.

"Double D is always the one telling people to do better. To be better. Right?" May asked. "He's the conscious."

"That's conscience." Nazz corrected.

"That too." May said. "But he ain't here. He's looking after Dutch. So what would he say if he was here?"

Nobody said anything.

May copied Double D's voice, doing actually a very good impression. "People, please. Jonny has learned his lesson. He didn't know that we changed. We all should have told him before he attacked Ed, Eddy and I. If we beat him up again, that might just make him even crazier. So for once, can we avoid settling a conflict with violence?"

Everybody looked uncomfortable. They had their fists up. But then they lowered them. A few of them were blushing, others were stroking their necks and looking away.

"I was going to kill Eddy, you know that?" Kevin asked quietly.

"What?" May asked.

"After the Dork, DDork and Dorky did that prank and we got really hurt—after I got scorched so bad. I can't speak for the rest of these dudes, but I wanted to put them all into a coma."

"Rolf did too. Then we saw his cowardly, weasely, Cobwebs Where his Brain Should Be Brother."

Nazz said: "And we thought, is that us? Is that what we wanted to do? Take the Eds and break their bones and make them cry?"

Kevin took off his cap and wiped squash meat off it. "We saw Eddy's douchebag brother pounding his face in. And then Jonny came and did it too. I got pissed off."

"Me too." Nazz said.

"Rolf too."

"We just kind of forgot, you know?" Kevin said. "Me and Nazz, Jonny and his board, Rolf; we got split up and we got snatched up."

"By us." Lee said.

"Yeah, Kanker. By you. After all that, and after we made it to Mondo, we…we just thought Jonny already was there too."

"I wasn't." Jonny said, sniffling.

The kids moved toward Jonny. Nazz grabbed his hand. He cringed away from them. Then Nazz pulled him in for a hug, joined by Kevin and Rolf.

Ed just stared at May. He had never seen this from her before. She was always quite pretty, but she was smart too. Much too smart for him. He knew that.

Sarah didn't care about anything anyone had to say.

"Get out of my way." she said. She tried to grab Jonny, but May blocked her.

Ed came up from behind her. "Sarah, please."

"Shut up, Ed! You guys can all sit around and sing campfire songs on the banjo all you want! He's mine!"

She started scuffling with May. Marie was starting to fight her too.

Lee started to move. Ed grabbed Sarah from behind and pulled her away.

"Get off me!" she screamed. She was near tears.

"I love you." he said and held her.

"I said get off me!"

Her arms were free and she started punching him in the sides. He winced but did not let go.

"You big dumb oaf! Get your damn hands off me!"

"I love you, baby sister."

She wasn't even trying to hit him anymore. She and Jonny were separated now, but she was clawing the air in front of her trying to get him. "He hurt Jimmy! His arms are broken! His legs! He can't even move!"

"I love you, Sarah!"

Sarah burst into tears. "He c-c-can't even move, Ed!"

Suddenly, she spun around. She cried into his chest. "He can't…"

"It's okay, Sarah. Big brother's got you." Ed said.

May smiled at Ed. It was a warm smile.

He felt his face turn red and didn't look at her.

[2]

Everyone forgave Jonny, and Jonny forgave everyone. Even Sarah, but that took so much time.

Even though they were friends, he would always keep a bit of distance between himself and the others. He would eat with them during lunch, and play with them during games. But outside of school, whenever there was someone missing, it was usually him.

He would hang out with Ed more. Maybe it was because Ed was the one person who hadn't said anything about wanting to beat him up.

They played video games together. Shooters were one of their favorite games. Not weak stuff like Call of Duty or Battlefield. They played Red Orchestra 1 and 2. People said they were some of the best tankers around, certainly the best in their clan—RAGE NATION. Jonny drove while Ed was the gunner. One time they went into a game, playing as Soviets with the T-34 and knocked out 10 Panzer IV's without being destroyed.

[3]

School went on and on. Ed didn't like school, but Double D was helping both him and Eddy a lot. Eddy's grades improved to mostly B's and C's, with a few A's in things like public speaking and economics.

Ed's grades improved to mostly C's. The only A he'd ever gotten was in History. Anything else, it was just too hard to focus on for too long.

In high school, though, there were parties when the parents were away. The D&D parties were pretty cool.

Then there were the booze parties, and they weren't so great. Some people were happy when they were drunk. People hated seeing Nazz drunk. She never stopped crying. One time, two guys had tried to take her upstairs, into Kev's bedroom. Eddy, Rolf and Kevin beat them up for it.

Double D was hilarious when he was drunk, but that had only been the one time. Eddy had slipped him some gin. He went into the living room, where people had moved the table away so people could dance. Kevin saw what was he was trying to do and started laughing. "Dorko thinks he can dance!"

"Stand back, Chin Bazooka." Double D slurred, "You can't handle this awesome power."

"Give me a break!"

The rave music was heavy and hard, just the way Ed liked it. Double D started bobbing his head to get the rhythm.

Then he started striking Samurai Jack poses in perfect timing to the rhythm! Marie was sitting on the couch and she squealed.

"Holy shit!" Eddy said joyfully. He sat in Lee's lap, and she couldn't stop giggling.

Double D even started rapping along with the dancing.

"The Man of Many Chins, thinks I can't move. So stand back people! Edd's got something to prove!"

Ed started cackling.

"So you think my thin body is not worth shit. Taste the power of my lightning kicks!"

Double D raised his feet high up in the air light Chun-Li and started rapidly kicking the air in front of him. Kevin's jaw hit the ground.

"So you're the top dog on sports aggression. Put on a dunce cap, scrub. It's time for my lesson."

"Get him, Double D!" Nazz said, laughing.

"You can throw a football really hard maybe. Come Geometry, you're at my feet, crying like a baby!"

Edd capped it off by sniffling and blubbering.

Everyone was laughing now!

"Shapes? That reminds me, how's that car of yours doing? It got wrapped around a pole and then your boxers got ruined!"

"Now back to sports. Basketball. Nine games this year; you lost them all. You got a sprained ankle just this fall. You tried an alley-oop. It got scooped…by a kid not exactly tall, Kevin."

"Ooooohh!" the crowd went.

Kev's grin was plastered on. His face was red.

"Dorko. Geek. Wimp. Yawn…what a bore. We've heard it all before. It's so tiring I just want…to…go…..to sleep…and….."

Double D dipped his head and pretended to snore.

Eddy was rolling on the ground. Rolf was doubled over, crying. He was pounding the floor so hard it was starting to crack in some places. Even Nazz could barely stand up.

Double D snapped his head back up. "Sorry. That's my bad. There's really no excuse. By the way, Kev, who made the uniforms for you? Oh, and dressing the ankle that you sprained, that was me too!"

He leaned to the audience. "But…least it wasn't a needle, right?"

"Cheap shot!" Eddy said, laughing. "Get it?! Shot?!"

Nobody laughed.

"I don't have to impress you people, you know." Eddy said, frowning.

"That's good because you didn't." Lee said.

"I get it, Eddy!"

"Shut up, Ed."

Double D puffed his chest up and threw punches. "Kevin the macho fighter! He'll knock your jaw loose. Just as long as Dorko D is around…"

He turned to the hysterical audience. "You know why?"

Giggling, Nazz asked: "Why?"

"Who else is gonna tie his shoes?" Double D said, and then winked.

And that did it. Everyone was on the ground, laughing.

Kevin was nodding, grinning sheepishly. "Okay. I see how it is with you people."

Nazz wrapped her arm around him. "C'mon, Kev. You know he's just fooling."

Ed bear-hugged Double D from behind. "Double D is a fool all right!"

"I'll make it up to you, Kev." Nazz said, pinching his cheek. "What do you say?"

"I say game on, baby." Kevin kissed her. The two of them went upstairs.

Marie came up and pulled Double D down from Ed's grasp. "That was good, sweetie! So good you get a present."

They went outside.

May was there, but she was talking to another guy. Eddy and Lee had already left.

Ed sat on the couch by himself.

[4]

School went on and on, like an endless tomb. But it did have an end. And everyone sat in the auditorium, even Ed. He'd been so worried about not graduating. There had been endless crying sessions in Double D's room. But they had done it. He had done it.

May was there of course. The Kanker Sisters sat in the row in front of them.

Say something, Ed. You got to say something to her.

He opened his mouth and nearly said something. Then he remembered the principal was giving his speech.

[5]

It was over and everyone went outside and threw their hats into the air. Ed threw his so high that he didn't see it come back down.

Eddy and Lee hugged. Edd and Marie kissed.

Ed walked up to May. "Uh…hi, May."

Her face seemed to shine when he talked to her. "What's up Big Ed?"

Say it! Say it right now! What are you afraid of?!

"Uh…I…"

"Yeah?"

He turned and ran. He felt ashamed but it couldn't be helped.

It wasn't really fear that she would barrage him with kisses. Since her sisters had hooked up with his friends, May really hadn't done that kind of thing anymore.

It was fear that she would learn about him. That she would know who he was. And she would know who he was, and she would think he was a freak. All girls thought he was a freak. They didn't like his video games or his comic books. They didn't like his habit of pouring beef and turkey gravy over everything. In middle school, it was okay. Great even. He avoided them and they avoided him.

Then high school came, and the feelings came with it. Double D said it was natural for boys to have the feelings. He and Eddy had them too.

Ed tried to fight them off anyway, by thinking and doing anything else. More comic books, movies and endless video game sessions. He tried to think of his dad. How his wife never did anything but nag him into the ground, just like Sarah did to Ed.

But the feelings remained. They came with whispering thoughts and grotesque images. Naked women in his bed, asking him to hurry up so that he could give and they could receive; joining with them followed by a release so strong that it would rip him in half.

He fought back against it all. There had been back and forth, but he finally earned a draw.

[6]

And before he knew what happened, he was 25 years old. High school had been a pain in the butt, so Ed had no desire to go to college. He worked as a farmer for Rolf and his family and couldn't see himself doing much of anything else.

There was a new game that had just gotten released. Its name was Sacred Fist.

Ed wanted to play it with his best friends. But Eddy was busy doing factory stuff and had a kid with Lee now. Double D was studying at the college to get his doctorate and was going to marry Marie in a year. Kevin would rather play sports than video games. He had actually gone pro and was playing for the Packers. Nazz was working in a salon out in California. Jonny was doing activist stuff in Africa.

So Ed was basically alone in the cul-de-sac with Rolf, Jimmy and Sarah. Jimmy and Sarah were going to be graduating high school soon and they didn't like video games anyway. Nobody in Rolf's family played them. Rolf had a Gateway desktop computer so old that it overheated and turned off within 20 minutes of being on.

He saw May around from time to time, but she didn't seem to want him anymore. He had a chance with her—scratch that. He had many chances with her but he blew them all.

Ed saved up the money for the VR equipment and bought it. He took it to his guest room in Rolf's house. Rolf had left the TV on and there was something in the news about Sacred Fist. He turned the TV off without looking at it. He wanted to experience the game for himself.

"I'll join a clan." Ed said. "Yeah, that's it. I'll make new friends in the game. We'll have big PvP battles. We'll go on dungeon raids. It's gonna be sweet."

A sinister thought came to him: Will they run out on me too?

He wiped a tear from his eye.

Ed went through the instructions for the gear, got on his bed, and put the helmet on.

The race he selected was human.