Disclaimer - Don't own south park or any of the characters, just bored and wanted to write something fun.

Authors note – Oh 3 chapters?! He's on a roll!

Chapter 13

Later that night at Stan's...

Randy woke both boys up around one. Kyle woke up too nervous to be tired, he was shaking slightly. He watched as Stan put on one of the track suits he was fond of. He handed a second one to Kyle. "Put this on, my mother placed magic on them to protect the wearer from some injuries. It'll feed off your magic though, so use it only as a last resort. Eventually we'll teach you to create a barrier of your own without these, they were made specially for me. Just one more crutch, Stan thought hating his handicap.

"Thanks." Kyle mumbled putting the tracksuit on, it was a bit big for a moment before it shrank down to his size. "Woah..." He admired the new perfect fit. Stan nodded, his mother always did good work. Stan pulled his katana down from It's rack sliding the sheath into special loop at his waistband.

"Here." Stan said picking something up and handing it to Kyle. He took it and recognized his fighting cane. "My mother prepared this for you while we were at the movies, It'll stand up to a lot more than any normal cane could, and It'll pack a bit more punch." Kyle nodded holding the cane close. He was hoping he wouldn't have to use it tonight, he'd had less than a weeks worth of training and hadn't managed to hit Stan even once. Stan must have sensed his uneasiness. "It's just for emergencies, you won't be in danger tonight. Are target is one single shell and everyone is going since It's your first time out. Just in case." He smiled and walked out of the room Kyle following close behind. Stan walked into the bathroom and pulled his hair back into the short ponytail he wore when they trained. He looked over at Kyle's long curls. "Uhh too late to do anything about it now, but you might want to consider a hair cut..." Stan ruffled his hair as he walked past. Kyle looked in the mirror and tugged on one of his curls, he'd never really had short hair, ever since his Jew fro had softened he'd been afraid to cut it.

"Stan you two ready!?" Randy called up the steps to the two boys. Stan turned the corner and began to descend the steps.

"Yup, just about." He answered as he reached the living room, Kyle came down a moment later. Sharon was there to see them off.

"Be careful dear!" She said hugging Kyle tightly. "Randy keep them safe." She said giving her husband a stern look. He nodded quickly.

"You know I will." He stepped out the door and started heading for the sidewalk. Sharon turned to her son then.

"And I know I don't need to tell you to look out for Kyle, just don't forget to take care of yourself sweetie." She hugged her son and kissed him on the forehead. She always liked to see them off like this even on the most basic of jobs.

"I'll be fine mom, all of us will. Ned and Jimbo are coming and dad will be there, we couldn't be safer." Stan said and he nodded knowing he was right. Jimbo and Ned were both accomplished hunters and her husband had quiet the reputation. Stan turned and walked out the door after his father. She couldn't help but see a lot of her husband in her son, she doubted he'd be too happy about it though. Kyle followed after him, she couldn't help but think Kyle looked small compared to the other two. She just hoped that Kyle would take to the job better than she expected he would. She shut the door and went to make a pot of coffee, she wouldn't sleep until they were back. Outside Kyle felt a little chilly, it was October 9th and it had been unusually warm lately. Seemed like the cold was finally coming.

"Ready for your first job Kyle?" Randy asked as he fished the glyph out of his pocket. Kyle nodded as he began to mumble quietly. "Open!" The way into the nightlands opened up before them and Stan and Randy strode in side by side Kyle followed close behind Stan. "Jimbo and Ned said they'd meet up with us closer to the job site. They're going to round up the shell and force it into the nightlands." Kyle looked at Stan for clarification on what he meant.

"Oh sorry Kyle, we can't exactly go cutting shells apart in the real world. Too many people and the collateral damage would build up quickly." He explained as they followed his father through the twisted version of South Park. "You experienced for yourself being pulled into the nightlands by the shells. They always bring their victims here, so Ned and Jimbo are acting as bait to bring the shell here so we can dispatch them." Kyle just nodded, made as much sense to him as anything else he'd learned this week.

"Why at night though?" Kyle asked why the jobs never took place during the day.

"Well It's not that we never do jobs during the day, It's just safer to bring them here during the night. Shells bring everyone within a twenty foot radius into the nightlands, during the day there's a greater chance of a bystander being pulled in. Normal people don't last here long on their own. If you don't put up a barrier to protect you this place saps your strength" Kyle remembered that, he'd felt drained the first time he came here.

"How come I didn't feel that way when they pulled me in at the school?" Kyle asked Stan just looked at him and shrugged.

"I'm not sure to be honest, maybe Wendy's divine protection affects even the nightlands of the school? Or possibly you just have a massive amount of magic. I'm leaning more towards the second considering that you lasted so long following me the first time here. Normal people generally faint within a few moments of being here." Randy wasn't paying attention to their conversation as he stopped and looked around.

"It should be just around her somewhere..." He pulled his shot gun off his back and cocked it. Stan had his sword an inch out of the sheath. Kyle figured he should have his weapon to be ready to go into a guard. They stood there quietly for an agonizingly long minute before they heard foot steps. Jimbo and Ned came around the corner running.

"We got a problem!" Jimbo said running past them closely followed by Ned. A moment later and several spindly spider like shells came around the corner. Stan and Randy both cursed as they turned and ran. Stan grabbed Kyle's wrist and pulled him along.

"What the hell happened!?" Randy yelled to Jimbo as he took cover behind the twisted reflection of a car and took a shot at the first creature.

"Our information was wrong! There wasn't just one minor shell, It's a nest of ghouls!" Jimbo shouted unslinging his rifle and taking a few shots of his own. Kyle was panicking as he and Stan hid behind the same car as Randy. These things, these ghouls as Jimbo had called them, were more monsterous than the ones who had attacked him at school. They were more similar to the girls who had attacked Stan a week ago, but these things seemed even less human if that was possible. They ran on four spindly limbs, their torsos emaciated and twisted. They had jaws like the jock that had tried to devour Kyle. Randy turned towards his son.

"Need you to get In there, I'll look after Kyle." Stan nodded and Kyle thought he was insane, there were six of those crawling shells out there and they were fast. Ned, Jimbo, and Randy were barely holding them back with their guns. Stan leapt up on top of the car. He examined the shells and decided to go for the farthest two first. He jumped down into the middle of the of shells and gunfire without flinching and charged past the first four. He skid left and right avoiding swipes of their spindly legs as he made his way past without a scratch. Kyle was once again amazed at Stan's speed, he moved around the creatures as though they were little more than scenery. He leapt into the air clearing the last ghoul in his way his sword coming out as he landed. The two in the back were on him a moment later, but that was a moment to late. The ghoul to Stan's right lost one of It's arms, the other wasn't so lucky as Stan carried the strike through and drove the tip of his blade into the right eye of the second shell. He buried the blade all the way to the hilt. He didn't move back the other way as Kyle believed he would. He simply rolled around the hilt so that he was in between both creatures now. At that same moment a third shell shredded the air where Stan would have been. Stan drew his sword from the now still shell and and cut up catching the second shell in the neck. His sword went clean through as the shells head and body fell to the ground. Stan crouched immediately avoiding the tackle of the third shell, his sword sang as it bisected the creature from beneath. Stan was splattered with the black ooze as he ran towards a fourth.

"How is he so calm?" Kyle asked as Randy, Jimbo and Ned held their fire. Randy considered Kyle's question for a moment.

"I don't think he is. Calm isn't the right word for it, I would say It's more somewhere between focus and fear." Randy put his gun away and lit a cigaret knowing Stan would finish up soon enough. His son was already a far better hunter than he, Jimbo, or Ned. The three of them were on the lower end in terms of hunter abilities, despite Randy's reputation he knew Stan took after his mother talent wise. Stan brought down the fourth with another decapitation and rushed towards the fifth and sixth that were trying to break through Jimbo and Ned's fire. Stan leapt onto It's back and went to drive his sword into the vertebrate at the base of the neck. As he brought his sword down though it met an invisible resistance that stopped his sword cold. The shell bucked and he was thrown to the ground behind it stunned momentarily. But it was a moment too long as the creature whirled and caught him with a strike of one of its long spindly arms.

"Ugh..."Stan was trying to get back to his feet as the two remaining shells charged him. He wouldn't be ready in time Kyle saw.

"Shit!" Randy started to run out towards the shells, he was trying to get into their path but he wouldn't make it and they were focused on Stan. Things moved in slow motion then as Kyle saw his friend helpless and injured, two monsters bearing down on him. The shells leapt jaws wide and Stan just stared at the approaching mouths.

"Sever!" Kyle screamed as he ran out from behind the car and swung his cane through the air creating a line with the two shells. There was a rush of air and then the shells were torn to pieces just in front of Stan showering his surprised face with black oozing gore. He turned stunned towards a heavily panting Kyle. Randy himself had dropped his cigaret in surprise. Kyle felt exhausted all of a sudden, he'd used too much magic again. He'd never used magic on such large objects before and he wanted to ensure they were destroyed so he'd put everything he had into it. He had meant to cut them in half not shred them into bits.

"Kyle that was amazing!" Stan said as he ran over to his exhausted friend excitement on his face as though he wasn't about to die a moment ago. Stan wiped some of the gore from his face and smeared a good portion of it too. "Eww, coulda done without the friendly fire though." Stan laughed while Kyle just stared at him breathing hard. Stan was about to say something else when Kyle punched him so hard he lost his balance and fell onto the hood of the car Kyle had been hiding behind. Stan started to get up but Kyle pinned him down and began yelling at him.

"What the fuck was that!?" Stan was taken back, he hadn't expected this kind of reaction out of Kyle. He wasn't even sure what he was mad for.

"Kyle wha-" Stan started. But Kyle shouted into his face once again.

"Shut. The Fuck. Up. How can you be so strong and so stupid?" Kyle had started to cry now as the relief finally started flowing through his body. "How dare you...you promised you wouldn't leave me..." Stan realized then what he'd done. He had been perfectly ready to die just then, he hadn't been afraid or tried to run. He had almost broken his promise to Kyle.

"Kyle I...I'm sorry." Stan sat up and hugged his best friend and savior.

"Stan you have to live no matter what...don't ever just accept your death like that again..." Kyle cried pulling Stan in tight. "And don't charge in like that alone! I'm supposed to be here to help, and so are they!" Kyle said jumping back and angry again. "The hell are you guys doing? You're hunters two, he's a fraction of your age and all you can do is hide while he fights monsters!?" Kyle was done being upset and scared, now he was pissed.

"Kyle, it isn't that we didn't want to help, Stan is a far better fighter as you've seen, he's a prodigy when it comes to martial arts and we only get in his way when he fights." Kyle looked to see Stan nod. "Stan sees things differently than most people. He can tell what his opponent is going to do before they do it. It makes him almost unbeatable." Randy said walking over to the two with a new cigaret lit. Randy could remember the first time he'd seen Stan fight off five shells at once. They'd been cleaning up a next of ordinary shells and had planned it out thoroughly. That was Randy's specialty, he was never a strong hunter, physically or magically, he had to out think and trick his opponents. He'd been ambushed by the shells somehow and Stan had just happened to be there. He'd only been on three hunts before that and had only killed a single shell so far. But his sword came out before Randy could even turn all the way around and the shells died without ever touching his son. Both of his children were on another level from Randy, he was beyond proud of both of them and happy they both took after his mother in terms of combat ability. "That being said, Stan what happened? You had that shell, why did you stop?"

Randy asked turning towards Stan who was examining his sword.

"Well I didn't stop willingly I can tell you that." He was looking at the tip of his sword which had a small crack in it. These shells shouldn't have been able to damage his sword, only magic could have done that. "Someone tried to protect that shell with a barrier. I surprised me and I didn't react in time."

"Mmmoh no." Came Ned's voice synthesizer.

"Yup Ned this just got a whole lot more complicated." Jimbo said walking over to join them after ensuring all the shells were done for good.

"What does that mean?" Kyle asked unsure why everyone seemed so uneasy.

"Warlock." Stan said for clarification though it didn't help Kyle much. He just shook is head and shrugged indicating that meant nothing to him.

"Essentially dark hunters, they are on the other side of the line, they use their magic to control shells and for power and domination rather than protecting the balance of the world and eliminating shells." Randy stated for him and sat down on the hood of the car they'd been using for cover. "They're some of the most insidious of enemies. They will pose as hunters and lure entire groups into traps and kill them. One of the benefits of South Park is that there are only a handful of hunters around. So we don't have to worry too much about infiltration."

"Dad, do you think the warlock might be who sent Clyde after me and the shells after Kyle?" Randy nodded, he had already thought the two events connected and now he was sure of it, he wasn't looking forward to tangling with a warlock again though.

"Well we need to head back for now, job complete. We'll need to tell the Jim and Allie. Stan you should tell Kenny and Butters as well, they might be targeted soon too if it really is a warlock." Randy standing back up and heading back the way they came.

"Who are Jim and Allie?" Kyle asked wondering who these mystery hunters were. Stan finished cleaning his sword off and sheathed it before turning to answer.

"Right forgot to tell you, they're Wendy's guardians, they're hunters pretending to be her parents. They were assigned to protect her by a larger hunter organization in Denver since she's a goddess." Then how come Kenny didn't have guardians? Before Kyle could ask though Stan had already guessed his line of thought. "You need to ask him that yourself. Sorry." Kyle just nodded and started to follow Stan. He was a lot more exhausted than he thought and was headed for the pavement when Stan caught him. Kyle was out like a light, he'd used all the magic he was capable of and had burnt out. "Rest easy Kyle, you definitely earned it tonight." Stan picked him up bridal style and jogged lightly to catch up with the others, trying not to jostle Kyle too much.

"And he survives once again." a young man with red eyes declared from the roof. And now they suspected there was a driving hand. Not that it bothered him if they knew, they couldn't stop him either way. "Well I suppose I'll let you have tonight." he faded away into the dark.

Authors Note – I really am enjoying writing this story! And thank you to everyone who has reviewed!