Author's Note: Hi all! These A/Ns are going to be really short
other then the reviews, ok? I just want to get this posted because I'm
supposed to be in bed right now.
By the way, in this chapter sorry if the characters are a little OOC. I tried to make them as close as I could.
Oh, and about the goriness and torturing of Stanley. If I didn't do it, someone else would. ^_~
Lovely Reviewers:
The One and Only Trey: I have yet to figure out if this is an insult or a compliment. But thanks anyway!
Sixstars: Stanley rocks! Heh, my penname amuses me too. Feel free to laugh at it all you want! Thanks for the review.
Incubus4lotr11: Fanfiction.net can be annoying, but you gotta luv it. * gives Stanley huggles * heh. * shrugs at blood part * Meh. Sorry about the blood. Theres....er, a lot of it. -_- Poor Stanley indeed. SPREAD THE HOLES LUVIN!
WheelerChick: I agree that it's 'ah'. Interesting word, 'ah', no? My dad works in the hospital too! Thank you, you don't know how much it means to me that I got my facts right. I may have to twist reality a bit for the plot (you're thinking right now, what plot? Lol), but I'll try to keep it real. Yo. OH MY GOD. It didn't mean anything to me when I first read this review, but think of the huge-arse coincidence. I wrote a fic with a matchbox 20 song (my first ever songfic!) and you just happen to go to their concert! I find that amazing. Cool. I envy you. I liked your Magnet ficcy! Thank you!
Rattler: Yet another review I'm still trying to figure out. I think this one is more leaning towards 'compliment' though, for which I'm eternally grateful! Thank you for the review! Ff.net is annoying sometimes. Sorry about the pain!
Eldalie Lavina: You have a hard screen name to type. Who's your first fav? Uhm, yeah. About your question. Mr. Sir knocked Stanley out with the shovel, showed the guys to their holes, and came back to hurt Stanley some more. Yupp, I'm sadistic. I think that's what happened anyway. I don't really remember, sorry.
Satan's Apprentice: Erm. Actually, he's not dead. Just really, really hurt. Sorry? Lol. Thank you!
Amy: Hmmm...Hmmm, good idea! Maybe later on in the fic or in a whole other fic, I haven't decided yet. But, good idea! (everyone's thinking, oh god Amy, what did you start... lol)
Emily: Thank you so much!
Celestra: Yay! I'm looking forward to your Holes fic, we need all we can get! Thank you!
Estelle Yavitil: Ok! Thank you!
Sagraco: OK! Thanks!
Burnin': I've said this before, you're welcome to hang around my review section! ^_^ Who's Leezardh8er? Sorry for not making you feel good. -_-. I must say I felt a bit sick with the last chapter, too. Heh, Burnin', you're a pyro like Ziggy! ^_^ Erm, hi everybody! Jeez, hard to keep track of everybody. I'd talk randomness to ya longer, but I really gotta post this and really gotta go to the bathroom...which you REALLY did not need to know. Sorry. Heres the update. I'll talk more next time, I promise! ^_~ BTW, did I miss it, or do you not have Ziggy there?
Alrighty, now on to the fic!
I love you all, thanks for reading! And remember to review!
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Holes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The cry echoed over the dry lakebed, caused diggers from A, B and C tents to raise their heads in curiosity. A scorpion flicked its tail in the direction of the cry, and a rattle snake shook it's tail vigorously in self defence against the sudden noise.
A yellow-spotted lizard jumped out of its hole with its teeth bared, only to leap back in after seeing the coast was clear.
"Sorry man." Squid muttered, his face pale. He continued the added pressure that caused Stanley to cry out. "But you getting up made the bleeding worse, we gotta stop it or you'll be even worse off."
"Seriously," Magnet said to Squid. "You. First-aid. How?"
Squid just glared at the Hispanic boy. X-ray raised his head and wiped off his glasses with his forearm sleeve.
"Would you guys cut the crap? This REALLY isn't the time." X-Ray said, a note of worry in his voice.
"Siento lo que hice." Magnet murmured, staring down at Stanley.
The boys were still crouched around Caveman. After his attempt to stand up, he had only gotten worse. Now he was bleeding more, as well as on the verge of just passing out altogether.
"Ah!" Stanley cried again, as Squid pressed down harder on the gash on his stomach. The boys crouched around him were pale and looked like they wanted to look away, but they didn't.
Zero grabbed Stanley's hand. He looked worriedly down on the face of his only friend. He seriously didn't know what to do. What COULD he do? What could any of them do? So Zero did the only thing he could think of.
"Spell 'Stanley'."
Everyone looked at Zero; Stanley opened his eyes.
"S-T-A-N-L-E-Y." Stanley said slowly; not that he couldn't spell his own name, but it was difficult to talk.
X-Ray nodded.
"Spell 'Zigzag.'" Zero said to Stanley.
"Hey!" Zigzag said.
"Spell 'Zigzag is a dork.'" Squid muttered, brushing sweat out of his eyes and unknowingly causing a streak of copper-coloured blood to appear on his cheek.
"Z-I-G" Stanley took a deep breath, his exhaling slow and shaky. "Z-A-G."
Zero looked to X-Ray to see if it was right and X-Ray nodded.
Zero looked up to see if he could find a new word in the deep blue sky.
"Giraffe."
Again, everyone except Stanley looked at Zero, who didn't say anything.
Stanley squeezed his eyes shut against new waves of pain.
"How DO you spell Giraffe?" Zigzag asked, his eyes wide on his pale face.
"G-I-R-A" Stanley paused, gasping for a haltering breath, his hands curling into fists at his sides. "F-F-E!" He finished quickly, his curled hand scraping up some brown dust involuntarily.
Zero looked to X-Ray who only shrugged.
"Livingston." Zero said. Stanley opened his eyes in shock. Clyde Livingston. He used to be Stanley's Idol. How did Zero know? Maybe Zero was just a fan.
"L-I-V-I-N-G-S-T-O-N" Stanley said in one breath, his eyes closing again. Than his faced blanched as pain racked his body.
"Antidisestablishmentarianism." X-Ray said.
"What the fuck?" Squid asked.
Stanley laughed quietly.
"It's the..." He paused for breath. "Longest word in the....the English language."
"Weird!" Zigzag exclaimed. "Anti...Anti-disease-estab-men-tary-ism!"
"Ok, seriously dude, not the time." Magnet said.
Nobody said anything for awhile and the only sound was Stanley's harsh and pain-filled breathing.
"Rex?" Mr. Pendanski called across the dry lakebed. "What's going on?"
Five heads snapped up and saw Mr. Pendanski coming quickly towards them with Armpit running beside.
"Anti-disease-estab-men-tary-ism!" Zigzag said when they were in hearing distance.
"Anti-what?" Armpit asked; he and Mr. Pendaski came forward.
"It's the longest word in the English Language!" Zigzag said proudly.
"Actually, that's not true." Mr. Pendanski said from about five metres away. "Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is."
"Again, what the fuck?" Squid muttered, wondering why the hell Mom was giving them an English lesson when Stanley was bleeding to death.
It didn't occur to them that Mr. Pendanski couldn't actually see Caveman yet, and was wondering why they were all crouched in a circle for no apperent reason.
"Language, Alan." Pendanski said sternly. "And.....oh."
He had finally seen Stanley.
Needless to say, Stanley wasn't looking that well.
Sweat and water made Stanley's slightly curly blonde hair damp and beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. His face was deathly pale, and there was blood running down the side of his head from a gash on his forehead. His pupels were dialated, the sign of a cuncussion, and he was constantly closing them against the dark throbbing headache raging in his head, not helped by the burning hot sun overhead. Blood covered about three-quarters of his torso. One of Stanley's hands was over the gash, the other laying in the dirt covered in blood.
Squid had both hands pressed against the wound, seemingly uncaring that blood covered his forearms.
"Seems like digging today might be a little harder, huh Stanley." Pendanski said brightly.
All of D-Tent stared at him.
"What the hell..." X-Ray whispered.
"You'll be ok, won't you Stanley?" Mr. Pendanski asked Stanley, putting him on the spot.
Everyone looked at Stanley, some wincing slightly.
Stanley blinked, trying to bring the blurry councillor into clear view. It didn't work, and only made him dizzier.
'Say no, say no....' Zero thought to himself. What was Mom going to do? Just leave Stanley lying on the lake? It was out of character for Stanley to complain. He had yet to complain about having a huge gash in his stomach. He probably blamed it on his no-good-pig-stealing-great-great- grandfather, but he just accepted it and moved on. 'Say no. He's got to help you, how are you going to get through this otherwise?'
"I'm fine." Stanley said, but then squeezed his eyes shut and squeezed his free hand into a fist, ignoring how his nails cut into his hand. More blood sure wasn't going to hurt. The pain assailed him in stronger waves, and he resisted the urge to cry out. When he opened his eyes again Pendanski was smiling lightly at him.
"Alright. No problem then. That's it Stanley, suck it up." He turned to go. He started walking, but then stopped and looked over his shoulder. "Oh, and the Warden is still going to want seven holes."
As Pendanski walked away, the boys stared at him in shock.
"What the fuck?" Squid asked for the third time, surprised. "Suck this." He fingered Mom's retreating back.
"Ooookay. Lot of help that was." Zigzag muttered.
"That was...Interesting." Magnet said slowly.
"Now what?" Armpit asked.
"We dig holes." X-Ray said, getting up indifferently. But his eyes betrayed his calmness; they were shining with worry as they gazed down at the pale, shaking and bloody Stanley.
"No-way we're leaving the Caveman like this." Squid said, pressing harder on the profusely bleeding wound. "He's gunna fuckin bleed to death!"
Stanley looked at him calmly.
"Go dig. I'll be ok." He said quietly. He knew he wasn't in a good condition. He needed a doctor, but how would an ambulance get to Camp Greenlake in less then eight hours?
Squid snorted. "Like hell you will."
"I'm not leaving either." Zero said quietly.
"You heard Pendanski!" Stanley said, gasping for breath. "He wants seven holes...I don't know how I'm going to dig mine though." He added as an afterthought.
"Come on Squiddy, you've done all you can. And you gotta dig some time today. Look at the sun! It's high already." Zigzag said, standing up with X-Ray.
Armpit and Magnet joined them in digging their holes. Squid tied his bandana around Stanley's waist as well as he could, then with a sideways smile stood up.
"I learned first aid after my mom got pissed drunk one night and threw her bottle at me. I almost bled to death, and after that learned first aid in case it ever happened again." Squid explained quietly.
Stanley nodded, and watched as Squid dug his hole. He turned to Zero.
"Zero...You gotta dig too, man." He said breathlessly.
Zero said nothing, only looked at Stanley like he could see through him.
"Only if you let me dig your hole." Zero said finally.
It was Stanley's turn to stare dizzily at him. The D-Tent boys said Zero was like a mole; he liked to dig. Stanley strongly doubted that. But he knew he couldn't dig his own hole, not like this.
Finally, Stanley nodded. Zero stood up, and glanced back at him before starting to dig.
Stanley was left alone.
Putting both hands behind him, he forced himself into a sitting position and squeezed his eyes shut. Breath. In and out. In and out.
New pain exploded in his stomach as he sat up. With his eyes still squeezed shut he wrapped his arms around his stomach and leaned forward, groaning.
Soon he felt a hand on his shoulder. Forcing his eyes open, he looked at the blurry face through the vertigo. Zigzag.
"Hey...Zig." He mumbled.
"You ok man?" He asked. Stanley nodded.
"Yeah, sure, whatever." Zigzag said disbelievingly.
"Ok, I feel not too good, happy?" Stanley asked. He was in too much pain to argue.
Zigzag sat beside him.
"You know, you're strange, Caveman." He said. Stanley tried to focus on him through his daze. "How can you possibly be that hurt and not be complaining to no end?"
Stanley blinked. This didn't sound like Zigzag.
Zigzag looked out over the dry lakebed. "I doubt I'd be able to stand it that well."
After a while, Stanley decided to try to answer.
"Well, I got sick a lot when I was younger." Pause for a deep shaky breath. It was getting easier to talk. Whatever Squid had done had helped. Or maybe if this kept up he would just naturally slowly get better. "My parents were poor....and I didn't want to tell them...if I was sick." Stanley inhaled and exhaled slowly.
"So if I was sick,...I pretended I wasn't. Now I just don't like to...admit I don't feel well." He finished shakily.
Zigzag said nothing, but then turned back to Stanley.
"Did I ever tell you why I'm here in the first place?" He asked.
Stanley shook his head, ignoring the increase in vertigo it caused.
"I used to be, well, still am I guess, a pyro. I burned down the school. And got sent here." Zigzag said. Stanley was distracted from his pain out of interest.
"The judge sent me to a shrink. Everyone thought either I had something wrong with me because I was a little different. First, for some reason, they wanted to find out if I had a phobia. I figured I knew I wasn't pyrophobic." He smiled. Now Stanley was really interested.
"You'd be amazed some of the ones they tried me for. I think they just wanted an excuse to say I was crazy. Actually, I'm just paranoid. "Suffers from acute paranoia." The shrink wrote. Hell, though, I've known since I was five I was paranoid." Suddenly, Zigzag laughed.
"I learned a lot of the phobias just because I was tested for a lot of them. Did you know people have a fear of fears? Phobophobia. Some people have a fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of their mouth. Arachibutyrophobia. You know what though, I should have lied on one of the tests. Maybe if I said I had mysophobia they wouldn't have sent me here." He saw Stanley's confused look, and laughed.
"Sorry, mysophobia is the fear of dirt." Stanley laughed. Zigzag sure didn't seem that crazy to him, now that he got to know him.
Zigzag sighed. "Well, I'd better get back to digging my hole." He said, and got up. "Listen, Caveman, you don't have to lie to me or the rest of D Tent about whether you're sick or whatever. It's ok. Don't worry about it. Hey, maybe next time you can tell me why YOU got stuck in this hellhole." He laughed and Stanley watched blurrily as he walked back to his hole.
The pain he had temporarily forgotten was back full force. Now he wished Zigzag hadn't left so he could have someone to talk to. The sun burned down on his forehead causing sweat to trickle down the side of his face. He wiped it off with his arm and saw blood there too. He really must look horrible. He wasn't surprised. He certainly FELT horrible.
He was incredibly tired, but he knew he wasn't supposed to go to sleep. Besides, undoubtedly one of the boys would just wake him up anyway.
An hour later, some of the boys finished their holes. But instead of going back to camp, they came and sat next to Stanley.
The sun on his face added to the fact he had lost so much blood as well as having a concussion caused him to feel ready to faint. But he forced his eyes to stay open and concentrated on watching the boys still digging, well, dig.
Finally, only Zero was left digging. Some of the other boys offered to help, but they knew it would go the fastest if Zero dug it. Zero threw the last dirt out of his hole, measured it, and then climbed out. He spat in the hole, and then walked over to where the rest of D Tent was sitting.
"How are you going to get back to D Tent, Caveman?" Armpit asked. It was a good question; one Stanley had been asking himself for the past while.
"Walk, I guess." Stanley said, still concentrating on breathing in and out.
"It didn't exactly work last time you tried getting up." X-Ray pointed out. Stanley didn't say anything.
"How is he going to get back then? We can't carry him." Magnet pointed out.
X-Ray sighed. "I guess we'll have to try the walking then. You seem a little bit better, Caveman, maybe you can stay up this time."
Stanley smiled weakly. True enough, he thought, I do feel a bit better.
Not much.
Squid stood up, stretched, and tried to wipe the dried blood on his hands on his orange jumpsuit. It didn't work. With a shrug he reached down and grabbed Stanley's arm. He pulled him to his feet.
Stanley doubled over in pain, his knees close to buckling. Squid and Magnet grabbed him before he fell, he held him up for a minute.
"Are you ok?" Magnet asked, as Stanley straightened up with a pain-filled groan. Stanley nodded, which caused Zigzag to sigh and shake his head. Stanley smiled ruefully at him.
Squid let go, and Magnet supported Stanley.
"Alright, it's not that far. You walked here by yourself before, remember?" X-Ray asked.
After a quick nod from Stanley, they set out. Magnet switched to Zigzag, then to Armpit, then Squid, then X-Ray, and finally Zero.
As they walked back into camp, most of the boys were already in the Wreck Room.
"Zero." Stanley said as they walked through camp. "I'm going to faint."
Zero looked worriedly up at him. He had his arm around Stanley's waist for support, and Stanley had his arm over Zero's shoulders.
"Come on. Just a bit farther." Zero prompted. "Spell tired."
"T-I-R...E-D." Stanley said, his eyelids starting to droop, but he forced them open.
Suddenly, Stanley stumbled.
"Whoa!" Zero yelled, as Stanley's knees buckled. Zigzag, who was nearest, grabbed Stanley from the other side, and looked down into Stanley's pale face.
"Caveman! Dude! Wake-up!" He yelled, slapping Stanley's face. "Come on, were almost there. You can sleep when we get to the tent, man."
Slowly, Stanley's eyes opened and he was pushed back to his feet. He swayed, but stayed upright. In, out. In, out. When did breathing become so hard?
Then they were at the tent marked with D. Zigzag and Zero led Stanley to his cot, and he collapsed onto it. Immediately he passed out.
Author's Note: * Feeling completely evil *
Please give me some feedback! Good? Bad? The other? PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You have no idea if your not a writer on ff.net how good it feels to get a review.
By the way, in this chapter, could you tell one of my favourite characters is Ziggy? ^___^
Oh, and all the information on the long words and phobias is real. Trusty internet. And how Ziggy got into Camp Greenlake is real too. I don't know about the shrink part though, it's likely. I think so anyway. Oh, and Pendanski knew about the longest word because he saw it on the internet (like me!) It seemed likely to me because he's a hacker. (Also true.)
Luv,
~Eh, Man
By the way, in this chapter sorry if the characters are a little OOC. I tried to make them as close as I could.
Oh, and about the goriness and torturing of Stanley. If I didn't do it, someone else would. ^_~
Lovely Reviewers:
The One and Only Trey: I have yet to figure out if this is an insult or a compliment. But thanks anyway!
Sixstars: Stanley rocks! Heh, my penname amuses me too. Feel free to laugh at it all you want! Thanks for the review.
Incubus4lotr11: Fanfiction.net can be annoying, but you gotta luv it. * gives Stanley huggles * heh. * shrugs at blood part * Meh. Sorry about the blood. Theres....er, a lot of it. -_- Poor Stanley indeed. SPREAD THE HOLES LUVIN!
WheelerChick: I agree that it's 'ah'. Interesting word, 'ah', no? My dad works in the hospital too! Thank you, you don't know how much it means to me that I got my facts right. I may have to twist reality a bit for the plot (you're thinking right now, what plot? Lol), but I'll try to keep it real. Yo. OH MY GOD. It didn't mean anything to me when I first read this review, but think of the huge-arse coincidence. I wrote a fic with a matchbox 20 song (my first ever songfic!) and you just happen to go to their concert! I find that amazing. Cool. I envy you. I liked your Magnet ficcy! Thank you!
Rattler: Yet another review I'm still trying to figure out. I think this one is more leaning towards 'compliment' though, for which I'm eternally grateful! Thank you for the review! Ff.net is annoying sometimes. Sorry about the pain!
Eldalie Lavina: You have a hard screen name to type. Who's your first fav? Uhm, yeah. About your question. Mr. Sir knocked Stanley out with the shovel, showed the guys to their holes, and came back to hurt Stanley some more. Yupp, I'm sadistic. I think that's what happened anyway. I don't really remember, sorry.
Satan's Apprentice: Erm. Actually, he's not dead. Just really, really hurt. Sorry? Lol. Thank you!
Amy: Hmmm...Hmmm, good idea! Maybe later on in the fic or in a whole other fic, I haven't decided yet. But, good idea! (everyone's thinking, oh god Amy, what did you start... lol)
Emily: Thank you so much!
Celestra: Yay! I'm looking forward to your Holes fic, we need all we can get! Thank you!
Estelle Yavitil: Ok! Thank you!
Sagraco: OK! Thanks!
Burnin': I've said this before, you're welcome to hang around my review section! ^_^ Who's Leezardh8er? Sorry for not making you feel good. -_-. I must say I felt a bit sick with the last chapter, too. Heh, Burnin', you're a pyro like Ziggy! ^_^ Erm, hi everybody! Jeez, hard to keep track of everybody. I'd talk randomness to ya longer, but I really gotta post this and really gotta go to the bathroom...which you REALLY did not need to know. Sorry. Heres the update. I'll talk more next time, I promise! ^_~ BTW, did I miss it, or do you not have Ziggy there?
Alrighty, now on to the fic!
I love you all, thanks for reading! And remember to review!
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Holes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The cry echoed over the dry lakebed, caused diggers from A, B and C tents to raise their heads in curiosity. A scorpion flicked its tail in the direction of the cry, and a rattle snake shook it's tail vigorously in self defence against the sudden noise.
A yellow-spotted lizard jumped out of its hole with its teeth bared, only to leap back in after seeing the coast was clear.
"Sorry man." Squid muttered, his face pale. He continued the added pressure that caused Stanley to cry out. "But you getting up made the bleeding worse, we gotta stop it or you'll be even worse off."
"Seriously," Magnet said to Squid. "You. First-aid. How?"
Squid just glared at the Hispanic boy. X-ray raised his head and wiped off his glasses with his forearm sleeve.
"Would you guys cut the crap? This REALLY isn't the time." X-Ray said, a note of worry in his voice.
"Siento lo que hice." Magnet murmured, staring down at Stanley.
The boys were still crouched around Caveman. After his attempt to stand up, he had only gotten worse. Now he was bleeding more, as well as on the verge of just passing out altogether.
"Ah!" Stanley cried again, as Squid pressed down harder on the gash on his stomach. The boys crouched around him were pale and looked like they wanted to look away, but they didn't.
Zero grabbed Stanley's hand. He looked worriedly down on the face of his only friend. He seriously didn't know what to do. What COULD he do? What could any of them do? So Zero did the only thing he could think of.
"Spell 'Stanley'."
Everyone looked at Zero; Stanley opened his eyes.
"S-T-A-N-L-E-Y." Stanley said slowly; not that he couldn't spell his own name, but it was difficult to talk.
X-Ray nodded.
"Spell 'Zigzag.'" Zero said to Stanley.
"Hey!" Zigzag said.
"Spell 'Zigzag is a dork.'" Squid muttered, brushing sweat out of his eyes and unknowingly causing a streak of copper-coloured blood to appear on his cheek.
"Z-I-G" Stanley took a deep breath, his exhaling slow and shaky. "Z-A-G."
Zero looked to X-Ray to see if it was right and X-Ray nodded.
Zero looked up to see if he could find a new word in the deep blue sky.
"Giraffe."
Again, everyone except Stanley looked at Zero, who didn't say anything.
Stanley squeezed his eyes shut against new waves of pain.
"How DO you spell Giraffe?" Zigzag asked, his eyes wide on his pale face.
"G-I-R-A" Stanley paused, gasping for a haltering breath, his hands curling into fists at his sides. "F-F-E!" He finished quickly, his curled hand scraping up some brown dust involuntarily.
Zero looked to X-Ray who only shrugged.
"Livingston." Zero said. Stanley opened his eyes in shock. Clyde Livingston. He used to be Stanley's Idol. How did Zero know? Maybe Zero was just a fan.
"L-I-V-I-N-G-S-T-O-N" Stanley said in one breath, his eyes closing again. Than his faced blanched as pain racked his body.
"Antidisestablishmentarianism." X-Ray said.
"What the fuck?" Squid asked.
Stanley laughed quietly.
"It's the..." He paused for breath. "Longest word in the....the English language."
"Weird!" Zigzag exclaimed. "Anti...Anti-disease-estab-men-tary-ism!"
"Ok, seriously dude, not the time." Magnet said.
Nobody said anything for awhile and the only sound was Stanley's harsh and pain-filled breathing.
"Rex?" Mr. Pendanski called across the dry lakebed. "What's going on?"
Five heads snapped up and saw Mr. Pendanski coming quickly towards them with Armpit running beside.
"Anti-disease-estab-men-tary-ism!" Zigzag said when they were in hearing distance.
"Anti-what?" Armpit asked; he and Mr. Pendaski came forward.
"It's the longest word in the English Language!" Zigzag said proudly.
"Actually, that's not true." Mr. Pendanski said from about five metres away. "Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is."
"Again, what the fuck?" Squid muttered, wondering why the hell Mom was giving them an English lesson when Stanley was bleeding to death.
It didn't occur to them that Mr. Pendanski couldn't actually see Caveman yet, and was wondering why they were all crouched in a circle for no apperent reason.
"Language, Alan." Pendanski said sternly. "And.....oh."
He had finally seen Stanley.
Needless to say, Stanley wasn't looking that well.
Sweat and water made Stanley's slightly curly blonde hair damp and beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. His face was deathly pale, and there was blood running down the side of his head from a gash on his forehead. His pupels were dialated, the sign of a cuncussion, and he was constantly closing them against the dark throbbing headache raging in his head, not helped by the burning hot sun overhead. Blood covered about three-quarters of his torso. One of Stanley's hands was over the gash, the other laying in the dirt covered in blood.
Squid had both hands pressed against the wound, seemingly uncaring that blood covered his forearms.
"Seems like digging today might be a little harder, huh Stanley." Pendanski said brightly.
All of D-Tent stared at him.
"What the hell..." X-Ray whispered.
"You'll be ok, won't you Stanley?" Mr. Pendanski asked Stanley, putting him on the spot.
Everyone looked at Stanley, some wincing slightly.
Stanley blinked, trying to bring the blurry councillor into clear view. It didn't work, and only made him dizzier.
'Say no, say no....' Zero thought to himself. What was Mom going to do? Just leave Stanley lying on the lake? It was out of character for Stanley to complain. He had yet to complain about having a huge gash in his stomach. He probably blamed it on his no-good-pig-stealing-great-great- grandfather, but he just accepted it and moved on. 'Say no. He's got to help you, how are you going to get through this otherwise?'
"I'm fine." Stanley said, but then squeezed his eyes shut and squeezed his free hand into a fist, ignoring how his nails cut into his hand. More blood sure wasn't going to hurt. The pain assailed him in stronger waves, and he resisted the urge to cry out. When he opened his eyes again Pendanski was smiling lightly at him.
"Alright. No problem then. That's it Stanley, suck it up." He turned to go. He started walking, but then stopped and looked over his shoulder. "Oh, and the Warden is still going to want seven holes."
As Pendanski walked away, the boys stared at him in shock.
"What the fuck?" Squid asked for the third time, surprised. "Suck this." He fingered Mom's retreating back.
"Ooookay. Lot of help that was." Zigzag muttered.
"That was...Interesting." Magnet said slowly.
"Now what?" Armpit asked.
"We dig holes." X-Ray said, getting up indifferently. But his eyes betrayed his calmness; they were shining with worry as they gazed down at the pale, shaking and bloody Stanley.
"No-way we're leaving the Caveman like this." Squid said, pressing harder on the profusely bleeding wound. "He's gunna fuckin bleed to death!"
Stanley looked at him calmly.
"Go dig. I'll be ok." He said quietly. He knew he wasn't in a good condition. He needed a doctor, but how would an ambulance get to Camp Greenlake in less then eight hours?
Squid snorted. "Like hell you will."
"I'm not leaving either." Zero said quietly.
"You heard Pendanski!" Stanley said, gasping for breath. "He wants seven holes...I don't know how I'm going to dig mine though." He added as an afterthought.
"Come on Squiddy, you've done all you can. And you gotta dig some time today. Look at the sun! It's high already." Zigzag said, standing up with X-Ray.
Armpit and Magnet joined them in digging their holes. Squid tied his bandana around Stanley's waist as well as he could, then with a sideways smile stood up.
"I learned first aid after my mom got pissed drunk one night and threw her bottle at me. I almost bled to death, and after that learned first aid in case it ever happened again." Squid explained quietly.
Stanley nodded, and watched as Squid dug his hole. He turned to Zero.
"Zero...You gotta dig too, man." He said breathlessly.
Zero said nothing, only looked at Stanley like he could see through him.
"Only if you let me dig your hole." Zero said finally.
It was Stanley's turn to stare dizzily at him. The D-Tent boys said Zero was like a mole; he liked to dig. Stanley strongly doubted that. But he knew he couldn't dig his own hole, not like this.
Finally, Stanley nodded. Zero stood up, and glanced back at him before starting to dig.
Stanley was left alone.
Putting both hands behind him, he forced himself into a sitting position and squeezed his eyes shut. Breath. In and out. In and out.
New pain exploded in his stomach as he sat up. With his eyes still squeezed shut he wrapped his arms around his stomach and leaned forward, groaning.
Soon he felt a hand on his shoulder. Forcing his eyes open, he looked at the blurry face through the vertigo. Zigzag.
"Hey...Zig." He mumbled.
"You ok man?" He asked. Stanley nodded.
"Yeah, sure, whatever." Zigzag said disbelievingly.
"Ok, I feel not too good, happy?" Stanley asked. He was in too much pain to argue.
Zigzag sat beside him.
"You know, you're strange, Caveman." He said. Stanley tried to focus on him through his daze. "How can you possibly be that hurt and not be complaining to no end?"
Stanley blinked. This didn't sound like Zigzag.
Zigzag looked out over the dry lakebed. "I doubt I'd be able to stand it that well."
After a while, Stanley decided to try to answer.
"Well, I got sick a lot when I was younger." Pause for a deep shaky breath. It was getting easier to talk. Whatever Squid had done had helped. Or maybe if this kept up he would just naturally slowly get better. "My parents were poor....and I didn't want to tell them...if I was sick." Stanley inhaled and exhaled slowly.
"So if I was sick,...I pretended I wasn't. Now I just don't like to...admit I don't feel well." He finished shakily.
Zigzag said nothing, but then turned back to Stanley.
"Did I ever tell you why I'm here in the first place?" He asked.
Stanley shook his head, ignoring the increase in vertigo it caused.
"I used to be, well, still am I guess, a pyro. I burned down the school. And got sent here." Zigzag said. Stanley was distracted from his pain out of interest.
"The judge sent me to a shrink. Everyone thought either I had something wrong with me because I was a little different. First, for some reason, they wanted to find out if I had a phobia. I figured I knew I wasn't pyrophobic." He smiled. Now Stanley was really interested.
"You'd be amazed some of the ones they tried me for. I think they just wanted an excuse to say I was crazy. Actually, I'm just paranoid. "Suffers from acute paranoia." The shrink wrote. Hell, though, I've known since I was five I was paranoid." Suddenly, Zigzag laughed.
"I learned a lot of the phobias just because I was tested for a lot of them. Did you know people have a fear of fears? Phobophobia. Some people have a fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of their mouth. Arachibutyrophobia. You know what though, I should have lied on one of the tests. Maybe if I said I had mysophobia they wouldn't have sent me here." He saw Stanley's confused look, and laughed.
"Sorry, mysophobia is the fear of dirt." Stanley laughed. Zigzag sure didn't seem that crazy to him, now that he got to know him.
Zigzag sighed. "Well, I'd better get back to digging my hole." He said, and got up. "Listen, Caveman, you don't have to lie to me or the rest of D Tent about whether you're sick or whatever. It's ok. Don't worry about it. Hey, maybe next time you can tell me why YOU got stuck in this hellhole." He laughed and Stanley watched blurrily as he walked back to his hole.
The pain he had temporarily forgotten was back full force. Now he wished Zigzag hadn't left so he could have someone to talk to. The sun burned down on his forehead causing sweat to trickle down the side of his face. He wiped it off with his arm and saw blood there too. He really must look horrible. He wasn't surprised. He certainly FELT horrible.
He was incredibly tired, but he knew he wasn't supposed to go to sleep. Besides, undoubtedly one of the boys would just wake him up anyway.
An hour later, some of the boys finished their holes. But instead of going back to camp, they came and sat next to Stanley.
The sun on his face added to the fact he had lost so much blood as well as having a concussion caused him to feel ready to faint. But he forced his eyes to stay open and concentrated on watching the boys still digging, well, dig.
Finally, only Zero was left digging. Some of the other boys offered to help, but they knew it would go the fastest if Zero dug it. Zero threw the last dirt out of his hole, measured it, and then climbed out. He spat in the hole, and then walked over to where the rest of D Tent was sitting.
"How are you going to get back to D Tent, Caveman?" Armpit asked. It was a good question; one Stanley had been asking himself for the past while.
"Walk, I guess." Stanley said, still concentrating on breathing in and out.
"It didn't exactly work last time you tried getting up." X-Ray pointed out. Stanley didn't say anything.
"How is he going to get back then? We can't carry him." Magnet pointed out.
X-Ray sighed. "I guess we'll have to try the walking then. You seem a little bit better, Caveman, maybe you can stay up this time."
Stanley smiled weakly. True enough, he thought, I do feel a bit better.
Not much.
Squid stood up, stretched, and tried to wipe the dried blood on his hands on his orange jumpsuit. It didn't work. With a shrug he reached down and grabbed Stanley's arm. He pulled him to his feet.
Stanley doubled over in pain, his knees close to buckling. Squid and Magnet grabbed him before he fell, he held him up for a minute.
"Are you ok?" Magnet asked, as Stanley straightened up with a pain-filled groan. Stanley nodded, which caused Zigzag to sigh and shake his head. Stanley smiled ruefully at him.
Squid let go, and Magnet supported Stanley.
"Alright, it's not that far. You walked here by yourself before, remember?" X-Ray asked.
After a quick nod from Stanley, they set out. Magnet switched to Zigzag, then to Armpit, then Squid, then X-Ray, and finally Zero.
As they walked back into camp, most of the boys were already in the Wreck Room.
"Zero." Stanley said as they walked through camp. "I'm going to faint."
Zero looked worriedly up at him. He had his arm around Stanley's waist for support, and Stanley had his arm over Zero's shoulders.
"Come on. Just a bit farther." Zero prompted. "Spell tired."
"T-I-R...E-D." Stanley said, his eyelids starting to droop, but he forced them open.
Suddenly, Stanley stumbled.
"Whoa!" Zero yelled, as Stanley's knees buckled. Zigzag, who was nearest, grabbed Stanley from the other side, and looked down into Stanley's pale face.
"Caveman! Dude! Wake-up!" He yelled, slapping Stanley's face. "Come on, were almost there. You can sleep when we get to the tent, man."
Slowly, Stanley's eyes opened and he was pushed back to his feet. He swayed, but stayed upright. In, out. In, out. When did breathing become so hard?
Then they were at the tent marked with D. Zigzag and Zero led Stanley to his cot, and he collapsed onto it. Immediately he passed out.
Author's Note: * Feeling completely evil *
Please give me some feedback! Good? Bad? The other? PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You have no idea if your not a writer on ff.net how good it feels to get a review.
By the way, in this chapter, could you tell one of my favourite characters is Ziggy? ^___^
Oh, and all the information on the long words and phobias is real. Trusty internet. And how Ziggy got into Camp Greenlake is real too. I don't know about the shrink part though, it's likely. I think so anyway. Oh, and Pendanski knew about the longest word because he saw it on the internet (like me!) It seemed likely to me because he's a hacker. (Also true.)
Luv,
~Eh, Man