A/N:
It's been too long, have some heartbreaking awkwardness.

It's not even a minute before Craig regains consciousness, but when he cracks one eye open, just a little bit, he's so disoriented he feels like he's been out for days. All he's able to see around him are legs and shoes and for a second the only thing he can think is that when he fell, he fell through a portal in the stage floor and now he's in Ralaylay or whatever the fuck Kenny had called it, surrounded by an army of leg creatures ready to stomp him to death. Weirder shit has happened in South Park, after all, and Cthulhu looks like Slimer from Ghostbusters eating an infinite plate of spinach fettuccine noodles, so who's to say leg demons couldn't exist too?

Oh God, fettuccine.

"Ughhh," he groans, his eye falling closed again as a wave of nausea washes over him. His skin prickles with goosebumps, courtesy of the nausea's accompanying chills, despite the sweat he can feel dripping off his hair and down his face. Craig can't remember if that's normal, to sweat this much when you're cold? He can't remember anything right now, actually, thanks to the massive headache pounding away in his skull. Every time he has a new thought, it's like it's being physically drilled into his brain from the outside.

"Hey." A voice drifts down from somewhere above him, sweet-sounding and vaguely familiar, yet entirely unrecognizable at the same time. "Craig, hey, are you okay?"

Is he okay? That's a good question. And probably not something a man-eating leg monster would ask, so it's probably safe to answer. Unless the leg monsters have evolved enough to know just the right things to say to lure their victims to their deaths. Although, Craig's mind argues, where would a leg monster even have a mouth? Actually. No. That's not something he wants to think about ever again.

Okay. Logic. Think logically. Ignore the fiery nails being hammered into your scalp and really think about this, Tucker. What are the chances of leg demons actually showing up? That definitely seems like the result of some ritualistic bullshit, and if there was anything like that going on in this town, odds are Craig would have been involved, because he's just eternally cursed that way. Kenny thinks he's got the ultimate curse, but Craig can say with confidence that he'd take the immortality over constantly being dragged into stupid schemes any day.

So, okay. Probably not leg demons. He still can't remember what the fuck is going on, but at least it's likely he won't get killed just for answering a question.

But when Craig goes to open his mouth to respond, his stomach clenches with a sharp, stabbing pain and he instinctively clamps his mouth shut as tightly as he can, curling into a ball with a, "Hhhhhnnnnggggnnn!" His damp hair falls across his face and even though it feels utterly disgusting, he can't muster the strength to lift his hand to move it.

"What kind of question is that?" A second voice chimes in, higher and harsher than the first, and much closer to Craig's ear. "Does he look okay to you?!"

Jesus Christ. Craig tries to move his head away from whatever living embodiment of a megaphone that had been, but only succeeds in tilting his chin up towards the ceiling.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck abort! The bright white of the stage lights blasts through his closed eyelids, lighting up the whole interior of his skull, and bringing another burst of pain along for the ride. With a tiny whimper, Craig immediately returns to his original position, pressing his cheek to the dusty stage floor, for once not giving a fuck about getting dirty because what's a little dust compared to being blinded? Not to mention the fact that he's in a little too much pain to be picky about something like cleanliness at the moment.

"No, he doesn't, and I don't think you yelling in his ear is going to help," the first voice says, and Craig really wishes he could open his eyes to see who this voice belongs to; he's never met a psychic in person before, and that's clearly what this person is, to be reading his mind like this.

"Do you think he needs CPR?" Voice #3 joins the conversation. "My boyfriend's on his way here from his CPR class and he could help."

"For fuck's sake, Lola, would you shut up about your boyfriend for five minutes already? God." Voice #2 sighs exasperatedly. "You don't need fucking CPR for fainting."

"Well, what are we supposed to do?" Voice #3, who has been identified as Lola, a name Craig vaguely recalls but can't place just yet, sounds to be on the edge of a panic attack. "He just collapsed in the middle of the stage, he probably hit his head, do you know how easy it is to get brain damage from that?"

Oh, shit. Brain damage? This isn't the first time he's hit his head in the past few days, what if he's actually caused some serious problems? That thought is enough for Craig to risk another shot of pain to his retinas; his eyes shoot open wide and his gaze darts frantically around the small area within his field of vision. Shoes, legs, more shoes, more legs, a partial view of the seats in the auditorium, an empty water bottle on the floor underneath one of the seats in the front row. If he had brain damage, he wouldn't be able to see all that so clearly, right?

He squints a little bit, trying to make out the label of the water bottle. Fuck. It's blurry. Maybe he does have brain damage. Wait. What's the other thing that happens when there's shit wrong with your brain? Something about bread, isn't that what he's learned in high school? What the fuck kind of bread affects your brain? Grilled cheese? Craig's stomach rumbles and he winces, holding his entire body as still as he can until the nausea passes. There's no fucking way he's going to puke in public.

He blinks once, mentally running through all of the useless information he's picked up over the years and filed away in the Craig Tucker Brainbary. Oh, God, combining words isn't a sign of brain damage, too, is it? No, it can't be, Clyde combines words all the time and he'd had to get medical proof that his brain is just fine years ago. Oh, shit, what if he's turning into Clyde? Sure, okay, maybe he wouldn't mind having Clyde's hair and his knack for dealing with people, but then he'd have to date Kenny McCormick and yeah, Craig's always had kind of a thing for blondes but no, thank you, not that particular blonde.

Focus, you idiot. Bread, brains, not grilled cheese, oh fuck, toast, burnt toast, that's it. Craig tentatively sniffs the air, wrinkling his nose when he inhales a couple of tiny dust bunnies in the process. Ugh, gross. Silver lining, though, he doesn't smell burnt toast anywhere. Just dirt and – what is that? A slight frown crosses Craig's face and he sniffs again, trying to place the scent combination invading his nostrils. It's like leather and...cinnamon?

"Okay, okay." The first voice, the voice of the person Craig is certain is a mind reader, speaks again. "Becca's right, Lola, I don't think CPR will help. I'll just take him back to his room."

Craig watches as the pair of legs closest to his head bend at the knees, whatever fabric covering them so tight it seems almost physically impossible. He feels a hand on his shoulder just as his stomach decides to attempt to turn itself inside out again and he flinches. "Fuckin'...fuck."

"Craig, hey, can you stand?" When Craig doesn't answer, clearly in too much pain to speak coherent sentences, the sweetest voice he's ever heard in his life continues, "Okay. Just hold on, I'm going to pick you up, okay?"

Craig thinks he nods, but he's not quite sure. He must have consented somehow, though, because a few seconds later he feels arms underneath him and then a weird weightless feeling as he's scooped up off the stage floor. Not weird in a bad way, though, just...different. He would never admit this to someone like Clyde, or even Token, but Craig, as tough as he likes to seem on the outside, sometimes wants nothing more than to be the one to be taken care of. So he could actually get used to this whole being carried around thing; plus, whoever this mind reader person is has really comfortable arms. He inhales deeply, the scent of cinnamon even stronger now, and shifts a little bit, turning his head away from the light, resting his forehead against his rescuer's chest.

"Aww!" Lola exclaims, her next words hitting Craig like a bucket of ice water. "Oh my God, Tweek, that's so cute!"

Tweek.

And, just like that, everything he'd forgotten for the past three minutes rushes back into his brain all at once. Tweek, the theater kids, the musical, Tweek, being on stage, the lights, Tweek, the attention, the eyes on him, Tweek in the fucking–

Craig eyes fly open and all he can do is stare, frozen, at the leather-clad body in front of him. Tweek's leather-clad body. Tweek, dressed in Speed Demon's fucking skintight leather bodysuit that had been the catalyst for Craig's fucking sexual awakening way back in the day. Speed Demon is the entire reason he knows he's gay, for Christ's sake, and dressed the way he is right now, Tweek is a fucking dead ringer for the hottest supervillain Craig's ever seen. Oh, fuck, fuck, this isn't happening, this can't actually be happening, Tweek is not actually holding Craig in his arms right now like something out of one of Clyde's fucking chick flicks, shit, what the fuck does he do now?

"Are you sure you don't want some help?" Red – or whatever Tweek had called her, Becca? – asks as Tweek starts walking across the stage, oblivious to the silent panic attack Craig is currently experiencing. "You're not going to fucking drop him or anything, are you?"

"No, I'll be okay," Tweek says. Craig's eyes flick up to the blonde's face just in time to see him bite his lip in concentration as he carefully steps off the stage onto the floor. "He's actually not that heavy."

Red mutters something else that Craig can't make out, not that he's doing a very good job of focusing on anything beyond the chorus of, 'holy fuck holy shit holy fucking fucking shit' echoing through his mind. Tweek apparently hears it, though, because his cheeks turn a little pink in response and he looks down. And, since Craig is still looking up, that means they suddenly are making eye contact. Oh, no.

"Hey," Tweek says, the corners of his gorgeous eyes crinkling with worry. "Are you feeling all right?"

"Uh." Using all of his inner strength, Craig somehow manages to tear his gaze away from Tweek's, instead choosing to look off to the side at the sea of auditorium seats as Tweek makes his way up the aisle to the door. How the fuck is he supposed to answer that?

No, I'm not, I'm dying of fucking embarrassment because every time I'm around you I make an idiot of myself, because you're the hottest guy I've ever laid eyes on, and you wearing that outfit is not fucking helping and I would kill to get you back in my room and rip it off you right fucking now–

Tweek makes a little annoyed huffing sound, and for a second Craig panics, thinking that he's said all that out loud instead of safely keeping those thoughts inside his brain where they belong. He risks another look at Tweek's face, relaxing just a fraction when he sees that Tweek isn't even looking at him, but instead has his eyes on something straight ahead. All right, either Tweek's just too disgusted to look at him right now, or that particular stream of word vomit hadn't actually crossed his lips. Craig isn't sure which it is, but he knows that he really should say something.

"Um," he blurts out, not having any idea where he's going with this, but almost at the same time, someone else speaks, and unlike before, Craig recognizes this voice right away. It's a voice from his past, a voice he would have been perfectly happy never hearing again in his life. So of course, of course, of course, he's hearing it right now.

"Hey, Tweek, is Lola…" Craig's mortal enemy since as far back as he can remember trails off, pausing for a second before letting out a loud burst of incredulous laughter. "No fucking way. Tucker?"

"You know each other?" Tweek looks down at Craig again, clearly looking for some kind of confirmation.

And it's all just suddenly way too fucking much for Craig to handle. All of the events of the past couple days that have led to this moment begin to replay on fast forward in his mind; every awkward moment, fucked up sentence, dumbass decision, and embarrassing situation he's found himself in in the last 48 hours continues on a loop, over and over and over until finally, he just can't take it anymore. He needs to get out of here, he needs to get the fuck back to his room where he can lock the door, hide underneath his fucking blankets, and pretend none of this ever fucking happened.

He places one hand on Tweek's shoulder, trying to ignore the rush of adrenaline that courses through his body just from that one small action. Without stopping to consider the consequences of what he's about to do, he pushes against Tweek hard, swinging his legs up at the same time, in an attempt to get out of his arms so he can make a run for it. All he succeeds in doing, however, which he should have known was going to happen, is launching himself forward into the air, falling four feet straight down onto the floor, landing hard on his side. God fucking dammit.

"Jesus, Craig!" Tweek immediately crouches down next to him, but Craig springs to his feet, ignoring the pain, only able to think about getting the fuck out of here.

"Oh yeah, we know each other. And it looks like he's just as much of a disaster as he ever was."

Craig turns his head, glaring daggers at the only person on the planet he can say he truly hates with a fiery burning bloody passion. "Fuck off, Marsh."

Stan crosses his arms, an amused smirk on his face that Craig's fists are just itching to punch off. He glances at Tweek and then back to Craig, a knowing glint sparkling in his ugly-ass blue eyes. "Oh come on Craig," he drawls, "Not happy to see your ex?"

"What?"

Craig grits his teeth, grinding them together so hard he wouldn't be surprised if they all crack in half right now and he has to walk around for the rest of his life with no teeth, all that money spent on braces wasted. A bubbling rises up in his stomach and the inside of his mouth tingles, the telltale signs that he's got about thirty seconds before the little bit of food he's ingested since yesterday is going to make another appearance.

Without answering Tweek, or firing a snarky comment back at Stan, or waiting for either of the two of them to say anything else, Craig shoves his way past his arch-nemesis and bolts, out the auditorium door and through the theater building, as fast as his shaky legs can take him; he doesn't even stop to spare a glance behind him, needing to put as much distance between himself and the worst moment of his life as possible.

So he doesn't see Tweek run out of the auditorium after him, holding Craig's forgotten chullo in one hand, a cell phone in the other, looking incredibly confused and just a little bit heartbroken.