Kenny awoke safely in his bed, old emotions prickling at his newly amended skin. Before he had been torn to bits and pieces after he had self-detonated, he had an embarrassing scratch on his nose, but both were from encounters with his franchise nemesis. He wanted to say he was back to normal, like any other death. But it wasn't. Besides still being horny as hell, he had forsaken his mission with Freedom Pals, and Eric might have overstepped ground zero.

Not that good to be alive.

Over the years, Kenny hated his all time best friend forever. He would be happy to beat that unruly bastard to shit, whose idea of a conversation starter was an acutely targeted insult. Genocide was not beneath him, and everything he did was an empty quest to confirm his empty excuses, not ever wanting to admit the truth, that things—Jews, gingers, hippies, Mexicans… minorities—weren't as bad as he made them out to be. And that's where Kenny would have to stop himself, because from there that asshole delivered his own dues. Eric was sick in the head, and sometimes Kenny felt he was the only one who saw it for what it was — a vulnerability. And so he always stuck by his side.

But last night he had really pushed Kenny to his limits. Of course Kenny wanted to screw him, of course he didn't want people knowing what a sex-crazed bastard Mysterion was turning into. Even Princess Kenny knew subtlety, when she tried. But then again, it ended up with her getting her balls farted on, and Eric somehow still being okay. Which meant he was probably fine this time, too. Why did Kenny always have to be on the receiving end of this madness?

Kenny was just tugging his parka shut when he heard Stuart was whistling idly in the hall. Not a minute later he popped his head into Kenny's bedroom. "Hey, Ken! Guess who got laid last night?"

"(Not me?)"

His father laughed. "That's a good one. So you remember how you couldn't find any more of those vials?"

"(Uh-huh.)"

Everything his father had to say worried him, but by the end of it he was just confused. What did not finding the vials have to do with getting laid? Who got laid? No, it couldn't be… "It's really a shame, but things are turning out for the better. I was real angry last night, and I thought I'd get as drunk as your mother to see how she liked it, and I guess it should have been obvious, but we ended up having sex!"

Seriously, what the hell was in those drinks, anyway? "(Good for you.)"

"Really, sorry about the cat piss. But I think I'm going to switch to beer from now! Maybe when you're older you can try some beer, too, huh?"

Beer, yeah right. He had something way better than a Bud Light, but he needed to catch it first. His father was glowing, but the reluctantly-still-alive Kenny couldn't bring himself to celebrate his parents' revived sex life. Before skipping away, Stuart added absently, "Hey, don't you have school or something?"

The worst part would be having to make up an alibi for his sudden death, or deal with the lack thereof. People only registered the event in their minds as cowardice, of Kenny running away. And this time around, that wasn't much of a stretch. Still, what could he do? Mysterion had some form of a reputation to keep up.

At noon, when the mass of orange parka made it to the Pals' lunch table, it sure enough received a couple cold glances. He mumbled, "(Hey guys, sorry about last night. I got distracted.)"

"It's all right," said Stan, munching a bologna sandwich. He didn't question Kenny's vagueness. Kenny didn't expect him to. "We only defeated Professor Chaos, General Disarray and his entire army, and then let Coon & Friends steal all the glory. It's no big deal that you ran out on us right as the Coon and his whole gang were advancing on us."

It was a cruelly skewed dismissal, and Kenny blinked away the stinging feeling it gave him. "(You didn't call backup?)"

"We did. It's just that we didn't have enough warning before Coon & Friends took over. They got Scrambles."

"(Scrambles?!)"

"Yeah, which means a hundred dollar reward. A hundred dollars. We're so behind, they've probably already got a Netflix series by now." He sighed.

Kenny tensed up. The table they were sitting at formerly belonged to Craig's gang, but ever since Civil War it was promptly snatched by a bitter Tweek and Token, and the rest of the gang went to the old table of Team Stan, the which Cartman never wanted to get his fat ass off of. Then Freedom Pals had the two rogues who didn't abide by any sense of allegiance, Timmy and Wendy. Wendy because she "worked alone" and Timmy because… well, it was always hard to tell with him, but Kenny theorized it was to make the group less clique-ish for new members to join. With his upcoming franchise plans, he was the one to assert the "inclusion" part of their motto.

Token must have noticed Kenny scanning the cafeteria, and he said, "Butters isn't here today since Coon & Friends took him into custody. We really fucked up yesterday, letting those amateurs take control. We were hoping Butthole would join up with us but… it's not looking that way anymore."

Butthole, once again, was the buttfucking traitor, reflected Mysterion. Butt. Fucking.

His eyes remained fixed on the distant table. "(Where's Cartman, then?)"

"Probably skipping." Token shrugged.

Unconvinced, Kenny said, "(He didn't… fall into lava, right?)"

Tweek twisted his head towards Kenny from across the table. "Lava? What makes you say that?" Kenny cursed himself as Tweek's paranoia alarmed the others. How could he have been so candid?

Withdrawing further into his parka, he explained, "(Look, he was there last night. Mysterion had to fight him. Like I said, I got… distracted.)" He refused to admit why, but he may as well have, since Tweek turned sympathetic and Token's mouth just creased.

Stan was less reserved. "I'm sorry guys, but I can't keep quiet about this anymore. Kenny, you bitch this and that about how we shouldn't be playing the wrong games, but then mid-mission you prance off with your fucking boyfriend. I mean, at least Call Girl had a reason to be there! And it's not even a game anymore! There's actual crime; we actually need the money if we wanna do something about it, and last night, Wendy confirmed the kingpin IS Cartman!"

"(It's not Cartman,)" Kenny scoffed.

"You weren't saying that before, Kenny. We all know you're just in love with him."

Kenny hummed a long woooow and said, "(Go fuck yourself, Stan.)" He didn't see how his feelings for Cartman, whether he had them or not, made any difference.

"You know," said Token, trying for peace. "You don't have to be in Freedom Pals if you don't want to be. It was a hard decision for Tweek to stick with the group, even though he didn't have to."

"I didn't?" said Tweek.

"Dude, are you trying to convert him to the other team?" Stan turned to Token, his attitude evaporating.

"Aren't you?" Token said. "I just think that it's an option. You can't say Kyle, Scott, Jimmy, Clyde, and Craig are all bad…."

Tweek grumbled between chews, "You could say that for at least one of them."

"…but it doesn't matter. The doc says we're going to be merging franchises, anyway."

Stan pouted again. "But they won't want to merge if they're more successful than us. Our only surveillance — Mysterion — ditched when even Call Girl was off duty. I'm not saying he should switch over. I'm saying maybe he should take his own advice and… where did Kenny go?"

Mouth full, Tweek said, "He left."