Chapter Eleven
You've Got an Explosion in Me


Stan Marsh was perched on a rock in the middle of a field on Old Denkins' farm. The blank expression on his face was definitely one of thought. Single-handedly, and without looking, he pulled a match from his coat pocket, struck it alight on his granite seat, and tossed it on a nearby cow patty. The resulting small explosion of fire caused a tiny smirk to form in a corner of his mouth for the briefest of seconds. With nothing better to do on a Monday afternoon, getting away from loud noises and loud people to collect his thoughts seemed like a good idea. The other alternative, Battletoads at Cartman's, did not.[1]

Stan pulled out another match, lit it, tossed it, and watched it crash and burn. Normally, lighting cow shit on fire brought him great amusement, but today he was just going through the motions. The reason being started three days ago at the grisly abomination that had been the Valentine's Dance. Up until the moment he watched Clarabella the genetically altered cow/human hybrid get violently impaled dead by a musical instrument[2], the only thing in life that really bothered him had been his break-up with Wendy. And even then, the cowgirl's death wasn't even what was on his mind at the moment. It was more what she had said to him not moments before she died.

"The one outside time..." he muttered to himself. What was that even supposed to mean? Was it because he refused to wear the watch his Aunt Flo had given him a few years ago? And what had she meant by telling him that all bovine kind regarded him as the harbinger of their destruction? Actually, what was a harbinger and why did it unnerve him? He reached into his pocket again only to discover that his matches, like his answers, were not available. He balanced his elbows on his knees and rested his chin in his hands. Despite the fact that it was silly being told that cows knew who he was- Well, his aura, anyway. -and that it was impossible for his mere existence to cause them to explode in gooey milky messes, he still found himself feeling guilty for it all. What if it was him? What if he had some kind of super power that caused cows to explode on his very whim? They could call him...The Milk Bomber, the Aqua Man of the South Park Justice League. He shook his head to clear his thoughts. The whole thing was utterly stupid, yet he still couldn't shake the feeling.

"Why doo yoo light excrement on fire, young one?" came a deep, almost feminine voice from behind him. It was almost soothing, as if the voice alone could take away all of life's problems. He doubted this person could.

Stan failed to look at the assumed female speaker behind him and continued on with his thinking pose. He just could not be bothered to turn his head. "I dunno," he suggested flatly, "Normally it makes me laugh, but..."

"Something troubling yoo?" The way this lady talked almost sounded familiar, but Stan couldn't figure out why. Well, in actuality, his subconscious was as clueless as a Neanderthal in a computer lab. His consciousness, on the other hand, was too busy fixating on Clarabella's puzzle and had zero progress to show for it. You could say he was getting nowhere at turtle speed.

Stan was silent as he eyed the distant horizon between the horizontal boards of a distant fence. Somewhere out there was his answer. He knew it. It was just a matter of finding it or, with his luck, having it fall in his lap ten years later after he had forgotten all about it and moved on with his life. "I met this girl the other day," he began, "She said something to me that I'm having trouble understanding." His face scrunched up into a frown as he tried not to remember the gruesome scene from the other night. He sighed, "I came out here to see if I could figure it out."

"Have yoo come to any concloosions?" the voice cooed in his ear.

Again Stan was silent for a moment. "No," he finally ventured with. His brain kept distracting him with the look that had been on Clarabella's face the moment it happened. It had been one of excruciating pain and suffering pleading for help, whether to remain alive or for a faster death he couldn't be sure. He did know that she'd still be alive if he hadn't busted her out of Mephesto's lab. For that reason is probably why he felt that there had been a touch of betrayal there as well. The fact that he hadn't been the one who had dealt the killing blow never dawned on him.

"If yoo don't mind my asking," inquired the faceless voice, "what did yoor new friend say too yoo?" In all honesty, he wasn't sure if he wanted to tell anyone other than Kyle what had been said. It had sounded silly, stupid even, when the words had left his lips that he'd bring the end of cow kind, but still it troubled him for some reason. It was almost as if he knew it was true, but it couldn't be, right? Still, it wouldn't hurt to get an outside opinion in on this. It could be something simple like the earlier idea that he never wore a watch. Or, alternatively, maybe he was the carrier of some strange form of cow flu that caused them to explode in an ooey-gooey mess. The world would never know.

"She said that I'm outside time and that I'm causing cows to explode." An exaggerated frown dropped in on Stan's face. "I just wish I knew what it meant and how..."

The voice hmmed a few times before speaking. "That is quite an accoosation. Oone as yoong as yoorself shoold be playing not contemplating the inner workings of the uooniverse."

"But I'm not thinking about how the universe works." At this point, Stan had turned to, for the first time, look at his dialogue partner. "I'm trying to-" Instead he found himself face to face with a cud chewing cow. Needless to say, he immediately forgot what he was saying in the confusion. "Oh, very funny, asshole." He whipped his head around to look for any hidden persons, but there was nowhere for anyone to hide except perhaps behind the cow, which shook its head and continued chewing its cud. Stan slouched with a pout even further into his rock.

"Oone day yoo'll discover the answer too that puzzle, yoong oone."

Again, Stan looked around to find the source of the voice. Finding no one, yet again, he balanced his arms on his knees and rested his chin there. "I'd like to know the answer now," he muttered with a furrowed brow.

"In all doo time. At any rate, yoong oone, yoo shoold stop pondering on what might be and instead foocus on moore important things, like what is."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean, dude?"

"It means exactly what it means," came an unhelpful and strained reply. Stan turned around to find that there was, again, no one around. Only the familiar sight of the cow he had seen not moments before. Except... Was the cow's udder bigger? He sighed and rested his head on a hand which was burying its elbow into his knee.

"Vague statements don't really help me," he murmured apparently to himself. After a few moments of hearing nothing but the wind and some jackass in the distance laying his car horn on thick, he jumped when a voice seemed to speak directly inside his ear.

"If it's any consoolation, yoong oone," it said with a slight uncomfortable tinge to its tone, "we cows doo not hate oor fear yoo." Stan's eyes widened in surprise. If he had been conversing with a cow this entire time, then that certainly would explain why the manner of speech seemed familiar to him. Clarabella had a similar way of speaking before her magic titty milk made communication easier. "Yoo, like us, simply are." Stan whirled around to again find only the cow, which seemed to be slightly distressed at the size of its now purple udder. "However, the winds oov change and time howl fiercely about yoo." The voice, to Stan anyway, seemed to grunt in pain. "Foor better oor woorse, things have changed and soon will change again."

"Um, that's great and all," Stan began as he warily eyed the purple bag of milk, "But you're turning-"

The cow quickly cut him off with a moo. "Yoo- Yoo have noo choice but too be at the center oov it all. Be stroong." Before Stan could respond, the cow exploded with a wet organic pop that sent milk and beefy gore in all directions.

A few cows in the distance mooed mournfully as Stan attempted to wipe his eyes free of chunky milk blood. He spat his mouth clear and stared at the remains of what once was a cow before huffing back on to his rock. What started out as a peaceful thought gathering outing had ended in bloodshed and even more confusion than what he began with. He folded his arms across his knees and angrily rested his chin there. His parents were going to kill him for the mess. He sighed in exasperation and murmured the words "God dammit," to no one in particular. This definitely had been the worst Valentine's week ever.


[1] The boys had tried that very activity a few weeks ago. The only thing that they accomplished were several hours of killing each other. They only made it to Level 2 – The Wookie Hole before it ended with an all-out real life brawl complete with bruises, a broken Nintendo controller, and Cartman in tears.

[2] And thus the children of South Park learned on that day that bad music really does kill.