Darkness was falling fast in the streets of a quiet mountain town in Colorado, the snow twinkling like a sheet of tiny diamonds in the dying light. Houses looked like forbidding monuments of a forgotten age, the squares of yellow flickering out one by one, dousing the rough pavement in colorless misery. A hollow wind blew through brittle branches, creaking in a symphony of cold notes and even chillier temperatures. It was a desolate kind of night...

Kyle Brofloski had gotten into yet another fight with his younger brother about this or that (their parents out at some couple's retreat), and as a result, all caution had been thrown out the proverbial window as the teen stormed down the sidewalk, biting his lip against the breeze that ruffled his thin sweater. He really wasn't all that dressed for long treks through the elements, but the redhead was so steamed by his younger sibling that it seemed the more appealing option. Normally he might have headed for his best friend's place, but he had it on good authority that he would be with his girlfriend, so yet again, Stan was not an option. It seemed like more and more, the older they got, Stan was becoming more and more impossible to reach.

So instead he opted for his other close friend, Kenny McCormick. In some lights, the McCormick household really wasn't a very desirable location, but on this night, it was the best that Kyle had, and since Kenny didn't have the money to go out, it was almost guaranteed that the other boy would be home. Sure, Kenny might have had company, but Kyle was more than willing to wait a couple of minutes for Kenny to kick her out. After all, it was bros before hoes.

It was a perfect plan, but what Kyle didn't expect was to find that no one was home. Of course his parents would be out on the same couple's retreat (a groupon making the visit possible for all the parents), but to see that both Kenny and Karen were out was... Well, actually, it did kind of make sense, since if it had been Kyle in Kenny's place, he wouldn't have wanted to be at home either.

But what was he supposed to do now? With Kenny gone who knows where, the only other place to turn would be Cartman's, and that was the last thing Kyle needed right now, to be ripped on. Thankfully for him, the town had a way of making things happen, so that plea was answered almost the minute he turned around to leave the property.

Breaking through the gale, a low cry - more of a whimper really - cracked the stale, vodka soaked air. It was coming from just behind the meth lab in the backyard, and it was human, but it was so weak, so frail... Intrigued, Kyle wandered around the rotting structure, expecting to find a junkie or something. What he found instead was much more alarming...

"Oh my God, Kenny?!" Kyle ran to his friend's side. Kenny looked just barely conscious, mind hanging on by just a thread. At first Kyle thought that he had just gotten into his parents' stash or something, but he quickly realized that Kenny was bleeding badly from a knife wound in his abdomen, somewhere around the kidney, and though half-lidded, his eyes were as clear as the stars winking in the black velvet sky. "Shit, we have to get you inside!"

Putting all his strength into it, Kyle hoisted his friend up into a standing position, and he proceeded to lug him inside, through the back door. Being what they were, the McCormick's didn't have to worry about theft, so the locks were often only used to try and keep the police out when they were home. Intimately acquainted with the layout of the house, Kyle dragged Kenny into the kitchen, so he could use the rags to stem the flow of blood. It was bad, but not bad enough to call an ambulance over. Bustling around, Kyle had left Kenny on the floor.

Doing the best he could, Kyle bandaged Kenny up and put him in bed. All they could do now was wait...

[South Park]

Slipping away and coming back throughout the course of the night, Kenny finally came to just after midnight. Aching all over, he sat up to find that he was shirtless, his waist tied up with towels and left wrist splinted with popsicle sticks and dirty socks from the laundry. There was only one person he knew that would know to do that for him, so the boy gingerly removed himself from the bed, unsurprised to find that the world was spinning on its axis. Taking his time as he came down the hall and into the living room, Kenny thought back to how he had ended up in this position...

Ambling into the darkened room lit only with the tv and full of the sounds of aliens being shot to death, the blonde was unfazed to see Kyle sitting on the couch. Apparently, he had preoccupied himself with his friend's X-Box Whatever while he waited for him to wake up.

"Kenny," Kyle paused the game and chucked the controller away as the game saved his spot and turned itself off. Now that his friend was awake, he could get to the bottom of what happened. "What the hell happened to you?"

A part of him considered lying, fabricating any one of the countless believable stories, but obviously his friend was truly frightened for him (he would have bailed and/or acted as if nothing had happened if he wasn't). It would have been better to lie, easier even, but he couldn't keep this secret to himself, not any more...

Sighing, Kenny sat down next to his friend. "I was at work when it happened... A customer got angry with me, and he pulled a knife." Kenny wasn't afraid of dying, because it happened to him quite often. "I thought that he was going to kill me, but the wound was too shallow..."

Kyle cocked his head to the side. "A customer did that to you? Didn't anyone else at work-" Kyle realized that Kenny didn't have work that entire day. "Wait, what do you mean a customer did that to you? Kenny?" Kyle looked at Kenny, sizing him up. "I thought that you stopped helping your parents sell drugs."

Face the perfect mask of sorrow, he shook his head, "I'm not selling drugs." He waited for it to dawn on Kyle. It didn't take long. "After Kevin died, there was less money coming in, so I had to take a second job. At first I had no idea what to do, but one day it just clicked."

"No." Kyle didn't need to hear this, to know that he had been partially responsible... "Kenny, tell me that it isn't because of us..." Cartman had been the one to crack on what a slut Kenny was, but it was true that neither Kyle nor Stan had stepped up to deny it. They had even joined in at times, but he had no idea that it was going to lead to Kenny actually becoming a whore.

Being the good sort that he was, Kenny didn't really blame them for the decision, not fully. "Face it, sex is one of the only things I'm really good at, so why not use that to help out my family?"

Kyle refused to believe that it was his only way out. "No, you don't have to do this."

Making a promise to himself as much as to his friend, Kenny swore that it would only be temporary. "It's not forever - only until I graduate and can get a better job." Kyle obviously had his doubts about that. "You trusted me with your secret, so now I'm asking you to keep mine. Please, dude."

It went against all his better judgment to agree, and it took a long time for him to come around and really mean it, but finally Kyle had agreed to help Kenny keep his second job a secret, so long that he kept his word and quit by graduation...

So it's a super cereal chapter. Serial? Anyways, much more serious than the present.

I do not own South Park, that's all on Matt and Trey, but I do own Hunter and Avery!