Gregory caressed Wendy's soft chin and then brushed her hair gently with his fingers. Wendy did not react to his amorous gestures—sat on the couch, she was just there, breathing and nothing else.
"My dear Wendy..." Gregory muttered.
He left her side for a second to walk to the window of the living room and take a look outside. He couldn't see or hear anything from his house—he would have to trust Timmy managing the situation well. But it was being difficult to trust him lately. He was a mentally challenged man but he was not a fool. Since Wendy wasn't functioning and, therefore, he didn't have to take precautions about his communications, he used his phone to contact Nathan.
"Boss." Nathan's voice replied. Judging the background noise, he was at his workplace.
"It's time you and Mimallah go pay Mr. and Mrs. Burch a visit. Just do enough for Timmy to know he should respect me. But before you go, check on Coon and Friends to see if they killed each other already."
"On our way."
Gregory hanged up and turned around. Wendy was in the same position as he had left her. He was returning to her side when they rang at the door.
"Gregory?"
Gregory frowned. He would call Nathan later to change the plans about the Burches: Timmy deserved a punishment for spoiling everything.
He walked to the door, but didn't open it immediately. Stan heard his steps and saw the light coming from the windows. He knew there was someone at home.
"Gregory, it's me, Stanley...Stanley Marsh. Uh...Yeah, it's been a long time and all but this is important. I got a cry for help from Wendy and I have to know if she's here with you."
"I'm sorry, Stanley. Wendy isn't here at the moment."
"...Okay...Uh, look, something happened to her. May I come in? Please, let me in. I know we're not super-best friends but I care about Wendy too, and she might be in danger."
Gregory, after a moment of thought, opened the door and offered him to come in with a gesture.
"Thanks. What was the last time you saw or ta-"
Stan saw her. Wendy, sitting on the sofa, completely indifferent to his coming, looking into space. He didn't have the chance to open his mouth: Gregory wrapped his arms around him and squeezed until he was deprived from oxygen.
"Stan comes to save the day once again, eh?" Gregory spouted.
He closed the door, then crouched down to carefully grab, not leaving his finger prints on the surface, what fell from Stan's hands: a couple of screwdrivers. He smirked, putting them away in a drawer in the hall.
"I will never understand what you saw in him." he commented to his insensitive lover, dragging him to the basement.
It was then when Timmy, after receiving a painful hit in the head with Jimmy's crutch, broke all mental control and Wendy blinked. She looked around, finding herself back to Gregory's house. She stood up and trembling, touching herself because she felt strange in her own body, rushed to the hall. There, she saw Gregory dragging Stan.
"You son of a bitch!"
Gregory dropped Stan. Wendy ran to him, but he grabbed her wrist and twisted it, hurting her.
"Did nobody tell you that it isn't right to control your partner?" Gregory pushed her until he got to press her against the wall. The fitness she had always admired was now an inconvenience. "I am upset, Wendy..."
"Stan! Stan!" Wendy called him, but Stan didn't move. "What have you done to him?! And Timmy?! What the hell are you doing?!"
"You don't need to know. But I will tell you something: you made a terrible mistake interfering. We could have been very happy, Wendy, and you spoiled it all."
Wendy bit the arm which was holding her and pounced on him. He managed to push her to the floor and grab her by the neck. Wendy scratched that pretty boy's face of his, and Gregory squeezed her.
"This is a pity, because I really liked you. I liked you more than I did when I first met you thirteen years ago...So beautiful, so intelligent...But not enough, it seems. Look what you made me do..."
Wendy was sure she had sent an alert message to the police and all of her friends, why was no one else coming? Gregory was squeezing harder and harder, her face was getting red. And Stan wasn't moving yet. Wendy prayed to God that Gregory hadn't broken his neck.
God seemed to listen. Oxygen came back to Stan's brain. He opened his eyes. It was almost a good thing he found himself lying on his stomach, because he felt he wouldn't be able to keep his balance. When he saw Gregory choking Wendy, he forced himself to stand up.
"WENDY!"
He grabbed Gregory by the hair and puller him away from the girl, with so much force that he was left with some hair and a bit of scalp in his hand. Wendy rolled to her side and took deep breath with her mouth wide open, touching the finger marks on her neck.
It was Stan's turn to immobilize Gregory on the floor.
"Is this how you treat your girlfriend, motherfucker?! Heh?! I am going to make your life a living hell...You are never touching her again!"
"Stan! He's been...manipulating Timmy..."
A small distraction, when Stan cocked his head to look at Wendy, was enough for Gregory to fight back. He kneeled Stan in the stomach, then punched him in the nose and pushed him aside in order to get up. A kick in the face with his perfectly polished shoes made Stan fall again.
"Too bad your uncle missed the shot..."
Wendy, still recovering, tried to get up, and she was easily knocked down.
Gregory walked to the drawer of the hall. He first took the gloves he kept there, put them on and finally grabbed one of the screwdrivers he had taken from Stan.
"Your ability is very unusual. A little bit useless...But this gives me an idea..."
He turned his eyes to Wendy, walking to her.
"Everybody knows that you couldn't believe Wendy left you, and that you started drinking too much...You just couldn't see her with another man..."
"I said you're not touching her!"
With a new kick to the face, he had Stan under control. Stan took a second to breath and then stood up. With difficulty, but he managed to do it. Hatred, seeing Wendy in danger, gave him the force.
"The hero..."
Gregory turned his back on him and turned to Wendy.
"Boy, it sure stung a lot that you weren't the one who saved Terrance and Phillip."
Although Gregory's face remained cold as stone, there was a subtle glimpse in his eyes that told Stan that he had put his finger on the sore spot.
"...You didn't even have a plan. I did. It was my idea to get Mole's help. I encouraged the other children...Without me, you wouldn't have done anything at all and gotten everyone killed...Like you did to Mole...All you did was to spoil everything I had planned carefully. And, somehow this...whore preferred you over me...You...a child who played to be someone important..."
"It was never a matter of glory, Gregory. Not to us. I'm sorry if you had your own priorities."
Gregory tensed his muscles.
"Enough talking. let's get this done."
He raised the screwdriver, ready to stab Wendy in the head with it.
She spat in his eye, allowing her to get up and grab him. Stan ran to help her. He extended an arm. He felt there was something somewhere. Yes, behind that door. It opened due to something pushing hard enough to get out. A drill flew to Stan's hand. He pressed its tip against the base of his skull.
"Since you know about my powers, I guess you have an idea of what I can do with this..."
Gregory felt the tool hot, even if it wasn't plunged, and obeyed. Wendy rushed to grab rope she found inside of the same closet and tied him with it.
"You deserve everything bad that can happen to a person..."
Standing up, she sighed and looked at Stan.
"...Are you alright?"
"Well, I'm not ready to go to the ball, precisely...But I'm still breathing...You?"
He touched her cheek, and he realized later that it wasn't really appropiate, so he removed the hand quickly.
"...I'm alright. I'm so sorry...I...I was so stupid to trust this...this piece of shit...I didn't know he..."
"Don't be so hard on yourself. I should have known there was something wrong too."
"Are you sure you are okay?"
"He just kicked me over and over, don't worry."
"Stan..."
"Yes, Wendy?"
Wendy swallowed.
"...That folder...with our photos..."
"What f-Oh. Right."
"Why didn't you erase them?"
"Because...Well, I've been in love with you since I was eight years old. Of course I couldn't just erase all those memories with a click."
"Yes, I-I guess so...But Stan...I really can't understand you. Help me understand, please. Why did you distance yourself from me? Why didn't you want to move with me?"
"Because I was so afraid to lose you...You...know that sometimes I screw up really bad. You've given me tons of chances already. And when you said you wanted us to live together, I...panicked. That was such a big step to me...We'd see each other all day and night and there'd be plenty of chances for me to fuck up...I wanted this time to be the definitive and...and..."
Stan had to stop. He was suffering a pretty bad retching.
"Sorry..."
"It's okay."
"I feared losing you so much that I ended up losing you for real. See? I'm a motherfucking idiot who makes no sense."
Stan drew a little smile, almost looking like a puppy. Wendy smiled too. After wiping the blood of Stan's lip with her fingers, she placed her hand on his chest.
"Yes. A little bit."
And she kissed his lips. Stan held her tight, so tight, as if he was preventing her from falling or running away. He was feeling so ecstatic that it was turning his stomach. He had to break the kiss for a second to step aside and throw up. Once he recovered his breath he was about to resume it but Wendy stopped him.
"Uhm, you'd better not..."
"Oh. Yeah. Sorry."
But she could still hug him, and that was what she did.
The door opened discreetly. A person watched the scene, but did not intend to be a voyeur. Nathan silently aimed the rifle he was carrying in his hands and aimed at Stan.
He was knocked down so suddenly that he couldn't help letting out a scream, which alerted the people inside of the house. Nathan found himself lying on the floor by Mimsy's side, and over him, stepping on the weapon, Jimmy smiled.
"N-Nice to see you again, Nathan, ol' pal."
"Hello, Jimmy! We thought we killed you!" Mimsy replied.
"Too good to be true..." Nathan muttered, shaking his head.
"Guys! Are you alright?!" Kyle ran inside the house.
"Yeah. And I see you're okay too..." he looked at the others behind him with a wary expression.
"Gregory forced Timmy to control them and attack us."
"What? Is that true, Timmy?"
"So that's the summer job you told me about, messing with handicapped people..." Wendy glared at him.
"Alright, alright, everyone, what's all this hullaballoo about?" Officer Barbrady made his way into the house, looking everywhere and to everyone. He didn't seem to understand the explanation he was given, but he understood that the Coon was there, there was a gun on the floor and three people had been reduced.
"Very well, I am taking these rascals to the police station...Let's see if I can finally figure out what's going on."
Gregory was being properly handcuffed at the living room, much to Stan's satisfaction, to join Nathan and Mimsy inside his car when he raised his voice.
"Well, if I have to fall, I won't do it alone."
Wendy could barely hide how much she wanted to slap that man until her hands started bleeding, but she placed her hands on her waist and listened to what Gregory had to say.
"If I did what I did, it was because someone convinced me. The director of the company I am an investor to. I didn't recognize him but he didn't seem to forget about me. We were both involved in La Resistance, during the war against Canada. We first talked about those times, and his tone got more aggressive. He reminded me of what you did to my plan, how you stole Wendy from me. He didn't stop until he sparked the idea. He told me about your powers and weaknesses. He told me Timothy was a very powerful individual, and adviced me to submit him, and showed me how, what screws I should tighten. He told me to give Stan and his friends...tests. Yes, something to be busy with. A lot of chances to fight or die. His own uncle, friends...This way, I hoped to convince Wendy to stay with me, to show her how incompetent Stan was—and if he died, he would be out of the way forever. This person has been following your steps. He is-"
BANG!
Clyde's face, behind Gregory, was stained with a red pulp. He jumped back, disgusted, letting out a scream. When Barbrady let Gregory go, he fell to the floor like a dummy. Everyone turned to the broken window.
"Gregory!" Wendy gasped, shaking him.
Tweek knew what to do and quickly placed his hands on his head. But nothing happened. His hands didn't even glow this time.
"I-I think he's dead..."
BANG!
Token teleported outside.
"TWEEK!" he called.
Cartman was lying on the lawn, with a hand on his stomach.
"He...He escaped..." he said, raising a finger covered in blood, trying to point into a certain direction but unable to do it.
The rifle Nathan had tried to use was on the ground, a few yards away from Cartman. The two handicapped were still on the car, trying to watch what was going on outside.