Apparently I wasn't clear enough in the last chapter, but, uhhh, this is an AU of sorts, where the kiddo squiddos actually DO have super-powers, hence why Butters could not only mop the floor with Kenny but also... yeah. A lot of HCs all around, yo. With that said, enjoy!

But he wasn't dead, no, not this time. Just passed out. And he would be for a while more.

Butters rushed through the town, trying his best not to be noticed, the limp form of his friend heavy in his powerful arms.

And soon, almost too soon, he was back home.

Neither his mother nor father knew he'd been out, and they could never know. Once inside the quiet home, he tiptoed over to the locked door leading to the basement. He fished a small key from his cloak and unlocked the door.

Once inside, he went down the stairs and placed his passed-out friend in a corner. Butters felt pretty bad about all this, but if anybody found out about his secret identity, forget about the police, he'd be grounded for years! The mere concept of forever-grounded made the 8-feet tall beef mountain quake in his footwraps.

Yeah, no. No way that's gonna happen.

A small black cat purred by his foot, and Butters was brought out of his thoughts to notice the dozen or so stray cats living in the basement. Bending down, Butters let his fingers run over the back of the small black cat. He couldn't feel the fur through the titanium gauntlets, but consider how happily the feline purred, he knew it was enjoyable for at least one of them. And that was quite enough.

Butters smiled and handed over to another corner, where a bundle of chains and shackles were piled up. Man, that had been weird. Well, at least he came out of it alright. A mumble from behind him alerted Butters to the urgency of the situation. Sure, pounding Kenny into the floor was easy (not exactly enjoyable) and all, but doing it in his family's basement wouldn't be very wise.

So, with the mildest of panic, he fastened the ends of the chains to the four corresponding parts in the walls, dragged Kenny's body over to the middle, and shackled him properly. It looked kinda weird and spooky, especially since Kenny wasn't even awake. But that would change soon.

Real soon.

"Hnng-," Kenny mumbled as he stirred back to life, his eyes slowly adjusting to the sudden darkness. It was dark. Very dark. Not a single light shone, not a moon nor a star. The air tastes cold and stale, filled with the scent of dust, dry mould and… ammoniac? Yeah, there was definitely that tangy smell of urine in the air, over there, just-,

The second he moved his head, a clanking clatter reverberated, like the ghost of Christmas present having a party. Startled, Kenny jerked his head in the other direction, only to find not only that very same sound but, also… he couldn't exactly move. His hands were the same. And his feet, too. Beyond just the noise and immobility, he also noticed how, well, it was heavy. He couldn't feel it much, but he knew he'd been shackled up with chains.

Butters.

He had to be behind this. But where in the world had he gotten chains? That couldn't be-,

"Butte-,"

"Shh!" a voice hissed from nowhere, a hand shooting out from just behind his head to clasp his mouth shut. "M-, my parents are trying to sleep upstairs, so could you just be a bit quiet?"

"Mphp-?" Kenny mumbled, muffled by the aluminium-covered hand.

"Yeah, it… it's me. Look, no hard feelings or nuthin' but, uh, I can't have you just bein' a huge tattle-tail on me or anything, so, you'll have to stay down here for a while. But, ah, don't worry! You won't lonely here, we have, um, little Sniffles here, and Ptolomy, and Ballerina, and Hickey, and Lars, and Johanna Oakley, and Jimmy, and then we have the litter, Kitty, Litty, Pitty, and Titty!" Butters said, pointing at cats that couldn't be seen in that horrid darkness.

"Mpfph," Kenny said.

"Oh? Oh, sorry! I'll let you go, if, if you promise not to scream or anything, right?"

Kenny nodded fiercely, causing the chains to jiggle and scrape together.

"Oh, okay!" Butters said and released his grip in Kenny's jaw.

Kenny took a deep breath, glanced at where Butters should be (it was hard to see in the darkness) and pondered screaming.

"Butters, where am I?" he said instead.

"Huh? You can't-, oh, yeah, sorry! I got real good night vision," Butter said as he moved towards the front of Kenny. If Kenny could have used echolocation, he would. But he couldn't, so he didn't have an excuse to scream. After a few seconds of light tapping with a final "click" to finish the movement, the lights turned on.

Well, even with all the lights turned on, it was still almost too dim for Kenny to see anything. The first thing that struck was, well… yeah, there were alot of cats. Second, he really was well-chained. He couldn't move a muscle if he tried. And, thirdly… for some damn reason, there was a large puddle of dried blood right in front of him. Just sort of there, like an old stain on the carpet bleach couldn't get rid of.

"Dude-," Kenny said, as a sort of reaction to all of it. Up at the top of the stairs, the hunched figure of Butters jerked, almost in fear.

"Y-, yeah?" he asked, taking a few steps down to stand face-to-face with Kenny, not seeming to notice the blood in the least.

Kenny anxiously glanced up and down between Butters and the old pool of blood. Whatever left that did so as a final gesture, he knew that for sure.

"Are you… are you going to kill me?" he asked, drilling into Butter's eyes.

"WHAT!? No, I-, of course not! Gee whiz, you think I did-, did that today on p-, purpose?!" Butters exclaimed, his whole body rippling and shuddering as a response to the mere idea that he might kill again.

"Then-, then what's that blood? Whose is it?..." Kenny asked.

Butters glanced down at the old stain, his eyes widening at the sight. Jerking his face back up, a tense, wry smile spread across his lips. "Oh, that, uh," he stammered, and although he seemed to be feeling a bit awkward about it, there was a deep pain in his eyes.

"Well, in-, in short, after all that Marejoine stuff when I pretended to be a girl, I got grounded, like-, like real hard, and my dad chained me up down here for a while. But-, but he must have cared about me an awful lot, cuz-, cuz he, he… well, it's not that important, but-,"

"He WHAT!? Butters-, he chained you up in here!? Just-, just for pretending to be a girl!?" Kenny exclaimed, appalled at the mere idea.

"Oh, no! Well, kind of, but, really it was all because I just had to go and pretend-die, at least I think so…" Butters said, his gaze trailing down to the pool of blood, and back up at Kenny. Chained up like an animal. Butters looked away.

"Well, I mean, that's understandable, but… down here?... in… in THESE chains?..." Kenny said, wiggling the chains on his right arm.

Butter gulped.

"Uh, yeah, Those. But-, but I don't have much of a choice! Well, I didn't back then, and now I don't either! I did and I do what I must!" Butters said, sounding more and more like Professor Chaos with every word. And, when Kenny thought about it… this did all explain the strange duality in Professor Chaos' personality. If you told him he'd hurt you, he'd say sorry. But in the same breath, he'd threatened the lives and well-being of all who stood near you.

Kenny couldn't help but look down at the blood once more. Old and dried. An old scar on a spot-free floor.

"Butters, what happened?" Kenny asked, nodding his head at the blood.

Butters was motionless for a good minute. Just standing there, staring down at that reddish blotch.

Slowly, his voice moved to life, his body still as stale as a corpse.

"...He left me a body. Dumped it down. Said I could eat. I didn't have a choice. He just left us there for two weeks. I was so hungry. So thirsty. I gave in to the thirst the soonest. Then, hunger. Only after two weeks could I get him to even consider letting me out. I don't know what I did. I'm sure I deserved it." His voice was as dead and monotone as his eyes looked.

"Butters, what the fuck-,"

Realizing what he'd said, Butters clasped his hands over his mouth, eyes glistening with tears. And with no further comment, only a single whimper, he ran up the stairs and escaped the basement, locking the door behind him.

"Butters!" Kenny cried, but it was no good. The walls were thick, the door was insulated, and Butters wasn't listening.

His voice could not reach him.