Chapter Text
I want to have the same last dream again
The one where I wake up and I’m alive
--Angels & Airwaves
GC: SO YOUR3 SUR3 4BOUT TH1S
CG: SURE AS I’M EVER GOING TO BE.
CG: DON’T TELL ME YOU’RE CHICKENING OUT NOW, PYROPE.
CG: CAN’T FUCKING BACK OUT NOW. CAN’T FUCKING PUT THE CLUCKBEAST BACK INTO THE BAG. MEOWBEAST. WHATEVER.
GC: C4T
CG: WHAT?
GC: HUM4NS PUT C4TS 1N TH3 B4GS
CG: DOES IT LOOK LIKE I FUCKING CARE WHAT HUMANS PUT IN THEIR BAGS?
CG: WE’RE GOING TO PLAY THIS GAME. IT MIGHT BE THE ONLY WAY TO GET OURSELVES OUT OF THESE STUPID FUCKING MONKEYSUITS.
GC: Y34H 1 KNOW >:[
GC: 1 GU3SS 1 F33L GU1LTY
CG: DON’T. IT WAS A SHITTY PLANET ANYWAY.
CG: ANYWAY, I DON’T WANT TO STAY ANOTHER YEAR AT THIS SHITTY SCHOOL. HUMAN ME WAS A BULGELICKING NOOKSTAIN FOR ASKING TO COME HERE.
GC: YOU DONT H4V3 TO D3STROY TH3 WORLD FOR TH4T!
GC: 1 DONT TH1NK YOUR D4D 1S GO1NG TO L3T YOU GO N3XT Y34R 4NYW4Y
CG: LOOK. ARE YOU READY TO START PLAYING OR NOT?
Your name is Karkat Vantas and you’ve been stuck in this stupid fucking monkeysuit for the last two months. Most of those last two months you’ve spent at Colonel Sassacre’s Military Academy for Boys, also known as the most retarded fucking school on this stupid blue planet. You really don’t know why Human You begged so hard to get to come here--all you know is that since he fucking did, you really can’t beg to come home without looking like stupid wiggler quitter. Even if you want to.
Not that where Human You lived before that was home. Really.
Really.
It’s okay, though. For a human hive, anyway. You really aren’t jealous of Nepeta and Equius getting to stay there year round, though.
Oh fuck it, you are, if only because it isn’t fucking Colonel Sassacre’s.
It is the morning of June 12th, 2009, which isn’t your wiggling day or even your human birthday. What it is, however, is the day you and your eleven best friends are going to playtest a game called SBURB, which Sollux and Aradia’s brother coded for some lady named Betty Crocker that you remember John having a fairly black crush on. (Evidently she is Eridan’s grandmother, which over the last few months you’ve learned is something like an Ancestor. You never knew John had such a thing for older women.)
You haven’t heard from your co-leader since the Scratch came and you woke up sans horns or teeth or claws or anything but soft skin that’s fucking brown-- brown, of all things, fucking brown as a dirtblood’s bathwater-- and you’re still not even a normal human because pretty much all the rest of the hornless fuckasses in this fucking school go trotting around looking like cartoon oinkbeasts, pink as candy and at the top of the stupid human skin-based hemocaste they’ve set up for lack of anything other than their bright red freakblood to give them an excuse to be horrible to you.
John and his friends were pinkish, you remember, for all that the viewscreens washed them out white as a ghost. You hope John isn’t a ghost now, wherever he is. You never thought you would miss the moron so much, especially when you have enough idiots among your friends as it is, and he’d shot you down so awkwardly over that whole stupid black thing you’d been stupid enough to have for him and then rubbed salt all over the wound by being basically the most un-dislikeable person you ever met. John was a really special kind of moron, and you guys were really kind of friends, after everything Sgrub put you through.
God, fuck Sgrub. And fuck the Scratch, and fuck every single version of you there’s ever been for thinking that absconding was ever the best option out, that you could take a game that pulled reality itself into causal ribbons and say ‘Oh, never mind, fuck this, I’ll have an easier one thank you very much’ and put it back on the shelf.
Bailing too soon is what’s what got you into this trouble.
Actually fucking knowing how to play the game for keeps now is going to get you out of it. You’re going in it this time and you’re going to keep playing until every last one of you are dead if that’s what it takes, this time, this is the last time for real, for ever. Scratch again and for all you know you’ll end up with gills on your neck and horns coming out of your ass.
You just wish Nepeta and Equius weren’t hogging the house and barn back at the human hive. You had to ask special permission to stay at the academy another day just so there’d be enough places for everyone to build from. Another fucking day. At least the blibbering bulgelickers you’ve been calling your classmates are gone now.
You won’t lie and say that Terezi randomly slopping paint over the ivy and brownstone of Colonel Sassacre’s doesn’t make you feel warm and squishy inside, because it so fucking does.You just hope the weird tactile interface Equius and Sollux made her works, because you really don’t need an alchemiter dropped on you. For some reason, Terezi can’t smell or taste colors anymore, so even though she’s not a hundred percent blind like she was as a troll, she’s still blind enough that the humans won’t ever let her drive a car, even with the stupid thick lenses that she has to wear just to make the blurring colors resolve into blurry shapes. And she still needs the human bump language to read anything.
(Really, as much as you want everyone to be trolls again, you’d be happy if just Terezi was back to normal. Being human has kind of screwed her over.)
GC: 1M R34DY
GC: 1 GU3SS
CG: ABOUT FUCKING TIME.
CG: HOW ABOUT GAMZEE? IS HE STILL STANDING BY TO GET YOU IN?
CG: I DON’T WANT THIS TO TAKE ANY FUCKING LONGER THAN IT HAS TO.
GC: H3 S41D H3 H4D TO G3T SOM3 MOR3 POT FROM H1S GR4MPS
CG: SERIOUSLY? THIS IS FUCKING IMPORTANT.
GC: TH3 WORLD 1SNT GO1NG TO 3ND 1F YOU W41T F1V3 M1NUT3S TO ST4RT PL4Y1NG K4RK4T
GC: W3LL NOT B3C4US3 OF TH4T 4NYW4Y
CG: HA HA HA.
CG: FINE. WHATEVER. SINCE WE HAVE TIME, WHY DON’T YOU RUN ME THROUGH THE CHECKLIST.
GC: MOSTLY CL34R3D ROOM W1TH PL3NTY OF ROOM FOR TH3 4LCH3M1T3R L4TH3 3TC OR 4T L34ST NOTH1NG 1N TH3 W4Y TH4T YOU DONT M1ND D3STROY1NG
CG: CHECK.
GC: SOM3TH1NNG TO ST1CK 1N TH3 SPR1T3 TH4T 1SNT GO1NG TO M4K3 TH3 D3RS1T3S 4 P41N TO D3F34T
CG: CHECK.
GC: 1TS ON3 OF YOUR HUM4N ROMCOMS 1TSNT 1T
CG: I AM NOT TELLING.
GC: WH3N 4LL TH3 1MPS LOOK L1K3 HUM4N M3G RY4N 1 W1LL PO1NT 4T YOU 4ND L4UGH 4ND L4UGH
For her information you are totally prototyping your sprite with Will Smith, your late and lamented hermit crab who perished heroically at the hands of your douchebag roomate, Troy, who you are very happy to picture being squished by the meteors which will soon be raining down on this stupid planet. You think you’re going to ask Terezi to record the blessed event so you can watch it in slow motion, over and over, with a sack of popgrubs.
Popcorn. Whatever.
GC: G4MZ33S B4CK BUT W3 H4V3 4 PROBL3M
CG: WHAT THE FUCK? WE HAVEN’T EVEN STARTED
GC: H3 DO3SNT W4NT TO PL4Y W1TH US
GC: H3 DO3SNT W4NT TO PL4Y 4T 4LL
Oh god, you should have known this would happen.
CG: WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU REFUSE TO PLAY?
TC: I AiN'T PlAyInG.
TC: SoRrY, bEsT FrIeNd, BuT I'M NoT GoInG To uP AnD ThRoW SoMe mEtEoRs aT ThIs pLaNeT
TC: JuSt tO PlAy a gAmE ThAt nEvEr bRoUgHt mE AnD MiNe nOtHiNg bUt pAiN AnD FrUsTrAtIoN.
CG: IT WASN’T THAT BAD.
TC: It wAs mOtHeRfUcKiN tHaT BaD.
TC: I LiKe eArTh.
TC: It's a bItChTiTs pLaNeT.
TC: We mAdE A GoOd uNiVeRsE ThE FiRsT TiMe.
TC: WhY Do wE HaVe tO MaKe aNoThEr?
CG: THIS TIME WE’LL MAKE A BETTER ONE.
TC: No.
CG: TAVROS WANTS TO PLAY.
TC: He'lL Up aNd fInD SoMe oThEr gAmE.
CG: IT’S REALLY FUCKING IMPORTANT TO ME THAT WE PLAY.
TC: I KnOw yOu tHiNk iT Is.
TC: BuT It's mY JoB To uP AnD StOp yOu fRoM DoInG MoThErFuCkIn DeStUcTiVe sHiT.
TC: YoU'D Up aNd dO ThE SaMe fOr mE.
CG: YEAH, WELL, WHAT ABOUT TEREZI?
CG: WHAT ABOUT TAVROS FOR THAT MATTER?
CG: REMEMBER WHEN VRISKA WENT GODTIER?
CG: SHE GOT HER ARM BACK.
CG: AND I AM PRETTY SURE THAT PEOPLE’S DREAMSELVES ARE WHOLE TOO.
CG: THAT’S WHAT I’VE HEARD ANYWAY.
TC: people already fucking died to make us better off
TC: I FUCKING REMEMBER
TC: i made those sacrifices
TC: AND MAYBE I WOULD DO IT AGAIN IF I NEEDED TO
TC: but we don't need to do it again because we are already in paradise
TC: THIS IS IT, MOTHERFUCKER
TC: don't tell me i have to do all that shit again just because you don't like my paradise
CG: GAMZEE...
CG: SHOOSH.
TC: I'M SoRrY
TC: It's jUsT ThAt wE'Ve bEeN GiVeN A MiRaClE
TC: A MoThErFuCkIn MiRaClE
TC: AnD YoU DoN'T GeT ThAt
You swallow hard and look out the window. After a long, long moment you slowly type:
CG: GAMZEE, THIS ISN'T PARADISE
CG: THIS IS A HOLDING CELL
CG: WHERE WE'RE SUPPOSED TO STAY UNTIL WE PLAY SGRUB AGAIN
CG: THESE LAST TWO MONTHS WERE AN INTERMISSION
CG: A SHITTY, POINTLESS INTERMISSION WITH VERY FEW GOOD SPOTS
TC: No iT FuCkInG IsN'T
CG: YES IT FUCKING IS!
CG: THE GAME EXISTS.
CG: SOMEONE HAS TO PLAY IT.
TC: LeT SoMe oThEr mOtHeRfUcKeRs dO It
CG: THEN WE DIE
CG: THE METEORS FALL
CG: AND WE DIE
CG: EITHER WAY THE EARTH IS DOOMED.
CG: AND SO IS THE TIMELINE IF WE DON’T PLAY THE GAME.
CG: THE VERY FACT WE EXIST MEANS WE ARE GOING TO PLAY IT.
CG: AND I KNOW YOU ARE FUCKING STONED BUT I DON’T THINK THE SMOKE IN YOUR HEAD IS SO THICK THAT YOU CAN’T UNDERSTAND THAT.
TC: YeAh.
TC: YeAh, I UnDeRsTaNd. :o(
CG: SO GO TELL TEREZI YOU’LL BE HER SERVER.
CG: I WILL MAKE SURE THAT BAD SHIT DOESN'T HAPPEN SO MUCH THIS TIME.
CG: <>
TC: <>
You find yourself smiling at the little purple diamond in spite of yourself. Gamzee is still fucking crazy and you wish that he wasn't deluding himself that everything he did was okay because you're all alive now but he's still your goddamn moirail and you pity the fuck out of him.
GC: 1 H4V3 NO 1D34 WH4T YOU S41D TO G4MZ33 BUT H3S B4CK 1N
GC: 1TS NOW OR N3V3R K4RK4T
CG: TIME TO GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE. SMELL YOU LATER, HUMANITY.
The next few minutes pass by in a flash, nothing worth paying attention to as you’ve already done this before; that you aren’t doing this blind means no dumb fuck-ups like almost killing Sollux. Finally, though, you're in, and it's time for Terezi to alert Gamzee so he knows to bring her in.
Speaking of which, it’s time to troll--oh, all right, pester--Sollux so you can bring him into the medium too. Like you told Terezi, you want to get everyone in as soon as possible, even if there isn’t an horrorterror lusus at the bottom of the sea just waiting to--
What the fucking fuck?
ectoBiologist [EB] began trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG]:
EB: hi karkat! did you miss me?
CG: WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK?
EB: wow, someone sure bothered to learn some new words in the last couple months!
EB: not!
EB: so i guess you must be in the medium now. future dave said we wouldn’t be able to contact any of you guys until at least one of you got in.
EB: something about there being no interstellar internets!
EB: so anyway, this is important we gotta talk about who’s whose server player.
CG: I’LL FUCKING SAY WE GOTTA TALK, FUCKASS. DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD WE LOOKED FOR YOU ON THIS STUPID NOOKSUCKING PLANET OF YOURS?
EB: oh for fuck’s sake, karkat, please tell me you are not that dumb right now, i don’t need this. why would you look for me on earth?
CG: EGBERT, PLEASE TELL ME YOU’RE A GREY-SKINNED ASSHOLE WITH CANDY-CORN HORNS AND A VIOLENCE PROBLEM.
EB: i’m a troll, dumbass. jeez, troll-you was right about humans being the stupid race, you’re kind of like a pile of bricks now.
EB: a pile of bricks that learned how to swear.
EB: but not even very well.
CG: OH FUCK YOU VERY MUCH.
EB: yeah, karkat, i hate you too.
EB: <3<
Did John just make a spade at you? Holy grubfucking shit.
EB: anyway guess what, you’re my server player, congratulations, now get me in.
CG: WHAT.
EB: you are my server, i am your client, rocks fall, everyone dies.
EB: is that simple enough for you, human?
CG: IF I FIND OUT THAT THIS IS JUST ANOTHER WAY FOR YOU TO FILL UP YOUR STUPID PRANKSTER’S GAMBIT...
EB: okay, okay, fair point! i’m not saying that this wouldn’t be a great way to get you killed in the most hilariously retarded way possible, but in this case we’re pretty sure we need you alive so quit bitching.
EB: look at the client list. i should be right there.
EB: this is pretty important, karkat. if you don’t get me in we can’t complete the loop how we’re supposed to.
EB: and we won’t be able to complete sburb.
EB: and we’ll get scratched again.
EB: and maybe next time we won’t remember! if rose is right, we haven’t any of the other times.
CG: OTHER TIMES?
EB: just look at the client list, fuckass.
Will Smithsprite extends a spectral claw helpfully; you shove it away as you can fucking read, thank you. There he is, right above twinArmageddons, glowing blue.
CG: IF I GET YOU IN, THEN WHO WILL GET SOLLUX IN?
EB: jade, duh!
EB: we went in reverse order this time, so she could play more.
You start typing your reply, then the door to your dorm room breaks down and a bunch of little wolf-shaped imps with Will’s shell on their backs burst into the room. Things get kind of hectic for a while as you slice away with your sickles at the little bastards.
It’s a good thing Human You lived on a farm. You have since learned that it’s practically impossible to find sickles anywhere else on this stupid planet.
Once the imps are grist, you turn back to the computer. Oh look, Sollux is pestering you. Asshole. What does he want?
TA: 2o kk, do you know anybody named gg? becau2e they are pe2teriing me and 2ayiing they're my 2erver, not you
TA: they are kiind of an a22hole
CG: YEAH I KNOW.
CG: LOOK. SOME PEOPLE WE PLAYED A GAME WITH A WHILE BACK WANT TO PLAY WITH US. THEY HAVE THEIR OWN DISCS. CAN YOU REMEMBER EB, TT, OR TG?
TA: maybe. 2ort of. tg wa2 an iin2ufferable priick. ii remember that much
CG: THAT IS ALL YOU REALLY NEED TO KNOW. THEY ARE ALL ASSHOLES. BUT I THINK WE MAY NEED THEM.
CG: TELL GG TO FUCK HERSELF FOR ME AND THAT I’M GOING TO MAKE HER USE A DUMBASS PASSWORD SYSTEM NOW AND THAT THE FIRST PASSWORD IS “KARKAT CAN FILL ALL MY PAILS.”
Oh yeah. Let’s see how you like it when the shoe’s on the other foot, Miss Jade Harley. You have not missed her horseshit at all.
Yeah that’s basically a lie, you missed her almost as much as you missed John.
Oh look, there she is trolling you.
GG: gross, karkat!
CG: YEAH YOU HEARD ME.
GG: yeah i did but the thing is you couldn’t even handle all the pails i have now!
GG: your password is dumb and you are dumb!
CG: THIS WHOLE CONVERSATION IS DUMB!
GG: yeah because i’m talking to you!!!
GG: <3<
Evidently the kids have managed to proceed even farther around the bend of bugfuck loonyville since you last had the terrible misfortune of dealing with their nonsense.
Either that or you are truly the master of black attraction. You take a moment to pride yourself on that before answering.
CG: WHAT.
GG: you heard me, fuckass!
CG: TECHNICALLY I HEARD ONLY THE SOUND OF MY SOUL GENTLY EXPIRING FROM SHEER REVOLTED HORROR, YOU GARGANTUAN BLACKSLUT, AS WE ARE COMMUNICATING IN AN ENTIRELY SILENT TEXT-BASED FORM OF COMMUNICATION.
CG: DUH.
GG: i know i was just being figurative it is a thing us higher life forms like to do with our extra brain cells.
GG: duhhhhhhhhhh!!!
CG: DUHHHHHHHH YOURSELF, YOU FUCKASS.
GG: duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh to infinity, you double fuckass!!
CG: YEAH WELL
CG: YOU
CG: TRIPLE
CG: FUCK IT, THIS JUST GOT DUMB.
GG: well duh!
GG: now go tell your pet freako nerdbuddy with the cute ass to shut the fuck up and get on my fucking client list already, he is all bluh bluh temporal causality and if i wanted to hear that kind of shit i would have asked!
GG: also MY password is going to be ‘karkat couldnt fill a pail if the imperial drone was giving him a reacharound’!
CG: OH MY GOD ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS
GG: i only ever fuck seriously, karkat.
CG: OH MY GOD
CG: OH MY GOD NEVER SAY THAT TO ME AGAIN.
GG: <3<
She did it again. She gave you another spade. Oh my god, she must really hate you. You don’t remember her hating you this much when she was a human--or at least not hating you this way. You thought maybe you were even kind of a little flushed for her, your thing with Terezi notwithstanding, but apparently you missed that fucking boat too. You are the worst shipper, it is you, you’d admit it right out loud if it just meant she wasn’t just yanking your frond here.
Fuck, you have missed proper romance with proper trolls. Okay, John and Jade are probably crappy trolls, but still. They’re trolls. With horns and bulges and nooks and everything. Actual skin like it should be, tough and colorless, striped with battle scars...
EB: karkat, stop being a dumbass with jade and get me into the medium!
EB: if i get squished by a meteor there will be no candle light hate date and also my ghost will haunt you forever and i think it’s really safe to say that neither of us want that.
CG: LOOK, SPEAKING OF HATE DATES
CG: I THINK YOUR ECTOFREAK SISTER IS KIND OF
CG: UH...
EB: yeah, she does that.
EB: and you’re a pretty fucking terrible guy, I gotta say, so like...
EB: i guess we could have a threesome!
CG: OH MY GOD.
EB: unless you’re backing out.
CG: OH MY GOD.
EB: unless the combined hotness duo of troll john egbert and jade harley is just too hot for your sad little squishy pink monkey self to handle. because you’re human, now, humans are just so awful at blackrom aren’t they? humans are pretty awful at a lot of things. and you, karkat, are pretty awful at ALL the things.
EB: all of them.
EB: by the way, my horns are awesome. so are jade’s. they’re just so big! i could probably destroy a mountain with these bad babies. two mountains!
EB: vriska told me about your nubbly little horns.
EB: i bet you don’t even notice the difference now that they’re gone.
CG: YOU SET THAT TABLE, JOHN.
CG: YOU SET THAT FUCKING TABLE AND I WILL FUCK YOU RIGHT THROUGH IT.
EB: it’s on, shortstack.
EB: see you in the medium!
EB: <3<
You have never been more confused or turned on in your life. Are black threesomes even a thing? Your entirely comprehensive mental archive of rom-coms says no but other bits of your anatomy say that maybe the matter needs a little more fucking attention...
Fuck, it’s Sollux again. What the hell does he want?
TA: 2o...
TA: what2 wiith the fii2h heart2 thiing?
CG: WHAT
TA: gg. 2he keep2 makiing fii2h heart2 at me.
TA: like <3<
CG: OH FUCK ME.
You resolutely decide to concentrate on getting John into the medium so you don’t have to think about what a raging hateslut Jade is.
(Is she giving everybody she trolls spades? Who does she think she is, Eridan? Not that you care. At all. Not even a little.)
Your server connection finally goes through and you can feel your human heart go sinking into your human stomach. You are so screwed, so very, very screwed: JOHN IS A FINE FUCKING FIGURE OF A TROLL. God fucking damn: wild hair, a highblood’s build already stretching the shoulders of his dark t-shirt out, he’s probably tall as fuck, goddamn it. Those fangs-- those horns. That elegant swoop forward-- a guy could probably really do some damage with horns like those. God fucking damn it.
You realize you are running your fingers through your own hair, and bitterly let your forehead clunk down against the keyboard. You miss your horns. Even if they were a bit nubbly. They were going to grow any perigree...
TA: no, 2eriiously, what’s up wiith that?
CG: I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. JUST WAIT UNTIL YOU GET YOUR MEMORY BACK FOR ANOTHER TEN MINUTES.
TA: fuck you, kk.
CG: NO, FUCK YOU. I NEED TO CONCENTRATE ON THIS.
Stupid asshole has a fortress. Of course the asswipe gets to be fucking blueblood. That would make Jade a... jade-blood? Ha ha, no. Not quite the right color. But she’s definitely got green text.
CG: SO DO ALL OF YOU HAVE BLOOD THE SAME COLOR AS YOUR TEXT?
EB: wow. that is the stupidest question I have heard all day. yes, karkat, we totally do!
EB: too bad you don’t have your grey blood anymore. i bet you must really miss it!
CG: FUCK YOU, YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT COLOR BLOOD I HAVE. HAD. HAVE.
EB: yeah, but it’s so much fun giving you crap.
EB: <3<
Another spade. Dammit, why do you have to be so sexy? How are you even this sexy? You don’t even have your horns anymore! What do they see in this stupid squishy human body? He can’t even see you, yet, even-- he’s got to be going off of just sheer magnetic force of your personality.
So you guess that Lalonde is probably a sea-dweller? And Strider... oh fuck, Strider would be another mutant. Just like you. You really don’t know how you feel about that. And from what you can tell, he’s survived being culled these last few month, so maybe they aren’t such crappy trolls as you suspect they’d be after all.
No, they probably still are.
Oh goddammit. WHY ARE ALL THESE ASSHOLES PESTERING YOU NOW?
TC: BeFoRe yOu gO Up aNd gEt yOuR AnGrY On aT HiM LeT Me tElL YoU ThAt tAv dIdN'T KnOw wHaT ThE MoThErFuCk hE WaS DoInG.
CG: OH FUCK WHAT NOW.
JEGUS FUCKING CHRIST, WHAT THE FUCK DID THAT SNIFFLING IDIOT DO NOW?
It just figures. Dumbass is still just as incompetent no matter what world he’s in. He better not have accidentally killed Gamzee’s gramps by dropping the building on him. (Although if he has, you suppose Gamzee can just prototype his sprite with him. Even though that would make for one fucking scary sprite. Gamzee’s gramps is one creepy motherfucker.)
AT: uM, sO, gAMZEE SAYS I NEED TO TELL YOU THAT I THREW A CLOWN POSTER INTO HIS GOATSPRITE, uM, aND I'M VERY SORRY,
CG: ASDFLKH;JKLJ
AT: uM, kARKAT, aRE YOU OKAY,
CG: NO. I AM FUCKING NOT OKAY.
CG: GO TELL ARADIA WHAT A NOOKSNIFFING MORON YOU ARE AND THAT INDIANA FROG IS CANCELLED.
AT: uM, oKAY, i DON'T THINK I UNDERSTAND, bUT OKAY
CG: IT’S ALL GAMZEE’S FAULT FOR HAVING ALL THOSE FUCKING CLOWN POSTERS ANYWAY. HE SHOULD HAVE GOT RID OF THEM AS SOON AS WE KNEW WE WERE GOING TO PLAY THE GAME.
AT: i, uM, dON'T THINK HE ACTUALLY WANTED TO, uM, pLAY, i KINDA ASKED HIM TO, fOR, uM, mE
CG: RIGHT. WHATEVER. JUST DON’T DO ANYTHING ELSE STUPID.
CG: WHICH I KNOW IS HARD FOR YOU BUT TRY TO RISE TO THE OCCASION.
Fuck.
Your.
Life.
You are going to get John Egbert into the medium. Then you are going to go outside, scream with rage, and kill every single fucking imp you can find.
CG: WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST PROTOTYPE THAT KERNEL SPRITE WITH?
EB: cowmeron. he’s my lusus. he got hit by a chunk of meteor because someone didn’t get me into the medium in time.
EB: by the way, newsflash, that someone is you, and you’re a total sack of dicks.
CG: LOOK, I’M SORRY. SOME FUCKING IMPS ATTACKED ME.
EB: if you’re sorry then i’m a steaming heap of horseshit.
EB: you were flirting with my sister.
CG: SHE WAS THE ONE HITTING ON ME.
EB: that’s not how i heard it, dicksack.
CG: FUCK YOU EGBERT.
CG: YOU DIDN’T ALL PROTOTYPE WITH YOUR LUSII, DID YOU?
EB: duh, yeah we did? we wanted to be able to talk with them. and after what happened to curie and cowmeron, it was probably a good idea! at least my lusus knows other words besides ‘fuck.’
CG: YOU DUMBASS. IF LALONDE’S HORRORTERROR LUSUS TURNS MAKES THE DERSITES UNBEATABLE...
EB: what? rose doesn’t have a horrorterror! she has an octopuss!
CG: REALLY?
EB: man, if duchess was a horrorterror, i don’t know how we’d have all handled staying at rose’s hive until it was time to play.
CG: HOW DID YOU GET SGRUB ANYWAY? DID HARLEY PROGRAM IT?
EB: wrong again, fucktard! rose’s mentor-mom sent us the game-grubs a couple days ago. she does that. send weird presents. mostly it’s wizard slash statues, but once she sent rose a pair of gold-plated fillial pails!
CG: YOU ARE FUCKING KIDDING ME.
EB: hahaha, no.
EB: maybe i’ll show you the spade one.
EB: if you think you can handle it, that is.
EB: you’re just so horribly human now i really bet you can’t.
EB: i bet i can make you cry like a little girl
EB: and i will lick your tears right off your pretty brown human face and i will FUCKING LAUGH, karkat.
EB: <3<
CG: UM.
CG: OKAY, HOLD THAT THOUGHT FOR A SECOND.
CG: .............<3<
You press your hands over your face and take deep breaths. So you just reciprocated your first real black crush. You don’t need to flip your shit like a little wiggler at his first schoolhive shuffle. You can be mature, and rational, and remain perfectly fucking calm, damn it. Steely-eyed and iron-willed, the picture of rationality and poise, that is you, you are so calm. Oh, fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, he hates you back.
Focus. Just think of something terrible-- platonically terrible-- like your asshole drill instructor naked. With a bucket on his head. No. A bucket on your head. In your hands. Or John’s hands. God, he had nice hands. FUCK, WHY ISN’T THIS WORKING?
This is-- not ideal. Of all times-- after two fucking months-- your stupid human equipment choses NOW to give a shit about the proceedings? You head directly to the closet, fumbling with your jeans. All it takes is the thought of John leaning towards you, murder in his yellow eyes and a black bucket between his claws, and you are finished with yourself almost embarrassingly fast.
You wipe off with an old shirt, grimacing--it’s not as if you’d ever managed to do anything like this with your stupid human equipment before, you can probably cut yourself some slack. God, that was satisfying. You’d thought you were broken, somehow, all these weeks, kept getting nightmares of human drones showing up and demanding you make babies and you couldn’t. You couldn’t do anything, ever. But apparently you’re still a troll on the inside, where it counts. Of course you are, though, you always knew you were a troll, a troll’s troll, and now you apparently have two trolls just polishing their bulges over the chance to hateslobber all over you.
Just thinking about John makes you feel kinda warm and fuzzy again. God, those horns... You’re going to have to have to get that towel captcha code from Equius. DAMN IT.
You stomp-- just a little wobbly-- out of your private den of iniquity and back to your computer. John’s not even at his computer anymore which is-- good. Great. You can get some real work done now.
GC: F33L B3TT3R NOW
CG: ACTUALLY, I DO.
CG: WAIT HOW DO YOU EVEN
CG: WHAT DID YOU
CG: HOW!?
GC:4 S33R H4S H3R S3CR3TS >:]
HOW THE FUCK DID A BLIND GIRL WATCH THAT?
John gets into the medium without any further incident and you spend a few minutes building his hive up to the first gate with the narrowest fucking stairs you can get away with, before telling him you’ll see him when he makes it to your land-- IF he makes it, you’re not quite spadeless enough not to taunt-- and signing off before he can get in any more hateflirting. Whatever your land is called. You haven’t really had time to look out the window, what with... everything.
AA: i heard about what happened from tavros
AA: i have found a substitute prototype for my sprite thanks to equius
AA: speaking of which dont give equius a hard time
AA: he doesnt realize what hes done
CG: DO I EVEN WANT TO KNOW?
AA: probably not
AA: youll find out soon anyway
AA: its not dangerous just embarassing
Right. He must have chucked some of his stupid musclebeast art into the kernelsprite. It’s the kind of thing he’d do.
One of the (many) worst things about humanity is that they still have musclebeast art, despite not having real musclebeasts! You have no idea why, unless it was something Equius contributed when the twelve of you made this stupid universe. (Or, well, the stupid universe this stupid universe was based on.)
Funny, though. You thought all of Equius’ musclebeast art was in his computer. Had he printed some out to hang in the barn while you were at school?
Never mind. Time to pack up your things and get the hell out of here.
You take the time to make a better sickle and some computer sunglasses so you can friendlead or whatever the fuck John calls it without having to open up your laptop all the time and then you’re off through the moldy-ass hallways of Colonel Sassacre’s, ready to kill imps and chew bubblegum. And you forgot to alchemize any bubblegum.
That nasty-looking goatclown imp must be Gamzee’s--the pirates with the gaming dice for heads are definitely Vriska’s. There’s a cat imp with tentacles and wings, which you guess is at least partly Nepeta? And maybe some of the lusii. And a pony imp with a cowboy hat and bee wings that you would have assumed was at least part Equius’ under normal circumstances, except it’s not nearly embarrassing as Aradia has led you to believe. And then near the bottom of the stairwell are a pair of bucket ogres.
Wait.
OH FUCK HE DIDN’T...
HE DID. You would recognized that milk pail anywhere, if only because accidentally walking in on Equius using it on the cow has scarred you for life.
CG: WHAT THE FUCK? YOU MIGHT AS WELL HAVE STUCK A DILDO IN IT.
CT: D --> how 100d
CT: D --> i have no idea what you're talking about
CG: PLEASE TELL ME YOU DIDN’T HELP ARADIA PUT A SEX TOY INTO HERS
CT: D --> of course not
CG: WHATEVER. I FEEL SO DIRTY FIGHTING THESE OGRES. THANKS A FUCKING LOT.
This is officially the worst fucking day of your life.
You finally kill the bucket orges and make your way out the door at the bottom of the stairwell. This land isn’t full of rivers of blood, but the hills look like they’re made out of human flesh and pale stuff at that, which you don’t think is much better. A bunch of intricate-looking godhives perch on every disturbing peak.
A name pops into your head: Land of Veins and Temples.
A shadow passes over you and the dormitory. You look up to see the biggest fucking monster planet you have ever seen hanging up there in the Void. That definitely wasn’t there the last time you played this.
What the hell is wrong with this session?