Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Being trapped on a Meteor was not all it was cracked up to be. In fact, it fucking sucked. There was nothing to do except fight, be hormonal teenagers, watch movies, sleep, makeout, or occupy yourself with something meaningless.

With eight humans and six trolls-all god tier-life was hard. Another defect session was a load on everyone knowing that everything they did was in vain. The death of friends and family for the deaths of Jack Noir, the Condesescion, and Lord English all just to end up back on the Meteor where the trolls started their adventure with the humans. It was only a question of what to do next.

However, that question was left unanswered and avoided. No one wanted to do nothing, but everyone was doing nothing as if it was the new craze. There were things to do though; one of them was ponder the idea of the reproduction of their respective species. Kanaya had the Matriorb but it wasn’t ideal for her to start the process of the creation of the Mother Grub just at this moment. Ectobiology would be use to create a race of humans, trolls, and human-troll hybrids. However, everyone wasn’t ready to create kids because they were all still teenagers.

The next problem was how to get off the Meteor. There was a way, but if there was it was hidden in the deepest darkest corner of the Meteor. It was a joke if anyone had come up with a good plan to get off the hellhole but the combined minds of the beings on the Meteor were drawing a complete blank.

Oh, everyone thought, how nice it would be to not have these responsibilities on our shoulders anymore out here in the middle of space.

And what was the nothing everyone was partaking in? The nothing happening was quite something. Karkat began to join Dave and Terezi down in Can Town with the Mayor to spend some more time with his boyfriend. If not, he was searching the Meteor for a way out. Roxy was teaching John the finer points of Ectobiology so at least some learning was happening on the Meteor. Rose and Kanaya were rereading any books read during the three-year timeframe spent on the Meteor and reading new book in hopes that somewhere enclosed in the ancient scripts were hints about how to escape the Meteor or any new secrets of Sburb or Sgrub. Jade spent her time occupying herself by creating a green source of energy for the Meteor and how to make their water supply last a million life times if all hope was lost and they had to call the Meteor their permanate home. Dirk was toiling over a new robot or his new AI to make life on the Meteor easier while they were stuck on the godforsaken rock. Jane was everywhere, in the kitchen baking cakes and other baking goods with Nannasprite or playing in Can Town, because in Can Town she was praised for her amazing detective skills. Sollux was still working on the whole blind thing but had successfully figured out how to act while blinded. Aradia was exploring Dream bubbles, going on adventures, and helping Sollux around in a pretty strong Matespritship with him. Davesprite was keeping to himself, but he made rare appearances in Can Town at times to help with the shitty doodles and the westward expansion. Jaspersprite stayed close to Rose and acted catlike. Finally, Jake was exploring on the Meteor in crazy adventures that he pulled anyone into if they were in his grasp.

Jake’s habit of dragging people away on his adventure was exercised when Karkat was on his way to the lab to talk to Kanaya. Karkat then got caught by the Page in question as Jake jumped a surprise on the agitated Knight of Blood because the mutant blood in question was going through another growth spurt.

“Tally ho Karkat!” Jake ran up behind Karkat. Jake had his god tier hood down and was wearing khakis over his god tier ‘Speedo’, though his legs were still undeniably smooth.

“AH!” Karkat stepped back in surprise, stepping on his god tier cape causing him to slip and fall like the idiot he was. “What the fuck do you want!?” Karkat angrily asked from the floor.

“I just happen to stumble upon an explored section of the lab and hoped that there could be some spurious hijinks relating to this discovery,” Jake informed Karkat.

“Why in the name of all that is sane would I fucking want to explore whatever blugesniffing part of the boring lab?” Karkat retaliated.

As answer, Jake supplied Karkat with a good helping of the famous ‘Egbert Puppy Face’. It was when John Egbert produced sad puppy eyes, a quivering lip, and a tear forming in his eye, looking like a kicked puppy. No one could stand the Egbert Puppy Face. Karkat then quickly buckled.

“Fuh-ine,” Karkat huffed. “I’ll go on whatever nooksucking adventure this happens to be produce from the part of your brain that is on the most acid.”

“Capital!” Jake said happily grabbing the lying Karkat’s wrist and dragging him to an upright position then in forward motion. “You’ll just fall in love with the lab I stumbled upon! Lots of doodads and machinery! Button galore! Gizmos and gadgets! This’ll just be a bang up adventure, I know.”

“Shut your fucking food chute until we get there,” Karkat growled as he tried to cup his cape into his free arm so he did not fall over it again.

“Don’t worry, my good man,” Jake informed Karkat opening a door Karkat had no idea was there and dragging Karkat inside. “We’re already here.”

The new room was quite the sight to behold. It seemed like a wonderland for anyone who was able-bodied with computers or any other technological item perchance. One wall of the room was lined with a large array of screens, button, levers, and joysticks. The screens showed various colored planets all with the same pattern as Earth but not blue and green. A large timer was placed above the screen, each with the time of thirty minutes in a countdown that has yet to begun. The other three walls had tables pushed up against them that were stacked with various drawings and sketches, scribbles and notes of future plans. Some of these plans were taped up on the wall as if it was to present to the world that this was the finalized idea and this is what the product would look like at the end of production. Half-finished inventions lay on the tables in a sad heap of scrap metal, knowing that they would never be finished. A thick layer of dust covered everything showing that this room had not been touched in the longest time. Cobwebs hung from the ceiling and a spider crawled down from its corner enclosure in its way of saying hello.

“Wow,” Karkat breathed out taking the whole room in.

“I told you that this adventure would be top notch!” Jake informed Karkat as Karkat trudged over to one of the many screens. The one screen he was looking at had a completely blue planet with an Earth-like surface pattern. There was a keyboard below that with arrow buttons, a joystick, and a large red button that had a large ‘E’ on it.

Karkat knew that he wasn’t good with computers, but he couldn’t help but explore what this large machinery held. He placed his hand on the joystick and wrapped his fingers around the red nub. He pushed the joystick forward and he began to zoom into the blue Earth. As he got in closer, the blue coloration began to fade away and it began to look a bit more like the Earth the humans knew and loved.

The screen zoomed in further until it reached a quaint golden city on the ocean coast. Not a cloud hung in the sky and the sun shined down through the deep blue expansion that was the sky. The city looked busy on this normal basis as if was the middle of the afternoon where the sun hung high in the sky directly above a golden building with a spinning planet on top. Every so often, when the front of the planet would face the direction of whatever was feeding this live-action image into the machinery, Karkat could see the words ‘Daily Planet’ on the ring attached around the miniature Earth. In the distances, planes flew through the sky and Karkat sworn he could make out the red and blue outline of a man flying through the sky, though it was he was clearly mistaken because humans couldn’t fly.

“Gadzooks! Would you look at that?” Jake said as he came up from behind Karkat to admire the scenery. “I wonder where in landsakes that would be.”

“I don’t fucking know,” Karkat answered.

“What does that button do?” Jake asked pointing to the red button with the ‘E’ on it. His finger was so close to the red button that if he made one slight move, Jake would have pressed it for sure.

“I don’t fucking know that either,” Karkat answered glaring at the button.

“Well, then let’s press the bloody thing already!” Jake protested.

“No!” Karkat barked. “We don’t know what it does.”

“What about pressing buttons?” Dave asked as he entered the room.

“English wants to press this stupid red button,” Karkat growled messing around the joystick control so now he was facing away from the ‘Daily Planet’ to the ocean.

“So? Press it,” Dave said. “What harm can pressing buttons do?”

“Creating twenty-four trolls and eight humans from paradox slime,” Karkat growled in return.

“Like that’s a bad thing,” Dave came up directly behind Karkat and wrapped his arms around Karkat’s waist. “If you and Egbert weren’t stupid enough to press a button then I wouldn’t be here for you to have hot sloppy makeouts with.”

Karkat paused for a moment, knowing that the fact Dave just spurted out was true, but he still wasn’t sure about pressing the stupid button.

“We don’t know what it does,” Karkat repeated.

“We won’t know what it does until we press it,” Dave moved from behind Karkat to directly next to him.

“True,” Jake agreed with that statement.

“Fuh-ine,” Karkat huffed again not ready to get tagged team by the British version of Egbert and his boyfriend.

Karkat moved his hand off the joystick and hovered over the button. The internal conflict of whether he should or should not press the button arouse inside his conscience for a quick moment. But the decision was already made before that. He was going to press the button. Karkat slammed his hand down on the red button and a voice came out from nowhere alerting Karkat of what he had just done.

“Preparing for entry into Earth One of Universe D,” a cool collected woman’s voice informed the three boys in the lab. “Entry into Earth One of Universe D in T Minus Thirty Minutes.”

The timer above the screen began to count down and the whole meteor lurched knocking Karkat, Dave, and Jake onto the floor of the lab. The rest of the Meteor most likely felt this sudden movement as Rose and Kanaya almost fell into the lab when they rushed in to see what had happened.

“Willy Howard Taft’s great tub choking bottom!” Jake exclaimed as he got up. “What in the name of cinematic humdingers just happened?”

“Can Town’s gonna feel that,” Dave said as he got off the floor.

“What did you do?” Rose said with almost a Grimdark glare in her dark purple eyes. A scowl was present on her face and she was holding the Quills of Echidna in her hands.

“Karkat pushed a button,” Dave tattled on his boyfriend.

“Thanks Dave,” Karkat said sarcastically for ratting him out. “You’re such a good boyfriend.”

Dave just gave Karkat a thumbs up as Karkat was subjected to Rose and Kanaya’s respective glares.

“They pressure me into it!” Karkat said pointing at Jake and Dave.

“Well, what happened?” Kanaya decided to go for a more relative approach.

“Here,” Karkat pointed to the screen he was just on. The screen had zoomed out from the city and was still zooming out far into the star system of whatever universe held that Earth. It kept a small dot on that Earth just so everyone knows where that it.

“That chick just said that we were going to enter another universe,” Dave said to Rose. “In about uh, twenty-eight minutes now.”

“We don’t have much time,” Rose said taking over the computer. “We either stop the meteor or we inform the inhabitants of that Earth that we are going to crash into it.”

“Crash?” Karkat asked surprised.

“Yes, because at the rate I believe we are going to pass through a universal barrier into another one, we would literally blast a hole into the center of the Earth,” Rose explained.

“We’d better then get Sollux or Dirk up here to handle the computers,” Kanaya commented.

“Dave, get Dirk to come here as fast as he can,” Karkat instructed Dave.

“Already here,” Dirk, the Meteor’s other resident coolkid, informed everyone as he entered the lab. “I was one my way to what happened with I saw this door open. So what’s the problem?”

“The Meteor is going to break the universal barrier and enter another universe at an unimaginable rate,” Rose explained letting Dirk take over. “If we don’t stop that we’ll destroy whatever Earth we’re aimed at.”

“Hhm,” Dirk hummed as he began to work pulling up different programs on to computer screen. He was exploring the program that was sending the Meteor hurtling to another universe and doing it pretty fast too. After a couple minutes he decided what would be the fate of the Meteor, “We can’t stop the Meteor from entering this universe.”

“What?” Dave asked worried. “So are we going to blast through an Earth?”

“No,” Dirk answered. “Just because we have to enter this other universe doesn’t mean that we can’t stop the Meteor. Once we’re in this universe we can make contact and tell the inhabitants of this Earth that we’re coming in hot. We also try to stop the Meteor as we go towards that Earth.”

“We’ll get Jade to shrink the Meteor,” Karkat came up with. “We all get out and the Jade can shrink so it does minimal damage.”

“I can’t shrink it going at light speed,” Jade entered the room looking over a tablet she had alchemized. “For whatever reason the Meteor is now traveling at light speed. It needs to be at least at a rate that I myself can keep up with flying.”

“We can get John to do with windy thing on it to try and slow it down,” Dave suggested.

“Dave, you and Aradia could slow down time so we at least have more time to work on a solution to this problem. Or at least make the Meteor’s entrance into Earths atmosphere slower,” Kanaya suggested.

“Can’t Sollux just turn into that giant fucking ghost thing and stop us or something really simple like that?” Karkat suggested.

“Can’t Jake be just really hopeful and turn into a giant hope guy?” Dirk questioned.

“Nope,” Jake answered. “I can only hope-splode.”

“Let’s start by getting John to do the windy thing once we enter this new universe,” Karkat decided. “Dave, go find Aradia and getting the information about anything that we can do to slow the Meteor’s descent with time. Also get Sollux and Roxy up here to help with this crap. Jake and Kanaya go and round up everyone else so we at least know where everyone is if worse come to worse and we can have back-up power. Dirk, Jade, Rose, stay here to see if there’s anything we can do and get ready to set up communications with Earth’s inhabitants.”

“What are you doing?” Rose questioned Karkat.

“After I’m getting Egbert in the air, I’m checking on Gamzee,” Karkat said. “When the Meteor shook, Gamzee could have gotten out of his holding cell. And someone has to deal with him if he gets out as we enter this universe.”

“Good idea,” Dave praised his boyfriend.

“Move out,” Karkat told the group. “And good luck.”

Everyone moved and Dave stopped Karkat for a moment to place a quick kiss on the troll’s lips, “Don’t aggravate Gamzee. I rather like you alive.”

“I won’t fuckass,” Karkat informed Dave. “I’ll be careful. I human love you.”

“I love you too,” Dave gave Karkat a small smile then ran out to door to find Aradia.

Karkat was close behind Dave and found John quickly. After filling in John on what was happening and his mission, Karkat traveled to the most secure place in the Meteor where his ex-best friend was held captive.

“Hey motherfucker,” Gamzee said, thankfully still in his cell tied to an unbreakable chair Dirk forged. Gamzee was wearing his old shirt and polka-dot pants because no one wanted to see him in his god tier outfit. Gamzee’s purple fairy wings lashed out behind him as a feeling of rage surged through him at the sight of Karkat. “Where have you motherfuckin been motherfucker? I was gettin all up and lonesome down here by my motherfuckin self. Also, these motherfuckin handcuffs are hurting my motherfuckin wrists. Would ya mind just letting them a little loose motherfucker?”

“No,” Karkat answered, leaning back up against a wall, careful of his red fairy wings. “You’re in there for a reason Gamzee.”

“By the way,” Gamzee continued on ignore his former friend. “What the motherfuck is goin on above my motherfuckin head? Sounds like a lot of motherfuckin commotion. And it must be motherfuckin important if you’re down here to see a motherfucker like me all by his motherfuckin self.”

“Gamzee,” Karkat said calmly. “You’re not getting out.”

Gamzee’s warm approached quickly turned dark, “How dare a motherfukin mutant blood like yourself tie up a motherfucker like me, the Motherfucking sub juglagator, in a motherfuckin cell. You can’t hold a motherfucker like me. I will mess you motherfucker up until all that is left is your motherfuckin blood, which I will use to paint beautiful motherfuckin pictures on my walls.”

Karkat stayed silent. It was better to let Gamzee go on his little tirade than to tell him that his crazy messed up dreams would never become a reality.

“When I get out of this motherfuckin joint,” Gamzee continued. “I’m gonna kill that motherfuckin teal blood bitch, along with your pretty motherfuckin human Matesprit. And your new moirail the jade bitch. You know, I may just as well motherfuckin kill every motherfucker on this motherfuckin rock and I’ll leave you alive, you little motherfucker. Just so you can be all by your motherfuckin lonesome, just like how you locked my down her all by my motherfuckin self.”

Karkat shut Gamzee out to not let the purple blood to get to his head. Karkat began to wonder what was going on above his head when he got a Pesterlog from Dave.

TG: yo karbabe
TG: you may want to brace yourself
TG: were entering this new universe in a couple minutes
TG: <3

Dave, even in the middle of crisis, he manages to be a big lovable dork.

In response to the message, Karkat grabbed a hold onto one of the bars of a vacant cell next to Gamzee.

“What the motherfuck are you motherufckin doin, motherfucker?” Gamzee asked confused at this movement to grab the bars of the next cell over.

“Brace yourself,” Karkat warned as the Meteor shook. It felt as if the Meteor was in a car crash but kept on going. Karkat fell down but managed to get up as the wave of motion passed through the Meteor and it was still again.

“MOTHERFUCK!” Gamzee exclaimed as he felt the shaking from the entrance to this new universe. “What the motherfucker was that?”

Karkat stayed silent as he got another message from Dave.

TG: yo kitkat we just entered the new universe and the timer restarted
TG: we have twenty four hours till we get to earth
TG: dirks gonna set me up to talk to some from earth
TG: gamzees fine right
CG: HE’S FINE AND AS CRAZY AS USUAL. HIS CELL DIDN’T SUFFER ANY DAMAGE FROM THE SHAKING AND HE’S STILL TIED UP.
TG: good
TG: you can come up now
TG: it should be a relativetly smooth ride from here on
CG: SEE YOU IN A LITTLE BIT
TG: see you
TG: <3
CG: <3

As Karkat left Gamzee in his rage, Dave began to talk to . . . someone from this new universe on earth.

TG: yo so heres the rub
TG: me and my friends on a meteor and headed straight for earth at the speed of light
TG: were tryin to slow it down so when we reach earth we dont blow a hole through it
TG: we may need some help slowing it down but were already working on it
TG: we have how were gonna stop it all figured out but we just thought that you would like to know
TG: that were comin in
TG: on a meteor
TG: with people on it
WATCHTOWER: Who is this?
TG: wow we actually got someone
TG: it doesnt matter who i am you just need to know that we may accidentally blow a hole straight through earth
TG: which we dont want to do
TG: and that were from another universe entering yours
TG: on accident
WATCHTOWER: Tell us who you are.
TG: dave strider
WATCHTOWER: Are you a human?
TG: yes
TG: can we please just get to the important information
TG: we can introduce ourselves later
WATCHTOWER: Where are you?
TG: somewhere on the far edge of your universe
WATCHTOWER: What is your mode of transportation?
TG: meteor
WATCHTOWER: Meteor?
TG: no need to repeat me
TG: yes we are on a meteor that has buildings on it and weve been living on it for about four years
TG: at least some of us
TG: others are relatively new to this meteor
WATCHTOWER: How many people are on board?
TG: eighteen
WATCHTOWER: How big is the Meteor?
TG: we never got around to measuring it
TG: but pretty big i guess
TG: will you just listen to what i have to say
TG: youre ignoring the important stuff
WATCHTOWER: How fast are you going?
TG: lightspeed
TG: trying to slow down
WATCHTOWER: How are you slowing down?
TG: johns doing his windy thing and were trying to find a brake or something
WATCHTOWER: When will you arrive on Earth?
TG: less than twentyfour hours now
TG: and heres the big thing
TG: if we dont slow down
TG: were gonna destroy earth into a million pieces
TG: and we dont want to do that
WATCHTOWER: How old are you?
TG: gog just listen
TG: it doesnt fucking matter how old everyone fuckin is
TG: what matters is that if we dont slow down earth is bye bye
TG: no more earth
TG: no more life on that planet
TG: everyone is dead
TG: and we dont want this to happen
WATCHTOWER: Just answer the question.
TG: NO
TG: DO YOU EVEN UNDERSTAND THE SITUATION
WATCHTOWER: We understand the situation. We need to know your age though.
TG: NO YOU DONT
TG: IF YOU UNDERSTAND THE SITUATION THEN TELL ME WHATS THE MATTER
WATCHTOWER: you are on a Meteor traveling at light speed. If you do not slow down, when you reach Earth you will completely destroy it. There is no brake but you have a friend named john working on it. You, along with the seventeen other members of your crew, do not want to destroy earth. Now, tell me your age.
TG: im older than the universe
TG: a real wise guy
TG: now do you understand whats the matter
WATCHTOWER: We understand the problem. Now, what is your plan to stop the Meteor?
TG: right now the initial plan is that johns gonna slow down the meteor with his windy thing until it gets to a speed where jade can keep up this shitting hunk of rock then jade will shrink the meteor and add it to her collection of large things that are now the size of a baseball
WATCHTOWER: Thank you. We’ll do all we can to help you when you reach earth in twenty-four hours.

-- WATCHTOWER disconnected--

TG: wait thats it
TG: fuck you

 

“Anything?” Rose asked once Dave got his iPhone.

“They just said that they’ll try to help us once we reach earth and that was fucking it,” Dave complained. “They kept on asking really stupid questions and I’m like why the fuck do you need to know this shit now? We may accidentally destroy your planet you don’t need to know my fucking age.”

“What’s going on?” Karkat asked as he entered the lab, his cape swooping out behind him as he entered.

“John’s actually slowing this hunk of rock down,” Dirk commented.

“Huh?” Dave asked gathering around the screen to look at what Dirk was talking about.

“The speed of the Meteor is decreasing,” Dirk explained. “At this rate, in twenty-four hours, we will at the greatest speed Jade can stop the Meteor. It’ll be hard for her, but Jade said that she could do it.”

“Where is Jade?” Karkat then asked looking around for the dog-eared girl.

“She went to go and talk to Sollux about what we could do,” Rose answered. “Just to get started on the creative process before he even got here.”

“So now what?” Karkat then asked.

“We wait,” Dirk answered. “We wait twenty-two hours until we need to begin to brace for impact.

“That’s it? Do nothing?” Karkat asked quite appalled.

“It’s what we’ve been doing for the past eleven months,” Dirk replied. Karkat huffed knowing it was true and pulled up a chair out of his Sylladex to sit down it.

“You’re still carrying that chair around?” Dave asked quiet amused with his boyfriend’s habits.

“So what?” Karkat asked sitting in the chair normally. “It’s not like there’s any fucking problem with me having a chair.”

Dave stood up for a moment before deciding, “Let me sit on your lap.”

“What? No!” Karkat answered.

“There’s no other chairs and I’m not getting my cape all dusty,” Dave explained forcibly sitting down on Karkat’s lap.

“You’re bigger than me!” Karkat protested.

“Check your latest growth spurt Karkles. You’ve just passed me on the height chart,” Dave answered snuggling up in his boyfriend’s arms. “This is nice. I now know what it feels like to be the smaller one.”

“Shut up,” Karkat answered actually enjoying being the bigger one but he wasn’t saying anything.

“Yup, that’s definitely doing nothing,” Dirk commented on the scene as he continued doing his work.

For twenty-two hours, everyone who wasn’t involved with exploring the computer got to do nothing. But it was an awkward nothing, an unsettling nothing. It was as if everyone was waiting for opening their presents on Christmas morning but instead of presents, it was the question of whether they would crash into the Earth or not. Everyone got little sleep during this time and everyone took turns to see if Gamzee had not escaped. Twenty-two hours later, everyone was preparing to enter Earth’s atmospheres.

“Get the Sylladex Suitcases,” Karkat instructed reaching into a cabinet filled with suitcase filled with hundred plus Sylladex cards. “Fill up various possessions and machines into the suitcases. Whatever we need. Alchemiter, beds, food, clothes, Ectobiology lab, movies, books, furniture, ect. It’s not just to lighten up the Meteor but to make sure that none of our stuff gets destroyed.”

“Then what?” Terezi asked.

“We help John,” Karkat answered. “Or help Dirk and Sollux with finding a break. Jade, get John’s stuff. Aradia, get Sollux’s stuff. Dave, get Dirk’s stuff.”

“What about the people on Earth?” Jane asked.

“They said that they would help,” Karkat answered. “Hopefully they will.”

Items were packed up and seconds pasted away like hours. As they were nearing Earth in the last half-hour, Karkat, Rose and Dave gathered around the panoramic window where they could see Earth.

“I see Earth,” Karkat alerted them.

“I see the moon,” Rose added.

“I see Superman,” Dave finished up.

“What?” Rose asked. Dave pointed and sure enough and red and blue spot in the distance was closing in on the Meteor.

“Superman?” Karkat questioned. “What a stupid name.”

“Where are we?” Rose then asked.

Dave took a moment to look back at Superman, and two other shapes closing in behind him that looked like a green dot and another red and blue dot, meaning that Wonder Woman and Green Lantern were coming to help too. Dave then looked at Rose and answered, “We’re in the DC Universe.”

Chapter Text

John was getting tired. It was no surprise because had been going at this, doing the windy thing, for about twenty-four hours, the longest anyone had used to their powers. John was worried that he wasn’t able to hold on anymore, but then after looking back and seeing Earth, he knew that he had to stop the Meteor or else he’d be responsible for the death of a planet . . . again.

As John worked, a blue and red shape came up next to him and began to help him on this project of stopping the Meteor. John couldn’t see the figure through the wind, but after catching the logo of a giant red ‘S’ in a yellow pentagon he asked surprised, “Superman?”

“Hello,” Superman asked through the wind.

“I must be knocked out,” John decided on, though he continued doing the windy thing. “I must have exercised my powers to my greatest extent and now I’m dreaming that Superman’s helping me stop the Meteor.”

“GL!” Superman called out for a superhero coated in green light energy to come up on the other side of John. Green Lantern created two giants hands out of green light and started pushing on Meteor along with Wonder Woman who was close behind.

“I’m dreaming,” John decided. “I’m dreaming. I’m in a bizarre dream bubble where superheroes are helping me stop the Meteor. We’re probably still back in the Veil.”

But though he told himself this that none of this was real, he did not stop pushing on the Meteor because something inside him told John that this was all real. Superman, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern were all really helping him.

As the descent down to earth began Dave, Karkat, Rose and Kanaya made one last check with Dirk, Sollux and Jade before starting the “We’re fucked” evacuation plan.

“Is that Superman, Wonder Woman and Green Lantern helping John stop the Meteor?” Dirk asked as they entered.

“Yes,” Dave answered.

“Alright,” Dirk just went with it.

“So what’s the diagnostic?” Rose asked. “Can we make it?”

“With four people trying to stop the Meteor,” Jade answered. “They should be able to stop it completely before they hit the Earth.”

“But not by a lot,” Sollux informed. “They could be just a few feet above a big city’s skyline.”

“That’s still good though, right?” Karkat asked.

“But that means that if someone slips, we could crush the city like an ant,” Dirk answered.

“Have you calculated Superman’s and Wonder Woman’s strength into whatever smartass equation you guys made?” Dave questioned.

“Yes,” Dirk answered.

“And how much Green Lantern can lift with his power ring?” Dave continued to question.

“Yep,” Dirk answered.

“What if another superhero comes up like Power Girl or Captain Marvel comes up and starts to help?” Dave then asked.

“Then we stop sooner,” Sollux answered.

“How do you know so much about superheroes Dave?” Rose questioned her brother.

“I’m a comic book geek,” Dave admitted. “So what?”

“I never saw that one coming,” Jade admitted.

“Yeah, I spent a lot of time the past four years recreating my fucking awesome collection,” Dave continued to confess.

“I’m obsessed with puppets,” Dirk reminded everyone. “It doesn’t matter if Dave’s a comic book geek.”

“Anyway, let’s just get ready,” Jade put aside. “I have to go and get ready to jump out and stop the Meteor at the last possible second.”

“Why the last?” Karkat questioned.

“Because at the last possible second it will be as slow as it has been in the last twenty-four hours,” Jade answered as she left the lab.

Everyone watched carefully as Earth began to get bigger and bigger and everyone began to get more and more anxious. Below them the city skyline of Metropolis began to grow clear and Dirk paid close attention to the speedometer as they grew closer and closer.

“We’re at thirty miles per hour,” Dirk alerted everyone. “Twenty-five, twenty, fifteen, ten . . . we’ve stopped.”

It was a minor celebration that the Meteor had stopped just feet above Metropolis’s golden skyline. Jade and John couldn’t be apart of that celebration because they were both outside the hunk of rock.

“We did it!” John said triumphantly but woozily. He fell asleep falling back into Green Lantern’s arms because the Meteor was being held up by Superman.

“He’s only sixteen,” Wonder Woman commented taking notice of John’s age as Jade came out to greet everyone.

“Hi!” Jade greeted the three superheroes. “I’m Jade Harley and you’re holding my brother John Egbert. Our original plan was to shrink the Meteor, but because there are still people on it, would you mind locating it to a large field or something, because there are still some things we have to pack up and everyone has to get out.”

“Sure,” Superman agreed to the plan. “There’s a field right outside Metropolis that we can place the Meteor in.”

“I’ll call the rest of the Justice League to meet us there,” Wonder Woman added.

“Does someone want to take John?” Green Lantern asked.

“I’ll put John in his room,” Jade answered taking John into her arms. “He’s been trying to stop it for the past twenty-four hours. It’s the longest any of us have used our powers, so it’s no wonder why he passed out.”

“Hhm,” Superman took note. “Are all of you on there sixteen?”

“Most of us,” Jade answered. “Jaspers and Nanna are different ages, and I have no idea how old the Mayor is.”

“You’d better get back in there,” Wonder Woman said ready to help Superman move the Meteor.

“Alright, see you soon!” Jade and John disappeared back inside the Meteor and the three League members moved the heavy meteor to a nearby field where when they placed it down it began to float.

“Dirk found an anti-gravity device,” Dave informed the superheroes as he came out. “Would have been nice to find it sooner.”

“I’m Superman,” Superman greeted himself. “Who are you?”

“I’m Dave Strider,” Dave answered. “And I know who you are. I pretty much know every superhero.”

“So, why are you here?” Wonder Woman then asked Dave.

“Karkat pressed a button,” Dave answered.

“Karkat? Strange name,” Flash said, just showing up.

“Alien name,” Dave explained. “He’s a troll.”

“Troll?” Wonder Woman asked surprised.

“Humanoid,” Dave explained. “Grey skin, orange horns, they have all different blood colors, four types of romance, filling buckets. They’re from a universe that doesn’t exist anymore.”

“What happened?” Green Lantern asked.

“Twelve trolls played a game,” Dave answered. “But that’s a really long story where in the short version of the story is exactly the same as the long version of the story. Any way, can you guys come inside? We’re mostly packed except that there’s one problem.”

“Alright,” Superman agreed and the four superheroes followed Dave inside. They were amazed by the complex labyrinth of the Meteor. Advanced technology mixed with an eerie feeling in the air was unsettling yet fascinating. On their way to where ever Dave was taking them, Dave got stopped by Terezi, the superhero’s first troll.

“Dave! The Mayor wants to know what we’re going to do with Can Town.” Terezi asked Dave surprising the superheroes by popping out of the Can Town room.

“Tell the Mayor that we’re gonna rebuild Can Town to be bigger, better, and it’ll have more shitty drawings than ever,” Dave informed Terezi.

“Alright!” Terezi agreed to this idea and headed back inside Can Town. As the superheroes passed, they got a glimpse of the room covered in shitty drawings and cans, as well as the small black carapace wrapped in dirty bed sheet and a sash around d his chest that said ‘Mayo’ with an added ‘R’.

Traveling deeper in the Meteor, Dave finally brought the superheroes to the holding cell area of the Meteor where Karkat, Dirk, Kanaya, Rose, Aradia and Davesprite had assembled for the moving of Gamzee.

“Look at all the motherfuckers that have joined my in my motherfuckin holdin cell,” Gamzee said at the sight of everyone. “Too bad you’re all gonna motherfuckin die.”

“Are these the superheroes you were talking about Dave?” Karkat asked Dave.

“Yeah,” Dave answered.

“Why is that troll locked up?” Superman asked.

“He killed multiple trolls,” Kanaya started out.

“Raised the cherub that was going to try and destroy all the universe,” Aradia continued on.

“Broke Terezi’s back and made her feel like shit,” Davesprite added. When he saw the superheroes’ confusion of an orange bird version of Dave, Davesprite added, “One explanation at the time.”

“And has threatened to kill every fucking one more times that I can count,” Karkat finished up.

“I will kill all you motherfuckers!” Gamzee shouted angrily.

“We need to move him to a more secure place,” Rose informed the superheroes. “He is not exactly in a safe place now that we have landed in a place where there are civilians by and he can harm them.”

“Just send him to Arkham,” Dave suggested. “He belongs in an asylum for sure. Higher security for the nut ball than the Joker though, alight?”

“Hhm, there would be a chance of him escaping though,” Davesprite continued the conversation. “Joker has escaped so many times that I can’t even count. Why not put him in a green square near a red sun like the Lanterns did to Superboy Prime?”

“How do you know about that stuff if you’re new to this universe?” Flash asked.

“You’re just fictional superheroes in our old universe,” Dave answered. “Well, the human’s universe.”

“That’s . . . quite a thing to take in,” Green Lantern stated.

“Anyway, Gamzee,” Aradia brought the group back. “What are we doing with him?”

“I say Arkham,” Superman cast his vote.

“Arkham is the easiest place to get him to at the time being,” Wonder Woman said.

“Green box in space,” Dave voted on, and Davesprite nodded his head in agreement.

The vote was disrupted by Batman coming in over on the intercom to Superman.

“Superman,” Batman began. “I want to interrogate those kids right now.”

“Batman they’re harmless,” Superman replied. “Well, except for the one that is locked up in a jail cell and is threatening to kill everyone.”

“We don’t know where they’ve been or what their intentions are,” Batman argued. “Let’s talk to them first.”

“Batman,” Superman began.

“I’ll be there in five minutes,” Batman replied before hanging up.

“What did Batman want?” Wonder Woman asked.

“He wants to interrogate them before anything,” Superman replied.

“Batman wants to interrogate us?” Rose asked.

“Should we be worried?” Kanaya questioned.

“Gamzee should be the only one we have to worry about because he’s the only one that has killed someone,” Flash said as he looked around the room. Everyone was casting worried glares, so then Flash asked, “Right?”

“That statement is incorrect,” Kanaya answered. “Gamzee is the only one who has a problem with controlling his will to kill.”

“You’ve all killed someone?” Superman asked surprised.

“Except Karkat,” Dave pointed out.

“The humans have killed villains that have threatened to destroy the universe,” Dirk pointed out. “Jane and Jade have killed some people but that was when they were under the control of Her Imperious Condesescion. And anyone they killed came back to life.”

“Condie for short,” Dave interjected.

“And trolls society in the beginning was a very violent culture,” Kanaya began to explain. “Society revolved around violence. We were basically trained for Her Imperious Condescension’s army by growing up on Alternia.”

“And who is . . . Condie?” Superman asked feeling weird by using the name Condie as an evil villain name.

“Evil bitch that’s dead,” Karkat explained. “Once ruled the trolls as an evil empress but was never home because she was always off killing worlds to claim the resources for Alternia because we basically drained our world dry.”

Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash, and Green Lantern all tried to imagine life that way where life was a battle in a culture so violent and rough.

“So you have killed someone?” Green Lantern then asked.

“I killed Eridan,” Kanaya answered. “But to be fair he killed me first.”

The four league members looked at each confused and Kanaya added to the statement.

“After Eridan killed me, I became the troll version of a vampire-a rainbow drinker,” Kanaya added.

Everyone was silent for a moment before Dave got a message from Terezi.

gallowsCalibrator [GC] is trolling turntechGodhead [TG]

GC: D4V3 TH3R3 1S 4 M4N DR3SS3D 4S 4 B4T TRY1NG TO G3T 1NTO TH3 M3T3OR
GC: WH4T SHOULD 1 DO >:?
TG: thats batman tz
TG: just let the playboy billionaire detective hero in
GC: H3 L3T H1MS3LF 1N
TG: did he break anything
GC: Y3S
TG: anything important
GC: H3 K1ND4 R4MP4G3D THROUGH C4N TOWN
TG: not can town
GC: Y3S C4N TOWN!
GC: TH3 M4YOR GOT 4NGRY 4ND THR3W 4 C4N 4T H1S H34D
TG: and it missed
GC: NO 1T SURPR1S1NGLY H1T 1TS M4RK
GC: 1 TH1NK H3 W4S DISTR4CT3D BY TH3 4MOUNT OF CH4LK 1 W4S STUFF1NG 1N MY MOUTH
TG: cherry red
GC: Y34H
GC: SO YOUR PL4YBOY B1LL1ON41R3 D3T3CT1V3 H3RO 1S LY1NG ON TH3 FLOOR OF C4N TOWN UNCONSC1OUS
GC: 4ND H3 M4Y B3 BL33D1NG 4 L1TTL3 B1T
TG: the worlds greatest detective
TG: the smartest man in the world
TG: and the greatest hero of all
TG: the man who has defeated the joker more times than anyone can count
TG: the man who has saved the world more times than anyone can count
TG: the man who has planes to bring down the entire justice league
TG: and the man who was one of my inspirations
TG: was brought down by a can
TG: fucking amazing
GC: H3 M4Y B3 D34D
GC: NOP3 H3’S MOV1NG
GC: H3’S L1FT1NG H1S H34D UP . . .
GC: 4ND TH3 M4YOR JUST H1T H1M W1TH 4NOTH3R C4N 4ND H3’S B4CK DOWN >:(
TG: i thought his suit was supposed to be bulletproof
GC: 1TS OBV1OUSLY NOT C4N PROOF
GC: H3H3H3H3
TG: ill bring the justice league down there because the bat wants to interrogate us
GC: W3LL H3S NOT GO1NG TO B3 H4PPY
TG: its his fault for destroying can town
GC: TRU3
TG: be there in a sec

Dave looked up to inform everyone, “The Mayor nailed Batman in the head with a can twice so now he’s unconscious down in Can Town.”

“Batman was brought down by a can?” Flash snickered. “Isn’t his suit supposed to be bullet proof?”

“That’s what I said,” Dave replied. “We should get going or else the Mayor’s gonna hit him in the head a third time.”