Chapter Text
Chapter 1 - All My Little Words
In the first weeks on the meteor, you mainly work on your laptop and turntables, inadvertently watching Karkat while he watches movies. Eventually this gets really fucking old. Your raps are tired. You are tired. Your head hurts. The only break you get from the laptop screen is looking at a short grumpy alien dude in a sweater two sizes too big for him watching alien versions of vaguely familiar romance movies. Meanwhile the nights are filled with the worst nightmares you have ever had in your life. As fun as the Mayor is, he's much more interested in his perceived Mayoral duties than having a normal chat or being your friend at the moment. Rose is too interested in Kanaya. Terezi is too interested in Vriska.
Legit that I'm spinning here grinning here winning
On this meteor hurtling through space spinning yo
A mind to compete with my sine wave mind craze
And memories coming like jeopardy a damn maze
The taste of asphalt and blood it lingers here stinging
Wounds and cuts that you sew with needle and thread
Times up wind up moving jaw parts and puppet head
You jam up the key in the lock and a sense of dread
Crawl through the gutter muddy water bloodshed
Money money money lines the walls of the vents
Wires to cameras snaking shivering segments
Acrid smell in the morning and the blaring of traffic
Left bleeding can't view through glare - it's too graphic
And my sapphic sister seraphic getting cartographic
Charting problems and neurosis until I'm burned out
Played clout no doubt and bugged out eyestrain
I wear it with a straight face plush bane no pain
My only break from the throbbing clanging of steel
Was the break I took to remember not to feel
The beat the beat the beat is on fire, crashing and fucking burning, destroying whole planets, a solar system wide catastrophe, a meaningless feedback loop of total flaming fucking balls of fire ass suck. You select and drag over everything you've made in the last week and drop it into the recycle bin. With a deep inhale you right click on the bin and exhale.
It's gone forever. From the corner of your eye, you see Karkat looking at you again. When you turn your head to catch his gaze, he's facing his movie. Hm. You put away your laptop, patting its surface before captchaloging it. It's not a tearful goodbye. You know you'll come back to it, when you actually have some freshly inspired beats to serve out. You know, the ones where you're not a whiny piss baby about your former life.
Dave Strider nothing phases him grazes him you know you want to blaze with him. <3
You decide pretty much on the spot to befriend Karkat Vantas. Partly out of boredom, but also because he seems curious about you anyway. You've spent the last few days pretending you weren't equally interested.
You stroll over to the threadbare velveteen couch, hands in your pockets, chill as can be, your impeccable swagger managed, keeping a straight face.
"Hey dude--" You begin, no stutters, no stops. Oh wait. What.
"WHAT DO YOU FUCKING WANT?" Karkat's face is suddenly horrid, warped, his eyes bulging and his mouth gaping in a nasty teeth-filled scowl. You notice he's paused his film to listen to you, or perhaps he did so in shock from the sudden interruption, you're not sure. You blink and frown very slightly. That went well didn't it? You could've sworn, just minutes ago, when he looked up at you, that he might've wanted company, secretly. Maybe you were wrong? Nevertheless you don't allow your face to crack.
You hold your hands up in what you hope is a universal sign of submission and peace, "Sorry to interrupt bro, I know that was a dick move, it's just, we've got the majority of three years left on this dusty rock that's hurtling through a starless joyless void, and that's the third time you've watched that kinda strained and contrived romance movie, I honestly didn't think you'd still be that engaged in it."
"HOWEVER MANY TIMES I WANT TO WATCH THIS ABJECTLY BAD ROMANCE MOVIE AS WE TRAIPSE THROUGH A STARLESS JOYLESS VOID IS MY BUSINESS," he yells, immediately unpausing his film and gluing his dark gray eyes back on the screen.
He is so grumpy. So petulant. Fuck. You sigh, forgoing any possible insults, sarcasms, or quips that arise in the forefront of your brain in order to avoid an insult-based rap off between the two of you. A verbal mexican standoff would further absolutely nothing towards friendship or at least mutual tolerance. So you sit next to him and you swear his yellow eyeballs nearly bulge out of his skull. You throw your arm up over the side of the couch and say, "I was wondering if you wanted me to alchemize you any snacks or drinks and we can both watch it, assuming that the couch here is still public territory?"
Karkat narrows his eyes at you suspiciously, really really fucking suspiciously. You'd think that he was actually purposefully acting dramatic, if his entire demeanor hadn't also changed along with his eyes. You watch his alien chest rise and fall, you want to smile at his 69 symbol, you don't.
Once again he pauses his film, expertly but slowly, laboriously, breathing out in a loud fed-up fashion while staring right at you with his cold dreary looking alien eyes. Ouch. "IT IS THE INTERMURAL DOMINION OF CIVIL CONVIVALITY," he says, but his barking tone is withheld, hissing behind his teeth as if it's almost impossible for him to use a neutral voice.
You can't help but laugh for a hot second at his word choice even if you're a bit upset and confused about his hostility, "I see you've been talking to the Mayor." It's impossible to not love the Mayor with your entire heart and soul. You haven't tried but you're convinced it's impossible to dislike him even a little bit.
Karkat does not return your laugh, nor does he even smile. You watch his ears twitch slightly. Now he turns his head and scarcely regards you, as if you were no better than an ant. "YOU MAY SIT. THIS IS A PUBLIC AREA FOR EVERYONE," He says, and his tone changes abruptly.
Are you actually an ant to him? That is good enough for you for now. Though you chuckle slightly under your breath at him. This boy is no Jade, no Terezi. He's not going to praise you for or goad you into being cool, aloof, and kinda smug. That feels wrong to you but also validating in another way that you don't quite understand.
"Oh thank you very much, your graciousness. First though, I'm going to get the snacks. If you aren't going to tell me what you want, I'll just end up bringing back a bunch of human shit."
"JUST BRING THE VILE HUMAN SHIT, I'LL MANAGE." Karkat's eyes stay focused on the paused movie.
You swallow hard and you study his face before you step away, the way his long slender neck falls into his turtleneck, the way his chunky cut hair curves around his cheekbone. You think he wears the sweater almost to mask how delicate some of his features are. You decide this makes sense for a violent alien race. You wouldn't want someone thinking that you're fragile, specifically if that someone was Bro. Speaking of, somehow, this little alien asshole is even less immediately sociable than Bro. He's charming and quirky in his hostility nonetheless. He shows tons of emotion even if those emotions seem negative. He also sounds like a sea of honking cars on the I-610 but he looks like a huge nerd. He is a huge nerd, as is evidenced by his repeated watching of stuffy B-movie romcoms. B-movie romcoms are objectively much worse than regular B-movies in any other genre, you decide despite having almost zero experience in watching them.
At this point, you've hardly seen the petite troll kid eat, let alone move from the couch. His eyes seriously look deceased, like the floating formaldehyde eyeballs of a dearly departed catfish. There are huge draping dark circles under them that you'd have to draw in an exaggerated fashion if you were to put his likeness into art. Which you seriously consider for a moment just for comedic effect. Does he sleep? A comic entitled Karkat Never Fucking Sleeps pops into your head, where an angry screeching Karkat shows up in increasingly strange places just to scream at you. Open the cupboard -- screaming Karkat. Open your closet -- screaming Karkat. Under your bed -- screaming Karkat. The joke is it seems like he should be sleeping in those places but he's watching romcoms in the dark alone and his eyebags keep getting bigger and bigger in each panel. It's too juvenile for your practiced hand, and not ironic at all - though you're pretty sure that you could make it funny. You're not in the mood to try. You muse all this to yourself while you alchemize up some Doritos and Mountain Dew. You have to remind yourself not to be xenophobic. You have three years to spend on this meteor. You're barely two weeks in and you're already bored and apathetic. Everyone else has already claimed a bestie to pair off with. As entertaining as it is to jam with the Mayor about the divergent municipal roles of a can of beets versus a can of pears, well... You sigh, fidgeting with the alchemiter and bouncing up and down in your pumped up kicks.
You see Karkat in your peripheral vision looking at you again. Guy can't keep his eyes off the soft sumptuous curve of your derrière, that's for sure. You don't blame him. You face the alchemiter to gain a completely chill composure while you gather your spoils, then you turn around with a slide, all smooth, expecting to catch him looking at you but you don't. Hm.
"I come bearing gifts," You announce, supererogatory. A placebo statement to uphold normalcy. Uncool. You don't care. By not caring you make it ironic, thus elevating the trite to the height of fashion. Karkat doesn't flinch. You feel like throwing at least 50 bean-assed squeak-toy plush smuppets at his face just to see his reaction. You don't do it.
You set upon the table the delicious booty of the alchemiter: Mountain Dew, Apple Juice, two different flavors of Doritos, and the old standard - popcorn; just in case he hates everything else as much as he hates you, friendship, light, sleep, and everything good in the world. You observe Karkat, with his arms stubbornly crossed. Is he actually adverse to friendship or is he pretending to not give a shit? He couldn't be just offended by your existence or your approach, right? It's really hard to tell. Right now he seems like a bratty four-year-old kid, stubbornly refusing to make friends beacuse he didn't come up with the idea on his own.
"Uh, this stuff has caffeine in it, I'm not sure how trolls react to that...," You say, pointing to the Mountain Dew and taking your seat next to him.
"WE REACT TO METHYLTHEOBROMINE JUST FINE." Sharp. Curt. Short. Do trolls really use the full chemical name? You want to snort laughing. You don't. The words came smooth from his lips. You decide he has potential. Potential for what though? You haven't decided yet.
Karkat's stare is piercing. Accusatory. Why?
You bite your tongue. Literally. You did this so often with Bro, biting your tongue. It's habit. Your tongue should have permanent indents in it. Somehow it doesn't. Maybe it has scars. Sometimes you'd draw blood. The memory is bitter like burnt coffee grounds and you wipe it away.
Karkat is so interesting, you've never met anyone like him, not that you've met many people or many aliens for that matter. He's just unlike anything you've ever witnessed. Ever. Anywhere. Sharp attitude, sharp teeth, sharp claws. Nubby horns. You notice the soft roll of his chest cavity under the fabric of his sweater, his entire ribcage is a different shape, possibly more rounded than yours. You kind of wish you could see it. You think it's too soon to ask to see a model of a troll skeleton.
Then Karkat, despite his giant fucking attitude problem, reaches out with all the will of a spoiled impudent child and takes a swig of the Mountain Dew, his eyes widening dramatically as he swallows. You can tell he almost spews the drink out but manages to withhold himself with impressive control.
"THIS IS CARBONATED!" Screech scratch shriek - A terrible sound like metal between grinding gears from the back of his throat. His voice is high and kind of melodic but it has this terrible warbling chirrup to it, this added cacophonic dissonance that you don't understand. You've noticed the same thing from Terezi, actually, but it's more pleasant to listen to her peculiar sounding reverberations somehow. Maybe that's because she's not fucking screaming at you every time she opens her lips.
"Yes, it's soda, my dude," You explain, your eyes widening behind your shades. For some reason you were not expecting his adverse reaction to your carbonated beverage selection.
"FIRST. I AM NOT YOUR DUDE. SECOND. IT'S ABHORRENT. IT TASTES LIKE THE FETID RANKROOT SWILL DISTILLED STRAIGHT FROM A DUNGHATCHED BLISTERBEETLE'S NECROTIC CREVASSE."
You chuckle at his undeniably hilarious verbage, "Okay okay, so the Dew is not your thing, I'm sorry about that. I'll just drink it then," you say, reaching out and expecting for him to thrust the beverage your way.
Karkat avoids your touch completely, bringing the glass of Dew close to his chest with his snotty scrunched nose in the air. "NO I WILL FINISH IT."
Oh okay Princess. You want to say he doesn't have to drink it, but he seems very uncomfortable with the idea of extending the olive branch to you, so you keep it away. You keep all the olives away, all of them. No fruits. No wood either. No twigs, branches, bark, trunks, or roots. Nope. You decide to shut up, noting for a second that you were almost looking forward to the physical contact between your hands just to feel how they're different. Karkat grabs the remote control and resumes the beginning of what appears to be a troll version of Runaway Bride. It's not a B-movie, you suppose, maybe.
Out of respect you try to stay quiet. Except you're you, and you're nervous, and you can't shut the fuck up. Ever. The olive branch, it beckons you to once again try to extend its shivering spindly stem and dangly drab green ovoid drupes.
"Is this Runaway Bride? With Julia Roberts?"
"ITS TROLL JULIA ROBERTS AND IT IS CALLED 'IN WHICH A WOMAN WHO LEAVES HER PREVIOUS THREE MATESPRITS AT THEIR JOINING CEREMONY AND GETS TRAILED BY A REPORTER WHO WILL BE OBSERVING HER FOURTH JOINING CEREMONY'-"
"Okay dude, it's definitely the exact same movie." Unbelievable. This alien is un-fucking-believable. He's almost a blessing because he's so terrible. Is his entire existence somehow the great irony that you've been seeking? What? Nah.
"YES."
"AND STOP FUCKING CALLING ME DUDE. WE ARE BARELY ACQUAINTANCES YET LET ALONE HATEFRIENDS."
Oh shiiiiiiiiiiiitttttttttttttttttttttttttt.
Has he taken the olive branch?
Silence. You just let it pass. You feel like you can't win him over now, but you sense it, you sense that you may win him over someday if you keep at it. You watch 'troll' Julia Roberts meander through her sparse gray futureslum village while 'troll' Richard Gere watches her. Except everything is so drab and gloomy and you completely lack understanding of the signage on the buildings. The architecture makes it look like a sci-fi flick but you can tell it isn't. That's kind of a conundrum you can't explain but you do think it's engrossing in its own way. It feels like looking at huge pyramids, megaliths, and castles from some bygone human era. In this case you can tell that the town troll Julia Roberts lives in is kind of small old, humble and by extension 'low class' despite how technologically advanced troll building styles seem to your untrained eye. You think it's a town for lowbloods, but troll Julia Roberts herself is a blueblood or cerulean. You're not really down with the appropriate names for troll blood castes.
"YOUVE SEEN IT? THE HUMAN VERSION OF THIS MOVIE?" Karkat suddenly asks. His tone is softer.
What? This dude is clearly into conversations about shitty movies for his entire demeanor to mellow like butter in the microwave over the impending movie discussion. You're familiar with that. You can do that. Amazing. Astounding. Incredible. You are awestruck.
The emo or perhaps more aptly named screamo troll kid is actually attempting to keep the conversation rolling. Wow. You hand him some Doritos, he takes the bag tentatively. You notice his ears flick again. Adorable. Wait what? Interesting. Interesting is what you mean, intriguing, though you guess it's also, without bias, a cute characteristic. You almost ignore his question in the heat of your thoughts until he glances at you. The way his eyes probe you, it almost renders your shades completely ineffective. You're perplexed by this because looking at Kanaya, Vriska, and Terezi doesn't have the same effect.
"Yeah," You confirm, "I was pretty young though. I don't remember it that well." You leave out the part where you rarely got to finish any movie to completion due to constant vaguely foreboding puppet interruptions and sword 'training'. Only when you got a little older did Bro ever leave you alone long enough to do things on your own. At that point, there was no way in hell you were going to waste your precious fucking time on Runaway Bride or other entertainment of its ilk. But now, with three years to spare, you might as well kill time. You're now lining up graves for your time like it's the fucking valley of peace, population 5 million.
"I haven't seen a lot of movies to completion. But I think that maybe, 80s and early 90s movies did this romance thing better; just an uninformed opinion." This is something you've heard and somehow believe to some degree.
His sigh could break mountains. Somewhere the ghost of Mount Everest is shedding a fucking solitary tear. He doesn't have to say it, you are clearly not doing your species any favors in the way of intelligent conversation.
"I HOPE YOU KNOW I HAVE NO FRAME OF REFERENCE IN REGARDS TO HUMAN ERAS, AS IN ZERO, ZIP, ZILCH, NULL."
"So, basically, this movie came out in 1999?"
"I DO NOT KNOW, DID IT?" His tone is exceedingly caustic and biting.
You bite your lip and you watch his eyes flick to your mouth and it furthers his frown.
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it did come out in 1999, at least the human version did," You say. You have a weird thing about time. It's a thing you shouldn't have memorized, but you usually remember the years that movies or albums were released.
"THESE SEASONED CHITIN CRISPS ARE VERY GOOD," Karkat muses, throwing a good handful of cool ranch doritos in his mouth. Oh? Something positive to say? What a change.
You nod and hum in approval and continue with your statement, "So I'm talking about movies before 1999. Like Pretty Woman? Sleepless in Seatle? Pretty in Pink?"
He gives you a blank stare.
"When Harry Met Sally? Overboard? Splash? Say Anything?" Clearly you've got all this bullshit memorized like the pop culture god you are. What could anyone else expect from Dave Strider.
Karkat muses, putting his hand on his face, "MAYBE THOSE MOVIES HAVE A KIND OF CHARM, IF I AM THINKING OF THE RIGHT ONES. THE HUMAN TITLES ARE VAGUE AND STUPIDLY SUCCINCT. BUT IT IS EQUALLY POSSIBLE I HAVE NOT SEEN THE TROLL VERSIONS OF THEM, OR CONVERSELY, THERE ARE NO TROLL VERSIONS."
You suppress a tiny laugh, "Well if you aren't sure if you've seen the troll versions, I could always try to get the human versions and we could watch those, even if we just make fun of them for the lulz." You just offer. You don't know why. Sometimes shit just tumbles out of your gaping maw and into the world like it is your gift to all of existence. There it is, my immaculate fucking turd, crown it now and make it your savior. All hail Dave's steaming pile of dung, King and Ruler apparent of Dungtopia, all who believeth in him shall inherit the Stench. In this case, it's the wafting permeating stench of a burgeoning acquaintanceship. It's never desperate, it's just like an island, always on the horizon, ports open, ready for any friendly ships to sail in and dock at its ample and acquiesing properly water-sealed piers.
"THAT WOULD BE ACCEPTABLE," Karkat says in answer to your offer. Your chest feels warm. You almost smile. Friendship. You're doing this. You're making this happen. No actual feces were required. You sort of picture a shitty artifacted boat ironically mislabelled "carcat" sliding into your Dave Island dock. Your mouth quirks up on one side.
While you contentedly settle back and take an appreciative gulp of apple juice, 'troll' Julia Roberts is trying on a wedding dress which looks considerably different and is darker than a human wedding dress. You think it's supposed to be her bluish blood color or whatever. Honestly the troll adherence to this blood color concept is really fucking mind-numbingly monotonous and stale. You're pretty sure if you were a troll, you'd get arrested just for having to wear a full fucking rainbow all over. Fuck the police. You'd get culled. You mention this to Karkat. He doesn't respond, he only chews his lip and shoots you a glance of disapproval and moderate ire.
The silence kills you. You want him to talk to you. :\ :\ :\ You tap on your leg with acute awareness of the 57 minutes and 36 seconds that have passed since you sat down next to him.
"Do you only watch romance?" You ask, establishing a basis of which movies you'll try to alchemize.
"ALMOST EXCLUSIVELY."
Well friendship with Karkat can't be worse than friendship with a guy that thinks ConAir is the height of cinematic perfection.
Replacing the strange country-inspired luau scene, an equally colorful troll counterpart plays out before your eyes with 'troll' Julia Roberts unable to be honest with her friends about her feelings nor is she able to keep herself from stuttering out her words and flirting shamelessly with 'troll' Richard Gere. 'Troll' Julia Roberts seems to be just as much of a failboat as human Julia Roberts was in Runaway Bride. You shake your head in reproach at her. You look over to study Karkat who is comically interested in the film, perched slightly forward with his fingers resting on his chin. You're pretty sure he knows all of the words because you can see his mouth moving very slightly when there's dialogue on screen.
"Do you want to fall in love, Karkat?" The question comes unbidden, just flies out of your lips too fast for you to catch. A critical homerun failure.
"THAT IS A VERY VERY RUDE AND VERY VERY PERSONAL QUESTION." He spits at you, his face flushing.
"It's a pretty normal question too, I think." Ah, you've fucked up bad haven't you? You frown. Frowns are allowed in cool town, population 1: Dave Strider. It's slight. It's a level 1 frown.
"DO YOU WANT TO FALL IN LOVE, DAVE?"
You wince. You deserve that misdirect. Wholly and completely. Something about Karkat and his weird mannerisms almost completely shatter your coolkid composure. It's not just that it looks like he's staring directly into your eyes. It's something else. You don't understand it. Your level 1 frown turns pretty much immediately into a frown that you haven't actually charted at all and you have no idea how your face looks right now. That's alarming. Bells and whistles somewhere inside you are going off, but you push that away, far far away.
His eyes always feel like they're churning somehow when he makes eye contact with you, they completely suck you in. Move over, Charybdis, you're ready to completely wreck your boat against the treacherous rocky isles of Vantas. They call it Davy Strider's locker, that beckoning deep gray abyss.
"I never thought about it before, actually. I think, everyone wants to fall in love, right? But I'm not sure I even really thought it was possible for me." You look down at your lap. You think this is the right answer but you can tell that your uncertainty and use of a blanket statement has pissed him off even further.
"*WE* HAVE TO THINK ABOUT IT. YOU BASICALLY GET CULLED IF YOU DONT. DESPITE THAT, EVEN IF I HAD FOUND LOVE, I WOULD'VE BEEN CULLED ANYWAY."
Silence. How the fuck do you respond to that?
"Aren't you glad that's not the case anymore?" You try.
"I AM STILL NOT SURE WE ARE GOING TO SURVIVE THIS."
"Me either," You respond. It's true.
Suddenly, Karkat switches off the movie and sits up. "YOU HAVE DONE THE NIGH UNFATHOMABLE, YOU HAVE ACTUALLY RUINED MY MOOD FOR ROMANCE THANKS A LOT YOU NUBSLURPING FUCKPOD."
He leaves. He doesn't look back. You are confused. Nub slurping? Fuck? Pod? What?
You think about yelling an apology to the stompy retreating figure but you don't.
Karkat pauses in front of the transportalizer and calls back at you, "I WILL RETURN TOMORROW. HAVE YOUR HUMAN MOVIES READY FOR JUDGEMENT," He yells, not turning around to face you.
You look down when you hear the whirr of the transportalizer in action. Pretty quickly the Mayor comes up and takes Karkat's spot, resuming the movie with his own tiny carapacian hands.
You pat his head. "You always know what's up, don't you little dude?"
The Mayor looks up at you and just exists for now. His existence is pleasant.
Sometimes he talks and its always about civic duties and city planning. Not today. Today he just sits with you as you finish the troll production of Runaway Bride. It's terrible, but it's better than the uncomfortable feedback loop of you making your own rap, remixing your own rap, and staying firmly planted in your own head with all your bullshit memories and issues piling up up like a monstrous jumble of obtrusive plush rumps.
--turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]--
TG: yo rose
TG: i tried to make a friend and failed miserably
TT: You? You failed at such a thing? Unbelieveable.
TG: i know right
TG: you know how i am rolling up in the streets talking to all the peeps and everyone knows my name
TG: my beats are ill my kicks are fresh and i got hella mad skills
TG: that is my claim to fame
TG: except i suck at making friends
TG: specifically crabby troll friends
TT: I have the utmost faith that you'll get it right if you keep trying.
TG: i might keep trying
TG: maybe
TT: I want to joke about how you lack feelings or sincerity but both of us know by now that that's a farce.
TT: As uncouth as it might be to break secrecy, I do have something to tell you regarding Karkat.
TG: what is it
TT: He had already contacted me a few days ago about the best ways to go about talking to you since your first introduction was rather tragic.
TG: what
TT: He said he felt bad that you seemed to be lonely but he knew of no common ground between the two of you beyond your shared class of Knight.
TG: is that why he kept shooting me looks
TT: Possibly.
TG: damn i thought he was into me like everyone else
TG: over there on that couch fucking pining for this choice ass
TG: hedging his fucking bets on the best looking horse
TG: all getting a load of these sweet filled out hocks and shanks and counting his fucking boondollars up to take to the bookie
TG: ready to rake in the dough and drop it in his enormous gilded porkhollow once he watches me speed over that backstretch with my swift and impossibly agile canter
TT: I presume that despite my prior conversation with Karkat, you were the one to approach him first.
TG: yes and he was wound up like a fucking dreidel ready to blast its way around the table at hanukkah
TG: he screeched at me like a table of jewish grandmothers ready to slap me up the keppie for my sassy mouth
TT: He was probably full of nerves considering what happened to his friends in this very lab not too long ago.
TG: idk
TG: he seemed really into the troll production of runaway bride
TG: like he knew the words and shit like they were the troll bible
TG: he was on his knees getting ready to worship that shit like he knew he was a hell bound soul
TG: gotta save his own ass from damnation and the only prescription for the pearly gates was to mouth all of julia roberts lines
TT: Dave the implication here is more towards the fact that you were staring at Karkat's mouth for the entire movie instead of watching it.
TG: listen rose have you seen his eyes
TG: theyre like a whirlpool of gray and when he turns ever so slightly
TG: they refract at you with these broken slivers of black and red
TG: its like youre staring into the void and it stares back at you
TT: Does this have something to do with your own eye color?
TG: no
TG: he's just
TG: an alien
TT: I can confirm that statement is accurate.
TG: and trolls apparently have a similar concept to a luau
TT: Fascinating.
TG: then i asked him if he wanted to fall in love
TG: he got super serious and fatalistic about it
TT: That is slightly uncharacteristic of you to ask that question.
TG: its not my fault
TG: dude is all into romance and shit
TG: what the fuck else was i supposed to talk about
TG: like hey crabstack lets watch this troll romance movie but im going to talk about the land speed velocity of a unladen swallow is that cool bro
TG: no ok well too bad
TT: Who would've thought that people into romance movies might be sensitive about their own romantic lives?
TG: god drag me
TG: im almost dread showing my sorry ass face tomorrow
TG: the conversation bombed worse than hiroshima and nagasaki combined
TT: Cultural insensitivity and its terrible aftermath aside, I believe it's worth it for you to try again.
TG: i sorta mentioned some human movies to him
TG: im probably going to alchemize them up tomorrow morning or die trying
TG: then look like a huge tool when he doesnt show up
TT: If you like, Kanaya and I can come alleviate that awkward and embarrassing social pressure for you when and if the time comes.
TG: no thanks i dont need a chaperone for my date
TG: this dance card is all filled up and all the slots say karkat
TG: gonna break out the red plush puppet tux
TT: I actually dare you to do it.
TG: what and get that troll kid all riled up with nowhere to go
TG: my fine ass laid out on that couch drenched in a thousand red rose petals
TG: hed be snorting the petals like a desperate jonesing crackhead looking for his next fix
TG: that fix would be my luscious velvet covered ass
TG: you know how plush that tux is
TG: theres just so much give to it
TG: troll kid could take a nap on it
TG: god knows he needs one have you seen those undereye bags
TG: he has packed his entire life in those fucking things
TG: ready to leave his wife and move to paris with his sexy french mistress
TT: I'm sure there's no way that Karkat could refuse your romantic advances if you wore your tux and peppered the common room with rose petals and invited him to move to Paris with you.
TG: what
TG: no it was a joke
TT: Sure it was, I especially liked the imagery of Karkat literally snorting rose petals before his face found a new home right between your buttcheeks.
TT: It sounds like you've put a lot of thought into this date and you want it to be as romantic as possible, so I might suggest the trifecta of date success; some candlelight, some soft music, some champagne perhaps?
TG: where the hell would we get champagne
TT: Oh you'd be surprised what I can conjure up.
TG: can you perhaps conjure up some romcom movies pre 1999
TT: No but I might be able to lend you some items that might make your efforts far more successful.
TG: thank you rose
TG: you always have my back
TG: best ecto sister ever
TT: Goodnight Dave
TG: night
--turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]--
--tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]--
As you fall asleep, kind of wary of the nightmares you might have, you think about Karkat and his crochety old-man type anger. Karkat and his weird quirky expressions and tendencies. You think about how he hides his hands in his sleeves, and how his brow is almost permanently folded into itself, and the twitching of his pointed downturned ears. What a nerdy little douche. It makes you smile. Thankfully Rose has your back in case you really actually fucked up hardcore. You were a little worried since she's been distant for a week or so. You breathe a sigh of relief to know she's still there for you.
Your sleep is dreamless, for once.