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You sat on a chair at your desk in the drafty meteor, staring blankly at the screen of your grubtop. John had just shot down your black advances. He didn't know enough about you to know that he also shot down your proposition of a moirallegiance and a flushed relationship. That’s what you wanted- one person to fill all your quadrants. This was just one more rejected romantic advance. Was that what you were doomed to be- another Eridan who’s every attempt at a relationship was brutally cut down? At this point, it seemed like it.
You ran your hands through your messy black hair. Why did you think for a second that someone, especially him, would like someone like you? He was a fierce, brave leader that was ready to fight until he died for good, who had lost so much and had seen too much and was still going strong. You were a pathetic leader who could barely get everyone on the stupid meteor to cooperate. Fuck, you were a pathetic person. Small and vile and worthless and broken and a goddamn mutant and incompetent and just shit. You were just a piece of shit. Where did you go wrong, thinking that you were something more for even a second? No one as great as John could ever love or even try to piece back together the broken pieces of Karkat Vantas.
Ignoring the soft sounds of conversation and tapping from the computer terminals around you, you slouched off toward a transportalizer, numb and beating yourself up inside. You wished you could cry out the shitty feeling in you, but you knew from experience that wasn't how it worked. Crying wouldn't solve anything. It’d just make you more pathetic. Stepping onto the platform, you barely noticed the normally uncomfortable feeling of your molecules scrambling and rearranging as you traveled through the meteor to your respiteblock. You set off down the chilly hall, not paying attention to where you were going, moving on autopilot, drowning in your own self-hate.
Stupid. Piece of shit. Pathetic. Unlovable. Weak. Useless. Mutant. Disgusting. Worthless.
You slid silently into your respiteblock and quickly swiped your sickles from their position on your desk. You wandered into the adjoining bathroom, leaning on the counter, staring into the mirror, dull eyes staring back. Add ugly to the list, you noted. You fiddled with the arm of your turtleneck, pulling at the delicate fabric. Were you really going to do this again? Were you really ready to sink in this far again? The answer was yes, you deserved it. You wanted this. It was practically marked out for you in the pattern of fate. This was your life.
You took off your pants and rolled up the sleeves of your sweater while refraining from looking at yourself in the mirror. Karkat without clothes wasn't a pretty sight. You sat on the counter, back to the mirror, one sickle in hand in hand.
You rolled up your boxers a bit and pressed the tip of the sickle to the skin there that was raised and whitish-gray from old scars. Both your inner thighs were a mess. You drew the metal along quickly, the cut springing open and candy-apple red blood flowing freely. You repeated the process countless times, zigzagging the lines, making patterns, reopening the wounds that had been closed for so long before this.
Once your thighs were satisfactory, you turned your attention to your forearm. The scars on your left forearm were much neater and deeper than the ones on your right. You repeated the process all over your arm, then used your shaky left hand to mark your right arm. Blood trickled and flowed freely, dripping onto the counter and sink and running down your arm and around your fingers. The sight simultaneously sickened and repulsed you. It was blood, it was beautiful, it was distracting, but it was your blood, your mutant blood. One more reason why you should be culled.
You turned on the sink to a cold setting, water bubbling out. You ran both arms underneath, letting the water wash away the marks. You wet pieces of tissues, wiping your legs dry. You pulled out bandages and cleaned yourself up, hiding them, preventing them from chafing against the fabric of your clothes.
You washed the sickle off, cleaned it, and laid it gingerly on the counter. You slid your jeans back on carefully and inspected yourself in the mirror. Same dull eyes. Same awful face. Same bad habits.
Just a little bit more broken.
You were Karkat Vantas, and you hated yourself more than you hated anything in the entire universe.