Your name is Dave Strider. You are a veteran and victorian of SBURB and have, alongside your human friends, recreated the Earth. You do not know what became of the trolls, as you lost contact with them just before you and your god teir friends went to face down the King.
At current, the most important thing on your mind is cats. You have never liked them, never had any reason to like them, and they disgust you to the ends of the new Earth and back. The only thing they have ever done for you is occasionally kill a feathery asshole- the only sort of animal you like even less.
Despite this, you are currently sitting with your head in your hands, foot tapping anxiously and a wad of blankets on the table before you. Contained within is an incredibly tiny feline. It had been left behind for obvious reasons (it is literally all fur and bones, just lifting it up makes you feel you'll break it) and the second you layed eyes on it, you got two simultaneous epiphanies. First, this kitten was doomed. Second, you had to change that.
It was pitch black with white tips on its ears and tail and, though they're closed and have yet to open for you, you know his eyes are red and gold. You look up as it shifts slightly and produces the most pitiful, broken sound you have ever heard. Unsure of what to do -you never had to deal with shit like this and Rose was being absoltuely no help when you texted her earlier- you pick up the popsicle stick you've been using to feed it bits of canned cat food.
You hold the stick out and the kitten wrinkles its nose and produces another shrill noise. You prod its nose. It tilts its head back. You follow through and it instinctively bites the stick; quickly wolfing down the bits of food once its had a taste of them. You offer more and just as quickly its gnawing on the bare stick again.
This continues for only a short time before the kitten looses interest in the food and lays its head down. You watch closely as the tiny rib cage, protruding grossly from the fur, expands with each little breath. You are both relieved and disgusted. Such a pathetic creature.
A few minutes pass and you're more anxious than ever. The fluff ball has apparently fallen asleep, as the breathing has digressed into the nearly invisible territory and more than once you've put a finger near its nose to check. It squeaks in annoyance and starts to curl into a ball, but stops short and goes back to lying limply in one of the most uncomfortable positions you could imagine.
Slipping your hand under its body, you lift the kitten up and bring it closer. You handle it like fine china, and, in all honesty, you're afraid to breathe. It seems like even the slightest breeze could simply shatter the little skeleton currently strewn across your palm, head on your fingers and tail scarce reaching your wrist. It groggily opens one eye (red, as you'd known from the second you layed your own eyes on it) and stares up at you with a glassy, dead look to it. You narrow your eyes in return.
"Don't look so fucking pitiful. Jegus."
The eye closes and the feline begins to shift onto its stomach, but again it falls short of its destination and flops back onto your hand. It's growing progressively weaker, you note. It mewls and you offer a little more food. No reaction. A tiny bottle with milk in it. No reaction. A poke just between its eyes. No reaction.
You grit your teeth in frustration, laying it back down on the blankets. The kitten's head rolls to the side and again its peering up at you, a few fangs uncovered by the dehydrated lips. It doesn't seem to notice or care. You feel sick. That look is one you know well. I'm going to die. So what. Nobody will miss me.
The Game did shit to your mind.
Turning away, unable to take the gaze, you rummage through your bookbag and produce a wet washclothe. You noticed the mud matting his fur had hardened and it was probably really uncomfortable. Taking the clothe you manage to start wiping away the dirt, but there are some places where you'd have to push harder and you shy away from them. All the while the cat remains placid, unreadable.
You toss the washclothe in the sink, which isn't far off, and turn your gaze back to the animal. It has started to wheeze, body jolting slightly as he sneezes. It falls still for a few seconds and you feel your heart throbbing in your throat. It snuffs and begins to breathe at a weak, leisurely place once more. You expel a breath.
It has only been an hour or two since you found him- it. Since you found the cat. Cats are horrible animals made for biting and scratching and complaining. Not to mention you've got an acute allergy to their fur. Nothing, especially not a cat, should be able to pull so violently at a Strider's heartstrings. You're pretty sure you know why, but you won't let yourself believe it.
That would just be stupid.
You move to pick the kitten up again and it doesn't seem to have any shits left to give. Its head hangs limp over your forefinger and its tail is draped near-lifeless over your pinky. You tell yourself its because he's tired and it will be better in the morning. You shift it into a lying position along your arm, resting against your chest, and force your eyes up toward the ceiling.
Looking at it makes you squirm. Not looking at it is excrutiating. Holding it hurts. Not holding it is agony. Saving it is impossible. Not saving it...
Ruby eyes glinting with untold pain, you look back down at the thin creature. It is slipping slightly and you go to right it, but something is off. It feels colder than it had before (it had felt like a miniature furnace when you first found it) and when you tug lightly at one of the whiskers, there is no response. Only closed eyes and a slack jaw.
You feel your heart seize in your chest like it had when you'd watched your own Doomed Selves stumble to their gruesome fates. Your palms are suddenly slick and your eyes wide as you give the kitten a gentle shake. Then jar it, trying to coerce it into opening its eyes. Trying to force it to wake up.
Tears are something you are unfamiliar with. This does not stop them from coming.
Why does this matter, you ask yourself. Why the hell does this matter. It's a scruffy rat you found out on the street a few hours ago. It shouldn't matter. It doesn't matter.
You can't help but feel a seering pain in your gut as you lie to yourself over simple truths. Maybe finishing the game made you soft. Maybe it was becaus you are alone a lot now-a-days and your poker face is unpracticed. Maybe it's because, for the first time in what feels like years, you actually had hope.
Hope is a cruel mistress.
"Cat," you snap, "open your damn eyes. C'mon, you weak little kitten, open your fucking eyes." You stand up, leaving the cat lying in the middle of the blanket, now stiff. "I said to open your damn eyes, Karkat!"
The words shoot from your mouth like heart-stopping venom, and the second the name is out you feel a terrible aching in your chest. Your tears are matting the kitten's fur and your sweaty hands are fisted on the table adjacent to its corpse. There is the subtle taste of bile in the back of your throat, but you ignore it.
You're losing your cool so fast your head is spinning. Or maybe you lost it a long time ago. You're not sure; you've become so good at faking it, you've somehow managed to trick yourself. You haven't been fine for years. You haven't been fine since the last time you saw the shitty little prick of a candyblood. You can't even remember what was said- but what you do remember is all of the unrequited bullshit you'd wanted to spill.
You, Dave Strider, are having a full-blown breakdown over the cadaver of an abandoned kitten.
Hunching over, you knot you fingers in your bangs, snapping and yelling, demanding he wake up. Your sunglasses clatter onto the table beneath you, barely missing the body, and you immediately jolt backward as though blaming yourself for almost hurting him.
With a harsh hit your chair is sent skittering across the floor on its side while you, the pathetic, pathetic little fuck that you are, pull at your hair and all but wail in grief. You're existance is miserable. Rose is the only one that knows this, better, even than you did, and later she will likely give you a long speech that is summed into "I told you so."
This is not what you want to hear. If you could hear anything, somehow use your powers as Knight of Time to go back to the meteor and do it all over again, you would revel in the ever little "fuck you" he ever snapped. But SBURB has come and gone and so have your powers. You're just a useless little human now.
You couldn't even save a cat. Let alone a troll.
You slump to your knees, face buried in your arms as you yell wordlessly at the kitten. You've failed twice now, not to mention ever Doomed Timeline you'd ever set foot on, and you wish now more than ever that you hadn't won. That you'd died a Just death for your failures as an almost-lover and allowed the others to go on to victory. Living is a hassle, but you know you don't have what it takes to end it yourself. Terezi taught you that one.
Tears have stained your pale cheeks a faint red and left your sleeves wet, but you don't really care. You stare over your arms at the thin black tail, reaching up tentatively, shakily, to brush your finger down to the white tip. It's cold and lifeless. You feel the same.
It takes you a few minutes, but you pull yourself to your feet. You right your chair, then, very gently (as though with an infant) you wrap the kitten up in the blanket he'd been resting on and pick him up. You cradle it in one arm as you make your way outside, grabbing a shovel off the small back stoop and stopping just beneath your bedroom window.
You have managed to recompose yourself into a Striderly silence, cold and emotionless as the shovel bites into the earth. It takes only two scoops to hollow out an appropriately sized hole and you reluctantly kneel down and set the blanket down. You can taste the bile again, swallowing hard. Somehow, this trumps finding your Bro's dead body staked to the ground. It beats watching yourself die. It beats the final glance you sent to Rose before the Cancer exploded and took the both of you with it.
And all of this over some little cat.
No second thought is allowed before the two scoops of soil and grass are replaced on top of the kitten. You grab a nearby stone and pause over the grave, gazing solemnly down at it for an unmeasureable length of time before setting it over the disrupted soil and dusting your hands off. You feel like you should pay some sort of respect to the body, but you don't. You can't.
Somewhere from the front of your house you can hear the rapping of knuckles on the door. Your stomach churns as you wipe your face off, grab your shades and put on a fake content smirk. The front door opens and there stand your three friends, smiling and ready to drag you out on some fun friendly outting.
Just before you decline you catch sight of Rose's curious studying of your person (you smell of wet cat food and dirt) and decide it would bring up too many quesions if you said no. So you grab your jacket and trot down the stairs like everything is totally chill.
Of course it is; you're Dave motherfucking Strider, and as far as your friends know, and as far as you'll let yourself know, everything is fine.
R.I.P. my dear little kitten. We only had her for a few hours, but it was no less a horrible moment when my best friend picked her up and burst into tears. We may not have been well-acquainted, but I had to do at least a little something to remember her by.