Warning: This is a small section of a much larger fic. This bit has been written for a while though, and I need to put something out there so I actually have a motivation for finishing the story. Don't be suprised if you see a modified version of this in a later, larger work.

Incidentally, this is also my first Homestuck fanfic. Whoop Whoop.

You are Gamzee Makara, and you are mostly okay.

Except.

Some days your head still feels so damn empty.

And that's- that's okay. Because Karkat helps you deal with that, with that empty nothing rattling around inside your noggin. He reaches up, pulls you down into a pile of whatever's laying around (leaves mostly these days, what with all the trees shedding their coats for winter).

He just pulls you down, tucks your head under his chin as well as he can. Sometimes he'll bring his mits up to massage at your temples, like he's trying to rub the crazy out, trying to smooth away the jagged edges.

And he talks. For such a loud, foul mouthed little fucker, he can be downright soothin' when he needs to be.

So your pale bro, he helps you pull your brain back into your head from where ever it is that it goes wandering. Brings you back into your head, helps you see things clear-like again.

But.

But your head ain't the only thing that's messed up. Maybe it's the way you grew up. Maybe it's your DNA. Who the fuck knows, but there is. SoMeThInG. something wrong with you.

WITH EVERY LAST FUCKING ASPECT OF GAMZEE MAKARA.

Because your think pan ain't the only thing that got rusted. Naw. The state of your brain ain't the only thing wrong with your sorry ass.

You don't know if it was a way to get away from the pain of YoUr DaDdY lEaViNg yOu like he did OR WHAT.

But your heart, sometimes it just isn't there. Like it's floating half-way out of your body. So you can think and analyze all so nice and clear but you can't. FEEL. a damn. THING.

And sometimes your limbs follow it, so it's like you're just a brain, floating around the world, seeing and perceiving but feeling nothin', free and unattached as some sort of cold god.

And Karkat, pale center of your dark little heart that he is…

He doesn't know how to fix a thing- a thing like that.

He doesn't know what it's like, being all cut-off from everything. Being able to see the bright wonderful world and long for it but not able to really feel it. You don't think your invertebro has gone a day without feeling in all his life. Troll's practically made of the feelies, all jammed up in his miracle of a heart.

But your boy, Equius. That boy, that blue boy with all his motherfucking strength?

Oh, how he's got the knowing of what it means, to not be able to touch nothin'. OH, HOW HE'S GOT THE KNOWING OF SUCH A THING.

So he knows just how to bring you back in. How to dig his claws into you, how to goad you into digging your blood-hungry claws right back into a brother, how to pull you back from the void down to this little planet you and yours now call home.

Your horse-brother's got the knowing, the knowing of when he can dig in and pull you back and when he just needs to give you something to hold onto while you claw your way back in on your own. He knows the difference between the needs. The difference between the need to be touched and the need to touch.

And you explain this to your pale-bro that night, the two of you lying all gangly and grown in your pile, staring up at new stars. Because you've got this need for him to understand, right? For these two sides of your heart to get each other, to get their motherfucking UNDERSTAND ON about how much you need them. Both of them.

Because you do need them, the both of your beautiful boys pulling you back into yourself, letting you pull them back to themselves in return. BECAUSE. because without them-

YoU'lL jUsT fAlL rIgHt ApArT.