Chapter 2

You walked as slowly as you dared blending into the mass of colors. Trolls of all sizes and blood castes we're heading all toward the shining ships entering orbit like a blaring army of suns in your face. Your bloodpusher no no heart was beating all drums in your ears. Beside you Karkat was keeping his head all down his hand squeezing yours tightly as if letting go would seal your fate right then and there. You glance around seeing if you could find any others you would be recognizing but none jump out to you in the sea of faces.

"...seeing a lot of clowns..." Your diamonds mutters under his breath just loud enough for you to hear.

You glance about noticing as well small groups of painted faces laughing cheerfully amongst other faithful brothers and sisters. A small part of you longed to be joining them in the merriment of conscription but you would rather be here with your moirail than anywhere in the universe.

"All's calm won't let no other motherfucker be seeing at you" You mutter all soft back at him trying to ease his fear.

You feel a small pang in your chest at the thought of your own faithful hurting your little precious moirail and for all you know he can fight tooth an nail he is still small and you know he wouldn't stand a chance. Up ahead you can see a large clearing where the ships have landed and you feel Karkat tense up hard hearing his breath come quick an panicked. You quickly glance about before tugging him gently off to the side behind a tree pulling him all close and running your fingers through his hair.

"Shush now my palest shush I got you, all is well this night will be over soon an we can motherfucking rest all gentle" you him at him a false sense of soothing.

You know his fear is well placed but you don't feel much. In fact you ain't even had much of those nervous feelings buzzing in your stomach anymore. You're sure you haven't felt this calm in your life which only made it easier for you to soothe your poor quadrant mate. This will be hard on him your sure of that but you take solace in knowing he'll be able to rest all peacefully real soon. You both will. You hold him tightly as he clings to your shirt his hands shaking hard while you make your hands to holding an papping at him.

"...there splitting everyone up...could see them up ahead...fuck I can't...I'm scared shit fuck...I should have been culled as a grub fucking painless..." Karkat is mumbling now his eyes all dazed an blown wide in fear.

You pap at his face hard maybe a bit harder than intended because he looks up at you all sudden.

"...sorry...but fuck you shouldn't all be thinking that way...glad I got as much time with you as I have been blessed by the messiahs to have." You whisper all soft as silk to him.

You wish real hard that you could have all had the courage to end his life for him all gentle an peaceful like you wanting but it isn't a possibility an it would be far too late now. You do get to thinkin on Maybe you could at least use your chucklevoodoos to get him his calm on, the least mercy you can do your brother. You, as gently as possible, work your Magic's into that miraculous thinkpan of his finding all that deep rooted fear and slowly easing it away. You can feel Karkat all tensed his eyes glowing all soft purple but he soon seemed to relax a bit. You give a soft little pale noise at him pulling him close one more time and kissing his forehead all soft an gentle.

"Come on bro let us not be evading the inevitable any longer" You gently pull him by his hand his eyes still all soft glowing purple. You feel your gut clench in guilt at having to use this on him but you know this will at least make his death as easy as possible you just hope he goes all quick an painless as can be. You even go so far as to offer it up in prayer to your messiahs to all be trading all his pain to you. You would rejoice if you could all be taking his pain in death for him. You do sincerely hope they be in a good mood as to be hearing your pleas.

You walk steadily ahead the traces of anxiety melting off you. You can do this. For Karkat you could take on every motherfucker here. He gives you all the strength you could even hope for but even you would have to admit you feel a pang if anxiety hit when you get to where they are all separating by blood caste. You give one last long painful glance at Karkat, your precious moirail your only friend. His eyes still holding that purple up in them the the calm damn near peaceful look on his face was all you could hope for. You lean over and take his hand kissing his soft palm and then his forehead before an adult forced you apart shoving you far down toward the other group of riled up purplebloods all dressed up in their colors and painted faces. You suddenly felt so motherfucking empty and tired like the whole damn world was weighing on you all heavy. At least you were able to all give Karkat some peace but fuck if you didn't want to keep holding him forever.

You suddenly just felt so mother.fucking.exhausted. Feel it seeping down into your bones up to your horns and every motherfucker around you all talking an chatting so loud all at once it bouncing around all in your thinkpan. You grit your fangs all hard into your lip knowing you be drawing some of that deep purple to the surface. Calm. Got to be calm. Just when you thought you couldn't stand the noise anymore all those fuckers around you went all quiet as death itself. You quickly take the welcome distraction of everyone to pull a small syringe from your pocket all full of swirling green liquid shoving the needle recklessly in your arm. Not like you weren't about to die anyway so who gave a fuck if you got a small infection. You could feel the calming effect of the sopor almost immediately clouding your mind while you lazily turned your face up to see what all everyone was staring at. On a small podium stood some tall ass motherfuckers one had horns all big as fuck and spreading out to the front of his face all wicked sharp from what you could tell. Obvious as shit this fucker was an adult though probably not too much older than you. You could also tell he all had face painted up with pride of a full blown subjuggalator. Beside him or her you couldn't quite tell in your hazed state was another fucked a head shorter than the other but from what you could see was a seadweller. Right down from those two stood two fuckers you did get some recognizing on. Standing heads held high in best motherfucking conscription clothes were Eridan and Feferi. You almost had to caught yourself from laughing at how awkward the little violet fish looked as well as how damn bored your fushia sister seemed. It wasn't too much longer before the adult in the face paint stepped up to start speaking.

"Hello conscriptions, my name is Gaxxic and a formal recruiter for the subjuggalators, we would like to bring this most formal greeting from the empire and congratulate you on making this far. The fact that you all stand here has proven you are strong but only the strongest 500 of you will go on to conquer for our great empire!"

You stand and watch and listen like every other fucker around you feeling some of the trepidation Of other groups grow. Thousands of us out here an only 500 fuckers get to make it that's some kind of cruel irony as complementing everyone on making it here. You sigh zoning in an out some the high concentration of sopor taking its toll on your mind making it wander about mostly to thinking on your little mutant blood. You try to remember him as he usually is all shouty and full of spiteful passion. Little brother has a sharp tongue and a even more fierce wit. Makes you all kinds of sad to see him broken down to such a mess. You don't realize how long you zoned out before you start hearing other around you talking all again. Mostly the brother an sisters in your caste all laughing about getting to explore space an some making cruel ass jokes about not being able to wait an see some lower bloods all get splattered on the ground.

You don't recognize the first scream that erupts from the crowd or any following it but you smell the salty sweetness of blood in the air and see several motherfuckers take off running into the trees all chased by drones with culling forks. It's begun. You take a deep breath an steady yourself sending another prayer for mercy on your poor moirail hoping he has met your makers already all quick and silent while you wait patiently for your turn. Drones all start weaving through crowds and a good part of the groups are chaos those as have nothing to fear all standing still like statues while those in your higher blood caste snicker An laugh amongst themselves. Even from here you can see smears if yellows and browns all that looked lightly fucking unnatural shades. Mutated. Before you could even fucking blink a drone all big and intimidating stood before you it's hard exoskeleton coated in sprays of swirling blood that matched the end of its culling fork. His large black soulless eyes stared deep into yours and you stood unable to move hair spiking up on the back of your neck in an instinctual panic. You waited for the pain to come but he just moved on through the crowd leaving you gasping for air like a fish out of water. Before you could even process what was going on you were being shoved up into a ship and seated another purple blood with swirling paint around his eyes going by an making sure everyone was all buckled in. Alarms started going off in your head. You weren't killed. Why the motherfuck weren't you culled where stood. Why did the drone spare you. Karkat. Your poor motherfuckign precious diamond was surely dead now his bright sinful blood spread out upon the grass and your bloodpusher squeezed all tight at that. Calm. As soon as

the fuckers realized your motherfucking addiction they will all cull you quick as a lusus protecting their grub. For now you will have to sit and wait your motherfucking turn. It isn't long before black starts to dance in the corner of your eyes and you chase them all the way to sleep.