I think it's about time I kicked up some more action. Are you reggie kids?
And I promise to introduce more ships in the future, because there's been a lot of KatNep. Trust me.
After hunting the previous day, Karkat dismissed everyone to do 'whatever the hell they wanted'. Essentially, that meant that Karkat was tired of keeping order and wanted to have some alone time with Nepeta, in a non-perverted way. That would come later, considering the author made it that before he died of writer's block.
Karkat took some cooked meat, some berries, and his water bottle and approached Nepeta.
"Want to have a picnic?"
Nepeta gleamed. "Sure. The place we found before?"
Karkat nodded. "C'mon, let's go."
The two stealthily left camp, making sure no one noticed to not arise suspicion. The pair casually strolled through the forest, enjoying the beautiful scenery and the occasional bird call. After a twenty minute walk, the two reached the spot. Nothing had changed from the scene before, and the view was still breathtaking. The two laid out a bear pelt and popped out the food, the two chatting happily as they faced the river, munching on their food. After all of it was gone, the two cuddled against a tree, watching the river flow and feeling each other's warmth. Eventually, the two broke off.
"What do you want to do now?" Karkat inquired.
Nepeta thought for a second. "I need to practice my hunting abilities. Let's play hide and seek."
Karkat rolled his eyes. "That's a wriggler's game. No way we're playing such a childish thing like that."
Nepeta used her secret weapon. She leaned on Karkat, making the saddest eyes she could muster.
Karkat felt the guilt swirl inside him. He could've sworn her eyes purged his soul, taking away his free will and replacing it with malleability. He couldn't control his own body as he caved in.
"Fine."
As soon as Nepeta turned, he ran parallel to the river, until he found a fallen tree. He carefully mounted it, climbing across without falling in and making his location obvious. After he reached the other side of the river, he evaded trees while running at a decent velocity. Finally, he came across a meadow, and he hid behind a cluster of trees. Just then, he heard her yell the famous phrase.
"Ready or not, here I come!"
Karkat controlled his breathing and stopped his movements, keeping a standing pose as straight as a pencil.
As soon as Nepeta shouted, she turned to the direction where she heard his footsteps originally. Sure enough, muddy footprints littered the ground in a straight line. Nepeta stalked, close to the ground. The footprints ended at an overturned log, which she pounced on and crawled across. The footprints resumed until she reached a meadow, in which she only noticed trampled grass. Soon, the footprints stopped, and she noticed Karkat behind a tree. She carefully tip-toed until he was straight in her view and she wiggled her tail, ready to pounce.
"Found you!"
She tacklepounced Karkat, who wore a face of absolute shock. After he realized it was her, he calmed down.
"Damn, you are good."
As soon as Karkat realized what he said, the two broke into profuse blushing.
"Um, not in that way. Well, in that way, but I didn't mean to..."
Nepeta's face turned even redder.
"I'm just making things even worse, aren't I?"
Nepeta gave a slight nod, and the two locked eye contact.
Karkat gave a slight cough. "Well, what happened before, I, uh, I want that to happen again."
Nepeta looked to the side. "Me too."
Karkat slowly leaned down on Nepeta, shortening the distance between them. The two hovered an inch between contact, ready to begin the kiss.
Suddenly, a blood-curdling scream permeated the area. The two stood up to see another troll staring back at them.
Except it wasn't a troll.
Although it had two legs like a troll would, its skin was white, it had no horns or fanged teeth, and its hair seemed decently-maintained. The figure had a rounded hat and a vest with a pocket knife protruding it. It had cargo pants with lots of pockets.
The scared creature whipped out some kind of contraption that the two instantly realized its identity.
It was a gun. Not quite as advanced as troll technology, but it was a gun. And it could kill.
Karkat put an arm in front of Nepeta, who cowered behind him. Karkat could tell, after a few seconds, that the troll-like person was equally scared of them, the gun furiously shaking in his hands, and beads of sweat cascading down his face. Finally, the figure spoke.
"*$^ !&# $*#? *%#$ $ $ *%#?" It asked.
"I don't understand what you're saying!" Karkat yelled.
The person thought for a second, then beckoned for them to follow. They reluctantly did, figuring that if they didn't, they might get shot. After a minute or two of walking, the group reached what looked like a portable camp. There were 3 tents, one of them being marginally larger than the others. The creature opened the flaps of the larger one, yelling inside.
"$# %! %*## )$* * %*# !"
Suddenly, a similar figure emerged. This one was taller, with jet-black spiked hair and was in more casual wear.
"%&# %#('% $#*% *%#)$*..."
The second one ran inside, grabbing some sort of contraption. It looked like a robot that Equius might build.
The taller one spoke to the robot in their language.
"#) %*# *$# #%* $% *%?"
The robot whirred, spitting out a message.
"Do you understand me?"
Both of them nodded.
The first one talked the robot, repeating his original message. The robot told the trolls a message in their language.
"Who are you? What are you?"
Karkat walked up to the robot.
"We're trolls. We come from another planet. Our hometown was invaded. Where are we?"
The robot spat out the message to the other creatures, who replied.
"Welcome to Earth. We are humans. We are excited to meet you."
The first one moved forward.
"My name is Jake. The other is Dirk. I am astonished we have met another race with human-like intelligence. It's an honor to meet you."
Nepeta replied. "The honor's all ours. How do you know our language?"
Jake continued speaking.
"I was once in a tomb, and I noticed writing. After taking pictures of all the instances, I gave it to my husband, Dirk, to analyze. He handed it to a piece of artificial intelligence, who eventually deciphered this and it has indeed come in handy."
Nepeta opened her eyes in amazement. "There were trolls here before?"
Dirk stepped next to Jake. "Or someone who knows your language. What do you call it?"
Karkat answered briefly with, "Alternian."
The two nodded, the Jake human writing it down. "Fascinating."
Then, it was Dirk's turn to ask a question. "Are you two alone?"
Both shook their heads, but Karkat elaborated. "There are ten of us total. One got left behind and another passed away."
"My sincerest condolences for your lost partner."
Both of the trolls nodded solemnly. "He was an, excuse my language, dickwad, but he was still a troll amongst us, and deserves respect as any other troll would.
Dirk laughed at the usage of the word from an alien race, but his smile diminished when Jake gave him a scorn look.
"Here, there are 6 of us. There's our adopted son and daughter, Dave and Rose. Also, there are our cousins, Jade and John. They seem about your age, however troll aging works. Teenagers, in human years."
The two nodded. "Maybe we could all meet somewhere?" Karkat asked.
"We can have a huge campfire at our camp, and the night after, we can have one at yours. Does that seem fair?" Dirk asked.
All of them nodded.
"Awesome," Dirk finished.
Nepeta waved as the two went back to camp. Today was (probably) the first meeting between human and troll.