Chapter 11

Rose fetched the orb and shooed Gamzee back into the healing room with everyone else. She sat down, holding the polished and gleaming artifact up. "I spent all of last day looking through this and finding out just what it was. Come to find, it's not just some decorative piece…but rather, an artifact that the Elder Grimdarks used long ago to do their scrying when their own bodies became too frail to be proper channels."

She ran her hand over it, and the orb seemed to ripple with darkness. "Considering John said it was covered with dust when he found it, explorers and the such might have simply thought it was a rock and passed it up. But he knew it was something else. With this, and a good bit of time scrying and focusing, I could use it to contact the gods and see if there's a way to transcend existences to send you guys home."

Vriska blinked. "Wow," she said. "Pretty impressive." She gave Gamzee a somewhat haughty expression. "Pity some OTHER religions aren't as useful with this sort of thing."

"Vriska, shut the fuck up!" Karkat snapped, warily eying Gamzee, whose eyes began to go orange.

"On the contrary, Vriska," Rose said, making everyone—including Gamzee—turn to her in surprise. "I'm rather fascinated with the Subjugglator conception, as well as the Mirthful Messiahs. In fact, I haven't ruled out the idea at all that the Messiahs could simply be two of the gods…in this universe, anyway. And from observing Gamzee myself, I believe that with some training and proper management of his own abilities, he could make a Grimdark Acolyte and in fact help me use this thing to send you all home."

Gamzee blinked, then smirked at Vriska, giving her the finger. "Motherfuckin' sit and swivel, spiderbitch," he said. Across the room, Dave gave himself another nosebleed from the massive snort he made. "Then lick it clean." This time, Dave went for a towel.

The sun was coming up, and everyone was grateful to go to bed. Karkat was less happy that he had to stay in the recuperacoon for the day, but considering it was dulling the ache in his chest, he wasn't complaining. He was about to close his eyes when the door opened and Dave slipped in carrying a cushion and a blanket. "…the hell you doing here?" he asked, keeping his tone conversational.

Dave grunted in reply, shutting the door before making a small bed on the cot in the corner. "…Rose asked me to stay in the block and make sure you didn't die in your sleep," he replied, making himself comfortable. "She's too busy working out that orb bullshit to grubsit you today." He reclined back on the cot, putting a cloth over his eyes in place of his shades.

Karkat chewed his lip, having gone through a thousand ways to bring up their shared blood color, but was now coming up with a blank.

It was bad enough he was constantly reminded of his own Dave…except when this Dave opened his mouth and suddenly Karkat was feeling almost Caliginous. It just wasn't until hours ago that he figured out why.

A loudmouthed asshole who would rather badmouth someone away before he could get hurt, and kept up a fake wall of bravado to hide the fact that he was a fucking coward…this Dave was almost exactly like himself.

God, what a fucking waste.

"…You're a real fucking asshole, you know that?"

Karkat's eyes snapped open, looking over in Dave's direction, seeing that the other candy-red hadn't even moved to speak. "…the fuck do you mean by that?" he asked, most confused than offended.

Dave's hands clenched into his blanket. "Just gonna lie there and pretend you didn't see my blood," he replied, sounding more like he was talking to himself than to Karkat. "I fucking SAW you, you fuckass. I saw the way you got when you saw my blood. You got a broken fucking sternum going after Clovis, you idiot." His hands began shaking slightly. "…Now you're just gonna sit there like nothing happened—"

"Oh shut the fuck up, Strider!" Karkat snapped, wincing as he sat up, glowering over at him. "You cant even…..I…..FUCK!" He buried his face in his hands, gnashing his teeth. "YOU'RE NOT HIM! YOU'RE NOT MY DAVE!" FUCK, now he was fucking CRYING. "YOU JUST HAD TO BE MY FUCKING BLOOD COLOR, DIDN'T YOU!? THIS GODDAMN UNIVERSE HAD TO FIND SOME OTHER WAY TO FUCKING TORTURE ME! FUCK! FUCK!"

He sobbed harder, not able to control his emotions anymore. Whether it was from his lack of sleep, the pain he was in, the bullshit he had been putting up with, or a combination of all three, it didn't even seem to matter as it all came pouring out. He missed Dave. He wondered if he was even ALIVE. He hated the conflicting, vacillating emotions that were making his think pan and blood pusher hurt.

Arms curled around his shoulders and a hand began papping at his head, the familiar motion calming him down against his better judgement. Almost like a miracle, he was back with Dave, being held and shooshpapped after watching a particularly emotionally-draining scene from one of his romcoms (something no one else BUT Dave had witnessed). Any minute now, he was going to suggest a bromance flick to lighten the mood…

Reality came down heavy like a thick fog when Dave began making soothing purring sounds, something his Dave was never capable of making. The worst part was, it was working. He let out a shaky sigh, letting his body unclench, leaning against Dave quietly. He could pretend for a while longer. After all this fuckery, he thought he was OWED some comfort.

"…I know I'm not your fucking moirail," Dave said quietly, petting Karkat's head, "but god fucking DAMN it if I know what it's like to see your Pale crush and not be able to have 'em. It's fucking torture." He sighed, hugging Karkat tighter. "I figured you'd…understand."

Karkat did. He understood TOO fucking well. He settled down, dropping off to sleep, feeling better than he had in what felt like weeks.

He woke up some hours later before the sun set, finding he was out of the recuperacoon and instead on Dave's cot. He was confused for a moment before recalling Rose saying too much time in that slime could rot his insides, deftly reaching up to touch his chest. There was only a dull ache of a bruise left, something he was sure would be healed by next sunrise.

Karkat looked around, frowning when he spotted Dave lying on the floor next to the cot, the cloth he put around his eyes having slipped away. Karkat noticed for the first time that Dave's eyes had scars around the edges, like someone had attempted to claw them out.

His gut clenched slightly, wondering just how deep Dave's hatred of his blood color ran, having the suspicion that Dave might have made those scars himself seeing his blood color show up in his eyes. Karkat himself dreaded that day that would happen. It was a stupid fear, considering everyone who mattered already knew what his blood color was, but it was a deep-seated and real fear…like somehow SEEING it all the time would change how they treated him.

Maybe he'd take to wearing shades like Dave.

He laid back down, rubbing his own eyes, wondering if his mutation would make them change color sooner than anyone else. It certainly seemed to have done so for Dave. John too, come to find, but that was a whole other can of worms. He stared up at the ceiling, mulling over last night.

He told himself it was just a one-time replacement moment, but it still didn't feel like it. He could feel it in his blood pusher, the Pale feelings for the troll on the floor, and it pained him. This was WAY too hair-thin of a line in determining if it was Pale infidelity. It WAS Dave, but it WASN'T Dave. The attitude may be different, but the SOUL was the same. He let out a muffled groan. None of his romcoms or books ever touched on THIS subject, FUCK no.

Karkat sighed, sitting up and easing himself off the cot, pausing before picking up the blanket and laying it over Dave. 'What a gigantic clusterfuck,' he thought to himself, slipping quietly from the room, making his way to Rose's nutritionblock for some coffee. 'Just a giant fucking pile of clusterfucking shit.'