I am sososososo sorry for the really late update, I started school last week and I have just been really busy. So, updates will hopefully be on the weekends, and every other weekend at the lastest, but don't hold it against me if im late. With out further ado:

The boy's skin was slate-grey. His fingers were gentle; a deep contrast to what the sharp nails upon them suggested they were intended for. I couldn't see all of him. Just his fingers, like it was a block in my memory. His eyes…were piercing through me. The gaze I felt under his intense, blood-red eyes made me shiver. Why did he seem so familiar?

"John." The boy's voice sounded rough, like he'd been crying or screaming for a very, very long time.

"John….John, please come home…" Home? What was "home" never had that been an existence for me. I had no inclination to what home felt like.

"John! Please!" the boy's voice underwent a strain of despair. His grip on my arm tightened slightly in his desperation, but just as suddenly as he was in my line of vision, he vanished into a cloud of slate-grey smoke, his image burned in my brain.

I awoke in a cold-sweat. The blankets were twisted around my body in a way that I felt I was cocooned. I took a shaky breath as I recalled the memories of my dream. Where had my subconscious ever come up with something like that? Who was this strange boy in my dream?

From the moment I woke up, to the moment I went to bed again that night, I couldn't get it out of my head. The whole situation seemed so real, like the boy had been with me, right next to me, whispering in my ear. And yet I couldn't put a face to the voice I'd heard. It seemed like I knew him, from where I couldn't possibly know. The only places I'd ever been for long periods of time were at the orphanage, and here at this hellish dump.

"John!" I jumped in surprise and looked up at Jake, who was staring at me curiously in my dazed state.

"You all there, kid? Looked like you were about to fly to the moon with that dreamy face on of yours!" he said with a sarcastic chuckle. I smiled back and punched him in the arm playfully.

"Only dreaming about you, right?" Jake laughed and shrugged.

"That is certainly the way to go!" Jade popped into the room at that moment, baring oddly wrapped parcels in her long, pale arms.

"Merry Christmas everybody!" she cried jovially as she began to hand out the small packages. My eyes widened at her burst of energy and announcement. Had I already been here that long? That was nearly nine months! I sighed wearily and rubbed my eyes with the backs of my hands. How could I have let that much time slip by? I needed to get out of here before I shredded myself into a million little pieces, both figuratively and literally.

"Here you go, John! I hope you like it!" she said, smiling widely. I nodded my thanks and smiled back.

"Thanks Jade! Sorry I don't have anything for you, I didn't even know it was Christmas time." The black-haired girl shrugged and shook her head.

"No need, the best present you gave me was being my roommate!" she giggled as she walked off to continue her present-giving. I looked carefully down at the small package covered in brown paper and tied with a white string sitting in my lap. I carefully untied the string and unwrapped the present, taking my time to not tear the paper. I opened the gift to find hidden beneath its brown concealments a light blue t-shirt. My eyes widened at this magnificent little beauty, and my heart swelled in my chest with happiness. I had come to this place with only the things in my back-pack from the orphanage, which wasn't much.

I turned the shirt around to look at the front and found it had a little, darker blue, swirly symbol on the front of it. I sighed with happiness, and turned to Jade who was sitting across from me.

"Thank you so much!" I exclaimed with feeling. Jade just smiled simply and nodded her head, turning away.

His hands balled into fists as he shouted and growled at the others. His blood-red eyes burned with frustration.

"Why isn't he fucking here? Where the hell did he go?!" I still couldn't see all of him, just flashes of his eyes, and his hands curled into and pulling soft, thick, jet-black hair, and arms flailing about to accentuate his exasperation.

"Relax, Kk, he'll come back soon."

"And how the hell do you know, Electrofuck? You never even fucking met him. You don't know anything." The boy's voice was coarse from shouting as he growled at his companion. I heard other hushed voices mumbling and whispering about him and the situation. They were looking for someone.

"Relax, we are all going through shit for you, Kk and you just give us crap about the whole gog damned situation. Have you ever thought that maybe this Johnny character just died? He WAS a mutation of some kind, after all." I watched as his eyes filled with over whelming emotions. First there was hurt, then grief, and finally anger which seemed to be the most common of his altering feelings.

"Fuck." He pounded his fist onto a black table and closed his piercing eyes as red tears began to pool from beneath the lids. "John. Come home."

I awoke again in the same cold sweat wrapped in my blankets. The dreams never stopped. Every night I was visited by the same boy with slate-grey skin and blood-red eyes. He was always full of frustration and sadness, as if he'd lost something dear to him that he truly felt he would never get back. And every dream ended the same with him calling out my name and begging me, with such desperation, for me to just come home. Wherever "home" was. A dark, dank place filled with prostitution and fucking glitter suits.

I sighed as I stood out of my bed and got dressed for my day off. Jade was already up and about, spreading her everyday cheer for the whole world to see. I went to the food hall and grabbed some breakfast before heading to Roxy's room. She surprisingly had a fantastic selection of books in her possession, and let me borrow them as long as I told her about it.

"JOHN!" I was attacked from behind by a strange British man. "John. Where are you off to?" Jake bounced behind me, hands in his pockets. I turned and plastered a smile to my face.

"Off to Roxy's room, I'm returning a book to her. What about you?" Jake grinned from ear to ear and draped one of his gangly-long arms around my shoulders. He pressed his lips close to my ear and whispered quietly, "I'm planning an escape."

I turned to him with surprise, eyes widened. How could he plan an escape? There was virtually no way out of this dungeon of a place. I hooked my hand on Jake's shoulder and stopped him.

"How? When?" I asked in a hushed voice, my heart beating wildly in my chest. If there was any way I could get out of here, I would do it in a second. Jake seemed surprised by my forwardness, but I didn't care and he edged it off.

"Once a year, there's a day that everybody has off, even the boss way up top, and he lets us wander around the city for about an hour. During that time, me, Roxy, Jade and Rose are all going to make a run for it. You're more than welcome to join us, lad. We'll be taking whatever we can with us, and never coming back. How's that?" I stared, wide eyed. How could it be that easy? There was just no way.

"If it were that easy, why hasn't anyone done it before?" Jake frowned and wrung his hands out in frustration.

"It's not that, john. It has been done before. Our good friend Dirk left last year, said he'd be back for the rest of us, but he never came. It's just that…for every bloke that leaves….a new one comes." Jake kind of gave me a sideways glance.

"Y-you mean that since Dirk left…." Jake nodded his head.

"You were brought here. The Boss just goes 'round to orphanages and picks attractive people off the streets in need of a home, takes advantage of blokes, he does." I gulped, my glee diminishing a bit. There was always a price for happiness, wasn't there?

"Jooooohnny. You got that book I lentcha?" Roxy drawled from her door frame. I smiled lightly to her and nodded my head, retuning the book to her possession.

"Come on in you ter ferllas! Let's get som hyp….hyap…. happ…happy times goin on hear!" Roxy slurred her words as she waltzed back into her room, obviously drunk out of her mind. Again. Jake chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck.

"I really shouldn't, Roxy. I was just accompanying our good bloke John, here, to your humble abode before heading off to get a few things prepared for next week." Jake whispered the last part, and Roxy's eyes widened slightly.

"Oh, yea. I gotta gte soem stuff ready for taht to!" she whispered coarsely back to Jake as he began to walk down the hall. Roxy threw another couple books at me.

"Get readin', sweet heart, rough couple days we got ahead of us."

Jade included me in her plans to get ready to leave, and as the days knocked by, I felt myself growing more and more weary. I just couldn't imagine why people wouldn't leave the moment they got the chance at this once-a-year opportunity. This place was horrible; we never got to see the sunshine, were kept in a basement for our whole lives, and sent to have sex with strangers at the price of our "boss". Most of everybody I had spoken to over the months was kidnapped, adopted from orphanages, or taken off the streets. Very few were from pleasurable backgrounds, but anything would be better than this, wouldn't it?

And on top of all that, my dreams became more frantic. Every passing night sent the boy in my dreams further into his angry, frustrated spiral. He didn't interact with the people around him well and often lashed out at the slightest things. He was becoming more and more frightened and desperate. He was slowly but surely losing hope for what he was searching for. Every dream ended in his same, groping hope that I would return "home", and it struck me down. I had never seen anybody like this boy before; he had grey skin and red eyes for crying out loud, but I couldn't help but feel so familiar to him. Maybe it was the fact that I had had so many dreams of him that he seemed close to me, or the fact that I felt his desperation, his need. We were the same, searching for the unattainable with worthless hopes and impossible dreams.

"Come on, John. We've got to get going now. Grab your stuff! Oh my, this is so exciting!" Jade babbled light heartedly as she packed a small bag of clothes and stuffed her wallet with some money. I nodded my head and did much the same, packing up my back pack and wearing the shirt Jade gave me for Christmas. I took one last look around the room that I'd "lived" in for so long, the place of my worst nightmares and best dreams. I rubbed the arm that was so badly scared from my previous endeavors and shivered as my fingers brushed over the uneven skin. This was it. This was my moment to shine and be rid of the horrors I had so previously endured.

I turned as Jade opened the door and there was a sudden commotion. I heard shouts of pain and yelling and feet padding roughly against the hard, stone floor of the hallway.

"RUN!" Was a howled scream from down the way. Jade turned to me, eyes wide with worry. My heart was pounding in my chest, my breath hitched as another scream was heard.

What is going on? Jade ran out the door toward the sound of the noise, and I followed her with a pounding head and burning adrenaline. I saw Jake running wildly in my direction, tears streaming down his face and eyes red and wide with fear.

"Jake! Jake, what the hell happened?!" Jade yelled at him, stopping in the hallway and grabbing his shoulders. Jake was trembling from head to toe, his hands were shaking terribly.

"Th-The police, they found out about this place…and they're coming." Jake broke down into tears and rubbed at his eyes. "S-so the Boss is getting rid of the evidence….he's burning the whole place down!"

The world, at that moment froze. Jake was still crying, and people were running around to no avail, and Jade threw her glasses off and was crying with him, but I couldn't hear their sobs. I couldn't feel anything. The world was turning, the earth was breathing, it was alive, but very, very soon, none of us would be.

And I began to run. I ran away from it all. I ran away from Jade, and from Jake, who were crying in each other's arms. I ran away from the screams and yells, and the flashing lights and strange, acidic smells that penetrated the hall. I ran from Roxy, whose short, blonde hair was singed and black, just like her skin. I ran from the door that I knew was colored orange and red and yellow and blue and black with flames and smoke and soot. I ran from my life, I ran from all I had ever known. I ran from "the boss" because I hated him for what he'd done to me, emotionally and physically. I ran from the orphanage because they let him take me away. I ran from Dave because the wonderful memories I had of him made my heart beat wildly in my chest with pain and fear. I ran from myself, because I knew that I was long gone. John, or Johnny, or whoever I was had disappeared so long ago. I had no idea who I was, and I didn't care. I didn't care because I was nobody; I was an empty, invisible shell of a human being indistinguishable from the rest. I was never particularly liked, never fit in, always the odd one out. There was six years of me that was never accounted for, six years gone that could have told me some part of who I was meant to be. An artist? A taxi cab driver? A family man with lots of money, a pretty wife, and cute kids? None of these things, these normal, human, everyday things fitted me because I didn't fit them. There was something off. But now, in this empty shell of an individual, I am finding something.

I am finding that I never could have fit into Earth's schedule. It was like trying to fit a circle peg in a triangular whole; I would never work. I was much better off dying off and burning to the ground, letting my imperfect bones and skin and flesh and brain melt into the dying, burnt soil with the burnt rock and rubble.

I hid behind a shelf in the furthest leg of the hall. It was a room I had never seen before, with large, strange machines with big buttons and drills and platforms big enough for people to stand on. It was one of these platforms I sat upon while I hid from the slowly approaching flames and gasses. I heard the screams, I heard the cries, I felt the heat, and smelled the poison, I tasted the acidity in the air, but there was nowhere else for me to run. My life had taken a turn for the worst, and now I was going to die a lonely kid in the basement of a whore house.

Tears were streaming down my face as the sobs wracked my body. Fear and pain were slowly taking its course as my heart was beating wildly in my chest, my veins pumping thoroughly with adrenaline and my whole body trembling. As the flames burst through the door, and began to consume the contents of the room, I thought about the boy from my dream. His most desperate wish was to find the boy named John. Or Johnny. Or whatever. He wanted him home. He always asked for him, always in disparity. Nothing could soothe him. I hoped with all my heart that the boy of my imagination and unconscious dreams had finally gotten his wish; that Johnny was coming home and they would finally be together again. I hoped that his only wish would come true, singularly because there was no way mine ever would. I would be stuck here for eternity; there was not a chance I would ever, ever get out of this hell.

The flames flickered closer and slowly but surely caught onto my clothing. It burned. And it hurt. It hurt like hell. But it was a good pain. It meant I was still alive. Although my skin was melting, and my hair was burning, and everything was fucking on fire, I liked it because it was better than the emptiness I always felt. I welcomed the pain, and when I screamed, it was pure agony. But it was good agony. I screamed and cried, but my tears were not nearly enough to put out the flames of the fire that burned all around me, within me.

I thought about the boy's red eyes, and how when he cried, his tears were the color of the blood that had dripped down my arm when I cut it. I thought of his gentle claws, and his slate-grey, smooth skin without a blemish upon it. I thought about his thick, lovely black hair. The few things I had ever seen of him, I cherished. I held onto him in my last bits of consciousness as the flames burned me and the smoke filled my lungs. I coughed and coughed and cried and screamed.

"I want to go home!" I cried out as tears spilled from my smoke-misted eyes. The pain grew to its maximum as I saw a flash of blinding light and felt a burst of wind blast over my body, leaving a wonderful, cool sensation. My body felt burned and crispy, my mouth was dry and I couldn't speak to save my life. Soon, the light died down and there was only darkness.

I must be dead. Is this what death is like? This numbness? This opaque black? It's like ink. I can't see anything at all. Oh. Wait. No. there is definitely no numbness. That hurt like a bitch. I felt a sounds gurgle from my throat, as a sounds echoed through my black haven.

"K…zzz"

"Ka…les…"

"Karkles!" I slowly cracked open my eye lids, and immediately wished I hadn't. Bright light impeded my vision and made me squeeze my eyes shut again. But there was a voice. I definitely heard a voice.

"Karkles….he's awake I think…..he tastes all burnt. Who the hell decided to have Johnny stew?" There was a cackle of laughter. Was it the voice of an angel? I tried to open my eyes again, and this time the light wasn't so horrendous. I made out a shadowy black outline above my head. It slowly came into view, but I had to squint.

The most I could see was the outline of a girl's head….but she was wearing something on her head that pointed out, kinda like…horns. Wait. What? Suddenly everything came into focus. For a very, very brief moment, everything was perfectly clear. I was in a large, grey-painted room, and there was a girl with large red sunglasses on her face and her tongue hanging out of her mouth. Her shoulder length black hair framed her grey face in a pretty way, but I hardly noticed that. I noticed that her skin was grey and she had actual horns coming out of her head. I felt my blood run cold, if I in fact, had any left. My throat made a strangled noise when the girl cackled and lifted her head to look at something on the other side of the room.

"Come 'ere Karkat, he opened his pretty blue eyes, just for youuuuuuuuuuuuu~" the girl cackled out a laugh and walked away from me. I couldn't see the other figure on the other side of the room, because even the slightest movement made burning, crippling pain seer through my whole body. The figure from across the room slowly came into view. This was a boy. His hair was crazy and splayed all over the place, but there weren't many distinct features I could make out. My mind was getting hazy again, and everything was blurry. I saw his figure come closer, so that his face must've been right over mine.

"Welcome home John."

It was then that my vision completely went and I was back in my muddled darkness, where all I could sense was the pain in my body and the steady beating of my very much alive heart. I couldn't see his red eyes, or his gentle claws, or his slate-grey, smooth skin, or see the thickness of his wild, jet-black hair, but I could definitely recognize the voice of the pretty-eyed boy from my countless dreams.

Sooooo, what do ya think? Did I rush it too much? Did this come to soon? What did you like? Hate? Want to claw my eyes out for? Please let me know in a review!