Sollux was never terribly good at dealing with people.
It was one thing to chat with people over a client. In that environment, he was still physically in a comfortable and private setting, and he could reply to those chatting to him at his leisure. It wasn't as difficult as trying to maintain a physical conversation. In those arenas, a reply was expected at once. Sollux still hadn't really grasped the finer points of pacing when exchanging information via auditory means.
And so it was that his replies were delayed and only vaguely relevant to Karkat's needling.
"As leader, I'm just saying that I should be aware of the general well-being of everyone in the immediate vicinity. Because as over-fucking-joyed as it would make me to hear that you threaded that guy's douchebag scarf through his digestive tract and hung him up to dry like an old pair of shitstained underpants, I kind of need to hear it first. That you did that. Because otherwise I have to worry about him coming up here in a rejected rage and trashing the shit out of the only habitable place on this rock."
Sollux had seated himself back at his computer, his brow slightly furrowed as he scrolled through the transtimeline bulletin he had opened up. His timeline had extended before him on the screen in the color of his yellow text. He let his mouse hover over it, and where he had coded the timelines to yield view ports to allow the user to see who they were interacting with, instead a gray screen appeared.
Perfect. He had just opened the thing and already he was having problems with it. He had to figure that his future self would never let it be that easy.
"Also, you're making a huge mess everywhere with your blood. I swear to god, I can't keep this place even remotely hygienic with you assholes running around. I had an easier time cleaning up after a ten foot crab lusus with stomach problems and some kind of weird pillow pinching fetish. Seriously, does no one know how to bandage wounds? Do you guys just like bleeding everywhere like fucking open packets of grubloaf mucus? You just enjoy watching your fluids drip all over this pristine floor, or what?"
"He'th probably crying to himthelf or thomething, I thtopped giving a shit," Sollux replied at last, cutting into Karkat's tirade as he tried clicking on a section of the transtimeline bulletin that was listed as a future post. An 'x' appeared over his mouse. More encryption. Now this was just getting irritating.
"Who are we even talking about? I was talking about grubloaf mucus and the fact that you need to get yourself a fucking tourniquet for the yellow slop you're getting all over the floor. If you're talking about the dumbass you tried to deal with, sorry, but that topic train left a long time ago. It pulled out of the fucking station, blowing its whistle, and I, the goddamned conductor, stuck my prongs out the window and waved as you stared blankly ahead like the lobotomized woolbeast that you are."
Karkat crossed his arms then as if to punctuate his finality on the matter. Sollux wasn't exactly eager to continue listening to the idiot berate him with tangential metaphors, so he didn't tag the little speech with any sort of reply. Instead he began attempting to look through the source coding of the transtimeline bulletin. If his future self had truly thought to encrypt later messages from him, he couldn't imagine it would be terribly hard to undo. And it only served to make him more curious about what could be so forbidden that he would encrypt it from himself.
Karkat narrowed his eyes, and Sollux could see him begin fidgeting in angry impatience out of the corner of his eye. "Okay, just because I'm the nicest fucking guy there is, I'll stop the topic train and allow you to drag your drooling woolly ass on board if you want," Karkat said at last, the phrase bursting irritably from his mouth. "So you didn't kill Eridan? I mean, I just want to keep a tally of which of you assholes has or has not managed to get yourself killed at this point. I mean, we've been sitting in this lab for a few hours, I'm surprised we haven't managed to get a healthy body count going yet."
Sollux squinted at his screen. He was unpleasantly surprised to see that the encryption was a complicated one. Certainly one he had no knowledge of. He wondered how far of a future self had put such an encryption in place. It was a fluctuating code as well, it would seem. As the bubble indicating his current self snailed up through his yellow timeline, the encryption would decay and allow him to make or read posts.
Still, the purpose of the bulletin system had been to get in contact with his future incarnations. If the entirety of the future was blocked off to him, it completely defeated the purpose of setting up the damned thing in the first place.
Suddenly he understood why Karkat always referred to his future self as such an asshole.
"All right, my generosity is dropping like a one-legged lussus on a unicycle," Karkat snapped. "I realize that you're no less than the messiah of programming geniuses and that your computer is like your heavenly fucking kingdom, but your amazing virus creating friend is sitting on his ass waiting on your fucking pleasure. He would gladly prostrate himself before your divine figure if you were to spare him one fucking moment of your valuable attention."
"I'm going to hold you to that, KK," Sollux replied, amused enough to get pulled out of his growing irritation at future Sollux. "I exthpect thome groveling now that I'm lithtening."
"That was sarcasm, dipshit. You and I both know that leaders don't bow down to shitty hackers. Like, this has been established. It was highlighted in the stirring leaderly speech I just gave. The one you would have heard if you hadn't gone skipping off to fight douchebag hipster assholes who can get to you using the most asinine methods of provocation ever fucking developed."
"You were probably glad I got him out of your hair for you," Sollux replied, turning to face Karkat at last. "I fucked him up enough to keep holeth out of the wallth for a few dayth at leatht."
"So he's not dead," Karkat stated again, his voice deadpan.
Sollux shrugged. "He might have killed himthelf after the duel, I don't fucking know. He'th the motht pathetic excuthe for a troll I've ever met."
"More pathetic than you?" Karkat asked.
"Yeth, I'm even willing to admit that much," Sollux replied. "I'm too pithed off to be deprethed and thelf-loathing right now. It wathn't even a duel, KK, he jutht ran hith thtupid ath around, and then bathically jutht thtarted hitting on me in the motht embarrathing way pothible. Tho I fucking told him that he wath being a dethperate jackath and that everyone within an eight mile radiuth could thee it. And he got all lip wobbly and he'th probably fucking crying down there, like I thaid."
Karkat threw his hands up in disbelief. "Wonderful. You hurt his feelings. Fan-fucking-tastic job you did with that, remind me to write you an elaborate message in customized stationary as an expression of my gratitude. In the mean time, I'm going to go bench press a couple of the robot parts that the sweaty douchebag left lying around. Because now it's become necessary to prepare my shoulder so that I can accept the fishboy wonder's enormous head when he blubbers his feelings onto it."
"You're welcome," Sollux replied before turning back to his computer.
Karkat was reduced to a string of profanities before he could come around to something more coherent, which went something like, "And I'm going to encourage him to fucking duel with you again. Every time the notion comes up, I'm going to encourage it, because you are that much of an unforgivable jackass who doesn't appreciate any of the nice things I do for you."
He stormed off then, going back to his computer and pounding on the keyboard furiously before Terezi came up to bother him. Sollux cocked an eyebrow at his nubby-horned leader as he noticed there were no especially heavy looking robot parts lying near Karkat's computer. Apparently the threat of Eridan's enormous head was not nearly as large as Karkat made it sound.
In the mean time, Sollux had a nasty encryption to deal with.
He began scouring the source coding for the bulletin. It was familiar enough to him, seeing as he had been the one to set it up. So the foreign aspects were not difficult to pinpoint. He had just begun piecing them together in a separate document when Trollian began flashing. He switched windows to open up the chat client and saw that he was being messaged by twinArmageddons.
Which was odd, because he was twinArmageddons.
He peered into the window and read the message that had been typed there in familiar yellow text.
FTA: 2o ii've come two giive you a me22age about 2omethiing iincrediibly iimportant.
Sollux frowned. Odd. He lifted his fingers to the keyboard and tapped back a quick reply.
TA: 2o thii2 ii2 future me, huh? ii gue22 ii have two a22ume 2o, 2ince you're u2iing the 2ame handle tag that the bulletiin2 employ. but iit shouldn't be po22ible for you two u2e the tran2tiimliine functiion2 on the trolliian chat cliient. You 2hould only be able two do iit through publiic chat board iinviite2. I 2u2pect 2ome kiind of triickery.
FTA: 2u2pect all you want but ii'd have thought you'd have more faiith iin your2elf as 2ome 2ort of wii2ard hacker or 2omethiing.
FTA: even iif that's a 2tupiid comparii2on 2iince everyone know2 that wii2ard2 don't exii2t.
TA: what the fuck are you even talkiing about? can we 2tay on topiic plea2e? ii'm pretty legiitiimately pii22ed off riight now about thii2 whole encryptiion debacle, and 2iince ii can only a22ume that you're the jacka22 behiind iit, ii'd at lea2t liike to know what your rea2oniing on keepiing me out of my own priivate bulletiin wa2.
FTA: okay fiir2t ju2t let me apologii2e for that wii2ard thiing.
FTA: ii realii2e that ii2 probably uncharacterii2tiic of pa2t me two 2ay. but ii've been hangiin around a certaiin da2hiing 2ea dweller lately 2o hii2 iintere2t2 have been rubbiin off on me.
TA: oh my god.
FTA: ii future 2ollux now thiink wii2ard2 are pretty cool, even iif they are fake.
TA: oh my god, future me ii2 a complete moron.
FTA: no, ii thiink we've come a long way. we've made a lot a decent progre22. e2peciially where quadrant2 are concerned.
TA: no. no no no no no no no.
FTA: ii'm afraiid iit'2 true you can deny iit all you want but ii am future you and 2o ii already know all of thii2.
TA: no ii refu2e two beliieve that any of thii2 ii2 happeniing. thii2 ha2 offiiciially become one of my niightmare2.
FTA: we've even fiilled a paiil or two, we've really come a lot farther than anyone really expected.
TA: my niightmare2 u2ually only iinvolve lot2 of hiideou2 torture and viiolent death though. thii2 ii2 beyond anythiing my fucked up 2kull could even come up wiith.
FTA: ii gue22 thii2 ii2 probably why future you encrypted the board. pa2t you ii2 haviin a really hard tiime dealiin wiith all thii2.
FTA: and when ii 2ay future you ii actually mean future me. future-y-er me.
TA: thii2 can't be real. can you plea2e tell me that thii2 wa2 all 2ome 2ort of twii2ted joke you devii2ed a2 a te2t of my mettle to 2ee iif ii qualiifiied to u2e the bulletiin.
TA: becau2e iif 2o, wow, that ii2 fucked up, even by my 2tandard2.
FTA: okay, ii'm tryiin to be 2eriiou2 wiith you and you ju2t contiinue to shoot me down. ii gue22 ii 2hould have expected a2 much. pa2t me wa2 a pretty 2tubborn a22hole.
TA: ii mean, ii know ii have tho2e day2 where ii feel liike the lou2iie2t piiece of 2hiit on the planet, but ii don't thiink ii could ever develop a level of 2elf-loathiing that would warrant abu2iing the mental facultiie2 of my pa2t 2elf on thii2 2cale.
FTA: ii'm feeliin pretty abu2ed now my2elf. kiinda startiin to wonder how any of your future event2 were po22iible wiith you beiin iin 2uch a clo2ed off 2tate a miind.
TA: ii can't even handle thii2. ii am 2econd2 away from blockiing future me forever, becau2e thii2 ii2 ju2t two depre22iing for me two deal wiith riight now.
FTA: you diidn't even li2ten two me, a22hole. you can't block me untiil ii relay 2ome viital iinformatiion becau2e iif you thiink that talkiin to pa2t me ii2 fun iit'2 not.
FTA: pa2t me probably would've found a more clever way two word that or 2omethiing but ii'm runniin 2hort on tiime here.
TA: ii can't even block you. ii don't know what ii2 wrong wiith me. ii actually triied two. my mou2e wa2 hovering over the button and everythiing.
TA: maybe ii'm entertaiiniing 2ome kiind of twii2ted fa2ciinatiion wiith a future me that ha2 apparently fiilled a bucket wiith eriidan.
TA: ii mean, 2eriiou2ly, tell me that wa2 ju2t two goad me. becau2e there'2 nothiing el2e that would di2gu2t me more riight now. 2o ii'm telliing you, future diip2hiit, two confe22 to your elaborate ru2e.
TA: well played, ii totally fliipped out. whatever 2ort of ju2tiice you meant to 2erve ha2 been 2erved. on a biig 2iilver nutriitiion plateau.
FTA: that wa2n't a joke and you're kiinda 2tartiin two up2et me wiith how badly you're takiin iit
FTA: liike ii thought that thii2 wa2 the begiinniing where the whole relatiinon2hiip got 2tarted. at lea2t that'2 what future-y-er me 2aiid.
FTA: now ii'm 2tartiin two thiink that he wa2 ju2t pulliin my fiin.
FTA: ii mean leg.
FTA: ii do fi2h pun2 now two ii mean how cra2y ii2 that ha ha ha.
TA: holy fuck ii thiink my braiin ju2t exploded iin my head. both of them.
TA: ii 2eriiou2ly ju2t felt 2omethiing rupture.
TA: maybe you're riight, maybe thii2 ii2 where thii2 2o called relatiion2hiip got 2tarted. becau2e you broke my braiin2, ii now feel de2tabiilii2ed enough to con2iider paiil fiilliing wiith that moron.
FTA: wow really?
TA: no, a22hole. iit wa2 a joke.
TA: ha
TA: 2ee, and that wa2 a laugh.
TA: becau2e ii made a joke.
TA: it wa2 a pretty fuckiing bad one that only de2erved two letter2 of text expre22iing miirth though.
FTA: ii fuckiin get that you made a joke jacka22 do you want congratulatiion2 or 2omethiing?
FTA: be2iide2 you 2eemed iin a pretty decent caliigiinou2 2tate of miind when we diid the deed. well, when pa2t me and future you diid the deed.
FTA: not that any of iit really matter2 anymore ii gue22.
TA: okay, weren't you on 2ome kiind of a tiime liimiit here?
FTA: 2orry ii gue22 ii ju2t wanted one la2t 2par wiith you.
FTA: 2iince iit look2 liike future me wiill be encryptiin all thi2 in 2hort order.
FTA: 2o ii gue22 all ii have two 2ay ii2 that you 2hould go back iin tiime iif your relatiion2hiip wiith eriidan ever hit2 a rough patch.
TA: you mean the relatiion2hiip that ii won't have becau2e thii2 ii2 all 2ome kiind of perverted prank?
FTA: ye2 that one.
FTA: ii mean ii'm not even iin the mood two defend iit anymore 2iince you obviiou2ly can't even entertaiin the po22iibiiliity of iit happeniin.
TA: al2o, 2top cliippiing your progre22iive verb2 two 2ound liike hiim.
TA: don't thiink ii haven't notiiced that. becau2e ii have, and ii wa2 ju2t tryiing two iignore iit 2o that you diidn't know that your other method of provocatiion wa2 workiing, but iit ii2.
TA: iit'2 actually driiviing my biifurcated braiin2tem to be iin danger of 2nappiing.
TA: 2o congratulatiion2. you've found every way in current exi2tence po22iible two iirriitate the 2hiit out of me.
FTA: oh 2orry, ii diidn't even realii2e ii wa2 doiin iit.
FTA: ii mean doiing iit.
FTA: ii really have ju2t been 2pendiing a lot of tiime around hiim.
TA: ii feel siick.
FTA: well ii'm 2orry you feel that way.
FTA: but ju2t two reiiterate, 2ince ii thiink the maiin poiint wa2 lo2t iin you fliipiin out over a relatiion2hiip that you haven't even had yet, you're 2uppo2ed two go back iin tiime.
TA: okay, ii'll defiiniitely do that. two rectiify my made up relatiionshiip wiith a fii2h douche that wiill never happen.
FTA: ye2. go back iin tiime two the land of brain2 and fire and make hiim come duel wiith you.
FTA: he wa2 awfully lonely when he wa2 iin the land of wrath and angel2, 2o he'll be more receptive two your advance2.
FTA: and that'2 all ii'll 2ay about that.
TA: 2o we're offiiciially through wiith entertaiiniing grubfuckiingly iidiiotiic hypothetiical 2cenario2 de2iigned wiith the expre22 iintent of pii22iing me off?
FTA: yeah ii gue22 2o.
TA: good.
FTA: yeah
FTA: um…
TA: what are we not done?
FTA: no we are ii mean there'2 really nothiing left two 2ay on the matter.
FTA: ii gue22 ii ju2t thought thii2 would go 2moother.
FTA: ii mean ii hope ii diidn't fuck anythiing up thii2 wa2 kiinda my only chance.
TA: on any other day, ii'd iinquiire about that, but ii've come two the conclusiion that future me ii2 a complete fuckiing retard, and ii've giiven up tryiing two communiicate wiith hiim or under2tand hiim.
TA: thank2 two you, ii'm now offiiciially dreadiing two become hiim. becau2e eiither you thiink thii2 ii2 all hiilariiou2 and you're doiing iit two provoke me or you actually genuiinely beliieve iin iit.
TA: ii don't know whiich ii2 wor2e hone2tly. ii mean eiither way ii've totally lo2t my fuckiing 2hiit.
FTA: you'll be okay iin the future. future-y-er you know2 what he'2 doiin.
FTA: ii'm goiing two block you now.
FTA: bye.
Sollux sat back in his chair, staring at the monitor even after the chat window went gray and text appeared over it saying that his future self appeared to be offline.
He wasn't sure how he was supposed to take what had just transpired. He was quite sure it had to be some kind of morbid joke. And yet a part of him had the horrifying thought that his future self had taken all of that seriously. And that part of him was larger than he wanted to admit.
It couldn't be possible that he would end up forming any sort of quadrant with the asshole he had just gotten done physically and verbally battering. No incarnation of his, not future or otherwise, would ever find someone with such devastatingly low self respect attractive. Not that devastatingly low self respect was Eridan's only fault, because it wasn't. Sollux could probably draw up a list of detestable qualities so long that he could make a new scarf for the douchebag.
And then choke him with it.
Because he wanted to kill Eridan.
Not fuck him.
He was still fuming over the situation when he heard the scrape of chair legs against tile. He blinked and looked up as he saw Feferi sitting beside him, smoothing out her particolored skirt. She seemed to feel his gaze on her, and met his eyes with a cheerful smile.
"Heeeey Sollux," she said, her voice light. "I'm glad to see that you survived that duel with my old grumpy moirail."
He sighed. He was never sure he wanted to reciprocate Feferi's feelings, but hers was the most welcome voice he had heard in quite a while. Especially since her competition on that front was one obnoxious raving leader, a tremendous whiny dipfish, and the promise of a loss of mental faculties upon moving a few hours into the future.
"I'm fine. I already thtopped bleeding too." He patted his shoulder gingerly for emphasis. "The whole thing wath pretty dithappointing to be honetht."
"Do you want to glub about it for a bit? I'm always good for lending an auditory duct," Feferi replied.
"I already went through everything with KK," Sollux replied, rubbing his eyes under his glasses. "And honethtly there'th really nothing to thay about it. It wath jutht pathetic and thad, like I thaid."
"I see. Well, I know he can be a big pain to deal with. I've had to put up with it for a long time. I mean, I guess he was kind of helpful in his own crabby way, but sometimes I don't think he would've even put up with killing all those lusi for me if they hadn't provided him with so many opportunities to play his silly games."
"Yeah, that'th jutht it I gueth," Sollux said, something flaring in his chest. A little ache that felt like anger. "How could anyone find any good qualitieth in him? I mean, even if they've lotht all their mental facultieth, there'th jutht nothing there to like. Ith there?"
"Weeeeeeeeell, I don't know. I know I could never find anything really. I guess that's why it was so hard being his moirail. I understand that moirails are supposed to be really different from each other to sort of balance everything out. But I think we were too different. I couldn't really get any satisfaction out of the moiraillegiance. He's a pretty shellfish guy." She had to pause to laugh at her fish pun. "Sorry, I know this is probably supposed to be serious, but I just can't help it!"
"Well, I don't really give a shit about the punth," Sollux confessed. "Frankly they make talking about that douchebag tool thound like a huge joke. Which it ith. Everything contherning him ith jutht a huge joke."
"Kiiiiind of," Feferi conceded. "I don't know if it's because I said it to him so many times to console him whenever he was feeling unloved, but I do think there's someone out there for him. I just hope that the someone has a lot more patience than I do!"
Sollux let his fingers hover over his keyboard out of habit before he realized he was talking to someone in real life, and there wasn't even a programming file up for him to work on absently while he talked. He let his hands drop onto his lap and looked back to Feferi.
"Yeth, they'd have to have a lot of patienthe. And probably a hole in their thpine bulge."
She laughed. "He's pretty persistent though. I know I'm not his moirail anymore, but sometimes I feel like I still need to talk to him and keep him under control. I guess it's really hard letting go of old habits!"
"If you're meaning to talk to him about not trying to duel with me anymore, don't," Sollux replied, his tone a deal angrier than he had meant it to sound.
She blinked at him, her eyes almost comically large behind her pink swim goggles. "Do you like dueling with him, Sollux?"
"Why the fuck doeth everyone think I have thome thort of a thing for him?" Sollux snapped, his tone now just as angry as he meant it to be. "I think he'th a tool and future me will never ever think otherwithe becauthe I am going to kill mythelf before it happenth. The reathon I told you to butt out wath becauthe I don't think you should have to deal with hith raging idiothy."
"I guess that's nice and everything, but I'm offering to solve the problem for you in a much faster way. Because I like you a lot Sollux." She didn't even blush when she said it. It was just a simple truth. And Sollux had learned very quickly that as cheerful as Feferi was, she wasn't afraid to be honest.
"Thankth," he replied feebly. She really was great moirail material. She had a way of making his numerous bad moods feel rather pointless and stupid. So the fact that she had been completely ineffective on Eridan was a testament to the sea dweller's hopelessness.
Either that or the level of his antagonism.
He tried to banish the thought, but it clung to brains like a bloodbiter, draining the rest of his mind into its expanding abdomen. Because Eridan was indeed the polar opposite of Feferi as far as Sollux was concerned. The nooksniffing god complex with fins had a way of infuriating him which even the likes of Karkat and Vriska couldn't touch.
It was something he had always been distantly aware of. Like air. But like air, it wasn't something that was ever at the fore as far as his attention was concerned. He breathed it and noticed if it tasted or smelled funny sometimes. But he wasn't ever acutely aware of its relevance to extending his lifespan.
Not that he wanted to afford Eridan the importance of air, but the simile was still relevant. Especially now that his jackanus of a future self had made him paranoid on the subject of air. Or, literally speaking, Eridan. Before all of the dumbfuckery regarding pail filling as an inevitable part of his future, Sollux had been perfectly content to regard Eridan's uncanny ability to antagonize him with nonchalance. Ignoring Eridan's effects on him had been as easy as breathing air.
But now future him had had the equivalent of a noxious bout of flatulence all over Sollux's clean and perfectly ignorable air. Now the mucus surrounding his bisected brains had become so thick with worry that he felt as if he were about to have a violent hemorrhage. What if Eridan's antagonism worked as well as it did because Sollux actually did have caliginous feelings for the seasucker?
"Are you okay?" Feferi asked, her head tilted slightly to the side. "You look a little green around the gills." She giggled, a lock of her voluminous hair falling over her shoulder. "Sorry, I know you're not a sea dweller, but I like that expression. I use it whenever I can."
"I don't want you to talk to Eridan," Sollux said, though his voice sounded sick even to him. "I thaid I wathn't going to drag you into thith meth. Tho I'm not going to. I refuthe to. He'th been a thorn in my thide for a while now, to be honetht. And a troll my age should have killed thomeone by now. And I don't mean that shit that happened with Aradia, I mean purpotheful thlaughter againtht thomeone who detherveth it."
"You're going to kill him?" Feferi asked, her eyes widening with surprise. "I mean, I know you talk about killing people a lot, but this sounds kind of serious!"
"It ith theriouth. He put me off of it before with hith dethperate attemptth at forming a kithmethith, but now I have to. If I ever want any hope of achieving a thtabilized thinkpan, it can't be while that fish thucking thlimebag ith thtill alive."
"Well, I don't really know how I feel about that!" Feferi confessed, her tone adopting a note uneasiness. "I mean, I like how cranky you can get over just about anything. It's so cute! I also like when you get all depressed, because then you're willing to glub about feelings, but never in an overly dramatic and irritating way. I don't know what I'd do if you weren't like that anymore."
Sollux sighed. "I don't mean Eridan hath any thort of control over my perthonality. My issueth with mood thwingth have more fundamental rootth than that. Like the fact that I have two goddamned brainth which claw at each other every night and torment me with bloody dreamth."
He shivered at the thought, and suddenly the lab felt uncomfortably cold.
"I'm thorry, I jutht can't deal with thith right now. I have to go thomewhere to think. And maybe butht thith encryption tho that I can get thome thtraight anthwerth from a future-y-er me. Maybe he'll be more thane."
He pushed his chair away from the desk, not bothering to explain himself further to a now very confused looking Feferi. She would not try to stop him though. Not from going off on his own and not from killing Eridan either. In a way, he wished she felt stronger for her old moirail.
Because Sollux had said that the purpose of the next duel would be to kill Eridan. But he was not so sure if he had ever meant it.
He was not so sure of anything anymore.