John Gets a Little Drunk With Nepeta

You head out the door and walk down the hall to the elevator. While you wait for it to come up, you wonder who else Jade brought with her. She's not usually very trusting of strangers, not since someone wouldn't stop trolling her when she was thirteen. It turned out to be your friend, Karkat, playing a prank, but she never quite got over it. It took her years for her to forgive him. The elevator dings and you step into it and press the ground floor button. The elevator doors slide open to reveal an empty lobby. You walk over to the lounge and sit down in one of the huge chairs, pulling your feet up and opening your book, The Fault in Our Stars, which Jade had insisted you read. You were about halfway through and it was REALLY, REALLY good. You kick your shoes off and start to read.

"John, wake up. JOHN." Someone's yelling at you.

"Ugh, five more minutes." You say, swatting at their hand, which is shaking your shoulder.

"John, you have the room key. You have to get up." The voice is more insistent now.

"Fine." You groan and sit up, blinking. Your glasses are hanging half off your face and your book is on the floor. "Aw, I lost my place." You say, straightening your glasses. You turn to see Jade and about seven other people standing around. "Did you bring this many people?!" You say, looking around at them and picking up your book and handing it to Jade.

"Well, yes. But it's not entirely my fault! Look who I ran into!" She says, pulling a short, wild haired, angry looking guy over to you.

"Karkat! Hey, I haven't seen you in forever!" You grab him and pull him into a tight hug.

"Hey, get off me!" He says, pushing on you. He's surprisingly quiet and you wonder if you had exaggerated how loud he was over time.

"Oh, come on. I haven't seen you in like three years. I get to hug you." You say pulling him in tighter. "You still dating Terezi?" You ask, finally letting him go.

"Uh, ya, she's around here somewhere. TEREZI." He yells, loud enough to wake up the drunk guy at the bar. Nope, you didn't exaggerate. He was just tired. A girl with dark brown hair and red glasses pushed her way out of the mess of people, sniffing at the air.

"Is that Johnny I smell? And Jade?" She says, poking you with her dragon cane. Terezi may be blind, but she sure can get around. She has the best sense of smell. It's a little creepy, but pretty cool, too.

"Yup, hey Terezi. Long time no smell." You say as she pulls you in for a hug.

"Hehehe. Yup, haven't smelt you since your cousin's wedding!" She says, pulling your hood over your eyes.

"Hey!" You say, but she's already turned to talk to Jade. You turn back to Karkat who's staring off at the drunken guy at the bar. You poke him. "So, are you gonna introduce me to all these people?"

"Ya, come on." He says, kinda dazed. He pulls a really tall, really muscular guy over to you. The guy is sweating buckets, even though it's below freezing outside and he's wearing a tank top. He's also wearing dark glasses that are extremely cracked and his black hair's pulled back in a ponytail. "This is Equius. Ignore his sweat." Karkat says, seeming even smaller next to Equius. Equius holds a hand out to you. "Pleasure to meet you…" He trails off, looking to you for a name.

"John. John Egbert. Nice to meet you, too." You say, shaking his hand.

"Where's Nepeta?" Karkat asks him.

"Over by the bar, sulking. Since they didn't let her take her claws on the plane she doesn't have them now." Equius says, pointing over to where a small girl is halfway through a pint of beer.

"Let's come back to her. She's an angry drunk." Karkat says, guiding you over the guy you met earlier and a tall guy with the craziest hair you have ever seen. "The one who looks like he can't stand up is Tavros, I think you met him earlier. And next to him is Gamzee." Gamzee looked like he was extremely high and nodded in your direction.

"'Sup motherfucker." He said, his words stilted. You nod back as Karkat drags you over to the girl you saw with Tavros earlier. You hadn't noticed it then, but she had the most beautiful hair you had ever seen. It was indescribable. She wore glasses that had one eye completely darkened and had what looked like a robotic arm.

"This is Vriska. She's a bitch. Stay away from her." Karkat says, starting to drag you away.

"Oh, come on Karkat." She says, grabbing your arm. Her voice was silky smooth. "I'm not that bad. Bluh bluh, huge bitch is all I hear from you! I'm so much more than that Karkles." She said, her voice becoming sickly sweet.

"DON'T CALL ME THAT!" Karkat yelled at her.

"Woah, Karkles, you need to calm down and tell me your cute friend's name." She turned to you.

"J-John." You stutter a little. She was intoxicating.

"Well, John, you gonna take us all up to this magnificent hotel room that we're supposedly staying at?" You nod and turn to go find Jade before she can say anything else. You grab Jade's arm and tell her to follow you up to the hotel room. She calls out for everyone to follow you. Everyone except Nepeta and Equius, who are still at the bar, shuffle after you. You lead them all to the elevators and you all crowd in there. Everyone is deadly silent on the way up. You're sure everyone is exhausted.

You head down the hall and open the door to the hotel room. Everyone pushes in, desperate to sit down, and Tavros falls on top of Gamzee. You pull them to their feet and get everyone's attention. "Alright, there's three bedrooms, each one can have two people in it. That means only six people can sleep in beds and the rest of us will have to make other arrangements. Dave, the guy who's paying for all this, already has one bed, so if someone wants to bunk with him, feel free."

"Equius is going to want the uh, couch and Nepeta will probably just sleep on top of some pillows or uh, something." Tavros says stumbling over to the kitchen chairs and plopping down on one.

"Tavros should get a bed. He flails around in his sleep so much he'll fall off anything else." Vriska calls from the kitchen. "I'll call down to reception and get a cot. I won't be sleeping much anyway. Germany has the best beer. I'll be at bars all night long."

"I'll get a cot as well. I don't need to sleep in a bed." You say, heading for the phone to call the front desk.

"John, no. I'll sleep on the cot, you can sleep in a bed. You need the sleep more than I do!" Jade says, grabbing the phone out of your hand and placing it back on the receiver.

"Let's just draw a chart. This is too confusing." Karkat shouts from the couch where he planted himself. He pulls out a pen and a piece of paper and writes all your names on the top. You argue over who's sleeping where for a while until you finally come up with an arrangement.

"Okay, Tavros and Gamzee have one bed, Vriska and Jade will get cots, Terezi and Karkat have a bed, Nepeta will get a bunch of pillows to sleep on, Equius has the couch, and Dave and I have a bed." You say, looking at the chart Karkat has expertly drawn up. You remember in college he was obsessed with them. Some things never change. "I'll be going shopping tomorrow, so if anyone has any requests write them down. I'm already getting adapters, winter clothes, which I'll need your sizes for, and groceries. If you want specific groceries, write them down. And none of that Betty Crocker shit. I won't stand for it." You say, flipping the paper over and putting it on the kitchen table with the pen on top of it. "Now I'll head to the bar to get Equius and Nepeta. I'll ask if they'll send up some cots while I'm down there." You say, glancing at Jade.

"Thanks, John. Also ask if they serve breakfast!" You nod at her, grabbing your jacket and your room key as you head out the door. You head down the hall, getting out of the way of several drunk couples. You manage to get to the elevator without knocking anyone over and you push the down button. You stand there for a couple minutes, slowly getting impatient. Elevators should be faster than this. Finally it opens, and the really big guy, Equius, stumbles out of it. He bumps into you and nearly knocks you down.

"Please, excuse me, I appear to be quite drunk." He enunciates quite well for someone who's hammered.

"Come on, I'll help you back to the hotel room." You say after realizing he doesn't know where the hotel room is. He slings an arm around you and gestures to the hallway.

"Do lead the way." You lead him down to the room, sliding your key in and helping him over to the couch. No one else is around. Probably all already asleep. license You set him down and go get a glass of water from the kitchen, setting it down on the coffee table. You grab a blanket that someone must have set out and throw it over Equius. He's already asleep and you head out the door again. Once again at the elevator, it comes quickly this time and you ride down to the lobby alone. The doors swing open and you step out, scanning the bar for the girl Equius had pointed out earlier. There she was. She was wearing an olive green t-shirt, baggy black cargo pants and a blue hat with what looked to be cat ears. There was a red jacket draped over the barstool next to her. You walk over and slide into the barstool on her other side.

She looks over at you and, in the cutest voice you have ever heard, asks, "Can I help you?"

"Yes, hi, I'm John Egbert. I'm one of the people you're staying with. Cool hat, by the way!" You say as the bartender walks over to you.

"Would you like something to drink?" He asks, with a thick accent.

"Oh, no nothing for me."

"I'll have another beer and he'll have one, too!" Nepeta says, turning to the bartender.

"Oh, no I really shouldn't."

"Oh, but you really should! The beer's amazing here! You have to try it!" She says, giggling.

"Oh, alright, one beer can't hurt." You couldn't believe Equius said she was an angry drunk. The bartender walks over to you with two HUGE beers. He sets them on the coasters by your seats.

"I just came down to tell you we're in room 612." You say, sipping your beer. Sweet lord this is the best damn beer you've ever had. It's only the second beer you've had, but still.

"Well, now we can talk! I've heard some about you from Karkat and Terezi. Mostly how much you love pranks and hate Betty Crocker. I've never met someone who hates Betty Crocker!" She says as you chug your beer down as fast as you can.

"Well, my dad made so much Betty Crocker stuff when I was little I got sick of it and started to hate it. I was devastated to find out Betty Crocker made Gushers. I made, admittedly, a bigger deal out of it than it really was, but I was a dramatic kid." You motion for the bartender to bring you another beer. "But what about you? I haven't heard anything about you!" You say, reaching for the beer mug the bartender was handing you.

"Oh, there's not much to tell. I run a matchmaker service and I go hunting in my free time!" She says, reaching out for her mug. As you're gulping down your second beer, the drunk guy who was passed out at the bar earlier walks up to Nepeta.

"Heyyyyy baby. Wanna go fuck?" He slurs, putting a hand on Nepeta. You're about to tell the guy to fuck off, but Nepeta beats you to it.

"Touch me again, I'll cut your dick off." Her cutesy tone is gone, replaced by a lower voice with a deep growl underneath. You're terrified, and she's not even threatening you. The guy takes his hand off her but continues to bother her.

"Come oooon babyyy. You know you wanna fuck me. Ditch the looooser and come to my room with meeee." He says and the next thing you know, he's on the ground with Nepeta wailing on him, breaking his nose and knocking out several teeth. You think you should probably stop her from killing him, but you're too scared to interfere. Finally you slowly reach out and pull her back.

"Nepeta, calm down. The guy already has to go to the hospital." You say, waving for the bartender to bring over another two beers.

"Anyway! There's not that much to me!" She says, her voice back to the high-pitched cutesy tone from before. You make a mental note to never get on this Nepeta's bad side.

"Well, what about the others? It looks like we'll be staying here for a while, I should know something about them." You gulp down another beer, and you start to feel it.

"Well, Tavros is super sweet, but he has some self esteem problems, which are mostly because of Vriska. She makes fun of the fact that he can't walk, even though she's the reason why he ended up in a wheelchair. She still makes fun of him, even more so since he got robotic legs and had to learn to walk again. He's really awesome and loves Disney movies." You're about to ask about how Vriska caused Tavros to lose his legs, but Nepeta plows on. "You know Karkat and Terezi already, and I don't think I should be the one to tell you about Vriska. We're not really friends. You could ask Terezi, they're really close. Equius is my best friend. He's really smart. He made Vriska's arm and Tavros' legs. He's really talented with electronics, but no one ever sees past how sweaty he is. It's a shame, because he's a really fun person, albeit a little controlling at times. But that's only because he cares." You feel a little guilty for judging Equius prematurely, and you gulp down the rest of your beer. The bartender is already there with another one. Did you ask for one? You can't remember. You shrug and start on whatever number beer this is. "Gamzee is a little odd. He had a small psychotic break one summer when we were all at camp. He tried to kill me and Equius. We don't know what happened, but he had been missing for a while, and when he came back he was insane. Karkat finally managed to subdue him after a while, but he was admitted to a mental hospital for a few years, so it wouldn't happen again. I don't think he's been sober since he got released. He felt so bad after it happened. He thought we would hate him, but we could tell he felt horrible and that he hadn't been in his right mind. I don't think it'll happen again. But he goes everywhere with Karkat, so if it does happen, Karkat can calm him down. But he can be quite sweet, it's no wonder Tavros likes him."

"Oh, Tavros likes Gamzee?" You ask, turning to the bartender to ask for a water.

"Ya, but I think Gamzee's too high to notice." Nepeta says, wobbling on her stool and starting to slide off. You catch her and she drapes an arm over your shoulder.

"Alright, let's get you to bed. You are pretty drunk." You say, stumbling over to the elevators, glancing at the clock. The numbers are swimming and you can't tell what time it is. "And apparently so am I!" You say, bursting into a fit of giggles. This is the first time you've been this drunk, and it's kind of fun. "How many beers did I have? I lost count." You say, pushing the button repeatedly. The elevator dings and you drag yourself and Nepeta into it, pushing what you hope is the number 6. You reach what appears to be the sixth floor and you drag Nepeta to the room. You slide the key in and she steps inside. You got a sudden urge to do something. You just didn't know what. "Hey, I'm gonna head down to the lobby. I have something I want to do." You say, turning around and closing the door behind you. You hope you'll figure out what you want to do on your way downstairs.