Why is everything I post so short these days? Grrr.
But oh. My. Goodness. I have literally been travelling since a few days after my last update (no, I haven't been keeping track of how long that's been. It's hard to care when you're exhausted), so I didn't have a lot of time to work on this. But I was really excited for this chapter (despite not getting to some of my favorite parts) that I just crammed as much as I could in those sittings!
An awful idea, really. I always write absolute SHIT when I rush. Also know that I actually researched Alternian slang so this is chock full of all kinds of weird phrases. I hope it makes since. Another thing: commas. Commas gave me problems for some reason. They have turned against me.
Oh well. I also had wanted to publish this on January 1st, but my clock says it is now past midnight, which means I juuuuuust missed it . . . bluh. Whatever. HAPPY NEW YEARS ANYWAY! Have a great night or day, everyone! 3
Karkat Vantas was finally satisfied.
The human was now sulking somewhere within the hive—a memory prickled at the back of Karkat's conscious, a whisper of deja vu too weak to break through his foggy thinkpan—probably because it was unhappy with its new role as the submissive, and while that would have triggered his instincts as danger any other time, this one was weak, obviously harmless. He wasn't sure how it had managed to establish itself as the dominant over the pale, eyeless humans, but their differential positions had been enough evidence to prove that this human was their leader.
The important thing to note was that its scent was heavy within the hive, though after a few days of solitude Karkat had managed to mix his own smell into it enough to feel comfortable. The human, too, now smelled enough like him for Karkat to relax and leave it in the nutritionblock, where it had tried to flee being marked earlier.
He wasn't kidding about it being weak. It couldn't even defend its territory; he was tempted to kill it and lay claim to the hive, but the other humans—the ones that weren't likely to die during the dark season—would likely come back to avenge its death, so for now, Karkat would let the creature live under his rule.
"This is so gross!" The human whined in a different block, but Karkat ignored its strange ramblings, nugbone far too heavy to piece together its feasible protests. "It got saliva all over me! Aw man, it soaked into my clothes too. Groooooooooss!"
He shouldn't let the human reject his ruling. Even in this state of mind, he could tell it was rebelling his methods.
A warning snarl rippled through the air, bouncing off the walls and ringing in his auricular sponge clots, sound flaps twitching in response to the sudden auditory intrusion. Somewhere else in the hive, Karkat could hear the human swallow uneasily, heart fluttering in trepidation, tinging the air sharp and sour. Triumphant, he made a pleased noise to himself and wandered back to what he was doing before the humans arrived. At the end of a dingy little hall stood an open doorway, absent of any electronic light power, not that it made any difference to troll bulbs.
While the rest of the hive was now thoroughly intermixed with his scent, he had hesitated to enter this block. The eyeless humans had guarded it fiercely; they had been much more violent in their assaults the closer he had ventured to this area. But they had since retreated, and when Karkat paused in the entryway, he caught not even the faintest whiff of the eyeless ones. No, this block was heavy with the smell of the leader, the odors of breeding, feeding, and lounging all cloying thickly here, a virgin cloud that boasted ownership and alpha.
Instincts screamed that it couldn't be allowed; one must dominant, and that one would be Karkat.
Soundlessly, in case the eyeless ones came back, he slid forward into the dark block, blinking into a comfortable night vision. A large, raised nest was pushed back against one wall, a long, thick fabric bunched and rumpled on top of it, reeking of undisturbed alpha male. He growled low in his throat, pressing one thigh into the soft flatness of the nest's base before giving up all subtleties and lunging on top of it. The fluffy fabric immediately coiled and tangled around Karkat's body, practically choking him in the stink of human. He rolled, burying two handfuls of claws into the soft base, rubbing himself into as much of the nest as he could. Some sort of bag filled with feathers was pierced through on one of his claws, lightly dusting everything in fuzz, and accidental twitches of his fingers caused a series of holes to tear into the fluffy nest material, but after much diligent rubbing and frustrated growling, Karkat buried his face into the bed and breathed deep.
The odor of human was gone, for the most part, leaving only the smell of sopor and troll. Good.
Chirping, he crawled off the nest and shook himself off the best he could, glancing around the room with narrowed eyes and a rumble. A pile of reeking clothes stood proudly in one corner; it didn't take long for Karkat to pounce on it and scatter the contents all across the floor, firmly pressing himself into every article until the smell of leaderly human was no longer potent. He did the same thing to the ground cover in the middle of the floor and contently pushed his face into the flimsy material covering a lidded hole in the wall. Soon, with the strong odor of human cut back, Karkat could comfortably take deep breaths inside the block. All was well then, and with a happy rumble, he dropped the wall coverings and trotted lazily from the respiteblock.
The human was whining almost too quietly to hear now, but Karkat paid no mind to it; the thing had proven to be useless by this point.
When Karkat pushed his way into the nutritionblock, he found it sitting at the wooden table with its head in its pink hands, a stained and smelly shirt dawning its cleaned torso. He took a moment to approach it and shoved it out of its seat, causing it to bounce down onto the tile with a grub-like squeak and continue its wiggler noises when Karkat pinned it down by sitting on its thighs and running his hands up and down the smell-soaked shirt, hissing threateningly when the human attempted to slap his hands away. It yelped and flinched below him, but made no other moves to fight against him, so he continued touching ever bit of the stinking cloth he could. He bent his head down and sniffed twice before determining it was satisfactorily marked and went to get off the human when he noticed its pump biscuit was beating too fast and fear was rapidly bleeding into the air.
He turned his ocular orbs downward, and was honestly surprised to be met with two wide, frightened gander bulbs gazing back up. The human was, without a doubt, intimidated into submissiveness by him, and Karkat may have been a predator, but he had no plans of toying like a meowbeast with his food (and certainly no plans of eating this disgusting pile of trembling hormones). Fear could turn prey into rivals as well, and Karkat's fog-addled brain did not like the idea of this human turning into a challenger one bit.
Shifting, Karkat leaned forward slowly, instincts reminding him that moving too fast would startle the cornered animal. The human whined when Karkat's face went close to its protein chute, but he only paused long enough for the creature to fall mute before continuing. One hand came up and carefully—very carefully—papped at the soft hair on the back of its squeak pipette, the human jerking with a surprised yelp. Karkat froze, fingers still barely brushing, but when the alien did nothing more he quietly resumed papping. His face was now firmly planted in the space between the human's meal tunnel and shoulder, each inhale drawing the smell of fear and human into his oxygen bags. Slowly, he felt the creature relax in small increments against him. It never relaxed entirely, never went pliant beneath his gentle claws, but Karkat allowed it for now. Once he deemed the human calm enough, he retracted his limbs and pushed himself off the floor, leaving the squishy thing blinking and sprawled out in its subservient position on the tile.
Hunger reminded Karkat to check the meal vault, and it was only seconds after he laid his glance nuggets on the clear packaging of meat that he had the wrapping torn away and the meat dripping between his prongs as he gnawed at it.
"Oh, okay. That's really gross." The human muttered, sitting up. Karkat paid it no attention, too busy shredding raw meat with his fangs.
Blood and fluid dripped down his chin, cold, but as red as the stuff running through his veins, red as the scars on the alpha human. That caused him pause. The human still had yet to fully stand; it was staring at him from its spot on the floor, bulbs grubbishly big and pathetic, hair sticking out messily. Though a different species and an alpha in its environment, Karkat could not deny the kinship their shared blood color gifted them, nor the helpless, inferior body and thinkpan of the human simpleton. The raw meat and hive blatantly belonged to the creature, if smell and markings were anything to go by . . . and it had red wounds much like Karkat's. It likely couldn't take care of itself, it the poor fighting techniques and the lack of territory defenses was anything to go by. Not to mention the group that came and went and the absence of a lusus . . .
Yes, that would be alright. Karkat would adopt this misfortunate moron into his own herd for care. The poor idiot needed it rather desperately.
Karkat ripped a palm-sized chunk of meat away with his claws, squirting thin streams of red down his hand and on to the floor below. The human watched, still with those confused wiggler-orbs, as he lumbered closer and extended the raw meat towards it in offering.
The human looked between the offered meat and Karkat and blinked, silent and unmoving.
This stupid, panless fool. It did not even realize it was being gifted food. Karkat wasn't sure how it had survived up to this point (and so healthy as well), but it was probably dumb luck. Fortunately for the human, Karkat was now here to help.
He walked forward, slowly, so as to not startle the hapless beast, the dribbling meat still extended towards it. When he finally came to a halt with his hand directly under its nose and it only continued to stare blankly, he frowned and nudged the food up against the other's protein chute opening. For whatever reason, the moronic thing jerked back, one fragile hand coming up to touch its blood-kissed noise trap. It did not appear happy. The dummy likely didn't understand that the substance was being freely given, and that Karkat was not a threat. Oh well, it wasn't taking the meat in any case, and Karkat wasn't nice enough to offer again.
Quickly, he shoved the last bits into the sharp points of his fangs and began to rip into the meal once more, not caring for the blood on his hands or face, and certainly paying no mind to the mess all over the floor. Such thoughts were best made under a clearer pan, one that Karkat hadn't had in days.
He burped once, finished, and found the mentally challenged human still staring up at him from the block's floor, looking both disgusted and terrified. The blood around its ignorance tunnel was faded, and a long, smeared streak of red had appeared on one of its forearms, proof that it had wiped the fluid off on its arm. Its pulse was spiking again, so Karkat reached over, grabbed a handful of hair, and yanked its head against his digestive tract, carding careful claws through the soft locks as gently as he could. It made a strange noise, high and warbling, but it didn't sound threatening and even if it did, the human had already established itself as the submissive, so he wasn't worried.
Karkat shooshed him, and after a good few minutes it finally began to calm down again, speaking its strange alien tongue in such a whine that made he unable to help the irritable growl that slipped out. The effect was instantaneous; it immediately went silent, though its bloodpusher began to beat erratically, and it took many a stroke and apologetic click before it relaxed again and began mumbling gibberish. This time the whine was absent in its voice, so Karkat allowed its strange phrases and words to fill the space between them for the few seconds right before he released its fur and walked around it to the nutritionblock exit.
The human, as if feeling the connection Karkat had been attempting to forge with it, followed, sputtering all sorts of odd noises and creating foreign, aggravating gestures with its whole body. Karkat didn't do too much though until it stopped him in the long, narrow block on the higher floor, and then a warm hand was pushing at his shoulder, trying to stop his progress, and no. Karkat would not allow this creature to dominant him.
He shoved it into the opposite wall, snarling and baring teeth, and it cowered and began making some sort of noise over and over again. It wasn't a rebellious or angry sound in the least, but soft insistence, blue orbs locked with his with that same persistence despite the fumes of fear fanning out into the block. Karkat narrowed his lookstubs, hands pinning the fool's shoulders against the wall, but he paused long enough to concentrate on the string of vocals leaving the beast's mouth. "Shower. Shower. Bath."
Yeah, he had no idea what this obtuse mammal was trying to communicate.