This was the day Sollux Captor decided to take it back.

He wasn't sure how long the kiss lasted. Realistically, it was likely no more than a few seconds. But with Eridan's lips pressed to his own, he suddenly became keenly aware of everything. The sudden sharpness of his senses seemed to stretch the moment out. Letting him register the warm breath washing over his cheek from Eridan's nose. The way his lips were soft, but chapped. Dry. Dimly, he was aware that it was the reason he had put his own tongue forward. Just to moisten them. It had caused Eridan's lips to part. And suddenly the cool taste of mint was in his mouth. He felt a tentative tongue against his own. Teeth bumping awkwardly against his lips. Eridan's weight as he began to lean forward.

Seconds. A mere fragment of a moment that was stretched out into an array of sharply colored sensations. Like a beam of light passing through a prism.

It was enough. And soon he was pulling away. Not only that, but putting his hands against Eridan's shoulders. Pushing. And time came snapping back. The wide spectrum of his senses condensed once again into a single beam of white light.

But he couldn't shake the cold feeling in his gut.

He looked away from Eridan, raising the back of his hand to his mouth, holding it there. Trying to ignore the chill on his lips from where Eridan's tongue had been. Attempting to focus on settling the bundle of cold snakes writhing in his stomach as the man beside him shifted. Turned toward him.

No. No. He looked away, keeping his knuckles pressed to his lips. He couldn't speak yet. Not yet. He felt sick.

But if there was one thing Eridan was bad at doing, it was shutting up.

"Sol, that was…" He could hear the tremor of nerves in Eridan's voice. Or was it excitement? Sollux's insides grew colder still as the man continued. "Well, I guess I don't really know what to think, I mean it kinda came outta left field and I wasn't really prepared for it and shit but…"

He trailed off as Sollux continued to remain silent. Continued to refuse to look at him.

"Sol…?"

Sollux swallowed hard. "Sorry, I just… That was stupid."

"Well, it was unexpected, yeah. Definitely. But I mean, if you're havin' a dilemma about whether or not it was welcome, I mean, it was. Not to say that I was expectin' it in the sense that it was something that I thought was bound to happen. Like I really had no sorta expectations regardin' the subject a your lips touchin' mine but now that it's come up, sure, I mean, that's something I can maybe work with, you know, maybe I wouldn't mind it so much if you wanted to try a second run."

He was babbling, stopping for even fewer breaths than usual. It made the knot of snakes in Sollux's stomach flip, and he felt a wave of accompanying nausea swell over him. He swallowed hard, pushing himself out of the bed.

"Wait, where are you goin'?" Eridan's voice was strained. Bordering on panic.

"Just to get a game or something. We should try out your new TV. I don't know how the color settings are."

He made his way to the opposite side of the room, rummaging in the dresser beneath the wall-mounted television. He dug out Castlevania and shoved the disc into the Playstation he'd brought from his house. It was already hooked up to the TV in anticipation of playing games with Eridan.

That fact alone was enough to make him want to put his head in his hands and sink to the floor.

But he didn't. Instead he snapped the Playstation's lid shut and jabbed on all the power buttons. The console and TV flared to life, and Sollux unwound the cord from around the controller and brought it back to the bed with him. He climbed in beside Eridan before dumping the controller onto the young man's lap. Eridan looked as though he were about to speak, but Sollux quickly cut him off.

"There you go. New game. Remember, you need to beat the prologue in under a minute if you want the best end-game stats."

Eridan stared at the controller for a moment as the game booted up and prompted the player to input a name. He then moved his cursor about in silence before eventually entering "DUALSCAR" and hitting start.

"Wow, really?" Sollux sneered. "Not Alucard? You can't just leave well enough alone can you?"

His voice sounded strange to his own ears. Almost too animated. As if he were forcing things. It made him want to put his knuckles to his mouth again and curl up on his side. Eridan made no reply as the opening cinematic played, zooming in on the blocky, texture-less castle.

"Get ready, douchelord. Under a minute."

As the game began and Eridan started running across the screen, Sollux tried to focus all his attention on the pixels, his muscles quivering with tension. Perhaps it was for that reason that he reacted so strongly when Eridan bounded up a set of stairs to retrieve the cross.

"Are you kidding me, you don't have time for that shit!" he burst out so loudly that he cringed once he'd finished.

He felt Eridan flinch beside him as well. "Jesus, Sol. I'm doin' it this way because killin' that guy in under a minute is almost impossible since they make you listen to that shitty cutscene."

Said shitty cutscene was already underway. Sollux watched as Dracula's sprite threw his tiny pixelated wine glass to the floor and proclaimed, "What is a man? A miserable little pile of secrets!"

And then the battle commenced. Eridan broke the candelabra beside the throne to reveal a jar of holy water. He picked it up, the cross tumbling from his inventory and to the floor as it was replaced.

"See, why the fuck did you even waste time getting that piece of shit if you're just going to use hydrostorm?" Sollux snapped as Eridan put the holy water to effect, Dracula losing massive amounts of health as he did.

"Because fuck you," Eridan snapped angrily as Dracula changed forms. "Like, are we just gonna pretend this never happened or what?"

"You're taking damage, moron. You can't take damage if you want the best end-game—"

"Sol, I don't give a FUCK about my end-game stats!" Eridan burst out as Dracula dissolved in a cloud of fire and the screen went black. He threw down his controller as a wall of text began to scroll up the screen, turning to Sollux, his face flushed with fury. "Like, what the fuck was that? What the hell am I supposed to be thinkin' right now? I mean, I was startin' to maybe sorta entertain thoughts of a positive nature about the whole predicament, but now I'm just sittin' here wonderin' what the fuck it all even meant. Seriously, what's goin' on?"

Sollux looked away. He was silent for a long while, the snakes beginning to writhe angrily inside him once again. He got up from the bed and approached the television, grabbing the remote to go to the menu to adjust the display.

"Sol," Eridan began.

"Your contrast is off," Sollux cut in. "It's driving me nuts."

"It's a fuckin' Playstation game from the nineties. I don't give a shit about whether or not the pixels are at their optimal viewin' capacity."

Sollux ignored him. He continued to mess with the sliders, dialing them up and down and back again, his fingers shaking as he pressed the buttons.

"Would you just fuckin' talk to me?" Eridan burst out.

"What do you want me to say?" Sollux snapped, whirling around so fast that the remote nearly flew from his hand. "I don't fucking know, okay? I don't know!"

"Then why did you do it?" Eridan was livid from his place on the bed. His knuckles were white as he gripped the blankets, and he looked about ready to launch himself to his feet. "Clue me in here, Sol, because I am havin' a hell of a time tryin' to penetrate your thick skull with my fuckin' super telepathy powers. Which I don't actually have, by the way, you stupid fuck."

Sollux dropped the remote onto the dresser beneath the television, putting his hands to his face. He rubbed his eyes with his fingers.

"It was stupid," he repeated.

"Why was it stupid, though?" The angry edge on Eridan's voice was beginning to sharpen into panic once again. "I mean, was it something I did? Because if this is about my performance in any way, let me just take this moment to remind you that I had no warnin' whatsoever, so I'm pretty sure if we tried again and I was decently prepared, then we could both have a more satisfyin' experience—"

"No," Sollux said, taking one hand away from his face to hold out in front of him. "It has nothing to do with that, okay?"

"Then what?" Eridan's voice grew more frantic still.

"I just…I just spent all of this time flipping out, okay?" He tore his other hand away from his face, his vision blurry as he stared at Eridan. "About you. About all the shit I did. Like the pool. God, the fucking pool. And how you wouldn't take your shirt off. And I realized it didn't have dick-sucking shit to do with the sun or your skin or whatever else sort of bullshit excuse you made up. It was…" He paused for breath, putting a hand momentarily to his mouth and swallowing before he continued. "It was your fucking scar. And I realized it and I remembered how much of a jackass I was to you that day—"

Eridan's expression was stony as he cut in. "I thought we were done talkin' about this shit. I told you that I don't want to hear about how you would've changed things. And I don't want you doin' shit different just because you know."

"And that's why it was stupid, all right?" Sollux burst out, running an agitated hand through his hair. "All of this. The painting and the video games and the TV and the purple bed sheets. This isn't… That's not what I do. I don't do shit like this, okay? Same with…" He waved his hand between them and gestured vaguely to his mouth. It was making his stomach clench too tightly to even mention again.

Eridan looked so small in the bed, swathed to the elbows in his huge plush comforter, his pale face standing out against the pillows piled behind his back. And Sollux felt something sick and hot prod nauseatingly at the base of his esophagus. He looked away.

"So you're sayin'…" Eridan's voice was quiet, "that all a this is likely just your way a respondin' to the health shit that's been goin' on with me?"

Sollux wanted to leave. He wanted to simply drop the conversation where it was and walk out of the room. And then maybe go back across the street, shut himself in his room, and curl up on his bed. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, letting the vision come and go. Then he swallowed and looked back up to Eridan.

"I've already lost one person that means everything to me. The thought of it happening again…with anyone…it's been really fucking with me."

"Right." The young man's voice was hollow. "So that was a pity kiss then."

Sollux said nothing.

Eridan picked up his controller and began playing again, the scrolling prologue having finished long before. He made his way through the first area of the castle, his face expressionless as he jabbed at wargs and zombies. Sollux listened to the sound of dying enemies behind him as he stood motionless in his spot, staring at the floor. At last he shifted his weight and let his gaze flick up briefly toward Eridan.

"I think I'm going to go home for the night."

"Yeah," Eridan replied. "Maybe you should go do that, Sol."

Sollux turned slowly to face the door, touching his fingers to the handle as the sounds of the game continued on behind him. He heard the cutscene with Death begin to unfold. He glanced briefly back at Eridan, watching as the young man stared blankly into the television screen. There, the cloaked, skull-bearing figure held its scythe ominously above its head.

"We will meet again," it proclaimed.

Sollux shut the door behind him with a soft snap. He then leaned against the wall in the hallway for a moment, rubbing his eyes. Sighing, he fished in his pocket for his sunglasses. He'd taken them off for today. In anticipation of seeing Eridan. As if it would mean something. Change something.

He curled his fingers shut around them, hearing them creak under the strain of his grip. He grit his teeth, staring at his fist, watching his knuckles turn white.

And then he slipped the sunglasses back on and pushed his way out of the house.

After trudging back across the street, he yanked the door to his place open, his gaze downcast. It was for that reason that he didn't see Tavros come barreling toward him. He only saw the tiny ball of fluff that darted between his legs. He blinked, lifting a foot as it dashed outside.

He was then knocked into the doorframe as Tavros came scrambling under his legs after it.

"Rufio, no!" the boy cried with more volume than Sollux had ever heard from him. He twisted around to watch as Tavros darted after the little kitten, which bolted straight for one of the trees beside the road, scrambling up the trunk in about the same amount of time it took Tavros to take two bounds across the yard. Rufio hung there for a moment then, halfway up the tree and still within arm's reach, staring back at Tavros as the boy ran toward him. Just as he reached out to take the kitten, Rufio decided to skitter the rest of the way up the tree and into the branches, where he looked down at Tavros with his huge yellow eyes.

Sollux blinked from his position contorted against the doorway. He slowly put his leg down and sighed. It could just never be normal over at his house. Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he shuffled across the grass, coming to a halt beside Tavros, who was trying to lift himself into the branches to retrieve his kitten. He dropped down, wincing and peering at some splinters in his palms before he noticed Sollux's presence. He quickly put his hands down, staring up at the man with a stricken expression.

"I'm, sorry for pushing you out of the way, like that," he uttered in his usual halting voice, balling his hands into fists. "It's just that, um, Rufio has learned to associate the sound of the door opening with, a chance to escape. So he's been getting out, a lot, sort of." He looked up at the cat with dismay as it continued to stare down at him from the branches, its tail swinging.

Sollux peered up at Rufio. "I think he just likes giving you a hard time."

"Well, I wish that he maybe didn't, have that particular interest," Tavros replied, looking at his palms briefly again before curling his fingers back up. "I get worried that maybe, I'll lose him someday and, won't be able to get him back."

"The cat castle will probably keep him more interested in staying indoors," Sollux said, shrugging. "Weren't you and GZ working on that?"

"Yes, but, it is a lot harder than, I think, either of us were expecting. So it might be a while before it gets done. And also, Gamzee has, sort of been, um, wanting to do other things besides playing card games, and, petting Rufio."

He ducked his head down, starting to pick at the slivers in his hands. Sollux could see the boy's cheeks getting pink, and suddenly realized that this was no longer a conversation he wanted to have. So he swung his arms a bit, and took a flying leap into the tree. He caught the third or fourth branch up, right where Rufio was perched. Not expecting such an advanced attack, the kitten arched its back and fluffed its tail in surprise. It gave Sollux enough time to take one hand from the branch, using it to scoop up the cat before he dropped back down to the ground in a shower of twigs and leaves. Tavros looked up at him with wide eyes as Sollux straightened. Rufio had already wrapped himself around Sollux's wrist and was digging his tiny fangs into the man's flesh, so it was with some difficulty that the kitten was transferred from Sollux back to Tavros. Once in his owner's arms, however, the cat immediately began clawing and biting at Tavros' fingers instead.

The boy seemed oblivious to the mini mauling he was receiving, however, and thanked Sollux profusely, smiling. Sollux waved a hand as he made his way back toward the house, passing Gamzee as the tall man was striding across the lawn toward the boy.

Sollux paused as he reached the doorway once more, looking back at the two of them. He was out of earshot, but the happy expression on Tavros' face as he spoke to Gamzee, and the way that the taller man put one large hand on top of the boy's head spoke loud enough. It made his chest tighten. Behind them he could see Eridan's house, standing quietly in the setting sun's golden light.

He shut the door behind him, sighing as he kicked off his shoes. It was then that he heard a piteous groan come from somewhere in the kitchen. Blinking, his eye still not adjusted to the shift in light from behind his already dark lenses, Sollux made his way carefully through the living room and ducked his head into the kitchen.

There at the table, lying next to three open containers of boneless wings and covered in barbeque sauce as if he'd just been slain by them, was Karkat.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Sollux asked as he went to the fridge to grab a container of juice.

"I went to Toppers," Karkat groaned.

Sollux uncapped the jug of cranberry juice before approaching Karkat. He lifted one of the containers' lids with one finger to see the logo before he took a drink. "Looks that way."

"I went to Toppers because I knew John was working today," the boy elaborated. "But I didn't want to not order anything and look like a jackass. So I didn't eat anything all day until I got home from work. And then I went."

"Sounds pretty bad," Sollux remarked, taking another swig.

"I was going to ask him for his number. So I just stood there after he gave me my three fucking boxes of wings. I just stood there and looked at him. Like a fucking moron. Oh my god." He reached over his shoulders and gripped the back of his shirt, pulling it over his head so that his face was buried inside, his lower back exposed.

Sollux stared at him. "So I take it it didn't go well."

"I said, 'I want your ranch sauce,'" came Karkat's muffled reply.

"What?"

"When he asked, 'Do you need anything else?' I just stared at him and said, 'I want your ranch sauce.'"

"Uh…"

"Ranch sauce, Sollux!" Karkat lifted his head off the table, his barbecue-covered face peering at him through the neck hole of his sweatshirt.

"…Yes."

"I can never go back there," Karkat's voice was a heartsick lament as he laid himself back on the table.

Sollux looked at Karkat for a few moments before swirling his juice around in the bottom of the jug, peering at it closely.

"Please tell me your day went worse than mine. I need to feed upon the misery of others in order to have any will to continue existing after the monumental fucking travesty that is my life right now." His voice was muffled by both his shirt and the table.

Sollux lowered the juice, sighing. "Well, it didn't go like I was planning, I guess. Not that I had really planned out much."

His interest piqued, Karkat lifted his head from the table, peering at Sollux through the neck hole of his shirt once more. "Dude, what the fuck happened to your face? Did he hate the colors of his room that much?"

Sollux touched his nose absently. He'd almost completely forgotten about it. "No, this was… It doesn't matter. He just opened the door in my face. It was my fault."

Karkat frowned, sitting up straight and pulling his head back through his shirt, regarding Sollux from under his mass of tousled brown hair. "Okay, what's going on here ? I swear to christ that guy is rubbing off on you. It's like you do nothing anymore but mope and worry."

Sollux let a sad smirk tug at his lips, pressing the bottom of the juice jug to his forehead. "I just don't know what to think anymore."

"What do you mean, you don't know? I thought we'd discussed this." He laid his hands parallel to one another on the table. "You stop having fucking fits in your room about your sick boyfriend and instead go do something productive to win his heart. Then you await his return, upon which he would be eternally grateful and allow you to take into your sweaty fist the goddamned key to his chastity belt or whatever. Which would unlock with a holy glow and the chorus of a thousand angels before revealing unto you his virgin ass. Come on, Sollux. It was a nicely laid out, step-by-step plan that had absolutely zero ways of failing if not followed by a complete and utter moron. Which you apparently are."

Sollux went to the refrigerator and tossed the juice back inside before pulling out a chair and slouching over the table across from Karkat. "I know I said some shit before. About feelings and a bunch of other garbage. And I know I might have given you the indication that I was maybe interested in something with Eridan."

"No. To quote you directly I think it was something more like, 'Oh God, KK, help I am tho attracted to hith thtupid ath and I need your infinite romantic withdom to help me capture hith heart becauthe I'm a complete fucking moron and all I do ith cry in my room all day over Minecraft. Waah, waah, why ithn't he online, KK, what if he'th dead? What if he died before I ever got a chanthe to fuck him on a table?'"

Sollux glared at Karkat. "I think you're confusing me with yourself, doucheprick."

"Whatever." Karkat shoved a box of wings away from him, scowling at it. "The point is, you gave more than a fucking indication of interest. You outright told me that you weren't going to dick around with this anymore. You said that you were going to get off your ass and give him the great holy fucking sacramental confession of love or whatever the fuck. Which I guess entails dedicating an altar and a sacrifice to his name or something? Who knows. Love is handled in grotesque and strange ways on your planet of origin."

"How about you stop being a jackass about this for two fucking seconds?" Sollux burst out suddenly. "I know what I said. And I thought that's what I wanted. Because having him in the hospital like that just messed me up to the point where I thought I was going to fucking lose it. So spending the whole day painting and fantasizing about some shitty romantic foray was a way better alternative to staring at that fucking Minecraft server for hours and just…"

He balled his hands into fists, staring hard at the table.

"He was fucked up, KK. You should've heard him. I had to hang up on him over Skype a few times because I couldn't take listening to him on all those pain meds. Even now, he just looks so sick…"

"Hey. Hey," Karkat barked, snapping his fingers in front of Sollux's face. "You're doing it again. I am officially losing you to the spiraling vortex of angst that is the topic of Eridan's hospitalization. Let's not fucking go there, okay?"

Sollux bared his teeth, knocking Karkat's hand away. "This is what I mean. That's all I can fucking think about. And it makes me act like this huge fucking jackass. I kissed him, KK. I fucking kissed him and he leaned into me and it was terrible."

Karkat blinked, his barbecue-smeared countenance blank with shock. "Wait, you kissed him? And he liked it?"

"I think so." Sollux put his head in his hands.

"I'm failing to actually grasp the shitty part of this situation. Did he then shit velociraptors or something?"

"No," Sollux sighed. "I just realized that I'm fucking with the emotions of a real person. Not just some idea."

"I'm still wandering the fucking labyrinth that you have suddenly made out of this conversation. Help me out here, because my metaphorical forehead is getting bruised from running head first into all these fucking emotional walls."

"I think those things I wanted were just born out of some kind of fear or relief or desire to make it up to him or whatever. But when he kissed me back like that, it just…it was like the real thing, okay? And I don't…" He let his hands drop. "I don't think I was prepared for that."

Karkat regarded him with an incredulous expression. "Uh-huh… So what exactly were you prepared for, then?"

Sollux stared at his open hands on the table. He didn't reply.

"Here's the thing with you, Sollux. You're scared of a lot of shit. But what scares you more? The possibility that you're not ready for this and that it won't work? Or the small chance that you are and that it will?"

Sollux tightened his fists. "I just don't think I'm in the right place for this right now. I thought I was. But I'm not."

"Right. Oh, okay, I'm glad you got that all figured out. In fact, let's throw a fucking party. Let's get a goddamned rumpus bonanza going on in here to celebrate the fact that you have it all fucking figured out." Karkat's tone darkened so suddenly that it caused Sollux to wrench his gaze away from his hands and look up at the boy glowering across the table at him.

"What the fuck is your problem?"

"My problem?" Karkat stood suddenly. "My problem? Not really anything except the fact that you keep creating all these goddamned imaginary barriers between you and captain asslord over there while I can't get the guy I actually like to so much as look twice at me. God, you're a fucking piece of shit, Sollux. Go masturbate into a cup and cry over how you'll never find love again, for all I care. But I am done trying to help you. Fucking done."

He gathered his half-eaten boxes of wings in his arms before stomping to his room and slamming the door shut behind him.

Sollux dropped his gaze back to his hands.

Karkat was pissed. Whatever. He had a right to be upset over an unrequited crush. But it didn't mean he knew anything. He hadn't seen Eridan's face. Surely Eridan could sense that Sollux's feelings weren't really genuine.

Because how could they be?

He hadn't done things like that in ages. He hadn't left his room or gone out of his way to talk to people he didn't know. He hadn't curled on his bed with worry, clutching his phone to his chest. He hadn't felt things so sharply. He hadn't laughed or hurt or cried.

Not since…

But that was unrealistic. He wasn't that person anymore. He could never hope to be that person again. He was different now. Hardened by the realities of life and loss.

What he felt now simply didn't fit.

And so it couldn't be real.

It couldn't.