Author's Note 4: Pretty much just a trigger warning for violence, so if you're not into that, this update is pretty much useless. But if you do like the violence, here's your present!

-themountainswan

Karkat: Be Scared As Fuck

Why did I leave my door unlocked?

Someone grabbed my arms in the middle of my thought and held them tightly against my back, not allowing me to move them at all. "LET GO OF ME!" I yelled to no avail, kicking and grunting to get out of his grip. But with a simple yank on my arm, pain shot through my shoulder and I cringed at it, falling to my knees. I was about to get up and struggle when a hand roughly grabbed my shoulder. "I wouldn't do that if I were you" said a horribly off putting male. My eyes widened at the threat and I simply sat there, practically petrified. "What the hell is wrong with you?" I yelled at the darkness, unsure of where to even direct my voice.

"Nothing's wrong with me. I'm just a man trying to keep his reputation. But just for your sake, I'll fill you in on why I'm here and why you're on the floor. See, we're a cover band around here, Accentuated Euphoria. I'm sure you've heard of us." And he was wrong, I had never heard of them once before, and I couldn't stop myself from talking "Some cover band…I've never heard of y" a loud crack and a searing pain made my sentence falter as my head flew to the right.

"If you could wait a minute before opening your trap, you will." My head slowly rolled back to it's neutral position, as I swallowed a lump in my throat. "Now, one of our members was at Hussie's music store when he heard your voice. Said it was pretty top notch, in fact, maybe even better than mine" he said bitterly, grabbing back onto my shoulder and squeezing it as hard as he could, causing me to grunt and clamp my teeth together.

"But" he abruptly let go of my shoulder, walking around me "obviously there will be people better than me, I respect that. What I DON'T respect, is people trying to get more fame than me. And a little birdy told me that you landed a gig with one of the most influential people in this entire fucking town!"

Influential people? Wasn't it just some little kid's birthday party? "Mind telling me who told you so I can go sort this thing out, because I honestly think you're absolutely insane at this point." He chuckled and exhaled softly "You really don't know how to shut up, do you…no matter. We'll get that fixed soon enough." The security in his voice sent a shiver up my spine, and I managed to quell my words.

"Back on topic," he said examining things around my house from what I could hear. "while it would mean a good thing if you showed and played, it'd also be an enormous failure if you didn't show." This caused him to chuckle for a little, before continuing "And that's what you're going to do."

"Fucking fine, I won't go to this gig if you just leave me the fuck alone you prick!" "I can't take your word for that. So I'm taking this into my own hands, and I'm going to make sure you don't make it to that party. I've got plans for you, don't you worry." "And I take it you're going to enlighten me on this fascinating bullshit?"

He walked over to me and grabbed my jaw roughly, looking straight at me and giving me a clear look at his eyes. They were glossed over…and pretty damn frightening. He smelled horrible, and the feeling of his hands on me made me want to vomit. "Yes I am."

I must have been spending too much time around Dave, because I just went full smart-ass. "Well can we make this quick? I have a lot of shit to do, and not a lot of time to do it." "If you don't shut your fucking mouth, you're never going to be able to do anything again besides talk to your creator."

My light smirk dropped once he said that, this just got a lot more serious. "Listen, fuck head. I don't know who you're talking about, but my band literally JUST got its first job. We're playing at a birthday party, not a damn playboy mansion, so before you go through with this absolutely brain dead plan, make sure you even have the right guy!"

The guy who grabbed my arms spoke up now "Yeah, maybe he's right. This guys nothing right now, all he's got is a good voice. Let's just make sure that he doesn't spill anything or go to that party and then that'll be the end of it." "You can't honestly tell me you're believing what he's saying! And from what I've heard, his stubborn as fuck personality is going to get him to that party anyways" he was probably right "so how about we stick to the fucking plan and break a few bones?"

That's it, keep fighting. I thought to myself, reaching into my pocket and desperately trying to find the dial button on my phone. I never closed out of Dave's contact information, so if I could just hit the call button, it'll patch me right to him and maybe I wouldn't be fucked. Ugh, god dammit! Where the hell is this fucking button?

Then, as if all the luck just spirit bombed its way right into me, I could feel the bump over the button I was looking for. I instantly pressed it, feeling very smug with myself, until the dialing sounds rang out causing a silence from their before constant bickering. I hung my head down, whispering "Fuck…" as they started feeling around my body.

They found the kind of cheap phone and pulled it out of my pocket, while I could hear Dave going "Hello? Who is this?" in the near distance. Out of desperation, I yelled out to the phone. "Dave! It's Karkat, I'm" the obvious ringleader then crushed the phone, throwing it against the ground. "Hey! I hope you're ready to pay for that, asshole!"

"Well well well, look who thinks they're sly! I was thinking of letting you go free, but now…now I've got to make my point. Right here, right now." And with that, a burst of pain crashed into my head like a car and I was knocked right out of the guy behind me's grasp. Then, someone grabbed the collar of my sweater, pulling me up and causing me to brace for some sort of pain when "Wait…"

"Tie him down here." Said the man I now figured was their leader, as I was thrown into some sort of chair. I got up off of it and threw a punch at the air, hitting nothing, and then getting the wind knocked out of me by a knee. At that point, throwing me back onto the chair was probably the easiest thing to do all night. Then, I could feel something being tied around my wrists after my arms were pulled roughly behind the chair. My ankles were tied next, and suddenly I was absolutely helpless. "If I get out of this…all of you fuckers are dead meat, you understand that, right?" I said through my attempt to gather air back. Everyone except me laughed, and I gathered that there were more than just the two people here now. Probably the entire band.

"Alright, everyone shut up. Now, since Karkat here has an absolutely dreadful attitude, I say we make this as painful as possible. Just to break that smug mouth of his." With that, my breathing became increased again and there was the trembling. But like hell I was going to show I was scared. "H-Heh…if you think you're going to break me, you've got another thing coming shit lords. So bring it!" "With pleasure" said a female voice this time. All I could hear was movement in the air before pain blossomed on the left side of my jaw. My head was thrown to my right and the chair almost fell over from the blow. Before I could even refocus, another punch was sent to the right side of my jaw, sending me the other way.

And from then on, it was just pain.

It would be a punch first, then a kick to my stomach, then an elbow across my cheek, stomach, face, face and so on. I cried out, yelling "HELP!" or "JUST FUCKING STOP ALREADY!" to no avail. Pain became the only feeling I recognized shortly after this assault began. My body was flinching in every direction as everything hurt more and more when the hits just kept coming. And the only thing I could think of was Dave could have been here.

Dave could have saved your sorry ass, but you had to ignore him.

Now you're going to die without a single thing to your name.

I probably would have questioned why I was thinking about Dave so much if my brain wasn't a pile of mush at the time.

My vision began getting blurry for the brief times where I was able to see, and I could feel a warm, thick liquid drip from my nose and mouth, slowly realizing the seriousness of this situation. But just as I thought that, the pain stopped and I began coughing horribly. "I think he's had enough, let's just go now" said someone.

Everyone started agreeing, but I wasn't going to just sit here and take this. Out of anger and lack of control, I did the stupidest thing I could have done. I spat blindly at the group, and judging from the sounds of disgust, I hit someone. "Still has some bite left, huh? Well, let's just see what I can do about that."

I heard the sound of something being picked up, when someone walked over to me, grabbing my mouth and prying it open. "Someone hold his mouth open!" Woah woah woah, what the fuck is this? No one moved at first, and he screamed "That wasn't a fucking question, now someone. Get. Over. Here." Obviously everyone wasn't on the same page as him, but they soon complied out of fear and held my teeth away from each other. I could then feel metal pushing into my mouth, and resting on my tongue. "Dude, this is pretty dark, I didn't sign up for th" "Shut up! Let me just do this already." I shut my eyes as tight as I could and whimpered softly, knowing how much it would hurt. Why didn't I fucking listen.

But the sound of a door busting open made the foreign object leave my mouth, and the presence of people surrounding me faded. There was a click that caused light to flood my vision rapidly, catching me completely off guard. I quickly flinched from it, shutting my eyes and throwing my head down. It was then I realized I was crying uncontrollably, looking down at my pants covered in both blood and tears.

I tried to listen to what was happening, but the ringing in my ears made only a few grunts and yells audible. After a few minutes, I heard someone calling out for me. I reluctantly pulled my head up and barely managed to utter "I-….In here…" When I saw movement in front of me I looked up and saw Dave standing there, looking down at me with his fists covered in blood. I could have sworn I saw tears or something but, who knows what was really there.

He quickly made his way to the chair, kneeling behind me and undoing the ropes saying "Fuck fuck fuck, I'm so sorry Karkat, I should have went home with you" or something along those lines. The last thing I got out of my hoarse throat before I slipped out of reality was a scratchy apology and then, darkness seized me and pulled me under.