THE WINNING CHAPTER~?
Dave: bring your twin an orange soda.

Dave leans over in the fridge shoving a few short swords aside to place the drinks he bought onto the shelf inside. He grabs one apple juice and one orange soda and shuts the door. Turning from the kitchen that's completely cluttered with paper, weapons, and puppets he heads for the door to the basement. Loud music and banging, buzzing, and even curses comes from behind the basement door. A common sound in the Strider household. Dave rolls his eyes as another stream of foul language comes bellowing out over the music as he pulls open the door. Dave stomps down the steps into the gray painted brightly lit basement diving at the last few steps to avoid the robotic projectile coming at him.

The basement is cluttered with metal, papers, and wires. A workbench set up near the center with a blonde glareing solid orange eyes in Dave's direction. His hair is set up in spikes, a pair of work goggles propped up on top of his head. He's wearing an orange tank top stained with dirt and oil and black jeans. Finally noticing Dave standing at the end of the steps he grins flashing a slight amount of fang and rubs his hand on his chest leaving another greasy smear down the front. His eyes start to bleed back into normal human type, well, except the bright color as he takes his goggles off and pulls his triangular sunglasses over them.

Dave walks over and shuts off the way too loud music before handing over the orange soda to his twin brother. "Sup Dirk?" he asks nodding his head in the direction of the robotic arm that now sat in the corner of the room.

Dirk shrugs while he opens his drink and takes a large gulp. With a satisfied sigh he looks back at his notes on the workbench. "I think I made it too small."

Dave turns a raised brow over at his brother before taking a calm drink of his apple juice. "Too small for what?"

Dirk blinks, slowly tilting his head in thought. "You know... I didn't think to ask. I just got the job request for a robotic arm and took it.

Dave laughs and rubs his hand in his brother's hair. "You always were one for getting details on everything but what you actually needed. If you don't know what it's for how can you know that it's too small?"

"It's not." A deep voice echos out from the corner causing both blondes to jerk their heads and stare. Twin shaded eyes meet cracked shaded eyes as the owner of the voice stands up holding the arm delicately in his hands. He has long straight black hair pulled back at the nape of his neck, broken rectangluar sunglasses, and dark gray skin. One of his horns was broken, sharp edges jutting only halfway up compared to the other which points at the end like an arrow. His arms are thick with muscles and a tattoo of a herd of horses gallops down his right one. He's wearing a black tank top and gray pants with boots.

Dirk pulls himself up to sit on his workbench pulling his knee up and propping his chin on it. "So it's not too small? Cool."

The god grins flashing a few broken fangs as he holds the arm up to take in the details. "No. This is perfect. The best gift for my neighbor's birthday."

Dave glances at the delicate feminine arm, then back up at the god of strength. "So Equius." He teases with a grin. "You gonna use this arm to ask her out?"

Equius bites his lip and begins sweating. He starts to make a fist but quickly stops when a slight crack sounds from the arm still in his grip. "I would never ask Vriska out! She is the goddess of Luck. Much too high in power to even consider being with a weakling god like myself. I know my boundaries. Besides, she's still obsessed with her dead mate."

The brothers laugh and Dirk runs a hand through his hair almost checking to ensure that it's staying in place. "You're the god of strength." he chuckles. "Isn't that the exact opposite of weak?"

Equius pulls a cloth from his pocket and wipes his face. He shoves the cloth back in his pocket and fidgets nervously with the arm. "Luck is one of the highest grades of power among our people. You cannot control luck. Strength can be controlled. You should really learn which people to befriend and which to avoid before the condense notices you."

Dave rolls his eyes. "Isn't the constant threat of your people trying to kill us a realization that we've already BEEN noticed?"

Equius pulls the cloth out again setting the arm down carefully on a shelf. He wipes his face and neck nervously. "Well yes... but those people know WHO you are. Not WHAT you are. I only know because of Nepeta. Besides, they're only trying to kill you to get their wishes. Or bring back Karkat." He shoves the cloth back in his back pocket.

Dave sits down on a nearby stool and pulls his foot up resting his chin on his knee mirroring his twin. "I met this Karkat, the guy who saved me when I was little. He didn't seem to WANT to come back. Honestly the way he ran away from that troll that makes everyone drunk you'd think he just wanted to be left alone."

Equius turns to stare down at Dave. "You met Karkat? He's here in this area? And he's met up with his old mate?" A look of hope crosses his face. "Did they get back together? Is Aradia Available again?"

Dave holds his hands out in front of him at the onslaught of questions. "Calm your horses there you're going too fast. He's apparently friends with my friend John. Though John still can't see you guys so that's a bit weird to me... Hey." Dave turns to look at Dirk. "Did you ever figure out why Jake could see them?"

Dirk chokes on the drink he was taking and coughs orange soda everywhere. Equius moves over holding out the cloth from his pocket. Dirk makes a face and quickly reaches over for his own grease covered cloth to wipe the drink from his face and hands.

Dave tilts his head in curiosity. "Dirk... what aren't you telling me about your little boy-toy? Twins are supposed to share everything with each other you know. It's rude to keep secrets from me."

Dirk looks quickly away and starts fiddling with a robotic rabbit skeleton sitting on his workbench. "I don't know what you're talking about. The drink just went down the wrong pipe is all."

Seeing the tension in the air between the two boys Equius places the stack of bills down on a shelf and picks up the arm. In a poof of blue smoke he disappears leaving the two to sort out their problems alone.

Next chapters!
Gamzee: Attack Dave.
Jake: Keep trying to Make-up with Dirk.