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Desiderata	By : grimreaperchibi Category: Web Comics > Homestuck Views: 1782 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Homestuck, nor the places, people, or objects within. I make no money writing this.

Chapter List
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Sollux stared at his computer screen and tried not to worry. He chewed on his lip as he watched his contact list, waiting impatiently for one of the names to spontaneously change from offline to active. He made himself get up, walk away, do something else. The problem was his apartment was tiny, so truly removing himself from the source of his contention was almost impossible. The computer was specifically placed in the main living area to be seen from virtually any corner he chose to be in. If he went to the respite area, he’d just pull out his phone. Coding or gaming was a lost cause with his attention so divided. Inevitably, he found himself right back in his chair, claws drumming on his keyboard as he tried to decide on what he should really be doing.
“This is stupid,” he muttered under this breath, once more pushing away, running his hands through his hair as his mind ran over everything again.
There was no explicit rule that demanded online attendance. They were all adults now, for as terrifying as that thought could be some days. They had jobs, obligations, lives that all existed outside the bounds of the internet. Being absent from time to time was simply a fact of reality…except Karkat was always online. Always. Even the times he stepped away to do whatever, he still logged in and answered any post sometime during the night. He may have officially given up his title as leader these days, but that didn’t make him any less of a focal point in any of their lives, human and troll alike. And no one had heard from him in four full cycles. Not since Sollux had walked with him to the train station.
Guilt flared like an insidious weed. He had known Karkat hadn’t looked right, had had an opportunity to at least partially figure out where the hermitic troll had hidden himself away, and had done nothing on either front. That was the deep taproot no amount of justifying could manage to pull out. From there, tendrils of doubt spread, because he hadn’t thought anything about Karkat’s absence in the beginning. The first night had been completely ignored, the second noted, though dismissed. The third was actually taunted as cowardice since that was the night for their online battle. It wasn’t until the fourth evening, his messages met with zero response that Sollux began to wonder if something was truly wrong.
He’d talked to everyone he could think of: John, Dave, Terezi, Nepeta, Kanaya, Kankri, Meenah, Jade…even went as far as to contact Eridan, for all the good it did. He went to all the places he knew Karkat hung around, various forums and chat rooms and websites, any place that he could convince himself didn’t count as blatant hacking into the other’s life, looking for insight. He found nothing. An entire night spent tracking old, decaying trails through cyberspace, and now a new evening with even less to work with. Of everyone, John and Dave had been the only two others to voice some concern. Their conclusions weren’t any different than anyone else’s, however. Karkat was allowed to take time to himself. He’d come back when he was ready. There was nothing to worry about just yet. It irritated Sollux that these “friends” didn’t realize how concerning the situation already was just as much as it made him wonder if he was really making a huge deal out of nothing.
Well, there was one way to be sure…
After waking to find that psionics was once again a part of his life, Sollux had purposefully tested his limits. The resurrection of his powers hadn’t been complete. His eyesight had been regained, but not the ability to perform an optic blast. The power of transvection and psychokinesis was still his, albeit in lesser forms. The voices that had once haunted his every breathing moment now only roused when he willfully chose to use his Vision Twofold. Considering Mituna’s psionics had come back following the same pattern, a complete loss of the power that had actually broken them, the reduced versions of traits used more passively, and then the circumstance to still use their most devastating ability but at an equally great cost, Sollux knew it wasn’t just a quirk in the redesign. He could Look and See if something had happened to his friend.
He argued with himself for another hour before finally standing and getting his shit together. If he was wrong, at least he had a fridge full of food and a brand new bottle of his migraine meds. If he was right… He really hoped he was wrong. In short order, he’d gathered everything he needed in his bathroom. A roll of paper towels because at the very least, he was going to end up with a bloody nose. The migraine medication was open next to a glass of orange juice to help combat the immediate effects of blood loss. There were a couple of glow sticks spread out around the sink because the florescent light was too much, but he still needed to be able to see the bathroom mirror. He dragged in the largest bean bag he could fit into the space to catch himself on in case he collapsed or passed out. The facet was turned on as high as it would go to act as white noise. Satisfied he was as prepared as he could be, Sollux closed his eyes, fumbled the light switch off, and removed his glasses. Leaning against the counter, he pulled his awareness into his mind, focusing down until the only thing that existed was the Path, the Things That Had Been and the Things That Would Be. Cold prickled along the peripheral edges of his awareness as physical sensation faded away, the indication that he’d crossed over into the metaphysical.
Sollux took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and opened his eyes.
He could still feel his hands braced on the counter, the solid floor under his feet, but the reality of either was questionable. There was no longer a bathroom, an apartment, a hive stem, a city, or even really a world. He stared at a reflection that wasn’t a reflection, but himself on the other side of the Path. Blackness stretched out to infinity on either side, filled with the afterimages of everything that had come into contact with his life across all time. What was illuminated had been mostly drained of colour, leaving only the twinned road through Oblivion defined, the red and the blue spiral that was his own journey. The gray connections moved around him as he sought his focus— an object or image that would connect him to his friend’s fate. Other paths twisted and dissolved into the nothingness as he turned in place, careful not to move his feet as he searched.
It was Karkat’s symbol that finally surfaced, an odd shade of gray compared to the rest of the miscellanea. When Sollux reached for it, fingers ghosting through, it lit up a burning shade of red. The Path adjusted, like now following like while the other remained unchanged. He took a step, slowly walking forward on both sides, conscious of where he was in either location with every movement he made, until the split diverged enough that he was two instead of one. Red Sollux now followed Karkat while blue Xander continued along their original route.
The darkness abruptly gave way to the last time both lives had crossed, outside the train station. The world was still gray, the furthermost details blurred and smudged beyond recognition, but each track retained its colour, as did the past forms of himself and Karkat. This time, when Karkat left, red Sollux followed him into the station while blue Xander continued through their past routine. Things became even more indistinct as he ghosted along behind his friend, the station itself a roiling mess of shadows that seemed to have no other form and filled with meaningless ambient noise that sounded like it was filtered through water. There was nothing that could tell him what train or track Karkat had left on. Time only skewed more the further he moved from their intersection since he was only preview to the points that were important to circumstance, leaving him no reference there either.
Once aboard the train, the whispering started, a rush of disquiet that was much more distinct what was perceived from the surroundings, yet equally unintelligable. While Karkat stared out a blank window at the nonexistent scenery, the darkness started to creep in subtly around the edges. Two or three times during the trip, he looked ready to be sick to his stomach, sitting as still as he could in his seat, claws rhythmically kneading at the armrest in an attempted distraction technique. Then they left the train and started walking through what appeared to be a small town, then out into something of a rural, forested area. The whispering became louder, the darkness more prominent the further they went, stopping several times in order to subdue some increasing malady. The first weak light of day was already starting to sting when suddenly there was a hive, small and well-kept and so vivid it could only be Karkat’s home. They were barely in the door before Karkat cursed quietly and made a stumbling dash to the nearest sink, retching pitifully. He was sweating by the time he was done, breathing unsteady as he made a half-hearted pass at closing the front door.
There was more cursing as the whispering became a low murmur. Despite obviously not feeling well, Karkat started working on something on his husktop instead of going to sleep. He started to tremble, eyes glazing over even as he struggled to power through it. Whatever was wrong became worse, forcing him to stop multiple times and curl into himself, arms wrapped protectively around his stomach and in enough obvious pain that tears would fall from his clenched eyes. In these times, the murmuring became almost understandable. And then it was back to work, fighting every step of the way against his condition until it seemed like he finally finished. The computer was shut down and Karkat tried to move on to whatever was next. His legs gave out after two steps. The murmurs became excited, steadily growing louder as he tried and failed to push himself back up. They became outright shouts when he finally stopped struggling, loud enough it made red Sollux’s ears hurt and head throb. Louder still, an excited, senseless stream of words that continued to crescendo until something broke through the front door, which had only partially latched closed…
With a violent surge of will, the red and the blue spiraled back together. Red Sollux was caught and held by the safe, sane blue Xander until they once more became one and the same. He became Solluxander Captor once more and stepped back into the physical world still shuddering in horror. He choked on his first few conscious breaths, a thick metallic taste on his tongue making his already agitated stomach threaten rebellion. There was an unbelievable pressure in his skull, like something inside was threatening to explode, a point that probably wasn’t far from the truth. He felt weak, strung-out as he fumbled with the running water, seeming to splash it everywhere except on his face as he tried to rinse the blood from his mouth. He swallowed three of his pills without a care that he was only supposed to take one at a time and slid to his prearranged pile with a fist full of paper towels pressed to his nose, trying to stem the blood flow.
Once the pounding in his head started to subside, Sollux blearily opened his eyes to the darkened ceiling of his bathroom and stared, asserting his presence in the physical world for a long time as he struggled against the fatigue of blood loss and mental over-exertion. For a while, it felt like it would never get better. Then, gradually, the screwed up signals of his body lessened, leaving him enough strength to reach for and sip at the orange juice waiting nearby. As the sugars in the juice began to kick in, Sollux took stock of the damage. His sinuses were clogged with clotting blood and the ringing in his ears proved to be (thankfully) nothing more than a byproduct of the pressure produced by said clogged sinuses. His lungs were sore from backflow and somehow, he’d managed to bite the tip of his tongue. The voices were still there, back to their murmurings. Now that his mind wasn’t split into two separate functioning selves, Sollux could actually understand what was being said.
That got him back to his wobbly feet, leaning against the walls and what little furniture he had until he was once more in front of his computer. His nose was still dripping and his stomach was starting to cramp with hunger as he began his hack. Karkat’s husktop might have been off, but that didn’t mean Sollux couldn’t track down the IP address he ran off of. The other troll had definitely become a better hacker since they’d initially met—he still wasn’t as good as Sollux was. He ate while his programs tracked all the sites Karkat visited and compared data routes, trying to find the one consistent in all of them. He purposefully loaded up on sugar until it sang in his fangs and between his horns as he matched the IP address to a physical location. A quick consultation with a map, a changed shirt, and then he was out the door, up the stairs to the roof and finally out into the air itself, blazing a path towards his hopefully still alive target.
He had to stop twice to make sure he was still heading in the right direction. When Sollux touched down the third, it was in front of the hive he’d seen during the Vision. It looked even smaller and less grandiose than his initial encounter had suggested, but that was only a fleeting thought as he rushed toward the front door. It opened easily, banging against the wall loudly enough to make him flinch. The sharpness of the noise emphasized the utter lack of sound in the hive. He closed the door, making sure it locked shut, then glanced around.
The main living area was completely open like his own apartment, save that the kitchen area was separated from the dining area with a low wall to support more cabinetry. A set of stairs lead to a second story. The furniture was all serviceable while the electronics were almost as good as Sollux’s own. And there was the computer set up, which meant Karkat was… Sollux rounded the edge of the couch and found his friend exactly where he’d Seen the other fall. He didn’t get a response when he spoke to or lightly shook the other, though Karkat did moan when he was rolled over. His skin was tacky with sweat and blistering hot to the touch.
The sugar rush that had gotten him there had already burned out. Adrenaline made a suitable replacement because he had to use his psionics to lift the other from the floor. Karkat was settled onto the couch as much out of convenience as necessity; the pressure was back in Sollux’s head, telling him was pushing into dangerous territory if his continued to abuse his powers. Digging through a couple drawers in the nutrition black yielded some clean towels and washcloths and a bowl big enough to soak them in. There was more moaning as the wet clothes were pressed to Karkat’s forehead and draped across his chest. Sollux poked around a bit more, glad to find some generic painkillers that he coaxed into his friend. Then all that was left was to wait and see if the care provided would be enough to change anything.
Four agonizing hours and a heart attack when something heavy thudded against the front door later, the fever-flush started to recede. Karkat’s breathing evened out and deepened as true sleep crept in. Sollux took away the wet towel on the chest, but left the one on the forehead as he tucked in blanket to help keep an encroaching chill away. He kept himself busy in between doses of medication and washcloth rewetting by playing on his phone or exploring as much of the hive as he dared. Something instinctive told him not to tread up the stairs, so most of his snooping was relegated to the kitchen, which was stocked rather oddly. When even that failed to hold his attention, he dozed fitfully.
Jolted awake by his phone sometime during the midday, Sollux noted that something had changed. He checked on Karkat, who was still resting easy, and noticed how quiet everything had truly become. No lingering voices continued to float through his head, which still felt like it had been used as a wrecking ball. Karkat’s fever hadn’t fully broken, but it was no longer a threat, only a slight concern. Sollux heaved a sigh—the other was safe. He’d changed circumstance. And while he was more than certain he would pay for his transgression against Fate sooner than later, it was hard to feel anything except contentment when surrounded by such glorious silence.
***
To be continued.
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Desiderata