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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
- 6
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- 8
Aradia was right; it wasn’t easy for a long time. It took a whole perigree for their online conversations to stop stalling out whenever one of them accidentally tripped over the unspoken line that separated acceptable banter from the dangerous territory that was memory. Another half perigree became swallowed by learning how to actually talk again via headsets when they started gaming together again. There was a lot of yelling, apologizing, and tense silences that made Sollux want to alternately kill his friend or himself, depending upon which course seemed more likely to resolve the issue.
One night, quite a while later, he got the courage up to revisit Karkat’s hive. It was under the guise of returning the movies that had accidentally ended up in Sollux’s possession (which he still maintained was clearly not his fault in the least). There was the same shocked hesitancy that had greeted him every other night he’d travelled there, but Karkat had let him in all the same. After a bit of floundering, they managed to wile away most of the night with a couple movies and several arguments about both. The next perigree, Sollux conjured up another reason to travel out, then another for the perigree after that. This went on for a handful of times before he stopped coming up with excuses all together and simply showed up. Karkat never did stop acting surprised whenever Sollux knocked on his front door even though he was always granted entry.
In public, Sollux had it together. In private, or to Aradia, he was a mess. Sometimes he was able to convince himself his flushcrush had been a product of stress and guilt, that what he felt was the product of some sort of psychological breakdown because he’d become entangled in his friend’s circumstances and nothing more. Other times, he came dangerously close to letting his pity overwhelm good judgment because he wanted so badly to take away the defeated air the other always carried, especially on the days when Gamzee was worse than normal. The little affections he earned throughout each night could leave him contented as often as it dashed all hope for anything more. Most days, he could bear the pain. There were still a lot of days he couldn’t, left a barely put together wreck in Aradia’s lap.
The night it finally all came to a head, Sollux had been mid-slide into a depressive cycle anyway. Until this point, he’d managed to keep it under control during his interactions with Karkat—he knew he had a burn-it-all tendency when caught in the grips of self-hate and destructive mental feedback. Half the battle always came down to distracting himself sufficiently that he couldn’t over-think whatever form his inadequacy decided to masquerade about as this time. The other half was keeping himself moving. Though calling off their interactive night might have been the smarter move, Sollux followed through with the hope that it would be a preventative measure.
He really should have known better. The oh-so-familiar sting of Karkat’s shocked look went quite a bit deeper than it normally did, leaving their usual argument over movie choice sharp and vitriolic. Karkat still won the way he always did, saying that because it was his hive and his electronics, it was also his decision. Sollux managed to swallow an unkind retort about how it would never be someone else’s turn because he never went anywhere. He didn’t manage to stifle the growl, doing so with enough teeth that he’d been snarled at in return. From there, it was a steady descent into the pan-rotting tedium of romcom plot development, because he was just desperate enough to actually pay attention. That proved to be his undoing. The story centered around a one girl and two guys, one of which filled the lovelorn childhood friend trope while the other was more plot device than a character. It was a human movie, too, which meant that the emotional smearing left everyone confused about what they were supposed to be feeling. That, of course, was what facilitated the drama, complete with poorly concealed jealousy, insubstantial suspicion, unintelligible fighting, but never any breaking up and moving on. Sollux managed to grit his teeth through it all until Plot Device Guy ended up in an accident. Then he snapped.
Karkat yelped as flashes of red and blue disrupted the dvd player and television, turning both off as static screeched through the stereo. “What the fuck is your malfunction tonight, Captor?” he hissed, kicking Sollux’s leg in retaliation. “I was watching that!”
“There’s nothing to see,” Sollux shot back. “All three of them are stupid; her for thinking her moirail would stop caring just because she did, the hipster asswipe for never being honest about his intentions in the first place, and the freak of nature, who was fucking happier missing half his pan, for expecting pity when he’d already lost what made him pitiful in the first place!”
Red eyes narrowed down, the only movement Karkat made for a long minute as he watched Sollux carefully for any further hostility. When he considered his odds of survival good, he opened his mouth.
“We’re not talking about the movie, are we?”
Sollux snapped his mouth shut as he tried to recall everything he had just said. It was too late to take any of it back anyway. Couldn’t brush it off, either, because he was obviously distressed, breathing hard and reflexively clenching his hands while sparks flitted around his knuckles. The gaping hole in his chest became a physical malady, making it hard to breathe as his mind once more made a point to drag up all the interconnected failures and fears. It felt like the already unstable ground under him had shifted so that he now could see exactly how far he had to fall. He kept trying to pinwheel back even as he tilted too far forward in a sick, masochistic ploy to see exactly how badly he could hurt himself. If he had any hope at all of saving himself, he needed to abscond with as much grace as he could. Now.
“No, I’m not, and I’m sorry. I should have cancelled—”
“And you didn’t,” Karkat interrupted, implacable as ever. “You’re here now and you obviously need to get some shit off the knobs you call shoulders, so sit the fuck down and get rid of it.” When Sollux wavered, he added, “You’ll fry long before you make it to Aradia’s at this hour. Obviously talking to her didn’t make any difference in how you feel anyway. Why bother killing yourself for a solution that doesn’t work?”
Sollux hesitated a moment longer, then slowly relaxed back into the couch. He wanted to hurt; might as well make the pain worth the time. “AA doesn’t know about this,” he sighed. “She suspects, but I never came out and told her. I think a part of her doesn’t want to be sympathetic to the heart that replaced her. Or maybe she’d feel obligated to do something in return on my behalf. I don’t know. Maybe I’m just over-thinking shit again.
“So here’s the world destroying secret as to why FF and I never got back together—Mituna Captor.” He smiled self-depreciatingly as Karkat blinked at him. “Yeah, talk about out of nowhere.”
“Mituna?” the other echoed, shifting to a more active listening position. “I thought it was Eridan.”
“Everyone thinks it’s ED, which suits him just fine because then he can complain about how bad he has it. And yeah, he’s a part of it because thanks to the whole sprite thing, I now enjoy the insanity of understanding why he’s such an insufferable asscactus, but he’s a much lesser part in all this than he likes to thinks he is. No, it was seeing MT and LT in the dream bubbles, so to speak. The way they interacted told me something wasn’t right with how FF and I were. I mean, he committed psionic suicide, fucked his think-pan up so badly that even now—healed—he’s still not completely there, and she’s always been there, is still there. Sweeps later, the two of them are still caught in first flush bliss. It’s seriously disgusting.”
He paused and found himself pulling at his horns. For as stupid as it all sounded in his head, it was six times worse out loud. “FF’s talked to me three times since the meteor; twice while we were in the bubbles, then again when we woke up. Every single time started off with her missing the psionics. Like that was the only part of me that was worth anything, which to a Tyrian-blood, I guess is true. Then she’d get mad at me because I wasn’t willing to let her ‘fix’ anything. I didn’t want my powers or my sight back; I was happy and she didn’t know what to do with it, so she did nothing. AA’s the one who mostly made sure I didn’t manage to perma-kill myself on accident. FF helped a little bit, but we were mostly strangers.
“So when she said she was confused about everything that had happened and wanted time to adjust, I didn’t argue. I was pretty fucked up too, trying to deal with all the ways I’d been dead, alive, and somewhere in between. I had to relearn how to control my powers at the least before it was even safe to be around me and that took a while. Apparently the whole reach-around-apology-sprite-splodey escapade was enough to get her to forgive ED. That pretty much sealed the deal—we never tried again.”
“Considering she wasn’t much of a moirail, I’m not surprised she’s a bad matesprit, too. It was a completely unhealthy relationship; you were both right to walk away from it,” Karkat conceded, then hesitated a moment. “What surprises me is you didn’t go back to Aradia.”
“AA?” Sollux shook his head and welcomed the familiar blossom of guilt. “If things had gone different the first time…maybe. We called ourselves matesprits, but we were also how old? What the fuck did we actually know about quadrants and being mates? It’s stupid how pale we were for each other, even back then. We could have tried in the dream bubbles, but it never really came up. We were both just happy the other was there.” He pressed at the emotional wound, searching for the infection he knew was still there. He found it with another lancing shot of pain. “At least I’m happy she’s there. Considering I’m the reason she died in the first place, then spent all that time being EQ’s smoochbot, she could have told me to go to hell or something.”
“I thought we agreed that wasn’t your fault,” Karkat interrupted.
“Agreeing, believing, and being blamed are completely separate subjects, KK. We can agree, but I still believe, and she can still blame, regardless of whatever really happened. Considering what did happen, not only is moirallegiance more than I could have hoped for, it’s more than I deserve. Especially after practically parading FF in front of her on the meteor.”
“Are you shitting me? She’d been dead for sweeps by that point—you were allowed to move on. Not to mention how fucked up Equius managed to make his wiring, trying to program in flushed feelings just because he’s got a boner for lowbloods. And if I recall correctly, which I fucking do, she chose you to say goodbye to before short-circuiting anyway. How the fuck can you sit there and tell me that means she hates your slimy entrails? You cried like a goddamn wiggler in public, for fuck’s sake; you know better. Quit listening to the bullshit side of your brain.”
“I know I’m the one responsible for two dead mates before reaching concupiscent age,” Sollux snapped. “I know my powers screwed me over in both cases. Listening to the ‘bullshit part of my brain’ is the only reason I haven’t made the same mistake a third time! How many times do I have to fuck up before I stop expecting a different result?”
“The only thing that’s fucked up is how adamant you are about blaming your freak light show for shit you can’t control! We were kids! Our shit was wrecked long before we even understood how messed up it could get. And yeah, sometimes our best still wasn’t good enough, but we got it done. We’re still here, motherfucker, and that means it’s not over yet.”
“Says the asshole who nearly died because he wouldn’t take care of himself!”
“Says the prick who used his all-damning powers to save that asshole!”
“Because I love you, you son of a slug eater!” Sollux snarled as his claws sunk into Karkat’s shirt, physically yanking the other towards him. “I am hopelessly, stupidly flushed for you and you have no idea what it’s like to be absolutely fucking powerless when you can burn cities to the ground with just a few thoughts! To try and stave off inevitability, to know what’s coming and then find out that your mere presence was the reason it was even possible in the first place.” The anger that had started the outburst crumbled away no matter how he tried to hold on to it. Because the anger was safe; he could deal with being angry, but not hurt. He was so tired of hurting… “That’s why it’s always been my fault and I can’t do it again, KK. I can’t save you just to kill you later and I’m sorry, I’ve been trying to let it go, but I can’t…” He let go to bury his face in his hands, unwilling to let the subversive tears in his eyes be seen. “I can’t stop feeling like this… I’m sorry…”
When Karkat finally moved, Sollux expected it to be away. He flinched a bit when a weapon calloused hand touched his wet cheek. “Last time I checked, asshole,” the other troll said evenly, “I was the one who got to decide what I needed from a mate. And for the record, being saved was never on that list, even if I needed it.” Then he sighed in aggravation. “Fuck, I don’t whether to slap you or kiss you, you pathetic moron. I swear to whatever omniscient asshole put us here, only you can make someone pity you while wanting to strangle you at the same time.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he scowled when Sollux lifted his head to stare, a slight dusting of red on his face as he suddenly started looking elsewhere. “Do I really have to spell this out for your inattentive ass? I like you, too, dipshit. I have for…for a long time, okay? Maybe not completely red, but not really pale either, and God knows how many times I waxed black whenever you decided to ride the douche-train into town. But first you were with Aradia, then you hooked up with Feferi, and the only thing I ever seemed good at was picking up the pieces instead of pushing you to be better. Then this happened.” He gestured to the hive. “Gamzee became the only thing I could care about.”
The words were registering, but Sollux wasn’t quite ready to feel their impact yet. “Then why do you look so damned shocked every time I show up?”
“Because I kept expecting you to not come back. Everyone else moved on with their lives—even you. I couldn’t ask for help and I couldn’t move on until he…something.” Karkat raked a hand through his hair before he punched Sollux’s shoulder. “But you kept coming back and I liked it and I didn’t want to like it. Not to mention how you keep running hot and cold every time we talked, so I couldn’t figure out if you liked spending time with me or just figured I couldn’t take care of myself.”
“I do like coming out here,” Sollux said softly, letting that glorious painful hope flourish. “I can’t live in a place like this, there isn’t enough distraction, but I like visiting. It’s a nice change of pace.” His blood pusher thumped hard as he took the next step forward. “KK, this is the point where you usually ask if we’re still friends. I don’t want to be just your friend, though. I want to be your mate, too. Considering my stellar track record in that department, I can’t blame you for turning me down. But I need that formal dismissal if you’re not interested.”
“Are you actually asking me, nook-sniffer, because I haven’t heard the right words yet.”
A weak smile pulled at Sollux’s lips. Well, he’d asked for this, hadn’t he? “Karkat Vantas, night does not end nor start without thoughts of you. Say the same of me. Let me be the one who fills your heart. Take me as your matesprit.”
Karkat snorted. “Holy shit, that sounds awful with your lisp.”
“Goddamn it, KK—”
“No promises,” he continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “This goes slow, and Gamzee never comes into it, got it?” Sollux nodded mutely, not quite daring to breathe. “Then I say the day cannot pass without remembrance of you and the night alone is not long enough to be in your company. I say this of Solluxander Captor. I will be the one to fill your heart. I will have you as my matesprit.”
A part of him wanted to ask, to make sure this wasn’t a tease, but he already knew it wasn’t. Formal declarations were not things anyone joked about for any reason. The protocol had been exact—there was no doubt that Karkat had accepted him as a mate even if the truth of that didn’t feel absolute yet. What really settled the idea that this was happening was the soft look Karkat gave him; slightly embarrassed, slightly vulnerable, but with clear pity in his gaze. Sollux stared so long that the other shifted self-consciously. “Say something, dumbass,” he muttered.
“You know, if this was one of your shitty romcoms, you’d have kissed me already.”
“Don’t push it.” Karkat still leaned in and shyly nuzzled their cheeks together, purring in a rough, disjointed manner, like he wasn’t used to making the sound. It was wrong how right that felt. The clenching in Sollux’s chest slowly released as he started purring in response. He wasn’t quite willing to give into elation yet, but it was hard to deny its existence as well. It was still too terribly fragile, all of it, to acknowledge that maybe this time, something good had come about. All he could do was remember that he’d already changed Karkat’s circumstances successfully once and repeat the mantra that he would not fuck this up this time.
***
To be concluded.
- 6
- 7
- 8
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Desiderata