Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The twelve of you had escaped the genetic engineering labs three years ago. Each of you had your own freakish mutations to come from being raised in cages and treated like animals. Of course, you suppose you were animals, since none of your DNA was one hundred percent human.

You all escaped and traveled far away, then found a small town to settle down in. You all split up, living together in small groups in various parts of town. Some of you had been luckier than others with your living arrangements.

Your living arrangements included sharing a cramped, one-bedroom apartment with a tall, lanky, brown-haired, bipolar hacker, known as Sollux Captor. You two had been best friends for a long time, ever since you could remember. Your cage in the lab was right next to his, as well as next to Gamzee’s on your other side. Sollux’s mutations weren’t all too noticeable to the general population, due to the fact that manipulating electric currents in the air and telekinesis were pretty damn hideable. Except there was another mutation he had, and it caused him daily agony. He is able to shoot powerful blasts from his eyes but they cause a lot of damage and fuck no, you are NOT letting him do that anywhere near your new home and uprooting you, him, and the other ten of you. You wish you could, though. Maybe you should take him out into the woods with you some day and let him go wild. You know that the power has been building up for three years in his eyes and it’s causing him to have the worst migraines and even WORSE mood swings as the days go by.

You land far enough into the woods to not be seen by anyone; not that anyone walks past the woods this late at night but you can never be too careful. You fold your grey wings back to their cramped position and pull on one of your many large grey hoodies and walk back to the cramped apartment you share with Captor. You walk about a half hour, the wind blowing through and even further fucking up your white hair.

As soon as you enter your apartment, you notice him facedown on the couch in the small living area. Great, another awful migraine. He didn’t used to get them daily but you feel as it he gets them every fucking day now.

You walk over to him and pull off your hoodie so your wings could fold the correct and non-painful way. Nobody can see them in the privacy of your shared apartment, so it didn’t matter if you exposed them here. “Sollux Captor, roll the fuck over and sit up a little so I can help you with that utter abomination of a headache you have,” You order softly.

He obliges with a groan and you slide underneath him, settling your legs on either side of him and letting him lean back against you. You firmly but gently rub his temples and he lolls his head back, closing his tired eyes.

“Why don’t you come into the woods with me tomorrow night? If you think I’m going to put up with giving you daily, hell even twice daily, temple massages for much longer, you are sadly mistaken,” You offer. His heterochromatic eyes, one a deep blue and the other a reddish brown open and meet your freakish bright red ones when you speak.

“Are you sure that would be a good idea, KK? I could thtart a foretht fire or thome shit and I don’t think that would do a very good job at keeping uth hidden,” He states, sighing.

“We’ll be fine, you assmunch. The forest is deep enough that even if there was a fire, nobody would really notice as long as we go deep enough. I also saw some kind of canyon on the other side and it’s deserted out there, too,” You respond, glancing over to the clock on the cablebox. “Fuck, it’s three o’clock in the morning, let’s head to bed.”

He stands up stiffly, wincing in a bit of pain from his headache and you get up as well.  He walks in front of you and you both enter your shared bedroom. You toss your hoodie into a hamper for dirty clothes and remove your black jeans, then slip into your side of your shared bed on your stomach. You let your right wing stretch and trail onto the floor, touching the wall due to your wingspan and the small size of the room. You let your other wing raise up a bit and wait for Sollux to get into the bed.

He soon joins you and you settle your left wing over him, letting it stretch out as well. You notice something you never did notice before, that being how nice it feels to have his body heat touching your wing and you wonder what it must feel like to have his body heat all over you. You feel really ashamed at the thought and turn your head away from his probably already asleep form, and soon you fall into a deep sleep of nightmares as well.

Chapter Text

You get roughly six hours of sleep that night, which is probably the most sleep you’ve had in at least two months. Of course, that six hours of sleep was haunted with nightmares about the hell you had been raised in. Needles, loads of blood, gruesome failed experiments being rolled in cages into the same room as your cage only to die in front of you, and many, many other monstrosities.

You finally decide that it’s been long enough laying there reliving those awful memories and fold your wings back up. Captor is still asleep, and you’re glad of it. He needs sleep probably more than you do to try and get rid of those migraines, but of course that can’t be totally handled until late tonight.

You stand up and grab a pair of boxers and tiptoe out of your shared room and into the bathroom. You switch on the shower to your usual temperature, which is boiling hot but you don’t mind, the heat feels nice. Especially on your wings that tended to cramp up when they were confined to your back for too long, but that was just part of your pathetic life.

Once washed, you quickly dried yourself off and put on your clean boxers. You then preen your wings a bit. You wonder if it would be easier if you actually had a beak to do this with rather than using your fingers. It probably would be easier but you’re glad you don’t have a beak, you have enough mutations to deal with without one.

Finally the deed of wing-preening is done and you sneak back into the bedroom and slip on some pants and socks. You decide against pulling on a hoodie right now since you’d rather save that agony for the unavoidable trip into public later. You do, however, find one of your t-shirts that has slits in the shoulder area to allow your wings to be free. It was a pretty plain black shirt but you couldn’t care less. After a bit of struggle and hushed cursing, you managed to get your wings through the slits and they folded back properly outside of the shirt.

You glance back at your thought to be still asleep roommate and he is sleepily staring at you. Fuck, how long has he been awake? He looks kind of dazed so maybe he hasn’t been awake that long.

“Well, good morning sunshine. How did you sleep?” You ask him sarcastically.

He sits up and stretches before putting his glasses on. His glasses were weird. In dim lighting or anywhere indoors they looked pretty normal but in sunlight the lenses didn’t match. One would tint red (over his red-brown eye, ironically), and the other would tint blue. You’ve asked him why they didn’t match when he first got them and he just simply replied “They matched my eyeth.”

“Jutht peachy, KK,” He replies, matching your sarcasm and running a hand through his hair which had went kind of out of order when he slept. “How long have you been awake?” He asks as he stands up and stretches.

You glance at an alarm clock on top of the dresser against the wall and shrug, “Maybe an hour and a half. I’m surprised the shower didn’t wake you up since it usually does but judging from how fucking shitty you looked last night, I guess it isn’t a surprise you slept so deeply.”

“Yeah, I guethh you’re right. But any thleep ith thtill torture for uth all, you know what i mean?” He states cooly. He walks over to the dresser and grabs some clean clothes before looking back at you. “Do you want to go to the cafe down the thtreet for breakfatht or thomething?” He asks.

You get kind of a giddy feeling in your chest for some reason and you nod. You know he’s just taking you out to breakfast because, one, you’re both fucking starving and two, you two always do that kind of shit. Why do you feel so goddamn special all of a sudden? You do this regularly so why does just the thought of it today make you so excited? You have a feeling it all leads back to your near-forgotten last thought before you fell asleep last night. You’ve seen so many movies that depict best friends falling in love with each other but you never thought it would happen to you and Sollux. Sure, you may have thought of it maybe before but it was just a random thought, nothing serious at all.

You go to one of your drawers in your shared dresser and pull out a hoodie you haven’t worn in a while. Sollux gave it to you as a gift for your “birthday” about a year ago. None of you really had known what exact day you were born on, but you all chose dates to mark as your birthdays. You chose June 12th. That day last year was when Sollux got you this hoodie. It was kind of a brownish red colour with a symbol that was red and represented blood, according to Sollux. You don’t know what possessed him to get it for you, but you found that, despite being not your usual colour choice, you really liked this hoodie.

You put one of the keys to your apartment into your hoodie pocket, still deciding to wait until last minute to put it on. No use in cramping up your wings any sooner, right? Right.

Soon enough, Captor wanders out into the hallway with his pretty usual attire on. Sweatpants, pretty plain black t-shirt, one black shoe, one white shoe. His hair doesn’t look like it’s been through a tornado anymore, and it’s styled in his usual way. It all was pretty flat to his head except it spiked a little up and out on the sides and back. At least his hair was manageable, unlike your messy clusterfuck of cowlicks.

“Ready?” He asks, pushing his glasses up on his nose. Damn, his nose was a nice shape. Fuck, you really need to stop thinking about that.

“Yeah, let me hide my wings, hold on,” You reply as you scrunch up your wings as close to your back as you could and pull the hoodie on over your head.

He saunters ahead of you and opens the door that led into the hallway in your apartment building. You follow him out the door and lock it behind you. The two of you walk down the stairs (this building is so shitty that it didn’t have a working elevator, though you probably wouldn’t be caught dead riding on it since confined spaces still scare the shit out of you). Soon you are out on the sidewalk and you walk beside him to the cafe maybe a five minute walk away.

“Your headache seems to have fucked off,” You comment as you look up at him. His glasses were already tinted to adjust to the bright sunlight and it looked like he was wearing 3-D glasses.

“Meh. I guethh you’re right. It’ll probably come back though, knowing me,” He replies, glancing around the street at the few people also walking in various directions. You had all learned to keep an eye out for people, anyone could be a potential threat.

You soon arrive at the little cafe with Sollux and you both enter. You order a cup of tea with a bagel. He orders a honey frappuccino and a breakfast sandwich of some sort. You go to take out your money to pay for it and he swats at your hand as it goes to your pocket.

“Dipshit, I’m paying for thith. You bought grocerieth yethterday,” He grumbles at you as he hands the cashier some money and in return you get your food and drinks. You carry your food and drink to a table against a window and Sollux sits across from you.

“Thanks for breakfast, fuckwit. You didn’t have to do that,” You say quietly as you stir some sugar into your tea and then spread strawberry jam onto your bagel.

He shrugs and smirks, “No problem, athhwipe.” He reaches for your bagel and you let out a growl. The growl is not heeded and he takes a bite of your bagel.

“Hey! That was mine, you cretinous douchebag!” You snarl and take the half of your bagel back that he had in his hand. He only snickers.

“Do you want it back that badly, KK? You can eat it out of my mouth if you really want to,” He opens his mouth, revealing the mush and disgustingness of what used to be a bite of bagel.

You feel your face heat up nonetheless and glare at him. “That’s fucking disgusting, even for you, douchelord,” You grumble and eat the rest of your breakfast in silence.

You begin to wonder how long you can hide these idiotic fucking feelings for the asshole. It feels like you won’t be able to suppress them forever.

Chapter Text

After eating breakfast, your paranoia decided to kick in and you thought you saw someone from the laboratories (though that was pretty much impossible). Said paranoia also made you grab Sollux’s hand forcefully and drag him quickly out of the cafe, which he obviously questioned as to why you were leaving so fast.

You briskly walked down the street with him and eventually slow down. He understood why you dragged him out of the cafe, but he still opened his mouth as you were deep in thought, “Hello? Earth to KK. You can let go of my hand now, I’m not thix yearth old, you know.”

You feel your face go a bit warm and you drop his hand, which you had barely noticed you were still holding, “Shit, fuck. Sorry, I was thinking about something.” You honest-to-fuck hope that he doesn’t notice the slight pinkness in your cheeks.

If he did notice, he didn’t make any move to acknowledge it and he just said quietly, “Yeah, I get it. There ith a lot to think about. Ethpecially thince we aren’t technically thuppothed to be alive.”

You nod and look up at him, he was a lot taller than you, though you wouldn’t consider yourself tall. Sollux had to be about 6’2” at least; not as tall as Gamzee, but still pretty damn tall. You watch him as he rubs at a temple absentmindedly; he only does that when he feels a migraine coming on and you shake your head and guide him to a park along the sidewalk and under a tree.

You sit down and he doesn’t even question it and sits down next to you before flopping over sideways so his head was in your lap. You slowly begin massaging his temples and you softly whisper, “Hopefully tonight at least some of this shit will go away once you blast part of the forest into an oblivion.”

Sollux just makes a quiet hum in agreement and his eyes close behind his tinted glasses. You continue massaging his temples and eventually you feel his breathing slow down as he falls into a light sleep. God knows how often he even gets enough sleep in this state. You never needed much sleep to get by, at least enough to get through a day without passing out. You honestly dreaded sleeping, especially since something about your fucked up mind made your nightmares even worse than anyone else’s but you’ve learned to deal with the lack of sleep to save your sanity.

Pretty positive that Sollux was asleep, you went from rubbing his temples to softly stroking his hair. You didn’t even pay mind to any of the stares you might have been getting since this probably looked like you two were dating or some shit, not that you would mind anyways since that would be pretty nice. Fuck, Karkat, you need to stop thinking about that, you scold yourself.

Sollux looks so... Relaxed when he’s asleep. The constant almost stressed look on his face seemed to melt away and he actually looked kind of happy for once. You obviously have seen Sollux smile before, but it was usually one of those smartass smirks that he did. You rarely ever see him smile because he’s genuinely happy and you wish you could make him smile and make him happy. But you were all a bunch of mutant freaks that had to hide their mutations from society, what could you be happy for?

You glance down at his sleeping face again and without your mind even consenting to your mouth decided to open, you hear yourself whisper, “I just want to make you truly happy, Sollux. You mean the fucking world to me, more than you’ll ever even know.”

His eyes twitch slightly and he shifts in his sleep. Oh fuck, did you wake him up? Did he hear what you just said? Apparently not, considering that he snored softly and you relax a bit. You pull your hood up over your unruly white hair and decide to at least try to take a cat nap as long as his head was occupying your lap since you couldn’t do anything else really.

You eventually fall into a light sleep, dreamless surprisingly. But you are awoken about two hours later by a light shaking of your shoulder and a sharp, “KK.”

Your eyes slowly open and are instantly met with mismatched red-brown and blue eyes. You jump back slightly and almost hit your head against the trunk of the tree.

“You dick,” You mutter, pulling your hood down and slightly readjust your wings under your hoodie since they relaxed a little when you fell asleep. He smirks at you and stands up, offering a hand to you.

You grab his hand and stand up as well. “How’s your head?” You ask, squinting up at him due to the bright sunlight filtering through some leaves.

“Better than your wingth probably are at the moment, we should probably head back to the apartment until tonight. I don’t know about you, but I’ve had enough of normal thociety for today,” He replies.

You quickly agree and together you both walk quietly back to your cramped apartment.

The next hours were pretty uneventful. Upon arriving to the apartment, you both ate a sandwich for lunch and then he suggested playing video games for a while, which you obviously lost at. You have Chinese food delivered for dinner and surprisingly convince him to watch a movie with you afterwards, but you couldn’t watch a romcom since he refused like the stubborn fuckhead he is. You both finally agree on Mr. Bean’s Holiday (though you both thought it was stupid, it was still funny).

Midnight eventually rolled around with you getting smoked again in more video games and you reach for the remote for the pretty crappy television you have. Sollux gives you a questioning look then a sly smirk.

“Finally had enough of lothing, KK?” He remarks as he cracked his knuckles. You swat at his face lightly after turning the T.V. off and putting the remote down.

“Dumbass, have you forgotten what we’re doing tonight? Wait, you probably did since you’re just that much of a brainless fuckbrick,” You fire back with a hint of annoyance to your tone.

His facial features change and he nods slowly, “Right, thorry I did forget, you caught me being a brainlethh fuckbrick. Not like you don’t do that on a daily bathith-”

“Don’t even start on that self depreciating bullshit now,” You cut him off. “I want to get at least two hours of flying in tonight and I will not come home past three thirty.”

You pull on your hoodie and grab your keys to the apartment and wait impatiently by the door as he gets up, cracks his back, and puts on his shoes.

After a few hours spend flying around the woods and watching Sollux destroy a few trees deep within the woods, you both stumble into the apartment, you both stumble tiredly into your apartment. You can tell that Sollux feels better than he has in 3 years, to the point where even his face looked healthier and less stressed. You make a mental note to take him with you to the woods at least weekly to help him with his power buildup.

"Hey KK, thankth," He says quietly. "I feel better than I have in like forever."

You look up at him and hes actually smiling. Not the smartass smirk that you usually see but a legitimate, happy, SMILE. You almost go weak in the knees but you don't. Seeing Sollux smile has to be one of the most beautiful sights to see, at least to you. And you haven't seen him actually smile in years.

You respond by giving him a slight smile back, you yourself didn't really smile much but there wasn't much for you to be happy about but if Sollux could smile, that makes you happy enough.

Chapter Text

Being only two of the twelve, you usually had at least bi-monthly meetups with the other ten of you.  Usually there was some status reports on blending in followed by just chatting with your fellow mutants or doing some dumb activities and acting like you were all kids since your childhoods were all pretty much stolen from you, plus it was fun to unwind a little bit. Tonight’s gathering happened to be at Eridan and Feferi’s house.

It had been about a week since you first took Sollux with you into the woods.  He, surprisingly, decided to join you almost every time you went out there, even to the point of shutting down his monster of a computer in the middle of a coding project so he could join you.  His mood swings seemed to have lessened drastically, and his migraines seemed to have alleviated almost completely, as well.

“Karkles, you and Lord Appleberry should stop being such party poopers and sing!” Terezi cackled, swiping her ginger bangs out of her face. She pointed in the direction of the karaoke machine. You still never would completely understand her mutation, it lets her almost be barely impaired even though she couldn’t see with her eyes. She could taste and smell things though.

You glance at Sollux at the same time he glances at you as you’re sitting next to each other on the off-white couch in a very well-decorated living room. He raised his eyebrows a bit and you both look back at Terezi, shaking your heads.

“TZ, do you really think it would be a good idea for me to thing with mithter crabby athh-hole? He already maketh fun of my lithp enough, think about it,” Sollux inquired the short redhead with a slight smirk.

You decide to add onto his point and playfully shove his shoulder, “Exactly, I would rather cut his tongue out of his mouth than have to sing with that lisping idiotic douchewaffle.”

He chuckles at your banter and Terezi crosses her arms with a determined look on her face, “But you two lovebirds are the only ones who haven’t sung and if you haven’t noticed, none of us are the greatest singers.” She gives a shiteating grin and you feel your face go red. God damnit, Terezi.

“Wha- We aren’t-” You stammer and Terezi drubs you on the head with her cane.

“Then prove it by getting up there and singing,” She challenges. You growl at her and stand up, then yank Sollux up by the arm. You hear Terezi cackle something like, “I knew that would get them to do it” as you trudge over to the god awful, fucking stupid, dumbass karaoke machine. You pick up a microphone and shove one to Sollux, which he reluctantly takes.

You point to the blasted machine and back at Sollux, "You pick, Captor."

Before he even selected, or even made a move to touch the screen, you knew what he was going to pick. Predictable as your best friend is, he picks exactly the song you knew he would. That song being a fairly new song called "A LIGHT THAT NEVER COMES" by Linkin Park. You were mildly entertained when Sollux first showed you the song and remarked on the capitalized title, "KK it'th like they hired you to come up with a title."

You nod at Sollux and hold your mic up to your face instead of at your side and he follows suit. You both are tone deaf as hell but for some reason even his below average singing gave you some kind of dumbass warm fuzzy feeling at your core. Not again. Why this. Fuck.

You both manage to get through the song without passing out or messing up terribly and once the song ends, the other ten mutants in the room all applaud.  You grab Sollux's hand and bow dramatically. "Thank you, thank you very fucking much, we'e here twice a month," you announce like some kind of famous person.

"We altho do birthday partieth and bar mitzvahth," Sollux adds with a smirk.

That pretty much concluded the meeting and everyone said their goodbyes. You and Sollux make your way to the car you both shared though you didn't drive so it was technically his car. Of course, neither of you have proper driver's licenses but Sollux drove so flawlessly he wouldn't get pulled over. And it wasn't like you guys even looked too young to drive, Sollux was approximately 22 years old and you were about 21 and though you both looked like more like teenagers than adults, it was at least the over-16 teenagers that you looked like.

You stare out the window of the car as he drives you home quietly. You finally switch on the radio so kill some of the awkward silence that seemed to fall over you two in the past few weeks until you make it home. He parks the car in its assigned parking spot and shuts off the car but then he just kind of sits there staring at his hands.

"Sollux what are you-" you begin but he cuts you off.

"KK there'th thomething I've kind of been meaning to athk about but I kept getting thidetracked," he states then blinks slowly and looks at you.

"Okay? Fuck, Captor, here I thought you just went braindead or some shit and I'd have to drag your limp, scrawny ass into the apartment all by my damn self. Go on," you reply, meeting his heterochromatic gaze with your bright red one.

"I- okay," he stumbles but keeps going, "Thomething hath been kind of off about you lately, KK. I can't really put my finger on it but you theem lethh... Aggrethhive..? Towardth me, like you don't theem to want to teathe me ath much or lecture me when I forget to eat a meal or thomething when I'm coding. You thtill do, but it't kind of empty. Did I do thomething thtupid to pithh you off?" He asks quietly.

Fuck. He thinks it’s his fault. Well it kind of is his fault for making you feel these things but not really. It’s more your idiotic self’s fault for letting yourself feel these things. Is that one of your mutations, you wonder; a mutation that ruins your life and causes you to fall for your best friend?

You snap out of your mind to realize you still didn’t respond to your question and he looks like he’s going to die or some shit if you don’t give him an answer. You can’t hide it anymore, he knows something is going on. You might as well tell him the truth. Here goes… One… Two… Three…

“Shit, no, you didn’t do anything. It’s me who’s been, well not really doing things, but, fuck,” You manage to say and pause to get your bearings. “Sollux. Do you remember when we were in the labs, and the other experiments who were older than us started feeling things… And nobody fucking told them what it was so they called it ‘flushed’?”

“Yeth of courthe I do, KK. But what doeth that have to do with-” He cuts himself off and his expression changes to understanding. “...Oh. Tho you like thomeone and you’re too dithtracted to call me out on my usual bullshit, thath’th it, right?”

“Yeah, we can go with that. The worst thing about it is that… They’re one of us,” You mumble.

He tilts his head with a curious look on his face, “Tho...Thith perthon you like ith one of the mutantth. Hmm. We’re betht friendth tho can I know who it ith…?”

You shake you head and slowly reply, “N-no… You would like hate me forever and kick me out of the apartment or some shit. You would at least flip all of your shit and our friendship would be ruined.”

He looks confused now, then seems to put it all together, or so you think until he speaks, “You know, AA and I are jutht like thiblingth and that whole methh with FF ith like yearth in the patht and we don’t feel anything for each other tho I’m not pithhed or anything if thith is what you’re thayi-”

“No. You don’t get it. It’s not either Aradia or Feferi. It’s not any of the, erm, girls. And fuck you if you think it’s Eridan, hell to the fuck no,” You cut him off and cross your arms. “Look, just, forget it, okay? I’ll be fine.”

He has that thinking look all over his face, it’s almost amusing when your nerves aren’t being chewed to bits. His thinking look is almost like a loading screen on a computer or something, processing. You notice his eyes slowly widen and you know he’s figured it out now and you’re fucked. And not in the literal way. But in the friendship-ruining way.

You quickly and without thinking throw open the door of the car and sprint off down the parking garage. You feel hot tears welling in your eyes, and god damnit Vantas, don’t cry now. You duck around a corner and curl up into a ball, pulling your legs up into your hoodie and burying your face in your arms. You don’t even hear the footsteps approaching because you’re so out of it and something shocks your shoulder.

“KK. I think we have many thingth to talk about,” Sollux states calmly. You look up at him and gulp.

Chapter Text

You shakily take in a breath and meet Sollux’s unwavering gaze. He must notice you feel like of overwhelmed because he squats down and settles himself so he’s sitting on his knees in front of you. You can’t read his expression, it’s surprisingly calm-ish, but there’s something under it that you can’t put your finger on.

You look down at your arms and wipe your eyes with your sleeve. Then you finally speak up, “I’ve said all I need to say, what else is there to say?”

He tilts his head as if agreeing slightly. He then blinks slowly as if, you think ,he is trying to come up with a way to tell you that it's never going to happen. Finally he decides to speak up, "KK, why do you think I broke up with FF and moved in with you, might I athk?"

You're kind of confused and ask in you head why would he be asking something like that at a time like this? "I don't know, Sollux, you never really told me. I mean I know you didn't feel the same way for her as she did for you after like a month but-" you try to reply but you're cut off by him.

"That'th right, I never thpecifically told you. I broke up with FF becauthe I developed feelingth for thomeone elthe and he needed me there for him," he replies sharply at first but at the second sentence his voice had gone quiet. "Now who do you think thith perthon ith?" He asked, and his voice had dropped to a whisper.

You stammer some syllables before giving up on talking and slowly raise your hand and point to yourself with your thumb, your hand shaking slightly. He calmly nods at you. "I'm not mad at you, KK. Obviouthly. You can be thuch a dumbathh thometimeth I mean god, I could have probably moved into my own apartment or even in with AA but I happily chothe to move into your cramped little apartment to be with you," he states softly. "I wath jutht waiting for you to admit to yourthelf that you had feelingth for me too, I knew you had them, everyone did except yourthelf. You alwayth cared the motht about me out of everyone, even in that brief time that you were dating TZ."

You stare at him, shocked. "You mean to tell me... You knew and didn't fucking tell me?" You ask quietly, feeling even more exposed.

He nods, "I wath jutht going to let you tell me at your own pace. Ever thince you thtarted acting different, I knew it wouldn't be too much longer."

"I, fuck, Captor. I don't know whether to hug you or slap you right now. I guess you did the right thing but why didn't you tell me that you had feelings for me?" You ask and he shrugs.

"I guethh I didn't want to thcare you away before you figured out your own feelingth. I didn't want to fuck up or anything," he replies nonchalantly. He then stands up and offers his hand to you so you can stand up too. "Your wingth are probably tho thore that they want to fall off, come on let'th go home," he says with a small smile.

You take his hand slowly and pull your legs out of your hoodie and stand up. He doesn't let go of you hand once you stand up, though. You grip his hand a little tighter and look up at him, "Does that make us..."

"If you want uth to be, then yeth," he replies and looks down into your eyes.

You nod and shuffle closer to him as you walk to the apartment building and rest your head against his shoulder. You feel him kind of half chuckle at your sudden cuddliness but what-the-fuck ever.

You both get home and instead of keeping your space in your shared bed, you ended up falling asleep with your head on his chest and his arms wrapped gently around you and your wings splayed out across the room both ways. You fall into a dreamless and deep sleep.

You wake up before him and you wake up kind of confused until your brain woke up more. Solluxander Captor, Sollux, was officially yours. And only yours. You smile a little before shifting so you weren't laying against his chest and quietly get out of bed. You grab some clothes and go to shower and preen your wings.

Once you've finished the usual morning routine, you search your small kitchen for something to cook or eat or something but you don't find anything, disappointingly. You curse at yourself for not investing in any breakfast food.

As you're mumbling at yourself, Sollux sleepily stumbles into the kitchen, still half asleep. He didn't even realize that his glasses were crooked and you feel like giggling like a giddy fucking schoolgirl. His pajama pants were dark green with little purple bees and jars of bright yellow honey on them. His hair was messy and the gel he had used in it the day before made it stay that way.

"Thup KK," He yawns, stretching his long arms up behind his head and touching the door frame.

"Other than you looking kind of ridiculous, nothing at all," you reply with a smirk.

He grumbles a little and opens up the fridge you've had since you started living here, taking out a can of energy drink. You half chuckle, "Didn't you sleep for a long time last night, the fuck are you drinking that for?"

He glances at you once shutting the fridge and opens up the can, "Yeah, tho? I feel like waking up fathter and thith tathteth like twenty two timeth better than coffee."

You nod and make yourself some instant coffee and lean against the counter as you drink it. Sollux finishes off his energy drink then goes to shower before mumbling something like, "KK your hair ith all in your face I think you need a haircut."

You look up at your bangs that were starting to hang down in your face and you guess he's right. You search your room for your wallet and make sure you have enough cash for a simple trim just to get it out of your eyes, write a short note to Sollux, pull on a hoodie, and walk out of the door.

You walk down to where the only person you trust to cut your hair works. Kanaya works in a salon but society and social standards can suck your dick if they try to make you ashamed for going to a salon. You don't trust many people, and even fewer with holding sharp objects near your neck.

You walk in and instantly see Kanaya. She smiles, her perfectly white and pointy teeth shining and greets you, "Well hello there, Karkat. I wasn't surprised that I would see you come in here so soon, considering I noticed your horribly unkempt and long hair last night."

"Yeah. Can you cut it now or are you busy?" You ask. Thankfully she nods which means she didn't have any appointments.

"So, Karkat, how is your relationship with Sollux?" She asks as she's wetting down your hair.

You half growl in response out of defense for your privacy in matters such as that, "What? Hell, Kanaya, it only got like official last night. How the fuck did you find out already?"

Kanaya smiles a bit devilishly, "Karkat, I've come to the conclusion that you don't think I know you as well as I actually do." She rinses out the shampoo from your hair and adds, "Plus, you seem to be overseeing the fact that he has a blog that he updates frequently, which I keep a tab on."

Right. Sollux runs a blog. Its mostly a gaming blog so you don't know why he'd post something like that on there but he's Sollux and with Sollux, he’d post about anything.

Kanaya cuts your hair and you idly gossip with each other, discovering that Vriska had gotten herself a boyfriend who was actually a normal human, which you found surprising. But of course, you guess it would be kind of odd for all twelve of you to hook up amongst yourselves.

You walk out of the salon and nearly run into an oddly familiar tall fellow, or so you think.

“Sollux, what the fuck are you wearing that horribly ugly shirt fo-” You get cut off as the stranger in a weird black and yellow shirt turns towards you. You swear to god this street stranger had to be Sollux’s doppelganger or some shit. Same height, same medium brown hair, same facial shape and nose, he even looked the same aproximate age as Sollux. This stranger had hair covering his eyes, though and he kind of spazzed out when you started talking to him.

“What the fuck ithhh a Thhholluckthh? What kind of god fucking- dumbathhhh name ithh that?” The stranger asks with a heavy lisp. Okay, this is getting weird. This couldn’t be Sollux’s exact copy, obviously though, this guy had something off about him.

“Shit, sorry, you kind of looked like my friend, who’s name is Sollux-” You explain hastily as a girl maybe an inch taller than you with red square shades and candy red-streaked black hair comes and takes this guy’s hand.

“Hey Tuna, who’s this?” She asks, smiling a bit at you. You can tell she’s one of those, what do you call them, gamer girls or some shit. She’s wearing some gaming shirt and a teal jacket with bright red boots.

“I don’t shit fucking know he-shit juthhht rammed into me and called me a Thhhholluckthhhh,” this “Tuna” guy stammers out kind of angrily, glaring at you. He flips his hair out of his eyes and he has eyes really similar to Sollux’s, but without the eyesight-damaging mutations and instead of a red-brown, he had a normal brown eye.

His, you’re assuming girlfriend, gives you kind of a confused look. You put up your hands innocently, “Hey, I wasn’t trying to start anything or some shit, I ran into him by accident and I thought he looked like my friend.”

She nods, understanding and pats “Tuna’s” shoulder gently, “Hey babe, he just got you confusizzled with one of his bros, he didn’t mean to run into you, that wouldn’t be very rad of him would it?”

He nods, understanding slowly and looks kind of ashamed of himself, “Thhhorry, white haired fluffy guy.”

“It’s fine, you don’t have to apologize, it was my fault,” You reply, daring not to touch this guy’s shoulder to show it’s okay, he seems pretty touchy. He even twitched when his girlfriend touched his shoulder and you don’t want to set him off again. You put up your hand for a high-five, though. He looks up and gives you a toothy grin, and misses your hand a few times until he finally gets it.

“I’m… Mituna,” He says to you, jabbing a thumb at himself. He then points to his girlfriend with the hand she’s not holding and goes, “Thithhh ithhh Tupil- Tulip- FUCK! Latula.” Latula gently pats his shoulder with a small smile.

You reply, pointing a thumb at yourself, “Karkat. Nice to meet you both, but I should probably be on my way.”

You say goodbye to Mituna and Latula, fuck, what weird names, but weird people so you guess it fits. Not that you had a normal name, nobody in the twelve of you mutants had normal names.

It was still eerie as fuck that this guy looked almost exactly like Sollux, though. You wonder where the labs even got Sollux. All twelve of you had basically been stolen at birth so could it be possible that Sollux had a twin…? But how likely would it be that they only took Sollux?

You get lost in thought and soon enough you’re walking into the apartment and you turn around to shut the door when suddenly a pair of slender arms wrap around you gently. You jump at the surprise because you didn’t see Sollux when you walked in. He’s a sneaky little shit.

“Wow, KK, I didn’t think you’d actually go get a haircut right when I thuggethted it,” He says quietly as he’s hugging you, careful of your folded wings.

“Well, I knew I needed one for a while but I give you all of the fucking credit for reminding my forgetful ass,” You reply, angling your head to look up at him. Curse your mutated genetics to make you stop growing at a pathetic five-feet five-and-a-half inches.

He lets go of you and ruffles your now shorter white hair and smiles very slightly, “It lookth nice.”

You bat at his hand and remove your hoodie so your wings could fold properly. “Thanks.” You decide to ask him one of the things he’s always kept to himself, “Hey, Sollux, do you know anything about where you came from? Like I mean before the labs. I know you’ve hacked into their database…”

“I know a little bit, but let’th go thit down,” He replies as his expression changes to one of thought and you both walk to your couch to sit down. He leans back against the back of the couch and looks at the ceiling.

“I know I wath born to thome people with the latht name Captor in a hothpital acrothh the thtate. I might have had a brother but the fileth didn’t mention many detailth except that my father worked for NASA, thomething with computerth, I think. There wathn’t much about my mother tho I’m athhuming she’th unemployed or dead or thomething. I did thome of my own rethearching and I found a little more about my dad, apparently he’th been involved in dethigning rocket engineth, too. But I can never find his firtht name, they jutht refer to him ath ‘P. Captor’,” Sollux explains, putting his hands behind his head. He looks at you with a questioning look, “Why do you athk? You never theemed interethted before.”

You wring your hands on each other as you sit cross legged sideways on the couch, facing Sollux. “Well, today I ran into someone when I was walking home and he looked, like fucking exactly, like you. Like, you two have to be related or he’s your doppelganger or something,” You reply quietly.

He raises and eyebrow, “Maybe he could be related to me, I read thomewhere in the fileth that I pothhibly have a brother. It’th weird how he’d end up in the thame town ath us, though.”

You nod, “His name’s Mituna. I’m assuming you’d search for his last name as Captor?”

Sollux nods, “But that’th for another time, I don’t feel like digging around right now.”

You nod in understanding, scooting closer to Sollux and positioning yourself comfortably against his side without squashing your wings. “Sollux, do you want to do something dumb and romantic? Because I feel like watching 50 First Dates and cuddling under a blanket, and fuck you for any smart remark you’re going to make,” You ask.

Sollux smirks a little, “I guethh I can be nice enough to watch your dumbathh Rom-com with you for once, you fluffy fuck.”

Chapter Text

One of the best yet worst decisions that Sollux could have made was to get an actual job.  It wasn’t anything that even would have challenged him or even fit his skills. He chose to work at a goddamn fast food mexican chain. You don’t know why he even chose that as a job when he could damn well be working for the Geek Squad or hell, even running his own computer repairing business. He always came home really late from work, smelling like the greasiest of tacos, and he was always exhausted, too exhausted to even talk. He just went straight to bed for a few hours until you woke his scrawny ass up to go let out his built-up psionic energy.

One night when you knew he got off of work about a half hour ago, you begin to worry. He usually gets home twenty minutes after his shift on average. You glance down at your phone when a message comes in:

“Sent from: Sollux

hey KK ii have a really bad headache becau2e iim exhau2ted 2o ii ju2t cra2hed at FF and ED’2 hou2e ii diidnt want two driive all the way home and get iintwo an acciident or 2omethiing. 2orry. iill be home tomorrow ok??”

You quickly reply with an “OK” and sigh. First they give him the dirtiest jobs. Then they make him work so late into the night that he all but collapses as soon as he walks in the door. You’ve had to force him into the shower and damn near keep him STANDING so he could wash himself some nights. Like hell you’re sleeping in the same bed as a taco; you don’t have many standards but you still have some.

Losing all motivation to even ponder going outside to stretch your wings, you settle for watching a movie curled up under a blanket. You get bored and feel like something is missing and suddenly you feel all alone. It’s got to be one of the scariest feelings to you. He’s lived with you for over two years. You were used to seeing him at least for an hour each day and cuddling him each night. He was yours, and you were his. You miss him.

“God damnit, Vantas, suck it up. It’s only one night he’s not going to be home,” You mumble to yourself. You give up on even being awake and just want tomorrow to come so you crawl into bed. It was cold.

You tossed and turned and finally fell into a fitful sleep, only to wake up gasping for breath from nightmares after four hours. You haven’t been having as many nightmares since you’ve fallen asleep in his arms each night.

You try to fall back asleep but constantly wake up with nightmares even worse each time. Around 8 AM, you’re huddled in a ball of blankets and shivering from a particularly vivid one and you jump, squeaking, when you hear the apartment door open and close.

Soft footsteps make their way down the short hallway and into the room. Instead of pulling yourself out of the blankets, you only curl up further.

“KK…?” He sits down on a corner of the bed and gently places a hand on your back, which you flinch at. He doesn’t pull away and softly rubs your back, careful to miss your wings.

“Thorry I didn’t make it home latht night. You had nightmareth, too, I take it?” He asks quietly, slowly peeling the blankets off of you.

When he finds your face, you peer out and nod. He doesn’t pressure you to talk about it, which you’re thankful for, and you don’t ask about his. You both understand each other’s minds enough to know exactly what they were about.

“You look tired, KK. Do you want to try thleeping again?” He slowly moves off of the bed and changes out of the clothes you’re guessing he borrowed from Eridan, which you were surprised that they fit him but athletic shorts usually are long enough for a variety of people. He changes into some pajama pants and a black shirt and you untangle the blankets so they’re useable.

He crawls into bed and you rest your head on his chest. He gently strokes your hair and he slowly begins to stop just as you’re drifting off. He moves for a quick second to take off his glasses and put them on the end table and soon enough he’s back to stroking your hair until you both fall asleep.

You dream about when you first met Sollux. It was actually one of the somewhat tolerable memories of the laboratory. The scientists had taken you outside, telling you that you were getting a neighbour and to meet him outside. A truck backs into the gravel driveway of the dingy, hidden building that was the hell you called home.

That's when the truck opened and some stronger men from the labs just... Threw him out. Still in a cage and everything. It crashed to the ground and the scientist who had escorted you outside shoves you forward, mumbling something like, "You better go make friends with him." That was the only scientist who really cared about you and saw you as just a little more than an animal, you never knew his name but you called him Crabdad. He was usually assigned to taking care of you and actually played a part in your escape, only at his life's expense.

You cautiously approach the cage and the first thing you notice of the inhabitant is how disgustingly scrawny he is. You don't even know how he had the strength to sit up, he looked borderline malnourished. His medium brown hair was cut messily short, like they had actually struggled to keep him groomed. He looked up at you, well more like squinted, which you didn't understand at the time since it was cloudy. There was distrust and a bit of fear in his eyes, one red brown and one deep blue.

"Hey, my name is Karkat. Who are you?" You ask as gently as possible, which was hard for you so it sounded like a command nonetheless.

He tilts his head and blinks at you, as if processing. Could he even talk? You know that sometimes transfers from other labs came in without the ability to talk. You trash that idea when he opens his mouth, you see his eye teeth are larger than someone of his size, perhaps another vampirish mutant like Kanaya? "I'm Thholuckthh Captor, experiment number 22 from the labthh in Plainwater," he responds.

Crabdad comes to get you and tells you that they'll be taking Sollux into your holding room once they run some tests on him. Sounds like you'll have an easy day today since they'll be working on Sollux rather than you.

Sollux is taken into your holding room sometime during the night and you wake up when he was. They had IVs in his arms and he was wearing the same kind of scrubs you had that were a pale grey colour. They must have been actually giving him medical attention rather than what tests you assumed they were running.

You turn over in your cage and sit up on your sleeping pad, looking at him. He basically collapses onto his own sleeping pad and faces you when he notices you. "Hey, Karkat right? Do you mind if I call you KK?" He asks quietly, his voice a bit raspy.

Thats when you noticed that his eyes were glowing faintly. You nod, "Stupid nickname, but whatever floats your boat. What kind of mutant are you, I've never seen any like you before."

He sits up weakly and raises a hand to the bar of his cage. Red and blue sparks start sparking around his hand and he reaches out to touch the electric lock that was on his cage and you hear the familiar sound of the cage unlocking. Your jaw nearly drops. He pushes open the cage and walks out, then sits outside of your cage where you were sitting, reaching out a hand, implying for you to shake it.

"You're not going to electrocute me or something are you? I really don't have that on my list of things to do with the new neighbour," you ask suspiciously. He chuckles and coughs a bit before shaking his head. You reach out cautiously and shake his bony hand.

"I can tell that we are going to be great friendth, KK," He says to you with a cheerful smile. You don't know how to react, was the lab he came from actually so bad that he could be happy in a place like this?

You spread out your wings a bit, you couldn't fly yet with them because you were only 7 years old and they hadn't fledged yet, but they would very soon. He looks at you with awe, "I wish I had cool wingth like that. I think if I try hard enough maybe I can fly with my pthionicth but they're really weak right now becauthe my lab got overpopulated and food rationth were lethhened. That'th why I got tranthferred here," He explains and you nod.

He goes back into his cage before a lab worker caught him and he even relocked it himself. They rarely check on the mutants at night, maybe only once or twice, which is probably why they didnt lock him into a cage with a different lock - because they didn't either notice or care.

You both fell asleep and the last thought you had before falling asleep that night was, "I really hope he stays alive here."

You wake up slowly from your sleep to find Sollux still knocked out. He probably will be for a while but you slept a good 2 hours and felt a lot better. You breathe in and he smells like Eridan's soap. Feferi likely made him shower when he crashed there but you breathe in deeper and you smell his natural scent. You don't know why you find it so comforting, you always have, even before being in a relationship with him. It just made you feel... Safe. In some bizzarre way, since you can damn well protect yourself from any physical violence. But this was some kind of new safe and you couldn't explain it, but it felt nice.

You slowly get out of bed and go through your morning routine, as quietly as possible to not wake your sleeping boyfriend. At about 11 AM, you creep back into your shared room and gently shake him awake.

"Sollux. Its damn near noon so get up you lazy excuse of a boyfriend," You mutter to him and his eyes slowly open.

"Nn... 'Mornin' KK..." He yawns, blindly reaching over to the bedside table to put his glasses on. He ends up putting them on crooked and you just shake your head and fix them for him.

He gets dressed rather quickly and then you set off into the dangerous normal world. Before he left for work yesterday, he said he wanted to spend the day with you since he has the day off today, thank god.

He takes you to the cafe for breakfast, and afterwards he pulls out movie tickets from his wallet and you just stare at them when you see the title. He actually... Bought tickets for a romcom that was playing in the local theater. You nearly tackle him when you launch into his arms even though it didn't seem like a big deal. But it was a big deal for you.

After the movie you decide to walk in the park with him, he rubs your shoulder to prevent your wings from cramping up. You walk past the skatepark which is around the center of the huge park and you hear a familiar voice.

"C'mon, 'Tuna! You totally have got this!" It's that Latula girl and Mituna.

Sollux notices you staring and gives you a questioning look with a raised eyebrow, "What, KK? Do you feel like thkating, I didn't know you coul-"

"Shut up, idiot. You know I can't skate. I was staring because your fucking doppleganger is over there," You cut him off, poking his cheek and he smirks.

"Well, let'th go thee him then," He responds, taking your hand and walking towards the skatepark.

When Latula sees you, she stops and waves before getting Mituna to follow her to go see you.

"Not him AGAIN, Tulip hithhh hair thhhcarethh me it'thh all like white like-"

"Sup Karkat?" Latula cuts him off before he could say anything too vulgar or idiotic. She smiles and pats his shoulder gently.

You nod a greeting and Sollux puts out his hand and Latula looks up at him as if she saw a ghost. "I'm Thollux, nice to meet you both," He says cooly.

Latula looks from him to Mituna and back to Sollux. "My god, Kar-dizzle you're right! They look a lot alike! Mituna, did you ever have a twin bro that you know of?" Latula asks.

Mituna shrugs and grumbles, "D-do you reeeeaally think I'd fu-fucking know that I can't even 'member what I had for breakfathht."

Sollux raises and eyebrow a bit before you elbow him in the side. This guy's head is obviously not screwed on all the way. He got the memo and nodded slightly, so slightly that you're pretty sure that you're the only one that caught it.

"Might I athk your latht name, Mituna? I'm a bit curiouth," Sollus asks calmly. He has a way with people that you will never understand since he can be such an ass half of the time. But it's just a quirk that you love about him.

"Why do you wanna know are you gonna try to BE ME AND THHTEAL MY THHHTUFF AND MY GRILLFRIEND BECAUTHHHE NO SHE'THH MY TULIP," Mituna's voice raises in volume and you flinch.

Sollux stays calm and his gaze doesn't flicker from the other tall man. "Of courthe not, but when I wath, eh, adopted, I kept my birthname and I'm curiouth ath to know if we're related," he explains.

Latula steps in with a sincere smile, "His last name is Captor."

You see Sollux's eyes widen behind his tinted glasses and his eyebrows raise. Well, things just got interesting.

Chapter Text

It turns out that Mituna is precisely the same age as you all guessed Sollux was, 22. Mituna's birthday is also apparently June 2nd and his dad is also the elusive P. Captor of NASA. It turns out his first name was really odd and hard to pronounce so everyone just called him Phillip or Phil rather than... Pissonic? No. P-sionic? Something similar to that you guess, considering you've only heard two lispy brothers pronouncing it, or at least trying to.

Mituna actually got really excited when he realized what this meant. Though he didn't remember that he had a brother, he seemed to accept Sollux and he basically tackled your boyfriend when it all came together in 'Tuna's scrambled mind.

You can't help but feel a little jealous, though you really shouldn't. He and Sollux would never be as close as you are to Sollux. And you know for a fact, that unlike Sollux, you were voluntarily given to the labs when you were born. So you kind of don't really know or care about whoever your family is. At least that's what you have told yourself for years.

Mituna ends up calling his/their dad and trying to explain what happened. Mituna smiles and hands the phone to Sollux, who gives him a slightly confused look before starting to talk on the phone to the man. He ends up wandering while on the phone to drown out Mituna's exciting babbling. You stay put where you are, makimg some idle conversation with Latula.

"So 'Tuna's got a long lost bro. That must be pretty radical," She states with a smile. You can't help but feel like that behind the red glasses (which you find eerily familiar) and the obvious strange fashion, that she may too be related to someone in your little mutant group. Maybe this town is where some or all of you originate from.

"Yeah, pretty fucking crazy right? I know Sollux really wanted to find out where he came from. Like he never openly shared interest in it but he did so much damn research that it was pretty obvious," You state, you mind suddenly snapping into perspective. That nose shape, the obsession with red, the way Latula's hair flips at the ends even though its styled to only do that on one side.

"Terezi!" You blurt out suddenly, then cover your mouth.

Latula looks at you like you just grew a second head. Or like your wings just popped out of your sweatshirt. Then it shifts to lile she saw a ghost. Eerie.

"...How did you know that was my dead little sister's name," She says quietly, barely a question but not a demand either. Almost like she can't believe that she heard the name you uttered from your big stupid mouth.

You shake your head, "No no... Wait. Fuck. You remind me of my ex girlfriend- I mean we dated maybe for like three days. She's still a good friend but she kind of knew that I was in love with Sollux before I did? If that makes sense," You stumble to reply, suddenly getting kind of twitchy. You take a deep breath. "How old would your sister be?" You finally manage to ask. Terezi is the second youngest in you little group, being approximately 18 and Nepeta being the youngest at 17.

"The doctors told my mom that she died right after she was born, gosh I was maybe four at the time but it was really traumatic. I was so excited to mentor a radical little sis. They didn't even let us have her body for the funeral," Latula replies, sadness dripping from every word she spoke. You can see her staring at the ground from behind her red shades, here eyes wide.

"I... I'm going to take a wild guess here but is your hair naturally red? Like not red red, but ginger? Or anyone in your family?" You ask Latula and she looks back at you.

"Well, yeah, my dad has red hair, but mine is black like my mom's. He really hoped for Terezi to have red hair, she probably would have too," She replies, reality slowly setting in on her face.

"Wait, does your Terezi have red hair?" She asks with a bit of an excited smile. "Could she really be alive?"

You nod. You walk over to Sollux, who is laughing at something his dad must've said on the phone. You reach into his pocket for his cell phone and pull it out. He gives you a look and you give him one back that says, "This shit's important. I need your goddamn phone." Thankfully he shrugs it off and you go back over to Latula and flip through his photo gallery until you find a picture of Terezi. Sollux and Terezi are pretty damn close for whatever reason, but platonically. Obviously not as close as Sollux is to Aradia but close.

You stare at the picture of Terezi and look back up at Latula, and back down again. Comparing faces. They both had the same slightly rounded cheeks and the same pointed features.

You hold the phone out to Latula and she lifts up her glasses to look at the picture without a red tint and she looks... Shocked to say the least.

"Oh-my-god is that my...? She's really...?" Now it's her turn to stumble on words. You nod.

"That's Terezi all right. She's currently 18 and blinder than a bat but still alive and kicking," You state.

Latula seemed to have lost her whole skater girl attitude at this point, except for her speech patterns and weird "radical" words of course. "Can... Can you call her? Please? I wanna meet my lil sis," She asks quietly. You take a breath and nod.

You dial Terezi and Vriska's apartment phone number and thankfully Terezi answers.  You really don’t feel like being interrogated by Vriska today. "Sollux? Is something wrong or did Karkles finally openly admit his undying love to you?" She starts cackling and you let out a low growl. "Oh? Sup Karkat, why are you using Sollux's cell?"

"I... Fuck. Listen. Come to the skate park in the center of town. There's someone here that wants to meet you," You explain. You don't really want to give away what happened to Terezi until she gets here and sees, well smells? Tastes? Whatever the hell Terezi does.

"Karkat, you know I may be blind but I'm not the type for blind dates," She says sarcastically. You can almost see the shit-eating grin on her face.

"No. Its nothing like that. Just get your blind ass to the skate park. Its kind of fucking important," You grumble lowly, trying to stress that this is important.

"...Alright, but if this is really some kind of date setup for a double date with you and Appleberry, I'll have you hanging from the nearest tree by your wings before you can say 'justice'," She responds, promptly hanging up.

"Terezi's on her way. And what I said about being blinder than a bat,  well. She's literally fucking blind," You warn Latula, who smiles and snaps her fingers.

"Well heckie, I guess losing senses is part of our soon to be SO TIGHT sisterhood!" She blurts out excitedly, then her voice goes back to normal when you give her an odd look. "Oh, I can't smell, just one day I lost my sense of smell," she explains.

All of a sudden, you are whacked on the head from a behind intruder with a thin object. You whip around after you recover with a glare. "What the FUCK, Terezi?" Your voice cracks sheerly from the surprise. Not that she doesn't drub you regularly, but it could give away her mutation if she's so accurate with it.

She leans on her cane, businesslike. "Hanging by a tree, Karkles. You know, the whole date thing applies to playdates too," she smirks at you, raising an eyebrow.

"No. Terezi. Meet Latula. Your biological sister. Better sister than whatever you call Vriska," You explain to her, and she turns her head directly to Latula.

"She doesn't smell like she looks like me, though I do smell a strong liking of red," she gives a devilish smile. Latula smiles back at her.

"So you're Terezi. My Terezi, little sis. You seem hella radical, shorty!" Latula says, smiling bigger. "You inherited mom's height, that's for sure. And oh my god you actually do have red hair! I'm so glad you're alive and you didn't really die when you were born and ahh!" Latula can't stand still anymore and she ends up hugging Terezi tightly.

Terezi squirms a bit, but accepts her fate.

You watch Terezi quietly ask to lick Latula’s face to help her “see” what she looks like and, surprisingly, Latula lets her. You shudder. Instead of the weird using other senses to make up for a lost sense thing being a result of Terezi’s mutations, it’s actually weirdly a family trait or some shit. Your jaw drops when Latula licks Terezi, commenting that she smells very good.

“Just… How,” You say quietly to yourself, then feel a hand on your shoulder.

“Pretty weird ithn’t it, KK? It’th like the thientithtth that thtole uth from birth actually got uth all from thith thleepy little town,” He meets your thoughts completely, and you suddenly realize something.

“Sollux. What if this is a test, like a really fucking messed up one. How weird is it that we end up coming to the EXACT town that some, or all of us for that matter, were taken from when we were born? What if the scientists programmed us to come here, if they’re literally watching our every goddamn move?” As you talk, you look up at him and he has a concerned gaze.

“It’th been three yearth, KK. Twelve out of however many hundred mutantth jutht leaving like that, they wouldn’t really care. They probably athhumed we died anywayth. And if not, we’re prepared,” He calmly states, though you do know that your words got to him. He squeezes your shoulder.

“...So what did you talk about with you dad?” You ask to change the subject.

“Oh, heh, not really anything too important. He thaid he’th going to vithit here, though, to meet me in perthon I guethh. He theemth pretty cool. Thmart, that’th for thure, and tharcathtic. I guethh my oh tho charming perthonality ith partially from him,” Sollux smirks, poking out his tongue slightly. You stick your tongue out back at him.

You wave to Latula, Mituna, and Terezi. Sollux kind of pushed you along in his own wordless way to say that you two should get going. You teased him, “What, does your dad want you in bed by seven?”

“You’re an athh, KK. To think I wath going to take you out to dinner,” He crosses his arms in a fake pout and you playfully punch his shoulder.

“You know I’m just teasing you, Solluxander whatever the fuck your middle name is Captor,” You take notice of your surroundings. You’re going towards the center of town, like the upperclass center. Why? You ask yourself. The only restaurants out here are fancy as fuck. Oh boy.

“Sollux. Are you aware that we both would look like street urchins if we went into one of these restaurants dressed like we are?” You ask, not that you give a fuck but it would make you guys stick out like a sore thumb.

He smirks and leads you… A parking garage? Now you’re utterly confused.

Well, you were utterly confused until you see a certain dark haired, fashionable hairdresser emerge from behind her car. And holding two full suits. And a hairbrush.

Kanaya hands you a suit. It’s simple and black with a red shirt to go under it with a black tie. You groan, “Kanaya, do you seriously that think either of us know how to tie a tie?”

“Of course not, but I obviously do and I am more than willing to help you two incompetent excuses for men with that task,” She smiles. “Now go change, I pulled a lot of strings to get these suits for you two, and even more for the dinner reservations. And you both still need a good tidying up.”

You and Sollux both take turns going to change in Kanaya’s SUV. There’s no way in hell you two would be able to change at the same time in there. It wasn’t really a privacy thing, since you live together. But it probably still would get a little weird. You’ve never actually seen Sollux completely… Unclothed. The same stands for Sollux never seeing you that way.

Once you change, Kanaya quickly gets to work with a spraybottle of water and a hairbrush to tame your hair. When she’s satisfied, she ties your tie for you and fixes your suit jacket. You feel pretty damn formal.

“Being fancy ith hard work I don’t like it,” Sollux mutters when he climbs out of Kanaya’s SUV in his suit. It was grey with a mustard yellow undershirt and he was holding a red and blue diagonally striped tie.

“Need I remind you that this was your idea and you only needed my expertise?” Kanaya asks with a sly smirk as she starts fixing Sollux’s hair and taming down most of the cowlicks. She takes his glasses off of him and he squints at her.

“I kind of need thothe,” He states, reaching for them but she dashes to the side.

“They are filthy, smudged,  and what did you do to these poor things?” Kanaya asks as she’s inspecting his glasses. She points to a place where Sollux actually superglued one of the nosepieces on.

“It broke off tho I glued it,” He explains. She takes out a nail file and a cloth and files down the glued area so it wasn’t as noticeable and she wipes his lenses for him. She sets them back on his face once they’ve met her standards.

“You could have at least freshly shaved this morning, Sollux. I don’t see how Karkat would be seen in a high end restaurant with you looking so scraggly,” She comments, fixing his jacket and he crosses his arms, rolling his eyes.

“I shaved latht night, it’th fine,” He grumbles. You didn’t even notice he didn’t shave today. But you shouldn’t be surprised, Kanaya cares a whole fucking lot about you, and part of her motherly instincts towards you means that she is a perfectionist towards your boyfriend.

“Now that you two are up to my standards, I believe you should get going. You may keep the suits since I doubt anyone would wear them other than you two, plus I tailored them to fit you both,” Kanaya says a she gently puts one hand on your shoulder and one on Sollux’s, gently pushing you both out of the parking garage.

“You owe me one, Sollux, and you are highly lucky that you happen to be in a relationship with Karkat,” She whispers to him, though you can hear it.

You walk with Sollux to the restaurant, a local pretty high-end place and you have to admit you were admiring how well he cleaned up the whole way there. Was there such a thing to be, like, way more goddamn attracted to someone than usual when they were in formal wear? You guess so, and decide that that isn’t just some cheesy movie cliche.

When he opens the door to the restaurant to you, revealing what it looks like inside, you feel something almost kind of melt deep inside you.

Chapter Text

You honestly think at this time that you died and reincarnated into some kind of romcom. This place was excellently decorated, with dark red decor and good atmospheric lighting.

Your server seats you immediately, he's dressed in a white dress shirt with a red tie and black pants with an apron. His hair was black and about the same length as yours, just tamed. This place is pretty damn high end and when did Sollux get the kind of money to take you here?

Then the damn server starts talking, "Now, might I get you two something to drink? In no means of offense, I will need to see some kind of identification card to serve you alcoholic drinks to know that you are of age, as it is required by la-"

"Hot tea please," You cut him off before he goes off on some kind of damn sermon.

"I'll have coffee if it'th not too much trouble," Sollux says calmly.

Once your server leaves, Sollux leans forward a bit towards you and smirks, idly playing with one of your hands. "KK, we're in a pretty nice rethtaurant, I would hope that you don't cauthe a thcene with mithter chatterbox waiter," His smirk widens and you lightly tap his cheek.

"It's not my damn fault that he doesn't know how to shut the fuck up. His parents or whatever dogs raised him should have taught him better," You reply, shrugging.

"Maybe they put uth with him becauthe we're gay ath hell and it would make him uncomfortable," Sollux says, grinning evilly.

"Oh, hell, Sollux. You know I'm only, quote, 'gay athh hell' for you. Dickwad," You roll your eyes, letting yourself slip a half-smile.

Your server comes back with your tea and Sollux's coffee and he sets it on the table.

"I seem to have forgotten to tell you what you may call me by if you need anything, my name is Kankri. My father named me afte-"

"Cool. Can we order now or are you just going to babble to us until we die of starvation?" You growl at Kankri. He looks kind of shocked and offended, to say the least. Good.

"Yes, I apologize if I hit any triggers, sir. What can I serve you today?" He fumbles for his notepad, looking kind of fearful. You almost feel bad, almost being the key word.

Sollux orders some kind of fancy sounding pasta dish and you end up getting crab cakes, wow actually real crab for once, along with some sides.

Sollux grins at you once he leaves, "Didn't I jutht tell you to behave yourthelf?"

"What are you, the police? Did you really want to hear that guy's whole fucking life story?" You ask him, hunger making you kind of crabby.

Sollux shrugs and comments, "Mmm, not really. But you could have been a bit more civil."

You reach across the table and grab his glasses, sliding them off and taking them hostage. He smiles a little and shakes his head at you. You know for a fact that he can't see dick squat without his glasses but you don't care. His mismatched eyes are nice, you wish you saw them more without his glasses on but you wouldn't want him getting contacts. He was one of those people that you couldn't imagine without glasses.

"No civility for the uncivilized," You reply, holding his glasses up in one hand.

He reaches for them, squinting, and misses. You didn't even have to move your hand, this is entertaining.

That is, until you feel a tingly sensation in all of your most ticklish places. You hold in a giggle and try your best to glare at Sollux, who's smirking at you with his arms crossed and his eyes faintly glowing.

"Hah..Not, hoohah, fair. Haha, you're a major, HAH-fuck you, asslicker sometimes," You stifle out, trying to suppress your laughter from his powers tickling you.

You finally give in and put his glasses on the table in front of him.

"Thaaank you," He smiles, putting them back on and the tickling sensations fade away.

Kankri quietly comes back and drops off some rolls for you and Sollux. He doesn't say a word and looks ashamed of himself. Okay, now you feel bad.

"Hey, Kankri, uh. Sorry for snapping at you. That was rude of me as a customer. You just need to learn to talk less," You apologize, and wow, the guy looks like he just found a million dollars.

"Yes, sir. I have been told before that I do talk and exceeding amount, but you see,my father is a priest and I have been listening to his long sermons my whole life and-"

"Let's not push it, here man," You cut him off more gently than the times previous. Sollux smirks at you a bit.

"My apologies, mister, erm?"

"Vantas," You reply cooly.

He looks surprised. Oh jesus fucking christ, not you too.

"I actually do believe that we have the same last name, though you don't look much like me at all, no offense intended, but maybe perhaps we are some sort of cousins? I know for a fact that I have an aunt whom I have not seen since I was just a baby, but from what my father tells me, she ran away from home as a teenager with another young man. I do not know if they ended up having children or not but perhaps these two would be your parents? I know that albinism runs in the Vantas family, as my father has it and his sister is most likely a carrier of the trait," Kankri babbles.

You nod, trying to pick out what the important details that were in his little speech.

"Well I'm an orphan. I just always had my last name on file so that might make a whole lot of fucking sense," You reply slowly.

Sollux gives you a pitying look across the table. That kind of hurt that you had two fucking parents and they sold you for money. You knew that's what had happened, Crabdad told you so many years ago and he didn't lie. You always kind of accepted it as reality, then again you thought that maybe it was a mistake in your files, but now that you put two and two together and found it true, you get an overwhelming feeling of rejection.

"Oh no, I do hope that I didn't trigger something awful towards you. Forgive me, maybe they aren't the same people. Perhaps we're more distantly related than first cousins-"

"It's fine. Just a sore subject for me, but its not terrible," You cut Kankri off again before he goes on a social justice spiel or something.

Kankri seems a bit more tolerable for the rest of the time you and Sollux are at the restaurant. Once Sollux pays for the food, even though you offered to buy, you two leave Kankri a tip and he exchanges cell numbers with you and you and Sollux exit.

You slump against Sollux's bony shoulder as you walk slowly and he puts an arm around you.

"...It mutht be hard, knowing exactly what happened and how inhumane it wath," He says quietly.

You nod, sniffling a bit. God fucking damn it, Karkat, don't do it.

"I-I just... I've always been a damn freak of nature and nobody ever wanted me, not even my goddamn parents. They sold me like I was an object..."

"Oh come on, KK, that'th not true. I want, hell, need you around. My life would be terrible without you. And I know the otherth need you around too, maybe not ath much ath I do but thtill," He reassures you, guiding you to a bench along the sidewalk to sit down together.

"...Thanks, Sollux..." You say weakly, and he wipes gently under your eyes.

"Don't you ever think that nobody wantth you around, okay?" He wraps his arm around you and you curl up against him.

"...I'm sorry," You sniffle quietly, burying your face in his shoulder.

"You don't have to apologize, you did nothing wrong," He strokes your hair in a calming way.

"...Hey, Karkat?" He asks for your attention, actually using your real name, which is rare. You let your face detach from his shoulder, which you accidently had stained with some tears.

His eyes meet yours and his hand cups your cheek gently. You know what's coming and you suddenly get a hell of a lot nervous. He leans in slowly and you can feel your pulse hammering in your chest, you can fucking /hear/ it in your ears. You hope to whatever mysterious god out there that you aren't blanching.

Then... His lips meet your's. Your eyes slip closed. He's warm, and it feels nice. His lips are slightly chapped but you expected that since he never used chapstick unless his lips were borderline bleeding from dryness. Your nervousness and uncertainty in yourself melt away and you kiss him back. Your hands find their way to his shoulders and his arms wrap around your waist, pulling you closer.

As fast as it started, it ended. Your foreheads stay touching and you're looking into his eyes again. He smiles just slightly at you.

"Sollux... That was... Really nice," You manage to say, still mulling it all over in your mind.

He chuckles a little and strokes your cheek again. "Glad you think tho, I've wanted to do that for like... Ever," He replies and blinks slowly.

Some people walk by on the sidewalk and you realize that you both must look really fucking odd. At least Sollux’s asshole of a manager didn’t walk by, you don’t know exactly how his manager feels about the kind of relationship that Sollux is in, but you are almost certain that he wouldn't be happy. Most people in this town don't exactly judge openly, but the manager of an establishment in this state is legally allowed to fire someone for their sexual orientation and that was terrifying and sick.

Sollux notices your sudden burst of self-conciousness and slowly shifts a bit so hes sitting up straight. "Tho do you want to go home now?" He asks quietly.

You nod, taking his hand and weaving your fingers together with his and you both stand up and walk home in silence.

When you get home, he ruffles your hair and takes your suit jacket for you and you do the same for him.

You go change into your sleeping shorts, some odd ones you found in a GoodWill store that were green and had crabs on them and the saying, "Crabby in the morning". Sollux had found them at the store first and thrown them at you shortly after he moved in with you. He told you then that they had suited you, and they pretty much did.

You take off the dress shirt that Kanaya had picked out for you and throw it in the dirty clothess hamper. You fold the pants and stuff then into your drawer.

When you walk back out of your bedroom, Sollux was already in his pajamas and you breifly wonder how he did it. Then you remember, oh yeah, the guy probably used telekinesis to get his pj's out of the bedroom before you even went in there.

He smirks at you and fucking scoops you up like some kind of poofy princess. Your wings flap a bit in uncertainty. Sollux may be many things, but muscular is definitely not on the list. His arms are pretty well defined, but you think its only because he basically lacks any form of body fat in general to hide the muscle that clings to the bones in his arms.

"Sollux, I swear to fuck if you drop me and cause me some kind of injury, once I am recovered, I will punch you in the face so hard that you lose your freakish fangs and go blind just from that one hit," You say to him, clinging to him for dear life and the asshole just laughs.

"Do you really think I'd drop you, KK? Thurprithingly, I'm thtronger than I look," He replies. You grumble and soon enough he plopped you down on the bed with no injuries at all from the scary journey of being carried by your utterly scrawny boyfriend.

You scoot over and he soon joins you, taking his glasses off and then pulling you into his arms. Your wings spread out and you sigh in content.

He nuzzles your now fluffy again hair and rubs your shoulders around your wings, right where they get sore during the day and it feels so nice.

"Mm, night, KK," He mumbles throught your hair and kisses your forehead softly.

"Night, Sollux, you dorklord," You reply and his arms wrap around you again and squeeze you slightly.

"I love you."

You feel like you just got blown up straight in the gut with a bomb made of butterflies and your heart feels like it joined your stomach. You're suddenly at a loss of words for like three seconds but you know you have to respond in some way.

"I-I love you too," You manage to stutter out.

You feel him smile and he nuzzles into your hair.

Even long after Sollux fell asleep, you're still awake. You feel so vulnerable and unsure and all of these dumb things are playing around in your head. You know you actually, legitimately, love him. And you've known him basically your whole life, so you don't understand why you're getting all of this anxiety. But what if he didn't mean it? What if he falls out of love with you? What if you just straight up heard him wrong and said something stupid?

You can tell that your self doubt is going to keep you up all night.

Chapter Text

You thank whatever mutation allows you to look like you've slept even when you haven't and end up creeping out of bed at around 6 AM. Laying on top of Sollux and just self doubting all night was starting to tear you apart. You'd only been together for... What? A month and a half officially? Was this normal? Even your expertise in romcons couldn't tell you.

You sigh and go through your mundane morning routine after eating a quick bite of breakfast food you'd bought a few days ago. After all of that jazz is done, Sollux is still asleep so you shrug and head to the main living area and sit at his desk where his extreme monster of a computer is sitting. You switch on one monitor quietly, then the other and you tap a key on the keyboard. The fan starts going and it honest to god sounds like you've just woken up a literal fucking beast.

The login screen pops up. Only one user account exists on this beautiful piece of machinery. And that account belongs to your sleeping boyfriend. You crack your knuckles and slowly type his password. The keyboard clacks loudly despite you trying to keep quiet. Finally, you've finished typing his elaborate, but easy password, "~twinarmageddonsrules~", and his desktop pops up.

You slowly click his loudass gaming mouse to open up a web browser. God damn, why did he have to have such a /loud/ mouse and keyboard? Every time you ask, he just replies with, "Well KK, I wouldn't expect you to underthtand, but they're mechanical and don't wear out ath much. Pluth it'h fun to thound tho profethhional." More like, "It's fun to sound like a major tool and piss off everyone with your obnoxious typing and clicking."

The web browser comes up at lightning speed and the home page is already on a search engine. Maybe some searching around will ease your mind a bit. You search for relationship advice, and it varies. Okay, so you know for one, he doesn't only want your dick. If he did, then he'd probably have already made a move on you about it. You two haven't even kissed on the lips until last night. Two, you have been living with him for a while and you know your feelings have somehow always been there. You don't get why you're freaking out, then. You feel like you need to talk to someone who's good with relationships... Or good with Sollux.

You open up his instant messaging system and sign into his account, too lazy to sign into your own. You glance at the list of people online and only find Nepeta online. Well... She wasn't exactly who you were looking to talk to... But if anyone knows a lot about relationships, it's her.

---twinArmageddons [TA] began trolling arsenicCatnip [AC] at [7:12 AM] ---

TA: hey nepeta.

AC: :33 < *ac cr33ps up behind her furry tall furriend and pawnders why he is up so early but says "hi pawllux!" and hugs him!*

TA: FUCK. NO. WAIT I'M NOT SOLLUX. IT'S KARKAT.

AC: :33 < ohh!! well hi karkitty! did you sneak onto pawlluxs computer?

AC: :33 < youre a furry bad kitty, karkitty ;33

TA: JUST... OKAY. SURE. PUNISH ME ALL YOU WANT. AS LONG AS IT DOESN'T INVOLVE ME EMBARRASSING MYSELF AND DOING... WHATEVER YOU ALWAYS DO IN YOUR SPARE TIME. I'M NOT INTO THAT SICK KINKY BULLSHIT OR WHATEVER YOU DO.

AC: :33 < karkitty im appawled that you think i do that kind of stuff x((

AC: :33 < all i do is harmlessly roleplay! and its not like THAT yucky stuff at all thats just gross! 33:

TA: OKAY. RIGHT. SORRY. I WAS PROBABLY THINKING OF VRISKA OR SOME SHIT BECAUSE I DIDN'T GET A SINGLE WINK OF FUCKING SLEEP LAST NIGHT AND I'M NOT IN MY BEST MENTAL STANDPOINT.

AC: :33 < now whos the kinky one?? h33h33!

TA: THAT'S NOT WHY I DIDN'T SLEEP! GOD. YOU COULD EVEN SAY THATS THE OPPOSITE WAY AROUND THERE.

AC: :33 < so you didnt sl33p beclaws pawllux didnt fill pails with you? 33www why are you telling me this??

TA: NO. NO NO. AGAIN, NOT WHAT I MEANT.  IF "FILLING PAILS" MEANS WHAT I THINK IT MEANS. I'M JUST HAVING SOME PROBLEMS AT THE MOMENT, NOT REALLY WITH SOLLUX BUT MORE WITH MYSELF? IF THAT MAKES ANY SLIVER OF GODDAMN SENSE.

AC: :33 < not really :(( youre being a little vague karkitty i dont exactly know what you mean

TA: RIGHT. BECAUSE I WAS A DUMBASS AND HAVEN'T TOLD YOU EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED YET.

TA: WELL... SOLLUX SAID SOMETHING LAST NIGHT TO ME AND I JUST FEEL KIND OF UNEASY. WITH MYSELF, NOT HIM.

AC: :33 < well what did he say?

TA: ...I'LL TELL YOU IF YOU PROMISE NOT TO TELL A SINGLE FUCKING SOUL.

AC: :33 < okay? thats an easy purromise

TA: ...HE TOLD ME HE LOVES ME

AC: :33 < 333333!!!

TA: YEAH. I KNOW. BUT CAN YOU SAVE YOUR IDIOTIC FANGIRLING UNTIL A LATER DATE, LIKE HOW ABOUT NEVER? I'M STILL HAVING ISSUES.

AC: :33 < oh right

AC: :33 < but why are you having purroblems? thats a good thing that he told you he loves you!! :33

TA: ...I KNOW. BUT... I DON'T EVEN FUCKING KNOW. WE'VE ONLY BEEN LIKE OFFICIALLY TOGETHER FOR LIKE A MONTH AND A HALF THOUGH. AND I GUESS I'M JUST DOUBTING WHAT HE SAID

TA: ...I'M A GOD DAMNED FUCK-UP, I KNOW.

AC: :33 < oh nooooo youre not a furrick up karkitty!

AC: :33 < its purrectly normal for those kind of thoughts!!

TA: OH OKAY. THANK GOD. BUT I WAS UP ALL DAMN NIGHT WITH THOSE THOUGHTS.

AC: :33 < it happens when you dont know how to handle them :33 if you only look at the reality of the situation then you negative thoughts will go away!

AC: :33 < be happy for yourself karkitty!! :33 im happy that you and pawllux are happy together!

TA: THANKS, NEPETA. THAT MEANS A LOT.

AC: :33 < youre welcome!

TA: SHIT. I HEAR RUSTLING AROUND IN THE OTHER ROOM. I GOTTA GO BEFORE HE CATCHES ME ON HIS COMPUTER. I'LL TALK TO YOU SOME OTHER TIME.

AC: :33 < oh okay!! s33 you later karkitty and good lick with pawllux!

TA: THANKS.

--- twinArmageddons [TA] ceased trolling arsenicCatnip [AC] at [7:47 AM] ---

You struggle to find a way to delete the chatlog from his computer’s files before he catches you and gets curious. His Trollian program is a lot different from yours, he must have programmed it himself to be a clusterfuck of confusion.

Warm arms wrap around you and you feel his chin rest on top of your head and you jump slightly from surprise. “To delete a chatlog, jutht go to optionth, then chatlogth,” He murmurs to you.

“...Thanks,” You finally manage to reply, feeling your stomach do the weird flipping thing again. Okay, calm down, Karkat, you think, just remember what Nepeta told you.

“Tho what are you doing up tho early on my computer, hmm?” He inquires sleepily, but not in an upset tone at all. “Did you butht your laptop again?”

“I uh, yeah I did, a while ago. I kept forgetting to ask you to fix it and it was just easier to use your computer since it’s faster and fucking huge and awesome,” You reply, turning around in the office chair to face him and he picks you up with his psionics, then sits in his chair and drops you into his lap. You whine a little in protest.

He chuckles at the terrible sound that came from your throat. “KK what wath that thound? You weren’t uthing my computer for watching porn thith early in the morning, were you?” He teases, poking your cheek.

“Oh god, fuck no. I’d rather have my dick impaled on a rusty fork than watch porn on your computer. You’d fucking kill me for going on ‘dangerous websites’. Plus, I don’t even watch that shit, humans are fucking weird, like I don’t even want to see two other people fucking,” You reply, swatting at his hand.

“Mmhmm, I’m thure you’ve never watched porn once in your entire life, KK. Even if it wath jutht becauthe you were curiouth,” He presses, wiggling his eyebrows.

You roll your eyes and start poking his upper lip to change the subject, “Go shave, Sollux, god. You’re starting to look like you did when you were like 16 with that weird, I don’t even think it can be considered a mustache, thing.” You honestly didn’t care much about it, you accepted Sollux for whatever he decided to do with his face, but you just kind of wanted to give yourself some more time to think.

“KK, you’re tho mean, but fine. I needed to shower anywayth tho I’ll be back,” He replies with a mockingly hurt tone to his voice. You get off of him and he wanders off to the bathroom to shower and get cleaned up. You can’t remember if he works today or not, but if he doesn’t, maybe you two could play some video games or some shit.

You sit down on the couch and your anxiety from earlier comes back for a split second. Then, you remember what Nepeta had told you and you feel a little better. You never knew that this is what it is like when someone tells you that they love you. Nobody had ever told you that before, except maybe a few of your friends, but that was always in a platonic way. This was a totally different meaning of love, and it was absolutely foreign to you.

You curl up on yourself and sigh. Sometimes all you wanted to do was not be a freak of nature who didn’t know what love actually felt like. Sometimes you wish you could just cut your damn wings off since all they’ve ever caused was complications, agony, and the title of, “Freak”. You know that everyone in your group felt partially the same way about their own mutations, but somehow nobody else seemed to feel as bad about them as you did. Maybe Aradia, who sometimes got too depressed to leave the house from all of the voices of ghosts she would hear and talk to, would understand. But even she seemed to handle it better than you.

You know that Nepeta’s cat ears and tail cause complications and have to be hidden, much like your wings, but she was always so goddamn /cheerful/ about it. That, and some people just think that her ears and tail are part of some fancyass costume (not to mention that her almost perfect black hair and catlike face were both so flawless, it could easily be a costume). Your freakish grey wings wouldn’t be able to pass off as a costume. Maybe if they’d been white, but the reality is that your wings are grey.

Your phone in your pocket starts buzzing and you pick it up without even bothering to wonder who it is. You already know.

“What the hell do you want, Vriska? Can’t I just wallow in self-pity without you getting all on my fucking case about it?” You growl into the phone.

“Of coooouuuurse you can’t,” Vriska dramatically replies. “You should learn to keep your thoughts to yourself, Vantas. Or think quieter, your loud thoughts of self-pity just woke me up.”

“I never told you to be listening to my damn thoughts, and what I think about is none of your damn business,” You snap.

“Oh, on the contrary, Karkat. You’ve known for a good long while that eeeeeeeeveryone’s thoughts are automatically my business,” You can almost see the thin smirk pulling at her blue lipstick covered lips, exposing her slightly sharp canines and flipping her long, blonde, blue tipped hair. You shudder. Vriska isn’t ugly or anything, but she’s damn scary. She’s the kind of woman that looks like a model, but can and will crush you under her boots in a split second.

“Then here’s an idea, why don’t you just tune out any of my thoughts from your freak brain? I consider it a good payback for you know, arranging your escape even though you were on a totally different floor on the lab than the rest of us,” You growl, becoming agitated.

“Ouch Karkat, that hurt a lot, like right there. Imagine me pointing to my heart, Vantas. You know, for a short babyfaced loser, you can get awfully feisty. Here, I thought I’d call since you seemed to need a friend to talk to,” Vriska says cooly.

“We aren’t friends,” You reply quickly. You don’t know what Vriska is to you, but she isn’t necessarily a friend, but she isn’t an enemy either.

“Well we aren’t enemies, now are we?” If she had been typing this in a message to you, you could almost /see/ the eight-eyed smiley face she would have used with that statement.

“Stop reading my fucking brain, already. How about we’re acquaintances, do you agree to that label of our relationship?” You ask.

“Yes, that could work. Anyways, listen to me right here. Are you listening, Karkat? Okay, yes you are. Excellent. You know, everyone feels that way about their mutations, even I, the greatest creation alive, feel that way sometimes. I actually blame it on the rest of you freaks for forcing me to listen to your whining about it, but that’s beside the point. Anyways. We all care about you, Vantas. You may be a short-fused little loser, but we all look up to you, believe it or not. You are the one who made this all possible, after all,” Vriska tells you, and you can tell she’s being serious.

“...Wow, Vriska, did that hurt, actually telling someone something nice for once?” You tease, but deep down you appreciate it. Your left arm loses control and you slap yourself across the face.

“You’re welcome, asshole,” She replies, and you can hear the smirk on her face. She then hangs up quickly.

You put your phone back into your pocket and rest your chin on your knees, smiling slightly with a stinging cheek. Sometimes, just sometimes, you think that Vriska isn't really as bad as you think. Maybe she is a friend, she just doesn't express it very well.

Chapter Text

--Sollux’s P.O.V. --

You shower and do the awful deed of shaving your face, per Karkat’s request. You only started shaving for his sake, if it were up to you, you’d go about growing the world’s longest beard. God, you hate shaving. But it makes you look a lot cleaner, so what are you to do?

You brush out your damp hair, spiking it slightly on the sides and back as you’ve always done. You glance in the mirror, looking into your own freakish eyes and growling slightly. You feel like you’ve pissed off Karkat for some reason, last night was so great but today he seemed… So distant. Like he was hiding something. It didn’t help that he barely looked like he slept last night; he thinks you don’t notice that kind of shit, but he’s not fooling you. Having lived with him for 2 years and having been close friends for even longer has led you to pay attention to every detail of the short, angry, bird kid. The short, angry, bird kid you love.

You walk quietly out of the small, steamy bathroom and hear Karkat’s voice. He seemed to be agitated, but you couldn’t quite make out what he was saying. Then, you hear a yelp and it sounds like he slapped someone, but that yelp was from… Him? Huh. Must be Vriska. You vaguely wonder why she was calling him but don’t give it much thought.

You continue your journey and make your way into the bedroom and pull on some clothes for part of the day. You know that at around 2:00 you’re going to have to work. God, you hated work. You don’t know what possessed you to apply for a damn taco shack. The coworkers were… Okay. But the only manager you could even stand for two seconds was this chick that always acted drunk. Maybe she is always drunk, it would make sense considering some of the insufferable assholes she probably has to deal with.

There’s also a kid there that works as a part time DJ, he’s pretty cool, you guess. He’s actually a total fucking dork, but he puts on this cool guy act, probably so people don’t make jabs at him at work for being such a dork (though you always hear him muttering raps to himself while he’s working). His name is Dave, and apparently Terezi knows him somehow.

You pull on some black sweatpants and a comfortable athletic shirt and stroll back out of the bedroom. Karkat’s curled up on a ball in the middle of the couch and you wander over and sit next to him.

“Hey,” You greet quietly, giving him a hint of a smile and trying to read him.

“Hey, Sollux,” He replies quietly. He glances at you a little and you see how tired his eyes look. You sigh, unsure what to do.

“Ith thomething wrong? You theem kind of upthet, or at leatht quieter than usual,” You slowly ask.

“I’m fine,” He states kind of shortly.

“Bullshit, KK. You didn’t thleep latht night, you act like I can’t tell. But I can,” You retort, trying to be gentle with your tone of voice but you’re getting mildly agitated.

“It’s… Nothing, Captor. Seriously. It’s just, ‘Wow, Karkat is a major fucking loser getting stuck in thoughts of anxiety time’, that’s all,” He replies, getting a little bit agitated himself.

“...Might I athk why?” You calm yourself and ask him, lightly touching his shoulder.

“I’m just… I don’t know…” He mutters, avoiding eye contact with you. “I just, you’ve dated Feferi, you’ve been in a relationship before and you’re the first time I’ve ever been romantically involved with anyone. And I guess that just freaks me out, like did you ever tell Feferi what you told me…?” He glances up, his small frame slightly shaking.

“Fuck, KK. Ith that what thith ith all about? Okay, no I never told Feferi that I loved her. Becauthe I didn’t. She jutht… Pitied me a lot and I couldn’t really thay no when she athked me out. I didn’t want to really hurt her, I guethh. But we never got far at all,” You explain to the best of your abilities. Way to go, Sollux. What a time to fail at communication skills.

He seems to visibly relax and he leans his head against your chest. You smile a little and stroke his fluffy white hair.

“Oh thank god, thank you,” He muffled against your chest and you keep petting him gently.

You both have a cuddlefest with some random snacks and one of Karkat’s sappy as hell movies. You’re starting to actually maybe like them, not much, but they’re tolerable. At about 1:00, you’re forced to get up to go to work.

He gives you a bit of a sad look and you pat his head gently. You change into your uniform while he puts away the snack bags and dishes.

Once you’ve changed, he meets you at the door and stretches up on his tippy-toes. No, stop being so fucking adorable, Karkat. He shyly kisses you and you kiss him back.

“Be home at theven, KK,” You wave as you pull on a zip-up hoodie and slip your car and apartment keys into one of the pockets.

“Yeah, whatever, fucknub. Remember to keep your greasy taco hands off of me until you shower when you get home,” He teases as he closes the door.

You walk down the stairs of the apartment building and in the lobby you see a familiar girl with long, dark, wavy hair. Eh, you have a few minutes.

“Hey, AA,” You greet her as she turns around, her large, very deep red but almost black eyes looking mildly surprised to see you, but happy.

“Oh hello, Sollux, how have you been?” She asks, her voice sounding empty as it always has been. It must be due to the voices of the dead screaming at her all the time, at least that’s what you’ve always told yourself.

“I’m pretty good, jutht on my way to work, how are you?” You reply, leaning over and giving her a light hug. She was kind of like your adopted sister, of sorts. All of the others seemed to think you two were dating a while back, but it wasn’t really true. The feelings you had for each other were strictly platonic. She transferred from the Clearwater labs shortly after you did.

“I’ve been doing kind of okay, I suppose. The voices have been and always will be part of my mind, as you know, but they aren’t as bad as they sometimes are,” She replies, smiling slightly. “Equius actually has been trying his best to help me with them, which I am grateful for.”

“That’th good that he’th helping you out a little,” You respond, quickly checking your phone. “Shit, I have to get to work, I’ll talk to you thome other time?”

“Of course, you’re free to drop by my apartment anytime,” She says, her dark red lips pulling into a smile. She waves as you rush off to your piece-of-junk, literally-falling-apart car.

You blast your music on the way to work, anything to get into the best mood you can before having to deal with your idiots of coworkers and asshole customers for almost six hours. God, the bass in your car is horrible. Probably because the speakers are literally falling apart. Heh, oops.

You part around the back of the taco shop and shed your hoodie before even going inside. You really, really, do not want your hoodie to smell of grease and fried food. One of your coworkers, John, is standing outside, taking a box inside. He grins, his buck teeth looking as goofy as ever and you wave at him on your way inside.

You clock in and Dave is leaning against the counter in the back. “Sup, Captor,” He mildly states, his face almost expressionless with those huge dark shades covering his face.

“Thup,” You reply, raising your eyebrows a bit. Damn, your lisp. You’ve already been nicknamed “Tholluckth” because of it. But you can’t do a thing about it.

“So how’s your kitten?” He asks cooly with a slight smirk.

“You mean Karkat. He’th good, I guethh. He wath freaking out earlier becauthe of hith, uh, trutht problemth I guethh but I managed to calm him down and he realized it wath all in hith head,” You explain calmly. You had kind of an interesting friendship with Dave, sometimes he’d give you relationship advice for nothing in return and it helps a lot.

“Cool, cool. There ain’t no reason he shouldn’t be trusting you, Captor. Hell, you barely even want to glance at anyone else. Karkat is one hella lucky guy,” He states, matter-of-factly.

Roxy stumbles over, drunk as usual and she points at you with a wink. “Solly-wolly, you’re on drive-thru for a while, ‘kay?”

You grumble, nodding. God, you hated drive-thru. You hated lazy assholes that couldn’t even get out of their damn car. Most of the time as they drove away they’d call you names, ue to your lisp, obviously. Not that any of what they said you really gave a fuck about, but it did annoy you after a while.

You grab the dumb headset and make your way over to your station. You hear stumbling behind you, and after checking that no cars were coming, you turn around and John is standing there.

“Hey, Sollux, I know Roxy said you’re on drive-thru but I know you don’t really like it and I don’t really like counter so I was kind of going to offer if you wanted to trade?” He asked, his blue eyes meeting yours as he looked up at you. John wasn’t really short, but he was a hell of a lot shorter than you.

“Oh, yeah, thankth, JN,” You say, a little surprised at how nice he was being. Maybe there was some weirdo that comes in on Tuesdays that John didn’t like and wanted to avoid at all costs, who knows. You hand John the headset and saunter over to the counter, next to Dave.

“John trade with you?”

“Yeah. You guyth theem really clothe, what wath that all about?” You ask.

“Dunno. I mean, I know he doesn’t like working on Tuesdays, and apparently his girlfriend thinks he works at a prank shop so maybe she gets tacos every Tuesday, who knows,” Dave shrugs, leaning against the counter due to the lack of customers.

That’s when Vriska, of all people, walks in. You can tell it’s her from even before she entered the building. You can’t mistake that long blonde, blue tipped hair for anyone else. And you know she recognizes you, too.

“Hey, Sol-loser,” She greets when she walks over to the counter.

“Vrithka,” You state coldly, glaring a bit. “How can I help you today?”

“How polite of you, Sollux, wow. Karkat must have put a pretty tight leash on your manners since the last time we met,” She crosses her arms and smirks evilly at you. You growl.

“You mind controlled me to theverly injure AA, of courthe I’m going to be pithhed about that,” You mutter, making sure nobody else can hear.

“But that’s all in the paaaaaaaast, Captor. That was years ago,” She raises an eyebrow, never faltering from her smirk.

“Don’t you have a date or thomething,” You growl.

“Nah, actually, my boyfriend is at work right now,” She pauses, drubbing a finger on her chin. “As a matter of fact, I do believe he told me he works at a magic shop, but other sources tell me that he works with your lispy ass.”

Your mouth drops open as you put two and two together. You then look back towards the drive-thru and notice John trying his best to hide from the front. Well, shit. You really didn’t expect that.

“Whoah, hold on. You’re dating… Egbert?” Dave asked, raising a pale eyebrow.

“Uh, duh. I’m definitely not with you or this nerd,” She states, pointing at you casually. You glare.

John eventually trades you spots back so he could chat with Vriska. Wow, you didn’t expect that. John seemed to be the total opposite of Vriska, but you guess they balance each other out? Who knows. Not your relationship, not your problem.

You manage to survive work at least until your break at 4:00. But of course, even your break can't be in total peace, as Roxy saunters over and drops into a seat across from you at a table in the corner of the establishment.

"Heeeeey, Sollicks," She slurs with a slight smile.

"Can't I jutht have my break in peace?" You grumble. Any other manager you'd respect more, but Roxy was different. She never got offended and rarely mad, probably because she was so damn drunk all the time.

"Mm, nah," She giggles. Ugh. You feel sparks fighting to crack at the back of your eyes, to let it go, but you don't. "You're into the computer shtuff an' shit, right?" She asks, pulling you from your thoughts.

Well, that was an odd question. "Uh, yeth I am. Ith it really that obviouth that I'm a geek-athh nerd?" You reply.

"Nah, not really. I mean yeahhh, sorta. Takes one to spot one though I think," She replies cooly, resting her chin on her hands. You notice the colour of her eyes for the first time and it's almost unsettling how... Pink her irises were. But damn.

"Whoah, you mean to tell me that you're into that shit too? No way," You respond, getting just slightly excited behind that surprise. You didn't expect your perpetually drunk manager to be good with computers.

"Hells yeah I am, pretty cool right?" She says, grinning a little. "Anywhozits, since you an' me are into the same shit, I heard theres a really awesome competition for hacksing like, next week."

"Really? Any rewards for me inevitably winning" You inquire with a smartass smirk. Roxy may be into computers, but there's no way in hell she can beat you.

"Of course there is, I actually WON last year, the competition is so lame," She replies, confidently putting her hands behind her head. "The prize is like, ten thousand dollars this year since apparently we got tons of new sponsors, and they'e makin' us team up this year but teams are our choice."

"Interethting. I'm guethhing you want to recruit me, ith that what you're thaying?" You press, raising your eyebrows to keep a calm composure.

"Yup, so whadduya say, Solly?" She waggles her eyebrows, reaching out a hand.

"Mm, alright, here'th the catch though, you have to be completely thober when we compete, don' even drink two dayth before, alright? I'm not going to let uth lothe due to thome drunken coding mithtake," You negotiate, not making a move to shake her hand yet.

"Dealio, I'll be totes sober by the time we compete, and not even hung over, I promise," She smiles drunkenly, nodding. Good lord, how can she even stay drunk all day? Does she sneak alcohol in her coffee somehow? "An' a Roxy promise doesn't break."

"I'll be the judge of that," You retort with a smirk, firmly shaking her hand.

"Oh, and Sollux, you can go home early if you wanna. It's obiously gonna be a slow day," She offers, and you dont't need to ask again.

"Oh, thure, thankth," You reply, already standing up so you can clock out.

"See you, Cat-purr," Roxy slurrs.

"Bye," You reply, rushing out and saying bye to Dave and John as well since Vriska left a while ago, thank the lord.

You drive home quietly and scramble up the staircase to your floor and unlock the door quietly. You walk inside and Karkat is standing there, holding something small and ginger and white. It moved. It's alive.

"KK what in the fresh hell ith that?"

He glances up at you, shocked to see you home so early. He cuddles the... Kitten to his chest. It moved slowly and mewed quietly. Then he glares a little at you, getting over seeing you home early.

"It, is a HE. And he is a kitten, obviously, dumbfuck," Karkat replies. He's getting attached to a tiny little kitten, you can tell already, great.

"Well where did you get... Him?" You inquire, getting kind of pissed that he didn't even talk to you first before bringing a cat into the apartment.

"...I was walking back from the woods and he was all alone on the roadside. So I called Nepeta and she came over and helped me clean him up. And before you blow up on me, I'll have you know that I already talked to the landlord and she is apparently a HUGE cat person. Also did you know she's deaf?" Karkat rambles, stroking the little pathetic animal. Damn it.

"Why didn't you give him to NP, though? I mean, we can't really fucking afford a cat, KK. We barely get by ourthelveth," You retort.

"...Because I need so spend time with someone while you're gone. And I really don't like travelling out in public much, as you know, you prick. And I already worked it out with Nepeta, she said she'd provide us with all of the cat supplies we might need. She gets them for free because she works at the animal shelter, remember?" He explains, a defensive look in his eyes.

Suddenly, all of your drive to argue drains from you and you just put your hands up in defeat. "Fine. We can keep the damn cat. But if it-HE cauthes any kind of trouble, he'th out," You mutter. You look at Karkat and his face lights up a little.

He pads over to you and hands you the little cat. It was a white cat with a few ginger patches, there was one almost in the shape of a T on his forehead and one that was almost like a collar that trailed down his chest and to his belly. His eyes were a bright yellow. You suddenly feel a lot more comfortable with the idea of a cat. He was just so... Cute. Kind of like Karkat, well not as cute as Karkat, but still cute.

"...Did you name him yet?" You ask quietly.

He nods and gives you a slight smile, obviously excited, and relieved that you were accepting the idea.

"His name is Turbo."