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“Come in Dave,” Karkat says, eyes alight. “You’ll like it I promise. It’s nice and warm, and I’ve told the cuttlefish to mind their own business for once.” He’s already more than half way submerged in the brilliant water, idly weaving a seaweed crown. Not for himself, never for himself, even if the golden circlet on his brow wasn’t already in place. He gently pushes it away into the water and watches it drift away on the slow, easy current with fond eyes.
You wade towards him, and he smiles, all pearly brilliance, and flower petal pink cheeks.
“How is it? If it’s too cold for you, you don’t have to stay. I’d feel like such an idiot if you froze because of my water.” My water. He speaks like the whole ocean is his to command, and truly, it is. And yet, you aren’t irritated by his casual display of ownership for something so vast. You’d give him everything he asked if he so much as smiled.
“It’s fine.” You’ve never been a quiet person, except around this kid. He isn’t the bubbliest person you’ve met by far, and neither is he the most positive, but he’s intoxicating to be around. It’s his innocence you suspect, that attracts you the most to him. He just has that something that makes you want to smile when he does.
“Good.” He says, firmly, and swims further out, graceful and quick as a fish. You follow, and he sniggers at your slow, uncoordinated flailing.
“Shit sponge,” he says fondly, catching your arm as you reach him and pulling you close. “You really need to learn how to swim properly.”
“Prince,” you say, “swimming is for squares. Life on land is where it’s at. And you don’t even have to trade in some weird ass merman tail and lose your pretty little voice to live happily after. Pretty sweet deal right there. You can get your hotty with a body free of charge.”
He shakes his head and frowns. “Don’t call me that. I like knight a lot better. And that’s what I am, now. Knight of Life. I’m not prince of anything. Alternia’s gone.”
“Karkat, it wasn’t your fault.” He won’t believe you. You don’t think he ever will. It’s this subject that makes him the unhappiest, and his circlet of seaweed has disappeared entirely from view, swallowed by the endless water.
“It was my planet.” He says, and bites his lip at the corner with a tiny little fang. “Mine to protect, and mine to rule.” He stares at the water, lost in hopes and dreams of long ago, and you make yourself a foam beard to cheer him up. He laughs and dunks your head under water in retaliation. He always was a little too easily distracted.
“Hey, not cool!” You splutter when you surface, kicking away from him.
“Are you alright?” He asks, bobbing closer to you on the gentle waves. “You haven’t been talking my fins off today, and I’m kind of concerned. You can tell me about it, if you want. I’m awful at this sort of thing, but that doesn’t mean you can’t talk to me.”
You don’t want to talk, not at all, but like always, he has such an earnest look on his face that it just slips out. “I’m sick of fighting for time. I’d like a bit of life instead.”
He nods, his eyes soft, and cups your cheek. “We’re really not too different, you and I. I’m fighting for life, and you’re fighting against death, through time. Our goal is the same.”
“No, bro.
I’m all about ticking time bombs and averting disaster, yo.
I’m just messing around a lot and getting killed every time I blink.
You’re the one keeping everyone going, wink wink.
They come to me when they’ve got a problem needing fixing, get me on the job, and give me their blessin’.
You’ve got that shit solved before its even messin’.
You’re the one stopping those mad problems in their tracks.
You’ve got ‘em running, no refunds or take backs.”
His eyes go kind of buggy as he basks in the sheer glory of your rhymes.
“That was awful, you grub muncher. You are a disgrace to the noble art of slam poetry. You rhymes sound like the verbal approximation of wet hoof beast shit.” He says all this with a serious face, and then he can’t handle it anymore and he giggles. You have never been more in love with this kid.
Oh damn. You didn’t think that just now. You’ve got a brain worm that’s hot for Karkat. That’s all. No big.
“You just can’t understand the brilliance of my jam, Karkat. These sweet musics are too rad for the fins of fish princes.”
He laughs some more. “Glub!” he says, and then he’s laughing even harder. You don’t quite get what’s so funny, but you smile anyway.
“Oh god,” he snorts, “you’re so awful at everything. …Why don’t you just stop?”
“Can’t stop won’t stop.”
“No, no,” he says, and his hands are back to cupping your cheeks, so his face is literally a couple inches away from yours. You maybe turn a little red, but I mean who wouldn’t? “Why don’t you just stop time traveling?”
You freeze, except not completely, because you’re still treading water. “Dunno. Never really occurred to me, I guess. I need my tables to save us from some awful future.”
He frowns. “You don’t have to be the hero, Dave.”
“Yeah, I do. I sure as hell don’t want to be, but the game made me one, and I can’t just stop because I’m a little sick of seeing my own corpse.”
“Oh,” he says, like he really hadn’t realized how much shit you’ve been through, and maybe he hadn’t, and pats one of your cheeks. “Shoosh now.”
“Don’t you start that diamond thing with me. You’ve got a whole team vying for that spot on your relationship square already.”
“Quiet!” His cheeks turn bright pink, and he pulls away his hands like he’s been burned. You snicker.
“…Terezi never told me that it was like that.”
“Yeah, well, Terezi is a Seer of Time, not a Knight. She’s doing things a little differently than I am.”
“I did have to bring her back to life though,” he admits, and the pink spreads to the tips of his ear fins. “It was weird.”
“You smooched on tz, and didn’t tell me?” You are deeply offended. And also, kind of jealous of Terezi. That’s the brain worm talking again, of course. It’s an active little fucker. You’re surprised it hasn’t completely taken you over yet.
“Oh glub, she was dead! I had to do it; otherwise we wouldn’t have had a chance at winning the game. And I didn’t want her to stay dead. So I kissed her, right on the lips, and they were warm, because she’d just been killed, and I cried but I saved her fucking life. But there was in no way, shape, or form red feelings behind that kiss. It was purely platonic, or pale, maybe, I’m not sure. It’s sort of confusing with her. There! Are you happy now?”
“Who else have you gotten your mack on with?”
You are disturbed to see him turn a brighter shade of pink. “Are you talking about purely concupiscent kisses, because human kisses are sort of limited to that sphere, right?”
“My god. What horrors have those lips seen?”
“Hate kisses with Vriska for one. It was really terrible and not enjoyable for either one of us. I had to bring her back to life after that too, and that didn’t help much. I’m pretty sure she’s hate crushing on Feferi now, and I’m kind of concerned. Now that I think about it, maybe I’m feeling a little ash for Feferi and Vriska. Shit.” He grimaces, biting his lip, and you recoil in horror at the image of those lips glued to one Vriska Serket's.
“Hate kisses with Sollux.” He continues, unaware of your silent gagging, “Those were better, even though he still thinks I’m awful at being properly hateful, which is utter nonsense and he is a bulge sucker. He also got his greasy face paint all over me, and I had to swim for like a half an hour to get it to come off. You didn’t answer my question about non concupiscent kisses, so I’m not going to go into detail about pale and ash kisses, but I’ve never had an ash kiss, and I’ve had a lot of pale ones.”
Wow, that’s a lot of kisses. You have no doubt he means it when he says there were a lot of pale ones. Not to mention all the platonic ones where he had to use his life powers to bring someone back to life. You are vaguely turned on. Um, yeah brain worm again. You know how it is.
“You are like Troll Casanova dude. Bitches be clamoring for your attentions.”
“Glub.” He says, and ducks under water. He swims all the way to shore, and you are not so vaguely turned on (worm) when he surfaces, because his clothes stick to his body like nothing else. You will keep trying to get him to switch out his black long sleeve for a white t-shirt for as long as you live. (Also worm. Right. You should really take care of that thing.)
You do your awkward doggy paddle after him, and flop down next to him before you realize that now your boxers are going to be coated in wet sand. Just great. Oh well, your legs are sore from treading water for so long, so you’ll just chill down here for a while.
“How many kisses have you had?” Karkat says, peering down at you as he wrings the water from his shirt.
“Nada, zilth, and all those other things that mean never been kissed dude.”
“Never?” Karkat is drying his hair by shaking it like a dog, which is pretty hilarious, and you just about hyperventilated laughing the first time you saw him do it. He pauses in his task to gape at you. “The way you and Egbert act I would have bet on at least one pale kiss.”
“Not our thing.” Like, not at all, but Vantas doesn’t seem to get that, so you’ll let it slide.
“Oh. Well, have you ever heard the song “Sea Dweller’s Kisses?” Or actually, “My Moirail’s Matesprit is a Violet Blood” is pretty great too.”
There’s a pause, and you slowly raise an eyebrow.
“Fuck, of course you haven’t. There’s some pretty great music written about sea dwellers. I really should have you listen to the latest “Glub x3” remix on Trolltube. It’s actually half decent. The original was used in Thresh Prince, did you know that? The only bad part of Thresh is all the sea dwellers are stuck up jerks. I think it’s because Troll Will Smith needed to have some black make outs to balance out his constant red flirtations.”
“Karkat.” If you don’t stop him now, he is sure to keep going. You know from experience that waiting it out is not the most favorable option.
“Sorry, I, oh glub, what was I…oh, well my point was, a lot of trolls think sea dwellers are really great kissers.”
“…Vantas, are you trying to come on to me?”
He throws up his hands in frustration, takes a seat beside you, and leans in. You don’t stop him.
“Wow,” he breathes, “Your lips are even warmer than Terezi’s. Also, you’re really terrible at this.”
“Shut up,” you mumble back, “I just need a couple practice rounds.”
He doesn’t object to those practice rounds. His lips are salty with ocean water, and when you go to cup his cheeks, you find they are curiously drier than his lips, like he’d never been in the water today at all, but it’s like holding a bag of ice cubes. Weird fish trolls.
It’s not perfect, and you can tell he’s a little thrown by your inexperience, lucky bastard that he is, but you press on, and you slowly start to get the hang of this kissing thing. It’s less forceful than you thought, at least with him. His kisses aren’t middle school playground variety, but you’re pretty sure you’re not in danger of getting the bedroom eyes either. But, that’s kind of just a theory, because this is your first kiss, so you could totally be off the mark here. Your lips smack loudly when you break for air, because they’re both still wet from the water, which is kind of embarrassing, but Karkat doesn’t seem to mind.
No, he doesn’t object to the kissing at all. In fact, you kind of think he starts to really like it. It’s only when you scrounge up the courage to touch his fins, just gentle strokes, because damn if you haven’t thought about doing that about a million times, that he practically scrambles backwards, and his face lights up like a Christmas tree.
“Oh my god.” He says, looking for all the world like you just stabbed him in the gut.
“Shit, sorry dude, I didn’t mean to freak you out. I just wanted to feel them. I should have asked.”
“I-oh my god.”
You’ve broken him. You want to bash your head against a wall. It would have helped to know what exactly the line you crossed was, if that was something that was taboo or what, but Karkat’s not going to be much help until he gets his wits back.
“Hey, I’m sorry, please don’t panic Karkat.” You want to scoot closer, but you don’t know if that will just make him freak out more, and that’s the last thing you want. He has a tendency to start hyperventilating when he gets too stressed out. It is not a fun experience for him, you’re sure, and it’s pretty unpleasant to watch.
He doesn’t seem to be calming down though. He keeps mumbling something under his breath, and he keeps staring at you with those wide eyes. Fuck.
“Alright, I’ll just head on out. Don’t want you to feel freaked out or anything. If you need me, I’ll be chilling in LOHAC.” You stand, and start moving up the beach.
“No, no wait!” Karkat says, suddenly, and leaps up to grab your arm. “Don’t leave. Just. Were you serious about that kiss? Are you actually red for me?”
“That was my first kiss. I let you deflower my virgin lips with the lips that have passionately hate smooched Sollux Captor and Vriska Serket. Does that answer your question?”
He makes a face. “Be serious here. This is actually a really important question.”
“Yeah. I want to stare at your butt all day Vantas, and I like it when you smile, and you’re basically really fucking attractive.”
He laughs, pearly whites glinting in the sunlight. “That was more information than I asked for, but I’ll let it slide. You do realize the commitment you’re making, right?”
“What, to stare at that ass some more?”
“No!” He says, and hits you over the head with his trident, which hurts like a bitch. “I’m a prince, asshole, and I have friends. So, if you just stare at my ass for a couple of days and then leave me glubbing alone, then I doubt you’ll survive the experience.”
You’re kind of dazed from the blow to the head with a fucking heavy ass metal weapon, but once Karkat’s face stops spinning, it sinks in.
“Good point.”
As much as you don’t like thinking about things, you might actually have to give this a second or two. Pretty much Karkat’s entire team is in love with this kid, in one way or another, even without the fact that he’s royalty. So, essentially, if you break Vantas’ heart, they’ll be eleven bloodthirsty trolls seeking revenge on you, and that’s not exactly something you’re in to.
“It doesn’t matter. I’d be staring at that tush even if it wasn’t a royal one. And honestly, you could just call them off. I doubt I’m going to break your heart, but even if I do, you’re going to be the one to do the deed, yeah?”
“I guess.” Karkat says. “Unless you severely pissed me off though, I don’t think I would kill you. I’ve tried so hard to keep everyone alive for the entire game. It would be awful to have anyone die now.”
“So, is that a yes? Will you Karkat, take me as your blushing bride? We will ride off into the sunset with a ‘Just Hitched’ sign on the back of a beat up old minivan and we will head to somewhere awesome for our romantic honeymoon. I’m thinking we might just go with cliché Hawaii, because it’s warm, and it has a shit ton of ocean because it’s a god damn island, so we’re pretty much set. What do you say?”
“Oh shit,” Karkat says, “I’m going to regret this.” He kisses both your cheeks, and then your lips.
Hot boyfriend = acquired.
Also, that shit about the brain worm? Fake. It was a pretty convincing story, hell, you even fooled yourself for a little while, but you’re pretty positive there’s no such thing as a brain worm that causes you to be in love with Karkat Vantas. Besides, you do that just fine on your own.