thecapitol | (OPEN) at least he's not dead now

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(OPEN) at least he's not dead now

Who| Karkat and whoever runs across him.
What| Now that he's out of the mini-arena, Karkat's exploring the place he has to live.
Where| All across the Training Center.
When| After his death in the mini-arena ~ a few days after. Anywhere around then.
Warnings/Notes| Karkat is pretty foulmouthed and irreverent, but nothing else. Feel free to use prose (whichever tense) or action; I'll adapt with you.

Of all the ways Karkat would wish to be welcomed someplace new, this was not one of them. Thanks to the arena, which they'd shoved him in with only minimal explanation, he'd suffered his second death in as many days. Wasn't it enough for Jane to fork him before he showed up? Did he really have to get...

He didn't want to think about it. Maybe it was better that it was something from the arena rather than a fellow tribute, but it didn't make being killed by an oversized, animatronic cartoon beast any better.

Even after, being alive was strange. Back during Sgrub and everything else before Panem, at least there were countless mechanics to explain why someone might revive. Here he didn't know what they did. Something technological? It wasn't unthinkable when they'd brought him here from another part of reality, and while he was glad to not be dead permanently, it was unsettling to think they had such technology at their disposal.

Now he was... not free, but at least somewhere safe. Not subject to the current edition of the Hunger Games, at any rate. He learned his district and what that meant. (District 6, transportation, here's your floor and your room.) He learned that the tower was host to tributes and the various mentors, escorts, stylists, and whoever else served part of this entertainment machine. Night would bring curfew, but days would be relatively open, giving him the chance to feel out his surroundings.

A.
One place he'd definitely find himself was the actual training center, the floor from which the building got its name. Being here would mean needing to be in shape and on his game, and while he had skills still left over from Sgrub, they would do no good if left unpracticed. If he could find a sickle amongst the weapons provided there, he'd be practicing with that. Otherwise he might check out the other stations. Learn knots? Sure. Learn edible plants? Worthwhile. And then there was regular old relief of frustration: he may not have been a fistkind user, but that didn't stop him from taking things out a punching bag.

B.
Night of course would leave him confined to the District 6 area. Unused to a bed, lacking sopor slime, and still rattled from the arena, he didn't sleep much. It didn't help that his species was naturally nocturnal, but even during the day he sought little rest. At least the common area had a TV and games to play, and the kitchen helped for hunger or thirst. It wouldn't be hard to spot the look on his face: tired and grumpy, with perpetual bags under his eyes.

C.
During the day again, he more than once found himself up on the roof. Here the atmosphere was less stifling, with fresh air and an actual sky to see, unlike the darkness or the void or luminescent shapes of dream bubbles back on the meteor. It wasn't his sky, not the one he knew from Alternia, but if it had been he wouldn't have been able to stand the sun. This was tolerable - relaxing, even - and it gave him a space from everything else.

D.
But beyond the rest, he wandered. The tower was big, and he knew well enough that people he knew had to be around. He'd heard mention, or seen a flash of horn in the arena he couldn't stop long enough to identify, and he had run into Eridan while he was still in there. It meant teammates or friends were here, and these above all else he sought out, carrying him through common rooms or the lobby or across hallways and elevators throughout the tower. Feasibly anyone could run into him; though short, most people weren't grey with horns, and it made him stand out.

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It might have been said to himself, but Karkat catches the words all the same. Or maybe a better way to say it would be that they catch him, running a tension up his spine to his shoulders to his skull itself. It's the verbal equivalent of stepping in something unpleasant, only what's left on him is the muck of unpleasant memories and the knowledge of his last conversation with Terezi before Jade zapped them off the meteor.

He turns, though not gladly, to see the clown failing an attempted retreat. That's not Gamzee, though. He knows Gamzee and his hair and his slouch, but those are Makara horns plain as he's ever seen. Is this guy taller, too? Maybe?

"Carlos?" he hazards. "Wait, weren't you mute? One of you was mute. Which fucking one of you was mute, there are entirely too many of you to keep track of who's got which disability for what reason."

Carlos, he calls him. Motherfucking Carlos. His body goes rigid and his fist clench with his grit teeth. Fucking why this troll.

"HIS NAME WAS KURLOZ," He growls, turning slow. Last he knew, Kurloz and Karkat hadn't met. He'd broken Terezi out of prison and got his ass avoxed in the course of two weeks. Kurloz had shown up just before then. Karkat had died right after. Perhaps in that time they'd run into each other, but more likely than not, they'd met some other way, out in the bubbles as what Terezi told happened.

Point was, of all the people what he'd be okay with disregarding and disrespecting him and his, this motherfucker was not one of them.

He turns around all the way and glares down, chin held high. "And you got your guessings on wrong," He hisses. "OF UNDERSTANDINGS DONE GRASPED HE THOUGHT WE WAS TO HAVING. You stay the fuck away from me and I ain't go no ways near to you. YOU SEEM FOR NEEDING A MOTHERFUCKING REFRESHER, APPARENT."

"Whatever," he says with an exasperated toss of his head. It's close enough, isn't it? Carlos, Kurloz. They sound alike. Leave it to this pissy clown to nitpick about it.

And that is it. As he turns and faces him, hearing him hiss out words more convoluted than Gamzee's style of speech, Karkat's face presses flat and unamused. So the face is different now that he sees - like both of them in ways, but painted different, hair different. A Makara nonetheless, but that's unmistakeable.

"There are no 'understandings done grasped'," he says, hands up with fingers wiggling, "when present me has yet to meet your surly, Faygo-farting ass in any capacity up 'til now. Just do me a favor: dump a whole tray of ice on those wildly flailing rumblespheres and chill the fuck down, would you?" He gestures again, thumb and pressed-together fingers closing together like a scolding Earth teacher.

"And stop looking down your snout stump like I'm something you stepped in."

Edited 2014-11-11 10:06 (UTC)

He can see it all so clearly, reaching out to take hold of Karkat. As easy as breathing, simply tearing that nugbone off his shoulders. Letting the bright spill all over motherfucking everywhere, the satisfying crack of breaking disconnecting bones like the sound of pure poetry. Blood in grand fresco all upon the walls and the carpet, negative imagery on for each part left uncovered. A skull in hand what he can toss up and take club to like a game of human sports, and the brilliant shatter of stardust off of it when the hit connected.

Messiahs fucking dammit, Terezi, why did you have to like this particular troll out all the motherfucking others what you could've liked for.

"And yet a motherfucker is just as charming and personable as what he up motherfucking remembers for," He says through a false smile of grit teeth. "BE HASHED OUR MOTHERFUCKING BUSINESS. You staying from me. AND MINE OWNSELF NOT TEARING INTO YOU. With all such done and said, you can go onto the motherfucking pailing of yourself on a culling fork before I get to listening to any of the shit what you spew from the unfortunate overworked dungheap what you call a motherfucking word-flap."

This is going so well.

Edited 2014-11-12 00:32 (UTC)

Karkat has no idea what the Initiate is imagining. In some ways this is for the better, but not knowing doesn't exactly stop him from being a dick. His gaze sits solid and unimpressed as that lingual trash heap gets shoved into his sponge clots.

"Fine, I get the picture," he says, hands swinging up and open in mock-surrender. "Your chest is in a permanent state of unrest and not anywhere in the Capitol exists a vat of ice water big enough to cool it down. My most expansive sympathies for your condition."

His limbs lower and fold in over his chest. "But honestly? Fine. I have had more than my fair share of carnival-stinking crap from my team's resident Makara, so the less I have to put up with your religious prattle and face paint and that garbage disposal of a speech impediment, the happier we'll both be." He lifts one hand just enough for a shoo, shoo motion. "You were getting in the ascension box, right? Good riddance."

Edited 2014-11-13 22:17 (UTC)

The door is there and ready to enter. He could absolutely just leave and walk away from this motherfucker before it all goes the step to far. He's trying to be better, ain't he? Ain't that the point of this all?

Ought to teach him a lesson, half of him hisses, like it's being the half of Messiahs. Can't harm tributes. Can't harm, can't cull. You promised anyway, whispers the other half, like the other Messiah. Do not kill him.

But can't a miracle descend on downward, preferably at a high velocity, to extinguish this little shit?

Come on. Calm down. Calm down.

"DO NOT. Motherfucking. ORDER ME. The fuck around, Vantas. THIS IS YOUR LAST GODDAMNED WARNING."

Nailed it.

Edited 2014-11-14 01:16 (UTC)

What bug crawled up this guy's chute? Karkat's eyebrows scrunch up and his head pulls back a tick.

"What?"

No, seriously. Asshat Makara here has some spring wound way the fuck too tight. Karkat's long since given up on Gamzee after finally being pushed off the slow sinking ship of their moirallegiance, and things with Terezi have only added onto the conviction. Kurloz was just weird and he made an effort of avoiding him. But this guy right here, whoever the fuck he is, has given him the most attitude yet.

"At what point did I order you?" he asks, hand leaving fold again to gesture helplessly out beside him. "You slammed the button for it earlier, don't think I didn't hear. And didn't you just make like you want to get away from me? What's wrong, can't even follow your own plans when they a heathen mouth makes mention of them?" His arms splay out. "You want an order? Here: try removing the stick from your ass!"

His last nerve snaps like twine tugged too tight. Like the snapping rope of someone's motherfucking hanging. It takes two seconds for that yellow in his eyes to turn to orange.

It takes one for his arm to snap out, grasping the collar of Karkat's shirt to twist and haul up higher than the motherfucker even deserves to be. He spins the mutant around to slam his back against the wall and pin him there. His other hands curls into a fists and slams into the drywall beside Karkat's sorry simple little skull. He snarls loud.

And then, after a second more of watching struggle, he drops him.

"You best thank Terezi Pyrope. YOU BEST OFFER HER YOUR GREAT GRATITUDE UNENDING. Because it is due by her, and only thanks to her... THAT I AIN'T BREAKING EVERY BRITTLE BONE IN YOUR WRETCHED MOTHERFUCKING BODY!" He roars. And then suddenly, smiles all sweetlike. "Enjoy the arenas, Vantas."

Just like that there's a hand at his collar and his feet are sorely missing a wonder called the floor. He doesn't get to react, not before his back hits the wall, knocking the air from him. It doesn't stop a flinch as Initiate's fist pounds the wall beside him.

"Wh--" His feet kick. His hands come up and clutch at the other edges of his collar. "W--"

He almost falls to his knees once he's dropped, just managing to fight off their initial buckle to straighten back up. The move rattled him, and it shows in his eyes even as he sucks breath back into his lungs, breath he couldn't get enough to speak a moment earlier. And the rattling continues still for the force of his voice, for the roar of what he says. And he has the nerve to follow it up with a smile?

"What the fuck?" he snaps out finally. His shoulders hunch in defensive, head just tipped in - for protecting the neck, but also a tip of his horns. Small, useless for anything real, but it's like an instinct. "What the hell is your problem with me?! I made a guess about who you are, you gave me shit, and you throw a fit when I fire it back at you?"

He's breathing hard still, less for loss of it than the adrenaline of what just happened.

"I don't know you, and I don't know your issue, so fuck off. And don't tell me to enjoy the death match, you trumped up paint stain!"

It's more habitual than not that Nill leaves the towers during the day - it's the best time to buy groceries, and also one of the better times to generally make a good impression on the people actually in the town, possibly make her public image before the Arenas better than it might be. She's had no doubt that her image was probably pretty okay, but there were people she wanted to protect, and the more people thought well of her, the more they might think well of the people she was with in an Arena.

So when Nill opens the door to the towers and there's a sudden burst of yelling, she recognizes the voices better than she does the words they're actually saying, but she manages to see Karkat, held off his feet, before he's dropped again, and "EVERY BRITTLE BONE IN YOUR WRETCHED--"

It's about all that Nill needs to see to understand the situation, and she knows enough of karkat's stupid fucking mouth to know that if he gets to say much more than that without intervention, the both of them are going to get into a hell of trouble.

She has a small bag of groceries, but Nill quickly drops them and sprints across the space between, immediately inserting herself between the Initiate and Karkat. Her wings are folded in and down against her back, and she tries her damnedest not to make it seem like she's defending one of them over the other, but she shoves Karkat back a bit and her face is towards the Initiate when she lifts her hands to frantically sign K U R L O Z at him, hoping he'll see that.

PEACE. KEEP. STOP.

By which she means, if you don't the peacekeepers are gonna come and haul the both of you away. The signs are as simple as possible, and she hopes that if he doesn't understand them, he'll at least catch the name, or stop, or at least something that's better than nothing.

Of course he doesn't stop. Of course he doesn't. Motherfucker could never just shut his trap, fuck this, fuck it all, he should just--

Nill slips in between them and his steps come to a dead halt. His eyes keep their orange burn but he doesn't move. This is the second motherfucking time in his life someone has stood between him and ripping the Vantas to shreds and the similarity ain't lost on him.

He growls through his teeth, but he doesn't ask her to move. He watches her sign at him. His name. Kurloz's name. It clicks in and clears his head enough to focus on the rest of what she's signing. Stop. Peacekeepers.

His eyes dart about him, spotting the ones getting ready to tag him down, possibly to drag him back to avoxing. He looks back to Karkat, over Nill's head, offering him one last snarl, before his attention goes back to Nill.

He signs. O.K.

She's right. He's not worth it, she's right. And he can't fuck this up again. He can't do that to Terezi. He takes some steps back.

What the hell just happened?

One moment Karkat was gearing up to start shoving if he had to, and the next he found himself getting smacked back against the wall by a girl he actually recognizes. It doesn't stop his oof at impact, but the intervention does shut him up long enough for him to goggle at her... hand... gestures? He doesn't understand a one, and is left to watch silently as, just as odd, the Initiate signs something back.

Whatever it was, it seems to work, and his would-be assailant backs the fuck up. He can deal with the snarl if it means this Makara has shut up and is keeping his hands to himself.

Karkat's posture eases slowly. He spares Nill a glance, long enough to ask, "What was that?"

His gaze returns to the Initiate just after. He doesn't trust him enough (or at all) to not keep his eye on him.

Edited 2014-11-14 03:24 (UTC)

Regardless of whether or not Karkat actually understands it, a good deal of the tension leaves her frame when the Initiate actually seems to get what she's trying to tell him, and he agrees to it. He signs okay to her, and her wings extend a little from her body, not the tense and unsure spot they'd been in before, out of sight (not a target). She offers the Initiate a very small, relieved smile. She takes the time to sign thank you at him before she turns her attention towards Karkat, not for a second budging from her spot between the two of them. She doesn't trust them not to go at each other if she did, honestly.

She whips out her notepad way faster than anyone else might, and the lettering to her message this time is large and messy, rushed, taking up most of the space on the blank page that she holds up for him to see. When she looks at Karkat the smile is gone, replaced with little more than obvious concern.

LATER
YOU SHOULD LEAVE

He accepts her thank you but doesn't respond. The anger, how fast it came on, still holds him. His face stays bitter and unhappy as he waits. Because it's Nill. Surely she'll come to him. Right?

He watches narrow-eyed and careful. She's not going to betray you, He tells himself, just to cut off them thoughts before they even get to motherfucking start. Should just be a second of her answering Karkat.

Speaking of, the moment the mutant gets looking at him again, he greets motherfucker with bared teeth.

It's hard not to respond to Initiate's bared teeth. He wants to snap something, or bare his own, or flip him off, or any other gesture just to strike back somehow. He doesn't want to back down, even if Nill's intervention likely means he missed getting quite hurt.

Speaking of Nill, her message gets a sharp frown. "No. I want an explanation."

He doesn't budge from the wall, though, keeping his back safely against it.

They do not have the freedom they need for this kind of bullshit. Her wings flare out a little, angry for the briefest of flashes, before she reins it in and shakes it off with a slight shake, feathers smoothing down. He doesn't seem to understand the situation the two of them are in right now or what might have happened had she not intervened, not at the hands of him or the Initiate, and she's not sure how much of that she can actually communicate to him right now.

It's probably obvious that she trusts the Initiate though, because despite the fact that he's more than a foot and a half taller than her and has some seriously ridiculous claws she turns her back to him, and actually backs up so that she's closer to him than Karkat. That way he can read what she's writing if he wants to. She spares him a look over her shoulder, worried, before she harshly underlines the LEAVE, and adds more beneath it, still writing quickly and messily but smaller than the letters taking up most of the page.

I TOLD HIM TO STOP
PEACEKEEPERS WILL TAKE YOU BOTH IF YOU MAKE A SCENE

Then, turning her head to the Initiate again, she signs O.K?, making it obvious that it's a question, before adding, Roof? Room? because if Karkat doesn't back down then she really needs to get at least one of them out of here before those peacekeepers try to take them down.

He almost takes a step on forward, but Nill reacts first. He watches her little wings spread, all a tiny avenging angel be she, summoning obedience or else. Even as his annoyance with Karkat remains steady, his trust in Nil grows.

He reads over her shoulder, taking her looking as invitation. He's terribly smug to see what she writes to Karkat, but he manages to keep it all down and hidden.

He nods at the first question, giving approval, then echoes the sign for room. As much as he'd like the roof and he enjoys the air and the sky above, it got far too much traffic, and peacekeepers still lurked there. Better to stay safe.

So much for going to visit Terezi.

No, honestly, he doesn't understand the full extent of the situation. Some things were explained to him before, but others have been a job of picking up as he goes, like this now about peacekeepers. Not that Nill's answer really tells him much, but it's enough to make her point, if not to stop how galling it is to think they can't take care of here and now amongst themselves.

He has to wonder why she's taking his side, too. Or at least it looks as such, with her signing and her standing in front of him as she does, back to him like he's the threat. What did he ever do? The Initiate's the one who picked him up and slammed him against the wall.

His gaze passes to him again as he takes one last moment to consider. With no further provocation from him, it's easier to decide.

With a sigh, Karkat turns to walk off. He's not sure where he's headed - out of the building for now, probably - but namely away from this clown. He can't resist one last parting gesture, though, as he flashes the middle finger after all.

"Later, Nill." He still intends to talk about this, even if he can't right now.

She's gonna have to try to find Karkat later and explain things better than she did up until now. It's easy for her to forget that being cautiously aware of her environment and how it works is second nature to her now, and that she generally asks more questions about things like this than people usually do, or that even occurs to people to tell you. It's not the same for other people. Her warnings should have been better. She should have known other people might not tell him.

She actually looks a little guilty as Karkat turns to leave, but she doesn't make any move to follow him or try to persuade him otherwise. She doesn't seem to mind the flipping off, or even think much of it, and just sort of waves after him, a lame half-hearted gesture. He can't see it, anyway.

Nill's quick to turn her attention to the Initiate again, and she offers him a very slight smile, though it certainly doesn't resemble the easy ones she usually gives him, even if she is a little relieved. She was kind of worried that would go worse, actually. Getting in the middle of arguments when you can't really argue properly is difficult, and she can only do so much, and even then only if people are willing to pay attention. Thank goodness both he and Karkat were.

Room?

Edited 2014-11-14 19:43 (UTC)

The Initiate wouldn't question such a trait from Nill. He's not exactly unfamiliar with a greater power's constant bearing down. But his temper gets the better of him and it is ever prone to fly. Even now, apparently, after he's been stripped down by the Capitol and then some.

But he's not guilty to see Karkat go. Rather, he has a split second jerk where he thinks to follow after for the flip off and then--

No.

Especially not when Nill turns around to look at him like that. His shoulders go up, like he's being scolded, then droop. His eyes drop down and now he feels guilt. Guilt and shame and why the fuck would he just lose control like that, in front of her too, he was such a fucking idiot.

He nods rather pathetically and doesn't speak. The two of them head off.

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(OPEN) at least he's not dead now

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Nill an Initiate will be getting their own log now, Karkat and Nill cam continue here as "later"