[closed] it's a circle, friend

[crabmunicator]

Who| Karkat and Phil, Alain, Roland and Signless
What| How to deal with the fact that you just murdered your ancestor's boyfriend and his friend/comrade, and that other murder earlier, and the person you couldn't save, and...
Where| Karkat's room.
When| The week between the end of the arena and Crowning.
Warnings/Notes| Description of gore and killing, allusion to or discussion of suicidal ideation.

Return from the arena sees a whole lot of shit to deal with. Roland and Alain each died because of him, and even if Alain killed him, too, it does a whole lot of nothing to make the burden easier. It was stupid and desperate and violent, one after the other, and Roland wouldn't let him do anything else.

(He thinks about it anyway, what if he'd done something different, what if he'd gotten the chair, what if he'd knocked him unconscious.)

Maglev and Sheen still haunt his memory in thoughts of what can't be undone and responsibilities failed. Sheen wasn't the first time he ever wanted to kill someone, and wasn't even the first he did it to. Gamzee and Eridan went murderous on the meteor, and Gamzee went worse over after the trip to the new session was done. He tries, then, and got killed for his trouble. And there was Nill in the space arena, a slow death looming over her if not for mercy. Even then, he had to use his teeth.

Now Nill is gone, too. If she were still here loops in his head, but he can't make her come back, and would feel too guilty to ask comfort if she did.

Then there were his rewards from the youth program.

He went to his room directly once he got back to the tower, ignoring reporters and media and fans, anyone in the halls to get there. They sat neatly laid out on his desk, merit badges and papers about his appointment to Jr Peacekeeper and graduation from the youth program, and some letter back from Drusus he couldn't bother to read more than a few words of. There were gifts: some kind of wind chime with little charms of his sickles and sign and lusus, and a model of the red, claw-like one he used in the last arena, contained within a glass case. Worst, though, were the replica hare's foot - Jackie's, that is, Maglev's token - and the video from Cable.

By the end he's shaking, breathing left an afterthought. It takes all his willpower not to destroy the things he's been given, and it's as if the effort exhausts him, for he collapses into his bed.

In this way he spends his free time over the next days. He leaves when he has to; there's no backing out of Peacekeeper training and duties. But he hides from his districtmates, hides from the media, and emerges only briefly for necessities.

The few times he's seen, he looks haunted.

Comments

[voiceinthephone]

"It meant something to me and her parents, does that still make it meaningless?" Phil corrected, his face locked down in a stern glare of a disappointed and deeply hurt man. He knows he's going in deep but at the end of the day, it's a ravenous tear on his back too. In Phone Guy's eyes, Maglev had become the Twelfth child who died because of his mistakes, one more body he had to carry in grief.

"I never said you were more right in what happened with Alain and Roland, that was self-defense if they were gearing up to kill you. But answer me this: what good would you dying bring about?" Phil pointed out without stopping, remembering what Sandy said in the mini-arena.

"Answer me that much." It's the finality in his voice that implied that by removing all meaning to Maglev's death, Karkat was playing into the Capitol's hands and making the native children just another number to be dismissed. And that was a surefire way to piss Phil Gray off. It might cost him Karkat's friendship but this level of self-hatred had to be nipped soon.

cw: suicidal ideation. crab's got problems.

[crabmunicator]

His anger flares again, and he tries to argue, "It didn't accomplish--"

Phil says more, though, and it cuts him off. He looks mad enough. A glare isn't something Karkat's used to seeing on his face, but it fails to cow him. His teeth grit together as a low growl rolls from his throat.

That question, though, is a lot easier to answer than it should be.

"If I were dead, then I wouldn't be able to fuck anything else up." His eyes are defiant despite the pink tears still rolling from them. There's a quaver to his shoulders, but his tone is solid. "You don't know how many mistakes I've made, Phil. There's a whole, literal universe out there that I helped create, that is now dead and gone because of what I did wrong. I didn't listen when my friend knew better, and all my friends back in Paradox Space suffered because of it. And that's not even getting to the mundane shit--half my team dead because I couldn't keep them together, more people dead because of more mistakes in the years after--And every single stupid thing I've done here that's hurt someone, that's pushed them into something dangerous or wound up with them dying because of me."

He sniffs, but his look hasn't changed. "That's what me dying would prevent."

[voiceinthephone]

Phillip held his tongue as he heard Karkat's story and understood more clearly where that sense of absolute self-hatred came from. He wants to say so much but this is one of the first times where Phone Guy decided to keep his mouth shut and not interrupt or dig any deeper. He pulled up a chair and sighed out a stilted breath, to then rub his forehead. He can't keep up the anger when there was so much more grieving to do. He'd offer a hug but he doesn't know how Karkat would take that.

"I didn't know." Because even as he was put in the mentor seat, he didn't go around prying into the Tribute files, he'd rather hear the stories from them. "But...and this might be salt on the wound but I'm glad you're still here." And that was the truth.

[crabmunicator]

They aren't words he can take easily right now, but they don't break him down, either. He rubs the corners of his eyes with thumb and forefinger, then wipes his cheeks with the back of his hand. It doesn't do much more than smear the pink, but he doesn't care about that right now.

"Doesn't matter." He's sure the Capitol will keep him around no matter what he does if they still want him here, then off him when he least expects it if they change their minds. "Do you want anything else, or is that it? I'll go to training like I'm supposed to, if you're worried about that."

Peacekeeper training, he means. He expects he doesn't have a choice about it.

[voiceinthephone]

Gray knew he messed up in his confrontation (he thought he did) but he doesn't overstay his welcome and nodded, "That was it, just wanted to say my piece and your Mentor and your friend."

Just because they were in different ranks didn't stop that trust from coming through. He still trusted the troll with his life and the lives of the other tributes. Phil didn't regret standing by Karkat's choices, and he sure as hell wouldn't stop that any time soon, "You'll be expected over at the training facilities but you'll catch up, I don't worry about that."

With that, he stood up, and gestured to the door, "Dunno if it means anything to you but my door is open if you ever want to talk again."

[crabmunicator]

"I'll visit if I feel like it," he answers simply. Right now the answer to whether he would want that is a solid no, but what the future brings isn't something he yet knows. He'll see what happens when it does, and he hopes for his sake it won't become worse.

With that he motions, a simple get on and go without the rudeness of the words themselves. From him it's enough to count as a kindness when he's feeling so bad as he is.

Only once Phil's left will he head on out himself, solely for a brief trip to wash his face. He'll eat the food Phil brought him after.