Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/366488.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Homestuck
  Relationship:
      Gamzee_Makara/Karkat_Vantas
  Character:
      Gamzee_Makara, Karkat_Vantas
  Additional Tags:
      Metamorphosis, Size_Difference, Meteorstuck, Troll_Biology_(Homestuck)
  Stats:
      Published: 2012-03-21 Words: 7547
****** Born for New Things ******
by Etnoe
Summary
     As the meteor journey nears its end, Gamzee's the first to begin the
     metamorphosis that will give him his adult form. Everyone expects
     this to end terribly, but things look like they might just turn out
     fine...
     Yeah, right. Like Karkat's going to buy that.
Notes
     This fic would have been for Porn_Battle_13, using the prompt "Gamzee
     Makara/Karkat Vantas, sleepy, size difference", but apparently I
     really can't write comment-length anything.
See the end of the work for more notes
===============================================================================

"So you're the size of a house now." Dave looked at the ruptured crater of the
cocoon, up to Gamzee blinking sluggishly at the rim. His jaw set squarer.
"What's the deal with that."
Karkat felt his teeth clenching the same way. "Life, the universe, and
everything hate us. That's the deal. Don't pretend you haven't noticed."
"Here I thought the size of this cocoon thing was just another example of the
symbiotic drama bug trolls require shoved up their asses in order to function.
Didn't think he was actually going to fucking fill it up."
Gamzee stared with his (huge) eyes wide - briefly, and then he winced and
shielded them with one (giant) hand, even though the lights in the block and
the closest ones outside in the hallway had been switched off. His eyes were
filled-in indigo, though the shade was pastel, filmy with newness.
He turned stiffly to look at the others, Kanaya - whose glow made him wince
again - Terezi, the Mayor and Serenity, Rose, and then back to Dave. He stared
in astonishment. "Look at that."
"Don't blame you if you still can't take all the Strider glory in. Even bigger
purple people-eaters have tried, crashed and burned."
"Hey." It looked like Gamzee was going to climb out, but then he glooped
further down into the biochemical stew of his cocoon. "You want to spar?"
Karkat drew up onto the balls of his feet with his fists lifting; as if there
was anything he could fight off. That was not like Gamzee. "Interesting," said
Terezi, and sniffed with the force of some vast cosmic vacuum cleaner to get
more details.
"You don't ask that way. Asking isn't even a thing that happens." An eyebrow
showed over one lens of Dave's sunglasses. "I've still got marks from your last
shy and retiring suggestion, you delicate blossom, you."
"That's good, I motherfucking guess." Not remotely as certain about it as he
ought to sound!
Rose gave in to the Seer's inherent need to dissect, interest getting her eyes
to damn near gleam like she'd grown out of being diurnal in the last two
minutes. "Is the metamorphosis supposed to decrease violent tendencies? That's
not at all the assumption I picked up."
"No, not even close," Karkat said. "How would you run an empire structured
around intergalactic conquest that way? Or that's what I would have thought."
He crossed his arms tight. "It's not like we have much to go on but memories of
the puberty-oriented propaganda and our copy of The Octocular Asshole's Guide
to Getting Laid." He mentally went over everything relevant he'd noted from
Mindfang's diary. "Shit, wasn't it the Condesce's MO to act really sweet before
calling a major culling?"
"Gamzee! Do you feel like hugging anyone ... to death?" Terezi skipped over to
bump Dave with a hip, and then tap his cheek with the snout of her dragon-head
cane for good measure.
"Don't even joke," said Dave fast, and Gamzee held up his hands. "I won't even
joke, bro."
"There's no need to worry, as there never has been." Kanaya stood with arms
crossed and fingers tapping rapidly on an elbow, all day-glow resplendence. "I
can still take him."
"My most monstrous sis." Gamzee took a deep breath, closing his eyes, and let
it out with a growing smile. "I think you're right about the worry. It's
looking like a thing that doesn't need to get at anybody."
It was the Mayor that got them to snap out of waiting for the other
executioner's axe to drop. He clambered up the buttery-coloured cocoon,
extended a hand and welcomed Gamzee back to wakefulness. Gamzee tapped his
fingers against the tiny palm and then heaved himself up by the rim, and god
damn those biceps were thicker than thighs. Luckily the Mayor provided another
distraction in the way he eyed the limey-purple, viscous mysteriousness in the
cocoon.
"Do not fucking eat that!" Karkat yelled, and then the situation felt normal
enough that they could get on with things. They threw towels and a human bed
sheet to Gamzee, then waited outside as he got wiped-off and covered up enough
to go to the ablution block.
He shivered visibly when he stepped out the door. "Cold."
Karkat stepped up against his side - not even clearing Gamzee's shoulder, and
finding it suddenly disconcerting how easily he'd moved closer - and put an arm
around him.
It set off another shiver, but Gamzee smiled and put an arm around him too;
damp and heavy, smelling of chemical ferment that tasted sharp at the back of
the mouth. He was quieter than normal and moved stiff and slow, especially with
the way he got distracted by staring down at himself. Mostly what he did was to
look too fucking much like that fucking picture in the diary.
The Grand Highblood watched everyone orbit him as they walked, shifting
position to keep him in sight. The Grand Highblood could straighten in the main
corridors of the lab and his horns would avoid scraping the ceiling by probably
less than a half-metre. As they waited for him outside the ablution block and
the remaining trolls went silent and fidgety, Karkat wondered if the other two
also felt that the Grand Highblood's silhouette had registered as something
bizarrely easy to disbelieve; an image nagging at half-used senses, telling of
nightmares that used to be shared on a planet he used to rule.
Then the Grand Highblood walked out of the ablution block in a half-assed toga
decorated with nakodiles, damp hair plastered over his unscarred face in little
curly licks. He let the Mayor glom onto his wrist and lead the way to the pre-
prepared recovery block, and the Grand Highblood smiled like it was three
sweeps ago and he'd just peeled his face out of a pie tin so he could wave to
the webcam.
Okay, so Gamzee looked a lot like mildly inventive agony - he was currently
chill. So Karkat took a deep breath, and tried to stop staring. And considered
that maybe they should keep his hair short; it looked easier to manage.
The recovery block had been prepped with food and water laid out on a table,
and a pile made up of blankets, plushes, pillows, and because these things
could never actually be comfortable, one-wheel device parts. Terezi had been
bored enough to do a mural on one wall, mostly executed criminals interspersed
with swathes of colour determined by deliciousness. Gamzee took it in and
beamed at her; she tilted her head in an expressively considering gesture and
then grinned back.
The others were easing up on the way they watched Gamzee too. Karkat felt
another fragment of relief sliding in place. Any minute now he might stop
twitching.
"So does baby want another sword chew-toy?" Dave said, watching Gamzee clamber
right into the pile. "Or do you not need more metal in your diet now that
'Stephen King's IT: The Hatchening' is behind us?"
"Hand one over, sir knight," said Gamzee, and the up-and-down of his voice
stayed at ease, as even as it ever got. He resumed staring at Dave in wonder.
"Some shitbit of pig-sticker wouldn't go amiss. In fact, motherfucking thanks."
"Yeah, 'tis an honour, yon large-ass lyricist. Is that period-appropriate,
Lalonde?" Dave handed over one of his broken swords - daring to hold the hilt
to Gamzee, which would have meant he deserved every finger lost but Rose
wouldn't like it; except that Gamzee lifted the blade gingerly, gently from his
hand. Dave and Gamzee looked as bemused as everybody else, and both of them
relieved, too.
Karkat grabbed a plate of spawn cakes off the food table. "Have real nutrition,
actually intended for ingestion first," he said, marching over - and Gamzee
didn't even make a crack about Dave's throat. He just put the sword down.
"That smells like righteously vicious deliciousness." Gamzee grabbed the plate,
and then grabbed him. The hand practically spanned Karkat's forearm and the
touch was carefully loose. "Shit, brother." His gaze trundled along Karkat's
arm up to his face. "It has been a while."
"You were in a semi-soluble state. You don't even know." Gamzee did still have
one faint scar running across his face. The pile looked like the most inviting
thing Karkat had seen all sweep. "Even showed up in dream bubbles as a cocoon,"
he muttered. "Now eat! And I'll get you water."
Gamzee hovered over the cakes and took very careful bites. "Break the tension
immediately," Karkat said, watching over his shoulder as he went back to the
table. "You are feeling okay, right? And tell us if there's anything we should
prepare for about pupation."
"I am feeling motherfucking nothing."
Surely, in another world, those were words that induced mass worry, shading to
panic. But Gamzee just sounded happy.
Karkat gripped the glass of water in lieu of being able to grab Gamzee until
only quiet and sighs came out. It stifled the stupid tremors in his hands,
which was nice - then his stomach did such violently acrobatic back-flips that
he froze when Gamzee snagged the glass. His reach was nearly doubled.
"All that fucking fuss!" Gamzee, smiling faintly, shook his head. "All of that
half-fucking-finished physical drivel tugging up on my strings from the inside,
just like what all of you three still got—" He grinned at the other trolls. It
looked like he was talking about miracles, but he was lucid-eyed and his voice
still at its steadiest. "All that bone-creaking, skin-popping, and itch-
teething and aw, you know, that real fucking feelings shit—it has gone and I'm
all up and having calm with me, feeling nothing like as rowdy as all of what
was being crowded up in me before, and it is. The bitchinest tits imaginable!"
"No come on you did not just act like that is seriously an acceptable phrase to
use ever," said Dave, whose survival instinct would never beat his mouth. "Uh.
But—"
"Can't hardly fucking feel it." Gamzee put the glass on the floor to cup one of
Karkat's hands between massive palms. "Anything, bro, I don't got but the
twitchiest little care if that motherfucker's here. It's all newness bright
right down up in the centre of me, and I don't got to look to get a hop on to
any beat but what I want..."
Karkat gripped his fingers. "Would you wait until we're alone? Show some
fucking decency!"
"Everyone, everyone," Terezi stage-whispered. "That was a hint!"
"Was not!" Karkat said, going for a snarl and instead whining, taking her
seriously on reflex when he'd learned long ago that it mostly resulted in
deserved humiliation. He put his free hand to his face. "No, I mean, sure. Good
plan. Go relax, or whatever."
"Us two getting into proper faceflapping would be a bitching thing," Gamzee
agreed, and the others said their goodbyes. Terezi had a quick question,
worrying about her 'sight' after pupation, and asked how long it had taken to
clean the sharp-smelling cocoon goo from his nose. She encouraged him to give
all the grotty details he could manage, grinning wider the more Rose gracefully
pretended to have lost hearing. Kanaya deigned to say she'd come around
tomorrow and take measurements for his new clothes, and Gamzee offered her a
snack in compensation. It was the best that could be hoped for. Even if it was
unsettling that he was willing to let her at his throat so soon.
Karkat pulled the food table close to the pile for ease of access, staying
quiet until the door shut behind the others. Then they were alone, which was
the point but also had an edge of weird about it. Gamzee, Grand Highblood.
Berserker, or ... god knows.
"So the puberty switch flipped and your hormones settled down?" Karkat asked.
"Here I thought I might never see another small mercy up close. Are you going
to back off Dave's bulge now, finally and embarrassingly belatedly? And have
some more of that water."
Gamzee gulped a few mouthfuls. "Well. If the motherfucker offers. But who
cares?" He shrugged and looked uplifted; also smug.
"It makes that much of a difference?" Karkat became aware of his own body as he
asked, its aches and restless energy. The twitches were going strong. He
allowed himself to pull a snarl but suppressed a growl, and watched Gamzee
staring at his own hands, spreading the fingers and making fists.
"I'm all new. I'm all difference. And here we'd all been up and thinking we
already knew me, and how it'd be." He looked a little relieved. "But it's not
that at all."
Karkat stared at his expression with his own relief, then twitched himself out
of it. "Well. Good," he said, trying not to sound anything but supportive and
believing. Pile-parts had been left scattered around the room as a relatively
discreet way of allowing them the option of making a two-seater, so Karkat
started collecting plushes and pillows and adding to the pile. "You haven't
missed much around here - Sollux's pre-cocoon nutrient binge inspiring him to
fold time, space, and magic to come find a Smuppet to gnaw is still, and can
only remain, the highlight of this trip, and you were still here for that."
He paused to eye the construction of the pile and begrudgingly acknowledged
that the one-wheel device parts gave a stable framework. Which was probably
going to stab them in their sleep. Truly the forces that directed piling were
more incomprehensible than even metamorphosis. "We still have no fucking clue
how he'll half-pupate, or ghost-pupate, or whatever," he continued, going back
to gathering. "But he remains, I'm sure this will shock you, 'ok with it'. What
is it about doom that does that, anyway? Aradia should be fine. Even if it is
weird to go through that kind of thing in Squid God Central, but whatever, it's
her chirpy gothique party. Mostly we're all still working on finalising the
breach into the humans' Scratched session, setting up necessities."
"You ain't sleeping," Gamzee said.
"Why didn't you tell us immediately that pupating increases powers of
observation tenfold?" Karkat yelled, because times when his excellent and
relevant points were ignored were really fucking not his favourite thing. "And
you're waist deep in a pile and you aren't sleeping either!"
Gamzee shrugged. "Kind of tired, but I've been as good as sleeping for so long.
Got too much me going on for me to be before all going to shut any eyes of
mine."
"Shut up. Slow down, think—" Karkat walked over and stepped up onto the heap.
"At any cost prevent your ramblings from taking these flying loop-de-loops
round the block." He pulled off the blanket on Gamzee's head, peered at his
face and finger-combed the damp hair away to investigate the hairline minutely.
"And you only have two normal eyes, so don't talk like you came back with
vision multi-fold. Just thinking of shit Vriska pulled gives me the creeps."
Gamzee shook his head to get rid of Karkat's hand and gave it a nearly wary
look, but he just said, idly, "You didn't know her back before all of the body
parts blowing up merry-go-round, did you?"
"Terezi told me stuff," Karkat said distractedly, and then wiggled his fingers
in front of Gamzee's face. "Did it hurt or something when I did that with your
hair? Your skin's that sensitive? UGH. What I wouldn't fucking give for
concrete information on this literal physiological meltdown!"
"Not that sensitive. But any tactility is feeling realer, same as all the
light's zapping round all brighter. Now get down here," Gamzee said, placidly
firm. "Bet you didn't get any shut for your own eyes all that time I was in my
growth cone. So sleep. Now, bro."
Karkat froze. He still had a Scalemate in hand from collecting pile-parts, and
part of his brain turned over the idea of making himself that vulnerable to an
adult and told him to eat the plush, choke, and die from that instead. Since
when did Gamzee give orders? Or did any scrap of forcefulness register as a red
alert now that he was all teeth and horns and fully-realised growth?
He jammed the Scalemate into the pile - Dear deplorable meat sack that props up
my consciousness: Don't think I didn't notice you trying to put me on level
with Sollux 'Plush-Muncher' Captor - and rubbed the heels of his hands into his
eyes. Now that he'd been reminded of his lack of sleep they felt gritty and
hot. It had been necessary and downright easy to stay awake during their
session, but on the asteroid there were no imperatives, things drifting until
the next dream bubble or sunshine surprise that Rose saw for them. He'd stayed
awake anyway, after it was obvious Gamzee wouldn't be in the dream bubbles
either. "If I get on this thing, we're not going to talk much. I'll probably
pass out in a fucking minute."
In significant silence Gamzee dragged himself out of the pile so he could put
an arm round Karkat's shoulders and draw him down. Karkat dug a wheel out from
an awkward spot, pulled a blanket loose, and pulled it over himself as he lay.
Settling in made Gamzee strain away with a reflexive wince, and then made him
hold on tighter. And that, finally, was fucking perfectly familiar.
Fragments of relief, pieced together since Serenity blinked out a message that
the cocoon was opening, set into solid peace as Karkat set his head on Gamzee's
shoulder. He moved gently to get comfortable, and then lay quiet. Now he picked
up distant echoes through the metal and stone of the lab; maybe some of the
others were working off energy by sparring.
"Tell us more tomorrow about the pupation process. Kanaya and Terezi had lots
more questions. Me too, when I can think again," Karkat said. Looking Gamzee
over from this close was like looking at a landscape, dips and rises going on
and on. The toga had shifted enough to show three deep creases along his
stomach, bringing up an image of him curled in the cocoon for all those weeks.
He reached over to pull Gamzee's free arm closer to inspect the few, faded
scars left on it. Careful as he was, it made Gamzee shift skittishly. "Find
alive Sollux and Aradia when you do sleep, tell them stuff too."
"Oh. Well. The whole thing, it's all good. Like what I was saying all of
before." He sounded like he was thinking it over, though, nervous now. "Pretty
much. Yeah. Whoa."
"From everybody else's point of view, it's a plunge into an inescapable abyss
where you basically turn into a cheap set of Troll Lego. Just answer whatever,
the questions." He thumbed a faint mark on Gamzee's lower arm; that burn used
to be so clear. "Also sound less like a fanatic."
"Yeah, uh, that's being a sure thing, but right now, though." Gamzee wriggled
away, setting off a pillow and gear avalanche. "What's got to be happening here
is you making your own pile."
"Wait, say what?" Karkat said, still automatically reaching after him.
Say nothing; instead shove your moirail heels over horns to the ground.
Karkat was on his feet and shouting before he stopped being dizzy. "You invited
me! What the fuck? Is this delayed-action loss of shit or are—?" He bit his lip
against the waver in his voice. "What the fuck!"
"You don't even really want to know. " Gamzee was changing position fast,
shifting his legs. "There was serious underestimation happening at my thinkpan
location. When I said I was all being more sensitive at present ... ha, well."
He pointed at his crotch. The motion was so casual that Karkat looked.
There wasn't actually anything to see but blankets Gamzee had pulled up, but
Karkat clapped his hands over his eyes anyway. "No, seriously fucking no! What?
I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING!"
"I know, right, motherfuck. But it's just reactive, bro, you know, the way of
how things sometimes get when you're all feeling ... keyed up... Hey." It was
too much to expect that he would wind down because of self-consciousness.
Instead he sounded knowing. "That's a lot of colour a brother's face has got to
wearing."
Also a lot of breath not to be breathing, a lot of fellow feeling he could do
without... In an internal protest of innocence, his mind was running through a
catalogue of things he'd hardly done - just a sigh against Gamzee's skin, hair
brushing his face, only tugging the sheet down by accident - and the idea of
those tiny touches cast in this new light made prickles surge frantically up
his skin.
His reddened face returned to its true home, his palms. "Sorry."
"Your hormones are still being all over the place, isn't that the way?"
"Fine, rub it in, I'm even more switch-flip bulgejump than you." Karkat turned
away. "See you tomorrow. Sorry."
"Got a better idea." Gamzee's voice dropped. "You want to?"
Karkat kept walking but couldn't convince himself to uncover his eyes
completely. He mimed enclosure talons all the more vigorously for using one
hand. "You know my feelings about '"extended" perfectly platonic bro bulge
bumps'! Twice was pushing it enough!"
"You're the one who's got so much feeling for calling it that. I'm more for up
and calling it, just, whatever the fuck could be good, going by physical kinds
of feelings."
The door - that was a positive sign in this dawning farce. Karkat grabbed the
handle. "Take this opportunity to wallow in your renewed soul, and we'll talk
tomorrow. I'll get up early."
"Nah, you're going to be catching all up on sleep. Remember? I said that
already."
As odd as it was to hear him sound commanding, he was reassuringly shit at it.
"Yeah, I'll catch up in my own block." So leave. Turn the handle. Shut up.
"Call me if you need to. I'll put my Trollian alert on loud."
"Come at me, bro," Gamzee said sagely.
"Are you likely to put that thing away first? It's probably twice the size that
you used to be as a whole."
"Are you likely to be up and leaving?"
Karkat crossed his arms. He turned to slump against the door and looked
strictly at the floor. "I'll make another pile since you're that..." Blood
flooded back to his face, making him look a liar. "Sensitive. Shove over some
of that stuff."
"All good with that, if it's how you want it. But you missed me." Like the best
surprise Gamzee had expected all along. "That's all that's worth worrying at
right here. If we're all up in a mutuality of being good to get the motherfuck
down to it, then why fucking not?"
'You missed me' was a trifling phrase to base anything of consequence on. It
didn't cover to proper effect the fact that it had been reasonable to spend
weeks thinking Gamzee might never get out of that fucking cocoon. He stared at
Gamzee and held his own elbows to stop his hands from feeling empty.
So Karkat marched to the pile. Logistics stopped him short at the foot of it,
and he sneered at Gamzee putting out a would-be imperious hand to get him
closer, then took off his sweater. Next, his shirt. "This is stupid," he said,
reminding the universe he was on to it.
"Relax, bro. Maybe do a little dancing for the mood." Gamzee fell back in
snickers and Karkat undid his trousers with not one hint at a shimmy.
"You make it immeasurably more stupid." And easier to not think about
undressing. He stepped out of his underwear and climbed on the pile. Gamzee
pulled him to sit between his legs, and Karkat pulled the toga-sheet away as he
went.
The damn thing between Gamzee's legs was nearly the size of Karkat's unsheathed
bulge and it wasn't all the way out yet. He did not grimace. He did not crack a
round of painfully awful jokes like someone would hand out cheap carbonated
intoxicant, though those too could be considered traditional in marking the
union of poor choices and fumbling. He got up on his knees and put an arm
around Gamzee's neck, pressing close to let the soft tip of Gamzee's bulge
start sliding up his abdomen as he massaged its base.
"WhatifIhurtyou?" Gamzee said, fear coming to him late.
"Truly a fascinating puzzle to put forth now. Just fucking don't!"
"Feelsgood." They both rocked with the breath he drew. "Oh, motherfuck. Now get
some slow-down going - yeah. Yeah. Feels real good." He draped his arms over
his legs so that they pressed lightly against Karkat's back, testing.
It was bizarre for him not be out-and-out terrifying in his certainties about
what he could get his body to do; but they could talk about that later. Keeping
things quiet felt like the best plan. That was how Gamzee had been with him the
first time, and it had been one of those small things you can't expect, that
you don't forget - hands laid on him with not a syllable's delay, accepting,
admiring, affectionate. A lot of things.
A big thumb ran a warm line alongside his spine lumps. Slow going, of course,
that was fine. It followed a firm curve to the juncture of leg and hip while
Gamzee hissed, not even up to expletives as the bone unsheathed fully. The skin
of his bulge stretched taut and smooth along Karkat's belly. The thumb slipped
over his thigh to let Gamzee's broad hand cover it, and then—almost clench,
almost claw at—but it didn't. He wouldn't, and it would be a miserable failure
to let him. Even if it would also feel nice.
That was the problem with cross-quadrant shenanigans. Karkat pumped his hand on
Gamzee's bone bulge and squeezed the soft tip, and the way Gamzee crooned made
things seem generally nice enough.
Gamzee relaxed enough to let go of his thigh and put his hand between Karkat's
legs. Somehow Karkat arched away, like the heavy feeling of growing desire had
literally been lifted, and then he swore at himself and ground down, nook and
bone and globes into Gamzee's palm.
"Sit back. Let me get at you decent," Gamzee instructed, and Karkat slipped off
to straddle his lap, legs spread wide over his much-broader frame. "That is the
way, bro."
"First it's handing out imperatives like candy you got off the floor, now
you're tacking on platitudes of validation. What, did you realise that nearly
an entire sweep ago I declared my position as leader dropped?"
"Sure. I'll be hammering the sponge out of you in a succession fight any
minute," Gamzee said. "Now imagine me getting an arm-flex on and grinning like
this joke's truly fucking hilarious, because I'm not up and letting go of you."
"Okay." Yelling about excessive inanities could go on the to-do list for
tomorrow. Meanwhile Gamzee was surer in his movements, putting an arm around
Karkat's waist and the other hand carefully providing slow-increase pressure on
a knot of muscles above his bulge, making his breath waver on order, and his
bone bulge slid out smoothly to full length. "Okay."
Grinning, Gamzee wriggled round on the pile to get leverage, then tipped Karkat
bodily back. He bent closer - lips parting. Wait, fuck, wasn't kissing too
redrom? More than the rest of this, somehow?
And then like some vast cut of beastrump Gamzee's tongue descended and licked a
tacky stripe across his face; Karkat howled. "Oh my unfucking god of boner
kill!"
The honest confusion on Gamzee's face could have caused death in the unwary.
"Thought that was all hot with you."
"Do I look like it is? Has any part of my reaction to any single thing about
Terezi made it look on any level like I was into that shit?"
"Fuck yeah it has," Gamzee said. "But I guess you do mostly look like you enjoy
absolutely candy-coated fuck-all." Solemn, even a little sad, he stroked
Karkat's hair.
Karkat took a deep breath and rolled his eyes with great emphasis. He pushed
into the touch with what was, in fact, clear indication of enjoyment. Was he
supposed to rampage cackling through life at the slightest provocation? No. He
was already venting urges in an embarrassingly obvious way, going along with
the clear flush of red blood showing through his skin and a buoyant feeling
growing in his chest that said: they were going to be all right. They were
still going to be themselves. He was here for it and so was Gamzee, for real,
and obviously, it could not be more obvious, that was enough.
"Hey." Gamzee's expression went tender. "See? It worked."
"Get your ludicrously vast grasping appendages on my globes with gentleness fit
to bring centuries-old veterans to tears, before I die of shame at ever having
started to associate with you. No licking!"
They cuddled up in borderline palerom parody - but the point was that he didn't
give a fuck about being close enough, he wanted, no quantifying and second-
guessing, simply to be close. Right at this moment it was just fine to have it
happen this way, hips grinding together, the stretched skin of their bulges
slipping along against each other. It was enough to get Gamzee panting, poor
shaky motherfucker, but he still took care about the hand held round the curve
of Karkat's ass, fingertips between his wide-spread legs stroking and rolling
his shame globes.
Karkat petted his chest and shoulders in what should have been the most
infuriating move possible in a sexual context - short of face-slathering, oh my
god - and Gamzee just held on with devotion. He seemed to keep reminding
himself to ease his grip, in fact, and said, "Tell me if it's too tight."
A smile had been sneaking up on Karkat for a few minutes. It caught him at last
as relatively terrible things started seeming like good ideas, and he tilted to
the side and bent a leg to get in a better position and said, "You tell me,"
slipping two fingers into Gamzee's nook.
"Filthy-mouthed motherfucker." Gamzee lost his voice on a high note. A shiver
went up his abdomen, the skin-shudder of a furred beast shaking off water.
"Worse joke than any of mine."
"Consider it revenge for those. About time I made you pay." He added another
finger, slipping in just as easily, and then crooked them, and Gamzee jerked so
hard one knee came up to Karkat's shoulder. Rubbing the pads of his fingers
against the walls made the muscle snap taut, and he flexed his knuckles into
the slick, malleable clench and turned them slowly. It sounded like he was
fucking killing him.
In the bad way, and Gamzee's movements alternated between jerks and stiffened
stillness. He whined and Karkat made an echo of the noise like the tail of the
hurt had hooked into his own throat, and he pulled out as fast as he dared.
Gamzee's neck was arched back over the curve of the pile so his face was
obscured. "Hey—"
"Yeah, okay." Gamzee patted his shoulders and said, "Better, best friend." He
wriggled a little deeper into the pile and held Karkat, and then started
rolling his hips again. "Fine now."
Karkat rubbed open palms over Gamzee's chest, trying to soothe but frantic in
all reactions as the friction against his bulge picked up. "What was the -
sorry," he said. "It seemed natural, last time you liked that, right."
"Nothing more natural. But not now, I guess. It's too much."
"Sorry, I really didn't mean—"
"If I had reason to think you meant it, you'd have my teeth someplace you
wouldn't be much pleased at," Gamzee said with his new firmness, and its new
tendency to stop Karkat dead. "I know, bro, you had all good intentions with
them hot little hands. Stick to this, it's still good..."
"Seriously, just bulge? You sure?" Words were harder than they ought to be.
Karkat drew up to see his face better. Gamzee bent towards him and started to
smile at catching his eye, but Karkat still had to ask, "Are you sure you're
okay?"
"I am perfect."
Apparently, that - thunderous, smug - was meant to be reassuring.
"Exactly all of what I am meant to be," Gamzee murmured, "but I guess it takes
getting used to, is the thing. All right, bro? All right, come on, it's all
just all right..." The petting extended down to his globes again, and there,
that wasn't so gentle, that was serious. He shook as Gamzee squeezed, hot skin
tightening up under hotter fingers. Two of Gamzee's fingertips dipped into his
nook and that was all it took to stretch him wide and ready to sing praises to
that particular blunt squarishness, when there was no other thing fingertips
were even likely to be. He moved his hips down and around, hard as he could,
again and again and—stopped short. With effort, he did not claw at Gamzee's
chest.
Time to say it. "Mm - I'm about to get my pail. You?"
"Did you know," said Gamzee, a wavering cross between preoccupied and
prayerful. "That you're feeling all of really fucking right up inside here?"
"Yeah, no. Not even the tip of your bulge is getting near any of my apertures,
or you will get a brand new club for specibus storage as you kneel before me,
cowed and broken. Get your fucking bucket, Gamzee."
"Better scare you up a kismesis. Do you good." He snagged his bucket out of the
air as his modus expelled it, keeping his other fingers busy (and thick and hot
and oh fuck) in Karkat's nook. "Try and get your mad on about Sollux or some
fucking thing. When you're grown some, though, nobody's got no fucking right to
be this small... Maybe when you're not all motherfucking soft like..." Like he
couldn't even say, busy as he was drawing shuddering breaths as heat wound
perceptibly up his bulge.
They disentangled, Karkat getting his own bucket. He scrambled to jam the cool
edges between his thighs, grabbing the spokes of a wheel to steady himself on.
He heard the sounds beside him of liquid hitting metal and couldn't hold on,
got his mind a little lost, finally just letting the fuck go.
Their breathing was loud when they were done. Karkat found himself listening to
that and all the sounds of resettling themselves, hardly looking up when he was
given a corner of the sheet to wipe down with, or as he got one of the back-up
sheets out of his sylladex and handed that over for Gamzee to wrap up in.
He slid down to get his clothes and dressed, then inspected the gouged pile he
sat on and contemplated being the kind of person who would get up and reshape
it into something decent. He was that kind of person. Ask anybody. The idea was
hilarious.
"Got to do this more often if it puts that sweet smile between those little
round nug lumps."
"No way. No fucking way we do this again," Karkat said on reflex. "At least-
" He craned back to look at Gamzee, and rediscovered that it wasn't an
embarrassing thing to do. "Not that it was bad, or whatever - but I need to
think about it first, okay? Then we can talk. And not do this again. Probably."
Gamzee grinned. "Scared of red?"
"Not talking about it yet!"
"Thinking about black instead?" Gamzee laughed low in his abdomen, flopping
back, and Karkat went still.
He studied the mountain range of reclining body. "Of course not."
"Don't worry. Couldn't take me if you tried ever so motherfucking hard." Gamzee
snickered dreamily at the ceiling.
Karkat shoved himself up. "Why the fuck would I try?" He put a hand round the
curve of Gamzee's cheek. Not much of a curve; the pubescent fat-padding was
gone, leaving the bone sharper under the skin.
That soft look still came easily to his expression. "You wouldn't, I know
nothing the way I know that." Then he snickered again. "But you really couldn't
take me. Just saying."
"Listen, Mr Apex Predator," Karkat said, "have a theoretical. Your answer will
be graded on a scale of one to my-bucket-will-be-your-brunch: if, say, Strider
gets your back up, the douchebag really ticks you off, exactly what would you
do to him?"
He almost mouthed it along with Gamzee, only going a little too fast for the
easy, thoughtless sluggishness of his voice: "Anything I want—"
"—'to do' is not what I want to hear I was not fucking kidding, you clownbound
shitpan!" Karkat hissed into his face. Gamzee had stopped short when the bucket
decaptchalogued into Karkat's hand.
"Bro, no." Even Gamzee could look shocked about some things.
"Well, apparently you need emphasis! An illustrative aid to get how fucking
awful what you just said was!" He would have gone on but Gamzee sat up, one
hand steadying the arm holding the bucket, the other gently squeezing his
shoulder.
Karkat considered the bucket, hormonal imbalances, and lack of sleep. "Fine,
this is fucking gross." He put it back in his sylladex. "But you have got to
realise! First you go on about how cool and collected you are now, then you're
ready to use Dave's teeth in a mosaic project at the first excuse?"
Gamzee shook his head. "But I don't want to. See, that's the thing, I'm all in
control. It's cool now, bro."
"Then stop saying you're going to beat me up. Which you've done several times
now."
"Hey, that's fucking talk. Some kidding around doesn't mean—"
"'Fucking talk' is generally intended to convey meaning. So stop saying it! You
never would have used to!"
Gamzee scowled. Not in the right way, where he looked like a cranky wriggler
who hated thinking. The expression was ponderous and disappointed, in
irritation at Karkat being slow. "You like getting bits of blackrom action up
in your business. Don't pretend like that is not a fact."
"Don't pretend that you don't feel better because we feel like lunch! If I can
lose an instinctive iota of bowel control when you act like you can tell me
what to do, I can sure as fuck believe you notice it each time. Like some urge
to prove dominance, or knowledge that like this you already fucking have it.
Just because the puberty roller coaster is over doesn't mean you don't have to
watch yourself."
"No. It's not like that," said Gamzee, probably thinking he sounded reasonable.
Here was the cranky wriggler, finally. "Of course I'm feeling good about all of
what I am now, it's natural. But it's not dangerous. I don't want to hurt
anybody."
"But you can and you know that, you're made to know it. Just like you've been
saying! Sure, you don't want to just fight anymore, but when you do feel the
urge again? Especially since your reaction to the idea is to titter sweetly
about how hard it would be to stop you!"
Gamzee looked at him, then slowly away. His eyes flickered, tracking his
thoughts.
"You're not king of anything," Karkat said. "No matter what the mirror tells
you."
"No, that never—" Gamzee pushed up onto an elbow to look at him, startled, then
trailed off. "Oh. Metaphor. Well, anyway. Nothing was saying anything. That's
one thing you don't have to worry about again." He lay back again and pulled a
hand down over his face. "Be right about."
"It won't last." Karkat said, sitting so he could keep a hand on Gamzee's
shoulder. "Me being right, because that situation never has staying power. You
riding the wave of superiority won't last either. It better not, got it?
Anyway, you're fresh out of the cocoon, some psychosomatic fuckery kind of
makes sense. At least we no longer have to mire ourselves in the whole empire's
unbearable memories and basest impulses when we sleep. That should help." He
paused. "You won't be able to pick up a single thing about what it's like to be
Grand Highblood."
"It's just, it wasn't even feeling anymore like that was what I had to be
thinking on, it was... I thought I wasn't supposed to be like... Just such a
mess as always."
"Here's a revelation for you. 'Growing up' doesn't mean increasing your
altitude enough to treat the rest of us to the ant's eye view of your cavernous
sniff funnels. Did you think it was going to be that easy?"
Big, billowing lungs put force behind Gamzee's sigh. "Nice to believe."
"The adjective you're looking for is 'stupid'. If you weren't so stupid you
would have learnt that much by now."
"Shut up," said Gamzee, and opened his arms. A little snappish anger and easy
forgiveness for Karkat cranking thoughtless fuckery out of his chitinous wind
tunnel like it was his real mutation. They curled around each other - like a
parody, ha, and a lot more like a need.
Eventually they settled more comfortably, side by side. Karkat's eyes were
staying shut for longer, and he was tentatively letting them.
Gamzee seemed okay with it. When he spoke his voice was set to low and lower,
steady in its softness. Soothing. "It'll be your turn soon. Getting to be
growing."
"Would like to get it the fuck over with." He hoped he'd be next. Or Terezi. So
long as Kanaya and Gamzee weren't the only two adults.
"So what do you think of who you're going to up and be?"
"Precedent says, I die young and leave a whole planet scared to say my name."
That had basically been a childhood ambition. It was nice that his genetic
double had managed. (And then, naturally, the suffering.) "Maybe I'll switch
it. Live forever, nothing about me and my name bothers anyone."
"So, no downsides either way."
"Nope." Karkat snorted. "But hey, that was a motherfucking joke, so you know.
Fuck ancestor destiny stuff, seriously. I'll just be me. That's all."
"Oh. Huh." The sounds seemed to accompany the square of the idea being
swivelled to fit the round hole functioning as Gamzee's think pan. "Yeah?"
Sometimes Karkat wished he possessed Kanaya's talent of her more shithive
moments, and could shed real tears just to be sufficiently sarcastic. He went
straightforward instead. "Gamzee, why would that surprise you?"
"Would've figured a right riotous motherfucker such as yourself would know he
really would only go to make himself to be better."
He opened his eyes; Gamzee shrugged. Honest confusion again, working a crease
back into existence over the bridge of his nose.
Future Karkat always left the impression of being as bad as the past ones.
Future Karkat was somebody he tried to avoid thinking of for as long as he
didn't have to do another memo, he had dream bubble Karkats to ragefroth at,
and this rock was hurtling past stars and dust and nothing. He'd spent weeks
with concrete knowledge of how Future Karkat was heading towards him at the
speed of inevitability, and now, this minute, it seemed like it was worth
thinking that a little further ahead of Future Karkat might be 'better'.
"Lead my way," said Gamzee. "Maybe I can live up to example."
"And I can take yours. Not worry about this too much." Karkat shut his eyes
tight, feeling like there was a betrayal of good sense going on. The optimism
persisted anyway.
"Yeah, right." Gamzee enfolded the top of Karkat's head in a hand, and tickled
the top of one ear presumably because he could. "Thank you. Keeping a watch.
Holding on," he said by-the-way, each word dropped awkward and separate, which
probably meant he was going to write reams in Trollian soon to try and really
make his point. At worst it would rhyme, and reference seventeen different
species of slam poet shit that Karkat might have to ask Dave to decode.
Karkat flopped his hands in defeat. "Thanks for your continued existence.
Thinking up alternatives was a problem for me."
"Always could make a party just by motherfucking showing up." Gamzee moved his
hand slowly down, stroking over Karkat's neck and shoulders.
In a last burst of vaguely cohesive thought, Karkat said, "We'll get there."
Which was still at a relatively high end of the random scale, so of course it
made fucking perfect sense to Gamzee.
"I guess we've got to. Guess I want to." A soft noise. "I guess I can..."
"Philosophy to continue after sleep," Karkat said, half in a memory of the
extraordinary bullshit they could spin together and half planning the fullness
of the following waking cycle. "Be ready."
There was a response of some sort, and knowing himself, which he constantly had
to, he probably even replied to it. He hoped he was saving the serious shit and
the seriously sappy shit for later; all questions and continued thank yous. It
didn't matter if he kept it for later or not, though, not the slightest bit,
because there would be a tomorrow to tell Gamzee anything in. They were getting
there.
End Notes
     If you want to see Karkat and Gamzee exactly as I pictured them in
     this story, Apologija kindly did some beautiful magic and took the
     image from my brain: http://kurlozmakara.tumblr.com/post/26047433234/
     born-for-new-things-this-is-inspired-by-the. (Thank you again!)
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