Chapter Text
Karkat generally wasn't sure what the worst thing about living with eleven other adolescents was: the noise, the hormones, or the smell. However, right at this moment one thing topped them all -- the sheer fucking MESS.
It wasn't just that Karkat couldn't help but trip over innumerable horns and disemboweled fiduspawn plushies when he tried to escape the computer lab. It wasn't just that the thermal hulls in the food preparation area were stuffed so full of everyone's weird alchemized crap that he hadn't been able to scrounge decent meal in days. It wasn't even that he had very nearly slipped in a puddle of... something when he'd tried to leave the cafeteria.
It was absconding to his private quarters, opening his secret room, and finding Sollux's beehive mainframes oozing all over his fucking floor.
As Karkat stared at the mess, the one tiny part of him that wasn't ragefed up to his horns noted with wonder how that little vein in his forehead felt three seconds away from bursting. Perhaps his entire head would explode. What would happen if his candy-red blood got all mixed in with the mind honey? Would it make an attractive orange that Terezi would compare to some delicious food item and lap up? Would it perhaps make his best friend a little tetchy that Karkat had ruined the hives with his mutant blood?
As much as Karkat was tempted to see if it would happen, simultaneously putting himself out of his misery and adding some much deserved suffering Sollux's life, that would be letting him win. It would be letting all of these sloppy, careless fucking morons win, and there was no way Karkat was going to allow that. He charged toward the computer lab.
"All right you disgusting swine, listen the fuck up," Karkat roared the instant he transportalized into the lab. "This place is so filthy I am about to vomit and I have tripped over your shitty piles of what-the-fuck-ever one time too many." He stepped off and turned, sweeping his eyes over the trolls present. "I am giving you an EXECUTIVE FUCKING ORDER to get your shit together before I get it together for you."
"What a great idea!" chirped Vriska as she darted to the transportalizer.
"You disingenuous--" Karkat stumbled, pushed aside by a fleeing Gamzee.
"Honk honk honk!"
"GRUB-FUCKINGLY RETARDED--" Karkat flailed as a cackling Terezi zipped past him.
"You're so sweet, Karkitty!" Nepeta bounced past Karkat and onto the pad.
"BUNCH OF COMPLETE ASSHOLES!"
"You're a glubbin pal, Kar!" Eridan called over his shoulder just before he disappeared. Karkat glared murderously at empty space fishface had left behind.
"Thee ya, thucker!" Sollux darted past, or at least tried to; Karkat lurched and grabbed the skinny bifurcated bitch by the back of his shirt.
"Oh fuck no, Captor." Karkat hauled his so-called best friend up short. "You got your mind honey all over my secret room and now you're going to pay."
Sollux struggled, twiggy arms flailing towards his escape. "I've got fifty boondollarth with your name on them--"
Karkat gave him a shake. "I'm not as stupid as you look, Sollux!"
Sollux glared over his shoulder at Karkat, his blue eye baleful. "It wath a joke, kk. Besideth..." His psionics crackled over Karkat's hand. "Do you think you can make me?"
"You wouldnaaaaaugh!" Karkat's entire body spasmed with the force of the jolt Sollux sent through his hand. He not only lost his grip on the other troll's shirt, he lost his grip on the floor, too; his knees gave out and he sprawled on his ass.
Sollux grinned down at Karkat and snickered. "Thith ith what you get for being a tin-pot dictator, kk." He straightened his shirt. "And thcrewing up my clotheth. Have fun playing maid!"
"Wait," Karkat croaked as he clambered to his feet. "Captor." He snapped his sickle out of his sylladex. "You step one foot on that transportalizer--"
The skinny troll froze and turned slowly. His eyes narrowed behind his glasses. "And you'll what."
"Well, that depends. You didn't reprogram the door to my secret room, so you might have trouble finding it again." Karkat smiled brightly. "Who do you think can get to your beehives faster?"
Sollux slumped. "You're thuch an atthhole, kk."
"That's why you like me."
Sollux liked Karkat so much that he bitched, moaned, and whined the entire time they tidied the computer lab. Had Karkat ever heard so much whining out of that lispy mouth? He doubted it! Whyyy do Tavros's games have so many caaards? Whyyy does Gamzee have so many hooorns? Why, why, why.
"Why do I put up with you?" Karkat snarled as he shoved another horn into a black plastic trash bag.
"That'th a good quethtion," Sollux sighed. "Maybe I should get out of your hair and jutht go."
Out of the corner of his eye, Karkat noticed Sollux sneaking past him, toward the transportalizer. "Nice try, fuckass. STOP!" Karkat whirled and lurched forward, intending to bodyblock the other troll. However, he'd miscalculated and it ended up being more along the lines of a bodyslam. Sollux yelped as the momentum sent them both stumbling sideways and into the bagged hornpile with a thunderous HONK.
They laid there stunned for a moment, then all at once Karkat became painfully aware of how his best friend was made most of angles and sharp edges, especially his teeth, which were frighteningly close to his face.
Sollux met Karkat's eyes and bared that mouthful of awkward teeth. "I'll show you who'th a fuckatth, fuckatth!" Karkat pulled away, too late; one long fingered hand tangled in his hair and gave it a sharp yank.
Karkat yelped. "The FUCK--" He gave Sollux's ribs a jab and Sollux squawked. "--do you think you're DOING?"
"Not--" Sollux yanked Karkat's hair again and struggled to throw him off. "--getting out of your hair!"
They rolled around on top of the horn pile, poking and pulling and shoving and screaming at one another. Karkat was far stronger but what Sollux lacked in strength he made up for in reach and leverage, and every time Karkat thought he pried one of Sollux's hands off of him the other sneaked in under his defenses to pull his hair or prod his ribs. They rolled and flailed and slapped in a cacophony of honks.
But quite suddenly they both stopped and stared at one another. Karkat felt a growing awareness of certain facts. One, Sollux had his hands up Karkat's shirt; two, Karkat's legs were clamped around Sollux's hips and his hands tangled in Sollux's hair; three, their faces were much too close together. There might have been a four, but Karkat really didn't care to think that far down, and from the look on Sollux's face, neither did he.
While it wasn't the first time they'd found themselves in that position, it was exponentially more embarrassing each time. Karkat's face grew hot, Sollux's cheeks bloomed mustard yellow, then they parted explosively and scrambled off into different directions.
"Let'th pretend that never happened," Sollux muttered.
Karkat squirmed. "Agreed."