An Unscratched Surface: Part 14

Once he's got Goatad, Karkat and Terezi out of the hive, the night passes far too slow for Gamzee. There's nothing he's excited for going on at the office now. No one important to talk to because Nepeta told him the day before that she wasn't coming in because she was getting all up and sick, and Terezi wasn't due in for the rest of the week. There were no appointments for Karkat, no cases to sit in on, nothing but paperwork and waiting for the work hours to end. And the whole time there's nothing in his thinkpan but the smell of Karkat's hair, the burning heat of his body pressed against Gamzee's, and the way that he'd tried to hide his tears at the end of the romcom when the two trolls realized they were meant to be matesprits, not auspitices. For all the pain and tension, all the concern, Gamzee couldn't help but view the night and day before as something miraculous, and tonight would surely be better. Tonight Karkat would be moving into their hive, and he'd have his bro, his temporail, his flush crush separated from him by only a thin hive wall.

The problem is that between when he gets to the office and when he returns to the hive is far too long. There isn't word from Goatad at the office—he's too caught up wherever he is with the paperwork and all that motherfucking stuff—and that's almost unnerving as it is. Waiting was never something he'd been good at. When he was young Goatad had always been there when he needed him, but the first time that Goatad had gone back to work, Gamzee hadn't known what to do. It'd only been for a few hours, but he hadn't quite understood where his guardian had gone, or why he'd been left alone. Tonight felt a bit like that. Like everyone he needed, wanted to be around, was gone. That they'd left him alone to fend for himself.

The second he'd able to clock out, he was through the door and headed for his hive. There was no knowing when Karkat would be escorted to the hive by Goatad and whoever else he roped into it. They could even be there already, so there was no chance that Gamzee was all up and going to dawdle when his temporail brother arrived. So Gamzee stretched his legs as far as they could go as he ran, rushing through the city without to pause for so much as a breath.

As he approaches the hive, his shoes crunching and slipping on the gravel path that led up to his door, he caught sight of the one thing he had wanted to see more than anything else. By the door a troll was sitting next to a box, with a few others scattered around. Karkat and his things. There weren't many boxes, though, far too few for a troll their age. Then again, that wasn't so surprising when Gamzee thought about what he'd heard Spided was like. While he spoiled his cerulean ward, and tolerated his olive, he wasn't the kindest to Karkat. If those boxes were filled with more than just clothes and a few odds and ends, Gamzee was going to be motherfucking shocked. Almost as shocked as he was to see Karkat here without Goatad around.

Each step brings him closer, and with each step he slows, a feeling of foreboding starting to gnaw at his horns. Why was Karkat here alone? Why wasn't he looking up at the sound of Gamzee's approach? Why was he all sitting there, knees pulled all up and under his chin, his face turned away? What the motherfuck was going on?

Gamzee comes to a stop in front of the smaller troll, but still Karkat won't look up, won't so much as greet him. It's like he doesn't even realize that a motherfucker is there. Like he doesn't even care. So Gamzee falls to his knees beside Karkat and reaches out. When his hand comes to rest on one of Karkat's sleeve-covered arms, the other troll hisses in pain and flinches away. And on the inside, Gamzee feels himself start to go the slightest bit cold.

"What's a brother all up and doing here alone?"

No response, just Karkat curling up on himself even more. Like a brother doesn't even want to be seen. Like he wants to disappear, never to be seen again. Again Gamzee reaches out, this time reaching past the shelter of arms and legs, and when he grips Karkat's chin, the other troll doesn't resist. Doesn't do a motherfucking thing as Gamzee lifts his head and turns it so that he can get his look on. Turns it so he can get his understand on.

But it's not some understand that all up and fills Gamzee. Not when he sees the red-eyes Karkat's sporting—makes him look like a fucking ringedbeast—not when he notices the wicked trail of blood running down the side of his temporail's face, originating from a scratch across his brow. Karkat's lip is swollen and crimson, and when he looks hard, Gamzee can see the trace of another bruise forming at the edge of the collar of his shirt. And he knows, has his wicked knowledge on that these aren't the only hurts. They'll be others, on his arms, his legs, his torso. Blows dealt by the damn hands that were supposed to protect him.

"Some bluebloods jumped me just before I got back to my hive..." Karkat started to say, but neither of them believed it.

"Where's Goatad?" Gamzee demands, his voice dead serious, a quiet kind of whisper he's never even heard from his own lips.

"Filling a report at..."

It doesn't matter. Gamzee's already on his feet again, his fists clenched at his sides. He knows that his knuckles are going ashen with how tight they are up and clenched, he can feel the purple blood oozing out from around his nails as they cut into the skin of his palms. And he does. NOT. care. All the caring's gone cold, like his stomach, like his thinkpan, like his motherfucking body. Ain't no motherfucking warmth all up and left in him, only a rage so fucking consuming in its fire that it's fucking ice in his veins. He feels like a spring made of cold steel, all stretched out with a tension that he isn't going to motherfucking deal with no more. No MOTHERFUCKING way he was going to stand by and let this pass. Ain't going to fall for no line about some random blues jumping a brother. Ain't going to go to no authority enforcers either, not like his guardian. This isn't a problem he's going to motherfucking up and accept no more.

"Stay here," he hisses from between clenched teeth, the words whispers so low that he can barely hear them.

"Gamzee..."

"I  SAID STAY THE MOTHERFUCK HERE!"

Karkat flinches back from the words, but right now a brother can't even up and get his feel on for that. Only thing he can think of now is that he can't, won't, all up and abide this motherfucking shit no more. No one, but no one, lays a motherfucking hand on your temporail, your motherfucking brother, your Karkat.

He's moving, he's already started walking, turned back towards the city with his fists clenched at his sides, dripping a trail of purple behind him. The distance between Gamzee and the city closes faster than he can make sense of, and then he's in the streets. More than once on the way and in the streets he hears someone call out, feels some troll catch at his sleeve, but he doesn't stop. Can't stop. The cold drives him on, demands that he move, keep moving, advance. So he glares at those trolls who get in his way, and not one stands in his way, they all abscond the first chance they get. They leave him be as he turns down streets he's never been on and yet knows like the back of his hand. Then he's there, motherfucking standing in front of a hive he's never been to, but that he knows. He MOTHERFUCKING KNOWS his is what he is looking at.

The door doesn't stand a chance when he lays into it with a pipe that came into his hand at some point. Sure, the first few blows leave little more than dents, but after that the pieces of wood are flying apart under his strikes. And from behind it he can hear the shouts, the fear, the anguish.

"Open," he growls, and with a final blow the wood falls, he's through the door, he's casting aside the pipe and launching himself at the cerulean blood beyond that is only just the slightest bit larger than him.

Fists fall, ones dyed purple and cerulean with their blood, left there from the first ambushing blows. Their bodies fall together, one whimpering, pleading, begging, the other aggressing, aggrieving, assaulting. With each blow the rage only grows, unable to be consumed, to be quelled, to be doused, only added.

The blows become harder, not because the cold has faded, but because there's weight on his arms. Beyond the red tint of his vision—the red of Karkat's blood and suffering—he can see why. Two trolls are clinging to his right arm, one to his left, and they are trying to hold him back. Gamzee can hear words too, mumbles only barely sensible through the pounding in his ears, and he knows they're abjuring, advising him to relent. None of them really cut through, not at first. Then there's a hand, gentle and just barely warm, pressed against his cheek. A voice whispered directly in his ear, calm and soothing. A shoosh, a pap, and promise that they'll make everything okay.

Arms grow heavy, far too heavy, and they fall slack at his sides. Still there's the weight expected from the trolls on either arm, they're too afraid to let him go because he might go back to abusing. And still the voice is there, gentle and sweet and promising that everything was going to be okay. That she'd make it okay. That she'd never let him down when he needed her.

"Hush, Gamzee. Shoosh. Do not allow this aggression to rule you. That is not the Gamzee I know, that I pity. He is so peaceful, so gentle, so sweet. How would he react to how you are acting?"

The weight on his left arm becomes pulling, and Gamzee follows it, letting the touch drag him to his feet and into the arms of a slender, gentle troll. The other weights are gone, happily having given him over to the ministrations of the one holding him, shooshing him, promising him something that he doesn't even know to ask for.

"Please Gamzee, do not do this anymore. It is not worth the effort that you would put into it. He is slime, lower than slime. Well below the worth of your attentions. Please Gamzee..."

"Kanaya," he whimpers, burying his face in her shoulder, not even questioning the presence of his moirail.

"I am here for you, my moirail. I shall always be here for you. Shoosh."

"Let me kill him, Kanaya. Let me end him."

"I cannot allow that my moirail to ruin himself like this. I will protect you, Gamzee, but to do so, you have to let me."

"Kanaya..."

"Shoosh, Gamzee. Shoosh."