(no subject)

[sleeplessinalternia]

Who| Karkat + Chibi Usa, Karkat + Signless, Karkat + YOU?
What| Karkat makes his first kill and meets his ancestor, among other things.
Where| Main Street USA, elsewhere?
When| Week Six
Warnings/Notes| murder, blood, kids killing kids

Karkat's been in the arena for an hour, maybe two. It's the crowning glory to an unbelievably shitty night, which began with him and his friends fighting the Black King and ended with a bunch of weird hornless aliens shoving him into a tube and sending him into a death match. The part in the middle where that demon-barkbeast-carapace-thing destroyed the door into their new universe just before Karkat slipped into unconsciousness hadn't helped either.

He's managed to pick up a few things via breaking into some of the little commerce hives that line the thoroughfare leading up to the big yellow horn-shaped cavity. Nothing that great, though. Certainly no weapons. The large spool of grey thread might come in handy once he can find a needle, but until then...

Well. When Karkat manages to score some more supplies, he'll figure more shit out. He's taken his cloak off, figuring that if nothing else he can use it as a makeshift garrotte for now, and waits in the dark spaces between buildings, hoping to get the jump on someone. Preferably someone with supplies.

Comments

OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

 

[tis_allgood]

Cuthbert hasn't been in the arena very long, and so far his best try at a weapon is a heafty stick. It won't last very long, but Bert has the same hope that he'll be come across someone with better supplies than he has. Which wouldn't be hard, he has a stick and clothes and nothing else.

He's walking around fairly casually, with his stick at his side and a surprising spring in his step. He is staring over his shoulder from time to time, seemingly an easy target. What better way to lure out someone than to use yourself as bait?

[sleeplessinalternia]

Karkat eyes Cuthbert suspiciously from his hiding place. Six sweeps of growing up on Alternia has taught him that nobody walks around with such casual carelessness unless they were fairly certain of their ability to cull anyone who got in their way. That went double in a deathmatch. Whoever this alien boy is, Karkat is sure that he's dangerous.

[tis_allgood]

This strategy isn't paying off the way Cuthbert had anticipated and now he's starting to grow impatient with waiting. He's also accutely aware of the silence all around him, and since he's trying to attract someone to him anyway he might as well go big or go home.

"I know you're out there," he yells in all directions. "Or they would come and crown me winner. Let's palaver, you and I, whoever you are. Sit a spell and speak, and no killing. You have my word."

[sleeplessinalternia]

Fuck. This alien kid is good. Also, loud and brash and definitely some kind of alien highblood. Fuck.

It would probably be better to make an alliance, Karkat reminds himself, if the kid really is as good at Karkat thinks he is. So Karkat waits until the kid is looking in another direction, then darts out from his hiding place.

"And how do I know you'll keep it?"

He still keeps a good distance between himself and the other kid, though, a few times the length of the boy's club. He might be negotiating a temporary truce, but he's not an idiot

[tis_allgood]

"You don't. But if you had it in you to kill me you would be trying already. We're both desperate and ill-equipped. Trust is the last thing we may have between us."

To prove it, Cuthbert sets down his makeshift weapon and holds up his hands in innocence. It's a risk, but he's already gone this far on a whim.

He's a bit worried about what this newcomer is, he doesn't look like anything Bert has seen before. But muties are not so uncommon in his world and it isn't as if anyone else has come forward on peaceful or not so peaceful terms. He could speak and he had enough sense to talk rather than attack. The situation isn't too far out of hand yet.

[sleeplessinalternia]

After a moment, Karkat shakes the rolled-up cloak out and attaches it back around his neck. He raises his hands as well.

"What the fuck are you?" Karkat asks. "You look like one of those nooksniffing aliens that stuck me in here. Is this your home planet?"

[tis_allgood]

"I should be asking that of you!" But since it seems like they're going to be on relatively peaceful terms right now, Bert sits down.

"I'm not of this world, my world is moving on and this one is just getting started. Not this exact spot, but you know of what I speak."

He looks around at their ruined surroundings and shakes his head. This isn't what he meant, but he assumes Karkat went through the same vetting process he did before getting into the arena.

[sleeplessinalternia]

"Maybe," Karkat says, before he sits down too. Just getting started? Was this their new world, then--the one they'd made with the genesis frog? The barkbeast demon had destroyed the door, but maybe they'd found some way out of the Medium anyway.

If this was the universe they'd created, then it looked like to be a pretty shitty one. His fault, he'd hurried Kanaya along.

"I guess you could say my world moved on," Karkat says. "Or ended." His fault. Fuck. "I'd still like to know what the fuck you are, though. You're sure as fuck not a troll."

[tis_allgood]

Cuthbert raises an eyebrow at some of that. He's never heard of a troll, but it's safe to say that's what he's talking to, considering the circumstances.

"Human as they come, say true. And that must make you a 'troll', for all that means to me. Do they give you names? That may be an easier way to get at this."

He isn't even trying not to stare, Karkat is definitely the strangest thing he's seen here so far, and that includes everything he saw before being dumped in the arena.

[sleeplessinalternia]

Don't worry, Cuthbert, Karkat is glaring right back at you.

Karkat doesn't answer the other boy's question at first, mostly because he's trying to decide if he should give him his hatchname or if he thinks he can get away with giving him an adult's title. After all, for all the alien knows, Karkat is an adult. Just a--very--short one.

He decides against it, mostly because he's not entirely sure if he's found the perfect title and he doesn't want to be known the rest of his (potentially very short) life by something that he's going to swiftly decide was a stupid idea.

"Karkat," he says finally. "Karkat Vantas. And you?"

[tis_allgood]

This is turning out to be a rather angry meeting of the minds, more so than Cuthbert expected, although he probably should have seen it coming, what with the death game and all. Still, it's no reason not to be a little civilized about things.

"Cuthbert Allgood, son of Robert. Not that anyone here would give a donkey's fart for my lineage. Well met, Karkat."

He has a little bit of trouble with the pronunciation, but knowing Cuthbert it's likely he's doing that deliberately. He wants to know more about who (and to some extent what) he's talking to, but there are more important matters at hand.

"I am not likely to last much longer, I came here unarmed and little prepared. Mayhap we would work better together than alone."

[sleeplessinalternia]

"Yeah, yeah. Well met, yourself." Karkat frowns. "What the fuck's a son?"

Wait, no, strange alien titles are not what matters here. Sealing the deal is what matters here.

"I've got someone I'm playing lusus to. Are we including him in this alliance?"

Re: OPEN THREADS

[nunpunching]

Punchy's in increasingly bad shape the longer he's in the Arena. The good fortune that blessed his immune system earlier is finally starting to give out, and the socket around his missing eye is puffed up and red. He slouches a bit now, exhausted and dehydrated.

But that doesn't stop him from wanting to take this whole place down. He's repaired his megaphone and is now carting it and its many wires and pieces around in an old cooler that some poor foodseller probably once used for slushies.

He brings it to his mouth when he sees someone who, he deems, is positively skulking.

"Yo, homeboy, you don't gots to be fronting, I ain't gonna be busting a move on your punk ass!"

Re: OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

Who's this douchebag?

Fuck. That's twice in a row that Karkat's 'hide in the shadows and take people out before they have a chance to realize you're there' strategy has failed.

"Yeah right," Karkat says, stepping out from the shadows, ready to run the fuck away any moment. "This is a fucking death match, not a schoolhive social. We're not supposed to drink punch with our exterior grasping digits extended--we're supposed to kill each other until there's only one of us left."

Re: OPEN THREADS

[nunpunching]

"The fuck is an exterior grasping digit extended?" Punchy yells into the megaphone. It doesn't seem to occur to him that he's going to garner the attention of everyone in a mile radius doing this. He starts to walk over towards Karkat.

"Bitch, if you be playin' their bingo-pad, you're way spaced out in the membrane. The real enemy's those hos up with their cameras coordinating this after-school special, dawg."

Re: OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

"It's this, you cretinous fuckwad," Karkat bellows back, holding his pinkie out, while aggressively miming drinking tea. "What the fuck are you doing with that thing? Do you want to bring every single fucking gladiatortainer into this commerce district?" He backs away from Punchy. "And could you stop talking like a pretentious fuckwad? You're not the fucking Condescension."

(Seriously, a few more fish puns and this alien shitnugget would be speaking flawless Court Alternian.)

Re: OPEN THREADS

[nunpunching]

"Trying to bring some homies together, jackwagon! I'm the cavalry!"

It's scary how much he really believes. And how little he understands of what Karkat's saying. Punchy approaches, casting an odd, one-eyed look at Karkat's hand gesture.

Re: OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

Karkat bristles. He wonders if his claws are sharp enough to claw this dickwad's throat out.

"Have you ever thought there might be people trying to sleep here?" he hisses, infuriated. Fuck, he doesn't want to even think how Signless must be freaking out, being woken up by a loud voice talking like purplest of nobility.

Re: OPEN THREADS

[nunpunching]

"Who'd want to crash out when some mofo might come up and ice your snoozy ass?" Punchy drops his hands to his side. "I'm doing a public service."

Re: OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

"You're being a public nuisance," Karkat hisses. "Now get the fuck out of my face."

Re: OPEN THREADS

[nunpunching]

"I ain't in your face, jackwagon! Now quit your shysting around and get your grey ass over here so's I can make sure you're all frosty and shit."

He just wants to make sure you're not injured, Karkat. He has medicine!

Re: OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

A lifetime of reading historical troll romance novels has given Karkat the ability to piece together meaning from this weird alien's highblood dialect, but even that is starting to fail him.

"Are you trying to hit on me?" Karkat's expression is distinctly murderous. He really wishes he had a sickle on him. "Newsflash, douchelord, I don't hate you that way."

Re: OPEN THREADS

[nunpunching]

"What? No! No homo, dog, I ain't into that kink shizz!" Punchy jerks his head back and wrinkles his nose. "I'm trying to make sure you're all in one piece and not needing the ambo or nothing."

Re: OPEN THREADS

[sleeplessinalternia]

"I'm fine," Karkat snarls. "Now get the fuck out of my face!"