Chapter Text
It’s cold and dark when you come to.
There’s a pounding in your pan, something worse than you’ve ever felt before, something pulsing under your skull. You groan, trying to shake the feeling off through your horns, wanting it to go away, but it doesn’t. You actually can’t even shake your horns much. What…?
Your eyes peel open, only to find darkness. The motherfuck? You don’t remember shutting any light off before you conked out. Were you still asleep maybe? Was this a dream? You don’t know. Karbro would know, if you could find your husktop, could hit him up and get his miraculous grey on your screen, get some answers. He knew reality from dreamland better than anyone; he’d know, he’d help you, precious as he is.
You make to sit up, but your horns hit solid wall. Huh? You try again, but it’s still there. Where… where are you? You blink your eyes open as much as your can, only to find more darkness surrounding you. The pain of your headache subsides into panic; this ain’t the meteor. This ain’t even your hive. Where are you, where are you? You flail your arms to the sides
You meet
Someone’s
Wh
What the
You twist your head to see what your right hand just collided into, only to be met with the vacant eyed stare of your favorite cat-sis, Nepeta.
But you know.
Just her head.
Just.
Her head.
Suddenly, so suddenly, the wave of memories crash into your think pan, mushing together into something so horrendous, so terrible, so horrible, it makes you feel sick. And damn can you feel it; every bone crushed to stardust under your fingers, the feel of a broken bow as you pulled, the give of skull as you bashed it to smithereens, the tear-wrench-twist of flesh and sinew as you dismantled body after body, the heady feel of power, of clarity, manipulation as your chucklevoodoos rang, make them kneel, make them pay, make them make them make make--
You throw up all over yourself without warning. Your eyes water, and if your pan didn’t ache before, it sure as hell wasn’t letting you forget it now. Oh gods, what had you done? What had you…
Predestined. It was all predestined. It had to, hadn’t it? Had to happen--
You don’t know that, you don’t--
It wasn’t me it was all him everything was him--
You DARE put blame on your messiah--
I ain’t giving him shit, I’m giving him credit for what--
What you did--
WE did, WE did--
To PlEaSe HiM--
With a hoarse shout, you thrash, the fridge rocking as you writhe in the pile of corpses. Someone’s horns-- you think Sollux’s, holy shit-- slices your left arm open as your hands hit the sides, trying desperately to do… something. Anything. Your gut drops again as you gag on nothing, apparently already out of stomach content to puke. You legs come up and kick at the top of your mini prison, Equius’s teeth gashing a hole in your ankle-- you murdered him, you murdered him-- and you feel eyes on you everywhere, voices whispering, the walls closing in on you saying Gamzee Gamzee Gamzee killer killer killer you killed your friends what will you do now all alone all alone you’re gonna die here die die die die die die--
Your voicebox screeches on its own accord as you crash most of your body into the top of the fridge with all your might. Something above snaps-- you hear it snap-- and suddenly the darkness gives way to light, too much light, too much and not enough all at once. Sunshine bears down on your heavy as your lug yourself over the edge of the fridge, ignoring the broken, rusted chains as you heave, eyes clenched shut, trying to will yourself to get used to the sun. For a moment, your pan connects the sunrays to Terezi-- poor Terezi, you’d always been a bit scared of her, but friendly nonetheless, and now you doubt she’d wanna come near you without being able to drive a blade through your chest-- and Kanaya-- Kanaya had wanted to kill you before, you were used to that idea-- and
And
And
You sob, eyes brimming with tears, slipping down your face and taking small streaks of mussed facepaint with it. You don’t move to wipe it away. Karbro had always told you to keep your face clean and now
Now
Now you shouldn’t even be thinking of calling him Karbro. You shouldn’t even try to deserve that level of friendship with your most precious, most valued, most beautiful diamond best friend person that you once knew.
Just Karkat now.
The thought is enough to make you cover your mouth to try and smother your crying. There you sit, in a fridge full of the dismembered bodies and heads of your once-friends and victimes, broken chains and all, crying over those you had lost, the pain, the memories.
Your thinkpan was free of everyone. Of everything.
Just you now, in there.
You don’t know if you like it or not.
Once you’ve quieted down, once the tears have stopped for now, once the memories become just a bit lighter on your shoulders, you force yourself to look up, try to get a sense of where you’ve landed. It’s a bright forest clearing. The trees grow tall around you, there are little featherbeasts flying around and chirping up a storm, little nut creatures and all the like scampering around and chittering as if to say “hi” to a motherfucker. With the sunshine not being all deadly and shit, it looks… looks so nice. Not a place for you and your dastardly self to be, nor this box of hell full of mistakes and the dead.
You pull yourself up despite your body screaming in pain. You roll out over the edge of the fridge, grunting as your back hits the ground. The grass is soft beneath you, but you don’t really pause to appreciate it.
Likes of you don’t get to appreciate.
You roll over to your side and make yourself sit up, ignoring the pain, and you try to get up on shaky legs. You’re still in your god tier. It’s in absolute tatters, rags on your thin frame, but you don’t give one singular motherfuck. This thing could burn for all you care. Codpiece included. You're sure Kurloz would dare to box you over the aural clots if he heard you think that.
You wonder where Kurloz is.
Wonder if he feels like you do.
You hold yourself almost straight. Something in your side creaks; your hand flies to that spot and you involuntarily hiss. Something’s probably broken. The parts of you that are bleeding streak purple behind you as you begin to walk (more of a stumble, really) out of the clearing, leaving the fridge behind you. You don’t look back.
All you know is that you have to get out of here.
And as far away from that prison as possible.
More tears slide down your face as your shamble off, your blood trail corrupting the serenity of nature as the sun shines right on down without a care in the world.