Chapter Text

In another location so distant as to render traditional measurements of spatial and temporal separation meaningless, an alien boy sits exhausted at a bank of computers in a small research station hurtling through the void. He worries about the fate of the crew that he still considers himself the leader of. They have won the game, but have no way to claim their prize, and are being hunted by the strange alien that came through the portal. With no solutions forthcoming to this predicament, the boy is nearly ready to storm off in frustration, when a message on his screen blares its way into his consciousness.

arsenicCatnip [AC] began trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG]

AC: :33 < * the huntress ac silently stalks her prey *

CG: BY THE INKY BLACKNESS OF SPACE THAT WILL SURELY SOON DEVOUR US ALL, WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT, NEPETA?

AC: :33 < * ac spots the lone beast *

AC: :33 < * she notes that it seems to be growing increasingly hopeless *

AC: :33 < * ac will need to put an end to its suffering *

CG: NEPETA YOUR PANDEAD, MORBID ROLEPLAY REALLY ISN’T NECESSARY HERE.

CG: IN CASE YOU HAVEN’T NOTICED YET, WE HAVE PLENTY OF PERFECTLY DEADLY PROBLEMS TO DEAL WITH IN THE REAL WORLD WITHOUT YOU ADDING ANY IMAGINARY MURDERS TO THE LIST.

AC: :33 < * ac smiles as her prey continues on oblivious to her intentions *

AC: :33 < * she approaches softly hiding in the darkness cast by the unused terminal beside her prey *

CG: SHIT. NEPETA ARE YOU SPYING ON M-



And the boy is knocked out of his chair as his friend pounces on him. Karkat screams and flails for a bit, until Nepeta backs off a bit to provide some breathing room.

“Don’t do that,” he says. “What would have happened if I had used my sickles on you? You could end up with a missing air pusher if you aren’t careful.” His attacker merely giggles in response.

“Oh fuck this.” Karkat pushes the other troll off of him, and begins to stand up. “We do not have time for these idiotic games. We didn’t have time for these idiotic games before the world imploded, and definitely don’t have time now.”

Karkat begins to walk away, but a hand on his shoulder restrains him. “Wait,” Nepeta replies, “I did have something important to say.”

“Well fuck, why didn’t you just lead with that? This might have been preferable to trying to make sure that one or the other of us lost a limb first. I mean unless your oh-so-important thing is that Equius decided to make us *all* into cyborgs.”

“If you wanted a new arm, I’m sure I could purrsuade him to-“ Karkat prepares to leave again, and Nepeta quickly changes her tack “No, wait. That isn’t what I wanted to say.”

The boy turns back, irritated, as she continues. “Well I was trying to alchemize some new claws-“

“Wait. Actual claws, or like saws or something and you’re just using your usual pointless cat pun thing.”

Nepeta frowns at him. “Claws of course.” Having failed to usefully answer the query, she continues, “Anyway, I was entering the code, when this white text guy started chatting with me.”

“White text? Is someone playing games with their color scheme?”

“I don’t know.” Nepeta answers. “Anyway, we were having a pretty good RP, when-“

“What? Your important news is that you have a new mysterious imagination partner? That’s really great, Nepeta. And by ‘really great’, I mean ‘absolutely stupid’.”

“You know, you could at least try to be nice sometimes,” she responds. “But no, that’s not it. I must have been distracted and entered the wrong code. Just one digit off, but I got a very different item.”

“Well?” Karkat inquires, “What? Something useful? Something dangerous?”

“I’m not sure. Here.” Nepeta reaches into her jacket and fishes out a note and hands it to Karkat. He quickly snatches it away from her and begins reading.

jade note number 1:

help!!!

jack is out of control!!!

after you prototyped bec, he got super spacedog powers, and is using them and dave’s sword to kill everyone!!!

you’ve gotta do something!!!

message id: 91943429540130183696

checksum: 2775944AE905311E042E

Karkat stares at the note in his hands for a long minute.

“OK. What the fuck is this?”