Karkat's Lessons

The Signless: Part Two

Karkat remembered something from his youth. He was two sweeps old, almost turning three, and he was locked up in his respiteblock, crying his eyes out. He cried because he was done. He was done hiding his blood, he was done running from drones, he was done being someone every troll despised.

He cried in his block, wishing to be any troll else. He would've rather been his recently culled neighbour than a mutant blooded troll. In all honesty, Karkat would've continued crying if his lusus hadn't shown up with a dead featherbeast in one of his claws. The ginormous crab lusus set the dead animal down before scuttling over to the young troll, this only made Karkat cry even more because he realised his lusus could've had a much better troll to take care of, he could've abandoned him. Hell, crabdad could've taken care of Gamzee instead! But no, his lusus stayed with Karkat, and he loved Karkat dearly. He loved him enough to stay with him for hours as Karkat continued bawling, he loved him enough to remind him that he was a good troll. Crabdad loved Karkat enough to give him a necklace with a small and old piece of iron shaped as his sign attatched to it. Crabdad loved him enough to let Karkat know that he would do great things.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Oh, no no no no no....." Karkat shook his head, unable to think of anything else to say. Him? The next Signless? "L-Listen Kankri, you MUST have the wrong Mutant blooded fre--"

"Karkat!" Kankri huffed, cutting off Karkat. Of course he would've, Kankri was still very sensitive on the "M" word. Karkat sighed and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Kankri, there's no way in hell that I'm the next Signless. I mean, look at me! Two of my friends got murdered infront of me by one of my best friends, my actual fucking best friend went insane and killed two more of my friends, and I didn't even THINK about Tavros..." Karat looked down as he listed the deaths of his friends that he could've prevented, but didn't. "And...I let JACK into our fucking session! I even fucking housed him for a while on LOPAH. I....I've fucked up way too much to even be remotely close to becoming the next SIgnless."

Kankri listened with a solemn look, he figured Karkat would react this way. The older troll scooted closer to his descendent and laid a gentle hand on his knee, ignoring his "no physical contact" trigger for the sake of comforting Karkat. "Karkat, you are still an excellent leader. You lead your friends to victory in your battle against the Black King. You were thinking on what was best for your friends, that's why you let Jack Noir into your session....although it did backfire on you....but your friends deaths were never your fault. They were bound to kill each other eventually, it's what highbloods do." Kankri smiled softly, hoping this would cheer up the other, and it did, but only a little.

"I...Kankri...how did they even know that The Signless's promise was true? For all they know he could've been some crazy troll spewing a final load of shit before he fucking died."

"Well...they didn't know. But their great leader didn't let them down yet. So, they put their trust in him and prepared for your hatching."

"Prepared for my hatching? What the hell do you mean they 'prepared'?" Karkat questioned, curious on how the ancestors had actually taken time to prepare for his birth of all trolls. Kankri smiled, seeing that he had sparked Karkat's interest and nodded.

"Yes, prepared. Haven't you ever wondered why you had a Lusus and I didn't?" Karkat nodded and sat up straighter, keen on listening to this. "Well, your ancestors took some drastic measures to make sure that you survived after you had hatched. Your blood color would've been a key issue in surviving, seeing as how no lusus would've wanted us. But, before the Dolorosa was taken into slavery, she and Redglare had traveled to caverns to...er..." Kankri thought for a moment, shifting uncomfortably.