The Peacekeeper

Chapter 6

"Alright Karkat," Dave called out as he shut the front door with his foot, his arms were busy carrying bags of food and other errands, "I got your vitamins, your sleep meds, your painkillers, and pretty much every other fucking medication the doctor prescribed you." The human glanced over to his troll friend who was just sitting on the couch, his twin sickles in his hands and staying perfectly still. Karkat looked as if he hadn't moved from that spot since Dave left approximately two hours ago. "...Come on over and pop one of these badass motherfucking gummy vitamins in your mouth." Karkat did as told. He obediently stood up and left a single sickle on the couch before walking over to Dave and waited patiently for him to set his things down and give Karkat his much needed vitamin.

Dave hated this.

Dave hated how Karkat was so...obedient...so robotic. So unlike himself. Dave missed the Karkat who retaliated everything with a snarky comment. He missed the Karkat with the spunk in his step. Yes it was nice having Karkat back, he missed his friend, but he never wanted Karkat to return to him so...different.

"The label says to only take one but you know what, fuck the label. You're taking two." Karkat shrugged and ate the two handed to him before sitting back down. Not a word was said and Dave was left in the kitchen with an open jar of gummy vitamins in his hand. Karkat was back to sitting quietly on the couch. "...I uh, I splurged a bit and got you some special treats." Still silence. This was fine. Dave knew how to fix this. He grabbed a plastic bag off the kitchen table and sat down on the coffee table in front of Karkat.

"Look. I got our-- your old favorites." Dave dumped the contents of the bag into the couch besides Karkat who turned to look. "Got us "Good Luck Chuck", some buttered popcorn, and even some of those sour ass candies you liked. This time they'll be the proper amount of sour instead of the shitty way I alchemized them." Dave smiled and looked at Karkat expectantly. "I figured we could...y'know, recreate old times on the giant rock. Snuggle up on the couch and watch our old favorite while munching on cliche and overused movie snacks." Karkat responded with a shrug and Dave swore he could hear his own heart break. "Oh, yeah, I mean, it's cool. It's whatever. We'll just see how you're feeling later, cool? Yeah. Yeah..." He cleared his throat and stood up, going back to the kitchen. "I'll get dinner started soon..."

This was going to be harder than expected.

~

Dave. Dave. Dave. Dave.

That one name. That one face. He kept popping up in Karkat's mind and it was distracting him. He hated that he missed Dave so much. He hated himself for getting distracted over Dave.

Dave. Dave. Dave. Dave.

Karkat was too slow and didn't block the opposing sword and was scratched. Thank god this was just a practice. If he were in actual combat he'd be dead by now. And all because he couldn't stop thinking about Dave.

Dave and his stupid smirk. Dave and his stupid hugs. Dave and his soft lips. Dave and his constant desire to tell Karkat he loves him. Dave and his comforting arms that were always there to hold Karkat when he needed it.

Fuck. Karkat missed Dave so much.

It wasn't like he didn't attempt to find out some way to possibly reconnect with Dave, Karkat tried every possible approach. The first was, obviously, asking about humans and the possibility of the empire being stretched out beyond their planet.

Karkat's idea was, of course, shot down. There was no expansion and the Empress would never dream of taking land that wasn't hers by force. If another Empire wished to merge with hers that was fine, but forcibly taking land from others? Unthinkable. Luckily Karkat had another idea.