My semi-sequel to 'It's All Fun and Games'. Kind of an in-between until the ACTUAL sequel.

You're a Moirail, John

It had been two weeks since that FUCKALL of a party, and Karkat was still feeling the trauma of it all. Even now, he couldn't bear to look at paint, empty Faygo bottles, a deck of cards, one of his romance novels, or even sweets anymore without twitching. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe humans weren't as soft as he thought. Because every moment of that day had been one torture after the other, the humans playing through like it was NOTHING.

And he was to understand most of those were CHILDRENS' activities. The Condesce could use these 'party games' as another means of culling. It certainly WOULD sort out the weak.

Karkat finished shoving his rom collection into a corner of his closet so he didn't have to look at them and headed to the transportalizer to head up to the rec room. The first thing that greeted him was the sound of loud arguing between, Karkat was surprised to see, Vriska and John.

The yelling was almost incomprehensible, but Karkat took a guess of what it was about by John's tall stance—still being a few inches shorter than Vriska—being a defensive one, and Gamzee being situated behind him, a mixed look of guilt, fear, and hope, looking almost small behind John.

"—DON'T CARE WHAT THE HELL HE DID, HE'S NOT GOING BACK TO BEING STUFFED INTO A REFRIGERATOR, WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU!?" John finally shouted, his voice hitting a volume that finally overpowered Vriska's, his clothing shifting with an angry breeze that was hot as desert wind. "YOU DON'T FUCKING STUFF PEOPLE INTO TIGHT PLACES TO SOLVE PROBLEMS, VRISKA!"

Vriska growled down at him, her hands flexing like she was contemplating using them to strangle some sense into his scrawny neck. "You're missing the fucking POINT, John!" she shouted back. "He was LITERALLY about to cut Dave's fucking HEAD off—!"

"FIRST things first!" John cut in, growling right back. "ONE, Dave is God Tier, and TWO, he's been warned REPEATEDLY to not recite THOSE lyrics to Gamzee! Dave KNOWS what it does to him, and if he decides to ignore that, maybe getting his head cut off for a while will teach him not to fucking do it again! Idiot Death isn't permanent!"

"Hey—!" Dave tried to cut in.

"STAY OUT OF IT, DAVE!" John shouted before turning back to Vriska. "You know what? I'm calling it DONE. You're DONE dealing with Gamzee, you hear? I'm making it MY business now! Step into MY business, and we'll see who's being stuffed into a fridge with rotting corpses!" That said, John whipped around, grabbed Gamzee's hand, and stalked off.

The rec room was in stunned silence for a good while.

"….WOW," Rose said, breaking the silence. "…the last time I saw John that angry was when he saw what Jack did to his dad."

"Mm," Kanaya concurred shortly, picking her sewing back up. "Pretty strange how quickly he picked up moiraillegience with Gamzee, and doesn't know it."

"They're NOT fucking moirails, Kanaya!" Vriska hissed. "He doesn't even know what the fuck it really IS. He's just buying Gamzee's stupid sob stories about being 'misunderstood' like the gogdamn bleeding heart he is. I'm telling you, first chance Gamzee gets, he's adding John's stupid-ass head to his personal collection!" She turned on heel and stalked over to the transportalizer, vanishing off.

Karkat walked over to Dave, who was looking quite haggard and a little hurt. "…Kar, what if Vriska's right?" Dave said. "What if he really ends up hurting John? She's kinda right, John IS a bleeding heart about this kind of thing…"

"Then like the idiot said about you, maybe getting his fucking head cut off for a while will knock some sense into him," Karkat replied, sounding somewhat distracted by the display he had just seen…and it didn't look like much of a farce, to be honest.

John's declaration of Gamzee being 'his business' was pretty much all any Troll worth their salt would need to make the call of that being a moiraillegience….and although Gamzee hadn't said a word, actually allowing himself to be protected like that was another sure sign. Karkat had seen it plenty of times with Equius and Nepeta; the brute of a Highblood would stoop down to places most wouldn't deign to for HIS moirail, and Nepeta in turn would be protected, and often push herself into more proper conduct for HIM.

Other than apparently almost beheading Dave over 'The Motherfucking Blasphemy', Karkat noticed that Gamzee had been very well-behaved for being completely sober when John was around. And Karkat ALSO noticed that John seemed to be making far fewer faux pas when it came to Troll culture and conduct.

Fuck, if this wasn't a genuine moiraillegience, Karkat would eat his own romfiction.

It was a few hours later that Karkat found John in the nutritionblock building up a large sandwich with a questionable make-up, with Gamzee nowhere in sight. "Where's the chucklefuck?" he asked, habitually flicking his eyes to dark corners.

"He's in his respiteblock," John replied, not worried. "He's taking a nap, so I figured I'd make lunch."

"…A nap, huh?" Karkat said, resisting the urge to run off to see if that were truly the case. "Didn't know Gamzee even TOOK naps."

"Oh yeah, he's really getting into it nowadays!" John chirped, smiling. "Naps are a GREAT way to let off some stress, so I think they're good for him. You look like you could use a nap, actually—"

"I don't need a fucking nap, Egbert!" Karkat snapped. He growled when John just gave him a 'see, you really do' look. "And how do you know he's ACTUALLY even taking a nap, anyway!? For all YOU know, he could be stalking around looking for anyone dumbfuck enough to be walking alone!"

John scowled at him, going from chipper to defensive in .2 seconds flat. "Not you too, Karkat!" he said, going back to building his sandwich, this time slathering on some mustard with more force than necessary. "Look, I know he's done some…questionable things in the past—"

"QUESTIONABLE doesn't even fucking CUT it, Egbert!" Karkat interrupted. "You couldn't IMAGINE the shit he's done!"

"I've seen the fridge, Karkat, so I think I DO know!" He slapped down the top piece of bread and began cutting it in half. "And he told me so himself, and you know Gamzee, he doesn't skimp on the details." He put the knife down, biting into half of the sandwich.

Karkat swallowed a little. He didn't really expect THAT to come up in any conversations, to be honest. "…And STILL, you stay around him," he said, his voice a mix of disbelief and accusation.

John chewed his food slowly before swallowing, like he was contemplating his words. "…You know, while the rest of you were having fun and filling Quadrants, Gamzee didn't have anyone. Anytime he tried, he was blocked or rejected. Hell, even YOU became moirails with Dave, and Rose became matesprits with Kanaya. HUMANS got Quadrants filled, and for most of our lives, we didn't know what the hell they were!" He took another bite of his food.

"…All Gamzee got was rejection, a tight leash around his neck, and quality time with body parts," he continued after swallowing. "So if you're looking for compassion on MY end of things, you're shit out of luck. If you didn't want him to go crazy anymore, YOU should've been his moirail. SOMEONE should have. I don't think I'm his moirail, I think I'm just someone who's showing him a little goddamn compassion, something he hasn't had for a long time. So, yeah. When I say he's taking a nap, I KNOW he's in his respiteblock, curled up on a pile of blankets and pillows, snoring like a bike horn, and he's going to be hungry when he wakes up."

That being said, John grabbed a bottle of Faygo, put the other half of the sandwich on another plate, and headed for the transportalizer before pausing.

"…and I might just be a 'goddamn bleeding heart', but my belief is if you want so badly to make a friend, you BE a friend. You all were just creating your own villain with him." He stepped onto the transportalizer before vanishing.

Karkat stood there in the nutritionblock, John's uncharacteristically-serious words rattling around in his brain. He remained motionless for a few minutes before transportalizing up to the floor Gamzee's respiteblock was, creeping down the hall and peeking in.

Indeed, exactly as John had described, Gamzee was asleep on a large, shapeless pile of blankets and pillows, drooling and snoring softly. John was chewing on the last bit of his half of the sandwich, sitting on the floor next to the blanket pile and reading an Alternian comic book.

Gamzee twitched in his sleep, growling out dark caste slurs, and John didn't even look up as he reached over and papped at Gamzee's head. Gamzee immediately settled down and cuddled into a pillow, purring loud enough for Karkat to hear across the room.

Karkat backed away from the door, trudging down the hall with his hands shoved into his pockets, cursing John fucking Egbert for—AGAIN—making him question an entire line of thinking in one short conversation. He'd never thought much about letting Vriska take control of the Gamzee situation, but John's description of it made him feel guilty for not even looking into it at ALL.

Highbloods without moirails were dangerous. He KNEW this, but he didn't do anything about it. Vriska sure as shit didn't do anything about it. But in swoops John, already having the situation handled in one fucking day, and only improving on it.

Caliginous feelings stirred up in Karkat again, and he forcefully repressed them. Fucker wouldn't even know what to do if he had them too, he thought bitterly.

Tensions remained high for the next couple of days between John and Vriska, with Terezi not-so-subtly taking bets on whether or not it would turn Caliginous, making Karkat want to beat her over the head with her own cane. He was NOT jealous, gogdamn it, TOTALLY not.

He buried his face in a book—NOT ROMANCE—and tried to ignore the barbs Vriska was trying to rile John up with. To his credit, John was doing a pretty good job of ignoring her as he was playing solitaire. Gamzee, on the other hand, was looking almost fed up and ticked off on John's behalf.

"So, you stared with the sloppy makeouts with your boyfriend yet, Joooooooohn?" he drawled, standing over him.

"Not gay, Vriska," he absently reminded, moving a card to one of the piles. Vriska smirked.

"That's not what you said during Truth or Dare, when you made out with Karkat and said you could be a LITTLE gay for him—"

"Jeeze, he's sitting RIGHT there, Vriska…" John said, referring to Karkat, who was holding his book even closer to his face to keep the flush of embarrassment and rage hidden. "Just knock it off, why don't you, and leave us alone!"

"Now why would I do a thing like that when picking on you is the highlight of my day?" Vriska crooned, picking at his hood with her clawtips. John swatted at her hand.

"Quit it!" he snapped, starting to lose his cool. "You're not funny, Vriska, you're just being annoying, and I'm getting tired of it!"

Vriska laughed. "Hey, I need SOMETHING to entertain myself with! So come oooooooon, John, don't be such a wet sock!" She then proceeded to dump her can of soda onto his head.

John was too busy sputtering and getting the soda out of his eyes to stop Gamzee, who jumped up, lunged over John, and slammed his fist into Vriska's face, her glasses flying and blood gushing from her nose as she slammed into the wall.

Everyone froze, watching Gamzee stand protectively over John, who was using the dry part of his clothes to wipe his glasses off, his eyes almost red and teeth bared challengingly.

"YOU KEEP YA MOTHERFUCKIN' DIRTY HANDS OFFA MY MOIRAIL, YA QUADRANT-STEALIN', SHIT-SUCKIN', MOTHERFUCKIN' PIECE O' GUTTERBLOOD SHIT!" he roared, his voice hitting at least two octaves lower than what anyone was used to hearing from him. "TOUCH MY MOTHERFUCKIN' MOIRAIL AGAIN, AN' IT'LL BE THE LAST TIME YOU HAVE MOTHERFUCKIN' HANDS! DO YA UNDERSTAND TH' MOTHERFUCKIN' WORDS COMIN' OUTTA MY MOUTH?!"

Vriska sat against the wall, staring, not really having imagined Gamzee getting the nerve to strike out at her, and immediately retracting her stance on the moiraillegience issue.

"I SAID, DO YA UNDERSTAND TH' MOTHERFUCKIN' WORDS COMIN' OUTTA MY MOTHERFUCKIN' MOUTH, MOTHERFUCKER!?" Gamzee shrieked, taking a threatening step forward.

"YES! FINE, FUCK, I UNDERSTAND YOU!" she shouted. She tensed, ready to God Tier.

Gamzee just gave her a snarl and walked over to a shelf and grabbed a cloth, walked back over to John, and dropped the cloth onto his head before sitting down in front of him, his expression going back to calm and lazy.

John smiled and reached out to pap Gamzee on the head before gathering up his cards to play Go-Fish with Gamzee instead.

The room heaved a collective sigh of relief, nobody really getting up to help Vriska stumble off to wash her face off.

Karkat looked over his book, his face having gone pale when Gamzee had snapped, but now looking with disbelief at Gamzee having defended John and then settled down without any intervention necessary from John at all. He even called John his moirail.

Inwardly, he couldn't help but scoff. 'Not his moirail', my ass, he thought.