[still shaken and distracted, Rin's watching the corners intently now, far more than he had at the beginning of their scavenger hunt]
Sharks can smell blood in the water from miles away. We're a big red target.
[a kind of half-frantic tug on Karkat's arm, and Rin starts swimming back the way they came, only to realise he's not entirely sure which way is Out anymore. they'd gotten pretty deep into the structure, and with his pulse still hammering in his brain, everything is looking the same]
Wow, I didn't know you felt that strongly for EVE. I hope the two of you are happy together, RIN-E.
[ karkat... admittedly was not paying attention to where they were going; he had just been following rin the whole time. he also does not point out that there are other things they have to worry about besides sand sharks, mostly because he does not want rin to have a heart attack.
trying very hard to ignore the blood that's spreading, karkat points at a direction that? looks familiar?? or maybe it's familiar from when he was darting around with that shark, who even knows. ]
[he wants to punch Karkat in the arm for that comment, but figures this is a bad time to start rough-housing, in the shark-blood and nest of things that want to eat them]
[Rin hangs back, following Karkat this time -- his sense of direction is usually impeccable, but he's a little shaken. he brings up the map of the area in his helmet, trying to locate them. if all else fails, he knows they can tell the drone to go back to base and just follow it (though he has a feeling it may not take the path easiest for two substantially larger swimmers)]
[ he pauses at a steel case, taps on it, and tosses it into his sylladex without looking to see if anything is inside it. maybe they can use it to store shit at the base. ]
[this is not the room they came in, this a room full of circling fucking sandsharks and bloodsuckers]
SHARKSfuck, lots of sharks fuckshit!
[Rin swims backwards, probably bumping right into Karkat. the sharks haven't noticed yet, that the fish swimming in the other room are not more bloodsuckers]
It's not that way it's not that way, it's this way --
[adrenaline slams clarity into Rin's brain -- it's left, right, up up, left, up, down, right, left, right, up. just like an Nintendo 64 cheat code]
[ karkat takes a second to appreciate rin's vocabulary.... make him proud, best friend.... but oh right yeah.
sharks are bad, so. ]
Wait. Wait, wait, wait, hold on.
[ karkat takes a moment to slowly swim over to grab another thing he thinks looks interesting and deposits it in his sylladex. ]
Okay let's try not to get eaten again, I guess. I know I told someone I was expecting the base's first death to be something really stupid but this is not what I meant.
That someone would die from a new guy choking them would be pretty stupid, yeah. Move it, move it, we've got plenty on the drone.
[Rin's taking some deep breaths in his suit. he has to get used to this, he knows he does, but one life-or-death experience has frankly been enough for one day]
I remember how to get out now. Let's just... quietly... make our escape.
[the absconding begins, with Rin becoming incrementally more relaxed with each successive turn away from the sharks. he may look like one of them, but he's as warm blooded as any other human]
[sadly, when they get to the kelp forest, it's stalker feeding time. The beasts are hunting the smaller fish darting in and out of the kelp, making it difficult to count how many there are]
[ karkat looks over them all, also more relaxed. stalkers can be tricky to deal with, but they're also not giant fucking sharks? the only problem is how many there are; if they get swarmed then it'd get tricky.
karkat tosses one of his sickles to his other hand, grabs rin's arm again with his now free one and, this time, doesn't let go when he starts moving. he's not moving as fast as he was before as to not draw the stalkers attention.
he also wants to keep rin actually close this time. ]
[Rin has to admit, he feels -- a lot safer, swimming closer to Karkat, rather than leading. it's a strange, uncomfortable sensation, as Rin has considered himself a lone entity for many years, and only recently come back to the fold of actually having friends. relying on them is still something he's working on, and this kind of relying -- so much more serious than letting Sousuke direct practice while he tends to a family thing, or even counting on Haru to do his best at training to give Rin himself more purpose -- is a little raw]
[(he wonders if this is what his dad felt like, with his crew; he wonders who he stayed near, when water pressed in)]
[these thoughts are way too grim for the already anxiety-inducing swarm of sharks around them; Rin shifts close, and swims just as slow, even though his legs want to kick off the nearest shark and swim back towards the base at top speeds]
[ karkat is just relieved that rin is actually following along with this; he had been a little worried that he might swim off again in his haste to get away from the danger. ]
It'll probably help. I know we have a lot of spare weapons at the base.
[Rin's pretty individualistic and self-driven, but he knows how to work in a team, too. it's probably one the things in life he looks most forward to, honestly]
I'd probably cut off my own hand, but just this once, alright. Thanks.
[swimswim, swimswim. the stalkers haven't noticed anything yet. or at least, they don't until the force from their legs knocks into a kelp clump, sending shivers up along it. what's that over there...? there's no rush, just stalkers slowly circling a ring or two closer, even as Rin and Karkat keep moving]
I can't believe I thought nationals were stressful.
[ honestly, karkat would prefer not to kill any stalkers because dave likes them and karkat is very #whipped. but rin's life is more important than dave's weird habit of adopting alien fish so. what he doesn't know won't hurt him, probably.
he just keeps staring straight ahead, not wanting to get too distracted by the approaching threat. if he thinks too much about it he might end up freaking himself out, which is a bad habit of his. ]
[Rin is absolutely getting distracted by the slowly approaching threat, casting glances back over his shoulder every few moments. intuition surges up in his gut; there's a decision coming up on them, fast]
Karkat...?
[one hand tightens on the weapon he doesn't know how to use, and his forearm tenses under the grip Karkat's still got on him. tell him what to do]
[ he can tell rin is just getting more nervous. if rin panics again, they may be fucked since it's hard to predict what someone would do when they're that revved up. and karkat doesn't know rin well enough to have a good understanding of what the other teen is like under a lot of stress.
there are a few options here. they can swim away, but karkat is the slower of the two and he's pretty sure that rin is the kind of person who would slow himself down for karkat's sake. like, he didn't have to intervene like he did in that wreck, he could have just let the actual experienced fighter take care of it, but he felt the need to help. and karkat doesn't want rin to do some type of self-sacrifice bullshit for him? that's a no.
they could attempt to fight off the stalkers, which is also a bad idea. rin may have a weapon now but he obviously does not know how to fucking use it. he might be able to injure a few creatures that get too close, but that's more ideally in an escape scenario rather than a battle one. there is no way he'll be able to do anything if they're legit taking the stalkers on?
so. ]
Do you see that big rock all the way over there? I want you to swim there, as fast as you can, and just fucking wait, okay? I'll meet you there in a few minutes. And before you ask, yes, I'm going to be bait. And no, this is non-negotiable and if I don't see you moving in the next ten seconds then I will feed you to the goddamn stalkers myself.
[did you say non-negotiable? because he's negotiating in those ten seconds he's given, with short, clipped thoughts. he may be getting nervous, but it hasn't affected his judgement yet --he already wants to make up for the shitshow back at the wreck, where he froze up and didn't know what to do (not helping had never been an option)]
I know being bait's your favourite thing, but why don't you just hold onto me while I swim to that rock? I train with drag suits, it's the same principal. You're not that heavy.
[the thing is, he may be out of his depth, but Karkat's right -- he's just not the kind of person that could let someone stay behind for his sake. it's for the team, or it's for nothing]
[ first of all... karkat is stubborn and he fucking refuses to hold onto rin as he swims to that rock? that's embarrassing and karkat has been in enough life or death situations at this point that he is pretty sure he would rather get eaten by the stalkers. ]
First of all, fuck you. Second, no. They're just going to follow us. Go to that rock or else I am going to do something really goddamn stupid, got it?
[and their ten seconds are up; Rin has to decide whether to listen to Karkat or make the decision for both of them what's going to happen next]
[the choice is easy. Rin may be used to being the leader, but he's not the guy who knows what to do in situations like these. Karkat's that guy, and Rin already didn't listen to his advice once, and nearly paid the price]
If you get eaten, I'm going to punch the stalker until it spits you out and I can kick what's left of your ass. Ready?
[Rin lets go of Karkat, body tensing as he prepares to follow orders]
If I die you can have the cool medal that Dirk gave me. But only if I die.
[ rin is like the third person that karkat just put on his will in the last week... he can't die now he doesn't want to actually give any of his shit away??
karkat glances from rin to the approaching stalkers, trying to time it right. his immediate thought is that dave would know the exact nanosecond that would be best to do this, but he isn't here. he should probably stop comparing himself to dave? that's probably not healthy. ]
[Rin shoots off through the water on Karkat's mark, as promptly as if a whistle had blown and he'd launched himself from the starting block. The movement immediately draws the attention of the stalkers, although Rin doesn't see this as he's putting his all into a front crawl that could literally save his life]
[And it kills him a bit, his heart pounding, that he can't look back to see what the hell Karkat is doing. He's got to get to that rock]
[ karkat immediately goes to attack the stalkers that look like they're about to go after rin. he still doesn't actually want to hurt them? since, again, his dumb boysprit loves stalkers and there is actually a way to tame them, you just need bait.
right now he's the bait.
what makes distracting the stalkers long enough for rin to get away annoying is the fact that karkat also has to keep an actual eye on in during it. he has to make sure none sneak away, or that some other creature doesn't suddenly appear after him. it does make him slip a few times and get bitten, but he slashes at the offending fish to get it off of him.
he counts to thirty. after figuring that's enough time for someone as fast as rin, karkat very suddenly bolts from his spot, surprising the stalkers who had gotten used to him attacking them. ]
I swear to fuck if you are not at that rock I am going to shove this sickle up your ass.
[sharp red flashes over the rock, and luckily this time the peering, creepy eyes belong to your predatory friend instead of a predatory foe. thirty seconds was more than enough to cover that distance, for Rin, and he's waiting for Karkat's next move]
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he figures he can come back with the drone later to pick up anything they might have missed out on. ]
I guess. Before any more come and try to pick a fight with EVE.
[ that is what karkat has decided to name the drone. after the wall-e character. ]
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[still shaken and distracted, Rin's watching the corners intently now, far more than he had at the beginning of their scavenger hunt]
Sharks can smell blood in the water from miles away. We're a big red target.
[a kind of half-frantic tug on Karkat's arm, and Rin starts swimming back the way they came, only to realise he's not entirely sure which way is Out anymore. they'd gotten pretty deep into the structure, and with his pulse still hammering in his brain, everything is looking the same]
[distractedly, it hits him]
You can't have an EVE without a WALL-E.
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[ karkat... admittedly was not paying attention to where they were going; he had just been following rin the whole time. he also does not point out that there are other things they have to worry about besides sand sharks, mostly because he does not want rin to have a heart attack.
trying very hard to ignore the blood that's spreading, karkat points at a direction that? looks familiar?? or maybe it's familiar from when he was darting around with that shark, who even knows. ]
Let's go this way.
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[Rin hangs back, following Karkat this time -- his sense of direction is usually impeccable, but he's a little shaken. he brings up the map of the area in his helmet, trying to locate them. if all else fails, he knows they can tell the drone to go back to base and just follow it (though he has a feeling it may not take the path easiest for two substantially larger swimmers)]
This doesn't seem right...
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[ he pauses at a steel case, taps on it, and tosses it into his sylladex without looking to see if anything is inside it. maybe they can use it to store shit at the base. ]
Which way then?
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[this is not the room they came in, this a room full of circling fucking sandsharks and bloodsuckers]
SHARKSfuck, lots of sharks fuckshit!
[Rin swims backwards, probably bumping right into Karkat. the sharks haven't noticed yet, that the fish swimming in the other room are not more bloodsuckers]
It's not that way it's not that way, it's this way --
[adrenaline slams clarity into Rin's brain -- it's left, right, up up, left, up, down, right, left, right, up. just like an Nintendo 64 cheat code]
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sharks are bad, so. ]
Wait. Wait, wait, wait, hold on.
[ karkat takes a moment to slowly swim over to grab another thing he thinks looks interesting and deposits it in his sylladex. ]
Okay let's try not to get eaten again, I guess. I know I told someone I was expecting the base's first death to be something really stupid but this is not what I meant.
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[Rin's taking some deep breaths in his suit. he has to get used to this, he knows he does, but one life-or-death experience has frankly been enough for one day]
I remember how to get out now. Let's just... quietly... make our escape.
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[ because hey, if he gets eaten then the sharks will probably be too distracted to chase after rin? everyone wins in that scenario.
he'll start pushing rin back towards where they came though, letting him know that is is okay to start absconding. ]
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[sadly, when they get to the kelp forest, it's stalker feeding time. The beasts are hunting the smaller fish darting in and out of the kelp, making it difficult to count how many there are]
Any ideas?
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karkat tosses one of his sickles to his other hand, grabs rin's arm again with his now free one and, this time, doesn't let go when he starts moving. he's not moving as fast as he was before as to not draw the stalkers attention.
he also wants to keep rin actually close this time. ]
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[(he wonders if this is what his dad felt like, with his crew; he wonders who he stayed near, when water pressed in)]
[these thoughts are way too grim for the already anxiety-inducing swarm of sharks around them; Rin shifts close, and swims just as slow, even though his legs want to kick off the nearest shark and swim back towards the base at top speeds]
I should bring something sharp next time, huh...
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It'll probably help. I know we have a lot of spare weapons at the base.
[ oh, wait, he just got an idea. ]
Unless you want to borrow a sickle from me?
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I'd probably cut off my own hand, but just this once, alright. Thanks.
[swimswim, swimswim. the stalkers haven't noticed anything yet. or at least, they don't until the force from their legs knocks into a kelp clump, sending shivers up along it. what's that over there...? there's no rush, just stalkers slowly circling a ring or two closer, even as Rin and Karkat keep moving]
I can't believe I thought nationals were stressful.
[Rin takes the sickle]
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he just keeps staring straight ahead, not wanting to get too distracted by the approaching threat. if he thinks too much about it he might end up freaking himself out, which is a bad habit of his. ]
What the hell are nationals?
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[Rin is absolutely getting distracted by the slowly approaching threat, casting glances back over his shoulder every few moments. intuition surges up in his gut; there's a decision coming up on them, fast]
Karkat...?
[one hand tightens on the weapon he doesn't know how to use, and his forearm tenses under the grip Karkat's still got on him. tell him what to do]
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there are a few options here. they can swim away, but karkat is the slower of the two and he's pretty sure that rin is the kind of person who would slow himself down for karkat's sake. like, he didn't have to intervene like he did in that wreck, he could have just let the actual experienced fighter take care of it, but he felt the need to help. and karkat doesn't want rin to do some type of self-sacrifice bullshit for him? that's a no.
they could attempt to fight off the stalkers, which is also a bad idea. rin may have a weapon now but he obviously does not know how to fucking use it. he might be able to injure a few creatures that get too close, but that's more ideally in an escape scenario rather than a battle one. there is no way he'll be able to do anything if they're legit taking the stalkers on?
so. ]
Do you see that big rock all the way over there? I want you to swim there, as fast as you can, and just fucking wait, okay? I'll meet you there in a few minutes. And before you ask, yes, I'm going to be bait. And no, this is non-negotiable and if I don't see you moving in the next ten seconds then I will feed you to the goddamn stalkers myself.
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I know being bait's your favourite thing, but why don't you just hold onto me while I swim to that rock? I train with drag suits, it's the same principal. You're not that heavy.
[the thing is, he may be out of his depth, but Karkat's right -- he's just not the kind of person that could let someone stay behind for his sake. it's for the team, or it's for nothing]
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First of all, fuck you. Second, no. They're just going to follow us. Go to that rock or else I am going to do something really goddamn stupid, got it?
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[the choice is easy. Rin may be used to being the leader, but he's not the guy who knows what to do in situations like these. Karkat's that guy, and Rin already didn't listen to his advice once, and nearly paid the price]
If you get eaten, I'm going to punch the stalker until it spits you out and I can kick what's left of your ass. Ready?
[Rin lets go of Karkat, body tensing as he prepares to follow orders]
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[ rin is like the third person that karkat just put on his will in the last week... he can't die now he doesn't want to actually give any of his shit away??
karkat glances from rin to the approaching stalkers, trying to time it right. his immediate thought is that dave would know the exact nanosecond that would be best to do this, but he isn't here. he should probably stop comparing himself to dave? that's probably not healthy. ]
Go!
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[And it kills him a bit, his heart pounding, that he can't look back to see what the hell Karkat is doing. He's got to get to that rock]
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right now he's the bait.
what makes distracting the stalkers long enough for rin to get away annoying is the fact that karkat also has to keep an actual eye on in during it. he has to make sure none sneak away, or that some other creature doesn't suddenly appear after him. it does make him slip a few times and get bitten, but he slashes at the offending fish to get it off of him.
he counts to thirty. after figuring that's enough time for someone as fast as rin, karkat very suddenly bolts from his spot, surprising the stalkers who had gotten used to him attacking them. ]
I swear to fuck if you are not at that rock I am going to shove this sickle up your ass.
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I made it, are you hurt?
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[ahah... we have fun here]
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