RESIDENTIAL FUCK UP

Closed RP account for Crocker Institute.

[crowingtaxidermist-blog]

Pest Problems

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

Everything was happened so fast. Way too fast for a half asleep mind like Karkat’s to process that he was just snatched up, princess style at that, by a blonde haired manic running from God only knows what, but he had the hinting suspicion it was the crushing weight of this guy’s fuck-ups and straight into a musky and dirty back of a van that held so many stuffed animal carcasses that if Karkat wasn’t still reeling on how absolutely furious he was he’d be absolutely freaking the fuck out right now. 

His head throbbed painfully and the scolding wouldn’t happen any time soon unless he wanted to worsen the headache that slowly began to form. Dazed, Karkat lifts his head at the thundering sound of something hitting the van multiple times. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment to gather himself as he’s pressed against a hard stuffing of something that smelt like chemicals and mild decomposition. It’s more than enough to force Karkat to push the so called loving arms of the incomplete grizzly bear to have scurried on the other end of the van with eyes wide and his heart having knocked against his rib cage unpleasantly. He turned his head to Dave and forced a snarl from his lips. “What the fuck!?” The shorter one shouted after the other had turned his head and stopped in his tracks. “Listen, you batshit crazy taint-chafing dunderfuck of the highest knight order, I don’t give a flying SHIT what you are going to say, but I am leaving this putrid ass van of decay and death to enjoy what little bit of my morning YOU have ruined, you piss-gathering retarded fairyshit.” He lashed out as he climbed his way up to the front seats.

The plan was to open the door and have strolled back out to finish his morning before he was going to do fuck all when as he reached for the handle stopped and stared at the flock of murder waiting for them all around the van. Oh what the fuck. Karkat flinched when one of the bastards flew down against the window and cawed loudly to his face. It only makes the Vantas let out a yelp and fell back against the stranger who had got him in this shitty situation in the first place. “Holy fuck! What did you fucking do to these birds?!” Karkat yelled out as he pushed himself back up and gave himself considerable space away from his kidnapper. 

Karkat shuddered as he takes another look outside to see them all waiting for them to walk out. It came to him that Karkat may just be fucking scared shit-less of birds, particularly crows when this somehow is over. 

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

Page Turner

Working at a library had it’s benefits that were suited specifically for Karkat. For example the place was normally quiet, or kept at a reasonable low volume that ensured to not feed or make a headache ache and throb between his temples. Most of the time people came in to either read, use the computers for research, or the few who had actually bothered to come for a isolated session to let their minds work without the pressures and distraction of common background noise.

The next thing had to be the books. They had such a wide variety of genres in the library, although his personal favorites were the ones that hovered their foot in the romance section with a side order of actual good plot. It seemed these days it was hard to find something like that these days and it was painstakingly difficult to rearrange the romance aisle from books with actual good plot and realistic romance in them to general shit holes within his first week. 

He’s learned to put up with it now even if he gives it a grimace now and then when his eye catches a particularly distasteful book.

Currently Vantas found himself with a large pile of books that had next to him that were returned at the end of the day. Most of them were the typical research books no one in their right mind would read without being forced at a gunpoint if they wanted to even so much as earn a respectable grade. He saved the more personal reading books for last though just to get an idea on what people seemed to enjoy looking at.

He’s not at all surprised at seeing the abundance of young adult novels in his pile. For now he goes through them with a silent nod of approval from him as he sets it into it’s rightful place. He comes across a romance YA novel called Hush, Hush while looking at it’s dreadful cover of a shirtless and shoeless angelic man with wings that looked diseased to have that little feathers and black as night. (Seriously what’s with this trope of having angels be shirtless and shoeless? They understand the concept of pants so why not other articles of clothing?!) and he snarls. “God, who the fuck actually read this?” Karkat hisses to himself although he’s cautious to raise his voice up to it’s normal louder level. 

The book is opened and he’s thumbs to a random section of the book and nearly cringes at it’s righting. He was right, this was shit. “So forced. Why would you fall for someone who is clearly stalking you, you crazy broad.” During his complains of the shitty book in hand he’s too engrossed in disgust and sick amusement to continue going through to hear muted footsteps walk towards his direction until it’s a bit too late and he’s caught red handed reading the clear abomination in which he snaps shut and his cheeks burning with embarrassment. 

“It’s not what it looks like. I was just… Looking at how atrocious this piece of shit was,” he mumbled out in defense with his perma-scowl planted on him. “And whoop-de-fucking-doo I was right. So, what do you want?”

[aestheticallycatastrophic]

Strolling into the library, Nepeta slipped a pair of sunglasses up from her eyes, enjoying the shade and the blast of cool air from the air conditioning. Even dressed for the weather, the summer heat was sweltering, but a trip to the library had been necessary. She had finished books to return and needed to pick up some new novels. While she still had work at the veterinary clinic, summer break meant there were no classes, which left her with quite a lot of free time. Nepeta increased the number of hours she was volunteering at the local animal shelter, but even still, there were more hours in the day than she knew what to do with, so she had fallen back on a guilty pleasure to pass the time. She had started reading romance novels again and it wasn’t the kind of literature she would be okay with her literary professors catching her read. Certainly some of the novels she was reading over the summer would fall into that category: anything by Jane Austen, older English novels, like Jane Eyre or Gone With The Wind, or some Russian novels, like Anna Karenina or Doctor Zhivago; however, that wasn’t the only kind of romance literature Nepeta was enjoying.

She was also devouring trashy or popular romance titles, even occasionally dipping into the Young Adult literature. Nepeta wasn’t proud, but that’s why it was her guilty pleasure. Novels provided an escape from reality, a chance to slip into a character’s life and not worry about what was going on with her own. Back on Derse, she tried to spend very little of her time with her mother, choosing to fill the free hours of her day with extracurricular actives and volunteer work. When she had to be home, Nepeta often buried her nose in a book, blocking out the rest of her family, well, expect for her cat. She read whatever she could get her hands on, which often meant cheap romance novels from yard sales as both her school and the public library were greatly underfunded. Attending school on Skaia had come with a lot of perks, Nepeta just never realized that access to giant library would be one of them. 

Stopped by the bin labeled Book Returns, she stealthily extracted the finished novels from her bag and slipped them inside. So far, no one had caught her with romance novels and she wanted to keep it that way. She even went so far as to avoid asking for help finding books and using the automated check out machines to avoid to library staff. Running her fingers through her short cropped hair, she weaved her way around study tables and the high stacked shelves, making her way to the section where she knew the romance novels were located. Nepeta rounded the corner and froze, not expecting to find anyone in the aisle. Glancing at the book in his hand, she laughed, hand flying up to cover her mouth and muffle the sound. Her taste might be trash, but even she would never be desperate enough to read that garbage. Pulling her hand away, her lips quivered in an attempt to keep the giant smile from her face. “Of course, because it certainly looks like you were seriously investigating that shirtless angel, let me guess, he follows the heroine around like some psycho, yet she think it’s a sign of true love.” She held her hands up like she meant no harm before gesturing down the aisle. “I’m just here for some books, you know, what people in the library are generally here to get.”  

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

The sharp cut off of laughter only causes Karkat to scowl as he nearly tosses the book over his shoulder. Except he doesn’t and puts it back in it’s place despite how much regret he feels having to put this up for some unfortunate fool to pluck from the shelves and read. When the book leaves his hands, he’s given the ability to cross his arms as he stares at the girl who walked in with an an unamused look, which was practically his default look by now. “How the fuck did you know? Actually, no wait, don’t tell me. I saw enough taking a glimpse into that atrocious writing and it’s made me wish I was blind.” Karkat comments as he glares back at the book resting innocently in it’s spot. When she speaks again, the sass filled tone despite raising her hands up in a sign of peace.“In the Young Adult section, right?” He chimes back as an eyebrow raises. 

Okay, so maybe he was being a bit antagonistic after being caught with a shitty book, but he’ll be damned to be dragged to hell without taking someone with him. “Well, if that’s you’re thing whatever. We just got a few new books in like Legend by Marie Lu, Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi , The Demon King by Cinda Chima. Pick your poison, though I guess. Most of the books in here have shitty romance plot lines anyways.” It’s been a long time since he had seen any good romantic plot devices in a book. Reading the Mortal Instrument series had Karkat nearly reeling from the genre in the first place with how idiotic the love triangle was and all the tossing around from the main power couple’s sibling relation to be true or not. It frankly hurt his head and he was a bit annoyed. 

He also wasn’t going to read through any romance novels that just seem too fake, too artificial for his tastes despite never finding himself actually in love. Karkat exhales and rubs the back of his head. Might as well leave her to her thing. “Well, if you need anything I’ll just be going back to work on putting these things back.” His head motions to the pile next to him of books that needed to be placed back onto the shelf. He wasn’t going to make the effort to talk to this stranger, especially not after she had caught him with that book. 

[carnifexexecutive-blog]

Living Shadow

Having a job shadow was a common thing amongst businesses, and while CrockerCorp prided itself in being a family name, it never really was a family oriented company. Yes, employees could bring their snotty kids to the company events and dinners, but when it came down to it there was never a ‘take your brat to work day’ or even internship shadows. That is, until corporate wanted to prove that they were as family involved as their namesake. And as usual, that meant Tierra had to spare her time to work out the details and execute said details in a way that pleased everyone. And thus the high school and college level job shadow program was born.

The census was easy enough to understand - students who were interested did a paper on why they would be a good choice for the opportunity to be a shadow for a worker within CrockerCorp, then did a short interview if their paper was picked based on multiple trivial reasons that corporate moguls did not explain - and as it was launched they soon quickly had applicants willing to join the temporary shadowed ranks. While Tierra wasn’t the one to do all the sorting of applications and the picking and interviewing processes, she had to be an example, which meant she was about to meet her new job shadow.

Standing at the pearly front doors of the main office building on campus, Tierra wore a very tidy pencil skirt and blouse, cardigan tied over her shoulders and draped artfully over her as she kept herself in a pristine upright position, ready for the day ahead and to meet her new shadow as the transit vehicle that had all the accepted student applicants in it pulled up in front of the building. With students pouring out of the vehicle, the Peixes stepped up onto a very neatly placed podium for her, taking the microphone and calling out to the crowd with a smile, “Hello, students, and welcome to the first ever job shadow day for Crocker Institute and CrockerCorp. We are all very happy you all seem eager to learn from us, and so that I do not bore you, I’ll cut to the chase and say that the suited men and women lining the perimeter here to keep everyone safe are also gonna be the people you will be shadowing. All of them have name tags for your convenience when finding your worker buddy, so please, go ahead and find your buddy and be off! And have a good day!” she finished, fake smile on her face as she stepped down, looking at the single student still staring at her and crossing her arms cooly, raising an eyebrow while asking, “Lemme guess, ya mah shadow?”

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

It didn’t come across as a surprise when Karkat would find himself hastily scribbled his pencil against the paper of his essay on why he should be one of the few chosen students to attend this event. He demonstrated his leadership qualities, giving evidence of his NHS membership during high school, his enthusiasm to one day become a working member of the very place he’s come to learn later on and that this opportunity will give him an understanding on what CrockerCrop were to expect out of their employees. It looked like a load of bullshit, honestly, but it was bullshit that the big heads would eat up. So he wasn’t surprised when he was pulled into an interview where Karkat found their questions to be a waste of time, but he supposed it was to weed the candidates out. Anyone could write a paper that sounded good but sound like a complete dipshit when meeting with professionals. Luckily Karkat was not one of dipshits.

Karkat was told he’d be assigned to the owner of CrockerCorp herself and all the need found himself absolutely giddy. The woman was well known and he held a special respect towards her and how professional she carried herself. Hell, he always wanted to be enrolled in her school, which he currently was. So, to him, it was a great honor to be her shadow for the day. He started the day to try and look half decent than his usual dishevel self. He even tried to pat and tame his hair down, but all it did was barely smooth it out and he’d spent too much time trying to bother to keep that mess down. His glasses are perched on his face and he pulls on a grey v-neck shirt and pulling it over a black jacket and simple denim jeans. It’s not exactly formal, but he doesn’t exactly have a spare monkey suit lying around in his room. It also came to him that it’s probably not worth the effort to dress up like that. Like hell he won’t look nice though while he’s crammed into a car full of other students that managed to pass in the first time chance of becoming a shadow. 

Tierra stood waiting for them as the car rolled to a stop and they all came out, with Karkat grumbling as he rolls his shoulders with how cramped he felt. The damn car had more than enough room, but this jackass decided to straight up near cuddle with the Vantas. Shooting the unknown student a glare as he makes his way into the crowd and listens in the welcoming everyone. Karkat crosses his arms as he and moves forward once the crowd disperse to find the people they’ll shadow. He watches as Tierra looks down at him and suddenly he feels anxious and he beings to grip his arms, realizing just how sweaty his palms felt. Arms that felt like pasta and knees that felt as if they’ll buckle in on themselves.

Fuck, she was much taller than he had imagined and he had to force the knot in his throat with a silent gulp. “Uh, yeah,” He stutters out when he realizes he’s being spoken to and hastily and hopefully secretively wipes his hand on his jacket’s fabric before extending his hand out. “My name is Karkat Vantas and I’m going to be your shadow for today.” Nailed it.

[carnifexexecutive-blog]

Tierra wasn’t surprised or particularly wowed by her new charge, but fuck if he didn’t look like more fun than the little snotty prep-school grade masses that she had to give her opening speech to. He looked… Regular. And to her, that was good enough for the moment. Who knows, maybe he’d even prove to be a little entertaining for her to work with. Also helped that she thought his red gene mods in his eyes were pretty sick. Well, assuming those were mods, considering people don’t have naturally occurring red eyes, do they? Eh, she didn’t really care, that was for her science lackeys to figure out. For the moment, she had to quit sizing up her new job shadow and quit undoubtedly giving him her usual scrunchy judging look.

Throwing on a sharp and politically correct smile, the Peixes executive adjusted the sweater hanging on her shoulders before holding out her hand for her temporary charge to shake, trying to be simple and clean about their introductions so they could get on with everything and probably be productive that day. Maybe. Pulling her hand away from his after a moment and noting that while her charge - Karkat - was dressed okay, he could do better. Well, that and Tierra would love a reason to shop around for a bit before hitting the grind. Snapping her fingers and having her personal assistant hand over her purse, the Crocker mogul slinging the accessory over her shoulder before starting to walk down the elegant front steps of the office building, waving behind her as a sign that Karkat should be following.

Pulling out her phone, Tierra began reading over emails quickly as her stretch jeep pulled up, climbing into the back and pausing as she glanced back at her ward, raising an eyebrow before calling out, “Hey Karkat, y’comin’ boy? Ain’t got time tah wait on ya, so’s y’bettah hurry an’ let’s roll! Got shit tah do, work tah accomplish an’ shit, but y’gotta dress fo’ h’part ‘fore we get that done.” she remarked, making a point of climbing into the back of the vehicle and patting the seat next to hers for him to sit down on as her personal assistant took up the seat across from them, not saying anything or even looking up from her tablet as she worked away at schedules and other stuff for her boss. At least one of the people in the vehicle was rearing to work.

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

The same scrunchy judging look had Karkat sweating from his palms and feeling his chest constrict uncomfortably. Oh God dammit he must look like a fucking mistake, already feeling her judging him right down to his freakishly red eyes. Damn it, he should’ve just wore his contacts instead of these damned glasses. At least then his eyes would actually look normal if not for small specks of red in the brown. He’s shifting on the balls of his heels as he suddenly catches a sharp smile from her and almost causing him to wince. Way to go, Vantas. Making himself look absolutely stupid in front of very important people must be his specialty at this point.

Her hand comes out and he’s staring at it dumbly, only furthering proving his earlier point. It only takes him a second to realize it was extended for a hand shake and he tries to discreetly wipe his palms (Ugh, fucking gross!) from his pants to raise it up to hers to grasp. They shake and it goes smoother than he’d ever expect as she pulls her hand away and retrieves her purse from her personal assistant. The poor boy looks even more confused as she’s walking down the steps and motioning him to follow which he quickly scuttles after. Nothing prepares him for the jeep suddenly pulling in and her words after she climbs in directed to him.

FUCK! He knew he was dressed worse than a blind man in a dumpster. Hell, he might as well be a blind man dressing in a dumpster and his cheeks flush for a moment as he looks down, mumbling a ‘yes m’am’. He should’ve went shopping for this had he known he was dressed incompetently to the point his shadow was going to go and get him his own outfit. As he slides into the backseat and next to her right where she patted, bunching himself as small as he could be. 

[crowingtaxidermist-blog]

Pest Problems

There were many things Dave was - attractive, funny, clumsy, a virgin - but one thing he would never intentionally be was an animal hater. Fuck, even though he loved dead animals, he loved living ones even more. So what was the problem, you say? One particular animal fucking hated his guts more than anything or anyone ever before in his goddamned short-ass sweaty teen life. And it wasn’t even an intentional thing that he did that made this animal hate him! There he was, enjoying a stupid game of bocce ball at a class barbecue last July, and as he was throwing the stupid bocce a crow landed on the grass just unfortunately enough where the ball landed. And god did he still feel terrible for hurting the animal and making it upset, but apparently no amount of corn chips set out on his windowsill was enough to sate this animal’s burning hatred.

But why would Dave recall such a small incident? Because the same idiot crow that was pissed after flying in the line of bocce fire was currently circling the coffee shop Dave was using as sanctuary. Admittedly, he kinda figured that bird would claim his revenge somehow, but maybe a few weeks or a month after the incident, not fucking hold a grudge for a whole goddamned year and exact it by preparing to murder Dave via murder. God, this was just his fucking luck to pick an unintentional fight with a harbinger of Satan himself, that is, if that bird wasn’t already hellish enough to fucking be Satan.

Standing with his face almost pressed against the glass pane of the coffee shop, his cappuccino in one hand, Dave watched in utter horror as the bird he so vividly recognized sat calmly on a branch in the tree directly in front of the shop entrance with about ninety of his fucking friends. How does a fucking bird even have ninety friends? What does he do to earn friends, tell them the best shitting spots? Point them towards the McDanks garbage cans? Either way, it was wrong and Dave had to nut up. And by nut up, he meant grabbing the nearest person who was moving to exit in that moment and hiding his head in their sweater as he picked them up and used them as a shield, blocking out their protests as he ran like hell and held firmly onto his coffee while yelling out, “I’m sorry! Sorry! Sorry! So fucking sorry!” and making a mad dash for his van parked two blocks away. He just really hoped this person didn’t kick him in the head and leave the Strider to be murdered at the hands(wings?) of a murder.

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

Getting up in the morning was never any easier for Karkat. It didn’t matter how much he managed to sleep at night (a whole whopping three hours) or how hard he tried to get more sleep into his tired and more than likely failing biological systems. He still felt like a fucking zombie and it was really starting to aggravate him. Maybe he shouldn’t have moved right out from his dad’s watchful eye since he usually was forced to bed whenever he’d be caught online or downstairs watching TV. Maybe he should have stayed longer, but no, Karkat just had to get his independence. Right now his independence meant coming to this coffee shop every damn day for what seems like a month now that even the baristas knew what time and had his coffee right out on the normal table he’d sit for. 

It was frankly pretty damn embarrassing, but he guessed it was to keep from hearing his grating voice shouting at them in the early working hours when everyone was still crusty from sleep. 

Karkat exhales into his cup as he takes a sip while he sits on his phone and reading whatever asinine news article that popped up into his feed to let the time go pass. The shop was pretty empty since he sat down and he lets his reddish brown eyes gaze from the dimmed screen of his phone to stare at the various other patrons of the coffee place and then outside where he found fuck ton of crows that caused the boy to furrow his brow in confusion. Superstition begins creeping in his head and so he gets up to pay for his beverage and finishes what little was left to stand and quickly make way for the exit and past the murder flock.

Or that would have been the plan if he wasn’t suddenly picked up and used as a god damn meat shield as another. “What the fuck! Let me go you sweaty sack of shit!” Karkat screeches like a banshee as he flails and almost near socks the other young man in the side of his jaw with his flailing elbows and arms.  Just who the fuck was this kid? “I swear to fucking God you impetuous sniveling moron if you don’t let me fucking down!” Or what? Karkat was more bark than bite honestly and if the stranger could carry him with ease as they pass by the seemingly angry (and very loudly squawking) murder and to an unfamiliar car.

Seemingly with luck Karkat manages to push himself and finds himself ducking at a crow that had flew right above him where his head would have been. “Holy shit..” He breathes out as he lays flat on the ground as they all fly away and to a tree to house themselves. The Vantas takes a moment to compose himself before looking at the asshole who got him in this mess and snarls as he pushes himself up and marches up. “Who the fuck do you think you are grabbing some random asshat to use as your fucking murder shield?” He sneers as he steps ahead to block him from his path of his van, unknown of the pack of crows waiting for another moment to regroup and strike. “And you think a dainty little fucking apology is going to make up for that? One of those little fuckers almost could have took my head off! I should throw you into a fucking ditch so they can get you where they want you, you insufferable prick!”

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

Page Turner

Working at a library had it’s benefits that were suited specifically for Karkat. For example the place was normally quiet, or kept at a reasonable low volume that ensured to not feed or make a headache ache and throb between his temples. Most of the time people came in to either read, use the computers for research, or the few who had actually bothered to come for a isolated session to let their minds work without the pressures and distraction of common background noise.

The next thing had to be the books. They had such a wide variety of genres in the library, although his personal favorites were the ones that hovered their foot in the romance section with a side order of actual good plot. It seemed these days it was hard to find something like that these days and it was painstakingly difficult to rearrange the romance aisle from books with actual good plot and realistic romance in them to general shit holes within his first week. 

He’s learned to put up with it now even if he gives it a grimace now and then when his eye catches a particularly distasteful book.

Currently Vantas found himself with a large pile of books that had next to him that were returned at the end of the day. Most of them were the typical research books no one in their right mind would read without being forced at a gunpoint if they wanted to even so much as earn a respectable grade. He saved the more personal reading books for last though just to get an idea on what people seemed to enjoy looking at.

He’s not at all surprised at seeing the abundance of young adult novels in his pile. For now he goes through them with a silent nod of approval from him as he sets it into it’s rightful place. He comes across a romance YA novel called Hush, Hush while looking at it’s dreadful cover of a shirtless and shoeless angelic man with wings that looked diseased to have that little feathers and black as night. (Seriously what’s with this trope of having angels be shirtless and shoeless? They understand the concept of pants so why not other articles of clothing?!) and he snarls. “God, who the fuck actually read this?” Karkat hisses to himself although he’s cautious to raise his voice up to it’s normal louder level. 

The book is opened and he’s thumbs to a random section of the book and nearly cringes at it’s righting. He was right, this was shit. “So forced. Why would you fall for someone who is clearly stalking you, you crazy broad.” During his complains of the shitty book in hand he’s too engrossed in disgust and sick amusement to continue going through to hear muted footsteps walk towards his direction until it’s a bit too late and he’s caught red handed reading the clear abomination in which he snaps shut and his cheeks burning with embarrassment. 

“It’s not what it looks like. I was just... Looking at how atrocious this piece of shit was,” he mumbled out in defense with his perma-scowl planted on him. “And whoop-de-fucking-doo I was right. So, what do you want?”

[carnifexexecutive-blog]

Living Shadow

Having a job shadow was a common thing amongst businesses, and while CrockerCorp prided itself in being a family name, it never really was a family oriented company. Yes, employees could bring their snotty kids to the company events and dinners, but when it came down to it there was never a ‘take your brat to work day’ or even internship shadows. That is, until corporate wanted to prove that they were as family involved as their namesake. And as usual, that meant Tierra had to spare her time to work out the details and execute said details in a way that pleased everyone. And thus the high school and college level job shadow program was born.

The census was easy enough to understand - students who were interested did a paper on why they would be a good choice for the opportunity to be a shadow for a worker within CrockerCorp, then did a short interview if their paper was picked based on multiple trivial reasons that corporate moguls did not explain - and as it was launched they soon quickly had applicants willing to join the temporary shadowed ranks. While Tierra wasn’t the one to do all the sorting of applications and the picking and interviewing processes, she had to be an example, which meant she was about to meet her new job shadow.

Standing at the pearly front doors of the main office building on campus, Tierra wore a very tidy pencil skirt and blouse, cardigan tied over her shoulders and draped artfully over her as she kept herself in a pristine upright position, ready for the day ahead and to meet her new shadow as the transit vehicle that had all the accepted student applicants in it pulled up in front of the building. With students pouring out of the vehicle, the Peixes stepped up onto a very neatly placed podium for her, taking the microphone and calling out to the crowd with a smile, “Hello, students, and welcome to the first ever job shadow day for Crocker Institute and CrockerCorp. We are all very happy you all seem eager to learn from us, and so that I do not bore you, I’ll cut to the chase and say that the suited men and women lining the perimeter here to keep everyone safe are also gonna be the people you will be shadowing. All of them have name tags for your convenience when finding your worker buddy, so please, go ahead and find your buddy and be off! And have a good day!” she finished, fake smile on her face as she stepped down, looking at the single student still staring at her and crossing her arms cooly, raising an eyebrow while asking, “Lemme guess, ya mah shadow?”

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

It didn’t come across as a surprise when Karkat would find himself hastily scribbled his pencil against the paper of his essay on why he should be one of the few chosen students to attend this event. He demonstrated his leadership qualities, giving evidence of his NHS membership during high school, his enthusiasm to one day become a working member of the very place he’s come to learn later on and that this opportunity will give him an understanding on what CrockerCrop were to expect out of their employees. It looked like a load of bullshit, honestly, but it was bullshit that the big heads would eat up. So he wasn’t surprised when he was pulled into an interview where Karkat found their questions to be a waste of time, but he supposed it was to weed the candidates out. Anyone could write a paper that sounded good but sound like a complete dipshit when meeting with professionals. Luckily Karkat was not one of dipshits.

Karkat was told he’d be assigned to the owner of CrockerCorp herself and all the need found himself absolutely giddy. The woman was well known and he held a special respect towards her and how professional she carried herself. Hell, he always wanted to be enrolled in her school, which he currently was. So, to him, it was a great honor to be her shadow for the day. He started the day to try and look half decent than his usual dishevel self. He even tried to pat and tame his hair down, but all it did was barely smooth it out and he’d spent too much time trying to bother to keep that mess down. His glasses are perched on his face and he pulls on a grey v-neck shirt and pulling it over a black jacket and simple denim jeans. It’s not exactly formal, but he doesn’t exactly have a spare monkey suit lying around in his room. It also came to him that it’s probably not worth the effort to dress up like that. Like hell he won’t look nice though while he’s crammed into a car full of other students that managed to pass in the first time chance of becoming a shadow. 

Tierra stood waiting for them as the car rolled to a stop and they all came out, with Karkat grumbling as he rolls his shoulders with how cramped he felt. The damn car had more than enough room, but this jackass decided to straight up near cuddle with the Vantas. Shooting the unknown student a glare as he makes his way into the crowd and listens in the welcoming everyone. Karkat crosses his arms as he and moves forward once the crowd disperse to find the people they’ll shadow. He watches as Tierra looks down at him and suddenly he feels anxious and he beings to grip his arms, realizing just how sweaty his palms felt. Arms that felt like pasta and knees that felt as if they’ll buckle in on themselves.

Fuck, she was much taller than he had imagined and he had to force the knot in his throat with a silent gulp. “Uh, yeah,” He stutters out when he realizes he’s being spoken to and hastily and hopefully secretively wipes his hand on his jacket’s fabric before extending his hand out. “My name is Karkat Vantas and I’m going to be your shadow for today.” Nailed it.

[crustaceousgenesis-blog]

Cautious Greetings

It’s been only five minutes in the teleport system when Karkat finds himself materialized when the soles of his grey converse fall it’s tiny few inches from the air to land on concrete. It’s unexpected and a curse shoots out from the Karkat’s lip as he flails not unlike a baby bird first learning to flap it’s wings to steady himself from a fate of eating straight up concrete. The wave of nausea suddenly hits him, stomach churning from just being jumbled around after being teleported across planets. Fuck, did he really hate transporters, but it was the fastest trip to get here unless he wanted to take the snail route. By sheer will (and dumb luck in Karkat’s opinion) had forced that wave down as he dealt with the watery mouth he was forced to endure as an earlier warning sign.

Fuck that, he was not going to be known as the kid who vomit all over the pavement on his first day. Karkat wasn’t thinking about trying to become in any social groupings, but he’d rather not deal with the social persecution. Reddish brown eyes gaze as he stared at the front grounds of Skaia. His new home for the next couple of years. His upper lip curls for a moment as he hunches over and shoves his hands inside of the separated pockets of his jacket. 

It still left a bitter taste in his mouth. How he got here; the feelings of having cheated and wrong someone out could never leave Karkat’s skull no matter how much he probably would try to bash his head against the wall to ease these almost intrusive thoughts. His sneakers scuff against pavement, scratchy sounding as he walks into the office to get his enrollment settled for once and all and recieve all his papers that included his schedule and his room so he can finally just toss the heavy duffle bag and suitcase off his sore muscles. 

Looks like he was in building Titan. A snort that could have been thought to have been an airy nasally chuckle left his nose as he makes his way and pulling the key card out of it’s paper holder. He’d have two other roommates which means he was on the ass end of living in the dorm, probably placed last minute. ‘Absolutely fucking wonderful!’ He thought to himself as he stopped in front of the door that read 104 dubbing itself his shared room. Pulling the key card to the reader as he quickly swipes it through. The whirling sound and then the light blinking off red to a solid green gives him to O.K. to open the door, ignoring the multiple people shuffling by him as he quickly makes his way inside to avoid any ‘pleasantries’ because the last thing Karkat wanted to do was meet any other people. Maybe if he’s lucky no one will be home so he won’t have to exert what little precious energy he had left to actually talk to the other two inhabitants of the dorm.

The door clicks behind him as it closes and he’s greeted with a silence for a moment while his hand blindly gropes the wall for it’s light switch and flicks it up, illuminating the rather impressively large room. “Hello?” He calls out, regretting it the moment he opened his trap as his rough voice echos in the room. “Anyone fucking home?”