Chapter Text
Rose lets Dave nick sedatives from the medical cabinet. At first, he thinks she just doesn't notice him, but one night she's waiting there when he turns around, staring. "I don't give a fuck anymore," she says, then turns away.
The drugs make Dave comfortable. It's nice. He's not novocaine-numb, it just feels like everything unpleasant stops an inch away from his skin. If this is anything like what Gamzee was taking, he thinks he understands. It might even be worth going crazy for.
Dave doesn't know if Karkat is on drugs, too, or if he's just losing his mind, but they spend a lot of time in the same rooms. The gym and the kitchen, various people's bedrooms, Dave's lab especially. Most of the labs are abandoned now, and those who still try to work usually end up staring blankly at things for hours until they give up or fall asleep. Dave and Karkat sit quietly in the air, sometimes facing each other, sometimes other things and sometimes the wall because it doesn't even matter anymore if Dave goes all Blair Witch in the corner.
Dave would rather pay attention to Karkat, though. Once again, it might just be the drugs, but he's actually kind of pretty. Dave is starstruck by the way his dark eyes crinkle up, the eyelashes sticking out at wild angles. The gaps in his teeth when he smiles. This part is probably the drugs, but even the most miniscule parts of Karkat's body are fascinating: the crescent shape of the underside of his fingernails, the crease where his palm meets his wrist, the hollow behind his earlobe, everything, everything, enough to the point where it's overwhelming. So many places on a human body that you never notice until you're in a drug-induced haze. Legalize it, man.
One time, when Dave is on a double dose, he strips off his uniform and floats in front of Karkat in just his underwear. They stare blankly at one another, as if expecting something that would make sense to magically happen. Nothing happens and Dave puts his pants back on and passes out in the hallway.
Scratch talks to certain people-- Rose, Sollux, Maryam, Megido-- but never to Dave. He doesn't want to hear it anyway. Rose always comes off the headset looking scared and furious in equal measure. Megido always looks sad. She looks sad even when she doesn't talk to Scratch.
Dave is worried about her. He's worried about Sollux, too, and everyone's worried about each other. The first time Dave notices the tracks of long fingernails raking up and down Sollux's arms, alarm bells start ringing in his head and he goes to the bathroom to confiscate the supply of razors. Someone has beat him to it, and he just hopes it wasn't Sollux himself.
It's only a day or two after that, who's counting anymore, when Dave and Sollux and Megido all end up in the same room together, all of them obviously trying not to look in anyone else's eyes or at anyone else's arms. Dave isn't high, for once, because he's not actually trying to get addicted or kill himself or anything.
"You look like shit," Sollux says to him. "You too." He stares down at Megido.
"Sorry," Dave mumbles.
"We need to do something about this," Sollux says. "I am not going to wait to starve or suffocate or overdose on this stupid fucking ship when I know I have some of the most intelligent and competent people in the world on board with me."
"So you want a task force or something?" Dave asks. Megido stares at nothing and Dave wonders if maybe she's been dipping into the pills too.
"Yeah, or something!" Sollux yells in frustration. "Your friend Harley's good with computers and shit, isn't she? Zahhak too, where the fuck are they?" Dave shrugs in response. "You find Harley and tell her to meet up with me to figure this out."
Dave is about to give a lazily affirmative answer when Megido speaks up instead. "Damara's station is nearby," she says absently, almost dreamily.
"What?" Sollux snaps his head around to look at her. "Aradia, what the fuck--"
"There might be something useful in it," Megido continues, talking right over him. "A radio that uses a different signal, maybe, or…" she trails off.
Sollux grabs her shoulders. "What are you talking about? We have no way--"
"I could spacewalk over to it," she cuts him off again, eyes averted even when he grabs the sides of her head to try and force her to look at him. "It's really not that far, I would be fine."
"It's farther than the tether goes!" Sollux says, shaking Megido around like a doll in the hopes of bringing her back to her senses. "You really think I would let you, that anyone on this mission would let you just fucking walk off untethered into the abyss?!"
"I'm not doing anybody any good around here," Megido mumbles.
Sollux slaps her in the face. Dave winces and wonders if he should leave, but something tells him there's nowhere left to escape to.
"You wouldn't be doing them any better if you were dead, you moron!" He screams just inches from her face. Something in Megido's face flickers and she finally looks him in the eye. "Trying to walk to the other station is fucking suicide, Aradia! You know it is! If you want to kill yourself that badly, just take some fucking pills like everyone else! At least then we'll have a body to send home!" Spherical tears float up from his eyes and he pulls Megido into a crushing hug. She wraps her arms around his waist, limply at first, then finding the strength to grab him back, her fingers pulling at the back of his jumpsuit as he buries his own hands in her hair. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that," he mumbles into her scalp.
"You're right," Megido sighs into his chest. She sounds a lot older than she really is. "You are. I'm so stupid."
Sollux mutters more reassurances to her. Dave really wants to leave now, but first he has an idea.
"Megido," he says cautiously. She turns her head to look at him, one ear pressed against Sollux's heart. Oh yeah obviously this is Sollux's girlfriend, Dave thinks. He's putting the pieces together disgustingly slowly these days. "I'm taking your helmet."
"Huh?" She blinks at him. Tears wash across her eyes, but not enough for surface tension to pull into a bubble.
"Your EVA helmet," Dave repeats himself. "We don't want you to end up sneaking out in the middle of the night or something. I'm not saying you would, but, you know… anyone can make a bad decision like that." He feels a little weird having the 'we' in that sentence be just him and Sollux, so he mentally decides it encapsulates the rest of the crew as well. They would all agree with him, anyway. Megido is better alive than dead. Most people are.
“Good idea,” Sollux confirms. “Go hide it somewhere. Don’t even tell me where you put it, okay?”
Dave nods and bounces from the main room to the flight deck. The deck is mostly huge bulky spacesuits branded with everyone’s name and details, hanging silently on racks. Dave finds Megido’s, close to the entrance. Her helmet gazes at him forlornly, the reflective gold visor pulled down to act as a mirror. Well, it wasn’t pulled down specifically for that purpose, but that’s what it’s doing. Dave is compelled to watch his own distorted image as he reaches up to pull the helmet down.
He half expects a skull to fall out, but it doesn’t.
Dave holds the helmet against his chest and drifts towards the greenhouse. Nepeta sometimes hangs out here, now that Nitram is… incapacitated, but she isn't around today. Only the quivering radish plants are there, basking in the magenta growlights. Dave ducks under the table of sprouts to hide the helmet in an empty cupboard. It barely fits, but he's able to shove it in and latch the door.
When Dave first leaves the room, he thinks something is wrong with his eyes. It's completely dark. He turns around and looks back into the greenhouse, where the pink lights are still glowing happily. The hallway is dark. The greenhouse is fine. The growlights have batteries, they plug into the wall, they're not connected to the main light control system.
So someone has cut their lights now, too.
Dave yanks a growlight out of the outlet, then grabs another in case someone else needs it. How much charge do they typically have, six hours? He'll have to ask Nitram. Dave holds one magenta lamp in each hand and uses his feet to awkwardly tip-toe into the main room. Sollux and Megido are still there, illuminated by a bright white LED flashlight. The edges of Jade and Karkat's faces are visible at the limits of the light cone. Dave can feel that there are probably more people there, but he can't see them.
"Dave?" Jade asks.
"Yeah, it's me," Dave answers, handing her one of the lights. She looks at it carefully before taking it. The magenta light turns her green irises into one of those bizarre non-colors you can only really see when you close your eyes or have a migraine.
Jade turns around with her light, revealing Rose, John, and Maryam all crouched in a line along the edge of the comms board. She hands the light to John in order to illuminate their side of the room.
"Where's everyone else?" Dave wonders aloud, scanning the room with the growlight.
"We don't know," Jade says with the faintest note of panic in her voice. "The intercom is out too, hopefully they'll be able to find their way back here and--"
She's interrupted by a spine-rattling scream from a distant place in the station. Everyone freezes, and Dave loses his grip on the growlight. He fumbles to grab it out of the air with sweaty palms.
The scream continues for several seconds.
"Okay, scramble," Karkat stands up. "Me, Dave, Jade, Rose, and I'm commandeering Sollux's flashlight." He snatches it out of Sollux's loose grip. "Everyone else stay right the fuck here. Lock the door." He hustles the three NASA astronauts out into the hallway and pulls the door shut behind him. Someone on the other side locks it.
"It's on the Prospit side," Dave reports. The screaming has faded out, but it still echoes metallically inside his head. "Go. And everyone keep talking or at least make some kind of noise, so we know if we lose you."
Dave leads them down the corridors of the station on the roundabout route to Prospit, all of them humming or clicking their tongues like Geiger counters. Getting into the other module requires crawling through an uncomfortably small doorway, and Dave has to toss his growlight in front of him in order to fit. He's still lit from behind by Karkat with the flashlight, but letting go of the light makes his heart pound anyway. Once through the doorway, he grabs it and holds it close to his chest.
"Karkat?" Sollux's voice punches through the silent darkness. "Intercom's back. Let me know what's up when you get to the next speaker."
The next intercom station isn't far, right outside the Prospit module bathroom. "We're on Prospit," he says, pushing his thumb against the button. "We haven't heard or seen anything yet."
"Okay," Sollux responds. "Keep moving."
The team inches forwards through the darkness, lights trained on the empty hallway ahead of them.
"Wait, stop," Dave whispers just loud enough that they can hear him.
"What?" Rose hisses into his ear.
"Everyone hold your breath for just a few seconds," Dave commands. Everyone does hold their breath, and then Dave can hear it for sure, barely audible over the ambient hum of the station systems. Someone else is breathing, very close, probably just out of reach of their light.
Dave raises the growlight with one shaking hand, leaning forward until he can see it.
"Nepeta!" Jade cries out from behind, pushing past Dave to grab the unconscious body. Jade grabs Nepeta's face desperately, trying to open her eyes. When she does, they just gaze vacantly at the magenta ceiling. "She's alive, she needs to go to the hospital," Jade stammers, pushing Nepeta into Rose's arms. "Dave and Karkat, you stay, we'll take her. Go go go!" Jade grabs the flashlight from Karkat, and the two women each grab one of Nepeta's shoulders and rush her back to the main room.
"They left us with the shitty light," Karkat remarks, half annoyed and half terrified.
"What the fuck happened?" Dave says. He can't hear anyone else but Karkat now, and the remaining growlight only gives them a fuzzy pink sphere of vision. They creep deeper into the blackout, trailing their hands on the walls.
Dave has not seen very many dead bodies in his life so far.
This is one of them.
Zahhak is floating near the ceiling, his back almost pressed against it and his head and arms hanging down limply. A trail of blood gently floats away from his mouth.
Dave almost screams, but the noise is trapped in his throat and he just stares wide-eyed and choking. "Fuck, fuck, fuck," he stammers, fumbling with the light to get a better look at Zahhak's face. It leers down from above, glassy and inert, and Dave feels his stomach twist like a hypnagogic jerk. "He's dead," he says, not willing to turn around and look Karkat in the eye. Never turn your back on a corpse, you know. Never risk it.
"You're sure?" Karkat says, his normally rash voice now obviously trembling.
"I can tell, I'm sure," Dave swallows a heavy gulp of air. "We need to go back to the intercom."
"Are we-- we can't just leave him," Karkat sputters.
"I'll do it. Hold the light," Dave grimaces and shoves the growlight into Karkat's arms. Gingerly, he then reaches up to grab the fabric of Zahhak's shirt and pull the body down from the ceiling. It runs into the floating droplets of blood on the way down, splattering red across Zahhak's face and hair.
Dave cautiously drags the body back to the intercom, trying his best not to actually touch the skin, but the dead arm accidentally brushes against his own sometimes and he screams internally. Karkat keeps his back against Dave's, so at least the lighting is poor and Dave can pretend he isn't staring at a dead human body. He can't close his eyes, though, because closing your eyes on a corpse is almost as bad as turning your back on it.
They make it back to the intercom and Karkat slams the heel of his palm onto the talk button. "Sollux?!" He yells into it, making the speakers throughout the station squeal. "Listen, Zahhak is dead," he lowers his voice but still speaks frantically. "Harley and Lalonde are bringing Nepeta to the hospital now if they aren't there already. No sign of anyone else."
"Got it," Sollux answers immediately. "Do you have Zahhak's body with you?"
"Yes," Karkat says. Dave releases his clammy grip on the body's shirt and wipes his hands on his pants. He resolves to drown this pair in sulfuric acid at the first opportunity.
There's some indistinct mumbling on the other end of the intercom before Sollux's voice returns. "Megido is ordering you to leave it there and get back here immediately," he barks. "Anyone else on this ship who is listening, get yourself to a secure room and barricade it. Stay there until further instructions." The speakers click off and Dave and Karkat leap down the hallways back to the main room.
John is standing behind the door, keeping it open just a crack, and he throws it open when he sees Dave and Karkat approach. They hurtle into the room and John slams the door shut immediately after them, locking it as well as holding it shut with his hand.
"Are Jade and Rose here?" Dave asks him.
"Yeah, they have Nepeta in the hospital," John answers, pointing towards the open door on the other side of the room. Dave ditches his growlight and swings in the direction of the hospital, but Sollux sticks his hand in front of Dave's chest and stops him.
"Do not interrupt them," he growls. Dave nods and lets himself float back in the opposite direction. The white glow of the flashlight in the hospital casts vague shadows across the kitchen floor, Rose and Maryam and Karkat dancing around each other to the sound of anxious whispers.
Someone pounds on the door and Jade yelps in shock. John leans to look through the plexiglass window into the hallway, but he can't see anything in the darkness. "Who is it?" He yells.
"Eridan and Feferi!" Ampora yells back. "Let us in!" John opens the door and shuts it again just millimeters away from the soles of Feferi's sneakers.
"Is everyone here?" Feferi asks frantically, scanning the shadowed faces around her.
"Everyone but Gamzee," Karkat says. "Nepeta is seriously injured. Zahhak is dead."
"Holy fuck," Ampora wheezes, beginning to hyperventilate. Feferi clutches his shoulder to steady him.
"Dave?" Rose calls from the hospital. Dave bounds towards her and she shoves some kind of medical scissors and the flashlight at him. "Take these. Nepeta needs oxygen. There's some in the burnt-out lab. Go, don't get killed," she pushes him away towards the door, which John dutifully opens and shuts again.
His mind gritty with static and scissors clutched in one white-knuckled hand, Dave navigates the short distance to the abandoned lab, where the crumpled door now hangs loosely off the sliding mechanism. He scans around with the beam of the flashlight until he sees it, a tall cylinder with O2 printed on a label, mounted to the wall with nylon straps. He quickly unstraps it and shoves it under his arm. The metallic blue surface of the canister is chemical-scorched but mercifully intact. Dave spins out of the room, through the abyssal hallway into the main room and then the hospital. Dimly, he wonders when it finally stopped being called the observatory.
Rose takes the canister and immediately attaches it to a rigged oxygen mask taken from the emergency panels on the top of the main room's walls. She opens the oxygen valve and the gas hisses out gently into the plastic tube. Rose straps it to Nepeta's face and both Rose and Dave watch the shuddering movement of her lungs, in and out and in and out, until they settle into a more normal rhythm. Rose lets out a long, warbling breath of her own and collapses into Maryam's arms.
Maryam arranges Rose horizontally on the floor of the observatory. "She hasn't slept in thirty hours," she explains, tucking Rose's arms to her sides. "She's just exhausted. It's okay." Maryam looks back at Dave and smiles a little. "Look, down there," she gestures at the glass floor. Dave scrunches his body awkwardly to look down without hitting any of the floating patients. "It's an aurora."
The bright green lights swirl around the North Pole, lingering on the edges of the Earth's atmosphere in neon halos. Dave stares and watches the glimmering aurora until it slips behind the curve of the planet, or he falls asleep. He doesn't remember which happens first.