
Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/263782.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      F/M
  Fandom:
      Homestuck
  Relationship:
      Jade_Harley/Karkat_Vantas
  Character:
      Jade_Harley, Karkat_Vantas
  Additional Tags:
      Voyeurism, Exhibitionism, PWP, Xeno, Xenophilia
  Stats:
      Published: 2011-10-12 Words: 3885
****** If Vision Is The Only Validation ******
by roachpatrol
Summary
     CG: HARLEY, WHEN I SAID THAT I WOULD RATHER CULL MYSELF WITH THE DULL
     END OF A SCALEMATE BEFORE I EVER GAVE YOU THE CHANCE TO RECOIL IN
     ABJECT REVULSION BEFORE MY HIDEOUS VISAGE
     CG: WHAT THE FUCK GAVE YOU THE IDEA THAT I WOULD SOMEHOW BE AMENABLE
     TO INSTEAD PERFORMING A DAPPER SHOW AND TELL ROUTINE?
Notes
     Written for the homestuck kinkmeme prompt: Jade uses her
     spectagoggles to spy on Karkat in a compromising position.
     Thanks to Meowgon for the excellent beta-job.
     i look up into the night sky
     and see a thousand eyes staring back
     and all around these golden beacons
     i see nothing but black
     i feel a way of something beyond them
     i don't see what i can feel
     if vision is the only validation
     then most of my life isn't real...
     --Black and Gold,Sam Sparro
Trolls don't look that much like humans, is the first thing that she notices.
The second thing is that considering all the other things in the universe they
might have looked like-- like jellyfish or spacewhales or slime molds or
whatever-- they do actually look almost entirely human. But Jade figures it's
probably human nature to get all hung up on the little differences, humans all
probably look so similar to each other-- compared to, like, slime molds-- that
the human brain is wired to pick up even the teenie weenie details. Rose would
probably know better.
Oh, god, Rose can never know about this, she will be sooooo smug and probably
try to talk about how sometimes Jade still sleeps with her manthro chaps in bed
with her and also that one time Jade thought 'taking the knot' was a metaphor
for getting married and made a really, really terrible joke.
Karkat looks a lot like a manthro chap, actually, something subtly other about
every part of him, and that's not even taking into account the little nubby
orange horns. Jade fusses with her goggles, focuses closer. It's different when
she's really looking at someone real, someone totally physical and awake. In
the dreambubbles everything shifts and warps, everything's symbolic. Feferi was
a bright cartoon girl, drawing and redrawing herself endlessly as she floated
and giggled, a scribble of wide white eyes and voluminous hair, triangle teeth
like a cartoon.
But Karkat is real. He's sitting in some stairwell or another in the veil, his
head leaned against the wall, some kind of big alien laptop balanced on his
knees. He looks tired. His skin is grey all over, not like cement or elephants
or cloudy skies but like fine faded velvet, the fuzz of it lengthening out
around his jaw and where his wild black hair bristles out in ever direction,
downy short and much darker around his big yellow eyes. His lips are shiny-
black as goth makeup and the teeth that press into them are big long fangs,
almost tusks, pale cream-white and just a bit yellowish at the bases. Wet-- one
of his eyeteeth is a little crooked, another one is a little chipped. He licks
his lips, a flash of wet dark-gray tongue, and he looks around with big flat-
yellow eyes like an owl's and his eyelashes are so long.
He's pretty. He's totally alien and really, incredibly, adorably pretty.
Jade hops up to perch on a wide welcoming curve of blue-green baobab roots, and
grins.
GG: hi karkat!
At that he startles-- she can't hear him, but she can see his mouth flash all
teeth, his eyes snap wide and then narrow. He peers at his screen. She angles
her view around and then she can see herself on his computer, like a mirror
reflecting mirrors, a small girl in a snuggly red coat perched in the great
teal sweep of a tree.
CG: OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE, WHAT NOW?

GG: guess what I'm looking at! ;D

CG: YOU'RE GAPING AT A SNOWBANK LIKE A MORON.

CG: DO I WIN?

CG: ARE WE DONE HERE?
Jade laughs, and watches Karkat watch herself laughing. She points at her
goggles, and feels a heady rush of vertigo as the girl in the monitor does too.
No lag at all, just the smooth transition of sciency magic, and Karkat tilts
his head so slowly to one side as he realizes.
CG: OH FUCK ME

CG: YOU'RE ACTUALLY SPYING ON ME WITH THOSE MONSTROSITIES, AREN'T YOU?

GG: bingo!!
She waves at empty space, then slouches back and folds her hands over her
chest. After a little concentration, she gets a split screen going so she can
watch herself over Karkat's shoulder and also peer up at his face at the same
time. It makes her head feel hot and thickly triumphant, like when she can
finally get a physics equation to balance just right.
GG: touch yourself for me!
she says, and Karkat's big gold eyes go so wide. Is that a blush under all the
grey?
CG: WHAT.

GG: i want to see how you work!

CG: HARLEY, WHEN I SAID THAT I WOULD RATHER CULL MYSELF WITH THE DULL END OF A
SCALEMATE BEFORE I EVER GAVE YOU THE CHANCE TO RECOIL IN ABJECT REVULSION
BEFORE MY HIDEOUS VISAGE

CG: WHAT THE FUCK GAVE YOU THE IDEA THAT I WOULD SOMEHOW BE AMENABLE TO INSTEAD
PERFORMING A DAPPER SHOW AND TELL ROUTINE?

GG: probably the fact that you always give in if i ask you nice!

CG: LIES AND FILTHY SLANDER.

GG: please, karkat?

GG: pleeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaassssssssse?

CG: STOP. DESIST. ABORT.

GG: pretty please? it doesn't have to be anything big you can just like pull on
your ears or something!

GG: do you even have ears under all that hair??

CG: IT IS NOT 'HAIR', IT IS FOLLICULAR CRANIAL PROTRUSIONS, OH MY GOD, WHAT ARE
YOU, SOME KIND OF SNOOTY DUCHESS?

GG: maybe I am!

GG: i am the duchess of snoot and you are my knight in shining turtleneck.

GG: come on, wiggle your ears at me just once!

CG: WILL YOU SHUT UP IF I DO?

GG: well i certainly won't if you don't :P

CG: YOU DRIVE A HARD BARGAIN, SHE-WITCH.
Karkat settles back from his husktop, and kind of looks vaguely around, as if
trying to determine where she's looking at him from. His dark bristly eyebrows
are knitted together, and one corner of his mouth is halfway to a snarl. It
tips over into a full-on grimace as he squares his shoulders and raises his
hands up to either side of his head. His bristly hair parts, and his round
yellow nails glint against--
GG: OH MY GOD YOU HAVE POINTY EARS!!!!!!

CG: YEAH

CG: SO?

GG: that is the cutest thing!!!!

GG: THE ~~~*CUTEST*~~~ THING!!!!

CG: OH MY FUCKING GOD STOP HAVING AN ANEURYSM THEY'RE JUST CARTILAGINOUS HEAR
HANDLES.

CG: LET ME GUESS YOU LOST YOURS IN SOME KIND OF PITIABLE WIGGLERHOOD TRAUMA AND
NOW THE ONLY THING THAT FILLS THE GAPING AURAL VOID IN YOUR WRETCHED EXCUSE OF
A LIFE IS SCOPING OUT EVERYONE ELSE'S HEADFLAPS?

GG: nope!

GG: it's just....

CG: JUST?
He actually chews on his lips with his fangs as he types that, hunching inward,
his head tilting to one side. He looks like a cat about to pounce on a laser
pointer, she can almost see him twitching with anticipation, and he can see her
giggling at him, her hand over her mouth, grinning exactly up at the patch of
space she needs to be looking to meet his eyes through the screen. Every minute
she delays winds him a little tighter.
GG: .....................just.....

GG: .........................................
He actually wriggles, right in place, like at any moment he is going to
explode.
CG: JUST WHAT COME ON HARLEY

GG: ......SO CUTE!!!!!!
He recoils: rocks back in place as if she had punched him square in the snout,
then drives forward, attacking the keyboard of his funny crab computer as if
each keystroke could punch her right back. Teasing Dave was never this much
fun. Karkat is so expressive!
CG: OH FUCK OFF AND CHOKE ON A RUSTED BULGE, THEY'RE NOT CUTE.

GG: they are too!

CG: ARE NOT.

GG: are too!!!!!

CG: ARE NOT!

GG: okay so show me something else!

CG: NO

GG: i'm gonna stare at you all day anyway karkat!

CG: WHAT THE FUCK.

GG: take off your shirt!

CG: WHAT

CG: I

GG: scared? >:D

CG: WHAT NO WHAT THE FUCK, HARLEY, NO!

GG: yes!

CG: NO!

GG: YES!!!!

CG: A THOUSAND TIMES DO I DECREE UNTO THEE NO, YOU SPASTIC SPACE VOYEUR.

GG: i'll take off my shirt too.
He pauses at that, blinks a few times. Confusion and hope is written blatantly
across his face in letters of fire.
CG: HOW WOULD THAT EVEN MATTER.

CG: WAIT NO DON'T
Galvanized, Jade grabs the hem of her top and rips it all off in one easy arc
that just clears her goggles. For a moment all she feels is triumph, and then
the cold hits like a million knives.
GG: oh my GOD it is FUCKING COLD AS FUCK OUT HERE!!!!

CG: YOUR LAND ISN'T CALLED FROST AND FROGS BECAUSE IT'S A BEACH PARTY YOU
COMPLETE SHITHIVE LUNATIC!

CG: OH GOD I CAN'T EVEN

CG: JADE PUT YOUR SHIRT ON

GG: NOT UNTIL YOURS COMES OFF!!

CG: JADE

CG: SERIOUSLY COME ON.

GG: DO IT OR MY BOOBS ARE GOING TO FREEZE TO DEATH!!!!!

CG: OKAY FINE!! FUCK!
He pulls his shirt over his head as she puts hers back on, his hair packing
down along the curve of his skull and then fluffing back into a wild shock as
the shirt moves over his head, the bumps of his horns making funny lumps. He
sits on the stairs with his shirt crumpled in his gray fists, his skin bare and
smooth. He’s strangely bony, like a living sculpture or a lizard, just gray and
sleekly angular all over, and his ribs are strange. Between three of them on
either side are dark black streaks, like seams or parenthesis, and they stretch
wider and narrower as he breathes. There is a taut intensity to every part of
him, each movement he makes, like a dancer or a gymnast flowing from one sharp
pose to the next. His arms are longer than a human's would be, it's obvious now
that his sleeves are off-- and they don't hinge quite the way it seems like
they should. She wonders if his legs are the same deal, if he even has toes on
his feet. What if he has paws inside his shoes?
GG: take off your pants too!

CG: OH COME ON!

GG: i did not get nipple frostbite just for one article of clothing!!!

CG: JADE HAS ANYONE TOLD YOU THAT YOU ARE COMPLETELY SCREWLOOSE GRUBFUCKING
CRAZYPANTS?

GG: not once. >:P
Which is technically completely true. But the more important thing is that he's
almost smiling as he shucks his shoes and then his pants off-- he can see her
grinning, it's almost like they're laughing together for real and he seems so
much more relaxed than he had been when she first started talking to him. Like
he's finally figured out that he doesn't have much choice but to do what she
wants him to and he's kind of eager about it, more flustered than furious, more
shy than resentful. His legs are long and thin like his arms, and for all that
he's got normal little toes with yellow toenails on his feet, he looks nearly
froglike, except for his face, his smile, that's not animal at all. That's just
Karkat, his face more familiar with each time she looks at him, easier to read.
He looks more like he wants to be mad than he actually is mad, anymore, and
when he's got nothing on but black alien boxers he sprawls back on the steps,
leaning all his weight on one sharp elbow and giving her a heated, challenging
stare that makes her stomach do a giddy flip. He is the most adorable thing
ever, like candy or squiddles or lolcats. She would watch a million cartoons
about him.
CG: SO IS THIS GOING WHERE I THINK IT'S GOING, THEN?

GG: i guess it depends on where you think it's going!
He curls up as fast as a startled clam. She's surprised too-- suddenly he's not
even the least bit happy or relaxed.
CG: WHERE I THINK IT'S GOING DEFINITELY HINGES ON WHERE YOU THINK ITS GOING
THOUGH.

CG: I MEAN AM I TOTALLY MISREADING THE SITUATION HERE, IS THIS JUST HOW HUMANS
SAY HELLO OR SOMETHING

CG: GREETINGS NEW LIFE FORM PLEASE RENDER UNTO US A SAUCY STRIPTEASE

CG: IS THAT HOW IT GOES?
Oh god. Oh god!!!! Jade feels her face go so hot it's a wonder she's not
melting the snow all around her for a hundred feet. Karkat's eyes are getting
wider and wider, his thin shoulders starting to compact inwards and his fingers
squeezing and scratching the edge of his computer as he watches her stare
blankly back at him. All the gears in her head have locked up.
GG: uh

CG: UH?

CG: NO NO NO HARLEY COME ON, WHAT'S UH, UH IS NOT GOOD, UH IS NEVER GOOD

CG: OH SHIT I DID FUCKING MISREAD THIS WHOLE THING YOU DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THAT I

CG: FUCK

CG: FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCKING FUCK!

CG: I AM SO SORRY.

GG: no, wait!

GG: i am sorryer

GG: i am the sorriest karkat

CG: FUCK YOU YOU ARE NOT THAT ILLUSTRIOUS TITLE HAS ALREADY BEEN CLAIMED BY MY
LAMENTABLE JERKASS.

CG: I AM SORRIEST FOREVER.

CG: AEONS FROM NOW THEY WILL SING TENDER CAUTIONARY BALLADS OF HOW HARD I
FUCKED THIS UP.
Huddled into himself like a sad gray pile of ash, all angles and self-loathing,
he reaches for his pants again. She makes the only possible decision. It is as
simple as balancing an equation, if a and b, then c, if that look on his face
and the jerky furious way he's moving, then--
GG: you dipshit!

GG: i meant i'm sorry i don't have any sweet stripper jams for this momentous
first contact

GG: it is not how we humans do this at all usually we get a dj

GG: i just wouldn't want you to feel unloved while you shake your groove thang!
Karkat pauses, and sort of slowly and suspiciously inches back into lounge-
position.
CG: DON'T YOU DARE CALL STRIDER IN. I WILL FLIP OFF THE GODDAMN HANDLE SO HARD
THAT WHEN I COME BACK DOWN EVERY BONE IN MY BODY WILL SHATTER UNDER IMPACT.
GIRLS AND SMALL WIGGLERS WILL WEEP, AND EVERY GOVERNMENT IN PARADOX SPACE WILL
DECLARE A DAY OF MOURNING.

GG: deal!
He actually smiles at that, a full-on toothy grin, and it makes him so
intensely pretty. He looks more alien than ever, all his fangs showing and his
nose scrunched up with satisfaction, but the emotion somehow comes through all
their differences. It feels wonderful to have put that look on his face.
Then he slides out of his shorts and suddenly his face is the last thing on her
mind. He's got this thing between his legs, thick and tapered, and the gray
fuzz of the rest of him fades into a slick black along its length. When he runs
one finger down it it kind of stirs, getting thicker and longer and curling up
into his hand, almost as long as his fingers. He smiles just a bit and squeezes
it, his head sort of rolling back and his long eyelashes shuttering down over
his eyes. Whatever it is he sure as hell likes what he's doing, and it makes
her feel really warm and interested.
GG: so tell me what that is!

CG: YOU DON'T HAVE ONE?

GG: nope!

CG: OH. WELL, THERE GOES THAT LITTLE FANTASY.

CG: I MEAN, UH.

CG: EXTREMELY LITTLE.

CG: MICROSCOPIC.

CG: NONEXISTENT.

GG: suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure, karkat.

CG: THIS IS SO UNFAIR, I HOPE YOU KNOW THAT. I'M PEELED DOWN TO MY FUCKING
CORPSEMEAT AND YOU'RE SQUATTING ALL SAFE AND SOUND UP TO YOUR OCCULARS IN SNOW
SO THAT I CAN'T EVEN ASK TO SEE YOUR

CG: YOUR YOU

CG: WITHOUT BEING A TOTAL FUCKASS MORON AND GETTING YOU KILLED FROM EXPOSURE.

CG: HOW IS THAT EVEN FAIR ANSWER ME THAT HARLEY.

GG: lol it isn't.

GG: so tell me what's up with your junk!

CG: IT IS NOT MY 'JUNK', THANK YOU EVER SO, DUCHESS SNOOTY VON WORDSMITH.

CG: IT IS MY EXTERNAL REPRODUCTIVE APPARATUS AND I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW IT IS
ACTUALLY SOMEWHAT LARGER THAN THE MEDIAN AVERAGE.

GG: it looks like a big slug.

CG: WOW, YOU SURE KNOW HOW TO MAKE A BOY FEEL SPECIAL.

GG: :P
He lets his head fall back against the steps, and wiggles a little, a sinuous
snake-like twisting that goes through him from shoulders to hips. His lips
move-- he's saying something, to the air, maybe to her. She wishes desperately
that her goggles had sound. His throat-- with his head tipped back like that
it's a perfect arc, and she can see it twitch with his breaths, his-- moans?
His mouth is slack, his lips parted, his eyes distant. His fingers rub at
himself slowly, and then pull the thing up against his lower stomach and his
hand slides-- beneath--
GG: okay wow what is THAT????

GG: karkat??

GG: >:(

GG: hey come on tell me what's going on!
He only glances at the screen, a slow lazy movement, more looking at her than
what she's saying, and then grins lopsidedly and does that wiggling thing
again, a captivating display of his bones, his skin, his beautiful alien hands,
all big knuckles and square palms, his yellow nails like little round stars,
those black crescents on his chest like arcane punctuation. Her face is so hot
she can practically hear snowflakes sizzling as they touch on to her skin, and
he's totally looking at her while he touches himself, looking at her looking at
him. He slips two fingertips inside himself, the dark slit, and they come back
wet, glistening candy-pink in the light from his computer screen. She hears a
sharp squeaking noise, and realizes that it must have been her.
Finally he spares a hand for the keyboard.
CG: FIGURE IT OUT YOURSELF.

GG: you fuckass!

CG: HA.
His head drops back to the steps. He's curled in a loose arc, watching her, and
his hands go all over himself, the planes of his chest, the bright rounded
curves of his horns, the stark lines of his narrow hips, that amazing stretch
of his throat. His external whatever the fuck it is twitches and swells against
his fingers every time he strokes over it, and when he trails his fingers down
to the dark slit beneath it his eyes lid shut and his throat moves,
emphatically. He's probably squeaking too. His lips move and his hands are more
urgent, they move faster, and he's twisting into himself, rolling back and
forth in place as he squeezes the substantial length of his alien junk and
slips two fingers up inside himself, then, with a sharp convulsion, three. His
face almost looks like he's in pain, but he can't possibly not be enjoying
this. He's shaking a little, and his jaw works as he mouths something. He's
talking to himself. God, why didn't she make sure the goggles had sound? She
wants desperately to be there with him, touching where he touched, hearing him
call her name, the sounds that his body makes as his fingers go in and out of
himself and his breaths get so ragged and his face goes rosy all over. But at
least he's looking at her.
Finally he does-- too much of something, enough, and his whole body snaps into
a taut arch up off the steps. His eyes go so wide, locked on to hers, and he
shakes like he's just gotten electrocuted, like he's going to fall apart. He
stops breathing entirely for one long twitchy moment and then slumps back with
gasp and a sigh, utterly limp for the first time she's seen him. Dark red pools
between his legs, his slack fingers, dripping down from one step to the next in
bright streaks, and she can only hope that doesn't mean he's bleeding out. His
smile is soft and goofy and entirely adorable, and she is breathless and warm
as toast all over.
GG: you're really beautiful, karkat.

GG: did you know that?
He startles at that, and then reaches out with his drier hand and taps at the
keyboard. His arm is kind of trembly, and his face is weird and wobbly, all
fangs and red-gray cheeks she actually has no idea what he's thinking.
CG: OF COURSE I KNEW

CG: I AM MAGNIFICENT IN EVERY RESPECT.

GG: oooh mister karkat oooh

CG: DAMN STRAIGHT.
He sits up completely and sort of inches away from the red gunk all over the
steps. His larger than average troll junk gets smaller, bit by bit, and he kind
of rubs at it with the heel of his hand until it tucks itself completely away
into the grey-black shadows between his legs, and then he grabs his underwear
to wipe up the mess. Jade rests her head in her palms and just watches the way
his shoulder blades slide around his back as he moves around, then grimaces at
the soggy fabric and captchalogues it anyway. He's much slower now than he had
been, and when he wrestles his pants back on he yawns, long and just like a
cat, a big flash of teeth and an unfurling of tongue, a mouth that goes so very
wide.
He slides his shirt back on, his horns glinting like candy corn against the
darkness of black fabric and black hair, and when he's got his arms back
through the sleeves he kind of shimmies himself all over to settle his clothes,
just like a bird ruffling its feathers, and then slumps against the wall of the
stairwell. His big pretty eyes are heavy-lidded and kind of dreamy. She wants
to bundle him up in her arms and keep him forever. She wants so many things she
hasn't quite figured out how to have, yet.
CG: SO HOW WAS IT, DUCHESS?

CG: IMPRESSED?
She grins, and watches him watching her watching him. He smiles back, and his
eyes slip closed. He jerks back awake, convulsively, and then fights off
another enormous yawn.
GG: extremely impressed, you wild alien stallion ;P

GG: now go take a nap before you fall down the stairs ok?

CG: I AM AN UNSTOPPABLE SEXUAL DYNAMO I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW

CG: I DON'T SLEEP.

GG: suuuuure, karkat!

CG: FUCK YOU I'M SERIOUS. I HAVE SO MUCH IMPORTANT LEADER TYPE STUFF TO LAY
DOWN AROUND THIS PLACE IT IS LIKE YOU DON'T EVEN FUCKING KNOW.

CG: I'M JUST GONNA SIT HERE FOR A SECOND TO MAKE SURE

CG: THAT

CG: YOU'RE OKAY.

CG: YOU'RE OKAY, RIGHT? THAT WASN'T TOO, UH,

CG: ALIEN?

GG: i'm not gonna lie, karkat, that was really fucking alien.

CG: OH.

GG: but it was so cool, and next time i'm gonna make sure that my goggles have
sound on them because if you sound as awesome as you look there is no way i'm
missing out on that!

CG: NEXT TIME.
His eyes lid all the way shut, and he relaxes again, huddled into himself in a
sleepy puddle of black shirt and gray everything else and soft slack mouth. His
fingers move so slowly.
CG: COOL.
And he's definitely out. Jade gets to her feet, startled at the soreness that
has built up in her lower back and shoulders, and slides down the giant roots
of the baobab into a snowdrift. White stuff flurries up everywhere, powdery and
sweetly cold, and she lies in the drift for a long moment, wondering at the
heat churning inside her skin.
Next time, she thinks, yes, next time: goggles with sound, and somewhere warm
she can take her own shirt off.
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