Chapter Text
The official clearly thought that Tavros was beneath any notice or mention. He wasn't really surprised when she was unable to suppress a shudder and a sneer when she leaned down to snap the collar around his neck. Somehow she got it under control when she straightened and Gamzee could see her face again. Her obvious desire to please the highblood was extreme to the point where even Equius might think she was going overboard. While the thought that someone was even more of a purplenoser than Equius was disturbing on several levels, Tavros was grateful for it. At least she wouldn't dare ask an exalted indigoblood why he would take a lowly brownblood as a slave.
Tavros wished desperately that he could give his matesprit a reassuring glance, but it was impossible. Even if Gamzee was in Tavros's line of sight instead of being seated behind him there was no way they could risk anyone seeing a shared tender look. The only reason why Gamzee was able to keep his composure at all was the flask of sopor slime he had downed before the ceremony started. Tavros had frowned at that; when the two of them got serious Gamzee started weaning himself off the slime. Tavros told him he didn’t have to but Gamzee said he thought he was missing things—and not just with his matesprit—when he was high and distracted. He was still Gamzee, still believed that blood meant nothing between bros and he still liked his Faygo. He was just significantly more aware of the world around him. Less numb in just about every field... and as Tavros suddenly found himself thinking, less numb in everything including touch. Gamzee started ‘waking up’ not long after their relationship had gotten physical. While this meant irritations like wearing sunglasses even in dim lighting because his eyes were so sensitive, it also meant he was so very sensitive in other areas. Areas which Tavros was all too happy to explore. Thoroughly.
Even though his very life depended upon this ceremony going off without a hitch Tavros still couldn’t keep the ghost of a smile off his lips and the brown blush from his cheeks. Luckily his subservient posture—sitting on his legs, hands on the floor in front of him, slouched down in a bow—hid his face from view. He wasn’t anywhere near as frightened as he thought he would be, in fact, he was very calm. Very, very calm. He wasn’t sure if he had just expended all his nervous energy in the various panic attacks he’d been suffering the last lunar cycle or if he’d just lost it. Even with the sneering official reading the list of freedoms he was about to lose and a culling fork leaning against the far wall he couldn’t make himself feel worried. He couldn’t make himself feel anything except resignation. It was almost as though he was the one who ate sopor.
The overwhelming numbness helped him when the knives came out. He didn’t mind at all when the sharp points cut into the back of his neck—being culled would hurt a lot more. But if he wasn’t so out of it then he might have jumped at the pain, ruined the design, and given them an excuse to bring the fork over. This was more than just a simple legal ceremony to take a new slave; it had quickly spiraled out of control into a giant political mess. Gamzee’s habit of befriending peasantbloods hadn’t escaped the notice of the others in his class. When he was younger he was widely considered an embarrassment and nothing more, but since he had sobered up there were some who saw him as a serious threat to the status quo.
This was made worse by the fact that he was known to have been a friend of Feferi, whose plans for the crown had been discovered by the Empress’s spies. Her ideals made her a much more immediate threat to the Empress; if Feferi just wanted the crown she’d wait until she was of age to make her play, but since she wanted to save lives it was likely she’d strike much sooner. Given that, Her Imperious Condescension started sending regular assassination teams to Feferi’s hive. None were successful due to Feferi’s own skill in battle, her monstrous lusus, and the protection of none other than Eridan. After a lot of personal discovery he had abandoned his genocidal obsession, his hurt feelings over Feferi breaking their diamond, and a sizable chunk of his pretentious attitude. In many ways the attacks were a boon; thanks to steady supply of assassins and their accompanying lusii Gl'bgolyb was well fed, which meant fewer trolls had to be orphaned for the greater good.
Feferi doubted that the Empress really expected any of the assassins to actually accomplish their mission—after the first couple waves Her Condescension only sent those who had displeased her in some way—but it served the greater purpose of keeping Feferi a prisoner in her own hive and make it much harder for her to stage revolution. Feferi was still managing, however slowly. Eridan was her only link to the outside world through a hidden hardline they had painstakingly set up between their hives; it was practically prehistoric but any wireless transmission could be traced. Eridan did his best to relay messages to the others but sometimes it was impossible to do so safely, so until a faster and more reliable means of communication was found the rebellion crawled forward at a slug’s pace.
Sadly the Empress hadn’t tried to kill Feferi herself; if she had then trollkind would already have a new ruler and Tavros wouldn’t be bowed over while the markmaker cut Gamzee’s sign into his neck.
The audience was supposed to be there to show their disdain for the new slave sitting naked in the center of the room, but in this case nearly all eyes were fastened on the master to be. Even though he couldn’t see any of it Tavros could feel their burning stares daring Gamzee to speak up when the markmaker was a little rougher than was necessary. Without the slime making his tongue heavy Gamzee might have done just that on instinct; ever since Gamzee started taking it easy on the pies he was able to acknowledge the hatred for high society he had always carried. Without the sopor clouding his emotions he started correcting those who denounced the lower bloods, particularly his friends. Gamzee never went so far as to actively speak out against the treatment of the lower bloods; even when in a sopor haze he knew that doing so would only put his friends at risk. But the glares and cutting comments he made did not go unnoticed, and the memory remained even after he learned to hold his tongue.
The memory was strong enough to warrant a squad being sent to his hive in the middle of the day. Eridan, ever vigilant, was alerted by his sensor net to the movement in shallow water and went to investigate. He got there in time to hear the story from the one attacker who was still alive. Unfortunately for the assassins, Gamzee was in a cranky stage of stepping back his sopor intake. When he woke up to strangers in his room he had a psychotic episode. Cackling he advanced on them, saying that if they wanted a highblood then they would get a motherfucking highblood. He then proceeded to paint his walls with their blood.
Eridan ended up slipping into the role of Gamzee’s moirail after that, and between his and Tavros’s calming influences Gamzee hadn’t lapsed back into that persona since.
After that, Gamzee and the rest of their circle realized that if they were going to live long enough to see Feferi crowned they had to put some societal distance between the classes on top of denouncing the heir apparent. So Gamzee bit his tongue and did everything he could to make it look like the others were just his amusing playthings, pretending that the apparent affection he showed them before was just the slime talking. Gamzee hated having to pretend that the others were beneath him. He really hated the fact that he and Tavros had to hide their matespritship so thoroughly that they couldn’t even announce it to their friends. While the couple were able to tell a few in person they couldn’t take the risk of a transmission being tapped; if that happened then the cross-class romance would put them all at greater risk.
As the indigo dye made of Gamzee’s own blood was ground into the open wound Tavros gritted his teeth both in pain—it wouldn’t surprise him to learn that they mixed salt into the pigment—and also to suppress a very out of character grin which was probably proof positive that he was in the middle of a nervous breakdown. But he couldn’t help it. All these highbloods thought that this was a battle won against Feferi’s rhetoric. It was almost too perfect; the indigoblood who used to embrace the peasants taking one of the gutterbloods as his bonded slave. And so they gathered in the ceremonial room so that they could show their smug contempt for Tavros who sat prostrate and naked in the center of the room. They not so quietly mocked the worthless cripple as the mark was painfully carved into the back of his neck. They cheered in whispers when Gamzee remained impassive and uncaring.
They could have their hollow victory. Gamzee taking Tavros as his slave was a solid win for the silent resistance. First and foremost it would save Tavros from being culled because of his disability; while he had dodged it for over two sweeps it was only because Sollux had hacked him off the list. But just after the last culling rounds Tavros turned 8 and so his records were transferred to the young adult system which had the same medical charts as the child database along with extensive financial records; most young adult cullings happened because of bank accounts instead of broken bones. Since so much sensitive fiscal information was kept in the young adult system it was much more secure than the child system. Sollux still thought he could hack it, but it was clear that he was nervous about the task. This solution was much neater and didn’t chance one of the resistance’s most valuable players getting arrested.
Secondly, if Gamzee took a slave then he would be in direct defiance of Feferi’s plans. It would look like he was embracing his indigo heritage and make another attempt on his life seem unnecessary. Gamzee’s documented distain for the peasantbloods would also protect the others since it would make it look like he didn’t care if they lived or died, so it would be pointless for the enemy to hurt them to get to Gamzee.
Lastly, and this was the idea that Tavros held onto for dear life as the markmaker’s knife flew across his flesh, a slave lived in their master’s hive. And that meant no more harrowing trips just to spend half a day with Gamzee. That meant he could touch his matesprit whenever he wanted. It meant they could be together in a way Tavros had barely dreamed of. Maybe that’s why he was so calm. He knew that what he was gaining was more than worth the pain of the brand on the back of his neck.
Maybe he was just so scared that he couldn’t feel it anymore.
The bandage, which was packed with more pigment, was placed over the wound. Once he healed the scar would be in the design and color of Gamzee’s sign—proof of who owned him. With the mark cut into Tavros’s flesh and all the paperwork signed, it was finally over. Gamzee owned Tavros, the sign on the back of the brownblood’s neck a symbol of humiliation and ownership. Or so the gathered highbloods thought. To Tavros it was a medallion of protection. Now that he was officially Gamzee’s property no one would dare touch him. The indigo-dyed scar would promise a swift and harsh punishment to anyone foolish enough to raise a hand to Tavros. As long as he steered clear of irritable sea dwellers he would be fine.
All the swirling thoughts were starting to make Tavros giddy and he bit down on his lip. Defiantly not calm. Definitely needed to get the rising hysterics under control. Even though he belonged to Gamzee now he wouldn’t put it past these people to cull him and say the slavery wasn’t official until they left the room.
Tavros focused on his breathing as he waited for the markmaker’s assistant to hand him his pants. He would have liked the shirt too but it had been thrown into the brazier as part of the ceremony; it symbolized how he had been stripped of his sign along with his freedoms. The only mark he could wear from then on was Gamzee’s carved into his back; his shirts would have to be plain from then on. The only part of Tavros’s sign he could keep was the color so that everyone would still know he was a brownblood. His slave collar, a simple silver ring that rested comfortably just above his collarbone, was inlaid with a band of brown stone the same color as his blood.
The minutes stretched on and Tavros was still waiting for the roll of black fabric, but it never came into view. With rising dread Tavros bit his lip and chanced a look at the small table where he had laid his clothes at the beginning of the ceremony. He had bundled up his underwear, socks, and shoes in his pants and had laid his neatly folded shirt on top for easy access.
The table was empty.
He bit down even harder on his lip and tasted blood. They couldn’t do this! he screamed in his head, except that they could. If questioned they’d probably say that he didn’t separate his shirt from the rest of his clothes and therefore had no choice but to chuck the lot into the fire. Even if there was some way to prove that they did it on purpose, and if there was any chance the gathered highbloods would accept that proof, his clothes were gone. Gamzee couldn’t afford to raise a fuss about this slight and Tavros certainly couldn’t get away with it. There was nothing else to do.
Tavros took a long hard look at that culling fork and forced himself to keep it together before slowly turning towards the arc of the audience’s seats. He kept his eyes down on the floor—if he looked any of these trolls in the eye they wouldn’t hesitate in making him pay—and slowly looked around the room until he found his four wheel device. It was pushed up against the low wall dividing the ceremonial area from the gallery, right in front of Gamzee’s seat. After what happened to his clothes Tavros didn’t entertain any delusions about his four wheel device being brought to him.
Tavros closed his eyes and tried not to hear as the first in the audience chuckled with the realization of what had happened. Pretending his ears were as useless as his legs he lay down on his belly and started pulling himself across the floor to his four wheel device. He was halfway there when they started openly jeering at him and making all manner of lewd comments; after all, what use was a paralyzed slave if his duty wasn’t to be on his back?
Tavros hated them. He hated all of them. A few sweeps ago he never would have thought he would be capable of such roiling platonic hatred but it was taking everything he had to bite back what he wanted to scream at the crowd. Maybe he was able to work up a proper blinding rage because, as far as he was concerned, the worst part wasn’t what they were doing to him; it was what this demented show was doing to Gamzee. Tavros was doing his best to keep his eyes off the crowd but when reached up to grab his four wheel device he caught a glimpse of his matesprit’s face. To anyone else there Gamzee appeared the very picture of an impassive highblood completely unconcerned with his new slave’s abject humiliation, but Tavros knew better. Just under the numb, slime fueled mask of disinterest was a tempest. Rage, fear, horror, all of it swam in Gamzee’s glazed eyes. And the crowd just would not stop.
The way he had to wriggle to get into the chair of his device just made them louder. He tried so hard to not let it get to him, not to hear what they were saying about his disgusting blood, his legs shriveled in atrophy, how Gamzee surely would make his new toy stay face down so he wouldn’t have to look at his slave’s ugly face. The tears welled up with the insecurity and Tavros fought to hold them back. He couldn’t let Gamzee see how much this was getting to him. He couldn’t give those malicious bastards the satisfaction of seeing him cry.
As soon as Tavros was settled Gamzee stood up. He offered up a vague goodbye to the trolls seated near him and then started towards the door without a backwards glance at Tavros, who followed as quickly as he could. Tavros knew why his matesprit wasn’t even acknowledging him; if Gamzee actually saw the brown tears welling then he would probably lose it. Despite the whole humiliating situation Tavros felt near to elated when the entranceway doors were opened. They had actually done it. They had succeeded in the ruse. They still had to wait for three hours for the next scheduled shuttle to Gamzee’s part of the coast, and Tavros was sure it would be torture to have all those eyes trained on his naked form, but it didn’t matter. He was Gamzee’s and they couldn’t do anything to him.
He was safe.