Karkat's a big stupid romantic, and romance is a language: sloppier than anything Sollux has ever programmed, but it still has its own grammar and its own important commands. This scar-trading ritual thing means, believe that I'm sticking around.

“Sir, please,” Kix says, the closest Cody has ever heard him to tears of frustration. It’s enough to make him stop dead, because Kix never sounds like that. “I just need to stitch you up, that’s all.”