Breathe - To be read while listening to Breathe (2AM) by Anna Nalick.
Rose hung up the phone and sighed. Dave was missing again, and she had spent the last hours trying to comfort Jade. Rose flopped onto her bed and lay there for some time, but predictably, sleep refused to come at her request. She had convinced Jade that Dave was more than capable of handling himself, but had failed to make herself feel better. Several years had past since SBURB, and Dave’s disappearances had been growing in length. As in every reoccurrence, Rose feared this would be the time he simply left and never called again.
She took the phone, and held it on her chest as she lay in bed. She knew she shouldn’t bother him. It was 2AM where he was. Knowing him, though, he would tell her not to be silly, and call him any time. It was selfish, but Rose gave up and punched in the familiar digits.
Three rings later he picked up.
“Hi, John.”
“Rose…”
Rose was silent for a time, happy to just hear his breathing over the line.
John finally broke the silence. “Is it about Dave?”
“No. Well, yes, I suppose you’re right. Jade is still taking it hard, but I’ll confess that I worry too.”
When John didn’t immediately respond, she continued. “I don’t want to talk about him, though. I’ve just been… feeling stressed.”
John started to sound like he was waking up. “What about your book, then? How is that coming?”
“Ugh… different subject please. Writer’s block - I’m putting it aside for a bit. How’s the theater business?”
“Well, it’s going great! My dad pulled some strings, and I’m going to go on tour with a group this summer.”
“That’s wonderful. I’d like to hear about this group…”
~~~
Rose was still in shock. The funeral was over, and she now sat in the enormous house with John, Jade, and Mr. Eggbert. Her mom had fought monsters, killed colossi with her bare hands, and survived everything SBURB had thrown at her. Eight years later, she died in a car accident. Rose hadn’t even cried… the whole matter still felt unreal.
Really, the only emotion she felt was guilt. Throughout their session, and the succeeding years, she had never come to understand her mother.
Rose buried her face in her hands, and attempted to stifle the sobs. After a long moment, John tentatively sat down next to her, put his arms around her shoulders and drew her to him. All of the stress, responsibility, and fear left over from Sburb came rushing to the surface. Then came life on Earth, her anger towards Dave for abandoning them, the frustration of comforting Jade through the years while she felt so twisted inside…
She cried into John’s shoulder, and he held her tight as her breath came in gasps.
~~~
Rose hardly left the house anymore, preferring the solitude of her too-empty mansion. No-one published essays or poetry anymore, so Rose had found an outlet in fiction. Sitting at her computer, she ignored the ever-blinking new email message and plunged back into her tales of magic, betrayal and war, where the heroes grow in strength and in character in a world where no side of the conflict is right. This fervor carries her late into the night, at which point Rose stumbles into bed and is instantly asleep.
Angry red light filters through the window. The forest is on fire. The rhythmic sounds of impacts vibrate the floor. She watches through her screen’s viewport as John makes a mistake, and dies. Rose tries to scream, but can only produce a whisper of noise. Dave won’t be saving them this time. Soon, Jade is lost to her own meteor, and the fire finally engulfs Rose’s house.
5:17 blinks vexingly on her clock, and Rose turned over and went back to bed.
In the morning, she went to the kitchen for coffee, and shot the calendar a leery glance. John had a huge show in Tennessee that could be the turning point in his career. In a week, he would be driving up to New York to meet her and celebrate. At first she had been excited when they planned it several months ago, but that feeling had since turned into a gathering dread. She had worked so hard to piece herself together again, and didn’t want to rock the boat. Rose was content in this house, alone with her writings. Being honest with herself, though, she was afraid John would leave. Just like her pet, the trolls, her brother, her mom, and everyone else. Yes, she loved speaking with John, loved it and feared it. Some days, it just brought her more pain than joy.
She made up her mind. Summoning her determination, Rose picked up the phone.
“Hi, Rose! What’s up?”
“John… about next week.”
“Yah?”
“My deadline is soon, and I’m sorry, but I won’t be able to see you. Good luck with your show.”
A pause, and a frustrated breath at the other end. John had seen through the excuse.
“Rose. What’s wrong.”
“I just don’t know if we should do this.”
“Rose-”
“I’m sorry, John. I… I can’t.”
Rose hung up the phone.
Rose returned to her writing. As before, she wrote with confidence, the words coming to her without difficulty. She skipped lunch, and only briefly paused for dinner. The house was too small, suffocating her, so she kept writing.
She took no pleasure in it.
The sun rose. Rose closed the blinds.
The doorbell rang. Rose ignored it.
It rang again. And again. Rose stormed downstairs and flung the front door open.
There was John. On his knees. With a ring.
Rose’s breath caught in her throat.
A/N:
EDIT: I realized halfway through writing that the AU is kinda similar to raequim's PTSD. It's not the same continuity, but if you want a bittersweet hornpile cannonball, check it out.
Breathe - To be read while listening to Breathe (2AM) by Anna Nalick.
Rose hung up the phone and sighed. Dave was missing again, and she had spent the last hours trying to comfort Jade. Rose flopped onto her bed and lay there for some time, but predictably, sleep refused to come at her request. She had convinced Jade that Dave was more than capable of handling himself, but had failed to make herself feel better. Several years had past since SBURB, and Dave’s disappearances had been growing in length. As in every reoccurrence, Rose feared this would be the time he simply left and never called again.
She took the phone, and held it on her chest as she lay in bed. She knew she shouldn’t bother him. It was 2AM where he was. Knowing him, though, he would tell her not to be silly, and call him any time. It was selfish, but Rose gave up and punched in the familiar digits.
Three rings later he picked up.
“Hi, John.”
“Rose…”
Rose was silent for a time, happy to just hear his breathing over the line.
John finally broke the silence. “Is it about Dave?”
“No. Well, yes, I suppose you’re right. Jade is still taking it hard, but I’ll confess that I worry too.”
When John didn’t immediately respond, she continued. “I don’t want to talk about him, though. I’ve just been… feeling stressed.”
John started to sound like he was waking up. “What about your book, then? How is that coming?”
“Ugh… different subject please. Writer’s block - I’m putting it aside for a bit. How’s the theater business?”
“Well, it’s going great! My dad pulled some strings, and I’m going to go on tour with a group this summer.”
“That’s wonderful. I’d like to hear about this group…”
~~~
Rose was still in shock. The funeral was over, and she now sat in the enormous house with John, Jade, and Mr. Eggbert. Her mom had fought monsters, killed colossi with her bare hands, and survived everything SBURB had thrown at her. Eight years later, she died in a car accident. Rose hadn’t even cried… the whole matter still felt unreal.
Really, the only emotion she felt was guilt. Throughout their session, and the succeeding years, she had never come to understand her mother.
Rose buried her face in her hands, and attempted to stifle the sobs. After a long moment, John tentatively sat down next to her, put his arms around her shoulders and drew her to him. All of the stress, responsibility, and fear left over from Sburb came rushing to the surface. Then came life on Earth, her anger towards Dave for abandoning them, the frustration of comforting Jade through the years while she felt so twisted inside…
She cried into John’s shoulder, and he held her tight as her breath came in gasps.
~~~
Rose hardly left the house anymore, preferring the solitude of her too-empty mansion. No-one published essays or poetry anymore, so Rose had found an outlet in fiction. Sitting at her computer, she ignored the ever-blinking new email message and plunged back into her tales of magic, betrayal and war, where the heroes grow in strength and in character in a world where no side of the conflict is right. This fervor carries her late into the night, at which point Rose stumbles into bed and is instantly asleep.
Angry red light filters through the window. The forest is on fire. The rhythmic sounds of impacts vibrate the floor. She watches through her screen’s viewport as John makes a mistake, and dies. Rose tries to scream, but can only produce a whisper of noise. Dave won’t be saving them this time. Soon, Jade is lost to her own meteor, and the fire finally engulfs Rose’s house.
5:17 blinks vexingly on her clock, and Rose turned over and went back to bed.
In the morning, she went to the kitchen for coffee, and shot the calendar a leery glance. John had a huge show in Tennessee that could be the turning point in his career. In a week, he would be driving up to New York to meet her and celebrate. At first she had been excited when they planned it several months ago, but that feeling had since turned into a gathering dread. She had worked so hard to piece herself together again, and didn’t want to rock the boat. Rose was content in this house, alone with her writings. Being honest with herself, though, she was afraid John would leave. Just like her pet, the trolls, her brother, her mom, and everyone else. Yes, she loved speaking with John, loved it and feared it. Some days, it just brought her more pain than joy.
She made up her mind. Summoning her determination, Rose picked up the phone.
“Hi, Rose! What’s up?”
“John… about next week.”
“Yah?”
“My deadline is soon, and I’m sorry, but I won’t be able to see you. Good luck with your show.”
A pause, and a frustrated breath at the other end. John had seen through the excuse.
“Rose. What’s wrong.”
“I just don’t know if we should do this.”
“Rose-”
“I’m sorry, John. I… I can’t.”
Rose hung up the phone.
Rose returned to her writing. As before, she wrote with confidence, the words coming to her without difficulty. She skipped lunch, and only briefly paused for dinner. The house was too small, suffocating her, so she kept writing.
She took no pleasure in it.
The sun rose. Rose closed the blinds.
The doorbell rang. Rose ignored it.
It rang again. And again. Rose stormed downstairs and flung the front door open.
There was John. On his knees. With a ring.
Rose’s breath caught in her throat.
Damn. You really know how to reach down inside a girl and twist, don't you? *brushes away a single tear*
I'm the same person here as I am on AO3 and Deviantart, and pretty much everywhere else. Check out my fics and arts and stuff!
Oh man...so much reading to do. Anyway, here's the next part of that space pirate AU I started back in the last thread.
Pirates of the Ether, Part 2
The lower decks on the Spider’s Claw were a messy, crowded affair. Directly beneath the main deck were the sleeping quarters, where everyone slept in hammocks hung messily across the space. Beneath that was the hold, where boxes and crates of supplies and stolen goods sat, along with Tavros’s hydroponic banks. Finally, in the very belly of the ship, the engine room and mechanics decks whirred and hummed. They were a twisted, confusing mass of pipes and conduits and corridors, and only Karkat truly knew his way around down there.
Which is why that’s where he and Terezi went.
Karkat led the way once they were down in his realm; the smell of lubricants and coolant was like a siren song to his sailor’s nose, and he made sure to get them good and lost among the metal and machinery. Tucked into an alcove behind one of the solar power converters, no one would ever find them.
Karkat entered the little space first, and so was taken by surprise when Terezi gave him a hard shove, sending him sprawling to the floor. He had just enough time to roll over before she fell to her knees, straddling his abdomen and grinning like a shark. The faint light from the converter glinted off her red visor, and Karkat’s breath hitched. It always did, no matter how many times they did this. He figured he knew Terezi better than any troll in the ether, and she still had the power to turn him into a half-frightened, half-eager little wriggler. Not that he would ever in a million years tell her that.
Terezi leaned down and they locked lips, and Karkat took the opportunity to undo the ties on her tunic, pushing it off her shoulders. Lightning struck wherever his fingers touched her warm skin, so his hands roved across her body, feeling the taut muscles in her back and stomach. Terezi unbuttoned his shirt, sliding off him so she could get at his neck and chest more comfortably. She buried her nose in the soft spot under his ear.
“You smell like oil and grease,” she whispered, before licking at the same spot. “But you taste like candy red berries…so delicious.”
“It’s fucking freaky when you lick me, you know that right?” Karkat hissed.
Terezi chuckled and dropped little kisses all along his jaw line, and Karkat shivered despite himself. “Shut up and let me enjoy my delectable matesprit,” she snapped, sealing her mouth over his again, pushing the heel of her hand against his crotch. Karkat grunted into their kiss, tangling one hand in Terezi’s hair and probing her mouth with his tongue, his other hand sliding down to cover hers, increasing the pressure.
A sudden shrill alarm made them both jump, and the moment of confusion in Karkat’s eyes hardened into anger as he recognized the sound. “Of all the fucking times…”
Terezi growled and removed her com from her belt, thumbing the activation key. “Yes, Captain?”
“Ms. Pyrope, I need you in my quarters, now,” came the strident reply, followed quickly by, “And how many times have I told you, call me Marquiiiiiiiis!”
“Yes, Ca—Marquise,” Terezi caught herself, gritting her teeth. “I’ll be right there.”
“Hurry! This is important!” The line went dead and Terezi replaced the com on her belt loop.
“She couldn’t have waited ten more fucking minutes?” Karkat snarled, and the set of his jaw, like he had been personally wronged, made Terezi laugh despite her irritation.
“We’ll finish this later,” she said, quickly pulling on her tunic and lacing it up. “I promise.”
Karkat met her eyes for a moment, and then gripped the back of her neck, pulling her down into another fierce kiss. “Don’t think I won’t hold you to that,” he murmured.
“My dear Karkles, I’m counting on it!” Terezi chirped, and then she was gone, having memorized the number of rights and lefts they had taken when they had gone down there, as she always did.
She darted up through the hold and living decks, and then up to the door of the captain’s quarters at the fore of the ship. After taking a moment to compose herself, Terezi knocked smartly and let herself in.
Cap—Marquis Spinneret Mindfang’s quarters were a sight to behold. Nothing was too expensive for the Marquis, and the various surfaces of her chambers were covered in sumptuous rugs, tapestries, and all manner of crystalline and metallic baubles from all corners of the Commune. Terezi paused at a new addition, a finely carved obsidian sea goat, recently plundered from the constellation Sculptor. The Marquis had of course taken all the most exquisite pieces for herself, and several other statuettes in addition to the sea goat lined the shelves, along with a pair of rearing, snarling Ceti that flanked the doorway.
“Tereeeeeeeezi! In here!” Terezi passed between the twin sea monsters and into Marquis Mindfang’s planning room. A huge table dominated the room, covered in maps and charts, and more of the same papered the walls. Little wooden and metal ship and sea creature figurines littered the table’s surface. The Marquis herself stood with her back to the door, leaning over the table and examining a star chart closely. “There you are!” she cried, spinning to face Terezi, her thick mane of jet black hair swirling around her. “You kept me waiting, Ms. Pyrope; I have such great, fantastic plans to share with you!”
“My apologies, Marquis,” Terezi replied politely. She approached the table, taking note of the star chart at the forefront, describing the section of space surrounding the royal ether of the twelfth circle, Pisces. Their current position, at the edge of Sculptor, was towards the lower right of the map. “What are these plans?”
“Oh, they are the best plans, Terezi, the best!” Mindfang cackled. She pointed eagerly at the star map. “We are here, see, heading out of Sculptor space. With my infallible knowledge of star paths, I realized that we are just a few days from the royal trade route that bisects the Great Circle! So, we’re going to head due west, and catch us some rare and expensive treasures!” She beamed wickedly, clearly quite satisfied with herself.
A quick glance at the chart was enough to make Terezi uneasy, however. “But, Marquis, if we sail in that direction, we’ll be heading into Cetus.”
“So?” Mindfang’s smug smirk remained firmly in place.
“So that’s wild space!” Terezi said. “No one lives there, and if we get stranded we’ll be food for the space beasts!”
“Exactly!” Mindfang crowed. “Those goons in the Royal Marines will be so busy looking for nasty critters that they’ll never notice the stealthiest pirate ship in the ether sneaking up on them, and by the time they realize their mistake, they’ll be dead! Literally,” she finished. “Then we’ll take whatever they have on board! I told you it was the best plan!”
She turned back to her charts, eyes triumphant, and Terezi allowed her composure to slip a tiny bit, her jaw clenching in frustration. The Marquis was impossible when she got like this, but Terezi owed it to the safety of the crew to try.
“Marquis,” she began, calmly, slowly, “look at all the fantastic pieces we plundered from the settlement in Sculptor. They’ll sell for thousands on the black market. Now,” Terezi began grabbing star maps off the table, sniffing them until she found the one she wanted. It was a map of the Lower Centrism, many small, unimportant constellations clustered together along the Virgo-Pisces Line. “Look here,” she pointed at a small constellation below Cetus, “we can head southwest instead, and raid Fornax. It’s another Tauren protectorate; they deal in metalwork and weapons. We’ll make out like bandits, and there’s no danger involved in robbing harmless craftstrolls.”
The Marquis seemed to consider it for a moment, before slamming her fist viciously on the table. “No! I’m sick of raiding towns and villages, especially ones that can’t fight back. There’s no challenge in it! What kind of pussy-ass pirates are we if we can’t even hold up a ship?! From this day forward, the crew of the Spider’s Claw will live up to their reputation as the fiiiiiiiiercest and deadliest pirates in the etheeeeeeeer!
“Besides,” Mindfang stabbed at the star map with one long nail, “that’s waaaaaaaay too close to that weakling Eridan’s territory. He’s always trying to leech off my kills, great pirate that I am, and while he usually fails, it’s so annooooooooying having to shoo him away every time I make a score on his turf.”
Terezi slumped inwardly; this was not going to be fun. The Marquis might make light of it, but space beasts were nothing to trifle with. A single bad encounter with a Cetus could leave them shipwrecked, dead in the ether, prey for whatever decided to come along. The crew would just have to hope for the best, and pray to the gods that they weren’t on the menu.
The navigator was jerked from her grim thoughts by a cold hand landing heavily on her shoulder. The clean, sharp smell of steel invaded Terezi’s nostrils, and the foggy image of Mindfang’s robotic left arm floated to the forefront of her mind. Most prosthetics these days strove for a kind of metallic realism; flesh and bone rendered accurately in aluminum and copper and iron. Not the Marquis’s. Hers was vicious, all sharp lines and hard angles, with exposed servos and fingertips made of reinforced alloy, sharpened to points just dull enough to make the process of stabbing someone with them a messy, horrifying affair. It was the Marquis’s most prized possession.
“Tereziiiiiiii…” Mindfang purred, her fangs somewhere just behind Terezi’s ear. “I believe I’m ready to turn in for tonight. Would you caaaaaaaare to assist me?”
“Of course, Marquis.” Terezi kept her voice light, but the request was, of course, no request at all.
“Eeeeeeeexcellent!” Terezi followed Mindfang deeper into her quarters, back to her bedroom. The room was smallish, furnished with a desk and chair, a small bookshelf, a wardrobe, and a large, sumptuous bed, the latter two stolen in a raid on a low ranking noble’s mansion in a small Aquarian protectorate.
Terezi removed Mindfang’s coat and hung it carefully on a hook on the wall. Then came the sword, the pistol, the boots, the tunic, and finally the trousers, all neatly placed where they belonged, until Mindfang stood, naked but for her stockings and the wrappings around her chest and waist. She sat on the bed and waited as Terezi retrieved a delicate looking, beautifully carved comb from the desk, and set about the business of brushing out Mindfang’s long, luscious hair. She mused that many trolls would enjoy this particular duty; the Marquis was quite beautiful in her own sharp, fierce way. Beautiful the way a finely crafted saber is when it spills your guts on the deck.
“Ms. Pyrope, I desire a story; will you tell me onnnnnnnne?” Mindfang sing-songed her request. Terezi, as she did almost every night, fought to ignore the clicks and whirrs of that infernal arm as she said the next lines in their ritual.
“Yes, Marquis. Is there one in particular that you would like to hear?”
“You knoooooooow…”
“Very well, Marquis.” Terezi cleared her throat, and began. “Once upon a time, there was a young troll—"
“A young, beautiful troll!”
“A young, beautiful troll,” Terezi corrected herself, “named Vriska Serket. She was special, for not only was she gorgeous, and smart, and wickedly clever…she was royalty. She was a Spider Child, a daughter of the Eight-Legged One, the Great Mother, destined to one day rule the tenth circle and all the sons and daughters of Scorpio.
“…If she could defeat all her rivals, of course.”
Terezi felt Mindfang tense under the comb, and she smoothly added, “This was no challenge for the beautiful and cunning Vriska Serket, however, for she was the greatest of her line of Spider Children. All of her sisters were jealous of her, or feared her, or both, and very soon she had cowed the great majority of them into being her loyal servants, putting her ahead of themselves as she prepared to take the seat of power over all of her realm."
Mindfang relaxed, and Terezi continued, “But there were some whose jealousy was so great that it turned to hatred. This was nothing new, of course; the daughters of the Great Mother had ever fought and betrayed each other for the right to rule their violent and unintelligent lesser brothers and sisters. But these trolls chose to move against the one true ruler of Scorpio, Vriska the Great, and so made the greatest mistake of all.
“Because they were cowardly, Vriska’s rivals dared not oppose her openly; instead they waited until the cover of night to set their foul plan into motion. As Vriska slept peacefully, they snuck into her dwelling, the grandest and most comfortable of all the Spider Children, and attacked. Vriska fought bravely and well, but the cowards had brought a debilitating drug distilled from the leaves of some tainted plant, and she could not overcome it. In the end, they cut off her arm, and worse, much, much worse, they gouged out her eye. The seven pupiled eye that granted Vriska her Vision Eightfold and a host of other incredible powers, and marked her as a true daughter of the Spider.”
Terezi laid the comb aside and began deftly braiding Mindfang’s hair into one long, thick plait. “Those horrible creatures that dared pretend to Vriska’s throne set her adrift on a ship bound for nowhere, certain they were finally rid of her. But Vriska, being the greatest and strongest troll in all the ether, easily survived their torture. She coerced a passing ship to take her aboard and give her a fine robot arm, whereupon she seized control and named herself their leader. She disposed of those members of the crew not willing to cooperate, and set about plundering and pillaging, a true pirate queen. She called herself Marquis, for that was the title stolen from her, and she knew that, not only was it ever and always hers, one day she would return to Scorpio…and take the throne back.”
Silence fell, the story apparently over, until Mindfang whispered, “And what will Vriska do to her terrible sisters who betrayed her?”
Terezi’s fingers trembled as she worked to finish braiding the black strands. “She will kill them.”
“Yeeeeeeees. She will kill them, slowly. Soooooooo slowly.” Mindfang turned, pulling the just finished braid from Terezi’s hands. “First, she will take from them what they stole from her…an arm,” she drew one hard metal fingertip over Terezi’s left shoulder joint, “and an eye.” Terezi felt the same finger tapping against her visor. She mastered the impulse to flinch. “Then she will skin them alive, burn them, break them, make them scream and cry and beg for mercy…’Please, Vriska, don’t kill us! We love you! We will serve you forever!’ Oh, Vriska will loooooooove their screams, they will be so sweet…” Mindfang was pressing closer and closer to Terezi, and Terezi was withdrawing, trying to be subtle, doing her best to appear calm and relaxed. “And then…at the end…she will feed them to the Great Mother, as all the lowest traitors and scum are. And she will finally be…Marquis…Vriskaaaaaaaa…Serkeeeeeeeet…”
Terezi waited, the only sounds those of their breathing and the gentle thrumming of the ship’s engines. Then it happened: Mindfang pushed forward and pressed her lips to Terezi’s. They were hot and dry, and Terezi fought to keep the bile from rising to her throat, simultaneously doing her best to appear receptive, desirous, even. Mindfang deepened the kiss, pushing her tongue into Terezi’s mouth, and Terezi couldn’t help but clench her fists on the fabric of her slacks, praying that it would soon end. It’s just Karkat, it’s just Karkat, she thought frantically, but although Karkat was many things, belligerent, rough, angry, and uncompromising among them, he was none of the things the kiss was: possessive, greedy, and endlessly hungry.
Finally, after a small eternity, Mindfang pulled away, and Terezi could feel her licking her lips in enjoyment. “Thank you, Ms. Pyrope,” she murmured. “That will be all.”
Terezi, forcing herself to move slowly, calmly, stood up from the bed and moved to the door. “Goodnight, Marquis.”
“Goodnight, Ms. Pyrope.”
--
Terezi sprinted from the door of the Marquis’s quarters to the railing, and spent the next ten minutes retching into black space.
A/N:
So I'm kind of worried I came on too strong with Vriska's characterization. Thoughts, anyone? Also, hopefully next time we will get to actual pirating!
Also, this is HELLA FUCKING LATE, but Ganato, the fact that you dedicated the epilogue of My Demii2e to me was...I don't even have the words. Thank you, SO MUCH. Also, it was awesome and kinda made me cry.
Last edited by Aerodactylus; 01-09-2011 at 12:30 AM.
Reason: forgotten SUPA PROPS
I used to think that fan-fictions were stupid, and had no point in ever existing other than making your least favorite character look stupid.
And then I saw this thread.
And now I've been thinking the complete opposite.
In fact, I just made my own:
HELP THAT NEVER ARRIVED
"You fuckiing ASTH-HOLE!"
Sollux sends a chair flying at Eridan, hitting him soundly in the head with a (poorly-drawn) "THUNK!"
"Who elthe diid you kiill?!"
Sollux begins to flip the fuck out.
Eridan is a bit nervous at the boy's rage.
Sollux is suddenly all over him, his hands clamping firmly around Eridan's... troll-word for "throat".
...
...
Perhaps we should take a quick rewind, a-back in time.
(performs a rewinding of time)
That's better...
...
...
A law of all the universes was broken.
Done by a man eager to test his power. He was on the verge of another success, but it backfired in the end.
And now, his vision is blurring, and he begins to feel different.
But, no, another form appears, giving him hope of completing the task he was going to do so easily.
It would be harder. Much more difficult. But it'd be worth it. He does not want to see what would happen if the current transformation continued for much longer.
And thus, he enters...
...
A WHILE LATER...
"NO! G---ET OUT!"
And with that, Eridan was unceremoniously booted from Feferi's respiteblock.
And he hates unceremonious things.
Especially when Vriska, Kanaya, and Sollux all happen to be walking by right at the same moment in time.
Which happened to be the case here.
"Ooooooooh, look at the failure we have here. At least some 8lackromey h8 is still availa8le with her..."
Vriska snickers, and as Eridan starts to walk away, trying to maintain his composure, Kanaya can't help but chuckle as well.
Sollux, however, is another story. He squints his eyes at the wandering Prince of Hope...
...and a little more later than that...
"WHERE THE FUCK IS EVERYONE?"
Terezi and Vriska laugh at this outburst, while Kanaya tries to help Karkat with the situation.
"Karkat, You Called This Arrangement Together Merely Two Minutes Ago. A Small Allowance of Patience Would Be Helpful."
"SERIOUSLY, FUCK YOU. WHERE IS GAMZEE?!"
"He Is Relaxing In His Pile Of One-Note Instruments"
Kanaya points to the horn pile, where Gamzee, sure enough, is snoozing. Equius approaches him, rather disgusted.
The Heir of Void speaks as if Gamzee can actually hear him... Though he probably could.
"D--> How can you act like this? I'm beginning to question whether I should trust you simply from b100d..."
"D--> Are you even paying attention?... I need a towel... Someone resting in a pile of horns is absolutely preposterous... I would never do such a thing in all my-"
Equius Zahhak flops forward into the pile of horns.
Vriska giggles from her success, as Gamzee pops open one eye to extract the fee-of-sleeping cost out of Equius's pocket.
Karkat starts shaking with rage. Sollux is calming him down, right as Tavros enters the room.
"uHH, hI EVERYBODY, sORRY I'M LATE."
Vriska's eye catches Tavros...
Tavros suddenly starts to stiffen up a bit...
"GOG-DAMN IT, DO ANY OF YOU KNOW WHY YOU'RE HERE?"
"We Were Waiting For You To Speak."
Vriska pulls out the chair next to her a bit, and motions Tavros to sit next to her.
He starts shaking like a maraca set on 300X-speed
Tavros approaches the empty chair next to Karkat, but his mind suddenly goes blank.
"FUCK, VRISKA. ARE YOU USING YOUR MIND-POWERS AGAIN?"
The Page of Breath suddenly does a fucking acrobatic pirouette over the table and into the chair next to Vriska.
He suddenly snaps back to attention and shivers in horror.
Vriska looks at him long enough to make him sink into his seat. Soon, only his horns are visible above the table.
Sollux and Terezi chuckle a bit, while Karkat and Kanaya...
NOT AMUSED.
...
Regardless, in comes Nepeta.
She happily purrs, and leaps into the seat next to Karkat. Karkat shies away a bit. Nepeta stretches her legs and extends her blue retractable claws.
This unnerves Karkat even further, while Equius slowly stands from the horn pile.
He rubs the side of his head and...
*POUNCE*
gets tackleslide'd by Nepeta.
"H3H3H3H3H3..."
"Karkat, What Again Did You Announce This Meeting For?"
"WE'RE AT THE END OF THE FUCKING LINE HERE. SOMETHING BAD IS GOING TO GO DOWN, AND WE DON'T HAVE A FLIPPING FUCK OF AN IDEA WHAT IT COULD BE."
"We can't know for suuuuuuuure if it's 8ad or not."
"THAT VOWEL EXTENSION WAS SO UNNECESSARY IT MAKES ME WANT TO PUKE."
Eridan saunters in.
"kar, wwhat issue to you havve to talk about noww?"
"YOU'RE LATE, ASSWIPE."
"Perhaps He Is Merely Timely, And The Rest Of Us Were Catastrophically Early"
"SHUT UP, KANAYA."
"SERIOUSLY, WHERE THE HELL IS FEFERI?"
"Last time I saw her was when she had 8 Eridan out in her respiteblock for asking her out... Again..."
Vriska grins evilly, as Eridan hangs his head slightly.
"i... i'm a fucking idiot..."
"YOU H4VE TH4T R1GHT! H3H3H3..."
Sollux looks a bit uneasy.
"You guyth... ii'm not thure iif Feferii iith okay..."
He suddenly flees the room. The rest of them follow.
"ii mean... Thiith iithn't liike her at all..."
Sollux is the first to arrive at Feferi's door, well before the others have even rounded the corner.
Sollux knocks on Feferi's door.
No answer.
He knocks a little harder, his hands beginning to shake.
Still nothing.
He opens the door slowly, not noticing the 8 trolls breathing into his ears from behind.
It makes a small creaking sound, and the first thing he sees is a small glimmer of violet.
Sollux's glasses fall off as his face reels back. His eyes widen.
Feferi is laying on the ground. Her googles have fallen off, revealing her shining eyes, wide open.
Just like her mouth.
The mouth that was open to scream, but silenced by the sinister object that had been pushed through her skull.
Her body lay on the floor, her torso twisted ever so slightly to the right, along with her head.
Her right hand lay on the floor, reaching out towards the door, as if calling to Sollux for help.
Help that never arrived.
The giant gash at the side of her head was visible.
As was the glimmering violet blood that slowly dripped from the wound, leaving a strange contrast to the bland, yet clean floor.
Emotions rushed at once, and yet no movement did.
She was dead.
There was no doubt. No possibility or hope of saving her life. Her life that had been filled with potential before being pulled away by the atrocity of SGrub.
The game that Sollux had introduced to them.
Sollux was the first to move, as he quickly excused himself from the room.
The rest of the trolls, now including the ever-sleepy Gamzee, just stared.
Terezi suddenly took charge of the situation, realizing what needed to be done.
The ellipsis is truly the Swiss army knife of English grammar. I too rather enjoy it's use.
Obviously, from the intro to this, Eridan will be accused of the murder most foul. Also Vriska's casual mind control bitchery is... entirely in keeping with her casual bitchiness.
The tense of the story did seem to change a bit, as was noted in the meta spoiler at the bottom. Other than that, nice fic.
From this distance, it resembled the moon in size. It would take another six hours to truly reach it. The ring could have sped things up considerably; the last leg was relatively safe, as the outer gods rarely stray too close to the Sun. It wouldn't save them any time, though. They would simply be waiting for the Tumor to tick down to zero.
Rose wasn't inclined to let him touch the ring again, anyway.
"...you can feel all the-"
"Threads, yes."
From Rose's mystically-shielded viewpoint, she could easily visualize them. A maelstrom of twine, spiraling out from the Sun in more directions than could possibly be understood in three dimensions. Innumerable civilizations across the span of all creation were at the whim of this virescent monstrosity, their wills and hopes seized, thwarted by its machinations even before their emergence.
She hated it.
The Dersian was oddly silent on the matter. She wondered if he felt the same.
"How far back can you trace them?"
"I would need to select some individual threads."
"Try it! Like, a last bit of practice."
She chose one, and focused.
She had to draw her inner line of sight forward - far forward - along this line of fate. It was unlike anything she had yet experienced; her practice sessions, as good as she was, were only with localized knots of fate, excepting those that ran through herself. The Dersian's intervention had realigned her destiny with a return to the Incipisphere, though it quickly frayed away again at whatever the Rift was. Rose looked forward to a degree of freedom, there. Apparently, Skaia wouldn't need her or her friends after they made their unnatural "exit".
She wondered what her friends would think of the little guy, assuming he accompanied her through. Clubs and John would probably hit it off nicely.
Anyway, time to focus, Lalonde. Let's see... A small world rested on the end of this thread, with a frog temple worshipped by low-stooping quadrupeds of a dark persuasion. Through the thread, an omnipotent green-white firefly presided over the congregation, warding believers away from the inner sanctum. And then-
It tapered off. Seems her mission's success would reach this world before too much damage was done.
She tried another line. It appeared to lead to... a colossal world of multi-winged... She couldn't describe them. Like bats, perhaps? But far, far more graceful. They resided in structures atop enormous plants, towering miles and miles above a vast ocean - the domain of a finned First Guardian the size of an aircraft carrier. The Sun's destruction wouldn't reach this universe within its lifetime. She saw the Guardian's origin through a Sburb-analogue.
The session's players failed, and perished.
She traced another. A tripedal, plant-like race, ruled and led by a First Guardian of its own kind, boasting ever-more-impressive organic technology until its downfall. Yet another. An ant-like race of bipedal, tribal marauders. Had Sburb's founding race placed a preference not only on genetic lifeforms, but on those races who were characterized by culture and contest? Were docile civilizations unused to competition amongst themselves or games simply wiped out by futile sessions? Or did Sburb have the "mercy" to exclude them from creation altogether?
Fascinating as it was, the experience wasn't helping her temper. She stopped.
"I can see countless worlds. Many beautiful, some terrible. None of them free."
"Will what you're, ah... blowing up the thing? Will that help them?"
"The lucky ones. I can't see what happens to them after the Sun loses influence, of course."
"Oh, I see."
"Sburb still operates regardless, I'd assume."
"Who?"
"Ah, we never got around to that, did we? Your Skaia isn't the only one. There are copies creating universes throughout the metaverse. I mentioned multiple Incipispheres, did I not?"
"Yeah, but I thought all universes were called that."
"The large planet you saw your ring pass through is my shattered homeworld. It resides in a universe separate from any instance of Skaia. Not that Skaia cares; your Reckoning turned it into a lifeless wasteland, pounding my race into oblivion."
"Oh..."
This wasn't helping her temper, either. Not many conversations had, ever since Clubs had boasted the tact and courtesy to point a blade at her chest.
"Are there any places where Skaia - um, Skaias - can't control things?"
"Planets where civilization never advances far enough to activate it, perhaps. Though, those would hardly be considered utopias. Other than that, quite possibly all of them. Skaia creates the universes in the first place."
"Wait, so there are no universes without Skaia messing with them?"
"There existed an originating race that created and programmed Skaia, the universe-creating system, in the first place. They might have somehow come from a free universe. However, I wouldn't be surprised if theirs was paradoxically created by a later session, as well. You've seen yourself how variable time can be, between realities."
"Nowhere, huh..."
The Dersian remained silent for a while.
---
You would imagine that a sun with the mass of two universes would be brighter.
It was still blindingly bright, of course. Without magical protection, it would probably burn out her eyes - and shortly afterward, the rest of her body. But Rose doubted the light and heat even began to approach that of her home Sun, even though they were close enough that its lime surface encompassed the entire forward side of their vision, and further. They had to face directly away, while they waited through their countdown; it was almost impossible not to see the Sun.
"We have just over fifteen minutes remaining."
"So, ten seconds before it blows, you 'un-catch-a-frog' it, and I warp it to the center? That's it?"
"Please attempt to remember to warp us home, within those five seconds. It's not a crucial step, but something tells me you would regret doing otherwise."
"Oh, uh, sorry."
She held out the ring. Clubs reached for it.
"You have a decent grasp of where 'home' is, right?"
"Sure do! I know I can feel it with the ring, at least. But if you want to be extra sure, I can pull your thread and-"
She clutched the ring back before he could touch it.
"Don't you fucking dare."
"No, no! I didn't mean it that way! I'll never do that again! I promised!"
"Good. I saw my thread leading home, anyway. I'll make it."
"Yeah, I know."
They stayed apart for a minute, looking as far away from each other as they could without half-staring into the blinding Sun. Eventually, Rose relinquished the ring. Clubs took it and slipped it on, attaining his winged dog-like form. He remained distant.
---
"Five minutes, Clubs."
"You might wanna prepare that bomb early, y'know. Just in case."
"...I suppose ignoring the formal precautions would be reckless, despite the temporal guarantee of our success."
It couldn't change the outcome of a thread to whom they were both subject. A pawn of fate cannot completely defy their own thread's outcome, and only unconnected entities could wholly redirect it. It's not as if threads can break.
She retrieved the Tumor from its card in her sylladex, letting it float in the space in front of them.
"I'm coating this with a strong protective ward. It can only stand the force of the Green Sun's interior for about twenty seconds, if we're lucky. Make sure you don't launch it earl-"
*BWOOONG.*
"...what the hell?!"
The Tumor was gone.
"WHAT DID YOU DO?"
"I moved it somewhere you won't find it in the next few minutes."
"Is that so?"
"I'm sending you back."
"You can't stop the Green Sun's destruction. The same thread that's through the Tumor runs through you until it's destroyed-"
"That's not what I meant. I'm sending you back and blowing it up myself."
"Do you think I would fall for that? What are you attempting without me present to stop-"
"I'm staying behind. I'm not coming back with you."
Huh?
"...what do you gain by staying here?"
"I dunno. I can stay away from the blast with my warpy powers, so I'll be fine."
"You can't even breathe out here without the Green Sun's power, fueling your ring. You'll just die."
"Not if I follow one of those threads! With the reverse-thingies, I can keep going anywhere the past Green Sun hasn't stopped shining. Then I can find someplace I like, maybe even a universe that doesn't-"
"Bullshit. I know you can't trace threads unless they intersect with something. Without me, once the Sun blows, your roadmap vanishes as well."
"I, uh... maybe I'll learn."
"Alright, fine. I smacked you around a bit. That's no reason to throw it all away. You're still better off-"
"There's more than one of me, isn't there?"
"Don't change the subject!"
"But you talk about stopping the Jack Noir from 'your session'! If there's lots of Skaias and lots of Jack Noirs, there's lots of me, isn't there?"
"We have less than four minutes. You'll have plenty of time to fly off the handle once we're safe."
"All those 'me's are trapped just like I was! All of them! I just got this lucky one-in-a-bazillion tipoff from nowhere, and now I'm the only one that's free!"
"Tipoff?"
"It just said to get 'out', that's all. And if I go back, I'll get trapped again and it's all useless!"
"You don't know that. We can't tell what's beyond the Rift."
"Your big silver thread led out. Out is here. So I'm staying here! Find one of the 'me's that didn't stab you and make friends with him."
"None of them saved my life."
"Bye, Rose."
*BWOOONG.*
In the light of the energy whisking her away, Rose caught a fleeting sight against the backdrop of the Green Sun.
A flimsy, jet-black thread coursed through the Dersian. Thinner than a strand of hair. Almost unnoticeable.
She wasn't sure what it meant... but perhaps this one had indeed carved out his own destiny.
---
It took her almost a minute to adjust her eyes to the light of Skaia, however distant it was at the edge of the Incipisphere. She was floating at their exit point, above a now-shattered Derse. Jack had certainly been busy.
A rhythm pulsed through the Incipisphere, one to which Rose had previously been blind. Threads of all colors and flavors danced and mingled, weaving fateful tales for the lives of souls and soulless alike. Artificial meaning, forced purposes, perhaps. On first sight, however... one could not observe this mesh of purpose in its entirety, this ballet of meaning, without feeling a profound sense of awe.
It was beautiful.
She looked down at herself. The dress Kanaya had made for her was tattered. Some lingering bruises and nicks from her journey showed through the gaps; her wrist was still a bit swollen, as well.
She retrieved John's gushers, dispensed two into her hand.
Rose couldn't bring herself to eat them. She should have left some of them with Clubs.
---
She pulled herself together, and took out her headset.
-- tentacleTherapist [TT] began pestering grimAuxiliatrix [GA] --
TT: Good afternoon, Kanaya.
GA: Is This Politeness I Hear
GA: Politeness From You Is Most Certainly No Indication That You Have Yet Another Pointless Cross Timeframe Errand For Me To Run
TT: Oh, is this such a bad time?
TT: I sincerely apologize.
GA: Having Me Do These Random Things Cannot Distract Me From Your Suicide Mission Forever
GA: But Fine
GA: I Have Quite Little To Occupy Myself On This Blasted Rock Anyway
GA: Just
GA: One Moment
TT: Hm?
GA: Where Did Sollux Run Off To
GA: ?
GA: The Timeline Tracker Seems To Be Bugged
GA: It Is Not Giving Me The Correct Time Of Contact
TT: Are you certain?
GA: Yes
GA: Unless
GA: Oh
GA: ...
TT: Am I discovered, already?
TT: I must have been smiling too wide on your screen.
GA: Oh My God
GA: You
GA: Oh My God
TT: I told you there was nothing to worry about.
TT: Why do you seem so worked up?
GA: Fuck You And Your Snooty Sarcasm Lalonde
GA: Not Even You Thought You Would Make It
GA: And Everyone You Cared To Let In On This Little Plan Thought You Were Dead
GA: I Was
GA: Just
TT: I hate to interrupt you, Kanaya.
TT: However, if this point was too late on my timeline for you to consider checking the viewport, I don't have much time.
GA: Yes Rose An Errand Is Exactly What I Am Seeking Right Now
TT: My friends know more about the Rift than I do.
TT: How soon does it happen?
TT: And more importantly, what is the entry process?
GA: Did My Sarcasm Not Sink In
GA: I Would Expect You Of All People To Have Noticed It
TT: Hurry, Kanaya.
TT: You might not get another chance.
GA: Fine
GA: First Of All
The Rift itself was rather ominous and impressive. A tear in reality, disintegrating open through the dimension like a wound cut with a ragged blade. Anything that could quake space itself was bound to be unsettling.
Unlike her friends scattered throughout the session, Rose only barely registered these things. She was too busy doubling over in pain, clutching her head desperately.
Deafening screams, right next to her ears. Metal crunching against metal, nails against chalkboards. Alarming heat, agonizing cold. Asleep limbs, a dry throat. Suffocation. Drowning.
Those feelings distilled, rolled together... it was a horrifying essence of distress, of wrongness. Unrelenting, it gushed in through her newfound senses. She would have thrown up if her stomach weren't so empty.
The threads had met their match.
Snapping, splitting, twisting, breaking! She could see it, hear each cord as it flailed and fell apart, even with her eyes closed and ears covered. It was as if Fate itself reeled in agony with each thread that weakened, failed, in an uncontrollable cascade of shrieking ruin.
The Great Undoing.
As the gravity of the disaster descended upon her, Rose found no solace in her only distracting thought.
"Did... did I do this?!"
---
*BWOOONG!!*
The Tumor was back. Its countdown timer was easy to sense, through its thread. He just had to wait.
Skaia was small-time. This stupid, large Sun thing was weaving so many threads that it looked like a...
Dammit, he can't even think of a good metaphor! Every animal he brings to mind just makes him hungrier. He's starving so hard it hurts and Rose isn't here and he still doesn't know what to do after he blows up the big dumb Sun and and...
And just what the hell was he doing, anyway?
This silver thread was supposed to lead out. Killing this Sun could cut down on some threads, but that wasn't all there was supposed to be. It meant more than this! This is just nothing, death isn't a way out! Is it?
Maybe not even that is.
Rose mentioned at some point about a friend that was brought back to life, one who spoke of experiences on the other side, despair and searching. Maybe the dead are just as trapped as the living... even if you leave out the possibility of being "ripped back to existence only to be used again", like Rose put it.
Oh, stop, stop. You're not dead yet! You've gotten outta stickier situations than this. Just get some more information, look for an escape route like you told her you would.
Dammit, the ring makes spacetime stuff easy, but its too much noise to sort through all these threads this way.
He took a deep breath, then closed his eyes and slipped off the ring.
It seared.
Good thing Dersian carapaces were strong stuff. He bore the pain for several seconds, searching hard amongst the threads for something, anything short enough to trace to a source.
No dice.
He put the ring back on. Just in time: he and the Tumor had nearly plunged to the Green Sun's surface.
*BWOOONG!!* Back in position. Whew.
So... there's no way out of here! Except back to Skaia, and you're not going there again. Anyway, it's not that bad. Plenty of time to think of an awesome last-minute plan. I mean, you've got all of - let's see - 40 seconds.
...wait.
Shit.
30 seconds.
Is that it? You're dead?
20 seconds.
No... that's not it. Nobody else has gotten here before besides you and Rose, and you're the only guy in the metaverse that gets to see this thing die.
10 seconds.
Might as well sit back and watch the show.
*BWOOONG!!* The Tumor went into the Sun.
*BWOOONG!!* *BWOOONG!!* *BWOOONG!!* He warped back along the path he'd taken with Rose a bit. The Green Sun looked moon-sized now.
The explosion made the Droll wish he had sunglasses.
---
He basked in the glow of the Sun's dying remnants. Great hunks of mass, larger than anything in any universe had right to be, circled the nebulous corpse of their parent star. As their power dimmed and flickered away, the Droll's ring began to blink out in turn. The power it afforded him was fading.
He'd blown up the Sun.
Had anything really changed?
The Droll's thoughts turned to the countless alternate selves he'd never seen, winking in and out of existence as mere pawns of Skaia. Had he earned a merely temporary reprieve from their collective fate?
The explosive force of the Tumor had died down. The gargantuan shards of the Sun began to reverse their courses, foretelling a violent collapse at their origin.
The ring flickered still.
Maybe dying is the way out.
Maybe you can die really hard, so hard that it shatters your very soul. Maybe that's where freedom lies.
He was angry that he wouldn't get a last meal.
The Droll used the remainder of his ring's fading power. He warped himself to the epicenter, and the Green Sun's remains converged on him at an impossible speed.
Collapse.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
---
Horrorterrors screamed and recoiled over incalculable distances and timeframes, fleeing in a gross mockery of their established appellations. Creation unfurled around him like a map, as simple to understand and traverse as the human mind. Universes like bubbles of light, inviting. The hills and valleys of the metaverse, a playground.
The former Droll was pleased. No thread could hold him now, no strand of fate was truly immutable. Destroying them was nearly as elementary as spinning his own.
As he wove his new form a fitting coat out of the fabric of surrounding space-time, he considered his next move. He was out. He was free!
But he was still very, very hungry.
A/N
Yup, that's what I was planning all along, since I came up with the idea. Was it too obvious?
Anyway, I need feedback/criticism remarks like Vriska needs muffins. In other words, all of them.
But please try not to spoil the ending for those who haven't read it!
CD is the shortest person in the incipisphere. ha ha ha ha ha xD
also "we need to get closer" = "we need to go deeper" y/n (bwoooooong)
Best of Forum Games Quote Archive brought to you by the Obliteration Party Station.
Originally Posted by absoluteCertainty
why is everyone roleclaiming
seriously if there is an obliterate tomorrow
and the next day
and the next day
and the day after that
etc.
14:26 <Deceptive> Once you get sucked into the vortex of mafia it is hard to escape.
22:46 CheeseDeluxe I was right about Patashu the whole time
22:46 CheeseDeluxe And nobody gave a damn
22:46 CheeseDeluxe ;^;
22:46 PrimeIntellect of course not
22:46 PrimeIntellect i was hungry
20:25 TallyBot No votes have been cast.
20:25 TallyBot A majority has been reached.
20:25 TallyBot beruru has died.
20:25 Trout Tallybot: "A no lynch? fuck that, kill beru."
22:27 ACionyx: 3 ( Sotek Trout Zatch ).
22:27 TallyBot A majority has been reached.
22:27 TallyBot nolynch has died.
11:01 Godbot LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL
11:01 Godbot that is your victory call
11:01 Godbot it's right here in my field guide
11:01 Godbot I have this little whistle to mimic your call
11:01 Godbot and some earplugs
Originally Posted by Epamynondas
Remember when you were in school, and half of the class was talking, and the teacher told you to shut up, and you answered that everybody else was talking too?
Remember when the teacher asked you how that changed the fact that you were talking?
Yeah, it's the same.
Except this time you'll die.
23:19 Sotek beru is only happy if she can make people eat words >:|
23:19 Sotek IT IS THE ONLY WAY SHE KNOWS JOY
Originally Posted by Sotek
Originally Posted by Chumpy
nick cage represents sanity
When does this happen?
when it is covered in bees
16:28 Patashu the only reason why you people die n1 is because you're the only people who know how to play mafia here
22:08 curiousCat I just keep going
22:08 curiousCat like an energizer bunny
22:08 curiousCat but like
22:09 curiousCat made of rotting flesh
19:58 Chirality "Hey Chiral, you now are supposed to have sick fetishes"
19:58 Watts Have an oblit fetish then
19:58 Chirality I got over it
19:58 Chirality When there was no one else to oblit
20:32 Chirality Physicists keep talking about space-time
20:32 Chirality It's actually space-derp-time
20:32 Chirality derp is an integral part of the universe
20:41 x1372 "The sacrifice is a gun that the witches accidentally shoot themselves in the foot with."
20:41 x1372 "the angel protection vote is more akin to a pillow"
20:41 curiousCat uh, no
20:41 x1372 "chumpy just used that pillow to decapitate the priest"
20:41 curiousCat The sacrifice is a gun the witches were using to intentionally shoot themselves in the foot with.
20:42 curiousCat P:
20:42 x1372 well
20:42 x1372 its just a good thing that's never become an issue in any of the dersehunt games
20:42 x1372 ANYWAY.
Originally Posted by Chirality
Never. Try. To. Control. Killers.
That would be all.
[23:23] <x1372> chiral isn't happy with victory
[23:23] <x1372> he's only happy when the moderator is weeping
<Wattz> Some people want to be the master of scumhuntmon
<Wattz> No fuck that
<Wattz> I wanna kill 'em all
<Wattz> Jan Valentine standin' proud on a charred mountain of blood and guts
<Wattz> scratchin' his crotch and smokin' a cigar
<Wattz> "Welp, time to go home and masturbate"
<Wattz> Like he always promised ;w;
<Wattz> Sotek should be banned from tournament play
<Trout> Sotek is the zapdos/pit of mafia
<gloomyMoron> Are there any minors here? Because this conversation is gold. But like gold that's been covered in feces and is filthy, but I can't tell whether it's hilarious or sad.
<Wattz> We would like to take this opportunity to remind you that the IRC cannot speak.
<Wattz> In the event that the IRC does speak, we urge you to disregard its advice.
[01:32] <Wattz> I can finger exactly one scum based on pretty much nothing
[22:40] <Chirality> werupu?
[22:40] <Chirality> Is that the evil self of Beruru
[22:40] <Chirality> Oh wait, Beruru is the evil self
[21:47] <Chirality> And on Beru's side, I think that she'd try to take down the Harper government before going for one city in a country she doesn't live in
[21:47] <Chirality>
[21:48] <Blueberry> well harper isn't the mafia is he
[21:48] <Chirality> Of course he is
<Brocrates> have you seen a diagram of female sexual organs
<Brocrates> ^u^ is that
<Brocrates> obviously
<Loather> only diagrams, bro
<Loather> only diagrams
[01:58] <Chirality> But, Yes beru
[01:58] <Chirality> You should be having adventure time in your bed now
[20:11] <soundlyParanoid> BUSTED LIKE A FIVE DOLLAR WHORE GOING DOWN ON AN UNDERCOVER POLICEMAN
[21:54] <Sotek> I successfully ate food without any getting into my hole!
<Jacquerel> turns out mafia was throwing soiled toilet paper at a giant crocodile
<Acionyx> PLEASE GOD(FATHER)
<Acionyx> JUST ONE VOTE
<beruru> you're the godfather
<Acionyx> SHIT
[20:53] <DeceptiveGM> Prime was...
[20:53] -->| Schazer (~Schazer@182.54.164.92) has joined #mspafia
[20:53] <Acionyx> PRIME WAS SCHAZER
[13:50] <CheeseDeluxe> You're fucking an /entire/ zoo?
[13:50] <CheeseDeluxe> that's gonna be hard :x
[13:51] <Acionyx> well it's kind of hard to do soft
[16:45] <Watts> If there was an internet equivalent to pantsing you could do it to me and I would prance about with my virtual ding-dong wobbling around
<Tallybot> beruru rides like a mechanical bull!
[18:59] <GenetiXientist> I'M JUST MAKING AN OBSERVATION
[18:59] <soundlyParanoid> THAT WON'T SAVE YOU FROM SARCASTIC REMARKS
[18:59] <GenetiXientist> WHY NOT?
[19:00] <soundlyParanoid> Y NOT GOT LYNCHED
[23:38] PrimeIntellect my pain
[23:38] PrimeIntellect is unbearable
[23:38] PrimeIntellect unberuable
[23:38] PrimeIntellect i cannot beru it
Originally Posted by imperviousScofflaw
I understand that my role is too bad-ass and you think that I can't possibly be what I claim, but I am NOBUNAGA, MOTHERFUCKERS. I DON'T GIVE SHITS, I CONQUER THEM.
17:44 Eidolonic Has anyone that I remotely trust with my mental health looked over the setup?
17:45 Eidolonic It's not that I don't trust you, Tea, it's just
17:45 Deceptive you don't trust tea with your mental health?
17:45 Eidolonic Would you?
17:45 Deceptive oh god no
17:46 Eidolonic It's like when I had sex with your mother, and felt like my dick was on fire.
17:46 Eidolonic Firections.
17:46 Eidolonic Hm.
Originally Posted by absoluteCertainty
obviously i am the pants charmer
i play my flute
the pants come off
"YOU SICK FUCK. FEFERI IS DEAD AT OUR FEET, AND YOU'RE SHITTING AROUND TASTING HER BLOOD?!"
Terezi then realized that it was time to get serious.
"F1N3, 1'LL G3T DOWN TO 1NV3ST1G4T1NG..."
"YOU DO THAT."
Suddenly, a sharp pain had entered the side of Karkat's thigh.
He looked down to see Nepeta, shiny-eyed and with blue claws lightly sunken into his pant leg.
"DO I HAVE A SIGN ON MY BACK THAT SAYS "PLEASE ANNOY THE SHIT OUT OF ME, I FEEL LIKE HAVING MY SHIT BRUTALLY AND PAINFULLY DEVOURED FROM ANNOYANCE OUT OF ME TODAY?!""
":33< not really."
"OR MAYBE A "PLEASE DIG YOUR CLAWS INTO MY LEG AND TEAR OUT ALL OF MY INTERNAL ORGANS" SIGN?!"
":33< nope."
"THEN WHY ARE YOU EVEN HERE? DIDN'T TEREZI TELL YOU TO SCRAM?"
";33< i'm here to make sure you two don't get into anything... purrverse."
Karkat sighed, making sure to not look too embarrassed. Nepeta looked pleased with herself, even if it didn't make any sense within the context of the situation.
At least she had let go of him.
"LEAVE, NEPETA. GO CHASE SOME DIRT-LICKING MOUSE."
":33< i'm staying right here!"
"1T'S OK4Y K4RK4T."
Terezi stood up.
"1 H4V3 TH3 3V1D3NC3... H3H3H3."
"WHAT'S SO FUNNY?"
"NOTH1NG, JUST SOM3TH1NG FROM TH4T D4V3 K1D..."
"..."
"WELL?"
"W3LL WH4T?"
"WHAT DID YOU FIND OUT?"
"JUST TRUST M3 K4RK4T."
"WELL SHIT, THAT'S NOT SUSPICIOUS AT ALL."
"S3R1OUSLY, YOU'LL F1ND OUT SOON 3NOUGH..."
Terezi boldly exited the room, followed by the other two.
Terezi and Karkat quickly transportalized to the main room.
Nepeta stood on the transportalizer, but quickly jumped off.
She had heard a noise - a faint noise, but a noise no doubt - coming from another part of the structure.
She walked carefully in that direction, and the noise became clearer.
After turning a corner, she recognized the sound as sobbing.
Rounding a corridor, she spotted Sollux.
He was sitting against the wall, his body tucked into a ball. His face was buried into his knees.
As she cautiously approached him, she noticed a small pool of yellow-tinted liquid forming around his lower body.
Sollux was crying. Weeping.
Mourning.
He knew she was there, but he didn't care.
He just mumbled on about Feferi... And Aradia...
The two people he cared about most... Gone... In only a few hours...
He started rocking forwards and side-ways and flip-ways until he finally toppled over in a destroyed heap.
Nepeta crouched down and starting pawing at his face, trying to cheer him up...
But no, Sollux just flipped over to face the wall,
and cry.
His shoes were matched in yellow tint.
Nepeta couldn't help it. Green tears came to her eyes as well.
The sadness seemed to unite the two.
They allowed themselves to dissolve into tears of anguish.
As they blubbered and bawled aimlessly into the night...
They fell asleep.
A/N or something weird like that...
I was going to do more than this...
But the clock hit 3:14, so I should probably hit the hay.
Also, thanks for the feedback!
Last edited by Doodled; 01-09-2011 at 03:29 AM.
In dedication to Nepeta Leijon: The best meowrail anyone could ask for AO3TindeckTumblr
Pain.
He had known little else for some time now. Those punks, those goddamn spotty brats had done this to him somehow. The prototypings were dragging on his mind, jabbering stupid bullshit nonsense into his ear about some kinda green sun thing. He didn’t know what that meant exactly, but when he got ahold of those gray freak assholes he was gonna cut an explanation out of them.
He could feel them, over the dull roar of agony besetting his whole existence. He could taste their fear, practically see them in his mind’s eye as they fled deeper into the lab away from him. Normally he would have just blasted the installation and its asteroid into drifting fragments, but whatever had happened to him left him too weak. Oh well, he thought, just have to do this like in the ol’ days. Knives an’ elbow grease.
The hallway ended in a door up ahead. He reduced it to glowing slag with a wave of his hand. In the room beyond waited a pair of the grayskin fucks. Coupla broads, he figured. The one on the left was wearing red shades and leaning her chin on a cane, the one on the right tossing a buncha blue things from hand to hand. Both were smiling in a way that made the crow part of him feel extremely nervous.
“Jaaaaaaaack,” the one on the right purred as she flicked her hair back. That eye of hers would have to go, it made him wanna fuckin’ puke.
“Mr. Key Lime,” added the one on the left, before breaking into a menacing giggle.
He raised his sword and snarled with a low, reverbating sound that shook the room. “Geddafuck out my way ‘afore I gut the pair of ya’s.”
The two turned to look at each other, then back to him.
“Oh my. Feisty, isn’t he?”
“Ehehehehe. A regular firecracker.”
Shades grabbed her cane in the middle with both hands and pulled, separating it into two lengths, each terminating in a candy-apple red blade as long as her forearm. Well if they wanted to play it that way, he was game. He raised an arm and willed a bolt of coruscating green energy into existence. A blinding flare obscured his sight for a moment, slowly dying down to reveal…
The two goddamn dames still standin’ there, smirkin’ their stupid hearts out. The one with the fucked-up eye started cackling, joined shortly by Ms. Shades. The laughter was like a railroad spike driven into his already aching head.
“Lousy luck you got there, Jaaaaaaaack.”
“Too bad you won’t get another chance to try that trick.”
As one, the Scourge Sisters flung themselves at him. Two throats in tandem cut loose with an exultant, Erinyean cry of wrathful joy.
And for the first time in his life, Jack Noir felt fear.
Welp it's Rosefic time. In a world where the coldly rationalist Rose is adopted by Bro and raised as a Strider...
The Strider Way
Alright, Strider, calm down. This apparent out-of-body experience you’re having seems insofar as you are concerned to be a real world, place, and universe, and if you’re dead the meteors have killed you already. In addition, the meteors crashing down into a real fucking universe seems to have a high correlation with the fact that the game can manipulate the world itself, play god with physics- So just think, and ponder, get used to your new extreme- and above all don’t panic because you may very possibly be fighting for your very life right now-
The fields of lava turned and roiled, an eternity of geothermal power fueled by a force quite beyond physics, continuously heating the sand piles that accumulated into landmasses and the spires that spiked high up out of the fluid. Above, huge concentrated ashy clouds rained flaming stone onto an uncaring sea. The Land of Heat and Rain, a world undisturbed, a world that shall be undisturbed.
Save for the one day in which disturbance occurs, and the status quo changes.
An apartment, beige, distinctly different from the rest of the scorched stone the world was forged from- manifests from nowhere, deposited by a cradle of glowing geometric curves.
The house stood on a network of granite and marble lattices which had stood there since the beginning, waiting for its payload- and they were more than enough to support the weight of the whole building.
In events resulting in extreme adrenaline and panic, find something minor, trivially easy but mentally reliant, to focus on. This helps condense yourself back to rationality and reality, if such an idea applies in this place. Ignore the flying flashing avian thing.
The flying crow-face didn’t help her return to thinking, though, and looking at the glowing sphere just reminded her of the huge expanses of flaming liquid beneath her.
Think of something else, then. You’ve been through these scenarios before.
She turned around and looked towards the horizon-
What… are those things made of? I can’t begin to imagine where so much stone with high melting temperatures could originate. Does such a thing even exist on Earth?
Rose didn’t like the fact that she could see those twisted formations of sediment and sand and stone on the horizon. She didn’t know what kind of material that was- but if it could survive the scorching temperatures of the lava- how valuable would all that undefined substance be anyways? Not any rock had such a high melting point, and thus this stone had at least some value to her.
That’s right, Rose, keep questioning. Remember when you read in that textbook- such feelings of extreme change and/or panic indicate a manipulable scenario and an important turning point in your existence, so keep the logic circuits going.
Of course, this was a game world- and Rose had to beat the game. Games were complex systems, and even Sburb, for all its world-manipulating, physics-defying powers, was a simple system. Not unlike a huge tool, the equivalent of a gigantic hydraulic lift or hammer that had insides and corridors- and all she had to do was learn to navigate the corridors, go through the motions so she could open a door- a more complex doorknob was all this was-
She was rambling again.
I could get down there later, extract a sample with something, and use it for alchemy in such a way as to imbue all my items with extreme heat resistance so that I can navigate this molten lava land? Meh, perhaps not worth the time, not enough returns on utility, and certainly not enough returns on not losing life or limb to the heat-
A flash of shifting white and orange and gold, molten vibrations of energy waving past her- intuition started up- her mind was surprised by the intuition- logic shouldn’t be intuitive, intuition and feelings aren’t efficient and they aren’t systems the universe runs on-
And yet, somehow, she knew, irrationally- it was time. Manipulation of time, in front of her-
Rose had once read in a science book somewhere about speculative workings of time- different models for how alternate timelines can be conserved in an infinitely large set-space of universes. The thing was, she didn’t know which one was right, and which ones were wrong-
But the concept stood. This existence was a being from another time, and naturally from that point she jumped to stories and expectations- tropes, Time Machines, magical space-time dilation, all those plot devices-
Rose’s brain ran search functions in that moment, and the search function coughed up some priors from various sources of fiction and documentation, and those priors told her that if this were a story, there’d be a fifty-percent chance, give or take, that the being manifesting in front of me was either me directly or one of my myriad descendants in some form-
Too many fragmentary sentences, too many dashlines closing incomplete thoughts. Rose didn’t get enough time to reason and come to a proper conclusion before the form manifested in front of her and rendered all those thoughts pointless.
Rose, standing straight in a universe of fire and entropy, looked at herself through the looking glass.
“What-"
The other Rose spoke quickly, cleanly and precisely, a crisp and neat speech that matched her crisp and neat attire. The intonation made it obvious- this was, if not repetitive, at least practiced.
Repetition combined with time travel sent up blazing warning signs, cached thoughts from all the science fiction Rose had ever read. When it comes to time travel, signs of repetition and of time loops are pretty damn obviously bad indicators-
“Wait for a second, because the rest of us are getting here in twenty seconds. I’ll explain then. Don’t say a word unless you want to unravel the timeline and condemn us all to burn in the pits of a burning green star of limitless torture and pain.”
Rose thought for a second, took some cached memories, applied them to this new consideration- establishing new hypothetical priors for a new query- and wisely determined that no, she wouldn’t talk, because frankly the idea of unraveling a timeline didn’t appeal to her much.
She would have questioned it, except that she also recognized that any accepted prior knowledge relative to time travel as applied to reality and not fiction was, perhaps not irrelevant, but put into question. Certainly, this would prove to be a great experimental test for all theories of time-
If only Rose were composed enough on the inside to consider it in such a scientific light, despite the calm demeanor she presented on the outside.
And then, in the midst of silence, a legion appeared in the skies.
“We’re here.”
All together as one voice.
Quite disturbing is what it is.
Well, they’re you, so it’s not really weird- In fact, Rose could see herself being quite amused by this. Still, Rose had enough discipline to separate the trains of thought, unravel the wrecks and form two spheres of comprehension- one of ironic coolguy humor her bro had taught her despite her nature, and the other one of babbling scientific terror at the ways that this made no sense at all-
Because this either implied an insane level of preparation, an insane quantum coincidence, or logical proof of some theory about human psychology’s stability- even if they’re all Roses, they can’t possibly be so synchronized-
They probably practiced it just to annoy me- them bastards.
And then on second thought…
Actually, let’s consider alternatives to this scenario’s current deliberate explanation.
What I have now is just the most likely probability in this fractionally miniscule probability of all things according to your priors and- Fuck, I can’t keep up with this bullshit. I can’t gun my brain fast enough to keep everything together and sane-
So of course Rose does the only thing she’s good at in the coolkid spectrum of skills, and shifts her face into neutral.
Keep up the stare, just ignore them and their smirks, Rose. You’re better than, well, yourself, and you’ve gotta show it-
“Rose, we know that you’re incredibly shocked on the inside and that you’re just hiding it. Come on, drop the fakey-fake cool bullshit. We have actual, serious issues to talk about.”
Shit.
Rose- the actual one, not any of the Roses that manifested from chronological holes in the last minute- spoke.
“So it is then obvious that we’re each near-perfect psychological replicas of each other and thus we can afford to be brutally honest and straightforward.”
That indeed made it a lot simpler, though it also presented problems, of possible Roses who might decide to deviate from the group standard- she could see herself doing it simply to be contrary, though the more acute problem is that all of them are undoubtedly better informed than she is, which puts a level of deception necessary to get her to do exactly what is necessary in this timeline for the good of the collective set of Roses- Which gave them reason to manipulate her, perhaps as a sacrifice of some sort-
And it was highly probable that there was something they wanted of her, or that in her timeline there was something that made her specifically special, otherwise they wouldn’t be there interacting with her-
She hated scenarios like this, which had up till now been purely hypothetical. How can I model for people who are psychologically exactly like myself but have reason to deviate from expectations to enforce a result that I cannot predict? Normal decision theory doesn’t cover this, timeless decision theory doesn’t either to my knowledge…
Then again, there’s nothing to worry about on a utility standpoint. You’ve read stories about this, Rose, you know that the protagonist always plies her future selves for information and cool tools- That’s what you’re going to be doing. Overrationalization will lead to failure simply by virtue of failing to seize opportunity, and rationality in its truest form must lead-
“To the path of greatest utility, of course.” Rose jumped as the words matched up perfectly with her thoughts- finely, like an articulated tendril that slithered into the cracks of her brain, and wriggled out a keyhole match like the most skilled lockpicker.
Of course. They’re all you. They were probably counting the seconds, recounting this entire stream of mental flow, and laughing because you have no idea what’s going on, Rose.
I should probably get going with the whole ‘manipulating timeflow changes to my advantage’ idea then.
But before she could open her mouth and ask questions that bubbled forth like an endless decanter, the first time-displaced Rose shook her head. “Rose- from now on we refer to you as Alpha Rose- before your questions you must understand some things.”
Rose (Alpha Rose, remember that, it’s your name now, follow the whisperings of linear time stability-) nodded, and waited for the dialogue. She would understand.
“I am Rose One, or just R1 for short. You are the Seer of Time- shut up with the internal monologue, yes the title is stupid- Anyways. You have time-manipulation powers in the form of alchemized equipment and inherent recognization of time-related stuff. So we’re all alternate versions of you-“
R1 turned around, and called over the floating Rose-crowd. “Who was Previous Alpha Rose, and what number are you up to?”
“Wait, what-“ Notice your confusion, Alpha Rose, for that is what you are, what I am. Confusion is to be expected in timetravel, and if I fuck up shit will go down-
“PAR here, Rose number 412.” At hearing those words, R1 whistled. “We’re already up to variant four hundred and thirteen? Damn.”
Rose was quite confused by all this lingo being slung around.
“Okay, hold on, what is all this- Variants? Previous Rose Alphas? That means-“ Her brain was already running conclusions based on her newly presented evidence- if there are previous Alphas, and each variant of the timeline has a Rose-
“Yeah, you got it. We splendidly fucked up our existence each and every one, so we came back.” R1 pulled out a notepad from her captchalogue system, and began drawing a diagram with a pencil produced in similar fashion.
“Okay, look here. The timeline, before this event, is singular for the purposes of our conversation. We have the same pre-Sburb experiences as you.” R1 stopped her pencil, in the middle of a straight line, and began drawing branches out in various angles from that single vertex where the line ended. “After this meeting of ourselves, the timeline branches.” Take it with stride, Strider. You must meet the expectations you are given perfectly. “I was the First Alpha Rose- and when I screwed up-“
“How’d that happen?” You have to make sure you don’t make those mistakes of all four hundred and twelve of your former failure selves-
“John got rather painfully pasted by Hephaestus. Anyways, I went back in time to this point.” R1 pointed towards the vertex where a veritable tree of branches stood. “At that point, it was probably just me, and the Second Alpha Rose was created. Of course, she fucked up too. Don’t ask how, we’ll talk about that at the end.”
Rose, for her part, nods.
“The thing is, time-traveled selves from a variant timeline, such as ourselves, are slated for destruction by the arcane workings of Sburb as an organic system-“
“Sburb’s an organic system slash game? That is mind-numbingly complex, how the hell did anyone on Earth program something so impossible by our time-“
“Magical goddamn codes from the Frog Temple, shut up because I have to keep talking before someone dies from spontaneous universe garbage disposal. Anyways, so I died pretty fast in Timeline Variant 2. Then Rose 2 had the idea of going back in time so that both she and I- Rose 1 and Rose 2, that is- would meet Rose 3, the new Alpha Rose. You see where we’re going?”
Brilliant- absolutely brilliant- I can’t imagine myself coming up with the same idea, except I actually have this empirical proof that I actually came up with such an idea in such circumstances due to this conversation- Weird time shit is what it is- and now if it happens to me I’ll carry out the exact same actions because my future self told me of the plan- doesn’t this fall under the paradox of spontaneous idea generation in time travel?
“And when Rose 3 fails, she does the same thing after you both instruct her to do so, right? Thus, an increasing amount of Roses show up to instruct a new universe variant’s Rose not to fuck up- And that’s me at this point. Four hundred and twelve of you here to advise me.”
dont you dare nod Rose alternate dont
She nods.
Okay okay okayokayokay calm down just because four hundred plus universes are riding on you doesnt mean you have to feel under pressure WHO AM I FUCKING KIDDING i saw this coming from a mile away anyways dammit
“You got it, girl. We figured that as a collective Rosemind we can eventually create a perfect timeline plan where nothing goes wrong, and ensure victory, if every defeat simply leads to pulling back and restarting like from a fucking computer reboot or something. Positive induction of the integers proves that at some absurdly asymptotically huge number of Roses we’ll hit equivalently asymptotically omniscient knowledge of the entire future.”
“…Great.”
R1’s face darkened slightly. “The thing is, all those other variants are like savefiles that got overwritten, in this extended comparison. I’ve died four hundred and twelve times and I don’t remember any of them, because we started over every time, so those deaths never happened…” she sighed. “This hurts my head as much as it does yours. I’ve been through this conversation so many times it’s frustrating-“
She stands up, stretches, and flexes her legs. Your legs, in an alternate nonexistent universe. “Don’t fuck up, okay? Rose Four One Three, R413, Alpha Rose. Don’t add yourself to our mass, don’t doom yourself over and over again to the repeated deaths we suffer at a violent universe that hates us, abhors us, and kills us, and would have retroactively aborted us somehow even without us creating knots in its hair-“
She’s been through more than I have. Or she knows it at least, and will know it for until her death in our variant- how could she have possibly prepared mentally for this idea- it would have broken me, as I stand now-
Rose One jumps into the kernelsprite.
Well, Alpha Rose, Oh Mighty Chosen Seer Of Time, you didn’t see that coming did you. No you did not, and you should probably have, seeing as she’s you. Nice “seer”-ing that was there. That was some absolutely perfect, accurate, and effective prediction of future event, Rose. No, really.
“That’s better. The Magical Orb Of Epilepsy Induction +5 was getting on my nerves anyways, zooming circles around all of us.”
Rose One- Rosesprite, now- takes to the skies, and above the whole milling mass of Roses manifests a huge, glowing pink platform, upon which all the Rose-variants land.
“Come onboard, Alpha Rose. Until we die, we have a lot of chatty chat to get through and a lot of junk to shove into your brain, so you don’t suffer catastrophic universal existence failure like us in case our plans go wrong.”
Rose hesitates- she waits- But four hundred and twelve of her can’t be wrong, and so she jumps and lands on the glowing solid hologram of a rock.
Of course it’s solid, of course you could have made the landing- stop doubting yourself in the literal sense.
As Rose lands, Rosesprite flutters down next to her, and pulls out a pair of runed, decorated sticks, no, wands, that seemed to form mobius loops with surface area and to twist inwards upon themselves- Rose could see, could feel and know a potential inside them-
“One pair of time machines for Alpha Rose, right here. Don’t ask questions.”
And yet, Rose couldn’t resist at least thinking her unvoiced questions.
There is no way this can possibly convince me, absolutely no way, the time machine is a pair of wands, how can the technology be compressed into such tiny things- where could is it possibly derive such exponentially large amounts of power from anyways? This makes no sense, argh-
As the flying platform began to move through the warm air, Rose asks one last question, the one of greatest expected utility in a new world of incomprehensibly complex mysteries and systems-
“Where are you taking us?”
“To your Denizen- that’s your planet’s final boss, by the way- Anyways, it’ll only take about two hundred of us to kill him at our skill levels, and we can spin on over to the other planets and kill their Denizens too, and then we go and hopefully by that time there’s enough of us left to kill the final boss before Jack Noir kills the Queen- I’ll tell you who those are later- before Jade enters the game and gets her own planet- then we just wait for her to show up before we claim the final prize and we will have everything beat. Sound good?”
Alpha Rose, the Seer of Time, has to admit- the plan has a nice sound to it. Elegance and effectiveness- not to mention style.
Don't mind me, I'm just imagining myself, leading an army of my timeclones, to break the game and win it easily- and when it’s all over and done, I’ll be all cool and shit just like Bro would want because this is the STRIDER WAY OF DOING THINGS- oh yes, it is.
Yes, this plan pleases Rose quite a bit. It would, of course- it’s the collective brew of all the Roses of her party- and their collective mental power is, Rose has to admit, quite impressive.
She’s always had a soft spot for flagrantly outrageous plans that break the rules in every possible way and yet still offer a greater chance of victory than anything else.
This is why we don't let Rose have the time powers.
this is probably the first fic to really sell me on au-kids; you can taste her strider upbringing, but she is still so excruciatingly rose, the girl who simply cannot switch off, and not just a female dave. given time powers and infinite retries, rose absolutely would attempt to defeat the game through playing the numbers, because it is the solution that is guaranteed to eventually result in success--even if it drives her insane in the meantime.
Welp it's Rosefic time. In a world where the coldly rationalist Rose is adopted by Bro and raised as a Strider...
The Strider Way
Alright, Strider, calm down. This apparent out-of-body experience you’re having seems insofar as you are concerned to be a real world, place, and universe, and if you’re dead the meteors have killed you already. In addition, the meteors crashing down into a real fucking universe seems to have a high correlation with the fact that the game can manipulate the world itself, play god with physics- So just think, and ponder, get used to your new extreme- and above all don’t panic because you may very possibly be fighting for your very life right now-
The fields of lava turned and roiled, an eternity of geothermal power fueled by a force quite beyond physics, continuously heating the sand piles that accumulated into landmasses and the spires that spiked high up out of the fluid. Above, huge concentrated ashy clouds rained flaming stone onto an uncaring sea. The Land of Heat and Rain, a world undisturbed, a world that shall be undisturbed.
Save for the one day in which disturbance occurs, and the status quo changes.
An apartment, beige, distinctly different from the rest of the scorched stone the world was forged from- manifests from nowhere, deposited by a cradle of glowing geometric curves.
The house stood on a network of granite and marble lattices which had stood there since the beginning, waiting for its payload- and they were more than enough to support the weight of the whole building.
In events resulting in extreme adrenaline and panic, find something minor, trivially easy but mentally reliant, to focus on. This helps condense yourself back to rationality and reality, if such an idea applies in this place. Ignore the flying flashing avian thing.
The flying crow-face didn’t help her return to thinking, though, and looking at the glowing sphere just reminded her of the huge expanses of flaming liquid beneath her.
Think of something else, then. You’ve been through these scenarios before.
She turned around and looked towards the horizon-
What… are those things made of? I can’t begin to imagine where so much stone with high melting temperatures could originate. Does such a thing even exist on Earth?
Rose didn’t like the fact that she could see those twisted formations of sediment and sand and stone on the horizon. She didn’t know what kind of material that was- but if it could survive the scorching temperatures of the lava- how valuable would all that undefined substance be anyways? Not any rock had such a high melting point, and thus this stone had at least some value to her.
That’s right, Rose, keep questioning. Remember when you read in that textbook- such feelings of extreme change and/or panic indicate a manipulable scenario and an important turning point in your existence, so keep the logic circuits going.
Of course, this was a game world- and Rose had to beat the game. Games were complex systems, and even Sburb, for all its world-manipulating, physics-defying powers, was a simple system. Not unlike a huge tool, the equivalent of a gigantic hydraulic lift or hammer that had insides and corridors- and all she had to do was learn to navigate the corridors, go through the motions so she could open a door- a more complex doorknob was all this was-
She was rambling again.
I could get down there later, extract a sample with something, and use it for alchemy in such a way as to imbue all my items with extreme heat resistance so that I can navigate this molten lava land? Meh, perhaps not worth the time, not enough returns on utility, and certainly not enough returns on not losing life or limb to the heat-
A flash of shifting white and orange and gold, molten vibrations of energy waving past her- intuition started up- her mind was surprised by the intuition- logic shouldn’t be intuitive, intuition and feelings aren’t efficient and they aren’t systems the universe runs on-
And yet, somehow, she knew, irrationally- it was time. Manipulation of time, in front of her-
Rose had once read in a science book somewhere about speculative workings of time- different models for how alternate timelines can be conserved in an infinitely large set-space of universes. The thing was, she didn’t know which one was right, and which ones were wrong-
But the concept stood. This existence was a being from another time, and naturally from that point she jumped to stories and expectations- tropes, Time Machines, magical space-time dilation, all those plot devices-
Rose’s brain ran search functions in that moment, and the search function coughed up some priors from various sources of fiction and documentation, and those priors told her that if this were a story, there’d be a fifty-percent chance, give or take, that the being manifesting in front of me was either me directly or one of my myriad descendants in some form-
Too many fragmentary sentences, too many dashlines closing incomplete thoughts. Rose didn’t get enough time to reason and come to a proper conclusion before the form manifested in front of her and rendered all those thoughts pointless.
Rose, standing straight in a universe of fire and entropy, looked at herself through the looking glass.
“What-"
The other Rose spoke quickly, cleanly and precisely, a crisp and neat speech that matched her crisp and neat attire. The intonation made it obvious- this was, if not repetitive, at least practiced.
Repetition combined with time travel sent up blazing warning signs, cached thoughts from all the science fiction Rose had ever read. When it comes to time travel, signs of repetition and of time loops are pretty damn obviously bad indicators-
“Wait for a second, because the rest of us are getting here in twenty seconds. I’ll explain then. Don’t say a word unless you want to unravel the timeline and condemn us all to burn in the pits of a burning green star of limitless torture and pain.”
Rose thought for a second, took some cached memories, applied them to this new consideration- establishing new hypothetical priors for a new query- and wisely determined that no, she wouldn’t talk, because frankly the idea of unraveling a timeline didn’t appeal to her much.
She would have questioned it, except that she also recognized that any accepted prior knowledge relative to time travel as applied to reality and not fiction was, perhaps not irrelevant, but put into question. Certainly, this would prove to be a great experimental test for all theories of time-
If only Rose were composed enough on the inside to consider it in such a scientific light, despite the calm demeanor she presented on the outside.
And then, in the midst of silence, a legion appeared in the skies.
“We’re here.”
All together as one voice.
Quite disturbing is what it is.
Well, they’re you, so it’s not really weird- In fact, Rose could see herself being quite amused by this. Still, Rose had enough discipline to separate the trains of thought, unravel the wrecks and form two spheres of comprehension- one of ironic coolguy humor her bro had taught her despite her nature, and the other one of babbling scientific terror at the ways that this made no sense at all-
Because this either implied an insane level of preparation, an insane quantum coincidence, or logical proof of some theory about human psychology’s stability- even if they’re all Roses, they can’t possibly be so synchronized-
They probably practiced it just to annoy me- them bastards.
And then on second thought…
Actually, let’s consider alternatives to this scenario’s current deliberate explanation.
What I have now is just the most likely probability in this fractionally miniscule probability of all things according to your priors and- Fuck, I can’t keep up with this bullshit. I can’t gun my brain fast enough to keep everything together and sane-
So of course Rose does the only thing she’s good at in the coolkid spectrum of skills, and shifts her face into neutral.
Keep up the stare, just ignore them and their smirks, Rose. You’re better than, well, yourself, and you’ve gotta show it-
“Rose, we know that you’re incredibly shocked on the inside and that you’re just hiding it. Come on, drop the fakey-fake cool bullshit. We have actual, serious issues to talk about.”
Shit.
Rose- the actual one, not any of the Roses that manifested from chronological holes in the last minute- spoke.
“So it is then obvious that we’re each near-perfect psychological replicas of each other and thus we can afford to be brutally honest and straightforward.”
That indeed made it a lot simpler, though it also presented problems, of possible Roses who might decide to deviate from the group standard- she could see herself doing it simply to be contrary, though the more acute problem is that all of them are undoubtedly better informed than she is, which puts a level of deception necessary to get her to do exactly what is necessary in this timeline for the good of the collective set of Roses- Which gave them reason to manipulate her, perhaps as a sacrifice of some sort-
And it was highly probable that there was something they wanted of her, or that in her timeline there was something that made her specifically special, otherwise they wouldn’t be there interacting with her-
She hated scenarios like this, which had up till now been purely hypothetical. How can I model for people who are psychologically exactly like myself but have reason to deviate from expectations to enforce a result that I cannot predict? Normal decision theory doesn’t cover this, timeless decision theory doesn’t either to my knowledge…
Then again, there’s nothing to worry about on a utility standpoint. You’ve read stories about this, Rose, you know that the protagonist always plies her future selves for information and cool tools- That’s what you’re going to be doing. Overrationalization will lead to failure simply by virtue of failing to seize opportunity, and rationality in its truest form must lead-
“To the path of greatest utility, of course.” Rose jumped as the words matched up perfectly with her thoughts- finely, like an articulated tendril that slithered into the cracks of her brain, and wriggled out a keyhole match like the most skilled lockpicker.
Of course. They’re all you. They were probably counting the seconds, recounting this entire stream of mental flow, and laughing because you have no idea what’s going on, Rose.
I should probably get going with the whole ‘manipulating timeflow changes to my advantage’ idea then.
But before she could open her mouth and ask questions that bubbled forth like an endless decanter, the first time-displaced Rose shook her head. “Rose- from now on we refer to you as Alpha Rose- before your questions you must understand some things.”
Rose (Alpha Rose, remember that, it’s your name now, follow the whisperings of linear time stability-) nodded, and waited for the dialogue. She would understand.
“I am Rose One, or just R1 for short. You are the Seer of Time- shut up with the internal monologue, yes the title is stupid- Anyways. You have time-manipulation powers in the form of alchemized equipment and inherent recognization of time-related stuff. So we’re all alternate versions of you-“
R1 turned around, and called over the floating Rose-crowd. “Who was Previous Alpha Rose, and what number are you up to?”
“Wait, what-“ Notice your confusion, Alpha Rose, for that is what you are, what I am. Confusion is to be expected in timetravel, and if I fuck up shit will go down-
“PAR here, Rose number 412.” At hearing those words, R1 whistled. “We’re already up to variant four hundred and thirteen? Damn.”
Rose was quite confused by all this lingo being slung around.
“Okay, hold on, what is all this- Variants? Previous Rose Alphas? That means-“ Her brain was already running conclusions based on her newly presented evidence- if there are previous Alphas, and each variant of the timeline has a Rose-
“Yeah, you got it. We splendidly fucked up our existence each and every one, so we came back.” R1 pulled out a notepad from her captchalogue system, and began drawing a diagram with a pencil produced in similar fashion.
“Okay, look here. The timeline, before this event, is singular for the purposes of our conversation. We have the same pre-Sburb experiences as you.” R1 stopped her pencil, in the middle of a straight line, and began drawing branches out in various angles from that single vertex where the line ended. “After this meeting of ourselves, the timeline branches.” Take it with stride, Strider. You must meet the expectations you are given perfectly. “I was the First Alpha Rose- and when I screwed up-“
“How’d that happen?” You have to make sure you don’t make those mistakes of all four hundred and twelve of your former failure selves-
“John got rather painfully pasted by Hephaestus. Anyways, I went back in time to this point.” R1 pointed towards the vertex where a veritable tree of branches stood. “At that point, it was probably just me, and the Second Alpha Rose was created. Of course, she fucked up too. Don’t ask how, we’ll talk about that at the end.”
Rose, for her part, nods.
“The thing is, time-traveled selves from a variant timeline, such as ourselves, are slated for destruction by the arcane workings of Sburb as an organic system-“
“Sburb’s an organic system slash game? That is mind-numbingly complex, how the hell did anyone on Earth program something so impossible by our time-“
“Magical goddamn codes from the Frog Temple, shut up because I have to keep talking before someone dies from spontaneous universe garbage disposal. Anyways, so I died pretty fast in Timeline Variant 2. Then Rose 2 had the idea of going back in time so that both she and I- Rose 1 and Rose 2, that is- would meet Rose 3, the new Alpha Rose. You see where we’re going?”
Brilliant- absolutely brilliant- I can’t imagine myself coming up with the same idea, except I actually have this empirical proof that I actually came up with such an idea in such circumstances due to this conversation- Weird time shit is what it is- and now if it happens to me I’ll carry out the exact same actions because my future self told me of the plan- doesn’t this fall under the paradox of spontaneous idea generation in time travel?
“And when Rose 3 fails, she does the same thing after you both instruct her to do so, right? Thus, an increasing amount of Roses show up to instruct a new universe variant’s Rose not to fuck up- And that’s me at this point. Four hundred and twelve of you here to advise me.”
dont you dare nod Rose alternate dont
She nods.
Okay okay okayokayokay calm down just because four hundred plus universes are riding on you doesnt mean you have to feel under pressure WHO AM I FUCKING KIDDING i saw this coming from a mile away anyways dammit
“You got it, girl. We figured that as a collective Rosemind we can eventually create a perfect timeline plan where nothing goes wrong, and ensure victory, if every defeat simply leads to pulling back and restarting like from a fucking computer reboot or something. Positive induction of the integers proves that at some absurdly asymptotically huge number of Roses we’ll hit equivalently asymptotically omniscient knowledge of the entire future.”
“…Great.”
R1’s face darkened slightly. “The thing is, all those other variants are like savefiles that got overwritten, in this extended comparison. I’ve died four hundred and twelve times and I don’t remember any of them, because we started over every time, so those deaths never happened…” she sighed. “This hurts my head as much as it does yours. I’ve been through this conversation so many times it’s frustrating-“
She stands up, stretches, and flexes her legs. Your legs, in an alternate nonexistent universe. “Don’t fuck up, okay? Rose Four One Three, R413, Alpha Rose. Don’t add yourself to our mass, don’t doom yourself over and over again to the repeated deaths we suffer at a violent universe that hates us, abhors us, and kills us, and would have retroactively aborted us somehow even without us creating knots in its hair-“
She’s been through more than I have. Or she knows it at least, and will know it for until her death in our variant- how could she have possibly prepared mentally for this idea- it would have broken me, as I stand now-
Rose One jumps into the kernelsprite.
Well, Alpha Rose, Oh Mighty Chosen Seer Of Time, you didn’t see that coming did you. No you did not, and you should probably have, seeing as she’s you. Nice “seer”-ing that was there. That was some absolutely perfect, accurate, and effective prediction of future event, Rose. No, really.
“That’s better. The Magical Orb Of Epilepsy Induction +5 was getting on my nerves anyways, zooming circles around all of us.”
Rose One- Rosesprite, now- takes to the skies, and above the whole milling mass of Roses manifests a huge, glowing pink platform, upon which all the Rose-variants land.
“Come onboard, Alpha Rose. Until we die, we have a lot of chatty chat to get through and a lot of junk to shove into your brain, so you don’t suffer catastrophic universal existence failure like us in case our plans go wrong.”
Rose hesitates- she waits- But four hundred and twelve of her can’t be wrong, and so she jumps and lands on the glowing solid hologram of a rock.
Of course it’s solid, of course you could have made the landing- stop doubting yourself in the literal sense.
As Rose lands, Rosesprite flutters down next to her, and pulls out a pair of runed, decorated sticks, no, wands, that seemed to form mobius loops with surface area and to twist inwards upon themselves- Rose could see, could feel and know a potential inside them-
“One pair of time machines for Alpha Rose, right here. Don’t ask questions.”
And yet, Rose couldn’t resist at least thinking her unvoiced questions.
There is no way this can possibly convince me, absolutely no way, the time machine is a pair of wands, how can the technology be compressed into such tiny things- where could is it possibly derive such exponentially large amounts of power from anyways? This makes no sense, argh-
As the flying platform began to move through the warm air, Rose asks one last question, the one of greatest expected utility in a new world of incomprehensibly complex mysteries and systems-
“Where are you taking us?”
“To your Denizen- that’s your planet’s final boss, by the way- Anyways, it’ll only take about two hundred of us to kill him at our skill levels, and we can spin on over to the other planets and kill their Denizens too, and then we go and hopefully by that time there’s enough of us left to kill the final boss before Jack Noir kills the Queen- I’ll tell you who those are later- before Jade enters the game and gets her own planet- then we just wait for her to show up before we claim the final prize and we will have everything beat. Sound good?”
Alpha Rose, the Seer of Time, has to admit- the plan has a nice sound to it. Elegance and effectiveness- not to mention style.
Don't mind me, I'm just imagining myself, leading an army of my timeclones, to break the game and win it easily- and when it’s all over and done, I’ll be all cool and shit just like Bro would want because this is the STRIDER WAY OF DOING THINGS- oh yes, it is.
Yes, this plan pleases Rose quite a bit. It would, of course- it’s the collective brew of all the Roses of her party- and their collective mental power is, Rose has to admit, quite impressive.
She’s always had a soft spot for flagrantly outrageous plans that break the rules in every possible way and yet still offer a greater chance of victory than anything else.
This is why we don't let Rose have the time powers.
this is probably the first fic to really sell me on au-kids; you can taste her strider upbringing, but she is still so excruciatingly rose, the girl who simply cannot switch off, and not just a female dave. given time powers and infinite retries, rose absolutely would attempt to defeat the game through playing the numbers, because it is the solution that is guaranteed to eventually result in success--even if it drives her insane in the meantime.
fantastic work.
I was going to say something intelligent about how well you pulled that off but the person above me said it better. I'll just say "Amazing work" and go back to lurking.
Sigquotes, or, The Metaflare Appreciation Station.
Originally Posted by Metaflare
Originally Posted by icu2jimy
So, Dave is Ironman?
TG: i
TG: am
TG: ironman
TG: danananananana duh na naa
Originally Posted by Metaflare
Originally Posted by rampantVariable
What the hell is going on in this thread!? And don't say "mIrIcLeS!" or "Magic" or any possible permutation of either.
Shenanigans
Originally Posted by Esrever
Just change "Sigquotes" to "Metaflare Appreciation Station."
Originally Posted by Metaflare
Originally Posted by Esrever
I am just not an RPG kind of guy.
I know, right? I prefer rocket launchers myself.
...OOOHHH, you're talking about games
Originally Posted by The Orange Man
Science is what you call magic once you figure out how it works.
Originally Posted by Esrever
Oh, wait.
My avatar is SCIENCE.
Originally Posted by redRevolvers
Well.
FUCK.
Originally Posted by BALLS AND ASHWALL
I just woke up and I had a dream last night where MSPA updated. Too bad it didn't update for real.
Originally Posted by Drillgorg
Oh a laptop, why didn't you say so? Just set the cookie on the keyboard and close the laptop.
Originally Posted by icu2jimy
Bouncy.
Originally Posted by A Salad
Originally Posted by Drillgorg
Also Salad you can stop posting the Batman, we get it.
Good, I had almost fully exhausted my folder labelled 'Joker Boners.'
Originally Posted by FieryBlacksmith
Originally Posted by Captain Lhurgoyf
Whoah, wait, that's it! Billous Slick is a frog who is also the universe...therefore, he's a universe-sized frog...universe-sized....
Gurren Lagann. I watch too much of it.
I've said it once, and I'll keep saying it until it happens.
:33 < Even when trapped by karma's cycle,
The dreams we left behind will open the doooooooor!
Evven if the univverse stands in our way,
OUR SEETHING BLOOD WILL DETERMINE WHAT WE'LL BE.
wE'LL, uH, bREAK THROUGH TIME AND SPACE.
And DEFY 4LL THOS3 wh0 w0uld 2top u2 TO TAK-E hOlD oF Our Path!
TENGEN TROLLPA GURREN LAGANN
@byb AAAAAA. I've been enjoying this series so much, and that is the best of endings
@jacobin that was pretty freakin' sweet. I think we need more fic with Vriska and Terezi working together.
Oh look Vriska/Kanaya sadfic because I am the worst person.
Hero
"Don't you like my new duds?" says Vriska. She does a little twirl. Kanaya has to admit that despite the blinding radiance pouring off the other girl, there is something about Vriska's new outfit that is, well, absurd. Kanaya smiles to herself, because isn't that just Vriska all over? She has always been the girl who pretends to be a flamboyant piratical spiderqueen in her spare time. If must be easier to kill if it's just a game.
"Oh come on, meddlewitch," says Vriska, twirling so hard she almost lurches into a tree, "I flew all this way to show off to you, didn't I? If you're just going to sigh at me like one of your broody mopey rainbow drinkers maybe I'll go flaunt my fabulous new attire at a more deserving candidate." She sounds, as usual, like a wiggler trying to get her lusus' attention, but now there is something metallic in her voice, harsher and brighter than before.
"No, it's... very nice," says Kanaya, "Very you. Very... orange."
"Well," says Vriska, "Aren't you going to ask where I got them?"
"Well one might suppose you alchemised them," says Kanaya, and realises the truth almost as soon as the words are out of her mouth. "Oh. Oh, Vriska. You didn't go through with it." A sick fluttering feeling rises in Kanaya's stomach.
"A Serket always follows through on her plans," says Vriska in a self-satisfied drawl that makes Kanaya want to slap her. "Are you worrying about me? Oh wait, of course you are. I told you I'd be fine, and I am fine. I might be an idiot girl but I can take care of myself. You're so ridiculous." Her grin fades, replaced by a prickly scowl.
"Vriska," she says, "I have if you recall expended an inordinate amount of time and effort in the no-doubt trivial endeavour of keeping you out of harm's way. When I heard what Aradia had done - they told me she was covered in blood. Your blood. I thought for a while - I didn't know - I couldn't live with myself." She sounds ridiculous, she knows.
"Jeez, lighten up, Kanaya," she says, "I'm right here. Better than ever before!"
"You were fine before," says Kanaya automatically, and after some thought, "We were doing fine."
"Oh, you're just jealous," says Vriska, though there's no malice or conviction in her voice. She leans back against a tree with a sort of angular, unconcerned gracelessness that nonetheless strikes Kanaya as terribly elegant.
"And why might that be?" says Kanaya with an exaggerated sigh designed to disguise the skipping of her heart.
"Because I'm going to kill the demon."
* * *
Vriska's pulse hums under clammy skin, as though she's feverish. Warm blood soaks into the front of Kanaya's dress, dark as ink.
"You're going to be absolutely fine," says Kanaya, setting her friend gently down under a tree.
Vriska looks up at her and does her best to scowl. "Liar." Her hands are still clutched around her shattered dice. The hard-edged splinters cut into her palms, but what's another wound? She has failed. She deserves to do penance.
"We're tough. I can see this healing very nicely," says Kanaya. Vriska winces, though she isn't sure whether it's the pain or Kanaya's attempts to be cheerful.
Stupid ugly fucking dogfaced bastard skewered me pretty good, she wants to say, I was the best and I wasn't good enough.
"I think he's going to come back," says Kanaya. She's trying very hard to sound calm and measured, but Vriska can hear the strain in her voice. All the gentle chiding amusement is gone. "It would be wise to make a swift exit."
"Shouldn't have come after me, fussyfangs," Vriska says, the words sticking in her throat like shards of glass.
"I'll call the others," says Kanaya, "I know Sollux didn't go to join the humans. He could help us." She retreats behind the tree, leaving Vriska to stare at the sky. The leafless branches of the tree rustle overhead in the breeze.
When her friend reappears Vriska can see that she's almost shaking with fury. She's seen Kanaya lose her patience before, but this is something altogether more frightening. She burns white-hot.
"They won't come," says Kanaya, keeping her voice flat. "Sollux and Eridan, our erstwhile friends. They don't think it's worth the risk. They don't think you're worth the risk." She twists her hands together compulsively, stuffs them in the pockets of her bloodstained dress, removes them and checks Vriska's hastily-bandaged wounds again. Every muscle in her body is tense.
"I'm not," Vriska croaks. Kanaya pretends not to hear, watching the horizon and trying to slow her breathing. "Stupid of me." Stupid and pathetic and no wonder the others wouldn't come for her.
"Karkat's on his way here from the humans' world," says Kanaya, "Half an hour, he said. You just have to hold on."
It's too late.
"L-look," she says. Kanaya turns, and sees a dark shape stamped upon the sky. Black wings, moving on the horizon. "Go. You can't take him."
"Now is not the time to suddenly develop the concept of selflessness, Vriska," says Kanaya, getting to her feet wearily.
"I'm dead already," she says, "Just go."
"Do you really think you can stop me meddling now?"
"Yeah this is..." she pauses, spitting out a little blood, blue on her lips. "This is like a Kanaya party I guess." She laughs, sending rays of pain through her ribcage.
"It's a shame," she says, "I would have liked to meet Rose."
Never mind about your human girlfriend right now, she hears in her head, I can't move ::::(
Kanaya rolls her eyes. "Don't be so melodramatic. You're going to be fine." Her eyes are shut, the lids trembling as though holding back tears. The shadow on the sky draws nearer in silence.
When Jack Noir lands there is something like a look of amusement on his twisted face. Kanaya supposes she does look a trifle absurd - a girl with a chainsaw standing over her friend's body and trying quite hard not to fall over. What kind of last stand is that?
Noir watches her, and she realises with a sort of dreamlike horror that he might try to speak. She tries to steel herself but her hands are shaking. She can't possibly fight like this. All at once, she feels an alien force in her mind, neatly clamping down on her panic and fear and shoving them to one side like so much discarded luggage. In any other circumstances this would be a violation, but just now Vriska's presence is strangely comforting, like a flickering blue candle flame.
[i]Don't, she says,I can do this. Let me do this for you. Noir seems to be laughing, a horrible sound between a bark and a snarl that makes the hair on the back of Kanaya's neck stand up.
Same to you, says Vriska. The monstrosity before them stops laughing and draws his sword.
Together, then. <3
When Karkat arrives, less than ten minutes later, Noir is gone. Instead, the bodies of two girls are fallen under the tree. They are lying a little way apart from each other, but their hands are tightly clasped.
A/N
The idea for this was largely borne out of conversations with Kazerad. Just to give credit where credit is due, and to assure you that I am not solely responsible for this awful thing. The title is from the song of the same name by Regina Spektor, because I am horrible at titles and the song is my go-to soundtrack for Vriska angst ("I'm the hero of the story/I don't need to be saved", anyone?).
Originally Posted by mutecebu
I'm the same person here as I am on AO3 and Deviantart, and pretty much everywhere else. Check out my fics and arts and stuff!
!
Tumblr - Romspec Archives - SC2 Homestuck AoS / Subforum - Mini-Grand 5101 / 5107 - Grand S!1
Sigquotes, or, The Metaflare Appreciation Station.Vriska died, so I stopped reading homestuck.
