MSPA Fanfiction IV

[Summergale]

I need to get to writing more sadfic. I may be going rusty on it! And that's terrible.

So. Um.
Do I get to re-post my fic, given that I all but pagebottomed with it and nobody seemed to notice it was there?

[egregiousBass]

You mean this?

Dark Carnival

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There's an awkward feeling in the back of Gamzee's head. A throbbing, pulsing pain that he knows only too well. He can dull the pain if only he had a pie. He digs through his sylladex in search of one, but his search is utterly fruitless. Panic swells as he stands up from his husktop, so suddenly that the chair he's sitting on crashes backwards in an agonised metal-on-metal screech. He's out the door and running down the hall faster than he's ever ran before, throwing himself at all the myriad chests he can find. Their black and gold interiors offer nothing but wicked elixir and, infuriatingly, empty pie tins.

When every chest has been opened, every Miracle modus card examined, Gamzee simply curls up in the corner of his room. His husktop's screensaver bathes the room in a bloody violet, and he shudders and whimpers as the feeling in his head intensifies. Tears run down his face. He hasn't been sober in sweeps. It hurts so much. He tries to supress the rage, to calm himself, but it fails and he curls his fingers into fists. His nails cut purple grooves in his palms.

He's scared. The pain wracks his body and he twitches uncontrollably. He doesn't like this. No slime. There's no sopor slime left and it hurts so much. He cries openly for the first time since his lusus died, and waits for the inevitable.





Welcome to the Dark Carnival.

terminallyCapricious [TC] began trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG]

TC: honk.

;-;

[Summergale]

You mean this?

Dark Carnival

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There's an awkward feeling in the back of Gamzee's head. A throbbing, pulsing pain that he knows only too well. He can dull the pain if only he had a pie. He digs through his sylladex in search of one, but his search is utterly fruitless. Panic swells as he stands up from his husktop, so suddenly that the chair he's sitting on crashes backwards in an agonised metal-on-metal screech. He's out the door and running down the hall faster than he's ever ran before, throwing himself at all the myriad chests he can find. Their black and gold interiors offer nothing but wicked elixir and, infuriatingly, empty pie tins.

When every chest has been opened, every Miracle modus card examined, Gamzee simply curls up in the corner of his room. His husktop's screensaver bathes the room in a bloody violet, and he shudders and whimpers as the feeling in his head intensifies. Tears run down his face. He hasn't been sober in sweeps. It hurts so much. He tries to supress the rage, to calm himself, but it fails and he curls his fingers into fists. His nails cut purple grooves in his palms.

He's scared. The pain wracks his body and he twitches uncontrollably. He doesn't like this. No slime. There's no sopor slime left and it hurts so much. He cries openly for the first time since his lusus died, and waits for the inevitable.





Welcome to the Dark Carnival.

terminallyCapricious [TC] began trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG]

TC: honk.

;-;

That's the one!

[mutecebu]

Quickie as response to latest update:

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CURRENT carcinoGeneticist [CCG] RIGHT NOW opened memo on board TEAM ADORABLOODTHIRSTY.

CCG: ANYONE RIGHT NOW WHO IS STILL SANE, JOIN THIS FUCKING MEMO.
CCG: OUR METEOR IS CURRENTLY INFESTED WITH GENOCIDAL MANIACS THAT WE USED TO CALL OUR FRIENDS.
CCG: STICK TOGETHER IF YOU CAN FIND EACHOTHER.
CCG: IF YOU SEE ERIDAN, HIDE AND RUN.
CCG: IF YOU SEE GAMZEE, RUN HARDER, PREFERABLY WHILE SCREAMING.
CCG: ANY OTHER MURDEROUS RAMPAGES OCCURRING THAT I NEED TO KNOW ABOUT?
CURRENT gallowsCalibrator [CGC] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.
CGC: Y34H
CGC: FUCK1NG VR1SK4 >:[
CCG: YEAH THIS IS AN EMERGENCY, TEREZI
CCG: SO COULD THIS FINALLY BE THE CONVERSATION THAT DOESN'T DETERIORATE INTO A LOT OF BITCHING AND MOANING ABOUT HER?
CGC: SH3 JUST K1LL3D T4VROS
CCG: OH.
CCG: SHIT.
CCG: ACTUALLY THAT DOESN'T SURPRISE ME AS MUCH AS IT PROBABLY SHOULD, CONSIDERING.
CCG: YOU KNOW WHAT?
CCG: FUCK IT.
CCG: NEW PLAN.
CCG: EVERYONE MAKE YOUR WAY TOWARDS VRISKA
CCG: AND WE'LL ALL JUST COWER BEHIND HER ENORMOUS ASS.

CCG closed memo.

This is great. I love it.

[JudgeDeadd]

I just wrote this on-the-fly.

Turn Around

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"I'm delivering this message through the console of one of my numerous unwitting proteges to give you a word of advice, and then you will not hear from me again.
Don't turn your back on the body."

Karkat stares, dumbstruck, at the words highlighted. With creeping trepidation, he turns around. The tableau of the room is just as moments before. Sollux is still sitting languidly, like a limp ragdoll, down for the count for the time being. Two corpses are doing their part to engloom the scene with uncheery purple and green. Nothing stirs as he watches.

He turns back to the computer. Types, "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN". No answer. Clearly the enigmatic anonym is determined to do good on his promise of a farewell. Even after Karkat pelts the chat window with some particularly repugnant morsels from his selection of expletives.

Then, a moan. The slightest sound, but it reverberates tenfold within these steel walls, and Karkat turns around again, only to see Kanaya rising up jerkily-gracelessly from where she lied.

"Kanaya?", Karkat notes the obvious with dull shock. "But you... You have a goddamn hole through your..."

"Oh, Karkat," Kanaya mumbles, flatly and timbrelessly. "You really shouldn't be worrying about that."

Karkat approaches, slowly. Something is not right. "Kanaya, I can see right through your stomach! How the hell are you even breathing? How the hell are you even speaking with that--"

"Karkat, you are so adorably naive." she says as she examines the gaping wound, touches it, picks up a few droplets of dull jade blood, and tastes. She smiles at the decadent flavor, and the smile brings out the entire chilling length of her fangs.

"It takes more than a wound," she continues to explain as she circles him, "to kill a rainbow drinker".

He should be escaping, but staring into her eyes makes him inexplicably entranced, and all of a sudden running, defense, anything seems absurd. Only staring into those bottomless eyes that slowly grow, expand without end, overtake the universe, are the universe--

She embraces him.

He feels a lightning-quick, double puncture on his neck.

...

Later, nothing.

(Terezi was right when she noted cherry red tasted the best.)

[egregiousBass]

I just wrote this on-the-fly.

Oh yes! I love it when the sexes get flipped turn-ways

[Miss Prince]

And also, I feel sad for the people who are offended, because this reflects on how you'll act when you lose someone IRL.

Okay, sorry to delurk just for this, but no it doesn't.

[egregiousBass]

I'm sorry. It was an inconsiderate hyperbole and I really don't have a position to judge.

So I take it back. Is it good that I redacted that sentence or do you want me to put it back?

@Sionnan: The instances of "you" were directed at whomever it may apply to rather than you specifically.

[JudgeDeadd]

I just wrote this on-the-fly.

Oh yes! I love it when the sexes get flipped turn-ways

...what?

[egregiousBass]

...what?

Because usually it's a dainty damstrel/teenage girl being entranced with a handsome bastard vampire's eyes.

This is me overthinking things again.

[NotAPumpkin]

I just wrote this on-the-fly.

Oh yes! I love it when the sexes get flipped turn-ways

...what?

Referring to Twilight? I think?

EDIT: Ninja'd by explanation.

[Decker]

Honestly, Decker and Seraph are probably more responsible for TIME COP BUDDIEZ than I am
We have concluded however that Dave would have to wear a 70s pornstache for ironic purposes.

I wanted it to be Aradia, but I was outvoted 2 to 1.

[sarasvati]

hey summergale, i like your crazygamzee story because i like crazygamzee. crazygamzee is the plot twist i have been waiting for.

[egregiousBass]

Wow, I feel like I'm spamming this thread the hell up. Little greendaves everywhere.

Okay, so;

I've done aristotelian theatre with the suicide memo.
I've done epic theatre with Aradia.
Should I round out the series and do postdramatic theatre with Gamzee y/n?

[Embargo]

y(10^99999999999999999999999999999999...)

[Zuki]

hey summergale, i like your crazygamzee story because i like crazygamzee. crazygamzee is the plot twist i have been waiting for.

Hehehee, it is a very you sort of twist, is it? I'd look forward to seeing what you might do with it.

[Kassiopeia]

@Bass yeah it's cool, I figured it was just an awkward phrasing. I do think it's a strength of literature that it can sometimes give you tools for dealing with stuff that happens to you in reality.

Also since because I have so many cents I apparently have to sprinkle them in sets of two wherever I go, my opinion on "oh no Andrew's trolling the fans" is as follows:

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The comic has always revolved around "trolling" the readers to some extent, in as much as almost every story in existence revolves around playing off the readers' expectations, and the format/structure of MSPA makes that transparently clear, in that the narration is in (a semblance of) direct interaction and often dialogue with the audience (this is especially the case with Problem Sleuth, but since Homestuck preserves the form if not the underlying suggestion-box mechanism it's fair to say a similar dynamic is at work here). Given the humour of the thing, the fact that these interactions are often comedically antagonistic is to be expected, and in the sort of story Homestuck has been for the first three or four acts, funny and apposite.

I think the reason a lot of people are having trouble is the injection of humour into unsettling, even tragic scenes in Act 5.2, where this humour seems to be actively mocking the characters' misfortunes (a comedy staple, I ain't denying it), and by extension the readers for having sympathy with them. Obviously where you start to have a problem with this is subjective, and there are apparently people who find the violent death of two teenage girls at the hands of a psychotic ex as the ideal silly joke time. Personally I found it tasteless and kind of alienating, given that this kind of thing actually happens with some frequency in the real world, but maybe I'm just not enough of a ~hardcore troll~ or whatever. Either way, I think it would be an enormously difficult task to try and carry off this kind of dead-baby comedy and simultaneously try to preserve the audience's emotional reaction, and I think it was a bit of a dropping of the writing ball here.

There's also the separate issue that introducing plot elements purely to say "fuck you" to your readers is kind of dumb and unfunny, but I'm pretty sure Andrew was kidding about that. I have no problem with the desire to take risks with one's characters, and in fact would advocate being absolutely merciless in the service of the story. However, there is a difference between killing off characters to further the plot and provide conflict/emotional reactions, and doing so in a way that deliberately makes fun of your audience's investment in your characters, an investment which you have presumably worked hard to build up over time.

As I said before, I also find it personally upsetting when these characters fall into marginalised demographics who are often victims of violence in our own society (women, disabled people, arguably LGBT folk depending on what you think about Kanaya's sexuality).

Am I taking this internet cartoon too seriously? Yes, but a) overanalysis is my mother tongue and b) the narratives we digest, even for the shallowest of entertainment purposes, do have an effect on our minds and our culture almost without our conscious recognition. Jokes about abusive relationships, to pull an example out of thin air, do contribute to the normalisation of that pattern of behaviour which is endemic to most societies. I'm not trying to say that Hussie is personally responsible for wife-beating or anything, merely that it does pay to think critically about the implications of the media you consume, even if you're still massively fond of them.

THAT SAID, I don't think there's cause to give up hope yet. Plenty of stories are redeemed in the final act. I for one will be restored to my former state of starry-eyed admiration if Eridan gets eaten by zombie Kanaya meets an appropriately karmic end.

e: spoilered because holy fuck do I enjoy the sound of my own voice

ex2: Summergale I liked your creepyGamzee fic! So upsetting

[Sionnan]

Gamzee fic


Tragedy

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See, there's this thing about clowns. He's always liked them, chill motherfuckers, don't be carin' bout who's got their hate on for their antics and such. How they can just roll with it even though they're all bathin' in the blood of innocents and still kinda give it a chuckle. Or a laugh. Or a full on motherfucking cackle; you know, whatever gets your glad on.

Every once in a while, he'll do a random web crawling about them. Hoarding pictures and video clips and tagging websites for later; that is, when his think pan's ordered enough to let him do all that without blanking out and left staring at the bright colors whirling across his screen.

One time, on a server outside Alternia, though he had no idea how he got there, or why he bothered to read the plain black text on the plain white page, shit wasn't eye catching at all, he found something that quietly embedded itself in his brain. It would arise periodically later, arresting him. It always brought about the rare moments of totally lucid thought in his jumbled brain, although they were quickly forgotten.

The text explained the use of clowns during the "medieval" phase of that world's timeline. He had no idea what that meant, but whatever, he'd keep reading past his bottle as he lifted the Faygo to take a swig. Apparently, clowns to these motherfuckers weren't so different for motherfuckers on Alternia. Back in the day, they were supposed to be demons, representations or minions of Satan, whoever the fuck that was. Clowns were given face paint to distort the wearer's features into a demonic grimace, and colorful garbs to show that they were creatures of sin. Bad motherfuckers, in other words, in both senses. Apparently, they were used in "miracle plays" (something that totally delighted Gamzee, fuck yeah miracle plays!)- as tumblers in between acts to keep the audience hanging around. Funny that even though those religion-going motherfuckers were there to be all righteous and shit, what they really wanted to see was some deranged motherfuckers getting their mad tumbling on.

Maybe the miracle in those plays wasn't all that silly shit about some big invisible dude curing the blind and shit. Maybe it was that it wasn't the play that made people listen and stay, and eventually think. It was the clowns, man. Everybody's fixated by the grotesque, especially the grotesque that reminds them of themselves. Motherfucking miracles, man.

Another time, he blindly stumbled on a half-corrupted website explaining shit like comedy and tragedy and stuff. The thing that people didn't get about clowns is that they weren't always about the mad laughs. Gamzee always favored the clowns that seemed steeped in the crazy tragic. Clowns with big, sharp grins and weeping eyes.

At any rate, he skipped to the tragedy, and felt a frisson. Maybe divine inspiration or something, a small miracle.

Tragedy stretched way back, back even before motherfuckers gawped at clowns during miracle plays. It started with some culture that called dramatic, sad shit tragedy. But that wasn't it- broken down, what the word actually meant was what cleared the puddles of noxious slime from his mind.

Tragedy was really actually two words: tragios and odia.

Goat song.

[Rimbaum]

Gamzee fic


Tragedy

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See, there's this thing about clowns. He's always liked them, chill motherfuckers, don't be carin' bout who's got their hate on for their antics and such. How they can just roll with it even though they're all bathin' in the blood of innocents and still kinda give it a chuckle. Or a laugh. Or a full on motherfucking cackle; you know, whatever gets your glad on.

Every once in a while, he'll do a random web crawling about them. Hoarding pictures and video clips and tagging websites for later; that is, when his think pan's ordered enough to let him do all that without blanking out and left staring at the bright colors whirling across his screen.

One time, on a server outside Alternia, though he had no idea how he got there, or why he bothered to read the plain black text on the plain white page, shit wasn't eye catching at all, he found something that quietly embedded itself in his brain. It would arise periodically later, arresting him. It always brought about the rare moments of totally lucid thought in his jumbled brain, although they were quickly forgotten.

The text explained the use of clowns during the "medieval" phase of that world's timeline. He had no idea what that meant, but whatever, he'd keep reading past his bottle as he lifted the Faygo to take a swig. Apparently, clowns to these motherfuckers weren't so different for motherfuckers on Alternia. Back in the day, they were supposed to be demons, representations or minions of Satan, whoever the fuck that was. Clowns were given face paint to distort the wearer's features into a demonic grimace, and colorful garbs to show that they were creatures of sin. Bad motherfuckers, in other words, in both senses. Apparently, they were used in "miracle plays" (something that totally delighted Gamzee, fuck yeah miracle plays!)- as tumblers in between acts to keep the audience hanging around. Funny that even though those religion-going motherfuckers were there to be all righteous and shit, what they really wanted to see was some deranged motherfuckers getting their mad tumbling on.

Maybe the miracle in those plays wasn't all that silly shit about some big invisible dude curing the blind and shit. Maybe it was that it wasn't the play that made people listen and stay, and eventually think. It was the clowns, man. Everybody's fixated by the grotesque, especially the grotesque that reminds them of themselves. Motherfucking miracles, man.

Another time, he blindly stumbled on a half-corrupted website explaining shit like comedy and tragedy and stuff. The thing that people didn't get about clowns is that they weren't always about the mad laughs. Gamzee always favored the clowns that seemed steeped in the crazy tragic. Clowns with big, sharp grins and weeping eyes.

At any rate, he skipped to the tragedy, and felt a frisson. Maybe divine inspiration or something, a small miracle.

Tragedy stretched way back, back even before motherfuckers gawped at clowns during miracle plays. It started with some culture that called dramatic, sad shit tragedy. But that wasn't it- broken down, what the word actually meant was what cleared the puddles of noxious slime from his mind.

Tragedy was really actually two words: tragios and odia.

Goat song.

That is going into my personal headcanon now.

[Kassiopeia]

SIONNAN

THE LAST LINE
YOU HAVE ALL MY LOVE
ALL OF IT
33333333333

[lucidSeraph]

@Sionnan: ... oh fuck yes historical references and MEDIEVALISM and

hells fucking yes :3

[Kassiopeia]

...nmmm this makes me want to write Gamzee fic actually. SIONNAN DID YOU MAKE ME OKAY WITH THIS PLOT TWIST SOMEHOW? ARE YOU A WIZARD???

[SkaianRedeemer]

Oh shit, I had forgotten that that's what tragedy meant. Nicely done!

[MoraicTrochee]

I do not ever write fanfiction ever, but I have a fever and it was sort of stuck in my head, and since I wrote it I thought I might as well post it....?

I don't know. I'm not even sure if it makes sense (since it was written during a fever). Oh well.....

I enjoy reading your guys' stuff!

Final

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(She blinked. Or she didn’t, but suddenly the world was a quick flicker of dark and then gone.)

You can dial back the time on a blade, and it still stays broken.
You can dial back the time on a soul, and it still stays dead.

Yet for a moment it is whole again, shining, smiling, with only the soft glint of hours glancing like light off the edges to remind you what really is.

She has died so many times. It never comes as less of a surprise. Sword goes through soul or steel, and there is always the 0h—

But now it is 0h!, now she is re-alive for real, and while he may be conscious of every tiny loop of time, she is aware, with a thousand ticks criss-crossing clockwork through her veins and arms and eyes--

(You can do it, if you have done it.
If you will do it, it can be done.)

So now she understands, in the moment of the final, as she spreads time thin to snapping. And around her (oldest power) rise the ever-present voices, resolving all so gray and formless. And this time it is familiar faces staring back in blank uncaring.

(All is blank.

She remembers.)

Those still alive fall silent, a hush deeper than space, looking at the singles and doubles and plurals of their fallen friends, but looking more at the sight of their empty-eyed other selves, who each in an instant of too-green fire stopped waking when they slept.

(Every broken sword was once unbroken,
Every broken soul was once alive--)

And she dials them back, even she marveling (feeling marvel! 0h, really real-alive) as the mist melts into a point previous when there were shapes and cells and smiling eyes.

Death is more impermanent than time!

The murderers are pale but it is he that she is after, they are after, and dial-redial despite death they advance, still regrouping in the face of green miles and bright stabs –

and when all is still there is a moment (all of time is moments) when all stand and stare and stare, looking long, those alive and those once-dead, across the chasm of what happened. And then there is a clumsy rush of tangled hands and tears and halted explanations, of holding and harming and i will never forgive yous. And she watches, even she partakes, but the pull of every second is so strong it almost hurts her.

(Easier to carry half a sword than whole.
Easier to let them rest, however restless.)

And when her painful grip slackens on the loops and time resolves, so perfect and so cruel, they flicker darkly and are gone.

Or perhaps she blinked.

What does it matter, winning, when they must leave you all at once?


It matters very much.

(Time is still less permanent than death--)

[lucidSeraph]

@Moraic: oh my gosh I love the ethereal style you have here and your use of italics and parentheticals. It's almost poetic.