#hbomb i missed you so much | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

whumpacabra · 3 months ago

Text

25. Instigator

Angst, military setting, toxic friendships, ableism and assault [a character touches/leans on/grabs another character’s mobility aid without permission], past captivity and torture mention, past beating and humiliation [forced to strip], past character death mention, briefly implied past noncon

AU Masterpost / Previous / Next

As much as Elias enjoyed the familiar bustle of the mess, Harrison was right. Eating lunch in the courtyard was so much better than sitting on those awful benches under fluorescent lighting. Here the air was clean and fresh, if a little dusty from the troops running drills in the dried turf.

Harrison, still on a limited diet to account for his starvation, had long since finished his measly helping of mashed potatoes, mushy peas, and mystery meat. Elias was savoring his plate; he never thought he would miss mediocre cafeteria food so badly.

“Hbomb!”

Harrison startled at the shout from across the courtyard, a smile splitting his face as the three stooges bobbed between annoyed patrols.

Parker was leading the charge, stocky and well built enough to dive between the other soldiers in the field like a plow tilling soft earth. Gale followed in his shadow, steps light and measured - showing off his childhood training as a ballet dancer. Moe stumbled after them, glasses knocked askew but saved from falling off his face with sweaty hands.

“You’re looking better, Gomez.” Gale huffed, leaning on Harrison’s wheelchair.

“And I’m chopped liver?” Elias complained half heartedly, an echo of grief in his chest. He missed Thatch and Clements and Orson, his clique even before the taskforce organized. Harrison still had friends here, and the look he shot Elias bled with sympathy. Parker didn’t notice.

“Nah, you’re just still lookin’ the same as before Walker.”

“Glad to know a little torture didn’t damage my good looks.” Elias couldn’t quite strangle his misplaced discomfort with humor.

“Well, it didn’t do you any favors, that’s for sure.” Gale quipped, Parker snorting while Moe cracked a nervous smile, scrubbing his glasses clean with the hem of his shirt.

Elias felt bad for the kid - he was a Private like him, but just behind his cohort. Parker and Gale seemed to tolerate him for his use as a scapegoat, but Moe was just happy to be included. It never sat right with Elias.

“You two got any juicy gossip from the higher ups?” Parker hummed, sitting on the bench between Elias and where Harrison’s chair was parked. He told himself the spike of resentment and stress was just the separation anxiety acting up.

“What do you mean?” Harrison’s laugh was tense, a hand weakly failing to bat away Gale’s arm where it leaned on his chair. Harrison and these three were close before the taskforce. Time didn’t appear to have made the heart grow fonder.

“Haven’t you realized?” Gale finally stood up, gesturing to the throngs of soldiers standing around between drills and marches. “Entire base is on fucking lockdown.” He huffed, as though offended. “First she says we’re on disciplinary leave then we’re on lockdown. Can’t a bitch make up her mind…”

“Watch it Gale.” Harrison’s growl was genuine, and the medic threw up his hands in mock surrender.

“I was just - ”

“No wonder you’re on disciplinary leave.” Elias huffed, poking at the plate on his lap. Moe was still hovering in the background, silent.

“Hey, it was for you, jackass.” Parker shouldered him gently despite his strength. He knew not to push the still recovering soldier too hard, so Elias took his insult lightly.

“What are you talking about? Had to defend our honor like some kinda damsel?” Harrison batted his eyes at Parker, but Gale’s dry hum had a venomous undercurrent.

“Someone had to make sure that fucker knew his place.”

“What?” Harrison’s voice was shaken, and Elias knew he had the same sinking feeling in his gut. Parker shrugged, leaning back on the bench with far less righteous satisfaction in his voice.

“Went down to holding. Roughed up that Wolf you brought back.” Harrison was looking at Parker with abject horror, and he tried to backtrack accordingly. “Just a few hits. Didn’t even break nothin’ - he took it like a champ.”

“You cracked his fucking ribs, jackass.” Elias shoved back a little too hard, swallowing back the anger in his throat.

“I - I pulled my punches, unlike someone.”

“Oh, shut up. You think he took his jacket off just to keep a bit of blood off it?” Gale crossed his arms over his chest, finally taking a step back from where Harrison was seething in his chair. “He wanted a little fight to take the edge off and we gave it to him is all.”

“You had him strip, G.” Moe’s soft voice made Elias suck air through his teeth. Gale would give the poor kid hell for - wait, what did he say?

“I joked that he was being a tease. Fucker didn’t have to - ”

“You made him strip?” Elias’ breath shuddered, words so quiet he wasn’t sure anyone would hear them. He wasn’t hungry anymore. In fact, the cafeteria food wasn’t sitting right with him.

“Hey, he’s the one that took off his pants - I, I didn’t make him do anything.”

“You saw the shape he was in and you still kicked the crap out of him?” Harrison had turned in his chair, but Elias didn’t need to see his face to know the disgust and anger painted on his face.

“Yeah, considering the shape you are in.” There was a thread of discomfort in Gale’s voice, but he was still defensive. Righteously convicted, he continued with a twinge of sincerity. Or at least Elias hoped it was sincerity. “We’re your friends, H. We thought you fucking died out there.”

“And that gives you the right to strip and beat a prisoner who didn’t even fight back?” Harrison’s head whipped back to Elias, eyes bright with anger. “I want to go back inside now, Elias. Are you done?”

“Yeah. Yeah I think I am - ”

“Oh my god Hbomb chill - we’re sorry alright, Gale - we took it too far.” Parker, at the very least, didn’t try to stop Elias from getting up. But Gale grabbed hold of Harrison’s wheelchair.

“Hey!”

“Dude, seriously, he fucking tortured you. Doesn’t he deserve a taste of his own medicine?”

“He’s had plenty now let, me, go.” Harrison’s glare was poisonous, and with Elias rounding on him, Gale finally took the hint and backed off. Not without rolling his eyes in exasperation.

“Fine, fine. Christ, what’s the matter with you? Defending that fucking monster - Stockholm syndrome much?”

“Gale. That’s enough.” At least Parker could keep that jackass busy. Elias pushed Harrison along the path, plate left cold on the bench. It wasn’t like he had the stomach for that mediocre cafeteria slop anyway. Harrison’s muttering was simmering with rage.

“Merrick should have told us - ”

“Protocol. He can’t rat out every asshole on base as a captain. Abuse of power and all.”

“As though they didn’t fucking abuse their power.” Harrison’s stage whisper dropped quieter as they passed a patrol. “God. Elias do you think they - do you think he thought - ?”

“No. And yes.” Those idiots were assholes, but they weren’t monsters. Not like that CIA schmuck that butchered Wolf. But the Wolf wouldn’t know that - he clearly didn’t expect anything less - and god, they weren’t giving him great evidence to the contrary.

“If they knew - ”

“They can’t. Merrick said this stays between us, Fergie, the Frizz and Briggs. And Mav too, I guess.” Elias didn’t like how the temperature dropped - just slightly - as they left the warm glow of the sunlight and entered the medical building.

He hoped the Wolf was having a better afternoon than them.

AU Masterpost / Previous / Next

Taglist: @stargeode @genuineformality @i-eat-worlds @light-me-on-pyre

@risk606 @sacredwrath

#whump #angst #military setting #past captivity #past torture #past beating #past humiliation #past character death #implied past noncon #how to tw for. the uncomfortable friends who clearly did something for themselves but are using you as an excuse for their behavoir #<- my disabled ass is projecting again ugh #dogs of war au

9 notes · View notes

vidreview · 2 months ago

Text

VIDREV: "Plagiarism and You(Tube)" by Hbomberguy.

[originally posted december 7th 2023]

youtube

i didn't initially plan to do a full VIDREV for this one. it's a long video that speaks plenty for itself, revealing a veritable cottage industry of video essayists who've found great success in brazenly stealing the works of marginalized creators. it's an infuriating watch, especially as someone who has put a lot of work over a lot of years into getting better as an essayist. at a moment when the gormless profit-chasing business degree havers of the world are pretty unambiguously winning in every avenue imaginable, it's gratifying to see someone like Hbomberguy use his significant platform to at least make a dent in that trend. i had a few gripes, sure, but i didn't figure they were worth the trouble. of course now it's been out for a few days, the video already has over 6.8 million views, and people are still talking about it on every single social media website of note. watching that discourse evolve from afar has sharpened some of the round edges on my aforementioned gripes, and given me reason to think that maybe weighing in isn't a totally fruitless endeavor. and besides, what's the point of having a video essay review blog if you're not gonna review what is arguably the video essay of the moment? ahhh, there's a Faustian bargain if ever i heard one.

in this post, i'm going to be critical of Hbomberguy's "Plagiarism and You(Tube)" on a few fronts of debatable importance. but first, i want to make it clear that i am genuinely grateful to Hbomb for putting so much time and effort into this investigation. plagiarism is a serious accusation that requires commensurate evidence, and Harris's got that covered in spades. the case is made so much harder to deny by the frequent juxtaposition of a plagiarist's voice-over with the original plagiarized text on screen reacting to minor trail-covering alterations. these sections occupy the bulk of this video's near 4 hour runtime, and while i have some issues with that length, i understand that the deluge of evidence is precisely to make sure that none of the plagiarists in question can continue dodging accusations the way they have done previously. in this process, Hbomb lays out a consistent playbook utilized by all manner of plagiarists, and (hypothetically) gives viewers the tools and awareness they need to better spot plagiarism in the future. this matters because, as he rightly points out, youtube isn't a fun little hobby site for posting silly cat videos anymore, there's real money to be made on the platform and virtually no oversight to protect creators with ethics and integrity (i wanted to pull a direct quote here but alas, you can't ctrl+f a video). it's an open question as to how or whether we can fix this problem, but we don't get to that conversation until we acknowledge that plagiarism is a legitimate, widespread, materially harmful phenomenon online. none of what i have to say in this review is meant to minimize its broad success in calling attention to a very real problem!

that said…

in the days since its release, i've seen a lot of back and forth over what this video is about. on one side you have folks calling for the blood of James Somerton and others mentioned in the essay, saying "fuck these people specifically." yet on another side, many insist that you're missing the point if all you see is more drama for the drama mill. "this is a systemic problem" they say, "that's what the video is about." i'm inclined to agree more with the latter than the former, as Hbomb does consistently circle back to talking about the unpaid victims of plagiarism, ending the video by explicitly highlighting underrated queer creators and even saying outright that he doesn't want the end result to be limited in scope to just retribution against these specific plagiarists.

and yet, when i see a meme like this one:

i can't help but think… is that what the video is about? is someone who just sees the drama missing the point? yes, certainly, Hbomb says as much, but how much does he actually say it compared to everything else? what's the proportion of (to be overly reductive) "drama content" to "systemic criticism"? because it seems to me that anyone who only/mostly gets "wow fuck these people in particular" out of this video has done nothing less than take the video in aggregate. the bulk of its runtime is spent detailing very specific acts of plagiarism, and while yes, as i said above, this abundance serves a very real purpose, it shouldn't go unacknowledged that the tone of these sections is often one of ridicule and mockery. i don't mean that as a criticism in and of itself, to be clear. you can draw a line from here directly backwards through all his "Measured Response" videos, dude cut his teeth on knocking overconfident hacks down a peg, a bit of ridicule and mockery is to be expected. but that does ultimately mean that Hbomb spends most of the video saying "fuck these people in particular," in a tone of voice he honed through many other videos devoted to saying "fuck this guy in particular", only occasionally stopping to add that "plagiarism is popular and insidious and even creators you trust might be doing it" before moving onto the next scornworthy particular guy. so it kind of doesn't matter that one is "the point" and the other is "missing the point" because he's genuinely saying both things, and he's saying one of them significantly more often than the other. you can't tell me the dunks aren't at least part of the point, and if they're part of it then they can and will be misconstrued by some as the whole point. the entertainment and spectacle of knocking these plagiarists down a peg is an indulgence that, while certainly earned, does exist in concrete tension with the systemic arguments that are meant to take priority. now, some of this does come down to how internet culture has shifted in the last decade to facilitate a much more aggressive style of engagement overall, which Harris cannot control no matter how often he says "don't harass the plagiarists." there isn't really a perfectly right way to go about this, and under the circumstances i do think he did far better than others might have done in his stead.

but even still, i think this misapprehension is made worse by the essay's conclusion, which in my opinion largely fails to tie the whole thing together into the systemic argument that supposedly is "the point" some viewers are missing. Harris commendably points out how the so-called AI revolution is at its core an act of automated civilization-scale plagiarism, and that future instances of plagiarism may be harder to catch precisely because of this technology. frankly i wish that perspective had taken up a solid 10% of the runtime rather than a couple paragraphs at the very end, seeing as on balance it's the far bigger and more likely threat to the livelihoods of people watching than old-school direct plagiarism, but that's me. what really bugged me was the brevity with which he discussed possible solutions to the problem. he rightly points out that youtube implementing a plagiarism reporting system would just be another tool for bad faith actors to silence marginalized creators on the platform, and then… he kinda gives up? he shrugs his shoulders and says, well, for now, just talking about plagiarism and spreading awareness of it is enough. for as well-intentioned and, generally speaking, true as that is, it bugs me as an essayist because i believe that a big part of the job is or ought to be expanding the audience's ability to imagine what's possible even if you aren't 100% sure about the answers yourself.

these are all very much "how i would have written it differently" criticisms, so they aren't particularly worth much, but i do feel it's odd that he doesn't even broach the subject of federal regulation, platform control, unionization efforts, or even just good old-fashioned consumer activism. virtually every website that the creative economy hangs on is a venture-capital backed corporate venture, and their ad-driven models for profiteering at a moment when wages are stagnant and layoffs are happening everywhere is, like, the reason this is such a problem. to address plagiarism as a systemic issue, we need to understand the systemic enablers of it as a behavior. if creators weren't getting such a small slice of the revenue pie, if we had more control over the platform and what rises to the top, if the companies that owned these platforms were beholden to federal regulations, if the government increased arts funding and gave out grants to independent creators that involved third-party quality checks, if online video creators had any manner of collective labor power, if the cost of living was lower by way of public healthcare, free education, mass public transit, and affordable housing, then this would be a drastically different conversation. these are not non-sequitors! this is as much an economic problem as it is a cultural one, so any proposed solution that stops at changing the culture is necessarily incomplete and doomed to fail.

look, i don't expect Hbomb to have the answers. nobody has the answers. but i think it's a bit short-sighted to leave so many possibilities unsaid when the one concrete possibility discussed is immediately (correctly) written off as a bad idea. it leads to a conclusion that feels iffy, a bit defeated, lost at sea, and that's an infectious mood. if the first step to solving plagiarism as a systemic problem is to encourage talking about it openly, i think it's equally important to at the very least gesture in the direction of the many possible avenues for a systemic solution, no matter how impossible or ridiculous they might seem in the current political climate. in point of fact, i think it's of utmost importance to include these possibilities precisely because they seem impossible, otherwise we will forever be trapped in a world of insufficient half measures, meekly reifying the conservative austerity of the liberal order because it's easier and safer than taking a wild shot in the dark.

again, i want to stress that this is a deeply subjective criticism. i'm an ornery Marxist, of course i have these kinds of gripes. and it's easy to get lost in criticizing what isn't there, which as an exercise generally tells you more about the critic than the object being criticized. so, to close out, i'm gonna shake my fist a little at something that is there.

there's a moment at about one hour thirty-five minutes in where Harris turns on some colored lights to get that patented blue-purple Bisexual Lighting, and then he says this:

This is a whole style of video now, and by "style" I mean one person did it first and then a bunch of boring people ripped her off. Stealing from lots of places is inspiration, but stealing from one place is plagiarism… unless you call it The BreadTube Style, and then it's fine. I don't even know what a BreadTube is, I just woke up one day and was told that I was in it, and that people hated me for being in it. I don't even know what it is!

i understand where this jab is coming from-- the whole BreadTube scene was a melodramatic nightmare, on account of being an audience-invented genre which that audience (and later creators who emerged from that audience) often inaccurately treated as a coherent movement. i understand the frustration expressed by a lot of creators in that first generation of left-ish essayists (Hbomb, Lindsay Ellis, Dan Olson, Contrapoints etc) with the atmosphere of that moment, and certainly don't begrudge them a desire to distance themselves from it and ridicule its shortcomings.

but this brief little jokey aside left a bad taste in my mouth. the creator he's talking about being "ripped off" here is obviously Contrapoints, who brought a colorful theatricality to her early work that elevated it above being something she shot for cheap in her apartment. this went hand in hand with her Socratic style of essaying, giving her characters a strange and vibrant world to occupy. i don't want to say she "did it first" because, let's be real, Natalie Wynn did not invent the idea of using dramatic lighting on the internet. but she was certainly the first person i saw on youtube doing it in video essays, and yeah, a lot of people followed her example including me!

but that's not the same thing as plagiarism, is it? this whole video is an extensive exploration of what genuinely counts as plagiarism: taking someone else's words and pretending that they're yours. style is almost never part of that conversation across the whole 4 hours, except where it involves use of prepackaged assets like transitions and stock footage, which Hbomb deliberately notes is fine and normal except when people act like they're the ones who invented it (this particularly comes up in the Legal Eagle section). by the terms of this joke, Abby Thorne of PhilosophyTube falls under the category of "boring people" who were "ripping off" Contrapoints even moreso than those who just lit videos like her, because she even does the Socratic-style dialogues! but somehow i don't think Harris would call that plagiarism. if the concern re: bisexual lighting in BreadTube is attribution, all i can say is that Natalie Wynn is one of the single most discussed and cited creators in the whole field. virtually everyone i can think of who "ripped her off" back in the day openly acknowledged being inspired by her at every possible opportunity. of course that's just my own biased recollection of the history, so who knows, maybe there are people out there acting like they did it first. but unlike most of the other victims of plagiarism provided in this video, Natalie Wynn is not wallowing in obscurity. her work is IMMENSELY successful, to the point where she's arguably the closest thing to a household name you can get from this space.

now, i'm sensitive to a joke like this because i always felt like if anything Natalie got too much credit for "inventing" the so-called "BreadTube style". her use of colored lights was striking and unique, yes, but it was also rudimentary and not particularly complicated. i worked in film lighting for enough years to see this "style" as equivalent to late 1910's era silent films blindly grasping at the bare fundamentals of montage that have become the backbone of all cinema. it's good, but it ain't Citizen Kane. i really hoped people would take Natalie's baseline not as a concrete template, but as a challenge to get even more ambitious and filmic with their lighting setups! instead things have stagnated, and we've kinda circled back around to a very slightly more colorful version of the standard pre-Contrapoints look. this is by no means to play down the work that Natalie did, because i know from my own years making video essays that it is NOT easy or simple to set up even rudimentary lighting that looks good. but come on man, have some perspective. she's a philosopher, not an electrician!

what's worse is that later on in the video, Hbomb talks about how many creators were inspired by AVGN to do twists on his formula, and why this was a good thing. near the end, when he's very rightly shouting out many underrated queer essayists, he spends a good chunk of time celebrating the spirit of remix that is so unique to the internet, insisting that there's a real tangible difference between plagiarism and inspiration. this is good! i agree with him! which is why it's so bizarre that there's this one aside that equates using bisexual lighting to plagiarism! it's a disarmingly hypocritical moment in an otherwise relatively on-point video, and its presence kind of weakens the rest of the essay for me (especially if you're sensitive to how near this comes to being all-out drama youtube, as clearly even Hbomb is by his own admission in the video).

the last i'll say is that i find it frustrating when a creator in Hbomb's position tries to act like BreadTube wasn't A Thing. no, it wasn't A Thing the way quite a lot of people thought it was (including many who called themselves BreadTubers). but these creators were often collaborating with each other to make guest appearances, read quotes, etc. certainly they mentioned each other often enough, which couldn't help solidifying in the audience's mind that there was indeed A Thing happening that involved multiple people with similar creative & political goals, regardless of whether or not that was the creators' intent. it wasn't formal, and it certainly wasn't A Movement (the lack of an articulated ideological spine is a BIG part of why things went sour the way they did), but they were happy enough to play along before Drama blew the whole endeavor to smithereens. and notably, successive generations of creators (like Sophie From Mars, Jack Saint, Lily Alexandre, CJ the X, and yes, also me again) saw the BreadTube genre as a place where interesting things were happening, where the kinds of things they/we wanted to create were encouraged and supported vociferously. it's no coincidence that a LOT of up-and-coming trans creators doing very BreadTube-y things got a huge boost from guesting on Hbomb's DK64 Nightmare Stream in 2019 (including me again, haha, oops), because there was A Thing happening even if most people were wrong about what, exactly, it was. none of this is to say that Hbomb should call himself a BreadTuber-- god no, i hope no one does that ever again, i'm embarrassed that i did back in the day! but this history does exist. mostly i just think this joke would've been better left on the cutting room floor.

okay, i think that's enough criticism for one day. one thought i had coming out of this is that i wish more video essays would publish concurrently with a written version on a dedicated website. not just a transcript but an article-format version. i wonder sometimes about the difficulty of indexing video essays, of getting their contents into a historical record that can be printed out and put into a library. but anyway, all my gripes aside, it's a good video and you should go watch it! preferably in chunks over a day or two!

#vidrev #video essay #video essay review #video recommendation #hbomberguy #plagiarism #youtube #breadtube #Youtube

9 notes · View notes

mellorphic · 1 year ago

Text

In Defence of c!Niki - a Four Part Analysis of Every Arc

People who didn’t watch C!Niki see, in the fandom, a big sister type character with girlboss energy who wants to kill a child. Niki isn’t that. She has a well-written narrative which focusses a lot on her relationships with others.

PART ONE: c!Niki’s Early Days

PART TWO: c!Niki’s Rebellion

PART THREE: c!Niki’s Disillusionment

PART FOUR: c!Niki’s Healing (you are here)

With the nuke plot to kill Tommy and everything that happened post-Doomsday, things seem bleak in terms of Niki’s character. But despite her words and her feelings, her actions show the audience that she does truly have some trust, some hope, some love, left inside of her. Buried deep down.

After all - she still wears Wilbur’s cloak. Despite all of her talk, and how much Niki blames him for a lot of things, it’s obvious that deep down she doesn’t really believe he’s the root of all evil. She still cares about him and misses him, otherwise she wouldn’t wear his cape.

Like Tommy, Wilbur is another scapegoat for Niki’s anger and pain. But she doesn’t actually hate him. She never did.

She was conflicted but she still loved him, she still cared about him, and it’s completely healthy and perfectly fine for her to have mixed feelings. It’s good that she’s not pushing it away and that she’s processing it. Her anger is justified, even if Wilbur hurting her wasn’t his goal.

HBomb and Niki were close, especially in Manberg, and when he tells her that he’s leaving the SMP, Niki asks for some way to keep in contact. She still values the people who have been kind to her, holds them in high regards and has attachments and trust towards them, no matter how much she may claim she doesn’t trust or care for anybody.

That stream was also when Techno offered for her to join the syndicate, but she doesn’t immediately except the offer, saying she’ll get back to him and speaking to her chat (writing in her diary).

N: I don’t trust anyone, y’know, I don’t know if I can trust Technoblade. But he seems like he’s one of- y’know, the most, I guess, hurt people by Tommy? Because he did get betrayed by Tommy.

As an inniter main I do have to say that I personally don’t believe that Tommy betrayed Techno but it is understandable why Niki, who had no idea about what happened in Tommy’s exile or what he was doing with Techno, would believe this to be true, especially as the narrative of him betraying Techno fits with what she believes of Tommy.

But that isn’t the part I want to talk about in terms of her healing - she may not trust Techno but she has compassion and empathy for him and what he’s gone through. That part of Niki is still in there, even if she doesn’t realise, and it shows she isn’t beyond healing.

Despite everything, it’s still you, and all that.

A lot of Niki’s time in early season three was spent in her Secret City, turned Secret Library, where she was on her own and didn’t want to go outside, with insomnia and night terrors when she did sleep. But while building, she had a lot of time to reflect on her feelings and actions, and began to distance herself slightly from Jack’s plans to murder Tommy. She was of course still friends with him, but she was realising that killing Tommy wasn’t what she wanted and coming to terms with the fact that it wasn’t his fault.

When she was on her way to meet Techno, ready to join the syndicate, she talked about him in her diary.

N: i don’t actually want to kill Tommy. He.. he’s just a child, and in the end it’s not his fault. It’s not Tommy’s fault that Wilbur left me, and it’s not Tommy’s fault that he… Wilbur… <sigh>… Wilbur- it’s not his fault! It’s not Tommy’s fault, and it’s not anyone’s fault, y’know? And I feel I’ve made myself a lot of.. a lot of enemies with that. So I wanna make it up.

Her ability to recognise her wrongdoings shows so much progress. I literally love her.

And she joined the Syndicate because she was finally able to see that there were people on the server who wanted her around. I don’t like some writing choices of most characters in the syndicate but I do think that in character this was the healthiest choice for c!Niki to make - she felt genuinely seen and heard by those in the syndicate and she’d trusted Ranboo for a long time, who wasn’t formally there when she joined but she thought he was.

It’s important for Niki to have that because she still finds herself frustrated with people who she thought she was close to, that don’t speak to her.

N: I-I don’t know what’s with Puffy, Puffy-.. hasn’t talked to me. She-she just doesn’t talk to me, she doesn’t talk to me! And I can’t deal with it anymore when everyone’s just not talking to me!

Puffychu. I miss you.

At the same time she has a lot of internal conflict about joining.

N: am I sure I want to do this? Am I- do I- am I sure I want to do this? Oh, I don’t know.. I don’t know.. I don’t know what to do.. I’ve never actually spoken to Ph- wasn’t- wait, no, wait- Ph- Phil was the person who killed Wil. Wh-wai- what am I doing here?! Wait. <laughs> am I sure I want to do this..?

….Remember when she made a promise? She still has her loyalty. Niki is still as loving as she always was, she still cares for Wilbur as much as she always did. It didn’t change.

N: on one side, Phil was the person who killed Wil, on the other side.. Wil was already long gone. The Wilbur I know, he was long gone. The Wilbur Phil killed blew up L’Manberg, and that’s- that’s where it all went wrong. So- yes, yes I want to do this.

Niki didn’t change, it was just the circumstances around her that changed, and now she’s taking the power back by surrounding herself with people who care about her and distancing from things that hurt her. Unfortunately people often have to take responsibility for a healing process they never should’ve had to go through in the first place. That’s exactly what Niki is doing and she never should have needed to but it’s great that she is.

N: … I will finally have a place to go again, right?

Throughout Niki’s time on the server she has always been the person to put her differences with people aside. It first happened with Eret and it happened with Techno and Jack and now Phil.

Niki’s Syndicate Code Name is Nemesis, based on the Greek Goddess of Retribution. People say she’s just a Goddess of Revenge but it’s a lot more like Justice, she often punished people for their hubris, an example being Narcissus. I love this for her and the context to it relating to her Manberg arc and it fits because she has a strong moral compass. While a lot of people connect this to the rocket duo arc I think it’s important to also look at it in the context of her past and it shows that she’s definitely reconnecting with that, compared to before where she wanted to push it away.

When she learnt Wilbur was revived, Niki was angry. She was upset he hadn’t come to speak with her after it had already been a few weeks and she was worried that he was planning something. Niki said a lot about manipulation and how she wasn’t going to be manipulated again and hoped that Tommy, Tubbo and Jack wouldn’t get manipulated either which shows us how she felt about the things that happened on November 16th - again, she trusted him not to blow it up, she literally hid the TNT from everyone else because that’s how much she trusted him.

I don’t actually think she was manipulated by Wilbur but it’s clear that at this point in time she felt like he must’ve manipulated her into trusting him.

But Niki was given a lot of time to reflect between that and when Wilbur actually spoke to her. And it’s clear she had been reflecting because the conversion she had with Jack after Dream escaped also tells us she’s come a long way.

Before we get there, though, this stream itself shows she’s been reflecting on things, too.

N: I’m not gonna blame it on Techno, I’m not gonna blame it on other people again because I always did that! I always blamed your mistakes and your betrayal and you hurting me on other people, <goes through nether portal to her Secret Library> and look where it got me. It got me nowhere.

When the syndicate got Dream out of the prison, Niki was not doing that for him. She was doing it to help Techno because of his favour, and to help Ranboo. The fact that it resulted in Ranboo’s last death had Niki distraught.

N: Dream had a favour, he held a favour over Techno.

J: Great! That’s between them.

N: but he’s my friend!

J: wasn’t I? Wasn’t everyone?

N: You’re still my friend, Jack!

J: do you have any idea where I’ve been? At all? For the past, like, three months?

N: no, I was waiting..

She’s gone from saying she doesn’t trust anyone and doesn’t want to be involved with anyone to actually being able to admit that she still cares about people and that they’re her friends.

J: it was fine that no-one else came, but you were the one person that agreed with me on things. You were the only person-

N: but how was I supposed to find you? Because you just disappeared. You disappeared out of nowhere.

J: but did you even try?

N: no. I didn’t. I didn’t..

She doesn’t beat around the bush - she admits it, and she sounds genuinely sorry for it, but she’s also telling him that he did hurt her too. Him leaving was exactly what everyone else did but Niki’s not angry this time.

N: why does it have to be like that? Why can’t we all-

J: it doesn’t have to be like that! But it can’t not be like that here. We can’t change the ay this place works. And that’s why I left.

N: why not? Why can’t we change this place?

J: what happened when we tried to make change, Niki?

N: …I know. I just think, I wanna give people a second chance, Jack.. and I want you to be here with me, giving people a second chance.

She’s regained her optimism and her hope, and I think the syndicate and the time she’s spent reflecting is why. Niki is genuinely opening herself up again, metaphorically in the sense of her being ready to let people in and give them second chances, but also physically, leaving the Secret Library more often to spend time with the Syndicate.

N: I had to help my friends. These are the people that took me in when I had nobody.

J: you know you could’ve always came to me.

N: you were away.

I love rocket duo sm.

And back to Wilbur. When he finally came to see her, Niki said everything she wanted to say to him, everything she needed to say, and heard him out when he spoke - and finally, Niki got her apology. That was all she wanted, and after that it was like they were back to how they were before, just goofing around. Niki got back what she’d missed. People wanted her to beat him up but I never understood why, because not only has Niki never been a character to use physical violence, she also never hated Wilbur as much as people make it out like she did. She was hurt, of course, but she never really hated him.

While we’re here.

N: why did you never come back?

W: … I was sick.

During Niki’s finale we see the full extent of her healing process. She’s able to have fun with Phil and bake with him, and able to immediately trust Kristin upon meeting her, and she hasn’t been able to trust anyone that quickly since the start of L’Manberg.

Niki is a character whose healing process meant getting back to a place emotionally that she was in before the trauma she experienced but as a final note I’d like to say that this isn’t the only way to heal and it’s not the only valid one. For a lot of people, getting back to the place they were in before their trauma is impossible and that doesn’t mean they haven’t healed, it just means they’ve grown in a different way.

The effect Niki’s trauma had on her was that it didn’t bring any change to who she really was, it just made her hide behind walls and anger and defense mechanisms. Her healing process meant breaking those things down and the Niki underneath was still the same.

Of course, the finale left her with many loose ends but that’s okay. People have loose ends. It’s more realistic for not everything to be tied up in a nice bow, especially when endings are a cause of an abrupt event like the server reset that meant she didn’t have time to tie things up. This is how things happen in real life too - most endings aren’t planned for.

Overall I think she’s an underrated character with a big heart and a character arc that shows cc!Niki’s potential as an actress and a writer, as well as a personality that brings a lot to the world of the Dream SMP canon as a whole.

77 notes · View notes

grandtheftgoose · 6 months ago

Note

Sixteenth Day Event Prompt:

Skeppy & Quackity - Wool

The sky is blood red tonight.

It reminds him of the egg, the different hues and tones. There was no breeze with the egg though. Everything was still with the egg, a kind of atmosphere that suffocates. That traps you in and chokes you, steals everything from you, eats you alive. If he closes his eyes he is back in the egg.

Slowly dying, smothered by vines.

If he closes his eyes, he can remember the hopelessness he floated in until it turned into apathy.

However, his eyes are open. He is standing at the tower in Las Nevadas, the desert does not smother but carries a breeze throughout. There is no feeling of despair and there is no apathy, he does not yearn for Bad. They haven’t spoken in three weeks and he is fine.

He keeps his eyes open and looks ahead at the not crimson red sky. It’s more of a cherry red sky. Maybe flecks of cardinal or cerise. Not blood red and definitely not crimson. The air is clear and not suffocating and there is no smell of lava or fire or smoke.

Las Nevadas is peaceful, he decides. He can hear the music from the casino below and the chiming of the slot machines. There are footsteps behind him, someone walking up the stairs. They’re not Bad's footsteps nor are they Ants so he’s fresh out of ideas. He’s fresh out of friends on this server too, the egg possessed them all and then they were blown up.

Skeppy turns around as the footsteps come to a stop, it’s Quackity. The guy who blew up his ex-husband (?) but also was one of his best friends. One of his only friends that wasn't controlled by a sentient egg.

“Hey man, didn’t wanna scare you there” he drawls, “it’s a beautiful view isn’t it?”

“Yeah, love all the lights and scenery” he responds, “beautiful sky tonight.”

The sky is slowly fading to dark, the red draining from the sky and the chill starts to pick up. Quackity lights a cigarette next to him, exhaling slowly out to the night sky. It almost feels like he’s back in the egg. But this time there’s someone with him, he never had the strength to stand then so maybe that's the difference between the egg and now. He can stand.

“Hey uh, whatever happened with Bad?” Quackity starts, “he’s been living with Foolish but I swear you two had a place together.”

Skeppy grits his teeth together. Quackity means no harm, he’s just making conversation. There’s no need to think of the egg and the vines and the voices. Right now he’s here looking at the view.

“Yeah we had a house together,” Skeppy starts “we’re kinda not seeing each other because of the whole egg thing y’know?”

“Right, damn that sucks.”

“Yeah” he looks off into the distance, the sky looks nice now that it’s dark. The casino lights paint a picture in the sky, almost like an Aurora Borealis.

“Well if it helps, I think he’s doing better” Quackity begins, “he’s been trolling Foolish lately. I think it helps him not think of the egg and the prison and everything.”

“Was Bad in prison or something?” Skeppy had basically forgotten about the prison. He was too busy being trapped in a sentient egg to care or notice.

“Uh no, he uh worked for the prison” Quackity rings his hands “he guarded Dream before he escaped.”

“Oh, cool”

“Yeah cool.” Quackity takes another drag of his cigarette. He can barely smell the smoke.

There’s an awkward pause as he takes in the city. He was never one for cities or the factions of the SMP. He could never keep up with the towns that kept popping up. He hasn’t gotten out much lately, other than Hbomb showing him around.

“So, what have you been up to lately with your new found freedom?” Quackity asks, “I’m glad we’ve been able to catch up man, it’s been a while with the prison and the egg and shit.”

He inwardly sighs. I haven’t been doing much besides breathing exercises and staring at the walls in Puffys office and going on walks in hopes to see Bad. I’ve been practicing what I’ll say to him, some days it’s “I hate you and I miss you” but most days it’s “I miss you so much I can’t breathe.”

He breathes out. Clean air. No egg.

“I’ve been chilling” he says instead, “I’ve been touring the newer cities in the SMP, I didn’t realize how many people live here now. Never really realized.”

“Yeah, man there’s a lot now” Quackity grins, “what’s your top three? Other than mine of course.”

He scratches his head. His number one would always be the Badlands but that’s not exactly new or here anymore.

“I really liked the snowy one, I think Tubbo’s maybe?”

“Snowchester” Quackity snaps his fingers.

“Yep,” the sky is full of stars now. Not a red hue in sight. “Uh, I also liked Foolish’s summer home, Hbomb and I checked it out briefly.” Bad wasn’t there when he went.

“Foolish is a great builder, a little crazy and slightly manic but he’s got personality y’know? Sam built some of Las Nevadas and he’s just so boring as a business partner.” Quackity drawls, looking out at the skyline.

“Oh yeah I can imagine,” Skeppy thinks of Sam with red eyes and a dull voice, his personality consumed by the egg.

“I also liked the one with the flowers?” he tries to think of the name, “something with a K, it had mushrooms all over the place.”

“Kinoko.”

Skeppy looks up at that, Quackitys voice turned sharp and on edge.

“Yeah” he says faintly, “that’s the one.”

He thinks of the residents of Kinoko, the ones he saw briefly. Tina, with her smile and comforting energy. Callahan, with his reassuring presence, a reminder of the old days. George, his melancholic demeanor and sleepiness that has never changed. Karl, his friendliness that fell somewhat towards manic. And Sapnap, his confidence and loud voice, his eyes that kept looking towards the door.

“Weren’t you and uh Karl and Sapnap like getting married?” he asks, maybe they’ll have a joint kingdom.

“Yeah we were,” Quackity says quickly, “but things got complicated I guess.”

“Guess we’re both bachelors then,” Skeppy says, chuckling to himself, “does your ‘complicated’ involve a cult?”

Quackity chuckles before shaking his head. “Before with the prison and now running Las Nevadas, I don’t have time. No cults necessary for divorce.”

The prison, an elephant so big he doesn’t even want to address it. But if Bad worked there and Quackity went there maybe he can hear more about Bad.

“So, the prison” he starts slowly, “you go there often?”

Quackity straightens up. Gears turning in his head while he takes a drag of his cigarette.

“Yeah, Sam and I were or are business partners so we would meet at the prison. Sometimes I’d visit the guards and Dream and stuff.”

“Was Bad ever there?” he turns to Quackity, studying his face. Looking for the threads that tie them together.

“Sometimes” Quackity shrugs, “He was always kind to Dream. Always used his kicked puppy voice on him, y’know the one.”

And boy does Skeppy know that voice. He misses it in a way. He thinks some days there is a Bad shaped hole in his heart, so big not even the best doctors or seamstresses could sew it back up.

“Was he a good guard?” Skeppy asks, swallowing his confession.

“Nah” Quackity huffs, leaning in, “he’s always been too soft for fighting or prison. He got fired because of the egg but I think it’s because of his empathy. He cared too much about Dream.”

“Oh” Skeppy looks out at the night sky again, “Bad’s always been like that. He’s got a big heart.”

“Yeah, he sure does.” Quackity stares off again before smiling, “enough about your ex or mine, how about we get out of the cold and go get a drink?”

“Sounds good, as long as you're paying.” he says smiling.

“Sure, sure” Quackity grins, “it’s my casino, I own the place.” he spreads his arms out, with the air of a man without a care in the world.

As they walk towards the exit, Quackity turns towards him. The night sky is beautiful behind him, the stars staring at him.

“Y’know I was meaning to ask you earlier” Quackity starts, “but Bad started a knitting club recently, it might be weird because you guys aren’t you guys anymore. But, I have leftover resources from building so I wanted to see if you wanted to come with me sometime?”

Skeppy stares out at the sky above them and the city below them. He thinks of the egg and Bad and his friends. Quackity in front of him and the messy tie that only ex-husbands could share.

Maybe knitting could be a start. Maybe trying something new could lead to a good hobby full of friends not possessed by an egg.

“Sure” he exhales, “I’ve been needing a new sweater.”

@sixteenth-day-event

#sixteenthdayevent #this is my first time writing for this fandom lol #my writing <3

9 notes · View notes

proudfreakmetarusonikku · 1 year ago

Text

on that note i do think a lot (not all obviously, nor even the majority, but a noticeable amount) of character bias is simply due to who has the most accessible vods. tommy and techno, the two characters i see get this most commonly, are among the few to have a complete collection of vods posted to their channels, therefore making finding their pov easy. meanwhile, if you’re trying to get into, say, hbomb lore, there’s so much missing that it feels like an impossible task. even with ppl who don’t have a shitton of lost vods, finding them can be a nightmare. and then there’s cases like Tubbo, where he has some bits of some vods saved but not all of them and not the full vod so you can find some stuff easily but some other stuff is a nightmare. this isn’t the reason it started- but it will increasingly become an issue as time goes on.

23 notes · View notes

pyreo · 1 year ago

Text

I know hbomb's vid was about the overarching immediate content landscape and awareness of emerging methods of exploitation

but also I wasn't aware of any of these people, I don't absorb much on youtube, I'd never heard of most of them and had never seen their content. hbomb was showing me them for the first time and all I could think was they sound terrible

specifically somerton, illuminaughty (??) and internet historian--they wanted to just reformat already available content that put themselves in the centre. Those three specifically - none of them sound engaging to my ear. They're putting on an affected dramatic voice as they recite other people's writing. That's not itself bad, obviously - that's technically what acting is - but that is the single thing they decided they were good enough at that you should watch them do it, and they fucking suck.

Like god I don't understand how people were interested in Somerton's presentation style. Sorry if this sounds like I'm doing an 'i'm immune to propaganda' bit, it's not that! he just sounds so bored by what he's doing!

Because all of them were uninterested-- as hbomb says, they gave so little respect to media creation and analysis that they snatched the work of others without a thought to the effort that went into ideas, writing and research. And they can barely hide that they don't care.

They're narrating things in a grating tone of voice with no real levity, no spark of interest, and I genuinely think you can tell. They have the affectations of pretending to care while being bad at acting. Someone reading their own script, or something produced for them in a proper way, you don't get that because they'd be excited and eager to relay that information, happy to discuss a topic, which is just... what art is. Communicating the world through the lens of yourself. It's personal specifically to you, who you are, what you see around you. What interests you. Centering yourself in art is the point of art, something that only you could do. Having the world look back at you, through the lens of your creativity.

The people in hbomb's video had nothing to say even as they placed themselves at the forefront of presenting it. And their presentation voices, like the void of personality missing because it's not their work, are dull, boring, uninterested. Something something confirmation bias sure maybe but I hated listening to all of them talk. Look at me, I'm doing my youtuber voice with pauses for effect, I don't give a shit about anything I'm saying, I'm going to use the same tone and croak my way through some noises that you idiots will click on.

I literally think the disdain is audible.

Anything, anything, made by someone about a subject they love has more worth than these glossy-eyed self serving inarticulate cunts who can't even muster a semblance of curiosity as they frame themselves as the best mouthpiece to click on for money.

#and i don't get it. i just don't. i love expressing my opinions #i'm expressing one with this post. i'm only writing this out of putting the anger somewhere #but also... why? why put in that much work over something that was meaningless to you?#how could anyone stand it. how can you stand to feign engagement with everything around you #what went so wrong for you to believe everyone should be listening to you when there's nothing you want to say

14 notes · View notes

dykeogenes · 1 year ago

Note

in case you are curious why few ppl seem to be commenting on it in the new video, hbomb publicly came out as bisexual a few years ago in his (very good!) video on h.p. lovecraft. he just hasn't mentioned it much if at all in videos, since.

OKAY SO I WAS RIGHT LMAO!!! yeah at first I was like “i can’t remember ever hearing him say it but I feel like he just Has Been Bisexual” and kind of assumed he mentioned it offhand ages ago or something, and I missed it? but then I saw people saying it was new information to them too. anyways good to know, thank you nonnie!!

#I also somehow haven’t heard he did a lovecraft video so I will have to watch that!!#asks #anonymous

6 notes · View notes

peninkwrites · 2 years ago

Text

A Man Lost Through Time

Connor's piece for @dreamoirezine !

Please check out the full project, it's amazing!

crossposted to ao3

Connoreatspants has come unstuck in time.

He sat down to chat with his business partner JSchlatt only to turn around and find him across from him in a courtroom in the midst of a lawsuit only to next find himself alone, drifting, months after he’d first been told of his old friend’s death.

He enters a new server, alone and unsure, only to next find himself settled into a little house, passively watching yet another court case unfold. Only for there to be a slightly more jarring shift, as he suddenly finds himself hosting a party with the ghost of that very friend alongside Karl, a time traveler still confused by the nature of his own existence. Connor doesn’t know how to explain to him how little his confusion matters. Karl has the luxury of most often one moment passing into the very next moment. Connor doesn’t have the chance to even attempt to give him an explanation, because now he is back to watching the bombs fall over a city-state he knows he had seen standing what felt like only a few hours ago.

“Hello? Connor?”

It’s Ranboo. He knows Ranboo now. Ranboo is alive now.

He’s sitting against a wall in a cell opposite Ranboo’s. So, alive, but not for much longer.

“...what’s up, man?” Connor blinks.

“You were telling me about…” Ranboo sounds reluctant. “Never mind. It’s fine, really. I think I… I think I got the gist of it.”

“Right, right,” Connor agrees quickly. He stares at the back wall. It’s going to break. If Ranboo is here, it won’t be much longer now.

Connor didn’t know Ranboo. Not yet. Right now the closest thing he has to a friend on this server is the grave he now stares at. He’s outside. The sky is overcast and behind him are fresh platforms built over a crater, in front of him is a grave he honestly thought his old pal Schlatt would have liked. It’s ornate, a tomb really.

Connor is almost tempted to ask Schlatt about his ideal resting place the next time he sees him, but he knows better by now. No one would understand. He could have warned Ranboo in the prison, and no one would have believed him. Better to just wait. If he waits, eventually they’ll be alive again.

Tommy is dead. He died in the prison. Connor is inside his house again. It’s a comforting thing to come back to, the occasional phases where he had been allowed to have Tommy’s house, and while there were other instances where he’d return there only to find Tommy still alive, free, or present, those times got annoying.

This time Connor knows it’s his house, because the rest of the server is in mourning. Ranboo had placed flowers outside Tommy’s door, because in this now Ranboo is still alive, and now Tommy is dead.

Connor took a leaf out of Ranboo’s book. He has a diary now. It helps with his sense of time.

i miss my friend jschlatt

im gonna solve mortality

if it's not that hard tho

if it’s a lot of work im good

–monday

Connor thinks it’s Monday.

Ranboo is still alive. Connor thinks Tommy is alive too. He’s running one direction across the Nether roof, he’s going to find people, he thinks. Ranboo, HBomb, and Foolish. He knows because of his chat messages. And then he isn’t on the Nether roof anymore. No wonder he keeps getting lost, he never sticks around long enough to remember where he’s going.

Connor is living in Tommy’s old house. It’s his house now, because… Connor scans the room. The ominous messages from Dream aren’t there, the walls are made of dirt. Connor steps outside and sees his own name over the doorway. It’s definitely his house, then.

Which is a bit strange because Connor turns around and sees Tommy crawling out of the sewer tunnels. Followed by Technoblade. Tommy is already a wave of chatter, Techno standing awkwardly between them.

“What’re you doing in my house?” Connor asks. It’s his house right now, he’s pretty sure. “What’s goin’ on?”

Tommy stops rambling and stops forward, colder now. He looks extra scrawny, he’s got bags under his eyes. That sort of look seems to come and go for Tommy. “This is my home, Connor.”

Connor disagrees. His name is over the door. So surely it’s his. Tommy disagrees as well. Connor turns around and finds the door has been blocked.

“If I was unexiled, would you give it back?” Tommy corners him.

Connor stares back, startled. Right. Tommy isn’t supposed to be here.Connor points this out. Tommy doesn’t take it well, and Connor finds himself walled in. He doesn’t take that well either, frantic as he’s trapped further, until there is only stone, not even light, Tommy and Techno’s shouting muffled through it.

Connor screams for help. He knows no one is coming. He pounds against the stone until he can see light, and immediately it is replaced by another. Connor is used to being out of control, but now he’s scared. He thought he would’ve been taken away by now, dragged to another point in time, but it’s still just darkness, it’s still just him pounding his fists bloody against cobblestone but every time he breaks it another stone takes its place. Connor doesn’t know why now is when he gets to stay in one place, he didn’t know that his existence out of time could also be freeing. He wants it to take him away again, he wants to go back to a time where he and Tommy are friends, he wants to go back home to when he and Schlatt were together, he wants out of this box–

Connor sees light and he bolts before Tommy can close him in again, but every exit is blocked and Tommy has a sword. Connor doesn’t know how Tommy feels about him right now. The last Connor remembered, they were friends. Tommy promised him his house. Tommy doesn’t look especially friendly right now.

“How much pain do you feel on a daily basis?” Tommy asks.

Connor thinks he can hear the blood rushing in his ears. Daily? I don’t have a daily. He knows he can’t say that, so instead he stammers out, “like… like on a scale?”

“Yeah. One to ten.”

Connor doesn’t know how to answer that. He doesn’t have a daily, and sometimes he’s in pain one second and then he’s not. He decides to high ball the estimate. “Honestly, like a seven..?”

“You’re about to be a nine, bitch!”

Connor doesn’t want to be in this one anymore, he doesn’t want Tommy to trap him again. He has never been able to control when he travels, and he accepts that often, but this is a bad one. Worse than most. “I don’t… I don’t wanna go back in the hole.”

As with all things in Connor’s life, he doesn’t have a choice.

It continues and Connor can only listen from behind a wall. He doesn’t think he knows how the rest of this one goes. He’s a unique sort of scared right now, fear of the unknown is pretty rare for him.

“I don’t wanna die…”

Connor doesn’t remember what life he is on. They let him out, but Connor doesn’t know if he should run. He’s, ironically enough, not a very good runner.

“Hey Connor, how many hearts are you on?” Tommy asks.

“Uh, all of them?”

Connor sees Tommy raise a crossbow, and then he is no longer there.

Connor hasn’t been shot. He feels a brief spark of relief, before recognizing his walls as that of a prison cell. Connor cannot remember why he was arrested. Only that he had been. Maybe it had been a mistake? Or it could’ve been some trouble with a fake I.D. Or living in a house that wasn’t really his. Something like that, usually. Sam put him in here, because if the prison is in operation, Sam is no longer that pretty chill guy who gave out pumpkin pies and went running around with Ponk. He went running after Ponk, it’s more like. Connor is used to being out of control, being locked in a cell isn’t that different, really. Just boring. He would have a neighbor soon.

Soon maybe . It could take days more instead. He doesn’t really know how long he is in the prison, how long he was. Would be. Semantics. It didn’t really matter.

Connor is spot on this time around. He hears voices down the hall, one cold and unfeeling, the other deep and unsure.

“You wanted to be put in here–”

“And now I don’t, okay? I have people who need me and–”

“–And they’re safer with you in here.”

Connor goes to the iron door, pressing his face to the bars. “H-Hey! Hey, man I did not want to get put in here, so, maybe we could do a little, uh, a little switcheroo and that guy– oh, hey, Ranboo!– can come in here and I can go home, okay?” Connor knows this isn’t where he gets let out. Still, might as well push Sam’s buttons a bit.

“Connor? Why is Connor in here?!” Ranboo is just barely visible, looking irritable, shoulders hunched inward.

“It doesn’t matter. Ranboo, please don’t make this harder,” Sam sighs.

“Please, Sam,” Ranboo grows quiet.

“Hey! Ranboo! Might wanna just like, do what he says, dude. If you were gonna get out of this, probably should’ve done that before you got, like, halfway into a super secure prison. But don’t you worry, buddy. We’ll get out of here before you know it!” Connor calls cheerfully from his cell door. He recalls the aftermath of the escape. He almost feels bad for lying to the kid, but it’s not like it matters. He’ll be dead for a moment, and then he will be alive again.

Connor screams. This is a new one. He has reawakened outside of his– Tommy’s?– house and he looks down at himself and sees nothing, no limbs, he doesn’t understand it.

“WHERE ARE MY ARMS?!”

Tommy and Techno are speaking to him. He’s friends with Tommy sometimes. He’s friends with Techno sometimes too, he even joined their Syndicate. Maybe this is one of those times.

Connor isn’t so sure.

He’s invisible and he thinks it’s Tommy and Techno’s fault. Oh. They’re not friends. Connor isn’t here by choice. He tries calling for help again. There is no reply. He thinks there should be. He’s a hostage, and he knows he isn’t a hostage forever. Someone gets him out of this. He wishes they’d get him out of this a little sooner. Tommy and Techno are hurting him again. This must be right after the last time. He hopes it is, at least. That Techno and Tommy don’t hurt him multiple times. He considers Tommy his friend. Sometimes. Certainly not now as he begins to drown, let up for air only long enough to stay conscious.

Connor is relieved to find himself no longer trapped. He can breathe. He can move freely. He’s safe, he thinks. Tommy is still here, but he’s younger now. He’s not hurting him. Connor is new to the server, and Tommy is just showing him around.

“There are a lot of assholes on this server, alright?” Tommy says intently. They’re standing on top of the community house, but he didn’t know it was called the community house yet.

“Technoblade,” Connor nods, agreeing, thinking of the man who threatened to put a pickaxe through his kneecaps not long ago with Tommy right beside him.

“Tech– Yeah, Technoblade,” Tommy nods, looking out over the prime path. “All of them. And I think what I need you to do is– Because I know that we’re… we’re friends.”

“Right,” Connor’s reply is automatic. He doesn’t want to think about Tommy laughing as he begged him not to kill him.

“Say we’re friends.”

“We are friends.” Connor doesn’t think he sounds particularly sincere, but he wants to be. Tommy was– or is going to be– the one to damage that. “Ethically.” Connor adds. Friends who don’t torture each other. Ethically friends.

Tommy laughs, that sharp cackle of his, “ ethically ? Why did you say that?”

Connor can’t explain, so he laughs too. “I’m– I’m sonic,” he says. Eventually people on this server will stop questioning his peculiarities. Until they do, I’m Sonic will have to suffice.

Connor follows Tommy down the prime path until he sees Church Prime. He’ll frequent its halls eventually, but right now he’s supposed to say, “what’s this?” And let Tommy show him the church, and the Prime Path, and Connor follows him.

Tommy is a good kid, really. Connor knows that hurting people isn’t his nature, even if it still stings.

Connor is outside the community house again, several renovations down the line. Tommy isn’t here this time. Niki is. So is Wilbur. Okay, so this is way down the line, then. Wilbur is alive, and he’s talking to Niki. That’s a change.

“I really want to do one good deed with you.”

“One good deed?”

“Something absolutely great–”

Connor approaches the community house.

Wilbur keeps talking, “ignore him. Ignore that guy. Oh god– Hello, Connor.”

“Did you guys say a good deed?” Connor doesn’t bother noticing Wilbur’s lack of enthusiasm. His ghost had been pretty chill, so Connor didn’t mind intruding. He wanted to do something helpful. Doing something felt like a nice change of pace to whatever motions he had been going through thus far. Wilbur wants to do a good deed as some sort of redemption type deal. Alright, that’s fair enough. “No, same, I just served time in jail,” Connor explains. “Is how I resolved that issue for myself.”

“Okay, in jail–” Wilbur gives him a careful look, pulling Niki aside, “Niki, who is this guy? He’s been in jail ? What the fuck? ”

Niki defends Connor. Because they’re in the Syndicate together now. That’s nice. Connor hopes he gets to actually spend some time with the Syndicate. “It was an accident?” Niki explains.

“What’s wrong with jail?” Connor gives Wilbur an unimpressed look. “You don't believe in reformation? Like, what’s the deal with you?”

“No, no I believe in reformation!” Wilbur doesn’t seem to know what to do with him.

“You’ve been a ghost too long, the world’s different now, buddy.”

Wilbur nods, “right, right you can come with us, Connor, just don’t touch anything.”

Wilbur sounds like he knows what he’s talking about, other than his outdated politics on prison reformation. Bla bla summon god, help the sheep, whatever. Connor doesn’t care too much about the details, he’s just happy to be along for the ride. He’s dealt with gods before, he thinks. Or he will. He’s not sure if Foolish counts.

Connor doesn’t get scared. Maybe a little nervous. The god shows, and Wilbur boxes him in in a way far too reminiscent of Tommy and Technoblade’s actions.

“Do you have a death wish?”

DreamXD is speaking to him , he thinks, but Wilbur is handling the talking. As per usual, Connor is tasked with waiting. Maybe he actually can’t stand being trapped like this again. Connor grows frantic, pushing against the gold walls Wilbur put around him. He doesn’t like being trapped. Connor feels shaky, he vaguely hears Wilbur say, “tell him we’ll stop,” and mumbles an agreement. He is doing his best not to freak out, keeping his voice level even as he turns around quickly, hoping to be sent to another time soon.

“What if I just killed your friend and your stupid sheep?”

Niki defends him, “uh, that would not be so great.” Connor is grateful again to be Syndicate buddies with her. Connor isn’t used to having allegiances that care about him and stuff.

“I mean, Connor, how do you feel about that?” Wilbur asks him. Connor stops spinning, turning to face him. “It’s easy, right? You could just get killed.”

“Uh, yeah, if that’s what you guys need, I’m just here to be helpful, y’know?” Connor doesn’t mind it. He dies, he goes somewhere else. Maybe it would get him out of this time faster.

Wilbur looks nervous. “I– Connor, I’m not sure about this, actually. I’ve changed my idea– How do you feel about it?”

Connor tries to remember. He’s not sure where he is in the state of things. A little bit ago, he’d said he had two lives, but he doesn’t think that makes sense. This far along, he thinks he’s died more than once. He isn’t sure if he’s lived both deaths yet, though. “Well, I mean, I only have like, one life left, so I–”

Then it doesn’t matter. It’s all gone. He’s dead. For a brief moment, he thinks he sees Schlatt–

And then Connor keeps going.

Connor tries to get his bearings. He tries to remember who is alive and who is dead. He is alive, that’s something good. Tommy is alive, but he’d been dead before too. Ranboo is alive, he thinks. He thinks Wilbur might be alive? He isn’t sure. He knows Schlatt is dead. He usually is. Which sucks as he thought for a second there he was going to get to see him again, but here he is instead. He’s living in Ninja’s old house again. He’s been waiting until he was back, past when Tommy had read his diary– he has a new diary now either way– to make sure Tommy wouldn’t see this part. It’s nice being able to plan ahead like that.

i don’t know when it’s gonna happen but i saw when i die.

it isn’t all that bad really.

i mean.

i wanted to be helpful.

kinda cool to get killed by god. makes prayer a little awkward though.

kinda was thinking i was immortal, though.

Because it just keeps going, right?

i mean actually i think i am immortal cuz i just said i saw when i die and here im writing about it so.

never mind.

-Friday

Connor thinks it has to be a Friday.

It feels like a Friday.

Connor is back in Tommy’s house, but he’s not going to get attacked by Tommy any time soon. Tommy is dead, and this is his house right now. There’s even a sign out front, and there are flowers outside of it placed there by Ranboo.

He needs to calm himself, to catch up. He has his diary in his hand.

The last entry:

I hope something happens today.

–Friday

“Me too, my guy…” Connor sighs.

I need a girlfriend

– thursday

“Ha, me too, me too. Which. Makes sense I guess,” Connor turns back one more page.

i miss my friend tommy

he died

got my house back

need food

– wednesday

Okay. So last time he was here, he felt good about Tommy. So, maybe later he won’t feel so messed up about the whole torture thing, right?

Connor’s necromancy powers work a little too well, because he’s pretty sure Tommy is supposed to be dead right now, not standing bruised and pale in front of him.

“Oh my god–” Connor panics, shoving him back toward the door, half expecting the guy to try to shove his head under water. “Begone, ghost!”

Tommy seems as scared of Connor as he is of him, running outside, begging him to stop. Before he runs back in with an axe. “Do not fuckin’ punch me!”

Connor is frantic, but there’s nowhere for him to run, “I’m c-calling the police! I’m calling the police–” They must have police or something, right? He’s going to end up in prison eventually.

Tommy stops, looking an inch away from a breakdown, “n-never fucking punch me–”

Okay. This Tommy isn’t going to hurt him. This Tommy is scared. Connor thinks that means they’re supposed to be friends right now. Alive friends. Ethical friends.

“Is that actually you?” Connor steps closer and Tommy does not attack him. Progress.

Tommy still looks scared of him. Maybe Connor’s impulse shouldn’t be to sympathize with him considering, y’know, a lot of things, but he doesn’t know why this kid looks so scared of being alive again. Connor feels like being alive is a bit more chill than being dead, generally. That might be because he hasn’t really gotten to spend much time dead.

Tommy is whispering and frantic. He died bad. He died in the prison.

Connor thinks of his own time imprisoned. “You know I have been saying we need prison reform on this server.” Connor wonders if Tommy knows his buddy Wilbur has some old fashioned views on prison. It doesn’t matter. Wilbur is dead today. Tommy is alive, and he’s scared.

This is after Tommy has tortured him. Connor doesn’t have any reason to show pity. He kind of wants to anyway.

Tommy is upset that Sam let him die. Wait until he finds out about Ranboo. Or, wait until that thing happens to Ranboo, Connor supposes. Connor will just listen. And then he’ll leave again. He leaves sooner than he thought.

~ Connor came out to Foolish’s construction site for a reason. He’s guessing he had a reason whenever that destination choice had been made, but right now he isn’t sure. HBomb is here. He’s someone to conspire with, Connor thinks. He has a feeling his intentions here had been conspiratory, even if the details are fuzzy.

Connor tries to piece together his surroundings. The mansion is super unfinished.

Connor has a nuke.

That part is unimportant. He can’t remember how he got it, and he’s confident he never uses it, he’s pretty sure he would’ve heard about that at some point. So whatever he came here to do, it’s something else.

There’s a beacon.

Stealing a beacon sounds like something he’d do.

HBomb covers for him, Connor grabs it, and he runs. He doesn’t think this is going to end well for him. He thinks he came here for a reason. That reason hits him the same moment Ranboo’s sword slices through his back and he feels his whole body burn.

Right. Ranboo kills him.

Connor is down to one life now, and he knows where that will lead, so he returns to the mansion. He knows he won’t die again, not here at least.

“Also, guys, I am, uh. Cursing this land with the nuke. I’m cursing it. So, at some point– I curse this place to be destroyed, with my necromancy powers that I have, um, and you guys are all screwed. You will rue this day and you will regret what you have done to me and my forefathers. See you later. Goodbye,” Connor turns and leaves. They don’t follow.

Connor is pretty sure his curse worked, because sometimes there is a big empty mansion in this spot and no one moves into it, and sometimes that mansion is haunted by Ranboo’s ghost, and other times it’s under construction until it drives Foolish mad. Or it’s before he cursed the land and Connor doesn’t see it at all. But that part is less relevant. His curse worked. Just like his necromancy powers work.

Connor is running. He stares ahead, there is nothing in front of him. What was he doing here? Connor stops. He turns around. He’s going the wrong way on the Nether roof again. Or maybe not again, this could be the same as the last time. Connor starts running the other way. He might kill someone. He isn’t sure. If he does, he only needs to wait and soon they will be alive again. Just like with the others, with Ranboo, with Tommy, with that Wilbur guy, with himself. He just has to wait.

Connor finally finds his way on the Nether roof, reaching the main portal. And he remembers why he went running off to kill someone. It’s because Ranboo killed him. Or rather, he was going to. When Connor got there. And instead of killing Ranboo, taking the Beacon and running.

Hm. Connor has maybe a second to wonder about self fulfilling prophecies before he’s swept away again.

Speaking of self fulfilling prophecies. Connor is pretty sure from the way everyone’s running around all freaked out, he’s pretty sure it’s Doomsday, or from the darkened sky, the night before probably.

Connor is on the prime path, he sees his house, the sign over the door confirming it. Tommy is here too. He’s standing at that one bench, looking quite serious. Tommy spots him and grimaces, leaving the bench, glancing from the house, the sign over the door currently reading Connor’s House and considers it for a moment, looking back at him with something almost pitying.

“...hello?” Connor tries.

“Hey, Connor!” Tommy is too loud.

“Tommy, I’m gonna be honest, I don’t really know what happened,” very true. Connor can’t remember the specifics of how they got here. He remembers doomsday, kind of. He doesn’t remember the before. Although, he supposes this might fill him in a bit. “I–”

“Hey, Connor!” Tommy interrupts, patronizing and abrasive. “You know how I’m out of exile now?”

“...you are?” Oh. Connor is starting to understand why a bit in the future he isn’t in that house anymore.

“I’m out of exile now! And it looks like–”

“Congratulations,” Connor means it. Tommy in exile had been the one vicious enough to, y’know, waterboard him and so on.

“Thank you!” Tommy sounds almost too genuine. “This is my house, Connor, I don’t know why you’ve, uh, stolen it.”

Ah. He’s getting kicked out now. Right now. The night before doomsday– he thinks– that isn’t ideal.

“Well…” Connor tries to think back. He’s mostly going off of context clues at this point. “You were evicted.”

“Just�� One second, just explain this one to me, Connor,” Tommy leaves, goes into the house, and returns in armor. He’s holding his axe. Connor isn’t sure why. He guesses it makes sense, doomsday coming and all. Tommy frowns. “Why’re you holding that?”

Connor looks down at his hand. He’s holding a lead. He cannot for the life of him remember why. He might not even have lived that part yet. “This is… this is all I have.” It’s true. His inventory is empty. Gloom is setting in. “I don’t… I don’t have a place to sleep.” Connor turns back toward Ninja’s house. It’s not a very nice house.

“Tell you what! I’ll pitch you a deal, right now. In exchange–” Tommy pauses, mulling something over. “And I am not gonna be the bad guy, ever. In exchange to stay alive, I give you this gapple, and you– and you live in Ninja’s house. Pants optional. For the time being.” Tommy gestures to the house across the prime path.

Connor already knows he’s going to agree. Even if he isn’t a fan of the idea. Tommy is right too. For the time being. Time being very iffy for Connor, in five minutes, he could have his house back again.

“...I’ll take it.”

“Yeah? Yeah, we’ll be next door neighbors! And in that way, I get to keep my home!”

“Yeah, yeah I’m down with that,” Connor goes into the little house. There’s not much here. And Connor is pretty sure it never gets any better. “I’d be honored to sleep in Ninja’s bed.”

“That sounds alright? Okay!” Tommy is quite pushy with this arrangement.

Connor doesn’t hold it against him. He knows next time he moves back into Tommy’s house, that time will end with Tommy coming home way more messed up than when he left it. He can wait around in Ninja’s house for now.

“For what it’s worth, Tommy.” Tommy is rambling over him, but Connor just keeps talking. Tommy will hear him, or he won’t. Little stuff like this doesn’t matter, Connor just wants to know he said it. “I don’t know what went on today, but, uh, even though you kidnapped me, and I’m still dealing with the trauma of that, you’re just a conflicted person, not a bad person.” Connor doesn’t know how long it has been since Tommy hurt him. For Tommy or for him, but Connor cannot exist in this life able to hold a grudge. Tommy has fallen quiet. “Um. And uh, I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

“Oh. Thank you, Connor.”

Connor turns back to his empty house. “Actually I need to go get a bed.”

And then Connor is alone.

Not gone, just alone. Tommy has left. Connor doesn’t understand why he’s like this. He doesn’t often let it get to him, but he feels like he’s seen so many people lately, none of them people he had truly been able to rely on. He likes Tommy, he does, but he misses Schlatt. He misses those times in his life, and he doesn’t know when or how he will get them back.

He feels like he should have run into Schlatt by now. It scares him to think he hasn’t had Schlatt in his life more than he has had him there, to think maybe he’s run out of time with his partner.

The way he figures it, from his side of things at least, he’d brought JSchlatt back from the dead, and then he’d been dead again, and then a ghost, and then alive again. Connor must have figured out necromancy to some extent. He didn’t feel like he’d done it yet, but he must figure it out eventually. Nothing stayed dead for him. Eventually he’ll end up in better times.

#dreamoirezine #my writing #connoreatspants #this project was so cool to work on!!

25 notes · View notes