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jui-imouto-chan · 6 years ago

Text

Part 10 of the Mostly Human AU

Level Select:

Getting through to the last of the suggestions from @manadrite ‘s most recent comment (as of posting this)! I love having suggestions, keep ‘em coming!

Connor isn’t one to get terribly scared. He actually gets a thrill from scary situations.

His sense of self-preservation is startlingly low, for a being granted with immeasurable intelligence. At least, that’s what Hank claims.

Furthermore, Connor loves Horror. From movies to novels to images, he loves things made to be scary.

- Connor may or may not have had a weird crush on Slenderman for like a week.

Maybe it was the towering height and the lack of a face, or maybe it was the slim fitting suit that made the creature so appealing to him.

Okay maybe Connor has a suit kink.

When he sees Gavin in an officer’s clothing and finds the man slightly attractive, it’s clear that he just straight (pfft) up has a uniform kink.

Connor will take this newfound information to the g r a v e.

Connor goes to see a horror movie with Hank and the twins, and he’s ecstatic.

He puts all of the pieces together detective style to figure out how the protagonists are either gonna die or solve the problem while Collin and Conan grip their seats a bit too tight and while Hank mutters flaws about the movie under his breath.

“This scene does not include a lap dance.”

“What was that?”

“Nothing!”

By the end of the movie, Collin and Conan had migrated to partially hide behind Connor, and Connor points this out to them.

They lie and say they were getting sleepy, and were dozing off on his seat.

Connor goes with it with a knowing smirk and a wink, mischief twinkling in his eyes.

Connor goes missing one day.

They try to give him a call when he they don’t see him that morning, but they receive no answer.

Hank and the twins storm through the house, upturning furniture and looking under the beds, in the closets, outside. He’s nowhere to be found.

They call up all of his friends, but nobody knows where he is.

The DCPD gets at least fifteen calls all at once reporting Connor missing.

While everyone is freaking out, Connor is actually, in fact, not missing.

He is out for a walk, Sumo at the vet’s for a check up and grooming, and he spots an animal shelter/pet shop.

There are dogs and cats in cages by the windows, and Connor gravitates towards them without thought to anything else.

He enters the shop and, after talking with the person behind the counter for ten minutes, is surrounded by animals, all vying for his attention.

He’d never seen a cat before this, and honestly, he now holds cats to the same regard as dogs.

It’s his first time seeing a lot of animals, all of them immensely cute. He giggles when a rabbit nibbles on his pointer finger.

The employee who allowed this to happen is melting against the counter, everything is too much. Too cute.

The employee pulls out a camera and records, knowing the manager would love to use this as an ad.

Connor already gave his consent for any media that his interaction might appear in, so it’s all gucci, even though Connor’s too preoccupied with the animals to even realize he’s being recorded.

Connor is there for a few hours, all of the time considered blissful to the android.

The video was sent to the editor as soon as the employee got clips of Connor interacting with each and every one of the animals.

It's edited impressively quickly, yet still professionally; the editor accredited it to “passion”.

When the ad goes up on all of the shelter/shop ‘s social media, with Connor tagged in the photo, everything halts.

Connor finally registers that his phone, being sat on by two guinea pigs, is ringing.

He answers it, and is disappointed when he's told to return home immediately by Hank. Hank sounds angry, distressed, and relieved all at once.

The employee reassures him, telling him that he can return whenever he’d like.

There’s an issue when Connor is on his way home, however, as he gets attacked.

A man tries to mug him with a knife to his throat, pushing him into an alleyway, and while Connor manages to push him away, he doesn’t anticipate the man having accomplices.

He gets a few surprise stab wounds that go into some biocomponents, but their timers are set to at least an hour before he shuts down.

He defeats his attackers and sends Hank his location, telling him that he needs emergency care needs to be taken to Kamski as soon as possible.

His systems kick him into sleep mode against a cold alley wall to preserve thirium, which leaks copiously from his many wounds.

Connor wakes up to the ceiling of Kamski’s “operating” room, vaguely wondering if the past few months had been the equivalent of a dream, if he had imagined all of the friends he’d made and all of the things he’d experienced.

The thought...saddens Connor.

Luckily, a few minutes after he awakens, he hears Hank’s gruff voice and a plethora of footsteps approaching the room he’s in.

Connor goes to sit up, but winces in pain. His movement brings up a prompt, asking if he’d like to interface with the android equivalent of an IV, though it contains a liquid that promotes self-reparation at the cost of his mental capabilities being lowered until his wounds are healed.

TL;DR, it’s the closest Connor can get to pain killing medication.

He accepts the interface and he suddenly feels...oddly happy?

Everything is moving around the slightest bit and Connor can’t help but smile. Everything was great and he was having fun, sitting on the table.

He giggles drunkenly.

His wounds are slowly closing themselves, and he scoots to the edge of the table while humming an unknown tune. He smiles triumphantly once his knees finally hang over the edge, he kicks them and rocks his head side to side.

When everyone enters the room, he’s surrounded by people and get-well gifts and he’s just so happy. He really doesn’t think of the consequences of his actions.

So that’s exactly why he thanks them all with hugs and kisses, skin tingly and buzzing while his chest feels warm and full.

The members of Jericho are frozen when he gives them all kisses to the cheek, and then all of them simultaneously slap a hand onto their cheek and stare at each other with pink faces. Daniel and Simon both duck their heads while Josh pulls his hood over his face and rugs on the drawstrings. North is suddenly more occupied with poking Markus’ red cheeks and teasing him as he shakes.

Hank tries to fight him off, but eventually relents, ruffling his hair bashfully. Conan and Collin both turn their heads as he approaches their cheeks, leading to him kissing both of them on the lips, though he just laughs good naturedly when they both nod at each other and go to opposite sides of the room, ears red.

Ralph and the Jerrys are surprisingly shy when Connor kisses them, but Ralph gives him a kiss on the cheek back, while the Jerrys all rub their necks and look away with silly grins.

Luther and Kara let Alice take their share of kisses, and she presses a kiss to Connor’s nose.

Rupert tries to escape Connor, but the brunette grabs his sleeve and gives him a kiss to the temple. Rupert immediately tries to flee the room, and Connor waves. Rupert hesitates before waving back and running away.

Connor goes to give Gavin a kiss, too, but the detective shoves a homemade cupcake in his mouth before he can. He still manages to give the guy a hug, though.

Kamski approaches, by Connor’s hug and kiss for him are stolen by Chloe, who had just snapped out of her shock at seeing Connor surrounded by a goddamn harem.

She growls at everyone in the room, sans Alice, Hank, Kara, and Luther.

Kamski is kinda concerned?? People don’t growl like that, wtf.

Also, he’s kinda upset that she’s keeping him from getting affection from his own creation but he’s not about to let his head get ripped off today

Chloe says that there’s too many people in the room, it’s getting late, and that Connor should get some more rest so that he can recover completely.

She tries to sound pleasant, but she really just sounds threatening af

Once she’s sufficiently scared the fuck out of everyone there and gotten them to leave, she puts her hands on Connor’s shoulders and tries to explain that nobody is allowed to touch him bc he’s too precious and, “nobody deserves you. This world doesn’t deserve you. The G-Man in the sky doesn’t even deserve you u pure boi.”

He doesn’t remember a word of this in the morning, but Chloe doesn’t know that.

He goes home in Hank’s car, Sumo already back from the vet and now laying across his lap, and finds out that Conan and Collin are at registration for their next year of college

(lol idk if thats something u have to go do at college, im 15 and clueless)

Next Level: College Care Packages and Birthday Parties (suggested by @supposedlymatureadult )

X | Continue to Next Level

O | Save Progress and Quit to Main Menu

————————————— •

I think I got carried away with the kissing but I just really wanted Connor to be overly affectionate. At least I didn’t go down the sexual route.

Leave suggestions in the notes or in my ask, along with any questions, comments, and anything else!

Side note: If you want to receive notice of this AU but not the other random things I post/reblog (don’t worry I‘m not offended if that’s the case), I’m marking them all with #Jui’s Mostly Human AU in the tags, so you can follow that instead if that’s preferable!

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applekitty · 6 years ago

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ive noticed that a LOT of fanfics that try to redeem dedede really dont try. like its not like the author is lazy but the way its executed is

i have never read a fic wherein dedede is given a satisfactory redemption arc, he’s usually just nice from the beginning and very flat with the same personality every other ‘game’ dedede has, basically just ‘i am loud, i’m not mean or cruel im just loud and also im very sassy and a dad dont mess with me im epic’ which seems at first like it might substitute for his evil nature but it doesn’t

or he’s just really outrageously stupid, which is more anime dedede.

i do agree with you, though i think dedede in and of himself is a hard character to do perfectly ‘correctly’. because when it comes to game canon, there is no correct way to write him. because dedede has no personality. he has hints of personality. which is not replacement for a personality. you are left entirely to your own devices when it comes to dedede’s flaws and his entire mindset in general, because canon supports absolutely everything you could ever put onto his canvas. i could say dedede is a hostile matriarch with no care for anyone other than himself and his kingdom and it’d be supported, because the only times dedede has been forced to act out of good is to defend his planet from something (potentially, in magolor’s case) hostile. or i could say he’s just a cozy uwu dad who’s done some wrong but he’s fluffy and cute nao and canon would sort of shakingly support that.

i went out a LOT about this on the hnk discord server. i’ll leave the entire transcript below but it’s about how people write game canon / why i don’t read game canon fics / the intrinsic, EXTREME difficulty with writing game canon fics. had this convo with @sociallyunacceptableorb , @toon-kirby , and azuranaito

i’ll tl;dr it here but: the reason why game fics seem a little strange while going in is because the games themselves lack a solid personality for the characters. fanon personality exists for them, and usually when writers write for them, they step in such a way which may not align with you, the viewer’s expectations of the fanon personality. it may seem inherently unsatisfying, to you, but for others, it’s very satisfying. the status of game canon and fandom canon makes it harder for you to be satisfied by the fanfics you read unless they are very surface level, boring sorts of fanfics.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:40 PM

kitty’s opinion time

most writers cannot go without incorporating the anime in some regard to kirby content due to how much the anime had bled into the interpretations of the games. people will write spanish meta knight as a game thing, people will write kirby being babyish / saying poyo being a game thing, as well as dedede being southern a game thingthe writers who decry the anime as bad / only good ‘at the time’ yet use anime personalities / interpretations make me lul extremely.(edited)

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:44 PM

Galaxia was from the anime.

Girlaxia was from 4Kids.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:45 PM

kirby saying ‘poyo’ is an anime thing, galaxia is an anime thing, to pick and choose from the anime shows that the games and their lack of writing cannot stand on its own without having to take from the very franchise that’s being decryed to help a worse written franchise

(edited)

no writing / intrigue writing ≠ good writing

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:47 PM

To be fair, it’s probably for the best that anime bleeds into the games or else we’d be stuck with oceans of edgelordery KIRBY IS EVUL AND EATS INNOCENT LIVES… though that’s already on AO3.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:47 PM

looks at matpat

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:48 PM

He ignores all canon to make people mad on purpose.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:48 PM

honestly if removing anime canon / anime’s bleed into the video game’s interpretation = writers to go 'KIRBY EVUL’ then idk what to say other than lul

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:49 PM

I mean, I don’t think the games writing is shit, but I also don’t trust edgy people with Void Termina.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:50 PM

i think saying 'game writing > anime writing’ is just blatantly.. wrongbecause that’s just saying 'little to no writing so that way you can focus on gameplay > a literal 22 episode made for television with themes and lessons’

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:51 PM

Oh! Yeah, that I agree on.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:51 PM

i also dont trust edgelords with kirby or void honestly

or any kirby characters

i dont trust edelords period

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:51 PM

I thought you were saying that all game lore was trash.

It’s crumbs.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:51 PM

i used to be one and i made EVERYTHING baaad

it’s comparing crumbs to a loaf of bread

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:52 PM

“Well, I hate pumpernickel! So the entire loaf is bad!”

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:52 PM

uerGHERUG

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:53 PM

“But you haven’t even eaten it.”“IT’S BAD.”…this metaphor is getting lost.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:53 PM

honestly it’s why i just.. dont read game fics, because there’s little to no ground for writers to stand on and write stuff with

things get too wild and they feel just.. weird ig

i dont know how to put it into words, really

AzuraLast Wednesday at 12:54 PM

That kinda makes me mad with what happened with one of my friends. People got onto her for crossing the anime and games together, which, when she wrote it, it wasn’t bad at all, but because the anime was involved people wanted to bitch at her for it.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:54 PM

interps of game canon are based purely off the person who writes it and all the people reading said thing all have different interpretations which inherently makes reading a game fic unsatisfying and ooc for you personally because your hc filled in the void the game left differently than the authors did. but for the writer it is ic.(edited)

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 12:55 PM

Like gijinka fic?

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:56 PM

reading mirror fics also, inherently, can be unsatsifying i think

for the same reasons

people have so many different interps of how mirror world works that reading anything about it, just on its core basis that the author uses to define a 'mirror world’ can feel unsatisfactory

gijinka as well suffers from this

AzuraLast Wednesday at 12:57 PM

My friend didn’t write gijinka. But she self projected quite a bit onto Meta; her HC for him was that he was an engineer trained under Haltmann.Which also ended up writing out the actual irl problems her major has which is an aerospace engineering.Hoo boy, with the Mirror World, there’s no clear line with it but the majority is usually edgy.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 12:58 PM

people have different interps, and because of how the western world works, we all think our interpretation is the best we can possibly have. usually when we read things we suspend our disbelief, and when it comes to kirby fics, game fics, gijinka fics, i don’t think people can really.. deeply get involved in them.it’s a problem fics i suppose in general have. but it’s especially bad for game canon writers, or gijinka writers.people have hugely different adaptations of the same subject. with the anime there’s clearly written rules and characters defined over the course of 100 episodes. there’s a clear cut story with lots of dialogue and content there to be tackled. but even still, it can be interpreted differently by different people because thats how life works. only the existence of a canon episode cannot be refuted; a fic can be

game canon is harder to do because yes you have the games, and a lot of them, but there is no writing. it is all gameplay. which means that personalities and dialogue and whatever else is not the focus. people can have extremely varying interpretations of canon because of this, which is what intrinsically makes game canon harder to write for. with anime canon it’s easier to write closer to canon because there is a clear cut one. but with game canon, there is no clear cut canon.

AzuraLast Wednesday at 1:02 PM

That’s also why so many people also freak out about all the supposed lore the games have, right?

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:02 PM

the lore in games is very open ended is the thing, so it leads to people’s speculation and very different extrapolations of the lore and canon, yes

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:03 PM

Yup! It adds to their own things; it’s satisfying less for the confirmation and more for the new content to tinker with.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:03 PM

kirby is very, VERY dry in terms of story telling in the games, so any piece of lore given is EXTREMELY important for content creators / theorists(edited)

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:04 PM

I can’t really fault people who build off lore since it’s such a personal thing. Other people get huffy and whine about them “not really appreciating the game” but I find it is appreciation, just in a different fashion. It goes downhill once people get childish and argumentative, though.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:05 PM

the thing is people can also do that ^ for the anime too

remember that one server you were talking about in #newbie-chat

lol

in the end we are the people going 'you are not appreciating the anime right and the way you write for the games is going to intrinsically be unsatisfying unless you go onto the crutch of anime lore'i do anime/game fusion because i know the games can’t stand on their own

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:08 PM

Aheh. But of course.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:08 PM

[snobbish laughter]

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:08 PM

I actually don’t for the same reason. It feels cheap, like I’m forcing a square peg into a round hole.The barebones of the games doesn’t mesh with the backstory of the games that well for me.

StarRodPiplupLast Wednesday at 1:09 PM

So, like, if I wrote a fic with a sentient Galaxia, and then threw the rest of anime canon in the trash, it wouldn’t be cool?

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:09 PM

it’d be relying on the anime canon in some regard, showing that the game canon can’t hold its own

StarRodPiplupLast Wednesday at 1:09 PM

Too many plot holes

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:10 PM

it would be a tad bit jarring, at least in my opinion because im the local brutal 4kids anime stan

but for other people it wouldnt be, i’m just a person with too much time to complain about kirby

StarRodPiplupLast Wednesday at 1:11 PM

I’ve been really curious if “a nightmare of a galactic crisis” was just a coincidence or a deliberate lore inspired word choice, hence why I’ve steered away from capitalist idiot nightmare….it’s fun to write him like that though.

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:11 PM

Also, if it’s a prequel… where the hell does Tiff go? The Cappies? Cappy Town? Dedede just abandons everybody for no reason and there’s a fountain powered by something that Kirby had to create by eating?

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:11 PM

schrodingers cappytown

AzuraLast Wednesday at 1:12 PM

I would like to know my own headcanons give my own appreciation to both the anime and the games. Games can’t stand alone with their bare bones and the anime can always be expanded upon. Nothing wrong with having fun while writing, that’s all it is, isn’t it?

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:13 PM

honestly i think the best way to write kirby stuff is anime/game fusions

i wonder if it’s because thats what i write HMMMMMMEIUGUIERGHERG

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:13 PM

I fuse. I go by manga lore.

Novel, whatever.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:13 PM

novel lore or bust

AzuraLast Wednesday at 1:14 PM

I fuse because it feels the most natural for me.

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:14 PM

Because the novels actually build on it! They don’t pop backstory in everywhere! It’s just a Kirby game with more explanations for stuff in it!

StarRodPiplupLast Wednesday at 1:14 PM

I just wanna write about an evil vampiric wizard for some reason

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:14 PM

the games do need something to help them, i believe. when it comes to content creation of the purely fic type, anywayscourtesycalling does great one-shot comics and what not, they do game lore to the t because their comics are.. well.. oneshots. they’re satisfying by themselves

anyways i’ve got a lot of feelings on people decrying the anime as bad or cool to hate then taking things from the anime and putting it into game lore. that’s mostly what this is about

AzuraLast Wednesday at 1:17 PM

It seems kind of hypocritical in a sense too, doesn’t it?“Oh, I hate the anime but love the games but I’ll piss on the anime as I write my fic because even though I love the games I need to strong bones of the anime to hold me up as I write my fic.”

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:18 PM

yeah that’s sorta what im on about here thank you for summarizing it for me

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:18 PM

Yep! I joke about it a lot myself.Especially people using 4kids voices when they say 4Kids is trash.

AzuraLast Wednesday at 1:18 PM

Same, all it seems to be is a freaking joke.

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:18 PM

Sorry for turning this into a Steven Universe-esque debate thread.

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:19 PM

i instigated it

Garlude Smoocher (Shirley)Last Wednesday at 1:19 PM

chingkittycatLast Wednesday at 1:19 PM

it’s an interesting thread anyways so

#they speak #Anonymous #i have never read anyone ever try to give anime dedede an actual redemption so im assuming this is about game dedede #analysis

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odeuteros-blog · 6 years ago

Text

--------------------- deutero- ;

second; secondary: //; ( deu·ter·ag·o·nist : the person second in importance to the protagonist in a drama. )

hey what up i’ve got stats homework im neglecting !!

* slaps the roof of this post * this bad boy can fit so much useless fucking info in it ( including my ooc intro but like , )

----- alrighty lets rock & roll buckaroos i’m linx, i’ve been on this earth two decades too long,,, and i’m in the est. canada baby. i’m super excited to write w/ y’all and i haven’t written an oc in ten years so bear w/ me & my word vomit yea?

mattias eriksson was born and raised ( for the most part) in an itty bitty tiny fishing village in iceland. by itty bitty we’re talking a population of about 300 ( pretty much based off suðureyri ). he was the middle child in a family that was ( now looking back ) at most times insufferable.

there’s tragedy somewhere in there. before he was capable of remembering anything. his parents sung praises when it came to his older brother but time reveals all truths. or at least articles and news clippings do. he’s four ( give or take ) when his brother is ‘ murdered ‘ by a super-human. he’s about fifteen when he puts the pieces together ( his brother wasn’t savagely murdered - on the contrary - he antagonized and harassed the ability harnessing girl until it boiled over & blew up in his face. all too literally. ) finally, he’s nineteen when he gets the FUCK out of there.

plenty happens in the in-between. he’s raised in an intolerant household. anyone who wasn’t STRICTLY human was an abomination, a curse, a plague upon this earth. his parents constantly spitting venom when it came to the loss of their firstborn son // while matti, conflicted, found it hard to mourn for a man he hardly knew. his focus much more so on his younger sister - who was, well, alive. there. real.

from a young age, he thrived on challenge. puzzles. anything to exercise the brain. there was always a better way to do something. he was often scolded for sticking his nose where it didn’t need to be - in adult business. eventually having enough of being chased off - he branched out. made some friends. two, in particular, stood out. a brother and sister ; patrek and magnea. in time the trio was inseperable.

eventually, a strain showed itself. patrek didn’t fit the strict /human/ criteria that mattias’ had grown up on - but time healed wounds, and his had barely been there. he couldn’t carry his parent’s grief. couldn’t pin that on his friend. but patrek’s secret wasn’t his to keep and it came out - with it came an unspoken ultimatum ; cut his ties with his friends or suffer the consequences with his family. the choice was fairly clear, though no less painful.

knowing there was nothing there for him in his hometown, except a life of fishing, it was time to take leave. the siblings aspired for more just as he did & so the three parted with their respective homes. no goodbyes. no notes. mattias leaves while his parents are at work - his biggest regret to this day is never saying goodbye to his sister. if they knew, he’d never have been able to leave. he needed the headstart.

like something out of a film, patrek aspired to do more with his abilities and so begun mattias’ life as the man behind the scenes. finally able to stick his nose in ‘ adult business ‘. it was a bit campy - but it was exciting. they lived a life on the road, constantly moving. helping where they could. mattias learned his way around technology, being hands on where he could. however, he never wished for the limelight. did not want to be on the spread of a newspaper. he just wanted to help his friends. there was some petty theft on their part ( you had to eat and sometimes money was short ) but they managed to stay on the straight and narrow. this lasted for three years.

something had to go awry eventually. he’s too close to the scene, catches an injury that initially looked, not horrible. a scar would become a permanent fixture on his skin - but he’d survive. --------- until infection sets in. until it blossoms into something their petty medical skills can’t cover. maybe slapping some bandages and medical tape on it & calling it a day hadn’t been such a good idea. they were still kids ---- and they’d fucked up.

their hand is forced. petrek and magnea drop him off at the nearest hospital - welcome to crystalline city - and have no choice but to continue on their way less their reputation should precede them and they get caught up with law enforcement. sometimes it was just easier to be ‘ the man behind the scenes ‘.

one hefty hospital bill later and he’s now resident in crystalline - much, MUCH, larger than where he’d originated. there’s some forgery on his part and plenty of loans and he eventually lands himself an apartment with the bare minimum. it’s a lot at twenty-two with an education that is scarce on paper - but he’s worldly & where there’s a will, there’s a way.

you can’t say he doesn’t have drive. it takes some time to scout out a job but he’s not above some begging and pleading if he has to ( he wants to keep that roof above his head somehow ). haggis tech is his beacon of hope and saving grace * finger guns to the real MVP harriet haggis. perhaps there was embellishing on his part - a resume and interview really was just about selling ones self - but he knew he had what it took to back it up - and nothing he’d ever done thus far was out of malintent. eventually ( more like somehow ) he lands on the radar of the harriet haggis and finds himself as a trainee. godspeed.

TL ; DR or the simplified summary

he’s just happy to be here.

on an emo note ; the type of person to feel lonely in a room full of people. would rather shy away from large crowds.

perpetually homesick even though his family / save for his sister / were assholes. they were still his mom and dad. also probably a little heartbroken because the likelihood of them ever looking for him or putting out a missing person notice is slim to nothing and he knows it - probably checked. shit was just too :/ rough. the relationships were kind of shot.

probably checks in on their online activity - discreetly though. like a window into their lives. it’s probably the part of his life he keeps tight-lipped about. partly ashamed and partly hurt.

& his friends kind of up and left him in the city so that adds to that sweet sweet homesick feeling. since that was his last tie.

probably also overcoming his conflicted feelings about people with abilities. it’s more like having to correct a negative thought. he knows it's not true - but he can’t help but feel it upon first meeting. oh they’re inherently dangerous. but like ?? he sees heroes all the time.

wanted/ideas for connections !!

give me that replacement for his little sibling. someone he dotes on. just let him fill ONE void in his life.

someone who he’s just like ?? attached himself to. something about them makes him feel better. the kind of relationship where he’s put himself on their doorstep waiting for them to come home. he’s that friend who spends more time at your house than their own. he’s pretty solitary but this is like the one person(s) that he likes to just have occupied space?? like they don’t even have to be doing anything - just the presence alone is enough - listen im jsut trying to fill this sense of loneliness in his life don’t @ me. if you want to spice things up this person can be a villain / someone he probably shouldn’t be associating himself with.

honestly im an angst hoe too so like throw anything angsty at me - enemies, friends to enemies idc.

friends are fine

GIVE ME A BICKERING. oof i love a good hate/love.

rivals

someone he might be trying to steer back onto the right path of life idk i mean he’s not squeaky clean but like out of villainy ?? that shits wack.

he’s my dumb son and i LOVE HIM. sk;ld also my dumbass doesn’t have discord but if you want to plot my IMs are open just like ??? know me and plotting have a rocky relationship.

#the more i think about it #the more he's probably in peter parker level debt #and thats okay #he's my good son but im amazed his ass isn't in jail #// he probably handed in his resume #with some straight up TRANSPARENT BS on it #sure jan :/#death tw #i probably need to edit the font size on my theme klsdkas smh #i cant think of anything else to add and now my friend wants me to go over her paper again skldk #my whole ass theme is getting an overhaul to be friendlier once i finish this skldjs #sakldj dashboard ver for uno momento

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alternautxyz · 2 years ago

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I have this notebook full of potential story ideas and character designs which had it’s spine ripped out and replaced with two very sad staplers for very enraging reasons and because of that i’ve been looking at a bunch of the old notes trying to fix the stapled mess

incase you haven’t gathered i am very upset for multiple reason because 1, it was roughly ripped out of the spring spine leaving a bunch of paper pieces everywhere

2 i wasn’t finished with the book and most of the empty pages are gone,

3 it is extremely fragile and has broken several times leading to me spending several minutes putting the papers back in the staple holes. also the type of corner staple is enraging for a very big notebook. either i fold it back and risk it breaking or i have a collection of paper sticking out of the side. idk how to describe it but you’ve seen the corner staple

4 since i never intended for me needing to put a notebook back together, no matter how i try to keep the papers as one book, whether it be clips, staples, tape, string, it will always be covering a page withs is unfortunate since i have covered every page with somethine. this means that if i were to use a clip, i would have to put it over where a picture or note is. tl;dr some notes and drawing are going to be straight up covered by something if i ever want to keep this book in one piece

5 i lost the front and back cover and i had the first page filled with personal information. also i lost the front and back cover and now everythings really floppy and fragile

6 it’s just generally really messy and hard to use, which is really annoying because i had actual things there i really want to use one day, and i wasn’t even done with some of the drawing. i have a lot of fond memories with the thing, i mean it’s where my personal little story i made first came to be, but that’s soured because now the whole book is just a sad stack of papers barely held together with clips. i really wanted to come back to this one day after i’ve grown and used the things here and remember how i started and how far i came. that bit of nostalgia just wont hit as hard like this, and that’s if it evens survives without falling apart

it was really upsetting to say the least and i may or may not have cried several times.

yet while i was looking back that sense of nostalgia came back even though it’s only been like 2 years. even after i improved on my art and ideas, i still feel kinda proud of it, which is insane for any creative judging from everyone on the internet. i’m still definitely upset and if anyone knows how to get a bunch of paper torn out of a notebook into something vaguely recognizing a book please tell me.

but to wrap up i’ve been looking through and even though im sad it will never be the same, for a brief moment everything was ok when i was reading the notes and out of context there was a note that just read “dragon gives students weed”

#long post #tbh this was mostly me just venting except instead of venting about life or mental struggles i complain about a book #also for the joke at the end because joking is a coping mechanism #i can still use the notebook at least #writing #drawing #story time #alttalks #idk why a dragon is giving students weed

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juunshua · 6 years ago

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thoughts on junhui and yanan's performance? i do kind of agree with hao when he said that there could be a tendency where yanan could be overpowered by jun and his role. and it did show in the performance... but god the concept of the stage in general? is so galaxy brain to me jkshafkjds its interesting that we see a lot of what goes on in junhui's brain junhui is so much more than a pretty face,,, tho i really do feel that yanan was overshadowed dsajhkjfd but the high note he belted out? legend

ahh did hao say that? i do agree that yanan was overshadowed, it was kind of already obvious from the previews though from their body language: junnie was obviously taking on a more leadership role. i must admit, as a jun stan, that definitely excited me. i dont recall a single moment where junnie has taken the lead in a musical endeavor, he was always passive for whatever reason. this might sound kinda...rough...but i think something about svt holds him back. back to the performance, though...same! i thought the stage was absolutely beautiful. to me this is what id call a ‘performance’. the way he combined acting with the music and singing was great. nothing was overbearing or felt unnecessary or out of place, which is something that i definitely felt with my i (it was ironic to me how a song that is about continuity felt so..discontinuous and truncated through that rearrangement). the composition itself was so bare at points! like not much is happening really its the same four chords more or less and the vocal melody itself is repetitive and predictive. thats how much the performance lied in the hands of the performance to make it interesting and i think junnie definitely pulled through. im not sure what the mission exactly was but two teams had to take one piece of music and incorporate it into another song? something along those lines im not sure about the exact nuances behind it but junnie and yanan did not really ‘weave it into the music’ perse? like i think the idea was to use that simple melody as a motif when u combined it with another song but junnie and yanan only had it playing from the record player. to me, i dont think that was a bad choice, maybe not what the show was expecting, but it wasnt a bad choice at all. it was interesting to see how they would tackle the ‘problem’ of that song and its interesting because the way that the melody was actually put into the song was as a plot point, almost something ud expect from musical theater. junnie is an actor through and through like the way his mind works is to see things as a story which i think is wonderful. if the mission was to incorporate two songs together and combine it into one, they definitely didnt fulfill that goal, but if it was just to use two songs for one performance then i dont see anything wrong with what they did. one song was used as the main melodic push and the other song was used as a plot point to enhance the performance aspect of it.tl;dr this stage was GORGEOUS and i loved seeing what sort of things are going on inside junnies brain. as u said, hes not just a pretty face, and hes not just a silly person who plays jokes all the time. he is both but hes a lot more than that too and as a jun stan its been a struggle to get anything from him past those two things that he always pushes in svt. i was very very very thankful for this stage. it might be a rare once in a lifetime thing but i hope to god it isnt i need to hear his artistic voice in svt more please its absolutely wonderful. and although yanans artistic voice could have been overshadowed, i do think theres something to be said about the person who can properly execute the vision of another artist like that is not easy either. must be something magical about the boy ahaha two of my fav stages have involved him (my fav from last weeks was his duet with jc). i cant wait for him to also unlease his magic and show the world what he can do! laksjdf under the cut is my interpretation of the stage and performance because i wanted to note it down somewhere ahaha

i think i read some translation somewhere that junnie meant for the performance to be like yanan as a spectator and jun as someone, i dont know how else to express this , but as someone who is 'losing their mind' per se? but to me it kinda seemed like two halves of a whole. perhaps yanan did start off as a spectator, and thats why the performance starts off with them either separated with a barrier or by space, distance, and direction. its right after junnie touches yanan that the record player starts playing again after yanan had stopped it at the beginning of the performance, and thats when he breaks it too. when yanan unmasks junnie its almost as if hes uncovered the other part of himself? like this mysterious masked figure just turns out to be himself in the end? its also after that part where they start singing to each other and gradually closing the space between them and even musically like did u notice their parts switched? the lines that junnie was singing in the first part of the song, yanan now sings and vice versa. they start becoming more and more unified as the song progresses, performance wise and musically as well. even the calm yanan gets a bit ‘riled up’ by the end of the song, you can see junnies persona seep into his own. but thats how i saw it. the wonderful thing about music is how open to interpretation it is. i think its these kinds of performances that are so open to interpretation that are even more musical imo laksdj idk how to explain,

#that g5 ? hmm idk thats kinda too high for tenors to mix in general idk why they gotta do that ngl #what i liked about it though was how the tone of that note basically was the same as the guitar that came in as soon as that note finished #thats my favorite kind of thing #to like akin the human voice to actual musical instruements makes me so happy asldkfj idk why #also junnie placed out of his nose for like the majority of this song #he sounded so nice why cant he always do this #this song wasnt also too high for junnie thank god and the higher notes went to yanan in general bless #also @hao...take notes laksdjf #hmm comparing haos and vins performance to this though #their use of twinkle twinkle little star wasnt as permeated as i thought?#it was only there in the beginning and the end #more or less what jn and yn did #hmm #replies #anon

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onisionhurtspeople · 7 years ago

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i’m 100% for lainey labeling their gender in whatever way feels right for them, dressing however feels right, and using whatever pronouns feel right. i’m not gonna doubt or question their identity or anyone else’s. what rubs me the wrong way is how they emulate and almost fetishize the “teen” aesthetic. when they’ve said they look like a 12 year old boy and implied that it was attractive/hot/a good thing, i was kinda creeped out. idk how to explain it but i think it sends a really bad message.

Ah, yeah, that’s another thing I’ve been considering writing about for a while: how much Lainey seems to fetishize adolescence. Get ready for another one of my pointless tl;drs that nobody ever reads or cares about, y’all!

If Lainey was removed from the context surrounding the reasons why we all spend so much time scrutinizing her behavior in the first place, I doubt most people would have a problem with the fact that she seems almost pathologically obsessed with portraying herself as a 15-year-old girl in both style and personality, rather than as the 23-year-old wife and mother of two that she is.

But the issue, of course, is that Lainey’s preferences do not exist in a vacuum; they mean something, and that’s what we’re here to analyze. She is married to a man who fetishizes teenage girls himself, because they’re easier to control and manipulate. She indulges in, and relates to, a culture that heavily emphasizes youth and immaturity (referring to boyfriends as “daddy”, having a DDlg (Daddy Dom/little girl) fetish, being “taken care of” by men (and treated like a little princess in bed), constantly alluding to not knowing what they’re doing in life, assuming a guileless pose in selfies that reflect a certain youthful confusion and spontaneity, constantly referencing their childlike habits (”touch my butt and buy me pizza”, “I have no idea what I’m doing”, “im a crybaby” flavors of meme), dressing like a 12-year-old in overalls, children’s Pokemon panties, and pastel-colored hair and clothing with simplistic, childlike patterns, etc - not that I think there’s anything inherently wrong with any of these things, but all of these pieces of the puzzle fit together to paint the picture of a person who is unhealthily obsessed with living out their life as a teenager. You guys know the ~aesthetic~ that I’m trying to drive at here).

She indulges in cultural trends targeted towards children and young teens. Her entire personality revolves around sensitivity, helplessness, passivity; she exudes anxiety, uncertainty, and confusion; and openly discusses being so sensitive that she becomes completely overwhelmed by even the most simple of tasks that adults are expected to be able to do. And again, I’m not saying that these are inherently negative traits (although obviously when these qualities run your life, it can become problematic); but Lainey seems almost proud of these traits. She’s more than just open about it. She brags about them. She romanticizes them. She constructs elaborate internal fantasies around them. Her entire identity revolves around being a ~smol sensitive anxious space prince daddy~.

On top of all these things, almost everybody that she hangs out with or considers to be her friend (from Sarah, who lives with her, all the way down to the girls who she interacts with on Discord) is a teenager. She does not speak to women her own age. It’s bizarre. I used to have a friend who was quite a bit younger than me, by three and a half years - the first time we met in real life was on her 16th birthday, and I was 19, almost 20; and despite the fact that we were best friends and that I had so many other friends my own age, there was a very obvious and noticeable difference in our maturity levels. I’m not saying that uneven friendships like this can’t work or are inherently inappropriate, but again, within the context of Lainey’s life, it’s an enormous red flag that she seems to be unable to relate with women her own age, and can only form friendships with teenage girls between the ages of 15 and 21. Even outside of the context of her marriage (because let’s not forget that she’s married to a man who openly admits to having a sexual preference for young women, because they’re at “peak fertility” according to him), the fact that she relates the most with teenage girls is a huge indication that Lainey herself is either a) extremely mature, b) purposely seeks to enter uneven friendships with younger girls because it balances the friendship in her favor, giving her more power and control (which wouldn’t surprise me if true, given that she’s married to Onision - she needs to be able to exercise control in SOME way), c) is emotionally stunted and frozen at the age of ~18 due to Onision’s influence on her psychological development, or d) a sexual predator who herself prefers teenage girls. I’m sure everybody has their own theory on why this is, but personally I think it’s probably a mixture of all four, with option c being the most prominent motivation.

I think Lainey projects herself onto teenage girls because she feels very much unprepared for this world, threatened by it, and does not trust her own ability to navigate adulthood successfully. In this regard, I think Greg managed to find almost a perfect partner for himself - a girl who is trapped in her adolescence in perpetuity (largely by choice, but partly through direction by Onision), who purposely cuts herself off from growing and learning and emerging as a young adult because it’s less dangerous and challenging for her to remain within her psychological safe zone, being coddled like a baby and completely controlled and taken care of by Greg, who looks after all of the hard things in her life that she struggles with (doing taxes, making money, going outside to get groceries, paying bills, interacting with strangers, making appointments, earning a living wage) - all of the practical, adult things that Lainey is terrified of doing, because it’s so overwhelming to her. Greg, of course, loves this. Lainey is his ideal partner: a woman who needs to be with a man like him, who defines her entire identity for her. A man who directs her, tells her what to do, is domineering and aggressive, and who makes all of her decisions for her. Tells her what to do, who to be, what to feel, how to act. A man who has complete control over every aspect of her life. A narcissist (him) and an inverted narcissist, or codependent (her).

And so this is why Lainey is so obsessed with portraying herself as a teenager. Teenagers hit that sweet spot in between childhood and adulthood that Lainey feels trapped by in perpetuity. On the one hand, she is not a child - she is a sexual being; she has kinks, and preferences, and desires to express herself and her sexual identity. On the other hand, though, neither is she an adult - she is immature, self-absorbed, has an unstable sense of self, doesn’t know who she is, hypersensitive, anxious, gets overwhelmed easily, indulges often in her learned helplessness, and makes no attempt to change any of this - she revels in her dysfunction; she romanticizes it. And there is no age that typifies this combination of traits better than a teenage girl does. She doesn’t just relate to teenagers; she wants to be a teenager, forever–and in some ways, she really is, because the interference of Greg on Lainey’s emotional, psychological, social, and sexual growth has had a catastrophic impact on her development. She is essentially a 16-year-old girl trapped within the body of a 23-year-old mother of two. And that’s exactly what she wants.

I think what’s ultimately going to be what destroys Greg and Lainey’s marriage is that eventually, Lainey is going to be too old for Greg, and he’s going to feel compelled to pick up another 17-, 18-, and 19-year-old girl again from his existing pool of die-hard fans. Already it’s quite apparent that Greg is bored of Lainey (as evidenced by the fact that he is still actively trying to find women to cheat on her with, even after what happened with Billie); but once the cost of maintaining her becomes more expensive than the cost of replacing her with a new, hot, young, alternative, impressionable teenage girl, he will do what he tried to do once before with Billie, and eject Lainey in favor of a new wife to manipulate. And the whole process will start all over again, until the day that either Greg dies, or he becomes incapable of drawing in new women. And at that point, sadly, the fact that Lainey is still a teenager - but only on the inside - will end up becoming the most painful struggle of her life, when she is forced to take on all of the adult responsibilities that Greg currently carries for her, and realizes that she is dangerously under-qualified to live her life as an adult woman instead of a pampered, permanent 16-year-old girl.

(Sadly - or maybe luckily - I think that Lainey is the type of woman who needs to be in a relationship with someone like Greg (an inverted narcissist; in other words, a codependent), so I guess here’s to hoping that when this inevitably happens, she will quickly find herself a new narcissist to date and define her entire identity for her, I suppose?)

Press F to pay respects for this ridiculously, unnecessarily long fucking essay that I just wrote that NOBODY is going to read. Praise the Noodle Lord. Amen.

#onision #laineybot #anti onision #anti-onision #narcissism #npd #still gonna use the npd tag #deal with it

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cruddyborderlandstheories · 5 years ago

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Museum of Mayhem Art Analysis

ahhh it’s finally here and it’s AWESOME. Lots of credit to @ifalnasminiatures for bringing this to my attention! Also credit to Hayder Hype for providing (nat zero six on gearbox forums) sources (Ashley Landry on twitter) in the description of his video because oh man it’s a lot

you can view most of these art pieces on the borderlands instagram as well

lots to talk about especially regarding the calypso twins so let us dive right in

tl;dr: tyreen has a weird red marking on her face in some old designs. i think troy used to be blind and missing his metal plates. more proof for my elpis/chemical sludge/lost legion theory that the twins are using said chemical sludge to give their followers psuedo-siren powers bc a dahl pumping station (hyperion pumping stations on pandora) but dahl had a presence on the moon

one of my favorites, it reminds me a lot of the Mask of Mayhem, but for villains.

Punk Girl is shown again twice, probably further proving she’s tied in with the CoV somehow

we also got some crazy looking villains such as

baby face. which is all kinds of extremely fucked up

this dude who looks like he could be a miniboss with the glasgow smile and the cool goggles

this guy who i legitimately thought was dr zed for a hot second there

could it be

the evilest brother?? pfft nahhh

this girl who seems like she could be a unique character with a baseball cap. wondering if maybe she’s related to Punk Girl in any way. What’s the verdict on the other band members? 🤔

uhh let’s give it a solid maybe and move on

this piece! very interesting to me

so, the very first thing i noticed is zane’s eye patch being on the other eye lol

amara’s tattoos are also gone, however that might’ve been for reasons similar to the japanese cover art of the game.

most interestingly is a point @ifalnasminiatures made and it’s that the calypso twins are actually palette swapped! you can see Troy is the one with the white hair and Ty is the one with the darker hair. which I think mayyy play into a few things we see later about the twins

we also see a tiny ship in the background. i can’t tell if that’s sanctuary-iii or the blue/yellow ship, it all blends together a lot due to the quality of the pic. but it is next to the calypso twins, which makes me want to believe it’s the blue/yellow ship we see with red markings all over it. you know this one from the mural of mayhem wallpapers

you can see the reddish markings on the back right next to the engines

then we have ummm

this cover art

😬

thanks for not using this one gearbox cuz

oh my god

she just reminds me of suicide squad, that’s not a good image you wanna dredge up from the deep recesses of your fans’ brains

she might be a unique character given the clothes/hair? cuz you don’t normally see psychos with stilettos on. or yknow, shoes in general. the hair also seems way to clean and neat to be a psycho/cultist

i just feel uncomfortable looking at this, so moving on

a different logo. also not my favorite cover art, but at least im not physically uncomfortable looking at this. that poor girl’s pelvis... anyway

lots of silhouettes

interestingly, i feel like the roses might have been a thing they just put in for the new cover art. haven’t seen hide nor hair of them across any of the pictures i’ve seen.

we got a lot of figures. out of them i most definitely recognized amara, salvador, maya, another salvador?, zer0, moze (maybe?), and axton. i thiiink one of them is maya as well, but im not 100% on that.

i can guess why they didn’t pick this one: it’s hard to tell who’s who. a lot of these poses make the silhouettes kinda hard to see and the merging together at the bottom makes things even worse. i do think it’s interesting there are some bl2 characters on here as well, but hayder hype mentioned they very well could be placeholders, and given that i can’t make out fl4k or zane, im inclined to believe him.

this art which was used during the promo for this event

rip elpis i guess LMAO

a better look at the psycho himself from the promo released by the borderlands twitter.

there’s a new red planet which hasn’t been shown off before, looks like a gassy planet kinda like jupiter, but interestingly it has this green crack in the side?

very reminiscent of pandora’s eridium scar. i am wondering if this is because this planet had a vault opened, or if it is tied to the Eridians at all. be interesting if it was their homeworld.

also i have no idea what the symbolism is in the homeworld destroying another planet but maybe we shouldn’t think about it too hard e_e

the other planet that’s being destroyed... idk fellas

it doesn’t match up to me but like, this is only one shot

i don’t know 🤔 if you really squint, maybe you can see that hint of purple at the bottom there?

here

tbh, i thought this was elpis the first time i saw it due to the cracks, but i figured elpis doesn’t have like continents across its surface, just craters. and wayyy more cracks.

so it’s probably not pandora and it’s probably not elpis.

huh...

i do think the actual shot is suspended above promethea, you can see the familiar asteroid belt surrounding it

there’s also a planet in the background,

which i imagine isn’t pandora bc no eridian scar

could be elpis or eden-6, or the 5th planet we don’t know about. i kinda get the feeling the 5th planet may be that gaseous red planet tho. which is probably going to be super weird to traverse now that i think about it. they said oz kits weren’t coming back, right? i wonder how that would work. hmmmm

there’s also this redder planet here which i actually DO think is Pandora. if you squint real hard u can see the purple from the eridian scar. plus the color matches up pretty well with the pictures provided above.

there’s also these two bodies over in the corner where the light is coming from. i can’t tell what they’re supposed to be

there are also these little dudes in the top right

i assume they’re maliwan? they remind me a lot of the maliwan drop ship things that fly overhead when you enter promethea

YESSS okay this is the start of some PRETTY WILD twin stuff

troy: missing his tattoos, blind in one eye, has a weird mark above his eyebrow. also, no metal bits!

Tyreen!!! with a red stripe across her left cheek going up to her eye??? no tattoos on her left arm as far as we can see, but that might be for marketing reasons (she’s also covering up part of her bicep). she’s also missing her coat and chains and wearing a different glove.

we also have a bunch of bl2 VHs taking up space. again i think hayder hype is right in that they’re simply placeholders. not much else to say, but

this trend of Tyreen having red markings on her face and Troy being blind in an eye (or both) actually continues through a fair amount of these posters!!!

more cover art. one of my least favorites again... i just think it looks like the psycho is puking out the VHs. also, seems to be an older version of the psycho mask.

fl4k seems to be less rendered than the rest of the cast? like they have less detail, especially on their coat

also you can see an older looking space shuttle up at the top, which reminds me a lot of the one we use in TFTBL to get to helios. except less caravanny and more rockety

the splatter also reminds me of siren powers, with the purple and the glitter. it’s cool that it’s showing a different shot than what’s behind it. maybe a hint to siren powers because it’s sort of like a portal.

more puke!

this time troy is blind in both eyes it seems,

tyreen seems to still have a mark on the left side of her face, im wondering if this ties into her scars at all? it doesn’t seem as prominent as the previous red mark.

Zane seems to have an actual eye patch instead of his more high-tech eye patch, which reminds me a lot of the leaked character concepts from like january i wanna say

amara seems to be dual wielding lol i wonder if originally that was going to be one of her 3 skills but then they were like “wait salvador. wait. nisha. FUC-”

also fl4k is being obscured by this weird saturn-like planet. let them be free!

moze is missing, the saturn like planet shows up 2 times total, and that blue/yellow ship is seen again behind troy

as for the purple stuff? you already know my theory that the twins are going to be using the chemical sludge on elpis to empower their followers. it could also just be straight eridium/slag. you know, like the testing from the WEP with bloodwing and even krieg. we’ll have to see. it would be interesting if they tied krieg into the story through there.

i do lowkey think it’s chemical sludge though, because some of it is actually glowing blue in places, you can see it clearly below amara’s feet. maybe some tie in to siren powers cuz they glow the same blueish color. who knoooows not i

big shot of this psycho here, looks like he’s crumbling.

i really like the 4 VHs standing at the base with the elongated shadows. very dark vibes from this tho, probably not suitable for the series as a whole. i can see why maybe they decided not to do it.

i wonder if we’ll see this giant psycho statue somewhere on pandora. it would certainly be a sight to behold.

also i kinda wish we had cloaks like the concept art shows. cloaks are cool

more sketchy art. this one is also kinda strange, i definitely get why they decided not to go thru with it.

possibly tie-in with the ‘mother’ imagery we get on the propaganda signs across pandora.

lmfao the foot

very bl2 like, im glad they didn’t stick with this. i like that they decided to change things up

troy seems to be blind and also missing his metal implants on his face. his jacket also looks a lot different, it looks more like tyreen’s with the spikes and stuff across it. we also can’t see his metal arm at all, tho we do see his sword! which looks a lot different, im glad they decided to revamp it to be more visually interesting lol

tyreen is more interesting to me. it looks like her right arm has like a silver coating over it? unless that is a metal arm as well. she also is wearing a different kind of glove. her tattoos are missing as well, but again, it’s probably because of the cover art. her scars also definitely seem to have reached her left cheek at some point.

zane also looks a lot different, tho amara, moze, and fl4k look about the same.

another shot of the ship, this one is definitely the blue/yellow one. there’s gotta be some significance with that, right? either we’re getting skins for sanc-iii, we’re going to be painting it a new color, or it’s a different ship.

what the HECK

maybe the twins stole sanc-ii and we’re using sanc-iii. idek. this ship is driving me up a wall lol

gun head.

not a lot to say here. i actually like this one lol it’s very mellow and straight to the point. it’s nice that the logo is right in the middle, not at the top like most of them.

game. buy it. okay? cool.

similar to the other background we did, a bit different. again, like @ifalnasminiatures pointed out, the twins are actually palette swapped here.

Zane also has the old eyepatch on his right eye instead of his left eye, and his jacket is black instead of blue. fuckin’ edgelord.

one of my favorite ones out of all of them. it’s beautiful, i really wish they had kept it. Fl4k is missing but i assume they were meant to go next to Amara? i also think it’s interesting Moze is in the front, as I took Amara to be the leader this time around. Zane is also an older design, with the eyepatch back on his left eye again (starting to think this is an aesthetic thing lol) and a black jacket instead of blue.

We see the twins on the top. Tyreen has that mark on her face again, and Troy is the same as the last few covers.

We also see Maya, Zer0, and for some reason Brick? Which is weird to me considering we have a few other characters who initially feel much for important to the story (cough Lilith cough), but I’m not complaining.

the purple splatters again make me think this is a tie in to eridium/slag/elpis’s chemical sludge. i also like the logo being worked into the design instead of just thrown on top, i think that’s a nice detail

i couldn’t find a great shot of this poster which is a shame because it’s one of my favorites

a lot of baddies to go around on here. i love the dude up top, he reminds me of the Anchormen from the captain scarlett dlc in bl2!

these dudes

we can see Punk Girl on the left again

and this guy who appears to be in some medieval armor

i have no idea what’s going on there but i am EXCITED

i’ve been thinking and tbh i think the multiple planets thing was just an excuse for gearbox to go absolutely ham on the character designs/settings.

i mean why should they have to hold back all their medieval armor designs for another dlc like tiny tina’s? all their pirate/sea-fairing designs for a pirate dlc? fuck it! go WILD. i think they did, anywho

there’s also this post which... tbh i can’t make out much at all. again, seems like an older psycho mask design. it looks like there are characters in the splatter on the bottom left, but it’s very hard to tell who’s who, especially at this angle and image quality lol

if we get a better shot later on i may return to this piece and try to figure things out!

we also have this piece which is giving me huge ‘Happy Together’ vibes. very trippy

moze looks like she’s using an untextured atlas gun? dunno what’s going on with that tbh lol

i really like this one too. it’s cool. i get why maybe they wanted to go a little crazier tho, feels too simplistic for the MAYHEM vibe they’re going for.

oof! can we get an F in chat for whatever planet/moon this is

lots of pink floyd vibes going on here as well

we see a different looking blue/yellow ship flying away from the explosion. it seems to missing a lot of the parts that make sanc-iii so recognizable including the engines/wings

i like the destruction vibe they’re going for here, really sells the “universe destroying power” the twins are supposedly going to get.

anyway, in addition to the cover art pieces, we also got a few concept art pieces as well!

this bit which looks like a gun

you see the aiming mechanism up there? you see how it’s aimed at that planet/moon? yeah i 100% timed this so you’d see the above concept art with this immediately after :P (im kidding i didn’t but hey now you don’t have to scroll)

fuck yeah babey

we also have seen something similar to this in the gameplay trailer!

i didn’t actually think it was a giant fucking GUN tho. can we get an F in chat for Promethea and/or whatever else this thing gets aimed at

yooo

i thought this was opportunity at first cuz of the bridge but it’s more likely promethea

when u go meet zer0 you can see some water surrounding the city so i would guess this is somewhere else on promethea

im mostly interested in the giant fuckin triangle in the middle of that courtyard looking area

oh also the giant trench of destruction on the right there. that’s probably important, too.

more concept art!

i think the bottom of the 4 VHs is actually what was leaked in january.

some art of the twins on the left there, tyreen is so much shorter than troy omfg

and this does indeed looks to be a younger version of angel so credit to @prettypinkdork for mentioning that on my angel post. it is nice to see those tech-y wings in action, definitely does prove it’s her.

we can also see this art of what i think is Punk Girl, which is interesting to me because she looks to be doing something with her right hand. possible siren powers? maybe!

we also get a much cooler, bigger version of that maliwan ship people were talking about, with what look to be maliwan... eye bots? surrounding it. this is soooo fuckin awesome to me because it reminds me of a sailboat. and airships are fucking COOL

but something interesting is that i don’t think this ship was actually always maliwan

we got an A in the back here... for Atlas? i mean... you know it’s coming... the colors would match up. Yeahhhhhhh...

more interesting is that it actually looks like maliwan covered it up with their flags/tarps. i would not be surprised if this was claimed by maliwan possibly during the takeover.

a cyclone, with a whole fuckin lot of detail. just... holy shit.

not much else to say here though. i like the stuffed animal on the side, though

a better shot of jakobs manor which holy shit looks badass as fuck

big turret/observation thing on the right there? im not sure

pretty sure this is eden-6. also more tropical trees? possibly a water planet? but maybe just ocean on eden-6. also there seems to be like webbing on whatever is on the road, so maybe some spider-like wildlife?

most important to me is this

yeah i would bet that’s eridium/slag/the chemical sludge from elpis

im pretty convinced this is something on elpis mostly because the DAHL logo on the side. which again, they were on pandora yes but they were mining for iridium not eridium. if this was pandoran pumping stations, that would be hyperion.

i do think this is elpis. and i do think the twins are using the chemical sludge that mutated the lost legion into those fake siren things to give their followers superpowers.”holy holy holy” indeed.

this, plus the rakk wings on the psycho in the mask of mayhem are just convincing me more and more

that’s all for now folks. i gotta run

#borderlands #bl3 #borderlands 3 #OOF

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mrfreezebug · 6 years ago

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Idk I’ve mentioned a few shitty exes in passing before. But I never go into detail. And idk man due to recent events I’m just gonna vent a little bit about a piece of emmett dating history. CW: Bad bad bad relationship things tl;dr tl;dr tl;dr s orry if you’re on mobile

So like YEARS AGO I got technically broken up with 3 times over a three month period which resulted in me being stoned out of my mind for three weeks straight and shit faced when i wasn’t up all up there. I just felt horrible. And through all that... I managed to meet someone who seemed super chill, fun, and nice and junk. And while we were casually seeing each other I got to meet new people and swing with them a lil. It was super therapeutic and they seemed so open minded and like they knew themselves so well... and I was still so lonely that I thought even though I didn’t have feelings yet I admired the FUCK out of them in the moment and thought i could grow to really like them?? We talked about it a lot and they sounded super understanding. Even though they constantly asked if I was ready they kept telling me they wanted "easy” as much as I did... But once I let go of my apprehensions of getting with them officially... It turned out to be a big mistake. SO shit happened and once we became official the person who I was seeing before who ghosted suddenly messaged me bein all “sorry babe” and I was all: “I gotta tell u something” And so I told them I was seeing someone else on accounta how they just ditched me for a month with no response. And they asked me who And I told them And they told me to get the fuck out that they were a trash person. They also guilted me for moving on. “I leave for a week and you’re already on to someone else??” like R U K I D D I N G M E and I thought they were just being a salty jealous piece of bitch so I told them to chill. But they wanted closure and I’m nice so I said ok to meeting up in person. But the person I was seeing currently said they feared for my safety and that I’d cheat on them with that person. (Needless 2say they did not like eachother) And I was just??? “I wouldn’t cheat and what sorta safety concerns r there” And they were all “they’ll rape you or something and I don’t want to date someone who puts themself in the position to be raped” That was a pretty big red flag lmfao.

I should have just told both them to fuck off then but Ive never learned to really just leave anyone like that before. Im way better at it now but before I didn’t want to break ties with the only person who seemed to want to be around me and make me happy at that moment... so I just ignored that gross comment and I just told the other person we couldn’t meet.

But sure enough that weird kinda controlling situation turned into 8months of a hellish relationship where they were just SCREAMING at me for EVERYTHING. Like they literally screamed all the time. There were more times I was being yelled at than not??? Other people often told them to even calm the fuck down in public. It was wild. The screaming bullshit got to the point where THEIR friends came to me to see if I was okay. They’d literally sit me down and ask me if they physically harmed me. Which, they didn’t but there were threats surrounding every time I forgot something or messed something up. Nothing like serious but, honestly? Who for real who says “it makes me want to smack you when you can’t remember basic things.” Thinking back to this rn is so shocking to me. Idk man.

A few times they would get way too into my face and I’d have to physically shove them away because it was too intense. Just yelling. Right in my face. I can’t even remember why they were yelling. They were just always over reacting over something small I did. It all blurred together at some point. I just know I was always either zoned the fuck out or crying. They also would often brag about being able to make people cry also. Like “I can make anyone cry. I know what to say to I get to people the most.” And it’s fucking gross, as well as a common thing I’d run into with other friends n shit. Idk why controlling people always end up with my wimpy ass. BuT ANYWAY I also couldn’t use my computer, go to conventions, or see friends without dealing with their controlling ass. So that was also a bag of shit. My life was fucking MISERABLE Talking to them only got me so far. Like five minutes of potential mutual clarity in any situation before they’d go on a rant about their problems and it’d basically end with me saying sorry with no progress. And I was still so soft spoken then when I tried twice to break up w/them it failed. It makes me want to go back and SHAKE MYSELF like why did I put myself through that for THAT MANY MONTHS??? Another kicker: similar to my experiences with other partners I was coerced into sexual situations probably every other week tops?? By threatening to break up with me, or tell me that I suck as a partner, telling me I make them feel ugly, etc… shits fucking weird like here I was crying like 9/10 times they guilted me for not wanting sex, my face is fucking UGLY and they still wanted it?? SHIT MAN. I cried during sex a lot. It fucks with me to this day. My initial instinct is to be too afraid to say no to sex.

But they actually ended up breaking up with me bc I went to go hang out with a friend and not tell them. It was probably more of a threat to try to control me but I saw that opening and booked it so far away, man I went to Denny’s that night for the first time without worrying about upsetting them for not answering their texts right away. I actually felt BAD that I didn’t care tho?? It was dumb but this thing is still a bit of a problem for me. Even if logically they deserve to feel bad, I feel horrible for hurting anyones feelings. They seemed WAY torn up about the break up. I made some empty promises like an idiot. Telling them I’d see how I felt if they worked on their anger issues and shit. It was so fucked up when I was alone with them I felt so bad for them. I felt like I really hurt them or that I owed them something for the times they were nice to me and paid for my shit and whatnot. I also have trouble staying mad. I always just forgive and wanna move on. So we’d actually meet up with peeps at gay events n what not, I was friends with their friends at this point and I didn’t want to rock the boat with anyone even when they tried getting me back at the most random times. But I’m hella distant from people in general. It gets me into trouble with people I genuinely used to like let alone with people who stress me out lmao So they’d send me paragraphs of friendship break ups and delete me from everything then message me and try to readd me again and then get upset again that I don’t “check in on them” how “I don’t care about anyone but myself” and just all around stress me the fuck out. I just have a hard time checking in on people bc of various reasons. I’m working on my self confidence for it. And I don’t want to make people stay if that bothers them. So I just kinda let them come and go but the constant confrontation is STRESSFUL. It makes it harder to check in on anyone who pulls that shit tbh.

And NOW they’re trying to do it again after a few years and like I feel BAD again and like I should be over everything tbh it was YEARS AGO BUT I REALLY DONT WANT TO CARE ANYMORE. IM KINDA PATHETIC T H E E N D

#i mIGHT delete this #but it's rly nice to just shit this out without actually bothering anyone #emmett chit chats

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blatherkatt · 7 years ago

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Title: The Calm Is Terrifying When The Storm Is All You Know [Homestuck]

Chapter 33: Declarations

Summary: There were two kinds of trolls who went to Earth: rich shitheads with too much money and free time, and desperate assholes who couldn’t survive on Alternia, even with the best efforts of the young Condesce. Karkat hated the planet almost immediately, but with his home planet too dangerous for mutants, he really didn’t have any choice but to hide out on this weird little diurnal planet. At least he’d be safe. Or so he thought, right before blundering his way into an accidental friendship with the son of an anti-troll terrorist.

Rating: M

Chapter Warnings: Implied/Mentioned abuse, mentions of terrorism, death mention, injury mention, depiction of an emotional breakdown, trauma aftermath; Illustrated; Pesterlog

FIRST | PREVIOUS | NEXT

— carcinoGeneticist [CG] began trolling tipsyGnostalgic [TG] —

CG: WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?

— tipsyGnostalgic [TG] is an idle chum! —

CG: FUCK YOU, I CAN SEE THAT FOR MYSELF, YOU PIECE OF SHIT PROGRAM. I’M GONNA FUCKING YELL ANYWAY.

CG: I THOUGHT YOU WERE GOING TO PICK ME UP AT NOON. IT’S LIKE, 1:30 AND YOU STILL AREN’T HERE, WHAT GIVES?

CG: IF YOU GOT KIDNAPPED, TOO, I SWEAR TO FUCK I’M PERSONALLY PUTTING THIS ENTIRE GODDAMN FAMILY UNDER PERMANENT WATCH.

CG: I’M NOT ABOVE SITTING ON YOU ASSHOLES IF THATS WHAT IT TAKES.

TG: okay first off i know youre like a literal alien but heres a protip for ya:

TG: general human earth etiquette is to not text people who you know are probably driving?

TG: its like a whole thing

CG: WHY

TG: idk probs because texting while driving’s a great way to fucking crash lol

TG: anyway!!

TG: yeah im real sorry about that mom fucking rang me up like

TG: hi im at the airport come get me!

TG: out of fucking nowhere because everything has to be a fucking hassle with this woman

TG: so i had to go get her

CG: WHY THE FUCK WAS SHE AT THE AIRPORT?

TG: because fuck me is why

TG: and THEN shes like

TG: ooooh i gotta do some mysterious whatthefuckever errand at some mall out in the middle of nowhere

TG: so now im sitting in the parking lot waiting for her to get back which might be a while because her bad leg’s been acting up lately

TG: and thats why im not there yet >:(

CG: WAIT. WAIT, HOLD ON, I’M CONFUSED.

CG: BY “MOM” ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT RACHEL? I DIDN’T EVEN THINK SHE HAD A BAD LEG.

TG: nonono

TG: ray is like. dirk and dave and rose’s mom

TG: i dont call her mom i just call her aunt ray cuz shes not my mom yknow

TG: my mom is aunt ray’s sister

TG: aunt ramona? they talk about her?

CG: OOOOOOH. YEAH.

CG: THE WOMAN WHO WRITES THOSE SHITTY SUPERNATURAL ROMANCE BOOKS KANAYA LOVES.

TG: hahaha yeah her trashy shit is great

CG: SHE’S HERE?

TG: apparently!!!!!!!!

CG: I’M SENSING SOME BITTERNESS.

TG: ugh its fine she just always does shit like this

TG: womans always gotta make a fuckin entrance even if that means not telling anyone shes coming

TG: and its goddamn annoying as shit!!

TG: but its fine i get it shes here to help out and we are kinda all hands on deck

TG: speaking of tho i heard something about kanaya not coming along after all?

CG: NOT YET, NO.

CG: SHE’S BEEN TALKING TO ROSE, AND APPARENTLY DAVE’S BEEN PRETTY UNEASY WITH THE NUMBER OF NEW FACES AT THE HIVE.

CG: HOUSE. WHATEVER.

CG: TEREZI’S PROTECTION DETAIL HAS HIM KIND OF ON EDGE, I GUESS?

CG: SHE’S GONNA COME AROUND LATER PROBABLY. AND MIGHT END UP STAYING WITH PORRIM AND KEEP IT TO VISITS, AT LEAST UNTIL THINGS SETTLE DOWN A BIT.

CG: SO IT’S JUST ME FOR NOW.

TG: ooooh yeah geez i bet

TG: poor dave :( :( :(

TG: i gotta tell you and mom some uh. serious shit about him when i pick you both up

TG: id pass it on here but its probs better if i just tell you face to face?

CG: OH, WONDERFUL!

CG: MORE NO DOUBT HORRIFIC NEWS REGARDING DAVE.

CG: I CAN’T WAIT. THIS PANIC ATTACK’S GONNA BE ONE FOR THE RECORD BOOKS, I CAN JUST FEEL IT!!!

TG: :(

TG: tl;dr hes not in great shape but hes getting better but theres some stuff we gotta go over

TG: jfc mom what the fuck are you doing its been ages

CG: SO WAIT. SHE JUST HAD YOU DRIVE HER OUT SOMEWHERE AND WALKED OFF ALONE?

TG: yeah

TG: woman can take care of herself just fine so like im not worried??

TG: but still, like. cmon woman!!! whatever it is hurry up a little

TG: it cant be that important we got places to be

In terms of location, it was almost an outlet mall; somewhat detached from the nearest city and surrounded by forest. It was mostly all one building, positioned in a dip in the ground next to a clear stream, and these features had helped make it a serviceable fortress during the invasion, although Derek had regularly complained that he’d have preferred a site that held the high ground. Still, they’d made do; the roof was high enough that one could see for quite some distance, the stream offered fresh water, the trees provided decent enough cover during skirmishes, and the walls were thick enough to turn away most weather and weapons. It hadn’t been much, but it had served well enough as home for six years for around threescore ragtag survivors-turned-fighters.

Out in the surrounding forest, those who hadn’t survived that conflict still lay buried in pitiful graves marked only with a stone or a chunk of wood. There hadn’t been time to properly put anyone to rest; it had been risky enough for two or three people to slip out during a stretch of quiet with a shovel and a body. They simply hadn’t been able to afford to have any sort of formal burial, not with the threat of an attack constantly looming.

Even so, even so…

Derek had picked a spot he would remember.

In life, the oak tree would have been the kind people would have thought of as a monarch, with branches spread wide and gnarled wood ancient and strong, holding children in its branches as easily as if they were made of nothing; but the tree had already been dead by the time the invasion started, a great, ancient, dried-out husk. Even so, decades later, it still stood, its branches reaching toward the sky, the other trees forming a circle around it as though too respectful to come too close. Mushrooms and trails of greenery crept about a quarter of the way up the ancient trunk.

At its roots, a rotting wooden spar stuck up out of the ground. This, too, had been reclaimed by flowers, grasses and mushrooms, decorating the splintered and decayed timber with dark summer greens and pale white-and-lavender blooms.

Derek Strider, down on one knee with his sheathed sword held in his right hand, sighed. Of course, the trouble with having to bury the dead so hastily meant that there’d been no one to look over the graves, so it was to be expected that it be in such disrepair, but even so, seeing this one choked out by the invading flora was…

It wasn’t right.

Overhead, the ancient branches rustled slightly, and the raucous calling of a bird broke the silence. Derek narrowed his eyes and ignored it, tried to write the disrespectful noise out of the scene.

The crow seemed to have other ideas. The bird lighted down on the wooden grave marker, red eyes fixed on Derek’s face. It flapped its wings a few times, cawing incessantly. Derek scowled, unsheathed his sword, and struck —

The blade passed through the bird with no resistance whatsoever. The creature’s body split in two, bloodlessly, as though Derek had cut through smoke — it even looked like smoke, like a cloud cut in two by a passing jet. As Derek looked on, uncomprehending and with a growing sense of dread, the bird’s body seemed to pull itself back together, a video played in reverse, and the bird’s accusatory squawks started up again as though nothing had happened.

Derek was on his feet in an instance, stepping away from the beast, and as he did, he happened to look up…

Perched on nearly every branch of the old tree were ravens. Unlike the crow, they were all silent, and aside from the occasional shifting of a foot or tilting of a head, motionless. Scores of staring animal eyes bored into him.

Derek had never been a superstitious man, but nor was he the sort of fool to ignore the truth his own eyes showed him. He’d spent six years fighting alongside a witch, and seen enough to learn that some things really couldn’t be explained away as coincidence.

Had it been anyone else, he would have responded to the sound of footsteps approaching this site with a furious attack; even Ben knew better than to disturb him here. But when he whirled to face the intruder, he froze.

She’d aged more since he’d last seen her than he would have expected. Hints of silver streaked her hair, and she leaned heavily on her gnarled black cane. A faint breeze stirred the black fabric of her dress, playing with the light shawl laying across her shoulders. The crow had fallen silent.

“Put that thing away before you take someone’s eye out,” said Ramona, nodding nonchalantly at Derek’s sword.

Derek narrowed his eyes, and did not respond aloud, instead choosing to slowly and deliberately slide the sword back into its sheathe. Only after his left hand had returned to his side did Ramona nod and continue.

“That’s better,” she said. “Now we can talk things over like reasonable adults. Mind you, I ought to do the world a favor and wipe you out right now,” and Derek took a slow, deep breath at that, as she continued, “But I’d prefer not to desecrate your brother’s grave by staining it with your blood. I respect him far too much for that. You, however, have somehow managed to exceed all of my worst expectations to a nearly unfathomable degree, as of late. I’ve held off on this confrontation out of respect for the past, but I can see now that this was a mistake.”

Derek shifted. “Everything I’ve done has been to protect our damn planet, Ramona,” he started, but was cut off.

“Really?” she said, “Well, then. I’m not about to attempt to ask you to cease killing trolls, as we both know that would be pointless, but I would very much like to know how exactly burning your own son alive plays into your grand battle strategy?”

“He…he turned on us,” Derek said, through gritted teeth, “He forced my hand, left me no choice!”

“He is a child!” Ramona snapped. “And you, of all people, should know better! If you really must follow this path of self-destruction to its end, fine, but he should never have been involved!”

“I—”

“And in any case, you had a perfectly good sword on hand, I’m sure. If young Dave really did need to die, you could have executed him with minimal pain, but no, you wanted him to hurt, to know he was dying and to fear you and suffer as he passed. How do you justify that, Derek? How does anyone, especially a child, deserve anything of the sort?”

The eyes of the ravens and that damned crow still drilled into him. He could feel the stares on his back, but kept his eyes locked on Ramona’s, refusing to back down.

He wasn’t going to take back what he’d done. There’d be no guilt, he’d done nothing wrong except overreact a bit. It was justified. That…that boy wasn’t Dave. Ramona was using the name like a blade, but she’d not win that way. He didn’t deserve the fucking name, didn’t deserve to have anything to do with Dave, he never would have let Rachel name the kid that if he’d known he was going to grow up to be such a pathetic, useless little coward.

“I don’t have to explain myself to you,” he said.

“No, I suppose you don’t,” said Ramona, folding her hands over the top of her cane. “I’ve a fairly good idea, in any case.” She sighed. “The war is over, Derek. The time to put aside this violence and misery is long since behind us. Our children do not deserve to grow up as we did.”

“The trolls are still here,” Derek spat.

There was a long silence. Ramona sighed again.

“Fine, then,” she said, “So be it. Do as you will. Chase violence as long as you like. But if you come near my family again, I will consider it an act of war.”

She turned, and he was tempted to take the bait, to try attacking her while her back was turned, but he held still. It was infuriating, knowing what a pointed insult turning her back on him was, knowing that she knew he would not risk attacking her—but she was right. She was much too dangerous.

“Come along, little one,” she said, abruptly. The crow rose off the grave and flew to land on top of Ramona’s cane. If Derek had cared to pay any attention, he might have noticed the crow look back at him with something like regret in its eyes, but Derek was already far too lost in his own thoughts.

As one bird, the ravens took wing, dispersing in all directions, leaving him alone again.

The trouble with trying to go from Alternian to English was a multifaceted one, to be sure, but so far the most obnoxious piece of it that Karkat could see was the tendency of guides on how to speak English to simply use the closest Alternian equivalent as an English word’s translation. More and more, the two languages were notably extremely different, and while he could speak English well enough that he’d never had any serious problems, there were any number of words that he kept tripping over as a result of a translation being extremely unclear and culturally misleading.

Witches, for instance, were clearly something very different on Earth. The Alternian word that was translated to English as “witch” was, like most Alternian words, a series of noises in the ‘click and growl’ family that most humans lacked the anatomy to create, and generally refered to certain lowblood prophets and healers in Alternian folklore. They were those who lived away from society and who, through some lucky genetics and convenient psychic powers, were able to fend of drones and effectively disappear from the world at large’s knowledge. They kept to themselves, sought to harm no one who didn’t attack them first, offered shelter to the weak and the hunted, and as such were always portrayed as utterly despicable beings in fiction, as no writer with any sense of self-preservation had dared to portray such reckless treachery under the rule of the last Condesce. There might have been some changes to the lore under the new one’s rule, but things like that changed slow.

In any case, they certainly weren’t anything like the old woman in a shawl who was sitting next to Roxy in the front of her car.

She was dressed all in black, for one thing. Alternian witches didn’t tend to wear much black. Some Alternian witches didn’t tend to wear all that much clothing at all, really. Most seemed to belong to ancient religions that weren’t particularly fond of shirts.

Ramona was definitely magic as shit, though, Rachel’d been right about that much. Was that all a witch was on Earth, just someone with magic? Fuck, if that were the case, then probably like at least a third of all trolls were witches by Earth’s standards. Then again, maybe magic was another poorly translated word? English didn’t seem to have a word to separate “things that we (read: trolls) know exist, like psychic powers and psiionics and ghosts and chucklevoodoos,” and “things that are super fake and don’t actually happen ever and make no sense.”

Whatever. In any case, Ramona didn’t look at all like Karkat had expected, and when he climbed into the back of the car, she didn’t react to his presence with anything stronger than an amiable nod. She seemed to have her mind on other things, and was largely silent at first.

Roxy wasn’t; she immediately piped up happily as Karkat swung open the door with a “Hey, man! Sorry about taking so long! Can you, uh, do me a favor and check on Jaspers? He’s in the carrier behind Mom, Rose asked me to pick him up while she and Aunt Ray were gone. He’s been missing them a lot, all staring out the window and kneading his blanket and shit, and he’s not a huge fan of car rides.”

“He’s asleep,” Karkat said after glancing into the little crate.

“Awesome. Alright, buckle up and we’ll get this damn show on the road.”

“On the road again, just can’t wait to get on—”

Karkat tilted his head as the car’s radio abruptly changed from quietly playing some human pop song over to something much louder and completely different. Ramona stifled a snort as Roxy stabbed a button, switching the radio back to the previous channel.

“No, thank you,” she said, glaring. “Christ, the fuck is with this thing today, I swear to god.”

“I suppose it may simply be getting into the spirit of things,” said Ramona with a smile. As the car pulled away from the curb, she turned back a bit to face Karkat. “It’s Karkat, isn’t it? Rachel’s been sending me any number of emails with updates, and from the sound of things, you’ve been rather instrumental in bringing young Dave back into the fold, so to speak.”

“…Into the what?”

“It’s a figure of speech, meaning in this case that you’ve helped us return him home as well as helping him to adjust to being there,” she said. “For which you have all of our heartfelt thanks. Ours is perhaps not the most functional of families, but it is ours, and as I’m sure you’ve seen firsthand, ripping away a piece of it the way Derek did has had some very painful consequences for all involved. We owe you a great deal.”

“Yeah, man!” Roxy said. “And from what Rose has been telling me, you were kind of a big part of why he finally spilled what he knows. Which, he did bee-tee-dubs, which means he’s off house arrest finally, so that’s good—”

“—And a partridge in a pear tree,” the radio crackled.

“What the fuck? It’s August,” Roxy scowled. She turned the radio off altogether as Ramona glanced hurriedly out the window.

“Speaking of Dave,” Karkat said, hopefully before anyone got distracted again, “Roxy, you mentioned that there was something that you needed to say face to face?”

“Right, shoot, yeah,” said Roxy. The car turned onto the long road that led eventually to the Lalonde hive. “Okay, so, like. There’s definitely some shit you should know before we get there, but I wanna preface it all real clearly by saying that Dave’s okay, y’know? He’s got a lot of healing to do, but the doctors said that as long as he’s looked after and we change bandages and shit and he gets plenty of rest, he’s definitely not in any danger anymore. He’s…weak, but he’s not like gonna keel over at any moment, okay?”

“Not actually making me feel any better, Roxy!” said Karkat. Oh, boy, with a preface like that…

“Well, fuck, I tried, I guess. Uh. So, Dave did get hurt…pretty bad, and there were some other complications—oh, for fuck’s sake!!”

“Watch me, watch me, hey, watch me, watch me!” The radio was louder than ever. Ramona’s hand flew up, poorly hiding a grin.

Karkat leaned around Roxy’s seat to glare at her.

“What the fuck, Roxy,” said Karkat.

“I’m not doing this!” Roxy said, waving her hand wildly. “I swear to fuck, I wouldn’t! I really do need to pass on some shit about poor Dave, and the radio’s never done this before? It’s been acting up since a little before we picked you up, keeps changing on its own and shit, augh!”

She fought with the controls, but the song stopped only for a moment before getting even louder.

“Why the fuck do you humans even have this obnoxious song?! Who listens to this?? It’s literally just some squawking wiggler screeching for its lusus’s attention!”

“I mean, I kinda love it for that honestly, it’s terrible and stupid and wonderful, but like, come the fuck on??? What’s with this thing?! Now is not the time!”

“Ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass—“

“GOD, that’s even worse!!” Roxy yelled, slamming her fist down on the dashboard. “Fucking stop!!”

“That’s enough for now,” Ramona said, almost murmuring it.

The radio turned off. Karkat and Roxy both turned a suspicious eye on Ramona, and with equal simultaneity, decided to drop it for now.

“Anyway,” Roxy said slowly, “What I was trying to say is, um…Karkat, do you know what it means for someone to ‘flatline?’ Because, um. Dave kinda did, for like, a minute and a half.”

Karkat shook his head, realized Roxy probably couldn’t see him with her eyes on the road, and said, “Uh, I have no idea what that word means, no.”

“Well, um…”

“It refers to a heart monitor indicating that the heart has ceased beating,” Ramona said. “The machine indicates activity with a line which shows peaks and valleys, and it goes flat when that activity has stopped, thus, ‘flatline’. The organ we call a heart serves an equivalent function to what trolls call a ‘blood pusher’ or a ‘pump biscuit.’”

Karkat felt for a moment like his own pump biscuit had stopped.

“Shit, Mom, when did you get so good at translating to trolls?” Roxy murmured.

Ramona shrugged. “I’ve made efforts to reach out,” she said. “The war ended, after all, and since we’re allies now, it doesn’t hurt to learn about each others’ cultures.”

“His fucking—What?!” Karkat screeched, unable to keep the harsh buzzing whine out of his voice. God, that was such a moirail noise, and any other time he’d have yelled at himself for not keeping it under control, but not now, not when… “His fucking blood pusher stopped and I’m supposed to be calm!?!”

“They got it moving again!” Roxy said. “He’s okay now, the doctors said it was going strong! It was, um, mostly just exhaustion, they think? Like, the burn wounds could’ve killed him on their own, sure, but they got on those quick enough that if he’d been healthy to begin with he probably wouldn’t have been so bad off? But between ten years of, you know…and just, apparently he hasn’t been eating enough even while he’s been back with us? And Ray’s gonna get on his ass about that, but, just—look, the thing is, Dirk doesn’t know about this yet, and Aunt Ray’s asked that we try to keep it that way, and I don’t really get why but I think she has her reasons?”

Karkat was definitely hyperventilating, oh fuck, oh fuck—Ramona’s hand reached back to touch his own, snapping him out of it.

“It’s fine to be worried,” she said, gentle. “I promise you, though, it is as Roxy says: he’ll be fine given time to recover and the safety with which to do so. He’ll be alive when we get there.” She sat back in her chair, turning towards the road again. “As for Dirk, I suspect Rachel is waiting for things to settle down before breaking it to him gently. He is, for better or worse, very like his father, and Derek handled his brother’s death poorly, in large part because at the time we could not afford to mourn. Rachel probably wants to make sure that Dirk does not feel he has to force himself to be strong when she tells him.”

“Makes sense, I guess,” Roxy muttered. “Anyway, the main thing about that is that he’s not got a lot of energy right now, so don’t…take it personally if he just falls asleep on you sometimes? Especially with the painkillers he’s on, apparently that’s a side effect, too. He can walk short distances, but he gets wobbly quick and needs help sometimes, so there’s that too.”

“Fuck,” said Karkat, softly.

The next ten minutes of the ride were carried out in tense silence. This was broken by the radio once again bursting back on and blasting the ass song again, at which point Roxy threatened to pull over and smash the fucking thing to smithereens.

By the time they actually got to the fucking house, Karkat felt like his soul was going to vibrate right out of his fucking body with impatience. They had yet another delay in the form of Terezi’s protection detail—Terezi herself wasn’t there, but some officers were, and they insisted on knowing about any weapons the three of them had as well as names, and went in to check with the family while making them all wait outside by the car. Karkat already had his fucking bag in hand, he was ready to go, but no, they had to go through this tedious procedure! Sure, it was probably a smart move, and when he was feeling a little more sensible he’d be more okay with it as it was the sort of thing that probably would make them all feel a bit safer (especially poor fucking Dave), but right now the were a pain in the ass and he was going to fucking explode!!! If they didn’t!!! Let him get in the fucking hive!!!!!

Rose stepped out as they were still talking to the police, and for the first time in his life Karkat was unspeakably happy to see her. She quickly confirmed to the police that all three of them were in fact expected and trusted by this household, and then gently let Jaspers out of his carrier. The cat immediately yowled and threw himself into her arms, kneading at her shoulders and rubbing his face against hers, and it all would have been super cute if Karkat didn’t have his mind on other fucking things.

“Come on in,” Rose said, nodding towards the door. “Dirk’s on the couch and Dave’s in Mom’s room, as neither of them can handle stairs right now and Dave needs his bandages changed at least twice a day. Karkat, do you—”

She was talking to air. He was already in the fucking door.

And then had to face the fact that he’d never actually been to Rachel’s room. Fuck. Rachel was coming up the hall, though, and a slightly bewildered young human (wait, fuck, that was Dirk, what happened to his hair? It looked so weird hanging down like that instead of spiked up) was sitting on the couch with an Earth husktop on his lap. Roxy pushed in the door with Ramona right behind her, dropped a heavy wheeled bag right next to the door, and immediately launched herself at Dirk, who gave a startled yelp as she did so.

Rachel rested a hand on Karkat’s shoulder as she passed him, rushing up toward Ramona throwing her arms around her shoulders. The two shared a long hug, and Rachel kissed Ramona’s cheek.

“God, I’m so glad you’re here,” Karkat heard Rachel murmur, before Rose tapped his shoulder.

“I was asking if you knew where Mom’s room is,” Rose said.

“Uh.”

“It’s down the hall to the observatory, but you take a left before you get to it. Make sure to make plenty of noise on the way over, Dave gets really jumpy when he’s the only person in that room. He can’t block the door since we need to be able to come in and out, and it’s got him a bit on edge.”

Karkat nodded, unable to get any words out past the lump in his throat. He more or less just dropped his bag on the ground and pushed past, zooming around toward the room indicated. Dave looked half-asleep when Karkat pushed the door open, and waved as he sat up with some effort.

God, the photo Rose had taken didn’t do justice to how fucking bad he looked. There were bruises across his face and neck turned a weird greenish-gray but still dark against his skin, and bandages everywhere, his hair was a mess (although that might have just been from sleeping). He was in some oversized shirt with an Earth hoofbeast on the front that was probably Dirk’s judging by the size, and Karkat had no idea why Dave had it on but right now he didn’t care.

“Hey, man, uh. Shit’s been crazy, huh?” Dave said with an awkward grin. He didn’t have his shades on either, which made sense if he’d been sleeping, except they weren’t on the bedside table (which did instead contain a nearly empty glass of water, several bottles of pills and salves, and a first aid kit from which clean cloth bandages overflowed).

Two weeks of emotion boiled over all at once. Wordless, Karkat stomped across the room and grabbed Dave’s stupid fucking shirt in both hands and tugged him close.

“It was three days, Dave,” Karkat hissed.

“Wha—?”

“Three days! And you got yourself fucking kidnapped by a terrorist on day goddamn two!! What the fuck, Dave?!” His voice was threatening to abandon him, but Karkat forced it right back into place by sheer willpower. This tangent would not be fucking stopped, hell no. “I take my eyes off of you for two days, and you get yourself into shit again! What the fuck!!! Do you have any idea how-how fucking agonizing it’s been waiting for news?! And you’re just sitting there like ‘Oh, hey! What’s up?’ What’s up is my foot up your waste chute, you hopeless fucking—!” Okay, nope, his voice was leaving after all, actually. He felt tears roll down his face, and he should’ve been more worried about that, but Dave already knew about his blood color and he was the only troll in the house right now, so, fuck it, fuck it all! Helpless, he tugged Dave closer again, letting his face press against that stupid shirt, claws still twisted into the fabric as he sobbed.

“Holy shit,” Dave muttered.

“I was so fucking scared,” Karkat gasped. This was pathetic, they weren’t remotely a couple, Karkat had no right to be this worked up and he knew it, but…Dave wasn’t exactly pushing him away, either, was he?

“I’m sorry, man, I didn’t even…It wasn’t planned this time, it just sorta happened, and Dirk got hurt, and I…”

“I’m not actually angry at you, despite having so much right to be that legislacerators everywhere have preemptively declared me innocent. I’m just fucking screaming for the sake of it, dumbass.”

“Oh.”

The awkward pause that followed was filled with only the sound of Karkat’s weeping, which, fuck, he was probably too fucking embarrassed to tell him off. Except…Dave’s hand lifted up to rest gently against Karkat’s back, so, maybe he didn’t mind that much? Was that wishful thinking?

“Sorry for this,” he said, just in case, as he pulled away a bit. “It’s really fucking embarrassing, I know, I just…”

“It’s cool, man,” said Dave. Then, with a wink, he said, “I know you got your massive Strider homocrush, it’s only natural—”

“Dave, I swear to fuck, injured or not, I will pummel you into dust with a fucking pillow, don’t test me!” Karkat snapped.

Dave snorted. “Hey, man, it’s fine, everyone’s allowed to be a lil gay sometimes with their friends, it’s only natural.”

“I’ll ‘natural’ you!! Motherfucker, I spent the two weeks worrying about your wellbeing and you come at me with more of this bullshit!!”

Dave cackled with laughter. Karkat rolled his eyes and sniffled. He feigned annoyance as best he could, but, God, it was such a relief to hear Dave laugh. Rubbing a sweater sleeve furiously across his eyes, Karkat pulled back, sitting awkwardly on the edge of the bed. “Okay, but seriously, what’s with the shirt?” he asked, gesturing at the floating head of the hoofbeast. It wasn’t even a joke or a drawing. It was just…a straight photo of a hoofbeast’s face, with no text or explanation of any sort. What the fuck??

Dave glanced down, and snickered. “Oh, shit. Uh, yeah, we needed something that’s easy to get me in and out of, since the bandages on this fuckin’ burn need to be changed like, a lot, not to mention the gross-ass cream they have us slathering all over it on the regular. We tried a button down, but the buttons were kinda chafing, and like…who the fuck wants to ruin a fancy shirt with gross burn juices, right? And Dirk’s shit is more comfortable, and this one’s big enough that it’s real easy to take off even if I’m high on the damn painkillers.”

Karkat winced slightly, but decided not to comment. The scream from the video echoed somewhere in his think pan. “Where’re your shades?”

“Bro fuckin’ stepped on them or something, man, I dunno. They fell off at some point, and they were already cracked before all that, and Terezi just found pieces. Which fucking sucks, I mean God dammit, those were a gift from John. Shit sucks.”

“John?” Karkat tipped his head.

“Yeah, he’s like, an old friend of mine. Have I not mentioned him to you? Whatever, he, uh.” Dave scratched at the side of his head. “He was an online friend from before Bro started doing the, uh, raid shit, and I kept talking to him and another friend, Jade, for a while afterwards even though I wasn’t supposed to?”

“Jade’s name I remember,” Karkat said.

“Haha, yeah, yeah cuz I told you about…anyway.” He cleared his throat. “I guess since Dirk’s college is starting up again soon, not that he’s going for the first couple weeks with his leg and a fucking concussion, but, it’s starting up, and John’s sister goes there too, and he’s gonna come with so we’ll be able to hang out for a bit? Which is fuckin’ rad, I haven’t even talked to the guy in three years and we’re finally meeting in person.”

“You want him to be here? While you’re this badly injured?” Karkat yelped.

Dave blinked at him like he’d just grown a secondary head.

“I mean, yeah?” Dave said. “Like, yeah, I’m not in great shape and I guess it’ll be a lil weird for him to see me like this, but I’ve missed him.” Before Karkat could press the question further, though, Dave yawned. “Ugh, fuck, I wanna keep talking, but I’m…halfway to falling asleep, shit.”

“Oh,” said Karkat. He got up, ready to leave. He wanted to stay, wanted to curl himself around Dave’s obnoxiously lanky frame as best he could and protect this fragile idiot human from the entire universe, but…it wasn’t his place, was it? No.

“You leaving?” said Dave, rubbing at his unbruised eye.

“You said you wanna sleep,” Karkat said.

“Right. Uh. Could you, like…fill this back up for me, then, I guess?” Dave said.

“…Sure,” said Karkat.

He was…still confused, but Dave was tired, so he didn’t press. But he couldn’t wrap his head around wanting a friend around while he was so injured—well, he’d wanted Karkat around, hadn’t he? He’d seemed happy to see him, aside from the, uh, yelling. Still, it didn’t make sense! Every troll knew as a small child that the only people you could trust when you were injured were your lusus, your moirail, and maybe your matesprit! Anyone else might take advantage of the weakness and kill you, that was just basic logic! But Dave didn’t even seem to be thinking about it.

And…and yet, come to think of it, Roxy’d been awfully forthright about how bad Dave’s condition was. Hell, she’d heard it from Rose, who seemed like the one most likely to know not to spread that weakness, but the humans were all sharing it and passing it around. It wasn’t just that they didn’t seem to care who knew that Dave and Dirk were injured, it was like they wanted people to know.

And as he filled up the glass of water in the kitchen, he watched as Roxy and Dirk talked on the couch, as Dirk told her that he’d passed on the news of their condition to Jane already, that Rose had told her and Dave’s friends, and it just kept going. Everyone had to be up to date on the fact that both brothers were injured and vulnerable, and yet…

“I hope the flight wasn’t too long,” Rachel was saying to Ramona.

“Nothing would be too long right now,” she said in turn, blowing gently on a cup of tea that Rachel had just poured her. “Times like these, we all need to do our part. I know I might not be able to do much, mind you. My leg’s been acting up something fierce, as of late, but I’ll do whatever I can.”

Something clicked. All at once, the curtains pulled back and Karkat saw the whole picture—saw maybe not what it always was, and certainly not what the Lalondes achieved on any sort of regular basis, but what it was supposed to be, how it was meant to work.

On Alternia, everyone lived in constant competition. Trolls had to be strong as close to all the time as they possibly could, or at the very least find a moirail who could, because otherwise their society wouldn’t particularly care much if they died. That just meant they didn’t deserve to be a part of the gene pool or to contribute to society. If they were injured badly and left vulnerable, it was seen as normal for others to take advantage of that weakness and exert power or outright kill a rival. It was how they survived so long, or so the cultural narrative had so long stated: by this competition, the strongest survive. Nevermind that this survival was built on the corpses of uncountable trolls who didn’t make the cut, it Worked.

As a result, trolls had been bewildered just as Karkat had by how humans as a species managed to be so frail and yet so reckless and to still survive, especially when they didn’t exactly have the kind of numbers that trolls did. Humans lacked the numbers to be expendable, lacked the strength and toughness that kept Trolls alive, and yet they looked Death in the eye and pointed and laughed, and pushed themselves to extremes for no purpose other than to have some warped idea of fun. It was a question that had lingered around his consciousness for ages; how the fuck do humans even work as a species? How had such a seemingly doomed race not died off yet?

The answer that hit him now, as he watched Roxy help Dirk stand up and balance himself on a pair of crutches, was that humans didn’t have to be strong all the time, and that was the magic of their little social units, their families—they took care of each other. No one person had to be good at everything, or so good at one thing that it could keep them safe in any situation. It didn’t matter that their skin was thin or that they weren’t particularly strong or fast, they always, always had others around who would pick up the slack, others who would come even across oceans to offer what aid they could in times of strife; they weaved together all their strengths and weaknesses into a fabric able to withstand just about anything. Fuck, no wonder they’d wanted Dave back so badly. The Lalondes may have been less a tapestry and more a patchwork quilt, but it was still their quilt, and Dave was a part of it….

He felt a near-agonizing pang of envy that he didn’t have a quilt of his own. Humans might have been stupid about a lot of things, but this…this they’d gotten right.

“Fucking water? Is that really the best you could think of? Fucking dumbass,” Dave muttered to himself. God. This was stupid. This was all really fucking stupid. He couldn’t even deal with being alone while he was asleep, for Chrissakes! Too scared of nightmares of a big mean dog, like some fuckin’ little kid.

Yeah, he was tired, but he really, really didn’t wanna be alone right now, was the thing. Not with that fucking troll-drug-induced nightmare lingering around the edges, waiting to chase him down again at its first chance. But. Like. Karkat was kind of right? Bros don’t watch each other sleep, that’s fuckin’ creepy. Like. Okay, so maybe they’d done a bit of that way back when Karkat had been kidnapped, but they didn’t have a choice back then, and anyways they mostly slept at the same time during that experience, which was super different from just asking his best alien friend to fuckin’ hold his hand so the bad dreams wouldn’t get him. Fuck.

So he’d asked Karkat to refill his glass, even though he wasn’t thirsty right now, because it was an excuse to make Karkat come back, at least for a few more minutes, and they could talk for a bit, and maybe Dave’d stop being tired, wouldn’t that be rad.

Karkat came back in looking really thoughtful. He handed the glass over, and Dave took a sip to try and look like he hadn’t been 100% bullshitting there, and mumbled a thanks as he set it down. Then, just as a thought, he jerked his head toward the rest of the bed—it was a big king-sized one, probably left over from before the divorce and Mom had just never downsized or whatever, so there was a lot of space to Dave’s right—and told Karkat he could sit down if he wanted, Dave wasn’t gonna, like, pass out right this minute or anything, haha.

Karkat stayed quiet, which was fuckin’ weird, but he did sit down. He stared at the sheets for a minute, and then spoke up suddenly, saying, “I think I get it.”

“Get what?” said Dave.

“Why they wanted you back so bad,” said Karkat. “I mean, way back when you were first arrested. I kind of fought with Dirk over it at one point, because my only experience with the word Dirk used for why you should be with him was fucking Strider. And also I think I get why this shit all works, for humans in general. I mean, I’m probably just saying obvious shit, but it’s not how trolls work, we don’t take care of each other, not like this.”

Dave tipped his head.

“I mean with the whole fucking family thing,” Karkat said, rolling his eyes. “I’ve been trying to get it this whole time, but this shit’s used to justify so much bullshit with you humans, and I think I get it now, and why it’s so fucking important to you as a species.”

Dave snorted. “Dude, it’s not that big a thing—”

“It is, though! It just seems normal to humans because it’s how you always work, but, Dave, I’m serious, back on Alternia it’s every troll for themself. Maybe you have one person who has your back if you’ve got a moirail, maybe some are lucky like me and have friends who are actually consistently on your side and won’t take the first chance they get to kill you or fuck you up some other way, but we definitely don’t have a whole cluster of others we can just fall back on any time we’re met with something we can’t handle alone.”

“Makes sense, I guess,” Dave started, but Karkat just kept going. Apparently he’d had some sort of fuckin’ epiphany in the past two minutes.

“It took me so fucking long to get this, but I get it now! You know what I don’t get, though, is why the fuck you ever tried to convince me that Strider is part of your fucking family.”

Something in Dave dropped like a stone.

He’d…had a similar thought, really. Repeatedly. Multiple times, over the past week or so. He’d been kind of trying to avoid it, because every time it popped up, he got really stressed out.

“And don’t give me any of the bullshit about being ‘related’ or what the fuck ever, I don’t wanna hear it,” Karkat kept right on going. “I still don’t get why you humans care so much about that. The whole point of this family thing is that you all take care of each other, not that you’re related or whatever! Your aunt’s here, did you know that? She flew across an entire fucking ocean just to make sure she could help out you and Dirk! What the fuck did Strider ever do for you?”

It was a good question. And the answer, of course, was: aside from trying to kill him, do you mean? Hahaha.

Karkat was still talking, but Dave wasn’t really hearing him. Fuck, this had been a mistake, he should’ve taken his chances with the fucking nightmare dog. That was better than this old song and dance with his own thoughts.

The facts were pretty simple. He’d operated under pretty clear logic when he went up against Bro: We’re family, so he loves me, so therefore if I ask him to let me leave and explain that I really can’t deal with this, he’ll let me go. Except, Bro had tried to kill him, which meant that…

That was as far as Dave ever got. He couldn’t think any farther than that.

He felt like…like the next thought should be obvious, but he couldn’t make himself think it. It was too big—not so much a square peg in a round hole as it was trying to cram a grain silo into a pinhole, and the thought threatened to overwhelm and destroy him, so instead of thinking it, his brain kept rejecting it, the effect being like a broken record skip-skip-skipping, over and over, repeating the last thought he could get to before the Big One, because he couldn’t not think the Big One, either…

It was so fucking stupid, it was just a thought, why couldn’t he…

“Hah, yeah, now that you mention it, I guess I was always kinda wrong about this shit, wasn’t I?” Dave said, unable to stop the sardonic laughter bubbling up in his throat. “I mean, fuck, no wonder it took you so long to get, I probably gave you the wrong idea. My dumb ass was convinced he’d never try to kill me, cuz we’re family, and, well, here we fuckin’ are!”

Skip, skip, skip—

Karkat was still talking in stuttered phrases in the gaps of Dave’s own flood of words, looking almost scared, but Dave didn’t comprehned any of them, and anyway, the ranting had started, there was no stopping this shit now. “Like, what the fuck was I even thinking, right? I really thought that was gonna work, that somehow he’d just let me go if I asked, like a fucking idiot! Haha, what a fuckin’ dipshit, right?! And here I was thinking he—” Frantic laughter bubbled up, overtaking the words, not that more would’ve come, that next thought was just too big. Was he crying? Fuck, Karkat didn’t need to see any of this shit, but he couldn’t stop, couldn’t think

Skip, skip, skip, skip, skipskipskipskipskipskip—

It wasn’t Karkat’s fault. It really wasn’t. He might’ve set it off, but the storm had been building up for days, now, and it broke hard, sweeping Dave up in a torrent of just wordless mental screaming. He couldn’t think the next thought. He couldn’t. But the thing was damming him up, and he couldn’t ignore it anymore, and he was stuck in the middle and left to just completely melt down and dissipate into the flood.

A sound like a cicada crossed with the creakiest horror movie door ever to creak ripped through the tides, and suddenly Dave found himself tugged into a full body hug, wrapped up in four limbs with his face pressed into a thick sweater. The touch dragged him out of the flood and onto dry land, brought him back into now before he even knew what was happening. Karkat’s whole chest was vibrating with some intense cricket-cat hybrid purr, and this should’ve been so embarrassing but he was so tired and so lost and it was fucking comforting, so who the fuck cared. Who cared anymore. It was all bullshit. He could be embarrassed later.

Too soon, Karkat seemed to have the same thought, and tried to pull away. “Shit, sorry, I shouldn’t—fuck, I’m so sorry, this is really presumptive and I know you aren’t even into boys,” he babbled.

Dave groaned, wrapping his arms around Karkat’s chest and pulling him close. “Dude, if you try to make this about alien romance right now, I swear to fuck,” he gasped out between harsh sobs. Christ, he was going harder than Karkat did like twenty minutes earlier, what the fuck.

Karkat paused. Good. It meant his warm arms were still there. “Dave, I…I mean, this is troll romance, this is textbook moiraillegience, and I shouldn’t just be throwing myself at you because you had a moment of weakness, no matter how bad I, uh.”

Dave sniffled, wracked his brain for a moment…Karkat had explained this stuff about a million times, which one was…”That’s like…the bros quadrant, right?”

“The what.”

“The one that’s, like, platonic and shit.”

“…Yeah?” The cricket-purr started up again, cautiously.

“We fuckin’ kinda do most of that shit already, don’t we?” Like. Yeah. He wasn’t gay. That was still a thing. But Karkat was warm and solid and real and Dave was fucking exhausted and didn’t want to be alone, especially not when he felt right now like he was wrapped in safety. “Please, Karkat,” he added, because why not beg. He was already at maximum pathetic, there was no digging this hole lower, fuck it. “I really don’t wanna be alone right now, just, please don’t go.”

Karkat was quiet for a long moment, but finally, the cricket-purr went back to full volume and Karkat’s arms tightened around him.

“Okay,” Karkat said quietly. Dave let out a breath he’d barely known he’d been holding and went back to crying.

“We’re going to have to talk about this later,” Karkat murmured, which put him at about normal volume for anyone else.

“Later, then,” said Dave, and let himself finally fall the fuck asleep.

#dave strider #karkat vantas #davekat #roxy lalonde #longpost//#u BET UR BUTT THIS OENS GOIN IN THE DAVEKAT TAG #ITS ABOUT TIME #fanfic #fanfiction #calmvsstormfic #calmvsstormchapter #katt does a writing #jkdfsgfjhsfjshf not the best start to a relationship but like its something #lord this got long.#why tf did i think 32 and 33 would ever fit into one chapter.

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