#serpent could also be what’s fucking up the machinery

[deaf-goat]

mismag 2 theory abt the origins of the well

my theory is that magic USED to be accessible for everyone until someone(s) made the decision to shield it from the majority of the world (maybe some catastrophic magic shiz happened), and in order to pull that off they had to construct a place for excess magic to collect and compound (the well)

so when our guys tried to spread magic to the world again, SURE, everybody can SEE magic is there now, but you can’t dismantle such an elaborate machine just by sharing information. i’d even go so far as to say that’s an intentional failsafe that whoever made the well built into the system

and speaking of failsafes, i’m pretty sure the storm serpent is another one, meant to protect the well

[famdommcfanface]

Doctor who thoughts again... This is a long one.

I know the snake guy (can't remember his name, y'know, evil sexy snake guy) was going to be in this episode but I'm still thrilled every time they remind us of that fact

Oh yeah that fucking angel thing. Bullshit. Sorry

Erm they're are angels there that aren't covering their eyes which is very bad. Like... either they're in some kind of dimension where it doesn't matter so why are most of them covering their eyes or big proportions of them are just unable to move. Possibly forever if enough of them have their eyes uncovered.

I love Yaz's period clothing. Obsessed.

They're Indiana Jones-ing I guess. I'd like to think without the colonialism but I'm not sure how

Is that Jericho? Jericho!!!! I love this dude.

Yaz this is theft and destruction of ancient artefacts I'm an archaeologist and Yaz just don't please.

OOD!!!

Ood has a new voice. Hmm. Ah well.

Oh. Her. Forgot about her. Do I want to know?

Exposition time. Thanks.

DYING for Yaz's clothes this episode I mean damn.

Where are these guys getting money from

What is even happening rn I haven't known for weeks now I guess.

YES YAZ I GET IT

It's Spectre! No.

Obsessed with Yaz just murdering people. She didn't even murder him but...

Sexy gay snake guy!! Not sure what he's doing here but I love the period clothing on him.

UNIT!!!!!

If this dude turns out to be a Lethbridge-Stewart... just to say only so many people can be Lethbridge-Stewarts.

Aww!!! Yaz watching the doctor hologram this is adorable they're so in love

I think if Yaz kisses the doctor next episode I'll forgive Chris of everything

That might be an exaggeration but Chris wouldn't you like to find out???

Oh also another exposition time. See, Chris? I nearly got distracted by the gayness! Had there been more gayness I might not have noticed the exposition at all!

I want Dan to be more horrified by the whole dead body thing. Jericho's doing alright but c'mon Dan.

GAY GAY HOMOSEXUAL GAY

She can't be a good guy she's got an ood. The relationship seems like it might be a kind of slavery one.

Oh you're defending the time lord directives now are you doctor?

N-space? I don't even really know what that means but oh wait they're in the void aren't they

KARVINISTA! You gay little bitch

Okay but the void was meant to be like... hell. It wasn't just nothing it was basically hell. I know that's weird but it did happen.

Hey Bel! I still don't trust Tigmi!

Karvinista if you hurt Bel I stg...

Ooh. Creepy.

Chris you love people talking exposition out loud to themselves don't you.

Swarm and Azura! I would die for these bitches.

'you are space how we are time' stfu swarm. stfu Chris.

Stfu weird mystery woman who probably isn't the doctor's mother

Okay I'm lost. No idea what's happening. Can we go back to Yaz being gay in period clothing please?

I'm going to have to read the explanation for this afterwards.

Oh she's so cartoonishly evil what is even the point of this. The division is ripe for moral complexity.

Wait what's her name? Yeah her! Fuck what's her name?

Tecteun! Right! Oh god that means I really don't know what's going on.

Sexy snake guy! You don't understand I'm really excited every time this guy is on screen because I thought he was only going to be in one episode

Oh the brigadier is going to show up isn't he. I think the time period could work. Private Lethbridge-Stewart or whatever.

It's like 'huh. TARDIS. Oh well'

Feel like Jennings (or anyone who turns up in the background) is going to be a classic who reference

Sexy snake guy just lived on earth for like ten years and gave away his cover so fucking quickly... Wait what the fuck I swear that's from men in black.

Huh. That was weird.

Grand serpent! That's it! Knew it was something about snakes!

Oh fuck I really don't know what's happening.

Tecteun honey that's so fucking dumb and you now it. Put the doctor next to the machinery you're using to do it so she doesn't stop it what are you doing

I'm not even sure what this argument is but I know it fills me with rage.

Yeah I don't like this. Something about the doctor complaining about the live she lives... she loves her life? There are other complaints to make? That's not the bad thing she did doctor?

Kind of sick of like six plots happening at once. Where is Yaz being gay in period clothing

Okay I never thought Vinder was dead but for a moment I thought we were meant to think Vinder was dead and that was really funny for some reason

Diane! Wish she'd been in the plot or something but hey.

Dan isn't wearing interesting enough clothes. He deserves more interesting clothes

How can this dude speak English. He's like a Tibetan hermit.

I actually don't mind the comedy character but it would be far less jarring if Chris put some comedy in the rest of the series.

Haha map montage! So ridiculously cliché. Kind of love it.

YASMIN KHAN IF YOU ARE DEFACING THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA I STG...

Okay I guess. That's alright.

Karvinista you gay bitch.

Doctor free the ood!!!

Yeah the universe is really full of ood. It's because the ood masks are reusable unlike things like silurians.

Jesus Christ the flux destroyed like 99.999999999% of all galaxies it looks like

Oh god please don't do the thing I predicted.

Ood you're psychic your whole thing is hearing whispering

That doesn't quite look like proper Gallifreyan, idk.

I love sexy snake guy I'll tell you that much.

*my brain* Prentis... Prentice... wasn't he a mole guy? I feel a very bad conspiracy theory brewing...

Want that spike worm to actually look like a snake.

Oh him. I don't even want to know what his deal is at this point.

Yaz stfu this could be important.

Yes it's a fob watch... wait the doctor could get her memories back? I kind of don't like that.

Yeah I don't understand the whole next universe thing. Not sure what's happening. Could Rose come back? If Rose can't come back I don't care about your whole next universe thing.

Also where the fuck is Kate? I was promised Kate!

Oh wait that was good timing.

Osgood? She's dating Richard Osman now y'know. Just a bit of gossip.

Imagine if he just murdered Kate Stewart... how funny would that be idk.

Huh. I'd expect Kate to have a nicer house than that. Either a big town house thing or maybe something in the country.

Osgood!!!!!!!!

Does Karvinista have Gallifreyan on his leg?

Look. I understand that it's 1904. You don't have to tell me every time.

Ooh go on what is it. Oh is it snake guy. I don't even know what this dude wants. I like his office though.

K. Sontarans. Cool.

The doctor spent this whole episode having a conversation.

And swarm and Azura did fuck all! They've kind of been replaced by a different sexy queercoded villain.

Oh god I really don't know what's happening.

Oh well she's dead I guess huh.

Kate had better actually do something next episode.

Daleks. Yeah I guess.

Oh and the house yeah.

[sans-nyan]

@undeathmetal

so like, it's been a few hours so everything's a little fuzzy now, and i don't really know why we were together at all in the dream but like. i'm reasonably sure it was your universe though. i... i feel like we were trying to solve some riddle of vecna's? i know vecna was involved. we were in a place that said it was a library/college but it seemed really militarized and had a lot of drones there which i thought was really fucking weird. i don't remember the phrasing of the riddle anymore - originally the riddle was somethin about vecna has a serpent to speak to, and the serpent will speak back... i think it was something you posted on your blog actually i guess - but somewhere along the way the riddle changed into a different one and it was strangely music based? and had the vaguest fuckin questions?

also this is. really long so i’m gonna put it under a cut so i’m not drowning like everyone in 8 paragraphs of me rambling

the place had a large room that had like, devices that i can really only liken to like... a piano, if a piano were just made of the keys and nothing else. there were three or four rows of large keys, and each had images on them? there didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to what keys had what images, but some of it was like... some of it was just splashes of colour, or were pictures of nature or machinery or whatever, and a specific one i remember was of big spiders.

but one part of the puzzle was to go through these piano keys, and find which ones were the loneliest. like what the fuck kind of vague "anything could be right" shit. you seemed to know what you were doing with this part and zeroed in on two keys, i don't remember the images on them, but you pushed those two down and it sounded rather discordant but you were confident it was the right thing and i was like. shit dude i don't know any better i'll take your word for it. i don't remember the rest of the puzzle's questions unfortunately but we were both pretty fucking stumped.

the drones were pretty friendly to us at first, or at least they didn't really care about our presence while we were trying to figure shit out. but we weren't figuring anything else out in the piano room, so we left and went back to the campus area. it was a really sterile science fiction-y sort of deal, where everything was whites and greys and very rigid. they had some squarely trimmed bushes but it mostly felt extremely sterile. i don't really know how long we were stumped on things but it was long enough for you to get frustrated with everything and neither of us really wanted to give up? i wasn't sure what to do and kind of wanted to pat you on the shoulder or something, 'cause. i just. i wasn't really sure HOW to help other than just... keep searching for information.

the drones started to get hostile when we went into the library, and i think they were pissed with us being there for so long, and it felt kind of like they were the like, proctors of the riddle/puzzle. we decided to split, you kept to the library and i guess i decided i was going to fuckin? talk to the students of the college and explore it and see if there were any clues in just how the place was set up and stuff? i don't really know at this point, but the drones were pretty pissed and hounding us and i took a student and hid in the bushes and that went about as well as you'd expect. i didn't really get any information, the kid was like DUDE what the FUCK those drones HATE you and i have to get to class or else i'm gonna fuckin get in trouble too!

and i have another gap in memory at about this point, but eventually the drones get us, and we're forced into a dark room, and we're going to get killed for not figuring out the puzzle quick enough. and i guess it's at this point i'm like oh SHIT I THINK I KNOW THE ANSWER NOW literally seconds away from death so like... @self thanks i guess?

so i'm shouting the answer desperately like holy FUCK DON'T KILL US WHEN I LITERALLY JUST FIGURED IT OUT and we take this opportunity of me figuring it out to just fucking BOOK IT to the piano room, while these droids are trying to kill us, and we fuckn slam down these piano keys, and the spider key ends up being part of the answer but i STILL don't fuckign remember the riddle fuck.

the droids at least don't kill us when we solve the puzzle but they are like okay just get what you came for and get the fuck out. i don't even remember what we got honestly? but? YEAH. i feel like there was still stuff that happened after that, but...? don't remember it. that was roughly when i woke up. but i was lke holy fuck i gotta tell khaz.......... when i'm more awake.

[wakraya]

Hiveswap Theory

So, with Hiveswap on the horizon and a couple of asks I’ve gotten lately, I have been thinking more and more about the story of the game, and wondered if what we’ve seen already may be enough to find some interesting things out about the overall story! I decided to give it a shot and go through all we know about Hiveswap and see if I can predict some stuff.

Thanks to @revolutionaryduelist for inspiring me to make this post! You should totally check him out, he’s got some amazing stuff.

First, let’s start by the things we do know about Hiveswap.

At its basis, Hiveswap is a story set in the past of the Beta Universe Earth of Homestuck, following the adventures of Joey Claire, and her brother Jude Harley. We know this happens on Beta Earth because Joey and Jude are Grandpa’s biological children, with a woman named A. Claire, full name unknown. It is possible, too, given Joey is called Claire and not Joey Harley, that A. Claire had a child with them before marrying Jake and having Jude with him, or perhaps there’s something else, it’s too early to say for sure.

Joey and Jude live apparently alone in the Harley Manor in Hauntswitch. While the name of the location has been told, the look of the previews doesn’t make it look like Hauntswitch is a town, and rather just the area of land they are in. Furthermore, Hauntswitch is a play on words, Haunts Witch, but also Haunt-Switch, as it has been confirmed the sequel to Hiveswap, following Joey’s brother rather than her own adventures, will be named like this.

Jude’s apparently very paranoid about their neighbours, of which we know very little about, and one day, these strange dark beasts with greenish mouths and no eyes start appearing all over the manor!

With no other option but running, Jude ends up trapping himself in the Tree House, and Joey rushes into the manor, where she eventually stumbles upon a strange machine in the attic. The key to the machine attaches to her and forces her to activate it, suddenly starting a countdown of eleven days until the end of the world, and transporting her to Alternia. Once there, the only way to fix the end of the world scenario, is to go back, however, Alternia is quite the hostile environment, with a new Heiress to the throne having started culling an insane amount of young Trolls, aided by a mysterious white man.

That’s about as much as we know for certain. Anything from this point is complete speculation, so let’s start shall we?

First of all let us address the elephant in the room. The catalyst for this entire adventure is the weird black monsters that appear and force Jude and Joey to escape. This is Earth, after all, and it doesn’t matter that there’s going to be an apocalypse coming in a few years or that there’s infinite inventory systems in the world, things like that just aren’t normal. Monsters don’t pop out of nowhere with no reason. Given the monster issue will never be resolved in Hiveswap, since Joey is warped to Alternia early on, we must assume it will be a focus of the next game, Hauntswitch, and if that is the case, there’s only one possible culprit for what’s going on:

The Creepy Neighbours.

Given the story of Homestuck and what we know about Grandpa Harley and Skaianet, I am going to bet one of two things are happening here.

1) They are Skaianet Employees. They are actually harmless and totally nice people, but Jude is just paranoid. During some experiment, they created those monstrosities and accidentally wrecked havoc on the nearby manor. This, while plausible, doesn’t leave much open in the way of story for a second game, sadly, so I feel the second option is more likely.

2) They are rivals or competitors of some sort against Grandpa Harley or Skaianet as a whole. This is a harder one to predict, because we know literally nothing about these people, but it would allow for a much more interesting story. If another company got their hands on SBURB-like technology, like how Skaianet did, they might start tampering with ectobiology.

As a third option, we have to remember that Condy exists in this Universe. The Condesce is on Earth at this point, as Betty Crocker, and we know Nanna said that the Baroness merely vanished one day. We know that Condy left to Alpha Earth eventually, but we know nothing of this shift. Perhaps there will be some shed light on the issue finally? Perhaps Condy is the final boss on both games, one when she comes back to Alternia to snuff out the Heiress, and another one on Earth as Betty Crocker. Wouldn’t that be an interesting twist?

There’s also the form of these monsters.

All of them are inky black, deformed, have no eyes, and possess large maws that open to show lime green insides. A green tone that looks suspiciously like that of Ectobiology slime. Although it also reminds me of another kind of green...

First Guardian Green. Could they be trying to clone First Guardians? And if so, why? Are these monsters escaped, failed experiments to manufacture more First Guardians? While it’s a very, very long shot, I do think there’s some validity to this theory, but I’ll get to that later.

Now that the monsters are covered, let’s go to another very important point. The Cherub Portal.

Obviously the portal has changed in design quite a lot since the first 3D previews. But in the 3D version, we can see the countdown thing starting to roll down. What we cannot see on the 3D version is the green energy going through the machinery. Even on the red-themed Caliborn side of the teleporter, there’s green glows and green sparks, implying there’s either radiation powering this thing up, or First Guardian Energy, and I bet it’s the latter, because of one simple thing.

This thing is not an ordinary device. It was not built by Grandpa Harley, or by anyone for that matter. This right here is a Juju.

Jujus have always been weird and fascinating things that are hard to explain, so why would this thing... Be a Juju? Well there’s three factors here:

1) The Key. As we’ve seen from the last trailer? The key Joey shoves in is alive. It has its own will and forces her to put it in. Similarly, the Lollipop Juju forced Jane to lick it even when she was trying to resist it.

2) The Other Portal. This is not a singular portal we’re talking about, after all.

This right here is the only image of the other side of the portal. We can see this is in a basement rather than in the attic, and given how Dammek goes through to Earth, it’s safe to assume this is in Dammek’s home. Why or how it got there, we still don’t know. But isn’t that the case with most Jujus? The only technology we know can connect two Universes is post-game SBURB technology. The bases for the exiles, and even then, they connected the Universe with the Game Session rather than the Universe directly. One single of these devices existing is strange, but two exactly equal versions that act as an entry point and an exit? I doubt Trolls and Humans had contact prior to this and tried to build a way to meet, let alone making it so the process begins a Countdown to the end of the world.

3) The Pattern. Through all the previews, we have seen the red/green pattern from the Cherubs we know. Calliope and Caliborn, or perhaps their parents. We do not know much about Cherub Culture, and just a little bit about anatomy- And even then it’s mostly reproductive habits. I don’t believe it was ever mentioned anywhere further into the comic, but Calliope states herself to be a Lime Blood and for that to be a rare color. We know this was in reference to the Troll’s Lime Blood, but it is true she has a different blood color than Caliborn. We have not seen any other unrelated Cherubs to know if they have more than Red/Green blood colours, but it wouldn’t be that weird to imagine. Even if ALL Cherubs were red/green coloured, though? Adding a third, unknown duo of Cherubs that are the same colours would be a bit strange.

Even if it was a third duo of Cherubs, however? It still couldn’t be technology manufactured by them. Cherubs don’t seem to have a home planet or any sort of technology. They are forces of nature, able to fly through space with no difficulty, and to annihilate entire planets and civilisations. I don’t know if it was in-canon or in another theory, but I recall having them be described akin to the immune system of the Universe, or a ‘Clean-up method’, a cycle of destruction and rebirth. Cherubs have no reason to build this kind of technology, so the only reason why it would be patterned like this is that it’s a Juju. And given it’s patterned to be akin to Cherubs?

I bet the Portal is going to collapse into a massive Black Hole that will swallow both Planets if the countdown reaches 0.

It would only be fitting wouldn’t it? Still, as much speculation on the portal’s origin, saying it’s a Juju solves nothing for the story. Not why it’s there, not it’s actual functionality.. But next to the portal, we see something.

Something.

Weird.

I mentioned this in my latest post about the trailer analysis, but why the FUCK is that clock there exactly? That’s a God Tier clock. The serpents coiled on the sides, the shape, it’s very obviously a God Tier clock. It HAS to be because the only other alternative to it being a God Tier clock is it being Lord English’ Clock, and I think that would make even less sense.

This raises two main questions. Whose clock is it, and Why is it there?

Well, it also raises the question if this is a joke. Because it could be just a reference and not ACTUALLY the clock, but it doesn’t seem like a silly filler thing they would put in there. Mainly because...

It’s hard to see, and it might actually not be. But the shape seems suspiciously familiar. Early concept art of the game ALREADY featured the clock there.

So it’s not a joke. Great. So why is it there? We only see the Clock physically appear in two occasions. One is after defeating Yaldabaoth, as a boon, Caliborn is granted the clock and allowed to destroy it with his Juju Breaker and absorb the essence of the God Tier resurrection magic, making him fully immortal. I heavily doubt Yolobroth is involved in ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM with Hiveswap, so we’ll dismiss this.

The other possibility? First Guardians. Bec, for example, never seemed as powerful as Doc Scratch, maybe because Doc Scratch was so cocky about his omniscience and omnipotence, maybe because him being Human and part Lord English made him even more powerful. But, we do know Doc Scratch had the clock there in his apartment, on Alternia’s Green Moon. He physically had two of them in fact, or a shifting clock that showed John’s and Vriska’s death status.

I should state it again, there’s no other place outside of a Boon by the most powerful Denizen, or decoration in an Omnipotent and Omniscient First Guardian’s room where these clocks have been physically seen. So unless there’s a third way to acquire these through SBURB Machinery or Alchemy, in which case Immortality would become kind of trivial in a Session, the only way it could be there is for Becquerel to summon it somehow. Or perhaps for it to arrive with the portal?

After all, the clocks have Cherub Snakes coiled along them. It could be plausible that, whatever the origin of the portal is, it’s the same for the clock. I am convinced it may have something to do with First Guardians, however.

At this point, some might have caught up about my obsession with First Guardians. The black beast, failed First Guardian experiments? The portal, powered by Green Sun energy? Now the clock, I have mentioned them a lot haven’t I? It’s for a good reason, however. This little buddy right here. Someone who was forgotten by many, and that has not appeared in a single concept art or preview of Hiveswap ever since.

Mr. Motherfucking First Guardian Axolotl.

This is a huge deal. A huge deal that a lot of people have forgotten about or haven’t even seen. This was one of the first pieces of concept art from the game, and one that never made any fucking sense. After all, this takes place on Alternia and Earth! We have Doc Scratch and Bec as the First Guardians! And look at the lower-right corner of that picture. Those are Trolls being vaporized, which means this is from Alternia specifically.

And yet, for it to have been one of the FIRST things to come out of the concept art, one’d think this buddy would be very, very important. Was he scrapped after Hussie remembered it made no sense? Well. Not exactly.

In one of the previews, there was something interesting. Prongle.

Prongle is the silly in-game Social Media the Trolls have in the game. And there’s someone specifically that caught my eye immediately. After so long without any news about the weird new First Guardian, we have a Troll.

A Troll with the Axolotl from Animal Crossing as their avatar.

With a lime blood frame around it.

It was confirmed that Lime Bloods would have a part in this game. Which means this is prior to the event that led to the prosecution and culling of all Lime Bloods or- The Catalyst for said caste-culling.

Fiamet having that avatar is no coincidence. That’s a hint. A very obvious hint. This Troll is closely related to the mystery of the First Guardian. I’d even dare to say maybe The First Guardian is their Lusus.

And then, things would start to make some sense. Why was an entire caste culled? How could they be removed entirely from the gene pool when the Mother Grub lays so many eggs, mutations happen, and every other blood color in between still happens?

Well, it is implied that, given his rare mutation, the Signless wouldn’t survive, and that later on the red-blooded lusii like Crabdad were genetically engineered or manufactured in some capacity to raise mutants in the future. So, a Troll without a Lusus won’t make it out of the Caverns.

Am I making sense yet?

Lime Bloods weren’t erased as a caste.

Their Lusii were.

There is some sort of correlation between Lime Bloods and First Guardian powers. First Guardians are rare, but Karkat implies they’re protectors of planets, not just SBURB constructs you make once. For them to occur naturally could be possible. And there is something in the game we know for sure, and that is that there’s a revolution afoot.

There she is. Ms. Second best at memes. Trizza Tethis, the Heiress to the Alternian Throne. Before Feferi, there were more Heiresses after all. And once they grow powerful enough to challenge Condy? She comes back to Alternia and culls them. Again, and again, and again. It’s hard to say if this is the Heiress DIRECTLY before Feferi, or if there’s a few Fuchsiabloods still in the way. Whichever the case, she’s the most powerful figure currently on Alternia, given how adults have to leave for war, leaving no other important figure on the planet.

And everyone hates her. Trizza is a bad memer. She makes horrible jokes, she steals other people’s memes, and then broadcasts them to the entire Alternian Population. Those who don’t laugh and accept her as their ruler? They’re collected by elite Drones and culled. Furthermore, they say that she ascended to the throne of Alternia aided by a mysterious White Man, obviously Doc Scratch.

Remember, Doc Scratch was using all sorts of strategies to make Alternia a vile, corrupted world, full of violence and hatred. Making someone like her have so much power is perfect for his plans. You know what isn’t perfect for Chaos and Dictatorship, however?

Rebellion. On the Tealblood’s tag we can see “Rebel Marshall”, implying that people are so tired of Trizza that they are preparing to overthrow her. And if the lower bloods band together enough to overcome the Drones and take the Heiress for the Throne away? They may just be able to gain enough momentum to spread the movement into an empire-wide rebellion, and turn the Hemospectrum around once and for all.

This doesn’t happen, however. We know this because Alternia is exactly the same when Homestuck starts. Hemospectrum differences, same authoritarian regime. So obviously this rebellion is not going to be successful, much like the Summoner’s wasn’t.

But something HAS to happen. It can’t not start, or happen off-screen, right? What if the Rebellion comes extremely close to being successful?

If Fiamet is in the Prongle list along with Cridea, Xefros and Dammek, we can assume they are on the good guys team. And their Lusus, arguably, is an incredibly powerful First Guardian.

My thought is that the Rebellion will reach the very gates of the Royal Palace, and at the very last second, Doc Scratch will intervene. Trying to keep the status cuequo (8^y) he’ll fight the other First Guardian, or perhaps personally banish the Lime Blood Lusii, thus making it impossible for any future Lime Blood to survive outside of the Brooding Caverns. With the Rebellion stomped, however, Condy will come back to Alternia, perhaps knowing of the Rebellion, perhaps just knowing about the new Heiress causing a mess, and will kill her off. If Doc Scratch doesn’t kill the Lime Blood Lusii himself, Condy will order mass prosecution to avoid First Guardian powers to be used against the Empire in the future.

And thus, the big bad, Trizza, will be shoved off the scene, making cullings go down, but keeping Alternia miserable enough for Homestuck’s events to follow as we know. A satisfying finale to the section of the story is given for the game, but we know how it will continue in the webcomic.

This is my guess to what will happen on Alternia. And yet, something evades me.

The Countdown. We know the Countdown is bad, we can make an idea of what will happen in the game with the characters we’ve seen so far, but there’s one thing we really don’t have enough information to understand. It has to be such wild speculation it would be impossible to give it a sound basis.

How do Joey and Dammek switch places again and stop the End of the World(s)?

We see in the picture of Dammek’s basement, after going through, there’s a barrier surrounding the portal. She can’t go back. Perhaps Doc Scratch will remove the barrier? A ‘boon’ for Joey to go away and leave Alternia alone, as he doesn’t want the order of things to be messed with anymore. Maybe it’s a Dragon-Ball sort of deal, where parts the key to unlocking the barrier is scattered through the entirety of Alternia, making Joey have to go adventure and find them? If Trizza came across one of these pieces, it’d also make sense why she’d see herself involved with the rebellion in the first place.

But if that’s the case, does Dammek also have to find a key on Earth? If it’s scattered enough to need an adventure of such proportions for Joey, than what are her brother and his new Troll friend going to experience on Earth?

Up until now I have thought the majority of Hauntswitch will take place in the enormous nearly-village-sized manor the Neighbours have but...

If their adventure has to be as big as Joey’s?

I wouldn’t be surprised if Crockercorp really does come into play.

But that’s just wild speculation. While I can say about the previous parts of this theory, about the nature of the portal and what will happen on Alternia, with a certain degree of confidence, there’s still nothing we can know for sure about what the endgame will entail regarding returning home.

All we can do for now.

Is wait until it’s out.

[thekillingquill]

At the Drive-In

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Pairing: Jughead x Reader Word Count: 2,442  Warnings: None that I can think of!  A/N: My first writing attempt in a while... can you see the rust falling off? This has the potential to be multi-chapter.

The escape was a muscle memory: one hand on the windowsill and one gripping the branch below. She gave in to gravity and let the momentum carry her towards the tree’s sturdy trunk--the only stable thing in Riverdale right now. Since the summer--since Jason Blossom and Sweet Water River--the ground beneath her feet had been shifting and falling out from under her. The town was losing its foundation and didn’t see it. Not yet.

She was halfway out of her window when the glass shattered followed by a loaded silence. Then a man thundered his outrage and a woman followed with a defiant screech. Calm over, storm to be continued throughout the night.

A gust of wind struck like a slap to the face and her entire body shuddered from the cold of it. It was like being doused with cold water, an abrupt awakening from a coma. It took far too long for her to come back to her body--she was up up up in the stars past Jupiter and then crashing down to her body standing ankle deep in the river where the body of her classmate had been found.

She didn’t remember walking to the river, just knowing that she shouldn’t be there. She couldn’t explain when realizing she needed to leave became an action, couldn’t pinpoint the moment she started to move, when it started to rain or how she ended up squeezing through a hole in the chain link fence at the Twlight Drive-In at 2:07 am on a Friday night. She only remembers the intimidating sound of grown men cock-sure with intoxication who should, by law, have left the drive-in after the last screening. Instead, they loitered and she trespassed. She was good at trespassing, but truly excelled at breaking and entering.

Back when your birthday meant inviting everyone in your class to a party, Reggie Mantle started a game of truth or dare. She couldn’t say for sure, but she thought it might have been Archie Andrew’s birthday, or maybe it was Betty Cooper. She remembered that the house had more than one floor and the lawn was so green it didn’t seem real, more like something out of a cartoon. It was nothing like her neighbourhood.

At ten and eleven they hadn’t heard the term classicism, but it ran rampant at that party. Cheryl and Jason Blossom targeted her specifically throughout the game which ended after the adult supervision heard Jason daring her to pick the lock at Twilight Drive-In. When parents began to collect their children, Jason confronted her once again.

“The dare still stands. I’ll meet you there tonight an hour after the last movie.”

Except he never showed up. Every night for a week she rode her bike to Twilight Drive-In with a broken pair of tweezers and a manipulated paperclip in her pocket. She waited for Jason Blossom for hours until something inside of her broke. On a Tuesday night in late July, she picked the lock to the booth at the Twilight Drive-In and started a life of crime. After that she periodically picked the locks to her neighbour’s houses when she knew they’d be out of town. When her bike was stolen, she would steal Reggie Mantle’s by picking the lock. It was one of those fancy multiple speed mountain bikes with a hand brake. It was so big that she had to walk it to a bench for a boost. The first time she took it for a spin around town she gave herself road rash because of that damn handbrake. After a year or so Reggie switched to a combination lock.

Tonight, however, she would revisit her origin story to escape from the cold wind and hopefully find a way to dry her socks and sneakers. Picking the lock felt like coming home, almost as easy as having the key. The air smelled of fresh popcorn and artificial butter. With the door shut and locked behind her, all she had to guide her was the faint glow off the machinery. She didn’t think there was a need to step lightly as she headed up the stairs.

The punch nearly sent her flying back down, but she gripped the doorframe as she leaned back and was able to recover quickly, cursing vehemently the whole time.

“What the fucking hell, dude!” Her heart pounded in her chest so hard she felt it crashing against her skull and suffocating her lungs. She lunged quickly away from the doorframe--more afraid of falling than getting hit. It took her far too long to process who exactly attacked her.

“Haven’t you ever heard of trespassing? You can’t be here, get out.” Jughead Jones had a cold fury, the curve of his shoulders defensive while his voice bordered on territorial. Her eyes shifted from him to the bed in the corner--the rumpled blankets and the sleeping bag half unzipped. She glimpsed a poster and a few other homely items before he demanded her attention again.

“Did you not hear me? Leave! You could get arrested for this, or worse.” He said, taking a step towards her.

“Worse?” She asked. “What exactly constitutes as worse than arrested?”

“I know you’re not as dumb as you’re pretending to be. So I won’t waste my breath explaining to you what would define worse.” He said, his words coming out rapidly. “You should go, now.”

“Go where, exactly? I won’t insult you by pretending that you don’t know why I’m here, Jughead.” The use of his name seemed to jar something in the dark haired boy. For the first time, he really saw what was happening. Her hair was curly from the rain and droplets slid steadily from her hairline, down to her temples and continued under her jaw where they reappeared on the soft curve of her neck. Her clothes were dark from moisture and a puddle was forming under her feet. His eyes traveled from her feet back to her face where he saw that her lips were discoloured from cold.

“You can’t stay here, do you understand me? This place has been claimed.” He said, his voice gentler than it had been in what felt like days.

“Because you were here first?” Jughead’s heart stalled in his chest at her words. It was the fact that he was caught, yes, but also her tone of indifference. It tugged at the few heart strings that hadn’t been severed during his childhood.

“Because I was here first,” he allowed.” Among other things.”

There was no choice but for her to accept this and head back into the literal and metaphorical storm. Keeping her back to the wall, she began to move for the stairs. Jughead choked on his words, words he wasn’t sure he wanted to will into existence, but he cleared his throat and tried again anyway.

“Just tonight,” he said. “You can stay tonight, but you can never come back here again. It’s Serpent territory.”

“And they don’t bother you?” She quirked a brow, surprising Jughead by her sudden confidence.

“I work here,” he replied, keeping his answer vague. He expected her to dig, but she surprised him again by her quiet acceptance. They both anticipated an awkward silence--she the interloper, Jughead the reluctant host--but she was wracked with a sudden bout of teeth chattering.

“How long were you out in the rain for?” Jughead asked. The question was a placeholder, a way to buy time so he could weigh the pros and cons of each level of accommodating he could be. This was his home--he didn’t want her to be here, not really. But he didn’t want her to get sick, didn’t want her to be uncomfortable. Didn’t want her to get hurt or be the next body to float to the river’s edge with eyes wide open and unseeing for eternity. 

“I don’t know.”

He couldn’t help but think about Jellybean. If it were Jellybean in this situation, he’d want someone to take care of her; to offer her a hot shower (he could only offer a sink full of hot water and paper towels), dry clothes (he was living out of a duffel, he didn’t have many clothes to offer and to lose out on even one shirt would be difficult for him) and something to eat (he had old popcorn and unlimited fountain soda).

“I can put your wet clothes on the heater and give you something to sleep in.” Jughead said, turning to his bag to avoid looking at her.

“Okay,” she whispered. The shame was starting to set in, the embarrassment choking her. The reality of the situation was trying to force itself to the forefront of her mind. She essentially broke into her classmate’s home, would be wearing his clothes, and sharing a room with him.

She turned her back to Jughead and busied herself with ridding herself of her waterlogged shoes and peeling the socks from her feet. Next she began to shimmy her hips out of her skinny jeans, bending over to start sliding the fabric down her legs and over her feet.

Jughead didn’t have any clean boxers to offer her, but he thought one of his sweaters might be long enough to act as a sleep shirt. He turned to ask if she thought it would work and in that moment his words died a thousand deaths on the journey from his mind to his mouth. She was bent down, removing her jeans, displaying her blue cotton boy shorts to him. A thought tried to form (soft to the touch) but he dispelled it before it could truly manifest. He turned back around and cleared his throat.

“I uh, only have a shirt for you.” He lifted it over his head to show her. She gently tugged on the sleeve of the maroon sweater and Jughead let it fall. She was overwhelmed by the warmth of the fabric in her hands. She turned and eagerly shed her damp t-shirt which fell with a wet slap to the cold concrete beneath her feet.

Her stomach quivered with butterflies the moment she put the sweater over her head. It smelled intoxicatingly of Jughead--she couldn’t compare it to a specific scent that she had encountered before, like mint (the smell of the lotions her grandmother uses), coffee (her mother’s breath in the mornings) or cigarettes (an acrid odor that clung to her father’s skin, coated his plaid shirts and made its home on the walls of their home). She could only describe how it made her feel: warm and safe. It was the kind of scent that made her fly.

“Okay, so my bra is wet. I’m taking it off and let’s just not be weird about it.” Jughead scoffed from the other side of the room where he kneeling next to his bed, attempting to arrange a comfortable nest out of a combination of Twilight’s towels and a spare pillow for the night.

“Telling me not to be weird about it is weird. Just so you know.” He turned to flash her a sarcastic smile, but was met with the sight of her frizzy hair cascading down her back, the water darkening his sweater in places. He was momentarily transfixed on her hands as they reached around her body, slipping easily under the hem of his sweater and moving upwards. He followed with rapt attention as the fabric lifted with her movements, revealing the soft curve of her hips to him.

And then her hands left and the sweater settled loosely over her to cover her hips and most of her thighs. His eyes snapped upwards, following the practiced motion of her hands as she reached inside of one sleeve and then the other, eventually pulling her bra through one arm. It was something he had seen done in the movies and on TV, but it never occurred to him that real women could perform with the same level of grace and subjective appeal. She bent down, picking up her pile of wet clothes and Jughead came forward to take them from her, avoiding eye contact, and swept up her shoes to be arranged carefully on the heater.

He wasn’t sure if it would be safe to put something so delicate and lacy directly on the heater, so he placed three paper towels in front of the heater and laid her brightly coloured bra flat. She was sitting cross legged on his bed when he returned, next to a pile of folded towels.

“Can I be honest with you, Jughead?” She didn’t allow him time to reply and his head was spinning with how quickly she moved between timid and confident. “I can barely feel my hands or my feet. I’m still very cold and given the limited resources we have, the best way for me to get warm would be through sharing body heat. As far as I know, you’re the only other body here. So, we’re going to share the bed. Unless you’d rather I get sick and die.”

“You’re being a little dramatic, don’t you think?” Still he put the towels away and she curled up on the side of the bed closest to the wall, wrapped tightly in his sleeping bag and spare blankets. She lifted the edge to Jughead when she felt the mattress dip under his weight. He slid under the blankets, turning his back towards her and facing the door.

She compressed her body tightly, fingers curled around the excess fabric of Jughead’s sweater and fists pressed tightly into her armpits for added warm. She tucked her chin close to her chest and pressed her head into Jughead’s pillow to let her breath warm her face.

Jughead squeezed his eyes shut tightly against the feeling of her trembling against his back. Every few minutes she would push her back against him as if seeking more heat. He knew that he could turn around, pull her body into his and mold to the shape of her to provide further warmth, but he didn’t. Eventually her shaking subsided, her teeth no longer chattered and Jughead was able to relax.

That night they slept with their backs to each other and the heels of their feet gently bumping. When they woke, their legs were hooked around each other’s. Her clothes were dry enough for the walk home and before she left, Jughead curled his fingers to cup her upper arm with a gentleness that paralysed her. He made sure to look her directly in the eye.

“You can’t come here again, Y/N.”

But she came back again that night.