#set in the same universe as my polypa story

[morsartis]

Tagora Gorjek x Reader

He ran at a temperature best described as lukewarm, it was always the first thing you were reminded of when you spent time with him. He wasn’t the coldest of the trolls you knew of course. Granted, neither of you got to do so as much as you’d have liked. He was a busy troll and you had your own things to stress over. Your chats and gossip were usually reserved for facetime on whatever app or device happened to be handy. Tagora had a strict schedule and while yours was more hectic due to family matters he always made time to talk. But luckily for you both of you had found the time to hang out in person again. It was a breath of fresh air- even if the pampering made you squirm. You knew that Tagora liked having a ‘spa buddy’ but that didn’t mean you didn’t feel bad for him spending all that money on you. As much as he made up a big deal about your debt to him you also knew him well enough now to know he was full of shit. He was throwing prices out there and not keeping track of what you owed at all. That and he wouldn’t let you pay him back even when you did have the money. He liked spoiling you for some asinine reason though you were getting better at returning the favor. 

Like now. A bottle of iridescent teal tail polish and that Starbucks he liked so much sitting on the little bedside table and a couple of ridiculously fluffy bathrobes- it’d been a dent to your wallet but that was fine really- you were finally going to hang out together. You’d both planned this day weeks in advance and Tagora hadn’t shut up about all the new products he wanted to try with you. Some of it you’d looked up and nearly had a heart attack at the prices. You knew you shouldn’t have checked the prices on the products because it always led to you being anxious about using them but there were a few troll products humans couldn’t use without consequences and you liked to be careful. Luckily Tagora was almost as vigilant as you when it came to products. Which was why you were both reclined on the human bed he’d gotten just for the two of you, your skin was so silky smooth now it felt like you’d gotten rid of a years worth of grime. It also smelled nice- certainly not as strong as most human products were. Just a faint scent that you wouldn’t have noticed if it weren’t for the sheer amount of it you’d both used. Somewhere in Tagora’s hive you could hear Ferret dad scuttling around and the soft sound of Tagora breathing. The bed shifted and you opened an eye to watch him grab his Starbucks from the table and sit up slightly. He looked peaceful laying back with you and drinking that sugary monstrosity. The rigid way he usually help himself had melted away to loose shoulders and half lidded eyes. They were filling out more with teal lately- an indicator of an adult molt coming up. He’d mentioned it a couple of times asking you to check in on his lusus when the molt hit and make sure nothing in his fridge rotted. That bit of biology lesson had been enlightening as well as deeply disturbing. It also saddened you to think Ferret dad would be leaving to find a new charge soon. Reaching over you grabbed Tagora’s free hand and gave it a squeeze. His lips twitched around his straw as he squeezed back. This was your favorite part of your spa days, just relaxing together. Being able to reach out and hold hands when you wanted to. He gave you a gentle tug as he leaned back over to set his drink on the table. When he settled again there was that familiar sly grin- sharp teeth poking out from behind black lips- that told you he had some sort of juicy gossip to share with you. 

“You won’t believe what I overheard the other day.” He started, voice hushed with glee. Oh, you thought with your own smile, this was going to be good. 

[heuristicallyinclined]

Nobody Knows

Hey, so this is my first public fanfic. I have been a Homestuck fan since the early 2010′s but Hiveswap slammed me back into it hard enough to write. Cringe is dead and it is going to be angsty and indulgent with canon treated as a suggestion. I’ve been spamming some of my favorite writers in the fandom with ideas in their inbox and decided to actually do something about some of them. Most of this comes from some future angst with Mallek I sent @clusband a few weeks ago during sad Mallek hours. Constructive advice welcome.

Get some hurt, comfort, fluff, a lot of angst. A lot of background characters.

Summary: MSPA Reader reflects on their current situation and unhappiness at not being able to see their old friends again. They accept that they past they once knew them in no longer exists, but what about the present? 

Chapter 1: Self-reflection and other cool ways to spend the day

Part 1/?

(Word count: 3,085 | Rated T | Past MSPA Reader x Mallek Adalov,  MSPA Reader x Mallek Adalov, Past MSPA Reader x Polypa Goezee, Background DaveKat)

AO3 Links: Part One (This) | Part Two  | Part Three

Being back in your hive after however long it has been brings up memories. Memories that you had spent so long aching for whenever the discomfort of that void inside of you passed. Focusing on that hollowness for too long always made you uncomfortable, but you sometimes would try to understand why that was. You tried, you really did, to the point of feeling that static so hard that your vision would go white and you couldn’t hear anything over the sound of it in your mind, feeling like you were going to pass out. You think one time you did, but it was hard to tell. Fuck.

You thought that getting them back would help, make you more content, fill it even, make you feel whole again? But you just feel even emptier and like an even more monumentally bigger fuck up. You drink your shitty, expired coffee made in the coffee machine Tagora bought you a long time ago in the mug Skyyla made you, thumbing over the Ladyy design on the handle. You smile at the idea of her making such a comparatively small mug for you. Imagining the struggle of her larger hands trying to make something usable for your much smaller ones. You feel the warmth from your drink and your memory. At least your makeshift home was too out of the way to be ransacked, that or too much of a death risk for anyone other than alien refugees to try to make their way into.

You look around you at all of the trinkets your friends had given you. Remembering how at the time, you felt so rewarded, accepted even. Trolls being, well, trolls, had a hard time opening up to others given how much of a hellscape the whole planet was. So every time you made some progress, you felt like you got the neighborhood cat to approach you without getting too clawed up.

You look over in the corner and notice the plastic bag you got when grabbing some oblong meat products for Dieman at Grub-Mart. You had some extra caegars and figured he might be exhausted after doing whatever drug that was at Ardata’s party. You figured that some sweet meat might help with the hangover. You definitely needed it.

Your teal highlighter had been covered in dust, having not been used since you decided to be a good friend and smuggle some snacks into the bookhive to support your favorite legislacerators-in-training late night, er morning, study session. You stayed as moral support, given you know fuck all about the laws of any given planet and also enjoy having your flesh remain unscorched. You feel like you learned a lot. Probably. You mostly shared meaningful eye contact and words of encouragement.

Drawings from clown children and sketches from Amisia cover your walls. So do ticket stubs from Marvus’ and Chixie’s shows. You felt an odd sense of pride in being one of the most normal people there, extraterrestrial status not withstanding. A set of indigo sweatbands from exercising with Nikhee that you would also use with Stelsa during scaerobics classes are hung on hooks. There was a rom-com with a title too long to read in your lifetime that you watched with Polypa and books borrowed from Galekh that you never returned.

You smile, but it doesn’t reach your eyes. You care about all of your new friends, of course you do! It is just that… you feel more like the universe’s least qualified guidance counselor instead of their friend sometimes. You’re older than them, so it is maybe more like a sibling or a sketchy babysitter kind of relationship. They all have kinda weird, hard lives, even the ones on Earth, so you don’t mind being an interdimensional taxi service, or a postman who delivers kids to other kids, but they tend to relate more with each other than with you. Which makes sense, and you're definitely happy they finally get to be with other people their own age, but seeing them hanging out with each other really makes you long for the people you once had the same kinds of relationships with.

You had Karkat ask about your hoodie before you got your memories back and Sollux mentioned Mallek, but you got a little occupied by drones. It had been a bit since then. After taking Karkat back to his hive after a movie night with Dave, you noticed him eyeing your hoodie again.

“HEY. SO YOU NEVER ACTUALLY TOLD ME.”

Told you what?

“DON’T BE OBTUSE, I GET ENOUGH OF THAT FROM ALL OF THE OTHER BULGELICKERS THAT HAVE TRAMPLED THEIR WAY INTO MY EXISTENCE. DID YOU KNOW SOMEONE NAMED ADALOV?”

Oh, yeah the hoodie. After remembering, you were not looking forward to this conversation. You look off and let him know, yeah, you did. You trying not to make a big deal of it has clearly had the opposite impact on him.

“YOU TELEPORTED YOUR HORNLESS ASS INTO MY HIVE. IS THIS WHAT YOU’RE GOING TO BE COY ABOUT? YOU DUMPED ME ON AN ALIEN PLANET AND HAVE THE INEXPLICABLE HOBBY OF TRYING TO GET YOUR FROND STUMPS IN EVERYONE’S PERSONAL LIFE AND I ACTUALLY WANT TO KNOW ABOUT YOU AND FIGURE OUT HOW YOU OF ALL PEOPLE MANAGED TO GET A HIGHBLOOD MOIRAIL AND-”

Matesprit. He pauses and actually looks taken aback. It is odd to see him momentarily speechless.

“WHAT?” Well that didn’t last.

He was my matesprit.

“AGAIN, WHAT? SO YOU HAVE BEEN HERE BEFORE AND ARE WEARING A SIGN THAT HASN’T BEEN USED IN FUCK KNOWS HOW LONG? BEING MUTATED CULLBAIT NOT KILLED BY DRONES AND YOU EXPECT ME TO BELIEVE YOU FILLED A QUAD?”

Quads.

This information seems to break him. You see a familiar crease being to form between his brows. You then pause, trying not to get offended.

Wait, hold on, he has totally accepted you being able to travel time and space, but you filling a quad is too much?

“YOU ARE STILL PUSHING IT WITH TIME. BUT EXCUSE ME IF THROUGH THE PANBOGGLING TALES OF YOUR FUCKING ESCAPADES THROUGH SPACE THAT THEY DON’T EXACTLY FUCKING TRACK ON BEING CONDUSIVE TO FILLING YOUR QUADRANTS.”

Fair. You sigh and tell him the story before he can take a breath because as much as you care about him, this boy has one setting and it is very loud.

You tell him about taking a walk, getting abducted. Saying you were a robot and then revealing you were not in fact a robot. You hesitate during the underground river part as you walk the line between Mallek’s privacy and sating Karkat’s curiosity. You smile recounting getting pushed in the river, saved, and how he called you cute and started blushing and trying to backpeddle. How the two of you hung out later and how he made an account just to talk to you. Karkat seems to soften by a modicum at this.

You laughed at how he showed up to tattoo a stranger just because you asked. You wistfully go through the memories that led to an eventual confession and how beforehand how your moirail Polypa was coaching you and Galekh provided you with literature on quadrants. A true bro move, especially since you don’t know how a conversation on them would have gone. You guessed it was since you helped him with his pitch quad and the tattoo. Maybe he felt like there was already something going on when we were both at his hive in matching hoodies, oh yeah he was the guy who got tattooed. His kismesis was your law partner. Karkat’s brow twitched, incredulous. Yeah you don’t know how Gorgor managed that either. Maybe having an alien alive and working for him on Alternia added to his court cred. You also think that that wasn’t the only part Karkat took issue with, but by some miracle, he lets you keep talking.

You kept expecting him to cut you off but he seemed somewhat enraptured by the tales of your romantic antics, despite his efforts to seem more interested in the you part, you were getting a feeling he was more interested in alien dynamics. You knew he was interested in romcoms so maybe this was just some new material for him, especially since quads were a new thing for you and maybe he has strong thoughts regarding the differences in alien ro-

Oh.

Oh you see why now.

Karkat seemed to pick up on the shift in your storytelling going from your personal life to human romantic customs.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT LOOK FOR?”

What look? There are no looks occurring.

“TRY THAT SHIT ON A MORON WHO JUST HATCHED. THEY MIGHT JUST BE MORE INCLINED TO GLEEFULLY SHOVEL THAT EXCUSE DOWN THEIR CHUTES.” He crossed his arms and squints at you. You knew how sharp his claws were from experience, not that you thought he was going to hurt you. There was just something very endearing about him trying to intimidate you while not subtly trying to glean more information about humans without seeming interested in humans. Or a human. Yeah, this is totally about Dave. You just have to find a way to gracefully skedaddle around that little detail.

I just had a bit of learning curve when dating an alien. So it is totally cool if you don’t know much about human stuff. I know quads can b-

“AND WHY DO YOU THINK I WOULD WANT TO KNOW THAT?” He says this clearly knowing what he thinks you think. You think it would be better if he didn’t think you thinked that, considering how the tips of his ears are turning red. You think.

You have romcom stuff everywhere and seem to really like them? Learning about human stuff might make it easier for you watch human romcoms and see how good or bad they are based on social norms. Kinda like romantic xenoanthropology.

Fucking nailed it. He huffs and rolls his eyes. Or at least enough that your answer plus the sheer amount of not fucking wanting to talk about that got you onto romcoms in general. He seemed to echo Polypa’s taste and you smiled at how animated he was becoming. A few of what you watched were now classics. Others that you didn’t like are prime pitch fodder. It had gotten late (early?) and that led you back to your hive. Just sitting alone and thinking. God you hate self-reflection.

You think of your time with Aradia. How she said you were a little broken. How she said you wouldn’t remember not being able to get to your friends again and being held by whatever the fuck that was. But you did remember, as much as you wish you didn’t. Guess you were more broken than she thought. It would be easier to just think you couldn’t get back because you didn’t try hard enough. But you did, you really did, and no matter what you do you just can’t. You are a shitty meta traveler and an even shittier friend. You thought about trying again but you get the feeling that you can’t access something that longer exists. You’d probably just get stuck in some corner of the universe and be alone all over again until you suffocate.

Can you even really die or be killed in anyway that matters anymore? At least in a way that doesn’t bring up the dull pang of a “bad end” followed by getting slammed dunked back in the past, before your fuck up, by an alarmingly cheerful time goddess?

Yeah, you didn’t think so. That would just add to the conga line of your dead selves letting you know how much of a dumbass you are.

But those people, those times. They don’t exist anymore. You keep thinking back to the way things were and who they were and how you can’t travel to those points anymore. All you have is the relative now and the people who exist now. Mostly.

You finish your terrible, bitter coffee, the cup no longer keeping your hands warm. You deserve this. In some shitty cosmic way, maybe you deserve this for not being better as a friend or partner. You can’t go back to the way things were to only to the people of now. And who even know who or what that even is.

Wait.

Maybe you couldn’t go back to the people they used to be because those were no longer who they were now. That thought sends a pang of hurt through you, imagining what little hope they had crushed. God dammit. But you have to try. Otherwise it is just you babysitting some 13 year olds who are trying to discover themselves and work through their issues with some interdimensional asshole looking over their shoulders. That asshole hopefully just being you.

You put your mug down and stand, closing your eyes, you try to repeat what you did with Aradia again, the memory of them doesn’t work. You know that. But with your new friends, it hasn’t completely been the memory? Maybe more accurate to say it’s them, some part memory sure, but more the idea of the present them, what they look like, who they are. You open your eyes and glance down at the sign on your hood. A sign you have mindlessly traced so many times. A sign that when you forgot it, gave you a dull sense of grief, now that you do remember though, it has sharpened and you are reminded of it whenever you are alone for too long or even slow down. Like the rest of you from other timelines will catch up to you in the current one and you get to experience your failures all over again.

You hold yourself tightly to ground yourself. Self-flagellation won’t get you anywhere, you’ve tried, you know this. So again, you close your eyes. You focus on your hood, the sign on it, the person it belonged to. The Mallek he was when he gave it to you vs. the Mallek he knew he didn’t want to be. The one he would have to be to survive. Your throat tightened at the thought of not being able to find him because he couldn’t do it and what if they got him an-

You slap yourself to stop catastrophizing.

Focus!

Adult trolls get bigger and their horns and claws grow with them. Their skin hardens and darkens as it does. You can’t tell if them molting was a joke someone told you or if they were serious so you don’t think about that part. Their blood color shows more through their eyes as they age. They wear black with their sign incorporated on it when they get spaced. You think back to the cerulean pirate you saw with Konyyl. Something like that. Okay you were getting somewhere. You could tell by how afraid you were to get there. You begin to get a headache, like your mind is a rubber band that you are trying to stretch to fit around something it shouldn’t.

Mallek said he would be a soldier or a spy and would be stuck ordering around lowbloods. No longer able to use his hacker skills how he wanted to. You imagine him, larger, older, more tired. Probably has more piercings and tattoos. You smile a little, despite yourself and the tension you feel continuing to build. He would likely play along, do what he had to do to do what he wanted to do. But at that point what would that even be? You imagine he would never truly stop messing with the system or hacking. His natural curiosity wouldn’t let him so he would be trying… something quietly on the side. He was sympathetic but you didn’t know how deep he would or if he would go down the rebel route, maybe just try to deal with his own corner of the universe.

Going along with what is expected seems to be the easiest way to keep under the radar. He has always been partial to not getting culled. Even when it was just the two of you, you knew it was a conscious effort to let his guard down around you, often requiring a change of scenery with you jokingly asking about if you would be needing goggles. Jokes often broke the tension of being afraid to be known with him.  

Despite his projected cool, you knew he was an anxious person and preferred to be alone. You could see that being warped to fit the expectations of being a cerulean. You remember from  conversations you had early in the morning, with ordeals approaching, you had some rare moments of verbalized vulnerability, of him exasperatedly going over what ceruleans are supposed to be with the unspoken and mutual understanding of what he was actually like. The coolness that he projected could morph into coldness, him wrapping it around himself tighter than any armor the empire would give him. Put some distance between himself and his team. You couldn’t see him being casually cruel, but definitely keeping people away through attitude and fear of his caste. The band tightens. So does your throat.

He hates having people over him and likely would at that start. Probably would be trying to do well so that he could use his performance and caste to be given his own ship and team so he could get some breathing room away from his superiors. Just be another team that does their job without question or issue in order to keep the space around himself. You realize that at some point during this, you started hyperventilating. You consider doing the breathing exercises Konyyl taught you, but at this point, you were tired of trying to be okay about it. You wanted to let it out in some way or another. You wanted to feel.

You thought of you, your disappearance. How that would have impacted him probably trying to find you, keeping himself up more than usual, blaming himself and then being taken off world. The not knowing would upset him the most you think. Would he even want to see you? What if he mattered to you way more than you mattered to him and you just showing up makes things worse? Another pang of guilt hits you for making things harder for another person again and you taste metal. You grit your teeth and refocus. The whole picture might never actually be known to you, but this is likely as close as it gets. You see this in your minds’ eye, the assumed idea of a person who may or may not exist, based off of who they used to be. Was this accurate, would this even do anything? Your hands clench around the hem of your hood and you drop to your knees and your leggings scrape the wood on the floor of your hive, eyes still screwed shut with tears pricking at the corners, breathing quick and heavy, jaw locked.

You try again.

The bands snaps.

And your head hits a cold, metal floor.

[twilightprince101]

The Friendsim protag is being controlled

The following contains my findings from all of the Friendsims up to volume 15, along with my theory to how exactly this will end and how it will play into the Hiveswap narrative. This is gonna be pretty long but i think I cracked the code so bear with me.

All of the friendsims that have been released so far I have enjoyed (the characters in every single one though is, debatable). I liked the bits of story that these one hour long things give, while preserving enough lore for the next act of Hiveswap. 

However there were countless times throughout these volumes that I noticed something weird. More than often, volumes would reference both good and bad ends from a specific route. Take for example our very first buddy: Diemen. In his route, the good end had you finding the meat locker and sharing the tender moment. The bad end, on the other hand, had Diemen literally die due to the MC’s iron ass. But a key thing in this mad end is that before he dies, he gives the MC his t-shirt as a sort of sling for his broken arm.

Fast forward to Amisia’s route one volume later. She offers to heal your broken arm when you get back to her hive with the power of technology, which is all well and good! But there is something that is hard to process: the sling is mentioned.

I was a little worried when this popped up, mainly since it implied that Deimen died. But since this was canon I accepted it. Bu then, fast forward even more to Mallek’s route and suddenly, there Diemen is. Living, breathing and working for the hacker punk.

There were several more instances of this later on, such as a reference to getting drunk with Chixie while also hearing her rap and knowing the purpleblood in Polypa’s route despite joining her at anime club. At this point I assumed that there was some sort of way that there are elements of bad ends that can happen in the good ends. After all, the MC and other Troll Call characters don’t recognize the contradictions present or acknowledge them, so it shouldn’t be anything huge.

And then Boldir’s route happened, and everything changed.

The good end isn’t exactly too much to talk; you save Boldir from an assassin. But the bad end is the moment of interest; you fail to save Boldir from the poison and she slowly dies, but as she does she tells the MC some things-specifically that fate is less about one thing destined to happen but the things that lead to a certain thing, butterfly effect style. The MC, right then, is prompted to think about how things led to their moment, and something big happens.

He remembers people dying because of him-failed routes. But that shouldn’t be possible, since the people that died were Deimen, Tirona and (if we’re counting off screen deaths) Tyzias. They’re all still alive and well, we’ve seen proof of this! But upon realizing their mistake, their mind practically shuts down.

And then we see the ever famous ending line of “Again? Must I do everything myself?” I’m sure you’ve seen it so I won’t put up the picture (that and there’s a ten pic limit)

This volume is, by far, the most interesting route of all the ones released, purely from a mystery lore standpoint. The information that the MC is prompted to recall almost traumatizes them, as if it was forced into the back of their mind. But this is not limited to Boldir’s route; we have seen this before in Galekh’s route when he prompts the MC to remember their home planet and how they got there.

Both times the MC tries to recall information, it causes something in him to set off a panic alarm and make them shut down, like something is stopping them from recalling it. But back to Boldir’s ending.

After Boldir dies, the volumes onward change. You can see it right away in volume 14 in the opening dialogue before you choose which character to befriend. Apart from the entirety of the past volumes, the focus on friendship is absent. Whenever friendship is mentioned in the opening it’s highlighted in yellow, but its gone in volume 14. There’s an immediate difference there. 

Another important thing to note here is that in Karako (previously known as “WHOMST”), in one of his bad ends, literally dies. Straight up. This could be lumped in with other bad ends, but what’s significant about this is that the MC goes down kicking with him, getting brought into the Dark Carnival afterlife along with the young lad. It’s one of the very first times the MC, without being given any sort of prompt, tries to do good for their own sake. Along with proving that the dark carnival exists in the Hiveswap universe, this is a key factor in this theory. Keep this in mind.

Volume 15 is where results begin to clearly, visibly show. Not just to the player, but to the MC as well. The opening has the friendship word separated from the opening narration, while the MC says that they don’t have a purpose (aside from FRIENDSHIP). It’s treated as a sort of side topic, not exactly worth mentioning all too much.

In Wanshi’s route, while talking to Wanshi and getting himself prepared to talk to the child, he recalls previous children he has befriended. But then the MC begins, unprompted, to recall when Tirona and Karako died and tries to shake it out of their head.

Even later in Wanshi’s route, the MC fights and defeats a bloodthirsty cholerbear rampaging at a convention, protecting the young child from getting mauled. A part of me feels like this will most likely be referenced, because this is important. This ending, along with Karako’s, is one of the few instances where the MC is confirmed dead. There was Chahut and Tagora’s bad ending, but those were vague and left the possibility open for the MC to escape. These though? The MC is dead, no doubt about it.

And then we get to Charun’s route, and the difference is jarring and right in your face from the start. The MC outright refuses to do anything related to finding new friends or hanging out with old ones. We’ve seen this before at the beginning of Boldir’s route, but that was more of a depression thing in general. This though is specifically a “FUCK FRIENDSHIP” message. And then the text slaps on screen, and by far the most important thing in the friendsims is shown.

The main character remembers and references Karako’s bad end, where they died. This should be outright impossible though, considering that they mentioned earlier that they befriended Karako and the fact that they are still alive! This point, right here, is where I realized:

The Friendsim protag is experiencing every single ending in every single route. Not only that, but they remember everything.

Upon realizing this, I tried to figure out why. I remember rumors going around that the MC could be connected to some sort of Time Aspect player, rewinding time to get the desired outcome and possibly even merging timelines (like we’ve seen in [S] COLLIDE with Dave and Terezi’s team attack). But I don’t think that’s the case. In fact, we already have a lead on who is doing this. We have since Act 1 of Hiveswap.

The puppet manipulator himself, Doc Scratch.

I know this sounds crazy, but for a moment, think about Doc Scratch’s character in the Homestuck story. He is a master manipulator, controlling both the Beta kids and SGRUB players into doing exactly what he wanted so he could ascend to becoming Lord English. He made Rose turn Grimdark, he tricked the Beta kids into creating the Green Sun, and had Sollux find and use the code for when the universe would end, summoning him into the multiverse. His entire character was manipulating others to set things into motion.

Now look back up at the Galekh picture, where the MC is prompted to recall what their home is like and how they got to Alternia. They don’t know why they did it. Sure it was referenced in Boldir’s route that they stole the spaceship and in Konyyl’s route it’s said that the MC wanted to escape Earth because it was a hellhole. But the inciting incident that led to stealing a god damned spaceship is never stated. It was almost as if they were blindly doing it for some reason.

Almost all of these friendsim volumes have that exact same unknown motivation in that friendship thing. I don’t know about you, but I think if I crash landed on an unknown planet with nothing but countless injuries, I don’t really think anyone’s first instinct would be to find a friend, no matter how lonely they were on Earth. It’s only after Boldir’s intervention that the MC begins to deviate from this motivation; trying to not get involved with Marsti, proving themself to themself in Karako’s route, stepping up to protect others without making a decision to do so in the first place and outright refusing to do the thing they wanted to do from the very start. It’s as if they only now came to their senses.

Did you notice how I called Boldir’s death an intervention? Did you notice that after Boldir’s death everything began to change? Did you notice that, despite literally dying, Boldir was almost content with doing so after giving her message to you despite how pointless it seemed? What Boldir said, about thinking about the past and how it led the MC to where they were then, that sparked everything. What Boldir did in the long run was intentional.

But this begs the question: how is Doc Scratch manipulating the MC? Throughout the first handful of volumes the MC doesn’t have a palmhusk after all, so there’s no way they have been contacted since landing. But I think there’s a more indirect answer: subliminal messaging. Through some unknown means, the MC is being sent messages on how to act and behave from the Doc. It sounds outlandish, but the proof has been right in front of us the whole time, every single time we boot up one of the Volumes.

White text.

What we saw after Boldir’s bad end was Doc Scratch’s message, complaining that he must do everything himself. The white text box that we see, is Doc Scratch’s subliminal messaging in the flesh, as he writes out your every move and translates those messages into thoughts. The entire 2nd person narration here was an illusion: it was actually first person. The end of Boldir’s route had the 2nd person structure break and for the first time, the narration is in first person perspective. Doc Scratch has revealed himself after being tricked by Boldir.

Another thing to note is that a lot of Friendsim takes place either before or during Act 1 of Hiveswap, (as confirmed by one of the devs). So when the text says “Must I do everything myself?”, this references what happens in Act 1, where Xefros receives the Scratchware protection program and traps the troll under rubble. The reason he does this is simple: with the help of Boldir, the MC is beginning to break free of Doc Scratch’s control.

So overall, here is what I’ve gathered and my theory about all of this:

Through some unknown method, Doc Scratch has been sending subliminal messages ever since they lived on Earth. He manipulated the MC to steal the spaceship and fly off into space, then causing the crash through some other means (such as manipulating one of the people building the spaceship to leave out certain parts to cause it to break down. I know this part is baseless but it’s the best I’ve got). Through these subliminal messages and other powers, the Doc has been manipulating the MC to do specific events and even crossover different timelines to lead to some sort of end goal that will show in Act 2 of Hiveswap. However since Boldir interfered and limited the manipulation, Doc Scratch had to resort to manipulating the main cast through the Scratchware program.

As for the Friendsim volumes, these most recent volumes are suggesting that something big is coming, and the events that happen in this story will directly cause what happens in Act 2. This not only would act as a sort of prologue to Act 2, but also give a reason to why Whatpumpkin is prioritizing finishing these before releasing any Hiveswap information. I’m not sure what might happen or what’s coming, but there is one thing we do know for sure about this whole situation.

He is already here.

[ellipticalcortex]

After playing through Hiveswap Act 2, and reading a bit about the controversies since I haven’t kept up with its production at all, I can see why people are upset with it, though as usual I feel some people are being a bit too harsh with it.

I’m gonna add a read-more just in case this ends up in any tags, don’t want a rambling post clogging up anything! This is mostly focused on my thoughts about Act 2, not so much about fan reactions as that first bit might imply.

The whole not crediting workers thing is terrible, I agree with that. Their excuse about not encouraging harassment sounds reasonable on paper, but the trade off of straight up not crediting people and the implication that they’re covering their own ass is just too much. I don’t know enough about the situation to form any real in-depth opinion about it, but man... I just hope WP gets their shit together soon if they haven’t by now.

However, I don’t think that WP’s messy internal affairs are enough to dismiss the game altogether like I’ve seen people doing. Personally, I had tons of fun with the game and thought its writing was fine, despite the game’s flaws, and from what I’ve seen here on Tumblr, from articles online, and from player reviews, the majority of people seem to feel the same, which is relieving.

The entire game was a blast to play! I actually got all the way to the end of the trial before deciding that I wanted a particular ending and went back to play the entirety of Act 1 just so I could import a completed save with the batteries, and I think it was worth it! I uninstalled Act 1 shortly after I played it 3 years ago, but it was nice to get a refresher. It let me appreciate Joey and Xefros in the parts I played and replayed during Act 2 a lot more. It also gave me the opportunity to go and inspect things from Xefros’s perspective, which I didn’t start doing until I was on the train during my first run.

I’m not going to lie, this game made me like Joey a little bit less and Xefros a bit more. This was by no fault of the game, just me getting to know the characters better and forming a more solid opinion. In Act 1, Joey felt very “little girl, big sister” to me which was adorable, but removed from her home and from Jude she lost that a bit. Her relationship with Xefros is really nice though! Seeing her urge him to make certain realizations about Dammek was sweet. I’m also wondering how long it’ll be until her comphet wears off and she realizes she can h*ld h*nds with other g*rls.

Xefros though... this game just solidified him even more as “son boy”. Usually I don’t feel this way about characters, but he really feels like a young teen to me! I guess it’s sort of the same feeling I get about my own little sister who is about his age. It helps that I enjoyed all the character animations a lot in this, and his trial sprite was especially nice, even if he didn’t show up during it all that much. Watching him try to process everything he’s seeing about his own culture and about how others deal with interpersonal relationships hurt a lot, too... and that bit near the very end was shocking, but sadly familiar. That was incredibly rough to watch.

Now, as for the game itself, it certainly did feel different from Act 1. From what I understand, a lot of content got cut out of it, like meeting Charun and Zebede. That is really disappointing, but I was fine with what we got. One thing I really don’t get is everyone complaining about the bee game. Just put your fingers on the corresponding keys! I guess it would be hard doing that whole thing with your mouse like it suggests, but I switched over after the tutorial and it immediately clicked, like, to the point that I want to play more rhythm games with that specific set up of vertical visuals and inputs. The music was really fun too. I didn’t even realize Xefros was beatboxing during it until my second time through, after I saw James Raoch comment about it! That was a really cute touch, the mental image of Xefros beatboxing while Joey does her weird little bee dance.

Before I get into the rest of the game, I guess I’ll address how the supporting cast is written in this. From what I understand, these are each of the Friendsim trolls’ original personalities, written before Friendsim ever came out. While looking through the tag on here, I saw people were super frustrated and even angry about this, expecting them to go back and rewrite these characters... after they even had to cut entire characters from the game... I don’t know, I can understand where these criticisms are coming from, but Hiveswap Friendsim is still there if you want to see their more developed counterparts. As the trolls exist in this game, they’re more so their bulletpoints of personality that you don’t even see that much of. Personally, I enjoy seeing the differences, and makes me appreciate Friendsim even more! There were a couple of spots where I /was/ disappointed with them though, specifically with Fozzer and Boldir... Boldir at least has the animation where she looks at the player and talks about the... universal re-convergence? Was that it? While Fozzer says and does nothing of import. I somehow expected them to be something more with what their roles were in Friendsim. The same can be said of Marvus, I suppose. But overall the characters remained largely the same, and you don’t speak to many of them for long anyhow.

The ticket machine area didn’t have much to it, especially in terms of interactions, which I would have hoped would be fleshed out a bit in lieu of narrative importance. Fozzer didn’t add much, you were seeing Folkyl again later anyways, and I have no idea what that other teal’s reason for being there was. The couple of tracks that loop in this area getting constantly cut off by an announcer was pretty funny though.

The loading platform was I think my favorite area in the game. I liked how the characters were presented, and how they interacted. “Gaegrl Elwurd” or whatever she said was incredibly funny, and now that I type it out I realize that the name she uses is probably supposed to be “L-Word” or lesbian. Feel silly for not realizing that earlier. Anyhoo I still despise Zebruh even if he’s incredibly funny, especially that walk cycle. I didn’t get the scene where Marvus blows a kiss at him though in either of my runs, which is sad. Is that another way to give him confidence besides the mic? I hope so. The bit with Chixie was nice too, as was Marvus’s introduction. I liked the tip-off where he said he knew Joey would be able to get onto the train. I think there’s a bit more left for me to do in that area, though I’ll leave it for when I inevitably have to replay Act 2 whenever Act 3 comes out so I can save some item or other.

The Burgundy/Bronze car had my favorite of the Ticket to Ride tracks, probably because it was the base for all the others, and its origin story is pretty funny. I really wish there had been more interactions with the trolls presented. Diemen was a joke character even in Friendsim, but I wish Joey hadn’t completely dismissed Vikare who had I think my favorite sprite/idle animation in the game. The convo with Skylla was nice though I fear for her lusus now, and Marsti was about what I expected. While I was going through the game I had a guide up mostly because of the trial and it was funny to see how the author referred to the characters. I couldn’t tell if they hadn’t read Homestuck before this or just skipped Friendsim, but how they referred to some of the characters was pretty funny, like calling Skylla a zookeeper, or thinking Marsti was a guy for some reason. I guess she was never referred to much in the third person, so that’s fair.

The Yellow/Olive car had my least favorite Ticket to Ride track, mostly because I’m not a big fan of chip tune and think the Olives should have been represented in the song as well. Folkyl and Kuprum were still super funny even if they didn’t have much to add past introducing the player to their blood color’s traditional role. Polypa and Boldir were neat, and I loved the scenes with Azdaja and Konyyl! The part where Xefros floors Azdaja after he hurt Joey was stunning, especially after seeing how powerful he really is through Friendsim. It wouldn’t surprise me if bugandies’ and bronzes’ powers were much stronger than they realize but triggered by emotion or something and that’s part of the reason they’re so downtrodden, to keep them depressed and placid, which would also tie into the supposed purpose of lime bloods.

I had a lot of fun in the Jade/Teal car, even if it /did/ drag on a bit too long like I’ve seen a lot of people say. Its rendition of Ticket to Ride rubbed me the wrong way, too, though mostly a certain part of it, and it might just be because I listened to it for so long. I liked how each of the characters were presented, as well as all of the drama. I saw some people criticizing this part as just being the Jades throwing venom at one another and... yeah? They are? I don’t see why that’s bad, it was to exemplify toxic interpersonal relationships and to show that even the trolls’ caregiver caste could still be terrible. Anyways, the first time I went around I didn’t have the battery nor the pogs which I traded for tickets earlier, but I only realized I needed them when I got to the recess. I’d been experiencing several bugs in this room specifically, including Xefros’s trial sprite disappearing, the screen becoming solid black after accusing someone, and basic dialogue bugging out. This was all very frustrating. Also, while I did end up having fun with the trial, it was a slog to figure out. I enjoy the Ace Attorney games, but what I like the least are the leaps in logic you have to make when figuring what to present and where. This trial took that aspect and made it five times worse. I did love having Tyzias by Joey’s side though, and the ending I got was super worth it. I’m still not sure who did it. I saw a video of Lanque chucking Joey off the train, so I guess it was him? Though I don’t know how or any of the specifics. I know you can implicate Lynera too as a scapegoat.

The Cobalt/Indigo car was pretty underwhelming. I’m sad I only remembered to click on Galehk’s footnotes after I’d done his task. That whole sequence was very funny through, and I’m curious to see the other ways you could’ve gotten through. All of the characters were pretty fun, and I loved seeing Elwurd again and having her save Joey from Ardata and all. Xefros and Joey’s conversation about the revolution afterwards was really nice too.

The clown car was, understandably, horrifying. I’m going to be hearing that stock honk for the rest of eternity. It was a very fun room, and its gimmick was super interesting. I loved the animations for the wheel! I also didn’t realize that the uh, clown religion involved the red and green snakes, though it makes sense that they do. I looked back at some backgrounds for Friendsim, and while Chahut’s clown church didn’t have the red and green, Marvus’s festival DID have red and green balloons, which was interesting. This entire sequence was incredibly tense, obviously trying to make you worry it would land on Burgandy. I’m also curious about some of the alternate stuff you could do during this, like that video with Tegiri being dramatic. Also, seeing Xefros kill Baizli was super upsetting, and I think another spot where having played Friendsim could make this game a little frustrating, since in Friendsim Barzum and Baizli are just lost, fun-loving clown twins that never directly kill MSPA reader. It was surprising to see Baizli come out and approach Joey alone. It was also terrible to see what Baizli dying did to Barzum. I wonder if that’s the last we’ll see of Marvus... I’ll be disappointed if it is. It feels like he should be more important.

Now, that last section I’ll admit was pretty bad. Literally the only action section in the game and you get so little direction and nothing interesting really happens. I did in fact use a guide for this because I simply did not care. It was a super anti climactic ending sequence.

And of course, there was the train blowing up and Joey and Xefros being impeded again. There was that droopy looking dragon thingy? That shot something suspiciously bright green at the train. It’s also curious how Chahut and Marvus seem mostly disinterested or at least unrattled by the explosion.

Well, that was... a review of the whole game! I loved it a lot, even if it wasn’t what it could have been. It had some bugs, which were annoying, and issues with content, a lot of which I’m willing to chalk up to the crew getting shuffled around and people leaving and the while switch over to Viz Media. Of course, there is once again the issue of people not getting credited. But, despite all of this, I think Act 2 was an enjoyable game, and I think there was love put into it, even if the people who put love into it were put in unfair and shitty situations because of WP. I’m hoping that things have straightened out with them after that fiasco and that Act 3 will turn out a bit better, and hopefully sooner than Act 2!