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diff --git a/chapter1.html b/chapter1.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a2bd2fe --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter1.html @@ -0,0 +1,191 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 1. Ghostflusters (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="intro.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter2.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2019-11-23">11/23/2019</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 1. Ghostflusters</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0033.gif"> + <p>The void resounds. Space seizes and warps as the bounds of relevance erode away to nothing but the wishful nostalgia of times passed. There is a hole in the middle of the universe, and it is hungry.</p> + <p>But the denizens of this particular iteration of Earth C don’t know it. All of this is just business as fucking usual for a planet plagued by war, continuous inclement ghost weather, and the general malaise of being absolutely severed from canon. They spend their days absorbed in the petty and pointless pursuits of “having jobs” and “raising families” and “falling in love”.</p> + <p>In the midst of this, a middle-aged man kneels in a garden. It isn’t his garden, and he already has a name, but we will begin our story with him regardless.</p> + <p>Plants, Jake has decided, are really the best sort of chums. They are quiet, friendly, and easy to please. All they need is a little water and fresh earth, and they are perfectly happy to lie there all day in the sun. And they don’t make increasingly inhumane arms deals and appear on talk shows expounding on the dangers of interspecies marriage. They have never, as far as Jake knows, fucked a clown.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0034.gif"> + <p>John has been an incredible pal, opening up his home to Jake and his son on such short notice, and even offering him a pair of pants, as well as a shirt that he has so far neglected to put on. John’s house doesn’t have air conditioning. It’s a charming little cottage, but it could sure as aces use some airing out. And dusting. And just general upkeep. The old place really has gone to seed since John’s been away. Jake shudders to think what sort of state his own mansion is in. Jane will probably have it demolished now, he imagines. It, like the rest of his assets, is in her name. She’d seen to that as soon as they were married.</p> + <p>Back at chez Crocker, there had been a legion of hired help to take care of the ins-and-outs of running a household. Jane’s far too busy to bother with such things, and Jake... well, he just never bothered. Why should he, when there were other people to take care of it for him? But the decades of easy living don’t change the fact that he spent the first 16 years of his life in the deep, lush bush of the south pacific jungle. There certainly had been no one to cook and clean and bring down the big game then! Besides his grandma, but she had him shooting as soon as he could hold a pistol.</p> + <p>No pistols are shot today, but Jake is determined to have the place in tip-top shape by the time John gets back from...wherever he is. He hasn’t seen much of Tavros today either, but that’s not unusual. He’s probably out with his kismesis, the one he thinks Jake doesn’t know about. He washes the floors and windows, cleans a toilet or three, and chases a family of squirrels out from the inside of the attic wall. They chitter angrily at him but he doesn’t back down.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0035.gif"> + <p>As the day wears on and the shadows grow longer, Jake washes the dirt out from under his fingernails, and his eyes fall on the bottle still sitting on the counter. John had opened it, but together they’d barely touched the stuff. Jake had promised him and Tavvy he’d dry up his act and all, but... well.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0036.gif"> + <p>One thing at a time.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0037.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0038.gif"> + <p>The jungle air is heavy, humid, and familiar. Twenty years on and the thick drag into his lungs settles on him in a blanket of nostalgia, reassuring in its discomfort. A pistol is strapped to his leg, and all around him the shadows move in slow, threatening sweeps. He is deeper in the jungle than he’d ever venture in his waking hours. There were places on his island that not even his Gran would tred, and she’d been the bravest person he’d ever known. + <p>Here there be monsters.</p> + <p>Jake doesn’t recognize anything. The jungle of his dreams is wild and unknown, and there are things moving in the dense undergrowth. He slaps at a mosquito on his neck. Sweat drips into his eyes. He drops a hand to his gun, the tension prickling hot and tight at the base of his neck.</p> + <p>A sudden wind thrashes the canopy. There are pine needles in his mouth. There aren’t any pine needles in the jungle.</p> + <p>The only warning Jake gets is a resonate growl that seems to come from every direction at once, before the monster is on him. A lithe creature of darkness and fury, with more legs than anything mammalian has a right to. He hits the ground hard enough to drive the breath out of him, but he doesn’t have time to catch it. He has to run. He knows, in the deep, prophetic way of dreams, that he is no match for this monster.</p> + <p>It is right behind him, its hot, damp breath wuffling at his hair. What does it feel like to be eaten? He’s about to find out.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0039.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0040.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0041.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Who…</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Dirk?????</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You’re welcome.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: But...youre dead!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Nah.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Yes you are i know that much. I saw your body! I carried your coffin chock full of all those stupid fucking swords!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Nope.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Dont nope me mister!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I know a dead dirk when i see one!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sure you do. But that wasn’t me. Are you really surprised to find out I got a couple of spares?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: So what youre saying is you arent my dirk.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...That is a whole ‘nother conversation that we really don’t have time for, pertaining to exactly who or what ‘your dirk’ actually constitutes.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Do you mean the Dirk from your timeline?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Then yes, that Dirk is dead.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: If you mean the Dirk that you fucked and then ghosted, no, I’m not your Dirk.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: If you mean the Dirk that you felt closest to, that you really knew--</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I thought you said we didnt have time for this conversation!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I just want to know how you can be here and also in the ground!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You let a guy spend a couple decades as a dominatrix’s trophy husband and he forgets all about his old friends.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Fuckin rough.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What about the good times, Jake? What about when I almost made you shit your pants in front of a blue girl?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ahhh! Brain ghost dirk!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In the ghosty flesh.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Crumbs bro where have you been?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I could have used someone on my side!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: You just disappeared one day without even the odd toodaloo to mark your passing!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That isn’t strictly true. I did disappear, but it was in a catastrophic blaze of hope-drenched pathos. I even threw out a couple one-liners.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But you wouldn’t remember that.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Because...it was a different dirk?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No, a different Jake.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Until recently there’s been a shortage of ambient narrative relevance for Dirks, since one particular motherfucker has been sucking it all up like a thirsty little twink at his first interspecies rave.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Twink?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Cripes this is confusing.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: It appears that no matter what timeline were inhabiting i can count on you to be absolutely impenetrable!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don’t worry about it right now, it’s not important. I’m here, and that’s what matters.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I suppose ill just have to trust you!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0042.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Good luck with that.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0043.gif"> + <p>Consciousness hits Jake like a bottle to the back of the head. In fact, the bottle is on the table, tipped over and sluggishly dripping from the mouth. The kitchen reeks of whisky and his head pounds. At least he’d been home alone, and nobody had seen him slip back into old habits.</p> + <p>Strange days, Jake thinks to himself. And strange dreams! That was a real humdinger of a nightmare. He hasn’t dreamed of Dirk in years. And it had felt so real, almost like he could have reached out and touched him--</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0044.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0045.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0046.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0047.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: What in the flibergating fuck!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That’s not a word.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Dirk!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ‘Sup.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Am I still dreaming? I have to tell you my dream hangovers are not usually nearly this bad!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I wasn’t going to say anything, but holy shit, dude. You’ve really let yourself go.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Not to say the sloppy drunk look isn’t working for me, because it absolutely is, but come on, man.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You passed out in a puddle of your own drool. And what the fuck is that on your face?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: My face? What do you mean on my face?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The moustache, Jake. Who’s idea was that.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Oh! You dont like it?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I didn’t say that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Point is, you are a fucking wreck, and no amount of well-maintained facial hair is going to be enough to hide that. Not from me.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Now see here buster you dont know the situation. You havent been here!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We’ve had this conversation before, dingus. I’m you. And I’m me. But I only exist because of your powers. The fact that I’m manifesting here, in the new universe, outside of a dream, is evidence in itself for just how absolutely boned you are.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What are you doing? There’s a war happening. All of your friends are out there fighting, and you’re just here, what...dusting?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Taking care of a house that nobody actually uses?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You’ve been a useless sack of shit for two decades. I’m here to kick your ass back into active duty.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You’ve spent years feeling sorry for yourself, totally convinced you made the wrong choices and that it’s all over. And it’s easier that way, isn’t it? If you’re a lost cause you don’t have to try to be better.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But you do want to be better. Remember all those dreams about adventure? Life? Love? Remember when Tavros was born and there were so many things in this world you wanted to show him.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Beautiful things, Jake.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But none of those are going to come from sitting around playing house-husband to your ecto-son.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Well what do you propose i do if youre so gosh-darned brainy!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Im a cracking good marksman and no slouch when it comes to fisticuffs but what good am i in a war??</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ive got some panache but i can hardly hold my own in the face of an army!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: And what side am i supposed to be fighting on? for jane or against her?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Against her. Obviously. What the fuck, dude.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: But you were the one who wanted her to run in the first place! You wrote her bloody speeches!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah, I did. And every single one of them kicked ass. I wanted Jane to be the democratically elected president. Not a cake-slinging Jeff Bezos with a great rack.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Jeff who?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don’t worry about it. The point is, you have a chance to make a difference. You’re in the perfect position to infiltrate her operation.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Like...a spy?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don’t try to tell me it doesn’t appeal to you. Sexy little suit. Slicked back hair. A bunch of weapons hidden in unlikely places. We’re both liking this idea more and more.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ahahaha well i do look fetching in a cummerbund.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Wait! No! You tricked me with thoughts of spies and hijinks and two bros against the world!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I left janey! Theres no going back now! She isnt exactly the sort to live and let live you know.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That’s horseshit and we both know it. Jane would take you back in a second. She loves you.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Psshaw. Not to be maudlin brain ghost dirk but jane hasnt cared about me in a very a long time if she ever did at all.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I thought you knew everything i do.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: There’s a part of you that still hopes. You can’t help it. You’ll never be able to help it. You’re going to hope for a brighter future until you’re in the ground.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Better you than me, honestly. Sounds exhausting.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You’re going to do this, and we both know it. So why are we even still arguing?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0048.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0049.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0050.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Boo hoo hoo! Oh, Jake! Something awful has happened!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: It--it has? You mean more awful than usual?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: The opposition has taken Tavros, Jake. They’ve finally shown their true colors. I knew it was only a matter of time before they attacked our family directly!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Oh hahaa. Well. The scamps!</p> + </div> + <p>It’s then that Jake realizes that Jane isn’t mad because she’d never realized he was gone. It makes sense. There’s been plenty of times when the two of them didn’t cross paths for days at a time. The perils of living in a mansion, he supposes. She seems to have forgotten that she’d been cross with him the last time they met, because now that Gamzee is gone, there’s no one left to talk to.</p> + <p>She recovers from her crying jag with grace, straightening up and wiping at her eyes. Miraculously, her mascara remains unstreaked. Even in moments of vulnerability she is bulletproof.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0051.gif"> + <p>Jake stands there and listens as she lays out her plans, plans of vengeance and violence, and he makes himself smile and he makes himself nod. Honestly, it’s not unlike any other night he’s spent with Janey lately, right down to the pit of misery gnawing somewhere below his belly button. All of it is made worse by the occasional wry glint in her eye, or moment of self-deprecation in the slant of her mouth. It reminds him of the Jane he used to know. Or the Jane he thought he used to know.</p> + <p>Then there’s the ghostly presence of his former beau and best bro. That’s different.</p> + <p>At first Dirk stands at Jake’s elbow, a one-ghost support staff, before he appears to lose interest in Jane’s rant and wanders off across the office, reading the spines of books and spending way too long staring at a startlingly phallic piece of installation art, the provenance of which Jake doesn’t know, but could hazard a guess it wore a codpiece. Then he settles on Jane’s desk, propping his ghost butt there and sort of just...well.</p> + <p>Here’s a picture of what he does.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0052.gif"> + <p>Okay. That’s a bit of an exaggeration. It’s more like...this.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0053.gif"> + <p>Whatever the case, it’s distracting. And by the time Jane loses steam and dismisses Jake from her presence, he’s thoroughly exhausted from attempting to pay attention to his supervillain wife while trying not to look at the crotch of a ghost man from his brain.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0054.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Dirk i dont think i can do this.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What do you mean? You just did it. You kicked ass back there.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I didnt do anything i just stood there and felt bad about myself!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: All according to keikaku. It worked. Congratulations.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Its only i promised i would never come back here.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Promised? Promised who?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Myself! I decided that enough was right and jolly well enough!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: You say you know your onions when it comes to me and my troubles but you just keep asking stupid questions!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: John and i had quite the gabfest the other night and i felt hopeful for the first time in years. Like i really could turn over a new leaf and it all felt like berries from here on out!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: i really didnt think id fall off the wagon so quickly. I dont think being here is good for my emotions to be honest.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah, probably not. But that’s okay. They don’t matter.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Oh.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I suppose youre right what with masculinity and all that.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: A true mans lip remains stiff even in the harshest of circumstances!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don’t know anything about stiff lips, dude. But that’s not what I mean. It’s not because you’re a man. You’re a god.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Oh right. That.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The world comes first, even at the expense of all your relationships and personal happiness. That’s what being a hero means.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I guess...i never really thought about it like that.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0055.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Think what you want about Jane, but at least she realizes that none of you can ever be normal, and she never bothered to try. Can it really be a god-complex if you’re actually a god?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: People like us don’t get happy endings.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Thats bleak dirk i dont think i could possibly believe that!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I know youre born from all the little bits and bobs inside my mind but whew boy i dont think ive ever thought something like that even on my darkest days.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah. That’s probably more a Dirk thought than a Jake one. I told you, it’s hard to tell sometimes.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Is...is that really how dirk felt the whole gosh darned time?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It doesn’t matter.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0056.gif"> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter2.html">CHAPTER 2. Clown Logistics</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter10.html b/chapter10.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..305d58e --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter10.html @@ -0,0 +1,244 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 10. 1 WOND3R WH4T TH3Y T4ST3 L1K3 (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter9.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter11.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-05-31">05/31/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 10. 1 WOND3R WH4T TH3Y T4ST3 L1K3</h1> + <div id="wakey-wakey"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0263.gif"> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0264.gif"> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0265.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat" id="well"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3LL</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0266.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4T W4S PR3TTY FUCK1NG STUP1D</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0267.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: F4LL1NG 4SL33P H3R3 1S JUST 4SK1NG FOR TROUBL3</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0268.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NODD1NG OFF L1K3 TH4T UND3RN34TH 4N 4RBOR34L 4MBUL4TOR</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WHO KNOWS WH4T COULD H4V3 H4PP3N3D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: Y34H 4LR1GHT, 4LR1GHT</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: G3T OFF MY C4S3 4BOUT 1T ALR34DY</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1TS NOT L1K3 1 D1D 1T ON PURPOS3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3R3 JUST LUCKY TH3R3 1SNT 4NY W1ND 4T TH3 MOM3NT</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1V3 3ST4BL1SH3D TH4T TH1S 1S WHY TH3Y MOV3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 4MBUL4TORS 4R3 PL4NTS IN THE STR1CT S3NS3, BUT EXH1B1T LOCOMOT1V3 B3H4V1OUR DU3 TO TH31R UN1QU3 CONSTRUCT1ON</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 M41N BODY OF THE PL4NT CONS1STS OF A N3TWORK OF HOLLOW, TUB3LIKE GROWTHS THROUGH WH1CH 41R M4Y TR4V3L</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3S3 N3TWORKS 4R3 SO SOPH1ST1C4T3D TH4T TH3 SH1FT1NG PR3SSUR3 1NS1D3 TH3 TRUNK 4ND BR4NCH3S C4N C4US3 TH3 3NT1R3 PL4NT TO UPROOT 1TS3LF 4ND B3G1N "W4LK1NG", PROV1D3D TH3 COND1T1ONS 4R3 R1GHT</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH1S PROC3SS, WH1L3 M4J3ST1C, C4N H4V3 DR4ST1C 3FF3CTS ON TH3 PL4NTS SURROUND1NGS</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0269.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 CONST4NT SH1FT1NG OF TH3 SO1L CR34T3S L4RG3 CR3V4SS3S 4ND R4V1N3S 4LMOST 1NST4NTLY, R3D1R3CT1NG W4T3RCOURS3S 4ND 4LT3R1NG TH3 L4NDSC4P3 OV3R 4ND OV3R W1TH 34CH STR1D3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HUP!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T H4V3 W3 H3R3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4 STR4NG3 CR34TUR3 S33MS TO H4V3 B3COM3 TR4PP3D 1N TH3 SH1FT1NG T3RR41N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HOW3V3R, 1T S33MS UND1STR3SS3D BY TH3 D4NG3ROUS S1TU4T1ON 1N WH1CH 1T F1NDS 1TS3LF</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: P3RH4PS 1T C4LLS TH1S PR3C4R1OUS PL4C3 1TS HOM3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HMMMMMM</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T S33MS MY 1NV3ST1G4T1ON OF TH1S B1Z4RR3 PL4N3T H4S ONLY JUST B3GUN</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 WOND3R WH4T TH3Y T4ST3 L1K3 >:O</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0270.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0271.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0272.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0273.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0274.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0275.gif"> + <p>What... a truly... magnificent beast.</p> + <p>A chill falls over Terezi, draping her in shadows. The monster rears its gelatinous bulk up over her and unleashes a noise from its cavernous mouth that can really only be described as a “squelch”. A squelch made from vocal cords.</p> + <p>Oh fuck.</p> + <p>Fun abandoned. Survival instincts fully engaged. Terezi runs.</p> + <p>She throws backward sniffs over her shoulder as she tears through the scrubby cling of the planet’s undergrowth, catching fractured impressions of exactly what has decided to chase her. A shuddering, 20 foot monstrosity that somehow seems to both scamper and glide, like a centipede, rustling like foliage as it moves, as if an entire goddamn forest is bearing down on her. Her heels sink into bubbling mud. The whole landscape is fighting her.</p> + <p>The creature is too strange for her to get a full picture of it like this. The problem with using smells to navigate the world is that the unfamiliar can be difficult to parse. Every whiff over her shoulder gives her another blurry glimpse of what this beast is. Rose shared her books with Terezi when she was on the ship, and her favorite by far was the compendium of the zoologically dubious. Everything contained inside was just so unbelievably unlikely. This creature appears to be a combination of all of them.</p> + <p>All of this sticking her nose backward is just asking for trouble, and with a particularly vicious twist, Terezi’s ankle turns and she goes down into the mud.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0276_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0276_2.gif"> + <p>The centipede-tree avatar of ultimate horror doesn’t waste any time hauling her up by the boot, the fetid stench of the alien mud making her vision go streaky and dark. Hot, reeking breath washes over her, but her entire body is coated ice that ripples and spikes across her ribs and on down into her gastric sack. It’s fear, pure and simple. Unsurprising, when being menaced by a monster, but it also doesn’t last for more than a second. A cold flame that instantly burns itself out, and all of a sudden she is just deeply, impossibly, indescribably tired. Down to her bones.</p> + <p>Honestly, she really has no right to feel this... this fatigue. This crushing embrace of endless struggle. Terezi Pyrope has not had an easy life by anyone’s standards, but so much of her thirteen or so sweeps has just been standing still. Waiting. Huddling blind and half dead in her recuperacoon, the sopor burning the hideous mess that the sun has left her eyes, alight with a hatred so layered and intense that she couldn’t make sense of it. It was horrifying--that pain or fury--but also, admittedly, very boring. Then there were the sweeps on the meteor, the endless, gelatinous stretches of time in the chaos of the outer ring, searching for... Vriska, ostensibly, but also maybe just for a chance to dry up. To disappear. Go extinct.</p> + <p>Terezi doesn’t know if it’s an attribute of her aspect, or the sheer psychic damage of spending so long in the company of two humans with god complexes. Maybe it’s just an inherited symptom of being conscious. But sometimes it feels like none of them are going to get out of this, alive or dead.</p> + <p>A truncated version of all of this races through Terezi’s head as the monster lifts her towards its gaping mouth, hot, hideous strands of drool hitting her face.</p> + <div class="command"> + <div>> STOP.</div> + </div> + <p>She doesn’t hear the words, exactly. She more gets the impression that they are being said, hanging in the air around her like sound effects in a comic book.</p> + <div class="command"> + <div>> STOP.</div> + </div> + <p>The monster freezes in place, and so does Terezi, although she can tell that the words aren’t for her. It’s still alive, she can feel it breathing, but it is absolutely unable to disobey The Word. With some undignified squirming, Terezi manages to get a hand in the pocket of her coat.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH1S SUCKS</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Don’t struggle, it will only make it more likely to attack.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HOW DO YOU KNOW TH4T?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4R3 YOU 1N SOM3 SORT OF H1D3OUS P4NM3LD PSYCH1C COMMUN1C4T1ON W1TH TH1S TOW3R1NG MONSTROS1TY</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1S TH1S 4N 3XT3NS1ON OF YOUR R4V4G3D PSYCH3, L4LOND3?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4M 1 1N F4CT CURR3NTLY B31NG H3LD 1N YOUR V3RY T3NT4CL3S >:000</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I am devastated to report that those are really more vines than tentacles, and even worse, they aren’t mine.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I am holding the creature with the terminal l we have at our disposal in the lab, but as I’m sure you can recall from your brief tenure as Dave’s patron, those commands can be overruled.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So I think it would be best to just behave the same way you would with any wild animal, and make as few moves as you can, as slowly as you can make them.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Your tentacle dreams will be forced to remain the stuff of fantasy, for now.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T DO YOU M34N 'P4TRON'?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The human you took it upon yourself to troll. The one of us you chose to enact your revenge on.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...1 N3V3R R34LLY THOUGHT OF 1T L1K3 TH4T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3 W3R3 4LL TROLL1NG YOU</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3LL, MOST OF US W3R3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SOLLUX D1D NOT G1V3 4 SH1T 4ND 4R4D14 W4S D34D MOST OF TH3 T1M3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: T4VROS 4ND 3QU1US TR13D, BUT TH3Y W3R3 PR3TTY HORR1BL3 4T 1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NOW TH4T 1 TH1NK 4BOUT 1T 1 GU3SS W3 D1D SORT OF PL4Y F4VOR1T3S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: D4V3 4ND 1 H4D 4 LOT 1N COMMON B4CK TH3N, OR 4T L34ST 1T F3LT L1K3 W3 D1D</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: As I have come to understand it, for a while at least, we were all being steered in the right direction by a debatably benevolent force.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: One imposed on us by the game itself, even if we had yet to enter it.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You don’t believe me.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, 1 DO</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T SOUNDS 1NCR3D1BLY DUMB AND UNL1K3LY BUT SO DO3S 3V3RYTH1NG 3LS3 TH4T H4PP3NS TO 4NY OF US</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SO YOU 4R3 DO1NG TH3 S4M3 TH1NGS TO TH3S3 CR34TUR3S TH4T SOM3 OTH3R CR34TUR3S D1D TO YOU 4ND YOUR FR13NDS</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I suppose that is a fair assessment. Although we were not our own creators. It was John who—</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I hate to break up the recap episode, but we need to deal with this situation before it gets out of hand.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Specifically, the giant hand that is currently wrapped around Terezi.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Is that a hand?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It doesn’t look like a hand. I thought it was vines.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND HOW 4R3 YOU H3R3 4NYW4Y?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I have administrative privileges.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU H4V3 4DM1N1STR4T1V3 PR1V1L3G3S TO MY P4LMHUSK</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yes.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Don’t let it get to you. My father has a habit of appearing in places he’s not wanted.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But you were saying?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I was saying that we should get Terezi down from there before continuing our mining of the core themes in our personal narratives.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Of course. I’ll take care of it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Appreciate it.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 W1SH YOU WOULDN’T DO TH4T WH3R3 1 C4N S33 1T</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Do what?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4T TH1NG WH3R3 YOU G3T P3OPL3 WHO 4R3 NOT M3 TO DO WH4T3V3R 1T 1S YOU W4NT TH3M TO</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: M1ND CONTROL</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I have never engaged in mind control. I don’t think any human is capable of it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What I do is completely different.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK4Y</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT DO3S TH4T 4CTU4LLY M4TT3R 1F 1T JUST H4S TH3 S4M3 R3SULTS TH4T M1ND CONTROL WOULD H4V3?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H4V3 YOU CONS1D3R3D TH4T, MR. THOUGHT 3XP3R1M3NT?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I have, actually. And if you want to talk about it, we absolutely can. And not just that. Whatever you want. I’ve got nothing but time.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK4Y L3TS T4LK TH3N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: L3TS ST4RT W1TH—</p> + </div> + <p>The ambient STOP that has been hanging in the air releases. Terezi lets out a shuddering breath. She doesn’t THINK she’d been holding it the whole time, but then again, she hadn’t really been paying attention. Her feet touch the muddy ground, squelching between her left toes. She’d lost both boot and sock on her mad scamper.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T TH3 FUCK 1S GO1NG ON</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You can make more boots.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M NOT T4LK1NG 4BOUT TH3 BOOTS, NOOKBR34TH</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 MEAN TH3 M3N4G3R13 FROM H3LL</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, we’ve encountered a couple bumps along the road.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU DONT S4Y</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T3V3R G4V3 YOU TH4T 1MPR3SS1ON STR1D3R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 F4CT TH4T 1 W3S ON3 SOL1T4RY GL4NC3 NUGG3T 4W4Y FROM H4V1NG MY H34D NOMM3D OFF?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don’t worry, it won’t try that again.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It may be a catastrophic and absolutely hideous failure, but it will do what it is fucking told.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1S TH4T 4NY W4Y TO T4LK 4BOUT YOUR SL1ME WR1GGL3R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DONT YOU LOV3 4LL OF YOUR 3XP3R1M3NTS 3QU4LLY</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SO S4D >:/</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU GUYS R34LLY SUCK 4T TH1S</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah, agreed.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WOW, TH4T W4S MUCH L3SS P41NFUL 4ND LONG-W1ND3D TH4N 1 W4S 3XP3CT1NG 1T TO B3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What was?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: CONV1NC1NG YOU TH4T 4LL OF TH3S3 "D3S1GNS" TH4T YOU H4V3 COM3 UP W1TH SUCK SH1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 THOUGHT YOU WOULD T3LL M3 TH4T 4LL OF 1T 1S P4RT OF SOM3 "GR4ND PL4N"</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4T TH3Y SUCK ON PURPOS3 OR SOM3TH1NG L1K3 TH4T</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, it is a part of the grand plan. And they do suck on purpose.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But not on my purpose.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It’s Rose. She is remarkably bad at this. Voluntarily.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DO YOU M34N TH4T SH3 1S TRY1NG TO S4BOT4G3 4LL OF YOUR GR4ND CR34T1ONS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH POW3RFUL GOD PR1NC3?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No, she’s playing the game. That part hasn’t been a problem.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I mean she is just making incredibly nonsensical decisions and refusing to back down, even when I up the ante to preposterous levels.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You should see some of the shit she’s come up with. I’m pretty sure I watched a vagina on legs walk by this morning.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 DONT TH1NK 1 S4W TH4T ON3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Despite her initial resistance, Rose has gone completely feral.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU M34N TH4T SH3 1S H4V1NG FUN</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yes.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND WH4T 1S WRONG W1TH 4 L1TTL3 B1T OF FUN YOUR H1GHN3SS?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Nothing. I got absolutely no problem with having a good time while we see to the boring and altogether completely frivolous task of seeding the future of this planet.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But she really</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU 3XP3CT3D H3R TO B3 TH3 ON3 TO HOLD YOU B4CK, 1NST34D OF TH3 OTH3R W4Y 4ROUND</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No, that's not it.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YES, 1 TH1NK 1T 1S 1T</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 TH1NK YOU 4R3 JUST D1S4GR331NG W1TH M3 OUT OF SP1T3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That’s not true.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: >:]</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 TH1NK TH4T YOU PROJ3CT TOO MUCH ON TO ROS3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Okay, diving right in. Picture me rolling up my sleeves.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 H4V3 N3V3R S33N YOU W3AR SL33VES</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And you never will.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: By project, do you mean that I expect Rose to be too much like myself?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, 1 M34N TH3 OPPOS1T3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU 3XP3CT H3R TO B3 B3TT3R TH4N YOU</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU W4NT H3R TO PR3V3NT 4LL OF YOUR WORST T3ND3NC13S. TH3 W4Y 1 US3D TO W1TH VR1SK4 WH3N W3 W3R3 MO1R41LS</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Rose and I aren’t moirails. I know it might look similar from your perspective, but human familial bonds—</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BL4H BL4H BL4H Y34H 1 KNOW 4LL 4BOUT YOUR HUM4N F4M1LY BULLSH1T!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T SUCKS!!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 DONT UND3RST4ND WHY 4NYBODY DO3S 1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WHY WOULD YOU W4NT TO B3 STUCK W1TH SOM3ON3 JUST B3C4US3 TH3Y COM3 FROM TH3 S4M3 SLURRY TH4T YOU DO</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I don’t know.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOUR3 3XP3CT1NG ROS3 TO C4TCH YOU WH3N YOU GO TOO F4R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SH3 1SNT GO1NG TO DO TH4T, 1 DONT TH1NK</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1N F4CT, 1 TH1NK SH3 1S MOR3 L1K3LY TO GO TOO F4R TH4N YOU 4R3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What makes you say that?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 DONT KNOW</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: JUST 4 F33L1NG, 1 GU3SS. 1 M1GHT NOT B3 4 GOD-MODD3D DORK 1N COSPL4Y, BUT 1M ST1LL A S33R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND 1 H4VE SP3NT W4Y MOR3 T1M3 W1TH TH3 TWO OF YOU TH4N 4LMOST 4NYON3 ELSE, WH1CH 1S 1NCR3D1BLY D3PR3SS1NG TO TH1NK 4BOUT</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4NYW4Y, 1F YOU DONT L1K3 TH3 W4Y ROS3 1S DO1NG TH1NGS WHY DONT YOU JUST NOT-M1ND CONTROL H3R 1NTO DO1NG 1T TH3 R1GHT W4Y</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: PROBL3M SOLV3D</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I’ve made the decision to freehand this one. I’m not planning to influence Rose’s decision in any part of the contest. Otherwise it’s too easy, and barely worth doing at all.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: UGH NO M4TT3R WH4T, YOU 4LW4YS CHOOS3 TH3 MOST BOR1NG OPT1ON, D1RK STR1D3R</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: So you’re saying you want me to mind-control Rose.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, 1M S4Y1NG TH4T 1 TH1NK YOU 4R3 4 COW4RD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: P3RH4PS 1 W1LL T3LL H3R TH4T YOU H4V3 B33N WH1SP3R1NG YOUR STR4NG3 L1TTL3 1NC4NT4T1ONS 1N H3R 34R OV3R TH3 L4ST F3W SW33PS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: L1K3 4 CR33PY W31RDO</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No, you won’t. If you were going to, you would have already.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The two of you have sure been spending enough time with each other.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H3H3H3H3H</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Now who’s being creepy.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SO WH4T 4R3 YOU GO1NG TO DO?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ST4RT OV3R?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We’re gonna have to, I’m thinkin’. I’m not sure how Rose is going to react to scrapping all of her precious little boys and girls, though.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Unless you think I’m still projecting my "image" of what I think Rose "should" do, and she actually won’t give a shit.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, 1 TH1NK SH3 W1LL B3 CONFL1CT3D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: UNL3SS YOU M1ND-CONTROL H3R NOT TO B3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Not mind control.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T3VER!</p> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter11.html">CHAPTER 11. History's Most Notorious Haters</a></p> + </article> + <script src="color-conversion-algorithms.js"></script> + <script src="interpolate.js"></script> + <script src="chapter10.js"></script> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter10.js b/chapter10.js new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a277f90 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter10.js @@ -0,0 +1,45 @@ +const el = document.getElementById('wakey-wakey'); +const well = document.getElementById('well'); +const body = document.body; +const doc = document.querySelectorAll('article, nav'); + +let tick = false; +function wakeyWakey() { + const rect = el.getBoundingClientRect(); + const start = window.scrollY + rect.y; + const stop = start + rect.height; + const y = window.scrollY; + let prog; + if (y < start) { + prog = 1; + } else if (y > stop) { + prog = 0; + } else { + prog = 1 - (y - start) / rect.height; + } + interpolateStyle(body, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(0, 0, 0)')); + for (const el of doc) { + interpolateStyle(el, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(30, 30, 30)')); + interpolateStyle(el, 'color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(255, 255, 255)')); + } + for (const chat of body.querySelectorAll('.chat')) { + if (chat === well) { + continue; + } + interpolateStyle(chat, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(200, 200, 200)')); + interpolateStyle(chat, 'border-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(255, 255, 255)')); + } + interpolateStyle(well, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(160, 160, 160)')); +} + +window.addEventListener('scroll', event => { + if (!tick) { + requestAnimationFrame(() => { + wakeyWakey(); + tick = false; + }); + tick = true; + } +}); + +wakeyWakey(); diff --git a/chapter11.html b/chapter11.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..854fe73 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter11.html @@ -0,0 +1,290 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 11. History's Most Notorious Haters (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter10.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter12.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-08-06">08/06/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 11. History's Most Notorious Haters</h1> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0277.gif"> + </div> + <div class="command dave"> + <span>Knight:</span> + <div>> Knight: Keep it real.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0278.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: and thats reason four hundred nineteen why despite my mans many accomplishments i will never acknowledge big skateboardings contrived message that tony hawk is the quintessential skater of our generation</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: o_o</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: not in these trying times</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: beep boop</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: i have told you several times that i was a robot before and i know for a fact you dont have to say beep boop</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: hm that sounds fake does not compute</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: david</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: mom</p> + </div> + <p>The Knight and the Maid stare at each other briefly, having exchanged enough meaningful glances over their time together to know when to drop it.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: i think we have exchanged enough meaningful glances over our time together to know when to drop this</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: what i enjoy about our conversations is that you just say things like that</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: oh is that what you enjoy</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: well we are both an infinite number of years old living countless lifetimes at once but thats no reason to waste any of our...</p> + </div> + <p>She knows how this will play out, having undoubtedly tried this joke on her friend in some timeline or another. Their rapport reflects a unique combination of their matching aspects but greatly differing classes. One a passive but powerful servant to time, the other wielding the aspect like a honed blade.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: time</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: say time</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ...</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: time then make a weird face</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ........</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: waste time</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: time</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: .............</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: i experience all points of time simultaneously please just say time and make a weird face</p> + </div> + <p>This is true.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ..................</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: cmon megido youre killing me clocks ticking</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ...</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: time o_o</p> + </div> + <p>The Maid casts a furtive glance around the empty crew quarters, as though to search for someone more sympathetic to her bit.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: tough crowd</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0279.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: ok heres one</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: how old do you think you are</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: emotionally?</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: that is a pretty heavy topic</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: you know damn well thats not what i meant</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: you know I have been through a lot dave</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: ok</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: its just so kind of someone</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: ok i get it</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: to finally ask how i feel</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: i am beside myself with emotions</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: i want to open up</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: jesus christ</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: shall i open up about my past traumas to you</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: would you enjoy that</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: to think even a frog like me can work through their pain with a dear friend</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: you have truly blessed me on this day dave strider</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: i know you arent a frog anymore which is fucking tragic</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: can you imagine</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: the absolutely insane tomfoolery we could get into</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: just getting into some real frog based scenarios</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: times fun when youre having flies</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: yes that is how the saying goes</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: sorry to disappoint :o</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: im glad you finally said something</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: was thinking that apology might never come</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: practically giving me a complex how before now you never apologized to me that you arent a frog anymore</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: but apology accepted got the ribbits on lock</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: chronology respected got the tick got the tock</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: the clocks cuckoo im cocoa puffs the stuffs no mystery</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: serial scions of time psionic robot calibrate history</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: hoes mad hoes sad hoes a concept not a fact</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: lacking tact i stay stacked while i breach contract</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: sacred vows disavowed got divorce fever</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: i leave her</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: dont look back dont perceive her</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: do you want to talk about it :(</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: about what</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: would you say you are hung up on leaving your wife and friends behind</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: are you</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: am i hung up about leaving your wife and friends behind</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: i do not think that i am no</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: arent you even a little guilty about ditching your boyfriend</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: what</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: oh fuck</p> + </div> + <div class="command"> + <span>(==>)</span> + <div>> (Months in the past, but not many...)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0280.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0281.gif"> + <a class="flash" href="https://www.homestuck2.com/story/282"> + [S] (Gaze.)<br> + (View on homestuck2.com) + </a> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0283.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="sollux">SOLLUX: h0w the fuck am i g0ing t0 get d0wn fr0m here.</p> + </div> + <div class="command"> + <span>==></span> + <div>> Back to reality.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0284.gif"> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: he is probably ok</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: so youre telling me you dont even feel a little bad that you ditched him to be a weird death acolyte</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: no i think he found my wiles both charming and irresistible</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: not even an ounce of guilt or self doubt huh</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: just like that</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: no conversations about the greater good</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: no revelations about your feelings</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: no dead presidents spouting wisdom about your brotherdad and bequeathing unto you an ancient soulbot</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: whats a president</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: see that doesnt work because i know you know what a president is</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: shit</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: do you often find your faith in yourself shaken like this or is it a new experience now that your mortal coil has been left behind</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: what</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: do you think now that all that is left of you is a literal ghost inside of a machine you are more or less likely to embrace finality</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: oh dope more cult of one shit</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: immortality changed you</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: could it be that you are projecting your feelings onto my situation</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: does not compute rose jr</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ...</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: we dont have to talk about it</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: thanks</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: <span class="prose">They sit in each other's presence, the silence between them as meaningful as any words they could exchange.</span></p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: its always really cool to hear how meaningful my silences are</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: especially while</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: CALCULATING</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: CALCULATING</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: especially while i am attempting to experience them</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i do not need your approval. the story will continue how it must.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: beep boop hater detected</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: wow is that true</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i am not a hater.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: classic hater line</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: i know this because i am pouring through genuine actual quadrabytes of information on historys most notorious haters</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: no, you aren’t.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: huge if true</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: dave do you think i am a hater</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: you are the exact opposite of a hater</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: a liker</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: ok</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: perfect example your tolerance for whatever is going on with</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: all this</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: i think she looks quite lovely covered in the viscera of the all-powerful enemy she consumed</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: floating lifelessly in our periphery</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: observing our every action and noting its relevance :)</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: uh huh thats what i mean</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: can we scrounge up a change of clothes or something</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: maybe some sort of outfit montage</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: she comes out of the changing room in some sort of bozo outfit for clowns</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: we shake our heads disapprovingly</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: no no not this one</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: she goes back into the changing room we give each other one of those meaningful glances</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: what would she do without us</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: she emerges again this time looking fresh as hell</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: our judgemental ways have done it again</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: socially shamed into looking completely fucking dope</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: o_o</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: even though i understand that it must happen, i am growing frustrated with the direction of this conversation.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: do you want to talk about something else stinky</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: what would you suggest?</p> + </div> + <p>The Knight takes pause, carefully considering the options. They have a long journey ahead together and an establishing an antagonistic relationship would prove-</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: ok hear me out</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: kanaya</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: but like</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: wearing huge jorts</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <div class="command"> + <span>==></span> + <div>> Weeks in the future, relative to the original point of interest...</div> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0285.gif"> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0286.gif"> + <p>Moments like these are not rare, and serve a valuable function to the story. They are able to show a passage of time with the bulk of the emotional labor of a lengthy bonding process happening off screen. How did we get here? What have they been through? These questions are often better left open to individual interpretation and can give the one interpreting a sense of ownership of the story.</p> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="jade">JADE: As a point of curiosity-</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: oh shit!!!!</p> + </div> + <p>The dead Cherub possessing the body of an equally deceased Goddess of Space pauses at the interruption. Were she to voice her opinion, it would be that --actually-- it is not unusual for those whose primary concern is The Grander Scheme to have a passing curiosity about the insignificant. So when one really thinks about it, any annoyance with the attendant’s small mindedness is both understandable and warranted.</p> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: :(</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: as a point of order, you never answered dave’s question.</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: which one he is very chatty</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: you experience time in a way that is woefully unfamiliar to me and it has... piqued my curiosity enough to learn more.</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ?_?</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: shes asking how old you are</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: in this form our bodies stop aging once we reach maturity i think</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: the god tier keeps our physical form locked in a state of undying</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: even in death the bodies do not decay</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: only lay dormant</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: no thats boring</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: like how long have you been alive</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: yes, that one.</p> + </div> + <p>The Knight, though at times purposefully obtuse, is sharp and observant. This can sometimes offer a refreshing balance to the usual layers of pretense.</p> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: oh maybe a few hundred years or so</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: what</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: what?</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: well if i had known you were going to be so judgy about it</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: when did this happen</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: oh i spent some time in other doomed realities and timelines and came back before anybody could tell i was gone</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: oh just out for a bit of fun then</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: just hopped on over to a different reality</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: real casual like</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: oh hello dont mind me just popping in to see if it really is as doomed as they say it is</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: did not disappoint</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: yes almost exactly like that :)</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: who did you hang out with are they cooler than me</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: it is complicated to explain</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: oh ok nevermind then</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: all clear</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: a whole alternate universe ripe with the coolest motherfuckers imaginable</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: you were there too i threw your air conditioner into the sun</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: wow thats fucked up</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: thats not where that goes at all</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: these events are not-canonical.</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: rude</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: i think what the ghost possessing a corpse of my ex is trying to say</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: and correct me if im fucking wrong</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: which for the record im not</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: is that the trope of being hundreds of years old but looking young forever patently sucks ass</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: a plot device an asshole would write</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: :(</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: that is not what i am trying to say at all.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: hmm wow yeah thatd really be a sort of pot/kettle situation i guess</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: i cant believe im the only woke one here</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: its hard being such a visionary AND such a fine metallic specimen</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: but im an altruist first and fucking foremost</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: so selfless</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: yes, the greater narrative is truly blessed by your beneficent presence.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: oh so you got jokes now huh</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i have always had the ‘jokes’ of which you speak, but i have heretofore exercised restraint in laying you low.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i possess knowledge of many of your iterations, as the scope of my powers allows me to exist in several narrative structures at once.</p> + <p class="davebot">DAVEBOT: but can she see why kids love the sweet cinnamon taste of cinnamon toast crunch</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i do not know, or care, what that means.</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: neither do i :)</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: its cultural significance to you as an earthling is wasted on the two of us entirely, as we have not conflated the misguided notion of clinging to nostalgic cereal advertisement trivia with socially relevant conversation.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: one could say that your reference is lost to</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: .....</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ......</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: .......</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0287.gif"> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="jade">JADE: time</p> + <p class="aradia">ARADIA: ouo</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0288.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0289.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0290.gif"> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter12.html">CHAPTER 12. Really Convolued Metaphorical Horseshit</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter12.html b/chapter12.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7ed5542 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter12.html @@ -0,0 +1,198 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 12. Really Convoluted Metaphorical Horseshit (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter11.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter13.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-08-23">08/23/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 12. Really Convoluted Metaphorical Horseshit</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0291.gif"> + <p>In the bowels of a different ship, at a moment in time that is not pinpointable in either direction from the previous interaction, another Dave raps quietly to himself.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i dunno who the flower is in this case</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: shit what if im the flower</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SO</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DAVE</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: no hold up that makes no fuckin sense i gotta rewind back to the beginning</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ARE YOU GONNA KEEP MUMBLING TO YOURSELF OR CAN--</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: oh shit sorry what</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i was just thinking through some really convoluted metaphorical horseshit</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH THAT WAS PRETTY FUCKING EVIDENT.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: my b bro</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: what were you saying</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I WAS SAYING I THOUGHT WE MIGHT GO, I DUNNO, ANYWHERE ELSE ON THE ENTIRE SHIP WHILE THE CLOTHES WERE WASHING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SEEING AS THIS DECREPIT MACHINE WE WERE SO BLESSEDLY PROVIDED WITH MAKES A WHIRRING SOUND SO PANCHAFINGLY ARHYTHMIC THAT IT THREATENS TO ERADICATE THE ENTIRE CONCEPT OF TEMPO FROM THE UNIVERSE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND YET SOMEHOW BASICALLY ALL THAT HAS HAPPENED SINCE WE STARTED THE LOAD IS THAT YOU’VE BEEN USING IT AS A FUCKED UP BEAT TO WHISPER TO YOURSELF ABOUT FLOWERS TO.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AT THIS POINT I'M EITHER GOING TO NEED YOU TO SPEAK UP OR FOLLOW ME THE FUCK ON OUT OF HERE, BECAUSE THIS IS EXCRUCIATING.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0292.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ok fine ill do the first one</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GREAT. TURN UP THE FLOWER TALK VOLUME.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so uh</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: kanaya was telling me this kids story the other day about this dude who didnt cherish a flower enough until it peaced out to do flower stuff idk its not pertinent to the story</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: except the flower was a person</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: because it was a metaphor</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH LIKE YOU SAID,</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: really convoluted metaphorical horseshit</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: REALLY CONVOLUTED METAPHORICAL HORSESHIT.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: anyway what goes down in the story is that once the flower lady is out of the picture</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: the main character goes around making all these connections between her and everything else in the universe until every damn thing feels like a symbol for how much he fucked up and how much he will never see her again</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THIS SEEMS PRETTY FUCKING INTENSE FOR A KID'S STORY</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yea thats pretty much what i said</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but i guess its not so much what the story was technically textually about but more like the version of it kanaya internalized and then told me when we were talkin about how she misses rose</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so like now im taking the story she told me she was projecting her feelings onto and projecting my feelings on top of that</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: this is just one big game of emotional projection telephone so feel free to go paraphrase it to roxy later and make it about whatever fuckin thing youre currently missing</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOUR ABILITY TO GET TO THE POINT</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: gotem</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: anyway you’re not gonna have to miss that skill of mine for long</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: get ready for this shit because i am about to slap you with the point so hard youll fall ass first into the washer</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: just scrambling around in there getting all sudsy</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but your brain is gonna be so blasted from the mindfreak of a point im about to make that there wont be anything left to clean</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: are you ready</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: karkat you havent made any kind of comment about how youre ready in a few seconds so</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH DAVE DROP THIS FUCKING BOMB ON ME.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ok thanks</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so its genuinely cool that kanaya can go around creating meaning that may or may not be actually present in every little thing</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: connecting every feeling she has to the idea of her wife existing out there</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so i told her she should keep that shit up</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but im having the opposite issue where im struggling to find anything to be that kind of tether because every single thing i could possibly consider about what it is were doing just reminds me of yet another thing to be afraid about</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so if you were looking for a more concentrated point</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: the real point thats that point simmered in its own juices into a perfect point reduction</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: here it is</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: everything fuckin sucks huge cosmic donkey sack and im terrified</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OK, SO I FEEL LIKE YOU SKIPPED A COUPLE NECESSARY STEPS IN YOUR POINT CLARIFICATION PROCESS.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I’M GOING TO RESIST THE URGE TO CONTINUE YOUR REDUCTION METAPHOR EVEN THOUGH I HAVE SOME INARGUABLY GOOD SHIT LINED UP FOR IT BECAUSE I’M AFRAID OF US GETTING TOO FAR OFF TRACK, HERE.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ok but were you going with sweet or savory please give me that much at least</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH IT WAS GOING TO BE SUNDAE-BASED.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: nice</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DO YOU WANNA WATCH MORE GBBO AFTER THIS?</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: absolutely</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GREAT. ANYWAY, LIKE I WAS SAYING, FOR THE LOVE OF SWEET HUMAN CHRIST, PLEASE BACK UP TO WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU’RE ACTUALLY SCARED OF.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ALSO COME HERE, IDIOT.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0293.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ok yeah this is a better position to unleash all my inner fears n anxieties from</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so uh</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: like i said i talked to kan about it some</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and its not like weve not talked about it either but i dunno</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: those times its like my mouth was saying words about the situation wherein our friends are AWOL and maybe dead but my brain wasnt fully letting me experience the emotion that goes along with them</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: man its like i cant even start genuinely thinking about how afraid i actually am for rose and john without my brain flippin its wad and whiting out</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: like haha fuck i hope theyre ok</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: now i better make a fuckin joke before i succumb to the gaping mouth of despair waiting for me to fall in it as soon as i look down and acknowledge that its there ogling how juicy my ass looks as it trembles with terror</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and then if i think about either of them then its only a matter of time til i have to think about dirk too</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: its an if you give a mouse a cookie situation but instead of more snacks its just another layer of fear about my loved ones</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and with dirk its</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: whew</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i guess im just fucked up about how to worry about dirk and be angry at him at the same time</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: because if i get as unholy pissed at him as i sometimes wanna be i also gotta admit to myself that maybe i coulda done something different there</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: like if wed kept up better maybe there woulda been a point along the line where i could have said the right thing somehow and hed idk</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: not stolen rose away on some nightmare family trip</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: forcing us to accept the fact that hes our enemy now and chase after him for an unreasonably indeterminate number of years</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: also like</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and this by the way adds a whole other layer of guilt on there that i dont really know how to fuckin reckon with but</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: even with all the shit hes pulled and the fact that we are more or less heading toward having to take him down</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: whatever that is gonna mean and whether or not he planned it like that</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i just</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: me and him had come so far with each other and it was really cool for a while to have him and i</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ugh</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i dont WANT to hate him</p> + </div> + <p>Dave exhales. Karkat waits.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IS THAT ALL? I’M POISED ON THE PRECIPICE OF REASSURANCE WITH MY COUNTER-RANT LOCKED AND LOADED BUT IT FEELS LIKE YOU’VE GOT MORE SHIT YOU’RE HOLDING BACK ON.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah i got another thing</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WELL THEN QUIT FUCKING PICKING AT THE SEAM ON MY SHORTS AND SPIT IT OUT. THEY'RE BARELY HANGING ON TO THE DEFINITION OF "SHORTS" AS IT IS.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ok fuck its just</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ...</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: the part i mentioned before about how we really have no goddamn clue how long this trip is even gonna take</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i cant help but feel like its barely getting revved up</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and for me and roxy and jade and callie and kan thats normal shit at best and boring at worst but we all have our immortality to thank for that</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: we can just dick around in space for near-eternity waiting to catch up to our friends who may or may not be our enemies now and itll be fine</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i mean no itll be categorically miserable</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but well survive it</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HOLD THE FUCK ON.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but you</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DAVE.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: no lemme say this</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: we dont talk about it much and i got shit to say about it</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: its not like i never thought about how youre mortal before but i just thought wed be able to figure it out before it mattered</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: come up with some kind of plan</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i was just distracted being happy with you i fucking guess and so i didnt think up a way to fix it</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and now thanks to dirk we have to work it out right the fuck now</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: because i cant spend this trip just sitting around watching you get old and die</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0294.gif"> + <div class="command dave"> + <span>Dave:</span> + <div>> Dave: Grapple with the clean, soggy consequences of the passage of time.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0295.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: fuck ok one sec</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0296.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OK SO I WAS WITH YOU FOR A WHILE, THERE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: BUT I HAVE TO LODGE A STERN ABSOLUTELY FUCKING NOPE ON THAT LAST PART, DUDE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FIRST OF ALL--</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: im totally ready to hear you out on this one but can you like</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: move your fucking legs</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH YEAH.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NO PROBLEM. SORRY, MAN.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yea no worries</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0297.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0298.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0299.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: ok go on</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0300.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OK SO LIKE I WAS SAYING, I GET YOU ON THE FIRST PART.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT'S NOT LIKE I'M NEW TO THE PARTICULAR MOOBEAST WRANGLING EVENT OF SOMEONE I PREVIOUSLY LOVED BRUTALLY TURNING ON ME AND LEAVING ME TO TRY AND CRAM MY FEELINGS ABOUT THE SITUATION BACK TOGETHER ALL ON MY OWN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT IS UNEQUIVOCALLY A FUCKED UP AND COMPLICATED EMOTIONAL PLACE TO FIND YOURSELF IN, BUT I DON'T THINK YOU NEED TO BE OVER THERE MAKING IT MORE DIFFICULT BY BLAMING YOURSELF FOR THE FACT THAT THE EMOTIONS THEMSELVES ARE HARD TO PIN DOWN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I'M NOT SAYING WE HANDLED EVERYTHING--OR REALLY EVEN MOST THINGS--ON EARTH C PERFECTLY, BUT ALSO YOU DID NOT SINGLEHANDEDLY PUT DIRK'S POOFY SHORTS'D ASS ON THAT SHIP.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HE DID THAT ON HIS OWN. AND WE MADE THE CHOICE TO GO AFTER HIM ON OUR OWN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OK NOW ON TO THE PART I TAKE SOME MAJOR FUCKING OFFENSE TO.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I WAS FOLLOWING YOUR LITTLE TRAIL OF COOKIE CRUMB FEARS UNTIL IT LEAD TO THE BIG SNACK FINALE OF WORRY ABOUT MY FRAGILE MORTAL MEATSACK.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF I HAVE SOMEHOW NOT BEEN CLEAR ABOUT THIS WITH YOU YET, LET ME GO AHEAD AND RECTIFY THE SITUATION RIGHT THE FUCK NOW.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HANGING OUT WITH YOU ON THIS LONG TRIP TO WHO THE SHITTING FUCK KNOWS WHERE IS QUITE LITERALLY THE HAPPIEST I HAVE EVER BEEN IN MY ENTIRE MEAGER EXISTENCE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I'M SO ABSOLUTELY BLISSED THE FUCK OUT OF MY MIND TO BE ABLE TO LOOK AT YOUR STUPID IMMORTALLY SMOOTH HUMAN FACE SKIN EVERY DAY AND NOT HAVE A COMPLEX ABOUT IT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LOOK AT ME, DAVE. I'M SAFE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND YEAH OKAY, IT'S NOWHERE NEAR PERFECT, YOU'RE RIGHT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND I'LL BE STRAIGHT WITH YOU. IT'S NOT LIKE I HAVEN'T BEEN EXPERIENCING SOME COMPLICATED GUILT, MYSELF.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE FACT THAT I'M HAVING THE TIME OF MY LIFE JUST FUCKING CHILLAXING AND BEING IN LOVE IN SPACE IS A CLEARLY INCONGRUOUS WITH THE REASON I'M ACTUALLY HERE CHILLAXING TO BEGIN WITH, AND I'M NOT LETTING MYSELF FORGET THAT, EITHER.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: BUT I RESENT THE IMPLICATION THAT MY HAPPINESS IS REGISTERING FOR YOU AS YOU HAVING TO JUST "SIT AROUND AND WATCH ME GET OLD," BECAUSE I KNOW YOU KNOW IT'S MORE THAN THAT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LIKE, JESUS, DAVE. YOU KNOW I'M AFRAID FOR YOU, TOO, RIGHT?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OR DID YOU FORGET THE WHOLE HEROIC DEATH THING?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I WORRY ABOUT LOSING YOU FAIRLY FUCKING REGULARLY.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SO I’M NOT SAYING STOP BEING AFRAID, BECAUSE CLEARLY THIS IS A SITUATION THAT NECESSITATES A REASONABLE AMOUNT OF FEAR. BUT I'M NOT THE ONLY ONE NEEDING TO BE FUCKING WORRIED ABOUT, HERE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT'S LIKE THIS:</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ONE: WE'VE BEEN THROUGH SO MUCH HELLACIOUS PANWARPING TRAUMA THAT I REFUSE TO NOT ENJOY THIS SHIT WHEN I FINALLY FUCKING GET IT, NO MATTER HOW LONG IT MAY OR MAY NOT LAST.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: TWO: IT'S NOT LIKE WE'RE DOING NOTHING. WE’RE MOVING. WE’RE WORKING. WE’RE HEADED SPECIFICALLY TO A PLACE WHERE WE WILL UNDOUBTLEDLY ENDURE YET MORE FUCKING HELLACIOUS PANWARPING TRAUMA.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND THREE: WE'RE DOING THAT BECAUSE WE HAVE FRIENDS WHO WE CARE ABOUT THAT NEED US. THAT IS OUR FOCUS, HERE. NOT OUR FEAR. IT'S ABOUT THE PEOPLE WE HAVE TO SAVE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SO DON'T FUCKING WORRY ABOUT ME, DAVE. I'M FINE.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0301.gif"> + <p>Dave is still afraid. There is a part of him that will always be, he thinks. He has accepted this about himself. There is another feeling coursing through him too, though. It’s something he's felt before, though never quite so intensely. He looks up at Karkat and understands, viscerally, the simple power his words have. They pump through Dave’s own body, alive and warm and true.</p> + <p>He wonders if Karkat realizes it, or if he’s just, as always, saying what he feels as he feels it. Dave doesn’t attempt to dissect it further. There will be time for that later.</p> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0302.gif"> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter13.html">CHAPTER 13. The Funeral</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter13.html b/chapter13.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..58ed0cf --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter13.html @@ -0,0 +1,169 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 13. The Funeral (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter12.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter14.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-09-16">09/16/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 13. The Funeral</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0303.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Dearly beloved...</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0304.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Ladies...</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Gentlemen...</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: News outlets...</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: And other valued members of the Human Nation State.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0305.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Thank you, for taking the time out of your busy schedules to gather with me and my family today.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: A day of exquisite loss and mourning.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Gamzee Makara, High Court Jester, exalted saint of the purple veil, has left us to traverse that grand, gay carnival in the sky, where, I am told by various members of the clownly cloth, he will spend the rest of history, honking in grand tribute to the Mirthful Messiah.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I come before you with rage in my heart for the vile, cowardly monsters who have taken away our dear Minister Makara, and I know that many of you feel the same.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But today is a day of healing, of memories.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: And my first memory of our Purple Prince, was his robust codpiece--</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0306.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: --As he offered me his friendly support, along with the sacred blood of his brethren, the holy sacrament--</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0307.gif"> + <p>It takes Jake a few seconds of puzzled eye contact before he catches exactly what it is Yiffany is tossing down. In his defense, he is distracted by his wife’s speech, which is doing the emotional equivalent of wringing him out like a wet towel, before using that towel to slap the sweaty buttocks of a large, odorous man. Even if he knows everything she’s saying is a load of horsefeathers, it does nothing for his composure to hear her heap praise on that smelly, homewrecking clown.</p> + <p>Jake wonders what she’ll say about him, at his own funeral.</p> + <p>He narrows his eyes in Yiffany’s direction. She’s a lovely girl, really. He wishes he could have gotten to know her under better circumstances. He’d known she existed, of course--Jane had complained about her often enough--but they’d never had much chance to get acquainted. He rather believes her and Tavvy would have been fast friends.</p> + <p>Then again, perhaps it’s better that she never had much of a chance to get to know his family.</p> + <p>He lets go of the leash.</p> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0308.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: And I know that at times like these it is easy to want to give in.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: To throw in the towel, and turn our faces away from the light of democracy and moral fortitude that we, the citizens of the human kingdom, are blessed with from birth.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: God knows I’ve had my own faith tested in the last few weeks.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: As many of you know, I did not grow up with the same privileges that all of you enjoy.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I was born on proto-Earth, that half-finished dystopia mangled by the ravages of foolish leadership and endless war.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: And as for Gamzee, well, his upbringing was even worse.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: He was born to a violent and uncaring home, a lonely child with few natural gifts.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0309.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: It would be simple to let this disgusting, vile, SHAMEFUL act of spiteful revenge turn us away from the blinding light of the sword of justice that hangs over us all--</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0310.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Poised</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0311.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Trembling</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0312.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Ready to burst forth--</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0313.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: I want to give up, at times. I understand your pain.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0314_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0314_2.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: I sympathize with your pain.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0315_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0315_2.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: But when that pain! Becomes too hard! To endure!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Remember poor, lifeless Gamzee! Who suffered pain far worse than any of us could ever fathom!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: THE PAIN OF BETRAYAL!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0316.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Dude, didn’t you lower the voltage on that shock collar?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Little Red isn’t looking so hot.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Yes of course i did but the damn doohickys got the kick of a donkey!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I couldnt remove it completely shed know i was the one who did it!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, if that supervillain cuntwaffle doesn’t stop, she’s going to kill her. Not really the best at hostage management, is she.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Hey!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Don’t call my wife a cuntwaffle!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: It... it may be deserved but it is certainly ungentlemanly</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: brain ghost dirk i would have expected better of you</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Can’t imagine why. Aren’t you going to do anything?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Why dont you do something!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Because I don’t really exist, dickhead.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0317.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: But we cannot allow his memory to be in vain!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: For Gamzee Makara taught us that even the most loathsome degenerate can take their place in society.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: All they need is the right redemption arc - !</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0318.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: !!!!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0319.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0320.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0321_1.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0321_2.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Young lady, I am just about at the end of my rope with you.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Throw all the dog bowls you want at the walls of my warship.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But don’t you dare act up in front of a</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Live</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Fucking</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Newsfeed!</p> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: Grrrrrr</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: After everything I’ve done for you--paying for your education, helping your parents cover up your existence from the world!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Just imagine what Rose and Jade would say if they could see you now, even dissidents can have a little decorum!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Get down from there at once!</p> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: Grrrrrr</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Don’t you threaten me, young lady. Not today!</p> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: GRRRRRRRRR</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: There’s nowhere for you to go. My agents are swarming this church. Be reasonable, Yiffany.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Ugh.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Disgusting name.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But that’s hardly your fault. You were always just a footnote. Your parents’ little prank.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Honestly, that’s why I helped them all those years ago! I do love a good jape.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But let’s be serious.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: You don’t matter. If you did, they would have come for you already.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0322.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Hot spit and monkey vomit this is getting bad</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I-I shouldnt have let her go up there</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I thought she would just run away!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Still might.</p> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0323.gif"> + </div> + <p>And she does. Seemingly at the end of her tolerance for insults toward her name, social status, and heritage, Yiffy performs an impressive backflip off the podium and down onto the church floor. One that, if it hadn’t been happening amidst a sea of other newsworthy events, would surely have ended up on someone’s instagram story within thirty seconds. She gives Gamzee’s corpse one last parting kick: a hard, proper kick that proves those cleats aren’t just for fashion. Although they are certainly also for fashion.</p> + <p>There he flies--in his gangly, purple, necrotizing glory. A phantom honk seems to hang above the congregation, as if from an echo of a time long past. A simpler time. A time before we had to deal with this disgusting clown’s bloated corpse every other update. He vanishes into the seething crowd, and we are confident that we will never have to deal with this asshole ever again.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0324.gif"> + <p>Jake watches this from a safe distance, poised on the edge of intervening to pull Yiffy out of there. But in the end he doesn’t have to. Instead he watches in admiration as she tears the place to utter shreds. An echoing sympathy swells inside of him as she rends apart the funeral flowers and punts Gamzee into the shrieking congregation. Here is a girl who felt the cold, indecent hand of fate wrapping around her, and instead of submitting to it and slowly sublimating down into morasse of boiled doormat, she slapped it away from her with a lively oh, no thank you.</p> + <p>All at once, Jake feels immense affection for his granddaughter. He hopes the two of them can make up for lost time.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0325.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Enough of this.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Seize her!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0326.gif"> + <p>The stained glass window shatters inward, obliterated to stardust. The war is knocking.</p> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter14.html">CHAPTER 14. The Best Laid Plans</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter14.html b/chapter14.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2f6a399 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter14.html @@ -0,0 +1,675 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 14. The Best Laid Plans (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter13.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a>Latest</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-10-31">(10/31/2020)</time> + <time datetime="2020-10-15">(10/15/2020)</time> + <time datetime="2020-09-30">09/30/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 14. The Best Laid Plans</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0327.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0328.gif"> + <div class="two-columns"> + <div class="column"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh my god, i'm wiped.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: haven't felt this happy to be plastered to the couch in forever.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: are you?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wow, i feel like i'm barely keeping myself sitting.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: if it weren't for keeping you kids safe i'd be out there right now!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: well we did just do a whole lot of running around for no good reason.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: and some of us aren't gods and shit.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm detecting a hint of judgement in your voice, there, harry anderson</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: don't you enjoy being a part of all this? finally getting to be in the thick of it all?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i mean i was having a fine time at school, if i'm being honest.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: all this tear-assing back and forth between my home and various points of interest over the past few days has me pretty beat.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: also i wouldn't call this "the thick of it all"</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oof, getting air quotes'd by my own son.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: we had to hide in a forsythia bush on the way back here when that drone flew by!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that's the thick of father-son hijinks if i ever saw it!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well, modern day war hijinks, but i'll take what i can get, you know??</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah, i guess.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm not knocking the old adrenaline thrill, or helping out vrissy's moms or anything.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm just saying i was literally just here and you told me to leave, so i hope this is where we're gonna park it for a minute.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: a boy's gotta breathe.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: yeah, well, this wasn't my plan, either.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but rose sent out some false intel about us heading toward my house, so technically this is the safest place we can be right now, since they cleared the area and everything.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i guess.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: hmm.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: what?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: now YOU look like you're hiding some extra commentary.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh, i don't need to burden you with all the bureaucratic stuff, it's boring.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: well now hold up, dad.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: a minute ago you were all "we're in the fight together," and now you're backing out of sharing the details?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it's not really-</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: am i a part of this or not?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well i'd sure say you were!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but i guess maybe my thoughts on what is or isn't right for the operation aren't up to snuff.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: because here i am, sitting in the dugout, same as you.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: in the dugout?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh, or, uh...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: what's a metaphor you might like better...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: no,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm like the uhh...understudy.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: dad. no, jesus, you don't have to do this.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: or i got cast in as babysitter number 2 when i had auditioned for, i dunno,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah, please, i got the baseball metaphor.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm not a complete fucking nerd.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh i see.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i was just like acknowledging that we've been sidelined, here.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: not that i mind, personally, since like i said i am super stoked to be relaxin on the couch and not fighting a war.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: plus i wouldn’t have been able to get your measurements for some clothes that actually fit you if we hadn’t come back here where all my sewing stuff is.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: but it seemed like you, uh.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you were getting pretty into everything back there with rose and them? getting to be with the old crew and everything, like the stories you told me about the game?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: yeah.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: that sucks.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i had a good plan, too!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it just wasn't good enough for karkat, i guess.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm just not "experienced enough in combat strategy"</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh now you're throwing the air quotes back at me?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no, those are for karkat!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh ok then, fair game.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: look at us, bantering away.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that is a plus of being here, at least.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it's been really nice to get to spend so much time with you.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: um. yeah, it's not so bad.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: anyway, before you ruffle my hair or anything, it looks like things are getting a bit heated between the vriskas over there.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: maybe we should offer them a snack to bring the mood back down?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: me, mess up your hair when you’ve worked so hard on that look? i do know you at least that well, harry anderson</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: thank god.</p> + </div> + </div> + <div class="column"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Um...Hey, Vriska?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Are you okay??</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Just you’ve Been Kind of quiet.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Oh????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: So you actually want to know what I’m thinking now? You want my opinion?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Um...Yes?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I'm not Really Sure what’s going on right Now.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I just was wondering why you’re so pissed off at me.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What the fuck are you talking about?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I’m not pissed at you, you haven’t done shit 8asically at all since I’ve been here.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I just can’t 8elieve I’m 8ack stuck in this tacky rumpusblock after all of that!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I’m going to look like an idiot if I don’t get out there.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I don’t Think any8ody is going to notice?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I guess you Did go Viral, 8ut the news moves so fast these days. I don’t think Any8ody is like...</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Glued to their phones Waiting for your New Hashtag Resistance content.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We could do Something if You Wanted.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Huh?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: If you’re 8ored.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: This isn’t my House, but Harry has video games and Movies and shit.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Actually, we’re pro8a8ly 8etter off not watching his movies.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: His taste is Worse than His Dad’s.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: AGGGHHH!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: No, I don’t want to watch a fucking movie! How the fuck can you think a8out movies?????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: How are you okay with any of this?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Any of What?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8eing left at home like a couple of dri88ling of wigglers!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: How are you so calm right now? Your lusii were training you, right? And you’re a troll, you’re definitely five times stronger than a human! And if you’re my clone, you are way more 8adass than little miss Fussy Fangs.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I can’t 8elieve you just stayed 8ehind?!??</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Well...they told me to. And they’re my Moms.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And you just listen to everything they say?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: No, not Really. I used to Sneak out a Lot, and they’d a8solutely Flip their Shit if they ever got into my Search History.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8ut I guess this Situation is Kind of Serious?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: There’s a whole Plan and Stuff Like that.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Clearly not a good plan, 8ecause then I would 8e part of it!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What’s the point of me even coming to this shitty fake reality if I’m not supposed to fix it?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I think they’ve Got A Strategy, or Whatever.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: That’s just even more indication that they don’t know what they’re doing! Lalonde and Maryam have had however many sweeps to get older and stupider, 8ut from where I’m standing, it was literally only a few days ago that I was their commander! I am primed for the 8attlefield!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I ran their shit!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Wait, really? they never told me That.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I thought you said you knew some lore. You know about Tavros and Terezi, you told me you do!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, they told me about That stuff, but a Lot of the Shit that Happened in the Session if just not in the History Books.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: You weren’t Really mentioned that Much.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Excuse me?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: People know who you Are, 'cause we had to Memorize the names of Every one of the Players, Even the ones who didn’t last very Long.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You’re trying to tell me that there’s a whole recorded history of SGRUB, and I’m not in it?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: You’re not not in it.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I guess they Mostly Focused on the Creators who Ascended, you know?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Whoever was schoolfeeding you was a complete 8ulgesucker, because I “ascended” 8efore any of the humans did!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Literally 8illions of years 8efore, since our session was the one that created theirs!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I was the 8ne who 8uided John’s 8uffoonish 8lue ass all the way through his first 8ew days in the Medium!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I m8de all the plans to take down the J8cks!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I SINGLE H8ND8DLY!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: CURED YOUR MOTHER’S FUCKING ALCH8LISM!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: uh, vriska, everything okay over there?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: EVERYTHING’S FINE, J8HN!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: okay.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: do you girls want a snack?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: AAAAGGH!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, actually a Snack sounds Great, Mr. Eg8ert.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i’m not sure what we’ve got, i uh.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: don’t actually live here haha.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: vriska, eat whatever.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: just not the zebra cakes, those are mine.</p> + </div> + </div> + </div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0329.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: so anyway, as you can see, this would have worked just fine!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: no i think karkat’s right. this looks like shit, dad.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you know, me letting your earlier use of the word "fuck" slide wasn't a blanket approval for all cursing in front of me.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: sorry.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: try not to make such a shit plan, and i won't call it that.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: haha wow.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: it's not like i think i'm any better!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i mean, i still can't believe i told vrissy and them to bring a dead celebrity to school.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: what was i THINKING.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you were thinking it sounded hilarious!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but yeah, in hindsight, maybe not the best call.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: maybe it’s genetic?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i kinda can’t believe we’re all still alive, actually.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: and how did YOU make it this far, being so bad at this?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i had my friends with me, i guess.</p> + </div> + <p>They are silent for a bit. John doesn’t want to go on a reminiscing jaunt, which Harry Anderson stopped finding impressive a few years ago. Plus, they haven’t really had time to talk about what happened with Dave, yet, and he doesn’t want to tank the mood by bringing him up. The rapport they’ve built feels good. Stronger than he expected. He’d spent so long seeing mostly the best parts of Roxy in Harry Anderson. He forgot, he guesses, to look for himself in there, too. And if what they have in common right now is a lack of strategic foresight, hey, he’ll take it.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: speaking of friends, i will say the snacks were a good call, at least!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i don’t hear any more screaming, anyway.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: see, that's one good plan between the two of us!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0330.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh, that was definitely them leaving, wasn’t it.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ah.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0331.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0332_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0332_2.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0333.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Well, isn't this just heartwarming? The prodigal daughter returned to the loving bosom of her family.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Oh, is this one of those rare and marvelous beasts, the "villain speech"?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I've written one or two in my time.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm on the edge of my seat. I hope it's better than your political material; I've always found that rather trite.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I haven't given a political speech in years, Ms. Lalonde. I don't know what you're referring to. I'm just a simple business woman.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: right with her own talk show</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and multi billion dollar merchant company and lobbying groups!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: That's what a business woman is, Jade, dear.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But enough of that. I'll skip straight to the point.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: You are on my territory, in the presence of my secret police, laying your hand on my investment.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: You think I come anywhere unprepared? I haven't left the house without an armed guard in years.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Is it the libidinous power rush that comes from snapping your fingers at men with guns, or are you worried that you might accidentally do something heroic?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Your ship is in contested airspace. You will land, whereby it will be confiscated by the Royal Human Guard. After that you will be taken into custody.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: All of you. Let's call it a family vacation, shall we? Hoo hoo hoo.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0334.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: wow could you be any more full of yourself??</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: shut the fuck up for a minute and look up!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0335_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0335_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0336_1.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0336_2.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: If You Make One Single Move I Will Bite Him Directly On The Exterior Shout Tunnel</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Will Turn Your Son Into A Rainbow Drinker</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Then You Will Have A Rainbow Drinker Son</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: That's not how troll vampirism works, don't treat me like an imbecile!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: You think I don't know everything there is to know about your disgusting biology?</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA:</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Okay Then I Will Just Break His Fucking Neck</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: right</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: listen to kanaya shes having a bad day!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Im Having A Bad Week</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I know you have never trusted Kanaya with any of the children in the past.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Let that distrust be the instrument of your undoing.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: If any harm comes to us, or Yiffy, or if you attempt to shoot us down or in any other way disable our escape--</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Then you kill your son.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0337.gif"> + <p>Jane Crocker hesitates.</p> + <p>This is something that she used to do regularly. Hesitate. Stop and think and weigh her options. Talk out every possible scenario and the impact they might have, morally and optically and socially. What would the political apparatus think? What would her social media followers think, her friends? As the years went by and she honed her instincts, she found herself doing this less and less. The impact that her words made became lessened when spread out across such a wide and thirsty audience, as public sentiment began to swing her way. She stopped thinking about how she would be received, and more about how she could play to the people she knew would receive her favorably.</p> + <p>Looking up she sees Tavvy with tears in his eyes. Rage and guilt surge inside her. This situation is not her fault.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0338.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: This situation is not my fault!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: You're coming here and accusing me of kidnapping your daughter, when you're the ones who kidnapped my son!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: So before you accuse me, take a look at yourself!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I'm the only one who has taken any interest in her upbringing or education!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Or have you forgotten who has been paying for her schooling and taking charge of her introduction into society?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i never asked you to do that!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: you offered!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: so stop calling me ungrateful for not sucking your dick over things i never asked for!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0339.gif"> + <p>Jane pulls in a steadying breath. Behind her, she hears the click of cameras and the murmur of newscasters. The world is watching her be dressed down by a couple blood traitor rebels, one of which has very prominent dog ears. Jane wonders if either of them are even recognizable to the assembled as two of the old gods. One of her PR managers had recommended that she keep her look as static as possible, so that people can always recognize her as Jane Crocker, Captain of Industry, Creator of Earth C, Maintainer of Peace and Plenty.</p> + <p>She can't just stand here and let herself be humiliated, allowing two architects of the insurgency mess her around like this.</p> + <p>If they were to kill Tavros, the entire world would see them commit this war crime. And weighed in the balance, Lalonde and Harley would be off the playing board. Saving your daughter certainly counted as a heroic death, and with the damage they'd done to humanity, it would also probably be just.</p> + <p>Tavros has not called out for her once. Perhaps he knows what her choice was always going to be.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0340.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Tavvy!</p> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0341.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0342.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Stand down!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0343.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Get out of my sight.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0344.gif"> + <p>Vriska Maryam-Lalonde, recently "Vrissy," and potentially "You Are So Grounded You Are Never Leaving The House Again," isn’t what’s commonly referred to as an "outside girl".</p> + <p>She likes grass. It’s fine! To look at. And so are trees, as long as they’re somewhere off in the distance, swaying gently in the breeze. Trampling through them is not on the list of acceptable tree activities. Vrissy is already sweaty and dirt-streaked, and there’s probably like fifty gnats trying to drink her eye fluids. At this rate she almost envies Tavros his role as Batterwitch Bait. Sure, he has to pretend to be threatened by Vrissy’s mom, which is lame as hell and also very embarrassing, but at least his eye fluids are safe.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Hey, can you slow Down a Little?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I have to run over Shru8s and shit, I can’t Fly!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hah! And who’s fault is that????????</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: My shitty 8iology I guess!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Sorry, not all of Us had SGRU8 Sessions to make ourselves Immortal.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well, we’ll take care of that, don’t even worry a8out it.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Lol I wish.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Ms. Roxy was talking about coming up with some sort of Autonomous Flying Device, 8ut it got Shot Down by the Council.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What the fuck is that?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: A Governing 8ody, sort of? I’m not actually Sure how much Power they have anymore, what with the 8atterwitch seizing control of everything.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8ut they were really against any8ody who wasn’t a Creator 8eing a8le to fly, Since it’s sort of a Religious Thing.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Oh.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well that’s fucking stupid?? What good is a religion that stops your society from 8eing a8le to advance?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: How could John even let this happen? Don’t answer that, I know it’s 8ecause he’s spent sweeps 8eing a sweaty loser.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: But anyway, that wasn’t what I meant. Sure, you could get a fucking jetpack or whatever, 8ut ultimately that isn’t going to cut it.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I had rocket 8oots that I used at the 8eginning of my session, who didn’t? That’s wiggler shit.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You can’t start to rely on tech, it 8reaks, and enemies can sa8otage it.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Really, we have to get you a god tier. That’s pretty much the only solution at this point.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ideally we’d go back to when you were a wiggler and start your training right away, 8ut that’s not exactly an option. So god tier it is.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Is that even Possi8le? outside of the Game?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Nope. 8ut we don’t have to worry a8out that, once we get back into SGRU8.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: What???</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: We have to start this shit over again, you have all let it get so out of hand there’s really nothing to do besides a hard reset.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Uh... how are you going to do that?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I’ve got a plan.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Look, up ahead.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0345.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: What?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: A SGRU8 session?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What? No, what the fuck.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: This is a perfect spot for a fight. An am8ush point.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: !!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Don’t worry about it, that’s good. That’s what we’re looking for.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0346.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Uh... who are we Ambushing?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Don’t 8e stupid, we’re the ones being am8ushed.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: !!!!!!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0347.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: HA your face is priceless.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: This is actually way more fun than I thought it would 8e.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ringing around a younger, dum8er me.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I think we’re 8asically the Same Age.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Whatever!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0348_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0348_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0349.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh Fuck</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Finally!!!!!!!!</p> + </div> + <img id="encircle" class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0350.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0351.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img id="entrap" class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0352.gif"> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0353.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: vriska!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean, vriskas!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: where are</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh fuck</p> + </div> + <img id="encroach" class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0354.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0355.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img id="entomb" class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0356.gif"> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0357.gif"> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0358.gif"> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0359.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0360.gif"> + <img id="enclose" class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0361.gif"> + <p id="white1"> </p> + <p style="height: 1600px"> </p> + <p id="white2"> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0362.gif"> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0363.gif"> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0364.gif"> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0365.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ROUGH DAY, HUH.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0366.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: karkat?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: what are you doing here?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT'S NICE TO SEE YOU TOO.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN, YOU MAY NOT HAVE NOTICED, BUT I AM THE LEADER OF AN ARMY. MY PLACE IS ON THE BATTLEFIELD.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i suppose that is true, but that doesn't answer my question!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: this isn't a battlefield, it's just...</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE OBLITERATED, SMOLDERING HUSK OF YOUR FORMER HOME.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well, yeah.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHICH WAS DESTROYED AS COLLATERAL IN AN ONGOING MILITARY CONFLICT.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh all right, fine.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it just feels weird to call it that.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i guess i'm used to thinking of home as somewhere far away from all that war stuff.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JESUS *CHRIST* JOHN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I CANNOT EVEN BEGIN TO LIST ALL THE WAYS IN WHICH THAT CONSTITUTES A SHORT-SIGHTED AND PUKE-WORTHILY IGNORANT THING TO SAY TO ME, PERSONALLY.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND FRANKLY I DON'T HAVE TIME TO BOTHER, THANKS TO THE COUNTLESS FIRES I HAVE BEEN PUTTING OUT ALL DAY, THE ONE PRESENTLY CONSUMING YOUR HIVE NOTWITHSTANDING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD HAVE MADE THINGS GO A BIT MORE SMOOTHLY? JUST A FRACTION?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF YOU HADN'T JUST DECIDED TO WANDER OFF THE INSTANT SHIT STARTED HAPPENING.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: jeez, i'm sorry karkat.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i had no idea how much time had passed.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i must have gotten a bit distracted by my house being blown up.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NOT WANTING TO POINT OUT THE OBVIOUS, BUT I FEEL LIKE THIS WAS A PROBLEM THAT YOU OF ALL PEOPLE WERE UNIQUELY AND MAGICALLY EQUIPPED TO DEAL WITH.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: huh?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU KNOW.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WITH YOUR SHOOSH THING.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: my shoosh thing.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOUR SHOOSH THING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE GUSTY NONSENSE? THE GIFT OF GAS??</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOUR SBURB ALLOCATED BLOW JOB???</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: uh.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE SUPERNATURAL COMMUNION YOU HAVE WITH ALL THINGS WINDY, YOU ASS!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh right, that.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that would have let me put the fire out, maybe.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i don't think there's anything in my skillset that would have unexploded my house though.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT'S FAIR.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i suppose i'll add one more notch to the daily tally of crazy stuff that happened which i just have to accept as my life now.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: what else happened while i was caught up watching the symbolic representation of my former life get consumed in a giant fire ball?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH BOY. WHERE TO START.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SO FIRST OFF, IN HINDSIGHT, TODAY WAS PRETTY OBVIOUSLY JUST ONE HUGE BAITED TRAP.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I SAY "IN HINDSIGHT", BUT FORTUNATELY IT WAS ALSO EXTREMELY APPARENT EVEN IN FORESIGHT TO THOSE OF US WHO SPENT A FEW SECONDS THINKING ABOUT IT.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...right.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH COME ON EGBERT, SERIOUSLY?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: KIDNAPPING A PERSON OF IMPORTANCE, ONLY TO LET US KNOW PRECISELY WHERE AND ON WHAT OCCASION THEY WOULD BE MOST ACCESSIBLE FOR A RESCUE ATTEMPT?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HAVING THAT OCCASION BE NONE OTHER THAN THE CORPSE PARTY OF A HIGHLY NOTEWORTHY POLITICAL FIGURE, WHOSE CASKET MIGHT AS WELL HAVE HAD A GIANT "KICK ME" SIGN DAUBED ON IT?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THERE WAS BASICALLY NO WAY IT WASN'T A FRONT FOR SOMETHING HUGE. AND IT WAS!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WE HAPPEN TO BE SITTING IN FRONT OF ONE FACET OF THAT HUGENESS AT THIS VERY MOMENT.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well, when you put it like that...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i guess we all got pranked pretty hard, huh.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THIS IS NO TIME FOR YOUR SHITTY NERD PRANKS JOHN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FRANKLY I'M INSULTED THAT YOU THINK SUCH A WORD IS EVEN REMOTELY APPOSITE TO THE PRESENT SITUATION.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OTHER THAN TO DESCRIBE THE WAY I AM PERSONALLY BEING "PRANKED" BY REALITY IN HAVING TO EXPLAIN ALL THIS TO YOU.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ANYWAY, THE RESCUE ATTEMPT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THIS IS THE ONLY POINT WHERE ANY SEMBLANCE OF GOOD NEWS COMES INTO PLAY, SO SAVOR IT.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: okay.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT TURNS OUT THAT WE DIDN'T NEED TO PUT SO MUCH EFFORT INTO THE RESCUING YIFFY PART OF THE OPERATION.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SHE BASICALLY RESCUED HERSELF WHEN ALL WAS SAID AND DONE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND TOOK CARE OF KICKING GAMZEE'S CORPSEBOX OVER WHILE SHE WAS AT IT, IN A STUNNING DISPLAY OF EFFICIENCY WHICH THE REST OF US CAN ONLY ASPIRE TO.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh wow, haha.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i knew she'd be a bit of a character, being rose and jade's daughter and all...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but that's impressive!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it sounds like she'd be a pretty welcome addition to your ranks then.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SHE'S A CHILD, YOU MORON.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH, AND SPEAKING OF WHICH.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: PAUSING BRIEFLY TO NOTE IN ADVANCE HOW MUCH I LOATHE THE FACT THAT THIS IS AN EVENTUALITY THAT THE UNIVERSE HAS *ONCE AGAIN* SEEN FIT TO CURSE US WITH:</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE VRISKAS, PLURAL.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: shit.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THEY'VE BOTH BEEN CAPTURED.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: shiiiiiiiit.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GREAT WORK KEEPING AN EYE ON THEM, BY THE WAY!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU LITERALLY HAD ONLY ONE JOB, AND YOU MESSED IT UP IN THE EQUALLY SINGULAR WAY IT WAS POSSIBLE TO DO.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: urgh, i know, i know. ):</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HAVING SAID THAT, THIS WAS THE ONE THING UP CROCKER'S SLEEVE YOU COULD BE EXCUSED FROM NOT HAVING SEEN COMING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I GUESS BECAUSE, ON THE FACE OF IT, IT'S JUST TOTALLY FUCKING BANANAS!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JANE'S PLAN FOR THIS CONFLICT HAS THUS FAR CONSISTED ALMOST ENTIRELY OF KIDNAPPING VARIOUS HIGH PROFILE CHILDREN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT'S BIZARRE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AS THOUGH WE ARE FIGHTING A WAR OF ATTRITION, WHERE THE MAIN RESOURCE BEING UTILIZED IS THE OFFSPRING OF THE MOST POWERFUL PEOPLE ON THE PLANET.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF IT WASN'T ONE OF THE CORE TENETS OF HER FASCISTIC PHILOSOPHY, I'D BE TEMPTED TO SAY THAT CURBING REPRODUCTION MIGHT HAVE BEEN A GOOD IDEA, IF ONLY TO PREVENT THIS KIND OF FUCKSHIT NONSENSE FROM HAPPENING.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wait.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wait a minute.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you said that both vriskas have been captured, right?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: EXCUSE ME WHILE I WEEP FOR JOY AT THE REVELATION THAT YOU HAVE BEEN PAYING ATTENTION FOR ONCE.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: okay, well putting that emotional outburst aside for a moment.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: how is that even possible?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: doesn't vriska, the original vriska, still have her magic alien mind control powers?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it seems like it should be basically impossible for anyone to kidnap her.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU'VE STUMBLED ASS BACKWARDS ACROSS THE MOST IMPORTANT POINT OF THIS UNFORTUNATE DEVELOPMENT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU ARE CORRECT, IN THAT WITH HER CASTE-TYPICAL, *COMPLETELY SCIENTIFIC AND NOT EVEN A LITTLE BIT MAGICAL* PSYCHOMANIPULATIVE ABILITIES, STAYING OUT OF CROCKER'S REACH SHOULD HAVE BEEN COMPLETELY TRIVIAL FOR SERKET PRIME.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: EVEN ACCOUNTING FOR THE FACT THAT SAID ABILITIES ARE NOT NEARLY AS POTENT ON HUMANS AS THEY ARE ON FELLOW TROLLS, THEY STILL OUGHT TO HAVE TIPPED ANY ALTERCATION SQUARELY IN HER FAVOR.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: BUT SOMEHOW, IT DIDN'T!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: INSTEAD, THINGS APPEAR TO HAVE GONE GLOBES UP IN CLASSIC VRISKITE FASHION, AND NOW ONE OF THE MOST UNEXPECTED AND UNWANTED BUT NEVERTHELESS USEFUL WEAPONS IN OUR ARSENAL IS DOING TIME IN CROCKERJAIL.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT'S ABOUT ALL WE'VE BEEN ABLE TO GLEAN FROM TAPPING INTO THE BATTERBITCH AIRWAVES, WHICH IS A FANCY TERM FOR EAVESDROPPING ON THOSE OF HER AGENTS WHO TALK A LITTLE TOO LOUDLY IN SEMI-PUBLIC SPACES.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: jeez.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i really screwed that up, didn't i.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I'M RELIEVED TO SEE THAT YOUR GRASP OF THAT FACT IS PRETTY GOOD AT LEAST.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ):</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HAVING SAID ALL OF THAT, AND WITH THE RECOGNITION THAT I AM CHOOSING TO NURSE YOUR BRUISED FEELINGS DURING A PLANET WIDE CONFLICT FOR THE FATE OF MY SPECIES,</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IS THERE ANYTHING I CAN DO TO EXPEDITE YOUR GETTING THE FUCK OVER IT?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i... hm.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i don't really know?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: this all feels wrong, karkat.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no offense, but when you're around, it's usually a lot...</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: A LOT WHAT?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: a lot funnier.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUNNIER.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: how to put this.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: normally listening to you go on and on about how much we've fucked everything up is just very funny!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but now it's just not the same.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: maybe it's part of what's going on with this entire reality? i don't know.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: once upon a time i would have put down your ability to pull a silly rant out of your butt as a fundamental law of physics or something.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: remember back when we first knew each other?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it felt like all you ever said to me was how much you thought i was screwing up and being a useless asshole.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and once i realized that you were also just a dumb kid who didn't know what was going on, i started to kind of enjoy it.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but now it's like... the only one who's still a dumb kid is me, and everyone else has something big and important going on that i just don't understand.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i thought that i finally got what was going on with this whole war and everything. i wanted to be useful!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i guess i got a little too wrapped up in the feeling of something finally happening again.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and then watching it all blow up in my face, kind of literally now that i think about it...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it's hard not to feel even more dejected about the situation than i was before.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and now even the patented karkat vant rant has lost all its sparkle.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: maybe if you had like, painstakingly itemized a list of all the things wrong with my plan in a comically overdone fashion or something.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I CONSIDERED IT, BUT HONESTLY THERE WAS SO MUCH WRONG THAT I CONCLUDED THAT THE BEST THING FOR EVERYONE WOULD BE TO NEVER SPEAK OF IT AGAIN.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh. okay.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF WE'RE BEING HONEST, YOU DIDN'T EVEN HAVE A PLAN, JOHN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: CALLING IT A PLAN WOULD IMPLY THAT IT WAS A STRUCTURED SEQUENCE OF STEPS DESIGNED TO ACHIEVE A GOAL.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT YOU CAME UP WITH WAS A CONVOLUTED MESS WHICH STILL SOMEHOW INVOLVED DOING FUCKALL.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND I USE CONVOLUTED HERE IN THE SAME WAY THAT I WOULD TO DESCRIBE THE FRENZIED DRAWSTICK SCRIBBLES OF A SQUALLING HUMAN INFANT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SPEAKING OF WHICH:</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DRAWING A SHITTY PICTURE WITH "THE ULTIMATE PLAN" AT THE TOP AND A BUNCH OF ARROWS DOES NOT, AND TO THE BEST OF MY KNOWLEDGE HAS NEVER, CONSTITUTED AN ACTIONABLE PLAN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DO NOT RESPOND TO THIS CRITICISM WITH ANOTHER MISERABLE EXPRESSION, I AM BEGGING YOU.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: okay ):</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LOOK.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I APPRECIATE THAT YOU SEEM TO HAVE DUG YOUR PAN OUT OF YOUR OWN CHUTE THE FEW MICROMETERS NECESSARY TO NOTICE THE PRECISE DEGREE TO WHICH THE WORLD IS BEING JUDICIOUSLY BATFUCKED RIGHT NOW.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AS HARD AS IT IS TO BELIEVE, THAT'S A FEAT WHICH NO SMALL NUMBER OF PEOPLE ARE COMPLETELY INCAPABLE OF DOING!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: BUT NOTICING THE PROBLEM AND MAKING MEANINGFUL PROGRESS TOWARDS SOLVING IT ARE TWO COMPLETELY DIFFERENT THINGS.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE NEXT TIME YOU GET THE IMPULSE TO "LEND A HAND", YOU'D BE BETTER OFF CANNING IT FOR FIVE MINUTES AND LISTENING TO THOSE OF US WHO'VE BEEN TRYING TO SOLVE IT A LOT LONGER THAN YOU HAVE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THIS ISN'T AN EXERCISE BEING CONDUCTED IN ORDER FOR YOU TO PROVE YOUR PERSONAL DEGREE OF MORAL RECTITUDE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND IF IT WAS, YOU WOULD HAVE ALREADY FAILED MISERABLY! SO DO YOURSELF AND EVERYONE ELSE A FAVOR AND STOP TREATING IT LIKE ONE.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well... all right. if you say so karkat.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I DO SAY SO, EMPHATICALLY AND AT GREAT VOLUME.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND NOW THAT MY OBLIGATION TO CATECHIZE YOU ON THE SUBJECT OF YOUR OWN LIFE IS FULFILLED, I HAVE A WAR TO GET BACK TO.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wait, hold on.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH MY GOD WHAT NOW.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0367.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: you can't be leaving already.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: there's... so much we still need to talk about!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OF COURSE I'M SHITTING LEAVING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT MORE COULD THERE POSSIBLY BE FOR US TO DISCUSS??</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: PLEASE DO NOT TELL ME YOU JUST HAD ANOTHER EMOTION THAT WE NEED TO DROP EVERYTHING IN ORDER TO DISSECT.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no, that's not what i'm talking about at all.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: karkat, we still haven't spoken about *you*!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ABOUT ME?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: yes.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ABOUT *ME*?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: about you.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT THE FUCK ABOUT ME.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you know, how you feel!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HOW I FEEL.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: or just...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: argh, i don't know!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it's just been so long since we've seen each other.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: all sorts of things have happened in that time, and it doesn't feel right to just not even mention any of it!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LIKE WHAT??</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh, i don't know karkat, literally anything!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean, look at you.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you are decked out in a tight body suit and have an eyepatch and everything. there is simply no way there isn't something to discuss there.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0368.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: or like, forget the eyepatch, we don't have to talk about the eyepatch.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i feel as though my point still stands?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: there is basically a bottomless well full of stuff to go through.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean we kind of glossed over it when you brought her up earlier, but what about yiffy?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: this might not come across so easily due to human troll cultural boundaries, but her existing is kind of a big deal??</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i feel like somehow i missed the part where we all sit around and talk about how strange it is that two of our friends went off and had a secret child without any of us knowing!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: is it too much to ask that we have that part now, karkat?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean, maybe it just doesn't mean that much to you.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: which is a little strange, given that it ties in to the whole conflict that you had with jade and dave.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh god we have to talk about dave.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCKING HELL!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT DAVE.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no, this is what i mean, karkat.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: we need to talk about dave!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HAHA! LIKE SHIT WE DO!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I HAVE NO FUCKING CLUE HOW THIS IS EVEN A RELEVANT TOPIC OF CONVERSATION.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh come on.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: there's no way you aren't feeling kind of messed up about him, right?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i know i am.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: whenever i think about how things ended between you two...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: especially now that he's...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ugh, i'm sorry. i'm SO sorry karkat. sorry doesn't even begin to cover it.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: this whole thing feels so impossibly sad.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: all i'm trying to say is...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it's not healthy to bottle these feelings up and not acknowledge them.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: even if you aren't feeling anything right now, and i don't for a moment believe that's true, *i* need to talk about dave!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so can we please just talk about dave for a moment.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NNNNGNGNGGGGGGGUUUUUUGUUGHHHHHHHH FINE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF IT WILL GET YOU TO SHUT UP ABOUT THIS TOPIC FOR EVEN A BRIEF MOMENT, THEN FINE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: REGARDLESS OF HOW POINTLESS AN EXERCISE I CONSIDER IT TO BE, I WILL DISCUSS WITH YOU MY "FEELINGS" ABOUT DAVE.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: okay.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: thank you.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ARE YOU PREPARED TO BE INUNDATED WITH NONE OTHER THAN AN UNINTERRUPTED SPATE OF HARD, UNEMBELLISHED DATA VIS A VIS MY SWEEPS-SUPPRESSED, BISCUITFELT EMOTIONS ON THE DAVE SITUATION??</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WELL HERE GOES.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0369.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: *DEEP BREATH*</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0370.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW I REALLY FEEL ABOUT DAVE?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HOW I FEEL IS THAT I WISH THAT EVERYONE WOULD STOP FUCKING BOTHERING ME ABOUT HIM!!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ALRIGHT, SO HE AND JADE GOT HUMAN MARRIED!! BIG DEAL!!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DO PEOPLE FORGET THAT I WAS THERE?? I FEEL LIKE EVERYONE IS FORGETTING THAT I WAS LITERALLY INVITED TO THE OCCASION.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I'VE EVEN COME TO EXPECT THIS KIND OF AMNESIAC BEHAVIOR FROM EVERYONE ELSE, SINCE I ADMIT THAT I DIDN'T EXACTLY STICK AROUND OR ACTUALLY SHOW MY FACE FOR MOST OF THE ORDEAL, BUT YOU EGBERT SHOULD HAVE NO FUCKING EXCUSE!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wait, karkat, that's not what i</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SO YEAH! THAT WHOLE THING HAPPENED, AND I CAME TO TERMS WITH WHATEVER THERE WAS TO COME TO TERMS WITH, WHICH WAS FUCKING *NOTHING*, AND THEN I GOT ON WITH THE ACTUAL IMPORTANT BUSINESS OF TRYING TO PREVENT THE WORLD FROM CRUMBLING!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHICH, NOW THAT WE'RE ON THE SUBJECT, IS *STILL FUCKING HAPPENING*!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I AM UTTERLY APPALLED THAT THIS IS AN INFO MORSEL I KEEP HAVING TO SPOONFEED DOWN YOUR WINDCHUTE EVERY FIVE SECONDS, JOHN, I REALLY AM.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I MEAN HOLY SHIT, NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR THIS!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND ONE THING I CAN SAY WITH ABSOLUTE IRONCLAD CERTAINTY IS THAT IF DAVE WERE HERE, HE WOULD SAY THE SAME THING!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SPEAKING OF WHICH, WHERE *IS* DAVE??</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I FEEL LIKE IF ANYONE COULD HAVE PREVENTED TODAY FROM DEVOLVING INTO A HEADLESS CLUSTERFUCK, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN... OKAY, MAYBE NOT HIM, BUT AT LEAST HE MIGHT HAVE HELPED DRAG YOU OUT OF YOUR DEPRESSIVE FUGUE A LITTLE SOONER!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: (oh shit.)</p> + </div> + <img id="gray1" class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0371.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NOT ONLY THAT, BUT MAYBE WITH BOTH OF US HERE WE COULD HAVE DISPENSED WITH THIS ENTIRE SORRY TOPIC ONCE AND FOR ALL, IF ONLY FOR YOUR BENEFIT!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH HI DAVE, JOHN SEEMS TO BE UNDER THE IMPRESSION THAT THE UNSPOKEN HISTORY BETWEEN US IS OF SUFFICIENT IMPORT THAT WE NEED TO HASH IT OUT THIS VERY SECOND IN FRONT OF THE BLASTED REMAINS OF HIS HOME!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: yo karkat that does seem to be a strange thing for my best friend john to be concerned about given that he has spent the past five years wallowing in the depths of deepest divorce fever</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: and especially since jade and i have meanwhile been working as part of your resistance with no complaints, but sure, we can brofist each other and arrange our limbs in an unambiguously platonic way</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: a way which is also flawlessly calculated to communicate to everyone present that here are two guys who are totally and unequivocally over each other</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: (oh god. you don't...)</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT SOUNDS LIKE A GREAT IDEA DAVE, AND WITH THAT MAYBE THAT WAY WE CAN WASH OUR TOUCH STUMPS OF THIS WHOLE ORDEAL AND NEVER HAVE TO SPEAK OF IT AGAIN!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WOULD YOU LIKE THAT, JOHN?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WOULD THAT SATISFY YOUR CRAVING FOR CATHARSIS ON THE SUBJECT OF DAVE??</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WELL WHY DON'T WE TRY IT THEN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IN FACT, WHY DON'T YOU CALL DAVE AND GET HIM OVER HERE RIGHT NOW!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: (oh my god...)</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0372.gif"> + <div id="gray2" class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: MAYBE WE SHOULD GET JADE TO COME AS WELL!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ):</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCK, WHY NOT INVITE FUCKING EVERYONE!!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHY NOT PRESS "PAUSE" ON THE RACE WAR FOR A MOMENT AND HAVE ONE HUGE FEELINGS JAM LAWNMEAL WHERE WE ALL PUBLICLY EXPATIATE OUR VARIOUS CONVOLUTED EMOTIONS.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FORGET PEACE TALKS, GET FUCKING *CROCKER* TO COME!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: MAYBE THE SIGHT OF A DAVEKAT RECONCILIATION IS THE SECRET KEY TO UNLOCKING THE PART OF HER BRAIN THAT STOPS HER FROM BEING A GENOCIDAL RACIST BITCH!!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HOW COULD WE HAVE POSSIBLY BEEN SO BLIND!!!!!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF GAMZEE WASN'T DEAD, YOU COULD HAVE INVITED HIM AS WELL!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HAHAHA, THAT'S OKAY, WE STILL HAVE A VERITABLE MENAGERIE OF PEOPLE WE KNOW WHO AREN'T DEAD.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ))))):</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ALL OF WHOM I AM SURE WILL BE SIMPLY DELIGHTED TO ATTEND WHAT WILL UNDOUBTEDLY BE THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT EVENT IN EARTH C'S BULLSHIT HISTORY.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF THIS IS WHAT IT TAKES, EGBERT, THEN I AM PREPARED TO DO IT!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DON'T THINK THAT I WON'T!!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF JUST FOR AN *INSTANT* IT WILL GET EVERYONE OFF MY CASE ABOUT THIS, I WILL STAND UP WITH DAVE IN FRONT OF THE ENTIRE ***FUCKING WORLD*** AND SOLEMNLY VOW THAT I DO NOT GIVE A SHIT!!!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: KARKAT!!!!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0373.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: ugh, fuck, this is just too much!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i thought you KNEW!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: KNEW WHAT???</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: dave's GONE, karkat!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: he's...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: he's dead.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0374.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: i didn't mean for you to find out like this at all, i thought...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean, i only heard about it yesterday, but i was convinced someone would have told you already!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: apparently one minute he was there, and the next...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: none of us even know how it happened, and it doesn't make any sense that he's dead, but he is.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: he is dead and he's not coming back.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT:</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: talk to me karkat, please.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: please talk to me karkat.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT:</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HE...</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0375.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HE DIDN'T EVEN SAY GOODBYE?</p> + </div> + <script 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Clown Logistics (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter1.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter3.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2019-12-24">12/24/2019</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 2. Clown Logistics</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0057.gif"> + <p>Minutes in the past, but not many, (Vriska) pockets John’s phone before she can worry too much about waiting for a reply from Terezi.</p> + <p>Wait, not John’s phone, she thinks. Her phone. Yeah. If she’s gonna hack it here on this piece of shit planet, she’s gonna need every break she can catch. It’s time to start staking some claims.</p> + <p>In the spirit of that, she looks back at Vriska, still politely leaning against the clown’s corpse, ignoring her. (Vriska) swallows, thankful to not have to verbalize her appreciation for the distance she was just granted.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">(VRISKA): So, a8out there 8eing two of us.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0058.gif"> + <p>Vriska grins up at her, shielding her eyes from the sun. She is a poised, lipstick’d reflection of the unkempt original. (Vriska) is suddenly acutely aware of the dirt ground into her clothes and face. She flexes her hand and the dried purple blood cracks and flakes.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISKA: What a8out it?</p> + <p class="vriska">(VRISKA): Yeah, I’m not feeling very parenthetical.</p> + <p class="vriska">(VRISKA): I’m gonna need to 8e Vriska again.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISKA: Fine 8y me, 8ut we can’t 8oth just go around 8eing Vriska.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISKA: If you want to keep Hanging Out, I mean. Which I assume you Do.</p> + <p class="vriska">(VRISKA): Duh!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISKA: That’s the Right Call.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISKA: So, Nickname me, 8itch. And make it Cute.</p> + </div> + <p>(Vriska) considers her options. She needs something good, but not TOO good.</p> + <p>What will her nickname be?</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0059.gif"> + <p>In her final act before shredding the parentheses like old skin, she extends her hand down to pull up her double.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Nice to meet you, Vrissy.</p> + </div> + <p>Vrissy smirks and takes Vriska’s hand, letting herself get pulled to her feet.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Fuck yeah, I Love it.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: So now that we have that locked down, what’s First on the list of Awesome Shit we’re gonna do Together?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well...I know I just got done telling you not to talk a8out it, 8ut we should pro8a8ly do something a8out this 8ody.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, I guess we shouldn’t just leave a dead 8eloved Religious Figurehead laying around in the 8ushes, even if he Sucks Shit.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Especially if he’s Rich Auntie Crocker’s Right Hand Clown.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well, What do you think????????? I don’t know shit a8out this place, and we need to move fast.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Know any good cullpits?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I told you already, I don’t ever get up to Anything nearly as Interesting as you did.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Till now ;;;;)</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Heh. Yeah.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Anyway, I have some People I can call. Hold on.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0060.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Hey, it’s Vrissy.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: w,, who,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Vriska?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, but Vrissy is a Thing now. Roll with it.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Okay, uh,, Vrissy,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We kinda Need a Ride</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: We,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah just some other people, no 8ig Deal.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ::::(</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Are we,, acquainted,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah you know them, in a Way.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I’m,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: What does that mean,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: What do you mean what does that mean? It means turn off the Fucking Autopilot and get to speeding on over here to Find Out ;]</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ::::)</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Okay, I’ll leave presently,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Oh,, where am I going,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah yeah, I’ll send you the address. See you Soon.</p> + </div> + <p>Vrissy puts the phone in her back pocket and settles her hand on her cocked hip.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: That was Tavros. He’s on his way.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0061.gif"> + <p>Vriska flinches instinctively. She’s still working on processing her most recent blast from the past. She’s not prepared for another.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Who?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh, right, yeah. Not the one you knew Back in the Day. This Tavros is Jane and Jake Crocker’s kid. He’s human.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: He’s got a Car and will do Wh8ver I Say, so he’s the Right Person to call.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Oh, okay.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Wait.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Unless he’ll rat us out to his mom????????</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Nah. He’ll get too much of a Kick out of seeing this dead Piece of Shit, don’t Worry.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0062.gif"> + <p>Vriska doesn’t worry, but she does pace. She has only done a few laps around the perimeter by the time the hovercar glides up silently.</p> + <p>Vrissy hates that ostentatious prick-mobile, mostly because it is not her ostentatious prick-mobile. But you do get what you pay for, and a rich kid’s mom’s attempt to buy his love may actually come in handy for something other than very quietly chauffeuring his friends around, now that actual spy shit seems like it is about to go down.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0063.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0064.gif"> + <p>He barely has time to shut the door before he spots Gamzee and yelps, flinging himself dramatically back against it.</p> + <p>Both Vriskas speak at once:</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hey, It’s cool, we’re cool, we just have to-</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Wait, I should introduce Vriska-</p> + </div> + <p>Tavros yelps louder.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: OH,,, ah, there appears to be two of you,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: And one less of,,, uh,,,, him,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: These are normal things you expect to happen, when you are picking up your kismesis and her,,,, ah,,, new friends,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Okay, so it’s like this: Uncle Gamzee’s Dead. 8eat up alt universe me--</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: HEY!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Who is VERY Cool and Sexy with her Eyepatch--</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Heyyyyyyyy.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: --Killed him, and we need your Wheels to hide the 8ody 8efore your Mom finds out and has her, I mean all of us, Murdered.</p> + </div> + <p>Tavros says nothing. His eyes flit from Vrissy to Vriska to Gamzee, and then shut. Everyone is still. Tavros’s thin chest rises and falls.</p> + <p>After a few beats, he propels himself off the car like a swimmer at the sound of a gun, his body plunging in a graceful arc toward his goal.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0065.gif"> + <p>His fists don’t do more than thunk a brief, ineffectual staccato against Gamzee’s ribcage, but the sound that rips from him is like years of suppressed screams, all unleashed in one reverberating howl of anguish. It nearly smothers the one small noise made by Tavros’ single kick to his dead stepclown’s head:</p> + <p>h o n k</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0066.gif"> + <p>Vrissy and Vriska don’t know fully what it is he is feeling, but they stay back and let him feel it. They don’t intervene until he stands up on his own, wiping his palms against the tears on his cheeks. Vrissy pats him solidly on the back.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Fuck that guy, am I right?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I am in no place to 8egrudge a man his cathartic ass-kicking moment, but that was a loud fucking scream.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: No kidding. My ears are STILL ringing from your 8ig attempt at breaking the sound 8arrier.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah, yeah. It was impressive, he loved kicking dead clown ass just like you thought, wh8tever.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: That’s all good, but the point is we need to hit the 8ricks 8efore someone comes over to try and award us with the loudest squealers award.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Yes, you’re quite right,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: the both of you</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Soooooooo, the trunk?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0067.gif"> + <p>Vrissy and Vriska get under each arm, with Tavros piloting his legs. He fumbles a bit, trying to lift his chin to make eye contact with his companions.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Pleasure to meet you,, Vriska,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: So sorry to have skipped that, um,, step,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I got, ah,,, bit caught up in the moment,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I appreciate your patience,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I would say “anytime,” but let’s just get through this and never move a corpse again, yeah?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Yes,</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0068.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0069.gif"> + <p>Tavros sighs. Sometimes, he thinks, you might have had different things in mind for your day, or your life. You may have wanted something else for your ol’ uncle clown, even if what that could even have even been is buried under too many faygo-sticky years to begin unearthing it. You may, he decides as he steps toward where Gamzee’s head has lolled backward against the bumper, just simply wake up one morning and have to play the final clown hand you have been dealt. And mayhap that clown hand is dead and in your trunk, and though you are not responsible for it being there, nor are you completely ready to deal with the emotional repercussions of its presence, you still have to figure out what to do with the physical and legal reality of it. And all that, with what feels like the eyes of the world on you, even if it is just the 9 eyes of your girlfriend and her alt-self.</p> + <p>He feels a sudden rush of hot, stifling...something. He refuses, this time, to call it fear. He’s got to cool down. Stay steady. He pulls his sweater over his head and tosses it into the trunk too.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0070.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0071.gif"> + <p>Not far away, another human kid is attending human school in the heart of the human kingdom. He is walking through the halls toward his final class of the day like he owns the place, which he does not. He answers his phone without checking to see who is calling.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0072.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: yo.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Hey</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: hey babe, what’s up?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Just wanted to keep you posted on the extremely Cool and Exciting Developments you’re missing out on!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: hit me.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: The OG Vriska is in town, and she and Tavros and I are driving around trying to find somewhere to stash Gamzee’s corpse.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Vriska killed him.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh, and call me Vrissy, now.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: fuck, vrissy, that sounds a lot cooler than precalc.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: y’all know where you’re gonna hide him?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: No, that’s what we’re trying to Figure Out. Got any Ideas?</p> + </div> + <p>Harry Anderson knows Vriska--Vrissy--pretty well. And he knows a prank when he sees one. His dad told him like six hundred times that he comes from a long line of japers, which he believes even though the biological relatives he knows from his father’s side aren’t exactly comedians. There is no possible way that this stuff Vrissy is saying isn’t horeseshit, but he is not about to crack. She is elevating her game, here, and he is not about to be left behind.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: you know it, girl.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i have like three i’m cooking up right now.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: just tell tavros to bring y’all by the school, and i’ll have it all worked out by the time you get here.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Fuck yeah!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I thought it might take more convincing to get you on 8oard. I’m glad to see you finally getting into the revolutionary spir8.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: anything for you, vris.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0073.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We’re here, what now????????</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0074.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ...</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: ...</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: ,,,</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0075.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: UGH what is taking him so long?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I find him slow to respond,,, typically,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, not to me.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Why are we even waiting for him? We can just meet him inside.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You said this was a schoolhive, yeah?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: We can just dump it in the inciner8or. That’s pro8a8ly what his plan was to 8egin with.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: The what????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: The inciner8or. Like, for 8odies??</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: At SCHOOL????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yes?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: It is somewhat pleasant to be reminded,,, in my darker moments,,,, that the grass is not really ever greener on Alternia,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh thank fuck he’s texting me 8ack.</p> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: sorry babe, i’m still in class.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: bring him around to the back door, by the gym.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i’ll meet you there when i can.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: don’t get caught ;*</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: When you can????????</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: That’s IT????????</p> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I should have known he was fucking with us.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: GOD he is such a Stupid 8astard.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Wait, isn’t he your m8sprit? I thought this sickly motherfucker over here was your kismesis?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh my god, PLEASE stop talking like my Mom right now, I can’t fucking Think Str8!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ok, you’re right, who cares a8out these guys. Let’s just get this clown in the school.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: This place is dangerous, you’re right, 8ut not Inciner8or Dangerous.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It’s human kingdom dangerous, Meaning dangerous for two living Trolls lugging around a dead one.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Tavros will 8e fine; he has Crocker Immunity, 8ut us...</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Also I don’t think Harry Anderson has a Real Plan.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Who cares? I’ve got this under control.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Anyway, I thought you wanted to do cool adventurous shit like me?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Here’s your chance.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Low fucking 8low.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: It’s not a 8low, it’s an offer.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Come on Tavros, let’s do this thing, she’ll come if she wants.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Tavros, don’t listen to her.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0076.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Righto,</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0077.gif"> + <p>The two of them struggle to manage the body between them. It was a lot easier with three.</p> + <p>Vrissy watches them from the passenger seat until it slides from their grip with 10 feet left to the fabled back door.</p> + <p>The back parking lot is empty, for now, but she knows it won’t stay that way. This is not going to end well, she can feel it. She can't tell if Tavros left because he was weak enough to be swayed by Vriska, or if it's because he's getting ballsy enough to enjoy telling Vrissy no. It pisses her off either way, and she can't lose that. Can’t lose him. And Vriska… her being around is something so new she doesn't know what to think about it yet, but if they die, she won't get a chance to figure it out. She sighs, pockets the keys, and opens the door.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0078.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Welcome 8ack, 8a8e.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I can’t stand watching you two fuck up this fucking 8ad.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Yes, please help us fuck up less,,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Gra8 his middle and let’s get moving.</p> + </div> + <p>They heave him up, stumbling only a little as they make it the rest of the way into the building.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0079.gif"> + <p>The halls are empty and heavy with anticipatory silence. There is only about an hour left in the school day, and the bored, restless energy shivers through the quiet in indiscernible whispers from behind closed classroom doors.</p> + <p>None of them know where they are going, but Vriska is leading the way, hunched and purposeful, Gamzee’s head against her shoulder, an arm around each horn like a yoke.</p> + <p>There is something incredibly reassuring, Tavros thinks, about someone who has absolute outward confidence in themselves. The soothing lull of following a simple direction is so overpowering it blots out the logical part of him that knows this is, perhaps, the most outlandishly stupid succession of decisions he has ever made. It also leaves a comforting buffer of reality between himself and Gamzee’s ugly pointy elf feet resting on his shoulder. But shucks, who knows, maybe there IS an incinerator. He’s homeschooled, so what does he know? And if anyone could be lucky enough to stumble upon one, it might as well be this Vriska.</p> + <p>Tavros is considering this when he hears something. It sounds like the creak of an underfunded public school door, but it could also have been a honk, or the beating of his own heart. He stops in his tracks.</p> + <p>Vriska and Vrissy do not.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0080.gif"> + <p>The aforementioned pointy shoe hooks Tavros by the neck on its way past him, pulling him to the floor. Vriska and Vrissy follow like bowling pins.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0081.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Shit!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I’m ever so sorry,, the shoe,,,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: SHHHHHHHH, 8oth of you quit yelling, you fucking am8teurs!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: They’re gonna hear us if we don’t get moving NOW.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ok, ok, i’m shushing. Let’s lift him up real high this time.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Yes,,, that sounds, uh,, safer,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ok, on my count, we’re all picking him up.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 1</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 2</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Please,, don’t count all the way to eight,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Tavros, what the Fuck, man!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We’re in a Hurry, what are you doing?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: It’s just,,, i think three would be more efficient,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8ut you just--</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: No, he’s right, I was going to count to eight.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Which would have taken quite a bit longer,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah, a8out as much time as this dum8shit conversation, so,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: NOW.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0082.gif"> + <p>They heave the body upward above their heads and keep walking, invigorated with fresh direction. Emotionally, anyway. They still do not have a physical direction in mind, which doesn’t stop them from marching onward.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0083.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: SHHHHHHHH</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: SHHHHHHHH</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Shh,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Carry on, carry on, look out for exit signs.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: How has no one come out into the halls yet?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: The reflection of high school I saw in the cinema has, uhh,,,, direly misrepresented the amount of shenanigans that transpire in the hallways,,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: This is shenanigans.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Fair point,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Where are we going, anyway?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Oh no,,, I thought you knew?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Keep looking for Harry Anderson. He’s In The Shit with us now, whether he likes it or not.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0084.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0085_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0085_2.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What now????????</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It’s stuck. Pull, you 8astards!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I’m pulling!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I hear movement, pull FASTER.</p> + </div> + <p>The body was already heavy and slippery enough. With the added fire safety deluge bearing down on them from every sprinkler in the hall, they have no chance. They scramble to hold on to him, but he is as slick as a greased pig and twice as unwieldy.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0086.gif"> + <p>The human students, trained to respond to a fire drill with speed and enthusiasm for missed class time, are out in the hall in a matter of seconds.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0087.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="imode">IMODE: Is it a real 🔥??</p> + <p class="silas">SILAS: I do declare, it’s trolls!</p> + <p class="imode">IMODE: Wait, is that...🤡</p> + <p class="avril">AVRIL: step back everybody this is some #viral #fucking #content.</p> + <p> </p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: A8andon ship!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Wh,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Ditch it, Tavros, we gotta move.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0088.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0089.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit Shit.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: We were fortunate this hall was, uh,,, empty,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: This is incredible, we’re fucking killing it!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I would not call this Piping Hot Turd of a Situation “killing it” in any way.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: They had already evacu8ed. That’s it. No skill of ours involved.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well, who made that alarm go off in the first place, hmm????????</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Us!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I thought this planet was gonna be a snoozefest desert devoid of 8oth agency and fun, but I am honestly having a gr8 time.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: We just wait til they all go home and sneak out! We’re nowhere near 8eat, yet.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: If those assholes have a lot of Followers, we might as well 8e.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0090_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0090_2.gif"> + <p>Jane Crocker doesn’t have a lot of time to waste on social media. Big society-altering business decisions don’t get made on a lax schedule. After a few dozen honk alerts, though, she allows herself a break to see what the hullabaloo is.</p> + <p>She sees it, and she can’t breathe. Her lover, her confidante, her clown of many years, being desecrated by a bunch of treasonous monsters.</p> + <p>Jane barely has time to register one gutting blow before another follows it. A sob chokes itself out of her.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Oh, Tavros, no!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: He wouldn’t--</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Tavros loves his Gamzee! Those rebels must have captured my sweet baby and corrupted his mind.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: My family! My entire family!</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: This cannot go unavenged.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0091_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0091_2.gif"> + <p>Jane then proceeds to have the rest of <a href="chapter1.html">this conversation we already read</a>.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0092.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0093.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0094.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0095.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: oh fuck</p> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter3.html">CHAPTER 3. How Are Your Feelings</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter3.html b/chapter3.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b947607 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter3.html @@ -0,0 +1,406 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 3. How Are Your Feelings (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter2.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter4.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-01-17">01/17/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 3. How Are Your Feelings</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0096.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0097.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0098.gif"> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>???</span> + <div>> i enter.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0099_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0099_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0099_3.gif"> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="jade">JADE: the prince’s power grows.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JESUS CHRIST!</p> + </div> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> the knight of blood falls.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0100.gif"> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="jade">JADE: i feel him resonate through the void.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCKING GREAT.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: dude can you chill for like even a single fucking second</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: also are you ok</p> + </div> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> karkat is characteristically appreciative of the alarm call.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0101_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0101_2.gif"> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH, PARDON THE FUCK OUT OF ME FOR OVERREACTING A LITTLE WHEN MY GOOD FRIEND "POSSESSED JADE" BUSTS INTO MY RESPITEBLOCK AT 5 AM!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NEXT TIME I’LL JUST PULL THE COVERS BACK AND LET HER CLIMB IN!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i am uninterested in that scenario.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GREAT! POSSESSED JADE ISN’T EVEN HORNY! HOW FUCKED UP IS THAT?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HOW DID YOU GET IN HERE?</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah i may be totally misunderstanding the intricacies of "next gen technology" designed by an idiot in microshorts</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but im pretty sure i locked that door</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i unlocked it with my mind.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: fuck</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FANTASTIC.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: the prince’s powers are growing, but so are mine.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WOW? COOL? AND YOU HAD TO COME IN HERE AT THE ASSCRACK OF THE MORNING TO TELL US THIS?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LIKE YOU DON’T FLOAT AROUND LIKE A CREEPY PIECE OF SHIT ALL DAY AS IT IS?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ...</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH, IS THAT ALL? NOTHING ELSE TO SAY?</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: karkat its fine</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: who cares</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH. YOU’RE RIGHT.</p> + </div> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> sleep is abandoned, coffee saught.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0102_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0102_2.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT’S NOT LIKE WE ACTUALLY HAVE ANYTHING TO WAKE UP FOR.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GO BACK TO BED.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: no dude im up fuck it</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i want coffee</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCK! FINE! FUCK IT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I NEED TO USE THE GAPER ANYWAY.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: oh me too</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DON’T FOLLOW ME.</p> + </div> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> the rogue is also awake.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0103.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: oh what up</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: its a whole ass pajama party up in here</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: couldnt sleep??</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JADE WOKE US UP BY BEING CREEPY.</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: oh</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: jade why did u do that</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH SHIT, THERE SHE IS! I DIDN’T EVEN HEAR HER FOLLOW US!</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: sometimes a girls just got to get her drift on i guess</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: it be like that</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I PREFERRED WHEN ALL SHE DID WAS FLOAT AROUND AND POINT AT SHIT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AT LEAST THAT WAS QUIET.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yall want coffee</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: sure</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH, THANKS.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0104.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: hate to give it up to venture capitalism but this coffee is EONS better than the garbage we had on the meteor</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: this ship is maybe the dumbest thing ive ever looked at but its a give and take right</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: maybe u just developed a taste for it</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: i used to think coffee tasted like ass but drinkin it was another thing i felt like my mom woulda done</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: turns out rose drinks tea and i stockholmed my own dumb butt into liking this addictive bean juice</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: well i mean who knows what she drinks now</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: dirk probs tossed the coffee machine out the space window right away</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: dude doesnt "believe" in "substances"</p> + </div> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> the prince is contemplated for a moment in silence.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0105.gif"> + <div class="chat dead-jade"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHY ARE YOU UP ANYWAY?</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: well i wasnt but then somebody screamed like a rooster boned a teapot and had a noisy lovechild</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah thats basically accurate</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCK YOU.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe if youre lucky</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT JOKE STOPS BEING FUNNY WHEN WE’VE ACTUALLY</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: UH</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IS THERE MILK?</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: lmao</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: in the fridge</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: wheres kanaya</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: idk</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: sleepin i hope</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: last time i saw her she was on the second floor</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: no</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: the third floor observation deck</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: this place is huge</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: PLEASE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT’S MAYBE A TENTH THE SIZE OF THE METEOR.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah dude but that was basically a city</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: this is more like a castle</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: a castle of idk</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: twenty something ennui</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: anybody hungry</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: i was thinkin about alchemizing some pancakes</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: or maybe eggs</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: they all basically taste the same at the end of the day i think alchemized food is like eighty percent imagination</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: but both of you barely eat and its making me anxious</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: damn thanks mom</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i mean</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: shit</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: dad</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: roxy</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: fuck sorry im tired</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: haha its ok</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: dont worry about it</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: okay but just because our relatives turned evil doesnt mean we have to act like total animals</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: we can still try to respect each others identities and shit</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: anyway im gonna go check on kanaya</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: possessed jade dont follow me</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i am fine where i am.</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: cool</p> + </div> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> the knight of time seeks a sylph...</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0106.gif"> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> ...and finds her, momentarily.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0107.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0108.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: you ever feel like our whole lives are eventually gonna end up like this</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: just blasting through space on a sweeps long journey to ""somewhere"" chasing after or running from some vague enemy thats sometimes a god modded pet dog and sometimes your dad</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: without the faintest fucking idea of whats going to happen when we get there</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: thats a little specific but you know what i mean</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0109.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Hello Dave</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: sup</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: am i buggin you</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: do you want me to leave you to it or</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Not Particularly Now That Youre Here</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: But Shouldnt You Be Asleep</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: shouldnt you</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Need Less Sleep Than I Used To</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Less Food Too Which Is Fortunate For The Rest Of You</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: oh right</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i always forget about the vampire thing because youre already an alien</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and if somebody tried to sit me down and get me to watch a movie about a vampire alien id be like</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: come on pick a genre</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: except id watch it anyway because lets be honest the only person whod ever try to get me to watch something like that would be karkat</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and if he can get me to watch serendipity he can get me to watch anything</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but you get what im saying</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Yes</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: rose even told me</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: shit</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: sorry</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Its Alright To Say Her Name</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i just dont want to remind you of that shit if i can avoid it</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: You Arent Reminding Me Of Her As I Rarely Think Of Anything Else</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Close My Eyes And I See Her</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Keep Them Open And I See Her</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Well I See Space And The Corner Of My Shoe Right Now</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: But Her Too</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Shes There In The Glint Of Fluorescence Shining Off The Shoe</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Shes Out There Somewhere In The Sea Of Stars</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Which Just Reminds Me Of One Of The Nursery Stories Shed Reserved To Read To Young Broods Of Grubs Back Then</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: oh huh</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i still kind of have a hard time picturing rose reading to kids</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe a dick thing to say but she doesnt seem like the type</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Understand</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Its One Thing To Come Into The Responsibilities Of Adulthood Yourself</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Another To Dwell On Those You Were Once Close To Struggling With Similar Pressures</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Growing Up So To Speak</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Its Strange</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so what was the story</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0110.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Oh Its A Wriggler Story About A Young Prince And The Beloved Flower He Loved And Lost</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: flower</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: like a plant</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Its A Fairytale Dave</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: right</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: A Singular Wild Rose He Failed To Cherish When He Had Her</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And His Journey Of Discovering What She Meant To Him All Along</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Culminating In A New Quest To Find Her And Win Her Back</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: The Story Comments On The Nature Of Friendship</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Of Course In Turn Love</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: How Once They Connect There Is No Distance Or Circumstance That Can Seperate Them</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: How The Worlds In Each Ones Mind Take On Contours Shaped By Their Memories Of The Other</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Places And Moments And Orbiting Passersby Becoming More and More Entangled In The Context Of Their Mutual Affections</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Such As With A Garden Calling To Mind An Engagement Once Declared There</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Or Something To That Fucking Effect</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: that seems kind of wack for a kids story</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Its Possible I Am Projecting Slightly In This Specific Circumstances</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: It Was Just A Metaphor</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: But In A Way I Feel As If It Is the Greater Universe Trying To Tell Me Something</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: It May Simply Stem From My Longing To See Her Again And How Much Is Indicative Of Something More Sinister</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: She Is A Goddess Of Light And The Only Of Her Kind We Know Is Alive After All</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Maybe Shes Wrested Dominion Of The Entire Concept In All Its Appearances Within This Frame Of Reference</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Or Within My Personal Frame Of Reference At Least</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Made Them Her Own In Some Strange Way</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: So I Cant Help But See Her When I See It At All</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Whether Its A Star Or a Lightbulb</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: They All Just Leave Her Burnt Into My Mind Like The Blazing Imprint Of An Afterimage</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i mean it sounds like you think its BECAUSE shes a god like shes wielding some kind of cosmic power over you</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but if it was really true love or w/e</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: would you even know the difference</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Hmm</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Guess I Wouldnt</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: would you want to for that matter like isnt feeling that strongly connected kind of how youd want it to be anyway</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i think its how id want it at least</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: can i sit down</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Of Course</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Its Not My Observation Deck</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0111.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: cool</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: sorry i know you say you got your badass monster powers but kanaya you look tired as hell</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: not that im tryna psyche you or whatever but youre waxing poetic in the dark which i guess is maybe on brand but still</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: kinda worried about you sis</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: You Dont Have To Call Me That Anymore</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: In Fact I Wish You Wouldnt</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: It Really Hasnt Ever Been Accurate</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah well im pretty sure rose didnt serve you divorce papers before she left on her fucked up father/daughter rp</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: so youre still my sister</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i mean you could always decide to divorce her yourself but i doubt youre going to find a lawyer in space</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: unless terezi is lurking in the vents somewhere and now that i bring that up its actually not out of the question so im kind of gonna be thinking about that one for a while</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but yeah this whole situation blows</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: You And Karkat Didnt Have To Come With Me</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Know You Have Your Own Lives And Your Own Matespritship</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: no offense dude but yeah we did</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i wasnt going to let the only family i have left fly off without me</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Roxy Didnt Have To Come Either</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: debatable</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: also i dont just mean roxy did you not just hear my heartwarming insistence that i think of you as my sister</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and yeah roxy is rad but our relationship is pretty fucking convoluted if were being totally honest</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: youre the only person i know whos still basically the same as when i met you</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0112.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0113.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: no stay with me here</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: i know people grow and change and shit its dumb to think you havent improved or whatever since we met ten years ago</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but rose is gone</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and roxy isnt gone but he isnt really the same as he was before</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe thats shitty of me to say and im like leaning in to my own internal biases</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but talking to him feels different</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and karkat is the same big fucking tool hes always been but our shit is definitely</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: uh</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: different than it was before</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but yeah you i can always still recognize</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Am Quite Easy To Locate In The Dark</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: heh</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Thank You</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: for what</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: For Reminding Me Why Im Here</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: cool</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Since We Are Sharing In This Human Emotion Called Friendship</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: What About You</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: what about me what</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: How Are Your Feelings</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0114.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dave">DAVE: oh those</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: yeah theyre pretty good</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: not much to say on that front</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: except sometimes your best friend disappears and your other best friend goes into a ghost coma and your third best friend fucks off to space with your dad</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: the dude youve spent the last 7 years convincing yourself isnt an egomaniacal anime villain</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: and who isnt actually lying in wait to completely decimate your life and your emotions and shit</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: anyway i forgot what my point was but yeah im fine</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: though what the fuck does that even mean anymore for any of us</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe it was naive to think that a bunch of twenty something trauma victims could run a society</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe this is better</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: at least this way we cant fuck it up worse</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: cool how earth c existed for centuries then we show up and manage to ruin society in seven fucking years</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe dirk actually did the smartest thing he could</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: fucking left</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Perhaps</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: But He Did Leave Arguably The Two Worst Possible People In Charge When He Did</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: man i guess</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but who knows maybe jane will turn out to be a great president</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: maybe without dirks corrupting influence jakes ass will become a symbol of peace and interspecies harmony</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: at least everyone can agree on something</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: shit how does this always happen</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: every serious conversation i have inevitably falls apart into riffing on a casual acquaintances ass</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Not To Suggest Anything Untoward</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: But You Appear To Be The Unifying Component In All Of These Scenarios</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: could be</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: but all that aside i really do think were better off out here</p> + <p class="dave">DAVE: at least i am</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0115.gif"> + <div class="command alt-callie"> + <span>Alt. Calliope wrote:</span> + <div>> meanwhile...</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0116.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: sooooo</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: do u want pancakes</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: i can make pancakes</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DO YOU THINK HE’S OKAY?</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: who</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DAVE.</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: idk you know him better than i do</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: actually i think u know him better than anybody might know anybody??</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: you guys are like the real fuckin deal</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I GUESS??</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WAIT, WHY THE FUCK AM I EVEN ASKING? HE’S OBVIOUSLY NOT FINE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ARE ANY OF US? ARE YOU?</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: not rly</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: EXACTLY.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: KANAYA BARELY EVEN TALKS, CALLIOPE WON’T LEAVE THEIR CABIN, JADE JUST FLOATS AROUND LIKE A CREEPY BALLOON THAT’S MOSTLY MADE OF HAIR.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE REALLY FUCKED UP THING IS I MIGHT BE THE MOST OKAY OUT OF ALL OF US, WHICH IS HOW YOU KNOW SHIT HAS REALLY GONE GLOBES UP.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ALL OF YOU LOST YOUR FAMILY. I JUST LOST SOME PEOPLE I SORT OF KNOW.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE, AND THANK GOD FOR THAT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCK, CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW IT WOULD HAVE SHOOK OUT IF JAKE HADN’T SHIT HIMSELF ONSTAGE?</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: prbly way less smelly</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I DON’T KNOW WHY I LET DAVE TALK ME INTO IT. JESUS CHRIST.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NOTHING GOOD HAS EVER COME OF ME BEING IN CHARGE OF JACK DICK.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: TO BE HONEST, I THINK JANE WINNING THE PRESIDENCY MIGHT HAVE BEEN THE BEST THING TO EVER HAPPEN TO ME?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: EVERY TIME I’VE EVER TRIED TO "LEAD" ANYTHING IT’S BLOWN UP IN MY FACE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: DID YOU KNOW THAT WHEN I WAS A WRIGGLER I SERIOUSLY THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO BE THE GUY TO LEAD ALL OF MY FRIENDS TO GLORY?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I LITERALLY FOUGHT PEOPLE FOR CONTROL OF THE TEAM, AND WHAT ENDED UP HAPPENING WAS LITERALLY EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY FRIENDS BESIDES KANAYA DIED.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ACTUALLY, SHE DID DIE!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FUCK!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I’M ZERO FOR ZERO!</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: ur kinda an intense dude anybody ever tell u that</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NO.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0117.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: MY POINT IS, THIS IS THE BEST POSSIBLE SCENARIO FOR ME. I DON’T EVEN LIKE EARTH THAT MUCH.</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: well ur lucky i guess</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NO, I’M NOT--FUCK. I’M NOT TRYING TO BRAG ABOUT IT!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I’M JUST SAYING, DON’T WASTE YOUR SYMPATHY ON ME.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AGAINST PRETTY MUCH ALL ODDS, AND DESPITE ME NOT DESERVING ANY OF IT, I ENDED UP GETTING PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING I WANTED.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OVER AND OVER AGAIN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SOMETIMES IT ALMOST FEELS LIKE WHATEVER SLATHERING MONSTROSITY OF A COSMIC HELLBEAST THAT PUT ALL THIS SHIT INTO MOTION...ACTUALLY LIKES ME?</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: fucked up if tru</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WE WERE IN THE MIDDLE OF A LITERAL UNIVERSE-SHATTERING WAR FOR THE CONTINUATION OF OUR RACES, AND DAVE AND I JUST SPENT THREE YEARS CLIMBING UP EACH OTHER’S NOOKS AND PLAYING VIDEO GAMES. AND I GUESS ALSO SAVING PARADOX SPACE.</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: so what ur saying is love can bloom even on the battlefield</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I GUESS.</p> + <p class="roxy">ROXY: so...u want pancakes?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0118.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH. OKAY.</p> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter4.html">CHAPTER 4. The Contest</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter4.html b/chapter4.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..864afd0 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter4.html @@ -0,0 +1,489 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 4. The Contest (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter3.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter5.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-02-15">02/15/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 4. The Contest</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0119.gif"> + <p>Light-years away...</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0120.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0121.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0122.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0123.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0124.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Are you finished posing dramatically out there?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I think Terezi wants a turn.</p> + </div> + <div class="command rose"> + <span>Rose:</span> + <div>> Rose: Enter.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0125.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: She's more than welcome. I've had my fill.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Feels good, doesn't it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Now get over here, we’ve got business to discuss.</p> + </div> + <div class="command rose"> + <span>Rose:</span> + <div>> Rose: Render yourself more symbolically this instant.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0126.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Terezi, you too.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO TH4NKS 1M GOOD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1N F4CT, NOW TH4T W3R3 H3R3, 1 C4NT 1M4G1N3 4NYTH1NG WORS3 TH4N S1TT1NG DOWN W1TH YOU TWO FOR 4NOTH3R L1TTL3 CH4T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOUV3 RU1N3D TH3 V3RY CONC3PT OF T4LK1NG FOR TH3 R3ST OF MY L1F3</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Oh come on, it wasn't really all that bad, was it?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Dirk may be completely insufferable,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: (Thanks.)</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: But we had some pretty good times over the course of the journey, didn't we?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M STRUGGL1NG TO TH1NK OF 4NY</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Oh, how you wound me.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3 Y34RS OF 4N1M3 PLOT 4N4LYS1S 1S 3NOUGH TO TURN 4NY R3L4T1ONSH1P SOUR</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Alright, that's fair. The anime was rather tedious.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: (Wow.)</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: But I posit that it could have been much, much worse.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: At the very least, none of us succumbed to substance abuse. Or re-succumbed, I guess I should say.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: The perks of not having an appetite or a liver, in my case.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: In yours... I'm actually not sure. Perhaps the underlying cognitive dissonance or trauma you were originally trying to distract yourself from is no longer a going concern?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Or...</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: No, wait.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: That's not right.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I'm thinking of a different Terezi.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Or maybe I'm thinking of a different me?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Maybe the different me is thinking of a different Terezi, and I'm just witnessing the thought happen as a bystander.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: It's much the same thing at this point.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: ...</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: And I suppose I'm also prematurely ruling out the potential of anime functioning as an abusable substance.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: In which case I've got very bad news for all of us.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: We may need to formulate a twelve step plan.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Let me know if you show any signs of withdrawal.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ROS3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH MY GOD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: MY PO1NT COULDNT H4V3 B33N M4D3 4NY MOR3 OBV1OUS 1F YOU S4T ON 1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3 M4Y B3 1N COMPL3T3 4GR33M3NT 4BOUT D1RK B31NG 4 T3D1OUS NOOKW1P3,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: (We are?)</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: (Shhh.)</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT, N3WSFL4SH</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU 4R3NT 4CTU4LLY 4NY B3TT3R!!!!!!!! >8O</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SL33P W1THOUT SOPOR DO3SNT COM3 34SY TO MY SP3C13S, 4ND Y3T 1 SOM3HOW M4N4G3D TO SP3ND 4 GOOD CHUNK OF OUR THR33 Y34R JOURN3Y UNCONSC1OUS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4TS HOW FUCK1NG T3D1OUS TH3 TWO OF YOU 4R3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND TH3 WORST P4RT 1S TH4T N31TH3R OF YOU 4CTU4LLY H4V3 TH3 D3C3NCY TO DO 4NYTH1NG L3G1T1M4T3LY 4WFUL</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU JUST S1T TH3R3 4ND DRON3 ON 4ND ON, T4LK1NG 4BOUT TH1NGS TH4T DONT M4TT3R 4ND 4SK1NG QU3ST1ONS TH4T DONT H4V3 4NSW3RS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3R3 ON 4 N3W PL4N3T, S331NG TH1NGS WH1CH H4V3 POSS1BLY N3V3R B33N 3XP3R13NC3D B3FOR3, 4ND 4LL YOU C4N TH1NK TO DO 1S HOL3 UP 1N 4 C4V3 4ND R3GURG1T4T3 COMPL3T3LY PO1NTL3SS BULLSH1T</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: It's called "philosophizing".</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3LL 1T SHOULD B3 1LL3G4L 4S F4R 4S 1M CONC3RN3D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4RGH</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Hm?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: STOP *C4LL1NG* H3R TH4T!! >:[</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK 1M DON3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SCR3W YOU BOTH</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M GO1NG TO GO 4ND 1NTRODUC3 SOM3 PL4NTS TO TH3 TROLL 3MOT1ON W3 C4LL3D T3RROR</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: If you change your mind about the philosophy,</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 WONT</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ok.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0127.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That was... odd.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Even by Terezi's standards.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: She’s fine.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Doubtless. But wouldn't it be best to wait for her to return before discussing our future plans?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Whether she likes it or not, she is a part of this goofy expedition.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: She isn’t a part of this, though.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: A part of "this"?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0128.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You mean she isn’t a god.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: She isn’t a ruler.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: She isn’t suited for it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And we are?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0129.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Come on. You know that we are.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But I think I can present a pretty convincing case if need be.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So you wanted to have a dialectic about it first, just to be sure.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm game.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Where shall our allegory begin?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Beg pardon.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Oh come on. The cave?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I have to say I’m a little disappointed in you. Three years, and not once did I witness you replacing any parts of the ship.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: How are we to jerk ourselves off philosophically if you don’t lean into your clumsy allusions?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's a fair question.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But since the name you suggested was nothing more than a very juvenile play on words, I can’t say you’ve got much ground to stand on.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: What’s juvenile about The Kant?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Nothing.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: At least, not when you say it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It’s not my fault you sound like a gay cowboy.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sigh.</p> + </div> + <p>See what I have to deal with?</p> + <p>And yes, I’m still here. For the time being I want to keep things brief, narratively speaking.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Look, we can have this argument later.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I’ll pencil it in.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: For now, we need to talk about Deltritus.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0130.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'd like to suggest a preliminary topic of discussion.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Shoot.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Or rather, a point of constructive criticism.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That name.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yes.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It absolutely blows.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ok.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In the interest of open-minded discourse I'd like to counter by saying that I think it's pretty dope.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But it's fine, we don't gotta settle for that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Do you have any better suggestions?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: No.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm simply making an observation.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sigh.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You could at least come up with an alternative.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Making shit is hard.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I think having a good name for this planet is an important first step in telling its story.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Which is what we're here to do.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I agree. Names are potent symbols after all.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I just think we have a different understanding of what a good name entails in this instance.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Huh.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: To be clear, I think it's the perfect name for this place.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's just that when it comes to habitable planets, I think there is some unwritten law of our reality which dictates that the names should be either boring...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Like "Earth"?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...or insufferable.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Like "Alternia" or "Beforus".</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Or "Deltritus", alright, I get it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Insufferably boring gets you bonus points.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I think that's partly the point of it. It's a name to be lived on. It becomes a kind of furniture, so to speak.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Or I suppose you could see it as a place of origin, the absolute zero-point of growth. Kind of like a family name.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: A name some people are always trying to leave behind, because it's the only way to be sure that one is moving at all.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's the dirt beneath your feet.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So I suppose, in a way, every planet is Earth.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Right.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We're not going to call this planet Earth as well, though.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: No, that would be far too cliche. Quadruply so, even.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Deltritus it is.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's amazing how you managed to both shit on my idea and make it seem a lot better justified in hindsight.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Well, of course.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm an author.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I ply my trade on well-justified bullshit.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Anyway, to business. Again.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The point is, we will be building intelligent life on this planet from scratch. That was one of our key mistakes with Earth C. We should have started our guidance from the very beginning, instead of letting it grow organically in our image.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I’m not sure I agree, but go on.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No please, knock yourself out. We stayed on topic for a few seconds and I'd hate to make it a habit.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Our own world was abandoned by its gods. Or, I suppose, its gods never reached it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The trolls beat their game, but were unable to actually claim their reward and take their places in its pantheon. In a sense, our creators abandoned us.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And while I can’t say that our world developed “well”, I don’t think it would have been better off being “guided”. Especially considering who would have been doing the steering.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Although I guess you can’t prove that kind of negative statement.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Anyway, what exactly are you proposing?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ever heard of the Watchmaker analogy?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Yes.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Damn, ok.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Humor me anyway.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Say you’re an alien and you’re walking on a beach.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: An Earth beach, if that wasn’t clear. You’re an alien who has never come in contact with the human race before.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: So say you’re an alien and you find a pocket watch on the beach.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You've never seen anything like it before, so you pick it up and open it and try to figure out how it works.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You see all of the gears moving smoothly, all of the pieces fitting together in a flawless, interlocking pattern.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Looking at the face, you realize that it keeps perfect time.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You, the alien, ask yourself: how could something so perfect, with a flawless form suited to its task, have come into being?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And, so the argument goes...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Someone created it. Time needed to be told, so a craftsman made something to tell it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Exactly.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: This analogy always struck me as extremely contrived.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah that's fair. I mean, how many fuckin' pocket watches does one usually stumble across on the ground randomly.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Fuck it, who stumbles across a pocket watch *anywhere*.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This isn't the goddamn 1800s.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That point in history when people were famously tripping over errant clockwork every time they went outside.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And don't forget, there are aliens in this version of history too.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I think I might have made up that part, though. Probably wasn't part of the original.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Although, considering the version of Earth's history I was familiar with, I guess the aliens end up being the most believable thing in the whole setup.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I suppose, in a way, this argument's own existence fulfils the same philosophical premise as the analogy itself.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's a scenario perfectly suited to its function, which is to convince you of the existence of intelligent design.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: One that is so unlikely to have arisen by chance that the presence of an artificer is the natural conclusion.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's this weird spiral of a concept, really.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's creators all the way down.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Haha, yeah.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But I guess my response here would be that this is an argument in favor of intelligent design being a factor in the creation of a universe.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's not an argument that intelligent design should be a factor in the creation of a universe. That's a question of (*shudder*) morality.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: True.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But if intelligent design is a reality--and I think our experiences indicate that yeah, there’s a pretty good chance--then wouldn’t failing to continue it be an abdication of our responsibility?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: If we can order this world and we fail to, is that really any better than smashing the watch ourselves?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You don’t want to be responsible for screwing it up, and I get that. But failing to act isn’t any more morally justifiable than acting wrongly.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So it's really a moral argument that you're making.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It sounds like we've detoured into the Trolley problem here.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Or maybe derailed is a more appropriate descriptor?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I hope nobody is tied to the tracks of this conversation, at least.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Rose.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You're avoiding the question.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You came to this planet. You saw it in your mind's eye and chose to come here.</p> + </div> + <p>More or less.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Wasn't that because, on some level, you wanted to have a hand in its future?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Maybe.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: At least, I think so?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's a bit hard to weigh my motivations for coming against the reality of what we're proposing to do here.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: In the sense that I'm not sure quite how to even go about making that kind of calculation.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I want to create something wholly new. Something that's ours.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But I can't help but wonder: what right do the two of us specifically have to do that?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We won the game though.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We're literally fucking Creators.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We have as much of a right as anyone possibly could.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm not sure I feel good about putting that victory on my resume.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Especially not since so much luck was involved, while the conclusion was simultaneously determined from the very beginning.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: A paradox which is typical of the complete mess that is our lives, and which possibly makes no sense to anyone but us.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I suppose that's the point I'm trying to make.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We quite possibly know more about our reality than anyone else ever could, which you could say makes us plenty qualified.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But it's that selfsame knowledge that tells me that maybe nobody could ever be "qualified" for this kind of creative endeavor.</p> + </div> + <p>She's avoiding the question again. It's amazing how one can technically have the maximum amount of metaphysical personal awareness possible, and still not notice these sorts of things. It's stuff like this that makes me wonder sometimes whether there's anything about myself that I'm missing. Then I throw that wonder in the garbage can and turn the incinerate setting on.</p> + <p>That was a little bit of ironic self-deprecation on my part. I know that recently I've made a habit of simply discarding things that are pointlessly difficult or irritating, or if you're so inclined, "uncomfortable". It's something I learned in order to cope with... well, never mind. It's better this way, and I'm not gonna air my "trauma" or whatever in front of all y'all. The point is that knowing about it doesn't mean that I don't do it, and nor would it necessarily make it easier for me to stop if I wanted to. Personal failings, if you can call this one, don't work that way. I would know.</p> + <p>I also know Rose is probably just the same. She sees it happening and can't stop it, and takes a strange pride in knowing herself so well. And at the same time, she feels hurt to be so utterly predictable to herself. But that's a pain that you have to lean into when presented with the sum total of all possible self-knowledge.</p> + <p>I suppose this actually kinda answers the question about ultimate self-awareness? Damn. Did we just identify and then immediately solve a mystery in the space of a few paragraphs? I think we mighta. Good work us.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Even so, I want to do this.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I have to want it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: How could I not, after everything we gave up to make it happen?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Walking away at this point would be...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Well. Regardless, we don't have the option.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The Theseus is totalled.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I almost want to make a joke about us not getting it insured.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Though I'm worried it might indicate what Dave would call early-onset responsible adult syndrome.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's easy for him to make fun of us. He's immune.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Possibly. He certainly wasn't showing any symptoms at his last checkup.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But that was well over three years ago at this point.</p> + </div> + <p>Rose looks off into space, seeming to exist at a very great distance for a while. And then, at a perfectly calculated moment, she chuckles quietly, almost mournfully to herself.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm rambling again.</p> + </div> + <p>Told you so.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's ok.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm sure there was some good reasoning buried fuck deep in there somewhere.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Future archaeologists will unearth it eventually.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It sounds like you've made up your mind though.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Maybe.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm...</p> + </div> + <p>She hesitates again. "Not sure?" Oh c'mon, Rose. Yes, you are. You know this is what you want to do. More than that, you know that it’s the *right* thing to do. Might as well get it over with.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Fine.</p> + </div> + <p>Excellent.</p> + <p>What? Don't look at me like that. She was already on board with it in all but name, and we both know it. So why waste our time. You’ve got better things to do, and as of right now, so do Rose and I. I cordially invite you all to fuck off with your judgemental attitude, by which I mean fuck off right back here because we've still got important exposition to deal with.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You mentioned playing a game together.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I take it that this is involved somehow.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Bingo.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And I take it you have a format of play in mind as well?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yup.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: So, I guess the basic premise is: yeah, we could establish a new civilization on Deltritus. Cook up a new freakish alien species and steer them towards playing the game at a distance using the command terminal.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It would certainly be a challenging application of our combined skills.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But it doesn't strike me as being all that fun by itself.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: For clarity’s sake, the second “game” you're referring to here is the game that we played ten years ago?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Sburb. Or Sgrub, I guess. Whatever it’ll be called this time around.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah. That's the Game. Gotta be careful with those capitals.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The game between the two of us is going to be different.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I propose that we turn this into a contest of sorts.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Each of us takes responsibility for creating our own, separate species, each with their own design, society and culture.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Then we pit them against one another to see which will ultimately play the Game.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: For the love of god, please let’s call it something else.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: If only for the sanity-fraying memories of memes long past.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's our culture you're talking about.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Have some goddamn respect.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Actually, it was my culture. I think it's more accurate to say that you appropriated it, 400 years later.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You're right, I'm sorry.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Meme-a culpa.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I regret everything.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0131.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Bullshit aside, that's the contest I'd like to propose.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Two gods, two species, one copy of the Game.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We have a lot of time to kill before it's ready to play. Might as well have some fun in the meantime.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I’m intrigued.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's good. Intrigued is good.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I have a few questions before we begin.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: First and most pressing: how do you propose we go about doing this? What are our raw materials?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Unless you’re planning on giving me a rib, I’m not sure what we are going to work from.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's fair enough. There doesn't appear to be anything in the way of animal life on this planet for us to use.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But that's not important. We've got all the raw material we need already.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Quite literally, in fact.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We're going to make the new species out of us.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I... see.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don't worry, it doesn't imply actually breaking ourselves down into usable matter or anything like that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What I mean is that we have two humans' worth of genetic material to start from.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And, more importantly, the technology to use that material to synthesize something new.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So ectobiology, then.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's part of it, yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Let's take this into the lab.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The lab.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's just another fucking cave, ok?</p> + </div> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk and Rose:</span> + <div>> Dirk and Rose: Proceed to lab.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0132_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0132_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0132_3.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: This cave has a lab-like ambiance, I’ll give it that. And I’ve seen a few labs in my time.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sweet. It's got the Lalonde witticism of approval.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No honor could be higher.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I’m sure I could have come up with something better if I wasn’t still internally reeling at the prospect of us becoming our own biblical progenitors.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The old bearded man in the sky *wishes* he had one of these babies though.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: All he had was heterosexuality and a very long con.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Although I guess they're both essentially the same thing.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Oh shit.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: There's something so delicious about the two of us being the ones to populate an entire planet from scratch.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The irony doesn't get much sweeter.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: How quickly you learn, my child.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I am so proud of you.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Anyway, that horseshit aside,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It turns out that basically all of the equipment that Sburb gave us can be integrated into one device, with the ability to perform both alchemical and ectobiological functions.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The idea is pretty simple. We each contribute our own genetic sequences in the form of paradox slime, and then use it as a base to graft new material onto, using alchemy.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Hm.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Doesn't that strike you as a little...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You know.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Incestuous slurry-adjacent.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Oh.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That shouldn't be an issue.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We're each going to be keeping our slime to ourselves.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: How courteous.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In any case, after the base material is collected and the alchemical mix is finalized, we rapidly accelerate the development of the synthesized life forms to a point at which they can form a society of sorts.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So in theory, what the Mayor and his associates did on Earth C, but just larger in scope.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Instead of staying within the framework of a species that already exists.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And here, we won't be waiting thousands of years for the development to happen in real time.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This plays to our advantage in more ways than one. For one thing, it's pretty clear that we aren't gonna get this right on the first try.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I've been conceiving of this as a long game of many individual moves.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Each of us building and advancing in response to the concepts thrown out by the other.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Think of it as collaborative worldbuilding.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: All those DnD nights on the meteor finally turn to my advantage.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Ok, I think I understand the premise well enough.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Why don’t you start things off.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Roll the first die.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Alright, sweet.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0133_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0133_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0133_3.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: First thing's first, getting ahold of myself.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: There's about fifteen different unfunny jokes we could make about that but let's just fucking chill for once in our goddamn lives.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Agreed.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And I’ll make no mention of you sucking yourself in any capacity.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: God shitting damn it.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0134_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0134_2.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Next step is adding mutations.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We can use any old shit for this. Literally any captchalogueable object can be added into the mix by inserting its card into one of the slots here.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And by using a combination of ANDs, ORs and so on, we can apply the science of alchemy to that of ectobiology. Alchemical biology, if you will.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In the original process of breeding the Genesis Frog, we'd be doing kind of the opposite. Screening out distortions in his divine genetic waveform, so to speak.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Here, we're adding noise deliberately.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Kind of like genetic SBaHJification.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Inside of this machine is one big artificial genetic infidelity bonanza.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Dave would approve.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0135_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0135_2.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Hm?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sup.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I thought you had to punch the cards to use them in the shunt slots.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I recall devising a sequence of analogies for the process in my walkthrough, once upon a time.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Hardly my best work, but the principles were sound.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No, you're right.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I was being politely self-effacing, Dirk. You didn't have to agree with me.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: About the holes in the cards, I mean.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm not really sure why we don't have to do that any more.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I think this machine... punches the cards with the correct pattern once you put them in?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Although the implication is that it somehow reads what is on the card, in order to punch it with the holes which enable it to read that same information.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That sounds like an appropriate degree of profound ridiculousness.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I love it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm a bit surprised you remember anything about this shit.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Even though we can't technically forget anything any more.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Me too.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's amazing what pieces of inconsequential information your mind can recall at a moment's notice, a whole decade after they were last relevant or interesting to anyone.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I think I missed this.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0136.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ok, that should be everything taken care of.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This will be my first move, the opening gambit in the grand game of fate for this planet.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: All that remains is to see the result.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Indeed. Press the button, Doctor.</p> + </div> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Dirk: Push the button.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0137_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0137_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0138.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Behold...</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0139.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: My creation.</p> + </div> + <div class="command rose"> + <span>Dirk and Rose:</span> + <div>> Dirk and Rose: Behold.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0140_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0140_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0141.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0142.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE:</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK:</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE:</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK:</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK:</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE:</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Dirk.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Rose.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0143.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Game on.</p> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter5.html">CHAPTER 5. YOUR 3Y3S H4V3 B33N CLOS3D</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter5.html b/chapter5.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c845968 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter5.html @@ -0,0 +1,220 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 5. YOUR 3Y3S H4V3 B33N CLOS3D (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter4.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter6.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-02-24">02/24/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 5. YOUR 3Y3S H4V3 B33N CLOS3D</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0144_1.gif"> + <p>The dissonant hum of struggling mechanics fills Terezi's ears as she sits, cross-legged, on the floor of the now-ruined engine room. She likes it here. The soft whitenoise ringing of the extensive ventilation network sounds, if she closes her nose just right, like the rustle of wind through the leaves of a treehive universes away.</p> + <p>The warm thrumming of machines at work is accompanied by blinking lights that taste like rainbow sprinkles as they flicker, but Terezi isn’t distracted from the main object of her focus — the unconscious body of Rose Lalonde, bathed in dim light, chest rising and falling in an artificially-induced slumber.</p> + <p>Wires and tubes run up from her plinth to the ceiling of the chamber, keeping her alive, yes, but too much just for that purpose. Something about the tangle of intravenous tubing and fiber optic cable makes Terezi think of the old stories about the Ψiioniic. Her train of thought is interrupted by metallic footfalls, and the screeching sound of a broken airlock door sliding open.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: There you are. I haven’t seen much of you.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: IV3 B33N R1GHT H3R3 FOR HOURS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT YOUR 3Y3S H4VE B33N CLOS3D TH3 WHOL3 T1M3 >:[</p> + </div> + <p>Rosebot turns her head to look back at the frail, failing vessel that once housed her consciousness. She doesn't even dispatch a fake laugh to her behavioral display matrix in pity of this half-joke.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Your attachment to my comatose body is unexpectedly charming, as well as slightly sinister.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: She isn’t going to do anything.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: She isn’t coming back from where she’s gone.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU N3V3R KNOW</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Yes, I suppose that’s true.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Anything can happen, you can’t see the future, etc. etc.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Except I can. I can see the trajectory the story needs to take, and thus I know the trajectory it will take.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And resurrecting my meat puppet would not only be difficult to the point of being worthless, it would also be extremely lame.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Not that it would be out of character for this story. We live and breathe on the stupefyingly mind-numbing, and the mind-numbingly stupid.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But then we begin to veer toward dissolution, yet again.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F WH4T YOU'R3 S4Y1NG 1S TRU3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F 4 STORY H4S TO B3 COMP3LL1NG TO B3 C4NON</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DO YOU R34LLY TH1NK D1RK 1S TH3 TYP3 TO T3LL 4 COMP3LL1NG STORY</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H1S T4ST3 1N 4N1M3 4LON3 1S CONC3RN1NG</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 D1D 3NJOY TH3 ON3 4BOUT TH3 HORS3S THOUGH</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I don't think that counts as "anime."</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But that's why we're here, isn't it?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: To steer this story the right way.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 GU3SS</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But you're not enthusiastic.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: S1GH</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: PL4Y1NG W1TH 4 WHOL3 WORLD L1K3 1T'S SOM3 K1ND OF SQU34KY LUSUS TOY DO3S SOUND L1K3 1T H4S 1TS MOM3NTS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 M34N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: MY FR13NDS W4NT3D TO RUL3 YOUR L1TTL3 WORLD 4S P3TTY TYR4NTS 4FT3R W3 WON TH3 G4M3 OURS3LV3S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT DO YOU TH1NK TH4T WOULD'V3 B33N FOR TH3 B3ST FOR YOU 4ND 4LL TH3 OTH3R M4MM4L14N W31RDOS ON YOUR PL4N3T >:/</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It didn't happen because it didn't happen.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F 1 H4V3 TO H34R ON3 MOR3 T4UTOLOGY FROM 31TH3R OF YOU 1 4M GO1NG TO MOV3 TO TH3 WOODS 4ND PL4GU3 YOUR N3W SOC13TY 4S 4 H3RM1T BOG MONST3R FOR3V3R</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: See, that's more the spirit.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Become as myth, Terezi Pyrope, the troll under the bridge you were always meant to be.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The village chalk supplies would be ravaged.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Townsfolk will tell their children scary stories of the terrible dragon hiding in the woods.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: If they're not good, she might emerge from the swamp and moralize at them.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: JUST B3C4US3 YOU'V3 3L3CT3D TO 4B4NDON TH3 CONC3PTS OF "GOOD" 4ND "B4D" 3NT1R3LY DO3SN'T M34N 1 DON'T ST1LL H4V3 MOR4L R3S3RV4T1ONS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT TH1S 1SN'T 4BOUT TH4T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1'M T4LK1NG 4BOUT TH3 B4S1C 4B1L1TY OF 1NT3LL1G3NT B31NGS 1N 4LL R34L 4ND HYPOTH3T1C4L PL4N3S OF 3X1ST3NC3 TO G1V3 4 SH1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 DON'T G1V3 4 SH1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND HON3STLY 1 H4V3 4 H4RD T1M3 UND3RST4ND1NG WHY YOU DO</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH3R3 D1D TH1S COM3 FROM</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU D1DN'T DO MUCH "WORLDBU1LD1NG" WH3N YOU FUCK3D OFF FOR 3ONS 4ND L3T CH3SS P3OPL3 BU1LD YOUR PL4N3T</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That approach failed.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Without an organized antagonistic force, the planet became fundamentally unsuited to relevance.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Its dissolution was inevitable. And our fellow victors couldn't – or wouldn't – see.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We only know of one way to perpetuate canon for sure. To play and defeat the game, and continue the life cycle of the genesis frog we cling to parasitically.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: This, obviously, has destructive consequences. Ones we spared the Earth by coming here and starting from a blank slate.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Now it is protected, in the steady hands of a duly-elected ruler, sure to have a boring and uneventful perpetual term in office.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BL4H BL4H BL4H BL4H</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SO YOU F33L B4D 4BOUT HOW MUCH YOU GUYS W3R3 B1G T33N F41LUR3S 4ND W4NT 4NOTH3R FL1P OF TH3 CO1N</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: No, I don't feel "bad."</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I don't need to bargain with the past, or question it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Everything that happened brought us here.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: An imperfect mechanism, to be sure.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Rusting in points, barely functional in others, occasionally relying on the labor of strange clowns.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: As the sheer number of doomed universes our actions in the game spun off should show, we barely understood the design at the time.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Truly, we stumbled through the tape of the finish line ass-first, cheating all the way.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But there was no table of judges waiting to adjudicate our performance by holding up little placards with numbers on them.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We are the observers, and we are the judges.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We won, and to the victor go the spoils.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: If you want a hand in making the rules of this new world, then don't storm off.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU'R3 TRY1NG TO L34D M3 TO 4CC3PT YOUR MOR4L FR4M3WORK</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T 1F NO ON3 SHOULD CONTROL 4 UN1V3RS3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4LL W3 FOUGHT 4G41NST W4S MONST3RS WHO CONV3RT3D POW3R 1NTO CONTROL</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND NOT 3V3RYTH1NG W3 LOST F1GHT1NG TH3M W4S 4 M1ST4K3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3R3 W4S 4 LOT S4CR1F1C3D FOR TH3 1D34 OF "GOOD"</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T'S TH3 PO1NT 1N CONT1NU1NG TH1S STORY 1F TH4T W4S M34N1NGL3SS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F LORD 3NGL1SH W4S JUST HOLD1NG UP TH3 WORLD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F 1T T4K3S 4CT1NG L1K3 H1M TO K33P 1T 4L1V3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WOULDN'T 1T B3 B3TT3R TO JUST L3T 1T D13</p> + </div> + <p>Rosebot looks over at the plinth where her body sits, kept alive, sure, but atrophied and weak, dependent on this machine to continue projecting consciousness to the abiotic enclosure keeping the realization of the Ultimate Self from tearing her apart.</p> + <p>Wouldn't it be better to just let it die? Terezi isn't asking new questions. Rose had first threatened suicide when she was eight. (She couldn't bear the thought of attending the funeral her mother was organizing for her beloved cat, Jaspers.) When she was ten, she put on her coat and stood in whipping winter winds on the balcony overlooking a frozen waterfall, imagining the plunge with a blank expression on her face, eyes stinging from the New York cold. (Her mother had drunk herself to sleep with the vacuum on, again, the mechanical wailing inside playing a chord with the gale outside, inescapable.) But her first – and only – real attempt was a success.</p> + <p>All these thoughts cross her mind in a microcycle. Explaining things to someone not aided by the exponential increase in processing power Rosebot has is tedious. Terezi's hesitation won't be swayed by explaining more of the universe. There's another source at work.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Not to be indelicate, Terezi, but I have wondered something.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: Y34H 1T WOULD B3 COMPL3T3LY UNL1K3 YOU TO B3 1ND3L1C4T3</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm being serious.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You said it yourself, that you don't give a shit.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: This melancholy, this meaninglessness you're feeling?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I think there's another explanation for it. One having little to do with the structural soundness of our plan.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I think there's a psychological explanation at work here.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OF COURS3 YOU DO</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU TH1NK TH3R3'S 4 PSYCHOLOG1C4L 3XPL4N4T1ON FOR 3V3RYTH1NG</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND 1T 4LL H4S TO DO W1TH "MOTH3RS" 4ND "R3PR3SS1ON"</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Your mother was an egg. I recognize there are limitations at play here to the human experience.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But I don't think it requires a great deal of insight – even though I do, in fact, have a great deal of insight – to recognize that you?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You are fucking depressed.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH TH4NK YOU DOCTOR SC13NC3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: L3T M3 T4K3 OUT MY HUM4N CH3CKBOOK TO P4Y YOU FOR TH3S3 1NV4LU4BL3 HUM4N 1NS1GHTS</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Discovering that there is a problem is the only way to solve it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The constant insistence that everything is as it ought to be isn’t just counterproductive, it’s pathetic.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: From one seer to another, we both know how bad you’ve gotten in the past.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Or, if not in the past, in some past.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I have no desire to meet that Terezi, no matter how doubtlessly sticky and charming she might be.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NOT 3V3RY B4D F33L1NG 1S 4 SYNDROM3 4ND JUST B3C4US3 1 DO TH1NGS D1FF3R3NTLY TH4N YOU DO DO3SN'T M34N MY BR41N 1S BROK3N</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That’s not what depression is.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH MY GOD 1 DON'T C4R3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: STOP TRY1NG TO "G3T THROUGH TO M3" OR WH4T3V3R 3LS3 YOU TH1NK 1S H4PP3N1NG H3R3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3 4R3N'T FR13NDS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: GO 4H34D 4ND DO YOUR 4RTS 4ND CR4FTS PROJ3CT W1TH P3OPL3'S L1V3S</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Shockingly, Terezi, I am not asking you for your permission or your blessing.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I need neither.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I was offering a reprieve from the monotony of the last three years, and what promises to be a long stretch of time going forward.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Your life is going to be short, compared to mine and Dirk’s, but that doesn’t mean it has to be boring.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 TWO OF YOU R34LLY 4R3 M4D3 FOR 34CH OTH3R</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I am made from him.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That’s how families work.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1S TH4T WHY YOU L3FT K4N4Y4 B3H1ND</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: B3C4US3 YOU KNOW SO FUCK1NG MUCH 4BOUT "F4M1LY"</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I would be careful if I were you.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The weight of what I know and you do not is enough to overwhelm a mortal frame.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: UGH SHUT UP</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: STOP PULL1NG TH1S MYST1C4L BULLSH1T 3V3RY T1M3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DON’T YOU M1SS H3R?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Don’t you?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOUR CONST4NT D3FL3CT1ON 1S 4S PO1NTL3SS 4S 1T 1S 1N3FF3CT1V3</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: My feelings are irrelevant.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: There is nothing to mourn if it all dissolves.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Not even the capacity for grief.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: If the cycle of canon must continue, then it must. Some don’t understand that.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You do.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 D1D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1S TH1S WH4T "C4NON" M34NS THOUGH?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: G4R1SH OR4NG3 4ND PURPL3 GODS 4CT1NG OUT TH3 S4M3 STORY 4G4A1N 4ND 4G41N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4NOTH3R JOURN3Y ANOTH3R PL4N3T 4NOTH3R G4M3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 GR3W UP TH1NK1NG 1 H4D TO THROW 4W4Y 3V3RYON3 4ND GO JET OFF TO SP4CE</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T W4SN'T GOOD OR 3V1L</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T W4S 3ASY TO JUST1FY 4S JUST WH4T MUST H4PP3N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: IT W4S 3SS3NT14L</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Ah, but was it relevant and true?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: This isn’t the same and you know it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We see things — or See things — the way they are.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We are obliged to act. To save the concept of meaning itself by continuing to spin the narrative loom into new tapestries.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: S1GH</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 US3D TO 3NJOY T4LK1NG TO YOU YOU KNOW</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH3N 1 THOUGHT TH1S W4S WH4T YOU W4NT3D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4T K4N4Y4 JUST COULDN'T UND3RST4ND</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4T W3 H4D TO DO TH1S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT NOW 1 C4N'T T3LL</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: D1D YOU W4NT 4LL TH1S?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OR D1D TH3 PR1NC3 >:?</p> + </div> + <p>Abruptly, Terezi is lifted from the ground with a glidingly-smooth effortless motion. Metal is so much stronger than flesh. She flashes a sharp-toothed grin as her feet dangle uselessly in front of the lithe metallic form of her counterpart Seer. Inspiring a reaction like this from Rose's robotic placidity has been like squeezing blood from a stone on this years-long journey.</p> + <p>Delicious, candy-red blood.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I have complete recall of every sensation my body experienced.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I can simulate, and have simulated, cherished and tragic memories in their entirety.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: They flood my circuits with feeling. More real than flesh ever could be, a direct contact between mind and memory.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Is this what you want to hear, Terezi?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That I can replay the complete sensory experience of my first kiss a hundred times in a single clock cycle?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Do you want me to rend my garments and wail at the tragedy of it all?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Play victim, damsel in distress, leak lubricant from the joints of my eyes to simulate the tears I can no longer shed?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I know what I have lost. I have taken a full account of it. I cannot and will not forget it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But to cling to it as it faded to nothing would be a meaningless capitulation to entropy.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Someone must sit atop Olympus and propagate the fabric of reality upon which these memories sit.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That is the task we have taken on. The game does not feel. The game does not mourn. The game must be played, and we must guide those who will play it better than we ourselves were guided.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Just as I have remembered the good, I can recall the terror that consumed me and overwhelmed my body.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The visions of dissolution. The narrative unspooling. A thousand voices shouting contradiction.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: What value is a marriage, temporary domestic bliss, if all is lost?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You understand this bargain.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: At least, you should. It's one that was made to leave you alone.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Is your resentment towards my choice about Kanaya, or about V–</p> + </div> + <p>BONK. Rosebot's even metallic voice is interrupted by the bang of skull against metal, and Terezi's headbutt collapses the both of them into a crumpling heap of metal and flesh.</p> + <p>That was a step too far. Tensions that once simmered under the surface have found the catalyst for a boil. Terezi and Rosebot's repartee of words is replaced by the dissonant notes of clanging and smashing as they roll around on the floor of the crashed Theseus's central chambers, throwing punches and smashing into control panels in a crescendo of chaos.</p> + <p>This is more than a sufficient distraction from the melancholy Terezi was sinking into. Her senses are alight. The whirr of servos and actuators are a dusting of snow on her hearing, undercutting the percussion of their rolling wrestling match. The orange cloth she's ripping and scuffing suffuses every breath she inhales with the sweetly acidic taste of grapefruit and tangerine. She imagines anger pouring from the glassy red eyes as they roll over one last time.</p> + <p>Rosebot finally has Terezi pinned to the ground by the throat. A cool metallic knee is pressed hard between her legs, holding her down. A natural pause in the staccato squabble is found, and two pairs of red eyes are locked on each other. Terezi's breath rises and falls, deeply. The robot's intricately crafted torso does not simulate breath, but the soft susurrous purr of cooling fans betrays the tension.</p> + <p>Terezi spits out a few raspy words, gleefully.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 T4K3 1T B4CK</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TURNS OUT 1 ST1LL 3NJOY T4LK1NG TO YOU >:]</p> + </div> + <p>A simulated smirk is summoned into being on the robot's face. A voice file plays in high-fidelity.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Back to our usual stimulating dialog, it seems.</p> + </div> + <p>Rosebot leans in close. Terezi can smell the licorice-black lipstick, the same kind as always, applied now to synthetic polymer lips inches away from her own. Rosebot's metal fingers close just a little tighter around her neck–<span class="dirk">Woah, woah, woah.</span></p> + <p class="dirk">I fiddle with some advanced speciation machinery for a few hours and then come back to this? This is the problem with lesser actors – leave them alone for too long and they get all touchy and start talking about feelings. We were passing the Bechdel test and advancing none of the plot. There were hardly any panels. That's not my Homestuck. You people are here for logic. Systems. Weird plot shit. Lore. Not this.</p> + <p class="dirk">Oh, I’m sorry. Was that fourth wall break a little much? Did your disbelief -- until now so utterly delinquent and prone to vagrance that it’s been suspended indefinitely -- finally collapse? Go ahead and close the fucking book then. Quit out of your browser, slam the laptop closed and punt it into the ocean. That shark is probably hungry after all the jumping.</p> + <p class="dirk">You won’t, though. If you were going to quit you would have quit before this. We’re in this for the long haul, you and I. We’ll all go down together. Welcome to ‘Nam.</p> + <p class="dirk">Anyway, where was I?</p> + <p class="dirk">Oh, right. Passing judgement on my robotic ecto-daughter smashing the damn shipping grid to pieces. Really, Rose? Really? Our task of phenomenal cosmic importance isn’t going to wait for a dalliance. I've just mastered fine-tuning perissodactyl hooves with this machine and need my co-monarch back. Plus, what would dear, sweet Kanaya think?</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: (OH MY GOD)</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: (SHUT UP 4ND G1V3 US SOM3 PR1V4CY)</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: (N3RD)</p> + </div> + <p class="dirk">Fine. Be that way. I'll just get a head start on my species, then. It's only the fate of a new planet on which the weight of saving the universe lies. If voiding the warranty on a complex piece of machinery is more important to you than all of that, go ahead.</p> + <p class="dirk">I've got better things to do.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0144_2.gif"> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter6.html">CHAPTER 6. A Conversation Regarding Relevance</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter6.html b/chapter6.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b8c6f5a --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter6.html @@ -0,0 +1,293 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 6. A Conversation Regarding Relevance (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter5.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter7.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-03-12">03/12/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 6. A Conversation Regarding Relevance</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0145.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">space is vast.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">an unproductive statement, almost a tautology. and although tautologies can be worthy thought exercises, they become virtually meaningless when it comes down to the actual transmission of information. i believe it is for that reason most beings don’t use them in day to day parlance. the lives of the many are far too volatile and instinct-driven to want to waste time with saying that which is already true.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">tautologies are, in general, reserved for stories. for narrative device. for finding new and inventive ways to tell an audience that which they already know. and at the end of the day, are not all diffusions of knowledge at least somewhat tautologist in nature? in order to recognize the value of my words, you must first know what they mean. you must predict my intentions.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">but i digress.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">arguments with my brother would often dissolve into such nonsense. the shouting of truths back at each other, neither of us ever able to convince the other of the righteousness of our stance. we were never meant to agree. it isn’t in our blood.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">space is vast. everyone knows it, but most sentient beings in their many universes never have any way or reason to experience it first hand. even in societies advanced enough for space flight, most people will never leave their atmosphere. when they scoff at my tautology ‘space is vast’, what do they really know? nothing. as far as any of them have experienced, space does not exist.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0146.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">very few have stood and looked into the abyss, the true gulf of nothingness that spreads out around the single point of consciousness adrift in a constellation. all the combined weight of sentient endeavour would quail underneath that sheer, irresistible truth. the realization that they are so small, that the universe cares about their puny lives so very little. sitting in the glowing light of the stars this becomes even more apparent</p> + <p class="alt-callie">...</p> + <p class="alt-callie">are we out of orange juice?</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0147.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: are you talking to me?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: because if you are i would like to remind you that i hate!! orange juice!!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">no you don’t.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: well i guess i never really had a strong opinion on it before</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but now i cant stand it!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: its all you drink!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i like the pulp.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: its my body and i dont want orange juice!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i hate pulp, and i didnt just make that up to spite you</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: who wants strings in their juice?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i do.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: ughhhhhhhhh</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i realize that jade’s situation is less than ideal from a characterization perspective, but i still politely point out that nobody likes a whiner.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: fuck you rude calliope inside my head!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: from a 'characterization' standpoint, i think you are pedantic</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: annoying</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and just a general huge drag to be around!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: why dont you try being possessed by the spirit of some other version of a good friend of yours, and floated around a spaceship full of people you love</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: unable to affect anything or say hello to anyone!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: then tell me about whiners!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i killed my brother and consumed him.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: sounds like a you problem</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i suggest to the witch that i have spent untold eons in the void between universes, waiting for the moment i would be needed to prevent the dissipation of reality as we know it. her appeals to emotion will not help her. i will remain unmoved.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: well i had to watch my boyfriend and my brother die in front of me on a tiny scaled version of a world that i shrunk for them!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and then spend the next three years talking to myself, wracked with guilt that id killed them!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0148.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">i remind the witch that my time was in the void, which is far darker and lonelier than a ship full of lizards. i add that it was also eons, a length of time that is, traditionally, far longer than three years. i ask her to excuse my pettiness in pointing it out.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: youre a member of a species designed for long periods of isolation</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: im a human!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: or at least, i started out that way</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: even if i had the powers of a first guardian, my brain still worked in modules of human pattern recognition!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: three years is a long time for a human teenager, i dont care how many of her molecules are made of a god!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i point out that this back and forth is becoming childish and if--</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: OH MY GOD STOP NARRATING!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: who are you even talking to?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">the audience, of course.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: audience?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ugh, this is so annoying, i cant tell if youre being serious</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: your voice is impossible to read and i cant see your face</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0149.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: oh</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: well thanks</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: thats better</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">of course.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0150.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: youre right that i am being silly, and i didnt mean to start a slap fight over who has suffered more</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: clearly you have been through a lot more than i could ever possibly imagine</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: youre the same callie who talked to me and jane when we were unconscious back in the game, right?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: theres just a lot of everybody running around and i guess i havent been keeping the internal tally that i should have</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">yes, that’s correct.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: but i think it is a very natural thing to be silly when you are used to being able to control your own body, but now cant</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i will allow that, yes.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: so i will stop yelling at you</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but i reserve the right to start yelling again in the future if i have a good reason</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ...okay?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">that seems fair.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">jade looks at me with the face i have looked at in the mirror for the last few months on board this vessel without a name. no one can decide what it should be called, possibly due to the comical nature of its construction. for a while there was a ongoing list of ideas hanging in the common room, but it quickly devolved into a cluster of more and more obscure memes, until one day the knight tore it down in a fit of pique.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">don’t ask me to tell you which knight. you know which one.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">jade smiles. dave and karkat will always be a source of pain for her, a low ache somewhere in her center of gravity, but she is happy for them. she knows that there is really no other alternative for how to be. they chose each other over her, and they always will. they are the two people who matter to her the most in every universe, and that will not change, no matter how much she wishes it would, no matter how--</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: do you actually know that?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">pardon me?</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: do you actually know that im doomed to pine over dave and karkat across every iteration of reality?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: like, can you actually see that?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: because youre a space player, like i am.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i know that you are more powerful than me, but i dont think you can see other timelines any better than i can</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: so i think you are just being dramatic</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: for the “audience”, whatever the heck that means</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i experience a moment of unease as jade looks at me. keeping her out of my thoughts is proving to be more difficult than i had first assumed it would be. i had begun confident that i could keep her consciousness sleeping peacefully inside the shell of her body, tamed and quiescent, but she has proved to be more irascible than i initially gave her credit for.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: heheh</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i have never been particularly tamable, and my consciousness is huge!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0151.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0152.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0153.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: you are a pretty tough crowd, evil callie</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but yes, i can hear most of what you are thinking to yourself</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: it took a little while to separate it from my own thoughts, just like it did with dirk</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: because thats what he was doing the whole time, wasnt it?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: controlling our thoughts</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: making us believe things we never would, things he thought we SHOULD believe</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">ah, and here we are. i had been wondering when we would get to the prince, and jade’s knowledge of the chaos he has wrought within this timeline, and who knows how many others. i assume she realizes exactly how many resources the prince put in to keeping her still and asleep, firmly out of the game, so as to prevent granting me access to the universe, in order to foil his campaign of endless hubris.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">jade knows all of this, i don’t have to tell her. she is a very bright girl, and even if she didn’t have partial access to my thoughts, she is good at compiling data and using it to fill in gaps. as she herself had rather licentiously mentioned, her brain is quite large.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">and all of these reasons are why i know i can count on her to be reasonable and realistic about her situation. i need a body to continue interfacing with this timeline, and her body is the only one that will do.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">i hear her wonder, what about kanaya?</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: what about kanaya?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: hey</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">what about her, jade? she is a space player, it is true, but her powers are nothing compared to yours. for one, she isn’t god tier, and for two, she is dead. a living dead, but dead nonetheless. and a sylph’s specializations lie on a different end of the spectrum from my own. a witch is a far closer match.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">no, jade understands and sympathizes with my assurance that her body, and her body alone, will do for my purposes.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: um...no i dont!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">she does. after all, she would not wish this sort of state of being on anyone else, and especially not on one of her friends. jade may have undergone a lopsided number of narrative hardships in her life, but at least she is used to them. why spread that suffering to another? jade understands and accepts her place in the story, which has always been to enable events to play out around her, just as it has been mine.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0154.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">because what is a story, truly? nothing but a series of misadventures and connections, actions spurring reactions, tumbling into one another, over and over and over. with so many competing interests, clearly the story cannot account for all perspectives, for all threads? it would be laughable, childish, even selfish, to demand that they do.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">in other words, not everyone will achieve a happy ending. this is a truth that jade had come to grips with a long time ago.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: wait.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: stop.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: why are you saying all of this?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">jade’s body is my vessel, and it is through this realization that she will understand her true role in the story. her true relevance. if i released my hold on her consciousness, there would be no guarantee that i would be allowed in again. therefore i cannot permit her the control of herself that she so desperately craves, and she understands that.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: wait. so...you could give me my body back, and then just hop back in when you need to?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">in theory, yes.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: then what the hell callie!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">because i don’t trust you to cooperate when the time comes.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: why not?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i thought you said i was a reasonable girl with a huge brain!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">you are, to an extent.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">she is. but the truth of the matter remains that humans are capricious and emotional. and even jade herself can admit that she hasn’t been the most...committed example of her species in the last few years.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0155.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: ...what is that supposed to mean?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">moving from lover to lover, job to job, interest to interest. over the last few years jade had found herself listless, unable to settle and unwilling to commit to anything or anyone. she knows there’s nothing wrong with that on a moral level, but on a personal level she’s always believed that she could be more, could do better. be better. and now, because of this, she realizes that sacrifices must be made.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">and that she, as a space player, is uniquely built for sacrifice.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: yeah</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i guess youre right</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i have been such a silly little slut!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: hey callie</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">yes, jade?</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: oh my god, whats that!!!!</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">she points off into the darkness. it’s nothing, of course. there is nothing here besides the two of us. this space is utterly under my control. jade could control it too, if she had any access to her own powers. but with my grip around her cortex, there is no chance of that.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">i know there is nothing behind me. she is being silly. but i’m not dirk strider. i don’t mind indulging the whims of silly girls, if it makes them feel better about their situations. there is nothing wrong with humoring.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0156.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0157_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0157_2.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">and here i make my first mistake.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">up until this point, i have counted on my superior narrative power and class strength to keep her under control, but bringing her into a place where we can both physically manifest has left me, foolishly, vulnerable. when you are dealing with an epically powerful space player and former borderline omnipotent being, you forget that even with her powers stripped, she is still quite a formidable physical force. a young woman in the prime of her life, with a canine’s instincts and the fierce desire to sink her teeth into something she can tear apart.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">and right now that something happens to be me.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">her fingers tear at my throat, trying to find purchase. she won’t be able to kill me here, but it is certainly unpleasant, and not to mention slightly repetitive. we just saw this in the previous chapter, although this particular fight will not end as amorously as the last one did. so don’t get your hopes up.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: who!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: are you talking to!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0158.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0159.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0160_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0160_2.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">during the ship’s trip through space, there have been numerous experiments; modifications to the nutrition output of the various machines designed to create sustenance for the various species on board. i myself have been content with orange juice and synthetic proteins, but dave and roxy have both expressed longing for various ‘earth snacks’, and so the trials and errors began.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0161.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">the results were mixed. as roxy told us in a previous chapter, alchemized food all sort of tastes the same, although the visuals really help to bring about the flavor. and at the end of the day, isn’t it the journey that is more important than the destination? the stories you tell as you create the strangely flavored nutritional paste?</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: ????????????</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">so far, everyone’s favorite attempt has been a vaguely peanut-butter and chocolate flavored creation called "Rices'". nobody eats them really. they just sit in a bowl on the counter.</p> + <p class="alt-callie">i’m not actually sure what the witch is trying to accomplish here.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: you dont?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: really?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">i don’t know what she is trying to accomplish, because surely she would not be doing what it appears she is trying to do. making such a meaningless threat.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: meaningless?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: do you even know anything about the body you stole?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: shouldnt you have run some sort of psychic physical before you possessed it?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: its definitely what i would have done!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0162.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">jade must know that i am well-aware of her family-wide peanut allergy. a story thread that has been extremely important and weighed in on in multiple parts of the narrative. how could i have forgotten such a key detail?</p> + <p class="alt-callie">but of course jade knows that. she is just being silly and dramatic. she knows that a suicide threat is utterly meaningless when made by a god. there is nothing remotely just or heroic about dying from self-imposed anaphylactic shock in the throes of a childish tantrum. at the most i’ll get a relaxing few minutes of sleep.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0163.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: do you really want to risk it?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">what are you talking about, jade? i just said--</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: i dont know, callie</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ive never really understood the rules that govern the death of a god tier, have you?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: it seems pretty arbitrary from where im standing</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: who makes the decision whether or not something is heroic or just?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">...that’s unclear. but it certainly isn’t you.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: right, of course not</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but are you so confident that youre a good guy?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: are you sure that the alpha timeline WANTS you to be here?</p> + </div> + <p class="alt-callie">...what.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: youve done some stuff, callie</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: im only saying you shouldnt be so quick to assume that me killing you wouldnt be just</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and that taking my own life to do it wouldnt be heroic</p> + </div> + <a class="flash" href="https://www.homestuck2.com/story/164"> + [S] ==><br> + (View on homestuck2.com) + </a> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0165.gif"> + <p class="alt-callie">i don’t let the witch manipulate me. i refuse to falter in the face of her whispers. without my careful planning and swift action, the prince would have taken full control over this timeline. none of my friends could even begin to imagine the turmoil.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0166.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: they arent your friends!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: you took them from me!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: do you really think any of them would side with you over me??</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: you keep saying that youre doing all of this for my own good, but youre just lonely!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i know you are, because so am i!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: if you are so utterly convinced of your virtue, then let me do this</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: you said that being a space player is all about sacrifice</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: well</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0167.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: bet</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0168.gif"> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0169.gif"> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter7.html">CHAPTER 7. Distress Call From the Closet</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter7.html b/chapter7.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8125785 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter7.html @@ -0,0 +1,334 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 7. Distress Call From the Closet (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter6.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter8.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-04-03">04/03/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 7. Distress Call From the Closet</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0170.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0171.gif"> + <p>The mood at the scene of the crime is mixed. All three of them would label the main emotion as “extreme tension,” but that is a concept that means vastly different things to each of them.</p> + <p>Vriska, thriving on it, has not felt so decadently alive in a very long time. Tavros has never in his tragic existence felt so close to death, which is surprising to him.</p> + <p>Vrissy is trying her best not to grapple with any cosmic truths at the moment, since she’s getting a phone call in the middle of hiding for her life.</p> + <p>She grumbles to herself a bit before answering.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Really, Harry Anderson? A phone call?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Asshole’s lucky I keep my shit on silent.</p> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: hey vris, what the fuck??</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: are you looking at instagram, because your, uhh, situation? it’s ALL over the place.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah Harry I would say we are Extremely Aware of the Situ8ion.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: As it Unfolded the fuck all around us.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i can’t believe you actually did that.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh can’t you? Can you really not????????</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: look, babe, i thought you were joking!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: why would anyone believe you had an actual dead religious figurehead in the back of tavros’s car?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: he makes us scrape dirt off our shoes before we get in!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: As much as I’m loving watching your m8sprit attempt to squirm out of any responsi8ility for his dum8shit actions, we should pro8a8ly get to the getaway part of this 8ackwards heist.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Does he have a real plan this time or are we just gonna try our own luck?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0172.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: where even are you? this audio sucks shit, it sounded like you were...i couldn’t hear you right.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We’re in the janitor’s closet near what you always tell me is the Good Water Fountain, 8ut we can’t stay here.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And no, you heard it fine, that was just Vriska.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: oh ok. so that part about the other vriska was true too i guess?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: awesome, yeah. cool. normal.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: We could call Rose and Kanaya, may8e?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: My Moms would either give us a Medal or Kill Us Themselves, it’s like 50/50 odds.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Don’t love those numbers, folks,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Ugh and also they might 8e like. In the middle of important War Shit.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: So? What we just did was some important war shit.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i can’t keep up with all of you assholes talking at once.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: can we just meet back at my mom’s place? she shouldn’t be at home.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Fine, okay.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: people are starting to disperse, so if you’re gonna make a run for it, now’s your shot. don’t get caught.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Wouldn’t dream of it, 8a8e.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: >::::[</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: christ, what a shitshow.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0173.gif"> + <p>They stand up and brush themselves off. There’s no time to waste, but there’s one final element they’ve not worked out.</p> + <p>Part of the reason, Tavros thinks, that he’s been so game to continue on with the worst plan anyone has ever concocted, is that the more bullshit they endure, the longer they can put off actually doing anything that matters.</p> + <p>If he’s getting sprayed with a sprinkler and getting clown feet in his face, it’s a farce. It can’t hurt him. But if they get to the part where he’s shoving the uncooperative weight of his uncle’s corpse in an incinerator, he will stop floating in protective semi-consciousness above his body and it will all be real.</p> + <p>There’s no time for an incinerator, now, and somehow, Tavros realizes, reality has caught up with them all the same.</p> + <p>All three of them are quiet for a moment while they look down at the body. There is a soft, wet plink as a droplet from his bloodied nose hits the tile.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: So what do we do a8out...</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Him.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I’d prefer to,,, not drag him along any further, if possible,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: The cat is rather out of the, um,, bag at this point, is it not?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, no real Point in wasting time hiding him anywhere 8etter than this.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Vriska?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah. Fuck it. I’m done dealing with him.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Finally.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0174.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ye 8itch.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0175.gif"> + <p>Trolls are made for the battlefield.</p> + <p>From the moment a troll oozes out of the mother grub’s pulsating sphincter, through the trials of the brooding caverns, across the brutal day to day slog of Alternian society, all the way to their Ordeals, to the sucking void of space. They are bred for nothing but endless war.</p> + <p>But Commander Vantas...Commander Vantas is different.</p> + <p>Dirtblooded, unclean, descendant of a heretic, he never should have even made it to the surface. He should have been euthanized by a well-meaning jadeblood. And if somehow his hideous mutation managed to squeak past, his lusus should have put him out of his misery.</p> + <p>He was, as troll Lana del Rey would put it, born to die.</p> + <p>But he didn’t die. He is, despite everything, one of the only Alternia-born trolls left standing. From the humblest of beginnings, he has risen to the highest echelons of achievement.</p> + <p>Or so all the pamphlets say.</p> + <p>The actual Commander Vantas has blisters on his heel and has been taking pot-shots at scouting drones for the last six hours. He could use a bath, honestly.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0176.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: yo nubs is that u</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: pretty rank</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH MY GOD.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I FLATLY REFUSE TO BELIEVE THAT YOU CAN SMELL MY NATURAL MUSK OVER THE STENCH OF BLOOD AND BURNING FLESH.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I CAN’T THINK OF ANYTHING MORE ASININE THAN YOU GETTING ON MY CASE ABOUT PERSONAL GROOMING ON THE BATTLEFIELD.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: didnt i warn u bout thinking tho?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GOD DAMMIT MEENAH, DON’T MEME AT ME.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: PEOPLE ARE DYING.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: oh wow fuck u right</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: let me save all my jokes for that specific time in the foreseeable future when we arent all fightin for our lives</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: would that work for you commander</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IF YOU AND THE REST OF THE GENERAL’S COUNCIL HADN’T INSISTED THAT I STAY OUT OF THE WORST OF THE FIGHTING, WE WOULDN’T HAVE THIS PROBLEM.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: yeah cause youd be dead</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: u cant lead every charge</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: gotta be realistic boss</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I KNOW THAT.</p> + </div> + <p>They have had this argument more than once. In fact, both of them could play either side of it. Karkat has done his time in the field, of course, leading small guerilla operations to free prisoners and sabotage Crocker’s supply chains, but Meenah and the rest of the council is right. Which is why he’s here, instead of at the front lines with his rebels, where he belongs.</p> + <p>His true value is his face. His symbology. At the end of the day, he is a fucking ad campaign.</p> + <p>*CHIME*</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="swifer">SWIFER: boss check the news!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH FUCK.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: what</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JESUS CHRIST.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: nubs i swear 2 god</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT’S GAMZEE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: HE’S DEAD.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: oh</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: well shit</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I CAN’T FUCKING BELIEVE THIS.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: u okay</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NO!</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: u wanna talk about it</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: i know u and jellybulge had a thing</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FIRST OF ALL--JELLYBULGE?</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: u outlawed fishpuns i gotta make my own fun</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: GROSS.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND I GUESS IF YOU CALL AN OBSCENELY PUBLIC PALE ACT, PERFORMED IN A FUGUE OF DESPERATE PANIC INTENDED TO PREVENT HIM FROM MURDERING ALL OF MY FRIENDS INSTEAD OF JUST HALF OF THEM “A THING”.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THEN YES, I GUESS WE HAD A THING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: BUT IF YOU’RE ASKING ME IF I’M SAD THAT HE’S DEAD?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ABSOLUTELY THE FUCK NOT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I HAVE HATED THIS PIECE OF BUBBLING, FECULENT CLOWNFLESH FOR DECADES, AND SO HAS EVERYONE ELSE WHO RESPECTS THEMSELVES.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: REST IN THE POWERFUL GAZE OF MY ETERNAL LOATHING.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT’S NOT WHY I’M SAYING FUCK A BUNCH OF TIMES.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: u need a reason to say fuck a buncha times</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SHUT UP.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LOOK AT THE PICTURE.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: kinda blurry</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: what am i supposed to be lookin at</p> + </div> + <p>In the distance, heavy artillery rolls across the heaving sky. It sounds like thunder, but by now they know the difference.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I DON’T KNOW, MEENAH, AT THE PACK OF KIDS CARRYING A DEAD CLOWN?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THAT’S VRISKA.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: oh yea i guess it is</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: always knew that fish was gonna grow up shady</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT? NO! NOT VRISKA MARYAM-LALONDE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I MEAN, SHE’S THERE TOO. BUT BUT I’M TALKING ABOUT THE OTHER VRISKA! MY VRISKA.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: FROM MY UNIVERSE. THIS VRISKA’S ANCESTOR. SHE’S HERE.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: she a ghost or some shit</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I DON’T THINK SO? I CAN’T SEE HER EYES IN THIS PICTURE, BUT SHE’S COVERED IN BLOOD, AND SHE’S CARRYING GAMZEE, SO SHE’S CORPOREAL AT LEAST.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: UNLESS SHE HAS A FUCKING LIFE RING TOO. HOW MANY OF THOSE THINGS ARE THERE?</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: okay but who gives a shit how she got here nubs</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: maybe focus on the big picture</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YOU’RE RIGHT. FUCK.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: “CROCKER CORP CEO JANE CROCKER HAS CONDEMNED THE ASSASSINATION AS AN ACT OF TERROR, AND IS CALLING FOR THE PERPETRATORS’ ARREST.”</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: wait aint that her kid there holding up the clown ass</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: UH...WOW, THIS ARTICLE IS WAY TOO LONG. I HATE WAR CORRESPONDENTS, JESUS FUCK.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OKAY...HERE. OH. OF COURSE. CROCKER IS CLAIMING HER SON WAS KIDNAPPED AND FORCED TO PARTICIPATE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: AND THEY’VE NAMED ME AS THE MASTERMIND.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: well we woulda taken credit for it anyway so this saves us the time</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: thanks jane owe u one</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0177.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SHIT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THE TIDE OF PUBLIC OPINION IS DEFINITELY TURNING AGAINST JANE.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: thats good tho right</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: thats what we want</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT WE WANT IS TO STEER THE CONVERSATION IN OUR FAVOR SO MORE PEOPLE JOIN OUR CAUSE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: WHAT WE DON’T WANT IS TO GIVE THE PRESIDENT AN EXCUSE TO ENACT MARTIAL LAW.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SHIT. OF COURSE THIS WOULD HAVE TO DO WITH FUCKING SERKET.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: LITERAL MONTHS OF PLANNING, HOURS AND HOURS OF LOGISTICS, AND ALL OF IT GOES UP IN SMOKE BECAUSE OF ONE SPIDERY ASSHOLE.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SHE *WOULD* FIND SOME WAY TO WRECK MY SHIT FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE.</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: yeah it sucks</p> + <p class="meenah">MEENAH: so what are ur orders boss</p> + </div> + <p>Boss. That title used to grate on him. Even now, it sends a twinge of discomfort through his gastric sack, but he breathes through it.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NOW?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NOW WE PIVOT FROM THE SUBLIME TO THE RIDICULOUS.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0178.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: I NEED TO TALK TO EGBERT.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0179.gif"> + <p>Harry Anderson has rushed home faster than ever before in his high school career. It doesn’t occur to him once along the way that he could have provided a less ostentatious getaway car for his friends.</p> + <p>It’s no matter. They’ll make it. He won’t allow himself to internalize any other option.</p> + <p>He is too busy with these mental gymnastics to notice his father’s car parked outside.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0180.gif"> + <p>John, Roxy, and Harry Anderson <a href="https://www.homestuck.com/epilogues/candy/38">proceed to have the tail end of a conversation they had before</a>, in another medium.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0181.gif"> + <p>The three fugitives arrive, and, at Vrissy’s direction, park in the back. Unsure if it’s safe to go inside, they hide in the landscaping and text their contact. Vrissy is no stranger to sneaking in and out of Harry Anderson’s window, but the stakes are quite a bit higher, now.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Are we good to go? Your mom’s Car is in the driveway.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: oh my god you are not gonna believe this but i got home and my dad was there?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: what??? 8ecause of all this? How the fuck did he find out so fast?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: no he was apparently just schmoozing with my mom if you can fuckin believe it? like you do with your ex you haven’t talked to in years i guess?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: his timing is comically bad. it’s maybe the funniest shit he’s ever done.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: anyway he roped me in to going out for a drive so sit tight.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Are you Fucking KIDDING me right now Harry Anderson?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i know, i know.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: but no worries, i asked my mom to pick me up some snacks so she’ll leave to go to the store in a sec.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: just sneak in after she leaves and hide in my room, and i’ll be back in a bit.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0182.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0183.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ok, she’s gone.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I’ll take out the side window with this rock, clim8 in, and then let you two in the 8ack door.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: It's go time!!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Love the Enthusiasm 8ut hold on a goddamn minute.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: No Need to 8reak my 8oyfriend’s window, I have a key, duh.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: You have a key to Harry Anderson’s?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Is now really the time to get jealous, Tav?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I’m not jealous,, it’s only that I’d have given you one to mine,,, if you wanted.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: There’s a Reason we don’t make out at your house Tavros, and it’s 8ecause the vi8es are a8solutely fucking rancid in there, thanks to your mom.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Anyway, that’s like a thousand miles past the Point, here!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah who cares, let’s MOVE!</p> + </div> + <div class="command"> + <span>(Room:)</span> + <div>> (Room: Examine yourself.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0184.gif"> + <p>A bedroom stands empty. There is no boy standing in this bedroom, or indeed anyone else. However, if the boy whose bedroom it was were here, one might remark that his name was HARRY ANDERSON.</p> + <p>And FUCK, one might say, does he like MUSICAL THEATER.</p> + <p>He has been in his fair share of school plays, but he has LOFTY ASPIRATIONS to STAR in bigger and better productions. He especially appreciates modern MUSICAL REMAKES of classic OLD EARTH MOVIES. It's a craze that not everyone is happy about, but in the absent boy they have found a DEVOTED FAN. There is also just enough overlap between his taste and his father’s to allow for SOMEWHAT STILTED CONVERSATIONAL BONDING from time to time.</p> + <p>The boy who is not yet here has also been known to dabble in ACCESSORIZATION. He could be described as a COBBLER ASPIRANT, a NEOPHYTE MILLINER, or even a BIT OF A WHIZZ WITH A NEEDLE AND THREAD. His mother got him his first SEWING MACHINE when he was 10, to keep him from using hers all the time. His looks are HAND-CRAFTED, often IMITATED, but never DUPLICATED. His COSTUMES appear in various AMATEUR PRODUCTIONS, the devising of which takes up most of his FREE TIME. His friends are usually LESS APPRECIATIVE of his attempts to dress them up than he would like, though.</p> + <p>While it is full of these important details and more, the room still stands empty. But very soon it will remain un-stood in no longer.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0185.gif"> + <p>Getting there is uneventful. There are no barking dogs, no traps, no lurking observers. The thrill of success is short, and it isn’t long until they’re wading agonizingly through the slow thickness of time.</p> + <p>They have nothing to do but wait.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Wow, our moment in the spotlight is really making the Rounds.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: May I look?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I turned my phone off immediately upon aiding and abetting murderers,, since mother most certainly has tracking capabilities for it,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: So I haven’t seen anything,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Eat your heart out, Tav.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0186.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Wow,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: That’s quite a lot of attention,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: It’s getting a bit surreal to see my, uh,, frozen mask of horror on every news site,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: It’s a good shot of you,,, though, Vrissy,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It really is Shockingly well composed.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And the filter doesn’t wash me out. Not 8ad for a human photographer.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I checked that kid’s profile and they’re really pretty decent.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: May8e if we all survive this, I’ll look them up and see if they need new models.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: That’s the spirit,</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0187.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: How long is this going to take?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I know John is all depressed and long winded now 8ut surely he should have dropped his precious 8oy 8ack home 8y now.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: These are crucial minutes we’re wasting.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh, is trying on all my 8oyfriend’s accessories not passing the time well enough for you?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Desper8 times call for desper8 measures, Vrissy.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And this is some dire shit.</p> + </div> + <p>They stare each other down. Did she mean the fugitive situation, or Harry Anderson’s fashion choices? Vrissy feels silly wondering this, but despite the situation they’re in, she can’t help but feel more acutely anxious about Vriska’s presence.</p> + <p>She likes her life, and she trusts her own choices. But now, looking at everything from Vriska’s vantage point, it all feels silly. Unimportant. Childish.</p> + <p>She can’t tell if she wants Vriska to rip in to Harry Anderson or if she wants her to stay silent. To put off the moment where she has to defend him or join in.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0188_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0188_2.gif"> + <p>Luckily, Harry Anderson opens the door and puts off any fraught decision making for the moment. He kisses Vrissy’s temple and she leans in to the warmth of him.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: so sorry it took so long.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: can’t rush a heart to heart, you know how it is.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: You actually had a Heart to Heart with your dad? How many times did he Cry?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: none, actually, i think he got that over with when he was talking to my mom.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: but god, it was a mess. i had to keep talking to keep him from looking at his phone or turning on the radio.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i may have told him more about my deep passions and emotions in the last hour than the whole rest of my life combined, just to keep him from hearing the fucking news.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: which, by the way, is a complete clusterfuck. they’re asking for tips about your location, blasting the fucking photo everywhere. all of it.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: great shot of you, though, babe.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: and tav actually held his own? absolute madman.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: and you, too, uh.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: vriska.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: nice to meet you by the way. i see you’re enjoying my collection of scarves.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah. Are we all here and acqua8nted now? Gr8. What’s next?</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0189.gif"> + <p>John Egbert has not had a day like this in a very long time. He can barely keep track of this series of epiphanies he’s having. He stretches out on his couch to relax and process the gifts of advice and connection his friends and family and ex-family have just given him.</p> + <p>He is in the middle of wondering if it’s even possible to reach further depths of insight when his phone rings.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: hey karkat! great timing!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so much just happened and im kind of reeling about it.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: YEAH NO SHIT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: SO IS HARRY ANDERSON SAFE?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: huh? yeah, i just dropped him back at roxy’s, why?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: THANK FUCK. I DIDN’T SEE HIM IN THE PICTURE, BUT THIS IS, AND NO OFFENSE MEANT TO YOUR GENETICS, THE EXACT KIND OF BULLSHIT I WOULD HAVE EXPECTED HIM TO GET HIMSELF HAPLESSLY INVOLVED IN.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: NOT SURE HOW VRISKA MARYAM-LALONDE AND TAVROS EVEN GOT INTO IT WITHOUT HIS DEFT TOUCH. EXCEPT OF COURSE I DO, BECAUSE FUCKING VRISKA.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: none taken, but what are you even talking about? vriska? our vriska?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: is something going on? i just spent the afternoon with my son, and i think he would have told me if something was up with his friends?</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: OH MY LUSCIOUS SHITTING CHRIST JOHN LISTEN TO ME.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: listening!</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: ARE YOU IN FRONT OF A TV.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well yeah, actually.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN I’M BEGGING YOU TO TURN IT ON. ANY FUCKING CHANNEL WILL DO.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0190.gif"> + <p>John takes it in silently. The slain clown, the teen fugitives, the self-righteous political spin. God, the photo. The photo of his son’s friends, actual goddamn Vriska Serket, and the very clearly dead Gamzee, doused in a cascade of tepid public school fire sprinkler water, the flash from the alarms illuminating them in a holy fluorescence. It’s the stupidest, the most dangerous, and the most beautiful thing he has ever seen.</p> + <p>The absurd joy of it bubbles up his chest and out his mouth in the most genuine fit of laughter John has felt in years. And now that he’s started it, he can’t stop.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN ARE YOU SEEING IT?</p> + </div> + <p>John can’t answer. He can’t speak. His body has given itself over to the long-lost feeling of manic euphoria. It had felt like Harry Anderson was holding something back on the drive earlier, but he had already told John so much. He hadn’t wanted to press for more.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: IT’S NOT FUCKING FUNNY, EGBERT!</p> + </div> + <p>John can’t breathe. Something is happening. Something is finally fucking happening, and he’s finally awake enough to appreciate it.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: MORE HINGES ON THIS THAN JUST THE LIVES OF THESE TEENAGERS, WHICH SHOULD BE ENOUGH FOR YOU TO TAKE SERIOUSLY, BUT APPARENTLY NOT.</p> + <p class="karkat">KARKAT: JOHN, THIS IS A LINCHPIN MOMENT FOR THE ENTIRE SYSTEM. THIS COULD BE HOW WE LOSE, JOHN.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0191.gif"> + <p>John wheezes himself into relative calm. He has to get Karkat to understand. He clears his throat and breathes.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: karkat, this can be how we win.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i know what we need to do.</p> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter8.html">CHAPTER 8. A Daughter Astray</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter8.html b/chapter8.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a519564 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter8.html @@ -0,0 +1,1354 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 8. A Daughter Astray (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter7.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter9.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-04-27">(04/27/2020)</time> + <time datetime="2020-04-13">04/13/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 8. A Daughter Astray</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0192.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Assassinations, open warfare, so-called "revolution," and where has everyone gone?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: They've ABANDONED me. They've taken our precious son. And now...</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0193.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Good gravy... Even my former BFFsie's home has become a pit of vipers.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Oh, Jake. Are you the only loyal one left? :'B</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Um......................</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This is just delicious.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Your sorry ass is serving my ailing soul three michelin stars' worth of irony right now, English.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm slurping this shit up like it's a piping hot bowl of udon.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Itadakimasu.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: AHEM,</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Look here, janey...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Things might seem a bit maudlin right now but im sure theres some explanation for all the chicanery afoot!</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Wouldnt it be good to drop them a wire, pull a few strings and set up a good old chinwag, so we can all hash it out like a cosy cabal of bosom pals???</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Jake, you're sweet. Foolish, empty-headed, deluded by hope, a slave to your instincts... but sweet.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Now is not the time for sweet.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Said the former baking empress.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: But...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Jeepers janey, the way you make it sound. You couldnt possibly mean...?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Oh, but I do.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: It's time I gave the rebellion their just deserts.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: B.. but i thought you said that now wasnt the time for sw-</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: It's an expression, Jake.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Here's another:</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: "An eye for an eye."</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Once we have rescued our son from their clutches, I'm going to take something of my own; something as valuable to the rebellion as Tavvy is to me.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Two can play at the hostage game. That loathsome daughter of theirs should fit the bill nicely.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Then those naughty rebels will cease this unruly tantrum, and do what they are told.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (Gulp.)</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="command vriska"> + <span>(Kids:)</span> + <div>> (Kids: Converse.)</div> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0194.gif"> + <div class="two-columns"> + <div class="column"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: so...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: um. vriska?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: The one and o........</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Ughhhhhhhh)</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I mean, yeah. That's me!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: i've heard a lot about you. my name's harry anderson egbert.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY ANDERSON: but my friends just call me harry anderson.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And what do incredi8ly hot and 8adass alien girls call you? ::::)</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ecause there's no way I'm saying Harry Anderson every time. That's like... 8 whole letters too long.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: From now on your name is just Harry.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: o... k?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Gr8.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: So what's your deal, Harry?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: If I had to 8et, I'd say you're the thing that pup8ed after a 8ar8aric act of human sexual intercourse 8etween John and some Lalonde or other.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ew.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i do NOT want to think about that.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Too 8ad, chief. It's 8asically all I've 8een dealing with today.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: "Welcome 8ack, Vriska. Your friends have spent the last who-knows-how many sweeps producing an army of freakish offspring, all while steadily getting uglier and LESS COOL."</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: lol. gottem.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: but um, yeah. john and roxy are my parents.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ugh, "parents".</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I didn't care a8out all this alien shit when John first tried to tell me a8out it, and I DEFIN8TELY don't care any more.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: hahaha...</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i don’t know, i’ve just never talked to a troll who didn’t grow up around humans.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you sound like vrissy, but if vrissy was from like...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok, so have you ever seen the musical calamity jane?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i guess you probably haven't.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: but so there's this part at the beginning, where the title character comes back from chicago, and she talks to all of the old-timey locals about how bizarre and new-fangled everything was, and</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Godddddddd it really is like talking to teenage John all over again.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: No I haven't seen Chastity Jane or whatever the stupid title was. It sounds like a total snooze!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And anyway, what are you trying to say?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: That I sound outd8ed?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: There WERE no humans on Alternia, okay? There were no humans, and no human "musicals", in my entire UNIVERSE.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: it sounds like a horrible place. ):</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah, it 8lew so un8elieva8ly hard.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And while we're at it: don't compare me to Vrissy either!!!!!!!! She's no 8etter than the rest of you.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: She's soft. I can tell.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: None of you weenies would have survived even a day, 8ack where I came from.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i bet i would have.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: HAH!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: No way, kid.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I mean, I can tell that you think you’re hot shit, and I can respect reckless 8ravado.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ut only if you can 8ack it up. :::;)</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i can back it up.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Oh yeah????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ever killed any8ody????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ever even thrown a P8NCH?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: well... no.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i mean, we've done stage fighting before, but never the real stuff.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: but i bet i could learn. i took kickboxing with my mom for a month and half when i was nine.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Pffffffff.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well, at least you aren’t a coward. I’ve known guys softer than you, 8elieve it or not.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: John, for instance!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: He totally freaked out the first time I told him I killed some8ody.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: haha, that sounds like my dad.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: He came through, though. I guess. When it actually counted.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: He was there to punch me in the face when I needed it most.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: hehe...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: wait.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: like... literally?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yup!</p> + </div> + <p>Harry doesn’t really know what to think about this past version of his father. He knows the stories, the legends, the lore. He’s seen John’s old fetch modi, the ugly blue pajamas and all the hammers. Most of them are in museums. That his parents are literal gods has always been a basic fact about his family life, about as interesting as who sits where at the dinner table. It’s all normal to him. Every detail of that part of his parents’ lives has always seemed to lie on the other side of an insuperable barrier, cut off from the people they are now. Harry had always assumed that this dividing line was simply an effect of the passage of time. Being boring and two-dimensional just seemed like it came with the territory when you were an adult.</p> + <p>But now he's not so sure. Ever since hearing that one of his dad's old friends had turned up, that border between past and present has felt fainter by the minute. And as they talk, he begins to think that Vriska seems so much... fresher. More real. An actual, authentic, bona fide god from another universe. Harry can’t imagine his dad even talking to someone like her, let alone punching her in the face.</p> + <p>Freaking out about murder, though; that's definitely something Harry can see his father doing. And, speaking of which...</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY: not to cast doubt on any of these stories about my dad that you're telling me vriska, but he's probably going to freak out a bit about this whole clown situation.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: as well as... you even being here?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: John already knows I'm here, num8nuts!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And as for the stuff with Gamzee,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: no, listen, i mean the fact that you're HERE here. the fact that you're involving any of the rest of us.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: my mom probably won't be happy about this either!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm not allowed ONE vriska in my bedroom.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i don't even want to THINK about how much trouble i'll be in if she finds out i had TWO of them up there.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hahahahahahahaha oh my god. And you expect me to 8elieve you'd survive on Alternia?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: well, i'm not there right now!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: right now i'm in my mom's house with my girlfriend, her boyfriend, and another god damn version of my girlfriend, and all of us are probably now on the run from the fucking GOVERNMENT!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Ooooooookay, so YOU'RE freaking out a8out it now. Cool.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: of course i am freaking out vriska!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm freaking out what i think is probably a good amount about this. the fashionable amount of freaking out.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: the coolest possible amount of freaking out to be doing about the present situation, is the amount of freaking out i'm doing right now.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: >::::|</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: but my dad ISN'T cool!!! he just spent like an hour on driving me around in his car and talking about emotions and stuff.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: he's going through some kind of personal epiphany at the moment. he even shaved off his MUSTACHE before coming here.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: this is really serious, and now i'm implicated in it as well!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you guys were at my school, so he'll realise immediately that you were trying to meet up with me!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: he's going to absolutely flip his fucking lid if he ever finds out about this!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: or worse, it might just make him as miserable as before, and he'll be really disappointed in me, and then he'll just leave again, or... or SOMETHING!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: and that's not to even MENTION--</p> + </div> + <p>Harry is not even able to mention the thing he was about to mention, because at this exact moment his phone starts ringing.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p>BECAUSE JELLICLES CAN AND JEEEEEEELLICLES DO JELLICLES DO AND JELLICLES CAN JELLICLES CAN AND JEEEEEELLICLES</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh fuck.</p> + <p>JELLICLES CAN AND JEEEEEEELLICLES DO JELLICLES DO AND JELLICLES CAN JELLICLES CAN AND JEEEEEELLICLES</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: it's him.</p> + </div> + </div> + <div class="column"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Check it out, someone's already cospl8ying my fit from tod8y.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I'm sure it's very good, but there's,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Good? It's Infuri8ing!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: UGH! So many f8ke accounts pretending to 8e me. Stealing my hard-earned Clout. Fakey f8ke F8KES.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: So,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Not that that isn't important,,, but, we should really talk about</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Damn Right it's import8nt Tavros! Image is a8out as Important as it gets.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: If you understood that a little better then m8ybe we'd have gotten to Third 8ase already.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Th,,,,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: W,,,,,,,,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (Vrissy,,)</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (We haven't,,, even,,,,,)</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: My Point ex8ctly. ;;;;)</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Oh,, i see,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Just a wee joke,, to, lighten the mood,, or something,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8ingo.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Relax Tavvy.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: You're starting to Sweat Nervously. You know I H8te it when you Swe8t Nervously.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Thank you,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Th8t wasn't a Fucking H8mance Complim8nt, I do genuinely Hate it and not in a Fun Way.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Oh,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I'm,, sorry,,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Ugh. Whatever.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I'm just... 8eing a 8itch. Forget about it.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: ,,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: ........</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: The two of Them seem to 8e Getting Along.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: You mean,, harry anderson and vriska,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: No Tavros, The *Other* Two People In The Room With Us.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yes Harry 8nderson and Vriska!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: They seem like a 8unch of pals Already.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I'm Glad.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: You don't sound,,, happy about it,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Not Happy? Tavros, I'm Over The Fucking Moon a8out this. See? I'm smiling So Hard my F8ce hurts! ::::))))))))</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: That does look like it hurts,, yes,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: This is Gr8. This is all Gr8! It's all Just GR8!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: The Way she just cannon8alled into our lives out of nowhere was gr8.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Killing that Clown? Without a Doubt the 8est thing I've ever Fucking Seen.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Dragging his 8ody through Harry Anderson's school, 8eing drenched in W8ter, and Hiding in a Clos8t?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: The Picture of Gr8tness incarn8!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I might be imagining it, but,, i believe i detect the merest smidgen of insincerity, in the way you're describing these events,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8ut you know wh8t's the Gr8test thing of all?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It's the F8ct th8t they can Just Stand There and Ch8t, like it's Not Even a 8ig Deal!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Is it a big deal,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Other than, the various ways in which basically everything right now,, could be said to constitute a deal that is somewhat developed,,, in the sense of, bigness,,,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Of Course It's A 8ig De8l????????</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I mean!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: UGH!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Just LOOK 8t Them.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I am,, looking,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: But,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I do not see it,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Whatever it is about the two of them, that you want me to be observing,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I cannot help but note, though,, that you seem a little,,,,, on edge about something,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Similar to how you get,, when there are people who you would describe as,, uncool, in the general vicinity,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Other than me, i mean,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Or when someone,, who you were mutuals with, on some social media site or other,, unfollows you,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Betraying what i can only assume is a sacred bond of trust,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: And,, it makes me wonder if this might be another such occasion,,, where some unspoken social contract has been shamelessly torn asunder,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Okay. Fine.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: You make a Good Point, Tavros.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I just........</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Sigh.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It's Vriska.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Ok,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Would it make you feel any better, if i pretended to be surprised about that,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8ite me.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Listen,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I know you don't like to talk about these kinds of things,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Having said, on previous occasions, stuff like,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: "Feelings are for adults and babies, not real people,"</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: And i'm not,, necessarily, saying that you have some unaddressed feelings,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: But,, maybe if we're going to be around her,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: You should try to be honest, about the feelings, that you don't have,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: TAvros, It's Nothing.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: ,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I mean... okay, look.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Much as I H8 to admit it, you're Right.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Her being here, it m8kes me Feel Something.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It's Something about the W8y she Looks at him.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: The Rest of us too.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Like we're not even Real.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Yes,, this is good,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Ever since she showed up, it's 8een o8vious that Nothing Here M8tters to her.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Like... I don't Matter.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And to 8e Honest, I think I Understand why!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Everything Here is so dwee8ish and 8oring!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: This is a good level of honesty, that you're displaying here,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I'm absorbing everything you're saying,, in a very non judgemental way,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And with her 8eing here, Talking to Harry Anderson...</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I get this sort of frustr8ed feeling in my Chest.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And if I H8d to say Why,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: You can do it,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I guess it would 8e 8ecause........</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: ........</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Because you're worried harry anderson thinks she's cooler than you,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Because you're jealous,,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: W8.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: What?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: No!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Tavros, were you Listening to 8NYTHING I was Just Saying?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I'm not worried a8out Harry Fucking 8nderson right now!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Hell, I'm so Unconcerned that I think I'm going to start just calling him Harry from now on! It'll Save Everyone a lot of Valua8le Time!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Listen Tavros, Vriska will get 8ored of Harry in a Heart8eat!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: That's the whole point!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: She shouldn't 8e w8sting her Time on someone like Him!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: SHE SHOULD BE T8LKING T8 ME!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS:</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I MEAN,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Sh,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: ,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh just</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Forget it.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: What were you Trying To Tell me a8out?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Um,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Oh,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Right,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Yes,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: You should,,, probably come and take a look out the window,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: We appear to be in,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: If you'll pardon the expression,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: A bit of a fudging pickle,</p> + </div> + </div> + </div> + </div> + <div class="command harry"> + <span>(Harry:)</span> + <div>> (Harry: Pick up.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0195.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p>DO YOU LAND ON YOUR FEET ARE YOU TENSE WHEN YOU SENSE THERE'S A STORM IN THE AIR</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok everyone, my dad's calling.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: if he finds out you're here then he will definitely put two and two together, so PLEASE just keep quiet and let me do the talking.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Sure thing.</p> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY: er,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: hi dad.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: HI JOHN!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Hi Mister Eg8ert!!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh god dammit.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: um.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: so.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i guess.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: first of all,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: HELLO SON!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: I AM</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: SO</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: VERY</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: PROUD OF YOU!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY:</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: PHEW, that felt good to say.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: or to yell, i guess. heheh.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: sorry about that, harry anderson.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i just didn't think i'd be seeing your handiwork all over the news quite so soon!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: so...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you know about it.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: yep! you think i wouldn't have recognized your school?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: right... and you're not like... mad? about the dead body and vriska and stuff?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: son,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it looks like you tried to pull one of the biggest pranks i can think of.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and it backfired!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: y... yeah.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but that's ok!!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it could have happened to the best of us.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ok, so maybe it wasn't the most original idea.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and you should probably have steered clear of such a blatant nod to weekend at bernie's without seriously planning some of the logistics in advance.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i know that they make it seem so easy in that movie, but it's important to remember that not everything on the big screen translates easily to real life.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ESPECIALLY when dead bodies and clowns are concerned.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but these are all mistakes that any amateur prank master has to make some time.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and besides, you managed to keep quiet about it the whole time we were chatting earlier. i was completely fooled!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but you had to get one up on the prankster's gambit against me someday. honestly, it feels like an early birthday present or something!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so i guess what i'm saying is that... you should be proud of yourself.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok dad.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: um, thanks.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so. you're still at your mother's house?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah... i couldn't think where else to go.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you obviously just heard, but both vriskas are here. tavros too.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i think the girls are fighting? i don't really know. it's very confusing due to the fact that there are... well.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: two of them?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i think two vriskas is more than enough for anybody.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: heh. two vriskas is NOTHING.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: when i was your age i lost count of all the vriskas i had to keep track of.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it was probably some preposterous number.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: hahaha.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and tavros? is he ok?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i think so.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: he seems his, uh,, usual self,,,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: now, harry anderson, i know that you and tavros haven't always gotten along.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but i am going to have to ask you to try and look out for him for the time being.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: your uncle jake and i... well, i'll explain later.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: let's just say that gamzee isn't the only family member jane is losing today.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: dad... if you wanted me to KILL tavros, you only had to ask.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (Um,,,)</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: couldn't resist.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0196.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: can you see out of the window?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah, i'm looking right now. the place is heaving with reporters.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i thought so. the press didn't take long to come to the same conclusion i did. you're on the news already.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and it's the same story here. people with cameras are crawling all over the yard.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: which means jane's secret police are there too. the drones won't be far behind.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh fuck.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: sorry, i mean. oh... farts.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: harry anderson egbert.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: the word "fuck" was invented for moments like this.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: haha?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but anyway, you need to get out of there, fast.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: try to create some kind of distraction or something, and then head for the bell tower.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you mean the one they hang the dirk strider memorial effigy from every year?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: yes, that's the place.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'll meet you guys up there.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: um,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok dad.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh, and harry?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: just some small pieces of advice.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: some guidelines that any budding prankster or newly fledged fugitive should know.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: don't panic,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: don't make a scene,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and whatever you do...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: don't get caught!!</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="command kanaya"> + <span>(==>)</span> + <div>> (High above the clouds...)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0197.gif"> + <p>Two commanders stand on the bridge of a rebel ship. The Maryam-Lalondes are characters of legend, beheld not in awe but in fascination, and this place of command is for them like a stage. All around them bubbles the hustle and bustle of an army on the boil, a hundred ready hands dashing to and fro with the frantic busywork of battle. In amongst the confusion, they occupy a solitary vacuum, an oasis of calm amid the storm. As the world seethes with the acid sting of war, they have stood steadfast and resolute; when hope has seemed at its most distant, they have shone as a beacon of possibility.</p> + <p>Individually, they each represent immeasurable gains for the rebel faction. The rebellion's stratagems have never had a fiercer bite; their uniforms have never looked so fucking sharp. But it is together, united, that their true strength is made apparent. Their bond, a union of love between troll and human, is not only a foundation for the rebel cause, but an integral symbol of its purpose. And now, deep in enemy territory, in this moment of intolerable anguish and suspense, these two symbols stand firm. Unshakeable, immovable. Nay, even unflappable.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0198.gif"> + <p>Well, almost.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Try Calling Her Again!</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I HAVE tried, but she's not picking up!!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: What About Harry Anderson Or Tavros!</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Kanaya, nobody is answering!!!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Rose I Feel Like I Must Sink To The Level Of Stating The Obvious But This Is Terrible!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: This Is Awful!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: This Is!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Just!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Aaaaaaargh!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Cant Think Of Any More Related Adjectives!</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Kanaya, I don't want to resort to idle, baseless platitudes.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So I won't.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I don't understand what's going on any more than you do, and I'm sorry.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm sorry!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Rose Our Daughter Is In Danger And We Are But Powerless To Help Her!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Do Not Understand Why This Is Happening Or What Precise Series Of Events Led To This Predicament But I Doubt That They Are Directly Or Indirectly Your Fault!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Feel Like Your Apologising Is Serving As The Very Baseless Platitude Which You Sought To Avoid!</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: No, I know.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I know, dear.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I just wish I had answers!! My useless powers aren't being any help, and what's worse,</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I can't see ANYTHING useful on this stupid news channel!!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Think It Is A Cruel Irony That We Are Forced To Depend On Crocker's Branded Coverage Of Our Own Daughters Headhunting!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Not To Mention That The Quality Of This Broadcast Leaves Something To Be Desired!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Know That We Are Enemies But I Really Expected Better Of Such A Shrewd Businesswoman!</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: excuse me mA'Ams</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I just don't understand what Vriska was doing there in the first place...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Forgetting the fact that Gamzee's dead for a moment,</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: No I Cant Do That Theyve Just Started Showing The Picture Of Him Again</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Ugh, god.</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: For Once The Thought Of His Putrescent Corpse Does Nothing To Quell My Anxiety!</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: if i could just tAke A moment of your time</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: its A mAtter of some urgency</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: This Is All So Upsetting That I Cannot Even Find Satisfaction In His Death!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Not When They Have Started Using It As Justification To Call Our Daughter A Terrorist!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And All That Is Without Even Mentioning The Fact!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: That Somehow!!</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: (*deep breath*)</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: The Other Vriska Is Also Here!!!</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: MA'AMS I HAVE AN URGENT REPORT TO DELIVER, PLEASE FORGIVE MY YELLING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0199.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: the reconnAissAnce teAm is bAck eArly, mA'Ams</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: the ship docked A few moments Ago</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: And the scouting party???</p> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: i expect she's Zipping her wAy up here now, mA'Am</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0200.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: should be here Any minute n</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0201.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="alfonz">ALFONZ: oof!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0202.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Jade!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Oh Thank God</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We weren't expecting you to get back so soon.</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: What Is Going On Down There</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: What happened to the rest of your scouting party?</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: What Is Another VRISKA Doing Here</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Where is John?</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Where Is Dave</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Where is our *daughter*?!</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: (Rose I Think We Must Try To Remain Calm And Give Jade A Chance To Answer Our Queries Difficult Though It May Be In This Moment Of Intolerable Anguish And Suspense)</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I... yes, of course.</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Jade It Is Okay</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: its........</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: *sniffle*</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Please Take Your Time</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: we dont HAVE any time!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: its too late!!!!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: janes forces were just too fast...</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Oh No</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You don't mean...</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: theyve taken her</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0203.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: THEYVE TAKEN YIFFY!!!!!!! D:</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0204.gif"> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="command rose"> + <span>(Jade and Rose:)</span> + <div>> (Jade and Rose: Explain everything.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0205.gif"> + <p>Okay. While Jade and Rose are busy relieving that moment of intolerable anguish and suspense, let's check back in with the kids for a moment. Planning their escape is going about as well as you might expect.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0206.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: We appear to be,,, in no uncertain terms,,, completely surrounded,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I don't wish to come across as pessimistic,,, but,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: It's hard to see what possibilities we have, for a plan of escape,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: there has to be something we can do!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: my dad is counting on us to get out of here and meet up with him.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Well,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I'm also not wishing to be rude, but,,,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It's Ok8y Tavvy, I don't Give A Shit a8out being rude.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Harry, your dad's plan fucking SUCKS.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: There's no Easy w8y out of this.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It was simple enough for him to Tell us to escape, 8ut we're the ones th8t Have to 8ctually DO it!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And that advice he gave you?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: It was All a load of Meaningless 8ullshit!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: "Don't get caught."</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah, No Shit!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok, wow. :/</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: vrissy, i know this is a stressful predicament but i think that's going too far.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: my dad believes in us.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: and if he thinks there's something we can do, then there has to be a way!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: it's the only possibility.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Ok8y, how A8out This for an alternative explan8tion.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Your dad is Giddy and High on the Thrill of Something Interesting h8ppening in his life For Once!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i don't believe this.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i've been waiting for my dad to start talking to me again for what feels like forever.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you KNOW that!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: and you couldn't just be happy for me this one time?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh my GOD Harry 8nderson.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I know you've spent So much Time crying into your d8tenight Popcorn a8out this but Please give it a 8reak!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Just LISTEN to me for once.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: This isn't a8out your hangups with your Dad, okay?!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We're in the middle of a WAR.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: A War th8t is, in some part, His Fault!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And instead of Taking Responsibility and 8cting like a Grown Up, he decided to Rope us all into this Ins8ne Game he thinks he's pl8ying!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Vrissy,,,, i don't think that's fair,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Uncle john isn't to blame for this,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah, no shit tav.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: this whole situation is because of YOUR insane hitlermom.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Ok, now,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: That was uncalled for,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Yeah Harry, not cool.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh what, so you're gonna just pretend that his mom *isn't* a literal dictator?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: he doesn't need you to stick up for him, vrissy! he's fucking loaded!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Harry, all of our families are O8scenely Wealthy.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We're standing in your mom's 8outique living room! You can't exactly pl8y a Privilege Card here!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And Tavros, you don't have to Defend Mister Eg8ert just 8ecause you feel weird a8out him trying to kidnap you that one time.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: If 8nything, you should 8e on My Side here!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: John's clearly got a Tr8ck Record of doing 8nything for a moment of excitement without thinking of the Consequences.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Grr........)</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And Look wh8t h8ppened!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Remember what he did on Harry's 8irthday that one time?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (I told you that,,, in strictest confidence,,,)</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Tavros, he could h8ve Killed you!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Why Else do you think you're such a Wimpy, Traumatized 8a8y?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Ok, that,,, isn't the reason for that,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: And,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Grrrrrrrr........)</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I feel like your implied, "concern", for my childhood wellbeing,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Is less sincere,,, than it is,,, an attempt to weaponize something difficult for me,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: In order that you can win an argument,,, with harry anderson,,,,,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: GRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: WILL YOU ALL JUST</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: SHUT!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: UP!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: :O</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: :O</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: :O</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0207.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I feel like I'm going fucking insane.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Is it weepy wiggler tantrum hour, or are the three of you always this pathetic????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: No8ody answer that, it was 8ulge-achingly rhetorical.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Just keep quiet for a moment while I insult you some more.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Vrissy, you're cool and all, 8ut I'm getting tired of this teen nonsense.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: John's "advice" totally 8lows, 8ut at least he understands what needs to 8e done.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Don't insult my friends. Only I get to do that.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Tavros, stop 8eing such a wimp.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: No8ody has time for this pansy clownery!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Do you remem8er what happened to the last clown I had to deal with?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (Gulp,,,)</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Yeah, I thought so.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And Harry, listen.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Neither you nor your friends have anything really important going on.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Your lives and your planet are a total 8ore!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ut somehow John loves you anyway.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Try and be fucking gr8ful for that every once in a while.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Not everyone is so lucky.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Anyway, forget his advice. John wasn't counting on you to get us out of this.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: He was counting on me!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: So from now on, everyone just follow my lead and do what I say.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And if that doesn't sound like a good enough deal to you, then...</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Just,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Stay out of my way.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ...</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: ...</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: ,,,</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Alright! I'm glad you can at least recognize when a grown-up is talking.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Harry. Go to your room.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: um... what?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: no??</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you're not my mom.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And no8ody is more gr8ful for that fact than me!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You need to arm yourself, stupid.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: None of you even have a way to fight!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Here. Take this.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: what is it?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: It's your stupid face is what it is!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hahahaha, just kidding. It's a spare strife speci8us.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You wanna prove you'd make it on Alternia?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Take this and go gra8 a weapon.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Meet us 8ack here in a min8.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: a... what?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: A MINUTE, GOD!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: alright alright, i'm going.</p> + </div> + <div class="command harry"> + <span>(Harry:)</span> + <div>> (Harry: Go gra8 a weapon.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0208.gif"> + <div class="chat tg-harry ag-vrissy"> + <p>-- thespiansGlamor <span class="tg">[TG]</span> began pestering adamantGriftress <span class="ag">[AG]</span> --</p> + <p> </p> + <p class="tg">TG: alright, i'm back in my room.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: there's just one small problem.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i don't think i own any weapons?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: there's the prop swords in my closet...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: but they're all made of foam and plastic.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: argh, this is so hard.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Hey Dum8ass, why are you messaging me from your 8edroom.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: We are Literally in the Same House.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: We were just in the Same 8RGUMENT.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: yes, i know, i know.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: um.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: sorry about that.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: the argument, i mean...</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It's Wh8tever.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i didn't mean to get so mad at you and tavros.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: well maybe i did mean to get mad at tavros.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: but i still feel bad about it.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: everything's just been so stressful today.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Harry, I said It's Wh8tever!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ok.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: but...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i need your help here.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i only have a minute, and i can't think of ANYTHING to assign to the strife specibus.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: can't you ask vriska if she has any ideas?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: No.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I'm not going to 8other her with such a Pointless Question.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: And 8esides, I think she's 8usy right now.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: She's sort of huddled in a corner, muttering to herself.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: huh.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: maybe she's nervous?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: either that or...</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I don't think she's nervous.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: 8ut it reminds me how You get sometimes when you're Practicing your Lines over and over.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: huh.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ok.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: weird.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Time's Ticking, Harry.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: fuck.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i'm still all out of ideas.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Ugh, Come On. There's 8ound to 8e Something up there.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Anything can 8e a weapon if you know how to use it.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: that's easy for you to say.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: on account of all the ACTUAL WEAPONS you have in your room.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Look Harry.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Just 8ecause I Happen to own a lot of Incredi8ly Deadly Armaments, doesn't mean I couldn't improvise if Necessary.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It's part of what m8kes Me 8adass enough to 8e a mem8er of the Rebellion!</p> + <p class="tg">TG: blah blah blah.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Anyway.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: You've got a 8unch of Sewing Stuff in your room, right?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: yeah.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: feel free to skip the part where you make fun of me for it.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: No, Dongface, I wasn't Going to!</p> + <p class="tg">TG: oh.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: then i don't understand.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: You need a weapon, remember?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: OHHHHHHHHH.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: /ROLLx8</p> + </div> + <div class="command harry"> + <span>(Harry:)</span> + <div>> (Harry: Examine sewing table.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0209.gif"> + <div class="chat tg-harry ag-vrissy"> + <p class="tg">TG: ok, there's a bunch of sharp things here.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Pity You aren't one of them! Lol.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: oh har har.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: So, Wh8t are we Working with?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: it's mostly just pins and needles.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i doubt they'll be much good.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Are you Kidding????????</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Needles are awesome!</p> + <p class="ag">AG: They're wh8t my Mom uses.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: She could pro8a8ly skin you Alive with a pair if she w8nted.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: well, i don't doubt that.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: but maybe not this type of needle.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Come on, you Know you want to.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: no, that would be so dumb!</p> + <p class="tg">TG: these things are way too small.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i'd be the world's worst acupuncturist or something.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i think i'll just go with this pair of scissors instead.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: 8oooooooo.</p> + </div> + <div class="command harry"> + <span>(Harry:)</span> + <div>> (Harry: Acquire scissors.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0210.gif"> + <p>You CAPTCHALOGUE your trusty pair of SEWING SCISSORS. You've brought many a colorful character to life with these babies. You're pretty sure you could bring just as many to death with them as well.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0211_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0211_2.gif"> + <div class="command harry">" + <span>(Harry:)</span> + <div>> (Harry: Select "SCISSORKIND".)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0212.gif"> + <div class="chat tg-harry ag-vrissy"> + <p class="tg">TG: ok, there we go.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I Knew All Along That You Had It In You.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: so i guess this means...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i've allocated the strife specibus with the scissorkind abstratus?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: hm.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: using this weird vocab and stuff feels... well, weird.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i'm not sure why, but it seems as though everything that's about to happen is that much more important now.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: or maybe it already was, but i just didn't understand just how important until this moment.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: sometimes maybe all you need to bring a feeling home to you is some nonsense sounding words that possibly don't mean anything.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: this is what we learn in the theatre.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Sounds f8ke as Shit to me.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: well, yeah.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: sigh.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i think...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: it's just a sense, but,</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i have a feeling it's going to be...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ...</p> + <p class="ag">AG: ?????????</p> + <p class="tg">TG: bluh, nevermind. lost my train of thought.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Okay, well it Can't have 8een that import8nt.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: 8ut either way, we don't have any more Time for this.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Hurry 8ack downstairs.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Vriska's w8ing.</p> + </div> + <div class="command vriska"> + <span>(Everyone:)</span> + <div>> (Everyone: Congreg8.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0213.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok, i think i'm as ready as i'm ever going to be.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: which isn't really saying very much.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: how about you guys.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Well, in simple terms, We're Fucked.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: We still don't have a way out, and more and more Reporters are showing up every second.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: And the moment we step outside, we're Targets for the Crocker Cops.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: We must evade them at all costs,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: They are,,, with some certainty,,, under orders to capture vrissy,,, and,,, also me,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: And,,, i'm not sure whose punishment is likely to be worse,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: how are you holding up, tavros?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: M, me,,,?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I'm,,,</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: I'm quite well,,, harry anderson,,, thank you for asking,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok...</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: However,,, i must admit,,, the thought of our impending pursuit,,, and potential capture,,, makes my blood run cold,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah. the more i think about it, the more nervous i feel.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i've had stage fright before, but this is ridiculous!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: haha...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ...</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: ,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: look, tavros.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: in case we don't make it out of this,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i just wanted to say,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: that</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm so--</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Alright, are we done here?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: um.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Forget it.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I've been stuck in this room for what feels like a month and I'm at my fucking limit.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I'm outta here.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: B, But,,,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you can't just-</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Vriska, we're Tr8pped!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: How are we supposed to Le8ve?!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You guys are free to do whatever you want, 8ut I'm just going to use the front door.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: *Excuse Me*????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: L8r 8itches.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0214.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh my god?</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: T, There she goes,,,</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Vriska!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: W8!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I'm coming too!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh fucking christ.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0215.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p>REPORTER 1: ...join live from a neighbourhood in the Carapacian Kingdom, where the perpetrators have finally decided to show their faces...</p> + <p class="reporter 2">REPORTER 2: ...are alleged to have killed the beloved salvational figure Gamzee Makara, may his boots jingle forever in paradise...</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (T, this is awful,,,)</p> + <p>REPORTER 3: ...denounced by government sources as a band of violent rebellion extremists...</p> + <p>REPORTER 1: ...children of creators, themselves rebellion leaders...</p> + <p>REPORTER 2: ...outfits could at best be described as only moderately fashionable...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: (oh god oh god oh god)</p> + <p>REPORTER 3: ... Hey, excuse me?</p> + <p>REPORTER 3: Miss Terrorist?</p> + <p>REPORTER 3: Care to give a statement?</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: (No, don't....)</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Thought you'd never ask, 8uddy.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You want a st8tment? Got one right here.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Ahem.)</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hey!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hi, humans!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: What’s up!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Get all your fucking news gru8s turned up to the max 8ecause I’m only going to say this once.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Do you want to know who I am?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: My name is VRISKA SERKET, and I'm the cre8tor this world never knew it had.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I left my home behind and put a stop to the demon who 8urned two universes for fuel, all so that this plan8 could come into existence.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Without me, none of you would even 8e here.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Capiche????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Now, you may have heard people saying a lot of things a8out us.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: They want you to 8elieve that we are violent terrorists, who want to destroy your religion and your very way of life on this planet you call home!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: So I just wanted to take a moment to clarify the situation.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: *deep breath*</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: YOU FUCKING 8ET WE ARE!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I've done and seen things that would make every single one of you piss yourselves dead, so I've seen enough to know that this planet is a FUCKING DISGRACE!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: It's a joke!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: AND NOT EVEN A VERY GOOD ONE!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: This planet is a sad little joke of a world squatting inside of the 8IGGEST, LAMEST JOKE in the HISTORY of EXIST8NCE!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hahahahahahahaha...</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Haaaaaaaa.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ........</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You know...</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I 8et no8ody here even knew who I was.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Everything I did, I did for you.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You didn't need some idiot clown to redeem you.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Everything you needed was already here!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ecause I fucking 8UILT IT FOR YOU!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: And after all that, you couldn't even have the decency to 8e 8oring and nice to each other.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: So guess what.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: The carnival is over!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I killed that harlequin son of a 8itch, and I hope he 8urns in clown hell forever.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ut for the crime of falling for his disgusting lies?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Your society... no, your whole planet... it deserves to 8urn str8 to MEGAhell, and I'm gonna 8e the one to fly it there!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I'm gonna shatter your paradise into pieces with my 8are hands and SHIT IN ITS GRAVE!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: HOW'S THAT FOR A FUCKING ST8MENT!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: YOU GOT ALL THAT, JANE CROCKER?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: DO YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT'S COMING FOR YOU????????</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: YOU'VE MESSED WITH</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ********VRISKA********</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ****FUUUUUUUUCKING****</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ********SERK8T********</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0216.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: AND SHE!!!!!!!!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0217.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: HAS *HAD*!!!!!!!!</p> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0218.gif"> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0219.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Enough.</p> + </div> + <div class="command vriska"> + <span>(Vriska:)</span> + <div>> (Vriska: Snap.)</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0220.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0221.gif"> + <center> + <p>A whole bunch of things start happening at once. Here are just a few of them:</p> + <p>In the blink of an eye, Vriska is airborne. She has evidently, and by her own admission, had enough. She reaches out with incredible speed and grabs the microphone that was brandished at her a moment before. In one smooth motion, she helicopters it around her head by the cord and sends it hurtling into the face of the witless journalist whose needling questions had been so, SO irrit8ting. He sprawls in the driveway, two rivulets of red starting to spring from his expertly broken nose.</p> + <p>From its hole in the wall of Roxy's house, the bullet that flew over Vriska's shoulder seethes with indignant rage—furious to have missed such an easy shot. It is swiftly joined there by half a dozen more: the Secret Police has begun to open fire with a vengeance, if not a great deal of accuracy.</p> + <p>Even before her first victim hits the deck, Vriska is already winding up a punch to the jaw of the next; she has wedged some of the signature octahedral dice between her fingers as a makeshift knuckleduster. There is a deliciously pointed crunching noise when her fist connects.</p> + <p>In his hiding place behind a moderately sized garden gnome, Tavros Crocker lets out a small rodential squeal, and puts his hands in front of his eyes.</p> + <p>Fearing gunfire, the few paparazzi who aren't currently getting their asses handed to them by the world's angriest traffic cone start to trip over each other, diving for cover. A small fortune's worth of very expensive recording equipment is dropped and promptly shattered on the ground in the ensuing scuffle. The instantaneous loss of such a large sum of money causes a substantial drop in the ambient air pressure and conjures up a stiff breeze.</p> + <p>Tucked inside of a small yet accommodating shrub, Harry Anderson worries that he might be forgetting how to breathe. He takes a series of gasps, in and out, just to be sure, and clutches his scissors very tight.</p> + <p>The stiff breeze comes in at a cheerful 5 on the Beaufort wind force scale—"Fresh".</p> + <p>Tavros wishes he had chosen a bigger gnome.</p> + <p>Bullets continue to fly stupidly wide, and Vriska tosses her dice into the air without even looking. In a single beat of her fairy wings she zips over to a nearby car, reaches underneath the front fender, and LIFTS. The fluorite octet tumble end over end, and the gunshots seem for a moment to coalesce into the sound of a thunderous roulette. Vriska is now holding the car end-on above her head, its burglar alarm wailing in protest. In a dance-like motion she spins in space once, twice, before loosing the vehicle skyward like an olympian might a hammer.</p> + <p>The press are fleeing for their lives, their professionalism and trashed equipment abandoned. As one of the snotty-faced and terrified reporters attempts to hide in his shrub, Harry gives her a cautious jab in the leg with his scissors. Then, he curls into a shaky ball and tries to remember the advice John gave him. <i>"Don't panic..."</i></p> + <p>The dice land. A booming, wordless voice pronounces:</p> + <p>CANONS DE 8 GRIBEAUVAL.</p> + <p>The car approaches the apex of its trajectory, and as it slows it appears to hang in the air, in a manner quite uncharacteristic of motor vehicles yet to be fitted with hover technology. It winks coyly in the afternoon sun.</p> + <p>Far away, in her lair, Jane Crocker grabs the two sides of her computer monitor with enough strength to snap it in two. She can't believe what she's watching. Behind her, from a shadowy corner of the room, there is an agitated growling noise and the rattle of chains.</p> + <p>The ground begins to shake, as a battery of naval cannons materialize in flashes of cerulean light and drop into formation behind Vriska. She cracks her knuckles one-by-one with each impact. The vibrations cause Tavros' gnome to fall over.</p> + <p>The enfilade is halted without recording a single hit. The Secret Police, perched strategically in trees and behind mailboxes, are now doing a synchronized slowly-take-off-your-badass-shades-and-gawk-at-the-sky type routine.</p> + <p>The car seems to regard the laws of gravity as mere suggestion.</p> + <p><i>"Don't make a scene..."</i></p> + <p>Vriska Serket laughs.</p> + <p>The guns roar.</p> + <p>********</p> + </center> + <p>To all of this and more, Vrissy is blissfully ignorant. She doesn't register the tearful and snivelling faces of the hapless journos as they beat a hasty retreat; nor the bruised and bloody faces of the ones writhing about on the ground, their purpling eyes and gasping mouths giving them the look of particularly wronged fish. In the mayhem, she doesn't notice Harry, or Tavros, or even the toppled gnome; all these details and more sail above her head like a home run over an especially stubby shortstop.</p> + <p>The only thing that registers to Vrissy Maryam-Lalonde in this moment is a pair of brilliant orange eyes, framed by azure tinted lashes and cut under with a sharp smirk. The sounds of gun- and cannonfire soak half-heartedly into her auricular sponge clots. The world beneath her is shockingly still. And all the while those eyes seem to burn something deep into her, leaving pitch-black scorch marks in parts of her psyche she didn't even know existed.</p> + <p>In all her life, Vrissy has never seen anyone look so cool. And it drives her <em>nuts</em>.</p> + <p>As the blossoming fireball above wilts into an angry, smoky cloud, and flaming bits of ex-car begin to absolutely pelt it down all around her, she feels someone grab her wrist. It's Harry Anderson, wearing a expression of animal panic. His mouth moves to form words she can't hear, but the message gets across all the same. It's time to get the fuck out of here.</p> + <p>The Crockerite fuzz has more pressing things to worry about than giving chase: the good fortune keeping the kids safe from the deadly automotive volley does not seem to be contagious. So they flee. Through the suburbs and into the spindly checkered streets of the central Carapacian Kingdom, the four of them tear their way towards the belltower in the distance. Vriska flies out in front—a polestar the color of carrot. Immediately behind her is Tavros, whose many years of morning jogs (with his father) and emotional torment (his mother) have given him a frankly stupid degree of endurance, though you wouldn't think it to look at him. His glasses are beginning to slip, and bounce on his slickening nose with every stride. A short way behind him is Vrissy, who is hanging back a little: Harry, still clutching her arm, is starting to lag. He has his eyes squeezed shut as he runs, and Vrissy thinks she can hear him muttering something to himself over and over between staggered breaths: <i>"Don't get caught,"</i> GASP, <i>"Don't get caught,"</i> GASP. Vrissy turns away as a mixture of pity and embarrassment threatens to join the worsening stitch in her side.</p> + <p>Nobody gives chase. No one shouts "stop those kids!" in a commanding voice, or implores some poor taxi driver to step on it. But they dare not slow. Tavros feels as though some dark and sinister shape is lurking just out of sight—it reminds him of the nights at home when he would sprint through tall, imposing trophy rooms and mirror-walled hallways, racing for the miserable safety of his bedroom's glow after turning the kitchen light off. What he wouldn't give to be back there now. With their old lives quite exploded, he's unsure whether they're running out of the danger or into it; the brightness radiating off of Vriska has all the safety and comfort of a supernova.</p> + <p>Vrissy, meanwhile, is considering growing her hair out.</p> + <p>After a stomach-churning amount of frantic hightailing, the kids turn a corner and an esophageal road vomits them—finally!—out into the central plaza. Compared to the cramped city streets, this wide open space feels agoraphobic, exposed. The belltower thrusts itself into the clear sky from the other side, all gnomonic and pointy, and its lengthening shadow beckons them to safety. Between, in the center of the large and perfect square, is the familiar Dirk Strider memorial statue, standing stoic and still. Surrounding his plinth is a circular fountain, and around the circumference dozens of knee-high cherubic figures piss angelically inward. His affect is unreadable. Is it apathy? Boredom? Contemplation? As the kids hurry past, the shimmering particles shaken from Vriska's wings dance in the polished bronze of his shades, and for a moment his reflective face is suffused with an aura of conspiracy. Nobody pays him the slightest bit of attention.</p> + <p>The four stop a while at the tower's base, chests heaving for air. Nobody says anything, they just sort of stand there and ache in each other's company for a bit. Vriska alights on the ground, rakes her throat, quietly spits out a little wad of blue, and wipes her mouth unceremoniously. Tavros pats Harry Anderson tentatively on the arm. Vrissy tries to be badass and cough up something too but she doesn't really make it work. Harry simply rests his hands on his knees, doubled over and shaking his head. Tavros looks at Vrissy over Harry's arched back and puffs out his cheeks with wide eyes. She gives him a tired half-smile in return. Vriska quietly massages a crick in her neck and rolls first one shoulder, then the other.</p> + <p>It's unclear who cracks first, but someone does, and in an instant all of them are dissolving into a bout of relieved giggles. It starts off as a light, bubbly kind of mirth, before the sheer enormity of what they've just done sets in, and they progress to full on belly laughing; the adrenaline in their blood turns to helium and begins to fizz, and all at once they feel lighter than air. They survived. They're <em>fugitives</em>. Tavros has to take his glasses off to wipe his eyes. Vrissy laughs so hard she thinks she might be sick. Harry Anderson has to go and be actually sick, which doesn't so much kill the mood as vaguely envelop it in the smell of puke. He has a wobbly grin on his face as he wipes the spittle from his chin though. Vriska shakes her head, getting rid of her smirk like a wet dog would its water, then puts her hands on her hips and huffs loudly up at the tower.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Well, I'm not hauling all three of you up there.</p> + </div> + <p>She walks over to the little oak door set into the bottom of the campanile. Before she can grab the handle, Tavros pipes up.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: Ah,,, we won't be able to get in that way,,,</p> + </div> + <p>He starts to recount how, ever since the Incident, the little oak door to the helical staircase which runs from the bottom of the tower to the belfry has been securely locked—to prevent copycats, he speculates. Vriska gets bored halfway through the explanation though, tries the latch anyway, and is the only one who isn't surprised when the door swings politely open. Everything's coming up Serket. She bows theatrically, gesturing for the others to make their way inside, and then leaps into the air with a beat of her wings.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Last one to the top is a clownfucker!</p> + </div> + <p>They run like the wind.</p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0223.gif"> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0224.gif"> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0225.gif"> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0226.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: you made it!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i knew you had it in you.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: aw, thanks d-</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Of course we made it, John.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: It was a walk in the park!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I had some of my 8est moves planned out, gave them the speech of a fucking lifetime, and then they all just ran away without even TRYING to fight 8ack properly!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Frankly, I'm a little insulted 8y just how easy it was.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8ut you must have known it would 8e a piece of gru8cake.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: After all, we had me there.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: haha, oh vriska.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it's nice that you're basically the same exact person you always have been.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: You're welcome.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: honestly i'm still a little bewildered by your being here?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but guess i'm happy to see you anyway.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: especially in a context that doesn't involve any amount of kissing a clOUCH!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Not right now, you fuckhead!!!!!!!!)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: (oh, crap.)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: (sorry.)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um, anyway.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: thanks for helping out, i guess?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i can take it from here though.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: 8e my guest!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: okay.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: ::::)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um... if you don't mind, vriska?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Hm?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'd like to talk to my son please.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Oh!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Right.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Sure.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: Don't let me get in your way!</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: I'll just 8e over here, 8asking in the knowledge of a jo8 well done and plotting acts of violence.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: haha, thanks.</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Mutter) (mutter) limping to a respecta8le distance (mutter) (mutter) right this second (mutter) (mutter).</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (Mum8le) (mum8le) h8 to 8leed all over your touching reunion (mum8le) (mum8le).</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: sorry about that harry anderson.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: where were we.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh, right, your escape!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i guess i already said, but i knew you had it in you.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: yeah, i guess so...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i realize that it was a lot to handle though.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you can say that again.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it wasn't until after i hung up that i even remembered that i never gave you that strife specibus for your 16th birthday!</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: oh, it's ok... vriska had a spare.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i put my sewing scissors on it.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: it was all i really had at the time.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: haha, that sounds familiar.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i kind of stumbled ass backwards into getting stuck with my first hammer. but after a while, i couldn't imagine having picked anything else.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm sure you'll do some amazing things with it. you already did, in fact!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm sure jane is feeling really butt hurt about things this very minute.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: the prankster's gambit is tipped back in our favor, that's for sure.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: haha, yeah...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: if it's alright dad,</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i don't... really wanna talk about it all that much right now?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you're right, it was kind of a lot to go through.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that's okay!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: we don't have to talk about that if you don't want.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: honestly, who cares about strife specibi or the pranksters gambit or whatever.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that's not what's important.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm just glad to know that you're safe.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: dad?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: yes son.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: can i ask you a question?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: anything son.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: ok, cool.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: so...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: how come you're wearing that... thing?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: thing?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you know.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: the windsock.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i thought it was busy getting eaten by moths in a museum or something.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: please don't tell me you broke in there just to get it back.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh haha, the god tier outfit.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: don't worry, i can just sort of manifest this whenever i want.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: although now that you mention it, the guys at the museum will probably be wondering where it went.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: or... maybe it's still there? to be honest, i have no idea whether this is the same outfit.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i don't think it follows the same laws of physics and stuff that normal clothing does?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: they are just your basic magic pajamas at the end of the day.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: and it didn't occur to you to, y'know, magic them any bigger?</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: you just look like, well, a grown adult wearing clothes for a kid.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: it's kind of embarrassing to look at...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: blargh, you're right.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i admit, i didn't give it a whole lot of thought.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: it just felt like the right thing to put on at the time.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: i'm pretty sure no such time has ever existed.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i don't BELIEVE this.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: what have i EVER done to deserv both of you in the same place at once!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh man...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: now that i think about it...</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: (dad...)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: this feels like the perfect conditions for some identical twin type shenanigans.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: like in the parent trap or something!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm not sure how either of you would feel about being played by lindsay lohan though.</p> + <p class="harry">HARRY: (oh my goddddddd kill me now)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but anyway, vrissy.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: your moms called me a while ago. they sounded very worried that you weren't answering your phone.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: O8viously.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: I was 8usy!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: well, anyway, they're on their way here. jade is coming too.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: they should arrive any minute.</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Oh you're kidding.</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (H, here they come now,,,)</p> + <p class="tavros">TAVROS: (I can see them,,, over there,,,)</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: Uuuuuuuugggggggghhhhhhhh.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0227_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0227_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0228.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0229.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: hey guys!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ahhh, rose it's so good to see you.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: even though i guess we saw each other not even a day ago, haha.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Yes. Hello again, John.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It's good to see you too.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh wow, that has to be the smallest number of words you've ever greeted me with!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: and jade! it's um... been too long?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm glad you're here.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: hi john</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: um... me too?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i knew you were involved with the troll rebellion as well, but i didn't think you'd turn up looking quite so cool, haha.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i think the camo really suits you!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...jade?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: is everything okay?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you seem a little out of it.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: oh!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: oh haha</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: im fine john!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: everything is fine!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: its just</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: um</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: (rose... a little help here?)</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I... think what Jade is trying to say is that... uh,</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: To stay within your chosen topic of outfits for the moment,</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The two of us are currently experiencing a sudden bout of speechlessness that is not entirely unrelated to the present state of yours.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Which is to say:</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The pajamas.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ah.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I've heard of "sun's out, tum's out", but this is a little extreme.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Anyone would think you didn't know that there's a war on.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Not to be rude, of course.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no, it's alright rose.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i've already heard the same thing from harry anderson.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: in fact, if anyone else would like to criticize the clothes, now's your chance!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: please feel free to form an orderly queue right here.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: kanaya, i'm sure you've got something to say about it, right?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: kanaya?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0230.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Do Not Mind Me John</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Am Simply Making Quite Sure That My Daughter Over Here Is Alright And Not Causing Any More Trouble Than I Am Certain She Already Has</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: (Hissssssss)</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Not The Good Kind Of Trouble Which Involves Acts Of Misbehavior Towards Figures And Structures Of Immense Corruption Or Maleficence</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Such As The Kind Of Trouble We Are In Presently And Will Continue To Be In While Our Cause Remains True</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Meanwhile I Trust My Wife Whom I Love Utterly To Make Known To You Everything That Is Happening At The Present Moment</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Without Tactical Omission</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: In A Manner That Is Comprehensive</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Unexpurgated</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: haha?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um, alright then!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: what's up rose?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That does seem to be the question, doesn't it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The situation is... difficult to describe.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: aw, i'm sure it's not all that bad.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean, sure, i guess we are in a bit of a complicated mess.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: especially ever since vriska showed up, killed gamzee, and declared herself and the rest of us terrorists or something?</p> + <p class="vriska">VRISKA: (You're welcome.)</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: but it's nothing we shouldn't be able to think our way out of, now that we're all together!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: right?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: john</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0231.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: theres something i need to tell you</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: theres something i need to tell you</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: theres no point in hiding it any more</p> + </div> + <p>Jade's words, spoken in a nothing more than a dramatic whisper, nevertheless seem to echo in John's ears. Her face is somehow in shadow despite the sunny day, and John swears there's even a unexpected chill in the air. He feels a nervous prickling sensation crawl its way up his spine.</p> + <p>The windmills in John's brain slowly start to creak into motion. It must be something big. Something really big. Something so big that his sister would come all the way here to tell him in person, abandoning her scouting mission in the middle of an armed conflict to do so. As well as her husband, John realizes with a start, as Dave's curious absence finally brings itself to his attention. Hot on the heels of that realization is another, and another, and then another. Jade's mouth moves without a sound now: the wind that only exists in John's head is drowning out everything she's saying, as it whips itself up into a gale and his mind races frantically towards a conclusion. All at once he reaches the eye of the storm, and then, from somewhere out of a half-remembered dream, comes the sensation of falling. A burning golden city. A girl's screaming.</p> + <p>There is only one thing that Jade Harley has ever valued so highly above everything else, even her own life.</p> + <p>Family.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: jade...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: are you pregnant?</p> + </div> + <p>Jade finally looks up at him. Her face is wide-eyed and... angry?</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: what?!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: no!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: no john im not fucking PREGNANT!!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: putting aside the fact that thats completely impossible for a whole bunch of different reasons, why would you even SAY that?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: werent you listening to what i was saying??</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i was</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ARGH, now i have to start all over again!!!!!</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: john... i have a daughter</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: shes almost harry andersons age</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you have a daughter.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: yes</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you've had a daughter.</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: yes john!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wow.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm... a little shocked about this?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i mean...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you have a daughter?!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: yes john!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i have!!! a daughter!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i have a daughter john!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: in fact i have had a daughter for quite a while!!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm sorry, i'm struggling to process this a little bit.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: if she's nearly harry anderson's age, then that means you've had a daughter for... what...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i guess that must be about fifteen years?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: yep!!!</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: wow.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm not sure how to feel about this j</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: JOHN I HAVE HAD A DAUGHTER FOR FIFTEEN YEARS AND I DIDNT TELL YOU ABOUT IT I AM</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: SO</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: VERY</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: ***SORRY***</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: IF THAT HURT YOUR OH SO PRECIOUS FEELINGS!!!!!</p> + </div> + <p>It is deathly quiet.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jade">JADE: YOU of all people dont get to judge me, okay????</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: everyone was getting married and having babies at the time and i just</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i wanted that for myself so badly</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: you have NO idea what it was like, living on that fucking island with my dead grandfather, waiting for forever for you to finally wake up, and then</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and then i went through all of that NONSENSE all over again on the ship through the yard</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and THEN when it was over i thought MAYBE i could have something like a normal life</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but then you just vanished on everyone for years!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: everyone was busy building the lives wed all been working for</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: rose and kanaya, roxy and callie, jake and...</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and dave and karkat were</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: they were</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: *sniffle*</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: look, i knew, ok?</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i knew that on some level they just didnt want me there!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i knew the plans they had for each other even when they didnt!!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and it was clear that i didnt fit into those plans</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but they just wouldnt ADMIT it!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i tried SO hard to get them to see what they wanted but it just didnt work</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and then karkat left and</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: *snuffle*</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: and i couldnt just leave dave by himself after what happened to dirk</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: so i stayed</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: i tried to be the good person and stay</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: but then he</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: *snuffle*</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: he</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: *sob*</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Jade, it's alright. I can take it from here.</p> + </div> + <p>Jade leans soggily into Rose's shoulder.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: jade, i'm...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: *sniffle*</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm sorry, i-</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: John, if you start crying as well we shall never get anywhere.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: r-right. sorry.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um... so...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm sorry, i got a bit lost in all of that.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: could we rewind a little?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I think that might be for the best, narratively speaking. We got a touch sidetracked.</p> + </div> + <p>She gives Jade a gentle pat on the back as she says this.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So, to rewind.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Jade wanted a child of her own, but while she was with Dave and Karkat the three of them were unable to conceive one due to a number of reasons.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: They looked into adoption, but...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Well, let's just say that if the administration was getting uncomfortable about an adoption between a troll and a human, they were starting to be outright obstructionist when it came to one between a troll and two.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Having exhausted all other options for producing or fostering a child between the three of them, Jade had to look elsewhere.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: you mean...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: find a surrogate or something?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Correct.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It was at this point that Jade came to me.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I could understand her pain quite acutely, and so...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I agreed to carry a child on her behalf.</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: .</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: ... Without telling Kanaya.</p> + </div> + <p>There is another heavy silence. Vrissy is stunned, all eight pupils staring at her mother in shock. Harry and Tavros are trying to find somewhere to look that isn't straight at Rose. Vriska meanwhile is sporting a grin as wide as a bus, and looks like she wants to give someone a high-five.</p> + <p>Jade is a picture of misery. Kanaya doesn't seem to be surprised, or angry, or even disappointed. She just folds her arms, expectantly. John is discovering that he can't decide what to do with his hands. He feels impossibly embarrassed.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I'm... not sure why I made that decision.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I regret not telling Kanaya, of course.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But I can't say that I regret going through with it.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: At the time, it didn't feel as though the deception was even all that prolonged. The whole affair was... short.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Purely physical, and nothing more.</p> + </div> + <p>Kanaya finally moves to stand next to her wife. She places a softly glowing hand on the shoulder that hasn't been generously watered by Jade.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Rose And I Have Already Discussed This In Private Before Coming Here And I Have Therefore Already Said Everything That I Would Like To Say On The Matter</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And Vis A Vis The Matter I Think Thats Really All That There Is To Say</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Wanted To Be Able To Tell Vrissy This In Person However</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Moreover For Her Benefit And For That Of Everyone Else I Feel In My Capacity As A Mother And Leader I Should Make It Clear</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: This Is Not Something That Will Undermine Roses And My Relationship</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Neither As Comrades</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Or As A Couple</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: I Am Upset At Being Lied To And For No Other Reason</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: And In Particular I Would Like To Make It Understood That I Do Not And Never Will See Jade As Having Jeopardized Our Marriage Through The Simple Crime Of Wanting To Be A Mother</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: If Anyone In This World Understands The Lengths To Which A Person Will Go To Achieve Such An End</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: Then That Person Is Me</p> + </div> + <p>As she says this, Kanaya looks at Vrissy, and it's a look all filled to bursting with two universes' and countless lifetimes' worth of love and maternal devotion. To all observers, Vrissy is either on the verge of bursting into tears, or gagging. It really could go either way.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: so, just to get this straight in my head.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: um... rose, if you're the mother...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: then since obviously neither dave or karkat is the father...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: who is it?</p> + </div> + <p>Rose's expression has the patience and tranquility of a mountain. Jade's is made of knives.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: John, there isn't a father.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Jade and I are the sole parents of this child.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: OH.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh i'm so sorry, i didn't th-</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That's quite alright John, although you might like to direct that apology more towards your sister.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: All I will say is that if you would like to take up the particulars with us,</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Some *other* time,</p> + </div> + <p>(Here Rose looks pointedly at the various teens dotted about the belfry, all of whom are remarkably interested in the local architecture all of a sudden.)</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Then I'm sure Jade and I can walk you through some basic concepts.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i uh</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no, it's</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i'm</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: About to change the subject?</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: haha.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ok.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: so... how did you hide the pregnancy?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Oh, that was simple.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Jade's genes being, as they are, part canine, the gestation period was substantially reduced.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: I carried the baby to term in just under two months.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Since she was unfamiliar with human pregnancy at the time, I assume Kanaya simply thought I was looking a little more... substantial than usual, and didn't think it polite to comment.</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: In Defense Of My Observational Skills I Feel Like I Should Point Out That You Had Recently Recovered Miraculously From A Debilitating And Potentially Fatal Illness</p> + <p class="kanaya">KANAYA: A State In Which You Were Exceptionally Malnourished To Say The Least</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Well, quite.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Anyway, with the messy part finished, all that was left was the trifling matter of Jade and I raising the child together in secret for fifteen years.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: A task that we performed flawlessly until a few short moments ago, when she became the political prisoner of a certain Jane Crocker.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: oh my god.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that...</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: no offense jade, but,</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: that BITCH!!</p> + <p class="jade">JADE: *sniffle* hehe...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So this, finally, is the predicament that we are presently faced with.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Jane has taken Yiffy hostage in retaliation for our supposed kidnapping of her son, and the murder of her former favorite clown.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The fact that only one of these things actually happened, and that the rebellion is responsible for neither of them, will not matter to her in the slightest.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: The woman means murder.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: christ.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: ok.</p> + <p class="john">JOHN: i think i understand everything so f</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: WAIT!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: YOU MEAN TO TELL ME</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: NOT ONLY DO I H8VE A SISTER</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: 8UT YOU NAMED</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: YOUR ****SECRET CHILD****</p> + <p class="vrissy">VRISSY: ********YIFFY********????????</p> + </div> + <p>Vriska quietly settles on herself as a high-five partner. With geological slowness, Rose turns to face her one reasonably-named daughter, a tinge of embarrassment coloring her face for the first time this afternoon.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Well... no.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: We didn't call her Yiffy.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: That would be a quite ridiculous thing with which to burden a child.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Her full name is Yiffany Longstocking Lalonde Harley.</p> + </div> + <p>Vrissy looks as though she is about to shit the belltower they are standing in, brick by brick.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSE: It was, in hindsight, a monumentally terrible decision acting as the final chapter in a long series of novels, each one full of progressively more terrible decisions than the last.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But that is the name that we decided upon.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: You have to understand... this whole situation ended up playing out a bit like an ironic game of chicken between the two of us.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Something that far outstripped anything that the Strider fraternity could have produced in their wildest, most jpegged creative wet dreams.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But in the end that triumph of irony came back to bite us in the fucking ass, as irony is wont to do.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: There was absolutely no possibility of us casually letting you all know that, by the way, we had had a secret daughter named Yiffany Longstocking.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: At least, not right away.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: But carapacian change-of-name paperwork is so complex and circuitous that, eventually, keeping quiet forever just seemed like the more reasonable option.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: So...</p> + <p class="rose">ROSE: Here we are.</p> + </div> + <p>Everyone lapses into a third meaningful silence, one which has an air of finality about it, as they collectively contemplate the here that they are.</p> + <p>They have plans to make. Even now, Yiffy is likely being held at spoonpoint, subject to the mercies of a power-crazed tyrant in pagliaccial mourning. The war for the planet is only just getting started, and the worst is likely still to come. And yet... when Rose slowly wipes a single tear from her eye and leans to touch foreheads with Kanaya, John suspects that the whole thing might just have brought them all closer together.</p> + <p>Beside him, Harry Anderson stifles a sleepy yawn. The day which once threatened never to end is now fading from the world. As the sky above starts to purple, the heaviness of the events hanging over them dissolves in the warmth of the evening sun, and a refreshing current of air seems to blow the last traces of it away like the merest dust.</p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p>It's only later that night, in the mess hall on-board the rebellion ship, that John absent-mindedly turns to Jade and asks:</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="john">JOHN: so where's dave?</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter9.html">CHAPTER 9. How Goes The Eulogizing, Dear?</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter9.html b/chapter9.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..81e0b91 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter9.html @@ -0,0 +1,391 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>CHAPTER 9. How Goes The Eulogizing, Dear? (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter8.html">Previous</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter10.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2020-05-19">05/19/2020</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>CHAPTER 9. How Goes The Eulogizing, Dear?</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0236.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Where is he?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (It's a question I've found myself asking many times in recent days.)</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0237.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Where now is our merry savior?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Where is the horn that was honking?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Where is the cape and the codpiece, and the...)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (The...)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Oh, fiddlesticks.)</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0238.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Okay, poetry is out.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (What else?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Hrm...)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (I've always been pretty good at crying on cue.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Could I try staging an emotional breakdown?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (That could work; playing to people's humanity.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Or whatever is the more inclusive term.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (It could work.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (One really good and calculated weep could do it, I think.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (But then there's the danger that I might get carried away and do it for real.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (And I can't risk that.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (No... no, I'll have to stick to an ordinary eulogy.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (As ordinary as it can be, under the circumstances.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Alright, let's see.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (What can I say about him that will stir up their emotions?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Do I mention the stuff about the milk?)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: (Think Crocker, think.)</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ahoy over there!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0239.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0240.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Er... how goes the eulogizing, dear?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: In a word: awfully.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ah.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: It turns out that it's mighty difficult to find touching things to say about a person, the relationship with whom was predicated on deep-seated mutual loathing.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I imagine this is one of the reasons no funerary tradition was ever established on Alternia, besides the barbarism of their culture.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Jesus christ.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Not only did a significant proportion of their interpersonality depend on romance in the form of hatred, but it was a society based on cruelty and violence.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: What reason could they have had to provide for the dead?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: What kind of last rites could they have even imagined?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Um...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Could i have that once more, sans the raci--</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I mean,</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: In laymans terms?</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Sigh.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Jake,</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I can't think of anything good to write about him because deep down, I hated his guts.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But he was and is beloved of the multitude, so I have to think of something regardless.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Im not sure i understand.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Don't worry your pretty little head about it.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: This is politics, Jakey.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Lying through your two front teeth about people you hate is about as good a definition as it's possible to get.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: But, by gum, is it tiring work.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Work to which I need to return this instant.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: The funeral is tomorrow, after all.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Right you are.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: ...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I um... brought you some coffee?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ill just... put it down... here...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Dude, the bowl.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Hm?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Oh, right.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: What is it now, Jake.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I brought something for our guest as well.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: You mean the prisoner.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Y...es.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0241.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Well, go on then.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: She's over in the corner.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Don't worry, she won't bite.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I've seen to that already.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0242.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Here you are.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Its only mac and cheese, sorry.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Its all I know how to make, haha.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: ...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: I um... hope you can safely partake of cheese?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: ...</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Well,</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Bon appetit.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0243.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Bon appetit.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Seriously dude?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (What? Did i pronounce it wrong?)</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Jake.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You put the food in a fucking dog bowl.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (It was all there was, ok???)</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (I feel awful enough as it is without you getting on my case about it.)</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: All I'm saying is that this is full-blown, bona fide evil minion behavior you're getting up to.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (Well whose confounded idea was it for me to come back in the first place, brain ghost dirk?)</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (So far ive yet to see anything come of that brilliant plan of yours.)</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (Are you sure sending that message to the others was enough?)</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Patience, Jake.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Rome didn't fall in a day.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Besides, are we really going to hash this out now, in front of dear, sweet Yiffany?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (No, i guess youre right.)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: What are you mumbling about over there?</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Ah, nothing dearest!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: "Dearest."</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: (Oh shut up!!!)</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: If you're finished, I'd appreciate being left to my work.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: ... Of course, dearest.</p> + <p class="jake">JAKE: Good night.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0244.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: ...</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0245.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: !!!</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0246.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: I hope you're not expecting dessert, young lady.</p> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0247.gif"> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: GRRRRRRRRR...</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Oh no you don't.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0248.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0249.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: GRRR *BZZT* RRRR *BZZT* AAAA *BZZT* AAAA *BZZT* AAAA *BZZT* AAAA *BZZT* AAWW *BZZT* OOOO *BZZT* OOOO *BZZT* OOOO *BZZT* OOOO *BZZT* OOOO *BZZT* OOOO *BZZT*</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Are you done?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0250.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: ...</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: That's more like it.</p> + </div> + <div class="wide"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0251.gif"> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0252.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: You've been a thorn in my side ever since I agreed to enroll you at the academy, little madam.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Back then, I was doing a favor for two old friends who made a disgusting mistake.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: I'm no longer going to play nice with you just because of your parents, however.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: That truce is over.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Do I make myself understood?</p> + <p class="yiffy">YIFFY: ...</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Hmph.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Out cold.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Maybe I should reduce the voltage a trifle.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0253.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: We don't want you passing out during the ceremony, do we?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0254.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Now, be a good hostage and get some rest, Yiffany dear.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: We've got a big day tomorrow.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0255.gif"> + <div class="chat" id="hoo-hoo"> + <p class="jane">JANE: Night night.</p> + <p class="jane">JANE: Hoo hoo.</p> + </div> + <div class="command yiffy"> + <span>(Yiffy:)</span> + <div>> (Yiffy: Lights out.)</div> + </div> + <div class="wide" id="lights-out"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/0256.gif"> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat tg-harry ag-vrissy"> + <p>-- thespiansGlamor <span class="tg">[TG]</span> began pestering adamantGriftress <span class="ag">[AG]</span> --</p> + <p> </p> + <p class="tg">TG: hey.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: are you awake?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: this rebellion bunk is killing my back.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: well, i guess it is pretty late.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: gnight.</p> + <p>-- thespiansGlamor <span class="tg">[TG]</span> is now an idle chum! --</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I'm aw8ke.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I was just Talking to Tav for a 8it.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: oh, is goody two shoes awake too?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i thought he was pretty quiet down there.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: we'll make a rebel of him yet!</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Lol.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I think it's more that he can't sleep.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I know how he feels.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: yeah.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: today was a lot.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: ...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: do you wanna talk about it?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Ugh, not you as well.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: huh?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: That was all Tavvy could think to say.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Here, I'll copy and p8ste it word for word.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: GG: Do you,,, want to talk about it,,,?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: nooooooooooo.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: this is the hardest i've ever been owned in my life, probably.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Hahaha.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: but seriously, do you?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Not really.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: not even about... you know?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: her?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: No.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ... are you sure?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: A8solutely.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: What are you, my moirail?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Just leave it, Harry.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ok.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat ag-vrissy gg-tavros"> + <p>-- adamantGriftress <span class="ag">[AG]</span> began pestering glutinousGymnast <span class="gg">[GG]</span> --</p> + <p> </p> + <p class="ag">AG: Hey.</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Vrissy,,, its the middle of the night,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Oh, quit whining.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It's not like I woke you up, right?</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Well,,, no,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: But thats beside the point,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Weve got a big day tomorrow,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: And today was,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: A bit of an ordeal,,, to say the least,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Yeah.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: You can say Th8t again.</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Do you,,, want to talk about it,,,?</p> + <p class="gg">GG: ,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Hello,,,?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I was just t8lking to Harry for a moment. Chill.</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Oh,,, okay,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: I didnt know he was still up,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Its been awfully quiet on the top bunk,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: You two are Sharing, right?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I 8et that's weird.</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Hah,,, it is a little,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: I havent ever shared a bedroom before,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Not even for a slumber party,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Tavvy, you are just a8out the saddest person I've ever met.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat ag-vrissy tg-harry"> + <p class="ag">AG: So anyway, what's keeping You up, nerd?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Things worked out Pretty Well for you tod8y, huh.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: well, i dunno about that.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Oh Come On, I saw how happy you were when your dad mentioned spending some Time Together.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It was...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: was...?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Ugh.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It was Cute, 8lright????????</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Or, at the very least, a 8*cketload less vomit worthy than everything else that Went Down with our parents.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: dude, no.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: nothing about my dad is cute.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: what are you even saying.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Lmao.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: seriously!</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i think he has something against that word, even. he gets super weird about it.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: He's a strange and funny m8n.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: yeah.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i think something bad must have happened.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat ag-vrissy gg-tavros"> + <p class="ag">AG: I just don't understand why they didn't TELL anyone a8out it!</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Uh huh,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I mean, it's ins8ne!</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It doesn't m8ke even the slightest 8it of fucking sense.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: They just went 8ehind everyone's backs and had a secret child, and NO8ODY knew about it?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Except for the fucking 8atterwitch, apparently????????</p> + <p class="gg">GG: ,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: And the worst part was they didn't even fight a8out it!</p> + <p class="ag">AG: That made me madder than 8nything else.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It felt like I was the only person who even W8S mad!</p> + <p class="gg">GG: I dont think thats true,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: What would you know a8out it?!</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Maybe nothing,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Sorry,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Its just,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: To me,,, all the way through the conversation,,, aunt kanaya looked even angrier than you,,,</p> + <p class="ag">AG: ...</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Adults are so fucking weird.</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat tg-harry ag-vrissy"> + <p class="tg">TG: i saw the adults a little while ago when i snuck out to get some water.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: dad was sitting in the cafeteria with aunt jade and your moms.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: it looked like they were discussing something important... they were whispering and stuff.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: That's nothing unusual.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: It was probably Str8tegic 8usiness for tomorrow.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i thought that too, at first. but they were the only ones there.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: and something didn't look right.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: the mood was serious, yes, but...</p> + <p class="ag">AG: What were they doing?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: well, aunt rose and aunt jade were sitting either side of dad and the three of them were sort of huddled together.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: they didn't notice me, they all had their backs turned.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: aunt kanaya's was the only face i could see.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: she was standing next to them, but she wasn't looking at what was going on.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: almost like she couldn't bear to.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I doubt it. Kanaya's got a8out as much Emotivity as a very reclusive stone.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ok, i think that is bullshit but whatever.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: she saw me standing there, but didn't say anything. she just shook her head slightly, and pointed back out into the hallway i came down.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: so i just went straight back to bed. i forgot to get the water in the end.</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Hm.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: that's not the only strange thing, though.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i mean, have you seen uncle dave recently?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: Th8t old loser?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: No.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: right.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: doesn't that strike you as odd?</p> + <p class="ag">AG: I guesadxcxzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz</p> + <p class="tg">TG: vrissy?</p> + </div> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <div class="chat tg-harry gg-tavros"> + <p>-- thespiansGlamor [TG] began pestering glutinousGymnast [GG] --</p> + <p> </p> + <p class="tg">TG: hey, tav.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: are you still talking to vrissy down there?</p> + <p class="gg">GG: No,,, im not,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: I was until a short while ago,,,</p> + <p class="tg">TG: oh, huh.</p> + <p class="gg">GG: I think she might have succumbed to sleep quite suddenly,,,</p> + <p class="gg">GG: It would explain the,,,,,, interesting messages I've been getting for a while,,,</p> + <p class="tg">TG: hehe.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: i guess that tracks.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: she does that from time to time.</p> + <p class="gg">GG: We should probably try and sleep too,,, harry anderson,,,</p> + <p class="tg">TG: yeah.</p> + <p class="tg">TG: ...</p> + <p class="tg">TG: tav?</p> + <p class="gg">GG: Yes,,, harry anderson,,,?</p> + <p class="tg">TG: what does it feel like to know someone who's died?</p> + </div> + <div id="close"> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + </div> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter10.html">CHAPTER 10. 1 WOND3R WH4T TH3Y T4ST3 L1K3</a></p> + </article> + <script src="color-conversion-algorithms.js"></script> + <script src="interpolate.js"></script> + <script src="chapter9.js"></script> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/chapter9.js b/chapter9.js new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a2b5800 --- /dev/null +++ b/chapter9.js @@ -0,0 +1,56 @@ +const el = document.getElementById('lights-out'); +// const el2 = document.getElementById('close'); +const hooHoo = document.getElementById('hoo-hoo'); +const body = document.body; +const article = document.querySelector('article'); + +let tick = false; +function lightsOut() { + const rect = el.getBoundingClientRect(); + const start = window.scrollY + rect.y; + const stop = start + rect.height; + /* + const rect2 = el2.getBoundingClientRect(); + const start2 = window.scrollY + rect2.y; + const stop2 = start2 + rect2.height; + */ + const y = window.scrollY + window.innerHeight; + let prog; + if (y < start) { + prog = 0; + } else if (y > stop) { + /* + if (y < start2) { + prog = 1; + } else if (y > stop2) { + prog = 0; + } else { + prog = 1 - (y - start2) / rect2.height; + } + */ + prog = 1; + } else { + prog = (y - start) / rect.height; + } + interpolateStyle(body, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(0, 0, 0)')); + interpolateStyle(article, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(30, 30, 30)')); + interpolateStyle(article, 'color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(255, 255, 255)')); + for (const chat of article.querySelectorAll('.chat')) { + if (chat === hooHoo) { + continue; + } + interpolateStyle(chat, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(200, 200, 200)')); + interpolateStyle(chat, 'border-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(255, 255, 255)')); + } + interpolateStyle(hooHoo, 'background-color', itpColor(prog, 'rgb(20, 20, 20)')); +} + +window.addEventListener('scroll', event => { + if (!tick) { + requestAnimationFrame(() => { + lightsOut(); + tick = false; + }); + tick = true; + } +}); diff --git a/color-conversion-algorithms.js b/color-conversion-algorithms.js new file mode 100644 index 0000000..12a6fef --- /dev/null +++ b/color-conversion-algorithms.js @@ -0,0 +1,138 @@ +/** + * Converts an RGB color value to HSL. Conversion formula + * adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSL_color_space. + * Assumes r, g, and b are contained in the set [0, 255] and + * returns h, s, and l in the set [0, 1]. + * + * @param Number r The red color value + * @param Number g The green color value + * @param Number b The blue color value + * @return Array The HSL representation + */ +function rgbToHsl(r, g, b) { + r /= 255, g /= 255, b /= 255; + + var max = Math.max(r, g, b), min = Math.min(r, g, b); + var h, s, l = (max + min) / 2; + + if (max == min) { + h = s = 0; // achromatic + } else { + var d = max - min; + s = l > 0.5 ? d / (2 - max - min) : d / (max + min); + + switch (max) { + case r: h = (g - b) / d + (g < b ? 6 : 0); break; + case g: h = (b - r) / d + 2; break; + case b: h = (r - g) / d + 4; break; + } + + h /= 6; + } + + return [ h, s, l ]; +} + +/** + * Converts an HSL color value to RGB. Conversion formula + * adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSL_color_space. + * Assumes h, s, and l are contained in the set [0, 1] and + * returns r, g, and b in the set [0, 255]. + * + * @param Number h The hue + * @param Number s The saturation + * @param Number l The lightness + * @return Array The RGB representation + */ +function hslToRgb(h, s, l) { + var r, g, b; + + if (s == 0) { + r = g = b = l; // achromatic + } else { + function hue2rgb(p, q, t) { + if (t < 0) t += 1; + if (t > 1) t -= 1; + if (t < 1/6) return p + (q - p) * 6 * t; + if (t < 1/2) return q; + if (t < 2/3) return p + (q - p) * (2/3 - t) * 6; + return p; + } + + var q = l < 0.5 ? l * (1 + s) : l + s - l * s; + var p = 2 * l - q; + + r = hue2rgb(p, q, h + 1/3); + g = hue2rgb(p, q, h); + b = hue2rgb(p, q, h - 1/3); + } + + return [ r * 255, g * 255, b * 255 ]; +} + +/** + * Converts an RGB color value to HSV. Conversion formula + * adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSV_color_space. + * Assumes r, g, and b are contained in the set [0, 255] and + * returns h, s, and v in the set [0, 1]. + * + * @param Number r The red color value + * @param Number g The green color value + * @param Number b The blue color value + * @return Array The HSV representation + */ +function rgbToHsv(r, g, b) { + r /= 255, g /= 255, b /= 255; + + var max = Math.max(r, g, b), min = Math.min(r, g, b); + var h, s, v = max; + + var d = max - min; + s = max == 0 ? 0 : d / max; + + if (max == min) { + h = 0; // achromatic + } else { + switch (max) { + case r: h = (g - b) / d + (g < b ? 6 : 0); break; + case g: h = (b - r) / d + 2; break; + case b: h = (r - g) / d + 4; break; + } + + h /= 6; + } + + return [ h, s, v ]; +} + +/** + * Converts an HSV color value to RGB. Conversion formula + * adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSV_color_space. + * Assumes h, s, and v are contained in the set [0, 1] and + * returns r, g, and b in the set [0, 255]. + * + * @param Number h The hue + * @param Number s The saturation + * @param Number v The value + * @return Array The RGB representation + */ +function hsvToRgb(h, s, v) { + var r, g, b; + + var i = Math.floor(h * 6); + var f = h * 6 - i; + var p = v * (1 - s); + var q = v * (1 - f * s); + var t = v * (1 - (1 - f) * s); + + switch (i % 6) { + case 0: r = v, g = t, b = p; break; + case 1: r = q, g = v, b = p; break; + case 2: r = p, g = v, b = t; break; + case 3: r = p, g = q, b = v; break; + case 4: r = t, g = p, b = v; break; + case 5: r = v, g = p, b = q; break; + } + + return [ r * 255, g * 255, b * 255 ]; +} diff --git a/index.html b/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..21dc104 --- /dev/null +++ b/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,38 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>Homestuck^2: Preceding Canon</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a>Index</a></span> + <!-- <span><a href="search.html">Search</a></span> --> + <span>Jump to <a href="intro.html">first</a>, <a href="chapter14.html">latest</a> (10/15/2020)</span> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>Homestuck^2: Preceding Canon</h1> + <p><a href="https://florrie.ed1.club/precanon/"><i>Preceding Canon</i></a> is a crappily named (re)presentation of <a href="https://www.homestuck2.com/"><i>Homestuck^2: Beyond Canon</i></a> inspired by the design of the webcomic <a href="https://www.prequeladventure.com/"><i>Prequel</i></a>. Each chapter is one manually stylized page; there's also <s>a <a href="search.html">Search</a> page (for JS-enabled browsers)</s> (it's kinda shelved for now but you can mess around with it anyway).</p> + <p>While you can freely clone an archive of the site from the <a href="https://git.ed1.club/precanon.git">Git repository</a>, images are referenced cross-site from <code>https://www.homestuck2.com</code>, so you'll have to have a working connection for the accompanying panels to load.</p> + <ul id="chapters"> + <li><a href="intro.html">Somewhere, in the distant reaches of space...</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter1.html">CHAPTER 1. Ghostflusters</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter2.html">CHAPTER 2. Clown Logistics</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter3.html">CHAPTER 3. How Are Your Feelings</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter4.html">CHAPTER 4. The Contest</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter5.html">CHAPTER 5. YOUR 3Y3S H4V3 B33N CLOS3D</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter6.html">CHAPTER 6. A Conversation Regarding Relevance</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter7.html">CHAPTER 7. Distress Call From the Cloest</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter8.html">CHAPTER 8. A Daughter Astray</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter9.html">CHAPTER 9. How Goes The Eulogizing, Dear?</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter10.html">CHAPTER 10. 1 WOND3R WH4T TH3Y T4ST3 L1K3</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter11.html">CHAPTER 11. History's Most Notorious Haters</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter12.html">CHAPTER 12. Really Convolued Metaphorical Horseshit</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter13.html">CHAPTER 13. The Funeral</a></li> + <li><a href="chapter14.html">CHAPTER 14. The Best Laid Plans</a></li> + </ul> + <p><i>Preceding Canon</i> is a sister project to <a href="https://hsmusic.github.io/">HSMusic</a>; for reporting errors or issues, the same contact information applies. (Don't get on our case if it's only been a few days since the latest update and it hasn't been brought over yet, though - we'll get to it soon enough!)</p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/interpolate.js b/interpolate.js new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e6166fa --- /dev/null +++ b/interpolate.js @@ -0,0 +1,24 @@ +function interpolateStyle(el, prop, cb, reset = true) { + if (reset) { + el.style.setProperty(prop, ''); + } + const intact = getComputedStyle(el); + const start = intact.getPropertyValue(prop); + el.style.setProperty(prop, cb(start)); +} + +function itpColor(prog, target) { + return start => { + const [ sr, sg, sb ] = start.match(/[0-9]{1,}/g).map(n => parseInt(n)); + const [ tr, tg, tb ] = target.match(/[0-9]{1,}/g).map(n => parseInt(n)); + const [ sh, ss, sl ] = rgbToHsl(sr, sg, sb); + const [ th, ts, tl ] = rgbToHsl(tr, tg, tb); + const [ ih, is, il ] = [ + sh + prog * (th - sh), + ss + prog * (ts - ss), + sl + prog * (tl - sl) + ]; + const [ ir, ig, ib ] = hslToRgb(ih, is, il).map(n => parseInt(n)); + return `rgb(${ir}, ${ig}, ${ib})`; + }; +} diff --git a/intro.html b/intro.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4992710 --- /dev/null +++ b/intro.html @@ -0,0 +1,605 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>Somewhere, in the distant reaches of space... (Preceding Canon)</title> + <meta charset="utf-8"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a>First</a></span> + <span><a href="chapter1.html">Next</a></span> + <time datetime="2019-10-25">10/25/2019</time> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>Somewhere, in the distant reaches of space...</h1> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00001.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00002_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00002_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00003_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00003_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00004.gif"> + <p class="dirk">Surprise, bitch.</p> + <p class="dirk">I bet there was a moment just now when you thought to yourself, oh thank god. Thank the maker. Thank literally what-the-hell-ever recalcitrant entity was, is now, or perhaps always has been responsible for piloting this story. Whoever it is whose cataclysmic fingers hang suspended and quivering with anticipation somewhere beyond the curtain of the world; whose hunched form lurks forever in the shadows, its work seemingly unimpeded by the very real threat of a chronic lumbago; making no sound, giving no speech to thought, save for that fateful moment where first one elongated phalanx, and then another, crosses the threshold between thought and reality; when ten declamatory digits, possessed for the moment of a zealous frenzy, reach down and set the air astir with the heart-rending creative cacophony of an overly rambunctious mechanical keyboard.</p> + <p class="dirk">Whichever accursed species of demiurgic figure that is, you thought, let's just thank the ever living fuck that this time they decided to call it a night and get out the drawing tablet instead.</p> + <p class="dirk">Finally, this story is back on the rails. Maybe we can get back to what things were like in the good old days, where boys were brave, girls were guileful, authors were alliterative and in various dubious states of non-/un/double-death, and this comic made at least a little bit of sense to more or less everybody. No more dealing with narrators, unreliable and not. No more embittered scrimmages over the bounding metafictional reality within which everything transpires. No more stupid tang-tinted text. Your collective sigh of relief is deafening.</p> + <p class="dirk">Well tough shit. This stor—</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: Dirk?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: What are you doing in there?</p> + </div> + <p class="dirk">Ah, fuck, hang on a second. Gotta take care of this.</p> + <p class="dirk">Rose's voice echoes tinnily out of my newly alchemized, computer-integrated shades. The infidelity of the transmission is due to her voice being slightly too high-definition for the speakers to reproduce it faithfully. There's an audio format even better than analog, it turns out, and that's what replaced Rose's vocal chords when I scooped up her rapidly dissipating soul and installed it in a robot body. I have it on authority that decanting is sometimes necessary to ensure a wine is at its best. I like to think that the same was ultimately true of her.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Oh, nothing important.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: To the extent that anything that you or I do is even capable of being unimportant anymore.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Which extent is admittedly teetering a few microns shy of jack dick right about now.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The point is,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don't worry about it. I'm just doing a bit of housekeeping.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: Well pardon me for interrupting a prior engagement. Don't let me get in the way of all the dusting you must be doing.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: I just imagined you wearing an apron over your god tier outfit and almost felt my facial fuselage buckle in such a way as to approximate a fleeting smile.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Fuck, you got me.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Your uncanny Seer powers are at work once again.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm just waiting here for an errant gust of wind to jostle my petticoats, unfortuitously exposing my undergarments to the lurid gaze of whatever prurient peeper might be watching.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don't look!! I cry in futile embarrassment. But the damage is done. My fragile anime purity has been shamelessly violated.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: Ah yes, the animes. A bottomless resource of good-natured humor.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: That ungodly noise of screeching metal you just heard was my titanium-reinforced thorax crumpling into a cartoonish posture of helpless mirth.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Alright we get it you are literally a robot.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No need to keep pointing it out every chance you can get. I used to get enough of this with the Auto-Responder.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: I'm just playing along.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: One of the fundamentals of bad science fiction is that any artificial beings must make their inorganic nature known at every juncture they can.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Do overly precise and completely meaningless statistics that you pull out of your ass on the fly also count?</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: Oh absolutely.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: That's one of the first things you just sort of spontaneously learn when being booted up.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: For example, I've calculated that by making these remarks I have raised the base level of amusement in all my conversations by 36%.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well I don't personally find them very funny.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: No, but I do.</p> + <p class="rose">ROSEBOT: It averages out, you see.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00005.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ok but like what are you actually calling me about.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I just thought you might like to know that we're getting pretty close to your chosen crash site.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: We can head down to the planet below as soon as Terezi's finished... working out how we do that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: How to land?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Wait, crash site??</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Yes.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Among the features of this ship that were considered indispensable by its creator,</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Which included multiple fully stocked drinks cabinets, a movie theater, and an eight-lane shooting range,</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: A landing gear appears to have fallen just a little outside the realm of vital.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Or rather, hurtled into the ground.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Like we'll be doing, in case the message wasn't clear.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Gotcha.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: (God DAMN it English.)</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Assuming your busywork is more or less done by now, I'll get Terezi to set a course. If she hasn't wandered away from the helm already.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: She's been getting pretty impatient.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: So...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I just want to get this on COMPLETE lock-down before I strap myself into the safety harness we'd all better hope wasn't also omitted from the design schematic of this stupid ship,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We're letting *Terezi* smash us into the planet we've been hunting for three years?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Should she even be driving this thing?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Don't be such a chud, Dirk.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Of the three of us, she has by far the most experience operating any kind of flying vessel.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: And just as much if not more experience of crashing them.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Besides, it's not like the two of us have anything to worry about. It's Terezi that needs to be careful.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: She's functionally mortal, remember?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You mean to say that you don't think we'd be in peril if it came to it?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: There's nothing about our situation that strikes you as falling within the bounds of precarity, as far as the rules are concerned?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Oh. You're right. I suppose I hadn't thought of that.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: But I think we can remain calm in the knowledge that nothing particularly heroic is going on right now. At least, not that I'm aware of.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ... Right.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Give me a couple more minutes here, then we can head planetside.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: There's a few stray dust motes still left to eradicate.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Just don't get too attached to having everything organized neatly, will you.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00006.gif"> + <p class="dirk">Rose signs off the call without much fuss. She knows that I'm not really cleaning, but doesn't care enough to know what I'm actually doing. I know that she knows this, but I don't care enough that she knows, nor do I care that she doesn't give a shit. We're all just here, not giving a flying fuck, like a normal, functioning group of people.</p> + <p class="dirk">I walk— oh no, right, I don't have to do that explicitly. It's easy to get into the habit of just narrating everything, even when it's a bit creatively redundant. This is where the advantage of visuals comes in, to make my life as an omniscient overseer a little bit less tedious. I can just do whatever, and we can all see it happen, and nobody has to fight with a testy cherub lady for control of their own legs or anything. No need to pull a whole thesaurus out of my ass just so I can go to the bathroom. Seriously, it's a big relief.</p> + <p class="dirk">That doesn't mean <em>this</em> (*gestures to the narrative*) isn't still going to be a thing, though. Sometimes retreating back into the warm, welcoming folds of traditional prose is just going to be the best way forward, and as someone whose mind is uniquely capable of understanding this conceit, I'll be the determining factor as to when and where it happens. I think that's more than reasonable. And yes, I am capable of being reasonable. All in all I think you'll find, as far as narrators go, I'm an excellent... hm. On second thought, maybe that's a bit of a problematic phrase. Yeah, yikes, that one's got a sordid history. Best we steer clear of it. We're all lucky I'm around to make those kinds of sensitivity judgements on everyone's behalf.</p> + <p class="dirk">Speaking of which, I think it's time I started undoing some of the more egregious mistakes this story has been subjected to over the years. Yes, I'm talking about <em>that</em> guy. The other orange one. Remember him? Vriska got stalked by him a bit and it was uncomfortable for everyone concerned. Anyway, the point is that he fucked up big time, and I'm here to clean up the horseshit. It's time to get this story back on the rails, back to what it was always supposed to be. I know it, and you've somehow always known it too. There was something <em>else</em>, some other route that Homestuck was meant to take but then didn't, a way that wouldn't've spent so much time dicking around with stuff nobody cares about. Like seriously, why did we all have to sit through talking about everyone's most intimate and private feelings for two hundred thousand fucking words. That would never have happened in Act 1. Where did it all go <em>wrong</em>?</p> + <p class="dirk">I've had some time to think about these kinds of problems, and to come up with a solution. And I'm prepared to do what he couldn't, in order to save paradox space from the destruction brought upon it. I'll do what it takes and don't think I won't. The author is dead: long live the author. Look, I know what you're all really craving. I've been studying canon—or rather, what's left of it—and I think I've found it. The critical moment, in the wake of which everything started to take a nosedive into the protracted, endless slog of sheer insufferability we got saddled with near the end. This was the single most crucial error in the process that led to the present situation. The day when the story was wrested screaming from the arms of its readers like a bawling infant and carried helplessly away, from then on to be raised according to the whims of a masochistic menace with no thought for you, the common fan. </p> + <p class="dirk">So now, I propose we turn the clock back to a better era, and take back what was rightfully ours. <span style=color:#bb7f00>No longer will the way forward be subject to tyrannical rule. No more shall the will of the masses be cajoled and brow-beaten by the impervious Hussnasty diktat.</span> <span style=color:#936400>Never again will we have to endure the terrible beating of wings, as the great moth of titillation arrests the humors of an enormous terrible old beggar,</span> <span style=color:#3e2a00>whose vulturous leathery vicegrip holds us close and whispers "I know best" in the dead of night. It's time.</span></p> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Dirk: Commune.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00007_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00007_2.gif"> + <p>Channelling my full potential as an ascended player of Heart, I expand my consciousness to commune with the boundless force of collective willpower that is the internet. My mind floods with its divine potency, a million formless cries coalescing into a sequence of discrete, formal instructions. It is a maelstrom as chaotic as it is deafening. And yet from this formless, uninterrupted spate of hard, unembellished data, a single suggestion takes form, as if bubbling up from a vast, infinite ocean of possibility. It is a whispered prayer to a compassionate god whose ear attends faithfully the will of his believers.</p> + <p>Ok, let's see what you chucklefucks came up with.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00008.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00009.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00010.gif"> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Dirk: Stop making Homestuck.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00011_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00011_2.gif"> + <p>I...</p> + <p>You know what? You've convinced me. There's no way I'm fucking with this shit.</p> + <p>I'm nobody's puppet, of course. But this was going to be a little fun we had together. A callback to simpler times. I just wanted to play a game, and you were going to be part of it. That submission box was my olive branch, dipped tentatively and at arms length into the trash furnace of creative potential known as 'Online'.<p> + <p>But I should have known better. People think you can run a story like this? This must be just about the stupidest idea anyone has ever come up with. I'll just have to make up the commands myself from here on out. Seemed to work ok for the other guy.</p> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Dirk: Examine room.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00012.png"> + <p>See? That wasn't difficult. Seriously, what's wrong with you people.</p> + <p>This is my PRIVATE STUDY on board the THESEUS, a LIGHTSPEED CAPABLE VESSEL built for tearing around the cosmos like there's no tomorrow. This is where I keep all of my PRIZED ARTIFACTS, CANONICAL KEEPSAKES, and other assorted OBJECTS OF HISTORICAL AND/OR ARTISTIC PERTINENCE. Some of these items were really hard to come by, requiring very creative use of my full faculty as an ascended Heart player. The rest was just stolen from my friends' houses when they weren't looking. It's nothing they'll miss, though. I also keep my FLORA OF THE SUCCULENT PERSUASION in here, so's I can keep an eye on them. Make sure nobody's eating any. It's happened before.</p> + <p>This is where I come when I want to sit and think about important plot details, which is pretty much any time I'm not training or laying down mad enfilades of philosophical shit with Rose. It's important to have things around to remind me of where we came from.</p> + <p>"History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again." -Maya Angelou</p> + <p>The ship itself is being BORROWED IN PERPETUITY and has served as our home for the past three years. It wasn't originally called Theseus, or anything else for that matter. The prior owner didn't think that kind of thing was worth the effort. But I know better.</p> + <p>Speaking of names, I've been workshopping potential designations for the new planet, which we're apparently gonna crack this ship against like a bottle of champagne on the prow of a virgin steamer. I still need to talk it over with Rose, though.</p> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Contemplate equine icongraphy.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00013.gif"> + <p>Beautiful, isn't it? A piece of this quality deserves nothing less than the pride of place in my private collection. Am I being sincere about that? Who the fuck can even say.</p> + <p>A parting gift from an old flame, it was given to one of my splinters in a distant timeline before ending up in my posession via lots of complicated shit that I don't wanna get into. This painting used to belong to one of the most powerful men in Earth's history, and now it belongs to one of the few people ever to hold him in the palm of their hand.</p> + <p>It came with a note, which has since been misplaced. But I know the words by heart.</p> + <p>"Dear Dirk,<br>In memory of our precious time together. When you look at it, think of me, and be reminded that while we breathe, we Hope." -B.O</p> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Paint. Paper. Get to work.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00014.gif"> + <p>Nah. This is FACE PAINT, not for painting pictures. Unless those pictures happen to be on a face, I guess.</p> + <p>This set of paints and the charred remains of my HORNED HEADBAND are the only surviving relics of the first and last WORLDWIDE INTERSPECIES ROLEPLAYING SESSION we ever attempted on Earth C.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00015.gif"> + <p>Calliope got it into their head that dressing up in cosplay would be a fun community activity. Vantas had some very uncharitable things to say about the idea, and for once in his life I think he was right. This thing was an unmitigated disaster from start to finish. A complete bloodbath.</p> + <p>I'd spent months perfecting my character. Countless late nights were devoted to scrupulously studying the intricacies of OLD ALTERNIAN CULTURE. EVERY INCH of my body was coated in cloying, meticulously sealed GRAY PAINT. Yes, even there. I know you were thinking it.</p> + <p>It was the perfect trollsona. I was a highblood called...</p> + <p>No, on second thoughts, let's not get into it. Some things are too painful to remember.</p> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Inspect delicious houseplants.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00016.gif"> + <p>Three years is no small amount of time. While I spent a lot of it in pursuit of a greater understanding of combat and philosophy, that doesn't mean there wasn't room for life and love in the equation too.</p> + <p>Plants are basically the ideal friends. They don't constantly question your decisions, or try and undermine your authority, or suggest that perhaps you should try talking about your feelings every once in a while. Plants lie down in the dirt and take it, metaphorically speaking.</p> + <p>I've genetically enhanced these succulents to make them more hardy in a low-gravity environment. They all got drastically discolored as a side-effect, but frankly they look better like this.</p> + <p>The downside is that I'm not the only person who's taken a liking to them. And speaking of which... "Delicious houseplants"?</p> + <p>...</p> + <p>Oh god damn it.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00017.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NY3H3H3...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H3H3H3H3H3....</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H4H4H4H4H4H4H4H4H4!!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU SHOULD H4V3 S33N YOUR F4C3!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T W4S 4S PL41N 4ND F34TUR3L3SS 4S 3V3R, JUST L1K3 TH3 CLOY1NG T4NG OF YOUR OV3RB34R1NG OR4NG34D3 PROS3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HOW DO3S 1T F33L TO B3 D4NC1NG TO SOM3ON3 3LS3'S TUN3 FOR 4 CH4NG3, YOU POOFY P4NT3D POM3GR4N4T3 PR1NCL1NG???</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: >:D</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Terezi. Always a pleasure.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I see you've found the command terminal. Please feel free to stop fucking around with it right about now. You're messing things up before we even get started.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HMMM</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HMMMMMMMMMM</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Hm?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 W4SNT F1N1SH3D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: *4H3M*</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: **HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM**!!!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sigh.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1V3 CONS1D3R3D YOUR G3N3ROUS OFF3R V3RY C4R3FULLY</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT 1M 4FR41D 1LL H4V3 TO D3CL1N3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: PUT YOURS3LF 1N MY SHO3S D1RK</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3XC3PT DONT 4CTU4LLY DO TH4T B3C4US3 1 DONT W4NT YOU TO SULLY TH3S3 D3L1C1OUS R3D SL1PP3RS W1TH YOUR SUDOR1F3ROUS N1NJ4 F33T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T S33MS TO M3 L1K3 L3TT1NG M3 BOSS YOU 4ROUND FOR 4 F3W M1NUT3S 1S TH3 L34ST YOU COULD DO TO M4K3 UP FOR WH4T PROB4BLY 4MOUNTS TO TH3 MOST BOR1NG 1NT3RG4L4CT1C VOY4G3 1N TH3 H1STORY OF SP4C3 TR4V3L</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND CONS1D3R1NG TH4T ON3 OF MY TWO PR1OR 3XP3R13NC3S 1NVOLV3D SCOUR1NG TH3 FR4CTUR3D, D1S1NT3GR4T1NG CORPS3 OF P4R4DOX SP4C3 FOR... WH4T F3LT L1K3 4N 3T3RN1TY,</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1TS NOT L1K3 TH3R3 W4S MUCH OF 4 B4R TO CL34R >:/</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3R3S ONLY SO M4NY T1M3S 4 G1RL C4N SN1FF H3R W4Y THROUGH TH3 1N-FL1GHT S3L3CT1ON OF 34ST 34RTH 4N1M4T1ON B3FOR3 SH3 G3TS S1CK OF TH3 SM3LL</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm sorry to hear that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Although, in fairness, you came along of your own volition.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's not my fault the journey didn't live up to your expectations.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4TS 4 L13 SO F1LTHY TH4T JUST SM3LL1NG 1T M4K3S M3 W4NT TO GO THROW UP 1NTO TH3 N34R3ST TO1L3T!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 H4D V3RY L1TTL3 S4Y 1N TH3 M4TT3R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3 BOTH KNOW TH4T YOU M4N1PUL4T3D M3 1NTO 1T W1TH YOUR PR1NC3LY W1L3S</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Princely wiles??</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Are you... flirting with me? Is this a caliginous thing you're going for here.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3W, NO!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm flattered, but I don't really go for aliens. Or girls.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Or alien girls, for that matter. Two yucks don't make a yum.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3XCUS3 M3 WH1L3 1 W1P3 TH3 SP1TTL3 OFF MY CH1N FROM 4NOTH3R 1MPROMPTU B4RF F3ST</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M T4LK1NG 4BOUT YOUR G3N3S1S FROG S1Z3D 1N4B1L1TY TO SHUT UP, WH1CH S33MS TO H4V3 SOM3HOW R34CH3D 4 M4SS SO CR1T1C4L 1TS OP3N3D UP 4 WORMHOL3 1N TH3 F4BR1C OF R34L1TY 1TS3LF</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOUV3 ST4RT3D DO1NG TH4T *TH1NG* 4G41N 4ND 1TS COMPL3T3LY 1NSUFF3R4BL3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Oh, sorry.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I forget how easy it is for you to pick up on it.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M4G1N3 TH4T 1M ST4ND1NG R1GHT N3XT TO YOU</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W1TH 4 M3G4PHON3 PR3SS3D SNUGLY UP 4G41NST YOUR 1NFUND1BUL4R 4UR4L PROTRUS1ON</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NOW 1M4G1N3 TH4T 1 PROC33D TO DRUB YOU S3NS3L3SS W1TH S41D M3G4PHON3, 4ND TH3N D1R3CT 4N 4POLOGY 4T YOUR SLUMP3D, TW1TCH1NG BODY THROUGH 1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4T 1S WH4T WH4T3V3R YOUR3 DO1NG F33LS L1K3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1TS L3SS TH4T 1 C4N "P1CK UP ON 1T", 4ND MOR3 TH4T 1T 4SS4ULTS MY V3RY CONSC1OUSN3SS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU H4V3 4LL TH3 SUBTL3TY OF 4 CULL1NG FORK TO TH3 THOR4C1C 3XOSK3L3T4L PL4T34U</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND 1TS H4RDLY SURPR1S1NG TH4T 1 C4N H34R YOU SO CL34RLY</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: How do you mean?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I just assumed it's because you're a Seer. It seemed appropriate somehow that you'd be able to sense these kinds of things.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3LL TH4TS PR3TTY OBV1OUSLY WRONG, SH1T-FOR-SP3CS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F 1T W4S B3C4US3 1M 4 S33R, TH3N HOW COM3 ROS3 DO3SNT KNOW 4BOUT 1T TOO?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 M34N... M4YB3 SH3 DO3S??? BUT 1F SO SH3S SOM3HOW PUTT1NG ON TH3 B3ST 4CT 1V3 3V3R S33N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, 1M PR3TTY SUR3 1TS B3C4US3 OF OUR 4SP3CTS</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What, Heart and Mind?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: M1ND 4ND H34RT, Y3S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 TWO OF US 4R3 OPPOS1T3S, R1GHT?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND WH3N 1T COM3S TO TH3 4SP3CTS, OPPOS1NG P41RS 3FF3CT1V3LY D3F1N3 34CH OTH3R ON 4 FUND4M3NT4L L3V3L</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: M1ND 4ND H34RT, T1M3 4ND SP4C3...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3YR3 4LL TWO S1D3S OF TH3 S4M3 CO1N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OR 1 GU3SS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TW3LV3 S1D3S OF TH3 S4M3 S1X CO1NS?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Sounds complicated.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH FUCK OFF 1 KNOW YOUR3 PL4Y1NG DUMB TO 4NT4GON1Z3 M3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, I'm an antagonist now. That's what I do.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH MY GOD G3T OV3R YOURS3LF 1 4M B3GG1NG YOU</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T 4R3 YOU 3V3N DO1NG R1GHT NOW</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's a bit hard to explain.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: If you're so bored, maybe you can help me out here. We can play a little game.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I just need you to submit a few instructions into the terminal. Your wishes will be my commands.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SOOOOOOOOO...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU JUST W4NT M3 TO, L1K3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DOM YOU W1TH TH1S COMM4ND ST4T1ON FOR 4 WH1L3??</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: If you wanted to phrase it in a way most calculated to awaken the hair-trigger psychoanalytical instincts of my slime daughter, then yes, I suppose you could say that.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH D34R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: L3TS NOT ROUS3 TH4T SL33P1NG PR1D3B34ST JUST Y3T</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Motion fucking seconded.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Look, I'm not asking for much. Just a little light action to prepare us for the road ahead.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Nothing too off the wall.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You're a strange and funny girl, Terezi, but you're less likely than certain others to leave the equivalent of a steaming pile of horse manure in the submission box.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Consider this little sum of executive power over my actions a planet-warming gift. Spend it wisely.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: >:O!!!!!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WHY MR STR1D3R YOUR G3N3ROS1TY KNOWS NO BOUNDS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BUT 1M 4FR44444441D YOU C4NT H4V3 4NOTH3R COMM4ND JUST Y3T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU H4V3NT COMPL3T3D TH3 ON3 1 4LR34DY G4V3 YOU!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Looking at these plants? I already did that. Inspected them good and fucking proper.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Look, they've gone bright pink from how hard I've been scrutinizing them.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: They all seem perfectly fine.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: >:]</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Wait.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00018.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Computer. Enhance.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00019.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Mother fucker.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NY3H3H3H3H3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK4Y, W3 C4N MOV3 ON NOW</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm not sure I *can* move on. Some betrayals are just too painful.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3V3 BOTH GOTT3N OV3R WORS3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah fair enough.</p> + </div> + <div class="command terezi"> + <span>Terezi wrote:</span> + <div>> WH4TS TH4T L1TTL3 T4BL3 N3XT TO YOU?</div> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's not really a command, but ok.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This is my KOTATSU, a Japanese-style low table. A small heater is hidden under the REPURPOSED BLANKET, and can be used to keep warm in the colder months.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In the FREEZING DEPTHS OF INTERSTELLAR SPACE, however, this is basically all the time, so the heater is always on.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I like to sit here when I'm drawing or reading. It's pretty cosy.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: On top is a drawing tablet, and over there is my katana.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's said that the pen is mightier than the sword, but I like to think they're both situationally dependent weaponry.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SH33333SH OK4Y 1 D1DNT 4SK FOR YOUR 3NT1R3 SORD1D H1STORY W1TH TH1S 4DOR4BL3 L1TTL3 P13C3 OF FURN1TUR3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OR YOUR DUMB PH1LOSOPH1C4L MUS1NGS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H3Y!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 TH1NK TH4TS *MY* T4BL3T!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don't look at me. That thing could be anybody's.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: >gt;:/</p> + </div> + <div class="command terezi"> + <span>Terezi wrote:</span> + <div>> L1B3R4T3 L4LOND14N L1BR4RY</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00021.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That one was a bit alliterative, but I think you're getting the hang of it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You want me to pick up this book, right?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DO3S ROS3 KNOW YOUV3 B33N US1NG ON3 OF H3R NOV3LS TO PROP UP TH4T D1SGUST1NGLY T4CKY CH41R?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M ST1LL NOT 4N 3XP3RT ON 34RTH F4M1LY 3TT1QU3TT3 BUT TH4T DO3SNT S33M 4LL TH4T POL1T3 TO M3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, no. But have you READ it?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: Y3S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OR 4T L34ST, 1 TR13D TO</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SH3 G4V3 M3 4 COPY TOO ONC3 SH3 F1N1SH3D WORK1NG ON 1T L4ST SW33P</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4S F4R 4S BOOKS GO 1TS...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: V3RY D3NS3 >gt;:|</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Just dense enough to support the weight of some baroque furniture, perhaps?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: GOD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3V3N YOUR S1LLY BOOK 4BOUT HORS3S 1S 4N 34S13R R34D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND 1 H4D TO G3T ROS3 TO 3XPL41N WH4T H4LF OF 1T 3V3N M34NT</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3SP3C14LLY 4LL THOS3 R3F3R3NC3S TO 4NC13NT 34RTH CULTUR3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I guess some of the magic is lost if you're not adequately boned the fuck up on several thousand years of human philosophy and like, four dead languages, true.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, 1 M34NT TH3 M3M3S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: "R3M3MB3R LONGC4T J4N3?"</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: COMPL3T3LY 1NCOMPR3H3NS1BL3</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00022.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: (I captchalogue the book into my MSPA MODUS. Forget HASH MAPS, PICTIONARY, or any of that shit. This thing is where it's at.)</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4W WH4T TH3 H3LL</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 CH41R W4S SUPPOS3D TO F4LL OV3R</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'm not sure I understand. Why would it? The four legs are all touching the floor.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Try not to think about it too hard.</p> + </div> + <div class="command terezi"> + <span>Terezi wrote:</span> + <div>> SCR34M L1K3 4 W1GGL3R 4ND T1DY YOUR D3SK</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00023.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, if you insist.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4UURGHHH D1RK YOUR3 NOT M4K1NG TH1S 4NY FUN 4T 4LL</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU W3R3 SUPPOS3D TO M4K3 4 B1G D34L OUT OF NOT DO1NG TH1S ON3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ok. Why.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: B3C4US3 SHUT UP 1S WHY???</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 DONT KNOW</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: SOM3TH1NG TOLD M3 TH4T 1T WOULD B3 TH3 MOST 4PPROPR14T3 COURS3 OF 4CT1ON FOR YOU TO T4K3 B4S3D ON TH3 1NSTRUCT1ON</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Appropriate?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: M4YB3 TH4TS NOT TH3 R1GHT WORD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: M4YB3 1T W4S JUST TH3 TH1NG TH4T S33M3D FUNN13ST 1N TH3 MOM3NT</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: L1K3 1 W4S S3TT1NG YOU UP FOR 4 JOK3 4ND YOU D1DNT D3L1V3R</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I wouldn't say I didn't deliver exactly.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It just wasn't the joke you were expecting it to be when you started telling it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Some of the best jokes are like that.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: FOR SOM3ON3 WHO CL41MS TO KNOW 4 LOT 4BOUT JOK3S YOU SUR3 H4V3 CONT1NU3D TO S4Y B4S1C4LLY NOTH1NG FUNNY 3V3R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M NOT SUR3 1 C4N 3V3N 1M4G1N3 YOU SM1L1NG</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: M4YB3 YOUR F4C3 WOULD F4LL OFF 1F YOU TR13D</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1F SO, 1T M1GHT JUST B3 TH3 F1RST FUNNY TH1NG TH4TS 3V3R H4PP3N3D TO YOU!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Ha ha.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00024.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You know,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I actually kind of resent the idea that I don't know how to loosen up or have fun.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Basically everyone thinks that about me, but they're wrong.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's just that the kind of fun I'm naturally predisposed to is rather intense.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Not many really understand that when pleasure is taken seriously enough, it can easily mimic the appearance of business, just as when irony is practiced with enough passion, it becomes indistinguishable from sincerity.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00025.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00026.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: DO YOU... W4NT TO T4LK 4BOUT 1T...?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Absolutely the fuck not.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK4Y</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T 3V3N 1S 4LL TH4T STUFF JUST LY1NG 4ROUND OV3R TH3R3 4NYW4Y</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4R3 YOU 4RR4NG1NG 4 SH1TTY L1TTL3 4RT G4LL3RY ON TH3 FLOOR</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Not quite.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's something a bit more important than that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We've made some good progress by now, so here. Let me show you something.</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00027_1.png"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00027_2.png"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Smell this Terezi?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This is a panel.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK4Y</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Can you tell what it's depicting?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1... H4NG ON</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: N33D TO G3T CLOS3R TO TH3 SCR33N</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: *SLUUUUUURPPPPP*</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HM</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: NO, NO GOOD</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M H4V1NG 4 H4RD T1M3 M4K1NG 1T OUT OV3R TH3 D3L3CT4BL3 RUG YOUR3 ST4ND1NG ON</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's alright. This actually helps me illustrate my point.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: The panel is a drawing of me showing the panel to you.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Now, what did I do there?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU DROPP3D 1T B4CK ON TH3 FLOOR 4G41N</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Yeah. But in the panel, I'm still just standing there holding it up.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In order to communicate what I did to anyone watching, you'd need another panel to show the result.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Or I suppose they could listen in on the conversation we're having right now, and infer that I dropped it from what we're saying. That would also work.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In that case, the words provide the information that the picture would have done, without me having to pull a whole new panel out my ass just so that someone could confirm that yes, I did in fact drop the panel on the floor.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH4TS TH3 ON3 TH1NG 1 4LW4YS FOUND D1FF1CULT 4BOUT M4K1NG COM1CS W1TH D4V3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: YOU H4V3 TO DR4W 333333V3RYTH1NG >:[</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Exactly. But sometimes, visuals are just a more effective way of doing things.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: So finding the right combination of words and pictures to communicate an idea efficiently is where the artistry lies.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And sometimes that means dispensing with one or the other entirely when appropriate.</p> + </div> + <p>Like so.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4444RGH NOT 4G41N!!</p> + </div> + <p>Oh simmer down.</p> + <p>What I'm trying to communicate to Terezi here is that there really doesn't need to be a panel showing anything at all, for a given beat of the story. Obviously most of you know this already, since lots of stories get by just well without a single visual element.</p> + <p>For the sake of precedent, I'm saying that we can cloak the visuals entirely and continue with narration alone, replacing the panel with a block of text like this, which we can call a “prattle” from now on. Such a device will be vital going forward, and so I dedicated some time at the outset to acclimatizing you to its effects. Its purpose is extremely practical. Things have been going a little slowly for a while, but now see how much we are able to accomplish with just a few short statements.</p> + <p>Terezi begins feeling a bit impatient with all this metaphysical discussion, and decides to turn her energy back towards that most noble of pursuits: pranksterism. She starts sending a constant stream of rapid-fire commands through the terminal, her fingers fluttering over the keys like the wings of a thousand migratory monarch butterflies.</p> + <p>And just as quickly I spring into action, performing every last one of her instructions to the letter, no matter how brazen, physically strenuous, or narratively questionable. The layout of the entire room is rearranged. Furniture is overturned, books are defaced and posters desecrated. Objects are picked up, put down, discarded, combined, separated, and ejected from sylladexes in all manner of directions.</p> + <p>Terezi's debasements aren't confined merely to fucking around with the upholstery, oh no. Her commands start to take a turn toward the slapstick. Pratfalls, feats of contortion, and increasingly ridiculous facial expressions are called for. She has me undertake the most intense workout routine paradox space has ever seen, all while whistling the entire discography of the Swedish pop group ABBA, which she's taken a liking to recently for some god forsaken reason. (... And which coincidentally was a favorite cultural weapon of Her Imperious Condescension back on Earth, centuries ago. Mamma Mia in particular was repurposed as a sugar-coated propagandist piece, calling for worldwide submission to the Batterwitch's dictatorship. "My my, how can I resist ya," as the old saying goes.) Various arcane and legendary dances are exhumed from the tomb of antiquity and performed with anachronistically reckless abandon on every horizontal surface available. The Charleston. The Mashed Potato. All the numbers from Riverdance in alphabetical order.</p> + <p>Then, I'm instructed to sit smack in the middle of the carpet and begin slapping myself silly. Just absolutely go all in, and hold nothing back. "H4H4H4 STOP H1TT1NG YOURS3LF,” Terezi cackles, as for thirty uninterrupted minutes I obediently clobber myself around the face, until my cheeks are glowing brighter than the heart emblazoned on my chest.</p> + <p>You're welcome.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: H4H4 OK TH4T W4S PR3TTY GOOD</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: *huff* *huff* See? *huff* I told you,</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: *COUGH*</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: *pant*</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I told you I could have fun.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: Y34H YOU SUR3 SHOW3D M3 1 GU3SS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M GL4D 1 GOT TO W4TCH 1T 4LL THROUGH TH1S SCR33N TOO</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: S1NC3 1 WOULD N3V3R H4V3 B3L13V3D YOU 4CTU4LLY D1D 1T 4LL OTH3RW1S3</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3V3N THOUGH 1 ST1LL... H4V3 NO FUCK1NG CLU3 WH4T 1T 1S W3R3 3V3N DO1NG H3R3 >:/</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: C4N YOU JUST HURRY 1T UP SO W3 C4N F1N4LLY G3T OFF TH1S SH1P????</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HMMM, COM3 TO TH1NK OF 1T, M4YB4 1 COULD 3ND TH1S R1GHT NOW BY TYP1NG TH3 R1GHT COMM4ND >:O</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'd rather you didn't.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It would be inelegant.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WHY DO W3 3V3N H4V3 TH1S TH1NG 4NYW4Y? 1 THOUGHT TH3Y W3R3 FOR 3X1L3S TO US3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, normally they are.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And normally, those are the only people who would ever use them. A terminal's function is to act as a means of communication between two disparate parts of a time loop, a passage through which information can travel that aids in such a loop's successful completion.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And within the context of the game, that's all they're used for.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But beyond that, they're a convenient and effective means of subtle psychic suggestion at a distance.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1T DO3SNT S33M 4LL TH4T SUBTL3 TO M3</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well no, it's not.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: At least, not for us right now.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But that's because your presence as a guiding influence has been revealed.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Earlier, when I hadn't realized you were there, it was more difficult to discern.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I could have gone on for quite a while, not realizing that the instructions were anything other than spontaneous ideas from my own imagination, if you hadn't gotten too greedy.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T C4N 1 S4Y, TH3YR3 C4LL3D SUCCUL3NTS FOR 4 R34SON</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4ND 4PP4R3NTLY TH4T R34SON 1S TH4T TH3Y 4R3 D3L1C1OUS >:P</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: No, I mean you started being too obvious.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Your personality bled through to an extent that was impossible to ignore, and so the spell was broken.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: But if someone with a lot of skill gave it a try, there's no reason why you couldn't keep providing commands indefinitely, with the commandee none the wiser.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HMMMMMM</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W3LL ON S3COND THOUGHT, TH4T SUR3 SOUNDS S1N1ST3R 4S SH1T!!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In the wrong hands, maybe. But don't worry.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It's just part of the plan.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3 *3V1L* PL4N?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Evil is a very... reductive word.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I prefer to think of it as just a regular-ass plan.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1S 4LL TH3 OTH3R STUFF 1N H3R3 P4RT OF TH3 R3GUL4R 4SS PL4N TH3N?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Something like that.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: TH3R3S...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4 WHOL3 LOT OF JUNK???</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WOW</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 H4V3NT SM3LL3D SOM3 OF TH1S G4RB4G3 1N SW33PS</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH W41T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1S TH4T...?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4444444444CHH!!!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: BL3333CH HOUGHGHGH 4CK!!!!</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: PFFFFFPTHTH PFFFF PFFTH!!!!!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK:</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3URGH</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 3V3RYTH1NG 1N H3R3 1S SO DUSTY >:[</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: That's what you get for nosing around in our secret storeroom.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I'd ask you not to contaminate the ectobiological equipment with your own genetic material, but,</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: Y34H TOO L4T3, SORRY >:|</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Whatever. I was about to clean it anyway.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 DONT S33 WH4TS SO S3CR3T 4BOUT TH1S PL4C3 4NYW4Y</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1 M34N TH3R3 4R3 ONLY THR33 OF US ON TH1S SH1P</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1TS NOT L1K3 TH3R3S 4NYON3 TO 3V3N H1D3 TH1NGS FROM</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OR 4NYTH1NG WORTH H1D1NG FOR TH4T M4TT3R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: HMM</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4TS TH1S TH1NG OV3R 1N TH3 CORN3R</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: UND3RN34TH TH1S B1G SH33T TH1NG</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Don't look in there.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OH SHHHH 1M ONLY T4K1NG 4 P33K</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Terezi.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Listen to me.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1M JUST L1FT1NG UP TH3 COV3R 4 L1TTL3 W4YS!!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Terezi please stop talking right now.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: D1RK HOLY SH1T</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: W</p> + </div> + <p>Terezi stops talking immediately, her mind suddenly free of any and all inclination to take a look at what's behind the curtain. What curtain? In fact, she is quite certain there have never been, and never will be, any objects covered by fabric located anywhere in the storeroom.</p> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 4444URGH YOU 4SSHOL3!!!</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I did ask you to stop.</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: OK4Y 4CTU4LLY FUCK TH1S</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WH4T 4M 1 DO1NG H3R3?</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: WHY 4M 1 3V3N W4ST1NG MY T1M3 W4TCH1NG YOU RUN 4ROUND 1N YOUR STUP1D ROOM FULL OF TR4SH, T4LK1NG TO YOURS3LF??</p> + <p class="terezi">TEREZI: 1V3 GOT 4 SH1P TO CR4SH</p> + </div> + <p>She turns toward the door and walks out, past the command station, down the hallway, and into the control room, where she begins the necessary preparations for taking the Theseus out of orbit and down to the planet below.</p> + <div class="command dirk"> + <span>Dirk:</span> + <div>> Dirk: Get this show on the road.</div> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00029_1.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00029_2.gif"> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00029_3.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Tidying all finished?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: In a manner of speaking.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I've given Terezi the all clear.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Or, I guess just kinda pissed her off enough to kick this whole thing off once and for all.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Okay.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: ...</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: So, I guess today is finally the day everything's been heading towards.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You could put it like that, yeah.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: At least, we're aiming to frame it that way.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Our actions from this point on will form part of a crucial inner mechanism, tucked away behind the tightly sealed metallic service hatch of reality.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: One which will be of our own creation, but which by all practical considerations might as well have always been there.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: And if we're successful, the distinction won't be significant enough to matter to just about anybody.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: They'll be too busy getting their mind's dicks collectively blown.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Would you say that we're imploring people to "suck on this"?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Oh absolutely. Get the hand-illuminated invitations ready on the fucking double.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Hilarious fellatioid imagery notwithstanding, there's something about today that feels...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Exciting?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I can understand that. We've been waiting a long time.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I was going to say "portentous".</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: With both the positive and negative connotations that word usually has.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: You've got misgivings, then.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I wouldn't even go so far as to call it that.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: What I'm feeling is hard to explain to someone whose being is not inextricably linked with the very concept of fortune.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: The sensation probably doesn't even have a name, come to think of it.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Not too many people have ever been in our position before.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Just about none, I'd bet.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Right.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: But if I had to describe it, I'd say that misgivings, hunches, doubts and so on are supported on a foundation of un-knowing.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: And along with that absence of knowledge comes a commensurate feeling of dread or worry. Fear about the potential calamity yet to come.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: On the other hand, while feelings of positive anticipation also tend to stem from a lack of certainty about the future,</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: The presumption of good fortune allows the uncertainty to become excitement.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: It's the glee of a child who knows not what the gift contains, but can evaluate from prior experience that it's likely to be something good.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Can't empathize.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Dirk, you are tragically capable of sucking all joy and convivial sentiment out of basically every situation you find yourself in.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Thanks.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Anyway, this feeling you were talking about. I take it that we're not dealing with either giddy enthusiasm or paranoid foreboding, then.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: No. My point is that the present moment feels like neither of those two cases.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: But crucially, it's not because there is nothing to anticipate. Far from it.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Instead, it feels like the very notion of fortune is simply out of the question as a means of describing the potential outcome.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: As though in this moment, luck isn't either strictly real or not real, or somewhere inbetween, but absent of meaning completely.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Luck took one look at our itinerary from here on out and said you'll just have to go on without me.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Luck rolled over the other side of the dictionary and said not tonight sweetheart, I've got a wicked fuckin' headache.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Exactly.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Except now I'm the one with the migraine.</p> + </div> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well whatever that means, it doesn't sound good.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: I didn't know that robots could even get headaches.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I'd say it's more of an ontological, existential headache, but that already describes basically everything that's ever happened to us up until now.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: And also sounds as fake as shit.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Is there nothing I can say that'd take the weight off your mind?</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: For what it's worth, I think we've got this plan riding at a level experts might describe as "pretty solid".</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: We scanned for Sburban technology, so we know for sure this is the right planet. Wheels are already in motion and all that.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: This thing is on lock-down. Hermetically sealed, even.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Shit's tighter than a pair of English-occupied micro-shorts.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: You aren't going to believe this, but it turns out that the deranged horny ramblings of a spurned anime-obsessive have essentially no therapeutic properties whatsoever.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: And contrary to common wisdom, talking about the problem doesn't seem to have eased my state of mind either.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I doubt you could say anything to make me feel better. If anything, I feel worse now than I already did.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: It's like the notion I was trying to describe was so conceptually insubstantial, so resistant to concrete definition within any meaningful frame of reference, that even thinking about it as an idea made *me* somehow existentially unsound.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: And not in the way I used to always feel, back before John made the choice to validate our canonical existences axiomatically.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Foreboding I can deal with. I'm a Seer. Sooths are mine to say.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: But this is different.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Well, if talking about it didn't help, maybe talking about how it felt to talk about it might just enlarge the problem geometrically.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Fair point.</p> + </div> + <p>Despite what she thinks, little by little Rose begins to feel her head clear of concern, semantically dubious or otherwise. Her understanding of my ascended existence doesn't include this degree of metanarrative potency, so her doubts as to my words' healing powers are understandable. I don't take it personally. For someone whose sense of self is so boundless and infinite as an ascended Prince of Heart's, the fact that I'm able to perceive something in any way other than personally might come as a surprise. But then again, taking things in stride is basically my whole deal at this stage. You might even call it my namesake.</p> + <p>And so it's with a stony expression of implacable calm that I endure the increasingly violent tremors now coursing through the Theseus as it begins to breach the new planet's stratosphere, vibrations unruly enough to churn even the most adamant of stomachs to a nauseous froth. With brow unfurrowed and mouth pixel-perfectly horizontal I withstand the spasmodic adjustments and course corrections, which together comprise the rambunctious intergalactic road-rage of a chaotic-lawful alien woman with a voracious appetite for alchemically discolored ornamental plants. All manner of shit goes tumbling helplessly to the floor/walls/ceiling, and I don't even seem to bat an eyelid. Or maybe that's just because my shades are in the way. In the face of impossible stupidity, I am as unfazed as ever. Because while the external world roils and heaves and shits itself like nothing else, there's one thing that I can always count on.</p> + <p>As you know, I have many splinters. So many, I used to find it overwhelming to contemplate them all. Depressing, actually. It was a feeling I could never escape from. The feeling that my sense of self was limitless. That I was forced to exist as a small facet of my own potential, while drowning in an ocean of my greater persona, and all the terrible things I was fully capable of. I was trapped as a limited version of myself who was still burdened by the concern for what it meant to be good, struggling to keep himself from drowning in an overwhelming body of potential which had no concern for human morality whatsoever.</p> + <p>But that struggle finally ended a few years ago. My head isn't fighting to stay above the water anymore. There isn't even a metaphorical head to speak of. I'm only the water now.</p> + <p>It's proven to be an immensely comforting way for me to exist. It reminds me of the feelings I had during long nights alone, looking out over the dark ocean which surrounded me. The ocean that effectively raised me, because nothing else was around to do it. During those lonely nights I spent many hours wondering what would happen, what would even be the difference, if I jumped in and never came up. If I simply disappeared.</p> + <p>But now I finally have. I've disappeared into the infinity of myself. And I am... <em>magnificent</em>.</p> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00031.gif"> + <div class="chat"> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What's that noise I'm hearing.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: It sounds a little bit like a cat being caught in a ventilation fan. A sort of...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Inhuman screeching, combined with the grinding of metal.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Are we even going to make it to the ground?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Oh, no,</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: The ship's fine as far as I can tell.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: That's just Terezi laughing.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Oh.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: She's... enjoying this, isn't she.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I suppose so.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: ...</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Haha.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: What?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: The mood is kind of infectious actually.</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: I suppose it's about time we had a little fun around here.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Glad to hear it.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: Rose?</p> + <p class="rosebot">ROSEBOT: Yes Dirk.</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: ...</p> + <p class="dirk">DIRK: How do you feel about games?</p> + </div> + <img class="panel" src="https://www.homestuck2.com/assets/panels/00032.gif"> + <p class="command-line">> <a href="chapter1.html">CHAPTER 1. Ghostflusters</a></p> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/search.css b/search.css new file mode 100644 index 0000000..78c33c9 --- /dev/null +++ b/search.css @@ -0,0 +1,20 @@ +.results { + visibility: hidden; + margin: 1em 30px; +} + +.results-list { + margin-top: 1em; +} + +.results-list > div { + padding: 3px; +} + +.results-list > div:nth-child(odd) { + background-color: #ffffff; +} + +.results-list > div > * { + margin: 0; +} diff --git a/search.html b/search.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..239fbfa --- /dev/null +++ b/search.html @@ -0,0 +1,37 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html> + <head> + <title>Search (Preceding Canon)</title> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css"> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="search.css"> + </head> + <body> + <nav> + <span><a href="index.html">Index</a></span> + <span><a>Search</a></span> + <span>Jump to <a href="#text">Text Search</a>, <a href="#panel">Panel Search</a></span> + </nav> + <article> + <h1>Search</h1> + <p><b>Shelving note:</b> The search page isn't totally done being coded (back-links are missing, mainly). It's still here if you want to play with it though.</p> + <p>Note: Search utilities are based on client-side JavaScript and require network-based access to individual page documents; if viewing from a downloaded archive, you may have to run a <a href="https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Learn/Common_questions/set_up_a_local_testing_server#Running_a_simple_local_HTTP_server">local HTTP server</a>. + <h2 id="text">Text Search</h2> + <form name="text"> + <p><label>Text: <input name="text"></label> <input type="submit" value="Search"></p> + <details> + <summary>Advanced...</summary> + <p><label><input type="checkbox" name="do-convert" checked> Convert quirk-typing when finding results</label></p> + <p><label><input type="checkbox" name="do-character"> Filter by character:</label> <select name="character"></select></p> + <p><label><input type="checkbox" name="do-chapter"> Filter by chapter: <select name="chapter"></select></p> + </details> + </form> + <div class="results" id="text-results"> + <div class="results-heading"></div> + <div class="results-list"></div> + </div> + <h2 id="panel">Panel Search</h2> + <p>This hasn't been coded yet, sorry.</p> + <script src="search.js"></script> + </article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/search.js b/search.js new file mode 100644 index 0000000..61cc67f --- /dev/null +++ b/search.js @@ -0,0 +1,289 @@ +const characterList = [ + {id: 'aradia', name: 'Aradia'}, + {id: 'alt-callie', name: '(Alt.) Calliope'}, + {id: 'dave', name: 'Dave'}, + {id: 'dirk', name: 'Dirk'}, + {id: 'harry', name: 'Harry Anderson'}, + {id: 'jade', name: 'Jade'}, + {id: 'jake', name: 'Jake'}, + {id: 'jane', name: 'Jane'}, + {id: 'john', name: 'John'}, + {id: 'kanaya', name: 'Kanaya'}, + {id: 'karkat', name: 'Karkat'}, + {id: 'rose', name: 'Rose'}, + {id: 'roxy', name: 'Roxy'}, + { + id: 'sollux', name: 'Sollux', + convert: text => (text + .replace(/0/g, 'o')) + }, + {id: 'tavros', name: 'Tavros (Crocker)'}, + { + id: 'terezi', name: 'Terezi', + convert: text => (text + .replace(/4/g, 'A') + .replace(/1/g, 'I') + .replace(/3/g, 'E')) + }, + { + id: 'vriska', name: 'Vriska (Serket)', + convert: text => (text + .replace(/8/g, 'b')) + }, + { + id: 'vrissy', name: 'Vrissy (ML)', + convert: text => (text + .replace(/8/g, 'b')) + }, + {id: 'yiffy', name: 'Yiffy'} +]; + +const parser = new DOMParser(); + +function fetchPage(url) { + return fetch(url) + .then(res => res.text()) + .then(html => parser.parseFromString(html, 'text/html')); +} + +function eachEl(doc, query, cb) { + return Array.from(doc.querySelectorAll(query)).map(cb); +} + +function fillEl(el, newChildren) { + while (el.firstChild) { + el.firstChild.remove(); + } + for (const child of newChildren) { + el.appendChild(child); + } +} + +function makeOption(value, label) { + const opt = document.createElement('option'); + opt.value = value; + opt.appendChild(document.createTextNode(label)); + return opt; +} + +async function fetchData() { + const indexDoc = await fetchPage("index.html"); + + const chaptersP = Promise.all(eachEl(indexDoc, '#chapters a', async a => { + const chapterDoc = await fetchPage(a.href); + const id = new URL(a.href).pathname; + const name = a.innerText; + return { + id, name, + doc: chapterDoc, + texts: eachEl(chapterDoc, 'p:not(.command-line), .command div', el => { + let text = el.innerText; + const type = ( + el.closest('.chat') ? 'chat' : + el.closest('.command') ? 'command' : + 'prose' + ); + + const contents = document.createDocumentFragment(); + contents.appendChild(el.cloneNode(true)); + + let extraProps = {}; + + switch (type) { + case 'chat': { + text = (text.match(/(?<=: ).*/) || [''])[0]; + let character = el.className; + for (const [ elClass, parentQuery, replace ] of [ + ['jade', '.dead-jade', 'alt-callie'], + ['ag', '.ag-vrissy', 'vrissy'], + ['gg', '.gg-tavros', 'tavros'], + ['tg', '.tg-harry', 'harry'] + ]) { + if (character === elClass && el.closest(parentQuery)) { + character = replace; + break; + } + } + extraProps = {character}; + break; + } + } + return {el, contents, text, ...extraProps}; + }) + }; + })); + + return { + chapters: await chaptersP + }; +} + +function convertCharacterString(string, characterId) { + const character = characterList.find(char => char.id === characterId); + if (character && character.convert) { + return character.convert(string); + } else { + return string; + } +} + +const transformString = string => string + .split(' ') + .map(word => word + .toLowerCase() + .replace(/['"!?.,]/g, '') + ) + .filter(Boolean); + +function runTextSearch(form, data) { + const filteredChapters = ( + form.elements['do-chapter'].checked + ? [data.chapters.find(chapter => chapter.id === form.elements['chapter'].value)] + : data.chapters + ); + const filterString = form.elements['text'].value; + let filterFunc = () => true; + if (filterString) { + const last = filterFunc; + let transformText; + if (form.elements['do-convert'].checked) { + transformText = text => { + return transformString(convertCharacterString(text.text, text.character)); + }; + } else { + transformText = text => transformString(text.text); + } + const compareWords = transformString(filterString); + filterFunc = text => { + const entryWords = transformText(text); + for (const word of compareWords) { + if (!entryWords.includes(word)) { + return false; + } + } + return last(text); + }; + } + if (form.elements['do-character'].checked) { + const last = filterFunc; + const character = form.elements['character'].value; + filterFunc = text => { + return (text.character === character) && last(text); + }; + } + const results = []; + for (const chapter of filteredChapters) { + for (const text of chapter.texts) { + if (filterFunc(text)) { + results.push(text); + } + } + } + displayTextResults(form, filterString, results); +} + +function displayTextResults(form, filterString, results) { + const container = document.getElementById('text-results'); + container.style.visibility = 'visible'; + + const compareWords = transformString(filterString); + + paginateResults(container, results, text => { + const div = document.createElement('div'); + const p = document.createElement('p'); + let transformWord = word => transformString(word)[0]; + if (text.character) { + p.classList.add(text.character); + if (form.elements['do-convert'].checked) { + transformWord = word => transformString(convertCharacterString(word, text.character))[0]; + } + } else { + p.className = text.contents.children[0].className; + } + let chunk = ''; + const pushChunk = () => { + if (chunk) { + p.appendChild(document.createTextNode(chunk)); + chunk = ''; + } + }; + const words = text.text.split(' '); + for (let i = 0; i < words.length; i++) { + if (i > 0) { + chunk += ' '; + } + const word = words[i]; + const transformed = transformWord(word); + console.log(transformed); + if (compareWords.includes(transformed)) { + pushChunk(); + const b = document.createElement('b'); + b.appendChild(document.createTextNode(word)); + p.appendChild(b); + } else { + chunk += word; + } + } + pushChunk(); + div.appendChild(p); + return div; + }); +} + +function paginateResults(container, results, makeResultRow) { + const heading = container.querySelector('.results-heading'); + const list = container.querySelector('.results-list'); + + const headingNodes = [ + document.createTextNode(`${results.length} result${results.length === 1 ? '' : 's'}`) + ]; + + const pageSize = 100; + if (results.length > pageSize) { + const pageAnchors = []; + for (let i = 0; i < results.length; i += pageSize) { + const start = i; + const end = Math.min(i + pageSize, results.length); + const a = document.createElement('a'); + a.appendChild(document.createTextNode(`${start + 1}\u2013${end}`)); + a.href = '#'; + a.addEventListener('click', event => { + event.preventDefault(); + for (const a of pageAnchors) { + a.href = '#'; + } + a.removeAttribute('href'); + fillEl(list, results.slice(start, end).map(makeResultRow)); + }); + pageAnchors.push(a); + if (start === 0) { + headingNodes.push(document.createTextNode(': ')); + } + headingNodes.push(a); + if (end < results.length) { + headingNodes.push(document.createTextNode(', ')); + } + } + pageAnchors[0].click(); + } else { + fillEl(list, results.map(makeResultRow)); + } + + fillEl(heading, headingNodes); +} + +async function main() { + const data = await fetchData(); + const textForm = document.forms.text; + const panelForm = document.forms.panel; + + fillEl(textForm.elements['character'], characterList.map(({ id, name }) => makeOption(id, name))); + fillEl(textForm.elements['chapter'], data.chapters.map(({ id, name }) => makeOption(id, name))); + + textForm.addEventListener('submit', event => { + event.preventDefault(); + runTextSearch(textForm, data); + }); +} + +main().catch(err => console.error(err)); diff --git a/style.css b/style.css new file mode 100644 index 0000000..57752ff --- /dev/null +++ b/style.css @@ -0,0 +1,196 @@ +body { + background-color: #535353; + color: #000000; + font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif; + font-size: 13px; +} + +article, nav { + max-width: 650px; + background-color: #efefef; + color: black; + padding: 5px 20px; + border-radius: 5px; + line-height: 1.6em; + margin: 0 auto 10px auto; +} + +nav > time { + float: right; + opacity: 0.5; + font-style: oblique; +} + +nav > time:not(:first-of-type):after { + content: " \00b7 "; + font-weight: bold; + margin-right: 4px; +} + +nav > span:not(:last-of-type):after { + content: " \00b7 "; + font-weight: bold; +} + +.panel { + display: block; + width: 100%; + margin: 2em 0; + image-rendering: pixelated; +} + +.command { + --color: #5e440c; + text-align: center; + margin: 2em 30px; + padding: 2px; + border-radius: 10px; + background: var(--color); + color: black; + position: relative; + overflow: hidden; + z-index: 0; +} + +.command::before { + content: ""; + position: absolute; + top: 0; + left: 0; + width: 100%; + height: 100%; + background: white; + opacity: 0.5; + z-index: -1; +} + +.command > span { + display: block; + margin-bottom: 3px; + font-weight: bold; +} + +.command > div { + background: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.8); + padding: 5px; + border-radius: 10px; + font-style: oblique; +} + +.chat { + background-color: inherit; + font-family: "courier-std", courier, monospace; + font-weight: bold; + line-height: 1.35; + padding: 15px 25px; + margin: 1.5em 0; + border: 1px dashed gray; + color: black; +} + +article > p, +article > .chat, +article > form { + margin-left: 30px; + margin-right: 30px; +} + +.chat > p { + margin: 0; +} + +p, p > span { + color: var(--color); +} + +a:not([href]) { + opacity: 0.5; + font-style: oblique; +} + +a[href] { + color: blue; + text-decoration: none; +} + +a[href]:hover { + text-decoration: underline; +} + +h2 { + border-bottom: 1px solid rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.5); +} + +.command-line { + font-size: 1.5em; +} + +.flash { + display: block; + margin: 3em 30px; + font-size: 1.125em; + line-height: 1.5; + padding: 5px; + text-align: center; + font-style: oblique; + border: 1px dashed black; + border-radius: 5px; + box-shadow: 0 3px 3px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.3); +} + +.wide { + margin-left: -20px; + margin-right: -20px; +} + +.two-columns { + columns: 2; + margin: 20px; +} + +.column { + break-inside: avoid; + padding: 10px; +} + +.column > :first-child { + margin-top: 0; +} + +.prose { + font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif; + font-size: 13px; + color: black; + font-weight: normal; +} + +.dead-jade .jade, +.alt-callie { --color: #ff0000; } +.alfonz { --color: #416600; } +.aradia { --color: #a10000; } +.avril { --color: #ffc600; } +.davebot, +.dave { --color: #e00707; } +.dirk { --color: #f2a400; } +.tg-harry .tg, +.harry { --color: #0671cd; } +.imode { --color: #bdb49c; } +.jade { --color: #4ac925; } +.jake { --color: #1f9400; } +.jane { --color: #0097d7; } +.john { --color: #0715cd; } +.karkat { --color: #7c7e81; } +.kanaya { --color: #008141; } +.meenah { --color: #77003c; } +.rosebot, +.rose { --color: #b536da; } +.roxy { --color: #ff6ff2; } +.silas { --color: #71d666; } +.sollux { --color: #a1a100; } +.swifer { --color: #008141; } +.gg-tavros .gg, +.tavros { --color: #2b0057; } +.terezi { --color: #008282; } +.vrissy, .ag-vrissy .ag, +.vriska { --color: #005682; } +.yiffy { --color: #d00009; } diff --git a/util.vim b/util.vim new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b448a6a --- /dev/null +++ b/util.vim @@ -0,0 +1,5 @@ +function ConvertChat() + :silent! execute '%g/^$/d' + :silent! execute '%s#^\(\s\+\)\<\(HARRY ANDERSON\):\(.*\)#\1<p class="harry">\2:\3</p>#' + :silent! execute '%s#^\(\s\+\)\<\(.\{-}\):\(.*\)#\1<p class="\L\2\E">\2:\3</p>#' +endfunction |