#There's no relative direction in the vastness of space {musings} | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

glorious-blackout · 4 years

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Soooo @rock-n-roll-fantasy wanted me to write an essay on my self-indulgent theory that Muse’s ‘Simulation Theory’ and Arctic Monkeys’ ‘Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino’ are set in the same universe, and my brain rather predictably used this as an opportunity to develop a novel-length crossover fic instead. I’m starting to doubt that the full idea will ever get written purely because life has a habit of getting in the way, but here’s a bit of an overlong teaser in place of your essay! 😉🥰

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The trek from Room 521 to the ballroom is a long, monotonous one. Not that that particularly matters; even if Mark didn’t know every corridor like the back of his hand, he no doubt would have been guided to his destination regardless, simply by following the growing ruckus of banal chatter overlying soft musical notes. His own band won’t be the ones playing tonight – thank Christ seeing as he barely has the energy to hold a mic for two hours let alone sing into it – but the prospect of spending the evening alone in his room had hardly been tempting. He could have arranged to meet one of the lads for a drink, he supposes, but he hadn’t wanted to impose. They all have lives beyond the hotel after all, whereas he remains tied to its walls like an obedient dog on a leash.

High-ceilinged corridors eventually lure him towards a set of heavy oak doors, the only veil remaining between him and a horde of guests who by now are likely enjoying their third glass of champagne. Muffled conversations become crystal clear for a moment as one guest stumbles onto the corridor looking considerably worse for wear, but the noise is quickly silenced by an exaggerated slam. The guest sways on his feet for a moment, narrowed eyes struggling to maintain focus on Mark’s face, before he huffs and takes the first step of what promises to be an arduous journey back to his room. No doubt he’ll have collapsed in a pool of his own vomit before he’s even halfway there, adding one more job to the cleaners’ already overflowing pile in the process. Mark sighs, already regretting his decision to be sociable, and forces himself over the threshold before he can change his mind.

The ballroom does ignite a certain pride within his chest, he must admit. The spacious hall - resting beneath a curved ceiling kept afloat by granite columns - is a stark contrast to the narrow claustrophobic corridors leading up to it, and the size is adequate enough that the space never feels too crowded. Waiters flit back and forth between packed circular tables on the fringes, offering blessed champagne or scotch from a well-stocked bar, and an elevated platform at the far-end of the hall proudly showcases the evening’s entertainment.

It would appear the choice of dance tonight is a simple waltz. Guests dressed to the nines in elegant frocks and sharp tuxedos glide effortlessly along the polished dancefloor; guided by lilting piano notes as they sway beneath the soft light of a glittering chandelier. As usual, Mark feels no particular inclination to join them. On occasion, he himself will be the one sat by the piano, enticing his guests to dance for him whenever the evening feels a little too stagnant, but it would appear that his influence is not needed tonight. Besides, the only thing enticing him for the moment is the bar.

Despite having to make his way through the masses in order to reach his destination, luck must be on his side for no-one takes the opportunity to disturb him. He must have timed his trip well enough that the drinks are already taking hold, to the point where the hotel owner himself has become an unnoteworthy presence. His short walk to the bar goes entirely without a hitch, so much so that it probably shouldn’t surprise him when he arrives to find that his luck has run dry.

There’s someone sitting in his usual spot. Logically he knows this isn’t an issue; there are plenty of free stools lined up against the horseshoe-shaped counter, but the sight gives him pause nonetheless. For as long as he can remember, that centerfold seat has been his and his alone, and the sight of someone new sitting there has unease coiling in his gut for reasons he cannot explain. If that were the strangest thing about this situation then he could have moved on and settled himself elsewhere without another thought, but what truly makes him gape is the appearance of the man who has seen fit to take his place.

In stark contrast to the stylish formalwear adorning the vast majority of guests, this man seems to have made it his mission to break every rule of fashion there is. The loud red jeans and shiny trainers would no doubt have been bad enough on their own, but in comparison to the gaudy nylon jacket and the lit neon sunglasses which remain fused to his face despite being indoors, the lower half of his body looks positively tame. Intricate circuitry is affixed to the front of the jacket, with wires snaking their way into a large pocket which no doubt houses a switch designed to make the jacket as loud as the sunglasses. Mark can’t help but wonder how this man hasn’t attracted any unwanted attention and has instead been left to cradle his glass of bourbon in relative peace. Perhaps this is the current fashion trend on Earth and someone has simply forgotten to give Mark that particular memo.

Shaking his head once and remembering his mother sternly telling him that staring is rude, Mark clears his throat and gestures to the free stool by his side when a pair of concealed eyes turn in his direction.

“Mind if I take this seat?” he asks, well aware that he of all people shouldn’t need to ask permission.

A knowing smile graces the man’s thin face and he nods graciously, removing his glasses to reveal surprisingly gentle blue eyes. He appears more normal up close than Mark anticipated, barring a pair of impressively sharp cheekbones and a hairstyle so haphazard he doubts an intense combing session would tame it.

“Be my guest,” the man offers in an accent which turns out to be English, to Mark’s not unpleasant surprise. Besides the lads, he can’t remember the last time he encountered someone from home. “Though I imagine that’s usually your line.”

A surprised laugh escapes Mark at the lame joke, causing the stranger to grin proudly before taking another generous sip of bourbon. Mark considers calling the waiter over – the impressive display of booze resting before him is enough to make his mouth water – but the man in question appears to be preoccupied with an uptight elderly couple nearby, and besides, his curiosity is already threatening to consume him. The booze can wait.

“Love what you’ve done with the place,” the man interjects before Mark can ask the question weighing on his mind. The words escape like a bullet, so rapidly that the compliment could easily be dismissed as flippant, but the stranger’s smile seems sincere enough. “You’ve got one hell of a mind, Turner.”

There’s a gravity to his tone that Mark can’t quite comprehend, but he doesn’t dwell on it.

“How did you get here?” Mark asks, aiming for a conversational tone only to flinch when the words emerge as confrontational instead. In an attempt to save face, he adds, “I don’t remember greeting you at the station, is all.”

‘I would have remembered if I had’ goes unsaid, though the implication doesn’t appear to be lost on his new companion.

“Interdimensional portal,” he replies without missing a beat, bringing his glass to his lips once more as he gazes at Mark with mischief in his eyes and a challenge in his smirk.

The ensuing silence is broken almost immediately as Mark bursts out laughing again; an action which appears to serve as an invitation for the other man to join him. The high-pitched giggle is unexpected, but the sound of it is enough to melt some of Mark’s lingering unease.

“I doubt technology’s reached that stage yet,” Mark teases once he’s recovered his composure. “Not unless they’re keeping secrets from me back home.”

“I wouldn’t sound so sure if I were you,” the man retaliates, that same challenge resting on his lips and a single brow quirked upwards with mocking intent. “How long has it been since you visited Earth?”

The lightness in Mark’s chest vanishes for a moment and his brows knit together as he ponders the question. Strange. Now that he thinks about it, he honestly can’t recall how long it’s been.

When it becomes clear that no answer is forthcoming, his companion simply shrugs before facing ahead once more, demolishing the rest of his drink with a single gulp. It’s impossible to tell how much he’s had already. His current glass barely seems to have touched him, unless his strange approach to conversation is merely the product of drunken ramblings. He makes no move to relinquish his seat however, nor does he signal to the now-free waiter for a refill, and Mark finds himself facing straight ahead as he contemplates the choice lying before him.

On the one hand, this man is clearly strange. The unease which continues to coil in his gut is proof enough of that, and Mark imagines that walking away now would spare him a world a confusion. His eyelids feel heavy enough as it is without his mind being weighed down as well.

On the other hand, he honestly can’t remember the last time he had a conversation that was so... spontaneous. He’s grown accustomed to forced chats about hotel business and band rehearsals, to the point where he can’t remember the last time anyone made him laugh in pleasant surprise. Until tonight that is.

And honestly, what is his alternative? Mingling with the guests and sweeping up compliments about the taqueria, or the pool, or the perfect view of Earth offered by the casino’s transparent ceiling? Having to listen to rich businessmen divulge their recent purchases of eye-wateringly expensive yachts or starships, while wives half their age hang onto their arm and pretend to look interested?

It isn’t really a contest in the end.

Decision made, Mark gestures to the waiter, who approaches with what he suspects is a put-on smile. To the man’s credit, said smile doesn’t falter even when he casts a sideways glance towards his boss’s unconventional choice of companion.

“Sixteen-year-old Lagavulin please, Andrew,” Mark orders with an easy smile of his own. “And one for my friend here as well.”

Andrew hesitates for only a moment before preparing the drinks with practiced ease, applying a crystallised ball of ice to Mark’s glass once both whiskies are poured. At his side, the mysterious stranger eyes Mark with what appears to be surprise at this unprompted display of generosity, but the smile returns soon enough as he takes his drink in hand and thanks Andrew with all the grace of a perfect gent.

“You trying to get me drunk, Turner?” he teases, though if he’s opposed to the idea he doesn’t show it.

“Just hoping for some interesting conversation,” Mark responds with a wry smirk of his own. “Scotch usually helps with that, I’ve found.”

Without further ado, he takes a sip and closes his eyes in satisfaction as the golden liquid instantly works its magic. A pleasant burn trails down his throat until warmth settles in his belly, and any lingering stress drifts away like smoke on a breeze.

“You can call me Mark by the way,” he says, raising his glass as an invitation. “It’s about time we introduced ourselves, don’t you think?”

A flicker of unidentifiable emotion crosses over his companion’s face, just for a second, before he returns Mark’s easy smile and brings their glasses together with a soft clink.

“Matthew,” he says, which strikes Mark as such an ordinary name for one committed to looking so extraordinary. “But you can call me Matt. Everyone else does.”

Mark nods in acknowledgement before returning to his drink, and they wile away the following minutes in companiable silence. The band appear to have moved on from classical waltzes and are now playing a smooth jazz number, the seductive groove of the double-bass soothing Mark into closing his eyes and forgetting the hundreds of guests gathered nearby. The chatter has died down slightly since his arrival, but the odd clink of a glass or drunken laugh is enough to assure him that he’s not entirely alone. Not as alone as he would have been had he remained in his room with only the hotel blueprints and a virtual reality mask for company.

In a few more moments he may even have found himself forgetting Matt’s presence, but it isn’t long before his reverie is broken by a now-familiar voice.

“What do you know of ‘Simulation Theory’?” Matt asks flippantly, as though it’s the most ordinary question in the world. The fact that Mark can only stare dumbly for several seconds is likely a sign that his scotch is already beginning to take hold, but he eventually forces himself to give a resigned shrug.

“Not much,” he admits. The name doesn’t sound familiar in the slightest, though he’ll admit that he isn’t known for scouring scientific journals. “I suspect that’s about to change though.”

That statement seems to be invitation enough for Matt, who downs the rest of his drink without so much as a flinch before launching into what appears to be a well-practiced spiel.

Mark can only try to keep up between finishing one drink and ordering another, as Matt starts explaining the concept of computers advancing to the point where they can simulate the laws of physics, so much so that the future of interplanetary travel may end up being achieved via the means of simulated reality - unlimited by the demands of the fragile human body - rather than old-fashioned means such as starships or satellites as ancient sci-fi shows had predicted. The whole lecture is delivered in what must be Matt’s typical rapid-fire delivery; Mark would likely have been left with little breathing room even if he had been entirely sober, which he is becoming less and less so as the evening wears on. With his keen enthusiasm and eccentric hand movements, Mark reckons Matt would have made an excellent physics professor in another life if the concepts escaping his mind weren’t so utterly ridiculous.

“Which of course poses the question,” Matt concludes eventually, pausing to stop for breath. A pleasant buzz is coursing through Mark’s veins by this point, and he rests his head on one hand as he studies Matt with an amused smile. “If we conclude that it is feasibly possible for technology to exist which is capable of simulating reality so convincingly, who is to say that it hasn’t already happened? What if we’re all just cogs in a machine, believing our decisions are our own and that everything around us is real, when in actuality we’re being watched and studied and controlled? Like ants under a microscope?”

“Hmm,” Mark ponders the question as best he can, taking another sip despite knowing it won’t help. It strikes him that the whisky has already rendered him soft and sleepy, whereas Matt doesn’t appear to have been affected at all despite the fact that he’s clearly had more. As quick as his delivery is, Mark can’t even recall hearing a slur. “Like characters in a videogame or summat?”

“Something like that I suppose,” Matt concurs, though there’s a tension in his skinny frame that implies Mark has barely scratched the surface. “What do you reckon would happen if a videogame character realised they were trapped in a videogame? That their entire lives were a fiction and that someone else was in control?”

“I imagine they’d spiral into existential dread,” Mark concludes with a dismissive shrug, polishing off what must be his third glass and placing it face-down on the countertop. It would probably be best if he stops now, seeing as Matt appears to be in a philosophical mood. “Good thing they can’t think or feel anything then, isn’t it? They just do as they’re told.”

An amused smirk graces Matt’s face and there’s a glint in those blue eyes that implies he wants to add something, but he keeps his mouth firmly shut. For now at least. Mark uses this window of silence to wipe the exhaustion from his eyes before casting a glance around the ballroom. It’s still relatively busy. The band have given no indication that they’re approaching the end of their set, and so long as the drinks keep flowing, there will always be ample opportunity for dancing and conversation. He loses himself for a moment as he observes the movements of the guests gracing the dancefloor; everyone from beautiful newlyweds to elderly couples celebrating their golden anniversaries locked in intimate embraces, with eyes only for each other. Matt’s musings weave their way through his mind and he finds himself searching for flaws in the system; a hint that what he’s seeing isn’t all it appears to be. He scans the faces of the guests to see if he can find any duplication; eavesdrops on nearby conversations in search of generic, repetitive sentences. He feels the warm cotton of his suit and the cool condensation on his glass and the sticky sweat on the palm of his hand, only to conclude that it all must surely be real. He knows all-too-well what it’s like to wander lucidly through a dream, and this isn’t one.

Still, the possibility is fascinating. Ludicrous, but fascinating.

“Let’s say you’re right,” he starts, taking a moment to select his next words carefully. He doesn’t usually feel the need to be so cautious in conversation, but Matt’s ability to spout ridiculous theories with the utmost confidence has left him feeling like he’s playing catch-up. “And let’s say that we’re the ones trapped in this game, or simulation, or whatever you want to call it.”

Matt turns to him as though shocked that Mark’s actually giving his ramblings any consideration, and he can’t help but wonder how many times he’s been shot down in the past. He pauses, half-expecting an interruption, but Matt’s only response is a smile followed by an encouraging nod.

“What if there’s a reason behind the fiction?” he proposes, more confidently now. “What if we’ve been trapped in a game because reality is terrible.”

“And therein lies our conundrum!” Matt says, eyes lighting up with childlike glee as he leans back and slams his hand on the counter. Tending to a guest a few seats away, Andrew side-eyes him warily, perhaps wondering if he’ll be forced to escort another drunk from the premises soon, but Mark’s total lack of concern seems to reassure him. “Is it better to exist within a terrible reality or a beautiful lie?”

The hypothetical weight of the question stumps Mark for a moment. Any thoughts which had previously been running through his mind fragment like shattered glass, leaving only a warm fuzz in their place. He lets himself imagine what it would be like to have an all-powerful, all-seeing creature manipulate his thoughts - moulding them like clay - and despite the room’s pleasant warmth, he finds himself shivering. It’s not that he believes Matt’s theories – far from it – but pondering the question elicits the same uncertainty planted by movies like his beloved Blade Runner; makes him contemplate deep, existential ‘What-ifs’ until sleep eludes him and a shiver creeps up his spine.

When the power of speech finally returns to him, he finds the words spilling forth without having crossed his mind beforehand.

“I think we’re both a little too drunk for philosophical discussions, don’t you agree?” he says blankly, though upon hearing the words even he is left utterly unconvinced. He may already be able to anticipate the crushing headache that morning will bring, but he’s managed to remain somewhat lucid so far. Matt, damn him, doesn’t appear to have been affected by the alcohol at all. Nor does he seem willing to let Mark back down; instead he pointedly says nothing as his lips curl upwards in an unspoken challenge.

Mark sighs, before forcing himself to answer the question with one of his own.

“If the fiction is so convincing that you could go from birth to death without realising it is a fiction, does it really make a difference?”

“A fair point,” Matt concedes with a shrug, though Mark doesn’t miss the way his expression darkens. A twitch in his jaw implies that his words have struck a nerve, only he can’t possibly see why that would be the case. He expects Matt to elaborate further – to quash his argument with a clever retaliation – but he simply turns back towards the wall of booze and signals to Andrew to bring him another glass of scotch. The temptation to tell him that he’ll need to be carried back to his room on a stretcher if he carries on like this is momentarily overwhelming, but the words remain glued to Mark’s tongue like resin. His mouth feels as dry as sandpaper and the flurry of unease which had been temporarily dispelled returns with a burning vengeance. All he can do is watch as Matt gratefully accepts what must be his fifth glass and gulps half of it down his throat without the slightest hint of hesitation.

Something stirs in the back of Mark’s mind. A distant memory perhaps; a vague flicker of recognition which had lain buried until this moment. He can honestly swear he has never laid eyes on Matt before today, but it strikes him that their camaraderie has been a little too easy tonight. Almost as though he should know Matt from his previous life on Earth.

But he doesn’t. He knows that for a fact, and any treacherous doubts suggesting otherwise are swiftly cast aside with an urgency he can’t explain.

It doesn’t take long for Matt to polish off his glass, setting it down on the counter with a finality which suggests it’ll be his last of the night. Just as well, Mark thinks. He can feel the evening beginning to wind down already, and he can feel fatigue settling into his bones.

Before he can offer to foot the bill, his companion finally decides to pipe up again. Any trace of his earlier bravado appears to have abandoned him, leaving him crouched and visibly exhausted, his voice impossibly small.

“If nothing is real – if everything around us truly is a fiction - then it stands to reason that there’s no underlying purpose to our existence. Our lives are there to serve as meaningless entertainment for something lurking in the shadows and nothing more. So everything we do or say, everyone we love...none of it matters in the end. Not really.”

He looks directly at Mark then, his once gentle blue eyes burning with an intensity that makes him want to shrink back like a frightened child. A silly notion really. Of all the words to describe Matt, ‘threatening’ doesn’t immediately come to mind, but the discomfort lingers regardless. Matt must notice, for he averts his eyes to the floor almost immediately and offers a small, apologetic smile as recompense.

“I just don’t think I could live with that,” he concludes with a certainty that has Mark’s chest tightening. “No matter how beautiful the lie is.”

A beat passes. Then another. Mark becomes all-too aware of his heart pounding in his chest, trying to assure him that he’s okay; that he’s solid and real. It occurs to him that he has forgotten how to breathe, and the discomfort in his chest outweighs the soothing burn the scotch had planted there earlier.

Matt doesn’t say anything else. Instead he runs a hand through his wayward hair, before ultimately deciding that fidgeting with his discarded sunglasses would be a better use of his time. Against his better judgement, Mark allows the weight of his words to sink in and momentarily imagines an existence in which all of his actions are pre-determined, his thoughts carefully filtered. Where everyone he loves are simply figments of expertly-written code. Where any responsibilities he may have are ultimately unimportant.

A simpler existence perhaps, but a wholly purposeless one.

“I don’t think I’d want to live like that either,” he admits quietly, so much so that he’s amazed Matt hears him. He must do however, for the words force him to look at Mark again, his expression unreadable besides a hint of sadness in deep blue eyes.

There doesn’t appear to be anything more to say. Words escape him - even the simple courtesies which usually come so naturally - and yet he cannot bring himself to look away. Matt seems to be in the same predicament. For a moment it’s as though they’re both gazing into a supernova, unwilling to look away despite knowing full well that the sight will blind them.

For the first time all evening he finds himself missing his friends. His Matt would have told him to snap out of it by now and Jamie or Nick would have called him a twat for getting so worked up about meaningless theories, and while Mark may have retaliated with a pointed ‘fuck off’, he no doubt would have felt lighter in their presence.

In the end it’s Matt who breaks the spell first. His eyes are drawn from Mark’s face to something lurking in the background, and a palpable shift overcomes him as thin lips are pulled into a grim line. Beneath soft overhead lights, Matt visibly pales and his pupils dilate with what Mark can only presume is fear, and white fists clench so tightly around his glasses that it’s amazing they don’t shatter. Dread claws into Mark’s chest with no explanation, and before curiosity can swallow him whole, he turns his head to follow Matt’s eyeline.

It only takes a moment to locate what has grabbed his friend’s attention. The new arrivals have barely made an effort to blend in after all. Standing out among the throng of increasingly drunk guests, two men linger at the far end of the hall, eyes obscured by dark sunglasses and twin postures stiff and unyielding. Both are clad in leather jackets which are only slightly less conspicuous than Matt’s own, and once again a treacherous flicker of recognition ignites in Mark’s brain before sputtering into a puff of smoke. The taller man must be pushing six feet, his brown hair cropped short and a 5 o’clock shadow darkening his features as effectively as the scowl on his lips. The smaller man must be around Mark’s height and appears slightly less threatening for it, though from a distance he almost resembles Matt himself with the exception of his dirty-blond hair.

For a moment Mark wonders if the two men are members of his own security team, seeking out Matt on grounds of a misdemeanor which Mark has been blissfully unaware of all night. Matt doesn’t necessarily look surprised to see them after all, though their presence certainly disturbs him. That thought is cast aside quickly, however. Mark has made an effort to familiarise himself with every member of his workforce, and even if these two are last-minute recruits, their outfits don’t resemble any worn by the rest of his staff.

The not-so-concealed carry lurking on their belts is hardly a feature of his security team either.

Blood freezing as two hidden pairs of eyes settle on the bar and its occupants, Mark turns to Matt in a panic; mouth open with the intention of voicing a warning, or demanding an explanation, or both, but Matt is already one step ahead of him. Those awful neon sunglasses are back on his face, albeit he has the good sense not to activate them this time, and he throws some crumpled notes onto the counter before turning to Mark with what is no doubt supposed to be a reassuring smile. It doesn’t work of course, though he imagines Matt is well-aware of that.

As a gesture of goodwill, Matt places a firm hand on Mark’s shoulder and offers what sounds like a very final farewell.

“It was good to see you again, Alex.”

And then he’s off, wandering past the quickly emptying dining tables and mixing with the assorted bodies on the dancefloor. Fat lot of good it does; he has about as much chance of blending in here as a giraffe does hiding among a gang of meerkats. Casting a glance towards the mysterious arrivals, Mark spots them making their way towards the dancefloor, the only indication of urgency being the grim determination on their faces. They don’t seem to have any interest in him for the moment, but that prospect brings him little in the way of relief. Instead he simply feels nausea crawling up his throat, and as Matt threatens to escape his eyeline, a new madness takes hold and compels him to follow.

Keeping Matt in his sights is more difficult than he’d hoped it would be. As much as he stands out among the crowd of dancers, once Mark finds himself trapped within that very crowd, his ability to focus on what’s directly ahead of him falters. The band has gone and a DJ has taken their place, enticing drunk youths to stumble to and fro under the guise of dancing, and Mark finds himself being roughly grabbed more than once by revelers inviting him to join in. One man pointedly tells him to “fuck off” when he manages to free his arm from his tight grip, before swanning off to harass some other poor sod, but Mark forces himself to recover quickly and carries on with his misguided pursuit. Later it will occur to him that he is not usually in the habit of hiring DJs, nor is the ballroom usually so crowded at this late hour as the casino tends to attract the night-owls, but for now all he can focus on is Matt’s retreating back sneaking onto one of the many corridors adjoining the hall.

Mark follows him seconds later, having escaped the horde with his limbs intact; not daring to look back to check if their assailants have located them. It occurs to him that as hotel owner, he could abuse his status and stand in their way in order to buy time, but he’s not sure he trusts them to resist putting a bullet in his head for insubordination. He may not have the faintest idea of what’s going on, but it feels so much bigger than him somehow. Like he’s been handed solid proof that everything he’s achieved – the hotel, his band, his reputation – is meaningless in the grand scale of the universe.

He stumbles onto the corridor just in time to spot Matt turning right at the far end, and he follows as quickly as he dares. The next turn is a left, then another left, then a right... an endless maze of blinding white walls and hotel room doors, flanked by sprouting monstrosities emerging from intricately painted plant-pots. After a while it seems like Matt has deliberately chosen this route to tease him, and he begins to wonder if this entire evening has been a devilish ploy, but the thought has barely had a chance to take hold when he finally reaches the end of the line.

There is no turning point at the end of this corridor. Only an unassuming wooden door leading into what appears to be a store cupboard. There aren’t even any hotel rooms remaining in this section; instead the route ahead is lined with marble columns sporting busts with expressionless faces.

Mark only manages one step forward before freezing, as icy fingers of dread crawl up his spine and clutch his heart in a fierce grip.

No being in the universe knows this hotel better than he does. He knows every room, every corridor, every little nook and cranny as surely as he knows his own name. As well he should; he designed every inch of the place.

And yet, he can say with absolute certainty that he has never laid eyes on this corridor before. Not even in a passing dream.

Before he can blame the obvious hallucination on the scotch, or even glance back in search of Matt’s pursuers, the silence is shattered by a blinding red light emanating from the cupboard door, illuminating the corridor in time with a sharp, mechanical whine. Mark raises a hand to his eyes as the light pulses in time with his heartbeat - giving untouched walls the appearance of being drenched in blood - and the accompanying noise slams against his eardrums with unrelenting ferocity. Against his better judgement, he presses onward, cowering as the assault on his senses intensifies with every step. No doubt he will be left with nothing but regret as a result of this choice, but he fears the lack of answers will drive him mad if he doesn’t see what lies beyond that door.

Besides, Matt must be in there. There’s nowhere else he could have gone, and Mark has little desire to leave him for dead.

The pulsating doesn’t stop until he reaches the door. Body trembling in the quiet aftermath, he takes a moment to recover as the light’s echo persists with every blink of his eyes and a sharp ringing assaults his ears. His breathing sounds painfully uneven in spite of his efforts to remain calm, and he can feel his heart hammering away in an attempt to break free from his chest. He finds himself wishing he could explain away these last ten minutes, but his mind feels numb with uncertainty and the alcohol certainly isn’t helping. Has it even been ten minutes since he’d been sitting at the bar? It simultaneously feels like it’s been mere seconds and several hours since he was enjoying his evening without a care in the world.

The cupboard door remains unopened, the handle a seductive enchantress promising answers he isn’t sure he wants. This new silence doesn’t bode well, and his lack of familiarity with this section of the hotel only increases his chances of running into danger on the way back. There is no doubt in his mind that he’s damned regardless of what he does however; he may as well sate his curiosity in the meantime.

A cool trickle of sweat slides down his cheek as a trembling hand curls around the door handle, and he pulls sharply before sanity can take hold, expecting resistance but receiving none.

It seems he will have to settle for not receiving answers either.

The cupboard is empty.

******************************

The details of how he stumbled back to Room 521 and wound up sprawled on his bed are a murky blur. Even as his drunken haze makes way for a pounding headache, he can only recall glimpses of dragging his feet back the way he came; wandering through an almost deserted ballroom followed by similarly empty corridors, before eventually collapsing into bed with a crushing exhaustion. Despite his fears, he never did end up encountering those two assailants on his way back, nor did he glean any further clues as to Matt’s whereabouts. All three men had vanished into the night as mysteriously as they’d appeared, and a numb regret settling over his mind is enough to assure him that he will never see Matt again.

That is, if he even existed in the first place. As the night wears on, he begins to feel more inclined to put the evening’s events down to the drunken hallucinations of a lonely mind. Perhaps if he calls Jamie in the morning, he can put his mind at ease and call him a silly twat, erasing the whole sorry ordeal in the space of one conversation. The urge to pick up the phone now is almost too tempting to resist, but he stays put for now. There’s no need to bother his friend with the drunken ramblings of a madman. Not at this hour anyway.

Reassurance can wait. For now, he desperately needs sleep which is stubbornly unforthcoming.

He misses the presence of moonlight. That notion is so strange that a weak rebellious smile tugs at his lips, before the bitter sting of tears replaces it. Homesickness is unlike him – he has never been inclined to hop on a rocket and return home no matter how easy it would be – but right now his yearning for Earth feels suffocating. He misses the moon’s comforting presence in the sky and the wonder it had elicited from him as a child. He misses it hanging overhead as he wandered along silent streets with friends and lovers, singing and kissing and stumbling drunkenly as joyous laughter broke through the relative peace. He misses waking up with his heart in his throat and a new lyric in his head, only to be soothed instantly by luminous streaks of light.

All he has here is thick, empty darkness which seems intent on crushing him down to dust.

Those memories of home seem so distant now. Unreachable; locked away in a chest sporting a rusted padlock and buried deep beneath the realm of consciousness. Perhaps it would be best if they remained buried. Even if Mark were capable of digging them up and freeing them from their prison, the sheer weight of the memories within would surely drown him in an instant.

Mark shakes his head and closes his eyes before bitter tears can trail down his cheeks. It would be best not to dwell on such things. His nights are sleepless enough as it is.

It only occurs to him later, as unblinking eyes linger on the ceiling above, that Matt had casually referred to him as ‘Alex’ and that the thought of questioning it hadn’t even crossed his mind.

#writing #long post #simulation theory #tranquility base hotel and casino #muse #arctic monkeys #i am extremely rusty but honestly it's been nice to write something just for myself again #well...myself and @rock-n-roll-fantasy :P #my fic

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pervasivescariness · 4 years

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[ A Gathering of Threads ]

Part One: Among Ruins

( @ivaan-ffxiv )

Old stone ruins stood tall, a weathered gray monolith set into the natural rock of the surrounding Dravanian mountainscape. The afternoon sun filtered through the broad leaves of the surrounding forest, the comfortable silence of nature settling in the secret space between jagged rocks that Ivaan had found himself in. Following a drunken rumor all the way from Limsa, he had made his way across Dravania to find these ruins. The promise of something terrible slumbering within had been enough to justify such a journey. The entrance lay open, a yawning circle of darkness framed in stone. Peering in confirmed both the existence of open space beyond, as well as the fact that someone else had beaten him to the punch. He was not to be dissuaded, however, especially not after having come so far. Ivaan Arkwright had a duty and he would not be caught shirking it.

The light pushed back the thick curtain of darkness that covered the entrance of the cave, the lantern revealing an open and rather empty stone antechamber beyond as he entered slowly. The inner chamber was small, empty, boasting only a single entrance at the back and a simple design carved along the inner walls. The stone that paved the floor was well preserved, tucked away from the elements inside the mountain, hardly a chip nor scuff nor crack along it. There was, however, decades of dust and dirt that covered the floor and ledges along the walls. The faint smudged impressions could be seen in the dirt across the floor leading towards the back of the room; the second sign that someone else had been here.

The further in Ivaan traveled, the darker the place became, the lantern light seeming to physically push against the creeping weight of shadow that filled the ruins. The daylight seemed content to wait outside the door, not daring to venture in past the threshold. Further into the antechamber, the stale air became colder. An arched entryway stood at the back of this chamber, leading to a longer hallway just beyond the dark stone stacked neatly into the wall, caked with dust and decorated with the wear of time. The light of the lantern revealed the depth of the hallway beyond, which split abruptly merely a few fulms in; A sharp left and a nearly caved-in right. Only the faintest of footprints could be seen through the dust along the left. It would appear that the owner of these tracks had continued further into the ruins, and in quite a hurry at that.

The third sign that Ivaan wasn't alone came in the form of a quiet humming noise from deeper into the ruins beyond. One would have to strain their ears at first to hear the occasional note that pierced the heavy veil of stillness on the stones. The further one walked down the left branch, the easier the noise was to make out. A vaguely familiar tune, though it was hard to pin with the way the notes occasionally trailed off into silence for a time. The path eventually opened up to a larger room, wider and taller than the antechamber. Familiar lantern light cast upon the adjacent stone wall marked the entrance as well as the presence of another. Whoever it was hadn't seemed to have noticed Ivaan's entrance nor his quiet creep through the halls as of yet.

The going had been slow once the light of day was left behind at the mouth of the entrance. Slow, deliberate, and thorough. A careful sweep of the lantern tied to the end of his polearm illuminated only a relatively narrow space at a time, which he used to find footprint after footprint in the layer of silt that lay upon the floor. A quick glance revealed that there was only one set of tracks, leading in... None lead out. He eyed the lantern he carried warily, weighing his options. There would be no sneaking up on whoever awaited him beyond, not with that lantern. Yet without it, he was blind. He was distracted from his musings by a sound coming up ahead. Humming? The sound slowly began to get louder and louder, with each step as Ivaan drew near the source. He took the left branch in the path, pausing now at the occasional lapse in the distant tune. Each time, he worried that he had revealed himself prematurely. Upon reaching the entrance of the second chamber, grander than the one that preceded it, Ivaan killed the light of his lantern. Delicately, it was placed upon the stone floor, every care taken to minimize any clack the metal might make upon making contact with the stone. His footsteps were marked with similar care, though he doubted there was any chance he could eliminate all the sound as he crept forward. With any luck, he might at least get a look at whoever was in here with him, allowing him a few more moments to plan his next move.

The humming continued uninterrupted as he crept forward, the shift of his armor and steps upon the stone going unnoticed as he approached the entrance into the last chamber. The stranger's lantern light filtered through several tall stone columns which stood about the chamber, like silent, watchful sentinels in the darkness beyond. From the entrance, he could see the faint impression of the vast stone walls which made up this final chamber, the light from the stranger's lantern was weak however and the walls farthest from it were swallowed once more by that heavy darkness which filled the area. The majority of the light seemed to be cast upon the large carving at the back of the chamber, round and massive, similar to the doorway on the outside. Strange figures were carved there, unfamiliar and dissimilar to that which littered the ruins of Dravania.

The lantern itself was set upon the stacked remains of stone piled up from the crumbled remains of a broken pillar closest to the back of the room. To the right of that was the remains of the pillar, cracked at the base, standing only a few feet high. It was from this pillar that the humming seemed to be coming from, and it was from just over the top of the ancient stone that Ivaan could make out two fuzzy ears poking just over the edge. He was not allowed much time to look, however, as a few more steps into the room gave him away to the stranger beyond the pillar. The slight shifting of metal plate at last caught the attention of the miqo'te beyond, the ears perking immediately, humming ceasing all together as the room was dropped back into silence. The ears remained frozen just above the pillar and angled in his direction. A second later they disappeared, followed by the sudden blur of a cloaked figure which rolled out from behind the pillar, snatching the lantern from the pile of rocks before disappearing behind another column.

A moment later, the second lantern was snuffed out and darkness rushed in to fill the space where the light had once been, leaving both parties fully in the darkness of the quiet stone chamber. Ivaan nearly swore as that second lantern went out, plunging the room into total darkness. It was inevitable, he supposed, but he would have at least liked to have gotten a better look at who his company was beforehand. If this came to blows, he would be in real trouble. Not only was he now blind, but being stuck underground meant that he could not beat a skyward retreat. Come to think of it, he was not sure if he could even find the entrance he had just come from in this darkness. He sighed. There was nothing else to do besides try and de-escalate the situation now. "Though I am prepared for a fight," he called out into the dark, "I do not wish to start one. I did not expect company. What is your purpose here? This is no place to be poking around without one."

With that, he waited, staring blindly ahead. He kept his ears open, listening to any footsteps signaling an approach, half expecting to be rushed at any moment. Only silence met him for a time, almost as oppressive as the darkness which now blanketed everything. There was no movement, no shuffling or steps, no fleeing nor rushing towards him, the stranger seemingly content with remaining where they were for the time being. His words rang through the darkness, though the only reply to them for a time was the faint echo of his own voice bouncing around the stone walls. Then at last, a reply came from the same direction the cloaked figure had fled indicating that if the stranger had moved at all, they hadn't moved much.

"My business is my own." The voice which replied was clear, defensive, feminine. "If you know what's best for you, you'll creep right out the same way you crept in."

The voice fell quiet, the stillness returned. It was not a physical fight he was looking at, but the stranger was clearly on the defensive and it could quickly turn to one if he chose his words wrong.

"I have come a very long way to get here... Unfortunately, your business has become my business as well."

As he spoke, Ivaan began to back away, counting the steps he had taken from the lantern he had set on the floor of the chamber. Once roughly sure it was nearby he knelt down, setting his halberd aside for just a moment as his free hand found the wayward light source. While one hand fumbled across the hot glass panes in search of the latch, the other rooted about one of the pouches on his belt. Fishing out a match, he quickly struck it across his vambrace, issuing acrid smoke and a hissing burst of light. Quickly he jammed it into the lantern, opening all of the blinds on each of the four windows. A circle of orange light now surrounded him, chasing away all but the most distant shadows of the room. If he did not look at the light, his eyes might adjust in time to see further, but for the moment he was not blind. Taking his weapon up in both hands again, he held his ground, straddling the lantern betwixt his legs as he stood. "You do not really expect me to just leave, do you?"

|| Two >>

#ffxiv #ff14 #ffxiv rp #balmung #crystal data center #rp #Ivaan Arkwright #Bee Ohkabe #[ Reunion ]#A Gathering of Threads #Part One: Among Ruins #A Gathering of Threads part one #i am so excited to share this finally ;w;#we've been working on this very hard #i hope you guys enjoy it as much as we did while writing it! <3

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keysforgames-blog · 5 years

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The Complete Revelation of FIFA 20

On the subject of gaming, FIFA is undisputedly one of the best and quite a few played video game titles globally. As its inception, EA Sports experience updated a multitude of features anytime they unveiled a new type of FIFA. Over the years that football simulation game features garnered a big fan-base.

FIFA 20 is definitely scheduled for being released technically as a part of the continuing FIFA set in Sept., 2019 regarding PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and Microsoft Windows. EA has publicized FIFA something like 20 will be unveiled worldwide at September 26th, 2019. Just as FIFA 17, FIFA 18 and FIFA 19, FIFA 20 let go date certainly is the last Friday upon September.

There is a mixed reaction within the gamers with regards to the upcoming FIFA 20, below discuss the actual highlights for doing this. This will provide help to not discover any nonsense train plus empower someone to make your unique judgement.

Discover what is New by using FIFA20?

The main countdown for FIFA 20 is at it has the peak!

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EA SPORTS possess uncovered the primary new FIFA 20 FUT, including Zinedine Zidane, Irish Pirlo and even Didier Drogba. These innovative FUT 20 ICON unit cards are depended on to be for sale in Ultimate Staff following the game's underlying launch date via EA Easy access.

With FUT ICONs currently accessible for the two controllers (PS4 together with Xbox One), these wonderful players undoubtedly are some key facts the FIFA Ultimate Workforce game method. Owning one of those cards, mainly in the beginning days of each headline discharge, may be a flat out particular advantage for your current squad.

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Have fun 3v3 Dash off to (No GK's), 4v4, 4v4 Rush, 5v5, and Skilled Futsal. Additionally, VOLTA football offers a variety of sizes associated with fields in addition to conditions utilizing and not having dividers, offering you the opportunity to have fun the terrific game your company direction.

Develop your team in VOLTA WORLD, head your guitar player through the VOLTA STORY Style, play by Promotion plus Relegation in the internet VOLTA ADDITION, or period preferred expert groups towards the lanes around VOLTA KICK-OFF.

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Changes will probably likewise be created to the conventional 11 versus 11 modes to energize increasingly one-on-ones and off-the-ball space formation. New penalty and free-kick mechanics would be executed and even updates is going to be made to often the ball content science.

Whilst the Xbox 1, PS4 together with PC options will have the vast majority of new shows, the Nintendo's creative designers Switch difference will relatively be an Older Edition, along with refreshed delivers, EAs as well as minor changes, yet but without the new VOLTA Football style or any from the other unique highlights.

A greater Gameplay

The actual in-game perform will see many significant improvements. Players will now have the capacity to appreciate much more command in the Decisive Instances that consider the result of each one match for FIFA something like 20. You can opt for your plan and time frame it from the spot. Include things like twist, launch, or knuckle to 100 % free kicks. A different pointing mechanic gives you more significant imagination through dead tennis balls.

Move together with greater ability. Bait the exact protector within. Beat regarding speed or even expertise. Brand new strafe pouring includes brand new measurements pertaining to assaulting enjoy in FIFA 20.

Recover ownership using Active Effect Tackling and also new exercises that encourage you just for well-planned diligent play.

Slowly but surely clinical filling out when 1 on 1. More risk to safety with volleys and longer shots. Refurbished shooting would make more accuracy before goal in FIFA 20.

However, these, members will additionally be able to affect the course of the action in both safeguard and breach with enhanced control plus much more alternatives inside 1v1 situation during goes. You will similarly cherish the fresh BALL PHYSICS. The Natural ball progress with slowly but surely genuine changes and skips make a per life go with involvement throughout FIFA 20.

Twisting images. Plunging totally free kicks. Knuckleballs. First-time soaring strikes instructions all manufactured conceivable via the new Baseball Motion Process in FIFA 20.

Considerably more current playlists, arenas, along with FUT Associations are ascertained to reanimate EA Physical activities from the dreary style of the continued FIFA variants.

A major bit of the new FUT Friendlies manner is Household Rules, which has been lifted price cut from FIFA 19's Start up update in FIFA 20's Ultimate Team parcel. As those ways included recently - Headers and Volleys, Survival, and so forth - fresh alternatives will be presented with FUT 20.

It is safe to say that you are energized by the current year's affirmed new FIFA 20 players? Which FUT 20 ICONs would you say you are most anticipating playing with in your very own Ultimate Team squad? We couldn't want anything more than to hear your musings and assessments, so please don't hesitate to connect.

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sophieakatz · 6 years

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I wish you would write a fic where... (some of/a few of) The Capil try to come to terms with an argument that their 'Knight', 'Sylph', &or 'Page' recently had around them. Are these really the same beings that descended from above to meet their ancestors? Have they changed, or has the perception of them changed

“And the Muse sighedwith great sadness, and said to me, ‘Gods often appear before foolish children,perhaps because they too are foolish children, and like is drawn to like.”

- from the Book of MS,the oldest holy text of the Capil

They were skipping out on school the day the children cameacross the Gods. But that day Paio had wisely pointed out that the morning wasmuch too hot to be spent walking along the street to the schoolyard, and thetwins Niru and Runi, as ever in competition for their best friend’s attention,were naturally eager to follow him into the woods, so one can hardly fault themfor bad behavior.

Under the welcoming shade of the trees, the three swung onbranches and crawled under bushes, not giving any thought to a future in whichthe dirt and leaves stuck in their fur would give away their adventure to cleanliness-focusedparents. They spoke of games, and interestingly-shaped rocks, and most of all,how happy they were to be doing what they were doing, instead of sitting in aclassroom.

“We deserve more holidays,” posited Paio. “And I mean funholidays.”

“Like Pagesfest,” said Niru, licking xer lips at the thoughtof little black spiral candies. “Pagesfest twice a year! Three times!”

“Exactly.” Paio reached up to give a nearby tree branch ahigh-four. “More Pagesfest. And no more Museday.”

“I like Museday,” Runi admitted. “The songs are pretty.”

“We can have songs without having to sit through them, and withoutdoing the most boring dance ever.”Paio skipped a few steps ahead of the twins before stopping to mimic themotions, adopting a clownish parody of a Teacher’s voice. “Stand up, sit down,now stand again, turn to the side, don’t sit until we tell you to, you noisy child!”

The twins giggled at his antics, and Paio grinned withsatisfaction.

“We don’t need that,” he said, continuing to walk onward. “Allthe supervision. The micromanaging. The ‘do this, don’t do that, it’s time togrow up now, whether you like it or not!’”

“We have to grow up eventually, though, right?” said Runi.

“Nah,” said Niru, working to keep pace with Paio bothphysically and mentally, “I’m gonna be a child forever.”

“And we’ll never be responsible,” said Paio, kicking a stoneout of his way. “We’ll just leave our lives to the will of the Gods. The goodold Gods, responsible for all.”

Runi put her hands over her mouth. A Teacher had told her,when she was very little, that the Gods could hear any awful thing you saidabout them, even the things that you never actually said. Even though Paio hadn’treally said anything bad, there was something about his tone that made her feela need for caution.

Paio glanced back at her. “Why so serious, Ru? It’s a funday, remember?”

He reached out to tickle her arm, and she swatted him with afanged grin. “Stop!”

Paio flashed an even sharper grin and set off at a run, thetwins in quick pursuit, double-jointed legs carrying them quickly and quicklystill through the trees. As always, soon into the chase the twins rememberedthat there were two of them and only one of Paio, and they leapt forward totackle him together, all three tumbling into and under a bush.

They lay there laughing beneath the grasping twigs andleaves, until a strange sound set their pointed ears upright on top of theirheads, and all three fell silent, their first thought that a Teacher had caughtup with them. As they listened, the sound came again from a slightly differentdirection – a swooshing, warping sound, like the very air sliding open and shutagain.

There was someone on the other side of the bush, and fromthat someone a feminine voice came shouting out:

“And you’re just telling me about this now because…?”

“I didn’t think you needed to know,” said another voice,much lower, but no less fierce. “It didn’t seem like a big deal at the time.”

“Not a big – There’s a God from another game out there, a Lord for that matter, trying to recruitpeople, including us, to abandon their universes, and this didn’t seem like a big deal to you?”

Paio inched along the ground to peek out from under thebush. He blinked as sunlight hit his sensitive eyes; there was a clearingthere, a rounded space free of trees. And he saw two pairs of legs, clad inclothing, like was worn in ceremonies and storms – a sweeping red gown closerto him, and green pants legs further on.

Runi’s fingers tugged at Paio’s chest fur, and he ducked backbeneath the relative safety of the bush.

“I said no, and he left!” said the low voice. “That’s allthat happened!”

“A Lord cameknocking, Alex.” The higher voice wascloser to them, coming from the red one. “Did Santek teach you nothing?”

The three pairs of pointy ears perked up even higher at theword. Santek. A holy name even theleast attentive student knew, for its sheer prevalence in the Book of MS. Santek,the Lord to the lady Muse. Santek, the Dead God.

The red one was still talking.

“A Lord left to his own devices is the most dangerous thingin the multiverse. Without a Muse to keep him in check –”

“Maybe he has one, we don’t know. I don’t see why we shouldcare.”

“Because what if he comes back? Would we even notice if he did come back? How does Void even work?We don’t know!”

Paio dared another peek out from beneath the bush, this timeat an angle just high enough to let him see the green one – though its back wasto the red one, and a hood covered most of its head – put a furless finger toan equally furless ear.

“Cody?” said the green one. “Get over here.”

But Paio hardly heard this as he retreated once more,looking at the twins with wide eyes, and mouthing, “No fur.”

Niru stared, xer mouth gaping, but Runi, in a rare moment ofcourage, inched forward to take a peek for herself. She saw the green and redhoods – the red one’s was down, letting yellow-gold hair cascade down her back,a color very few Capil in this part of the world had in their fur without useof dyes, but one she knew very well from the painted glass mosaics in the Temple,and from the song, “…golden rays on apale cloud / was the head of the Sylph of Time…”

Runi drew back again, trembling and trying very hard not to,lest it shake the leaves and cause sound.

The swooshing, warping sound came once more, this time withan extra little bang of displaced airthat just plain felt like showing off. A new voice followed it, the mostyouthful yet. “What’s up?”

“Tell her what you told me about Void,” said the green one.

“You told Cody but didn’t tell me?!” said the red one.

“I thought he did tellyou,” said the new voice. “Alex, you said you’d tell her!”

“And I did! Just now! Never mind, just tell her we don’thave to worry about it.”

Paio took one more look out from under the bush, and sawwhat he on some level expected: a much shorter figure with dark brown furlessskin, clad all in black aside from bright red boots. He returned his gaze tohis friends with a grim expression, and his certainty cemented theirs; this wasthe Page of Space, here to speak with the Knight of Mind and Sylph of Time. TheGods were here in the world.

“Well, as I get it, it doesn’t have much to do with us,” thePage was saying. “It’s an anti-Light thing, not anti-Space. About knowledge. ALord of Void is master of what he doesn’t know.”

“Or master of notknowing,” said the Sylph. “What if he’s hiding something from us?”

“What we don’t know, can’t hurt us, isn’t that the oldsaying?” said the Knight. “Been a few relative centuries since I heard anyoneuse it, but it’s still fresh.”

“It very well can hurtus!”

“What exactly do we know now that we didn’t know before thisguy showed up, Abby?” The three under the bush heard the Knight’s footsteps inthe grass, coming closer. “That there’s a whole vast multiverse out there, somany worlds all doing their own thing? Lots of things we don’t know about? Orhave any reason to care about? We knew this.So why worry?”

“Because he came here.”

“And he left again. We’re not in any trouble here.”

“As far as you know! Which, let’s be honest, isn’t sayingmuch!”

“Guys, come on,” said the Page, “let’s take it down a notch.Or two. Or seven.”

“I know plenty!” said the Knight. “Enough to know that wedidn’t want what he was offering.”

“What exactly was heoffering?” said the Page.

“Jesus. Really,Alex?” The Sylph’s gown swished across the grass as she crossed the clearing,sitting on a large rock near a tree stump. “You told him first, but noteverything? I thought we were over this need-to-know-basis crap.”

The Knight ignored her, turning to the Page. “He said he wasmaking a new universe, one that would be able to grow without creation of a newgame. He offered us to leave our universe here, and go to that one.”

The Page said something too quiet for the three in the bushto hear.

“Yeah,” said the Knight. “Pues, I knew we didn’t want that. So I said no. We’ve made what wewere meant to make, and we’re ruling what we were meant to rule, and that’sthat. End of story.” The Knight turned, extending his address to the Sylph aswell. “He left, we’re here, and everything’s fine.”

“She’d love it,” said the Page.

Silence fell in the clearing. Even the birds and the windseemed to hold their song.

“A universe without the game. She’d love it.”

The Knight sighed and walked over to sit on the stump nearthe Sylph’s rock.

“Yeah, well, she gave up any right to hold moral judgmentover us when she ran away,” he said. “We live our lives, she lives hers.”

The Sylph snorted. “Says the guy who immediately startedpicking fights with her new family when we found her.”

“I’m not saying I’m proud of it!” the Knight snapped. “Ijust… wanted to make sure she was alright.”

Silence again.

“How long’s it been since we did that, anyway?” said theKnight.

“According to whose timeline?” said the Sylph.

“Never mind.”

A bug was crawling in Niru’s fur. Xe resisted the urge toscratch it away.

“So what do we do now?” said the Page.

“We do our best,” said the Knight. “That’s all we’ve everdone.”

“We’ve done worse than that,” said the Sylph.

“Then we’ll do better,” said the Knight. “And so will theCapil, once they’ve grown enough. They’ll be their own Gods of somewhere new.That’s the way it is.”

“That’s the way it is,” the Page repeated.

“That’s the way it is,” the Sylph said as well, as though finishingan oft-repeated prayer.

There was another round of the swooshing sound, and thensilence, gradually filled once more by the birds, bugs, and winds of the woods.Normalcy taking place over the supernatural.

The three children lay there for several long moments beforefinally crawling free of the foliage, into the now-empty clearing. But thoughthe Gods had gone, they still eyed the pieces of space they’d held with acautious reverence – the grass they’d stood on, the stone and stump on whichthey’d sat.

Until Paio strode forward with a snarl and kicked at thestump, slashing it with a claw.

“Paio, no!” Runi gasped at the sacrilege.

“It’s so stupid!”Paio exclaimed, kicking the stump again. “Are these the Gods of our ancestorsour parents so want us to believe in? They’re supposed to be wise! Responsible!Competent, even! But they’re not! They’re stupid!” Kick. “Helpless!” Kick. “Children!”A missed kick, causing the little Capil to fall on his back.

“Like I’m ever gonna sit through Teacher’s lectures abouttheir greatness again,” he said.

Neither twin thought it wise to mention that Paio rarely satthrough the lectures anyway. There was something different about it now.

“We should tell someone,” said Niru.

“We shouldn’t tell anyone,”said Runi. “We’d have to say we skipped class.”

“And they’d think we were lying to stay out of trouble,”Paio added from the ground. “So stupid. Three stupid children in the woodsarguing about how to stay out of trouble. Just like us. We’re as good as the Gods.”

He sat up, and shouted it to the sky. “We’re as good as the Gods!”

A few birds startled out of the trees as the shout echoedaway. Runi put her hands over her mouth, but for the first time, she had reasonto think that maybe the Gods weren’t listening to the awful things she wasn’tsaying.

“Maybe better,” said Niru. The others stared at xem, and xeshrugged. “I mean. We know we’restupid children, yeah? We’re not trying to pretend we’re anything else.”

“Is it less stupid to know you’re stupid?” said Runi.

Paio started to laugh. “Nah. Nah. ‘Cause then you actually know something! See, like they said, we’realready on our way to being our own Gods.

“Pull me up,” he added, extending his arms towards the twins,who each took a hand and helped him to his feet.

“Come on,” said Paio, brushing down his front in ahalf-hearted way that hardly dislodged any of the mess in his fur, “let’s showup at lunch and say we’ve been there all day.”

The three headed back into the woods, at a more sedate pacethan they’d come in with, and chatting less, as well.

They spoke up twice the whole way back, the first time whilestill well under the cover of the trees:

“We’re not gonna tell anyone?” said Niru.

“Nah,” said Paio. “Let the grown-ups have their dreams.”

“Right,” said Runi.

And the second time, as they neared the edge of the woods:

“So,” said Paio, “New Gods of a universe of our own, huh?What do you think our own would be like?”

The characters in this story are OCs in a Homestuck spin-off universe, created for an ongoing roleplay campaign between me and @wherethestoryhasimagination.

For more fanfiction, click here.

Tip the writer here

#wherethestoryhasimagination #tumblr originals #fanfiction #homestuck #science fiction #answers #fanfic prompt #muse of heart

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jastiss-blog · 7 years

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Gamble - Ignis x fem!reader Greatest Showman AU Pt. 2

Finally, the second part of this is done. Took me ages due to health, and I’m relatively OK with where it’s at so, here we go.

Lots of angst involved. Obviously this has major spoilers.

@shadeswritings @atarostarling @sevansheart

[Part One]

The shift in your husband’s demeanor is insidious, creeping. At first, you’re positive you’re imagining things. Business booms, which is truly a splendid thing, however he spends much of his time within the theatre performing with his troupe. While you’ve resigned yourself to supporting Ignis, your girls are finding it increasingly difficult to mask their disappointment.

Every missed tessenjutsu competition breaks your daughter's heart into more pieces. It hurts you to hear her sobbing into her pillow at night, her and her sister rarely seeing their father as what he ends up calling a circus runs late into the night.

Something rouses you from sleep one evening; your elder daughter climbs into bed with you, eyes red and swollen with grief. Soft sobs wrack her body as you wrap arms around her tiny frame, burying your face in her dark blonde hair.

"When will we see daddy again?" she manages around hitching breath.

"Soon, darling," you soothe, hands moving to rub circles on her back. "Soon."

Quiet sighs against your chest, where your heart races, knowing you've told her a bold face lie. In truth, you aren't sure when your husband will return to being a more constant fixture in your lives. A single tear rolls down your cheek before the call of sleep pulls you back under.

Months pass, and you can't deny that the success of the circus makes life much easier. Bills no longer go unpaid, you don't fear something being taken from you for lack of funds. Ignis is able to have the holes in the roof patched and do other improvements to your home, and things become comfortable. It's baffling to think you even manage to start saving.

Ignis wakes you one morning with a gleeful smile, tugging on your hand as you struggle to blink away the dredges of sleep.

"Darling, come on!" he whispers excitedly, working very hard to not wake your daughters.

Stumbling out of bed, you notice that many of your possessions are missing, immediately raising alarm that in your sleep, a thief somehow managed to nap your things. The anxiety must be plain upon your face, for Ignis draws you to face him, smiling.

"It's fine, Y/N," he assures, bending to plant a kiss upon your lips. "I have something to show you and the girls. Could you get them up and ready?"

"Ah, well, of course, dear," you agree, still confounded.

An hour later finds you in a carriage heading somewhere very familiar. The tang of salt fills your nostrils, the willows outside the window heralding your approach to the sea. An inkling at the back of your mind, suspicion growing as you pass your parent's home.

"Ignis, are you taking me to the place went to that night all those years ago?" you question, eyes narrowed.

Though his answering smirk tells you all you need to know, you pull up to the sprawling mansion that you recall being devoured by ivy. Instead, its majesty is unmarred by the years of decline, looking as if it has just been built. Your breath catches in your throat, the sheer beauty of it all overwhelming you.

"For you, my darling," Ignis whispers, stepping up behind you, winding his arms about your waist.

Around you, life moves in double time, your girls squealing in ecstasy as they explore the grounds of your new home. Ignis presses a kiss to your hair, finally prompting you to return to life.

"It's... it's so much," you breathe, still in shock. "You didn't have to do this for us, Ignis. We were happy in our home."

"And just think of how much happier you'll be here, in this life I promised you," he insists, and, rather than argue, you allow his mood to infect you.

The girls have claimed their rooms by the time you enter the grand foyer, visions of the past causing a bit of cognitive dissonance. It's surprisingly easy to remember how the space looked last you visited, the wonder taking over your senses, selling you on a life of mystery. A small part of you wistfully wishes for a grand life far from the one you left behind. A larger part wonders if the return to wealth will restore your relationship with your father.

"Does this mean you'll be home more often? If we're able to afford this, it would be nice for you to take a break," you wonder aloud.

"Ah, that," he answers, wincing. "I'm exploring some potential directions to take the circus. I've found a partner, a man I believe you're familiar with. Noctis Lucis Caelum."

Stopping dead in your tracks, you whirl to face your husband, eyes wide in shock.

"You've convinced Prince Noctis to be your partner? What on Eos is that boy thinking? Ardyn will lead the press in an assault on his character the second he catches the boy with you," you rant.

"Darling," Ignis laughs. "Perhaps you aren't the only highborn bored with playing the game."

You huff a breath. He makes a fine point. "His father must be so angry."

"I would guess he cares not for his father's opinion," Ignis muses. "At any rate, he's going to assist me in appealing to higher society. We've got the attention of the middle- and lower-class population."

The confession forces your lips into a thin line, annoyance rising within you. "We don't need the attention of higher society, Ignis."

He pats your arm in comfort. "Of course, Y/N. You'll see. It's going to be wonderful."

It was the first time you begin to question his motives, and as it would turn out, not the last.

Not long after moving into your new home, Ignis arrives home early one day, a crazed grin pulling at his lips. Immediately, you're on edge.

"Noctis and I are heading to Tenebrae with the troupe," he announces.

"What? Tenebrae? Whatever for?" Incredulity turns your question into an accusation.

"He's gotten us an audience with Queen Sylva Nox Fleuret," Ignis clarifies, as if it should be obvious. "It's going to open up so many more possibilities!"

"The Queen... of Tenebrae," you sputter, standing and pacing about. "Ignis, what's this really about?"

"Y/N, I'm simply attempting to fulfill my promise. To you, and to your father. To give you the life I said I'd give you, the one you wish for," he states.

A wave of clarity crashes into you, stealing the breath from your lungs. You pause in your anxious steps, turning slowly to face your husband. He's still in his uniform, and you notice a travel bag in his hand.

"The life I wish for, Ignis, or the one you do?" you whisper, flinging the accusation before the courage to do so blows away in the winds of change.

Ignis either doesn't sense your hostility or chooses to ignore it. "They're one and the same, my dear. Now, bid me farewell. I must get going."

Before you can manage a scathing reply, your daughters run into the room, immediately clinging to their father. Happy chatter from them seems to pass by him as he quickly gives them hugs and kisses, stepping over to give you the same treatment before leaving.

The sight of your daughters chasing after his carriage, crying for him to come back, breaks you and you sink to the floor, agony-laced tears dropping from your eyes.

~~~

The subsequent month is trying, dejection creeping into you and your girls as the days pass without Ignis. Your eldest no longer wishes to do tessenjustsu, preferring to stay at home holed up in her room when the three of you aren't working on studies. Similarly, your younger daughter keeps to herself as well, sometimes wandering out to the garden to wait for her father's carriage to bring him home.

Return home he finally does, but he feels strange, distant. Something has changed and immediately, your heart worries that your future is uncertain.

To your surprise, he takes time to play with the girls in the garden, their muddy feet crossing the threshold well after dark. You try desperately to ignore the rising panic, but after dinner when the girls are tucked into their oversized beds, you corner Ignis.

"Why do I feel as if you're further away now than you were in Tenebrae?" you worry aloud, voice thick with emotion.

“I’m not sure I understand this air of melancholy, Y/N,” Ignis states, deftly avoiding the searching nature of your musings.

“Something is happening,” you refute, voice flat. “Why won’t you tell me?”

When he pauses, your heart leaps into your throat, choking you. Taking deep breaths around the lump is difficult, almost painful, but you try desperately to rationalize that yelling won’t fix anything. His expression momentarily betrays his silence, and your stomach drops to the floor.

“While in Tenebrae, I made a business arrangement with Oracle Lunafreya,” he clarifies at last. “She shall be putting on a debut performance here in Lucis and depending on the reception, perhaps we will explore a longer-term contract.”

“There’s more to it than this!” You launch your words like grenades, your anger palpable at his evasion.

He simply smiles at you, his eyes far away. “Everything is going to be fine. You’ll see. Luna's performance is in a few days. I have little to coordinate so I shall be here with you and our girls.”

Somehow, the idea doesn’t assuage your fears.

Ignis keeps true to his word, spending a majority of the following days at home. The girls are all smiles and starry eyes, hanging upon his every word as he regales them with tales of the trip to Tenebrae. They spend much of their time outdoors, either in the vast gardens or by the sea. You feel much like you’re experiencing your own life as if from the outside, barely going through the motions as the days pass.

Through Ignis' influence, the girls are very excited to see Luna perform. On the day of the debut, they dress up in their finest wear, their best shoes, hair shining in perfection. You, in sharp contrast, are nervous for reasons inexplicable, dressing in a daze and hoping for the best. Many years have passed since you’ve been in the company of high society; you can only hope you remember all the etiquette courses you took as a girl.

Your father is likely to be present as well, the icing on the proverbial cake. The man’s never even seen your daughters, despite living not a mile away.

To be fair, the performance is beautiful; the rumor that her voice is a healing balm certainly holds some merit. However, there’s as gnawing in the pit of your stomach, your intuition scrambling to set off warning bells but for what, you’ve no idea. At the very least, it doesn’t take long to find out.

Ignis introduces you and your children to Luna, at which time the gnawing blossoms into full-fledged burning. Something is amiss, yet it eludes you before you can place your finger upon it. You smile despite your immense discomfort.

During the reception, your suspicions over your husband’s actions are confirmed when he makes a grand to-do in front of Cor. Lips set in a sneering smile, he waves his new status in your father’s face, flaunting that he’s never come to know his granddaughters, nor achieved what Ignis has. As the scrutinizing eyes of upper society slide to your shocked face, you scurry forward to collect your children.

“Ignis,” you hiss, embarrassed and angry, “stop this nonsense at once! We're leaving!”

Retreat is the only option; some of the patrons titter behind their hands at the shameful display.

“Still the tailor's son,” Cor laughs as you flee.

The world blurs as embarrassed tears burn your eyes, anguish rising as physical pain in your chest. It steals your breath, forcing you to slow your hurried steps, the worried faces of your daughters coming into view as you hunch over. They cling to your legs, pressing tiny faces into your dress as they sob with you.

"Mother," your elder daughter murmurs, "what's wrong with father? When are things going to return to normal?"

At her query, you loop your arms about the two of them, shaking your head. "I don't know, darling. I don't know."

Ignis doesn't return until well into the early hours of morning. Grief has kept you awake, willing you to remain alert until his feet cross the threshold of the home you've come to resent. To you, it represents the loss of magic, the change in your husband, the many hours spent alone while he does whatever he's doing when away from home.

With that thought festering in the depths of your mind, you round on him as soon as he enters your bedchamber. A tired greeting dies upon his lips as you storm over to him, fury rolling off of you in turbulent waves.

"I knew, Ignis," you seethe, "I knew this wasn’t about getting the higher society's attention to better things for us! You lied to me, you lied to your children, and Six, what's left of us?"

He's taken aback, as if your anger is something that blindsides him. For all you know, he truly has been oblivious to what his behavior has wrought. "Darling, what's this about?"

"What's this... what's this about?" you screech, disbelieving. "How can you look me in the eye and not see what you've done to our family? All of this to prove something to my father, to the highborn society that you aren't poor anymore. Their opinion doesn’t matter, Ignis! Your family is what should matter!"

It's when he falls silent, not so much as an apology passing his lips, that you zero in on the packed bag in his hand. Hackles raise immediately, another flood of sickening animus taking over.

"Oh, I see," you snarl, jabbing a finger in the direction of the bag. "Off on another adventure, not so much as a discussion over it. Where is it now, Ignis? And for how long?"

"Luna and I have set a contract for a national tour," he explains, voice lifeless. "A few months, to be sure. I leave Noctis as ringmaster in my absence. With the extra profit from the tours-"

"I don't care about the profit," you spit. "Keep your profits. Keep it all. Just go."

"Ah, well," Ignis fidgets, "I'm merely making ready. We won't set off for another few days. I'll get to spend more time with you and the girls before I leave."

"I don't even understand why you need to go with her," you grumble. "It doesn't matter. I'm going to go to bed, Ignis. I can't deal with this any longer."

In the days he remains home, it's almost easy to forget the troubles weighing heavily upon you. He doesn't visit the theatre once, spending his time doting on your girls, trying to reconcile things with yourself, smiles upon his tired face. Beneath layers of exhaustion, you can still spy the remnants of the starry-eyed boy you met a lifetime ago.

The illusion shatters when he leaves again. This time, you're not so sure you can piece it back together.

Every day Ignis is gone widens the aching hole in your heart. You find yourself dancing through the house, remembering the steps you and Ignis used to do in tandem. A sad melody bubbles up from your wounded soul in time with your feet, the actions a soothing salve on the sting of solitude. If only it could return your husband to you. Imagining yourself as the piper brings a fleeting smile to your lips.

The days dredge on, and news reaches you that more and more protesters are gathering outside of the circus. The girls don't have much desire to go lately, and it's hard for you to face that which has torn your family tatters. You note that Ignis' share of profits from the circus is decreasing and for the first time in years, you start to worry about your future.

An abrupt letter from Ignis states that he'll be returning home, asking that you meet him in a few days at the depot. Unbidden, your heart soars; perhaps his return home earlier than expected indicates that he has finally awoken from his dreams of fame. Even your daughters start to get excited.

However, when the day arrives, it ends up being a nightmare. Any joy you may have felt at having your husband back in your arms is stolen away when a fire crew races past you, heading for the theatre. Of course, Ignis follows, you and your daughter not far behind. The sight that greets you is a harrowing one: the theatre engulfed in a raging inferno, the troupe desperately working to get free. You spy Noctis run back into the flames, apparently looking for one of the girls.

Ignis turns to you, desperation settling in crazed jade eyes. Suddenly, it occurs to you that he means to enter the building as well.

"Ignis, no!" you shout, but it falls on deaf ears.

Witnessing your husband run headlong into a burning building is enough to break you, let alone the subsequent collapse of upper floors after he does so. Tiny gasps from your waist drag your eyes away from the wreckage to grip your girls tight, despair falling over the three of you in a stone blanket.

Minutes pass, and finally Ignis returns from the scorched building, holding Noctis' unconscious form. The fire team takes Noctis to the nearby hospital, leaving Ignis to sit dejectedly outside his ruined theatre. Relief washes over you upon seeing your husband safe and you make to comfort him when a newspaper catches your eye: the front page graced with a photo of Ignis and Luna on stage, their lips meeting as they embrace.

Ice shoots through your veins at the betrayal and you rush to get your daughters away from the scene before they note the newspaper as well. Leaving Ignis behind, you take your children and head home to consider your next move.

The universe seems to have decided your fate for you; there's a notice upon your door proclaiming that the bank is foreclosing upon your home. Crazed laughter forces its way out of you before you can form a thought, your daughters gazing up at you in alarm.

"We have to leave, mother?" your youngest asks, a waver in her tiny voice.

"Yes, darling," your voice holds a similar tone when you answer. "Pack your bags. It's time you got to know your grandfather."

Packing is a haze, an autonomous process that's drowned out by the thundering of your heart in your ears. Your mind moves faster than you can process, the photo in the paper plastered across each and every thought, the words in your mind static. A petty part of you is glad Ignis is losing everything right along with you. The nausea roiling in your stomach threatens to send you retching.

Hurried footsteps crunching over the gravel of your driveway draws your attention and you're glad you're done packing and can leave. You've no desire to deal with Ignis in this state and if you're being honest with yourself, maybe never again.

"Y/N, wait!" he wails as you stomp out of the front door. "I know you must be upset but please allow me to explain!"

"No, Ignis," you fire back, allowing the anger from the past few hours to seep into your tone. "I cannot... you and that woman... I knew something was not right when you left. And to top it off, the bank taking the home back? I cannot, Ignis..."

His breath hitches and he doesn't move to stop you as your girls trail behind you, bags in tow. "Where are you going?"

"Home."

"This is your home!" he pleads, voice cracking with emotion.

A startled, sardonic laugh bursts forth. "No, it isn't. Nor is it yours any longer."

Something you never expected to do was walk up to your father's door in the middle of the night with two children and no husband, yet here you stand, breaths quickening in anxiety as you stare at the familiar door. The very same home that felt like a cage to you for so long would now be your refuge. Well, you certainly hope it will be. Surely Cor wouldn't send you away, would he?

Stepping up to the door, you knock upon it with a firm hand and hold your breath. Moments pass and you're about to give up when the large door opens slowly, the suspicious eyes of your father peering into the night. Recognition flares in his eyes and he throws open the door with a gasp.

"Y/N," he hums, and while he's never been of the emotional sort, you can hear it in his voice, "I... I saw the paper. Please, come in."

Though it feels a bit awkward, you usher your girls in as he retreats to allow you space. They huddle into each other, clearly out of their element. Cor apparently senses this, coming forth to kneel next to them, extending a polite hand in greeting.

"Hello girls," he says, a warm smile on his face. "I'm your grandfather, Cor. It's very nice to meet you."

They shyly shake his hand and you think maybe this will turn out better than you thought. Cor directs you to 2 of the bedrooms upstairs, where you take one to settle the girls in for bed. The day has been so hectic and emotional, they practically fall asleep the moment their blonde heads touch the pillows. On the other hand, you're feeling very high-strung, wandering back downstairs where you're surprised to see Cor waiting.

"I..." he starts, opening and closing his mouth a few times. "I'm sorry to see that things have come to this, Y/N. I cannot say I'm not happy to have you home, however."

You shake your head, fighting tears. "Please, father, not today. I know your opinion of Ignis. I know you said I'd come home. Please, please... leave those words unsaid."

Whereas you expected a fight, he simply nods and steps toward you, arms extended. The emotions of the day overwhelm you and you close the distance, crying out your grief into his worn sleep shirt.

Two days pass in which grief does not loosen its grip upon you. Hooked claws score your soul, bleeding you of all tears and leaving a hollow shell behind. There's a small amount of solace taken in that the girls get on very well with their grandparents and for the majority seem to be enjoying themselves.

The sea calls to you, drawing you to its edge where in the white sand you made a friend. Allowing the song of the washing waves to take your thoughts, you find yourself humming the song you and Ignis used to sing when life was simple and full of wonder.

To your surprise, a second voice joins you, harmonizing. You wonder if you've finally lost your mind, but when sliding footsteps in sand reaches your ears, you turn.

Your heart clenches at the sight of Ignis standing before you, eyes alight with something you haven't seen in years.

"Darling, I..." he begins. "I've been such a fool."

While you want to be rude and twist the knife in his gut, you simply draw in a shuddering breath, gesturing for him to come closer.

"Yes, you have," you grouse instead.

"I allowed my desire to succeed cloud my judgement, turning it into a personal vendetta against the life I was forced to live as a boy," he continues, silently seeking permission to touch you. "It put me in a position for things to be misconstrued, Luna turned on me out of jealousy and I lost everything in the blink of an eye."

"Tell me, Ignis," you demand, allowing him to take your hands, "what really happened with the Oracle."

"She apparently thought I was interested," he clarifies with a grimace. "When I denied her and made the decision to return home, she sought to ruin my image and pulled me into an unwilling embrace on stage."

You peer into his eyes for many moments, finding naught but truth within them. A small smile pulls at the corners of your mouth. "So, Ignis, where do your priorities lie?"

"With you, and our children," he answers without hesitation, holding your gaze. "Always. I would like to see to the circus and hand it over to Noctis that I may spend my remaining days with the three of you."

Releasing the breath you hadn't realized you were holding, you wrap your arms about him. "Go, then, and return to us when you've finished."

Life returns to normal as Ignis does just what he promises. The two of you invest in a smaller home, near enough to Cor to freely visit, with enough space for the four of you without too much extra. Your eldest daughter resumes her tessenjutsu and to your surprise, your youngest attempts it as well. Finally, life is precisely the way you imagined it as you stood within the overgrown mansion and truthfully, you couldn't be happier.

#ffxv fanfiction #final fantasy xv #ignis x reader #greatest showman au #ignis scientia #noctis lucis caelum #reader insert #cor leonis #female reader #this thing is a beast #longest fic I've written #trash tales

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intergalacticstarlight · 6 years

Note

⁂ Reunion (you can decide whether it's for Rose or James)

[ Send a ⁂ for my muse to take a bullet for yours. ]

[ @goldenwolfgoddess - Long Awaited Reunion ; The Eleventh Hour Verse ]

The Doctor had decided to take Rose and James to one of his favorite places- a planet called Juatiia in the Borati system. He figured it would give them all time to talk, give him time to get to know James a little better, away from the confines of the TARDIS and the ever-present evidence of his former activities before they’d found him again.

He’d slowly begun to reconvert the TARDIS, getting rid of certain rooms and creating other, more appropriate ones, but it was a long process and there were still a few rooms he hadn’t yet touched. Every time he reconstructed a room he tended to get into a mood, the darkness inside of him twitching and insistent, so he had to pace himself to avoid having any more episodes. It worked… for the most part.

So here they were, he and Rose walking hand in hand across a bridge that spanned a vast river, the water of which shimmered beneath the dual suns in various shades of pink. The planet was much like Earth, side from the pigmentation of the foliage and water systems, and of course a fair amount of the wildlife and insects. Perfect for a relaxing day of conversation and information exchanges.

It had spawned a conversation that saw the Doctor knee-deep in conversation with James about the variabilities of the Relative Dimensional Stabilizer and why it couldn’t be converted to actually travel to another dimension despite allowing the regulation of the outer plasmic shell of the ship in relation to the exterior and interior size. Displacement, he’d explained, was much different, much safer and much easier to accomplish than dimensional crossing.

He’d also explained that the Time Lords were generally the ones regulating the crossing of dimensional walls, including Void regulation, but that since they weren’t around anymore the risk of fracturing the fragile membranes between dimension was too great to consider it any longer. There was no one to fix a mistake should one occur and the destruction of two dimensions, two Universes, was far too great a price to pay.

It was around the time that the conversation was rounding on the debate of whether or not the dimensional displacement system could be re-routed through the directional unit and into the time anomaly relocation distributor in order to avoid disaster when crossing dimensions when it happened. There was a bright light that split the sky apart as an enemy space craft landed, and the three of them had taken off running toward the TARDIS to regroup and suss out what was happening.

They’d gotten a fair distance, able to see the blue box looming just a handful of meters in front of them when a group of the enemies had rounded on them. It was lucky the Doctor had given up his ‘no-weapons’ policy long ago, and even luckier that the darkness within him had no hesitation when it came to killing. The only unlucky bit was that his chosen weapon only had enough rounds to kill three of the enemies outright. The fourth hit the ground still alive, still able to wield his weapon, still able to get a shot off before surrendering to the afterlife.

The Doctor acted on pure instinct, the only thought in his mind as the sound of laser fire rang out was to protect Rose and her son at all costs. They would not be hurt because of him. His arms flailed outward as he placed himself between the enemy and the other two, taking a direct hit square to the chest. His body went alight for fraction of a second when the laser hit, leaving a scorch mark that burned away the fabric beneath and subsequently the his flesh as well.

He let out a strangled grunt of pain, followed by a shuddering breath as he fell to his knees, hunching over for a moment as he attempted to breathe. Rassilon it hurt- more than he’d expected it to considering he’d been shot with laser fire before. His arms curled inward, cradling his own abdomen for a moment or two as tears filled his eyes. He hoped that Rose would forgive him this, this impulsive act when he had no regenerations to spare. He wouldn’t be coming back from this one. He wouldn’t be getting the redemption he so desperately sought with his Rose.

Before he could prevent it he was falling onto his back on the ground, looking up at Rose and her son with a look of apology and adoration, speaking as quickly as possible between clenched teeth, dizziness already setting in, one of his hearts already stopped. “I love you, Rose Tyler… I love you so much….” He grunted in pain but continued speaking, “R-Rose, listen closely… you’ve got… you’ve got to get back to the TARDIS with James and leave this planet… please, Rose… you’ve got to run… run…” Tears fell from his eyes and he blinked to clear his vision- it was still a bit blurry after.

#goldenwolfgoddess #11th Doctor Muse #v: the eleventh hour #tw: gun #tw: gunshot #tw: shooting #tw: death #death #tw: grief #grief

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ulfwolf · 4 years

Text

Air — Musing 42

My blood is happy With every lungful of air So many new friends

It is usually not at the very forefront of our minds, but each liter of air we inhale contains 30,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 air molecules; a number that makes you wish you were a bushman who seems to get along just fine by counting “one, two, many” and leaving it at that.

The word, by the way, is sextillion, thirty of them, at least, each breath.

Me, counting breaths, count “one.”

My blood, happily counting molecules, counts “Thirty Sextillion.”

What really amazes me, and what should give just about anyone pause, is the sheer number of events involved with each breath. We’re talking six hundred million alveoli (lung sacs) going “Hooray” in sustained welcome of the new air feast and we’re talking busy blood, swooshing by and collecting a few trillion (or more) molecules per drop. Meanwhile, personally, I just keep typing, blissfully uninvolved in this air-to-blood spectacle.

I also recently read somewhere that there about one billion chemical reactions in each of our body’s cells every second. Let me repeat that: There are about one billion chemical reactions in each of our cells every second.

That is even harder for me to wrap my wits around. We think of a second as a smidgen of time; for a cell, a second is probably akin to one of our years, or even decades or centuries—totally different concept of time, these little guys.

Okay, so how on earth can so many chemical reactions take place every second in our cells? Well, seems it’s all about their size.

A chemical reaction, by the way, always involves atoms and/or molecules trading electrons and such so as to re-arrange the molecular or ionic structures of the parties involved—from one substance into another.

Now, whether a reaction will take place, and how long it takes to complete are determined by, firstly: How frequently atoms and molecules in a given space crash into each other, which is a function of the size of the container relative to the number of atoms and molecules it contains; and secondly: at what speed these atoms and molecules are moving when they do collide, which is a function of temperature.

Now, do not for a moment forget that the reactions that do take place are in fact by design: they are, as it were, controlled. I picture someone, with a very small clipboard, keeping track, shouting directions, herding molecules about, directing traffic, streamlining mayhem. There is intelligence involved, minute, accurate, and incredibly speedy.

That said, it just so happens that the average Eukaryotic cell, which is what makes up all multi-cellular organisms, has a volume of about 0.000000000001 liter, which while extremely small is also the size that nature (by trial and error, I guess) developed over time as the perfect size for the most efficient biochemistry, that is, the perfect number of collisions per given unit of time (as in one billion per second) at body temperature, which is 37 degrees Celsius for us humans.

These chemical reactions are the basis of life as we know it and include copying our DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid—the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms which is part and parcel of each old and new cell) and manufacturing new organelles and cell walls so the cells can multiply; transcribing DNA into RNA (ribonucleic acid, whose principal role is to act as a DNA-messenger carrying instructions from the DNA about the synthesis of proteins); the actual synthesis of these proteins, which are the building blocks of organic life’s structures, and also comprise a vast array of enzymes (traffic cops), which help reactions occur under the right set of circumstances—things like sugar and fat broken down into usable energy and harmful things like bacterial toxins destroyed and expelled, hormones synthesized to communicate with other cells—the list goes on.

Again, all by design—directed by cellular (I guess) intelligence; the little molecular conductor leading the cellular orchestra, waving his baton, and interpreting the DNA/RNA score.

Here's a cool aside: by the time you have read this far, trillions and trillions and trillions of these chemical reactions have occurred in your body; and yes, many of them involving oxygen, which is how we slid onto this side track in the first place.

The image does arise for me: Even at deepest rest, my body is a galaxy of trillions of chemical reactions every second—about as far from at rest as you could possibly imagine.

And to think that we’re walking around in this sea of activity.

All the time.

Well, it keeps my blood happy.

P.S. If you like what you’ve read here and would like to contribute to the creative motion, as it were, you can do so via PayPal: here.

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utopianparadoxist · 7 years

Text

Witch of Space==> Ascend : What is Jade Harley’s Story?

Alright here we go I finally get to write about Jade. My biggest Homestuck secret is that for how relatively little I talk about her, Jade is actually probably my favorite Beta kid.

I love the others and Rose and Dave in particular are intensely personal to me but Jade vibed with me in a way pretty much no character in fiction ever did because she’s an unabashed furry and that’s basically the subculture that raised my preteen catholic ass.

So Jade means a lot to me, and the way her narrative grows has always spoken to me as much as Dave’s narrative about overcoming toxic masculinity, or Rose’s struggle to find existential meaning. In a way, Jade’s struggle IS Rose’s struggle! Jade and Rose have narratives that lead us to twin conclusions about the nature of Homestuck’s reality.

That’s getting ahead of myself though, and I’m going to do this wild thing where I try to impose some structure on my approach so hopefully you can come away with a clear idea of what I think Homestuck is doing. (I want to give special thanks to @landofsomethingsomething for helping me out with the feedback that led me to striving to improve in this respect.)

So. This post has three thesis statements that I hope you come away with at least seriously considering, if not outright buying into.

1. Jade’s character arc was as thought out and deliberate as any of the kids’. She was not “shafted” by the story. The two reasons fans most likely seem to think she was were the Three Years trip she spent alone, and that she “didn’t do anything in Collide”. I believe both are misreadings of the canon.

2. Jade’s arc is meaningful both for herself and for the broader narrative, and builds to one of the most important revelations about Homestuck’s universe.

3. Jade and Davepeta are not only canon but deeply romantic, and Davepeta stands to improve one of the biggest reasons fans feel Jade got “shafted”--not to mention that some fans might take issue with Jade’s lack of a romantic arc, and Davepeta...well...is her romantic arc.

But before we can talk about where Jade’s arc succeeds, we need to talk about what it is, which means we need to talk about her title--Witch of Space. For the record, here’s my view on the mythological roles:

They aren’t a pasted on set of superpowers, and they aren’t given to the kids by Skaia. The titles describe the nature the kids had all along, and the way their patterns of thought reflect onto the world around them. They also foreshadow their narrative arcs and trajectories in their entireties--Just like the titles Hussie was inspired by in creating the system, the Hero of Time and Hero of the Winds structure from the Legend of Zelda.

I’ll begin by tracking Jade’s similarities to her fellow Witches and Space players. By pointing these out I believe I should be able to give you an idea of what I think Jade’s arc is about, exactly.

After that, I’ll expand my reading of Jade as a Witch of Space to include her later narrative turns, as well as explaining how I feel Davesprite--and later Davepeta--is inherently tangled up in her arc, as well as being a better romantic partner for Jade than basically anyone else in the story.

Let’s go. I’m hoping this is the beginning of something really excellent.

Where lies the Witch’s magic?

The first striking similarity between Witches is their bond with an outside force much more powerful than they are representing their Aspect. For Jade, this is Becquerel. For Feferi, it’s Gl’bolyb-who is about as Lifey an entity as it gets. It is, after all, defined by being unknowably massive, incomprehensible Living things, with conscious awareness of its own.

It is simply a completely alien kind of Life to our own, and thus the Cosmic Horror. Gl’bolyb also requires the consumption of vast quantities of Life that Feferi has to provide it, tying it to Life’s themes of edible consumption. More on Life stuff when I write about Jane soon, though.

Like Jade, Feferi has little direct power early in her life. But she’s able to accomplish stunning feats through her connection to her guardian--which functions effectively as a Witch’s familiar. Before ascension, a Witch’s power is linked to the symbol that identifies her as a Witch in the first place.

Feferi is also ambitious. Not only did Feferi originally aim to change the rules of Life in troll society imposed by the Condesce’s will, but through her connection to the Horrorterrors, she’s able to fundamentally change the rules of Life on a metaphysical level, allowing Ghosts to exist inside dream bubbles in an unnatural limbo.

Damara has an outside power figure linked to Time, too--Lord English, who she associates with and wishes to work for. She also changes her relationship with Time--turning it into a weapon to use against her friends as revenge as opposed to a tool and series of systems she needs to serve like Aradia and Dave do during their sessions. She’s quite willful and ambitious about both her relationship to her “Familiar” and her use of her Aspect.

Both witches are driven primarily by their own ambitions and desires, and both witches are also fundamentally Changed by their Aspects. Feferi loses her life and becomes a ghost, her will becoming almost indistinguishable from the Horrorterrors’. And Damara’s primary use of her Aspect coincides with a drastic change in outlook and personality, making her cynical, bitter, and willing to serve her Familiar over connecting with others.

Now--if Witches are ambitious about and defined by both changing and being changed by the domain of their Aspect, then what is Jade’s field of ambition in this regard? To answer this question, it’ll help to look at her fellow Space players.

The weight of Space

We don’t see Porrim pre-session, but from their introductions, Jade, Kanaya and Calliope are all defined by a unique passion for Sburb. This makes sense--Sburb, after all, is the construct that defines the Space they will exist in their entire lives.

Waking early on Prospit also essentially makes them grow up in two environments--places--at once, meaning that they grow up influenced by the culture inherent to two different environments.

This is particularly notable with Kanaya, who is uniquely untouched by Troll culture compared to her friends. Her morals are much more aligned with Sburbs’ spirit of growth and cooperation, and she takes a passionate interest in fashion--which is to say, the expression of ideas about oneself through clothes.

This kind of self-expression is something Sburb encourages constantly, and is in fact it’s core philosophy. Kanaya internalizes it completely to such an extent her identity is created by her relationship to Sburb--and Space--much more than by her relationship to Troll culture. Calliope, too, is so inspired by Sburb’s philosophy of cooperation and possibility that it works against her Cherub sociology.

This connection also allows them to use the insight gained from one environment to influence the other. Space players tend to set the stage for their own sessions, laying the Setting for their games in their own unique ways.

Calliope--the Muse of Space--inspired Dirk and Roxy to set the stage for the Alpha session, and influenced Jake into setting the stage for the Beta session as well. Lord English’s particular exploitation of Trolls was also influenced by her, setting the grim stage for both the troll sessions as well. Kanaya used Rose’s guide and her visions to help set up her session, too.

Finally, all Space players seem to end up somehow becoming entities they surround themselves with and are influenced by in life, in this sense being drastically affected by their own environments. Kanaya grew up influenced by troll rainbow drinker novels, and just so happened to develop an affinity for the Alternian sun.

And once she died, she was outright reborn into one. Sylphs being the Passive Creation class, this makes sense--Kanaya heals and Re-Creates herself as her own ideal image. If her ability to do so is intrinsic to her being, that’s no surprise, since Sylphs are considered a kind of Fairy or Elemental, and so are intrinsically connected to and created by their Aspect.

Once she transforms, she gains super speed--ie: an increased ability to navigate space-- and the ability to fill her environment with Light, which she always found highly desirable. This pattern is repeated across Space players--Calliope is able to inspire others to see her as a Troll, while Jade is able to deliberately Change herself into a Furry. More on that later in this essay.

Now a picture begins to emerge.

The Witch is the Active Change class. One could parse the title as:

One who Changes X, or Changes through X.

With the corollary attribute of One who is Changed By X.

And as Sburb defines everything about the setting of Homestuck, and the enviroments of Space players growing up. And given Witch’s ambition and zeal, it makes perfect sense to think Jade’s ambition and execution would concern Changing not just Space, but Sburb itself.

Which is true! Among the main kids, Jade is uniquely passionate about actually playing the game. She sets up her session, gets Rose interested, and takes charge of orchestrating and executing the plan that leads to the Beta’s victory.

And she is uniquely changed by the environments the game exposes her to--the divide between Jade’s Dream Self and her Waking Self is by far the widest of any Player.

Dream Jade is relatively pampered and aloof, and while having access to a whole other world makes Waking Jade’s life far less distressing and lonely than it might otherwise have been, she still ends up more practical.

And once the game really gets going, also more demanding. In her desire to protect people and be an asset, Jade holds herself to a very high standard. As such, she actively tries to be strong and keep an upbeat attitude, and in execution Jade’s approach to this is quite similar to John’s--she ends up coming off as weirdly emotionally detached from the consequences of what she’s doing.

The difference is that Jade willfully uses that detachment for her own benefit, like Jake does. After all, reviving Dream Jade this way directly leads Jade to becoming a God Tier, and embodying Space as a First Guardian.

Dream Jade, meanwhile, dies, and is greatly changed by the stagnancy and fatalism inherent to the Dream Bubbles. Jade tries to comfort Jadesprite, but this also brings us to another core facet of Jade’s. Jade has a habit of bottling up her emotions in a big way, like Jane. Jade wants to be reliable and useful, and to her that parses as a focus on practicality and solution-oriented thinking.

So when Jadesprite--who’s another version of her--fails to live up to her standards, Jade tries to be caring... but tries to find practical solutions which go ignored as Jadesprite copes with the trauma of her circumstances. Jade’s frustration with the game, with Jadesprite’s defeatism, and with Jadesprite as a reflection of herself build until finally she gets fed up and...

Blows a gasket. Jade’s got self-loathing issues just like anyone in Homestuck, and for her they manifest as being angry at what she could’ve become under different circumstances. She hates Jadesprite for being so malleable to her environment, and for being something she sees in herself--Selfish. Jade didn’t think too much about Becquerel before creating Jadesprite, after all, did she? Active classes are intrinsically self-motivated, and Jade is no exception.

Jadesprite is the only character Jade is quite this cruel to other than Karkat, who torments her for years and exhausts her with hyperemotional debates that distract her and waste her time. But this attitude is still something she carries across her relationships. She’s kind to Tavros, but his logic turns circular for long enough that she gets frustrated and turns their attention towards practical matters.

She extends much more time and patience to her friends, consoling Rose when her Mom dies...but even then is immediately concerned about what she will do with her feelings. In this pesterlog she also begins to question the nature of the game they’re playing, beginning to note Sburb seems outright cruel at times--foreshadowing her more intense struggles with the nature of the Space she inhabits.

Which brings us to Davesprite. Dave and Jade had a special relationship growing up, and Davesprite is a Dave brought into being by the game Jade is so invested in. And Davesprite is the one who finds Jadesprite at her lowest, and comforts her. He then makes her aware of her own power...

And encourages either Jade’s first great feat of magic as a Witch of Space. Immediately after this, Jade ascends, becoming one with Jadesprite and bringing the entire session under control--an action Davesprite bears witness to in it’s entirety. Soon after, Jade and Davesprite start dating during the three year’s boat trip. But…

It doesn’t work out. Why?

Well, there’s two reasons. The first is that Dave is an abuse victim, and that isn’t really the kind of trauma Jade could easily relate to--she’s been exposed to neglect and isolation, but the experience of being subjugated under an overbearing guardian would be alien to her-- and she never takes it particularly seriously growing up.

Grimbark Jade clues us in on the second. Davesprite also feels set apart from the kids, distanced by his Sprite status. He considers himself auxiliary to Alpha Dave, the same way Hal does with Dirk. John even rubs it in a couple of times, and openly wonders about Davesprite’s importance relative to Alpha Dave himself. And of course, Davesprite himself admits it.

This is something Jade can relate to to some extent--she was solely a Sprite for a time, and distanced and set apart from all society besides that. But the game fixed both of those for Jade, through bringing her closer to her friends and God Tiering. Not so for Davesprite.

Note what these issues have in common, though: Neither abuse trauma nor existential marginalization are problems that come with practical, tidy solutions--which are Jade’s instinctive method of dealing with things.

Jade wants to look for something to Do about everything, but there’s nothing to really Do for Davesprite. So Jade bottles her feelings of frustration up, only to have them come out when she goes Grimbark. But even while evil, brainwashed, and pissed off about Davesprite breaking up with her...

She still sticks up for Davesprite’s validity and personhood. Now, let’s move on to the retcon.

Davepeta happens, obviously--Nepeta acting as a Rogue to “Steal” Dave’s Heart for his own benefit. Davesprite transcends both his issues with his Bro and his tortured sense of auxiliary identity. Nepeta benefits from this arrangement, too--but we’re talking about Jade, so let’s see how the retcon treats her.

In the Post-Retcon version of the three years trip, Jade ends up completely alone and isolated. Fans usually hate this about her arc, but hear me out, because this is where I make my case for the first point I laid out at the beginning of this:

This isn’t just about tormenting or “shafting” Jade. It isn’t Hussie being lazy or not caring about her. Jade is struggling with her Aspect, the same way Dirk is tormented by his Splinters, Terezi by her Choices, and so on. And as she struggles with Space, she also struggles with the Game--and the label it seemingly “assigns” her. Space. She dreams about and meets Alt!Calliope, who tells her the Game has ordained this tragic reality for her, and as a result Jade feels distanced and set apart from her friends--just as Davesprite once did. When she meets Alt!Calliope again, she reinforces this notion, seemingly telling Jade that it is in a Space player’s nature to be alone.

But that’s not all she tells her. As she’s exposed to the fully-fledged Muse of Space the longest, Jade is also uniquely privy to the deepest secret of the nature of all of the entire Homestuck multiverse. A secret implied and built up to literally from the moment John first bites Sburb’s apple and enters the game(citation pending--I’ve got that video recorded already):

That Paradox Space is composed out of the abstractions of thought called the Aspects. This is the root of my second point, that Jade’s narrative is important both for herself and the wider Homestuck story--not to mention our understanding of it’s Multiverse.

The implications of this stunning revelation are enormous. Calliope literally states that ideas are made up of the Aspects, and what the Alchemy system does is make physical objects out of ideas. All of Paradox Space grows outwards from these twelve tiny elements of thought, and so reality is literally something created by those perceiving it. In Homestuck, existence is created by thought--and so too is all physical matter.

This is why I argue all depictions of Light in Homestuck symbolically contain the Light Aspect’s fundamental ideas--because Light as a physical presence is simply a concentrated enough amount of Light aspect abstractions to be visible in physical reality. The same is true of every Aspect--in this same sense, you can argue all food is made out of Life, and all absence out of Void.

Imagine being granted the key to understanding the entire universe. That’s what is happening here. Jade doesn’t understand all of it right away, but the core idea gets across. And understanding the true nature of reality this way could take Jade’s interest in science to an entire other level. There’s practically no limit to what she could do with this information, I mean--if all of reality is created by thought, then what are the real limits of what’s possible for anyone?

Having delivered this information, Calliope leaves--leaving Jade as close to the biggest symbol of Space in the comic--the Green Sun--as she could get. Jade lingers, waiting, under the impression she is inherently meant to simply comply with the will of her Aspect and Paradox Space, when along comes…

Davesprite, freed of all the issues that made their relationship originally unworkable. Only now it’s Davepeta, and Davepeta is a wholly new entity, completely and utterly defined by their relationship to the Game that functions as one of Jade’s primary domains of power and influence. It would be literally impossible for Jade to have met any version of any person even remotely like Davepeta elsewhere. It had to be here. It had to be through Sburb.

Davepeta also has unique insight into the nature of the Player’s ultimate reality, and is one of the few characters with more insight into that reality than Jade herself.

In keeping with the Light motif with Homestuck’s romantic relationships, Jade lingers in the dark Void of her loneliness, not knowing whether she should Do anything, by a hyper-incandescent 2xSprite, an entity literally created to provide aid and information as well as giving off Light physically.

As if that weren’t enough, Davepeta is also a twice over Passive player--a Knight who serves their friends Time, or serves them through Time, and a Rogue who can Steal Hearts for the benefit of others.

And Davepeta is also coded as a cat and a bird, simultaneously--the two animals most commonly associated with Witches.

Do you see where I’m going with this? Now that Jade is a fully ascended Witch who has mastered Space, along comes Davepeta, framed perfectly to act as the Witch’s Familiar. A Familiar whose existence reflects not just dominion over Physical Space, but mastery over both Sburb and the nature of Paradox Space.

And what does Davepeta do when it’s, for once, Jade at a loss for what to do next, trapped in a circular spiral of logic on whether to even move forward? Davepeta says that’s dumb, and that Jade should do whatever she wants to, and offers her a practical solution to help her do it. Making it clear that Davepeta is capable of being a partner and aid to Jade’s desires and ambitions.

Jade then wakes up, and decides to follow Davepeta’s (and Calliope’s) advice: She has fun.

In Collide, Jade chooses not to fight, but rather to use her space powers to play with Bec Noir and PM, distracting them and keeping them busy. Doing this leads her to Changing the game in the most powerful way possible.

The two First Guardians are completely equalized by Bec’s influence on them, making them equal in power...but also giving them equally powerful feelings of love for Jade.

This gives PM the advantage. PM is the one able to control her own emotions, find nuance in her situation, and take a middle solution between really hurting Jade and complete inaction--which Jack is unable to do.

By setting up this situation, Jade turns the core fatalism of Sburb on it’s head--setting up a scenario where White can do the impossible and defeat Black itself. That’s about as “Changing” the nature of “Space” as it gets--a Witch of Space, fully realized.

And now Jade is hanging out, happy with her friends and not lonely or isolated at all. Jade is having fun and enjoying herself on Earth C. That’s a pretty satisfying narrative, as far as I’m concerned.

Jade struggled, but she also gained unique insight and knowledge entirely in keeping with her Aspect. At the very least, considering the importance of the information Jade got from her journey and all the thematic imagery surrounding it, I think it’s likely that approach was intentional and not a byproduct of Hussie “not caring about Jade” or “shafting” her.

Whether you guys do or don’t like where he took Jade’s arc is another conversation, albeit one I’m willing to have--I’m just arguing there was intent behind the chaos.

That said, now I’m going to do something I don’t usually like to do, and speculate about Jade’s future a little.

I personally think Jade’s “arc” is complete enough as it stands now--Davepeta’s a compelling romantic partner, but it’s not like Jade necessarily needs a romance in the first place. I won’t be upset if I end up wrong about this stuff-- I just think the nature of all this build up between Jade and Davepeta makes it more likely than any alternatives I can think of.

So here’s some thoughts about the Epilogue you may want to consider:

Whether Davepeta will survive to meet up with her again is, admittedly, an open question...but considering all this narrative buildup, the fact that we already know Sprites exist past the end of the Game, and that Davepeta already fought Lord English and survived, I have a hard time believing they’re going to be killed off at this point.

Especially considering [S] Credits is clearly setting up the Masterpiece, and if we see the Beta kids get sucked into that Juju it’s likely we’ll also see them pop out the other end...in the Void, where Davepeta is.

And one last thing:

We already saw Roxy steal something from nothing, so it’s not impossible to think Davepeta could reach across the Timelines they already see, and steal the Heart or Time Game Over Jade spent with John and Davesprite in the original timeline back from the Game that took those experiences from her--fitting into Jade’s motif of Cheating the game to suit her desires.

This is the nature of my third and final point--that on top of everything else Davepeta adds to Jade’s narrative, they could subvert the lasting pain and suffering the Game inflicted on Jade across those three years, enabling her to remember her relationship with Davesprite, and also potentially giving John and Roxy another person who remembers the old timeline.

No idea if that’s gonna happen, or be shown in detail if it is. I just think that given the sheer depth in which Davepeta’s and Jade’s arcs are interwoven, it’s not impossible. If it doesn’t, I’m personally pretty happy with Davepeta giving Jade some good advice and helping her out at the end. Feel free to let me know what you think! :)

Alright, that’s all I got on Jade for now, guys. Hoping to write one post about Jane soon, but I’m going to be refocusing back towards video editing and job hunting, so these written posts may slow while I devote more energy to making videos. This has essentially been a side project to my Homestuck, Explained series as I gathered my thoughts on the endgame enough that I thought it warranted posting some more of them.

If you’re interested in enabling me to write more of these posts and making more videos, it’d be cool of you to check out my Patreon. We’ve got a neat little Discord community of Homestuck aficionados thinking and talking about a bunch of different Homestuck analysis topics, and doing so can also get you perks like previews of my video scripts and previews of the videos themselves.

That’s all for now, peeps. As always, thanks a ton for reading.

See you again soon, everyone.

Until then, Keep Rising.

#Homestuck #Jade Harley #Davepeta #davepetasprite^2 #Classpects #Witch/Heir #Sylph/Maid #Witch of Space #My MSPA Analysis

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chasingthecosmos · 5 years

Text

By any Other Name

Fandom: Doctor Who Rating: G Pairing: The Doctor/Rose Tyler, Eleventh Doctor/Rose Tyler (The Doctor/Clara Oswald, Eleventh Doctor/Clara Oswald) Chapters: 6/26 Read on AO3 here.

“Rose Tyler was dying - or, at least, she was relatively certain that that’s what was happening …” A Season 7 AU where Rose returns to her home universe only to find that 100 years have passed and nothing is quite the way that she remembers it. She wakes up with a new body, a new life, and a new Doctor. What has the Bad Wolf gotten her into this time? Rating may go up as the story continues

Of course, the soufflés never actually ended up happening - the Doctor was far too eager to get moving and Rose rolled her eyes at his back as she mused over the fact that some things certainly never changed. It was one of the reasons that it had taken her and her husband so long to perfect their own soufflé recipe - the Doctor was easily distracted and as impatient as a four-year-old, so baking delicate confections had never been an easy task when he was around.

She had just barely finished brewing her first cup of coffee before the Doctor was racing back to the TARDIS without even bothering to look over his shoulder to see if she was following. "Hurry up and get dressed!" he called back to her eagerly. "There's something I still haven't shown you yet!"

Rose was surprised when she surveyed Clara's closet to find that it was filled to overflowing with a variety of dresses and skirts. In her old life, she had preferred dressing in comfortable denim and shoes that were easy to run in. It had seemed practical, and she liked the way that the jeans hugged her curves and showed off her figure.

But she was even more surprised to find that she actually preferred the skirts, now. She liked the way that the wool tights clung to her like a second skin and made her legs look skinny and feminine beneath a gauzy, flowing skirt. Rose found that she finally understood why the Doctor always went through his costume changes with each new regeneration. The new look just felt right.

As soon as she was ready, Rose followed the Doctor out to the TARDIS and did the whole wide-eyed, "it's bigger on the inside!" song and dance for him because she knew how much he secretly enjoyed it. She also quietly hoped that her fake shock would help dissipate some of his lingering suspicions about her. She figured that if she played the part of the typical, human companion, then perhaps he would stop trying so hard to figure her out.

He was dancing around the TARDIS console with his usual enthusiasm when he suddenly clapped his hands loudly and whirled to face her once more. "So, where do you want to go, eh?" he asked tantalizingly. "What do you want to see?"

Rose ducked her head and smoothed her fingers over the new but oh-so-familiar TARDIS controls in an attempt to hide the wide smile that she couldn't quite manage to keep off of her face. It had been a lifetime since she had had all of time and space at her disposal. When she and her husband had been trapped in their parallel world, they had kept some of the Doctor's TARDIS coral with them, but it hadn't been able to grow into anything of any use. Their new home was simply too different from the TARDIS's original universe. It seemed that no amount of petrol in a diesel engine would ever get it to run properly.

As Rose caught the Doctor's gleeful smile out of the corner of her eye she was reminded of that first time he had asked her this question ...

"Right, then, Rose Tyler, you tell me - where do you want to go? Backwards or forwards in time? It's your choice, what's it going to be?"

"You think you're so impressive," she had teased.

Well, it looked like that hadn't changed, either.

"What would I like to see?" Rose repeated, tossing him a challenging smirk. "Well, something awesome, of course."

The Doctor's grin only grew as he snapped his fingers at her and then began his manic dance around the console controls. Rose noticed idly that his driving skills hadn't exactly improved in over a century of time, but the landing, at least, was a little less shaky than normal.

The Doctor threw on the hand brake and then came to stand before her, his green eyes positively sparkling as he leaned in close and whispered, "Close your eyes."

"What? Why?" Rose asked, startled into defensiveness as she carefully tried to gauge his expression.

"You'll see in a moment, now close your eyes," the Doctor insisted eagerly, shifting his weight impatiently between his two feet as he looked down at her.

When she did nothing but flash him another doubtful look, he took another half-step closer and whispered, "Please. Just trust me."

And Rose knew that this man was not the Doctor that she knew - and he certainly wasn't her husband - but in all of time and space, there was no one who she had ever trusted more, so she did as he asked and closed her eyes.

She felt his large hands on her shoulders, leading her out the TARDIS doors and onto unknown soil as she blindly followed his direction. The air smelled different, and Rose instantly knew that he had taken her somewhere far away from Earth. There was a permeating, peaceful quiet all around that was an unusual change from their normal adventures, though.

"Can you feel the light on your eyelids?" he asked quietly, continuing to move her slowly forward.

Rose hummed in assent, secretly thrilling at the way that she could feel his solid, comforting presence so close at her back. She still desperately missed her husband, but it was no secret that she had always loved the Doctor. It seemed that a hundred years of time and space and parallel worlds hadn't been enough to change that particular truth.

"That is the light of an alien sun," the Doctor explained, continuing on completely oblivious to her silent thoughts. "Forward a couple of steps," he instructed, and then he leaned down and whispered in her ear, "Okay, are you ready?"

And if the breathless smile breaking over her features had absolutely nothing to do with an alien sun and everything to do with the alien man standing just beside her, Rose figured that what the Doctor didn't know wouldn't hurt him.

"Yes," she breathed quietly, and when the Doctor made no further response, she slowly blinked open her eyes to gaze upon the sight before them.

Had seventy years really been all that it took for her to gorget how amazingly beautiful the universe was? Rose had loved her perfectly normal life with her husband in that parallel world, but in all that time, it seemed that she had somehow managed to reduce the memory of how dazzling a life with the Doctor could be.

"Welcome to the rings of Akhaten," the Doctor stated dramatically, looking between the constellation of asteroids dancing around in the sun's glow and Rose's look of wide-eyed wonder with an expression of pure, childish glee.

Rose immediately recognized the name from the Bad Wolf, but she didn't let on as she continued to stare out at the vastness of the alien star system before her with barely-constrained awe.

"Can we see it?" she asked after she had patiently allowed him to give his usual Doctor-lecture on the system's history and culture. She found that she was almost afraid to hope that she really could just jump back into her old life of traveling the stars so easily. What had she ever done to deserve such a gift, such a second chance - and with the man who she loved most in all of time and space to go along with it?

The Doctor gave her a sly smile that she felt all the way down to her toes as he offered her his hand without another word. Rose almost expected him to shout, "Run!" before they dashed back into that amazing blue box of his, but he simply continued to smile knowingly as she fit her hand into his and he led her back the way they had come.

Rose marveled at the way that - even though they were two completely different people - their hands still fit together as easily as they always had. It seemed that no matter the time, no matter the place, Rose Tyler and the Doctor were simply made for each other. She wondered if he could feel the same sensation of satisfied completion that she did as they ran back into the TARDIS and prepared for their newest adventure.

--------------------

Rose began to suspect that maybe the Doctor was catching on to her when they finally touched down in the alien bazaar and began wandering around the various strange species and their wares. It was all so similar to their first trip to Platform One that she began to wonder if he did the exact same series of adventures with all of his companions, or if he was simply somehow subconsciously replaying their old times together. Neither thought brought her much comfort.

The Doctor made no comment of the similarities, though, so Rose couldn't be sure what his true intentions were as he showed her around the overflowing booths and pointed out the various species, cultures, and food that he liked the best. Rose didn't have to fake her wide-eyed interest as he led her around the busy streets, and her heart softened every time she caught the Doctor watching her out of the corner of her eye. It was clear that he needed this as much as she did, and Rose wondered (not for the first time) what he had been through in the past century to make him so sad and alone.

His off-handed mention of his granddaughter only managed to heighten her concern as Rose quietly studied him. Her husband had told her stories of Susan as well as all the rest of his family that he had left behind on Gallifrey. She knew the depth of importance of his favorite granddaughter and the fact that he was bringing up those old memories now concerned her greatly.

Before she could ask him about it further, though, the Doctor was shoving a basket of glowing blue fruits into her hand and encouraging her to try one. However, Rose could remember trying similar glowing fruits during her past journeys with the Doctor (though the ones she had tried had been purple rather than blue), and she recalled them to be watery with an odd metallic taste that lingered on her tongue for hours afterwards. She turned her nose up at the blue fruit on instinct, deciding not to take any chances. The Doctor made an offhanded, disappointed sound as he returned the basket to where he had found it.

"Think they've got chips anywhere around here?" Rose asked suddenly, deciding to test his memory of that trip from long ago, which she still fondly referred to as their "first date".

"'Chips'?" the Doctor asked incredulously. He said it like it was a bad word, but he was turned away from her once more and wouldn't meet her eye. "Why would you want something like that when you've got local homemade cuisine all around you? Look! There's hodir from the Krisini System - piping hot, right here under your nose, but what does she ask for? Chips. Honestly, you humans ..."

Well, it was better than "apes", she supposed. At least he had grown out of that condescending moniker.

"You could have just said 'no'," Rose grumbled in irritation anyway. But she realized as she considered the surrounding booths that she didn't actually fancy chips, anyway. It seemed that this body was more suited to sweet things rather than savory.

"What's that?" she asked, pointing to a pile of what looked like fresh baked pastries.

"Er, those are melashi buns," the Doctor muttered, pointing his sonic at them for a quick scan before adding, "They'd kill you, stone dead in five minutes flat. Best not. Ooh! Here, try these!"

He shoved what looked like a bright green whipped pudding cup into her hand, turned back to the booth, and then returned to stab a little plastic spoon into it.

But Rose had lost all interest in alien confections as she openly stared at the device that the Doctor was still fiddling with in his hands. He caught her looking and displayed the instrument with a proud, cocky grin. "Sonic screwdriver," he explained simply.

"It's ... green," Rose muttered awkwardly. And that wasn't the only new thing about it, either - but she decided to stick with the obvious in an attempt to not let on that she knew exactly what a sonic screwdriver was.

She supposed that it shouldn't have been so shocking that he would got and get a whole new casing - especially when he had already gone and changed both his TARDIS and his face as well - but it still struck her as odd in a way that made her uncomfortable. When she thought of the Doctor, she thought of his sonic screwdriver - he was never without it. But it seemed that even that had changed in the past one hundred years that she had missed with him.

"Yes, it's green. Of course it's green," the Doctor replied, his tone taking on a certain amount of defensiveness. "Green is cool. Why? Do you not like green?"

"No, green is ... green is fine," Rose replied haltingly, staring hard at the alien delicacy in her hands and not daring to meet his eye. "I just ... always liked blue."

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