#im supposed to be packing for a trip and instead im thinking about ghost edging you AGAIN | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

tumblunni · 5 years

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I had a really weird dream involving Dr Maddiman. Its a shame i can barely remember any of it and also it seems i woke up before it ended? Like i just had this overwhelming sense that allll the plot threads were gonna be wrapped up any second now and then BOOM awake. So just a whole bunch of random stuff happened with no real explanation at all.

It was some sort of post apocolyptic setting i think? Humanity was in these small isolated cities fighting against some sort of invading army but we never actually saw the aliens themselves. And some part of my brain was like "it makes sense its the same rules as a hairdresser and the design takes cues from a pack of AAA batteries". I have NO idea what that means! So basically everythibg was super vague and undescribed and dream-me just had a sense of already being a long time fan of this series and knowing enough to fill in the gaps. Apparantoy this was some sort of adaptation of a thing id already seen, but id been told the ending was different and more accurate to the manga? Also i wasnt actually a person watching this show i was still the protagonist of the show yet i acted like i'd been reincarnated and relived this week a million times or something

ANYWAY the way dr maddiman comes in is that he was some sort of 'brilliant but dangerous' expert the government had hired to help our fight against the aliens. It wasnt really explained why he was.. yknow.. maddiman. Like is this meant to be that ghosts also exist in this sci fi universe? Was he a half alien hybrid instead of a yokai? Was it just human maddiman with the personality of yokai maddiman due to ptsd...? In any case he didnt seem entirely tethered to the laws of reality and nobody knew exactly how he pulled off all his scientific miracles. He was treated as the only guy who could understand the mindset of the aliens, but that also made him dangerous because he trapped in the delusion of everything being okay and fun and happy and he often did evil things by accident while having good intentions. But they didnt have anyone else who'd cracked the code of the alien weaponry so they had to put up with him. He was just sorta assigned a crack team of secret agents whose job was Be The Old Man's Friend So We Dont All Die. Dont let him realise how the world is all destroyed and such, just play along with his goofyness and try and remind him to do his important work while dancing around why its important. it was super creepy how he was locked up and gaslighted like this!! And he was all 'oh im sure when im done with my ultimate experiment i can go home to my wife and kids' and yeah it was implied here that the same backstory applied :( 'distract the old man and validate his false opinion that his family is still alive and waiting for him' :( poor sci fi madds :(

Oh also for some reason he seemed to be wearing elements of Adventure era Dr Eggman's outfit? But just the general style of the coat and the wearing goggles that he never actually uses. And he had a very warm and cuddly autumnal colourscheme

Anyway i was part of the Super Secret Grampa Cherishing Division whose job was to act as his assistant but also secretly be packing a bazillion weapons to neutralize him if he poses a danger to humanity. But i started to genuinely care for the guy and question the 'any atrocity is permitted for the sake of saving the world' philosophy of my bosses. Also it was just very weird how it was this post apocolypse alien fighting action thing yet i didnt see ANY OF IT cos this story was confined to this one laboratory. It was surreal hearing about all this stuff happening offscreen!

I think Maddiman's main project was some sort of dimensional transport thing using salvaged alien tech? It was just a door in his lab that usually led to a closet but if he got it working itd teleport us straight to the alien base and save the world. And a lot of it wasnt explained but i got this great sense that itd all come together with a great twist ending evebtually but then i woke up before i got that far. Same for the reveal of this maddiman's new sci fi backstory and soooo many other dropped plot threads. Alas!

So anyway: closet. Closet with one of those bead curtain things cos i was thinking about them when i fell asleep. It was supposed to be a teleport but when it malfunctioned it had really scary negative effects warping people's biology and stuff. I remember one of the test subjects was sent in for a five day trip to a specific alternate dimension but then when they came back itd been several years and theyd had to survive in a deadly wasteland and been mutated into a hellbeast. And maddiman had a huge breakdown because he felt like his recklessness and optimism towards this experiment had caused this mistake to happen, and he'd never realized just how awful the consequences could be. He was babbling motor mouth discussing theories for where it went wrong and there was something like 'we'd only tested it for one day trips and assumed that just programming two of them would equal two days but actually with each additional number on the screen it multiplies the days by 3" And there was something about like...the bead curtain was the machine rather than the door itself? Like trying it on a bunch of different doors around the lab to try and find a way to cure this person.

And there was some sort of artificial intelligence computer with the personality of an adorable lil girl, who helped maddiman do calculations and stuff. She missed the mistake in this calculation cos her concept of linear time and the limits of human organs was kinda undeveloped. She only existed within the realm of numbers after all, and didbt even have functionality to record footage of her human friends's faces. No idea wtf a human looks like! So maddiman was lost in his desperate grief of potentially accidebtally killing or at least mentally scarring a person and the government would probably kill them now if they saw they were a super mutant. And he was sobbing and begging this AI to help, his last resort was her maybe being able to see a brainwave that he'd missed. But she was freaking out cos she didnt even fully understand why maddiman was crying let alone what to do to fix it. Eventually she did manage to find a solution theough some simple different logic thing that she had from her perspective as a computer. And that person was saved but still traumatized and maddiman had a moment of realizing just how high stakes everything was and freaking out. He was like 'whats wrong with my head, why didnt i notice that, why was i so reckless, why cant i seem to grasp basic human logic that i need right now" Having a big existential crisis of 'wait how did i even get in this lab, where's my family and why do i seem to have superpowers'. Protagonist mission: hide all the goddamn mirrors to avoid this weird ghostgramp (...aliengramp??) from realizing he's dead (..or an alien??) and losing control of himself. And everyone was running around talking about 'containment procedures' and poor maddiman didnt know that if his panic attack continued he might just straight up be killed for outliving his usefulness. So the protagonist was desperate to help him calm down and it sucked SO MUCH cos they had to lie about his past and weave the web of deception around him again for his own safety. In the end they just hugged him close until he calmed down, and all the other employees were like GASP THEY ACTUALLY TOUCHED THE EVIL DANGEROUS SUPER EVIL MAN and protag was like 'i am 1% away from slapping the next bitch who insults this grandpa'. And it was super depressing cos once he'd calmed down he seemed to start forgetting that anything bad had ever happened?? And he was really panicking and scared cos he didnt understand why he was forgetting, and he knew he had to cling onto something important but he didnt know what. And then five minutes later he was back to haha cheerful nothing is wrong and i love doing my fun science in this room im never allowed to leave. And protagonist was crying the tears that this poor gramp wasnt allowed to cry :(

Also actually i think maybe he was a ghost AND an alien? Like he was a scientist who died in some sort of tragedy back when the aliens first invaded, but along the way he'd been infected so his body got back up as a twisted combination of human and inhuman. And this was something unique to him, like he just happened to have a genetic mutation in his blood that was totally undetectable in life but happened to mix unpredictably with this alien virus to turn him into a hybrid instead of just killing him. So the government was very interested in finding a way to replicate this and create new supersoldiers, as well as just taking advantage of this dude's confused mental state that granted him a unique understanding of alien tech that made him more effective than other scientists. And, of course, also made him easy to manipulate :(

And i also had a feeling that maybe his backstory was mixed up with Adventure dr eggman? Like here it seemed he had a daughter instead of a son, and she had a similar death to Maria Robotnik where she was assasinated by the government he worked for, and it tipped him over the edge. I think Maddiman-alien-scifi-dude originally died trying to save her from being used in some sort of experiment? Like she was already dying of a disease and thats why maddiman took this job to have access to powerful government technology to try and look for a cure. But when the whole alien apocolypse happened, the evil government decided to use her for experiments cos she was 'basically dead anyway'. Theyd just lie and tell maddiman she died of her illness. So this was how they found out that this particular family's bloodline had a mutation that let them form a viable hybrid with alien dna. They were turning this poor kid into a monster in the basement while lying to her dad about her being dead! And maddiman was about to commit suicide from having no reason to live anymore, with the hell of this apocolypse world and the false impression that his kid was already dead. But somehow monster-daughter sensed this or something and broke out of containment to try and save him, and when he saw her he was able to recognise her even in her twisted state. So when the soldiers gunned her down in front of him and fed him some lies about this not being his daughter, he just completely snapped. He tried in vain to fight back and take down as many of them as possible in revenge, but well he was just a simple round dad with no ability to fight a government. So he was unceremoniously executed along with his kid and they shoved the bodies back in the lab to continue testing. "Damn that overemotional science dad, he made us execute our most valable test subject! But at least this way we can analyze his corpse to see if the mutation is passed down on the patrilineal side." But at some point during the fight, monster-daughter's blood had splashed on her dad and gotten into his bloodstream. So the seemingly dead body suddenly got up out of the morgue and started sucking people's blood or something. And this led to the current situation where they have him locked up cos he's a valuable test subject but also hey he has 100% reason to kill all of us and we're screwed if he remembers his past. Also i think the computer AI thing was his subconcious attempt to recreate the personality of his daughter even if he couldnt remember she'd ever existed :(

Anyway at some point things escalated and there was this final showdown versus both the invading aliens and the evil governmebt guys. I think there was some corrupt greedy politician dude who stole maddiman's teleporter tech and sold us out to the aliens cos he wanted money and power or something. And probably predictably the aliens just threw him off a bridge after he gave them the thing, because seriously even this evil army thinks these government dudes are too evil!

So this big actiony event was happening and Maddiman was freaking out like 'no no no i cant leave the lab everyone wpuld be mad at me, i dont even know what its like outside this room' even when he was in the middle of being attacked by aliens. He was forced to face his repressed memories to survive, and he naturally had a massive fuckin freakout! And i think maybe when protagonist character was trying to protect him he accidentally lashed out with his powers and hurt them, and he was so horrified thinking another person he cared about was gonna die because of him. Protagonist was like 'dont worry gramps its just a scratch' but he'd already freaked out and run away into the battlefield to his heavily implied death.

BUT THEN at some sort of moment of dire need, he came back all powered up and re-memoried and was like 'i have every reason to despise humanity but im not gonna let more children die because of these damn corporate monsters (and also literal monsters which are infinately less scary)" And he did some sort of great sacrifice to save the protagonist at the cost of his own life, and it was super dramatic falling from a building into a lake of fire or something. While sobbing and smiling peacefully thinkibg "did i atone for my sins? Will i be able to see my family again?" As his smiling face sunk beneath the flames and the protagonist cried out into the abyss...

Aaaaand then i dont really know what happened in the big battle and i also never found out wtf the solution was to fixing the transporter thing or how the aliens invaded or any of the million plot points that were non gramp related.

I just remember that when we all saved the day and defeated the baddies we found that maddiman had actually survived and it was a big hugs reunion. He was like "OH YEAH i totally forgot i literally already died once and regenerated from it, and this was the entire start to my story. My bad!" *shrugs inexplicably not dead arms*

So yeah in summary im glad my brain summoned up a universe where my favourite sad granddad is literally immortal now, but also why did it torment him with an even sadder plot than his original one

#weird dream tag #the sequence with trying the teleporter curtain on different doors actually took up the majority of the dream #it was ridiculously long and i wish i could slap my brain and be like 'geez save some time for explaining gramp backstory more!'

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sillyandquiteawkward · 7 years

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(This was started in response to your sweet pic of guy and Pickman kissing and not the other thing you drew with the death and the romantic killing. Though if you don’t mind I like using events that you draw as “cannon” to fanfic. I hope you like it, do what you want with it. If you don’t mind I’ll finish the ending and send that to you as well?)

im going to cut this so its not too long but aaaaaaa!! id love to read more, if thats something you want to do, and i dont mind that you base off the story of some of my art (but lmao i hope it wouldnt end in the same way as the death and romantic killing one, i dont think my little gay heart could take it). but i love what youre writing my friend ;w;

Pickman drops off the map. Soul isn’t concerned. More to the point he has too much else to worry about one overly artistic raider killer. He categorizes all the other things he has to worry about as he stares up through the holes in the starlight cinema’s ceiling. Prestion’s itching to retake the castle but Soul is having a hard time giving the order, “pulling the trigger.” This is the big test. He’s been rebuilding Preston’s militia on auto pilot since he put Soul in charge of the damn thing. Flying by the seat of his pants. If he messes this one up the minutemen are done, for good this time. Even if they both survive he doubts Preston will stick around after Soul sends the guys last hope in humanity crashing and burning into the ground.

Soul rolls over. There’s plenty of room. He spreads out like a starfish but that feels too exposed so he curls into a tiny ball on the edge of the mattress. He thinks of his wife and he thinks of his son and he thinks about his dead world. Somewhere in that mess, the thinking becomes dreaming, and he wakes up feeling more scrambled than when he lay down.

Soul ties back his growing mane into a rat-nest ponytail and packs for a trip. The destination is rattling around in the back of his head but he doesn’t care to look for it.

Pack over shoulder he decides to check on the new addition. The water filter in the center of the shanty town rumbles healthy under his hand. He pats one of her pipes thankful for small favors, a pack full of clean water. The residents of Starlight holler farewells and he raises a hand as he sets off the road.

The Commonwealth roads seem subdued. Everything is fuzzy around the edges. He finds himself standing in front of a red door and stares at it for a second, a memory gnawing at the corner of his awareness. He drags it back and examines it. A few hours ago, five ferals on the way, all but the last one killed before they woke up. The last one takes a bullet through the leg as it darts forward.Then another one between the eyes as it lays on the ground. The weather is threatening rain. His head tilts up at the dirty sky.

“Truce for today?”

The commonwealth doesn’t respond.

Now he’s here. Soul starts back to himself and wipes away the streams of water running down his face. He pushes open the door and goes inside just to get out of the rain.

The house is cleaner than his last visit. The gallery itself still sets his gut in knots. Soul walks through it quickly, only glancing at the new additions. There are new additions, surprise and relief catch in his throat and produce something between a grunt and a cough. He assumed- but he was wrong.

The blood stains still coat the floor but it’s no worse than any raider hideout. Soul sits down in a cleanish chair and props up his aching feet on a table. Resting the pistol on his abdomen as he leans back.

Introspection was never his strong suit. Asking why he was here would just mix him up more, he was here. Now what.

He pulled a Snack Cake out of his pack and ate one. He was sitting in Pickman’s house with his feet up on the table getting this powdery stuff all over the place. The rapper crinkled as he stuffed it back in the bag.

A note. He could leave a note in the safe. Soul tucked the gun away and left his pack at the table. Pickman had to have paper and pens around here somewhere. He pushed open a closet door to find it empty, then a bedroom door. The press of cold mettle on his throat and the slam of his body against the hallway wall, their faces are very close. Soul notice’s Pickman’s lips are cracked and bleeding. They stand against the wall for a moment before the grin plastered on pickman’s face falls and he dropped the blade.

“Soul.” He bends to pick up the knife. “You didn’t knock.”

“Hi Pickm- Richard, how- um, how’s it going?”

“I nearly slit your neck. Do you have doors in Sanctuary?”

Soul considers his old home, blasted open as the pressure wave hit “Not anymore.” He chuckles. “I still should have knocked though, sorry about that. I honestly figured you were dead.”

That takes Pickman back. Soul gets a chance to look him over as he steps back and turns 180 to stare back into his bedroom. “Yes, I understand how you would reach that conclusion.” He doesn’t look good. His hair is messy and he is wearing the same suit with only one shoe. The room beyond is dark, boarded up windows and a single mattress.

“I have been out of sorts lately. Nothing to do with you so you shouldn’t concern yourself. I’ll contact you in a few days.” He turns and makes a dismissive shooing motion with one hand. The hand with the knife in it. Soul thinks it might be a more threatening gesture than Pickman intended, but then everything the man does is threatening.

The pack is still sitting beside the table. Soul walks past Richard and begins pulling things out. Carefully packed as it is, the cans aren’t hard to find. He pulls out two and pops them open.

“Drink?”

“No, thank you.” Pickman waves him off.

“You’re dehydrated. Headache so bad you can’t see straight right? How long since you drank something?”

Pickman’s ears move back, it’s the only sign on his face that he’s gritting his teeth.

“I think you might be misinterpreting the situation Killer. I am not your friend or your lover and I do not need you here to pity me.” The last sentence punctuated by the knife’s violent entrance into the tablewood.

“I need you’re help.” Soul responded sloshing the can. “Some tactical advice for the minutemen.”

Pickman drops down in the chair opposite Soul’s, side and takes the proffered can of water. It vanished in a moment and Soul replaced it. He opened a package of deviled eggs and set them on the table between them, popping one in his mouth and sitting down himself watching Pickman sip at the purified water.

“Presumably you didn’t come for advice from a dead man.”

You look like a dead man walking Soul wanted to reply. He recognised the far away look Pickman had in his eyes. He saw it in the mirror often enough.

Instead he just opened his own water can and downed half. He had to be more careful about getting lost from himself for such a long time.

“I suppose I should be thankful you found your way here again. I don’t know how long- how long has it been since we fixed the library’s Mutant problem.”

“About two weeks.”

Pickman shakes his head. “I thought I could break the rules and look where it got me. Thank you for the water but you really should leave now.”

“Not happening.”

“Why?”

“I need some tactical advice and I won’t trust it till your at 100%”

Pickman smiles, it has less poison in it than before, he rubs his eyes. “If you are intent to stay then stay.” He roots around under the table and finds his other shoe. Unlacing and putting it on as he talks. “I have no intention of letting you distract me till my painting is finished.”

Soul spends a moment cataloging rations and water supply for two people in his pack. About three days if he stretches it. GoodNeighbors close enough for a day trip. He nods. “I’ll wait.”

That’s what he does. Pickman moves about the house like a ghost at all hours. The rain lets up but never stops. They talk sometimes but mostly Soul tries to keep out of his way when he’s glassy eyed and leaves open food containers out on the table. He finds them empty. It doesn’t take three days but they are low on everything, Soul is sitting on the front step considering wading through the calf-deep river the streets have become.

He hears pounding. Inside Pickman has a nail between his teeth and he’s hammering another one into the Gallery wall. The framed painting leaning against his leg depicts a building on fire the flames turning in to faces as they climb towards the sky.

Soul feels his skin crawl. It’s the front of the Boston library Pickman has drawn and one of the faces is unmistakably Soul’s own.

Pickman hangs the painting up on it’s wire and adjusts it to sit square with the others. He turns to Soul still standing in the doorway and pulls a hand down his face.

“I would like some of that water now. If you don’t mind.”

They sit down in the kitchen again and soul cracks open the last of the water. They drink in silence before Pickman sighs and speaks not looking up from the gash in the table.

“I apologize for my ill manners earlier Soul. Your opinion on that nickname during our last outing was quite forceful, I assumed using it would drive you away.”

“I’ve been called worse things. That was days ago anyway, I honestly forgot about it.”

“Days?” His eyes widen it’s the most expressive the man’s seemed since he got here. “They’re getting longer.” Pickman grumbles.

“Mine too if it makes you feel any better.” Soul says tipping up the last of the water can. “I walked all the way here like a robot, shot some Ghouls without even thinking about it.”

Pickman blinks. “Ferals, one would hope?”

“Oh, oh ya. No I wouldn’t- I hope it would never.” Soul chokes on the liquid swallows and tries again. “I’ve never killed a person like that. Well- one but he didn’t make it easy.”

He thinks back to MacCready pulling the gun out of his hand as it clicked over empty, again and again. “He didn’t make it easy but he had it coming.”

A well timed roll of thunder and the clattering of the windows increases as the storm piles on. They might be stuck here for a while if this didn’t let up.

“Was he your first?” Pickman asks The flashes of lightning illuminating everything in small doses.

“What? We didn’t- I had a wife. And before that even-”

“Your first kill.” Pickman says nearly laughing.

Soul shakes his head scratching at his crusty jacket. “No, I was in the army before. I remember killing people but not who was first.“ Was that a common discussion point now a days? He remembers MacCready asking the same thing. "Do you?”

Pickman has his hands under his chin leaning forward like he’s listening to an interesting drinking story. “Oh yes.”

…..

(I’m having some trouble figuring out what’s next. I’m thinking a flood? Pickman and Soul try to save some of the artwork but Soul REALLY DOSN’T WANT TO TOUCH IT? Your input would be valued. I am trying to get close to Guy but its difficult with so little to go off of so I feel strange using his name. Anyway thanks for the goldmine of artwork!)

a flood sounds exciting! youve already set up all the water and rain and omg i love the idea of trying to save his art;;; and dont feel bad about not adhering exactly to guy, hes pretty unpredictable, even to me, haha. i let him do whatever he wants, he never tells me anything about himself XD so i dont mind at all that soul isnt guy, hes tricky and a bit convoluted. but im glad i can provide art that you can enjoy and honored that youd write a story for me! :D i love reading your writing;;; i love how you have the characters interacting and the little exchange at the end here made me giggle out loud :D

#endless thanks to you #im love this #submission

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