Entry tags:
[Fic] "Giant Robot Mayhem Doesn't Happen in a Day" (and two others) -- Homestuck
Today is Jadefest reveal day! I wrote three stories, all for ![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/b164c54b26e4/-/archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
ratherrumpus, all in response to the same prompt. I am going to talk about them all in one post, since they are all heavily interconnected.
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First, here is the prompt from which I was working: After their session is complete, the game's resident robot experts, Jade Harley and Dirk Strider, team up to rebuild Skaia Labs. Is this merely a shallow excuse for them to build giant robots together, pilot said robots, and annoy all their team members who dislike wanton giant-robot destruction? Perhaps. Is it going to be awesome regardless? Absolutely.
Ratherrumpus made two other prompts. The first was about Jade as a boxer, possibly with Vriska as a rival, and, well, let's just say that on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being watching linoleum peel and 10 being Homestuck itself, boxing is a very firm 0.5 on my scale of "Things I Find Interesting." Even if it might involve humans and aliens living together. So I didn't even try to work with that one. (I am quite happy that other people enjoy boxing. To each their own! But it is so far from being my thing that boxing and I ought to live in separate galaxies.)
The second prompt I didn't use was about Jade going grimdark instead of Rose, which I kept as a backup idea in case I couldn't get the giant robots to work. I can do grimdark, I can do desperation and angst, and I figured it wouldn't be too difficult to find a split point where it made sense for Jade to bargain with the horrorterrors... but when given a choice between horrorterrors and giant robots, I'm sorry, but I had to try the giant robots first. :-)
It turns out writing giant robots is harder than it looks.
Or at least it is for me. Which is probably because I have a curse known as world-building, which meant I couldn't just say, "Okay, giant robot time!" I had to figure out why Jade and Dirk would be building giant robots, and apparently "Because they're awesome!" doesn't cut any ice with whatever part of my brain deals with plots and character motivations. :-/ I spent nearly a week spinning various ideas that died horribly within the first two sentences, assuming they even made it that far.
The first attempt that clicked enough to be worth trying to write was the third fic I posted.
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( Linnaeus Never Had a Robot )
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( If Kaiju, Therefore Mecha )
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( Giant Robot Mayhem Doesn't Happen in a Day )
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I was unsuccessful in my quest to install Microsoft Office until just a couple days ago, so I wrote all these fics in Google Drive... which was a challenge since my internet connection had been breaking sporadically over the past two weeks. (It was definitely a router issue, which means it was either my upstairs neighbors' problem or the cable company's problem, neither of which I could do much about.) But I got the story done and posted, and people have enjoyed it, which is all one can really ask for.
(I think from some perspectives I may have 'won' Jadefest? At least in terms of hits and kudos and bookmarks? That is a very strange experience for me. Also, seriously, there are a LOT of awesome words and art in the collection. They deserve love too!)
I was surprised that I was the only person to write and post anything in the Jadefest Treats collection! This was frustrating, since I couldn't point people toward that collection without raising the question of, "Oh, and why haven't you left kudos or comments on these stories you want me to read, eh? Eh???" I am pretty sure a couple other people were making noises about trying to fill more than one of their giftee's prompts, but the full prompt list didn't get publicized until Friday so I suppose that restricted opportunities for extra creative efforts. Ah well. So it goes.
---------------
Lastly, ratherrumpus drew an illustration for "Linnaeus Never Had a Robot," which you should go see and praise: they were cool even before the robots.
I could not effectively advertise this before, since I was the only other person with works in the Treats archive, but now I can, and I assure you it is awesome. :-D
---------------
First, here is the prompt from which I was working: After their session is complete, the game's resident robot experts, Jade Harley and Dirk Strider, team up to rebuild Skaia Labs. Is this merely a shallow excuse for them to build giant robots together, pilot said robots, and annoy all their team members who dislike wanton giant-robot destruction? Perhaps. Is it going to be awesome regardless? Absolutely.
Ratherrumpus made two other prompts. The first was about Jade as a boxer, possibly with Vriska as a rival, and, well, let's just say that on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being watching linoleum peel and 10 being Homestuck itself, boxing is a very firm 0.5 on my scale of "Things I Find Interesting." Even if it might involve humans and aliens living together. So I didn't even try to work with that one. (I am quite happy that other people enjoy boxing. To each their own! But it is so far from being my thing that boxing and I ought to live in separate galaxies.)
The second prompt I didn't use was about Jade going grimdark instead of Rose, which I kept as a backup idea in case I couldn't get the giant robots to work. I can do grimdark, I can do desperation and angst, and I figured it wouldn't be too difficult to find a split point where it made sense for Jade to bargain with the horrorterrors... but when given a choice between horrorterrors and giant robots, I'm sorry, but I had to try the giant robots first. :-)
It turns out writing giant robots is harder than it looks.
Or at least it is for me. Which is probably because I have a curse known as world-building, which meant I couldn't just say, "Okay, giant robot time!" I had to figure out why Jade and Dirk would be building giant robots, and apparently "Because they're awesome!" doesn't cut any ice with whatever part of my brain deals with plots and character motivations. :-/ I spent nearly a week spinning various ideas that died horribly within the first two sentences, assuming they even made it that far.
The first attempt that clicked enough to be worth trying to write was the third fic I posted.
-----
( Linnaeus Never Had a Robot )
-----
( If Kaiju, Therefore Mecha )
-----
( Giant Robot Mayhem Doesn't Happen in a Day )
---------------
I was unsuccessful in my quest to install Microsoft Office until just a couple days ago, so I wrote all these fics in Google Drive... which was a challenge since my internet connection had been breaking sporadically over the past two weeks. (It was definitely a router issue, which means it was either my upstairs neighbors' problem or the cable company's problem, neither of which I could do much about.) But I got the story done and posted, and people have enjoyed it, which is all one can really ask for.
(I think from some perspectives I may have 'won' Jadefest? At least in terms of hits and kudos and bookmarks? That is a very strange experience for me. Also, seriously, there are a LOT of awesome words and art in the collection. They deserve love too!)
I was surprised that I was the only person to write and post anything in the Jadefest Treats collection! This was frustrating, since I couldn't point people toward that collection without raising the question of, "Oh, and why haven't you left kudos or comments on these stories you want me to read, eh? Eh???" I am pretty sure a couple other people were making noises about trying to fill more than one of their giftee's prompts, but the full prompt list didn't get publicized until Friday so I suppose that restricted opportunities for extra creative efforts. Ah well. So it goes.
---------------
Lastly, ratherrumpus drew an illustration for "Linnaeus Never Had a Robot," which you should go see and praise: they were cool even before the robots.
I could not effectively advertise this before, since I was the only other person with works in the Treats archive, but now I can, and I assure you it is awesome. :-D
