Elizabeth Culmer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
edenfalling) wrote2013-10-10 02:45 am
edenfalling) wrote2013-10-10 02:45 am
Entry tags:
[Fic] "Trollstuck," part 40 - Homestuck
back to part 39
I think I am going to end up splitting the chapter, but I'm not quite sure if I want to do it between parts 39 and 40, or between parts 40 and 41. Things will probably become clearer after I write part 41, which I will do tomorrow night.
In the meantime, please enjoy part 40. :-)
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Trollstuck, part 40
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====>Be Jothan
After a long and tiring quest, you have finally reached Vriska's respiteblock. Hurrah!
Her door is shut.
This is not too unusual. Vriska gets really into Flarp and stuff and likes to pretend she's drawing up her campaigns in a super-secret gamblignant lair or something, and you think she might also shut her door so she gets an extra second of warning if she's looking at stuff online that doesn't match her image. You're not sure why she cares -- it's not like you don't know she's a giant dork. All your friends are giant dorks. They'd be really boring if they weren't.
Her door is also locked.
That is unusual. You drop by Vriska's hive a lot, and you've only found her respiteblock door locked three times before. You still have no idea what she was doing those nights. Usually she can't wait to brag about the awesome things she's been doing since the last time you saw her, but every now and then she clams up and the few hints she drops sound almost like Alonde, so you've never pushed. You just hope she isn't getting into black majjyyks. You can handle one huge witch for a hatefriend. Two would be asking for trouble, and anyway, you like Vriska the way she is.
You hesitate, then knock.
No response. You press your ear as close to the door as you can -- it's a little tricky with the angle of your horns -- and hold your breath, hoping to hear some sign that Vriska's still alive. But either the door is soundproofed or there's nothing to hear.
You bite your lip, wondering how mad she'll be if you just break down the door and storm in dramatically like it's the climax of an action movie. Busting up your friend's hive is a kind of shitty thing to do, but it's not like Vriska doesn't bust stuff herself when she's working on her doomsday devices, and anyway, better a broken door than a dead friend, right?
Suddenly you hear heavy footsteps echoing through the maze-like interior of the hive. What the hell? Who else would be visiting Vriska? All the rest of your friends are pissed off at her right now, and you're pretty sure she doesn't have any other friends outside your circle.
She does have enemies, though. What if someone heard she's been having trouble and came to take advantage?
You close your hands around the haft of your warhammer and press yourself against the wall, waiting for the intruder to round the corner.
====>Be Aradia
The world stutters.
You see yourself floating in front of yourself, see yourself hurl Davven away, see Sollux turn.
You have no strength left.
Fuck that. You're already dead -- you can feel yourself burn, hear yourself scream: eerie counterpoint and harmony to Davven's own screams as he holds you tight. Who care if you kill yourself two seconds faster by pureeing your brain and forcing it out around your eyes?
You grab hold of yourself and Davven and hurl them away. You turn. You raise a shield. One second, and another, and just one more.
Liquid gushes from your nose, runs down your cheeks; wisps of reddish vapor cloud your sight.
You lose the shield.
====>Be Davven
You just died. You just watched yourself die. Aradia died too. Except not you you, and not Aradia Aradia. Future you and future Aradia. Except not anymore, you hope, since obviously they came back in time and who does that if it's not a last resort to fix something?
Okay, you're pretty sure Jothan could reel off at least a dozen movies about time travel that don't involve the end of the world and horrible death, but that's not the point.
The point is you've already died once tonight. And unless you blink out of here right the hell now, you're probably going to die again.
You really, really do not want to go the way future you did.
Screw facing Sollux; it's obviously a rigged game. You're going to grab Aradia and go stop this at the source. Now where in the name of lost little squeakbeasts has she gotten to?
====>Be Aradia
There are three new ghosts hovering hazily over the churned-up, burned-up mess that used to be your lawn. Two blur and fade almost before you can identify them: yourself with a wink and a wave, Davven frowning, confused and lost with no shades to hide behind.
The third seems even more confused, which isn't surprising. You're not sure horrorterrors have a proper concept of death, which would render the idea of an afterlife completely incomprehensible. But right now you don't have time to explain metaphysics to the psychic remnant of an eldritch squid.
You tap the ghost on one metaphorical tentacle and show it what you need to happen.
====>Be Davven
Light crackles above and to the right. You whirl, ready to blink, but before he can strike, Sollux's eyes film over with purple-black and he falls to the ground like an unstrung marionette. The only light left is the fading stars and the slow encroachment of dawn beyond the horizon.
Aradia touches down beside him, stumbles as she lands -- girl looks like she's running on empty but she's not letting it slow her down one bit. She kneels, wedges her hands under the assembly of twigs and bailing wire that masquerades as Sollux's body, and hauls him over her shoulder. Then she stands and faces you, grim as the sun at noon.
"This needs to end."
You nod. "Yeah. How?"
"Take us to Vriska," Aradia says. She points behind you, at the corpses. "Take all of us."
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Hey look, it's the first instance of traditional dialogue in the whole damn fic!
I realized partway through Jothan's POV (chapter 6) that I had yet to have any characters physically in the same room, and that therefore the first time people spoke to each other on-page could potentially have dramatic weight. (This resulted in one completely rewritten scene, because I didn't want to blow that dramatic tension on a petty argument between Jothan and Equius; I shoved Equius offscreen and had them write notes instead.) And then once I finally got Davven and Aradia in the same location, their potential dialogue would've been a bunch of explaining the plot, and that didn't really seem weighty enough either, so I elided around their conversations -- likewise with Davven and Jarlia during the most recent memo.
But this seems worth breaking that silence.
Hopefully you agree. :-)
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continue to part 41
Okay, I need sleep now.
I think I am going to end up splitting the chapter, but I'm not quite sure if I want to do it between parts 39 and 40, or between parts 40 and 41. Things will probably become clearer after I write part 41, which I will do tomorrow night.
In the meantime, please enjoy part 40. :-)
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Trollstuck, part 40
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====>Be Jothan
After a long and tiring quest, you have finally reached Vriska's respiteblock. Hurrah!
Her door is shut.
This is not too unusual. Vriska gets really into Flarp and stuff and likes to pretend she's drawing up her campaigns in a super-secret gamblignant lair or something, and you think she might also shut her door so she gets an extra second of warning if she's looking at stuff online that doesn't match her image. You're not sure why she cares -- it's not like you don't know she's a giant dork. All your friends are giant dorks. They'd be really boring if they weren't.
Her door is also locked.
That is unusual. You drop by Vriska's hive a lot, and you've only found her respiteblock door locked three times before. You still have no idea what she was doing those nights. Usually she can't wait to brag about the awesome things she's been doing since the last time you saw her, but every now and then she clams up and the few hints she drops sound almost like Alonde, so you've never pushed. You just hope she isn't getting into black majjyyks. You can handle one huge witch for a hatefriend. Two would be asking for trouble, and anyway, you like Vriska the way she is.
You hesitate, then knock.
No response. You press your ear as close to the door as you can -- it's a little tricky with the angle of your horns -- and hold your breath, hoping to hear some sign that Vriska's still alive. But either the door is soundproofed or there's nothing to hear.
You bite your lip, wondering how mad she'll be if you just break down the door and storm in dramatically like it's the climax of an action movie. Busting up your friend's hive is a kind of shitty thing to do, but it's not like Vriska doesn't bust stuff herself when she's working on her doomsday devices, and anyway, better a broken door than a dead friend, right?
Suddenly you hear heavy footsteps echoing through the maze-like interior of the hive. What the hell? Who else would be visiting Vriska? All the rest of your friends are pissed off at her right now, and you're pretty sure she doesn't have any other friends outside your circle.
She does have enemies, though. What if someone heard she's been having trouble and came to take advantage?
You close your hands around the haft of your warhammer and press yourself against the wall, waiting for the intruder to round the corner.
====>Be Aradia
The world stutters.
You see yourself floating in front of yourself, see yourself hurl Davven away, see Sollux turn.
You have no strength left.
Fuck that. You're already dead -- you can feel yourself burn, hear yourself scream: eerie counterpoint and harmony to Davven's own screams as he holds you tight. Who care if you kill yourself two seconds faster by pureeing your brain and forcing it out around your eyes?
You grab hold of yourself and Davven and hurl them away. You turn. You raise a shield. One second, and another, and just one more.
Liquid gushes from your nose, runs down your cheeks; wisps of reddish vapor cloud your sight.
You lose the shield.
====>Be Davven
You just died. You just watched yourself die. Aradia died too. Except not you you, and not Aradia Aradia. Future you and future Aradia. Except not anymore, you hope, since obviously they came back in time and who does that if it's not a last resort to fix something?
Okay, you're pretty sure Jothan could reel off at least a dozen movies about time travel that don't involve the end of the world and horrible death, but that's not the point.
The point is you've already died once tonight. And unless you blink out of here right the hell now, you're probably going to die again.
You really, really do not want to go the way future you did.
Screw facing Sollux; it's obviously a rigged game. You're going to grab Aradia and go stop this at the source. Now where in the name of lost little squeakbeasts has she gotten to?
====>Be Aradia
There are three new ghosts hovering hazily over the churned-up, burned-up mess that used to be your lawn. Two blur and fade almost before you can identify them: yourself with a wink and a wave, Davven frowning, confused and lost with no shades to hide behind.
The third seems even more confused, which isn't surprising. You're not sure horrorterrors have a proper concept of death, which would render the idea of an afterlife completely incomprehensible. But right now you don't have time to explain metaphysics to the psychic remnant of an eldritch squid.
You tap the ghost on one metaphorical tentacle and show it what you need to happen.
====>Be Davven
Light crackles above and to the right. You whirl, ready to blink, but before he can strike, Sollux's eyes film over with purple-black and he falls to the ground like an unstrung marionette. The only light left is the fading stars and the slow encroachment of dawn beyond the horizon.
Aradia touches down beside him, stumbles as she lands -- girl looks like she's running on empty but she's not letting it slow her down one bit. She kneels, wedges her hands under the assembly of twigs and bailing wire that masquerades as Sollux's body, and hauls him over her shoulder. Then she stands and faces you, grim as the sun at noon.
"This needs to end."
You nod. "Yeah. How?"
"Take us to Vriska," Aradia says. She points behind you, at the corpses. "Take all of us."
---------------
---------------
---------------
Hey look, it's the first instance of traditional dialogue in the whole damn fic!
I realized partway through Jothan's POV (chapter 6) that I had yet to have any characters physically in the same room, and that therefore the first time people spoke to each other on-page could potentially have dramatic weight. (This resulted in one completely rewritten scene, because I didn't want to blow that dramatic tension on a petty argument between Jothan and Equius; I shoved Equius offscreen and had them write notes instead.) And then once I finally got Davven and Aradia in the same location, their potential dialogue would've been a bunch of explaining the plot, and that didn't really seem weighty enough either, so I elided around their conversations -- likewise with Davven and Jarlia during the most recent memo.
But this seems worth breaking that silence.
Hopefully you agree. :-)
---------------------------------------------
continue to part 41
Okay, I need sleep now.