Note: This ficlet was written for a Tumblr anon, in response to the prompt: For your Black Jewels/Homestuck verse: Dave, Jane, Responsibility?Jewelstuck!Jane has some Issues vis-à-vis authority. Dave's issues are still mostly about insecurity and living up to other people's legacies, and thus don't really get dealt with here. (500 words exactly)
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"I never wanted to be anyone's Queen," Jane says as she and Dave sit on the gray, game-construct platform, studiously ignoring the battle planning session behind them. "It seems so invasive! People should choose how to organize our lives, not get yanked around willy-nilly by genetic compulsions."
She can still see her friends' faces, tense with the strain of fighting themselves in order to disobey her. She can still feel the way she'd choked them with intangible threads, scarred them with invisible claws. She can still taste her own cold, vicious anger that they dared to stand against her, her thirst for their coming punishment. And none of that was the Condesce; it all came from her.
"I don't even like gardens," she adds, somewhat illogically.
"Not even for, like, growing your own kitchen herbs? Home cooking and all that?" Dave says from a respectful two feet away, which feels simultaneously too far away and far too close.
Jane pulls her knees to her chest and makes a face at the glitch-scarred void. "No. Oh, I've given blood to my backyard, and the park down the street -- it would be irresponsible not to! -- but I don't care two beans about the land. I always wanted to be a hearth-witch and not have to worry about anybody serving me except in return for salaried remuneration. Capitalism and democracy aren't perfect by a long stretch, but they beat all hell out of rural feudalism."
"I'm from Houston. You're preaching to the choir," Dave says. Then he tilts his head, the joint-claws of his wings shifting slightly where they hook over his shoulders, and adds, "You are my Queen, though. And Dirk's. Probably everyone else's too, but it's not as punch-in-the-nose obvious for them as it is for Warlord Princes. We don't have to do anything about that connection, especially since we don't have anywhere near enough people to make an official Court, but ignoring emotional shit just makes everything weird and I am so fuckin' tired of making like nothing's wrong when everybody is obviously falling apart."
Jane rests her chin on her knees and closes her eyes. "I don't know, pretending has been working pretty well for me."
"Really," Dave says.
Jane sighs. "No, not really. Ugh. Why is it so hard to be a mature and sensible human being?"
"Hell if I know," Dave says. He moves closer and rests one hand on her right shoulder, bare fingers just brushing the skin of her neck. The contact feels oddly right somewhere in the darker parts of Jane's mind that she's been trying (and failing) to slam the lid on since she was deprogrammed. "But hey, we can all practice together once we beat this unbeatable demon and reconstitute the multiverse through the joys of radioactive frog-farming. Which is not a sentence I ever expected to hear myself say, but whatever. Life's full of surprises. We just gotta help each other roll with them."
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[Fic] "Noblesse Oblige" - Homestuck/Black Jewels
Date: 2016-03-10 04:50 am (UTC)---------------
"I never wanted to be anyone's Queen," Jane says as she and Dave sit on the gray, game-construct platform, studiously ignoring the battle planning session behind them. "It seems so invasive! People should choose how to organize our lives, not get yanked around willy-nilly by genetic compulsions."
She can still see her friends' faces, tense with the strain of fighting themselves in order to disobey her. She can still feel the way she'd choked them with intangible threads, scarred them with invisible claws. She can still taste her own cold, vicious anger that they dared to stand against her, her thirst for their coming punishment. And none of that was the Condesce; it all came from her.
"I don't even like gardens," she adds, somewhat illogically.
"Not even for, like, growing your own kitchen herbs? Home cooking and all that?" Dave says from a respectful two feet away, which feels simultaneously too far away and far too close.
Jane pulls her knees to her chest and makes a face at the glitch-scarred void. "No. Oh, I've given blood to my backyard, and the park down the street -- it would be irresponsible not to! -- but I don't care two beans about the land. I always wanted to be a hearth-witch and not have to worry about anybody serving me except in return for salaried remuneration. Capitalism and democracy aren't perfect by a long stretch, but they beat all hell out of rural feudalism."
"I'm from Houston. You're preaching to the choir," Dave says. Then he tilts his head, the joint-claws of his wings shifting slightly where they hook over his shoulders, and adds, "You are my Queen, though. And Dirk's. Probably everyone else's too, but it's not as punch-in-the-nose obvious for them as it is for Warlord Princes. We don't have to do anything about that connection, especially since we don't have anywhere near enough people to make an official Court, but ignoring emotional shit just makes everything weird and I am so fuckin' tired of making like nothing's wrong when everybody is obviously falling apart."
Jane rests her chin on her knees and closes her eyes. "I don't know, pretending has been working pretty well for me."
"Really," Dave says.
Jane sighs. "No, not really. Ugh. Why is it so hard to be a mature and sensible human being?"
"Hell if I know," Dave says. He moves closer and rests one hand on her right shoulder, bare fingers just brushing the skin of her neck. The contact feels oddly right somewhere in the darker parts of Jane's mind that she's been trying (and failing) to slam the lid on since she was deprogrammed. "But hey, we can all practice together once we beat this unbeatable demon and reconstitute the multiverse through the joys of radioactive frog-farming. Which is not a sentence I ever expected to hear myself say, but whatever. Life's full of surprises. We just gotta help each other roll with them."
"Yes," Jane agrees. "I suppose we do."