hs_olympics | BONUS ROUND 1

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bonus round

BONUS ROUND 1

Bonus Round 1

Genre-Mixing

Hey, shippers! Welcome to your very first bonus round proper--we hope you have lots of fun with it! This time around we're going to be asking you to mix it up a little--each fanwork posted for this round will be a mish-mash of two different genres, blended together in a delightful incestuous slurry to create an UNSTOPPABLE CREATIVE CONCOCTION--er. Or. Something.

Yeah, we're genre-mixing. That's what we're doing this round.

Rules

Submit prompts! Prompts should consist of two different genres and one ship. This cannot be your team's ship! These are worth 5 points each, for a maximum of 100 points per team.

Look through the prompts and fill whichever you like!

You may not fill prompts for your ship, nor may you fill your own team's prompts.

Fills should be posted as replies to the prompts which they are for, following the format below. They may be any medium.

Title Format
If you are starting a new thread, please use this format in your title.

Replace [YOUR SHIP] with the name of the team YOU belong to; please use the characters and quadrant, not whatever portmanteau or nickname you've come up with.
If your team name is not in this format and in the title we cannot guarantee that it will be counted.

If you are filling a prompt, use this format in your title.

Replace [YOUR SHIP] with the name of the team YOU belong to; please use the characters and quadrant, not whatever portmanteau or nickname you've come up with.
If your team name is not in this format and in the title we cannot guarantee that it will be counted.

Posts not using this format in the title will be understood to be unofficial discussion posts, no matter what they contain. They, like all comments on the comm, are subject to the Wank Policy.

Scoring
For prompt posts: 5 points each (maximum of 100 per team)

For fills (as stated here):
First 5 entries in each post: 30 (per entry)
Entries 6-10 in each post: 20 (per entry)
Entries 11-15 in each post: 10 (per entry)
Entries 16+ in each post: 5 (per entry)

All scored content must be created/assembled new for this round.

If you have any questions, please ask them at the FAQ post here, or email them to us (homestuck.shipping at gmail). Otherwise, we cannot guarantee that we will see them in a timely fashion!

Page 67 of 146

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

You'd think those genres would be easier to combine, wouldn't you? Here's my go at it, at any rate, and I hope you enjoy it!

From The Revelation

"We're almost up to the point, I think," says Rose, scribbling in her book, "where you go mad. I'm frightfully sorry about that."

"Huh?" You look over from your computer, where your pdfs of Mindfang's journal are glitching like crazy again. Last time they did that, it was... was... when? You can't remember. "What are you blathering about now? More of your laaaaaaaame, pointless predictions?"

"Oh no," answers Rose, looking up. She's grey again, black mist swirling around her in a way that, as usual, you try very, very hard not to let your vision eightfold resolve into shadowy tentacles. "It's merely a hazard of being a Hero of Light. The sort of understanding of probability we inescapably discover along our personal quests is bound to drive us bugfuck insane. It is a natural consequence of abruptly realising the sheer meaninglessness of fortune in the light of the game's ultimate nature."

"God, can you be any more obscure and annoying?" Oh fuck. This is one of the bad days, when she just won't stop ruining the moment with random longwinded non sequiturs that are frankly getting kind of disturbing.

"It also comes from being a tragic hero," she goes on, and oh no no no no no no no no, not this again. You slam your husktop shut and march over to her, wings fluttering in agitation.

"What are you doing? I told you to stop talking to them, Lalonde, it's not helping!"

"Oh?" She quirks a lusus-white eyebrow, and you want to die from how adorable the movement is, but that would be the lamest death ever and you don't need to embarrass yourself in front of the only other person left in the universe who isn't a creepy squid-thing. Yet. "I didn't realise that was the quadrant we were in. I apologise for my inappropriate physical advances, the-mmph!"

You have blood on your lips when you draw back. You hope grimdarkness isn't haemally transmitted, you'd rather not turn into a tentacled monstrosity like your stalkers, but Rose seems a little paler again, and pleased. "Well, then," she says with a coy smile and reaches for your hand, fingers curling around yours like tentacles and pulling you closer. "Now that you've re-established that we're not moirails, I'll be quite delighted to be tanglebuddies with you, Miss Serket, but first there is something I wish to show you."

Tanglebuddies. That's a word you can't recall her using before, though Peixes used to say it all the time so it's probably a horrorterror thing.

"Show me what? There's nothing to see in this stupid lab and outside it's all just dust and rocks and Feferi's stupid squid as far as you can see."

"Hm." She draws back a little, and regards you like an interesting lab experiment. "It seems you would benefit from some cheering up before you go mad."

Uh oh. A statement like this always leads to her pulling out the cheat codes, and she knows yours eidetically, as she proves when she leans in and presses her lips against yours, a silent request which the script demands that you oblige, ravaging her willing mouth with your tongue, and then her free arm comes up around you, her weird human warmth only increased by her body's feverish response to horrorterror possession, and for the first time you relax. You don't what this creature is that you love, how much of it is Rose and how much is Elder God and how much is something new born of the two, and you should be terrified, but you grew up in the care of something that liked you less, even if only your body was ever in danger on that front, so you can't bring yourself to care. (Sometimes you wonder if that's part of her psychic squid powers too, but that leads to infinite recursions that keep you awake all day and you hate that. No, you're pretty sure you honestly, sincerely pity the fuck out of Rose Lalonde, poor little human girl with gods in her head and no more able to escape into death than you.) But she's definitely fucking with your head, because suddenly you feel cold, and when you pull back you're surrounded by open black void instead of grey walls and metal corridors.

Or maybe she's not reading as far ahead as she thinks and you're already going mad. Who knows, maybe it's contagious.

"Come on," she says before you can protest, and she keeps whispering in your ear as she leads you over to the edge of the roof, and you flinch and shove her away.

"You know I can't speak horrorterror! Talk like a normal person!!!!!!!!"

She sighs and pulls you right up to the edge and a lesser troll might pull back, but you're a Serket, and you're not afraid of long drops. (Even after all this time, part of you still forgets you can fly, and if you fell here, your story would be over. Or epilogue. Rose insists this is an epilogue, a side-chapter in a larger epic, a branching line that no longer matters, but you won't accept that. You won't be relegated to being a side-character.) No, it's not vertigo that makes you abruptly struggle to pull back from the edge, to flee into the safety of the lab, but Rose holds you, not just with hands now but with tentacles of black smoke, intangible but irresistable, with her dark whispers, with the burning in your blood where it mixed with hers, and you have to look.

"Come on," says Rose, still speaking grimdark but with subtitles planted in your think pan like out of those cartoons Leijon loved, and what the fuck? You signed up for a tale of classic heroism and epic caliginous rivalry when you played this game, not bad translations and - She tugs at your hand. "It's better from down there."

It's not smart. But there's a reason the pair of you aren't pale, and when she jumps, you jump, wings spread and fluttering hard to slow your fall.

Her descent is more elegant, borne on the black boiling smoke of her possession, and on impulse, when you land, you stick out your foot.

She doesn't trip, but she gives you a faint grin for the attempt, and it helps. You want to see her be silly.

John wanted that too, you think. But you never really got to ask him about it.

Then you look up at the sky again and clutch your dice so hard you can feel the points cutting into your skin.

"Isn't it beautiful?" Her hand is on your arm, soft and still burning, always burning, with that alien heat. "It's nothing to worry about, Vriska. It's actually rather enjoyable, living between pages."

"Pages..." you murmur. "Hahahahahahahaha, that's sooooooooo funny, Lalonde, I'm hysterical!" You are, but not with laughter, as you stare up as what she found for you, the darkness of the Furthest Ring split open by circuits and code, ~ATH and html, and she was right, you are going mad. You must be mad, to see this now. To see this only now. How everything you are and were and should have been and won't be, is decided in the end by someone else.

"Perils of being a might-have-been," says Rose, and there's something satisfied in her voice, and maybe you should have cared that she was more grimdark every day and less Light, the mad Seer in her pit of smoke, and maybe you should have run, but it's too late now, and besides, you still don't want to. "Now you understand," she says, sliding her arms fully around you, her breath warm against your neck, and you want her to bite, to infect you with the things that live in her head because this is too much for you, alone in your body, "why luck doesn't matter."

You couldn't fathom before what madness felt like. You didn't expect it to feel like the fear skittering in your abdomen, like your hopelessness at the thought that your luck and your choices were never your own and you can't even fathom the mind of the being they belong to.

Now, staring up at the darkness of the server in which your Incipisphere drifts, the glimmers of light from a story that somewhere continues without you, in the arms of a being so reasonable and yet beyond reason, you think at last you know. You just didn't expect it to be so oddly comforting.

Oh my god I just started laughing MUCH HARDER than I should have.

This is probably the first time I've written in a while, so I apologize for how crazy and sarcastic it all sounds. I'm tired, but I managed to whip up a sketch for it. Wonderful prompt, though!
____________________________________________________________________

You and Dirk work as crew members of a pirate ship. The captain is quite a considerate guy, and he (surprisingly) hasn’t thrown you two overboard yet for being the best slackers out there. You blame Dirk for that, though. He’s constantly throwing jokes and stuff at you, and you always have to do his chores. But you stink at cleaning, so the captain usually has to get some other guys of the crew to finish up after you.

You love jokes. Jokes are great. You don’t have anything against Dirk, it’s just that his jokes quite literally suck and shouldn’t even be considered jokes. Most of them are sexual innuendo or deadpan anyway, and it’s quite obvious that he somewhat likes you. You don’t know how to respond to that. You’ll appreciate that he tries, at the least.

It’s getting late and the sun is setting—and you see Strider striding up to you to bother you some more.. He better be looking for something serious to talk about since you’re busy scrubbing the part of the deck that he was supposed to scrub.

He isn’t going to say anything serious. You can tell.

You two start discussing some of the usual things. The "usual things" consists of you complaining about how lazy he is and that you have to do all his work and him coming up with excuses of why he shouldn’t sweep or scrub or wash something. The "usual things" don’t consist of anything serious.

"You should get to work, Dirk. I don’t think Cap’ll be happy when he finds out that you’re walking around with his parrot on your shoulder. Help me sweep. " You toss him the other broom.

He gives in and helps you—you’re glad. But he’s definitely not going to shut up, and you know that.

"I’ve been teaching him some phrases. He’s a quick learner. " He looks satisfied as he glances at the bird on his shoulder. It’s like he’s expecting you to be impressed with all his hard work. Pffah.

You snort, wondering if he actually believes he can teach it to rap-off (as he calls it) with him, or something. "You’re ridiculous. He’s a parrot. He can’t compete with your mad skills. " You intended that to be sarcastic, but he looks like he’s going to take it as a compliment.

"Mad skills? You really think I’m that good? " He shrugs and starts sweeping again. "Yeah, I guess you’re right. I shouldn’t be competing with an old bird that can’t do anything but sit on your shoulder and stare people down. "

You sigh and stay quiet as the two of you work on swiping down the whole deck. You wonder when he’s going to disturb the silence again with another attempt at impressing you. Soon enough, he looks up at you with a smile, and you can tell he’s going to say something else stupid. Your mouth turns into a fine line as you wait for the millionth joke of the day. Patience, you tell yourself.

"Other than rapping, you know what else I’m good at? "

Here it comes.

"What. "

"This. " He gives you an extremely flirty smirk, and you feel your face go hot because he’s really stupid and that seriously stunk and wow, he’s an idiot and you’re one too for putting up with him. You feel embarrassed for him because of how terrible that was.

"Ughhh, Strider! Jesus flippin' christ on a cracker Dirk, I think you should stop!" Great, that sounded terrible.

"Okay, but the deck's not the only thing we'll be sweeping up once we're finished. " He sounds so serious, and you guess this is another of his deadpan jokes. You give him an annoyed look and settle to not responding to his chattering for the rest of the day.

"Dirk, please just stop and help me sweep, okay?"

This guy’s impossible, and you wonder if there even is a way to shut him up.

Edited 2012-06-13 15:57 (UTC)

Daaaaaaaamn look at these kids. Wow this is great! I love the color on Jade, especially the veil. And John's hand on her waist is very sexy, look at that girl's hips go. And John! So dapper! And his ear is pierced wow. I'll stop now before I sound even sillier but thank you so very much for this, it's great!

Wow. This was really amazing and I love it just.... ahhhhh. Feelings.

EVEN A SKETCH???
oh this is PERFECT! Thank you!!!

Dave<>Terezi. roadtrip + surrealism.

Edited 2012-06-13 16:12 (UTC)

planning on filling this :3

The picture above inspired me so here is a double fill I guess. I didn’t see any note against it in the prompt rules so hopefully that’s alright? :)

*

The first time you see her it’s night and you’re reading Poe with the aid of an oil lamp. She’s pressed against the window, soft as moonlight, skin dripping silverwhite like candle wax. You’re certain it’s all a dream, some fleeting trick of the mind, but when you wake up, the are handprints on the windowpane.

At breakfast you spread marmalade over freshly baked bread and ask your mother if anyone’s ever died here. The maid looks scandalized, but mother sweet just laughs and pats you on the head, telling you that you’re too young to be out looking for ghost stories.

You smile politely, finish your tea, then spend the afternoon in the town hall digging through old newspaper logs until you find it. Aradia Medigo, age 14, fire. In the photograph she looks young and wide-eyed. There are flowers in her hair and a streak of dirt on her white dress. There’s a hint of mystery in her eyes, or so you’d like to think, a kind of childish trickery, come away with me, come play with me.

The archivist enters the room and let’s you know that your time is up. You reassure him that you had the decency to use gloves and walk away tasting dust.

*

The next time you see her, you’re ready for it, but that’s only because you opened your window and shimmied down the side of the veranda the second you see moonlight waltzing through the trees. She leads you through the forest and up the hill, voice tinkling like fairy bells and laughter and all the things your mother told you not to do. You’re fully aware of how foolish you’re being, but the stories of the girls staying at home in their nightdress are never any fun. The hats and the dresses and the books are fun and all, but you want something gritty and concrete, you want leaves in your hair and dirt beneath your fingers, you want a secret and a mystery and a tale you’ll only ever tell to someone you can trust. The hummingbird thump of your heart leads you on more so than the tug of any fishing line.

When you catch up to her, your hair has come undone, you have a stone in your shoe, and you are hopelessly lost. She turns slightly, framed by the stars and the sky and the black ink horizon. Her hair is coiled, spooling silver, her skin translucent, her lips bright red. She’s the most fascinating thing you’ve ever seen.

“What are you looking for?” She asks, and her voice reminds you of a music box you had when you were younger. You lost it in a river.

“An adventure,” you tell her, because you’re young and breathless and desperate enough to say it.

She smiles. Her mouth is diamonds. Her mouth is glass. Her mouth is bones splitting from the earth and reaching skyward to grab at passing ankles.

“Well,” she says. “You’ve certainly come to the right place.”

The place in question is a graveyard. You're only seeing that now.

She skips and lands on the head of a tombstone, feet light, arms spread, hair wild. She clicks her absent tongue and you realize she has horns curling on either side of her head.

"Do you want to see where the ghost are?"

You say yes, and the ground opens, and swallows you whole.

Aradia <3 Sollux
Film noir + paranormal

I don't know what I'm doing. I don'y even know if I hit the genre you wanted, but I hope you like it. I was going to make it longer but every thing I tried to add took away from it. :/

-
Ten million courtiers
Unparalleled magnificence
Revolving around the centre of power
The empress
Let there be sought a young woman
A beautiful, admirable woman with
Dignity and
Nobility
Confident
Dynamic
Efficient
Let her comfort and lie in thy bosom
Moirallegiance, the pale quadrant
Perfectly Arranged
-

Sources:
tvtropes.org
The Book of 1st Kings: The Bible
www.emilypost.com/image-consulting
mspaintadventures.wikia.com/wiki/Troll_Relationships

ahhhhhh this is gorgeous. Hats off to you!

That was beautiful. Thank you.

Nepeta<>Equius

Letters+Military

DEAR FUTURE ME,

HAS IT REALLY ALREADY BEEN A SWEEP? THE MARKS ON THE WALL MUST BE WRONG. I WOULDN'T PUT IT PAST PAST ME TO FORGET WHAT BILUNAR PERIGEE IT WAS AND SLIP IN A FEW EXTRA TALLY MARKS IN AN AMNESIA-INDUCED STUPOR. THAT GUY'S A FUCKING IDIOT.

YOU KNOW, AFTER ALL THIS TIME, I THINK I'VE FINALLY FIGURED OUT WHY I'M STILL HERE. IT'S TIME I STOPPED BEING SUCH A FUCKING CRYGRUB AND OWNED UP TO THE FACT THAT I'M NOT DREAMING, AND I HAVEN'T DIED AND GONE TO TROLL HELL. THIS ISN'T JUST BECAUSE I'M OFF THE HEMOSPECTRUM, EITHER. I COULD'VE GONE OUT WITH THE GLUB, TOO, BUT GL'BGOLYB MUST HAVE KNOWN SOMETHING. MAYBE FEFERI TOLD HER ABOUT ME, OR MAYBE SHE HAD SOME WEIRD ELDRITCH POWER THAT ALLOWED HER TO SEE INTO THE THINK PAN OF WHATEVER POOR SAP HER GODFORSAKEN WHIMS CHOSE. BUT SOMEHOW, SHE MUST HAVE KNOWN ME FOR WHO I AM: THE SINGLE WORST EXCUSE FOR A TROLL IN THE HISTORY OF TROLLKIND. SHE KEPT ME ALIVE AS A FORM OF TORTURE, AS A FINAL "FUCK YOU" BEFORE HER LAST GASP, JUST SO I KNEW WHERE I STOOD.

MAYBE IF I WASN'T SUCH A NOOKSUCKER TO EVERYONE I MET, MAYBE IF I ACTUALLY LIVED UP TO ANYTHING I TOLD ANYONE I WAS, MAYBE IF I EVER ENTERED ANY MEANINGFUL RELATIONSHIP THAT DIDN'T END IN COMPLETE UTTER FUCKING FAILURE, IT MIGHT'VE MADE A DIFFERENCE. BUT YOU KNOW WHAT? I FUCKING DESERVE IT. OF COURSE I CAN'T APOLOGIZE OR MAKE IT UP TO ANY OF THE PEOPLE I KNEW. THAT MIGHT GIVE ME SOME SEMBLANCE OF SATISFACTION. BUT THE WORST PART OF ALL IS THE FACT THAT MY ONE COMPANION THROUGH ALL THIS IS THE SORRY SACK OF SHIT I CALL A SELF. I HATE READING PAST ME'S LETTERS. HE ALWAYS SAYS THE DUMBEST SHIT, WHILE ALL I CAN DO IS JUST SIT THERE, PROTEIN CHUTE AGAPE, WISHING I COULD SOMEHOW REACH THROUGH TIME AND SLAP HIM IN THE FUCKING FACE. MAYBE IF I STILL HAD TROLLIAN, I COULD WARN HIM WHAT A FUCKING MORON HE WAS, AND PREVENT SOME OF HIS INANE CLUCKBEAST SCRATCH FROM EVER REACHING A PIECE OF PAPER. BUT NO, FATE HAD TO BE CRUEL ENOUGH TO TAKE THAT AWAY, TOO.

OH, WHO AM I FUCKING KIDDING? GL'BGOLYB WAS A BIG-ASS TENTACLE MONSTER WHO COULD WIPE OUT EVERYONE IN THE GALAXY WITH HER FUCKING VOICE. SHE DIDN'T KNOW SHIT ABOUT ME, AND EVEN IF SHE DID, WHY WOULD SHE GIVE A FUCK? I ONLY SURVIVED BECAUSE I'M A FUCKING FREAK OF NATURE.

AS MUCH AS I HATE MY LIFE RIGHT NOW, AND AS MUCH AS I'M ONLY KEEPING MYSELF ALIVE TO STAVE OFF WHATEVER THE FUCK COMES NEXT, THERE IS AN UPSIDE TO ALL THIS. I REMEMBER TALKING WITH FUTURE ME BACK BEFORE THE WHOLE PLANET WENT TO SHIT. YOU ALWAYS HAD SOMETHING UNBEARABLY FUCKING SMUG TO SAY, TO MAKE ME FEEL EVEN MORE WORTHLESS THAN I ALREADY DO. NOW I CAN WRITE TO YOU, AND YOU CAN'T WRITE BACK. AND YOU KNOW WHAT? WHEN I DO ALL THE TALKING, YOU'RE ACTUALLY KIND OF FUCKING BEARABLE. ISN'T THAT SAD? THE ONLY PERSON WHO CAN EVER GIVE ME ANY KIND OF COMFORT IS SOMEONE WHO NEVER SAYS OR DOES ANYTHING TO ME. I GUESS WHAT THEY SAID IS TRUE: HELL REALLY IS OTHER TROLLS.

MAYBE I CAN'T BRING THE OTHERS BACK, BUT AS LONG AS I'VE GOT YOU, I'VE GOT HOPE. I DON'T CARE IF IT TAKES SEASONS OR EVEN SWEEPS, BUT BECAUSE OF YOU, THERE'S AN INFINITESIMALLY SMALL CHANCE THAT, EVENTUALLY, I MIGHT EVEN BE FUCKING HAPPY.

MAYBE THAT'S SOMETHING WORTH LIVING FOR.

( Optional ending image because I don't know how many people would get the reference: http://i882.photobucket.com/albums/ac29/Gjarble/karkat-karkat.gif )

"Looks like quite a crowd out there today!" You grin as you finish your traditional peek through the curtains. It's hard to see everything in venues like this, but you can see enough.

"I know! It's so pawfully exciting, isn't it?" Nepeta gives you a big, toothy smile. "We haven't had a crrrowd like this in so long!"

"Well, I told them that our act would bring people in, didn't I?" You take one last slip of your second martini - you're allowed to have exactly two martinis before you begin your act now, since the ringmaster is a bit of an old-fashioned sort, and two martinis afterwards to celebrate and relax. It took you a long time to get him to agree to even that compromise! But you do better on stage with a drink or two, honest!

"And now, in the center ring, we have an act that will astound you, ladies and gents. A lady who can change shapes right before your eyes -"

You reach over and give Nepeta a pat on the back. "You ready to go, kitty?"

"Totally!" Her olive eyes are gleaming with excitement.

You hustle out the curtain - if you let yourself get distracted by all of Nepeta's enthusiasm and happiness, you might end up missing a cue again. Much better to hold off on all of that, at least until the act is over.

"And so, ladies and gentlement, I present to you, the lioness and her partner, Nepeta and Roxy!"

You're ready for your cue as soon as the spotlight comes on, posing with your hands on your hips - you don't need a crop, not for your sweet little kitty - and Nepeta lounging behind you in her blue leotard and kitty mask. She stretches, poses, does amazing acrobatic contortions as you stalk around - this isn't the act. This is just a warm-up, something to keep the audience's attention while the hands set the stage for the real act. Still, the audience eats it up, and if you didn't have to smile for the audience you'd eat it up too. It's perfect, that time - the crowd's roar is loud and perfectly fuzzed by the martinis, and you're ready. You're ready for anything.

Nepeta finishes her posing and leaping and lands on all fours, and you glance over the stage entrance, looking for the flash of light - and there it is, blinking from the curtains. So you look back at Nepeta and signal, a complicated sort of wave that means hey, kitty, we're ready to go!

Nepeta grins, nods at you - and then roars. The audience gasps as Nepeta begins to shift, her body tearing out of its leotard as her hands shorten to paws. Soft olive fur covers her entire body, and her kitty tail is cast aside in place of a real one. The next time Nepeta roars, she's not just a troll-girl who looks a little like a kitten - she's a real jungle-cat, with fur the color of her eyes and massive white teeth.

And now, you think, it's time for the fun part! You leap onto her back, balancing yourself on her muscular shoulders, and point. "Go!" you yell, and she looks back at you and gives you a kitty-grin, just before she leaps.

And then you're off, balancing on her back as she makes her way through the elaborate course that the circus hands have just finished designing - leaping too, when she has to run under things that are too low for you to crouch under. You're feeling fantastic - you spent most of your childhood leaping through windows and rolling under logs and things, just so that someday you could do something like this! (Of course you never thought you'd be doing it on the back of a troll that could turn into a jungle cat, but those are just details, right?)

It's an amazing course, this time - they've really outdone themselves, right up to the to hoops at the end that sudden burst into flames as you approach, one of them way higher than usual. It takes an awesome leap for you to make it up there, but somehow you do make it, and the crowd just goes wild! You're just overwhelmed as you and Nepeta make your final bows, amazed by the way that they just love you, your entire body pumped full of adrenaline. You barely even hear the ringmaster's final words as you walk backstage with Nepeta, still in her kitty shape.

She stays in it until you make it back to your trailer. You two have a private one, now, for which you're very grateful. "That," she said as she shifted back and flopped onto the cot, "was pawsome."

"It definitely was!" You flop into bed next to her, and give her a long hot kiss. "You were amazing, Neppy, you really were!"

She makes a self-satisfied little purring sound and reaches for you, pulling you close. "I know. But you were amazing too, you know!"

"We're both amazing, okay?" you say, and kiss her again. It's usually like this after a performance, which might be why they gave you the private trailer, to be fair.

You'll have those martinis later. Right now, you've got something better.

Edited 2012-06-16 16:38 (UTC)

You bring him flowers for his bedside table - daisies and bluebells and buttercups - wild ones, since that's what he likes best. It's the only thing you carry. The doctor's told you to stop bringing in homework a week and a half ago.

His sitting up when you enter the room, head turned to the window, hospital gown hanging loose on shoulders grown too skinny. It's closed, because it's spring and it's still kind of cold, but when he asks you to open it, you do. The breeze is cool and smells like lilacs.

They told him he was too young to change things and now they're saying he's too young to die. He laughs when he tells you that, but it's not a hollow sound. His eyes are still bright. His eyes are still bright so that's what you zero in on. You look past the IV drips and the lank hair and the brittle wrists and think, you are a survivor. You tell him this much. Yes, he says. There's still so much left for me to do, he says. I can't die just yet, he says.

Three weeks later you're standing in front of a funeral casket holding a bouquet of flowers your mother gave you. The plastic wrapping feels all wrong in your palms. This feels all wrong. The sun is shining and there isn't a cloud in the sky, and that feels like the greatest injustice of all.

You think of all the nights spent counting stars and sharing dreams and secrets.

You don't think about his corpse in the box covered with department store flowers.

Revolution, he used to say. And you think, the world's gotta know.

The Sufferer<3The Disciple

Passion play + Poetry

Ahh this is fantastic. I love your Feferi, all friendly and bubbly and excited and shouting H's but then making frighteningly casual comments about helmsman. So great. :)

Rule 63 + Sukeban/Japanese Yankee girls, Dave <3 Tavros

bonus love if Aradia is actually their boss

Edited (clarification) 2012-06-13 17:38 (UTC)

Karkat<3Equius

Heartwarming family film + Parody

god bless im on this

"Come on, KK, hurry it up."

Karkat grimaces at the voice in his earpiece. "Go rot, Captor. The more you interrupt me the longer it'll take. I have to start all over again, you pustulent shithole."

On the roof above, Sollux stays agreeably quiet for the space of about ten seconds. "Just as long as you're aware that our timeframe before sunrise is ridiculously short, and it only gets smaller with every-"

Karkat snarls. "Oh, fuck you. How long do you think it takes to crack a safe?"

"Roughly zero point two seconds if I can hack it. We'll of course have to make concessions given your so-called 'skills,' but even so-"

"Then go take a blind flying leap off a cliff. There's a mechanical component to this one."

"No wonder it's taking so goddamn long. TZ should be doing it."

"Go choke down her bulge, you hideous pile of trash. She's busy in Scratch's office. Why aren't you hassling her?"

"She's actually good at her job. Hey, KK, you might crack that safe faster if you didn't have one hand down your pants fantasizing about my fellatio skills-"

Karkat rips the earpiece out, shoving it into his pants pocket, but he can not so much hear as imagine Sollux's maniacal cackle nonetheless.

The last tumbler slides into place just as an electronic ding sounds from Snowman's computer. Karkat jumps despite himself. He quickly takes the files from the safe and is sliding the door quietly shut when the computer makes another noise. Scowling, he stalks over and jiggles the mouse to banish the screensaver.

He doesn't have to read the mustard yellow text in the IM window to guess what it says, but he growls and leans forward to read it anyway.

TA: ill blow you two iif you a2k niicely
TA: p2 delete thii2 from the chat hii2tory wiill you

Karkat pounds angrily at the keys in reply.

DELETE IT YOURSELF, MORON.

It's another few seconds before a reply appears.

TA: dont fall on your way out

It remains on the screen for a moment, then the chat window closes and the computer puts itself back to sleep, fans whirring to an eerie halt.

Karkat slides the documents into his jacket and straps the harness back onto the rope hooked over the window ledge. He gives it two firm tugs to warn Sollux of his ascent and climbs onto the sill, looking anxiously down the 60 floors to the street below and thinking of that last message.

He wouldn't.

Still, Karkat thinks, sliding his foot into the ascender, the only thing he hates more than Sollux Captor is having Sollux Captor in a position of power over him.

---

A thick folder of papers lands on Karkat's desk with a thump, and he looks up just in time to see Sollux leaning back in a stolen chair and propping his feet up on his desk. "What do you want now, idiot?" he asks, when Sollux just sits there grinning and showing all his teeth rather than explaining his presence.

"TZ said you were crying."

The tips of Karkat's ears burn red hot. "Fuck off," he snaps, shoving at the mismatched shoes on his desk. Sollux's chair clatters noisily back to the ground.

"I could have told you how to untangle the rope if you'd put your earpiece back in."

"That would require you to be both helpful and not an asshole."

"Good thing TZ was there to save you."

"I had everything under control."

"Salty tears streaming down your cheeks. I wish I could have seen."

"I hate you."

Sollux pauses, a considering look on his face. "Buy me a coffee."

Oh gosh...this is so beautiful! I am kinda crying, really ;-; amazing! Thank you so much!

oh god i hope i'm not prompt-ing wrong

i'd like to see eridan<3<vriska with comedy and pirates (is that even a genre?) yeah okay enjoy

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Page 67 of 146

BONUS ROUND 1

Bonus Round 1

FILL: TEAM GAMZEE<>KARKAT

Re: FILL: TEAM Tavros<3Vriska

FILL: TEAM ERIDAN<3KARKAT

Re: FILL: TEAM [Bro<3John]

Re: FILL: TEAM JOHN<>VRISKA

Re: FILL: TEAM ERIDAN<3KARKAT

PROMPT: TEAM GAMZEE<3JANE

Re: PROMPT: TEAM Aradia<3Jade

FILL: TEAM GAMZEE<3JANE

PROMPT: TEAM Eridan <3< Sollux

FILL: TEAM Eridan<3Roxy

Re: PROMPT: TEAM SOLLUX<3TEREZI

Re: FILL: TEAM JAKE<3TEREZI

PROMPT: TEAM Eridan <3 Roxy

FILL: TEAM BRO<3GRANDPA

FILL: TEAM ERIDAN<>ROSE

FILL: TEAM GAMZEE<3JANE

PROMPT: TEAM Eridan <3 Roxy

Re: FILL: TEAM JOHN<3KARKAT

PROMPT: TEAM Aradia<>Dave

PROMPT: TEAM Eridan <3 Roxy

Re: PROMPT: MINDFANG <3< REDGLARE

FILL: TEAM JADE<3JOHN<3KARKAT

Re: FILL: TEAM GAMZEE<3JANE

PROMPT: TEAM TAVROS<3VRISKA