[HE KNOWS, OKAY. ALL OF CAMP IS REMINDING HIM. His voice is coming from behind his bunk's curtain, where he's busily answering the horrific deluge of texts he's gotten.]
[ Her smile's broad and bright as dawn on the horizon when he opens his curtain for her. Instantly she worms her way in, wriggling past and over her to make herself comfy on his bunk. ]
[She's weightless to him, but he still makes a show of being annoyed when she clambers over him to squeeze between his body and the rover wall. After her illness the other day, he's more inclined to be patient with her whims. Also, he prefers it when she's close; less trouble to get into thay way.]
You remember that Haroomba contest during lockdown? While I was in Rover 12, Loki asked me to make his haroomba rickroll his roommate. Ghost judged the entries.
[ She spent a large part of day 21 laid up in the medtent, tired in a way the dead shouldn't be able to get. It was a pretty instructive experience, honestly; though she needs few to none of the things the living do, she can be affected by those things nonetheless.
Still, her mood is sunny now, as capricious as it always is. She's inclined to be favorable of Noh-Varr. She may not have been at risk of double-dying, but he still went out of his way to help her - all while acting in a way that read I care about you with painful obviousness.
She should be cleaning. But she wants to be here, instead. Skinny limbs tangled up pretzel-like and strangely comfortably as she lounges on his bed. ]
You know, I thought he sounded sort of familiar. But I didn't think it could actually be Troll Rick Astley! [ She cackles. ] So this is Ghost paying you back, huh? I like it.
Something like that. I need to figure out a way to get him back without this happening again.
[Of course he cares about her. It's hard not to care about people you live with, especially when you end up spending most of your waking hours with them.
It's what he tells himself, anyway. Vriska's not as immediately lovable as the Teddy Altmans and Billy Kaplans of the world.]
Now I'm curious. What does Troll Rick Astley sound like?
[He passes her his blackglass device, synced to the premium access card she'd gotten him. It's up to her to find TRA in the library.]
Are you kidding? Starting a prank war with one of the instructors sounds like the best idea I ever heard and couldn't possibly backfire. You should do it!
[ She takes the device and starts scrolling through it. ]
You know, they sound pretty much the same, believe it or not.
[ It takes her a minute or so, but she finds Troll Rick Astley, and puts on his version of his biggest hit.
The only difference is that every instance of the word "Never" has been replaced with "Always."
Always gonna saaaaay goodbye, always gonna tell a lieee and hurt youuuu... ]
I guess, in like this ironic way? It's really big with kismeses and auspitices. Kismeses treat it like an anthem and auspitices like it was written about how hard their lives are, haha! And everyone else just kind of rolls their eyes. I guess it is not a terrible song, but I sort of don't really care?
[ She's smiling lightly, though, amiably chatty. ] It's funny. I don't think I ever gave a shit about music till I met you.
Aside from the oh so revered Alternian "art" of slam poetry, higher bloods weren't ever really big on that kind of stuff! [ Not only does she inflect her voice to make those quotes audible, she actually does the air quotes hand motion. ] The arts are a waste of time when you could be out conquering your enemies instead.
[ It doesn't seem like she's much reacting to the song, but she starts unconsciously tapping a finger on her knee in time to the beat once she puts her hands back down. ]
Anyway, they're two types of romance where I come from! It is kind of hard to explain. It will sound bizarre to anyone who's hung up on the human idea of monogamy. Just take my word for it when I say they all thought it was, like, sooooooo romantic, hahahaha.
[ She's surprised for half a second, blinking, then shrugs and takes the device, flicking through it again. ]
Like it? Not really! Remember that kid I told you about? The one I mind controlled? He was reeeeeeeeally into this stuff. He thought he was such hot shit, but the truth was he totally sucked at it. What a joke that guy was.
[ Her mouth pulls to one side, then the other. Flick flick flick flick-- oh, here we go. Vriska hands the device back to Noh-Varr.
It's worth noting that the name of the song isn't really a title so much as a weird, absurdly long summary. And it's rap. Just straight up rap that won't sound much different at all from Earth's version. ]
[He says nothing to 'mind control', mouth thinning a bit while he focuses on the music instead.]
In your world, do Alternia and Earth share trade relations? Why is Alternia's music so similar to Earth's? [A beat, while he considers.] Or is it the other way around?
It's the other way around. To the humans, our planet would have been destroyed many millions of years ago, or something ridiculous like that. Let me explain it this way.
In my universe, it was my friends and I who created Earth! It was the fruit of our victory over our session's Black King. We were to reap the ultimate prize of Sgrub: the chance to make an entirely new universe, and be its gods.
Of course, shit went wrong. A powerful enemy we hadn't counted on completely fucked us up, and we had to escape before we could claim our prize! So Earth developed all by its lonesome out there in the cosmos.
I had a lot of time to think about this. I can't prove any of this, so it is more like a pet theory than anything else. It used to be mysterious to me that a bunch of aliens would share so much in common with us, but I think it's because we created them! It would make sense, wouldn't it? So they were influenced by our history and our culture.
Edited (too many text tags.) 2014-08-19 05:47 (UTC)
[ For a second, she just stares at him blankly. Then her expression twists up with exasperation as she groans. ]
Uuuuuuuugh. I should have known you'd want all of that explained. Do you need a flowchart and a bunch of diagrams, too? No, I'm not joking. That was the power of Sgrub.
[ Deep breath. ]
Sgrub is a game my friends and I played. When we started, we didn't know it would set off the apocalypse. We also didn't know that it wasn't actually the trigger, and that the apocalypse was always already going to happen, but it sure seemed like the trigger at the time. That is how my planet got blown up! It was destroyed because the circumstances of the game mandated it.
The whole point of the game is to create a new universe! To do so, you have to go on these epic quests spanning many planets and undertake lots of grueling personal journeys! Not to mention kill tons of monsters. Of course, I skipped a lot of that bullshit, because I was an awesome gamer and I was great at breaking the rules. [ She cracks a smile. ]
So my friends and I played the game and we all became pretty strong! Strong enough to face what should have been the game's final boss. The Black King. But it turns out we completely miscalculated, and we paid for it! We ended up having to run and hide on some meteor out in the middle of fucking nowhere, and that was it for us.
Anyway, our instance of playing the game was one session. The humans we knew played another session, and my ancestors played another! And finally, there was a second human session. Four sessions altogether, spanning four different universes, all of which begot each other through a series of events I can only describe as shenanigans.
[ She pauses, then lowers her chin to give him a sharp, arch look. ]
I like flowcharts and diagrams. [ He says it with good humor, but his expression fades into quiet attention as he listens. What had seemed complex earlier with her foreign terminology begins to crystallize in his mind. It reminds him of his Macroverse travels, and the flow of time as described in his cadet training manuals. If you were to misplace your pen, and go back in time to when you knew where it was, and bring it to yourself in the future, you would continue to have no pen, because the pen no longer existed in the past.
It's more than a little complex, with splintering timelines where each action along the timestream creates its own separate mayfly dimension. All those Earths he'd turned into the capital of the new Kree empire, for instance. The Black King she's speaking about--some kind of Celestial, or Astro-God? Perhaps bigger than that, by the reckoning of her own multiverse.
He does have questions, as a matter of fact. ]
Sgrub. Where did it come from, who or what created it? How does the game begin? How are the players chosen?
Haha. Those are the kind of lore questions I don't really have answers to. You have to get fuck deep in end game meta to find that sort of thing out, and we haven't hit end game yet. [ She pauses. ] I can tell you how the game begins, but I don't know for certain how the players are chosen. I have a theory, though.
[ Story Time 2: Electric Boogaloo. ]
The game begins pretty innocently! As far as I know, across all universes and all instances of the game, it starts off as a computer program. Running the executable creates a connection between two players. One is the client, and one is the server! The server player has some control over the client player's world. Like moving around their furniture and stuff. Pretty annoying! But necessary. The client player will be racing against a clock to satisfy some necessary conditions to escape to their designated land before their homeworld gets blown up by meteors.
All players enter the game this way, except one very special circumstance that doesn't really apply here. It's how all my friends and I entered the game. That's how it begins! Pretty straightforward.
As for how the players are chosen... [ Vriska leans back, stretching both arms above her head and then letting them flop back down into her lap before she continues. ]
Sgrub and Sburb - that's the name of the version all the humans play - are both designed as coming of age mechanisms. They always take players who are on the cusp of physical and sexual maturity, and throw them into a bunch of crazy shit! I always saw this as intentional. A way to force us to mature, quickly! Especially because, if the game is played correctly and you win your universe, you and your fellow players will be tasked with perpetuating your decimated race. [ She grins suddenly, toothy. ] It never worked out that way, but that would have been the idea.
This set of circumstances likely influences the choice of players! But the most important thing to remember is that everything to do with the game is predestined to always have occurred. Skaia requires this! Skaia is a more complicated concept to explain, so for now, let's just say it's something like a set of necessary win conditions, sort of! Everything Skaia requires must be met, or you can't win the game. And one of those requirements is a very specific series of events! One single timeline to which everyone has to adhere. The alpha timeline. Any deviations result in a bunch of bullshit and dead kids.
[ She rubs her face with one hand, brow furrowing. ] I'm getting sidetracked. To get back to the point, with all the predestination crap? My friends and I were always going to be the people to play Sgrub. There could never be anyone else! It was the same for our ancestors. In fact, our ancestors playing the game made it so that we would never have any choice but to play! Their actions caused our actions, and vice versa.
This is a bunch of stupid timeline bullshit that I can admit I am not well-equipped to explain! Time isn't my aspect. Dave is around here somewhere, you could ask him, if he got his head out of his ass for more than two seconds. Really, the short answer to your question is "predestination, and also shenanigans." It's not really a satisfying answer as to, you know, why, but predestination is the how. The creation myth stuff, though? That's completely out of my scope. The only person who might have any idea is not only not here, but even if she were, I pretty much do not want to speak to her ever again, so I wouldn't be the one to ask.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
unfavoured
no subject
[HE KNOWS, OKAY. ALL OF CAMP IS REMINDING HIM. His voice is coming from behind his bunk's curtain, where he's busily answering the horrific deluge of texts he's gotten.]
no subject
[ Now she does laugh. ]
Don't make me come in there.
no subject
[Look, sometimes he knows how to not take himself seriously. Sometimes.
He pulls the curtain away, exposing him down to the shoulders. His glare is half-hearted.]
Is it 'making' if I give you permission?
no subject
[ Her smile's broad and bright as dawn on the horizon when he opens his curtain for her. Instantly she worms her way in, wriggling past and over her to make herself comfy on his bunk. ]
So spill! What's the deeeeeeeeal, anyway?
why are all my icons shirtless....
You remember that Haroomba contest during lockdown? While I was in Rover 12, Loki asked me to make his haroomba rickroll his roommate. Ghost judged the entries.
[CAN SHE SEE WHERE HE'S GOING WITH THIS...]
bc noh-varr, honestly.
Still, her mood is sunny now, as capricious as it always is. She's inclined to be favorable of Noh-Varr. She may not have been at risk of double-dying, but he still went out of his way to help her - all while acting in a way that read I care about you with painful obviousness.
She should be cleaning. But she wants to be here, instead. Skinny limbs tangled up pretzel-like and strangely comfortably as she lounges on his bed. ]
You know, I thought he sounded sort of familiar. But I didn't think it could actually be Troll Rick Astley! [ She cackles. ] So this is Ghost paying you back, huh? I like it.
no subject
[Of course he cares about her. It's hard not to care about people you live with, especially when you end up spending most of your waking hours with them.
It's what he tells himself, anyway. Vriska's not as immediately lovable as the Teddy Altmans and Billy Kaplans of the world.]
Now I'm curious. What does Troll Rick Astley sound like?
[He passes her his blackglass device, synced to the premium access card she'd gotten him. It's up to her to find TRA in the library.]
no subject
[ She takes the device and starts scrolling through it. ]
You know, they sound pretty much the same, believe it or not.
[ It takes her a minute or so, but she finds Troll Rick Astley, and puts on his version of his biggest hit.
The only difference is that every instance of the word "Never" has been replaced with "Always."
Always gonna saaaaay goodbye, always gonna tell a lieee and hurt youuuu... ]
no subject
[Still, he lets himself be carried off by the sound of Troll Astley, huffing out a breathy laugh when the lyrics catch up to him.]
Is this popular on Alternia?
no subject
[ She's smiling lightly, though, amiably chatty. ] It's funny. I don't think I ever gave a shit about music till I met you.
no subject
[If he believed in the spiritual notion of souls he'd say something poetic about how music fills his. But no.]
Kismeses and auspitices, though? You've lost me.
[He flicks the device and changes the tune. Still the 80s, but a totally different style.]
no subject
Aside from the oh so revered Alternian "art" of slam poetry, higher bloods weren't ever really big on that kind of stuff! [ Not only does she inflect her voice to make those quotes audible, she actually does the air quotes hand motion. ] The arts are a waste of time when you could be out conquering your enemies instead.
[ It doesn't seem like she's much reacting to the song, but she starts unconsciously tapping a finger on her knee in time to the beat once she puts her hands back down. ]
Anyway, they're two types of romance where I come from! It is kind of hard to explain. It will sound bizarre to anyone who's hung up on the human idea of monogamy. Just take my word for it when I say they all thought it was, like, sooooooo romantic, hahahaha.
no subject
Alternian slam poetry...do you like it? Can you show me some?
[Passing the device back. He sounds genuinely interested.]
no subject
Like it? Not really! Remember that kid I told you about? The one I mind controlled? He was reeeeeeeeally into this stuff. He thought he was such hot shit, but the truth was he totally sucked at it. What a joke that guy was.
[ Her mouth pulls to one side, then the other. Flick flick flick flick-- oh, here we go. Vriska hands the device back to Noh-Varr.
It's worth noting that the name of the song isn't really a title so much as a weird, absurdly long summary. And it's rap. Just straight up rap that won't sound much different at all from Earth's version. ]
no subject
In your world, do Alternia and Earth share trade relations? Why is Alternia's music so similar to Earth's? [A beat, while he considers.] Or is it the other way around?
no subject
It's the other way around. To the humans, our planet would have been destroyed many millions of years ago, or something ridiculous like that. Let me explain it this way.
In my universe, it was my friends and I who created Earth! It was the fruit of our victory over our session's Black King. We were to reap the ultimate prize of Sgrub: the chance to make an entirely new universe, and be its gods.
Of course, shit went wrong. A powerful enemy we hadn't counted on completely fucked us up, and we had to escape before we could claim our prize! So Earth developed all by its lonesome out there in the cosmos.
I had a lot of time to think about this. I can't prove any of this, so it is more like a pet theory than anything else. It used to be mysterious to me that a bunch of aliens would share so much in common with us, but I think it's because we created them! It would make sense, wouldn't it? So they were influenced by our history and our culture.
no subject
Vriska, none of that made sense.
[ He turns his face to her. Squints a little. ]
If this is a joke, it's going to backfire, because I'm about to ask you to explain everything you just said.
[ He's not at all kidding. ]
Define 'created Earth'. Define 'session'. Define 'Black King'. Define 'Sgrub'.
no subject
Uuuuuuuugh. I should have known you'd want all of that explained. Do you need a flowchart and a bunch of diagrams, too? No, I'm not joking. That was the power of Sgrub.
[ Deep breath. ]
Sgrub is a game my friends and I played. When we started, we didn't know it would set off the apocalypse. We also didn't know that it wasn't actually the trigger, and that the apocalypse was always already going to happen, but it sure seemed like the trigger at the time. That is how my planet got blown up! It was destroyed because the circumstances of the game mandated it.
The whole point of the game is to create a new universe! To do so, you have to go on these epic quests spanning many planets and undertake lots of grueling personal journeys! Not to mention kill tons of monsters. Of course, I skipped a lot of that bullshit, because I was an awesome gamer and I was great at breaking the rules. [ She cracks a smile. ]
So my friends and I played the game and we all became pretty strong! Strong enough to face what should have been the game's final boss. The Black King. But it turns out we completely miscalculated, and we paid for it! We ended up having to run and hide on some meteor out in the middle of fucking nowhere, and that was it for us.
Anyway, our instance of playing the game was one session. The humans we knew played another session, and my ancestors played another! And finally, there was a second human session. Four sessions altogether, spanning four different universes, all of which begot each other through a series of events I can only describe as shenanigans.
[ She pauses, then lowers her chin to give him a sharp, arch look. ]
Any questions?
no subject
It's more than a little complex, with splintering timelines where each action along the timestream creates its own separate mayfly dimension. All those Earths he'd turned into the capital of the new Kree empire, for instance. The Black King she's speaking about--some kind of Celestial, or Astro-God? Perhaps bigger than that, by the reckoning of her own multiverse.
He does have questions, as a matter of fact. ]
Sgrub. Where did it come from, who or what created it? How does the game begin? How are the players chosen?
[ A lot of questions. ]
oh god i'm so sorry
[ Story Time 2: Electric Boogaloo. ]
The game begins pretty innocently! As far as I know, across all universes and all instances of the game, it starts off as a computer program. Running the executable creates a connection between two players. One is the client, and one is the server! The server player has some control over the client player's world. Like moving around their furniture and stuff. Pretty annoying! But necessary. The client player will be racing against a clock to satisfy some necessary conditions to escape to their designated land before their homeworld gets blown up by meteors.
All players enter the game this way, except one very special circumstance that doesn't really apply here. It's how all my friends and I entered the game. That's how it begins! Pretty straightforward.
As for how the players are chosen... [ Vriska leans back, stretching both arms above her head and then letting them flop back down into her lap before she continues. ]
Sgrub and Sburb - that's the name of the version all the humans play - are both designed as coming of age mechanisms. They always take players who are on the cusp of physical and sexual maturity, and throw them into a bunch of crazy shit! I always saw this as intentional. A way to force us to mature, quickly! Especially because, if the game is played correctly and you win your universe, you and your fellow players will be tasked with perpetuating your decimated race. [ She grins suddenly, toothy. ] It never worked out that way, but that would have been the idea.
This set of circumstances likely influences the choice of players! But the most important thing to remember is that everything to do with the game is predestined to always have occurred. Skaia requires this! Skaia is a more complicated concept to explain, so for now, let's just say it's something like a set of necessary win conditions, sort of! Everything Skaia requires must be met, or you can't win the game. And one of those requirements is a very specific series of events! One single timeline to which everyone has to adhere. The alpha timeline. Any deviations result in a bunch of bullshit and dead kids.
[ She rubs her face with one hand, brow furrowing. ] I'm getting sidetracked. To get back to the point, with all the predestination crap? My friends and I were always going to be the people to play Sgrub. There could never be anyone else! It was the same for our ancestors. In fact, our ancestors playing the game made it so that we would never have any choice but to play! Their actions caused our actions, and vice versa.
This is a bunch of stupid timeline bullshit that I can admit I am not well-equipped to explain! Time isn't my aspect. Dave is around here somewhere, you could ask him, if he got his head out of his ass for more than two seconds. Really, the short answer to your question is "predestination, and also shenanigans." It's not really a satisfying answer as to, you know, why, but predestination is the how. The creation myth stuff, though? That's completely out of my scope. The only person who might have any idea is not only not here, but even if she were, I pretty much do not want to speak to her ever again, so I wouldn't be the one to ask.