milliways_bar | (no subject)

Snoop? That's ridiculous. Nobody would do that.

Oh wait.

Karkat is completely intent on his giant ridiculous chart He switches a couple of values around, then back, then switches them again.

He should really write an algorithm to detect ship conflicts. Writing software for planning the script for a fictional movie that will never be made is pretty much the least important, stupidest way he could spend his time, and if it wouldn't pretty much definitely probably end with his computer exploding he would do it right now.

It's hard to make out all the details of the chart from the back of the heavy chair she's perched on, behind Karkat's own chair. Pretty fascinating stuff, though.

It'd be more fascinating if she had any idea who these people are.

They are... these really incomprehensible doodles Karkat has been making! That's who they are.

Maybe... maybe he should take some time to buff up on data structures first. As he plans to read about writing software for... etc, he experiences a deep, satisfying frisson of complete irrelevance that he hasn't felt in weeks.

In the meantime he can always play with font sizes. The correct font size and color coding is so important. Glancing at the reflection in his screen, he dials it extra small.

!!!

Oh she can barely read it now! And he's typing something new which she HAS TO SEE.

Nepeta shifts her perch, anchoring herself better, and leeeeeans closer to try and get a good look at the WHOA WHOA WAIT

Karkat reaches back over his shoulder, snags the cuff of one wildly flapping sleeve, and tugs.

It's enough to turn the chair's wobble into an outright topple, and also to change its trajectory to a diagonal so that it won't hit the back of his chair. What it ought to do, further, is deposit Nepeta neatly on the chair next to his.

Except that when one's perch suddenly becomes unsteady, the thing to do is leap.

Nepeta winds up somersaulting over Karkat's head in a flailing scramble of limbs and tail, and landing on her back with a thud and a tiny "oof" on the table in front of him.

She blinks dazedly up at him, upside down; her head currently occupies the spot directly in front of him that his crabtop hurriedly scuttled to vacate.

Thwap in the face with the coat. That fucking coat.

"JEGUS, WHAT IN THE TAINTCHAFING HELL IS WITH THESE ALL THESE UNRULY ACROBATIC GODDAMN LEAPS, WOULD YOU CALM YOUR RAMBUNCTIOUS ASS THE FUCK DOWN AND STOP BREAKING FURNITURE?"

He contributed nothing to this chaos, obviously.

Another blink, and then a wriggle. She curls her legs under her and sits up cross-legged, still on the table, and brushes imaginary dust off her sleeves with appalling I-meant-to-do-that nonchalance.

"Nothing broke," she says virtuously.

Karkat withdraws from his nose-to-nose ranting posture to allow her to sit up. "NOT FOR LACK OF TRYING," he grumbles. The crabtop, clinging to the side of table, scuttles tentatively back towards them.

Nepeta promptly leans around to try to see the crabtop's screen. "What are you working on?"

Karkat scowls, but... he would kind of like to have her input.

"DURING THE GAME DID YOU EVER HAPPEN TO HAVE HEARD ABOUT MY SCREENPLAY?"

He knows for a fact that Terezi stole it and staged dramatic readings with some of the rest of the Red Team, but he had kind of hoped the joke hadn't spread as far as the other side of the Medium.

Her eyes widen. "You have a scr33nplay?"

Well, that answers that. "IT'S IN PROGRESS," he says hurriedly. "I HAVE SOME CHARACTER IDEAS AND A BUNCH OF SCENES HALFWAY DONE BUT I REALIZED I HAD TO WORK OUT ALL THE EMOTIONAL ARCS AND WHERE THE SHIPS WERE HEADED BEFORE I COULD REALLY GET ANYWHERE, AND SINCE I FINALLY HAVE SOME TIME ON MY FRONDS THAT IS WHAT I HAVE BEEN DOING."

"THIS IS THE EMOTIONAL MATRIX OF THE WHOLE STORY, PLUS A BUNCH OF MISCELLANEOUS CHARACTER NOTES I HAD TO STICK IN SOMEWHERE." While he talks he hurriedly shuffles together his scrawled pictures, carefully not mentioning them.

"Oh! Is that who all those drawrings are?"

She leans forward with renewed interest. The chart's all very well, but the heart of shipping is understanding the characters involved.

Glare! He shovels them under the spindly legs of the crabtop. "THOSE ARE JUST SKETCHES, I DID THEM IN A HURRY. I WAS JUST TRYING TO GET SOME STUFF FIRM IN MY HEAD SO I COULD COMMIT TO SOME DECISIONS ABOUT THEIR PERSONALITIES. THEY'RE NOTHING OF CONSEQUENCE."

Cheerfully: "Oh. Okay, nefur mind then."

Karkat is not the only one who can feign a lack of interest to draw out some unsuspecting prey.

"So what did you decide about their purrsonalities?"

"WELL, LOOK, I WILL JUST TELL YOU ABOUT THE PREMISE," he says, relieved attention has been drawn away from his shitty drawings. "DID YOU EVER HEAR ANY STORIES ABOUT THE MUTIMERCENARIES? THEY ARE PROBABLY DEFINITELY COMPLETELY MADE UP AND TOTALLY ILLEGAL, SO IF YOU WEREN'T POKING YOUR DAMP NOSE INTO ILLICIT CORNERS OF THE INTERCLOUD YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED THEM."

"WAIT, DO CATS HAVE WET NOSES?"

He doesn't really know shit about cats.

"Cats," she says with dignity, "do not have wet noses. Except purrhaps when they've b33n nosing into something wet."

Beat.

"I think I heard about the mewtimercenaries somewhere? But I don't remembpurr much about them."

"YEAH, THERE IS NOT MUCH TO THEM BUT RUMORS. I USED TO HEAR ABOUT A LOT OF SKETCHY STUFF WHEN I WAS AN ENTHUSIARCH WITH THE... GROUP I WAS INVOLVED IN."

There is probably no point in keeping the secrets of the Spoilers Guild even now, but... secrets are fun.

"THE STORY GOES THAT NOT EVERY SINGLE TROLL WHO GOT CRIPPLED OR EXPOSED AS A MUTANT OR JUST DIDN'T FEEL LIKE FOLLOWING ORDERS GOT CULLED. SOMETIMES THEY DESERTED OR HIJACKED SHIPS AND JOINED THE MUTIMERCENARIES. THEY WERE SUPPOSEDLY ROGUE TROLLS ON THE RUN FROM THE FLEET, MAKING MONEY AS HIRED GUNS AND NEVER STAYING ONE PLACE FOR LONG."

"OBVIOUSLY THIS IS PRETTY ROMANTIC SHIT BUT EQUALLY OBVIOUSLY THE IMPERIAL PROPAGANDA MACHINE NEVER TOUCHED THE SUBJECT, IT WAS TREASON JUST TO ADMIT THEY EXISTED. SO I AM WRITING A ROMANTIC COMEDY ABOUT A CREW OF ROGUE TROLLS WHO GET THEMSELVES INTO SOME SHIT."

Ooooooh. This is fascinating.

"So kind of like pirates," she says. "Have you got a dramatis purrsonae for the crew yet?"

Scowl! "NO, PIRATES ARE FILTHY SLAVING THIEVES OUT OF MADE-UP HISTORY, MUTIMERCENARIES ARE BADASS LOVABLE ROGUES OUT OF THE MADE-UP PRESENT DAY, IT IS COMPLETELY DIFFERENT." Besides, Eridan and Vriska liked pirates.

"ANYWAY, YEAH, I HAVE THE STARTING POINT ALL WORKED OUT, IT IS JUST MAKING UP MY MIND ABOUT HOW IT UNFOLDS AND WHAT DRIVES IT. AT THE BEGINNING THEY ARE A CREW OF FOUR. WELL, FOUR AND A HALF I GUESS. THEY ARE ALL THRESHECUTIONERS WHO SURVIVED A SUICIDE MISSION AND DECIDED TO RUN FOR THE BORDERS INSTEAD OF GOING BACK BECAUSE THEY KNEW THEY WOULD BE CULLED IF THEY DID. I DON'T HAVE THE NAMES NAILED DOWN YET..."

"THE CAPTAIN IS A RUSTBLOOD WHO WAS A JUNIOR TECHNICIAN OR SOMETHING BUT DURING THE MISSION THE COMMANDER WAS KILLED AND THE SECOND-IN-COMMAND WAS GOING TO GET THEM ALL KILLED SO HE MUTINEED AND TOOK COMMAND WITH SUPPORT FROM ANOTHER BLUEBLOOD. HE IS A NOBLE BUT WITH A PRETTY ROUGH AND UNRULY MANNER AND HE IS SMART ENOUGH TO KNOW THE CAPTAIN IS A BETTER LEADER AND PLANNER THAN HIM. HE GOT PRETTY BADLY BURNED IN THE MISSION SO HE IS A PRETTY GNARLY-LOOKING GUY.

"HE IS THE MUSCLE. THEN THERE IS A MECHANIC OR TECHNICIAN WHO IS A BRASSBLOOD, SHE IS THE ONE WHO THOUGHT THEY SHOULD HAVE GONE BACK, BUT THE OTHERS DON'T TRUST THE EMPIRE. SO OBVIOUSLY SHE IS PRETTY NAIVE AND STUPID. THE CAPTAIN IS FLUSHED FOR HER AND CLEARLY THERE IS A PALE ATTRACTION BETWEEN HIM AND THE MUSCLE BUT THE MECHANIC AND THE MUSCLE CAN'T FUCKING STAND EACH OTHER SO THEY ARE STUCK IN A CLASSIC ASHEN TRIANGLE."

"Rustblood captain, blueblood muscle, brassblood tech," Nepeta recites. "That's thr33. Who's the furth? ... And what do you mean and-a-half?"

"OKAY, WELL, THAT IS ONE OF THE KIND OF WEIRD ELEMENTS AND ONE OF THE THINGS I AM NOT SURE I AM GOING TO STICK WITH."

"THEIR SHIP HAS A BINARY PSIONIC DRIVE, WHERE THEY HAVE TAKEN A TELEKINETIC TROLL AND USED HER SPONGE AS THE ENGINE, AND THEN THERE IS ANOTHER, LESS POWERFUL PSYCHIC AS THE NAVIGATOR WHO CHARTS THE COURSE AND IS THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN COMMUNICATE WITH THE BRAIN IN A JAR. USUALLY THE SHIP IS NOT EVEN CONSIDERED A CHARACTER BUT THE IDEA I HAD IS THAT THE NAVIGATOR AND THE ENGINE WERE MATESPRITS ON ALTERNIA AND HAVE STAYED TOGETHER ALL ALONG, WITH THE ENTIRE RELATIONSHIP BEING MENTAL SINCE THEY WERE KIDS."

Nepeta's eyes go round. "So the ship's engine is alive? I mean, awake? That's ..."

Beat.

"I can't decide if that's ameowzing or horrible."