(no subject)

[crabbycustomer]

Some time ago for romantic purposes Karkat came into possession of a large holographic video display. He has been nursing an idea for a while, but the weather outside in mock-Scotland has been too grotesque to make it feasible.

Tonight, however, the grotty mist has finally stopped and when Karkat rises with the moon he discovers weather that is almost practically tolerable, especially once he deploys a firepit and spreads a tarp over the damp ground.

He fiddles with the projector a bit, finally managing to project the king-sized screen he wants over the lake. The first romcom he cues up is Pretty Woman, and he grunts with satisfaction as he plops himself into an stuffed husk he hauled down from his room and the familiar opening begins to unfold.

Welcome to the drive-in. The second film in the triple feature will be Grosse Pointe Blank, followed by My Best Friend's Wedding.

[OPEN THREAD! Feel free to use the setting with or without tagging Karkat, he will out here all night marathoning cheesy romantic comedies. Feel free to suggest movies that will follow Pretty Woman, and I will update this post with a list of the ones this cranky sumbitch has approved that people can reference playing.]

Comments

[cantdiequiteyet]

"That sounds more like my home than any world I've visited from here," Teresa says. "We only had one kind, but we had a lot."

[crabbycustomer]

"AS SOON AS WE CAME OUT OF OUR COCOONS WE WERE KIND OF TURNED LOOSE IN AN ENDLESS LABYRINTH FULL OF THEM AND BASICALLY EVENTUALLY ONE WOULD ADOPT YOU OR ONE WOULD EAT YOU," Karkat says with the callous resignation of an r strategy species.

"AND THEN FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE, OR ITS LIFE, YOUR LUSUS WOULD BE SORT OF A GUARDIAN AND VISCERAL MENTOR. IDEALLY YOUR LUSUS WOULD PROECT YOU FROM ALL THE OTHER MONSTERS, AND ALSO ALL THE OTHER TROLLS, UNTIL YOU WERE OLD ENOUGH TO TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF."

"SOME OF MY FRIENDS HAD CUSTODIANS WHO WERE LITERALLY HOLY TERRORS TO FUCKING DEAL WITH BUT I GUESS I KIND OF LUCKED OUT. I MEAN, PHORCYTES WAS HUGE AND HARD AND SMELLED TERRIBLE AND WOULD DRAG HOME DEAD SHIT AND EXPECT ME TO BE EXCITED ABOUT IT. AND HE WOULD HACK OFF MY HAIR WITH HIS GIANT FUCKING CLAWS WHICH I THINK IS WHY MY HORNS ARE STILL KIND OF NUBBY. BUT HE WAS PRETTY MUCH ALL RIGHT."

[cantdiequiteyet]

The last time Teresa encountered a child being raised by a monster, the child was traumatized to the point at which she couldn't speak.

That was Clare.

"Why would they do that?" she asks, casually. "Raise another species' child?"

[crabbycustomer]

"I DON'T KNOW, IT WAS JUST THE WAY IT WAS. IT IS PRETTY WEIRD TO ME THAT HUMANS ARE RAISED BY ADULTS, I NEVER SAW AN ADULT TROLL IN MY ENTIRE LIFE."

"WE HAD SOME PRETTY ELABORATE SYMBIOTIC SHENANIGANS GOING ON ON THAT PLANET, MOST OF OUR TECHNOLOGY WAS ORGANIC AND WE WERE JUST GENERALLY PLUGGED TIGHT THE FUCK INTO EVERY ASPECT OF OUR PLANET'S BIOSPHERE."

"ONE PIECE OF IT WAS BLOOD COLOR, NORMAL ANIMALS AND MONSTERS HAD RED BLOOD LIKE HUMANS, BUT SPECIES WHO WERE IN THE SYMBIOTIC LOOP HAD BLOOD COLORS LIKE US. AND A LUSUS WOULD NEVER PICK A TROLL OUTSIDE OF ITS OWN BLOOD COLOR, THAT WAS LIKE A RULE."


"WHICH HANGS A HUGE FUCKING QUERY HOOK OVER MINE, I KNOW, BUT I CAN'T HELP YOU THERE, HE HAD TOO MUCH ARMOR. I NEVER SAW HIM BLEED. SO I DON'T KNOW IF HE WAS A FREAK LIKE ME OR JUST... GOT CONFUSED AND THOUGHT I WAS NORMAL."

[cantdiequiteyet]

He's clearly got some emotional stuff going on, but he doesn't seem to be traumatized to the extent Clare was. So maybe it works for them?

Honestly, Teresa thinks he's probably got a better deal. If you don't have real parents, you can't watch one of those parents kill and eat your family.

This is the story of thing that happens to people on Teresa's world.

"Are you dead?" He's using the past tense, like she is. "Like me?"

[crabbycustomer]

That's... a complicated question, but not the reason for the past tense, in any case. The reason for that is: "ALTERNIA IS."

He always has to brace himself for pity after that revelation, but maybe she will be different. She seems pretty unusual.

[cantdiequiteyet]

"Oh."

Teresa has absolutely zero attachment to her world. She's not sure she'd understand it. She accepts the answer like he'd told her that he moved house.

She adds, "that's one way to kill a lot of monsters at once."

[crabbycustomer]

"PRETTY MUCH," is all he has to say that.

Including a bunch of monsters who thought of themselves as people.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Some humans are just monsters who think of themselves as people. Teresa only cares about a very few of them.

Well, one of them.

And that one doesn't think of herself as human. Her personhood is up for debate.

Teresa doesn't have a lot to worry about, it makes her particularly easy going.

When there are some loud off chord notes from the movie, she looks back at the screen, to see something going on with a piano.

"There's one of those things in the bar," she remarks. "Is that what this is for?"

It's worth pointing out that Teresa isn't exactly sure what the two humans are doing. She could guess, but that's not really something warriors get up to.

(At least, not something Teresa has ever thought about.)

[crabbycustomer]

"I GUESS SO," Karkat says. "I MEAN, IT IS ALSO USED AS A NOISEMAKER, I KNOW, BUT I'M NOT REALLY SURE ABOUT ANY SECONDARY REPRODUCTIVE FUNCTIONS. I'M NOT REALLY THAT EXPERT ON HUMAN MATING RITUALS."

"YOU'RE DEFINITELY NOT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT IN THE BAR, THOUGH," he adds after a few uncomfortable seconds (on his side, at least, as an adolescent male).

[cantdiequiteyet]

"Of course," she says, amused. "That's one of the rules, isn't it? I never understood why."

[crabbycustomer]

"I GUESS MAYBE THEY FEEL LIKE HAVING ONE OF THOSE THINGS AROUND IS SORT OF AN IMPLICIT INVITATION THAT NEEDS TO BE COUNTERMANDED? BUT THEN I DON'T KNOW WHY THEY WOULDN'T GET RID OF IT."

"THERE IS A BRIGHT YELLOW JUT HAMMOCK STAPLED UP OVER THE BAR TOO."

[cantdiequiteyet]

She tries to remember if she's seen it. Something yellow above the bar?


"Is that what those things are called?"

[crabbycustomer]

Karkat knows perfectly well that humans usually have their own word for things; if they don't, then the human word generally overlaps with the higher caste terminology, rather than the vernacular he is more inclined to use. For instance blueblood trolls feel the need to call a nutritional plateau a table, a thermal hull a refrigerator, an ablution trap a bathtub, and a jut hammock a brassiere.

However, Karkat is also a troll.

"YES," he says decisively. "OR SOMETIMES BULBHUGGERS."

[cantdiequiteyet]

Claymores have armor! And presumably their underwear minimizes bouncing, but they certainly don't have anything like the yellow thing over the bar.

"And I suppose it is related to the no nudity rule. Despite being clothing."

[crabbycustomer]

Shrug. "I THINK THE PURPOSE OF SOME CLOTHING IS TO MAKE SOMEONE LOOK NAKEDER THAN MERE NUDITY EVER COULD."

Julia Roberts has some outfits like that in this movie.

[cantdiequiteyet]

"There is a more naked than naked?"

She's almost laughing at the mere suggestion.

[crabbycustomer]

Karkat darkens, in his grey-skinned version of a flush; out of embarrassment for perceived stupidity, not anything about the ostensibly racy topic. "MORE PROVOCATIVE," he suggests, as a substitute for the non-word nakeder.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa didn't even notice. Or more accurately, she doesn't care.

She shakes her head, still amused.

"Humans."

[crabbycustomer]

"HOW DOES FREAKY MONSTER ROMANCE WORK, THEN?" he asks, because if Karkat is anything, it's incessantly curious about romance.

[cantdiequiteyet]

"Yoma?" Teresa asks.

"They don't, as far as I know. I never met one that was interested in anything other than killing and eating."

And yes, that means she has no idea where new yoma come from.

[crabbycustomer]

"WAIT, SO... ARE THEY PARASITIC? LIKE THE REAL MONSTER IS A LITTLE SYMBIOTIC CREATURE THAT SPREADS TO NEW HOSTS AND CONVERTS THEM INTO YOMA WHICH THEN RAMPAGE WHILE THE PARASITE REPRODUCES INSIDE OF THEM? WE HAD THINGS LIKE THAT ON ALTERNIA."

[cantdiequiteyet]

"Well, they do take over the bodies of people and pose as them while they're preying on a village," Teresa allows, cheerfully shrugging. "That sounds as good a way as any for them to make new yoma."

She has her suspicions as to the truth of it. But that doesn't mean she's going to speculate out loud. When you work for the Organization, it's not generally a good idea to voice opinions.

[crabbycustomer]

For a minute there he thought he'd figured it out, but... no. "OK, WELL, THEN WHERE THE FUCK DO YOU COME IN? I MEAN, IF YOU AREN'T A HALF-BREED AND YOU AREN'T HALF-CONVERTED THEN HOW THE HELL CAN YOU BE HALF-MONSTER?"

THIS SHIT IS CANON

[crabbycustomer]

“Wow this question is silly, BUT DO ADULT FEMALE TROLLS WEAR BRAS? Or do they not have meat sacs on their chests?”

Whatever it is they wear, they probably don’t call them bras. They probably call them something ridiculous like heft satchels or protrusion hammocks. Bulbhuggers?

Jut duffels.

Gland hoisters?

Ok one more…

Actually no that’s all I got.

(Wobble rucksack.)

http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/18106704483/ok-i-answered-some-more-questions