I asked how bad I should make this. I was told to make it terrible.

[bonermagic]

WHO: Dirk, a generic NPC, maybe someone invisible, and hopefully a PC of some kind.
WHERE: Outdoors, in a...park, yeah, sure.
WHEN: Noon. On...some day. A Wednesday?
WARNINGS: Probably language.
SUMMARY: Dude talks to an invisible friend whose lap Dirk accidentally sat in.
FORMAT: I'm just writing in prose style because I'd rather not have three paragraphs in tiny brackets.

Where you are in this unfolding drama is a good question. Were you...or perhaps the third person they would be more appropriate in this situation...they accompanying Dirk on some adventure or another? Meeting him in the park for some reason or another? A random bystander who happened to stand by at the right place at the right time? Excellent questions which won't be answered in this part of the narrative.

This is what he was doing: he had happened to sit down because of a sudden need to text someone or another through the network. He was more than capable of walking and typing, and yet...and yet why not? There was a bench. There was a man on the other end who was animatedly talking and it was no big deal...at least not until the point in which he stood up and started talking to Dirk.

Or it seemed like he was talking to Dirk. He was talking in Dirk's direction. He just happened to be talking to someone who didn't exist, existed in a different dimension, or was invisible and Dirk just happened to be giving him a lap dance. Given how things worked all three possibilities were actually reasonably plausible.

After a moment's pause he scooted over and got up.

Comments

[glowsferatu]

[ kanaya crosses her arms and just watches this unfold with vague amusement. she waits until he actually gets up before she interrupts. ]

Visiting with a friend?

[bonermagic]

[And...okay, so they're not exactly BFF OMG but thinking about it...thinking about it this is something he's okay with. Kanaya's cool. Good people.] I interrupted something. I figured I'd give the man some privacy.

[glowsferatu]

Well, then I'm sure he'd thank you for a pleasant time. [ doing what? she doesn't really want to think about it. it isn't important anyway and speculating would probably only turn the conversation in an uncomfortable direction. ]

Works perfectly well for me, I was looking for you for a specific reason.

[bonermagic]

...really. [He's getting ready to take back the good people thing.]

[glowsferatu]

I wanted your thoughts on an ongoing problem, one I've been attempting to solve. He holds you in esteem, so I hoped you might have some insight.

[ she takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. maybe she's wasting her time with this anyway, i mean technically she's known him longer than dirk, but it can't hurt to try, can it? ] It's about Dave. The one who's still here, I mean.

[bonermagic]

[There is a pause. Somewhere off in the distance a wayward gull flies onward toward the sea. A student reaches for books gilded in filemot. An algid breeze slithered down the neck and down the spine of some hapless pedestrian. And Dirk Strider summoned the most neutral, bland, even expression he could muster and turned to her.]

What about him?

[glowsferatu]

[ she blinks once. twice. she screws up her lips. this isn't going quite as easily as she'd hoped. striders. ]

I'm sure you must have noticed that he turned prodigal nearly two months ago. The two of your are meant to be biologically connected, aren't you concerned?

[bonermagic]

[Oh god. With his gameface in place he's going to shrug. It's a very deliberate shrug.]

I'm not gonna say that I'm indifferent but at the same time I'm not his Bro, ectobiology aside; I don't know what you'd expect from me.

[glowsferatu]

[ it's the taciturn disposition that's the most difficult to deal with from the orange texted striders. dave had the same problem with keeping closed off, but at least his walls had an almost endearing way of manifesting themselves. ]

Well, not the same one, obviously. I'm pretty sure he's dead. [ uh. well worded there. ] I just think, maybe, it might be wise if you were. I think maybe he needs one, and, I don't know, aside from being the best candidate, you might gain some benefit yourself.

[bonermagic]

...I don't know, Maryam. Genetic relationships aside I'm not sure I'd be qualified to be anybody's Bro. [And yes, he put a certain emphasis. It wasn't merely a bro, it was a Bro.] Hell, do you even know if he'd want me to try?

[glowsferatu]

I doubt he wouldn't. [ even if he's an aloof tool who acts like he doesn't and it totally isn't a big deal or anything. because davesprite. ]

Though I'll admit that, outside of our time here in the City, I generally know the one of the less birdly inclination better. But given how he idolized you--or the other version of you, at least--I'd be surprised if the element weren't common between them.

[bonermagic]

Yeah well. Maybe. [...idolized some version of him? ...] But no matter how identical the two are there's still differences that accumulate over years that would account for...hell, that element being negated somehow. [He might be sounding like he's trying to convince himself of something at this point.]

[glowsferatu]

Perhaps. I mean one of them was stuck on the ship traveling through...whatever portion of space they were traveling through with Jade and John while the other was on the meteor with us. But somehow I doubt that his feelings toward his forebear had changed.

[ of course, she doesn't know that davesprite was actually onhand at bro's death...or likely had access to the corpse if he decided to pay any final respects. ]

[bonermagic]

[Wait, what? This is new.]

What?

[glowsferatu]

They were separated when their iteration of your universe was engulfed in the scratch. Only Rose and Dave were on our meteor, as you would have seen, and anything I know regarding the second party is entirely secondhand.

[bonermagic]

... [...alright.] I guess it's kind of nice to know our session wasn't the only fucked up one.

[glowsferatu]

[ she lets out a small laugh, but there's really no amusement to it whatsoever. ]

Oh, of course not, that's more the rule than the exception with Sburb. Even our own session was broken, despite the fact that we saw it through to its completion.

[ of course, that was a result of the universe they created, which she's always kind of felt was due to her breeding the frog wrong. ]

[bonermagic]

At least you achieved some sort of completion, I guess, even if I'm assuming that it wasn't anything satisfying. [You know, the unamused laugh.] But I'm curious: tell me about the meteor.

[glowsferatu]

Well, after defeating the Black King and releasing the Vast Croak which created your universe, our passage into it was sabotaged and each of our individual planets destroyed. We then took shelter in the only meteor not released by the Reckoning, the very lab where our ectobiological origins could be traced.

It was certainly a proper size to host us, with twelve areas we could designate as our respiteblocks and twelve terminals to occupy us. Almost as if the game anticipated this result and prepared for it, as it has been known to do. Our interaction with the session that preceded yours began here, though there were only about ten and a half hours between our arrival and later departure. Though those ten hours weren't...uneventful. [ there's a lot she isn't saying there, and the hesitation she says it with betrays that. ]

Ultimately, Jade and Karkat collaborated on a plan for our escape, so once we received the signal, we had the meteor moved outside our dead session to the Green Sun, which was where Rose and Dave had found themselves, due to a complicated series of events on their own end.

From there we were to move throughout the Void until we would eventually reach your own session, a trip that would take three of your years. When last I was there, I had seen two of those.

[bonermagic]

[He considered jumping on that hesitation, it not having escaped his attention, and he decided to save it just in case the conversation were to swerve back to Davesprite.]

Anything exciting happen during those last two years or was it pretty much just kicking back and waiting?

[God, actually, that sounds pretty awesome the more he thinks about it. Dammit, Dave. So much envy.]

[glowsferatu]

[ she'll get back to it eventually, once she realizes how off-track they've gotten. right now she's caught up in that off track too much. ]

There were the dream bubbles we would often pass through, like the one we'd encountered you in. We'd managed to dig out some books from various compartments throughout the meteor. There was...each other.