“I may have accidentally sort of adopted five cats.” and/or "Please stop petting the test subjects." for Roxy
ah, this seems like a good time to write about my favorite pair, pre-fic Project: SSCAIA Roxy and Dirk!
[query: if I have more scenes set before the “fic” than during it, does “pre-fic” become “fic” and “fic” become “post-fic”? this may be relevant, albeit not very important]
.
Dirk knew in advance that he was moving in with a cat. Two, if he took into account the way Roxy herself fell asleep in sunbeams and make wibbly eyes at him until he pet her hair when she was particularly drunk - i.e. three or four times a week. Or more. Definitely more than Dirk was comfortable with anyone else in the world finding out about.
Jaspers, thank fuck, was a much less needy creature of a feline nature. Aside from being undead - which was only noticeable when Dirk really looked so shoutout to the necromancy skills of the teenage Lalonde twins - he was basically a regular cat. He ignored perfectly good food, shed on the furniture a bit, and generally pretended nobody but Roxy existed until he’d met them at least seventeen times. Even then, he just barely deigned to notice. Dirk and Jaspers got along fine.
The second cat was a bit less okay. Not that Dirk was particularly surprised when Roxy came home one day in October cradling a black kitten with four eyes - the specifics were odd, but in general it was nowhere near out of character. Of course they kept him. Rescued (stolen) from a university lab, the newly christened Mutie was understandably skittish, inclined to run at the slightest sign of physical contact and hide in the smallest, darkest place he could find. As a kitten, the options were many, ranging from under the couch to behind the cereal to, one very memorable time, in Dirk’s left trainer. He got stuck there.
There was caterwauling in the alleyway next to their building most nights, often dominated by Jaspers with his undead strength, and when the weather turned snowy, Roxy started leaving the side door open just a crack, just so they could get a warm place to sleep. And bowls of water and even food, when they had cat-healthy leftovers or there was a good deal on cat food at the store. So there were cats in the lobby now, which the super ignored because they technically didn’t belong to anyone and Roxy slipped him an extra hundred dollars a month. She greeted all the cats by name whenever she came in, and sometimes they followed her upstairs, meowing pitifully for more attention.
It was March when Drik gave up on his latest robotics project, threw it across the room, and flung himself backwards on his bed, only to be startled right back up by a loud and incredibly indignant feline yelp.The teeth scrabbling against his back hastened the jump.
“Sorry…cat,” he said to the glaring lump of orange fur. He couldn’t keep the names straight himself. Pumpkin? She looked like a pumpkin. Also he was apologizing to a cat, which was a whole ‘nother question not to raise.
Pumpkin snarled for good measure, though Dirk noticed she made no effort to actually move herself. Fine. It wasn’t like he couldn’t still fit on the bed, but the moment of ironically dramatic frustration was already past. He might as well go get a soda.
He stepped carefully over Mutie, who fit in the shadows of the small apartment hallway much less well than he had even just last fall, and ignored the stare of the imperial Siamese surveying its kitchen kingdom from atop the fridge. Chilled Fanta in hand, he wandered into the living room, where Roxy was curled up on the sofa with her laptop. Theoretically she was catching up on reading for her Advanced Systemics class but - Dirk checked over her shoulder - yep, that was wizard fic. The hand she wasn’t using to scroll slowly down the page was rubbing behind the ears of the elegant tortoiseshell stretched out next to her half-under the blanket. Dirk knew that one - Ophelia.
“How many of those do we even have?” he asked, apropos of nothing.
Roxy glanced up. “What?”
“Cats.”
“Umm…” She started ticking off her fingers. “Jaspers and Mutie. Ophelia-” she gave the cat in question another headscratch, and was rewarded with a purr. “Blueberry - oh, we should de-fur the shower again soon. How much time do they need to spend in the apartment to be defined as ‘ours’, technically? Because Jerry, Pearl, and and Pumpkin are hit and miss and Georgio never comes up, but he always says hi. And Ginny technically belongs to the neighbors but-”
Fandom: Homestuck
Relationships: Rose Lalonde & Roxy Lalonde, Roxy Lalonde & Dirk Strider
Characters: Roxy Lalonde, Rose Lalonde. Dirk Stride, rHorrorterrors
Additional Tags: Supernatural Elements, Original Character Death(s), extreme creepiness
Summary: About a year after graduating college, Roxy is kidnapped by cultists looking to summon the Eldest Gods to the mortal plane. That was their first mistake.
Guess who wrote an fic for an AU she’s built more than actually written, changed all the characters’ names, turned it in for her Intermediate Fiction class, got workshopped by her peers, edited a little (including changing the names back) and now is finally posting it online? Hell. Fuckin’. Yeah.
(Problem is, I’ve written so many things set before the hypothetical main fic now that I feel like I have much less to write in the hypothetical main fic. Oh, who cares, this whole ‘verse is designed to do nothing but entertain me.)
for the record, I just posted to AO3 two of the Project: SSCAIA scenes previously posted exclusively (oooh, exclusively! dramatic!) to my tumblr. I'm still not writing a coherent story per se, but here's are probably the most plot-relevent things thus far:
In Which Rose Isn't Quite On Top of Things and Eridan is the World's Least Competent Siren
In Which Sollux is a Better Hacker than AR Had Anticipated (Heheh 2uck IIt)
In Which Jade does Science and Everyone Else Makes an Interesting Discovery
Aradia and John watching Ghostbusters together and/or playing that Ghostbusters video game
It’s Jake instead of John, because Jake/Aradia friendship is important (adventuring!!) and also I’ve decided that Jake’s official position in Project: SSCAIA is Chef/Maintenance. Because someone has to feed everyone.
.
It’s going to be a pasta night again. Your grandmother taught you to cook properly - she always had something stewing in that great cauldron! - but the most complex thing you can do for a group this large is pasta. With sauce, of course; you aren’t a barbarian. You even have a sous chef tonight, so there’s no excuse not to produce a truly scrumptious meal!
"Peppers are done!" Aradia chirps. "Shall I add them to the pot?"
"No, these come last. Have you got the onions, too?"
"One minute. This knife really needs sharpening. Have you ever even made a sacrifice with it?"
"No, just took down a couple phobomorphs." As a ghost, she can’t handle iron or steel, so she’s using your old bronze dagger to chop vegetables. You are standing over the stove, slowly stirring the warming hamburger meat. You hum softly as you work, a habit from many years alone.
"Hm. It could be a good blade if you took more care of it."
You make a noncommittal noise as she resumes chopping. You do try to keep all your weapons in good working order, but honestly, you prefer pistols to daggers. They’re much more gentlemanly.
Your mind drifts a little as you stir, and you start wondering if you should add something more to the sauce than just your grandmother’s classic ingredients. Cooking, she always told you, is an adventure, and you should never be afraid to go off the beaten trail.
Aradia starts singing under her breath, a hollow vibrato more suited to a dark, creaking house than a bright kitchen. “When there’s something strange…in the neighborhood…who you gonna call?”
You almost chime in with an energetic, “Ghostbusters!” before you realize she was singing along to your humming. You turn around, cheeks growing red. “Oh, I’m terribly sorry, I didn’t mean to cause offense.”
The ghost grins brightly. She’s barely see-though at all, actually, looks just like any full-bodied, dark-hair young woman of about twenty-five. Except her legs vanish into a whisp of ectoplasm, and her eyes are bright red. “It’s no problem, Jake. I loved that movie when I was alive!”
"Right?" you exclaim. "It may be a highly erroneous representation of hunting, but it’s a brilliant film! Every line is hilarious!"
"My favorite is the library scene," says Aradia, nodding happily. "When the statues come to life!"
"I think I prefer the climactic battle myself," you admit. The stewing meat is temporarily forgotten, but that’s alright, it doesn’t really need constant stirring.
"You know what we should do?" Aradia says brightly. "We should have a movie night! Everyone can watch Ghostbusters!”
"That’s a brilliant idea! We could all use an evening off from worry and stress, I’m sure. With silly movies and popcorn!"
A timer beeps, telling you that the water is boiling. Time to put the pasta in! You grab the appropriate box off the counter and start dumping it into the huge pot on the stove. “There’s a large screen in the staff room, I’m sure we can do it.” You lower the heat and glance around the kitchen. “Probably not tonight, though, I don’t think we have popcorn.
(I have no better name for this than that. Feel free to recommend one.)
.
You’re woken by a shouted “Catch!” and something flying at your face.
You shove it away telekinetically and are on your feet, katana raised to ward off a second attack, before you even finish opening your eyes. The follow-up (small, soft, plush, your lagging mind notices) gets sliced in half in midair.
It’s only on about second three that your adrenaline-rushed senses fill in the smell of pancakes, and the fact that it’s Roxy (dangerous but friendly, disregarded as threat at first glance) who’s standing in the doorway of your bedroom and throwing cheap puppets at your head.
You lower your sword. “Did you phase into my apartment to ambush me awake?”
“You gave me a key last month,” she giggles. She crosses the room to pick up the first projectile and present it to you with a wide smile. “Merry Christmas, Dirk!”
It’s December 26th. You cautiously accept the puppet. It’s a panda, the sort where you put your whole hand in, a finger for each arm and three awkwardly in the head. It’s pretty much suited to a toddler. You hope Cal’s face is buried in the blankets, so he doesn’t have to look at it.
You glance at the bisected puppet on the floor. It’s pretty much the same design, only a tiger.
“Um, thanks. I guess.”
Roxy smirks. “Aslo I got you an actuell present. It’s in the kitchin.”
“Oh thank god.”
You sheath your katana and leave it leaning against the bed again, secure in the wards on your apartment. Sunglasses still go on, because you have a style to maintain now that you’re awake.
“Bring ur phone, btw,” says Roxy. “Lil’ Hal is gonna like this too.”
You consider swapping the phone for the panda puppet, but honestly, you aren’t sure if you want to leave this in your room. You pick the broken tiger off the floor, too, and a small box out from under your bed, and head for the kitchen.
Roxy is already back in front of the stove, flipping pancakes with expertise. They’re just Bisquik, but they smell good.
You put your stuff down on the small table. “How long have you been here?”
“Aboat half an hour,” she says, tossing three last lightly browned pancakes onto the looming stack on the plate at her elbow. “You sleep liek a rock.”
“I sleep like an alert cat,” you remind her. “You use dark magic to move around silently.”
She winks broadly and passes you the laden plate. Then she catches sight of the small brown box. “Oooh, whassat?”
You masterfully do not twist your hands behind your back and shuffle your feet. Mostly because you’re holding the pancakes. “I got you a present, too. Sorry it’s not wrapped—I didn’t think you were going to be back until Thursday.”
Her lips twist down. “Yeah, well, Rose never showed and it’s not lake our aunt was partacularily sad to not have her, or me. So I stole all the eggnog and vamooshed to a rad-eye. Red-eye.”
“That sucks.” You haven’t had a happy family Christmas since you were fifteen, and that’s seriously stretching the definition of “happy family.”
Roxy’s crossing her arms in the way that isn’t stern so much as hugging herself and hoping nobody notices, so you try again. “I’m glad you came back.”
You are rewarded with a smile, a little less boisterous than usual but still basically too bright for this early in the morning. Dirk: 1, depressing lives: still approximately 50 million but temporarily put out of mind.
“This is all very saccharine, but what about the present that I will allegedly ‘like’?”
Your phone lights up as your AI joins the conversation, with a reasonable electronic facsimile of your voice. It wouldn’t fool anyone—it’s a little too robotic—but that’s intentional for ironic purposes.
Roxy breaks into a real grin, by which you know this is going to be genuinely good. “Idk,” she teases, “presents should raelly wait ‘til after breafkast. You guys don’t eben have a tree to lave it undre!”
“Lies.”
The screen flickers through several screens before any of them can load fully. Then the lock screen is back, ironic Rainbow Dash—okay, unironic Rainbow Dash—replaced by an animated 8-bit dancing Christmas tree.
“Check it out,” says the AR. “A 100% authentic Douglass Fir, raised and watered by generations of reindeer in the Canadian wilderness, lovingly hand-drawn here by the Holy Order of Nuns of St. Animatus. The most perfect tree in existence for—all my camera’s picking up is ceiling here. Are you even looking at me?”
Roxy leans over the phone and waves. “I stand totstally corrected, that’s a hella nice tree. I gue-ess…”
“I’ve eaten a pancake already,” you say truthfully. Just because there’s conversation going doesn’t mean you were going to ignore free food handed to you.
“Lall right!” she exclaims. “Check it: ‘s’even under teh tree already!” She swoops down and pulls out a small package which she’d evidentially taped to the underside of the table. You decide not to ask why there and just accept the gift when the puts it in your hands, in exchange for the pancake platter you were still holding. It’s a sort of flattened cylinder, rounded on both ends, hard beneath the Santa-patterned wrapping paper.
“Glasses?” you guess as you carefully peel off the excess tape. “Or at least, a glasses case, holding something significantly more specific to my interests?”
Roxy grabs a pancake. “Maaaybe. Can I open mine?”
“Sure.”
She stuffs the pancake in her mouth and dives for your plain brown box. By the way she tears it open, you know she would have haphazardly ripped any wrapping paper to shreds.
It’s not that flashy a present either. It’s just a mug with a hungover-looking cartoon cat thinking, “Too much milk last night L” You saw it in a store window and thought of Roxy, and bought it on impulse.
“Oh em geee!” she squeals, holding it aloft. “Tha’s sto cute!.” Her curls bounce as she flings her arms around you. “I loove it. Thanks, Dirkie!”
You return the hug with one only somewhat awkward arm. “You’re welcome.”
She pulls back excitedly. “Now do yours, c’mon, c’moooonn.”
“Hold your horses, it’s a delicate operation.” Okay so maybe you give up and just tear the wrapping paper a bit—good god there is a lot of tape. Everything comes off at once, ripped Santas and all and…yep, it’s a glasses case. Bright orange. New shades, maybe?
“Open it!” Roxy urges. She’s holding up your phone so AR can see too.
You open it. Those are definitely not cool new shades. They are glasses, but they are neither shaded nor by any standards “cool.” In fact, they have a little thing attached that looks about as uncool—
“Holy shit, how did you get a Google Glass prototype? Those aren’t supposed to be released for the public until next spring.”
Roxy claps her hands (“Hey!” protests AR.) “I know! I stole it from my cybernetics porfessor, she got a test pair and leftem at school over break. So we only have until like Janaruy three to reverse engineer them and put them back togehter soes I can get ‘em back on her dresser.”
“Huh.” You turn them over in your hands. “We can do that.”
“Right! You can stop bieng like ‘omg I’d totes look taht up if my AI wernet stuck in my phocket,’ and you”—she points admonishingly at your phone—“can stop begin like ‘ugh lemmee see, lemmee see!’ ‘Cuz you’ll be on his nose!”
“I can’t get a nice nose?” AR protests.
“It’s your nose, too,” you remind him. “At least, it was. It’s really only improved since then.” Nobody looks their best at age sixteen.
“So le’s get started!” says Roxy. She picks up the pancake plate then puts it down again, darting behind you to the fridge. “Wait, no, I five-suresies need some cocoa in this cute-nifiscent mug. You want some, Dirkie? With maybe a splish of somethnig stronger?”
“No thanks.” You’re already itching to get a screwdriver in these, right after plugging them into your computer and mapping the imaging system. “What are you looking for? The milk’s still on the counter.”
“Oh duh!”
She spins back around and goes for the cabinet where you keep your odd assortment of pots and pans. She’s known where they are since, like, the first time you let her into the apartment. You’d be a little discomfited if it weren’t…no, you’re still a little wigged out, actually, nobody’s supposed to know your space as well as you do. You keep it deliberately bizarrely organized just for that purpose.
She goes up on tiptoes to reach the saucepan and trips on air on the dismount. You flashstep to catch her. She leans back and giggles up at you. “Le swoon!”
“The swooniest.”
You set her carefully back on her feet, discreetly judging the redness of her eyes and cheeks. “Did you sleep at all on the plane?”
“Umm…not per siggitty, noep. But I’m fine, I had soem Irish coffee.”
“Uh-huh.” Roxy’s default state may be slightly drunk, but it’s seven in the morning and Christmas. Sort of. You’re pretty sure that’s a combination reserved for sleepless parents of three or more. “I didn’t actually get very much sleep last night either. I was up until three working on Squarewave. We should probably at least eat a full breakfast before starting on the reverse engineering.”
“Dur, that’s what the packnanes are for!” She gestures proudly to the pancakes on the table. “We can eat while we engenier.”
You close the Google Glass back in its case with a decisive plastic snap. Trump card time. “Yeah, but we’d get crumbs on the prototype and your professor would notice. If you had a suck-ass Christmas and I had a basically boring one filled with robots who can’t rap nearly as well as they think they can, why don’t we make up for them now with a cheesy, pirated holiday special while we eat delicious Bisquik pancakes and drink non-alcoholic hot chocolate? We already did the presents-under-the-tree bit.”
Roxy pokes you accusatorily in the chest, which honestly would be significantly more intimidating if it wasn’t the same height as her chin. You’re fully aware that she could stick her hand in intangibly and physically remove your heart, so you don’t take comfort in the height difference, but it’s the tiniest bit amusing.
“I know waht you’re doign,” she says, scowling. It’s not serious. “Stop trynna look out for me.”
“I head they made a 90-minute show out of that ‘Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer’ song. How bad do you think it is?”
Now that’s a flicker of a genuine frown, and she hits you on the arm with the saucepan. “It’s the most bestest,” she says fiercely. “Cousin Mel’s a bitch.”
“I can’t wait,” you deadpan, and swipe the saucepan from her hand. “I’ll make the cocoa.”
.
Roxy’s asleep by the time Mel spikes the fruitcake, your chest being the pillow. You were lying through your teeth about staying up late, and, taking care not to dislodge the blanket, consume all the remaining pancakes while watching Jake and Grandma save Christmas and their holiday kitsch shop. It’s December 26th and you’ve had much worse Christmases.
In Which Jade does Science and Everyone Else Makes an Interesting Discovery
You sort of love your job. You loved researching the supernatural and inventing things on your island, too, but you’ll be the first to say that you’re really glad you got hired for the SSCAIA project. Studying (more) magical creatures up close! Working with other people, other trained scientists who believe in both Mendeleev AND Merlin! Getting paid, basically, to to work on your hobby of combining magic and technology, in ways you never would have THOUGHT of without help! It’s pretty much the coolest thing you’ve ever done.
Admittedly, some parts of it might not be the most morally upright. But all your subjects are…okay, not really volunteers, but they’ve all killed humans at some point, and so would be hunted anyway if they weren’t here.
“All right, Tavros!” You check his receiver headband one last time, making sure it’s secure to his skin. It won’t do you any good if it falls off when he shrinks! “Can you feel anything yet?”
Do any of the trolls know each other before they get captured? I assume Kankri would technically know OF all of them, which might be really fun (and really annoying) when he actually shows up and just knows everything about everyone already. But did any of them interact? (forces you to flesh out your fic while doing no writing of my own..)
No, none of the trolls know of each other - I considered having Nepeta and Equius already be besties but nah. they’re just caught and brought in at the same time so they meet slightly before anyone else and start bonding early.
Kankri doesn’t know of them either, actually, he’s just as hard-up as Karkat i.e. living out of more or less sheer stubborn refusal to die. Before I said that Kankri and Karkat are each others’ blind spots, but I keep oscillating between that and them being involuntarily open to each other, so as soon as Karkat starts interacting with everyone, Kankri knows them too? Or at least they can connect voluntarily, so once they call him, Karkat let’s Kankri see everything that’s happened to him in the past however-long-it-took-I-haven’t-decided. That seems good.
