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kiwinatorwaffles · 2 years

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hermits species headcanons!

UPDATED VERSION (february 12, 2024)

DISCLAIMER: i have not watched all of the hermit povs. i also only included the hermits i have headcanons for! if you have any headcanons for both the hermits i did write and didn’t write, please feel free to add on :]

also there is some form of an order listed, i swear. like. alphabetical but kinda scuffed

anyway, full post under cut!

bdubs- moss… thing? nobody is really sure what he is. but they know he’s definitely not human and he is a Menace

edit, feb 5: based on what a lot of people said and my own realization, bdubs is a glare! he hates the dark and is a little feral creature <3

cub- alien shapeshifter! he fakes forms based on the people around him. for example, the hermits are mainly humanoids, so his regular form is human as well. however, he can change to anything he wants!

cleo- zombie (duh) cleo is definitely undead, but a magician put a spell on her so that she has the traits of a living being and will function similarly to one. she actually doesn’t smell undead, but rather like flowers. it’s pretty nice!

doc- creeper… goat… cyborg… thing??? the hermits are not sure if the goat or creeper came first, but they definitely know the cyborg thing wasn’t originally there. but they Do know that this madman genetically modified himself to have a weird centaur-like goat body just to get extra inventory storage.

edit, feb 26: he also now has fae blood! (related to stress on dad’s side) he now has the power to steal your pronouns and change your gender presentation <3

etho- ?????? etho is an enigma. he looks human and acts human, but there is one detail: his mask. it doesn’t move when he speaks. he never takes it off. he doesn’t even need to eat because his account is so old that it doesn’t even have a hunger bar. he’s tried taking it off before but it won’t budge. nothing makes it move. they all have given up.

gem- deer hybrid! she’s a saytr-like deer lady with cute ears and legs :] but even though deers are herbivores (and consequently, so is she) this tiny little lady can be incredibly Violent when she wants. and man, those hooves hurt.

grian- parrot avian! he has little bird feathers for ears, parrot wings, and bird talons! he is also able to mimic voices perfectly (which he uses to play pranks and swear in other hermits’ voices) and is a Hollow Boned Menace :] he carries a lot of bird tendencies, like loving shiny items or preening his friends’ hair when it’s too messy (which is always)

npg- ????????????? he’s supposed to be a robot, but he has wings and flies sideways?????? not even grian is sure of what he created tbh

robot grian- robot. exactly as the name suggests.

edit, march 24:

hypno- warlock! maybe he was human at some point, but who knows anymore. who did he make a deal with to get power? we don’t know either.

impulse- imp! has little horns and bat wings. looks generally normal until he yawns, where then he becomes a lovecraftian horror being whilst also looking adorable like a cat. it’s really scary.

iskall- cyborg! well… they don’t know if he was fully human before getting the cyborg parts, but acts sure like one. other than eating redstone, of course

jevin- slime! nothing else to it. no known reason as to why he’s blue, though.

joe hills- ???????? now this guy is Weird. he looks human and acts human, but only if you’ve seen him for less than five seconds at a time. if you look closer, there are things that obviously Are Not Right. he has a little more teeth than average. he has a purple-tinted tongue. he leans forward when standing. his pupils and irises are reversed. you don’t know what he’s capable of, but he vibrates whenever any politician is mentioned. don’t mess with joe hills.

mumbo- robot! with a core heart and stretchy limbs, he runs mainly on the consumption of redstone and occasionally typical foodstuffs. he had a creator before the days of hermitcraft that taught him all there is to know about redstone and the outside world. he also inherits the british accent and mustache from his creator.

pearl- lunar deity! she’s a being created by the moon’s consciousness herself, manifesting into the mortal world to build with the earthlings. her power and energy increase the bigger the moon gets……

ren- weredog! can shapeshift into a dog form, which he usually uses to either run fast or play fetch. he’s also more prone to change when the moon is larger…. also probably has rabies, but who can tell?

scar- wizard! he’s very clearly magical, as seen from previous seasons and how he can magically float his wheelchair for convenience. jellie also is his familiar! but this wizard just happens to also be a capitalist.

stress- fairy! just because she gives off the vibes of one :)

tango- ?????? everybody knows tango is not a human, but he refuses to elaborate on the pointed ears and red eyes. so they do not ask any further

edit, march 24: hes a blazeborn! or at least he used to be anyway. i should’ve done this sooner but here’s the link to my full post about it LMAO

wels- human. yes, it’s very typical, but hey! at least he’s a knight!

hels- ???? is there a species for evil clones created by copying machines or

xisuma- voidwalker! created by the young void gods, he was made as the first experiment in giving life to a void being. he can walk through and survive in the void, and he also can borrow powers from his creators. he also may or may not have a mouth, just because nobody has seen it before.

evil x- also a voidwalker, but this time the void gods pressed random on a picrew and sent him out into an alternate dimension. this little rascal has red scleras, ram horns, and a devil tail. he also has sharp teeth and can eat pretty much everything.

zedaph- human, but he’s not sane. i mean look at this guy. look at what he’s doing. this is not a mentally stable man. also has a weird obsession with worms

worm man- surprisingly, human. or maybe he once was. but he lives with zedaph so he might go insane if he stays with that man for too long

and that wraps it up! again, if you have any hc species headcanons feel free to drop em below! i am very interested in y’all’s thoughts

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hermitcraftheadcanons · 4 years

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AU Raffle: Cryptid AU!

[COMPLETE]

The result of the random selection was the Cryptid AU! Multiple people suggested this, so I'm looking forward to hearing all the ideas and extensions you guys will come up with. This will be a masterpost collecting them all, and it will be pinned for the duration of the AU.

Original suggestion: "For the Raffle. Cryptid AU. None of the Hermits are truly human and they all are really powerful cryptids that are hiding their true nature. The catch! Every Hermit thinks the other Hermits are totally normal and they are the only cryptid one. Hilarity ensures with everyone trying to explain the extrange things that keep happening "

Some ideas I came up with:

- every Hermit is a cryptid or monster of some kind, except for Grian, who is fully human and completely clueless about everything that's going on (suggested by a previous ask)

- Team ZIT is an investigation group trying to prove the existence of cryptids, but each one of them is subtly trying to sabotage the investigation to hide their own cryptid-ness. None of the three know the other two are also cryptids. Hilarity ensues.

- Xisuma probably knows what's going on with everyone, but he's not saying anything

- Mumbo is doing an absolutely horrible job of hiding that he's a cryptid, but somehow people still don't notice. Iskall is probably the closest to figuring it out.

- VintageBeef has already figured out that Keralis isn't human, but Keralis is bribing him to keep quiet

I hope that's enough to get the ball rolling! Send in your ideas using asks, and I'll put them down here!

If you need ideas about which cryptid would fit best with which Hermit, this list may be helpful.

Anonymous Additions:

- I feel like xisuma should be some kind of shapeshifter

- cleo was brought back to life by a family that loved her very much- or at least, that was what they tried to do. in reality, they brought a completely new soul back in the body of a deceased relative. cleo felt uncomfortable around people who thought she was a different person than she was, so she ran away and eventually befriended the hermits bc she just felt ~drawn to them~. she disguises her bloodless skin and lack of body heat with thick clothes and lots of makeup

- Cleo, of course, is a zombie, but she also has ties to Cthulu that she doesn't really try to hide, but that people overlook all the time. I'm just saying, an avatar of an eldritch being having to be a zombie kinda makes sense...

- Cthulu needed a body, and this kind family was nice enough to supply one! It was kinda their fault really, praying to ancient gods and making deals without reading the fine print. Cleo might feel guilty, but it wasn't on her, not really

- cryptid au: joe isn't a human, but a changeling: a shapeshifting, nonhuman entity that evolved to invade human families like a cuckoo. he has the ability to bend light to make illusions, but he normally just uses his powers to make himself appear human. however he does like to make all lime green things he sees invisible, for the lulz

- What about mumbo being a vampire, it just introduces the idea of so many odd behaviors that the others are just oblivious to

- What if ren is a werewolf(I know it isn't original) and he just thinks of the other hermits as his pack and is therefor very protective of them

- Obligatory Ren is a Werewolf for the Cryptid AU. He is acts like a gigant puppy when he is in wolf form. Nobody questions why sometimes they found a gigant wolf trying to play fetch with them. But nobody is complaining. Everyone talks about it and Ren is just upset because the gigant pupper has never come to see him. Surprise!! Not even Ren knows he is a werewolf

- idk if your still doing cryptid stuff because i don't really know how this works but,, what if everyone thinks that Grian Is Something when he's not. They keep trying to figure it out by asking him weird questions or trying to get him to do weird stuff, but he still stays completely oblivious. And then since Xisuma knows what everyone is, he thinks it's hilarious trying to watch everyone try to find something that isn't there.

- Cryptid au: Doc has made it obvious that he is a cryptid like, he explains it so obviously even an idiot would tell that he's one, But no one has figured out yet. So after the 15th time of explaining things he decides to present how he's a cryptid, by making a goatess.

- For the au, I have 2 ideas for grian, either he is very outspoken about not believing in the super natural, or he very much does believe in the supernatural, either way he unknowingly befriends multiple cryptids and is very confused

- Cryptic AU: Tango has fire for hair, and no ones really questioned as to why?

- What if false was a siren, just because it seems like an interesting idea (my addition: Wels would also make a great siren)

- Stress seems like the type to be an elf, graceful and cheerful, and of course admiring nature's beauty

- What if Impulse was mothman, I like this idea because of the whole team zit being paranormal investigators and they just go looking for mothman on one trip, and Impulse is just standing there probably feeling a bit awkward

- If Impulse is Mothman and he can fly and Tango is like a fire demon that controls fire, is only fair that Zed is an aquatic Cryptid. Maybe related to a lake monster or he is a Sea Serpent

- Yeti Iskall getting used to the hot environment of the Jungle??? Maybe?

- i have no clue how this works but etho is related to ningen in a way (Antarctic sea creatures from Japanese folklore)

- Joe's poems seem to stick in your head, echoing around for hours after you hear them, ringing between your ears. Their subjects vary, but they often seem eerily prophetic, warnings encased in rhythm and rhyme. Sometimes you swear you can hear the soft scritch of a pen on paper, before you realize you are the only one around.

- Wait how the hell would jevin hide that fact he's a slime? Better yet how do the other hermits not put to and to together? Through I think jevin probably wouldn't even bother trying to hide it, I mean he's a huge blob of slime how would you not be able to tell

(my response, summarized) Jevin inhabits a body of slime because that's the easiest way to hide his true form. "Jevin" is a non-physical entity that can possess other lifeforms by destroying their will. He chose a slime this time because it was easy and inconspicuous.)

- Cryptid au: Team ZIT have a headquarters and they all pitched in to commission Etho to make their door bell chime, the ghost busters theme, and afterward interrogated Etho to the ground.

- Doc is not a creeper with cyborneticts. Doc is the AI that came with the cyborneticts and over-wrote the conciousness of the creeper. Figured that making Doc something else would be too dificult so maybe subverting what he is with what we got alredy is enough (like you did with Jevin)

- I am putting this here for vampire mumbo in the au because the thought will not leave my head. It's dark, and mumbo's eyes seem to reflect light very well, his canine teeth seem just a bit too long and sharp, they seem to be stained red,was he always this tall? Something about him seems off, he seems very elegant in this darkness.

- cryptid au: when joe was young, he was ignored so much that he turned invisible. you can still see his shadow but you could look directly at him and not see him there with the best tools. he disguises himself by staying quiet, using text to communicate with the other hermits or by covering himself with clothes and masks so nobody would be able to see his body even if he wasnt invisible.

- For the au I think that Iskall could be a dryad because of his base this season

- Imagine if you will: Tango leaves town for a bit so the team ZIT can't do their "investigations". Impulse gets bored and decided to pretend to kidnap Zedaph in mothman-form. When Tango returns, Zedaph tells him how he almost was kidnapped by Mothman (and is over-exaggerating on every detail)

- What if in the au there is a situation where team zit is in some sort of danger, and so each of them just independently decide that they have to reveal the fact of their cryptid selves, and they just collectivly think,"huh. Okay." And after they are safe, they just talk about it as a group

- Beef is big foot.

- Biffa looks like a robot or cyborg, which one? He won't say. Maybe its because its neither, maybe he's just a walking body with a mind, maybe he's just a suit of armor roaming the world, maybe a spirit or ghost from the past, maybe a mob whose inhabited and pilots the body, maybe he's just Biffa. Only he knows, but he won't say

- Cryptid AU: I’m just imagining zedaph or tango throwing a bell at grian in an attempt to “capture” him under the suspicion that he’s part fae or something at a server meeting

- About Cryptid!Wels, sometimes, when the night is dark and the world is silent, you'll hear it; a soft voice in the darkness. You can't help but listen to it as you get lost in the song, swaying to the melody as your foot moves to the beat. The song gets louder and your feet are more frantic as they seem to take you somewhere. Suddenly, the voice stops singing and so you stop moving, and when you open your eyes you find yourself on the edge of the cliff overlooking the ocean. The siren lurks near

- Doc isnt a Creeper with cybrog parts but a robot made to look like a creeper, that arm and eye? yea just exposed parts from years of just not caring enough. He's waiting to see when someone will call him out on it. So far, only TFC and X but they like to watch how long this will go. Doc isnt even hiding anymore, he loves to mess with Grian by making remarks that imply he's a robot but Grian just can't figure it out

- tbh I love the idea of Joe as a regular human who just acts super cryptic and strange, and has a bit of skill at poetry. others try and figure out what he is, and he's just vibing in a corner, the last one anyone would expect to be the sole normal person on the server

- Cryptid AU. Joe and Cleo as the ‘One Bagel. No!! Two bagels!’ Vine. Joe being the one that asked and Cleo ignoring Cthulhu

- Joe starts sharing different ideas of what he could be, and only Cleo knows (mostly... she's the closest at least). Joe's mystery is a Hermitcraft classic, greeting every hermit except X, who still only has what Joe's told him to go on. He delights in the chaos he causes

- Scar is a poltergeist, he hides it well. One time Grian caught him using his powers, after scar fessed up, in private, they both bring some amount of chaos to the server, but not to much so the ZIT crypt hunters, name in progress, don't know about the chaos, thus not puting the duo in danger.

- Mumbo might be a vampire, but it isn’t for blood (at least, not anymore). Only Grian has come close to figuring it out, and it’s due to seeing how refreshed and satisfied his friend looks after being around 2+ groups of people. If only he would just straight up and ask. - 🦊

- Rather last minute but do you have any ideas of how Evil Xisuma could fit into this? Would he be a shapeshifter as well. A copy of X's true form? A demon haunting Xisuma? Just X's pesky brother? There's a handful of ideas I can't personally decide what would fit best. Maybe none of them at all, who know?

Cryptid Au. Xisuma shapeshifts for fun. Thats how we get Turtle!Xisuma, Beesuma and Stridersuma. All hermits just assume X changes his suit because they have never seen his face so there is no way for them to know he shifts. Also clasic headcanon that TFC is Herobrine and he is just laying low in Hermitcraft after years of going around worlds. Everyone knows the legend about Herobrine but have not connected the dots yet because TFC is just everyone’s grandpa. No way he could be Herobrine.

- @/ivi-prism

- While most might assume that Grian would be a harpy, its actully Scar. He's incredibly flexable in Human form, hes able to manuver his foot behind his head, and moret than once has Cub walked in on Scar with a living fish in his mouth. He never questioned it because "Hey, Vex magics weird."

- Imagine- sytyr Zedaph and Fae Impulse walking in on Willowwisp Tango who,because willowwisps are typically tiny, shrunk in response to panic and is now stuck in a caldron. I think that be hilarious. Just the idea of impulse going-"YOUR A CRYPTID?" while Zed just "WAIT I KNEW I DIDNT BURN THOSE PAPERS!" Which leads into a discussion of ZIT internal sabotage, and suddenly ZIT invesigation changes direction from "Are cryptids real" to "Is anyone else a Cryptid cause this cannot be a Coincidence"

- @/crypticalwitch

- Cryptic AU: Tango can also control his hair, to an extent. He can slick it back, but it still looks like burning embers. It's a bit mesmerizing

- Cryptid AU: Cub was a normal guy, maybe with some weirder interests, before the Vex. "Playing" with their magic too much is what made him a cryptid. So maybe he understands that the other hermits aren't exactly "human". But it isn't his business, and it means they don't question what the Vex get him into, so he just doesn't say anything about it

- Cryptic AU: Team ZIT's strongest evidence for Grian is the fact he's a master with an elytra, especially since he first said he "might use it a little bit" for long journeys. He's flown into a dark hole in a dark wall that's barely big enough to fit him multiple times, with ease, among other risky stunts that would get other hermits killed. The fact there's not much else to go on, besides his pranking zeal only matched by Zed himself, drives them up the wall

- Cryptic AU: when you stay out too long at night, you might start to feel watched. You'll turn around and nobody is there, but still you feel eyes on your back, and the breeze always seems hot and brushes your neck like too-close breathing and a hand. Finally, you catch it: a familiar figure that stands too stiffly, always just too far away to name. Then it vanishes with an airy shriek, and phantoms descend from the stars. Bdubs did always say the worst things happen in the night.

- Cryptic AU: Impulse's smiles are just a little too big. If you look at one too long, you feel as though it's stretching wider and wider, the cheery shine in his eyes twisting into a hungry gleam, but then you blink and he's back to normal ol Impulse and you question if you really saw anything. That time you saw his smile glinting in the darkness just beyond your bed must've been a nightmare. Your imagination.

- Cryptic AU: Don't look into his eyes. Look in, and you will see the universes. Billions of stars, trillions of futures, all impossibly swirling together, hauntingly beautiful. You'll fall down, down, down through the glittering spirals, until with a breathtaking snap you're on your knees, on solid ground. You're lucky he doesn't want to keep you, like others might. The lives and worlds you glimpsed will echo through your mind, weave through your dreams. Do not fear. Do not look into his eyes.

- The mountain is his territory. If you enter it unbidden, he will ensure you leave, lucky to keep your life. His contraptions are nonsense, seeming to serve no purpose other than to confuse. They distract from how the air crackles on your skin, how it tastes of storms and thunder. They distract how, from the corner of your eye, Zedaph's limbs are too long, fingers with too many knuckles and legs with too many knees. All angles and bones, like his designs. Do not look too closely at his garden.

- Everyone learned not to ask about him. Mostly because in trying to form the question, you'll find the words slipping from your mind. So Tango's hair burns, his eyes are red cherries. In the darkness he glows, the embers of a forgotten fire. His skin is always hot, almost feverish, yet he isnt sick. If he gets too close to lava, the illusion fades, reveals the magma that forms his skin. Illusion? No, that was just a burn. He relishes the smoke and rubble of explosions. Control. Always controlled.

- xB doesn't mind being away from the other hermits. It's quiet there; far enough away that most aren't bothered to prank him. He doesn't like surprises. Surprises get people hurt. Gets his friends hurt. His guardians appreciate the still predictability. The calm. Yes, he prefers to sit back, quiet, and watch. If he looks too long, bad things happen. So he observes it all, never focusing too much on one detail, never letting them go unseen. It prevents surprises.

- Because that last one wasn't all that clear, xB is a guardian-based cryptid! While nothing seems inhuman about him at a glance, he has a close affinity to water, and when threatened the spines he hides with his clothes will stick out. (Guardians only spawn in water, but they actually don't suffocate in air! Though their desperate flopping is a sad sight to behold) Plus, laser-eyes

- Xisuma wasn't always able to change his form as easily or drastically as he can now. But by now, he's forgotten his own face. Now, he'll feel his skin, his body begin to itch with the need to change. He's glad the hermits don't seem to care when he does. Keralis's mimicry was a surprise, but a welcome one. He feels less alone. Loneliness is how he would lose himself. He's scared of that possibility.

- When he sleeps, he walks through the minds of those whose eyes met his, as if it were his own dream. He'll hear their thoughts as if they were his own. He doesn't like this. It feels like an invasion. He feels like a parasite, and maybe he is. Whoever he dreamed through last, they seem exhausted and jumpy after, while he feels energized, near invincible. It's through this ability he knows their deepest secrets, but they aren't his to tell. Sometimes, he wishes he could understand. (Xisuma pt 2)

- Cryptid AU: another reason that Grian cant possibly be a human is his clothes. Just. How does he have something for every occasion. He even has a janitor one? Why did he have that? This "man" doesn't own a single closet yet has at least 20 different costumes-- not to mention you blink and he's changed! Wh- he had a REAPER costume for himself AND SCAR???

- @/basaltdragon

- Cryptid AU: Grian used to be against cryptids because of Sam (YHS) and his bunny attributes, but has since accepted the fact Sam was just a bad apple, and cryptids as a whole are neutral/good.

- Your heart, it beats, like redstone ticking away within you. He knows redstone through and through... so why not you too? Every pulse sent though the machine of your body is one more reason for him to reverse engineer you. But he restrains, takes a step back, as these machines could never be put back together.

- He's been here since the beginning; not of Hermitcraft, but everything. Watching as the game evolved over the years... He smiles at the thought. His hair now matching his eyes - like harsh reflective snow - he recalls these memories fondly. As his eyes fade to their piercing blue, he sighs, for this is home.

- When any of the other Hermits (at least the ones with blood) get injured, Mumbo has to step away. The need for their blood, their lifeforce, is too overwhelming.

- @/12u3ie

- Cryptid AU: with the team ZIT headquarters I thought of something similar to the TEA headquarters from season 3. Probably more confusing, colourful and chock full of even more excessive redstone doors. Why not add another elevator? Where's the coffee machine? Maybe the next room over? Was that corridor there before? I don't know. What's the use of that room? What's behind that door? What's behind you?

- Cryptid AU: with the whole burning hair thing on Tango, another explanation for why no one questions it. That's just Hermitcraft, people just assume he either royally messed up a redstone machine, or succeeded completely, you never know with Tango. Or maybe they think they're sleep deprived. They haven't slept in a while, Bdubs has been reminding them to do so. What were they doing? Maybe they should go home instead. Whatever they were doing can probably be done later. What were they doing?

- @/the-royal-bat-snake

- If joe is a changing then he is some kind of fae folk or as the irish and the Scots call them "the good neighbours" he could like anything, from a human, a small man, like knee height or a small green impish or goblin esque creature. Also changlings were the very old fae folk, not just the babies (humma women were stolen to be nurse maids cus fae folk cant make milk, also stolen to be mistresses) I know a lot of irish faerie lore so if you want to know anymore

- @/whatschooldoesntteachyou

#hcraft #hermitcraftheadcanons #hermitcraft #hermitblr #mod shade #au raffle #cryptid au #hermitcraft server

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gamzee · 4 years

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I was going to keep this card up my sleeve for the purposes of writing the act 8 intermission, but homestuck as hamlet and fandom as ophelia is resonant. I spilled the beans on twitter so I will spill them here too.

OPHELIA: Good my lord, How does your honour for this many a day? HAMLET: I humbly thank you; well, well, well. OPHELIA: My lord, I have remembrances of yours, That I have longed long to re-deliver; I pray you, now receive them. HAMLET: No, not I; I never gave you aught. OPHELIA: My honour'd lord, you know right well you did; And, with them, words of so sweet breath composed As made the things more rich: their perfume lost, Take these again; for to the noble mind Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind. There, my lord.

Cascade felt to many of us like a promise of the core ethos of a future homestuck rather than the cultural zenith it has become in retrospect. Another work like Cascade is not sustainable in the times we live in, but hauntology has fully settled in and won’t let anything come after without us remembering that beautiful, wonderful thing that happened. Many promises were made back then... many....

HAMLET: Ha, ha! are you honest? OPHELIA: My lord? HAMLET: Are you fair? OPHELIA: What means your lordship? HAMLET: That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty. OPHELIA: Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than with honesty? HAMLET: Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness: this was sometime a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love you once. OPHELIA: Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. HAMLET: You should not have believed me; for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it: I loved you not. OPHELIA: I was the more deceived.

Language floats about on twitter nowadays about how it truly is our fault for our misidentification of homestuck’s real aesthetics and ambitions, and comments that specifically point out tumblr creating a false, softer homestuck feel about as gendered as hamlet’s upcoming take on cosmetics. Is fandom, or bad fandom, only cosmetic?

My takeaway is that... yes, actually, there was something we didn’t realize about the relationship we were all getting into. Perhaps it was obscured underneath all the voices of various contributing artists; [S] Explore made me feel a sense of haunting beauty that hasn’t left over a decade later. Lexxy’s god tier jade is a wonderful painting of a happy young girl who came back to life and saved everyone, but beauty in homestuck now is about pure, unadulterated terror. Terror of beauty, and terror of each other.

(Well now I’m sounding artsy, let me just get this snippet from a PDF of the script.)

[caption; for a moment Hamlet has been touched by the sight of Ophelia with her book of prayers. yet there is estrangement in the word “Sylph” “Nymph.” She inquires for his health (having seen him yesterday); he answers as to a stranger; formally, as he does to Osric... and with some impatience; he will tell her nothing. She produces his gifts; he has been sent for by the King; Ophelia, like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, has doubtless also been sent for; he falls back on his accustomed method of baffling half-truths. These toys were the gift of another Hamlet to another Ophelia-- not his.]

Homestuck begins to question the base nature of canon and the expectations held to canon, and thus everything feels a bit like evasive maneuvers re: accountability for anything that is said or done whatsoever. Baffling half-truths, questionable sincerity in open derision, like as follows;

HAMLET: Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; but yet I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me: I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. Where's your father? OPHELIA: At home, my lord. HAMLET: Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the fool no where but in's own house. Farewell.

Lol, house.

OPHELIA: O, help him, you sweet heavens! HAMLET: If thou dost marry, I'll give thee this plague for thy dowry: be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, go: farewell. Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enough what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go, and quickly too. Farewell. OPHELIA: O heavenly powers, restore him! HAMLET: I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; God has given you one face, and you make yourselves another: you jig, you amble, and you lisp, and nick-name God's creatures, and make your wantonness your ignorance. Go to, I'll no more on't; it hath made me mad. I say, we will have no more marriages: those that are married already, all but one, shall live; the rest shall keep as they are. To a nunnery, go. (Exit)

The suspicion fostered in narrative by the epilogues is in fact a kind of “lesson” we are to take towards all narrators and all stories. But is that any way to live-- like, no reciprocation, no honesty, no trust or gentleness-- there shall be no marriage. This sort of intertextual reading (wait is it... intertextual if it’s paired with a narrative external space? It’s not like i can just CALL Kristeva to ask) ...does kind of imply the Epilogues were inevitable and a result of homestuck’s “real” philosophies. But you still get to ask, is it a good philosophy? Hamlet agrees and he’s just a famously good and emotionally stable guy, so who’s to say.

(My real answer is that Hegel’s m/s model was right and that mutual recognition is not only better but the best thing humans can do and strive for, and so this all feels petulant to me. But famously good and emotionally stable Ophelia drowned in a river so maybe don’t take my word for it.)

Pair with Errant Signal’s videos on The Beginner’s Guide and That Dragon Cancer if you like which both have thoughts about narrative-reader connections. (The latter discusses the former.)

Anyway, this should be my new twitter bio;

OPHELIA: O, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown! The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword; The expectancy and rose of the fair state, The glass of fashion and the mould of form, The observed of all observers, quite, quite down! And I, of ladies most deject and wretched, That suck'd the honey of his music vows, Now see that noble and most sovereign reason, Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh; That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth Blasted with ecstasy: O, woe is me, To have seen what I have seen, see what I see!

#i have a meta tag now #that i will curate some day in the future

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redknight3996 · 4 years

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23: Prometheus

If you were asked what type of superpower you would want if you could have it, what do you think you would answer? Whatever it is, you’re wrong. The correct answer is all of them.

If you are ever presented with three artifacts of immense, cosmic power, all linked to beings beyond your imagination, wouldn’t you take all three? Isn’t that just human nature?

You’re only meant to take one, that’s what they tell you, but why wouldn’t you? You have two hands, presumably. You have a mouth, assumedly. Even if they’re far from each other, on some stupid pedestals, wouldn’t you still want to get them all at once? Wouldn’t you try to reach?

Even if they hate your choice, even if they loathe one another, who genuinely gives a fuck what they think? You want what you want, you should take what you can get! Reach out and grasp the world, grip the moon and sun in both palms and demand they bow to you before biting down on a black hole!

When born into the world, you should look to your parents and demand to know why they did not birth you as a god, why they have failed you in such a way, and then you must seize godhood for yourself.

Such is the ethos of the man strapped to the electric chair. He grips its armrests, digging his fingers into the wood, and grins wide. His eyes have burst, his teeth are cracking as he grits them, his gums are bleeding, and yet he smiles, because he is a part of the ambience. Hell must have its condemned, and laughter bubbles, electric and crackling as he jerks and writhes, still not yet dead. Cooking, but not dead.

And then you let him out.

He is bald. He is naked. He is fat. His body twitches with aftershocks as he stands, jerking and laughing, because those stupid fucks couldn’t kill him, not yet, not ever. You might realize his sockets have a gleam in them, but that might just be pulsing nerves.

His skin is a patchwork of stitches and staples, keeping the segments of his body attached properly. He strolls from his cell with a casual twitching, uncaring of the dark and dirty stone halls around him.

There’s a man named King in one cell who makes all the rats; sterile things, incapable of transmitting any virus as they squeal and struggle and tear their way out of a squirming, screaming man bound tight to a chair. A proper filthy dungeon has rats, so they needed a source.

The prisoners here are mistakes, broken things made of half-finished ideas and thoughts. Even the zombies, uninspired as they are in ratty gray jumpsuits, have limbs replaced. Claws, blades, hooks. Some have metal muzzles, some have spikes in their skulls, some crackle and jerk with the same electricity. The same source.

The real interesting things are kept lower than this, deeper. The labs under the park have been broken into. Crawl deeper if you want. The surface is becoming more hostile.

He will let out others. That’s only natural, only right of him. There were plans and plots and discarded ideas. The operators discarded the hospital angle, found it too dreary, hence the hulking doctor with the chopped off nose; cults were too tricky, too hard to figure out, but the figures in robes are easy to release, and they’ve been waiting oh so eagerly for the opportunity; and there was an early idea, inspired by mimics, for some sort of trap monster. No one would go for a treasure chest, but a tank of water was considered unassuming enough.

And one technician really did want to use the name Rusalka.

Prometheus knows these things because he was on that team. He knows a lot of things about how the park works, why it works, who it works for, but he has no tongue to explain why the man in the mountain is a fool who lacked vision, who lacked attention, who built something he never fully understood but that the sun behind his peak most certainly did.

Even then, there are things people just can’t expect, even when they think they have everything figured out.

A wolf would work first.

Prometheus thought things through, he had a great deal of time to think while in that chair, and he’s positive on his course of action in finding a barghest–those lovely canines sharp in the moonlight–and shoving his arm into its mouth.

He smiles and grips hard so the teeth sink in, then tosses away the twitching, smoking creature as the hair begins to sprout and his gait starts to change. His nails extend, his legs lengthen, his smile gets sharper, but he is not fully them. He finds an icthyan next, before the mutation can spread too far, and offers a simple key to the palace below if she would just bite his wrist, right on the bleeding part, as hard as she could.

She does so, and he willingly shows the way under. There are places to explore, to see, still to find, but first, he returns to the castle and finds a nosferat while his skin squirms into mottled scales. One more set of teeth sink into his arm as the mutagen sings in his veins and he laughs once more. Wings burst from his back in a bloody spray and he sinks his rows of sharpened teeth into the final donor’s neck, drinking deep of its warm blood as he grows and changes.

Frills and fur and gills and gore. His ears lengthen, his muzzle stretches, his body ripples as muscle and fat redistribute. He still has no eyes, but he’s solved the issue that brings. No need to see when he can hear, smell, and feel everything so much easier. The flesh grown where his eyes once were is evidence of that.

The end result is a mess of color. Brown and black fur, green scales, white skin, all wreathed in crackling blue. If pushed, it’ll all go white, and the stitches and staples still present will stand out stark, but for now, he’s content to lope while he waits for things to devolve further and further.

You won’t die to him, or at least he won’t deliberately kill you at the moment, but he’s out there now, and it’s just one more thing to be aware of.

So keep your eyes out. He’ll be doing the same, as much as he’s able.

#31 day horror park #sanguine park #horror #halloween #my writing

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