Special shout out to LuluKatrina (thanks for the awesome review!) who brought up a really interesting theory about Gamzee. I'm just gonna post what she said up here: "would you mind if I shared a little theory I have about why Gamzee started eating the pies in the first place? I think that deep down Gamzee didn't WANT to be a killer highblooded psychopath. The sopor slime knocked him out of it enough that he could be normal, relatively, and as long as he was doped up the :o) and Do: vioce-things in his head were quieter and not as murderous. Not sure why he stopped though. My friend spoiled me about his flipping out before I got to that part, and she said it was because he ran out, but I don't really remember reading that anywhere. Or maybe the ICP thing really did enrage him enough to be a trigger, idk." I thought it was completely fascinating. Also she helped me understand Gamzee/Tavros, at least on a level of them being good friends. Jessica says, maybe not Matesprit, but definitely best buds, which I answered with something to the effect of, "Sollux and Karkat are best buds, but I still read slash fiction about those two!"
Which brings me to my next issue: Trends in Slashfiction! Why does Karkat tend to bottom? I put my own thoughts here about which guys in Homestuck would top/bottom in slashfiction, and I'd love to hear what others think about this. I want to know where YOU would put Karkat, and why you think he belongs there! And other characters too, if you like. ;)
Also, Jessica obliterated any arguments of slash fiction with the argument that trolls' anatomy isn't actually human anatomy, which means that the sorts of things that happen in the smutty stuff that I love can't actually happen in canon! She attempted to write a small fic describing what might REALLY happen if a troll and human got together, but she failed. SO I CHALLENGE ALL OF YOU! Write a fic about that scenario! Only make it realistic - would there be confusion? Ridicule? Awkwardness? Or would it be surprisingly hot (in an alien-taboo sort of way)?
Other theories have been thrown around in this installment of the ongoing conversation, so any thoughts you have about other stuff, I'd love to hear about that too!
Random names thrown around in here (and other chapters): James is Jessica's brother, Skye is her cat, Morgan is my twin sister (who ALSO writes the Avatar and SnapCracklePop FF with us!)... Morgan had drawn a couple pictures of the trolls.
And, again, the links are broken, and, again, I don't feel like fixing them.
Jarkat Slashfiction
(later…days?)
JESSICA
You seriously need to catch up on Homestuck when you get the chance. It's kind of sad (and don't forget to watch the panels at the top)
JESSICA
by the way, Sollux must be psychic still:
"TA: fulfiilliing 2ome requiirement for a true prophet of doom.
TA: iin order for the vii2iion2 two be riight, that ha2 two happen, and the uniiver2e wiill make 2ure iit wiill.
TA: iit2 kiind of liike how a prophet earn2 hii2 2triipe2, by beiing bliind, liike how an angel earn2 iit2 wiing2"
so he's a true prophet of doom now?
JESSICA
Something has been toying at the back of my mind, and has only now shown its face. I think the kids create Alternia. It only makes sense. There are the twelve parts of the zodiac for each of the trolls, and there are the four components of romance for trolls. It has been hinted before that each kid is a certain suit (John spades, Dave heart, ok, I can't remember the girls, but I would assume Rose is diamond and Jade is club although they could easily be reversed). Just as the trolls were worked into the subconscious of humanity, the kids were worked into all of Trollian. That's been bothering me ever since they first showed John in his spade shirt and I just wanted to run it by you. Did you have that feeling too?
KALYN
I have caught up, it depresses me because both John and Karkat are so...idk, I don't want them to hurt the way they are! DX and I watched the panels. Jade and Dave are doing a pretty good job! And I didn't really think about that before, but it makes sense. John had a spades shirt? and what makes Dave hearts? You should probably show me where these were hinted at, cuz I totally never noticed.
JESSICA
He had a hearts shirt too, I'm pretty sure. People have had it on DeviantArt and I knew it wasn't baseless (them being alligned with the four suits that is) I just can't remember Jade or Rose exactly. I know the spades was at the beginning of one of the acts, the one where Karkat is watching John's life and getting super pissed. I'll find the exact page for you. Dave will take a little more tinkering.
JESSICA
And yeah, super sad, I haven't checked todays yet though.
It hasn't updated further than what I read. So, yeah...
KALYN
-sigh- Karkat's words depressed me greatly I almost don't want to go back and read them, it's a horrible note to end on. I'll probably go back and reread them once this whole story becomes happy again.
JESSICA
yeah, I know. It was so sad. Karkat asking if there was actually something to their relationship was what got me the most. Because Kar cares! He cares.
KALYN
I think what got me was him saying that his best friend was whoever he was feeling most sentimental to at the time, which was Gamzee, and we haven't seen how he took care of that yet
JESSICA
Yeah, we'll definitely get to that soonish
JESSICA
John's wearing his spades shirt in this one. And I really REALLY love the music. It's so perfect.
.?s=6&p=004526
JESSICA
There was in fact interaction between Tavros and Gamzee. They spat sick rhymes with each other .com/?s=6&p=004023
but nothing worthy of matesprit, that much i can tell you
JESSICA
You both then proceed to have one of the worst rap-offs in the history of paradox space.
So then they were pretty good friends, and if you don't want to read it, Tavros was Gamzee's server player. I just brought that up because you mentioned that we may want to think about that above. As far as I am we have Tavros=Gamzee, Terezi=Karkat and more to come. Actually, I remember there being a chart with their symbols. When I find that we can look at it in depth (if you want to).
JESSICA
actually, the chain should look more like this so far: Tavros=Gamzee=Terezi=Karkat
JESSICA
Will this cheer you up? .?s=6&p=005579
(video: All: Behold the Warhammer of Zillyhoo)
KALYN
fuckin-okay, did you also notice that Gamzee had that hammer before? and that Karkat was beholding it? how did I miss that completely? so somehow, THAT hammer passed through a couple of trolls' hands before it got to Jade. and, if you're "humans made the troll universe (I can't bother myself to remember the name of the world right now)" theory has merit to it, then maybe Karkat is John's supposed "grandson", just because of that whole deal? Like how Karkat insisted on calling himself John's god when he first talked to him? THIS HAMMER IS THE KEY!
KALYN
And the sad thing is, I think I DID notice before (not in this video, but at some other point) that Gamzee had that same hammer, and I didn't realize the implications that surrounded the fact. I just offhandedly thought that they acquired or created (can't bring myself to remember this term either! the letter A hates me today.) the same hammer somehow coincidentally. I didn't think that maybe the very same hammer would somehow get to Jade's rabbit robot gift for John for him to growify and use... O.O
JESSICA
Appearify? Yeah, I did notice Gamzee had it, but I didn't notice Karkat taking. I don't think Karkat is Jade's "grandson" I don't think that's the case at all. However, Jade does seem to acquire a few choice Troll artifacts. I think one of which was Eridan's gun thing. So they are obviously connected someway, and I am sure they will meet.
JESSICA
Ok, do you want to read something frivolous to cool off a little? Sometimesit's nice to read something a little more whimsical after something so intense. If you do I would really suggest Problem Sleuth. It's a little slow at the start, but it gets really good at the end. It's a comedy where Homestuck is a tragedy. so check it out if you want; it's a lot shorter than HS an is a little more like a game too.
JESSICA
Ok, this is super silly: .com/track/nic-cage-song
KALYN
! we actually listened to this today but I didn't know what it was...O.O
KALYN
I've ditched the grandson theories for now. I pretty much don't care who it is anymore, we'll find out later. Just like we'll find out why the hell Kanaya is suddenly a vampire!
JESSICA
Yup, did you read today's? Be warned if you haven't. You probably won't like it at first.
KALYN
yes I read it
won't like which part?
JESSICA
Oh, ok. I thought you wouldn't like Dave dying...although now that I think about that happens a little too often...
KALYN
Yeah I read it and was all "aww sad" but then Karkat said he was fine. "WITH JACK STANDING THERE LIKE A CREEP AND EVERYTHING" lol
JESSICA
yeah, that was pretty great. And I knew prototyping Jade's sprite with Bec was a good idea.
JESSICA
Jack could have easily killed Jade then, but he didn't!
Has Morgan read this yet?
KALYN
Actually I'm definitely going through the entire thing with her. Right now. She's watching me type. Just sitting there, watching like a creep.
JESSICA
lol who, by the way, am I texting?
KALYN
texting?
that would be Morgan, apparently
JESSICA
That's what I thought. If she asks, I'm not ignoring her for stating such an atrocious thing as drawing Gamzee. The text hasn't sent itself yet for whatever reason. Probably the weather.
Oh, and tell her she's a creep for reading over your shoulder that's just creepy.
JESSICA
Like I was telling Morgan, I drew Eridan and John recently-ish. Eridan when I read the whole thing with him and Sollux, and John yesterday.
KALYN
hahahahahahaha
JESSICA
haha?
Haha!
Hahahahahaha!
Why are we laughing?
KALYN
lol I just wanted to type a very quick response before Morgan had a chance to read your messages
I guess hahahahahahahahahahaha was the first thing that came to mind
Actually, it was more of the devious laugh that was in my head as I thought how awesome it would be to type quickly and hide the messages from Morgan
so, less to what you said and more to Morgan's inquiries "what did that say?" I thought something like "YOU'LL NEVER KNOW! hahahahahahahahahahaha"
And so that's what I typed. :P
JESSICA
hahaha! So you didn't tell her? Your terrible!
KALYN
well she must have seen it just now while I was typing all that. we're still going through all the messages up here, so we'll get to it eventually. btw, she says your ipod messages aren't making sense
This is how our thread looks on the phone:
JL: (2/2) ...
JL: WITH Sollukth?
JL: Or was he another picture?
Me: Sometimes if a message is too long it won't send at all
JL: And by mostly I mean entirely contained
Me: ?
JESSICA
(2/2)?
KALYN
JL: Me shouthing Gamzee's name indicative of
JL: A person shaking her fist at the sky on anger
JL: I don't know of that was the text you were referring to
JL: Ummmm... Right, I forget about that. Anyway, that last text mostly contained
Are these out of order?
JESSICA
It just said "Gaaaaammmmmmzzzzeeeeeeee" dot dot dot, it was a little shorter in text form though
KALYN
(2/2) means the second of two messages that were one when you typed them, so they had to be sent as two.
Often it's too long to send, so we won't get the first one
JESSICA
nope
KALYN
Seriously, those aren't out of order? Is your brain out of order?
(Morgan's words. And I believe this is verbatum!)
JESSICA
ahaha, sorry, or as Tholluckth would say "Thorry" (I love his lisp...maybe too much)
KALYN
I think so too
2orry
btw, Gamzee and Sollux are in the same picture
JESSICA
well, the last one should have been first (i missed that) but it was referring to the whole "too long message" thing
gah! Why?
Is Sollux hating Gamzee at least?
KALYN
he's annoyed by Gamzee, who is being slightly ornery in the picture
JESSICA
lol, ok
Do you ever listen to the soundtracks?
KALYN
I was just listening to them today actually, and I downloaded the "How do I live" cover onto my Sansa! :DD
JESSICA
lol, that's a good one too. I think it's the quality of the guy's voice. He did the Mobius Trip and Hadron Kaleido album too.
Wahahaaaahaaaaaahaaa Zillyhoooo...
Zilleeeeeeeeheeeeeheeehooo
KALYN
lolololol Our pink lemonade conversation is one of the funniest things I've read, going back on it. I'm going to save all of it!
Yes, We're back to copy/pasting!
JESSICA
Hahaha, ok X)
(20 minutes later)
KALYN
apparently I've been copy/pasting for 20 minutes!
I'm not even to the pink lemonade yet!
XD DX
don't know which one's more appropriate at the moment
JESSICA
aw, didn't yo all ready have the beginning done?
KALYN
oh, yes, but I stopped when I started doing the DA spamming, remember? I'm copy/pasting everything AFTER that, and there's a lot!
JESSICA
I guess there was, huh
(20 more minutes later)
KALYN
Yeah, I'm past the lemons now
also Morgan went to bed, long ago
lazy bum
JESSICA
wow, yeah! She's not much of a night owl is she?
KALYN
and now, another 20 minutes later, I have caught up and can now go back to copy/pasting shit RIGHT AFTER I TYPE IT!
btw, remember when I said I couldn't think of an A word and you suggested Appearify? Yeah, I definitely meant Alchemitize
So there you go
JESSICA
sorry, appearify was all i could think of
(after a few days of sparse, inane, inconsequential conversation)
KALYN
Okay, here's the conclusion I've come to in my fanfiction trends
So I've been reading lots of slashfiction (because it's apparently all I read since I'm a closet perv or voyeur or something)
and I've noticed something about Karkat when he's paired in slash
and that's that, unless he's paired with John, he's always on bottom. Not once have I seen him top with anyone other than John (who is evidently the ultimate bottom...)
I just had Morgan help me do some research on this, and we went through all of the Homestuck fanfiction we could on and found him paired with Gamzee, Sollux, and even Dave. He bottomed each time (only with Gamzee, it was more implied, with his whole rapey persona nowadays)
Basically I was wondering why people tend to put him on bottom. Is it because it seems he tries so hard as a leader and is really frustrated that maybe he should step back and let someone else take the lead for once (in sex?)?
Or is it just that everyone else is just more masculine and sure of themselves? Is there just something people like about the idea of a submissive, vulnerable Karkat?
Your thoughts?
JESSICA
Ok, let me say this: Karkat is in no way sure of himself, at all, around other trolls. He flexes his muscles playing at being leader. The only reason I can think of why he's the leader is because he hasn't totally botched anything and everyone else is cool with that.
I don't really think the faygo, pied-out Gamzee would be on top (he wouldn't care what karat was up to (bad word choice?) if he really wanted that relationship with Karkat. Although, I would agree that the current Gamzee would probably be on top, if only because that's the only way he's "gonna get some" from Karkat.
JESSICA
My first thought with the KarxDave is Kar would be on top because he wouldn't want to show that vulnerability to a human. Yet with them I really haven't a clue. While Dave has his "cool kid"-ness to outshine Karkat, he's also not that sure if himself. However, I would think Kar would prefer being on top.
JESSICA
Now John is never going to be the topper on a beefcake. IF he were to "swing" that way (although o suppose we are dealing with hypothetic situations here) he would be on the bottom, so yeah, I do think John is probably the "ultimate bottom." No matter what relationship he has with a guy, I don't think he would be the one asserting himself. Even with the girls he isn't assertive. So, yeah, with Karkat he would be in the bottom.
JESSICA
Although we both know this is totally hypothetic, because trolls have slurry filled buckets. I don't think they really "lie down" together. They just dump their genetic info into a bucket. Cuddling yes. Sex no.
KALYN
Yeah, I know that naturally any slash fiction with trolls will be inaccurate since, to make it erotic and not disturbing at all, they have to have human (or near-human) anatomy. Nobody knows what troll anatomy is like (apart from AH) and so people just make them very human. But that's not really the issue here. It's the concept of who's the aggressive member in a relationship and who's more submissive. And yes, I know John's "not a homosexual," but has that EVER stopped shippers? (ps. your terminology is some of the best I could have asked for in a response! XD)
JESSICA
Lol, I realize shippers will do what they want.
KALYN
Morgan and I were thinking about making a slash-tree, putting all the male characters in some sort of order regarding whether they top/bottom and to whome
whom*
John was, of course, our ultimate bottom
Tavros and Equius were mostly-bottoms too
Eridan was a both-ways guy (in my head, anyway)
Gamzee was top-psycho, either-way-sober
Karkat tops only the mostly-bottoms
Sollux and Dave are tops
agree/disagree?
btw, this is half headcanon, and half just what I've seen in fanfiction
KALYN
FUCKINGANSWERME
JESSICA
But I would think it would be kind of funny if they kept the original anatomy that we know of.
"John sat in the room he had been given after the humans arrived on the trolls' meteor in the outer reaches of the Medium. He had been surprised to see how different the trolls really were from them.
"Karkat had looked at him strangely after everyone was introduced to the other. John hadn't really thought of it, but there were a lot fewer trolls than he originally remembered.
"'Twelve. There were twelve of them when they entered the Medium originally.' he had hoped to finally meet Vriska face to face, and maybe go on that date. But that wasn't going to happen. She was dead. He knew it was part of the trolls' nature to kill each other, but it was still hard to believe.
"Suddenly there was a knock on the door (which doesn't actually exist, since the troll rooms are only entered via a transporter). Either way, Karkat stood at the entrance of the room; his cheeks blushing a bright red under the grey skin.
"'Hey Karkat, what's up?'
"'Nothing.' Karkat answered angrily. He looked around the bare room. He just stood there looking around everywhere except where John stood.
"'Karkat? What are you doing? Not that I mind you coming into my room,' He laughed happily. 'You know, since Rose, Jade and Dave all had to go through my house, and of course Dave and Rose went through all icky things.'
"'God, you do talk too much, don't you?' Karkat growled at John, and John smiled back. 'I just want to tell you something I guess.' He looked aside awkwardly. 'When I watched you grow up, I hated you so much, I wanted to make your life miserable, but I had to tell the others to troll jade, Dave and Rose too towns sure they didn't think I waxed into the black for you. But I had, I never hated anyone else so vehemently. Then I continued trolling you, and your confidence made me angrier at first, but we continued to work together. Against my better judgement, my feelings went from the black to red. I tried to distract myself by having a romantic relationship with Terezi, but she had fallen hard in the red for Dave, and I knew that we couldn't really have a relationship then.'
"'Jarkat, what are you going on about?' A smile cracked on his face, but he looked at Karkat a little wearily. He knew the troll could be rash, and he didn't want to be caught off guard.
"'You're so STUPID! I'm confessing to you that's what I'm doing!' As Karkat said that, he also lunged forward, and kissed John on the lips. It was harsh at first, but John was surprised he enjoyed it so much. 'I want you, John Egbert to be my Matesprit.'
"'But, but I'm not gay,' John grasped desperately for an excuse he knew was false. 'Karkat...' He couldn't help the feelings he felt , he was attracted to this troll like he had never been attracted to anyone else.
JESSICA
So, that was supposed to end with John having normal 13 year old reaction to a similar situation, and Karkat being extremely confused and disgusted (it wasn't even supposed to be Karkat originally, but Vriska, but Karkat and John would have to be
my OTP.
KALYN
haha, okay, so you wrote that? I think I need some explanations. was that supposed to go with the anatomy statement (which I also didn't quite understand)? "Jarkat" lol... I got the premise for the most part, I quite loved it...Karkat being extremely confused and disgusted? with his own feelings, or...? anyway, yeah, that was amazing
What did you think of our tree?
JESSICA
No, the anatomy, it was originally intended to be a reaction to the differing anatomies, but instead it turned into just a normal Jarkat story. I couldn't stand doing that to them
I liked the tree though
Made sense to me, and before I left I was typing this: "I would agree, especially Eridan, since he would do anything he could to have a relationship, although I think he would prefer being on top."
JESSICA
did that suffice?
KALYN
yes, for the most part... I think I especially like the idea of Equius bottoming to everyone (with the possible exception of the humans, but who knows?)
and now, since you failed your mission, we should challenge anyone who sees this to write a troll/human fic about differing anatomies
and the reactions and hijinks that ensue!
JESSICA
Naw, he would act all tough, but then he would tell them to tell him what to do. So if he is on top it's because whoever he is with told him to.
KALYN
hah "Be the master"
JESSICA
Yup