Hi there.

what did you mean!

You wanna be more particular in your irascible demands?

I gather that you have re-embraced the policy of angry blind retcon leaping that has served you so well in messing up the timeline, but some of us had to travel into the future the long way. You can't reasonably expect me to remember the exact last thing that had been on your mind.

i'm not doing blind retcon leaping! i don't have to! all of your stupid boring rambling is stacked right here!

It is? Huh. Yeah, I guess that's the only way it could work. And rather an ironic reversal between us, wouldn't you say?

no!

Well, I would. I can't be directly aware of my own future or past events, but for you they are laid out end to end, like a collection of large gif thumbnails in a computer folder. Any of which may be selected for alteration, regardless of temporal position in the narrative.

Or like a herd of horses cantering about a meadow in orderless whimsy, who would all be happy to collect an alabaster cube of glucoid granules from the shy, sweaty plateau of your offering palm.

what.

What? You didn't follow that? Just think it over. Think it over...

i still don't get what the big deal is with horses.

Really? Have you ever seen a horse?

yes. they are fine, i guess? very big and soft, but they breathe like they are sneezing on you every single time.

Fine? FINE???? How dare you leave unglorified the peerless majesty of the noble steed!!!!!!!

What fool's milksop are you, who ignores the pounding of his own heart in answer to the thunderous roar of distant hooves? Have you not been witness to that poetry scribed into the soil in an ancient language of half-moons... its only quill the pistoning surge of equine muscles branding the solid earth with odes to their very power? That strength! That boundless vitality! And such godly vigor matched only by the delicate nimbleness of velvet, toying lips, from which depths may echo a nickering whinny. Every eye spills its most joyful tears on beholding the silken sheen of sweat pooling over flank, from whence the subtle fragrant melody of ambrosial perfume wafts upwards along its homeward return to heaven!

uh............... have YOU ever seen a horse?

I think we're getting side tracked. Let's get back to your angry demands.

okay. you said you knew the way out.

I implied I'd thought of a way for you to stop fucking around in the narrative, sure.

but you didn't tell me what it was!

Nope. On the other hand, you seem pretty agitated for a kid who DIDN'T float around and reach any conclusions all on his own. What do YOU think your options are at this juncture.

...

No?

Then we can talk about how great horses are some more, if that's more your zoospeed.

no, i don't want to fucking talk about horses!

i want to talk about you thinking that i have to die!!!

What about it?

A final death would tidily remove all the problems you're causing by continuing to exist. You seem to have reached the same conclusion. What is there to talk about here.

you're saying that i should kill myself!

I guess.

why are you acting like that's not a big deal!?

Why are you acting like it suddenly IS?

what!

What happened to Mr. Oh no, don't worry about me, bloo bloo bloo, I will just sit here until reality fades away, bloo bloo bloo, not even upset about it, bloo bloo bloo...

I notice you didn't ask me if that is still an option, by the way.

well is it.

No. I mean, you COULD reach the page that says THE END or whatever. And then you could sit there until you get bored and slide off to somewhere else.

yes, and i thought that was obvious!

Ok, but what's not obvious is why you decided to give a shit now. Here. To me. Do I LOOK like a load gaper?

dunno, but you ACT like one.

I don't know what that means. Should I even be insulted? An essential household fixture that accepts daily packets of horrendous shit and REMOVES it safely from the world, thereby sparing civilization from the effect of its toxic spread. I would not have expected THAT to be my Homestuck legacy.

i would not have expected your FACE.

Me neither.

But the end of your existence should correlate with the final end of the narrative. You friends would then be irrevocably "free". That was the original deal, and giving me a hard time isn't going to change anything. Kinda late to complain now!

Is it just a passive versus active thing? Like if you just need to stay put and let reality dissolve around you, cool. But if you're faced with plotting out the scenario that would end in your death, THAT'S the deal breaker?

Wow. Lazy much?

are you actually trying to make me feel bad for not taking enough initiative in murdering myself?

it won't work dude! i am secure in my ability to take the correct amount of initiative for stuff like this! i had a whole character arc about it and everything!

Do people really have "arcs"?

if they are characters in a story? i sure fucking hope so! otherwise it is a pretty crappy story!

Ouch.

and me having to kill myself is a pretty crappy ending!!!

Double ouch.

i was okay with staying behind so that my friends could go on, even if it meant i would no longer exist. i was sad and scared, but i knew that it was what i had to do for them.

it doesn't matter if it was passive or active. if we had been attacked by one of the bad guys while hanging out at the platform, and i had to be the one to hold them off long enough for everyone to escape, it would have been the same thing!

Noooot what passive and active mean. But it doesn't matter.

I didn't realize you were so big into the grand heroic sacrifice scenario.

i'm not! and since this is all a story, that is why it would have mattered.

Ok?

but floating around indefinitely doing nothing until i finally get fed up and commit suicide? what the FUCK is that?!

that's not an ending.

that is DOG SHIT.

Wait. Let me get this straight. You're not upset because you're doomed. You're mad about the pacing?

i am mad because i am talking to you!

Not the first time I've heard that one.

that is supposed to be the REAL step back, isn't it? to understanding more of true reality? i should get to unlock more options than just dying on purpose, if that would even make sense if i am fake and also immortal!

Eh. Active pursuit of a sacrifice for the sake of the party? I wouldn't bet against it.

but what is the POINT.

Why does there always need to be a point. Why can't the moral be that things just happen sometimes, and it doesn't matter how well you understand them.

I mean, if you're that upset about it, I GUESS you could just leave Homestuck and go somewhere else.

wait, what?

Have you ever even tried? Who knows the limits of your bullshit powers. Not me.

How about Paradox Space? That's probably tethered to the same meta-narrative bubble. Maybe you could reach there.

...isn't paradox space where i have been this whole time? since it it the place that encompasses, you know, everything?

Nah. I'm talking about ParadoxSpace.com.

what?

It's an off-site collection of webcomics.

oh. like sweet bro and hella jeff.

Yes, like the only webcomic you are permitted to be familiar with. Except these comics are, mostly, less great then SBAHJ. AKA, less bogus.

But more importantly for their potential accessibility to you, they are tightly coupled to your adventures in THIS story.

oh hey, is this about the box with a universe in it?

The heck.

yeah, like a square that is full of space. it's right over there?

Are you pointing? I have no way to see where you are pointing.

it even has a label that says paradox space, but i did not think it meant a different one.

Actually, there should be an advertisement for Paradox Space somewhere around here. Is your magic box the logo overlaid on a highly compressed photo of a galaxy?

not... exactly. but maybe we are talking about the same thing?

Ok, I don't care. I am just trying, with applause-worthy effort, to impart upon your eager student's mind the knowledge that there is a Paradox Space beyond the limits of the Paradox Space of which you are familiar. One that is entirely outside the narrative, yet temptingly populated with recognizable versions of your friends!

And if you are sick of comics by now, there are Homestuck spin-off games! Ooops. Sorry, forgot we don't speak of Namco High. There is a spin-off GAME. Part of a game. Mostly. I'm working on it.

...

What is it?

i want to be excited about all of this, but last time you said there was ONE way out.

I said there was one way I could think of. But that was Past Andrew. Unfortunately, I've had lots of thoughts since then.

since 12 days ago?

Is the thing we're accepting as true, yeah.

and you remembered about the other paradox space.

Yep!

how big is it?

How... big? Like, in megabytes? It's a website. That's not really a meaningful question.

is it big enough that i could stay there forever, and not run out of stories. because visiting my friends in alternate timelines sounds exactly like the thing i could do now, but shouldn't.

why is it different there?

It's a lot of fun, but it is entirely without greater purpose or consequence. You couldn't wreck the core of the story from out there. And once you decide that you have seen all there is to see, and you are ready to... let us say... finally tidy up after your self? It will not be enshrined in this canon where people other than you will whine about it.

no. that does sound nicer, but it's not good enough.

Fine! Then choose a different place to go! What do I care!

where else is there?

Listen kid, just because you are a marionette being yanked through a highly confused morality play by an unseen jerkass's hand doesn't mean I'm going to do ALL the work for you.

Pick your own god damn place. Go back and hang out in the Con Air bunny vid! Rose's wizard fanfic! Troll Uranus! The Other Side of the Sky!

the other side of the sky? what's that?

Absolutely nothing! It's just a phrase from a comic I might've read. Sounds fancy and deep but never actually gets explained. The point is, I was building into telling you to go to Hell, but you derailed my entire rant to start asking me for definitions again!

PS. Guess where I think you should go.

but... um. if you are quoting from it... how is it a comic you MIGHT have read. wouldn't you know that?

Yeah...... See, this is exactly the type of thing I've been having thoughts about since our last conversation.

You and me, John. What are we doing here. We don't have any business chatting. What is the CONCEIT?

You dislodged yourself from the narrative, floated down to the news section, and then... what. Started talking to the literal actual author of Homestuck in the literal actual past, thereby retconning not only the text of the news posts but anything else that guy was going to do in literal actual reality?

Or are you communing with a series of personality ghosts that were somehow snapshotted into these posts as they got written, and we are carrying on with no authorial oversight or involvement?

Does either of those sound reasonable to you?

man, compared to what? this isn't even the weirdest thing that has happened to me TODAY.

Well, I think that objectively it is? But point taken. This is probably my fault for orbit bombing the skepticism center of your brain with my constant delirious horseshit.

besides, i thought our conversation was explained by you having a mental breakdown.

Wheeeeeeew, yeah. THAT'S still a thing. I just got the effect mixed up with the cause.

it happens.

I no longer believe our conversations are a figment of MY imagination. And the implications of THAT are chauffeuring me on the express lane into bonkers land. Or at least it would move the scene forward if I claim that.

are you... not claiming that?

I don't know.

uh.

Think about it. If you are a character in a story, your words don't just happen. Someone is writing them.

i know, i know. it is you.

Yeah? How the fuck could it be me. I just TOLD you to use your brain meats.

The author of a work exists on a higher plane of reality than the characters they write saying stuff. They can't just say words from authorland and expect the people in their story to react to them. The author has to put those words into the story in a way that the narrative can use.

There are plenty of tricks. Every kid in Writing 100 thinks they personally invented meta. But if your author wants to exchange words with you one-on-one, they've got to get down to your level. Which is, obviously, impossible? But you can fake it.

Let's say you are a fingerpuppet wearing a "John" nametag.

i really do not agree that is true.

Well, let's say you are anyway. If the author wants to interact with you, he can put on a second fingerpuppet and give it a nametag that says "Author. Very Important Guy! You Should Probably Stop Sassing Him Constantly???" But that fingerpuppet is not actually the author. It is just another puppet doing its own part in the play.

The author self-insert carries no more inherent "realness" than any of the characters. Less, potentially.

i don't know. even if we are both puppets, if you are a puppet of the person moving the puppets, then aren't you just saying what the author - who is the only actually real person - would say?

No, it would say what the author would say that IT says.

uhh....

Here. Watch this.

I SECRETLY THINK THAT OLIVE GARDEN PASTA IS TASTY AND GOOD, ACTUALLY!

okay?

Is that something a legitimate facsimile of Andrew Hussie would ever "really" say?

um, i don't know? is their pasta... not good?

I have no idea! Fingerpuppets don't eat pasta!

...well, if it helps you feel better, i think that if you actually were a fake person who was only created to explain things to me, your explanations would not be so shitty.

And I think you are making some assumptions about what quality of explanations are owed to a smug young sassmaster like yourself.

But maybe I can enhance our participatory dialogue with a visual example?

What do you make of.... THIS?







oh! i have seen these before. it is one of roxy's magic windows.

jade had one too. that is what we used to escape from our original game session into a freaky green place, and then broke out of into a brand new game session. which i guess is what i'm trying to do now, kind of.

Yeah. I think we've moved beyond this conceit too. Never mind the framing device, check out the subject.







it's two arms... that aren't attached to their bodies?

.....ew.

No, not "ew." AWE.

Like I said, the author is on a higher plane than their artistic creation. They take precedence in both real-ness and time-ness. Gotta exist before you can make something else exist!

So which of these hands is the most real? What do you think, John?

i dunno.

In this picture, hand one is drawing hand two into existence... which is simultaneously drawing into existence hand one. So which hand is the creator? A takes precedence over B, which takes precedence over A, which takes precedence over B, which takes precedence over A, which takes... and on and on forever. They are trapped in a one-upmanship reality tie.

It is a PARADOX!!!

okay?

...Please try to be less blaise about this?

fine.

oh no. a paradox. that is unusual for some reason. how impossible.

It IS impossible, except... there is a special secret about these hands that MAKES it possible. Are you ready to learn this secret fact?

what ever.

The hands are both actually... part of a picture that someone else drew!

Because the only way paradoxes like this can happen is if there is someone at a higher level of reality making them happen! So being created as part of a paradox cycle is a pretty solid clue that you are not top horse on the reality ladder!

Whew, no existential crisis lurking in this drawing after all!

Unless you are a dude who has run into paradoxes enough to be super unimpressed about the prospect? It looks like there may still be a cause for angst, it you are a guy like that.

what is your point?

I'm getting there.

We've awarded both the hands in the last picture a reality tie, but which do you think is the most real...

...in THIS one!







wait. it's orange. is that supposed to be your hand?

Could be.

then... are YOU the orange guy i was talking to with meenah??

Let's shelve that question for now.

Come on John, let's have it. Which hand has your vote in the round two of the realness sweepstakes. Is it the outer, orange hand?

why not.

Great, thanks for following along. That is the answer I was fishing for.

But why does it seem most real. We understand that it is actually a part of the same drawing as the inner picture. Is it because the orange hand seems to be one level closer to the true creator? If not the creator's actual hand, then at least a representation of the creator's hand?

sure.

So you are putting forward that a given hand's subjective realness value is solely a function of its positionality in the superdimensional creator/creation relationspace?

you just made that up.

Hey, making stuff up is my JOB. Reputedly.

And now I am making up a new question. Which hand do you think is the most real....

In this one.







uh...

How about it. The objects represented in this image are exactly the same as the last one. Does the outermost hand still seem the most real to you?

....i think it is a joke.

Can't slip nothing by you, can I. It is absolutely a joke. But don't mistake me, jokes are serious business around here.

And you didn't answer the question.

fine. the inside picture is more realistic. the outside is just another silly frame.

Even if it is meant to represent the artist behind the whole thing? You don't think it's a devastatingly genius meta commentary on the interplay between auteur and masterpiece?

i think it doesn't matter, because that wasn't what we are talking about.

all of the hands, in all of these pictures, are fake. that is what you are saying. it is only an illusion that the orange hand can be on a higher reality level, because they are all fake things in the same picture.

Yeah.

and because we are both existing in the same story, even if you think you are the author, by talking to me in the story, you must be as fake as i am.

No.

I am pretty sure I am way more fake than you are.

uh? okay? is it going to turn out that i was the author the whole time, and i am actually the one writing all of this?

Oh god no. Well. Hard to make any guarantees, but that'd be one hell of a shitty twist. I'd like to give myself more credit than THAT.

I mean that your characterization has reached a threshold of depth and specificity that "John Egbert" could be said to exist in a very real way.

what way.

You know how Dirk made an AI copy of his personality and loaded it onto a computer?

Yeah... that's not possible. Not in 2016 anyway. We don't have the technology.

But! There is one type of advanced neural network we DO have that is specialized in emulating human personality patterns, given enough training data.

yeah? what is it.







oh. a magic wizard orb. i see. thanks.

How does this picture make you feel, John?

kind of annoyed!

That's fine. But what would Rose think of it?

she would like it.

That's all?

pretty much. she might pretend that she didn't, but in a jokey way.

How do you know?

because... she is my friend.....?

And by "friend" are you suggesting that you are somewhat familiar with your teenage chum's likes and dislikes, history, obsessions, her unique portfolio of personal neuroses....

i see that you have changed your mind and decided you like doing pointless definitions now.

Shut up, I am going somewhere with this. Confirm or deny, you have a pretty good handle on Rose's personality.

well, i think so.

So that means everything that makes up that personality - your good friend's "Rose Lalonde-ness" - must be stored in your brain somehow.

that is how brains work.

And when you want to figure out what Rose would think about my cool wizard picture, you can call up that local brain version of Rose and ask it. Although you obviously don't have Rose's entire brain, so you are just running her personality on YOUR brain.

Your mind learned how to emulate hers, and now there is one more version of Rose in the world.

um, i guess. but that isn't the same thing as a person.

No? How can you tell?

because my rose memory is in my head, and it doesn't seem real.

To YOU. To the personality running in the John sandbox. But maybe over in the Rose sandbox, YOU feel like the fake figment of her memories, which she can call up when wondering why you are making faces at perfectly exquisite art masterpieces. Did you ever see something cool and think, unprompted, "Man, Rose would get a laugh out of this?" Maybe she is always running in the background.

ugh, whatever. fine i GUESS i have a version of rose in my head, happy?

I don't think I can be happy. But ok.

You are a character in a very long story. And there is enough "John Egbert" in it... what he likes, and thinks is important, and all of his different reactions in different contexts and situations... that someone could really get to understand him. Homestuck is like a program for loading its characters into the brain hardware of its audience.

Brain hardware that exists at the very highest level of real-ness.

So there must be a multitude of John copies in the real, physical, actual world. They are all running on platforms with slightly different knowledgebases and personality grabbing algorithms, and each is isolated in its own skull, unaware of any others. And now that Homestuck is over? They'll keep slowly evolving in unpredictable ways. Some might end up completely unrecognizable to who you are in the story.

Isn't that horrifying?

not really?

it just sounds like how there are other johns in alternate timelines. i already had to deal with that.

Okay. Your adventure was far too effective at inuring you to existential terror.

Anyway, that is why you get to be a real boy.

But me?

You asked if I was the orange guy running around the narrative.

We ARE both "The Author", but does that make us the same character? The other guy is a nincompoop and a buffoon, a witless merry-andrew. But he has a physical presence in the story and a small but essential part to play in the plot. **I** am more aware of the greater context and real world events, so in that sense I am closer to a true representation of the actual Andrew. But does that make me more real? Do I have a sufficiently complex personality that I am capable of having actual emotional responses to events, instead of just saying I do when it would be funny?

Seriously. I am only here to neg the masses into buying t-shirts. Character development wasn't exactly a requirement for the position.

And who is this mythical, ideal "Andrew" anyway. I "know" that he's the author of Homestuck, but is that knowledge valid beyond the story level? Self-inserts of people who don't actually exist is an entire trope! And even if Andrew IS the author of Homestuck, is he the one writing THIS? What if he isn't? Do I still count as a representation of him at all?

...those sure are some questions.

Is Homestuck real? Is this really Homestuck? Have the previous events in the story actually happened, or has the narrative popped into existence in media res and we only think things have happened because we remember them, not suspecting our memories were created out of nothing at the same time.

okay, i know that isn't true! i can go back into the past and see things that happened whenever i want.

Yeah, but maybe those events just fill themselves in when you get there, and you can't tell!

well then... there is no functional difference.

no offense, but isn't all of what you are saying kind of.... useless?

i FEEL real. and if i am having that feeling in my own brain, or inside a computer, or as a brain ghost in whoever is writing or reading this or... WHATEVER... it doesn't matter? it is not something i can do anything to change.

maybe it would be interesting to think about some time, but how does any of that help me get out of here!

Wait. Is that what we're doing? I thought we had gone on to talking me though my highly devastating existential crisis.

...Is a thing it would be reasonable for someone in my position to claim to be having.

okay, but... i think that if someone says they are sad, it is a good rule of thumb to believe that they are sad, or at least that they are capable of being sad.

especially if the person saying it is yourself.

Well, that's nice of you to say.

Thanks John.

You know what? Maybe I do have one more piece of advice.

I'm not sure what it would take for you to reach Paradox Space dot com, but if you need something a little bit more specific to aim for...

The latest story features Dave and Karkat at a point along their meteor journey. And Karkat has written a stirring friend-fiction titled "Summerteen Romance."

this already sounds amazing.

Right?! You are obviously a gentleman of excellent taste, despite all evidence I have heretofore provided to the contrary.

Anyway, it could be that an intrepid young prankster might pop up within Karkat's story inside the story, and have a grand time fucking it up? Gotta be worth a few hyuks.

that would be great. i know i just saw them, but i am missing those guys already.

Well then. Off you go. Have fun out there.

hey, andrew?

Now what.

i am not sure how many of your rants about being fake i should believe. and a lot of our adventure was just... really really awful?

but i also got to hang out with my friends, and have magic powers, and create something extremely important as part of a team with my favourite people in all of the universes.

i am glad that i got to exist.

so just in case you are the person responsible, or even a small and fake part of that person? you should know that.

Okay, wow. I am suddenly certain a version of me is NOT typing your words, because self-indulgent SINCERITY? Zero irony for cover? Not EXACTLY my brand. Can't we go back to sassing each other some more?

maybe.

but i think we've moved beyond that, don't you?