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There's one battle tactic you can use to genuinely infuriate me.

[He shifts so he can sling an arm around Dave's shoulder and keep him close for a half-hug. He needs Dave to understand this, even if he can't accept it yet. But Dirk keeps finding different ways to say it.]

If you let yourself get hurt or killed, no matter how good the reason, I would be incredibly pissed off. I always am.

[ ...........damn it.

dave's still for a moment before he sighs and drops his head onto dirk's shoulder, letting the hug happen. one of his arms goes up to complete the half-hug circle into a full hug. or a locked half hug. whatever you want to call it. ]

Sucks for you that I'm a Time player, then.

[ there's absolutely no bite in his tone. ]

Do you seriously not find anything else I do obnoxious?

[ he feels like that sounds like a question a little kid is asking, but dave just. wants to know. ]

It does.

[A lot. He doesn't even want to think about how many times some version of Dave has died. (He thinks about it often, he thinks about it more than he can stand.) He accepts the closed half-hug and leans his head on Dave's.]

Obnoxious is part of the Strider family name. But I really like you and your company. So not really?

You're ruthless as fuck in battle but I respect that.

Sometimes I really hate you.

[ wait. shit. that's not what he meant to say - or not how he meant to say it. but what else is new? but no matter what he does here, bullshit magic song included, dave hasn't managed to find the switch that changes dirk to bro. not entirely.

not that he's looking for the sw - yeah no okay when he does this, when he picks apart things dirk says, he's kind of looking for the switch. ]

I love you way too much and it's only been a few months and I guess I was lyin' to Karkat, there's actually nothin' scarier than caring about someone that much.

[ "it is simple" in response to "here you are, stating it like it's the simplest shit in the world" and no, it actually isn't simple at all. maybe it's not scary when it's karkat or rose or john or jade because he knows them inside and out and there's no version of any of them who has actually hated dave (karkat tried but he's never been good at hate in dave's opinion), no one they could become who he would stop loving. or who would stop caring about him in return.

he's terrified of how fucked up he'll manage to be if dirk goes over the edge neither of them wants him to step over or if he disappears like some of the others or...whatever. his grip on dirk tightens just a little. ]

Stupid goddamn supportive piece of shit.

[ truly a heartfelt insult there. the clingy hug really sells it? ]

[It isn't a flinch Dave would feel in a half-hug, it's just an involuntary micromovement of face muscles and then the immediate emotional reaction, the confirmation of what he is still too insecure not to fear, fades a little bit, but not entirely, because Dirk is scared of it too: what the edge might be, how he could switch over, what he'd become and what it would do to Dave. He can't let it happen. But he puzzles over Bro, twists what he knows against what he is and tries to find the difference, the nail he's wanting, something definitive and certain that separates Dirk from that splinter so he'll never slide into it.

He tightens the hug as best as he can.]

It's sorta impressive the way we can turn any of our conversations into agonizing explorations of our interpersonal relationship. I'm wondering if we'll ever run out of material, but I suspect not.

Edited 2016-07-08 02:59 (UTC)

[ he needs to learn to think before he speaks. but he's still trying to figure out how to accept that dirk isn't some cosmic trick who's going to disappear or warp the second he accepts him as an unchanging constant. ]

Sorry. [ for his mouth. for dragging the conversation into a weird place, again. ]

I'm okay with the agonizing explorations of our interpersonal relationship, though. [ well. he would prefer they not happen so frequently, but. ] I mean, they're like repeatedly stabbing our eyes out for fun but I think they get the job done. If the job is baby steps towards being semi-competent idiots instead of emotional morons? The other day I actually attempted to initiate a feelings jam with someone else about a thing I definitely did not feel like talking about and I 100% blame you.

[ how fucking dare you make him start talking about shit? ]

Nice job on the echeladder of interpersonal communication skills. [He takes one arm out of the hug enough to offer a fist bump.]

You've helped me a lot, too.

[Talking to Roxy. To Jake. Just letting himself admit to the things he hates in himself. Not keeping it bottled up, reaching out, seeking help. Not trying to do it all on his own.]

Consider this a fist bump for your own level-up, too, then. [ because, okay, he can break the hug for a second for a fist-bump.

look at them, having emotional conversations dave doesn't freeze the fuck up in because of bro flashbacks. baby steps. ]

We should get Wiz to make us some gold stars.

[They're doing so well. Dirk returns to the hug.]

Fuck yes. I need you to design mine. [Because a Star designed by Dave Strider is probably going to be hilarious???

Exactly that reason yes.]

Only if you do mine.

[ mostly because he's curious about what would happen...

and also the dude who inherited dave's humor through messed up timeloops is bound to do something to make dave laugh. ]

Deal.

[They are both so stupid. Dirk is genuinely happy for how much time they can spend doing absurd bullshit and just hanging out.

Even if there's a lot of clinghugs involved whatever no one can judge them except URSULA.]

[ ursula is like the least judgmental ai in the world so they're probably safe.

there's a pause before dave does another sappy thing. or says it. whatever. he already did but: ]

Love you and shit.

[ ...it's still nice to wait for the response and to actually kind of assume it will be positive. he and rose don't really exchange the words that often, even if he knows she'd happily shank anyone in the world for him and loves him without any real qualifiers.

it's sort of nice to trade them, though. ]

[Dirk smiles, just a little bit.]

I love you too.

And shit.

[Dave is definitely sentimental. But so is Dirk.]

...So what are you working on here, anyway, or were you just pretending to work on something in order to corner me into a convo.

[ is it something cool ]

I'm building Sisi a robotic swimsuit.

[Do you think building a roboswimsuit for a corgi is cool? Because if you don't Dirk doesn't know you anymore, that's it, that's the conditional on his love.

At the moment, Dirk is working on shaping the exterior plates. It is mostly done by now, but he wants to be sure all of these parts are properly built. Can't have the doggie getting wet!]

Oh my god? Oh my god.

[ OH MY GOD??????????

guess who tries to pet sisi every day. ]

Oh my god we have to make my camera like super waterproof I have to document this?

[ the corgi roboswimming not dirk working on the roboswimsuit ]

Hand it over and I'll make the modifications.

[Because why not do even more things with his spare time? LOOK. Dave needs a thing + Dirk can do the thing = Dirk does the thing. It's just how he works. There are water corgi home videos at stake]

[ he will immediately grab the camera from his sylladex to hand over? thus kind of ending the hug but he'll sit nearby so.

if dirk goes through the photos there will be a shit ton of shots of the family, karkat, and john. some of them getting progressively more annoying in rose and karkat's cases. and like. way too many corgi photos. does he just take at least one daily...? (yes)

also selfies.

dave why are you the way you are.

there's also like artsy shots of like, dishes in the kitchen sink and shit. ]

[Dirk pauses at one of the artsy kitchen scene shots.]

It's a shame you never made it far enough to see Instagram.

[But sure he'll take the camera. Waterpoofing is what he's working on right now anyway so it's easy. Dirk turns the camera over in his hands a few times to inspect its current state before he goes after it.]

What's instagram?

[ no. the truest sadsuck in homestuck is this:

DAVE STRIDER NEVER GOT TO DO VINES??????????? ]

It was a photosharing website. Your arthouse dish photos would be at home there.

[Okay, he's got it. Now Dirk is just going to work on making sure everything is secure and safe for the rest of this conversation, so assume coating and stuff. Whatever.

It's true about vines.]

God, the apocalypse made me miss all the cool websites.

[ the fucking nerve. ]

[For a moment Dirk thinks about telling Dave about vines.

Then he decides that Dave has been through enough of an emotional rollercoaster today.]

The Reckoning has no respect for the advancement of pop culture.

[ dirk, no. do you want your brother to ask you to help him make some sort of base internet just so they can make base instagram and base vines.

because that is the only thing that lies down the path of telling dave about vines. this is the kid who wasted all his dream bubble time making a glorified version of twitter spouting out random bullshit quotes from himself? ]

Rude as fuck, tbh. I only got, like, twitter and shit.

I can't say that you missed much from my perspective. There were advancements, but mostly it was terrible. At a certain point, pop culture was all ICP and Faygo.

[Truly, the apocalypse was a terrible thing.]

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