5I Meta Post: Troll-Human Hybrids
Dec. 27th, 2012 04:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
universe_cOkay! I'm going to preface this one by saying that I am not a biologist. I'm more of a science fangirl. So, any obviously wrong, implausible and/or poorly thought out stuff is all me. That said, here is a xenobiology blog a million times better than I could ever hope to accomplish.
Anyway! Continuing on. Warning! Graphically technical descriptions of NSFW content ahead!
Troll-Human Hybrids in 5I: The Monotreme Bonobos of Lisa Frank's World
Generally, the troll-human hybrid species in 5i 'verse looks fairly close to humans, though there is enough subtle difference that they might be firmly in the adorable side of the uncanny valley if we were to see them. Body builds and heights exhibit slightly greater variation than humans but not nearly so great as trolls. Physical strength and bone mass are more similar to trolls, stronger and heavier than human normal. Dentition is omnivorous, with flat molars similar to humans', and sharp front cutting teeth that are more similar to trolls'. Everyone has human-red, hemoglobin-based blood. Everyone has troll-like pointy or animal-esque ears.
Hair, Skin and Coloration
The skin and hair is pigmented with melanin in much the way humans' is, and there is a whole range of possible skin tones and hair colors just like humans have. However, the keratins in their species' bodies carry a wide variety of structural colorations - microstructures that refract light in different colors, much like insect wings or bird feathers.
This effect is subtle in the keratin of the skin itself and shows up the brightest in places where there is no melanin, like the lips, palms, tongue, bulge and labia. Coincidentally, this also means that people who are paler appear more colorful. The purpleness of Rose's skin is relatively easy to see through her gothick pallor, whereas Gamzee's indigo tint is fairly hidden by his tanness. Tavros's coppery tint just makes his skin look darker.
The structural pigmentation of the hair, nails and horns is different, causing a brightly colored, refractive 'sheen' of iridescence. This is somewhat similar to the highlights in human hair, though the refraction is stronger and comes in a much wider variety of colors. The iridescent sheen of the skin actually comes from its fine vellus hairs (you can see your own if you hold the smoothest part of your forearm so it's silhouetted in front of a bright light).
All the players, including the humans, exhibit this coloration of skin and hair and eyes in their signature color (orange for Dirk, pink for Roxy, etc). The skin and vellus keratin color is always inherited from the gestational parent, while melanin levels and 'sheen' color of the hair and eyes can be from either parent or a combination. This means that the kids are going to quickly become clashing rainbowy little messes.
Fingernails are heavier than human normal and could be filed into claws and maintained that way. As for bodily fluids, it's only the genetic material which carries any kind of distinctive coloration. Tears, saliva, sweat etc are clear.
Horns
Horns are sweet and everyone has them now. Here's a little pic I whipped up for the humans' horn shapes.
Dave has awesome ibex horns.
Jade has classic Bec-ear horns, though her ear-ears are possibly a bit furrier and doggier than other peoples'.
Caliborn has stereotypical devil horns, though they are actually the shape of his Cherub teeth. They rival Karkat and Kankri's in shortness. Positioning is very close to his hairline, curving outward slightly over his forehead.
Calliope looks just like her trollsona, including those bodacious caduceus horns.
Horn shape shows very wide variation in their species. A child's horns will almost always be some combination of their parents' shapes.
My headcanon is that horns are primarily for display and temperature regulation. Blood supply is concentrated in the portions nearest the hornbed, where the horn appears red to orange.
Gills and Amphibious Adaptations
Everyone has gills now, too. This is one of the things that I'm not satisfied with the biological underpinnings of, so I'm not going to go into it in much detail. One to three gill slits are located on sides of the neck. Up to four additional gill slits are located between the ribs. Gills have to be very, very efficient to extract enough oxygen from water to power a body as big as a human's. Therefore, people who have fewer than the full compliment of gill slits will gradually suffer reduced oxygen levels as their gills fail to keep up with their body's demand. Over time, the species will evolve toward having a median number of gill slits, something like 5-6, but these will become more efficient, allowing most people to be fully amphibious.
Everyone has a clear nictitating membrane, used to protect the eye underwater and in strong winds, and to help protect against UV radiation. Other Seadweller traits have been sort of 'smeared' down the hemospectrum, so there's more overlap with the indigos, ultramarines and ceruleans in terms of who has water-dwelling adaptations such as webbed toes and half-webbed fingers and face-fins.
Only violets and tyrians, including Roxy, are able to live underwater indefinitely, and in fact both Fef and Meenah have made themselves second houses in the bay or surrounding waters. I imagine learning to breathe through gills must have been a pretty bizarre experience for everyone who didn't have them previously.
Again, these traits will become randomly spread throughout the genepool within a few generations.
Sex and Reproduction
Yes, time to talk tentabulge. I don't have a tablet or a scanner, so I can't draw you a diagram, though. Sorry.
Hermaphroditism is the normal condition of this species – that is, every individual can either bear or sire a child. Everyone has both a bulge and a nook.
Normally, the bulge is sheathed inside the body, with the opening of the seedflap laying closed. The bulge is fully prehensile, though it is not always under the conscious control of the brain attached to it – if you're not paying attention your excited bulge may act on its own, though you can usually rein it in with a little concentration. My version of tentabulge doesn't differ much from the well-established fanon, and I encourage you to go perv over here if you haven't already.
The nook and egg-sac/uterus I'll go into a little more as I discus heat. The nook is a vagina. A pair of glands analogous to shame globes/testes sits inside the nook, behind the root of the bulge. This is basically like the prostate/g-spot in that it feels pretty great when stimulated. Arousal causes it to release genetic material into the nook to lubricate it, and the same genetic material is ejaculated through the bulge during orgasm. The egg sac sits in the deepest part of the vagina and has attached ovary-analogues. During orgasm the strong muscles of the nook produce suction on the bulge to help retain genetic material received. Coitus typically doesn't involve much thrusting – it's more of a clasp-and-grind-with-bulge-writhing-action thing. Mutual penetration is very common and especially instinctive during heat.
During heat, the body releases an egg cell into the egg-sac, where it floats around awaiting a nice bath of genetic material. The egg cell has half the number of chromosomes needed. The genetic material is basically a stew of nutrients and exploded cells, rich in free-floating chromosomes. The egg will selectively accept these chromosomes as it runs into them, until it is fully fertilized. This means that a child can have a lot of different fathers, but will only have one mother. It also means that fertilization takes longer than in humans, and needs an extra behavioral push to make sure it happens. This is not necessarily an evolutionarily advantageous reproductive method, but that's just what happens when you smoosh together pail-based reproduction and peen-based reproduction.
Heat produces a huge hormonal surge in the effected individual, which causes changes in temperament and behavior. Mostly this entails a loss of inhibitions, trouble forming and accessing short-term memories and feeling SO HORNY YOU COULD DIE. Body temperature is elevated. The muscles and skin of the nook, egg sac and abdomen relax and become very elastic, and genetic material production is routed away from the bulge until the egg leaves the body. The body also produces a distinctive set of pheromones, which can stimulate other individuals into rut.
During rut there is a similar, though less pronounced spike in hormones. The globes begin to produce a whole lot of genetic material and can feel swollen and full if it is not released. A set of similar symptoms including loss of inhibitions, memory problems and elevated body temperature occur. Rut symptoms will fade within about a day if the person in rut is not breathing enough of those heat pheromones to remain sufficiently stimulated. Heat, by contrast, will not fade until the egg is either fertilized and begins embryogenesis, or is expelled from the body. People in both heat and rut have distinctive scents. Heat and rut can be suppressed or skipped entirely by extreme physical stress or poor health, similar to the way menstruation in humans can be suppressed or disrupted by same.
After the egg is fertilized, the mass of genetic material is put to use as raw material for turning the egg cell into an egg that can survive outside the body. A membrane develops around the zygote which filters all the lipid and needed protein components from the slurry, forming the yolk. The keratins that give the genetic material its coloration are organized into the shell and membranes, and the chalazae that holds the yolk in position inside the egg. Egg shells are leathery and more similar to reptile or turtle egg shells than bird eggs. The leftover proteins and water form the albumin.
Eggs and Babies
The egg takes about 7-8 weeks to form inside the egg sac. The entire gestational period from fertilization to hatching is fairly close to human normal, about 38 weeks.
Eggs produce their own set of pheromones, which alter the brain chemistry of anyone who is sufficiently exposed. These pheromones suppress heat/rut, since the egg might be discarded if the caretaking individual were to become pregnant themselves. They also soothe aggression and promote feelings of calmness, wellbeing and nurturing by stimulating the production of oxytocin. As the embryo becomes fully developed, the egg will start to release a second set of pheromones which stimulate lactation. This means that whoever spends the most time around an egg will be fully prepared and predisposed to care for the child when it hatches.
Children hatch with horns already developed, which they use to help puncture the egg shell. They are also able to vocalize and smile when newly hatched. Strength, mobility and manual dexterity develop faster than in human babies, allowing the child to ride or cling to the parent before they are able to walk or even crawl on their own. This is often accomplished by the baby sitting on the shoulders and clinging to the parent's horns because that is adorable damn it, shut up.
Social Aspects
So, okay. Heat and rut. Part of its appeal as a fetish is in the loss of control, but in (imaginary) practice it leads to a certain amount of dubious consent or outright non-consensual behavior. The thing is, after the Players figure out what is actually going on with their bodies, how it works, and that every single one of them are subject to this set of uncontrollable circumstances, they begin to develop a set of systems to make sure that heat is not traumatic. This is a cultural phenomenon, but it's driven by that underlying urge to mother things that Dirk was theorizing about and by the understanding that it will happen to them, all of them, whether they like it or not.
The cycle of heats is triggered by a triple-conjunction of the planets' moons, an event which happens about every three to four Earth years (solar sweeps on their planet are just over one and a half Earth years. As an aside, there will never be a four-way conjuction of the moons, because Wanderer and Aimless are Trojan to each other, sharing the same orbit.). A different Aspect will come into heat first, depending on the time of year in which the conjunction occurs. After the first Aspect, all the others will come into heat in a predictable cycle. No one knows exactly why this isit's just a motherfucking miracle.
So, I imagine that in the future of their society, heats will be extremely predictable and well understood. Everyone will know when it's going to be a child-bearing year well in advance, and they will have plenty of time and motivation to get their quadrants in order, to decide whether they want to have a child this time around, and generally to make plans.
In many future societies, enduring a heat with a partner will be considered inherently pale rather than red, because of the level of trust involved. To go into heat with someone entails letting them see you stripped down to your most animal self, and your moirail is partner you trust to care for you at your worst, ugliest, lowest and most vulnerable.
Gender
All of the 34 Players transposed from the previous universe come from cultures where gender is an established social construct. All of them seem to have internalized it to some extent. Even, somehow, the Cherubs, which really makes no sense. So, therefore, even though there is only one physical sex in the new species, the idea of gender will exist in their society at first. I imagine that it will begin to break down fairly quickly, though, especially as various individuals begin to discard it. For example, after he gets pregnant, Gamzee decides skirts are super comfy and wears them all the time. Jane breaks out her extremely fashionable mustaches whenever the mood strikes her (and omg, I love me some genderfuck Jane best thing ever). In fact, as a Life player, Jane could easily cause herself to grow a mustache if so desired.
Some of their first generation of children identify strongly with one gender or the other. Some just kind of go along with the gender they drift into or their parents assign them. Some rebel against their assignment, and others ignore the whole issue or identify strongly as agendered. Equius's oldest child is one of the first kids to identify as agendered – Jane busts out all her mustaches in support. Kankri and Cronus raise at least one of their kids as agendered because Porrim dared/browbeat Kankri into it. Porrim at some point will notice that the majority of the children seem to learn whatever gender their parents assign them. There will be a lot of debate and back-and-forth about this issue among people for a bunch of years in there. But ultimately, I see the idea of gender breaking down and falling away from their society, because it's kind of useless to their biological experience and egalitarian social organization.
Secondary sexual characteristics like breast size, hip size, and body hair density become kind of unmoored from each other in the genome, resulting in a variety of body types that wouldn't fit comfortably into a human-style gender binary anyway.
Anyway! Continuing on. Warning! Graphically technical descriptions of NSFW content ahead!
Troll-Human Hybrids in 5I: The Monotreme Bonobos of Lisa Frank's World
Generally, the troll-human hybrid species in 5i 'verse looks fairly close to humans, though there is enough subtle difference that they might be firmly in the adorable side of the uncanny valley if we were to see them. Body builds and heights exhibit slightly greater variation than humans but not nearly so great as trolls. Physical strength and bone mass are more similar to trolls, stronger and heavier than human normal. Dentition is omnivorous, with flat molars similar to humans', and sharp front cutting teeth that are more similar to trolls'. Everyone has human-red, hemoglobin-based blood. Everyone has troll-like pointy or animal-esque ears.
Hair, Skin and Coloration
The skin and hair is pigmented with melanin in much the way humans' is, and there is a whole range of possible skin tones and hair colors just like humans have. However, the keratins in their species' bodies carry a wide variety of structural colorations - microstructures that refract light in different colors, much like insect wings or bird feathers.
This effect is subtle in the keratin of the skin itself and shows up the brightest in places where there is no melanin, like the lips, palms, tongue, bulge and labia. Coincidentally, this also means that people who are paler appear more colorful. The purpleness of Rose's skin is relatively easy to see through her gothick pallor, whereas Gamzee's indigo tint is fairly hidden by his tanness. Tavros's coppery tint just makes his skin look darker.
The structural pigmentation of the hair, nails and horns is different, causing a brightly colored, refractive 'sheen' of iridescence. This is somewhat similar to the highlights in human hair, though the refraction is stronger and comes in a much wider variety of colors. The iridescent sheen of the skin actually comes from its fine vellus hairs (you can see your own if you hold the smoothest part of your forearm so it's silhouetted in front of a bright light).
All the players, including the humans, exhibit this coloration of skin and hair and eyes in their signature color (orange for Dirk, pink for Roxy, etc). The skin and vellus keratin color is always inherited from the gestational parent, while melanin levels and 'sheen' color of the hair and eyes can be from either parent or a combination. This means that the kids are going to quickly become clashing rainbowy little messes.
Fingernails are heavier than human normal and could be filed into claws and maintained that way. As for bodily fluids, it's only the genetic material which carries any kind of distinctive coloration. Tears, saliva, sweat etc are clear.
Horns
Horns are sweet and everyone has them now. Here's a little pic I whipped up for the humans' horn shapes.
Dave has awesome ibex horns.
Jade has classic Bec-ear horns, though her ear-ears are possibly a bit furrier and doggier than other peoples'.
Caliborn has stereotypical devil horns, though they are actually the shape of his Cherub teeth. They rival Karkat and Kankri's in shortness. Positioning is very close to his hairline, curving outward slightly over his forehead.
Calliope looks just like her trollsona, including those bodacious caduceus horns.
Horn shape shows very wide variation in their species. A child's horns will almost always be some combination of their parents' shapes.
My headcanon is that horns are primarily for display and temperature regulation. Blood supply is concentrated in the portions nearest the hornbed, where the horn appears red to orange.
Gills and Amphibious Adaptations
Everyone has gills now, too. This is one of the things that I'm not satisfied with the biological underpinnings of, so I'm not going to go into it in much detail. One to three gill slits are located on sides of the neck. Up to four additional gill slits are located between the ribs. Gills have to be very, very efficient to extract enough oxygen from water to power a body as big as a human's. Therefore, people who have fewer than the full compliment of gill slits will gradually suffer reduced oxygen levels as their gills fail to keep up with their body's demand. Over time, the species will evolve toward having a median number of gill slits, something like 5-6, but these will become more efficient, allowing most people to be fully amphibious.
Everyone has a clear nictitating membrane, used to protect the eye underwater and in strong winds, and to help protect against UV radiation. Other Seadweller traits have been sort of 'smeared' down the hemospectrum, so there's more overlap with the indigos, ultramarines and ceruleans in terms of who has water-dwelling adaptations such as webbed toes and half-webbed fingers and face-fins.
Only violets and tyrians, including Roxy, are able to live underwater indefinitely, and in fact both Fef and Meenah have made themselves second houses in the bay or surrounding waters. I imagine learning to breathe through gills must have been a pretty bizarre experience for everyone who didn't have them previously.
Again, these traits will become randomly spread throughout the genepool within a few generations.
Sex and Reproduction
Yes, time to talk tentabulge. I don't have a tablet or a scanner, so I can't draw you a diagram, though. Sorry.
Hermaphroditism is the normal condition of this species – that is, every individual can either bear or sire a child. Everyone has both a bulge and a nook.
Normally, the bulge is sheathed inside the body, with the opening of the seedflap laying closed. The bulge is fully prehensile, though it is not always under the conscious control of the brain attached to it – if you're not paying attention your excited bulge may act on its own, though you can usually rein it in with a little concentration. My version of tentabulge doesn't differ much from the well-established fanon, and I encourage you to go perv over here if you haven't already.
The nook and egg-sac/uterus I'll go into a little more as I discus heat. The nook is a vagina. A pair of glands analogous to shame globes/testes sits inside the nook, behind the root of the bulge. This is basically like the prostate/g-spot in that it feels pretty great when stimulated. Arousal causes it to release genetic material into the nook to lubricate it, and the same genetic material is ejaculated through the bulge during orgasm. The egg sac sits in the deepest part of the vagina and has attached ovary-analogues. During orgasm the strong muscles of the nook produce suction on the bulge to help retain genetic material received. Coitus typically doesn't involve much thrusting – it's more of a clasp-and-grind-with-bulge-writhing-action thing. Mutual penetration is very common and especially instinctive during heat.
During heat, the body releases an egg cell into the egg-sac, where it floats around awaiting a nice bath of genetic material. The egg cell has half the number of chromosomes needed. The genetic material is basically a stew of nutrients and exploded cells, rich in free-floating chromosomes. The egg will selectively accept these chromosomes as it runs into them, until it is fully fertilized. This means that a child can have a lot of different fathers, but will only have one mother. It also means that fertilization takes longer than in humans, and needs an extra behavioral push to make sure it happens. This is not necessarily an evolutionarily advantageous reproductive method, but that's just what happens when you smoosh together pail-based reproduction and peen-based reproduction.
Heat produces a huge hormonal surge in the effected individual, which causes changes in temperament and behavior. Mostly this entails a loss of inhibitions, trouble forming and accessing short-term memories and feeling SO HORNY YOU COULD DIE. Body temperature is elevated. The muscles and skin of the nook, egg sac and abdomen relax and become very elastic, and genetic material production is routed away from the bulge until the egg leaves the body. The body also produces a distinctive set of pheromones, which can stimulate other individuals into rut.
During rut there is a similar, though less pronounced spike in hormones. The globes begin to produce a whole lot of genetic material and can feel swollen and full if it is not released. A set of similar symptoms including loss of inhibitions, memory problems and elevated body temperature occur. Rut symptoms will fade within about a day if the person in rut is not breathing enough of those heat pheromones to remain sufficiently stimulated. Heat, by contrast, will not fade until the egg is either fertilized and begins embryogenesis, or is expelled from the body. People in both heat and rut have distinctive scents. Heat and rut can be suppressed or skipped entirely by extreme physical stress or poor health, similar to the way menstruation in humans can be suppressed or disrupted by same.
After the egg is fertilized, the mass of genetic material is put to use as raw material for turning the egg cell into an egg that can survive outside the body. A membrane develops around the zygote which filters all the lipid and needed protein components from the slurry, forming the yolk. The keratins that give the genetic material its coloration are organized into the shell and membranes, and the chalazae that holds the yolk in position inside the egg. Egg shells are leathery and more similar to reptile or turtle egg shells than bird eggs. The leftover proteins and water form the albumin.
Eggs and Babies
The egg takes about 7-8 weeks to form inside the egg sac. The entire gestational period from fertilization to hatching is fairly close to human normal, about 38 weeks.
Eggs produce their own set of pheromones, which alter the brain chemistry of anyone who is sufficiently exposed. These pheromones suppress heat/rut, since the egg might be discarded if the caretaking individual were to become pregnant themselves. They also soothe aggression and promote feelings of calmness, wellbeing and nurturing by stimulating the production of oxytocin. As the embryo becomes fully developed, the egg will start to release a second set of pheromones which stimulate lactation. This means that whoever spends the most time around an egg will be fully prepared and predisposed to care for the child when it hatches.
Children hatch with horns already developed, which they use to help puncture the egg shell. They are also able to vocalize and smile when newly hatched. Strength, mobility and manual dexterity develop faster than in human babies, allowing the child to ride or cling to the parent before they are able to walk or even crawl on their own. This is often accomplished by the baby sitting on the shoulders and clinging to the parent's horns because that is adorable damn it, shut up.
Social Aspects
So, okay. Heat and rut. Part of its appeal as a fetish is in the loss of control, but in (imaginary) practice it leads to a certain amount of dubious consent or outright non-consensual behavior. The thing is, after the Players figure out what is actually going on with their bodies, how it works, and that every single one of them are subject to this set of uncontrollable circumstances, they begin to develop a set of systems to make sure that heat is not traumatic. This is a cultural phenomenon, but it's driven by that underlying urge to mother things that Dirk was theorizing about and by the understanding that it will happen to them, all of them, whether they like it or not.
The cycle of heats is triggered by a triple-conjunction of the planets' moons, an event which happens about every three to four Earth years (solar sweeps on their planet are just over one and a half Earth years. As an aside, there will never be a four-way conjuction of the moons, because Wanderer and Aimless are Trojan to each other, sharing the same orbit.). A different Aspect will come into heat first, depending on the time of year in which the conjunction occurs. After the first Aspect, all the others will come into heat in a predictable cycle. No one knows exactly why this is
So, I imagine that in the future of their society, heats will be extremely predictable and well understood. Everyone will know when it's going to be a child-bearing year well in advance, and they will have plenty of time and motivation to get their quadrants in order, to decide whether they want to have a child this time around, and generally to make plans.
In many future societies, enduring a heat with a partner will be considered inherently pale rather than red, because of the level of trust involved. To go into heat with someone entails letting them see you stripped down to your most animal self, and your moirail is partner you trust to care for you at your worst, ugliest, lowest and most vulnerable.
Gender
All of the 34 Players transposed from the previous universe come from cultures where gender is an established social construct. All of them seem to have internalized it to some extent. Even, somehow, the Cherubs, which really makes no sense. So, therefore, even though there is only one physical sex in the new species, the idea of gender will exist in their society at first. I imagine that it will begin to break down fairly quickly, though, especially as various individuals begin to discard it. For example, after he gets pregnant, Gamzee decides skirts are super comfy and wears them all the time. Jane breaks out her extremely fashionable mustaches whenever the mood strikes her (and omg, I love me some genderfuck Jane best thing ever). In fact, as a Life player, Jane could easily cause herself to grow a mustache if so desired.
Some of their first generation of children identify strongly with one gender or the other. Some just kind of go along with the gender they drift into or their parents assign them. Some rebel against their assignment, and others ignore the whole issue or identify strongly as agendered. Equius's oldest child is one of the first kids to identify as agendered – Jane busts out all her mustaches in support. Kankri and Cronus raise at least one of their kids as agendered because Porrim dared/browbeat Kankri into it. Porrim at some point will notice that the majority of the children seem to learn whatever gender their parents assign them. There will be a lot of debate and back-and-forth about this issue among people for a bunch of years in there. But ultimately, I see the idea of gender breaking down and falling away from their society, because it's kind of useless to their biological experience and egalitarian social organization.
Secondary sexual characteristics like breast size, hip size, and body hair density become kind of unmoored from each other in the genome, resulting in a variety of body types that wouldn't fit comfortably into a human-style gender binary anyway.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-28 12:10 am (UTC)Jane, perhaps inspired by her moustaches, could start behaving more and more butch and masculine, and be one of the first ex-humans to deconstruct gender completely, presenting as agendered or redefining zirself into a 'male' role.
While John is going the other way. Or, even-- Dave, much to zis own surprise.
The trolls don't have the cultural baggage that humans have so for the ex-humans this process would be especially poignant.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-28 01:10 am (UTC)Aw, Jane! Aaaah, wait, have you seen this? Best. Jane.
I think, for most of them it would just be a process of becoming more and more themselves. Letting go of pointless expectations of these societies that no longer exist. Realizing that the people around them aren't going to disapprove unless it's hurting someone. Finding out what they're good at and what they enjoy, as well as what looks good on them or how they enjoy looking. I think most people won't even bother to think about it that hard because it's very confusing and yet has very little real impact on their lives. Porrim and Kankri will have lots of long arguments and everyone else will just roll their eyes and get on with their chores.
For humans there's the added aspect of coming to terms with their anatomy. So that kind of accelerates the process for them, maybe?
For Jane it's totally easy. I love the idea that all those years of decorating her walls with mustachioed men, she was dreaming of being one. She's the only human girl not to go for a full-on fancy battle skirt/dress. My heart actually broke just a little when she smashed her mustache headset. She just looks awesome in a dignified, dapper mustache. I just hope she has 4 other replacements like a sensible person. Then there's this issue with her kid needing support for er own lack-of-gender identification. Jane is all over that. She is very motherly.
Dirk and Dave totally get pregnant together. Dirk is like *ironic squee* and Dave is like *faints*. So then Dirk goes all super intense on the ironic squee thing, and sews them matching frilly clothing items or whatever. And Dave has to wear it in their endless battle of ironic oneupsmanship. They throw an ironic baby shower. Terezi is so into it. John thinks playing the doting father is hilarious, but Jake is filled with poignant emotion and super serious about it. As a bonus the whole scenario drives Karkat up the wall. And then Dave kind of just doesn't give back his pink frilly skirt. It's just so ironic and comfortable. And easy-access. John's into it. 'Rezi is SO into it. And Dirk just smirks knowingly. Dirk, of course, has been completely 100% fine with having a vag from day one, since he's an enlightened 24th century kind of guy or something.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-28 01:29 am (UTC)Dirk still gets the swag, doesn't he? He's just the dude with all the swag. There's kind of nothing much else to say about that-- although I bet Dave keeps a lot of words all up behind his teeth about it. At least, for the first decade or so.
Speaking of swag, dammit-- I am begging for answers to these questions! I have good reasons I promise! http://stellaomega.tumblr.com/post/38919719563/for-those-of-us-who-dont-have-material-penises-or
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 12:44 am (UTC)i really love this too: "Secondary sexual characteristics like breast size, hip size, and body hair density become kind of unmoored from each other in the genome, resulting in a variety of body types that wouldn't fit comfortably into a human-style gender binary anyway. " it sounds really fucking awesome. how long are they going to live for? because i'd kind of love to see glimpses of that future, man. *__*
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 02:27 am (UTC)Cal totally goes to the distant future, because that's just the kind of thing he does. Unfortunately, he's just not that interested in gender politics, so I don't have all that much latitude to go into it. I've actually been working on this scene all afternoon.
Pronouns are kind of a problem! I've been going with this schema that everyone who has borne a child is generally referred to as 'she' as a sort of respectful title. But then stuff like, they're discussing Dirk - should they be calling him she? Probably! And then should Cal notice/comment/get confused? Maybe I should do a post about it or something.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 02:33 am (UTC)Dirk is swag all the way down.
Apropos of nothing! I have this amazing idea for a back piece tattoo that I will never get. But, that update where Dirk and AR were talking about turtles/splinters all the way down reminded me of it. So, up near the shoulders would be an awesome turtle with the world on its back. And then a stack of turtles descending down the spine in receding perspective. Okay, I'm a science history nerd and I thought it was an awesome idea at the time, shhhh.
Dave and Dirk's relationship will be so interesting! I'd dying to see them encounter each other again in canon.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 02:50 am (UTC)You know the story of the turtles all the way down, right?
of course you do!
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 03:07 am (UTC)Also, Jade subtly herding things is ADORABLE. Nepeta would notice and like, tackle pounce her for cuddles because it's just so cute. Jade will never pick up on this.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 03:32 am (UTC)Other people will never notice, and always be herdable. Equius for instance... Gamzee will just consider it miracles.
no subject
Date: 2012-12-29 04:06 am (UTC)Karkat is probably the counting goat. AKA, the person who keeps looking around to make sure everyone is with the group when people are going somewhere together.
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Date: 2012-12-29 04:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-01-13 12:25 am (UTC)Is heat affected or inhibited by stressful and physically taxing situations? The impression I got was that John, Tavros, and Rufioh's heats were all delayed because they were tried, worried, and working hard to get everyone back home. There was also Mituna's heat being basically interrupted/non-productive because they were all too stressed out over Calliope going missing.
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Date: 2013-01-17 05:03 am (UTC)