>>90381
David had no bugs, so Nate thought that when he showed up with bugs it meant David was cheating on him (like Doug picking up the spider of the person he's dating).

>>90384
I still think they're ants. The not-on thing might be stylistic choice. Toxoglossa can we have a confirmation on ant or not-ant status of the red things on David's antlers?

>>90395
You know, if they turn out to be ants, does that mean David cheated on Nate with Doug?
Haha
World comes around.

They aren't ants. In chapter 1 Nate mentions that they're ticks.

Ohhhhh my god you guys.

I was thinking about how Nate's therapist could have been messing with his head and it makes SO MUCH SENSE.

First, I realized Nate isn't afraid of bugs while in his dream world thing. This is because his therapist has been working with his inner parallel to try to cure the outer one. When Nate goes into the inner world he must be taking on some of the inner parallel's mental state.
So then I was thinking... Nate told his therapist about the inner world thing and she immediately came for a house call but seemed to do... nothing much but talk to Diego a bit. Then suddenly Diego has some similar psychic ability? She's had this ability herself for a long time and has been trying to unlock it in others! Nate was her first success, so now she's trying to hone her technique before she goes public with it. I'll bet she just tried to do something similar to Zeke in the hallway, too.

I'm thinking Lester's mental instability may be due to Dr. Cooper messing with his mind and screwing it up. Or maybe his conspiracy theory is centered around him subconsciously realizing that she was messing with his head- maybe she was too direct with Lester.

>>91241
...holy shit.
holy shit that is incredibly plausible.

>>91241
remember when we first told her we could do this she took it surprisingly well and did not ask many questions about it,. she also said to be careful as we could do serious damage, hat if that was from first hand experience.

>>91241
So basically all the shit we were suspecting about Doug doing with his powers, SHE'S been doing the whole time? Only she's doing it for a good cause?

>>91357
Maybe for a good cause.

What if she's the alien? Could be trying to uplift the world after learning that the people can be made sentient (I assume she'd heard of it from Nate's childhood) so that she can get the people of Earth to help modify the system? But then Nate started working at building up a system himself, which she could use to help modify the warp.

So, when are we gonna move from the awkward gay romance back into saving the world?

Anonymous 2015/06/01(Mon)17:37 No. 91520 ID: 0ee153
File 143320543328.png - (184.75KB , 1139x291 , tgchan.png )

>>91519
Never

>>91520
Man, that is like the plot of Game of Thrones!

>>91519
You're talking like awkward gay romance isn't saving the world. I don't understand.

Bringing up (avoiding) Love Dodecahedrons in the main thread reminded me of something I thought I'd like to share.

I first became aware of this thread back during chest day when someone posted chest fan art of Doug on their Weasyl account.

So... yeah. My mind might be slightly tempted by certain topics, but I swear I'll be good.

Okay, just one thing, completely unrelated to the homo romance. And this is all spoilers on the latest chapter:

Who thought it was smart to eat the fucking white royal jelly/whatever the hell it was!? (Im not sure what it was.) It obviously was not good news! It was just that one bee producing it, it couldn't have possibly have been too important at the time.

>>93740
bees don't need to make a shitload because only a young queen will ever eat any. the workers and drones wont touch it. so since only one bee ever eats any, making a ton of it is pointless.

Just to point out that there's usually several pods of royal jelly that they raise a few queens in (Incase some die or otherwise), and it is fed to all developing larva for a few days, though they stop for developing workers and breeders.

>>93742
Royal Jelly is fed to all larva, regardless of sex or caste. When they want to grow new queens, they construct special cells for the purpose, which are quite larger than the standard hexagon ones. Since the Royal Jelly was being gathered in a hexagon cell, it was not for the purpose of creating a queen, but just for growing larva.

I think Diego is turning into an actual custodian then, or becoming part custodian at least.
I don't know what to do about that though. I think the only thing Nate can do is get Diego to a safe place, or try and leave Zeke's mind then enter Diego's mind again.

We only read Zeke's mind for a practice run and not to get a new thing, I mean, if we could get a new thing it would have been awesome but Zeke's problems look way too hard to fix on our own. We helped Diego out by showing our support, but Zeke actually needs medicine to deal with his shit. There's not a real mental metaphor we can use to help him.

Quick question, should we assume jungian or fruedian theory?

Not Freudian. Probably closer to Jungian, but I'm not pulling directly from any particular school of thought.

>>/quest/664706
Before anyone drives themselves crazy trying to crack the crazy bee runes:

Aug 23 18:11:59 <toxoglossa>its not a code myco. you can stop

>>94365
It's not a code, it's assembly instructions for Ikea furniture.

I mentioned in the main thread that I had an idea too off the wall to expose Nate's psyche too just yet. So, here, just for the other intrusive voices to hear... what if Heather is somehow related to Lester?

I mean, their ears are somewhat similar, and while their tails are different, I think they are close enough to allow for species differential. We kind of got hit over the head with strong suggestions that Heather would be important to the plot eventually near the end of chapter two... and while exclusion doesn't necessarily equal correlation, when Heather mentioned helping her mother she didn't mention those efforts being alongside her father.

Could Heather be Lester's daughter? It would certainly be plot convenient, though there are other answers. Most low hanging fruit of which is that whoever this woman was that Lester can't remember, maybe he can't remember her because all traces of here were removed in order to create a machine somewhere out there... which is honestly all the more advocacy for trying to do this ethically.

So... thoughts?

>>94686
Maybe the drone got to him before we did and took something, causing him to finally snap?

>>94688
I'd err on the side of that being unlikely. Zeke mentioned the whole "give her back" thing as part of what he's been shouting to himself in his apparent for awhile now.

Oh, I get it. His custodians altered his memory, made him forget about someone. That's probably what happened to Doug. After all, Doug said it happened when the custodians got too numerous, and Lester is COVERED with them.

Even though this quest is all about rootin' around in people's minds, I still fear that we've broken Diego's mind for good. If the quest ends and he's not better, that'd be a real punch to the stomach. The kind of punch to the stomach that makes me very sad.

Through the wiki (which I use as my bookmark) I discovered Black Ice, and after reading that I finally worked up the nerve to read Book of Worms, and it all left me with two impressions. One: Toxoglossa does wonderful work no matter what. Two: I REALLY want to get up the nerve to post in Into the Quest to ask what advice Nate would give to Aether, and in turn what advice Dale would give to Nate and Aether.

Number two will never happen, of course, but it has brewed inside my head long enough to crease a second question: what if each of Toxoglossa's stories are inspired by a request from the previous protagonist. Think about it...

*Dale has an eldritch horror story filled with leaches and tapeworms.*
Dale: Could we tone down the whole parasites within thing?
*Nate has an adventure with a diverse array of invertebrate instead of just two black and white suspects.*
Nate: Could space maybe be a happy fun place instead of the source of Earth's destruction?
*Aether wakes up on a distant colony away from Earth, where the ten year journey through space to get there is a pleasant happier time.*
Aether: I don't know... maybe it could be warmer.
*Unnamed fourth protagonist looks out at the rocket hurtling into the sun that is to be the setting of their adventure.*
Unnamed: ...is there another thought you have on your mind. ...no, really. Anything else.
Aether: Well option two was to ask for a sandwich.
*Unnamed blinks and then looks to Nate and Dale for help. They shrug and scratch their heads respectively... only to suddenly be reduced to screaming terror as the sandwich in Nate's inventory manages to actualize it's existence finally and leaps out, biting onto Nate's ear. Nate starts flailing about in panic, while Dale backs away to keep from getting backhanded... only to trip over a hoagie that immediately starts chewing on his shoe.*
Unnamed: ...right. Whose got some sunscreen?

I know, probably isn't how the creative design process goes for Tox, but it made me laugh to I wanted to share.

I've been noticing a trend, but and it's starting to get real obvious that it's important... or the biggest red herring ever.

We've spilled Nathan's guts in Deigo's mind, lost an ear in Anthony's, lost an arm in Zeke's, and now a foot in Lester's mind. A few more accidents like this and we might be able to build a second Nathan when all this is over.

>>95349
...wait... that means there are bits of wasp hive in everyone. What if the wasps are trying to spread to multiple hosts?

>>95350
C'mon now, isn't that conspiracy theory reaching a little?

>>95350
It's actually one of my more worrying theories about Diego at the moment, though not connected to the discarded Nate parts. A wasp stung Diego last chapter, and one of the ways some wasps reproduce is by injecting their eggs into other insects so their young can eat them from the inside out. Just a disturbing thought I hope won't come true.

>>95351
Well technically every theory is reaching, even after five chapters. We perceive things just as the characters do, and like shadows on the wall we can't be sure what is true or not. Maybe it's aliens... or maybe aliens are an elaborate fiction constructed by someone else. Maybe the wasps are Nate's custodian... or maybe they really are an infestation that killed and replaced his original custodian. Who knows but Tox, and unless one of us figures out how to hack brains over the internet we aren't going to find out the truth till the very end.

>>95354
Diego should have white blood cells that would take care of any parasites like that, if the wasp was real and DID inject eggs into him.

I don't hear about it happening often happening in humans though, so it would be farfetched if eggs were succeffuly implanted within Diego from that sting. I mean, a lot of stuff in this quest is farfetched, but if that wasp was physically real and not some psychic mental metaphor thing, I think it has to operate on real life rules.

The odds are small, not one-in-a-million small, which would make it certain to happen. maybe 1/999,999

>>95356
I have no doubt that if it was a regular wasp it wouldn't happen. The whole inject larva into other insect is more a concern about his beetle than Diego himself. I mean, the beetle's appearance in chapter four was dramatically different from it's introduction in chapter one. Much more inline with the near humanoid appearance of the wasp in chapter three when it appeared to take down the scorpion. Add in the possibly weakened mental immune system while under the effect of the royal jelly...

Something happened / is happening and we aren't privy to the details. It's not even clear at the moment why the wasps aren't defending their hive, but it would be interesting to speculate that if they were establishing a second hive they would have less concern for Nathan's safety.

Oh, and if obeying physical laws is still a hold up, think of this... where did the wasp go after stinging Diego? Wasps aren't bees, they don't die after one sting. It's just an idea, but theories have to start somewhere.

I just have to say... Nathan looks super badass with mismatched broken horns.

So... am I the only one having trouble making suggestions when we might be "helping" a bad guy destroy the world?

Funny. When we initially started suspecting Doug of sharing our abilities, I immediately started drawing comparisons to The Shining and Doctor Sleep.

And now, appropriately enough, Doug reenters the story in an elevator pouring gallons of blood (or "rust"). Stay creepy, Doug.

What I'm wondering now is... did Doug make peace with his ants and is on our side, and was using the alien computer in some way that's beneficial to us, or has he gone completely bonkers and is siding with the robot?

>>98162
>>98169
Or maybe the ants are in league with whoever has the quantum computer - and they've managed to control Doug. Especially if these are red ants, get ready for a boss (heh) fight.

>>98178
Well we can just... spray ant killer on them.

>>98179
Might turn out to be too damaging to Doug. Remember ants mainly communicate via pheromones, so whatever's controlling them must have some kind of pheromone controller. If we can block that out, or jam the pheromones by messing up the scent trail, we can release Doug from the supposed antmind control.

tl;dr drop perfume on Doug instead of the ants.

Anonymous 2016/03/29(Tue)17:22 No. 98736 ID: f91364
File 145929733295.jpg - (73.74KB , 480x480 , caterpillar chain.jpg )

In case you missed it, having a "cable" of caterpillars isn't that far from real life.

And the first five-atom quantum computer is made in MIT.
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2016/04/mit-team-successfully-builds-five-atom-quantum-computer/

I'm hazarding a guess that Apex's quantum computer in the satellite has 8 atoms?

My first thought when Doug disappeared from the satellite in the forest was that he felt betrayed by Nate's reaction to being covered in red ants, since red ants are Doug's bugs.

After that spooky The Shining elevator sequence, though, I'm not so sure.

Hey. I'm a little late to the party and have a doubt I couldn't find the answer for: Was it ever established that Nate didn't reprogram Diego's mind making he like Nate?
I mean, Nate convinced a projection of Diego's inner self to let go of his obsession over people he no longer got contact with, offered himself as a replacement and dragged the metaphorical emotional link Diego had with those people to his domain. After that he escalated from briefly calling Nate cute to inviting him to a date, then presented a telepathic awareness of Nate's security and location, then accepted a bunch of weird behaviors coming from Nate despite his concerns, then become the host of Nate's parasite wasp. So did Nate accidentally made Diego like him more than he normally would like we suspect Doug did to Kim?

I just had a terrible thought.

What if Doug is the drone? As in, the drone arrived decades ago, and Doug is the identity it assumed/stole in order to blend in? The alien in the computer said that the drone had started to go mad because it was away from the homeworld for so long. Could the drone's madness and Doug's madness be one and the same? That would explain why Doug was able to create the maze and why he has such solid beliefs about the Axle. Maybe we were right at the start to suspect the robot in the scientist lady's head was Doug.

On the other hand, this makes me far more worried about what Doug is planning. If he has the expertise to manipulate the Axle and the power to rip minds apart to find pieces for whatever mechanism he's working on, his mad mind might be planning to destroy the world rather than move it. Both worlds, even. It would remove uncertainty, wouldn't it? Can't be uncertain when nothing remains to analyze.

>>100490
That sounds like a solid theory actually.

I binged the adventure these last day. Thanks for this Toxoglossa, it's really captivating.

I have to concur. That may be my favorite quest so far. Thanks for making it.

So, I still like to imagine this as very Jojo's Bizarre Adenture -equse. Which makes me think of themes.

Nate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uykGi7vXAsk or/and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUL0269awIk - something not necessarily violent, but showing he can really go for it when the chips are down.

Diego: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGcV3XNyiAI or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4d5mpIyJn14 - he's a cool dude, helpful when possible, total bro/love interest to the main character, and he's in trouble.

Zeke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es4HIymI188 or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRP_wcYpxYQ - chill dude, very open minded, fuck with his friends and he'll fuck you up.

Dr. Cooper:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBr65T8PKso or/and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXNjnt3LrSo Very calm and put together, although certainly capable of showing emotion and is willing to help her allies.

Detective Hunter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2mt1r0Z2m4 (can't think of a second one) Mentally tough, it seems, and arguably the person with the most control over her Stand- ah, Custodian that we've seen to date.

Doug: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2K1E6wx_Sc and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq_PJ999gMI - a well-dressed and thoroughly creepy fellow who's also oddly powerful.

...so yeah that's my thing.

I love all of your quests Tox, but I liked book of worms a bit more. Zombies and Eldritch horror are my jam.

>>101438
Well CoW is more of a cosmic horror kind of thing, which still falls in Lovecraftian horror.
But instead of zombies we have a bodysnatcher. Or more precisely, a mind-and-bodycopier.

Sorry I don't respond in here very often, I'm really glad to hear people are liking things so far! At this point I feel like I have a better grip of the quest than I did say, 2-3 months ago and I'm hoping I can wrap it up in a way that's at least as satisfactory as Book of Worms. I'm not sure how long that'll take but I feel like its getting to the home stretch in the not too distant future and its given me a lot of drive towards finishing. In other news, I've been toying around with an idea for another quest, but I definitely want to finish CoW first before starting.


>>101433
I really really need to get into JJBA at some point, but these are all pretty rad! I don't think I ever put together specific songs for each character, but I remember putting together a playlist I based off of the quest a while ago. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhX420ao4gNBwNgMva8mHC0LhKEugaYYq It seems kind of dated now though.

>>101528
it's all up on crunchyroll. watch everything but brace for part 3 to be kinda bad before part 4 swoops in and saves the show

>>101552
I thought Part 3 was pretty cool.

>>101552
God dammit Dio don't kick with your bad leg!

As said by a certain very angry and very drunk JoJo.

Random thing I just realized. If the insects can affect real world objects, then STANDO BATTRUs could totally be a thing! (Already sorta was with Lester/Zeke.)

I mean, there's no reason for it to happen outside of very odd circumstances, but it could.

...i want it to happen shut up

Giant. Insect. Stands?
I just squee'd a little.

>>101739
I KNOW RIGHT?

I didn't even realize it at first, but then it hit me with the whole Diego and Doug thing that they work VERY much like Stands, inside and outside your mind, only more autonomous. Not only that, from what I can tell, you have to be 'aware' of the insects in order to physically perceive and affect them, and to be 'aware' you have to have taken a mind-walk at some point.

Although this begs the question of how Dr. Cooper managed to mind-walk in Leslie, if that's the case- she knew about the bugs, in a roundabout sense, but didn't mind-walk until that altercation. Maybe if someone's in a trance, anyone who touches them, regardless of if they're aware or not, mind-walks and is made 'aware'.

Doug, of course, is a just a giant 'what' at the moment.

All of this, however, makes me wonder how people become 'aware' independently...

...I still just want to see some Stand battles, though. Dr. Cooper, Detective Hunter, and Zeke specifically. Oh, Diego if he recovers, as well.

There's been no indication Custodians can affect the physical world.

>>101762
I could've sworn they did something physically...might've misinterpreted it. I hope not.

>>101767
Looked through, there's a vague thing when Nate's wasp ended up in his coffee, but that's still iffy.

...I really hope they can affect the waking world, if only in a loose sense.

Well even if they can't affect the "real" world they can still affect each other right, so at least we can still get some insect Stand fights.

>>101797
That was some unidentified bug we weren't even sure was someone's Custodian at the time.

>>101762
>Or Diego if he recovers
Or Diego if he doesn't recover.
Weird, Wasp-Possessed Diego.

>>81536
Hunter stays being the coolest, although I do hope her mental issues aren't too horrible. One guy just posted a theory that makes me worry.

So uh, I'm not sure anyone's pointed this out yet, but...

The drone is part of Nate's Parallel Network. It was the first one to join up, in fact. So since then, the drone has had inside knowledge of everything Nate has been doing. I suspect this is why the wasps abandoned him and have generally been difficult. They believe (rightfully so) that Nate cannot win while the drone is watching his every move.

I think there's a hidden advantage to this situation though. Tch'arl said that the drone may be behaving this way because it's been isolated for too long. Is it possible that immersing the drone in a strong Parallel Network will bring it to its senses?

>>101955
So your plan is to defeat the drone with friendship?

Weaponized friendship: the tactical nuke of the Parallel.

>>101955
Interesting theory. I'd say if that's the case, we've choices of one or two parallel networks, at least.

Okay so I'm thinking we make a beeline for that giant monolith if we aren't already.

>>102177
More like a waspline.

uuughhhh this is nerve-wracking and I feel like no one is coming up with clever enough solutions. Myself included.

>>102363
I'm just too nervous. In my experience those Tron bikes explode in seconds.

Going to be honest. I have no faith in anybody suggestions and am mentally preparing myself for Hunter to go splat.

Going to be honest. I have no faith in anybody suggestions and am mentally preparing myself for Hunter to go splat.

This is really really really really frustrating because I'm not sure what we could've done.

>>102396
And now I really really hope the next update is fast because I want to help Hunter so bad because she's probably my favorite character and really, there's just a lot I want to say but most of it's negative.

>>102396
Hey man, nobody backed the trampoline option
woulda worked for sure

I got a theory about the core: Maybe the giant Hunter is Hunter unconscious self changed the same way conscious Hunter did.
Inside every mind space we visited there were a version of the person that, unlike the people that entered through Nate, wouldn't remember the experience. I didn't expect to find one in Hunter's mind because she entered with Nate, but I wasn't considering them separate people: her inner self and her resulting self.
If that is the case the engine is the rod thing and it's purpose is to cause pain and anger. Maybe it's some self immolating guilt.

>>103322
If the interpretation that the whole place is more of a nuclear reactor, removing those rods would lead into a meltdown. Those rods are supposed to be control rods, neutron-dense materials to regulate the amount of chain-reaction happening. Remove that, and the chain reaction goes out of control, and a(n emotional?) meltdown could happen.

So honest question in that case- why do some of us want Hunter to go nuclear?

So honest question in that case- why do some of us want Hunter to go nuclear?

>>103402
Some men just want to watch the world burn.

>>103401
Maybe they want her to be Punished Snake.

...well here's a bad pun that just suddenly popped into my head.

What if Hunter is bipolar?

I wish I had any clue what to do here, but I don't.

>>103758
So try anything you can think of! We're throwing science at the wall and seeing what sticks.

Hope this isn't abandoned with that new quest Toxo is doing...

I still plan on finishing CoW. I think Im just riding that new quest high right now and as the pace slows down I'll be back to updating semi regularly

Because you deserve money for this. Seriously though Toxoglossa, do you have a patreon?

>>107495
Thank you! I don't have plans to make a patreon in the immediate future, but its something I've thought about. I might set one up at some point, but at the moment I just do my thing because its fun. Even if you don't have the means to, the idea that you want to throw money at me is really awesome, and I really appreciate it! Rest assured, if I do open up a patreon or commissions you guys'll be the first to know.

Once again I apologize for the gap in CoW updates, Im kind of in a flow with Sunfish and I hope everyone is enjoying it so far.

>>107510
Sunfish is pretty goofy and fun so far with a sort of low key foreboding feeling that things could go horribly wrong at any moment.

Bt the way, just to make sure we're not reading this completely wrong, can you confirm that as far as Sam knows, the message about the Sunfish was a real e-mail sent by another Sam and the copy in her head wasn't involved?

Wouldn't want to accidentally lie to Dr. Spencer just because we didn't know what our protagonist does (accidentally lying because she's mistaken is fine).

>>107632
Email? I thought Sam got told by Old Sam via their shared mind thing.

>>107636
It kind of doesn't help that Sam doesn't seem to draw a clear distinction between Old-Sam-living-in-my-head and Old-Sam-the-original when she's talking about them.

But yeah, I think you're right, the inner Sam was the one nudging flake Sam, not the outer Sam.

I noticed the other thread too late, apologies
>>107636
>>107643
In that case, it means Sam doesn't actually know shit about outer-Sam's current status, or whether she's even alive.

Hmm.

I wonder if suggesters in Sunfish are Old Sam in some way. Sam doesn't seem to be flirting very much with anyone but Annie and Bucky, despite the occasional suggestion for it. Perhaps that is one of the ways Sam is different from Old Sam?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJ_K2VRPf9U
This is now what you think Flint sounds like

Dunno if anyone else has mentioned it, but it looks like Tch'arl is learning to use English verb tenses.