Block Enthusiast

THANK YOU SO MUCH THOUGH!!! AAAA- I'm so glad you enjoyed it!!

AND YES YES!! I have so much I can say.... First of all I have to thank random ambient noise soundtracks for carrying me through the entire fic. Without them, I definitely wouldn't have been able to keep focus for long stretches of time without getting distracted by something.

Fun fact: Fic was not titled until it was time to publish LOL- I was so indecisive

I think my original ambition with the fic when I first started was just writing an Apocalypse AU... but at the same I also wanted to write world-hopping. I was inspired by a comic I had read back when I was in the UTMV (Undertale AU) fandom that explored AUs through way of dreams, and I've been wanting to try my own spin on that for a while so this was the perfect opportunity.

Now the plot wasn't actually supposed to go so crazy, that was mainly me getting extreme brainworms over the concept of an inter-dimensional organization stepping in. Originally, it was going to be mainly exploring the grief that comes with being unable to ever see the one person you feel you connect to most. Having to either accept that fact, or find a way to let go. (Definitely way more depressing, i think)

I was so stuck on the plot for a while, how to wrap it up with everything I'd planned. For a while, I was originally planning to have Grian be the one interrogated, in which he would then hide things from Scar to keep him safe, even going so far as to say they should never talk again. And then the real reason would be revealed when GIGA stepped in.

The way that was set up though, it basically meant all the cool stuff was happening where the readers couldn't see it. So after a long conversation with my good friend @/boxofwasps, I had a stunning revelation on how to swap it around- which is where the fic stands today. I think I remember literally stopping in my tracks and going "Wait. I know how to fix this. I know what I need to do." and Sprinting for my doc to write it down. Imagine me with a cork board and a bunch of red string- that was me putting this fic together

Another fun thing was that, I had so much fun writing the apocalypse world in chapter 1 that I partially wanted to just keep writing that instead of moving on with the plot LOL. I think if I had more time I definitely would have fleshed out some of the AUs they were in, as well as Scar's travels in the waking world and his own lingering trauma

Another fun fact? Me and @/cuteiemonster actually have a whole alternate timeline tree exploring the various ways the plot could have differed if things were just ever so slightly different. There's three main ones, though. Dreams (canon timeline), Nightmares (scar's awful no-good very bad day), and Delusions (grian's awful no-good very bad day) with varying degrees of angst. Please talk to me about them, because I'll likely never write anything about them but I have so many notes.

OKAY AND NOW TO ANSWER THE SECOND PART OF YOUR QUESTION!!!

I'm guessing you're asking about the cage from the hanging cages chapter? I love that scene so much btw there's so much symbolism there.

Every one of the main characters in the fic is stuck in their own cage, in a different way. I think in that chapter in particular, the cages themselves represented the fact that Scar and Grian were both trapped in separate universes. Leaving the cage wasn't an option, there. All they could do was reach across the gap and try to make do that way. Scar fiddling with the bolts of his cage is a show of his motivations and ambitions to escape the confines of his universe to get to Grian, far before he even says it aloud.

Grian stays in his cage because to him, there is no other way out. He's weighed the options, seen the dangers- and even the smallest movements out of line cause the cage to sway. It's just not worth it to try anything different, even if it means being trapped for an eternity...

I AM SO FLATTERED THAT YOU NOT ONLY READ IT BUT RE-READ IT??? HELLO?? I'm sobbing

I am so so so excited to write more for this series, I'm not going to lie. I've been writing notes and gathering ideas for what exactly I want to focus on for a potential sequel. Thanks to help from @/cuteiemonster I have a lot of headcanons for their roommate (yes, roommate) behavior. As well as what they're up to post-fic!

I will say, there is a chance there will be something I put out before the sequel fic- depending on where my motivations lie. I've been thinking about writing the story of Scar's family, and what happened to them. After all, Scar wasn't always alone out there, in the wastelands... Ooh, just thinking about it just makes me excited

The main reason I haven't immediately jumped to write more already is mainly due to school taking up a lot of my time atm! Not to mention I've been getting into a new minecraft server I've been playing in (if you see the art I've been posting to this account LOL), which is basically just every trope I'm obsessed with (Multiversal Purgatory...)

AND!!!! INSPIRATIONS AND STUFF! The anomaly was originally going to be a Creature of uknown origins, but I felt it would be more fun to make it someone with a name and face. Mumbo was a character I've been really interested in writing, so it was a bit of a no-brainer when it came to picking him. Though, it did change things slightly, because the anomaly was originally going to be an irredeemable villain character. But the more I wrote about Mumbo, the more I was like "dude this guy is too wet of a cat to be a villain on purpose" so instead we ended up with the Mumbo in the fic, who's just ever so slightly too casual about world corruption (against his will)

As for universes? I'm going to be honest, pretty much all of the universes in this fic were pretty much straight from my own noggin. I just wrote whatever felt right! There was that Pirate AU with renchanting and navy captain Grian, the Graveyard AU with a groundskeeper Scar and vampire Grian, the Superhero AU with Hotguy and the unnamed villain Grian (who's either named Xelqua or Poultry Man lets be real). A lot of the universes I wrote in-depth about were universes that I would love to write standalone fics of, so this fic itself was partially a collage of various ideas that I may or may not ever write about.

MAN I wrote way more than I was expecting. Tbh I could've written more but I don't want to keep you for TOO long LOL! If you want to talk more about it I'm so chill to chat on discord or through tumblr messaging (im crazy)

Ok one more thing