Today's chapter of "The Wonderful World of Fanfiction" is brought to you by the 4000th review of "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" by AlleyKat2014, who really really really wanted some questions answered, goddammit Muffin!

It is also brought to you by this public service announcement from the Muffin herself, "Dudes, you realize this is a Q&A fic, right?"

Normally, backstage of "The Wonderful World of Fanfiction" is a chaotic merging of worlds which should not have any business touching one another.

One might spot the newly anthropomorphized Sauron from "Eru Lee and the Sundance Kid" dubiously eyeing the newly anthropomorphized Ring from "The Wasteland" who dubiously eyes anthropomorphized Sauron back in turn.

One might also see Uzumaki Kushina from "How I Met Your Other Mother" and Gilgamesh from "The Demiurge" engaging in a drinking contest to settle not only who their respective wife loves more but also to prove their undeniable brilliance to the other and determine once and for all whether a nine-tailed fox or a two-thirds god has a better alcohol tolerance.

One might even see Dead Last try to find a fellow straight man in the constant comedic pairing that is standard in The Muffin Verse but constantly find himself running into either Senju Tobirama or more often than not some variation of an unamused Tom Riddle.

Today though, is a special day, in that it is the chapter following The Carnivorous Muffin's written avatar's untimely suicide in front of a live studio audience (rest in peace), and after the events of last chapter, none other than chronic whipping boy Frank the vampire secretary, has been chosen as the new talk-show host.

"Alright Frank, you can do this, you have been preparing your whole life for this moment," Lily stands before him, handing him the stack of letters that had mysteriously appeared in the chaos that is backstage and had to be rescued from pop-culture references gone wild, "This Frank, is the big one, your shining moment!"

Frank, being whipped, can only smile with a somewhat wide-eyed, almost paralyzed, look on his face as he numbly takes the stack of letters.

"This is the dumbest thing we have ever done," chronic skeptic tag-along Wizard Lenin is distinctly unamused as always, glaring down at the letters, Lily, and Frank in turn.

"No, Lenin, the dumbest thing you have ever done was mistaking my mom for me in the past and then deciding to get petty revenge and blowing yourself up in the process," Lily responds, revealing very recent spoilers from "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" where we finally learn just why Wizard Lenin sticks his head into the sand like an ostrich and makes strange comments regarding Lily Evans every now and then. For those members of the audience who have better things to do than read "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" (but somehow don't have better things to do than read "The Wonderful World of Fanfiction"), Wizard Lenin was essentially trying and failing to avoid an existential crisis on a massive and personal scale.

Unfortunately, this failed completely, and now at least subconsciously he must recognize that his life is utterly pointless and everything he has ever been and likely ever will be revolves around Lily.

For the sake of this story though, he's still in sweet denial, "We are not discussing that here!"

"I don't know, Lenin," Lily remarks blandly and entirely unamused, "It was a pretty large deal, I mean chapter wise it was even a large deal, people have been waiting over fifty chapters for that sucker."

"I do not care how long they've waited, we're, not, talking, about it!" Wizard Lenin says, pausing for emphasis dramatically in between his final words in the type of tone that, coming from Severus Snape in a classroom, would have had Neville quaking in terror.

"Well we've got to talk about it sometime," Lily grouses but holds up a hand to forestall Wizard Lenin's complaints, "But alright, fine, that's probably best saved for canon anyways. No use rehashing it in here after all, even if you did blow your self with petty vengeful green death lasers."

Wizard Lenin opens his mouth for some truly scathing retort, but Lily pauses as she hands the last stack of envelopes to Frank, a concerned look on her face, "Oh, oh no, this can't be right."

"What can't be right?" Frank asks, clearing his throat and finally getting a word in amongst the bickering.

"These are for The Carnivorous Muffin," Lily states, then, seeing the looks of disinterest and blank comprehension on Wizard Lenin and Frank's parts respectively, she clarifies, "The Carnivorous Muffin is very dead."

"Then don't ask the questions," Wizard Lenin says with a far too overdramatic sigh that plainly states that no one appreciates the effort he puts into these ridiculous shenanigans, "Honestly, I'm not even sure why we still have a talk show, given that the author is officially dead."

"Well, no, the author clearly still exists," Lily points out, motioning to herself, Lenin, and Frank, "We're still here, I mean, still talking. So, someone up there is pushing all the buttons and putting the words to paper. They're just… not here right now."

"More's the pity," Wizard Lenin grouses, conveniently ignoring the fact that were this story or any of The Carnivorous Muffin's stories, to abruptly end, he would cease to exist in any capacity except the strange fanfics of fanfics floating around as well as fanart.

It is, on the thought of the benign, benevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent writer The Carnivorous Muffin, well within Wizard Lenin's best interests that The Carnivorous Muffin keeps doing what she's doing.

"Still, these are questions that deserve some answer," Lily said as she read through a few of them, "At the very least, people are probably expecting answers."

Although it is important to note that these same reviewers have not received an update to this in months, so they are perhaps used to waiting.

"What kind of a person expects answers from a story like this?" Wizard Lenin asks, "And does this really even constitute as a story? In any general chapter we hardly have a plot, in fact, it was so bland and banal that the author killed her own avatar last chapter and seems to have no regrets."

"You're missing the point," Lily dismisses and then begins to truly think on the topic, "We need… We're going to need some kind of quest, you me, either nine or eleven more people depending if we're going for an 'Ocean's' theme or 'The Lord of the Rings' to go and find The Carnivorous Muffin."

"Why am I going?" Wizard Lenin asks, already knowing it's entirely too late to back out of the fellowship of the muffin now, and because of that Lily doesn't even bother to answer.

"Frank, hold down the fort, we're off to find Godot… I mean God, I mean The Carnivorous Muffin. You know what I mean!" Lily says as she stuffs the remaining envelopes into Frank's pale hands.

Frank stands, cries out desperately as the reality of his situation sinks in, "Wait!"

But it's too late, Lily is pulling Wizard Lenin along through backstage, past backstage into the worlds themselves where somewhere out there, in some distant time or place, The Carnivorous Muffin awaits.

And just like that, the curtains are up, the show is on, and it's time for another chapter of "The Wonderful World of Fanfiction"

The crowd cheers, welcoming Frank to the stage beneath the truly blinding lights, watching as the poor man squints, swears under his breath, and tries to see out into the audience, "Well, hello everyone."

The audience cheers again, prompted by large signs with neon lights while Frank just grins awkwardly at the noise.

"As you know, The Carnivorous Muffin is unfortunately now deceased, and I have been… volunteered to be our new host," Frank says, the audience cheers and laughs at what is supposed to be a joke but is very much not one, "Yes, yes, it's quite… exhilarating. Truly, a highlight of my day."

It is not, in fact, a highlight of Frank's day but the live studio audience seems blissfully ignorant of this as they tend to be blissfully ignorant of anything happening on this stage. The live studio audience, the true audience should be informed, was bought at a discount rate.

"Right, well, since there's apparently a question for me in here I thought I'd just get started…"

"Where's Lily?" A voice from the audience shouts, Frank pauses as he sorts through envelopes, squinting out beyond the spotlights and trying to see into the dark mass.

"What?" he calls out.

"Where's Lily, Lenin, and Gilgamesh?" a different voice calls out, "I liked when they were hosts."

"Yeah, that was funny!" the first responds.

A general murmur starts and continues, and among the mutterings the consensus seems to be that The Carnivorous Muffin isn't nearly as missed as was previously thought, and most people enjoyed the "American Idol" type panel of judgmental judges far more than the talk-show format previously witnessed in this ongoing dumpster fire that calls itself a story.

"I don't know," Frank calls out, again a tad awkwardly as there's no good way to respond to a dark pit, "I think they're on some sort of quest or something, it's really not important…"

"Well, I think it's important!" a voice cries out.

And for the first time on stage, and perhaps even in any story, Frank loses it and disregards sorting through letters and instead shouts out at the audience, "Well, no one cares if you think it's important! No one certainly cares if I think it's bloody important! We all have to sit down and shut up and take it even if the boss and Tom Riddle are off doing god knows what in god knows what corner of the fandom!"

His words echo, the audience shocked into submissive silence as he glares at them, for once actually looking the part of an intimidating vampire.

"Now, may I please read my own bloody question?!"

There is no response, and in the stifling quiet, Frank opens a single envelope with his name on it and reads, "From AlleyKat2014 who asks, 'What is it like being the new host?"

Frank looks up, blankly at his audience who stares back, he then throws his hands into the air and declares, "I quit, I quit, I am done and I am quitting and…"

"Frank!" Lily darts onto the stage, looking curiously quest-ready in an outfit rather reminiscent of "The Lord of the Rings" or what Lily imagines should belong in "The Lord of the Rings", behind her is Gilgamesh adorned in his trademark golden glowing armor and a smirk that is more than ready to put these wretched mongrels back in their places, as well as Wizard Lenin in his most communist of outfits and looking none too pleased by the current state of affairs.

"Frank, oh good, we're just about to set off and I wanted to let everyone know that I managed to get Wizard Lenin and Gilgamesh to tag along, since, you know, the whole panel thing last time and three's not that bad of a quest number and…"

"Good," Frank says, placing all the letters back into her hands, "These are yours now."

Then, for the first time in his life, in a fic that is so not-canon it's not even funny, Frank grows a spine in front of Lily and walks off the stage like a boss. Leaving Lily, Wizard Lenin, and Gilgamesh standing dumbly in his wake with a quest and a boat-load of questions from readers and reviewers.

Now Presenting

More from the future of "How I Met Your Other Mother" with focus on Namikaze Hari and Uchiha Shisui

Prompted by Random

By The Carnivorous Muffin

There were a few solid, undeniable, truths in Shisui's life. Well, that was perhaps untrue, there were certainly more than a few. His world, in many ways, had always seemed too rigid and unforgiving since the very beginning. The clan and the village pulling him in opposite directions, neither caring that one day they'd tear him in half.

Those truths, the clan before the village, the village before the clan, were ones that Shisui had had to learn to skillfully navigate so that he was not too far to one side and not too far to the other. Whether he was successful in this was hard to say, there were still grumblings within the clan, but Shisui was not their pawn and unlike Uchiha Obito had not been excommunicated either.

No, he'd managed to land somewhere in the middle, a friend of Itachi who himself would one day be clan head, and with a world of expectations on his shoulders.

Still, better to be balancing on the edge of a knife than to land on one side or the other. Or, rather, on Obito's side because if push came to shove… Shisui would never say it, or at least, not until he had no other choice, but if push came to shove he would choose the village.

He just hoped that push never came to shove.

However, while these thoughts were never far from his mind they weren't exactly what he'd been thinking about right at this moment. There were some other… slightly less integral truths that Shisui couldn't, and wouldn't, deny. One was that the yondaime hokage, Namikaze Minato, was goddamn terrifying and in many ways Shisui's idol. The other was that if there were a pair more terrifying than him, it was his wives, Uzumaki Kushina and particularly Eru Lee. The third was that the yondaime was known for being… almost overprotective of his now sixteen-year-old oldest daughter Namikaze Hari. The fourth, and perhaps the worst, was that Namikaze Hari was very pretty.

Granted, this last one he hadn't noticed for years. Mostly because she'd always been Sasuke's little girlfriend and then suddenly she was Sasuke's older girlfriend and then she wasn't Sasuke's girlfriend at all. He'd always liked her, thought her dry wit, intelligence, lack of Sasuke-worship, and ability to beat Sasuke into the ground was good for the brat. Then she'd become Sasuke and Namikaze Naruto's genin teammate with Obito for a sensei and that'd all been good too, he'd watched the chunin exams and been genuinely impressed by her and the team's performance and that had been about it.

About it until one day he'd looked up and realized that she'd clearly gone through puberty, was almost as tall as Shisui was, and suddenly had become very interesting even to shinobi a few years older to her.

Shisui, unfortunately, being among their number.

The unfortunate part being that while Hari seemed more or less indifferent to this new state of affairs, her terrifying father was not, and if Shisui didn't want to deal with the yondaime at his passive aggressive finest then he should be anywhere other than where he was sitting right now.

Here, of course, being local ramen stand Ichiraku's with Namikaze Hari.

He looked over at her, and she was dutifully focused on her book, almost obsessively so as if to avoid glancing at him, and aside from noting the strange turquoise color of her eyes he noted again that even though she was older now she was still young. Probably too young for him, if he really didn't want to be toeing the line he'd have the decency to wait two more years at least.

Except they weren't even doing anything, he thought to himself, sure they were eating together but they could be eating as friends, had eaten together as friends the week before (except no, that had pretty much been a date too) and as it was until Shisui worked up the nerve to actually do or say anything they might as well just be friends.

"So…"

Her head whipped up, eyes blinking, wide and blue with a hint of green that left him just slightly dazed, "Yes?"

"Nice weather we're having," Shisui finished rather lamely.

She paused, then smiled equally awkwardly back at him, but he still loved the sight of it, "It is, isn't it?"

The awkward, stifling, silence returned between them and Shisui could see Ichiraku himself shaking his head at the pair of them out of the corner of his eye, as if to say, "Oh, these stupid kids and their stupid awkward dates."

"How's Itachi?" she asked, which was a terrible question and they both knew it, her mother kept in close contact with all of her students, both Obito and Itachi, so Hari no doubt knew very well how Itachi was doing.

"Good, he's doing well," Shisui said, which was about all one could ever say for Itachi, with the weight of the world on his shoulders.

"Good," Hari said with a nod, "Sasuke's still trying to catch up."

That was the understatement of the century, in Shisui's humble opinion Uncle Fugaku had done Saskue no favors in pitting him against his older brother. Where Sasuke had once been an adorable boy he'd turned into a scowling adolescent and then a brooding and scowling young man with a goal that very well could be impossible for him to meet.

Shisui would wish him the best of luck but he sincerely doubted that it would ever happen, and besides, he had to take Itachi's side on this sort of thing.

He glanced at her again, taking in her usual practical civilian wear that edged on something more tactical. She was a lot like her father in that respect, in many respects, he could see her mother in her from time to time, in her biting sense of humor and her lack of patience, but it was the yondaime hokage that Shisui always thought Namikaze Hari most resembled.

And he decided if he was going to hell he might as well do it in style, "Say, Hari, what do you say you and I go to a real restaurant tonight?"

And while Namikaze Naruto would no doubt have been offended over the idea of ramen not being real food, Namikaze Hari just smiled and then grinned, as she realized precisely what Shisui was getting at. And if she could smile at him like that, it couldn't be such a bad thing, could it?

"Do I even want to ask where we are or where we're going?" Wizard Lenin, skeptic and critic of any quest no matter the shape or size, is already very clearly not having a good time as he, Lily, and Gilgamesh march through Lily's own home universe of "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" searching for The Carnivorous Muffin.

"It's not about where we're going, Lenin," Lily says with an overdramatic and rather aggravated sigh, "It's about the journey, you have to remember that none of this is really happening, so things will just plod along and if we keep walking long enough and hit all the necessary plot points there's a very good chance we'll find God."

It is to be noted that being in fourth wall breaking dumpster fire like this one, Lily has become even more genre-savvy than ever before, whether her companions at all appreciate this is an entirely different story.

"That is not how that works," Wizard Lenin grouses, and then appears to remember just kind of a world he lives in as his expression darkens, "Or at the very least it shouldn't be."

"Nonsense, brother, it has been far too long since I have been on a quest like this one. Not since Enkidu was alive, I think, have I embarked on this kind of a journey," Gilgamesh, needless to say, is in much higher spirits as he imagines taking on gods left and right with his new regrettably twelve-year-old wife in the place of Enkidu and with his mongrel of a brother-in-law tagging along.

Given that they're in Scotland, he's likely to be disappointed.

"Are you going to storm off again?" Lily asked, "Because that's getting kind of old Lenin, you have to learn to go with the flow, like I do. So, life is fake, big deal I knew that even when I wasn't a part of this show. So, none of us are actually real thinking beings and are typed up on some laptop, again, it's more than what I expected from the universe and actually does give our lives a shocking amount of meaning. So, the avatar of God died last chapter, well… That one actually is a slight problem."

Wizard Lenin just grits his teeth, much to Gilgamesh's amusement, and is clearly trying not to think too deeply on the existential horrors that Lily seems to have accepted with alarming ease.

"No, I am not going to storm off again," he says even as through the road that winds itself through the village of Hogsmeade they finally make their way closer and closer to Hogwarts itself, great and imposing and having all the trappings of reality with none of its complications.

And in this strange mesh of worlds, somehow Lily in her homemade armor, Gilgamesh in his golden and divine form, and Wizard Lenin the communist, do not look so out of place as they should on this yellow brick road of theirs.

"I'm not sure I trust that," Lily says, eyeing her partner in crime critically, "So I'm just going to read all your questions now before you can sprint in some other direction."

"I have questions?" Wizard Lenin asks, apparently forgetting just how popular he is, or how much people enjoy seeing him uncomfortably squirm.

"Sure, why wouldn't people ask you questions?" Lily asks in turn, apparently forgetting that last time Wizard Lenin stormed off in a rage after responding to most questions with expletives too strong for a T-rated fanfic to go mope with Uncle Death off stage.

"Right, well first one's from pixelherodev, 'If you had some way of going back in time and making it so you never met Lily – but were also never trapped in her head, and as such capable of carrying out your revolution – would you?"

"Yes," Wizard Lenin says without hesitation, eyes glaring forward at the gates of Hogwarts growing closer as the three approach the castle.

"What?" Lily asks, eyes wide and alarmed and more than a little hurt and angry with Wizard Lenin's callous response, "Seriously?!"

"My life would be so much less complicated, so much more sensible, so much more meaningful without you in it," he hisses, and part of this is the frustration of the current time and place, but there is a thread of a deep, dark, genuine hurt and fear in this statement. For Wizard Lenin as he is, is intrinsically shaped and chained to Lily, everything he is or does is in fact hers and even his greatest of dreams and ambitions pales beneath her dark shadow.

But this is a complicated question with a complicated answer, one that Wizard Lenin in this time, place, and world is in no position to truly complicate. So instead Hogwarts looms over this strange trio, as Gilgamesh smirks, Lily pales and glowers, and Wizard Lenin glares right back as if he means every word and then some.

Some things in this world are not meant for mere question and answer fics.

Gilgamesh, sparing a glance towards Lily, softer than he should be capable of remarks, "Remember, Lily, that at his heart he has always been a mongrel."

Lily says nothing, closes her eyes and swallows, then opens them again and tosses the one envelope aside and tears open the next, reading it tonelessly, "This is from AlleyKat2014, they want thoughts on something called 'Danganronpa'."

Lily then throws the envelope aside without a word as neither The Carnivorous Muffin who writes nor Wizard Lenin have seen Danganropa and thus have no thoughts to give on it. The gate is then in front of them and Wizard Lenin works to unlock it even as Lily continues to tonelessly read, rage and hurt still bubbling beneath the surface of her pale skin.

"Again, from AlleyKat2014 (AlleyKat2014 has a lot of questions), 'Of all the crossovers of your Fanfiction with other fandoms that you appear in, which one do you hate the most and which one do you think is the weirdest?"

"This one," Wizard Lenin says with an edged calm that matches Lily even as he forces open the gates, "I loathe this one most of all, even more than the 'My Immortal' crossover where I lost my mind and all capacity of thought, this, this, is what I truly hate!"

And this, for all Wizard Lenin's tantrums and biases, is perhaps not wrong. Because here there is no hiding from what you are, Lily, Wizard Lenin, and all the others are forced to perceive themselves in ways that they no doubt did not wish to. It can be a troubling thing, to see past all your own pretenses.

Gilgamesh however has done all this before in his own side fic so can only give a bemused glance in Wizard Lenin's direction, "Brother, even a mongrel such as yourself should know when to be gracious. You're acting like a child."

"I do not need to be lectured by you," Wizard Lenin says as he pushes open the gates and the trio wanders inside, Hogwarts students stopping, gawking, and sometimes fleeing at the sight of them.

"My wife is far too lenient on you to do it herself, so it seems the task must fall to me," Gilgamesh says with a rather put-upon sigh, as if it is just like a mongrel to force someone of his stature to lecture them on public displays of rage.

"Look, this is all great, but AlleyKat2014 has some more questions like, 'How many chapters of this do you think you can endure before you snap and go insane?"

Wizard Lenin stops midstep, miasma whirling about his feet, and turns to Lily to tower over her with eyes burning in unholy light, "Was that a rhetorical bloody question?!"

"Yes?" Lily asks, naturally not knowing, but either way the answer is more than clear that Wizard Lenin hit his existential limit about three chapters ago.

Wizard Lenin seems to deflate at this, realizing perhaps how ridiculous he looks or else that he's terrifying the nearby children, and sighs asking, "How many more of these?"

Lily flips through her stack of envelopes, "Only four more, that's not so bad."

"Fine, fine, let's hear it," Wizard Lenin says, rolling his eyes skyward, "God knows it's not like we have anything else to do in this ridiculous place than wander around answering inane questions."

"Okay then, from Vickeynessz, 'There's a fan film coming out documenting your years at Hogwarts titled 'Voldemort: Origins of the Heir'. How do you feel about that? Offended? Interested? Disgusted?" Lily asks before blinking as they step into the castle, still ignoring the students fleeing in every direction, "Wow, I didn't realize you had a film, I wonder if it's any good."

For readers' information, The Carnivorous Muffin has heard that the fan film was god awful and mostly laughable and has no actual desire to see it herself given the descriptions as well as some of the plot elements.

"I'm sure it's trash," Wizard Lenin responds, because at this point nothing amuses him, and as far as Wizard Lenin is concerned a film about his youthful life would be mostly uninteresting if only because The Carnivorous Muffin does not head-canon baby Death Eaters and what have you but imagines that aside from the chamber debacle and familicide, Tom Riddle spent most of his time at school going to school like a normal student.

Wizard Lenin's revolutionary exploits and what have you don't occur until years after he graduates, and the memory of Tom Marvolo Riddle has faded.

"Right, well, oh, this next one's by burntdream and… I don't think you'll like it," Lily says as she reads the words, "But I guess there's no time like the present so, 'How creeped out are you by your own obsession with Lily—because let's face it, Trotsky is a version, a face of you—and how do you feel about your future liaisons with Bellatrix? If held at gunpoint, wand point, whatever, would you choose the crack head or your former redhead host, of whichever age?"

"I would murder you both in cold blood and leave your bleeding carcasses for the vampires," Wizard Lenin answers by not answering the question at all, because in this fic, that's about all you can expect from the man.

More, regarding the question period, there are some things that for very good reasons Wizard Lenin prefers not to think about.

"Perhaps a worthy answer, mongrel, for I would not share my wife," Gilgamesh chimes in, needlessly reminding everyone of his presence, and the plot of "The Demiurge" while he's at it. In case you somehow forgot that Gilgamesh and Lily got drunkenly and dubiously married in a karaoke bar.

"Twelve, Gilgamesh," Lily reminds him with a somewhat strained smile, "I am currently twelve… Why does everyone keep forgetting that?"

If Wizard Lenin is doomed to be miserable then Lily is doomed to be creeped upon while ridiculously underage.

"Well, anyways, this is from Guest, 'If you had to choose between reading Twilight, some cringy yaoi fanfic, or having to read a Captain Underpants book for the rest of your life which would you choose?"

"The hell is yaoi?" Wizard Lenin balks, not being a connoisseur of fanfiction himself.

"Gay fanfiction softcore porn," Lily summarizes, which misses the greater idea of the word but does get to its specific usage, leaving Wizard Lenin with a very difficult choice indeed, as for him all of these things would be toxic.

After a moment too long, he finally says with a slight shudder, "I'll take the glittering vampires, because at least in that there's no underwear to be found. There's only one left, right?"

"Yup," Lily announces, popping the 'p' on the end of the word as they step into the great hall, each looking for some sign of The Carnivorous Muffin, "From AlleyKat2014, again, 'Who do you hate more: Trotsky or Gilgamesh? What is the reason for your answer to this?"

Wizard Lenin sighs and shudders as he asks, "Must I rank these equally vile things in my head for the amusement of this banal audience?"

"It seemed pretty clear, there is a clear ranking, with reasoning, that's supposed to be happening here," Lily says and this truly appears to be a difficult choice for Wizard Lenin. For a moment his eyes linger on Gilgamesh and seem to settle there as he takes in the man's undying and overwhelming arrogance but then they move, because of course, there in the doorway, is none other than Wizard Trotsky.

"Oh no," Lily says, "Oh dammit! I knew he was going to show up eventually, but did it have to be this soon?!"

"You knew?" Wizard Lenin accuses but Lily just waves the envelopes.

"His were next in the pile, he has questions to answer, that's probably why we're walking through bloody Hogwarts first thing! Oh goddammit! Forget it, Lenin, I have your answer, I hate Trotsky the most because he is the worst! Oh my god, he is the worst!" Lily, falling to her knees in despair, has no issues figuring out who she likes the least in this duo. Lily will take Gilgamesh (pun intended) any day of the week over Wizard Trotsky.

"Lily, what a thoroughly pleasant surprise," Wizard Trotsky asks as he strolls over towards them with a grin, before his eyes land on Wizard Lenin, "And Lenin, what a thoroughly unpleasant surprise."

"Shouldn't you be crying in despair in some seedy brothel?" Wizard Lenin asks in turn.

"You burnt the brothel down," Wizard Trotsky drily retorts, having far less shame than Wizard Lenin and seeing no need to refute the crying in despair portion of the statement, "Besides, I could hardly stay there forever, now could I?"

The look on Wizard Lenin's face says that yes, it would have been very nice if Wizard Trotsky had simply stayed there and burned to death, indeed what a brave new world that would have been.

"If I ask the questions he might leave," Lily whispers then to Wizard Lenin, "He left last time, and if we don't ask them he'll have to stick around for vague plot related reasons."

Dungeons and Dragons, we discovered last time, was enough to drive off even the most determined of suitors.

"Oh, I don't intend to be driven off quite that easily," Wizard Trotsky says with his most blindingly charming smile, perfectly at place within Hogwarts, yet somehow legitimately terrifying despite the ease with which it falls on his aristocratic features.

Lily's smile is tight, her eyes burning, as she asks, "Alright, Trotsky, this is from AlleyKat2014 who asks, 'Who do you hate more: Lenin, who has spent over a decade with Lily, or Gilgamesh, who slept with her after they got drunk and declared that they were married?"

Wizard Trotsky blinks for a moment, considers the pair with Wizard Lenin's glower and Giglamesh's challenging raise of his golden eyebrows, and answers, "Oh, Lenin, easily. Gilgamesh and I bonded last chapter, he may be swine who took advantage of you…"

"You are one to bloody talk," Lily interjects rather bitterly but Wizard Trotsky conveniently pays no mind.

"However, Lenin deserves a special place in hell," the blinding smile returns, "Was that the one that was supposed to drive me off never to return? I must say, I'm a bit disappointed, surely you can do better than that."

Lily looks at the next question with burning, determined, eyes as if this single question will be her saving grace that will drive Wizard Trotsky off from whence he came, "This is from Vickeynessz, 'There's a fan film coming out documenting your years at Hogwarts, titled, 'Voldemort: Origins of the Heir'. How do you feel about that? Offended? Interested? Disgusted?"

"I can't honestly say I give a damn."

And it is clear that this time Wizard Trotsky is going nowhere, that Lily and her fellowship are now doomed to be three instead of four, and that this time author intervention and plot will not save her. Perhaps she should have known better, for nothing good ever happens to Lily inside the walls of Hogwarts.

All she can do is fall to her knees, letters in hand, searching for a god who is both fickle and indifferent, and cry out in wordless despair at the cruel nature of the reality she calls anything but.

Now Presenting

More of Lee and Obito from "Finishing the Hat" visiting Pluto from "Lily and the Art of Divine Responsibility" and "Light and Shadow of the Distant Sun"

Requested by Someone at Some Point

"I wish that it hadn't come to this."

Obito was standing, outside in the barren dark wasteland, staring up at the distant stars that were both familiar and not. Turning his head though he found himself looking at the strange blonde local, the alien with the dark eyes and an appearance so very human and yet not quite, as well as a younger Eru Lee.

She was an adolescent again here, dressed in strange, English clothing, but her eyes were as old as they ever were. Filled with cold, distant, starlight and the indifferent light of the cruel universe. The god of death, Obito thought, peered out of those eyes.

The man, the light and shadow of the distant sun, was bleeding.

Neither could see Obito, as if a veil of shadows passed between them, or perhaps it was because even now, with his eyes in the real world closed and his mind drifting among dreams, Obito could recognize that this was a moment that had come and pass without him in it. For now, he lingered, as he lingered in that twilight world of 'might have been' where Eru Lee did not exist and no one had come for him in Madara's cave.

The man tried to smile, but it was marred by pain and his swiftly approaching death, but his eyes… Obito knew those eyes, they were his eyes, staring up at Rin that final time with boulders crushing down upon his body.

Trying to memorize and hold onto every final second while the end approached far too swiftly.

"When you see your other people…" he began, his voice rough, coughing in the middle as dark blood spurted from his lips while the adolescent, civilian, Lee only stared, "When you see your other people remember us and what we died for."

For a moment she stared, then her lips stretched into a smile, a grim one that was both pained and pleased by the irony of this moment as she said, "But I don't know what you died for."

And he smiled, forced himself to smile, and Obito… Obito could see everything in that smile, every ounce of life the man had ever had or would have, and then it was gone and the man's eyes were glazed over and his body still.

Obito, gasping a breath in as if it had been his body, woke up.

He glanced over to where Lee was still sleeping, buried beneath a pile of blankets, and then out into the dark. It was hard to tell if it was supposed to be day here or not, everything was so very dark, but he supposed it was close enough.

With a sigh, realizing that after that he was hardly likely to get any sleep, he exited their small building to get a better look at this strange alien village they'd found themselves in. Or at least, that was the plan until he found none other than the star of his dream waiting outside.

"Shit!" Obito exclaimed before switching to English, "How long have you been standing here?

"It was no bother," the man replied with a polite smile, failing to answer the question at all which Obito took to mean nearly the whole night.

Of course, Obito hardly blamed him, Konoha would have done the same although they would have at least been subtler about it. But these people, for all their chakra, didn't quite scream shinobi to him, and more he got the feeling that he and Lee were something of an oddity.

That they didn't have visitors from Earth too often.

"Ah, well, you could have knocked," Obito offered before elaborating, "Shishou's still sleeping but I can get her up if…"

The man held up a pale hand, "Ah, no, this is fine."

"Right," Obito said slowly, wondering if the fact that the man was more than fine with Obito alone should make him nervous. There was something about this man, more than just his chakra, that put Obito ever so slightly on edge.

Perhaps the man realized this, as his smile took on an edged, almost smirking quality.

Obito with a small nod, took a small step forward, towards the great statue of the adolescent Lee-shishou watching over them all with all the benevolence and wrath of a god. The man, of course, stepped with Obito and kept pace.

"I have wanted to talk to a human," the man said after a moment, "I have not had much of a chance, and years ago, when I had the chance I had little interest."

"Really," Obito said, again not quite sure how he felt about it, he supposed it made sense but something about the way the man said it made him feel like a specimen on display.

"God rarely travels with humans, though she visits their world frequently enough," he said with a nod, "They… disappoint her often, I think."

"Well, Shishou has yet to be disappointed as far as I know," Obito said with a truly awkward grin, eyes drifting to the statue then back to the man.

"Yes, she seems fond of you," the man agreed, but there was something distant in his tone as he said it. It was hard to read his expression, his eyes, impossibly dark and large, were different enough that Obito couldn't parse what he was thinking.

"We're close," Obito simply said, "We have been for a while."

"She came back for you, didn't she?" the man finally asked, and they were at the edge of the village now, the statue still off in the distance but closer than it was.

"What?"

"She came back for you in the darkest of places, where even the light of the stars could not touch you, and she was the rising of a second sun inside the place where you expected to die," the man said, and then his smile grew, something biting and bitter, "You know, Obito Uchiha of Konohagakure, she did not come back for us."

Obito stopped walking, felt his sharingan flicker to life, taking this man in and breaking him down piece by piece even as softly, warily, he said, "I'm sorry."

"It was years ago now," the man dismissed, and just like that the moment was gone, and Obito's sharingan flickered out.

The smile was softer as they walked forward, his gaze lingering on the statue, "And for all her protests, for all her angst, the statues still remain."

Obito nodded, before taking it himself, far larger than the hokage monument, and noted a bit drily, "Still, it's a bit much, isn't it?"

The man laughed, the sound of it ringing against the village buildings as well as the mountain range itself, and for all Obito's feeling of unease, he too, couldn't help but smile and chuckle at least a small amount.

Because if there was ever a god who despised prayer, it would be Eru Lee.

Now Presenting

Even more of "The Avengers", "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" style

Requested by AlleyKat2014

"Lily."

"Lenin."

In another time and place this moment would be shared between the two of them, perhaps in Lily's head with anything and everything between them, but instead Wizard Lenin's in his own body and is seated across from her at a truly fancy conference table on the bridge of a giant invisible floating aircraft carrier along with Thor the Norse god of thunder, the apparently kidnapped Dr. Bruce Banner, Tony Stark as this universe's answer to Batman, some guy who called himself Captain America and really liked red, white, and blue spandex, former Soviet assassin Black Widow, eyepatch wearing Nick Fury, and Lily's own tagalong of the silver armed brain washed Terminator who so far other than grunting a few Russian words now and then had been spending an uncomfortable amount of time staring at Captain America.

Every gun in the room had been trained on Wizard Lenin when he'd shown up out of nowhere, but they now predictably found their guns floating and sticking to the ceiling and a ward around the table.

And Wizard Lenin's eyes were a strange, unnatural, burning blue that they had never been before.

"Lily," he started again, "I have come to see if you will be reasonable."

Lily blinked, blinked again, took in the irony of this moment, "Lenin… You do know that you're brainwashed, right?"

He grimaced slightly and hedged, "I'd hardly call it brainwashed…"

"Lenin, you've just agreed to become Loki Laufeyson's love monkey…"

"I am not his love monkey!" Wizard Lenin snapped, at least some of his personality breaking through whatever hold Loki had him under, "His majesty, Loki of Asgard, would never stoop so low as to…"

"Wow," Lily interrupted, "Wow, Lenin, that is… If you could hear yourself talk."

"I can hear myself talk!"

Lily talked over him, "I mean, I am insulted for you. Actually, I'm furious for you, which is why I'm going to bash in Loki's head and take his… Oh, Thor, what did you call it?"

"The Tesseract," Thor chimed in, all muscles and hair and earnestness, "But I would prefer it if you left my brother to…"

"Right, the Tesseract, going to take that and use it as my brand-new paperweight while Loki's mercenary army comes to collect," Lily declared, before looking at Thor to reaffirm, "They are mercenaries, right?"

"Well, he did not fall within the nine realms and…"

"So, they're probably mercenaries," Lily said, wondering just what Loki had managed to promise them to lend him his mind manipulating stick as well as a space army.

"Lily, Loki is not an unreasonable…"

"Too late," Lily said, "I saw him on television, it was ridiculous."

The man had shown up, in Germany, dressed as some kind of demented golden reindeer or ram, and proceeded to tell everyone to shut up and kneel before his magnificence. Lily had been watching the whole thing on television with her brainwashed buddy (who of course during all of this had come to try and fail to kill her again), and that was when she'd been clued into where Wizard Lenin had disappeared to for the past week or so as he'd been staring at Loki in a cross between adulation and cringing.

Because even brainwashing Wizard Lenin with magic, apparently, could not make him appreciate bowing before any man, king, or even a god.

"He has potential, Lily," Wizard Lenin insisted, "He is young, but give him time, give him a kingdom and I have seen…"

"Isn't he three thousand years old or something?" Lily asked, her brow furrowing, "You're a lot younger than he is."

Across the table Tony Stark snorted, apparently having decided that this wasn't violent enough to need his intervention quite yet, but was instead the most entertaining thing he'd seen all week.

"You're missing the point," Wizard Lenin hissed, clearly at his wits end, well, at his brainwashed wits end. Clealry, Wizard Lenin was not at his best at the moment.

"How am I missing the point?"

"You are doing what you always do!" Wizard Lenin cried out, motioning to their surroundings, to the men and women glaring at him just waiting for the opportunity to strike, "You hang around these morally obnoxious losers, who under any normal circumstance would not have a chance in hell, and you insist on taking their side out of a sense of adventure or else pettiness!"

"Oh no, Lenin, I was going to make Loki regret he was ever born long before I joined up with the Avengers."

"You are not a part of the Avengers Initiative!" Nick Fury, Eyepatch Magoo, said but Lily also paid him no mind because clearly she and Soviet Terminator were very much a part of the Avengers no matter what they had to say about it.

"In fact, if doing it with these losers makes it that much more humiliating for him, then by God I will grind him into dust with the power of love and friendship," she leaned forward, eyes burning into Wizard Lenin's, burning through to the dark god that controlled his heart, "And one day, Lenin, when you remember yourself, you will thank me and spit on his shallow grave."

"Oh, I am enjoying this so much more than last chapter," Wizard Trotsky says with a smile, walking next to Lily who has been edging closer and closer to Gilgamesh as the move along. They have now exited Lily's world are in transit, between one muffin fandom and the next, but despite the alarming sights surrounding them where the hills of Scotland roll into the Kanto region, none seem at all focused on their surroundings.

Wizard Lenin looks as if he is close to wishing he had never been born or at least that Lily had never dragged him into this mess in the first place, Gilgamesh is looking as if he is beginning to regret agreeing to go on a quest with so many mongrels, and of all of them only Wizard Trotsky is looking remotely pleased with himself.

"Lily, I hate to ask this, but does this quest of yours truly have an end?" Gilgamesh asks, his lack of amusement showing clearly on his face.

"Oh, it will end, trust me it will end, or I will… I will do something very drastic!" what Lily is possibly capable of, of course, is unclear. For of all the characters in this tale Lily approaches her unreality on the best terms, however, that does not mean she has quite grasped how powerless she truly is here.

"Nonsense, we get so little time together," Wizard Trotsky muses, ever the tender and terrifying romantic, "And so little of it when you are yourself in all aspects… I have to treasure what time I get even in worlds like this."

And although he is sincere in this, as Wizard Trotsky is always so desperately sincere in all that he feels, Lily none the less blanches at the very idea of it and begins flipping through letters, eyes reading off a name, "I can't believe I'm saying this, but now would be a great time for Rabbit to show up already."

And speaking of the devil he is suddenly there as if he has always been here. The landscape is still caught halfway between Scotland and Kanto, and yet, they now stand on a great bridge over a raging river, on an island across the water are three brothers standing in the twilight, a dark hooded figure before them.

And like the first star of evening fighting through the rays of the sun, Rabbit is there on the bridge, looking at them with cold fathomless black eyes.

"I shouldn't have said that," Lily immediately says at the sight of him, but Rabbit doesn't move and neither do our quest members, instead they stare at one another waiting for the other to speak.

Rabbit turns his head towards the brothers, the sun reflecting in his eyes, and perhaps it is the light of the sun or perhaps it is something else but for a moment there is… something in his expression, something that covets and yearns with a quiet ferocity.

Lily glances over, but she does not understand this moment yet, so she does not linger and nor do the others. Instead, tearing open the first envelope, she says, "So, Rabbit, I have some questions for you that, well, hopefully you'll just go ahead and answer. First, from Guest, 'What would you do if one day Lily took that train waiting for her in purgatory?"

Rabbit, for a moment, simply stares blankly, then in a quiet voice states, "It makes no difference, there are other worlds than these, and yet in many ways there are no worlds at all."

Lily pauses, taking this in and failing to truly consider it with the weight it deserves, "Alright, well, I'm not sure I get that but… Whatever you say, Rabbit. Next, from BananaPie, 'What is something that you find fun?"

He says nothing, likely because there is nothing to say, he is not a being that can appreciate much less understand the concept of fun in any capacity. Though he wears the form of humanity, twisted into cruel perfection, he hardly has any of its trappings.

Lily glances to her companions, seeing them at just as much of a loss as she herself is, and decides that this question is a lost cause and moves to the next, "Well then, Rabbit, Stranger Harbor asks, 'How long is forever?"

A slight quirking of the lips, "Longer than any world or any universe will last, longer than even God can hope to hold its breath."

If it's possible though, I'd like to ask Rabbit if he would eat the Ghost Pokémon if he were included in that crossover.

Lily, if she's too thrown off by this answer, doesn't show it as she simply moves right along, "Right, well, from AlleyKat2014, again, 'Would you eat the Ghost Pokémon if you were in 'Wearing the Faces of Men'?"

For those not in the know "Wearing the Faces of Men" is a "Pokémon" and "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" crossover that thus far has focused on the all the moral dilemmas of Pokémon and then some. It's also funny.

Rabbit merely cocks his head and stares, whether to prove that he has no idea what she's talking about or else is entirely indifferent is unclear, and perhaps inconsequential. Either way, it appears that Rabbit has nothing in particular to say to this. Rabbit, after all, is a mysterious being of mystery.

Lily just nods slowly, pursing her lips, and clearly wishing she was elsewhere. She opens the final envelope for Rabbit, reads through the contents, and pales, "Oh, oh no, oh I do not want to hear the answer to this one…"

She pauses, stares up at the sky and willing herself courage and determination in the face of all obstacles, then looking directly at Rabbit she asks, "AlleyKat2014 asks, 'Do you have the ability to devour Lily like you do everything else?"

Rabbit stares, as he always stares, but then he does what he does not and should certainly not be capable of. He laughs, and the sound is at once majestic and wretched in its imperfect perfection. It cuts through the river, the bridge, the three brothers, and all of Lily's world tearing it apart as he rakes a pale hand through white hair and falls to hysterical pieces.

And just like that Scotland is suddenly gone, pushed back to some other realm, Rabbit along with it, leaving only Kanto and the world of Pokémon behind.

Now Presenting

A "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" and "Hellsing" crossover

Requested by danialacharry97

"Goddammit Hellsing!"

Now, normally when walking into the site of a massacre, Lily would like to believe she'd be more alarmed than this. However, it turned out that there were reasons that Frank typically did not go on extended business trips to other countries, and that reason was called the Hellsing Organization.

Frank wasn't necessarily the fastest, strongest, and most intimidating of vampires but what he was good at was lying low and looking for all the world like some pale dweeby accountant who couldn't hurt a fly. What this meant, apparently, was that while the Hellsing Organization was busy ruthlessly eliminating what they deemed to be true undead threats (but in recent years were just a bunch of hooligans pumped up on blood and some sort of inserted mirco chip), low-key vampires like Frank and company could slink under the radar.

It also meant that Frank could keep some of the more arrogant braggarts, or vengeful types, in line. And when he wasn't around, it meant that some of Lily's hench people went and attracted the attention of the Hellsing Organization, which launched the whole "search and destroy" thing, which ended up with Lily having to do a lot of hiring and a lot of clean up multiple times a week.

She was also running out of vampires to hire.

"Ah, I was wondering when you might show up," there on the couch, lounging in a red trench coat, yellow glasses, and a ridiculous hat was none other than the chronic exterminator, the chained vampire Alucard.

"It's been some time, hasn't it?" he asked, his grin far too sharp and jagged to be human.

"Isn't this a bit out of your jurisdiction?" Lily asked in turn, because as far as she'd been lead to believe, if you stayed out of muggle London then the wizarding side was fair game. The Hellsing Organization was beholden to Queen and Country, not to the Minister of Magic.

"My master does not believe in quaint ideas like jurisdiction when it comes to maggot vampires," Alucard said, the grin never dimming, and his hand never leaving the hilt of his polished silver gun either.

"Your master better watch her step," Lily muttered under her breath, still, the vampire cocked the gun all the same and added it at her head.

"Oh, Lily, are you going to make my night interesting after all?"

She considered him for a moment, the gun, and then looked away with disinterest, "No, I don't think so. You can't win against me chained up like this. Plus, loosen those binds anymore and we'll destroy London completely, wizarding and muggle side of it. Somehow, that, I think, is not in your master's best interests."

Alucard said nothing, kept the gun aimed at her head, and she knew that he wanted her to do it as he'd wanted her to do it the first time. He might wear the face of a human but something monstrous and unworldly writhed beneath his human skin, and it was practically dying of ennui in much the way Lily herself was. It, however, had chosen to be chained to human masters rather than face eternity where Lily had simply tied herself to Wizard Lenin and then Hogwarts.

"That's a pity," Alucard finally said, "I was looking forward to a real fight."

"You can look forward to it with someone else," Lily said, and she knew that if he didn't know she was impervious to death, if they hadn't tested that theory and then some the first few times they'd met, that that silver blessed bullet would be in her head and heart right now and they'd do it again.

But it seemed even Integra Hellsing knew when to back off and let things lie, because Alucard was grinning and slinking off into the shadows once again, back to his masters on the other mundane side of London.

And, as usual, Lily was left with the cleanup, "Maybe I should just stop hiring vampires… Or wait for Frank to get back."

Our four debatable heroes march through the mountains of Kanto, searching for God, and bickering with one another as they are wont to do on any occasion.

"I'm just saying, Lily, that you can't really blame me for overreacting," Wizard Trotsky says motioning to himself as he tries to justify his desperate wiping of her memories and rewriting her as his cousin Morgan Gaunt in recent chapters of 'Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus', "After all, every time I see you you're callously walking out of my life in one way or another. Is it so bad that I want you to simply… stay, if only for a little while?"

Lily, needless to say, has no answer to this as she hasn't to any of Wizard Trotsky's attempts to speak with her during the journey. There is a cold divide between them, one not to be crossed idly if crossed at all, and it grows wider by the second.

"What was I supposed to do?" Wizard Trotsky asks, throwing his hands in the air, he then looks desperately towards Gilgamesh, his partner in wooing of underage girls in extremely dubious circumstances, "Gilgamesh, you'll support me on this, won't you? What was I supposed to do?"

Gilgamesh for his own part seems now less than pleased that he's being lumped in with lecherous mongrels, particularly the teenage version of his brother-in-law, and merely says, "Perhaps, mongrel, you would consider that you attempted to rewrite the memories of a god. I find that my wife has been unconceivably generous with you."

Wizard Trotsky glowers at this, a dangerous flash passing through his pale eyes, but perhaps he knows enough to hold his tongue as he looks away, up into the mountains, where perhaps Mount Moon awaits some unknowing travler.

However, today, that is not our heroes destination.

Instead Lily with a grin rushes forward as she sees a giant talking cat sitting across from none other than Pikachu as well as Metapod, "Oh thank god, they're all here."

Now, why these Pokémon would all be sitting together is a matter of some debate and in itself could no doubt be an interesting story. However, suffice to say, they're here for that magical thing called "writer's convenience" as such are not to be questioned too closely on why on of these beings would hang around the other.

"The cat?" Wizard Lenin asks rather dubiously, as despite knowing the plot of "Wearing the Faces of Men" he's still not entirely willing to trust the sentience of a giant talking burglar cat who seems all too willing to sell his brothers into slavery.

"Meowth!" Lily cries out with a grin as she darts forward, ignoring the cat's look of alarm, "Oh, Meowth, I have a question for you from AlleyKat2014!"

"Hey, what's the big idea?" the cat hisses but Lily pays no mind as she tears open the envelope and reads.

"What are your thoughts on the fact that you, Jessie, and James tried to steal Lily's Brick when it was really her godlike powers that made you smash into a wall?" Lily's face falls as she finishes the question, which has outed her to Meowth, who now blinks in alarmed confusion as he realizes that Brick (now Stack of Bricks) really is just a brick.

"Eh?" he asks, fanged mouth open wide in surprise and dismay.

"I am not responsible for readers' questions," Lily offers blandly in response, ignoring the unamused looks of the rest of her audience, who are more than in the know regarding Lily's power level.

Lily then glances towards the oversized green cocoon, "Oh, I'm supposed to get Metapod's answer too, apparently."

Metapod stares with all the blandness that a giant green cocoon can muster, which is quite a lot, and responds with an unenthused, "Metapod."

By which he undoubtedly means that this is old-hat and no one cares anymore, Meowth probably would translate this, but he's too busy having his horrified epiphany over what exactly this means that Brick is not a brick at all and that Lily is only wearing the face of men.

"Right," Lily says at this rather boring scene in front of her, "Well, Pikachu, one last question from AlleyKat2014 for now, 'Will you ever agree to battle for the benefit of Lenin?"

Pikachu glances towards Wizard Lenin who stares back with equal unamused indifference, his eyes then slide back to Lily, and it's more than clear that the answer for now, is a dignified "no" on both ends of that equation.

So, in this awkward silence Lily merely nods her head, clapping her hands together, and offering a few empty words to wrap up this strange obligatory moment in time, "Good talk, good talk."

Now Presenting

A Fragment of the "Star Wars" and "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" Crossover that is Rather Unlikely to Actually Happen (And is Secretly "Dune")

A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. This every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. To begin your study of the life of Muad'Dib, then, take care that you first place him in his time: born in the 57th year of the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam IV. And take the most special care that you locate Muad'Dib in his place: the planet Arrakis. Do not be deceived by the fact that he was born on Caladan and lived his first fifteen years there. Arrakis, the planet known as Dune, is forever his place.

From "Manual of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

Frank Herbert, Dune

The girl, Eleanor Lily Potter, Muad'Dib as she had jokingly referred to herself when she'd introduced herself to Anakin and his mother, was not from Tatooine. Of course, few were from Tatooine, it was a planet of slaves and smugglers, everyone was from everywhere else.

Still, Ellie was from even further than that, past the furthest edge of the outer rim and maybe even past the galaxy itself. Muad'Dib, they said, came from nowhere and nothing.

All Anakin knew was that one day she'd been brought to Tatooine as a slave. Except, no, he'd asked her once and she said she'd walked out of the desert. He'd always thought that was some sort of strange metaphor, she was very fond of elaborate and strange metaphors, but he thought sometimes that she really meant it.

That just one day, out of nowhere, she'd walked out of the desert and into Mos Espa where she'd been taken in as a slave by Gardulla the Hutt.

Anakin hadn't known her then, hadn't even heard of her, no one had at that point. She was a slave like any other, like Anakin himself was for Watto, except that they said she hadn't spoken a word of Basic at the time.

Except they would, all too quickly everyone would have heard of her, and everyone would know her name and either whisper it with reverence or curse it in despair and fear. Anakin had been cleaning parts for Watto when he'd felt it, the moment that Ellie must have decided to act, because it felt as if a door had swung wide open and a great painful light had flown in.

And in the light, he could see her, blood and oil streaked across pale cheeks, red hair flying unbound behind her in the desert wind, green eyes burning, standing over the shattered bodies of droids and bounty hunters, freedom trailing behind her as a great and undeniable shadow.

Anakin thought he had known in that moment, before anyone else, that one day she'd be an empress.

So even after the slave rebellion with her single handedly at its head, even after the deaths of all the Hutts and the coronation of her by the remaining slaves and wary smugglers, even after she turned parts of the desert into strange vibrant life with powers that bordered on miraculous, he knew that one day she'd come for him.

And less than a year later she did, standing barely taller than himself, her hair just as red, her skin as pale, and her eyes as green as he remembered.

"Anakin Skywalker?" she'd asked in a voice that still held its unfamiliar accent, and even though she was dressed so similarly to him, in simple, plain, clothes of a working slave, she looked every inch the childlike god empress that people called her.

He'd blinked and nodded, and she'd smiled, a delighted strange grin that looked at odds with the otherworldly light that shone out of her eyes.

"I'm Eleanor Lily Potter, known to my recent friends and enemies as Muad'Dib, the Little Mouse, conqueror and empress of Tatooine," she took her hand in his, and for a moment he felt… he wasn't sure, only that it was more than he had ever felt before, "The universe told me to come and find you, there's work to be done, Anakin."

"I think we might be lost," Lily declares this far after the fact that our fellowship of now somewhat weary heroes, had indeed gotten lost. Though it's hard to get lost when you don't know where you're going or what you're looking for, yet somehow the group has managed it because their surroundings don't resemble any fandom that The Carnivorous Muffin has dabbled in.

They are instead a strange warping of reality, indescribable, that sets each and every party member inexplicably on edge.

"We must have taken a wrong turn somewhere…" Lily says, trailing off as she looks left, right, and then behind her as if that might somehow point the way towards a better and brighter world than this.

"How could we have taken a wrong turn?" Wizard Lenin asks.

"Well, I don't know, Lenin, except we clearly did!" Lily points out, but then sighs, after all, perhaps this sort of thing is expected when one goes looking for God amongst mortal things. Either way, the group loiters, waiting for something, anything, to happen.

Lily then notes the envelopes in her hand, dwindling, yet still a healthy sized stack despite all the questions asked so far. Sighing she picks one up, notes her own name, and tears it open, "I guess I might as well start going through mine while we're stuck here. These are all from Vickeynessz, 'What do you do in your free time; do you have any hobbies? Do you think you could ever convince Rabbit to eat something for you, like Hindenburg? What's the most annoying thing about Lenin, and the best thing about Lenin? What's the least Lenin-like thing Lenin has ever done?"

"Well, that's a lot of questions," Lily mutters, more to herself than anyone else as all her companions have marched away in different directions, looking for some sort of exit, "I don't think I have any hobbies really, unless periodically saving England and or Hogwarts is a hobby… As for Rabbit, well, his eating things is bad so I'd prefer not to ask him. And Lenin…"

She trails off, eyes moving to Wizard Lenin, arms crossed and glaring out into the empty wasteland in the distance, "I don't know, he is… Complicated, and close, and sometimes I love him and sometimes I hate him and it's hard to say why. I just… I don't know."

She tries to smile, but it's a strange sad thing, a desperate quirking of the lips that does not reach her eyes, and it is gone all too quickly as she opens the next envelope, "Alright, from BananaPie again, 'What are the least and most nonsensical things about the universe, according to you?"

"Oh, that's hard," Lily states, as she looks out into the distance thinking on herself, the world, and all her theories regarding it, "There are so many, far too many, things about it that had never made sense. I don't think I can pick one, as for it making sense… I guess I'll say what I appreciate the most about the world, and that'd have be Death and Lenin, because even in their worst moments they're more than the world to me."

She nods, pleased enough by her own answer, then opens the next, "From burntdream, 'How do you feel about being the great Lolita of your generation? Granted, Trotsky seems rather put off you're so young, but probably not as much as he should be. Gilgamesh, in this chapter, still insists you are his wife. What is it about you that enamors your paramours so, do you think?"

Lily blanches, glances towards Wizard Trotsky then Gilgamesh in turn, shuddering, "I honestly try not to think about that too much. But… Well, I don't really know, and I haven't really asked. I mean I guess Wizard Trotsky keeps trying to explain it but… I don't think it's one of those things I can ever really get, no matter how many times he says it."

Indeed, there is a great and terrible irony, that Wizard Trotsky can scream his feelings and thoughts from the highest mountaintop and no one will ever hear him or truly understand. He and Lily, for all his feelings, will never truly touch one another.

Even now, in this empty wasteland, there is a great divide between them.

But Lily pays it no mind, as she has always paid it no mind, and instead opens another envelope, "From AlleyKat2014, 'What would you do if Trotsky and Lenin somehow merged back together into one person?"

Lily blinks, blinks again, then blandly states, "I'd hope that Lenin eats that son of a bitch alive."

"Oh, last one," Lily says with a smile, brushing off the last envelope labeled with her name, "From Lazyass, 'Have you ever thought or been interested in meeting another entity labeled as 'God' or create of life, the universe, or a sentient race? As to, you know, compare?"

Lily frowns, "I know it'll sound weird but I've never really thought of that, though I've heard rumor that that sort of thing happens in 'Finishing the Hat' if you're interested in that story line."

Lily then sighs happily, waiting for the scene to change, when it doesn't she frowns, "Dammit, I was hoping that would solve something."

She sorts through her pile again before sighing and calling out, "Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh there's a whole pile of questions here for you!"

Gilgamesh glances over, that perpetually amused smile on his face, and yet something softer in his eye as he takes in the form even of his hopelessly underage wife. Still, he walks over, golden and gleaming even in the desolate emptiness, until he is standing before her, "Ah, I had wondered if these reviewers of yours would recognize my presence since it was so lacking last chapter."

"That or your story finished up around the time the last chapter was published so…" Lily starts before shaking her head and trailing off, "Either way this might be the kickstart we need to find out where the hell we're going. First, from BananaPie, 'What is the thing about the modern world that you like the best? Lily doesn't count as an answer."

Gilgamesh laughs, "Well, the wine is dull, your televised plays duller… No, I'm afraid Lily that the answer is you and shall be you, as three thousand years ago the answer would have been Enkidu. This world… it has always been a trying place."

He trails off, thinking perhaps of Babylon and his own tyranny, or else Fuyuki Japan and its strange modern empire that deformed the land itself while Gilgamesh's kingdom wasted away into ruin so that only his tale remained.

"I don't know, I'm a great fan of modern movies myself," Lily says with a grin, but she misses the soft knowing look that Gilgamesh gives her, as she tears open the next question, "From Luna Bass, 'In 'The Wasteland' a younger Lily merges with Cracker Jack (who you have met on this very show) to create a whole new being. What is your overall reaction to this information?"

"That he is a mongrel who undoubtedly deserves a maggot's death," Gilgamesh says without hesitation, fingers tightening then loosening as he considers this idea, "However, I also know that Lily's adventures… Are often strange, and that to peer too far into their depths would only upset me."

Lily laughs, "Well, I can hardly argue with that, still Luna Bass has another question here, 'What do you think of the alternate version of Lily in 'Finishing the Hat?' AKA Adult Eru Lee"

Gilgamesh seems somewhat taken aback by this and asks at first, "Are all these questions in this vein of thought? I can see why my brother the mongrel finds them so utterly tedious."

He then sighs and considers the question as best he is capable, "I can't say I've met the woman, so it's hard to say… I imagine that she, being you in at least some capacity, is certainly worthy of my attention. However, more than that is impossible to say, we belong to two different worlds, this Lee and I."

Then, glancing over at Lily, he asks, "How many of these are left?"

"Just two," Lily says to which Gilgamesh seems perhaps a tad too relieved, this however disappears all too soon as Lily reads, "Luna Bass states, 'In 'How I Met Your Other Mother', Lee has a child that isn't yours."

"Dammit woman, how many men and women have you slept with?!" Gilgamesh asks, apparently hitting his metaphorical limit, even as Lily just shrugs, "Me personally, nobody, but can I help it that all the side fics have put me in other dimensions and aged me up?"

With Gilgamesh, Wizard Lenin, Obito, Kushina, and Minato in the running Lily and or Lee has managed to get herself quite the sexual collection through side-fics alone. And this isn't even delving into those non-consummated pairings that abound.

Still there is a great irony in that Lily in one capacity or another, gets around almost as much as Gilgamesh himself did back in the day.

"And the last question from AlleyKat2014, 'What would your preferred honeymoon with Lily look like?"

Gilgamesh however is standing, still preoccupied by his underaged wife who in the future in other worlds gets lucky numerous times and pregnant others, "We will spend it slaughtering any man or woman cur who dares to look at you!"

And with that, the path opens, and our heroes can finally move past their author imposed purgatory and onto the rest of the fic where interviews and more await.

In another time and another place, Luna Bass requested that Gilgamesh meet Uncle Death as well as Namikaze Hari, and because this is "The Wonderful World of Fanfiction" both of these events happen at the same time.

"Gilgamesh," Death says dully as he catches eye of the gilded demigod descending upon them with a sneer. Across from him is his niece/granddaughter, Hari, who was named after him and is sipping tea in a place that she has no right to be in.

Gilgamesh, eyes lingering on the pair of them, the girl in particular, seems to have no trouble coming up with exactly who and what they are. Finally, his grimace turns into a sneer, "Hari, my wife's bastard daughter, you must look like your father."

Hari's eyes, which indeed do resemble Namikaze Minato's widen, and then narrow as she bristles beneath his contemptuous glare.

"There are other worlds than these," Death reminds Gilgamesh, but there's something darker in his gaze now as he looks at the man, pale hand squeezing Hari's in reassurance, "It would behoove you to remember, Gilgamesh, that you aren't at the center of any of them, not even your own story, 'The Demiurge' revolved around you."

The Gate of Babylon opens behind him, swords pointed out to be hurled down upon their foes as he asks, "You would dare, mongrel?"

"I am older than you can hope to imagine and have lasted long past the Earth itself, let alone Babylon, turned to dust," Death states, every year held in his voice, "You have no power here, king of Babylon."

A younger Gilgamesh would no doubt have refuted this, a younger Gilgamesh may have even taken the girl to bed if only to prove some sort of terrible point, but this is not a younger Gilgamesh. This is a Gilgamesh after not only Enkidu, but Lily as well. So instead he stares, and he loathes, and then he turns from where he stands so that Death and his granddaughter can only watch as the red of his cloak and the gold of his armor vanish from sight.

"We must be near the end," Lily says with a grin as the climb a high mountain peak that is also, oddly enough, not in The Carnivorous Muffin's usual repertoire, "Look, all of these ones have written in responses, that it only happens when it's one-off questions to characters that really don't have too much to do with each other."

"I am overjoyed," Wizard Lenin replies, clearly anything but overjoyed, though he should be as it means this blessed chapter is nearly at its close as Lily suggests.

"I bet you God is at the top of this mountain," Lily says, "Like a burning bush, or a divine muffin, or something like that…"

"If you say so," Wizard Lenin instead adds with a shrug, himself and Wizard Trotsky struggling the most with the climb while Gilgamesh scales the face of the mountain with aggravating ease.

"I do say so," Lily says with a grin even as she holds up the next envelope, "I say we'll see the dawn yet. This is to Dead Last from BananaPie again, they asked, 'You said that you feel very unsafe on your team (despite one of your teammates able to bring people back to life), so what would be your dream team? Normal doesn't count as an answer, since, well, do normal ninja even exist?"

Lily flips through a page and then, clearing her throat as she climbs says, "And Dead Last said, 'Normal can be relative, there are teams that are 'more' normal.' Which I guess is an answer now, although it kind of skirts the rules."

"Next, from AlleyKat2014 again, to Alexander from 'The Demiurge', 'What are your thoughts on Trotsky?" Lily says before flipping through yet another page and saying, "Alexander sort of writes a lot of ellipses and then says that Trotsky is… interesting."

"Interesting?!" Wizard Trotsky asks, "What's that supposed to mean."

"I think it means he finds you bizarre and creepy," Wizard Lenin remarks.

"Oh, you are one to talk," Wizard Trotsky spits only to earn a pair of dark raised eyebrows in response.

"I am one to talk," Wizard Lenin retorts mockingly, "You are, after all, my distinctly lesser half."

"Hey, come on guys!" Lily shouts, "Only a few more questions to go here and then you can all start killing each other. This one's from Lazyass again, and it's for Matsuda from 'God of the Machine', 'You just shot L in the head while, in canon you also shot Light several times which, ultimately led him to die. That would make you the murderer of two main characters of Death Note (albeit in different realities of it) so… How does that make you feel?"

"Oh, what did the mongrel answer to that?" Gilgamesh asks, always ready for schadenfreude.

"He kind of didn't, but I think after he heard the question, or maybe before, he was in some bar drinking somewhere," Lily says, not too certain of the specifics herself given that Death Note isn't exactly her fandom, but none the less this is a very accurate assessment of Matsuda's mental state after the horror of killing both Light and L.

The summit is in sight, glowing at the top with the rising sun, and with it the hope of finding God in this strange land of questions and answers and interviews.

"From Lazyass again, this time for Cracker Jack from 'The Wasteland', 'As a once part of Sauron's spirit, do you also possess some memories of his shenanigans previous to your creation, like from the first/second age? If so, what do you think about them?" Lily turns the page, "And Cracker Jack said… Well, he sort of refused to go into it, simply stating that perhaps some things in this world are best left buried."

Which is perhaps fair as that, if anything, is a question to be answered and delved into in "The Wasteland" when it updates again versus this silly question and answer fic.

"And finally, last one," Lily says as they take their final steps towards the glowing summit above even the clouds, "From Strange Harbor, to Luna from 'Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus', 'Do you ever feel overwhelmed dealing with being the de facto second in command of Default along with all the Rabbit watching?"

And with a grin Lily reads Luna's thoughtful and eloquent response, "And she said, 'If I do then I remember that Ellie, for what it is worth, bears far more weight and responsibility than I do or can. And so, in turn, I must do what I can or forever find myself lacking. This is the burden I have been chosen, and choose, to carry."

And in a sense Lily carries that burden now, even with her companions beside her, as they step upwards into the great unknown to meet their maker.

Now Presenting

The "All you Need is Love" crossover with "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus"

Requested by DaughterofDemeter123

How and why Grunnings would send Vernon Dursley, of all its employees, on a business trip to Tokyo with his family was one of those decisions that was not to be questioned. Similarly, how and why the Dursleys would bring along four-year-old Eleanor Lily Potter with them, rather than dumping her on Mrs. Figg for the duration of their trip, was also a mystery.

None the less, these important facts build the premise of the story, that very early in her life Eleanor Lily Potter was once taken to Japan and then conveniently left behind in a mall at the Dursley's earliest opportunity.

Which was eventually how Naomi Misora, bleeding heart that she was, and crusader of all those trodden underfoot by their fickle and uncaring overlords, ended up finding the girl and taking her to the police. Then when that failed took her to L who as predicted did absolutely nothing except suggest that perhaps Ellie could have a place in Whammy's Dog Fighting School for Boys. And when that finally failed figured that the influence of another child surely couldn't make her own demonic hellspawn of a child even worse and decided to take her home until someone from England finally came for her.

Needless to say, no one from England ever came for her, and somehow, she did make Duck Penber even worse.

"You know, and I can't believe I'm saying this, but I do believe we're friends," Duck said as he and Ellie watched Saturday morning cartoons, an activity he had never indulged in, but Ellie was growing to love as the strange epilepsy causing Japanese cartoons were far superior than their English robotless counterparts.

"I just… I didn't think it was possible," Duck continued, "It all seemed highly unlikely that mother would simply stumble across the one person my age who isn't an idiot in a shopping mall of all places."

Ellie simply shrugged as she said, in surprisingly fluent Japanese after only having been living with Naomi, Light, Duck, and Raye for half a year or so, "Well, if it makes you feel better, I think it was just the easiest place for the Dursleys to leave me. Plan B was probably Tokyo Disney."

"Well, Light Yagami, I'm sure, would leave me to rot in some back alley," Duck noted darkly, "Still, at least he makes only the barest pretense of not being the scum of humanity."

Ellie, having Light Yagami's fulltime job as a serial killer with a magical notebook explained to her shortly after having moved in, merely nodded thinking that Light did do a much better job of living up to his Hannibal Lecter standard than the Dursleys ever had. In fact, the Dursleys had been far too wrapped up in the pretense of being normal that they overshot it completely, on any given day, Light Yagami did come off far more normal and charming than Dudders ever had.

So, on the whole, Ellie wasn't quite as upset about being abandoned in a foreign country as you might expect her to be.

"You know, and I say this because you're my friend and this is what friends do, we could… get rid of your biological family, if you'd like," Duck noted as one cartoon giant robot punched a different cartoon giant robot in its robot face.

"You mean murder them?"

"Well, if you want to be crass," Duck said with a sneer of discontent, "But it just strikes me that, after everything you've told me about them, they're not really worthy of sharing blood with you. That and I know I would be rather bitter if I grew up in a cupboard."

"That sounds like a lot of work," Ellie noted, thinking of how two four-year-olds swiftly approaching five would manage to buy airplane tickets to get all the way to England, then plan a murder, and then get away with it and get back to Japan with no one the wiser especially when Raye and Naomi were both in the force in one capacity or another sounded like an awful lot of effort for the Dursleys of all people.

"Nonsense, that's what friends or for," Duck said before frowning, "Or so television tells me."

Lily considered this, nodded slowly, as she was never one to argue with television specials. Then, with a grin, she said, "Maybe over the holidays or something."

And Duck grinned back, and for a moment, Ellie thought it really was nice to have friends.

"OH CHRIST, IT'S YOU PEOPLE. WHAT THE HELL DO YOU WANT?"

These are the words that greet Lily, Wizard Lenin, Wizard Trotsky, and Gilgamesh on top of some unnamed mountain in some unnamed world. Lily blinks, staring up into the great ball of light that she thought was the sun but may just be The Carnivorous Muffin's new avatar.

"There were questions and things," Lily states, "People expect things of you, and us, and you can't just leave!"

"I WAS MAD AS HELL, WHAT DID YOU EXPECT?!" The Carnivorous Muffin's great and powerful voice echoes into the abyss.

Meanwhile Wizard Lenin mutters, "I just find it ironic that even God doesn't want to be here."

"SHUT UP, LENIN," The muffinly god commands, "NO ONE APPRECIATES YOUR SASS."

Except for The Carnivorous Muffin who is in fact writing this scene, who as of this moment with tired fingers and tired eyes, very much appreciates Wizard Lenin's sardonic lack of appreciation for this terrible travesty that masquerades as a story. It is through Wizard Lenin, The Carnivorous Muffin believes, that we can all breathe.

"Yes, but suicide, in front of a live studio audience?" Lily asks.

"IT WAS NECESSARY, THE REVIEWERS ASKED, AND I DELIVERED. ALSO, IT SOMEHOW MADE THE LAST CHAPTER MILDLY INTERESTING."

"Oh lord," Lily cries out, shielding her eyes and squinting away from the light, "Why are you speaking in all caps locks?"

"I AM DIVINE NOW, THIS IS WHAT DIVINE PEOPLE DO. THEY SPEAK IN ALMIGHTY CAPS LOCKS, IT'S INTIMIDATING AS HELL," it is indeed intimidating as hell, the mountain quakes beneath the very sound of it, but Lily and company have travelled a long way and thus are more or less immune to the awe-inspiring effects of caps locks speaking.

"NOW ASK YOUR QUESTIONS SO WE CAN ALL GO HOME," the divine, incorporeal, The Carnivorous Muffin demands of the characters.

"Well, alright then, any objections?" Lily says turning to the other members of her party but they all shake their heads no that this is as fine a time as any to wrap things up already with this very anticlimactic climax to something that really wasn't much of a quest.

Lily, clearing her throat, opens the first envelope and squints in the bright light to read the question, "Um, first, from Vickeynessz, 'On your tumblr you mentioned that the song 'Meant to Be Yours' from Heathers: The Musical was part of your inspiration for Trotsky's character. Are there any other songs/works that you've drawn inspiration from (particularly your LatAobS characters)?"

"TOO MANY, ENTIRELY TOO MANY. MY PLAYLIST IS AN ECLECTIC MESS WHEN WRITING THAT I WOULD NOT WISH UPON ANYONE. AND THAT'S SONGS, THAT'S NOT EVEN GETTING INTO WORKS. OFF THE TOP OF MY HEAD… STILL TOO MANY, THIS IN ITSELF IS PROBABLY WORTHY OF A TUMBLR POST OR TWO. THAT SAID I WILL SAY THAT PARTS OF 'PIPPIN' ARE DRAWN FROM AS WELL AS PARTS OF 'SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE', 'INTO THE WOODS', 'MY FAIR LADY', AND WELL, MORE AS FAR AS MUSICALS GO.

IT'S REALLY NOT THE SORT OF QUESTION THAT CAN BE ANSWERED IN A FORMAT LIKE THIS. THERE'S A LIST FLOATING AROUND ON TUMBLR OF VARIOUS INSPIRATIONAL WORKS BUT IF YOU WANT MORE SPECIFIC AND COMPREHENSIVE THAN THAT I'D HAVE TO THINK ABOUT IT AND WRITE UP SOMETHING FORMAL."

"Also, they asked, 'have you considered doing a Game of Thrones/LatAobS crossover?" Lily cries out now that the voice seems to have stopped.

"HA, HA, HA," the voice laughs though whether out of amusement or pain is anyone's guess, "ONLY VAGUELY AND NOT SERIOUSLY. IT'S NOT A GOOD MIX OF WORLDS AND COMING UP WITH A PLOT THAT I'D WANT, OR BE INTERESTED IN IS A LITTLE TOO MUCH EFFORT ON MY PART WHEN I ALREADY HAVE SO MANY UNFINISHED STORIES IN THE WORKS. SO, I WOULD NOT EXPECT ANYTHING ON THAT END ANYTIME SOON."

"Oh, well, that's good," Lily says to Wizard Lenin, "That place sounds like not fun. Anyways, next, Ambiguity in D Major asked, 'I have to ask if you have ever read Homestuck?"

The answer is swift and immediate and divine in its muffinly goodness, "NO."

"Well, alright then," Lily says, likely not sure what to think on this herself given that she too has no idea what Homestuck is, "Well Random asks, 'There's going to be a new Blade Runner movie soon, right? Are you looking forward to it?"

Note though that with the timing of this question "Blade Runner: 2049" has come and gone from theaters. Still, the question certainly deserves answering.

"I HAVE… THOUGHTS ON THE NEW MOVIE. I THOUGHT IT WAS CINEMATICALLY BEAUTIFUL, AND IT WASN'T A BAD FILM, IN FACT IT WAS ONE OF THE BETTER ONES I'VE SEEN RECENTLY. THAT SAID I WILL BE ONE OF ITS FEW CRITICS AND SAY THAT IT DID NOT LIVE UP TO THE FIRST AND I DID NOT APPRECIATE MANY OF THE CHANGES MADE.

(NOTE SPOILERS HERE, SKIP THE CAPS LOCKS IF YOU CARE).

FIRST, I BELIEVE THEY WERE TRYING TO MAKE A POINT THAT HAD ALREADY BEEN MADE IN THE FIRST FILM AND HAD MADE THESE POINTS BETTER. THE ULTIMATE THEME BEING THAT REPLICANTS AND HUMANS ARE INDISTINGUISHABLE FROM ONE ANOTHER. BATTY'S DEATH AND DECKARD'S AFFAIR WITH RACHEL HAD MORE THAN MADE THIS POINT, IT HAD DONE IT IN A BEAUTIFUL MANNER. HERE IN THIS NEW ONE WE INSTEAD RETCON/REMOVE THE VOIGHT-KAMPFF TEST AND REPLACE IT WITH A QUICK, EASY, SCANNING OF EYES, WE INSERT AN UNSEEN REPLICANT REBELLION, AND WE BUILD THE PLOT AROUND THIS HALF REPLICANT CHILD.

IN DOING THIS WE TAKE AWAY ONE OF THE KEY ASPECTS OF THE ORIGINAL FILM, THAT ONE TRULY CAN'T TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A REPLICANT AND A HUMAN, JUST TO TRY AND REINFORCE THIS MESSAGE INSTEAD WITH REPLICANT JESUS. I FOUND THIS TO BE A RATHER CHEAP TACTIC THAT I COULD NOT APPRECIATE, EVEN IF I LIKED THE BRIEF GLIMPSES OF THE DAUGHTER AS A CHARACTER.

TYRELL, 2.0, SIMILARLY WAS MADE TO BE NEW AND DIFFERENT FROM TYRELL BUT CAME OUT WORSE FOR IT. I FOUND HIS QUASI-RELIGIOUS DIALOGUE TO BE BIZARRE AND UNCONVINCING AND NOWHERE NEAR THE BEAUTY OF TYRELL'S DIALOGUE IN THE ORIGINAL FILM. BELIEVE ME, I AM A FAN OF PHILOSOPHICAL RANTS IN FILMS (AS ONE OF THE FEW PEOPLE WHO ENJOYED 'PROMETHEUS' TAKE THAT AS YOU WILL) BUT IT HAS TO BE DONE WELL AND HE WAS ALL OVER THE PLACE.

I DID LIKE THE ASSITANT REPLICANT FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH BUT IN A WAY, I FELT SHE LACKED DEPTH. YOU MAY DISAGREE WITH ME ON THIS, AND THERE WAS CERTAINLY SUBTLETY IN HER PORTRAYAL THAT I APPRECIATED, BUT I DID NOT HAVE THE SAME CONNECTION TO HER AS I DID THE DESPERATE ANDROIDS OF THE ORIGINAL FILM.

AND THEN WE GET RYAN GOSLING, I DON'T KNOW WHY, AND THIS IS NOTHING AGAINST HIM AS AN ACTOR. BUT I FIND HIM UNBELIEVABLY BORING, WITH THE EXCEPTION OF 'NICE GUYS' AND 'LA LA LAND' EVERYTHING I'VE SEEN HIM IN HAS LEFT ME UNCONVINCED AND REMOVED FROM THE CHARACTER. WHICH, WITH HIM AS OUR CENTRAL CHARACTER, IS NOT GOOD. BUT THIS IS A LESSER PERSONAL COMPLAINT COMPARED TO THE ONES ABOVE.

ANYWAYS, I COULD GO ON ABOUT THIS FOR A WHILE AND THAT'S NOT REALLY HELPFUL TO ANYONE. HERE'S HOW I'LL WRAP IT UP, WAS IT BAD FILM: NO, IT WAS ONE OF THE BETTER MOVIES I'VE SEEN FOR A WHILE. THAT SAID, IT WAS BY NO MEANS THE ORIGINAL BLADE RUNNER. VISUALLY IT PERHAPS MATCHED IT, BUT AS FAR AS THE STORY LINE GOES AND THE SCREENPLAY, BLADE RUNNER WINS HANDS DOWN."

If you managed to get through that caps locks filled rant, The Carnivorous Muffin is quite impressed. As it is our characters on the ground wince at the noise and rub their eyes, clearly wishing they were home already.

"Huh, a new Blade Runner… Not sure how I feel about that either," Lily notes, "Alright, next one, Random asks, 'What do you think of the Kingsman movies?"

"THE FIRST ONE WAS GOOD, I ENJOYED ITS RIDICULOUS PLOT AND KILLING OF EVERYONE. MORE THAN I THOUGHT I WOULD ACTUALLY, I AVOIDED IT LIKE THE PLAGUE AFTER THE TRAILERS BUT THEN EVERYONE KEPT SAYING HOW GREAT IT WAS, SO I FINALLY GOT AROUND TO IT. AND IT WAS INDEED PRETTY DAMN ENTERTAINING. AS FOR THE SECOND IT WAS… THE FIRST BUT WORSE. IT TRIED TO PULL THE SAME SORT OF PLOT AS THE FIRST EXCEPT IT BROUGHT PEOPLE BACK FROM THE DEAD WHICH… EH… SO IT WAS ALRIGHT, BUT AS I SAID, I LIKED THE FIRST BETTER."

As expected, no one has much to say on that, if only because these movies are a bit beyond their time frame, so Lily just moves on to the next question, "From BananaPie, 'What are your thoughts on the My Immortal author reveal? In case you didn't know, apparently it's Rose Christo, a published author who seems like a really cool person and is releasing a book next year which talks about writing My Immortal (among other things, like how she used My Immortal to find her brother in the foster system, as wild as it sounds) (and yup, it was a trollfic)."

The Carnivorous Muffin, a floating ball of light, considers this for a moment and then answers, "HONESTLY, THIS IS PROBABLY A DISAPPOINTING RESPONSE FOR YOU GUYS, BUT I KIND OF DON'T CARE. I KNOW, YOU THINK I WOULD, BUT I REALLY DON'T. I'VE HAD A FEELING IT WAS A TROLL FIC FOR YEARS, AS SHOWN LAST CHAPTER EVEN, AND SO TO ME IT'S NOT THAT GREAT OF A SURPRISE.

OTHERWISE I DON'T REALLY CARE WHO WROTE IT OR TO READ THE STORY OF HOW AND WHY IT OCCURRED. IT PROBABLY IS AN INTERESTING STORY, BUT STILL, AT THIS POINT MY CURIOSITY IS MOOT. THE FIC, HILARIOUS AS IT IS, SPEAKS FOR ITSELF AND I DON'T NEED T HEAR OR SEE MORE ABOUT IT BEYOND THAT."

The Carnivorous Muffin could probably get more into this if it was so desired from the audience, but this distills her basic feelings well enough to the masses for you to chew on as you please. In general, though, The Carnivorous Muffin has always cared less about the actors or the authors than the work itself. A work, in many senses, must stand on its own merit for better or worse.

And, in this case, The Carnivorous Muffin just mostly lacks interest in the true author years after this fic came and went.

"Oh, this is a good one," Lily says reading the new question and showing the other members of her party, who are far less interested than she herself is, "Kain Vixehmeim asks if Frank is really our new host."

"SURE, WHY NOT? SOMEBODY'S GOT TO DO IT."

This answer, for now, can be taken as a yes. Although AlleyKat2014 who specifically requested that this monstrosity be updated, stipulated that Lily, Gilgamesh, and Wizard Lenin should do their panel type thing again. Wizard Trotsky just got pulled along for the ride.

"Well, as long as it's not me again," Lily mutters before reading aloud the next question, "This one's from Guest, 'I am sad to hear we will not see any more of "do Android's dream of electric sheep", I was hoping it would be updated sometime in the future. Of course, I was also still hoping "all you need is love" would update again like some sort of fic-zombie, so perhaps I have unreasonable expectations. Do you plan to finish any of the long fics you started? Or do you think you will get distracted again into something even more complex?"

"OKAY, THERE'S A BIT OF STORY WITH THIS.

FIRST, THERE'S SOMETHING YOU SHOULD KNOW. ALTHOUGH I DO LOOK AT FAVORITES AND FOLLOWS FOR STORIES ONE THING I PAY A LOT OF ATTENTION TO IS REVIEW COUNTS. IT'S A GOOD WAY, EVERY CHAPTER, TO GAUGE INTEREST IN A FIC. THIS ISN'T ME BEGGING FOR REVIEWS, THIS IS ME STATING THAT IF I SEE A FIC ISN'T GARNERING MANY REVIEWS IN A CHAPTER I WILL MARK READERS AS HAVING LESS INTEREST IN THAT STORY. WHETHER THIS IS TRUE OR NOT IS HARD FOR ME TO SAY, BUT AS I SAID, IT'S A GOOD WAY FOR ME TO AT LEAST GAUGE READER INTEREST.

NOW, FIRST, ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE. I UPDATED THIS RELIGIOUSLY FOR A VERY LONG TIME BUT REVIEWS, AND I ASSUME, AUDIENCE INTEREST WANED. CRACK FICS CAN ONLY GO ON SO LONG AND PEOPLE WERE GETTING TIRED OF MY JOKES, THEY NO LONGER CARED WHERE I WAS GOING OR WHERE IT WOULD END, AND IN THERE LACK OF CARING I TOO BEGAN TO LOOK TOWARDS THE HORIZON OF OTHER STORIES THAT COULD BE WORKED ON. IT GOT STALE, AND WE ALL KNEW IT.

THEN I RECEIVED A GOOD AMOUNT OF REVIEWS THAT WERE… LESS THAN COMPLIMENTARY FOR MANY OF THE CHAPTERS. THIS WAS ALREADY AFTER I HAD POSTPONED UPDATING FOR A WHILE AND READING THROUGH THEM, ARGUING MANY POINTS TO THEIR DEATH AND CONCEDING THAT A FAIR NUMBER OF THE POINTS WERE VALID AND ACCURATE, I FELT THE FINAL NAILS BEING SLAMMED INTO THE COFFIN. I REALIZED THAT NOBODY GAVE A DAMN ANYMORE AND CONSEQUENTLY NEITHER DID I. IT WAS NOT A PERFECT STORY, PERHAPS IT WAS EVEN A FADING STAR, AND IT WAS TIME TO MOVE ON TO BIGGER AND BETTER THINGS. SO, I DID, AND SO HERE WE ARE.

SO FAR, ONLY A FEW VOICES IN THE WILDERNESS HAVE COMPLAINED ABOUT THE LACK OF ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE IN THEIR LIFE, SO I CONSIDER MY CHOICE THE RIGHT ONE.

AS FOR DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP? IT'S A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT STORY THERE. FIRST, AGAIN, THOUGH IT'S EXCEEDINGLY POPULAR ESPECIALLY BY MY PREVIOUS DEATH NOTE FANDOM STANDARDS, IT DID NOT HOLD UP TO EITHER OCTOBER OR LILY AND THE ART OF BEING SISYPHUS IN TERMS OF FAVORITES, FOLLOWS, AND REVIEWS. MOST PEOPLE DID NOT CARE ABOUT THE INTROSPECTIVE WHAT HAVE YOU OF DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP? CHAPTERS FOR IT, BECAUSE OF THAT PHILOSOPHICAL WAXING AND IMAGERY, ALSO TAKE A LONG TIME AND A LOT OF THOUGHT TO WRITE EVEN COMPARED TO LILY AND THE ART OF BEING SISYPHUS OR OCTOBER. AS A RESULT I DECIDED AT ONE POINT TO TAKE A HIATUS FROM THE FIC AND COME BACK TO IT LATER, WELL, AGAIN NOT TOO MANY COMPLAINED AND MOST PEOPLE SEEMED INTERESTED IN OTHER THINGS SO I ACCOMODATED.

THAT SAID, UNLIKE ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE (WHICH I CONSIDER WELL AND TRULY DEAD) THIS ONE I DO PLAN AND WANT TO COME BACK TO. OCTOBER, WHICH IS IN IT'S LAST THIRD OR QUARTER OF THE STORY, IS MY POINT TO START OTHER STORIES BACK UP AGAIN AS WELL AS OTHER LARGER PROJECTS I'VE BEEN HOLDING OFF ON. SO, WHEN I FINALLY FINISH OCTOBER YOU CAN EXPECT TO SEE DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP? POP UP AGAIN.

IF YOU WANT TO SEE IT SOONER THAN THAT, AS THAT MAY TAKE A WHILE, THIS IS SOMETHING YOU SHOULD LET ME KNOW. ONE OR TWO PEOPLE HAVE APPROACHED ME ALREADY, AND TO BE FAIR I DID KIND OF WRITE THEM OFF WITH THE 'AFTER OCTOBER' IS DONE SPIEL, BUT IF PEOPLE REALLY WANT TO SEE MORE OF IT I DO TRY TO ACCOMMODATE.

AS FOR LONG FICS I INTEND TO FINISH, REGARDLESS OF READER INTEREST, I TYPICALLY DO NOT START FICS UNLESS I INTEND TO FINISH THEM. NOW SOMETIMES THIS ISN'T TRUE BUT THE MAJOR ONES I DO INTEND TO FINISH (SO HELP ME GOD) I WILL LIST HERE:

LILY AND THE ART OF BEING SISYPHUS

OCTOBER

MINATO NAMIKAZE AND THE DESTROYER OF WORLDS

FINISHING THE HAT

DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?

WHEN HARRY MET TOM

THINGS I WILL NOT FINISH:

ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE

SANDS OF TIME

THINGS I'D LIKE TO FINISH BUT MAY FALL OFF THE WAGON PARTICULARLY IF READERS LOSE INTEREST (OR ELSE I DO):

THE WASTELAND

GOD OF THE MACHINE

WEARING THE FACES OF MEN

THE SHADOWS OUR SOULS WEAR

OTHERWISE I TRY, VERY HARD, NOT TO START NEW EPICS/PROJECTS THAT I CANNOT CONCIEVABLY FINISH (YES MANY I DO START SPIRAL OUT OF CONTROL, I KNOW). ALSO, THIS IS ANOTHER REASON TO KEEP IN MIND THAT ONE SHOULD BE WARY OF ASKING FOR CROSSOVERS FOR SIDE FICS FROM ME. THE LONGER THOSE ARE/MORE INTENSIVE THEY BECOME, THE SLOWER THIS ALL GETS, AND THE LONGER YOU WAIT FOR DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP? AND IF YOU WANT TO SEE SOMETHING UPDATING, START PMING/REVIEWING/LETTING ME KNOW, OTHERWISE I HAVE NO IDEA WHO CARES AND WHO DOESN'T."

If the characters are gratified to know that their respective fics will finish except in the event of The Carnivorous Muffin's sudden illness and death, they do not say as much, Lily merely raises her eyebrows and says, "Alright then, so, this is from AlleyKat2014, 'Is the written representation of The Carnivorous Muffin ever coming back? If no, how will questions to The Carnivorous Muffin be answered from now on?"

"IS THIS NOT ANSWER ENOUGH FOR YOU?" The written representation of The Carnivorous Muffin asks, which in itself probably answers the question, that apparently The Carnivorous Muffin will now answer questions in obnoxious caps locks as a great ball of light to be summoned or sought out when needed.

"It is certainly answer enough for me," Lily nods, looking to her peers for support, but they all appear to be more or less quested out as they wait for the chapter to end already, "This is from qanda, 'In the Tolkien universe, the supreme being is called Eru Ilubatar – is Eru Lee connected to this?"

"THAT'S A HAPPY COINCIDENCE," The Carnivorous Muffin's voice booms, "EXCEPT WHEN IT'S CONVENIENT LIKE IN ERU LEE AND THE SUNDANCE KID, IN WHICH CASE I CAN DRIVE CANON CHARACTERS MAD WITH PANIC OVER WHAT IS ESSENTIALLY A HAPPY COINCIDENCE."

"Our God, I think, does not have our best interests at heart," Wizard Trotsky mutters to Wizard Lenin, who shares a wary look with him as they begin to realize just how callous their writer truly is towards them as characters.

The Carnivorous Muffin does not write fun, soft, adventures for her characters. She writes about pain and suffering, it builds character.

"Oh, only three more to go, thank god, this is getting a little weird," Lily remarks, "I don't think I like caps locks."

Then reading through the questions Lily remarks, "Oh, and these two are pretty much the same so I might as well ask them at the same time. First, from Elliot Green, 'How much of yourself did you put into Lily? Your written avatar reminded me a lot of her.' Second from GlassGirlCeci, 'If the esteemed Muffin ever returns to life, I'd like to know how much of themselves They put into Their writing and Their characters, and Lily specifically? Are there any of Lily's attributes that are your own, exaggerated or otherwise?"

"I'LL ANSWER THE LILY ONE FIRST I SUPPOSE. FIRST, I PUT… HM, HOW DO I PUT THIS?

LILY AND I SHARE A LOT OF QUALITIES BUT SHE'S MYSELF TURNED UP TO ELEVEN. WE SHARE A LOT OF THE SAME INTERESTS, OBVIOUSLY AS I WRITE WHAT I KNOW, AND SOME SIMILAR PERSONALITY TRAITS SUCH AS LILY'S PRAGMATIC APPROACH TO HARD WORK (WHERE SHE TENDS TO PUT IN THE WORK REQUIRED FOR TASKS SHE FINDS UNINTERESTING, BUT PUTS IN NO MORE THAN THAT), SIMILAR APPRECIATION FOR PHILOSOPHY (THOUGH LILY TAKES IT TO A PRACTICAL EXTREME THAT I DON'T ON A DAILY BASIS), SIMILAR STUBBORNNESS (THOUGH AGAIN I IMAGINE LILY'S MORE EXTREME THAN I AM), AND LILY SOMETIMES WILL SAY WHAT I WOULD THINK IN A SITUATION BUT NEVER SAY OUT LOUD, SHE LACKS MY TACT AND SOME OF MY SITUATIONAL AWARENESS.

LILY IS… MAYBE WHAT I WOULD HAVE BEEN LIKE IF I HAD THE INTELLIGENCE OF AN ADULT AS A VERY YOUNG CHILD, GREW UP IN A CUPBOARD, HAD GOD LIKE POWERS, AND WAS FORCED TO CONTEND WITH A UNIVERSE THAT DID EVERYTHING IN ITS POWER TO SEEM FICKLE AND INCONSISTENT.

WHICH, I THINK, SAYS QUITE A LOT ABOUT THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN ME AND LILY.

IF THERE WAS A 'WHICH THE CARNIVOROUS MUFFIN CHARACTER ARE YOU?' QUIZ, ALTHOUGH I MIGHT GET A MORE THAN DECENT MATCH FOR LILY, BUT I DON'T THINK I'D GET A FULL ONE.

AS FOR MY WRITING AND CHARACTERS IN GENERAL, A LOT OF ME GOES INTO THEM, ALMOST ALL CHARACTERS, CERTAINLY ALL THE MAJOR ONES, HAVE SOME ASPECT OF MYSELF LURKING INSIDE OF THEM SOMEWHERE. GRANTED, IT MAY NOT BE OVERT, BUT IT'S USUALLY THERE AND THOUGH I WOULDN'T SAY I STRUGGLE TO WRITE CHARACTES THAT DON'T SHARE SOME TRAIT WITH ME, I DON'T USUALLY GRAVITATE TOWARDS THEM AS NARRATORS.

THIS MEANS THAT LILY, DEATH, WIZARD LENIN, AND MANY MORE ALL SHARE SOMETHING WITH ME, THOUGH SOMETIMES IT CAN BE VERY SUBTLE. I WOULD SAY THAT I HAVE A SURPRISING AMOUNT IN COMMON WITH WIZARD LENIN AND TOBIRAMA SENJU.

I KNOW, THAT SOUNDS EGOTISTICAL BUT I'M NOT TALKING THE INTELLIGENCE HERE. THE DRY, SARDONIC, MANNER OF SPEECH AND SOMETIMES THE WAY THEY THINK ABOUT SITUATIONS, EVEN MORE THAN LILY WHO IS AT MANY TIMES AN EXAGGERATED VERSION OF MYSELF, RESONATES WITH ME QUITE A BIT. TOBIRAMA IS A LITTLE CLOSER THAN WIZARD LENIN, FOR OBVIOUS REASONS, BUT I WRITE THEM AS SIMILAR CHARACTERS SO IT'S A BIT OF A MOOT POINT (TOBIRAMA IS WRITTEN BASICALLY AS 'IF WIZARD LENIN HAD MORALS AND WAS LESS OF AN EMOTIONAL DIVA BUT WITH JUST AS MUCH OF A TEMPER'). ALTHOUGH WRITING THAT NOW, I TEND TO BE MORE LILY-ESQUE WHERE TEMPERS ARE CONCERNED…. HM, I GUESS I KIND OF AM LILY. WHAT A TERRIFYING THOUGHT."

"Wait, so I'm an avatar of God?" Lily asks, looking somewhat ill at the thought even as Wizard Lenin corrects her, "No more than I am, apparently."

"Right, well, last question, from pixelherodev, 'Carnivorous Muffin: are you a computer program, and is the program behind a Series of Failed Turing Tests your attempt to reproduce? A fanfic that came from Twilight that isn't crap, the whole "My Immortal" stuff... you have to admit the evidence that you're supernormal is quite compelling."

"BEEP. BOOP."

Starring:

The Carnivorous Muffin as Sir Not Appearing in this Chapter or else a Robot?

Lily as The Prophet

Wizard Lenin as The Skeptic

Frank as the Temporary and Extremely Reluctant Host

Gilgamesh as That Guy Along for the Ride Again

Namikaze Hari as The Technically Legal Love Interest

Uchiha Shisui as He Who Unwittingly Finds Himself in a Rom Com

Wizard Trotsky as That Undeniably Creepy Bastard

Obito Uchiha as The Stranger in a Strange Land

Eru Lee as Another Reality's God

Light and Shadow of the Distant Sun as The Enigmatic Alien Stranger with Alarming Secrets

Rabbit as That Undeniably Cosmic Creepy Bastard

Alucard as The Ubermensch Vampire Suffering From Crippling Ennui

Meowth as He Who is Blindsided

Pikachu as The Unamused Giant Mouse

Metapod as The Unamused Giant Cocoon

Anakin Skywalker as The Kwisatz Haderach… Almost

Death as Everyone's Favorite Uncle

Duck Penber as Proto Lenin and a Blast from the Past

Author's Note: I HAVE RETURNED! Well, in some form or another. As it says at the top this was brought to you by the 4000th review of "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" otherwise it would have... been a while til I got around to this. Yes, that's really all I have to say about that. A note that if you do want questions answered faster, at least from me, tumblr is a good place to do it or else just PMing me works too (and perhaps better).

Thanks for reading and reviewing, reviews... well, fuel this story among other things.

Disclaimer: I only own the alterations to the fandoms, not the worlds themselves.