The Strings We Pull
is a fanfiction written by nonsensicalshitposting, starting on January 27th, 2022 and still ongoing. This is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover between OneShot, Deltarune, OFF, Purrfect Apawcalypse, Night in the Woods, The Hex, Inscryption and The Magnus Archives.
One day, Asher, a seemingly-normal person living in Portland, finds five video game characters who have been displaced from their worlds to his home, by unknown means. Trying to figure out what happened, how to send said characters back to their worlds and, in addition, not being killed by at least one of them, they find themself quickly embarked on an adventure going beyond what they could have possibly imagined, notably involving eldritch creatures and a certain game containing some very dangerous data…
In addition to the main story, several spin-offs have also been written :
- Stay In Your Coma, showing Asher, Patches & Mae as they are trying to find the Batter after he goes rogue and kidnaps Kris.
- Lightbringer, which brings more light to the past of Asher’ family.
- An Old Journal, which consists in a series of journal notes made by Mae throughout the main story.
- What They Hid, a prequel presenting several tapes having been recorded before the start of the main story.
- The Strings We Pull but it’s dumb, a non-canonical, more comedic subseries presenting what could have happened during the main story if some minor things were different, with generally humorous outcomes.
The entire series can be read on AO3, here.
This fanfic and its spin-offs show examples of the following tropes :
- Adaptational Gender Identity : In Inscryption, P03’ gender identity was pretty ambiguous, with male pronouns being used at times. Here, the « it/its » pronouns are used whan talking about it.
- In OneShot, Niko' gender was also ambiguous, with a Mathematician's Answer applied to it. Here, they are referred to with "they/them" pronouns.
- Adaptational Jerkass : Kris (partly due to the fact that they can now talk) has a bigger tendancy to make snide remarks and doesn’t even bother to hide their hate of Asher. Justified, as they are the player and spent a lot of time controlling Kris.
- Art Shift : A written variant. At several points in the story, chapters switch from the usual third-person narration to a style that is closer to the recordings from TMA.
- Back from the Dead : Of sorts. Luke Carder comes back after being shot by Amanda, except that this time, he’s trapped into Asher’ computer.
- Big Bad Ensemble : On one side, you have P03 and its mysterious benefactor (later revealed to be Elias Bouchard), who want to use the Hex to escape Asher’ computer. On the other side, you have the Batter, still hellbent on purifying the world and having Asher be his puppeteer again, and Annabelle Cane, who decides to help him (and convinces him to betray P03).
- Canon Welding : In canon, even if they were already here, the connections between The Hex & Inscryption were far from visible. In this fic, however, they are made way more explicit, with P03 being especially interested in everything related to the Hex that Rootbeer Reggie and the patrons of the Six Pint Inn used to open a portal and murder Lionel Snill. Also, it's made more explicit that Amanda and Sado are the same person.
- Children Are Innocent : Niko is clearly this. On the other hand, there’s Kris, who is the exact opposite.
- Crazy Jealous Guy : Asher, towards Mae (even if the former isn't technically a guy). Due to their crush on her, the narration notes that they specifically took some decisions while playing NITW just so they can have Mae all for themself.
- Curb-Stomp Battle : In TWSP but it’s dumb, it happens several times to the Batter.
- Dark and Troubled Past : Some of Asher’ internal thoughts show that they had quite the troubled life and several mistakes that they feel still guilty for. And that’s not even talking about the connection between their family and a certain Lou Natas…
- Eyes Do Not Belong There : After Asher fully fuses with The Eye, they start having, well… a lot of eyes all over their body.
- The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You : In TWSP but it’s dumb, in the vignette when Asher is an avatar of The Hunt, they start to notice the reader. Then, they realize they have their scent and it stops when they’re about to lunge out of your computer to get you.
- Heel Realization : Downplayed at first with the Batter. He states to Asher that he needed to be disposed of but because of his perceived lack of purity rather than any awareness of how dangerous he was. It’s then completely subverted when he kidnaps Kris, planning to resume his mission.
- Hostile Show Takeover : When the World Machine tries to investigate what is happening with Asher’ computer, it finds the OLD_DATA. It’s all P03 needs to do to take over said computer and force Niko to go along with what it wants.
- Late-Arrival Spoiler: An absolute bunch of them.
- Massive Multiplayer Crossover : One between seven video games and one podcast.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits : Both Asher and Luke’ groups are definitely this.
- Refugee from TV Land : Niko, Patches, Mae, the Batter & Kris are all this. Asher’ main goal in the fic is to discover why and sent them back (of course, P03 won’t let them).
- Trapped in TV Land : Luke Carder after his death.
- Troll : Helen is pretty much made of this, when she’s not snarking.
- Unreliable Narrator : When it’s on the tags of the fic, you bet.
- Unrequited Love Lasts Forever : Asher is in love with Mae. The fact that she is in their room, seemingly real, doesn’t help them to keep a cool head (on top of all the things they already need to face) and, ironically, Mae thinks they hate her (even after clearing the misunderstanding, there’s no indication that she reciprocates at all and it seems very unlikely to happen). In TWSP but it’s dumb, there’s at least two vignettes when Asher fares better (and even then, they botch it in one of them by filling the Batter’ insides with spiders).
- What If? : The entire premise of TWSP but it’s dumb. All the vignettes in the series play it for laughs.
- Would Hurt a Child : The Batter, full stop. Just ask Kris.
