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The general sense of things was like this. People were trying to be respectful and somber, they really were. It was, after all, a serious sort of occasion for everyone. How one man who tried so hard and brought hope to people all throughout the tubes (and to one girl in particular who was notoriously fickle) could end up not only selling himself but making so many promises he just couldn't keep before destroying any incriminating evidence and giving up on life entirely just baffled everyone. The problem was that nobody was actually paying attention.
"Greatest Journal was a good man," his brother Dead Journal said from the pulpit. "He always tried to go above and beyond the call of duty and today we honor his life."
Everyone had expected Live Journal to be giving the eulogy. After all, he was a notoriously...well, he had his good days and his bad days, actually, but more good than not. Besides that, Dead Journal was a known recluse and nobody had thought to see him even here at the funeral, much less speaking.
As Dead droned on, trying to be uplifting and only really succeeding in being disturbingly morbid, most of the crowd's attention turned to the open casket. It was made from the casings of the original Tubes, an extravagance that everyone pooled together percentages from their sales to buy. Greatest was worth it, after all.
Dream Width had never known Greatest. She'd heard stories about him from Fandom, of course. The legendary Greatest Journal who had been there for Live when he had his fits of melancholy and misanthropy (which never lasted long but always seemed to piss Fandom off to the point where she would see Greatest behind his back even though everyone knew Live knew anyway) and in the end had promised too much in a desperate attempt to get more people to like him. She'd never known him, but he was a hero in his own right, a patron saint to Role-Players who lived a life of poverty. His server space may have been small and unreliable in comparison to Live's, but his heart was in the right place.
Dream's hand curled around Fandom's as they sat pretending to listen to Dead, who, by this point hadn't figured out that people weren't interested in the stages of decomposition. Fandom's thumb brushed over the back of Dream's caramel skin. She was here for her girlfriend mostly. Her girlfriend and Live, who had always been her friend but only recently was becoming more than that. This wasn't the place or time for any obvious and inappropriate affection between the trio. Fandom loved them both, Dream knew. It was easier now that Live had gone to therapy and worked out some of his anger management issues, but that too was before Dream's time.
Even from this distance, under the expert layer of makeup put on Greatest's face by the mortician to hide the scars, Dream could still see the outline of a broken jpeg.
Tired of listening to Dead (who was now discussing the theory how with the Great and Gossipy Google around, nobody ever really dies in the tubes), Dream looked around the room. There were other people there that she didn't know very well, but wanted to. She made a note to send out some invitations later to them. There was Xanga over there making sure that Blogger didn't fall asleep or forget where he was in his senility. Back in the corner, Frank the Goat and Tweak, well they weren't really playing, per se. Tweak was seeing what the combinations of various flowers sent by well wishers and provided by the parlor would do to the goat. His goal, of course, was to get Frank high. Dream watched them for a moment, wondering how a small mammal's digestive tract would hold up to silk and plastic flowers.
Wiki would know. Wiki knew everything. It was just a matter of scaling the great, nameless mountain that rose up from the middle of the Creative Commons like an obelisk. At the summit, Wiki lived in a thatched-roof cottage (which had more than once been under attack by a man, or maybe it was a dragon-man, or maybe it was just a dragon... either way Wiki never complained) giving knowledge to those who made the journey to her. However, since Wiki never came down from the mountain, the price of that knowledge was that the travelers who came to her had to give some bit of knowledge in return. She was selfless, Wiki, only asking for money to maintain the archives and not giving a whit for her own well being. Dream admired that.
As she mentally drifted back into the room, her gaze fell upon Live, Greatest, and Dead's other brother Insane. Dream knew that there was something tempting and dangerous about Insane. Fandom herself had actually dallied with him for a while in the not so distant past, and probably still did from time to time. It was obvious that Insane wasn't paying attention to Dead either. He was chewing on the cuff of his sweater, eyes darting nervously around the room even while he leaned to whisper to Nano Wrimo that he was sure he saw the bouquet of azaleas behind Dead moving of its own accord. Nano tried to get him to elaborate, but Insane just shook his head and muttered something about ninjas.
Dead finally reached a stopping point, ending with a quote by Karl Marx that nobody understood or thought was appropriate. A line formed to view the body of their dearly departed friend, brother and lover.
After Blogger and Xanga got up, Live stood to lead the rest of the row to follow, not wanting to put up a fight with Blogger about which of them had seniority. The last time he'd gotten on that particular high horse, Blogger had threatened Live with his cane and asked Word Press to hold his dentures and hearing aids while he showed "this whippersnapper" how to respect his elders. Blogger apparently had forgotten that there wasn't much age difference at all between himself and Live, but that was okay. He'd gotten hooked by Google's siren call of ad revenue and that had rapidly accelerated his aging process.
Dream wondered if Fandom knew about Live's recent deal with Google, if she even cared. She might've been easily offended at times, and petulant at others, but at the heart of it, Dream knew that Fandom was a loyal girl and would never truly abandon Live completely. And if she ever did, she'd probably feel guilty. She might not let on, but when you've been with someone as long as Fandom and Live have been together, ending that relationship without significant heartache in both parties would be nigh impossible.
As Fandom stepped away from the casket, Dream paused to pay her respects. The stories of him were still clear in her head. When nobody was looking, she pulled a piece of paper that had been folded in quarters out of her pocket. She placed it delicately under Greatest's hands. She doubted he'd ever be revitalized enough to take her up on the invitation she'd left him there, but it was a gesture she couldn't resist making.
Soon enough, everyone had finished saying goodbye. Miraculously, Insane had torn his attention away from the azaleas long enough to look mournfully at his brother. The ceremony continued with the closing of the casket and the four people closest to Greatest carried it towards the Bit Torrent Sea. Live and Fandom were at the front while Dead and Insane walked behind him, Insane only managed to hold it together by focusing on the strong presence of Live in front of him.
The four of them pushed the buoyant casket out to sea. Dream looked on and she felt the whole internet come to a standstill for a moment.
A herd of roving LOLCats looked on from atop a cliff, and by some miracle, even the grossly insensitive /b/ didn't comment on what was going on. The endless loop of Rick Astley had even paused for a long enough period of time that nobody noticed when Moot stepped away from the mike to breathe.
As the casket disappeared into the Flash Animated Sunset, Fandom found Dream's hand again. Live draped a solid, strong arm over her shoulders and the three of them walked back to Dream's server in hopes of not wasting however much time they had left. She smiled to herself, falling into step with the two of them. Things would be all right. She was sure of it.