Author commentary: The red vs. blue conceit established with the troll teams, along with Sollux's bifurcation stuff, is extended here to include an ongoing reference to two universes (which was already somewhat true, since we saw two universes referenced this way in ~ATH code earlier). Blue represents the troll universe, red represents the human one. We're zooming in and out of Sollux's shades as a transitional device to link the two universes to these colors. (This also relates to Dave's shades, which have been cosmically imprinted with stars and galaxies as well, a feature that traces back to their original appearance in Problem Sleuth, believe it or not). It felt important to visually link the two universes to these two colors, so that they could be signified with such simple visual associations in the future. This becomes useful later in the story. There are some pretty abstract ideas to convey, involving entire universes, specifically the destruction thereof. For instance, the Tumor, a huge bomb, has two explosive components: a big blue tube and a big red tube. Both of these are meant to signal that in some abstract way that they "contain" these universes, and when both universes are destroyed in one circumstantially simultaneous event, then the entire bomb detonates. Stuff like this would be pretty challenging to communicate without the use of these color-coding methods. Generally speaking, color coding goes a long way in the story to help readers form associations and understand many abstract things that would otherwise be harder to pick up on.


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