#Doc Scratch x Calliope

[davekat-sucks]

Is there any good pairings for Calliope? I don't think her and roxy make a good pair because it's doing the opposite of what it's trying to do unless it's like a toxic relationship gaslight pairing where Calliope forces herself into all of Roxys interactions and Roxy dating someone way too young for her and everyone just looks on in disgust i can get behind that because it at least sounds entertaining. Then i guess there's Caliborn? Some gross toxic sexist dynamic with incest thrown into sounds kinda funny i guess? Idk I've seen people ship her with Jake because he likes skulls though i can't remember a time they interacted in canon and pairing her with Jane is boring. Idk fuck it imma pair her with Doc scratch (Calliope x Doc Scratch is a better ship than davekat) Scratch can get his little girl while Calliope can truly live her life like it's fanfiction like she always wanted

Doc Scratch x Calliope is better than Davekat. Caliborn x Calliope works because technically in Cherub standards, much like trolls, they are fine with incest. Their toxic relation that's equivalent to kismesis, is technically how they mate and interact to possible love interests. So it confuses me why people get so grossed out when they are species they are fine with those shit. They aren't like humans. Same applies for trolls. Jegus knows that people think Karkat and Nepeta are vaguely brother/sister because of their parents would be The Signless and The Disciple, but they forget they weren't born directly from those two and that the slurry would still be mixed with OTHER TROLLS in the Mother Grub. ALL OF THE TROLLS THAT WE KNOW, BETA AND ALPHA, are related to one another in some way because they were hatched from eggs the Mother Grub pumped out. The only thing separating them is caste names. Vriska and Terezi are literal SISTERS when one thinks deeper. So shipping them is incest and its fine in their standards. And if you carry it over to Earth C for something like Homestuck^2, all the trolls would still be born the same way as the other trolls and that would mean they would still be related. So a ceruleanblood boy and a rusty girl could be fucking even if they are aware that humans have weird standards about incest, but they get a pass because trolls get some privilege for being weird aliens born from an alien Queen Bug that has to have DNA from all trolls given to her. Calliope x Jake would work. But I would also think their relationship would actually be one of kismesis. If Caliborn had thought highly of Jake to be his true friend, the Calliope would be one to be a rival for him. She probably go in more passive aggressive ways, but I have a feeling that it will be Jake be the only one who picks up on her bitchyness. Seen some ship with Nepeta, due to parallels of being fangirls. Much like how Caliborn gets compared to Karkat. Though now it's Eridan being the proto-Caliborn, according to Andrew Hussie's book commentary. Because we can't have our uwu Karkles be equivalent to a toxic masculinity person.

[rockkal]

HOMESTUCK BEYOND CANON NEXT UPD8(s) PREDICTIONS (I'm delusional, btw) /SHITPOST

We get to see Jack Noir be a pathetic little meow meow and has depression because he's too busy working at the mine coal to see his wife

The Felt come into the screen, also somehow snowman, and they all say "We voted for Obama" (this is very important homestuck lore, btw)

Brand new character called HEROIN ADDICT is introduced. Son of Karkat and Dave. Has a brother named John Egbert Strider Vantas

Clover flirts with Jane and gets sent to the weed dungeon. And not like the good weed. I mean like the weed that really feels like shit

Jake becomes new leader of the Felt and Crowbar becomes his dad (Crowbar dad AU, write that down, it'll be on the test)

We get to see Death, the character, talk with ULT Dirk and he brang along the Midnight Crew, Mom Lalonde B1 and Dad egbert because he thinks they're cool (also, Mom Lalonde and Dad Egbert kiss a lot in death's office and have tea and buscuits with the Midnight Crew)

CALIBORN COMES FOR A SINGLE PANEL AND MAKES JUNE OFFICIALLY TRANS! BECAUSE HE HATES JUNE AND HE HATES WOMEN SO HE COMBINES THE TWO THINGS HE HATES INTO ONE (this is a joke, btw. I honestly want June's transitioning to be more in character then just the gremlin guy I like does it for me)

Ms Paint. becomes narrator of both Candy and Meat and it's just a podcast about different types of paint

Something related to The Midnight Crew's creator, Professor Mayasaka or however the fuck ya spell it, something translated into midnight. Whatever. I just wanna see the professor man come in and do something

JANE REVIVES AIMLESS RENEGADE SOMEHOW AND HE GOES GOD TIER! (His Classpect is Mage of Blood because I say so)

Sollux and Eridan kissing

B

Roxy breaks the fourth wall and says "it's Roxy Lalonding time" and Roxy Lalondes all over the place

A bucket appears and yeah

We see Andrew Hussie in a bath robe

Terezi manages to give back the legal rights to Beyond Canon back to their creators (sorry, I forgot your name, mister cool homestuck guy. I forget easily :'(]

Vriska dies. (I hate Vriska! (In a Kismesis way))

Equius comes back to say "I require horse" and then he gets prototyped with the universe frog

Matchsticks gets a personality and we learn he wants to become an actual fire fighter and save people since he was a kid

Stitch becomes hella cool by partnering with Kanaya to beat the shit out of Dirk

Rose just stays Rose because I forgot she existed

21 again but with Dave

June Egbert gets two new dads and they're Eggs and Biscuits from The Felt because it reminds her of her dead dad's cakes

Diamonds Droogs/Draconian Dignitary x Dad Crocker 20 hour oiled up make out session flash animation

Calliope has a child with Roxy. (comment what ya think they would be called)

Dirk eats a baby (it's John Egbert Strider Vantas)

AR gets to have a robo body and becomes friends with AR and Aradia and also Aranea is there to keep them in check and they call eachother the "AR squad", but Aranea is the out cast because she is blue

Eden Gardner (homestuck OC of @springselkie) gets a mention.

Monkeys become relevant to the plot

Jack Noir gets to show us his stabs

Bold Eagles are Aimless Renegade's second power, because he's the only AMERUCAN character in homestuck

Jake gets a beard and celebrates by showing us his level 100 GYAT

What Pumpkin office remains is an important location in the story

Mommy Condie comes back and marries Earth C's version of Colonel sassacres

Freddy Fazber, new character, literally the best. Hor hor hor hor.

Something related to drugs, I guess (I'm running out of ideas)

Fortnite becomes canon and everyone loves it

Deltarune reference

Jack Noir eats money and becomes lamborghini

Jack Noir villain arc where he and June kiss (their kismesis, it's ok. They want to kill eachother)

Rose's wifi is STILL shitty! COME ON, IT'S BEEN 10 YEARS, FIX YOUR INTERNET CONNECTION, GURL!

Kanaya gets to make something Lord English related

We see Doc Scratch because he's awesome

Wayward Vagabond comes back from the grave and does ANOTHER revolution against monerchy. He is truly the best diplomat.

MLP gets mentioned

Problem Sleuth shows up for 5 panels and then dies

Nepeta gets to kill Pickle Inspector

Eridan smokes weed

[S] Terezi: Do the mackarena

Weed chapter

Karkat gets a period cramp

Something something Lord English in black void, becomes normal Caliborn, being room mates with Equius, Gamzee and AR (auto-responder)

Free Bird fight sequence

Joe Biden gets a mention because he was probably in office before the clown fuckers took over D.C. Washington

Cockaine chapter

MSPA reader gets hella blazed and yeah

Caliborn kisses a rule 63 version of a Miku body pillow

Pic Yaoi sequence or smth

Sawbuck stays a fat fuck and eats the earth at the end

Itchy dies from tripping on a rock

Doze unslows himself and does a break dance

Trace and Fin make out session

Quarters gets to shoot ULT Dirk and is declared a war veteran

Bog from RHG shows up to eat a chocolate bar

I'm high

Ok, that was the end of this dumb shitpost. Hope ya got a kick out of it. Or not.

Wait

Shit

I should probably add an image so that I could look cool

Give me a sec

Yes, God of Yaoi.

Perfect for this.

See ya

[mmmmalo]

Rambling

Since turbans act as an orientalist motif in Homestuck, I thought I might try scanning for hijabs as well. "The Veil" was the first suspect, but textual support did not immediately materialize. At least not in the form of wordplay -- it's mildly suspect that the game's cloning equipment is within the Veil, since the first lab we see is associated with Mom, but since the meteors in turn become the sperm impregnating Skaia/the Earth, I'm hesitant to commit to the gendering. Maybe one of those "size of your mom's dick" kind of moments? Shrug

"Curtain" was the next search term -- apparently the word hijab originally described a curtain separating Muhammad's main house from the wives' quarters, for modesty. Presuming euphemism, it becomes interesting that Karkat (who I tend to read as Alternia's only Female) is determinedly buried behind thick curtains at the beginning of Meat, as though they were part of his feminine repertoire of hysteric fits and romcoms -- all the more so because Dave reasons it would probably be fine to throw stones in a glass house if curtains were up, insofar as stoning-as-execution is still proscribed under some interpretations of Islamic law. Going back to the Veil, this would imply the meteor strikes are framed as a planetary stoning? Which in turn brings about the mummy-shrouded Exiles, wandering the sand dunes. Unexpectedly tidy, if we permit that the narrative's need to denigrate the Terrorist overrides any strict gendering

Other instances of curtain don't scan as readily... the various "pay no attention to the X behind the curtain" Wizard of Oz jokes seem ripe for misuse, but nothing stands out... Jane's comment on the "right" side of curtain being the side where everyone can see you... it rings as passive aggressive in light of the Islamophobic superstructure, but unlike with Dave I can't identify a complementary signifier to affirm the superstructure's applicability. Mildly annoying. But if you /assume/ its applicability, gently coaxing Calliope out from behind the curtain and encouraging her to be herself likewise comes across as somewhat passive-aggressive, I suppose

All that stuff about Roxy's Void-based unknowability from the Epilogues had struck me a sexist mystification, but the association with veils of darkness gives the misogyny a certain orientalist flavor... and if that holds, Roxy's earlier blackout powers fall under the same banner...? I don't recall anything objectionable in the discussion of them though... If Doc Scratch's head is a turban, I suppose the grimdark blackout becomes Rose's veil, adding to the sense of assault that came with Scratch "smothering her with surprise noodles" (eroticizing the question mark).

The cue-ball/turban is also light, of course, and the matter of Karkat blocking out the light contributes to his feminine framing... though I suppose the same could be said of the Strider's sunglasses? "Those rare, intimate moments that Jake was allowed to slip off Dirk’s shades and look upon his face, unobstructed" might be leaning into the erotics of removing a lady's veil... as well as the general mystique built up around Strider Eye Moments. The artifact of Stoic Masculinity doubles as an artifact of Islamic Femininity. Textual affirmation in the form of puns isn't really forth coming, but the matter AR wanting to get out of the shades might have an undertone of cultural condescension akin to Callie and the curtain... especially since as "anime shades" that "literally only the Japanese could consider to embody the Platonic ideal of 'cool,'" the sunglasses are explicitly linked to the Orient

[blaperile]

Homestuck: Beyond Canon (reactions page 666 - “Davepeta feather” path)

Ok, finally got around to writing a reaction to this update

I was very surprised to see Vriska was not in this update!

It's funny, because beforehand when looking at all the images for the different chapters, this was the one that seemed the most obvious, showing Davepeta's feather and implying another conversation between Vriska and Davepeta.

After the previous update, I was convinced it would be about Davepeta trying to help Vriska move on from the traumatic Doc Scratch conversation.

Instead, we get a surprise Jasprose appearance!

Again, I'm very happy about all the new talksprites we got in this update :D

And FINALLY we get an update addressing the bonus stories the old creative team made! I'm actually surprised it's in this way though, I thought that perhaps they would first integrate all the old bonus panels into the main comic, but apparently not.

On the other hand, the things Jasprose said here only briefly touched upon the events of the Catnappped bonus story, so perhaps when it properly focuses on them again there will first be the old panels (maybe a URL link, kind of like the old Homestuck days with some panels about the Exiles being on a separate page linked from a normal panel?).

Anyway, only after a while I realized something quite sad: this is only the first time in the entirety of Homestuck^2 that we see (a version of) Dave and Rose interacting. Because with the events of the Epilogues, both the Meat and Candy versions of Dave and Rose got entirely separated from each other.

And even now, Davepeta and Jasprose are in totally separate realities, only managing to talk to each other via sprite magic.

If you start thinking even harder about it, Jasprose is technically from the Meat timeline while Davepeta originates from neither seeing as they weren't on Earth when the timeline split happened.

Though I guess you could wonder, IS there a Candy Jasprose? What if she was also outside of the normal reality when the timeline split and there really is only one version of her as well? Then the same thing could be true about Gcatavrosprite, Erisolsprite (wherever the hell he suddenly came from) and Nannasprite (ok not entirely, there's 2 versions of her but that's already from before the Meat-Candy split, haha).

That's something to think about.

Anyway, let's talk more about the actual content of this update, haha.

I like how the music utilizes the Sunsetter leitmotif, referencing the Davesprite song that was already used for Dave's walkaround music in Openbound.

So, all chapters now retroactively got names, with this one being Chapter X. Makes sense to not be a number, when all the other numbered chapters follow Vriska and seem to indicate in what year they're taking place.

Does it mean the next update, the 8-ball path, will be "Chapter 8" and take place in year 8? It would make sense thematically, as well as be an excellent transition with how this conversation between Davepeta and Jasprose ended.

It's also good to know that in the outside world only an hour or so should have passed. I mean, obviously they wouldn't have let years pass by, but it also means that Vriska isn't INSTANTLY back from the perspective of John, Roxy, Calliope and Sollux. What will have happened there in the meantime? Will Vriska be returning at a very climatic moment?

It's interesting that Jasprose claims she's only been in Midnight City for a night. But on the other hand, it's basically always night there! So she might as well have spent a pretty long time there, who knows!

I like that they addressed this Rose's alcohol problem. Good to hear she's not fallen off the wagon!

[godawfulhomestuckships]

as penance for sending you a fairly straightforward ship wall, i present you this.

Crowbar X Doc Scratch/Lord English

Names:

You're playing it wrong

Red and green but not in the Calliope and Caliborn way

That one dirkjake fic where dirk is doc scratch and jake is lord english's special little nepo baby

(sorry if all of these suck i'm making them up on the fly. i'm sure you can come up with something better)

I make things up on the fly dw you got this heres my own shitty contributions:

Come on lucky number 7

Doctorate degree in fucking up

Scratched up crowbar

Cue bar

[yandere-homestuck]

Masterlist Guardians, Sprites and Others

🧢 Bro Strider 🗡

Yandere--stuck:

Yandere!AU!Bro Strider x Reader Drabble

Yandere!Bro Strider x Reader Headcanons

Yandere!AU!Bro Strider x Reader Drabble (part 2)

Yanyan-stuck:

KinkTober Day 1: Somnophillia with Bro Strider

Yandere!Bro Strider x Reader Headcanons NSFW

Yandere Alphabet Headcanons (A, L, and Y)

Vikkirosko:

Yandere!Bro Strider x Reader Headcanons

Yandere!Bro Strider x Reader Oneshot His room

Yandere!Bro Strider x Reader Oneshot I just want to help you

🍸 Mom Lalonde 🧣

Yandere!Mom Lalonde x Reader Headcanons [Yanyan-stuck]

🕶 Davesprite 🐥

Yandere!Davesprite x Reader Headcanons [Yanyan-stuck]

💾 Lil Hal ⚡

Yandere--stuck:

Yandere!Lil Hal x Reader Headcanons

Yanyan-stuck:

Yandere!Lil Hal x Reader Headcanons

Yandere Alphabet Headcanons (A, G, and J)

⚕️ Calliope

Yanyan-stuck:

KinkTober Day 9: Xenophilia with Calliope

Yandere!Calliope x Reader Headcanons

Yandere!Calliope x Reader Headcanons NSFW

Yandere Alphabet Headcanons (F, H, Q, and W)

⛎ Caliborn

Yanyan-stuck:

KinkTober Day 12: Suspension and Overstimulation with Caliborn

KinkTober Day 15: Handcuffs with Caliborn

KinkTober Day 26: Chubby Appreciation with Caliborn

Yandere!Caliborn x Reader Headcanons

Yandere!Caliborn x Reader Headcanons NSFW

Yandere!Caliborn x Reader Headcanons Mistreated Darling

Yandere Alphabet Headcanons (G, J, Q, and T)

Doc Scratch

Yandere!Doc Scratch x Reader Headcanons [Yanyan-stuck]

Yandere Alphabet Headcanons (A, J, and N) [Yanyan-stuck]

🎱 Lord English

Yandere!Lord English x Reader Headcanons [Yanyan-stuck]

♠ Spades Slick

Yandere!Spades Slick x Reader General and NSFW Headcanons [Yanyan-stuck]

[skaianest]

Active VS Passive

If you take a look at most classpect / title / class / aspect tumblrs most describe whatever class they’re talking about as “active/passive x class” but most people when asked what active / passive mean in regards to homestuck don't seem to have a solid answer of what that even means. This is further exemplified when certain classes active/passive - ness is called into question. There is also an unknown scale to which every class is graded upon that is their activeness / passiveness which is also a topic of debate, The fact that there is a scale however also implies that there is a notable enough of a difference in activeness / passiveness in classes that is not only recognizable but also integral to the character. The most popular theories that I've seen as to what active / passive refer to is their capabilities and tendencies such as Active Classes force their aspect / Passive Classes are natural

Active Classes have to learn their aspect / Passive Classes are instinctual

and the biggest one I've seen is

Active Classes use their aspect selfishly / Passive Classes use their aspect for others.

now based on what I've read from homestuck and from the word of god, I'd say that that what activeness / passiveness refers to is in any situation how likely they are to act / react. and I believe one of the biggest misconceptions is that this does **not** only apply to their use of their aspect. In regards to your classpect (title) and how its shown in the story I believe it is a good idea to read the above linked post as it came from hussie himself and gives examples from within the story as well, but my interpretation of it is that active/passive is your class GOAL and may not accurately represent the character early in their arc (I.E rose is active early in the story but her class is passive and as soon as she becomes god tier she simmers down, the opposite can be said of jade who was passive but became active.)

Of course as stated in the above link that is only one distinctive difference in active/passive, as stated by calliope a rough starting point is that active classes tend to use their abilities selfishly and passive classes tend to use their abilities selflessly, this however as stated is a ROUGH STARTING POINT and not an absolute, this is likely because it can be difficult to interpret if an action is selfish or selfless, was aradia using countless aradiabots lives to simply buy time for her and her allies to escape from jack selfless because she did it for her allies? or selfish because she killed countless other timeline aradias to save herself? is vriska selfish for mind controlling the ghost army to fight lord english? or is it selfless because she knows she can't convince them and its the best bet against a multi-dimensional multi-timeline destroying demon and as we see in act 7 vriska confronts LE with the house juju, which shows she planned on fighting along side the ghosts on the front line and not letting them (double?) die instead of her.

and while we're led to believe most of the active/passive system is a list of tendencies and not absolutes I believe that going god tier may give you an instinctual realization of your class/aspect goals to some degree, Possibly over time through the accumulation of all of your alternative selves knowledge and prowess as seen in HS^2 with Dirk, or possibly somewhat immediately likely to help you be able to utilize your newfound abilities easier shown when Dave/Rose both go god tier and become more passive, or when jade goes god tier and becomes more active.

The best examples of active/passive would be Gamzee and Kurloz / Eridan and Cronus, When we look at these pairings we see or hear about them doing similar but notably different things.

Gamzee worships lord english and attempts to get his friends to believe in "MoThErFuCkIn mIrAcLeS" he later uses his aspect/highblood powers to psychologically torment terezi which leads to a kismesissitude and to her restoring her sight. Meanwhile Kurloz worships lord english and preaches about "messiahs" and "angels of double death" and later is shown to use his aspect/highblood powers to control meulins, his former matesprite, mind.

We see Eridan, a boy who does not believe in magic and he wishes to murder all "land dwellers", he constantly pursues other trolls into a black relationship, when he entered sburb he started killing the game constructs referred to as angels but doc scratch claimed (without naming him) that eridan was "taken under the wing of fearsome angels and learned to destroy hope with their light" and at some point he learnt a prophecy about the "lord of all angels" however disillusioned he believed the only hope was to join jack who he believed was the lord of all angels, soon after he believes in white science and gains a science wand. And lastly we see Cronus, a boy who truly believed in magic, He constantly pursued other trolls for a red romance and he attempted to feign suicidal threats to garner attention albeit to no avail. and at some point he learnt a prophecy from the game constructs known as angels to defeat an evil magician however disillusioned he no longer believes in magic at all.

The Active/Passive dichotomy has much more complexity then the things stated above however the extent and what that entails is honestly unknowable unless hussie comes out and confirms things, which I actually doubt he will ever do (make me eat my words hussie).

edit: I posted this at 12AM and believe I didn't do the debate quite the justice it deserved in regards to more specifics and what calliope has said in the comic, and so I am adding onto this.

[abundantchewtoys]

Homestuck Candy p1-4

So, finally we've found the time to start reading the other epilogue, aka the Candy path.

You'd think COVID19 would have given us plenty of opportunity already, and yet... we always managed to fill our spare time with other stuff, XD.

But I think it's fitting that we'd start reading again, 11 years to the day after Homestuck started. Especially with the cherub theme of the epilogues. Not just the meat/candy dichotomy, either - apparently the books solved by VIZ Media feature a black & white Sburb logo as the symbol for these epilogues!

I wonder what differences both paths are going to be showing, and what twisted parallels. Are Dirk & Alt Calliope fully replaced as antagonists by an alternate Caliborn and... somebody else?

Crack theory: the Davebot shown in the final page of the epilogues is from the Candy path. :P I'm working from the assumption that the Candy & Meat path will merge at some point, though the Meat path kind of feels "more canon" to me, but then I'm biased for having read it already. Under that light, it would make sense that the final page would feature characters from both paths - and the Jade we saw seemed to be the Meat version of her Game Over self.

But I wonder how much the Candy path is going to stray over to the "Diabetes" side. I mean, it's pretty much a given everything is going to turn out a lot sweeter, but we know from the Trickster arc that that could delve into uncanny territory as well, no problem.

It stands to reason that there's going to be different POVs we didn't have in the Meat path, but even then, I think events will turn out differently on Earth C too. For want of a nail and all. For want of a John, the election was lost. So maybe with his continued presence, Karkat will be able to win. Then again, a lot is going to depend on who's the narrator(s) of this path, too. Dirk and Rose's evolution isn't just going to go away, now, is it? Unless the narrator replacing them (mis)uses their powers to depower their expanding awareness, of course.

In more immediate future events, no points for guessing John's clothes are going to become sticky and rifled with sugar bits from all the candy he's about to consume.

---

Page 1

What the SHIT.

Hahahahh, and directly we get a reference to how this path might be less influential, with John feeling less substantial.

And this talk about splinters and splitting leaf veins, hahah. It's possible the splinters were referring to Dirk and how his relevance might have become nullified now. And the splitting how, even if this timeline doesn't contribute to canon, Paradox Space MIGHT NOT CARE.

But then.

Roxy opens up to John, and they (she?) confesses how she was hoping for him to stay. It's a valid point to make - if they're no longer relevant, what's the use in fretting about things.

Though, then Calliope asks something of John that turns everything upside down. John freeing Gamzee?? I wonder if that means only freeing him X thousand years in the future, or retcon zapping him to then, when he would find Caliborn & Calliope's egg.

The more I think about it, the more it seems fitting. Candy John takes care of loose ends "outside" of canon, on Earth C, while Meat John went back into canon. It sheds more of a surreal light on Caliborn & Calliope's session though - they found a way to "re-enter" canon on their own! Also, they contacted canon from outside it - making them even more of a symbol for Homestuck's fandom and hatedom!

Now, Blaperile seems convinced that Gamzee's going to be given the time to make up with his friends and then finds the "serenity" (pardon the phrase) he has when we see him on LOCAM. Yyyyes, I mean, I can see how that'd work, but I'm with John - whether it's time for forgiveness or not, he's still a murderclown, even if he was suffering from withdrawal symptoms from sopor slime at the time of said murders.

---

Page 2

Well that happened.

Dear god though.

For a full minute I was actually genuinely convinced Gamzee was sincere, but yeah, like John says by the end - it really feels performative.

But, why in the blazes did Candy John go into canon after all? Didn't they bring the fridge along, then? Boy, this marks yet another split timeline, I guess, since now the fridge didn't go through all that bullcrap during [S] Collide. It also made Gamzee's suffering in the fridge less painful, well, physically, by a certain margin.

But I guess he did have some trouble breathing in there. Still, that's karma, seeing as what he did to Equius.

Note!

John contacted Terezi, and from the sound of the conversation it didn't seem all that exceptional that he could! While in the Meat path, they seemed to have been out of touch for a long time. So, like, does the Candy path in reality diverge a lot earlier than the Meat/Candy choice? (Well, from a certain viewpoint, I guess you could say the path diverges from the moment John went back to LOTAK to steal Gamzee, in fact. If you ignore the fact Earth C is outside of canon. So for want of a clown, the canonicity was lost, I suppose.)

If not, does this mean that this Terezi is the same as the one Meat John found? I seem to recall Terezi making some kind of weird remark to John regarding the time she spent in the blank remnants of the Furthest Ring. Does it retroactively mean she was talking to Candy John all this time?

Or are there now two versions of post-Collide Terezi, too? Ugh, gonna have to follow the MST3K mantra I think.

Gotta say, I REALLY wasn't expecting John to message her, of all people, but he's right! If anyone knows how to feel about Gamzee in a similar way, it's definitely her.

So, Blaperile voiced the theory that maybe Candy Calliope turns out to narrate the Candy path, and with how vaguely sinister and mysterious she's behaving, I'm inclined to agree. What, does that mean that this version of Dirk is going to take over the narration from her at one point? It would also mean that, from a certain viewpoint, Dirk & Calliope were narrating the epilogues in the exact same manner, until the Meat/Candy diversion point. Since Doc Scratch is kind of the Calliope to Lord English's Caliborn, and he shares slime DNA with Calliope's body & Dirk's mind, that's not that far out there.

---

Page 3

Wow. Okay, I started to think we wouldn't get any reference to Dirk's Ultimate Self narrator-overtake shenanigans from the Meat path.

But no. It seems Dirk is fully aware that he's no longer in the "relevant" path, and he's actually quite hung up about it!

He apparently immediately gives up on everything - his political plans, his fights with Jake - but I wonder why?? Does he know, in some immeasurable way, that whatever the Candy path has to contribute to canon in the end, it isn't that?

He also seems to acknowledge something is dreadfully bad right now.

It will just have to turn out whether he means something besides his own grand plans not having a chance of working out - or not!

I'm looking forward to him explaining just how John's choice will have an effect on EVERY living being on Earth C, and what that effect could be. (Crack theory - irrelevance is going to slowly start turning all of their personalities into caricatures, flanderized Trickster-like semblance. :P I might not even be half wrong in this!)

Does this mean that Karkat will still run for presidency, even? Maybe him and Dave still hear about Jane's cancelled plans and are inspired? If so, I wonder what'd be the unintentional bad effects of Karkat's presidential turn.

---

Epilogue Two Page 4

Well, now, if there ever was a page seemingly MADE to be read after the Meat path, it sure is this one!

Seems like Dirk's influence, or at least a certain foreboding sense of danger and stress regarding Rose's illness, was already making Kanaya and Rose slowly drift apart.

I know we're going to be seeing bad influences from the Candy path in due time, but for now, at least this makeup scene helps as a reminder that, whereever Rose and Kanaya ended up during the Meat path, they still have a chance to make amends later. (I do wonder how Dirk and Rose's narrative influence is going to be dealt with in Homestuck 2.)

---

This seems like a good, lethargic cathartic place to stop reading. I hope we're in for 28 more pages, since if I counted correctly, it would mean Candy & Meat together would then count 64 pages, aka 8x8. (Or 8^y, where y=2.)

[the-hs-etaverse]

Homestuck Characters as Dwarf Fortress Patch Notes, Part 2

(Sources: x|x)

Part 1: x

Damara: Stopped elves from being pleased with unethical trades.

Rufioh: Cleaned up the bear situation.

Mituna: Adjusted value of bees.

Kankri: Seems impossible to satisfy a need for “introspection”.

Meulin: Tigerman does not have ears.

Porrim: Ghosts of vampires still drink blood.

Latula: Social skill gains by attending parties is off the charts.

Aranea: Stopped ghosts from maintaining secret identities.

Horuss: Fixed a bug with mules ****ting luggage.

Kurloz: Added an aperture flag that stops mouths from being gouged out.

Cronus: Humans in farming houses are naked.

Meenah: Stopped children from buying shops.

Calliope: Made dwarves care if you melt down their masterpieces.

Caliborn: Fixed problem with the king coming early and not actually showing up.

Doc Scratch: Demons masquerading as gods will try a little harder.

BONUS:

Rosemary: Allowed dwarves to get married.

Vrisrezi: Made thieves and their support groups respect each other.

All the kids: Stopped aerial births.

[classpectanon]

the lord and muse’s verb: command

obviously i’m like ten years late on the train here, mostly because i didn’t like the idea. it felt too simple for me, but nothing else really fit in the paradigm and we didn’t get a great enough sense of calliope’s powers to figure out where the muse fell, in my opinion.

now we do.

lords command, muses invite commanding. (epilogue spoilers ahead)

firstly, this excellent video by textalks is pretty much mandatory listening but if you dont want to i’ll summarize its salient points, namely that

a: each aspect stands for some kind of narrative or meta construct, in addition to its more obvious and literal meanings

b: those are as follows

light/void = where the plot is focused hope/rage = plot coherence/contrivance mind/heart = audience interaction (speculation/interpretation) blood/breath = narrative priority (character driven/plot driven) time/space = the "stage" (the sequence of events/the setting) you can't have a story without the place the story happens and the things that happen life/doom = character arcs (high points/low points)

obviously, we’re focusing on one pair in particular - time and space. the foundational building blocks of a story. the setting, and the things that happen in it.

caliborn as the lord of time commands the story’s sequence of events. he takes the narrator role, it is his influence that literally controls the entire story before it even starts (roundaboutly through time shenanigans), by permeating through the timeline he ensures that the sequence of events in the story has to be one that leads to his creation (and inevitable demise). he literally commands a bunch of time minions.

and through inversion rules (doing X does its inverted opposite), by commanding the sequence of events, he ends up inviting command of the setting, allowing entities like Doc Scratch (which, true, are partly him) to manipulate worldbuilding to his ends.

on her head, calliope doesn’t quite get this far, but that’s okay, because it’s really muse calliope we’re talking about here. there’s probably a bunch of muse of space shit she does, but the biggest, most absurdly literal is the creation of her snowglobe, the space that encapsulates all of noncanonicity (i.e, fanfiction). She is literally allowing others to command the setting - not only does Vriska imply that John is actually subconsciously controlling candy world even if he thinks he isn’t (with the added possibility that maybe others are doing so as well?), but she’s giving US, the READERS the possibility of commanding settings inside of her snowglobe.

and obviously, creating a story in them leads to the invention of a sequence of events. ;)

i will be making a masterpost about the other 22 muse/lord aspect combinations and how i believe they may be able to manifest on a structural and metanarrative level, so, stay tuned for that.

[pgenpod]

Aysha and optimisticDuelist join a grouchy Kate for a roundtable on Dirk Strider. Topics: Misandry. Catharsis. Foreshadowing of Dirk’s descent in Homestuck proper. Terepy Pipes. Ultimate selves. X-Men. Perspectives on Dirkjake. Ikuhara. Transphobia. “Redemption arcs.”  Hiveswap Act 2. Tyzias. AU fic. Doc Scratch and misogyny, Whistles: The Starlight Calliope.

[stonerpunk]

I got taaaaagged again, its under the read more !!

Tagged by @universe-in-reverse

Rules: choose any three fandoms (in random order) and answer the questions, then tag 10 people you want to know better

I choose:

>Persona 5

>Homestuck

>Gravity Falls

First character you loved:

>Akira Kurusu/Ren Amaiaaiaayaymaaianaya I’ve never stanned someone so strongly

>Jade Harley... a b e an

>Mabel Pines is also.... a  be an

The character you never expected to love so much:

>Ann Takamaki i was worried she be another of “those” characters atlus does but !!! I was proven wrong!! in the first palace at least :’)

>Karkat Vantas my boy was an asshole and he still is but in this house we love our asshole son

>Stanley Pines i fucking LOVE the development they gave him i would die for my fictional grunkle

The character you relate to the most:

>Akiraaaaaaaaaa i too am a nerd on the streets and a hoe in the metaverse sheets

>its a triple combo between Karkat, Dave Strider, and Aradia Megido...

>Maaaabel shes how i aspired to be when i was a teeny 12 year old

The characters you’d slap:

>MASOYOSHI SAMUEL SHIDO I HATE THIS BITCH !!!!

>fucking uuuuuuuuuuuh bro strider ngl 

>THAT YELLOW BITCH BILL WHAT A FU C K

Three favorite characters (in order of prefrence):

>(Why Must You Force Me To Rank My Kids) Akira, Ryuji, Ann

>Karkat, Dave, and a tie between Aradia and Feferi

>Mabel, Dipper, Stanley

A character you liked at first but don’t anymore:

>I honest to god loved Kawakami but god the fans ruined her for me i cant see her anymore without being reminded

>This one got me thinking cause ive grown to love a tiny bit of everyone, but the ones i hate ive always hated?? i guess Doc Scratch since he was Cool but then he was  A Fuck

>Same as above i love all of my kids

A character you did not like at first but now do

>Prooooobably Akechi, my boy is a boy i would not hesitate to throw off a cliff but id still be there to catch him and soothe him

>Caliborn? I thought he was just a piece of shit but hes also a real interesting character? i like him character wise, personality wise id deck him straight through his stupid fragile green skull bitch doesnt even drink MILK his bones are WEAK

>Stanford, he punched my boy stanley and someone doesnt just do that and get away with it, but ive grown to love my nerdy owl

Three otps:

>I will Not Lie Ann X Shiho is fucking endgame and Atlus is a company of cowards

>Roxy X Calliope X Jane my gorls

>uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh Soos x Melody such sweethearts <3

I taaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaag @maeveolent @thatbloodyginger @acuzia

[betweengenesisfrogs]

OTCHS FOLLOW-UP #1: HEARTS AND MINDS

So, Tumblr seems to have eaten the message, but re: my last post about the nature of the self, someone messaged me pointing out that I completely neglected to mention the Heart aspect, which basically represents the very thing I was talking about: the ur-Self! Which inspired some great reflections, so let’s touch on that before I drop eleven pages of Gnosticism on you later tonight. If that was you, please let me know so I can give you credit!

EDIT: Ah, I figured it out! It was homeschool-winner! Thank you for the terrific message! :)

So, in the past I wasn’t much for classpect analysis ‘cause I kinda saw people trying to use them predicatively, like “this will happen because Character X has Y classpect,” and there was always just such a wide range of interpretations available that any claim to certainty seemed a bit dubious. But now that Homestuck’s over, I find I’m fond of them, not as predictors but as tools for understanding all the weird symbols in Homestuck’s hyperflexible mythology.

I totally agree that Heart represents the Ur-Self. It clearly represents the soul, as Calliope tells us, and we see it on full display with Dirk’s ability to suck out souls (and put them in something else). He’s the Destroyer of Souls, and possibly also a destroyer by means of souls (by accidentally creating the Calsoul and thus Lord English? By duplicating his soul in the form of AR/Hal, whose soul is real enough to be part of a kernelsprite and the Calsoul?) Dirk fucks things up with/for souls. That’s pretty clear.

But these souls also seem to carry enough of their person’s qualities to represent their Ur-Self. LE certainly has qualities of all the people in the Calsoul. It seems pretty reasonable to interpret Heart as relating to people’s Self. That would make Dirk someone who destroys or suppresses Selfhood. Makes sense; Bro was certainly able to suppress Dave’s self, as we see it emerging by the ending. And LE’s Hal definitely comes out in Doc Scratch’s manipulations, which serve to rob others of their agency. So it checks out.

I really love the way souls are represented in the SBURB Glitch FAQ/Replay Value AU (which is an awesome AU, btw, y’all should check it out), where they’re nicknamed shinies, and basically everything has one. They’re the code for rocks or grass or game objects or people, and Heart Players can mess with them as one of their means of exploiting the game engine to compensate for bugs like the debug menu in a Bethesda Game. It’s awesome.

Imagine a game engine that calls up individual manifestations of you, which behave like different entities but they’re all called from one base file that’s copied and modified for different circumstances. That might be the kind of game we’re working with here.

But no classpect is ever just one thing, right? That’s what’s fascinating about them, they’re often multiple meanings fused fluidly together. Light is Luck, but also Information, Knowledge. Even Time and Space have subtler qualities. So I think we need to look at the Leijons as well.

When we first hear about Heart, it seems like it might be a silly, power of heart aspect, right? Because we (all too easily) dismiss Nepeta, and see Heart as just meaning love, meaning Nepeta’s shipping.

But I’m gonna say that Shipping, Self, and Agency all roll together into one concept called Heart. By pairing people up, Nepeta is exploring compatibilities among archetypal versions of people. Terezi fits with Dave in some ways, and Vriska in others. A Rogue of Heart might be able to move people around to their benefit to find better combinations. (A Thief of Heart would of course ship people for her own benefit rather than theirs, a classic seducer and heartbreaker...but maybe she’d also be someone who could steal a literal soul.) Meulin does this too, but more directly, as matchmaker more than shipper (the Mage at work). Heck, I think Davepeta’s very existence is a strong argument for this, right? The fusion of Nepeta and Davesprite’s souls created one hell of a positive, affirming combination. Like a bird and cat-themed Garnet. Meanwhile LE’s souls amplify a monster.

So yeah, in Homestuck Heart means: Soul + Self + Agency over Events+ Compatibility + Love.

Thinking about Heart also got me thinking, interestingly, about Mind. They’re an obvious aspect pair, right? One is the soul and one is the brain, duh. But I was never able to explain them on a larger level than that.

And then just now I got it. Because Mind in Homestuck means Choice. We see this everywhere in Homestuck. Terezi’s Mind abilities allow her to see what choices people will make and how to get the best results from them, to the point where she can use people’s choices to defy luck. Her retcon arc (which I will talk about in so, so much depth later) is about rewriting her own choices, or really giving herself the freedom to make new ones. Meanwhile, Latula uses her own choices as a shield but can easily interpret the choices her peers made as the Ancestors.

So, like Time and Space, Light and Void, and so on, Heart and Mind are a balanced pair where the further you go from one, the closer you move into the other. Heart is your Self and your role in the cosmos altogether. Mind is the individual choices you make to differentiate yourself from all your other selves! Heart is what’s consistent across all timelines, Mind is what makes individual timelines exist! Heart is Dave-ness; Mind is the difference between Doomed Dave, Dave, and Davesprite. Heart is what’s unchangable about you; Mind is what’s changing. Every self matters, but so, too, does the eternal Self

You could almost think of it as if Heart’s your base stats in a video game, and Mind’s the stat boosts you gain a long the way. Say, Pokemon. I bet Terezi would be really good at EV training. >:)

Hell, this even gets spelled out for us! Remember how Karkat introduced the concept of different game sessions to us?

CG: TRY TO THINK MORE ABSTRACTLY. CG: THINK ABOUT VIDEO GAMES. CG: WHAT'S AN EARTH GAME YOU LIKED TO PLAY? CG: NAME ONE. EB: ummmm... EB: crash bandicoot? CG: OK I DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT IS, BUT I HAVE A FEELING IT'S A REALLY LAME EXAMPLE, BUT THAT'S FINE, IT'S NOT THE POINT. CG: SO LET'S SAY YOU PLAY YOUR BANDICOOT AND I PLAY MY BANDICOOT. CG: THEY ARE ESSENTIALLY THE SAME BANDICOOT, SAME APPEARANCE AND DESIGN AND BEHAVIORS. CG: BUT THEY ARE STILL COMPLETELY SEPARATE BANDICOOTS ON SEPARATE SCREENS. CG: SO WE BOTH HAVE OUR OWN ASS BANDICOOTS TO OURSELVES, THE SAME BUT DIFFERENT. CG: OUR JACKS ARE THE SAME BUT DIFFERENT TOO. CG: SAME GUY, DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES AND OUTCOMES.

Think of all the Dersites and Prospitians, and all the different roles they take on. Jack and all his gang and even WV and PM at different points in their history. Funnily enough, in many ways the players of the Game have a lot in common with its NPCs.

We are all our own individual Bandicoot, yet still part of the much larger Bandicoot that makes us who we are.

Which means that Heart and Mind aren’t just any other aspects. They tie very directly into one of the biggest thematic concerns of Homestuck itself!

That’s so freaking cool!

So yeah, thanks so much for this insight! :D

(PS: Also, I really dug the point that the ur-Self could be described as the Platonic Self, that the “archetypes” I keep talking about really resemble Plato’s theory of Forms. A connection that’s worth checking out, especially when Dirk, Prince of Heart  has the username timaeustestified, a reference to a major Platonic Dialogue. Dirk is the Platonic Form. It’s him. Thanks for that insight, too!)

[raguna-blade]

Homestuck And Colors

This is very much a ramble and I’d like you to stick with me through this if you have any interest in homestuck. Otherwise feel free to vamoose, as i’m sure this will make less than reasonable sense. So, Some time back I realized there was this interesting thing going on with the the characters, and those tied to...I suppose one of four archetypes. Not the classpect system, although that’s probably relevant too though i haven’t put much effort into examining that yet, but rather, throughout homestuck there are certain colors that we come to associate to mean certain things or link with certain characters. I mean that’s obvious right? it is painfully obvious. But what struck me as weird specifically is that there seemed to be this weird little thing where two of the most important and demonstrably powerful characters in the story have pretty direct color ties to two of our leads in the shape of the beta kids. And obviously, these are Jade and Callie and Dave and Caliborn. Or Green and Red Respectively. And I thought, huh, that’s interesting and kind of weird, so I decided to do a little mental digging to see if there is any such link for the other two. John was easy, because he demonstrably becomes by the end of the story one of the out and out most powerful individuals period what with his ability to just fuck off and do whatever the hell he wants in regards to time travel and monkeying with stuff. Sure, there are probably limits to that, but we haven’t seen them, and it gives him a level of agency that is simply absurd considering the rules that seem to govern time travel for literally everyone else, include the basically deific figure of Lord English. But purple...That is Roses color seems...Missing. There doesn’t seem to be anyone who maps to that quite as well, in the sense of demonstrating ridiculous and game breaking power, especially in her particular shade. An argument could be made for the Jasprose I suppose, but perhaps a more obvious one MIGHT be Gamzee, given that it is through his actions (and seeming flouting of the rules that everyone else has to deal with) that causes things to roll out the way they do in large part. For the precise moment I’ll give it to him, but I’m unsure given a bit of distance since I last properly read homestuck, and the fact that this entire thought is kind of just loosely connected in general for the moment. Still. That raises a question though, in that ok, so there seems to be a color link between the four beta kids, and the most powerful individuals in the story (or perhaps most influential?) So what. It’s a neat parallel I suppose, and it does link X with Y to an extent, so maybe that deserves some looking into (especially considering one is literally just linking with himself, although I suppose you could also consider the other big blue being skaia itself which has it’s own curious implications given that Skaia very much does seem to want everyone to do their own thing and Breath as an Aspect, and John as perhaps the most well versed and active user of it, would suggest the proper y would be Skaia which...Not unreasonable I suppose) And welll I suppose I spoiled it a bit, but I guess the point I’m getting to is that fundamentally each of these colors SEEMS to have some some...coding? Coding with roles and abilities within the story. To whit, Blue seems to be the color of agency. You could say it’s the protag color, or the color of those who actually act and influence things. That is, personally. It doesn’t quite ripple out beyond others, beyond what a given person does with their agency, But it does seem a little obvious to my sitting that Blue coded characters tend to have, through their own action/inaction, HUGE influence on the plot (see Vriska, Roxy once she embraces the void). Red then, is probably the counterpoint to that. Perhaps appropriately, given their usual opposition Now while the comic does go to lengths to point out Red and Green as Opposing, especially with the Calliope/Caliborn goings on, it also very clearly demonstrates that they are super complementary, if not necessary for each other. Literally in the case of the cherubs with their predomination dealie deal, They complete each other. Not so much in the case of red and blue though. Where Blue is Agency, Red seems to be...Setting the stage? The Environment? No, perhaps more accurate, the chain of cause and effect? Fallout I suppose. Where Blue concerns itself with the YOU CAN ACT, Red concerns itself more with AND HERES WHATS GOING TO HAPPEN. Now it doesn’t hurt that two of the big red characters we know of are Time Aspects (Dave and Caliborn) but the chain of cause and effect does fit pretty well with other red coded characters, Such as Aradia(another time character) and Karkat(whose blood coding does put him in opposition with the breath aspect, but he does very well at actually dealing with the consequences of his and others actions for better or worse, and one could read his directing of others towards doing various things very much in line with, if a much reduced form of, Lord Englishes ensuring everything goes to plan.) Green then is...I suppose it’s stage setting? Although that’s not quite right either. The major characters connected with green are obviously Jade, Calliope, but you really can’t forget any of the cherub forms, Doc Scratch, and several others who are tied with space...But really I say stage setting, but in keeping with the kind of complimentary thing going on with Red, rather than the stage it’d perhaps be more accurate to say green seems to deal with what is actually there. The rules, the tools available. Setting yes, perhaps in keeping with the space aspect that seems to run close to the heart, but it’s how things connect and run together essentially. Here is the ABC for Things to happen to I suppose. Which leaves us with Purple, which bugs the hell out of me because Purple seems, but the logic and rules i’m more or less working with as I presently understand it, leaves it with...Anti Agency. Inagency. One or something that is acted upon which feels...Very strangely off to me, even if it does seem to fit well, and even does the complentary but opposite thing that red green does with blue purple. But....Buuuuuuuuut.... That seems wrong and super off to suggest that Rose Get’s the, in the what I’m connected to olympics and all, the role of acted upon. It may be a reasonable conclusion, but it still gnaws as wrong, especially considering that by and large i’m not wholly convinced that my options of Apex Purple character are at all correct or even accurate. One could point to Jasprose, and that would probably make a great deal of sense except that she feels...Not quite as built up as the others? The rules of purple seem to elude me, and it really may be just that obvious. Also somewhat annoying, is that purple is basically what you get when you combine blue and red, which suggests some kind of influence there (even if you want to read roses color more as pink thats still a pretty purplish pink I think) It feels off to not include her, but at the same time, what inclusion she has does seem to point to well...the acted upon. Especially considering what goes down with all those who are coded purple (basically pick one and they get manipulated one way or the other)...Although maybe rather than a lack of agency, it’d be better to say they’re a reactive force? I dunno. I’ll probably revisit this whenever I get around to rereading homestuck. For now, if you read this far, hope you had fun, and if it jogged something in your head feel free to share. Cause it ain’t like there’s only 4 colors anyway...

[mmmmalo]

I am now beginning Homosuck (A6A6), the most important part of the story.

HE BECAME A GOD TIER OBVIOUSLY. IT WAS EASY, INVOLVING A TRIVIAL ACT OF SELF SUICIDE. IT WAS NOT A VERY BIG DEAL AT ALL. THAT'S WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU'RE THE BEST. YOU BECOME THE BEST THING QUITE CASUALLY. AND OFF SCREEN. LIKE IT'S NOT EVEN THAT IMPORTANT.

I wonder if Caliborn lied about going god tier, like Gamzee... this all just sounds kind of insecure and defensive (though he could just be embarrassed about how it occurring off screen damages his credibility). Just before this act started, Aranea was going on about how Caliborn was pathologically incapable of choosing the path of the martyr (ie self-sacrifice, ie suicide), that the Choice to him was not really a choice at all... and it would be a decent primer for further distortion as Homosuck continues.

But then again, Aranea’s contention is kind of challenged by the way Caliborn killing Calliope (and Hussie-as-Calliope) is already coded as a suicide of sorts? So I’m at a loss... I’ll hold out for further developments, but his might be a point where reduction into the suicide-framework stops being useful.

I WISH I WAS MAKING THIS UP. I REALLY DO.

Ambiguity! Though ostensibly an expression of Caliborn’s contempt for the ridiculous world he’s describing, HE REALLY DOES wish he had created Homestuck -- that’s the whole conceit of Homosuck, right? Mocking imitation of the original (to prove he is above it) that nonetheless contains traces of envy, kind of like Doc Scratch (x).

YOU NOTICE BY NOW MY STORY TELLING GENIUS. I DREW MY PUPPET. AND I DREW HIS ROOM. AND THAT'S IT. NOW ALL I HAVE TO DO IS MOVE HIM AROUND THE ROOM AND MAKE HIM DO MEANINGLESS THINGS FOR "LAUGHS". BUT THE REALLY FUNNY THING IS? THE LAUGHTER IS MOSTLY COMING FROM ME

I’m sure there’s a better example but as far as I can remember, this is the loneliest thing I’ve ever heard Caliborn say.

[mmmmalo]

Why did Rose stock B2 Roxy's room with liquor?

I have no clue about her motivations whatsoever, but I can speculate on the symbolism a bit.

Since house represent heads, and liquor is a Void symbol, you could maybe go from loading a house with liquor to loading a head with Void? Which depending on your framing, could be read as 1. a dramatization of Rose “hiding” things from Roxy, including herself (scare quotes because characterizing Rose’s silence as an imposition of Void is not a neutral act) or 2. a suggestion that Rose has erased part of Roxy’s mind (in the same way that Gamzee used Equius’s Void-associated blood when blacking out Calliope’s copy of Homestuck). I’m more interested in 1 personally, since A. making alcohol both a symptom and symbol of neglect feels very Homestuck and B. we were recently talking about silence-as-aggression in relation to Rose and Jade (x), and the way that topic lends itself to miscegenation jokes could offer another reading of Roxy’s “barkley not too big” typo. But Act 6 also hints at whispered memories of pre-Scratch lives haunting everyone, so I can’t exactly rule out 2.

Another approach would be to regard Rose as more of a lusus than a person, thereby folding her into Roxy’s own psyche. This would make Rose supplying Roxy with alcohol somewhat akin to Spidermom compelling Vriska to murder kids – the guardian becomes an abstracted representation of the addiction. Which would imply that Roxy is the sort of person who would buy a bunch of alcohol on impulse, feel overwhelmed by all the alcohol she bought, then drink it anyway to spite her past self? This isn’t an assertion, just an exploration of what this framing could yield. I will say though, if we’re humoring the idea that alpha!Rose and Condy are to Roxy as Spidermom and Scratch are to Vriska, the empress’s acronym HIC (non-coincidentally, also the noise drunk Rose makes) could support the notion that the guardians can function as figures of addiction, just as Rose uses the phrase “scratching the itch” to describe the drive for truth* that eventually leads her to Doc Scratch.

…now that I’ve said all that, I’m actually really into how neatly this merges Rose and Condy, to the degree that they exist as figures of Roxy’s psyche? Wahoo