Eight Kids Vaccine Thread: All Eight Kids, All The Time (The Kids Thread)

[Conspicuous]

You do not like the realization that she's actually a very messed up girl, who grew up isolated from society and basically knew four people?

[colwag]

Yeah.

The idea that she managed to stay mostly together, save some awkward cultural misunderstandings, is one of the cool things about her.

Ending up in a bad situation and being pretty okay despite it all. Except she's not as okay as I thought?

[Conspicuous]

None of them are, they're basically 13 year old children who are forced to go through a lot of shit, the fact that they didn't all break down sobbing is a testament to their fortitude and friendship.

[nostalgebraist]

One of the things I've always wondered is just what Jade did with all her time.

Like, she clearly didn't go to school. After her grandpa died, her only real-life friend was a wordless dog. Did she just spend all of her time on the internet? How would a person whose only human contact has happened through the internet behave? Probably not like Jade, right?

In terms of her behavior, she's if anything the most "normal" of the kids, yet she had by far the least normal upbringing and it's weird that we don't see more of the effects of that.

This is probably one of the things the story will just never go into because it's a cartoon and it's not meant to be thought about in this manner. But feel free to point out if I'm getting anything wrong.

(I guess I've always just figured that she just spent a huge amount of time asleep, and lived most of her life on Prospit, which is why it's such a psychological hit when her dream self dies, and why she might be happier and more "complete" now that she's merged with her dreamself. But then it's kind of funny that, due to the incomplete connection between dream and waking selves, we don't really see the effects of her spending lots time on Prospit.)

[Bandages]

They all pretty much completely trust each other, with the exception of dave being a bit snoopy (lol), but that's probably just a little paranoia from the dreams about death and the constant asskickings his bro performed on him.

Compare that to the four new kids, and they're all at least somewhat mistrusting of each other. Jane flat out didn't believe anything Roxy told her until the legitimacy of her claims were proven much later.

[Conspicuous]

She probably did a lot of self-study, given that she has shown to be a pretty good scientist.
And I don't know if living with the Propitians would work out, they act mostly human, but culturally they're centred around a futile quest, knowing that they always lose.

Jade ended up to be rather silly, but not what I would consider ill-adjusted, it's possible that Grandpa left her a lot of books on human etiquette, but even then she'd lack the social grace most people have.

Although we might see more of that now that she's on the ship with other people, I'd consider it a fun avenue to see explored.

They all pretty much completely trust each other, with the exception of dave being a bit snoopy (lol), but that's probably just a little paranoia from the dreams about death and the constant asskickings his bro performed on him.

Compare that to the four new kids, and they're all at least somewhat mistrusting of each other. Jane flat out didn't believe anything Roxy told her until the legitimacy of her claims were proven much later.

Well, John didn't really trust Dave about the future self thing until he remembered Dave was supposed to be his best bro, but yeah, the old kids had a far stronger bond from what I could tell.
But then again, they didn't have the whole romance stuff to deal with.

And Dave's probably the one kid who trusts his friends to a fault. When John told him Rose's house was on fire and he had to connect to her to save her, he believed John in an instant.
He's pretty much the grand marshal of gross chumpage.

[Ace of Dark-Hearts]

Go for it, the character analyses are why I enjoy this thread so much.
I'd be interested in seeing your take on the characters.

Thanks, also FTFY.

Pfft, challenge accepted.

I guess since I just made a favorite characters list and Karkat ended up on the top I'll do him.

I just wrote a paragraph, and realized this is the EIGHT KIDS THREAD...

Okay so...how about Rose? She is my favorite kid and seems like a generally untouched upon character.

Rose is shown to be a snarky know it all. She is excessively verbose and is very intelligent. For some reason she constantly feels the need to make sure everyone knows this, even in the casual setting of an IM service. At first Rose seems like she doesn't like pranks, playing games, or telling silly jokes.

Later on in her introduction we are given a little bit of intell on Rose's interests. She seems to genuinely enjoy being creative, but is very shy about it, even in the safety of her own home. Rose(/the narrator) then reluctantly admits that she likes to play in video games with her friends from time to time. This initially striked me as kind of contradictory because of her harsh nature and dislike torwards pranks and other things like that.

Later on in the story, she just can't help but satisfy her urge to be silly with the magnetic W. This is a big moment, because it shows that Rose actually does enjoy being silly, she just makes sure to never let is show in front of her friends.

Then we learn about Mom. Rose avoids (sorry) Mom throughout most of her pre-entry period. Rose is obsessed with passive aggressive campaigns of one-up-man-ship, that probably only existed in her head. She basically interprets every single gesture by Mom as passive aggressive. Why would Rose be blowing shit out of proportion like this? She sees herself as cynical and sarcastic, and doesn't like it. She doesn't like herself. So what the next best thing besides self deprecation? Projection. She projects all of the things she dislikes about herself onto Mom.

Rose's entry cruxite artifact was the bottle, which symbolized a leap of faith and trust in her friends. This is one of Rose's biggest challenge. She is so self conscious about her (figurative) appearance to her friends that she can't bring herself to trust anyone. She is afraid that if she reveals the silly Rose who likes to play video games to her friends that they might think less of her, and her intelligence (which is probably one of of the only things she credits herself at being good at).

When Rose loses Mom, she is devastated. She admits to Jade that feeling concern and going to look for her Mom would have been the normal thing to do. She finally starts to realize how ridiculous this whole charade was. Without Mom to project upon anymore, Rose finally feels the burden of all of the things she dislikes about herself pile on top of her at once. She was at her wit's end. During this moment emotional susceptibility, Doc Scratch easily manipulated Rose into going grimdark.

After her episode at Skaia, John kisses Rose and she ends up at Derse with Dave. She doesn't care about dying anymore. She is so self loathing at this point she'd rather fly the moon to the green sun by herself and be done with the whole thing. And she does. She tells Dave not to come because she wants to do something important, instead of just being the brains of the operation for once. Dave doesn't listen. He comes anyway and proves to Rose that she can trust her friends. She realizes that John and Dave have both come through as friends.

All in all, her problems are pretty similar to Dave when you take a step back.

Am I doing it right?

[Conspicuous]

Am I doing it right?

Yes, I found it quite an enjoyable read, it gave me a few things to think about.

Although I'd like to add a few things:

Rose absolutely won't give up, even when she realizes that their session is completely fucked, she will do anything to succeed.

This later leads her to trusting only herself, while she's consorting with entities far beyond her capabilities, ignoring her friends, while believing she can outwit Doc Scratch.
She starts working with everyone on a need-to-know basis, telling John only to get the Tumor without telling him what it is.
She will do anything to accomplish her goals, but she only trusts herself to go through with it, Dave was convinced he'd get to pilot the moon, but Rose tricked him and took the mission for herself, telling Dave to return to Jade and John.
In the end, she still has to learn to trust her friends to help her, because while she definitely cares about them deeply, she does not seem to be aware that they care just as much about her.

[heretherebemonsters]

Sorry, taking the thread back a bit, but...

Bro dies (sword imagery happens, which would require a completely separate essay to dissect)

...

The second is, I think, more significant since that's the last time Dave actually interacts with his Bro alive, the origin of the broken record imagery in Homestuck, and the origin of the broken sword imagery in Dave (not to mention the whole "half of a hero" thing). Probably more, too.

Actually, can we talk about the motif of broken things with Dave, because I've always found that really interesting.

Well, his brother dying probably didn't help at all. Although I doubt he'd be so open anyway, he's a Strider. They tend to play things cool.

Yeah, but Dirk is a lot more genuinely inscrutable than Dave ever was. He's better at it.

[deathsbuddy]

I may do that tomorrow. Don't count on it.

[unbeliever536]

So, I finally figured out John the other day. He is the opposite of a stereotypical teenager: instead of refusing responsibility and demanding to be treated as though he is a responsible person, John insists on taking responsibility and then vigorously denies that he has. This is why he comes up with so many ways (in addition to his assigned role) to help with the Green Sun plan, and yet insists that he is not a leader. In a way, John is to leadership as Dave is to heroism.

Also, here's an essay on John's weapons I wrote in the symbolism thread:

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Let's try John.

John is the Heir: a receiver. He (very unlike the others) receives help at every step of his quest: a highly active sprite, versus useless or much subtler sprites; a helpful and informative exile, versus useless or absent exiles; two extremely helpful trolls (Terezi got him the rocketpack and maps, plus the aid of several other characters), versus (except Terezi) trolls that must be cajoled into helping, if they can be. John even recieves the help of Dr Meowgon Spengler and all of his group's guardians in what is arguably the most pivotal moment of his quest: ectobiology and subsequent ectobiolobabysitting.

John's first "received" weapon is Fear No Anvil, from Dave, a Derse dreamer. Fear No Anvil is a few things. First, it is the most powerful weapon Alternate Future Dave has seen, well beyond Caledfwlch or Caledscratch; it is the weapon of a Denizen. Second, it is a tool. Hephaestus is a blacksmith; Fear No Anvil is the hammer with which he performs his role and probably the hammer that turns the broken Caledfwlch into the whole Royal Deringer. Third, it is representative of Dave's power: it can freeze enemies in time. Fear No Anvil is representative of (1) John's great power, (2) John's responsibilities as Leader, and (3) the assistance John has received from his friends (especially Dave). John loses Fear No Anvil when he is killed on his quest bed. This is followed by a number of periods of goofing around, doing personal things and generally not being the Leader, with a single exception that will come back in a bit.

John's next received weapon is the Warhammer of Zillyhoo, a colorful and toylike hammer, reminiscent of an inflatable toy given to a toddler. He gets it most directly from Jade (particularly, Jade before the death of her dreamself), and less directly from Jake and either his future self or Gamzee. In any event, all are Prospit dreamers. Zillyhoo represents John's whimsy and childishness. Most of all, Zillyhoo is John the Friend, the face John wears when he doesn't need to be the Leader (or Derpface John).

Next up we have the Needlekind Specibus, Rose's final gift. Rose is, of course, a Dersite. Needles are, again, a tool. However, they are a softer tool. For Rose, they are a tool used in a hobby craft, not a job, as with Hephaestus's hammer. In further contrast, knitting needles cannot be used to make weapons of war, as a blacksmith's hammer can. Receiving the needlekind is an important part of John's mission, but it is not the most difficult and does not really involve John's powers, the way every other portion of his mission does. Here we begin to see a blend of roles: a tool, necessary for the mission, but not a tool that can only be used for the mission.

Almost immediately afterward, Vriska, a Prospitan, gives John her Fluorite Octet. The Octet are certainly not a tool of work, but they are not exactly a toy either. The dice are a tool of play, used by people ranging from mature children up into adulthood. Vriska, note, is the precipitator of that moment of seriousness mentioned above: she gets John back on task with the retrieval of the Tumor. However, she tells him to do it in the language of games. She tells him to "8e Cre8ive". Likewise, the receipt of her dice is followed by John's long and windy journey. The journey is fun, but also important, since it is presumably during this journey that John retrieves the items he needs from his corpse, and he winds up on LOHAC, where he can scout for his coming battle at Beat Mesa. The Fluorite Octet is combined with the Warhammer of Zillyhoo on this journey, creating the Popamatic Vrilly-Hoo Hammer and completing what I will call the Gift of Prospit. With the Popamatic, John has an expression of everything good from the childhood he is leaving behind: his creativity, his great potential (from the dice, which deal variable damage), and his inherent friendliness.

John's last gift, the Needles of Echidna (another Denizen level weapon), come from Jade, but it is not the same Jade that gave him the Warhammer of Zillyhoo. This Jade dreams not on Prospit, but in the Furthest Ring. In many ways, she has moved closer to Dersite "alignment." She is far more serious than the Jade that gave him Zillyhoo, far more focused on her plan to save the session and players. In many ways, she is now like Rose. The Needles this new Jade gives to him allow John to fulfill his mission, but again they are not the element that requires John particularly. These Needles, coming from a Jade who has become close to Derse, are a Dersite gift: they are a gift of responsibility, leadership, and adulthood.

I predict that during the Intermission that just began, John will combine the Needles of Echidna and Fear No Anvil, completing the Gift of Derse. With this weapon, John will have an expression of all the good he will find in the adulthood he is fast approaching: responsibility, great personal power, and the ability to direct the great powers of his friends and allies. He will return to the dual hammer style of [s] Enter and [s] Act 4, wielding the Gifts of Prospit and Derse together, uniting his adult and child sides and playing the role of Friend and Leader as one.

Basically, John's arc =/= done.

[deathsbuddy]

For those of us who don't hate that one Rose and Dave impending doom arc
this is definitely worth a listen

[Conspicuous]

Because when you're faced with your impending death, it's a good time to break out into song.

It was pretty good, though.

[Tirgo]

roxy/john

discuss

[Conspicuous]

roxy/john

discuss

In which infiniquant?

or ?

[deathsbuddy]

I ship em in

(The Dave in the emoticon represents Roxy, obviously)

[Conspicuous]

I ship em in

(The Dave in the emoticon represents Roxy, obviously)

Well yeah, who did you think Dave got the attitude from?

[deathsbuddy]

Hahahahaha, Freud.

[Conspicuous]

When Roxy wakes up in A6A3 we'll get to see her hit on Dave.

No doubt about it.

[MQuinny1234]

It'll be perfect just to see him look at the floor in self-loathing as he debates whether or not to flirt back for half-ironic laughs or just spill.

[Conspicuous]

In line with my earlier musings, I'm going to continue analyzing Jade here, because quite frankly, I find her a highly interesting and complex character, who's often underappreciated amongst the fandom.

Jade has always been a somewhat inaccessible character, she doesn't nearly have the storyline focus the other character have and she only entered the game during Act 5 Act 2.
Given that generally, their entry is when a character's arc really starts moving, her character arc took a long time to reach the point where she would really be confronted with her flaws and insecurities, giving us the appearance of her as a character who isn't as interesting as the others.

Jade is a very complex character.
On one hand, she is strong-willed and brave; on the other hand she is emotionally vulnerable.
On one hand, she can be gentle and kind to people she cares for, on the other hand she can be hostile and cold to those she does not.
On one hand, she is self-reliant and capable; on the other hand she needs the support from her friends to keep herself together.
On one hand, she is smart and great at understanding things and people; on the other hand, she is bad at understanding herself.

As with most characters, Jade generally gets generalized into just a few character traits, either she's weak and helpless girl who needs someone to come save her, or she's the always happy and cheerful girl, who has absolutely no problems whatsoever.
Jade is far more than that, however. She is strong and capable, smart and wise, gentle and reassuring.
But she is also incredibly messed up. She's not okay; she has her own insecurities, her own fears, her own vulnerabilities.
It's all a part of her character, she is complex and multilayered and I will attempt to explain some of her character here.

Jade's childhood was always very interesting to me, as her life was completely different from the others.

Jade's childhood
After her Grandpa died, she had to raise herself. She would be forced to mature at a very young age. Although Becquerel would keep her safe and serve as her Guardian, he's still just a dog and wouldn't quite be able to raise her as human could.
There was no-one to teach her, to help her, there was only herself and Becquerel, and she would have to learn everything herself, from securing meals to learning how to take care of her home, from avoiding danger to learning how to use rifles, from living alone to meeting people on the internet. She would have to go through life all on her own, lacking anyone to teach her. She was forced to become self-reliant, dealing with all her problems on her own, while she was still but a child.
This would all leave a strong mark on her, she would solve her problems herself, after all, there was no-one but her to do so.
She wouldn't wait to someone to help her; she would face her problems head on, to learn to deal with them herself. She would grow up to be a strong and self-reliant individual, who has no place for weakness or fear; she wouldn't tolerate those qualities in herself. They are weak, they are for pansies, and they wouldn't help her with anything. She would take those feelings and lock them away, they had no place in her life and she wouldn't let herself be brought down by them.

In time, she would wake on Prospit, where she would gain the guidance of the clouds; she would learn what was to come, and what would need to be done to accomplish this.
She would meet with the Queen, who told her of her destiny, that she would one day become a hero, to create a new world together with her friends.
She would learn that she could bring her Grandpa back to life when she would play the game, that she would meet her friends in person, that she would do great things and create a new future for everyone.

She would spend much of her life guided by the clouds, her life was already written, and she would follow the path laid out for her.
She would spend much time preparing for the future, setting up the game, to ensure that what was written would come to pass.
She would bear her burden in stride, she wouldn't complain about having to live all by herself, to deal with everything on her own. She would grow to be very responsible, to always take great care of everything.
She would always take great care of the things around her, to set things up so that everything functions as it should, she placed her life on strict rails and would ensure that her future was safe and stable.
This is perhaps most notably shown in the differences between her and Jake. Where Jade would take great care of her tower, to keep it in perfect condition, Jake would let it fall into decay, to let the pumpkins grow across the entire island, turning it into a jungle. Jake would consider it an adventure, he would adapt to his environment, rather than control his environment to his liking, as Jade did.

She would meet with the Prospitians, who are all simple being, driven by a single goal for each of them.
They are driven by their duty, to fulfil their purpose as the kingdom meant for failure.
Their devotion to duty would shape Jade greatly; she too would dutifully serve her purpose, to fulfil the path laid out for her. In this regard, she is similar to Kanaya, the troll young Prospit waker. They would both care greatly for their duties, to fulfil them and bring them to pass.
However, there would be one significant difference between her and the Prospitians.
Her future would carry hope, not hopelessness. She was promised a lot by the game. She would meet her friends, create a new future. She would also be able to return her Grandpa back to life. She would no longer have to live alone; she would finally have what every normal kid had. Her life would lead her to do great things, and she would get everything she wanted.
And yet, she too would carry a grim fate with her. She would know that she would have to die, as her dead dream self stood in the attic. She wasn't aware that her dream self would die separately from her, she believed it would be her own death, that although she would find happiness in the game, it would not last and she would ultimately die.
Despite her knowledge of her ultimate fate, she would never despair; she would lock her sadness away, and refuse to lose hope despite knowing full well what fate would await her. She would put on a brave smile and work to secure the future, regardless of what was to come.

She would learn that there were others like her, each a prince or princess of the moon, who would share the same fate as she has.
She would eventually meet these people over the internet, where they would become her closest friends.
She would meet with the open and honest John, whom she would keep in the dark about her dreams, as she knew he would eventually have those as well.
She would meet with the elegant yet distant Rose, who would perpetually try to find out the truth behind the workings of Jade's dreams.
She would meet with the cruel-tongued, yet constantly concerned Dave, who would pretty much take everything at face value.
She would also meet with her pen pal, Jake, who would become the closest thing to family that she had. He would bring with him the promise of family, that she would meet someone she would fall in love with and that she would raise children and start a family herself.

She would grow close to these four people; they would all become her friends, and serve as her social circle. Though she could not meet them in person yet, she would know that she'd gain the chance to finally meet them during the game.

Not all of her contact with the outside world would prove pleasant however, throughout her life she would continually be contacted by the trolls, who were rather rude and mean-spirited.
Especially the one known as Karkat would torment her throughout the years, she would prove to be rather hostile towards him, refusing to listen to anything he would say.
Even though not all of them were hostile towards her, she would consider them all loathsome, that they were all just out to ruin her life.

Her lack of direct human contact would have her end up with strong emotional responses towards people.
She was amongst the most pleasant and caring of people towards those she cared for and were nice towards her, and she would be hostile and harsh to those who weren't nice towards her.
She wouldn't put up with people who would wrong her, she would call them out on their behaviour immediately and refuse to accept their shit.
This can be seen in the way she would call out Dave, Karkat, Eridan and Tavros on their actions.

Sburb
She would ensure that everything was in place for the game to begin.
She would set up the delivery of John's package to her past self, ensuring that WV and PM would be able to receive and send it to the right time and place.
She would sacrifice her treasured stuffed bunny, collaborating with Jake to ensure John's safety.
She would convince Rose to play the game, subtly manipulating her by playing to her desire to return Jaspers to life.

She would follow the path laid out for her and journey to the Frog Temple, where she would obtain Dave's Sburb disks, which she would use to connect to Dave, and start playing herself.
This proved to be a fairly rough going, Dave had little patience for her breaking all of her shit and he cared even less for her dream self's decision to prototype the impaled crow, leading him to trick Jade into slapping herself awake, something she rightfully called him out for.

Jade would come across the Courtyard Droll attempting to steal the Queen's Ring. She wouldn't hesitate to attack this unknown adversary, because she knew that the Ring was highly important and as such would do what she considers to be the right thing without question.

Jade would spend much time sitting next to John's dream self, believing it to be her responsibility to wake him up. She has little luck in this venture and doesn't know what to do about the situation.

She would continue to council Rose about the nature of the game and she would continue to build Dave's house up to his first gate. She would serve in a support role while her friends would begin their quests and be thrust into their destiny as heroes.

This would continue until Jade's world literally came crashing down on her.
When Jack Noir destroyed Prospit and cut the chain to the moon she would not hesitate to save John's life. Despite her own fears she chose to rush towards John's still sleeping aid, she would throw him out of the way of Prospit's moon, saving his life and losing her own in the process.

After the death of her dream self, Jade would have to deal with a massive amount of traumatizing events, the clouds never showed her what would happen here, and she was thrust into a situation she was never prepared for. Her once well-controlled life took a turn for the worse, and everything she knew was turned upside-down.

She immediately had to deal with dreams in the Furthest Ring, freaking her out enough for her to declare that she'll never sleep again in the subsequent conversation with Feferi.
Shortly afterwards, she has the pleasure of dealing with a couple of Karkats, she's rather grumpy throughout it, after dealing with both the antagonistic Past Karkat and the suddenly all nice and sweet Future Karkat who's trying to defend Jade from his past self for some inane reason for a bit, she flips out at both of them at large, calling them out on all of their horseshit, being completely shit of their shit. She latches onto Dave's sudden appearance, hoping that he'll "save [her] from this insanity". After that proves impossible she chews out the Karkats some more and leaves the chat.
She's getting rather frustrated and stressed out at this point; she was never prepared to deal with all of this and doesn't really know how to handle it.
Thankfully for her, she got to talk to John again, showing us a return to good cheer. Although she may have missed out on meeting John on Prospit, she is glad to see that he's safe and sound. She knows that while she lost her chance to show John around Prospit, she'll have a chance to meet her friends in the game regardless, and she prepares do deal with her entry, she attempts to seek council from Dave regarding her Cruxite Item. He proves to be impossible to contact at that time, due to his being asleep at the time.
Afterwards, she had to deal with her rather rough entry.
Then she fell asleep again, and had another disturbing dream, although this one wasn't as bad as the last one. She meets up with Feferi, and isn't particularly at ease here, being unfamiliar with the workings of the dream bubbles. When Feferi reveals the truth about herself, the shock causes Jade to wake up again.
She was besieged by an imp, and had the pleasure of dealing with Becsprite's rather unique way of speaking.
Fortunately for her, at that point she received aid from Dave, who at that point dedicated himself to helping her out throughout the game.
She seems a bit more on edge during this conversation, starting off by telling him off for supposedly "nakking" at her the one time she asked for his advice. She also has little patience for his gross metaphors and is rather annoyed when she believes he's leaving her to fend for herself again.
While preparing for her Alchemy Binge, she learned the regrettable fact that she was personally involved in the death of her Grandpa. Although she's not really angry at Tavros for accidentally killing her Grandpa, she's quick to tell him off when he implies he's going to commune with Becquerel against her wishes.
She managed to be in high spirits again during her little Christmas celebration and the associated Alchemy Binge, crafting herself a set of wondrous tools, clothing and weaponry.
Immediately afterwards, she has a talk with Mr. Ampora, who she really doesn't like. She doesn't even attempt to put up with his crap and calls him out on his shittyness immediately, only accepting Ahab's Crosshairs after he keeps insisting just to shut him up, although she refuses to use it no matter what.
With her newfound tools, she goes on a journey of exploration, coming face to face with the rather harsh nature of the game, a fact she doesn't take well to.
During the ensuing conversation, there are a few things of note:

• Jade is basically freaking the fuck out. She's downright hysterical.
• Despite the fact that Dave's Bro died, Dave seems fairly accepting of it, stating that it's "not much to talk about" and that during the "serious existence threatening shit going down" in the game some people are going to die. We know Dave is far more affected by the death of his Bro than he leads on, but regardless of whether he's keeping a brave face to himself or to Jade (considering she was already freaking out about Felt Dave's corpse lying around), it would show Jade that her friends are still focusing on what's important, despite their fears and tears.
• Dave offers to listen to Jade's troubles, which shows us that Jade still has friends she can rely on, who offer her support.

Despite what happened to her, Jade would still refuse to lose hope, she still believes that there must be a way to win that doesn't involve a crazy suicide mission.
This leads her to prototype her dead dream self, she doesn't want Jack to go around murdering everyone she cares for, so she first attempts to allow Tavros to go through with his plan to direct Becquerel to fight Jack. When she fails to contact Tavros, she decides to prototype her dead dream self, believing herself to be the perfect person to trust with the job.

However, she did not think her plan through, and her rash decision will prove to be one of the most notable moments in Jade's character arc.

Jade's choice to prototype her dead dream self results in her having to deal with another version of her, who proves to be completely hysterical and unwilling to calm down and fight Jack.
Jadesprite is essentially the embodiment of the negative aspects of Jade's personality; she is unable to cope with her situation and has completely fallen into despair.

Jade's views on herself
One of the aspects of Jade's personality that I always found to be very prominent in her character is how she is shown to be extremely harsh towards herself.
She holds herself to very high standards and refuses to accept any sort of weakness in herself, striving to always be strong person who gets things done. She had to be, in order to make it through her childhood. She couldn't fail; she had to do everything herself, so she shunted out her negative feelings in order to cope with her situation.
Unfortunately, this left her unable to really cope with them, so when confronted with the harshness reality of the Game and what it brings, she doesn't take it well.

Her harsh stance towards herself can be first seen during her interactions with her Grandpa.
Grandpa has been dead for most of her life now; her memories of him would be vague and coloured through the lens of herself when she was still young and innocent.
When we see her interact directly with her Grandpa's stuffed corpse, she acts as if he's giving her a stern lecture, to tell her off for not bringing a bigger gun.
Afterwards, she mentioned that her Grandpa was much easier to deal with when he was alive.
Considering how Grandpa's been dead for so long, she's basically admonishing herself.
She so concerned with holding herself up to her standards that her memories of her Grandpa have warped to the point that it started to define their relationship.

More evidence of her inability to deal with those feelings can be found throughout the story.
It's noticeable in how she deals with Karkat during the pesterlog between her, Past Karkat and Future Karkat.
She flips out at the Karkats and calls Future Karkat out for trying to protect her from his past self, as if she would need someone to save her from the vile Past Karkat. She deals with her own shit, and doesn't need someone else to do it for her, is what's she's trying to say here.
However, when Dave appears to make fun of Karkat, she immediately latches onto him to "save [her] from this insanity :(", showing us that despite her "No-one needs to help me" attitude, she's still freaking out to the point that she just wants someone else to deal with it, just to get away from all this stupid bullshit.
Karkat calls her out on her hypocrisy shortly afterwards, noting that he'd rather deal with her further future self. Jade then flips out some more and leaves, trying to forget about the whole ordeal.

It is also shown in how she sees herself as "sooooo lame" when she compares herself to her friends, despite the fact that she only just entered and naturally wouldn't be as powerful as they were.

Jadesprite would berate herself and claim that she had completely forgotten how to be strong and help everyone, believing herself to be weak and useless compared to her living counterpart.

Jade and Jadesprite
Her interactions with Jadesprite would prove to be the occasion where she was the most strongly confronted with this aspect of her personality.
Jadesprite is completely traumatized, she has gone through so much that she's completely hysterical and unable to calm down.
Jade however, flips out at Jadesprite, claiming that they had the exact same experiences, and that Jadesprite had it easy, because she didn't have to go through what Jade went through after her dream death.

Jade however, doesn't really know what happened to Jadesprite, she doesn't understand the sheer depth of her traumatic experiences.
Let's compare what the Jades went through:

Jade's side of the story

• After Jade split from her dream self, she immediately had to deal with dreams in the Furthest Ring.
• Shortly afterwards, she has the pleasure of dealing with a couple of Karkats.
• She had to deal with her rather rough entry.
• Then she fell asleep again, and had another disturbing dream.
• She learned the regrettable fact that she was personally involved in the death of her Grandpa.
• Immediately afterwards, she has a talk with Mr. Ampora, having to put up with his obnoxious arse.
• She comes face to face with the rather cruel nature of the game.

Jade at this point has gone through a large number of traumatic experiences, yet her strong will allows her to keep her head up and focus on what she considers to be important, rather than falling into despair, she refuses to acknowledge her own fear and sadness, because she feels that she has to be strong, to keep it all together, for the sake of everyone else.
She is nearing her breaking point however, she has become quite stressed and frustrated, and is close to breaking down entirely, and now she's confronted with her own weakness in such a direct manner, she get angrier than she has ever been before, if she can be strong and keep everything together, why can't Jadesprite? Who is she to just sit there and wallow in self-pity while that monster is going around murdering everyone she cares for? How dare she want to run away from her problems, claiming that she shouldn't have to deal with it any more.

Jadesprite's side of the story
There has always been a slight difference in personalities between Jade when she's awake and Jade when she's asleep.
When asleep, Jade would forget things, she would be more ditzy, not as aware and sharp as her waking self was.
She wouldn't carry the burdens of her waking life, to have to deal with the burdens of her waking life. She was a princess on Prospit and her life was happy and carefree.
Dream selves are generally "truer" to ones true nature, Jade would lack the seriousness she has while alive, Rose and Dave would waste time on frivolous activities, rather than hiding behind masks and John would spend time dilly-dallying around, much less focused on a goal as he was while awake.

When Dream Jade died, she would go through a large amount of traumatizing events herself, which I will list here:

She died trying to save her best friend, leaving her to an existence in the Furthest Ring amongst the nightmarish Horrorterrors.
She also found herself completely alone. Now, to put this into context, please remember Jade's life before then:

• She lived most of her life by herself after her Grandpa died, the only company she had was Becquerel, who is a wonderful friend, but also just a dog. He would always be different from her, not quite someone she could relate to.
• After some time, she awoke fully on Prospit, where she would many Prospitians. Yet these Prospitians aren't quite human, they're all created specifically to serve as game constructs. Each of them is created for a purpose, a singular goal which drives their entire being. Also, to them, Jade is their pyjama'd princess, fated to be a hero one day, they would always treat her differently, not quite like themselves. Although she still makes many friends amongst them, they'll always be somewhat inhuman to her, not quite relatable.
• She would get to know real humans years later, although that would be through the internet. These three would become her best friends, they were very similar to her, and each of them was also a prince or princess of a moon and was fated for the same destiny.
• She would spend years of her life preparing for the game, learning that she would create a new world with her friends. She would set up the pieces necessary for the game, ensuring that everything fell into place, that she had all the information she clouds could offer her, that Rose would connect to John and kick the entire game off.
• She would spend much of her time waiting for John to wake up, to her, this would be the first time ever she could meet someone in person. There was a lot she wanted to show him around Prospit, she could finally spend time with one of her best friends and she was going to have so much fun.

But then, she died, and everything she worked for all those years, all those years she patiently waited for her time to come, proved to be for absolutely motherfucking nothing.
There was absolutely no-one around, she was more alone than she ever was before.
Everything the Queen told her, everything the clouds told her proved out to be for nothing. It was all a lie.
She would spend quite a while looking for John, whom she believed died in the same manner she did. However she could not find him, and was forced to drift along alone.
Eventually, she would meet new friends, and would come to terms with her new existence, her past merely a bad memory. It wasn't quite what she expected, but she was content with her new existence, happy to be among her new friends.
But her happiness would not last forever.
She would be dragged out of her new existence by the actions of Jade, dragged back to her old life, which she put behind her long ago, forced in a body that's painful merely to exist in.
She was brought back into her old life, which she put behind herself long ago, and all that awaited her was more sorrow.
Jack has grown even more powerful, and is busy murdering everyone she once cared for.
Her "real" self is actively trying to force her to go fight that guy, whom she's absolutely terrified of, for good reason, and Jade's calling her a coward and a cry baby, and that she should just suck it up and deal with it.

At this point, Jadesprite's entire reality has come crashing down. As far as she's concerned, there's absolutely nothing left for her here.
There's no hope any more, just death and destruction and sadness.
She simply cannot cope with the situation at this point, she seeks to die again, to return to what she had in the afterlife.
After getting smacked around by Jade, she leaves for The Battlefield, completely hysterical. She feels even worse now, believing that her "real" self is far stronger than her, that Jade can still help everyone and do important things, but that's she is completely useless herself.

Jadesprite's trauma is far more than anyone could be expected to handle.

There's no-one around who tries to help her and offer her support, she is left all alone again.
Rose has distanced herself from her friends, and spent all her time planning and scheming.
John would prove concerned about Jade, but Jadesprite is but an afterthought to him.
Dave literally has all the time in the world and spends it to help Jade out, but he never once mentions anything about Jadesprite.
She would wander around The Battlefield while crying until she came across Davesprite, who would calm her down and restore her confidence in herself.

Jade simply refuses to understand Jadesprite's situation, to accept this weakness in herself, to the point that she literally tries to beat Jadesprite into submission, to get her to man up and fight Jack.
She completely fails to understand what Jadesprite has gone through, and she refuses to accept that she could be like that and fail to go through with what's more important, even if she felt scared and helpless.
She's so hard on herself that she's outright hostile to herself, she reacts violently when confronted with her own weakness and fears. Jadesprite isn't Jade, according to Jade, she rejects that part of her she represents and she can just get lost if she cannot to put her troubles away and do what's important.

Jade and her Quest
Karkat then contacts her, and Jade is so stressed out that she would rather speak to him than deal with Jadesprite again. Here it is where Jade realizes that she's been yelling at Karkat for doing the same thing she did just now, and this is where they reconcile and start working together.

Jadesprite leaves for The Battlefield, where she can merely continue to wallow in her own feelings of uselessness and tears.
Jade never really reconciles with Jadesprite, she's glad that Jadesprite left and that she doesn't have to deal with her anymore.

At this point, Jade's life takes a turn for the better. She begins her quest as Witch of Space and is aided by Dave, Karkat and Kanaya. Her quest is relatively uneventful, calming her down significantly and leaving her to fulfil her duties once more.
She would meet with Kanaya, who would teach her about her duties as the Hero of Space, Jade would learn that Kanaya is much like her, both waking on Prospit early and serving as the ones to create the Genesis Frog.

She would have to deal with a significant amount of death during her quest, these ones are mostly strangers to her however, and these deaths wouldn't affect her as much as the previous ones.
She would try to comfort Rose after the death of her Mom, berating herself in the process for supposedly not being good at comforting people, she expects better from herself, although her upbringing would logically leave her without the social experience normal people would have, as Rose is quick to remind her of.

She wouldn't get a chance to talk to John about his Dad, so despite how worried she is about Rose, she has to simply hope that Rose will be alright, lacking any way of tracking her down and needing to spend her time on the primary objective of the game.

She would continue with her quest, meeting new people along the way through the dream bubbles, she would learn much from them and cooperate with them to form the plans for The Scratch. Rather than relying on the Skaian Clouds for guidance, she would forge her own destiny, growing to be truly independent.

Hunting frogs
However, she would have to deal with one more extremely traumatising event.
Specifically, when Jack attacked and used her to murder Dave.

We don't get to see directly how Jade is affected by this event, but given what we know about her it's pretty safe to assume it had significant impact on her.

Try to imagine how she would have felt in this situation.

Dave is the first of her friends she would meet in the flesh.
Now try to imagine how much she has been looking forward to this moment.
She has spent literally her entire life alone on her island. Her chance to meet John on Prospit was cruelly snatched away by Jack.
She would try several times to get people to meet her in person.
She would try to get Dave to play in the snow.
She would try to get Dave to come to her house to make a plan to kill Jack.
She would try to get Karkat to go to sleep so she could meet him in the dream bubbles.

So when she'd finally get the chance to meet one of her friends in person it would be a memory she would treasure forever. She would even wear the fancy-schmancy dress she reserved for super special occasions.
And as a bonus, he was coming over to help her out with the frogs.
This was going to be totally awesome and something she would never forget.

She has also felt responsible for Dave, considering she is his server player. This can be most notably seen in the conversation where she cheerfully announced herself to be Dave's server player, stating: "GG: so now it is my turn to be the star! GG: i will be your hero GG: its me", her continued concern is shown in this conversation with John, where she mentioned that she completely forgot about him and should check up on him.
However, throughout the game, Dave would spend more time helping her out than she would spend helping him.
Dave would serve as her server player after John became unreachable, he would calm her down after her hysterical episode over Felt Dave and he would help her throughout her quest as Witch of Space.
These aren't duties assigned to him by the game, he would help her out on his own accord.
Jade would likely feel as if she owes him somehow. After all, he has done far more for him than she did for him. She needs all this help and what does she offer him in return? Not much really, just more stuff she needs him to do.

So she ends up inadvertently killing him.
Who would she blame for this situation?
Jack? This would be the logical choice, but she doesn't really seem to blame him. As far as she's concerned, Jack was just trying to fetch her bullet, just like Becquerel would.
No, much like she would blame herself for Becquerel's prototyping and Jack's subsequent rampage, she would likely blame herself.
After all, it was her that fired those bullets, he was only on her planet to help her out. If she could just do her own damn job he wouldn't have to be there and he would still be alive.
No, clearly the blame falls solely on her shoulders.

She suffers another mental breakdown, another hysterical episode after her first one.

She has to be snapped out of it by Karkat, who talks her through the situation.

And now she has to kiss the corpse, not quite a pleasant experience.

And now Dave is off to get himself killed again in a great big Green Sun shaped explosion.
Fate dealt her a cruel hand once more, and she won't even get the chance to grieve.

She has to stay strong, to finish her quest. So she once more puts on a smile and tries to stay cheerful.

Echidna and the Final Frog
Jade would continue with the frog breeding, still assisted by Karkat and Kanaya.
She would continue to set up The Scratch, to ensure that all the pieces were in position.
She would meet with Echidna, who would offer her The Choice. Jade would be offered an impossible bargain, the location of the final frog in return for saving everything in the session from The Scratch.
As The Choice is closely related to facing their mortality Jade would have to face her own mortality once more, unlike her Dream Self in the attic however, she had a choice this time. She would end up accepting Echidna's bargain, accepting that it may lead to her own death, coming to terms with her own mortality in the process.
She would also secure the Quills of Echidna and send them to John, ensuring that he could perform The Scratch and set everything in motion.

She would succeed in breeding the Genesis Tadpole, finishing her quest as Witch of Space, she would be the only one of the kids to truly complete her quest.

And then she got killed by the Courtyard Droll.

Cascade of fortune
While dead she would learn of the fortunate survival of Rose and Dave, and the result of their mission.
Fortunately for her, Becquerel's prototyping would prove to be enough to cause Jack Noir to carry her dead body onto her Quest Bed, leading to her ascension.

This is where all her work would finally pay off, everything she worked for would lead to this.
Now would be the time to get everyone out of the session and into the safety of the Yellow Yard.
And no-one is going to stop her, not Jack, not the imminent destruction of their session, absolutely no-one.
This is what she worked for all those years, and fuck if she wasn't rewarded for it.

After getting everyone to safety she would learn that she had to journey through the Yellow Yard for three years.
Though she would finally have the chance to live a somewhat normal existence surrounded by her friends, she would also have to spend three years separated from two of them, as well as the trolls.

She would strongly distinguish between Dave and Davesprite, while to John, they are "so not different", Jade would remark on the differences between them, although she states that they are "just some slight differences in personality". She likely differentiates between them less because of differences in personality between them and more because of the different sets of memories attached to each of them.

Jade's life has always been heavily involved dutifully following the path laid out for her, she would not try to break everything in a mad attempt to salvage victory from the ashes of defeat nor would she half-ass her duties because she's tired of all the shit that went down. She would always work diligently towards the accomplishment of a greater goal, responsibly taking care of what needed to be done as well as planning for the future and ensure said future would come to pass.

[BlackholePA]

Something's been bugging me lately, specifically the "apparent" age of some of the characters in the comic; Dave especially. I know his actual age, but in terms of how I actually perceive him, he seems much older at some points later on in the comic than he does at the beginning (especially during his strife with Bro), despite most of the events so far happening on the same day. My headcanon is flipping its shit trying to get a unified image together.

EDIT: Dave would make a lot more sense from my point of view if he was a year older when he was introduced. But oh well, that's just my opinion.

[deathsbuddy]

Conspicuous: yep, a lot of that definitely aligns with my own thoughts on Jade. She's definitely one of my favorite characters in Homestuck.

In other news, the revelation that Roxy was raised by and grows food for the carapacians makes me like her even more. Hrmmmmm.

[Conspicuous]

Yeah, it's good to see that Roxy is more than just a drunk teenagers.
She's hiding a good heart behind that bloated liver.

[Ace of Dark-Hearts]

I honestly thought that Roxy was going to end up being somewhat two-dimensional, but I think this recent update might have proved me wrong.

It's just hard to think about possible character development for Roxy. I mean, it isn't her fault she's lonely, and an arc centered entirely around alcohol dependence might be a little boring.