Homestuck Epilogues 9: YOU ARE DIRK STRIDER.

Part 9 of reading the epilogues! Give it up for day 9! Today we're picking back up with Dirk, who it turns out did not have a heart attack or a stroke earlier like I thought. I'm gonna aim to get to the end of Candy Epilogue 4 / Candy 21 today, since I realized I am not keeping pace with what I did before. Not that it matters or anything but I'm looking forward to starting HS^2 and some other homestuck bits.

Trying to get this done a bit earlier today since I want to try and work on making some more algorithm art or working on a different project. I'm feeling good today and kind of want to take advantage.

Homestuck Epilogues

Candy 14

This world has been set on a path that you cannot tread.

• Is Dirk going to kill himself.

What could you accomplish in a dead-end existence like this? There are no stakes. No meaningful challenges. No structures or themes—only residual chemical reactions in a dying brain, a physical system’s obligate compulsion to exhaust its own lingering momentum. A cockroach with its head cut off, waiting to die of thirst.

• Of course he decapitated himself

When you think so little of yourself as a moral character, any act of self-termination will result in a death that is Just.

Candy 15

• The head gets a second casket
• Of course the head gets it's own casket
• Why is Gamzee one of the pallbearers
• Dirk's note was apparently incomprehensible for the most part
• Dave is not handling Dirk's suicide well
• And is assuming the reason it stuck is because Dirk thought he was cosmically bound to turn evil
• Gamzee is giving a eulogy now

If inside this church there were an adjacent room full of wet dogs eating garbage, everyone in attendance would run to that room immediately to escape the stench emanating from this smiling clown.

• Gamzee has a final message from Dirk, which he then destroyed by accident
• Karkat continues to heckle him

ROXY: BRAVO!!! DAMN I FEEL LIKE IF I NEVER HEARD ANOTHER WORD THIS GUY EVER SAID THATD BE FINE BECAUSE THAT WAS ALL JUST SO PERFECT

• Dave and Karkat almost kissed before John startled them outside
• John is offering to, undo Dirk killing himself
• John can apparently not do the retcon thing
• Roxy wants to marry John?
• It's been so long since we saw Calliope
• I hope they're okay
• They're going to get married

Candy 16

TEREZI: YOUR HUM4N W3DD1NG

• We just advanced like, multiple months worth of time from Earth C's perspective
• Six, to be precise
• They're already married

TEREZI: D3FU4LT CULTUR3 P41R M4T1NG 3V3NT

• Despite the amount of weddings I've been at, I've never actually seen a bouquet throw
• Jade, Dave and Karkat are all together now
• Jade is dating Dave and Karkat who still haven't worked anything out between eachother

JOHN: now i have to pretend to laugh and think it’s funny when she makes jokes about being the next to “tie the knot.”

• Ugh
• Roxy is pregnant!
• And John is texting Terezi

TEREZI: 4R3 HUM4NS NOT C4P4BL3 OF H4V1NG S3X UNL3SS TH3Y 3NT3R 4 CONTR4CTU4L 4RR4NG3M3NT?

• Now Jane is dating Jake and Gamzee
• And there is, visual evidence
• Terezi talked to Dave and Karkat at some point, yay
• Karkat and Jade's relationship is not going well

Candy 17

ROSE: Vriska, don’t chew on your chair’s dinner tray.

• Another three months has passed
• John is still being weird about texting Terezi
• Kanaya does not understand human pregnancy
• Neither does Karkat apparently
• John is weird-ed out by Rose and Kanaya calling the child Vriska
• John and Roxy are apparently naming theirs

ROXY: harry anderson egbert

• I recognize that name! I know there's one of those in hs^2
• It's apparently a reference to the show night court, which I said I would watch at some point
• Which I haven't
• Oops
• We are having Vriskourse and What-Happened-To-Lord-English-ourse
• Rose seems to not care about any of the stuff she told John in the prologue anymore
• Which I guess is because that was all Dirk's influence?
• And has settled on Vriska killed Lord English

JOHN: if i didn’t stop lord english, then... then...

JOHN: are we even really here at all???

• It's been like a year where the fuck is Calliope
• John is having a moment
• He's getting out of there to try and get in contact with Terezi

JOHN: i mean, on the surface everything is fantastic! everyone’s so happy and it finally seems like we’re all making real progress as adults.

JOHN: but at the same time...

JOHN: everyone is also acting crazy!

JOHN: i feel like i’m the only sane person left in this entire universe.

JOHN: i’m the only one who seems to... care about anything?

JOHN: i mean, care about anything... BIGGER.

JOHN: bigger than like, what to name a baby, or who’s stuck in a terrible relationship with who.

...

JOHN: you’re the only thing that still makes sense to me, terezi.

JOHN: right now i... i just really need you.

JOHN: please come make some sense at me...

Candy 18

• Jane still doesn't like troll reproduction
• Which Gamzee apparently only just realized
• Gamzee is, like her scribe?

GAMZEE: iT lOoKs To Me LiKe ThE hUmAn MaN iS tRyInG tO kEeP mY pEoPlE dOwN, aLl DiScRiMiNaToRiLy AnD sUcH.

• Gamzee is, one of the characters of all time

JANE: Who in the world gave a literal insect in clownface like you the authority to be “canceling” anybody?

...

JANE: Oh, forgive me if I’m a bit nettled to hear a drug-addicted clown who murdered half of his friends tell me that I—JANE CROCKER—am... am...

JANE: CANCELED?!?!?!

• Jesus christ what is happening
• This is all happening infront of their child Tavros
• Loud clown sex penetrates the air
• Jade has considered asking Rose to act as a surrogate for her and Dave to have a child because she is, ill-equipped
• Jake is not getting it

Candy 19

• John has a mustache now

DAVE: johns a Man

DAVE: not a lowercase m man but a fully grown up legit fuckin Dude with a leather briefcase and a suit that he only wears on special occasions

• Apparently the human administration are preventing trolls from adopting humans?
• Dave thinks he would be a bad father
• John accused Jane of raping Jake, I think
• The sky is falling?
• Green Lightning
• Jade's body just fell from the sky
• I, guess that is the Jade from meat who went into the black hole
• She needs to talk to Jane about this, apparently

Candy 20

• Oh yeah Jane can raise the dead I forgot
• It doesn't seem to be going especially well
• The seer of light is drawing blank on the situation
• She's not dead but she's not alive
• Roxy wants to hold a corpse party
• Roxy accidentally put her foot in her mouth about troll reproduction
• Everyone is fighting
• Is this where Karkat is going to become big boss
• Calliope mentioned
• Yknow I was expecting Davebot and Aradia to be in candy
• Funeral for dead teen jade in a week
• Everyone just, forgot and moved on from working out why there was a second Jade

Candy 21

• Calliope is here!
• Karkat isn't even sitting with Dave and Jade anymore
• Blue rose symbolism
• Aradia and Sollux are here!!!!

KARKAT: MAYBE FUCKING NEPETA IS ABOUT TO POUNCE FROM BEHIND THAT GROTESQUE STATUE OF THE HUMAN SUFFERER T-POSING OVER THERE.

• They have christianity on earth C?
• I mean they mentioned cathedrals and churches but I sort of assumed they were being used as generic terms for places of worship for, whatever religions had emerged on earth C

GAMZEE: i EvEn GoT a HeAlThY mUtUaLlY fUlLfIlLiNg kIsMeSiS gOiN oN wItH tHaT fOxY hUmAn BrOaD uP fRoNt.

• Aradia wants to see the corpse!
• Where the fuck did Aradia and Sollux even come from
• Dave tried to consol Jade about seeing the corpse but failed
• They put a flower crown on the corpse

JOHN: but you’re kind of a weird person to like... cry in front of?

JOHN: no offense.

ROSE: What??

JOHN: the first time i ever got upset in front of rose irl, she put her arms around me and it was so awkward that i had to ask her if she was hugging me or reaching for something on the shelf behind me.

• What the fuck is Jane's problem
• Roxy just went into labour
• Calliope is about to chase after John and Roxy to the hospital when she stops to witness dead teen jade raise from death

JADE: i am not jade.

• That was in alt!calliope's red text

Meeting her gaze is like peering into a realm where light goes to die. Calliope finds the sensation disturbingly familiar.

... JADE: my name is calliope.

JADE: i am the muse of space.

JADE: and i have entered this body to protect your world.

• So, is alt!calliope not the narrator?

Stopping Point

Well what the fuck! I really wasn't expecting that! I figured Aradia would show up at some point but I didn't think it would be like that, or that Alt!Calliope wanted teen Jade to use as a vessel. I guess this is probably where the action is going to pick up a bit? I'm not at all sure.

Candy is so weird, it's still really good.