dreamselves | post o5.

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Okay, for a couple posts now I've been trying to kickstart some discussions about this lovely lady but have gotten no dice. "Why doesn't anyone want to babble about this chick, god damn?!" I cried. But then one day I finally woke up and told myself, "Be the change you want to see in the world, Anon." (It was kind of a habit to refer to myself as Anon. Sorry.)

So the question I have come today to ask you about Kanaya is: What do you think really changed about her when she became a rainbow drinker? I ask because I see a lot of people saying her "new self" is "bloodthirsty" and otherwise imply she's intrinsically different from how she was before, but I don't really think this is true.

Let's engage in a thought experiment. Say that when Karkat attempted to revive Kanaya, she did wake up in the body of her Prospitan dreamself who had miraculously survived. This would leave her resurrected but biologically still an ordinary troll in golden pajamas. What do you think would differ in this scenario from her canonical return as a rainbow drinker?

Assuming there wasn't some temporal difference caused by flying back all the way from Prospit or Jack Noir, and ignoring the requisite lack of blood drinking, I think her essential actions would have been the same. I think that much to the shock of the local highbloods, just as they were about to show each other down, she would have alit upon the rooftop. I think that, upon perceiving that Gamzee had murdered Equius and Nepeta and showed every sign of not being satisfied with that body count, she would have immediately made an attempt on his life in the name of the greater good for everyone on the veil. I think that upon seeing Vriska, enraged by all she had endured for her sake (though the topic of exactly why I think Kanaya is so very validated in her anger at Vriska for her actions around page 4270 is literally an essay of its own), she would have punched her in the face. I think that she would have been motivated to debunk the wand she made as anything but a weapon, both to protect and to vindicate herself and others. And I think she would have had both the gumption and the motivation to go ahead and attempt to cut Eridan in half: The former proved by her similar treatment of Tavros earlier the same day, the latter cemented by his destruction of the matriorb, a crime meriting execution. Perhaps -- and this is pure conjecture here -- were she successful, she might have still gotten the glasses to land on her face, reapplied her now-bloodied lipstick, and caused Vriska to view her as concupiscently attractive.

The thing is that I'm about to slip into the indicative mood for convenience -- that is, I think the thing is that that Kanaya's Prospitan dreamself is still a gawky, awkward teenage troll identical to her real self in several ways: Probably not gifted with enough speed to counter Gamzee's flashstep ability, probably not physically attractive enough for Vriska to view her with concupiscence, definitely not powerful enough to beat Empiricist Eridan in a fight, and finally inconveniently just as dead as her real self was after the fight that proved the previous assertion. In short, Kanaya as a member of the ranks of the living does not have the narrative aura required to make glasses land on her face. The narrative demanded a means for Kanaya to come back swifter, sexier, and stronger even though she had become a cadaver, especially considering she had talked to future Jade, but no quest beds were available on the veil. So the rules of Homestuck's story that would later plunge Rose into grimdarkness demanded that Kanaya come back from the dead some other way for the purpose of executing all the actions listed above. And that's in my opinion why she became a rainbow drinker: Not to "change" her essential personality and goals, but because every event in her life since wigglerhood meant that page 5421 onward had to happen, sweet sexy undeath simply being the necessary means.

Okay, so that's what I think. ~~But what are your thoughts on yuri~~ Your thoughts?

well, this also depends on what you're asking. is it about what changed in her mood or what changed in her biology? the second is largely extrapolation and conjecture, whereas the first is something i'd attribute more to the circumstances surrounding her death than the assumption of undeath itself.

I guess mood changewise mostly!! Like I just see some people insist that if Kanaya did not glow in the dark she never could have been asked where she was going and answered "clown hunting", when as argued above I agree there was a lot more circumstance involved and all. Also because biology changes will probably never be answered, cue prayer circle.

yeah, the way i see it, the only part the biology played into that is giving her the capability, where the disposition and willingness came more from the very literal destruction of her hope and running against failure in pretty much every undertaking she'd adopted throughout canon

could that capability have somewhat encouraged her willingness? maybe to some degree! but not entirely, or even for the most part, i don't think.

so yeah, i'm pretty much +1ing you on this one

making a new thread for the new kids

let's go let's go

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