Dream self



A dream self is another feature of the wonderful world of the Incipisphere: an alter ego that's supposed to awaken whenever the real person falls asleep. Dream selves are not independent entities, but simply representations of the dreamers. All four of the Homestuck Kids and eleven of the twelve trolls have been found to have one; only people who are fated to play Sburb have dream selves in the first place. Jade's has been a huge part of her life, while the other kids are rookies who only become aware of theirs in Act 4.

Dreamsprites operate from lavish towers on the moons of Prospit and Derse, so they likely come with Sburb. Certainly Jaspersprite has HS 3526 (shown inherent knowledge of the matter). The kids have had theirs before entering; whether or not they've always had them is probably not a meaningful question.

Interestingly, Sollux has two dream selves, one each for Derse and Prospit, while Aradia has none. This also creates an imbalance: in the Troll session there are 7 dream selves on Prospit and only 5 on Derse.

Features
Dream selves can fly. Dream Jade could conjure up extra arms at a whim, so they have at least some ability to pull hitherto unforeseen powers out of nowhere, the way people do in dreams. Dreamstuff seems to work the same way as regular stuff: Dream Jade pummeled Courtyard Droll very effectively, and Lil' Cal's dream self made its way to Earth to become Lil' Cal. (Sigh.) Dream selves are usually asleep when the realself is awake, and awakening a dream self causes the real self to fall asleep immediately. Dream Dave is a slight exception, as he's been awake all along but is passive and occupied with his computer. When Dream Rose catches his attention, Real Dave immediately falls asleep.

One reason why dream selves are not crazy death machines is the word "dream." The person is asleep. They seem to act the way people do in dreams: free-spirited, sincere, immune to second thoughts, and as dumb as a sack of hammers. This is why the first thing Dream Rose and Dream Dave do when meeting face to face is have a dance party and why Jade's tender ministrations left Dave with a brainless feathery asshole in his Kernelsprite.

Each of the kids' dream selves sleeps in a tower that houses a dream version of their room. John and Jade's towers are on a moon orbiting Prospit, while Rose and Dave's towers similarly orbit Derse. Everything in a kid's dream room (including the dream selves themselves) coexists alongside their regular selves, as Lil' Cal's dream self made its way to the Ectobiology Lab, where it is HS 3670 (seen in the same panel) as the awake John.

Prospitian dream selves see visions of the present, past and future when the Prospitian moon passes into the clouds of Skaia. Dersite dream selves apparently hear the whispers of The Noble Circle of Horrorterrors.

Using her dream self, Jade is able to control her Dreambot, which mimics her dream self's actions. Given that the Dreambot was an invention of Jade's grandfather, this indicates that Grandpa was aware of dream selves.

Dream selves and related objects are physical and have been found in the "real" world. Several items from Dream John's room landed on the Battlefield. Lil Cal was paradoxically created because of Dave's fear of Lil' Cal. One of Sollux's dream selves presumably survives and becomes "real" Sollux.

Awakening
Jade states that the method of awakening one's dream self is to face (often unpleasant) things one has not before, such as John learning what his father really does for a living. Though this is not directly seen, Rose and Dave managed to awaken their dream selves in the alternate timeline resulting from John's demise due to Terezi Pyrope. Rose managed to stay awake when she traveled back to the main timeline by going to sleep just before the alternate timeline's destruction, going on to help Dave awaken his dream self. Dave was HS 3543 (said to be) awake all along without being aware of it, as he had frequently had nightmares where Lil' Cal talked to him. John is woken up in a different manner: being manhandled by Jade and then narrowly avoiding a gargantuan fiery explosion in the face.

Each of the dream selves corresponding to kids in the medium has scrawled some manner of disturbing images on the walls of their rooms. John's room is covered in garishly colored scribblings of harlequins and insults. Rose's is covered in anagrams of "MEOW", with each letter corresponding to the nucleotides of DNA (G, C, A, and T). Dave has glowing images of Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff. Jade, whose dream self was awake the whole time, did not have this problem.

Death
According to Tavros Nitram, not only HS 3836 (can dream selves die), but the trolls' all have (except one of Sollux's, see below), which may be another thing caused by the Mobius Double Reacharound Virus. Dream Jade HS 3840 (promptly demonstrated) the death of one's dream self by means of a gargantuan fiery explosion in the face. This also caused her Dreambot to blow up. Later, Grandpa found Dream Jade and stuffed her like he was himself, following a family tradition.

Apparently the dream self can be used as a sort of "extra life" within the game - at the end of Sgrub, Sollux and possibly Vriska are using their dream selves as their "real" bodies. This may be the manner in which the Trolls "die", as prophesied (visioned?) by Sollux Captor ; Sollux himself mentions that he will die twice, correctly foreshadowing the death of his waking self and possibly foreshadowing the death of one dream self.