Spades Slick

Spades Slick is the notorious leader of the Midnight Crew.

Slick is the height of Problem Sleuth, is physically capable, and wears a trench coat much like his Sleuthy counterpart. In Homestuck his preferred weapons are knives, however in his original appearance in the non-canonical Problem Sleuth donation commands he is able to wield using cards to project his powers.

Biography
The Midnight Crew originated as Agents of Derse in the post-scratch trolls' session of Sburb. Spades Slick is the trolls' version of Jack Noir.

Jack formed an alliance with Karkat Vantas, cooperating with the trolls to remove the Black Queen from power. Jack, the Black Queen, the Hegemonic Brute, the Draconian Dignitary, and the Courtyard Droll ended up exiled to the destroyed Alternia.

As an exile, Jack Noir took on the name HS 3174 (Scurrilous Straggler) and wore wrappings similar to the Wayward Vagabond, only with a Spade on the side. Due to time travel shenanigans he sees his future self and takes a moment to approve how plain and serviceable his hat is. He never suspects that the stylish stranger is in fact himself.

At some point, the Scurrilous Straggler took on the identity of Spades Slick and formed the Midnight Crew along with three of his fellow exiles. He embraced the reference to the frog god Bilious Slick in his new name as a big "fuck you" to the former Black Queen. It is unknown exactly where and when he picked up the moniker. Though the term is used to describe the Ace of Spades due to a different finish from other playing cards. Spades and the Midnight Crew would rebuild society in the form of a Film Noir-style cityscape where they would compete with rival gangs such as.

On one occasion, the Midnight Crew attacked the mansion of the Felt's boss,. While at the mansion, the Crew killed most of the Felt, but Hearts Boxcars, Diamonds Droog, and Clubs Deuce were presumably "killed" by temporal distortion. As Spades attempted to unlock the vault to 's treasure, the Black Queen reappeared, now a member of the Felt by the name of. She destroyed the key to the treasure, removed Spades's arm, and locked him in the vault.

However, by flipping his sprite, Slick was able to use the barcode on his arm to enter the vault. Inside was a computer with twelve screens. The only active screen showed Karkat. Recognizing the young troll, Spades began to type Karkat a message. Slick had been watching the trolls run amok all along since he was locked in the vault, and is thoroughly aggravated by the fact they keep kissing every time he looks at the screen, yelling that he hates them all at Karkat.

After getting from the vault to Alternia's moon, he later on bursts into 's manor, with an eyepatch and robotic arm, dealing Scratch a vicious drubbing with the Cast Iron Horse Hitcher as Scratch tries to calm him down. This particular Spades Slick would have been killed by shortly after setting Scratch's manor on fire. However the killing of this possible future Slick is seen by, who proceeds to kill before he mows Slick down with minigun fire. After Spades' safety is ensured, he advances toward with 's crowbar, appearing to be attacking her. He then drops the weapon and proceeds to have a sloppy makeout session in 's home, to which the said Doctor reacts with shock and consternation. After Scratch shoos away, Slick proceeds to attack Scratch's grandfather clock with his crowbar, damaging it, possibly cancelling Vriska's resurrection by tilting it into landing on 'just'. Scratch begins to recount every rude gesture Slick has shown since his entrance, and beats him to a pulp with his scrapbook. As Slick is lying in a pool of his own blood, Scratch mentions how disappointed he is in him. Scratch gives Slick his gun, tells him to kill Snowman, and teleports Slick away to an unknown location. It is shown before he is teleported that Jack does have his finger on the gun, aiming at and preparing to kill Scratch.

We later see Slick HS 6009 (facing off) against on a rooftop, presumably that of Scratch's manor. taunts him, telling him to draw, despite the fact that killing her would mean the end of the universe. With nothing in particular left to lose, or live for, Slick complies. At this point, the trolls' universe ends, and Spades Slick is somehow saved by Hussie from dying with it. Because of this, Jack Noir is in effect the one who directly destroys both universes.

While he was originally presumed dead with the destruction of the Alternian universe, Hussie claimed that he lived and that he was personally nursing him back to health, a claim that was later HS 6571 (confirmed to be true). While Slick survived the destruction of the universe he was greatly injured and has been further cyborg-ified. When Andrew Hussie's building was invaded by, Hussie pushed Slick over the side of a balcony to save him, causing him to fall into the water below.

He was HS 6844 (later seen) to have survived the fall and had climbed up the side of the building. When he reached the top, he stood upright and accepted a glass of milk from the butler, showing that he was not fully bedridden. He then investigated the scene of Hussie's death, took the gun used to kill him, and met up with Ms. Paint.

After collecting his belongings from a box where they were placed in one of the many pantries, Slick realizes that he had 's doll in his possession. He then continues to pull every one of mob's pins out-except 's, reviving  and claiming the position of their new boss. Slick offers Ms. Paint the possession of the eight-spot in the gang, and she accepts. Then Slick commands to show them to a suitable hideout, and they walk through the fifth wall into 's old apartment.

Eventually finding a suitable exit through 's grandfather clock, Slick puts the crew into ' oven, places the oven in his inventory as a playing card, and lights 's apartment on fire before going through the exit himself.

Once through, Slick sees that that the exit led to the Furthest Ring, where he stands inside of the server that activated the ~ATH program to summon. Looking up, he sees the Alpha Kids' Incipisphere, calls it a "jackpot", and flies towards it using an inbuilt rocket.

Personality
Slick is very black and white in his judgements, and quickly makes decisions with little to no forethought. His reactions to given commands are of swift and clear certainty. He will do the things he says he will do, or he will quickly end whatever he doesn't want to do. He is very temperamental, and when Slick is not involved with violence, his countenance is often surly and vulgar, albeit outwardly quiet. He keeps his thoughts to himself and responds with action rather than words. He is not very good at uttering cold blooded one liners, instead letting his knives do the talking for him. In the Blood Spade adventure he is seen using Occam's Razor to solve the problem of the pinned heist plans quickly and simply. If completely frustrated, he will succumb to soul-blackening rage and sport an unnecessarily elaborate assortment of fancy blades. In the Intermission he deals with whatever is in his way by often stabbing it or ignoring it. He seems to care a great deal what others (particularly ) think of him, as he throws down his hat in disgust when she sees him Riding his Horse Hitcher and pretending to joust, claiming that he'll never live it down. He also berates Hearts Boxcars for leaving his SMUT around while privately assuring himself that no one would ever find him leaving "Terrier Fancy Magazine" lying around... and even if they did, that could be ANYBODY's copy. He is also very determined, seemingly never giving up in the face of any threat, fighting against, who outnumber and outgun his crew, and attempting to kill , with the gun given to him by the Doc, even after Scratch had beat him to the edge of death. This validates Spades' total badassery.

While both Spades Slick, the former Jack Noir, and Jack Noir, the Sovereign Slayer of the human session, are essentially the same person, their personalities are slightly different. Perhaps because Spades Slick wasn't tortured with horrible clothes as much as Jack Noir was, because he didn't get the ring, because of his experiences following Karkat around, or just because there isn't much to do in a post-apocalyptic wasteland other than create. While Jack Noir has an all consuming, homicidal rage for all existence, killing innocent people for pleasure, Slick is a far more constructive thinker, seeking to rebuild civilization in his ideal of a noir style gangster utopia. Anyone who tries to cause him trouble is a dead man, most specifically anyone related to, but he has an agreeable relationship with anyone who works alongside him, even if he hates them a little.

Inventory
Slick and the other Midnight Crew members have a peculiar inventory set up where they can wield five weapons - all of them suffering from that same confusing and idiotic glitch in Problem Sleuth.

Slick's weapon of choice is the Cast Iron Horse Hitcher/Ace of Spades. His other weapons include a Double Edged Sword/Eight of Spades, the Bait and Switchblade/Seven of Spades, the Saber Rattle/Four of Spades, and Occam's Razor/King of Spades. He later equips 's Crowbar, 's Cigarette Holder/Lance, the Butterfly Effect Knife, and the Rapier Wit.

Slick carries the rest of his inventory in his trusty Deck of Cards, which is also a War Chest. The Chest contains Spades' Heist Map, Vendetta Itinerary, Aradia Megido's Crosbytop Computer, a Backup Hat, a Spades Key/Rules for Blackjack card, and an assortment of bladed weapons of great variety, from swords to daggers. As a throwback to Problem Sleuth, he keeps two Licorice Scotty Dogs in his Backup Hat.

He has also stolen 's voodoo doll and 's crowbar in preparation with his showdown with. He also acquired 's Cigarette Holder/Lance, but not willingly, and later had it acquired from himself in turn (in a manner that was needlessly painful, to boot). ,, and a deceased were brought from another timeline inside the War Chest (the latter two also in Hearts Boxcars' Wrathtub).

Abilities
He has incredible skill with bladed weapons, once beheading three opponents with a single swing of his RAPIER WIT.

He also has the ability to "flip his sprite" and reverse damage to the sides of his body (e.g. his right eye was stabbed out, but he could reverse it to his left at any given time.). This is a reference to a common trick used in 2D video games; making a character look the other way simply by flipping the image of that character, like how Link becomes right-handed when he's facing east.

In donation commands, supposedly Midnight Crew members can wield "Sinister Shadow Based Magic" but only Spades has shown anything resembling of the sort. Other than his hand glowing with a dark purple and transforming Mobster Kingpin into a Midnight Crew member, he hasn't really made much use of it. Midnight Crew members can also do a Hive Ragtime. Their Hive Ragtime, Fill'em With Midnight, allows Spades Slick to jazz up a piano hard enough for it to be ridden like a mechanical bull.