Canon • 
Dubiously CanonAradia Megido, also known by her Trollian handle “apocalypseArisen”, is one of the Alternian trolls who created the Earth's universe.
Her sign is Aries, Sign of the Excavator.
Concept and creation[]
Aradia's role as a ghost and communicator with the dead relates to her role as a Hero of Time.
=Etymology[]
Her name was suggested by Mikker and Megido was suggested by fizzix. It appears to come from Aradia, a goddess and witch from Neo-Pagan folklore. A messianic principal figure of Charles Leland's 1899 work Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches, is also named Aradia. She is said to be the daughter of the Roman moon goddess Diana and Lucifer. Lucifer is a Latin word literally meaning "light-bearer", a name for the dawn appearance of the planet Venus, heralding daylight. Venus is in Aries in its detriment, because Aries is the opposite sign to Libra, which Venus rules. This Aradia was sent down to Earth to teach the oppressed about witchcraft to use against the upper classes and the Roman Catholic Church. This is echoed by Doc Scratch teaching the Handmaid “clockwork majyyks”
with which to challenge the highest class troll of all – the Condesce.
Megido is the place where a number of religions believe the final battle will take place, and from which the word Armageddon is derived. It is also the name of a known excavation site, referring to her love of archaeology and her sign being 'the Sign of the Excavator'. This links with Aradia's knowledge of the apparent apocalypse, as well as her Trollian handle. Meido is a Japanese word for the underworld, which ties to her death theme, and for maid, fitting her title as Maid of Time and her dancestor's role as an “asian schoolgirl”. The word "Maid" is itself concealed backwards within her name (Aradia Megido).
The handle she uses alludes to two things within her life. One, “apocalypse”, refers to the end of the world, which she considered important. “Arisen” relates to the fact that she has died multiple times, but has managed to come back, or "rise from the dead", in a way. “apocalypseArisen” could also refer to the fact that she uncovered the Sgrub Beta, which causes the apocalypse. "Arise" is also an anagram to Aries (♈), her associated zodiac sign and horn shape.
Biography[]
Aradia used to be something of an archaeologist, and her hive was surrounded by dig site trenches of her own doing. She was present when a meteor from The Reckoning traveled back and crashed nearby, revealing the presence of the Frog Temple and carrying with it Lil Cal and a deceased alternate Aradiabot, both severely damaged. She sent Cal on to Kanaya Maryam for repairs and spent some time exploring the Frog Temple.
She is able to hear the voices of the dead, which she has heard since she was young. The voices have been getting louder ever since she was in a fatal role playing accident; the magnified voices led her to descend into fatalistic resignation about everything and left her only concerned in dealing with the impending apocalypse of which the voices warned.
Aradia's Fetch Modus, the Ouija, is uncontrolled by her. She says that it's “not up to [her] to decide” what she gets from the sylladex; it is “up to the spirits.” She goes on to say how they are sometimes cooperative with what she wants, but are commonly cryptic in their choosing.
Roleplaying[]
- Main article: Flarp#Team Charge v. Team Scourge
Some time before the events of Hivebent, Aradia played Flarp as a member of Team Charge alongside Tavros Nitram. She was distracted at the time of Tavros' paralyzing accident, and subsequently felt guilty about not being able to help. Although advised against it by Terezi Pyrope, a close friend at the time, she attempted revenge against the person responsible, Vriska Serket. Upon the urging of Doc Scratch, Vriska elected to strike back at Aradia after she summoned spirits of the dead to haunt Vriska over her crippling of Tavros. Vriska took control of Sollux Captor, made him fly to Aradia's hive and eat mind honey. The resultant eye blasts leveled Aradia's hive and killed both Aradia and her lusus.
Hivebent[]
After death, she came to learn that the Frog Temple contained technology and/or code which would be important concerning the impending apocalypse. She documented the code present, and Sollux adapted it into Sgrub, the trolls' version of Sburb. Being the original discoverer of the technology leading to the creation of Sgrub, she knows quite a bit more than other trolls about the game, and as a result, serves as a guide or unofficial leader of sorts to the other trolls. She also psychokinetically decapitates the Frog Temple's giant frog head statue and keeps it for herself, later prototyping it.
An enraged Aradiabot.
After entering the Medium, she tier-2-prototypes herself. Equius Zahhak provides a soulbot to give her a much-needed physical form. Aradia travels to the Land of Maps and Treasure to confront Vriska, brutally beating her and leaving her to bleed to death. Over the course of the game she gathers an army of alternate selves from doomed timelines and uses them in the battle against the Black King to suppress his ability to release the Vast Glub.
When Jack Noir appears shortly before the trolls can claim their ultimate reward, Aradia summons a teleportation pad and transports all the trolls into hiding in The Veil, leaving behind her army of alternate selves to confront Jack. All of the alternate selves are effortlessly killed in the confrontation.
Post-Hivebent[]
Aradia remains as a sprite in her soulbot even after the death of all the Lususprites. Much of the endgame events in Hivebent are shown through Aradia reviewing her "soulbot video log". It appears to be the case that all of the video logs are shared on a cloud server available to all of the Aradiabots, as we see the one who survived in third person in one of the logs, and Vriska asks Aradia during Alterniabound if her various selves noticed any weaknesses with Jack. Aradia refuses to talk to any of the newly-discovered human kids, only relenting once to express her distaste for Rose's destructive behavior and indicates she is fully aware of the role they played in causing the trolls' present blight and their eventual role in resolving it. 4 hours and 13 minutes before some CRITICAL MOMENT, Aradia's soulbot explodes in front of Sollux, Equius, and Nepeta.
Aradia stopping Bec Noir using her Maid of Time powers.
Her hitherto-unknown dream self was killed on her Sacrificial Slab when Jack attacks Derse, removing her soul from the soulbot (causing its explosion) and ascending her to the Maid of Time. She successfully but temporarily freezes Jack with her new time powers, and in the split second after releasing him jumps through his portal-flashing body to the Green Sun, where she awaits Rose's arrival with The Tumor and Jade Harley's execution of her survival plan. (Ironically, this was after Aradia told Rose that Aradia “never had” a dream self and that finding the Green Sun is “imp0ssible”). She passes the time by visiting a nearby dream bubble, and she, accompanied by other characters, investigates the origin of Doc Scratch ( - ). She also talks to a deceased alternate Dave Strider about his new situation and what it means to be a Hero of Time ( - ).
When Dave, Rose and the alive trolls arrive at the Green Sun, she and the half-ghost Sollux use their telekinetic abilities to propel the meteor to the Furthest Ring at Rose's behest. Aradia and Sollux stay behind, with Aradia promising to slow Jack down as much as possible.
Later she and Sollux are seen as part of Vriska's crew as “specialists”, whose powers will be useful once they retrieve the Treasure. When she is last seen, Aradia seems to remain in the dream bubbles watching the skies for Lord English's trails of destruction.
New timeline[]
It is unknown whether any aspect regarding her character has changed since the retcon, however she has been confirmed by Terezi to still have been guiding “SOLLUX'S H4LF GHOST”. Aradia and Sollux are seen with Tavros' ghost army as well as other points in dream bubbles. Because this Sollux was a half-ghost instead of fully alive and blind, this confirms that Aradia has another alive self roaming around since the retcon. It's not known whether the Aradia from the ghost army is pre-retcon or post-retcon.
Later she appears alongside the dream ghosts to confront Lord English. Alongside Meenah Peixes and Tavros, she gleefully strangles and time-freezes him, but is eventually driven back.
In Act 7 Aradia makes a brief and presumably final appearance watching the black hole created by the Green Sun's destruction with a smile on her face, fulfilling her desire to “see what happens when this whole place breaks apart”.
Personality and Traits[]
Hero Mode Aradia.
Aradia lost most of her interest in ordinary activities after her death, and appears to be constantly bored. Breaking things is the only way she is comfortable in showing her emotions. She refuses to allow herself to acknowledge that she has emotions because it makes her feel safe to feel nothing. She also seems to blame herself for her death before she entered the Soulbot, saying that the circumstances that led to her death involved “s0me bad ch0ices” on her part.
Before her death, she seems to have been happier and more enthusiastic, complimenting Tavros on his sense of fun while playing Flarp. It also appears that she enjoyed the movies of Troll Indiana Jones, which likely influenced her decision to be an archaeologist and use the whipkind strife specibus. Post death, she has since stopped caring about both archaeology and role playing, along with essentially all of her former interests.
Her ability to hear the dead, including her ancestors, may have also contributed to her archaeological exploits. They are what led her to the Frog Temple Ruins in the first place, shortly before her death.
Aradia is obsessed with temporal inevitability, and her motivations usually involve doing things solely because she knows they have to happen. It is this attitude which often allows time loops to form in the first place, and easily makes her a pawn of Sgrub and whatever beings influence the timeline, including Doc Scratch, who likely had her killed for this purpose.
Aradiabot hopping between timelines
After entering the Soulbot made by Equius, she appears to have regained some emotions. These seem to be violently extreme, although it is possible she's simply forgotten how to handle emotions, having spent so much time without them. As a ghost, she once told Vriska that she was “0k” with her own death, but shortly after she enters the soulbot, she seeks out Vriska and beats her to death for what appeared to be revenge, but might have been to ensure Vriska's ascension to god tier. After getting used to the body she still appears to be fatalistic and jaded, but now a lot more violent and confrontational, though she does acknowledge certain trolls (such as Karkat Vantas) as friends. This change is probably brought on by the violent tendencies from the blue blood in the soulbot. Karkat has called her a “SPOOKY TIN CAN PSYCHOPATH”, and suggests that she would be closer to her original personality if she were to be properly brought back to life.
This is more or less true once Aradia achieves god tier and is, officially, very much alive and intends to stay that way. She is enthusiastic and kind even when talking about depressing things. She is convinced that there is no reason to grieve, and thinks that things are going to turn out okay. Considering her knowledge of the time stream, it is likely that she knows some hopeful things later in the timeline, as she knew Sollux would see her again, but he would be blind. Aradia has abandoned her typing quirk now, even though she used it prior to her death. This change might be related to her claim that she feels “truly alive for the first time”.
When Aradia entered the Medium, she self-prototyped the Frogsprite. In this new form, she took on the Frogsprite's body, including webbed fingers and a Kermit the Frog-esque neck fringe, but with her old head and sleeves. Her horns also appear to have been replaced by a set of froglike eyes.
As a Sprite, Aradia has (or maybe had) access to important game information similar to Davesprite, but due to the nature of a Kernelsprite, she cannot communicate it without being obtuse. This provides absolutely no change from her previous behavior.
Relationships[]
Lusus[]
Ribbit.
Aradia is unable to prototype her Lusus, dead before the game and presumably incinerated in an accident by Sollux's release of psionic energy. Her lusus appears to have been a small ram-like creature.
Vriska Serket[]
Aradiabot attacking Vriska.
Vriska attempted to befriend her when they were beginning Sgrub. Vriska found it odd that Aradia did not care that she had killed her, but tried to make it up to her anyway by passing along a robotic body built for her by Equius, which she was trying to present as a gift from herself. Aradia ended up connecting it to Equius, and kicked Vriska off the blue team, causing Vriska to flip out at her. After fusing with the robot and regaining emotions, Aradia killed Vriska in an act of vengeance, thus allowing her to ascend to god tier.
After being introduced to John Egbert on Vriska's ship in the afterlife, Vriska claimed to have been “willing to let 8ygones 8e 8ygones” and “happy to have her on [her] crew in whatever capacity she likes”, implying that the two are most likely friends again.
Equius Zahhak[]
Equius is quite possibly the only person still capable of weirding Aradia out in her ghost state. Later, when Equius gives her a robot body (with blue blood instead of dark red, an intentional choice to match his own caste) programmed to have romantic feelings for him, Aradia reacts very badly. She proceeds to flip the fuck out, rip her new heart out, beat it to a pulp, smack the shit out of Equius, and then surprisingly kiss him, seemingly not under the influence of her programming in any way. The exact nature of this relationship is unclear, though it seems they are wavering back and forth between the flushed and caliginous quadrants of troll romance, which is fairly common. Later during the Ministrife, Aradia mentions that she “never should have kissed [him] that time it was such a mistake :(” most likely ending their difficult relationship for good and implying that she regrets it.
Sollux Captor[]
Aradia seems to have a longstanding and close relationship with Sollux. It is popularly believed that they were at one point in a romantic relationship; although this has never been confirmed. Nepeta's shipping wall tells us that at one point, she wondered whether Aradia and Sollux were in a flushed relationship, though later she crossed out the possibility. This is not enough to definitely pin down their relationship, and when a reader asked Andrew Hussie on his Formspring what kind of relationship they had, he said that "maybe it's more interesting if it's not spelled out".
Some time after being killed by Vriska through Sollux (and forgiving them both), Aradia had continued to converse with Sollux as before and the two had cooperated to begin their session of Sgrub. Becoming increasingly troubled by her doomsaying, Sollux eventually attempted to rebel when Aradia revealed that the game would destroy the world. After entering her soulbot, she barely said anything to Sollux, but she chose to spend her last few moments before it exploded to reconcile with Sollux. She seemed glad to talk to Sollux in dream bubbles and led him back to his friends after he died. Aradia opted to stay behind rather than proceed to the new session and Sollux decided to stay with her.
The two were later seen together on Vriska's ship as “their a8ilities [would] 8ecome useful once [they retrieved] the treasure”. However, claiming that the adventure made him feel dirty, Sollux decided to leave the crew shortly after Tavros, while Aradia went on ahead with Vriska and her crew. However, he did offer to “catch up again later, h0pefully when [it was] all 0ver”, with Aradia eagerly responding in agreement.
After Game Over, it appears that Aradia and Sollux remain together in both the pre- and post-retcon timelines.
Tavros Nitram[]
Prior to her death, Aradia was good friends with her roleplaying partner, Tavros, and seems to be among the few trolls who showed him respect. Before their infamous FLARPing revenge cycle, Tavros discussed the FLARP adventure with Aradia, and she claimed that Tavros “might be the 0nly flarper in the w0rld wh0 really understands the true spirit 0f the game” and shouldn't “hesitate t0 ask f0r help” if he were in trouble. However, right before the event of Tavros's paralysis, Aradia had not been there to help him and later expresses her guilt and self-blame to Terezi regarding Tavros's injury.
Terezi Pyrope[]
Aradia seems to have gotten along well with Terezi since around the beginning of their FLARPing days. After Tavros's paralysis, Aradia had expressed her guilt and self-blame to Terezi regarding Tavros's injury, after which Terezi consoled her and told her that she (Terezi) was distracted by Doc Scratch too. The two also together agreed that their teams' “gaming days [were] 0ver then”. Terezi attempted to convince her to not get revenge on Vriska to avenge Tavros, however Aradia failed to resist the urges of “the voices” to “make her pay”.
Before their meteor journey to new session, Terezi claimed that she “4CTU4LLY THOUGHT [4R4D14'S] WHOL3 D34TH F4NG1RL TH1NG [W4S] FUNNY 4ND K1ND OF CH4RM1NG” and that “LUCK1LY [SH3 M4D3] 4N 4DOR4BL3 H4NDM41D TO TH3 M4ST3R OF D34TH, 3SP3C14LLY 1N [H3R] CUT3 CH3RRY P1X13 3NS3MBL3”. This continued friendliness in their conversations implies that the two remain friends.
Karkat Vantas[]
Aradia and Karkat were on friendly terms when she “USED TO NOT BE A ROBOT”, but before her ascension to the god tiers he finds her a “A SPOOKY TIN CAN PSYCHOPATH”. He shows affection for their previous relationship by saying that IF [THEY] WEREN'T ALL ABOUT TO DIE, [HE'D] DEDICATE [THEIR] WHOLE TEAM TO FINDING A WAY TO BRING [HER] BACK TO LIFE[1]
Other trolls[]
In the dream bubbles Aradia encountered and befriended many troll ghosts, such as Eridan Ampora and Feferi Peixes',[image?] and many versions of Nepeta,[citation needed] who was her server player in life.
Kanaya Maryam talks to Aradia a lot, which she finds bothersome but flattering.[citation needed]
Humans[]
Rose considers Aradia “actually interesting.” While exploring dream bubbles, Aradia also gets along well with Jade and an alternate Dave, who she regrets ignoring when they had the chance to talk.[citation needed] As members of Vriska's pirate crew Aradia speaks to John, though their conversation only leads John to believe that the trolls “are all so insane!”
Gallery[]
Merchandise[]
Aradia is the "Ace of Pentacles" in the Homestuck tarot card deck, and appears on the "Five of Wands" card with the rest of the pre-Act 6 cast.
Trivia[]
While trivia sections are fine, it might be a good idea to merge some of this material into relevant sections of the main text, because this trivia section is bloated.
In particular: There is way too much information in the trivia that easily could be merged into the main article.
- Aradia, unlike most of the trolls, has an ancestor who is not dead by the start of Hivebent. She shares this trait with Feferi and Sollux.
- Additionally, her ancestor was the only one that did not arrive in the past like the other 11 and was sent into post-apocalyptic Alternia where her meteor would be intercepted by Doc Scratch.
- Along with Jane Crocker, she is one of only two characters to have entered the medium
twice, although in Aradia's case it was a doomed timeline Aradiabot who re-entered in the alpha timeline.
- One of her songs, "Arisen Anew", takes a quote from Doctor Who, a television series centered around time travel.
- Luka Megurine, a Vocaloid (popular voice synthesizer), can also be heard. Her lyrics are "Toki no hime wa inu wo tometa" which means "The Princess of Time has stopped the dog" (referring to Jack).
- In canon, Aradia and Damara, her dancestor, are the only characters asked by a third party to render themselves in a more appropriate manner.
- Aradia and Damara have flat teeth, but Aradiabot has sharp teeth.
- The death of Aradia's dream self might be a reference to the Roman Agonalia festival. In the festival, a ram was sacrificed to a guardian god (which could be a reference to Bec Noir).
References[]
- ↑ [S] Past Karkat: Wake up.. “KARKAT: YOU KNOW WHAT WAS GREAT? WHEN YOU USED TO NOT BE A ROBOT. / KARKAT: CAUSE THIS ROBOT THING? THIS IS BULLSHIT. / KARKAT: IF WE WEREN'T ALL ABOUT TO DIE, I'D DEDICATE OUR WHOLE TEAM TO FINDING A WAY TO BRING YOU BACK TO LIFE / KARKAT: BUT WE ARE SO GUESS WE'LL HAVE TO RIDE OUT THE NEXT FEW HOURS WITH A SPOOKY TIN CAN PSYCHOPATH, SOUNDS LIKE A BLAST.”
