John Egbert

Biography

John, traveling by meteor, arrived on Earth as an infant, which resulted inHS the death of his ectobiological mother. He was adopted and raised by his genetic half-brother who took the role of his Dad. At some point during his childhood, Gamzee Makara used his chucklevoodoosHS on John, causing a doll resembling Jack NoirHS to appear in his dream room on Prospit. This caused John to write self-depreciating remarks and draw pictures of harlequins on his walls while sleeping, however he was not cognizant of these while awake. His dad, who was generally supportive of his interests, began showing an interest in harlequins too, in an attempt to bond with John, but failed to realize John's distaste for them. At some point John became friends with Rose, Dave and Jade over the internet. Little is known about this other than the fact that Jade first contactedHS John on one of his birthdays. All four would go on to play Sburb together. On Jade's birthdayHS, after being harassedHS by trolls, John changed his Pesterchum handle from ghostyTrickster to ectoBiologist

Biography(2)

Sburb The story begins on his birthday, when his copy of Sburb arrives. He also gets an awesome Bunny from Dave. He sets up the first connection with Rose as his server. Despite his penchant for video games, he initially does not have a firm grasp on the concepts of Sburb and has trouble remembering some of the technical jargon. However, he later shows some more proficiency at playing by the game's rules, and gets the ingenious idea of combining two punched cards to create a new weapon with the Alchemiter. Even later, he makes other items ( - ) based on the same principle. After John prototypes his kernelsprite with the harlequin doll his father got him for his birthday, the area around his house is hit by a meteor and engulfed in flames just as he takes a bite of the Cruxite Apple and enters the Medium. His house is spared from absolute destruction, being suspending on a pillar of rock in the Land of Wind and Shade (LOWAS), the setting Sburb had prepared for his personal quest. His Dad is kidnapped upon entering the game; consequently, his only guides in the Medium at first are Nannasprite and Wayward Vagabond's voices in his head. His house is also overrun by Shale Imps. After messing around his house fighting imps and ogres for a while, John reaches the first Gate, sending him to the surface of LOWAS. He explores his land and begins talking to some trolls

Biography(3)

Terezi is able to trick John into attempting to fight his denizen long before he was ready, and this creates an alternate timeline where John is killed . Dave eventually travels back in time and stops him. The John who died in that timeline later meets deceased Vriska in a dream bubble, and they date each other for a time before breaking up. This John was eventually obliterated by Lord English. Despite Terezi deceiving him, he decides to trust her again, and flies to his second Gate which led to Rose's house. Rose is asleep at the time, so he takes her birthday gift to him: a bunny similar to the one he got from Dave . Tired of waiting for her to awaken, he leaves to explore the Land of Light and Rain (LOLAR) and finds a small island with a transportalizer, which leads to the Veil. Here he does some ectobiology, creating the kids and their guardians , including himself, as paradox clones and giving them gifts. Initially John's dream self is mostly asleep, with only brief glimpses of waking up and sleepwalking. This changes when Jack Noir begins The Reckoning and attacks Prospit , causing the moon to come crashing out of orbit. Dream Jade attempts to wake John before sacrificing herself to save him from certain death. Dream John awakens after the celestial collision and finds his fallen friend face down on Skaia's Battlefield. He takes the White Queen's ring from Jade and foresees his destination in the clouds

Biography(4)

Meanwhile, his other self, sleeping in the Veil, is saved by an Authority Regulator of Derse. On the Battlefield a Parcel Mistress gives him his birthday present from Jade, which was the same bunny as his other presents, but this time enhanced with cybernetic upgrades. He is confronted by Jack, who assumes the bunny will continue to help him, but this is a mistake. Jack flees , leaving John to wander the Battlefield. Soon he encounters his Dad and Rose's Mom, but before reuniting with them, John is awakened by Vriska's powers and loses the Queen's ring. He becomes friends with Vriska, who advises him to do things which he was going to do anyway; this is all part of her paradoxical efforts to be the guiding hand behind Jack's ascension and eventual (at least in her mind) defeat. John retrieves his server copy of Sburb and connects to Jade, however he is put back to sleep by Vriska before prototyping her kernel. Later he is in mortal danger , as Jack uses his new first guardian powers to destroy LOWAS with green fire. With WV's help he manages to use his wind powers to 'do The Windy Thing', putting out the fire on LOWAS. Later, on the advice of Vriska, he goes to sleep on his Quest Bed and gets killed by Jack, and his dream self ascends to god tier. John travels through Skaia in his new form with the Wizardly Vassal and drills the planet to retrieve The Tumor .

Biography(5)

He comes across the Courtyard Droll who had been carrying Liv Tyler with him, getting its Warhammer of Zillyhoo. He sends Liv, CD? and WV? to Derse to drop off the Tumor at the moon and gives his wallet to WV?, forgetting it carried his Crosbytop where Jade messages him later about his dad's death . John finds a grimdark Rose descending to the castle where her mother and John's father were slain. They reunite and Rose tries to explain the situation but could only speak in eldritch tongues . Rose leads John to the top of the castle where their parents lie and he encounters Jack Noir , but as his strife began Jack immediately stabbed John. Due to his death being neither just nor heroic, he comes back to life , only to discover a dead Rose. Following Vriska's advice, he kisses Rose, allowing her dream self to survive. Then, following Karkat's orders , John goes to the Land of Heat and Clockwork (LOHAC). It is here that Karkat first trolled John from his perspective . Future Karkat explains how to initiate the scratch, which John successfully does . Later he is transported to Jade, who had just acquired god tier, and observes as Jade fulfilles Echidna's request traveling to a new session through the Fourth wall

personality and traits

John's physical appearance could be described as a kid with black messy hair. He has an obvious nerdy look about him, a trait inherited from his ectobiological mother. His outfit has a picture of what appears to be Slimer from Ghostbusters, but is in fact a Japanese knock-off. John's interests are movies (especially Con Air), web comics, and video games. He enjoys paranormal lore, practical japery, and magic tricks, the latter of which he also performs. He owns a computer and likes to make programs, no matter how bad they may be. He also has a long-standing hatred of the Betty Crocker brand and can play the piano quite well. His room has various items to suggest his hobbies, such as a Magic Chest filled with trick objects. His walls are littered with posters of movies, web comics, and video games. One example of a real-world videogame that John has played is Crash Bandicoot . Notably, this collection of items, when colored, are typically green, but John associates with the color blue. John tends to be a bit of a goofball, making bad jokes and using off-beat humor and subtle irony. He tends to be passive in nature, complying with commands not because they made logical sense, but because he was told to. His optimism through stalwart skepticism ( , ) causes his friends think of him as the leader, while he prefers just being their friend. From Dave's description, John is the kind of person who generally does not get emotionally wavered by events that would drive others to the brink, but instead gets riled up and irrationally stubborn over ridiculous minutia, to the amusement or confusion of others. This is proven true on a number of occasions throughout the comic, as he is shown to react calmly and appropriately during some of the more traumatic events of their session, but loses his mind when he briefly loses interest in Con Air. In a sense, he is one of the most innocent characters in the comic.

personality and traits(2)

John is more prone to bad ideas than his friends and is made the butt of a lot of jokes when chatting with them through Pesterchum. He also celebrates the birthdays of his friends, sending them gifts. John has a tendency to be given commands about making noises and shitting on things. Fortunately, he hasn't complied with any of these, though he often seems to consider them against his better judgement . John is by far one of the most inventive of the main characters; from the beginning, he shows more innovative prowess in combining items than any of the others, even before the introduction of the alchemiter; he demonstrates this with his poster-nailing and harlequin-funniness-amplifying abilities. He is the most grounded of the main characters, contrasting Rose's bookish, logical demeanor, Dave's unceasing pursuit of transcendent irony, and Jade's air-headed, scatterbrained antics. He is also the kindest - Rose is generally very cold emotionally, Dave is quite willing to put the pursuit of irony before consideration for others, and Jade's ideas of kindness tend to be a bit odd, although not out of actual malice. John proves to be quite generous and spends more time than the others helping his Consorts. This is in special contrast to Rose who actively antagonizes them and intentionally sets about destroying her own planet once she learns their session is null, and Dave, who appears to have disregarded them entirely when he wasn't stealing all of their money through the LOHAC Stock Exchange. His post-scratch self is described by Dirk as being a real kindly old cornball and that a nicer guy you couldn't hope to meet . He also has a strong propensity for self-described "HILARIOUS ANTICS", and has all of the points on his Prankster's Gambit. All of them. Although Rose and Dave both frequently take potshots at the quality of his jokes and pranks, he appears to have a genuine talent for comedy, as his post-scratch self became a world-famous comedian .

Relationship with Beta kids

Dave, Rose and Jade are John's best friends, and have been for quite some time. None of their feelings for each other has changed since the session has started, although he does think Rose has gotten crazier, and has half-jokingly sworn to rescue her from the clutches of evil caused by her commune with the deep ones. John is seen to have a close sibling relationship with Jade, as he refused to leave her alone and stayed with her on the ship for 3 years HS. John does think that Dave is cool, but only says this between him and Dave as seen in the birthday note he sent him HS. On multiple occasions, Dave has described the two of them as "best bros." He appears to be nervous about Karkat's idea of him marrying Rose; although John has brought up the shipping grid and marrying Rose on quite a few occasions, despite his supposed hesitance. Additionally, around the time of Seer: Descend, John began to show multiple signs of having a romantic crush on Rose. His reactions to Jade asking him if he was in love with roseHS also suggest this. However, after meeting her again three years later, John no longer behaves this way around her.

Relationship with Roxy Lalonde

Mirroring the aforementioned romantic crush John may have had on Rose as well as the relationship between Rose's Mom and Dad Egbert, Roxy's crush on Jake, and even Roxy's crush on Jane's Dad, John and Roxy hit it off upon meeting - John attempts to keep them entertained, and Roxy makes a mental note to mack on John, considering him possible boyfriend material HS. When they met again on Roxy's planet after the events of GAME OVER, John attempted to comfort Roxy. Terezi insisted that his awkward goodbyes displayed P41NFULLY 3V1D3NT ROM4NT1C T3NS1ONHS. They meet again after John finishes his quest and discuss what to do next in terms of the main plot. After several timeline-related shenanigans, Roxy is visibly happyHS to see John return to LOWAS. John hands the ring of life over to her, and she in turn grabs John's handHS as they venture onward into what can only be assumed to be even more timeline related shenanigans. John describes Roxy to Dave as really nice and fun and easy to talk to HS. John also stated that he felt worse for Roxy after the catastrophic events that he witnessed than he felt for himself. After John tells Dave about his experiences with Roxy, Dave notes these highly probable romantic feelings, telling John that it sounds like you like her, to which John responds maybe HS. In Act 7 he is seen walking with Roxy and Calliope.

Relationship with Jake English

John quickly develops a friendly relationship with Jake when they meet - they have, among other similarities, a common fondness for movies and similar personalities. John invites Jake to join him, Rose, and Roxy in making plans for dealing with the villains, likely so that he can spend more time with him. John's stated that Jake strikes him as a nice regular dude who likes movies and stuffHS.

Relationship with Karkat Vantas

John's relationship with Karkat had become a duo of hate and friendship. John now enjoys all of Karkat's hate-filled rants because of the sheer "insane trolling" Karkat is capable of. While not his patron troll, Karkat has trolled him backward through almost every step of his journey. After he finished his backward trolling, Karkat's feelings toward John became far less antagonistic, and he has even apologized for all his bad behavior to him and his friends. John has called Karkat his favorite trollHS.

Relationship with Terezi Pyrope

John's talks with Terezi have been strained at best. The first time they talkedHS, Terezi threatened to kill him as a prank, which caused him to change his Pesterchum handle. Later on, he gets involved in Terezi's plot to mess up the timeline, although they constantly antagonized each other. Since Dave has started working together with Terezi, she has stopped talking to John for the most part, as Vriska became his new patron troll. Having met up after the bloodbath on LOFAF, the two of them began scheming to use John's powers to F1X TH1SHS. Although their plot was successful, Terezi and John still appear to be on bad terms, with Terezi calling him and one of his alternate selves N3RDSHS and making belittling remarks, and John thinking that she's been pranking him, also frequently calling her either weird or insane. After John explains to DaveHS his interactions with Terezi, Karkat insists that John has a caliginous crush on Terezi, although John argues that humans cannot have those kinds of relations. Dave, however, supports Karkat's claim, saying that karkat knows his shit when it comes to quadrantsHS. John later has mixed feelings about the idea, denying that he is black for her but heavily implying otherwise. It is possible that Terezi returns John's black feelings (or has some sort of other feelings for him), supported when she says to Vriska, N3V3R N3V3R N3V3R T3LL H1M 1 S41D TH1S BUT FOR 4 DORK, H3'S...HS, and does not finish her sentence. Later, John and Terezi have a conversation, which, although we don't get to see what they say, seems to be filled with black flirting and trading insults. When Terezi leaves, John retorts with BYE, IDIOT!!!!!!!HS and then blushes as Roxy looks at him.

Relationship with Kanaya Maryam

John has talked to Kanaya twice: first (from John's perspective) months in the past, and second during Sburb through Rose's account. John said she was kinda coolHS during their first conversation.

Relationship with Aradia Megido

John has twice talked to Aradia since joining Vriska's pirate crew. The first time he was introduced to her, he questioned her ghostliness, and she told him she was aliveHS. The second time, he asked her about her opinions on Vriska's crew's adventure. However, her response, to which John replied you are all so insane!HS, seemed to have creeped him out.

Relationship with Vriska Serket

John's relationship with Vriska is a very complex one. It seems to fluctuate between admiring and disliking her. At first, Vriska decided to help John on his quest as a means of competing with Terezi, who was helping Dave. Vriska was very bossy and a controlling of John at first, which he found mildly annoying, but still enjoyed talking with her. Vriska and John's feelings continued to develop; John used more of her typing quirk to please her, Vriska made an outfit for John that she said made him totally hot, and John showed her Nicolas Cage, who became her fangirl crush. However, after Vriska killed Tavros, Vriska opened up with more of her feelings than she had with anybody else. She held John's opinion of her in the highest respect, fearing that he would be angry with her (HS - HS). She has told John about not only her remorse for the killing of Tavros and others, but how her views of killing compared to those of troll society, how much she admired humans for being weaker but nicer, and her entire backgroundHS. Though he was a bit freaked out after hearing that Vriska had murdered twice and killed thousands to feed her Lusus, he didn't seem to think less of her after receiving the shock. John was shown to still care about Vriska's wellbeing afterward, and Vriska reciprocated these feelings, hoping that John would get strong enough to stop Jack and protect his friends in case she died trying to fight him. Before her death, Vriska asked John out on a date, confirming that Vriska's feelings for John were red after all. John accepted, but Vriska was killed by Terezi, leaving a visibly shaken Karkat to look through their last pesterlog and respond through her accountHS. After switching to his own account, he asked John if he genuinely liked Vriska, upon which John confirmed he did—prompting Karkat to withhold the information of Vriska's death and the specifics of Gamzee's rampage "for now" to avoid distracting John from the important tasks at hand HS.

Relationship with Vriska Serket(2)

During the ride to the new session, John claimed to no longer care much about romance. When Jade asked what this meant about Vriska, he said he barely rememberedHS what he and Vriska talked about, and that is was a bit silly to base a romance on just a day's worth of conversations. John referred to her as that troll girl who was sort of into meHS, suggesting that he forgot about Vriska somewhat. However, when he talks to MeenahHS a little later, he asks her if she has seen Karkat or Vriska (the only two trolls he really got to know well) around, showing that John does remember her more than his conversations with Jade suggested. He later met Vriska's ghost in dream bubbles twice, and after seeing she was using the other dead trolls' ghosts as bait to defeat Lrd English, he began to be somewhat disturbed by her, considering her to be dangerous HS. John confessed to Roxy that he was beginning to think he might actually kind of hate her, and went so far as to call her diabolical HS. However, during John's retcon shenanigans, he interferes during Terezi and Vriska's standoff. Per future Terezi's directions, he prevents Vriska's death by punching her in the faceHS, showing no hesitation in punching her nor in preventing her death. Soon afterward, he does apologize to the unconscious Vriska for punching her, and admits that it will be neat to meet her alive self HS, showing that his former hatred for her either diminished over time or was vented out in that punch. After arriving in the new timeline with Roxy, John is happy to see Vriska, saying that her, um, *ways* probably are more valuable to have here, in the land of the livingHS, and complimentsHS her thought-out plan for taking on all the threats in the session

Trivia

John is the only human kid whose death before ascending to god tier was not by an explosion. John's title, 'Heir of Breath', may be a play on Inherit the Wind. John's god tier hood heavily resembles a wind sock. Breath may be used interchangeably with air, a homophone of Heir. Thus, his title may be a pun on his associated classical element, air, because interchanging the first and last words produces "breath of air". It may also be a play on words of the title of his favorite movie, Con Air (Con Heir). John may be named for James Dallas Egbert III, a student at Michigan State University who was incorrectly alleged to have disappeared into the school's steam tunnels for reasons related to the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons (D&D). John's last name may also be a reference to Roger Ebert, the movie critic, which would be connected to his love of movies. You would have to ask Cuttlefish, the user who originally named him on the MSPA forum to know which, or if something completely different. John has a severe allergy to peanutsHS. Jake shares this allergy. John's current screen name, ectoBiologist, has the initials EB which refers to EarthBound, one of the video games that inspired Andrew Hussie to make Homestuck as stated in Book 1 of Homestuck. He is the only character whose screen name has changed at some point. Coincidentally, his screen name also happens to have the same first letters of the two syllables of his last name (Egbert). His address (21605 Fir Dr, Maple Valley, Washington) is a real place. In one of his pesterlogsHS with Dave, the word "white" was changed to "Íæûë€Å" (part of it was removed; it tripped the spam filter with a particular character), until being changed back. John has a cowlickHS. John's hair was different from the first pageHS until ==>HS, when he is next seen with his current hair from John: Resist great urge to take the wedged shaleHS onwards.

Trivia(2)

This pageHS and this pageHS are a reference to Ghostbusters, where a cart chases a slimer down a hall when provoked by Stantz, where in the panel shows John (Cart) crashing into the wall when holding onto Jade (Stantz), who was following Jaspers (Slimer). When the slimer hit the wall, it revealed a green slime covering it, similar to the pink slime left by Jaspers. John's ghost slime shirt is a fictional Asian knock-off of the ghost slime from Ghostbusters. More info on that here. He wears black boxers with ghost slimes in ACT 6. The name "Zoosmell" is a reference to some of Andrew Hussie's older blurbs, named Zoosmells. Along with Karkat's Sicklekind specibus, John's Hammerkind specibus is symbolic of communism. They were both the leaders of their respective sessions. This was later directly referencedHS by Dave. On the first pageMspa icon of Homestuck Beta, it says John was born on April 10 and was 10 years old. In the final version of Homestuck, he was born on April 13, and was 13 years old. This would have made his original patron troll Nepeta Leijon instead of Vriska Serket. There are only 8 pages in Homestuck Beta; John's patron troll is the eighth sign. This is the possible reason why Andrew Hussie decided to make Homestuck come out on 4/13 instead. In the Homestuck Tarot card deck, John is depicted on the "XII: the Hanged Man" card, the "XVII: The Star" card with Rose, the "XIX: The Sun" card with WV, and on the "XXI: The World" card with all four B1 kids. He can also be seen on the "Five of Wands" card with most of the pre-act 6 cast. John is the only Beta kid to not have had an alternate self prototyped into a sprite at some point. Considering Jane Crocker is related to Betty Crocker (a.k.a The Condesce) this would technically mean that John is also related to other members of the Peixes family such as Feferi and Meenah.

Trivia(3)

John being an Heir of Breath may also be a reference to this, since juvenile fuchsia bloods that are waiting to become the next rulers of Alternia are referred to as heirs/heiresses. Both the Breath and Life signs appear to be flipped versions of each other and compliment each other in a way. (In order to be alive you need to breath and vice versa.) John and Jane are both the leaders of their groups and destined to be leaders just like their fuchsia blooded relatives. In the credits during Rose and Kanaya's wedding, you can spot John in Trickster Mode. Based upon his birthday, aspect, and lunar sway, John's Extended Zodiac sign is Arus, the Wanderer When the first of Andrew Hussie's hidden Toblerones was discovered, the fan who found it tweeted that June Egbert, the most popular name chosen by fans who headcanon Egbert as transfem, should be made canon. Hussie responded with "you were the first to find my treasure, and so it will be done", however as the request fulfillment of the Toblerone hunt appears to have been meant as a joke, this has not affected official Homestuck media in a significant way. The name June is a reference to a pesterlogHS where Vriska types 8x8 o's in the word John, and Egbert decides to pronounce it as "a really long 'june.'" John's cruxite artifact is the Cruxite Apple, which may be a reference to Johnny Appleseed, who shares a name with the character.

Appearance

John has short black hair that is kinda messy in the back, a little pointed upwards. He has deep but dull blue eyes. He has buck teeth and glasses, kinda like a nerd. he wears a white t-shirt with the ghostbusters ghoul symbol on it. and he wears basic jeans.