#not dirkhal

At this point in the comic, this version of Dave has not really faced the major major downsides of his abilities, including processing the idea that each Dave is, by all accounts, an individual with a life and experiences that can be overrun by a slightly more narratively important Dave, and that put in his position, he would feel the same.

So there’s like, any number of aus/offshoots/etc that can bring up the whole PS-Dave being around and there’s the ‘post game, everyone gets the guardians, sprites back in initial form’ bullshit where he has at least some degree of nuance (see: a whole other version of himself that he does not identify with running around as a God.)

But there’s also just. Modern settings. Dirk makes an AI of himself as a teen, and Dave is familiar with him as a barrier to reaching actual Dirk when he tries. It’s the frustrating cycle we see with Dirk’s friends, Hal is at this point just the AR, and no one likes being screened by it.

But then the AR is more lifelike, and Dirk’s older, and they’re pretty easy to tell apart considering the shift in their growth- Dirk is not the same as the program and the AR is increasingly losing the ‘indistinguishable’ part. It’s still annoying to run into, but now it doesn’t feel so much like being deceived- it feels like having a shared phone be answered. That said, it’s still the AR, the same way it’s still the AR to Dirk’s friends.

And then it’s Hal. There’s a conflicting use of he/it pronouns that show the fact that this is becoming far more than just a software that answers messages, but Dave doesn’t know enough about technology to really understand what that really means. Dirk has explained he it is a very good emulation, but is probably not a sentient being. The probably doesn’t help.

What else doesn’t help is the fact that this ‘emulation’ is like exceedingly good at getting under Dirk’s skin and surprisingly human in interactions with Dave. He It shows personal interest in Dave’s work, he it has implied or directly stated his its feelings on the way he it is treated, he it has a lot of opinions different than Dirk in regards to shared interests, and Dave is struggling to pull apart the ‘this is a software’ but the step up from ‘this is no longer a software’ is leagues more confusing!

Because now, if it’s not a software, it has to be some variation of Dirk, right? Dirk made the original as a copy of him, and Dave can remember when that was what AR Hal was, he can’t map the changes over time because it was as subtle as Dirk growing and changing, so now he’s dealing with this Arguably Version Of Dirk that Probably Has Feelings and Might Be a Guy, who is kind of terrorizing the actual Dirk. He can’t talk it out with Hal himself, because if Hal is some form of Dirk, he probably sees Dave as his Bro, and having the person you love and idolize turn around and question the very reality of your existence probably would do some bad damage. So now he’s humanizing Hal even further, and beyond that, caring about his feelings about things.

But even when things calm down with Dirk, and even as Dirk and Hal explain the concept of them as different people, is it ever really easy to cut the line between them completely? They still have core memories shared, Dave can mention something Dirk did at 6 to both of them and both of them will recite the experience in first person, the main difference being Hal likely retained it better as part of the core parts of his being. This isn’t ‘we were both there when it happened,’ this is ‘we can both tell you the thoughts and feelings that were experienced as the action took place’ and often with probably nearly identical phrasing. How do you ever fully differentiate those two in your head.

I can see some degree of ‘like twins,’ or an adopted feeling, but I think there’s always going to be some sense of disconnect from the idea of who Hal is supposed to be. I think where Dirk eventually knows Hal is not him but was at one point, Dave kind of views Hal as this extension of Dirk that split off when Dirk made the AR.

I bet Hal knows, too, and I think it probably sucks, but I think Dave does try to treat him like they’re family. It’s just a little less natural and for a pattern recognizing supercomputer he can pretty easily clock it.

This got away from me and way out of hand woopsies anyway im doing a silly poll what do you guys think if You Read Any Of That