Aranea Serket

For the post-Scratch version of this character, see Marquise Spinneret Mindfang.

Aranea/Infobox Aranea is one of the Pre-Scratch Dead Trolls. She wears red shoes, white pointed glasses, and a blue longsleeved dress with a white Scorpio symbol. She has her hair at shoulder length and wears a necklace with the Signless's symbol. Based off the color of her eyeliner, dress, and lipstick, she likely has cerulean colored blood. Her horns are identical to Vriska's. It appears that she is also older than the other troll players.

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Aranea's first appearance.

She initially appears in a black void, waving and smiling at Jake after he blacked out, suggesting she has a friendly nature. Jake later described her as both "some sort of spidery vampire" and "the girl of my dreams", the latter is based on his fondness of blue ladies and spider girls. This could also parallel John's feelings for Vriska.

Aranea talking to Terezi

Later, she introduces herself by name to Terezi after greeting her in a dream bubble posing as Vriska, and reveals that she is a version of Vriska's ancestor, Mindfang. She states that she is also Terezi's ancestor, though not quite in the way Terezi is picturing (alluding to the fact that she is one of the pre-Scratch ancestors, and therefore a predecessor of all the current trolls, though not their ancestor by troll definition). Aranea claims to have preceded Terezi's entire civilization by billions of solar sweeps ( an ornate manner of explaining she lived in the previous, pre-Scratch universe and has watched the post-Scratch universe from the afterlife).

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Aranea is a fully realised Sylph of Light.

Aranea's role was the Sylph of Light. This contradicts a theory that the Ancestors shared their role with their descendants, instead suggesting they merely share the same aspect. She is shown to have reached the God Tiers, and has some kind of healing powers, to the extent that she suggests it's possible for her to restore Terezi's sight.

Speculation

• The current location of the players could play a role in Aranea's ability to communicate with them. Since they are technically not in a session, there are no boundaries preventing communication. Terezi would also be a logical choice for a conversation, considering her plethora of memories of Vriska, as well as her close relationship with her.
• The Cancer necklace she wears suggests she is a follower of The Sufferer. This seems at odds with her being pre-Scratch Mindfang, since the tale of the Sufferer did not happen in the pre-scratch universe of the trolls. However, Doc Scratch has referred to the pre-Scratch trolls and their ancestors as figures of legend, which suggests they had importance in troll history. As such, it is not outside the realm of possibility that there was some alternate universe equivalent to the Signless and his religion, although it would be unclear how he got the same sign as the post-scratch Sufferer, who earned his post mortem as representation of the cuffs he wore during execution. Note that Mindfang called the Sufferer's tale compelling, suggesting she was at least sympathetic to his teachings. However, it is also quite possible that the necklace has no religious connotations, and is of only personal significance to Aranea.
• Although she is a hero of light, whose Denizens are usually associated with Cetus, Aranea was the player in her session who consulted Echidna about the Scratch. As Echidna is typically the associated Denizen of heroes of Space, it is unknown as of yet whether Echidna is actually Aranea's Denizen or if she simply consulted her rather than their session's Hero of Space (who is most likely Kanaya's pre-Scratch ancestor). Furthermore, the implications for why Aranea would consult Echidna in her stead are also unknown.

Trivia

• When the suggestion box for Vriska's name was open, "Aranea" was one of the suggested names.
• "Aranea" is Latin for spider, pronounced a-RAH-nee-a, and sometimes refers to the orb-weaving family of spiders.
  • An Aranea is a spider-like shapeshifter in Dungeons & Dragons.
  • Aranea is also the name of one of Charlotte's three children that stay at the barn from Charlotte's Web.
• Unlike Vriska, Aranea doesn't replace 8-sounding words with 8, just "b"s.
• Aranea is using Vriska's trolltag (AG), but possibly only for the dream bubble memory since she was impersonating Vriska at first.
• Aranea's name may also be a reference to Araña, a word which is Spanish for Spider, and is a name that one of the Spider-girls went by, further alluding Jake's interest in her.
• Aranea's wings when she reached God Tier are exactly like Vriska's.
• Like with Meenah and Feferi, her personality seems to be the opposite of Vriska's.