I'm so sorry to do this, you are literally SO nice and patient and answer all these asks and don't even get a thank you most of the time!!! But listen, I've been professionally diagnosed with Dumb Bitch Disease and I would really appreciate if you walked me through the events of Cascade. I'm so sorry to ask you this cause I don't want to waste your time but my case of Dumb Bitch Disease is terminal. Also even if you don't answer this, thank you for all your hard work. You're the best!!!!
Lmao don’t worry at all! I like lore recaps! Okay, so!
Cascade is a masterful show of event simultaneity with like, so many different things going on at the same time as the countdown of the Tumor slowly crawls towards 0.
We begin with John initiating the Scratch, 10 minutes and 25 seconds before the Tumor blows up. Powerful Underlings come to try and stop him but at that point he’s kind of severely overpowered and doesn’t even break a sweat to summon Lava Tornadoes. This is also, specifically, after John took Rose’s Needlekind specibus from her corpse, and Jade sent him an enlarged pair of Echidna’s Quills to scratch the disc.
Then we cut to Bec Noir mourning the death of Jade- Death he himself orchestrated, but since he’s part Bec he’s grieving. He just murdered CD for blowing her up, and we see a shot of his hand- Teasing us as it transitions to the 00:00 moment, showing us how Jack has his hand covered in blood in the future and we still don’t KNOW why. He summons the Red Miles with the Queen’s Ring and tears through the Universe. In future Earth, the Exiles see this happening and prepare to blow up the Stations so that they may not be used to interfere with SBURB now that their work is done. WQ waits patiently for WK to pop out of the Time Capsule, and a new one resets to open exactly in 10 seconds, a wilted flower.
Bec Noir, saddened by Jade’s death, and with Bec’s instincts, tucks her into her Bed- Her Quest Bed, that is. And immediately after leaving her there, he goes to the meteor with the Frog Temple, goes right into the Time Capsule, and pops up 10 seconds after WK popped out of it, murdering both him and WQ before they could get a proper reunion. He sets off to slaughter PM as well, but AR starts blowing up the capsules and grabs his attention. He cannot destroy the Cork capsule, since WV is inside, and that moment of hesitation to blow it up leads to Jack decapitating him. Inside the capsule, we see one of the many machines we’ve seen before, with a dial going from one side of a frog to the other spirograph- A representation that’d been in front of our faces about how it warps you to the Session that created the Universe. Since there’s no fuel, however, Jack tears the piece of Uranium WV ate back in Act 2 right out of his stomach, staining his hand in blood at long last, and using the machine to warp. The capsule opens and PM rushes inside.
Meanwhile, Dave and Rose are headed to the core of the Moon of Derse after dealing with DD, who tried to ambush them. Inside the crypt, they find their Sacrificial Slabs, and set the Tumor within. The black and white shell opens to reveal a red and blue machine- Equating the colors to duality as well. We zoom into the Red part of the machine and see the Kids’ Universe, being torn apart by the Red Miles. Then, we zoom into the Blue part to see the Trolls’ Universe, where Snowman and Slick are having a stand-off.
Snowman tells him to shoot her, and so he does. She doesn’t even defend herself, it’s her purpose. The bullet is a cue ball, that sinks the 8 ball, Snowman. “If you kill her, you destroy the Universe” comes true, and as the bullet passes through her heart, reality starts to come undone around them. We zoom back out of the Universe and out of Derse, and transition to Jade’s Land.
In a moment emulating John’s Ascension, we see Hummingbirds gathering around her corpse, and a zoom-in from WV’s place, where we briefly glimpse PM freaking out as WV slowly bleeds to death. Yet another zoom out, and we move into the Battlefield, with meteors raining heavily down upon it, and Davesprite and Jadesprite watching hopelessly as a huge one heads right in their direction. They’ve pretty much assumed their fate at this point.
Of course they don’t die, because Jade ascends just in time. Her Dreamself counts as alive since she’s mixed with her sprite, and as such, she Ascends, mixing not only her Witch of Space powers, but also Bec’s First Guardian powers. She effortlessly shrinks down the meteor about to blast them, lifts up a Prospitian ship, and immediately sets off to accomplish what she promised Echidna she would do- Bring everything with her. She shrinks down the Battlefield, warps to her Land, and brings John- Who at this point has finished Scratching the Beat Mesa- onto the ship.
Rose and Dave watch the countdown getting dangerously close to the 00:00 moment, PM drags WV out of the capsule, hopelessly staring up into the sky, as the Queen’s Ring falls out of WV’s pocket knife. She knows exactly what to do. Jade quickly shrinks down all 4 of the other Planets, and we reach the Climax of Cascade.
Swiftly switching from one scene to another, we see everything that’s going on and that has happened. Snowman, Dead, Slick shooting. Billious Slick dying and Jack using Red Miles. Rose and Dave staring at the Tumor, PM slowly putting on the ring, the Beat Mesa ascending towards Skaia- And then Jade pulls out the 4th Wall Karkat told her to captchalogue, slowly shrinking it.
As everything is erased from the Timeline, we see the comic flashing on the screen, and stopping on Gamzee- At the critical moment we saw already a little while ago. We see this time, however, that Doc Scratch has been talking to him! And he’s been following his orders. Now he only has one last message to highlight:
S u c k e r s .
Scratch doesn’t lie, but he tells lies of omission. The Tumor has enough force to blow up the Green Sun, and going through the Furthest Ring would lead them to its location, sure… What he didn’t tell Rose was that they’d arrive before the Green Sun was created. And while the Tumor has the force to destroy it? He never said it would. Roughly the mass of two Universes finally gains context, as the Red and Blue Universe’s deaths are used to detonate the bomb, and instead Create the Green Sun.
The explosion alerts both Jack and the Trolls, but while Sollux uses the last of his Psionics to thrust the Meteor in the Sun’s direction, Jack is distracted by something coming from the same platform he reached the Troll Session through.
Having been standing on their Sacrificial Slabs, Rose and Dave Ascend to God Tier right outside of the Green Sun, meeting up with Aradia, and Sollux’s half-dead ghosty self. PM has a stare-off with an astonished Jack, and she’s brought both WV’s bleeding out self and Serenity with her.
Finally we see what Jade’s doing with the 4th wall. She enlarges it in front of the ship, and shatters through it, away from the Session and into Meta Space where Hussie lives, outside of their reality and escaping the Scratch. 4 Kids, God Tiered, away from the Scratch. Jack Noir, meeting his match, caught by surprise. The Trolls, headed to the Green Sun, about to reunite with Dave and Rose.
And on that triumphant note? The curtains close, and the Act ends.