Davekat

Davekat is the slash ship between Dave Strider and Karkat Vantas from the Homestuck fandom.

Canon
Initially, Dave and Karkat did not get along, and rarely talked to one another. Their only dialogue before Act 6 was a memo in which the two bickered about "sloppy interspecies makeouts".

Dave later briefly crashed the very next memo and mocked Karkat for hypocritically showing interest in Jade and John, although Karkat's past and future selves simply banned Dave out of the memo.

When they actually meet on the meteor, they get along even worse, due to competition over Terezi. Their relationship is so strained that Karkat even begins to view Dave's actions as black advances at some point, although he claims he is not interested in that kind of relationship with him.

However, by the time the third Openbound rolls around, the two seem to have become friends, or at least interact relatively enough. Right before arriving at the session in the pre-retcon timeline, Karkat expressed concern that he and Dave would not be friends anymore when Dave reunited with John.

In the retcon timeline, Dave and Karkat develop a much closer relationship during the meteor trip. They can be seen playing hopscotch and ring-around-the-rosie, holding hands, and Karkat can be seen playing with Dave's turntables in the Vriskagram flash, even cuddling on the couch at one point, which Dave later mentions having done so frequently.

It has been confirmed that they are in a relationship by both Vriska and Jasprosesprite^2. Vriska believes that they had a complicated romantic situation which went beyond the four quadrants, and Jasprose says to Nepeta that Karkat is involved with someone romantically, confirming it.

When Karkat is knocked unconscious by Kanaya and makes a speech for himself to prepare him for the upcoming battle, his final line in the comic itself has him worried about whether or not Dave is okay.

In Act 7, when Dave arrives on the victory platform, Karkat gives him a hug and smiles, and on Earth C they are shown having a picnic with Jade. They're also shown hanging out as kings of the Troll Kingdom and in the MSPA Snapchat.

Fanon
On AO3, Davekat is the most written ship for both Dave and Karkat. It's also the most written ship in the Homestuck tag.

While the ship did have a fanbase before, the ship primarily sailed after the Vriskagram flash, where Dave and Karkat were shown to get along very well and bonding easily.

Most fanfictions involve slow burn and the enemies to friends to lovers trope, the former usually involving either Dave or Karkat (or both) not wanting to admit their crush for the other. Some fanfics may also go with the Humanstuck AU - An alternate universe where all the Trolls are human.

Fandom
FAN FICTION

TUMBLR

Trivia

 * Dave had a heart on his bib from his early childhood, while John had a spade on his shirt. This plays into their relationships with Karkat, seeing as Karkat had black feelings for John (which is represented by a spade), and Karkat and Dave are in a red relationship (which is represented by a heart).