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Post by blahzor on Feb 8, 2021 18:00:08 GMT
Seeing as Zimmy had seen the future in the form of tic-toks there's a chance she's seen Kat looking from the time pool every time. And might have seen the other times a Kat has tried
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Post by drmemory on Feb 8, 2021 18:29:28 GMT
Well at least we know where PEB (Pouncing Elf Boy) went. This raises more questions than it answers though. Why did he end up backstage with Gamma and Renard instead of in the town? Why did his attack immediately trigger Zimmy and is this related to why most of them got pulled in to Zimmytown, but not him? Is this a "special" elf in some way? Has he been backstage this whole time? Eavesdropping or lost or what? As for Kat, I've always wondered what the court's plans for her were. This could be as dark as them ordering the Donlans to produce her, or to raise her if she was created by the court in some way. I don't think her parents are evil, and they clearly love her, but they also go along with what the court wants. It seems like I remember a comment about Kat being born outside of the court but then raised there all her life, but I can't find where I saw that. Maybe I imagined it? If I didn't, it might have been a tiny rebellion against the will of the court. We know the court will do some heartless things if it meets their needs. I've worried that she might be Omega, or else something they needed in order to bring Omega into existence. Like the fairy calculators, only on the computer side. Another (bad) option is that she is meant to bring the robots under total control of the court. We know they don't fully trust the robots and that many robots have tried to leave the court or otherwise rebelled (their CPUs are in CPU Jail). We've also seen some heartless mods done to robots recently, more or less lobotomizing them. Maybe this is happening because their plan for Kat isn't going as planned?
We also know that Donald is in deep with the court. Possibly as deep as Tony. Example. Another. The big mystery (to me) in that chapter is Tony's comments in the last two panels here: "They were going to wait until graduation and then cast her out. Banish her from the court and the program entirely". What the heck is up with that? Normally, one attends school, then graduates, then leaves and builds a life. Just because Tony decided to stay on and get deep into the intrigues of the court doesn't mean that Annie would want to! At best, he's trying to lay out the rest of her life for her. At worst? Well this could be pretty bad. I assume that Kat also has her life planned out for her.
Back on current events, the Gamma/Renard conversation also seems to confirm one of the more interesting Norn comments.
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Post by zbeeblebrox on Feb 8, 2021 20:50:58 GMT
To all the people replying to my question with speculations about Gamma's abilities: I like those theories and I hope Gamma has also some power of her own, but I feel obligated to point out that aline 's idea of Zimmy having explained it to her is also likely. true, if so, then Zimmy is the one with more abilities than we realized.... one way or another, someone here may have some vague ability to see into the future or alternate timelines. It sounds too definitive to be speculation.... Zimmy can’t have more abilities than we realize, since that presumes we understand her abilities in the first place ;P
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Post by gpvos on Feb 8, 2021 21:50:41 GMT
Only Tom can create a comic in which something like Verðandi's answer is so deeply ominous.
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Post by pyradonis on Feb 8, 2021 23:13:54 GMT
Gamma could just be, you know, making an educated guess. It might just be my screen or the contrast against the black background, but to me that elf's hair looks rather grey. There is one other young man with grey hair in the comic, and he has been inside Zimmy's mind multiple times now... true, but it is the same color as Tam's hair as well. www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=2404So by Occam's shaving instrument, it is most likely Tam. It'd be funny if Jack got elf-ified somehow tho! Also, to me, Gamma is "talking" with such certainty here, it isn't like she is speculating on the future, its like she is describing it. Oh, I did not mean to imply Tam was really Jack. My thought went into the direction of "youth has grey hair -> sign of certain etheric abilities" in the Gunnerverse.
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Post by shadow3 on Feb 9, 2021 0:49:56 GMT
Gamma with the sudden multiversal awareness.
What if Gamma is secretly the final boss of Gunnerkrigg Court?
Hmm...
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Post by Jelly Jellybean on Feb 9, 2021 1:01:52 GMT
It seems like I remember a comment about Kat being born outside of the court but then raised there all her life, but I can't find where I saw that. Maybe I imagined it? If I didn't, it might have been a tiny rebellion against the will of the court.
Was Kat born at the Court? no
Did Katja and Donald leave the court at some point after they finished school? Did they receive court based teaching training? They did leave for a while, but returned shortly after Kat was born.
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Post by drmemory on Feb 9, 2021 2:52:48 GMT
It seems like I remember a comment about Kat being born outside of the court but then raised there all her life, but I can't find where I saw that. Maybe I imagined it? If I didn't, it might have been a tiny rebellion against the will of the court.
Was Kat born at the Court? no
Did Katja and Donald leave the court at some point after they finished school? Did they receive court based teaching training? They did leave for a while, but returned shortly after Kat was born.
Thanks Jelly. That's exactly what I was looking for. As is typical, Tom just answered the specific question and didn't even hint that it might be important or be tied to other information or events.
So like, one of my next questions has to be, why did they leave the court? Followed by, why did they come back after Kat was born? I mean, it seems like it has to be attached to the birth of Kat, but we don't really know that. Maybe they rebelled, but were blackmailed into returning? That's a total guess but we know the court will do things like that. I can think of many reasons they may have wanted out but not too many reasons why they'd want to come back with their newborn child.
Hmmm. Maybe asking Anja for help and telling her all that stuff wasn't such a good idea after all. It made sense at the time, and it worked out in that Annie Prime was saved, but I have to think it also revealed a lot of information to the court. Tony is the only one to claim that he made his house surveillance-proof, and we already know that the court has taken info from Anja and used it, against her wishes (her shield tech).
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Post by mturtle7 on Feb 9, 2021 2:59:35 GMT
Gamma with the sudden multiversal awareness. What if Gamma is secretly the final boss of Gunnerkrigg Court? Hmm... Gamma IS Gunnerkrigg Court: all the Shadow Men and other employees ultimately report to her, and all the Court's machinations are just part of her attempt to become a God! Ever wonder why she supposedly never learned any English in all these years? It's because "sweet innocent Polish girl who doesn't know any English" is actually her perfect COVER IDENTITY. That's how the Court found Zimmy: after a year or so of field research, Gamma decided to bring Subject Zeta in for further study closer to home, and so she called in those agents to offer "both of them" a place at the Court. And it's the reason that the Court never bothered Zimmy after Loup's attack - Gamma got them to leave her alone, under the guise of simply not caring about Chester. But it was all leading up to this chapter, where Gamma uses Zimmy's massive emotional breakdown in order to complete her Omega Device at last!
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Post by lurkerbot on Feb 9, 2021 4:15:01 GMT
I've noticed over the past few pages that Gamma has consistently used the name "Antimony" instead of "Annie", unlike most, if not all, of her peers (at least) throughout the comic. And yet on this page she's calling Katerina "Kat", despite Renard's using the long form of her name. Probably not significant, but hmm...
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Post by blahzor on Feb 9, 2021 6:51:36 GMT
I've noticed over the past few pages that Gamma has consistently used the name "Antimony" instead of "Annie", unlike most, if not all, of her peers (at least) throughout the comic. And yet on this page she's calling Katerina "Kat", despite Renard's using the long form of her name. Probably not significant, but hmm... Has Zimmy called Annie Annie I'm highly blanking on what she actually calls her (not possessing someone else times)
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Post by saardvark on Feb 9, 2021 12:04:26 GMT
I've noticed over the past few pages that Gamma has consistently used the name "Antimony" instead of "Annie", unlike most, if not all, of her peers (at least) throughout the comic. And yet on this page she's calling Katerina "Kat", despite Renard's using the long form of her name. Probably not significant, but hmm... Has Zimmy called Annie Annie I'm highly blanking on what she actually calls her (not possessing someone else times) I think she's called her "Carver" at least once....
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Post by pyradonis on Feb 9, 2021 12:10:58 GMT
I've noticed over the past few pages that Gamma has consistently used the name "Antimony" instead of "Annie", unlike most, if not all, of her peers (at least) throughout the comic. And yet on this page she's calling Katerina "Kat", despite Renard's using the long form of her name. Probably not significant, but hmm... Has Zimmy called Annie Annie I'm highly blanking on what she actually calls her (not possessing someone else times) Most of the time, Zimmy calls people by their last names or nicknames she makes up.
However, when she first met Annie, she called her "Amtinomy".
Was Kat born at the Court? no Did Katja and Donald leave the court at some point after they finished school? Did they receive court based teaching training? They did leave for a while, but returned shortly after Kat was born. Thanks Jelly. That's exactly what I was looking for. As is typical, Tom just answered the specific question and didn't even hint that it might be important or be tied to other information or events.
So like, one of my next questions has to be, why did they leave the court? Followed by, why did they come back after Kat was born? I mean, it seems like it has to be attached to the birth of Kat, but we don't really know that. Maybe they rebelled, but were blackmailed into returning? That's a total guess but we know the court will do things like that. I can think of many reasons they may have wanted out but not too many reasons why they'd want to come back with their newborn child.
Hmmm. Maybe asking Anja for help and telling her all that stuff wasn't such a good idea after all. It made sense at the time, and it worked out in that Annie Prime was saved, but I have to think it also revealed a lot of information to the court. Tony is the only one to claim that he made his house surveillance-proof, and we already know that the court has taken info from Anja and used it, against her wishes (her shield tech).
Your guesses all assume they left with no intent of returning; why? They could have just taken a sabbatical. Made a trip round the world before settling down as parents with responsibilities. Or wanted their child to be born in one of their home countries. There are lots of mundane explanations. I can't think of a single panel in the comic where Anja or Donald insinuate they don't like working for or living in the Court (unlike Tony).
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Post by fia on Feb 9, 2021 22:05:15 GMT
I can't find where I said it or whether I even did but I seem to recall speculating noticing once that all the MechaAngel appearances of Kat were when someone was scared already or scared of her. That kind of meshes with what Gamma is saying on this page.
I think I wrote that in response to someone asking why Kat doesn't look like the MechaAngel to, say, Annie all the time and not just some of the time. I think it was really only that time when Annie was scared inside the lock mechanism, and the time the robots were scared when Kat was yelling at them for the ship whale thing, and the time that Zimmy was scared after she punched Annie's dad and lost control of the psychic stuff in the room.
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Post by Gemminie on Feb 10, 2021 5:55:30 GMT
I can't find where I said it or whether I even did but I seem to recall speculating noticing once that all the MechaAngel appearances of Kat were when someone was scared already or scared of her. That kind of meshes with what Gamma is saying on this page. I think I wrote that in response to someone asking why Kat doesn't look like the MechaAngel to, say, Annie all the time and not just some of the time. I think it was really only that time when Annie was scared inside the lock mechanism, and the time the robots were scared when Kat was yelling at them for the ship whale thing, and the time that Zimmy was scared after she punched Annie's dad and lost control of the psychic stuff in the room. Interesting. I had been assuming that Kat appears as the Machine Angel when she's using her tech powers – that is, when she's taking on an Aspect and raising an Attribute (apologies to Zelazny). The one exception to this (and the sample size isn't great, since we've only seen her as the Machine Angel three times) is when Zimmy sees her, and Zimmy has perception on levels that others don't. But I hadn't considered that it might have to do with the mental/emotional state of the viewer. Zimmy's scared of her (she says so). Annie's already in a scared frame of mind when she sees the Angel (she's trapped in the arrow). Paz is in a somewhat scared frame of mind, I suppose (she's been through a harrowing experience, but she had a big role in bringing it to an end, and things are winding down).
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Post by Bo No Bo on Feb 10, 2021 6:03:14 GMT
I can't find where I said it or whether I even did but I seem to recall speculating noticing once that all the MechaAngel appearances of Kat were when someone was scared already or scared of her. That kind of meshes with what Gamma is saying on this page. I think I wrote that in response to someone asking why Kat doesn't look like the MechaAngel to, say, Annie all the time and not just some of the time. I think it was really only that time when Annie was scared inside the lock mechanism, and the time the robots were scared when Kat was yelling at them for the ship whale thing, and the time that Zimmy was scared after she punched Annie's dad and lost control of the psychic stuff in the room. Interesting. I had been assuming that Kat appears as the Machine Angel when she's using her tech powers – that is, when she's taking on an Aspect and raising an Attribute (apologies to Zelazny). The one exception to this (and the sample size isn't great, since we've only seen her as the Machine Angel three times) is when Zimmy sees her, and Zimmy has perception on levels that others don't. But I hadn't considered that it might have to do with the mental/emotional state of the viewer. Zimmy's scared of her (she says so). Annie's already in a scared frame of mind when she sees the Angel (she's trapped in the arrow). Paz is in a somewhat scared frame of mind, I suppose (she's been through a harrowing experience, but she had a big role in bringing it to an end, and things are winding down). This would align with how the gods of Gunn. Court, as described by Coyote, seem to come straight from the perceptions of mankind. Perhaps it is Kat's influence upon others, her potential for this 'dark path', and her proficiency in tech that together elevate her to 'MechAngel' status
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Post by TBeholder on Feb 10, 2021 7:02:38 GMT
Oh. It's that guy. Also… — Uh oh. — Scarper, Gamma!
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Post by wies on Feb 10, 2021 7:41:34 GMT
Paz is in a somewhat scared frame of mind, I suppose (she's been through a harrowing experience, but she had a big role in bringing it to an end, and things are winding down). I think the robots Kat was admonishing at that time are more fitting as the scared viewer. Which could explain why Paz was staring at Mecha!kat and still not talking about that (Rest assured, if my lover momentarily turned in a robo-bird being, I would take some time to talk that out with them) because she is not seeing what we and the scared robots see.
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Post by Jelly Jellybean on Feb 10, 2021 11:00:13 GMT
I can't find where I said it or whether I even did but I seem to recall speculating noticing once that all the MechaAngel appearances of Kat were when someone was scared already or scared of her. That kind of meshes with what Gamma is saying on this page. I think I wrote that in response to someone asking why Kat doesn't look like the MechaAngel to, say, Annie all the time and not just some of the time. I think it was really only that time when Annie was scared inside the lock mechanism, and the time the robots were scared when Kat was yelling at them for the ship whale thing, and the time that Zimmy was scared after she punched Annie's dad and lost control of the psychic stuff in the room. Interesting. I had been assuming that Kat appears as the Machine Angel when she's using her tech powers – that is, when she's taking on an Aspect and raising an Attribute (apologies to Zelazny). The one exception to this (and the sample size isn't great, since we've only seen her as the Machine Angel three times) is when Zimmy sees her, and Zimmy has perception on levels that others don't. But I hadn't considered that it might have to do with the mental/emotional state of the viewer. Zimmy's scared of her (she says so). Annie's already in a scared frame of mind when she sees the Angel (she's trapped in the arrow). Paz is in a somewhat scared frame of mind, I suppose (she's been through a harrowing experience, but she had a big role in bringing it to an end, and things are winding down). The two Mecha-Angel appearances occurred through Zimmy the first time and while Zimmy performed a level 6 distortion the second time. Zimmy said she is terrified of Kat, but Zimmy's abilities are also a possible explanation.
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Post by mturtle7 on Feb 11, 2021 4:18:06 GMT
Paz is in a somewhat scared frame of mind, I suppose (she's been through a harrowing experience, but she had a big role in bringing it to an end, and things are winding down). I think the robots Kat was admonishing at that time are more fitting as the scared viewer. Which could explain why Paz was staring at Mecha!kat and still not talking about that (Rest assured, if my lover momentarily turned in a robo-bird being, I would take some time to talk that out with them) because she is not seeing what we and the scared robots see. I agree that the robots were probably frightened & awed by Kat at the time, but I can also well believe that it was a leftover Zimmy distortion that Paz also saw. After all, not only was it literally just for a second before she turned back again, Paz was only glimpsing it at a distance through a thick cloud of smoke, right after an extremely stressful experience in Zimmingham, where pretty much everything looks at least a little like...well, that. It wouldn't be too hard to rationalize it as just being a trick of the eye/mind, and thus no reason to mention such a weird and crazy thing to her gf.
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Post by saardvark on Feb 11, 2021 13:11:41 GMT
I think the robots Kat was admonishing at that time are more fitting as the scared viewer. Which could explain why Paz was staring at Mecha!kat and still not talking about that (Rest assured, if my lover momentarily turned in a robo-bird being, I would take some time to talk that out with them) because she is not seeing what we and the scared robots see. I agree that the robots were probably frightened & awed by Kat at the time, but I can also well believe that it was a leftover Zimmy distortion that Paz also saw. After all, not only was it literally just for a second before she turned back again, Paz was only glimpsing it at a distance through a thick cloud of smoke, right after an extremely stressful experience in Zimmingham, where pretty much everything looks at least a little like...well, that. It wouldn't be too hard to rationalize it as just being a trick of the eye/mind, and thus no reason to mention such a weird and crazy thing to her gf. but if the emotion of being scared is important, would robots even be able to trigger it? Robots could be logically concerned (eg, computing possible current course of events that would lead to a poor outcome), but I would think actual emotions are beyond them, at least they would be before Kat starts engineering them to be partly "bio" (vis Robot and now Arthur even more so).
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Post by DonDueed on Feb 11, 2021 14:23:01 GMT
I agree that the robots were probably frightened & awed by Kat at the time, but I can also well believe that it was a leftover Zimmy distortion that Paz also saw. After all, not only was it literally just for a second before she turned back again, Paz was only glimpsing it at a distance through a thick cloud of smoke, right after an extremely stressful experience in Zimmingham, where pretty much everything looks at least a little like...well, that. It wouldn't be too hard to rationalize it as just being a trick of the eye/mind, and thus no reason to mention such a weird and crazy thing to her gf. but if the emotion of being scared is important, would robots even be able to trigger it? Robots could be logically concerned (eg, computing possible current course of events that would lead to a poor outcome), but I would think actual emotions are beyond them, at least they would be before Kat starts engineering them to be partly "bio" (vis Robot and now Arthur even more so). Well, we know that robots could experience crushes and true love, even pre-Kat. Those are surely emotional. It certainly seems like fear could also have been possible for them.
Whether those robotic emotions were equivalent to human ones, and could therefore influence the appearance or perception of the robo-Kat form, is a separate question.
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Post by saardvark on Feb 11, 2021 15:06:01 GMT
but if the emotion of being scared is important, would robots even be able to trigger it? Robots could be logically concerned (eg, computing possible current course of events that would lead to a poor outcome), but I would think actual emotions are beyond them, at least they would be before Kat starts engineering them to be partly "bio" (vis Robot and now Arthur even more so). Well, we know that robots could experience crushes and true love, even pre-Kat. Those are surely emotional. It certainly seems like fear could also have been possible for them.
Whether those robotic emotions were equivalent to human ones, and could therefore influence the appearance or perception of the robo-Kat form, is a separate question.
good point... and I was not very clear. I was thinking that robot crushes/love/emotions weren't equivalent to "actual" human ones, but it isn't entirely clear if that is true.
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Post by Corvo on Feb 11, 2021 19:34:15 GMT
I've noticed over the past few pages that Gamma has consistently used the name "Antimony" instead of "Annie", unlike most, if not all, of her peers (at least) throughout the comic. And yet on this page she's calling Katerina "Kat", despite Renard's using the long form of her name. Probably not significant, but hmm... A quick look through the archives brought me this results: Zimmy calls Annie: - Amtinomy (once) - Annie (once, refering to herself when she assumed Annie's identity) - Carver(s) (all the other times) Zimmy calls Kat: - That Donlan kid (once) - Bignose (once) - Nose (once) - Donlan (half a dozen times or so) Gamma calls Annie: - Annie (twice) - Antimony (this chapter) Gamma calls Kat: - Kat (this chapter)
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Post by drmemory on Feb 12, 2021 6:21:18 GMT
Did we ever find out why some robots change form in the Zimmyverse? Humans and elves generally don't. Of course humans and elves may body swap or be taken over temporarily, but if you see an Annie she generally looks like Annie, or at least one of her fire forms. It isn't all robots either - the king and the others that came to rescue Kat didn't transform. But the Seraphs and the fingers did. Not only that, but they transformed consistently! All the Seraphs looked like um mecha-gargoyles maybe? Evil birds? The finger robots were even worse - their tops got larger and their arms changed into claws and their legs changed into pincers. Yet the other robots, in the rescue party, did not change. There are a lot of warped-looking things in the Zimmy city but the incident with the robots in The Torn Sea seems pretty different from anything else I can remember. We have seem some one-of-a-kind creatures there, like here and here but the finger robots and the Seraphs almost seem to have a secondary form that only manifests in Zimmy's carnival of fun.
Maybe we'll learn a bit more from Gamma while she's feeling chatty.
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Post by drmemory on Feb 12, 2021 6:31:03 GMT
Has Zimmy called Annie Annie I'm highly blanking on what she actually calls her (not possessing someone else times) Most of the time, Zimmy calls people by their last names or nicknames she makes up.
However, when she first met Annie, she called her "Amtinomy".
Thanks Jelly. That's exactly what I was looking for. As is typical, Tom just answered the specific question and didn't even hint that it might be important or be tied to other information or events.
So like, one of my next questions has to be, why did they leave the court? Followed by, why did they come back after Kat was born? I mean, it seems like it has to be attached to the birth of Kat, but we don't really know that. Maybe they rebelled, but were blackmailed into returning? That's a total guess but we know the court will do things like that. I can think of many reasons they may have wanted out but not too many reasons why they'd want to come back with their newborn child.
Hmmm. Maybe asking Anja for help and telling her all that stuff wasn't such a good idea after all. It made sense at the time, and it worked out in that Annie Prime was saved, but I have to think it also revealed a lot of information to the court. Tony is the only one to claim that he made his house surveillance-proof, and we already know that the court has taken info from Anja and used it, against her wishes (her shield tech).
Your guesses all assume they left with no intent of returning; why? They could have just taken a sabbatical. Made a trip round the world before settling down as parents with responsibilities. Or wanted their child to be born in one of their home countries. There are lots of mundane explanations. I can't think of a single panel in the comic where Anja or Donald insinuate they don't like working for or living in the Court (unlike Tony). This is true. I assumed there was some weight to it because 1. Vacationing while very close to giving birth seems odd, 2. Tom usually doesn't mention things like that unless there is more to it, 3. It seems to me there are a lot of mysteries surrounding Kat. Also, the court cannot be trusted. Even though we haven't seen Anja or Donald complain overtly, we have seen that they are resigned to the court getting their way. I still think there could be court involvement in Kat's birth (creation?) that has yet to be revealed.
I could be wrong, of course. I think this place is affecting my mind.
You are right that there could be a more innocent explanation for them leaving the court and staying out until after Kat was born, but that wouldn't be nearly as interesting to think about.
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