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Post by drmemory on Jan 13, 2022 20:20:05 GMT
Ok, I can't resist. One more message about the need for a large source of ether. I've already talked too much about that in the past, but still, new info has been made available in recent weeks.
Possibilities:
1. Needed to do the move
2. Needed to prevent those not invited from tagging along or even finding them (perhaps a shield?)
3. Needed to kill or at least disable all the ether-enabled beings
4. Needed for some motive of Omega, that we don't know about yet
I'm still quite worried about where they may get this ether and what they may be willing to do to get it. I fear for our friends.
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Post by todd on Jan 14, 2022 0:04:45 GMT
Given how much of the cast wouldn't be allow to go (so many that it would be difficult to tell the story in a recognizable way after that), I suspect that the Court's move is going to fail - most likely Loup showing up to sabotage it.
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Post by speedwell on Jan 14, 2022 0:36:07 GMT
I will refrain from commenting on the need for a large source of ether and such for the moment and instead ask a different question:
Who doesn't get to go?
...
Obviously I'm not sure of all of this. Do witches count? What about clearly not human people? Involuntary powers, like Andrew's? I'm guessing that things that come from tattoos (like Eglamore and Parley have) wouldn't disqualify one.
Who CAN go then?
...
So all the fun people, or at least most of them, won't get to go. Or perhaps it's better to view it as won't be forced to go. 
I suspect that their rules will be based more on capability than on promises. I bet Aata wouldn't have been invited even had he not slipped when he saved Shell.
A decent and well-considered sorting that I will now proceed to nit-pick  - All bets are literally off when it comes to Andrew.
- They may indeed be intending to force Zimmy to go, if their aim is to neutralise her powers. However, I'm of the opinion that she has a critical role in the endgame against Loup. This doesn't rule out the possibility that she would be happy to be rid of the anguish her powers cause her. It also doesn't rule out the possibility that she will be the next source of Ether they attempt to channel.
- Tony, a Shadow Man, had a leading role in the development of the physical bodies of the New People, so there may be no significant Etheric connection other than that their Etherically-gifted teenage Creator was their other "parent". As for their mental being, that's still chip-based, if I'm reading the archives correctly.
- I'm suggesting that a line be drawn along the narrow boundary between otherwise mundane individuals possessing Etheric gifts or knowledge (such as Tony and Kat) and individuals who but for the Ether would not have a being at all (such as Annie and Renard).
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Post by lurkerbot on Jan 14, 2022 1:14:51 GMT
I will refrain from commenting on the need for a large source of ether and such for the moment and instead ask a different question: Who doesn't get to go? <snip>
I bet Aata wouldn't have been invited even had he not slipped when he saved Shell.
Would Aata have repeatedly tried to harness the ether to support the Court's relocation plan if he thought he wouldn't be included in its implementation? |
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Post by mordekai on Jan 14, 2022 1:34:30 GMT
I will refrain from commenting on the need for a large source of ether and such for the moment and instead ask a different question: Who doesn't get to go? <snip>
I bet Aata wouldn't have been invited even had he not slipped when he saved Shell.
Would Aata have repeatedly tried to harness the ether to support the Court's relocation plan if he thought he wouldn't be included in its implementation? Yeah, because he is a Bodhisattva (well, a failed Bodhisattva...). |
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Post by warrl on Jan 14, 2022 5:19:04 GMT
So suddenly we have the threat that when the Court moves, Annie and Anja will be left behind while the Court will want to take Kat, Donnie and Tony... And the clock is ticking! We've seen Kat and Donald use the ether. It's been implied that Tony sort-of has, and has done experiments with it. So they'll be abandoned. The Court's Protectors, current and apprentice, as well as Andrew, will not be traveling with them. At least two of the four houses of students won't be going. I suspect that their teachers and staff are disproportionately from those houses, simply because staying where the use of ether is fairly common would be more comfortable for people who do so routinely (at least as compared to where it's likely to be forbidden). All the nonhuman sapients (such as Lindsey and Bud) will be left behind. They'll lose their gardeners. Then, some percentage of the people who the Shadow men WOULD be willing to take with them, will decline the opportunity. Ya know what? The group being left behind can start a school and community for people with unusual etheric potential! (And maybe they'll get along better with the folk of Gillitie Forest, once the former administrators have left.) |
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Post by pyradonis on Jan 14, 2022 16:05:40 GMT
a bunch of fairy kids... there must be a reason they gathered them... Well, it's not as if they weren't using them already to crunch data that computer programs are not good at processing.
Given how much of the cast wouldn't be allow to go (so many that it would be difficult to tell the story in a recognizable way after that), I suspect that the Court's move is going to fail I'm sure people thought the same thing about the possibility of Hogwarts being taken over.
So suddenly we have the threat that when the Court moves, Annie and Anja will be left behind while the Court will want to take Kat, Donnie and Tony... And the clock is ticking! We've seen Kat and Donald use the ether. It's been implied that Tony sort-of has, and has done experiments with it. So they'll be abandoned. I think you are mixing up being able to influence the Ether by using appropriate devices with actual Etheric sensitivity. Anyone can operate a machine that channels or measures the Ether. Donald and Tony were never shown to do anything else. Even Kat always relied on technological devices to influence the Ether. |
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Post by Gemminie on Jan 14, 2022 20:52:50 GMT
Shell doesn't answer Renard's question about whether the Ether is "unjust" or merely as unfair as the rest of life is. Instead, Kat asks another question that's raised by what Shell's been saying: if the Court's goal is to get rid of the Ether, or at least to separate itself from it, why does it need a godlike source of Ether? The answer is ... Shell doesn't know. Either it's a technical detail she doesn't understand, or it's on a need-to-know basis and she doesn't need to know.
But Annie's come to the logical conclusion: if the Court's going to separate itself from the Ether, it can't take people who can use the Ether with it. They'll have to stay behind. Certainly Annie and Renard aren't going. This means she'll be separated from her dad, unless he chooses to stay behind to be with her. Will Kat be able to go? The Court probably doesn't consider her to be an Ether user, but is she or isn't she?
That final panel. Shell is very weirdly drawn there. She's sitting in a very uncomfortable looking position, and there seems to be a bit of a Dutch angle as well. All is not right.
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