[2576] "We need to find Loup."

[imaginaryfriend]

You never know who's listening. Gadgets are great but old-fashioned eavesdropping gets the job done.

[shadowhunter]

The crush on Annie was a sneaky clue the whole time.

[madjack]

Jan 24, 2022 8:13:40 GMT shadowhunter said:

The crush on Annie was a sneaky clue the whole time.

And the dark complexion with shaggy brown hair.

Loup doesn't have the bodysnatching power though, Renard still has that so he must have shapeshifted into the Jerrek persona or something.

[flowsthead]

I'm curious if that means the original New Human is in there, or if it's just Loup now. The crush might be from Loup, or it could be convenient for Loup.

[blahzor]

That explains his attraction to Annie I guess

[philman]

Well I don't think I saw that coming but I am sure someone can claim cookies!

A good place for him to be though, right under everyone's noses.

[imaginaryfriend]

Was Jerrek just a disguised "Loup" or is he just hiding in Jerrek? If the latter, was he crushing on Antimony before or after?

Also: Hope Piter is ok, he's a nifty repeating character.

[stclair]

ohhhhh dear.

[madjack]

Wildspec time: Given the conversation with Lana about bodies on the train, "Jerrek" seemed like a newer transfer. I'm gonna put forward that he was one of the very latest batch and Loup hijacked his transfer, or rode it along so there are both of them in there and he can use the real Jerrek's memories and personality to better blend in.

Either that or Loup invented Jerrek out of whole cloth and is just having fun pretending to be someone else. Coyote could trick everyone so well that he even tricked himself, no reason Loup couldn't do something similar.

[justhalf]

Whattttt? Nice plot reveal!

[flowsthead]

Jan 24, 2022 8:18:37 GMT blahzor said:

That explains his attraction to Annie I guess

Not necessarily? You probably didn't mean it this way, but the implication in your statement is that he wouldn't have been attracted to Annie otherwise, which we have no reason to assume.

[speedwell]

Jan 24, 2022 8:23:48 GMT stclair said:

ohhhhh dear.

I said the same thing, but it began with an F.

[csj]

ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL

[arf]

Loup doesn't have the power of possession back from Rey, so it will be interesting to find out what's going on here.

[laaaa]

YIKES. I found this a lot more unsettling than I'd expect.

[madjack]

Going back to the start of the chapter, the Dover Demon zeroed in on Jerrek then started dancing around in front of the Seraph.

Perhaps it was trying to warn them.

[blahzor]

Jan 24, 2022 9:38:02 GMT arf said:

Loup doesn't have the power of possession back from Rey, so it will be interesting to find out what's going on here.

Maybe with the roboticness of the NP's he's not doing the possession Coyote gave up

[bendoubles]

Jan 24, 2022 8:20:21 GMT imaginaryfriend said:

Was Jerrek just a disguised "Loup" or is he just hiding in Jerrek? If the latter, was he crushing on Antimony before or after?

Also: Hope Piter is ok, he's a nifty repeating character.

In the conversation on the train, he brushes off the question about his old job with “it’s hard to remember”. None of the other new people seem to have difficulty remembering things. Piter apparently is still quite the barber. Lana remembers her old job. Neither Robot nor Arthur seem to have any issues either.

I think Jerrek is definitely all Loup now, and it’s probable that there never was a Jerrek. Other forest critters were able to wander into the dig site. Loup could have observed for a while and then transformed pretty easily.

[theonethatgotaway]

Jan 24, 2022 9:10:47 GMT speedwell said:

Jan 24, 2022 8:23:48 GMT stclair said:

ohhhhh dear.

I said the same thing, but it began with an F.

Fohhhh dear? That doesn't mean anything!

[guntherkrieg]

John Carpenter famously said that shock is when danger comes out of nowhere for both character and audience, but suspense is when the audience knows danger is lurking but the characters don't. So we've gotten a shock, and now we have the suspense. Well played, Siddell.

[outofpseudonyms]

Is anyone else wondering how much of what we saw of Jerrek was an act? Maybe Loup thinks learning to be more and less than a god will help him escape his fate.

[pyradonis]

Oh...oh!...OH!

Was the hint that Jerrek was the water pipe maintenance bot from "She gave us an Ocean" a red herring then? Or is Loup able to posses a New Person's body even without the power from Coyote? Or did he shapeshift into Jerrek while the real Jerrek is actually getting a haircut?

Anyway, I loved the reveal! Everyone of us asking ourselves where Loup is hiding, and he was right there the whole time.

[speedwell]

Jan 24, 2022 12:01:32 GMT pyradonis said:

Oh...oh!...OH!

Was the hint that Jerrek was the water pipe maintenance bot from "She gave us an Ocean" a red herring then? Or is Loup able to posses a New Person's body even without the power from Coyote? Or did he shapeshift into Jerrek while the real Jerrek is actually getting a haircut?

Anyway, I loved the reveal! Everyone of us asking ourselves where Loup is hiding, and he was right there the whole time.

At the slight risk of histrionic paranoia, we actually have no evidence that water pipe bot wasn't himself taken over by Loup at some point. It would be an excellent way for Loup to gain access to strategic Court infrastructure. Knowing that Kat's focus is on production quantity, it would be an even more clever way for Loup to obtain a New body.

[ohthatone]

AaaaaaAAAAAAH!

That said I have a feeling Loup is hitching a ride with the actual jerrek. I think his previous job is hard to remember because Loup is in there messing things up.

[todd]

Since Coyote's body-possessing powers are still with Reynardine, and Loup hasn't recovered them, the "he was Jerrek all along" seems the more likely explanation.

[zbeeblebrox]

Did Loup just pull a reverse Agent Smith and jump into a robot body, or did he simply do a bang up job duping him and the real Jerreck is locked up in a closet somewhere like a poor forgotten robot...

[Bo No Bo]

Loup: If the Robots can all make gijinkas, SO CAN I!!!!!

[batsugars]

Woww. Tom got me good. I really can't believe Loup could put on such a convincing act this whole time.

What does Jerrek-Loup look like in the either? Do we have any examples of a purely-etheric creature being able to disguise its presence there? I recall that Renard's body looks gray since he's possessing an inanimate object, but it's likely that Loup is shapeshifting right now, not possessing.

And now that Loup is freely roaming on this side of the court, I wonder if he'll lead us to what/where that light he saw in the court was. Is it really Kat? (On the topic of Kat, she was never allowed into the forest, and so she's never met Coyote, Ysengrin or Loup. I feel like that was done on purpose narratively, so I'm excited to see if Kat's encounter with Loup will be meaningful!)

[Alkazar]

Loup really needs to stay away from Zimmy if he wants to keep his disguise up. She sniffed Renard out in a matter of a few pages.

[pyradonis]

In any case, I have to tip my hat to Loup. I wouldn't have expected him to have such convincing shapeshifting and acting skills. All this time I thought the best he could do at imitating a human was this.