[2943] There will be an...event

[bicarbonat]

I'm sure it's fine.

Why does this make me think of Surma and Annie?

[imaginaryfriend]

I'd think the "a girl" of prophesy would be Kat... but "an event" makes me think it's Antimony. That's assuming the event referenced is Antimony falling from the bridge after which Omega prophesies became less accurate, of course.

[edit] Additional (fun) thought: What if they decide to prevent this problematic girl from ever being born by sending her father to the ends of the earth on some made-up fools' errands? Have him constantly going away to watch grass grow or slugs mating or something? [/edit]

[arf]

"Durn kids on my timeline!"

[philman]

The "girl" is presumably Zimmy, and the "event" is the split where Omega is split into Omega and Zimmy, this split causing a reduction in Omega's predictive powers? Also explaining why the Court was so eager to find Zimmy and offer her sanctuary in the court so they could keep an eye on her, as they already had her "other half" in Omega.

[exquisitecorpus]

Now I'm thinking--could Omega have been responsible for the Court's quest for determinism/ether-independence?

Edit: As in the primary mastermind, not just the catalyst/inspiration?

[justcurious]

May 20, 2024 7:57:19 GMT exquisitecorpus said:

Was Omega responsible for the Court's quest for determinism/ether-independence?

I was wondering about that too.
I'm guessing that the girl is Antimony and the event is her rescue by the Tick-Toc.
If Omega makes predictions based on the past then an intervention from the future might interfere with her ability to predict. This is no longer the timeline that her predictions were based on, and she won't regain her accuracy until she starts basing her predictions on the new timeline. Can she do this?
Another question is, how much does she know about the Court's past? She can find out what has happened in the past. So, does she know about Jeanne?

[yellowb]

The event is obviously Annie falling off the bridge. It has been practically established. What makes people think it's something else?

[lisanela]

Just as Coyote and Loup said, predicting events to such a degree sounds like a horrible life to live, so I wonder if Omega shared the same feelings? Was she excited about the future inaccuracies or simply accepting that it would happen ?

(Also Parley father is known to have predicted Parley's birth pretty accurately - does he share power with Omega, did he just go on the Omega google for answer?)

[rafk]

She's more machine now than woman. Twisted and... well, probably not evil actually.

[arf]

Am I starting to get 'for science!' vibes here?

[gpvos]

The event is obviously the appearance of the tic-tocs from the future to save Annie, which split the timeline and made Omega's predictions inaccurate. The girl is probably Annie, who wasn't supposed to be here according to her predictions. However it could also be Kat, who actually controlled the tic-tocs and the timeline interference; Omega just didn't see Kat's meddling because it was in the future and Omega didn't see the connection and so didn't avail herself of that information. (Or maybe the realm of the Norns is just impenetrable to her.)

What's also interesting here is why Omega got angry at Shadow 2 (assuming she actually got angry and not just very determined to jump to some place in the distortion with him). Maybe there was a misunderstanding and Omega (and the Court) attributed the source of the timeline disruption to Shadow 2, who after all caused Annie to fall of the bridge, and Omega felt the need to investigate Shadow 2?

[Hatredman]

May 20, 2024 7:46:01 GMT philman said:

The "girl" is presumably Zimmy, and the "event" is the split where Omega is split into Omega and Zimmy, this split causing a reduction in Omega's predictive powers? Also explaining why the Court was so eager to find Zimmy and offer her sanctuary in the court so they could keep an eye on her, as they already had her "other half" in Omega.

It has been already stablished in canon that Annie falling from the bridge is the reason for the innacuracies:

www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=2669

[morrahadesigns]

Okay Charles (why does my brain say I spelled that wrong?) I am rescinding my suspicions of you, for now. Ms. Omega is clearly on board with this enterprise and going along willingly. But I'm gonna keep my eye on you.

[ctso74]

"We must do more."
Like "scoop out your brain and put it in a jar" more, or "send our daughter/son off to Birmingham" more?
Why "must" they? Are they deliberately leading the Court to their doom, or are they true believers?
Very interested to see the rest of her life.

[freeman]

May 20, 2024 11:42:22 GMT arf said:

Am I starting to get 'for science!' vibes here?

"We must do more."

[storyteller]

Yeah, decidedly certain at this point that Zimmy is a descendant of these two. The funny thing is - Omega probably would say things like Zimmy being a lot like Charles.

See Zimmy inherited the powers or at least a variant, but not the desire to do anything with them. But she's always been extremely clear that she'd do anything for Gamma.

And when Zimmy is at her best - she can and does help people, typically with etheric nonsense. Think the White Legs infestation (though that was partially her fault), merging the Annies, and especially her saving Annie when a certain someone was cutting the fire out of her. Thing is she's very rarely at her best.

[Gemminie]

This is another one-page flashback sequence, like the previous page. Evidently they have been experimenting with predicting the future, and also evidently some years have passed. Charles tells Omega that her prediction was once again perfect, which Omega knew would be the case, and that the Court is "positively giddy with the possibilities," which is tantalizing, but we have no other information about exactly what her prediction was about. We then see a closeup of Omega, who is wearing a hooded cloak and a cloth tied around her neck; she looks considerably older.

Omega says there will be an "event" involving "a girl" at which point her predictions will become less and less accurate. She also says Charles shouldn't tell the Court about this. Finally, she tells him that they must "do more," and we see that she appears to be attached to some apparatus.

She seems to be more and more bound to this room. Previously it seems to have been the case that she just needed the "focusing amplifiers" in order to be able to function, but now it may be that she needs the machinery to stay alive. She may not be able to move far at all. It's not a very good life, but she seems determined to keep doing what they're doing. This may explain more about why she's seemingly so giddy to be able to move around. It's been a long time.

So ... what happens at the end of Omega's natural lifespan? What happens at the end of Charles' life? Has he found a way to extend her life? Has he applied this to himself as well? Is Charles still around in some form, or is Omega the only one for whom his apparatus can work, due to how her abilities function? The "Omega Device" may be the machinery that keeps Omega going, or it may be that the modern Court sees Omega only as a prediction machine and is ignoring the fact that she's a person ... unless they've actually replaced her with a machine. Or it may be that only the absolute inner circle knows that Omega is a person and people like Don and Tony are only told that Omega is a device.

[morrahadesigns]

I just noticed that Tom's comment on today's page is "What more is there?" And all I can think of is the "What else is there?" line from The Swan Princess.

[Gemminie]

May 20, 2024 9:00:50 GMT yellowb said:

The event is obviously Annie falling off the bridge. It has been practically established. What makes people think it's something else?

I agree; it's pretty well established that Annie's survival of that fall is the reason why Omega's predictions become less accurate, so it's pretty clear that the "event" is Annie's fall from the bridge. Of course, Omega could be talking about either Annie or Kat here when she says "a girl," because Annie survives the fall when she's not predicted to, but Kat's tampering with time is the reason why Annie survives the fall.

[Gemminie]

May 20, 2024 14:07:25 GMT ctso74 said:

"We must do more."
Like "scoop out your brain and put it in a jar" more, or "send our daughter/son off to Birmingham" more?
Why "must" they? Are they deliberately leading the Court to their doom, or are they true believers?
Very interested to see the rest of her life.

I haven't chimed in on whether I think Zimmy is a descendant of Omega or not. I kind of think not. We've seen no evidence that Omega has had a child, but many years have clearly passed between the previous page and this one; that's more than enough time for there to have been a child. But that child can't be Zimmy, obviously; this is far too long ago, probably late 19th century by this point. This doesn't mean that Zimmy can't be a descendant of Omega and Charles, but I doubt it, though I could be wrong.

What I'm saying is that if the random factors aligned to produce Omega, they can align again to produce Zimmy. I notice nobody's suggesting that Paz is a descendant of Omega, or that Anja is, or anyone else with etheric abilities. Everyone's focused on Zimmy. However, we have Word of Tom that Zeta is just Zimmy's real name and that the Court didn't create Zimmy; they found her. Without more evidence I'm going to continue to think that Zimmy is just another person on whom the unjust random factors that Aata militates against have bestowed etheric weirdness.

And yes, what exactly does "we must do more" mean? Well, considering that in the same frame Omega says that, we see that she's hooked up to machinery, I think that could mean "we must find a way to extend my life so that I can keep making predictions," and that probably leads to "we must extend the survival of my consciousness beyond the survival of my physical body." We've seen no mention of the Court's plan to go to another world; perhaps that plan doesn't exist yet – or perhaps it's included in the scope of "do more." Perhaps we should instead consider that "we must do more" immediately follows "there's going to come a time when my predictions stop working" (paraphrased). That could lead to "we must find a way to get my predictions back on track, maybe by removing ourselves from the influence of these disruptive events."

However, the Court must know that Omega uses the Ether to make her predictions. Or must they? I've speculated before that they may have forgotten that Omega is (or once was) a person and may now think she's a mere prediction machine (due to the fact that she's technically dead, and the dead are gradually forgotten as their Ether fades away), so they may think they can just bring Omega to the new world and live their ideal predestined life with no free will. Except they're in for a surprise.

[fia]

Do more? For whom? For why??
As Tom wrote, what more is there?

[Daedalus]

Does anyone think that Charles will become the Artilleryman, or another member of the Court's founding group?

Or is the setting of this Omega flashback too late, do we think?

[storyteller]

May 20, 2024 16:42:43 GMT Gemminie said:

May 20, 2024 14:07:25 GMT ctso74 said:

"We must do more."
Like "scoop out your brain and put it in a jar" more, or "send our daughter/son off to Birmingham" more?
Why "must" they? Are they deliberately leading the Court to their doom, or are they true believers?
Very interested to see the rest of her life.

I haven't chimed in on whether I think Zimmy is a descendant of Omega or not. I kind of think not. We've seen no evidence that Omega has had a child, but many years have clearly passed between the previous page and this one; that's more than enough time for there to have been a child. But that child can't be Zimmy, obviously; this is far too long ago, probably late 19th century by this point. This doesn't mean that Zimmy can't be a descendant of Omega and Charles, but I doubt it, though I could be wrong.

Look at the page where Zimmy is talking to the Annies after intervening with Paz. She specifically referred to the Ether as the unseen world. That's a turn of phrase really reminiscent of how Charles talks about stuff.

That's the bit that really makes me think she's a descendant of some sort. Everyone notices the look alike nature between Zimmy and Omega. But the thing that gets to me is how much Zimmy is similar to Charles in personality. Complete with emergency house call to help with malignant ether shenanigans.

[Hatredman]

May 20, 2024 19:57:57 GMT storyteller said:

Look at the page where Zimmy is talking to the Annies after intervening with Paz. She specifically referred to the Ether as the unseen world. That's a turn of phrase really reminiscent of how Charles talks about stuff.

That's the bit that really makes me think she's a descendant of some sort. Everyone notices the look alike nature between Zimmy and Omega. But the thing that gets to me is how much Zimmy is similar to Charles in personality. Complete with emergency house call to help with malignant ether shenanigans.

Well, think of it this way: inherited qualities are physical or, at least, instinctive. But a phrase (an exact one, for that matter) is not instinctive, even less a wart, the color of skin/hair/eyes or a short leg. A phrase is something you learn. And learning has nothing to do with ascendence or genetics. Learning is environmental and needs someone to teach you. Someone who may not necessarily be your biological parents.

[Igniz]

"There will be an... event. A girl..."
This can refer to either Surma, Annie, Kat or Zimmy.

Of course, this being Gunnerkrigg Court, she can be referring to someone else altogether.

[Hatredman]

Two things I did not see anyone point out:

1. Omega is perpetually attached to that machine. This page makes it clear. Also, I am under the impression that the machine is huge, heavy and encumbers her movements. And is attached to her head, none the less, so I must think that her neck is under heavy stress. Also, this page makes me feel like she is standing all day there, with no chair or bed in sight. She must feel not only mentally exhausted, but physically too.

2. She looks like a 60-something woman (in today's standards); if this is the late 1800s/early 1900s she must be at least 40. Charles, OTOH, did not seem to age.

[pyradonis]

Woah, Omega seems intent on catching up in age with Charles, she looks like her own grandmother here.

May 20, 2024 16:42:43 GMT Gemminie said:

However, the Court must know that Omega uses the Ether to make her predictions. Or must they? I've speculated before that they may have forgotten that Omega is (or once was) a person and may now think she's a mere prediction machine (due to the fact that she's technically dead, and the dead are gradually forgotten as their Ether fades away), so they may think they can just bring Omega to the new world and live their ideal predestined life with no free will. Except they're in for a surprise.

Since there are no other prediction machines, I find it a bit hard to believe that everyone would just go "oh it's just a regular prediction machine". One doesn't need to be a genius scientist to understand that it's impossible to know the full state of the universe without a computer that's bigger than the universe, so everyone involved with the so-called Omega Device today must at least suspect that there's Etheric means involved somewhere. That, or be heavily delusional.

May 20, 2024 17:26:15 GMT Daedalus said:

Does anyone think that Charles will become the Artilleryman, or another member of the Court's founding group?

Or is the setting of this Omega flashback too late, do we think?

Since the Artilleryman was one of the Founders, and the Court already existed when Charles found Omega, I'd put the chances for that at about zero. Also, both technology and clothing in all of these flashbacks have looked much more modern than those from the era of the Founders.

[manabi]

May 20, 2024 11:42:22 GMT arf said:

Am I starting to get 'for science!' vibes here?

It reminds me of DeadSound's Autodale series of videos, in particular the last one he's done so far, Immortal Machine.  In the flashback the mayor's modified himself much like Omega appears to be modified here.  His later appearance is significantly less human, also much like Omega.  There's only seven videos in the series, the rest of the playlist is making of/creative process videos.

[caber]

May 20, 2024 12:06:13 GMT gpvos said:

The event is obviously the appearance of the tic-tocs from the future to save Annie, which split the timeline and made Omega's predictions inaccurate. The girl is probably Annie, who wasn't supposed to be here according to her predictions. However it could also be Kat, who actually controlled the tic-tocs and the timeline interference; Omega just didn't see Kat's meddling because it was in the future and Omega didn't see the connection and so didn't avail herself of that information. (Or maybe the realm of the Norns is just impenetrable to her.)

What's also interesting here is why Omega got angry at Shadow 2 (assuming she actually got angry and not just very determined to jump to some place in the distortion with him). Maybe there was a misunderstanding and Omega (and the Court) attributed the source of the timeline disruption to Shadow 2, who after all caused Annie to fall of the bridge, and Omega felt the need to investigate Shadow 2?

She also looks suitably miffed during this scene: www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=2890

Which... Tom's comment is FOMO, fear of missing out. And Omega said she didn't see anything... hah, I just got that.

[justcurious]

May 20, 2024 22:31:53 GMT caber said:

May 20, 2024 12:06:13 GMT gpvos said:

The event is obviously the appearance of the tic-tocs from the future to save Annie, which split the timeline and made Omega's predictions inaccurate. The girl is probably Annie, who wasn't supposed to be here according to her predictions. However it could also be Kat, who actually controlled the tic-tocs and the timeline interference; Omega just didn't see Kat's meddling because it was in the future and Omega didn't see the connection and so didn't avail herself of that information. (Or maybe the realm of the Norns is just impenetrable to her.)

What's also interesting here is why Omega got angry at Shadow 2 (assuming she actually got angry and not just very determined to jump to some place in the distortion with him). Maybe there was a misunderstanding and Omega (and the Court) attributed the source of the timeline disruption to Shadow 2, who after all caused Annie to fall of the bridge, and Omega felt the need to investigate Shadow 2?

She also looks suitably miffed during this scene: www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=2890

Which... Tom's comment is FOMO, fear of missing out. And Omega said she didn't see anything... hah, I just got that.

Yes, all of this suggests that interventions from out of her timeline or time stops disrupt Omega's prediction abilities.
And why are her NP form's eyes brown rather than her original red?