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Stature

Story Friday December 23, 2016

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And we have no way of knowing if Pandora has actually left, or is invisibly lurking.
Neither does Adrian or Noah.
Max might know something the rest of us don't.  But naps are more important.

This is one of those pages that will add a lot to the drama of the story when a future reader goes through the archive.  But for the present readers, the story seems to drag.

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2 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

This is one of those pages that will add a lot to the drama of the story when a future reader goes through the archive.  But for the present readers, the story seems to drag.

Big talk from the Pharaoh who had his pyramids decorated with hieroglyphics that took how many decades to translate? And that was after the find of the Rosetta stone, mind you.

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5 minutes ago, ijuin said:

It's hardly his fault that Egyptians forgot how to read the Old Script in the intervening millennia.

The operative word in that sentence is 'millennia.' See? See? And he has the gall to complain about pacing! >.<

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While I understand that there's a bigger issue between Pandora and Adrian over Pandora's actions in the past year, I do feel that the Dex issue is significant, Adrian is blaming her for that when she very likely wasn't even involved at all. Really makes me wonder if Voltaire wasn't just trying to traumatize Tedd, but maybe create an even larger rift between Pandora and Adrian? What would happen if Adrian got killed by the vampires? We already know that Pandora wiped out the werewolves over Blaike's death, will she fly into an even greater rage and go after all aberrations? If she finds out that another Immortal orchestrated the whole thing, will she attempt to kill all other Immortals? Maybe it will be worse than that...

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4 minutes ago, mlooney said:

I just hope that wasn't a force reset we saw.  That Would Be Bad.

I doubt it, I would thing a forced reset would be more dramatic. Pandora's description of it and the whole "Any Immortal who breaks Immortal law has a minute tops before they reset" makes me think that an Immortal would feel it happening.

I do think there's a possibility that Pandora will end up resetting when this is all over though. And we'll see a younger (as in actual age rather than physically looking like a kid) "Box" carrying out Pandora's vow in helping Sarah learn magic.

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16 minutes ago, Scotty said:

And we'll see a younger (as in actual age rather than physically looking like a kid) "Box" carrying out Pandora's vow in helping Sarah learn magic.

I've assumed that from the start of this arc.  And I expect the feels to be massive.

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I've been thinking Pandora might reset all the way to an infant. Given that Hell is about to rain on Moperville, it could turn out something like the third season ending of Sailor Moon where Sailor Moon comes back from the final battle with baby Sailor Saturn in her arms.

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I suspect that An Unkindness ends with this comic, though. The Shive is wont to conceal plot points until later. Would it be blasphemy to suggest that The Shive hasn't figured out exactly what the chore will involve?

We haven't seen Susan and Diane meet yet, and Elliot's meeting with Ashley hasn't appeared or been referenced since Everyone Has to Talk. And given that The Shive has been running the canon NP arcs Marker and Escape from the Mall simultaneously with Sister III, I think we'll be seeing the magically upgraded Catalina and Rhoda before the end of the approaching Hellstorm.

Maybe there really will be a Part 23.


 

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On 12/23/2016 at 1:19 PM, Tom Sewell said:

I've been thinking Pandora might reset all the way to an infant. Given that Hell is about to rain on Moperville, it could turn out something like the third season ending of Sailor Moon where Sailor Moon comes back from the final battle with baby Sailor Saturn in her arms.

I like the mental image of Adrian raising and/or training a reset Pandora, all the while still calling her "Mother".

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5 hours ago, ijuin said:

I like the mental image of Adrian raising and/or training a reset Pandora, all the while still calling her "Mother".

Regardless of the details of the reset, Pandora would probably be functioning as an adult in less than a year.  Even if it was an improper reset, the most difficult problems could be mitigated if Adrian was caring for her.

But Adrian would find himself in the position of a single parent.  Even with his magic, he can't watch her 24/7 for a full year.  Could he trust Noah as a baby sitter?  Who else would be useful or appropriate fir the job?

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6 hours ago, ijuin said:

I like the mental image of Adrian raising and/or training a reset Pandora, all the while still calling her "Mother".

15 minutes ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

Regardless of the details of the reset, Pandora would probably be functioning as an adult in less than a year.  Even if it was an improper reset, the most difficult problems could be mitigated if Adrian was caring for her.

Magus once said of the immortal pair that they had reset improperly and "didn't know their asses from holes in the ground". So we know they reset 'improperly', which suggests a forced reset, that they are now newbies, AND that they forgot their previous lives! - which is also mentioned later, whereas normal resets allow for memory retention. As far as I know, it's common consensus that they're the French immortals - the comic I referenced just now even say that their speech is translated from French! - and that they had a forced reset due to either the Susan/aberration/Nanase stuff, or something irresponsible they did later. We have seen Jerry before and after resetting voluntarily, and so we can assume that voluntary immortal resets result in reserved memoirs (which could be used to teach the fresh immortal) and retained capabilities 'n' personality. Raven wouldn't need to teach a voluntarily rest Pandora at all, which is the most likely reason for any reset anytime soon (due to review of feelings of the need to protect and look after family), as opposed to a forced reset, which would be possible, given that she may feel that she's broken immortal law now, and only then would we receive a possiblity of Raven raising Pandora, although he would most likely presume her to have just stayed hidden and avoided doing much at all, over having reset for any reasons.

So after all that, ijuin's situation would only occur if... Pandora is reset now or in the near future and Raven discovers this happened and he feels responsible for the reset, therefoe choosing to raise/train her again.

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Even if Adrian does not feel personally responsible for her having been reset, she is still his mother and he would want to see after her well-being until she is properly self-sufficient.

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1 hour ago, Trix Marano said:

Magus once said of the immortal pair that they had reset improperly and "didn't know their asses from holes in the ground". So we know they reset 'improperly', which suggests a forced reset

I am not at all certain that les immortels were forcibly reset.

Susan, Grace, and Sarah happened upon Jerry as he was preparing to die, but the encounter was not a significant expenditure of time or magic on Jerry's part so his reset could continue effectively uninterrupted.

Helena and Demetrius awakened Nanase, marked Susan, and trained them to use the hammers.  That seems like it would have a greater cost in magic, time, and effort.  If they interrupted the reset too close to a critical point in the dying process, it could seriously complicate the process.

Still, this brings up a tangential hypothesis.  Every time Susan has knowingly encountered an immortal, that immortal was about to "die".  Could Susan herself be some sort of harbinger of immortal mortality?

Can we arrange an encounter between Susan and Cheshire Colonel Volty?

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2 hours ago, Trix Marano said:

Magus once said of the immortal pair that they had reset improperly and "didn't know their asses from holes in the ground". So we know they reset 'improperly', which suggests a forced reset, that they are now newbies, AND that they forgot their previous lives! - which is also mentioned later, whereas normal resets allow for memory retention. As far as I know, it's common consensus that they're the French immortals - the comic I referenced just now even say that their speech is translated from French! - and that they had a forced reset due to either the Susan/aberration/Nanase stuff, or something irresponsible they did later. We have seen Jerry before and after resetting voluntarily, and so we can assume that voluntary immortal resets result in reserved memoirs (which could be used to teach the fresh immortal) and retained capabilities 'n' personality. Raven wouldn't need to teach a voluntarily rest Pandora at all, which is the most likely reason for any reset anytime soon (due to review of feelings of the need to protect and look after family), as opposed to a forced reset, which would be possible, given that she may feel that she's broken immortal law now, and only then would we receive a possiblity of Raven raising Pandora, although he would most likely presume her to have just stayed hidden and avoided doing much at all, over having reset for any reasons.

So after all that, ijuin's situation would only occur if... Pandora is reset now or in the near future and Raven discovers this happened and he feels responsible for the reset, therefoe choosing to raise/train her again.

We still don't know the true nature of Helena's and Demetrius' reset, it's obvious that it was improper which does suggest a forced reset, but according to Jerry, disrupting a natural reset could also cause an Immortal to not return with their knowledge intact. Also I don't think that their interaction with Nanase and Susan would have been the direct cause of their reset either because if lying to them to get them to kill a vampire was all it took, then Voltaire should be due for a quick trip to improper resetsville as well for lying to Tara to get her to kill Elliot. What's more forced reset worthy? Getting a couple teenagers to kill a dangerous being that all Immortals despise? Or trying to get a very powerful griffin to kill an innocent teenager because he wants to traumatize someone who may end up being the most powerful wizard in a long time.

The other thing about Helena's and Demetrius' reset is they weren't reduced to children in terms of intelligence, sure their knowledge of their past lives were fragmented, but they still knew how to walk and talk and maybe even chew bubble gum at the same time. If Pandora was forced to reset and her knowledge got fragmented like that, it's likely the only thing that Adrian would be able to do would be to help sort it out with her, everything else would eventually come naturally to her. Her vow with Sarah might be tricky though, I imagine she would have that nagging feeling that she should be helping Sarah, but she might not remember what unless she's told. That's why I'm pretty sure Helena and Demetrius has been watching over Elliot this whole time, because they vowed to do so to someone.

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On 12/23/2016 at 9:00 AM, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

And we have no way of knowing if Pandora has actually left, or is invisibly lurking.
Neither does Adrian or Noah.

Neither does Pandora. She was so shocked she stopped paying attention which plane she's on.

On 12/23/2016 at 3:45 PM, Scotty said:

While I understand that there's a bigger issue between Pandora and Adrian over Pandora's actions in the past year, I do feel that the Dex issue is significant, Adrian is blaming her for that when she very likely wasn't even involved at all.

The problem is that Pandora MIGHT've done something like that. Based on how Sister II went, the difference between how the event played with Voltaire and how would Pandora play it could very well be in details too small to be mentioned to Adrian (although we saw some of them).

On 12/23/2016 at 3:45 PM, Scotty said:

Really makes me wonder if Voltaire wasn't just trying to traumatize Tedd, but maybe create an even larger rift between Pandora and Adrian?

Considering he didn't predicted how much would Tedd be traumatized by finding out about Will of Magic, I think this is in the "hey, if I knew this would happen I would totally help it happening" category.

On 12/23/2016 at 3:45 PM, Scotty said:

What would happen if Adrian got killed by the vampires? We already know that Pandora wiped out the werewolves over Blaike's death, will she fly into an even greater rage and go after all aberrations?

As far as we know, werewolves are NOT aberrations.

And yes totally, if Adrian would get killed by the vampires Pandora would raise her credit in immortal community by making aberrations extinct.

On 12/23/2016 at 4:12 PM, Scotty said:

I do think there's a possibility that Pandora will end up resetting when this is all over though. And we'll see a younger (as in actual age rather than physically looking like a kid) "Box" carrying out Pandora's vow in helping Sarah learn magic.

... that wouldn't really help Sarah so much.

On 12/23/2016 at 10:19 PM, Tom Sewell said:

Given that Hell is about to rain on Moperville, it could turn out something like the third season ending of Sailor Moon where Sailor Moon comes back from the final battle with baby Sailor Saturn in her arms.

I don't think she would reset before the "hell". She's likely to at least make sure the clog is unblocked.

On 12/24/2016 at 11:38 PM, Tom Sewell said:

We haven't seen Susan and Diane meet yet, and Elliot's meeting with Ashley hasn't appeared or been referenced since Everyone Has to Talk. And given that The Shive has been running the canon NP arcs Marker and Escape from the Mall simultaneously with Sister III, I think we'll be seeing the magically upgraded Catalina and Rhoda before the end of the approaching Hellstorm.

Maybe there really will be a Part 23.

... part 47 will be especially interesting. It will definitely involve Susan.

7 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:
9 hours ago, Trix Marano said:

Magus once said of the immortal pair that they had reset improperly and "didn't know their asses from holes in the ground". So we know they reset 'improperly', which suggests a forced reset

I am not at all certain that les immortels were forcibly reset.

Susan, Grace, and Sarah happened upon Jerry as he was preparing to die, but the encounter was not a significant expenditure of time or magic on Jerry's part so his reset could continue effectively uninterrupted.

Helena and Demetrius awakened Nanase, marked Susan, and trained them to use the hammers.  That seems like it would have a greater cost in magic, time, and effort.  If they interrupted the reset too close to a critical point in the dying process, it could seriously complicate the process.

I don't think they were in the process of dying when they marked Susan. Also, Jerry was ready to mark Sarah, and it would presumably not interrupt his dying.

No. I think they were forcibly reset. I, however, don't think it was because they broke the law. I think it was result of some attack, possibly by Voltaire or Pandora.

 

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17 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Considering he didn't predicted how much would Tedd be traumatized by finding out about Will of Magic, I think this is in the "hey, if I knew this would happen I would totally help it happening" category.

I saw it as "If I had known this would traumatize him so much. I wouldn't have wasted all that time trying to get Elliot killed".

22 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

As far as we know, werewolves are NOT aberrations.

There is a big difference between them, specifically in the fact that werewolves are cursed and have no control of it, whereas aberrations willfully changed themselves for power.

30 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

And yes totally, if Adrian would get killed by the vampires Pandora would raise her credit in immortal community by making aberrations extinct.

I don't think aberrations would ever be extinct considering the nature of how they are created, the temptation for immortality and power would continue to make some people turn to the dark side.

I guess it's possible for werewolves to make a return as well if a lycanthropy spell backfired or someone powerful enough recreated the curse.

47 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

... that wouldn't really help Sarah so much.

That really depends on how much Pandora is able to do after her reset. She may be able to help Sarah finds pockets of magic for her to use her spells in, transfer some of her own power into Sarah to help. It might not take much for Pandora to do something like that and it'd still fall under guiding and empowering. Now if she was improperly reset, that might make things more difficult.

53 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

I don't think they were in the process of dying when they marked Susan. Also, Jerry was ready to mark Sarah, and it would presumably not interrupt his dying.

If they were about to complete a reset when they got wind of something about to happen to Nanase and Susan, they could have halted the process which put them on a timer to get what they needed to do done. Like "this is risky as it would mean messing up our reset, but if we don't do this, someone will die", their disappearance after taking Nanase and Susan to the vampire could have been their time running out and the improper reset  being done.

59 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

No. I think they were forcibly reset. I, however, don't think it was because they broke the law. I think it was result of some attack, possibly by Voltaire or Pandora.

This is probably more likely, though I'm leaning more towards Voltaire now than Pandora. While Pandora and Magus knows about Helena and Demetrius being improperly reset, I'm not sure whether they know why they were improperly reset. What we've learned from Pandora in this arc doesn't seem to jive with the original idea that she was responsible for everything, especially considering Voltaire has already claimed responsibility for part of it and his behaviour seems more fitting of being responsible for more of the stuff.

Pandora seems more interested in harmless fun and pranks and will fiercely defend anyone who's friends with Tedd, while Voltaire has been pretty darned violent and wants to see Tedd suffer. I still think Pandora's "Egg" threat was mostly an exaggeration on her part just to see Edward and the paranormal division run around, she knows Edward is Tedd's dad so she wouldn't hurt him, she probably just wants to keep him on his toes. Voltaire, on the other hand, might be more willing to take that scenario and make it a real dangerous situation.

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

As far as we know, werewolves are NOT aberrations.

Pure speculation here: ONE werewolf was an aberration. Somehow it came in contact with the Dewitchery Diamond, producing:

  • one being that can shapeshift at will into a werewolf form, and possibly is not an aberration but has previously demonstrated intent to be an aberration - so likely would become an aberration again soon after
  • one being that is permanently in werewolf form and possibly an aberration, and can spread its condition to others
  • * if this latter being bites someone and they survive, they get permanently shifted to werewolf form and maybe become an aberration but can't spread their condition

Then later the legends conflated these three beings, and the non-spreading werewolves that survived being bitten by the permanent werewolf, got conflated into a single mythical sort of being.

(This is consistent with what we know of the Dewitchery Diamond. It may not be consistent with the timelines. Even if it is consistent with the timelines, it may not be what happened.)

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

And yes totally, if Adrian would get killed by the vampires Pandora would raise her credit in immortal community by making aberrations extinct.

There's no clear evidence that aberrations are needed to create other aberrations - as far as we know, each is self-created. Therefore, extinction is not possible save by extincting every species that can turn themselves into aberrations.

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15 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

It may not be consistent with the timelines.

The Diamond was created to heal a werewolf IIRC, thus lycanthropy predates the Diamond.

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Hmmph...

Back in Egypt, turning into an animal (or a human with animal features) was privilege restricted to the gods.

Alexander, the Ptolemys, and the Romans took the legend to Europe where it became a curse.

It can be so difficult to accurately translate the real meaning of a story from one culture to another.

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19 hours ago, Scotty said:
20 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Considering he didn't predicted how much would Tedd be traumatized by finding out about Will of Magic, I think this is in the "hey, if I knew this would happen I would totally help it happening" category.

I saw it as "If I had known this would traumatize him so much. I wouldn't have wasted all that time trying to get Elliot killed".

Doesn't change that he didn't predicted that.

19 hours ago, Scotty said:

I guess it's possible for werewolves to make a return as well if a lycanthropy spell backfired or someone powerful enough recreated the curse.

Why powerful? The dewitchery diamond still exists. With it's help, the list of people able to recreate lycanthropy includes Tedd and if you count cats, Sarah (she certainly does have the catgirl watches) and Catalina.

Of course, lycanthropy done this way would likely not include any bloodlust, rage or other components which would make them dangerous ...

19 hours ago, Scotty said:

Pandora seems more interested in harmless fun and pranks and will fiercely defend anyone who's friends with Tedd, while Voltaire has been pretty darned violent and wants to see Tedd suffer. I still think Pandora's "Egg" threat was mostly an exaggeration on her part just to see Edward and the paranormal division run around, she knows Edward is Tedd's dad so she wouldn't hurt him, she probably just wants to keep him on his toes. Voltaire, on the other hand, might be more willing to take that scenario and make it a real dangerous situation.

She may be less friendly to Helena and Demetrius than to Tedd, Edward and Adrian. Also, Adrian's meeting with Abraham was not really dangerous, because she PREDICTED he wouldn't be seriously hurt, but it sure LOOKED that way ; The "Egg" event might be same, including the self-fullfilling component of "If I threaten Edward, he will be careful enough and not get hurt seriously".

18 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

Then later the legends conflated these three beings, and the non-spreading werewolves that survived being bitten by the permanent werewolf, got conflated into a single mythical sort of being.

The issue with this theory is that the legends are not consistent with definition of aberrations. Vampires MUST consume blood to survive, according to most legends about them. Werewolves don't have such attribute, at least not widely.

3 hours ago, HarJIT said:
18 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

It may not be consistent with the timelines.

The Diamond was created to heal a werewolf IIRC, thus lycanthropy predates the Diamond.

... also this.

18 hours ago, Don Edwards said:
20 hours ago, hkmaly said:

And yes totally, if Adrian would get killed by the vampires Pandora would raise her credit in immortal community by making aberrations extinct.

There's no clear evidence that aberrations are needed to create other aberrations - as far as we know, each is self-created. Therefore, extinction is not possible save by extincting every species that can turn themselves into aberrations.

We are talking about centuries old Immortal doing it. There may be some way, possibly related to HOW people turn to aberrrations. Or, she can just kill all aberrations and then continue killing everyone who tries while turning into aberration.

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