Girl Genius XXVIII: Dancink! Ve is here for de dancink!

[HandofShadows]

I don't think Der Kastel really shut down, if it did it was only a very brief time. It just hadn't been allowed to take part before presumably on direct orders.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Heh. Der Kestlebot is bringing her the book too.

"Oooh, book."
"MINE!"
"If you loved me..."
"Define love."

[Grif]

A somewhat anticlimatic end, but perhaps very much in the spirit of Solstice.

And just in time for a very well-deserved continuation of the main story.

[TeChameleon]

*blink*

I... I can't believe this didn't occur to me sooner. I don't remember if this came up in the previous guesses as to what our mystery friend would look like, but my official guess, once he(?) has been fully dimensionally integrated? He's going to look like the geisterdamen, or something related to them.

[theangelJean]

*blink*

I... I can't believe this didn't occur to me sooner. I don't remember if this came up in the previous guesses as to what our mystery friend would look like, but my official guess, once he(?) has been fully dimensionally integrated? He's going to look like the geisterdamen, or something related to them.

Not the Dreen? They're the ones who were supposed to be tangential to time...

Edit: Yes, I have confused the two myself in the past, until Gil explicitly called that out.

[TeChameleon]

Not the Dreen? They're the ones who were supposed to be tangential to time...

Edit: Yes, I have confused the two myself in the past, until Gil explicitly called that out.

The Dreen are from an earlier incursion, though, and I'm not sure they were ever actually stabilized, dimensionally, given that from what we know, they popped out of an old Heterodyne experiment and were promptly shuffled off to the Corbetite Monks without any further work being done on them (they already had hats).

The Geisterdamen seem to be from another reality also- they make reference to having been sent to the "shadow world", and elsewhere talk about a portal being used to bring them to the main GG 'verse.

I've got at least one almost entirely unsubstantiated theory about the geisters (that a rogue faction of Lucrezia's priesthood attacked Castle Heterodyne and kidnapped her for the sin of bearing a male child, as the Geisters appear to be universally female), but aside from that, there's also at least one other enemy faction that we know almost nothing about- whoever it was that attacked the geisters around the time of Agatha's birth and who Vrin referred to as being 'the gods at war' (unless that was Bill and Barry?).

[Rodin]

I've got at least one almost entirely unsubstantiated theory about the geisters (that a rogue faction of Lucrezia's priesthood attacked Castle Heterodyne and kidnapped her for the sin of bearing a male child, as the Geisters appear to be universally female), but aside from that, there's also at least one other enemy faction that we know almost nothing about- whoever it was that attacked the geisters around the time of Agatha's birth and who Vrin referred to as being 'the gods at war' (unless that was Bill and Barry?).

The rogue faction is unlikely since we know what was happening moments before "the attack." Assuming the novels aren't a full alternate continuity (and I see no reason to believe they are), a pregnant Lucrezia was attempting to transfer Castle Heterodyne's consciousness into the Muse's body. She pulled the switch and then "things were very different indeed".

My take on what happened is that Lucrezia's experiment went wrong. Trying to stuff the Castle's body into too small a container caused the Castle's consciousness to be ripped to shreds. The structure suffered the equivalent of a grand mal seizure, tearing itself apart and causing onlookers to believe it had been attacked. At this point Lucrezia panics - Bill and Barry would figure out what she had been up to. So she murders her lab assistants and burns all her notes. She flees through the portal to the Geister realm and creates the previously seen flashback where she arrives "in great distress".

After that, things get really fuzzy. Somebody attacks the Geisters and steals Agatha. My guess is probably Barry since he winds up with her. Lucrezia leaves or is taken, and when she returns she has fully become The Other.

[theangelJean]

The rogue faction is unlikely since we know what was happening moments before "the attack." Assuming the novels aren't a full alternate continuity (and I see no reason to believe they are), a pregnant Lucrezia was attempting to transfer Castle Heterodyne's consciousness into the Muse's body. She pulled the switch and then "things were very different indeed".

I have the novel and hadn't realised that Lucrezia was pregnant at the time. So much for my theory that Bill caught up with her post-Castle-breakdown and she "made up with" him again before fleeing.

[Manga Shoggoth]

I do note that the castle seems to have picked up some social skills (or at least, less anti-social skills) - the small Castle clank is arriving with her book AND her husband has arrived with cake. At the same time.

And it's a Castle if its word. Who knew?

[TaRix]

*blink*

I... I can't believe this didn't occur to me sooner. I don't remember if this came up in the previous guesses as to what our mystery friend would look like, but my official guess, once he(?) has been fully dimensionally integrated? He's going to look like the geisterdamen, or something related to them.

I think it'll be von Zinzer. It gets him out of Mechanicsberg and still lets him comment on the yet-to-occur-but-already-happened friendly time windows. The guy was already a self-confessed sort-of clown, too.

[Shining Wrath]

I do note that the castle seems to have picked up some social skills (or at least, less anti-social skills) - the small Castle clank is arriving with her book AND her husband has arrived with cake. At the same time.

And it's a Castle if its word. Who knew?

I think the Castle believes very strongly in the idea of reputation - both of the Heterodynes, and of itself as an extension of them. That's why it was important that "Agatha" not be captured, and also why the Castle will keep promises made to non-Heterodynes who serve the Heterodynes well. The Castle can't go full sociopath and just kill people for fun, otherwise Mechanicsburg would eventually not have enough people to properly serve the Heterodynes. It may enjoy killing when it gets the chance, as we saw during the siege - especially of people who are trying to hurt The Heterodyne - but it has some rules it lives by. It's terrifying and within Mechanicsburg nigh omnipotent, but not capricious.

EDIT:

My guesses as to who our disembodied-about-to-be-embodied friend might turn out to be:
1) A current method of the party, but time traveling.
2) An ancestral Heterodyne.
3) Bill or Barry. That would really complicate things, but maybe it's time for Agatha to have family.
4) The Baron. Who would have witnessed many things, and would now know Agatha is not the Other, nor controlled by her.
5) Someone else caught in the Mechanicsburg time trap who got out by force of will to report to the Heterodyne - so, probably a Jager General. Madame Glinka?

[Rogar Demonblud]

It does pretend to be capricious, though. Probably for the amusement value in watching others squirm. As Higgs said, there's always a point.

[SZbNAhL]

I don't know how long this page has had a title, but it seems that the Vozzler's real name is

Spoiler

Show

Kjarl

.

[Rogar Demonblud]

If that's based on actual Scandinavian languages, the kj- is pronounced 'sh'.

[theangelJean]

3) Bill or Barry. That would really complicate things, but maybe it's time for Agatha to have family.

Nah, Agatha already has family. She has Lilith and Adam, who are supportive, secretive and (up until recently) taciturn. She has Lucrezia, who's embarrassing and controlling. I still think this is a story themed around what your family wants to make of you (in some cases literally) but I really don't see where Bill or Barry would fit in.

[Rogar Demonblud]

More about trying to fit in with a family legacy that is quite mixed. Plus some info on the Other War.

[Fyraltari]

Nah, Agatha already has family. She has Lilith and Adam, who are supportive, secretive and (up until recently) taciturn. She has Lucrezia, who's embarrassing and controlling. I still think this is a story themed around what your family wants to make of you (in some cases literally) but I really don't see where Bill or Barry would fit in.

Barry is the one who tried to supress her potential.

[HandofShadows]

Barry is the one who tried to supress her potential.

He was trying to keep her safe from the Other, who he seems to have thought was the Baron.

[Manga Shoggoth]

He was trying to keep her safe from the Other, who he seems to have thought was the Baron.

And, more to the point, prevent her talent from killing her because she was too young to control it. She started to break through at a very early age.

[Shining Wrath]

And, more to the point, prevent her talent from killing her because she was too young to control it. She started to break through at a very early age.

^Exactly this. He didn't say "Oh, your power will be a threat to me." Or "Oh, you're a girl, you can't be a Spark". He said "It's too soon", and when he put the locket on her, he cried.

And we know that being a Spark that can't defend themselves is usually fatal, as is being a Spark who can't control their power. Madboys don't last long when they are Madgirls and defenseless.

[Thomas Cardew]

I still think this is a story themed around what your family wants to make of you (in some cases literally) but I really don't see where Bill or Barry would fit in.

Supportive mentors. People who are more capable than you and help grow your talents. Gil and Tarvek are peers (and love interests). Even background sparks like Othar or Trewlany aren't on her level. The Clays raised her, but they weren't and aren't sparks, they were minions. The only people who we've really seen stronger than Agatha were the Master of Paris and Albia. There hasn't really been a chance for her to bask in the approval of someone who is better than you. Bill/Barry give the chance for that, to show off how much you've mastered/grown to a person who truly understands.

Introducing Bill or Barry back makes the politics part of the story harder. Who is THE heterodyne etc. But could be plenty of room for them in either a contained arc focusing on teaching/helping Agatha grow or an arc where she interacts with them but also learns why they haven't come back and solved the problem already.
.

[TeChameleon]

The rogue faction is unlikely since we know what was happening moments before "the attack." Assuming the novels aren't a full alternate continuity (and I see no reason to believe they are), a pregnant Lucrezia was attempting to transfer Castle Heterodyne's consciousness into the Muse's body. She pulled the switch and then "things were very different indeed".

My take on what happened is that Lucrezia's experiment went wrong. Trying to stuff the Castle's body into too small a container caused the Castle's consciousness to be ripped to shreds. The structure suffered the equivalent of a grand mal seizure, tearing itself apart and causing onlookers to believe it had been attacked. At this point Lucrezia panics - Bill and Barry would figure out what she had been up to. So she murders her lab assistants and burns all her notes. She flees through the portal to the Geister realm and creates the previously seen flashback where she arrives "in great distress".

After that, things get really fuzzy. Somebody attacks the Geisters and steals Agatha. My guess is probably Barry since he winds up with her. Lucrezia leaves or is taken, and when she returns she has fully become The Other.

Ah. I don't have the novels, so I wasn't aware of that little detail.

That being said, we do know that there's a renegade geister faction, or at least that they think there is. Whether it has any connection to the Castle attack, only the Foglios know, it was just a wild stab in the dark on my part.

There does seem to be a bit of a question mark around the timing between Lucrezia leaving the night the Other attacked and arriving in the Geister realm, though, given that there's absolutely zero awareness- even amongst those who really should know, like our Master Heliotrope- that Lucrezia was pregnant the night of the attack. Given that when she arrived in geistertown in 'high distress' she was visibly 6-8 months pregnant, that raises some questions. Although given the Mongfish tendency towards biological mastery, I suppose it's entirely possible she decided to speed things along after experiencing the 'joys' of pregnancy the first time and had only been pregnant for a few days or some such goofy spark nonsense.

[Rockphed]

My money is on lucrezia and bill having gotten together one last time after the attack. Either way, I think it was a good 6 months to a year between the attack and when lucrezia went to geisterland.

[BRC]

Hrmmm, is it accurate to say that the Zeetha/Agatha/Violetta trio matches up with the classic archetypes of Fighter/Mage/Rogue?

[InvisibleBison]

Hrmmm, is it accurate to say that the Zeetha/Agatha/Violetta trio matches up with the classic archetypes of Fighter/Mage/Rogue?

Given that all three of them are fairly skilled in some form of melee combat, I wouldn't say it would.

[theangelJean]

Complete side topic:

Othar's Twitter: He's been through some time-travel shenanigans lately, and now he's become involved with Eotain, the Geister, after the attack on Paris.

It's late enough that I can't remember if anyone has brought this up before in twenty-eight threads, or even if I've already suggested this, but:

Othar's mission: destruction of the world's Sparks. What if he got wasped?

Lucrezia created the wasps, but what if she made a deal with Othar or influenced him somehow? Gave him access to the town-destroying machinery (detailed in the novels) which took out the most powerful sparks in Europa (while Klaus was absent) with seemingly no warning or motive, as a ruse to spread her wasps unnoticed?

I mean Othar as the Other, it's right there in the name...

[runeghost]

Complete side topic:

Othar's Twitter: He's been through some time-travel shenanigans lately, and now he's become involved with Eotain, the Geister, after the attack on Paris.

It's late enough that I can't remember if anyone has brought this up before in twenty-eight threads, or even if I've already suggested this, but:

Othar's mission: destruction of the world's Sparks. What if he got wasped?

Lucrezia created the wasps, but what if she made a deal with Othar or influenced him somehow? Gave him access to the town-destroying machinery (detailed in the novels) which took out the most powerful sparks in Europa (while Klaus was absent) with seemingly no warning or motive, as a ruse to spread her wasps unnoticed?

I mean Othar as the Other, it's right there in the name...

If he'd been wasped, I'd think he'd be more effective at the Spark-destroying. Othar is very competent in his own unique fashion, but his priority list seems to be:

Gentleman
Adventurer
.
.
.
.
.
Destroy all Sparks


If he'd been wasped and commanded, I'd think the "destroy all Sparks" would be higher on his priority list. OTOH, maybe not - the wasped Baron was still very much himself. Although... wasn't the wasp that got Klaus a one-of-a-kind protoype? That would mean that Othar couldn't have been wasped earlier that Klaus, though he may have been wasped later, if there are more wasps capable of affecting sparks.

[Calemyr]

Complete side topic:

Othar's Twitter: He's been through some time-travel shenanigans lately, and now he's become involved with Eotain, the Geister, after the attack on Paris.

It's late enough that I can't remember if anyone has brought this up before in twenty-eight threads, or even if I've already suggested this, but:

Othar's mission: destruction of the world's Sparks. What if he got wasped?

Lucrezia created the wasps, but what if she made a deal with Othar or influenced him somehow? Gave him access to the town-destroying machinery (detailed in the novels) which took out the most powerful sparks in Europa (while Klaus was absent) with seemingly no warning or motive, as a ruse to spread her wasps unnoticed?

I mean Othar as the Other, it's right there in the name...

If he'd been wasped, I'd think he'd be more effective at the Spark-destroying. Othar is very competent in his own unique fashion, but his priority list seems to be:

Gentleman
Adventurer
.
.
.
.
.
Destroy all Sparks


If he'd been wasped and commanded, I'd think the "destroy all Sparks" would be higher on his priority list. OTOH, maybe not - the wasped Baron was still very much himself. Although... wasn't the wasp that got Klaus a one-of-a-kind protoype? That would mean that Othar couldn't have been wasped earlier that Klaus, though he may have been wasped later, if there are more wasps capable of affecting sparks.

Heh. I read theangelJean's post the same way the first time. Even wrote up a big explanation why I thought Othar was more likely suffering from some kind of post-traumatic psychosis and that it was important for the narrative that Othar's beliefs and actions be genuine as a counterpoint to Agatha, Lucrezia, and Klaus. Then I reread the post and deleted mine because I ranted at something that nobody had said. I do agree with you, though: If Othar had already been wasped, he's managed to be even more hard-headed and cunning than Klaus in the same boat.

To answer the question I think is actually being asked, Othar in the near future becoming wasped and allied with the Other would be a devastating shift for Agatha. Every moral guidepost she has would be either presumed dead, amoral monsters, compromised by mind control, or presumably simply evil. Agatha is still young, she's still learning to define herself and it's important for her to be able to look at a variety of role models and compare herself to them to determine what she is and what she isn't. She is not Good like Othar and Bill, nor Evil like Lucrezia and the old Heterodynes, she's not domineering like Klaus or Lucrezia, she's not as chaotic as her Jaegers, and, unlike any of them (except maybe Klaus), she is guided by unbreakable loyalty to the monsters her family have bred. She believes in quiet, gentle, but ultimately overwhelming power as always demonstrated by Punch. Take Othar and Klaus off that map, and Agatha would have a much harder time finding just who she is. She'd still find it in the end, but she'd have to learn more by trial and error and make many more mistakes. Could be fun to watch, honestly, but Girl Genius has shown that dragging things out further than necessary is a recipe for boredom and frustration.

That said, Othar's antics could be quite fun for a breather episode. Imagine Othar's genre savvy, good luck, and indestructability redirected to the role of an evil overlord. Imagine what a truly competent evil overlord would be like (Klaus only acts like one to keep everything peaceful). Imagine a true enemy for Agatha that was on her level (or even a bit weaker), but so competent that she simply couldn't beat him*. That could be a lot of fun, but it wouldn't do to make it last very long.

*It reminds me of an episode from the Beast Wars: Transformers cgi cartoon (from the late nineties). Quiet, passive, but brilliant good guy Rhinox is turned into a bad guy by Megatron. With his morals and motivations altered, he's so good at being a bad guy that Megatron has to hit the reset button or be ousted by an actually competent mutineer. I found that episode quite entertaining, but only as a one episode wonder, just as I predict Evil Othar would get old fast if it became a long-running plot.

[Rodin]

^Exactly this. He didn't say "Oh, your power will be a threat to me." Or "Oh, you're a girl, you can't be a Spark". He said "It's too soon", and when he put the locket on her, he cried.

And we know that being a Spark that can't defend themselves is usually fatal, as is being a Spark who can't control their power. Madboys don't last long when they are Madgirls and defenseless.

Even worse - she was Heterodyning. Being a child Spark makes her stand out and is dangerous. Being a child Heterodyne outside of Mechanicsburg is suicide.

My money is on lucrezia and bill having gotten together one last time after the attack. Either way, I think it was a good 6 months to a year between the attack and when lucrezia went to geisterland.

Again, this is ruled out by the aforementioned prologue. Lucrezia was pregnant at the time of the attack and the Geisterdamen present were convinced the unborn baby was the Holy Child. Baby Klaus was with the Seneschal at the time. This doesn't rule out there being some period of time afterwards prior to her going to Geisterland.

[theangelJean]

Heh. I read theangelJean's post the same way the first time. Even wrote up a big explanation why I thought Othar was more likely suffering from some kind of post-traumatic psychosis and that it was important for the narrative that Othar's beliefs and actions be genuine as a counterpoint to Agatha, Lucrezia, and Klaus. Then I reread the post and deleted mine because I ranted at something that nobody had said. I do agree with you, though: If Othar had already been wasped, he's managed to be even more hard-headed and cunning than Klaus in the same boat.

Sorry, yes, it was half past one in the morning and I couldn't do the complex grammar I was after. But the scenario I was thinking was, what if in the near future Othar were wasped, something something something time travel, and then in the past Othar + Lucrezia = "the Other" as an explanation for the targeted+insidious nature of the attacks that ravaged Europa, twenty years ago. (Do we even know where Othar was during that time period?)

I hadn't even considered the effect on Agatha, which I guess is the most important part of the story, and you're right, it wouldn't be good or particularly fit in to the story as they're telling it. And in the light of day, it's not a great theory. All it explains is the targeting of powerful Sparks, and to be honest, that's probably innate to all power hungry Sparks - Lucrezia would easily have come up with that all by herself. I liked the irony of the Good Guy's motives contributing to the Great Evil, but this isn't OOTS. I was just thinking how I would love it if the denouement of the story were, in the end, the Girl Genius rescues the Hero, nobody gets married and they all live happily ever after. (Now that I think of it, they already did that - Agatha has already rescued Othar at least once.) Ahh well. I should know by now that trying to second guess the Foglios is folly, and just enjoy how it plays out.