The Dresden Files > DF Reference Collection
The Gatekeeper fixed LC and other PG musings [spoilers up to CD]
Ms Duck:
--- Quote from: wizard nelson on February 13, 2013, 05:07:20 AM ---not to retcon on things but it seems to me altering time requires the mortal touch of free will. just as in DB changing harry's fate was an act of free will in the face of predestination. so a god to facilitate the working and a mortal to carry out the actions. dude look at it this way. time manipulation is odin/kringles forte and harry owes him a favor. this sets up the presumed time travel jim says will probably happen. IF on the other hand the time thing refers to harry doing kringles job one snowy christmas eve and stretching time to visit every kid in the world, i'd be cool with that too ;)
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ever read Hogfather ? youd like it.
wizard nelson:
--- Quote from: Ms Duck on February 13, 2013, 05:13:39 AM ---ever read Hogfather ? youd like it.
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no but, i'll add it to the list of things to look for on my next library trip.
wyltok:
--- Quote from: Ms Duck on February 12, 2013, 09:39:44 PM ---not to derail, but both of those have been answered:
seeing in the future is not a static future, but a potential future; what she sees are what may happen. As to if she can, even Harry (in CD ) says she does, hes just not sure how far or how well.
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Actually, what Harry said in Cold Days (after going through the star light circle) is that Mab can either see the future, or prepares for every eventuality. To put it simply, chess players can't see the future, they plan for it instead. Mab is a superb chess player. Look at the scenario at the end of Cold Days. She certainly didn't see Maeve's move coming, but she still had a backup in case anything happened to Sarissa. Similarly, she didn't see Harry's threat coming afterward.
Am I missing something that proves that she can see the future(s) instead of merely being a chess player?
--- Quote from: Ms Duck on February 12, 2013, 09:39:44 PM ---second is answered in text as well, in DB: she says she is required to do what lea would have done, but she is not limited to it. For example, lea knows little about the word of Kemmler, but Mab does, and she told harry things Lea does not know because she decided to.
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Actually, Dead Beat is the eminent example of Mab only going as far as Lea's knowledge instead of her own when it comes to fulfilling Harry's obligations. She even made a point of rubbing the rule in Harry's face and proceeded to offer him the Knighthood (again) as the price for the knowledge.
On the other hand (here I go shooting myself in the foot again), the conversation between Harry and Lea at his grave about Corpsetaker in GS is a good example of Lea being more than fair to Harry in answering his questions than what the deal strictly required. So it's a problem, but a workable problem, it seems.
Editted because I forgot to to reply to this part:
--- Quote from: Ms Duck on February 12, 2013, 09:39:44 PM ---not to derail, but both of those have been answered:
I rate WAGs based on how many serious objections there are; right now there are none for Mab that I am aware of, Jim nailed down the last loose boards in CD.
Rashid has very few if any, the only big one being why?
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I actually think the reply lies in what you wrote in one of your latter posts, specifically the part I bolded.
--- Quote from: Ms Duck on February 12, 2013, 10:56:19 PM ---that's not the result. the result is :
Harry becomes warden of DR
Mab lays a trap for her enemies
kills many of their agents lose on earth
makes Molly new winter lady
you are mistaking the first two moves for the endgame. When Mab plays chess, she plays fricken chess. ;D
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Mab outright tells us that she didn't plan for Molly to succeed Maeve as Winter Lady; she was just an understudy for whichever Lady spot became available first (in Mab's mind). I propose that the person who saw what was coming and planned for it was the Gatekeeper instead. That's why he told Harry that all would work out if he was just himself.
Ms Duck:
point one: Dead Beat
after he refuses to take the WK job, Mab still helps him anyway. PG 180. Hard back
"I must do what I might to preserve your life. Know this, Mortal: should Kemmler's heirs acquire the knowledge bound within the word.."
and she does one of her prophecy moments the next page away :
"one day you shall kneel at my feet."
these are kind of important, because Mab cannot lie. If she uses future tense like that, it means its something she has foreseen. and there a bunch of them.
(I have a standing WAG that after the series is over, a reader will be able to go thru the books and check off everything Mab said.. its very Jim, somehow.)
in CD, Harry doesn't question if Mab can see the future, but how far
"could Mab see that far ahead? or was this simply a case of superior preparedness in action? "
as to the things Mab said in CD at the end, she deliberately used squishy language. She has gotten very good at letting Harry assume what he wants to hear. ;)
the one thing (and maybe its just egotism) that make me think Mab is the more likely is the logic chain. Using it, back in 2006, I predicted the end of Cold Days with some accuracy. I also predicted that Harry would die, that Mab would brign him back, that it would involve demon reach..
Now I got the details wrong. Time Travel wasn't directly involved, but indirectly thru Mab's precognition; and the attacking force was the outsiders, not the black court.
but it was close enough that even though I had left the board, people started emailing me to say things like 'OMG DUCK !!'
so it must have been somewhat on the ball... lol.
or just very very very lucky.
wyltok:
As with last time, wizard nelson's posts are in the spoiler box. A quick summary:
1. Mab doesn't need foresight in order to stop Harry from blowing his head off. She can just keep him busy long enough that he won't use it before she gets a chance to fix it.
2. What message could Rashid possibly get from the future that would lead to the chain of events in the book (sending Harry after Molly with Bob while sending someone to Harry's house at the same time to find and fix the flaw in LC) without revealing and therefore fixing a bad future as unfixable?
My replies:
1. The problem I have with a non-foresight equipped Mab fixing Little Chicago is the level of baby-sitting involved in stopping Harry from using it before the fix. At the very least, it involves:
- Sending someone to run him over so that he'll get home later
- Orchestrating the attack on Pell so that boyfriend Nelson will be arrested in time for Molly to have to call Harry to bail him out
- Reconnecting Harry's phone
- Not kidnapping Molly until LC has been fixed
However, someone with access to future knowledge knows that all of the above will happen already, so they don't need to do it themselves. After all, the consensus here is that the Chrysler attack was done by Ace, and the phone call in the middle of the ritual, I would argue, if it's not a coincidence, is courtesy of angelic coincidental intervention (the same way Michael appears during the trial).
2. OK, first of all, a caveat: WoJ is that when Bob doesn't know an answer, he'll give a theoretical answer or just his best guess. Why is this important? Because during the events of PG, Bob didn't know about time travel and foresight. We've seen plenty of things, from the Oracle spirit in Death Masks to the discussion with Odin in Cold Days that propose that Bob highly overrates how paradox works.
But, if we assume that Bob is right, and that a message from the future must be a) true, and b) inevitable, and c) intended to change something that is not directly mentioned by the message itself, then it should be possible to imagine a Bad Future that would lead to a message that will help Rashid figure out what he needs to do here (think Heroes if you ever watched that show). You earlier accused me of twisting facts to fit the theory; I think I may just be doing that with the bit below.
So, elements of this bad future (located inside the Spoiler):
(click to show/hide)1. Molly is still important, and the events of Splattercon!!! are likely very similar to what we see. Molly is probably still taken, and Harry probably still tries to use Little Chicago, with fatal results.
2. Harry does not throw Summer Fire into Winter's Wellspring. The armies of Winter are not called from the Walls. No Outsiders take this opportunity to enter through the Gates.
3. Without Harry, Molly stays in Winter, and proceeds to be molded by Winter's philosophy. Maeve recognizes Molly for what she is: an understudy, and Nemesis likely sets her up and has her killed.
4. Without the Outsider reinforcements breaking in while Winter's army was distracted defending the Wellspring, there are less Outsiders in the World. However, without Summer free from guarding its borders from Winter, more of the Outsiders attacking the White Council survived the attack. So the total number of Outsiders inside Reality may be more or less than in the normal timeline.
5. Without Harry as Winter Knight breathing down Maeve's neck, the attack on Demonreach likely doesn't take place. Nemesis instead decides to continue to stick to the long game.
6. It is still likely, however, that Maeve still kills Lily, forcing Sarissa to replace her.
7. Without a Knight, and with a Lady who's infected and kills every replacement before they can be trained, Mab and the Gatekeeper find their position too weakened to continue to defend the Gates.
The bad future I envision, basically, is one where Mab doesn't have a second option for Maeve's replacement hidden away, forcing her to keep Maeve alive. Molly is the ideal candidate for the job, and in order to keep her hidden, Harry has to live and take her on as his apprentice. On the other hand, if Harry ever finds out that his apprentice is destined to become Winter Lady, he'll do everything in his power to stop it from happening. So, with those constraints in mind, here's the message I would send, if I were future Rashid:
"A user of dark magic will gain Winter's Favor. Fate and coincidence will stop Chicago's Warden from using the scrying tool he developed with Kemmler's familiar until X nights after the warlock's execution."
X is the number of days between the start of PG and when he actually uses LC (can't remember off the top of my head). It's a fairly subtle way of giving Rashid a deadline without telling him something bad, wouldn't you agree?
(The spoiler box below contains wizard nelson's posts I'm replying to).
(click to show/hide)
--- Quote from: wizard nelson on February 12, 2013, 11:58:38 PM ---@wyltok
1 ummm...... damn! uhh... yea your right. i looked thinking to find the quote, now why did i think that? Mmmm...
2 yea but not necessarily the i see the future kind. like duck i opt for the "I am mab! i've thought of everything fool!" answer along the lines of sun tzu kinda gathered intelligence. mabs just good like that, its her job.
3 i assume that was so you'd understand rashids msg and how it worked? rashid knowing to hit harry to divert him is a little iffy though. how can you get that msg across in a vague way(as i believe future GK MUST be to not screw with the timeline). i mean "harry gets into a car wreck at precisely 2:45" is too informativ. i suppose rashid steal a car to tail harry and keep on the lookout and was driving it when future rashid sends back a description of the same car he's driving. viola 2+2=4 rashid realises he must hit harry because he's driving the car that does it. yes i know i'm supporting your idea now :P and my ps3 will cut this off soon so 4 willbenextpost
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--- Quote from: wizard nelson on February 13, 2013, 12:08:23 AM --- THAT is great butcher forshadowing. it jives right with me.
4 kinda yea. the only event in the future that would give rashid all the pertainent info needed would be harry dying. i don't see any other reason rashid could know about LC, or that it had a fatal flaw in the future except this event. thats really meddling in time there.
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--- Quote from: wizard nelson on February 13, 2013, 05:07:20 AM ---not to retcon on things but it seems to me altering time requires the mortal touch of free will. just as in DB changing harry's fate was an act of free will in the face of predestination. so a god to facilitate the working and a mortal to carry out the actions. dude look at it this way. time manipulation is odin/kringles forte and harry owes him a favor. this sets up the presumed time travel jim says will probably happen. IF on the other hand the time thing refers to harry doing kringles job one snowy christmas eve and stretching time to visit every kid in the world, i'd be cool with that too ;)
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