The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
What weird dynamic in the mirror verse do you want to see?
Mira:
--- Quote from: g33k on March 13, 2025, 04:40:57 PM ---I halfway expect Jim to write the choice as something that seems really really minor, from our current POV; not one of those obvious, high-drama moments.
I'm hoping he brings in Uriel (cosplaying as Clarence) to explain things; that likely won't happen until the very end (when he tells Harry to click his Ruby Slippers three times).
(yes, I'm crossing the streams pretty severely here)
--- End quote ---
It is possible and I like it when Uriel shows up. What came to my mind a bit ago after I posted, was that moment when it was Thomas that pushed Susan towards the vamps that is critical. It doesn't have to automatically be something that Harry chose that set off a whole avalanche of consequences.. It could be what others chose which caught Harry up in the fall out which then forced him down different paths.
g33k:
--- Quote from: Mira on March 13, 2025, 05:12:37 PM --- ... It doesn't have to automatically be something that Harry chose that set off a whole avalanche of consequence ...
--- End quote ---
No; but it's WoJ that the Mirror mirror book would be based upon a choice of Harry's (and makes good sense for a Harry-Protagonist novel, after all!).
My own headcanon is that the choices of a Starborn often carry extra weight, even up to generating whole new branches of the multiverse.
Mira:
--- Quote from: g33k on March 13, 2025, 05:57:20 PM ---No; but it's WoJ that the Mirror mirror book would be based upon a choice of Harry's (and makes good sense for a Harry-Protagonist novel, after all!).
My own headcanon is that the choices of a Starborn often carry extra weight, even up to generating whole new branches of the multiverse.
--- End quote ---
Possible, but here is a little tidbit easily missed that maybe significant. Remember Lydia? The one with the Casandra tears that Bianca was going to use the Sword of Love to sacrifice with? The little thing that set off the riot at the party.. Well, Harry, Thomas, and Michael are gathered at Harry's place trying to come up with a plan to save Susan and Justine... Lydia is also with them, still sound asleep from her ordeal. Harry thought it might be a good idea to wake her up, that she might have some useful insights.. Also Harry begins to think their escape from the party was too easy... Anyone smell set up?
Anyway, they proceed to wake Lydia and this is what happens, bolding and italics are mine; page 298-299 Grave Peril
--- Quote ---I started to push myself away from Lydia, but her fingers reached out and dug into the sweater I was wearing. I jerked against them, but she held me, easily, not at all moved. The pale girl opened her sunken eyes, and they were flooded with blood, all though the whites, scarlet. She smiled, slow and malicious. She spoke, and her voice came out in a low, harsh sound totally unlike her natural tones, alien and malevolent."You should have kept her from sleeping. Or killed her before she awoke."
--- End quote ---
Now supposedly it was Nightmare that was possessing Lydia's body... But what if Nightmare is just another name for Nemesis? What if the decision to let Lydia live had repercussions that extended beyond? Harry did have a choice, he chose to wake Lydia, he chose to let her live, but what did he turn loose by doing that?
To further build on that, we need to go back to near the beginning of Grave Peril where Lydia actually tells Harry her vision.
page 30 Grave Peril;
--- Quote ---"Fire," she whispered. "Wind. I see dark things and a dark war. I see my death coming for me, out of the spirit world. And I see you at the middle of it all. "You're the beginning, the end of it. You're the one who can make the path go different ways."
--- End quote ---
All this time, I thought anyway, Lydia's vision was about the war with the Red Court, that the fire was what took place at Bianca's party. But what if that was a bit of a red herring? Yeah, the whole fricking war with the Red Court including the attempt to sacrifice little Maggie which led to the demise of the whole Red Court.. Lydia's death did come from the spirit world, Nightmare killed her and took over her body, or was that Nemesis? At what point did that happen? Because when they tried to sacrifice Lydia with the Sword of Love it tinged out in objection about killing an innocent... So at some point between that moment and when Harry made the decision to bring her sleeping body back to his place, Lydia was murdered and her body taken over by Nightmare... Or was it Nightmare? Isn't that the M.O. of Nemesis as well? The war Lydia spoke of wasn't the war with the Red Court, yeah, Harry was at the beginning and the end of that, but he, as a star born is very important to the BAT to come..
--- Quote ---"You should have kept her from sleeping. Or killed her before she awoke.
--- End quote ---
That has huge ramifications, if it indeed was Nemesis speaking, Harry chose to save who he thought was Lydia, but instead he turned Nemesis loose on the world.. How could Harry have known? He couldn't, he didn't have the knowledge at the time.. He made a choice, and it was the wrong choice, maybe Mirrormirror won't be evil Harry so much as Harry trying to fix the error he made that is causing the world to go to hell.
LordDresden2:
The problem with alternity is that the question: "What would have happened if Person X chose Decision X differently?" has multiple answers, all valid. That is, because a different chain of events proceeds from that moment, subsequent choices also have to be made, both by Person X and other people too, and each one of those subsequent choices makes a different world.
If all possibilities happen (which is the usual assumption behind diverging timelines), then there are endless worlds springing from whatever different Choice Harry made. Worlds where Michael lives or dies, worlds where Harry and the Council are at odds and standing firm together, worlds where Karrin is married to Harry and worlds where Karrin wants Harry dead, all springing from that same Choice, because subsequent Choices also get made.
Mira:
--- Quote from: LordDresden2 on March 15, 2025, 06:25:55 AM ---The problem with alternity is that the question: "What would have happened if Person X chose Decision X differently?" has multiple answers, all valid. That is, because a different chain of events proceeds from that moment, subsequent choices also have to be made, both by Person X and other people too, and each one of those subsequent choices makes a different world.
If all possibilities happen (which is the usual assumption behind diverging timelines), then there are endless worlds springing from whatever different Choice Harry made. Worlds where Michael lives or dies, worlds where Harry and the Council are at odds and standing firm together, worlds where Karrin is married to Harry and worlds where Karrin wants Harry dead, all springing from that same Choice, because subsequent Choices also get made.
--- End quote ---
That was the clever bit about "It's a Wonderful Life," the hero of that story wishes he'd never been born because he feels that his life is screwed up and that he has screwed other people's lives up. So the angel Clarence shows him what it would have like had he never been born. No choice, he is taken completely out of the picture because he had never been born. Since he had never been born there is no moment when if he chose A then B,C,and D would have happened and so on. In the original Trek story, it wasn't about choices either, a transporter accident sends Kirk and company to an alternate universe where things are the same but not.. As per usual Kirk tries to set that right by his eyes by handing the assassination device over to that reality's Spock and tells him to assassinate that Kirk and change that world to what our Kirk believes is the better. If you think about it, you know that will fail because that isn't how that alternate universe works.. That was a bit of a ramble, but my point, the story was never about what if Kirk had made another choice... It would only be so if there was a Mirrormirror part 2 and we actually see the repercussions from our Kirk choosing to hand that assassination device to the alternate Spock.. Would the alternate Spock kill the alternate Kirk? If he did, would it really change the nature of that alternate universe? Or for all his appearance of having the same integrity as our Kirk's Spock, the alternate Spock would become no better than the Kirk he killed..
If I understand what Mirrormirror is going to be about, is Harry finds himself in an alternate universe where that Harry isn't what our Harry thinks he should be... Not much said about the rest of it though.. Who knows, Murphy may never have become a cop at all and stayed married to her first husband happily and have six grown kids... It isn't about choices so much. Now apparently Harry in one of his moods and decides "if only," over a decision he made in Grave Peril. I can see time travel coming into the picture, but I don't see evil Harry unless our Harry is successful changing something and then becomes evil Harry.. Then what would be the incentive to change back? Don't know if I want to continue to read about the adventures of evil Harry.
Actually I think Harry will have difficulties with little Maggie because she is getting to the age where kids do become difficult.. Harry wishes Susan was still alive to handle it because little Maggie needs a mother, and somehow Lara just doesn't fit that role... That would put us back to Grave Peril and decisions he made about Susan,then he decides to travel back in time to change things.. However taking that a step further, what about Susan's decisions? She made her own bed on that one when she chose to forge the invitation, disregarding Harry's warnings about the dangers at that party. So maybe Harry thinks if he destroys that invitation after he decides not to go, Susan couldn't have forged it and been at the party in the first place. Then I think Harry will discover by doing that Susan breaks up with him with real anger, and the results are there would be no little Maggie at all.... Then what does he decide to do?
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