Okay, so Kat has some control over the time travel. Which is exactly what I was hoping wouldn't happen.
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Okay, so Kat has some control over the time travel. Which is exactly what I was hoping wouldn't happen.
Deus ex something something
So there is a catch. Or, a "task," anyhow.
Well, if the bird(s) were just to save Annie... then they'd all not be seen until the moment she fell off the bridge.
That the bird(s) were seen all over the Court, watching... well. Something else happened in the future to change from 'save Annie' to 'observe the Court'.
Y'know this arc feels a little directionless to me. What exactly is Kat trying to do here? I mean Kat didn't build the bird with the inention of using it to change the past. She didn't seek out the Norns because she wanted to change something, but because she wanted to resolve the feelings she got when she found out she did it before. So the norns gave her control of the time stream so she could send the bird to the past and... do what exactly? Kat never actually mentioned their was something she wanted to change... Sure there is the current problem of the two Annies, but Kat hasn't really highlighted how sending her bird into the past would fix their problem. It feels like Kat's just messing with the time stream because she can. Really feels like there should have been a moment where Kat actually considers what she's been given the chance to do and decides on what she wants to change
An alternate future version of herself did, though, and she's now in a loop where she's sending it back to fulfill what that other-future Kat wanted to change. Namely, Annie dying when she fell off the bridge.
If she didn't, then Annie would have died, and she'd be heading into that original future where she built the birds to keep Annie from dying. And she'd find out what it really would be like to lose Annie. (Except for the timeline where she DID, so yay, another timeline branch)
As for the dual Annie problem, that's going to be even crazier since both are teens ... which means that they're both from post-Annie-Rescue-By-Katbird timelines.
And it looks like Kat is learning something about 'free agency is an illusion'.
Decisions made in the future are driving the present, in order to get to the action in the present to change the past.
I'm guessing she'll stop using it for now when she has had the bird do everything she knows about it doing. Then, whenever she learns about another thing the bird did, she'll contact the Norns again.
Getting a mix of Avengers:Endgame and Ender's Shadow vibes from this chapter.
Here's the thing though, what bothers me in THAT case, is that having multiple timelines generally BREAKS the possibility for Paradox's and time loops. Being able to alter the past and create a new timeline means that no one has to do anything, and there is no chance of breaking causality because anything that would cause a paradox would instead create a new timeline. Dealing with multiple timelines, is more like dealing with multiple dimensions that can interfere with each other. The original Kat lived in a timeline where annie died after she fell off the bridge, and that what led her to make the original bird, meet the Norns and mess with time to save Annie; this in turn created a timeline/universe we see where Annie never died. Original Kat did something in the past that did not happen in her own timeline. Our Kat shouldn't need to repeat what original Kat did because the "annie doesn't die" timeline already exists thanks to original katQuote:
Well, naturally. She can only do the things that have already been done. She can't do what hasn't happened yet. Otherwise, causality is violated.
For instance, Kat is sending her bird into the past and is creating each and every instance of when the bird appeared in the story; however according to the Norns when kat herself visits the norns in order to do any of this is not always the same... so like timeline requires that these events with the birds are written in stone and Kat herself has to perform them, but the timeline does NOT require Kat to visit the norns at any specific time and place, and say or do the same things. It doesn't really quite add up
Not to mention there were actually FIVE birds present when Annie was saved, and it only took 2 to carry her... so now would come the question of where those other 4 birds are coming from. Will kat send all of those birds, or are their other birds from other kats? And if those other birds are being sent by other kats, then that means that our Kat didn't need to do it, because her not doing it doesn't stop the other kats from doing it.
No, our Kat will do it because she will probably come to the conclusion that the second bird is needed to help Annie because two birds helped Annie, so she looped another bird into the same time.
The other three were her trying to dial in the right time to intercept Annie's fall - and missed.
I hope we finally get the answer as to why Ys buried the TikToc (or it was really Coyote who did it).
Kat already came to the conclusion they're all the same bird.
So the narrative conclusion is - she already did, so she can and will.
I just Re-read where Kat explains the bird, and I think I've got it.
Kat knows that if she does nothing, everything will be fine. Everything you said above applies - Annie survives in this timeline no matter what.
However.
The original Kat created the bird because she was so sad that she broke time in order to save Annie. If our Kat does not send the bird back, that will create another Kat who loses Annie. The loop goes infinitely, and every time Kat doesn't send the bird back another version of herself becomes incredibly sad. Another version of Annie dies.
Kat has to maintain the loop or create infinite suffering across the multi-verse. I'm not saying this is accurate, but it appears to be what Kat believes.
Here's a weird thought I had on this re read: instead of parallel universe + time loop series (which invalidate each other), Court Annie is Annie from the "start of the loop" saved prior to actual death and placed in the current timeline.
You still have Annie being absent from a timeline, but it is a time line that she would die immediately if she returned to it. Kat's thought process of the devastation on missing her friend if she died/disappeared (as noted from both revelation of Annie being phased in from a different reality) are both the same "timeline".
I believe this is a bit muddled from the fact that I believe that "both" Annies are pointed out as being "out of phase", but that could mean that the method of a seamless shift like this (complete memories) cause a distortion.
Eh, it may not stand up to scrutiny.
Why do parallel universes and time loops invalidate each other?
This setting clearly has mythical magic, should we just be assuming that the hypothetical physics / logic of time travel even apply?
I guess it doesn't so much as I see it, you never experience the success of your meddling with the past. If you send a probe back in time to prevent the death of a friend, you still live out the rest of your life with your friend haven't died, but you have created an alternative dimension (and all preceding ones from that decision) to have the effect.
So I guess it doesn't invalidate it. It just means that you yourself never benefit from the action.
As for should we apply this sort of reasoning to Gunnerkrigg Court specifically: Well the ether is basically Dream Logic Manifest, so probably not.
Exactly. There's every possibility that the flow of time as we 'expect' it to be doesn't even exist. Perhaps the reason Kat saved Annie is because she did - maybe what we are interpreting as a 'loop' is simply a fixed point in reality that has no beginning or end. Most importantly it probably doesn't matter - the story is going to explain things however it feels like doing and everyone's personal opinion on how time travel 'should' work isn't really going to matter.
SpoilerI don't know. We've seen multiple of them carrying her together. They didn't seem separated in time by a second to me.
I wonder if this is going to fail, and she's going to have to go build more birds.
Feel free to ignore my time travel ranting if you don't want to share my headache
Spoiler
I can't really buy that... I mean Kat's not just trying to repeat what the other Kat did, she's actually creating every known instance of the bird's appearing in the comic, including the ones she wouldn't even know about (like the instances of the bird appearing before Zimmy, which Kat treats as unintentional). The comic here is implying that Annie was not saved by an alternate Kat that lost Annie, but by OUR Kat
Here Kat is not effecting and creating an alternate timeline, but is instead effecting her own timeline. But we were told that's not how things worked for the Other Kat that lost Annie... losing Annie is what led that Kat to seek out the norns and send the birds to save her, but if Kat could effect her own timeline like our Kat can, then she would be living in a timeline where Annie never died, just like our Kat and would have never experienced what it was like to lose Annie.
The thing about time loops is that there is no real beginning to the loop. "Event A" happens because "Event B" happened, and "Event B" happened because "Event A" happened. One can not happen without the other. In a time loop situation there shouldn't even really be a "first Kat" or multiple other kats, there would just be our kat.
They are pretty much two different solutions to the same problem, which is solving for time travel paradoxes. With a timeloop, everything that happens is part of the same timeline, which is why the time loop exists; "Event A" happens because you went back in time to make it happen and its not possible for you to NOT make it happen because that would break casuality. However if your time travel rules state that changing the past creates an alternate timeline, then that in turn breaks the time loop. Going back in time to create "Event A" does not change YOUR timeline, it creates a new timeline where "Event A" happens, and since "Event A" already happened, there's no incentive or reason for the people of that timeline to go back in time and make "Event A" happen. You can't really create a loop, if your changes create a new timeline that you yourself are separate from
And this is why introducing time travel to a story can be such a mess
Even if a story has a mythical magic system, there should still be internal consistency within the story about how the magic works. It doesn't have to follow OUR logic, but it should have to follow its own internal logic... If a character does "A" and gets result "B", then anyone in the story that also does "A" should get result "B".
If one kat messing with time creates an alternate timeline, then our kat doing the same should also result in an alternate timeline. If our Kat can not change time and can only repeat what's already been done (time loop), then that means that no other Kat's should be able to change their timelines either
Until you get into that free agency idea.
Our Kat created the bird and sent it through time because another Kat created the bird and sent it through time.
Because our Kat figured out that Kat created the bird and sent it back in time, she believed she -had to- create the bird and send it through time to fulfill the loop that she believes exists. Even though it's possible it's not a loop, and a divergent universe.
She didn't do it because she absolutely had to; she did it because she believed she had to.
And her belief made reality, while reality led her to her belief.
Oh, THAT'S what broke the Tic-Toc!
Dang, it never occurred to me that after the "all one bird" thing was revealed that it actually matters what damaged the one that fell on the banks.
And, uh, I was absent for a while so pardon me if this was already covered, but if Kat sent the bird back using the Norn's magic time pool, doesn't that mean that she didn't actually invent or discover time travel? Which isn't how I expected this to go.
That would be right.
She initially assumed she did because she didn't know about the Norns.
"I built this bird sometime in the future. Or is that supposed to be: I will build this bird sometime in the future? It came back in time. Therefore, I figured out how to send things through time."
Hm, if Coyote's tooth can cut through the earth, how does Coyote's claw fare?