Girl Genius XXV: It needs work! BUT THE CONCEPT IS SOUND!

[Rodin]

Well, Zinzer was a recent acquisition, whose value was still in the air. While DuMedd was one of the students he apparently paid more attention to and work with previously.

Plus, Von Zinzer is an adult and likely had no illusions about what the Baron was like. The Baron was trying to cultivate a good relationship with the young Sparks and royalty as an aid to keeping future rebellions from happening. Von Zinzer is* "just" a Spark, with no family connections making him more important.


*not

[Squire Doodad]

Hmmm... I wonder if this will become one of those self-fulfilling prophesies. Albia sucks this version of Lucrezia into a container, Lucrezia is interrogated but also learns a lot during her interrogation, then Lucrezia goes mad & escapes to become the version that hunts down the queens.

There are two probable scenarios that involve Lucrezia being the antagonist of the rest of the arc; either a) Lucrezia is put into a container that she escapes (via revenant, accident, magic stuff, etc.) or b) Agatha gets trapped in the container, Lucrezia is stuck in Agatha and they need to go fight her and such and then reclaim the body. Option A seems more likely and more interesting personally. I imagine that, assuming all the Lucrezias eventually obtain knowledge of one another upon meeting each other (they talk), this one would be the one responsible for either causing her to perform the actual hunting of the Queens or at least for knowing where/how to do it. The fun thing about time travel is that once you learn to recognize yourself, achieving the impossible gets much easier because you can tell where you will succeed.

[Ellen]

About Gil fighting Jagers, there are some hints Gil may have more in common with them than he knows:

http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comi...8#.XRBL1-tKi1s

[geoduck]

About Gil fighting Jagers, there are some hints Gil may have more in common with them than he knows:

http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comi...8#.XRBL1-tKi1s

The print-novel version of that scene

Spoiler

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far more explicitly states that yes, the Baron made numerous physical improvements to Gil when the latter was a child, even more than Gil realizes as he was asleep for a lot of it.

[runeghost]

The Baron-in-Gil's suspicion of Tarvek reminded me of my own suspicions aimed in Tarvek's direction. Have we ever seen him truly put in a position to make a Agatha over Lucrezia decision, or act on such a decision? (Did the Baron-in-Gil just save Agatha from having her personality wiped?)

Irrespective of the above theory, which I think is unlikely to be right, what are the odds that Agatha ends up accidentally pulled out of her own body for a time?

[SZbNAhL]

"Your entire family is in thrall to her". Does the Baron know something we don't, or has he not been paying attention to his intelligence reports? Grandma is incredibly hostile to Lucrezia, Martellus has no known links (and seems unlikely to agree to sharing power or having an overlord - that's why he's rebelling in the first place), Tarvek is the only major family member left who's even dealt with The Other and if it weren't for him and his inoculation, half the empire would be revenants.

[Narkis]

"Your entire family is in thrall to her". Does the Baron know something we don't, or has he not been paying attention to his intelligence reports? Grandma is incredibly hostile to Lucrezia, Martellus has no known links (and seems unlikely to agree to sharing power or having an overlord - that's why he's rebelling in the first place), Tarvek is the only major family member left who's even dealt with The Other and if it weren't for him and his inoculation, half the empire would be revenants.

I think he meant more immediate family. His father is responsible for the mess they're in and his "sister" is the Other now.

[geoduck]

This one bothers a little. They unstrapped Agatha from the chair? Higgs doesn't make himself scarce around Gil/The Baron, while Zeetha is off doing.. what, exactly?

[Traab]

I dont like the fact that lucrezia has calmed down. I think she senses opportunity here. I also distrust "klaus". It wouldnt surprise me in the least that he intends to suck out agatha and take "lucrezia" prisoner in her new sole occupancy body. It would solve many problems. With agatha out of the picture he wont have to worry about the heterodyne anymore, he can do the whole gil thorpe marriage deal, he will have lucrezia as a prisoner to squeeze for every drop of intel they can get, and after a suitable mourning period gil will move on and stop dangerously obsessing over agatha and mechanicsburg and concentrate on the empire entirely. Or at least, thats how he might think it will play out.

[HandofShadows]

The print-novel version of that scene

Spoiler

Show

far more explicitly states that yes, the Baron made numerous physical improvements to Gil when the latter was a child, even more than Gil realizes as he was asleep for a lot of it.

I wonder though if some of it though if from his mother. Just look at Zeetha. She took as sword through her heart and lived. That is far from normal for a regular human, but it's something I can see a Jaeger doing. She also has the teeth to an extent (as does Gil when he gets mad.)

[sihnfahl]

I dont like the fact that lucrezia has calmed down. I think she senses opportunity here.

I disagree. I think the arrival of the Baron and the invocation of Albia's name has sent any ideas of escape / evasion out of the realm of possibility.

The tiger sees it's in the cage, and has no means of escaping.

[Douglas]

I dont like the fact that lucrezia has calmed down. I think she senses opportunity here. I also distrust "klaus". It wouldnt surprise me in the least that he intends to suck out agatha and take "lucrezia" prisoner in her new sole occupancy body. It would solve many problems. With agatha out of the picture he wont have to worry about the heterodyne anymore, he can do the whole gil thorpe marriage deal, he will have lucrezia as a prisoner to squeeze for every drop of intel they can get, and after a suitable mourning period gil will move on and stop dangerously obsessing over agatha and mechanicsburg and concentrate on the empire entirely. Or at least, thats how he might think it will play out.

I doubt that will happen. Klaus's priorities list right now looks something like this:
1. Keep Gil safe.
2. Stop Lucrezia.
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3. Everything else.

He will not do anything that adds even a slight risk of letting Lucrezia go free, and giving her control of Agatha's body would add a major risk of her escaping. Plus, nearly everyone there would react to such a betrayal by attacking him, and there's at least a small chance that all of them together could hurt Gil. I would say a large chance because of Higgs, but I don't think Klaus knows how dangerous Higgs really is.

I expect Klaus to fully cooperate in moving Lucrezia to an artificial container that literally can't do anything at all. After that is done, then he might start trying to contain Agatha and disrupt Gil's relationship with her, but doing it now would risk interfering with the removal of Lucrezia.

[HandofShadows]

Gil kept Higgs very close and has seen him fight (remember all the dead Spark Hounds). I would be very surprised is Klaus and Gil both at least suspect who Higgs is and they should know. What find interesting is that Higgs is very relaxed on this page.

[Rogar Demonblud]

And to be honest, Klaus is probably more interested in Lucrezia dead than Agatha freed. So if the extraction process looks like it won't work, he'll triage based on getting rid of Lu.

[SZbNAhL]

Gil kept Higgs very close and has seen him fight (remember all the dead Spark Hounds). I would be very surprised is Klaus and Gil both at least suspect who Higgs is and they should know. What find interesting is that Higgs is very relaxed on this page.

He spied on Klaus for an unknown length of time, but probably enough to get a measure of how he thinks and acts. He's not going to kill Dimo or Violetta, he's not in immediate danger of harming anyone else and Higgs is fast enough to intervene if the situation changes. May as well hang back and watch, as he usually does.

[Squire Doodad]

Given how Klaus is able to circumvent things in general, I imagine that while he did do the mind-override thing to Gil, he did so with an older version of his mind, meaning that Klaus is Wasped, but the Baron-in-Gil (can we call him "BiG"?) is a non-wasped model. Klaus probably avoided putting in a wasped version by using the fact that an older sample would be "more reliable" or was "in better, more stable condition" or something.

There's a 75/25 as to whether Lucrezia is silent and will continue to be so (meaning this is a victory in the "no more possessed Agatha" sense) or that, in the much darker path, we get one final possessed Agatha arc with Lucrezia having already managed to take control, and is purposefully playing normal in order to get Agatha removed.

[SZbNAhL]

Given how Klaus is able to circumvent things in general, I imagine that while he did do the mind-override thing to Gil, he did so with an older version of his mind, meaning that Klaus is Wasped, but the Baron-in-Gil (can we call him "BiG"?) is a non-wasped model. Klaus probably avoided putting in a wasped version by using the fact that an older sample would be "more reliable" or was "in better, more stable condition" or something.

I'm operating under the assumption that the wasps make a physical change to the subject's physical brain, so as long as Gil's body isn't wasped, BiG isn't wasped either.

[halfeye]

I'm operating under the assumption that the wasps make a physical change to the subject's physical brain, so as long as Gil's body isn't wasped, BiG isn't wasped either.

Yes, I agree, it makes sense to me that BiG came free of wasping by being copied out of wasped Klaus.

[Squire Doodad]

Yes, I agree, it makes sense to me that BiG came free of wasping by being copied out of wasped Klaus.

Huh, that would also make for a very elaborate way for Klaus to save himself as well as the main goal of time-freezing Mechanicsburg; it makes it so that the BiG acts as his presence, while Gil works to figure out a way to take the BiG and transfer that back into the original Klaus, meaning that if the wasping is reversed then the Baron almost never left, in a very strange sense.

[halfeye]

Huh, that would also make for a very elaborate way for Klaus to save himself as well as the main goal of time-freezing Mechanicsburg; it makes it so that the BiG acts as his presence, while Gil works to figure out a way to take the BiG and transfer that back into the original Klaus, meaning that if the wasping is reversed then the Baron almost never left, in a very strange sense.

It's been said that the BiG is a lot less than Klaus, so I don't think that will work. Saving Klaus will depend, IMHO on removing the wasp.

[Squire Doodad]

It's been said that the BiG is a lot less than Klaus, so I don't think that will work. Saving Klaus will depend, IMHO on removing the wasp.

I mean to bring him 90% back up to date after dewasping.

Side note: given how Klaus is, what do you guys think are the odds that the person who had a "failed affair with Albia" (the wellkeeper said this) is one of Klaus's...ah, "brothers", who before the accident that led to their parents create the Baron had the name Klaus. And maybe his face (which would explain why he is named as such).

[SZbNAhL]

Side note: given how Klaus is, what do you guys think are the odds that the person who had a "failed affair with Albia" (the wellkeeper said this) is one of Klaus's...ah, "brothers", who before the accident that led to their parents create the Baron had the name Klaus. And maybe his face (which would explain why he is named as such).

I think that Klaus's current demeanour is the result of his betrayal by Lucrezia. We're reliably informed that he used to have a "soft-hearted romantic streak" but tht it was "burned ... right out of him". Nothing ruins your appetite for romance more quickly than a romance completely ruining your life and devastating Europa. Klaus probably believes that if he hadn't been sent away he could have saved the Heterodyne Boys and prevented the Other War.

[Squire Doodad]

I think that Klaus's current demeanour is the result of his betrayal by Lucrezia. We're reliably informed that he used to have a "soft-hearted romantic streak" but tht it was "burned ... right out of him". Nothing ruins your appetite for romance more quickly than a romance completely ruining your life and devastating Europa. Klaus probably believes that if he hadn't been sent away he could have saved the Heterodyne Boys and prevented the Other War.

Ah, right. Forgot about that.

[Rogar Demonblud]

I mean to bring him 90% back up to date after dewasping.

Side note: given how Klaus is, what do you guys think are the odds that the person who had a "failed affair with Albia" (the wellkeeper said this) is one of Klaus's...ah, "brothers", who before the accident that led to their parents create the Baron had the name Klaus. And maybe his face (which would explain why he is named as such).

The accident happened when they were kids, IMS, so not possible. Klaus just was still in his mushy-romantic-sweep-women-off-their-feet stage when he visited England.

[Ellen]

Lu may think he's had the romantic streak burned right out of him, but he seems to have feelings for his wife.

Although, as we only know that because of a conversation he had with Othar, Homicidal-Nutjob-Adventurer, when he was planning on letting him escape, I'm not sure if it counts, especially since he seems to believe his wife (or someone back in Skifander) might send assassins after their son. Doesn't exactly sound lovey-dovey.

[HandofShadows]

Klaus probably believes that if he hadn't been sent away he could have saved the Heterodyne Boys and prevented the Other War.

He's probably not wrong about that. He would have kept marrying Agatha's father.

Lu may think he's had the romantic streak burned right out of him, but he seems to have feelings for his wife.

Although, as we only know that because of a conversation he had with Othar, Homicidal-Nutjob-Adventurer, when he was planning on letting him escape, I'm not sure if it counts, especially since he seems to believe his wife (or someone back in Skifander) might send assassins after their son. Doesn't exactly sound lovey-dovey.

It's clear Klaus loves his wife. When you fall deeply in love you tend to not to feel all that romantic about other people. Of course drugging someone and shipping them off to another continent also can do that. And here is where Klaus thinks that Zeetha may be out to kill Gil.

[Willie the Duck]

He's probably not wrong about that. He would have kept marrying Agatha's father. [/URL]

I think you left a few words out of this sentence, but now I totally want to see this storyline.

[SZbNAhL]

He's probably not wrong about that. He would have kept marrying Agatha's father.

I think you left a few words out of this sentence, but now I totally want to see this storyline.

Especially since he keeps marrying him. I imagine that each time it happens, Barry files for an annulment and Klaus just grabs Bill and runs back into the Red Cathedral.

[Manga Shoggoth]

Lu may think he's had the romantic streak burned right out of him, but he seems to have feelings for his wife.

Although, as we only know that because of a conversation he had with Othar, Homicidal-Nutjob-Adventurer, when he was planning on letting him escape, I'm not sure if it counts, especially since he seems to believe his wife (or someone back in Skifander) might send assassins after their son. Doesn't exactly sound lovey-dovey.

According to background information, it's because Zeetha and Gil are fraternal twins, and the Skif don't react kindly to twins. Hence Klaus' comment here: "I kept you alive".

[Calemyr]

According to background information, it's because Zeetha and Gil are fraternal twins, and the Skif don't react kindly to twins. Hence Klaus' comment here: "I kept you alive".

I figure it's an issue with it being a matriarchy, and Chump being a dominating sort of guy. Culturally, they don't want a male heir, especially if the kid takes after Chump.