Never Be A Weapon 2016-05-27

[lake_wrangler]

What I think of when I hear the name "Walter" :

And here's what I think of, when thinkin gof the name Walter...

[Warrl]

As far as Katherine adopting them, I suspect that there was an enormous amount of behind-the-scenes vetting and testing going on even before that scene where Katherine asked Atsali. I just don't see any orphanage - even a mundane orphanage - even allowing Katherine to ask Atsali before they weren't reasonably certain that it would be a good match.

But that wouldn't be shown because who wants to watch someone slog through mountains of paperwork - in quintuplicate! - and tell the shrink all about how this bully in third grade stole her lunch money . . .

Considering Katherine's origin, she's been closely watched since the day she was found.

[Sgt. Howard]

If you want to win a war, don't even think about attacking unless your army has twice as many forces. Twice as many infantry, twice as many tanks, twice as many planes, twice as many ships, twice as many spies, etc.

If you want to be sure of it, make that thrice.

I don't know the actual ratio of paras to norms, but I'd hazard to guess the combative paras would not be able to overwhelm the armies of the world so completely as to keep all of the vulnerable paras safe.

In conventional warefare, yes- 'Quantity has it's own Quality' as goes the old Russian proverb- but in shadow wars, intel is more deadly than bullets and precision strikes cause more harm than battalions. The problem is that the US has little successful experience at shadow wars on a large scale- and those that have useful experience tend to be 'kited' ('Expended') for fear of them turning on their own. Retirement is abrupt. That which motivates your operatives is love of country- that which disillusions them is the petty, anal, self-serving manner that higher ups ('Suits') deploy your resources and skills. Your life means nothing to the corrupt official who bribed and cheated his/her way into office- your mission has more to do with 'showboating' for the next election and nothing to do with actual national security. Your team mates die so a career politician can continue to live in the limelight... and if you survive, you become a liability because you know the truth.

When it finally hits the fan, guess who is likely to win.

[oldmanmickey]

If you want to win a war, don't even think about attacking unless your army has twice as many forces. Twice as many infantry, twice as many tanks, twice as many planes, twice as many ships, twice as many spies, etc.

If you want to be sure of it, make that thrice.

I don't know the actual ratio of paras to norms, but I'd hazard to guess the combative paras would not be able to overwhelm the armies of the world so completely as to keep all of the vulnerable paras safe.

In conventional warefare, yes- 'Quantity has it's own Quality' as goes the old Russian proverb- but in shadow wars, intel is more deadly than bullets and precision strikes cause more harm than battalions. The problem is that the US has little successful experience at shadow wars on a large scale- and those that have useful experience tend to be 'kited' ('Expended') for fear of them turning on their own. Retirement is abrupt. That which motivates your operatives is love of country- that which disillusions them is the petty, anal, self-serving manner that higher ups ('Suits') deploy your resources and skills. Your life means nothing to the corrupt official who bribed and cheated his/her way into office- your mission has more to do with 'showboating' for the next election and nothing to do with actual national security. Your team mates die so a career politician can continue to live in the limelight... and if you survive, you become a liability because you know the truth.

When it finally hits the fan, guess who is likely to win.

The side with the hundreds of grumpy old men that taught the young wolfs how to fight?

[Sgt. Howard]

Bingo! More like 'hundreds of thousands', BTW- and remember- the military swears an oath to protect the CONSTITUTION, not the Government or the President... which is why the current administration has no respect for those in uniform. In truth, they are frightened by the military.

[TheOtherOne]

Ya know, we didn't see Leucoisa killed. But, I'm not wondering if she is actually dead, I'm wondering who or what killed her? Was it one of the Keystone Killers sent to do her in, or did a para show up to make sure she, at least, was dead in the end. Maybe didn't have time to get Atsali as well, or was not going to kill the child regardless of orders. Of course, the sheer fact she saw nothing could be why she was spared. Wasn't worth trying to tear into the safe room to get her. Too many loose ends in this whole thing yet.

[FreeFlier]

The attackers may not have had time to get to Atsali, especially after Leucoisa apparently jumped them before they were quite ready.

They also may not have enough people to hold off the reaction force and still get into the safe room.

That's the true function of a safe room (or other fortification): hold off the attack until the reaction force (internal or external) takes the attackers from behind. Plus it can be the anvil to the reaction force hammer.

--FreeFlier

[jwhouk]

It's also entirely possible that Walter came in with the defense force - and drove them off before they could go after 'Sawi.

Or... 'Sawi wasn't a target.

[scantrontb]

It's also entirely possible that Walter came in with the defense force - and drove them off before they could go after 'Sawi.

Or... 'Sawi wasn't a target.

i'm pretty sure that the agent talking about "the guards at the lab" was meant to be taken as "the guards and Walter were killed by the same type of weapons as were used here" thus implying that no, Walter didn't make it out of the lab like Leucoisa had wanted him to, and that they were both killed by the same shadowy operatives .

my theory is that the "Shadow Government" talked about here, and the "immortal Politicians" from the Calendar Machine arc, are the SAME GROUP of people... the reference to how they are immortal, but CAN BE KILLED (how the Timekeepers got killed off) and the fact that they know about the paranormal society already, are billionaires, and are relatively reclusive, all lends itself to a group of people that while they may hate each other after so long of a life hanging around each other, they will probably stick together to neutralize a threat to themselves... ie, the relative power levels of the various Para's versus them as "mundane" humans with no special powers (other than money)... who just happen to live forever... the few threats to them staying alive were the para's like the Sphinx's and the Fae... both of whom seem to have been reduced as threats due to this Treaty that's been talked about... but like any back-stabbing bunch of "paranoid billionaires" they fear the treaty wasn't enough, so they did illegal/immoral research to create a weapon that would give them the power to wipe out the Fae (and anyone ELSE they deem a target) unfortunately for them, the scientists involved had an "Attack of the Conscience" and decided to NOT follow thru with the weaponization project, therefore they were eliminated because of it... i'm sure that if the MIB hadn't gotten involved/shown up as fast as they did, that Atsali and Pickle would have been kidnapped and the experiments/weaponization project would have continued after suitable staffing replacements. maybe the new team of scientists would have been given the two of them as initial test subjects from "a previous project that showed promise but, because it was oriented in a different direction, this project was started... see what you can do with them, etc..." and they would be starting out cold-turkey with no knowledge of what happened to "the other project" because of the "need to know" basis of the security behind it... and "since you don't NEED to know... you DON'T." therefore there would be none of the sentimental bonding that should dissuade them from continuing the experiments, as they would only be "Test Subject's ABC and XYZ" and not "Atsali, My Daughter" and "Castella, ?My Neice" (i can't think of a good enough relationship to use here, especially when talking about sentient plants, but you get my drift... ) and it would take time before those new staffers would build up the empathy enough to sabotage the new project enough to require "retirement" as well, but by that time, the process would be too far along and the kids would know nothing else BUT that life... kinda like what happened to Kurt Russell's character in the movie "Soldier"...

[Vitrbjorn]

my theory is that the "Shadow Government" talked about here, and the "immortal Politicians" from the Calendar Machine arc, are the SAME GROUP of people... the reference to how they are immortal, but CAN BE KILLED (how the Timekeepers got killed off)

Everything can die, saw off the head of one of those immortal politicians and they are dead, end of conversation, set the body on fire and encase the actual head in molten Lucite and arrange on a nice shelf. End of problem.

[illiad]

my theory is that the "Shadow Government" talked about here, and the "immortal Politicians" from the Calendar Machine arc, are the SAME GROUP of people... the reference to how they are immortal, but CAN BE KILLED (how the Timekeepers got killed off)

Everything can die, saw off the head of one of those immortal politicians and they are dead, end of conversation, set the body on fire and encase the actual head in molten Lucite and arrange on a nice shelf. End of problem.

or the whole thing was faked??? bodies killed off, to be replaced with different ones... have you seen the film Zardoz???

Or they are like the jaguar girl - atomize the body, the spirit comes back in a fresh body....

[eee]

If you want to win a war, don't even think about attacking unless your army has twice as many forces. Twice as many infantry, twice as many tanks, twice as many planes, twice as many ships, twice as many spies, etc.

If you want to be sure of it, make that thrice.

I don't know the actual ratio of paras to norms, but I'd hazard to guess the combative paras would not be able to overwhelm the armies of the world so completely as to keep all of the vulnerable paras safe.

Numerically I would agree the paras are probably greatly out-matched.

But how do you count all the gods who were on Earth when the Barrier was raised (we know Poseidon's around), the Fae and other magic users, and especially the GGG? At the time of Leucoisa's death Bud and Brandi were shut down, but Jin was loose, running the MiB and trying to manipulate things so Monica would be able to finally fix the Calendar Machine. Would all the governments in the world - or any of them - want to get into a war with a being who can only be knocked around by nuclear weapons, not hurt, and who can destroy any city - any continent - with a single punch to the ground? AND who, if things were going to go pear-shaped, would know about it from the 56 cycles she'd lived through, before, and would be ready for it?

[FreeFlier]

I thought Poseidon came in through the Library . . .

Devyn also mentions Hades and Jove, but that could be because she goes out to visit, probably through the Library.

--FreeFlier

[jwhouk]

Poseidon, Zeus, and Hades* are allowed to come to the Library, but are only allowed to return via the portal whence they came. That is presumed from how Devyn refers to her uncles.


* - Oxford comma FTW.

[AnotherFairportfan]

Or they are like the jaguar girl - atomize the body, the spirit comes back in a fresh body....

That's not the Jaguar Girl - that's the Phoenix, Monica's third hat.

[eee]

Since Devyn threatened the pool flunkie with her uncle Poseidon, I assume he's on Earth and capable of interfering with mortals still. Or maybe he owned the pool.

That she refers to the main male gods are her uncles, though, would suggest - unless this is 'uncles by adoption', as Astali has Aunt Bud and Brandi and Monica etc etc - her mother is one of the original Olympians. Probably Hestia. So we know there ARE still gods on Earth. It would probably be best for humanity not to cross them by attacking their children.

[My2Cents]

Acacia, Brandolyn, and Mayahuel don't die, don't age, and cannot be killed, and have the power to be destructive to a degree comparable to a large number of thermonuclear weapons.

In the case of Acacia and Brandolyn that will have to be an extremely large number of large. I estimate that Acacia as more powerful than a supernova (which won’t destroy the adjacent star of a close binary pair, Bud will at that distance, at her minimum setting) if ignoring neutrinos (which are 99% of the output and won’t have any effect on the adjacent star).

[My2Cents]

As far as Katherine adopting them, I suspect that there was an enormous amount of behind-the-scenes vetting and testing going on even before that scene where Katherine asked Atsali. I just don't see any orphanage - even a mundane orphanage - even allowing Katherine to ask Atsali before they weren't reasonably certain that it would be a good match.

But that wouldn't be shown because who wants to watch someone slog through mountains of paperwork - in quintuplicate! - and tell the shrink all about how this bully in third grade stole her lunch money . . .

Given Kathryn’s status at the time there was a lot “Make this happen. NOW!” involved. With paperwork to follow later, when and if convenient. The fact that Kathryn turned out to be a very good parent for the two paranaturals, after the fact, helps, but the initial adoption process was incredibly fast given Atsali and Calista ages.

[chicgeek]

Shelley is a Titan/Sphinx hybrid. From what I understood, she is as immortal as any Grecian Titan, but she also happens to have wings and a cat butt.

You get a prize for that.
*Hands Glytch a Cat-Ass-Trophy*

*Deposits a bowling trophy in the Pun Jar*

[jwhouk]

(Ahem)

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