Wapsi Square Forum

KnightDelight wrote:Come to think about it, could be Kath was once a nurse/medic/paramedic, or even doctor. Who....

Kath was Doctor Who?

Hey, I'd buy that...

Dave wrote:Owwie is right! Poor kid - a dislocated arm, and the resetting thereof are terribly unpleasant.

(Typo: "fold you arm up")

I dislocated a finger when i destroyed a possibly-one-of-a-kind sport car in Italy when i was in the Navy.

The doctor said "Hmmm. Let me see that ..."

...and without warning, he snapped it back into place.

Jabberwonky wrote:Wow! Talk about foreshadowing, this is from a year ago!

What is?

KnightDelight wrote:Tork must be sirenese for some sort of bodily waste or perhaps a degrading term regarding one's lineage.

I think it's the sound effect of a shoulder joint popping back into place.

Kathryn is the character that everyone, including the rest of the cast, know the least about. We are now is a sequence where it is likely that a lot of her past history is going to be revealed. So I am going to step so far out on the limb I can’t see the trunk and do some speculation.

Kathryn probably has a PhD to hold her position at the museum, so she has to have done some field work. It is also unlikely that such an introverted personality would have made it through the academic program that far. But then in an emergency she is cool, practical, and immediately takes charge, with apparently has a wide range of practical knowledge. Then add in that she had no problem catching, killing, cleaning, cooking, and eating that squirrel on the rooftop that ate her plants.

What if the expedition she was on was one that went totally horribly wrong, as in sole survivor walking back to civilization though impossible terrain for months wrong. Massive survival skills and self reliance, but with a load of PTSD layered on top of survivor guilt producing her personality change. Her position in the museum may even have originally been a sinecure in lieu of compensation.

If the past history that is what is coming is something like that, then Kathryn would still be a weak human, but mentally she is the toughest one of the bunch.

Fairportfan wrote:

Jabberwonky wrote:Wow! Talk about foreshadowing, this is from a year ago!

What is?

The date on this thread has 2012 as the year. Hence the droll observation.
…
I really like My2Cents take on Kath's possible backstory.

Interesting thought just blew through my head. Luckily since it traveled in vacuum it made no sound. Asti is a puzzle as to who she is. Can you really see Phix, or Nudge, giving her total access to all the portals in and out of the library? She acts like a typical giddy teenager and we all know you have to be careful handling them. The thought is the deed and disaster follows in its wake. Boys are easier as they just don't think but react based on the moment. But to be helpful she calls up the library schematic of the portals and immediately finds just the right entrance for them.
Most of the folks we've seen use the library have been limited to one, or a few, entrances. This girl apparently has access to all of them. This is like giving your 16 year old daughter the keys to your car on Friday night and tell her to go have fun. A nice gesture but expensive in the long run. Another point is that we have a lot of shape changers in Wapsi don't we. Phix was intrigued with Kath's choice of knowledge and adventure. It's quiet possible this is Phix, or nudge, playing along. It's even possible it is a third party doing the role playing with Kath.

Jabberwonky wrote:Wow! Talk about foreshadowing, this is from a year ago!

Did you intend to have a link here??? [@dadman, Duh!!!]

Actually, this strip http://wapsisquare.com/comic/betterprotection/ (from six years ago!), bespeaks of very early planning (fourth from last panel). Just how far out has Pablo storyboarded the Wapsiverse??? Let's hope he doesn't plan on retiring for at least another 10-15 years.

zachariah wrote:This is a hard way for a 15 year old to learn life is not like a book. ... All the heroes look tough and strong because they went through this to begin with.

Those that survived, that is.

A quote I came across recently: "Learn from the mistakes of others, because you will never live long enough to make them all yourself."

My2Cents wrote:Kathryn is the character that everyone, including the rest of the cast, know the least about. We are now in a sequence where it is likely that a lot of her past history is going to be revealed. So I am going to step so far out on the limb I can’t see the trunk and do some speculation.

While we're speculating, @displaced yesterday speculated about the dolls in the cover image for this arc/chapter http://wapsisquare.com/comic/lost-dolls/.

However, I don't recall any discussion about the other obvious clues - the spider legs framing Katherine and, especially, the sub-title: loxosceles reclusa - the brown recluse spider.

Do not spiders have solid black eyes? And reclusiveness certainly fits Katherine to a tee. We could probably find more examples of other spider-like behavior in the archives. [And I'll say it here before someone else does: spider don't wear clothes!]

Fairportfan wrote:

Jabberwonky wrote:Wow! Talk about foreshadowing, this is from a year ago!

What is?

Check the subject of this post for the typo.

TheSkulker wrote:

My2Cents wrote:Kathryn is the character that everyone, including the rest of the cast, know the least about. We are now in a sequence where it is likely that a lot of her past history is going to be revealed. So I am going to step so far out on the limb I can’t see the trunk and do some speculation.

While we're speculating, @displaced yesterday speculated about the dolls in the cover image for this arc/chapter http://wapsisquare.com/comic/lost-dolls/.

However, I don't recall any discussion about the other obvious clues - the spider legs framing Katherine and, especially, the sub-title: loxosceles reclusa - the brown recluse spider.

Do not spiders have solid black eyes? And reclusiveness certainly fits Katherine to a tee. We could probably find more examples of other spider-like behavior in the archives. [And I'll say it here before someone else does: spider don't wear clothes!]

Not sure I'd want to see that. Very disturbing image in my mind. And don't female spiders usually end up eating the male after the fact? ?

Wyvern wrote:I'm glad I'm not the only one to notice that Katherine is surprisingly capable in this emergency. (It may be interesting if we find out where she learned first aid.) Atsali may learn another unexpected lesson: that older people have been doing things a long time. This one sometimes comes as a surprise to teenagers.

Definitely not the only one to notice. Apparently only a few of us had the "Wait?!? How did she know how to do that??!?" reaction though...everyone else immediately seemed to start assuming potential back-stories.

dadman wrote:

Fairportfan wrote:

Jabberwonky wrote:Wow! Talk about foreshadowing, this is from a year ago!

What is?

The date on this thread has 2012 as the year. Hence the droll observation.

My bad. Just corrected it in the initial post so it indexes properly, but that won't help the subsequent entries.

And would you believe, it's due to a combination of fumblebrain on my part, and a mental copy-and-paste error? Yesterday's thread has the same error in the year, and when I went to double-check the thread index before posting, that's what I saw and I didn't catch the error

And on topic - here's Shelly's dolls, the first time we get a good look at them:
What's So Special
After looking at the strips surrounding the calendar machine arc (starting roughly here), the dolls are supposed to be Monica, Jin, Bud, and Brandi. We only see Brandi holding her doll once, but it's similar to Tina's clock key - which appears to be the "shiv" that Shelly put into Monica's head (and turned her into Jaguar Girl).

zachariah wrote: It's even possible it is a third party doing the role playing with Kath.

... and we've been told fairly authoritatively that Bia was capable of shapechanging from her adult form into that of a small girl (young enough to be Shelly's father's "childhood friend").

So, it's within the realm of possibility that Atsali is a Titan with similar abilities (or perhaps even Bia herself, although Bia might be somewhat Deus Non Grata around the Library these days if Phix has anything to say about it)

I'm a bit concerned about all the damage to Katherine's head (bruises, a gash, bleeding ears) and her slight disorientation at first. Hopefully she doesn't start acting oddly as time goes on.

Of course, this being Katherine, it might be hard to tell...

Aed wrote:

KnightDelight wrote:Tork must be sirenese for some sort of bodily waste or perhaps a degrading term regarding one's lineage.

Or it may be a reference to an obscure Armenian deity of strength. vOv

Or it might be verbal shorthand for 'torque', which for someone with a dislocated arm is something you want to avoid...

Lee M wrote:

KnightDelight wrote:Come to think about it, could be Kath was once a nurse/medic/paramedic, or even doctor. Who....

Kath was Doctor Who?

Hey, I'd buy that...

I was thinking that, too! But wrong gender.

But she might have been a Companion. That would explain her desire for adventure. It can apparently infect you; Sarah Jane went on to become an adventurer in her own right. And also explain how she has such first aid knowledge. The Doctor gets hurt a lot...

Fairportfan wrote:

Dave wrote:Owwie is right! Poor kid - a dislocated arm, and the resetting thereof are terribly unpleasant.

(Typo: "fold you arm up")

I dislocated a finger when i destroyed a possibly-one-of-a-kind sport car in Italy when i was in the Navy.

The doctor said "Hmmm. Let me see that ..."

...and without warning, he snapped it back into place.

Is a femur popping out and back into a pelvis considered a dislocation? Managed to do this while running (away from something) and trying to look behind me at the same time. My situation at the time excluded the otpion for professional help, so I'm lucky it popped back in, but walking for the next few weeks was AGONY (that I had to pretend didn't exist).

donoho wrote:Is a femur popping out and back into a pelvis considered a dislocation? Managed to do this while running (away from something) and trying to look behind me at the same time. My situation at the time excluded the otpion for professional help, so I'm lucky it popped back in, but walking for the next few weeks was AGONY (that I had to pretend didn't exist).

Ow. If fully out of the socket, it was a dislocation. If only partially out, it would be referred to as subluxation.

When hiking in the Marble Mountains with friends some years ago, a hillside trail slumped out from under my feet, I fell, my weight came down on my arms, and my left (uphill) shoulder joint subluxated. I was fortunate it didn't actually dislocate and require the sort of agonizing torquing that Atsali's did. Even the partial subluxation was bad enough... it was nearly a year before I could raise my left arm above my head comfortably, swim with a crawl stroke, etc.

I don't think Atsali is likely to be carrying Katherine through the air with that arm anytime soon.