Comic Discussion > ALICE GROVE

Unanswered Questions from the Alice-verse

<< < (2/16) > >>

improvnerd:
One more question:

Could the Praesides hear Gavia?
In a high tech world it makes sense that the Praeses could hear you from anywhere. But why would they be able to hear in a place without any telecommunications infrastructure? Was Gavia incorrectly assuming they could hear her, because she couldn't imagine otherwise?  (Kind of like a 21st century denizen marooned on a desert island being surprised that he couldn't summon help on his mobile phone.)

BenRG:

--- Quote from: improvnerd on 29 May 2015, 04:49 ---
--- Quote from: BenRG on 29 May 2015, 01:59 ---The Wind Turbine is, in my view, a red herring.
--- End quote ---

It sticks out like a sore thumb. The thing about the wind turbine is that it's not something you could easily bootstrap without full-fledged 20th century industry. So is it an ancient relic, or did it come more recently from a more advanced culture elsewhere on the planet (or off)?
--- End quote ---

Ardent has established that there is some permitted communication between 'Up' and the Habitat (as we wikia members call it). It is possible that the Praeses or some contact Alice has in space has been slowly sending the turbine to her, piece by piece, over a long period and she has been assembling it by hand to prevent anyone thinking that she has access to 'out of town' resources.


--- Quote from: improvnerd on 29 May 2015, 04:49 ---
--- Quote from: BenRG on 29 May 2015, 01:59 ---Where do Ardent and Gavia come from?
Somewhere in space; likely the Moon or Mars. [...] I'd expect that a civilisation on a free-floating space colony (even with a gravity-generating habitat area) would have genetically engineered in free-fall adaptations (such as monkey-like 'hand-feet' for working in the zero-gee areas).

--- End quote ---

Why a planet in the Solar System? Gravity-wise Mars and the Moon are problematic. Mars is about 38% of Earth gravity, and the Moon is 16.6%, yet neither Ardent nor Gavia seem to be suffering under the pull of what would be 3-6 times their normal weight. (Although that would be one explanation for Gavia floating everywhere.)
--- End quote ---

Without invoking Clarke-tech magic, a planet in the Sol System is easier to imagine them teleporting from. Without stargates or warp drive (both highly energy-intensive), interstellar travel is hard and, more importantly, slow. Their coming from a nearby world makes travel easier.

Don't forget the regenerative power that both kids have shown. I suspect that it would be relatively simple to instruct their nanobots to start boosting their muscular strength and bone density. Given Gavia fully regenerated in a matter of hours towards the end of volume 1, it might not even take that long!


--- Quote from: improvnerd on 29 May 2015, 04:57 ---Could the Praesides hear Gavia?
In a high tech world it makes sense that the Praeses could hear you from anywhere. But why would they be able to hear in a place without any telecommunications infrastructure? Was Gavia incorrectly assuming they could hear her, because she couldn't imagine otherwise?  (Kind of like a 21st century denizen marooned on a desert island being surprised that he couldn't summon help on his mobile phone.)
--- End quote ---

Implant communicator in Gavia's head; obviously supposed to have interplanetary range, given that she clearly expected a reply. Maybe the antenna cable runs parallel to her spinal column and might have loops running through her ribs or collarbones.

Wildroses:
All this stuff about whether or not the Praeses could hear Gavia is relating to one of my most burning unanswered questions:

Why did the Praeses allow Ardent and Gavia to leave space and come to the planet?

Alice knew from the start they weren't supposed to be down with her. Her response to hearing Ardent was hacked into this world via a geeky transport volunteer and that Gavia asked a Praeses to send her down to fetch him was along the lines of: "Ardent tricked a Praeses which isn't possible, and it then violated it's first principle to send Gavia down here?" A few strips later, right before Gavia's unsuccessful attempts to call them and go home she insisted they weren't supposed to be here, to which Alice responded: "And yet both your Praeses let you come. Something very strange is going on here."

Personally I lean towards the theory those two were heard but deliberately marooned, or else deliberately allowed to go a place from which the Praeses knew they would not be heard. But there are many possibilities for why.

Possibly some terrible event has happened to the spaceborn society, and Gavia is not heard because the Praeses are all dead along with everyone else which makes Gavia and Ardent the last survivors of their world. If this is so, I don't believe either have had any clue something was wrong. In this scenario it is possible Ardent managed to get down their as the Praeses were horribly distracted by the upcoming catastrophe, and Gavia was sent after him believing that she would be safe down there with him. The Praeses might have believed it would only be for a short time and they'd be able to get them back soon, but were wrong. A variation of this is that the Praeses are currently dealing with said catastrophe and unable to fetch their truants, who will later return with Alice to resolve the crisis and save the day.

This theory hinges on the idea that the Praeses are good and have the best interests of Gavia and Ardent at heart. There is no evidence to suggest they do, especially after the recent comic in which Alice hints they withhold knowledge from their people. Even before that, I was suspicious of them. There are plenty of scenarios I can think of as to why they would have deliberately marooned the siblings.

That statement of Alice's that it wasn't possible to trick a Praeses instantly made me suspicious. What if that is a complete fallacy and the Praeses don't want people realising they are trickable and not always right? This would make Ardent getting onto the forbidden planet for a vacation a major disaster for them, as they wouldn't want it getting around that they had failed like that. So they took steps to ensure the person most likely to kick up a fuss about him being gone, his sister, was quickly encouraged to go fetch him. Gavia is young and stupid enough that I consider it highly possible to manipulate her into thinking she has to go and fetch her brother quickly while believing this was her idea. With both trapped on planet, it isn't going to get around that the Praeses are capable of screwing up and being fooled. We haven't actually heard yet how Gavia knew so quickly her brother had got in or why she thought it was so important to find him and bring him home as soon as she possibly could. I think Ardent had only been on the planet less than a day before Gavia appeared. If it was the Praeses who told her and sent her, it would explain why Gavia was so sure she would be heard and why she was so shocked when she wasn't.

Of course, it might be more simple than that. Maybe the Praeses were just sick of babysitting the terrible twosome and decided to make them someone else's problem. Neither are exactly shining examples of maturity and wisdom.

Another possibility is that Gavia and Ardent are important in some way they don't realise, or haven't thought to tell Alice. They seem too young to hold important jobs (from their size I've been assuming they are teenagers) although I can't rule out the possibility. Maybe they are related to important people who are working against the Praeses, so their children were exiled for revenge, or to prevent their family from moving against them (Your children are somewhere you cannot get to. Behave and they will remain unharmed). One thing that makes me uncertain about this theory is neither has yet mentioned any other relatives, or seems to be mourning the loss of anyone in space they are now permanently exiled from. I must say I consider it strange it was the sister of a like age who came to fetch the truant teen as this is usually something an older parental figure does. My brother has severe disabilities and when we were growing up and he vanished my first reaction was never: "Fetch him myself" but "Find Mummy and Daddy straight away so they can search for him." But it is possible that Gavia and Ardent just aren't close to the family member the Praeses are trying to upset. Working against the Praeses may have taken up too much of their time to build a close relationship with either.

And my final possibility is that Ardent and Gavia have some feature or attribute which the Praeses fear, such as, I dunno, an anti-Praeses gene. The major thing wrong with this is: "If they are so afraid of the kids why didn't they just kill them instead of going through this elaborate process of marooning them?" to which the only reason I can think of is that the Praeses for some reason cannot kill or harm humans. Maybe it violates one of the principles Alice thinks they have.

Thrudd:
Welp - looks like it is confirmed that the Praeses are trees are large ancient intelligences and that they harbor vast quantities of knowledge/information.
The mentioning of sap was troubling until it dawned on me that the use of nanites would be a very appropriate vector for communication and information storage..

TinPenguin:
I'd think Jeph's comment of 'CONVOLUTED SAP METAPHOR' underneath the comic should be quite clarifying.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page