THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Comic Discussion => ALICE GROVE => Topic started by: brasca on 27 Feb 2017, 13:34
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Since Alice Grove will be on hold for a couple of weeks while Jeph Jacques gets ready for conventions I thought I'd start the next poll for March. With the way things are moving we're sure to meet the Praeses some time next month.
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I'm wondering if we're going to see a tree wired up to a computer programmed by some mad scientist some time in the past who was sure that it made it possible for the 'Tree Spirits' to communicate with humans. The verbiage the communications software produces in response to the tree's bioelectric impulses might be what the bio-engineered super-tree is 'thinking' but it might also be what the scientist thought they should be thinking. So, you basically have a civilisation following the hallucinations of what a long-dead bio-engineer thought that the Dryads were saying to him and using that to formulate policy that could end millions of lives.
Really, it's much like the role of religion in war throughout the middle ages, when you think about it.
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Sounds similar to the Star Trek episode "Return of the Archons" where Beta III is ruled by a super computer based on a long dead leader, Landru. The only difference was Landru perpetuated the same level of civilization for 6000 years without ever deviating. The praeses seem like they want to shake things up by bringing their way of life to Earth.
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(http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/tenchi/images/a/a9/Ryokolhw.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120210093106)
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Looks like Alice got an upgrade..
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Characters have spoken of Praeses in ways that suggest a more current interactive sensible sort of presence. Even though not physical human mobile active. I wonder though if how they perceive and describe Praeses matches the reality, or if there's both bias and anger clouding everything up. How accurate are the descriptions of the situation, the ascription of motivations. Also, great big tree, little tiny ship. Which also makes me wonder how it is Pate got as powerful and determined to do whatever he's up to while at the same time seeming so ill-prepared for the actuality of scale. Like an ant planning on eating a t-rex while being unaware of the impossibility of the scope. Which if Ardent's purpose is actually to be bringing Pate there, or if Church is not quite the lackey he's made out to be, or if Alice isn't quite a straightforward as she seems. A lot of ways this could actually be heading.
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Big. Tree.
I wonder if "the nearest praeses" may not have been what Ardent really wanted, and the ship took them to an unfriendly one.
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Are any of them actually friendly?
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I'm sure that they consider themselves benevolent. Whether that translates to 'personable when actually face-to-face' is another matter entirely!
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Is it conceivable that one of the praeses (praesides?) engineered this situation so as to obtain downsider allies, perhaps against others of its own ilk?
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Now,don't be hastey
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Is it conceivable that one of the praeses (praesides?) engineered this situation so as to obtain downsider allies, perhaps against others of its own ilk?
There could a rogue praeses among the others. Alice seems to thing they're all in cahoots, but she hasn't been right about everything.
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Is it conceivable that one of the praeses (praesides?) engineered this situation so as to obtain downsider allies, perhaps against others of its own ilk?
That wood be an interesting twist :claireface:
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ya gotta xyl'em if you wanna phlo'em
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I just got around to voting.
I'm impressed at the evenness of the results.
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Trouble is my vote would be "none of the above".
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I finally got around to binging Alice Grove.
But what I'm concerned about now is: if one or more of the Praeses intentionally sent the two of them down to cause havoc, is this particular tree involved, and if so, will it be happy to see them back in space?
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Im actually interested in seeing how thinkgs go for Pate and Church now thatt they're actuallly in space and about to make contact.
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Im actually interested in seeing how thinkgs go for Pate and Church now thatt they're actuallly in space and about to make contact.
Very badly right now...
[up]
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Trying to make sense out of what just happened. It appears the bubble car is popping, but the flames seems to be erupting from within.
As for the reactions Church's eyes are now open, but his expression is the same. Alice who was surprised that they could teleport doesn't seem surprised to see the space habitat which makes me think she's seen it before. Pate and Sedna are still in awe, but the latter isn't completely speechless. Ardent is pleased to be back, but Gavia can't even look out the portal so her reaction intrigues me the most. Maybe she knew this was going to happen or maybe she made it happen.
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The explosion - if that's what it is - seems to be happening on the left front prong (?) of the ship - where Alice and Sedna are. Conceivably Alice did something; she looks like she's thinking in panel one, where Sedna seems more absorbed in the scene. Or, conceivably, something external attacked on that side, perhaps to strike at those two.
Or, conceivably, I'm all wet on both counts. Insufficient data....
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And so they all burned up in space. The End. (Finis Alice Grove.)
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So, yeah, it turns out that Gavia had enough of her nanobots left that they started regenerating over time. Her power levels are still low so she's been playing possum and building up charge for one solid kill shot at Church.
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More seriously, it looks like the praeses sent down Ardent to help bring up Alice, and possibly Sedna, (remember Alice would have got to the spaceship even without Pate). Having got them, it shucks off the spaceship, and will soon hold them captive.
I'm guessing the praeses was not expecting Pate and Church. They may end up having a role to play beyond stock villains before this ends. (Recall that in AG characters tend to get introduced as seemingly powerful and evil - Gavia as the floating torch-gal, Sedna as Battle-Girl - and then have more detail added.)
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Given Gavia's expressions in the past few comics, and her tendency to set things on fire, perhaps the little flame deluge is her way of saying she doesn't want to go back to orbit.
Edit: or at least doesn't want to bring Church and Pate to orbit...
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Well!
That escalated quickly
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The explosion - if that's what it is - seems to be happening on the left front prong (?) of the ship - where Alice and Sedna are. Conceivably Alice did something; she looks like she's thinking in panel one, where Sedna seems more absorbed in the scene. Or, conceivably, something external attacked on that side, perhaps to strike at those two.
Or, conceivably, I'm all wet on both counts. Insufficient data....
Other way around. It's the side that Pate and Church are on that caught fire. The first panel we are looking in from the front of the ship and P&C are on the left side. The second two panels we are looking from the rear of the ship, so C&P will be on the right. We can tell this is the back because they were looking forward at the Prases, and in the second ones, the Prases is in the background, so we have to be looking at the stern of the ship. Also you can see what appears to be drive exhausts and the way the shape of the ship flows backwards says 'rear'.
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Other way around. It's the side that Pate and Church are on that caught fire. The first panel we are looking in from the front of the ship and P&C are on the left side. The second two panels we are looking from the rear of the ship, so C&P will be on the right. We can tell this is the back because they were looking forward at the Prases, and in the second ones, the Prases is in the background, so we have to be looking at the stern of the ship. Also you can see what appears to be drive exhausts and the way the shape of the ship flows backwards says 'rear'.
Yep, you're right. There's a reason I left that third option open.
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On second viewing it looks like the bubble ship is burning away instead of popping like the alt text says. Since they are in a vacuum the explosion should be spherical. I still think the praeses are behind it, but maybe this is Alice making her move. I don't see how Gavia could do it and even if Ardent designed it to pop the look on his face shows no sign of deviousness.
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I'm no expert on exploding spaceships, but should the explosion necessarily be spherical? If there are gasses venting from inside the ship, couldn't that affect the shape?
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It isn't an explosion, it's a directional blast from Gavia, towards Church and then past him out of the hull. A few hundred milliseconds later, it'll look spherical as the pressure hull ruptures progressively away from the breach but, this early in the event, it's still directional.
If you want to be technical about it, the sphere of the explosion would be centred on where Gavia's attack came into contact with the hull rather than in the geometric centre of the vehicle.
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I'm not convinced anyone really knows what an exploding spacecraft [exploding in space that is] looks like, and long may it continue that way...
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Hmmm...Gavia's been up to something alright. In panel 1 here (http://www.alicegrove.com/page/4) she's heading aft, looking over her shoulder, and in the next two frames her back is to Ardent and Sedna. There's shadows of the Valkyrie and its blobs on the trunk of the Praeses, too. They mean something.
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Hmmm...Gavia's been up to something alright. In panel 1 here (http://www.alicegrove.com/page/4) she's heading aft, looking over her shoulder, and in the next two frames her back is to Ardent and Sedna. There's shadows of the Valkyrie and its blobs on the trunk of the Praeses, too. They mean something.
Interesting observation, but I'm still not sure how she could pull this off. Even if she was lying about losing her nanotech she probably would've used it out of desperation in the aftermath of Church's fight with Ellie so I don't think she has any, however, she could've sneaked away when Church and Pate weren't looking and got a stick of dynamite from the archaeophiles. Or maybe they gave it to her as payback for what happened to Ellie. Perhaps with everyone so in awe of the space habitat she had enough time to light the fuse. For her sake as well as anyone who's not an immortal super soldier I hope she stuck it behind Church's back.
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@brasca,
The mistake you are making is to assume that Gavia either has her nanotech-based powers or does not. I do not believe either of those are correct. Rather, she has the powers at a very low level (she may have only recently realised that she still has a few nanobots left and they are regenerating). Since they were captured by Pate and Church, she has been slowly building up her 'charge' at the maximum rate her reduced powers can support to try to take down Church. This has taken her hours, possibly ever since Ellie's death.
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Perhaps, but it would be ironic if she used antiquated technology against Church.
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Since they are in a vacuum
Are they, though? Seems to me like the giant-space-tree-thingy is big enough to have its own thin atmosphere.
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Since they are in a vacuum
Are they, though? Seems to me like the giant-space-tree-thingy is big enough to have its own thin atmosphere.
Not unless it has an artificially-generated energy field of some sort holding the atmosphere in. It is nowhere near large enough to generate sufficient gravity to naturally retain an atmosphere. It would need to be well over 1,000km long for that and would generate tidal effects on Earth as it moved around the planet.
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Perhaps, but it would be ironic if she used antiquated technology against Church.
^^This^^
Ever see Ralph Bakshi's Wizards (1977)? Good guy wizard, Avatar, and his more powerful and very evil bad guy wizard brother Blackwolf are setting up for a battle of magic when Avatar says, "I'm glad you changed your last name, you sonofabitch," simultaneously pulling a pistol out of his sleeve and blowing Blackwolf's shit away. (That was four years before Indiana Jones pulled his pistol and shot Scimitar Guy.)
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Would dynamite even come close to hurting Church, though? He's comparable to Alice at the very least and Alice can punch through nanotech.
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Would dynamite even come close to hurting Church, though? He's comparable to Alice at the very least and Alice can punch through nanotech.
On Earth no, but in space he's vulnerable if the ship is destroyed in an explosion. Church wouldn't be harmed, but the explosion would propel him away from the space habitat where he'd float around harmlessly in the vacuum of space until Earth's gravity well pulls him down. Alice and Sedna would suffer the same fate too, but if Gavia is desperate enough to sacrifice her own life as well as kill Ardent and Pate then I don't think she cares all that much about inconveniencing them too.
I actually hope I'm wrong about Gavia blowing up the ship because I don't see how she, Ardent, or Pate could survive the blast.
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I really don't think this is Gavia's doing. I think the ship just set off some kind of defensive response from the big tree when it got too close.
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It's most likely the Praeses, but it's fun to explore all options.
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It's most likely the Praeses, but it's fun to explore all options.
Could Gavia have been communicating with the Praeses I wonder?
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Unless she can talk to them telepathically I doubt it. Every other time she tried to request they bring her and Ardent home she was verbally speaking to the nanotech that serve as communication.
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Add on top of that, there was every indication that her transmissions were being ignored.
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...her transmissions were being ignored.
ignored != unheard!
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...her transmissions were being ignored.
ignored != unheard!
True, but it greatly increases the chances that any signal from her transponder is either being blocked or automatically disregarded.
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Another possibility - Gavia spotted some device (survival weapon, perhaps?) that was standard equipment on the Valkyrie-like craft she and Ardent are familiar with, but didn't take into account that it would be far more powerful after being transformed by her brother's "magic" touch. She takes a pot-shot at Jesper and/or Church and blows the starboard fore corner of the cockpit out.
Gavia's one to place blame but she loves her brother. It wouldn't be hard for her to transfer her anger at their current situation from Ardent to J&C (even though all indications are the Praeses are behind it).
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Another possibility - Gavia spotted some device (survival weapon, perhaps?) that was standard equipment on the Valkyrie-like craft she and Ardent are familiar with, but didn't take into account that it would be far more powerful after being transformed by her brother's "magic" touch. She takes a pot-shot at Jesper and/or Church and blows the starboard fore corner of the cockpit out.
Gavia's one to place blame but she loves her brother. It wouldn't be hard for her to transfer her anger at their current situation from Ardent to J&C (even though all indications are the Praeses are behind it).
Interesting theory. I didn't think of the ship having something Gavia could use as a weapon. Regardless of whether she knew what the effect might be I think she's desperate enough to try anything. Despite her previous argument with Ardent I think she still loves him, but she's willing to sacrifice both their lives to keep hostile intruders from setting foot at their home.
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Strip is up and Gavia looks pissed... Well more so than usual.
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Well, I think her glowing hands and eyes remove any doubt that Gavia was the cause of the explosion.
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Yeah, I guess it was her after all. I figured Jeph might have given us a slightly more obvious clue that she had gotten her powers back than the extremely subtle things others have pointed out, but obviously I was wrong.
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"I HAVE THE POWEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!"
Well, this is a turn-up for the books!! I'm wondering if the Praeses 'Recharged' her when they got close, and just how much of a match she might actually be now for Church especially
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The 'bots are back in town.
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"Oh no! It can't possibly be Gavia" they all said! :wink:
Firstly, I just love the way that Sedna is putting Ardent's 'elegant tail' to unexpected use as an emergency tow rope. I also wonder if Alice will need to punch out Gavia's lights before she compromises her pressure suit. However, most of all, I'm wondering if Gavia is 100% in control of what is happening or whether she's been the Night Walker's meat puppet since the moment it grabbed her in Sedna's house!
Is Pate the target here or is it the Praeses?
Oh, and FWIW, given the apparent size of the Earth from this strip, I'd say that they're in Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO).
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Since Ardent was secretly implanted with bootstrap tech, it's not unlikely that Gavia was also secretly implanted with instructions to protect the Phraeses in case this happened.
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Or at some point Ardent unexpectedly(?) upgraded Gavia (maybe she had one odd nanobot left...)!
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"Oh no! It can't possibly be Gavia" they all said! :wink:
Firstly, I just love the way that Sedna is putting Ardent's 'elegant tail' to unexpected use as an emergency tow rope. I also wonder if Alice will need to punch out Gavia's lights before she compromises her pressure suit. However, most of all, I'm wondering if Gavia is 100% in control of what is happening or whether she's been the Night Walker's meat puppet since the moment it grabbed her in Sedna's house!
Is Pate the target here or is it the Praeses?
Oh, and FWIW, given the apparent size of the Earth from this strip, I'd say that they're in Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO).
It could still be the Praeses or the Night Walker behind this because if Gavia had any nanotechnology she would've attempted to use it when Pate made his intentions clear. However, it could be Gavia if she's more than just an augmented human. I've had a theory that Gavia might be a prototype clone of one of the super soldiers, but never realized her full power because she was inhibited by her nanotechnology. Since the Nightwalker attacked her body regenerated to function without the nanotechnology and building up strength she never knew she had until finally on impulse she popped the balloon ship. The Praeses may be interested in a countermeasure against the immortals so they tested it on Gavia and now that it's proven to work they could suppress Alice, Church, and Sedna's abilities. Of course that's just my theory.
Regardless of who is behind it what happens next is far more critical. The pressure suits seem to be keeping Ardent and Pate alive, but they can't live in the vacuum of space indefinitely and considering the direction they are going with the Earth in the background everyone except the immortals will burn up on reentry if something doesn't block them. As for Gavia I'm not sure if she's even still wearing her pressure suit and may not need it if she can conjure up fire like that.
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Is Gavia scared shitless, berserk angry, or both? Pate, OTOH, is bloody terrified and Church is clearly protecting him with what looks, from just this one frame at least, like actual loyalty.
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Regardless of who is behind it what happens next is far more critical. The pressure suits seem to be keeping Ardent and Pate alive, but they can't live in the vacuum of space indefinitely and considering the direction they are going with the Earth in the background everyone except the immortals will burn up on reentry if something doesn't block them. As for Gavia I'm not sure if she's even still wearing her pressure suit and may not need it if she can conjure up fire like that.
Trust me, they'd suffocate long before their orbit decayed enough for them to reach the top of the denser atmospheric layers. The destruction of the ship will have maybe knocked a few miles off of their perigee at worst. They're still orbiting at around 22,000 miles altitude and that orbit won't change in less than a century unless one of them has a high-efficiency long life propulsion system stashed away on their persons.
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Agreed with BenRG that there's no way the explosion imparted enough delta-v on them to meaningfully alter their orbit.
I came to link this, and only in doing so noticed that I wrote it exactly a year ago today:
One more thing that came through very clearly on my re-read: although occasionally childlike/naive/impulsive, Gavia is extremely intelligent and observant. I do not think that she's going to simply be a victim/witness - she'll have some major role to play in how this all turns out, before all is said and done.
(Now, it didn't occur to me until reading the thread that Nightwalker or other outside influence may be a factor here.)
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Well, that was an unexpected turn.
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Trust me, they'd suffocate long before their orbit decayed enough for them to reach the top of the denser atmospheric layers. The destruction of the ship will have maybe knocked a few miles off of their perigee at worst.
Agreed (unless the magic bubble suits can keep them alive for years, and this is LEO)
They're still orbiting at around 22,000 miles altitude and that orbit won't change in less than a century unless one of them has a high-efficiency long life propulsion system stashed away on their persons.
I don't think we have ever been told the praeses are in geosynch orbit. You get a lot less radiation if you stay below the Van Allen belts...
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"Oh no! It can't possibly be Gavia" they all said! :wink:
Firstly, I just love the way that Sedna is putting Ardent's 'elegant tail' to unexpected use as an emergency tow rope. I also wonder if Alice will need to punch out Gavia's lights before she compromises her pressure suit. However, most of all, I'm wondering if Gavia is 100% in control of what is happening or whether she's been the Night Walker's meat puppet since the moment it grabbed her in Sedna's house!
Is Pate the target here or is it the Praeses?
I've thought that this whole thing has been set up by the Praeses, who want/need Alice and Sedna (and possibly even Church) in orbit with them. Did you think it was a coincidence that Alice and friends got to the archaeophile community just after they had uncovered a bunker that just happened to have a launch vehicle?
The Praeses sent Ardent down with his midas touch to force Alice into action and to give her a way to get off-planet in spite of the technology decay, and they sent Gavia down with a nanotech payload that would provoke the Night Walker into doing whatever it did. Between Ardent's touch, Gavia's temper, and both of them being annoying idiots, there was no way that Alice could do nothing. And having been passive for so long, she would need the help of someone who would know where to get access to a transformable way into orbit, hence Sedna. Finally, Pate, being a sociopath, would not be able to resist the temptation to take control of the situation, and would bring Church with him.
The Praeses then needed a way to get Alice and friends out of the spaceship and into/onto the tree, so they re-enabled Gavia's nanotech and provoked her.
And now we're slowly going to find out what task they have in mind for Alice and her motley crew...
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That's an interesting idea. Very good first post!
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Welcome, new person!
That would account for lots of odds and ends of plot points.
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Maybe even hyper-intelligent-sentient-tree-overlords have all the impulses of a small boy poking a stick into an ants' nest.
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Maybe even hyper-intelligent-sentient-tree-overlords have all the impulses of a small boy poking a stick into an ants' nest.
"We made them smart. Unfortunately, we were never able to make them smarter than us."
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Up!
Flashback?
Still not sure I quite understand it...
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Up!
Flashback?
Still not sure I quite understand it...
Ardent handed Gavia a breast implant. Apparently, she felt like it was some kind of insult and she lost her temper.
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Up!
Flashback?
Still not sure I quite understand it...
From what I can discern Ardent's upgrade advanced the contents within like space suits transformed into pressurized body stockings and apparently those spherical things contained nanotechnology. It's uncertain if Ardent knowingly did this or it happened when he upgraded what was a highly state of the art space fighter 5000 years ago or what could have been on board that would transform into nanotechnology, but both he and Gavia recognized it since he wordlessly hands one over to her and as soon as the opportunity presented itself she absorbed it back into her body and made her move. With everyone else so distracted by being in space it couldn't have worked out more perfectly and despite everything that's happened these two can work together for the common good. As such Gavia seems to be acting on her own although she may be temporarily crazy as she reintegrates the nanotechnology into her body. Hopefully, she'll return to her senses and save Ardent, help Alice and Sedna, and if she's feeling merciful do something that doesn't involve leaving Pate to float around in orbit until he suffocates. I would definitely theorize that unless the praeses are master chess strategists they did not anticipate nor control this outcome.
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Let's assume Alice was correct (http://www.alicegrove.com/post/126112043354/at-last-the-central-conflict-of-alice-grove-is), and that the Praeses want to take over the planet. Let's also assume that Alice, Sedna and Church are the only three immortals on Earth, and that they would be the main obstacle to the Praeses' takeover ambitions. Well, all three are now stuck in orbit, out of the way. "There'll be no one to stop us this time." (https://youtu.be/XYZdQRUU5IA?t=67)
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Looks like she's goin' nuclear! Just how many of those jars of nanobots did she ingest anyway?
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Just one by the looks of it, but with Ardent's upgrade she might have better nanotech than before or just enough to destroy the bubble ship and send Church and Pate hurtling through the vacuum of space.
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So, Ardent decided to apologise for what happened with Gavia by finding a way to give her her Nanobot Powers back.
Nice gesture in his part if you ask me - especially after she tried to beat the crap outta him over it.
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It was as much as way to atone for his actions as an act of self preservation. I'm not sure if Ardent could control nanotech and even if he could he was constantly being watched. Gavia has the preparations and neither Church nor Pate were watching her when she reemerged with the nanotech.
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Spacing Jesper ("eyes bulging, peeing blood," Robert A. Heinlein) and burning Church up as he reenters the atmosphere is too easy. Look for Alice & Friends to be forced into an uneasy alliance with Pate and his Monster Flunky with at least one of the Praeses as the likely antagonist(s). Political intrigue between the Orbiting Ents can make for an even more interesting script.