hippogrif

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Welcome.

This is a thread for discussing the Girl Genius novelization Agatha H. and the Clockwork Princess, as well as all Girl Genius in general. The subject matter is the property of Phil and Kaja Foglio.

No spoilers are required in this thread. The assumption is you've read the material already. That is why this thread exists--to provide a place for people to talk without having to try to avoid giving away secrets.

I own this account. If you're rude or a jackass, I will delete your post. If you're debating in good faith and not annoying the natives, I won't. If people really can't behave, I'll delete the whole fershlugginer thread.

Have fun. Talk at will. If you don't want spoilers, run away now.

Hippogrif.

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From:

hippogrif

I have to say, I'm not at all sure what Tarvek's plan was, and given the whole spark-slaver wasp thing I am uneasy.

The bottom line is that I can honestly see Tarvek as he starts out feeling that Klaus is in every way a valid candidate for wasping. Klaus IS a usurper, he HAS put together a far from stable Europan union, he has kept the Fifty Families from what many would consider their "proper" national sphere while letting them pretty much do what they like without checks within their dominions, and from Tarvek's POV he's proven himself to be unreliable, unjust, and unlikely to be willing to reason or compromise...if only because Klaus doesn't DO politics, and politics is how Tarvek sees the world working.

If the way to ensure a stable union and a peaceable transfer of power was by way of a spark-wasp, I can see Tarvek deciding that, yes, this was the best answer. But we've seen the cost, and we disagree. So we're left with the real possibility that Tarvek gave the spark-slaver wasp to the Giesters fully intending to act on the plan he presented.

The trouble is, we also know that the current state of affairs was in no way what Tarvek wanted or aimed at...and the way he laid out was never confirmed as his actual intent. So much of what he did in Sturmhalten was a juggling act trying to survive far too many factions.

It's just...if Gil decides that Klaus' wasping, and his (possible) death are Tarvek's fault, I can't for the life of me decide if he's right or wrong. Mostly wrong, in that Lucrezia-in-Agatha's the one who opted to wasp Klaus then and there. But...

And then there's Lunevka. I don't know if Tarvek even realizes she's still out there. But I also don't know who he thinks is puppet-mastering Klaus. He knows someone is...his reaction to realizing Klaus was wasped was too extreme for me to doubt it. He knows SOME Lu has control. But who does he think it is? Zola doesn't have the voice. At least, we don't think so.

I wish I knew that little bit more. Because the trouble is, if Klaus does die, Gil's going to be entirely within his rights to consider Tarvek responsible even if this is in no way what Tarvek wanted or was aiming for--just really, really crappy collateral damage. Nor is Gil ever likely to accept that Tarvek's own goals and motives were not necessarily "evil."

From:

lightningnettle.livejournal.com

I don't know what Tarvek's plan was either, wouldn't it be nice to know? I agree that for practical purposes, if Tarvek felt wasping Klaus was the lesser evil he might plan to do it; but I think he would have to expect some large amount of bad consequences to leaving Klaus free in order to consider it (civil war for example). Thus, if it was part of his plan, I would guess that it was a worst case back-up part of the plan. I'm not sure that in that case I could even disagree with the boy myself.

Even so, Gil has a right to be deeply, coldly angry with Tarvek even if Klaus doesn't die; because Klaus has been wasped and Tarvek was an integral part of the chain of events leading to that consequence. Certainly we've seen Gil be furious with far less reason in canon. I suspect Klaus himself would find it easier to forgive Tarvek, and he's no mush-bunny. It certainly provides excellent plot points for the Foglios to use, again with the both sides have *reason* for their behavior, reason we can understand and empathize with.

Now, we have seen Agatha forgive Von Pinn for killing her parents; and both boys have forgiven Agatha for hurting Von Pinn so very badly. There's precedent for forgiveness in the story of precisely this situation.

And Gil needs Tarvek, needs him to save Agatha; he must work with him and he knows it. He's had a bit of acceptance and forgiveness already; though while in denial of Klaus being wasped, so it isn't, can't be, the final forgiveness. Gil saved Tarvek, sent him to Agatha in the flyer after Tarvek confessed to plotting to wasp Klaus, so there's been forgiveness for the plan. He didn't even seem particularly angry with Tarvek at that time, after the initial flare of temper in the hallway. So I think, I think that he can work through the knowledge that wasping did indeed happen.

Klaus has raised Gil to be pragmatic, and not to flinch at dark solutions to problems. I think that if Gil can be brought to listen to Tarvek, and is given some time to really digest the whole thing, that he will be able to forgive Tarvek's grey pragmaticism here. Huh? I wonder if that's one reason Gil was so reluctant to believe Klaus had actually been wasped? (It is easier to forgive an evil plan that didn't succeed than one that did.) Because he didn't want that conflict with Tarvek? Of course it's also a horrible fate for his father that would be hard to accept. I wonder if Gil growing the ability to forgive could be one of the points of this plotline?

It will be an easier journey for Gil if Tarvek can make some sort of restitution to Klaus; help him in some way, as Gil made it easier for Agatha by rebuilding her parents. I don't see the pathway here, but I can see that it might exist. The only guess I have is the very unlikely one that if Tarvek can move Klaus's personality into Olga's unoccupied body; the wasping might be undone that way.

I'd love to peek into Tarvek's head and see where he thinks Lunevka is. One of the things that perturbs me is the possible multiplication of Lu's in this story with the expanded parameters of the Summoning Engine. It's so very messy for the plot when there could be umpteen villains. But with that many potential Lu's and Tarvek knowing there might be so many, his concern is well founded. His ability to recognize Lu's personality may be essential if there do get to be a lot of them.

I am very worried that Klaus will die. I am somewhat less worried that Gil will have to do the killing. I am *hoping* that the wasping will be a sufficient stripping away of his parent from Gil, that Klaus will, in fact, not have to die as Agatha's parents and Tarvek's family did for their journeys. It would not surprise me if Bangladesh, as Gil's sister substitute, did die. It's a mark of my own lack of morals, I suspect, that her death wouldn't bother me nearly as much as Klaus's.