#meaning i probably need to use another model's hair physics as well and somehow transfer them on zack's hair too or smth like that maybe

[emeraldblonde]

I tried to mod something and the good news is, it didn't crash the game. 🥳 The bad news is, not what I was looking for lmao.

Like, don't get me wrong. I've seen way worse (the stuff of nightmares) on a modding channel I've been teaching myself this stuff lately, so. It's not like I completely fucked this thing up or anything like that.

It's just... I still gotta ask though.

What went wrong here?

[atamascolily]

more CotJ meta, because apparently I cannot be stopped

I don't understand how essence transfer works in Children of the Jedi.  It seems... wildly inconsistent depending on what is narratively convenient at the time.

I don’t know why Callista is able to make the jump from her original body to the Eye of Palpatine’s gunnery computers and then from the computers to Cray’s body without (much) issue, while poor Nichos couldn’t. Maybe it's because Callista had received secret Jedi training from her master that Nichos didn’t have access to? Or because it would interfere with Hambly’s plot to give Callista Cray’s body? 

(I think we all know the answer to this, but I’m gonna go through all the arguments anyway.)

Luke does float the idea of Cray creating a droid-body for Callista to inhabit, which Cray and Callista both reject, but for wildly different reasons.

   “You said Djinn Altis showed you—taught you—to transfer your self, your consciousness, your … your reality—to another object. You’ve done it with this ship, Callista. You’re really here, I know you are …”

   “I am,” she said softly. “There’s enough circuitry, enough size, enough power in the central core. But a thing of metal, a thing programmed and digitalized, isn’t human, and can’t be human, Luke. Not the way I’m human now.”

So Callista’s argument is basically that a giant ship is big enough to contain her spirit, but a droid wouldn't be? How did Exar Kun manage this, then? I mean, granted, he was evil, and had low standards for ethics, but still... I don’t get it.

I get her main point here: she believes she's more "human" as a ghost than she would be as a droid, or with her spirit somehow “translated” as a series of zeros and ones, as Cray was somehow able to do with Nichos. And I can see why she wouldn’t want that kind of existence for herself. But I still don’t get how consciousness works in this novel, and why Callista can’t transfer herself--her real self--into a different object, the way she did before, instead of being “translated” by Cray into a digital copy.

This also begs the question of how much Callista's HUMAN spirit is influenced by thirty years in the computer core, which the novel doesn't address, but fics like Deaka's "Blue Screen" on FFN are fortunately there to fill the gap.

Here’s Cray’s take on Luke’s request to “fix” Callista:

   “To turn her into what Nichos is? To cannibalize parts from the computers, wire together enough memory to digitalize her, so you can have the metal illusion around to remind you what isn’t yours—and can’t be yours? I can do that … if that’s what you want.”

   ...“Not the way you and I are human.” Cray came over to them, her blond hair catching fire glints in the greasy light. “Not the way Nichos was human. I should never have done it, Luke,” she went on. “Never have … tried to go up against what had to be. My motto was always ‘If it doesn’t work, get a bigger hammer.’ Or a smaller chip. Nichos …”

   She shook her head. “He doesn’t remember dying, Luke. He doesn’t remember a switchover of any kind. And as much as I love … Nichos … as much as he loves me … I keep coming back to that. It isn’t Nichos. He isn’t human. He tries to be, and he wants to be, but flesh and bone have a logic of their own, Luke, and machinery just doesn’t think the same way.”

   Her mouth twisted, her dark eyes chill and bitter as the vacuum of space. “If you want me to, I’ll make you something that’ll hold a digitalized version of her memories, her consciousness … But it won’t be the consciousness that’s alive on this vessel. And you’ll know it, and I’ll know it. And that digitalized version will know it, too.”

So Cray rejects it because she doesn’t want Luke to make the same mistake she did: of seeing a replica as the original. And she makes a point of calling herself out on her attachment to Nichos, so much so that she warped and twisted her life to try and hold onto to him when she couldn’t. And she’s telling Luke not to do the same thing with his own life--which he will of course ignore.

I'm used to thinking of identical digital files as interchangeable, but that's not the case here when you're downloading human consciousness. There's also this idea that the droid/digital versions isn't "real," which is also worth chewing on, but a whole 'nother philosophical debate in and of itself.

But Cray's other point is also worth considering: the body we inhabit has qualities of its own that are impossible to deny; they shape our experiences of the world. This is why I'm absolutely floored that nobody ever follows up on Callista's experiences in Cray's body--how she's able to just smoothly take over, and the only issue ("software bug"?) is that she can't access the Force. This is... probably not how it works. I wrote a fic about this, but it only scratched the surface of the story possibilities for dysphoria and "body-as-a-character".  

(I solve this problem of essence transfer in other fics by arguing that it only works smoothly--i.e., with minimal dysphoria and a complete transfer of Force powers--if your spirit jumps to a physical clone of your original body. This explains why clone!Palpatine can access the Force, while Callista can't, because Cray's body 'recognizes' Callista's spirit as foreign to itself and is continually fighting her, so much so that all her Force abilities are tied up in holding her in that body--which is also Force-sensitive.)

Also, re: robot bodies and human consciousness, I’m reminded of a passage in Yeats’ “Sailing to Byzantium” here:

   Once out of nature I shall never take    My bodily form from any natural thing,    But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make    Of hammered gold and gold enamelling    To keep a drowsy Emperor awake...

"Sailing to Byzantium" is all about what it means to be old in a failing body, right from the opening line--"That is no country for old men". And while it's poetry and there are a lot of ways to interpret, one valid take is that it's about shedding your bodily form to become a robot/artificial construct so you can live forever, and I have a lot of Feels about that in relationship to Star Wars. (Paging Anakin Skywalker!) But I digress.

Going back to CotJ.  an additional problem is that any physical components will be carrying the malvirus of the Will:

   “Thank you, Cray. And don’t think I’m not tempted. I love you, Luke, and I want … I want not to have to leave you, even if it means … being what I am now, forever. Or being what Nichos is now, forever. But we don’t have the choice. We don’t have time. And any components, any computers, you take from this ship, Cray, will have the Will in them as well.

I don’t know why she can’t jump to an object unconnected with the Will--like, say, her lightsaber. Isn’t Exar Kun using a big statue of himself as an anchor? I mean, it’s kinda of impractical compared to being inside a computer, but maybe it could be a temporary thing until Luke is able to build her a ship of her own??

(A lightsaber would be a really good choice as an anchor because of the kyber crystal inside, which Callista may or may not have a working relationship with if you hold them to be sentient or partially sentient beings...? There's fic potential there, that's all I'm saying.)

(As a further aside, in my Star Wars/Portal crossover “Testing Limits,” I postulate that the Will is a GLaDOs-like uploading of a human consciousness into digital form. I still believe that holds true for canon, even though there’s not much supporting evidence other than that the Will is set up as foil to Callista and it adds to the incredibly Gothic atmosphere. Either the Will is human consciousness, or it’s modeled after human consciousness for maximum Uncanny Valley effect because Luke is always describing it as having a presence and malevolent intentions, and Callista is always fighting it.)

So Barbara Hambly spends a lot of time establishing that Cray's body is the only viable (hah!) option for Callista, which will be important later on. But let's get back to Nichos for a minute, and his failure with essence transfer. 

It's weird because at the beginning of CotJ, Cray talks about Nichos transferring his SPIRIT to the droid body using the Force and Ssi-ruuk entechment--which sounds eerily identical to what Callista did thirty years earlier--but they know something's wrong right away when Nichos can't use the Force. Cray's all "I can fix that, it's a technical difficulty!" but Luke knows better. Everyone knows, except for Cray.  

I think THAT is the moment where Luke and Cray should have had a Talk, when it was absolutely clear to everyone that whatever Cray was doing hadn't worked--that she'd succeeded in making a digital copy, and the original Nichos was actually dead.

Instead, Cray buries all her considerable energy into "fixing" Nichos mechanically. She believes with enough research, she can shape the droid Nichos into a human being... which doesn't solve the fundamental problem and misses the point entirely.

He heard her voice, its usual brisk sharpness honed to the brittleness he’d heard in it more and more in the past six months...

“It’s really just a matter of finding a way to quadruple the sensitivity of the chips to achieve a pattern, instead of a linear, generator. ... Hayvlin Vesell of the Technomic Research Foundation spoke in an article of going back to the old xylen-based chips, because of the finer divisibility of information possible. When I return to the Institute—”

“That’s what I’m trying to impress on you, Dr. Mingla—Cray.” Tomla El’s voice was a murmuring concert of woodwinds. “This may not be possible no matter how finely you partition the information. The answer may be that there is no answer. Nichos may simply not be capable of human affect.”

“Oh, I think you’re wrong about that.” She’d gained back the smooth control in her voice. She might have been speaking to a professional colleague about programmatic languages. “Certainly a great deal more work needs to be done before we can dismiss the possibility. I’m told also that in experiments with accelerated learning, at a certain number of multiples of human learning capacity, tremendous breakthroughs can occur. I’ve signed up for another accelerator course, this one in informational patterning dynamics …”

Her voice faded down the corridor. A great deal more work, thought Luke, hurting for her, pressing his hand to his brow. It was Cray’s answer to everything. With sufficient effort, sufficient maneuvering, any problem could be surmounted, no matter what the cost to herself.

And the cost to herself, he knew, had been devastating.

I actually really like Cray's arc in this novel--that she's forced to drop the perfectionism and workaholism she uses to block her considerable pain, and comes to accept the situation as it is, and finds peace in doing so. I just wish this realization didn't culminate in assisted suicide, that's all.

(That said, this scenario gets 100% creepier if you imagine flipping the genders here--if “Dr. Mingla” was a male scientist resurrecting his female lover in a droid body. I wonder if Luke would have intervened sooner in that case, instead of just assuming Cray had everything under control because she was an expert?)

While we're on the subject of "by any means necessary" and "avoiding one's problems": in contrast to Cray, Callista's original decision to transfer her spirit to gunnery computer to watch over it is framed as laudable. But even there, there are hints all is not well:

“It wasn’t … so bad, after a time. Djinn had taught us, had theoretically walked us through, the techniques of projecting the mind into something else, something that would be receptive, to hold the intelligence as well as the consciousness, but he seemed to regard it as cowardly. As being afraid or unwilling to go on to the next step, to cross over to the other side. Once I was in the computer …”

I.e., there's a reason why essence transfer is mostly practiced by the Sith--because it's a kind of clinging to life, or a version of life, rather than embracing what is and moving on...

Also, I don't see anything in this explanation that requires computing capacity, as Callista will claim later, so... *shrugs* I don't know what's happening there. CotJ has this weird relationship between the Force and tech, where Luke can physically manipulate objects with his mind, even though the Force is only generated by "life", but Irek remote-starting the Eye of Palpatine or controlling Artoo-Detoo is seen as "impossible" and novel. And yes, Irek does have special training and tech augments to help him, and I like the implication this is a specialized skill, but...like I said at the beginning, I don't get how this all works except for “narrative convenience” and “authorial fiat”. 

Anyway, CotJ strongly implies that Cray was misguided to cling to Nichos and to pursue "life" for him at all costs, for both Nichos and herself. Yet somehow when Callista does it, it's okay, because Luke loves her... even though Callista herself is way more ambivalent about what she's done, and her acknowledgment that

“Everything has to be paid for... I should have known there would be a risk... I might have guessed there would be a price.”

And I think that's one reason I like Children of the Jedi so much: that there IS a cost, that there ARE consequences, and not even magic space wizardry can fix or solve every problem. I like that Callista pays a price for the ethically dubious act she does--somewhat, but not entirely mitigated by circumstances, and by Cray's eagerness to participate in this (unprecedented?) experiment.

Also, you want more nightmare fuel? I just realized last night we only have Callista's word for what went down on the ship in its last moments--that, and it seems 100% in keeping with Cray's state of mind leading up to this, to the point where Luke was afraid to leave her alone because he was worried she was going to hurt herself. It gets even creepier when you realize Callista's ghost immediately volunteers to sit with Cray after Luke realizes this,  and I can't help but wonder what happened between the two women when Luke isn't around to witness it.

Callista's account at the end makes it sound like Cray realized at the last minute that she wanted to follow him--that it was an impulsive decision, somewhere in between stunning Luke and stuffing him into the shuttle and the destruction of the Eye of Palpatine--but I wonder. I really wonder. Cray and Callista clearly had time to plan a "what if Luke doesn't cooperate?" scenario and leave a recording for him to find in the shuttle, so I wonder how exactly the whole "you can have my body, I don't want it" conversation went down. There's a fic in there for sure.

But even taking Callista 100% at her word, I like the irony that she chooses to go along with Cray's scheme in part because she's so in love with/emotionally attached to Luke (just as Cray can't let go of Nichos and Luke can't let go of Callista)--only to eventually realize that there's something she values more than her relationship with him, namely her own life, and her own relationship to the Force, which has always been a part of her life and is now "missing". Cray chooses to die for love, Callista chooses to live for love... only to set it aside, because LIFE is more important to her than her love for one specific human being... just like she sacrificed her own life to destroy the Eye, and left her first lover in the process... PARALLELS, Y'ALL. I LOVE ME SOME NARRATIVE FOILS, YO.

Anyway, this got long and rambling, but I believe my initial thesis that essence transfer is wildly inconsistent and the results depend almost entirely on narrative convenience still stands.

[rason-rodd]

Nightwing: The Rise of Flamebird (Chapter 3)

Summary: Nightwing and Flamebird were two ancient Kryptonian gods, yet completely opposite. He was darkness and rebirth, tasked to hunt the evils in the shadows. She was fire and destruction, born to annihilate the creations of her mate, Vohc The Builder. Destined to fall in love and achieve great things but fated to be separated. That's the story Dick Grayson and Terry Olsen heard. Strange that it is also, somehow, their story

Major Pairing: Nightwing/Dick Grayson x Flamebird/Original Female Character

Chapter Summary: Isaac Peterson, the child that was kidnapped, is still missing. As Nightwing finds his first evidence that leads him to a strange woman in Meadowdale Mall, Detective Elise Svoboda and Terry Olsen begin investigating on their own, not really glad to work together.

[Previous Chapter] [READ ON AO3]

Readers List: @dcvenomqueen, @cheyennneee

If you're interested you can ask me to add you to the list. Also, don't forget to tell me what you think about the story. Your opinions mean a lot.

Blüdhaven Police Department – Morning

“Impressive … very impressive” Commissioner Foster was skimming through Terry’s curriculum as if he was discovering it right now in front of her. “Degree in Criminology and Psychology, excellent physical condition and amazing results to the aptitude tests. Which makes me wonder … why would Metropolis let such a valued cop leave?” He threw the files on his desk and stared at her with his arms crossed over his chest. “What awful mistakes did you make?”             She didn’t really know what to answer. So many things had happened, so many things that would justify why she was sitting here today but they were so personal and so shameful, still full of guilt, pain and remorse. And yet, she wanted so much to confess. The words were screaming in her head. Come on, tell him. Tell everyone what you’ve done and what you can’t resolve yourself to do!       

Her mouth opened slightly but the man started laughing. “I’m kidding, Olsen. You should have seen your face.” She tried to laugh as well, but the embarrassment blocked the sound in her throat. “Are you guys in Metropolis always that uptight?” “I’m sorry, Commissioner. It’s my first day. I’m a little nervous.”       “Don’t be, kiddo. I’m not going to torture you to know why you had an A and not an A+ at your gymnastics exam or anything. You’re probably the best element that ever been transferred here.” She smiled slightly. He hadn’t reassured her, at all. On the contrary, knowing that he was certainly expecting a lot coming from her was making her more stressed than she already was. “Plus you’re arriving at the right time. There’s a case waiting for you.” She pursed her lips and massaged her moistly hands discreetly under the desk. “Johnson, send Svoboda.” The man ordered after pushing a button on his phone.

Elise Svoboda entered the office, reeking of cigarettes, a pile of files under one arm and a mug of coffee in one hand. “Commissioner. You wanted to see me?” Her casualness bewildered Terry and she guessed Svoboda noticed it since she briefly glowered at her. “Yes, this is Teresa Olsen, a detective transferred from Metropolis … and your new partner.” Terry’s eyes widened and she stared silently at the old man in shock. “What?” Elise almost chocked on her coffee.             “She’ll help you with the Peterson case.”         “ I don’t work with teammates...” She hated it actually. Elise was a very strong and independent woman. Working in duo, and furthermore with a novice, was something she was seeing as another responsibility she’d rather avoid. “ ... especially when they are Victoria’s Secret models who just got their job by kneeling under the right desk.” The insult rooted Terry to the spot. What the f…? “Excuse me?” The young woman asked with daggers in her green eyes. “No one talks to me like that.” “ Svoboda, that was inappropriate.”   “ Inappropriate? That’s putting it mildly.” Terry stood up to face the tall forty-something woman next to her, her fists clenched to help her keep her fragile cool. “You don’t want to work with me, fine. The feeling is mutual. I’ll take care of that case myself.”   “ No one’s working alone. Olsen, you’ll need Svoboda. She’s been living in the Blüd since forever. She knows this city. And Svoboda, you’ll need Olsen, too. She’s perfectly qualified for this case and a pair of young eyes is still useful. Now take this” He put Terry’s badge on his desk along with a brand new black gun, a Glock 22. “And get to work!”   Both women sighed before leaving the office, Terry following closely Elise who was already running away from the department. “ So about the case?”     “ Oh hell no. Stop right there, Victoria Secret. I’m doing this on my own.”       “ What? But Foster said …”     “ I don’t care what Foster said. This is my case. Mine” She pointed a finger at herself and looked straight in Terry’s eyes. “Look it doesn’t delight me to work with you either. But we were given orders.”             “ You’re in the Blüd, honey. There are no orders. There are no rules to follow. This city is rotten, just like this police department. So if you think things are going to be the same they were in Metropolis, you better go back there. Now let me do my work.”  

Ravenshood Heights – Blüdhaven - Night

Ravenshood Heights was the richest neighbourhood in Blüdhaven and not a place Nightwing was familiar with. Apart from occasional burglary in the most fancy houses, it was a rather peaceful and tranquil area and weirdly – or not – where the police was patrolling the most. ‘Protect the ones who can pay’ being certainly the credo of all corrupted cops in the city. Funny, all the bribes didn’t prevent the kidnapping of nine years-old Isaac Peterson.       Nightwing was combing the room with his domino mask, looking for anything that the police could have missed. The parents of the child had let him in even though they were not fond of “thighs”, as the vigilantes were called here. But desperate times called for desperate measures.        

Despite the stripped bed in which the child had slept in, the room was clean and tidy. Nothing, not even an ounce of dust on the scientific books on the shelves or toys or Legos scattered on the ground. “Isaac is very meticulous. It can be obsessive sometimes. An habit he kept from the orphanage” The mother had said.

Dick could remember the little time he had spent in Wayne Care Centre. Not the best place in the world when it comes to intimacy even for someone who used to share a trailer with a dwarf. Four beds in the same room, barely enough space to play or even to move, and some weird children with annoying tendencies to steal whatever you may leave on the ground. "Finders keepers!"  So you take great care of the few precious things you own since they'll be the only ones you'll ever have. You always keep an eye on them. You make sure not to damage it and check every day that no one touched them. Dick had done all this when the only thing he had to remember his destroyed happiness was his mother’s bracelet and his Flying Grayson poster. But he only stayed there few weeks contrary to Isaac who basically grew up there. No time to make this a habit.    

So why don’t organise the books in alphabetical order?         Nightwing frowned and stared at the books. Few of them were dog-eared and they were not old at all. With a lot of precaution, he removed them from the shelf and scanned them all with his domino mask looking for prints or anything else. “Bingo” It was a long blond hair and no one in this family had blond hair.     “ Alfred?” Nightwing asked through the earpiece. “Master Grayson. I believe this is not a casual call.” “ No indeed. I would need you to search someone for me. I’m sending you the DNA sample” Dick placed the hair in his gauntlet, which immediately began scanning it to send the DNA to Alfred in the Batcave. “Anything?”     “It appears the hair belong to a certain Jane Antol, an ex waitress working for Penguin at the Iceberg Lounge.”         “ Do you have an address where I can find her?”       “ No, but she was arrested two weeks ago by the Police of Blüdhaven for prostitution and possession of prohibited substances. Perhaps Detective Svoboda could tell you where to find that young woman.”         “All right. Thank you, Alfred.”   “ Anytime, Master Grayson” Dick pressed the earpiece to cut contact with Alfred and immediately called Svoboda on her police wireless, hoping she would provide him the information he was looking for. “Good evening, Detective.” He scoffed when he heard her gasp and cough through the radio. He had surprised her, scared her even. “How did you decode… Never mind.” She sighed, regaining a normal heartbeat. “Any news concerning the Peterson case?”           “ I’ll need you to tell me where to find a girl called Jane Antol. I believe she is involved in the kidnapping. I found one of her hair on the crime scene.”           “ Jane Antol. Doesn’t ring a bell.” She confessed as she bit in her pink donut.           “ She was arrested two weeks ago. A prostitute with blond hair, possibly Polish and drug addict” He heard her chewing loudly. Either she didn’t want to speak with her mouth full or she was in an intense reflection, which was more likely. “Oh yeah, Ann Darrow.”         “Ann Darrow?” Nightwing frowned. Ann Darrow was the name of the blond young lady in the King Kong movies. Strange name for a prostitute. “Well, that’s the name the guys in the department gave her. She used to lay with Gorilla Grimm.” Or not. But right now, he had no time to ponder over prostitute names. He had a little boy to find, a little boy who was certainly frightened and in great danger. “You’ll probably find her at Meadowdale Mall.” Of course, Meadowdale Mall was Blüdhaven’s mostly illegal street market, a place tolerated by the police where prostitutes, dealers of all kinds and criminals escape authority and justice to attend to their shady business. He had been there before to collect information on Gorilla Grimm. And he had met that girl. Jane. Hopefully, he would find her again. “I think I know who that is. Thank you, Detective.”         “ Do you need help? I can send a unit to arrest her.” Elise suggested             “ I’m fine” And he just hung up without saying another word.

Elise sighed and relaxed against the backrest of her car, allowing herself to close her eyes for a second when she heard someone knock her windowpane. She opened one eye and noticed Teresa, arms crossed over her chest. “Stubborn child.” She mumbled as she lowered the window. “What?” she grumbled, definitely annoyed.         “ Honestly, I don’t give a damn you’re working with Nightwing.” Elise’s jaw dropped as she thought briefly about what to reply though she didn’t get the time to. “All I want to know is how a prostitute could enter the Petersons’ house.” She declared authoritatively with a serious look and no qualms at all. “Damn, girl! Don’t you know the word ‘privacy’? And how can you guys hack police radio?” Terry ignored the questions. “The house is highly secured: alarm, camera and motion sensors. Plus there was no sign of breaking in. You wrote it yourself in the report.”       “I did.” “ So how does a prostitute from the rough area enter a house like that?”           “ I don’t know, Barbie.” Elise confessed, persuaded she will get the answer very soon judging by the young cop’s quick thinking. “She was invited in.” That wasn’t what she expected, though.     “ Sure, the ‘rich father fucks the monkey-fetish STI nest junky prostitute’ sounds very likely.” The sarcasm didn’t affect Terry who kept standing her ground. “Did you ever study psychology, Svoboda?” “ No but I’m aware of my husband’s Internet history. And I’ve never seen a porn like that.”   “ The Peterson spent years trying to have a child. Eight artificial inseminations, hormone therapies… His wife wanted a child so badly that I bet it had impact on their sexual life. He certainly began to see himself as a mere sperm donor. So, he began to screw prostitutes to feel sexual desire again. The fact that they were from Meadowdale guaranteed discretion as the police have no control over this area. I’m sure if we check the Petersons’ bank accounts we’ll find traces that’ll prove my point ”         “ Except you’re forgetting something. The wife was there, in the house, the night of the kidnapping.” Though Elise was right, Terry was still convinced she was somehow right. She remained quiet for a short moment, thinking about different alternatives to her hypothesis.       “Then, I guess we’ll have to interrogate the Petersons.” Svoboda thought about protesting for a splint second but when she saw that glimmer in Olsen’s eyes she smiled genuinely. “I drive, Victoria Secret.” Still, she didn’t want a partner. 

[NEXT CHAPTER]