No. First, Phix answers to an Power and Authority which spans many worlds and and species. She is herself a Power. She owes no explanations to anyone here. She may give some out of friendship.
Second, I point out that causality only applies when dealing with a one-way stream of time. It is entirely possible, in this here-and-now, that Phix has yet to visit Shelly in her closed and reversed time bubble.
I suspect that repairing the closed loop of time was only one concern of the Library, one of many. On the scale on which it operates, it may not have even been a major one.
She was against it but has adapted to it with much less whineing than Monica.
Perhaps it’s part of her Sphinx heritage. Even if she didn’t know about it she WAS part of the ‘goings on’
I’m reminded of when she first met Tepoz ‘the badger’. She was going hellsbells on him at first but soon happily joined in with it.
Same as Bud. She was nervous about her sure but..she was scared about what she could DO to people..not who she was.
Probably a lot of adaptability is due to her being Comanche. She’s grown up with a much more open view of spiritual and supernatural possibilities than Monica.
Having gone on her Vision Quest, dying, and being revived by someone like Jin can do things to you that make you flexible about what is real.
I agree with that. My dad was Choctaw/Arapaho, but not really raised with a lot of the traditional ways. Ma was Kiowa/Comanche, and raised us in those ways. We spent the 70s in the SF Bay Area, kinda how Shelly’s family are up in Minnesota, and having a anchor to the old ways is comforting when you’re not a local. Our tradtions will allow us to take a few “impossible” situation in stride.
Also, Shelly has been shown to be more impetuous and hot-headed than Monica, and she doesn’t have Monica’s experience of being sent to the Retreat for the Extremely Nervous, which leaves Monica with a certain restraint in dealing with or mentioning the supernatural.
As I see it, the Shelly we know (knew) and love (loved) is gone, probably dead. This is a Shelly from a different time line from before the last time the calendar machine reset time last. She exists because, like Phix, she was outside of time when it reset. Every time the machine reset time, a new Shelly was born, became a Sphinx, went to the grove, and released the Shelly from the last time around. Since our Shelly had not become a Sphnx (probably someting to do with the calendar machine being destroyed) she did not survive. If I understand it right, it makes me sad. Shelly is still in the comic, but the one I grew to love is dead. Or, does anyone have a better explanation?
In reply to that post way back. It is my contention that the Shelly we saw holding the relic and the one we see the day before are different as everyone is wearing different gear for no appearant reason. If you are Shelly why take off the backpack and put on a shirt just to take the relic back. Yes the others put on clothing but why do it in a split second just to see what she sees? It makes more sense that this is a scene of Shelly 1 preparing to leave and then the next day she finishes her sentence in the forest.
You need to look back at the pages in April starting with Bud wearing the piece of the submarine. First Bud dressed like she is in today’s page, then she fixed her hair and went to Monica’s. Monica put her shirt on before Shelly arrived. It was only Shelly and Tina that dressed just before Shelly’s trip. None of them knew what was going to happen when she used the relic, so why would they have dressed for that?
But that violates the law of causality. For this to happen, Shelley would have to wait 40,000 years, enter the forest in the future, put the plutonium in the tree, then wait another 40,000 years as time rewinded to meet herself; but she can’t do this because she just died. The only way thsi could happen would be if she survived the radiation, popped out of the forest, and there will be 2 Shelleys for 40,000 years … That doesn’t make sense either.
Wow, so all they saw was she touched it, and suddenly her hair got longer and her clothes were gone. For Shelley, 80k years passed and she watched “herself” die 56 times.
“…and then I sat there for fifteen hundred years and a sphinx visited for a while after about three hundrfed and then I appeared and I died and then I sat there for fifteen hundred years and…”
Phix has got to answer for. She never hinted at any of this or warned Shelly. Maybe she couldn’t and maybe she chose not to warn any of our characters.
hard to say with time in one realm moveing forward and the other going backwards and the library existing outside of time phix could have always known but telling her or stoping her would stop something that had alrdy happened and thats the kind of stuff that causes paradoxes and rips holes in the universe
People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually – from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint – it’s more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly…timey-wimey…stuff.
It would have helped to use the first (third) person quasi-dual future pluimperfect linear semi-passive re-optative mood. Of course, that only could be done in Classic Gallifreyan.
In the real world, it’s more than an assumption. Time has never been shown to flow backwards. Slow down, yes. Reverse, no. Jump around, no. I don’t believe there is any provable case of effect preceeding cause, time flow wise.
Phix may not have visited Shelly yet. The Biblioteki’s time sees to be coterminous with the Real World time. So until a few minutes ago Shelly hasn’t traveled to the Sacred Forest realm. So Phix may get the needed clue to visit Shelly to import the knowledge, wisdom and needed companionship to allow Shellinx to do her thing.
Phix has consistently stayed out of the game. She gave Monica the book because she was supposed to. Anything else she did nothing but offer encouragement. Brandi’s book was her’s to begin with. So Phix not saying anything is totally consistent with her. Her reply would be, That’s my job.
Exactly! But “head-Librarian” seems to entail much much more than putting books back where they belong, me thinks.
I think it’s about time she popped in and gave some motherly warmth to Shelly while explaining some more. I believe she can now, because time is fixed, and progressing as it should for the first time in 80-something thousand years.
Besides, as a former library worker, I also know that there’s just too much information out there to tell everyone everything. You don’t even know what they are interested in until they ask.
And who ever asked Phix about Shelly–or even knew enough that they might need to ask?
That’s assuming that Phix HAS visited Shelley the Sphinx yet. Maybe the reason she goes to see, is because this iteration of the character goes and tells her that she will?
i *think* he means that the library works different time wise so monica and shellinx could poit over tomorrow and tell phix she had visited shellinx and for THAT to be the cause that phix actually goes to the time-forest to visit her.
Not only were questions answered, but they were answered without raising more questions. Clearly this means that Paul intends to raise a huge number of questions in the future and want s the plate cleared so that we can spend all our time speculating about those.
I wonder… Does he have QWERTYUASDFGHJZXCVB mirrored in his forhead from all the head-on-keyboard banging ,and decided to put an end to the wild conjecture because he started to doubt himself??? 😆 😆
I learned in a math class in college that statistically speaking the properties landed on most frequently are the Red, Orange, Yellow and Green. If you own all of those, you are far more likely to win than if you own Boardwalk and Park Place. 🙂
I never went for the dark blues. I prefer the light blues, cause its easy to get them to hotels, which would then get me money for the oranges. (watching my friend counting the spaces to my hotel instead of free-parking has always been a personal joy of mine) Then I would get the greens next.
but stats mean almost nothing in single games. I played once where my cousin went around the board not once but twice without landing on any properties. He had to trade his get out of jail free card and $500 just to get his first one. the dice were not with him that evening….
Ah, but did Shelly end up in the forest because of Fate, or because Phix kept her mouth shut?
Paradox is overrated, especially since the whole damn universe keeps getting reset…
i ment which shelly was in the forest. or which shelly segment was shellinx going through.
did phix turn up immediatly after shelly arrived or was it later after a couple of shelly had died.
I think most of the Shellys died so quickly that the odds of a Shelly being alive at any random time was pretty much nill. If Phix needed to have a Shelly there, she probably could have timed her arrival appropriately, though.
Aaand..some “journey” it was. I tend to believe that Phix knew already what was going to happen. I mean, she acted almost like a Mom or guardian to Shelly.. (oh, and how come girls in turtle-neck knitted sweaters are sooo cuuute??)
Indy was supposed to sword fight the guy originally, but Ford was suffering from the “trots” that day and didn’t the energy. He discussed it with the director and stuntman and they improvised that scene. Funny that it’s the one people always remember.
Well, I got my version of the facts from an interview Harrison Ford did on one of the ABC news shows. Of course, being an actor, he might have “improvised” this version of the story. But it did tumble from his lips, so I’ll accept it as fact.
I thought i read that the knot got its name because a fellow named Gordias tied it.
Hmmm. As nearly as i can tell from the Wikipedia article about the knot, it got the name because Godias tied it, after entering the city of Telmissus (the ancient capital of Phrygia) driving an ox-cart, which, because of a prophecy, made him King of Phrygia. (ABout 8th Century BC)
However, by the time Alexander showed up (333 BC), it seems that the city’s name had been changed to Gordium.
That book has a classic American retelling of the Gordian Knot story, wherein the kid actually unties it and wins free pizza for a year (or life?)–but he’s allergic to pizza.
I’m sure its been mentioned before that when the ‘host’ body dies the demons usually go straight back to demonville.
I would assume they would immediatly go and grab another host but I’m usually incorrect on these matters 😀
At least she wasn’t quite as alone as we thought. That’s good. Perhaps the sphinxes use the forest as a sort of R&R place to unwind.
Obviously Phix couldn’t help her, either for time related reasons or because she was forbidden by higher authority. At least she visited and helped her understand what was going on. I wonder though, did all those sphinxes she met visit her or did sphinx Shelly visit other realms from time to time?
Too bad she’s not immortal now. Next big question is, can she transform? All in all, she’s taking being a sphinx in stride. Not like she has a choice, of course.
I’ve assumed sphinx were like cats but perhaps they’re more like dogs 🙂
Or maybe its a gateway.
Sure it was Shelly-Omega to Shelly-Alpha for Shellinx but perhaps for the Sphinx it was a way for them to travel back in time for them to be able to kill demons.
If the forest was anything like around Watersmeet, Devon(and the realm’s trees look suspiciously like they look there), there’s a delightful victorian tea-house that I can really imagine being frequented by sphinxes ,chatting and enjoying the R&R…. 😛
Does this denote an appearance from Phix soon? Which in all likelihood will freak Tina out some more. Though rereading the one from yesterday, I wonder if Tina’s really freaking out because of Shelly’s new sphinx perfume, or just how wonky Shelly’s now 80k aura must have looked to her.
I’m sure she will be the same as she always has been.
After all she said that she has always been a sphinx.
She is just more aware of it now.
The 80k years will have had an effect on her that she will be more grown up but well..other than that 🙂
I cannot understand why everyone seems to think anything has been explained, cuz I’m still perplexed.
If a single sphinx could not be harmed in the tree realm, then who was in danger when Phix came to visit? Who are these demon hunters of which she speaks? There were other visitors while she was in the tree realm? Who and when? Can Shelly transform into her sphinx form on earth, given that her lifespan is still limited to human scale?
Seems to me the only thing that’s been made clear is that Shelly is not currently a danger to Tina…
“Seems to me the only thing that’s been made clear is that Shelly is not currently a danger to Tina…”
You’re correct. While all that other stuff is interesting, it’s Shelly’s reintegration into the group and interactions with those close to her that’s going to make for great reading now. Paul will probably give out that related info by drips and drabs as things proceed. It’s not really important to know at this point.
Well, as far as I’ve understood it there’s demon-hunting and non-demon-hunting sphinxes, and she’s one of the latter – i.e. Tina actually doesn’t need to freak out about Shelly…
Unless she does something to get Shelly really, really riled. Even a non-demon-hunting Sphinx could probably take out a deserving demon. But only if Tina deserves it.
Shelly is definatly shellinx and remembers being a sphinx (check)
Shelly was not alone in the forest and had company (check)
Shelly spoke to Phix about being a sphinx (check)
Shelly was a physical manifestation in the forest and not just a mind manifestation (check)
There are two types of Sphinx (check)
She wasnt alone there which accounts for her not being insane (check)
Shelly won’t kill Tina and everyones/tinas fears of the pouncing followed by the grr-arrgh won’t happen (check)
no explinations but immensly satisfying to check off a few things we have been pondering about.
And yes..if you look in the comments peeps HAVE been pondering on if there were two types of sphinx 😉
Right. I would say there are at least two types of sphinxes. Also, it’s good to have the view sphinx Shelly was talking to another sphinx just before she came back, and not some pretend conversation to Shelly Alpha’s corpse.
Which might raise another question: Are they separate species (or the equivalent) or merely separate cultures, or even different jobs? That is, what really distinguishes the groups?
We don’t have many clues to tellus. If I were to hazard a guess, and I will, I would say heritage and culture mostly. Phix’s case demonstrated the sphinxes, as individuals, can hold contrary views to the accepted norms for their species. This would indicate it’s not all in their instincts alone.
I know at least ONE person is going to (deliberately) make me regret asking, but here it goes:
Did our Shelly (from the comic we’ve been following since 2001) meet thousands-of-years-old Sphinx Shelly, die via radiation, then get replaced with Sphinx Shelly (hence the “That’s not Shelly!”)?
.
Or did our Shelly touch the artifact, enter an anti-time microuniverse, become a Sphinx, meet every other Shelly from latest to earliest for tens of thousands of years, then finally return to the moment she left?
OK good. I mean I figured the one that we saw die saying “the calendar” was the biggest confirmation, but I still couldn’t tell if Tina was saying she’s different coz she’s a Sphinx or that she wasn’t “their” Shelly. I mean being trapped in that forest universe for TENS of THOUSANDS of years sucks enough as it is, but at least now we know she had some company (besides herselves). And I gotta say, she looks damn cool with paws and wings.
Yes she does. Makes me wonder. What if we did have that gene and any of us could become a sphinx? Not only that, but you would be immortal on earth and could transform at any time. All you had to do was guard the time tree forest for 80,000 years. Who among us would actually take up on that offer? Would it really be worth it? We get bored with the same thing in a few hours. Get cabin fever if we have to stay indoors for a week. I can’t even imagine doing the same thing for 80 years, let alone 80,000.
If there was a portal to the library, and occasional visits, I would.
I have the vague inklin’ that time and it’s progression is experienced quite different by immortal beings. Being immortal is a standard thing for them. I bet their brains are wired for it.
Shelly, on the other hand is a hybrid, and bored pretty quick. I can only hope her realm was bigger than that bunch of trees, say ,a complete planet, so she would have some exploring left to do.
Heck ,If I were immortal and invulnerable, I’d walk&swim to the USA via Russia and Alaska, and on to Argentina. just for fun. Stuff like that. If You got all the time?
It’s actually kind of funny to think that what Shelly is saying in the first panel makes more sense to we, the reading public, than it would to Monica…I still do not think Shelly has told them ANYTHING about the tree realm yet.
Then in the third panel she ignores Monica’s question from the second panel. She seems to be answering questions that nobody in the room is asking but that she wants to answer before they get asked, almost a side effect from spending so much time alone. Before anyone says anything I know she wasn’t totally alone, she just said she wasn’t alone the whole time, I just mean that she probably spent a lot of the 80k years alone.
In the third panel she seems to be both: 1) continuing her train of thought from panel #1 and 2) responding to Bud’s comment regarding Tina.
I get the impression that Shelley’s memories are coming back fairly quickly regarding the “current time” or else she’s just become exceptional at reading people and situations from all her “thinking time”
Shelly did say that she was in a place where a single sphinx could not be harmed. She was saying something about the tree realm then, but hasn’t even mentioned that there are trees there.
Shelly is saying things in a strange way, but that’s fairly normal in the comic. “I learned as much from her words as I did from her silence” sounds like something that someone might write, but wouldn’t normally say.
This is a strange situation for Shelly. She is really talking to us. I don’t think you can read anything more than those two things from the way she is talking today.
It seems to be just dawning on Monica that she has done something really bad to her best friend. Bud, OTOH, has that “been there done that, burned the blood soaked tee-shirt with fire breath” nonchalant look.
Reverse the order you say. Hmmm, I hadn’t thought of that let’s see how that reads.
“Them of one not I’m.”
“Them of some met I’ve.”
“Hunter Demon a not I’m that say just let’s.”
Okay I have to disagree with you here this just sounds like gibberish to me.
After I wrote my comment I read it over and couldn’t stop thinking that when you read it that way it sounds like Yoda from Star Wars. So I searched up this actual dialog from Yoda and thought he could almost be talking to Shellinx in the Tree Realm.
“It is the future you see. ”
“Difficult to see. Always in motion is the future.”
“Decide you must, how to serve them best. If you leave now, help them you could; but you would destroy all for which they have fought, and suffered.”
“I’m not one of them.”
“I’ve met some of them.”
“Let’s just say that I’m not a demon hunter.”
I think that’s what Yamara meant.
I thought the “Yes…and No” refered to Tina’s statement from yesterday but now I’m not so sure. It does kind of make sense if you assume that she’s still, partially, thinking backwards to compensate for reverse in time that she spent 80K years in.
And then, possibly, the conversation from Monica’s and Bud’s ears is in the order it’s written and the conversation from Shelly’s point of view is 3 to 1.
That seems to imply that Phix said more than Shelly thought she might have, under the circumstances. It seems to indicate that Phix was actively being helpful. It also seems to indicate that Shelly would have expected Phix to not want to say much, perhaps because Phix should feel guilty.
I can understand why Tina would detect a differnece in Shelly via her aura, but why has neither Shelly nor Monica noticed Shelly’s obviously longer hair since her clothes suddenly disappeared?
There’s a distinct difference between noticing and commenting. For example, women are likely to notice when a fellow female coworker is showing signs of being pregnant, but they won’t say anything until it is confirmed out of courtesy since said coworker could just be getting fat. 🙂
It’s all about the timing of a comment, gents. The hair thing will come up once everyone’s calmed down a smidge about the rest of the situation. The nakedness was probably brought up because it was the more shockingly noticeable aspect of change, but the hair can wait.
Noticed, of course they have. But those have been minor issues compared to Shelly’s originally blank, uncomprehending stare, then her ‘definateness’ towards Monica, then Tina’s freaking out and Shelly’s monologue…
It is odd–but it’s a Greek consonant-stem, Σφίγξ. The plural would generally take the ξ (ks) off, and a -κες (-kes) or -γες (-ges), depending on the word. In this case, for whatever reason, the Greeks went with the -ges.
Worse, it could lead to things like:
How many hinges could spinges tinge
if spinges could tinge hinges?
or
Unhinged binging sphinges cringe at impinging syringes
“One hen; two ducks; three squawking geese; four Limerick oysters; five corpulent porpoises; six pairs of Don Alversos tweezers; 7,000 Macedonians in full battle array; eight brass monkeys from the ancient sacred crypts of Egypt; nine apathetic, sympathetic, diabetic old men on roller skates with a marked propensity toward procrastination and sloth; 10 lyrical, spherical, diabolical denizens of the deep who hall stall around the corner of the quo of the quay of the quivery, all at the [very] same time. ”
(My dad used to quote that to me all the time; it’s an announcer’s test, but he used it to mean a whole lot Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot-Interrogative events. Like Sphynges.)
Diligent rationing of found food I’d bet… you know, things that might wander into the area and die… small but very beefy and muscular things that come along…
I don’t know what FatUncle thought answered the question, but I suspect that he thought the other sphinxes brought food. Eating the Shellys wouldn’t go very far because only one would show up every 1450 years.
I think she just didn’t need to eat there. If she couldn’t be harmed and couldn’t die, she couldn’t starve. Problem solved! 😀
in all seriousness, she probably didn’t need to eat. If you can’t die, that means you can’t starve, and she probably isn’t perpetually hungry, living 80k years mostly alone is torture enough. Maybe there was an apple tree area of tree land?
oooh, better yet, she gathered her power *because* she eats herself! like highlander… with canabalism.
quick, everyone start eating past and/or future versions of yourselves to see if you grow wings and a tail!
It does nothing LIKE begging the question! “Begging the question” is a logical fallacy where the point to be proved is instead assumed as the place of beginning, as thus:
Sam is really mad right now.
How do you know that?
I know because he’s so angry.
THAT is begging the question!! It is NOT “raising the question,” which is what you meant–and utterly failed–to say.
Whatever dude. I am already happy I speak more languages besides my native Dutch, like, say, German ,French, Frysian ,Drenthian dialect AND a bit of Spanish…… :raspberry:
By the way. Look: Shelly’s face is already getting less haggard. Her eye-bags are gone ,for one.
She’s reverting to ori-Shell. Good!
Old ‘n tired face Shell was somewhat disconcerting. Though she still looks a bit like what Paula said yesterday :”Will they still like me” Time for “Busty-Mom-hug”
Paul did clue us in yesterday with Shelly’s mortal/sphinx hybrid remark. And the nature of a mortal hybrid was different from what I was expecting, as well.
so here’s some speculation…
If Phix could visit Shelly in the TTF, why couldn’t Shelly go to L-space? It seems as though it would be an easy out for the whole trapped thing….
Maybe by then Shelly knew she had to stay, to give the many Shelly-deaths meaning, or because if she left too soon bad things would happen. That is, she could escape–but at what cost?
For Shelly
.
For who I was and what I was
I sang a song of life and love
I sought no answers and read no books
Enjoyed the sun and lovers looks.
.
I did not know or want to see
I did not look but found a tree
The truth was hard and shook my soul
As I filled up with long ago.
.
There is no song to change the past
The way has turned to another track
Who knows the way the future goes
As I life a life I can’t have back.
Well, summarizing what Charles R. Swindoll said, 90% of life is attitude. If Shelly wants her old life back, it’s up to her to reclaim it. Of course, she may no longer want that life. It’s pretty much a matter of “how ya gonna keep ’em down on the farm” for her now. Whole new worlds are open to her. Entire new views and philosophies. She has received an education far beyond any university or any normal school of hard knocks.
I think there could be more to it than that. Experiences change people, for better or worse. Sometimes the experience can be so overwhelming that your unable to even comprehend who you used to be, what you worried about or why the people you are with matter to you.
The question is, is Shelly still Shelly?
…and the answer is yes, she is :P. She has a lot of time under her belt, but shes still her. When she was being all cryptic and slightly manipulative to get herself to cut the tree, she still just got frustrated and lost her patience and rolled her eyes.
If there was a tractor motor around at the time, I’m shure she would have thrown it into orbit.
…and that was a very Shelly-esque style of manipulation, too.
Kind of like the article i read Many Years Ago,about the the three “hunting season” Warner Bros cartoons.
The article pointed out that Daffy is just as smart as Bugs, just as able to see what he needs to do to control the situation … but he gets too anxious, too excited, and gets ahead of himself. And Bugs, who has a cooler head, comes out ahead.
On his own, dealing with Porky or Elmer, Daffy does a lot better.
I really do feel for Monica. Shelly used to be like her, a regular person witnessing strange events. Now she’s on the other side of the river, with the supernaturals, an ancient entity with human qualities but greater knowledge and experience with the preternatural world. Monica’s sort of lost a friend. They can become re-acquainted, sure, and even be close again, like Monica is with Tina and the chimera kids. But it won’t ever be like it was. Shelly and her are no longer on the same ground.
I guess that will apply for all of Shelly’s loved ones… She’ll see them now as someone peering across a great expanse at distant figures, and however close they come, a gulf will still rest between them.
Not yet, but soon. Right now I think that Monica is simply appalled that she sent her friend away to be mostly alone for 80,000 years (she didn’t really, but she’ll still feel responsible). And she won’t feel any better when she learns that Shelly had to watch 56 Shellys die.
That reminds me of two recent back-to-back volumes of Perry Rhodan (the biggest weekly Sci-Fi novel series ever) where one of the immortals that make up part of the cast aged 9.6 million(!) years while running an errand in some kinda subspace-fold that’s best summed up as “collecting a few vital bits of stuff that are scattered over the length of several light years – on foot!” while for the rest of the cast just a few hours passed…
(And no, I don’t think that left him the same as before either – but that’s something for future issues to tell…)
One thing that jumped out at me was Shelly saying, “I was somewhere that a single sphinx could not be harmed.” Earlier, she said that she couldn’t be harmed there.
Putting that together, was she saying that she is the only sphinx ever that could not be harmed there? If so, can she flee there anytime she wants and be safe? Was she protected there because there was some special duty for her (and her alone?) to perform there? If so, did it have to do with the trees?
I suspect so. The concept of a Sacred Forest may come from traditional African worship, but the idea seems similar to Native American practices, too. Shelly may have been selected as an appropriate guardian for that. However, she talked about it as if were already obsolete technology. However, with time going backwards there, if she is destined to return, she might wind up continuing to guarding it while the technology becomes current. Or maybe it had nothing to do with her background and she just happened to be selected because she was the first sphinx there.
Another possible interpretation is that a lone sphinx would be safe, but if any other sphinxes were there, they all would be vulnerable. That seems strange. Or maybe there is something there that automatically protects a sphinx if it is there, but it can only cover one at a time, so it ignores the presence of any additional sphinxes.
Another possibility is that sphinxes have enemies so they normally stay in riddles for protection, but there any sphinx would be safe, even when by themselves. That would seem to indicate that Shelly is in danger now, but perhaps staying in human form is enough to mask that she’s a sphinx and keep her out of danger.
I picture Phix visiting Shelly, waiting till Shelly finishes her insanity outburst, then Gibbs slaps Shelly. Ergo, one sphinx is always perfectly safe–and Shelly can’t be seriously injured or killed.
Shelly said she was in a place where one sphynx is invulnerable. When Phix was there, one of them couldn’t have been invulnerable if the rules are “one sphynx”.
I tried very hard to find a video clip of the scene I was picturing; I couldn’t find it solo, but try here and fast-forward to 3:18. Necessary info: Tony, a good guy, is the one in jail interrogating himself; Gibbs, Tony’s boss and also a good guy, brings pizza. Also, a slap upside the head is, according to NCIS, “a wake-up call”–not technically damaging, but will make someone say “Ow!”
Before all this I would have scoffed at such an idea, but now … Perhaps it’s why Shelly was so drawn to him. Only another sphinx-in-waiting can really bring her into heat?
Monica’s having trouble understanding that Shelly did in fact leave and return. Not only that, but she was gone for 80,000 years. And she is now sphinxified. Monica is going to have some adjusting to do too. Shelly has had millenia to come to grips with this. Monica is going to be a while coming to grips what it means. E i g h t y t h o u s a n d years! Bud will not let her get all emo. I think Tina will be okay with this too. One more in the club.
Hmm, I see in here people talking about Shelly needing a haircut when all this is over. But I have to ask, Why? In my opinion her hair looks better like this. I like it better anyway.
It’s a shame she would not be immortal after going through 80,000 years of existence, or at least really long lived. It seems like such a waste. I wonder about Phix. If she stayed in human form would she, likewise, age as a human and die, or is that only for human sphinx hybrids?
Who knows, perhaps in the distant future, when the arc wraps up, all the mortals involved will become immortal in beginning the next great story arc.
Ok i think i get it. Shellys time-forrest did run reverse to the Callendermachine. Now shes 80k years old. Could it be that she actually became one of her own ancestors if some of the other sphinxes have “courted” her?
And what about the Bunny? In what kind of relationship are shamanic spirits linked to this entire mumbo-jumbo of supernatural powers and beings. Is her super-strength linked to her sphinx part or to the bunny?
And how does that work for Tina? Somehow she reminds me to a shinigami from death-note. I wonder how she realized that things like does she see the age of person? As some kind of counter mayhaps?
Phiiiiiiiiix!!!! You got some explaining to dooooo!!!
Ah but will she be able to 🙂
She already did some.
No. First, Phix answers to an Power and Authority which spans many worlds and and species. She is herself a Power. She owes no explanations to anyone here. She may give some out of friendship.
Second, I point out that causality only applies when dealing with a one-way stream of time. It is entirely possible, in this here-and-now, that Phix has yet to visit Shelly in her closed and reversed time bubble.
I suspect that repairing the closed loop of time was only one concern of the Library, one of many. On the scale on which it operates, it may not have even been a major one.
Yea Minor What is 80K year time loop compared to a 13.75 billion years in Space time? I think the calendar machine was cause more headache. No?
PBH
Especially when you consider that the library and the place where Shelly was, were outside of the calender machine “groundhog day” time loop.
Actually, as this is the ‘beginning’ of Shelly’s loop, Phix could not visit sometime in the future. That’s before Shelly came along.
that answers alot
and yet gives us more questions also 😀
I think it’s ironic that Shelly was really against getting involved in any of the super-natural stuff a couple of years ago.
Bet she didn’t see this coming back then 🙂
She was against it but has adapted to it with much less whineing than Monica.
Perhaps it’s part of her Sphinx heritage. Even if she didn’t know about it she WAS part of the ‘goings on’
I’m reminded of when she first met Tepoz ‘the badger’. She was going hellsbells on him at first but soon happily joined in with it.
Same as Bud. She was nervous about her sure but..she was scared about what she could DO to people..not who she was.
Probably a lot of adaptability is due to her being Comanche. She’s grown up with a much more open view of spiritual and supernatural possibilities than Monica.
Having gone on her Vision Quest, dying, and being revived by someone like Jin can do things to you that make you flexible about what is real.
I agree with that. My dad was Choctaw/Arapaho, but not really raised with a lot of the traditional ways. Ma was Kiowa/Comanche, and raised us in those ways. We spent the 70s in the SF Bay Area, kinda how Shelly’s family are up in Minnesota, and having a anchor to the old ways is comforting when you’re not a local. Our tradtions will allow us to take a few “impossible” situation in stride.
Also, Shelly has been shown to be more impetuous and hot-headed than Monica, and she doesn’t have Monica’s experience of being sent to the Retreat for the Extremely Nervous, which leaves Monica with a certain restraint in dealing with or mentioning the supernatural.
As I see it, the Shelly we know (knew) and love (loved) is gone, probably dead. This is a Shelly from a different time line from before the last time the calendar machine reset time last. She exists because, like Phix, she was outside of time when it reset. Every time the machine reset time, a new Shelly was born, became a Sphinx, went to the grove, and released the Shelly from the last time around. Since our Shelly had not become a Sphnx (probably someting to do with the calendar machine being destroyed) she did not survive. If I understand it right, it makes me sad. Shelly is still in the comic, but the one I grew to love is dead. Or, does anyone have a better explanation?
Nope. This Shelley IS our Shelley, from before she most recently touched the artifact.
It’s been confirmed by Paul that this is the most recent, the one who helped break the CM loop, the one who ‘resisted arrest’, etc.
Read this:
http://wapsisquare.com/comic/blew-her-clothes/comment-page-1/#comment-47049
In reply to that post way back. It is my contention that the Shelly we saw holding the relic and the one we see the day before are different as everyone is wearing different gear for no appearant reason. If you are Shelly why take off the backpack and put on a shirt just to take the relic back. Yes the others put on clothing but why do it in a split second just to see what she sees? It makes more sense that this is a scene of Shelly 1 preparing to leave and then the next day she finishes her sentence in the forest.
You need to look back at the pages in April starting with Bud wearing the piece of the submarine. First Bud dressed like she is in today’s page, then she fixed her hair and went to Monica’s. Monica put her shirt on before Shelly arrived. It was only Shelly and Tina that dressed just before Shelly’s trip. None of them knew what was going to happen when she used the relic, so why would they have dressed for that?
But that violates the law of causality. For this to happen, Shelley would have to wait 40,000 years, enter the forest in the future, put the plutonium in the tree, then wait another 40,000 years as time rewinded to meet herself; but she can’t do this because she just died. The only way thsi could happen would be if she survived the radiation, popped out of the forest, and there will be 2 Shelleys for 40,000 years … That doesn’t make sense either.
Wow, so all they saw was she touched it, and suddenly her hair got longer and her clothes were gone. For Shelley, 80k years passed and she watched “herself” die 56 times.
Harsh.
And in the blink of an eye, she now has 80,000 years of stories to tell!
Just sit right back and hear a tale, a tale of a fateful sphinx….
And an 80 eon trip…
“…and then I sat there for fifteen hundred years and a sphinx visited for a while after about three hundrfed and then I appeared and I died and then I sat there for fifteen hundred years and…”
Rinse and repeat.
You forgot “Lather”.
No i didn’t.
He was thirty years old today.
Fairportfan: I hear young folk call him famous…
/me sends newspaper clippings
And started in a forrest grove
…that lasted just a blip.
Phix has got to answer for. She never hinted at any of this or warned Shelly. Maybe she couldn’t and maybe she chose not to warn any of our characters.
hard to say with time in one realm moveing forward and the other going backwards and the library existing outside of time phix could have always known but telling her or stoping her would stop something that had alrdy happened and thats the kind of stuff that causes paradoxes and rips holes in the universe
That was what I was thinking of when I say that perhaps she couldn’t.
Or couldn’t for other reasons.
Often in stories of magic/the supernatural if you’re told in advance about something, it doesn’t happen of it goes wrong because you know about it.
Sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy in reverse.
[River Song]Spoilers, sweetie![/River Song]
Or you see a bunch of butterflies in the Amazon basin flapping their wings.
People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually – from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint – it’s more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly…timey-wimey…stuff.
Started well, that sentence.
It would have helped to use the first (third) person quasi-dual future pluimperfect linear semi-passive re-optative mood. Of course, that only could be done in Classic Gallifreyan.
… and only in writing, as Classic Gallifreyan was developed by a race of deaf-mutes.
In the real world, it’s more than an assumption. Time has never been shown to flow backwards. Slow down, yes. Reverse, no. Jump around, no. I don’t believe there is any provable case of effect preceeding cause, time flow wise.
Phix ‘may’ have only just visited Shellinx a couple of seconds ago also 😀
Phix may not have visited Shelly yet. The Biblioteki’s time sees to be coterminous with the Real World time. So until a few minutes ago Shelly hasn’t traveled to the Sacred Forest realm. So Phix may get the needed clue to visit Shelly to import the knowledge, wisdom and needed companionship to allow Shellinx to do her thing.
Actually, Shelly’s 80,000-plus year habitation of the Sacred Forest just ended.
Phix has consistently stayed out of the game. She gave Monica the book because she was supposed to. Anything else she did nothing but offer encouragement. Brandi’s book was her’s to begin with. So Phix not saying anything is totally consistent with her. Her reply would be, That’s my job.
Exactly! But “head-Librarian” seems to entail much much more than putting books back where they belong, me thinks.
I think it’s about time she popped in and gave some motherly warmth to Shelly while explaining some more. I believe she can now, because time is fixed, and progressing as it should for the first time in 80-something thousand years.
Besides, as a former library worker, I also know that there’s just too much information out there to tell everyone everything. You don’t even know what they are interested in until they ask.
And who ever asked Phix about Shelly–or even knew enough that they might need to ask?
…and very often, they don’t know what they want.
But they think they do.
That’s, no doubt, very true, It’s said that to find the right answer, one must first know the right question.
That’s assuming that Phix HAS visited Shelley the Sphinx yet. Maybe the reason she goes to see, is because this iteration of the character goes and tells her that she will?
Not much doubt there. Or am I missing something?
i *think* he means that the library works different time wise so monica and shellinx could poit over tomorrow and tell phix she had visited shellinx and for THAT to be the cause that phix actually goes to the time-forest to visit her.
Not only were questions answered, but they were answered without raising more questions. Clearly this means that Paul intends to raise a huge number of questions in the future and want s the plate cleared so that we can spend all our time speculating about those.
Well, somes questions were raised.
What did Phix know and when did she know it? What does she know about the Relic and it’s significance?
Also, who are these other sphinxes? and how did Phix acquire such knowledge on the relic?
He loves to torture us.
Yup
But we line up for the torture happily 😉
We’re masochists. XD
Hey, speak for yourself – I’m American…
Oh, wait, not “Macedonian”.
Never mind…
I don’t think of it as torture. I love the anticipation…
Or clearly this means Paul is getting tired of reading 500+ comments 😛
How strange if this sudden rush to answer all our questions is just to shut us all up so he can get on with the Important part of the Story.
I wonder… Does he have QWERTYUASDFGHJZXCVB mirrored in his forhead from all the head-on-keyboard banging ,and decided to put an end to the wild conjecture because he started to doubt himself??? 😆 😆
quick grab his gravatar and slap that on there for him, just so newbies know what kinda crowd we are…
Well that’s straight forward and helpful. XD
And one another note, it seems to me that Shelly has developed a negative view on demon hunters.
But I’m just reading between the lines…
I’ve never met any but seems like they are a type of sphinx who kill first and ask questions later.
After all..Nudge was able to ve evicted from Tina.
Perhaps ALL the demons are able to but by killing the host it…inprisions the demons for a time?
Or killing the human is just the quick easy way of restoring a demon.
Or some sphinxes just get a charge out of spilling human blood…
Removing, not restoring…
But Nudge isn’t a demon…I get the feeling that was part of what made removing her in the way Phix did even possible.
“I’ve met some of them” — That implies that she’s had a lot of sphinx visitors. I wonder how many there are around.
i’m just glad she wasn’t on her own for 80k years (barring the odd shelly every so often)
Yes, I agree. That there were visitors, of any sort, conversations and some company other then her own dying self is very good to hear.
Hear hear. Apparently a lot of sphinxes (a sphinx sorority?) and maybe other beings as well. But we still don’t know where Conscience went…
Hey–Shelly may be odd, but not that much more than the rest of this crew of misfits… 😉
Considering that they’re immortal, maybe all of them.
Well. Lots of things I’ve been wondering about have been resolved nicely. Hazzah.
Give it 24hours and you will have a whole new set of things to ponder over. If you haven’t started considering some already 🙂
Oh I have, I didn’t say all 🙂
Seems like a lot of sphinxes landed on the Just Visiting border of Shelly’s prison.
So she’s had some socialization.
Of a kind.
I suppose there might have been some androsphinxes over the last 80,000 years.
How to explain that to Officer Crotch-Rocket? “But honey, it was on an opposite arrow of time! It didn’t mean anything!”
Hmm
which begs the question
if you were a sphinx – which plots in the monopoly board would you try to buy 😀
I always go Blue, Orange and Yellow 😀
I learned in a math class in college that statistically speaking the properties landed on most frequently are the Red, Orange, Yellow and Green. If you own all of those, you are far more likely to win than if you own Boardwalk and Park Place. 🙂
But owning those wouldn’t hurt…
I never went for the dark blues. I prefer the light blues, cause its easy to get them to hotels, which would then get me money for the oranges. (watching my friend counting the spaces to my hotel instead of free-parking has always been a personal joy of mine) Then I would get the greens next.
but stats mean almost nothing in single games. I played once where my cousin went around the board not once but twice without landing on any properties. He had to trade his get out of jail free card and $500 just to get his first one. the dice were not with him that evening….
“Sorry hun but you know what they say. Once you go androsphinx, umm you see it’s the best of all kinks?…”
Ah, but what if there WERE no androsphinxes? 80,000 years of built up lust, heading Justin’s way…
Phix isn’t making friends…
Well, let’s wait until they all hear Phix’s explanation. She may well have reasons with which they will agree.
I’m just wondering when or if she’s going to show up at Monica’s.
I’m sure Phix is very aware of the fact she could not say anything to Shelly. Time paradox and all that.
Ah, but did Shelly end up in the forest because of Fate, or because Phix kept her mouth shut?
Paradox is overrated, especially since the whole damn universe keeps getting reset…
Both
well that explains why she was so…non-helpful to Shelly.
Shellinx has been coached by Phix.
Okay now we need Monica to visit Phix.
Im curious on how the timeline would seem like to phix.
Did she visit Shellinx a couple of seconds ago or ages ago?
Shelly’s first(?) visit with Phix:
http://wapsisquare.com/comic/girlwiththekeys/
Yup
First in OUR timeline. :p
Wonder which Shelly was around when Shellinx was visited by Phix.
I think all of them since the library exists outside time.
i ment which shelly was in the forest. or which shelly segment was shellinx going through.
did phix turn up immediatly after shelly arrived or was it later after a couple of shelly had died.
I think most of the Shellys died so quickly that the odds of a Shelly being alive at any random time was pretty much nill. If Phix needed to have a Shelly there, she probably could have timed her arrival appropriately, though.
Shelly Omega’s first visit with Phix.
Not Phix’s first visit with Shelly Omega.
As another time traveler often says, “I believe we’ve already met.”
Maybe Shelly warned Phix about “spoilers”.
Something Important
Ah, one sphinx complimenting another (future) sphinx…
Aaand..some “journey” it was. I tend to believe that Phix knew already what was going to happen. I mean, she acted almost like a Mom or guardian to Shelly.. (oh, and how come girls in turtle-neck knitted sweaters are sooo cuuute??)
She had to have already visited Shelly there.
You know, some might compare these storylines to knots. Twisting, turning, doubling back.
I remember someone in history who needed to unravel an unbreakable knot.
HE USED A SWORD!
heh
that reminds me of the Indiana Jones scene with the guy all sword showy-offy and Indiana pulls out his gun and shoots him 😀
Indy was supposed to sword fight the guy originally, but Ford was suffering from the “trots” that day and didn’t the energy. He discussed it with the director and stuntman and they improvised that scene. Funny that it’s the one people always remember.
Q: But who was the swordsman?
A: David Prowse
Indy shot first.
Not according to IMDB – “Terry Richards – Arab swordsman”.
If it were actually Prowse, he’d be listed somewhere, if only in the “Trivia”. I mean, the producer as a pilot is listed in the “Credits” section.
Sorry, my mistake for not verifying my facts.
oddly enough they mentioned this on the ‘one show’ today
matt smith was there also (for the fans of dr who 😛 )
in that version Harrison Ford had got a bad back.
So says his stunt man anyway.
I heard that he hadn’t gotten the latest script pages until five minutes before and couldn’t recall what he was supposed to do.
/shrug.
Well, I got my version of the facts from an interview Harrison Ford did on one of the ABC news shows. Of course, being an actor, he might have “improvised” this version of the story. But it did tumble from his lips, so I’ll accept it as fact.
that was Alexander the Great
INDY SHOT ALEXANDER THE GREAT!?!?
Shush! You’re giving away the plot of the next movie.
Macedonians. I hate these guys.
+1!
Tx, I said five pluses! That’s one plus! Can’t you count?!
😉
Yes: King Alexander of Macedon, at Gordian. Which he went out of his way to visit to see and cut the knot.
I thought i read that the knot got its name because a fellow named Gordias tied it.
Hmmm. As nearly as i can tell from the Wikipedia article about the knot, it got the name because Godias tied it, after entering the city of Telmissus (the ancient capital of Phrygia) driving an ox-cart, which, because of a prophecy, made him King of Phrygia. (ABout 8th Century BC)
However, by the time Alexander showed up (333 BC), it seems that the city’s name had been changed to Gordium.
(Gordias, BTW, was the father of Midas.)
http://www.amazon.com/Maniac-Magee-Jerry-Spinelli/dp/0316809063
That book has a classic American retelling of the Gordian Knot story, wherein the kid actually unties it and wins free pizza for a year (or life?)–but he’s allergic to pizza.
Or killing the human is just the quick easy way of restoring a demon.
Or some sphinxes just get a charge out of spilling human blood…
Crap that was meant to go to Paula…
restoring a demon?
not sure what you mean there.
I’m sure its been mentioned before that when the ‘host’ body dies the demons usually go straight back to demonville.
I would assume they would immediatly go and grab another host but I’m usually incorrect on these matters 😀
Sorry. That was my stupid iPad’s auto correct feature. I meant REMOVING…
Maybe it’s different when a sphinx does the killing.
At least she wasn’t quite as alone as we thought. That’s good. Perhaps the sphinxes use the forest as a sort of R&R place to unwind.
Obviously Phix couldn’t help her, either for time related reasons or because she was forbidden by higher authority. At least she visited and helped her understand what was going on. I wonder though, did all those sphinxes she met visit her or did sphinx Shelly visit other realms from time to time?
Too bad she’s not immortal now. Next big question is, can she transform? All in all, she’s taking being a sphinx in stride. Not like she has a choice, of course.
I’ve assumed sphinx were like cats but perhaps they’re more like dogs 🙂
Or maybe its a gateway.
Sure it was Shelly-Omega to Shelly-Alpha for Shellinx but perhaps for the Sphinx it was a way for them to travel back in time for them to be able to kill demons.
Yes, but it might be a long wait to get back to when they want to go. Of course, being immortal, they might not mind the wait.
I have imagegry of sphinxs practicing ‘pouncing’ in the forest now 😀
yea..i shouldn’t be made to get up this early..8am to early for me :p
You can get used to/accept a lot of things in 80,000 years.
If the forest was anything like around Watersmeet, Devon(and the realm’s trees look suspiciously like they look there), there’s a delightful victorian tea-house that I can really imagine being frequented by sphinxes ,chatting and enjoying the R&R…. 😛
For those that want to know (oh..and notice the tree? hm? hm? hm?)
watersmeet
Ooooooo! I could live a few eons there!!! Very nice! Thanks, Jay-Em.
Does this denote an appearance from Phix soon? Which in all likelihood will freak Tina out some more. Though rereading the one from yesterday, I wonder if Tina’s really freaking out because of Shelly’s new sphinx perfume, or just how wonky Shelly’s now 80k aura must have looked to her.
If the timeline is that Phix knew about Shellinx the day she met Shelly then..
I am convinced that when she told Tina to not freak out over people ‘like her’ that she was informing her not to freak out over Shellinx
If the timeline is that Phix visited Shellinx 5seconds ago then well..hmm..got nada 😉
No It calls for a trip to the library… *Poif* PBH
As a side question, what is going to be like when she meets her dad? Is that something she may not remember?
If she can remember her friends I think she can remember her father.
I’m sure she will be the same as she always has been.
After all she said that she has always been a sphinx.
She is just more aware of it now.
The 80k years will have had an effect on her that she will be more grown up but well..other than that 🙂
He’s going to know something significant has changed.
Question is, did her father know of her potential?
I like that fact that she’s seeming more grown up. You can really notice the difference in her these past few comics and I really like it.
I cannot understand why everyone seems to think anything has been explained, cuz I’m still perplexed.
If a single sphinx could not be harmed in the tree realm, then who was in danger when Phix came to visit? Who are these demon hunters of which she speaks? There were other visitors while she was in the tree realm? Who and when? Can Shelly transform into her sphinx form on earth, given that her lifespan is still limited to human scale?
Seems to me the only thing that’s been made clear is that Shelly is not currently a danger to Tina…
This is only Tuesday. Give it till Friday, then see what questions remain.
…or arise.
Or reduce us all to catatonia.
“Seems to me the only thing that’s been made clear is that Shelly is not currently a danger to Tina…”
You’re correct. While all that other stuff is interesting, it’s Shelly’s reintegration into the group and interactions with those close to her that’s going to make for great reading now. Paul will probably give out that related info by drips and drabs as things proceed. It’s not really important to know at this point.
Well, as far as I’ve understood it there’s demon-hunting and non-demon-hunting sphinxes, and she’s one of the latter – i.e. Tina actually doesn’t need to freak out about Shelly…
Unless she does something to get Shelly really, really riled. Even a non-demon-hunting Sphinx could probably take out a deserving demon. But only if Tina deserves it.
Well, Phix has specifically said that she’s not one of the apos … but she seems quite capable of dealing with demons.
Or at least The Gang thought she was.
okies
not so much explained
more like … verified.
Shelly is definatly shellinx and remembers being a sphinx (check)
Shelly was not alone in the forest and had company (check)
Shelly spoke to Phix about being a sphinx (check)
Shelly was a physical manifestation in the forest and not just a mind manifestation (check)
There are two types of Sphinx (check)
She wasnt alone there which accounts for her not being insane (check)
Shelly won’t kill Tina and everyones/tinas fears of the pouncing followed by the grr-arrgh won’t happen (check)
no explinations but immensly satisfying to check off a few things we have been pondering about.
And yes..if you look in the comments peeps HAVE been pondering on if there were two types of sphinx 😉
Right. I would say there are at least two types of sphinxes. Also, it’s good to have the view sphinx Shelly was talking to another sphinx just before she came back, and not some pretend conversation to Shelly Alpha’s corpse.
Which might raise another question: Are they separate species (or the equivalent) or merely separate cultures, or even different jobs? That is, what really distinguishes the groups?
We don’t have many clues to tellus. If I were to hazard a guess, and I will, I would say heritage and culture mostly. Phix’s case demonstrated the sphinxes, as individuals, can hold contrary views to the accepted norms for their species. This would indicate it’s not all in their instincts alone.
I know at least ONE person is going to (deliberately) make me regret asking, but here it goes:
Did our Shelly (from the comic we’ve been following since 2001) meet thousands-of-years-old Sphinx Shelly, die via radiation, then get replaced with Sphinx Shelly (hence the “That’s not Shelly!”)?
.
Or did our Shelly touch the artifact, enter an anti-time microuniverse, become a Sphinx, meet every other Shelly from latest to earliest for tens of thousands of years, then finally return to the moment she left?
The latter, I think.
Door number 2. Paul has confirmed it.
OK good. I mean I figured the one that we saw die saying “the calendar” was the biggest confirmation, but I still couldn’t tell if Tina was saying she’s different coz she’s a Sphinx or that she wasn’t “their” Shelly. I mean being trapped in that forest universe for TENS of THOUSANDS of years sucks enough as it is, but at least now we know she had some company (besides herselves). And I gotta say, she looks damn cool with paws and wings.
Yes she does. Makes me wonder. What if we did have that gene and any of us could become a sphinx? Not only that, but you would be immortal on earth and could transform at any time. All you had to do was guard the time tree forest for 80,000 years. Who among us would actually take up on that offer? Would it really be worth it? We get bored with the same thing in a few hours. Get cabin fever if we have to stay indoors for a week. I can’t even imagine doing the same thing for 80 years, let alone 80,000.
Maybe sphinx are like domestic cats. Hunt 10% of the time and sleep the rest.
It would help make the millennia go by more quickly.
Bus Shelly says she’s not immortal on earth – “On Earth I’ll only live as long as any human.”
If there was a portal to the library, and occasional visits, I would.
I have the vague inklin’ that time and it’s progression is experienced quite different by immortal beings. Being immortal is a standard thing for them. I bet their brains are wired for it.
Shelly, on the other hand is a hybrid, and bored pretty quick. I can only hope her realm was bigger than that bunch of trees, say ,a complete planet, so she would have some exploring left to do.
Heck ,If I were immortal and invulnerable, I’d walk&swim to the USA via Russia and Alaska, and on to Argentina. just for fun. Stuff like that. If You got all the time?
@Jay-Em…where are you starting from again?
Yes, the second one.
Why would you regret asking? It allows us to consolidate where we are in this quite complicated plotline, so I for one appreciate it.
It’s actually kind of funny to think that what Shelly is saying in the first panel makes more sense to we, the reading public, than it would to Monica…I still do not think Shelly has told them ANYTHING about the tree realm yet.
Then in the third panel she ignores Monica’s question from the second panel. She seems to be answering questions that nobody in the room is asking but that she wants to answer before they get asked, almost a side effect from spending so much time alone. Before anyone says anything I know she wasn’t totally alone, she just said she wasn’t alone the whole time, I just mean that she probably spent a lot of the 80k years alone.
In the third panel she seems to be both: 1) continuing her train of thought from panel #1 and 2) responding to Bud’s comment regarding Tina.
I get the impression that Shelley’s memories are coming back fairly quickly regarding the “current time” or else she’s just become exceptional at reading people and situations from all her “thinking time”
Shelly did say that she was in a place where a single sphinx could not be harmed. She was saying something about the tree realm then, but hasn’t even mentioned that there are trees there.
Shelly is saying things in a strange way, but that’s fairly normal in the comic. “I learned as much from her words as I did from her silence” sounds like something that someone might write, but wouldn’t normally say.
This is a strange situation for Shelly. She is really talking to us. I don’t think you can read anything more than those two things from the way she is talking today.
It seems to be just dawning on Monica that she has done something really bad to her best friend. Bud, OTOH, has that “been there done that, burned the blood soaked tee-shirt with fire breath” nonchalant look.
Excellent summation.
Even better observation.
MAJOR feelings of guilt, imminent…
Interesting phrasing in Panel One – i think i’d have reversed the order of “silence” and “words”…
I was noticing that both in panels one and three that reversing the order one reads Shelly’s dialogue makes them slightly more poignant.
Reverse the order you say. Hmmm, I hadn’t thought of that let’s see how that reads.
“Them of one not I’m.”
“Them of some met I’ve.”
“Hunter Demon a not I’m that say just let’s.”
Okay I have to disagree with you here this just sounds like gibberish to me.
After I wrote my comment I read it over and couldn’t stop thinking that when you read it that way it sounds like Yoda from Star Wars. So I searched up this actual dialog from Yoda and thought he could almost be talking to Shellinx in the Tree Realm.
“It is the future you see. ”
“Difficult to see. Always in motion is the future.”
“Decide you must, how to serve them best. If you leave now, help them you could; but you would destroy all for which they have fought, and suffered.”
Try,
“I’m not one of them.”
“I’ve met some of them.”
“Let’s just say that I’m not a demon hunter.”
I think that’s what Yamara meant.
I thought the “Yes…and No” refered to Tina’s statement from yesterday but now I’m not so sure. It does kind of make sense if you assume that she’s still, partially, thinking backwards to compensate for reverse in time that she spent 80K years in.
And then, possibly, the conversation from Monica’s and Bud’s ears is in the order it’s written and the conversation from Shelly’s point of view is 3 to 1.
That caught my ear as well.
Maybe Phix, being a wise sphinx, offered more compassionate silent presence than words.
That seems to imply that Phix said more than Shelly thought she might have, under the circumstances. It seems to indicate that Phix was actively being helpful. It also seems to indicate that Shelly would have expected Phix to not want to say much, perhaps because Phix should feel guilty.
I can understand why Tina would detect a differnece in Shelly via her aura, but why has neither Shelly nor Monica noticed Shelly’s obviously longer hair since her clothes suddenly disappeared?
“…her clothes suddenly disappeared.”
It’s all women around. Indeed odd that the hair didn’t seem to get noticed.
Bud noticed the nekkidness though, and given her reaction, it must have looked like everything exploded around poor Shell’…
Yes – but the clothes would be a shock. The hair is just “Hmmm. Interesting.”
There’s a distinct difference between noticing and commenting. For example, women are likely to notice when a fellow female coworker is showing signs of being pregnant, but they won’t say anything until it is confirmed out of courtesy since said coworker could just be getting fat. 🙂
It’s all about the timing of a comment, gents. The hair thing will come up once everyone’s calmed down a smidge about the rest of the situation. The nakedness was probably brought up because it was the more shockingly noticeable aspect of change, but the hair can wait.
Just yesterday: “I know! I said it before, and I still think it’s important…Someone get that woman a haircut…STAT!!!” 🙄
Well, at least you know that your comments are read. 😛
😛 I never said that I have the kind of tact implied by my generalization.
Noticed, of course they have. But those have been minor issues compared to Shelly’s originally blank, uncomprehending stare, then her ‘definateness’ towards Monica, then Tina’s freaking out and Shelly’s monologue…
Sooo.. Shelly’s realm was a regular club of Sphinx-Anonymous..
That begs the question I asked yesterday: Are all realms connected to the Biliotheki?
Aaaand she’ll only live as long as any human. Pfeeuw. No problem when she gets in a relationship with a human then.
Aaand “not a demon-hunter” i.e. Quite specifically a “Guardian”, so she can still be friends with Tina. Good.
Ohkay……. *takes some time to breathe*
Shelly really got introspective I’d say.
Now about that cut, wash ‘n blow-dry……
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L_space#L-space"L-Space.
Frads.
L-Space
Oh, I see. Well, it looks like Paul used Pratchett’s funny ramblings as his construction manual then.
And also begs the question of how well does a sphinx get along with an orangutan? ( What IS the plural of “sphinx’? Sphinx, sphinxes or sphinxi??)
–noun, plural sphinx·es, sphin·ges
from
Dictionary reference
which is … odd.
Sphinges???
It is odd–but it’s a Greek consonant-stem, Σφίγξ. The plural would generally take the ξ (ks) off, and a -κες (-kes) or -γες (-ges), depending on the word. In this case, for whatever reason, the Greeks went with the -ges.
Another thought: Maybe knowing that a group of more than one sphinx would be a riddle of sphinges is part of what keeps them so solitary.
Worse, it could lead to things like:
How many hinges could spinges tinge
if spinges could tinge hinges?
or
Unhinged binging sphinges cringe at impinging syringes
“One hen; two ducks; three squawking geese; four Limerick oysters; five corpulent porpoises; six pairs of Don Alversos tweezers; 7,000 Macedonians in full battle array; eight brass monkeys from the ancient sacred crypts of Egypt; nine apathetic, sympathetic, diabetic old men on roller skates with a marked propensity toward procrastination and sloth; 10 lyrical, spherical, diabolical denizens of the deep who hall stall around the corner of the quo of the quay of the quivery, all at the [very] same time. ”
(My dad used to quote that to me all the time; it’s an announcer’s test, but he used it to mean a whole lot Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot-Interrogative events. Like Sphynges.)
“Whinging sphinges”?
It’s official; I must read this author’s works.
Also answers where Shelly got here food sources.
Diligent rationing of found food I’d bet… you know, things that might wander into the area and die… small but very beefy and muscular things that come along…
>.> I’m saying she probably ate herself.
I don’t know what FatUncle thought answered the question, but I suspect that he thought the other sphinxes brought food. Eating the Shellys wouldn’t go very far because only one would show up every 1450 years.
I think she just didn’t need to eat there. If she couldn’t be harmed and couldn’t die, she couldn’t starve. Problem solved! 😀
Exactly – I was thinking visitors such as Phix and other sphinxes brought her food.
Meals on Paws?
in all seriousness, she probably didn’t need to eat. If you can’t die, that means you can’t starve, and she probably isn’t perpetually hungry, living 80k years mostly alone is torture enough. Maybe there was an apple tree area of tree land?
oooh, better yet, she gathered her power *because* she eats herself! like highlander… with canabalism.
quick, everyone start eating past and/or future versions of yourselves to see if you grow wings and a tail!
Is there an app for that?
godsbeDAMNEDtoit!!!
It does nothing LIKE begging the question! “Begging the question” is a logical fallacy where the point to be proved is instead assumed as the place of beginning, as thus:
Sam is really mad right now.
How do you know that?
I know because he’s so angry.
THAT is begging the question!! It is NOT “raising the question,” which is what you meant–and utterly failed–to say.
Whatever dude. I am already happy I speak more languages besides my native Dutch, like, say, German ,French, Frysian ,Drenthian dialect AND a bit of Spanish…… :raspberry:
By the way. Look: Shelly’s face is already getting less haggard. Her eye-bags are gone ,for one.
She’s reverting to ori-Shell. Good!
Old ‘n tired face Shell was somewhat disconcerting. Though she still looks a bit like what Paula said yesterday :”Will they still like me” Time for “Busty-Mom-hug”
Before I go reading comments…hat out of carrot. I wasn’t expecting that at all…
Paul did clue us in yesterday with Shelly’s mortal/sphinx hybrid remark. And the nature of a mortal hybrid was different from what I was expecting, as well.
I for one was wondering if Paul meant a hybrid between a mortal and a sphinx, or did he mean a hybrid that was mortal. It could be read either way.
Very cool story and all…
..
I miss Tepoz. And the others. :/
so here’s some speculation…
If Phix could visit Shelly in the TTF, why couldn’t Shelly go to L-space? It seems as though it would be an easy out for the whole trapped thing….
Maybe by then Shelly knew she had to stay, to give the many Shelly-deaths meaning, or because if she left too soon bad things would happen. That is, she could escape–but at what cost?
Shelly was trapped in her tree realm. In as much as Phix couldn’t leave the library but for limited amounts of time until Nudge was brought back.
Kudos to Shelly for quickly dispelling any demon-hunter related fears that Tina might have. 🙂
For Shelly
.
For who I was and what I was
I sang a song of life and love
I sought no answers and read no books
Enjoyed the sun and lovers looks.
.
I did not know or want to see
I did not look but found a tree
The truth was hard and shook my soul
As I filled up with long ago.
.
There is no song to change the past
The way has turned to another track
Who knows the way the future goes
As I life a life I can’t have back.
ooooh..*clap clap* purrdyy.. and fitting.
nice
sad but happy at the same time
*sigh*
poetry does odd things 😛
Well, summarizing what Charles R. Swindoll said, 90% of life is attitude. If Shelly wants her old life back, it’s up to her to reclaim it. Of course, she may no longer want that life. It’s pretty much a matter of “how ya gonna keep ’em down on the farm” for her now. Whole new worlds are open to her. Entire new views and philosophies. She has received an education far beyond any university or any normal school of hard knocks.
I think there could be more to it than that. Experiences change people, for better or worse. Sometimes the experience can be so overwhelming that your unable to even comprehend who you used to be, what you worried about or why the people you are with matter to you.
The question is, is Shelly still Shelly?
…and the answer is yes, she is :P. She has a lot of time under her belt, but shes still her. When she was being all cryptic and slightly manipulative to get herself to cut the tree, she still just got frustrated and lost her patience and rolled her eyes.
If there was a tractor motor around at the time, I’m shure she would have thrown it into orbit.
…and that was a very Shelly-esque style of manipulation, too.
Kind of like the article i read Many Years Ago,about the the three “hunting season” Warner Bros cartoons.
The article pointed out that Daffy is just as smart as Bugs, just as able to see what he needs to do to control the situation … but he gets too anxious, too excited, and gets ahead of himself. And Bugs, who has a cooler head, comes out ahead.
On his own, dealing with Porky or Elmer, Daffy does a lot better.
So the pieces are starting to fall into place I guess…
Speak for yourself… I’m totally lost in this whole thing 😛
I really do feel for Monica. Shelly used to be like her, a regular person witnessing strange events. Now she’s on the other side of the river, with the supernaturals, an ancient entity with human qualities but greater knowledge and experience with the preternatural world. Monica’s sort of lost a friend. They can become re-acquainted, sure, and even be close again, like Monica is with Tina and the chimera kids. But it won’t ever be like it was. Shelly and her are no longer on the same ground.
I guess that will apply for all of Shelly’s loved ones… She’ll see them now as someone peering across a great expanse at distant figures, and however close they come, a gulf will still rest between them.
Right you are, and that’s what will make the ongoing story so great.
Not yet, but soon. Right now I think that Monica is simply appalled that she sent her friend away to be mostly alone for 80,000 years (she didn’t really, but she’ll still feel responsible). And she won’t feel any better when she learns that Shelly had to watch 56 Shellys die.
Monica is really good at feeling responsible.
That reminds me of two recent back-to-back volumes of Perry Rhodan (the biggest weekly Sci-Fi novel series ever) where one of the immortals that make up part of the cast aged 9.6 million(!) years while running an errand in some kinda subspace-fold that’s best summed up as “collecting a few vital bits of stuff that are scattered over the length of several light years – on foot!” while for the rest of the cast just a few hours passed…
(And no, I don’t think that left him the same as before either – but that’s something for future issues to tell…)
He must have been running at quite a clip. Even walking at a brisk 6mph, he would have needed over 114 million years just to go one LY.
This is Perry Rhodan … which has less connection to consensus reality than Wapsi Square.
Having read only some of the series I am forced to agree with Fairportfan. No Contact with reality as most people know it.
Ahhhhh feedback explained!
One thing that jumped out at me was Shelly saying, “I was somewhere that a single sphinx could not be harmed.” Earlier, she said that she couldn’t be harmed there.
Putting that together, was she saying that she is the only sphinx ever that could not be harmed there? If so, can she flee there anytime she wants and be safe? Was she protected there because there was some special duty for her (and her alone?) to perform there? If so, did it have to do with the trees?
I suspect so. The concept of a Sacred Forest may come from traditional African worship, but the idea seems similar to Native American practices, too. Shelly may have been selected as an appropriate guardian for that. However, she talked about it as if were already obsolete technology. However, with time going backwards there, if she is destined to return, she might wind up continuing to guarding it while the technology becomes current. Or maybe it had nothing to do with her background and she just happened to be selected because she was the first sphinx there.
Another possible interpretation is that a lone sphinx would be safe, but if any other sphinxes were there, they all would be vulnerable. That seems strange. Or maybe there is something there that automatically protects a sphinx if it is there, but it can only cover one at a time, so it ignores the presence of any additional sphinxes.
Another possibility is that sphinxes have enemies so they normally stay in riddles for protection, but there any sphinx would be safe, even when by themselves. That would seem to indicate that Shelly is in danger now, but perhaps staying in human form is enough to mask that she’s a sphinx and keep her out of danger.
Oh, who the heck knows? 😆
Any number of cultures have had the idea of a sacred grove or forest – the Greeks, the Romans and (espcially) the Celts.
I picture Phix visiting Shelly, waiting till Shelly finishes her insanity outburst, then Gibbs slaps Shelly. Ergo, one sphinx is always perfectly safe–and Shelly can’t be seriously injured or killed.
Slapping Shelly made her invulnerable? Wouldn’t a magic wand have been better?
Yeah, but a good magic wand puts a real crimp in the old Sphinx Express card while a slap is priceless.
No; not quite.
Shelly said she was in a place where one sphynx is invulnerable. When Phix was there, one of them couldn’t have been invulnerable if the rules are “one sphynx”.
I tried very hard to find a video clip of the scene I was picturing; I couldn’t find it solo, but try here and fast-forward to 3:18. Necessary info: Tony, a good guy, is the one in jail interrogating himself; Gibbs, Tony’s boss and also a good guy, brings pizza. Also, a slap upside the head is, according to NCIS, “a wake-up call”–not technically damaging, but will make someone say “Ow!”
In my scenario, Tony=Shelly and Gibbs=Phix.
…So of course I now find exactly the clip I was looking for. Here you go.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5w9_oqFK8gg&feature=related
I wonder if Officer Tight Buns is also a proto-sphynx?
Before all this I would have scoffed at such an idea, but now … Perhaps it’s why Shelly was so drawn to him. Only another sphinx-in-waiting can really bring her into heat?
hsssss
Is there a leak in here?
Errrr…. I dunno?
Monica’s having trouble understanding that Shelly did in fact leave and return. Not only that, but she was gone for 80,000 years. And she is now sphinxified. Monica is going to have some adjusting to do too. Shelly has had millenia to come to grips with this. Monica is going to be a while coming to grips what it means. E i g h t y t h o u s a n d years! Bud will not let her get all emo. I think Tina will be okay with this too. One more in the club.
Hm. Only 232 comments as of 9:30 PM CDT? The barrage seems to be subsiding…
Hmm, I see in here people talking about Shelly needing a haircut when all this is over. But I have to ask, Why? In my opinion her hair looks better like this. I like it better anyway.
It’s a shame she would not be immortal after going through 80,000 years of existence, or at least really long lived. It seems like such a waste. I wonder about Phix. If she stayed in human form would she, likewise, age as a human and die, or is that only for human sphinx hybrids?
Who knows, perhaps in the distant future, when the arc wraps up, all the mortals involved will become immortal in beginning the next great story arc.
Maybe after 80K years, she doesn’t want to be immortal. Go back and look at Jin’s attitudes on immortality.
Good point.
Yeah, but Jin’s immortality experience was a ‘Groundhog Day’ sort of thing. That would put anyone off of immortality. It would be more like damnation.
Ok i think i get it. Shellys time-forrest did run reverse to the Callendermachine. Now shes 80k years old. Could it be that she actually became one of her own ancestors if some of the other sphinxes have “courted” her?
And what about the Bunny? In what kind of relationship are shamanic spirits linked to this entire mumbo-jumbo of supernatural powers and beings. Is her super-strength linked to her sphinx part or to the bunny?
And how does that work for Tina? Somehow she reminds me to a shinigami from death-note. I wonder how she realized that things like does she see the age of person? As some kind of counter mayhaps?