Mouse's Origins

[kingcrow15]

i can't believe i didn't understand the flying monkeys joke, i mean it was well before my time but still i feel stupid anyway.
i love mouse i feel bad that we probably wont see a whole lot of him in the next few books.

[pmcanulty01]

The followup question, of course, is "Who's the Wicked Witch who sent the monkeys to get the little dogs, and maybe Harry, too?"

[Eleyctra]

Harry only briefly mentions in the book, Blood Rites, that it took him a week to hunt down some punk wannabe sorcerer that kidnapped them and wait until he/she left to get food so that Harry could paralyze his/her flying monkeys and get out with the puppies.
I always wondered why the kidnapper never followed up on revenge through the book Blood Rites, or the series so far...

[Arjan]

Harry only briefly mentions in the book, Blood Rites, that it took him a week to hunt down some punk wannabe sorcerer that kidnapped them and wait until he/she left to get food so that Harry could paralyze his/her flying monkeys and get out with the puppies.
I always wondered why the kidnapper never followed up on revenge through the book Blood Rites, or the series so far...

There are a few possibilities. If he was hired help he would not be personally interested in revenge, only his employers and we may have met them already.

Harries reputation could have scared him away.

His employer could have killed him. Either to clear up loose ends or because he failed.

He could have been brought in from somewhere else and just gone back. With nevernever traveling magic crime would be even more international than normal crime is today.

He may not even know who Harry is.

[Veritas]

yeah i was suprised that harry didn'tkill the sorceror( he probably did not violate a law of magic).

[Zuriel]

Harry probably didn't pursue the punk wizard, because he wasn't a big threat.  He stole puppies, didn't kill anyone.  Besides, Harry didn't know the pups were as special as they turned out to be.

And I was wondering...

The Wardhounds at the White Council, the Chinese Temple dog statues that come to life, aren’t they most likely Foo Dog spirits, too?  Mouse's brothers and sisters?

[magnusth]

About how mouse might've gone from "Foo dog scion" to "Foo dog"... couldn't he have, well, chosen, either on purose or inadverdently, through his actions?

[TheCuriousFan]

Harry probably didn't pursue the punk wizard, because he wasn't a big threat.  He stole puppies, didn't kill anyone.  Besides, Harry didn't know the pups were as special as they turned out to be.

And I was wondering...

The Wardhounds at the White Council, the Chinese Temple dog statues that come to life, aren’t they most likely Foo Dog spirits, too?  Mouse's brothers and sisters?

No, they're constructs made by Ancient Mai IIRC.

[Second Aristh]

Jim likes to mention that he's a lazy writer and doesn't like to waste characters that he's already developed.  Mouse's kidnapper used summoned help from the NN.  Hmm, doesn't that sound a little familiar?  What other practitioner do we know that works for hire and likes to use primarily summoned muscle? 

I think we should start looking at Binder more closely as a candidate for the kidnapper.
 
Someone had to have arranged for the puppies to be kidnapped.  It's not too much of a stretch to assume that the BC had a hand in the scheme (what evildoer wants a litter of foo dogs in his backyard?), and Binder has a history of working with the BC in Turn Coat.  A puppy heist seems just his speed from the background that we get for Binder.  He's a careful guy but limited in the precautions he can take.  Harry does a little mundane investigating to figure out when the kidnapper went out for dinner, but would that involve a good enough look to identify him?  Plus, the kidnapper could have been using lackeys to help out if Harry did identify anyone involved in the heist.

[Veritas]

I just has an idea of why an evil wizard or creature would like to get a baby Foo Dog. It is my belief that a Foo Dog draws its supernatural power in the act of guarding something( temples) or someone ( Harry). It appears to me that the foo Dog binds themselves to the person or place. So if a dark wizard gets a young puppy foo dog then it will bind to him and become like him ( Dark Foo Dog).

[Phariah]

nice going so far Serack. there was a piece of a quote from the book you cut off i think is significant though. when you talk about his sentinel abilities you left off that he can harm spiritual creatures and his bark effects across the NN boundry. that is powerful in itself.

as to when he tells Lea he won Harry. i have always said it was meaning he won the PRR (Puppy Royal Rumble) to stay with Harry.

[microbird]

I have different take on the "win-win" conversation between lea and mouse in changes. I believe lea means win as in win harry over or harrys love, while mouse uses win as in winning the lotto or the best job. See it could be that mouses litter had a certain number of lets say slots to be filled and he feels that he got the best slot, job, or opportunity being he was so adventerous. Also it could be that mouse got the top job, guarding the outsider bane!!                         

[KevinSig]

Really only related to the first post, but in a thread that discussed things that Uriel has tweaked, I suggested that Heaven might have arranged things very slightly, to get the Foo Dogs to pass through Chicago.

If Heaven can tweak things to get Sanya a SUV when he's going to be needing one, they can certainly play with flight delays other minor things.

Mind you, I'm not suggesting that Heaven arranged the theft, just mitigated the damage by making sure that they passed through Harry's territory & making sure the Monks contacted him.  Maybe also just getting Mouse to appreciate Harry, without messing with his free will.

[robertltux]

What confuses me, is why does Uriel call Mouse "Little Brother" when Mouse is from from a Buddhist tradition? What does a Foo Dog have to do with Christianity?

As they are both "servants of The Divine" they are in a way "brothers". Not much but i would bet that Doctor Wilburn would still take his shoes of if he visited a Buddist Temple.

[Cruness]

One thing to note, text-wise, Mouse enters the story immediately after Harry is exposed to Lasciel's shadow. Something tells me this isn't a coinicidence. If I were Mr. Sunshine, I might makes sure that a certain wizard that seems to be tied to many important events had a positive influence in his life that balanced out the negative.

Lash was a corrupting influence, whereas Mouse gave harry positive memories to draw on, even a motivation. There is a passage in Dead Beat, where Harry is feeling like he is in over his head, and he recalls that Mouse "thought I was pretty darned cool" and it picks him up.

I don't think this was a 7 words type balancing of the scales. But more of a life-line if you will.

nice going so far Serack. there was a piece of a quote from the book you cut off i think is significant though. when you talk about his sentinel abilities you left off that he can harm spiritual creatures and his bark effects across the NN boundry. that is powerful in itself.

as to when he tells Lea he won Harry. i have always said it was meaning he won the PRR (Puppy Royal Rumble) to stay with Harry.

and the part of Blood Rights where Harry looks back at the Pups and finds that the Notch-eared Puppy had fought his way to the top of the dog pile supports your theory wonderfully.