Rereading Summer Knight, Big Clues as to Who Orchestrated Simon's Murder

[g33k]

That is very true, ugly, influencing Simon to commit suicide.

Not suicide.

I doubt even Peabody could have forced Simon to drop his wards for an invasion force of Ramps.

Say rather, fatal error.

How about a delusion?  Seeing McCoy or Luccio at the head of a large troop of Wardens, when he's been primed (by Peabody) to expect a big Secret Plan to attack the Ramps.
 

[SerScot]

Not suicide.

I doubt even Peabody could have forced Simon to drop his wards for an invasion force of Ramps.

Say rather, fatal error.

How about a delusion?  Seeing McCoy or Luccio at the head of a large troop of Wardens, when he's been primed (by Peabody) to expect a big Secret Plan to attack the Ramps.

No.  Too big a move. Remember, older minds cannot be bent only tweeked to do more of what they are already inclined to do.  A full on delusion implant would be detected.

[kbrizzle]

@Mira
Good pickup! Personally, I don’t believe the Black Council wanted the Ramp war to start when it did - as pointed out, the Ramps needed a couple more decades of preparation & planning in order to beat the White Council. Since the fall of the White Council is one of the Outsiders’ (& Black Council’s) goals, I believe they too would’ve wanted to hold off on the war for a while.

Therefore my theory is that Peabody was ‘nudging’ the Senior Council members into being more suspicious of Harry (they are already afraid of what he may become), so that the Council would give him up to the Ramps & end the war before it starts.

Unfortunately some factions within the Red Court & Black Council believe they are ready for war & attack Archangel. I believe Simon is Cowl & that the Ortegas were not Nfected. I also believe that Cowl & Peabody are in different factions of the Black Council.

[Kindler]

I think Peabody was responsible for Simon's death, if he did indeed die. But I think the intent was to get a younger mind onto the SC, one that's more susceptible to control. Eb had a claim of seniority, though I don't know by how much offhand. Either that or the goal was to get a Senior Council member who would be another Merlin flunky (isolationist, passive, less likely to get into a brawl with the Reds). While he worked on that, I think Peabody saw an opportunity to try to bump off our favorite Starborn.

[Mira]

I think Peabody was responsible for Simon's death, if he did indeed die. But I think the intent was to get a younger mind onto the SC, one that's more susceptible to control. Eb had a claim of seniority, though I don't know by how much offhand. Either that or the goal was to get a Senior Council member who would be another Merlin flunky (isolationist, passive, less likely to get into a brawl with the Reds). While he worked on that, I think Peabody saw an opportunity to try to bump off our favorite Starborn.

Eb did have a claim, it looks like a couple of wizards were more senior to him, but they weren't at the meeting so as the next on the list, Eb got the job.

[Avernite]

No.  Too big a move. Remember, older minds cannot be bent only tweeked to do more of what they are already inclined to do.  A full on delusion implant would be detected.

Ah, but Harry occassionally mentions Wizards are niquely scornful of illusion magic, because hey, how hard is it with the Sight?

So, Simon sees Luccio and a bunch of Wardens coming, as he expects. Is he going to use his Sight, or is he going to be arrogant enough to think it can't possibly be an illusion? I don't think Harry spends much time using his Sight on Eb or Susan when he is expecting them, though by the time of Skin Game basically everyone has gotten more paranoid.

[toodeep]

I had never really thought about it before, because Cowl has obviously always seemed like the ultimate master of the dark forces, but what if Cowl is Simon, but Simon only became Cowl because of the manipulations of Simon?  If Simon spent years building Simon's disillusionment with the Council and willingness to do... whatever it is Cowl is trying to do, it might be that Simon was more key to the Black Council than just as an intelligence source.  He may have been one of its primary recruiters.

[Mira]

    In my opinion Cowl is Cowl,  he isn't Simon or Justin or anyone else but himself.

[Bad Alias]

Some thoughts:

1. I think Mira's theory is the most likely. Peabody mind controlled/influenced someone, probably a young someone, to lower the wards, and that's how the Red's were able to get in.

2. Elaine doing it is possible. Here is how I see that one. Elaine and Harry wouldn't just know how to open Simon's wards, but they would know the theories and techniques Simon would use to set up the wards. With this knowledge, they would be able to figure out how to open his wards. It would probably take some time and observation. Isn't there a statement that given enough time, just about any wizard would be able to figure out Harry's wards?

3. Another possibility is that Simon is Cowl. This has a part A and part B.

Part A is that the vamps got in because Simon was in the Circle with them, and they gained entrance that way and betrayed him, they gained knowledge of his wards that way, or they gained an agent who betrayed him that way. The agent could be Elaine.

Part B is that Simon orchestrated the whole thing for "reasons."

4. If Simon is Cowl, it is reasonable to believe that Justin was bad from the get go. Simon knew all about Justin's Elaine and Harry project. After Elaine disappeared, Simon finds Elaine and continues her dark training/subjugation/whatever. He then places her in the Summer Court as an agent.

Some other thoughts:

No, one has to look at the long term goals of whomever was backing Peabody.  In Luccio's case the goal was to turn the Council against the Wardens, also to knock out the two most effective Wardens.

Murphy suggests that LaFortier had stumbled onto something that would lead to Peabody finding out, so he acted out of desperation to cover his tracks.

There is no indication that Peabody is merely a slob.

He was in fact fastidious.

After she was shoved into a younger body by Corpsetaker.  The SC could only be tweeked not bent due to their age.

This is correct. It wasn't that Peabody was powerful enough to manipulate the powerful Luccio. It's that Luccio's young mind was supple enough to be warped without breaking.

    In my opinion Cowl is Cowl,  he isn't Simon or Justin or anyone else but himself.

He's definitely hiding his identity, so he is someone. Whether or not he's anyone we would know or care about is up for debate. I think he is either someone we know or someone we will know for Doylist reasons.

[Snark Knight]

Good pickup! Personally, I don’t believe the Black Council wanted the Ramp war to start when it did - as pointed out, the Ramps needed a couple more decades of preparation & planning in order to beat the White Council. Since the fall of the White Council is one of the Outsiders’ (& Black Council’s) goals, I believe they too would’ve wanted to hold off on the war for a while.
...
Unfortunately some factions within the Red Court & Black Council believe they are ready for war & attack Archangel. I believe Simon is Cowl & that the Ortegas were not Nfected. I also believe that Cowl & Peabody are in different factions of the Black Council.

The Circle position seems to have been that they want evenly matched powers fighting each other to sow chaos and leave the survivor critically weakened. Waiting that few decades for the Ramps to win decisively like Ortega wanted would probably have been counterproductive for them. Besides, it would have overshot the big conjunction that all the powers in the know are planning towards (WOJ that it's "five minutes to midnight" and the players like Mab, Nic, Odin etc are trying to get ready for shit to go down, even though Harry isn't properly aware of it).