Chapter 5 Drop

[Arjan]

  He has done it before, so who knows?  All I am saying that if she dies and it fits the story line
it is no more disrespectful that when Susan died.  Now I want to know, is he
having unprotected sex yet again? 

I don't think there are any magical wizard cures for Murphy.  LTW's medical degrees are all from
vanilla medical schools if I remember correctly.  Wizards heal more quickly because of their make up not because of any magical medicine.

If I remember correctly the more they use magic the faster they heal, it might even be woj.

Mab did it with Harry. Odin gave the ability to Gard. 

It is possible but you need a lot of power and you might get a mantle of some sort and those things don't come cheap. That is the Faustian deal mentioned.

But maybe you can encourage healing with magic. Elaine did something small in white night and I imagine Listen to Winds knows all about it. It must be possible to help the regeneration process a bit.   

[magnuskn]

  He has done it before, so who knows?  All I am saying that if she dies and it fits the story line
it is no more disrespectful that when Susan died.  Now I want to know, is he
having unprotected sex yet again? 

I don't think there are any magical wizard cures for Murphy.  LTW's medical degrees are all from
vanilla medical schools if I remember correctly.  Wizards heal more quickly because of their make up not because of any magical medicine.

I don't see the build up for such a "final storyline" for Murphy, though. Susan had a lot of things going on which led to her ultimate act of self-sacrifice. Murphy, at this time, is reconvelascing from her wounds and needs to adapt to her current situation. Her and Harry difnally being able to have a romantic relationship is still building up. I just don't see her character arc making her be someone to be taken out of the story.

[Mira]

I don't see the build up for such a "final storyline" for Murphy, though. Susan had a lot of things going on which led to her ultimate act of self-sacrifice. Murphy, at this time, is reconvelascing from her wounds and needs to adapt to her current situation. Her and Harry difnally being able to have a romantic relationship is still building up. I just don't see her character arc making her be someone to be taken out of the story.

  You could be right, however just a reminder, in the trailer we had a scene where Murphy was removing her cast.   I doubt she was doing that because it was making her itch.  So obviously in Murphy fashion she is going to try and go out to fight along side of Harry or to save Harry.  Now she might find sans cast she isn't going anywhere.. Or she goes and is ineffective because she is about forty percent physically able to do so, gets further injured or killed in the process.  What would really be phony is suddenly by some miracle she is fully healed.  As far as her doing things that could lead to her demise, she isn't unlike Susan in that.  Only difference between them there is Murphy is a well trained warrior both in hand to hand and with a fire arm, Susan wasn't.  Once she got vamp power she was better for sure, but Susan was never trained in combat.  Now Murphy can still shoot, but that depends on whether or not she can physically get herself in position to fight.  Part of what has made her attractive to a lot of her fans is her ability to kick ass, if she becomes confined to a "desk" job or equivalent, things could change.  Actually there are hints in the chapter that if she has to adjust to that it isn't going to be easy for her, and it will affect her relationship with Harry.  In my
opinion Jim has been struggling with what to do with her since she was removed from the police force.   I guess he could make her a police chief, that might work.

It is possible but you need a lot of power and you might get a mantle of some sort and those things don't come cheap. That is the Faustian deal mentioned.

But maybe you can encourage healing with magic. Elaine did something small in white night and I imagine Listen to Winds knows all about it. It must be possible to help the regeneration process a bit.   

There in lies the rub as they say, Murphy cannot stand to be controlled by anyone, she has her own ideas so a Faustian bargain would spell disaster for her.   

What Elaine did with Harry if that what you are talking about wasn't so much magic as kind of a yoga treatment to relieve Harry's head pain.  I have to go back to reread that, but I believe that is what she said, don't think it could heal the real damage Murphy suffered.  Also keep in mind she was doing her thing on another wizard. 

[morriswalters]

@Yuillegan
Why is IA investigating Murphy? She isn't, and hasn't been a cop for a while.  And I would generate a permanent revenue stream collecting money from a doctor who discusses my treatment with a cop.  And unless they are attempting to connect her to illegal street fighting why does it matter how she was hurt?  Nothing in her injuries admits to a crime per se.  This is a very poorly motivated chapter.

[GWPfark]

Put me in the Murphy gets the Summer Knight mantle. It fits her. She is about helping others and preventing bad things. The Queens know bad things are coming and Twitch isn't up to the job. Murphy and Dresden are used to working together and it would also technically put them back in an adversarial role. Screw with Harry's love life while twisting the foreshadowing of Murphy becoming a Knight. Just now one of the Cross. And I am betting Rudolph is no longer a cop by the end of these books.

[Arjan]

@Yuillegan
Why is IA investigating Murphy? She isn't, and hasn't been a cop for a while.  And I would generate a permanent revenue stream collecting money from a doctor who discusses my treatment with a cop.  And unless they are attempting to connect her to illegal street fighting why does it matter how she was hurt?  Nothing in her injuries admits to a crime per se.  This is a very poorly motivated chapter.

Unless the supernatural movers behind the scene just have more influence there. They can not be everywhere and IA catched their attention because of Harry.

Also remember Cold Days and the use of the small folk against Harry? Using IA against Harry might just be their evil sense of humor or even balance.

 

[Mira]

@Yuillegan
Why is IA investigating Murphy? She isn't, and hasn't been a cop for a while.  And I would generate a permanent revenue stream collecting money from a doctor who discusses my treatment with a cop.  And unless they are attempting to connect her to illegal street fighting why does it matter how she was hurt?  Nothing in her injuries admits to a crime per se.  This is a very poorly motivated chapter.

  It is obviously phony, just because they claim it is a police investigation doesn't mean that it is.  Remember back in Skin Game Harry worried that all the blood and mayhem around the bank would attract attention, and he was assured, I cannot remember by whom, that there was a very good clean up crew and cover up.  No, I think there is someone on the inside trying to blackmail Harry, Binder maybe?  Also let us not forget the final scene at Marcone's place where Harry confronted Mab.
She wasn't a very happy with either Harry or Molly, she wouldn't do anything overt, but she might covertly to put her Knight in his place.

Put me in the Murphy gets the Summer Knight mantle. It fits her. She is about helping others and preventing bad things. The Queens know bad things are coming and Twitch isn't up to the job. Murphy and Dresden are used to working together and it would also technically put them back in an adversarial role. Screw with Harry's love life while twisting the foreshadowing of Murphy becoming a Knight. Just now one of the Cross. And I am betting Rudolph is no longer a cop by the end of these books.

I just don't see it, simply because Murphy thinks independently..  Harry gets by with it to a degree with Mab because of who he is, but he still has to find a way to follow orders.  Remember Murphy is in her current state because she didn't agree with the rules governing the use of the Holy Swords.  I think she will last through this book and possibly die in the next..  I see her working for Uriel along side her father after her death.

[g33k]

For some reason I had this rather odd thought while reading through this when they were discussing Murphy's healing.  Neither wizard magic nor medicine hold the answer, but there are other ways Murphy could be made viable again.  The most obvious would be doing what Dresden did when he broke his bad.  She could take up either Knight mantle. Mab wouldn't easily relinquish her claim on Dresden, but we haven't really seen much out of the Summer Knight lately.  The current Summer Lady may even believe she owns Dresden a favor worthy of allowing him to recommend Murphy as Fix's replacement if something where to happen to him in the next book or two.

No, Harry mentions the idea -- "getting Faustian" -- and Murphy shuts that down "firmly."
 

[Mira]

No, Harry mentions the idea -- "getting Faustian" -- and Murphy shuts that down "firmly."

  One of the things her fans seem to like the most is that Murphy is a simple vanilla human.  Making her suddenly Summer Knight or an Einherjar kind of goes against that, and her own religion as far as that goes.

[Snark Knight]

I didn't think that Harry and Murphy suspected that Rudolph worked for Marcone.  It was pretty clear in Changes that he was unknowingly working for the Red Court.  I suppose Rudolph can just be generally corrupt and work for the highest bidder. 

I kind of doubt Marcone is actually behind it. It seems like accepting the weregild and then sending crooked cops after Harry anyway would be a violation of his standards of conduct. He might order a hit for an unrelated reason at any time, but using something he's already accepted payment to settle? Seems inconsistent for him.

[Snark Knight]

I don't think there are any magical wizard cures for Murphy.  LTW's medical degrees are all from vanilla medical schools if I remember correctly.  Wizards heal more quickly because of their make up not because of any magical medicine.

The Alphas seem to have figured out limited adaptations of shapeshifting to healing. They can close wounds quickly - it's not perfect and leaves considerable scars, but that's better than the alternative. But it's not clear Murphy has even the limited potential it would take to learn the werewolf spell, or that their healing would do her any good by the time she put in the years of practice to catch up to the Alphas.

[Vriah]

Not to mention, WHY is it that magic is so bad a healing? Harry has bent gravity, manipulates elemental forces, breaks into minds and souls etc. He can even cross space-time and travel across the world like walking through a door (followed by some confusing and sometimes semi-dangerous terrain). But knitting skin and bone together is hard? Repairing ligaments is hard? I get that JB needs Murphy to be injured for the story. But the reasons stated for healing being tricky have NEVER been very convincing. I am not sure why either. It isn't hard to work into a relatively hard magic premise. The things modern science can do now is already incredible. I would expect wizards to at least be that good, if not better. But Harry won't look anyway.

The things modern science can do now are incredible - but the methods of getting there left a lot of dead patients along the way. And modern medicine still has a huge mortality rate despite all of our advances. In a system where the governing force of magic is famously unforgiving of things like mistakes and accidents, I can understand how medical magic would advance at a snail's pace. If you're using magic to heal a patient and mess up, you've just violated the First Law. Muggle medicine has thousands of doctors and researchers to advance their practices - wizards have a handful of people that all risk the death penalty if their experiment in cell regeneration goes wrong.

[Mira]

The things modern science can do now are incredible - but the methods of getting there left a lot of dead patients along the way. And modern medicine still has a huge mortality rate despite all of our advances. In a system where the governing force of magic is famously unforgiving of things like mistakes and accidents, I can understand how medical magic would advance at a snail's pace. If you're using magic to heal a patient and mess up, you've just violated the First Law. Muggle medicine has thousands of doctors and researchers to advance their practices - wizards have a handful of people that all risk the death penalty if their experiment in cell regeneration goes wrong.

We are also talking a forty or forty plus woman,  age affects extent and length of recovery.  There are amazing noninvasive types of surgery now that account for swift recovery.  Joint replacement is also being perfected,  I find it odd that if Murphy's knee is as bad as described they don't just replace it.

The Alphas seem to have figured out limited adaptations of shapeshifting to healing. They can close wounds quickly

Murphy isn't a shape shifting Alpha, they start out being able to manipulate their bodies from human to wolf..  Murphy is a forty year old vanilla human, she cannot manipulate any of her cells.  Don't know if it matters or not, but all the Alphas were also teenagers when they learned this spell, young bodies, more adaptable.

[Regenbogen]

I still think, Murphy will be taking up a coin some day.
There is the healing. Her being a ragged angel in the Sight, could be foreshadowing of a fallen angel.
And Harry's sex dream in Skin Game. This could have been a mislead. We were supposed to think it meant that Lasciel is back, but it could also have meant that Murphy will be one of the nickleheads soon. I have written that theory down somewhere here.
I still have a feeling this wouldn't be so far fetched.

And it would screw up Harry so lovely. 
Poor Harry.

And I loved the chapter. But they should have ignored the door. 

[edf]

No, Harry mentions the idea -- "getting Faustian" -- and Murphy shuts that down "firmly."

That discussion is what made me think of it... Also, wasn't Summer described as the force that polices Winter?  Murphy has always put what needs to be done ahead of Harry (and other past relationships).  She makes a pretty good safeguard against Harry in a few ways.  Harry couldn't bring himself to use his might against her, but she doesn't have the same hangups (or priorities).