Who is Thomas talking to?

[LostInTime]

Harry cut off all other prisoners not in the same confinement mode from communicating with Thomas. There's only one prisoner before Thomas in 'contemplation' mode. The British guy.

[morriswalters]

The correct answer is that no one knows and Jim has said nothing, other than it isn't Merlin.

Speculation includes Chandler and any other person with an English accent.  Some believe Jim is dissembling and that it still might be Merlin. 

My personal favorite is that it is Merlin (AKA) Harry Dresden coming back to his present in stasis and attempting not to change the timeline, so that there are effectively two Harry's. He can't openly come out while Harry 1 hasn't gone back.  He may have made a stop or three coming back to the future. Dropped a copy of Calvin and Hobbes off in the basement once and fixing LC another.  He's doing a once around time loop.
 
I personally will stick with this until Jim decides to enlighten us, or until I croak, whichever comes first.

[Mira]

  Wild thought, it is Kemmler, but that doesn't fit because he has been a prisoner though several Wardens.

[KurtinStGeorge]

  Wild thought, it is Kemmler, but that doesn't fit because he has been a prisoner though several Wardens.

Kemmler has been a prisoner?  I thought Kemmler was a former Warden of the island, maybe three Wardens back, but never a prisoner.  He was heading back to the island to release all of the prisoners when the Council and friends finally nailed him.

[Yuillegan]

Kemmler is apparently dead. One would think the Warden's would have remembered incarcerating him. I can't imagine the White Council would have approved the idea of imprisoning the man on the very island he wished to be on.

Also, I think he has a German accent in a Fistful of Warlocks.

As most villains in the series have a British accent, and the guy is a prisoner on Demonreach who quite literally feels the need to be imprisoned, I would say he probably isn't a good guy.

Also, do we know that only the British Prisoner is the only being in contemplation mode?

[Mira]

Kemmler is apparently dead. One would think the Warden's would have remembered incarcerating him. I can't imagine the White Council would have approved the idea of imprisoning the man on the very island he wished to be on.

Also, I think he has a German accent in a Fistful of Warlocks.

As most villains in the series have a British accent, and the guy is a prisoner on Demonreach who quite literally feels the need to be imprisoned, I would say he probably isn't a good guy.

Also, do we know that only the British Prisoner is the only being in contemplation mode?

I said it was a wild thought, I guess I didn't make myself clear enough when I said it didn't fit because he'd been a prisoner though several Wardens.  By that I meant that the so called "British Prisoner," had been in the prison though several Wardens which wouldn't fit Kemmler, because he was killed or dealt with in the last hundred years.  I pulled that number out of the air because I do not remember a year given for his demise.  However having said that, he still could show up in some form or other.. He wouldn't be the first character that Harry thought was dead, that wasn't.

[Ed0517]

Hey, in Star Trek Jack the Ripper was an extraterrestrial who possessed a human..... maybe that's Jack?

[Mira]

Hey, in Star Trek Jack the Ripper was an extraterrestrial who possessed a human..... maybe that's Jack?

Hmmmmmmm........Could be..

[LostInTime]

Whichever. I'm sure it won't have any strong implications on Thomas' eventual fate. 

[Mira]

Whichever. I'm sure it won't have any strong implications on Thomas' eventual fate. 

  I think it is too soon to tell.

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Kemmler is apparently dead. One would think the Warden's would have remembered incarcerating him. I can't imagine the White Council would have approved the idea of imprisoning the man on the very island he wished to be on.

Also, I think he has a German accent in a Fistful of Warlocks.

As most villains in the series have a British accent, and the guy is a prisoner on Demonreach who quite literally feels the need to be imprisoned, I would say he probably isn't a good guy.

Also, do we know that only the British Prisoner is the only being in contemplation mode?

If it’s a telepathic voice and is that of a villain, Harry’s mind immediately assigns it a British accent, it’s from watching too much films and TV as a child where the bad guys not only had British Accents but also spoke with Received Pronunciation due to being classically trained RADA graduates slumming it from the Royal Shakespeare Company.

The British Prisoner may not be so, but may be. Or Jim wrote the character just to get James Marsters to say “piss off”. I am sure he writes so much Toot and Lacuna just to get Marsters to do the voices.

[morriswalters]

As most villains in the series have a British accent, and the guy is a prisoner on Demonreach who quite literally feels the need to be imprisoned, I would say he probably isn't a good guy.

Also, do we know that only the British Prisoner is the only being in contemplation mode?

There was one prisoner held below in a kind of unique stasis, something that could most closely be considered sleep.

Butcher, Jim. Peace Talks (Dresden Files) (p. 322). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

That appears to answer your question.  In the initial encounter his emotional state is described.

There was a long moment of silence. And then a thought filled with a terrible weariness and purely emotional anguish, like something I’d experienced only at the very lowest moments of my life, flowed into me—but for this being, such pain wasn’t a low point. It was a constant state. Someone who needs to be here. Go away, boy.

Butcher, Jim. Skin Game: A Novel of the Dresden Files (p. 4). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

If he a bad guy he would seem to be a repentant bad guy.  He could also be someone who has watched too many bad things happening to those around him. It depends on how canny you believe the author is.  Is the British accent a play against expectations?

[Mira]

If he a bad guy he would seem to be a repentant bad guy.  He could also be someone who has watched too many bad things happening to those around him. It depends on how canny you believe the author is.  Is the British accent a play against expectations?

Maybe not a bad guy or evil villain in the classic sense, but a good person forced to do "bad" things for the greater good.  It seems contradictory I know, but think of ordering the dropping of the atom bomb on Japan to end the war and save lives, good, but evil because in the process, cost lots of innocent lives and began the arms race.  It is a moral dilemma, say a very powerful wizard is forced to do bad things for the greater good one too many times. The very conflict of emotions may make him wish to sleep, he also may feel he deserves the "punishment" he is receiving.  Though Jim says he isn't, it does fit the legends surrounding Merlin according to Bulfinch's Mythology.  We will have to see, I do agree about the British accent that Harry thinks he hears, not just with this prisoner, but Outsiders as well. Heck it might even be a star born thing and that is why he hears it the way that he does.

[Conspiracy Theorist]

He says he deserves to be there, it sounds almost as if he is seeking Sanctuary.

One of my many, many theories is that he is Leas ex and the father of Bob, this is the only place he is safe from her.

[Mira]

He says he deserves to be there, it sounds almost as if he is seeking Sanctuary.

One of my many, many theories is that he is Leas ex and the father of Bob, this is the only place he is safe from her.

I don't know if he is seeking Sanctuary .  But then again in the Middle Ages when someone entered Church grounds and claimed it, they also became in effect prisoners because if they left the grounds they were subject to whatever they were seeking Sanctuary from.. At least that is the way I understand it, but there might be more fiction than fact there. 

I think it is more a case of someone who has done some really bad stuff and it caught up with him.  He understands fully what he did was wrong, and the only way he can atone for it is prison.. Another idea is perhaps he is there because he was evil all his life, did something good at the end, but it wasn't enough to warrant full redemption, so this is sort of a compromise, as in he isn't going to Hell because of what he did, but he doesn't belong in purgatory either..  Kind of like in the Bernard Shaw play, "Joan of Arc."  While she was being burned at the stake, she called out for a Cross, the guards and officials refused to get her one, all except for one priest who did go eventually to fetch one for her.  Meanwhile a lowly English soldier thought this was wrong and made a Cross out of two of the sticks from the pile they were burning her on and gave it to her, for this act he was allowed one day off from being in Hell, a year..