PsyNet and ShadowNet

If Silence falls, and the PsyNet is thrown into chaos because of it, is it even remotely possible for the ShadowNet to merge with it to sort of stabilize it somehow? Or would that just make things worse?

I know both Nets have sentient 'keepers' (the split NetMind and DarkMind in the PsyNet and the unnamed 'Mind' in the ShadowNet). I also know that the one in the ShadowNet is very very young, so I think it could be absorbed by the twin Minds, maybe even help them come back together somehow. Maybe not. It's just that the ShadowNet is so incredibly chaotic, yet whole and healthy, and the PsyNet is sick because it isn't whole.

Things are just going to be so bad when Silence finally falls, and the Forgotten, who make up the ShadowNet, have experience with chaos, since they never Silenced themselves. So maybe the two Nets stay separate, but the Forgotten are able to help somehow anyway. They have trained Empaths, if nothing else.

Okay, enough obsessing from me! Back to reading

Something tells me the Forgotten would be about as enthusastic about doing that as South Korea is about absorbing North Korea. After years of being hunted I don't know that they would be willing to open their net to the ones who once treated them as prey.

Plus, there is the question of whether they are even compatible. Katya made it but only because of her love for Dev. And even then it was a very near thing.

Nalini made it clear that the two nets are incompatible unless there is a "buffer". Dev is Katya's buffer.

the brains of the forgotten are no longer wired the same.

The only way the Psynet can heal is if all the E-psy "awaken" as it is stated in BOJ. Then they would need to be trained and that is where Sascha would come in handy as Kaleb mentioned in one of the books (brain freeze, can't remember which book). Just like Sascha trained Toby and learning to control her own power she could be essential to the healing of the net as would any of the anchors who are stable.

I don't think there are enough E-Psy in the net to save it. Even if there were a ton of them before Silence a hundred years have passed. In that time artificial insemination has become the norm. Artificial insemination gives the parents a lot more control over what sort of skills their child does or does not have. Not many are going to deliberately have a child with the E gene.

Of the E-Psys that have been born in the last hundred years I would be willing to bet that the vast majority of them have undergone "intensive Rehabilitation".

Nalini herself mentions somewhere early in the series that there are E-psys in the net, but they have been conditioned to ignore that part of themselves, and also do not know what they are because no one is telling them.

i'm betting that a lot of the dark spots in the net are due to the E-psys either dying, going crazy, or not being allowed to be born in a given area.

also remember that the Net mind is concealing others like Sascha. even so, there can't be too many E's since there was a time when protocol was to either abort or otherwise keep one from being born, until the Psy realized that that was a a big problem when it came to the short term stability of the Net. after that they let them develop, but in the meantime there had to be a period of time (years?) when there were no new ones being born, and that would have created a hole in the population numbers.

isn't this all just too fascinating!!

D

I'd forgotten about the NetMind protecting them. That's a good point.

I don't think that there is actually a hole during those times. As much as there were times when no new "E-Psys" are being born, it does not mean that there are no Psys with other main designations and E as a minor ability being born.

One of the books (I think it's BbF, I don't remember for sure), it was mentioned that Toby has some E abilities. He is a cardinal Tp, I believe, but he E is a minor ability of his that would have remained dormant if there were other E-Psys in the net. But since there weren't any in the Lauren net, his E abilities developed. That would also be the case in the PsyNet. Even if there are no E-Psys being born, there will be others with that minor ability for the stability of the net, which the NetMind (and possibly the DarkMind) is hiding.

I have a feeling that after Silence falls completely, and the PsyNet becomes stable again, it would turn into something very similar to the ShadowNet. In fact, I think the ShadowNet looks exactly like what it used to in the PsyNet. In HtP, Ashaya mentioned that prior to Silence, some emotional connections are visible on the Net. I believe that description closely matches that of the ShadowNet's "chaos."

I'm rambling and going off topic, but no I don't think the two Nets will merge. The Forgottens have evolved so much in every way that they probably won't and don't have any incentive to join with the PsyNet.