Talk:Margulis/@comment-192.0.164.254-20190115014128

Okay, there's tons of debate about who Natah/Lotus and Margulis actually are, and while I still think that originally they were separate entities/egos, we really have no idea about the circumstances behind Margulis' execution besides that it was by the 'Jade Light' and that that is accompanied by a flash and gore. While that seems pretty final, it's also a sci-fi trope, and is touched in WF, that mind-scanning is frequently a thing (Ordis), and that there is some protocol loading called 'Margulis' in the mission start message.

Most writers skate the problem this causes, which is to say that completely gathering all possible information from anything requires completely destroying it and looking for the byproducts of that destruction, allowing data reconstruction of the base object from those byproducts (this is how particle accelerators work). This also requires very high energy particles to slam into nuclei to break them (or photons to bounce off the object to be scanned, but this doesn't seem possible and would still pretty much destroy any matter more complex than a nucleus). The byproducts of the destruction (nuclear fission emits a range of photons with differing energy levels, among other particles) would to an observer be a 'bright light' even if it most of it wouldn't technically be in the visible spectrum. The Orokin also don't strike me as the types to destroy completely an asset during wartime, suggesting that a copy of her memories was preserved to be used (like in the lander protocol, with suggestive wording like 'implantation' rather than 'loading' or even 'injection') and was possibly salvaged in part by Natah later on, or was given to her (by Ballas perhaps), or perhaps that's all bull and the Red Veil are right and Natah just used Tenno memory to create her Lotus persona out of her own emotional reasons/totally calculating reasons (doubt the latter).

That doesn't explain her seemingly conflicting motives, however. She's betrayed the Sentients by not following her mission through, but also somewhat betrayed the Tenno by hiding their nature, and (obviously) was aligned against the Orokin. Either she's very conflicted; has a fractured consciousness (DID-esque); or is an entity on her own outside Natah and Margulis, on a side of her own not aligned with any current factions.

I think it likely that there is the influence of two sets of memories at play, or two egos, in the entity we know as Lotus. This also might explain why she has a humanoid (pod and in orbiter) and Sentient (escape with Ballas) body seen in the questline.

One person is not the other, and perhaps they are neither at our point in the story: Natah may have used info about Margulis to essentially write into whatever system modulates Sentient consciousness (or well.. sentience), since they're synthetic life, as stated, I'd think them programable. In any event, Margulis is dead. Scan or execution, or both, any of those destroys her immediate chain of consciousness, but a clone of her could *possibly* be made if the Jade Light is a scan and *all* the info was preserved, which would be identical to the original at the moment of execution, though after that point they would diverge into separate people.

But what if only some information was preserved? You'd probably get an entity that resembles the Lotus if partial info was used by the Sentient, Natah, especially given her sterility. I can see the temptation for a Sentient to go that route.. in fact.. if you really want to read into it.. two beings joining together.. raising and protecting children.. it has.. parallels.

/probably overthought speculative rant (also wow that was over a page long)