Fifth Head of Cerberus: Shadowchildren vs. Abos

James Crossley · 11 Apr 2008, 03:36 · from 2008-April.txt.gz

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From: ishmael at drizzle.com (James Crossley)
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 20:36:47 -0700
Subject: (urth) Fifth Head of Cerberus: Shadowchildren vs. Abos
In-Reply-To: <ca4bdd8f0804101704r349a0ae3tb976358b08e515c0 at mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <C4242ADF.6B33%ishmael at drizzle.com>

On 4/10/08 5:04 PM, "E" <euth82 at gmail.com> wrote:

> I found a transcript of a chat w/ Gene Wolfe
> 
[snip]
> 
> So if Wolfe is being truthful, Marsch was replaced by a shadow-child,
> not a humanoid abo.  Meaning that VRT is a shadow-child.
> 
> I know there was an unresolved debate about whether shadow-children
> are the original abos or are the result of early space fairing humans
> degenerating due to addiction to the drug found on the planet.

My understanding was that the shadow children were the original inhabitants,
able to shapeshift but lacking a humanoid model until the humans arrived and
colonized the planet.  Once that happened, the shadow children mimicked the
colonizers (becoming known to them as "abos" along the way) sometimes so
successfully that they might forget their true nature.

James

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