(urth) Cassie's Mobile Home (AEG spoilers)

[Dave Tallman]

Something very strange was going on with Cassie's apartment in this story.
There are too many inconsistencies for the explanation to be typos or
mistakes. I believe the answer is that Cassie was unconsciously warping
reality. Dr. Chase implied that the change he enabled in her was more than
just bringing out latent talent: she had been raised to a near-angelic level
of power. "It is easy, terribly easy, for someone who has transformed up to
slip back down" (p. 100).

   1. In the beginning, Cassie lives on West Arbor (p.81), next to apartment
   3B (p. 52), so she's in 3A. It's probably on the third floor of a small
   building; it's only a few steps from the elevator to her door (p. 52).
   2. It's within a short walk of a Baskin-Robbins (p. 43). It's not a big,
   upscale store since only a single surly teenager is on duty there.
   3. It's eighteen blocks from the home of the successful Sharon Bench,
   probably on the poor side of town (p. 24).
   4. There is a mention of windows, but not French windows or a balcony (p.
   43).
   5. It's difficult to find parking places nearby -- Chase has to walk four
   blocks (p. 81).

A couple of days later:

   1. She's on the fifth floor (p. 111).
   2. The view shows several cars parked on the side of the street, at about
   the same time of day as when Chase had trouble finding parking (p. 111).
   3. Some nearby buildings have doormen (p. 111), but apparently not hers.
   Several people call unannounced. Her telephone is working, but she gets no
   calls about them (p. 105-110).
   4. That night, she suddenly has a doorman who calls to screen her
   visitors (p. 116).

She didn't just move to a fancier place with her success. She had the same
upstairs neighbor, Brian Pickins (pp. 85, 250). The hole Gideon Chase made
to break into her apartment also connects the places (p. 76, 87).

After she goes to the South Sea island, the assassin gives her address as
181 East Arbor Boulevard, apartment 301 and Cassie confirms it (p. 249). The
fact that it is back on the third floor suggests that it's reverting to a
lower level since she is not there to maintain focus on it. The doorman may
also be gone, since the cultists have managed to kill a tenant and take over
his apartment undetected.

In the end, she seems to have lost her power and she is prematurely aged,
possibly from burn-out as well as her harrowing experiences. Her apartment
has gone back to the west side of town ("Best of all it was on the east side
of Kingsport, across town from her old one." p. 293). This transition was
rougher than the others and it seems that in the process all of her
possessions were lost (p. 292).

There are several other instances of reality-warping in the rest of the
story.

   1. People start thinking she is famous before she has even given her
   breakthrough performance (p. 45), and Sharon calls her a famous actress the
   day after that performance (p. 89).
   2. Early on, Cassie is familiar with Mickey the stage manager and asks
   for him by name (p. 58). Later, she doesn't know his name (p. 137). A famous
   star wouldn't know a lowly stage manager, unlike the struggling actress she
   was.
   3. Vince Palma knows her full name and uses it in public (p. 63). Later,
   Cassie is so surprised that Reis has found out her real first name that she
   stutters (p. 146).
   4. She sees Alexis Cabana as a waitress at Rusterman's (p. 118). Alexis
   doesn't remember acting under that name (or she pretends not to). I don't
   believe this is just a coincidental resemblance. Possibly the past has been
   warped so that Cassie played the main role ("By this time you'd be Jane
   Simmons." p. 54).
   5. Cassie hid her diamond necklace in her hotel room and the next morning
   finds it in a room safe she doesn't remember using (p. 152-153). I believe
   she created the room safe overnight out of her wish to have a more secure
   place for her jewels.
   6. She calls Sharon from the South Sea island at her breakfast time (p.
   236), which would be nearly Sharon's lunch time because Cassie is a late
   riser ("I get up at eleven, don't I, Margaret?" p. 139). There is almost no
   time difference, which is impossible if Sharon is really back in the states.
   I believe Cassie has time-warped this call. It's possible that some sort of
   time-warping is available on the islands and that Reis makes use of it,
   because he acts so quickly to find Cassie almost as soon as she is recruited
   by Chase ("This afternoon I found my director." p. 66). There seems to be a
   connection between Woldercan, where ethermail messages can arrive out of
   causality order (pp. 18-19, 298), and the Chtulhu-ruled islands. (Woldercan
   is the name of a city where a pagan god was worshipped with human sacrifices
   in "The Circus of Dr. Lao", so a link is definitely implied). Former
   ambassador Klauser also says that time is an illusion (p. 298).

In the end, "Fiona" was hoping to bring Cassie Casey back (p. 296). She was
going to Woldercan to see Gideon Chase. I doubt he would be able to perform
the same trick twice, but he will love her anyway ("As soon as he spoke, he
knew that for him no reversal would have the least effect." p. 81). There's
a chance for a bittersweet happy ending, but Cassie was still deep in grief
over Bill/Wally. She may have had a sense of Bill's presence because of the
last fading traces of her power which she lost when she got far enough away
from Earth. That would account for her sudden desperate cry: "Please, oh,
please, Wally! Come back to me!"

Reis had good intentions, but he had a "touch of megalomania" (p. 304) and
wanted to rule the world ("I have that island now, but I've seen a better
one. A blue isle in a sea of black. I fight for it every day, and I'll win."
p. 125). He did far more harm with his good intentions than the amoral Dr.
Chase, especially when he provoked a fight between the Navy and Cthulhu. I
would say that the power of his alchemical wealth was the "evil guest" in
this story which destroyed both him and Cassie.
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