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Fine Structure: Difference between revisions
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* [[Dystopia]]: [http://qntm.org/?crushed Crushed Underground] is an example of one that is totally necessary to the survival of humanity. At least a few others rise and fall as the world develops technology and has it taken away from them by Anne Poole and the Imprisoning God.
* [[Earth Is the Center of the Universe]]: It's one of only two places in our universe where intelligent life developed, and Oul wiped out the other one already.
** Earth is also the center of the (3+1 dimensional at least, higher dimensional multiverses could care less) Multiverse; but only because the rest of the universe is dreadfully boring and also the Multiverse was created during one of Mitch's escape attempts, so civilizations center around interdimensional travel rather than exploring the rest of the universe.
* [[Earthshattering Kaboom]]: In the [[Final Battle]].
* [[Eldritch Abomination]]: Several of them. [[Big Bad|Oul]] is one, and so is the Imprisoning God. Technically, so is [[Big Good|Xio]], but he spends most of his time [[God in Human Form|in a mortal human body]], with human motivations and goals.
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** {{spoiler|Mouka ends up as an [[Unperson]], and only one person remembers him, and he can't do anything about it. It's quite likely he lived for some time after this}}
* [[Fighting a Shadow]]: Zykov/Oul represents a tiny fraction of Oul's power. In [http://qntm.org/over "this is not over and I am not dead"], Zykov/Oul ''kills himself'', evidently feeling he can do no further damage to humanity in that manifestation.
* [[Fight Scene]]: The [http://qntm.org/?fs Fight Scene] subsection, natch. Arika vs. the [[Cape Busters]]. Ends with a [[Human Shield]], followed by [[Shooting Superman]].
** The first Power-related story, [http://qntm.org/power "Power Of Two"], also qualifies.
* [[Final Battle]]: Oul vs Ching.
* [[First Contact Math]]: "Eka", AKA the Script, starts out from prime numbers and works its way up to describe the entire physics of the universe. It's also [[Functional Magic]].
* [[God in Human Form]]: Mitch/Xio and Zykov/Oul are, for all intents and purposes, this.
* [[Heel Face Mind Screw]]: It is implied that Mitch/Xio uses the same [[More Than Mind Control]] powers as Zykov/Oul does, especially on John Zhang, leading to Zhang's [[Heroic Sacrifice]] below.
* [[Heroic Sacrifice]]: Five examples.
** Jim Akker kills himself while Zykov/Oul is telepathically probing his mind, in an attempt to [[Taking You with Me|take him down too]]. He also sends a last-minute warning to Ching.
** Jason Chilton sacrifices himself to save millions of people and several named characters from the [[Unstoppable Rage]] of the Twelfth Power.
** John Zhang kills himself in an ostentatiously physics-breaking way, forcing the Imprisoning God to isolate our entire solar system from the rest of [[The Multiverse]], which locks out Oul.
** Anne Poole jumps onto a black hole to undo the results of John Zhang's actions, allowing the [[Final Battle]] to go forward.
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* [[High-Pressure Blood]]: The slaughter at the top-secret Soviet lab in [http://qntm.org/?halfway halfway homes, catacombs, twilight zones] features far too much blood for a normal gunfight. Justified by the fact that the scientists had just unleashed the [[Sealed Evil in a Can]].
* [[Humans Are Special]]: Humans are (according to [[Word of God]]) only the second intelligent life to evolve in a universe at the far end of habitability (that is, 3+1 dimensional): extremophiles, like deep-sea vent dwelling archaeobacteria, and Oul killed the first already.
** Definitely in full force with Ching, who scares ''two'' functional gods and kills one of them.
* [[Hyperlink Story]]: After "On Digital Extremities", all the scientists go their separate ways and have seemingly unrelated superscience-related adventures, only reconvening back at the MPR in "The Story So Far", which is also a recap episode and roughly the midpoint of the series.
* [[It Only Works Once]]: Because the Imprisoning God breaks it once you use it (not after merely one use at first, but faster and faster over time.)
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* [[Lightning Can Do Anything]]: Each Power is empowered when a bolt of lightning strikes them, earthing a fraction of Oul's or Xio's power in them. Other incredibly precise lightning strikes turn out to be [[Bolt of Divine Retribution|the will of the Imprisoning God]]. The most common thing the bolts of divine will do is ''reprogramming computers''.
* [[Lost Technology]]: Anne Poole spends thousands of years trying to slow down humanity's inevitable rediscovery of weapons of mass destruction, particularly nuclear weapons. When she inevitably fails, planet-wide mind wipes are carried out, returning such tech to [[Lost Technology]] status.
* [[Magic Pants]]: [[Lampshaded]] in [http://qntm.org/?power Power of Two]. Jason Chilton notes that his body armor has been torn almost completely apart after his fight with the Tenth Power, but his pants have remained miraculously intact.
* [[Mind Screw]]: Not helped by Sam being fairly tight-lipped as he was writing it.
* [[More Than Mind Control]]: Zykov/Oul uses overpowering telepathy to the point where his servants try to kill millions on their own initiative, because they believe its the right thing to do.
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* [[Shrug of God]]: At least one question in the comments on the [http://qntm.org/?faq Q&A] is answered "Who cares?"
* [[Subspace Ansible]]: As far as most of the scientists are concerned, the plot is kicked off by the discovery of the A-Layer, which ''should'' allow faster-than-light communications, but doesn't.
* [[Superpower Lottery]]:
** All the standard-issue superheroes are [[Flying Brick|Flying Bricks]], most notably Arisa McClure and Jason Chilton. Later members of the Line are stronger, but few manage to live long past their Birth.
** Anne Poole has almost perfect [[Immortality]], although this is really more of [[Blessed with Suck]] considering she got it and then spent 18 months trapped in a coal seam completely conscious and insane.
** Mitch Calrus/Xio can become [[Intangible Man|Intangible]], and extend the effect to things he touches. He can also [[X-Ray Vision|see through things]]. Evidently he also has [[More Than Mind Control]], but just how often he uses it is up to the reader's interpretation.
** As Zykov, Oul has [[More Than Mind Control]], as well as an unknown degree of super-strength. In the [[Final Battle]], Oul's power is [[Reality Warper|reality warping]], to an even greater degree than Ching, but less imaginatively applied.
** Ching ultimately gains the powers of a self-aware [[Reality Warper]], but he can only warp reality in a particular way once before that option is excised by the Imprisoning God. Any [[Language of Magic|Eka]] speaker theoretically has this power, Ching just has it to an incredible degree due to earthing all of Xio's power in himself.
* [[Super Soldier]]: The US government can evidently turn people into Class VI supermen at will.
* [[Super Weight]]: Ranging from -1 for normal humans to 5 for the Imprisoning God, and everything in between for high dimensional beings.
* [[Teleporters and Transporters]]: Teleportation works by swapping two areas of space. The very first teleportation experiment results in Anne Poole being sealed in a coal seam. The consquences only get worse from there - later, four scientists are simultaneously killed. Finally, an entire building is teleported underground, and ''teleportation is excised from the fabric of the universe''.
* [[The Glasses Gotta Go]]: [[Subverted]]. One minor character, Srin Shapur, is described like this explicitly:
{{quote|She has the kind of hair that's ideal for pinning up in a tight bun and then shaking down in slow motion halfway through the movie, and even has the thick, [[Nerd Glasses|nerdy glasses]] to take off dramatically too. Unfortunately, this will never happen, because she needs the glasses to see.}}
* [[The Stars Are Going Out]]: In [http://qntm.org/?astronomer The Astronomer's Loss]. This turns out to be a good thing though.
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* [[Title Drop]]: In the very first story. A few of the individual chapters do this as well.
{{quote|Then it's over, Heaven number seventy-nine dopplering into our wake, torn bodily from its extradimensional moorings, fine structure bucking, scattering and shattering.}}
* [[The Atoner]]: Arika, after Jason's death. At that point she's killed or caused the death of 223 people since she got her powers. A few years later, when she loses her powers, she's in the middle of saving her 223rd life.
* [[Unperson]]: The result of applying an anti-memetic weapon to a human being. Such a person cannot be remembered or recorded. As far as anyone is concerned they ''don't exist''. This happens to {{spoiler|}}, and as a result, we, the readers, cannot ever know why<ref>It's implied he realized what Mitch really was and/or realized he was brainwashing the others</ref>!
* [[Unspoken Plan Guarantee]]: In the lead up to the [[Final Battle]], Mitch/Xio has a stated plan of reaching the Solution in Antarctica, and we hear a fair amount about the trip. He shows up just hours too late, but Ching, whom we haven't seen since he tried to drag Mitch out of the universe, shows up with the Solution and all of Xio's remaining power, ready to challenge Oul.
* [[Unstoppable Rage]]: For the first 15.8 seconds after becoming a Power, the person in question is an absolute berserker. Civilian casualties are usually very, very high. This is why most of the Powers 10 and higher are killed.
** Powers perceive time differently. For a sufficiently high Power, that 15.8 seconds can mean many hours. Plenty of time for them to destroy a whole city.
* [[The Wall Around the World]]: The Imprisoning God prevents any travel out of 3+ 1 dimensional space, keeping Oul and everyone else in.
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* [[Wild Mass Guessing]]: Just read the comments on the various stories. Note that comments were not there from the very start, but were put in place about halfway through.
* [[Word of God]]: Anything Sam says in the comment threads is this. He generally only clarifies points in his stories, rather than giving new information. The [http://qntm.org/?faq Q&A] is the major repository of [[Word of God]].
* [[Your Mind Makes It Real]]: [[Word of God]] is that a [[Applied Phlebotinum|Klick Device]] is "a metal box with ''nothing in it'', which serves as the focal point for a machine which [[Reality Warper|its user]] builds entirely in his or her ''head''".
* [[You Shall Not Pass]]: Zhang's [[Heroic Sacrifice]] creates the New Cosmology, an impenetrable barrier around the solar system, keeping Oul at bay for the necessary thousands of years.
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