Helping Rand die

[nashdude]

I theorized a little while back about the possibility of Rand and the DO being linked through Rand's link with Moridin. My thinking is that, in order to "break the Wheel" and change Randland's chonology from cyclical time to linear time, Rand would have to be balefired. This would burn him out of the Pattern, and Tarmon Gai'don really WOULD be the Last Battle.

 

Of course, a number of people balked at this idea hehe

 

So I went back to the drawing board. And tonight, while I was on my VERY FIRST READ of KoD (finally!!! ;)), I came across this little jewel...

 

You know of people who hear voices in their heads? Sometimes' date=' very rarely, the voices they hear are the voices of past lives. Lanfear claimed he knew things from our own Age, things only Lews Therin Telamon could know. Clearly, he is hearing Lews Therin's voice. It makes no difference that his voice is real, however. In fact, that makes his situation worse. Even Graendal usually failed to achieve reintegration with someone who heard a real voice...[/quote']

 

Did you catch that? REINTEGRATION. Semi goes on to say that if such reintegration is impossible, the subject descends into madness rather abruptly.

 

Now, I'm sure this has been fleshed out a number of times since KoD came out, but this is my first read-through, so yall'a just hafta suffer while I get this out hehe

 

My latest theory---if the balefire theory cannot be correct---is that Alivia helps Rand "die" by reintegrating Rand and LTT, as Graendal attempted to do in the AoL. Rather than them being two personalities stuck in the same body, Alivia would actually FUSE the two together in a Isam/Luc-esque way.

 

In that moment, the man who was once Rand would cease to exist, as would LTT. Alivia would have helped both men "die", creating a new Rand in the old one's place---one that had the personality, memories, and skills of BOTH men in a single soul, and none of the madness that the former schizo-Rand might have been victim to---a new Rand that is capable of defeating the DO once and for all.

 

Make sense?

[benr]

Your other option here is that Rand has decided that self-determination is better than an endless cycle, and that HE is planning to break the wheel.