HFQ Official Snippet #5

Tanstaafl wrote:

PeterZ wrote:Sorry, Randomiser, but the convolutions necessary to explain how a pro Langhorne colonist learned or remembered Spanish would be so torturous as to give Clyntahn an exquisite jolt of sadistic pleasure. Occam's razor suggests Khody was a crew member.


Demon and opposing crew member might well be synonymous. I don't think an ignorant colonist with with some tech goodies would be classified as a demon. Demon worshiper without doubt, but not demon. I may of course be wrong.

Peter,

I think you are confused, what does not happen often.

Kohdy appears to belief in the CoGA, what no crewmembers do.
He got doubts and showed the ability to write spanish after he was captured by a demon (=Shan-Wei follower).

We know Shan-Wei converted a number af Adams and Eves by hooking them up to a NEAT. We know groups of these converted A&E went out in the world as seeds and/or to proselytize.

Occam's razor makes Kohdy an Adam, captured by a Shan-Wei follower who did have access to a NEAT.

Because to use a NEAT you need implants, and only humans born on earth did have them.

Ah, the heady speculation!

runsforcelery wrote:

Ah, the heady speculation!

words like 'ratbag' and 'meanie' spring to mind, for some reason!

If we work from Nynian's assumption that Kohdy wrote "en Espanol" to protect anyone who might inadvertantly read his diary from falling into error, why wouldn't he also use 'Demon,' the accepted coloquialism for enemies of the regime. If he is sufficiently aware that he is writing for history that he hides the truth of his thought in an indecipherable tongue, then surely he would be cognizant enough of it to use accepted vernacular.

We also seem to be working from the assumption that all crew members were "in" on the conspiracy. There is no reason that Bedard could not have also overseen a "re-education" program for lower level crew members. This may not have been as pervasive as what happened to the colonists, but may have simply been a steady diet of propaganda. Remember, the ships would have had only State-run Media, and voices of dissent were ostracized and ridiculed. A lowly seargent-at-arms or construction team supervisor probably would not have had access to the insights that we as readers are given through our access to Shan-Wei and Kau-Yung.


What I think would be awesome to see is the story of the SSK, and Nynian in particular, in a graphic novel form drawn by Steve Epting, with layout and script by Ed Brubaker, but that's probably reaching a bit. Still, this might be an interesting sidelight for the guys doing the Honor comics or someone else at Image.

There's an option being forgotten here. Khody could have been the child of a Spanish crew member, and secretly tought his parents native language as a way of keeping the parents heritage alive. (Or south American of course)

He's having too much fun to enlighten us.

isaac_newton wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:

Ah, the heady speculation!

words like 'ratbag' and 'meanie' spring to mind, for some reason!

Just speculating here, have anyone considered that Kohdy and SSK may be a total fabrication?

Maybe the SSK was founded by a crewmember in Shan-Wei's faction as a last resort when the war went badly, which means that Kohdy and his journal is a fabrication.

It may have been done as a way to preserve vital information and set up an organization that Nimue would be able to use when she was awakened. No one else on Safehold would know how or have the means to translate spanish.

It kind of makes sense in a way, if you have to make sure information is preserved for ~800 years that Nimue would need to defeat the church and bootstrap Safehold.

"Why couldn't they just contact Owl and dump the information then?" you ask. Well, maybe they didn't have any high tech transportation left or they didn't want to tip off the last of the "lesser" angels that still was alive.

As I said, just speculating...

The memory wipe may also not have been perfect. There is a lot of individual to individual variation in neurobiology. Some individuals (Kohdy?) may have been inherently resistant to the memory wipe. Language is so basic that by the time one is an adult it's almost a reflex. If a memory wipe works anything like "normal" memory loss the elderly experience, the most recent memories would be the first to go, childhood memories toward the last, and fundamentals like language only at the end. So, if anything were to be missed by a wipe of that type, something that fundamental (Spanish) would be.

DrakBibliophile wrote:Why would a crew member consider another crew member on the other side a Demon?

PeterZ wrote:Sorry, Randomiser, but the convolutions necessary to explain how a pro Langhorne colonist learned or remembered Spanish would be so torturous as to give Clyntahn an exquisite jolt of sadistic pleasure. Occam's razor suggests Khody was a crew member.


Demon and opposing crew member might well be synonymous. I don't think an ignorant colonist with with some tech goodies would be classified as a demon. Demon worshiper without doubt, but not demon. I may of course be wrong.

As was posted down thread, Drak, a supporter of the CoGA would use the vernacular of the colonists in correspondence and conversations that colonists would be privvy to. Not doing so would undercut the CoGA's authority in some small way. Done often enough and that authority would be shredded.

biochem wrote:The memory wipe may also not have been perfect. There is a lot of individual to individual variation in neurobiology. Some individuals (Kohdy?) may have been inherently resistant to the memory wipe. Language is so basic that by the time one is an adult it's almost a reflex. If a memory wipe works anything like "normal" memory loss the elderly experience, the most recent memories would be the first to go, childhood memories toward the last, and fundamentals like language only at the end. So, if anything were to be missed by a wipe of that type, something that fundamental (Spanish) would be.

The only problem with that is apparently the other 8 million Adam and Eves were successfully wiped.

biochem wrote:If a memory wipe works anything like "normal" memory loss the elderly experience, the most recent memories would be the first to go, childhood memories toward the last, and fundamentals like language only at the end. So, if anything were to be missed by a wipe of that type, something that fundamental (Spanish) would be.

I don't think a memory wipe works anything like "normal memory loss.

Why is everyone ignoring the "serendipity," "Coincidence," or whatever you want to call it that Nimue's last upload to her PICA was for a trip to the Andes -- where Spanish happens to be the primary language.

Saint Zhernau (sp) expected Nimue/Merlin to appear. Why wouldn't the Sisters of Saint Kohdy have the same sort of "prophesy" and a secret message that only Merlin can be expected to read.