TFT Snippet #18

phillies wrote:

SCC wrote:This just occurred to me, but could these new bio-implants be how Merlin got that recording of the inside of the Temple? What are the limits on the sensors of these implants?

Marching toward creating an inner circle corps of supermen that will be more powerful and, given human nature, eventually as corrupt, as the old Inquisition.

Not with the demonstrated integrity of Nimue Alban (and her two avatars). They are effectively immortal, so they will continue to act as check on any megalomaniacs that might arise.

Thanks for another marvelous snippet. Judging from page count in the Amazon look page, we now have more than a quarter of the book almost 30%.

phillies wrote:

SCC wrote:This just occurred to me, but could these new bio-implants be how Merlin got that recording of the inside of the Temple? What are the limits on the sensors of these implants?

Marching toward creating an inner circle corps of supermen that will be more powerful and, given human nature, eventually as corrupt, as the old Inquisition.

Well now, there's a cheerful approach! However it is very unlikely to happen, given the ethical standards of the inner Circle as currently constituted, Merlin and Nimue's lock on the others -he/she/they are still the senior TF officer on planet and can lock down access to OWL who provides the only datanet available and most importantly of all, that they are planning a less than 1 generation time span to the great reveal , beyond which huge numbers of people will be getting the interfaces. If everyone is a 'superman' the supermen can't dominate society.

phillies wrote:Marching toward creating an inner circle corps of supermen that will be more powerful and, given human nature, eventually as corrupt, as the old Inquisition.

Weber's already done that with the Mesan Alignment in the Honorverse.

fallsfromtrees wrote:

phillies wrote:Marching toward creating an inner circle corps of supermen that will be more powerful and, given human nature, eventually as corrupt, as the old Inquisition.

Not with the demonstrated integrity of Nimue Alban (and her two avatars). They are effectively immortal, so they will continue to act as check on any megalomaniacs that might arise.

Immortality is no guarantee for staying sane and in touch with reality in the long run. Merlin already admitted that he at certain moments had thought more about Charis immediate priorities than Safehold's priorities.
I would assume the more effective check on this development is that the 1000 year Return of the Archangels will likely resolve the threat of the orbital bombardment system one way or another.
Either the inner circle is no longer around, or it will be time for the reveal.

If they stick around for another century in hiding I would be more worried about the inner circle loosing focus and start playing god.

runsforcelery wrote:So they made the decision — with his concurrence — that they aren't going to repair it until/unless the truth about the Federation and the origins of Safehold can be fully revealed. Given the state of medicine on Safehold, the physicians there know the damage to his arm is permanent within the capabilities of the medical science provided to them by the Archangels. That means that repairing his arm would constitute a "miracle," and they aren't going to present that kind of miracle tied to Hektor.

Hmm...now that I think about it, I hope they were at least able to prevent Hektor from having to deal with any chronic pain.

Kufat wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:So they made the decision — with his concurrence — that they aren't going to repair it until/unless the truth about the Federation and the origins of Safehold can be fully revealed. Given the state of medicine on Safehold, the physicians there know the damage to his arm is permanent within the capabilities of the medical science provided to them by the Archangels. That means that repairing his arm would constitute a "miracle," and they aren't going to present that kind of miracle tied to Hektor.

Hmm...now that I think about it, I hope they were at least able to prevent Hektor from having to deal with any chronic pain.

Remeber that it was already enough of a miracle that Hector lived at all - immediately after the attack Irys was told that there was no hope of his surviving, and she was just waiting until he died when Merlin showed up to explain things. Adding another miracle on top of that would have been WAY too much.

Pure fluff. I loved it thank you RFC!

I suspect preventing any chronic pain from his injury would be safe as long as Hektor's arm still doesn't work.

As RTF (the MWW) said, fixing his arm would be very noticeable.

But preventing the pain likely wouldn't be noticeable to the Safehold doctors.

fallsfromtrees wrote:

Kufat wrote:Hmm...now that I think about it, I hope they were at least able to prevent Hektor from having to deal with any chronic pain.

Remeber that it was already enough of a miracle that Hector lived at all - immediately after the attack Irys was told that there was no hope of his surviving, and she was just waiting until he died when Merlin showed up to explain things. Adding another miracle on top of that would have been WAY too much.

DrakBibliophile wrote:[...] fixing his arm would be very noticeable.

But preventing the pain likely wouldn't be noticeable to the Safehold doctors.

That was what I was thinking, yeah. Given the Inner Circle's propensity for deception through honesty, I could see him smiling tightly and saying that the pain isn't bad whenever anyone asked, if this were the case.