(urth) the prime calcula/ his citadel and other quotes

[Andrew Mason]

>
> In favour of your argument is the possibility that the embryo storage
> station was attacked, perhaps even by Echidna possessing the dead foreign
> chem soldier who was found by Silk and Mamelta.  But this seems a bit
> speculative; the place could just have been trashed by looters looking for
> something in particular.  Indeed, you'd expect a cleaner job if the object
> was to destroy a targeted embryo.

I had supposed that the soldier was guarding the lander and was killed
by the raiders, rather than the other way round. But in any cases
there's no doubt, is there, that the store has been raisded by looters
looking for embryos to sell on the black market? As well as Silk,
Mucor, perhaps others such as Auk, the lynxes, I suspect also the
catachrest come from there.
>
>
Marc Aramini wrote:

> Gerry, one of the things I quoted you dismissed as just Silk being introduced to a new name, I was trying to imply they cast doubts on the validity of Mamelta's clear memories.  Mamelta says her name is mamelta, and when silk asks if that's really her name, she says ... "I think so. I can't ..." indicating she HAS been tampered with.  If I ask you if your name is Gerry, do you say, "I think so."?  Its indicative of supreme confusion, and Rigoglio, aka Roger, also says the memories of those placed aboard where altered in Short Sun.  I don't think it says that her name is NOT mamelta, but it does say that she has been messed with and is confused.

As others have said, there's no doubt her memories have been tampered
with. But the general impression I get is that memories have been
tampered with to obscure them; the bits that, after some reflection,
she gets back are genuine. I don't see any evidence for actually
creating false memories. The bit about 'They told us we were going to
a land of peace and plenty' rings true, and provides significant
evidence of what happened. It doesn't fit the monarch's mistreess, who
knew what was going on, as she was holding his hand when he was
scanned into Mainframe, and demanded to be scanned herself.

Unlike Gerry, I don't believe this counts against her being Silk's
mother, since I think that if she was, it would be by egg donation;
but it does count against her being Kypris.

> The monarch wants a son to succeed him, and at the end Silk's face on Pas shows just that succession.

But it strikes me as odd that Pas would want his son to succeed him in
_that_ way, because he presumably thought that, on the Whorl, he would
be immortal. And in general, I have a problem with the idea of Pas
setting up all the events of _Long Sun_, because they only had to
happen in that way because Pas was dead - and I take it he wasn't
planning to die. If he had been alive, the exodus could have been
announced from the Sacred Windows of all the cities; if the plan
involved an heir, he could have been publicly pointed out. But because
Pas was dead, it had to be kickstarted by the Outsider in this odd
way.

But here's a thought - could we see the conclusion as Pas's desire for
an heir being fulfilled, but in a way he did not expect? That would
make quite a satisfying story, I feel.