(urth) Short Sun Notes: Chems

[António Pedro Marques]

No dia 01/12/2012, às 22:34, Andrew Mason <andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com> escreveu:

> This is a small thing, but I think an interesting one. The question
> has been raised in the past why, apart from Marble, there appear to be
> no chems on Blue.

It may be that the plan of Pas is to send bios to Blue, not chems. Chems seem to have started off as slaves - in the sense that they need no sustenance and their roles are determined by others. They are well suited to the Whorl, where the conditions are not too rough for their mechanical nature. But Blue or Green have no roads, nor controlled humidity, so even a possible function for them as heavy workers would seem to be limited.

> Later (RTTW 9), again wondering about who might be an inhumu/a, the
> Rajan says ‘Hide, Vadsig, Aanvagen, Beroep, and Azijin can be
> dismissed; I have been too close to all of them far too often to be
> thus deceived. In my judgment Cijfer can be dismissed as well.’ Why,
> if not because of closeness? But if she is a chem – which presumably
> an inhuma couldn’t imitate – this would be an explanation.

But shouldn't the wording then be more like 'of course' or even 'if I'm correct' rather than 'in my judgement', which, to me, suggests it is a complex matter?

> If Cijfer is a chem her husband, Wijzer, must be as well. In the light
> of this it may be significant that in the final battle he killed five
> inhumi, ‘twice strangling one with each hand’.

That one is immensely suggesting (suggestive?), agreed.