(urth) Short Sun notes: Remora

[Lee Berman]

>Gerry Quinn: It's possible that they were in contact with elements of MainFrame.  
>Or that they lurked in the tunnels and contacted only selected individuals.
 

What Windcloud says is: "In the Whorl, I made the acquaintance of *many* of
your race.’" This would not seem to be the way one would describe electronically 
wandering around Mainframe or lurking in the tunnels. I think it implies Windcloud
wandered around places like Viron, connecting with the regular sorts of Whorl residents
we know best.

Moreover, we know that Inhumi have infiltrated the Whorl and walked among its residents 
incognito, I expect the revelation that Neighbors were also on the Whorl to follow a similar
pattern rather than have it be a random and purposeless event.

>Marc Aramini: Native is such a difficult word when you are talking about hybrids. Components 
>from here, components from there. As the inhuma said after seeing the red sun whorl: 
>"we are everywhere!"

I agree. Such dispersion is to be expected from a species whose niche is to imitate
other species and hitchhike. Like weeds on earth, their very essence is to be able to
disperse everywhere and grow anywhere.

So who/what/where on Urth do we find shapeshifters.....? This has been hotly debated on
this board in the past. There are hints of shapeshifters on Urth to be found with Mother
Pyrexia, the angel in Melito's story, the Armiger's Daughter/lark story, and perhaps others.
But even the most stringent skeptics agree that Tzadkiel is a shape-shifting example which 
cannot be denied.

So, is it possible Inhumi-types could somehow evolve (or hybridize?) into mighty angelic 
beings? The hints of an aquatic origin for Tzadkiel and Barbatus and Famulimas seem to 
hint at a connection to such beings as Abaia, Erebus, Scylla, the Mother, etc. Is Apheta's
insectoid nature somehow related?

>Andrew Mason: The iNeighbours whom Horn/the Rajan meets certainly seem to be higher than
>humans, but we should remember that they thought that humans would be
>better able to cope with the inhumi threat than they did.

My interpretation is that humans are baser animals than Neigbhors and are thus more equipped
to resist infection by Inhumi. SilkHorn beats Jahlee to death. Other groups bury the Inhumi 
alive etc.  Perhaps The Neighbors were unable to perpetrate such violent atrocities against their parasitic enemies and were forced to escape to another plane of existence.  They were unable to 
deal with the Inhumi here in the material world, as humans are at least partially able to do.

>Of Windcloud, however, we do know that he had previously lived on Blue,
>since he reveals that he was the original occupant of Inclito's house - he
>says that the Rajan came to stay in his house, being invited by a man who
>was living there (and we are indeed told that the core of Inclito's house
>was an old Neighbour structure). 

Good point. But is there any indication that Neighbors have a lifespan?  If he is more or less
immortal, couldn't Windcloud have originally lived in Inclito's place then gone to Green and 
become entwined with the parasitic Inhumi? Getting onto the Whorl and being able to walk among
and interact with humans seems so completely Inhumi-like. My sense is that the original Neighbors prefer to keep to themselves. Horn has to go to their camp, not vice versa. (Remaining above vs.
mixing it up with the humans and their lives. I think there is a God/Demiurge/Devil analogy in 
there somewhere).

>Gerry Quinn: The discuission reminds me of Fifth Head of Cerberus, in which all parties 
>(I think particularly of the three groups present on Sainte Anne before the 
>French landing, but it applies equally well to humans thereafter) seem 
>fairly well convinced of their own race's superiority.  Though in truth no 
>group, aboriginal or human, appeared to have too much to be proud of.

Well, I think that is a good, objective, agnostic sort of analysis that I would tend to share,
personally.

But in his writing and also in interviews, Gene Wolfe seems to express a personal belief in higher
and lower beings.  so I have to interpret his work in light of these apparent intentions.