City of IF

[Key]

The next chapter of the featured storygame "The Machine's Daughter" has been posted:

Chapter 15: Revelations on High

Discussion and voting are complete for chapter 15.

For more about the storygame, see the New Players Start Here topic in this forum.

[Muaddib]

Poor Salva...

I think Pilla's questions here were spot on. I think Pilla should tell Aquilla to take her to Prometheus.

[Shady Stoat]

Good chapter - pretty much what I expected, until the eagles came along :)

The eagle lord seems to have worked himself into a position where he wants to be convinced now. I think he's more likely to co-operate with a rationale than a request at this point though. So, we want to see the Watchmaker and we have to try to convince him that it's in his best interests to do so as well.

How about reasoning that loyalty without rationale is easily swayed by the first challenge. In order to understand why he must be on the Emperor's side, he must grasp the logic behind it. He must see Prometheus and come to understand for himself why the Watchmaker must be punished for two thousand years - or whether he should be punished at all.

She'll have to be careful though. It won't do to forget that we're dealing with creatures of emotion rather than logic. We've made that mistake already with the Scarpi.

[Muaddib]

IMHO it seems like the Eagles are logical people. Aquila became doubtful of the Emperor's actions only because of Pilla's logical questioning. He's probably prepared for some emotional plea.

[Smee]

Great chapter- fantastic dialogue with the King that covered a lot of issues. :D

I'll be back after more thought, but for now Stoat's logic is very good. Seeing the Watchmaker is definately the thing to try and do.

Happy Writing. :)

[LordoftheNight]

Seeing Prometheus does seem to be the only sensible option left available.

[Stubby]

Fantastic chapter Key - open her cage and pass my praises to your captive author for that one :)

It is very interesting to try to fathom whether this world is a fantasy prehistory realm where legends are true, and Aquila is an eagle who has existed since before there were skies for him to fly in, or whether it is a scifi realm, where the wheel is an artificial sattelite orbiting the world, where creatures such as the eagle were programmed initially with all of their memories of the history of the place.

It seems to me that the Eagle King is already uneasy about the logical discontiuities in the story of the Emperor - who claims that the makers are simultaneously the rightful rulers for whom he is regent, and that they must also be wiped out for wanting to overthrow the current order. But they are the current rightful order, which should give them the right to change it however they wish.

I think she should press on that, try to speak to the watchmaker, preferably with Aquilla along with her, and find out more from his perspective about the ancient history. I think that she could well convince Aquilla around to her way of thinking - at least to the point that he could become neutran, rather than blindly obeying the dictates of the regent.

[Ingrothechundyer]

Or we could try to go see the Serpant Witches again ;)

[Alegria]

I'm going to have to back up Stoat on this one.

I personally don't think that she should request to be taken to the Serpent Witches. For all we know they're one of the Elders the king is there to guard. If you ask the king if you can see the Serpent Witches, he may get irrationally angry.

You know, it was easier dealing with the Zigots.

[Ravenwing]

That was a really thought-provoking dialogue we had there. It had me thinking certainly.

Well it seems that already, Pilla has already planted some doubt into Aquila's head about the Emperor Regent. Although his conviction behind the Emperor Regent is still strong only because he has been serving the Man for so long. Trying to persuade him otherwise seems hopeless. He seems to be one of those who has to see it to believe it kind of 'person'.

I would like to see this Emperor Regent personally. I wasn't clear on who was doing the execution. Was it the Emperor or Aquila? Because if its the Emperor, Pilla could pretend to accept her fate, and be taken to the Emperor's city to be excecuted. And as a last wish before her death, ask to be taken to Prometheus.

[D-Lotus]

Nice Chapter. :D

Aquila (sounds like a combination ot Attila and Aquiline) is loyal to the Emperor, but I think this loyalty can be shaken if Aquila understands that a new age is dawning, in which the Emperor will be overthrown.

Pilla has to convince Aquila that by siding with her and the makers, the stronger power (although she seems puny) he will be on the good side of the winds of change when they blow.

Explain to him that his choice will be decisive for his people. If he stays loyal to the emperor, the winds of change will blow him away, but if he sides with the makers, he will fly in those winds like an updraft.

Tell him this is what he should do: ally with Pilla.

It might sound haughty, but the truth might snap him out of his loyalty to the emperor.

Anyway, its just another option.

[Chinaren]

Go and see the watch maker.

[Ravenwing]

I am all for going to see the Watchmaker, but we first need to decide on whether or not we want to go with or without Aquila's notice. Well he would probably know either way. If we can get his trust, seeing Prometheus seems easy enough.

[Stubby]

Given that we can't so far get from ANYWHERE to ANYWHERE in the mountains so far without being carried there by an eagle, I doubt that we will be able to see the watchmaker - who isn't even on _this_ mountain necessarily without the king knowing about it!

We are kind of totally screwed here without the kings help.

Haughtily telling him that we plan to start a new order and he'd better be on the correct side will just reinforce his beliefe in everything the emperor REGENT has told him.

We have to press on the regent status of the current ruler, and convince him he has no allegience there when there is a maker who may have a rightful claim to the throne. Not just the crown, which the regent wears still, but the throne!

[Ravenwing]

The thing is we're going to have start from a new perspective for our argument. Actually it may not be the most logical, since it seems we've already tried that outlook.

[D-Lotus]

Stubby wrote: Given that we can't so far get from ANYWHERE to ANYWHERE in the mountains so far without being carried there by an eagle, I doubt that we will be able to see the watchmaker - who isn't even on _this_ mountain necessarily without the king knowing about it!

We are kind of totally screwed here without the kings help.

Haughtily telling him that we plan to start a new order and he'd better be on the correct side will just reinforce his beliefe in everything the emperor REGENT has told him.

We have to press on the regent status of the current ruler, and convince him he has no allegience there when there is a maker who may have a rightful claim to the throne. Not just the crown, which the regent wears still, but the throne!

Good point.

[Ravenwing]

Short and too the point as always D. :D

[ethereal_fauna]

Great chapter. Again her plans have seemed to go awry, but perhaps she can make something of this, and not only find out what she needs and wants to know, but actually make a difference in her world here.

Quote: Those who have opposed him have brought nothing but strife and ruin on the Wheel.

Quote: He created a race that followed logic above all else, even the laws of honor and duty.

You aren't going to sway the King by your logic. He has already witnessed and recognized the inconsistencies in the Regent Emperor's attitudes and actions. He doesn't need you to point out the obvious.

Question now, are you going to be self-serving, and look out for solely your own quest for knowledge, relevant to you specifically? Or are you going to ally with the King, to draw him into something greater?

Even if he would not be your ally, you could impress the King (and save your own life) if you demonstrated that you are not like his image of a Maker, and not like his image of a Zigot. Don't press him with your own demands to see the Watchmaker, or burden him to give you potentially sensitive information about the Emperor.

Instead show him that you do have honor and duty, that you don't intend to bring strife and ruin to the Wheel. Tell him about Salva, and tell him about Nogola. Emphasize how you feel for the plight of the Scarpi, a people of the Wheel, and how you seek to unify them.

Surely all those that would support you as Queen are not dead. Perhaps the eagle King will ally with you, or perhaps he will only sit back and watch you, as he did when you were sleeping. But when Pilla abandons her logic (as she was forced to do, dying in the desert) she comes closer to her ultimate goal- finding out who she is.

Her answers don't lie in her logic, but instead somewhere in the complex, emotional, and illogical turnings of the Wheel.

[Ravenwing]

*nods in agreement* I made mention of how logic is not going to help Pilla in this situation. I think her heartfelt plea for the Scarpi people may sway the eagle King onto our side.

[Mother Goose]

What allegiance does Pilla have to the Scarpi? She had never even seen one till a few weeks ago. True, they befriended her when she was in danger, but all the ones who did that are now dead. Trying to unite such a fractious and warlike people sounds like a thankless task to me, and not Pilla's main object. She never aspired to be their queen, and only killed Rigiva in self-defense.

Asking Aquila to take her to Prometheus (and come with her) would seem to lead to more knowledge - especially if he's the creator of the race she does identify with - than trying to establish rule over a race who mostly want to kill her on sight.

[ethereal_fauna]

It's not a matter of alliances, but of principle. Pilla needs to be more than the sum of her knowledge. More than a wind-up person. She wants to discover the truth about herself- and there's a lot more to that than what can be written in a book, or observed from a mountaintop. Is she to discover now that she can become involved in the affairs of her fellow creatures, and watch them die for her, and then dismiss that as if it were worthless?

Then the eagle king is correct, and she is there to bring ruin, or she knows nothing about honor and duty. She has discovered all she really needs to know about herself, and all the eagle king will need to determine that Pilla's life is best ended with her execution.

[Ravenwing]

Mother Goose wrote:
Asking Aquila to take her to Prometheus (and come with her) would seem to lead to more knowledge - especially if he's the creator of the race she does identify with - than trying to establish rule over a race who mostly want to kill her on sight.

But I don't think Aquila has the trust within him to allow her to visit Prometheus alone or not. I think first we need to argue our case against the Regent.

[Key]

Let me make sure I've got the options right. In terms of what we ask Aquila, I've heard:

Ask him to take you to Prometheus
Ask him to take you to the Serpent-Witches
Ask him to take you to the Emperor
Ask him to help you unify the Scarpi
Ask him to ally with you and disobey the Emperor

There's also been lots of discussion about how you go about convincing him to do one of those things, whether you argue logically or emotionally. This is all good and I'll work that into the next chapter as much as I can, but I'm going to make the decision point about what she's asking for, not how she argues. Sound good?

[Ravenwing]

That outlines I think all our choices. :cool:

[LordoftheNight]

Sounds good.

[ethereal_fauna]

Works for me.

[Ravagerrr]

I agree with the choice selection myself. In continuing with HOW she goes about the decision, I'd like to comment on what's been said and add some thoughts as well.

First of all, I agree that since we have been given an indication that the Watchmaker does indeed exist, I think that not only would she feel it of the utmost importance to visit him, but she would lose sight of anything else. This is the issue that has been tugging at the back of her mind since before she even left the Zigots and I don't think she can pass that up, even for a detour.

So the question of how to get the Eagle king to take her there is already half solved. He has asked her what she thinks he should do with her. Possibly just asking him to take her there would work, ya think?

If not then she could probably impress on him that if the Emperor was to send someone to meet with him in response to his message regarding the capture of a maker, only to find out that he had indeed NOT captured an actual maker, as she still doubts herself to BE, than he would not be a very good servant of the Emperor would he? In fact he could expect punishment. So it is in his interest as in her own, to verify for sure that she is indeed a maker.

He may doubt her, believing her to still lie that she does not know herself to be a maker, but she can remind him that she was born to the Zigots and that goes against what he knows to be the source of a true maker. She must reason with him that the only one who could know for certain how the Zigots would have concieved of her must be the crafty Prometheus who created the Zigots in the first place.

Inspire the Eagle's curiosity, and remind him that the more information and awareness he can show his emperor, the more his emperor will know him to be the loyal servant he is.

She should make sure he flies her to him, as only the eagles really know where he is, and as the king himself would need to hear it all from Prometheus, and perhaps even need to be there to force Prometheus to explain himself and his intentions in creating the Zigots and Pilla's role in the whole thing.

It is important for Pilla to NOT NOT NOT explain to the king that she was attempting to unite the Scarpi, as this was blatantly an act against the authority of the Empire.

I think for now she should stay away from challenging the Eagle's beliefs about the Emperor directly. However, while she travels with him, relate stories, personal stories from her experiences with the Zigots and the animals that could help to instil some ideas, without saying them outright.

She could suggest that the animals are suffering under the rule of the Empire. She could plant the thinking in the Eagle's mind, that while the Empire was carved by the hands of a previous maker, that does not mean that the present Emperor has the same intentions as the first, nor even necessarily good intentions at all. Considering the slavery she has witnessed, the Emperor obviously has detrimental intentions towards the people as a whole. She could use her recent experiences with other power hungry enemies to illuminate this point. She could begin to insinuate that his mighty and proud eagles may eventually fall captive to the very Emperor they serve so proudly. She must get the point across that the Emperor wants the makers dead because they are not only a threat to his rule, but that the gods have sent the new round of makers to heal the world again. To heal the world this time from the evil of the Emperor himself, a guy who has no claim to his power, yet the makers, any of the makers, have a greater claim than he. The makers do not want to destroy the empire, but rather have returned to govern it with kinder and more benevolent intentions towards its people, trying to improve things as they(we) have always done. Ack... how to put that in a story or insinuate it I'm not sure, but her recent political experiences could help to draw analogies.

Also, she needs to probe into the past, according to Eagles. He made mention of a lot of things she would not have known anything about, like the world serpent and so on, and I don't know if any of it would differ from what she learned from the Zigots. She may be able to pinpoint the differences in what the Zigots were taught from the what the mainstream empire has been taught to find some pieces of the puzzle.

She should remind him that her intentions are constantly changing to match what she knows and her "destiny" is as uncertain as the wind because of this. If he can explain to her why he himself feels loyalty, as a virtue, to be so important, it would be helpful. I'm sure she could rapidly understand his cultural biases as she is a star student of complex Zigot Philosophy.

She still really has no basis to feel for or against the Eagles, but due to the loss of basic freedoms she has witnessed, she would want to at least influence, if not completely reguide, the Empire.

Still she must see the value of the Empire itself. If ruled in the right hands it could be a great force for good in the world, so she could firmly and truthfully assure the Eagle King that her intention is NOT to break up the empire, but perhaps even increase its power, but only through good, and not through evil.

True honorable service must consider the morality of its rulers, for the ruler is given power over the people for the benefit of the people. If the ruler uses power over the people for his own benefit alone, or the benefit of a small select elite, and at the cost OF the people, (present state of America today), than the people suffer, and all who serve the ruler are as evil as the rulers to not question and rebel such tyranny.

I'm sure her education could help her to be VERY persuading, as logic can persuade the honor bound to follow a higher calling of honor.

Ok, enough rambling, my vote will be firmly in the court of getting the Eagle king to take her to see Prometheus!

[D-Lotus]

I have another option:

Pretend to be meek so he won't think you are a danger to the emperor.

I know its not so good...but at least its valid!

[Key]

Poll is up! :D

[LordoftheNight]

Voted, and winning.

[Ravenwing]

Added my vote.

[ethereal_fauna]

Ravagerrr's impassioned declaration swayed me, and I opted for the Watchmaker. :D

[Ravenwing]

That was a really long post. :cool:

[Muaddib]

I voted for asking him to take us to Prometheus. It's neither suspiciously meek nor brazenly bold.

[Ravenwing]

It's amazing about how Pilla's goals keep changing so fast. First it was about herself, then it was possibly about unification of the Scarpi people, and now it's about herself again somewhat. :D Just some thoughts.

[Ravagerrr]

Yeah, sorry about that, I kinda got carried away there...

[Ravenwing]

Do not worry, it had a lot of thought put into it I am sure. I am just the kind of person that skims a long post for the main points.

*looks at poll* Eleven votes for asking to visit Prometheus. Wow. :P

[Stubby]

I didn't notice Pilla's goals ever being Scarpi unification.

A lot of Scarpti, and a lot of readers wanted that, but Pilla was simply heading for the Serpent Witches, and telling the Scarpi that they were going to test her divinity was a way of getting them to to use the sting test (which she just failed) to see if they should kill her or not.

The closes she came was in not wanting to get her friends hurt, but she was still not, in my opinion [/i]aiming[/i] for unification.

[Ravenwing]

*sighs* Put down so easily. Okay, I think I rephrased that wrong. Unification of the Scarpi people was option open to us readers early on.

[Key]

Poll is closed. Asking to see Prometheus won by a large margin.

The next chapter will be up tomorrow. :-)