Protip: This isn't Rose's arc. This is Serafina's arc.
Really, her swan song before she leaves the orbit of the Construct for good.
Disagree. Her character arc was the Mexico City arc. That's where all of her development was. This may be the one where she
shows it off to everyone else just as Henriette showed off her development from Arc 2 in Arc 4 (and almost certainly she'll be showing it again in this arc against Sanjeet but no one says it's her arc either). It's their triumph, sure, but they're done. They've made their choices and set their path already, and we don't even need to see them (Serafina, Henriette) beyond bare glimpses to know that they're there because we know they've changed already. All that's left is the wider acknowledgment.
This one should have been Rose's because this is where all her development should be happening, the character transformation where she (presumably) overcomes her obstacle and low point, where she grows into young adult Rose. I mean, I think there is an argument to be made that this isn't her arc as portrayed in story but that's more an acknowledgment that the protagonist moments went to Donald. That's a separate argument as to whose arc it should have been, and I made the argument that this
should have been Rose's, but whatever, done is done, Donald's (extended) arc, here we come.
Also Rose being the "heir of Lior" because she's Reina's reincarnation would be far too much on the nose. Rose is really nothing like Reina and isn't even in the same Convention and has a completely different Paradigm. Her path lies in rejecting the future set out for her by others and if that means she never becomes a major leader of the Technocracy then that's a culmination of her themes, not an abandonment of them.
Right. I agree that we rejected subsuming Rose for Reina and Rose isn't a Reina copy. I posited that a possible future for Rose would have been to lead the Construct Movement, playing off both her own suggestion that constructs don't have to stay with their convention, inspired by Reina's leadership, but a rejection of Reina's
goals (the people rather than the god machine, the peace instead of the endless war). You don't need to be a copy of Reina to be inspired by her, and you can even be inspired in different ways. I think she should learn
something from Reina because otherwise, the story is - saw a great leader, didn't really agree with her, don't think I can change anything, just gonna be my moeblob self forever. Welp.
... except... Leon already has used the 50-generations-ahead stuff. Like Ms Candle, and the body Alicia is inhabiting. He is explicitly working with Threat Null, is a fucking Progenitor, has been shown to have used Transhuman tech on three different occasions, and will have been introducing this stuff to the other radical Progenitors with him.
I didn't see anything in Candle or Alicia that's anywhere near ISOBEL. As exemplified by the fact that no one even batted an eye in the Candle fight - and in fact, the real threat was Yinzheng, who kicked ass as her normal nwooblet self - whereas everyone went OMGWTF in relation to ISOBEL and their thoughts on her abilities (and of course, her canon feat of taking down an entire DC team with her). As far as we can tell, the evil space ghost hivemind, ISOBEL aside, basically spend their time ... doing nothing on Earth. There's been Blanc... There's been Anathema and God Machine.... Those are the only people we've seen contact and work with Clock and Co.
Maybe the Resident at one point.
But alien invader VEs and ISOBEL both acted like rogue actors, not ones working with evil Panopticon and Clock.
If Leon already had info from the hivemind, he would need labs and people to work with ... but he wouldn't need
Exemplar research because he'd already know what to do. The fact that he has to base it off of that is indication that it's working off of present-day research, just more cutting edge, not 50 gen ahead to the point where no one even knows where to start to get to ISOBEL.
So, I went back and re-read the line in context. It was a good read. It was also pretty blatant in context that "knows the truth about Consensus and can ignore a bunch of the Focus rules" was *exactly* what they were talking about.
I agreed that it was talking about E6... but it was definitely also about leadership in my reading.
"You know," she says, "how much time did you spend around people in the Inner Circle?"
"Me?" Kessler shrugs. "At first, not much. I was just a grunt. Once I trained as an enlightened scientist, I saw more of them. Old General Williamson was the one my unit reported to in the end, and he'd take an interest in us from... oh, '86 onwards or so. After we bagged that big Taftani HVT and got medals for it. Occasionally we'd get passed down some new gear he wanted us to field test, straight from Autochthonia. Sometimes he'd have missions and ask for us 'specially. Those were usually the toughest ones, but always seemed to come with medals."
"Mmm," Jamelia says. "My mentor was Inner Circle. Jeremiah Blanc. They were the ones who were setting such policies. I always wondered exactly what you had to do to get onto the Inner Circle."
"Always seemed to me that it was a mix of long service and talent," Kessler says, with a casual shrug.
"Pretty much all the Inner Circle moved out to space," she says.
"Gotta be careful 'bout Traditionalist assassins."
"Yes. Of course. And of course, most forms of hypertech work much better in sterile space stations."
"Yeah. Or not even in sterile space stations. On Xanadu and in that Hollywood-y noetic space, I could overclock my old boosts to a way that'd have them failing on Earth."
Both of them are leaning forwards by this point. She thinks he knows. She thinks he thinks she knows.
"So," Jamelia says softly, "the question is this: what qualified a person for the Inner Circle? What made a person suitable for judging whether something was Reality Deviancy or not? What would one have to do - to know - to join their illustrious ranks?"
When Jamelia talks about Inner Circle, she's very clear that her view is heavily related to Blanc and specifically, that the Inner Circle sets policy for the Technocracy. These are the people who determine what being a Technocrat
is as opposed to being a RD. The Inner Circle,
for Jamelia, is wrapped up in idea of policy setting (exemplified in psychic NWO bouncing back and forth as to whether it's RD or not).
"Yes. We do. First question. What about Command?" Kessler says. "Do they know about this whole thing?"
"No." Jamelia says, and her answer comes much faster. "I think they're the blind leading the blind, or if they know, they're doing a good job of pretending not to. I don't think the decisions they're making on research and development are being deliberately considered so much as shaped by what we need to keep things from falling apart."
"Dangerous game. What people are considering plausible, near-future science fiction is getting increasingly high-tech. Our upgrade cycles are becoming shorter and shorter." Kessler assents.
Contrast this with her thoughts on the IC being policy makers who can determine what's going on. This is a condemnation or at least, acknowledgment that Command is not fully in control.
Well, of course, it's true that Jamelia states they are just
candidates for the Inner Circle, which I thought was telling. E6 is a
prerequisite, necessary but not sufficient in and of itself, to be Inner Circle. To be Inner Circle is to actually help set the course of the Technocracy (policy making).
