## [RT][HF] Sparring Match, Part 2 (The Maker's Ark)

* Author: u/DocFuture *
* URL: http://docfuture.tumblr.com/post/161830904201/sparring-match-part-2
* Score: 13

* Created: 2017-06-14T23:35:55

### Post:

[Link to content](http://docfuture.tumblr.com/post/161830904201/sparring-match-part-2)

### Comments:

> **u/DocFuture** [+1]  (2 minutes later)
> 
> And here is Part 2.  Writing is still going slowly, and the story kept growing.  I'm drawing the line at novelette, though--it doesn't get to be a novella 8-)
> 
> Should have the third and final part up within a few weeks.

> **u/Empiricist_or_not** [+1]  *Aspiring polite Hegemonizing swarm* (an hour later)
> 
> Hmm . . . so now we have *counts on fingers* 6* semi-sane self modified people.
> 
> *Counting all Stellas except Yiska as a single person, not counting AIs, and only counting one Villain as not an insane failure state.

>> **u/DocFuture** [+2]  (an hour later)
>> 
>> Well, there is a pretty huge survivorship bias, because I don't find writing about dead people as interesting 8-)
>> 
>> But I'm interested in which Villain you might be thinking of:  Tabula Rasa and Mechmaster never tried and Cyberlord, Brainwave, and The Nietzschean most definitely went insane.  Mad Hatter, maybe?  He's kind of a borderline case--he doesn't need his Thinking Cap to do his thing.

>>> **u/Empiricist_or_not** [+1]  *Aspiring polite Hegemonizing swarm* (2 hours later)
>>> 
>>> I assumed Mechmaster was a semi successful augmented, because he kept up with Doc on mechs and how he apparently hadn't really done anything to justify being as heavily locked up as he was, if I remember the passage correctly, that and Stelllas comment about mad scientists.  Hatter was a assumed non-augment or more likely a survived failure state down the path of everything looks like a nail if you have a hammer.

>>>> **u/DocFuture** [+2]  (2 hours later)
>>>> 
>>>> Mechmaster is a smart, talented, monomaniacally-focused normal.  He can keep up with Doc on mechs because they were just a minor hobby for Doc--which is the original source of his jealousy:  "How dare he be almost as good as me when he's just a casual dabbler at my life work!" 8-)  He was only in the Box because normal jails aren't good at coping with genius-level tinkerers who are determined to keep escaping.
>>>> 
>>>> Mad Hatter is a magician, like Journeyman.  His special talent was for making enchanted clothing and he specialized early on headgear because of personal preference.  He is more benignly monomaniacal--what broke him was Brainwave mind controlling him and forcing him to make the augment helmet--which was a constant drain on his power and sanity for as long as it existed.

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