Story Wednesday September 27, 2017

[mlooney 3,417]

3 minutes ago, Don Edwards said:

So now you have a host who's about 20 years old and in good health, with no connections, who is the sole heir of your previous host. You're good for at least a couple decades. When the time comes to do it again, be sure to pick a different university and an intern from a different town.

Why does it sort of bother me that you have a detailed plan for doing this?

 

[hkmaly 490]

1 hour ago, Don Edwards said:

Otherwise, praise said intern fulsomely and express great paternal affection.

Sounds like something Sirleck wouldn't enjoy doing, but considering it will be worth it ...

1 hour ago, mlooney said:

1 hour ago, Don Edwards said:

So now you have a host who's about 20 years old and in good health, with no connections, who is the sole heir of your previous host. You're good for at least a couple decades. When the time comes to do it again, be sure to pick a different university and an intern from a different town.

Why does it sort of bother me that you have a detailed plan for doing this?

Too much empathy?

 

[mlooney 3,417]

4 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Sounds like something Sirleck wouldn't enjoy doing, but considering it will be worth it ...

Too much empathy?

 

Not likely that.

[Don Edwards 548]

On 9/29/2017 at 3:13 PM, mlooney said:

Why does it sort of bother me that you have a detailed plan for doing this?

As a computer systems analyst I spent 30+ years figuring out conditions for a situation and writing extremely-detailed plans to achieve a desired outcome...

[Tom Sewell 268]

On 9/29/2017 at 2:09 PM, Don Edwards said:

So now you have a host who's about 20 years old and in good health, with no connections, who is the sole heir of your previous host. You're good for at least a couple decades. When the time comes to do it again, be sure to pick a different university and an intern from a different town.

If Sirleck could do all that, he'd be running the world after a few generations. By accelerated aging, I'm thinking at least dog years, seven to one. And there's that "no empathy" thing. I think Sirleck lucked into finding a host already so mean that he could take him over without rousing suspicion.

However, while I don't buy your theory for Sirleck or any other Moperverse vampire/aberration, I think it's a really neat design for a character, and not necessarily an evil one. Make the chosen heir a loathsome little weasel (but smart and cunning) and we get a gotcha ending worthy of a Twilight Zone episode.

[hkmaly 490]

5 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

If Sirleck could do all that, he'd be running the world after a few generations.

Because ruler of the world is the best place to hide at, right. He needs to keep low profile, because body snatchers are considered the worst kind of aberration and if he would be revealed as one immortals and wizards would be queueing to kill him. (Also, it explains WHY are body snatchers considered the worst kind of aberrations.)

(Also, ruling world is overrated. Too much work, too much publicity, everyone is blaming you for any problem even if you didn't caused them ... not sure why would anyone want to do that. Although you can avoid some of that if you are not official ruler.)

[Tom Sewell 268]

3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Because ruler of the world is the best place to hide at, right.

It isn't, but being a really rich obnoxious guy who has to have a lot of enemies and a lot of people looking into his misdeeds for justice or for blackmail isn't the best strategy to hide either. And Sirleck clearly enjoyed lording it over his minions a lot, over and above living a life of luxury.

Which brings up another question: does Sirleck have the ability to experience human pleasure? Does he taste what his hosts eat and drink? Does he get anything out of sex? That's a mighty attractive secretary he had, but could he do anything with her other than look?  Maybe is having the power to manipulate others provides most of the pleasure in his unending, unnatural, and perhaps increasingly boring life?

[hkmaly 490]

2 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

6 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Because ruler of the world is the best place to hide at, right.

It isn't, but being a really rich obnoxious guy who has to have a lot of enemies and a lot of people looking into his misdeeds for justice or for blackmail isn't the best strategy to hide either. And Sirleck clearly enjoyed lording it over his minions a lot, over and above living a life of luxury.

I would assume he's as rich as he dares, and as unknown as possible.

... or, this might be limit of how rich can he be without getting famous. Like, wouldn't surprise me if he would be 402th richest american just to not end up on Forbes 400 (although there are likely other ways how to not end up on such list than not being rich enough).

2 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

Which brings up another question: does Sirleck have the ability to experience human pleasure? Does he taste what his hosts eat and drink? Does he get anything out of sex? That's a mighty attractive secretary he had, but could he do anything with her other than look?  Maybe is having the power to manipulate others provides most of the pleasure in his unending, unnatural, and perhaps increasingly boring life?

While valid question, I would note that

1) His inability to do anything more with the secretary might also by caused by his host age (and, in fact, I would assume the eating and drinking is not as good as with younger host as well)

2) I suspect he ALWAYS enjoyed power more than more mundane pleasures.

[Drasvin 123]

19 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

Make the chosen heir a loathsome little weasel (but smart and cunning) and we get a gotcha ending worthy of a Twilight Zone episode.

Is it bad that the 'bouncing ferret' scene from Harry Potter flashed through my mind?

10 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

It isn't, but being a really rich obnoxious guy who has to have a lot of enemies and a lot of people looking into his misdeeds for justice or for blackmail isn't the best strategy to hide either. And Sirleck clearly enjoyed lording it over his minions a lot, over and above living a life of luxury.

Being rich means he can afford not just luxury and pleasure, but also to pay to keep people quiet (either via bribes or via more permanent means). Also, depending on what kind of business he company did, he could avoid attracting a lot of attention from the wider populace. If his company does something like screws, nuts, and bolts, then the only people likely to care about his company are regulators and the businesses that purchase those screws, nuts, and bolts in significant quantities. And even then, to the typical individual, Sirleck(or at least his host) just appears to be yet another sleezeball CEO. Maybe an impending PR, HR, and Legal nightmare, but not a literal monster. All he needs to do is keep out of the spotlight enough to disappear into the sea of statistics. Being a rich CEO of a company, if a monster hunter gets tipped off that he might be an aberration, they could follow the trail to him, but they would have to get tipped off first, when there are numerous CEOs in the world and unfortunately, a lot of them use their positions of power to do terrible things. On top of that, by all appearances, the magically community in EGS is really bad about communicating and therefor coordinating efforts, so investigating all the corporate executives for potential monsters would be a daunting task. Organizations, like the DGB, would probably be better at coordinating internals, but they have limits of resources and budget, and they also have to do more than just investigate the rich of the world, when magical bad guys could be any jerk that happens to stumble across magic.

[Tom Sewell 268]

13 hours ago, hkmaly said:

2) I suspect he ALWAYS enjoyed power more than more mundane pleasures.

I think he shares that trait with Bad Tom, though BT's a sand-lot bad guy compared with a big-league villain like Sirleck.

5 hours ago, Drasvin said:

Is it bad that the 'bouncing ferret' scene from Harry Potter flashed through my mind?

I'm thinking of Negi's chain-smoking, underwear-stealing ermine.

[hkmaly 490]

6 hours ago, Drasvin said:

Being rich means he can afford not just luxury and pleasure, but also to pay to keep people quiet (either via bribes or via more permanent means). Also, depending on what kind of business he company did, he could avoid attracting a lot of attention from the wider populace

Yes.

6 hours ago, Drasvin said:

If his company does something like screws, nuts, and bolts, then the only people likely to care about his company are regulators and the businesses that purchase those screws, nuts, and bolts in significant quantities.

If the company doesn't do anything tangible - say, it's in insurances or loans - it will still be unlikely someone else than regulators would care. And I suspect that CEO's in such business rarely possess high level of empathy.

It might even be SAFER for him if he can laugh at accusation of being monster with some witty remark like "sure, I have it in job description" or "only from 9 to 5".

6 hours ago, Drasvin said:

there are numerous CEOs in the world and unfortunately, a lot of them use their positions of power to do terrible things. On top of that, by all appearances, the magically community in EGS is really bad about communicating and therefor coordinating efforts, so investigating all the corporate executives for potential monsters would be a daunting task. Organizations, like the DGB, would probably be better at coordinating internals, but they have limits of resources and budget, and they also have to do more than just investigate the rich of the world, when magical bad guys could be any jerk that happens to stumble across magic.

I think that number of CEOs is big enough that even with good coordination it just isn't worth investigating.

1 hour ago, Tom Sewell said:

14 hours ago, hkmaly said:

2) I suspect he ALWAYS enjoyed power more than more mundane pleasures.

I think he shares that trait with Bad Tom, though BT's a sand-lot bad guy compared with a big-league villain like Sirleck.

You need lot of experience to get from Bad Tom to Sirleck, yes. Maybe, if he didn't hit Susan (and without magic reset), he would be aberration in 40 years.