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For the Changer, see Bora Horza Gobuchul (Changer).


Bora Horza Gobuchul was a Culture Mind that was created during the Idiran-Culture War. It survived an active wartime career.[1]

Biography[]

Infancy[]

During the war, the new Mind was aboard a factory ship in the path of the Idiran advance. It was intended for a General Systems Vehicle.[2] The Mind was evacuated by being installed in a ship assembled from salvage before the factory ship was destroyed. The escape ship was also intercepted and the Mind ordered it to self-destruct and ejected into hyperspace.[3] The Mind used the explosion to not only to slip past its pursuers, but also encoded a message in it containing its destination and intentions. The Mind jury-rigged its warp unit to act as a warp motor. It then travelled to Schar's World‎ and emerged from hyperspace within the Command System.[2]

The Idiran 93rd Fleet realized the intelligence value of a captured Mind, especially one which they suspected was intended for use on a new class of GSV. They dispatched troops and a Changer agent, Horza, to capture it.[4]

Schar's World‎[]

Upon arrival the damaged Mind took refuge in the Command System. Its fields were crippled, it no longer had access to more than three-dimensions, and it had only one remote drone.[5] A self-destruct by annihilation to avoid capture was undesirable because it would turn Schar's World into an asteroid belt and incur the wrath of the Dra'Azon.[2] The Mind used the Command System's workshops to construct a crude turreted projectile gun-armed vehicle. The vehicle was destroyed fighting Idiran troops sent to capture it. The remote drone was expended as a decoy while projecting a weak soligram of the Mind, although it did not register on a mass sensor like a real Mind.[6]

Evasion[]

Main article: Raid on the Command System

The Idiran soldiers did not have a mass sensor but the following group led by Horza did. The Mind hid inside the train parked in the main cavern in station seven; it hoped the reactor and train would mask its mass signature.[7] Its remaining fields were sufficient to maintain the integrity of the reactor car against slight impacts. However it was effectively trapped and barely able to discern anything going on outside.[8]

The Mind's scheme was undone when another train was activated and set to collide with the train it was hiding in. It had no choice but to leave the car and expose itself to its pursuers. The Mind took laser fire from Xoxarle and was damaged further.[7] It could no longer communicate nor move itself, but could understand input and float.[9]

Once the fighting ceased Balveda recovered the Mind. She pushed and pulled it back to the surface and onto Clear Air Turbulence.[9]

Return to Service[]

The Mind was repaired aboard the GSV No More Mister Nice Guy. The Mind had been so damaged it could not remember anything between its daring hyperspace escape and its return to full functionality. It was emplaced aboard an Ocean-class GSV and took part in the war.[1]

After the war it transferred to a Range-class GSV and took the name Bora Horza Gobuchul. In this form it later operated in the galaxy clusters around the Milky Way. Here it ferried Gimishin Foug and her family to the System-class GSV Determinist on their return trip to the Milky Way.[10]

References[]

  1. 1.0 1.1 Consider Phlebas, Dramatis personae
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Consider Phlebas, State of play: one
  3. Consider Phlebas, prologue
  4. Consider Phlebas, chapter 2
  5. Consider Phlebas, Interlude in darkness
  6. Consider Phlebas, chapter 11
  7. 7.0 7.1 Consider Phlebas, chapter 13
  8. Consider Phlebas, chapter 12
  9. 9.0 9.1 Consider Phlebas, chapter 14
  10. Consider Phlebas, epilogue
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