While drafting a post that was itself a tangent to another post, I was reviewing relevant pesterlogs and encountered an underdiscussed point of Earth C lore:
VRISSY: Ms. Roxy was talking about coming up with some sort of Autonomous Flying Device, 8ut it got Shot Down by the Council.
...
VRISSY: A Governing 8ody, sort of? I'm not actually Sure how much Power they have anymore, what with the 8atterwitch seizing control of everything.
VRISSY: 8ut they were really against any8ody who wasn't a Creator 8eing a8le to fly, Since it's sort of a Religious Thing.
But, of course, Tavvy can fly.
Its the first thing we see him do in HS^2! It's even *specifically* an "Autonomous Flying Device", since it has an autopilot.
My conclusion from this isn't that the writers just forgot, not just because these sections aren't paticularly far apart, but also because that is a quite frankly boring conclusion. So what could this mean instead?
A) Crockercorp have been entirely ignoring The Council
Ie, these devices are on the market despite the Council's protests. Vrissy's comments about them not having as much power under the Batterwitch could back this up, but this also makes the whole exchange more bizarre; why mention it all at that point?
It's like if in a conversation about planes you said "The Wright Brothers tried to invent the first heavier-than-air flight, but unfortunately their design crashed on September 17, 1908". Nothing there is *false* per say, but the redundant fact tagged on the end comes across as implying that they failed. It'd be a strange phrasing.
B) Crockercorp are not internally subject to these rules
Ie, since Crockercorp belongs to the Maid, and the Maid is herself a creator, persons involved in facilitiating the Maid's goals are allowed to fly. This would explain Tavvy being allowed access to his car, as well as the Crocker drones and Crocker warships (assuming these two aren't the same thing), without interference from the council.
This is similar to (A), and has similar issues. The device was still "come up with", even if here it's not as widespread.
A slight variation of this is that Crockercorp is instead not subject to these rules because they're breaking them with plausible deniability. Crockercorp work through a Secret Service, after all. Maybe this is a situation of "Drones? What Drones? I have no idea what you mean! Hoo Hoo Hoo!", but it still seems strange here that Tavvy is flying one without issue.
C) The Council is a *troll kingdom* governing body
Other mentions of a "Council" in HS^2 that aren't the nymph COUNCIL OF HIGH PROPHETS or Honeyfall's COHORT COUNCIL refer specifically to A Rebellion institution:
KARKAT: IF YOU AND THE REST OF THE GENERAL'S COUNCIL HADN'T INSISTED THAT I STAY OUT OF THE WORST OF THE FIGHTING, WE WOULDN'T HAVE THIS PROBLEM.
This could also explain the known facts. If this council was a troll kingdom institution that is now sympathetic to the Rebellion, it could have been implementing rules that applied to Vrissy but not Tavvy. This might also explain why this governing body isn't the same HOUSE detailed in A Treatise On Representational Democracy, since it'd be a local government instead.
This could potentially explain all of the known facts, but it doesn't feel reasonable.
An issue with this direction is that the Rebellion also have their own Flying devices. This isn't unassailable, since there might be exceptions for the Rebellion's Creators in the same way as in (B) for Jane, but it does somewhat neuter the appeal of this theory on other fronts.
It also doesn't help that it's reliant on 2 quotes from a single scene. If Candy was more interested in worldbuilding in general, we might also say that it'd be the sort of thing that would have been mentioned, though that element was never at the forefront.
Overall, none of these explanations are entirely satisfying.
This is mostly just an opportunity to think about how Earth C works, which is always fun. I'm sure there are other ways this can be taken; maybe The Influencers are involved somehow. Maybe we can make this about Silas's mum.
What do you make of Autonomous Flying Devices on Earth C?
