An Analysis of Henry's Cybernetics
Long post ahead! Goes over his injuries, what we know, and what we can apply!
I've got a nutty little mind that gets sparked by trying to figure out how things worked, so I figured I could apply that to my favorite ending, Revenged. I'd always assumed Henry's cause of death was due to hypothermia or drowning. I spent a few hours compiling this, doing research, and rewatching the cutscene. Without further ado, I present to you all, my findings.
CANON INFORMATION
Cybernetics Capabilities
Under the assumption that fails are within his range of abilities, just not the correct choice, we can gather that:
His jetpack is able to fly at supersonic speeds (When he first took off, he caused a sonic boom able to be heard from ground level, implying it to be at least 750 mph.)
His left hand can transform into a machine gun, a thin blade, a baseball bat, and an energy absorption funnel.
His left hand can also fire itself, and have a spare hand. The spare hand is also used if the transformed hand becomes damaged. We see him replace hands two times in the right path- Once when the blade snaps in RHM's lens, and a second one when he staples Reginald to the airship.
His spine, at least from the front, can withstand being hit an upwards of 10+ feet into the air by RHM's blade without being cut in half.
Able to form a small energy projectile that explodes into a big blast on impact.
Increased strength.
He has a built in jetpack
Henry's Injuries
Upon first falling from the airship, and being dead in the water, what is shown to the player is as follows (Keep in mind that stick figures don't bleed)
No visible damage to the back of the head, either arms, or upper back. All are intact. We're told he was "gone for a bit" from Dr. Vin, and it's implied to be for ten hours at most. His head is bandaged when he first wakes up, implying some sort of abrasions were there when Dr. Vin found him dead.
Dr. Vin tells him that she was forced to replace his spine and left arm, whether or not his full torso is robotic is kind of up to interpretation, he's a stick figure.
10 Hours, huh?
An average commercial aircraft carrier flies at roughly 575 mph. We know they were flying south for ten hours before Henry woke up.
Doing the math, they've flown 5750 miles so far.
For context, this is 5750.62 miles.
Henry's first reaction is to take off, and he hits supersonic speeds FAST. He has less than a minute of consciousness before he's after them, so he most likely took zero breaks.
Let's say Henry is going 1000 mph. Fast enough to cause an audible sonic boom, and high speed for military jets. Dr. Vin did say she specialized in military augmentations, after all.
My first conclusion was that it'd take Henry 5 hours and 45 minutes to reach the Airship, but that's not quite right. The airship is STILL FLYING when Henry gets there. Henry's chasing after a moving object, not a stationary one.
Our equation is
1000x = 5750 + 575x
x is the amount of hours it takes for Henry to catch up, so we just had to solve for x. The equation is
(Henry's flight speed)x = (Airship head start) + (airship speed)x
1000x - 575x = 5750
425x = 5750
Dividing this by 25
x = 230/17, which roughly equals 13.5 hours.
13 and a Half Hours of Flying at Supersonic Speeds
This is our number, and it's a generous one at that. We're assuming that the Toppat Airship is flying at the average speed of a commercial airliner, Henry is able to hold up supersonic speeds the whole time (Very rarely can military jets hold it for over five minutes), and Henry doesn't take any breaks.
Cybernetic Surgery
While doing my research, I found out that scientists HAVE returned some patients with fully severed spinal cords back to being able to walk with electric implants. Neat! (Link to the BBC Article, I highly recommend giving it a read!)
We see Henry fall in the betrayed, and it's from pretty high up. A drop of 100 feet onto water is already considered fatal, and 20 feet is enough to break a bone. He landed on his upper back, back of the head and neck. I'm surprised he doesn't have much brain damage, especially in the visual processing area. What kind of beating did his occipital lobe take? I'd love to see fics where Henry's battling with a newfound inability to recognize faces or words.
Using this as basis, I'd assume that Dr. Vin decided to replace the spinal cord in it's entirety. Completely severed spinal cords are typically a complete loss of leg function, and a completely removed spinal cord does count as such. As for the arm replacement, I'd assume it'd taken damage, rather than exposure to the elements, as the right arm would've needed replacement as well. The nerves that connect our arms to our spinal cord is known as the brachial plexus, so it's safe to assume that Henry's left brachial plexus was damaged enough that it was simply easier to replace it than to leave it.
Both brachial plexi attach at spinal nerve T1, or thoracic spinal nerve 1, and because Henry retains full functionality in his right arm, the spine severing would have needed to occur below T1.
We can gather a lot of information over the spine's functionality when it's shot, more so than what we see otherwise.
Reginald's shot didn't destroy the spine. Not entirely. Henry's still able to move his legs, and his left arm gives out shortly AFTER the crash, not after the bullet. Also, he can feel pain in his cybernetics. Neat!
Upon being shot, Henry grabs onto the cockpit chair for support, showing sudden weakness or imbalance.
After the crash, we watch as Henry's left arm gives out, he's forced to use a branch as a cane as his left leg gives out, and we can see his right leg still have functionality as he dies.
For all we know, Reginald's shot could've been the final nail in the coffin. Henry might've already been on death's door, from overexertion alone.
My Assessment
Henry's initial drop severed his spine somewhere in the thoracic grouping of vertebrae, and likely caused death on impact. His left brachial plexus was most likely deemed too damaged to be worth salvaging, and Dr. Vin decided to replace his whole left arm. His lumbar nerves however, were left in good enough condition to still work when stimulated by the cybernetic spine.
IN CONCLUSION
Henry flew a minimum of 13.5 hours straight before reaching the airship
While far fetched, scientists have already repaired broken spines with electronic implants
Reginald's shot only partially severed his spine, leaving reduced function in his legs
And lastly, Henry Stickmin is a stick figure, and this is all mere intellectual play. Don't feel pressured to change up your headcanons or lore because some teenager spent an hour trying to apply real world science to the silly stick figure game, I want to see your own takes on it!
