Thank you for answerring! It's very helpfull. I agree that Pritchard doesn't seem like a guy who would get augs. But he could get them when he was younger and maybe fell under the influence of someone. And then decided to not get rid of them, it's brain surgery after all. Or Sarif could make him, when he was fresh out of prison and vulnerable. What do you think?
I’m glad it was useful! :)
I have strong feelings™ with Sarif that may differ with the general fandom opinion. Don’t get me wrong, though. I think he’s a great character, I just don’t share his ideas.I don’t want to get involved in any drama so I’m not going to say much publicly, but… yes, I also think Sarif would most likely have something to do with Pritchard’s aug surgery.
Regarding a young Frank having an aug surgery… There is nothing written about this, so we can only speculate, but if you want my honest opinion: I don’t think Pritchard did that madness on his full own initiative.
Yes, this fancy new augs would help him to hack better, but what is the point? When you do illegal things on some network it is VITAL (with a capital V) not to leave a trace of your activity. It’s even more important than finishing whatever you wanna do.
Would Pritchard trust a device completely foreign to him to commit computer crimes? I would say no. I mean… I definitely wouldn’t. Yes, maybe I’m at a disadvantage with the other hackers and yes, maybe I’m more likely to make human errors, but I’ll always know what I’m doing and I’ll know for sure that nobody is gonna clap my ass for shit I can’t control. And Pritchard isn’t stupid, he knows how to deal with shit that goes downhill.
That said, I’m not dismissing outright your idea that he might do it in his younger years, it may be. But I’m inclined to agree that someone had to influence him for it.
In fact, my headcanon of Pritchard’s backstory is very hard and sad. I’ve been making changes over time, but the general idea has always been drama, drama and more drama.A person isn’t so acid and bitter out of nowhere. There must be something horrific behind him to try so hard to distance himself from everyone like that. It’s a defense mechanism. (But maybe I’m missing the point of the question here haha).
In short: I agree more with your other idea; for him to kick his paranoia and to make up his mind and implant the chip, someone he appreciated and was very close had to influence him taking advantage of a moment of vulnerability. That person could be Sarif when Frank got out of jail, some old friend taking advantage of some hard time, a former partner… someone.
On a side note: Today new methods to do cranial surgery are being investigated, using robots and AI, but (in general) if you need to do a surgery today, you need to make an incision along the entire skull to expose the brain.I wanna think that in the DX universe this technology of robots and AI for cranial surgery is much more advanced, and with a small incision in the skull (Like a laparoscopy, but in the brain), they can introduce the chip. My heart hurts just thinking about this surgery and a young Pritchard scared and alone on a hospital stretcher.
Thanks for your questions, anon. I love answering them, definitely are very interesting!
One lingering, sobering thought remains: had twentieth-century Wales been a fully fledged nation with international clout, would writers of the calibre of Saunders Lewis, Emyr Humphreys and R. S. Thomas have been rewarded with a Nobel prize for literature?
