Hent Cogs (Who Rises & Falls)

Hent Cogs (Who Rises and Falls) Tinkerer and New-Thinker is a named, titled Circle Citizen.

Hent was a one-twenty-eight who spent most of their time working in mycology below the Farm Ring but living aboveground. They spent a lot of time on pulley-lifts with large pallets of mushrooms, fertiliser, or tools. Whenever possible, they preferred to use ladders under their own power because they lived with a constant fear of the rope slipping its pulley, or the anchor failing.

They spent much of their spare time looking for a better way. A lowering and rising mechanism that didn't rely on a single anchor, a single pulley, a single rope. For a long time, they tried two or three pulleys but that proved difficult to manage in practical use. So, they resolved to replace the pulley entirely.

Enter: the cog. Small crenellations carved neatly into the side of a wooden wheel, these would mesh with cogs on other cog-wheels and transfer rotational energy.

Hent was not aware that they had broken two social taboos at once whilst inventing the single most important object in recent history. Hent was happy with their anxiety-free lift.

Hent's foreman made the mistake of assuming Hent was a Person and encouraging them to write about their cogs, as these were a new thought and should be properly documented so that Hent could earn their proper name and title. Hent, alas, was illiterate.

No matter! They dictated an essay to their foreman, who sealed it on Hent's behalf, and sent it off.

Though it wasn't writ into law, people were....uncomfortable...with the idea of granting a name and title to a beast. The People's Society looked into Hent's records. "Ah!" they said, "128! clearly a rounding error!" and quickly corrected the mistake on Hent's records, informing Hent of the matter, and offering them their name and title.

Hent had just been shot into person-hood at close to the end of their life. They regretted it immediately. Their children would regret it moreso.

The people were happy with the situation, because now it would remain on record that no beast had ever had an important thought, and that the greatest technological revolution the city has ever seen, the Age of Cogs, came from an intelligent person.