Grrl Power #1329 – How not to be seen
That would be SO. LOUD. It would make your vision vibrate.
Triceratopi is definitely the plural for traceratopses. Don’t look it up.
Sydney’s new nickname for Slam is “Blue Moon.” She won’t explain why, or why she’s as familiar as she is with doo-wop music from 1961. But she remember the lyrics as “Bong-a-dong blang, clang-a-dang-bang, bong-a-long clang, bling-a-blang clank, Blue Moon…”
Sydney probably should have gotten on the horn… the Arc-Com-network, not doing something inappropriate with Slam, I mean. She should probably have called someone as soon as she had a serious suspicious about Sciona. But it also makes sense that she’d want a little more evidence to back it up, not just a vague reference to someone wanting to stab her, which is evidence of nothing more than they’d met her.
The new vote incentive is up! (Finally.)
I’m revisiting a panel from a recent page, but I included some comic reactions and a few outfit swaps, so hopefully you all enjoy it. I also plussed up the art from the comic version a bit, though I suspect that despite the time I spent on that, not a whole lot of people would immediately notice that, so I’m gratuitously pointing it out here.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
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So, in the previous page’s last panel, did Halo’s orb of intelligence gathering glow or was it just a coincidence that one of the glow-y bits of the background was behind it?
I need to check if the passive was purchased for it, I think it was.
Slarty, is that you?
I think it is a coincidence. There was also a flash behind the orb with the tentacles inside. I think that is the hentorb.
While many large herbivores do prefer to fight rather than run or hide, the definition of “large” was a bit different in the Cretaceous.
Also, I haven’t been reading a lot of the comments, has anyone mentioned that while Barney was a purple theropod, his friend Baby Bop was a green trike?
at up to 30 feet long and weighing up to 10 tonnes Triceratops was big in any era
Nowhere near the Sauropods but still big
I love a relatively obscure Python reference!
Maybe I’m just older, but the definition of “obscure” was a bit different in the 90’s…
What is Optimus Prime doing there.
Ssh. He’s a robot in disguise.
Wrong colour, that’s Rodimus Prime
Helping the council work on this dungeon, like any other sapient construct?
IIRC they have a dedicated councilor position.
And you call yourselves bot fans … Orange big rig was Huffer! Sheeesh …
Wait, that was the one who took Opti’s trailer when he wasn’t using it, right?
Why haven’t they gone back to their human forms? Especially Slam, a 10′-12′ purple were-dino is possibly the least sneaky thing on Earth. I get that’s probably the form she’s supposed to be using for construction, but she was introduced in her human form. Or is there some lore I’m not getting, like, one shift a day or something. That would actually explain why Kat is still were’d up.
A triceratops would be about as stealthy as a rhinoceros, and for the same reason.
Actually, rhino’s can be very stealthy when they want, and when they don’t, well, they are generally headed in your direction faster than you thought they could move
Slam did sneak up on Sydney right here on this page, and did well enough at it to get Sydney to go ‘Aah!’ at Slam’s sudden presence.
Good thing Sydney is no longer automatically punching anybody that surprises her. “Damn, your face is hard!” the sequel.
Wait until the heroic author introduces the were-tyrannosaurus, or perhaps the were-bruhathkayosaurus (perhaps 240 tons, 150 feet long).
“Scarper,” is a great word. It doesn’t get used enough.
Also, Sciona should be realizing she needs to flee & disappear, right about now.
>Also, Sciona should be realizing she needs to flee & disappear, right about now.
Unless Sciona did a sloppy job of setting up her cover identity (which would make implausible she passed the background checks for her job in the first place), that would be a bad overreaction that would throw away everything she built for herself in her new life. So would trying to silence Halo.
As things stand, Sydney only got a few clues (liable to different explanations) that the Senatorial aide is a closet super (no offense anyway), and a hunch, unsupported by any evidence, that she is Sciona back on Earth and reborn in a different body. The best thing Sciona can do in the light of Halo’s suspicions is to avoid doing anything that would confirm them in Archon’s eyes. Even if Max & co. are willing to give Sdyney the benefit of the doubt, it is very unlikely it would come to much more than a few routine checks as things stand.
I think you are making an assumption, and not considering the ramification of our world-building.
The assumption, in this instance, is that Sydney’s chain of command wouldn’t take her “weirdness meter” pegging out seriously. Max has already validated her intuitive process as an asset, if not always reliable, and her unorthodox, “genre-aware” perspective as valuable input, given the world they inhabit. Honestly, it is more likely that Sydney herself will be less inclined to take her own heebie-jeebies seriously than Max, Dabbler, Anvil, or almost the entire team would. Hell, Kat will probably relay it to the Werewolf Mafia ™ and _they_ will almost certainly take it seriously, as that sort of “vibe check” is completely SOP for the supernatural world. And in any case, if Sciona has used her time wisely at _all_, she’ll be aware that The Mighty Halo is for all intents and purposes a walking, talking, human-shaped Nightingale Floor. There is an approaching-zero statistical chance that others aren’t notified by her, even unintentionally, as has literally already been shown to be occurring as we speak, witness the two lycanthropes, who now know “Sydney was weirdly surveilling the Senatorial Aide.”
Honestly? Sciona’s best move would have been to stay in the fucking car unless she absolutely could not avoid it, and even then, to absolutely minimize the number of potential information leaks. Piss-poor tradecraft, on her part.
The overlooked ramification of it all being, yeah, no, “the Senator’s staffer has already been BGC’ed” is never going to be sufficient for any agency. There are literally entire task forces that exist exclusively to, “Oh hey, this person has done or been involved in something odd, let’s just have a quick go again, shall we.” And I’m not talking about the usual alphabet agencies. This will find its way to X’s desk within 18 hours, and if my Boss is even half as good at tradecraft as we all assume he is, Sciona is gonna find herself on the business end of ‘DArchon’ in short order.
Oh well, guess Sci shoulda staid on Alari Prime and just died with the rest of her people, right?
Yes in this comics Trump and Felon Skunk are not in charge of everything including intelligence …
Idiocracy in all federal government , and adding one minute to the doomsday clock.
Switching from unthinkable to very unlikely a limited military confrontation with Europe …
And perhaps the end of Ramstein if Olaf Scholz grows a pair …
After all the sole E.U nuclear state has no US base since 1966.
Honestly, I remain sceptic it should be anywhere that easy for Sydney and Archon to reap this undeserved victory. I deemed Sciona’s post-reincarnation arc one of the best things to happen in the story, and very interesting even by genre standards at large. On the other hand, I have Mariana Trench-level negative interest in reading all of it crumble down instantly b/c Sydney had to get the nth bout of overwhelming specialness, adamantium-level plot armor, and Mary Sue luck by no merit of hers, and Archon waved its infallible intelligence magic wand. I won’t deny it may happen, but if it does, I shall cry for missed opportunities, and hate every step of it. Silver Age-style “The Good Guys Always Win with Zero Effort” idiot plot. I dunno what would be worst in that case, Sciona cast back to square one as a fugitive, or captured and made the source of even more Sydney-centered cheap filler comedy like Lapha.
The real question is: What is Sciona thinking she IS doing there as the “senatorial aide” she is roleplaying? Directing construction work in a business dress? She is giving away the fact she doesn’t need protective workwear.
True. Even the “suits” will don a hard hat when visiting a job site, if only to set a good example. Or to keep OSHA off their back. Even if it is a “Supers Only” jobsite there are bound to be a few that don’t have invulnerability as a part of their power set.
You have a point. Everyone on site, not just Sciona, should have hardhats, except the ones with powers that make them redundant. However, none has.
My best guess it is a case of artistic license. The characters would have hardhats, but Dave is sparing himself the chore of drawing them differently, so they look the usual way. Alternatively, or in addition, the author is embracing the No OSHA Compliance trope for this scene.
At a guess, she’s officially there to liais’ with the site supervisors, to keep “the Senator” in the loop.
It’s pretty obvious the real reason she’s there is…nominally to get access to construction intel that, honestly, she probably could have gotten anyway, without putting herself on the site, and potentially exposing herself, which means she’s “actually” there because “It Is Time for Shenaniganery!”
What form that might take is yet to be scene.
*shares popcorn*
A government background check is not a joke to pass, but super powered brainwashing would make it a lot easier to fake. But an investigation would probably rip right through the deception. And unless Sidney was in the habit of accusing people at random, any professionally paranoid security guy would take the tip and start poking holes in a fake background. Sciona needs to hurry up whatever evil scheme she has cooking, although the narrative will not allow ARCHON to actually catch her in time, of course.
She’s got to be reprogramming the dungeon to spread or make her the dungeon master or something.
Early days Sydney was totally in the habit of accusing people way too quickly.
I’m not sure exactly how much time that has been in comic, but I think most of the time passed was in the time skip, which her coworkers should realize was not a two month period of Sydney character growth. As such, Sydney probably needs more evidence to get much traction with her accusations.
Well, either that, or a better presentation. I mean, “I think that senator’s aide is Sciona. She recalls stabbing me but doesn’t remember why. and Sciona’s the only one that stabbed me in a way she might not remember well.” would probably not fly. However, “That senator’s aide says remembers stabbing me but can’t remember the context. That’s odd. Anyone have any idea what that might be about/’ probably would work better. Since that wouldn’t be a conclusion, it would be less affected by the “Sydney jumps to conclusions too quickly” reputation.
There’s also the very plausible and potentially amusing possibility that Sciona, having returned home to find it devastated, saved her people, established herself in a position of both power and influence on her people’s new home, and secured an “acceptable” paramour, has sort of found her place in the world. She has the power of both a well-functioning criminal empire AND internationally potent politics in her grip, and she’s comfortable. Ensuring her previous efforts (done out of desperation and pragmatism) don’t come back to bite her would no doubt provide substantial entertainment.
Smarty, is that you?
Like the Platypus, Triceratops is a Greek name and so a plural formed by an ending i is incorrect, as that is Latin.
For the Platypus, the correct form would be Platypodes, or Platypuses (no matter how odd that looks and sounds), so the plural for Triceratops would either be Tricerapodes, or Triceratopses.
I apologise for being somewhat picky on this point. :-)
Triceratopses! We hates it!
Triceratrope, and platypus would be monotrememe
According to Wikipedia, the plural of ὤψ (ops) should be ὦπες (opes), so the plural of triceratops should be triceratopes; the correct plural of platypus should be platypodes. That is, if we were to use the greek declensions: all the scientific names, however, are latin words, even when their origins are greek. That means they should use the latin declensions: platipi is the coerrct plural usally accepted by the scentific community. For the triceratops, the situation is more tricky, and there isn’t a fixed rule: it could be triceratopes as well as triceratopites. Since it is a new word, introduced way after latin stopped being actively spoken, the creator should have specified what the complete declension was, but since he didn’t bothered, I would use the greek one, since that was also a common practice for greek words lent to latin. The Oxford dictionary uses triceratopses, by the way…
«…which is evidence of nothing more than they’d met her.»
Ah… Um… Hahahahahaha!
Not that anyone is counting but this is the first time I’ve seen anyone touch one of Sydney’s Orbs.
Umm, Math did, way back when he managed to beat Sydney in a fair fight (the first ‘fight’ doesn’t count, she upper-cut him without warning… and he faked it anyway)
But that was Sydney moving the orb to block Math’s feint. So really Sydney hit Math with the orb, just like she’s done with many other people.
I agree with jayessell. I don’t recall any other time when someone not Sydney intentionally reached out and made contact with an orb.
No, Math tapped one of Sydney’s balls which diverted it into her leg causing her to fly backwards over the couch
Speaking balls, remember Shadow No-Nuts? The sneaky fucker who snuck into Mr Buble without Sydney knowing and tried to kill her? Fairly sure her balls made contact with his in a way that would prevent any offspring
No, he tapped Sydney’s leg which diverted it into the path of the ball.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-133-tibiassault/
Okay, but Sydney’s ball connected to Math’s jaw earlier
Math thumped one of the balls with his index finger during a fight with Sidney in Grrl Power #133 – Tibiassault.
I think it was one of the unknown balls.
I read that as Sydney blocking his hand with the orb rather than the other way around. Hence the “Hah! Denied!” statement. He then nudged her leg into the path of the other orb.
It… wasn’t Slam’s head that knocked the girder-stack over ;)
I wonder what Sydney would see with the Comm ball on magic sense mode.
The Comm Ball should be her go-to for just about all spy work. She could have sent out the light bee, had her illusion appear and then merged in so only her glasses and eyes appeared out of the steel.
…I wonder if her glasses would work for her illusion self. I feel like there should be some rule that makes them not work, but her regular glasses must work for correcting her vision so I don’t see why the zoom capability wouldn’t necessarily work. Only reason I can think would be if the zoom function came from a sort of camera feed rather than just lenses bending light. So regular binoculars would work but if she was holding a smart phone and looking at the camera feed it wouldn’t show her illusion self the camera feed from the illusion perspective.
That would assume Sydney would choose logic over the possibility of Mission Impossible spy shenanigans.
A…shall we say… highly unlikely turn of events…
Wouldn’t the true vision orb allow Sydney to see that it’s Sciona? Also, the telepresence orb would make it safer to check her out more overtly? Whatever, she should be defaulting to use her shield whenever she’s in doubt these days!!!
My recollection is that the true vision orb sees through illusions
It’s not an illusion
She can see magical auras but whether Sciona’s current state would produce a magical aura is unknown (and Sydney doesn’t know how to interpret them anyway)
No, because it’s not an illusion
No, because it is not an illusion. It is not even classic possession since Escorpia’s mind/soul/spirit are long gone and Sciona’s are the only ones occupying and animating that body. The situation is much more akin to reincarnation than anything else. To gain useful information the orb would have to be able to make an in-depth analysis of Sciona, including her spiritual status. No available orb function we know of is currently able to do that.
Maybe someday if Sydney decides to upgrade it.
Yep. A ‘HUD sense’ that functions like a package of super-science & magic senses (and/or the Stat-O-Vision often found in settings that works like RPG Mechanics ‘Verses) would be a quite plausible and fitting upgrade for the true sight orb that Sydney might unlock in the future.
IIRC, however, she did not do anything recently that would warrant an upgrade in the near future. It has been a lot of comedy filler, slice of life, and low-challenge training of late.
If she had a single drop of talent at stealth, yes, this would be a much better plan.
Keep forgetting, Sydney has to concentrate to have her balls orbit other than her head
That’s why she was keeping them in the poster case before she “came out”. Super-hero 101: Never be in your super “look” when in stealth, whether it’s glowing balls, huge bunny ears, or a dino crest, it’s VERY noticeable! Plus, not noticing that big boobs pushing on a loose stack of “I” beams does have VERY noticeable tell-tale sound…
Sydney is a normal person that doesn’t think of how she looks, you get used to having wild hair, or glowing balls circling her head, they are always there and she got used to it, she just forgot.
Besides, what moron would stack “I” beams like that? That’s a workers-comp case just waiting to happen! Maybe not for supers, but not everyone there can shrug off a 200lbs hunk a metal landing on a foot, leg, or any other body part.
Was saying: she consciously had her balls lowered around her shoulders for the first four panels, but when Slam joined the party her concentration started to slip and they started to return to their normal position
She can’t “Set and Forget” where her balls are when they are not locked away in Ben Casey
What is wrong with how they are stacked? It’s not normally so easy to move a “200lbs” hunk of metal
You would prefer them not stacked at all, just laying on the ground individually?
Best practices with I-beams (or S-beams) is to stack them in H orientation, so that they are harder to spin. But you’re probably right that those particular beams are heavy enough that it doesn’t really matter unless they get hit by a superpowered individual or heavy machinery. If it were me stacking them, I probably would have had them in rows of five or six side-by-side (with a few inches of space in between), oriented like an H, with 3-4 pieces of 4×4 lumber spread out evenly between each row. That way the lumber helps to hold the stacks together and upright, and gives enough room for a forklift to get in there. Or, with each row offset enough that each H has its legs on top of two different beams in the row below. (That one’s better for long-term storage)
Okay, yeah, having space between them for regular lifting equipment makes sense
How many supers are capable of lifting the beams individually let alone in multiples without knocking the whole stack over? Even Sydney would need space to fit her tentacle under
So she didn’t end up calling this in, instead opting for Looney Tunes buffoonery. What a shocker.
Oh no… we are going into “walking dead” mode, as in the characters (Halo) fogets that there is a method that worked perfectly before but instead does something “new and stupid”.
quote “Powers: Halo’s name and powers are derived from HIGHLIGHT TO SEE POWERS the spheres that orbit her. Each one grants her a different power, but can only use 2 at a time (1 per hand). Flight, force field, energy beam, telekinetic pseudopod, *telepresence*. The powers of two of the orbs are unknown.” oh and true sight
The power of one of the two unknown orbs is now known. It transforms gaseous matter from one molecule to another. This helps Sydney renew the air in her bubble or smother her adversaries (i cant rememberwhich color orb does this).
Understood, I was quoting from the desc. give in the bio. (am i[date with color code would be nice) My point is it is a poor choice for a character that has the ability and has used it in the past to spy from distance to now have them stand behind a wall 20 meters away.
I’m still at a loss as to why Sydney is at the construction site. If it was explained on a previous page I’ve missed it.
She also wants to play Dungeons & Construction Sites.
With both Slam and Katrina there, I’m pretty sure that’s the same construction site they were all at the night before. It’s the site they are building the Archon Dungeon.
For the same reason Anvil and others are there: part of the construction crew and security
Oh gods, these three combined are just a chaotic disaster and I am here for it!!!
I’m guessing it’s triceratopae.
I’m no taxonomist, but that word strikes me as being more suitable for describing a genus.
Clearly Peggy’s training program urgently needs to address Sidney’s -20 stealth stats.
Sydney is forgetting her advanced levels of “How Not to be Seen”. If you are on a jobsite all you need is a clipboard with a list of indecipherable numbers. If anyone asks, you are checking lot numbers on the steel beams. The item doesn’t really matter as long as it is present and not particularly interesting. As you go about quietly counting things people will forget that you were even there.
What does Scarper mean?
https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day/scarper-2022-10-13/
I learned it from Red Dwarf.
best show to learn anything from ;P
Katrina is soo CUTE as were hare. Moar please.
She was cuter as a were-bunny though :(
I thought Sydney would have, y’know told someone that she might have found Sciona. I mean, it’s one of the classic blunders in fiction to not do so! Just send a quick text message, and bam, job done.
Unless she did off camera, and she’s just ‘keeping an eye’ on Sciona. Which is possible.
If not, I guess Sydney will grumble at herself for not letting anyone know. Maybe after getting lectured over it.
Sydney should both call Arc AND do something “inappropriate” with Slam. Possibly at the same time just to try and show up Dabbler
I think Sydney has found her group in ARC.
Thought her group was the A-Team?
It’s so frustrating to have Sydney be smart and people around her immediately grab the idiot ball.
Old Halo: YOINKS! RED ALERT! SUSPICIOUS LADY OVER HERE, COME ARREST HER! Why? She’s got killer abs and giant boobs and silver hair! PLUS red heels! Classic villain-in-disguise kit!
People around her: That’s not how this works.
New Halo: I have a suspicion, but I will accrue more evidence before alerting my superior in case I am wrong.
People around her: HEY WHAT ARE WE DOING SPYING ON PEOPLE? WATCH ME HEADBUTT THIS WALL. RUN AWAAAAAAY!
Any affection I had for those two just died.
It would haven’t been as obvious to anyone that it was Sciona if she hadn’t decided to change her hair to white, ’cause… reasons I guess. Not only is it longer, but the same color as her previous incarnation. I’m not sure about evidence, but there are more than just a couple of alarms going off to be sure.
She is literally in a different body, her hair has nothing to do with anything
why on earth would Halo even get close to being seen why not just use her ability to scry while safely hidden
From the text: Of course Sydney is familiar with the song “Blue Moon”.
She has an encyclopedic knowledge of science fiction, fantasy, and horror movies.
That song is part of the soundtrack from ‘An American Werewolf in London’
I like the way this page implies that when Sydney doesn’t concentrate on it, the orbs naturally start circling her head :)
Yeah, thought the same thing :)
Is the title a reference to the Monty Python sketch?
Don’t be silly now. Everyone knows it’s Tricopodes
I have re-read this page like 3 times JUST for the SFX in the last few panels…. Absolutely *perfect* – I can hear them in my head and I’m still giggling.