Grrl Power #324 – She should put all those answers on a shirt
So yeah, they missed something fairly obvious there, but they didn’t have much time to experiment. And when Sydney was saying “no whammy” she was hoping that Varia didn’t get feces-kinesis powers from her, projectile mucus, super miasma, or something else awful. Feces-kinesis would be a pretty awful power to have to fight against though. I’m pretty sure I’d surrender right away instead of facing some sort of poopocalypse.
Varia obviously answered some but not all questions about how her powers work, notably whether or not it’s always on when she’s touching someone and if it lasts after she breaks contact, but like I’ve said before, I’d like to get out of the habit of making sure everything gets explained right as it’s introduced. It’s fine to leave stuff for later, and that includes Vance’s introduction for the moment, what with the team leader popping in.
My original draft of panel 3 had Varia just saying “you’re adopted” and the girl with a surprised look on her face, but Xochitl isn’t a dick like that, so I changed it so she’s saying it to a kid who obviously already knows. That said, using her powers to tell if a child is related to their parents is trickier than telling if a brother and sister really are brother and sister since they would have fairly similar DNA, whereas their parents (hopefully) don’t. (Insert joke about the American deep south here. Or European royalty I guess.)
I’ll be at A-kon starting in the late morning. There’s not much going on Thursday, but I work with guest relations and help bus guests in from the airport and all that sort of stuff. The plans for a meetup this year besides trying to bump into each other at one of the webcomic panels is 8pm Friday in front of Media, which is a bar and grill in Atrium II (the main… well, atrium.) Follow me on Twitter if you aren’t already as it’s the easiest way to keep up while I’m at the con, assuming T-Mobile gets reception there. Sprint was mostly no bueno but I’ve switched now. I think I’m going to actually wear my battle pie chart shirt on Friday as the one Grrl Power shirt I have isn’t in good shape. I usually think about getting a new one made when it’s only 3 days to the next event when I’d want to wear it.
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If it works on animals, or insects, she can carry around a number of powers in portable form.
If it doesn’t work on animals in general, what about higher primates?
Will it work with a corpse that she never touched while alive?
If it doesn’t work with “dead parts” what about a blood transfusion from a compatible blood type donor, to keep the blood alive for however long the red blood cells last?
If it does work with “dead parts”, how about just hair?
Will she work out ways of using powers in conjunction with others as a tactic, like cap America shield and thor’s hammer in avengers two. Heat girl fire and her conjoined cold power to make a fog cloud for cover?
And then there’s pregnancy. Something that Marvel comics has always skirted around or outright ignored such as the What If? where Captain America and Rogue had a kid (before Rogue could control her powers). With that, even if she was artificially inseminated and we just say that it’s epidermal contact, pregnancy eventually ends with skin-on-skin contact.
Also, along similar lines, what happens when she comes into contact with someone else whose powers are similar? When Rogue and Scrambler touched during the Mutant Massacre storyline, they both got the mutant version of BSOD on both their powers and their physique. If a gestalt power touches someone whose power is based off absorbing/mimicry, what happens?
Now that I think about it, would Vehemence’s power interpret Varia’s touch as an attack even if the intent were non-hostile? Is it possible that this is why she’s not getting anything from Halo? Perhaps her orbs render her as some form of null-state since (as far as we’ve seen) there does not appear to be any form of auto-defense with the orbs and Sydney isn’t holding an orb.
Lots and lots of grey areas here.
Pregnancy wouldn’t be a problem, as she specifically says that her powers don’t harm the people she gets them from. Worst case scenario, she’s stuck with the same power for nine months. And I think pregnancy normally does worse things to you than that.
Best case scenario, her child, being related to her, gives her a power that works in synergy with hers. Like something that makes all her abilities more powerful.
Quick! Time to knock her up – FOR SCIENCE!
Pyre, you missed something. :-D Watch the orbs in the last set of panels.
“New user accepted”?
Maybe she only used a four digit PIN number ….?
Oh snap! Nice catch. :D
What if Varia touches someone whose power is to nullify the powers of others upon touch?
There are no such powers in this universe, per the author. So it is a moot point.
To be precise, there’s no one-size-fits-all power nullification devices or spells.
The nearest we have seen is the medicate-and-monitor restraints.
Ummm…. I reeeally want to say something like “oh yeah, talk nerdy to me” but….. not sure how people would feel about that. Still, though. Woof.
Woof, woof, WOOF!
*wags tail*
I think she’s not getting any powers because Sydney is not holding an orb. Silly Sydney, you’re the rules lawyer of the bunch, you should have figured that out immediately!
But without the powers, Sydney’s a normal, so she should get some powers from Sydney.
I just noticed it. Look at the orbs.
Yeah, I’m with you on this, I think it lets her use the orbs. She’s not holding any currently, so all that happens is the orbs shift orbit.
Heh. Shift orb-it.
I’m sure Sydney will get to that joke sooner or later.
Heh. Shift orb-it.
I’m sure Sydney will get to that joke sooner or later.
Heh. Shift orb-it.
I’m sure Sydney will get to that joke sooner or later.
Heh. Shift orb-it.
I’m sure Sydney will get to that joke sooner or later.
Alright; I think we got the message the first three times. :P (I’m guessing you’ve been trolled by the ‘submit’ button? XD)
I’m sorry that this has nothing to do with the discussion, but love your avatar! I miss the Wotch…
OF COURSE! The orbs are letting her use them too! All she needs to do is reach up and grab one!!!
:-O
I hope she has better manners than that!
She should at least buy Sydney a drink first.
so she gets to share sydneys orbs…
yup, they be ballin.
Yep, the amount of possibilities is insane. Clever workaround from the author to let him show off Sydney’s abilities in combos of more than 2, while still creating enough limitation for them not to be OP.
Peggy … is wearing 2nd Lt. bars. In the biographies, she’s listed as a 1st Lt. Which of these?
She must have done something to get herself promoted between when this flashback ends and the ‘real’ time.
At this point, wasn’t that more of a Flash-forward?
In the US Army, Marines, and Air Force 1st Lt. is ABOVE 2nd.
Captain is two silver bars.
First lieutenant is one silver bar
Second lieutenant is one gold bar.
Peggy must therefore be a Second and a half lieutenant.
feces-kinesis Was the name of my band in high school. We were the premier grunge punk electro prog fusion group in the greater mid eastern El Cajon area.
Is it just me, or is it a bit odd to have two exit links from a single text bubble? In the first panel, the bubble to the left of the “Hey!” bubble has exits both to the right and downwards to the bubble below…
Easter Egg!!, he needs to delete the one going down, and leave the one going to the right, as that will make the flow of speech bubbles correct.
Oh yea. I hadn’t realised it, but that accounts for reading all that text being a bit harder than it should.
I tend to go down, then come back up for the “hey”, only to be directed back down into the bubble I have already read.
OMG!! I JUST THOUGHT OF SOMETHING!! What if someone like… Boston, up there, is the condition for the other two Amazorbs?!
Also, gotta agree with Arianna. Doesn’t roll off the tongue. Howsabout Incredorbles?
Amazeballs. :)
Orbamentals?
Incrediballs. I think that’s my favorite. Let’s use this. I can hear the commercials.
“These orbs aren’t just incredible, they’re Incredi-BALLS! Each with a unique color and power set! Collect them all, and trade with a friend for the ones you don’t have, yet! Not only that, but if you buy the whole set, then we’ll include, at no extra cost, the Incrediball(tm) Halo Rig! Be just like The Mighty Halo(tm)*
*We do not actually recommend being like The Mighty Halo, as you *will* get your mouth washed out with soap so often, and with such vehemence, that your tongue will, quite literally, turn white. This company is not responsible for bleached and scrubbed tongues from children trying to be like The Mighty Halo.”
With each Energy Blast Ball children will receive a special code in the package that will unlock a special “test” in the online mmo to see if they are “Halo Approved” hip enough to use the term “PPO”. (also included with the Deluxe Expansion Pack of the ARCHONLINE’s next expansion, “Mysteries of the Unknown Orbs” preorder NOW!!)
I wonder if the have the Incredibles movie in that world. She already has cross brand name recognition with Halo the game.
“get your mouth washed out with soap so often, and with such vehemence” When V lets them license his likeness they could include a little bar of soap and comic images of him washing her mouth out with soap during the big brawl? If fans like it he could get his own line of cleaning products starting with soap. “Our Vehement cleaning products are aggressive on grime and do violence to dirt!”
Sydney actually uses obscene or sacreligious terms amazingly seldom… that’s probably why she’s a 7th-dan black belt.
Yeah, I agree. If you’re trying to phonetically spell a near incomprehesible accent, why not go whole hog?
This is an odd question but is this all still part of a flash back or did we catch back up?
we’re still in the flashback, as this is technically the day after the bank heist and press conference, with the dinner fight afterwards… then she went home to sleep and go into the comic store the next day only to get interrupted by Harem showing up to tell her Max expects her to show up at Archon TODAY… during which, she butts in on the Prez and gets told to go into training A.S.A.P. therefore this is still in the past according to her flashback intro of “let me back up a few months”
We’ll get to see some testing and training etc… before we get to her casually walking in to her job as a full whatever she was at that time. I suppose a table top rpg group has to be formed too. When you see a hint of that we are probably getting close.
I can’t help buy add that 3 1/2 years later, we are still in the “flashback”…
Just had to share this:
https://www.goblinscomic.org/
What is scary, is the large percentage of RPG’ers who play like MinMax. Even after playing for decades. *sigh*
Except MinMax is a subversion. He legitimately roleplays all his weaknesses and flaws, alongside his incredible combat ability. A better example of bad(It’s not inherently bad and at times makes the most sense RP wise.) Minmaxing would be R2-D2’s player in Darths and Droids, where he has all these flaws, but not really, as they don’t affect him.
That is the correct way to play him though. He used intelligence as his dump stat. So anyone who plays him as a smart character is not role-playing. They are abusing the game.
No, what I am saying, is that I have met a LOT of RPG’ers who are still playing in the same manner that they did in their first session. Blast everything, collect EXP and loot. I was amazed to watch 30 year veterans use this technique over and over again, then have the stupidity to complain that the GM was cheating when the players had no clues to solve the mission, since they had killed all the NPC’s instead of talking to them.
Yea, I followed your intent. I just took the other route, as the door was open.
I was going to say that I have been lucky in not suffering the same. But, thinking on it, there were good reasons for it. Not that I get the chance to play anymore, being out in the arse end of nowhere. But, back in the day, I had a pretty tight group that kept going (in one form or another) up until shortly before I emigrated.
And nobody who played in my campaigns would retain habits like that beyond the first session or two! One of the perks of players managing to outlive characters.
The other reason being that when I got into convention-going, I always tended to pick events which were aimed at role-players, rather than dungeon crawlers. Further, had there been any dumb player on the team, I would not have found out. If there was something that had a hint of ‘this is someone we need to talk to’, I would ensure that we did not splash their blood on the ceiling.
I always preferred playing in those situations though. So would only volunteer as a GM if there was such a shortfall that there was a risk of not getting a game at all. However did GM a fair number, over the years. There though I was lucky, in that I can only recall one session where I had bad players. But that was actually a whole table full of them!
In that case the scenario actually had an NPC who was advising them. Whom the story had given good reason for them to trust. Not that they failed to, as they let the character come along. But ignored all advice he gave. Even when they knew that they were going the wrong way (from other hints I was able to emphasise, within the spirit of and using elements present in the scenario).
I am guessing they were used to a DM who just outright told them, “no don;t go that way, the story needs you to go the other way”. Silly thing though, the scenario was set up to do exactly that! And I did repeatedly, via the NPC. Especially when they got frustrated at their lack of progress. Yet they failed to even acknowledge his existence, no matter how heavily he pushed the case. They were only interested in each other’s options and arguing with each other about what to do next.
Had there been an award for ‘least progress made’, they would have won it, with distinction!
Mind you some roleplaying teams I have been on have had massive fun even when not bothering with trying to complete the objectives (sometimes for idealogical reasons, if the scenario did not motivate the characters correctly, given their backgrounds and/or alignments). Saddest thing though, was that this lot were crap roleplayers, as well as being awful at dungeon crawling.
Add all their IQ’s together and they still could not outthink MinMax!
Contact with Sydney activated ‘boob bounce’ powers (panel 7).
No one can stop talking about the orbs, can they.
I bet the power she got has to do with the amount of heat that Sydney can eat at one time, quick get her the hottest food you can find!!
So, if varia bypasses maxima’s skin by say putting s hand in her mouth, would she bypass maxima’s seeming immunity?
The inside of your mouth does have skin, or your blood would fall out. It is just a different type.
Maxima’s forcefield extends there too. Every single cell of her body is protected.
actually it’s not skin inside your mouth, it’s a different type of epithelium, and falls into the category of “mucous membrane”. Skin comes in 2 variants, thin, like what is on most of your body, and thick, which is on the soles of your feet and palms of your hands.
Speaking off missing something obvious I have a question about mister black hulk is his super adrenalin chemical in nature or a power say scientists take a blood sample could they take it and extract and synthesize a synthetic. A lesser version for non power soldiers giving them bullet time abilities like there progenitor. By the by I say His name should be Bullet time it’s a cool enough name.
We don’t know. Possibly the super power just directly creates the effect, say by manipulating time. It might be a heightened form of adrenalin though. Which could potentially be synthesised.
Note that he also implies that he has super strength from it. If so it would be even more useful, than you realise.
Unrelated to any theorizing above… I gotta compliment Dave on Varia’s glass/ice look in the second panel – translucency like that is a tricky thing to pull off well.
+1
Yep the ice look is captured perfectly. I have seen some truly awful attempts at that, by otherwise capable artists. So Dave has done a great job here.
Does the last two panels mean that Sindny being able to use the orbs is genetic in nature, or just that the orbs are linked to her keyed genetically and Varia is sharing those genetics enough through her gestalt power that the orbs are recognizing her?
There are many possible mechanisms, so we can only guess. Varia seems convinced that there is a genetic link. But that contradicts information we have from the press conference and when Sydney and Peggy were talking. Both of which are more reliable sources than a new recruit.
However, the very fact, that she has only recently been discovered, might mean that science has not yet been able to study, peer review and publish their results on her yet. So it is possible that she is the Rosetta Stone of supers, that allows researchers to unlock the principles of how powers are gained.
To be precise Sydney and Peggy were talking about it can’t be something like X gene since they think one gene can’t mutate a person this much. I wonder though what is this Works like a binary set? For example in a 8 bit set of binary there are 2^8 possibilities what if X gene mutate into a third sign in this? it creates 3×2^7 possibilities 2^7 possibilities more than usual now it is suspected that there is about 10k genes in a human genome and we don’t know how it works yet we just make speculations.
Also even if it is not that working that way noone said it is just one gene that is different in supers. Maybe a whole chromosome pair are different? It makes 1/23 of a difference than humans which should be enough to give superhuman Powers.
Something just struck me, so I decided to mention it now, rather than working my way through the comments.
It has already been pointed out that this will make enemies immune to any attack power that Varia aquires from them. However there is something else to ask. Is that an absolute immunity to the effects of the power? Or does it discriminate and only grant immunity to directly harmful effects?
Immunity to direct harm only. Varia can:
• use healing powers to cure an unconscious healer
• use ice powers, gained from Heatwave, to negate her heat aura
• encase Heatwave in a block of ice (it is not harming her, just containing her)
Absolute immunity to power. Varia can:
• heal herself, but could not heal the healer.
• create a barrier (be it force field, wall of stone/ice/fire etc) which her gestalt partner can walk through
• create a trap for an enemy (use the force field, wall of stone/ice to create a bridge over a pit or some other hazard. Varia can walk over it herself. Her opponent will fall through.)
Oh My God! She’s turkin’ your ORBS!
They are not detachable. Wherever they go, I go.
My Orbies and me! ♪♫
Godzilla is now a Japanese citizen.
I am glad to see that racial prejudices have broken down, and they no longer try to kill him with aircraft and tanks.
There is something that surprised me, which nobody has specifically mentioned yet. Although I suppose this is masked by the fact that Varia appears to have to hold hands to get her power to work. But it may yet turn out that she retains the power (even if she does not have to turn it on), until she replaces it with a new one.
If her power does work the latter way normally, then her partnership with Sydney is going to be more limiting than with anyone else. In terms of freedom of movement.
The orbs will stop them from moving any significant distance apart.
With interesting implications if one falls off a cliff, jumps onto a moving train, gets snatched by a flying foe, steps through a wormhole or gets teleported..
If she unlocks the third or even fourth orb possibilities they are better off sticking together so they can share the shield.
True. But I could well see Varia becoming frustrated at that. Most of the time she will just be a passenger sitting there, with nothing to do. There are not a huge number of situations where Sydney will be ineffective with her usual two orb limit.
Especially when you consider that Varia is the most flexible, and thereby potentially the most valuable member of Archon. Dabbler will probably remain more powerful, as she always has a range of options available. Whereas Varias are dependant on who happens to be in the area. And can only use the one power (or set) at a time.
But when you consider things at the strategic level, rather than the tactical level, if Varia does get trully varied powers (as opposed to versions on a theme, but not covering the gamut of possibilities) she will eventually be able to provide a solution for practically any given problem. With the appropriate support.
Every time she shakes a new person’s hand, Varia gains a new super power. That outstrips even Harem’s rapid learning skills. And has probably already passed Dabbler’s total number of powers.
So not utilising that capability is actually incredibly wasteful. No matter how useful she might be to Halo, from time to time, as a back-seat gunner.
Not that I am advocating that they should not team up. They will work well together. But having a limit which prevents them from splitting up, when Varia is desperately needed elsewhere? That can potentially be a big problem. And one that will become more and more likely with the passage of time.
I had just assumed you meant in those situations where Sydney and Varia were teamed up on purpose by their team leader or by mutual agreement. Not that they would be forced to do so all the time. However I did have a comment like that a while back and you read everything it seems so I could see how you would assign that meaning here.
However (since you bring it up) depending on what the two unknown orbs do if Varia combined with Sydney granted four orb use its very possible that their combined might would, not all the time but most of it, outstrip Varias usefulness separate from her for one simple reason. Sydney’s orbs appear to be literally made to work perfectly together so that she can choose any two and they don’t interfere. This will translate to using four as well. That means that, most likely, with the edition of the two unknown orbs there is a good chance she could replicate the basic powers, strategywise blaster-tank-strongman-telekintetic(tentacle kind of does both strongman and telekinetic to a degree and can extend pretty far)-etc… (to her own orbs’ levels), of most of the supers out there and never have to come out of what may well be one of the strongest defenses in the world. (not real far from that now before they figure out the last two powers but the others all fit basic “jobs” game style so I suspect at least one and probably both of the last two will as well.)
Varia, once they categorize enough powers available from the support staff etc…, is the plug and play girl for when they need that hard to find power to get through this latest particularly unusual situation. I think someone else was thinking of that when they called her the “Deus Ex Machina” of the group, which is technically incorrect since we know about that aspect of her now, seems like we can’t get very far before Dave’s love of powers with great variety of application causes someone to bring up that word. (incorrectly… ) But when it comes to most situations, if they get 3-4 orb control but especially four, Haria/Valo will be the ready solution without having to bring along tons of support staff to activate her powers. Especially if the situation crops up on the fly.
This is why, if 3-4 ball activation is real, Dave is probably gonna let the team NOT figure out what Varia’s power is with Halo for a good long while so that they can develop enough as separate and useful entities, as well as having preset “routines” with other team members, that it won’t immediately and naturally occur to their leaders to semi-permanently bond them as a mini-team. If they can only activate 2 then all whisper of this threat against their individual character development diminishes to practically nothing which is another good reason, beyond making Varia “overpowered”, that her power may require constant hand holding.(constant hand holding. Hah! *crickets chirping* Really?) Dave’s found forced usage of the entire palm of the hand to be a great power limiter before and I can see him going to it again to prevent this potential little trouble maker. If they can only use two nobody is gonna suggest they team up a lot even if it is occasionally useful against hordes of targets (mad scientist flying mecha drones!) as a specialized gunner. (Death Blossom! )
I agree that there is a good possibility of this. Whilst your arguments are reasonable, I do not think that would be why though. It is simply because it would be really funny!
Plus there is a real possibility of power generation through doing this.
Hook up pipes to impatient readers ears and connect those to turbines. The sheer volume of steam pumping out of their ears, at the frustration of not seeing the team up, that they expect, will probably be enough to power a small town!
1) One falls off a cliff:
Slams, perhaps a bit painfully, to a stop in midair after screaming in a humorous fashion.
2) One jumps onto a moving train:
If they don’t have the shield orb that one probably gets killed by the force of the train since they were the once trying to move past boundaries. Scary as hell and since Sydney hasn’t mentioned that fear shows that she is always the first to think of super power related things OR she is damn brave to choose a life of action that great increases the chance of such a thing happening.
3) One gets snatched by a flying foe:
Depends on his power levels. If he is super strong both in body and flight he rips through the one he grabbed or rips of a “souvenir” as he is pretty much the train scenario all over again. If he is weak in one of these ways he probably gets stopped “comically” (though still a bit painfully) in midair.
4) One steps through a wormhole or gets teleported..:
Considering what they do to scrying spells I think the orbs makers would have thought of that as an “ordinary” way of getting too far from the orbs. So a general “Dimensional Anchor” would be in affect for either one attempting to go through without the other or all of the orbs. Which means that, even without Varia, Sydney can, once she figures it out, easily resist forced portals and teleports if she is able to tell one of her little orbies to hide itself outside of range of the affect. The unintended extra powers of the orbs keep growing! So now we have…
Unintended “Extra” Sydney/Orb powers: Glowlights, Telekintetic extra “fists” or tools, Physical Anchor (not actually a plus MOST of the time… as The List well knows), *hypothetical* Dimensional Anchor (the strongest,so far, as while it could be a negative in a special situation it is most likely a good defense in super combat).
“shows that she is always the first”
Isn’t. Isn’t always the first. Why does that keep happening. I’m almost positive that enough pressure should have been applied for at least ONE of the three missing bits to be typed… I swear I saw it at the time. Its like some kind of autocorrect feature from hell but I don’t have one that does that. I don’t think I do.
Yea, I consider a dimensional anchor to be likely too.
I think this depends on the status of orbs. We only saw orbs pulling sydney when they were contained in the box. However now orbs orbits around both of their heads. I think in all scenerios it is possibile that orbs just continue to orbit in an ecliptic or even in an 8 shape between two baring the dimensional one even with dimensional theory orbs may start shifting between dimensions to orb over both of them half circle over one in one dimension thna fades to other person for another half circle over her.
I vote Ren gets the superhero name: Redline.
Untz untz untz!
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt1483797/
+1
Ohh spiffy can Varia play with Syndey’s balls while touching Sydney?
I’m really surprised we haven’t seen anyone else offer to play with them. They obviously take up space since way back they popped the foam out of the tube. though also way back Dabbler said they didn’t have any marks either and for Sydney they plainly do.
If Varia can use them, does she have to be touching halo with a hand? if not, strap them back to back with Sydney in a rucksack and together they can wield 4 of the 7.
Phrasing!
I think Varia would have her hands free to touch Sydney if they were wearing this special battle suit together.
https://g03.s.alicdn.com/kf/HT1dl_LFHxcXXagOFbXo/220816014/HT1dl_LFHxcXXagOFbXo.jpg
I was expecting one of those two-person underwear sets.
I am pretty sure that, behind the scenes, Maxima has a hand in this. Sydney was paranoid about the government wanting to study her and the orbs. Note that we did not see Maxima briefing Peggy beyond “I have an assignment for you.”. I strongly suspect that Maxima told her not to touch Sydney’s orbs.
Firstly this would avoid triggering any paranoia in Sydney. Allowing Maxima to broach the subject when she felt that Sydney was comfortable with it.
Secondly it would also be for safety reasons. Everyone else here has grown up with their powers,* so will be familiar with them. Should anyone be able to use the powers of the orbs, they would not be familiar with them, and could pose a threat.
Thirdly the orbs have safety features able to overcome even Maxima’s capability (her strength versus their immovability). It is not inconceivable that they might also have lethal defences, to stop attempts to subvert them. Something Varia has, hopefully, overcome.
So any testing would need to be done under controlled conditions. My assumption is that Maxima will have, discreetly, spread the word to that effect.
* Varia is not an exception here. Even though she gains a power every few hours, she is used to doing that. And her own power actually has safety features built into it, to allow her to do so with some confidence.
FOR DAVE
Speaking of Max’s ‘screwy’ skin, the only way for her to have blue blood is if it’s cobalt-aluminum based. The formula is CoOAl2O3, and it is, as one might expect, cobalt blue. It’s a combination of oxidized cobalt and oxidized aluminum, and it’s that factor–that it’s produced by mixing two oxidized elements–that allows her to ALSO have red blood. Here’s how it works:
Cobalt Nitrate is Co(NO3)2, or CO + 2N + 6O…and cobalt nitrate is red. Nitrogen is found in the air and in normal human blood, so including it is no big deal; she can inhale and exhale it, and we don’t have to worry about its presence in the mixture of CoO and Al2O3 because it can form bubbles of pure nitrogen in her blue blood. This is also, interestingly, MASSIVELY more efficient than human hemoglobin. Cobalt Nitrate is 6O/Co with 2N/Co. Hemoglobin is a massive structure with an Fe at the center surrounded by 4N, carbon, carbon dioxide, and a lot of methine (CH, or in this case CH2 and CH3) bridges, for a lousy 2O and 2(OH). I don’t know if your body can strip four oxygen or just two from that. Per mole of base element, Cobalt is 50% more efficient than iron at carrying oxygen, and while cobalt nitrate is a salt, it’s soluble in water, so it theoretically (super biology) works as an oxygen carrier. Unlike hemoglobin, it doesn’t have all the ‘extras’ except for 2N. Strip the nitrogen as nitrogen gas, strip 5 oxygen/Co, and you’re left with CoO: oxidized cobalt is actually the oxygen LOW state of her blood, much as hemoglobin turns blue after you strip the oxygen, but unlike hemoglobin, CoO won’t oxidize further on contact with air, so if she bleeds blue blood, it STAYS blue, but her oxygen HIGH state of blood is red.
Al2O3 is also known as corundum, as in ruby and sapphire. The red in ruby is caused by traces of chromium. Now, being a crystal, it’s not a good oxygen carrier. It doesn’t even like to break up. If you add cobalt oxide, you get cobalt blue, a salt like cobalt nitrate. I don’t know what happens if you add it to cobalt nitrate, but I think it’s better to assume it’s not in her blood stream. If that’s the case, it has to be something that her blood would ALWAYS mix with in order to produce blue bleeding while having red blood…like maybe ruby blood vessels. I think that would be cool, given her gold skin, and while it’s biologically super-weird, so is Max.
Ruby blood vessels and cobalt nitrate/cobalt oxide blood results in her having red blood to blush with, and bleeding blue from arteries as the cobalt oxide mixes with the aluminum oxide of her blood vessel. This would be particularly true of nosebleeds, which are burst capillaries. Unlike hemoglobin, her blue blood stays blue on exposure to oxygen (her lungs have to do some wicked chemistry). The upside is you have a Dabbler’s Science Corner to explain Max’s blue blood, and Max is hyper-oxygenated. That level of oxygen in her blood would give her massive strength and stamina even if she was human, and I mean way past Olympic level of natural athletic ability at everything requiring strength and/or endurance. It could easily be part of how her power works, particularly her energy pool that she can shift around. That energy pool is her oxygen, which gets munched on by cells that produce ATP and/or super powers.
The downside is that she only bleeds blue from arterial wounds. If you stab her in a vein, she bleeds red. I believe capillaries, like her busted nose, are ‘used’ blood, and would be blue, but someone else on here probably knows better.
There is an alternative.
If you want her to bleed blue everywhere, her blood has to be one part cobalt and two parts aluminum with no trace elements. Oxidize the two elements, and you have blue blood. The cobalt gets one oxygen and every two aluminum get three oxygen. It’s not a very efficient carrier of oxygen, but it’s probably still better than hemoglobin. Now, if you want her to blush red, give her ruby blood vessels as before, but then she blushes more of a purple than red. You might find that looks good, unlike blushing blue, and retcon her coloring like you’ve done to Jiggs and Max’s rank. Alternatively, she could have traces of phosphorous in her cobalt blue blood, which makes it GLOWING blue blood, and then, especially if she has ruby in a layer of her epidermis (it DOES have a Mohs hardness of 9), she blushes red not because you’re seeing the extra blue blood, but because you’re seeing the extra light from the glowing blood after it passes through ruby.
If I were you, I would experiment with coloring and whether or not I felt okay with Max bleeding two different colors, and then I would do a super-awesome Dabbler’s Science Corner.
BTW, I loved the one that explained Harem, particularly the fact that her mind is entangled on a quantum level. The trick show was pretty funny, too.
New thought. The orbs changed orbit but not to “around both of them” they changed to include Varia as a member orb. She is being held, and is in fact granting Sydney a power, If Varia retains the power set until she gets another she will be unable to walk away from Sydney…
Thump. “The LIST!. You. You. You. Oh Hi Varian, why are you curling up and levitating?”
It is always something related to the powers of the one she touches (if they have powers) and often extends their abilities somehow (like metal skin could only do that to himself, but it extends to her. Harem can only port herself and it extends to Varia)
He he. Ingenious twist.
Supporting evidence: Second to last panel, Varia’s orbs are attempting to rise up into their correct orbit. Doubtless, in a moment, as you imply, she will rise up fully off the ground and start to orbit Halo!
Sydney will, of course be able to direct her, just like any other orb. Allowing them to perform a fastball-special attack together!
I suspect that the power, granted to Sydney, when she grasps her new living ‘orb’, is the ability to shapechange into a velociraptor!
For practical reasons, Varia probably does so too, as dragging her around would just be weird, at that point. So there would be two dinosaurs running around. When not flying.
Xochitl’s new callsign: Varia-ball
makes me think of the morph ball in metroid, the suit is called the varia suit.
A chameleon will change it’s skin color to match the background. I get the impression that a similar mechanic, to “blend in”, is what drives Varia’s mimic power. Sometimes the blending matches perfectly the person who she is touching, and sometimes not so much.
IF Varia can do her magic trick with just blood samples, then there should not be a problem with acquiring cooperatively a little blood from Maxima, and THEN testing to see what that unlocks.
However, allowing Varia the ability to release a power based on the contents of a blood smear or cheek scraping (DNA test) would make Varia entirely too powerful, within the context of a continuing story. I would, if I worked at Archon, build a backpack with internal automation that would dispense just the sample asked for with insignificant lag, giving Varia well into a couple hundred abilities to almost instantly choose from.
So I caution against that – she should be limited to touching the whole living person and one can just Marvel physics this to mean she can’t unlock without their “aura/spirit” available.
Also, considering that people are shedding hair and skin cells all day long (it comprises a surprising percentage of household dust), if Varia needs just a small sample to unlock her power then I say she’d be bursting into purple spotted flaming wallabee form every time she walks barefoot across a room.
One wonders if Varia can get anything out of dead tissue. Though not dinosaurs because there doesn’t seem to be much, if any in the way of actual tissue left. However there are many others she might sample. However what about DNA scrambling? Can her power sort it out I wonder?
Don’t forget the dust/skin eating mites that are on our skin and everywhere else too. Unless there are limits to her powers…which would be logical.
Looks like she can use the orbs from how the orbs started revolving around them both as the center. That or floating hair.
Indeed. The floating hair is due to jumping up and down, to test if she can fly.
this has probably been said in four pages of chat but in the last set of panels she gets three of Sidney’s orbs and just doesn’t notice it the touch half the orbs to her so I would figure she can use them like halo does just the ones that go to her. ( force field telepresance and an unknown green yellow and dark blue)
That means with the two of them four powers can be used at one time from the seven orbs.
It appears to me more as if the entire path that the orbs transit around Halo’s head has expanded to now orbit around both Varia and Halo (perhaps centered at a point exactly between the two of them). So I think the orbs are recognizing Varia and Halo as ”owner”, while Varia is holding Halo’s hand. *Probably* this means Varia can use at least one orb, herself, while in contact with Halo. *If* the contact can be maintained skin to skin (and not hand in hand) then there’s the potential for the 4 active orb combination. A flying, shielded, yellow orb targeting, ppo wielding, combination of mass destruction. Good times!
The power she gets i believe is obvious. she gains the ability to use Sidney’s orbs see how there floating around her head too now?
No she gets Sydneys supercursing power and iron stomach
Bueller?
Been forever since I watched that show. what was it called… Ferris Buellers day off?
am I making up first names or is that what it s called? lol I do that a lot.
also love Maxima’s line.
Bueller. Yup, does indeed seem to come from that.
Hey, DaveB, the speech bubbles have an error. Right where the black hulk interjects, you have two connectors to the next bubble on accident.
Going back to this after a while, I’m really surprised no one tried a litmus test using a braid of hair from somebody else (okay, assuming her grabbing the hair on a person, instead of their hand or skin, would start up the power).
Yea, it does rather make Varia seem to be not very bright. Maybe she was a late bloomer? Maxima did not get her energy attack at a young age. Perhaps she has not had the powers for long, as a result. And has been too distracted with the fact that she gets new super powers every few hours (or even minutes).
I can see how being able to teleport, create ice sculptures from thin air and control magnetism would all be rather distracting. And she can get new ones every hour of the day, if she chooses!
Fortunately, her other comments do show her to be a thinker. She just seems to have been focussed on other things. Which can happen. Any of us can sometimes miss something obvious. Albeit not necessarily for years. Perhaps she is one of Lois Lane’s relatives?
Clearly she is a new recruit, at Archon, though, and they probably have a whole course of tests scheduled to investigate her unique capabilities. That will just be one on the list, I am sure.
So, she only has the powers while touching? Makes a four handed Amazeballs usage harder…
Possibly, possibly not. We have yet to find out. If there is a ‘only whilst touching’ limitation, how that touching needs to take place can influence the degree of restriction.
Varia is not picking up any superpowers (that she noticed) from Sydney because, at the moment, Sydney only has one superpower: the orbital orbs.
Now if Sydney were to take an orb in her hand…
And I’m going to go with a guess contrary to the apparent general expectation: Xochitl/Varia *cannot* grab the orbs and use them as anything other than hard objects (but they’d make lousy thrown weapons, because they would immediately go back to orbiting, and I expect loud protests if she tries to use one as a hammer).
But whatever orb or orbs Sydney/Halo is holding, if Varia touches her Varia gets some sort of reflection (perhaps via a fun-house mirror) of their powers.
Such a little detail but OMG. OK panel 5 to panel 6. What is different? The ORBS! They go from just around Sydney to both of them! She could grab one and activate it! I am betting that!
I just realized. Certainly, the orbs are spreading around the two of them instead of just Sydney, but as Varia holds Sydney’s hand for a while, she grows increasingly taller and rather more … developed. Poor Sydney. It figures that her superpowers work with everyone BUT her.
Actually, she’s hopping. Trying to see if she can fly/change mass/et cetera.
Hmm. I was going to postulate that maybe it doesn’t work because Halo’s powers aren’t really “her” powers, but Varia said her power works on normal people too. Maybe Sydney is actually special in her own right, and the orbs wouldn’t have worked on just anybody? That’d be exciting!
You need to re-examine this page very carefully. Or cheat and look through the comments. You are missing something significant.
Oh shit! At first I was like “Watchoo talkin’ about Willis?” but then I noticed the orbs start going around both their heads! Holy crap! I can’t wait for them to figure that out!
I hate Boston accents. Also, if she’s Aztec, why is she white?
She is an android, or a star princess or an incarnate demigod. Or she is a white-looking Aztec. Or one of her parents is white.
She’s a little darker skinned than a stock caucasian, but she grew up in Boston, and not anywhere near the equator, so she’s not nearly as dark as she could be.
*Looks again* I’ve seen more color on my own skin and I’m a white ginger who can’t tan.
Watch the orbs
*head goes round, and round, and round*
*falls over*
Don’t worry Varia, *I* appreciated your Frozen reference.