Grrl Power #462 – Seating arrangements
Azilus is being slightly melodramatic. Their presence doesn’t endanger the Council, but their coming and going could. If they constantly broadcast a publicly available GPS signal, then their presence would be problematic. Still, there’s a huge difference between working with clandestine agents, and someone who is the fame equivalent of the AAA actors who play those same agents in the just released summer blockbuster about clandestine agents.
This seems to be the “people peeking in from the bottom of a panel” page. I should have put Trilla, Valen’s faerie companion doing the same in panel 1.
Yes I know I said no robots, but I couldn’t help sneaking a Bastion into the background. Let’s assume it’s a race that can shapeshift who is just messing with people, because if you could shapshift, let’s face it, your raison d’être would probably be “messing with people.”
#MakeComics So I’ve been experimenting with some different coloring over the last few pages, and it may be a bit more prominent on this one – mostly cause I decided to skip the inking and color over my pencils. This did not, as I had hoped, save a ton of time, as I spent a fair bit cleaning up my pencils. Really, when you’re working digitally, cleaning up pencils and inking are basically the same thing. Anyway, I mostly colored this page using grisaille, which is just a fancy term for painting in all the tone work in grayscale, then doing a color wash over top of it. The benefit of this is that I can focus on the light/dark better, and I think it produces better subtle details. The disadvantage is there’s a hard limit to how saturated the colors can be since the color layer is done in Soft Light mode. (Manga Studio doesn’t currently have a Color layer mode, but I experimented with this in PhotoShop, and there seemed to be a similar limitation.) My solution was to duplicate the Soft Light layer and drop its opacity ~50% and merge that with the tone layer. Anyway this was my first attempt and even if I don’t stick with it I think I learned some stuff, and it’s always good to try new things. If nothing else I’ve always thought my skin tones were a bit monochromatic, so expect some slightly rosier noses and cheeks maybe. Hopefully characters won’t suddenly look like they all have colds, but in all fairness I’ll probably over correct a bit before reeling it back to a sensible level.
Oh and if you’ve ever wondered why I’m such a slow artist, it’s because I often have to draw everything twice (at least) before it approaches acceptable.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon as soon as I get up. $1 and up, but feel free to contribute as much as you like :)
Here’s the link to the new comments highlighter for chrome, and the GitHub link which you can use to install on FireFox via Greasemonkey.
SuperheroThey're super, thanks for asking!
Meatspace ComicSeriously these are awesome. Check 'em out!
Not UpdatingNo longer updating or only updates sporadically, but definitely worth reading.
SeriouslySeriously you guys. If you like Grrl Power the check these out.
"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
It IS a good point.
No worries about the pace. If you want a frame of reference, check out goblinscomic.com. It usually takes weeks for him to post a new page. Glacial.
Keep up the good work and thank you for what you do.
https://www.goblinscomic.org/
(wrong link originally)
Yeah, one reason it takes him so long to update Goblins, he had a breakdown because of it within the last year, surprised it’s being continued at all (glad it is though, got quite a bit of catching up to do)
On top of that, he took a break to work on the Goblins Card Game art.
Add in the kickstarter issue as well
We know that DaveB works into the wee-small hours of the morning, and even takes his tablet with him on holiday! I am more concerned with him also having a break-down, if he considers that he is too slow.
My dad will take six months to paint a single picture. As a retired photographer he chooses to make pictures which could not be taken with a camera. For example composting in various aspects of a town, into a single shot. Which residents would swear is true-to-life, but in reality you would have to be in three or four different locations to actually see all the aspects shown.
Yet Dave did that in a single frame, when Halo was flying over the city. On top of the rest of the page!
Dave, you are not slow!
IMHO, the only time one can complain about how long it takes a webcomic to be updated is if one has paid specifically for it to be updated more frequently and the creator doesn’t have a valid reason for failing to update more often.
“comPOSTing in various aspects of a town”?
Dear Yorp, your father must be a gardening supervillain if he levels complete neighborhoods into compost for his plants. (Understandable, an intellect such as yours is likely inherited from a good source!)
You should warn him that ARC-SWAT might come after him! Quick!
Why do you think there is a six month process? Decomposing a scene takes time, if you want it to be true to life.
I hadn’t thought of it that way. Good point.
I bet your father is one of the most relaxed supervillains out there, gardening is a great stress-reliever, so gardening at city-scale must relieve him into an tranquil nirvana!
Maxima: “Drop the Sonic-Enhanced Bio-Decomposer Ray or I’ll be forced to blast you!”
Pa Yorp: “My my, such stress! all in good time my dear, all in good time. Would you like some homegrown tomatoes while you wait? They’re delicious. Tea perhaps?”
:-D
Yeah, T. Hunt’s hiatus from the comic had some very good reasons, but the fact that he does continue with the comic is a good sign that his issues are resolving. I’ve been still checking Goblins at least once every couple of days; updating is still pretty inconsistent, but the quality of his work has lost nothing. His use of dialogue in conjunction with facial expressions is exemplary & I still get those frequent “chills” when reading his work;
“He WILL scream my name. In this way, he will speak to me. But I will not answer him.”
~Big Ears, Goblin Paladin
Damn straight!
“~Big Ears, Goblin Paladin
Damn straight!”
I beg your pardon but you are wrong, we know for a fact that Ears is gay.
How do you know that the “Sacred One” (being held at bay by that axe) isn’t a homophobic that Big Ears is going to smackdown? Please look at the wording of that quote again…
O.o
Uh? Not sure what you mean. “Big Ears… Damn straight”, I was just joking with the word “straight”, you know, Ears is not straight, but I’m not that good with English, maybe I did some error?
How do we know ‘for a fact’ that Big Ears is gay? Noddy has been in hiding for years
Heh, I needed to look up that one :)
You’r back! YAY!
I was going to send out the search parties last night. But I decided that might be a bit premature. Glad you returned, from the wilderness, on your own!
*happy doggy dance*
@Yorp
Heh, thank you :)
But I should not be doing this, I can’t afford it :( Actually I should not even reading the comments, which I tried cold turkey and lasted just a couple pages.
I’m starting to fear I’m hooked :/
Better than Greg Dean.
That update pace is BRISK compared to some, like Outsider. If I like a comic the pace doesn’t bother me unless it doesn’t have a reasonable chance of resolving a story arc in my lifetime.
Then you might not enjoy The Mansion of E much…Just look at how many years it took to get through the first day of comic time! All of that was merely “the day that everything changed,” and so far the second day is mostly the background material on what everything used to be like before it all changed
I may only be 55 years old, but I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll live long enough to see it all resolved.
;)
I am sure you will get to see them making a mosaic, out of shiny pieces of world-rubble.
I just think it’s a bit ironic: The comic’s first day is the day that Everything Changed, but we don’t start to learn what anything was until Day 2…
But we have yet to find what was,** or what was.*** Maybe that is for days 3 and 4?
* Past participle present altered timeline.
** Past participle previous unaltered timeline.
*** Past participle potential future altered timeline.
And then there’s Spindrift, updating fifteen times in the last twenty-four months, going from once a month-ish to once every couple of months. Not quite as bad as Outsider, as Iarei mentioned. I thought that both of those were on permanent hiatuses for a while until I decided to check up on them again, not so recently.
yeah its a good point, but its one that was addressed by the fact they approached here in secret through fast travel in roundabout ways they couldnt be followed after separating so they wouldnt be such visible targets.
That looks awful like a robot in the background, animated statues maybe? Or is it part of a fancy chair or something?
Omnic seige automaton.
Its totally not Bastion >.>
Maybe not the Bastion but certainly a bastion.
Well, it’s obviously not -the- Bastion, I don’t see Ganymede anywhere.
Dave already explained, it’s a shapeshifter who’s just fucking with you.
Or… maybe it is Bastion fucking with you by pretending to be a shapeshifter fucking with you
I think that it is likely.
Well, it could still be argued that it’s not a robot there, but a cybernetic organism (incorporating living biological tissues). Just as a Terminator (800 series) is “cyber”netic only due to having living tissue surrounding the exterior (ie: if stripped of all tissues, it still functions as an actual robot), perhaps this guy’s organics are all contained internally.
Just because he’s an ass doesn’t mean he cannot raise good points.
Also, now I see why he needs his fledglings here; he cannot look in a mirror to correct himself!
Good point. Err, that is not to imply that you are an ass. Not that there is anything wrong with asses. There are some very fine asses out there.
Thank you!
::takes a bow, does a little tap dance with his hooves and doffs his Fancy Hat::
Sitting down would be awkward without them.
It’s also difficult to achieve an upright bipedal posture without them too…
Even though he does make a valid point, I think he’s just using that as an excuse for wanting to act like a dick anyway.
;)
“What are Minons for?”
well you could send them out for bananas
https://minions2015.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Best-funny-minions-banana.jpg
Or, more likely, they could drive you bananas.
Panel #2, lower right: Indiana Jones?
I do believe it is
i think it’s actually supposed to imply a species based on the “invisible man” from the old monster movies.
If that was it there wouldn’t be a whip under the hat. And if it wasn’t then it could be the invisible man, ‘The Spector’ (pre-comic), various old clandestine spy organizations….
So…. If the council is not supposed to have humans, and Indy was on the council, then it means that Indy is not human. No wonder he met up with aliens in his last movie.
The banner is actually a reference to Gold Digger and their super archaeologists. Yet more humans for Azilus to moan about.
I’m still trying to decide if the green banner next to it is a crescent moon and star combo, a cyclops happy face, or a back-lit Deathstar about to fire.
It’s about time that they got to the point of this whole shindig. BTW nice touch sticking Bastion in the background. ;)
That guy is gonna get wrinkles from all that scowling
No, Azi is being an ass, not a dick
When the body was first created, all the parts wanted to be Boss. The brain said, “I should be Boss because I control all of the body’s responses and functions.”
The feet said, “We should be Boss since we carry the brain about and get him to where he wants to go.”
The hands said, “We should be the Boss because we do all the work and earn all the money.”
Finally, the asshole spoke up. All the parts laughed at the idea of the asshole being the Boss. So, the asshole went on strike, blocked itself up and refused to work.
Within a short time, the eyes became crossed, the hands clenched, the feet twitched, the heart and lungs began to panic, and the brain fevered. Eventually, they all decided that the asshole should be the Boss, so the motion was passed. All the other parts did all the work while the Boss just sat and passed out the shit!
Moral Of The Story: You don’t need a brain to be a Boss—-any asshole will do.
I’m reminded of the Dicks, Pussies, and Assholes speech in Team America: World Police.
It takes a real asshole to make Superman turn into a dick:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cl_5UwS57X8
Darkseid qualifies…
“The Council has… usually had good relations with the US government.”
= veiled hint about why excluding them might be a bad idea?
“veiled hint” …? I see what you did there ;)
Believe it or not, that was accidental!
Ahh, the NSFW wardrobe slip.
The lesser known “Dance of the Single Veil”?
Nah, it’s far well known, you do need to go through the other six ones to get to it, though.
Maxima’s nuke demonstration was not just for super-villains and megalomaniacs, it seems. And the point seems to have hit home, to Azilus, in the final panel. In one form or another (or maybe both).
Of course if things go really bad, it would explain why Maxima considered having Halo here to be handy. She has already field-tested her nuke in conjunction with Halo’s shield. And there would be squishies to protect here.
Not that I think this is Maxima’s primary line of thought. But I think she has her bases covered, just in case.
Then again, it occurs to me that Maxima only claims to be the strongest SUPER. She might have nothing on, say, a millenia-old Vampire Lord. And if her powers come from accidentally ingesting alien nanotech like we suspect, it’s entirely possible that there’s other alien races advanced enough to have personal systems strong enough to easily neutralize her.
Hell, the orbs might already be such a personal system that could crush Maxima, if only Sydney had the instruction manual.
Maxima could probably annihilate everyone in the room with a single blast from her finger, so staying in the good books of the human world is most likely in the best interests of this council.
The only other character in the room that we definitely know would survive is Halo and that’s only if her shield is active.
And doing that would drop the Veil and all out war would start, with the extinction of the Human vermin race
There are presumably some very powerful people in that room.
Maxima isn’t god. She couldn’t even beat Dabbler 1 on 1.
I think you could be onto something…
“Plans within plans”: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1178
So… y’all still think The Council is a well-intentioned collective that /isn’t/ mostly directed by vampires? Because this doesn’t seem very reasonable, and is looking to start a ruckus.
Ingsol I like. He was being calm, reasonable, and was trying to move from old business to new business. (Kinda reminds me of the Union president when I worked for the government.) But then this jerk cut him off, and looks to be motivated to start more than just a little riot. He attempting to rally everyone against Archon! o_O
actually he has a valid concern, the members of Arc-swat who participated in the “barfight” V had started(i can’t recall his villain name off the top of my head, the Violence powered guy) are now basically known around the globe, if anyone had tailed them it would be like putting up a neon sign outside saying “No Secret Meetings here, Move along” sending in members from one of the other Branches would’ve been the better choice. (Arc-Dark for example)
Vehemence. That was his name, and he’s one of the coolest villains I’ve ever seen.
Azi’s concern is valid, but he is presenting it in a barbaric, aggressive way. He’s being hostile towards Ingsol and Archon, and is trying to rouse up the entire room against Archon. I suspect a fight might break out.
Yeah, Vehemence is so cool, he’s chillin’
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1881
I’m sure they typically *do* send Arc-swat (it has not been shown/implied Maxima has mental protections by herself), but I assume the reason is part find out more about Halo’s orbs, and part some oath swearing for Halo about not talking about this information (since it’s above her own paygrade, but her truesight outs them).
I’m personally hoping for a mini-brawl that gets cut short via Maxima’s speed + Halo’s Shield & Molestorbs
His name is Kevin.
I know him! I thought he sounded familiar.
i’m also gonna go out on a limb and say that Azilus is ALSO trying to get the Veil itself abolished so that us “puny humans” can be subjugated “properly” by the “Master Race” (that being Vampires, of course) and no more sneaking around in the shadows anymore… I’ll bet that he’s also been a rebellious Vamp that has always been a pain in the neck (no pun intended) to the older n’ wiser Vamps that know the value of cooperation with humans, and that he’s is always getting in trouble for “almost” going too far and revealing their existance in ways that the Veil can’t quite cover up… always “by accident” of course…
Actually, Scantrontb, The Veil would be far more advantageous for vampires. If he were actually trying to take over The Council, well…
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/comics/2016-09-08-GP0456.jpg
Panel 8 says it all. Cryptids pose a far greater threat to cryptids than humans do, because humans are unable to properly perceive them. Since they can’t properly perceive them, they’re unable to properly defend themselves.
No, it’s in Azi’s best interest to maintain The Veil, but allowing humans (supers) into Council meetings sets a precedent to allow more humans (particularly humans that are members of the US government) to possibly have influence in said meetings. They don’t have vote… yet, but can influence other members to vote for them by proxy. If this happens, there may yet be a push to do away with The Veil, as Ingsol has alluded to a “reweal.”
TL;DR Azi is a conservative, and wants to build a wall to keep humans out of Council meetings.
That’s generally my reading as well. He’s comfortable with the current situation, and isn’t eager to change the way the world works. The implication we seem to be working towards here is that Ingsol is anticipating a world where human society has changed so fundamentally that the Veil is no longer necessary; if humanity can handle coexistence with the weird and inhuman without feeling a need to purge it, then cryptids can ‘step into the light’.
It takes a person of vision to see the potential for such a world, though, and Azi isn’t one. He’s got a point, yes, but his concept of what the council is and should be is stagnant, and will probably ultimately lead to destruction from within.
Yes, but will he make humans PAY for it? ;)
“No, it’s in Azi’s best interest to maintain The Veil, but allowing humans (supers) into Council meetings sets a precedent to allow more humans (particularly humans that are members of the US government) to possibly have influence in said meetings.”
that being said, it must also be said that most species of cyptids have to be capable of interacting/cooperating with humans, even if only under clandenstine methods. It’s been proven in the past that humans greatly outnumber cryptids & that any attempt to assert an overall dominance over humans is just asking for extinction; take note of the “Inquisitions” conducted against cyptids in the past that have tried to dominate the human race.
Like it or not, the cryptids must maintain some level of cooperation, even if humans are their “prey species.”
“It’s been proven in the past that humans greatly outnumber cryptids & that any attempt to assert an overall dominance over humans is just asking for extinction”
Citation please. Not about the ratio of humans to cryptids, but rather the extinction part. Because I don’t see that happening, especially since the US government is allied with The Council. The only way there’d be a genocidal war is if there were a civil war in the US, which isn’t practical at all given the military’s resources.
It’d have to be some kind of insurgency, with guerrilla tactics and terrorist threats, but that’s impractical as well, and wouldn’t do any good in a world where magical obfuscation (like The Veil) can prevent your enemy from even perceiving you.
But I digress.
“it must also be said that most species of cyptids have to be capable of interacting/cooperating with humans, even if only under clandenstine methods…”
Clandestine interaction is not, by definition, cooperation.
“take note of the “Inquisitions” conducted against cyptids in the past that have tried to dominate the human race.”
Are you talking about panel 8? https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/comics/2016-09-08-GP0456.jpg
That’s cryptid on cryptid violence. From Ingsol’s testimony not a single individual in that panel is human.
“Like it or not, the cryptids must maintain some level of cooperation, even if humans are their “prey species.””
That’s not cooperation. That’s subjugation and systematic oppression of billions of people.
Just check out the top entry in the list of genocides, by death toll. Beating even the Nazi-caused Holocaust.
Hardly. Neither by definition nor in practice. Governments regularly co-operate in a clandestine manners, both with each other and with non-government groups. For instance the Allies supporting partisans in WWII had to be done in a clandestine manner, in order to prevent them from being killed, if it were done openly.
“Just check out the top entry in the list of genocides, by death toll. Beating even the Nazi-caused Holocaust.”
I’m not taking sides on this debate but for the sake of accuracy I think is worth to notice that the entry “Native American Genocide” (first place with an estimated minimum of 12 million deaths) was added less that two days ago and do not mention sources. A very quick search did not give me reliable sites baking that figure, and most of them include deaths due diseases.
I must admit I was just looking for the entry, rather than its position.* Well done for spotting that, and thank you for pointing it out.
Therefore please ignore my snarky comparison to the Nazis. Plus allow me to instead point to ‘the USA entry’, wherever it should correctly appear in the list.
* I imagine the figure is intended to encapsulate all of the deaths in the Americas, caused by Europeans in general, including, as you say by disease. As various of the cities had populations in the millions, when European cities were only in the 100,000s, the total might be credible, hence me not giving it a second thought. But it would be grossly unfair to attribute all those to the USA!
However they certainly did do their share, and a lot of it was wholly intentional. So the basic point stands.
“I imagine the figure is intended to encapsulate all of the deaths in the Americas, caused by Europeans in general,”
Sadly no, that one is believed to be around 80 millions or even more :( The 12 million figure do is possible to be the deaths among natives in the nowadays North America alone. Anyway I just wanted to warn about its “unofficial” nature, at least from Wikipedia’s point of view. Also the concept of “genocide” do include causes like imported diseases, but since people usually take it as “murdering”, which the topic in the thread could reinforce, I wanted to make that distinction clear as well.
Also, my response is that genocide isn’t extinction. Furthermore, I will reference Panel 8. The only genocide against cryptids that we’ve seen in this story is by other cryptids. Humans, on the other hand, have been systematically oppressed by The Veil.
Ugh… I absolutely detest using buzzwords like “systematically oppressed.” I feel like throwing up in my mouth.
Is it still genocide when it’s not targeting a genome or genus (or, y’know, people perceived to be of a single genetic legacy), but is instead focused on suppressing a specific behavior? I’d think that’d make it simple mass murder… or, in the case of deaths being carried out by the lawful government of that individual, capital punishment.
Unless, of course, what we’re seeing in Panel 8 isn’t portraying Council activity at all, but rather one of the Cryptid Wars waged before the Council’s formation. That’s not in line with Ingsol’s caption, though.
For once, I have to agree with A Gray Phantom. The official definition of genocide has nothing to do with extermination.
Genocide: the deliberate killing of a large group of people, especially those of a particular ethnic group or nation.
Note that even though it says “especially those of a particular ethnic group or nation”, it does not have to be. Take 5,000 people from every country in the world. Killl them all. It’s technically genocide, even though you’re not targeting one specific ethnic group or nation.
By the gods, that’s the most horrific link I’ve ever clicked, and I’ve been on the original Steak & Cheese.
Azilus also appears to be the one who comments on how “We’ve done more than police our own.” He’s probably the type who likes the advantages provided by the veil, but not the restrictions enforced by the council.
Sure, lower profile supers would definitely be a better choice for a veiled council, I agree with that. It’s not a good idea to angrily kick out and/or threaten anyone of Maxima’s strength level. Halo still needed to be introduced to the Council because of her “ability to pierce the Veil” provided by the comball. There are some things she might need to be present for due to the introduction, so no kicking her out yet.
Agreed. Azi is dangerous, but I doubt he’s stupid enough to attack Archon right there. Maxima would kill him, then stick his head on a pike, then give some kind of impassioned speech about how she’ll murder anyone who tries to get out of line again, then give the floor back to Ingsol.
No, if Azi were to try something, it’d have to be when Archon least suspects it, and while Maxima is too preoccupied to do anything about it.
You may be right, or DaveB might just be setting this Azilus guy to be a baddie down the road. Even now I can believe that the Council as a whole is looking for peaceful coexistence. We shouldn’t dismiss the who group just because this one guy and his friends decided to be rude. Let’s wait and see if the Council goes along with Azilus, or if the vast majority of the delegates tell his faction to kiss their asses.
Is the Council directed by the vampires? I dunno, but they certainly seem to be the noisiest group so far.
whole group, not who group . . .
“whole group, not who group . . .”
It’s cool, bruh. I understood what you meant. Everyone makes typos ;-)
“Even now I can believe that the Council as a whole is looking for peaceful coexistence.”
Ahem… https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/comics/2016-09-08-GP0456.jpg
Yeah, panel 8 looks REALLY peaceful ^_^;
“Is the Council directed by the vampires? I dunno, but they certainly seem to be the noisiest group so far.”
Ah! Finally! We can both agree on something. Vampires have the most to benefit from The Veil. Anonymous sex tourism be damned, vampires need to eat, and The Veil allows vampires to do just that without getting caught. So of course they have the most at stake (pun intended) and would be the most vocal about Council proceedings.
It had to happen sooner or later! 😊
The thing is… those bodies you keep pointing at in proof of the council’s hostile nature are the bodies of PEACEBREAKERS. Remember, the Council’s core function, before all else, before the veil, before concerns about general humanity, is to keep the various kinds of cryptids from factionalizing and going at each other’s throats again. In a very literal sense, peace is the core of their purpose. What’s more, it’s heavily implied that the retribution we see portrayed against those peacebreakers is proportional, at least in the view of the Council’s membership, which really says something about what actual Cryptid WARS look like (or looked like back in the day).
Of course, this just raises eyebrows at the scale of the matter, when the Council was able to sell the various Cryptid nations on the idea of forming a unified government through the threat of humanity, and further arguing that the most effective path would be concealment rather than preemptive war. Perhaps it’s because even then humanity had the numbers to power through their individual potency on the battlefield, or perhaps it’s because a number of council species are dependent upon humanity as either a food source, a component of their reproductive cycle, or both… but the Council had the opportunity to take on humanity when our numbers were relatively few, and our most advanced piece of technology was castle forged steel. They decided it was a fight that they didn’t want to have, EVER.
Given Azi’s conservative bent, humanity’s technological advancement, and overpopulation… He and his faction are probably more attached to the Veil than I am my left arm. Ingsol’s implied position of ‘all things change, and we must change with them’ probably sounds INSANE to him.
100% agreed with everything above.
Yes, everyone slaughtered en masse in panel 8 are likely vampires that attempted a more aggressive, open takeover than what The Council is now, which is a shadow government.
(This is partially speculative, as we don’t know any of the reasons why all those bodies are piked. BUT! The Council /is/ a shadow government.)
This makes me wonder… why is Azi still alive?
Let’s make assumptions based on the speculation that can be gathered from Panel 8. (I’m just going to keep referring to it as Panel 8.) Let’s assume Azi was alive at that time. If he was in favor of an aggressive takeover, then he should have been executed same as all those other poor sods. From this we can conclude that Azi wasn’t in favor, and maybe even fought against the “Peacebreakers” in Panel 8.
I bet he was a skilled soldier, but not likely a general. No, he’s too ill tempered for that. (Also, Dave has confirmed he doesn’t hold much authority due to his “lack of diplomacy.”)
So this means he has helped maintain The Veil, and has fought to protect it. He’s probably lost close friends in fights to keep the Peacebreakers from taking over.
So, yeah, when you look at it that way, Azi has a very reasonable gripe to even suggest making changes to The Council or The Veil. (All speculation.)
But…
Here’s the deal. It’s not The Council that’s changing, it’s the world around The Council. Human beings are advancing, and multiplying, and evolving. The Council, and The Veil, cannot be supported the same way it has indefinitely… not without continuing very aggressive subjugation and oppression of all mankind. The only way that would be possible is to not allow Archon any representation, nor any entrance, into Council proceedings.
This must be extremely frustrating for an old vampire, seeing his food become aware, and potentially learn that they are food, and have been lied to and oppressed for many, many years. It threatens everything he’s fought to build, and, due to his lack of authority within The Council, makes him feel impotent to do anything about it.
Not bad speculation.
*offers a Yorpie Snax™*
It… smells like dog food ಠ_ಠ
That would be because Yorp is a dog, and it is his food.
It’s rude to turn him down now that he’s offered to share his food.
*just wag politely and go bury it in the yard*
It may be dog food, in the sense it is Yorp’s preferred snack, but it is designed to be eaten by hyu-mons as well
I don’t know… in most group dynamics that I’ve seen, the noisiest are usually the ones that don’t have significant power, so they try to attain it through volume and passion. Ingsol may be the Chair at this meeting; and vampires certainly have a larger vested interest than some others, but that doesn’t mean his faction holds significant power beyond that.
Azilus is an older vampire but he’s not the vamp spokesman due to his general lack of diplomacy.
That confirms my suspicions, which makes him even more dangerous. This means he’s been denied authority positions by The Council, and is resentful about this.
Spite is the most motivating emotion anyone can feel. This makes Azi very motivated to cause dissonance in The Council.
I’m sure the immortal races have a significant influence in the council, purely through experience, and time to build up relations.
Wait, is Assdick jealous that the GEoD (and Sydney) are allowed to sit at the Big Boys Table while he is stuck in the Peanut Gallery (again)?
I’m willing to bet, and this is speculation, that he’s an old vampire who doesn’t like change. He doesn’t want any humans knowing about vampires, and would rather have his favorite meal being harvested from a farm ala Daybreakers.
But that’s my speculation. Here’s an observation: he spoke out of turn, is being very rude, and is trying to rally The Council (or rather the room) against Archon.
Yeah, that as well: by being stuck in the Peanut Gallery, all he can do is shout dissent rather than force it from the Round Table
He may be a competitor for Ingsol’s position as a representative for the vampires on the Council.
There is some irony in Azilus’ objection – vampires, of all the races represented on the council, are far MORE human than the others – being ‘ex-humans’, and having to live amongst them in order to feed. I’d find it more reasonable to hear a xenophobic stance from, say, a fey, or a golem. It suggests to me that Azilus’ objection is more self-serving, than idealistic.
Uhm, no, the “in order to feed” bit is one of the reasons he wants to keep potential Veil breakers away from the council. Certain books aside, vampires will still have something a PR issue to deal with if they’re ever unveiled. When is the last time you heard of a Golem Hunter or a Fey Hunter?
Precisely. Golems and Fae don’t feed on humans, thus they wouldn’t mind so much. And because they don’t feed on humans, there isn’t much lore talking about people with specialized skills to hunt them.
I’d like to retract my earlier speculation about Azi being the sort that’d want a Daybreakers style domination. Nah, he’s the conservative type. He wants things to continue staying the same, and that means not letting any humans, even if they’re classified as “supers,” to have any seat in Council proceedings.
Most fae don’t. There are fae in lore that did. Black Annis, for example, was a faerie hag that ate human children. The redcap doesn’t eat humans, but he does decapitate them and dyes his cap with their blood… and in some legends, drinks their blood. The Glaistig is a water fae, part woman and part goat. She would lure men to dance with her before she fed, vampire-like, on their blood. Kelpies (aka the “water horse”) would take the form of a handsome man or beautiful woman to lure you close to the water, where they would drown and then eat you.
And, of course, there’s all the fae who would murder your children for petty grievances, steal and enchant brides, steal mothers to serve as nursemaids, steal babies and replace them with changelings, etc. The point I’m making here is, in legend (not necessarily in DaveB’s world, obviously), not all fae are nice. Most are capricious at best, downright murderous at worst. (Though there are some helpful ones, and others that are helpful as long as you show them respect.)
Of course, so far, we’ve only met Valen and the fae who used her wings to fan Halo when she fainted, and they seem fairly reasonable (as far as we know). But it could still turn out to be a mistake to assume that the vampires are the only race on the Council that still preys on human flesh and/or blood.
Note that I’m not saying you’re wrong. In DaveB‘s world, you could be absolutely right (and I’m 99.9% sure you’re right about Azi). I’m just reminding people of the risks of making assumptions and jumping to conclusions.
Yep, the Fey can cause a lot of havoc just because they DON’T see things like we do. They might actually be trying to help when they kill all your cattle (Because they were sick and you didn’t know it perhaps?). Don’t get me started on the Banshee, she stubbed her toe, some idiot of the O’Brien clan dies of a heart attack, and she got blamed for it.
8-P
I can see Sidney just piping in like, “I can see through the veil. We’re here so I don’t freak out and hug werewolves and vampires in public drawing attention to your people.” sms just having everyone get quiet and confused.
And that would just paint a giant neon flashing light on her back for those who want The Veil’s existence to remain unknown
Aye. Especially because her True Sight is supposed to be kept secret — apparently even from most of the other Archon members.
Ingsol spoke about it with Sydney out loud though.
As head of the vampire faction he’s probably privy to more classified info then others.
Nah ha. I just looked back to make sure. Veil yes, orbs no. Unless I missed it first time round and in my double-check.
Mind you this is a good occasion for me to congratulate Sydney on her willpower. Managing to resist touching any of the orbs, for all the time she has been in here, is a herculean feat! But a very wise one. Until she gets the nod from Maxima that it is OK, that is.
Using truesight, in a society which has both medusae and invisibility, can result in a stony reception.
She will just mention in a few comics, why is there someone standing behind X seat member, about to drive a dark sword on it’s head, while being hidden, while holding a little yellow ball in her hand.
I’ve gotta give RobK credit on this one. Ingsol knows *about* Sydney’s truesight ability, even if exactly how she does it wasn’t explained during the meeting.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/2250
My point still stands that most folks at *Archon* are in the dark on this matter, however ;)
Blimey, I stand corrected. I guess I should have eaten those nasturtiums, rather than casting them at RobK!
But, nasturtiums are so tasty
::nods vigorously in agreement with guesticus while munching on a bouquet of thistles::
I’m really liking the rise in suspense and excitement here. Whether it turns into a fight or just stays as heated negotiations, I’m on the edge of my seat. Also, I’m definitely liking the second sketch more.
+1
In fact, here, have a +1 suit of bonfire invulnerability!
Yaaay! *polishes teh suit*
How do you polish a suit? o_O
Suits made to prevent fire tend to be smooth rather than made out of flammable fabric. Thereby making polishing (with a non-flammable product) a good way of both caring for it and making it look good.
Like Maxima, above.
Ask any number of “Knights in Shining Armour”
If Crimson got put into the Who’s Who for being a fusspot, shouldn’t Scarlet have, too? Or did she get excluded because we can only see the back of her head! ☺
Agreed – Scarlett should definitely be in the Who’s Who, if Crimson is.
Sometimes the number of speaking parts forces Dave to cut some, in order to prevent the Who’s Who from being too big and potentially causing problems on some devices/ set-ups. Although I think six is probably OK.
More than OK, we have had up to nine: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/846
Azilus will try to convince the rest of the council that Sydney must give up her orbs and to Ingsol banished from the council along with his sirelings!!!!
Do you suppose Azilus would be happier if they teleconferenced? I’m sure nobody could bug the line or break the encryption! I know for a fact that Deus wouldn’t do anything like that!
*Sarcasm mode canceled*
Say, The Mighty Halo does have a telepresence ability thanks to her orbs. Maybe she could act as a go-between! Sydney stays in Archon HQ and just sends her holographic self to the Council meeting, telling Maxima what’s going on and relaying messages back and forth. So far as we know, nobody has the power to tap into that! This might actually be a good idea . . . if Sydney weren’t so excitable, easily distractable, and just plain adorkable.
Harem would probably be a more reliable choice, if slightly less subtle.
Triple-agent Harem? The one who tells Deus all Archon’s secrets? That Harem?
But, yea, powers wise she would qualify.
Do note how irritated Maxima gets with Harem for teleporting into closed-door-meetings though. Potentially with supernatural beings. I suspect that Harem’s clearance is way lower than Halo’s!
As far as Archon knows, That Harem yes.
Deus seems to think she is a triple agent. If he is right, then they are in the loop.
Still standing by the supposition that Harem is not the double agent, she is working to find out who it really is (and the true identity will come as a much as a shock as it did to the Rock in “Fast and Furious 6”)
Better option would be Harem, as long as her other three selves are properly accounted for (one at the Council Meeting and one relaying the information to Archon)
but, one problem with that, is no matter how fast her relay is, she can’t report everything
Unfortunately, Harem also likes to tell tales that she shouldn’t . . .
Yeah, that as well (was actually just thinking of her relaying the information in ‘real time’, forgot about her passing on that information later)
X, Dabbler, and Gwen all have abilities that allow them to be more subtle than Maxima or Sydney can, by Maxima’s own admission. Add in the fact that Dabbler already knows of this place, and having Sydney come in more than once is pointless and risky. The first time made sense, but only because this might make her less likely to make a scene when she sees someone like Chorius walking around at the grocery.
Got to say it. Love the way your art evolved maxima had true golden shine. Also the suprise in the background is fun.
Feedback: DaveB, the new art style may not be much of a time-saver, but I think it’s a worthwhile adjustment; if for no other reason than it makes Maxima look MUCH better
Yeah, just the two sketches shows how much improvement there is; the second sketch really makes it look like he’s being a dick, rather than the first sketch simply voicing a reasonable concern.
Love the sheen that Maxima has on this page. Looks great!
Yes. She looks like she is skinned with glass-like gold instead of just being golden colored. Looks a lot cooler.
Sorry, but their presence will eventually make it easier for supernaturals to do away with the veil, once supers are fully accepted by the human populace it’ll make things much easier for supernaturals if they want to reveal themselves.
Who is in panel 5 lower left?
More likely simply someone we haven’t met yet
Granny Weatherwax? ;)
Impossible, a witch isn’t a witch without her hat!
Yeah, a witch without her hat is a no-body
She is at what we guessed is the Witch banner, though.
She’s what happens to Mahou Shoujo when the turn 30. ;)
The individual is showing a green and purple color scheme. This combo was used by Lexx Luthor, Green Goblin, the Riddler, the Hulk, Barney the dinosaur, or Spike the dragon from MLP. So take your pick.
All of which are male. Yet the individual (from the only hint we have of the hair being in a bun) may well be female.
You needs to find us another choice.
Madam Mim?
Purple hair only. Given my problem with names, at first I wondered if you might be linking to Mamma Gkika. But she is green hair only.
I suspect that this is not an homage, but an original character. Who will show up again someday. In a spooky forest!
Although Mamma Gkika does have “de fun color change-y hepidermoose”, so at least skin tone would not have been a problem.
Apparently a bit part, so far.
Soooo…
teleconference?
Or just send ARCdark (or whatever they’re called) to meet and share info cause they aren’t all that public – at all?
Wonder how far Sydney can send her illusionary self?
Strident feminist that she is, how high do you think Maxima’s hackles are right now over seeing those two women fawning over Ingsol?
Maxima: Oooh! If I didn’t have to play the diplomat with these people . . .
Their fussing over him isn’t necessarily sexist, though. As DaveB points out, they are minions and that’s one of their roles regardless of the respective sexes of the higher and lower vampires.
Kevin! Dave! Stuart! Get over here! And put down those bananas!
Yeah, even public figures & celebrities hire “Image Consultants,” ya’ know.
He’s kind of like… their dad?
…
‘Sired’ just means that he turned them from being humans into being vampires. If he had any children, before becoming a vampire himself, one or both might be decedents. But there again so would half of Europe, after seven hundred years of breeding.
I don’t expect that Observer meant they were literally his daughters, just that they were fussing over and caring for him as if he was their dad. It’s a good point, as is the one Deof Movestofca made!
Oh noes, you have already said the restricted word. So I will just have to apologise to ‘the one who must not be named’!
Looks like the edumacation Dave gave his Spamguard whatsit is still holdin’…
Do you mean this guy, this guy, or Obs-
*Startled gasp as a hand is clamped over my mouth*
I don’t know who that is?
Which one? Since I can’t say their names, we’ll have to do it this way:
The first guy was this guy!
The second guy was this guy!
The third guy was of course that guy who’s name you won’t let me use.
Now I know. The second guy is not as hard to avoid as this though.
I was aware of what it meant. It was actually a part of what I wanted to convey.
In a Vampire culture who you are Sired by is probably way more important than kids you had before you were really you, as vamps see things. Sirelings are made by your bloodline, have traits/powerlevels “inherited” from you and a supernatural bond of somesort I gather beyond all that? These sirelings are probably what you would see as “blood” familia if you were the type of vamp to care about such things. Ingsol and his sirelings strike me as the sort to see it that way.
Given how very young they are compared to him and the huge difference in power despite being given a third of his at “birth”, cause he’s just that old, why wouldn’t they see him as their father? In vamp land that is exactly what he is. (and Mama too but we shan’t go there today)
You can’t choose your family, but you can choose your three ‘maidens’.
Trouble is, calling them ‘daughters’ would go counter to a lot of vampiric lore. Dracula went with ‘brides’, but Ingsol does not want to be associated with him.
Let me see, red, more red and should I go purple or pink next?
And that may be a thing that happens in some vampire lineages as “family bonding” but I’m just not getting that vibe from Ingsol and crew.
Also it seems like most of these stories I read the first thing the vampires do is tell you all about how Dracula movies are wrong. I mean that’s pretty much the first thing the werewolf leader did – tell us how the moon thing was bogus.
But mostly its my reaction to what DaveB is showing us here. They just LOOK AND SOUND like daughters fussing over the old man and telling how uncool his look/style is. (not exactly but that’s kinda how it comes off)
Yea. :-)
He made them what they are today!
Where did Ingsol’s Starfox ‘do come from in the last panel?
Isn’t that somebody behind Azilus and thus in the peanut gallery rather than at the table? Thus, not Ingsol.
Yup, it’s one of the other vamps we saw in a previous page dealing with the Peanuts in their Gallery
Wait, now that I see this page and the one you refer together… https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1189 (central panel) Mmmm…
I think Guesticus is referring to the 7th panel on https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/2253
The silhouetted couple you refer to look more like the two on the last panel of this page: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1395 (Opal and Vekter), but not enough to be certain.
I know, that page is what I meant with “the one you refer”. I also knew about Opal and Vekter and the theory of them being those one, but I think this new pair fit even better.
I agree the similarities are remarkable:
• Gallery background*
• Blonde hair almost an exact match (unlike Opal’s).
• Silhouette hair stylistically similar to the male vampire’s (again closer than Veker’s)
• The pointy teeth certainly speak more of a vampire** than Vekter’s clearly human teeth.
Pivotally Opal and Vector were pawns, not masterminds. Plus we already have Vehemence, in the movers and shakers page. So I think we can discount them. But I would say all the other matches point to us having a significant pair quietly biding their time.
* Dave will not have created the layout of this chamber yet, but may have envisaged this as the introduction point for that pair. So that could be the initial visualisation of this scene. And Dave does tweak that page (at the end of arcs) to match up, if there are inconsistencies. As with the Vehemence panel.
However we have not seen the entire complex, which does extend above ground. So part of the gallery may lead to an outdoors balcony like that. Or even just a better illuminated chamber than this one.
** Ingsol stated that there is a lot of variability amongst vampires. Not all therefore need to have the classical two pointy teeth that he and Azilus have. Notably that vampire’s mouth is not visible when he speaks, so it may be he has a mouthful of fangs.
Oops, I apologise, I misunderstood your meaning.
Thanks for clarifying!
Good spottage: had vaguely recognized her hair style in this page, but wasn’t sure where had seen it prior
Problem is, The Council already knew of Maxi… unless, those two were talking about Sydney with her shield of Shielding
Indeed, somehow they aspect didn’t click on the other page but it did now :) I always took it as they were refering to Syd, and now it fit perfect here.
I’m surprised. It seems we have a faction of the Vampires plotting to use Archon or some of their members for their own secret agenda. I would have expected the commenters believing on Supernatural’s nefarious intentions to feast on this :)
Probably, but I thought maybe Azilus had moved. But now that you mentioned it, he wouldn’t appear in front of Ingsol wherever he moved and Ingsol wasn’t seated next to a blond, braided woman.
Different hairstyle too. Although I must admit, I had to work my way through the clues initially myself, in order to ensure that it was not Ingsol speaking.
Yes, I already realized they had different hairstyle, which is why I made my “Starfox ‘do” reference. The confusion arises because practically every other physical indicator that appears, such as light eyes, light skin (although Ingsol’s is a bit chalkier), and high arched hairline, either matches Ingsol’s or can be explained by change in lighting. Furthermore, the statement sounds like what Ingsol might say if he reflected upon what Azzy said.
So, because someone said in the last page’s comments that it looked like another orb was growing out of an alien’s head, I thought of this. It’s dark, though.
N(note)1: What if it really is an alien head-orb, kinda like how the Jumi (Legend of Mana, Playstation) had jeweled hearts in the shape of orbs that people killed them for because they were magical and were good for enchanting?
N2: Continuing with N1, what if the skill tree is just… I don’t know, they just create that shape because the individuals that… technically WERE those orbs, knew each other or were related or something?
N3: Then what if the level-up abilities and whether or not abilities could be used (comm, PPO, etc) were powers that those individuals had, and the level up options were just parts of their own personal potential? That would also explain the two orbs that don’t do anything- the others tried and failed to protect the ones who couldn’t protect themselves. Also maybe those aliens dissolve in saltwater, or someone else’s powers eradicated them but left their orbs.
N4: This message brought to you by (I remember every detail of every piece of media I consume and combines it constantly) a combination of The Legend of Mana (synchronize powers, Jumi) and Tales of Vesperia (how blastia are created).
Interestingly thought through. If true, Irradon showed remarkable restraint in responding in a friendly and relaxed way and yet not reacting to them, in any way. At the very least, he would probably recognise the orbs, the same way that we do if we see a human skull.
I would be freaked out, if I saw seven glowing dog skulls, orbiting some alien’s head!
Considering what the orbs allow, it could be possible that, culturally, they’re fine with them being used that way. There were human cultures that commonly ‘harvested’ the skulls of loved ones when they passed, and used ceramics and paints to do them up like the living faces of those loved ones- they then just sat these decorated skulls around the house. Probably talked to them as though they contained the spirits of the dead whose skulls they were.
It could be that, using one’s Orb for the good of others is a laudable thing in that culture.
*nods*
*sniff sniff*
I… got commendation from you with another thought I said, but no stars. Ah well, the three you gave me the first time will have to get me through this.
I have confidence that you will need more than that, in future.
*passes over a few spares, to keep you going*
Daaaang, that new colouring technique really paid dividends on Maxima, though. Her face looks incredible!
Yes, it really looks much more like metallic gold now. Quite an improvement.
Definitely. Valen, Ingsol, and Azilus are so pale it’s less evident (although Azilus has interesting features in his closeup). But Maxima’s astounding.
Technically, a superhuman is still human. Even though some humans have enhanced abilities like Bruce Lee’s superb martial skills, Simo Häyhä’s deadly sniping capabilities that numbered 505 confirmed kills or the Genius intellectuals such as Leonardo Da Vinci, Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking or even the Tsutomu Yamaguchi, a man who survived being nuked TWICE on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and got to live past the age of 90.
Wait, didn’t Hiroshima and Nagasaki get bombed on the same day? o_O
And they were Atomic bombs, not nukes
No. August 6th and August 9th, respectively. Four days apart.
Time to get pedantic with myself, before someone else does.
Slightly over three days apart (based on the time the bomb was actually dropped), not four.
… well, darnit.
::wanders off in a mope having missed an opportunity to be pedantic::
All that fuss about the number of days between the bombs, and nobody bothering that there was a dude with a quadzillion hit points!
Oh, I don’t disagree with that assessment. Yamaguchi was about 3 km (1.86 miles) from the explosion both times, though the second time, he was indoors at a military factory (which of course was reinforced to protect against conventional bombing), so he escaped all injury from Fat Man.
Little Boy had a lower yield (only 15,000 kt), so even though he was outdoors, walking back to his workplace to get something he had forgotten, the explosion “only” ruptured his eardrums, blinded him temporarily, and left him with serious burns over the left side of the top half of his body. If he hadn’t been walking away from the epicenter of the explosion, his blinding might have been permanent.
He died at age 93… and yes, it was stomach cancer that killed him… but experts all agree, since the bombings happened so long ago (65 years), that the radiation from the bombs had nothing to do with his cancer.
Was Yamaguchi just lucky, or a low-level superhuman? Your guess is as good as mine.
Getting pedantic with myself again, because of not having an Edit function. Little Boy had a yield of 15 kt (or 15,000 tons)… not a yield of 15,000 kilotons. I mean, what are we trying to do here, destroy a city or turn all of Japan into a crater?
I think he certainly had cosmic timing. Having survived Hiroshima, he returned to his home town of Nagasaki, and, the day after getting back, and despite still being injured, he reported in to work. As you do, if you can shake of a mere atomic bomb blast, like he could.
Telling his supervisor that a single bomb had destroyed the city, the supervisor said he was crazy. Which was the moment the Nagasaki bomb detonated!
Forget the craziness of hiding in a fridge. Indiana Jones should have just ducked behind that guy!
“Tsutomu Yamaguchi and The Radiating Stones – The man who lived”
Such a wasted bestseller…
He also wrote poetry–the English/Japanese bilingual edition is titled And the River Flowed as a Raft of Corpses.
Powerful stuff.
“Nakamura-kun! You’re late!”
“Amano-san, they dropped a huge bomb! My house was set on fire! I’m half blind and I have ringing in my ears!”
“Such excuses! Yamaguchi-kun was here on time and he’s had bombs dropped near him twice!”
“With respect, Amano-san… Fuck Yamaguchi.”
“Atomic” weapons like Fat Man and Little Boy assemble a mass of fissile material (enriched uranium or plutonium) into a supercritical mass (the amount of material needed to start an exponentially growing nuclear chain reaction) either by shooting one piece of sub-critical material into another (the “gun” method) or by compressing using explosive lenses a sub-critical sphere of material using chemical explosives to many times its original density (the “implosion” method).
The difference is that a thermonuclear weapon uses a fission reaction to kickstart a fusion reaction, but they still get most of their energy from nuclear fission, because a fission reaction is required as a “trigger” for the fusion reactions, and the fusion reactions can themselves trigger additional fission reactions.
Either way, the point is that both types of weapon get their power mostly from nuclear fission. Therefore, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed with “nukes”.
You say “fission,” I say “fusion.” Let’s call the whole thing off.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2oEmPP5dTM
To my knowledge those are actually two separate things, opposites even. Fusion is what happens in stars when the heat and pressure bind atoms together, creating heavier elements. Fission is the splitting of atoms, generating energy and lighter elements. Pretty sure that radiation in general is a low-level fission reaction, but that’s conjecture, I haven’t heard or read that anywhere.
Correct! Fission is the splitting, fusion is the merging.
Both are “nuclear” reactions, because they involve the “nucleus” (i.e. core) of the atoms.
“Atomic” reaction is also correct, but outdated. “Normal” reactions involve molecules (i.e. connected clusters of atoms), whereas nuclear reactions involve only single atoms.
Your conjecturing about “Radiation in general” is mostly on the mark, but you missed the high-energy cosmic stuff.
Both fusion and fission reactions cause radiation, but in different quantities and in different mixes.
“background radiation” is a mixture of the slow natural decay of radioactive particles in the earth/everything else (indeed: “low-level fission”), producing a nice mix of alpha, beta and gamma radiation.
The part you missed: high energy cosmic radiation (mostly gamma rays) comes from whatever high-energy stuff happens in space (particles falling into black-holes, supernovae, fusion in stars, aliens nuking eachothers space ships, etc)
There’s alpha-radiation, which are particles containing two protons and two neutrons (i.e. the nucleus of helium, without its electrons, a helium 2+ ion). Alfa radiation is very reactive, but can’t penetrate anything thicker than a few sheets of paper (it reacts immediately with the first thing it hits).
They are produced whenever a nuclear reaction (fission and fusion) has “leftover” protons and neutrons. These are highly biologically active if you get them inside them (just don’t eat them or their producers, your dead skin cells do a very good job of keeping them outside, just like a paper suit would)
Beta radiation is electrons and positrons (anti-electrons, real anti-matter!) that result from nuclear reactions. Again “left-over” particles. The antimatter positrons come from some weird quark-shuffling when a proton decays into a neutron (I don’t get that myself, the wikipedia link has more).
This is the stuff we use when you get “radiation therapy” for your cancer.
A few millimeters of any conductive metal will stop beta radiation (since it’s charged), or a few dozen centimeters of other stuff.
Gamma rays are ‘normal’ light / electromagnetic waves, just very very far outside the visual spectrum. (which goes long-wave radio -> short-wave radio -> red light -> blue light -> ultraviolet -> soft X-ray -> hard X-ray -> gamma radiation). This is where all the left-over energy goes that doesn’t end up in alpha or beta particles. They penetrate multiple inches of lead.
Gamma rays are not exclusive to nuclear reactions. That’s just physics for you: excess energy? dump it into a photon! hot light-bulbs, fireflies, fluorescence, Bremsstrahlung, nuclear reactions, all the same :-P
Indeed some high-energy gamma rays seen in space have more energy than any single nuclear reaction could ever produce. These are from the exotic stuff like supernova.
Then there is the variety that comes at the end. Omega radiation.
A person’s GPS unit doesn’t work by transmitting a signal at all, it works by listening for timing signals sent out by the emplaced constellation of satellites, and based on exactly when it receives those signals, it solves in 3 dimensions (based on transmission delays based on the speed of light and distance between transmitters and receiver) where the receiver is. The positions of the satellites are known to a fine degree of accuracy, and I’m sure that when each broadcasts its timing pulse, it includes an identification code, to give known points from which to start positional calculations.
The more satellites it can receive from, the more accurate the calculated position becomes. Civilian models may be set up to only resolve signals for 3 to five satellites at a time, giving decent positional accuracy (approx 25-50 feet), while tactical units for infantry and police might be allowed to calculate from the signal of more satellites, giving better accuracy, (probably into the 1-2 feet of error), while intelligence operatives, military intelligence, engineers and space agencies may calculate from all available satellite signals, giving reliable accuracy to fractions of an inch.
The different classes of GPS units probably also have limits of how many decimal places the calculations can be solved to, which also would limit the accuracy of the calculated position.
At no point during this process is it necessary for the ground-based unit to transmit at all.
It is when the GPS is built into a cell phone or other communications capable equipment that problems occur.
Those devices do communicate your GPS location and at times even when you think you turned them off they can still be “live” or turned back on in stealth mode.
This is why anyone concerned about anything in relation to their devices will either pull the battery or place the device in a RF tight container of some sort because there are not nice people out there and weirdos with strange proclivities, who can and will put that information and access to not so good use.
“…there are not nice people out there and weirdos with strange proclivities…”
*cough*cough*NSA*cough*…
Something bugging you there buddy?
*pats MidnightDStroyer, on the back*
That’s the problem…They’re bugging everybody.
“If they constantly broadcast a publicly available GPS signal”
DaveB might be referring to the flight transponders built into gear like Sydney’s arm-band. Users would need to turn that off before visiting anything secret like the council or a witness protection safe house.
GPS accuracy has also come into the news due to needed updates. The satellites can give your location on the global grid down to a foot or so, but it may not relate exactly to the location on the map you are using. Continental plates move in relation to each other by an inch or two every year. The distance from America to Europe increases by about a foot each decade. If you are using a older US based GPS on your trip to London you may find Big Ben a bit farther east than shown on screen. (Tokyo is actually getting closer. Maybe they should reduce the rates for the shorter trip.)
I was thinking about the ‘publicly available’ part — No matter how good their tech is, someone out there will probably either stumble across their frequency/-ies or hack into it, eventually. In the real world, there are very few, if any, such telecommunications & tracking forms that are absolutely 100% secure. In their world, sure, you have aliens, magic-users, and the like helping to secure them, but you likely also have aliens, mages, and the like among the bad guys who wanna hack into those systems. Sooner or later, this could become a liability.
Needs more robots on the council. -nod-
POINT OF THE DEBATE
BASTION
For standing around in the background in fully automatic agreement.
Is Maxi looking a little ScarJo to anyone else? Something about her nose
I didn’t see that at first, but yeah, now that you mention it…
Also, since we’ve talked about the skin and bone structure of Max’s face seems to vary based on her mood (smoother and less “hard” when relaxed, more angular and more “armored” when upset or threatened), doesn’t she look particularly metallic and angular here? I wonder if this was intentional on DaveB’s part to signify Max reacting to what she is perceiving to be a threat or dangerous situation.
Okay, obviously the change in the art was intentional, but what I meant was…
Never mind…
You mean, her structural outward form is semi-fluid
In other terms, Max is expressing the stress between her mind (trying to exercise some diplomacy) & her body’s (hardening of her features, as if to a threat) desire to choke the living shit out of some asshole who so richly deserves it.
;)
Yes, its a good point, as you may end up with human military (and ARC are part way there) in the rooms.
But on the other side, this chap could be wanting to start trouble. He could cause a non-aggression pact or two to be broken for his own ends.
Ahh, clever trick. Get in on the ‘super’ ticket, in which case Halo, as an Apex Heroine in Training could get to sit in, even with the regular human negotiating contingent present too.
I want to believe!
Google error 403 on that. Maybe because it is pointing at ‘googleusercontent’, assuming that is not designed to be publicly shared?
Dangit.
I still want to believe!
Heh.
Can I just say how very amusing it is to hear the word ‘fusspot’ being thrown around in casual conversation? Really puts the authentic stamp on Ingsol’s becenturied tongue.
If the council wishes to object to having good relations with the US government, the US government can choose to view them as foreign invaders rather than an allied embassy.
BTW, I’d kind of like to echo the sentiments of the guy in panel 1. If you include the strip of traveling to the park, we’ve had 25 strips of them getting involved with this council without any clear indication of what the heck they’re actually doing there. Even when browsing through the archives rather than going update-by-update, that starts to feel a bit like a long time without a clear direction.
[irony sense tingling!]
Hey, if someone named Random Wanderer is saying something is too directionless, maybe things have gone a bit too far. :D
“Not all those who wander are lost”
No matter how far or how long one may wander, much will be missed without the occasional moment of not wandering to admire the sunlight reflecting from the surface of a lake or the scent of wildflowers.
So the people subject to mental tampering don’t deserve representation? This guy does realize we’ve fought wars over being subject to others’ decisions without representation, right?
Jefferson: “I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”
Adroitly put.
So, what are the odds that Halo is the one that comes with a good counterpoint to his statement?
Considering who the primary protagonist is with this story, I’d say the odds are pretty good.
;)
Oh thank god. For a minute I thought I messed up the graphics settings on this new computer I’m using.
Just use my nose. It is what I use to sense if things are OK. Just check to see if my nose is suitably shiny.
Hey, a dick can have a good point.
Sometimes they can be a little blunt, though.
::flickers an ear manically::
Your message came wildly.
Most would prefer a big blunt to a little prick.
Is this Drug Humor or Sex Humor? Or maybe both? :D
Yes. :D
If it qualifies as humor at all I will call it a raging success…
You are more likely to be in need of a big blunt before you have the little prick
The best deterrent I’ve found for intoxicated streakers is to simply point and laugh.
Especially when your not justpointing at them, but pointing at what lies below the waist.
To quote one ”Hey, my boobs are down here!” to which I replied without looking down ”Lady, your nipples should point up, not at the pavement.”