Grrl Power #843 – The run away PA
Deus doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who would engage the services of a dominatrix, but as they say, variety is the raised welt on the backside of life.
So, I’ve figured out why I like Lorlara so much. It’s not that complicated, really. Lorlara is basically Sydney – if Sydney was some sort of party line authoritarian. I just like writing over the top characters, and it’s been a while since Sydney has done anything really nuts. Okay, she’s done plenty since that incident, but that remains kind of peak Sydney I think.
Yes, obviously they’re going to meet at some point.
Edit: Forgot to mention, Maxima’s expressions on this page were modeled after Julia Louis Dreyfus trying not to laugh at Jerry Stiller.
I forgot to mention, but Michael-Scott Earle is running a new kickstarter, this time for the second book in his Monster Empire series.
Fun fact, he published book 1 about a week before his Amazon kerfuffle. I bought it, but didn’t read it right away – I think I was in the middle of a different series at the time or something, and then when the ban hit, I decided not read it, because I don’t like getting invested in something if I know there’s only a tiny bit of it out there. It’s like a tease. I tend not to buy novels until there’s at least three in a series, but that also sometimes depends on the author and how prolific they are.
Anyway, I haven’t read the first one. I’ll probably start it a day or two before the second book comes out. I assume it will be good.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like!
I nominate Lorlara for “Employee of the Month”.
you had better, or there will be castration!
“Sir, I have arranged for the new Eunuch Programmers you required.”
“UNIX! I said Unix Programmers!”
(With apologies to Scott Adams)
As for the woman in the catsuit, my assumption is Deus is the type to try anything he has heard rich people do, even fictional rich people, and heard about 50 Shades of Gray.
And of course now, with the Alari in Galytn as well as those in his direct employment, would be the perfect opportunity to compare shades.
She’s Deus’ Sydney
Ha, when Max handled her getting in her face so well I thought it was because of all the time she’d been sending with Sydney recently, but you are totally right, she is Deus’ Sydney ( at least for attitude, Vale is his Sydney for mysterious power).
Proof that Max got the better recruit.
Deus had to get TWO people on the books to get the same amount of both Crazy Over The Top Attitude and Mysterious Powers No One Understands!
the golden troll award goes to maxima
Maxi hasn’t even done anything, she’s just sitting there enjoying the show
I mean, she’s gold and trolling Deus right now…
No, Lor is trolling SmugD, and she doesn’t even understand she is doing it
It isn’t trolling if there is no intent to annoy.
It’s not even trolling if someone else thinks it’s funny. There’s actually a term for that called “Gadflying.”
Trolling is specifically for the amusement of the Troll. Gadflying is for the amusement of the Gadfly and others, just, you know, not the target.
Golden Gadfly is more alliterative.
One of the (many) rules for good writing skills:
Always avoid alliteration. Always.
Agreed, alliterations are absolutely awful.
At any time!
Maxi, taking Lor aside: “You, I like.”
She probably wouldn’t have been quite so mellow if it weren’t for her now being used to Sydney.
Even random threats of castration are less jarring that some of Sydney’s old cursing, lol.
Max is probably suddenly appreciating how much less of a headache Sydney is compared to Dues’ new assistant. Also, his power play is complete ruined by said assistant.
Dues = how much you have to pay
Deus = his name, also translates as “god”. “Deus Ex Machina” = “God From Machine”.
Deus owns Machina Industries.
Machine from God.
Inversion.
Know who he is now? I’ve been wondering when someone else will say it first, but I haven’t read every single comment, only most of them.
This assumes of course that Deus’ name reflects reality :)
The other question depens on which Pantheon we are assuming.
Though wouldn’t it be fun if he really is a god, slumming it among the humans, and when finally asked ‘the’ question he answers: “none of them. all human gods are imaginary”
In fact, it would not be out of character for him troll an interviewer that way.
Very well said, and you corrected something I misspoke, with my fingers.
I’d say Deus is a god of “Maxima Annoyance”. That work for anyone? I’d think it’d be more Eastern anyway, where gods aren’t… powerful. They’re just any supernatural anything, but with so many in the Grrlverse, he stands out. Intentionally.
I mean, even the gods have gods, right?
Yes, but they tend to be Small Gods. Or disinterested ones who aren’t what you (or they) expect.
We-e-e-llllll, according to somewhere in the the Book of Acts, the Greeks of the time had an “Unknown God”… Deus X?
When Max gets back to HQ to tell this story one word will fit: Schadenfreude.
Umm, does Lor have a license for that letter opener? :thinking:
You don’t need a license to carry a blade 6″ or less in length in most states (excepting daggers–both edges are sharp–in WA state; I know that one is illegal here), especially when it’s 1. sheathed and 2. in plain sight. (Sheathed is NOT the same as concealed carry.)
The sheathed part is important, because that means there’s no chance of it accidentally hurting anyone, nor of it being “brandished as a threat” because, well, it’s in a sheath. The in plain sight part is equally important, because no clothing has to be moved, no purses or bags have to be opened. It’s right there, on her waist, everyone who can see can tell that she’s carrying it.
There is one more rule, and that’s 3. She’s not in a bar (or bar section of a restaurant.) Carrying weapons into bars is prohibited in many places (if not all of them), especially concealed…but basically just into any section of a restaurant that served alcohol to of-age-folks-only. USUALLY this refers to guns…but in WA state, you cannot even take a staff/walking stick that’s over 6′–or any OTHER weapon over 6′ (almost 2m) into a bar. (Which kinda sucks if you’re wearing a bullwhip as a belt, but alcohol and ouchy-things don’t go together, and I can respect that as a sensible precaution.)
As for Deus and any lady with the shiny black suit stuff…BDSM is a spectrum with Dominance/submission games at one end, and Sensation Play at the other. (That’s why it’s Bondage, Domination, and Sado-Masochism.) They often do go together, but there are just some people who really enjoy being spanked, but who would get pissed off if you tried to dominate them & order them around…while there are others who enjoy the Domination/submission side of things, but who would quit the scenario immediately if they were so much as patted playfully on the butt. And of course, plenty of people between those two extremes, who like to mix it up.
We don’t know where Deus falls on that spectrum. But we do know one thing about him: He has a lengthy collection of little black books…which are actually big brown books full of sketch art and notes on all the non-human folks he’s banged. (I am NOT about to assume Deus is strictliy hetero; he seems fairly egalitarian to me, though I’ll presume if he has a choice, he’ll probably pick a lady over a guy.) If he wants to get it on with a member of a particular race who happens to be into that sort of thing, it’s quite possible he’d *cough* submit to it in a playful sense. Why do I say that? Because he told Sciona that he’d get her his thread count requirements for being her bedslave, if she & her fellow Alari ever successfully conquered Earth.
Then again…Deus seems to know a LOT of things he couldn’t possibly know under ordinary circumstances…so I’m betting he’s an information-collecting super. I don’t know how his super powers work to gather that information, however…so he could gather it by skin-on-skin contact from people he *cough* contacts. Not too terribly likely, but it’s possible. And in the case of Galytn’s former government, he clearly found video footage of horrible things being done, so who knows exactly how his powers work…? (For all we know, they come to him as visions when he experiences pain, which would definitely place him in the masochist category…but again, not completely likely, but not utterly impossible, either.)
Either way, I’m definitely having fun watching Lorlara tormenting Deus through her ferocious loyalty.
The other option would be a Black Cat or Catwoman crossplayer. I think that would be something Deus would be into. Harem probably too.
Even before reading your comment, “Harem” was in my mind.
I hate to say this about Washington state doesn’t ban double edge blades had to check the RCW 9.41.250 which covers blades. It only pertains to concealing them as long as they aren’t spring loaded or gravity assisted. Used to be able to purchase double edge blades at all the knife and blade stores that used to be in the Puget Sound area. You could also could get them from all the blade makers at conventions and SCA events. Which if it was illegal wouldn’t be allow. Link to the RCW and to and article pertaining to the subject at hand. https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=9.41.250 https://knifeup.com/washington-knife-laws/
So no switch blades or gravity assist blades like butterfly knives. Everything else is allowed within reason Seattle had some special rules dealing with swords no longer than 32 inches unless for display and again can not be concealed.
In Bondage, the masochism player, reserves the power to sat NO.
Lorlara, I think I love you.
I’d be afraid not to…
But I wanna know for sure
Come on and hold me tight (not quite that tight)
Next page:
Max: In some ways, you remind me of one of my co-workers.
Dues: The purple alien with the four arms?
Max: No, but I can see the comparison there too, but she is, in many ways, quite the opposite of Lorlara. No, I was thinking of Sydney Scoville. You met her once in your outer office. I think she commented on your sword collection. Oh, by the way, are you still presenting them by clamping the tips? That is really hard on the swords.
Deus: Oh, I remember her. Charming girl with a wild imagination and impressive knowledge in some fields. In some ways, she seems more like an opposite to Lorlara than Ms. Tantalis.
Lorlara: Who is this Sydneyscoville? I will smite her for the honour of …
Max: I very much doubt that. Fighting her should be the last thing you think of if you meet her. Mind you, that could be the last thing you think of if you meet her.
“With THOSE swords, if the clamps aren’t hard on them, they aren’t going to hold them.”
Seriously, it’s fine to display swords by clamping the tips, as long as the clamps are padded. Foils, no. But swords? It’s fine, they’re not fragile. THOSE swords, especially.
But clamping a sword by the tip obscures one of the finer parts of craftmanship on it, where the skill of the smith really comes to a point. Besides, it’s very easy to arrange discrete support for even sturdier parts of the sword, like a ricasso, or similar.
Well, sure, but again, with THOSE swords, your concern is less with damaging them than with keeping them from escaping…
Yeah….dunno if Sydney has PPE, but she sure has the PPO, and that will wreck. Especially if Lorlana finds out WHAT Sydney was able to do.
Sydney’s shield is PPE.
This page is my favorite in a long time. I firmly agree with Max’s reactions here.
I fear the day Lorlara discovers sugar and/or caffeine.
Lorlara VS Snowflame would be interesting.
I fear the day Lorlara discovers Sydney Scoville Jr.
They become buddy-cop buddies and are forced to work together to
defeat an uncommon common foe.
DO NOT SET FLAGS FOR THE AUTHOR! You’ve just set the Flag for the upcoming battle with Sciona…
It would be like a setup within Doctor Who. Something they can’t possibly write, leaving it in the hands of better writers (come on, better writers! write that fanfic).
Me (Ashieldr, the living that can’t die)
The Impossible Girl (Clara Oswin Oswald, the dead that can’t live)
Traveling around in a TARDIS together.
I’ll set another flag.
Lorlara and Jabberwonky (am I right?) in a sparring match, and we find out each are equally clumsy and accident-prone.
*hint hint Dave*
Lorlara: 0
Jabberwocky: 0
Office Carpet, Furniture, and Door: 6
Math is forced to watch the match, and keep score.
Precedent for that was already set! Yay! Let’s wave this flag together.
rather fear when Sydney introduces Lor to her favorite cuisines
The day Lorlarla discovers ADHD meds, she’ll be unstoppable.
It’s nice to see Deus fail for a change.
who read all of lorala’s lines in Macho’s Voice after ? I know i did!
I prefer to imagine Lorlara being that intense with Kristen Schaal’s voice. Maniacal over the top intensity and a cutesy little girl voice.
“NOTICE ME, DEUS-CHAN!”
https://m.youtube.com/watchv=g5cmh5o20cw
Given Lorlarla’s grasp of English, Maxima should not be so ambiguous in the final panel.
Ambiguous lanuage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6cake3bwnY
So what does Max really mean by inviting Lorlari for “joining us for dinner?” Having a threesome on the table might get…socially awkward…in front of the other customers.
Well, she may or may not be aware the restaurant is owned by Deus. If she is, this has the benefit of allowing her to watch its 5-star rating crash faster and harder than the spaceship she shot the big hole thru.
But the reason I’d do it (besides the above)? This is a negotiation and Deus is now seriously, continuiously distracted. Deus has his plan for this set, he’s completely confident he’ll get what he’s really after (not that silly opening salvo from earlier), and now Lorlara is dropping incendiaries and high explosives all over everything. Max should offer to pick up her dinner tab; she invited her AND she’s throwing Deus so far off his game he’s forgotten he’s playing.
Deus: “Lorlara, I will be having my lawyer over for dinner next Friday.”
Lolara: “Certainly, sir. How would you like him prepared? Roasted, grilled or stuffed?”
DAVE! I’ve got Monster Empire, Audible version because I couldn’t find Kindle/text version of it. I say voice acting is Hella cringy. So much so I couldn’t stomach listening it to the end. Otherwise the story is an American take on isekai genre what Earle has already made before. I’ll stick with Japanese ones.
There’s a new version of the audiobook, recorded by the same M/F team that did Tamer and Star Justice available over at MSE’s bandcamp site. https://michael-scottearle.bandcamp.com/album/monster-empire-book-1
Again, I haven’t listened to it yet, but they’re a great pair for dual narration.
I’m pretty sure this page kills off the fanon theory of Lorlara being Deus’s daughter. If she’d lived her whole life thus far on Earth and steeped in Alari culture, then it’s – though technically possible – extremely unlikely for her to have learned five other languages between her mother’s native tongue and her father’s.
She never was to begin with. After all, Deus very specifically said Sciona was the first Alari he slept with, per his “list.”
‘First’ doesn’t mean ‘last’ or ‘only’
But given that his encountor with Sciona was a) his first with an Alari, and b) within the last couple months, it does preclude Deus from being the father of any adult Alari, including Lorlara
And if in the next couple of pages we see a blue police box conspicuously inconspicuous standing in a corner then all bets are off.
In that case Lorlana may actually be another incarnation of Deus, from a different time and possibly from a different universe :)
Genetic manipulation and/or hyper aging has produced an apparent adult in many a science fiction narrative
*Next time Maxima has to meet with Deus(ch)
Maxima: Lorlara, meet Sydney, Sydney meet Lorlara. I’m sure you two will get along like a house on fire.
Deus: If they set my penthouse on fire, you’re footing the bill.
Maxima: Worth it.
Maxima: “Hear that, you two? No fire.”
It feels like Deus now has his own Dabbler, but more violent and less horny.
No, not Dabbles, his very own Sydney!
Much much more fun (for everyone else watching :P )
Sydney really has toned down on the cussing. She used to be unable to form a sentence without offending a censor. Gr
Toned down on the cussing, you say?
Omg, I love Lorlara.
The term that enters my mind is “spunky” but that can be so wildly misinterpreted…
“severely unfiltered” is how I would put it. Spunky is usually more upbeat or chipper and less… er, dogmatic?
Lorlara is my new fave, right after Dabbler. Syd’s a cutie, but Lor and Dab are crazy and sexy to the max. I don’t think Lor misspoke when she said “castrate” either.
Is there any significance to the two African Americans on this page both being left handed?
One is a left-handed ‘Mericun, the other is a right-handed European.
I don’t know. Doesn’t have to be dominatrix to wear a shiny black suit of the cat. He could just like the look of a woman in such an outfit.
True, but the context is scourging.
I suspect Maxima’s charmed partly because she’s reminded of Sydney since the two get along so well.
Also, while Deus assumes she means Castigation and not Castration, I have a suspicion she actually meant what she said. She is a hardline authoritarian.
Good. Douche needed to be taken down a peg or dozen. I’m with Maxima. This be hilarious.
With those kinds of nonsense outbursts, I’d say she’s more like the Ultimate Warrior than Macho Man.
You know, Lorlana and Sudney would both get on each others nerves….. until they both discover they are both massive MLP fans.
*Lorlara
*Sydney
Stop picking on the big-fingered people typing on itty-bitty cell phone screens. You are not the Spelling Police.
I worked on an app for construction guys in the field on iPad minis – one of our guiding principles was (informally) “fat finger design.” I have big hands myself, even with a moderate-sized phone the keyboards are just ridiculously undersized.
Anyone else watching the animated Harley Quinn series?
Sydney might fit right in there, language and all.
I like Lorlara more than I do Deux, Maxima, every one of the male heroes, Anvil, Harem, Peggy.
Dying. I am dying of laughter. Lorlara may be as amusing to me as Sydney
Max should ask Larlara if she has offered Duse her children yet… :D
I meant to say offered Duse to father her children…
Actually, I do not think that to Lorlara there is a difference :)
I still haven’t decided if she must be kept away from Sydney at all costs or be forced to meet her…
She MUST meet Sydney. I will die a very very happy chow chow
I just wanted you to know that you broke me. I can no longer read lorlara’s line out of macho man Randy savages voice.
Anyone that gives Deus a headache probably gets a bonus in Max’s book pretty much automatically….
That’s what I interpreted.
You wanted this, Deus. Remember that. You choose to do business with these people. You choose to pursue a lifestyle for yourself and if possible your whole planet that emulates this culture. You look at Lorlara and see your own end goal, the ultimate realisation of your own philosophies.
So, we have determined Lorlara isn’t Macho Man. We have yer to determine if she’s a randy savage…
Like most of her race she is probably a Warrior.
Maxima: “Lorlara, would you be willing to come with me back to my base? I think everyone there would fall in line if they hear YOUR words.”
(Archon hears Deus’ plans by means of someone incapable of subterfuge, subtlety, or nuance.)
Cue Sydney’s Sydneyism.
Never mind Sydney’s Sydneyism. Get her within range of Krona.
In panel 1, Lorlara is channeling Ron Swanson.
And to think, Max almost passed up on witnessing this.
I think a better response to someone saying “Bring me ALL the Bacon!” would be:
“Could you give me a specific amount? So if you require more than we have in stock, I will be able to procure the amount we require to meet your request”
“Procuring additional bacon may make the order take longer, so if we have enough in stock it would be best to know so we can get the amount you require to you as soon as possible.”
&heart; + 1
“Wait… wait. I worry what you just heard was: Give me a lot of bacon and eggs. What I said was: Give me all the bacon and eggs you have. Do you understand?”
“All we have is a kilo of bacon, would that be sufficient for Your Highness?”
Bwahahahahaha, “…Glad you’re joining us for dinner!!!