Grrl Power #881 – Gesundämmerheit
In case you, like Torchy, were indeed wondering where the stasis pod was.
This guy has a universal translator, but he’s one of those aliens with an insanely loud barky, clicky language that the translator isn’t able to set up a sufficient interference waveform to “mute” normal speech. Oh, sure, he could buy one that’s specifically made for loud talkers, but he’s an honest, hard working space merc. Why’s he gotta spend his own money on something that benefits others?
In my mind this guy sounds a lot like the Mars Attacks aliens, but with more growls and roars, along with that slight delay like the guild navigator peon from Dune talking into that 1920’s radio mic.
Sydney doesn’t know this guy is male. She’s probably got about a 40% chance of being right, as most humanoid species are dioicous, but there are some which are monoecious, triecious, hermaphroditic, etc. It’s also entirely possible it’s the female of this guy’s species that can attack vomit 11 gallons of acidic mucus on command, but her glasses don’t do species and/or sex identification. There’s probably an upgrade for that though. It would actually be super useful if you were an intergalactic trader or diplomat or something.
The word “intergalactic” suddenly bothers me. Shouldn’t it be “intragalactic?” Most science fiction deals with only a single galaxy and the adventures contained within.
Vote incentive is updated with a clothed version and not just the censored bars. By “clothed version,” I mean tiny strips of technically SFW* lace.
NSFW version is over at Patreon as usual.
*Depending on where you work.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like!
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.
I just wanted to share this:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-54436575
“See this helm icon? I had to pirate the dlc for that app.”
“Why?”
“YARR, because it be drivin’ me nuts.”
This is why I am opposed to making everything a smart device……………
Also, Why?
“Dioicous”. That is most certainly a 64 dollar word. Had to look it up in the dictionary, then I had to do two more dictionary look ups to understand that.
Let’s face it, you’ve been waiting years to use that one in a conversation.
Actually I had to google it for this post. :) It seems like one of those words that should show up in sci-di more often than it does.
I only loked at it shortly, but I think Dioicous simply means “plants that do have Genders.”
As the usual plant is a Hermaprhodite.
Sydney! When you’re confronted with an extraterrestrial who expects very little of your species — ie. “You can read Galactic Trade Standard? I thought this was a backwater.” — the CORRECT response is, “Shows what you know! EVERY Terran is taught Galactic Trade Standard by [ridiculously low number] years of age!” It’ll leave him second-guessing his own expectations, and he might even think twice before the NEXT time he tries to deceive ANYONE ELSE on Earth!
Speak softly, carry a big stick…
Don’t raise their expectations or next time they’ll overkill.
That was indeed the right state for Churchill in his current situation, but we’re here in a very different situation.
If you’re the strongest around and an unimportant target getting people to underestimate you keeps them from organizing a superior force together, but if you’re the weakest and an important target looking strong keeps the estimated price of squatting you above the estimated benefit.
Or even for Roosevelt in his situation…
Alternatively “Actually I just guessed, but thanks for confirming that for me.”
Yes, I do know the language spoken in this backwater galaxy of the civilized universe.
The best victorys are the ones not fought. The true victorys never need refought. There shouldnt be a next time.
Sydney should be mocking them. She killed kaiju and swarm ships and dodged orbital bombardment from planet killlers. They didnt bring a ship or worthy meele weapons for the encounter. The sooner they know the sooner they surrender.
That’s why Higgy proposes bluffing.
If she tells him that earth has full access to the galactic trade standard language she is implying that earth knows a lot more about the galaxy than they think and can thus more effectively prepare for his attacks, making them less profitable.
No the correct response is, “Of course I can. why the hell would I mean, it’s written. It’s a language. It’s out in plain sight. What the hell are you talking about not being able to read it?”
That will scare them a hell of a lot more than some story about teaching our kids to read galactic standard. Think about the implications of there existing a species that can read literally anything.
Ivan Drago says “I must break you, little green alien man.”
It’d be funny if the alien WAS the female of that species! And yes, I know it might not be male or female…but it’s better comedy if it’s female.
…I just read 881 strips of this all at once over the past 8 hours. Goddang, now I’ll have to jump aboard the wait-train with y’all for this _amazing_ comic
Welcome to the community. Now be aware that many of those strips had layers of hidden content, either in the background, in dialogue or clever subtleties. So there is still a lot more for you to discover, whilst waiting for the next issue.
A tempting treat to wave before the newcomer, Yorp. ;) Yet having partaken of several archive dives myself, I can’t call it a cruel one. I’m only glad I never felt the need to read all the comments for past strips. 0_o
Although it would be really, really nice to get all the observations from the forum into a proper wiki so people can find some of the great insights (and quit asking about the common ones).
I’m not sure why, but in panel 9 (Hwarf!) the alien doesn’t *feel* as if he’s bearing weight. he just kinda feels… there. Sydney, in the next panel, seems to be bearing her weight fine, she feels like a physical object. But Hwarf boy doesn’t. Probably due to him having a copletely inhuman and crazy body plan that’s difficult to draw. Love the comic, and the art has progressed tonnes since the start, but just thought I’d offer some honest feedback.
I think he / she / khe etc is probably gripping to stop it being taken while the lighthook is weight bearing.
Agreed. Although with an ultra tech society it is equally possible that they put gravity dampeners on any heavy devices which need to be used in the field.
Something like the stasis pod clearly has life-saving applications for emergency situations. Making it collapsable allows it to get into tight spaces, through small airlocks and so on. Reducing its weight likewise. In fact it need not even be done through gravity control. It may simply have been built with ultra-light weight components.
The reason why my mind went straight to gravity control though was that if you can control time (enough to slow it down or stop it in a confined area) then you are at a technomagic level where gravity control should be similarly easy. Plus if you are manipulating the time part of time-space, you can probably utilise a bunch of the same components to tweak the space side and mess with how gravity interacts with things.
why I didn’t think DaveB was giving these mercs time distortion tech but kinetic containment tech at first; it just felt too high for what we’ve seen so far and been described in the comic. Time manipulation tech at any level, which I’d put a slowed down time bubble with a visible occupant staying put relative to all the mass around it is way too advanced, with that level of tech that stasis pod should be in a pocket dimension generator fitting in their actual pockets, use ring sized energy weapons with trans-finite power, gravity mines holding people in one place…honestly at this point it makes more sense that the stasis gun is actually a magical artifact these mercs found or bought that was found on a prehistoric civilization extinct for eons planet and they just put gear over …
top of it to read it out.
or just go full Kaiba or FLCL with the tech and don’t try to be realistic with anything.
I mean there is some creative go around, like that is experimental tech off the black market taken from the 2.5 and above members of the Xevoarchy smuggled from a lab and being passed around the black market despite all being based on dangerous prototypes.
the real problem comes with is it common, rare, new, or found.
an Amendment:
I know there is suspension of disbelief and sci-fi has these levels of realism (that seldom age well), along with many side branches for story telling, aesthetics, and overlapping points for specific stories like an anomaly has occurred, uncovered ancient super tech that breaks the rules of the setting so far making it a McGuffin (see the library from Outlaw Star for instance),
To put it this way; so far the majority of the aliens and their tech we’ve seen has had a vibe similar to (Star Gate, Babylon 5, Battlestar Gallactica, and just on the edge at time with Star Wars and Star Trek);
the time stasis handheld gun device feels like some Tenchi Muyo, tech just landed in Babylon 5. Like Washu or a Jurain Imperial scientist accidentally dropped one of their tools through a reality rift and it landed in the lap of some seedy mercs in Babylon 5. Just picturing the officers on the station going, “what the hell is that thing?”
You seem to be forgetting Fracture. A Dyson sphere (hint: a Dyson swarm is something achievable with science we can envisage, the sphere though is something beyond), but not just any old one, but built around an exotic type of stellar body which even advanced Dyson sphere builders would find challenging.
Then consider that Nth generation tech (like Halo’s orbs) is known to exist, but is unavailable to the vast majority of civilisations in the galaxy. Also we must not forget that magic is readily available and commonly used (the Succubi for instance utilise both technology and magic equally in their factories). With some races having greater magical aptitudes and/or racial capabilities (demons for example).
Combine these with your own observations, and we can see that the galaxy does not have a homogeneous technonmagic level, available to all equally. Many of the local civilisations may be operating at the Battlestar Galactica level, whilst others could be tooled out with Star Wars goodies.
But if you can offer a prize which could unlock Nth generation technomagic like capabilities (which is what top end super powers emulate), then the big players will be willing to break out their cutting edge toys and/or precious hoarded lost-tech artefacts, as the case may be.
We know that Nth generation tech is rare enough to have wars fought over it, and only the strongest would be able to retain such or anything approaching it.
So even though we may commonly see a lower level of technomagic, our Heroines are likely to come across the top end a lot more frequently than average galactic citizens might see.
Those are good points, why my last little paragraph and sentence with the amendment are there after the rant. We have seen some more advanced tech.
Although it should be noted Nth tech was stated by Cora to only be theoretical and no proven examples found *until Sydney’s orbs displayed what should be one impossible feat, the jump point obstacles and distance ignoring Aetherium Causeway function*, until then assumed they were magic of some kind.
Supers definitely feel like they could be Nth tech based especially with the body type modification and the number of A and S class showing up out in greater numbers than they thought; the game avatars or physics adjusting to reformat the planet aspects are potential theories.
Now Cora alone gives away there are definitely different levels of tech around; her hard light body is approaching Steven Universe gem tech levels of complexity; or external holodex projections from later Star Trek series…before the pessimistic reboot era of course.
Why I said, okay, I can see them having it in the sense of being like mercs that got ahold of black market sold higher end civilization tech. Like a tool being used by the 2.5 scale civilizations who are probably the types who made the Xevoarchy in the first place; the Vorlons of this setting, like mercs on Babylon 5 somehow got their hands on Vorlon technology.
The Fracture put me in mind of similar structures in other sci-fi (we don’t know we built it, but we are going to use/live on it); example the Kyln in Marvel Comics (not the MCU, that Kyln might as well have not even been called by the same name)…in the comics the Kyln is a massive ring world prison built around the center of the universe; the Kree, Xandarians, and a few others have taken to using it as a prison; however the one who built it was Galactus for the purpose of three of the cells being used to imprison promial gods (beings of his own level of power),
the sort of deep space anomaly (we found this awesome thing in space, at first we put researchers on it to study it and over time a colony built on that and we just kept building over top of it and now there is a thriving city built ontop of this relic of an unknown civilization).
third option, the Galaxy Police/Galactic Academy from the main Tenchi Muyo continuity; a massive ring world that fits around a solar system. Most the species being trained there couldn’t possibly have made something like it, but it was built by the combined efforts of two or more of the most advanced cultures in the galaxy, namely the Jurains and the Space Police. In that setting you could see space pirates trying to get their hands on Jurain technology as it puts everything else they can get to shame.
This whole universe make me think more of Babylon 5 then anything else, with superheros thrown in.
Many races and species sharing a common area of space at varying levels of limited space faring capabilities (“If you don’t got jump gates( light speed) your probably confined to your own solar system”).you may not know how to build a jump gate but you know how to use them. But there are also several known races with magic like abilities and super advanced technology lurking around.
I swear that Dabbler said that Nth tech was thought to exist, but not confirmed…?
Cora was talking to Sydney at the Fracture space port about it, Cora did say Dabbler believed the Nth existed but there was no proof during that conversation.
which is surprising in the meantime we didn’t get any page with Sydney telling Dabbler and her reacting to the possibility.
I am curious what Sydney would see should she fire up the menu on her orbs, but while using her new spectacles compliments of Cora. Although I guess, since Dabbler didn’t see anything using her cyber eye, Sydney wouldn’t either.
I like how Dave did her bangs this time. during the meeting with the magic folk when Decolette gave her the magic hair band. she had a round face and was actually kind of homley. he has done well with this one.
interesting that the shield has texture enough for the Acid phelm to stick to it.
that or we’re seeing it in motion sliding down right after being splashed on.
I think the thing that throws me the most here is…His pants. Like, he’s this goop-vomiting nightmare lizard beast in a pair of Wranglers. I get that it’s entirely plausible that alien civilizations would come up with the same idea of stitching cloth together into leg coverings, but…Like those are JUST NORMAL PANTS. Not even humans had the same clothes until world trade started happening and we all just settled on the same things, and even then every civilization has their own styles. Is that the lesson here? Is this the fate of all civilizations on a long enough time scale? Are pants the one universal truth? Are we all destined for pants?
to be fair the majority of human civilizations did develop some sort of pants independently of one another,…belts, tool pouches, and pockets not as common across cultures. Even if those cultures only had them for specific jobs like soldiers, farmers, construction workers, and other jobs where leg protection would come in handy and less fabric flapping about to catch on things. For a wide variety of reasons, climate, brush, poisonous plants and venomous snakes;
fun fact Jeans were originally designed as protective leg gear for ranchers…for the purpose of planned obsolescence the majority of jeans you can buy just look like them and lack the durability; and funny enough until just a few decades ago it was considered unprofessional to wear jeans and had some “rebel” taboo biker gang thing becoming attached to it…until enough young people who wore them grew up to still wear them and the market adjusted to it.
The historical trend is that the easier cloth is to make and acquire, and the more advanced the technology for joining pieces of it gets, the closer garments fit. I mean, if you were in Rome, and everything had to be stitched by hand, you wore clothes that didn’t involve much stitching, like togas and chitons. Middle 17th to early 18th, we’d figured out at least how to make really good needles and gotten a little bit of industry going where we had enough of them for everybody, and suddenly even the commoners were now wearing shirts with sleeves. Mostly still skirts though, until they finally got mechanical looms working and there was enough cloth to go around. At that point you got even more seams, and formerly unthinkable wastage in the parts that were cut off, and men started wearing pants.
Just the men at first because the men were doing things more outdoors and around things that would snag on a skirt, and women were doing things indoors and so didn’t have such a need for closer fit.
Aliens who use clothes – at all – If they have otherwise advanced tech I’d expect to find them in clothing that fits them reasonably close. With occasional departures from the trend mostly in formal and ritualistic contexts.
He’s trying to pass for an alien tourist that doesn’t want trouble with the law. A little bit cultural consideration is in it’s place.
Um, why is the lighthook blue and not its usual pink? And why does her shield have none of its usual texture, and why has no one else pointed this out??
My favorite part of this exchange, is that this alien isn’t using a translator- So he is screaming out that a corrupt cop is trying to rob him, in a language only the alien tourists and his co conspirators can understand, ie the same people who would be able to read the words on the stasis pod proving he is lying. Sydney found the LEAST competant of the alien kidnappers.