Grrl Power #899 – Throne bound
So it seems obvious that someone has really studied every piece of footage with Sydney interacting with her orbs. Really, the game was given away in the bank parking lot. Well, most of the game. Mysteries still abound.
You know, after being instrumental in taking down Vehemence and wasting 1, probably 2 of those mega kaiju things on the Alari homeworld, Sydney is probably going to be a little bummed by being totally dominated by a non-boss villain. At least the last time she encountered Concretia, she wasn’t a boss, though she seems to have upped her game at bit.
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Honestly, what is Sydney doing walking into a room labeled “Yoga 401?”
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I’m hoping Concreta has good intentions here, as our girl is on trouble.
Until now everything she did was not only no-lethal but also not damaging. Sidney is not even tied to that throne as far as I can see.( maybe is really form fitting?)
So it is still possible she is actually working at that construction site and she is just doing what she can to avoid it being damaged in a super-fight.
she’s bound to the “throne” by the fact that Concretia moved Sydney’s orbs away, and since the orbs are somehow tethered to Sydney, that tether pulls Sydney against the throne.
Thanks for pointing that out, I couldn’t work out what was going on!
That should not be how it works though. When Maxima tried to pull on Sidney’s Orbs early in the comic, she could not influence sidney’s movements by doing so.
So far I have been under the impression that the tether works one way. As in, the orbs actively resist being pulled away from sidney, without pulling on Sidney.
True, but neither could Sidney move away from the orbs of her own free will (like when Max put tubey’s strap under the car tire). Concretia seems to have correctly divined the subtleties of Sidney’s relationship to the orbs.
Same thing happened when she initially left Tubey in the car to stop for lunch, she was unable to walk away from them.
I think it’s less ‘pulling on Sydney’ and more that she pulled the orbs away, while simultaneously pushing the chair into Syd’s back.
Honestly, she could at any time have said “Hey, I just want to talk,” but didn’t.
I don’t believe her intentions are any kind of good.
at the same time, her goal seems to be to neutralise halo rather than hurt her. there are far more painful ways to restrain someone than a chair
“bring fourth the comfy chair”
“No, not the chair! Anything but the chair!”
-sits down-
“Torment!”
I feel the need to post this in response to your post. :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02sOITrffiE
Tied? Those orbs are like a physical part of her body. They can only go so far from from and vice versa.
Imagine this… You have a stick figure on a piece of paper. He lives quite happily in his 2D world. Now give him a few circles, only the circles protrude out into the 3rd dimension and snake around to the stick figure’s body, connecting to it. The tethers in the 3rd dimension can only extend so far away the stick figure’s body. To anybody watching in 2 dimensions, it looks like the circles are not connected to his body, but they are, but you’d have to see in 3 dimensions to notice.
This basically what’s going on with Sydney. Her orbs are connected to her body through an unknown fourth dimension. That’s why when Concretia shoves the orbs through the floor in panel 3, Sydney gets dragged backward in the exact same direction at the exact same time.
Concretia doesn’t need to tie Sydney, she’s already grabbed Sydney’s by the balls, literally.
-v- no…bad Tokumei…bad *gets the spray bottle* no puns *spritz* bad
When Maxima tried the same earlier in the comics, she failed. Hard. The comic made it rather clear earlier that you cannot pull sidney along by her orbs.
That applies to pulling either Sydney or the Orbs beyond their tether distance, but moving one or the other within that distance appears to be fine. So Concretia pulled both ends of the tether, until it hit its limit. If one end had stopped before the other, then the other end could just keep going.
You’re misremembering. Maxima didn’t put much muscle behind that, and Sydney moving made the tube the orbs were being carried in skitter along the ground. One can absolutely pull the other.
The reason Maxi failed, hard, was because, as Tokumei said, she didn’t put much muscle behind it, and the shock of the stop caused her to slip off of the curb
Although she did put enough muscle into it that she expected it to move and when it did not, she said ‘THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW STRONG I AM?’ :)
Concretia is moving Sydney and the orbs away from each other, until she can’t move them any further. If Maxima can’t move the orbs away from Sydney (or presumably Sydney away from the orbs, then Concretia can’t. If she exerted great enough force trying, she’d just shatter the concrete and let the orbs loose. She’s figured out there’s a maximum distance, and lucked out in that there seems to be a maximum force with which Sydney can will the orbs to move independent of following her.
The potential issue for Concretia is that the limitation on moving the orbs is probably only one of Sydney’s imagination. If the orbs can keep up with her when she’s flying over Mach 4, they can move at over Mach 4. She would never really need or want to pull them towards her hand that fast, or want to kill (rather than nut-crack or head-thump) someone with them via high-velocity impact. So she’s never probably thought to will them to move at ludicrous speeds. That doesn’t mean she can’t, since they’re obviously capable of moving that fast in at least one circumstance. It’s also possible that she might be able to make them circle at high speeds, and abrade the concrete like a very blunt but indestructible chainsaw (or a water jet cutter that uses very large, very hard water droplets?).
I’m not sure it’s proven that the Orbs can be spun at ‘ludicrous speeds’ relative to Sydney herself, even if they can follow her flying at that speed. Everything they do seems to be relative to her, so there’s a difference between how fast they can move within that frame of reference and how fast the frame of reference itself can move. For analogy, your hands can only move at a few tens of metres per second relative to your body, regardless of whether you’re standing still on the ground or flying in a supersonic aeroplane.
It appears that they orbs rotate very rapidly immediately before the skill tree opens, and Syndey has speculated that she may be able to initiate that process by spinning them herself.
Fair point, I’d forgotten that incident. So we’re somewhere between “Sydney can move the Orbs at high speed relative to herself, at will within tether range” and “the Orbs can move at high speed, but only in a vertical circle and only in a ‘cutscene’ as part of the levelling-up sequence”.
What part of avoiding being damaged required her to attack Sydney?
If she’d just stayed hidden, no one would have even known that she was there.
The fact that Hench Wench has geokinesis says that Concretia is one of the shareholders.
Which, incidentally, make her a boss. QED.
It heavily implies it at least – doesnt mean it definitely. But it’s a safe bet.
I’m still thinking it’s a red herring, but only because it would be an interesting literary twist. I can totally understand anyone who has decided that Concretia is in the Mercenary LLC.
Define ‘good’ intentions. She’s got Syd pretty well restrained, but doesn’t seem interested in hurting her, which she could easily be doing at this point. I don’t think she plans on killing her, but she’s probably going to keep Sydney out of this fight, so she can continue with whatever nefarious scheme she and the rest of the LLC are up to. So, hardly on the side of the angels, but not evil, either.
Do you recall the very first thing Sydney did when confronted?
I dunno, looks like the start of a fun bdsm session to me :)
With this kind of power, she could have already inflicted significant damage. Clearly the goal is to capture Sydney unharmed.
I wonder if you took two orbs and pulled them in separate directions, would Sydney be suspended in midair?
the tether is non Newtonian. maxima could not pull Sydney out from under the car with it. a three step process you could do that- separate the balls in two or three directions. then drop the floor out under Sydney and she’s suspended by her balls.
Hoisted by her own petard.
A Petard is a bomb, by the way, and “hoist” (blown up) not “Hoisted” is the correct word for the idiom.
given the emissions of human rear ends… petard meaning bomb or butt seems allowable.
‘petard’ actually comes from the French word for ‘fart’, so the comparison is apt, if not entirely accurate.
I suspect you simply would be unable to move them apart
No, this page directly counters that. The balls are clearly movable by an outside fore as long as they stay in Sydney’s range. It’s only at the boundary that things start getting weird.
Palmvos got it right. You can’t lift Sydney into air by pulling the orbs, but you can capture the orbs in maximal distance and then drop the floor and Sydney will stay in place, hovering in midair … and rotating when she tries to move, as I suspect she will be hold by her center of gravity, which makes her orientation very unstable.
As Maxima shows in the bank incident.
Sydney can’t go away from the balls and the balls can’t go away from Sydney and if blocked the one with the highest starting velocity is stopped.
This time Sydney had the highest starting velocity because, she was accelerated, while the orbs were stopped by their prison.
Just like there’s a maximum separation between Sydney and the orbs, I suspect the orbs can’t be separated from each other very far.
So now we have to consider if all of this is in fact some Diabolical Plan ™ to capture Sydney has just been a distraction.
Concretia being in the right place at the right time with the right powers to capture and neutralize Sydney is kind of convenient.
Well Hench wench had earthbending powers, so I assume Concretia is one of the villains who hired her.
She was probably folowing sydney, becuse their whole plan was to get their hands on space tech.
Concretia going full Earth Bender up in this bitch.
Anyway, looks like she’s done a pretty good job of completely shutting Sydney down, assuming that the balls aren’t smart enough to go the long way around, or they’re at the absolute limit of their tether. I’d bet that Concretia would be able to feel the resistance of motion seriously increasing and that’s how she decided to stop.
I would also posit that this is a good indicator that A) Concretia’s body is nearby giving her better abilities than in the parking lot, or B) Concretia as some method of observing what’s going on so that her new Sciona hairdo isn’t impeding her.
I think they’re in a concrete bubble, we just see a cross section for clarity
There isn’t a “long way around”, they’re encased. The window is for our benefit.
You’re thinking 3D. The balls are almost certainly not limited to 3D, considering the Etherium causeways.
It’s definitely a cutaway view of a complete enclosure – on the previous page we saw the concrete snake chomp jaws around the orbs.
You did get me wondering about something though. What happens if Sydney spreads the orbs out and flies through the causeway, taking some with and leaving one or more orbs behind when it closes? Does it keep the causeway open with a micro-wormhole? Sever the connection to that orb? Does the abandoned orb just pop through anyways, say into the same relative position (even if there’s something there)? Could she summon a separated orb across the galaxy at lightspeed?
I’d assumed that Concretia’s body goes intangible and possesses the rocky material, not that she leaves her body to do it.
I am reasonably sure that the green figure IS her real body, or something her body turns into when she activates her power. It is still possible the green figure is an astral projection of course, but I don’t think that is it.
That form is yellow. Also is the Forb cracking the concrete in panel 8?
Good point on the cracking, that may be a way out for Sydney. Most concrete within the United States has a Mohs hardness rating of 5 to 7 – if the orbs are harder (and why wouldn’t Nth tech be at least diamond hard) she could get them to spin, and grind her way out of this.
I suspect we’re about to see what that last unknown orb is for.
I’m more of the opinion that while waiting she will get an upgrade prompt for a point to spend with one single got highlighted in the Lightbee section –the return to hand option. As in, she can port Lightbee to herself and then port her person (and all the other orbs, no matter where they were) to another location.
got –> dot *damn spell wrecker)
Spending a point requires touching an orb.
Material hardness isn’t the only factor – a smooth sphere is a terrible shape for a drill head, even if it’s extremely hard. Drills and even grinding wheels work by chipping/cutting away material with the pointed edges, not by pulverizing the material. The orbs being smooth have no such edges, so they might give the concrete a good polish, but would take hours or days at high speed to actually cut a hole through.
Hammer impacts would be far more effective, especially from inside the shell where it would cause tension rather than compression – concrete tensile strength is generally only 10-15% of its compressive strength.
Either way, Concretia may be able to heal the concrete as fast as Sydney’s balls can bash, cut or polish it.
True, but if she can force some of them to orbit in a circle, she might be able to get something going. Pressing into the concrete would create a very slight dimple (much like various hardness testers), and then forcing the orbs sideways would help smash the orb against the slight raised surface/crater wall.
Diamond hard? Those orbs are not ordinary matter (might not be matter at all). I don’t think there is any way to deform or scratch them. They may also be more smooth than possible for something made from matter … which, as Brichins mentioned, make them very bad drilling tool.
Wait so does she comunicate with an earpiece or with the collar? It would be kinda weird to have a mic on a collar and a button on your ear.
I guess her trump card this time will be her secret eye-operated glasses
It’s a throat-mic, so that it works in noisy environments, or with sub-vocalisation for stealth.
The collar contains the electronics, throat mike, and whatnot. It originally had a cable connecting to the earpiece, but I guess they got a Bluetooth upgrade on it?
I sure hope that choker has an alarm in case it is removed without being turned off first. Then head quarters can narrow down the location of the choker and send backup.
Max: Sydney, what was that?
Leon: Colonel, I just got an alarm from Sydney’s choker. She is at Madison and East 79th, about 2 miles to your north-east.
Max: Anvil, handle this guy. I am going after our lost lamb.
Anvil: Has my commanding officer read you your rights yet?
I doubt it. Harem removed hers when reporting to Deus, and having someone check on her would have blown her cover.
I’d bet that either:
1. Harem was able to take hers off with impunity, because they knew she was undercover, knew who she was under cover with, and knew she could simply leave at any time if she wanted. She therefore got complained at much later when she wasn’t at risk for a cover blow for doing an action that could’ve covered her doing something treacherous, which is a lot less severe than she’d have gotten if she just did the treacherous thing she did.
2. Harem might know how to disable that alarm before taking it off. It’s less likely that Concretia would know that, since there isn’t any video of anyone in Archon doing that of which we’ve been made aware.
3. Deus might know how to disable that alarm. I mean, they get them from *somewhere*. He’s one of their suppliers. Is that his product? Is it one of his competitors’ products that he therefore knows? Or is it just something that he knows that he “shouldn’t”?
If any cop, anywhere, EVER fires twelve rounds rapid and sends a transmission that cuts off mid-sentence, ALL AVAILABLE BACKUP IS COMING, NOW!!! Concretia has to do whatever it is real fast, while she still can. Points to Sydney for getting the ID out.
She is quite far away from rest of group AND in middle of height of that building. May take some time before the backup will find her.
Key word there is “available”.
There’s probably a difference between the choker being *taken* off, and it being *torn* off. There’s probably already a “weak link” so as to keep the wearer from being strangled or hanged by their own choker; adding an alarm wire should be a no brainer.
Curious what would happen if Concretia tried to dangle her by the orbs. Would she be suspended in mid-air?
Unlikely, considering when Maxima early on tried to yank the tube holding the orbs SHE was the one that was stopped cold, it didn’t cause Sidney to move in the slightest.
But on the other hand, when Sydney accidentally left them in the car, Sydney was unable to move out of their range, without any apparent effect on the orbs (they were just resting in the passenger seat of the car that was facing toward Sydney when she got stopped). I think what the “maximum distance” thing amounts to is that neither can actively travel more than x far away from the other, and any movement that we saw here was Sydney trying to get them to come to her.
Well, in that particular case, I imagine the reason they didn’t move is because they were in the “Sleep Mode” she talked about when she first opened the tube to demonstrate them. The only thing active at the time was the tether, which is an always-on feature.
Depends how she goes about it. Trying to directly lift Sydney up by the Orbs is unlikely to work, as they’d stop once they hit tether range without moving her – although it would probably prevent her moving from that spot where the plane of the floor tangents the sphere of tether-distance from the Orbs. Lifting both Sydney and the Orbs from that point, and then removing the support under Sydney, may well leave her hanging – now it’s Sydney ‘trying’ to exit tether range due to gravity, so the Orbs are the stationary anchor.
And Sydney is captured. I was hoping she would be able to get out of this and not have to be rescued but oh well. Better luck next time I guess.
I’m definitely fine with the way this has played out since it demonstrates the competency of both sides. Sydney, once she was aware of the problem, did everything she could try to avoid this, but Concretia, having prepared for it, was able to nullify Sydney’s efforts. Sydney couldn’t have done any better (unless you want to argue that an enemy shouldn’t have gotten a drop on her at all), but she still was nullified by a combination of surprise and research into the proper way to actually incapacitate her.
Well, in hindsight she should have unloaded into the concrete ball holding her balls, instead of shooting concretia herself.
At that range there was too much risk that the bullets would ricochet off the concrete ball and hit herself. By sticking the gun’s muzzle in Concretia’s mouth Sydney avoided that risk.
Also, we have the gift of hindsight. She could have shot the concrete trapping the orbs but didn’t because she was shooting was was directly threatening her. Its a good reaction to have
Yes, the first choice not working is not evidence that the first choice was not better than the second choice.
She needs to practice having at least the shield orb station keeping by her hand at all times.
True, but she is still a Rookie and never really encountered someone that has identified and nullified her weakness before. When this encounter is done, Halo and Maxima will probably review tactics and implement new procedures for Halo to try and prevent such a weakness from being exploited in the future; maybe having the orbs circle her arms instead of above her head.
Both her firing at Concretia and not having hand access to her shield orb (or any other orb for fast protection/escape) while in a hostile environment (which the whole of NYC should be considered until they have left the area) would fall under the lack of training that has been shown several times in the past. Furthermore, Halo was shown that bullets can neutralize Concretia in the super brawl, but didn’t understand that those rounds packed much more punch than a side-arm.
I feel that enough of the message got through, coupled with Maxima understanding Halo better and understanding the lack of comms would be an indication of her being in trouble, that someone will be sent to find/support Halo. I believe they mentioned the collars had GPS tracking in the past, so the last known location will be where they start the search.
Finally, as someone else mentioned, the supers are here to mug Aliens for their technology. Concretia has disabled Halo and then run. She won’t harm her as there is no point and she now has a stasis pod that will probably sell for a lot of money. It doesn’t matter that the power core is removed, as they will probably sell it to a competitor of Dues and they can figure out how it works. Halo will be fine physically, but might have more emotional issues because of this.
When sid’s been faced with an impossible situation (like being stuck offworld when the wormhole collapsed, semi-drowning in the pool on top of Archon HQ where she discovered the air orb) she freaks for about 1 second, then her brain kicks in and she explodes outward in some unexpected direction.
I think she’s about to explode again.
Not sure if it has been demonstrated that she can separate her balls from each other when not clutched in her sweaty hands, which means the only way for that to happen is to have all seven of them floating around her wrist, which would make using her hands for, well, anything extremely problematic if not outright impossible
Her first instinct, when she detected something behind her, was to put her hand up for Mr Buble, unfortunately, she was just a little too late (or fortunate in the fact she didn’t get her fingers caught in the concrete, possibly severed if not mangled
Prepared to bet shes about to get a free Trip offworld.
Why? Cree is not an alien, and JuggerNot and co are not working with the aliens
I dunno about ARC comms but I would have had a forcible disconnection alarm built into that collar that beacons last position if it’s disconnected on mission. Also similar at the base station to track contact lost and last known position. You could scuff the microphone I guess?
I’d’ve woven the electronics into their uniforms (unit patches maybe) so as to not have such a prominent target.
I remember that they said the chokers were all GPS/comm devices. They seem easy to use and if soldiers could have these instead radios they have to hold up to their mouths, they would. It is really smart of Concretia to grab these from Sydney before leaving her here.
Wait, can the glasses send out messages? She can get them from Cora’s crew but can Sydney send them out?
They are eye operated so I assume she can use them, I just hope she remembers anyone’s phone number.
Actually I assume it has a phonebook, but I hope she has her team in there, not just woof.
Frix can still contact Cora to help Sydney. It does not matter who she contacts, as long as the message gets out.
Obvious communicator, plus secondary woven in locator and mic. If lucky only the obvious one is removed. ;-)
Maybe additional locators in booth boots. All with dead man switches.
Also Sydney’s glasses should have some “Look here for 5 seconds to get keyboard for messages.” function.
You could have both the collar comm and a comm built into the uniform. Set up so if the collar get pulled off, the uniform comm activates, records and broadcasts everything that’s being said nearby.
If they haven’t built in some kind of backup system, I would assume that after this incident, ARC-Swat will take measures to ensure this weakness can’t be exploited again.
Given that “none of the prior equipment survived x seconds into the encounter” in the parking lot, they probably did put in a backup.
With so many hot girls (and boys, I guess) in the team uniforms are going to be destroyed pretty regularly. It is almost a a rule of physic in superheroes’s comics, after all.
Chockers are simply more durable. :-)
What is Sydney doing walking into a room labeled “Yoga 401?”
Hoping that it’s Hiro and Math, not Dabbler and the Harems
Honestly? You would think the orbs could break out of something as brittle as concrete. They can stop MAXIMA from moving them, so why not the opposite?
Maybe if Sydney focuses enough, the orbs can break through anything to get to her. They can break bone like we saw with Sciona that one time.
If you notice, concrete seems to be getting to stay the orbs themselves, using her peers to push them away from Sydney. Also, there are cracks forming in the concrete, because she’s still pushing both them and Sydney apart.
I think the orbs are going to break out in the next comic, and Concretia is gonna figure out you can’t get one without the other.
I do see some cracks. Good eye. Ya, this might be the case. It may also take some willpower on Syndey’s end. I hope she does discover something new about the orbs rather than just her getting restrained and left here. If that’s all it is, then this will be a good learning experience.
The are immovable, not unstoppable
Is it possible that Concretia works for the construction site, but the site is owned by that sme LLC that is powering Hench-Wench? i.e. she is powering H-W without even knowing it?
I ask becasue I have no idea how LLC actually works.
LLC is limited liability corporation, a type of commercial company in the usa.
As I understand it, the LLC structure just allows them to spread the top spot on the ‘chain of employment’ across multiple people. If they’re all equally her employer, then HW’s power can claim on the group rather than a single ‘prime’ employer. But it would lock onto the top spot in the chain, rather than anyone lower down: if Concretia is in a different branch of the employee structure, or even somewhere between HW and the top spot on the same branch, then HW’s power would bypass her.
Note that this is as I understand it. Anyone with more experience of the technicalities is free to correct me! Also note that I’m focusing on the use of the LLC structure, not any legal implications of an LLC acting as this one appears to be doing.
TLDR: yes, it’s possible.
Maybe Concretia plans to sell Sydney’s orbs and if she sells them to Deus,will he accept?
Dues is more likely to turn her in. he probably guesses Sydney is not separable from the orbs. He’s got enough ego to believe he can keep harem and max from seeing them, but they become a lot less useful in that mode.
I really would like to find out what happens when someone else grabs them.
Sydney is now neutralized… Probably…
she is also unpredictable, so it’s a wild guess… also, if Max did hear that, Concretia will be in a hell of a problem. If she did not, then Syd in problems.
Sydney is not truly neutralized unless her mouth is covered up. She’ll be able to either talk Concrecia into letting her go, or goad Concretia into making some sort of mistake that allows her to break free.
Weaponized ADHD
Scary stuff indeed.
As Archon’s resident loosest cannon and neophyte, if removal of her choker doesn’t set off alarms and a locator ping, tech isn’t doing their job.
This is trouble. I bet….
Whomever she (Concretia) is working for, simply doesn’t know if killing Sidney is a positive or negative.
So it is kidnap testing time…but i hope not.
Finally time to find out last orb ability? Anti assassination power maybe?
its the portable bathroom Sydney just hasn’t gone there.
If Sidney’s starship analogy hold, they must have some form of … garbage disposal, for example. some limited matter converter, maybe?
Sydney probably ought to keep at least one of her orbs in her hands at all times, so this doesn’t happen again. Maybe have a pocket on her sleeve for it?
Honestly the fact that the sartorial section didn’t take this weakness of hers into account IS fairly surprising, since he was completely open about it during her interview–no ability to touch the orbs with her hands=no powers. They can clearly be restrained as easily as a normal poster tube, so, like a vest with pockets for the PPO and Yellow Orb (since the Lighthook, Flyball, and Shield are her go-tos while Yellow is more classified) would be a really good idea. PPO can free the other orbs from potential containment while Yellow could port Sidney out of immediate danger. Unless Red Orb has some use we don’t know of, she’s in trouble here.
We’ve seen that she can mentally order the orbs into tubey, to spin to bring up the user’s guide, etc. There’s been no testing I’ve seen/heard of that scopes out an upper bound on just how hard the orbs will try to follow her or obey her mental orders to move. I’d think the orb builders ™ would have “what if’ed” this scenario.
Entirely likely, but both Sydney and Archon didn’t take this weakness into account in a stronger way–especially after Sciona KILLED her by just holding her hands shut. Deprival of the orbs is a big, big deal, and my guess is Equip Branch will be looking into it after this incident. Sydney shouldn’t have to rely on “I hope whoever made these had an idea for this” all the time.
Sci-fright didn’t kill her ‘just by holding her hands shut’, and killing her at all is pure speculation anyway
Hmm…I’m guessing Deus is behind this somehow.
Whoever’s planned this is pretty confident that they know the limits of Sydney’s capabilities. While some guesses at her limits could be deduced by watching recordings of fights and the scene at the bank, there’s only one time that Sydney outright stated that she can’t use her orbs if she can’t touch them – and that was in the boardroom meeting.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-98-triple-facepalm-and-sidebutt/
And who else was in the boardroom meeting when she said it? Harem, AKA Deus’s little double-agent.
It’s still too early for Deus to tip his hand, so either this capture is not quite as sinister as it looks, or there’s some middle management involved.
Soo…. It could just be that Concretia is currently working as a construction worker in the building currently undergoing renovations… and just didn’t want to be associated with the villainous doings down below. Everything else was just a comedy of errors…
Concretia hasn’t made an appearance in this fight yet. New bogey + interrupted call = Maxima knows something’s up beyond Sydney’s normal wonkiness. She wastes maybe ten seconds trying to get Sydney to reply, then gets Leon to ping the gps on Sydney’s choker/bracer/phone. Max might be focused on Wench right now, but could send someone as backup. Or maybe she’ll decide she can reach Sydney, lay out Concretia, free Sydney, and be back to fighting Wench inside of 20 seconds. Either way, if Sydney can just get Concretia talking, that’ll buy her the minute or so she needs for a rescue.
Right move by Sydney. Asking for help might be embarrassing, but military and police alike know that one of the best weapons at their disposal is their radios.
But if backup’s not coming, what options does Sydney have left? Concretia’s obviously trying not to kill her, so can she talk things out? She appears to have dropped her phone, her orbs are sentenced to immurement… where’s her bracer? Might be best to keep it hidden if Concretia’s forgotten about it. Anything handy in her utility belt?
Honestly, this whole thing is only dragging out for this long due to Maxima trying extra-hard to be PC (probably since there are civilians around with cell phone cameras) instead of operating as a Military unit. It would appear Hench-Wench is using Brüt’s powers for her durability. Durability which doesn’t begin to stand up to Maxima’s destructive output. The instant that Max decides that the gloves come off to counter the lethal threats individual team members are facing, she’s a MFP-uppercut + particle cannon shot away from turning Wench and/or Brüt into superhuman fireworks. Honestly, probably better to kill Brüt and the other LLC members to chip away at Wench’s available powers.
It’s not about cameras. There are civilians around who would become collateral damage if Maxima would go full power.
The tactic I proposed would avoid civvy casualties. Brüt doesn’t appear to have super speed enough to avoid a bullet (but Max FAR exceeds that). Provided that she’s able to send him upwards three or four thousand feet with the MFP-uppercut, she’d have plenty of clearance to test a particle shot at around the same potency that took off Vehemence’s arm. Need more room for the blast? There’s lots of room Up.
Max doesn’t know what Hench Wench can do at this point, but it doesn’t really matter. She can just snatch HW and Brut, and fly them at super-speed a few miles out to sea and 10k feet up, then talk them into surrender while dangling over the ocean.
Even if they can fly or teleport back, it gives the rest of the team time to arrive and moves the conflict away from civilians. And if another fighter arrives, Max is still on the comm channel and can be back on scene in seconds.
This right here is why you really want a team of dispatch controllers directing and monitoring these guys.
And maybe make them work in pairs whenever possible.
Concertos hopefully gets feedback from her concrete powers, or she could accidentally squish Sydney against her own balls.
“Okay, Sydney. Your primary advantage has been taken from you. Time to use all that training that Max ordered. What do you do?”
“When in danger, dark, or doubt,
:Run in circles. Scream and shout.”
for all else when you fear or dread pretend to sleep, or to be dead.
(modified black lantern oath) *grins*
Hmm, how fast can Sydney spin/orbit the orbs? Her little practice fight with Math showed that they can physically hit things, and if she can orbit them at a few hundred, or better yet a few thousand r.p.m. she could just basically use them as a ball mill and cut (well really pound/abrade) them out of that pocket in the concrete. Honestly, concrete is not terribly strong when you get right down to it.
That could work, but Concretia would probably just reshape and repair the cage. It’s not so easy when the container is sentient and self-repairing.
Concretia has not repaired her face
Be… cause it has only been a few seconds since she lost her head? And has been currently busy restraining Sydney?
Possibly. But based on her past examples, it doesnt look like she can rebuild what’s been broken that easily. Possibly because she can’t CREATE concrete, she can only manipulate it, and her body does not have extra concrete to manipulate without taking it from other parts of her body, weakening her overall.
Then again she might have learned more since her time in the parking lot fight.
Still useful – if Concretia (Anima?) is focused on reforming the cage, that diverts attention from whatever the original plan was and its execution.
It like that, spin them into concrete breaker.
I don’t think Concretia ever reshaped her concrete vessel like this in the battle royale. Either she’s gotten tougher, or she didn’t go all out there.
How the hell do you kill or even contain someone like this? Break her body, and the intangible ghost-thing inside comes out, runs away through a wall, and comes out the other side in a pristine new concrete body. Maybe Dabbler would know how to trap ghosts…
Who you gonna call?
Does her ability have a fail-safe?
There are all sorts of ways to turn off abilities. Power dampers, psionics, sonics, etc.
But what happens when she is still merged with the concrete?
Does she get shunted out or becomes one with the concrete which most likely would prove fatal.
Contain her in a prison surrounded by hard vacuum or anesthetic gas. Or deep underwater. Assuming her ghost form still needs to breathe.
Have to find out if she can “possess” metal or wood or whatever.
Wood-paneled cell with an electrified cage around it. Job done.
I didnt even think of that. How far can she move around in her disembodied state. And yeah I guess also can she possess other stuff. I’m assuming she can’t until she actually does so though.
But I didn’t even consider the idea that she MAYBE can’t just move around in a disembodied state that far. :)
Well the Diner folks were Vehemence induced to it; she might be naturally non-lethal and was resisting similiar to some others (Our local Succubi for instance didn’t just haul off with her swords and rail guns..) So; vehemence might have let it slide or as he stated, he didnt’ want anyone’s death originally though later Max’s whose too strong. So he didn’t whave Concy sink someone to death.
Though I’m actually wondering if thats her. Or if it’ll be the Vamp girl soul
Trapping ought to be attempted. Someone (Hiro?) destroy her existing body in mid-air with Sydney nearby, have Sydney raise her shield around the three. Concretia (Anima?) is in spirit-but-visible form with no material to form a new body, she’ll either need to turn to flesh-and-blood if she can or she’ll almost certainly be trapped by Sydney’s shield and at her mercy. One-way flight back to the Alari homeworld for exile?
What’s the backup option? I mean, if Dabbler DOESN’T know how to trap ghosts, who you gonna call?
(#sorrynotsorry)
The creators of the orbs likely accounted for a situation like this. There has to be a /stuck command available.
I’d say Sydney is real lucky Concy isn’t on a Kill Game Order. Possibly capture,
or she’s after the tech. — and is smart enough to NOT kill Max’s minion; at least not after having her name stated.
That is a good power use there though.. I’m guessing she was actually not willing to be violent combat in the Diner scene; or she’s been training in the 4 months
Im confused about how Concretia knew about the distance limitation of the orbs. Theres no way she could have found that out as far as I know.
The original parking lot scene had reporters and cameras. No reason to believe film of Maxima and Sydney didn’t get out from that, showing the interactions between the orbs, Sydney, and an outside force (Maxima).
There’s also the fact that https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-31-urge-to-kill-rising/ contain footage that specifically shows Sydney is tethered to the orbs, not just that they’re tethered to her. And if we assume that Leon scrubbed that footage, it’s possible there’s footage from https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-27-the-calorie-denial-force-field/ that was missed.
Weren’t Sydney and Max on-camera for a bit of the hijinx outside the bank where the distance limitation of the orbs was first revealed to Max, and her whole ‘do you have any idea how strong I am!?’ incredulousness at being unable to move them?
Concretia probably did research and saw that and learned about the distance limitation that way.
Note that the method of restraint that Concretia has used does not depend on knowing in advance exactly what the tether distance is between Sydney and the Orbs, or which of them acts as the fixed point. All she needs to know is that there is a tether distance. There’s plenty of room in this building site to keep moving both the chair and the cage until the tether stops them both, whether that be at one or ten metres separation.
They were outside the bank, but they had just shown Sydney roll under the ambulance on TV, and it looked like Arianna and Harem were watching the broadcast, so I think it all went down on-air and was a lack of judgement on Max’s part. And news teams were in the shop when she took them out of Tubey to show Joel and Olivia, so anyone analyzing any Sydney footage could have figured it out.
Yeah I guess they figured out a lot more than I expected from those two interactions that got caught on camera. I would have probably just assumed that you can’t move the orbs away from Sydney so any attempt to try would cause the orbs to come back to her, no matter what barrier was in the way (including Maxima’s strength).
But this is still consistent. Thanks to everyone who explained it to me. I forgot that part was televised.
This reminds me of a line from spider man homecoming: if you’re nothing without the suit, then you don’t deserve the suit. In this case it’s the orbs
Point is it’s time for Sydney to up her training
Nice reference, and very accurate, too. I completely agree.
Sydney has already shown resourcefulness without the use of her powers–during the Vehemence fight, she was critical in taking down For Whom The Death Tolls (without Sydney, Death Tolls might’ve actually neutralized Maxima if Maxima attacked him one-on-one) and was also the one who came up with the actual plan to defeat Vehemence.
So she’s already shown her merit without the orbs.
That said, her doing so again here would certainly be a welcome addition to the list!
I’m confused. If the orbs are tethered to Sydney’s head, can’t she just slide backwards out of the concrete chair? She might have to arch her back a bit, but the thing is already slanted backwards, and her head has full range of movement.
If it is tethered to center mass, she might still be able to slide backwards out of the chair, though that might be harder to accomplish, since she has to go “up” to do so, while the orbs are trapped behind and “below” her. Her head doesn’t have that limitation, the images show she has enough wiggle room to accomplish that no problem.
I think Concretia worked out exactly where to put the orbs to keep Sydney trapped in that chair by feeling the resistance to move the orbs away, and grew the throne just enough in places so Sydney couldn’t roll out or shimmy up and over or whatever.
It appears in the third and fifth panels that Concretia has shoved the pocket holding the orbs down through the floor. So Sydney is not just being pulled back against the seat, she’s also being pulled down into it. She can’t slide forward and she can’t slide up.
I think this is basically Concretia doing a “Sit down Shut up, so I can explain.” Cause we know some supers punch first ask questions later at the AAR session if they bother to go at all.
She’s not hurting Halo, just immobilizing her.
My thoughts
1- Concretia works here. She’s finding where the crews made short cuts so that the crooks can be nailed. (for giving concrete a bad name).
2- She never was captured, so it was never established that she was a neutral or good guy screwed over by Vehemance’s magic.
3- She noticed the disturbances downtown and doesn’t want to get involved.
so she’s gonna ask nicely of halo WHAT IS GOING ON. And What is she doing here. What’s with the aliens. What’s with the light show downtown and why is it dark now?
Halo knows she’s screwed now. All that has to be done is cover her face with cement and it’s adios.
That she has a comfy seat (yet is immobilized) is slowly gonna sink in.
When this happens either we get the story or we start to get the story and aliens/enemy mercs track her down.
ABout when Halo promises to not damage the building and stop destroying Concretia’s body anymore, the real bad guys show up… soHalo has to protect the building…
Think bad guy will be flyer and the real geomancer. Geomancer will destroy the chair(s) *(think concretia would make herself one for a tete a tete – more civilized that way) and ball prison.
Thinking that the Stasis podis in one of them…
Halo’s balls will be freed….
just a guess at next few pages…
I had similar thoughts – it really looks like Connie is trying to defuse the situation as fast and completely as possible (and doing a really solid* job of it) without actually hurting Halo. There could be lots of reasons for that, but the fact that she made a simple chair with no villainous restraint straps seems to bode well.
* sorrynotsorry
I agree. I think it would be a good twist that Concretia is not in the LLC, and is just there for reasons completely unrelated, and wanted to defuse the situation (admittedly in the dumbest way possible) because she figures Archon would arrest her before she can say anything due to what happened in the parking lot.
But if she turns out to be in the LLC, I wouldnt be surprised. The only surprising thing is that she happened to be in this building, far from the combat zone back in Times Square. Which is the main reason I keep leaning towards Connie being a merc being a red herring.
Speaking about your peaceful intentions would have been a good first step. Behaviour to date suggests Concretia’s trying to avoid becoming a cop killer since that’s a big deal.
At best she might believe Sydney is on par with the kind of police that lead to BLM protests and that this was necessary to keep herself safe but I’m leading towards her being a no kill type involved in the crime.
True, but Concretia may have decided (based on her previous interaction with ARC) that she had to disarm Sydney at least temporarily in order to be sure of getting her side of the story across. Combat reflexes run a lot faster than considered judgements, so immobilising the body’s reflexes gives time for the brain to catch up. This would fit with the sequence of events: first neutralising the Orbs, then neutralising Sydney only when she proves that she can be “slightly inconvenient” even without them.
Note that Concretia doesn’t know about Sydney’s time-jumping shenanigans or the details of her training. However long she’s actually had to be trained and conditioned for a blend of police and combat work, Concretia thinks she’s had nearly two months more and might think she’s been in purely military boot-camp.
Given the assetvalue of the supers on the team, and the resources the U.S military can bring to bear, it’s highly likely a room full of people is monitoring the throat mics and associated sensors of the ARCSWAT members. Control knew within a third of a second when Sydney’s choker was disconnected, and they were tracking her location. They probably keep an extra special eye on her because they lose signal everytime she bubbles up, and she can fly at mach 16. Expect incoming extraction team, shortly.
But because the “chocker” was desighned properly ripping it off triggered an alarm and a gps function alerting all her teammates to her position.
Umm, how do you think the chocker is put on?
It obviously has a clasp of some sort, but that clasp should absolutely have some telemetry indicating if it’s open or shut. Ideally, it should also have at least 2-3 integrated failure points (not the clasp itself) with a moderate failure point, to prevent someone using it as a garrote, and breaking those should trigger a very noisy alarm back at the monitoring station.
Ideally, yes, but very few things in life are ideal until after you need them to be
This will probably be the new design for the chokers, just like how they are going to redesign the glasses to be more like goggles since none of the glasses survived the parking lot fight (according to Hiro in the after-meeting about the fight).
Either a) Sydney is going to be rescued from this, or b) this comic is going to end a LOT sooner than I was expecting.
Well, we are coming up on a round-hundred page number…
… we are still in flashback. The scene from first page of comics didn’t happened yet.
Technically, the scene from the beginning was a flash-forward, rather than this being a flashback.
I’ve always felt that the “orbs” are really a single artifact. That artifact was smart enough to bond with a “mere” human like Sydney, and present it’s interface in a fashion that made sense to her (ie, a skill tree), while simultaneously training her in how to use them at gradually increasing levels.
My speculation is therefore that there is some level of “intelligence” within the system, and there might be some kind of backup protocol for a situation like this.
In other words, the orbs might do something on their own.
That would be interesting if they did – especially if it has something to do with the central pips on the Orb skill tree (right now we’re mainly assuming it puts Sydney more in tune with how the orbs work).
Hm. Well, it took me several pages, but I realize that Concretia must have stalked her until she was alone just for this. Kinda freaky.
Well, lessee, here…
The Orbs are about as close to unbreakable as we can currently determine, & Sydney’s still able to mentally move them. I say it’s time to find out just how fast she can make them spin in a circle. Get some scary-serious level of momentum going as they jackhammer away at the inside of their prison, & not even Concretia will be able to keep them confined for long.
… What if there is no room for Sydney’s balls to move?
@[Guesticules]:
Dude — don’t be givin’ Concretia no ideas!!!?!
;)
“Dominate”? No this is a defeat. Concreta could kill Sidney casually at this point. It is over.
Yeesh. Spin the orbs at high speed in their confinement. The vibration will shake the concrete apart and they’ll pop loose. If they have friction, they’ll grind it away as well. Remember, concrete isn’t solid, and it’s pretty obvious they are in a clump with space around them.
Think of having a handful of marbles, then roll them around in your fist.
Your fist is malleable, concrete is not
If Concretia is part of the criminal LLC (likely at this point), and they studied all available public footage of Archon members it goes to explain two things, the stealthy take down of Halo *as a careful study of the footage gives away these weaknesses *has to hold orbs*, *is tethered to orbs so both can be restrained*.
and the second why they under estimated Maxima. As we’ve discussed on previous pages public record of Maxima could be mistaken for a glass cannon as she always stays back in the fight, relies on energy blasts heavily, and the only physical fights visible to the public, vs Vehemence, there was little to determine how strong either actually was as they mostly just fought each other and it was a close quarter fight. So a third party with only News footage would hardly be able to tell without prior information on anyone. The tank demonstration also mainly demonstrated Maxima’s energy but given general metaphysical defense field rules her standing in her own blast means nothing as typically energy manipulators are immune to their own energy.
*an aside watching Maxima march up the stasis beam also tells human mercs very little as it is unfamiliar technology; they don’t know if Brut or other super strength supers could over power it or not as they don’t know anything about it.
I think the Max vs Vehemence fight was late enough in the dinner fight that most if not all of the cameras that would have seen it were wrecked already. Concretia was *there*, at least earlier, but could have easily decided to bail as soon as Halo cut off Vehemence’s fight aura.