Grrl Power #914 – Power stunts 201, with Prof. Scoville
For some reason I think things from space named “Space XYZ” or “Astro ABC” is really funny. Astro bucks, Space Hookers, Galactic Lunch. It’s so dumb and generic and pointless. It’s like reminding everyone that a bunch of races have achieved space travel. Yeah, we know. We’re in space right now.
Concretia’s having a real facepalm moment here, but Henchwench still has a leg up on her. We don’t know if Concretia can animate rock while in her human form or if she has to project herself into her phantom form. What did I decide to call it? Concrastral form? I’m don’t feel like looking it up. Anyway, that’s not the trick Henchwench has mastered here. She can keep Meatwench conscious while Concrastrally projecting. If that’s something Concretia can do, she’ll probably have to return to her body first and test it in steps. Apparently she can’t just wake herself up and let the Concrastral projection dissipate – she has to return to… uh, meat Concretia and merge back into her body. Conmeatia? Meatcretia?
Ug. Meatcrete sounds like something demons would come up with. And not the sexually mischievous ones like Dabbler. Like, Doom demons. The ones that decorate their walls with stretched faces. Which… I guess means that when they’re not murdering their way across some new planet, they’re very into arts and crafts. Those faces have to get on the walls somehow, right? I guess their planet murder rampages are like a trip to Hobby Lobby for them, and they have to sign up for specific invasions to get the right color palettes. Like if they want an accent of blue for the den, they have to murder rampage some Maliri or Na’vi or, uh… Kree? There’s not a lot of blue alien races for some reason. Twi’lek. Knew I was forgetting an obvious one. Yes, some Night Elves are blue. Obviously there’s Smurfs, but you’d probably only want them to do like a nice checkerboard accent for the bathroom. Like a strip around the shower.
Check the vote incentive to see Sydney not naked. And then there’s the Patreon version.
(. )( .) & ( ! )
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.
ACME Space Cleanser and Chitten Polish. It’s also a floor wax and a desert topping.
You’re showing your age there Wellington
It’s ideal for that perfect finish after a generous application of Supa-Shellac, I can tell you.
Pfft that imported stuff. Still can’t beat Shimmer, they’ve got choco, vanilla and new BA-nan-A! Also pretty good at hair removal if you let it dry on.
https://www.deviantart.com/seuraaron/art/Flair-for-the-Dramatic-399628076
Oww Oww Oww!!
…why!!!???
I will not click on the Deviantart link. I will resist!
It is a bottle of normal shape and substance. The label is hilarious.
And it’s not like it’s a trap-site like TV-tropes (or whatever the fuck it’s called)
Dunno about that. It is my picture though, and the latest incarnation of the site makes it very frustrating to search.
deviant art’s latest updates made it incompatible with my ancient computer so I’ve not been able to upload anything from my PC to it, to retain a presence I can upload off my phone but that’s just pictures, and bad drawings and my Halloween personal mods aren’t the stuff I would normally upload on any regular basis.
I have so many short stories and chapters now on other sites that when I do get a new computer my deviant art account is going to be SOOO far behind.
*also can’t really manage my watch list on my phone so I probably have several hundred things to go through in there as well by the time I get a new computer.
Yeah, use to be able to sneak past the age restriction by entering a date, now you have to actually register and log in just see the adult crap
I will keep in mind they did that as it will mean sharing my more (adult) stories with people on my facebook groups when I share them will be a problem with ones who aren’t deviant art members. Currently sharing my stories links to my facebook groups via fictionpress (which has added some anti-bot measures even for casually looking at the site that are annoying)…click every image that contains a boat…oh and some are zoomed in so far that you need to recognize what boat controls look like or find a hint of water in the corner of the image….kind of *and that is an actual example* images.
I would rather not link my Hentai Foundry copies to facebook…mainly because if even friends only I don’t trust the Facebook bots not to flag them.
Same goes for forums and such, Deviant art was just easier, especially for character sheets and what not that don’t really fit on other story sites (as they aren’t stories or chapters of stories). I can always use pastebin for that purpose, but I tend to forget to upload the finished products to there and its just bits and pieces of back ups for the most part.
I think they should make finding her body a priority.
Fairly sure that’s why Cora let Lefty and Righty leg it
Think she put a tracker on them, or has some way to track them in general?
He’s literally showing us that she’s remotely watching the fight via remotes, how hard is to extend that to the thugs?
She’s remote watching the fight because “Cora left some spy drones to monitor the battle.” like it says in the comic on panel 5. Pretty sure she’d be more stealthy with the goons she let go.
All good spy drones have an invisible stealth mode and plenty of plot armor.
Makes as much sense as anything else. :)
I’m pretty sure that’s how Jeff Bezos will get packages into our homes without us even noticing.
and evil spy drones are huge, make a ton of noise, and for some reason seldom carry weapons anymore and just crash into their targets.
Just get Connie to give you a heading from two locations and plan a snatch and grab for the location where the headings intersect.
I was wondering how long it’d take someone to suggest triangulation.
It’s probably worthwhile pointing out that when humans say they can point out the direction, they always really mean “the rough direction”, because we’re really not that precise. Even if Concretia knows the exact direction, her ability to point exactly that direction will be limited. It could be helpful to take a few more readings to help narrow down the exact target.
If she’s able to point from a third place and the lines actually intersect at the same point as the other two, you may be good. But otherwise, some averaging of the intersection points may be in order.
Of course, she only needs to specify where at range to enough specificity to uniquely identify a single boat, unless Cora or Dabbler have some teleport technology that doesn’t require a beacon at the point of origin that they’re willing to use to assist. That seems highly unlikely, considering all of the teleportation they’ve shown thus far has been non-living things going from one location with a beacon (ship stores or lab) to another (Cora or Dabbler).
On a more genre savvy note, it would trivialize the sort of action that Dave has been showing us.
On the other hand, Harem has line-of-sight teleport, and we don’t know of a range limit on Halo’s light-bee teleport.
I think the Halo option is more fun, because she can use the light simulacrum to throw the guards off.
In navigation (um, in non-GPS navigation, which these days comes up only when something knocks out the electrical systems on your boat) we always take at least three sightings. You draw out the lines on your chart, and you always get a triangle in the center where they don’t quite all meet. This triangle is called a ‘cocked hat’. I have no idea why.
But anyway, if your hat size is too big, you need to go back on deck and take another sighting.
The term is very old and and refers to the then-current hat fashion – the little triangle with extended corners looks very similar to a cocked (tri-corner) hat.
The harbor is only so big. It would take Maxima what, two heartbeats to search every boat in the rough area that Concretia narrows it down to.
At this point there’s enough options to rescue her with the forces available to ARCswat that not rescuing her for whatever reason would feel like plot-induced-stupidity or plot railroading. I’m gonna feel pretty bad if her captors get away with her. I just want nice things for her ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
We know that magic exists though – any decent villain should have proximity wards as a deadman’s switch. That said, it’s too much work to redraw the wards with every personnel change, so there’s probably a [strike]MacGuffin[/strike] amulet the cronies carry, but Archon still has to acquire one first.
Then again, magic detection is also a thing in this ‘verse and Archon has been shown to employ several competent magic users.
And a few incompetent magic users :P
She got a spaceship with a capable crew.
Spydrones to track the fight – and the escaped henchmen.
Propably a cloaking device and/or broad vector stasis field generator on the ship too, so easy to secure the body.
Well I hope this means someone is going to go liberate Concretia’s body!
I am liking the character.
Let’s see…Concretia could lead them to the shoreline (not in direct line of eyesight from the water), point the direction for them & give them a rough estimate of distance. With Sydney’s Flight & Shield orbs, they (with or without Concretia) could approach underwater & remain unseen. Cora could use a small, innocuous drone to spy out (Sydney’s Light Bee from her Comm Orb might be too obvious) exactly where Concretia’s body is kept. Then a plan to snag the control box away with Concretia’s body & Cora can disable it with her tech savvy.
From there, Sydney definitely has the legal powers to arrest everyone on board & also give witness that Concretia was coerced.
All Cora would need to do is locate the ship. There is a zero percent chance that an EMP gun isn’t part of her arsenal (Too useful to take down robotic foes) All she’d need to do is EMP the ship, shorting out all electronics, and the equipment that shocks Concretia’s body is toast.
An EMP takes out the electronics, sure.
– What does it do to someone wearing a shock collar? It’s possible that Concretia would really feel it. I mean, I’m sure Concretia would be willing to experience a little shock, or even a fairly big one as part of a successful rescue operation. But would Cora be able to determine for certain it wouldn’t be fatal without a test run?
– An EMP won’t shut down any people on the boat. Sure, Cora doesn’t need to worry about what they can do to Cora and any would-be rescuers. But they could have orders to kill the prisoner.
Generally speaking an EMP destroys solid state electronics, thus it would have zero effect on Concretia’s body and would immediately and permanently destroy her shock collar without causing it to trigger and hurt Concretia.
It would also disable the boat/ship, preventing engines from starting up, causing all lights to go out (including emergency lighting), cutting off communications via marine radio and the like, etc.
Someone would need to react to a power outage by thinking “Huh, that’s strange. I guess I’ll go commit murder now” in order for this course of action to place Concretia in any danger. And since the hypothetical EMP is presumably targeted the kidnappers would have to be pretty fast about it since I’d assume that using the EMP would be immediately prior to storming the ship.
“Someone would need to react to a power outage by thinking “Huh, that’s strange. I guess I’ll go commit murder now” in order for this course of action to place Concretia in any danger. – Oberon
Or have standing orders that, if an attack is imminent, the asset dies. The equivalent of an embassy burning their codebooks; it’ll be inconvenient to recover from that action, but not as inconvenient as letting the attacker capture and use the asset, and doing it at the start frees up an extra guard to defend against the attack. Whether the EMP on its own is treated as an imminent attack, or just puts the guards on alert for a potential attack, depends on who’s on the boat and what orders they’ve been given.
That is assuming they’d identify the sudden power outage on a boat as an EMP and not other mechanical failures. Contrary to what movies tell you , you as a human can’t detect an EMP visually or audibly *not directly*, they would have little reason to assume right away that a sudden power outage was an attack, they could realize something is up if they when checking notice devices not connected to the ship’s battery and motor are also out like phones so moving quickly is still required as the main point of the emp is to disable the collar , communications, and the boat.
That’s true, but in a modern setting it’s probably a reasonable assumption that there will be sufficient independent bits of tech to check easily that it’s not just a single-system failure.
Example scenario. Hench-1 is in the cabin and the lights go out. So he takes out his (battery-powered radio to ask Hench-2 whether he’s having power problems – but the radio isn’t working either. Once is happenstance, twice can be coincidence, three times suggests outside action, so he checks something else (a phone, a watch, etc.). And then he knows they have a problem.
I didn’t mean to imply that an EMP might negate the need for the assault force to move quickly. Like any preparation, it would need to come as shortly prior to the main assault as is compatible with not hitting the attackers on their way in – which is a function of the EMP’s area of effect, the assault force’s speed, and what level of tech they’re relying on.
True… and the light bee is not so obvious, really, since it would be underwater until it got to the ship, then quickly go to Cree’s room, then pop Sydney in, rip out the wires and pain harness, and we’re done.
Smash and grab in ten seconds.
Of course, there are also 150 other ways to do it, with Archon.
1) Harem teleports to the ship, same deal as Halo.
2) Max at full speed at high altitude, then drop an Anvil on the ship, sinking it. Rescue Cree’s body first, then the rest. Or Heatwave holes the ship with a blast, or Peggy holes the ship with a laser, same strategy.
3) JIggawatt shorts out the electronics on the ship. Cora or Peggy with EMP, same deal.
4) Mr Amorphous pretends to be Boss Salsa. Could be fun.
That lightbee idea is actually a brilliant idea, Dal. Plus the lightbee orb itself isnt very noticeable in the first place anyway.
There are some problems with other ideas you mentioned.
1) Harem can’t teleport somewhere that she can’t see, unless she’s familiar with the area.
2) You don’t know if there are any other innocent people on the ship, including other prisoners or other people who work on the ship who have no idea that they’re in a criminal enterprise. Going straight to sinking it would be a problem.
3) … okay the third idea could probably work, since it would short out the thing electrocuting Concretia.
4) The other two henchmen were let go and probably will be letting the people on the boat know what happened to Cree’s handler and how he now has a wonderful new careers as a chunky red velvet yogurt impersonator.
“3) … okay the third idea could probably work, since it would short out the thing electrocuting Concretia.”
shorting out means making all the connection closed in circuitry normally. if you ever shorted a relay it will connect (at least momentarily and if the wattage is high enough permanently on as it fuses the contact points)
PS read your arguments with Oberon , man tries to invent interpretations w/o understanding legal basis. –me over 20 years use of force instructor from Guardian Angels to Local LEOs.
And now we see why I’m an attorney and not an electrician.
Okay maybe not ‘short out’ but ‘disable’ would be a better word. I thought short out just meant disable and make not work anymore.
But in any case disabling all electronics and electrical-based systems on the boat with some sort of EMP (or if Jiggawatt can do something to disable it) would be a pretty good plan imho. :)
Also very cool about your expertise. :)
Oh, you did? That’s wonderful! So I’m sure that a man with your claimed many decades of experience won’t mind citing some examples instead of just throwing out a blanket statement which has zero meaning out of all context.
I love Internet experts. They always have so much experience, but rarely seem to be capable of backing that up when challenged.
I literally showed a picture of my degrees, diplomas, and certifications on my office wall :). Not to mention that everything I’ve ever said has been provable by a simple google search, or a brief search on Westlaw. :)
And once again, you’ve never given any information in your arguments. You make declarations, then call the other person stupid or some other form of the word stupid.
All Vulture said is that he has 20 years of being a force instructor for local law enforcement. What exactly are you wanting him to ‘back up’… and where has he been challenged to do so?
And once again, you’re just lying. Every time I’ve called you out for providing your legal opinion in a way which no competent lawyer would, I’ve told you exactly why I was doing so.
But that fact is inconvenient for you, so you’ll do as you’ve always done, and just reply with the rhetorical equivalent of “Nuh-uh!” Your clients, even assuming that you are a lawyer, are paying you too much.
Cite an example if you would please, any page any argument any time where what you said is true.
Perhaps you can show an example of you giving anything more than a declaration followed by an insult? I literally constantly give rather long diatribes on legal definitions, elements of crimes and torts, and existing caselaw and statutes WITH the references. That’s what passes for a ‘nuh uh’ for you?
You are forgetting that Cora let the Henchmen go on purpose. there is no way she would have let them go without a reason. My guess is she planted a tracker or have someone tracking them so they would lead them to the Big Bad Base. That or she brought back up who swept them up and are interrogating them as they speak.
Agreed. There’s simply no way Cora allowed people on foot to get away from her, carrying a firearm, unless she had a purpose for doing so.
That they even tried to run strains all belief.
There’s a reason for the saying “You run from a man with a knife. You run at a man with a gun.” If you can hoof it away faster than the guy with the knife you’re safe, but a man with a gun can just shoot you as you’re running away. Your only chance is to try to close the distance to hand to hand range. There was no cover nearby, so Cora should have just been able to say “Stop!” to get them to freeze in place and surrender.
Sydney can’t see while deploying ‘Bee, she only has a ‘general sense of what is around her’ (mostly, what isn’t around her), she has to stop and pop Holo-Halo out to get her bearings
I didn’t recall that being specified that way, but your interpretation matches the usage during her time on Team X-Ray where she got maybe killed after learning to teleport.
She has to look like Sydney, but she can still be mostly underwater. Doesn’t seem like much of a problem.
Yeah, that’s how Sydney described it to Harem. Although she CAN see through Holo Halo, according to her interview at Archon. I’m guessing she can’t ‘see’ only when it’s the holo orb, but once it turns into Holo Halo, she CAN see.
Her exact quote when Harem asked “How do you steer when you can’t see where it is?” was:
“Uh, I dunno. I can feel a path, but I can’t really tell what’s around me. I guess I can only tell what’s NOT around me. How do you teleport into a place you can’t see?”
And Harem responded with: “I can feel if something would intersect with me before I commit. Souns kind of similar really.”
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-497-path-finding/
Here’s the link to the earlier part in the interview btw:
“See, hear, talk. Can’t touch though.”
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-89-badgers-apparently-terrifying/
That’s what meant: ‘Bee is just the little glowy ball (that may or may not be able to pass through walls)
According to DaveB it is able to pass through walls – it’s basically a hologram, like Holo Halo is. He just…. forgot it could on that page :).
Easily fixed plothole by just assuming that Sydney’s the one that forgot it could, which would definitely be sooo Sydney.
I do wonder what the range of the lightbee is though. It’s definitely a lot farther than the physical distance of the orbs’ tether to Halo.
Personally like the idea of ‘Bee being solid, that way Holo-Halo can stick her head through a wall to check out what is happening on the other but can not fully phase through (any minor limitations that keep Sydney’s OPness in check is, POO, a good thing)
Not so much the distance that interests me, more the fact it’s limited by Sydney’s own speed, like, it could travel the length of a small city only in the time it would take Sydney to jog (gives another minor limitation, but this time, it’s something Sydney can improve on with her own personal fitness: ie at the moment it might take her two hours to jog a mile, but give her another year and she may lower that time to… one hour forty-five :P)
Maybe there’ll be another Dabbler’s Science Corner in the future to go into more detail about the lightbee.
So Dabbler how does the Light Bee work?
Dabbler *shrugs*, “Its Nth tech how the hell would I know. I can give a long series of educated guesses based on similar devices and spells, however as I can’t scan the orbs directly; only observing the effect I can’t ascertain the specifics of the mechanisms involved only that they may use a known method through an unknown mechanism or utilize entirely different principles that only resemble similar operations.”
She seems to be able to see perfectly well if she forms her holo-body. She was able to see her surroundings well enough to call the number and configuration of fingers Maxima was holding up, to shove a holo-arm through Ariana’s brain pan, etc.
Using only the light bee might be more subtle, since it is smaller, but it seems like the best course of action would be to go with the holo-body and enjoy the far better perception. After all, it seems to be unable to be harmed, and Sydney should be better at moving it around.
One problem with using Holo-Halo is… she could be easily seen, whereas ‘Bee is slightly sneakier
The Holo-Halo is certainly the better choice once she gets to the boat, as it allows her to gather far more information. But that needn’t rule out staying as the Light-Bee while travelling to the boat, when there isn’t as much to see and (potentially, depending on guard placement) a greater chance of being seen.
A really SMART and PARANOID evil villian (so probaby not these guys) would have a deadman swithch on the sleeping bodies collar. Cut the power and the electromagnet holding back the syringe of instant acting shellfish neurotoxin is realeased – or the solonoid holding back the spring loaded guilotine…
Dabbler:- “If we scrag the boat, either with EMP or by physical damage, we then can’t use it as a Party Boat!”
Maxima:- “Also, there may be other hostages. And I can’t believe you used the word ‘Scrag’. Why do you want the boat so much?”
Dabbler:- “Do I have to repeat my self? PARTY…..BOAT”
Mr Amorphous & Achilles:- “WOO HOO!!! PARTY BOAT! PARTY BOAT! PARTY BOAT!”
Hmm, thats an idea for an entry, have Achilles do a Drunked Frat Boy Chad approach onto the boat…….
Can’t cora just hack the shock collar or something?
… but that still leaves them in control of her body, and might break her connection with it, or her sense of where it is?
Doesn’t Harem know anything about this? Or are her powers fundamentally different, in some way?
Harem’s powers are completely different in every possible way.
She’d need access to the real body for that, wouldn’t she? Unless the remote is still around, and maybe she can somehow locate the body from that.
If they try to hack the collar by tinkering with the control box that Mr. All-Over-The-Place dropped, it might be rigged to send an alarm to those who are holding her body captive. Best to secure her body FIRST before trying to hack the collar so that they can take precautions to avoid such a situation.
If you’re in control of the body, you can just physically remove the collar.
Not if you are also restrained.
Who are we talking about being in control here? Because if it is Concretia she can be in control of her own body and also use her geokinesis to free her body from any restraints.
You are both officious and argumentative. I do not like you.
Try to have a little more self respect. I’m sure you’re worth liking, even if it is only by yourself.
Depends on how it’s been secured, and what tools/skills/time you have available. You may be able to remove it given a day in a well-equipped workshop, but that’s of limited use if you only have 15 minutes in the boat’s cabin before the guard gets back.
You can’t just remotely hack something that doesn’t receive any input other than “shock on”.
Easiest way to remotely hack and remove the shock collar is to bribe one of the henchmen who already has access to do it.
Cheaper way is to disguise yourself as a henchman, sneak on board, and remove the collar yourself.
First trick is finding the body. Second trick is ensuring that they do not have guards who unload a round into her head should they expect the collar to be broken.
Especially if that body might try to kill them or bring super heroes to make them a meaty paste when the public is not watching… Like their handler/boss had learned by “oops”
Their handler has unaccountably not been able to pass that information on.
Meanwhile, the drones following the henchmen are gathering intel for Cora. The henchies obviously have some place to report to, other than the NY minion unemployment office.
I’m absolutely sure Krona could hack it.
“Oh, shock on…. I think that ought to say, fastener off. Don’t you? Here we go….”
“But… that was a physical buckle, not any kind of electronic lock at all.”
“You’re right, it was. And now it’s not. So?”
Krona is definitely one of the most OP characters, I think that’s why she’s a Vi to justify only showing up rarely.
I’m not sure but I think Sydney might get just as easily disturbed if some guy put his thumbnail, with thumb & hand still attached to the rest of him, in her bra too…Frix being one notable exception.
Well, yeah… I think most women would….
And some men
Well, at least it was not a zombie one… and still wriggling.
I hear you on the “space” waffles etc. Dave. For a while now, lazy sci-fi writers add “quantum” in front of everything. Quantum energy, quantum interference, quantum toilet paper, you get it.
Sometimes it makes sense, but you can tell when that was intentional or coincidence. Still better than sci fi that takes random words they grabbed from a text book like an amp ray or oh no the monster is withstanding all fifty jeouls of our ray guns.
In the webcomic “Macho Guys Doing Macho Things (aka: thepunchlineismachismo-dot-com)” the main character Commander Badass is from the “non-descript space-future navy,” where everything is chrome. The trope is real enough…
Haven’t looked at that webic in… way too long, didn’t it end or something?
It went on a hiatus a few years ago. It seems unlikely that it will return soon. Too bad, it was one of my favorite webcomics.
The punchline is there are only so many jokes about machismo before it all just gets repetitive. :/
There was a lot of potential for developing the story there, but the comic ran until the author ran out of interest in the base subject.
I’d expect if the comic ever comes out of its hiatus, it will probably be with a very different take on how it moves forward.
Thought it was put on hiatus because the author had a job working on cartoons or something
From the “current” comic page author’s comment, “I had no ideas, no energy, no time, I just hit a breaking point where I was sick of putting up unfunny filler comics every week and needed to take a break to sleep and play a videogame to make a videogame joke about hahaha.”
Digging a bit, I see she made a post on Patreon about it back in 2019 November. That reads more like burnout on account of trying to get a paying job outta another project she was working on. In any event, she mostly seems to be doing stuff on Slipshine.
I’m kind of torn on that. I’d like to be supportive. I mean, that’s why I signed up on Patreon despite her going on indefinite haitus before I found MGDMT. But Slipshine’s apparently an IP for hire sort of place, and I have a bunch of complicated feels about that shit I don’t even know how to verbalize. Maybe I could use some straight talk from Rock Lobster to set me straight on that, but I don’t see him around all that much lately.
That said, I first heard of Slipshine because of Damn You Willis, and he definitely makes comics actively that aren’t restricted to Slipshine users. That suggests to me it’s about how much motivation and inspiration she’s feeling about MGDMT.
Maybe we’ll have some updates after a bit. I’ve seen some comics come back after longer haituses. Who knows?
Yeah, 2019 sounds about last time checked it out
Quantum Entanglement: Space Bordello
followed by; Quantum Entanglement 2: Space Bordello Boogaloo
and Quantum Entanglement 3: Space Bordello Boogaloo Harder
But my favorite was Quantum Entanglement 4: One Knight in the Space Bordello.
A common issue with power copiers, a new outlook means trying out feats the original didn’t even consider.
Remember that time Whats’hertits* ‘borrowed’ Iceman’s body? When she finally gave it back, she had taght him some new tricks with his slushie-powers (heck, he wasn’t even ‘Ice’man before then, more ‘Fluffy Snow-man’, now he was ‘Spikey-Ice Man’)
*can visualize her, just… all her names are playing ‘fuck you, leave us alone!’ with me right now :(
you mean Emma Frost? Where she showed how Iceman could do things like become completely water, join a river, and come back as ice? Thus proving Bobby was an Omega?
So he was Otto from Trek too?
Something similar happened with Husk, where someone took over HER body, and she was husking into stuff like FIRE and gaseous forms, which Paige herself was never able to do because she didnt know how.
Yeah, the ironically named White Queen (remembered just before falling asleep :( )
Not ‘Ironically’. Named as such, due to ties to the Hellfire Club. She was also named as Black King and Black Queen, based on where her position of power was within the club itself as one could rise and fall in the origanization. So it’s based on Chess.
Was referring to her real name: “Emma Frost”
Ahh. Pardon. Though the conversation does bring to mind theories I had on different mutant powers, if they were taken to logical conclusions. Like the a-fore mentioned Iceman. I know in DC with Captain Freeze, everyone originally thought it was just an ice-gun.
Nope. It was a cold gun. In-universe, the gun itself literally slowed/stopped molecular thermal action, causing the molecules themselves to hit absolute zero. Ice/Frost was just a byproduct.
Magneto could, at some points in the older comics [90s/00s] even screw with the Earth’s magnetic field, and if they went by current science, that would include electromagnetism… which the brain itself generates in minute quantities.
Used to be a little mental exercise I’d do, picking various powers and extrapolating how far one could go with them.
Also, blood typically has minute amounts of iron in them, they kinda weakarse touched on that in the… second(?) X-Men movie when Mystique injects that guard with what looks to have been mercury (or some other type of liquid metal)
Yeah some like Magneto and Storm saw their powers rise and fall based on writer creativity and enforced nerfing at times because Marvel can’t decide if they want balanced or hyper powerful characters. Magneto is a prime example as with full electromagnetic power he can manipulate all forms of electromagnetic radiation, including gamma rays, light, charge particles in the air for energy attacks, heck he could even bend light and turn invisible at one point and hear radio waves
Or trying out feats the original attempted when they were too young to pull it off, and just accepted it wasn’t something they could do, which sounds like this particular case.
Focusing on doing two things at once is difficult. Most human minds have no reason to do that, since we only have one body, and we have one side we’re much better at using than the other. But doing things with two bodies is a level beyond just doing unrelated things with each of your hands.
I’d guess that Hench Wench has experience with a power that allowed her to get beyond that, regardless of whether she has a power like that now. Or, considering her coordination when she came out with that move, I’d guess she *doesn’t* actually have a power like that, but did before, to open her mind up to the possibility more.
mean, I could imagine attempting what she attempted without having had such experience. But I imagine the first effort would have even less coordination than what she demonstrated. I remember when I first tried doing unrelated things with my hands at the same time. I was actually part of a group who were all challenged to do this, and it wasn’t just me who had a lot of difficulty doing it. Even those who were ambidextrous had difficulty. They actually got frustrated and quit before I did.
Maybe she’s been practicing it in secret every chance she had ever since she gained Concretia’s power set. Maybe she’s had Concretia’s power set longer than we think she’s had it.
That said, I will admit that the whole superhero genre has a lot of examples of people who gained additional limbs and immediately started using them as adroitly as if they’d had years of practice with them.
Hench Wench knows that she’s inexperienced with this power so something being difficult is normal for her. It’s also possible she stumbled upon this because she didn’t know how Concretia does anything and happened upon a more efficient way to use the power.
That said Hench having a way to optimise any powers would make sense.
The far more common trope is the “You just borrowed my powers, I’ve been using them for years!”
Super Skrull fell prey to this many times.
Not exactly a borrowed power example, but I recall the FF’s Human Torch being schooled by the original, android version of the Human Torch in a battle, by hitting him with “different temperature” fireballs that actually hurt him, however that’s supposed to work when you’re supposedly immune to all fire while in your flaming form… Comic writers have a fine tradition of making up shit that doesn’t even make a little sense and using it to justify their plot points.
Yeah that is the older and more common as a result version.
I think the power copier displaying new feats trope came about as an excuse to show off new ideas on how to use the powers and give an excuse for the original to start doing them too after so many years of only using their powers in specific ways and not showing any training or hints at diversifying them. The idea isn’t a bad one, the idea being they either didn’t think they could, were so young when they got their powers that they never tried again to do something they couldn’t before; or basically just got too comfortable using their powers a specific way it just never occurred to them to even try or that they could do something different.
Although another way around that is more often the moment of “what did I just do?” or “I didn’t know I could do that?” when in training suddenly do something by reflex or like a strengthened muscle from being exercised. Astral muscle I guess, or by accident a “wait…if I shock the radio and keep my shocker going I can hear and tune into different radio frequencies…the hell?”
Amazing page.
And phew, I am sloowly stopping to feel queasy.
Dave, that was not really …. smooth.
True, it had chunks and nails in it ;)
Yeah those humanshake making bullets didn’t worked as advertised. Cora should ask for a refund.
Well, she bought them from Kablam Corp, aka Space Walmart.
Wait, isn’t Kablam Corp from near the base of the “Carina-Sagitarius” arm? Like, the wrong side of the galactic center? I admit they have some impressive ordinance (and some stuff that makes this look kind of tame), but I prefer to get my stuff from a bunch closer.
Sirius Cybernetics may have a bunch of wonkiness issues with all of their products, but it’s easily enough to wow the locals. I mean, yeah, their ray guns somehow shoot visible light that’s surprisingly difficult to use to tag the broad side of a barn, but it stops most of the yokels around here in their tracks (admittedly, mostly due to their jaws dropping to the ground rather than any direct effec), it’s *unlikely* to require excessive paperwork just for using it, and they’re not that far away.
Just remember to ‘Share and Enjoy’ your ray guns with Genuine People Personalities!
So, the other goons ran. I don’t blame them after what Cora did. I would to.
The guy who was menacing Sydney needed to die. HOW she did it was extreme and the fact that she grandstanded while doing it was a bit off putting, but I am actually a bit pleased that she let the minions flee. Wholesale slaughter is not actually a very good thing outside a battlefield and sometimes not even ON one. What better way to find a hidden base of bad guys than to follow fleeing henchmen?
Unless of course, said goons read anything dealing with operational security. In which case, Cora better have something/someone following them.
Um, yeah…Since Cora let them go, they’ll have to try rescuing Concretia’s body quickly. All it would take is for one of them to make a phone call & then Concretia is in deadly danger…
Why’s that? All they saw was their boss get blown up and they ran. They didn’t see Cora having a conversation with Concretia.
A logical assumption on their part is that her form got destroyed after they ran.
If they have a higher intelligence than the standard evil henchman they should question why she let them run.
“Because she was busy fighting Concretia” would be a seemingly plausible explanation,
That could work, so long as they both managed to put on a convincing show for the spectators without any prior coordination.
Considering the way Cora said “don’t worry about them”, I suspect they won’t be making calls.
which leaves three real options.
tracer was put on them,
a neural disrupter was used on them so they forgot what happened, or the forget juice in the needle that was still there was used,
or she is going to remotely detonate their heads or something.
options A and B being the more tactical.
but in all this still feels time sensitive, given her “handler” was killed and won’t be reporting in any time soon, leaving Concretia suspect to his death by willing to kidnap and torture supers to work us dime store Hellfire Club/The Hand/Court of Owls.
Yes, there does seem to be a time constraint here. Concretia doesn’t seem like a bad person, just trapped by bad people.
I do wonder what would happen if she voluntarily leaves the LLC that is powering Hench Wench? Some LLCs have options to do so, but such evil scum as employed ‘Daddy’ likely would not have put such a clause in any contracts.
Also… What was the REST of Cora’s crew doing while she is saving Sydney?
Fundamental part of contracts: all contracts can be broken.
Human laws usually do not enforce contract provisions that require death to exit the contract. At least in our world, The US legal system (with a possible exception for Louisiana, because it’s frequently exempted from blanket statements about the US legal system made by the law school my ex went to) generally prohibits such clauses. That doesn’t necessarily stop people from making such a contract, but it can cause a judge to throw out a newly filed case before the first hearing. (That would only happen if the law suit was specifically to request the court enforce such a provision, due to severability clauses being pretty close to universal on US contracts, especially those that attempt such shenanigans.)
FOOTNOTE: Louisiana law descends from France’s Napoleonic law, so many of the base assumptions of US English-derived law need caveats there.
Henchie was the one who wrote the L.L.C. contract, or sure as hael involved (remember, she knew more about it than her seemingly-at-the-time boss, JuggerNot)
“Disrupter” is such an unpleasant word for anything about to be used on the body.
Never purchase from the insano weapon depot the Guided Rectal Disruptor Pocket Missiles.
As far as Cora letting the two henches run off, I wouldn’t be surprised if during the gore fest she didn’t sneak some sort of tracker on them so they can lead her back to their home base.
It would definitely make sense if she did.
andalites are blue, but I’ll probably be hunted for the rest of my life for suggesting them
Klingons are red,
Andalites are blue;
Sydney’s feeling horrible,
How about you?
The Tau from 40k are also blue, but I don’t know if even the Doom demons can handle 40k
Doom is a prequel to 40k so yes they certainly can handle it.
Wait, what? That means Doom is in the Warcraft universe as well
Source please?
I checked through some googling and the two aren’t owned by the same company. and neither’s production history references the other. and according to Wikipedia have different designers, creators.
Doom:
*Designers*
John Romero
Tom Hall
Sandy Petersen
Kevin Cloud,
originally made by id software. current owner: Zenimax media
Warhammer 40k
made by: Games Workshop, Citadel Miniatures, Forge World
main designer: Rick Priestley
-game created based on a previous fantasy Warhammer series.
Spin-offs include: Space Hulk, Battlefleet Gothic, and Dawn of War
The two franchises are not related.
Eh, they’re supposed to be the good guys of their series, but they’re still kinda dicks. Accidentally enabling the Yeerks was unfortunate, but outlawing all forms of generosity toward any non-Andalite was a massive overreaction. And then there was the outright war crime of the genocide of the Hork-Bajir…
I’ve seen tons of gruesome and gore, but I have never had to deal with body parts disconnected from the body. Well aside from that guy’s face after the flatbed trailer incident, but technically it was still attached, along one edge.
Statement from a trucker relative of mine:
“You see one cop pick up a head and put it down by the side of the road, and you don’t look at wrecks any more, ever!”
“I’ve got fingers on my blisters!”
Who said “I’ve got blisters on my fingers!” – that line sounds familiar.
Oh yeah wait. The Beatles.
“Don’t worry about the hench men that ran off”.
I’m betting that means they got some kind of tracker on them.
I hope so. If she didn’t, she did something really stupid
since cora is familiar with dabbler, i am assuming she is also familiar with some earth tech, like cell phones, so i bet she tagged them to track, and also block communications, so they have to report in person, meaning at least the boss they report too
Nothing ruling out Henchie not having some extra power to let her split focus
Maybe Harem works for Bad Guys R Us, LLC. Of course, Hench probably would have used teleportation before now if it was in her arsenal. She could be saving it for a dire moment, but she…doesn’t seem big on self restraint.
Last panel. Concretia feels dumb because she hadn’t thought of doing that herself before, I assume.
Oh, and that cleanser isn’t going to do anything about Syd’s clothes. I wonder if she found her utility belt and neck communicator?
Will anyone eventually ask Cora how she knew Syd was in trouble?
1: Yes that is the implication.
2 & 3: I am more curious how no one else with a working com (Heatwave, Achilles, Amorphous) Dabbler given the overlap of time especially with the scene of Maxima fighting Henchwench at this point in the screen is only happening now may still be knocked out; but those other three should have gotten the partial “Concretia is..” before the loss of contact, and tried to call back but got nothing; and Sydney’s phone was used for the call…which means an additional, the bad guy’s phone number is in her phone’s memory and that information can be used to find out who this guy was and follow leads from there.
Meatcrete makes think of the old Necroscope books where the vsmpires would literally build their giant flying fortresses and whatnot out of still living victims, using their shape-shifting capabilities.
My first thought was the wall of bodies from 300.
Keep meaning to watch the original black&white movie, have had the DVD for awhile now…
OK! So, Cora just let them go!? I really hope she is actually tracking them and its not her bravado talking. Otherwise I would be extremely pissed at her.
Well, she could have messaged Dabbler, ARCLight, or both while heading to Sydney’s location, so that could be why she’s not concerned; she’s just the loud breacher at the front door while the rest of the squad cover the exits.
Hopefully that is the case. Dabbler was mentioned in Sydney’s invisible person conversation. The concern I have is that it might have been to loud of a knocking at the front door. The shadowy organization of Orgy Masks R Us might come to the same conclusion that Cora has disclosed information to the authorities. So, if the baddies want to stay hidden they have to cut losses, and by cut losses, I mean execute everyone involved and try again months or years later (if they are patient). Cora being gung-ho is good short term but long term it just lets the baddies react and stay hidden longer.
We can’t forget that she also has a crew of people she commands, so while she came in for the direct assault, they could be waiting to restrain anyone that attempts to leave. This also would include anyone from ARCHON, friendly aliens, or others who weren’t preoccupied in the battle.
I can picture an angry Frixx, not being able to go in to save Sydney, applying some maintenance tools to “fix” their little consciousness issue. Or is Frixx still off world?
I’d read that phrase
“Don’t worry about them”
as a succinct way of changing the subject without saying out loud
“You, Concretia, should not worry about the operational details, which are none of your business because you are an enemy thrall at the moment.”
Tracking seems like the safe bet,
and not, when no one was looking she fired micro-needles made of nanites into the backs of their necks that spread through their sensory nerve centers in the brain and motor functions and are sending back visual and environmental data to the ship to track and observe from their perspective and when the time is right could flip a switch to gain manual control of their bodies to operate them like avatars via their motor function centers with their will power a non-issue as it is completely bypassed and they are mere helpless observers in their own bodies. Utilizing their bodies to remove Concretia’s restraints and escort her to safety, or launch a surprise attack from within while another extraction team moves in among various plans.
-same tech could also be used to shut them down *asleep or death* or make them kill themselves, but hey, the nanites could also deactivate after the operation if anyone is squeamish.
That said, they are just henchmen so might not even have this access, so watching where they go from a drone is just as effective.
Although I still think they were given the memory wipe so as far as they know none of this happened and they are waiting wherever they were before and wandering where their boss guy wandered off to.
If concretia has not under surveillance at all time, I’m sure she could just contact Archon and ask for rescue at any time and receive it.
Oh, Concretia, we have *all* had moments like that, and yah just never stop feeling stupid about it. XD
“Wait, this thing does *THAT* and I’ve been doing it the hard way all this time? FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF…”
Now I really want her to join in with the good guys.
The best meatcrete may be what the xenomorphs use in their nests. You can’t go wrong with Giger if you want creepy. Not only do they use their own freaky forms in meatcrete they also decorate with their victims. That’s taking meatcrete to the next level.
Can’t believe you forgot the Asari from Mass Effect for blue aliens.
Ah, right. Sometimes you just blank on the obvious stuff. I call it the gameshow effect, where someone asks an obvious question and you seize up because of the pressure and time limit.
“Name a state that begins with ‘M'”
“Uh….. Muuuu…. Uh… Mountain?”
Nothing sums that up as well as this clip: https://youtu.be/LlCEmPF4-V0
I know there is a term for forgetting something because you weren’t thinking about it and someone asked you out of the blue. There is also a related term for a massive brain fart where in a situation like that someone tells you something you know can’t be true but you end up believing it and going along with it because of the situation and their authority…I know the term back fire effect applies if this gets too serious and you reject corrective information as if it were a mental threat as a mental defense mechanism.
but the general, gameshow effect you mention is something else.
there is also lethologica, where a word is on the tip of your tongue but you just can’t remember it.
(I suffer this so much when writing, especially if tired or writing a particularly “wordy” or intellectual character and just that …I know this word…Its right there…try to spell it out…*worse when spell check can’t figure it out and I have to go check the online dictionaries to try and find it taking me out of the scene I was writing; but it has to be done, can’t have characters saying things they wouldn’t say just because I’m too lazy and fill in a different term).
which may be what you mean, but I know there is another term for “I forgot because I was asked out of no where about it”.
And the Pantorans, Chiss, Ortolans, Togruta (They come in most of the same colors as Twi’leks)…
@DaveB, I’m guessing there’s an interstellar company either called ‘Space’ (or ‘S.P.A.C.E.’) or has a division called that, that does all the galactic white label goods that start product names with Space.
Astro and Galactik/Galactic, are owned by other such companies and applied to their white labelled products.
They are everywhere, they even infiltrated our TV-programmes like Star Trek (“S.P.A.C.E, the final frontier.” talk about hidden advertising).
They’ve infiltrated all our keyboards, too. Guess which key is made by them.
Actually, S.P.A.C.E isn’t the only company putting hidden advertising in Star Trek.
The greeting, where they hold up their hand with the ‘split’ between fingers…
That’s sponsored by PSA Peugeot to sell Citröen cars.
The fact that the show also airs in the USA where those cars aren’t officially sold is just a bit of a smokescreen.
It has also caused some discerning Americans to import used Citröens themselves.
Let’s croak us some toads!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyKI1CHPMNw
Interestingly, there is a Kiwi comic-actor named ‘Willy DeWitt’, no idea who came first though…
That would explain a lot.
After this,Sydney must face the ultimate evil known as….the Karen!!!!!
STOP GIVING THE GM IDEAS, SYDNEY!
yea Syd is so Genre savvy that she can point out facets of others powers that they haven’t thought of it’s a pretty handy skill
Seriously, Sydney is one of Archon’s most valuable assets for that reason alone. She’s had insights that even Dabbler missed.
“I feel so dumb.”
Don’t feel too bad about it “Rocky”, some things are just WAY more obvious to people looking in from the outside.
Sydney’s even made Dabbler feel dumb with having very simple but correct answers to supposedly difficult problems.
HenchWench is in for a major shock, once Sydney et-al rescue Concretia’s body and she abandons the LLC as she was only a member by force, the ConcreteHench will solidify, with Wenchie trying to make it move whilst still 1 on 1 with Maxima.
Andorian and Bolian are both blue aliens, fairly old in media too.
Alternate to the skit at the bottom:
C: “How do you know it’s a thumbnail?”
S: “Because it’s got a little picture on it.”
Reminds me of the time two drums and a cymbal fell off a cliff.
Teleport the body, leaving the collar behind. Naturally, no one here will consider the attack ‘teleport the opponent body, leaving its clothing behind’.
… How?
I’d be stunned if Dabbler didn’t ahve a spell for that.
However, even if she didn’t, she could repurpose the full-strength version of the one that dissolved Br(umlaut)t’s clothes.
Then, if it fit in aq small enough pdelivery package, the spell could be delivered by Harem or Halo.
I wonder, if the clothes are dissolved from Concretia’s real form, what happens to the simulacra of clothing on the statues…?
Better yet, teleport the collar away. That’s something Harem can actually do because it’s within her weight limit. :)
So many questions asked on previous pages have just been answered.
1) How was HW able to animate both her body and the golem at the same time/split her consciousness?
2) Does Concretia know where her body is, and if so why doesnt she just go back into it or into something close to it to fight?
3) What happened to the other two guys?
4) Does Concretia know anything about the other supers at the fight? (she clearly does since she knows Hench Wench’s name)
5) Where is Concretia’s body being held? (the fact that it’s on a boat means there’s probably nothing around her body that she can possess in order to free herself)
Yay for answers!
Also yay that I was right about several of them (I was wrong about if Concretia knew where her body was – I guessed that she didnt)
There was some discussion about the history of concrete boats several pages back* – now we know the real reason concrete vessels were abandoned!
* when Concretia appeared again or maybe when HenchWench started cretebending?
Andorians have a nice pale blue.
This reminds me of the old Dave Barry article titled Body Parts in the News where a restaurant worker found two crows pecking at a human thumb and had the natural reaction of throwing it in the dumpster. I guess that’s Florida for you.
Assuming that some proportion of alien races developed marketing patterns similar to ours, there would have been a period when “space” carried connotations of new and exotic, and space-related names would have been slapped on a bunch of products. Fast-forward to a time when those races are integrated into galactic society, and “space” labels are still around, but they’re playing on nostalgia for the era of exploration.
As a brand name, “Space Cleanser” is sort of equivalent to “Granddad’s Gunk Getter” (to invent a hypothetical Earth product). It’s meant to evoke thoughts of old-fashioned, get-the-job-done practicality.
Also, you know there’s shock involved when people’s hair goes Miyazaki.
Sydney is really good at discovering auxiliary powers… i wonder if max had an session with her about that.
ps: damn is really difficult to clean that much gore.
There must be an Evil Overlord Rule that says when low-level henchmen return to HQ without their squad leader, assume the Good Guys let them go with a tracking bug, and act accordingly.
Unless they have a cellular organization where the cell members only know their immediate leader and thus can’t betray the greater organization.
Hm. Yes. Good point.
Perhaps a *really* evil overlord would direct mooks who lost their immediate leader to go somewhere not terribly valuable and push the button clearly labelled “Contact Bigger Boss”, which promptly explodes.
Really evil, not necessarily really effective. You go that route, you lose any intel they may be bringing back.
How about we steal some tech from the ‘good guys’, in the shape of Mission Impossible‘s exploding phone handsets? Give each operative numbers to contact the others in the cell, plus one for the person to whom their cell reports, plus those of anyone who reports to them. In a three-per-cell hierarchy, that’s six people, not all of whom need be known as more than a number.
And we give them an extra number, to be used only for emergency reporting when normal upward channels are lost. Calls within the ‘normal’ numbers are perfectly safe. A call to the emergency number primes the handset grenade. And it’s up to Central whether they set off that grenade, and if so whether they tell the operative in time to take the handset away from their head.
rewinn, that would certainly have entertainment value. Minions who can survive have a lot of potential value. They may be your next evil mid level manager. An effective evil organization would have an anonymous contact point for operationally isolated minions.
Hmm…is DaveB deflecting on his own foreshadowing there? Someone who can split focus…like Harem?
Ooh, was that a Marvel RPG reference there? What a great underrated gaming system from the 80’s way ahead of its’ time. I’m pretty sure it’s out of copyright too, so you can download every published book as a PDF online somewhere.
The only superhero RPG game I’ve ever played was Abberant, which was easy to pick up on because I was already used to the Storyteller RPG system. It’s a pretty good game.
DaveB should think about making a Grrlpower RPG system for his world too :) I’d definitely buy it.