“Striking Sparks” — Page Fifty-Six
Happy New Year and welcome back to 3 Minute Max – Crisis Strike!
As a number of readers have speculated might happen, Max is indeed doing a literal flashback to Crisis Strike HQ in order to pump out some heartbeats, flush a little lactic acid, oxygenate the red cells, and get a fresh jolt of brain juice. He’s also grabbing the oxyacetylene welding equipment seen at the beginning of this ep — seems he’s got a plan in mind!
Oh, and it also involves a mop bucket full of slime, but not entirely by choice. Sometimes you gotta work with what’s available.
More below!
Bobservations
A Quick Pit Stop
In case you were wondering how our Holiday Break went, it is currently forty-five minutes until this comic goes live and I am still waiting for Max to send the final art for this page. Of course, I was frantically working on it myself yesterday, well into the evening, so it’s not like either of us have been slacking. And we did get some good work done on roughs and general planning for the next few pages. But it is just the nature of Holiday Breaks — you have this idea that you are going to build up this huge buffer and get some breathing room, and it doesn’t actually happen. Life (and doing fun guest art for other comics) just gets in the way.
I’m not really worried though. Max always comes through. The Vote Incentive art may take a bit longer, but hey, first things first.
Still, if the idea of the Holiday Break was to get a brief respite from pressure and come back revitalized, that it did do. Max and I got to spend some Family Time together instead of Work Time, festivities were enjoyed, and I am ashamed to say a certain number of unnecessary calories were consumed. I’ve been trying to find that Magic Spot on the floor where the bathroom scale registers about seven pounds lighter — you know the spot, you probably have one yourself — but it seems to have vanished. All I can find is the Jovian Gravity Zone, and that’s too grim to be borne, at least without squinching my eyes half shut while checking the readout. Still, that’s what New Year’s Resolutions are for.
On the upside, I’m really quite jazzed about our plans for the next few pages. I hope the weather cooperates, because I’ve got some special stuff to shoot if I possibly can. It’s going to be as busy as Crisis Strike HQ around here for a while, so stay with us! Should be a spectacular 2015!
— Bob out
Addendum: And at 29 minutes to deadline, the page comes in! That’s my boy. We are living the Countdown moniker!
wait… the metal wont go. so… suddenly unpressurized flammable gas and a puddle of water. hmmm
That’s not entirely true…. acetylene explodes spontainiously at 30 psi, so it is stabilized by dissolving it into acetone soaked cork. The cannister would stay behind, but the acetone/acetylene/cork would go, where the acetylene would fizz out like CO2 from a shaken soda. Cool, but not exactly an immediate cloud of flammable vapor.
*swears at educated readers; swiftly Googling acetylene tank construction, agamassan, acetone, pressure, and accidents* You are correct, Balthazar, damn you, but it looks like the design with the porous substrate is primarily for safety if the tank is dropped or cracked — having it vanish altogether should still give us a fairly good spew. At least within the bounds of comic book physics!
Like diet coke and mentos soaked in marshmallow suddenly minus the bottle.
okay, so he already knows where to have them aim it for best effect, gotcha. I was worried that it was about to be used to set up an explosion. heh.
That said, they should probably start making/stockpiling non electromagnetic versions of common items, ceramic ladders and tools for punching through things, planks to make bridges out of, ect. and teach everyone sign language so he can ask for things on the fly!
also, that explains the lack of echo and still having a gurgle to them in “empty” acetylene tanks.
I Hope that bucket and oxyacetylene welding equipment and more importantly tanks are not made of metal or else Virgil’s yet unspoken objection is going to end up with a puddle of dirty water and two large clouds of oxyacetylene in a room with a ignition source.
Or perhaps Balthazar might beat me to the punch with a more science based resolution with a lack of explosions, looks like you can stop prepping the explosion room Bob. no fun for you. :/
It’s been awhile since I’ve seen a residential-sized mop bucket made of metal. They’re all plastic with metal handles nowadays. So I suspect that Max will still have his bucket of water on the other end, just with no handle. I hope he’s smart enough to not be holding it by that handle when he ports over, or he won’t have it for long.
That just leaves me wondering how he figures that bringing an expanding cloud of acetylene into a fire scene which is already choked with toxic gasses could possibly be a good thing. Can’t wait to see how this works out!
Don’t forget he did tell everyone to barricade into a small room. I think he is going for the boom. the water might be simply to put himself out. It could also be to shock cool the glass. though to be honest I doubt the glass is hot enough for that to work. of course comic book physics are in play.
I’d suggest wearing safety glasses, but you can pop an incandescent light bulb with three drops of really cold water. Of course I found out without safety glasses as a 14yo kid. I’m really surprised I survived my childhood sometimes.
HA! I found out the same way, with a water gun, and then rediscovered it later by spitting.
Same thing here, water gun!
Nnnno! I won’t try that! Hnnng!
These light bulbs are on their way to extinction, every one of them is too valuable.
2014/11/23 for the last comic he was herding people in. Would be funny if the windows survived after this like that indestructible coconut from Loony Tunes.
I don’t know what Max is planning, but glancing through the comments indicates to me that this isn’t going to be pleasant 🙁
Hmm… He ordered to barricade in a small room… And he can’t break the glass… And he teleports explosive acetylene in… Dayum. That is one hell of a plan probably rivaling Creed’s tactical genius here.
Hey, what about “Everything comes back, even the air in your lungs.”? If Max takes the container with him, they can’t cut the connection – what will they have at their hands once the the exploded acetylene-oxygen-mix comes back??
Smoke. And other fumes.