“Striking Sparks” — Page Sixty-Six
Our hero is a mess. For that matter, so is the Strike Gate, after backporting all the soot, CO2, water vapor, uncombined gas molecules and other explosion residue. Some serious repair work called for in both cases. And apparently the job’s not over.
There is time for a drink, however! St. Paddy’s-themed Vote Incentive!
More below!
Bobservations
Battered and Fried
I’m awfully hard on my heroic characters sometimes. Even in this particular story, where Max hasn’t had to actually kill anybody, he still ends up bashed and burned. And if you ever read The Owl (or for that matter, GyreWorld) you’ll know that painfully pummeling the protagonist just seems to be part of my creative process. Although to be fair, a lot of the primary-character punishment in GyreWorld was scribed by my sister, who apparently shares my proclivities.
It’s probably an Irish thing. Or possibly not, but saying so allows me to segue into the fact that St. Paddy’s is one of my favorite times of year. I stay away from the drinking part these days, but I will indulge in the occasional Shamrock Shake. And since St. Paddy’s tends to coincide with things like Lent and Passover, various culinary indulgences like gefilte fish, coconut-covered marshmallows, and fried cod sandwiches tend to be offered at discount prices. All guilty pleasures. I’m afraid that, yes, I do myself some damage during this period. But it is fun damage, unlike what is pictured above.
I’m a person who has to go on a diet after Lent.
And I’ll be plenty hard on myself at that point, you may be sure.
But for for right now, Sláinte, pass the potatoes, and fire up the Boondock Saints!
— Bob out
“In my medical opinion, you are seriously BANGED UP SIR!”
Gee doc, what makes you say that?
Was it the flaming hair? or maybe the fact that he looks like he made an orbital drop WITHOUT powered armor?
Dr. Sharma is flawlessly proficient at the art of the understatement.
Is it possible that Sharma is sampling the wares? On a reread he comes across as… stoned. Maybe the constant failure of his espionage has taken it’s toll.
On the other hand, he might be finally gelling with the team is his new role as Dr Feelgood.
I freely admit I’ve been basing Sharma a bit on Walter Bishop. 🙂
Awesome page. It’s interesting to me how much I enjoyed reading this even though it’s post-action, not tremendously story-advancing, etc. I guess the obvious candidate for why I like it so much is the need to have a place to exhale after all that. Also it reveals that he gets the fact that he now clearly knows that he owes Sophie his life, which is a nice bit of near-symmetry.
Bit rambly, but just wanted to say that it was really fun to read this one.
Thank you very much! Everyone should read Brian’s webcomic as well- it’s a rather gripping read and lavishly illustrated: http://www.brian-shearer.com/williamthelast/. I enjoy Brian’s own commentary on being slammed with work, life, and THEN somehow finding time and energy to draw a webcomic… it’s a sacrifice I know too well!
Just want to be clear, I’m not Brian, just a fan that can’t believe that awesome comic isn’t getting more traffic. (I just want to make sure no one starts mistakenly attributing my comments to him, or his work to me.) Like you say, Brian has interesting life-and-process comments too–not likely to compare to what we get here with details about how to make explosives 🙂 🙂 :)…I mean…special effects, but still–it’s a great comic, and we all need something to do while we’re waiting for our next fix here :).
oops! Well, regardless, everybody should read everybody’s awesome webcomics 🙂
Wot those guys above me said & a nice view of Marissa’s privately held assets.
Definitely a great view of Marissa and her privately held assets
What is killing me is that I somehow missed the private assets until they were pointed out. Guess I was worried about how in the heck Max is gonna salvage that note from a collapsing building in his condition…
The note is back at the airfield the old guy took off from.
He isn’t going to have to, the pilot put the note in the drawer of is desk at the airfield, not in the city hall.
I’ll make them a little more obvious next time! Can’t have these things being overlooked 🙂
Oh, that’s right! It’s been awhile since we saw the copter!
Actually he underlooked them.
Even though the viewpoint was also underlooking.
There was a confluence of underlooking.
Aww, I bet that getting some little “I knew it!” moments for the true detectives among us and a reason to go back and look it up (you could always drop a hint to the specific page in the page-comment, like the creator of Magellan often does) for those who are less eagle-eyed and without a photographic memory* would be fun, also.
*: I’m surely not one of them – I thought there was something to find on this this page but there was nothing…
There comes, on occasion, times when Marissa’s privately owned assets are over/underlooked. Being blown through a safety glass window to the roof of the parking structure across the street, having both shoulders dislocated, a laundry list of other injuries.. Max, you wuss.. assets! Right there!
Hovertext.
https://3mm-crisisstrike.com/3mmcomic/striking-sparks-page-thirteen/
explicitely shows us the note from the poor pilot. And, unless my lysdexia is strikingly bad today, that’s the top RIGHT drawer of the desk. The pilot’s ghost said top left. Good luck finding that note.
Uhh…
*Bob hastily fires up the Photoshop and works frantically*
Nope! Nope, pilot says top right. Must be your eyes. Whew! Had me worried there. 🙂
Wouldn’t have been a problem anyway – everyone’s natural first instinct if something is not in the drawer where they were told to look would be to start searching the other drawers, so it would only delay the finding of the note by a a bit. Unless, of course, the pilot’s *other* note, written to his mistress, was in that top *left* drawer and it gets misdelivered to his wife….ooops….
Just came across this today. I’m loving it.
Awesome! Thanks for joining us!
Now I’m in the mood for salsa.
Doc Sharma’s being a little generious with that morphine this time around, isn’t he? He’s usually bemoaning the fact that that’s the only arrow in his quiver.
…or a doctor who likes giving needles.
_Love_ the alt-text!! I haven’t laughed that hard in a while!
I don’t understand how Max is “banged up”. Didn’t we establish that his body molecules all return to the spots where they originally were pre-port, which would render him fully healthy no matter how much damage he took during a three-minute mission?
Gorram, all the molecules that were ported out do come back, but they don’t come back to the exact same spot. The very first time Max ported out and fought the punks in the warehouse, he used a scissors to cut his outer armor off. The armor backported with him, but came back in a pile behind him.
Huh! I’d forgotten that outer armor, and I guess so had Max, or he probably would have put it back on for this latest ‘port.
Max needs room to move and the overarmor wasn’t flexible. Also it needed repair and isn’t particularly fire resistant.
Max is ex military. It’s obvious that Max is going to build up specialized non-metallic gear eventually but he is still convincing the team that the Strike Gate can be useful for many time sensitive jobs other than hostage situations.
Virgil seems to be over-focused on hostage situations because one cost him his daughter. I am sure the Forwards have a plan in motion that develops all of this. I am still waiting to see Max grab a nightclub or a set of stone and wood tools for a trip out! I am eagerly awaiting the appearance of cheap Chinese bamboo lockpicks…
Just received my order of the ‘Owl”. …today..(11:30 am)…just finished the book (10:04 pm)…your right, your very hard on your main charters… At least Max has a doctor to fix dislocated hips, as opposed to the do-it-your-self of A. L’Hiboux.
Loved the book, now I want the next one..sigh…The ending…wow..didn’t see it coming.
Thank you for writing.
Glad I found the web comic, , your writing skill and your son’s art make this (I feel ) one on the better stories out there. Your commentarys are SO worth reading. I feel sorry for anyone who just reads the comic , and doesn’t get to enjoy them.
So again, Thank you Bob for the writing .
Man. Thanks so much! I (we) really appreciate it!
Woohoo! Thanks!
Love panel 2(Who wouldn’t?)!
Privately-held assets… mention of salsa… frak…
Assets covered in salsa… followed by fracking… Gurglegurlgedrool…
If the rules state that everything gets teleported back, even the air molecules and the acetylene gas… Then any air molecules that got teleported which a person or animal happened to breathe should get ripped right out of their cells. And the acetylene gas should get teleported back as un-oxidized gas molecules, ready to explode once again on the teleport back. (When it exploded it oxidized with air that did not get teleported.) The lab should be a smoking ruin now… right?
Molecules are not reassembled on backport, any more than our hero is. We supplied the oxygen in the original teleport so only a small amount of ambient air was used for the blast. Most of what gets teleported back is soot and water vapor.