Endtown by Aaron Neathery for September 30, 2015

Soo, Holly. What was that about wanting to ditch Kirby?

Now where are they going?

Holly: “It’s mine and you can’t have any.”Wally: “I think it’s time we sat down to have a little chat.”Kirbee: “Is it just me, or those Topsider ships something new?”Chic: “I hear voices in my head. What’s a ’Devil’s Tower?”Irving: “Now there’s something you don’t see every day, Chauncey.”Clive: “My name’s not Chauncey.”

When we met Holly, she seemed a more rational person. She’d found a measure of comfort and security in Endtown. But, like everyone there, she’d survived the war and everything after it. So, the Holly we’d met was dealing with the situation, trying to be positive. And it mostly worked. She supported Wally. Even helped Kowalski, who’d tried to take out her brain. But then the “milk trial” happened, and Holly’sisland of security…sank.

Those look like Bug Zappers. Carousel! Run Wally, Run! See Wally, Run!

Voting links for TopWebComics are in my profile. JusSayin

Oh! The “mothership” came and took them all away. Close encounters of the WORST kind. ;-)

Scotty beamed them up.

Maybe they’re just the local topsider dog catchers… ;-)

Happy now, Holly?

Now did they beam up the supplies too?I think Holly will be okay.She lost her mind, now she has it back.Crossroads are approachingWally will try some coachingHolly will complain.She will say she is not insane.Kirbee and Chic play games.To ignore the hunger pangs.

The dittos may have done their job. That looks more like two rocks than bags of supplies. Topsiders may have left it there believing the Mutts were just stupid and all it was were two rocks.At least till Clive gets pinged again. The next time Topsiders themselves may show up.When technology is insufficient refer back to Model 1 Information Gathering System. A human on the ground.

It looks like the TS have been busy indeed. This is a pretty big step beyond anything we saw in the strip up to the countdown arc. I’m guessing that the ships involve a scaling up of the technology used in the airscouts. Are these ships using some form of tractor beam? I was certain of it at first, but that should have caused everything to rise at the same time. The supplies seem to be remaining on the ground. Its possible that the mutts are equipped with some form of antigravity device and the light from the ship was a signal for them to engage the device.I am beginning to think that TS are automating the great mutant hunt. It could be that they feel they are suffering too many casualties. Its possible that the loss of people to suicide and a fairly low birth rate means that they are unwilling to risk anybody out in the wastes if they can avoid it. It would be interesting to hear from the TS on that matter.

Actually the looks seem instinctive. Wally’s seems to be asking, “why did you endanger us AND lead two members of our group to risk their lives over a plasticized brain?” Its hard to say what Holly’s sideways glance means. It could mean embarrassment at endangering the group or it could mean “don’t look at me like that!” I’m guessing the latter.

The Topsiders died on their way back to their home planet. The End.

It looks like the mutts left the supplies behind. which is great.But the big question in my mind is What was That all about? Seems like the mutts may have been lost and just happened upon our group, and the topsiders were looking for the lost mutts.

Holly is being incredably rude. Not thanking them and not even greeting them.Most people would have told them how brave they were and how much she feared they would be hurt or captured.Then hugged them all. I can’t figure out why Holly changed from the brave plucky mouse-girl into a mental case.Not just saying that, she really has gone and done a flip-out.She was so sweet and kind and so in love and bonded with Wally, and then she and Kirbee worked so well together to rescue Wally and getting out of Unity.

Well, Holly has had 2 really bad experiences lately. The milk trial and all that went with it and Unity was a nightmare situation.I hope that those are the supplies and not rocks. Since you can only live about 3 days without water, and there has been no sign of water Anywhere topside, if the supplies are gone the group will be too.Makes me wonder if they all die and a new arc with other people starts. I really hope not but it is conceivable. We haven’t seen Linda or Petey or or Al or what’s happening in end town.But I love all of our travellers We have had them for so long I hope they survive and get to the green area.WHich makes me wonder; with all the advanced technology, it would seem like the TS’s would have found it by now.

Oh dear. I think Wally is giving Holly the ‘we need to talk’ look.

Maybe this is an alternate Opabinia Queen 6.3, deconstructed, modded, copied, refitted with Scavenger MUTTs, because a recycling vessel needed drones to scour larger areas and bring the booty back to the recycler.

It’s Holly and the BrainHolly and the BrainOne is plasticThe other’s insane.

Along with the obvious, “oh poot, new and nastier TS tech” is the cranky hard SF side of me going, “oh poot, new and more fantasy-tech now in the story”. Not that I have a basic dislike for fantasy tech, but that it wasn’t really foreshadowed and is now thrown in to substaintially change the game. Even full-on fantasy can work if there is a inner consistancy (or establishes a consistant lack of consistancy) but, unless there is a good reason for the new reveal, it will fall into sloppy/ill-considered story-telling.

Maybe…the dittos are working, but not in the expected way. These visits have an unreal element to them. Suppose the dittos are responding to Holly’s fear for Clive (which may be the deeper fear of losing a infant) and projecting her hallucinations for everyone to “enjoy”. We’ve seen something like this when Wally was in the ring in Unity.

Against all odd, they survived.Now, Holly, what’s eating you?

That look on Wally’s face says it all… Holly knows she seriously F’ed up. And Wally is going to have to have a talk with Holly. Her irrationality is more of a danger than Kirbee’s happy-go-lucky clumsiness to their safety.Even with Ditto protection, stupid risks like that are best avoided.

I’m not sure about Holly’s look – is she ashamed or slightly looney?

Holly’s PTSD is making her bond to Clive a little strong.

If top-siders have the technology to make silent drive in hoverships without rotors or wings (anti gravity?) and tractor beams to pull MUTTS off the desert floor, they should be able to locate and destroy any mutant colony they wish with relative ease.

Holly, next time you go and get the brain!!

Have to disagree with your interpretation Darwinskeeper. So far the tech has been more or less consistant, the only surprises have been in the profligate quantities of items(masses of transports, mutts, drones, and a whole decoy launch complex, the rocket was not special, just demonstrated far more resource than Flask had been lead to believe). The scout’s propulsion hasn’t been explained, but could well be some kind of thruster, but if the TSers had any kind of grav-tech, then why bother with rockets, missiles, or rotor wing drones heretofore? On the other hand, if Arron has a major plot reveal, this all might get explained.

I still think it’s a colony of mutts, airscouts, and transporters who have regained their consciousness and created a new community.

The ships aren’t necessarily that advanced. They could be dirigibles. Or they could be dimensionauts from a more advanced universe.

Steve Gallacci,You do have a point about these new ships. If they have access to the technology to build them — whether it involves some sort of “grav-tech” or some sort of advanced thruster — then they wouldn’t need rockets to launch satellites and they should have incorporated this technology into the drones. One guess would be that the technology (assuming that it wasn’t based on Airscout design) was so new that the TS didn’t have it when the satellites were launched or when the drones were designed. It could also be that the TS have an internally secretive structure where different TS groups may not be aware of what other groups are doing. The satellite launching group and the drone designers may not have been aware of this technology and were unable to use it.A third, somewhat less likely, possibility is that the TS have a limited amount of the material needed to make these ships work. Thus they didn’t consider it worth using on satellite launches or the expendable drones. That doesn’t explain why these ships merited the new technology. If we see the TS having large numbers of these things, this option is off the table.Darwinskeeper

I like to think the mutts are as happy as their little fixed smiles make them out to be. A little plasticized brain lobotomy, remove free will, make them perpetually happy. Sure they go around murdering mutants without a second thought, but- they’re happy. They don’t understand right and wrong anymore.