Endtown by Aaron Neathery for April 08, 2016

Hasn’t Lynn looked straight at Wally before? What’s up with that?

Is that a mouse tail I see vanishing around the corner in panel 4?

He’s giving them a look like he blames the four of them for all this. (And if Lyn is self-aware in this Life-of-Holly play, are we even sure it is Lyn?)

How long will this ditto nightmare go on? Don’t know who i’m more worried about- Holly, Wally, Kirbee, or Lynn. Great job getting us to care about your characters, Aaron!

I think she may have had the baby.

Eye see you.

Blink and you miss it.

Well one thing’s for sure. THIS is definitively where she lost the child. Very cleaver way to sensor what is truthfully a hyper violent and traumatic event for any woman.

It’s not necessarily where she transformed through. The blood stains are across the lower half of the body. They’re heavily pooled at the bed and trail off when running for the bathroom. This could indicate shrunken size, but is just as liable to be her running like crazy.

I do believe this fits the description of “Not good.” Not looking forward to Monday… ;-(

Are we almost done with The Twilight Zone already? Get your mutated tail out here, Rod Sterling!

Maybe Lyn’s looks are conveying “Pay attention, because I’m not going to repeat this story.”

It looks like Lyn is saying to Wally “You just HAD to Know, didn’t you?” And“This was a Very Private matter, and You are making us go through all this just for Your Curiosity!?!” Wow, that even guilt trips me a bit!

I think she knew that this was happening before Lyn left. I don’t know, but it seems like losing a six + months along baby would be similar to a birth, having the pains, back ache, the water breaking,, It looks like as soon as he was out the door she made a mad-dash for the bathroom.

Interesting to notice the look that Chic is looking at Wally, he had noticed the scowl that Lyn gave Wally, and he is trying to see if Wally deserved the scowl for some reason. Excellent, Aaron in all your details!

I don’t think she was shrinking while running, but could be.Just thankful I never experienced that.

At t 6+ months along, IS the baby big enough to survive with special help of a doctor, or not?Maybe the baby died, but he was OK after the plane crash..

miscarriage?? Where is Doc Rat when you need him????

That is quite an amount of blood there. But must have been some kind of pain if she woke up from it while turning. Which tbh makes it interesting why the baby didn´t mutate as well when she did – besides the dramatic effect.

That is quite an amount of blood there. But must have been some kind of pain if she woke up from it while turning. Which tbh makes it interesting why the baby didn´t mutate as well when she did – besides the dramatic effect.

I’m wondering if Lyn’s stink eye is part of the dittos drawing from Holly’s memory and a projection of her likely resentment of reliving this period in her life. Remember, none of this is REAL, but an artifact drawn from mind and memory. Those scenes that Holly didn’t actually witness are likely just reasonable assumptions cobbled together. Remember Wally was able to create stuff out of his imagination with the dittos earlier. A further thought, perhaps the dittos (or whoever is running the show) are also drawing off the memories of our heroes to fine tune the presentation?

I suspect that the 4th panel represents a time skip in the story. Holly had just dropped off to sleep before Lyn left the room. The trail of blood suggests that Holly has just had a miscarriage of some sort, possibly because her new form is too small to support her baby. I believe this would have taken place a few hours after Lyn had gone and the director of this production decided that it would be best to move things along.Lyn’s dirty look is interesting. It could be that whatever is directing the show (possibly the ship’s AI) is warning Wally & company to pay attention or it could be that the director has taken a dislike to Wally and feels that he doesn’t deserve Holly and isn’t up to the task of helping her. It could also be a projection of Holly’s mind who is upset with Wally for the attention he has shown Kirbee or for his lack of support over Clive. Hopefully we’ll understand this in the future.

Wally is expected to do something. He may not be doing it, or he’s being warned to do it. Lyn may be signaling to Wally, “This is the love of my life. TAKE CARE OF HER.” Or, “DON’T HURT HER.” Lyn might have survived the End in some manner and arranged this shadow play to get Wally to be responsible for Holly because he can’t do it himself. Or he might not have survived and this is a ghost story.

I doubt that Wally can have any effect in this story of Holly’s mutation and miscarriage, but that play is coming to an end and there is the question of the final member of the audience. Soon Holly will rejoin this group, she has probably been forced to watch this show again or is aware that Wally, Kirbee and Chic are aware of what she did. What Wally, Kirbee and Chic say and do when they see Holly again will be critical.

Methinks the stink-eye is a reminder to stay the heck out of the Jacuzzi. This flashback is so Wally can understand Holly’s delicate psyche, and help her deal with it; not to have a pool party with his new crush.

I definitely get the idea that the glance is one of anger. “Why are you making us go through this again?” Is what it says to me. That they are there to learn something is certain, but does this go beyond just trying to explain Holly’s behavior? There’s certainly enough background to why the whole world is the way it is to help them understand everyone’s role. The question then becomes what are they supposed to do with that information?

She just lost the baby I think. Damn.

I am guessing, if Holly just mutated, this is where she goes on the run, to try to escape the remaining six Buddibombs. She knows what the Buddibombs did to Ethel Etheridge post-mutation. Neathery never mentioned what happened to Ethel’s daughter, Melissa. But what of Lyn? Does Holly abandon him? Seems unlikely, but she is quite traumatised at this point. Does Lyn throw himself on the remaining Buddibombs to save Holly from annihilation? I suspect the Dittos are channelling Holly’s deeply repressed unconscious. And it is so horrible, the dittos have to use Wally as a proxy to work with Holly’s Traumen. Yeah, the Ditto Lyn may be giving Wally the uradik look. Kirbee may have intitiated The Kiss, but Wally wasn’t totally unreceptive. Holly was deeply troubled, and troubling, and Dragon Girl has quite the tongue.

Still, it is not necessarily a miscarriage. It could be an event where the baby still survives, but the mother and child are in emergency need of medical care. It might be kind of difficult to go to the ER looking like a giant mouse. Doc Chase would probably discretely help, and maybe make a housecall, but if Holly has mutated, she may need to go on the run to some sort of Underground Railroad for Mutants.

Is Lyn still alive in the Endtown Universe Holly and Wally have mostly occupied?

Some cartoons DO a little swapping. It would be cool if Doc Rat could show up and save the day.Doc Rat being a great Doctor with fine credentials and Holly, whether human or mouse could sure use him now. Rats Are the Best pets ever for living in an apartment, anywhere else too! It’s always best for them to have a companion. My last little lone rat didn’t live too long.

My medical opinion? This was not a miscarriage. A miscarriage happens early in pregnancy, when there is no viable baby. This was a labour and delivery. By human Holly’s size, she was close to full term, with a baby ready to be born. She went into labour, which woke her from sleep, and she gave birth to her baby. However, in her sleep she had transformed into a mouse. Then, panicked and obeying the mouse thoughts in her mouse brain, Holly did what mother mice do under stress. She had the baby and… had the baby.Is that horrible enough for you?

Drawings and music fill in the spaces when there is much to be said but words don’t convey the sentiment correctly. Beautifully portrayed.

Lyn has been saying more with actions than words in this strip, “Turn away. And don’t judge once you see what’s next.”. Which has been a lot of the Molly arc of the story. A lot of people both in Endtown and Real Life have been making a lot of assumptions about Molly, what it meant when she “lost the baby”, judged her to be mentally incompetent when she was basically going through a double down dose of barely contained grief.

Music queue: What it’s Like by Everclear.

Er, Holly, Holly, dammit!

What if while Holly was asleep she changed, but the baby wasn’t asleep? She may have awakened giving birth to one of those shapeless horrors. That would be enough to push anyone over the edge. The baby’s mutation may not have been a viable one and it died not long afterwards. That could be how she lost the baby. I agree the 4th panel was a time jump. Too much disarray and blood for a few seconds time to have passed. Poor Holly, loss of self-identity and her much anticipated child would fracture anyone’s psyche.

Doctor Chase, Holly’s step father, was transformed into a badger which best fits his somewhat grouchy disposition. Also, it is possible that Lyn is on the ship and is angry at Wally for taking Holly away from him.

“Lyn may be signaling to Wally, “This is the love of my life. TAKE CARE OF HER.” Or, “DON’T HURT HER.””It just occurred to me that maybe Lyn is angry to meet “the other man” in Holly’s life, and there’s going to be pugilistics in the near future for both of them.

Endtown has already crossed over into Doc Rat, in the past, for a week. Doc Rat became sick with a virus and had Endtown dreams, with a bit of Electromatic Radio thrown in. At that time, the Doc Rat web site was also sick with a virus.

Um, what are the chances the baby was infected, and mutated, while Holly was unaware/visibly untouched. Birthing a bloody horror, with all of those emotions and “bonding hormones” raging, I don’t know what would scar her worse; birthing a live or a dead “baby”.Can’t read this at night anymore. It’s like watching the intense parts of a movie from the corners of my eyes, head turned, trying to remember where MY reality is.:"(

Monday’s strip may be delayed due to the holidays. I don’t know what Neathery’s religious observances may be, but here are some of the more notable holidays observed Monday.April 11, 2016 is Barbershop Quartet Day! April 11, 2016 is International Louie Louie Day! April 11, 2016 is National Cheese Fondue Day!  April 11, 2016 is National Eight-Track Tape Day!  April 11, 2016 is National Pet Day! April 11, 2016 is Submarine Day!  April 11, 2016 is World Parkinson’s Disease Day!  So, basically, Monday is a celebration of the 1970s culture. I am guessing platform shoes have their own special day.

What some people are mistaking for a tail is a smear of blood on the wall. Enlarge the strip to see it better.If the blood isn’t from a premature birth, then she may have inflicted wounds on herself. We’ve seen that she’s suicidal, but haven’t known how far back.

From what I can tell from the strips, the mutants seem to weight about what their size suggests (remember that anthro Holly was able to fit in Wally’s backpack, and weighed no more than the books he usually kept there). Its also noted that Maude called herself a quarter ton cow (suggesting a body weight of 500lb) and Gustine has been said to weigh about 700lb. That suggests that mutation somehow breaks the first law of thermodynamics which suggests that energy or mass is not created or destroyed. Oh well, different universe, different rules.

The time between panel 1 and panel 4 is only a few seconds in Wally’s time, but is another “time jump” in Holly’s story. It appears we are jumping to significant moments in the story. The other time Lyn acknowledged Wally, they jumped to the baby shower.