Endtown by Aaron Neathery for January 18, 2012

WOW Holly looks scared in Panel # 3- – -she’s actually put her hands up into fists! She really looks ready to defend herself.Great drawing, Aaron!

KUTGW,

Noreen

Whoo-Hoo! First, today. Hot diggity dawg!

somebody topside KNOWS flask!

So, you caught that, right? Flask’s original job as a Topsider? Wonder if the one talking is the one that originally backstabbed her.

So the project was created by Flask?

@RockHouse That’s what I’m taking out of this, which also explains why she had such exacting intel on it, knew exactly what chip to replace, etc.

It also illustrates just what an egomaniac Flask is, to assume that her work on the project was SO ESSENTIAL that her successors wouldn’t make any critical changes in like of a potential security threat. Poor Flask.

Would also explain why she didn’t seem too surprised when Mallard first told them about the rocket.

you know I hate to say this but they might just have to take the topsider base out now. strictly for survival.

I think everyone is afraid that Flask will go major psycho now that her past has been revealed and she has been bested by both TS’s and mutants.

Huh. Not how I expected the truth to come out, but I guess it works. Now get the angst over with quickly, people – we’ve got a satellite to shoot down!

ROCKET MA’AM, to the tune of Rocket Man http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMMYxSS_1Fkby Elton JohnThey cracked my suit and let the virus inYears ago, and way back when,And I’ve had to get by as a cat since then.I miss my family. I miss my life.It’s lonely underground,In such a soul-less fight.Ind I think it’s gonna be a long, long time‘Til smack-down brings me ’round again to findI’m not the cat they think I am at homeOh, no no no, I’m the Rocket Ma’am.Rocket Ma’am, burning out her fuse out here alone.This planet ain’t the kind to raise your kids.It’s flat and dry as hell.And there’s no-one here to raise them if you did.And all this moralizing I can’t stand.I only want to wipe things clean.The Rocket Ma’am. The Rocket Ma’am.And I think it’s gonna be a long, long time… (etc.)

The TS person is in a suit, even if broadcasting. I though the TS person would be broadcasting from the rocket launch room. Interesting. So just walking thru the town combing hair may not work as an offensive. -Now the TS will have to decontaminate the town where Flask walked. -The TS person knows Flask, but no one can recognize Petey. That could be interesting. And he is not there anyway. -Yeah, an assult of some kind on the TS city seems to be an option. But can 4 do this? I am not really sure.-The TS community still has nukes, or is presumed to have nukes or their equivalent. So if you trigger that while it is in the TS community, you win. Winning, you become as amoral as the TSers. —I am trying to make paragraphs using CR dash dash CR.

Well, that paragraph idea did not work, but it is an evolving thing.In a comment for cross comic stuff, over on Freefall Florance is forced to wear a french maid’s outfit. That reminds me of what Holly is wearing. So, then, why did Holly keep her apron when she went out to adventure?

Goldenroya, how do you make paragraphs?

The Endtown mini-comic that I produced for Comicpalooza 2011 is now available to YOU for the offensively low price of $2.50 (price includes s&h, international add $1 for each copy ordered ). Besides sporting a snazzy full color cover, it contains an all-new 22 page story that is available nowhere else. And just because I feel like doing it, I’ll sign and personalize (if desired) each and every copy I mail out. Simply pay via PayPal using my email address, aaronneathery@gmail.com, and be sure to include your mailing address. If you can’t pay with PayPal, send payment to:Aaron NeatheryPO Box 920558Houston, TX 77292And, just so you know, I’m completely open to donations. The cat and mouse that live in my head will thank you. :-).. and original Endtown art is still for sale. Contact me for details @ aaronneathery@gmail.com

Existential – She stinks therefore she am?Alas for the Captain….

Played like a cheap violin.

I knew it. It’s all coming out now.

all i have is, “oooooh”.

Good grief! Months of speculation, sifting the dust for clues to what is “really” going on, and now WHAM! it’s like a dump truck full of backstory and exposition! And on a Wednesday! This is great! With this trove of new information to be assimilated, I sense a significant cliffhanger approaching on Friday. Thanks Aaron! If positive reader reaction encourages you to continue pushing the edge of this excellence then consider this an overwhelming YES!

Anybody notice the small army of mutts that is surrounding the transporter while their attention is fixed on the floor? If Flask is an exitistential threat to the TS, then it only stands to reason that vice versa they are the same to her! We’ve suspected for a while that the rocket was a trap set to lure in mutants. What if it was actually bait to lure Flask in particular?

DANG, Aaron!! You have a fantastic left narrative hook! :)

Project architect… and she never told Mallard or anyone, hunh? This cat has all kinds of grudges going around in her head. And we’re about to find a few.

GF— for line breaks, use “< br >” (no quotes or spaces, of course)

A possible scenario: Petey was an engineer working closely with Flask. They fell in love and Blackie was his pet name for her. He got in trouble resulting in his becoming a transport, and she tried to intervene, resulting in her mutating. She escaped and thought Petey was lost forever. She joined Endtown and plotted her revenge against her betrayers. Finding he was still alive and had some memories of her intensified her grudge and made her more unstable. Whatever she had been planning might have worked if Petey hadn’t shown up.

Flask, the key architect of the mission For premature-rocket-ignition Is now, we have heard One who designed the bird Somehow that seems a major omission Do we think Mallard knows? Well, perhaps All who deal with Flask are shooting craps With her issues and more The odds are quite poor And favor those Topsider chaps So our team is alone and surrounded And no doubt by the MUTTs they’ll be hounded But this person knows Flask And did not have to ask They’ve a grudge.And it’s probably well-founded =|====/ Level Head Vote for Endtown 2.0 And for Doc Rat, too The Endtown Forum

Why do I have this feeling that even before her mutation, Flask was a… “Bad ol’ puddy tat”?Flask is about to explode in 5… 4… 3… 2…

Revenge is a very primal emotional driver, but even older and deeper is self-preservation. Fight or flight is about to take over and seeing as they are heavily outnumbered, flight may be the most attractive option. They need to spring Petey and get the heck out of Dodge!

I was just looking back on the older panels, and I know we have reason to believe that Flask might have been mutated through the weak spot in the bio suit that she pointed out (and exploited) in Linda. However, if she’s an architect, who is to say that she doesn’t know about the suit’s weakness because she had been either part of – or more intimately involved with – the development of the suits? She may not have made them herself, but could it be possible that she wasn’t exposed that way, and instead knows about it through affiliation with other topsiders who either developed the suits or have seen the mistake happen on the field? Also I’m in agreement that Petey may either have had a resistance to the mutation (like Al) or he was disembodied while still a full fledged Topsider and had never been exposed to the mutation at all. I don’t have any real predictions of what exactly caused Flask’s change, but I have a strong feeling that she was betrayed by her fellow Topsiders. I also wonder, since the Topsider speaking to her said that she couldn’t be trusted even as a human, if she had mutant sympathies or misgivings about what they were doing? If so, then she might have been a decently good person before the change, and she became unhinged somewhere between then and now. But then again, for all I know she was just as gun crazy before the mutation as she was after. Only time (and Aaron ;) ) will tell.

I wondered that myself, Godel.

Well, it’s an assumption that he/she is broadcasting from inside somewhere. What’s to say he/she’s not in a transporter headed their way?