[MV] The Super Wizard From Space #48: The Red Hand Of General Dragutin, part 5

Andrew Perron pwerdna at gmail.com
Sat Jul 12 20:33:30 PDT 2014


On 7/9/2014 8:56 PM, Wil Alambre wrote:
<snip>
> Far enough away to prevent eavesdropping sprawls millions
> and millions and *millions* of restless, hulking,
> *monstrous*  bees. The *entire* transformed population of
> Volsci. Milling about the sky. Covering the sandy horizon.
> Carpeting the rolling desert landscape. All buzzing and
> bunching and generally anxious to be doing *something*. We'd
> brought the whole lot of them with us. At least, I think we
> did. Its near impossible to get an accurate headcount of
> them. Its near impossible getting *anything* out of them.
> But we've been managing, Vaso and I. We're nothing if not
> old hands at improvising.

Fascinating.

> "We don't have to. We just need to
> check a handful. They're a eusocial colony with telepathic
> abilities. If any of them have it, they'd all have it
> in short order."

So I went back and looked at previous issues - are we talking about 
space-greed, here?

> "But he calls you 'General'. Are you two some
> szort of military?"

I was wondering that myself.

> "Well, its like... hm. There's what we *want*
> to be, and there's what we *need* to be. For the lucky ones,
> that can be same thing. For others, for the rest of us, its
> a balancing act."
>
> "So, which is it? For you... is thisz what you want? Or
> what you need?"
>
> I stop. And I stare at her.

Purrrrrrrrr. <3

> "Some confusion's expected when travelling. Usually, you'd
> experience this through the swarm's telepresence technology,
> but..." ...she stops listening. There's a child-like
> excitement in her eyes as she wanders away from me. She
> reaches up at the sky, trying to pluck down the stars.
>
> "Ah! Ah! I see it! I see it now! That's Alpha Circeii! And
> that's Fabrateria Vetus, the binary! That would put... yes!
> Yes, there's Sora and Arpinum! And Atina Gamma! Foreign
> constellations! I'm seeing completely foreign
> constellations! Ha ha ha! This is wonderful! I'm on another
> planet!" She turns back to me. "What planet is this? Does
> it have a name?"

Ooooooooooh. Now there's a very nice reaction. <3 <3 <3 Not as controlled by 
the transformation, hmmmm...

> "Officially, it has an incredibly long and complex serial
> number, but everyone calls it 'Planet M'."

Nice.

> She looks at me. Shocked. And frightened. She wants me to
> lie. Not this time. "I told you, I needed your help."
>
> She shakes her head. "I thought you meant our recordsz! Our
> noteszz! I gave you our aszZtronomical data!"
>
> "Yes, that's why I visited Volsci originally, and trust me,
> the intelligence you provided will be immensely invaluable.
> But now, I'm talking about *you*. You, personally. And your
> troops. Your countless forces. Finding purpose. Finding
> worth in whats happened to them. Help me complete my
> mission. Do what has to be done. Be my red right hand."

Oh shi--

> The direction of this arc as veered from the original
> direction I had it going. There's a plot point in the
> upcoming issues that doesn't feel as solid as I'd like
> it. I've been able to 'stall' for a bit with Sybilla's
> introduction, but I haven't been able to cement that
> problem completely yet. I'll wait and see how the rest
> of this arc - and this series - is welcomed.

Hmmmmm! Interesting. I'm looking forward to it.

> I don't often have so much dialogue in a single issue.
> I prefer people acting rather than talking. Keeps the
> action moving. But because I just came off an
> explosion-filled sequence, I thought I could get away
> with a slower chapter. I took the opportunity to
> tell as much as I could with only what characters
> *say*. I even stripped out as much dialogue
> attribution as I though I could get away with. With
> luck, no one gets lost with who said what why :)

All of it made sense to me!

Andrew "NO .SIG MAN" "Juan" Perron, exploding sense!



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