Strip 60 - Click on page above to goto the next page.
-- First Seen: 2008-12-05
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Now we get to wait 2 weeks while Kickstarter transmits the funds, and Scott can order the books, and send surveys to backers to get current e-mail addresses for the .PDF versions and mailing addresses for the physical books.
All of this should show up in June.
The Transcript For This Page
Panel 1
Big ginormous farkin panel, taking up a 2/3 of the page. Leave a space in the upper left corner for the EFT logo.
Dominating the frame is a 25km-wide assemblage of several dozen huge and variously colored bolders, with something that looks like a giant silver spider tightly embracing it. The spider is the mining settlement and its various extensions. In addition to the spider’s body housing the spacedock and central operations there are little nodes scattered on several of the boulders. The captions explain a bit more of how the asteroid should look.
A personnel transport ship is crossing the field between us and the asteroid, arcing in for touchdown near the 'spider’s' main body. This craft is an 8-passenger runabout, considerably smaller than the Burner ship, meant for short trips.
Caption: The asteroid 51384 (2008 TX) is actually a large collection of smaller rocks of varying types which have clumped together under their mutual micro-gravity. It has metallic sections, stony sections, carbonaceous sections, even ice sections in places that had never seen Sol.
Caption 2: Early miners affectionately tagged this chaotic mass ‘The Flying Spaghetti Monster,’ although most now simply call the place ‘Ghetty.’
Caption 3: This rare collection of all 3 major types of asteroid makes on-site ore processing practical, and so this operation is one of the most profitable of all the Belt mining enterprises.
Panel 2
Inside the passenger cabin of the transport ship. About the size of an original Star Trek shuttle-craft interior, eight seats including te pilot’s, arranged two by two. On board in addition to the pilot are Bert Guzmán and Lorna Cantrel, who represents the mining company. Lorna looks about 30, moderately attractive, dark complexion. She is dressed in colorful, South Asian-styled garb which shows some cleavage and a bare midriff but covers her legs entirely in flowing material. She is also wearing a PDA on her wrist which is similar to but not identical to Guy’s.
Bert and Lorna are sitting in the second row back and Guy and Fiorella are sitting in the third row. The fourth row is empty. Pilot and co-pilot up front.
Fiorella is reading an information page projected above her PDA. This is where the captions above came from, and now she completes the section reading aloud.
Fiorella: In the last Standard Year MIDGIT MINING extracted 18 kilotons of processed iron ore, 25 kilotons of refined carbon, and 87 tons of gold, silver and platinum, as reported in the last shareholders’ report.
Panel 3
Close shot of Guy, practically licking his chops. We see Fiorella in the background, wearing her poker face again.
Guy: Do you have any idea how much that much metal comes to in Continentals?
Guy (2): And this is just one of 6 enterprises like it in the Belt!
Panel 4
View from just behind the pilots. Berg and Lorna exchange troubled glances as Guy babbles on behind them.
Guy: There is fabulous wealth out here, Ms. Stellina. Think of all the wonderful things UW can do with this once we get our fair share!
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