Strip 973 -- First Seen: 2012-06-08
Escape From Terra is updated with new pages every Monday through Friday.

Halfway there!

The Kickstarter campaign to print the next volume of Quantum Vibe: Novo Palermo - Part 1 is now halfway to our goal. We need your help getting the rest of the way there. Tell your friends, family members, and your pets to back our campaign.

Every little bit helps! The campaign ends midnight (US central time) November 18. So there's still time to get the word out, or maybe add another item to your current pledge.

Your reward for backing our campaign starts with a personalized signed copy of the perfect bound printed collection of the online strip. You may also choose the ebook edition, a PDF downloadable from DriveThruComics.

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QV on a short break

QUANTUM VIVE is taking a break for a few weeks, as we prepare for Part 2 of the Novo Palermo story, and also for a Kickstarter campaign for Part 1, which will start in September.

In the meantime, Not-Safe.Space will continue, as a murder mystery begins and the relationship between Eithne and Diana develops in unexpected directions.

Not-Safe.Space is a NSFW strip but more than half the pages are SFW so I've set those to *not* require a Patreon membership. Readers should be able to follow the story without seeing the NSFW pages. If I've done this right.

The Transcript For This Page

Panel 1
Marsha's office, at the Vesta Council's suite in the Pumpkin Center offices. Marsha is at her desk, reading something on her desktop holoscreen, when her adjutant (a female Mascon) enters, looking a bit frantic.
Mascon 6: Marsha! It's the protesters! They --
Marsha: {Sigh} Yeah, yeah, that handful of malcontents complaining because the power companies raised their rates. Our security team can handle them.
Panel 2
Two-shot of Marsha and her adjutant.
Adjutant: It's not about the power companies, it's about us!
Adjutant: Remember last evening's meeting, when we discovered there are hundreds of unregulated mini-nukes on Vesta?

Panel 3
Medium shot of the adjutant, relating the story.
Marsha: Yeah, can you imagine? We found out just in time to avert disaster.
Adjutant: So, we ordered them all to undergo inspection and testing, at a cost of 20 gold-grams each ...
Marsha (OP): I was there, Evelyn. What's your point?

Panel 4
Two-shot of Marsha and the adjutant which includes a view of Marsha's desktop. She is touching a key on ther keyboard.
Adjutant: Uh, take a look at the front-door security-cam.

Panel 5
Looking over Marsha's shoulder at her holoscreen, which shows HUNDREDS of angry, chanting locals. We can also just barely see the adjutant in the frame.
Marsha: JEZUS CHRIST!
Adjutant: Shall I call for backup?
Panel 6
Marsha resting her head on her fingertips, elbows on desk, looking tired but not defeated. The adjutant looks on.
Marsha: Yeah-yeah, call Wang Security, get 'em over here.
Marsha: This business has really gone off the rails. We need a strategy.
Panel 7
Wide panel, showing the crowd of enraged protesters pressing against a phalanx of uniformed security men (most of them Chinese) who have positioned themselves in front of the Council suite doors. In the far right of the panel, we get a medium close-up of Sanderige Kasteel, wearing a headset, doing a live broadcast (we don't see a cameraman, Kasteel is facing the reader, with a sardonic expression.
Kasteel: I guess this is Pumpkin Center's first authentic Chinese fire drill.