The idea here is that the energy shields around the Khoruysa Brimia fry anything that touches them, so Ril has to cut the shields before the crew hits it. In the original script, I focused on this a bit more and amped up the anxiety and impending electrocution of the falling crew and the last-second timing of the shut-off. But when it came time to draw the sequence, I found that it would have taken too many panels to really convey all that, and that would have made the fall seem to take a long time, when it actually occurs in seconds. So I opted to cut it down in order to keep the pace of events quick and chaotic.
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Good idea, I really like the pacing in your action sequences. Also, I guess now I know what Cember has under his hat (frame 5)….
Yeah I agree – you made the right decision and I think we get that he has to do that or there’s a problem. Loving the story.
Thanks for the great comments, and I’m glad you all are enjoying the story. I’m really psyched because it’s only another 2 months until the next arc starts posting. And that’s ALL NEW material and in COLOR! Spread the word: RUNNERS: THE BIG SNOW JOB begins in Sept! Woo-hoo!!
Great strip today. The tension was palpable.
I’m amused by the fact that Roka lost his pistol and Cember kept a hold of his but he lost his hat!!
I’m not sure that I can stand the loss of “Cember style”! 🙂
“und any plan vere you lose you hat iz a BAD PLAN” (I’m channeling a Jaegermonster here)
So, more like a wall of fire than a physical shield? Doesn’t physically ‘stop’ things, but wrecks them to impotence when they go through?
I figure it’s an energy shield that helps to disperse energy blasts but is also strong enough to fry physical objects of smaller mass. So if the ship were flying through a field of small debris, the shield would vaporize those bits on contact before they could actually hit the ship itself. Obviously, it wouldn’t be effective against bigger objects, but people wouldn’t fare well.
I’m only just starting my foray into the universe here, but it seems to me that it would be power-intensive to fry/disintigrate impacting objects, and instead would be more economical to reflect/redirect their momentum into “glancing blows”. Granted, it would still be an issue for living beings impacting the shields, particularly in this case (they’d “slide off”), but it wouldn’t be as dire as being incinerated. 😉
Regardless of the “science” behind the technology, I really enjoy the scene and think it would make for a stimulating discussion topic. 🙂
Interesting point. Yeah, I didn’t intend the shield to be primarily used to vaporize objects. In most cases, it would basically do what you are describing, deflecting them away from the ship. The energy level is just high enough to fry very small objects. As for people, they wouldn’t be incinerated, but the energy level would be enough to do serious harm. More electrocution type harm than disintegration harm.