Ooh!! Mechanical arm!

I’m not sure if it was obvious, but I made sure never to show Azarek’s other arm until now, which again made the previous fight panels pretty difficult to stage. While the poncho was effective in hiding the arm, it was actually part of that original Grissom design as well. So that worked out!

The arm surprise also contributed to my decision to cut the earlier fight scene with the three bounty hunters, since I think it would’ve been hard keeping his arm hidden the entire time without it becoming distracting.

Some of you may notice the use of more sound effects here. In past commentaries, I mentioned my ongoing struggle with when to use sound effects and when to let the action in the artwork imply them. Recently when posting my comic over on Webtoon, some readers mentioned the big fight in Vol 2 feeling oddly silent without the sound effects and I kinda agree. At the time, I felt like I used too many in Vol 1 but now maybe I used too few in Vol 2. We’ll see what happens next!

“Black jack” is a term I used waaaay back in the very first RUNNERS story ever, which appeared in the Small Press Expo 2000 Anthology. It basically refers to any kind of dampener or disruptor that shorts out a system.