Endtown by Aaron Neathery for November 26, 2021

…that assumes you know “oblivion” will be like—and that you’ll like it—Terrence!

The peacock is a chicken! Or, the bird is flipping – should be the other way ’round, Terrence..

WOW! Talk about throwing your (friends) under the Plexus! (or into)

Mr. Zero Gun: Ooh! Ooh! Can I give it to him?

Wally will probably step up and agree to do it. Terrance is panicking, but Wally is thinking of Kirbee and Chic who are still trapped in the Eden bubble.

“I’m now a talking bird… and I’d rather be dead…”

Oof. Not sure these are the people you want to be telling that, Terrence. Knowing how well Topsiders normally get along with anthros, they might… get ideas.

Actually, none of those present are guinea pigs. I suppose they could knock out some of the remaining topsiders and open a few suits and TRY for a guinea pig or two…

That zero gun could take out Wally’s head right now.

Terrence’s expression in panel 2 says it all.

Oh come on, we can’t lose YET ANOTHER character we’ve grown attached to after all this short time. No More! We must make a stand here, and make a Picard Speech about how this will not occur. We are not losing our peacock. Not this time!

Terrence’s resistance reminds me of an old song by Harry Nilsson….I’d rather be dead.

Would you like to stay here and fry

When the nukes come down from the sky

Join the hive-mind known as the Eye

Or would you rather be a bird?

Just in time for Thanksgiving…

Maybe it’s time to flip the bird.

So long, it’s been good to know you. Not!!

If the scientist has lost his curiosity, maybe it is time for his exit.

Terrance, what makes you think you’re being given a choice? You can either walk into the nexus wide awake, or be thrown through it zapped unconscious. Either way, it’s closing time. You can’t stay here.

My name’s Terrance and I’ll take door #3.

A talking bird with a pretty fair set of teeth in evidence. In cases of uncertainty, I often fall back on “what might be on the next meal menu?” as the decider. With a beak and teeth, a broader set of possibilities.

I can’t decide if my respect for Terrance has increased or decreased. On one hand, it’s a deplorable choice to embrace oblivion. But on the other, it’s a decisive choice to not float along with the story.

We’ve had many months now of just talking heads.

It is about time for some action.

LWK makes an interesting comment above that perhaps even a central character to this story may be tiring of just „floating along“…

Probably, by summer someone will enter it.

Instant death, or eternity as a tortured, sentient, immortal toothbrush? Imagining something possibly worse? Curiosity doesn’t even get a walk-on part.

“Why can’t my choices be Cake or Death?”