Endtown by Aaron Neathery for February 23, 2012

I think we go this way . . .

Tag-along Flask, looking a little subdued.

Flask is at war But it’s war with herself There’s a truth still in store Back on some hidden shelf And she’s probably not Even able to see it Her leadership’s shot She can no longer be it But notice that now She’s content just to follow It’s hard to see how Or how much she can swallow Their host’s not anthro Or so I’m presumin’ Just look down, you’ll know: For “To-Arrow’s human” =|====/ Level Head Vote for Endtown 2.0 And for Doc Rat, too The Endtown Forum

Come out, come out wherever you are. We’ like to thank you, or blast you, as the case may be.

More dittos?

seems like some dittos are there to show them the way

Neither was Flask there a moment ago. Did Pety get her out? He is making a hush sign at her or a OHOH sigh. Boy I go all out with my imagination. But I love it. Keep it up Aaron.Blessed BE

What about DV???

No, it was always there. You just weren’t paying attention, what will all your walking, and your talking to each other and your general whatever it is you organics do when you’re not disturbing us… Anyway, it was there from before.

I really hope Holly’s going to wash her waitress uniform before she serves her next customer.

do you think well get to see who saved them by friday or well get a shadow and one of the characters saying ‘what are YOU doing here ?’

By the way, because of an odd bug in the GoComics comment mechanism, you cannot put links to strips in the same paragraph with any single or double quoted text. This is why my links above are separated from where you’d expect (i.e., the paragraph where they’re first talked about). I’d used quoted phrases and could not put the links there. GoComic kinks Prevent simple links I rephrased the things It’s working, methinks =|====/ Level Head Vote for Endtown 2.0 And for Doc Rat, too The Endtown Forum

That arrow looks like a ditto construction to me. Are the dittos somehow controlling this ship? Is someone controlling both the ship and the dittos? Hmmm…

I’m going to add something that does not rhyme. Please be patient with me: Prose is not my first language. Flask is conflicted. We saw this early on, but it continues to manifest in interesting ways. An example is her notion of “duty”: She takes seriously her duty to protect Endtown residents (and in a larger sense, anthros) in theory — but in practice, this doesn’t always translate to individuals. It was easy for her to kill Crawford and Mike. She had rationalized their “crimes” as “complicating a simple matter.” That was enough, in her odd notion of justice. I suspect that, more recently, she let Linda live not so much because she was “sworn to protect anthros” but because it suited her to use Linda to tweak Wally. But she willingly risked her life to protect the gang that she had brought to the surface to gather evidence for Al and Gustine’s mock trial. That was tough on her; as we now know, she still had strong linkages to the Topider world that she had just left, but she was killing her former team-mates. At the end of it, she said to Professor Mallard (at that time, in the body Petey would later wear): “Aren’t you proud of me?” Remember, that was NOT Petey she said that to: she knew that she was talking to Mallard, probably the closest thing she had to a friend at that moment despite the animosity. Mallard knew her background, and accepted her … something Flask, I think, has always desperately needed. Now, she has been rather pointedly un-accepted, and she cannot force her acceptance on these people at the moment. It has utterly deflated her — but I think that her natural tendencies, and amazing ability at both self-delusion and cruelty, will make her a dangerous team mate. And probably sooner rather than later. =|====/ Level Head Vote for Endtown 2.0 And for Doc Rat, too The Endtown Forum

I hope that’s not the shadow of a falling anvil. I hate those things.

IMHO, and FWIW, I still hold to the theory that Sparkplug is behind all this, controlling the Dittos.

Way to go Wally! Cover ALL the bases

I wonder if this is part of the answer to a question I submitted to Linda in the Ask Linda part of the Endtown Forum. It could be that this is an automated Topsider scrap material gatherer and recycler. Or so it appears to me.

Looks to be an awful lot like something connected with the dittos!

If Sparkplug or anyone else has been able to make an alliance with the dittos… watch out, they’re the true masters of earth now. Look at all the raw material they have to work with!

With all these munchkins, shouldn’t it be a yellow brick arrow?

OK, a “grey” brick arrow….

I wonder if endtowners can have kids.

96th place! Moving up in the world!Still sticking with the sparkplug theory…I wouldn’t count flask down and out just yet. She may still redeem herself. She may even end up sacrificing herself to save the munchkins. And if the dittoes are indeed on the good guys’ side that TS satellite may well prove worthless, as the dittoes could show it anything they want it to see…

Besides our voting on TopWebComics (awesome results, by the way!), it would be nice if GoComics gave a degree of attention to EndTown also. I imagine they rank strips by the number of views, or hits, but if they’d respond to the number of comments given I think we’d have a little more visibility. Anyone know of a way to see comment ranking here?As for the DV, my impression is the team is exploring and will be back once they know where they are and how to get out.

I’m also not sure how long Flask had been in Endtown before this. You’d think she would have had to take some time to rise up through the ranks to become chief of security, but I’m wondering if Mallard didn’t just appoint her there from the start, for “security” reasons. (“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”) (Well, that and her zero gun may have done some negotiating and “pulled some strings” for her.) In any case, she is obviously a complex character that has a lot of backstory. I look forward to learning more about it eventually, but if past experience is any guide, those questions won’t be answered at all quickly.

Run where? They’re in an airship surrounded by whatever it is that’s running it. They could go around in a tight little circle, but that might not help much.

Plus, “Frog Applause” makes me queasy.The fierce mouse for me!

endtown is not the only enclave of mutant survivors…

Umm, I’m thinking we’re about to learn more about what Dittos really are.

I would feel more comfortable if Flask had stayed behind to sulk. Her presence seems like a bad omen.