#396 – Thwarted vengeance

This is not an April Fool’s comic but maybe it should be! Thanks for reading, everyone.

  • Eleanor
    Oh my god!! :O No way! :( This is awesome, im hooked o.o
  • Crystal
    um... loveD?????? wait... so... the injuries are, like, transfered? OMG PILL BOTTLE YOU'LL BE OKAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
  • Yeah, which makes me wonder if she's got Al'bert's 5 broken ribs in there too. : x
  • Crystal
    lol, "hey bruddah, you wanna play tag wif me?" awwwwwwwwwww i hope everything turns up in philidelphia (city of brotherly love? lol, i'm so clever)
  • Pip
    Haha, that's an almost Iago-esque exit!
  • whimsicalwishing
    wow. i am in awe. this page is sooooooooo beautiful! i love it!
  • Dani
    I'm afraid that either Al'bert or Bactine will have to die, probably Bactine and possibly both. Great triumphs require great sacrifice-- for everyone to live just because we don't want them to die would cheapen the victory and their sacrifice, not to mention undermining the story and everything that has led us to this point. I realize this comic started as silly fluff, but it's become so much more. I only hope Colby has the guts to kill off a character. If not, an otherwise powerful and moving comic will end up no more substantial than a piece of... well, lint.
  • Living can be rather moving too. There can be great stories where none of the main characters die-- and often it seems like characters die off just so the authors can say "Look, see, it's compelling! Someone died!" THAT would be more of a letdown for me.
  • Dani
    True. But I've also seen books where all the charecters live despite the highly dangerous situations they're in by making insanely improbably escapes, and you can tell it's really just because the author can't stand to kill any of his/her creations. And that really kills a story for me.
  • You do realize this comic is still silly fluff, don't you? :D
  • Dani
    Of course I do, and it's a wonderful peice of silly fluff which makes me giggle about every other panel. But it's not *just* silly fluff, and it's not *always* silly fluff. If it were, it wouldn't be nearly so engaging. If it were just silly fluff, we wouldn't all be perpetually pearched on the edges of our collective seats, biting our nails, waiting anxiously for the next comic. Your comic is silly, and fluffy. It's also angsty, and touching, and surprising, and heartbreaking, and infuriating, and exciting. It has a villain we both hate and pity. It has heroes who hurt and strive and fail and sacrifice and love and win and lose. It's not a *safe* comic. We never know which way you're going to turn our emotions next. And that's really why we (or at least I) love it so much.
    So I guess I'm saying, whatever you choose to do, don't be safe.
    (at least I think that's what I'm saying... I'm on allergy meds, so I'm not quite sure...)
  • Wow, great compliments, thanks! Well, honestly, nobody can say with finality "This person HAS to die, or THAT person must die, or else the story will suck." because the only person who knows how everything's going to develop is me. So I guess *I* could say that, but I'm not giving out any clues. :D

    Also, death is only one type of sacrifice.
  • selfevident
    Coming back and reading this now that Sang has found her dead (?) on the floor after seeing Fang delivered to Zed makes me wonder what exactly you mean. I think a lot of people have observed that after Healing Zedwig, Bactine seems to have aged, and I agree she looks aged and tired, and then bloody, too. Could she choose death and her sacrifice grants her something more...?

    Just wondering how Fairies... come to be if they don't fall in love, really. Are they born or made? Because that would be an awfully convenient way to refresh the bloodline.
  • Ellie
    You give me hope...
  • Jessla
    I, personally, love the "Fang! Vengeance!" ("Hey ... wait! Come back! You're not standing still to be killed! Hello?") Hehe ... oh, it makes me laugh.
  • Falco
    Haha, you can totally tell which one's the litlte brother.

    Last panel though... bait and switch, wow
  • Ellie
    ACK!!!! There are no words...
  • LalkiN
    It is JUST a flesh wound! You know it is!

    okay, so this comic is 5 panels funny, 4 panels sad, funny wins out!

    And doesn't she also have like broken ribs or something from Al'bert...? That's 3 healings in one day, not very fun...
  • ding
    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO PLEASE DON'T DIE BACTINE!!!!!!! WHY!?!?!? NOT BACTINE!!!!!!!!!! :'( *cries*
  • XD "You can't run! I'm executing vengeance!"

    "Loved"... past tense? D: *worries*

    So awesome.
  • Inkblot
    So this is kind of unrelated, but I just started watching the show "Legend of the Seeker"... It's so cool. The point I'm getting across here is - aside from this crazy mage Zed:

    http://planussea.deviantart.com/art/Compulsion-...

    There's also THIS crazy mage Zed.

    http://multipleverses.com/wp-content/uploads/20...

    In his first scene he was standing around naked holding a chicken over his privates.


    OUR Zedwig still totally wins, though.
  • LyssaGirl
    Oh, what's with the colored hand, anyway? Is it from healing Zed?
  • Lissy
    her hand is covered with blood from the wound she pulled from sanguine. that's how empathic healing works, you take their wounds (or as much as you can of them) and heal your own body faster. but right now, bactine has taken the double whammy from healing both zedwig and sanguine of fatal conditions, only a few minutes apart. sounds like she doesn't think she will make it.
  • Zypher
    *sniffle* Nooo, Bactine!!!!!

    Like most people... I love that "I suppose I've no choice but to... RUN!!" But.... BACTINE!!!!!! T_T
  • sadfulness
    That's great and all, but I honestly prefer "You can't run! I'm executing vengeance!" Absolutely hilarious. And then to follow it up with Bactine being tragically wounded...*le cry* :(

    But anyway, am I the only one who thinks Fang's arm looks a little strange in the first panel?
  • Zypher
    Okay, the whole first row of panels = major luffs. ^_^

    And no, his arm does look a little weird... it's seems almost a little bowed near his shoulder. But perspective does that sometimes.
  • Kam
    I agree! "I'm executing vengeance! Fang! Vengence!" is the best panel here!

    Ah Bactine. I may have to draw you now. Luff ya, girl.
  • Psalm
    Smart thinking, mein Emperor!

    Those who fight and run away, live to fight another day!

    Death to the usurpers!
  • Dantes
    Fang, while awesome, is no Bonaparte. He doesn't command the fanatical loyalty that Napoleon did, and I doubt any will follow him to put him back on the throne. He isn't that much of a tactical genius, either. The mages are comparable to Bonaparte's artillery, but... (you quoted the good Emperor in your second phrase, and the cry, I believe, was used by his followers when he returned for the Hundred Days)
  • It's true, Fang is pretty good but no Bonaparte. I think of him more like one of those old-timey B.C. conquerors who had some extra firepower and just busted it out there, conquering all the previously-unaware people in his path until the strength is exhausted. Kind of like a wildfire.

    Fang's main failings are that he never gained the love of his infantry or cared to, and maybe he never cared to have plans for what he would do once he'd conquered all of these people. I think, for him, the experience of conquering people was what he desired, having a certain lust for destruction and violence to make up for lacking elsewhere in his psyche, and he didn't care what would happen afterward in regards to sustaining or maintaining what he conquered at the time. He conquered an empire, but came to the state of mind too late to actually want to govern the thing, so even if he wanted to now, which he does, it's probably too much of a house of cards to stop from falling. Anything's possible though, and from the experience, and also due to Zedwig's influence, Current-Fang would actually make a brilliant (but in no way benign) ruler, if he could turn back the clock and start over from the beginning.
  • Enter Xylic to hold her hand and make her fight for life! *crosses fingers*
  • o hai thar
    That's my kinda thinking.
  • A Reader
    AAAGGGHHH!!!! Bactine canNOT die. She's in love with everyone, and everyone is in love with her, and I would be tragically destroyed. *wail*
  • Elise
    I'm going to be stubborn and keep holding on to the hope that this is just an April Fool's joke. Denial, denial, denial....
  • Celidah
    I laughed...I cried...it moved me, Bob!

    Bactine...nooooo....
  • Me
    ROFL Fang cracks me up in this page--

    But the second half is sad =(

    *still laughs at first part tho*
  • kizie
    I have very mixed feelings thanks to this update -- do I laugh at the first half, or cry because of the second half? Or do I laugh at the second half and cry because of the first half? So complicated!
  • HelenaHermione
    Oh, Bactine! I guess Sangwine doesn't yet realize what all is involved in healing...if she does die, he'll blame himself--because of the wound and because he went off after Fang. She only hopes that he can forgive himself because she did love him and did everything she could to save him--knowing the consequences. And yes, Fang running does have a...slightly comical effect. Just like that Count (?) in 'The Princess Bride'
  • yerk
    thats exactly what i thought!
  • Aura
    Only this comic can make me laugh and cry in one update :<
  • Lyssa
    Fang you coward!!!! COWARD! COME TAKE IT LIKE A MAN! er....Elf....or....Whatever....

    I love that, though, so informal. In the movies you see "I'm going to take vengance on you" "Okay, I will take it like a man." Okay. FIGHT"
    Here it's "I'm going to kill you" "I'm going to RUN" "I'm going to pout because he's not taking it like a man!"
  • Well, remember that she still has whatever she took from Zedwig when she healed him, and now a bullet wound...it's possible that she may just not have the energy to expel it all. >_>
  • Inkblot
    LOVED? Loved as in 'I don't love you anymore' or 'I'll be dead so soon I'm talking about myself in past tense'? Anyways this page is somehow really funny on top and really dramatic on the bottom. Bactine looks so... unwell. And hopefully Fang will run straight into Kelneth, or Xylic, or Al'bert (Vengeance!).
  • ACK no come back! You expected that but hoped it would not happen!
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