The girls plan a little bit of international border law violation, for funzies.
Transcript
Idrisah: (ASL) But it would be VERY ILLEGAL!! Not company theft illegal, international border law illegal!
Talita: Yeah… uh… what are potential repercussions of this?
Idrisah moves the contents of her frying pan to a bowl while Gillie explains.
Gillie: (ASL) SIMS copy errors happen often enough with mass convoys that it wouldn't directly implicate us. And an investigation wouldn't happen unless Bip decides to make another wormhole jump.
Bip's avatar crosses their arms and looks sullen.
Bip: I'd rather not be investigated.
Gillie smirks conspiratorially.
Gillie: (ASL) Hiding something onboard?
Bip: Just myself. I prefer not existing.
35 thoughts on “Runaway to the Stars: Page 174”
JoB
… out of interest, what’s the ASL equivalent of SHOUTING IN UPPERCASE that Idrisah apparently accomplishes in the first panel?
Varyon
I would assume exaggerated movements, but I know very little of ASL. I know that’s what I do if I’m trying to be particularly emphatic (or trying to get someone’s attention, another reason you’d shout when communicating verbally) when gesturing, anyway.
Hosp
Is Gillie’s desktop background a bunch of beans?
godspeed
Since BIP talked about whatever BugferretsTM had done to them, this scene reminded me of Spirited Away, where Haku explains that Yubaba owns their names and they can’t be truly free unless they remember it. BIP makes me sad I wanna give them many hugs ;_;
Still a lawyer
Nice, I called it.
Planetfall
Grumpy Iridesh face on the third panel! XD
Arcstone
CAREFUL what you wish for there, bip.
A monkey paw might be listening.
Lettuce Vervain
frowny distance Idrisah is making my whole day. little >:[
Teod
I can’t help but still feel that there’s gotta be some less shady way of doing a lot of this. Like, Ixion is a commercial company, you can just buy the junk you need. It might be expensive, but the expense of nerves from not doing that might be bigger.
Enai
They have that big pile’o’phones which are reportedly very expensive. Since those are presumably Bip’s, they could sell them and pay for at least some of what they need that way.
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Of course, Bip may have picked thise up when they fell off the back of a (space) truck…
evileeyore
“buy the junk you need”
With what resources? Bip has no money, is currently occupying scrap (the ship) that Ixion owns. Legally speaking it’s probably iffy that Bip’d be able to sue for ownership if Bip even wanted to try to regain the ship legitimately, since Bip is probably either legally dead (and wants to stay that way) or nonexistent (and wants to stay that way).
That “junk” even as scrap/salvage is going to be expensive so the ladies also do not have the funds to just “buy whatever” Bip needs. No, because Bip is a (presumably wanted) criminal entity, Bip has do all of this on the down low. Which means anyone helping Bip has to do things on the down low.
IncompleteMachine
Not to mention somebody already shot the ship down once. it wouldn’t be a big jump that whoever put the hole through the hab would be a bit shocked that the ship they killed showed up again.
HAL9000
i suppose ship refurbishment can’t be that common, considering the Runaway was scheduled to be scrapped despite her being in relatively good nick. so yeah, hope the gang never run into the mystery murder ship
Phasma Felis
So, this particular criminal escalation is *Gillie’s* idea, huh?
The catgirl didn’t need much of a push to become a criminal mastermind. Which fits with the catgirls I know.
Ruby
So Bip better get comfortable wherever they get dropped off
JoB
I think that this is the first time we’ve heard of controlled borders in RttS space, isn’t it? And seeing that the question where Bip wants to go from Dirtball is still unanswered, I’d take it that there’ll be such controls no matter where they turn to, even if they were to just hop from Dirtball to one of Dirtball’s governing authorities’ places (Nexus Jovia or the Dominion of Tiiliit). And as anyone coming into the Ixion system stops (only) there, I suppose that the orbital station polycule double-serves as the local customs checkpoint … ?
Enai
I thought Dirtball was under Nexus Jovia jurisdiction? You don’t usually see “border controls” between different parts of the country you’re already in.
evileeyore
The wormhole nexus however is controlled by the bugferrets, not Nexus Jovia (which is human space). So the bugferret corporation is the one determining the “border controls” and it’s probably their way of managing border crossing fees, tariffs, contraband control, etc. Not including whatever borders the different polities have set up – Nexus Jovia is human space and Dirtball is owned by the Avians (IIRC).
Vinemaple
Oh, I think I get it: Dirtball is in Dominion territory, but probably most of their scrap gets bought by, and shipped to, customers in the Jovian system. Because Ixion, being a Human corporation, would find it easier and simpler to do business with other Humans.
JoB
> I thought Dirtball was under Nexus Jovia jurisdiction?
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Considering this exchange between Mel and Ohwitiil, I’m rather under the impression that it’s rather what we’d call an (international) condominium between Nexus Jovia and the Dominion of Tiiliit …
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> You don’t usually see “border controls” between
> different parts of the country you’re already in.
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Which is why I’m taking note of the fact that the ladies expect Bip to run afoul of such controls regardless of where the Runaway goes from Dirtball.
Enai
I expected the paperwork to be like “Yeah, this document certifies that the Runaway belongs to (Bip or the Centaur Clan, not Ixion because of the decommissioning-that-wasn’t), and the cargo doesn’t exceed max load, making her
roadwormhole safe” type of papers. Stuff to show the space traffic police to certify you haven’t stolen the ship and all it contains and also aren’t going to be too much of a danger to space traffic (space traffic is always dangerous of course, just like the planetside kind), unless you want to cross space borders. Which is why, up to this page I thought they were forging those kinds of documents, not international passport documents. So yeah, I’m agreeing with you actually. Having to show legal identification at the wormhole surprises me.Bright
I feel like they’re less like hard borders and more like administrative borders, i.e. anything that happens here falls under these specific laws. Sort of the same system we have on Earth for ships. Basically within x-number of miles from a coastline, the laws of that nation apply (e.g. If you’re off the coast of the US, your ship, cargo, and crew need to comply with US laws/regulations). Less like a guy sitting in a booth (metaphorical or real) and checking everyone’s papers and more like knowing that this is where Nexus Jovia’s laws start applying. Hard borders would only start applying if/when you properly dock at a station or land on a celestial body.
JoB
> I feel like they’re less like hard borders and more like administrative borders
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As far as we’ve heard in-comic, space travel in RttS does have choke points where you can install a bureaucrat in a booth – namely, the wormhole gates that allow ships to travel out of whatever system (without spending more time to arrive in the next than anyone except AIs can stay alive). No installation of walls (Dyson Spheres?) necessary – though it obviously doesn’t cover all the borders between some homeworld’s nations there are.
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(Of course, things would get interesting again if there happen to be not only pirate ships, but rogue wormhole gates, too …)
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However, what’s the difference between a “hard” border and an “administrative” one to Bip and their aides? First and foremost, the probability of getting caught circumventing it, I’d say. And from the discussion on this page, I’d conclude that they estimate that probability to be high enough to consider the border crossing a “hard” problem …
Greebus
They must be so extremely bored to be considering committing international crimes for someone they’ve only known for around two months. I love it. I also love the perspective and shading on panel 5. That’s great art.
atriflemiffed
Hooked on the story because I really want to find out what happened to Bip so I can determine exactly how many hugs they need (they already need a lot, given all the stuff we know they’ve been through so far)
Tumorhead
Seeing Idrisah cooking always makes me hungry, I bet her cooking is yummy af
Hanroz
That’s a big fridge! Are they normally that big in the future?
Greebus
Maybe because Dirtball is so remote, people would need more food storage?
Peter Jensen
Looks like a fridge/freezer combo. Gotta have room for all the zucchini-derived foods for the next six months!
Ruby
It’s for all the surplus zucchini
JoB
We don’t have a lot of data points there; what we can say is that the Touati-Sharpe’s clunkomoth seems to be a good deal larger than Talita’s, in spite of her being what, four to five times?, the combined live weight of Gillie and Idrisah.
Phasma Felis
I think poor Talita’s diet is pretty limited (though nutritious), while Idrisah keeps a big stock of different ingredients and prepared meals.
Enai
I suppose if anything special must be imported at horrific cost, you’d do bulk orders once every blue moon to cut down on shipping costs and just store your precious ingredients in the freezer for later use. Hence, large freezer.
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Talita doesn’t import food in the first place, apparently. I would like to see her try the delights her homeworld (or rather, native ecosystem – I think her “homeworld” is Nexus Jovia as she grew up there) has to offer for the first time. Would she even like most of them, or would the foods be mostly too unfamiliar for her palate?
Vinemaple
Talita ordered these dumplings of some sort once, from the Centaur homeworld, she absolutely loved them… and she’s never been able to find them again, because the importers never label products consistently.
zaratustra
Could be part of whatever bulk order they did to get freezers for agronomics.