Talita and Idrisah having an anxiety-off here.
Transcript
Idrisah swiftly taps the decline button for the invite.
SFX: WHAP
There is a pause where Idrisah stares at her laptop and Talita stares at her. Then they both start talking at the same time.
Talita: Should I–
Idrisah: Ahaha you were saying–
The laptop ringtone starts again, this time with a video forum invite from her Dad. Idrisah frantically taps the decline button while Talita looks on, wide-eyed and uncertain.
SFX: WHAP WHAP WHAP WHAP
Idrisah grips her forehead in her hands and hunches over her laptop screen, sweating.
Talita: If it’s urgent, I can, er… leave…
Idrisah covers her face with her hands.
Idrisah: It's not urgent. My parents keep trying to get me to join these big family reunion planning calls…
39 thoughts on “Runaway to the Stars: Page 154”
palmaris longish
I am currently in the “lots of cadaver videos” part if training to become an LMT and seeing how much care went into Talitas anatomy blows my mind on a weekly basis. Like the layers of her being some cool ass space beast approximating human body language is so fucking cool!!! Look at those graspers!! Yo!!!!!!!!
lightspeed lunatic
i understand its actually just for comedic timing but i like that this implies that idrisah’s mom sent her multiple requests knowing she would decline the first few (because there’d be a good delay between “declination received” and all)
IncompleteMachine
oh no i think that knowledge makes it much funnier XD
Phasma Felis
I think one request is from her mom and the other from her dad. Which is just as funny, given that they’re probably in the same room.
JoB
First the Whop, now the Whap. I think I see hints which one Idrisah likes better … >;->
Gar G
Well this isn’t awkward in the least :3
Famout
I only JUST realized that Talita practically has two thumbs….
kulupu [kasi lipu suwi]
in total that’s ~12 sorta thumbs
Claire
Really? I count four. /s
Ducks
2 thumbs per hand times six hands/feet
Ruby
Today it’s Idrisah’s turn on the muppet face
Jackie
I to would not want to deal with planning a reunion where presumably multiple members are not only cross planet but cross planetary systems
Greebus
I love that Talita is grabbing her trunk. Honestly, if I were a centaur, I would be doing that.
Ducks
I think Talita’s hands are in *front* of her trunk, otherwise her middle fingers are kind of going through her trunk. She can’t be clasping her trunk with both hands at the same height unless her hands overlap or her fingers intertwine.
Eux
IDRISAH………..IDRISAH ARE YOU GOOD……. (she’s not)
Vinemaple
Last page made me freak out a bit, but this page makes me feel so good, because they’re talking and listening and trusting and respecting each other, and it’s so comforting to see that. \
It came as a surprise to me that Idrisah is, in her own way, just as much of an outsider as the others: she grew up in a huge, close-knit family, but she can barely communicate with any of them because the only languages she’s fluent in are Jovian English and Tiiliitan. She essentially has to look in from the outside at a major part of her *identity.* And I get a sneaky feeling that everyone, including her parents, say “Why don’t you just learn Urdu?” and think they’ve solved her problem.
hessian
god. ouch. i felt that. idrisah is such a relatable girl
Trees
Well… Looks like the ladies gotta Strangers-on-a-Train this situation.
Each can murder* the source of the other’s anxiety. Bish, bash, bosh, problem solved.
.
*…have a frank and open conversation with…
eden
lol the irony of you own advice biting you in the ass
HAL9000
so like, what if it was urgent? is that the fastest method of interplantery/intergalatic (<- i've forgotten where dirtball is. its not in the milky way is it? i feel like its not) contact? not that you could really do anything if it was urgent but eh… i'm curious
Feather
I think so – the limitations they’re working with are physical constraints of light taking time to travel, even with an interplanetary wormhole internet system. Of course they’d probably send a text message as opposed to uploading a video if it was properly urgent, but even a small message has to physically travel through space.
Amber
Dirtball is hanging out around Jupiter :3
Green Heron
I think you may be thinking of Nexus Jovia. I don’t know if Jay’s ever said where Dirtball is.
Enai
No, can’t be. I thought so, too, though I can’t recall what gave me that idea, but Jay says here that Ixion-3 is closer to the dominion of Tiiliit than Earth, which rules out our entire Solar System.
.
But there is in fact a dwarf planet callen Ixion in the Oort cloud. It is much too small to be Dirtball and, of course, too close to Earth to match the description.
DasGanon
Ixion is star for Dirtball (the planet’s official name being “Ixion-3” meaning it’s 3rd planet from the star, similar to Earth) and it’s sized between Mars & Venus (ish, that’s only off of the .79g on the location page). At this time, we the readers don’t have a Galaxy map anywhere.
He’s a mad king in Greek Mythology, basically the first kin-slayer, and punished by the gods to be stuck to a spinning wheel of fire that goes across the sky.
(Also as an aside, a game that’s basically “Frostpunk” in Space that’s a similar near future vibe to this, but uh…. way bleaker. It’s fun though)
JoB
AFAIK Jay never specified what interstellar distances the wormhole gates transparently bridge, or what galaxy, or part of the Milky Way, specific planets besides our own are in. But since the wormholes do make distances other than in-system ones irrelevant for both ships and transmissions, it’s not of much importance here, either, I guess.
·
Dirtball got stripped by an avian mining operation before getting sold to Jovia-based Ixion, so I’m pretty sure it’s not within our star system. IIUC Jovia obtained its independence before First Contact.
·
Alas, I’m not versed enough in astronomy to look at pages like #144 and go “hey, that’s the Belt of Orion parallax-shifted 47’11”, Dirtball must be in the Scutum-Crux Arm!” :-3
JoB
P.S.: Note that the farthest-reaching political entity is called the Bug Ferret Galactic Council, though …
Lilac
Is talita grabbing onto her trunk in panel 5 jgfhfjs is that the centaur equivalent of cupping your hands over your mouth
Lilac
I looked up stock photos of “cupping hands over mouth” to verify what I was thinking of and instead there was like a bunch of ones about putting the hands around your mouth to shout which is Not the same and Not what I meant I meant like. Covering you mouth. Yknow gjfjfjs just wanted 2 make sure
forest @ swifty's hq!
im seconding this sentiment because its sooooo funny and such an easy analogue. i would do this too if i was talita in this situation. grab snout.
Vinemaple
I’m glad someone’s ahead of me on this, because the transcript’s “Talita looks on, wide-eyed and uncertain” DOES NOT DO JUSTICE to how keyed-up it looks when Talita is actually grabbing her trunk tightly in both hands and I don’t think we’ve EVER seen her do that before!
tminusfiveminutes
I love the implication that Idrisah’s parents knew she wouldn’t pick up, so because of lightspeed lag they had to queue a bunch of calls at once to get a chance of one of them being answered
Yay
lol i love that idea.
JoB
Forum status line for the duration of one RTT plus one manual button mashfest:
“Current Users: Mom, Dad, Uncle Ed, Aunt Wanda, Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), Idrisah (ringing), and 4711 more”
Vinemaple
Same as every family video forum.
JoB
Maybe, but theirs randomly switches the places of the “Accept” and “Decline” buttons on the touchscreen with every invite!
creetur
Whatever emotion Idrisah is going through in the bottom left.. I’ve felt it too.
K
It’s all fun in games trying to coach your friend on their specific flavor of anxiety and it’s triggers until the universe throws your own specialized made-just-for-you anxiety trigger at you and you look like a hypocrite lol
furubatsu
God, the faces (Idrisah AND Talita’s) through this whole page are amazing.