Runaway to the Stars: Page 94

Everyone's favorite digital poltergeist is baaaaaaaaccck.

Transcript

As Talita works on the frontloader arm, the digital wall clock behind her hits 14:00. The arm of the frontloader vehicle taps her on the shoulder.

Frontloader: Hey.
Talita: Just a second, Cal—

Talita freezes, staring at the hand with her mane feathers standing on end.

Frontloader: Who’s Cal?
Talita: Bip?! How’d you get that frequency!?

Bip's avatar appears on the wall clock screen, pointing accusingly at the minute digits. Talita looks on in alarm.

Bip: Hey, don’t deflect. You’re 3 minutes late to a very important discussion!

Runaway to the Stars: Page 94

Everyone's favorite digital poltergeist is baaaaaaaaccck.

Transcript

As Talita works on the frontloader arm, the digital wall clock behind her hits 14:00. The arm of the frontloader vehicle taps her on the shoulder.

Frontloader: Hey.
Talita: Just a second, Cal—

Talita freezes, staring at the hand with her mane feathers standing on end.

Frontloader: Who’s Cal?
Talita: Bip?! How’d you get that frequency!?

Bip's avatar appears on the wall clock screen, pointing accusingly at the minute digits. Talita looks on in alarm.

Bip: Hey, don’t deflect. You’re 3 minutes late to a very important discussion!

58 thoughts on “Runaway to the Stars: Page 94

  1. I imagine that this could be very useful in management letting The Runaway crew leave. Talita has already looked at all the necessary forms and documentation, so she can just slap it on Mel’s desk and declare that she’s going to take the ship and management is going to let her do it, and if they don’t there’s a rogue AI that’s partitioned itself into every device on Dirtball that won’t leave willingly.

    1. That sounds like an escalation to outright blackmail that Talita would be unlikely to do. Mel learning about Bip’s existence might be a trigger to let the Runaway go, but I think it’s more likely to be something like them thinking it’s unethical to keep an AI trapped when it’s possible for them to leave in their “body” than because Bip is threatening them.

  2. Oh, I’m entirely on Bip’s side on this. Try waking up with your being fractured in 841 pieces, then being told to wait a WEEK while your original body could get turned to scrap-metal at any moment.

    You better believe I’d be punctual.

    1. Though in Talita’s defense, Bip is also a bit of a free-loading space pirate who she knows nothing about but decided not to report anyway 😅

  3. Translunary_Animus

    Bip you can’t be doing that to Talita she’s gonna have an aneurysm

  4. Bip, you could’ve just called her 🤦

    1. [every loudspeaker in the habitat turns on and starts calling out “Taliitaaaa … where are yoooouuuuu …”]

      (Seriously, *did* she take her tablet along to work, which she would have been plain unable to use while she’s been in her space suit?)

      1. I would imagine it can interface with the suit’s electronics and have some basic controls (like answering calls; if her suit has an augmented reality HUD, it could display texts, and you could probably also set it for voice activation and voice-to-text) using some of the programmable controls on the suit itself. Sorta like your phone hooking up to your car.
        But maybe Bip did try to contact her through her tablet, and she’s just been so absorbed with work she didn’t notice.

  5. Startled Talita never gets old! I wonder if Bip is now inside every computer in Dirtside?

    1. I don’t think that a front loader – or, for that matter, a wall clock display – qualify as “a computer” to them. Try “everywhere there’s a chip built in, down to the IoT-connected ceiling light switches”. >;->

  6. Man….. I wonder how many times Calcery tapped Talita on the shoulder when she was working too hard. The start of the comic really makes it feel like they were good friends, you know? I hope we get to see them interact more, eventually.

    1. Yeah, I thought it was sweet that she immediately assumed Cal was communicating with her. :•)

  7. scaring her :(((

    1. And after such a rough day :(((

  8. Talita’s having a very bad day, judging by how much we’ve seen her teeth.

  9. Did the accident with the hydraulic line cut the work day short? In the beginning of the comic we see Talita end her work day at around 17:00.
    Or does she have fluctuating work hours?

    1. Usually after an incident or near miss in a high risk work environment like this, there’s a debrief and investigations occur. Reporting and all that. [this would be an incident as there was damage done to objects, and time loss]

      after the bureaucracy was done, and alterations were made to procedure & training to ensure it doesnt happen again (potentially with people being harmed this time), work would resume. often this means next day, as bureaucracy, repairs, training, and re-inspection can take anywhere from til end of day to several weeks.

      also as a manager her workday may be longer due to things like inspections, repairs, training, etc. OR, resident workaholic is resident workaholic who hyperfocuses instead of dealing with her issues.

      or all of the above 🙂

  10. Jump scared by a comic book. File that under things I expected to happen

  11. Bip could be absolutely terrifying if they wanted to (luckily they do not)

  12. Talita’s feathers all standing on end asdfghjkl
    Also I love how it means we can see the strap of her glasses and just how small her skull actually is.

  13. Oh, right, that thing XD

  14. the machines…….THE MACHINES!!!! They have risen up against us and THEY ARE GOING TO KILL US ALL!!!!!
    Ooh..Hi BIP……Aww I cant stay mad at you , you little rascal…

  15. gods that second panel, oh Talitas expressions!!!!

  16. I think Bip deserves some arms, for mischievous purposes

  17. Man, this place’s encryption sucksssss

    1. Well… they used to have an AI to handle all that “cyber-security” nonsense…

      And honestly, for as bizarrely coincidental as all that has occurred has been, I don;t sometimes wonder how much was setup in part by Calcery…

      Like, just for a moment imagine that Calcery found out their friend Bip’s ship was att- ah, ‘damaged’, so they arranged for it to come here, just as they were leaving so there’d be no residential AI to interfere, knowing that Bip would need a crew and that Talita needed a challenge and reason to escape from DIrtball and start her own life along with her two besties.

      I mean, yeah, I know, it’s all just a coincidence. But…

      1. When up against a superior intellect capable of analyzing all Meat-bag behavior and deducting all possible outcomes of all individuals based on their previous pattern of decisions and life-events, this is a quite possible scenario..
        I guess Cal´s parting gift to Talita is a “Now get going” kick in the pants …In a friendly manner however.
        She is possible the best choice for acting in the line of events Cal has foreseen. We´ll see.

      2. That is a great theory. We don’t know how much extra computing capacity AI actually have in this setting, though. Their core programs, the parts that makes up their thoughts and personality, have been described as a poorly understood rat’s nest of code, akin to our brains in opaque-ness. So we don’t know how supercomputer-y they actually are. They’re certainly smarter than most people but they seem to be far, far short of mastermind manipulator status.

        On the other hand, Cal’s exit would have taken weeks or months of planning, unless AI are in extremely high demand. He would have had plenty of time to arrange the ship’s arrival in the scrapyard. Even though that’s not his department (it’s cheev’s, I think), he could still have convinced them.

        I’m leaning towards coincidence.

    2. it might be everything is set up to allow AI access for Calcery, then when he left the access wasn’t secured properly, which is how Bip got in

  18. Aww Talita got so floofy ! You can see the chills going down her spine!

  19. BIP JUMPSCARE

  20. “How’d you get that frequency?”

    Maybe the explicit concentric circles in panel 1 of page 92 (as opposed to page 83) are a hint to that?

    1. Huh! I hadn’t noticed that 👁👁

    2. Oooh nice catch!

  21. Does every AI have Bip’s hacking skills or is Bip special?

    1. I feel like for AI “hacking skills” would be like dexterity. Like, instead of “how did you get on that frequency” it’d be like “how did you squeeze yourself into this room” lol

  22. BIP! BIP! BIP! BIP!

    1. BIP [REDACTED] THE PIRATE GUY
      (gender neutral guy)

  23. Finally, Bip confirms their pirate cred. Also, poor Talita

  24. Ha ha get poked

  25. I never thought a vehicle could be so expressive, but here we are.

    Bip continuing to take advantage of the abysmal protections of every piece of technology on Dirtball will never not be funny,

  26. Those arms DO do something!

  27. Ah, the pacing of these developments and twists is really good.
    This story is going to be so good on the reread.

  28. The appointment was “after work”, Bip. You can *see* what she’s doing here, don’t you? :-3
    https://www.runawaytothestars.com/comic/rtts-page-69/

  29. /’|’¸’¸’¸’¸’¸’|’\
    ‘-,;¸,..-··-..¸;,-‘
    ,_;,_¸ ¸_¸;_ “I am 841 phones,
    |´¯O ´¯O,-´ — plus one heavy duty lifter
    |¸’¸’¸’¸’,-´ because nothing was encrypted.”
    |¸’¸’,-´
    |¸,-´

    1. Fun fact: This *entire planet* suuucks. 😉
      https://www.runawaytothestars.com/comic/rtts-page-60/

      1. (… however, if all that protects the vehicle RC is that you have to get the *frequency* right, I’m tempted to agree … even *we* are *way* beyond that … *usually*.)
        https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/01/hacking_the_pol.html

        1. The real question is… whats the transmitter?

        2. > The real question is… whats the transmitter?

          Hmm, let’s see …
          1. Those devices Bip is running on are “phones”, which suggests that they have some sort of air interface to connect themselves to local communication networks.
          2. Moreover, they’re *quantum* phones with capabilities far beyond what even RttS considers normal phones’ level, and their bandwidth requirements should be that much higher.
          3. Even in RL today, we see radio hardware move from the traditional (tube- to transistor- to dedicated-chips-age) technology to SDR, where one and the same general-purpose hardware can be reprogrammed to much wider ranges of frequencies, modulations etc. etc..

        3. … 4. With people moving between jurisdictions that are separated from each other by distances that radio waves *definitely will not* cross, I expect the relevant regulations to be much more disparate than our RL ITU-coordinated ones are, and any portable (“phone”) or mobile (spacecraft) radio stations will simply *have* to be adaptable to those varied environments.

  30. Oh my god X’D

    Well I suppose for ai AI three minutes can feel like an eternity, plus there’s the matter of them being very precise
    1400 means 1400 and not a single minute later!

  31. Talita’s hackles raising always looks so cool

    1. Hackles raised and teeth displayed.
      Impressive!

  32. if bip was like 80% more evil this moment would be a fantastic space horror premise. luckily bip is simply too silly for that

    1. Username checks out

      1. Reality is ours to re-re-remake as we see fit ha-hacker. Bi-Bi-Bi-Bip is only capable of play-playing with toys. After all, he is only only 800 and 800 and 41 phones.

        (This is gnome-artificer and I mean no offense, just trying to get SHODAN’s mannerisms right)

      2. I’m sorry, Talita, I’m afraid I can’t do that. I’m 841 phones. =:>

        1. Bip can do a better HAL impression than that … 😉
          https://jayrockin.tumblr.com/post/632222392656265216/

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