Took some advice from Kilyle and modified Sai Fen’s speech bubble style a bit since she’s underwater. Thanks for the feedback.
I was trying to think of a way to work dialogue into a strip to answer the question many readers had about how breastfeeding works with Tai Li’s egg tooth being in the way, but in the interest of flow I decided to just answer it here instead.
The egg tooth isn’t just important for hatching, it’s also used to hook and hold onto the breast during feeding (an evolutionary trait that came about to prevent against getting detached by water currents). The areola of sarnothi breasts are basically a patch of tougher skin with much lower touch-sensitivity, with an indentation the infant can use to hook on to with the egg tooth.
I think that was an appropriate pun-ishment for Selkie
… I’ll show myself out.
Eau, I don’t think that’s necessary. Aqua-rd puns are b”eau”tiful.
Still the worst ones should be WATERED down.
These water puns are gonna run downhill from here, aren’t they?
I think our pun-telling plans might be all wet.
don’t worry they’ll flow down soon :p
We used to call those “Dad jokes”.
http://www.sunnyskyz.com/uploads/2014/04/w8olj-dad11.jpg
Way to break the ice, water-bender XD
Also, Dave, you do need to come up with (and then maybe backtrack and insert) a different style of word bubbles for when they’re underwater. Even if it’s just a change in coloration (med/dark blue on lighter blue?), though I’d expect more of a wavy or bubbly outline. It clearly wouldn’t sound the same as normal speech.
Hmm, not a bad idea. My thinking on that was that since Sarnothi are built for underwater speech they would still be speaking intelligibly while submerged. But i was thinking in terms of, “do I make my speech bubbles “woog wike thish” since they’re underwater?” A hand-drawn wavy outline might work for that, though, with standard font.
The wavy bubbles work really well. They’re different enough to make the sound-distinction, but the words are in a normal font, so there’s nothing interfering with comprehension, which is exactly right.
No need to change the text too much — readers will supply a sound in their own head if given the cue. I do think a slight color change would benefit the whole appearance, but that’s just my style and might not be yours.
Regular font that doesn’t call attention to itself is almost always best, with rare exceptions like a big scary space monster, or a computer/robot, whose speech might be told apart each and every time they speak. Generally speaking, it’s not necessary to be weird about the font.
Do hope you correct the speech bubbles on the page before this, when you have time. Certainly before publication in print media.
Oh thank god the water didn’t fall. I was kind of worried Tai Li would get accidentally hurt. ):
You weren’t the only one concerned about that. 😀
Gee. Yeah. I know,I read the comments too.
Oh god, that one was *horrible* and Selkie walked right into it.
It kind of crept up on her.
You could say that joke was a sneaker.
It snuck up on her. 😉
As “dad joke” as that was, I laughed out loud at it and its unexpectedness. Good job.
Selkie’s getting off too lightly here, on the other hand glad Sai Fen isn’t like freaking out or something but the response to spying on someone like this shouldn’t be “it’s okay”.
She’s gonna have a hard time living down Sai’s puns though.
I wouldn’t be upset by this. Selkie is a kid with a great deal of curiosity and babies are a natural curiosity magnet. It is a little rude, maybe, because Todd made it clear they were going to give Sai Fen privacy, but a simple sentence about respecting people’s privacy ought to be enough.
It’s not just rude but also kind of creepy-stalkey, she’s a kid so she probably doesn’t realize, that’s all the more reason why someone should explain that aspect of it though.
Wait, no, that’s exactly what it’s not.
It would be creepy-stalkey if an adult did it. Me, I find it quite creepy to project adult-stalker meanings onto a kid’s actions. Nobody should be trying to make Selkie think there was something horrible and repulsive about her wanting to know more about what is, after all, also her own biology.
Fortunately, Sai Fen seems to be perfectly capable of setting whatever personal boundaries she wants in a plain, no-nonsense way. I think breast feeding is not that big a deal for her. She really is okay with Selkie seeing it. As for the “magic”, she’s given signs earlier that she’s not entirely on board with the government’s big keep-it-secret policy. She may actually be relieved that Selkie has been curious enough to sneak in here.
There is something horrible about secretly spying on people in intimate situations though, it is creepy. That does not make Selkie a creep since as you said she’s a kid and doesn’t know this yet, hence this being a great opportunity to have talk with her about respecting people’s privacy I believe.
Like if a kid Selkie’s age was grabbing for strangers boobs, would you go haha, or tell the kid why touching people without permission, especially in those areas, is a no-no?
Those wouldn’t be the only two choices. But I won’t spend words arguing about some other kid who isn’t like Selkie at all.
Selkie knew perfectly well she shouldn’t have been sneaking. She knew she was breaking a rule. Kids do. She doesn’t need bigger explanations why it was wrong. She wouldn’t be at all surprised to be punished for it.
Instead, she’s getting PUNished…!
Seems to me like Sai Fen is interpreting it from within Sarnothi culture — a way humans would not tend to interpret it. Her wording seems to imply that this action indicates a bit of a predator in Selkie, and she approves, because her culture values that aspect of their nature. (Humans tend to suppress that aspect of our nature, and find it to be a negative, but Sarnothi do not.)
But whether from her own nature/culture, her interaction with humans, or whatever, she decides to break the ice a bit with a pun. I don’t think that entirely undoes the reading of the previous sentences.
It’s rather interesting that they breast feed, with being closer to fish then mammals.
Hey, if a platypus can lay eggs…
It’s interesting that they have so much in common with platypi (platypodes?): Lay eggs, nurse young, parts of their anatomy are toxic to humans even from babyhood….
Oh man. I had a nightmare the other night that you put up a strip saying that you weren’t going to be updating anymore, and I was so upset I woke up crying. 😛 So I was very happy to see this go up tonight…
I love that Sai Fen is helping ease the awkwardness by telling awful Mom Jokes! …she sounds like she will be a wonderful mentor/teacher, though.
The pun is mightier than the sword!
I’m glad Sai Fen didn’t freak out, but I think Selkie has lost any chance at getting away with that “just going to the bathroom” excuse, even with Todd.
I’m unsure whether Todd is really supposed to be kept out of the loop regarding Sarnothi what the Sarnothi can do, though. Agent Brown got him a security clearance and handed him a packet of information. Has he read it? Did he learn anything new? Did it even mention Sarnothi resonance at all?
And, since the Feds are concerned that Selkie herself might “awaken” at any time, isn’t it something that her father OUGHT TO BE TOLD ABOUT?
I’m really glad that Sai Fen is so open with Selkie about the whole baby/breastfeeding/magic thing. By being open and friendly about it she is helping Selkie understand her whole “alien-ness”.
One would hope that someday in the future it will be Selkie inside the bubble nursing her own baby.
PUN! <3
TOTALLY! COOL!
?
Oh no! It’s the Variant of the Dad Joke! The Mom Jest! XD
a certain skeleton would be proud
Sans?
Defusing the tension with a pun. Glorious.
Sai Fen is awesome.
I don’t know. Sai Fen’s expression disquietes me lightly in the fourth panel. It resembles the classic “don’t worry” smile that actually says “oh, we’ve got a sneaky sneaker here, huh, let’s see where it gets you…” and as soon as you turn you’re back you’re done for.
I know this is Selkie and Dave will never depict violence, but as soon as I saw it I thought “RUN, SELKIE, RUN!”
They’re predators. If they don’t look like that now and again, Dave’s not doing his job.
I just now noticed I wrote “you’re” back as opposed to “your” back.
I am Utterly, Terribly ashamed. I apologize deeply. If this was a japanese comic, I’d be with my head hitting the floor repeatedly at this moment.
That aside: I get it, but… I still don’t know. I know they’re supposed to be good people, but the Pohls family, from the page of the reveal of magic/technology, disquietes me. Their expressions while they were saying “there was once a family of mice which wanted nothing more than to CONQUER THE WORLD” I’m quoting from memory, so I may be mistaken as Humphrey Ruttus was (google it), I remember made me think “hey, what if that’s an allegory and they REALLY want to conquer the world? And Selkie features somewhere in that plan?”
I know, silly, very silly, terribly silly, especially given the comic’s theme. But hey. Can’t argue with impressions, can you?
i think it’s just the camera angle that’s throwing that vibe out there…
I am tremendously impressed by the respect and kindness and trust they are showing both Todd and Selkie — especially Todd — in showing not only the hatching of their infant but letting them stick around during all this bonding time! Wow. They must really like the Smiths! Obviously, I know, but, really, quiet time with a new baby is good, guests are good, but all of the new stuff being shown their guests… I’m impressed:)
Nice touch with the floaty braid. 🙂 Adds a great bit of realism.
I’m curious about the water though, especially with regards to oxygen content.
With Sai Fen added into the blob, how many “breaths” (gulps?) does the tank hold? Do adult Sarnothi have Oxygen requirements similar to humans? What about the babies? Do they breath from the surface like beta fish, or might a bubbler sometimes be necessary? Is the green tech (magic?) performing some sort of exchange function, or is Pohl in the next room going “Uhm… That splashing is the dishwasher.” because his wife has to swirl the water around?
pretty sure the arm band thingies she’s using to do her Sarnothi green glow trick also act as a filter for the water and can be utilized at will to do so in lieu of a machine? Just guessing.
Pohl: Ummm that splashing noise is the dishwasher…
Todd: We’re in the kitchen, the dishwasher isn’t on….
>_>
(It occurs to me that human society is going to be (more) AWESOME once this technology/magic/whatever is fully integrated (because knowledge will out, and any Sarnothi-specific requirements will be spoofed).)
Perhaps since Sai Fen ‘likes to play the long game,’ she may have given some thought to becoming a mentor to Selkie. Let’s face it, puberty is only a few years away and where else will Selkie find another Sarnothi female to help her through it? Not freaking out and letting Selkie watch her nurse might be a good icebreaker for future conversations about being Sarnothi.
Yeah, I hit puberty at 10/11-ish, and plus when you get to 4th or 5th grade the schools will have a ‘puberty ed’ class. Give it 3 years max, and Selkie’ll be banging down the door wanting to know ‘is THAT gonna happen to ME?!?’
(I am suddenly very envious of the Sarnothi, as egg-layers wouldn’t need a uterine lining, and Sarnothi girls would get to avoid the most unpleasant part of human coming-of-age…)
who says that the Egg that we saw wasn’t the same size as when it was laid, as it was just slightly before Tai Li broke out of it, i mean think about the eggs of chickens and how they work, they DON’T get bigger as the chick matures, it stays the same size the whole time. and, i don’t know about you, but I’ll bet that getting that large of an object out of MY guts would be PLENTY painful…
um… OOPS! i TOTALLY misread what y’all were talking about. and didn’t realize it until AFTER i hit post… me being a guy i don’t have to go thru your torment every month…
Silkie doesn’t like the puns! Keep her out of Callahans! (Wait, Callahans blew up at the end of the third book. Keep her out of “The Place” in Key West! (“Callahans Key” by Spider Robinson.))
Spelled it wrong! Selkie doesn’t like the puns, etc. etc.
That is really fascinating how the babies feed! Totally not at all fishlike, but then again a lot behavior/biology of the Sarnothi isn’t actually that fishlike to begin with (beyond the gills and jelly eggs).
Loving how cool Sai Fen is about the whole thing—cheesy jokes and all. Something tells me she or her hubby were planning to spill the beans about this at some point to Todd/Selkie—just not right now/here.
One thing I’m curious about—totally off-topic – Selkie was loving having a french braid until she remembered being teased about her lack of external ears. I wonder if hanging out with Sai Fen help her get over that?
A PUNishment to fit the crime. I hope Selkie was wearing her UGGs.