Comic Archive

View down a dark corridor with an armed robot in the distance, Max aims the plasma rifle towards it.
Max: Here goes… I hope this rifle is not a total gimmick.
Alana: Me too, I only have a few rocket grenades, and I am not that good a shot at such distance…

View of the robot being hit and destroyed by a plasma projectile.
SFX: WHAM!

Max: It actually works! And pretty well, I must say. That bot is toast!
Adil: Wait, something is happening over there. Zhang, I think it's time to get tactical.
Zhang: Whoa, never thought this ridiculous bat would ever be useful!

Alana: What does your “tactical baseball bat” reveal, Zhang?
Zhang: What the heck? There's another one of those bots… spawning?
Steve: What do your mean, spawning?

A view through the “tactical” scope: a kind of chamber with another robot materializing inside it, almost complete.
Zhang (voice): It looks like it is sort of being 3D printed in that chamber; only then incredibly fast, and out of thin air.

Zhang gets hit by a projectile coming from the freshly spawned bot. He starts to appear fuzzy, similar to how they look every time they re-appear inside the simulation.
SFX: POW
Zhang: Aaarghh!
Alana: Zhang, look out!
Max: Too late!

Zhang is gone, with only his backpack and the “tactical bat” lying on the floor.
Heidi: He must be respawning, back at the Crapfilth as always. Convenient, but also problematic: as we progress deeper into this building, time for each round trip will increase. Let's retreat and take cover while we think this over.

Steve: It will be hard to get past that “printer” if it keeps churning out bots. Let's destroy it.
Heidi: Wait, maybe we shouldn't. It seems to rely on quantum technology… again reminds of Quantuple. With help from OIB-A271, we might be able to turn it to our advantage.

Alana: Now you've lost me.
Steve: Oh wait… System Shock. Are you telling me we can turn this here into a “resurrection chamber,” for real?
Heidi: Well, in this simulation, “real” is a bit of a flexible concept…

View of OIB-A271 in the real world.
Heidi (voice): If the spawning of those bots is similar to our respawns, we might indeed be able to hack that chamber such that we respawn in there. OIB-A271, do you see a way to do that?
OIB-A271: I briefly had more access while the bot was destroyed. But, I'll need more bandwidth to pull off a stunt like that.

Heidi: Would it help if I get closer to the chamber with my virtual monitoring device?
OIB-A271: Definitely, the closer the better.
Max: Let me blast that new bot, then we sprint towards the chamber.
Adil: Hmm, then my avatar had better be fitter than my real self.

Alana: The worst that can happen is that we'll all have to respawn. Adil, take Zhang's bat and start thwacking at any materializing bot, for what it's worth. Just don't damage the chamber itself.
Adil: No hand grenades then?
Alana: No!