That was... cold blood murder?
Are we sure Haley is still chaotic Good? Or even Goodish?
I would have never thought Haley would do something like that; it seems really odd from what we know of her personality. I mean, she was the one unwilling to use Soul Bind on the linear guild...
This comic looks... inconsistent, and in a bad way.
As for graduality of alignment shifts: that's because people usually change theyr values gradually. Look at V: we could see something going on since ages earlier: be cranky, refuse to rescue Lien, kill Kubota, leave the fleet etc. There was a progression and it fitted nicely. This seems to really be out of the blue.