Girl Genius XXXI: Let’s look at it from farther away!

[Fyraltari]

That is a big fish.

Please, one time I caught a fish *moves hands away from each other* that big.

[sihnfahl]

Maybe the island was the Song Keeper?

No. It was corrupted by the runoff from the island, though.

Also, I wasn't expecting Adrian Rakethorne to be the one to recognise it, but I guess someone had to. Did we see a Song Keeper on panel in the comic before, or did we only ever meet Leviathans?

No. The Great Cetaceans remarked that it had been corrupted a while back, and they went out of their way to avoid it because it was ... maddened.

But we never saw it.

[Shining Wrath]

No. It was corrupted by the runoff from the island, though.


No. The Great Cetaceans remarked that it had been corrupted a while back, and they went out of their way to avoid it because it was ... maddened.

But we never saw it.

And it's making them mad, too.

[Manga Shoggoth]

"It's bigger than the Island!"

Yup. Adrian knowing that this is the Song Keeper specifically makes a lot more sense now...

[Willie the Duck]

That is a big fish.

Not as big as the one I almost caught the other day, you should have seen it...

[Gez]

"Song Keeper" meaning one of the ancient leviathans has been corrupted? We're talking "end of civilization" level threat, then. If that guy can deliver a thousand monsters, each 10x the size of an airship, to Londonium or Marseille or Athens, who or what will stop them?

For Londinium I don't know; but for Marseilles and Athens I'd say the thing that will stop them is having to squeeze through the Straits of Gibraltar.

[InvisibleBison]

For Londinium I don't know; but for Marseilles and Athens I'd say the thing that will stop them is having to squeeze through the Straits of Gibraltar.

At its narrowest point, the Strait of Gibraltar is just over eight miles wide. The Song Keeper is big, but it's not that big.

[Gez]

At its narrowest point, the Strait of Gibraltar is just over eight miles wide. The Song Keeper is big, but it's not that big.

And at its shallowest point, it's only 280 meters deep. That beastie would have to crawl along the floor.

Not that it could hope to swim effectively anyway, due to anything over 100 meters in draft suffering from dead water effect... Sometimes big isn't beautiful.

[Grim Portent]

I'd be willing to bet that the exposure to the corrupted spring has made it fully capable of walking on land, at least for short periods of time. Major physical mutation and enhanced strength are the primary effects, so it's plausible that it's fins have become stubby clawed limbs that could drag it over land, and it's presumably an air breather given the whole 'cetacean' thing.

I'm curious as to what exactly it was carrying around before the mutation began, the miscellaneous monsters it's spitting up don't really look like sea creatures. I wonder if they're just supposed to be that extremely mutated that they lost all resemblence to their original form, or if the song keeper is meant to have had a smorgasboard of lifeforms from different places all living in it.

[geoduck]

And at its shallowest point, it's only 280 meters deep. That beastie would have to crawl along the floor.

Not that it could hope to swim effectively anyway, due to anything over 100 meters in draft suffering from dead water effect... Sometimes big isn't beautiful.

We've seen a depiction of one of the Great Cetaceans swimming, so unsurprisingly they've found a way to deal with the problem.

[Gez]

We've seen a depiction of one of the Great Cetaceans swimming, so unsurprisingly they've found a way to deal with the problem.

I was talking specifically about swimming across the Straits of Gibraltar, not about swimming in general.

The dead water effect is when a ship (or a giant mutant fish) is big enough that 1. it crosses the halocline and cannot be entirely within one of the water layers and 2. the two water layers flow in opposite directions. Which is the case for the Straits of Gibraltar, as you have the Atlantic water flowing into the sea on the top and the much more saline Mediterranean water flowing out to the ocean on the bottom. The ship (or giant mutant fish) being caught between the two opposite flow will end up "getting stuck in dead water".

This phenomenon is usually only encountered in fjords, where the layer of fresh water is thin enough that ships can realistically have a draft tall enough to cross the halocline and get stuck. But that thing here is easily over 300 meters tall, and the halocline in the Straits of Gibraltar is at around 100 meters.

[smuchmuch]

Look I like nerding over physics and versimilitude of realism as much as the next person but as far this comic is concerned...
This is a comic about time travel, talking cats, steampunk mad "science" that is effetively magic by any other name and that has abandonned any sense of versimilitude of even having rules beyond rule of cool and absolute plot armor for it's protagonists a while ago. Do you think a creature that obviously ignore so hapilly the square cube law and all rules of biology that comes with it (a thing so big that an entire flying cavalry squadron came through it's pupil !) would care about the Dead water effect ? Besides the song keeper would just float over the straight of Gibraltar with the "totaly scientific" power of reality altering whale songs or giant steampunk mecha lobster

Anyhow what's important right now is that it's another threat interrupting the queen fight and tje retreat of our protagonists. Also it lost an eye. Let's not think too hard as to what could wound that thing so.

[Agi Hammerthief]

This is a comic about time travel, talking cats, steampunk mad "science" that is effetively magic by any other name.

Sufficiently Advanced Biology?

[WanderingMist]

Love this comic. Need to catch up. Read the entire thing in like October 2020 I think and haven't read a page since because I like having a lot of it to read but I want to collect all the volumes in printed form.

[Shining Wrath]

Bang is going to have big monster eat hordes of smaller monsters. She only has to risk total annihilation to do it.

[St Fan]

Yup, Bang opted for an insanely dangerous stunt. Which means it's probably crazy enough to work.

[Shining Wrath]

Cue Othar Trygvassen: Agatha is a hero at heart. Also, green monster is about to eat a wrench.

[geoduck]

Cue Othar Trygvassen: Agatha is a hero at heart. Also, green monster is about to eat a wrench.

My immediate thought was hoping they don't need that wrench when working on the engines.

[f00bar]

New comic.
Sparky Princess Neena confirmed?

[Shining Wrath]

Even monsters are afraid of MegaClankrezia (panel 3).

I think perhaps Albia is about to pay a visit, using Neena as a vessel. The "you want to be a Queen? Let me show you what that really is" moment. Possibly involving the death of Neena, because sacrifices must sometimes be made for the good of the realm. It'd be a dark twist.

Or we'll get yet another Rescued By Monahan moment.

Or perhaps the Song Keeper will decide Clankrezia looks tasty.

[sihnfahl]

Or Neena is going to have a Spark moment of her own. She DID just ... 'snap'.

[Rockphed]

Or Neena is going to have a Spark moment of her own. She DID just ... 'snap'.

And Mommy has a very clear "no sparky daughters" rule, so Neena has been suppressing her spark for over a decade. She will make a fitting distraction for Tarvek.

[geoduck]

And Mommy has a very clear "no sparky daughters" rule, so Neena has been suppressing her spark for over a decade. She will make a fitting distraction for Tarvek.

Very clear? We don't know that Albia has that rule, or that Neena has been suppressing anything. We still don't even know if her daughters are biologically related to her. She did declare at one point that Agatha was to be treated as a princess of the realm.

[Shining Wrath]

Citation needed on "no Sparky daughters", especially because she does tolerate non-family Sparks. We still don't know how Queen Albia goes about producing children - parthenogenesis? Sparky science? Or normal "boink followed by 9 months gestation"?

[InvisibleBison]

We still don't know how Queen Albia goes about producing children - parthenogenesis? Sparky science? Or normal "boink followed by 9 months gestation"?

I see no reason to assume she produces all her children through the same process. Variety is the spice of life, after all.

[theangelJean]

Very clear? We don't know that Albia has that rule, or that Neena has been suppressing anything. We still don't even know if her daughters are biologically related to her. She did declare at one point that Agatha was to be treated as a princess of the realm.

Actually I've been wondering if Neena's lack of sparkiness is directly related to proximity to Albia in another way - and also the reason Albia wants to keep Agatha. The oblique references to Albia's "safe power source" and the Garden ... Is Albia draining them somehow?

[Shining Wrath]

Actually I've been wondering if Neena's lack of sparkiness is directly related to proximity to Albia in another way - and also the reason Albia wants to keep Agatha. The oblique references to Albia's "safe power source" and the Garden ... Is Albia draining them somehow?

I think the "safe power source" is likely a Flame, since Clankrezia spoke of using Albia's Flame to complete ascension.

That doesn't preclude Albia's Garden from being full of sinister delights such as captive Sparks used as batteries when the Flame is ebbing. Royal prerogatives and all that.

Myself, I don't see how Neena breaking through saves her & Agatha from Clankrezia. She's got no weapons or tools handy.

However, Krosp can fly, and has the Gloves of Static Shock. He could try to do something.

[Gez]

Myself, I don't see how Neena breaking through saves her & Agatha from Clankrezia. She's got no weapons or tools handy.

She didn't break through, but she did cast Summon Bigger Fish.

[Jimorian]

I like how this is literally a case of

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"My mom can beat up your mom!"

[Fyraltari]

This might have come in handy at school.