Hero Go Home

We’ll talk more about his encounter with airport security later.

Oh, and the Drillers plus scar tissue were worth 10 pts. in Champions. Just sayin’.

In movie special effects, they will sometimes film several passes of a miniature model to capture different aspects–a matte pass, a lighting pass, etc. When they do a pass to capture the surface detail on the model, they call it a beauty pass.

This is the beauty pass on the Drillers. Normally, I’ll just depict them as gray metal, but for today’s strip, I decided to show them in more detail.

They are battered and scarred from thousands of deflected bullets and blades and other attacks. The three dark lines on the forearm unit are welding scars from when Digger attempted to jazz them up by adding fins (as described by Digger in the short story “Double Secret Weapon,” available at Baen’s Universe: “At one point, I got so bored with them that I tried to weld on little Cadillac-style fins, give them some panache, but after two or three battles, they were beat all to hell. Looked really pitiful.”)

The three discolored spots on the hand unit are evidence of more recent welds, but he doesn’t talk about them.

Digger’s complicated relationship with Playco Toys was explained in more detail in the story “Double-Secret Weapon,” published in Jim Baen’s Universe, December 2007. I’m busy transitioning to a new day job, but the story should be available here in a few months.

Wait, what are these “Driller Beam Generators” of which you speak? Did I miss something? If you’ve read any of the published Digger stories, you already know, but if not, well…

Explanations coming Friday.

Hey, it’s our one-month anniversary, and we’re finally out of the airport! Cool!

Based on a true story! Really!

Splash page! Roll credits! Let the story begin!

About time!

Yes, not much happening here, but this’ll be important later.

Yes, he can stick to stuff.

Digger’s a prick. On the plus side, that’s a hell of a durable pen.

Oh, and a special easter egg, too.