693 | I Ran to It

693 | I Ran to It

April 27, 2014 | 8:51 pm, by Pascalle Lepas

I got a little choked-up when I drew this page, no lies. We have gone full-circle.

EDIT: SO cool story!! So many of you decided to reread the entire archives today that you just destroyed the server. The site is back up, now! Hopefully we don’t have that problem again! Be nice to the site on update days, please and thank you!



Comments

  • Canin Christell

    Guys, Pascalle was kind enough to save us the wait, and posted the next comic early: http://www.zapcomic.com/2003/07/20030718/

  • ForTheLulz

    And we still love you!

  • ForTheLulz

    Good one! The skill difference is insane. She’s gotten soooooooo much better!

  • Just read it on a loop forever!!!!

  • And I did go ahead and post the first panel from the next page on my tumblr, so you can see how they flow together.

    http://lepas.tumblr.com/

    Redrawing those old scenes man! It got me!

  • Private Eye

    Please tell me he’s going to explain *HOW* he got/tricked/whatever Naveed to erase his memory. I’ve been wondering about that ever since I started reading and began to understand that his mind had been erased and that he wasn’t, in fact, just a lovable idiot.

  • I mean, I’m not sure how much more you want? The specific dialogue that went on in between them?

    Throughout the series we showed that Naveed is jealous of Zap and Gunner’s friendship, and also that she is brash and impulsive. Then you add that Zap can predict events and it’s not hard to see how he could easily frame an interaction that led to her erasing his mind and dumping him off on Yardis.

  • Psithief

    I still don’t know what Efrem’s psychic speciality is.

  • And yet… the last page has 70 or so comments with people discussing it, and the implications it has to the plot.

    Very curious.

  • Private Eye

    So he just manipulated her in some way that led to his mind getting wiped? I mean I don’t want to come off as trying to pick your story apart. That wasn’t my intention at all. I guess because it’s something I’ve been curious about for a long time I was expecting something a little more than “And then that happened. Anyway…”

    I think the part I’m most unclear on is why he needed Naveed (or someone else in general) in order to do it. Maybe I just have to let my imagination wander a little more

  • Psithief

    Ugh. Be back in an hour.

  • Because after he had his mind wiped, how would he remember to hop into a starship and pop into a bar on Yardis?

    It didn’t HAVE to be Naveed, just someone who would hit all the appropriate marks (erasing his mind, dropping him off on Yardis, playing the patsy so that Gunner would think it was an accident).

  • I mean, Gunner even yelled it at him in the last chapter too. IDK BRO.

  • Dang, that would have been cool, but makes no sense with the rest of the plot.

  • Psithief

    Please stop joking about taking my jokes seriously. :P

  • It would have been a good twist, though! Do all this work to re-humanize Efrem to people and then NOPE! HE’S A MONSTER!

  • Psithief

    I think there’s something very wrong with that reflection, Pas!

  • Psithief

    It’s implied!
    It’s not like I would keep coming back if I didn’t super enjoy the work.

  • I dont know what is going on with comments tonight. They are messed up. Sorry. My comment is gone now??

  • Psithief

    The Girl from his Dreams

    I thought it was a fake-out. Like, “what is his super-secret special power, not the one everyone thinks he has?” :D

  • Psithief

    No, it is “awaiting moderation” because you edited the f-bomb in.

  • wow, I’m the admin for the comments and it is just GONE for me.

    That is not an ideal feature.

  • Psithief

    I still see it as a placeholder. I can’t reply to it.

  • And here’s the original flashback! http://www.zapcomic.com/2003/08/20031128/

  • Speedy Marsh

    “Oh, Navee-eed! I’m gonna tell Gunner you’ve been vivisceting people without him again. You know I have like zero impulse control, so as soon as he walks in the room, I’mma tell… unless my memory gets wiped somehow…”

  • It’s been ten years and she’s been working very hard!

  • Speedy Marsh

    I got an error message from HostGator the first time I tried to open this page

  • That has to do with traffic. We’re just kind of hovering at the edge of outgrowing the hosting plan we’re on, but there’s just not enough comic left to really worry about it. Trying to sneak through to the end without blowing it up.

  • Well, I swear a lot, so I guess shame on me.

  • safyrejet

    Oh that last panel. There’s that clueless dopey expression I grew to love. I appreciate how intelligent Zap really is, but there’s something about the doofy idiot part he played when he had no memory that kinda liked.

    One chance, eh. Gee Zap, kinda taking a gamble there with the fate of the universe and stuff.

  • safyrejet

    Hasn’t Efrem already done enough double crossing about faces plot twisting for one story? ;P

  • safyrejet

    Oh, well I’m sorry we’re kinda killing your webcomic with our traffic WEJUSTLOVEITSOMUCH

    sorry, not sorry

  • Crestlinger

    Out of How many paths?
    Can we see the one where Gunner goes to the fair and gets hit hard enough by that falcon car that he thinks he’s a clown at the circus?

  • Alex

    It’s weird seeing this rounding up, I wasn’t here from the start (ten year old me had no clue what the internet was) but this was my first comic i ever read and oh man it has just continued to be wonderful. Everything from the sweet psychic battles to the sweet moments between… well a lot of people really.
    Thanks for making such a great comic :D

  • Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!! GOGETER!! Go get Miss Angel Face!

  • Speedy Marsh

    I would kinda’ like to see how she explains it to Gunner. When he finds out, you know he’s gonna say something along the lines of, “You got some ‘splaining to do, Lucy!”
    (You know you’re old, when the TV references you make were in black & white)

  • Speedy Marsh

    Naveed? Next time, please be careful with that neuralizer. You not only wiped Zap’s memory, you wiped the whole website!
    You also made Pascalle forget to post an extra Thursday update. Not that there was a website to post it to on Thursday, anyway, but you catch my drift.

  • I never promised an extra page this week, captain greedypants!!!! :P

  • Speedy Marsh

    Ha ha! Of course you did. It was just before Naveed wiped the website and your memory.

    I wouldn’t make this stuff up… Okay, yes I would. But, you’ve gotta give me credit for being creative with my begging. I could have just said, “Please, please, please give us an extra page next week!” Not that I’m above such tactics, if need be, but I just thought my way would be less annoying.

    Anyhow, are you sure you didn’t promise us an extra page?

  • Well, after the website got totally exploded I made some changes to it and now it just runs like a champ!!!

    Hopefully no more error messages and exploding servers/databases!

  • I just need to take a moment to realize that there are people reading the comic now who were ten when I started.

    OY!!!!

  • Psithief

    It runs pretty good.

  • Alex

    I was the tenniest of all the tens.
    That means this comic has existed for like HALF OF MY LIFE

  • Thank you!

  • The_Assimilator

    It indeed does not make sense why Naveed would do this of her own free will. She may not be the brightest kitty kat, but she would certainly understand the repercussions of Gunner finding out. Given that she dotes on Gunner, why would she do something that she knows is going to make him angry with her? What would have made more sense was for her to go and tell Gunner what Zap had asked her to do.

    Alternatively, assuming she did decide to go along with Zap’s plan, why bother taking him to a very specific bar on a very specific planet after mindwiping him? Why not just dump him out an airlock to be certain he’s never going to be a problem again?

    The simplest explanation, therefore, is that Naveed DIDN’T choose to mindwipe Zap; he psychically programmed her to do it for him.

  • Mark Linimon

    Yes, things were a little … different … in the beginning. (I no longer remember if I was with this exactly when it started, but certainly was early on. Odd to see it coming to a close …)

  • Rexan

    Wow. His ability to read the future ain’t no joke.

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