The continuing saga of Tank
November 13, 2017
3:03 am
Hahaha sorry all the dialogue in this got totally rewritten from when I posted it at midnight, I accidentally fell asleep in the afternoon and woke up with an hour to make it so I wrote the word bubbles in like eight minutes.
I mean.. Commanders not wrong, at least it would keep the whole wire snag thing down.
True but neither is Tank.
Get the team to sit in on the procedure.
Anyone starts doing anything more complected than tucking the wires away inside the chassis, you cripple their nipples.
“cripple their nipples” That sounds terrifying XD
…But effective, nonetheless.
“Not worth dealing with whatever else they decide to plug in while I’m under” is such a terrifying line. Sheesh.
yeah I wouldn’t want my Cyber CNS hanging out in the breeze like that. I’d set him up with articulated plates like they have on motorcycle armor with a half dozen allen screws a piece. That way if he’s going to fuck up his system, he’ll have to have help and remove an awful lot of screws to pull it off.
I think Tank needs to find himself a Black Clinic to do the work rather than relying on the tender mercies of the TAILS docs who seem to be first cousins to the Ork Pain boyz from Warhammer. Well, that or find some dirt on one of the surgeons to make him stick to the procedure.
Personally I’d wire up my aggro juice to a big NOS button in the back of my head, smack the go button when it’s go time. I don’t know why having a Bane-esque “bring the pain” button wired to my head appeals, but it does. :D
Rock’s got a pot… Loose wires always a sign of a shitty cyborg.
This makes me think of my brother in an odd way, and it’s tugging at my heartstrings a bit.
I guess that’s what happens when you’re stuck halfway.
While I’m sure someone thought it looked cool, “pull here! =D” bright pink wires hanging out of someone’s brain seems like something of a tactical disadvantage…
Only if you can get behind him.
could be part of the whole “cool” aesthetic thing the future military has
imagine the public response to the visual, Tank has this baddy by the throat, it tries to yank a wire out, and throws Tank into a rage instead of shutting him down
way “cool”
Yeah, I assumed that was it. Aren’t they all multi-colored when they’re not mostly hidden under his hat/coat? Some douchebag product designer was like “we need to make it as obvious as possible that he’s part machine.”
they’re tubes full of liquid that run down his back and attach to cannisters inside his abdomen that hold all the fluid they run into his brain to rebalance it.
It would make an awesome fake weak point. Goad the enemy into going crazy lengths to get behind you and pull out the wires, and it turns out they’re not actually attached to anything.
it would be cool and safe if they were actually just Cosmetic cords….or traps, you think its a shitty thing and its a vulnerability so you pull it and to your dismay they are actually inhibitors and you just made him more capable.
Eh, just get him a good sturdy scarf
He now needs a little animal to sit on his shoulder and defend his neck. Master blaster, anyone?
Commander suggested a robot therapy dog back in tge survival competition arc. Perhaps the dog could guard his wires too?
Make the robot therapy dog a “breed” small enough to fit on one of his shoulders. Robot therapy corgi anyone?
I was going to correct you and point out that Corgis get up to 30lbs, 1ft tall, and 3ft long on average…but then I remembered that Tank is well…a G**DAMN TANK
Or it can be whatever breed Gave the Dog was
*Gabe
Pom.
Just give him Rocket Raccoon. He’ll guard his cables (unless he’ll try to steal or tinker with them) while also doubling as a shoulder cannon. They can also bond over people tinkering with their bodies.
I then suggested cyborg raptors, or the parrot T. rex. Someone needs to show us what the bird beasties are up to
Nice to see that Tank has as much trouble as I do with remember the correct order of “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger”.
This is a nice conversation and it is impressive that you knocked it out in eight minutes. I’m wondering whether or not children pulling at the bright pink wires has ever been a problem, though.
I’m surprised the park bench hasn’t broken yet.
This one’s been reinforced just for them lol
With all the Tank updates, I hope the Thanksgiving post is Tank smoking an entire thanksgiving dinner (including vegetables and cranberry sauce somehow and pumpkin pies somehow) cause he only likes slow cooking cause it’s stress relieving for him.
I suppose that would be Tanksgiving, then.
That would be nice. A full cast Tanksgiving enjoying that cooking would be fantastic. Get the spacefuture, manly guys, and current time cast all together for it.
What could possibly go wrong?
Artist’s cramp?
Man. This is just rough for Tank. The cyborgs don’t respect him because he’s not cyborg enough, the regular humans don’t respect him because they fear him. I can see why a guy like him would be prone to fits of unstoppable rage even without being chemically altered into doing so.
Even more respect for Rock Lobster for being seemingly the one person who treats him like a person, not as a failure or as some terrifying figure.
Well, this is the Commander and his brother. Things can get pretty Zen between brothers who’ve been through shit together and thrown shit at each other in the past.
…Didn’t Rock already win legal rights for their kind? At least in regards to requiring permission before shoving hardware into their bodies? Tank shouldn’t have to worry about that – and if he does, he should have a trusted comrade AND a lawyer present during the operation.
(With an added challenge of “if you try to talk me, or them, out of having them present, then I’ll have two trusted comrades, a lawyer, AND a member of the independent press watching. No I DON’T trust you, can’t imagine why.”)
Depending on the legal system of the spacefuture, he might not count as the same “kind” as Rock now that he is a cyborg.
Time travel’s a thing – just send him back before the rights were passed and poof. He was a big hunk of cyborg before all that, too, so most of it’s already done with.
As I recall, in the event they “need” to do something to keep him alive, they can do whatever they want to the Commander and Co. Real easy to say futzing about with brain wires nearly ended poorly.
The more I read of Tank and his dialogue, the more Im falling in love with the big ole lug. Just shows just how complex the characters of this series are, and I LOVE IT!
In which Tank becomes one of the most reliable sane futurefolk.
This is a nice bit of chemistry between the exes.
… I never wanted to give an Eight foot tall cyborg from the future a hug before. Well done. I love experiencing new things.
Dangling wires is about the same disadvantage as having exposed pneumatic or hydraulic pistons mounted along a limb…Hard to protect those too. On the other hand, tank could *specify* ahead of time that he just wants the wiring installed internally AND NOTHING ELSE done to him before he goes under. I’m sure The Commander could help him come up with the legal papers for that…
;)
Even as it is, Tank seems to have his head back on straight & has consequences in consideration with his choices now.
The problem with that is, the people who’re in charge of those sorts of operations have proven they can’t actually be trusted to keep their word. And they’re all military, which means it’s very easy for TPTB to justify it under the argument that Tank’s a more effective soldier afterwards.
Tank’s got the right idea – he can’t be sure what they’d even do, asides from tucking away the external wires, and he has no real need to risk it.
Stop . . . you’re making him too likable xD
i’m really glad I got to see the initial dialogue. This is much more polished and clear, and flows better- I understand the parties implicated in Tank’s words better. But it was such a good glimpse into The Process, and snagged a wee bit of backstory extra out of it too. =)
I’m also glad Tank recognises the shifting standards he’s been subjected to. My mind instantly highlighted parallels in, like, women’s bodies and weightloss, but it’s also a thing dudes have too. My dad knew someone in the forces who just could NOT put on chest bulk- he did the work, but no dice. got joked at and about. Got pec implants- Got made even MORE fun of for bowing to pressure and getting ‘fake breasts’. fuck off mates ay.
Holy shit, time travel vs. law passing dates is a huge can of worms isn’t it?
I guess the laws from the traveler’s origin point would need to apply. But then the people in the past would need to be informed about the laws of every point in the future whenever a time traveler shows up for an operation.
Tank is such a likable and engaging character. The whole super military space future family is, but I’ve got a special soft spot for Tank.
Clearly he just needs a rainbow-multicolour dreadlocks wig or something to camouflage those wires.
I wish he’d wear one of those hats with ear flaps. That metal plate looks like it’d be painfully chilly in cold weather. Although I’m basing that on hearsay.
Who is that guy by the way?
Tank, the big Robot guy when they were in the survival contest, one of Commander’s exes
Is Tank not allowed to have someone trustworthy watching over him while he’s under to make sure they don’t do anything to him that he didn’t agree to?
BTW loving the Tank character development here.
Rock and his whole team, looming over the doctors with baseball bats. OR standing there with a lawyer who is one flick of a finger away from lawsuiting them all to Hell.
I’m reading Tank’s voice with a new England accent.
I really like Tank, I hope we see more of him. Maybe he can start working with the commander to get away from all the stuff that’s bothering him on the outside and deal with what’s bothering him on the inside. I think Tank and Jared would get along really well, Tank’s down to earth nature would mesh well with Jared’s creativity and spontaneity.Also, Jared’s best friends are Mr. Fish and the Commander, I doubt that he would be afraid and that is a huge problem that Tank is facing.
I would think that there are tinkerers’shops and hacking places that could serve clients like Tank, with enough fear of Commander to not mess up. Or bake some synthezoid parts? I dunno.
Except recall that their bodies are technically government property, they probably arenb’t allowed to make unauthorized modifications.
http://thepunchlineismachismo.com/archives/comic/the-more-things-change
Except recall that it’s been established Commander “went through a lot of work jailbreaking [his] system,” so it’s already been modified. I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure they don’t care about what they are and are not “allowed” to do.
I have been reading science fiction since 1949. I didn’t know it until today, but all this time I have been waiting for some character to say “The other cyborgs act like I’m some kind of half-assed science project.”
I always love how you let these characters have down time to have emotional conversations with each other
A sign that your comic is really on the up-and-up: when the Akinator 20 questions tool knows who Commander Badass is. I was very cheerful because of this.
You probably could’ve switched “harder” and “better” around for a Daft Punk reference.