‘Not A Villain’ Webcomic – Page 507

Back to colors by Audrey. Special effects are a combo of me and Audrey.  Everything else is by me.

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90 Comments

Soooooooo… How many of the fans watching the game do you think ship Danni and Kat?

Oh if this webcomic is planning on depicting anything symilar to the internet in a realist way by the time this fight ended there would already be a page filled with porn about them. Humans are that way and we all know it. Tho I kinda hope that, if there is in-cannon, at least it’s just mentioned and not shown… I doubt this would go NSFW really, leave that to the shippers.

By the way: wanna bet on wether or not the fans have already made porn of this? XD I say rule 34 always applies, f*ck one day I found BEESERKER porn when searching for that comic so… Rule 34 ladies and gentlemen…

Ah Ah Ah! No invoking Rule 34 unless you fully intend to abide by Rule 35: If you do not find porn of a given thing, you are obligated to make some. I personally don’t want that job, do you? So let’s put the worms back in the can.

Too late! The can has been opened! You are now obligated to fulfill your duties to rule 34 or 35, respectively.

No no, Rule 35 is that someone will make porn of it if it doesn’t already exist.

Dunno. If social interaction is mainly in the virtual world, what is the basis around which shipping can occur?

Ok, so this is Kleya, but assuming no super cyber powers for spawning new AIs, I don’t see how they can grow a family together, except by adoption, and offhand the only kids I know of who might benefit from adoption belong to Bloody Mary…

Dude. Are you seriously implying that the primary attraction of a ship is their ability to have kids? I mean, they are already F/F?

If you want it that much, there are always AUs for that anyway.

There is the science option too, the issue is lack of proximity for having physical interaction, or offspring.

Some people will ship anyone.

Given that “ship” is defined as “Fantasize about 2 characters having a relationship despite a complete lack of evidence, continuity, or reason”, I wouldn’t give it much thought.

Jane x Kat?

I almost suggested Jane x Dude but they actually have some interaction.

A ship from one hug would be a bit early for my tastes, though I can fathom people doing that. However, considering how abundantly the game players are dressed even though their income depends on Game revenue, we have reason to believe that Rule 34 is not a thing (or not a big thing) in the NAV world.

It wouldn’t just be the one hug. Kleya and Danny have been seen together since the qualifications, and Kleya has been snapping pretty harshly at anyone who says even the slightest bad thing about Danny. And this from someone trying to portray herself as a pacifist.

By contrast, Danny has been trying to curb Kleya’s outbursts. And now here she is saving her life.

You have to consider that most aren’t aware of Kleya’s desire for redemption, and that she’s simply acting it out through Danny. Or Danny’s situation, and why she’s grateful to Kleya. They would have good reason to think there’s something more going on between those two.
And, honestly, Kleya seems to care a heck of a lot about Danny considering they’ve only known each other for a few days.

Her name’s Danni and I’m pretty sure she’s crippled outside the game and needs to make money or she’ll have to be put to work. Kat knows about her money problem and that’s why she’s feverishly helping her.

Pretty sure Danni is indeed crippled in the Real World, which is why dancing in L.i.F.e seems to be so important to her… however I have a feeling it’s a lot more than that. It seems to me that she’s actually on life support and that the City she’s in doesn’t want to spend the resources to keep her alive, so she’s trying to pay her way for the sake of herself but also for the sake of her parents who are working themselves to the bone to keep her alive in whatever way they can manage.

Of course, this is all just my own speculation based solely on the various hints we’ve been given in the comic itself.

See this is what I hate about the way things are this generation. There are no such thing as a true friend helping someone though something or caring for someone. Just because you truly care about someone, defend them and try to look out for them when you can, you have to be wanting to have a relationship!

Relax. 🙂 It’s just a First World Problem. I’m happy not to have any Third World ones.
It’s true that their actions are no indication whatsoever for them to be more than true friends in the future, but people will ship them anyway. By far not all readers, though.

I mean, friendship does count as a relationship for a certain category of shippers.

(It doesn’t have the potential to turn NSFW, true, but an AU where a hero and his nemesis are roommates and grow inseparable… there is appeal in that)

(but yeah for most shippers there are SEX GOGGLES – or romance goggles – that say friendship does not exist or does not matter. Bleh)

This being the internet fans have already shipped every character with every other character. Personally I think the shippers for Bloody Mary and Kleya will be the most amusing, opposite attract and all that, besides with Bloody Mary the term “slash fic” may be a bit more literal.

Aw yeah. That’s one quality ship.

Shippers gonna ship.

There is a Youtube song “I ship it.”.

I know I am.

*cackles* How about some more in depth ships? How about…Danni & Kleya as a moiraillegiance?

????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay but Danni just saved her, didn’t she? In multiple ways. Stopped her from being killed by Bandit AND brought her back from the brink of a major hack.

Indeed, my exact thoughts where: whoohoo! Go Dani Go!

Totally… I think that was her ‘trance’ whatever it is when she’s hacking, breaking, as she ‘falls’ back into the reality of the game… or however you want to put it…. epic!

It looks like Kleya’s focus on D and the code has been shattered by Danni tackling her (as evidenced by the little D faces throughout the broken fragments). It also looks the Bandit’s hit might have hit the tree, but I can’t tell that for sure.

The biggest thing for me on this page, though, is how tightly Danni is holding Kleya. The reason this is huge is because we know how Danni feels about physical contact with others. This shows just how much Kleya means to her, even though they haven’t known each other for that long, and they both are masters in the art of standoffishness.

“The reason this is huge…”

Great comment Mighty. Really enjoyed your analysis.

My thoughts to add to all these here: In-game, powers take on visible form (otherwise how would we know they’re there?). Whatever Bandit hurled at Kat may have taken the form of a “shell” that was broken via outside interference (bless Dani). Or as some have indicated, it could have been Kat building up hacker power, or it could be simply Kat coming out of some sort of internal trance, visualized.

It also occurs to me the slight possibility that Dani has put two and two together and already knows who Kat is… and like Bandit is trying to protect her friend from herself. (I know that possibility is remote, but Dani isn’t stupid.) Lotsa possibilities… which makes this unexpected twist so much fun. : )

That would be a very remote possibility, methinks. Danni has mentioned passionately hating hackers before, I think, so she wouldn’t think of ‘the monster that destroyed the world’ as ‘possibly a nice girl I met who went far out of her way to take care of me’. It just… won’t connect. She’d probably stay in denial even faced with actual undeniable evidence, much less vague personality resemblance that only rings bells for people who knew her personally.

Just… no way.

Danni:
The true hero that Kleya is trying to be.

As I thought, no D running wild after all.

As for symbolism:
I’m generally bad at this and couldn’t think of anything for quite a while. Probably because for the longest time I could only see the Demoli attack eradicating the tree, until I took a close look at all the pieces, seeing some D-lines.

Then I remembered that one scene from Naruto in the Chuunin exam when Sakura hugged Sasuke from behind to make him snap out of his blind rage caused by an evil seal on his shoulder, making him become “good” again. So maybe this is something similar? Danni saving Kat from using D, breaking his summoning into pieces? Is that it?

I wonder if Bandit is going to try to blast them again. XD
I also wonder how low his percentage is by now.

I just realized: Danni helped a Kat down from a tree. Maybe THAT was the symbolism instead. 😛

i just found this comic through an ad of all things, and just finished it in four straight hours. This is an amazing work you’ve created, and I’m DYING to see what comes next. ^_^

Hah! Join the club, Hagan – we’re all hanging out to see what happens next (which, IMHO, is a mark of a good author – the readers are all waiting patiently/impatiently on the next chapter/page/installment).

Ah, we have caught another one…

Gotta catch them all!

Wait, that’s another game, right?

Welcome to the fan-base!

Heh, I’m not quite as fast a reader, but I just finished about a day to catch up from finding the comic. (Hi!) I’m amazed at how much the art has improved and how steady the output has been. I can’t keep this pace even with only text stories. 😮

I also think many of the assumptions by Bandit and even Kat about her guilt may be misapplied. I think her parents had as much or more influence on the outcome. What alignment were they? (I’d bet at least one was a manipulator) Alignment can be slightly controlled or hidden by a player, even in the old tabletop days, but more importantly, REAL alignment keeps peeking out. The White Wolf game’s Nature and Demeanor are better sometimes to handle complex characters. Kat is in such pain because her demeanor as a hotshot coder and games player has been taken as her true nature. Even Bandit isn’t sure, though he manipulates others’ opinions so much he should look under the more easily manipulated demeanor more.

How old were Kat and Bandit at the time anyway? Were they even legally adult, as full adult responsibility keeps drifting older in more complex societies. Her hands seem almost childlike when she said goodbye to her mother? If she was, then the baying of the mob is just active demogogery to grab power (and we have enough of that everywhere, don’t we?) I’ve seen no hint she actually wanted to really harm her mother any more than what many teens might shriek during a shouting match. WHERE WAS THE FATHER WHEN IT HAPPENED? His role in the disaster is too silent. Even cocky coders just don’t have a motive to cause that many disasters at one time. What good is showing off your coding if everyone is dead? What Bandit hasn’t realized, nor has a world desperate for scapegoats after a techno meltdown, is the core of Hanlon’s razor: “Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.” Cockiness always gets a comeuppance and her father seems to have been grooming her for that cliff. The deeper questions for me: what really happened?* and who actively worked to take advantage for malice or power? I just can’t see Kat, her PTSD obsessed on guilt and redemption, as that actively mean, malicious, or exploitative. If there hadn’t been a bunch of other tech meltdowns, the events around her mother’s death would have been properly investigated. A Jessica Fletcher or Columbo would have gotten further with their compassion if she was a traumatized murderer.

*I don’t want to fall into the survivor’s PTSD and call it the Ending. Even if some tech is staggering on on stilts, Bandit is right that they need anyone who is not actively malicious to rebuild. The Game and LIFE are sucking away too much of the drive to rebuild, that before, humanity has used after every disaster no matter the cause. Someone who cannot hammer a nail should help with keeping up the games as off-time and rewards for those who can. Matrix isn’t the only parallel, so is STOS’s “The Menagerie,” and even the Mirror of desire in Potter-verse and the lotus in greek myth/Percy Jackson. It’s not an ending, it’s more like a chapter boom transition in a story-driven game, and Dr Grace or equivalent needs to cast it in gamer terms so every PC starts to look forward. Super volcanoes don’t have to end humanity, but it will if they don’t pick themselves up.

The real apocalypse is the enforced sensory deprivation as humanity waits for the world atmosphere to get fixed. Looks like building tech got so OP that tho the world is absolutely un-livable… there are pockets of survivors everywhere. Humanity simply can NOT “pick up and fix things” without access to the raw materials lying outside. The Game is a way for people to socialize and wait out the geological settling period. Its been two years now and looks like a lot more years after that. (Short in geo terms, but long for human lifespans)

I’m also wondering what exactly is “working in the fields”. And why its so mind-numbingly difficult. Doubt its actual farming fields – atmosphere is too damaged for crops yet. Scavenging? Mining? Shoveling ash off the solar collectors?

It’s probably fields, just under domes or something…but that factor might make it less than ideal conditions for the workers. Plants like a lot more CO2 and manure than humans find comfortable, in an open air field that is ameliorated by…well, open air.

Also, they probably cultivate a fair amount of myco-protein (of which mushrooms are the most…charismatic variety), though you do need photosynthesizing plants to have an aggregate energy input to avoid the problem of continuous reduction of the viable bio-mass in your ecosystem, edible fungal products can be an efficient way to recycle some kinds of bio-mass more rapidly. I imagine working in THAT kind of field would be…not quite as pleasant as an enclosed manured area with a relatively high concentration of CO2 that at least required light for photosynthesis.

I’m sure that, if they could run the technology properly, a lot of that could be automated. But they killed most of the people who knew how.

As long asit isn’t Soylent Green,

Re: mouseover

Aah! I get it! I got it! I got it pretty quickly, before even reading the mouseover text. The action made me love Danni so much it moved her to my 2nd favorite character (just behind Jane) but the artistic feeling of the page might have even moved her to 1st place.
I love Danni so much.
Also, this page; I like it so much and it works so well with the build-up and contrast of the previous pages.

Hooray! Danni saves the day! Danni saves all the days. Except… she saved it from Kat. Seriously, this plan of hers still isn’t going to work… and they’re only delaying the inevitable. The only possible reason for Kat to actually be in that game is to meet up with Saisuke… and she doesn’t even know it…

Just one thought came to me: “pheew!!”
(And I actually never use more than one exclamation mark)

aaaaand literally everyone called it didnt they
well okay i didnt… i didnt see a way she herself could survive this >_<
i hope there is one…

Well, it’s pretty clear that Dani saves Kat from using D, because she either tries to save Kat from the attack or because she just hugs Kat as a thank you for saving her. Probably the first of the two, that makes way more sense XD

Holy Shhh! GO, DANNI!

*cheers!!!*

Hmm. It’s a little hard to tell exactly what happened, but I think Danni dived out of the tree and tackled Kat out of the way, with the attack detonating behind them action-movie style. Though with them both already hurt – and the Dude still in the tree – is everyone going to make it out in one piece?

And if they do, what the heck is going to happen with the other group? And, for that matter, with their ratings? I assume villain groups are expected to contain a certain level of self-destructive behavior, but so far every villain-oriented action the group has taken has been thwarted…

I think this is a great page and comes over very well. 🙂

Whooo go Danni! Hopefully this boosts her popularity high enough. Maybe she’s finally got the hang of the gravity?

YESSSS!!!

Also – I see lots of tiny D’s on the shards xD

Man. . . what a killblock! Bandit just can’t get any, can he? :P.

Best guess at the symbolism: Danni is “breaking” Kat out of her dastardly evil ways and reminding her that she has some good in her, and telling her (for what seams like really the first time someone has) that they’re a team and Danni has (both literally and figuratively) Kat’s back.

I absolutely adore this page by the way. Emotionally, aesthetically, it’s awesome.

So would you say, perhaps, that Danni “Came in like wrecking ball?” … I’ll show myself out.

Good pages… I’m wondering if the print version will put this page opposite the last page on the same sheet – one page you have Kleya starting her hack-o-doom, turn the page and find Danni’s shattering through everything to the rescue.

Ah yes, it was time for a cooldown hug.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CooldownHug

I noticed that both Bandit and Kleya have the tendency to not take the other players (in thier own team and thier enemies) seriously.

TVtropes is the bomb!

Danni for the WIN!
Saving the life of our favorite hero, AND saving her from doing something that surely EVERYONE would regret.

Ok, it took me a minute, but I think what is being shown here is Danni breaking through the barrier between the Game and the sort of alternate space Kleya sees when she’s in a rage, and pulling Kat back into the regular Game view. I suppose this effect would be partially psychological, though it might also just be how Kat’s hackervision represents the interruption. Thanks for the tip, Alex– I didn’t notice that the fragments had D-lines on them until you pointed it out.

I love the idea. I have no clue how to make it easier to see.

I LOVE Kat’s face here! So soft, so confused, SO COMPLETELY ADORABLE!!!

This is going to be GREAT for their team’s ratings!

Oops, just read the mouseover. Yups, the shattered orange glass is symbolic of Kat’s hacker power building. No one else sees it but her… if even she sees it. “Artistic symbolic”. Means we as readers have an “in” in this panel. 😀

Wow, this page is absolutely beautiful!!!

So, I’m a little confused. Does Danni know that Kleya is dirty cheating world-breaking hacker that is being sought by the authorities, and she grabbed her to keep her from exposing herself, or did she just grab her to keep her from being Smoked by the Bandit?

On a side note, is Bandit’s name a deliberate reference to that movie, as he is trying to keep a lawbreaker from being caught, or did I just see an unintended Burt Reynolds reference?

I don’t think Danni knows who Kat really is – there isn’t really any way she could.

My prediction, Danni knocks Kat out of the way, and (since Dude still has his Esone) in an attempt to save Bandit from being turned into a tree because of Environment damage, Dude face tanks the hit.

What a beautiful page! It seems fairly clear what is happening–or at least, I agree with the general consensus. If we’re ALL wrong, then the page is unclear. ^^;

Yes! Way to go, Danni! You have literally saved Kat’s life!

I think I got the symbolism of the page — Kat was shattered out of her thoughts when Danni grabbed her.

Page moral: friendship is magic.

That’s my take too.

After two years of hidding and fearing, being sure that everybody hates her and wants her dead, suddenly a person jumps in to protect her, to save her. She sure is thinking “Shs’s saving me? Me??”

As you said that’s what I see here too: Kleya being blowed out of her destructive habits for Danni caring about.

PS: It also could add on that after two years of being alone, Kleya got a huge hug, an unexpected and likely much missed human touch.

A true true friend helps a friend in need
A friend will be there to help them see
A true true friend helps a friend in need
To see the light that shines from a true true friend

Back to Reality. Oh, there goes Danni. She so grabby. Kat choked. She’s so mad but Jake Won’t give up that easy. Nope. Dr. Grace’s watching, whoa!

Drat! That last one didn’t rhyme. Whelp! Back to the day job.

Her expression is fantasitic. Like she cannot comprehend getting a hug.

Aneeka, I just want to compliment you on your choice of colorist. I’ve really enjoyed how these past several months’ art has been done by Audrey. She is truly exceptional, and for your work she maintains a constant simple combined with breathtaking and illusory approach that I feel fits NAV perfectly. I also want to say that I think I get the symbolism present here.

I also believe I remember Danni and Kat making a promise in an unfinished museum or high school. *wink wink*

Also, still haven’t gotten your pen when you were working on this… eh?

Wow wow wow! Best page yet, incredible!

I can’t tell for sure, but it looks like Danni took the hit for Kat! If that is the case, then Danni is dead! Noooooooooooo!

It’s like watching the world crumble away…

CAN I GET A H*** YEAHHH?! YOU GO DANNY YOU GO!

H*** YEAHHH!!

That is EXACTLY what I wanted. I love you for it.

Danni pulling the bomb out of the fire as the fuse lights?

They just had, like, the craziest first encounter ever, didn’t they?

… Ok, that’s it, I’m shipping you spaghetti. Might arrive a tad stale, you know, international postage, but STILL!

So….she is keeping her in place to make the fireball hit? 😛 jk jk

Things become Grim when you realize she figured out who Kat was via Jake whispering her and is holding her in place.

Holy crap, for a second there I thought Kat had four arms!

Hooray Danni!

As a rule, there’s nothing I like better than being unexpectedly tackled from behind. As my head snaps back, painfully colliding with the skull of the person behind me and in the process causing a pinched nerve and mild whiplash, I usually painfully bite my tongue or chip a tooth. Any saliva present goes instantly down the wrong way, causing initial gasping convulsions followed by a hacking cough… which I can’t get out properly because they have me bear-hugged about the chest.

This is what friends are for. : )

I think Danny just got a massive spike in popularity.

My joy at seeing the new pages is matched only by the frustration of awaiting the next update.

Totally got it, no worries. Your artistic symbolism is both crystal clear and beautiful.

I feel like this is probably the moment she starts realizing she’s part of a team, and not just by herself having to do everything.

Is Danni wearing a glove or was there just some confusion on how to make her wrist bend? XD

Not A Villain Webcomic

Webcomic of a semi- reformed hacker trying to redeem herself in a post- apocalyptic world she may have created.

‘Not A Villain’ Webcomic – Page 507