Pages 87-88: Going Down

Greetings! Another quiet week on the social channels while I settle into the new day job, though I am glad to report I have had no further incidents regarding illness or the like.

This time on Lyrae, an effort has been made to try and be a bit more dynamic with scene composition. Some astute viewers may have noticed a trend towards what is often referred to as “floating head syndrome” which has a nasty habit of infecting dialogue heavy scenes.

Expect some more creativity in character poses, action and viewing angles as the team deal with some inconvenient structural issues going forward.

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Last year we had Chapter 2 premiere on July 4th – next time we will be awkwardly justifying a connection to the British firework-based holiday on Sunday 5th November!

And oh boy. There will there be fireworks indeed…

Pages 86-87: Precious Cargo

Greetings! Been a quiet couple of weeks due to starting a new day job and a slight bout of ill health just beforehand, but LYRAE is back with the usual fortnightly pages!

Carr Darrow continues to insist to Mel that the very bulky equipment strewn across what passes as his lab is actually vitally important to the Bastion. The Executive isn’t immediately swayed, but the scientist insists that High Command would want his research saved.

And Mel wouldn’t want to disappoint High Command, right?

You can jump straight to the newest pages here!

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Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 23rd October!

Pages 84-85: Exit Strategy

Greetings! This time on LYRAE, Mel must secure the Archer building and hold out until Trench can arrange a rescue for her team.

Not all the crew are too happy with plan, however. Laika continues to question Mel’s authority, while scientist Carr Darrow appears to have some confusion concerning the team’s goals.

On a side note, if you would allow me a moment of self indulgence, I do really like the transition above from the Archer’s command level back to the labs. Playing around with panel formats like that is really fun.

Anyway, I’ve complimented my own work enough for today, so you can jump straight to the newest pages here!

And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Recently, the comic has gained a Facebook page!

Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 9th October!

Pages 82-83: Calling Home

Greetings! This time on LYRAE, Mel calls High Command to confirm Carr Darrow’s story. She doesn’t hear what she wants to hear and, to the surprise of no one, loses her temper.

Unfortunately for her, the High Commander isn’t someone Mel can yell at to get her own way.

At least she gets some advice on how to move forward as the invaders put the Archer under seige.

Jump straight to the newest pages here!

And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 25th September!

Pages 80-81: Precious Cargo

Greetings! This time on LYRAE, Mel leaves to call High Command after learning the identity of the scientist hiding within the Archer Building.

With her indisposed, Singh has a few questions of her own to be asked in a somewhat less-hostile manner. In particular, why is the husband of a pirate captain here? Just what is inside that box?

Laika, meanwhile, has not had her mood improved by Mel’s departure as she takes some issues with Singh’s line of inquiry.

Jump straight to the newest pages here!

And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 11th September!

Pages 78-79: Improvised Medicine

Greetings! This time on LYRAE, Mel is still bickering with the scientist, Carr Darrow. While she does, we catch up with Singh, who has been conspicuosly absent from this chapter after her close call back in Chapter 2.

Rest assured that she is fine. All things considered.

While Mel continues her impromtu interrogation, Singh is having her shrapnel wounds tended to by their new ally, Kel. However the Archer labs are somewhat lacking in proper medical supplies to handle such injuries. Thankfully, Kel has something that might just help out,

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And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 28th August!

Pages 76-77: Knock Knock

Greetings! Today on Lyrae, Mel very much wants to talk to the scientist Carr Darrow. So much in fact that she simply doesn’t have the patience to wait for him to answer the door.

Meanwhile, the somewhat confused scientist has very little time to work out exactly who it is that has just broken into his laboratory.

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And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 14th August!

Pages 74-75: Mistaken Identity

Greetings! Today on Lyrae, Mel’s new companions try to explain the situation surrounding the Archer laboratories and Darrow, a known pirate rebel of whom Mel does not remember fondly.

The explanation does little to help Mel’s mood as she storms into the curiously purple lit work spaces of the Archer.

Finally, to follow on the last update with regards to the website layout, all pages of Lyrae are now consolidated into a scrolling format within their respective chapters. I have been tweaking the exact set up here and there to try and optimise loading times, but the end result should be a far smoother reading experience.

Jump straight to the newest pages here!

And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 31th July!

Pages 72-73: The Exchange

Greetings! Today, Chapter 4 starts with Mel being annoyed at someone. This is actually somewhat normal for Mel. This time though, hearing Laika namedrop Darrow – whoever they are – at the end of Chapter 2 has left her rather more displeased than usual.

Rather violently displeased.

It’s sadly a bit of a messy update this week due to a surprise bout of illness. I intended to do a cleanup of the website’s interface to coincide with the new chapter but evidently that hasn’t quite happened. Not in full, anyway.

As part of the rework, Chapter 4 is now entirely contained on a single page stacked scrolling format. Each update hereafter will update that page rather than adding a new one.

The intention is to convert the entirety of the comic to a similar format, though each chapter will still have its own page to try and avoid exploding anyone’s bandwidth with a million images loading at once.

This conversion will likely take a while to complete between making sure I don’t break any vital links, working at the day job, and generally staying on top of actually writing more of this comic. When it is done, however, the site will hopefully be a little nicer to navigate.

Until then, Chapter 4 can be found here!

And as always, you can follow the comic on Twitter and Instagram. Our next update is in two weeks, on Sunday 17th July!

Interlude: “June”

Greetings! With Chapter 3: Heatwave now complete, it is time for another between-chapter interlude page!

I quite enjoyed making January late last year when travel plans prevented work on the comic proper. It made a nice change of pace to experiment a bit with a different artstyle and work with different limitations.

This time, June has a bit more colour in it, bringing it closer to the usual style. However colours have been kept blurrier and messier than usual to indicate that, like January, this page is also a flashback.

This glimpse back in time is far more recent than in the last interlude. Rather than a brief glimpse all the way back to The Bastion’s founding, today’s page looks at a character we already know from the main comic…

Lyrae will continue as usual with Chapter 4: The Exchange starting on Sunday 3rd July!

Until then, why not keep up with comic’s progress on Twitter or Instagram?