Saint James Infirmary 345: Surplus Personnel

[Daphne]

Tuesday, November 4th!

[jmundt29]

Collision of brothers henchmen and unclaimed henchmen?  Well, I guess we'll see what we'll see.

[laguna85]

Well Derek is show up

[GodWilling]

Yup, that's just about the right level of asshole for me. Thank you.

[Haight]

Cherry must be a lich or something. How is she not fucking freezing?

[jmundt29]

I suppose we were due for a reminder of just how selfish, stupid, and incompetent Derek really is after his surprisingly successful teamwork with Jen and negotiation with Claudia.  Sometimes, it seems like it'd be an effort for him to remember to breathe.

Which is why, in spite of how instructive this little exchange is, it is INFURIATING that he gets another crack at Caitlyn. All this gorgeous art and we're suddenly back almost 250 issues in plot development.  AARGH!  He needs to break something more valuable to him than his nose.  By Thanksgiving (the next 6 issues).  I'm sure you can imagine my suggestions.

[peers]

Is Derek the most hated character in all Daphne's works?

[jmundt29]

No, there was one comic full of people (male and female) as bad as or worse than Derek who were manipulated by a self-aware HAL-like computer system.  Did one commit suicide?  I've tried to block that comic out of my memory.  He's also dumber than similarly potentially malicious counterparts (like Bertram and his successor in the Found Objects continuum or the guy from Bigger).  It's close, but I don't see him as the most hated.

[laguna85]

Will Adrain find out that Derek got his lovely Caitlyn sex slave back and want to have fun

[Haight]

Derek is not as bad a person as Jakob (I always get the two brothers confused, I mean the one who faked his death). Derek is just a lascivious horndog with access to mind control tech. Jakob was a sadistic motherfucker. I'm guessing Johannes is probably just as bad. Hell, Vic was willing to shoot people.

I'm not rooting for Derek, but there are worse people in this comic. As far as other comics go - some of the ones from the Martian Harem are certainly murderous violent assholes.

[mns_95125]

Hmm.

First I have to say that watching Caitlyn get reduced, over the course of 3 comics, from an armed action girl to a commodity literally traded off for convenience was really hot.

That said, though, this left me really confused about the relationship between Johannes, Julian/Cherry, Derek, Claudia and Zenon.

I've been assuming that Zenon works for Claudia and obtained the crystal from her.  But since Derek also works for Claudia, why would it be news to him that Zenon had the crystal?  #327 strongly implies that Claudia didn't even know that Johannes knew about her, but #345 suggests that Cherry/Julian, who work for Johannes, know Derek, who works for Claudia.

I feel like I'm missing something basic here.

[Haight]

I agree with you that we're missing something; I get the feeling we're going to get a bit of a reveal when the big man himself arrives.

Ditto on what's happened to Caitlyn, and while repetition is bad, the scene cuts during the induction scenes are always a bit frustrating. Good induction can be damn hot; we're all here because we've got that kink after all.

[jmundt29]

Wait, we're sure they work for Johannes?  They're there to intercept him, not greet him.  Cherry has been thinking and acting as if she's the arm of the presumed dead Jakob.  Derek was "working" for Claudia.  The odd couple here appear to be getting their information from Johannes' assistant who isn't working for Johannes.  She seems to be a mole Jakob planted in his operation.  I think we've yet to actually see someone who works for Johannes (absent that Nordic pilot with the impossible name, and even she was his spy in a military organization).

[Haight]

I was under the impression that Johannes thinks that certain people are working for him; they're likely working for Jakob.

[GodWilling]

In the car at the end of 321:-

Cherry: The boss called while you were in the store. He's flying in.

Julian: This will be exciting.

Cherry: We'll work it out.

Julian: We always do.

It's a private conversation, so they've no reason to be cagey. And there's apparently no need for further clarification: Julian knows who the boss is and who's flying in.

Since they're at Concord now and they know that Johannes is flying in, we're bound to think "he" is Johannes. The only question for us is whether "the boss" and "he" are actually the same person.

I suppose if Johannes's secretary were their boss, this form of words would still make sense. But I don't think it would if their boss is a man who isn't Johannes. Unless he's flying in too. Or unless Johannes flying in is an event so inevitable and widely anticipated that "He's flying in" could refer to nothing else.

The rest of the conversation perhaps suggests that they do not view themselves as a fully integrated part of "the boss"'s team. That degree of detatchment might perhaps allow them to (pretend to) be working for more than one person at once. (It's interesting that Cherry says "We'll work it out" and Julian uses the same phrase in 345. Perhaps it's their motto.) But as I say, one of them can just refer to "the boss" and the other one knows who that is.

You could read what Julian says to Derek about the crystal as being deliberately vague. Presumably Derek knows what the crystal is because Julian's words would make no sense to him otherwise - and Derek was involved in a plan built around the use of the crystal. What Julian says is true: Zenon had the crystal and they used it on Caitlyn. What he doesn't say is that they stole the crystal from Zenon. What he says sounds a bit like: Zenon had the crystal and so we (including Zenon) used it on Caitlyn. It sounds like they're working with Zenon, who's working with Claudia, so that's all right then, isn't it Derek?

I see Cherry and Julian as basically lying to everyone, making it up - working it out - as they go along. Exactly whom they're working for isn't clear. Perhaps it's just themselves.