I tend to do all my blogging about the comic over at Patreon.com/Drive these days, but since it’s the end of Act Three, I thought I’d bring these two bits of news here, as well!
1.) We’ll be Kickstarting the Act Three hardcover in a few weeks! It’s gonna be so awesome-looking!
2.) Here’s one of the write-ups I did for Patreon on the state of the story:
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At the end Act Three, we find ourselves with all the major set pieces in place for a tripartite fight between Earth, the Continuum, and Vinn. Let’s take a moment and assess where that leaves us:
The Empire: Having pulled its forward fleets back to defend the core system around Tierra, it is building ships as fast as it can. The Emperor, La Familia, IndústriaGlobo, and the Jinyiwei have all maintained the bulk of their power, in part by letting some distant power centers go “unmanaged” during this time of trial.
The Continuum: The Makers are still in the midst of their own trials. The first “trial” seeks to judge their greatest living Maker, Ahmis, for having birthed a Spirit that is itself a Maker. All the while, a new power is appearing on the outer fringes of Continuum space, as minor science colonies fall to advancing vanguards of Vinn.
The Vinn: The Vinn themselves are on the move, conquering larger and larger areas of space. And we’re only just beginning to learn what drives them.
The Grasskans: Having lost the entirety of their 3,500-year old empire to the Vinn, the remnant Grasskans are continuing to settle on Saseet. With more and more refugees arriving each day, the shipyards are being set up to build the fleet the Emperor demanded — with the promise that the planet becomes theirs at the war’s end.
The Five Moons of Slaughter: The Five Crime Families of Slaughter are now… mainly dead. Or mainly Vinn. 🙂
The Prahsitt: Just on the border of the Grasskan Empire, we actually don’t know the current fate of Kik’s homeworld, Wirum.
The Rebellion: With the Empire’s fleets pulled back, and new ringship plans distributed by the Tres Primos, the rebels of Las Hermanitas are primed to start building their own ships.
The Fillipods: Like the human rebels, the Fillipods have also come into working plans for a ring drive, and have built their first working FTL ship. But it has not kept them from holding the annual “Take-a-Chance, Do-That-Dance” Dance-Off that’s held in the capital. (First prize: Bespoke caps.)
The Nyx: The inscrutable, highly creative Nyx have themselves just been shown the plans for a ring drive, courtesy of their Fillipod guests. Nyx seeing those plans promises an entirely different answer to the old question, “What’s new on Du Fu?”
The Tesskans: The Tesskans are now just a remnant species on Tesskil and on various planets across the Empire. But one group of Tesskans is a notable exception, having commandeered the largest ship ever built: The SPARK OF THOUGHT.
The Sill: The last of a once unimaginably vast Empire, the remnant Monks of Yanta are dying, dying, dying. The only Type-2 Kardashev civilization that the Milky Way ever produced…now wordlessly fading away in the ecstasy of The Quiet.
The Veetans: With the human fleet away, the Veetans will….bake, most likely.
The Qen: Now in the third year of their rebellion against the Empire, the Qen will start taking greater and greater advantage of the amazing tech found in their rediscovered Slipstream ship. Especially with the help of the Tres Primos, who have recently arrived on Paa’q.
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NEXT WEEK: Act Four Begins! I hope you’re looking forward to it!
