Not Remotely Manipulated – Check – Chapter 8, Act 1, Strip 11

Despite the fact that she strongly suspects that mysterious meteorite to be nothing more than your standard, run-of-the-mill mysterious, alien, inexplicable-events-causing meteorite, Mopey nevertheless sets out to examine it thoroughly and scientifically. No test left at home! Well, aside from the Scoville Organoleptic Test, which she needed for her chili preparation and then, well, left at home. But all other tests are going to be applied! After all, she has to try her best to maintain her predecessor’s spotless scientific reputation.

Of course, she has to try and maintain his reputation for exemplary lab safety, as well. That’s much easier, though, since that wasn’t even nearly as spotless. It was, in fact, pretty spotty. Which doesn’t detract from the fact that it was exemplary! After all, there is such a thing as a bad example. I guess Professor Dr. just went through too much in his life to be completely on board with the highest imaginable standards on that issue – spending too much of his youth with a standard of “perfect safety” that extended to “those enemy mortar shells aren’t impacting that closely or densely”. And while Mopey doesn’t share in such experiences, she has her own reasons not to go far beyond his relaxed standards – aside from her habitual flirting with death, there’s also her impatience. >_> If she had maintained proper safety standards, this strip might have run to a three digit number of panels before that lid would have been open. So, yay for Mopey’s impatience?

More on Monday.