“Since the days the oceans drank Atlantis” is only fantasy speak for “a long time ago”. Since everybody knows how long ago it was that the oceans gave up drinking…it took an intervention by several other bodies of water, though, but since back then the oceans have mostly stayed on the bandwagon, save for a little volcanic island or two. Of course, long-time BMC readers know what really happened to Atlantis, since that was dealt with in Chapter 3 – which I can’t unfortunately not link to right now, since the archives aren’t back up yet (but will be soonish, I hope). Anyway, leaving the specific fate of Atlantis in this timeline out of consideration, the Evergreen Forest has existed for a long time. Which is why you can also call it eternal with a bit of hyperbole, since that’s also generally understood to meaning a large, but not really infinite, amount of time.
Today’s strip shows us more of the Eni’lef village’s paging system in action, but doesn’t gloss over the little drawbacks. On the plus-side, the call travels far and fast as sound – and the recipient travels only marginally slower than sound on the way back to the village. On the minus-side are the forest fires caused, the conspicuous scorchmarks centered directly on the village…oh, and the fact that you’ll get knocked over if you don’t drop the can fast enough after triggering it. One more for the plus-side, though: look at K’ip’s happy face! Do you know any other kind of paging system that gets that sort of reaction?
More on Thurs…uh, Monday, when we will learn who it was that sent that urgent message.