How many times have you heard someone say “if I had his money, I could do things my way?” But little they know that it’s so hard to find one rich man in ten with a satisfied mind. —“A Satisfied Mind,” Porter Wagoner (1955)
Okay so here’s the thing. Yes, in-game there are sewers beneath Freeside that you can enter and explore. Yes, as far as dangers go, there are ghouls in parts of the sewer. No, none of these sewer tunnels actually allow you to subvert the Vegas gate via subterranean means, like I very confidently thought they did when I first outlined this volume of IKROAH and scripted this issue probably close to a year ago. Yes, it would have required rewriting the entire outline of Volume 2 to account for this because Agnes would have to get out of Freeside a different way. Yes, I care much more about telling a strong and coherent narrative than I do about what strictly happens in the video game Fallout: New Vegas. Yes, this is very sexy and cool of me.
Everybody give a big round of applause to @tarberrymentats for crushing the art again just like they did last December, they’ve been one of my favorite artists since I first ever became a part of this community and it’s been great to become such good friends outside of just the Fallout fandom. I love it so much when I get a guest ink-and-colorist because adhering so close to my pencils creates this really interesting hybrid of our styles that you just don’t get from any other kind of collaboration. It’s an especial honor to have had Halk work on this issue specifically, too; I couldn’t help but get the number one ghoul aficionado to assist with an appearance from of my favorite minor NPCs in the game: Rotface! He was fun to write, and fun to use as a way to show a little bit more of Agnes’ character and history. First that “maniac medic” thing Beth mentioned, now this? What the fuck is her deal? Maybe we’ll finally find out for sure in an issue or two. Maybe.
Also of note: IKROAH has a brand new font! Caveat Brush has been the font for all of the previous issues, but as my lettering has gotten much better and much more attentively professional over time, I started to disagree with it. The new font going forward is “Unmasked” from BlamBot, a possibly generic font that is nevertheless very suited for my purposes here.
Original Pencils (click for full size)
It felt really great to draw Agnes again after so long. With this issue primarily just being a conversation, I wanted to make sure the layout was interesting throughout, and conveyed the emotional beats and narrative focus very intentionally. I’ve included the original thumbnail sketches on the pencils for page 5, because that page had so much empty space anyway due to the way it looked in the final product. You can see a few alternate designs for the fifth page among them, such as a more typical-looking page, a dizzying overhead shot, and a close-up of the Lucky 38, but I went with the sort of “tunnel system” layout for Rotface’s dialogue rather than try to stack a bunch of balloons.
You can also see on the fourth page an original sketch for Agnes’ “flashback” panel (to the very first issue of IKROAH) that wound up getting replaced for old art. It just didn’t look good with the whole page around it, and using the old panel from Issue #1 carried a lot more weight. It was still a pretty cool design, though, so I’m glad you can all still see it in the pencils.
And lastly, there’s the final page, which was actually added after I had already scripted and drawn the entire issue. The issue originally ended just with Agnes walking away, but it felt like it was missing something, and this extra coda with Agnes and Cass entering the sewers was a much better final note. I just want to say, going into this issue, it was probably my least favorite that I had scripted just because it felt far too purely functional as a matter of getting Agnes from Point A to Point B. But it went through many dialogue revisions, especially during the process of lettering it after it was already drawn, that kept the same idea while adding much more emotional depth, and now I’m instead very fond of this issue and what it does for Agnes’ character.
Tumblr was being very difficult with letting these particular pencils be viewed at full size on desktop, so just click here (1),here (2), and here (3) for them instead.
Transcript
EXT. FREESIDE, a street corner. A ghoul known as ROTFACE sits on the sidewalk against the building of a pre-war water filter installation business.
Suddenly, over him, is:
AGNES:Is this seat taken?
ROTFACE:It is if you’reasking, ugly. Take a hike. Unless you maybe care to spare a cigarette.
AGNES SANDS sits down next to the ghoul.
AGNES (sitting down): Thanks, Zeke.
ROTFACE:Don’t mention it. How’re you doing, Agnes? S’been a while.
AGNES:Yeah, I was, uh…shot in the head.
ROTFACE:You’re fine otherthan that though, right?
AGNES (weakly smiling): Yeah. Yeah, just peachy.
ROTFACE:Y’know,Iheardyou were back in town—well, figured, because what I heard specificallywas that you killed Dixon.
AGNES (removing two cigarettes from a box): Oh.Well…there was, uh, well, it was this whole thing with the Followers*—
ROTFACE:Oh, I’m wellaware, ha ha. Grecks said he could hear Dr. Farkas chewing you out from four blocks away.
AGNES (handing cigarette to Rotface): Zeke, I really don’t want to talk about it.
ROTFACE:Alright, sorry. Tough break, Ag. I mean it.
AGNES:Um…nicehat, by the way.
ROTFACE:Aw, thanks! You think so? Cost a lotta caps, but man, worth it. Really brings out my eyes.
AGNES:Wait—where’d you get the money?
ROTFACE:Just because I’m a beggardoesn’t mean I can’t save up for stuff. something nice every once in a while. The last time I really got anything nice for myself was that steak dinner after my surgery.Besides, this is more of a long term investment. I spend my caps on food, that’s gone as soon as I eatit, right? But this hat? Bought it three weeksago.
AGNES:Iworryabout you…please don’t buy hats instead of food.
ROTFACE:Bury me in it, then. If you worryso much, why don’t youbuy me something to eat?
AGNES:I’mserious, Zeke, come on. I’m only here at all because I need to get on the Strip.
ROTFACE:For business or pleasure?
AGNES:Uh…no, it’s…I…I…
A memory of blinding light from the barrel of a pistol, a gunshot, and then the silence and darkness of the grave.
AGNES:There’s someone I’ve been trying to find.
AGNES:But I blew the last caps I had herejust trying to scrounge enough for the gate.
AGNES:…I’m worried I’ve really fucked up.
ROTFACE frowns sympathetically.
ROTFACE:Y’knooow, I heard that security has been kind of lax at Mick and Ralph’s lately—
AGNES:No.I’m not going to stealit, Zeke. And not from them.
ROTFACE:Not gonna steal from Dixon either, or did you at least loot his corpse?
AGNES glares fiercely at ROTFACE.
ROTFACE:…eheh. Sorry.
ROTFACE:Well…alright, fair. I’d be a bad friend to make you go back to that shit, anyway. So let me be a good friend. Maybe Ican get you onto the Strip.
AGNES is stunned. She leans toward ROTFACE urgently.
AGNES:You’ve got enough cash for the gate check!?
ROTFACE:Ha! Good one. If I didthen I sure as hell still wouldn’t be in Freeside.No, what I dogot for you is a damn good tip:you want to go in?Gounder.But it’s dangerous.
ROTFACE:What you do is pry open the manhole on east Fremont and take the old sewer tunnels. It’s gonna be miles of maze-like bullshit, sure, but all the pre-war stuff’s still connected. The first ladder you’re gonna want goes up behind the Ultra-Luxe, I think. Squattersused to sneak onto the Strip this way sometimes, but it’s been a while, might be sealed off by now…might be. I’m not sure. That’s not why they stopped.
ROTFACE:No…that’d be because of the ghouls. And notthe kind capable of a pleasant conversation like moi.
AGNES:Huh. If it is sealed, would you know with what?
ROTFACE:Probably nothing that you couldn’t pick apart in your sleep. Shit’s gotta flow somewhere, and sewers need maintenance, so it shouldn’t be all tombed up with concrete like what Mr. House did to that one vault hotel.
ROTFACE:But yeah, that’s it. Fuckthe gate check. Get a little messy, or just a whole lot lucky—and Agnes Sands is on the Vegas Strip for free.
ROTFACE:Reallygotta watch those ghouls, though. Get caught, and you may not spend any money, but it still might cost an arm and a leg. Know what I mean?
AGNES:Thanks. It’s, uh…at least I know what to expect.*
CAP:Wouldn’t be the first time. See IKROAH #11.-Lou
ROTFACE:No problem, friend. And I’ll sell my hat for a nice grassy plot if you don’t come back.
AGNES (standing up): You really mean that?
ROTFACE:Hell no. You’ve told me before that you’d want to get cremated, anyway. Now scram,I don’t need deadbeat beggars like youhogging my corner.
AGNES (walking away): Thanks, Zeke. I’ll be seeing you.
ROTFACE (waving goodbye): Aw, don’t mention it, Agnes. And best of luck to you in Vegas!
EXT. ELSEWHERE IN FREESIDE.
AGNES walks a few blocks to reconvene with ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY, and they share a few words before they continue walking together.
ROTFACE (cont.): I always wanted to go and try the machines. Y’know, slots…but if I was a good gamblerthen I probably wouldn’t be a beggar,ha ha.
EXT. ELSEWHERE STILL, EAST FREMONT STREET.
AGNES and CASS approach a sewer lid over a manhole in the middle of the dilapidated street.
ROTFACE (cont): There’s always some kind of system in place that just makes sure you lose anyway, right?
CASS casts a nervous glance toward AGNES.
ROTFACE (cont): So it’d probably be a bad idea no matter what.
AGNES returns the look impassively.
ROTFACE (cont.): There’s an old saying like that, I think, but…gun to my head, I can’t remember how the whole thing goes…
The manhole lid is off, and AGNES and CASS are gone.
Don’t you know that she’s had a bad, bad fall? And if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. —“If You Can’t Say Anything Nice,” Roy Orbison (1965)
Whewwwwww this one was a project. I’ve always wanted to experiment with doing a multiple-page spread like this, and I’m glad that I finally found an excuse! It basically doubled the amount of coloring work that I had to do, but as you can see the result was well worth the trouble.
That being said, IKROAH will be going on a sort of semi-informal hiatus (which just means it might be a while until the next comic) because I have some other non-fandom comics I want to work on before the end of the year and also I have been working so hard for so long oh my god I just want to hide in a hole and play video games right now. So I will.
Anyway! See you next ish! I’m gonna go beat Metroid Dread.
Original Pencils
Since I work traditionally, it actually took a lot of effort and precision to make sure the background spread lined up correctly on each page. And it still wasn’t enough because I had to correct the alignment a bit on each page anyway during digitization! You can also see my abundance of notes-to-self about little fixes to make during the coloring process, as well as some…uh…”cut dialogue.”
The unique grittiness of the flashback panel in which Agnes confronted Dixon was achieved by leaving it uninked. By scanning it as raw pencil instead of clean black and white, I got a much rougher-looking smattering of black on it during digitization.
You can see how large I drew the flyers on the original pencils at first; I shrunk them down digitally. It was easier to draw them bigger and I knew that I could just reposition them later.
Something that proved surprisingly difficult during the art process was thinking of things to draw in front of the Fort’s walls. On the original pencils here, you can see that I drew somebody tripping over a rock on Page 5 because I thought that it’d be funny, but I replaced him with birds during the inking process because on second thought it just seemed too distracting.
Transcript
JULIE:I can’t believeyou…youkilledDixon?
INT. THE OLD MORMON FORT in FREESIDE, the Vegas-area headquarters of the FOLLOWERS OF THE APOCALYPSE. The director JULIE FARKAS is engaged in a shouting match with AGNES SANDS, while AGNES’ companion ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY stands by beside her and JULIE’s associate ARCADE GANNON frets behind her.
AGNES:Heattackedme!What was I supposedto do?
JULIE:I don’t know, notleave yet another murder victim out on the streets of Freeside, maybe?
ARCADE: Julie, please…
JULIE pinches the bridge of her nose, stressed.
JULIE: I thought you’d convince him somehow, not…this!
AGNES:Wetried. He said we’d have to pay him off, but we didn’t have the caps—
JULIE:You could have come back!Andaskedfor the caps!
CASS:Sowhat, then, the followers just open their wallets for any asshole selling on their block? Shit, Agnes, maybe weshould start pushing and get our money thatway.
ARCADE leans in to speak to JULIE.
ARCADE: Julie, I hate to say it, but she’s got a point. Even if we did give Dixon the caps, it would have set a bad precedent…frankly, we can’t afford to be extorted.
JULIE:And this justifies murder,Arcade?
JULIE turns her attention back to AGNES and CASS.
JULIE:Somehow I doubtDixon just attacked you two for no reason.
AGNES:Itoldyou. He asked for a bribe…that we buy him out, basically. And we, uh…we couldn’t pay, and so…and so I improvised…and I threatenedhim—
JULIE cuts AGNES off, pointing at her furiously.
JULIE:—and so you startedit!
AGNES:I…no, look, he pulled a knife—
JULIE:No. Stop. I don’t care.It’s already taking allof our effort to keep tensions between Freesiders and NCR squatters from boiling over into all-out riots, and everyone’s only been even moreon edge since somebody took out the Silver Rush*. People are scared, and killing a dealer like Dixon no matter howscummy is only going to make things worse, not better. We’ve been struggling with our patients’ withdrawal symptoms enough as-is.
(NOTE: Julie would know who if she’d read IKROAH #17—Lou.)
JULIE crosses her arms, immense disappointment and frustration on her face.
JULIE:And furthermore? I don’t need yourperspective on violence in Freeside. I livehere. I knowDixon’s type, and the Followers of the Apocalypse have worked with plentyof people just like him without everresorting to threats and violence. Do you fucking getit yet?
AGNES seethes behind her sunglasses.
JULIE:Do you understand what you’ve done?
AGNES’ teeth clench tight.
JULIE:You’re a murderer.
AGNES:I—
CASS (interjecting): Yeah, yeah. Nice lecture. But we didwhat you asked. That asshole won’t be dealing where he’s going, guaranteed. You’re not happy at all?
JULIE looks at them hard.
JULIE:No. I’m not. I’m nothappy that I seem to have put my faith in a pair of hitwomen. You and the Followers have no further business.
CASS:What about the caps for our trouble?Nothing?
JULIE (turning to leave): The caps you were promised will go toward Dixon’s burialexpenses. Arcade, please escort these two out of The Fort.
Exeunt JULIE as she enters one of the Followers’ medical tents.
ARCADE:I’m sorry about Julie. I mean, I agreewith her, but…well, I don’t actually know why I’m apologizing, then. Murder is bad, as it turns out.
AGNES:…it’s fine.
ARCADE:And she really doesn’t meanto be so harsh…things have just been really, uh, tensearound here lately.
ARCADE smiles sincerely.
ARCADE:Listen, if you’re ever in need of help, you cancome back anytime. Really. Just talk to meinstead of her.AllI’ll lecture you about are, uh, medicinal herbs. Haha.
CASS (turning to leave): Thanks, four-eyes. We’ll keep that in mind. Come on, Agnes.
AGNES hesitates to follow CASS, remaining still. ARCADE turns to rejoin JULIE, but looks back at AGNES with a worried expression.
AGNES:Yeah…thanks.
EXT. THE OLD MORMON FORT, the STREETS OF FREESIDE.
(Do ya need any help?) No help wanted. (Do ya need any help?) No help wanted. (Do ya need any help? Do ya need any help?) I can handle this job all by myself! —“No Help Wanted,” The Carlisles (1952)
Hi! This issue went through some pretty significant revisions over time, so I figure it’ll be fun to go over them real quick so you can get a glimpse into the writing and scripting process behind the scenes.
When this issue was originally scripted, Agnes would have lost the caps needed to get to Vegas in a much “nicer” way. As she took the money from Garret, he would lament that Agnes wouldn’t be around to do more work for her because he was hoping she would help shake down a few debtors of his around Freeside (a reference to the in-game quest “Debt Collector”). Then he would mention that without her, he’ll have to use the Wrangler’s usual bounty hunter, who’s a lot more trigger-happy and tends to collect debts in blood instead of caps. From there, the final page of the issue would have been the same, with Agnes being cagey about why she doesn’t have the money for Cass and the implication being Agnes paid off those debts out of the goodness of her heart.
This was very wisely rewritten for several reasons. The first is that the gesture was uncharacteristically altruistic of Agnes: she’d probably be disturbed by Garret’s flippant ruthlessness, but it’s ultimately not her problem and she doesn’t even know these people. Furthermore, she slaughtered the Khans in Boulder City because one of them merely helped Benny shoot her. I can’t imagine her putting off her pursuit of Benny just so she could do something nice. The second reason is that the original angle was extraordinarily boring, as I’m sure your eyes almost glazed over reading that first paragraph. It’s mostly just Garret talking to himself, and Agnes suddenly deciding she cares for no good reason. And that, the no good reason, is the third reason I rewrote the issue. It’s important that Agnes and Cass don’t have enough to get to Vegas, so finding the right excuse was thematically crucial.
So I thought of the rewrite, where Agnes blows up at Garret for being a creep towards her instead. The emotional rise of her indignation boiling over and getting the better of her while she’s talked down to and objectified by Garret as he holds the purse strings was waymore suspenseful and interesting, and of course her deciding to punch him out and walk is a much more compelling sacrifice and character moment than the original script’s random act of kindness. This new script also manages to foreground her transness in a way I prefer to never pass up (and believe me, I’ve gotten more than a few James Garrets in my Twitter DMs in my time).
The tricky part about the new script was adequately conveying what happened without showing it, because the smash cut to the outside of the Wrangler is a lot more effective than showing the actual attack. It’s a somber, frustrating, miserable moment for Agnes, by the end of the issue the momentary catharsis of cleaning Garret’s clock is already gone, so omitting the image of the punch itself is intentional. In the first rewrite, Agnes was even morecagey about what happened in the Wrangler, but too little detail and it sounded like she just murdered him. Having Agnes state that she doesn’t want to take money from him, and coloring a little blood on her knuckles, lets it read better without holding the hand too much.
So never let it be said that the first draft is always the best draft…I find myself rereading my master script document often and making changes and revisions where they’re needed, especially since so many scripts like this one are written a very long time in advance.
On a lighter note, it’s good to be back! It’s been so long since I’ve completely drawn and colored an issue myself that I worried about whether I could still handle it. Really happy with how this issue came out, so I think I certainly still can. And more are on the way!
Also, the old Mexican woman in the group shot on the second page is Emilia Vasquez, a character created by @socksual-innuendos who would absolutely be chatting up Beatrix Russell in this or any given canon. It’s hard to work in cameo appearances like this because of how few group shots normally come up in IKROAH, but we’ll be in Freeside a while yet so maybe we’ll get more yet.
Original Pencils (click for full size)
This was a reallyfun issue to pencil. The layout was simple but really gave me a lot to work with in terms of pose and expression, and it gave me the opportunity for a rare crowd shot where I get to draw a bunch of different characters at once. There’s also a lot of close-ups, especially on the second page, where I got to flex more of my technical drawing ability (look at Agnes’ teeth! That whole sequence was just “fun with render distance”). You can see a few spots where I left myself blanks to Frankenstein complete panels together later, on the pages where repetition was artistically important. That’s the one thing really tricky about drawing in pencil on paper…there’s no copy-and-pasting and no layering. Everything’s gotta be as-is, so I plan ahead for what I can do digitally.
I also neglected a lot of detailed backgrounds in this issue intentionally. Inspired by Shrimp’s lovely guest art on the previous issue, I wanted to experiment with much more pop-art backgrounds that are more of an “abstract compositional artistic gestalt” on the page as opposed to every panel being a realistic camera-shot. In short, that meant I was fooling around with the juxtaposition of different colors to convey mood, and was more concerned with looking interesting as opposed to looking realistic and deep. Whether to draw the entire background as-is is something I always deliberate on with each panel because there’s a nagging part of me that thinks gradient or simple backgrounds is a lazy cop-out (and sometimes it can be) but I really like how I utilized the colored backgrounds here, especially with how they complement the tone shift on the third page, which doesn’t have the pop-color backgrounds at all.
Transcript
INT. THE ATOMIC WRANGLERCASINO,a dimly-lit dive where one half of its sibling proprietorship JAMES GARRETis behind the bar, grinning wide.
JAMES:Hey!There’smy favorite headhunter! You get the talent I asked for?
In front of the bar is AGNES SANDS, hands in her pockets, head turned back towards three people—well, two people and one robot—behind her. They are OLD BEN, the ghoul BEATRIX RUSSELL, and FISTO.
OLD BEN: Hello.
BEATRIX:Hiya.
FISTO:NEW USER WARRANTY AGREEMENTS ARE AVAILABLE.
FISTO looms over AGNES as GARRET continues.
JAMES: Thank God. If we didn’t get that sexbotbefore long, management would have been terriblyupset.
AGNES:Aren’tyoumanagement?
JAMES:Well, yes, but what I meanis that it’s bad for business to not be meeting my needs.Speakingas management, I mean. My need to meet the needs of our clientele.
AGNES:…right. Just pay me.
JAMES:Of course, of course.
Beat. JAMES keeps grinning, eyeing AGNES while she awkwardly waits.
AGNES:Well?
JAMES:You know, I’ve been thinking—you’ve alreadygone through the trouble of recruiting some veryspecial talent for the Wrangler…and in the process, I just couldn’t help but notice yourparticular…talents.
As JAMES continues his pitch, AGNES realizes where he’s going with this. He’d better not be going where she thinks he’s going with this.
JAMES:I mean—a leather domme, an old smooth talker, and, uh, Fisto…as you can see, we get a lot of nicherequests—
He’s going there. AGNES interrupts, seething.
AGNES:Give. Me. My money. James.
JAMES:Listen, what I’m trying to say is that if you need money, there’s a lot more I'd—that is, you could be making here.
JAMES continues, oblivious to AGNES’ mounting offense.
JAMES:I’m telling you Agnes, there’s a lucrativelocal market here for just the kind of experience that youcan provide! Believe me, I’d know. You’re a little dinged up, and older, to be fair, so we’re not talking premiumrates or anything…but you stillwouldn’t believe what people would pay here for just fifteen minuteswith a—
EXT. ATOMIC WRANGLER, nighttime. Neon signs and streetlights bask the streets of FREESIDE in a warm gold glow. ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY leans against a streetlight pole just outside the casino.
After a moment, AGNES exits the Wrangler.
CASS:Took you long enough. I wanna get out of here and see the strip already.
AGNES continues trudging past CASS, into the empty street.
AGNES:Come on. I don’t have the money.
CASS:What!?What do you mean you don’t, did that asshole not payus?
AGNES rubs her knuckles, a chunky bloodstain already fading from her right leather glove.
AGNES: No. And he’s not goingto. And I don’t want him to. We’ll have to get the money somewhere else, that’s all.
AGNES continues her march away from the Wrangler while CASS remains against the streetlight pole, aghast.
CASS:Somewhere else…? Agnes!…but then how are we—Agnes! Agnes, god damn it, what did you do?Goddamnit!
Don’t want a real live boy, they give me grief, always make me cry into my handkerchief. So it’s a robot man I’m dreamin’ of because I can depend upon a robot love, yeah! —“Robot Man,” Connie Francis (1960)
It feels so good to be back on a pretty regular production schedule! Almost as good as it feels to go a round with Fisto!
The art this ish comes from @comrade-shrimp (art blog: @jepsxyhn), who did a great job with this issue, which is a lot more lighthearted than the previous one. I have so much love for them, and they brought so much necessary vibrancy to this issue; I’ve been wanting to experiment more with poppy, colorful backgrounds like this for a while, and they were an utter delight to work with. Everybody say “Thank you, Shrimp!” for doing such a spectacular job and for being so cool and nice.
Original Pencils (click for full size):
Since Shrimp took care of the art this time around, all I have are my original layouts for this issue, on top of which they worked their magic. These are really rough (and really old!) but I always really enjoy doing layouts like this for my guest artists. There’s definitely a certain charm to making something so intentionally loose and sketchy that still puts in as much detail as needed to get a good idea of what the final product will look like.
One minor but funny difference between my pencils and Shrimp’s art is on the third page, where Agnes is stomping away from Cass and FISTO. Originally, I had Agnes drawn with her arms thrown up in the air exasperatedly. However, when drawing at production scale, it was impossible to draw her like that without it looking like she was pretending to be an airplane and flying away.
Transcript:
INT. the run-down workshop of CERULEAN ROBOTICS in FREESIDE.
AGNES SANDS and ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY stand in front of a PROTECTRON ROBOT encased in some sort of stasis capsule or holding dock.
AGNES:No.Absolutely not.
CASS:Do you want to get to Vegas or not? The Garrets are paying us more than enough caps to get past the credit check—all we need to do is get them new blood.
AGNES:It’s a robot. It doesn’t haveblood.
CASS approaches a terminal attached to the ROBOT’S dock and flourishes a tape drive.
CASS:Wellbloodain’t the most important bodily fluid for itsline of work going forward.
CASS inserts the tape into the terminal with a chunky SLOT!sound.
CASS:Let’s wake it up already.
The terminal screen lights up, displaying console text: Operator Interface for Fully Integrated Security Technotronic Officer. Initializing Start-Up…Calibrating Protocol…
New data flushes into the ROBOT’s system as it awakes, coming to life with a deep, growing hum.
The dock’s display pane slides away, opening up for the ROBOT to step out and onto the floor of the workshop.
ROBOT:GREETINGS…I AM FISTO…AND I AM PROGRAMMED FOR YOUR PLEASURE.
CASS:Gets right down to business, doesn’t it?
AGNES:…“Fisto?” Did youname it that?
CASS:No, must have been part of Ralph’s tape. Creative bastard.
FISTO:PLEASE ASSUME THE POSITION.
AGNES, unnerved, starts walking away.
AGNES:Fuck, that’s…skin-crawling. Let’s just bring it back to James already, okay?
CASS:Now hang on…
AGNES turns back around, in horror.
CASS is throwing herself at FISTO like a fawning supermodel, arm playfully draped around its “shoulders” and leg hoisted up against its chassis.
CASS:Aren’t you at least a littlecurious as to what this thing can do for a woman?
AGNES:Fuck no!! What’swrongwith you?
CASS:Comeon,Agnes, loosen up a bit!
FISTO:FISTO OFFERS GREAT COUPLESRATES.
AGNES, reflexively, hovers her trembling hand just above her holstered pistol. She speaks through gritted teeth.
AGNES:Don’t you darebring that…that thing…thatliterally fucking thing anywhere nearme.
CASS:Suit yourself—but I’ll try anything once, and I’m not passing up a freebie when I see one.
AGNES makes a furious about-face and storms away from CASS and FISTO, heading out of the building.
AGNES leans against the wall across the courtyard from the workshop entrance, smoking a cigarette. From the opposite door come the sounds of FISTO’s many “functions.”
Suddenly, the sounds cease, and it’s quiet in the courtyard. AGNES looks up.
CASS emerges from the workshop door. She’s out of breath, sweaty, and her face is deeply flushed. She has to lean against the door frame just to stand up.
CASS:Oh, man, Agnes—you, uh, wouldn’t happen to have any more cigarettes, would you?
I stood there shivering in my pajamas and watched the whole world go up in flames and when it was all over I said to myself, “is that all there is to a fire?” —“Is That All There Is?,” Leslie Uggams (1968)
Rose of Sharon Cassidy had gotten her revenge. With the help of the courier, Agnes Sands, McLafferty was dead and the Silver Rush was a blazing wreck. So why can’t she fucking relax? Why can’t her pulse stop pounding? Why can’t her hands stop shaking? How many drinks does it take to feel okay again? After absconding to the Atomic Wrangler, she’ll drink her companion under the table to know for sure.Read on Archive of Our Own.
Finally! IKROAH returns! And man does it return with abang,right.
This has been a very busy summer for both me and @yesjejunus which is why the comic sort of fell into hiatus for a little bit, but now I think everything’s back in order. You can expect new issues of IKROAH every two or four weeks on a regular basis like usual again, because believe me, nobody hates it more when this thing falls behind schedule than me. I have exactly one hundred issues of story to tell here, and I’d really like to get it done in my lifetime!
But anyway, YJJ fucking blew this issue out of the water. You may remember him from his grayscale art on IKROAH #11 (the Searchlight issue, one that remains very personal to me) but the sheer volume of talent in the colors of these pages is astonishing. He’s one of my favorite artists to collaborate with because of how much we geteach other, and it’s with immense pleasure I finally get to show you all these pages we’ve been putting together for so long.
Also don’t miss ABV! I worked hard on those seven thousand words and I hope that you enjoy it (if you’re over the age of eighteen). The bittersweet thing about the vignette structure and visual medium of IKROAH issues is I don’t get so much room to really get into characters’ heads, so expanding upon certain moments in the comic with companion pieces is a really great exercise. ABV also contains a lot that, like the Searchlight issue, is really meaningful to me, and I think you’ll find ABV to be a story that really carves deep into the nature of how Agnes and Cass relate to each other.
Original Pencils (click for full size):
I love it when artists volunteer to do full art for me because it means I get to go wild on little pencils like these without any of the pressure to polish them. Check YJJ’s blog sometime soon after this and I think he’ll be posting side-by-sides…it’s really amazing what that man can do to my layouts.
May the unnamed guard of the Silver Rush, affectionately dubbed Door Guard-kun by YJJ and I, rest in peace. We felt so bad about it because YJJ drew him so goddamn attractive. YJJ wound up basing his depiction of him on a specific model at my suggestion, a no-prize to whoever can guess who that model was. Your hint is that it’s a very embarrassing internet microcelebrity crush of mine.
The absolute hardest part of drawing this issue, the part that we came back to dozens of times, was the panel where Agnes plants the bomb on the Silver Rush Guard. We went through so many different takes of Agnes’ pose because it was very hard to make it look like she was planting a bomb on the guy while feigning a flinch, and not just stiff-arming Door Guard-kun for no reason. I’m pleased with the final result.
Anyway, we’ll have another amazing guest artist doing full guest art for me next issue, so you’ll get to see more pencils like these when that comes out. See you then!
Transcript
EXT. FREESIDE, the run-down outskirts of NEW VEGAS. This is where the refugees from the NCR and Mojave meet the people too poor to get into the shining city itself.
A scruffy-looking DOOR GUARD stands vigilantly outside of the SILVER RUSH, formerly a pre-war gambling hall but now the largest commercial supplier of energy weapons in the region, thanks to its proprietors the VAN GRAFF siblings.
From around the corner, AGNES SANDS approaches the GUARD.
AGNES:Excuse me, do you know how to get to the Mormon Fort from here?
GUARD:What? Yeah, a few blocks north.
Suddenly, with a shattering CRASH,a glass bottle breaks against the street, having been tossed from somewhere in the shadows.AGNES and the GUARD both recoil in surprise; AGNES leans her arm against the GUARD to catch herself from falling, but seems to slip something into one of his bandolier pouches as she does.
GUARD:Hey!
The GUARD flips his laser rifle up to a ready position and scans the dark street around him.
GUARD:Damn punks, always throwing shit.
The GUARD turns his attention back to AGNES.
GUARD:Are you newhere, man? Watch your back.
AGNES gives a light wave to the GUARD as she departs back down the street from whence she came.
AGNES:Thanks. You too.
MEANWHILE on the top floor of the building across the street, ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY has been observing the entire interaction. AGNES appears behind her from the stairsleading up to her perch, and sits down against the crumbled wall overlooking the street. She starts to light a cigarette.
CASS:Alright, so now what?
AGNES:Wait for the change in guard.
CASS:Looks like it’s changing now. He’s going inside.
AGNES:Oh!? Shit, good timing then.
CASS pulls a small black device out from her back pocket.
CASS:And you’re surethe thing is—
AGNES:Yeah, when you threw the bottle.
CASS:Shit, you aregood. Think Crimson Caravan knows we stoleit?
AGNES:I’d hope they have biggerthings to worry about right now. Now hurry, we don’t have much time to—
CASS presses the button on the device.
SFX: CLIK!
THE SILVER RUSH EXPLODES. An enormous fireball erupts from within the building, blowing out the windows and sending shards of glass and steel in every direction down the street.The sheer force of the blast throws whole firearms into the street and rends all the SILVER RUSH PERSONNEL inside, the VAN GRAFFS included. CASS holds onto her hat to keep it from flying off her head, while AGNES’ cigarette flies out of her hands.
AGNES carefully stands up. The SILVER RUSH is a hollow smoldering box of brick and mortar.
AGNES:Fuck, Cass, you could have warned me first.
CASS stares into the flames across the street. They reflect in her eyes like something haunted.
AGNES:Cass?
CASS glances sidelong at AGNES. She doesn’t turn away from the fire.
CASS:You know, I wanted to make her knowit was me. To make her die scared. Like McLafferty. But now that it’s done…Fuck it, there’s almost something poeticabout it, right? Gloria Van Graff burned my caravan to ash. Now her and all her fucking laser guns and hired thugs are nothingbut ashes in that…inferno.
The SILVER RUSH continues to burn. There are no survivors of which to speak of that could run out from the flames.
CASS:Dust to fucking dust, you bitch.
AGNES looks across the street and watches the armory burn beside CASS. She looks over to her companion softly.
AGNES:Are you alright?
CASS glances over at AGNES and they hold each other’s gaze for a moment. She turns back to the fire before replying.
CASS:Yeah. I’m alright.
CASS turns away from the window and walks towards the stairs that descend out of the building.
CASS:Let’s get out of here.
AGNES remains by the window a moment, watching CASS leave. Then she turns back towards the SILVER RUSH again as the flames and smoke continue to pour out of the building.
Finally, she turns around herself, and follows CASS down the stairs.
The strangest gal I ever had never happy ‘less she’s mad. Oh, I got a woman mean as she can be, sometimes I think she’s almost mean as me. —“Mean Woman Blues,” Elvis Presley (1957)
I want this issue to speak for itself so I’m going to cut right to gratuitously thanking our latest guest artist, Esseress, who did a completely phenomenal on these five pages. We’ve been working on it for a long time and I’m over the moon to finally bring it to you now on this blog. I love writing this comic, and I loved doing the lettering and composition for it, but mygoodness do I love Esse’s art. It was a real privilege to have that art as part of It Keeps Right On a-Hurtin’, especially since the artist was such an immaculately pleasant collaborator. If you’re reading this, thank you again for such a fun project (and talking about Naruto with me lol).
Original Pencils (click for full size):
This issue was one of my most fun composition challenges yet because something that you want to avoid in comics as much as possible, I think, is talking heads. You want to avoid shots that are static, overly repetitive, and uninteresting. Now the challenge is, how do you do that when your whole comic takes place in a small storeroom and is nothing but a conversation between two characters?
Playing with angles and expressions, and using repetition intentionally with the percussive referent of Agnes cutting into the floorboards, made for some really suspenseful page layouts that complemented the script in a major way. I’m especially proud of the third page, with its quick cutaway to the exterior of the office and the cutting continuing beneath Agnes’ dialogue. Also, did you notice that you only ever see Agnes’ left side this issue? You never get to look her in the eye this issue, and given how cagey she’s acting, that evasiveness was an intentional compositional choice. It was satisfying to pull off, but hear me, it took a lotof planning in the thumbnail stage to pull off well.
The other fun challenge of this issue was lighting. When you’re in a closet a night and don’t want to be seen, how do you see? The delightful answer was to have Agnes actually use that damn flashlight she wears on her shoulder; attentive readers will notice that this is the second time she’s used it in the comic, with the first time being back in Boulder City at the end of Volume 1. Hmm…guys, I wonder if it’s a bad omen that she only seems to turn it on when she’s about to commit or assist in a murder…
Speaking of lighting! One last fun hiccup about this issue was the final page. The script I wrote called for it to transition from night to morning between the first and second panels, but in a case of unforeseen and magnitudinous pedanticism, it was while coordinating the lighting on that page with Esse that I looked up the actual time of sunrise in the Mojave Desert for the time of year this issue takes place, which is November 5th if you’re curious. Turns out the sun shouldn’t be rising until after 7:00 AM, which hardly makes McLafferty the exceptionally early riser her planner says she is. That’s not to say it’s actually7:00 AM in the comic…go ahead and play the CinemaSins ding for the wrong sunrise time, or whatever. And it’s not like any of you would have known or cared if I didn’t say anything! It was just too weird of a writing quirk to not bring up. The lesson, folks, is to always remember your temporality when writing. It’ll help you sleep a lot easier.
Transcript:
EXT. CRIMSON CARAVAN, night. The lights are out and everyone in the caravan compound have retired to their barracks for the night. From inside one of the compound buildings comes a soft sound.
SFX: SKRITCH SKRITCH…
INT. CRIMSON CARAVAN OFFICE. AGNES SANDS is bent over on the floor of a storeroom, carving into the wooden floor with her bootknife. ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY leans against the door behind her.
SFX: SKRITCH SKRITCH…
AGNES:So…have you ever killed anyone before?
AGNES continues cutting into the floor without looking at CASS as she speaks.
AGNES:Third, her planneron her desk confirmed what I already suspected—that she’s an early riser—so we’ll see her soonerrather than later,while the rest of the company is still asleep.
SFX: SKRITCH SKRITCH, SKRITCH SKRITCH…
AGNES:Fourth, we want to send a messageto everyone else.So it has to be at least a littlespectacular.
SFX: SKRITCH SKRITCH, SKRITCH SKRITCH...
CASS:Oh…you’ve really thought this through.
SFX: SKRIT-
AGNES stops cutting. She slowly lifts her knife out of the floor.
AGNES:Yeah.
CASS:Where’d a medicget so good at murder?
AGNES rises from bending over the floor to a kneeling position, turning back towards CASS and frowning.
CASS:Sorry. You probably don’t want to talk about that,either.
AGNES:Maybe another time. For now…
AGNES leans back, kneeling over an intricate cross-hatch, about three feet in radius, of deep cuts and gouges into the floorboards in front of her.
AGNES:…just trust me.
EXT. CRIMSON CARAVAN. Night turns to early morning, and ALICE McLAFFERTY, the boss of the caravan, walks up the steps of her office and enters.
CASS:Rose of Sharon goddamnCassidy, of Cassidy fucking Caravans,youbitch!
ALICE:No, you’re—
SFX: KABLAM
The sound of a shotgun going off in the middle of the compound wakes up the whole caravan. Crows scatter from the courtyard while guards start rushing towards the office door.
AGNES:Alright, now let’s go!Shoot the floor here where I—
SFX: KABLAM
The guards close in on the office while wooden shrapnel falls from a new hole in the floorboards of the office, and AGNES and CASS drop through to the ground outside, and crawl away from the caravan guards under the hut just as they reach the McLAFFERTY’s front door.
Whiskey river, take my mind, don’t let her memory torture me. Whiskey river, don’t run dry, you’re all I got, take care of me. —“Whiskey River,” Shotgun Willie (1973)
MAN that’s gotta hurt!! Volume 2 kicks off with a bang, literally if you count the gunshot and honorifically if you count Socks’ knockout color job on this issue. Look at those lovingly rendered bullet wounds!! Muah!!!
It’s been a relief having a month off from the comic as I handled a bunch of other things but there’s a lot to look forward to in Volume 2, as you can probably tell from that very forboding fist clench at the end there. Will Agnes and Cass get the revenge they’re looking for? Can they make it big in Vegas? Will it keep right on a-hurtin’? Find out next ish as Cass leads Agnes to meet the first of their new “friends.”
Original Pencils:
The pencils for this issue are like an autopsy report of all the things that can go wrong with your art if you don’t plan ahead and pay attention. Listen, friend, to my tale of woe, and learn from my mistakes so they don’t become yours!
First, you can see a lot of places where there’s floating objects, empty backgrounds, and incomplete heads. Part of this is because I always intended to just copy and paste repeated elements across each panel instead of drawing them multiple times, but other times I was forced to just because of my lack of planning. The top three panels on page two, for example, required me to draw the background I’d use for them on a separate page.
Second, you can probably tell that I actually had to flip the two raiders around in the final lineart because I forgot to keep the hands their were holding their guns in consistent—and since I couldn’t flip the middle panel on the second page without ruining the composition, I decided to flip all of their other appearances so that they’d be lefties. I doubt you even canseamlessly wield those particular guns left-handed.
Third, the size of the cart that Agnes and Cass are kneeling behind changes CONSTANTLY and is dramatically oversized from the third page onward. After inking these pages, it took a lot of work to correct the inks and shrink that cart in each panel, but fortunately it came out looking good.
And finally, I completely redrew the second panel on the fifth page because it wasn’t until I had already handed he pages off to my colorist that I realized having a second profile shot of Cass so soon after a first one was just…redundant and lazy-looking. So I went back to my sketchbook and whipped up a much more unique, striking angle (I also just wasn’t satisfied with the quality of my art on that panel, so I’m very glad I redrew it). But again, my failure to plan ahead bit me in the ass and my redraw attempt wound up taking up a lot more space than I thought it would, so after inking it I had to basically surgically remove it from the other inks.
I’ll be honest with you folks: part of the reason that I work in such simple, thick, high-contrast lineart is because it’s very easy to make corrections and adjustments with stuff you could technically color in Microsoft Paint.
Transcript:
EXT. SOMEWHERE IN THE MOJAVE, morning. AGNES SANDS and ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY stand over the wreckage of a caravan, scattered over a dirt road.
CASS:Hell.
EXT. SOMEWHERE ELSE IN THE MOJAVE, midday. Looking over a second wrecked caravan, at the bottom of a ditch.
CASS:Fuck.
EXT. PRE-WAR HIGHWAY OUTSIDE OF VEGAS, mid-afternoon. AGNES and CASS survey a third wrecked caravan.
CASS:Shit. The proof is in the pudding. Or the pile of ash, rather. These attacks were done with Van Graff guns for Crimson Caravan caps. I’m sure of it.
As CASS explains her theory to AGNES, a short distance from the caravan two RAIDERS peer at the two of them from inside a barn at a ruined farmstead. They have snake-bite tattoos on the sides of their shaved heads and are holding rifles.
CASS:The scorchmarks and residue in the wreckages? That’s energyweapon shit. Plasma and laser. Silver Rush special. Not like it’d be the Brotherhood. And Crimson Caravan must have bankrolledthis fucked-up little hunting trip themselves.
The RAIDERS move out from the barn, sneaking up on two passers-by who’ve stopped at the caravan wreckage.
CASS:That explains why they bought me out…they needed the last loose end to saddle up back west with a tidy sum.
(NOTE: *Agnes delivered it and Cass signed it in IKROAH #7—Lou.)
CASS:It’s a racket, Agnes: torch the local competition and it’s win-winforboth the f—
SFX: KRAK
A gunshot rips out from one of the RAIDERS’ rifles and sears across CASS’ shoulder.
CASS (gasping): —uckers.
CASS slumps down beneath the overturned caravan wagon on the road, clutching her shot shoulder.
CASS:—Aaggghghhhhhhh.
AGNES:Cass! Are you—
CASS:Fuck!Agnes, get down you moron!
AGNES ducks behind the cover of the wooden caravan wagon just as another gunshot splinters the top lip of it.
SFX: DTHWAK!
The RAIDERS advance on CASS and AGNES’ position, firing at them from off the road.
SFX: KRAK
AGNES leans over the top of the wagon with her pistol, returning fire.
SFX: BTAK BTAK BTAK
AGNES lands a shot right in one of the RAIDERS’ guts, and she drops her weapon and falls down.
SFX: SPLUT
CASS, leaning out the side of the wagon, takes as careful of aim as she can with her shotgun by holding it with her good arm. Trembling, she fires, connecting with the other RAIDER.
SFX: KBLAM
The would-have-been RAIDERS are dead.
AGNES:…were those the Van Graffs?
CASS:No. Just some vultures.
CASS leans back behind cover to sit against the bottom of the overturned wagon again, wincing from her shoulder injury.
CASS:Ugghhn.
AGNES (slipping off duffel bag): Cass, your shoulder—
CASS:Yeah, it’s been shot. I’m pretty fucking aware.
AGNES (unzipping bag): Quick, can you take your shirt off—
CASS:What!?
AGNES: —so I can dressthewound,Cass!
CASS:Oh! Good! So you weren’t coming onto me on what remainsof Griffin Wares Caravan.
CASS starts removing her shirt while AGNES produces a bottle of something from her duffel bag, and dampens a rag with its contents.
CASS:And since when are you a fucking field medic,anyway?
AGNES:2269. NCR Certified.
CASS:What?
AGES: Yeah. I’ve been one kind of doctor or another since I was six.
CASS:What?
AGNES:Now hold still, this is antiseptic.
CASS:Since you were six!? I…shit, wait, hang on, Agnes—
AGNES pressess the rag onto CASS’ shoulder wound, and CASS winces instinctively. But, confusingly, there isn’t any pain.
CASS: …isn’t this supposed to sting like hell?
AGNES: No, not really. It’s an acetic acid solution. Vinegar,basically.
AGNES begins cleaning the wound with the rag.
CASS: I thought you put alcoholon wounds to clean them.
AGNES: That’s…a common misconception. It’s good for tools, maybe, but too strong for skin. And it can complicate healing if you apply it directly.
CASS: So you’re telling me, all my years, I’ve been wastinggood whiskey only making my boo-boos worse?
AGNES: I mean…it’s better than nothing in a pinch,but…
CASS:Well, then. Thanks for the lecture, doc. Can you just pass the whiskey anyway? Shoulder still hurts like hell regar—
AGNES hands her the whiskey bottle. She’d already gotten it out.
CASS: —dless. Oh. Thanks.
AGNES unspools a roll of bandages in her hands, then begins wrapping it over CASS’ shoulder and across her chest..
AGNES: So. It’s a relatively minorwound, more of a deep grazethan a real gunshot.
CASS: You’d know allabout real gunshots, huh?
AGNES (unfazed):Uh-huh. I can suture it if necessary, but for now, these bandages will be fine. Just hold still. How do you feel?
CASS:I feel fucking pissed,Agnes!
AGNES recoils, taken aback slightly.
CASS: As I was sayingbefore I got shot in the shoulder—which, however “minor” the wound, is realfucking close to my head, Agnes—this wasn’t some random attack. These caravans, mycaravan, got hit by the Van GraffsandCrimson Caravan. It ain’t just some tragedy anymore. Now I’ve got names. Places. Faces.
AGNES resumes bandaging CASS.
CASS:I told you—ow!Don’t pinch my tit, dammit—
AGNES: I said hold still.
CASS: —I told you, when you told me about this guy who shotyou…when I let you drag me out of that fucking outpost…and when we went to Boulder City…that I would do the exactsame thing in your shoes. Now, it isthe exact same thing. Thisfucker shoots your eyeout,thesefuckers ash my caravan…thesesamefuckers I sold my own goddamn nameto on a piece of paper. I mean…what elseare we doing out here, Agnes? Getting shot at by Khans and Raiders just for kicks? Are we just fucking around?
AGNES finishes bandaging CASS, then leans back,pensive.
AGNES:No…no, I really guess we’re not.
CASS:That’s what I thought.Your friend in Vegascan wait. Help me get mine, and we can get that shitheeltogether, and that’s a prom—
CASS raises her arm to shake her fist as she speaks, straining her shoulder injury.
CASS:—mmmmmmghhhh.Ooww, oww, oww, oww…
CASS grabs her shoulder in pain while AGNES looks off in the distance and stands up. She looks out towards the horizon—towards VEGAS, and the pre-war casinos and hotels that still gleam and glitter in blinding sunlight.
Her fist clenches. Her brow furrows. Her body tenses, all over, staring at that city, that place.
The caravan wreckage remains alone on the highway, brahmin bones long picked clean by scavengers.
There were a few different designs considered for my cover, and by a few I mean these:
It was a VERY close call between the first and third options, but I ultimately went with the third because I already have “big vertical object as point of interest” planned for a different cover down the line and I didn’t want to be too redundant. The second option was deemed too difficult to execute well, and the fourth was just so perfect that I didn’t want to make the whole rest of the comic seem less good by comparison.
The third design is actually an homage to the cover of the Batman comic Three Jokers, a comic that isn’t particularly good or notable in my opinion but is so absurd in concept that it’s sort of become an inside joke that I have with myself. Here’s the original:
Anyway, after deciding on the third design, I had to make a full-size version based on my original half-size thumbnail:
As you can see, I drew the background and foreground separately, and Victor was made bigger in the digitized version of the art than he is here. I also wound up switching the side that Agnes is holding the chip in! I had already drawn the hands, like that, but I wanted her scarred side to be in the reflection of the chip. I’m glad I drew them separately because it was very easy to just mirror that layer when it came to the final cover (and the charming doodle at the top was just filling empty space while watching a music video).
As for the variant cover, please give a huge glamorous round of applause to my guest artists! When I needed a pair of glamorous Vegas-ready outfits for Agnes, I turned to @theyoungbuck immediately for consultation and costume design, an absolute expert in this field.. He was also the artist who designed the composition for the variant cover, and you can see the original costume design and drafts of the cover here:
All of this was designed in early January when I was largely between issues of the comic. We ultimately decided against the second draft, because if we went through the trouble of designing these outfits for Agnes and Cass then by god we were going to show them off.
With the recent finale to Volume 1, over the last few days me and @tarberrymentats teamed up to bring that original draft to life, and viola! You’re looking at the glamorous results!
It’s always a tremendous pleasure to collaborate with guests artists on issues of the comic, but I’m especially hoping to have a variant cover for each volume going forward because it’s just so much funto do the artistic equivalent of taking a photo of somebody, then excitedly saying “alright, now let’s do a silly one.”
I don’t care what’s right or wrong, I won’t try to understand. Let the devil take tomorrow but tonight I need a friend. —“Help Me Make It Through the Night,” Sammi Smith (1971)
It Keeps Right On a-Hurtin’ #14 - Boulder City
Collaborative Issue! Guest Inks and Colorist: CSGM (Twitter)
It’s been an incredible journey working on this comic since I published the first issue on June 15th, 2020, and fifty-two pages later, this is it: the conclusion to Volume 1: “The Death of Agnes Sands.” There’s plenty, plenty more to this story, so stay tuned for the cover reveal and beginning of Volume 2 coming soon. Keep your eyes on @fallout-lou-begas for announcements, naturally.
This issue wouldn’t have been possible without the incredible artwork of CSGM, a comic artist whose work you can find and follow on Twitter at @smakkine. I thank them so much for taking an interest in my comic and for turning in such breathtaking work, and they’re open for commissions if you’d like to give them money for artwork of your own!
Original Pencils (click for full size)
As with all guest ink and colorist spots, I do my own original pencils that the artist then draws over.
As an added bonus, here’s some of my original thumbnails, plus reference/practice sketches for the Khan characters: Jessup, and then my original characters Grant and Kari (who I named after the Mythbusters B-team). They’re both extremely cool, almost too cool for one-note characters, but in the words of Ranger Ghost: not all of us get to have a legacy. Some of us just get shot and die.
Transcript
INT. BOULDER CITY - GREAT KHANS HIDEOUT.
MacMURPHY is unconscious on the floor of a bombed-out pharmacy. JESSUP is shaking him vigorously, trying desperately to rouse him. They’re flanked by KARI, who’s keeping lookout by the front window, and GRANT.
JESSUP:Come on, Mac, come on…just wake up…don’t…don’t…fuck!
KARI:Forget it, Jessup, he’s gone.
JESSUP:I’msorry,man, I…I’m sorry, I didn’t…
GRANT:Hey. It’s not your fault that asshole screwed us, okay? We’ll find him and get him back.But for now,we have to get outof this.
JESSUP:Wecan’t get out. We’re not gettingout.
EXT. BOULDER CITY - RUINS
NCR TROOPS, rifles raised, surround the Khans’ hideout. LT. MONROE barks into a radio receiver, barely lit by the Khans’ own lookout fire in the rubbled streets.
JESSUP:We’re surrounded, we’re outnumbered…we’re under fucking siege! What do you want me to do,man?
INT. BOULDER CITY - GREAT KHANS HIDEOUT
GRANT grabs JESSUP by the collar and slams him against the wall.
GRANT:You’rein charge! What do you want usto do?
JESSUP:I don’t know…just couldn’t go back empty-handed…I didn’t want Papato…to… (trails off)
KARI:Grant. Jessup.
GRANT and JESSUP turn towards KARI, expectant. Outside, SOMEONE in a black coat and boots with a pink mohawk skulks in the shadows of the ruins.
KARI:Someone’s coming.
JESSUP:…what?
KARI (leaning out window): They’re sending someone over. A woman, unarmed. NotNCR, no uniform.
GRANT:A negotiator?
JESSUP:Or a trick.Hold your fire, but be alert.
A gloved hand reaches for the front door of the store.
SFX: KNOCK KNOCK
The Khans glance towards the door. It creaks open. The negotiator arrives.
CASS:Hey, handsome.
JESSUP:Uh…who’re you?
CASS:Apasserby.Heard there was a good place to get a drink around here.
GRANT and JESSUP stare at CASS, confused.
KARI:Is this some kind of joke!?
JESSUP:Not sure if you saw all the troops outside, lady, but you just walked into a goddamn hostage situation. You’d better have something real important to say..
Around the corner in the storeroom of the ruined store near the back door, two NCR HOSTAGES squirm in their buildings. Outside, SOMEONE is kneeling in front of a door, working on picking the lock.
JESSUP:…or you’re not getting outof it.
CASS (shrugging): Right…the hostages. I’m not here for those.
JESSUP:…what?
HOSTAGE:…what?
CASS:I’m here for you.About a mutual friend.
JESSUP:Mutual…?
JESSUP, initially confused, sours with sudden realization.
JESSUP:Oh. Yeah, I might know him.
CASS (bristling): Uh…alright. Anyway, you’ve been by Goodspringslately, right?
JESSUP:A while back.
CASS:Business or pleasure?
JESSUP:Nothing pleasurable aboutworking for that rat. Complains about the heat, takes foreverjust to shoot somebody, ditches us without even fucking paying. I’ve got kids, lady, I neededthose caps. And not like The Chairmen should be hard up for cash,right?
GRANT and KARI listen to JESSUP recount how he got suckered, a suckering which got them all into their present situation.
JESSUP:So…yeah. How’d Benny fuck youover?
CASS:Wait, hang on. Benny?Who’sBenny?
GRANT and KARI’s eyes widen in alarm. What does she mean “Who’s Benny?”
JESSUP:…what?
CASS:Whatever. That’s enough,anyway.
Around the corner in the back room, the NCR HOSTAGES are gone. SOMEONE is inside, walking towards the front.
CASS:When we heard about the stand-off, we had to make sure you were the right Khans, is all. Heridea.
JESSUP:Her? We? What do you mean? Aren’t you a negotiator!?Youbitch,I’ll—
SFX: CLIK
The sound comes from behind JESSUP, from the entrance to the storeroom. He looks behind him and sees SOMEONE.
It’s AGNES SANDS.
She’s holding a 10mm sub-machine gun.
She’s found the man who dug her grave in GOODSPRINGS.
She opens fire.
SFX: DAKKA DAKKA
…
EXT. BOULDER CITY - OUTSKIRTS
CASS leans against a disused train car while AGNES sits and smokes on the ledge of it. They’re approached by LT. MONROE, who addresses CASS.
MONROE:Thanks for your help. If it hadn’t been for you two, our men would still be in there.
CASS: Hey, no thanks necessary.
MONROE:Did you find what you were looking for in there? You mentioned you neededsomething–
CASS:Yeah. We got it.
CASS looks aside towards AGNES, who’s staring into the horizon, eyes frozen wide, one hand cupped tightly over her mouth and clutching to her cigarette.
She’s a wreck, shaking with tears.
CASS:As much of it as we’ll everget.
MONROE turns and walks back into BOULDER CITY. It’s just CASS and AGNES.
You can say that you’re leading me on but it’s just what I want you to do. Don’t you notice how hopelessly I’m lost? That’s why I’m following you. — “Misty,” Johnny Mathis (1959)
It Keeps Right On a-Hurtin’ #13 - 188 Trading Post
Collaborative Issue! Guest Inks and Colorist: @worthlesssix
This is one of my favorite issues I’ve scripted because it’s just Agnes and Cass kind of hanging out, a type of issue I don’t really have a lot of room for in a series that moves forward as deliberately and intentionally as IKROAH does. A year into this pandemic I’m also really, REALLY missing diners, so it was natural for me to interpret the 188 Trading Post as such.
Also, the next issue, #14, is the final issue of Volume One. It feels like I’ve been working towards it forever, but also that it’s sneaked up on me so fast. Anyway, it’ll be out two weeks from today on March 27th. Readers, I’ll see you in Boulder City then.
Also also, it seems like @worthlesssix is just destined to do the inks and colors on all of the scripts that I love the most, because she really painted this one in a lush, warm, lovely style that just took my breath away. The desert sun, all the intimate little details of the 188, the mauvish and cracking overpass…just an absolute privilege to work with such a wonderful artist and friend a second time on this project.
Also also also, the traveler in the gas mask chatting up Veronica is Charlie, who belongs to @jepsxyhn / @comrade-shrimp. It was so much fun to draw them in! There’s tragically not a lot of good crowd scenes in IKROAH for cameos like this, or else I’d do them more.
Also also also ALSO…that butterfly on the Forecaster’s finger is a desert black swallowtail, a native to the Mojave! Just a fun detail, in case you were curious.
Original Pencils (click for full size):
Six’s inks and colors on this issue are so incredible and stylish that I almost forget that the she drew it over the skeleton of my own pencils. But yes! Every line, every detail, every tough perspective shot was real lead on real paper first, and to be honest, folks, I’m really proud of these ones, especially the deep shot of the Forecaster and Gun Runners on the third page. Note the extremely intense Frankensteining that went into the first and second page. The reason there’s two floating mugs in the pencils for the first page was because I originally intended for there to be three panels, not two, with one of the panels being Cass taking a sip, and the other panel being her saying it was too bitter. And then…I just fucked up the pencils, haha. But the layout was definiely better for it, it would have been too cramped otherwise. I also decided against “switching” the top two panels like I originally must have intended.
Transcript:
EXT. 188 TRADING POST.
AGNES SANDS and CASS are seated at the small, sheltered bar of the 188, having a late breakfast and coffee. A few other travelers stand around or sit, with MICHELLE KERR manning the counter. The RADIO behind the bar is playing, and CASS takes a thoughtful sip of her coffee as MR. NEW VEGAS introduces a song:
RADIO:You know, sometimes the journeybeats the destination. Especially when your spursgo “jingle, jangle, jingle,” and you meet some nice galsalong the way. We’ll be back with some news, after this.
CASS:That’s not bad. Smoky. A bit too bitter.
AGNES:A bit too bitter?
CASS: I guess I’m not one for strong flavors.
AGNES:Not one for…? Cass, when I first met you, you were deep in six bottles of whiskey.
CASS:And I was deep in another six last night trying to forget what Searchlight smelled like. Sorry to disappoint, but maybe I’ve just burned my taste buds offby now.
(NOTE: *IKROAH #11—Lou.)
CASS bites into her sandwich with a CRONCH,then looks askance at AGNES.
CASS:I didn’t do anything embarrassinglast night, did I? I don’t remember much.
AGNES:Not that I know of. When I went up to our room, you were still talking to that sniper. I was asleep already before you came back.
CASS:Uh-huh.
Beat. AGNES takes a bite of her omelette, CASS has some more coffee.
AGNES:Wait a minute. You were already out when I woke up, too. You did come back to our room, right?
CASS:OHHHH MY GOD,now I remember.
CASS’ head hits the bar with a miserable THUD.
AGNES:How bad?
CASS:You ever try to come onto a guy who’s grieving his dead wife?
AGNES (sipping coffee): No, I don’t come onto men in general.
CASS:Ha ha. Funny. Good for youthatyou don’t have this problem. Ugh.
MICHELLE swings by the two, a pot of coffee in her hand.
MICHELLE:More coffee, ladies?
CASS, head still down, gestures her mug affirmatively.
CASS:Please. My head’s still killing me.
RADIO:…aaaaand we’re back, folks. It’s midday in the Mojave, and boy, is it a hotone out there…or is it just me?
RADIO:Ourtopstory today…the stand-off at Boulder City between the NCR and a splinter group of Great Khans has entered its third straight day of tensions.
AGNES (flash of recognition): Huh.
RADIO:The Khans refuseto yield their hostages, but they can’t stay holed up much longer, according to an NCR spokesperson. Folks…let’s just hope they don’t blow it up again, am I right?
AGNES:Cass, do you hear this? Those might be the Khans who shotme.
CASS:I thought you said some guy in a checkered suit shot you.
AGNES:He hired two Khans as help.
CASS: Alright, so the accomplicesto your attemptedmurdermightbe in Boulder City, and you want to…do what,exactly?
AGNES:I…I, uh…
CASS: Just saying, if you rush in guns blazing, all you’re gonna do is get yourself killed. For real this time.
CASS:I’m not saying don’t go…if all this had happened to me, I’d make all these fuckers choke on the end of my shotgun. But we’re really going to need a plan, is all.
AGNES:We? So you don’t mind squaring up against Khans?
CASS:I’m a red-blooded Californian, ain’t I? Fuck the Khans. Speaking of, it’s not like the NCR and them are having a tea social together. How do you suggest we interrupt a standoff?
AGNES stands up, throwing some caps onto the counter with a jingling of light, metallic KLINKA-KLINKsounds.
AGNES:We’ll just…think of something when we get there. We should probably go now, too, if we want to get to Boulder City before nightfall.
AGNES starts to leave as CASS gets halfway out of her own stool, hurriedly finishing her coffee.
AGNES:Come on.
RADIO:…you know, they say nonews is goodnews, but I think my program would be awfully dullif that were the case.
RADIO:You’re gonna lovethis next song. I guarantee it.
NEW!The comic is now posted directly to @ikroah! No more redundant links, only archive links, and production notes and original pencils are together with the transcript below.
Notes / Original Pencils / Transcript:
Notes:
Funny seeing you here. In case you didn’t notice, comics are now posted first and fully to@ikroah instead of getting reblogged from @fallout-lou-begas. Originally I liked separating the notes and pencils from the transcripts because I felt like it would be too long all together, but ultimately I hated having two different sets of links for the comic under each issue that went to two different blogs. It was confusing and pointless!
Also, don’t miss that new link in the comic links: I’ve uploaded IKROAH to AO3 for easier and more convenient reading and tracking! You’ll still get the same original posts here on Tumblr, but if it’s easier for you to keep track of a fic that way, the option is there. This also means you can now leave comments or kudos on individual issues easier than ever before, so say something nice, why don’t you.
As for the issue itself…whew, haven’t had an issue this long and dialogue-dense since Primm. My poor hand still needs to recover. There’s a lot of really great strengths to the vignette approach to making IKROAH, especially as a fancomic, in that it lets me gloss over a lot of the stuff that people would already be familiar with (especially exposition) and get right to the character moments and interactions that forward the story of Agnes, not necessarily the story of Fallout: New Vegas. An expat of New Reno herself, it felt almost necessary to give her a chance to catch up with Bruce Isaac in Novac and reminisce about their time with the Bishops, and especially their “mutual friend” Yancy. Yancy’s an original character, by the way, don’t go looking for him on the Fallout Wiki.
Original Pencils (click for full size):
Not a lot of post-production magic on this one, actually! Almost every line you see on the final product was a line drawn on paper, with the only real exceptions being instances where I wanted to duplicate panels exactly (like on the first and fifth pages) or knew it’d be easier to color background characters separately and place them in the shot afterwards (like on the last page, where Boone, Cass, and Daisy are floating in the sky).
That exception on the first page actually resulted in my favorite funny thing to ever happen while drawing. I wanted to copy Agnes’ face exactly between panels so that it would succeed as a match cut, but I didn’t want to freehand the eyepatch she’d wear in the present day in post-production, so I drew a “spare” eyepatch to place over the face after I copied it. However, all that did was end up giving Agnes a very big “:D” face, and honestly if I was just a little bit more fun and cartoony of an artist than I already am, I would have been tempted to keep it in.
Transcript:
EXT. NOVAC.
AGNES SANDS walks along the balcony outside the second floor of the DINO DEE-LITE MOTEL.
AGNES (thinking): Hmmmmm…shit.
INT. MOTEL ROOM.
The doorknob jiggles as AGNES tries her key.
AGNES (thinking): Did Cass say that ours was the first or the thirdroom?
SOMEONE is already inside the room. They hold up a revolver, readying themself as AGNES opens the door and walks inside.
SFX: KLIK
AGNES (thinking): I’m pretty sure she said third.
SOMEONE: ST-STOP!
Years earlier in another place, AGNES grimaces. Her hair is longer, she’s dressed in a dress shirt and slacks, and both of her eyes are open wide in alarm. She’s been recognized by BRUCE ISAAC.
BRUCE: I know you! You work for Mr. Bishop! He sent you after me, to—
AGNES (hands up): Hey!Hey! Don’t shoot! I workedfor the Bishops. Worked,that’spasttense. Not anymore. Not for years.
BRUCE sheepishly lowers the gun.
BRUCE:…Oh.Sorry, there. Didn’t mean to give you a fright…admittedly, I was wondering why he sent his safecracker instead of a skullcracker, if you know what I mean.
AGNES:Yeah…but how‘d you know that? Officially, I was just their doctor.
Years ago, again. AGNES and BRUCE sit across from each other in a booth in a hazy club. A young man with scars over his eye and smoking a cigar has his arm around BRUCE.
BRUCE:Oh! I was a singer at the Shark Club.Yancyreally liked me, like a friend. He’d talk about, uh, business. I’m not sure if I was ever supposedto know any of it, but hebought the drinks, so I’d just let him talk. Did you ever see me perform by the way?
AGNES:I might’ve. I’m sorry, I don’t remember. I try not to think about New Reno much anymore.
BRUCE lights AGNES’ cigarette.
BRUCE:Don’t worry, friend. I think I’d like to put it behind me, too. I’m Bruce Isaac, by the way, currently out of work. You must be, too, if you’re also all the way out here.
AGNES:Agnes. And, well…no, not necessarily. I guess I’ve been taking some time off. Didn’t really think it through.
BRUCE:HA! “Time off.” Sure is one way to put our situations.
AGNES:Can I ask you something, Bruce? About the Bishops?
BRUCE winces, a bit bashful.
BRUCE:Oh, uh, sure. Go ahead……so long as it’s not about who Mr. Bishop’s little girl has been sleeping with.
AGNES:Rachael?Ohno,youdidn’t.
BRUCE:Well…I didn’t say I did, didI?
AGNES:Fuck, Bruce. Forget the Mojave. You’d be better off hiding on the moon.
BRUCE:Yeeaahhhh…he’s about that mad.
As AGNES and BRUCE recollect, images and emotions from the past resurface. For AGNES, it’s like she’s there again.
AGNES:Anyway…you know that…thingthat Yancy bought after he got glassed…
BRUCE:Yeah, I know. The robot.
AGNES:Yeah. The robot. Do they still have it?
BRUCE:Ahaha, in storage, maybe. Despite all the caps Yancy sank on it, all it ever did was scare gamblers away.
AGNES:…I always hatedit.
BRUCE:You weren’t alone. Imagine singing to it.
BRUCE (coy): Can I ask you something about the Bishops?
AGNES:Sure.
BRUCE:You were the one who saved Yancy the night he got glassed, right? And that’s why they hiredyou, “doc?”
AGNES:Tch,unfortunately. I’d say “conscripted” is more accurate.
BRUCE:Mhmm.And I know he likedme, but…he wasn’t a nice man, I always thought.
AGNES:Yeah. You’re telling me. The attack scarred his face. Not as bad as mine, you know…but he was just so vain,right?Vain.
AGNES’ expression grows more serious, more worried.
AGNES:I think he only keptme because I’d saved his life but not his face, and he was just so angry about it. He let me have it all the time. Insult after insult, screaming abuse. Not sure if he ever even knew my name, really, just…for…for…
AGNES (quietly): …foryears.
BRUCE:And how did Yancy Bishop die, Agnes? That was right when you left, if I recall.
Beat. AGNES looks away before looking back at BRUCE to respond.
AGNES:He died in surgery,Bruce.
EXT. NOVAC. The sun sets over the town.
BRUCE:…weren’tyouhissurgeon?
AGNES:He was shot by the Wrights,thenrushed to me, bleeding out. I did all I could for him, Bruce. I did everythingIcould for him.
One last memory: The Shark Club, 2274. YANCY, AGNES, and BRUCE backstage. AGNES and BRUCE are laughing.
I threw the holy grenade in Legate Lanius and he became a kind off super saiyajin and started flying before falling catching fire and die by fall damage
I’ve spent 50 levels, 80+ hours, and well over a hundred screenshots with Robin, but if there’s one thing New Vegas has taught me, it’s when to let go. Plus I’ve done every side mission I’ve come across and discovered every location in the game, so there’s not a whole lot more to do.
