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(Jon sez:)

Your Writer: Jon Kilgannon This page demonstrates why it's important to have a writer and an artist who pay attention to one another. The script as written suggested that Sally the Martian detector would stand up and walk away. Mark's comment was "I couldn't come up with anything that would allow her to walk without looking like some sort of refugee from a Sesame Street cartoon (like, a giant walking letter C.)" Thus, he has Sally flying.

His way looks much better than mine.

On to science. As I write this, an asteroid up to half a mile across is passing by the Earth just outside the Moon's orbit. It's not going to hit us, but if it did it would cause civilization-changing mayhem. This is one of the reasons why we have things like the Minor Planet Center and the Near-Earth Object Program.

The Minor Planet Center plays a small, obviously fictional role in MoS.

(Mark sez:)

Your Artist: Mark Sachs 1. Yes, MAD PROPS to the Minor Planet Center. You guys rock. Keep on saving the world.

2. I find it amusing to speculate on what's going through the mind of that soldier. "Do I fire? It didn't do anything hostile. It just got up and walked away. ...I'm not allowed to just get up and walk away."

3. Do you recognize this artist? For a certain cohort of science fiction fans this style is hardwired into the back of our brains.

4. Also, very cool new fan art! It's by someone in the Netherlands! That's like a whole other country! (Unless you live in the Netherlands, I suppose.) (Wait, I already used that joke.)