Author notes

309 - Risky Business

El Cid

on April 6, 2020

I meant to get this page posted by the end of last week… and obviously, I failed. But I'll definitely get three pages posted this week. And I'm definitely not going to fail again this time, like I have the other times, because reasons.

AUTHOR'S NOTES

In the third panel, Rana is referencing a confrontation which happened at the end of Chaper 2. Jetta turned Rana down when she asked her to undertake a daunting mission for her, and Rana is not one to take “no” for an answer. So kidnapping Manu was her backup plan, apparently.



The speed of light is the fastest speed allowed by the universe, at least according to current physics. But how fast is that, exactly? Not as fast as you might think. Everyone knows that, for interstellar travel, light speed is dauntingly slow. It takes years to get anywhere interesting at that speed. But even within our relatively insignificant solar system, you might be surprised with how long it takes light to travel. Even the seemingly short distance between the Earth and moon is not an instantaneous connection at light speed; it takes light 1.3 seconds to cross that distance, leading to a noticeable signal lag in communications. And if you're going to Mars, it takes light 3.03 seconds to reach Mars at its closest point in its orbit, and up to 22 minutes if it's at its furthest. So it will probably never be practical to have a real time conversation between an Earther and a Martian. Here's a cool (but long) video illustrating in real time how fast (or slow, depending on how you look at it) light travels from the sun to each of the solar system's planets. It stops after Jupiter, because otherwise it would be four hours long if they went all the way out to Neptune.



And because I know you're not crazy enough to have sat through that entire video, here's a chart of all the planets and how long it takes light from the sun to reach them: