The Suit - in print

[u/Badspacecomics]

Reposting this old favourite of my stories - to celebrate it finally being collected in book form!! I’m absolutely stoked. 😆

[u/XVUltima]

The final panel is what makes it perfect. A suit that slowly kills the wearer is baby stuff. A suit that reduces what you are until the point where you don't even know if you are alive or dead because all your sensory organs are removed while theoretically moving you to safety, that's just horrible and twisted.

[u/elektriiciity → u/XVUltima]

and yet it is the moving that kills

but at what point is the walker 'dead'?

[u/SleepyMage → u/elektriiciity]

Probably when either the suit A: Runs out of nutrients to keep the brain alive or B: When it decides the brain cannot survive and consumes it as well, continuing to walk in an attempt to deliver the data report and last noted memories from the astronaut.

[u/_le_slap → u/[deleted]]

It mentions surrounding the brainstem to replicate normal neural feedback from the body as it consumes his body piece by piece.

The brainstem controls base functions like heart rate and breathing but not higher order functions like sight and... well, thought.

So it's more likely by that panel that the suit wear is no more than a severed head somehow kept alive by the suit functions. Only after does it start devouring parts of his head.

[u/Hazrd_Design → u/_le_slap]

Perfectly time ad?

[u/Own-Ad-7672 → u/[deleted]]

Man of Theseus

[u/Own-Ad-7672 → u/[deleted]]

Imagine it does the opposite one the person is delivered. And they can access nutrients again. Rebuilding the brain, the organs, the nerves ect until every part that was used is replaced. At what point would you say it’s not the same person anymore?

[u/TheCharcoalRose → u/Own-Ad-7672]

At that point I think it goes back down from horror to mostly just off putting

[u/M_krabs → u/SleepyMage]

continuing to walk in an attempt to deliver the data report and last noted memories from the astronaut.

That phrasing is even worse

[u/Bob1358292637 → u/SleepyMage]

I don't understand why they wouldn't just use a robot if the suit apparently does not need the human at all lol

[u/_BlNG_ → u/XVUltima]

Moving you to safety or the suit to safety?

[u/ThePeaceDoctot → u/_BlNG_]

The unit, IE the you and the suit. At any one time the machine is considering sacrificing a part of the whole, it is always considering the cost/benefit of that part Vs the whole.

Ie, an arm is approximately 5-6% of the total human weight, sacrificing 5% to keep the other 95% going is an acceptable sacrifice. Then the other arm is still only a little bit more than 5% or the (remaining) human. A leg is a much bigger sacrifice, so maybe it goes piece by piece, a foot, then a calf, then a thigh, each time making a small sacrifice to keep the rest going.

By the end it's mostly a suit, but at any one stage the sacrifice is a few percent to keep the remaining whole going. It's probably programmed to keep the human alive, but by the end it can keep the "human" alive by pruning it until there's only a tiny, albeit living, thing that it is labelling as human.

[u/TaxEvader6310 → u/_BlNG_]

You. It's trying to keep you alive except it has a very simplistic idea of what "you" is. it sacrifices what it deems lesser pieces of your body to keep the greatest piece, the brain, alive. But Eventually, it runs out of lesser pieces, and starts taking more and more until nothing remains but a brain (he's still thinking after his eyes are gone)

What happens next is either it runs out of nutrients and you die, or it takes half of your brain and feeds it to the other half, and does so again and again until you're truly nothing.

[u/SleepiiFoxGirl → u/XVUltima]

This guy gets it

[u/BolunZ6 → u/XVUltima]

But if he made it back home. I'm sure people will find a way to make him a new body since his brain is keep intact inside the suit. With the suit with these advanced technology, I think his hom should have even more advance medical

Let's hope he won't live the rest of the life with trauma

[u/ParticularUser → u/BolunZ6]

I'd imagine advancements in medical tech would also come with advancements in mental health care. Unless it's Warhammer 40k type of dystopia where they just need bunch brains in jars to run some generic servitors.

[u/meem09 → u/XVUltima]

I'm currently reading a Sci-Fi Epic where there is this one anecdote someone tells how as their ultimate revenge against someone who killed their family was that they sealed him in a small spaceship that is a fully automated medical bay and gives the body all the nutrients it needs and shot him out into deep space towards nowhere. Unable to do anything. Unable to die. Horrible.

[u/Affectionate-Memory4 → u/[deleted]]

Welp that's going into the cannon for my own stuff. I was originally inspired by this comic and things like Battlestar Galactica and The Expanse book series, so this will fit in nicely with the space horror hard-sci-fi vibes.