As they travel back to Zoz, Zik wraps up the story of how he met his ex-girlfriend Haven. Amelia is curious though: why is Zik no longer dating Haven if they got along so well? Zik explains that it’s because he and Haven live in different worlds; she spends her time under the waves researching, he feels more at home travelling the stars. Their day-to-day experiences couldn’t be more different!

Amelia tells Zik not to worry. He’ll find someone who shares his love of flying! Hm, I wonder if that reminds us of anyone?

So ends the third and final part of Forging The Defender! It was fun spending a bit of time on Zoz, and exploring the Zozian civilization a bit. I hope you enjoyed the trip down memory lane! We’ve got a bit of an epilogue coming up next, and then the gripping action of- well, no spoilers!

Back in space, Amelia notices something wrong with what Zik has just told her. Haven’s comment belies the fact that she hadn’t heard of the “famous” Zik! But Zik explains that Haven gets so absorbed with her work underwater that she barely notices that the rest of the universe exists. She was only barely aware that Zik had saved her life once before during the incident with the asteroid!

Zik continues his story. The underwater lab is starting to buckle under the weight of all the rocks that have fallen on it. Haven wants to leave using the submersible she usually uses to get to the lab, but Zik informs her that the bay doors are blocked by debris! There isn’t time to clear it all away before the lab collapses!

A frustrated Haven begins stripping off her clothes in preparation to swim to the surface. She gathers some necessities: a waterproof bag filled with her all-important research data, some emergency balloons designed to allow someone to be lifted rapidly to the surface, and a device that emits EM waves designed to repel sharks. Zik is a little surprised to hear about the sharks!

Outside the lab, Haven starts to play with the EM shark repeller, but she can’t remember how to activate it. Zik notices that it’s too late to get it going; a shark has arrived, and it’s noticed them! Uh oh!

Amelia is curious about the type of girl Zik likes to date, so Zik starts telling his next tale! The last lady he dated was Haven LeClaire, a marine biologist.  She had an underwater lab near Zik’s island home on Zoz, where she was researching dolphin and whale communications. On the day they met, Haven had just made a breakthrough: she had learned how to communicate with dolphins! She was also close to discovering how to communicate with humpback whales, and there was a lot of activity around her lab. The ocean was crowded!

Welcome to the third and final part of Forging The Defender, the second Defender Zik episode! We’ve been learning about how humble asteroid miner Zik came to be known as Defender Zik on his home planet of Zoz. In this part, we will learn how he got the last part of his nickname: Zik the Gallant Defender of Zoz!

It all starts with Amelia asking if Zik’s fame has extended to a lot of attention from the ladies of Zoz.  He admits that it has, although he’s single right now. Could Amelia have a motive beyond curiosity for wanting to know that?

Zik wraps up the story of the attack of the space commies! Amelia has decided to make herself comfortable, pulling her chair right up to Zik’s and using your favorite space hero as a couch. He doesn’t seem to mind too much.

Meanwhile, over on the Kodiak, James has brought Trent Quickdraw onto the bridge to show him some of the features of Trent’s new battle armor. The visor has a bunch of cameras on it, one of which will allow Trent to see through walls! There’s a limited range, and he can’t see too much detail, but he can see enough… Enough to see that Zik and Amelia are a little closer than he’s comfortable with! While Jason may be jealous of the cool view settings in Trent’s armor, Trent is preoccupied with what he sees on board Zik’s ship!

So ends part two of Forging The Defender! There’s one more part to go, where Zik describes where the “Gallant” part of his name comes from. Tune in next week for that!

Welcome to Beta Lalande 4, home of Baker Mine!

While a drone unloads Zik’s asteroid rubble into the processing plant, your favorite space hero hangs out in the security office with his pals Tanaka and Arata for a spirited game of dutch blitz, a card game popular among the Chadee.

But they’re interrupted by the station chief Frank, who sees something alarming on the news!

Welcome to Part 2 of Forging The Defender! For those of you just joining us, we’re on the way back from the Zernabian prison planet with some refugees of Queen Elcyra’s despotic reign. One of the refugees, Amelia, is flying with your favorite space hero Zik, and is getting him to tell stories from his past!

In this part, we will learn how Zik became known as a defender of justice on his home planet Zoz! What are Jairians? Stay tuned to find out!

Defender Zik wraps up his first story about how he became so well known on his home planet of Zoz! With all the preparations complete, he launches his escape pod and leaves the asteroid behind. It’s all in the hands of fate, now!

He lands the pod in the middle of Zoz’s largest ocean, the Mirabilic, close to where the asteroid will be passing by.  Sure enough, as he emerges from the escape hatch, the asteroid streaks by overhead, exploding with a giant sonic boom!

Amelia is pretty impressed with the tale. No wonder Zik became so famous! Few people have ever saved an entire planet before. Zik tells her that this wasn’t the first time he made headlines on Zoz. What will be the next tale?

As Zik and Amelia finish listening to Metallica, they get back into Zik’s story about the deadly spinning asteroid and it’s direct trajectory towards his home planet Zoz.

Zik’s strategy to spin his ship to match the rotation of the asteroid and land at the pole worked! He was able to land safely, anchor his mining ship, and fire up the powerful engines to begin pushing the asteroid on a new trajectory to hopefully nudge it away from Zoz.

In the meantime, though, his friend Ramesh is in serious trouble after that crash landing! Zik is unable to get into contact with Ramesh, meaning that he’s incapacitated somehow.  Quickly donning his breathing and grappling gear, Zik prepares to save Ramesh!

Just in case his mining ship gets dislodged from the asteroid, Zik anchors himself to the hull. He carefully makes his way across the surface of the asteroid.  It’s spinning so quickly that the stars appear to be whizzing through the heavens! Indeed, the closer he gets to the equator, the faster the rotation is, and eventually there isn’t even any gravel or stones left on the ground.

By the time Zik is near Ramesh’s ship, the force of the spin pulling him away from the asteroid is greater that it’s limited gravity, and up and down have reversed themselves! Zik is now fighting to stay attached to the asteroid, hoping that his grappling gear is strong enough to hold him!

Your favorite space hero Zik pauses in his narrative of the tale of the spinning asteroid because this part of the story reminds him of a song. He’s twisting, turning through space trying to land on an asteroid, and the lyrics to an Old Earth song by Metallica fit quite nicely! He sets the ship on autopilot and loads up the tune so that Amelia can hear it.

For those curious, here’s the song:

Meanwhile, on the Kodiak, James Anchor is on the bridge watching Amelia’s flying lessons with amusement. She certainly seems to be having fun out there! Gerald, currently at the helm, agrees.

Tactical officer Emma has been busy analyzing the recent battle with Queen Elcyra in the hopes of discovering all she can about Zernabian technology. She gives Captain Anchor an update, and he asks her to focus on the torpedoes for now. It’s very odd that guided torpedoes could miss the only target in the area, and James wants to know why.

But first, he needs coffee! Incidentally, coffee is a great beverage to enjoy awesome space adventure comics with! Grab a cup with me! Mmmmm, that’s good stuff.