After both their civilizations were decimated by an interstellar war, human Sam Walsh and alien Hazel Birch are, as near as they can tell, the last of their respective kind. Still pursuit by the enemy, they strike out into the galaxy trying to get as far away from the war as they can.
A sci-fi space opera romance.
Went on hiatus from March 2017 to December 2018 before relaunching. Old strips available here
, relaunch (which picks up an indeterminate amount of time after the last series) starts [here. Occasionally NSFW Blog is currently defunct, but archived here.
This webcomic provides examples of:
- Action Girl: Hazel proves to be one after a bit of a false start. Benefits of natural weapons and fast twitch muscles.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Their first ship AI's at least seem to be on the lower end if the intelligence scale given how easy it was to hack, and how easy it was to work around the hack. The Ominous Gale's AI waffles between second guessing all of Sam's decisions to recommending Sam for an order of merit from an extinct civilization.
- All There in the Manual: Lots of information on the universe as well as the characters and their motivations could be found in the presently defunct blog.
- Arbitrarily Large Bank Account: Between the two of them, Sam and Hazel have the combined liquid assets of two civilizaitons spanning hundreds of world.
- Beard of Sorrow: The progress of the comic can be measured by Sam's beard.
- Bizarre Alien Biology: Korchian, hazels species, have nothing that would be that unfamiliar to most SF readers. In universe though, Hazel to Humans. She assumes Sam is having a seizure when he's shaking due to the cold, was surprised to learn that he could swim, was horrified when he received a black eye and seems somewhat confused about his hair.
- Cool Ship: The Ominous Gale. A small two seat fighter/scout capable of surviving a dogfight at 5:1 odds. Bonus points for being bullt from spare parts in the hold of a dead dreadnought.
- Four-Fingered Hands: Lampshaded in the blog
24th century geneticists realized the fundamental truth that the fifth finger was a fundamental defect, and efforts were made to correct the problem so that we could be more like our glorious cartoon super men.
- Gratuitous Latin: Nothing in-universe, but the title ("Res Nullius": Belonging to no one) the companion blog ("Dum Casta": For as long as she is chaste) and even the author's handle, ("Nuct Dimittis": now dismissed)
- Great Offscreen War: The story takes place in the aftermath of a war that more or less killed all humans and Korchians.
- Hartman Hips: Hazel, possibly all korchians
- One Head Taller: Sam to Hazel
- And I Must Scream: What happens when you freeze an endotherm.
- Intimate Healing: After a suit malfunction on a cold planet, Sam had to share body heat to keep Hazel alive. For Sam it was a simple rescue procedure. For Hazel it became much more.
- Interspecies Friendship: Between Sam and Hazel after a bit of a rocky start. Slowly turning into
- Interspecies Romance: Although both seem clueless to the other's interest.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Sam, he mellows out a lot when he's not stuck on a dying ship.
- Last of Their Kind: Discussed. While they can't rule out survivors and even the possibility of self-sufficent colonies somewhere in the galaxy, space is big enough that the possibility of meeting survivors of their species is nil.
- Minimalist Cast: Other characters show up but with the main duo on the run none stay long.
- Mr. Fanservice: Sam's received his fair share of shirtless scenes
- Mr. Imagination: Hazel has always daydreamed about being a Damsel in Distress and getting rescued by her hansom prince. And then Sam starts fitting in the roll . . .
- Non-Mammal Mammaries: Hazel.
Word of God more or less says "I like breasts and she's an alien, so no reason not to". - Octopoid Aliens: The 1st mate of the passenger ship is one.
- Officer and a Gentleman: Invoked
- Properly Paranoid: Sam. Having the civilization that genocides your people after you makes this a necessity.
- Secretly Wealthy: If Sam and Hazel show off too much of their wealth they may attract attention of the aliens hunting them.
- Starfish Aliens: Rubber forehead aliens are pleasantly averted. If Res Nullis was ever adapted to film, Jim Henson Studios would have their job cut out for them.
- The 'Verse: Pan Galactic Society or PGS for short. Covers countless civilizations and species over the entire milky way.
- Translation Convention: Everyone is speaking galactic basic. This is the reason why Hazel Birch has a human name in spite of being a repillian alien.
- True Name: Hinted at with Hazel and other Korchians.
- The Unseen: Whoever or whatever fought the genocidal war that wiped out two races. We haven't seen them or even heard their name.
- Wretched Hive: One near a spaceport which features eating other sentient species as an available activity in addition to the standard drugs and prostitution.
