the bug zone

This is a place for my art and creatures. I post a lot of pet bugs and Pacific Northwest nearshore wildlife, so be careful if you don't like creepy crawlies! I also occasionally post artistic nudity.

I'm currently mostly working on art for Sea of Spires, a sci-fantasy setting with speculative biology elements.

I also have the planet Attis, an older hard scifi leaning project that I'm in the process of dusting off.

Reference sheet for Mona and Lucien. They are an egg twin sibling pair that used to be cliquemates with Sunbeam and Viola.

Clique relationships among kee aren't sexual, and aren't really romantic in a human way. They are more of a strongly bonded group that cooperate to raise eggs and share resources. Usually cliques are made up of egg twin pairs, selecting for clique forming behavior by cooperating in raising their siblings offspring.

Two more kee characters. They've existed in my worldbuilding for a while but I have been more recently exploring them in more detail.

These are Lucien (left) and Mona (right). Their names in Z'shi//--'ee are  Ah'oo'har//--'weit'-- (roughly translates as "star") and Ah'oo'har//hu'tt'sd (roughly translates as "Moon") respectively.

They are ex-cliquemates of Sunbeam and Viola and don't have much correspondence with them anymore. Lucien is adamant about maintaining distance while Mona feels deeply uncomfortable about the whole thing

Let's do this thing!

Apparently it's make a terrible comic day.

Here is an image of my character Yarlu styling her integument in a gender affirming fashion. She occupies a transfeminine/transmodor gender space within her culture, with short "feathers" being considered somewhere between feminine and gender neutral.

She is a Lower vitvit who has joined a nearby monastic order for a variety of reasons. Members of her monastic order tend to wear gender neutral clothing and "hair" styles which is what initially attracted Yarlu to the order.

The mirror she is viewing herself in has a stylized vitvit eye at each corner, which serve a religious/ apotropaic purpose. The bottle on the shelf in front of her is stylized with "kee plant" imagery and contains oil used to stylize and maintain the scale-like integument common to both vitvit and kee.

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Hell is the sun

Sunbeam has a panic attack.

Sunbeam has some mental health issues which are very much exacerbated by grief + a bad "breakup". Kee psychology isn't 100% like that of a human, but there is some overlap in certain areas. Social loss however impacts kee much more deeply, often being felt as a fundamental change to self and identity.

Give me a shot to remember

An image of Viola during the last military action it took along with its cliquemates. This is one of the earliest military events during which kee got exposed to firearms. The technology for such was adapted from Terran sophonts (like alver) which adapted to the technology more quickly than their kee and vitvit counterparts.

Kee and vitvit from the area were not aware of the technology, especially birdshot and buckshot which was used to take down vulnerable kee squadrons.

You can also see here one of the ways kee express emotions. Their eye discs have chromatophores that can change between white and red. There is always a small white ring around the lens, which expands to cover more of the eye disc with fear or discomfort.

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A reference sheet for great alver I made last year and forgot to upload. This is still pretty accurate!

Alver are diprotodont marsupial sophonts native to the Terran biotope. They have moderate sexual dimorphism, with males being slightly larger and in possession of mobile display fangs. Female coat patterns tend to be less patchy and with fewer colors, tending towards solid coats, but there is a lot of variety in color and pattern so this doesn't always hold true.

Hey look! It's Bainan!

An up to date reference for my marsupial guy. He's a great alv, a species of sophont marsupial in Sea of Spires. He is transmasculine, though this identity isn't viewed in his society exactly the same way as it is in contemporary western culture.

Don't worry, you and me won't be alone no more.

A more photorealistic illustration of Viola (the larger kee) and Sunbeam (the smaller kee) comforting one another.

This illustration gives a better indication of what kee integument is like. They are covered in feathery, insect-like scales, which tend to stop growing on areas with scarring. They also have a naked patch surrounding their mouth and eyes. Their eyes are highly mobile and chameleon-like, but are not capable of independent movement. Like terran animals kee use hemoglobin in their blood, giving their exposed flesh a pinkish hue.

Both Sunbeam and Viola have some amount of facial scarring but Viola's is more extensive. Viola's left tympanum (the crescent shaped structure behind it's eye, used for hearing) has damage which makes it hard of hearing on that side and predisposes it to infections.

Minor question: Is Sunbeam a hybrid of different groups of kee?

Thank you!

Sunbeam and the rest of their clique are alive during a time of ecological upheaval. Crops are failing, livestock aren’t doing well, and conflict is on the rise.

This is somewhat less of an immediate problem for kee since they are small, can easily travel, and aren’t that reliant on animal food sources (they are technically omnivores but have a preference for frugivory). Vitvit, however, rely a lot on animal protein and are under more immediate threat. This has led to increased conflict between polities with large vitvit populations.

While kee aren’t typically that violent amongst themselves for a variety of reasons, they tend to be more open to fighting with other species. This lends itself to kee being hired on by vitvit to provide air support and reconnaissance during wartime.

Sunbeam’s clique were originally itinerant mercenaries but ended up taking on an extended contract with a hybrid kee-vitvit city. This location has historically relied primarily on cropland, fisheries, and trade for it’s food resources. Their trade and fishing industries had been less heavily impacted by ecological change, making the location a tempting target for nearby peoples more reliant on nomadic pastoralism and more greatly impacted. Eventually this culminates in an extended siege, with Sunbeam's people being on the losing side.

More Sunbeam!

Here they are wearing some traditional battle gear (left) and naked to show off their anatomy (right).

You can see that the claws on their right t-type wing are naturally longer than their left. The scales lining the edge of the wing are naturally longer on that side as well, but Sunbeam keeps them clipped to match their other wing so that flight isn’t impacted. On the propatagium of their right wing Sunbeam has a tattoo representing their four cliquemates, which is common and expected in their culture for kee that have officially joined a clique.

The outfit Sunbeam is wearing is pretty standard armor worn by kee light infantry and mercenary forces. Because of their extensive patagium kee usually wear clothes that cover only the head and chest, along with a small cap that covers the genitalia Their armor tends to be very lightweight and made of many layers of cloth, and those with more resources wear armor that incorporates lightweight advanced ceramics. When needing more extensive armor, kee use temporary adhesives to affix cloth or ceramic plates over their back and chest.

Sunbeam is wearing the cloth version including small metal studs on their jacket for extra protection. They are also wearing metal claw covers and a beak cap intended for close quarters fighting. Their wing claws are decoratively enameled, but the colorful coating also strengthens them without adding too much weight. Other decorative elements of their outfit include the dyed plant stalk on the headdress and the logo on their left shoulder. The logo is their clique’s battle emblem.