🎼 unfinished character sketch ♪*. full story below ↓
I liked how this turned out, so I decided to post the black and white version )) this is Biruta (her name is an homage to a character in "Syzyfowe Prace"), she's a working class student from Cerewa, more on her in the next paragraph. I'm still not sure how I want to incorporate her story in the main Jane Doe storyline, with Adri, Alicja & the crew. In my head (and in docs) they are two separate stories. For now, her storyline is called Morderca Psów/Dog Murderer/Killer of Dogs; as I said before - it also takes place in Cerewa, but not in Nirsk; she comes from a place that's way worse, way more run down and hopeless.
Ruta is very outspoken, she never shies away from confrontation (conflict seems to be more like a driving force in her case) & has the street smarts, she knows everyone in her area but also knows who to avoid. Her comrade/brother used to take care of the locals when Cerewa went into lockdown, but after getting into an altercation with foreign military (who were there to keep people in place basically, not letting them out of the city even when food was running low, the only people who were allowed to leave were "volunteer soldiers") he suffered brain damage that left him very unstable. He could no longer take care of their neighbors or children because of his erratic behavior, it got so bad Biruta lost contact with him. So- she took over his role, albeit clumsily.
She's a student, although it's a university only in name - classes take place in an old library and are led by volunteer professors. Some of them local (who Biruta likes), some led by volunteers from rich-er countries/regions (who Biruta doesn't like) that want to do a good deed! Help the poor people in a poor country! While staying at the only resort in the area, that's there precisely for the type of people who stay there: faux philanthropists born with a golden (ruby and diamond-studded) spoon in their mouth and equally rich artists who want to visit a rundown place like Ruta's hometown to get inspired, to have a new, exotic experience. Pretty much just tourists and sometimes international cargo workers.
Her hometown falls into ruin, simultaneously becoming an international bedroom, for the privileged, of course. The education isn't great, her peers don't need to work or study as the foreign military gives out food rations (which are not big, people are starving) and another emerging problem is the lack of medicine. Ruta herself suffers from an illness that requires taking pills, but after the lockdown for some reason there weren't any available and if they were, the price skyrocketed; people are stealing and selling drugs in order to buy food or find whatever addiction or dreams they have going for them. She knows she's going to die, every day is worse, her only chance at survival would be to steal the medicine or leave the region to a richer part of Cerewa, which, of course is impossible.
Her days turn into an endless cycle of checking on her comrades and neighbors, flaking on classes, looking for meds or substitutes and feeling her body deteriorate more and more every day. Her drug-seeking escapades make her run into other disabled or sick people, whom she bonds with. They naturally form a group that tries their best to re-obtain as much medicine as possible and redistribute it back to the community.
There's more I have in store for this character, but that's the gist of it )) her best friend is a man around her age who suffered spine damage (you can see his cane on the left from her) I'll draw them together soon!
also, of course she's a commie, duh.
