#oratio

His mother is initiating a Sea siren greeting, reaching her hand to his opposite to hold on to it and do a twirl. She is tired and though she cares for him (evidenced by the greeting) she is also disappointed with his performance as leader. She sees clearly that he is not ready, but tradition put him in the role and she is not willing to disobey it.

His sister (bottom right) has bitten him. This incident actually happened when they were younger than is shown here, he made a mistake and disastrously botched a hunt, his sister was furious and Oratio was humiliated and pissed. They got into a real fight and their mother intervened. They both felt terrible about the fight afterwards but desperately needed the outlet. His sister has always looked up to their mother and knew that she would take her mother's place when her mother grew old, until Oratio was born. She's angry on behalf of her mother and was very immature about it.

While Oratio's sister had their mother's cognitive/survival maturity, Oratio's brother (top left) had their mother's social and emotional maturity. He tried to support and understand Oratio (though he'd often refuse the help, Oratio's immature in perfect contrast to their mother.) He knew they couldn't go on like this and though he was happy to break tradition he knew their mother and sister weren't, so when Oratio expressed a want to leave to pod with the responsibility of leader returning to their mother, his brother encouraged him.

Oratio's niece and his brother's daughter (top right) was naive about Oratio's responsibility and was the only person without expectations for him. Her mother (not pictured) was from a different pod and joined Oratio's after meeting his brother. Regular members of a pod can join and leave as they please, but leaders (and pups) are expected to remain in their pod.

After Oratio left he found a fishing village on the beach and started hanging out with his new best friend, Penelope. He still misses his family but has been too nervous to show his face again.

This was originally an acrylic painting. I redid it digitally but I'm not sure which version I prefer so here's the original.

original:

(he/him) Oratio spends his days on the beach and in the waters around a small fishing town. He enjoys hanging out with Penelope, chatting, relaxing, and smoking. He plays the Hurdy-gurdy

Notably he has erythrism, a pigment condition that causes an unusual redness of the fur.  Sea sirens like Oratio scar white. (similar to Risso's dolphins) This causes many folk stories about pigment conditions. In Oriatio's pod the most scarred individual (and therefore most experienced) are placed as the leader. Before Oratio was born his mother was the leader but after he was born his paleness caused him to be placed as the leader, despite being the youngest of his siblings. Nobody was very happy about this arrangement, least of all Oratio. Eventually the stress got to him and he left his pod. They loved him and he loved them, he just couldn't fulfill their needs as the leader. He came across the fishing town and stayed to eat the fisher's trimmings and hang out with his new best friend, Penelope. 

Sea sirens are born, live, and die underwater, so when on the surface he has a headaches and joint pain and can't see or hear well and the entire sensory system of his whiskers are dulled significantly. But he stays up there anyway because his friends and his movies and his hookah are up there, so he tolerates it. He's very calm, but since he has difficulty regulating the tone of his voice he can appear very stern or irritated. He uses a lot of 70s stoner/surfer slang in order to appear more friendly. It kind of works.

He likes eels.