in snakeladders the kaleans (or at least the ones we meet in the story) have a written language comprised of glyph symbols which represent syllables (I think this is called logosyllabic?)

so kaleans who are living with humans and using human technology like to use text emojis

specifically, they use certain emojis to represent certain glyphs from their original writing system and their text messages are just walls of seemingly unrelated emojis that only they can glean any goddamn meaning from

khaa doesnt usually wear human clothes but when he does he looks like a damn acronym ad

khaa is a cool dad

dang tumblr it’s been a minute

i havent just done like... random weird art for myself in a while, so enjoy some of roadrunner with @goldengoatblog‘s Grey. they’re... they’re friends

set up a temporary workstation at my parents’ house, using a laptop i got from @rewhined. testing it all out by messing with a character design for snakeladders

trying to remember how to draw by doodlin’ southpaw bc i just love drawing this joker

i previously stated that he perms his hair but that is a lie because of two reasons:

1. it’s way more fitting for this character to go get a silk press or do it himself

---

This is how it always starts:

Raze had just about managed to cool down, sitting as he was in a somewhat trance like state with his face pressed into the cool towel. He wasn’t expecting to be approached, though -- staring, he’d learned to live with. Keeping his camouflage or any visual deterrent active in such big crowds was beyond his abilities, but usually he was able to dissuade people from taking pictures or approaching him. Usually being the operative word here. There was way too much going on in his head at the moment for him to be fucking around with anyone else’s.

So he sensed and smelled and tasted, in heavy crackling heat in the air, the human approaching him before he really registered what he was saying. Raze lowered the towel slowly, his eyes readjusting to the light before raising to meet those of this sudden source of interruption.

“What?” He asked, frowning, more frustration in his voice than he’d really intended. The guy wasn’t doing anything wrong, but just his presence was an intrusion, a new source of heat weighing tense and heavy that set him on edge again, had his scales just beginning to go dark. “I’m sorry, you want spar with me?”

~~~

And inevitably escalates...:

The first fake was easy -- Raze had Kain pegged right away as an opponent who would try to misdirect and distract. He had the reach advantage but the human was fast, and the split-second of smugness of having initially out-maneuvered him distracted Raze enough that the second punch connected no problem. He let out a quiet, frustrated huff but he was focused now, deflecting most of the human’s attacks with his forearms or dodging away with his upper body.

With the way he was built, raising a leg to kick would be slow and leave him open to be unbalanced, but planted he was quick and light, more than one might guess given his intimidating size. When he did go on the offensive it was with center-mass precision strikes, landing as little more than firm taps if they weren’t intercepted, that would have been devastating with the full strength of his arm behind them.

For the first few rounds, at least, he would call it once they’d both landed a few solid attacks, backing off a few seconds to refocus before going in again, an easy rhythm that, in theory, would keep them both calm and cool-headed, focused on technique and not each other.

In theory.

The veneer began chipping the first time Kain successfully unbalanced him, the vicious snarl that left him when he hit the mat definitely a far cry from calm, sportsmanlike, or human.

~~~

These people live in space and don’t know what animals are:

“I’m in biosynthetics,” Priya explained, taking Lucas’s hand with a smile. “HERMES is one of our projects, so Roadrunner is our dutiful little guinea pig.”

“Aw, you don’t gotta flatter me,” Roadrunner said with a laugh. “The hell is a guinea pig, anyway?”

“I don’t know, probably a kind of pig?”

“I dunno, I seen pigs. Mama call them ‘cochinos’ but I never seen anything called a ‘guinea pig.’”

“I mean, it has to be a kind of pig. But I’ve never seen pigs as lab animals so…?” She gave a slow shrug.

-

“It’s actually a rodent.” Lucas said, amused at their guessing. He pulled his hand back from Priya after shaking it. He had bugged his mom about getting one when he was younger, she had said no. He held up his hands about eight inches apart. “A little furry one, about this big. They’ve been domesticated for a couple thousand years, make decent pets.” He said with a smirk. -

“A rodent?” Priya said, frowning. “Why would you call a rodent a pig?”

“I dunno,” Roadrunner said with a shrug. “Maybe the same reason you’d call a frog a chicken?”

“What?”

“You know, a mountain chicken?” 

“A mountain chicken is a frog?” Priya said, giving an exasperated sigh as the elevator stopped at the ground floor. “I don’t think I believe you, you didn’t even know that a guinea pig is a rodent.”

~~~

Also Priya is super gay, especially for ladies who can lift her one-handed:

“Hm.” Priya gave a little smirk and nod at that, then leaned back a little into her chair, crossing her legs. She smoothed out the top of her skirt, but did nothing to correct how the movement had edged the hem of her skirt higher on her smooth, brown thighs. Alexandria Dryden was a person of interest, and indeed on Priya’s shortlist of priority assets for some of her upcoming operations. But seeing her here, now, all hard edges and imposing stature, had Priya wondering if she could take the most direct route to getting the woman into her corner. 

She wouldn’t deny that she had a type.

~~~

And Santiago is in trouble:

It had been a while for Santiago as well. Between administrative drama with his business, trying to get his new engines guy comfortably installed, and damage control for whatever his team had stepped in with Horizon and Bad Karma, it was hard to justify taking the time for himself. Especially when it meant the long drive downtown. And being single now, it was easy to neglect himself, to forget how important it was to do things just to enjoy when he wasn't doing them for someone else.

He'd almost ignored the notification on his comm, the algorithm that determined he'd probably want to check out this new bar in the Academy district. He got a lot of those notifications, sometimes automated, sometimes from actual friends, but there just was never time. But the name of this place had caught his eye before he deleted it. Maduro. He'd laughed, thinking that it'd been a while since Ganymede had a decent cigar lounge, and as he'd tried to remember how long ago it'd been he realized he hadn't been out in months.

He'd forgotten how nice it felt to get dressed up, just a little, a white button down and thin black tie under his soft vintage leather jacket. Dark, pressed jeans and dress shoes replacing boots and oil-stained denim. Enjoying the drive into the city, rather than rushing it.

And of course the lounge was all him, warm and quiet, softly lit, leather furniture, and a tall cute thing with incredible legs waving at him as soon as he walked in and holy shit that was Kain.

He still waved back, approaching him with a smile, though he quickly looked around for his alien paramour and seemed to relax a little when Raze was nowhere to be seen.

“Yeah, it's definitely my kind of place,” he said with a nod, joining Kain at the bar. “Like you could actually summon my ass just by turning the lights on in a joint like this and waiting.” He looked up at Kain, then laughed, honestly a little glad to see him here.

“You look great, man, it's good to see you out! How have you been? Is it… is it weird to buy you a drink?”

as y’all may or may not know i’ve been in the process of reworking Snakes & Ladders to pubilsh thru Mary’s Monster, which is a creator-owned web publisher affiliated with/partially supported by Hiveworks comics

do y’all know this? i have no idea if i ever posted it or now

we’re working on the web design right now and the shit looks dope as fuck, I’m really excited about it.

it’s been slow going because, well, other things have had to take priority (read: i am constantly battling chronic fatigue and major depression and it is very difficult to me to find a work/life balance where i can actually be productive)

i have, however, been doing a lot of content and character design & development in the meanwhile, and one of the main ways I develop on concepts it by RPing them with my good friend @goldengoatblog

over the past year or so we have written an OBSCENE amount of fiction in the Snakes & Ladders universe. Of course, it’s mostly silly and shippy, and a lot of it is (very) NSFW. but it seems silly to have ALL OF THIS CONTENT for only the two of us to enjoy.

so the question!

would there be any interest if we decided to share some of this stuff? we are developing other original content to be part of maybe a patreon-supported series of short stories, and there’ll be more on that later but uh

ok i cant stop drawin santiago cuz i been rping him with @goldengoatblog ‘s OC Kain

these two are ah

hoo

hoo boy

they sure get into it