-THE MIND'S EYE-

As the time we hopefully move out with a friend in the summer slowly approaches, we are. reminded that we do not have that much money to our name, so. We've set a new ko-fi goal of $500. This, combined with the money we've managed to hold on to should be a decently helpful amount when the move happens. More would be ideal, but we'll start at $500. We can't have that much more. Disability, SSI, etc. The goal is tracked on our ko-fi, you can find a link to it on our pinned post.

We will also be accepting ko-fi commissions for the first time. Any ko-fi donation that is equivalent to any of our commission tiers can be used as payment for a commission. You get ONE commission per payment, regardless of how much you spent or the tier of comm you request- any extra that is not spent on complexity charges, extra characters or backgrounds will be considered a tip. This is non-negotiable. You are encouraged to say that you are paying with intent for a commission when you donate, details can be discussed in private messages. You MUST request the commission either in private messages or the donation message on the same day of payment, or we will be very annoyed.

All that aside. We would appreciate the help. Or just spreading this around. Please help a trans woman escape texas with a small bundle of savings.

Didn't want our skills to completely rust into dust, so. Redesigned an old Mismagius sona. For practice. idk how to feel abt how it turned out, we like it more than the old one in some ways and less than others. meh.

If you like our art consider getting a commission

Finally got around to making a Limbus Company Sinner Sona like we've been meaning to for ages, plus some bonus self shipping because we're incorrigible and a poly lesbian. YES all six. anyway

If you like our art, consider getting a commission

It would not be a sona of ours if we didn't redesign it about 80 times Honestly, this funny fucked up cat game is probably the only thing keeping us sane lately.

If you like our art consider getting a commission

Madness Combat is a good series and we will have a bunch of OCs and sonas in it. For fun. Just a quick drawing of Vallie having to drag Faye back from the dead through 2BDamned's tried and true methods, plus the colorless reference we made of the two of them ages ago and forgot to post. Both characters use she/her, Faye uses it/its in addition.

We were debating with ourself on whether or not to post this, and we landed on yeah. Yeah, we're going to. As evidenced by it being posted asdflkjn

We wanted to just draw a piece for Pride, and we wanted to draw our synth sona again, so two birds with one stone. Maybe a bit more suggestive than what we normally post here, but... well, why not do it if not for pride. So yeah. Happy pride

Just in case this breaks containment btw- sona/OP primarily uses it/its and fae/faer.

If you like our art consider getting a commission

We found our Phelions in our files again, and seeing our Phelion sona... made us really want to draw it again. We missed it. We should draw Vy again too. We just always get intimidated by the amount of detail on both of them and psyche ourself out Honestly just wanted to draw her, like, very soon after the first shift and just getting a look at faerself. It also gave us an excuse to actually design a proper Array for her, something we've been procrastinating on for almost as long as we've had her. We imagine the individual pieces rotate around the center piece slowly

Anyway. Phelions are a closed species by @ausp-ice, their art and stuff is swag and u should peep them

If you like our art consider getting a commission Also reblogs are appreciated bc we spent hours on this

Wanted to add little details to our chassis.... want to feel fancy ;w;

We'll make a new outfit too.... at some point asdflkjn

Odd Jobs

heyyyyyyyy guys

it's been a while since we've posted any real writing, but we finished smth a few days ago. it's for Hunter, not Scintillam, sorry, but we had to write something and Hunter was what we could get ourself to type out, so Hunter is what you get "well why did it take you a few days to post it" well, for one, we had to get it proofread rq(thanks to @artnerd1123 for that <3), and secondly we just... kind of ended up overthinking ourself into a downward death spiral over it. we're not getting into why.

fun fact, actually- this third chapter of Hunter had over FIVE complete rewrites! some of those earlier versions are going to be reworked into later chapters, but the long and short of it is just "it feels too early to jump into the main meat of the story, and we have character building to do" so we're doing a bit more character building

anywhere, here u go

A small, desert planet. Relatively close to Terran Standard Hours, but not quite. Mostly empty, save for an early settlement or two, and a few camps. Temperate for most of the year, despite its ecology. Might not even need terraforming to grow plants. The main issue was the wildlife. But those were all facts for planetary settlers to worry about.

The planet’s gravity was what one was focused on today. It was slightly heavier than something like earth. Not enough to affect day to day life, for the most part.

But it was enough to affect the trajectory of a bullet. 

Bang. “Shit-!”

Nothing new to an interplanetary bounty hunter, however. Just some slight calibrations, that was all that was needed.  Raise the scope by a few micrometers. 

Bang.

Increase power to the chamber. 

Bang.

A few more micrometers, accounting for the heavier rounds.

Bang.

Steep walls around the camp, nestled in a ravine. Account for tailwind.

Bang.

A stomach flat on the ground. Low. Shields charged, just in case. Comfortable, laying next to a neat stack of fresh mags. The boxy magazines were heavy enough you could kill someone just by hitting them with it. The bullets were large, and each mag held two dozen. Quick kills, long distance, armor piercing. Perhaps a bit expensive to be shooting at common pirates, but everyone would get one. She made sure she brought enough to share with the whole class.

Two pirates stood nestled behind a rock, cowering from the shooting range their camp had turned into, rifles at the ready. Others were ducked tightly, hugging the ground around the camp as they found cover, while the unlucky ones littered the killbox. The armored ones had holes blown in their chest pieces. The more fragile ones had limb scattered about, a few heads that simply vanished.

“The fuck are you lot waitin’ for?!” The big one yelled from across the way, voice gravely and slightly distorted by a low quality speaker in his helmet. He was bulky, armored, with two sets of arms- clearly the leader, or the closest thing the pirates had to one left. “Get out there or-!”

“All due respect, hoss,” another called, human, frontier accent, “that ain’t happenin’.”

“It’s one hunter!” He bellowed in return towards his uppity accomplice. “One human-! They can’t kill us all!”

“True enough, everyone willin’ to gamble their heads in that open sightline, say aye!” He gave a snarky, shiteating grin as he glanced around at the sheer reluctance that permeated the camp. “... sounds like the crowd has spoken. God bless democracy.”

“Shut up, scragfuck-!”

Bang.

Everyone flinched, and one fell to the ground in a panic, nearly dropping his weapon as the bullet pierced his cover and impacted the dirt next to him.

“It was your idea to set up camp here, ‘hoss’.”  The big one growled, hunkering down as much as his frame and joints would allow.

“... that it were, that it were indeed.” He admitted, sucking in a reluctant breath of air. “I said it would be defensible, and… well, it is, but…”

“But, our gods damned camp is getting slaughtered by one sniper because there’s no scragfucking cover!”

“I am acutely aware, hoss-”

“Well then come up with a solution, ‘deputy’-!”

“I am working on it, scragshit-!”

Bang. “Fuck-!” The deep, bassy explosion of the bullet exiting the barrel once again shook the nerves of everyone in camp, this time managing to pierce the steel wall one was hiding behind, going limp from their prior crouched position.

He took a breath.

He looked around at everyone at camp, all the crouched figures, the one standing next to him, and all the bodies. He raised his gun around the rocky corner, slowly deliberately, and tossed it to the ground.

A moment of silence later, and he stepped out from his cover, hands up.

“What are you doing-?!” The boss whispered, gripping his weapon.

“Shh-!” He stepped forward, towards the mouth of the ravine. Bang. Everyone flinched, but no-one flinched quite as hard as the deputy, tripping over his own two feet and landing on his ass as the bullet landed mere inches from his foot. “Fuck-!”

“Not one step closer, ‘hoss’.” The voice on the other end of the scope called, voice modulated slightly and boosted moderately by the high quality speaker in her suit.

“I ain’t armed! See?” He gestured to the rifle on the ground, slowly accumulating desert dust as he slowly made his way to his feet, hands still in the air. “They pay more for alive than dead, don’t they? Like in the movies?” He forced a lighthearted chuckle, halfway between a smile and a wince.

“We may be in a desert, and you might be dressed like a cowboy, but this isn’t a western.” Ariis retorted, unmoving.

“Look- we… we got a lot of money back here!” He loosened his posture slightly, shrugging. “I’m just saying! We could pay ya a lot more than whatever those hick colonists are payin’ ya!”

“And you’ll shoot me in the back when I come to collect. Or you’ll try to, anyway. Cute.”

“No- ma’am, you have my word, on my gentlemanly honor,” he placed a hand on his chest, and one in the air, “no harm shall come to you, if you deliver no more harm unto us. You can take the money and go.”

“Is that even your real accent?”

His voice hitched a bit, stammering quietly and briefly. “I… y-yeah? ‘Course it is-”

“Oh, so you’re just leaning into the bit, then?”

“Well, I… I-I-I have a reputation to uphold, y’see.”

“I am aware.” She shot, coldly, finger menacingly depressing the trigger slightly, despite no living thing being close enough to witness the threat. “People pay a lot for reputations, ‘y’see’.”

He swallowed a ball of fear, glancing towards the sweet embrace of the rock he was previously hunkered behind.

“Unfortunately for you and your gang, your reputation is the sort that gets me paid just as good dead as alive, because they’re gonna kill you anyway.”

“... w-why uh… haven’t ya shot me, then?”

She shrugged invisibly, not disturbing her firing stance. “Curiosity, mostly.”

“... w-well… if it makes a lick a’ difference, uh… i-it ain’t my gang-”

“Semantics.” She sucked in air, holding it in her lungs.  “... and semantics isn’t my line of work.” Bang.

A shot through the heart, left arm ripped violently from its socket and flying halfway across the ravine. Dead, instantly.

Exhale.

“This is an odd job, boys.” She called from her perch, smiling under her helmet. “You know what that means? That means I don’t have anywhere better to be. Go ahead. If anyone else wants to be a hero or a smartass, then step forward.”

The stand off continued well into the night. It wasn’t until the sun broke the horizon that the last of them were dead. A few more bullets spent than she’d like, but such is life. Nobody’s perfect.

She took a few souvenirs, just things to show to the client to prove the job was done, and collect her reward. A shootout with some hick gang on a backwater planet… a far cry from the diplomatic assassination from months ago. But there always had to be smaller jobs like this when things got slow, to break up the monotony.

“And they’re all dead?” The representative questioned, looking the hunter up and down.

“Yes, I wouldn’t be back if they weren’t.” Ariis snapped, arms crossed as her attitude was growing increasingly cross. “I did all the paperwork. You can either give me my money, or I can file a complaint with my handler.”

“That- that won’t be necessary, miss Sol-” They coughed awkwardly, and started to fidget with a tablet. “The money will be in your account before you go offworld. Thank you for your service.”

She just wordlessly stepped out. Funny how she always felt more at home staring down a kill zone through a scope in a dusty ravine than in a clean office filing paperwork. Bureaucracy scared her more than any mark.

She was about to hop in her ship after that, at least until she saw a familiar ‘face’ lumbering his way up to her at the shipyard.

“Wait… is that-?”

[There she is.] The voice was deep, heavily modulated and very low quality, using an old speaker to broadcast an ancient translator in a patchwork junker of an environment suit. A juggernaut of a sentient, various multicolored tubes sticking out of and snaking into various ports.

“Uncle Guz!” She called, stepping back down from her ship’s side and towards him, meeting him halfway up the landing pad. “It’s been too long, what are you doing in this backwater?”

[Looking for you, actually.] He muttered, face hidden behind the emotionless, multi eyed faceplate of his env suit.

“For me?” She parroted skeptically. “... I’m guessing it’s not just to say hi.”

[Smart girl.] He handed a tablet off to her, staying silent for a moment as she browsed its contents. [Wanted to take you along for a jank. Gib. J-] Guz smacked the side of his helmet, a reverberating clang startling the technicians, but not Ariis. [Job.]

She just let out a sigh. “... this isn’t a salvage job.”

[Salvaging isn’t my only culling. Calling.] A very muffled, bubbly groan that wasn’t picked up by the translator barely managed to make its way out of the suit. He was going to need to replace that translator eventually.

“I know.” She handed the tablet back off, the giant shuffling it back into a pack at his side. “But still, was hoping we were going to get drinks or something.”

[Maybe after, toddler.] Another barely audible groan.

“Yeah, that nickname never translates well, even with the new ones.” She chuckled lightly. “Still, I just got done clearing pirates, and now I’m getting dragged along to kill more…”

[No-one is dragging you along.]

“I know, but that doesn’t mean I’m not coming.” She tilted her head slightly. “You wanna take my ship? It’s faster.

[No. Too quiet. If a ship’s too quiet-]

“-then something’s broken, I know.” She sighed. “You’re attached to your junker.”

[Gertrude just has character.]

“A spaceship has as much character as you give it.” She turned on her heel, heading back towards her own spaceship. “See you there, then. Don’t break down on the way.”

[No promises.] Despite the monotone of the translator, she could feel the sarcasm as he turned and started to board his own characteristically boxy, patchwork ship. Compared to hers, it looked like a brick. That was part of its charm, though. Always was.

… never a dull day.

hiiiiii it's ussss we've been thinking about maybe attempting to sell adopts, since income from commissions has been. well, lets not sugarcoat it- nonexistent. so we thought maybe some adopts might get a smidge of extra cash. that ofc brings us to our point- we're taking suggestions on themes for adopt batches. suggest a theme, if we like it then we'll make anywhere from 2 to 5 adoptables. and, ofc, as a heads up, anyone who supports us on patreon- any tier- will get first chance to buy any adoptables. still deciding on the time frame they'll remain patreon exclusive, but we're hovering around anywhere from a week to a month.

tldr; we're going to start making adoptables, patreons get first grabs. send suggestions for themes for the adoptables.