"Have you heard the stories about the old subway network? Folks say there's monsters down there; you can hear them moaning if you listen closely."
Boy oh boy; I'm really getting my mileage worth out if things related to Beneathness, ain't I? Not that I'm complaining; I've been having fun taking the concept and running with it, and the chance to better establish my Inkling's personalities/"voices" has been very helpful; it's only fitting that I gift the story with cover art, so to speak. So here, from left-to-right, are Skint m, Brassic, and Warp as they appear in the story (both in terms of outfits and their overall emotional states- poor Skint is terrified, bless 'im), in the shadow of one of the creatures they bump into. I realise I should actually clarify this, for those that read it and wondered; yeah, the weird creatures in the subway WERE Sanitized Octolings, but not quite as... stable as they were in Octo Expansion. I don't profess to know exactly how Sanitizied Creatures work, but given their nature as goopy gestalts I'm at least reasonably confident that they needed Commander Tartar around to remain physically stable and fully cognicant; following on from his destruction, the Sanitized Denizens of the Deepsea Metro have begun to decay and deform, their forms melting and decaying as their minds fray and fry. They're wandering aimlessly through the underground, currently, attempting to attack those they come across. The gaggle the trio meet in Beneathness are the first ones to get close to the surface- and, hopefully, the last.
Man, I still need practice getting the hang of Inklings; this was I think about attempt seven at this image (all six prior ones ended when Ininevitably cocked up rendering Brassic's 'hair', because I was DETERMINED to have him facing head on), and it still looks a tad rough around the edges for my taste. Given I've only drawn Brassic once before and Warp twice, though, it's no wonder I'm still trying to find my feet when drawing them. I think this is also the third time I've done an image with this kind of composition; I have a thing for 'heroes pose in front of spooky figure' images, apparently.
~ Decon Theed (24/10/18)