duskydergun:

Xorek and Ree, A pair of alien siblings who live on a small space craft, exploring their Universe to study the many species within it! 

These two are my own characters and I’m super happy with their designs and the art. 

Xorek is the elder of the two siblings, as well as being taller than his sister, being 6′4′’ while she’s a mere 5′1′’. 

I’ll be using them on a sideblog where I do more with my original species and singular alien creatures within my own character-universe. 

Morning Routine

It was, perhaps, frivolous to spend her earnings on corals and seashells but to go without her morning ritual felt wrong to Joanna. She had lived inland for years, but the sea had never left her heart.

The Earth has lent thee thy body, the Ocean thy soul. To both thou shalt return. Words spoken during her childhood drifted like whispers as she ground the ingredients and the water into a fine pink paste. The sound of the pestle against the materials and the mortar felt like a strange sort of music. She hummed. The candlelit shadows of her bedroom danced.

Once it had smoothed, she placed the mortar down to set the paint, and cleaned her brushes. The first light of the sun began to pull away the dark of the sky; her clouds painted in familiar pink hues. She dipped a tiny brush into the soft pink paint, pulled her hair out of her face, and watched herself in the old, blackening mirror as she painted the tiny, delicate shapes onto her forehead.

“The sun brings forth the warmth and light, so that we might learn to grow,” she said, painting a circle. “But it is the moon who guides the sea, and through the see guides us along our path.” She painted a smaller circle within the first. She paused and took in a breath, placing the brush down in favor of a smaller one. Above the concentric circles, she drew a small triangle, pointed up. Beneath them, two small vertical lines. She let out the breath and swapped brushes again. The sunlight began to drift in from the window, drowning out her candles one by one.

“In this life,” she continued, “we are blessed with the drive to move forward.” She painted a small arrow at the bottom of the lines, tip up. She paused and moved her head around, checking the balance of the image in the mirror. The bottom of the painting rested just below her brows and was centered enough. She nodded and dabbed more paint onto the brush. “With the flexibility to change course.” She painted a line on either side of the circle, curved parallel to the shape, neither end quite touching any other piece.

“And the means to reach out and uplift others.” A pair of diamonds, small and almost insignificant, where the curved lines came to meet the dashes. She placed the brush down and examined herself again. The emblem resembled the skeleton of a fish, abstracted out. She smiled.

Joanna scraped the rest of the paint into an empty vial and placed the brushes into a cup of water. The sun’s rays filled the small bedroom, and Joanna took the time to extinguish her morning candles.
“In this life,” she began again. She blew out the last candle and inhaled the soft smell of smoke as it drifted through the room. She paused and let herself feel the warmth of the sun against her skin. “We are blessed,” she continued, making her way back to the mirror. She took a seat on the wooden stool and jumped, only a little, when it shifted, legs uneven. “With the opportunity to grow.” She took a piece of her hair and separated it out from the rest. She started to braid.

“With strength of body.” A bird chirped outside her window.
“With strength of heart.” Joanna closed her eyes.
“With strength of mind.” The door to the bedroom creaked, just loud enough to distinguish itself from the bird.
“And with strength of spirit.” Joanna opened her eyes and paused to look at the reflection of the room. The door was closed. The room was no more occupied than it had been when she had sat down.

“And so it is our duty,” she started. She took the small braid and draped it across her forehead, careful not to let it touch the still drying paint. “To spread our fortune; to bring a better life to all whose paths we may cross.” She tied the braid in place and held it away from her skin, a facsimile of a halo, or at least a partial one.

“Amen!” cheered a voice. Joanna, still focused on her reflection, watched the young girl fall with a giggle onto the bed. Joanna smiled.
“Yes,” she said, “Amen.”

“You’re not dressed yet,” said the girl. She pointed at Joanna’s nightgown.
Joanna retorted, “you’re not supposed to be up yet.” The girl giggled and Joanna spun herself around in the stool. “I hope you haven’t worried Sister Azalea.”
The girl waved Joanna off. “She’s fine,” she reassured.
“And brother Marcos?”
“Is cooking breakfast in the kitchen,” the girl replied without missing a beat. Joanna nodded.

“Alright then, just give me a moment to get dressed.

Italy gives world-famous opera Carmen a defiant new ending in stand against violence to women

sespursongles:

One of the world’s best-loved operas has been given a radically different ending in Italy, with the heroine killing her tormentor rather than being killed herself, in a stand against violence to women.

In Bizet’s original story, Don José is a naïve soldier who is lured away from his military duties and his childhood sweetheart by Carmen. But she then falls for the handsome bull-fighter Escamillo, driving Don Jose wild with jealousy. The last act of the opera is set outside the bullring in Seville, where Carmen is stabbed to death by Don José.

In what is believed to be a world first, a production of Bizet’s Carmen will see Carmen shoot her thwarted admirer Don José with a pistol that she grabs off him, rather than being stabbed to death by him.

The dramatic departure from operatic orthodoxy is an attempt to shine the spotlight on the modern-day abuse and mistreatment of women, an issue given added resonance by the outrage over the behaviour of Harvey Weinstein and Donald Trump.

The new version of Carmen will open at Florence’s opera house this weekend, with the first few nights already sold out.

“As far as we know it is the first time that the ending to Carmen has been changed,” the opera house’s Paolo Klun told The Telegraph.

The producers said they had changed the denouement of the story in part to protest at the large number of Italian women who are killed each year by jealous husbands, boyfriends and lovers.

Sociologists and campaigners say it is driven by men feeling threatened by the greater freedoms and enhanced economic independence that many Italian women now enjoy after decades of being seen as pliable possessions.

With horrific cases of domestic violence coming to light almost every month, the directors of the work said they were uncomfortable with the idea of audiences applauding the final scene, in which Carmen is stabbed to death and lies motionless on the stage.

“At a time when our society is having to confront the murder of women, how can we dare to applaud the killing of a woman?” said Cristiano Chiarot, the head of the opera house, the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino. […]

Italy gives world-famous opera Carmen a defiant new ending in stand against violence to women

A Sense of Deja Vu

Maddie watched Void’s mother’s car head out of the parking lot and was turning to go back inside when the blonde man passed her. He wasn’t much taller than she was, and his face was young. She hadn’t seen him pull into the parking lot; but sure enough, a small black Cadillac was parked haphazardly in the nearest lot. She scrunched her face; she was sure that hadn’t been there before.

A thought tickled in the back of her mind.

The man had rushed into the school and was headed up the stairs when Maddie felt her phone buzz in her dress pocket. She paused and pulled it out. She didn’t recognize the number, but she opened the text anyway.

“Wait,” it said.

She considered texting it back, but her phone buzzed with another text. This one was from Hollie. “Maddy, you might want to come back, I think we’re going to time travel.”

What?

Maddie heaved a heavy sigh. When the adventure had started, she had loved it; but she had found herself shaken by the pixie incident. It had been too easy to discard consequences up to that point. Therapy had helped, but finding herself suddenly facing an uncertain future did not. She headed up towards the classroom anyway; there was no sense in being left out.

She couldn’t stop glancing at him; the blonde man. His name, apparently, was Doyle though that didn’t ring any bells. But something about the sound of his voice, his crooked nose…something felt incredibly familiar. She caught him glancing a few times as well, little looks of drunken curiosity.

He took advantage of Hollie getting into a distracted conversation with one of the heavily armored women to sidle up to her.

“Madeline,” he said, “Knew a lass by that name once. Saved my life.”

She couldn’t place his face, but she knew he had to be talking about her.
“Oh?” was all she could manage.
He nodded. “Aye. Got shot in World War Two. Field Nurse ran right out like a bat outta hell.” He chuckled. “Kept talking to me, tried to make sure I stayed with her.”

Madeline smiled. She remembered that. Shot had been something of an understatement, but she had smelled the life lingering on him. His uniform had said “Mcready”

Doyle gave her a knowing smile. “Ah, don’t worry ‘bout it. Just nice to know ya share a name with a hero like that, eh?”

She chuckled. “Yeah…I guess that is nice.”