Dahksa Vahjj Concept Art

Concept art I drew last night of Dahksa Vahjj, my Doc Savage pastiche from Kingdom Cryptiqqa. Please forgive the, er, style (proportions? Shading? Perspective? What are those?), this was just for fun.

Headcanons I've developed about Vahjj fairly recently:

-His skin is a pale blue or green.

-He is a member of a religious order of some kind, with "Dahksa" possibly being a title. Therefore he would have other types of "brothers" assisting him than does Doc. His robe is inspired by the ruby-wielding Doc Savage from the '40s comics.

-This is a given, since I created him and all, but he is probably as gay as the Fourth of July. Even in trying to draw a virile muscleman I can't help but instill my male characters with an elfin twinkishness.

-Oh, and yes, he has four eyes. 

 

 

 

Pluto Mini-Comic

 

Pluto: Pardon me, miss...could you please get me one of those jars behind you?

Alien girl: ...huh? Oh, yeah, of course!

Pluto: Thank you. You know, I think your dog is going to pull through.

Alien girl: Oh, I hope so - wait...

Alien girl: I didn't tell you my dog was sick!

Pluto: Be not afraid, my dear - and thank you again. 

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(Click to enlarge, by the way.) Pluto was inspired by an encounter I had while working at Barnes & Noble with an almost angelically sweet and fragile-seeming old man, who I am still not convinced was not some sort of ascended being who happened to be in need of some greeting cards that day. In-universe, Pluto is Persephone's alter-self - they are one being, even though their appearances and personalities differ. Pluto is Persephone's field agent, serving to "onboard" the people she ends up helping. Though he takes his primary orders from her mandate, Pluto will also intake "clients" who he personally believes to be worthy, as seen here. Even though Persephone seems to aid her "clients" fairly soon after their encounter with Pluto, from her perspective there are often many years or even decades separating Pluto's intake from her arrival in the client's timeline. Occasionally this causes miscommunications with the client that complicate her efforts to help them.

My sources inform me that bleenut butter tastes like a very earthy raspberry jam. Apparently, Chamky's brand isn't very good, but it'll do in a pinch.   

Persephone Mini-Comic

 

 The Grand Father: Did you take out their legion in the seventh stellar zone...without me?

 Persephone: I had to do something! You forgot to pay the wi-fi.

 The head of a robot devil-demon from Deneb sparks helplessly in the GF's hand. 

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This week saw me start a new mental health program in response to my longterm therapist's concerns about my PTSD. I am currently trying to engage with life from a skills-based perspective, and part of my current plan involves branching out with my art, so that I have more things available to distract me. I've always hated my drawing, but I decided to try my hand at it anyway, without too much worry about the result. Hence this mini-comic, featuring Persephone (from my book Kingdom Cryptiqqa) with her dad, the Grand Father (from Night of the Living Dead: Beast Wars). Neither of those books flesh out who exactly either of these characters are, but I'll say for now: they're not Jeunes-Vieillards, they're not humans, and they're not angels either, despite the occasional resemblance. They have their own mandates to follow, and they were among the first beings to appear in our universe - heck, they probably pre-dated it. Persephone doesn't always like her dad, who she considers to be unkempt and unprofessional, but she loves him all the same. Not pictured is Persephone's alterself Pluto, who is almost never in the same place or time as she is. If you want to know my headcanon for who the Grand Father is: God, maybe? Or one of them. I'm...pretty pleased with how this turned out, actually. I suck ass at hair, and hands, but at least I tried?

 

Night of the Living Dead: Beast Wars Now Available!

 

PhantomEye Press's first book release is here: my novella Night of the Living Dead: Beast Wars!

The official blurb:

"HELL IS JUST THE BEGINNING...THIS IS WHAT COMES AFTER! 

The world was rocked in 1968 by George Romero's classic zombie film Night of the Living Dead. In this exciting sequel, we find out the zombies were only the beginning of humanity's misfortunes - now, countless other monsters, each more horrific than the ghouls, manifest on Earth to prey upon the living. Demons unseen since the world was young return to continue fighting their brutal and deadly BEAST WARS! This PhantomEye Press launch title crosses over with concepts from the universe of Doctor Who!"

And that last sentence is indeed true, as the novella features an appearance of the planet Nellon, which was introduced in my DWU-licensed novella Kingdom Cryptiqqa (Odd Tales Productions). 

Check it out in ebook or paperback editions! Enjoy!

Ebook

Paperback

 

Genesis of a Ghostly Oculus

Hello? Hello, can you hear me?

You can? Oh! Well, that's just lovely.

We have arrived! Yes, it's true, today is the first day of the cool new PhantomEye Press website! PhantomEye is here to bring you exciting, radical new stories from all over the Multiverse. We are the successor to the fantastical Odd Tales Productions, which published fiction and essays from 2016 to 2024 - we carry on Odd Tales' ethos of resisting fascist tyranny in all its forms. We are a micro-press, so far being mostly focused on publishing the works of owners Atom Mudman Bezecny and Katherine Avalon - however, stay tuned for future submission opportunities. I, the Mudman, will be Yr. Humble Blogger on this site.

Sometime in the next few days, I will work on putting together the PhantomEye Checklist, the ongoing masterlist of all of our publications, with links to where you can check them out.

Our first publication, coming very soon, will be my novella Night of the Living Dead: Beast Wars - a sequel to George Romero's 1968 zombie classic! Follow Ben Green as he continues his struggle to survive the ghoul apocalypse - even as he learns that the ghouls are far from the only monsters roaming the land...

We at PhantomEye look forward to entertaining you and challenging the oppressive, hateful forces of our world. Thank you for stopping by, we hope to see you again soon!