SIIGHHHHHH looks who’s making comics again. This one’s a quick four pager and by quick I mean I was fighting for my life the entire time to make it look good (point and laugh??). Guy goes out to get xeir meds and experiences macroaggression from some weirdos.
Some (a lot) info because I like YAPPING about what’s going on here :
Kerik (the guy with the stupid rectangle hat) lives alone, which is verrryyyyyyyyy unusual and potentially unhealthy for a Dorest (recap from some of the stuff that I yalked about in the reproduction post but basically most Drecu need a lot of social and chemical feedback/reinforcement from other Drecu to maintain a stable headspace and physical condition). There is some infrastructure in place for those in his situation where they are currently without a unit, are unable to join a unit, or willingly choose to avoid one-mainly in the form of artificial pheremones/enzymes once can take instead of being around real Drecu and community housing somewhat like a homeless shelter. The stuff he was picking up from the pharmacy was an artificial pheromone mix meant to help with mood and to keep his hair from falling out.
Kerik has a lot of reasons for living alone, mainly his vitiligo and the whole draft-dodging situation he’s in. He was isolated from a young age due to the skin condition since it makes it very hard/basically impossible to communicate with other Drecu on the same level, since their native language uses scale colors being shown in certain shapes and patterns to make up the characters and entire words (as well as some hand gesturing and pheromone exchange to set the mood and tone. Usually, Cerest with obvious physical differences like this are culled in egg or larva stage, but since larva are already without pigment no one noticed until he pupated (and by then he was legally considered a Real Person who they couldn’t just stomp on. They definitely tried their best still, but had to settle for the second best option of making him feel fundamentally alienated and Worse than everyone).
unfortunately for them, Kerik showed a propensity for math and science that was better than their clutchmates, so he gave himself a reason to be kept around. The guy was on basement larva care duty and not allowed to be seen by other members of his own unit or any of the other ones, and was constantly assured that he was Built Wrong, didn’t deserve to see the sun, and again only around because he’s very smart and could be helpful to the unit that is graciously not killing him or trading him off to some work camp or factory. Thanks to some makeup and virtual/remote tests and meetings, and sheer spite, he was able to rise to the top of the Ret class he was born into, shown by the single large rectangle permanently inked onto his forehead. Then he ended up fleeing the Empire anyway because he got infected and became a Conduit (and by law had to join the military). He did NOT want to get conscripted or figure out what the real big dog upper classes would do to him when their full attention was suddenly on him, so he used what he’d learned handling identity documents at his old job to slip around the border before it was Really locked down like it is currently and live in the SEZ.
So basically, he’s avoiding other Drecu because 1)most of them think he’s sub-Cerest based on the way he looks 2) he’s a contrarian who hates authority and who has never felt like belonging in a unit as they are now and 3) if any cerest found out he fled his unit/military duties in the empire he’d be big time screwed, and even more screwed if a human authority figure found out he was a recent immigrant who is not living in a designated Cerest Area. Kerik would’ve kept walking as quickly as possible away from these guys if he hadn’t accidentally auto-invited them to talk/greet him back with his antenna (decentralized nervous system, so they literally did that on their own. That part was probably shocked/excited to see another Dorest..the rest of him not so much.)
Many Cerest chose to live outside of their typical Imperial land long before any conflict and don’t support the current Imperial ideals. However, Imperial sentiments and structures still exist on the SEZ/DRSS side of the border though the units who live there now (who were trapped during the border redraw/closure that happened postwar or were just displaced to another area that wasn’t typically imperial land thanks to the conflict . ) Enclaves and of Cerest in the DRSS are just repurposed internment camps, with all of their species-specific food/housing needs concentrated there to keep them all in one place since they’re the “enemy species”. Enclaves in the SEZ are not the strict living areas of all Cerest there since there are more scattered housing/food resources (though it is still very very hard for a Cerest of either kind to live away from those areas thanks to the scarcity). All this to say there’s Cerest in the SEZ and DRSS who are normal and there’s also ones who act like they’re still in the Empire, which is what caused this interaction to go south.
Btw, the group of four strangers is an Arch (the Rox who just stands there aura farming) and three of xeir sires (the clear favorite who does all the “taking” and the two lackeys who are carrying the group’s stuff). That’s why they have the same size, number, and shape of forehead tattoo (though the size/shape/number thing doesn’t automatically mean a Drecu is part of the reproductive group, there can be people with that same Diamond who aren’t sires/arches, they have clothing and jewelry to make the distinction. Ermmmm I’d need to make a clothing post though lol)
The Dorest with the Diamond on xeir forehead is speaking with [[ to signify xei are in an upper class (Kes, represented by the diamond shape), while Kerik is speaking in [ which is what lower classes use (Ret (Rectangle, and what Kerik was part of) and Tel (represented by a pentagon)). Var, which is the military class, would be shown using a < shape and is spoken by the Var as well as some in the Sundyne class (like Maro and Rinshi! ) but the Sundyne also have their own separate language they use. All the different ways to speak are to further cement in the differences in classes (and to make it harder to move between them. Upper classes know the lower ones language, but not the other way around. Kerik only knows some Kes because he was a high ranked Ret who worked with some before, normally a Ret Dorest would have no idea what that guy was saying and would need one of their superiors or their Arch to translate. The only reason why diamond-head entertained the idea of talking at Kerik was because he was able to reply to xeir questions , so they automatically assumed he was someone important in a unit.
Kerik keeps touching his neck like that because he a cybernetic implant in his neck to speak (since him trying the scale thing is like someone who’s talking but every other sound is cut out). The pressure on both of the lil pads on either side activates it, producing a voice that is meant to mimic a natural Cerest voice under ideal/trained performance (and sounds a bit like glados, idk that’s just the closest thing i can think of rn, basically he has a similar cadence, and his voice is feminine-sounding and robotic/pitchy because of the cheap model of implant he has, I’ll do a voice claims post I PROMISE). He also definitely has some undiagnosed stuff going on too, and is just prone to tapping himself/other stuff in general to make himself feel better.
