Caption: Later that day, Xkolp spoke to a new lifeform that had just emerged in the great slime lake of Ortentrum IV.
Xkolp: What do you mean, you're afraid? What nonsense is that?
Caption: Xkolp often talks to new lifeforms on Ortentrum IV. As a professional sentience counsellor, it's all in a day's work for him.
Creature: I'm afraid I'll fail! Suppose this breathing thing doesn't work out! I'll choke to death!
Xkolp: Look, buddy... If you can't get past that, your life is seriously not going to amount to much.
Creature: I know...
Caption: New life forms emerge almost daily from the ooze of Ortentrum IV...
Creature: ... And I would so like to go to Deserted Muck to open a booking agency there!
Xkolp! See what I mean?
Caption: Most of them immediately need professional co
This page and whatever pages will follow are a collaboration between my 20-year-old self, who drew a version of this in 1992, and my current, grizzled 44-year-old self. 20-year-old me worked in black and white and used draughting pens to ink. 44-year-old me works in color and uses digital tools almost exclusively. The original version of this fizzled out after about five pages. The new version may do the same, or not. I don't know. As we go along, I expect to deviate more from the originals anyway, so I'll gradually get to the stage where I'm on my own.