"Velasquez to command. Yeah, this research facility of yours? Is it supposed to be covered in slimy, organic resin? I didn't think so. And I don't suppose there's a good reason why I'm reading several thousand life signs in what should be a colony of forty? Oh, sure. Proceed with all due caution. Gee, I was going to waltz in blindfolded in nothing but my underwear. Good thing you're looking out for me. *sigh* I don't get paid enough for this."

So I have a soft spot for badass female characters, especially in sci-fi settings. It probably has something to do the Metroid series and Samus Aran (don't talk to me about Other M), but I'd also put Ripley, Sarah Connor, Tasha Yar, Commander Susan Ivanova, and Firefly's Zoe Washburne and River Tam in that category. It seems sci-fi has done a much better job than a lot of other genres of presenting female characters who don't degenerate into sex objects, plot devices, or symbols, feminist or otherwise, and I'm hoping to carry on that tradition with some of my own stories.

Anyway, this piece was created for the Fur Reality 2013 Conbook, whose theme is "Into the Labyrinth." Fantasy/mythology seemed like the obvious way to go with that sort of prompt, and I wanted to do something a little different - so instead of a maze of Cretan ruins patrolled by a minotaur (or David Bowie), we're following this intrepid explorer into the slippery depths of an alien world armed only with a plasma pistol and a motion scanner. The background is very definitely an attempt to mimic some of H.R. Giger's iconic designs.