pictured is emma crouched onto her knees, sharpening a cleaver as she prepares a briefcase of weapons, as she reflects on her memories.

i thought how i could develop emkay, the friend of kokomo and koma, the sons of the ko family. I already had a pretty close idea of who she was as I created this drawing. something about trauma that made her dress and act the way she does today: bitter, rough, and searching for a sense of belonging and recognition. she is an arms dealer from vegas (and a prostitute on the side), using the money to live day by day in a ratty motel called the Twin Diamond Motel not far from the strip. her story goes like this:

Emma K Sylvester, aka Emkay Sly, or just Emma, was raised into a rough childhood. her parents were both present, but they treated her like a small pet who only needed food and shelter and little else, neglecting her of attention and love. This neglect gave her a prickly and rough personality, deflecting many others so she can protect herself. But as she became a teenager, her angst peaked. She found a connection to weapons at this time, marveled by their destructive power, something she lacked in her childhood. Running away from home, she stumbled into a gang her took her in and raised her. She felt a vague sense of community here, but it was with the gang's arms dealer who gave her the most attention. it blossomed into a father-daughter relationship, something familial with love that she never had before. He taught her about firearms, how they work, how to disassemble them. He taught her the workings of gangs. The two formed a close relationship and on one day, the two visited the strip, to which Emma had never been before.

She found a connection in the neon colors of the lights and the glitz and glamour of the strip. Sin and vice, drugs and gambling. There was a reality here to humanity that was more real than anything else. But the two--the dealer and emma--made great and fond memories. ones where emma felt genuinely loved and happy for the first time in her life. Tragically, the Dealer was killed in a drive-by a few days after. wraught with grief, emma fled from the gang, soul-searching and in great search of her purpose. she used her connections to local gangs to work as a small arms dealer, selling pistols and rifles. it was during this search that she came across kokomo and koma.

the three developed a rough relationship. kokomo and koma saw her as weird but funny. they laughed at her, but emkay took it as something mocking, but they clarified they always laughed with her. being prickly and thorny, she gnashed her teeth at them, seeing their petty and small crimes of vandalism and shoplifting as "small and forgettable shit that doesn't even come close to the real world of crime." but despite this, they kept coming back, like annoying things that kept pestering her if she was okay, or if she needed to go commit some crimes with them. emkay did not know what her goals were in all of this--in everything. maybe it was her memory at the strip with the dealer that guided her. maybe it was love, finally. she didn't know it yet, but perhaps kokomo and koma were the key.