On Earth back in the Ice Age, the Seeker and her family bury their parents. But why is the persistent Cat present there and then? Find out in Inkblot #11 from Image Comics!
INKBLOT #11
Writer: Rusty Gladd and Emma Kubert
Artist: Rusty Gladd and Emma Kubert
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: August 4, 2021
Previously in Inkblot: The Seeker has been chasing a magical entity that appears to be nothing more than a cat, except for its ability to travel through time and to other worlds. She has decided it is of the Void which was broken by her brother Xenthos. Its travel has dragged the Seeker around through time, even to her own family’s past. But she is not the only person who has found the cat. The daughter of the queen of the Elves follows it into a cave, finds a magic wand, and the Seeker’s brother Xenos lands on her after falling through a portal, right at the time the Void was broken. The Elf girl grabs Xenos and they follow the cat away from the Void…but right into the unknown!
BACK TO A BEGINNING
Inkblot #11 continues to meander through space and time. This is not to say it isn’t a fun book; it is fun. But by virtue of the cat’s time travel, we do need to regroup and figure out where we are in the grand scheme of things. The Seeker’s family are nearly immortal beings who feed off the energy of monsters they kill, and when the monsters ran low, Xenthos broke the Void to allow them to connect to new worlds. But early on, they were stuck on Earth. And Earth is where the issue starts, in the time of the Ice Age. The opening scene is a battle between mastodons, with the Cat disturbed from its nap in a nearby tree. The narrator is the Seeker, who ponders whether the Cat is an actual piece of the Void.
Blink and you might miss it, but as the Cat bounds away, it loses the tip of its tail. When it pounces on the small piece of inky black, it turns into an insect and flies away. The Cat chases it, awakening a monster in the snow, but ultimately ending up near a small camp of people.
It is the Seeker’s family. Their parents have recently died, and they are a group of ten, mostly children, surviving on their own. Earth is not where Xenthos was born, but the rest of them were. Xenthos sees the birds stirring and knows something big is coming their way. He orders the children into a cave, and they go, with some arguing and bickering, except for young Inos, who spotted the Cat and wanders after it. This Cat gets everyone into trouble, and it has attracted Inos more than once.
The snow monster arrives just as Xenthos finds Inos. The Seeker doesn’t think he can outrun the creature. Xenthos realizes this and alerts her that he is going to toss the little boy to her. She breaks off a tree branch and tosses it to him in exchange. He stabs the creature with the stick, swirls of magic happen, and while he doesn’t realize what has happened, she does. He has taken the monster’s power.
THE MAGIC OF ANCIENT EARTH
It is the Cat who directs our attention through Inkblot #11. It is so utterly, perfectly cat-like, but what is interesting about it is that it is as black as the Void. Other than its eyes, it has no shadows, no highlights, mostly no features. Yet even though it is mostly a silhouette, it is lively and full of expression. Most of this is from its unearthly bright green eyes, which can range from hugely startled when the mastodons start fighting to meltingly cute, but the art also captures its body language. Overall, it is ridiculously fun.
I like that the Cat disturbs the snow monster early on, and then it comes around again. It is an interesting cross between a triceratops and a giant humanoid made of snow. I think its horns and the icy spikes on its shoulders make it particularly threatening. It’s almost a shame that its sole purpose is to be a threat so Xenthos can learn how to kill it for its power, but it does make for a good fight.
BOTTOM LINE: PAWPRINTS THROUGH TIME
Inkblot #11 has an underlying plot that is being revealed bit by bit. But honestly, the fun of the story is just in seeing the nonchalant Cat weaving its way through history, connecting chunks of the overall narrative and drawing them together.
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Inkblot #11
Why does the mysterious Cat seem to have a connection to the Seeker and her family through the ages?
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By day, she’s a mild-mannered bureaucrat and Ms. Know-It-All. By night, she’s a dance teacher and RPG player (although admittedly not on the same nights). On the weekends, she may be found judging Magic, playing Guild Wars 2 (badly), or following other creative pursuits. Holy Lack of Copious Free Time, Batman! While she’s always wished she had teleportation as her superpower, she suspects that super-speed would be much more practical because then she’d have time to finish up those steampunk costumes she’s also working on.