The Futagawa twins

And now we have the third of the Death Machines. (That's right; the Futagawa twins are collectively considered the third Death Machine rather than the third and fourth respectively. This idea was taken from Cyprine and Ptilol, the fifth of the Witches 5 in Sailor Moon S.)

That's Haruka Futagawa (the elder twin by eight minutes) on the left and Akira Futagawa on the right. Born to an upper-middle-class family on June 20, 1992, in the fashionable Shibuya district of Tôkyô, the twins also died together on January 13, 2008— they were both victims in a shooting incident at their private junior high school.

Because they had died together and had chosen the same fate, Akira and Haruka became soulbound (that is, if one should be vanquished, the other "dies" as well). The twins have the same mechanical attachments— a high-pressure water cannon arm and a communicator ear— but the placement of those and the stitched areas (which tend to ooze water) on one twin mirror the placement of those on the other.

The family name Futagawa contains kanji meaning "two rivers." The twins' given names reflect personality distinctions; Akira ("bright/clear") is more athletic, energetic and overconfident; Haruka ("far away") is more an intellectual, logical thinker, but is also more sarcastic and less talkative. Despite these differences, however, the twins get along fairly well. None of one twin's trendy, cutting-edge outfits match any of the other's (except for the fact that, because they had attended the same school, they wore the same uniform).

The Futagawa twins together hold the "Gemini" position on the Death Machines (Gemini was their Sun sign and their Ascendant sign; its ruling planet, Mercury, gives the twins their water-based attacks).

I absolutely love how this turned out; I chose to create such a background to reflect not only the twins' water element, but also the personality differences between the two. So, Haruka gets a more somber canvas background, whereas Akira is in front of a brightly-lit aquatic background which uses both the wave filter and wet-edges function of the paintbrush tool.

The outfits were difficult, but fun, to design; much of the influence came from submissions to the The World Ends with You contest (including entries such as this and this). Haruka's sneakers, on the other hand, were inspired by one of my favorite Mega Man X-series villains: High Max, whose design I like very much.

I like how the colors communicate, too; they did wonders to not only make the outfits stand out, but also helped considerably to further the contrast between the Futagawa twins. This is my favorite of the colored Death Machine pictures (but then again, the twins were one of my favorites in lineart as well) though I'll gladly take any suggestions that may make the picture better still.