A clandestine meet occurs in the Echelons under cover of darkness where Top Secret intel on the stock market changes hands. The insider tip gets the gothic hacker Jester engaged in a high tech game. Parliament votes to lower harsh stock market regulations fueling the Corporation’s bottom line, a payoff from ministers who were propped up by illegal corporate campaign donations. Ordered by Jester, the teenage hacker Rom infiltrates the largest high volume brokerage house causing wild gyrations in trading. When Jester triggers an insidious stock market payload, all hell breaks loose threatening the pristine City. Will Zoon, the leader of the Triumvirate, get roped into the fray? Can Raven, the government hacker, put the cryptic clues together before the market crashes? Find out in grydscaen:dark. Whose side are you on?
Series Blurb:
Lino just wanted peace. All he got was war.
In the year After Colony 2055 there was the Great War. SenseNet government scientists harnessed their knowledge of nuclear weapons and created a new form of energy. This kedek energy was a natural found occurrence that existed in pools far inside the planet. Harnessing this energy into weapons called kedek bombs, scientists warned these weapons were unsafe and should never be used.
The draconian Atlantea Federation conquered more than half of the world’s territories. A group of islands and nation states formed the Pacific Territories and in a single brave act retaliated in a battle known as the Blood Red Incident. The Atlantea Federation responded with wrath releasing the kedek-based Dionysis Effect nuclear bomb stolen from the SenseNet. The untested weapon’s radioactive fallout created Codesswhich manifested as psychic powers.
Pacific Territories’ society was segregated into citizens and non-citizens. Only citizens could reside in the pristine City. Non-citizens were left with poverty and strife in the Zone where the bomb had gone off, or in the Echelons with the Red Light District, drugs, and crime.
A group of hackers rose up to combat government oppression and injustice by the Zone Police. Enforcement squads rounded up psychics nightly taking them to work camps in the toxic kedek mines. The Terror Hack used guerrilla warfare to fight the Elite government. The Packrats, a cyber terrorist organization vowed to regain control and free society through cyber revolution. Run by the elite hacker Faid Callen, he created the Packrat Sprawl and set up the Runners, Wastes, Acolytes, Hosts, Prophets and Mobile Command. Each faction possessed deadly skills and laws in the Packrat Code that ruled their actions. Civil war ripped at the heart of society.
The son of the Viceroy, Lino Dejarre had psychic power. All he wanted was peace. He joined the Psi Faction as a clandestine psychic operative and was tasked to capture Faid Callen and quell the violence. When the Atlantea Federation attacked the City, Lino found himself once more answering the royal edict and forced to become Sub Viceroy and rule as war raged around him.
Separated at age nine and banished from the royal family, Riuho Dejarre’s hatred for Lino grew as he tried to scrape out a life in the slum level Echelons while Lino lived in the pristine City. Stripped of his citizenship, Riuho vowed he would get revenge and did everything in his power to thwart Lino’s every move. From his first encounter with the Atlantea Federation, Riuho found his place and the resources to get what he desired.
The Atlantea Federation attacked brutally on the ground and also threatened the Pacific Territories’ space colonies. Lino and his Psi Faction team were roped into global diplomacy, inter-colony politics, covert missions, battleships, and space battles where they encounter the Atlantea Federation head on. When Riuho once more enters the fray, the high stakes game threatens to destroy everything for which Lino has worked.
Intrigue, psychic powers, clandestine operations, treaties, politics and a hacker revolution. From space battles, to kidnappings and assassinations, and battleships off the coast, grydscaenis filled with in depth characters and richly detailed storylines that peak your interest and keep you coming back for more.
Natsuya is giving away eBook copies of two of his other works – grydscaen: tribute and A Storm’s Coming one shot manga – with this tour. Enter via Rafflecopter:
Writing Questions:
- When did you know you wanted to write, and when did you discover that you were good at it? I won a writing competition in the third grade. I wrote a story based on a dream I had. It involved wheat fields and flying angels. Now I had never seen a golden wheat field but for some reason those angels were fighting an epic battle in the air above the field. Much later when I went to a psychic with one of my friends, the psychic said I was a visionary and could see into the music of spheres and the divine and that I was a sensitive and that is why childhood was difficult because my parents and no one understood me. I always wanted to be a writer and that dream solidified it. I discovered that I was good at in in middle school where I would write short stories. The hacker character Rom in “grydscaen: dark” which was just released was actually a character I created in the ninth grade. Rom is the first hacker that was created in the grydscaen series so I have a certain affinity to him and he has a long history and lush backstory because I have been with him for much of my life. One of the original stories that I created in college was incorporated into the anthology grydscaen: tribute and when it was reviewed the first reviewer pulled a quote from that story to highlight out of the whole 400+ page book. It was like validation of my whole writing career.
- What was your first published work? Tell me a little about it. My first published work was a poem called “Blues Deville” about a Gibson guitar but lets talk about the first novel that I published which was grydscaen: retribution which is volume 1 of the grydscaen series. It is not the “first” book in the series because there were backstory books as well published after. Retribution tells the initial story of how Faid Callen the psychic hacker and leader of the cyberterrorist Packrats was captured by the government and experimented on and how Lino Dejarre the clandestine psychic operative is sent to bring him back and his escaped half brother Riuho Dejarre who was also a prisoner of the government-run Psi Faction. The first hints of the Packrats’ terrorist actions are seen and the dynamic between the hatred Riuho has for Lino is foreshadowed. When I wrote Retribution I figured I would write one book but when I got to the end there was just so much more story. There are currently 9 grydscaen books published and more to come.
- How long on average does it take you to write a book? I can write a novel length work in 4 days if I need to. I did NaNoWriMo one year and wrote a 70K novel in the first week of the competition. The story I wrote for that is called “The Seer of Ice and Sky” and is currently in beta and will be released soon. Most of the grydscaen novels took about a month to write, so I guess I average about a month to write a first draft of a novel.
This Book:
- Tell us something we don’t know about your heroes. What makes them tick? Lets pick Rom one of the lead characters of grydscaen: dark for this question. Rom is young only 16, he actually has a birthday in grydscaen: dark which is just another day for him he is alive and not dead from radiation sickness from the pervasive fallout in the Echelons. Rom is a hacker but he is also homeless and is taken in by the Packrats so he does not have to squat on the street like he was doing. He panhandles, goes dumpster diving for food and has a host friend who picks up johns, and a homeless trans girl who is his friend named Iin. He keeps to himself most of the time. He also has an expensive cybernetic implant in his arm that stores data and memories which he got while he was hacking the Parliament before the government captured him and erased his memory for hacking as punishment. Rom is a citizen from the pristine City, or was after the government threw him out on the streets of the slum level Echelons. He is offered a chance back into the City but instead he gives it up and stays on the streets. He is motivated by right versus wrong and hates government overreach and corruption. He lives simple and due to the memory wipe it is hard for him to remember things like his name some days and how to be a hacker. Rom just wants to do the right thing and if that means taking down the government for wrongdoing then that means by any means necessary.
- What inspired you to write this particular story? What were the challenges in bringing it to life? Well, I have worked in high tech industry as a cyber security analyst and systems analyst. I work with hackers and wanted to explore current events and the stock market more because it interests me. At one point I wanted to take my Series 7 to be a broker but decided I am in technology and that is a better fit for me but if I understand how the broker’s think then I can be a better analyst. I also write about cyberterrorists in the grydscaen series and have been for about 8 years. I remember even as a child that hackers fascinated me and if I ever got a chance to go into that field that I would. I write blog posts about social engineering and hacking and wanted to explore that more in this book. Challenges for this book were to make hacking not just “staring at a computer screen” and pushing the story line out to 2055 when grydscaen takes place. I also wanted to make sure I didn’t write a log book about how to hack into a corporation for fear the government would come knocking on my door so I left stuff out I know purposefully to ensure everyone had a good time reading the story. Also the whole United States Net Neutrality ridiculousness just occurred so this was the right time to write this book which talks about the “gridscan” which goes with the title of the series grydscaen and represents the “network of everything.”
- Tell us one thing about them that we don’t learn from the book, the secret in their past. Jester, the lead hacker in the story, had a mangy black stray pet cat when he lived in the Zone trying to survive after the nuclear blast occurred there when the Atlantea Federation attacked the Pacific Territories. Jester fashions himself a gothic aristocrat wearing elaborate clothes that are smuggled into the Echelons from the City. His high end ridiculously over the top outfits are mostly black and dark and are inspired by this pet cat which he loved and would sit on the desk in the bunker where he started the Jester Hacker Guild when he was hacking into street lights which is his past time causing traffic havoc. Jester does not talk about the cat in the book but the animal had a deep impact on him.
Personal Questions:
- If you had the opportunity to live one year of your life over again, which year would you choose, and why? I liked being eleven years old. It was the age I started writing seriously in middle school, it was the age I determined I would be androgenous like David Bowie and discovered his music after seeing “The Man Who Fell to Earth” and saw the scene with him and all the televisions. The Packrat Sprawl in grydscaen has a wall of televisions that was inspired by that very scene in the center of the hacker lair as does the Jester hacker guild.
- Tell me one thing hardly anyone knows about you. I am a Zen Buddhist monk. I took vows, received my robes, bowls, made my rakusu (I have two), and shaved my head. I meditate daily, eat simply and am a vegetarian (often times vegan). I use technology and my writing to increase my Zen practice of simplicity and ephemerality. I still follow my traditions and do free spiritual counseling for homeless teens based in the teachings of the Dharma and the Buddha.
Fun Questions:
- If you could create a new holiday, what would it be? I created a few holidays in grydscaen. One of them is called “Holling” and it is a feast day when once more it was safer to go outside after the radiation died down from the initial blast by the nuclear bomb when the Atlantea Federation attacked the Pacific Territories. On Holling there is no milk consumed due to the radiation levels and food is served outside with elaborate preparation. Holling was the first day the air raid sirens did not go off warning of high radiation. There are 5 holidays in grydscaen, this one which is talked about a few times is my favorite.
- What are you working on now, and when can we expect it? Right now grydscaen: dark was just published and The Seer of Ice and Sky book 2 is in beta. I am also working on book 6, the final novel in the graphic noiz series.
“Not here. Hide the data till we are off the street. This way,” Toapfyl hurriedly motioned to the data messenger in the blue military coat, dark cargo pants and combat boots who followed him off the sidewalk and down another alley. He was wearing the typical garb for a data messenger which made Toapfyl comfortable when he met the stranger in the alley leaning against the wall, easily identifiable.
Toapfyl, a Level 3 hacker, was wearing maroon jeans and a zippered black hoodie pulled over his ebony half shaved head, exposing a slap of dirty brown dreadlocks gathered in a ponytail at his forehead hiding his right eye.
A prostitute wearing a pink miniskirt and fishnet stockings kissed a businessman in a black suit under a sickly yellow streetlight. Toapfyl and the data messenger were once again shrouded in shadow by the derelict buildings as they passed leaving the two to their pleasure.
Toapfyl pushed in a dilapidated door at the end of the alley, grime from the street creating a dusty haze in the air leaving a putrid stink. They entered a staircase. There was no light as they descended. Toapfyl sparked up his aegis to his hand, the manifestation of his psychic power, and lit a path to the basement.
He pushed in the door onto a dimly lit room and revealed Jester, the leader of the Jester hacker guild sitting in a rickety folding chair in the center of the empty room smoking a cigarette from a long black holder. A soft haze filtered over him from a light fixture dangling precariously from ceiling wires, the glass cover filled with dead moths that had happened their way inside and lived out their final days circling the artificial sun. The wan flickering light cast shadows that danced at the corners, the bulb swinging back and forth, moved by the basement door opening.
Legs crossed, Jester was wearing black patent leather platform boots, a shiny mahogany lace skirt, skintight black denim jeans, and a slick dark vinyl blouse with embroidered crimson roses, He sported an elaborate olive short coat with a high collar and dark cuffs and epaulets. A monocle optical sensor over his right eye, he was wearing a green top hat with a scarlet rose perched at the brim. His pink straight, shoulder length hair shined in the light.
He made an irritated gesture with his hand. “Don’t keep me waiting. Where is it?” Jester took a long drag from the cigarette and blew out a puff of smoke. He waved as Toapfyl closed the door.
“Not until I get paid.” The shocked data messenger prompted pulling out a red etched credit sized data card shaking it.
“Do the needful,” ordered Jester raising an eyebrow. He turned his back to them as he continued to smoke his cigarette taking a long drag.
Toapfyl pulled a platinum credit card out of his back pocket. The data messenger pulled his. They locked the two cards at the long end, pins embedded in the technology. Toapfyl typed out the amount of 55,000 credits on the virtual keyboard appearing on the face of his card. The cards chimed signaling the encryption key matched and the credits transferred from Toapfyl’s account.
The data messenger released his card and ran it through a handheld confirming the amount. He nodded stashing the handheld in his chest pocket.
“Done,” responded Toapfyl.
Jester turned back around not witnessing the exchange purposefully and stuck out his hand with his black lacquered fingernails in the knitted fingerless gloves. The stitching was coming apart at the seams on the thumb and index finger, the gloves covered in little white pills. Where everything about Jester’s appearance was immaculate, the gloves gave away an underlying confusion or sloppy disregard for his perfect veneer.
Jester was one of the hacker guild leaders who almost never showed his face in public. It was well known that Jester did not make meetings with data messengers or low level hackers, like a Level 3. He couldn’t be bothered with them. The fact that the data messenger insisted, and that Toapfyl made it happen, kept the data messenger on guard. He placed the red card in Jester’s palm and turned to leave.
Toapfyl jerked raising a gun to the data messenger’s temple. He touched skin. “No one leaves until the data is confirmed.”
Rom, the teenage Level 9 hacker, emerged from the shadows behind Jester. Eyebrow raised, he was annoyed with Toapfyl. Rom pulled a handheld out of his tan trench coat as he came into the dim light. His dull blonde unkempt hair gleamed with a blue streak at the front. He took the data card from Jester and swiped it in the port on the handheld reading the file as the system ran the security check. He typed on the deck triggering an encryption key prompt as the handheld’s computerized female voice spoke the request.
“The data is encrypted? Why didn’t you mention that?” questioned Toapfyl suspicious. He pushed the gun barrel closer taking a step in and made the data messenger move his head back.
“No problem,” interrupted Rom. “Most data messengers are Packrat Runners smuggling data from the City into the Echelons. It should take a Packrat decrypt key. I have access to the Packrats’ archive of one-time, pre-shared obscure keys. What I need for this, right?”
“That is why I wanted Jester at the meet. Toapfyl, all data messengers use encryption. If you don’t know that, you are an idiot. No self-respecting hacker attached to Jester would even ask the question you did just now. Only a Level 9 can penetrate. Jester would know a Level 9. Rom is one of the best in the business,” the data messenger revealed his disgust with Toapfyl and yanked the gun out of his hand pointing it back at the hacker.
Toapfyl blanched confused how he had been disarmed and lowered his eyebrows at the disrespect. Rom shot him an angry glare silencing him.
Jester smirked giving Rom permission to engage and waved the data messenger off. The messenger lowered the gun handing it back to Toapfyl.
Toapfyl opened the basement door and motioned the data messenger out accompanying him up the stairs leaving Jester in the room with Rom.
He studied animation and game design in art school and has published the grydscaen manga “A Storm’s Coming” which features the LGBT teen Rom from “grydscaen: dark,” and two manga in the yaoi series “graphic noiz.” Two episodes of the short anime “A Storm’s Coming” is available with a third episode planned. Four counseling centers are currently using the “A Storm’s Coming” novelette to help LGBT homeless youth and troubled teens with self esteem.
He is author of the dystopian cyberpunk “grydscaen” series, the dark fantasy trilogy “”The Seer of Grace and Fire,” and the yaoi novels and manga “graphic noiz.” He enjoys skydiving, cosplay, watching anime in Japanese, watching French news, World Cub futbol, eating ramen and anything with matcha, and writing poetry.
Author Website: http://www.grydscaen.com
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