Dominion Rising Bonus Swag

by Gwynn White

  What would the character most like to change about herself: She would really like to be driven and passionate about something important, to do something important and meaningful with her life.

  RELATIONSHIP WITH OTHERS:

  Opinion of other people in general: Overall she likes people, but she’s a little afraid of them. She has a fairly optimistic view of human beings in general, but when it comes to individual people she’s cautious.

  Does the character hide her true opinions and emotions from others? To some degree, yes. She feels she has to, to appear “normal.” She also hides her ambition from the world to a large degree, and the fact that her “laziness” is much more a lack of direction / frustration with her options versus genuine disinterest in working.

  Person character most hates: Tina (Jaden’s “biggest fan”)

  Best friend(s): Cass and her adoptive brother, Jon

  Person character goes to for advice: Jon

  Person character feels responsible for or takes care of: her mother, Cass

  Person character feels shy or awkward around: Revik

  Person character openly admires: her brother, Jon

  Person character secretly admires: Feminine women that men like (like Tina, the groupie who hangs all over Jaden)

  Most important person in character’s life before story starts: Jon and her mother

  After story starts: Revik

  Character Interview: ALLIE

  Welcome! Please introduce yourself…

  Hi, my name is Allie Taylor, but most people just call me Allie or Al. What is this for again, exactly?

  It’s just an interview about you and your world. Can you tell us anything about yourself?

  About my “world?” (laughs) There’s not a lot to tell, really. I’m twenty-seven years old. Human. I’ve lived in San Francisco my whole life. I’m a waitress. I do tattoos on the side. I’m a sometimes dabbler in other art-isms of various kinds.

  You say you’re human, but hasn’t that been in question at times?

  What? No! My race has never been in question. Who told you that?

  You have a rare blood disease, don’t you?

  Yeah, a human blood disease. I’ve been tested hundreds of times, so I’m not sure where you got that “race in question” thing. I’ve never come up as anything other than human, and I’ve probably been tested ten times more than anyone I know, since I was adopted and they never found my birth parents.

  What about your adopted parents? Can you tell us anything about them?

  Like what? They are amazing. I completely lucked out. I can’t imagine that my birth parents could have held a candle to either of them. I feel lucky they abandoned me, truthfully. I can’t even imagine what kind of person I would be without either of them.

  Your father is deceased now, right?

  Yes. From MS… multiple sclerosis. (Pauses) I really don’t want to talk about that.

  Your mother has a drinking problem, right?

  Yeah, we’re not going to talk about that, either. Find something else.

  Can you tell us a little bit about your world?

  Well, from what you’ve said, my world is a lot like yours. Only in mine, humans discovered another race of people living in the mountains in Asia around not long before the turn of the last century, in the late 1890s, I think. From what you said, your world only has humans living on it. There are other differences, too, mostly in some of the tech, but a lot of what you said is pretty similar, even a lot of the wars and so on sounded pretty similar.

  Can you tell us about that other race you mentioned?

  I don’t know much, honestly. Just what they teach us in school, and some things I’ve seen on the feeds. A lot of information on seers is pretty tightly guarded by Seer Containment and the World Court, but they do show some things on the black (illegal) feeds. Those are kind of difficult to keep access to, though––they shut them down every few months before they pop up again. My brother Jon is pretty political about that stuff. He thinks the World Court keeps us ignorant about seers so regular, civilian humans don’t freak out and realize that the World Court and major corporations are using seers to spy on us and control our minds. I think he’s overstating it, honestly, but he might have a point about them worrying about regular people panicking. There are tons of conspiracy theories out there about seers as it is.

  What can you tell us about them?

  Well, their official name is Sarhaciennes or “Sarks” for short, but humans mostly just call them seers. They look a lot like us but they’re actually a completely different species with whole different DNA and blood types. They can’t reproduce with us. Their organs are actually set up a bit differently, from what I’ve been told.

  They also have these pretty intense psychic powers. They can read minds and push people to do things they don’t want to do and a bunch of other things. That’s what they say on the black feeds, anyway––most of the network feeds talk about them more being used to spy on other countries and corporations, and for the sex trade, of course. Most humans couldn’t afford their own seer, though. They’re really expensive, and all the permits and everything are really expensive too, from what I know.

  If they have all of those powers, how is it that seers are the ones enslaved, instead of humans?

  (Sighs) That’s pretty complicated, from what I know. According to the black feeds, and also some of the history I learned in school, seers had all of these strict rules about when and how they could use their powers, and they were really religious and non-violent. There also weren’t that many of them, compared to us. They breed a lot slower and a lot of them are sterile. Also, humans figured out how to control their powers via sight-restraint collars and so on.

  Supposedly their culture is starting to change though. The black feeds talk about that a lot… about how an uprising is inevitable now, given that the new generation of seers wasn’t raised with the same peaceful ideals of their parents and grandparents.

  So now a lot of the seers are pretty pissed off, and there is a lot more terrorism that’s seer-related these days. Not all of it is from seers themselves––a lot of humans don’t think seers should live around humans, either.

  Basically, we kind of ruined that whole “peaceful” vibe of theirs, not only by experimenting on them and enslaving them, but by forcing them to work in violent or military roles. I think that started with the first two world wars. Now a lot of them are trained to kill and screw with human minds for major corporations and the government… which, yeah, is pretty short-sighted of humans, if you think about it.

  Would you like to be a seer, do you think? If it meant you had their powers?

  Me? No. I’ve seen way too much on the black feeds about what they have to go through, especially as kids. Most are taken from their parents not long after they’re born––trained, beaten, collared, raped. Yeah, no thanks. No amount of “magic powers” would be worth all that.

  Plus, their supposed to have “issues” with sex, which sounds like it would be more of a curse than a blessing.

  What kind of “issues” are those?

  I don’t know the correct term––abnormally high sex drives? Higher sex drives than humans? Whatever the exact differences, to humans they come across as oversexed, and unable to say no to sex or affection. From what I’ve seen on the black feeds, they need sex and affection, or they literally can’t survive. That sounds way too difficult to me.

  Tell us one of your bad habits

  My boyfriend… kidding. Well. Sort of.

  If you lived in the same world as we do, what would you be like?

  Probably the same? It doesn’t sound like your world is that different for people like me, honestly.

  People like you?

  Most humans. Regular people, I guess––civilians. You don’t have to wear headsets all the time or get implanted or tattooed by the government, so that’s a bonus, but I’m not sure I’d have any more luck with the art / money / men side of things in y
our world, either, from what you’ve said. You said you have MS in your world too, so my father likely would have still died. I’d probably be a weirdo magnet in your world too, given that most people drawn to me now are human.

  What’s your favorite piece of artwork you’ve ever made?

  My favorite? (thinks for a minute) Well, I don’t know if it’s the best thing I’ve done, but there’s this table I painted for my boyfriend for his birthday one year, when he said he wanted a coffee table for the house. It had an image of snowy mountains on it, and one of those pyramids I paint a lot, and a boy sitting in the grass, looking up at the sky and the mountains. I don’t know why, but I really liked that one. I would stare at it a lot when I was stuck on a project, or when I was trying to clear my mind. I put glass on it to make it a coffee table since Jaden kept leaving beers on it and it was starting to chip the paint.

  A quickfire round of your favorite things:

  Food: Tuna casserole, big burritos with avocado, sushi in those little boats

  Drink: Espresso dropped in a cup of coffee. Well, okay, I’ve only had that once, but I really liked it. Mostly, I drink a lot of cappuccinos at work.

  Music: For the last few weeks, I’ve been listening to that new seer band, Exit North. Cass kind of got me into them, since she has a huge crush on their lead singer (he is pretty hot). I also like The Hemmings and Borrowed Luck. Those are local SF bands.

  Holiday destination: Definitely somewhere with a beach/ocean, like maybe Hawaii, or Fiji. I don’t know anything about Fiji really, but I saw a picture once and it always stuck with me. The water was so incredibly blue, and there were these grass huts on stilts just sitting out in the middle of it. It looked so peaceful.

  Film: I watch a lot of kung fu movies late at night with my brother. Sometimes we make up whole new plots / words for the ones that weren’t translated into English. Oh, and there was a big seer movie recently that I liked. It was about the life and death of Syrimne, this major seer terrorist during World War I. Maybe even the first seer terrorist. That movie was pretty cool.

  Books: I read a lot of historical fiction and biographies of painters. I also like comic books.

  Color: Sky blue

  Any last words?

  What is this for again? You’re not going to use this for anything public, are you? I’m not really into having my name out on the feeds anywhere, so could you keep this anonymous? Or maybe just use my first name. I’d be okay with that.

  * * *

  WANT TO READ MORE ABOUT ALLIE AND REVIK?

  Try the BRIDGE & SWORD WORLD, starting with: ROOK (Bridge & Sword: Awakenings #1)

  http://www.jcandrijeski.com/rook

  Yanked out of her life by the mysterious Revik, Allie discovers that her blood may not be as “human” as she always thought. When Revik tells her she’s the Bridge, a mystical being meant to usher in the evolution of humanity––or possibly its extinction––Allie must choose between the race that raised her and the one where she might truly belong. A psychic, science fiction romance set in a modern, gritty version of Earth.

  * * *

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  About the Author

  JC Andrijeski is a USA Today bestselling author who writes paranormal mystery, along with apocalyptic and cyberpunk-y science fiction, often with a metaphysical bent.

  JC has a background in journalism, history and politics, and currently occupies herself by traipsing around the globe and reading whatever she can get her hands on. She grew up in the Bay Area of California, but has lived abroad in Europe, Australia and Asia, and from coast to coast in the continental United States. She currently lives and writes full time in Bangkok, Thailand.

  Read More from JC Andrijeski

  http://jcandrijeski.com

  Dating Sucks…especially if you’re an AI.

  (A Warships of the Spire Outtake)

  S.M. Schmitz and Lisa Blackwood

  Vengeance was busy overseeing three-dozen routine repairs, including a minor realignment to his transit engines, which was the least boring of his various tasks, when he paused to evaluate his remaining duties. Unfortunately, next on his list of “most important tasks to be completed by the mighty Spire Warship Vengeance” was a face-to-face meeting between his humanoid drone and Captain Welner and Commander Lisk, which would likely be a few more hours of tedium.

  Oh, how he missed the good old days when there was new territory to explore and patrol, and raiders, insurgents, and pirates to hunt. Alas, long ranger sensory showed no such interesting distractions. He’d have to suck it up and sit through the long meeting with the highest-ranking officers of his crew.

  But maybe there was a way to make the next meeting a little less boring. If he could find an excuse for Master Engineer Goodwin to attend the meeting and, say, bring along his newest apprentice, the prodigy Journeyman Engineer Olivia Hawthorne, that might make for a less monotonous affair. And certainly a more pleasant view.

  Vengeance was just merging with the comm system to invite Goodwin when intense humor invaded his primary core. Curious, he redirected a portion of his consciousness to the source of the disruption. Ah, Renee. His oldest friend and primary telepathic link. She was reading something on one of her mobile energy webs and whatever it was clearly delighted her. At least she hadn’t picked up on his somewhat unhealthy obsession with his newest journeyman engineer.

  But what did Renee find so humorous? There was always one way to find out—a tried and tested Spire AI technique called snooping. Such small distractions—especially ones that might solve a mystery—were always a welcome part of his existence.

  And presently his humanoid drone form wasn’t far from Renee. Four minutes and thirty-nine seconds later, his drone arrived in Renee’s quarters and got an eyeful of what she was reading.

  He wished he’d just gone straight to the meeting. But he hadn’t. Now he stood dead center in the middle of Renee’s quarters with his arms crossed over his chest, glowering at the energy web she was holding out to him.

  “Oh, come on. It’s not going to bite. It’s just a compatibility survey.” She gave the small device a wiggle and grinned at him, her expression making her look young again.

  “I’m not interested.” He frowned at the device, toying with the idea of just neutralizing its data feeds, but that would be juvenile and likely useless since Renee, as his primary link, was also strong enough to reestablish the energy web’s data feeds with little trouble.

  “You’ve been going through a rather long dry spell, don’t you think, Ven?”

  His drone actually winced. Shit. Not this again. Same conversation. Different angle of attack.

  “I don’t think you should worry about my… spells,” he retorted.

  “Somebody has to,” she teased. “As stubborn as you are, you’ll spend the rest of your life sleeping alone—”

  “I don’t sleep,” he interrupted.

  “And where’s the fun in having a nearly immortal existence if you have to sleep alone?” she finished, clearly ignoring him.

  He scowled at the energy web again and shook his head. “No way. Of all your plans, this is by far the worst.”

  “Take it,” Renee ordered.

  “You take it,” Ven shot back, feeling very much like a petulant child.

  Renee arched an eyebrow in his direction, warning him this meant war. He almost regretted his defiance.

  “I, at least, found the love of my life, even if it was only for a short time.” Renee flipped her thick gray braid over one shoulder then lifted her chin, ready for battle. “You, on the other hand, have a very long existence ahead and you haven’t even started to look—”

  “I’m good. Thanks.”

  “No, you’re not.”
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  “That’s my problem then, isn’t it?”

  Renee might be like a sister to him, but that didn’t mean he had to take her shit.

  “This is for your own good, you cantankerous old goat.” Renee poked him in the shoulder to punctuate her words. “If you don’t fill this out, I will do it for you.”

  “Go ahead. It won’t make one bit of difference,” he challenged.

  Renee’s eyes widened a moment then narrowed again thoughtfully as her telepathic gift unfolded and reached for his primary consciousness. He knew she’d found some betraying emotion he hadn’t buried deep enough when she drew in a sharp breath and let it out on a chuckle. “I think a certain Spire Warship is enamored with a certain journeyman engineer. And I think we should talk.”

  Renee sat in a chair in front of a holofire and pointed to the one across from it.

  Inwardly, Vengeance groaned. Once Renee had a scent, there was no putting her off, but maybe if he filled out that damned compatibility survey she’d second guess herself.