#seranid

[junypr-camus]

psst.

It'll soon be six months since I published A City Without Birds, so to celebrate I'll be making the e-book free for a few days! Please interact with this post if you want to be tagged when that happens.

[junypr-camus]

“The cameras aren’t watching you. You’re watching yourself.”

If you’re into dystopian science fiction, a feisty yet fragile aro-ace genius, found family, or the likes of Hunger Games and Ready Player One, you might like this story about fighting a government that no longer needs to use overt propaganda — because it can manipulate minds into creating a destructive social order.

Genre: Science Fiction Tropes: dystopia, propoganda & mind control, memories, cyberpunk, the price of change Aesthetics: moodboards

You can get it here! And it's free with Kindle Unlimited :)

More info below!

Terry Silver doesn’t know she’s living a lie. Despite the feisty attitude that angers her university teachers, she’s unaware of the dissentious thoughts erased from her mind, or the half-truths fed to millions of Seranidians to maintain the paradise of the City. Even, of the fact that she may have taken a life. But when the mysterious Professor Camus Remin whisks her from the crosshairs of Seranid’s elite killing squad and into Slums, she finds stolen memories — including ones of her long-dead father — and a people trampled by innovation — who call her the Phoenix that will herald the rebirth of the nation. As Terry tries to foment an uprising, she faces more than her own mortality: resurfacing trauma, the deaths of loved ones, and the looming threat of all-out nuclear war. She’s forced to ask herself: what price would you pay for change?

CHARACTERS

Terry Silver: Barely having known her father, with a mother who doesn’t notice her, Terry grows up contrarian, her feet planted on the ground in Seranid City, where everyone’s heads are in the skies. Her rebelliousness when the task force is sent to eliminate her for something she can't remember. Terry’s first memory | Sketches | Terry’s mirror

Camus Remin: First her physics professor, Camus becomes Terry’s friend and confidant after he whisks her out of the City and into the Slums, away from the government’s prying eyes (or so they believe). It’s only later that Terry realizes why… Quote��| Sketch

Marco Luiz: An old friend of Camus and a resident of the Slums, Marco knows the injustices of Seranid’s system firsthand. Both idealist and kind-hearted, he’s quick to sacrifice himself to help those in need.

Janette Thornell: Hardened by past failures, the steely leader of the Resistance often clashes with Terry. But despite her stony countenance, Janette loves those she protects. And she hides a secret that only her lover Emmy doesn’t know. Janette’s Secret

Emmy Wood: A City surgeon who defected to the Resistance, Emmy is more a scientist than a fighter. But when fate separates her, Camus, Marco and Terry from the rest of the Resistance, the four must learn to fight – and survive – together.

OC’s a ten but…

SETTINGS

North America, in the distant future…

Three countries share North America: materialistic Seranid on the West Coast, militaristic Leifen in the East, and modest Mirena, caught between the two superpowers. Each has their own way of surviving in this cruel new world, and each has their own flaws.

Seranid sees itself as bold and innovative, and yet the Slums, where the workers hide, share more with the farms of Mirena than they do with the skyscrapers of the City.

More Descriptions | Sketches | Leifen | Mirena | Ideals

THE SYSTEM OF SERANID

Seranid’s Government rules Seranid by dividing the country. Knowledge workers: doctors, engineers, teachers, and scientists are kept in the City, a bubble of utopia, while the rest are cast into the Slums, where poverty, disease, and corruption run rampant. Status symbols implanted at birth label Seranidians and feed them propaganda, altering their thoughts and memories to keep them in line. The task force eliminates any remaining rebels. The Council, the coalition of the six business heads of Seranid, is the guiding force and source of comfort in many Seranidian’s lives. From controlling the weather in the City to providing aid to those in need, they are the sympathetic heart of Seranid. And the driver behind the City’s endless consumerism. Propoganda

[junypr-camus]

I present to you...

stop motion gifs!

progress pics below the cut

a few hours drawing and cutting

experimental word scrabble

I shot this in three different sessions... oops. Shouldn't have filmed next to a window. But pretty happy with the attempt

I used Stop Motion Studio. Pretty barebones, but functional and easy to use if anyone wants to try it out themselves

[junypr-camus]

It's......... done!!!

Literally cannot believe. But. A City Without Birds is now available for preorder (will be released June 14!!!)

And now the nice, polished version will all the dogfights and memory manipulation and antimatter bombs (oops maybe I shouldn't spoil) and geniuses-who-cannot-for-the-life-of-me-take-care-of-themselves is out there in the wild.

ahhhhh *quiet screams*

[junypr-camus]

Favorite Lines Tag

Thanks for the tag, @sourrcandy!

RULES: post a line that you're tremendously proud of writing & a line that’s just out-of-context ridiculous.

FAVORITE: My four-year-old gaze met his, and for a moment I saw the sea behind his eyes, saw the storm that threatened to wash away all the colors in the world.

RIDICULOUS: With that snoring? I don’t think even the freshly dead could.

Tagging: @lyutenw, @violets-in-her-arms-writes, @gk-writes, @on-noon, and @talesofsorrowandofruin! (no pressure :)

[junypr-camus]

Last line tag

Thanks for the tag, @winterandwords!

From A City Without Birds (formerly Seranid):

Carolina had eased Emma to the ground. She pounced. I had only a moment to flinch, putting my hands up to stop the twin blades within her hands. I caught a glimpse of the gleam off of the blades, a flash of her flaming red hair —

Tagging @sam-glade, @rexxles, @planetahmane, @aether-wasteland-s, and @timetobuttonmash!

[junypr-camus]

Find the word tag

Thanks for the tag, @oh-no-another-idea!

My words: three, grind, peel, flash, taken from A City Without Birds

three

I had woken up in many places in the past three weeks — Marco's floor, the Resistance base, the back of a van, and most recently, the back of a helicopter. But nothing matched the disappointment of waking on a concrete pavement between two mud-splattered concrete walls, with an ache in your legs and a stiffness in your spine that would not let you walk. It was made worse by the fact that the only other conscious living thing was the pigeon who was looking at you like you were a half-eaten chip packet.

grind

“Can’t risk collateral damage,” Professor Remin whispered. “It’s hard to make people forget a wound.” “Forget?” His answer was drowned in the sound of grinding machinery. An agent had switched off the elevator, forcing people to pour off of it. The few above us turned, staring at the commotion.

peel

When reds and oranges burnished the sky, we stopped at the nearest town, passing the houses one by one as we searched for flaming hearts. In a narrow alley, where the house’s ceramic roofs nearly met and the path was nothing more than pounded gravel and sand, we found a door covered in peeling paint, bearing a single paper ornament — a black flaming heart. Emmy dismounted her bike, and pulled off her helmet. She glanced at us, one eyebrow raised. I nodded. This must be the place.

flash

I turned away from him, closing my eyes. “Fine.” I tried to let the air running through my lungs calm me with its chill, but all I felt was the bite of choking smoke, and a flash of blown-away screams.

Tagging @inkovert, @isabellebissonrouthier, and @kyofsonder to find red, midnight, fear, dream, wish.

[junypr-camus]

Heads Up Seven Up

Thank you for the tags, @dogmomwrites, @happystarfishnightmare, @spuddlespud and @autumnalwalker!

Been fixing up Seranid to flesh up the story, so here's a part I added in towards the beginning:

The more I looked, the more I saw signs of life. Life unlike that in the City, life in which those living had to find new ways to assert themselves, because personalities weren’t ready to buy from the nearest convenience store. I saw dyed cloths covering the gap-toothed windows and cut paper lanterns made from newspaper scraps and most of all, spray painted art. There was the forest of fists uplifted, the murals of the sea, a painting of a bird soaring above the cares of the world. But the mural that called to me the most, the mural that seemed almost freshly painted, was a mural of a girl with fiery wings. Feathers of flame outstretched, she rose towards the sky, trailing a dress of ashes behind her. Her arms reached upward, longing for a better future. I felt myself in her pose, myself with those soaring wings. I saw the looping writing that surrounded her: Terry Silver. Our phoenix. Our hope. My heart stopped.

Tagging @talesofsorrowandofruin, @writingpotato07, @wildswrites, @eccaiia, @writersandpoetsunited, @isabellebissonrouthier, and @l-antre-des-merveilles!

[junypr-camus]

Wip Intro: SERANID

One outsider. One professor. A decades-old Resistance. And maybe a plan to change this nation. My name is Terry Silver. I'm tired of running from Seranid's government. It's my time to take a stand. This is my story.

Genre: Science Fiction

Tropes: dystopia, propoganda & mind control, memories, cyberpunk, the price of change

Aesthetics: moodboards

Settings

North America, in the distant future...

Three countries share North America: materialistic Seranid on the West Coast, militaristic Leifen in the East, and modest Mirena, caught between the two superpowers. Each has their own way of surviving in this cruel new world, and each has their own flaws.

Seranid sees itself as bold and innovative, and yet the Outskirts of Seranid, where the workers hide, share more with the farms of Mirena than they do with the skyscrapers of the City.

More Descriptions | Sketches | Leifen | Mirena | Ideals

Characters

Terry Silver: Barely having known her father, with a mother who doesn't notice her, Terry grows up contrarian, her feet planted on the ground in Seranid City, where everyone's heads are in the skies. Her rebelliousness gets her in trouble after she writes an essay that is reported to the government -- and the task force is sent to eliminate her. Terry's first memory | Sketches | Terry's mirror

Camus Remin: First her physics professor, Camus becomes Terry's friend and confidant after he whisks her out of the City and into the Slums, away from the government's prying eyes (or so they believe). It's only later that Terry realizes why... Quote | Sketch

Marco Luiz: An old friend of Camus and a resident of the Slums, Marco knows the injustices of Seranid's system firsthand. Both idealist and kind-hearted, he's quick to sacrifice himself to help those in need.

Janette Thornell: Hardened by past failures, the steely leader of the Resistance often clashes with Terry. But despite her stony countenance, Janette loves those she protects. And she hides a secret that even her lover Emmy doesn't know. Janette's Secret

Emmy Wood: A City surgeon who defected to the Resistance, Emmy is more a scientist than a fighter. But when fate separates her, Camus, Marco and Terry from the rest of the Resistance, the four must learn to fight -- and survive -- together.

OC's a ten but...

The System of Seranid

Seranid's Government rules Seranid by dividing the country. Knowledge workers: doctors, engineers, teachers, and scientists are kept in the City, a bubble of utopia, while the rest are cast into the Slums (formally known as the Outskirts of Seranid), where poverty, disease, and corruption run rampant. Status symbols implanted at birth label Seranidians and feed them propaganda, altering their thoughts and memories to keep them in line. The task force eliminates any remaining rebels. The Council, the coalition of the six business heads of Seranid, is the guiding force and source of comfort in many Seranidian's lives. From controlling the weather in the City to providing aid to those in need, they are the sympathetic heart of Seranid. And the driver behind the City's endless consumerism. Propoganda

Read

Currently about a third of the story is posted, but almost all of it is written. I try to update Seranid every 2-3 days. Inkitt | Wattpad

[junypr-camus]

Incorrect Quotes

Thanks for the tag, @kyofsonder and @caligraphyzev! This was so much fun :)

Rules: use this quote generator & list as many quotes as you like using characters from your WIPs, then tag as many people as quotes you listed.

Terry: The next time I open up to someone, it'll be my autopsy.

Camus: Do you know that we are made out of atoms? Camus: And atoms never touch each other. Camus: So in my defense, officer. I did not punch this kid.

Marco: Yeah, well I've never died so how do I know that god is real.

Terry: My life isn't as glamorous as my wanted poster makes it look.

Emmy: Firstly, how dare you use mathematics to make me look stupid! Emmy: I’m actually very good at mathematics. Emmy: Thirdly, I think you might be right.

Janette: WHOEVER CAUSED THIS MESS IS GOING TO- Emmy: It was me... Janette: ...Is going to be forgiven because everyone deserves a second chance.

I'll tag (no pressure) @vmccombs, @ezestreet, @verba-writing, @eccaiia, @wildswrites, and @starlightscribe!

[junypr-camus]

The Phoenix

Thanks to @flashfictionfridayofficial for the prompt! This is a short piece, building on the world of Seranid.

That’s why they called me the Phoenix. The girl who would rise from the ashes of the old Resistance. Who would create a country reborn.

Some days when we were working in the basement, I would notice Camus watching me. Watching the way I held a pair of pliers, the way I twisted my connections and squinted at the soldered joint. There was a heavy gray in his eyes, like clouds on an overcast day, a thickness that even the sun could not penetrate.

Some days, I felt that his eyes were still cloaked in the past.

He always looked away when he realized that I realized that he was watching me. But one day I stared back. Willed him to meet my gaze with my narrowed eyes.

Camus stared at the gutted droid in front of him, his slender fingers tracing the tangle of wires. He had wire clippers in his hand, but he wasn’t cutting anything. Just looking. He didn’t meet my gaze. He said, “You work just like him.”

I pressed my lips together and set down the pliers. I knew who he meant. Ethan Silver. My father. The man whom everyone seemed to know, except me. The parent who was robbed from me when I was only four.

It was always the first thing that people here asked me. “You’re Ethan’s daughter, aren’t you?” If it wasn’t something in the deep brown of my eyes or the arc of my cheekbones, it was something in the way I moved. The way I cut through crowds like they weren’t there, spun stories of what could be with every step. Like I knew where I was going, and would bend space and time to get there.

That’s why they called me the Phoenix. The girl who would rise from the ashes of the old Resistance. Who would create a country reborn.

I didn’t know if that was who I was. Who I could be. It had only been a week since I learned how the original Resistance was formed, how it failed, and how my father died.

The memory of that stark, sterile room, the memory that wasn’t even mine, still haunted me. When I looked at Camus, I saw that it haunted him too. Shadows of the past encircled his eyes; invisible scars drew lines across his skin.

He saw my father in me, just like they all did. At least he didn’t see me as the Phoenix, too.

I watched the pliers glint in the flickering light, bright against the layer of dust that we had yet to sweep away. “I’m not my father,” I said. “And I’m not the Phoenix. Not the one everyone expects me to be.”

His gaze shifts from the droid to meet mine, eyebrows raised ever so slightly.

“But I wanted to continue their legacy,” I said. “I want to honor them.”

He gave me a nod and the faintest hint of a smile. He whispered, “You will.”

[junypr-camus]

Unusual Character Associations

Jumping onto @thenightmarewrites's tag game!

Tagging: @on-noon, @houndsofcorduff, @kyofsonder, @shineywrites, @talesofsorrowandofruin!

Terry Silver, from Seranid.

Seasoning: lemon pepper

Weather: a crisp spring breeze

Color: crimson

Sky: foggy golden sunset

Magical power: telekinesis

House plant: venus fly trap

Weapon: swiss army knife

Subject: spacetime

Social media: no

Makeup product: crimson hair dye

Candy: dark chocolate covered pomegranate seeds

Fear: vulnerability

Ice cube shape: crushed ice

Method of long-distance travel: wormhole

Art style: neoclassical

Mythological creature: dragon

Piece of stationery: swiss army knife

Three emojis: 😶🏍️🪛

Celestial body: mars

[junypr-camus]

Heads Up Seven Up

Thanks for tagging, @kyofsonder (x3), @on-noon (x2), @houndsofcorduff, @blind-the-winds, @thenightmarewrites, @writingpotato07, @caligraphyzev, and ANYONE ELSE I MIGHT HAVE MISSED!

I realize this is very late. Very sorry.

As we gazed upon the room, the lights brightened to the brilliance of a cloudless dawn, casting the room in a pure white that put all other whites to shame. Just as fast as it came, the light faded away, melting into a scene of the City. Holograms depicted the City’s buildings on the walls, making us feel as if we were on the roof of the tallest building in the City. To our left was the University; to our right, the entertainment district. And both in front and behind us stretched the City, a galaxy of illuminated windows to match the stars above.

I am going to leave this as an open tag!

[junypr-camus]

Heads up, seven up tag

Thanks for the tag, @autumnalwalker!

Tagging @forthelanterns, @worldstogetlostin, and @on-noon!

From Seranid!

Camus had been staring at the formless sheet over the gurney. His voice was low and hoarse when he spoke. “They’ve already started.”

Emmy clasped her hands over her mouth, but the sobs escaped her fingers. “Oh Seranid,” she whispered. “Oh sweet Seranid.”

Pince leaned back on the console, basking in the stickiness of the situation. His grin grew with each sob until it nearly split his face open.

I felt Camus step closer to me, felt the edge of his coat brushing my hand. He whispered my name under his breath, his lips unmoving, so subtle that it could have been the wind whipping around the buildings. Then he pressed something into my hand.

An impossibly heavy coin.

I flicked my wrist, letting the coin tumble, and spin, and fall just the tiniest bit too slow. It unspooled, and unfurled, in an instant engulfing Pince, Camus, my mother and I in an impenetrable dome of darkness. Pince whipped the gun around, pointing it at my chest. I tried to fake an intimidating laugh, though it came out as more of a wheeze. 

“Don’t try that,” I said. “If you kill us you’ll be here until you die.”

[junypr-camus]

Manuscript Search Tag

Thanks for the tag, @talesofsorrowandofruin!

My words: simple, memorise, stammer, arrogant and accidental.

simple:

I recognized the handwriting immediately. Strong downstrokes, tight loops. Simple, written in fountain pen. It was the same handwriting on the letters my mother kept in her bedside nightstand — and cried over when she thought no one was looking. It was my father’s handwriting.

memorize:

“Try locational info,” I suggested. “See if she remembers how the building’s laid out, where things are, that kind of thing.” “Ah. Yes. She has most of the psychology area memorized. I’ll take that.”  He made a grabbing gesture.  “We can save the little bit of knowledge she had, see if we can piece it together. It probably won’t be very helpful, but it’s worth a try. Ok. I’ll —”  He broke off. “What was that?” We froze, straining to hear the hum over the pounding of our hearts. Gyrocopter blades. Seranid gyrocopter blades.

stammer:

Henry shrunk away, struck by Skylar’s words. “I-I was trying to save her,” he stammered. “The government was going to kill your mother for restoring people’s memories. I was trying to take her name off the hit list.” “No you weren’t. Your meddling put her name on that list. Or did your head get messed up when they wiped your memory?”

arrogant: This describes Terry perfectly, but considering the story's told from her perspective, she isn't going to say it.

accidental: This also didn't come up :(

I'll leave this as an open tag. Your words are: false, alone, bird, dream, unlike

[junypr-camus]

Find the Word Tag

Thanks for the tag, @kyofsonder!

My words: voice, equal, second, purpose, and greed.

voice:

“Alright,” he said, “once I pass back your test, you are dismissed.” He went, from row to row, handing back papers and whispering condolences or congradulations, in a voice old not just in age but in manner too, the same cadence that must have been used to announce Einstein’s special relativity, the cracking of the Enigma code, or the discovery of the Higgs Boson over 200 years ago. It was a voice that brought one back to a time when there were still hills and moors filled with heather, overseen by rainy, damp weather instead of the City’s near-perpetual sun.

equal: somehow this only comes up once

“I was born in Leifen, under the monarchy. My parents had two children. Two daughters. They taught us to take the world in our hands; to change it for the better. When we got older Anne joined the Equitist Party. She wanted to overthrow the monarchy and establish a completely equal society. I wanted to help others, so I traveled abroad to Seranid, where Ethan found me and brought me into his Resistance."

second:

I watched him out of the corner of my eye, worried that I would break down if I faced him. “I’ll be fine,” I said, more to the smudged outline of the Slums than to him. I fumbled with the throttle for a second; Anjali glanced at me and we gave each other a nod. We turned as one and sped off, the wind visceral against my skin, trailing its long fingers through my hair. I closed my eyes, wiped the grit of my face, and cleared my mind, conjuring to life the image of the task force officers patrolling the border. Shaded helmets, sky blue uniforms with turquoise trim, the crest over our hearts, the bullet-proof bulk. I squeezed my eyes, then opened them, blinking. Our edges were fragmented by holograms; bit by bit we became our worst enemy.

purpose:

Like Seranid, Leifen’s capital was prosperous, busy, and for the most part clean. But that was where the similarities ended. Instead of curved cells, Leifen’s buildings were blocks and needles of steel, glass, and concrete, squatting by the road or piercing the air. The residences and apartments had a no-nonsense, cookie cutter feel to them, repeating with a regularity that gave me the feeling that I was looking into infinity whenever I glanced down a side road. The place didn’t seem hostile, per se, but there was a sense of unwelcoming austerity. The people here walked with purpose — soldier straight, cog-and-cam-like purpose. Their clothes were starched white and gray, with a uniformity that mirrored the buildings around them. No one stopped to look at us, or the buildings, or the wristwatches and earpieces I expected them to have. There were no neon signs or holographic advertisements to distract them. They walked as if seeing nothing but the steps in front of them, oblivious to the rest of the world.

greed: this didn't come up, but here's disagreed:

I opened my eyes, taking in the people before me. They held hope in their gazes, meeting my eyes with those that had seen the deaths of loved ones and refused to let those deaths be in vain. Upon meeting their gaze I felt the fluttering in my chest die. Despite everything we had been through, everything we had disagreed about, we were in this together. As one.

I'll leave this as an open tag! Your words are: false, alone, bird, dream, unlike