Vitalerium: Descent into the Void Part 4 - Nicholas Keating Casbarro - Sci-fi Cyberpunk Dystopian Book

Hey Side Questers! We are back with part 4 of our discussion of Nicholas Keating Casbarro's Vitalerium: Descent into the Void. Nick joins us for this final episode. We get a little taste of the next book in the series.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Nearly six centuries have passed since humanity discovered vitalerium, which ushered in a golden age of space exploration and colonization. Planet Deorum’s society is centered around this illustrious, gravity-bending blue crystal. The year is 2701.

Following a near-fatal disaster, roughneck freelancer Roman Matthews becomes unwittingly trapped at the center of a harrowing conspiracy. Hunted by Deorum’s government, the Coalition for Prosperity, Roman must use his deadly skillset to survive against all odds.

Roman and his band of unlikely allies will discover that the Coalition’s indiscretions threaten the delicate balance of advanced civilization. As a sect of the Coalition prepares to implement its Machiavellian vision of utopia, the proverbial pendulum begins to swing toward chaos

Vitalerium World:
Website: https://vitaleriumseries.com/
Nick’s Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/InsideVitalerium 
YT: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkGe5mgjNnAl2VJ3E5TBmAg 
Insta: https://www.instagram.com/vitaleriumseries 
Twitter: https://x.com/vitalerium 
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@vitaleriumseries 

-Publicist - Eve Bailey / Flo Agency: https://flo.agency/  
-Cosplayer 1 Shanice Foster: Luxsteez Cosplay - https://www.instagram.com/luxsteezcosplay/ 
-Cosplayer 2 Matthew Harden: MH Cosplay Design - https://www.instagram.com/mhcosplaydesign/ 
-Comic Illustrator - Francisco A. Hnilo: https://www.behance.net/fahilustracion 
-Comic Colorist - Chandran Ponnusamy: https://www.facebook.com/ponnusamychandran & https://www.deviantart.com/ponnusamychandran/gallery 
-Graphic Designer - Ahmed Geatar: https://www.behance.net/ahmedgad 


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If you’re a reader looking for something deeper or an indie author working on your book, The Side Quest Book Club is for you. We skip the usual book reviews and ratings. Each episode turns fun side quests into real lessons, so you’ll leave not just entertained, but with a better understanding of why storytelling matters.

[NICK]
He's a funny character, but I actually modeled his personality after a good friend of mine named Mike. And Mike actually won that character in a golf bet with me. He said, if I win, I get to be a character in your book and I get to choose everything about him.

[JONATHAN]
Big wager.

[NICK]
And I said, you get to choose two things. He has to and he and I was like, you You know what's funny? That was a little bit of a learning, growing experience for me because I learned that little things like that, just little tidbits that can make a character more human adds a little bit of color and detail to who they are.

I got a book to finish. I don't want to make Jonathan sad.

[JONATHAN]
Thank you. I appreciate you looking out for me.

[MATT]
That was one of my favorite parts of the book of all the characters that you meet, they all have some sort of depth. They matter. It's not just random NPC one with like, oh, go this way or find this thing.

It's like there was no fetch quests. Everything felt so, like you said, you said organic a couple of times. It felt very organic.

Like I was talking or meeting people.

[SLAVA]
Coming to you from the Endless Library, where every book is read and every spoiler discussed. Join us as we dig into the lives of fictional people who cannot defend themselves. This is the SideQuest Book Club.

[JONATHAN]
Welcome back SideQuesters to the final episode on Dioram with the author himself, Nicholas Keating-Casbaro. Thanks for joining us, Nicholas.

[NICK]
Good to be here.

[JONATHAN]
We absolutely loved your book. And I think I commented on Instagram saying that I really believe it's the like the next IP that could take off because it's got twists. It's got turns.

It's gritty. I don't think we've had a good gritty book in a while. And so for the listeners, we are going to be full spoilers.

If you haven't read the book, pause this episode, come back later. But like we're not, we're just gonna talk about everything. So that's your fair warning.

The rest of it, you'll just have to deal with all the spoilers for, you know, the next 10 books. So Nick told us he's going to tell us all about it and ruin the rest of the series. So if you're here for that, then please stick around.

So we were just talking about this a minute ago, but I made a comment to Nicholas on the socials. I was like, I really thought that Monique was not dead. I really thought that you were going to keep her alive because Roman's starting to soften, you know, a little bit.

And she's dead. She's dead.

[SLAVA]
Very dead.

[JONATHAN]
So that surprised me. It was a twist and then turn.

[SLAVA]
Yeah, I'm glad she's dead.

[JONATHAN]
We know.

[SLAVA]
And not because I hated the character. I loved Monique. I thought she was great for Roman.

But as we were talking about the gritty part, that makes the story so much more dark and gritty. And it leaves Roman still, you know, on the road to softening, to use your terms, Jonathan. So he's still in this position.

He just lost the love of his life. He's lost everything he's known. And now he has to go up against this.

It's called coalition of. Well, it is called the coalition, the coalition of prosperity. So, yeah.

[SPENSER]
Well, I still think Monique's not dead. I feel like she's somehow going to be revealed as alive in book two somewhere.

[JONATHAN]
A bionic woman.

[SPENSER]
Yeah. Somehow. Yeah.

I don't know. Because, yeah, I also expected her to still be to still be alive. So, yeah, definitely a twist there.

[NICK]
I wasn't expecting that would be a very Rick and Morty approach. Did you did you guys ever watch Rick and Morty? Oh, yeah.

It's a bird person. And yes, what was that?

[SLAVA]
Oh, yeah. But oh, yeah. Rick and Morty is one of my favorite.

Yeah. Tammy, I think one of my favorite shows. It's the kind of humor and just weird, dark, off the beaten path stuff that I love.

[NICK]
Yeah, that's definitely right up my alley, too. So I enjoy that stuff. But I'm glad you enjoyed the book.

That's it's thank you guys for the feedback.

[JONATHAN]
Yeah, the I'm most frustrated that book two isn't out yet because I like to crush through series. And so it's frustrating to me, but it's also good because then it gives me something to look forward to. I don't know if any of you other guys do this, but I basically juggle authors because books take a while to write.

And so I'll listen to your book. I'll do somebody else's. Your book comes out again.

I'm coming back to you. Great. I finished that one.

Now where's book three? And then I have to go back to a few other people because I have to wait another round. So that's how I get my fix, if you will.

[NICK]
Well, I'm definitely working hard to make sure I can get book two out for you guys as soon as possible. I actually just finished another chapter yesterday. Still got to.

I've still got a couple more to go. Okay. Just a couple.

And then we get to the fun stuff.

[JONATHAN]
Is it going to be about the same size? Roughly 31 chapters or is it going to be a lot longer?

[NICK]
It's going to be a little longer. Just a little bit.

[JONATHAN]
Good. I honestly would prefer like 60 chapters, frankly. I'm speaking for myself.

I'm not kidding. But I also like a long story because it gives you, as the author, the opportunity to explore more, give me more moments, whether it's drama, action, suspense, whatever you want to take the character on. I then get to sit and enjoy the ride.

So 31 chapters in Vitalarium, not enough for me to get my hit. So we're doing the drug analogies this morning. That's what we're doing.

[NICK]
I'll make sure the second batch is stronger. There you go.

[JONATHAN]
First one's free.

[NICK]
First one's free. It's going to be about 36 chapters. And I've got probably one more narrative in this story than I had in the previous one.

So there's going to be a lot going on in this book. But once again, everything's going to tie together throughout the story. And we're going to see some unlikely folks joining forces.

And I'll leave it at that.

[SPENSER]
Nice.

[SLAVA]
Yeah. Well, we got that a little bit at the end of the book, the former cop or whatever. He's kind of a cop, right?

[JONATHAN]
CP guard.

[SLAVA]
CP guard and Roman. Roman, he's too. Oh, yeah.

Braxton Hughes.

[NICK]
Yeah. So he's the commander. He was the commander of Durail station, the mining operation at Durail station for the CPIO.

So interstellar operations. Yeah. And he's a funny character.

I don't know if I mentioned this the last time, but I actually modeled his personality after a good friend of mine named Mike. And Mike is a little bit of a ball buster. And Mike actually won that character in a golf bet with me.

OK, let's hear that.

[JONATHAN]
What were you guys playing? How many holes? What was the rundown?

[NICK]
This was so we were probably two holes in and I'm feeling pretty confident. I'm shooting really well that day, apparently. And he starts throwing out bets.

And at one point he says, well, I'll tell you what, if I win, because, you know, I had a really good shot off T number three. He said, if I win, I get to be a character in your book and I get to choose everything about him. And I said, and I said, you get to choose two things.

And he said, OK. And I don't even remember what I asked for, but he ended up kicking my ass on the back nine. And yeah, so we're sitting, we're driving back in the golf cart.

I said, all right, what's your two things? He said he has to not be able to take care of house plants and he hates the sound of Velcro. And I was like, you mother.

That's it. But I already worked one of them in there. Nice.

I don't know if you noticed that, but I did not. So as he is, you first meet Braxton, you're on Doral station. He's basically laying in bed, listening to the Cyrus Boland show, which is basically a legal media.

And he gets ready. He goes out for the day. He passes a dead house plant, like a dead succulent.

And then it was, which was a gift from one of his. Oh, I do remember that. Yeah.

And so she comes up, she walks up to him at the end. She's like, permission to speak, sir. And he's like, granted, shoot.

And she goes, water your plant. Yeah. Yes.

Yep.

[JONATHAN]
I did think that was a, there was a, a moment that stood out that I was like, huh. Okay. Uh, interesting.

[NICK]
I, you know, it's funny. That was a little bit of a, a learning growing experience for me because I learned that little things like that, just little tidbits that can make a character more human, make them just adds a little bit of color and detail to who they are. That can help massively in terms of making a character memorable.

And it was kind of a happy accident that I, uh, that I lost that, that, because I found that throughout the book, doing that with certain characters would be, would actually make them just, it would, they would stick in people's heads a little bit more. And finding, finding little things to, uh, little quirks to give people and little actions, whether it's like a little tick that they do or a little, uh, the way they speak. Um, like Norval's a good example of that.

Norval's are always kind of like, it's like his brain's moving faster than his mouth. So it's all always kind of like stuttering a little bit or, uh, yeah.

[SLAVA]
I like Norval a lot. I don't know if I told you Nick, but I did tell the guys as we were discussing him, he reminds me of the doctor from Metal Gear Solid. Like the doctor who helps snake and he's kind of quirky and a little mousy and, but very smart and working with Roman against the bad guys in Metal Gear Solid.

Like I pictured him in my head, like I had this nostalgic moment, like to me being 14 playing my PS1 at two in the morning and playing Metal Gear Solid. And all I could picture as Norval would talk in any of the scenes was that guy in that game. So it was a very nostalgic moment for me.

[NICK]
And it's, it's, that's awesome. I'm glad, I'm glad it kind of triggered that because that's, if you can trigger like a memory of someone with some, you know, a personality that you create, like that's, that's a good thing. It's, it's, uh, it, it means that it's reading real like us, or at least reminding you of someone that you've seen or met before, or in this case, you know, Metal Gear Solid, it's been, you'll have to forgive me.

It's been a while since I've played Metal Gear. Oh, same. Well, what was the character's name again?

[SLAVA]
I forget the character's name, but I can look him up real quick. It's the doctor from Metal Gear Solid. So bear with me here.

[JONATHAN]
Well, he's looking that up. Did you lose any other bets or have any other unique stories in how the characters came about for the book?

[NICK]
No, no, no other bets lost.

[JONATHAN]
All right.

[NICK]
I do, I do have, um, a couple of characters that I, I am basing on people I know in future books. One of them, one of them you won't get to meet until book three, and the other one you won't get to meet until probably book four or five.

[JONATHAN]
Oh, wow.

[NICK]
And yeah. And, uh, those, those will be interesting characters for sure. Um, and, and, and this time I actually, I gave, I gave them a little bit of, uh, freedom to, to decide what kind of characters they wanted to be.

And I'm, I'm finding, I already know exactly how I'm going to fit them into this, uh, this type of story. So it's been fun for me.

[SLAVA]
So Dr. Huey Emmerich, that's the guy. Okay. Dr. Huey Emmerich. Huey Emmerich. He is, uh, the creator of Otacon, one of the Metal Gear solids, and he designed all the technology for it. And then he begins to work against his employer with Snake.

[NICK]
Oh, okay. I see. I, I do remember him now.

He's, he's in the wheelchair, right?

[SLAVA]
He eventually needs to be in the wheelchair. Yeah. Yep.

Okay. Gotcha.

[NICK]
Gotcha. Yeah. That's Batman.

That's a throwback. I haven't, I haven't played a Metal Gear game in a long time.

[SLAVA]
Yeah. Same. I played two in my life.

One way back when, when I was like 14, that the game I referenced and the most recent one, uh, which came out about four years ago. Well, that's the only two that I've played in my life. But anyway, Dr. Huey Emmerich.

[NICK]
Well, I'm up early now. I, uh, well, no, I should probably write. I was going to say, maybe, maybe I'll, maybe I'll, uh, play some video games after this, but no, I I've got, uh, I got a book to finish.

I don't want to make Jonathan sad.

[JONATHAN]
Thank you.

[NICK]
I appreciate you looking out for me.

[JONATHAN]
No, I've been telling literally everybody that I run into. I'm like, oh man, we're having this guy on, he wrote this new sci-fi book and just like basically, uh, plot dumping, if I can call it that. And they're like, oh, that sounds interesting.

When's that coming out? And I was like, the book's out. This is not an advanced creative copy.

The book, the book exists. You got to check it out. And they're like, oh, all right, we'll send me a link.

So definitely be getting some, uh, some evangelism already.

[SLAVA]
Oh yeah, for sure. I told a guy at work who really loves sci-fi that you about your book and he, he was ordering an Amazon as I was talking to him. So you got at least one reader out of me.

[NICK]
I appreciate it very much. That's, uh, every, every, every book sold to gets me that much closer to turning this thing into a film series or a video game or whatever down the line.

[JONATHAN]
Yeah.

[NICK]
And I assure you that I definitely do have all of, all of those in kind of my, my 10 year plan. So we'll see what happens.

[JONATHAN]
I've even gone into, um, uh, diatribe with some of my marketing folks because I, I still am just, uh, impressed by your decision and foresight to have this moment at the con where you're like, oh man, I look forward to one day having someone dress up as one of my characters. And then you're like, why am I waiting? Literally I could just do this now.

And then that, that gal won, uh, the contest. That was, that was so cool.

[NICK]
So she, so I, I wasn't even at that convention. And so no, I, it was one that I had, I had a different convention that weekend, but she was, you know, kind of scheduled to be at the booth at, you know, a different convention. She was like, Hey, I'm still going to dress up as this character here.

And I was like, okay, so I'm sitting at the booth at a different convention and I get a video sent to me of her walking up on stage and getting a trophy for, I was like, oh yes. So that was a, that was a nice surprise.

[JONATHAN]
That's a great surprise.

[NICK]
And she deserved it. She did an amazing job putting that, that costume together. I, I, um, like, like far exceeded my expectations.

So as I'm getting videos of her making this costume, I'm like, holy shit. Did I make the right decision hiring this? Yeah.

And, uh, yeah, yeah. She, she crushed it. Lux, Lux D's cosplay.

Shout out to her. She's yeah.

[SPENSER]
I'm looking forward to, uh, to book two as well. I didn't, um, yeah, it was the, the twist there kind of at the end where, where Roman takes over, um, the Webatoni. Yeah.

Um, I was not expecting that. I thought that was pretty cool. Yeah.

And I liked how you kind of set it up, you know, right there at the end for, for book two to sort of pick up right where, where, where, where one left off. So yeah, it was, was, uh, yeah, it was a good ending, but also was left feeling a little bit like a cliffhanger. So I thought that was, was well done.

I was like, no, there's, there needs to be more. Where's this fight with Zerus? I'm sorry.

[MATT]
Hungry is a good word for that for sure.

[NICK]
I so, so Roman taking over, uh, the Webatoni it's, it's more like, uh, he's kind of driving the, the vision of it now. And what you're going to see as you start to get into book two is, you know, as modus kind of comes out of his funk, still very much involved. He's not just like retiring, you know, he's, he's kind of in it for the fight as well.

Um, but it, it, the events really do kind of, kind of break it. And you see that at the end where, you know, Roman has kind of come to terms with like, all right, this is, this is the path I'm taking. This is kind of like the incipients of his rediscovery of purpose.

And he goes down into the basement and finds modus just drunk off his ass. Um, and that's what, you know, it, I, I want, I always loved that kind of like fight scene to get the truth out, you know, between, between two people who know each other. And that was the way that I kind of set up this, um, this handoff, so to speak, where, you know, modus basically says, look, you know, I'm not you, you, whatever this thing you've got going on is this is no one knows what the hell this is, but I don't have that.

You, you've got something special. You're going to use it. And, you know, you're going to, you're going to take this, you know, for, you know, I've taken it as far as I can.

Now it's your turn because he has, he has always kind of been, um, like a little bit of a father figure to Roman and you can definitely catch whiffs of that or, you know, over the course of the book. Um, he was, uh, Roman was kind of always one of his, one of his favorites in the Wibitani. And that, that becomes clear just by the fact that he was kind of allowed to leave the way he did.

Um, but also by the way they speak to each other like that, that it becomes really clear there because there's almost kind of like a, like a, an un, I don't know how to, how do I put it? There's almost like, it's almost like Roman is still kind of stuck in his teenage years when he's talking with modus, like he still hasn't passed that phase yet just because of everything that he's been through in his life. But, um, there's a little bit of a rebellion still in him there.

[JONATHAN]
Got to prove something to dad. Make sure he knows I'm a man.

[SPENSER]
No, that makes sense. And, uh, I think, yeah, by the end of book one there we can see, see Roman, you know, all the, all the shit that he went through, you know, at the end where he was, um, you know, captured and tortured and, um, yeah, obviously those, those types of things will, will do things to your, to your psyche and cause you to have to, yeah, make some decisions that you probably, or that you normally wouldn't have, uh, in life.

And now Roman, you know, he's on this, um, I don't know if the vengeance quest is, is, is right, but, but he's definitely out for, for revenge, uh, you know, for Monique. And so, uh, yeah, he's, he's finally, it seems got this, um, goal in mind, this, you know, force that's driving him where as I felt like earlier in the book, he didn't, uh, he was just sort of floating through life, taking jobs here and there, um, you know, just doing kind of whatever he wanted with no real purpose. Uh, and now I feel like we finally see him start to, to find that, uh, that purpose.

Um, even if it is just, um, uh, revenge from Monique, but, but like, I feel like he, he grew as a character in the sense of like, okay, now he he's finally realized there are things that he has to do, things that he finally has to take care of, and he can't just sit by the wayside anymore and, and just passively live. He's gotta, he's gotta go do something. So, uh, yeah, I appreciated that.

[SLAVA]
Yeah. So we got glimpses of Roman with the little girl that he saves from those scavengers. We get him in the, the bowels of the, wherever they find those, uh, uh, hybrids in the caves or whatever, in the tunnels, we get glimpses of him actually caring about people other than himself or other than just surviving.

So I think the setup that you're talking about, Spencer, getting him in this place, this is more than just revenge, although I'm looking forward to the revenge because Roman has a penance for it or a, right? Uh, not penance was the word for it. Uh, uh, penchant.

Yeah. Thank you. He has, he has a pension for it.

[NICK]
Gotcha.

[SLAVA]
He does it really well. And I think the revenge part, but also fighting evil for the sake of fighting evil is going to come together in the next books. So I'm looking, I'm really looking forward to that.

[NICK]
And, um, you're definitely going to get to see more character growth. It's funny. I just talked to, uh, I just got some feedback on the book recently from some readers and they were very surprised that, uh, Roman, you know, you know, at the beginning of the book, he's really a dick and, uh, you know, it's surprising for our protagonists.

And I'm like, yeah, he's a mercenary. He's literally immersive. Like he's like, imagine, imagine living that life.

Do you think that person's going to say like, Oh gosh, darn it. And you know, say, please. And thank you to everyone.

No mother. No, I w I w exactly. Yeah.

So I wanted that to come off as real. And the other thing is that, you know, they, uh, and I was talking with, it was, it was another author I was talking with and he was like, and at the end of the book, he's, you know, still a dick, just a slight, slightly less of a dick, but an empathetic dick. Yeah.

And I was like, well, consider this. Like he's had, he's got years and years of trauma and the book takes place really over the course of like, you know, if you, if you kind of take out the, the backstory, you know, Roman's backstory before the time jump, it's like a couple of weeks that all this is happening. So you don't go from, you know, 20, I think I made Roman like 28, 29, 29 years of trauma to being, you know, a Saint in four weeks.

Doesn't happen.

[JONATHAN]
That's not, that's not how that works.

[NICK]
Especially now it's well, if that is how it works, I'm doing it wrong, but so are we, but you know, I also wanted, I wanted this to be a story of growth that continues throughout the entire series. It's not something that's going to happen overnight over the course of seven books, you're going to see Roman evolve in a major way, but it's going to be kind of a step-by-step process through all of the different things that he has to undergo on this quest, which, you know, spoiler, will become much larger than he anticipated.

[JONATHAN]
I'm going to be real disappointed if the whole universe isn't involved. I'm just going to tell you that right now. Vitalarium as a, as a substance.

Now we've got like the mining, you know, ordeal. We've got the, the, oh man, I just got my cup of coffee. Who's the guy above Zerus?

What's his name?

[NICK]
Oh, the IGB.

[JONATHAN]
IGB, thank you.

[NICK]
Grand Regent Kodo Wingor. Thank you.

[JONATHAN]
And it was like a long title, but we've got them, you know, trying to do whatever they're doing, which we still don't really know. And then we've got Zerus trying to do his coup, which is great, but this is just the one planet basically still, or like the one area. And so if Vitalarium is as profound and robust and like changes humanity the way that it sounds like in the prologue, I'm waiting for other spaceships to show up.

I'm just like, no.

[MATT]
I feel like this is the tease. So I don't know who all has played Final Fantasy VII, but when you play Final Fantasy VII, Midgar is, I feel like that's book one. Like Diorum, all that, that's Midgar.

And at the end of book one, just like at the end of the first disc in the Final Fantasy VII game, you are opened up to the entire world, but you know who Shinra is, you know who Sephiroth is, you know, I mean, Heidegger is basically like the Black or the Golden Phoenixes. And then you've got Shinra is probably the overarching IGB. And it's just like, okay, I know all the players.

I know somewhat of what the games are being played, but we're just getting started, baby. And it's the coolest thing. Like Spencer said, I could not put down probably the last three chapters.

I stopped working. I said, I'm going to go take a break. I'm going to go to the gas station, get something for the boys.

And I just sat in my truck and listened to the last three chapters because I was like, I can't put this down. This is, I just want to finish and see where this goes. And then it finished and I was like, no, I want more.

I want it all. I want it all right now. I was like, man, I can't wait for Saturday.

[NICK]
Well, I'd say Matt and Jonathan, you've got some very, some, it's an interesting, it's an interesting thing you think might be brewing.

[JONATHAN]
I'm waiting. Look, I can already tell like how great of an author you are just by reading the book. And like, again, uh, for anyone who's tuning in new, this is Nicholas's first book and it reads like it's his fifth, right?

Like we still know that he's got some stuff he wants to do, but a lot of writers don't put in the nuance of like, Hey, this guy had a succulent. Hey, here's a little sprinkle here and there. Uh, you talked about quirks earlier and I wanted to circle back to that.

Like, how are you deciding as an author, like which quirks to give your characters? Do you try some of them out? And then they don't work.

And you're like, nah, that's not good. And you have to do kind of like a re write for the through line for that guy or, or gal, or do you just like, it comes to you and you're like, Oh, this is, this is right.

[NICK]
It's, it's kind of, it's, it's a little more organic. Um, sometimes it just kind of comes to me as I'm writing the character. So I, I give for every character that I create, no matter how small of a role, if they have any sort of speaking role in the book, whether they appear for, you know, three pages or, you know, 15 chapters.

Um, I, I write a backstory for that character before I even start writing them. Um, like, uh, once again, that includes, you know, the character, their name. I always pick a, um, either a person I know or an actor or an actress so that I can visualize that person.

So, and I search far and wide to try and find like someone that I'm, that like fits what I'm going for with that character. I write their backstory, uh, and I write the theme that they kind of embody. So like what they represent in the book.

And if I do all of that before I even start writing the character, I feel like the, the dialogue that you get from them, uh, feels a lot more real because it's based in something, you know, I can imagine like, all right, this is, this is what this character, this is what this character's life is like. This is what they are like. I know how they would talk, or at least I could, I could imagine more clearly how they might interact with other people.

And then the, the quirks, the things like that, the, the little things that I want to add, they become more apparent, um, as I'm, you know, kind of going through and writing them. And so that's kind of my process for character creation. Um, and like I said, it's, I feel like it's helped me to create characters who are definitely profoundly different from one another.

They're, they're kind of like easily identifiable. Um, and that was, I, that was important to me considering how many characters and how many kind of moving parts I had going on in this story. Um, so yeah, it's, it's, it's more of like an organic thing that just kind of comes up from, you know, creating their character.

[MATT]
That was one of my favorite parts of the book too, of all the characters that you meet, they all have some sort of depth. They matter. It's not just random NPC one with like, oh, go this way or find this thing.

It's like there were no fetch quests. Everything felt so, like you say, you've said organic a couple of times. It felt very organic.

Like I was talking or meeting people. I mean, all of the, the concert and everything too, that when you met nails and, uh, Dieter and all those other people like nails and also the audible performance was gorgeous.

[NICK]
It was perfect. It was amazing.

[MATT]
I want to talk about that later on too, in this video. Um, but when he was awesome, awesome, but when he's, when you're talking to all these people and he whips out like the Australian accent, like we've all got our own Australian accent in our head, but being able to hear that too on audible, that was just, it was perfect. So yeah, every, every character just has so much more depth than I'm used to, like reading these kinds of books to where it's like, all right, well, this is a person.

I hope they don't die because I've been scarred. We've all been scarred by game of Thrones. So I like to meet characters and know the characters and hopefully see them live.

[NICK]
Yeah. Nails was a particularly fun character to write. That was, I was proud of him.

I was proud of him.

[SPENSER]
Uh, yeah, I enjoyed him as well. Yeah. I think, I thought, I thought people would be, again, disappointed to see him die, but yeah.

[MATT]
I thought he would have been more like, after the first interaction that he was just going to be the, not dits, what's the right word? Just kind of the not comic relief. I didn't think he was going to be the comedic relief.

He ended up being the comedic relief, but I thought he was just going to be more of like a pokey asshole and just bug Rome in a bunch. Like, especially after he called Valyria.

[NICK]
Yeah. Yeah.

[MATT]
After he called Valyria, he's like, I don't want this Coke head fricking riding with me. This is terrible. And then he shows up and he's doing bumps off of his guns.

I was like, this dude's wild. This is Ozzy Osbourne, the mercenary. This is nuts.

[SLAVA]
My favorite part about nails was, all right, we're not going to use grenades. We're not going to go in loud. The first thing that guy does is just takes a bump and just loves grenades everywhere.

Crazy person.

[NICK]
Writing the dialogue for him was probably the most I've laughed to myself.

[MATT]
That was probably my favorite chapter.

[NICK]
Yeah. So he literally it's, I was, my goal was just to be like, what is the craziest thing he could possibly say in any situation? And like the first thing, like they get caught, like, they have no idea what's happening when that room begins to turn.

And I was like, what's the funniest thing he could say? And I was like, action. Boom.

Just, just action. And then just go right into it. Like, like he's in a movie.

And, and that, that, yeah, that he was a fun, fun character to write and create and just mess around with different, you know, funny dialogue options. Because I had, there were, he was one where I did kind of go back and forth on what I would have him say a little bit more than other characters, because really he did, he was, yeah, for, he, he was a little different because he was, like I said, he, he did, he did, he does kind of become a little bit of a comic relief. Right.

And so writing the, or writing in such a way that would kind of relay that took a little bit of trial and error and, you know, making sure like, all right, is that, is it too much? Does there need to be, you know, and kind of also keeping a balance where like they're in a gunfight, you can't just be like, you know, you know, throwing firecrackers the whole time. Right.

So it had to have some kind of structure to it still. But yeah, that, that was a, that was an interesting character for me to write. I had a lot of fun doing that.

Another one of my favorite scenes that I wrote in terms of like fun I had just in the writing process was Roman's flashback scene to his drunk night out with Monique. Did you, did you guys like that one? What'd you think?

[JONATHAN]
I love, I mentioned this in the last recording we did, how you took something and made it unique, but we knew that it was a, like a, it was both flashbacks and this like hazy recollection after a night out. And you're like, because a lot of us have been there before and it's hangovers, baby.

[MATT]
What? It was the hangover chapter.

[SLAVA]
And it just never, never been there. How does that happen?

[MATT]
Yeah, yeah.

[JONATHAN]
Okay. Yeah, sure. You didn't live a precarious life.

[MATT]
Tell you what, Slava, come to Michigan. We'll show you.

[JONATHAN]
But it was, it was unique. And the, and the writing of it too, just like going through and it's a snippet here and a snippet there. And it's like, Oh, there's a little bit.

I love that. I love when authors go, I'm going to try something a little bit new. I'm going to try something that's, that's a little off the beaten path, but still communicating in a way to the audience by that uniqueness.

Loved it. Absolutely.

[NICK]
Yeah. Yeah. That, that, that, and trying to find a way to do that for, uh, kind of his brownout scene was, uh, was, was a fun process for me because we've, we've all been there.

I, uh, I, I had quite a night out myself last night, uh, speaking up. So, um, but Hey, if, if, if you, uh, if you want to write, you got to live, right?

[SLAVA]
So I enjoyed, I enjoyed the night after or well, well, it was many nights after Roman wakes up and, Oh, I'm blanking. Um, Monique's father calls goodness. Why am I can't remember the guy's name?

Modest. Thank you. Modest calls him and Romer Romer.

Uh, Roman is trying to hide the fact that he's there. And she's like, Hey, and then Modest is like, Hey, tell Monique to come to you or whatever. He says, what?

So those, those kinds of moments in my stupid brain, because I like stupid, dry jokes and puns. So those kinds of moments just makes me giggle inside as I'm reading the book. I'm like, ha Roman, you know, I can just imagine a woman's thinking in that very second where he's thinking he's sly.

And then the dad of the daughter that he's just, you know, had a wild seven day, you know, trust with, says, Hey, tell my daughter to come to Bender. So yeah. Yeah.

[NICK]
Uh, Tristan, not a trust. And, uh, I don't know. I don't know if you caught it, but I, I even preface it.

Uh, because, because the first person to call Roman that morning is Norfolk and he's all, and he's disappointed because he's like, everyone knows you've been out on a Bender. I said, he's like the whole city knows. He's like, I thought we were supposed to be laying low.

I'm working here for nothing. He stuck me with him. And he's like, and Roman's like, like, calm down.

I'm going to do something. He's like, wait, did you say everyone knows? And he said, hang on a second.

[MATT]
Modus is ringing in. I got to hang up with you and talk to Modus.

[SLAVA]
But no, I noticed that as the reader outside the world, I noticed that, but I imagined Roman not making the connection. He's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Norville shut up.

I'll, I'll, I'll take care of it. So Modus calls him. He's like, yep, everything's fine.

We're ha ha ha. And I don't think in his drunken, the way I imagined it, I don't think in his drunken mind or his drunken stupor, he actually put the two and two together. At least that way.

I read it. It's more funny for me that way.

[NICK]
And, and, but, but Modus does kind of allude to it because he, he says like, I'm sure all those hotels you're staying at are getting expensive. It is like, yeah, totally.

[MATT]
I'm broke, man. I wish I had a job.

[JONATHAN]
The Monique hotel. It's difficult.

[MATT]
Backbreaking work.

[NICK]
Yeah, that's that, that, those were all really fun scenes for me to write. Um, like I said, this, this, this whole process for me, this whole venture in general has been just probably the most fun I've ever had doing anything. Um, and so I I'm, I'm just kind of keeping that mindset as I move into some of the other books.

Um, I will say this book too, you're going to find a little bit more of a serious tone, um, just due to the circumstance of, you know, the situations that, you know, the characters are in now. Um, but you know, like I said, there's, there's seven books, so don't, don't fret.

[MATT]
And you can answer as you can answer as little as you want. Serious, how like serious, dark, serious, as in we're starting to see more problems. Like what, what kind of serious are we looking?

[NICK]
Oh, there's going to be, there's more problems. There's, um, they're, they're basically where, whereas Roman was kind of, you know, floating from job to job and, you know, kind of just trying to forget everything and party in between, you know, they're, they're kind of, they're going to be on like, you know, kind of full force, uh, this one because they're essentially, you know, thrust into hiding. And so they're, they're kind of working around the clock this time.

[MATT]
Knife's edge type deal.

[NICK]
Exactly. Exactly. And, uh, and there will be a couple more characters that I introduce, um, not too many for book two.

You were going to start to see more, um, in the second segment of the series, which is when we start visiting all of the other colonized planets.

[JONATHAN]
Are you enjoying today's side quest? Make sure that you're subscribed. So you never miss an episode we're available on YouTube and all major platforms so that you can listen to us anywhere.

Now back to the show.

[SPENSER]
Well, even at the end of book two, the end of book two, Oh, geez. Even at the end of book one, uh, in the epilogue there, you, you bring in this, um, I think, uh, Ubuntu or I think that's how you say that. Um, where it appears that they are some sort of alien race who, who is sort of monitoring the human, uh, progress.

Um, so, so that was, uh, again, another unexpected twist that I was not expecting, uh, aliens to come into the mix. Um, so I'm, I'm looking forward to seeing how, how they are going to interact with humanity, like what their whole purpose is, like what they're looking for out of, uh, out of humanity and, and their, um, journey with Videlirium. And cause it sounds like, um, they, they know, or I see how to say they, they obviously know about Videlirium, um, but like what their, like what their purpose is and all of that stuff.

So, um, yeah, I'm, I'm curious to see, see how that all plays out.

[MATT]
It almost seems like the aliens have known about humanity longer than we think to not just since they're on Dior. It's like they've moved from earth to Dior. Um, and we've been watching them this whole time, several thousand years later, and this is becoming interesting.

So some like either higher power alien race, or I I'm, I'm excited. There's so many, dude, I could glaze.

[SLAVA]
They're the guys providing commentary in the beginning of the book, right? Nick, we, when we talked with you in the interview and I said, I love the commentary about humanity. They're the, they're the people that provided people providing the commentary.

Am I correct in the beginning? Correct. Excellent.

Correct. I love it.

[NICK]
That's, that's, that's, that's why I said, you know, I, I, I, I, when I mentioned, I write in the omniscient perspective, I do it for a reason. And that is, that is the reason is because it's basically, it's through the eyes of the watcher. Right.

And, and you, you get to learn, you get to, you get a snippet of, of what that is. Um, when I talk about, uh, Ubuntu is using like a, they call it site diving and, um, it's almost like, uh, we'll call it like a remote viewing kind of stuff. And yeah, she could, uh, kind of, and you, you, I don't want to give too much away cause we really dive deep into it in the, in the coming volume.

And, uh, but you'll also notice that they, they are familiar with Roman's, uh, affliction or not as affliction, but his, uh, is particularly what seems like a unique interaction with vitillarium. And I don't know if you caught onto this, but I mentioned that Ubuntu has a number of perfectly circular discs in her stomach.

[SPENSER]
I did catch that there. She was the day she, I don't know, um, we're worried about, uh, we're worried about that or concerned maybe. Yep.

[NICK]
Not that, and not so much concerned, but that it, I was, what I was alluding to was that she actually has the same thing that he has.

[MATT]
It's a familiar diagnosis is what it seemed like. It's also familiar with that situation.

[NICK]
We won't call it a diagnosis. We'll call it a, uh, a gift. We'll call it, we'll call it a gift.

And it's something that, uh, still extremely rare, extremely rare, but is more familiar to, uh, to a race that has maybe been around for a bit longer. So, so a race that is, it has a little bit more experience with vitillarium is a little more, uh, attuned to it's different types of uses. Okay.

[SLAVA]
Now, how closely related is this race to humans? How compatible are the two, or they're completely different in.

[JONATHAN]
I feel like Slava, this is a D and D question. Like, I want to F that dragon. Can I do that?

[MATT]
I make a perception check. Do they have holes? What does it look like?

Well, you caught me. That's exactly what I'm getting at. Slava is the bard of the party.

Okay. It's a party.

[NICK]
I, I am, I'll be honest with you. I am still working out some of the finer details of the entire species itself. We'll say, but, um, I have a, I have a, I have a good idea, but you know, as you write, you kind of come up with more detail and more prevalent the characters are, the more detail you need to go into.

And so I'm still kind of building some of that, but I will say they, I mean, they are somewhat humanoid. Okay. And, and so there's definitely some similarities.

And if you'll notice in Roman's dream sequences, um, Jarek, anytime Jarek is there and he looks over into the corner, you know, and you see like that kind of humanoid shadow that is, you know, it's just the proportions are odd. There's, there seems to be, um, tendrils coming off of it. Um, what you'll see in the, in the epilogue is that what, what is the first thing that happens?

Well, the tubes disconnect from Ubuntis as she's being lowered. So it's, it's, it's something like, uh, okay. It's, it's, it's a little bit of like, he, like he's, he's seeing the vision, the, the visage of what is watching him.

[SLAVA]
Very cool. Interesting. That I, I like that a lot.

[MATT]
Yeah. Yeah. That's cool.

Ubuntis is Jarek. I'm calling it.

[SPENSER]
Well, cause even Roman realizes that it's not actually Jarek. Uh, cause he's like, oh, Jarek wouldn't talk this way. That's not like the word.

[MATT]
Now you're asking the right questions or something like that. Yeah.

[SPENSER]
Yeah.

[MATT]
Yep.

[NICK]
It's an interesting theory. You'll have to see in book two if you're correct or not.

[JONATHAN]
So I got a question. Does Zerus have family and does Roman get to do to Zerus' family what he did to Monique? Probably two on the nose, but.

[NICK]
So Zerus is kind of, uh, the, we'll call it the, the, the last of his kin. So his, his father was the previous overseer of Dior. Um, and I dive into a little bit more of how Zerus kind of ended up taking his seat after he died.

Um, and why and how, but Zerus is, is in, in a lot of ways, kind of similar to Roman. He's, he doesn't have a family that he's necessarily beholden to. He's kind of, you know, entirely, we'll call it, you know, political career focused.

And that kind of creates a monster. Uh, or I'll, I mean, I won't say that you don't say particularly creates a monster, but, um, I mean, because, you know, his father Gannon definitely had a hand in that. Um, and I explained that in, you know, one of the chapters, I believe it's when they're testing the, uh, the voice, which is that orbital kind of laser cannon.

Um, yeah. And he tells Daruk the story of the first time, uh, the first time Zerus killed someone and how it happened, how he gets the scar on his hand. And, uh, yeah, so he, he's definitely, uh, been a, a psychopath in the making for quite a while, but yeah, but in a lot of ways, like I said, it's, it's, they, they're similar in a lot of ways.

They've both experienced a lot of trauma and a lot of pain. They're dealing with it in very different ways. And they're, they've been, you know, kind of going through very different lives and we're going to see Zerus, uh, humanized a little bit in book two.

[JONATHAN]
I was wondering, I was wondering if you were going to like jab me a little bit through the story and make me go, I hate this guy that much, I guess.

[NICK]
And we're also going to see, um, we're going to see some unanticipated, uh, connections between certain groups of characters. We're going to see the reason why Zerus is so hell bent on, you know, achieving his goals. Um, and once again, which I, I, I, I only allude to it in book one, um, in book two, you get some more detail because there's, there are other things at play.

[SLAVA]
Yeah. Well, when that thing happened in whatever chapter that was, where we get a glimpse of Zerus's childhood and he, you know, with his dad that humanized him to me in a, in just a tiny little way. And that prompted the question that you just answered.

I'm like, I wonder if we get more of him in book two or three, but the story, the arc, the, you know, the origin story of Zerus, because that's one little event that already prompted a lot of questions in my head because that's a traumatic event. You're what, nine years old and you know, your dad does that to you. That's a, that's a great, you know, um, dark, I don't want to call it, maybe, maybe there's for lack of a better term, a great inciting incident for, for his origin story.

And so I'm glad that we get more of, of that, of his childhood and his rise to power in book two. I'm very interested in that.

[NICK]
You, you, you definitely get a little bit of that. And it's, and it's usually, it's good. It's going to be through, uh, conversations with his new chief administrator.

[SLAVA]
Okay.

[NICK]
Who also has an important role, which I will not divulge at this point in time. Excellent.

[MATT]
It seems like you've got a lot of foresight on a lot of these characters that we've been introduced to so far. How do you balance what to reveal and what not to reveal? I know you've got a lot of books, a lot of content coming out.

How do you keep, I mean, I've never written a book. How do you keep readers engaged in wanting to know more about like these characters without revealing too much?

[NICK]
It's a lot of just trying to find the balance between revealing just enough and revealing it through characters as they are discovering it themselves. Um, and so like, let me find an example of that. So like, for instance, um, in terms of discovering what's going on, why, why the, who the, the vitillarium, uh, mining operation pirates really are, um, why, uh, there's potentially vitillarium missing and discovering that it's being stockpiled and, Oh, what is that for?

What are we leading to? How are we putting the pieces together? You're seeing ARP and Delgado kind of come to all of these conclusions as he's basically, you know, spying on the overseer and trying to figure out what's going on.

Um, so finding different ways to reveal little bits through Xerxes conversation and pushing the puck forward kind of little by little with each kind of, uh, interaction, you know, you end up getting the full story. Um, and just cause there, there were, and a lot of that comes down to the editing process as well, because I kind of have it all up here as far as, you know, what I want to do with, you know, the, the reveal portions, but to make sure that it comes off appropriately in the, in the book that takes a severe amount of editing. Um, and I had a really good, a really good editor.

Uh, his name is John Smith, most generic name in the world, but great, great guy is very collaborative. But there were parts where he was like, is this what you were going for? And I'd be like, Oh, actually, no, it was this.

He was like, all right, well, this is, you don't give quite enough here. You got to give maybe a little more or like, Hey, this is really obvious. Like maybe a little too on the nose, maybe dial that down a little bit.

And it's good to be able to have someone who can give me that feedback because then I can say, okay, this is perfect. So I can, I know where I can modulate things appropriately. And that definitely takes a second eye because again, I, I know like I I'm, I'm creating the story.

So I know what's going on and making sure everyone else who's reading the book knows that's a different story. And that, that requires a little bit of a back and forth with someone who's, you know, not familiar with the full, the full plan. Um, so that's, that's, uh, that's my, my long answer to that question.

[SLAVA]
Love it. I imagine it's kind of like a, this analogy will fall apart as many do. I imagine it kind of like a tasting menu, right?

Each scene, you know, you have to write the scene so it's engaging and it tells the story of the book that you're currently writing. But there is, um, hints, if you will, or illusions or foreshadowings. And I imagine it as a tasting menu.

If you have like, well, this tasting menu, we're going to do something from South America and all the dishes that come out are just bits and pieces of, for this example, South America. And then you get the full course and you're like, oh, okay. So they have vegetable dishes and they have fish dishes and they have this.

I know very loose analogy, but I imagine when writing those scenes, this is just a little piece of the full meal and that itself has to be somewhat engaging without giving everything away. You can't just pile all the dishes into one, one bowl and then serve it. Right.

Am I kind of can't get in there.

[MATT]
I know that that's, yeah. And that's why you never start with dessert.

[SLAVA]
Yeah.

[MATT]
Right. Never get to the good stuff first. You gotta, you gotta weasel your way.

You gotta eat your vegetables, sticking with food analogy, Slava. I love it. I'm getting really hungry.

[NICK]
Yeah. The dessert is the epilogue for sure. Yep.

[MATT]
Very, very tasty finish.

[NICK]
Yep. So no, that's, that's a good analogy.

[MATT]
That's a good analogy.

[NICK]
Yeah, absolutely.

[SPENSER]
So, Nick, I have a, I have a question. You'd kind of talked about the inspiration for some of your characters is just, you know, based on people that you know. I'm curious if there's, as far as the, the idea behind the book, like, and you mentioned earlier in another, in your first episode where you kind of had some inspiration from like Asimov and some other authors.

I'm curious if there's any other like media or authors or anything that kind of served as inspiration for this book or like maybe kind of talk about like, like how did that idea come into, how'd this book, the idea for the story, how'd that all come into, come into being?

[NICK]
Yeah. So I, I mean, there's definitely a number of other authors. Frank Herbert, for sure.

Arthur C. Clarke, Orwell, Aldous Huxley, kind of the dystopian classic sci-fi writers. There's definitely a lot of sci-fi literature that I kind of grounded the, the feel of the book and William Gibson, you know, with his Sprawl trilogy that he's kind of like the, the grandfather of cyberpunk.

And I loved kind of like that dark grittiness that his worlds have, have because it's, he's basically describing like high-tech squalor. And that's kind of what you're looking at in the grind. Although that is beginning to spread into the outer sphere as well.

And you kind of see that like the further out you get from the center, the kind of more run down the, just the environment becomes that everyone's living in. And yeah, it doesn't just stop at literature either. I mean, I love sci-fi films and TV shows.

I was a big fan of The Expanse and I don't know if you guys have ever seen Firefly. There's definitely a touch of Mel Reynolds in Roman, for sure. And what else?

I mean, you name it. It's my favorite genre. So if it's out there, I've probably seen it.

[JONATHAN]
Did you see Ink?

[NICK]
What was that?

[JONATHAN]
Did you see Ink back in the day? It was like an indie film, 2009.

[NICK]
No, I actually don't think I have seen Ink.

[JONATHAN]
Okay. It's got this utopian feel. It's an independent film, so like it doesn't have the polish that you might expect.

But I think if you like the sci-fi and the punk and the stuff like that, you'll enjoy it.

[NICK]
All right. Maybe I'll check that out today. That's, yeah.

[MATT]
Jonathan dropping indie book stuff. Big surprise. Did you go find it in a coffee shop too?

[JONATHAN]
I live on a weird part of the internet. My wife can attest and she also complains about it.

[SPENSER]
I can attest to that through Instagram Reels.

[JONATHAN]
We didn't ask you to. That's fine.

[SPENSER]
You brought it up.

[NICK]
So I also like video games too. I mean, I'm a huge fan of Mass Effect. Halo and all those kind of games.

Prey was one that I really enjoyed. I don't know if you guys played that one. That was fantastic.

That was very well done. Yeah, it was amazing. And then there was an old game.

It was probably the first sci-fi game I ever played. It was an old PC game and the game was called Freelancer. Okay.

Interestingly enough, but in that game, it was like one of the first games where you are a freelancer, so you're basically doing odd jobs, but you have a ship, you're a ship captain, and you're going to different planets and doing different missions for all of these different factions. It was the first one where it was like an open world space game where you could literally just, okay, I'm going to go dock on that planet. If it had a civilization on it, you could actually go dock and upgrade your ship and stuff.

This was going back like 20 years ago. This was an old game. Actually, one of the creators of that game is now the creator of Star Citizen, which is that new one.

He made Freelancer back in the day.

[MATT]
Star Citizen is a big one, yeah.

[NICK]
Yeah, I still haven't played it yet. I really want to, but my time is like... I just don't have any time lately.

[JONATHAN]
2003, Freelancer came out.

[NICK]
Yeah, there you go. Yeah, 22 years ago. Wow.

Yeah, that was a good one. My father actually was playing that game because my father was a police officer. Then he retired after 20 some odd years on the job.

He was like, well, now what do I do? He just started playing video games.

[MATT]
What a great retirement plan. Oh, yeah.

[NICK]
That and bringing us to track practice and everything else, me and my brother, bugging us all the time. He was playing video games. I would play video games with him.

He was not as tech savvy. He'd control a couple of buttons as he was doing a mission. He'd be like, all right, hit the missile button.

I'd hit F to fire a missile. Or like, oh, I need to heal the ship. Hit the nanobot button.

I'd hit Z. Then eventually, I was like, I'm going to make my own profile on this. I started playing when he wasn't.

That was one of the first sci-fi games I played.

[MATT]
I love that. My dad and I had a similar kind of relationship when it came to video games. He didn't play a lot, but when he came home, it was called Splinter Cell.

It was Splinter Cell on the computer. I love it. It's one of my favorite series.

He would control the mouse and I would control the movement. For some reason, that was the most intense. We were just looking like five inches from the computer screen.

It was just so intense. It added the element in a stealth game like that. It added another element of just intensity.

My dad and I got so sweaty playing Splinter Cell. It was Splinter Cell and then Splinter Cell Pandora tomorrow when that game came out. He actually took a couple of days off of work and we played it like I stayed home from school on a Friday.

If we played it together, it was fun.

[NICK]
That kind of playing, that'll dial you in. You got to be in it together. That's kind of funny.

Very similar.

[SPENSER]
That freelancer game reminds me a little bit of No Man's Sky. I don't know if you've played that at all. Another exploration.

Visit any and every planet you can think of. Star System. Very, very cool.

[NICK]
There's another one I played that was a little more recent that was right up the alley. Outer Worlds? I loved Outer Worlds.

I loved the kind of comedy element that is kind of overlaid on top of that future dystopian world. That was a fun game to play. Actually, a new one's coming out.

Isn't it?

[MATT]
The second one just came out, I think, in October. It's a pretty good review. It's pretty good acclaim.

I haven't had a chance to play that one either. I haven't played it. I could see some stuff going back to the book.

It made me think of Outer Worlds when I would play some of the... Bringing Nails back into it. The comedic relief that wasn't overwhelming comedic relief.

There was still suspense. There was still intensity in the situations that were around when he was in the narrative. It was like, oh man, that's kind of funny.

That brings me back to Outer Worlds because I played the piss out of that game when it first came out. I couldn't put that game down, just like I couldn't put the book down. It was so much fun being able to see all of my favorite sci-fi things, like Mass Effect, like you said, Halo, all of these different things I see in this book, but I don't correlate them to where it's overwhelming.

The book is still the book and it's not like, oh, it's just a knockoff of Mass Effect or Outer Worlds or anything like that. It's a great amalgamation of a new story and narrative that I cannot wait to keep diving into. I had a very good time reading this book and I couldn't wait to talk to you and ask all these questions.

[NICK]
Thank you, Matt.

[MATT]
I appreciate that, man. Jonathan says, I'm the resident sci-fi expert. I'm a huge Star Wars nerd, so I've got all the sci-fi stuff.

[NICK]
That's awesome.

[JONATHAN]
Nick, can you give me your dreamscape of what your video game is going to look like? We're talking about video games, so what are some of the fun things that you want to see in your video game next year? I'm going to try and say it's coming soon.

I know it hasn't started, but I want a little tasting.

[NICK]
I would love to see this as one of my favorite games that I ever played was The Witcher. Great game. If you were to take the grittiness of cyberpunk, that street-level view of the future, the political interactions, the far-reaching, space-faring civilization where you're going from planet to planet from Mass Effect, and the abilities and the third-person viewpoint of a Witcher game where you're able to level up your character.

Maybe Roman is able to become more proficient in his use of his powers. That would be my ideal game. Eventually, you may or may not have a ship.

Having the ability to upgrade that, have space-faring battles, go to different planets, be interacting with all of these different governments and factions, and doing missions across space, but also being able to have a character that can upgrade his own stats and skill sets, and giving him some very interesting abilities through the interactions that he has with Vidilarium.

[MATT]
If the Vidilarium game comes in, I want to be able to ride rooster, and I want to be able to go fast.

[NICK]
Hell yeah. Me too.

[SLAVA]
I love it. That's one of those moments, again, for my dumb brain and my kind of comedy. The fact that he thinks rooster is a ferocious earth animal.

I thought, that's the greatest thing ever. That was so wonderful.

[MATT]
They are. Cockfighting. That's what I was like, oh my gosh, there have been legends of cockfighting.

That's why he named it rooster. I was like, this is amazing. I love this.

[NICK]
I also wanted to show, because there are definitely like, he's super familiar with all of the different fauna on planet Diorum. He's definitely, he's almost like a survivalist. That's the skill set that he has.

It kind of stems back from his father quizzing him on fauna Diorum books, and you kind of get a glimpse of that in chapter one. He has like this kind of almost like autistic memory of all of these types of things. That's one of the reasons why he's able to kind of survive outside the walls of Kairos and do these missions.

It basically becomes his livelihood, right? I also wanted to show that not only is there like an interest in other things, but there's also a lack of knowledge in places, right?

[MATT]
Still a lot to explore.

[NICK]
So I think the, what is it? I think I described like the salesman who like sold him the bike, like described it as some ferocious earth beast. And he's like, all right, cool.

That sounds metal. Let's name it Rooster. And he's having no idea that it's like, you know, compared to the things that he's fighting.

It's, you know, one swift kick and no more rooster. So yeah, little things like that are fun to write. Also, I'm from Rhode Island, and the state bird is a rooster.

[SPENSER]
Okay. Oh, interesting.

[NICK]
So we'll factoid about where that may have stemmed from.

[SLAVA]
I have a question for you about the aesthetic of the book. We talked about this when we first interviewed you, you know, a while ago now, but like the aesthetic of the story, you mentioned goth, neopunk, like, can you unpack that for the people listening to this episode? The how you came up with that?

I think you even coined a term that was called gothic punk, right? Am I remembering correctly?

[NICK]
cyber metal, cyber metal.

[SLAVA]
Yeah. Tell us more about that. Because Spencer and Matt hasn't haven't heard it.

And I want them to get some insight into that.

[NICK]
Yeah, so I'm still I'll be honest with you, I'm still working on defining the exact look of that. And I'm trying to find you know, I I'm finding inspirations all over the place of little things that are ultimately going to kind of build into that. But it's almost like more of a it would be kind of like cyberpunk mixed with more of like a gothic industrial type of look, like aesthetic.

So definitely still a lot of neon. We're still talking squalor. But in terms of, you know, the, the outfits, the kind of general clothing, you know, the way that some of the buildings are built, it's going to look a lot more intimidating.

A lot, a lot of use of like, black, a little bit more mechanical with some of the way that some things are built. And that is going to be once again, kind of the majority. Whereas as you start to get closer, to the center of the city, you're looking at more of like, you know, your beautiful kind of utopian, quote, unquote, right type of future look.

And yeah, so again, it's it's something that I'm, I'm still, still kind of defining in terms of the actual aesthetic of, you know, that term. And it's not a far departure from cyberpunk. It's just more metal.

[MATT]
Speaking of metal, I have, I had, there's the part in the book where they're drifting from club to club and Monique's in like the, you know, the club scene or whatever. And then he walks into like this heavy metal concert and you write it. I can't remember what it is, but Roman's just like, yeah, this is the song of my people.

Have you, did you write that with like any personal experience with that? Because I love metal. And whenever I was like, babe, listen to this song.

She's like, I mean, it's nice. It's not my cup of tea. Some Rage Against the Machine shit.

[NICK]
Yeah, it's I, I'm a, I'm a big metal head. So actually like, I have a playlist that I listened to when I wrote the book on Spotify and it's got all of the music that I listened to while I was writing it. And it's a lot of metal, a lot of like dark electronic, like, like dark clubbing type of music, like all, all this like really heavy kind of what I would imagine music to sound like in the future.

And some of it's just like weird stuff, like stuff that I had to kind of scour Spotify to be like, yeah, I'm here for it. Send it over.

[MATT]
Techno metal is like one of my favorite subcultures of metal, like CrossFaith. I don't know if you ever heard of CrossFaith.

[NICK]
I think I have a couple of songs on the playlist.

[MATT]
Yeah, that is, that is what I future like, or I future I vision as music in the future of like a cyber punky type of place. It's techno, it's metal, it's party. Like the song Jaeger Bomb by CrossFaith perfectly embodies that scene.

They're drinking in a concert. It's heavy metal screaming, but it's got techno beats. I'm like, this is the coolest thing ever.

This is what I envision the future music to be like.

[NICK]
So I love metalcore too. So like you'll find you'll see like a lot of like Parkway Drive on the, on the playlist and a lot of stuff, which I love Parkway Drive because of the kind of the themes that they sing about too, which definitely matches up with the themes that I discuss in the book. And so, yeah, there's, there's a lot of, there's a lot of that for sure.

Some, some of those, some of those club scenes I wrote, those were, those were very, very fun to write.

[JONATHAN]
Personal experiences?

[NICK]
I've had a few. I've had a few. I was definitely, I was a raver for a while.

I, I've always loved metal, you know, going back to the first album I ever bought was System of a Down, Toxicity.

[MATT]
First one I ever bought with my own money.

[NICK]
I was like 12.

[MATT]
Mine was Asking Alexandria, Step, Step Up and Scream. That was the first album I ever bought. And that's got another, a little bit like a techno-y kind of heavy metal to it.

So yeah, that's funny.

[NICK]
Hell yeah.

[MATT]
Love the concert scenes. Those are, that was a nice little reprieve from the sincerity of the situation too that I appreciated, but it didn't take away again from the, from the overarching problems. It was just like, all right, we just, he just had this huge life-changing moment.

He's got glowing rocks in his skin. I'm going to go on a bender. And it didn't, it didn't like, it built a relationship between him and Monique and it was good.

And the writing that kind of went into it, I could tell that maybe there was a little bit of like personal experience in it. Cause sometimes when you read books where they take a little side quest, side quest, away from the plot, it's just like, we're just going to do something. Cause I need filler.

It didn't seem like filler. A hundred percent did not seem like filler. It felt like it was there for a reason.

And I'm curious, why did, why did you choose clubbing as like the, the segue there?

[NICK]
Yes, definitely a little bit of, you know, learned experience. I'll say that. But we're also dealing with, I wanted to show like we're in a different part of the city now, and this is kind of what the area is like there.

They're in like the entertainment district, right? So it's, it's, it's a lot of partying, a lot of clubbing. It's where everyone's kind of going out.

You are, you're seeing kind of the, the budding relationship that is, you know, Roman and Monique, and it's not necessarily the most constructive relationship. If we're being honest, it's almost, yeah, a little bit of trauma bonding and using kind of, you know, what, what's, what's at hand to just kind of forget a little bit because that's, I wanted to highlight not only their kind of growing relationship, but also like Roman's penchant to kind of ignore the problem. Right.

Which he's done for a very long time. And, you know, that's, that's, that's kind of, you know, as soon as, right after you meet him as an adult and he kind of fucks up everyone in Tarly's bar, he's, what does he do? He goes, he goes right to drinking and, you know, philandering.

And he's, once again, he's just kind of, he's, he's in like this cycle of just trying constantly to forget, you know, the situation that he's in, what he's been through and everything else. And so this was a great way for me to say like, okay, well, this could be something that the two of them could kind of bond over. And maybe it's a little bit of a toxic relationship because of the fact that it is, you know, yes, it's helping him forget, but also they're not getting anything done.

She's not really showing up to work either. They're kind of enabling each other. Yeah.

And so, and so, yeah, that was, that was kind of where I was going with that. That's why I chose that. And it also allowed me a lot of creative freedom to do things like, all right, well, guess what?

He's going out and getting drunk. He's going to be making mistakes, like showing off his powers to a group of people so that he can drink off some, some rich gangster's table, you know? So like, like that's which ultimately, you know, kind of screws him in the end because that's, that's how he that's how he gets caught.

And little things like that I find are, that's kind of the way I find better ways to progress the story as well. So, you know, yeah. So he goes out and I didn't know what I was going to do with that for a little while.

And then suddenly I was like, well, wait, how is, how is the CP going to kind of catch onto this? What was the, what was the club he was in? Well, it was this and it's a golden Phoenix from, and guess what?

You know, that, that golden, that Riku, golden Phoenix leader, he's, he is a, he is an ambitious man. And he seems like it seems like it. And so it's certainly not the end of the golden Phoenix either.

We're going to see them a little bit more in book two as well. You know, taking on some, some very interesting roles. So.

[MATT]
That was my follow-up question too, is to be like, did you write it with the intent of like, all right, we're going to go through this and then it's going to move the plot forward? Or is it, I'm just going to write and see, see where this goes.

[NICK]
It's a little bit of both. Like I said, sometimes I, I, I do just kind of like write and see where it goes. And then other times I'm like, okay, this is, I need to be, you know, revealing certain things in the scene.

So let's really put a lot of thought into how we're going to do this in a methodical way and what we're going to connect to that. And so I find there's, it changes, it changes depending upon kind of what's required. And sometimes the pieces just fit together in a way that I did not see.

And I'm like, oh, that's perfect. That's how I'm going to make it work. And that was how that was like, that's a perfect example of how that kind of came about organically.

I wasn't really sure how I was going to connect the coalition forces basically coming after Roman until I, I kind of thought back and I was like, what, what do I have at my disposal? And I was like, oh, perfect. He was around in a club and guess what?

He got videoed. A potential mole in the, uh, in the Wibitani ends up basically passing on the information. Yeah.

[JONATHAN]
So, so I got a question about Roman slash Monique slash his toxic relationship. You mentioned how much, cause you work in medical as an industry, how much psychology did you do in terms of like going through, oh, here's what Roman's been through versus how I want him to grow. Or is it just all organic for you?

[NICK]
Um, I mean, I, I, a lot of it was organic. Um, I wasn't doing a whole lot of psychology research. That is not to say that I haven't, you know, taking courses and all that kind of stuff in the past.

Like I was on a, I was on, I was on a doctorate route when I was in, when I was in college. I had a, I had a, uh, a minor in psychology and, um, that makes sense. Actually I did not get the minor in psychology when I graduated because, and this bugged the shit out of me.

I, uh, I, one of the courses I took was, um, it was actually, I was a freshman and I was in a, in a class with all seniors because I had screwed up how I signed up for classes. I had signed up really late and there were a bunch of classes that were filled. And I was like, all right, well, how do I feel like another psychology thing?

And I ended up choosing a course that was in the school of psychiatry for people who are getting like, and so, and it, and it, for some reason it didn't count. They wouldn't count it towards the psychology major. And I was like, what the hell?

And by the way, I, I was in way over my head there because that, like I said, those were seniors in the psychiatry major who I was taking class with. And I think that, I think the professor to her credit, she kind of was like, all right, this kid ended up here by accident. This guy's not supposed to be here.

I think I may have gotten a gentleman. See Freud. All right.

I wasn't that bad. I wasn't that bad, but I was definitely in a little over my head. Like we were doing role plays for how to deal with like unruly patients and things like that.

And I was like, I just turned 18 three weeks ago or 19 or whatever it was. I don't remember. That's funny.

But yeah, so so there's, there's, I definitely have like a history and a lot of that stuff. So it's something I, I certainly enjoy, but as far as like getting nitpicky with the like the types of psychology I'm implementing that I would say is a little more organic. And I feel like, I mean, you can pull from past experiences.

Like I've, I've, I've certainly been, I went to college, I've been in toxic relationships before. I know what, I know what that can look like. So, so, so yeah.

So I feel like I didn't really need to do a whole lot of research there. A lot of the research I was doing was more on the the physics and kind of the hard science side of trying to put this world together. That's, that's where a lot of the research really came in.

So yeah, yeah.

[JONATHAN]
I would say that you did a good job. So I've read a lot of psychology. I didn't get a minor in it.

It was just something I do.

[NICK]
Oh, neither did I. Guess we're in the same boat.

[JONATHAN]
But I'd say it comes through. I could be reading into it. The other guys maybe can attest more from an objective perspective, but I think that there's, that I can see the, the, the workings of it where it's like, Hey, this person has been through this thing.

Even to something you mentioned earlier, you don't become a saint in four weeks, right? Like this all, this all goes on. He's got to process this stuff.

And so that's one of the things that I'm looking forward to in these subsequent books is this idea of like, he still have a lot, he has a lot of shit to work through, but like the author is taking him on a journey and like, Oh, he's, he's softening here. He's still an asshole over here, but like, he is softening on this side, you know, where he took care of the little girl and things like that. It's, it's like, okay, because that's how we change as humans.

We have these moments we go, I don't have to make the same decision I made before. Oh, this decision made me feel a little bit better. Or I wanted to protect her or whatever, whatever his motivation is that we get to engage with.

It's like, Oh, there's more to live for. There's a re there's a regaining of purpose. And I think that that another underlying thing with your book that spoke to me is I really believe, and if any of our long-time listeners have been, have been listening, I constantly talk about like purpose and will, and like your desire to have this higher arc, higher, higher pride.

There's gotta be another word for purpose, but there's not right now. So just like a bigger thing to live for. And that, that drive from within you that keeps you going during this, the, the biggest dips of your life and the hardest moments that you go through, because like, look, life's hard sometimes.

Like, I don't care who you are, what you're going through life's hard. And that's the beauty that I love in sci-fi and fantasy is like, okay, it makes you feel like you're not alone. Even if all your friends are busy and whatever, and you can't hang out with them, you can't spend time with them.

You don't have family. Like there are other, I'll use people, right. Who've gone through worse or the same, and you can go, okay, I'm not alone.

I feel seen. Right. And I think that even though Roman's scenario is, is unique, it's also relatable to us as humans.

So good work on you. I really, really appreciated all that stuff.

[NICK]
Thank you. Thank you. Making a character's kind of decisions come off as real feeling going back to kind of the psychology thing.

A lot of that is really coming down to once again, the character creation process and making sure that they're well-defined because if I kind of know what they've been through, I can, and if you have the ability to kind of put yourself in someone else's shoes and say like, all right, well, what would they do in this scenario, given everything that, you know, kind of forms them that it, it seems to have, I guess, created characters that are making decisions that kind of, I guess, fall in line with whatever, you know, psychology circuits that, you know, you know what I'm trying to say. I guess it kind of keeps them on track.

Right. Yeah, exactly. It keeps, it keeps that on track.

So that's, that's where a lot of that stems from is the character creation process.

[SPENSER]
Yeah. Who do you, who do you think your most challenging character to write was?

[NICK]
That's a, that's a good question.

[JONATHAN]
Spencer with the hard hitting questions.

[NICK]
Probably, probably Zerus.

[MATT]
It's kind of hard to write a psychopath, isn't it? Yeah.

[SPENSER]
Because they don't feel human sometimes.

[NICK]
Right. But yeah, it's, writing him was, I would say, a little tougher because I had to try and find small ways to humanize him while still maintaining kind of that overarching, this guy is like, he means business. He's, he does not mess around.

He is. And also I wanted to kind of affect like the, the, the young leader syndrome because he's not, I mean, like there are some people who are in the, in the government who are like, you know, in their seventies and eighties, like, like Arpin Delgado and Tomlin Cornathus, who is, you get to meet him a little bit more in book two. He's an interesting kind of like, you know, former military, hard nosed, like always got a scowl on his face type of dude.

And you, you, you get to dive into him a little more, but I wanted to, Zerus is only supposed to be like in his late thirties. And so, but he's ruling a planet. And so what is that going to do to a person who, you know, may not have the same type of wisdom that, you know, someone who is much older would have.

And typically was, I can't remember where the quote came from, but it was that the, the young are always more radical. And that was, that was kind of what I wanted to portray as well. Like he's not doing things in a diplomatic way a lot, because he's just like, I need, I need to accomplish this.

I'm going to accomplish this by any means necessary. He's very Machiavellian in that regard. And towing that character line, you know, and trying to get that right definitely took, I'd say a little bit more thought than certain other characters.

Yeah, for sure. No, thanks for sharing. Another one that was probably the most times I ever rewrote a chapter was the chapter where Roman sits with Emmanuel.

So kind of like the second to last chapter, because that whole chapter is basically a conversation with, you know, between two men over a medical table, right? So Emmanuel is basically, you know, he's performing surgery and fixing up Braxton and, you know, kind of like expressing his disappointment with how Roman, Roman's life is kind of turned out. He's like, so you're still doing this, huh?

There's another kind of like a father figure to Roman. And yeah, yeah. So that, that one was tough to write because that one sums up a lot of, not only, you know, the themes that are discussed in the book, but kind of the trajectory of Roman's path in general.

And that one took me a while, a while to get right, for sure.

[MATT]
Yeah. That, that chapter seemed very monastic, I guess. And like he's very much like a monk.

Emmanuel was very wise and thoughtful father figure that he didn't have in modus or since his actual father in his life. So I really appreciated the depth to the conversation that he had. And you could tell that there was a very strong relationship between the two of them, even when you flashback to like Emmanuel's mannerisms and how he reacted to what things Roman was saying, and then how Roman reacted to things that Emmanuel was saying in the third person and the narrative too.

So it seemed like, it definitely seems like that would be the more challenging one to write, but it was written very well.

[NICK]
Well, thank you. Previously, which I don't really, I allude to in the book, but I don't really like write about in detail, is Emmanuel is the one that found Roman after Jarek was killed. So he's the one who, that's why he's got the big scar on his, on his, on, Roman has the big scar on his left shoulder, basically for taking a, taking a plasma charge.

And Emmanuel was the one who basically fixed them up. And that's how that relationship kind of started. So if, if modus to Roman, let's put it like this, modus to Roman is discipline, whereas Emmanuel to Roman is philosophy.

[SPENSER]
He almost, Emmanuel a little bit reminds me of almost like a Mr. Miyagi from the Karate Kid, where he's just like trying to, trying to get, you know, Roman, trying to talk sense into Roman. And, you know, Roman's just not listening. He doesn't understand why he has to, you know, do all of these things.

[MATT]
Wax on, wax off. Why? Exactly.

Yeah.

[SPENSER]
That doesn't make any sense. Just tell me how to fight, you know, and, and, but Emmanuel, you know, he, he, he's patient with Roman, even after, you know, 10 years or whatever it's been, 10 orbits, you know, he doesn't, he doesn't get impatient with Roman. He doesn't, you know, just kind of give up on him or anything like that.

So, so, so yeah, I, I appreciated that, but you also reminded me a little bit of, of Mr. Miyagi there. So yeah, that was cool.

[MATT]
Very big picture character, Emmanuel is.

[SLAVA]
I have a question, a little bit more lighthearted, for lack of a better term. I really like your naming conventions because you have some names that are definitely not Earth names, right? Or what we would imagine as Earth Western names are, and then some names like Roman and Monique, like I know Roman, I know Monique.

So like, so I liked the way you did that. I'm wondering how did you decide, like the naming convention, how did that come about?

[NICK]
That, that is something I'm still trying to figure out myself, if I'm being honest. I, I, I, I wish I had like a defined protocol for the way that I named things, but I really don't. Sometimes, I will say this, sometimes when it's more important names or more important characters, sometimes I do a little bit more of like a deep dive, like I mentioned, I think I may have mentioned in the past, like the planet Diorum.

Diorum in Latin means of the gods, and I, and I named it that because when they colonize the planet, they find all of these ruins from the, the Glef, as was, was what the civilization, that's what they call the civilization, and the Glef are no longer there. There's, there's nothing there except for a whole bunch of different alien creatures that kind of want to kill you, and so that's why I named it that. That's Australia?

[JONATHAN]
It's, think, everything wants to kill you? It's like Australia. Yes, yeah, yeah.

[NICK]
Yes, Diorum is the Australia of our galaxy,

[MATT]
and a whole new perspective on this book now,

[NICK]
but so, and then other times, I'll just, I'll just kind of take a moment to think, and I'll, I'll just say, oh, that's it, that sounds right, like sometimes it's just a memorable jumble of letters that fit together in such a way that I'm like, that, that's, that's perfect for this character, for whatever it is, whether it's just the sound or something about it, it fits for that character, and so that's what I'll go with for those characters, so sometimes there is, you know, some kind of depth to the, to the meaning behind each name, and sometimes, sometimes there isn't. Yeah, so that just sounds right. Sometimes it just works.

[SLAVA]
Yep.

[NICK]
Yeah, yeah, I, I, I wish I had a better answer for that.

[SLAVA]
No, that's a perfect answer, because it doesn't have to be, it doesn't have to be better, it is what it is, and I was just curious, because I found that fascinating, because you read other sci-fi books, and the names are not western or earth-like at all, or you read fantasy books, and they're definitely just, you know, made-up names, for good, or bad, or indifferent, and here you got Zaras, I don't know any Zaras, but like I said, I know like two Moniques, and I know a Roman, and so the combination of regular names, quote-unquote, and more sci-fi names, I found, I found very neat, so.

[NICK]
Well, well, if you think about it, names kind of come and go too, so who's to say that there might be another surge of Romans 700 years in the future, you know, right, and I also think that like a kind of juxtaposition of some more common names with some just made-up names, or much less common names, I think that also, it, it, it makes them more memorable as well, rather than just having a jumble of things you need to remember, there's kind of like a, there's, oh, there's Roman, and then there's, there's Monique, and there's, you know, this, and then, oh, then there's Norval, like, yeah, that's an interesting, and I actually, there was, there was a guy I used to work with whose name was Norval, okay, that's just, I, I, yeah, I used his name, it was, I was like, that's a, no, he was a good dude, I, I was like, but I was like, dude, you got a, you got like a physicist name, and yeah, yeah, real, real good guy, I actually spoke with him recently, and he was like, oh, dude, you used my name, you tuckerized me, I was like, yeah, man, yeah, yeah, well,

[SLAVA]
the thing is, now that I'm, it's coming to me right now as we're talking through it, this is Earthlings, yes, it's far in the future, yes, it's on a different planet, but it's still Earthlings, so some naming conventions in world would, like you said, continue through the future, so that makes sense now.

[MATT]
A little bit of ancestry callback, yeah.

[SLAVA]
Yeah.

[NICK]
Yeah, yeah, that's it, Earth is still alive and well. Yeah. At least that's the way I wrote it.

There you go.

[JONATHAN]
I want to talk about the golden phoenix ceremony, it's a totally, like, shifting over, was that difficult to write, or did you, like, base that on something, or it all just came up in your imagination through your noggin, or was, like, where did you get this, you know, three chalices, you know, gifting to the golden phoenix, etc., etc.?

[NICK]
I wanted to show not only how ruthless they are, but how disciplined they are. Ritualistic, basically, like, I mean, literally, they're like, the whole ritual is around, like, shedding your past life and giving yourself to nothing but the golden phoenix, and it's dark, and it kind of shows you how they operate, in terms of, you know, who they are, not only in the story, but who, you know, what they represent in the city, because they're basically, you know, their businesses are around all of, kind of, the real, the much darker aspects of crime, whereas, you know, the Wibbitonis, you know, they're dealing in black market trade, they're doing some gun running, they're doing, which, you know, that's not good stuff, but the golden phoenix deals in, like, hard drugs, human trafficking, black market stuff as well, they've, they're, they're larger than the Wibbitonis, and to be able to, kind of, corral an organization as nefarious and as, kind of, big as they've become, that's, that's kind of the, I guess, the, some of, that's, that's, kind of, the, the personality that they've taken on, as an organization, is that they are, they are ruthless, and, yeah, and, and it's funny, because you also get a, get a chance to see a little bit of, you know, what the Wibbitonis stands for as well, you know, as, I believe it's as, right after Roman comes back from the mission in, what is it, the, the junction tunnels, where they, you know, they, kind of, discover the hybrid trafficking operation, which is hand-in-hand with the CP and the, the Golden Phoenix. He comes back, and he, kind of, you know, turns in the mission, like, hey, you know, like, I got it, I'm exhausted, I need to sleep. You get to see how, kind of, Modus is, like, putting his actions on a pedestal to some of the recruits, and then he walks downstairs, and the recruits are actually, kind of, they're, they're getting ready to, you know, do whatever training they're going to do, and they're reciting their, kind of, mantra, which is all about just, like, basically, like, live free or die.

Like, you know, we, we, we're not relying on the state that doesn't give a shit about us. We are, we are going to build ourselves up by being proficient. We are going to do whatever it takes to, you know, grab a piece of that pie, and yes, it is certainly capitalistic, but there's, there's also, like, a, I guess, there's, like, there's a, there's a touch of honor that's, kind of, worked in there, despite the fact that they are thugs, right, but, you know, if, if you have your, your, your pick of faction, I mean, you can, kind of, see how drastic the two are, you know, juxtaposed to one another, and then, yeah, I think some of that came from, I used to, I've, I've done martial arts, like, my whole life.

I started with Taekwondo when I was a kid, and I did that for many years, and then I went to boxing and kickboxing, and then I did a short stint of Muay Thai when I was in college, and I did Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu most recently. After that, I actually need to find a studio closer to where I'm living now, so I, I missed that. That was, I really enjoyed that one, but when I, when I was, yeah, yeah, hell yeah, it is, it's fun, you know, you, you're playing body chess, and it's true, yeah, yeah, and I'm, I'm still not particularly good yet, yeah, but, but I, I, I want to get good, but anyway, so, like, when I was in, when I was a kid, you know, in Taekwondo, I went to, like, a, it wasn't, like, your average, like, kind of karate class where, you know, it's all about, like, confidence boosting. This was, like, all about hard discipline, and, like, there were, there were things that we would have to recite each, each class.

There were things that we had, and I was, like, okay, well, let's throw something like that in there to, kind of, give people a glimpse of what the Wibitani is all about, and how, yes, they're outlaws, yes, they do some bad shit, but there's, kind of, there's, there's structure, and there's a little bit of an honorable structure to what they're trying to build, or at least in what modus has built, in terms of the framework of the Wibitani, versus, kind of, the ruthless, just nature of the, the Golden Phoenix, which is a very different type of organization, but has been allowed to become much larger due to their ruthlessness.

[MATT]
It does seem a lot of the factions are very, like, tribal. There's a lot of honor, the individual, in the individual to the factions, there's a lot of, like, this is honor in what we do. We're doing it for, you know, the betterment of the faction, or the gang, or the group, tribe, whatever you want to call it.

All of the factions, CP, even the government factions, the CP, the IGB, the Golden Phoenixes, the Wibitani, everything, it seems very tribal, not to the point where one is any better than the other. There are obviously some that do worse things than some, but from, if I look at it from, like, a citizen, I don't think the Wibitani is, like, the hero gang. They still do some shady shit.

They're still just the gangs that some, like, little kids want to be a part of, like, oh, my uncle was in the Wibitani, I want to go be a part of that. It's very tribal, culty, almost, it seems like. Was that by design for each of the factions, or was it just, kind of, something that, again, organically came about?

[NICK]
Oh, yeah. I mean, you think about it. I mean, what is a country?

I mean, it's a group of people who are sharing certain similar ideas. I mean, every country has an anthem, every country has, or a national anthem, excuse me. Every country has, you know, a set of laws that one must abide by.

Every country has its own kind of history and culture that expresses itself in the way that people interact with one another and what they do. In a lot of ways, you know, that's, I mean, we're all in a cult, you know, no matter where we are. If you're looking at it from more of a, you know, kind of a top-down view, like a 30,000-foot view.

[MATT]
36,000.

[NICK]
Now, if your cult is, you know, if your cult leader is saying that he wants to have sex with your girlfriend, then maybe you're in a real cult. Does that happen in book two? No.

No comment. That doesn't happen in book two. But from that state, it's almost like, you know, how does a country become a country, right?

I mean, at some point, I mean, in past history now, starts small. And it starts with, you know, kind of a group of loyalists, and who I imagine are very tightly connected to one another. And it begins to grow and grow and, you know, if you do it right, then the culture is preserved in some way.

And, you know, the culture is the thing that binds you. And so every organization has to have kind of its own culture, just like every company has its own kind of company culture. And that is important to maintaining the morale of everyone who works at the company.

It's important to making sure everyone's kind of staying on task and doing what they need to do, what needs to be done for the company to operate. And so in a lot of ways, like the structure of things, yeah, you can call it culty, you know, because maybe it's kind of foreign to what we're used to now. This is 700 years in the future.

I mean, this is anyone's ballgame, man. You know, people are colonizing new planets. And you'll get to see a little bit more of kind of what that looks like in, you know, coming books and why we've almost kind of stopped at planet seven for the time being.

And you're going to get to see a little bit more of that through the control that the IGB exerts over the other planets. But they're not really ruling, they're not ruling in the light. We'll say that they're kind of there.

Everyone knows they exist. But the, but kind of the power that they have is a little bit more like, let's say, let's say, let's say this, if, if, if the governments on the planets are kind of like, you know, the governments, then, then the IGB is more like the Illuminati that's pulling the strings from in the background. And they actually do, or the Grand Regent does a severe amount of work to make sure that, you know, sentiments are, you know, basically remain neutral of the IGB, because the planetary governments are basically like the kind of, almost like the scapegoat.

So.

[JONATHAN]
He's doing a bang up job on Diorum.

[NICK]
We'll see how long that lasts.

[JONATHAN]
Yeah. I'm so excited. I really want to see the IGB just come and like crush Zerus and then have himself uprise again.

I'm looking for that strong tension here, Nick. I'm just waiting for it.

[MATT]
It seems very palpitating. Zerus, I think I talked about this in one of our other episodes when we talked about it. Zerus seems very Palpatine-esque.

He's very powerful being, but he's young, very, very young. So that's the only, I mean, the big difference between him and Palpatine. He's very young and he's made a couple of mistakes and he's very, oh gosh, what's the word?

He's too eager. He's impatient. There we go.

Impatience is a good word. He's impatient to move forward with his plan. Whereas Palpatine waited years and played every little piece meticulously.

That's what I'm getting from Zerus, but he's just a slightly more impatient from like, oh man, well, okay. Who's going to get caught where? Edge of my seat stuff, man.

Love it.

[JONATHAN]
I want to ask a question about Modus in the future here. Are we going to get to see Modus rebuilt as a man or is he, that's it, he's in the background now. He's not going to come back.

[MATT]
I hope it's not a Disney trope.

[NICK]
Oh no, no, no, no, no. Modus is a good old boy. He's a tough one.

He'll come back. I actually have, if there's any character I'm going to do like a spinoff series on, it's him.

[MATT]
That would be awesome.

[NICK]
Perfect. Because as I was writing his backstory, I started getting all of these ideas and I was like, oh, this guy's awesome. There's no way that I'm not going to, like how, like basically how he ended up on Diorum and like the incipients of the Wibitani would basically be like the narrative of that story.

Yeah.

[JONATHAN]
Are we also going to get, and this is just something that came to me as we were talking today, are we going to get a stories from the grind, like just a series of short stories or vignettes or like moments of just like things that have happened in the grind or other places on Diorum?

[MATT]
Don't make him have more work. He's got to finish the books first, Jonathan. Damn.

Yeah, I do.

[NICK]
I do need to, that's still my number one focus. I assure you. That's a good idea.

I will say this for the comic book, by the way, did I send you guys episode zero yet?

[SLAVA]
I think so.

[JONATHAN]
No.

[SLAVA]
Is that the third comic? Oh no, no, no, no, no. You didn't.

Not that one.

[NICK]
Well, I'm going to send you that afterward because that just came out. I'll send you the digital copies. Oh yeah, you got one or two.

I've got the third one for you. Awesome. Blessed.

And I mentioned before, like I'm going to do a thing where anything that comes before episode zero is going to go backwards chronologically and anything that's following the narrative of the book, episodes one, two, three, four, that's going to go forward chronologically. A lot of what you're going to see in some of the stuff, you know, pre episode zero is going to be Roman doing missions for all sorts of different characters throughout Kairos, visiting different parts of Diorum and doing some very interesting work for some very interesting people. So you're going to see a little bit of like a mission anthology type of release for that comic.

[JONATHAN]
There's your vignettes, Jonathan. I'm here for it. I want to get, you know, you said you wrote all these backstories and things like that's, I'm like, I'm foaming at the mouth.

[MATT]
George Lucas wrote the trilogies before he wrote any of the other stuff, okay? Let the man cook. Let him cook.

[NICK]
Don't worry, I'm cooking. I'm cooking on overtime.

[MATT]
I smell what the rock is cooking and I can't wait to feast.

[SLAVA]
All right. Well, should we wrap it up, boys?

[MATT]
Land this plane, Slava.

[SLAVA]
All right, one final question. Does Roman find love again?

[NICK]
Yes.

[SPENSER]
Fantastic. I still think it's Monique.

[NICK]
It's actually Monique's sister.

[SLAVA]
Hopeless romantic.

[NICK]
Nah, that would make him seem like a dick again.

[MATT]
Well, she's dead. So we're going the wrong way in character development, boys.

[NICK]
No sisters.

[MATT]
Well, we are 700 years in the future or however long in the future. There is cloning. Maybe.

[JONATHAN]
Nick's like, I gotta go rewrite book two real quick.

[SLAVA]
Oh, gosh. Well, Nick, thank you so much for joining us again. The book was fantastic.

We loved it. Having you on for the interview was great. Having you on for this recap episode, the whole experience has been a blast.

You're a really cool dude. We love you and we love your work.

[NICK]
You guys are awesome too. It's been a lot of fun. Thanks for having me.

I'll definitely make sure you guys get an ARC copy when book two comes out.

[JONATHAN]
Hell yeah.

[MATT]
Awesome. Thanks, Nick.

[NICK]
You got it. Yeah, very cool.

[JONATHAN]
All right, SideQuesters. Until next time, be sure to pick up Vidalarium if you haven't yet and give it a read and join Nicholas on his journey of creating the next great sci-fi IP over the next 10 years. See you next time.

I have a favor to ask you. If you like what we're doing, the simplest way to support the show is to hit subscribe. In return, we'll keep leveling up and we'll listen to your feedback and read authors that you suggest.

And of course, we'll take SideQuest along the way. Thank you for joining us and we'll see you next time.