Grid Runner Synopsis

The epic tale of Grid Runner revolves around six extraordinary individuals, unknowing of
each other, whose destinies will entwine with the common goal of saving the grid from
something called The Erebus Hole (the universe is often referred to as the grid in the novel).
The Erebus Hole, according to folks within this universe, is commonly labeled as myth and most
will argue that creating one is physically impossible. The idea is that once one is crafted and
ignited in a hot spot, such as the core of a planet or star, it will swallow its surroundings and
expand exponentially over an infinite timeline, eventually turning the universe into a big black
nothing. The horrifying truth of an Erebus Hole is that if one was ever successfully created,
there would be no turning back and every unsuspecting molecule in the universe would,
eventually, cease to exist.
Now, our main characters and the readers will not be made aware of any of this until
further into the story. Everything that leads into the climax will just be backstories, romances,
adventures on strange planets helping some species survive because of a disease the
government may or may not have caused, or exploring ancient scientific museums aboard a
derelict space station out in the corner of the universe, fun little stories to help build strong
appreciation for each character and, more importantly, to define how extraordinary each of
them really is.

Character Bios
Lavitz
Appearance:
So I have it in my head that he would look sort of like the track runner from the Animatrix
chapter World Record.


Or the bounty hunter with the dual pistols from Alien Resurrection.


He is the first character our readers will be introduced to.. And he is, without question, a
badass. He pilots a Mech Suit about 15 meters tall, complete with all sorts of killing gadgets;
pulse cannons, energy swords, machine guns.. all that good stuff. To give you a sense of the grit
on this guy, Im going to briefly sum up his introduction story (which will also be the opening
scene of Grid Runner):

So we see our hero held down within the crevice of a cliff in some desert wasteland, in
front of him is an army of assorted killer robots, each waiting their turn to rip apart our hero.
Behind him, we see an endless heap of freshly obliterated robot innards plastered against the
cliff sides. The shot then pans out and we see the cliff open out to a field giving us a view of the
millions of robots, of all sizes and types, funneling into the cliff. The next shot you see is a first
person view of his Mech Suits piloting HUD and hes running low on gun juice. At that point, a
gargantuan mother ship breaks through the clouds. Lavitz draws his energy blade and starts
hacking his way out of this overwhelming situation. But as the mother ship nears and millions of
drones begin to waterfall out of its mouth, our hero senses defeat. He opens a panel in his arm
and starts a countdown sequence (like the ending scene of Predator), but before he can finish
running the sequence, a video feed appears on his HUD. Its his girl, shes pinned to a metallic
bed with screws drilled into her shoulders and shes screaming in agony. It isnt clear what
exactly is happening to her, but blood is spurting out everywhere and high pitched drills are
humming. Lavitz dawns a massive rocket launcher and starts firing into the sky, screaming
LAAAATTIIIISSSS. But this only aggravates the captor and the volume of torture is increased,
and so Lavitz disarms.
After all this, The Overlord explains to Lavitz that he is, now and forever, a slave. For
insurance of his compliance, they will eternally preserve and torture his wife. So for the first
half of the novel, Lavitz is, by profile, a bad guy.
SPOILER: So about that panel Lavitz was messing with before the video feed came on, the
reader wont see it again until much later in the story. The reader will then be shown that, this
whole time, the sequence countdown was not a self-destruct sequence, but instead a secret
super-weapon hell use to kill his captor.







Elroy
Appearance:
Elroy would likely look how Naruto might look if he we was portrayed as a more realistic (lose
the anime features, whiskers and spikey hairdo) seventeen year old kid. Hes scrawny, blonde,
and bolsters a do-as-I-please persona.




Ill introduce these characters in sequence as to when they are introduced to the reader.
Elroy is first seen, lying in bed, in a small one room shanty. His parents are arguing with some
Republica captain about taking their son away to battle. After much resistance and tears from
his parents, Elroy gets up and sobbingly tells his parents farewell. Elroy climbs into the back of a
jeep and they drive off. The Captain is furiously staring down Elroy in the backseat and, after a
moment, Elroy starts cracking up in laughter.
The Captain says, Thats the last time Im doing anything for you, Elroy.. I feel like such an
asshole right now. And stop laughing, it aint funny. Your parents were hysterical.
Elroy hides his smile, Alright, alright. You got my bag?
The Captain throws him his bag, and Elroy pulls out his energy-tech arm-cannon and
charges it up with a satisfying grin.
So this gives you an idea of what and who Elroy is. He isnt the strongest of the six, but
hes young and has potential badassness. And if there had to be a main character of the six,
Elroy would be it.


Ra
Appearance:
Ra is both nonhuman and most-human at the same time. He looks like one of those masked
guards from Stargate or a Mondoshawan from Fifth Element (just not so wide bodied).


Ra is most-human because, according to his stories, he is the only Earthling left in the
universe. His story starts hundreds of thousands of years ago on Earth at the eve of its
destruction. A deep space mining crew brings back a small artifact to Earth, and the presence of
the artifact causes an outbreak epidemic and within the first fifty years, 90% of the world
population is wiped out from disease. Ra and a few thousand survivors build refuge in a self-
support space station in Earths orbit while they wait out the remaining hundred years or so for
humanity to expire. On his last days, Ra (who was not named Ra then) is visited by a star in the
form of a man. The star offers Ra and five others an eternal vessel for their souls (a new body
and eternal life) on the condition that they protect and preserve the human race for as long as
they live (to be clear, eternal life meaning they will persist through time without age or
deterioration, but can still die of other causes). The star carries the ship to a paradise-like
planet where the human race can rebuild and prosper. Just to be clear, this backstory is a
paraphrase of a summary when considering the extensive profile of Ra. And now, two-hundred
thousand years into the future, the human race (in addition to everything else in the universe)
is under threat and Ra has come out of seclusion.
For the majority of the story, Ra adventures with Caprice, whose immediate objectives
are relative of each other, and so a mutual partnership is made between the two as they travel
the universe looking for clues of a rumored Erebus Hole spawning.

Caprice
Appearance:
Shes a foxy young mech-engineer/bounty hunter who could look like Marisa Tomei with a
splash of steampunk (Including the New York personality). She has a brown leather jacket with
all sorts of belts and harnesses and holstered weapons, but her most noticeable aspect (besides
her stunning appearance) is her weapon. A custom made Vortex hand-cannon which looks like
the turbine off a 747 aircraft, just more relative in size obviously.
Marisa Tomei
We first see her at an intergalactic 50s style diner orbiting among the asteroid ring of
planet whatever. Shes sitting at the bar ordering her regular and chatting with the waitress
about the strange cloaked fellow at the end of the bar. The stranger is Ra trying his bes t to
cover his unorthodox appearance while staking out a girl who hes been informed frequents
this diner often. After a quarrel and brawl between Caprice and a few drunken patrons trying to
get familiar with her, quickly regretting their decision, Ra is convinced this is the one he is
looking for. After introductions, they set off in her custom made P-Class cruiser, traveling the
universe for evidence of an Erebus Hole.





Club
Appearance:
Well... hes a lion. He has jointed thumbs and walks on two legs, but besides that, hes a lion.
An easy visual illustration for him would be Ajani from Magic the Gathering.

Hes equipped with a gas-powered boomerang tethered to an iron chain so he can
quickly recoil the boomerang. And throughout the novel, he is shadowed by Lei, his dead
brothers bride-to-be.

So, how exactly does some low-intelligence beast-walker tucked away on some god
forsaken, smelly n hot jungle planet end up saving the universe? Well. his ass gets thrown off
because suddenly this planet is worth something to the warring factions.
The story starts when the village finds out that Clubs eldest brother has been killed.
And the higher ups and sons of the chief are bickering over who becomes head honcho, and
just when tensions are highest, a platoon of Republica soldiers bust in, herd up all the villagers
and take them to a refugee camp. Club, the more humble of the brothers, finds Lei and tries to
reason with the soldiers to set them free. The Guard Captain couldnt give a rats ass. Then they
try to gender divide the tribe, taking Lei from Club. Club grabs the escorting soldier by the neck
and lifts him three feet high, growling threateningly. The Guard Captain intervenes and lets the
princess stay with Club. From that day forward, both he and Lei are treated horribly by the
guards for the years to come.
They eventually break out of the camp and escape their home planet, now consumed by
war. And Club has sworn, with his life, to always protect Lei and his unconditional devotion to
her safety is shown throughout the novel.






Emily

Emily is an eleven year old girl, artificially inseminated and birthed in a Republica lab
deep underground. Shes adorable, giggly, playful and the most dangerous being in the
universe. Her story starts when an ignorant admiral decides to visit the Republica lab to get
progress results on psionic mutation research. As the admiral and chief scientist ride the
elevator down, the scientist explains what marvelous resul ts they are getting when implicating
the mutations during fetus growth. He seems very excited to show the admiral a young girl who
can manipulate matter with just her mind! Now, Emily isnt the type who would hold a spoon
and make it bend from side to side, she would just turn the spoon into a ten-foot bladed
harpoon hovering in the air.
The admiral steps up to the small window space and peers into the holding cell. Emily
moves on all fours from the far corner of the room and climbs up the door to inspect the
admiral through the window. The admiral, startled by Emily, pulls out a chocolate bar and
waves it in front of the window. Shes enticed and the admiral is getting a kick out of it. Well the
young girl doesnt like being teased and starts snarling into the admirals eyes. The admiral
doesnt like the situation anymore and, in that moment, realizes what is about to happen next.
Her eyes start to glow intensely violet and the seams of the lab begin to tear apart. Then, a
barrage of velvet energy explodes out of her and everyone instantly boils into puddles of
liquefied guts and bone. She makes her escape into the surrounding woods until she finds
peace and quite so she can enjoy her chocolate bar. The Matriarch and her pet, a quicksilver
metallic tiger called Rychn, track her down and capture her, which is about the worst thing that
could possibly happen.
The Matriarch is leader of the Odysseus, the warmongering chaotic faction of Grid
Runner and a real thorn in the Replublicas ass. So Emily is raised by a not-so-very-nice mother
figure, the type of mom who brags about personally ending more than a million lives and loves
to tell the stories of her favorites to Emily as she goes to bed each night.


So the stories all start as the universe is in its most dire conflict. There are good reasons
why I chose to have six main characters. This way, the novel never slows down. It just moves
from one core scene of a hero to the next. And just when you think youre getting closure from
the story, something goes horribly wrong and the novel immediately moves to the next heros
story. This will be the rhythm of the novel.
Its also important to note that two of our six heroes are employed by the baddies for a
majority of the story; Lavitz, who is stuck in a situation he cant get out of, and Emily, who was
enticed with revenge against the Republica by the Matriarch. The reason is, the novel will
always follow one of the six, so that the reader only knows what our heroes know. So back and
forth we see the inner workings of each faction, their plans and their logistics. The story isnt
going to be chronologically linear either. And honestly, it doesnt need to be. Most of the
heroes wont even be aware of each other until closer to the climax.
Finally, Grid Runner is epic in scale. When you take into account the six heroes, the
assortment of planets, a few conflicting factions, many opposing villains, different races of
intelligent species, science, magic, spirit; its just a strange and compelling big-ass universe.

For the Illustrators

There are some things artists should know about this project:
1. Youll need a sense of creativity and imagination, specifically for science fiction. Ill do
my best to explain each page as detailed and specific as I possibly can, but you need to
be able envision the picture and draw the sheet within the given parameters. The
reason why I bring this up is, if you arent into drawing in this genre, the project will
probably become mentally exhausting. But I will always help if you need more specifics
of any kind, or any general question at all.
2. The novel actually wont require a great amount of detail on each page. Im only
interested in a light amount of shading, if any at all. I plan on personally coloring a
variety of pages. And, with the exception of the really important scenes, I dont expect
too much detail in each page, especially when it comes to things like the background.
3. I cant pay much. I definitely cant pay more then $25-30 a page, depending on the page,
and even that price is pretty brutal. And Ill most likely only be able to afford 1 or 2
pages per paycheck (every two weeks). So at least you wont be overloaded with work.
But if you see success in this novel, and I manage to publish it, you will definitely get
whats deserved. I care only about seeing this novel finished.
4. You may have noticed, this project is pretty huge. All in all, Id say well over a hundred
pages, but its hard to determine how much more. And if youre in, I hope youre in for
the whole project. If you have to out in the middle of the project, its no big deal, it
would just be a drag to have a change in drawing style right in the middle of the novel. A
good option, if this all seems too heavy, is to designate an illustrator for one or two of
the six main characters (honestly, I think itd be interesting to see a slight change in style
between characters).

Thank you sirs and maams,
Mike Bolts
Mikebizzolts@gmail.com