Sol

*Sol* is the first novel in the main cycle series. All *Sol* related notes will go to this page.

## Characters

**Jaymeson Nicks** is one of two protagonists and the husband of Cera Nicks. He failed out of the Consortium's Academy program and instead became an on-earth scientist.

**Cera Nicks** is one of two protagonists and the husband of Cera Nicks. She was born in space. Space is in her blood.

**Søren** is Jameson's best friend. He was born in the Soviet Union and immigrated to the United States.

**Merci** is Sara's Alliance contact on Dosijing.

**Avion** is an Alliance officer and double agent actually working for the Technocracy.

## Plot Points

Basic Outline

* Prologue: Jaymeson on Mars
* Section one: Jaymeson's Earth exodus, flight, crash on Mars, survival on surface.
* Flashback one
* Section two: discovery of Veragrad, introduction of Cera's perspective. Death of Petras.
* Flashback two.
* Section three: Building the rocket, Mars exodus and trip to Dosijing. Cera's Alliance exploits in the Main Belt.
* Flashback three.
* Section four: uprising on Dosijing and Kamijing. Jaymeson arrives. Alliance involvement and falling action into resolution.

### Flashbacks

1. Jaymeson and Cera's early period. Courtship and marriage. Falling out with Jaymeson's parents. Early life. Jaymeson enters the Academy. Two attempts at pregnancy and subsequent miscarriages. This flashback takes place during Jaymeson's dire survival while alone on the Martian surface.
2. Middle years of their relationship on Earth. Some rocky times. Cera accepts that she will never see her family again. Jaymeson fails out of the Academy. This flashback is shown while Jaymeson is at Veragrad and Cera's perspective is starting to be shown in the narrative.
3. Choice to leave Earth. Adjustments in life. Excitement. Jaymeson takes his job with the synthetics plant while Cera works for the Alliance through their friend and Alliance connection Søren**.** Ends with Cera boarding her shuttle to the cycler craft that will take her to the Main Belt. This flashback is seen while Jaymeson is in transit to Dosijing. He arrives directly after this flashback is over.

### Flight to Main Belt

Once he is off of Mars, on his flight to the Main Belt, Jaymeson miscalculates one of his burns due to an electrical grid failure and accidentally burns most of his hydrogen, accelerating rapidly. This also causes a fire that nearly burns out the whole craft.

He has enough net hydrogen to get to the Belt and still make a retroburn to decelerate. To solve this problem, he shuts down his electrical systems so as not to engage the fuel cells. He carefully rations his water, but does not have enough water to reverse electrolyse to produce more hydrogen. He also rations his breathable atmosphere and saves LOX by altering the breathable mix to the minimum amount of oxygen necessary, breathing mostly nitrogen and more-or-less living in his spacesuit.

He uses battery power to occasionally check his course with the GPU and makes an EVA to gimbal and turn fuel valves by hand, rather than relying on the faulty electrical grid. He finally uses the remaining power to radio into Dosijing once the platform is within sight, at which point he learns of the Technocracy's revolt on the platform.

## Notes

Jaymeson Nicks listens to music en-route to the Belt, on all phases of his trip. It becomes something of a motif.

Jaymeson inherit's Petras' mantle as *de-facto* leader of the Veragrad community after the latter's death.

Mars as the setting for desert spirituality. Sophia is the Wisdom master to Jaymeson: "You're like something out of a dream. This whole place is like that," he will tell her.

Jaymeson could never get his Consortium license precisely because the engineering of modern craft were so different compared to the archaeotech that he

## Behind the Scenes

"*Sol* is celebratory of the most human aspects of myself. It is my answer to the essential question "What does it mean to be human?". It is a lifework and an entirely selfish affair. I have a great love for it and if no one else shares that love, then so be it. I will have enjoyed working on it. It's constant companionship throughout my life is most enjoyable." - Revan Filiaexdeus

The genesis of *Sol* came in 2009 through collaborative writing with Zeto Parix. An intense period of research came this, as the vision for *Sol* was one of pure, hard science fiction. The project was put down in 2012 when Revan Filiaexdeus began his long period of traveling and was revived in mid 2013 while living in Jackson County, Missouri. The primary motivation for the revival of the work was Revan's intense heartbreak at having the love of his life torn from him.

*Sol* is dedicated to Adee Dancy.