A child adopted by a pediatrician and a perinatologist, a reserved intellectual prodigy since high school alters the destiny of a young pianist. An intimidatingly aloof reclusive science driven workaholic neurosurgeon dabbling in optics, there are countless scientific journals in which she has been published. She drives a van, occasionally leaving science and her conservative appearance behind.

Highly respected, wise and energetic, his inventions interact with his cooperative signature cyclical element to create sculptures of color and reflection hidden around the world. Somewhat careless of his appearance, sharing food mutually with animals, he contends that given enough time and a constant presence, everything is eventually smoothed; we move towards another as interfering obstacles are either swiftly avoided or eroded slowly according to basic organic laws.

Happiness is never beyond his grasp. Prone to cognitive flares in which he contemplates beyond the present reality, usually with mischievous results, he is gratified with whatever sensory opportunities present themselves. Totally unflappable, he is impulsive, oblivious to anything unpleasant and negative. A magnet for the world's oddest people, his notion of reality has grown improbable. Apparently under the protection of a phalanx of exhausted guardian angels all working overtime he again falls under the influence of one of this intractable whims or yet another of his odd random acquaintances in whom he liberates the reckless element. Whomever he comes into contact with finds him curiously liberating and refreshing. Perpetually bewildered, his attention span is frustratingly short. All his intentions are as positive as his modes of implementation are bizarre. Cooks, sort of.

Guarding the door of the apartment building, sitting and reading magazines all day, he ponders his future while sitting on an agonized metal folding chair than is bending to his weight. Bulky and brooding but friendly and respectful to the senior residents who have seen him grow up in the neighborhood, they constantly advise to use his potential elsewhere. Not a gossip, but a connector who watches and surmises relationships like how they do in the television cop shows, he was slowly moving up the gang hierarchy. He knows he is capable, and anticipates a logical ascension; he would be a smart lieutenant. Discouraged by an act of nepotism, the rest of the organization feels his pain and commiserates with him, but what is done is done. For now.

An apparent loner known to play straight pool and solitaire for hours, pale and wearing the same UV 500 post mydriatic glasses he was given as a child when his eyes were dilated by his optometrist, Dr. G is a highly respected forensic psychiatrist academic, a master of correctional psychiatry, he performs evaluations for involuntary commitment and determination of mental competence to stand trial. Having performed more assessments for insanity plea acquittals than he cares to remember, he contends that there exists a rational core within the seemingly irrational, not the other way around and that eccentrics are differently sensored. A nonlinear stoic dour fatalist who ascribes to the Italian proverb, "Alla fine del gioco, il re e il pedone tornano nella stessa scatola" (at the end of the game, the pawn and the King go into the same box), Dr. G’s singular task is to probe the nature of the human, a pursuit that has rendered him into a seemingly perpetually exhausted (or alternatively hyper-caffeinated) recluse. Continually psychoanalyzing his colleagues having made him a pariah in the professional community, he is now focused on problem-solving and cognitive processing, developing an affinity for the highly odd amongst the supposedly ordinary.

Tall, white haired and graceful, he moves at a measured pace and is not given to raising his voice. The people in the kingdom are a manifestation of his values. His reputation for wisdom extensive, a patron of art, a paragon of fairness and benevolence, an aging philanthrope, tolerant, inquisitive, versatile, a combination of social, political and intellectual impulses, he strives for his court to indulge in learning. A compassionate, humorous generous king to his people, abhorrent of violence, his wife guides his spirit as he pities kingdoms at war. Events have impressed upon him the fragility of life. His gift of phronesis will be called upon in its entirety: the barbarians have arrived.

Not so much tangible entities as changes in the texture of that which is considered present, the Dragon, Pheonix, Tiger and Tortoise each hold seven constellations and guard one of the Four Directions from Mount Sumeru, the peak at the center of the world and the heavens, the intersection of all dimensions. Aware of everything, detached, objective, amorphous and yet powerful, jostling planets and rending galaxies in half as they ward off evil and provide protection from malicious spirits, defeated demons squirm pinned beneath their feet. The fixing of attitudes and desires decides the trajectories that determine which entities will collide, and thus in which dimension an entity will exist at any given moment. Turning their heads full circle, their senses have infinite range and sensitivity as they embody conflict, bliss, growth, teaching, and longevity as they exercise their collective purpose: to maintain, undisturbed, the peaceful dream of the Enlightened One which is the sole reason why all, even the Guardians, exist. And now, something is amiss.

All business and articulate, he is the respected dealer whose ethics established a system that benefits his people albeit by illegal means. Mid-level, he has no interest in expanding his operation farther than the small cluster of apartment buildings which he and his chiefs have been operating efficiently. He had so far successfully managed to maintain a redemptive independence, his genuinely philanthropic organization generating funds in an uncomfortably familiar way. His operation is a good example of sellers not consuming the product, with the exception of one person. Interested in helping people directly, he knows that he will never be part of the legitimate system. Everyone has his or her place, and he knows where he is tethered. Respectful and respected despite recent familial events, there are stories from his chief about an overwhelmingly consuming force which is changing adjacent operations from the bottom up, the network being dismantled by someone whom he has only heard about but never met. Until now.

His mind always sharp and quick, ever aware of indignities and the intense rejection and ostracism that he has suffered, Hel senses a deficit of fairness and equity in the world, an imbalance that must be reciprocated. He find unacceptable the fact that death will overtake him before he can enact revenge on the notion of life itself; he yearns for retribution beyond his lifetime. Gradually losing his conscience he takes the first step towards sophistication: pairing pathological purpose with premeditation. In modernity his isolation gives way; he is energized in sophisticated, efficient, and devastating ways. Empathy and remorse being eradicated by rejection, dark forces mindlessly gravitate towards him, falling into his increasing sphere and gravity of influence. The bloody, lawless, anarchic results now threaten history itself, to whom he directs an invocation: "May your time of pain be endless, erasing your past, searing your present, and commanding your future. Your love will wither before the fires of hate. The days will blind you as the night steals your breath. The sky will suffocate you as are crushed by the land while being drowned by the sea. You will come to hate life, and death will be your only thought." He has arrived.

A strong daughter to her father, one side of a balanced equation, politically savvy and headstrong, she is an ambassador and co-advisor as they the lead kingdom together. She coordinates the public works, supervises the building of roads, engages in civil engineering and social planning, and, when she’s not busy, works with the infirmaries who in turn work with the wizards to make medicines and ointments, and on the days when she is relaxing she is helping to build places for worship and study to attract teachers of natural sciences and architecture, which happen to be her two favorite subjects. Highly literate and mature, she acknowledges the experiences and travails of all women who have come before, and her diligence has led to a kingdom endowed with women doctors, judges, professors, lawyers, writers, and artists. She is inspired by women in other places who continued to fight oppression even after their husbands were killed, calling to arms those who would fight, and training other women to lead armies of their own. And now a frozen tear, her last immutable hope, is the eye to her heart.

A nonassertive apprentice gardener pursuing an emotional inquiry, he has resigned himself to being socially invisible. Very observant and common, he is aware of everything happening in the kingdom. In public, doesn't really talk unless spoken to, preferring to observe public interactions, but with his mother he is talkative and full of stories. Honest and simple, he is the last person in any gossip chain; nothing goes farther than him. Thrust into unfamiliar surroundings he cannot understand conspicuous consumption and arrogance, and nondistribution of wealth. He is the unrequited, underqualifed, and hopelessly dedicated admirer of Javaz, now driven into action.

A phantom technophile, John lives in a conceptual world beyond even the farthest end of the bell shaped curve, the residence of Toy, his rumoured computational counterpart. An ever-consuming and thus ever increasing compendium of nonlinear, novel strategies to problem solving, Toy self-generates its own design based on the application of the Boolean subtraction operation to integrate spatial and structural parameters. While conventional ally computers deal with one and zero bits, John and Toy also cater to zip and infinity bits, referring to the state of affairs before and after the Big Bang, respectively, working on the assumption that there was not a single Big Bang, but an infinite series of them. John is working on Toy's ability to derive data from the most subtle and sensual human sensation of all: heat.

A bit slow on the uptake, an unambitious minion who doesn't like anything that takes a lot of thinking or effort, Lo-Smak is suddenly promoted at best time of his life. Or worst.

Intelligent, proud and regal, the supportive wife of the king continues to hold his heart and guide his will. From a lineage of strong women who completely reject any notion of female weakness, the women of the kingdom consider her, more than the king, to be the moral backbone of the Kingdom and the definite figurehead elevating them all. In her mind, spouses were not property, but rather someone to protect from threat or injury.

Equated with blood and fire, earth and space, adhering to the axial religions and ways of thought, she is dynamic and strong, but contained and restrained. An undefeated master fighter, during a fight she becomes totally present elsewhere and upon arriving at an intellectual conclusion, ends the match decisively and gets back into the immediate challenge before her in life. The embodiment of bushido, she is savvy in aerospace law. Her mother was a master of all styles of flower arrangement, interpreting the triad of heaven, human and earth, and ying/ yang. Misao believes that the artist’s notions extend far beyond a painting’s border, symbolizing the transitory nature of the material world, into infinity.

Abandoned at birth to become a ward of the state, he is taken in by a lower middle class childless older couple and loved despite a social tide that sculpts into into a wiry, animalistic, inherently violent, underground cage fighter of ill repute. Known for brutal methods, he agrees to a long sought for challenge for an inordinate amount of money. Always fighting, he has forsaken bushido for base purposes. Put off by what has become of his skills he takes an opportunity to be of service, to perhaps redeem himself.

A hustler who annoyed his uncle into a promotion, he is always flitting about, trying to hustle the hustlers with his fast mouth. Disrespected because he came up the ranks by nepotism, he as been relegated to being a host, serving drinks and snacks during meetings. His uncle the Head wants to keep him close because his actions and decisions in the past have caused embarrassment, especially when he is drunk or high. Oran believes he is worthy to be at the top, and makes a career move that will not be forgotten.

Pot bellied and sporting nondescript hair styles, the reliable no-nonsense security guards drive from their respective suburban homes toting their respective suburban home lunches in time of their shift at the planetarium. Their order collides with frivolity, disrupting their repetitive, safe circles of routine and monotony, and their work site will never be the same.

A hard working clever widow, she is a candlemaker who takes pride in her craft. Maternally protective, her main concern is that her son be a good person. Fiercely proud of the kingdom, she is subtle in displaying her talents, but the barbarians are advancing and now she must call upon her knowledge of the flame.

Rep has never slept, the case having been published by a pediatric neurologist in Helsinki studying the neuroanatomy and neurochemistry of sleep. Now, amongst the highest in command yet barely discernible, nonviolent, yet persistent and threatening, Rep is the intimidating alpha figure with clearances at the highest level. A mechanistic counterpart to the humanistic, an unthinking automatic counterpart to the inventive and whimsical, tenacious and unblinking, Rep bypasses all security measures. Inexhaustibly kinetic with an idetic memory and endless resources, Rep has traveled the globe so many times and is in possession of so many state secrets that full diplomatic international immunity has been granted. Politicians, presidents, ambassadors and commissaries have tried unsuccessfully to recruit Rep for their own political infighting.

The collective conscience of the universe, an amorphous spirit possessive of the first burst of energy from which the universe was born and a pulse still emanates: the rhythm inherent in all forms of life. Basking in the overall positive sum total of peace, the Enlightened One is serene, peaceful, its dream of wisdom, love, respect, humility, truth, bravery and the courage to do what is difficult so intense that it becomes reality Without prejudice, totally given in to synthesis, conjecture, and making connections between fleeting elements that come through insightfulness, the Enlightened One’s musings are the basis for the realities that all souls seek through research and art. When a living creature or entity anywhere in any dimensions attains perfect peace, even for a second, the Enlightened One becomes forever aware of the existence of their soul, no matter what their physical form or shell. In the mind of Enlightened One aspirations meet in an environment of perfect placid peace; there is no turbulence of emotion. The dream of the Enlightened One is never to be disturbed.

Her black pupils being a bit smaller than usual, with a congenital superior and inferior coloboma, the combination is cat-like and unsettling to the observer. Either she is angry, nor not; nothing in between. The leading general of the Barbarians, given in to unsympathetic conquest, without emotion, she has proven to be the most driven. Her generals agree that she is unbeatable in conflict, concede to her questionable morals and refer to her as a living war machine. Pathologically competitive, totally given into the military arts, strategy, and the art of war, proficient in all weapons, she believes that it is better to acquire by the shedding of ones blood than by the sweating of ones brow. She will challenge an army already rumored to be superior, an army comprised of spirits and ghosts, but Zarina is of a different ilk and will not be deterred.

Loyal, petite, the King's closest friend and advisor, Zora is disciplined, sympathetic, sober, discrete, and calm. Distinguished and gentle of voice, she ponders deeply the skein of things. A highly pragmatic anatomist, the lead midwife for the entire kingdom, she has witnessed both deliveries successful and otherwise; she has seen life and death occur together, leading her to see things very philosophically with regard to mortality, the immutability of the human race.