Evany Starr & Midnight Penn™ STARRFALL THE starr blog
New Verance City™ is bleeding through time. The past is breaking in. And three people who never asked to be heroes are the only ones who can stop it.
Who??
Midnight Penn – A private conservator and secret heir to an ancient bloodline. Her memories of that legacy have been erased, but when a series of targeted thefts hits her shop, she realizes the city is assembling something catastrophic. She doesn’t chase power; she chases containment.
Evany Rae – A self‑taught engineer and former Coda street vendor. She dreamed of inventing a new sport, but after the Guild rejected her, she kept her prototype bat for protection. By jury‑rigging a broken Vein Core relic into the bat, she created STARR — a reality‑bending weapon that forces ancient magic to obey human engineering.
Emma Rae – Evany’s twin sister. Emma can rebuild her own memories into physical holograms that overlap with the real world. The cost is devastating: the deeper she searches for clues about their missing parents, the more her present‑day memories are violently erased. A faceless stranger haunts her most precious memories, evicting her whenever she gets too close to the truth.
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Meet Evany Rae
Some people inherit greatness. Evany Rae tries to build it. Evany Rae is the older twin sister of Emma Rae and one of the central protagonists of Evany Starr & Midnight Penn: STARRFALL. Resourceful, fiercely protective, and endlessly determined, she's an engineering prodigy who believes every problem has a solution - you just haven't built it yet. Growing up as an orphan in New Verance wasn't easy, but Evany refused to let circumstance define her. Alongside Emma, she found purpose both in the city's orphan baseball league and as a standout player for the Red Owls Ball Club, where her competitive spirit and quick instincts made her just as comfortable swinging a bat as she was taking apart a machine. When life demanded more than baseball could offer, the twins found themselves surviving inside New Verance's underground Coda network. Working under Ledger, one of the city's Broker Delegates working for the Chantry, Evany learned to navigate black-market engineering spaces where damaged technology was stripped down, rebuilt, and repurposed. While others repaired machines, Evany quietly taught herself how to create them. Hidden away inside one of those Coda engineering labs, she built her most ambitious project: S.T.A.R.R. The Stabilized Twin-Chamber Active Reactive Rod. Originally conceived as the centerpiece of an entirely new competitive sport, STARR was never intended to be a weapon. It was a demonstration of engineering, precision, and imagination—a vision Evany hoped would earn her a place within the prestigious Inventors Guild of New Verance. She submitted her designs. Presented her prototype. And was rejected. For most people, that would have been the end of the story. For Evany... it was only the beginning. As events beyond her control begin pulling the sisters into a much larger mystery, the invention she once dreamed would change sports may become the very thing that helps protect the people she loves most. Everything changes the day Evany and Emma cross paths with the mysterious relic curator known as Midnight Penn. Neither of them realizes it yet... but that meeting will alter the course of all three of their lives. "It wasn't supposed to be a weapon. It was supposed to be a game." Character Snapshot Name: Evany Rae Role: Engineer • Protector • Inventor Strengths: Engineering, athletics, problem solving Known For: Creation of the STARR Bat prototype Former Affiliation: Coda street operative Closest Bond: Her younger twin sister, Emma Defining Trait: If something doesn't exist, she'll build it. 
How does a generic baseball bat compare to STARR you ask? There's a huge difference and they're not in the same ballpark anymore.
Evany's First Blueprint Spec For STARR MK-I
Evany's INVENTORS GUILD APPLICATION PACKET: STARR MK-I BLUEPRINT PG #04
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Sounds of New Verance or, New Verance Sounds
I've added a new music category to the blog called Sounds of New Verance, starting with this post. For years, I've held back the music side of my creativity without really letting it evolve. Sitting on my hard drives—and scattered across different corners of the internet—are more than 40 original instrumental compositions that very few people have ever heard. I always felt they were waiting for the right moment, the right atmosphere, or the right story to finally give them purpose. While building the world of New Verance, I discovered something unexpected. When I revisited my old music library, I realized that many of the themes from this universe needed were already there. Long before Evany Starr & Midnight Penn existed, I had unknowingly written pieces that carried the moods, emotions, and atmosphere of this world. Hidden inside those beats and compositions were stories just waiting to be discovered. One of my goals with this series is to show how the New Verance Sound was born from the Sony and Microsoft music platforms of the late '90s and early 2000s—the tools that first sparked my passion for composing. Those early experiments have become part of the creative DNA of this universe. As you explore the music, you'll discover that I've repurposed, mashed together, sampled, and reimagined many of those original compositions into modern covers and remixes. Those new interpretations will be waiting for listeners over on Suno. In fact, you can already hear one example. The Mask Atlas landing page theme is woven into the twins' first release, Rollback City. Around here, nothing goes to waste. Alongside those instrumental pieces, I'll also be sharing original songs written specifically for the world of New Verance. These tracks allow the characters to speak in their own voices, sharing their histories, struggles, and personalities through music. Whether it's a city anthem, a Mask Atlas theme, a baseball team anthem, a character theme, or even a battle theme, each song becomes another piece of New Verance's culture—and ultimately part of the graphic novel's original soundtrack. The complete collection of instrumental tracks, theme songs, and vocal music will be hosted off-site on Suno, organized into their own playlists. Here on the blog, I'll occasionally feature selected songs in video form, paired with artwork inspired by the graphic novel and other related projects. The Sounds of New Verance, along with these promotional videos, are another way to expand the world beyond the printed page while introducing it across my social media channels. As the collection grows, the videos will eventually find a permanent home on a dedicated YouTube channel, where the music can continue to evolve alongside the graphic novel. – Yvel If someone this meticulous left his workbench before putting everything away... what could have been important enough to pull him away? The tablet offers our best clue. It's still running, while everything else remains exactly where it was—as though the investigation simply paused mid-thought.
 Researcher's Desk
Someone was working here.
Someone expected to come back. Or perhaps someone found the answer they were looking for and left knowing exactly where the trail would lead. The Researcher, one of 6 Acolytes of the Chantry - is not simply a collector of old knowledge, he helps preserve and create it. Alongside the Architect (another Acolyte), he has spent years restoring lost texts, translating ancient records, and publishing modern editions for Chantry study. Many of the volumes stacked across his shelves are their own work, field journals turned reference books and forgotten histories given new life. Unlike most Acolytes, he commands no Delegates of his own. Instead, trusted sources are loaned to him by his peers because his investigations serve them all. His research underpins much of the Chantry's understanding of relics, resonance, and the world they believe is unfolding. Unlike many scholars, he prefers to verify his findings firsthand. Thorough practical, and often working in the field, he is just as likely to be examining an artifact as reading about one.
The shelves themselves tell a story. Studies of Vein Cores and Resonance and Rollback phenomena sit beside restored accounts of ancient artifacts. Discussions of the Lattice sit beside historical surveys and field manuals. Some volumes build upon one another. Others seem to argue quietly across the shelf, offering different interpretations of the same old mysteries. Some of these books were recovered from forgotten archives, old scrolls and manuscripts. Others were written here, assembled from years of investigation and careful translation. The Chantry preserves history—but it also continues the conversation. The desk itself reveals an equally practical side of its owner. Resting atop an older, occult-looking volume are two exposed Vein Core relics, carefully laid out for study rather than display. Beside them sits an intricate magnifier, its layered lenses positioned for close examination. Someone wasn't simply cataloging artifacts here. They were comparing, measuring, and looking for details hidden beneath the surface. The open notebook, the resonance logs, and the field samples scattered across the workspace suggest the same thing: observation from every angle before reaching a conclusion. Today's focus is on 3 of the books and the notepad:
Book 1: 𝐕𝐞𝐢𝐧 𝐂𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐒𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐞𝐬 - Composition, Reaction, Interaction Vein Cores are the remnants of an ancient system. They don't just sit there—they interact with the Lattice, the underlying structure that keeps reality stable. When two cores come close, they try to synchronize. That's not a design flaw; it's a feature of the original system. But the system was never meant to be triggered by people who don't understand what they're handling. The book breaks down:
But if you read carefully—between the lines, in the margins—you'll find the warnings. The Researcher didn't just document the mechanics. He documented what happens when someone gets it wrong . What you need to know: The book exists because the Researcher has spent years trying to understand a system that doesn't come with instructions. His findings are a map—but the territory is still dangerous. Book 2: 𝐁𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐖𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 - Rituals, Lineages, and the True Calling Where Vein Core Studies is clinical, Blood Wakes is esoteric. If one explains the mechanics, the other preserves the ritual. Believed to have been compiled over generations by Acolytes of the Chantry, Blood Wakes predates what modern followers now refer to as the Red Awakening. It is less a technical manual than a theological record—part instruction, part warning—describing how Vein Cores were once joined with specially prepared vessels. The text explains that a Vein Core is not itself a weapon, but a condensed reservoir of ancient resonance. Only when housed within a compatible frame—whether an engineered receptacle, ceremonial relic, or lineage-bound artifact—can its stored resonance be directed into a useful form. Ancient craftsmen carved these housings with precise resonance pathways that matched the unique structure encoded within each core. The resulting object became an extension of both its bearer and the Lattice itself, capable of extraordinary defensive or offensive function depending on its intended design. Most surviving frames are inert. Without a compatible Vein Core they are little more than beautifully engineered relics. Likewise, an unmounted Vein Core remains unstable potential—power without purpose. The final chapters describe the Blood Wake, a rare awakening in which certain lineage-bound vessels recognize both their rightful bearer and the Vein Core housed within them. Modern Acolytes attempt to reproduce this event through what they call the Red Awakening, believing the ritual itself grants power. Whether they are restoring an ancient process or misinterpreting it remains uncertain. What you need to know: This is the book the Acolytes don't talk about publicly. The Researcher and Architect preserved it because they believe history shouldn't be erased—even the parts that contradict their own doctrine. 𝐑𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐏𝐡𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐚 - Temporal Displacement Zones — Observed Effects Rollback Zones are locations where parts of the city appear to have slipped out of sync with the present. Streets, storefronts, and technology may reflect earlier decades despite showing no signs of preservation or reconstruction. Most people never question these inconsistencies. Acolytes believe the phenomenon subtly influences perception, encouraging observers to accept the environment as normal rather than recognize it as impossible. Whether Rollback Zones are remnants of past events or evidence of something still unfolding remains unknown. Researcher's Annotation"Rollback is often described as reality moving backward. This interpretation is misleading. The evidence suggests reality is not reversing—it is remembering." Notepad and Tablet: The notebook records more than observations—it captures an investigation in progress. Every note references the same event: the Library Incident. The accompanying tablet is fixed on a single resonance return, while nearby Vein Cores appear unusually active, suggesting the Researcher was comparing multiple sources in real time. His interest may never have been the twins themselves. Instead, they may have represented the first observable proof that resonance disturbances could be tracked across the city. If Rollback Zones are echoes left behind by changing resonance states, then perhaps the tablet wasn't searching for people at all... ...it was learning to follow the city's memory. 
MASK ATLAS game
New Verance City™ is calling through the static. You’ve reached the Memory Archive — a restricted resonance terminal where the city itself is trying to be remembered. Mask Atlas is an investigative resonance simulator. Players operate a Lens Device to study New Verance™, learning to read its hidden patterns through Guild and Coda interpretations. You operate a Lens Device to read the hidden resonance of New Verance City™. Every scan teaches you to understand the city a little better, until finding masks, uncovering lore, and building enclosures becomes second nature. Every enclosure you lock changes something. The city will remember… or forget. No heroes. No tutorials. Just you, the signal, and a living map that reacts to your choices. Welcome, Operator. Mask Atlas is designed to stand independently before the graphic novel launches. The Memory Archive terminal (newverancecityarchive.com) is live. Sign‑up there is coming soon; for now, subscribe on this blog. Use the form on this page to join the signal list as test notifications and launch updates go only to subscribers. This is an early preview, more to come. -YG 
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▼ Mask Atlas – Art Direction Update |
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Blog Intro
STARR BLOG POST #1
WHATS THE NAME ABOUT?
AuthorI’ve been a comic artist since 1992. This is my first story — born from a dream, lost to corrupted hard drives, but kept alive in sketchbooks from 2003. After a recent rewrite, it’s finally here. Archives
January 2030
Categories
All
Researcher's Desk
The Championship That Never Happened But They Won
Vein Core Relics
The Rae Twins & CODA
The Remidy Saga:
Unwanted War
MASK ATLAS ARG DEVELOPTMENT UPDATES
Welcome to New Verance City™
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