Brought to the brink of extinction by a series of cataclysmic time travel wars, the world of the Relativity Universe is reborn in the 23rd century, separated into six city-states of varying wealth, political ideals, and opportunity. United by a common goal of peace, the city-states band together to destroy their time machines, leaving only one intact, which they agree will be protected by the Knight Guardians – an elite team of men and women tasked with preventing future leaders from ever using time travel again.
The Characters
If there’s one thing GoT excels at, it’s the never-ending family drama we all love and sometimes cringe (see: Red Wedding) to watch. An enticing, fantastical universe is driven by these relationships, with powerful bonds forged by loyalty, love, power, and (often) hostility – the worlds we emotionally invest in are centered on the people who fill them and give them meaning.
The Relativity Universe is wholly defined by its exceptional relationships, relationships which ultimately shape the fabric of its space and time. In New Humanz, we are introduced to Riley, a mother who – with her daughter Sadie – is sucked into a temporal vortex and ends up in the city- state of Turigus, 200 years later. In the process Sadie is literally ripped to pieces, and has to undergo painful robotic surgery just to survive. Riley thus becomes a single immigrant mother, lost in time, who finds herself in a strange land and in care of a disabled daughter – one who requires a new bioengineered body from the mysterious New Humanz Corporation. Risking everything, including her daughter’s safety and her own life, Riley’s story explores what it means to be human in a world that no longer values our humanity.
In Weathered Spirit, we follow Jenna – a woman shaped by the grieved disappearance of her mother at an early age – who is pursued by a banshee, stalking her with its terrifying presence. A supernatural mash-up of classic ghost stories and Jessica Jones, Jenna is a no-BS, independent protagonist, reluctant to let anyone in. It’s only when she opens up to her cousin Alice, who shares the same supernatural gifts, that her journey begins – helping the ghosts of the 23rd century (some of them casualties of the 4th world war) to move on.
Sayyida continues the feminist mash up thread, only this time it’s an RU take on the kick-ass 16th century female pirate Sayyida al-Hurrah, who dominated the Mediterranean in partnership with the Portuguese pirate Barbossa (whom you may have hears of in that other pirate movie franchise). In the 23 rd century, Sayyida is a refugee from the Middle Eastern city-state of Siraf, on a mission from the Mad King to find the crucial element of building a new time machine: the Hadron Converter. It’s a swashbuckling adventure that recalls the sea-faring Greyjoys in GoT, but with better costumes and a sci-fi edge that makes old tropes new again.
Which brings us to the lynchpin property in the RU universe, The Knight Guardians of Relativity. Beginning with the death of the eldest Knight Aaran Seth, this epic storyline concerns the breakdown of the decades-old peace between the city-states, as a new temporal arms race is ignited which threatens to result in a Fifth Great War that could finally extinguish humanity.
