Volkonir: Rise of Semaphry

Volkonir: Rise of Semaphry is a novel and film pitch in the works as of April of 2015 via Dozerfleet Comics, as an epilogue adventure for the titular Volkonir and Semaphry characters. It is intended to be a caper in which the heroes must save a friend from the Death Master File whilst recovering an old ally and outwitting the Gwirdons in their latest diabolical scheme.

Plot
Main article: In-depth plot synopsis for this story

As Prince "Vinny" Volkonir "Mason" Morlikusson and his girlfriend Kayla Tarington begin discussing their relationship, they are called in to the office of Dr. Fred Hanom, their benefactor who is working with them and collecting Cortascian relics on Earth. They and their friend Carlos Modi arrive to discover that Hanom's old rival Terrence Hoshijo, now with the Social Security Administration, has gone missing. Kayla grows nervous when she remembers that Hoshijo was the man responsible for the death of her daughter many years earlier. Their equipment detects a Cortascian signal in Yellowstone.

Suspecting a trap, Vinny and Kayla both go to Yellowstone. The evil King Gwirmalesh and the Gwirdons are revealed to be working with Hoshijo, who intentionally has added Hanom's list to the Social Security Master Death File so that he will soon be registered as a credit zombie, freezing off Team Volkonir's monetary assets and quickly making them fugitives. The monster Diabloq is sent with some Gwirdons to Yellowstone to make trouble for Kayla and Vinny. But when Diabloq cannot decide between finishing off Volkonir and recovering the Golden Lion mogriffer from Kayla, he leaves Vinny for dead in the chasm of an extinct geyser. Vinny revives Silnya Semaphry from the spell that turned her into a statue, and she hands him the Crystal Swan of Cortascius mogriffer. They share a brief moment reminiscing of how she was his mentor back on Cortascius. She dies in Vinny's arms, and he flees the chasm with her powers to save Kayla.

Kayla and Diabloq take their fight to Bozeman, Montana. However, SWAT teams arrive to take down Team Volkonir. Carlos is sent to prison while Hanom finds a secret escape route to make his way eastward. As the SWAT teams attempt to take out Volkonir and Diabloq both, the latter kills several of them and leaves one female SWAT injured. Kayla tends to the injured woman in exchange for leniency while Volkonir forces Diabloq to retreat. Both Vinny and Kayla retreat when they hear reinforcements arriving. They head back to Vinny's apartment to reconfigure Silnya's powers to work with Kayla without injuring her. However, SWAT teams attack and Volkonir is forced to fend them off while Kayla completes her first transformation into Semaphry II.

The two of them use a transporter to get as far as Pittsburgh, while the villains continue to elaborate on their plan and even discuss assassinating the president. Kayla and Vinny review their plans to save Carlos and infiltrate the Social Security building to legally resurrect Hanom. However, Kayla worries to Vinny that they will receive life sentences for all their trouble, instead of being rewarded. Vinny does his best to assure her that won't happen. She suggests breaking into a motel room; but he decides to use Pittsburgh's anti-homelessness ordinances to their advantage to pose as homeless so that they can temporarily hide from the feds by being taken in by city police.

The ruse works until Kayla's fingerprints are matched with federal records of her after she did time for punching Hoshijo years earlier - when Hoshijo's bullying of her with CPS led to her daughter drowning. Volkonir and Semaphry escape the Pittsburgh station easily, and rendezvous with Hanom to get new transporters. Hanom and Kayla head to Washington directly to cause a stir and draw out Gwirmalesh and his forces, a plan which works. Kayla manages to resurrect Hanom's file, then battles Diabloq in the streets. Vinny uses his Golden Lion mogriffer to get Carlos out of prison so they can meet up with the others. Gwirmalesh attempts to take the fight directly to Washington, even turning Hoshijo into a giant monster out of desperation.

Team Volkonir manages to save the president, but not before several buildings are destroyed. An injured Volkonir hands his Golden Lion mogriffer to Kayla as Semaphry, to use as a power-up. The Golden-Enhanced Semaphry disposes of the monster and even manages to finish off Gwirmalesh himself. The other Gwirdons retreat. A grateful president grants pardons to the members of Team Volkonir and even allows them to rebuild their base so they can continue their quest to stop the Gwirdons from threatening Earth. King Morlikus, Volkonir's father, is revived; but ill. He uses his brief time on Earth before passing to recruit more allies and powers for Team Volkonir. Meanwhile, a new Gwirdon king replaces Gwirmalesh, swearing revenge.

Characters

 * Vinny Mason / Volkonir: The Cortascian prince and last heir to King Morzhuk. Trapped in a toy for 400 years, he was finally set free in 2008.  Since then, he has sought to find a way to blend in with Earth culture following the destruction of his homeworld.  Now, he and Kayla have a secret relationship.  Vinny possesses the Golden Lion of Cortascius mogriffer, which gives him powered armor and allows him to wield the magical sword known as Selshon.  It was his failure to protect the Candle of Hope that led to his original downfall in battle, and inability to ward off the wand beam that turned him into a stuffed toy wandering the Earth for centuries.  Growing weary of his personal war, he sees Kayla as an opportunity to find another purpose in life.


 * Kayla Tarington / "Macy Dixon" / Semaphry II / She-Volkonir: An office secretary to Dr. Hanom and ally to Volkonir in the fight against Gwirmalesh. She has a troubled past, and is secretly dating Volkonir behind Hanom's back in spite his concerns about professionalism.  As she plans her future, her past comes back to haunt her.


 * Carlos Modi: The clumsy-but-fun Mexican-American drifter through life that first discovered Volkonir in Texas some time after he was freed from the Gwirdon toy spell by Cassie Helm. The two have been like brothers ever since, though he grows suspicious that Vinny and Kayla may be more than just good friends.  Little does he know that he'll eventually be chosen by a revived King Morzhuk to become the new Red Serpent of Cortascius, Crimazol.


 * Dr. Fred Jared Hanom: A rich inventor and scientist with tremendous curiosity about Cortascian history - both on Cortascius and on Earth. His achievements have come at a price, and he's made more enemies than just Gwirmalesh by taking Volkonir in.


 * Silnya Semaphry: A Cortascian female knight and bearer of the Crystal Swan of Cortascius mogriffer. She went missing some time before King Morzhuk's palace was destroyed and the Candle of Hope was extinguished.  Recent energy signals from Yellowstone indicate that she may still be alive.  She was a mentor to a young Prince Volkonir, and actually encouraged him to become the Golden Lion and defend Morzhuk from Gwirmalesh and the Gwirdons.


 * Lenny Drae: A former NSA worker who got careless with some top secret files and was found to have leaked info to a friend. He is sent to the same prison that Carlos is sent to for association with Volkonir.  He helps Carlos escape, and is later issued a presidential pardon for his role in stopping Gwirmalesh.  He eventually gets to join the team as the Silver Ferret of Cortasius, Rumastik.


 * King Gwirmalesh: The evil Gwirdon king and a member of the Gwirdon leader class. Specializing in nearly all forms of Cortascian magic, he once swore to destroy King Morzhuk and wipe Cortascius clean due to the loss of his daughter to a mass murderer named Marzwhatti - who only knew of his daughter's location because of Morzhuk's carelessness with keeping secrets.  After many years in hibernation, he and the Gwirdons have come to Earth to conquer it and to eradicate what remains of Morzhuk's legacy in exile.


 * Terrence Hoshijo: A rogue office drone at the Social Security Administration that used to be a scientist/inventor along with Hanom. When Hanom did some underhanded things to get all the credit for an invention whilst sabotaging Hoshijo many years ago, Hoshijo swore revenge.  He gets it by having Hanom declared a credit zombie, and then joining forces with Gwirmalesh to outlaw Team Volkonir.


 * Diabloq: A Gwirdon leader class that has been modified into Gwirmalesh's latest monster, a devil-like being sent to reactivate Silnya from within her statue imprisonment and use the trap to steal the Golden Lion from Volkonir. When this plan fails, he attempts to go after Kayla.  He is then called back before completing this mission to aid in springing a trap for Team Volkonir in Washington while Homijo and Gwirmalesh plot their takeover.


 * Gwirdon leaders: Higher-up, sophisticated Gwirdons that are almost human - except for their green skin and bug-like faces. Nearly all of them are magical to some degree, giving them some protection in a fight.  They are Gwirdon high society, but are few in number.


 * Gwirdon treaders: Gwirdon foot soldiers, of which they are the majority. They are even more bug-like than their high-society counterparts, often can't speak intelligibly, and are not known to be particularly bright.  However, they are known to be determined fighters.  They make up most of Gwirmalesh's henchmen.  To get around, they rely on the magic transportation of their leaders - Gwirmalesh in particular.  It has been shown that with proper battle training or knowledge of martial arts, ordinary Earth humans lacking Cortascian powers can take on a few Gwirdons with little trouble.

Equipment
In addition to Hanom's lab and inventions, Team Volkonir employs a variety of items to assist them.


 * Golden Lion of Cortascius Mogriffer: This magical trinket allows Volkonir to summon his armor. Silnya, the original Semaphry, trained him in its use.  The Golden Lion powers contained are coordinated so that while almost any humanoid can use them, they will only work long-term when used by Volkonir himself or another Cortascian of Morzhuk's line.  Others attempting to use these powers will only be able to do so for a limited time, before the powers begin injuring the user.


 * Selshon the Sword: A magical sword that comes with the Golden Lion powers used by Prince Volkonir / Vinny Mason. It can function as a regular sword, an energy sword, a freeze gun, or an incendiary planter, allowing Volkonir to freeze Gwirdons in place and then blow them up.  It can also allow its wielder to jump higher-than-normal distances, though this has been shown to affect non-Cortascians adversely.


 * Muflaze the Magical Bow: A magical bow with energy arrows, wielded primarily by Semaphry.


 * Crystal Swan of Cortascius Mogriffer: Semaphry's primary mogriffer. Originally configured to work with Silnya, Volkonir's mentor on Cortascius.  Reconfigured to work with Kayla's biology.


 * Transporters: Inventions of Dr. Hanom's that are similar to Zeran teleporters in Gerosha mythos, but have a much wider range.

Locations

 * Earth
 * Bozeman, Montana
 * Yellowstone
 * Washington, DC
 * Pittsburgh, PA
 * Cortascius (pronounced "Core-ta-siss"), Volkonir's old world - where very little still lives after the collapse of Cortascian (pronounced "Core-tay-shan") civilization.

Mogriffer calls

 * "Golden Lion, Cortascius, defend!": Activates Golden Lion of Cortascius armor for anyone wielding the Golden Lion mogriffer.


 * "Golden Lion, Selshon summon!": Generates Selshon for a non-mogrified wielder of the Golden Lion mogriffer.


 * "Crystal Swan, Cortascius defend!": Activates Crystal Swan of Cortascius armor for anyone wielding the Crystal Swan mogriffer.


 * "Crystal Swan, Muflaze summon!": Generates the powered bow with magic arrows known as Muflaze, for a non-mogrified wielder of the Crystal Swan mogriffer.


 * "Golden Lion, Crystal Swan merge!": Turns the Crystal Swan into a power-up for the Golden Lion armor.


 * "Crystal Swan, Golden Lion merge!": Turns the Golden Lion into a power-up for the Crystal Swan armor.

Target audience
As plot work was being developed for Sodality: Vindication and Cherinob, it was seen fit to create a similar story that would be slightly more appropriate for a younger audience; with the themes of evil, darkness, romance, sex, etc. toned down significantly or in some cases even absent. While a TV-14 or hard PG-13 is the typical nature for the other programs mentioned, the contents of the Volkonir universe aim to be more of a hard PG or very light PG-13 in nature. The goal was to create a story as compelling as the other works mentioned above, or even comparable to some of the best action thrillers available elsewhere - yet, keeping the themes light enough in presentation method that an audience of as young as 10 would not be completely out of the question if adapted to film.

Visual representation
Once the decision was made that Volkonir would get a follow-up story and be revived, work began with The Sims 3 to develop a look and feel for the characters. Stock actors are still pending, as are actual costumes.

Mythology
The mythology of Cortascius is kept as close as possible in this version to what was portrayed in the original 2008 film pitch, with some expansion material added. Similarly to how Marvel's The Incredible Hulk did things, Volkonir: Rise of Semaphry nods at the original story's premise while filling in as many bare-essential details as necessary about the heroes' origins - bypassing the need to devote an entire story to just the origin story before anyone can understand what is going on. It assumes that readers/viewers will already know - or not care - about Volkonir's origins going in, so the story itself can focus purely on telling a good story.

Rules governing how the universe of Volkonir's world operates rely on typical tropes found in most tokusatsu programs in the US and Japan. The aesthetics for both the Golden Lion Volkonir and Crystal Swan Semaphry outfits were intended to be modeled after several Knights from various seasons of Power Rangers, as well as taking inspirations from shows in the Kamen Rider and Metal Heroes franchises. Gwirmalesh's personality was modeled on that of Lord Zedd, but made less hot-headed and more methodical. The Gwirdon treaders were most closely inspired by the Maggot Foot Soldiers from Saban's Masked Rider, and by Carly Ojala's "Tinkle Tinkle" monster, though they were also based on the Gwirkers from The Golden Toad. Gwirdon leaders are shown and discussed as a way of showing that not all Gwirdons are as stupid as the treaders.

The idea to make Volkonir's adventure a fugitive arc was inspired by such films as National Treasure, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and the 60 Minutes special "Dead or Alive."

Music
In keeping with the original 2008 film pitch, "City of Sunshine" by David Malinich of Gene Michael Productions was the template for Volkonir's theme this time around. Other songs by Kevin MacLeod considered to lend themselves well to the genre include "Exhilarate," "Gearhead," "In a Heartbeat," "Pump," "Ready Aim Fire," and "Severe Tire Damage." Songs were chosen as samples in April of 2015 inspired by YouTube samples of Ron Wasserman tracks that were remixed for the 2012 reworkings of his classic songs for Power Rangers.