A Day Of Faces by Simon K Jones

got back together, or how Kay and Marv managed to get up the remaining floors and up into the Aviary itself. That stuff might have been pretty cool, but it would also have just been a continuation of ‘Infection’s action sequence, without really adding anything new into the mix. Better to skip forwards to when something interesting is happening, and infer what came in-between.
    Something I was acutely aware of by now is that there’s a number of unanswered questions, with more coming in every episode. Hopefully I’m doing it in a way which is fun and intriguing, rather than drawn-out and frustrating. Time will tell.
    The big entrance at the end fairly obviously links back to the character of Holt from ‘Interlude #1’. Originally this would have been Holt’s first appearance, as ‘Interlude #1’ was a last minute addition to the story, providing a diversion into stuff that isn’t going to resolve itself for a while. It changes the entrance of the scarred man in ‘Lineage’ from being completely out-of-the-blue into something more intriguing - it’s still not entirely clear where the characters from ‘Interlude #1’ fit in, but the puzzle’s starting to reveal itself.
    That’s the idea, anyway.
     
    Soundtrack: Repeating myself, but you can’t beat the Matrix scores for writing this kinda stuff.
     
    Apex Predator
    ‘Apex Predator’ marks the big finale for the first ‘story arc’ of A Day of Faces. If this was a book, it’d be the end of part one. If it were a comic, this’d be volume one’s conclusion. If it were a TV show, this would be the final episode of the season.
    Instead, it’s an online serial, so I’m not entirely sure of the terminology. Bear with me on that one.
    There’s two things I want to reference here. The first is the computer game Deus Ex - the original, from way back in 2000 (or thereabouts). It was a sprawling epic, traversing multiple continents through a very twisty-turny plot. Crucially, though, by the time you got to the end of the game you could look back and see the incredible path you’ve been on, and marvel at just how much had changed. The journey itself made you catch your breath.
    Deus Ex isn’t unique in that, obviously, but it’s a particularly acute example that’s always stuck with me. All good stories have a plot that goes somewhere or characters which change during the story. If you get to the end of something and everything still feels very status quo, it feels like you’ve been wasting your time.
    Thus, hopefully by the time you get to the end of ‘Apex Predator’, and think back to what was happening in ‘Generation’ at the start of the series, it’ll feel like you and the characters have gone on a legit and unexpected adventure. That’s one feeling I wanted to invoke.
    The other one is exemplified by the conclusion to season 1 of the 90s TV show Babylon 5. In that episode, ‘Chrysalis’, the show completely pulls out the rug, redefining itself in the process. It’s not just an exciting finale, with everything back to normal by the start of season 2. It has proper ramifications, and things are never the same again. You have a sense that things will be different from now onwards.
    ‘Apex Predator’ should have that feeling in spades, if I’ve done my job right.
    This experiment of writing a weekly serial has been really thrilling, and I hope the results are worth your reading time.

How to write an online serial
     
    I don’t claim to be an authority on this topic, given that A Day of Faces was and is my first attempt at such a thing. What follows is a collection of tips based on my own experience.
     
    Why online?
    Self-publishing in any form used to be considered a joke; something only failed writers did to create their own vanity projects. Back in the 90s, before the internet properly took hold of the mainstream, perhaps this had an occasional element of truth. Arranging a print run for your own book and pushing it into bookstores when