Vaxis - Act II: A Window of the Waking Mind (novella)

Vaxis – Act II: A Window of the Waking Mind is a novella written by Claudio Sanchez and Chondra Echert and illustrated by Chase Stone. It was published by Evil Ink with Deluxe Edition of Coheed and Cambria's album of the same name released in 2022. It is the second chapter in The Amory Wars sequel saga and features some returning characters from the original arc.

Plot Summary
Five years after Vaxis is born, Nia and Nostrand broke into a pharmaceutical company established by House Doxt on Crosif. They stole several vials of drugs still in development. They also encounter several creatures being experimented on, including a Scolorustia—a mythical monster with a centipede-like body and a skull-like head. They get caught, but in breaking the Scolorustia out, they are able to escape. Back aboard their ship, the Rixen Freckle, they greeted their assistant droid, ARP-51, who began analyzing the vials they acquired.

We then cut to the Five Houses of Star Supremacy, focusing on House Doxt as he enters the Seed, a free-floating structure built around a captured star that acted as a kind of head quarters for the five Heads of the houses. We learn that the five Heads all had various attributes that kind of defined them and that together, they combined these traits to enact their supremacy over the worlds. They discuss a few important things: They are aware there is a connection between Windows and Quintillian Speakers, and that Mr. Wish used to be a Window under HOSS control, but he escaped. They employed a Doctor Helix Warey to not only study the aforementioned connection, but also conduct experiments to try to merge the two in the hopes that the event or resulting being would be able to restore their decrepit bodies.

In a flashback, Worn and Crane took a two year-old Vaxis to a doctor to try to get some answers as Vaxis seemed to be catatonic. He sleeps at odd times, doesn't speak, and doesn't seem to be able to recognize any of his surroundings, including his own parents; doesn't respond to voices and doesn't look toward anyone. His eyes also seem to have a film over them, but the doctor made clear that this isn't obstructing his vision, but more similar to albinism. The doctor dropped a bombshell on the parents: Vaxis seems to be in horrible, consistent pain and he recommended they give him a really powerful pain reliever, which they were reluctant to use it since they had seen many junkies addicted to it.

Back in the present, Crane gifted Vax with a Laot he stole from the lab on Crosif. The Laot was a light purple reptilian that had the ability to change its colors, but doesn't use it, which Crane said makes it honest. They name the Laot "Keneyto" after a Laot Crane stole when he was young (his first theft). ARP-51 had analyzed the compounds of the vials they acquired and he determined just one might have a 52% chance of success, with a 48% chance of catatonic failure. Frustrated with yet another seemingly dead-end, Crane threw the vial against a wall.

Both needing some space, Worn made a visit to the planet Rheforth where she restocked on rations and medicine in a free city called Golliath Zerlace. While there, she runs into Siv and Gob Trafinder, conjoined brothers who she used to work with. In fact, Gob saved Worn from certain death during an accident, which led to him becoming conjoined to his brother, Siv's body. Worn had always thought of him more as a brother, and he told her that he had come to terms with this fact. They were joined by a stolen and modified HOSS droid called IxVox3. She told them about her son and his state of being, and they agreed to help her, recommending she and Crane return to the Liars Club, a black market syndicate that they use to do jobs for, but she was reluctant.

Back on the Freckle, Crane was attempting to work out with Vaxis and Keneyto lying on a nearby table. 51 came in to administer his daily nutrition, and Crane decided to do it for him, telling him about how he got his nickname and promising that he would always be there for him. We cut to Dr. Warey herself on the Seed as she begins an experiment introducing an elderly Window to a Speaker. It seemed to go well, until it didn't; the Speaker melted the Window away.

Finally, Worn returns with the Trafinder brothers and Ixy, which immediately makes Crane uneasy as he is aware of the history between them. They explained their reasoning for believing the best next move would be to go back to the Liars Club: Candelaria, their leader, is known for having eyes and ears everywhere and can acquire seemingly anything—including a Speaker, which Gob in particular believed would be able to heal Vaxis due to an encounter the brothers had once before.

On the Cotillion, the Liars Club's main ship, the group witnessed their annual ritual that drove them away in the first place: Inaugura. Candelaria led them to a private room and they spoke about why they were there: they needed a Speaker. Candelaria agreed that that could be arranged for a price: they had to deliver a package to HOSS. Since accomplishing their task would require them to go to the Seed anyway, and Candelaria would have his men handle the anonymous package, they agreed.

On the Seed, Candelaria really had hooked them up; a HOSS Liars Club member provided them with an armband that used holographic tech to make it look like they were all HOSS soldiers. Candelaria's men and Vaxis with ARP-51 stayed behind. Going through the Seed, they found hundreds of Windows all wearing uniforms and helmets similar to Mr. Wish. They didn't have much time to investigate this as an alarm began blaring; a trail had begun. They quickly found a room full of Containment Units and nabbed one. As they arrived back at the ship, the group witnessed Candelaria's guards handing off their package and other HOSS guards moved to arrest them, having been betrayed by the Liars Club.

A fight broke out. During the brawl, the package from Candelaria to HOSS was opened and from it rose Naianasha, a Prise, who helped them escape on to the Freckle. ARP-51 was in pieces, but Vaxis and Keneyto seemed unharmed. Siv and Gob navigated the ship out of the Seed while Naianasha examined the Containment Unit the group had brought aboard. She recognized it as Keywork energy and opened it, allowing the Speaker to be free. When she did this, Vaxis suddenly spoke for the first time and more than that, hopped out of his father's lap, approached the Speaker, and reached into him to pull out another figure: an elderly astronaut. This astronaut stood, lifted his face shield to reveal an old man, and said, "All Mother, we're free."

In the epilogue, we are reassured that HOSS had resolved to make the remaining Unheavenly Creatures pay for all the destruction and theft they had wrought.

Publication History
The novella was originally published as a hardcover book bundled with the Deluxe Edition of the album with the same name on June 24, 2022.

As of yet, it has not been reissued or re-released in any other format.

Creative Team
Chase Stone is an illustrator and concept artist with his most notable credits for Wizards of the Coast's table top RPG Dungeons and Dragons, and TCG Magic: the Gathering. His other work includes cover illustration for Sci-Fi and Fantasy books like The World of Ice and Fire and a spin-off series Gods of Thrones. He illustrated 27 images in Act I's novella, and an additional piece on the album, all of which were used for various videos on the band's YouTube channel, such as "The Dark Sentencer", "The Gutter", and the Acoustic version of "The Gutter."

Stuart Ng probably was the supporting concept artist as he was on Vaxis 1. Of course, all final art was done by Chase Stone. Ng has most notably done concept art for big-named games like League of Legends, Sleeping Dogs, Disney Infinity 3.0, and Smash + Grab.

Album Comparison
"" The album seems to be very one-to-one, though some songs don't have a counterpart and seem to be from Vaxis' perspective, who we don't get any stream of consciousness for. For example, "Beautiful Losers" has lines like, "Beautiful losers / You're my heroes" which would be weird for either of the parents to say. "Comatose", "Bad Man", "Blood", and "The Liars Club" all have direct (no nearly) direct lines lifted from their lyrics while songs like "A Disappearing Act" seem to depict a connection Vaxis has to Sirius which takes place near the end of the story, or perhaps had already been taking place, but it uncertain. Furthermore, "Ladders of Supremacy" seems to be the general feel of the entire act and more explicitly, "Window of the Waking Mind" describes, events throughout the act that have to do solely with Vaxis and his relationship to various key points: the doctor who evaluates him, himself, his parents, and even HOSS—perhaps even his place in the world.

Trivia

 * The title of this act likely refers to Vaxis himself as he is revealed to be a Window, but by the end of the act, is also revealed to be, perhaps more sane in the presence of a Speaker than other Windows.