"Execute contingency protocol Delta; my disgustingly beautiful abominations have arisen!" -Darkness Assassin 8000 BC.
Within the Assassin Clan, the Royal Family has a full list of protocols to execute when needed, from Alpha to Epsilon. The Alpha protocol, once activated, becomes the safeguard protocol: the entire Clan must regroup at a designated location and go into complete hiding to protect the royal family. This can occur during a cataclysmic, world-changing event like Armageddon. Once activated, Beta Protocol is the arming protocol. This is to signal the entire clan to take up arms for war. It can be considered a last-line protocol if the Alpha protocol fails. The Gamma protocol is the most cataclysmic, next to Delta; the archives state that once activated, the royal family will combine all their powers at a well located in the center of the royal palace to unleash an unspeakable horror. There are no records of what this horror is, and what its weaknesses are, if any. There are also no recorded instances of the protocol being put into effect, and younger scholars of the Clan pray that it never has to be. The Delta protocol is the least controllable on the list. This protocol is when Darkness Assassin, the Dark Lord himself, unleashes his Legion of Chaos. Within the Assassin Clan, any members who cannot control their Chaos mutation will be put into a sealed chamber roughly the size of 4 baseball fields put together in a large square chamber, which is set in the lower point of the Mesosphere layer of the planet, roughly five hundred miles above the outer core, in the archives it states that this protocol unleashes the entire Legion onto the world to cleanse the world through fire and destruction, it also states that there has only been one instance of the Legion being unleashed onto the world, the rest of the archives about the Legion are classified with only the Dark Lord himself being able to add to and see such archives. The Epsilon protocol describes splitting the entire clan into branches to achieve broader reach and dominance. There was only one instance of this protocol being implemented: the original form of the M.I.S.T. Organization.
August 22nd 1997 - Fulcrum Scarcell
It's been just over a month since the incident happened. There was no funeral for the poor Dripper; those giants swept away anyone who was still around the contamination at the time of his death. I later found out they were members of the Assassin Clan, our great gods made manifest during a time of confusion and fear. They still haven't found who or what caused the murders and the contamination at the gardens. Since the murders, there has been talk of a new Head Chaplain being chosen; the woman down the hall, Kara Lynch, has been gossiping about it all morning in the hallway outside of my room. "I hear it's gonna be Katasha Silther or Blake Cunning," she said to another woman, Ribilia Clyne, I think. "No way, it's got to be Cleo Nostra or Toby Lustriva," Ribilia replied to Kara. After gossiping for another ten minutes, I decided it was time to get out of my bed, get dressed, and greet the hallway with my presence. After putting on my robes and adjusting them, I grabbed my satchel and faced my bedroom door. Standing a few feet away from it, I held out my arm towards it with my hand vertical and only my thumb, index, and middle finger extended towards the wooden door in front of me, and with a flick to the left with my wrist, the door flung open just enough not to rattle the frame; I walked out of my room and the door shut behind me without any influence. The ladies from the sudden commotion stopped their gossip and began to stare; my head ached as I looked at them. Kara Lynch was a Priest who resembled a Scarecrow; her abilities aligned with the theme: communicating with crows, spreading fear toxins, and controlling wind like me. Ribilia was our dark Priest; she could control bones and make puppets out of them. While most Priests had more bedazzled cloaks and clothing as if they were royalty, Ribilia always preferred darker clothing and makeup with a paper-white skin tone, while Kara was more tan. Rubbing my forehead, I walked past them and a few feet down the wall before Kara asked the question, "Hey, Fulcrum, who do you personally think is gonna be the next Head Chaplain?" I turned around to face them before responding with, "For all of our sakes, I hope it's an Assassin." After they turned to each other, bewildered, I turned back around and continued my way down the hall. The Assassin Clan, while looked upon like Gods and Goddesses made manifest, were looked at like boogeymen in the eyes of the Priests, especially after the incident that left a veteran Hunter dead and contained, and another Hunter abducted and contained by the very same boogeymen; it's no surprise that the rat bastard Louis fell to Chaos but to cause such destruction was shameful even for an unstable Priest like he was in mortality, now he's loose doing gods knows what, and what bothers me the most about it is that there is no effort to find him after the Assassin's appeared at the gardens, anyone with real authority left in this chapter just says, "It's their matter now, let them do the work they were bred to do" and, "You know better than to meddle in affairs that go above our power Fulcrum" it doesn't make sense to me! The more I thought about it, the more confused I was about why we're not even bothering to help the gods we worship so dearly. I made my way down the stairs at the end of the hall, which led to the second floor. Eventually, on the bottom floor, after stretching my legs, I walked down the hall to the job board, which stood barren and empty like a desert devoid of life, holes where parchments with jobs that were written like cornrows in a field littered the wood of the board like craters in a warzone yet to be filled, the sight alone depressing to the naked eye. Almost instinctively, I walked out of the building and into the courtyard at the front of the property, which hugged the sidewalks leading to different parts of the district we Priests are supposed to protect. To the left, or the northern part of the courtyard, there's a garden being maintained by the property's caretaker, a Priest by the name of Trisha Lancaster, who specializes in earth abilities like growing plants with her hands, being able to give them more energy simply by touching them, and being able to understand plants overall. To the south or the right, there are a couple of combat specialist Priests sparring, on the left, there's Toby Lustriva our lightning-based Priest who can manifest weapons made completely out of his element from his hands, he can also shoot pure lightning out of his fingertips but only in short bursts, on the right, there's Cleo Nostra another dark Priest who can manifest weapons made completely out of bones blade and all, Cleo also has the Compound Shroud genetic anomaly making her more unique than Ribilia, for individuals who're blessed with Compound Shroud they get the shroud form ability making them look smoky and sludgy like a black goo formed into the shape of their body, in this form they can go through solid objects, they also have the Reapers Arrow ability, a projectile they can shoot out of their fingertips that upon launch like homing missiles lock directly onto the victims heart and explode it from the inside leaving what infected Dripper. I decided not to mingle with any of my colleagues and made my way east and out the front gate which shut behind me, it was then that I was met with more familiar faces coming to me from the left, my squad mates, in order from left to right we have Gojo Sandevan our heavy-hitting fire Priest, in the middle we have Sanji Dankler our poison-based Priest who also carries the Compound Shroud blessing nicknamed the Witch amongst the criminal underground, she's known for torturing and experimenting on any criminals she gets her hands one almost like the Dark Lord himself, rumor has always been that she has a cellar in her house where she keeps personal prisoners who're her most favored experiments, the more I look at her the more I believe it. While Gojo resembles a robed knight almost as tall as an Assassin, Sanji embodies the look of the Shroud having none of her physical body visible to the naked eye, every inch of her body under her black robes is covered in black bloody rags, a weird white mask replacing her face to cover up anything that the rags couldn't, every day I see Sanji her mask changes in design with each one being creepy or downright unsettling, today's was no different, she wore a white cloth mask with black holes for eyes, pupils invisible from the outside with no visible mouth or any other defining features. Typically, she's seen testing her toxins on herself with syringes the size of long soda cans, occasionally twitching in the shoulders, arms, and neck regions, and speaks in a rather rushed, stuttering tone: "Hello, Fulcrum. I have a new test batch; this one's got more of a kick with the 3 tablespoons of Concentrated Radion Flakes. It's almost beautiful. Want to try?" I swear, since day one, she has been trying to kill me. I shake my head and look out into the nearby street, watching the cars as I motion slowly towards the nearby wall on the opposite side and lean against it before asking, "What's the agenda today?" Gojo, being the silent statue, shrugged at my question, with Sanji motioning a foot closer. "I have my new recipe," she answered, shaking the syringe, making a few passing pedestrians look in discomfort. I shook my head. "You're doing it again, Sanji," I groaned. She put away the syringe in defeat; ironically, Gojo signed, "Walk and talk?" Gojo's a mute, hasn't spoken a single word during the entire ten years we've known each other. The only way he's ever communicated is Morse code and hand signs or gestures. I nodded at his proposal, and we began walking down the path of the sidewalk that was to my left. I pulled out my journal, swiping through pages of lists, entries like this one that I was writing, and crude maps of areas I've traveled through like I was in some kind of video game, trying to mark down my frequently used paths to navigate around the district, one of which we were approaching. I turned to Gojo and realized he was in the middle of signing a sentence. "Start again, big guy; I wasn't paying attention." He gave a blank expression before starting over. Gojo signed about recent events going on in the district, including the incident with the Head Chaplain; his sources about who may be becoming the new Head Chaplain, but he warns not to hold any breaths, and potential contracts we could take for collective funds till there are jobs at Headquarters, where every Priest lives and works from. I nod in acknowledgement of his signs and begin scratching my head before looking across to the surrounding roads and other sidewalks, families with different clan crests on their clothes shuffled through like animals migrating to their respective destinations to complete their cycle until they eventually have to go back to point A. Turning back, I realized that Gojo was trying to get my attention again about a topic, feeling bad that I had him start over, and he nodded. Through his signs, he claims, "I found this bunker-looking place; it looks pretty ancient, but I'm not sure it's big enough to be Assassin-related." My eyes lit up like stars in the night sky where there's no light pollution to disturb your gaze. A bunker, he said? Sanji suddenly jumped up onto my back, wrapping her arms around my neck, strangling me. "A bunker, Gojo? That sounds pretty intriguing. What do you say, Fulcrum? Down for some bunker crawling?" Giggling through her words as she tried pulling up higher, strangling me harder, through my fading consciousness I choked out, "fuck off, Sanji," before blasting her backwards into the nearby street light, letting me regain the ability to live. Gojo shook his head as he watched Sanji slide down to the ground, wrapped around the pole at her neck. She groaned in pain while I managed to say, "You better not be paralyzed; then we gotta replace you, and that's a lot of paperwork," shaking my head back and forth as my larynx began to open back up. After I had recovered from the attempted murder and Sanji finally got up from the ground, cracking her back in two places, we went down the sidewalk to get to the Bunker that Gojo was talking about. When we got to the Bunker on the outskirts of the city, it flat-out didn't make sense to me. The closer we got, the more abandoned buildings there were altogether. It brought me back to when we were kids going through the academy to become priests. Sanji was still trying to kill people just in another classroom, and Gojo was alongside me the whole time. The instructors frequently used abandoned houses and apartments for field training exercises for our respective Magicka amongst the Priests. I turned to Gojo in front of me who also studied the buildings, most of them were residential building with some shops sprinkled few and far between with little to no differences, white walls, a boldly colored rectangle sign written in a language I couldn't understand, with bamboo doors that were kicked in on each one we passed, these outskirts run like a deep ring across the whole city spanning three miles with the whole city being segregated by themselves like some messed up pizza from hell, anyone caught outside of their district either gets beaten back into their district or is sent to their family in a body bag, thats how they got Dad ten years ago, mama was beside herself while i was sent to the Academy because I was the next of kin in line to serve the Priests, I never saw her after that, rumor has it that she passed away 5 years after to an unknown illness but I always knew better. After half an hour of walking, we got to what looked to be a run-down park with a tree line on the far side. We walked towards and into the in-between of the trees and through the bush, passed twigs, branches, and even saw a few native mushrooms, which Sanji studied before collecting and bagging them in her satchel, running quickly behind to catch up to Gojo and me. It didn't dawn on me that nobody knew where any of us were; we just stumbled here alone because Gojo thought it would be cool to check out. We made it to the outside perimeter of the ancient encampment, what looked to be a single-chamber building with a window still holding sturdy, stained, and molded by time and the planet we reside on, and its ghastly critters made manifest by life. We got to the door and gave it a tug towards us with no luck. Sanji crawled through the window once used by the enlisted forces, who we knew nothing about, yet meddled in the long-dead affairs solely for our entertainment because we were bored with our current state of living. After a few moments we see the door swing forward almost smacking me and Gojo as it moved, we walk through and see Sanji who for once wasn't boasting, we get in and theres three skeletons of the long departed, mummified figures bigger than Gojo all uniformed in military fatigues that looked like they would turn to dust upon meeting mortal touch, Sanji examined them closely yet without disturbing their rest, hands behind her back as she scanned and observed before concluding "these bodies are Assassin Clan members, insignia is the standard Shock Trooper insignia of the Assassin's, it has the Clan sigil here behind the military logo in a circle boarder which is supposed to resemble a crown of thorns" pointing to each detail while keeping her finger five inches away, Gojo signed "we should be careful moving forward" which Sanji and I agreed with. Moving around the bodies, we find a door that leads to a downward staircase resembling that of a U-shape design, as we proceeded down the U-shape flights we could hear what sounded like feral animals scattering around from below, Gojo snapped his fingers creating an orb of raw magma in the blink of an eye before holding it like a ball in his left hand, he dropped it down and we watched it fall all the way down to the bottom, once it fell onto the floor a bright orange light shot up all the way to the top exposing numerous figures, fingers, eyes, all retreating once they realized there was signs of life aside from them, scattering like rats to their hiding holes, Sanji quickly jumped up onto the railing and threw three vials of toxins into the abyss and we ran back up the stairs to where the dead laid, I swipe my left hand like a backhand smack and the door to the outside world swung out and off of its hinges, as we ran towards the door I turn to see multiple abominations of flesh and man running and crawling like demonic spiders towards Sanji, I stick out my hand like a finger gun with my index, middle and thumb, aim, and bang, a blast of wind shoots at the horrors before me with each bend of my thumb and wrist because of the recoil, Gojo rushed to Sanji, threw her towards me and grabbed the door using it as a shield to bash the beasts back into their prison while I held my hands up and sent them down violently shutting every window of the bunker "seal it Gojo!" I commanded while shooting the demons away, he looked back towards me and nodded before flipping the door towards me and charging into the Bunker "Gojo no!" I yelled and started to run towards the door before a huge wave of heat, fire, and magma sent me and Sanji flying backwards into the nearby trees. I didn't gain consciousness until hours later, Sanji was still out cold with a high risk of a concussion and a few broken ribs, I turn back to the door to see that it was melted to it's metal frame locking it permanently, as i looked at the windows i could see the same results, all I can remember is rushing towards the door and smacking at it with all my might before the heat sent me onto my rear, my hands covered with third degree burns from slamming them into it. After what felt like an eternity I lifted Sanji onto my shoulder and walked through the trees, through the park, through the streets of the abandoned slums and to the nearest Hospital for Priests, as I laid her on the stretcher I looked towards the nurses and stated "call a Code A, there's a bunker full of Chaos by the abandoned slums" before I collapsed to the ground "get another stretcher!" Is all I could hear as my vision funneled into darkness.
August 23rd 1997 - Yoko Gerong
The first thing that comes to memory is darkness. As I got more used to my solitude I began to slowly navigate around what I assumed was a cell, feeling the cold walls, jumping up to touch a ceiling I could never reach, and feeling the ice cold floor beneath my bare feet, I realized my clothes and all my belongs were gone, replaced with what I could only assume is a jump suit made of a material unknown to me but felt more ragged than hemp fibers, it felt like an eternity was passing, started hearing voices with no sense of which direction they were going, started hearing my own heartbeat, my own blood pumping through my veins, I felt like I was gonna die, I felt like I was never gonna see light or see a real person's face "what do you want from me?!" I would shout off the top of my lungs, I couldn't even tell how long in between it would be until I started screaming once again only to be met with silence, i could hearing laughing in my head each time, not a cackle but just a couple chuckles. Immeasurable time had passed before anyone decided to finally open the door, I was malnourished, dehydrated, and psychologically broken by the time they finally opened up the door, a panel of the wall which would electrocute me i touched it. Robed Giants dragged me by my biceps, my feet dragging on the cold smooth floor which felt like marble as we kept moving towards another chamber, an arming chamber with technology and weapons I had never seen before, technology that the public could only dream of, and in the center was the beast that had eviscerated Dripper, without his helmet he looked more man but still had a demonic aura to him, he turned to me and nodded at the men who dropped me onto my stomach "rise" he commanded and I slowly and weakly obeyed, gathering myself onto my knees as if I was meditating or praying "do you know who I am?" The figure asked and I shook my head before he responded "I am Slyver Assassin, Kin to the Gods you blindly hold so dear as if we don't walk amongst you having to keep you and your wretched in check whenever you see to do damage that you will never understand the gravity of unless we transfer such knowledge into your brain which would explode like a bomb if attempted" all I could think to do was stare into the void that was his eyes, the Irises glowing a bright blood red as the pressure in the room intensified by multiple levels, the air felt toxic as I breathed it in "why am I here?" Was all I could muster from my dehydrated snout, he snickered as he turned back around "your tainted boy, a demon, a parasite on the society you hold so dearly" the pressure kept amplifying as he talked, the robed men who carried me suddenly collapsing while I remained still "yet you possess a lot of strength for a Canis, the Canis we have here have watched you closely, carefully, precisely and they have taken notice in your strengths, your weaknesses, and your senses that you can't even grasp yourself, you lack discipline and if it were truly up to me I would have had you slaughtered along with the others who had to perish because of the toxins that flooded your blood alongside theirs but regardless of that we need you because quite frankly you should be dead alongside them" he went on as he looked at the robed men who weren't breathing anymore, their bodies sunk by the pressure which quickly lifted, bones could be heard cracking and breaking and blood slowly pooled from their hoods, I look back at him as he grabbed me by the scruff on my neck and shoved me into the platform, as I landed on the platform an invisible force pulled me up and suspended me two feet above the platform "because of your strength I have been tasked with one simple procedure that hasn't been done in millennia since we discovered this planet and brought forth the life that you have been familiar with your entire existence" he explained as dark red aura formed around his arms and his hands like snakes "I have been tasked with making you into an Aspirant, an honorary Assassin, congratulations boy you are becoming one of the gods you hold so dear to your heart" as the aura shot into me I blacked out from the pain it caused, left with an overwhelming anxiety and met by Gods made manifest.