Candle's Art Book

Protogen - Fallout

The guilt-ridden but reserved demolitions expert of the Divine Intervention, Fallout was and is an interesting protogen. After the team's disbandment, he was given the same choice as many others - joining the government or staying with Mason. And like many, he chose to stay with Mason. Both as an obligation to his captain, and to put to rest and reverence of his fallen comrades.

He took up the position as a bodyguard to Mason and the teachers on staff. While Freefall took care of regular security on the campus, Fallout was there to protect Mason and his family, and his fellow teammates, and new additions.

He's one of the few that visit the graves of the other protogen from the team, below the monument to Rip-Cord. A monument to Fallout's sins.

He himself dug those graves by hand, and placed those headstones, and tended to those graves. All but one of those that were laid to rest upon the planet were his fault, and he hoped to atone for his recklessness and lackadaisical use of his Flow through discipline, rules, and reverence.

Fallout hardly ever fights, hardly ever uses his Flow unless it is to train to grow more controlled and disciplined in it, or if any threats were to ever come. He has only sparred twice in his entire time at the Divine Institute, once again Mason and Ja'Kle, and the other again Freefall after she begged hard enough. And both times were a spectacle.

Fallout is the last resort of the institute. A man-made god of flame, brought forth by the Boson coursing through his very veins, his power has only quadrupled in his time, quickly approaching Mason's own after Divento's downfall, though not quite there yet.

He is the disciplined and relaxed bodyguard needed at the institute. A ruby bomb in the shape of a protogen, just waiting to let out against whatever would do him, or anyone else, harm.

He is truly firepower personified. And nothing is more evident than the fact that he was the very first to receive that coveted and secretive Black Letter.

Story - In the Shape of a Bomb

The aroma of gunpowder, the smell of smoke, the desecration of earth and the ripe scent of burning metal. The dust and debris, the rocky muscles of the ground exposed to the deep light of the star in the sky. The explosions.

All created by one man, by one protogen, by one faux-deity. Fallout.

The ruby protogen lexed his claws, feeling his tight muscles ache and burn. He looked at the devastation around him, and he only sighed. He brought his hands back, his visor going blank as he let loose an explosion against the ground.

His small frame rocketed high into the sky, booming across the lands and through the canyons of the planet. Arid deserts marked with sandstone and brick, collapsed tunnels and broken and eroded monuments to nature. The desert was his domain to train and explore his deific gift. To train and make sure that he never unintentionally harms someone again.

Even after the death of Divento, though a god can never truly die, Fallout still felt that guilt. Each time he stared up at those cliffs overlooking the institute, he saw Rip-Cord's statue, his monument, his promise of guardianship. He saw the man, the god, that he should be. That he wishes he could be.

He still remembered burying those empty graves. Digging them with his ruby laws through stone and dirt and rock. He remembered personally going to their rooms, grabbing their close possessions and bringing them to the graves. He remembered placing them in, neatly and orderly, clean. And then burying them, as there was nothing else that remained of them.

Twenty-Five.

Twenty-Five was how many members the Divine Intervention had upon landing on Gold-Standard. They only had eighteen now. A staggering amount to be sure, but they had lost many on their journey. Most not due to incompetence or some god killing them. No, most of those deaths were on Fallout's hands.