Iscariot: Section XIII

Iscariot. Section XIII. Names given to an organization, centuries old, created specifically to obliterate the enemies of the Catholic Church, named after the traitorous apostle of Jesus. It became a band of fanatical killers, willing to lay down their lives in the name of God, obeying the will of the Pope. Special technologies were developed with time to help deal with the horrors of fighting these creatures, and holy magic was twisted to aid in the destruction of these fiends. Eventually, in the late twentieth century, Enrico Maxwell was granted the position of leadership within the organization. As thus, he encouraged more brutal methods of dealing with threats, deploying the notoriously powerful and intimidating Paladin Alexander Anderson, who had been one of the most privileged agents of the organization. Unfortunately, he also was a smarmy, disdainful man with little patience for others.

He directed Iscariot to conflict with its British competitor, Hellsing, due to the differences in creeds and the usage of loyal vampires to aid in the fight against the undead. The first incident was in Badrick, Ireland, where Anderson was deployed by Father Renaldo of Iscariot. There, he confronted the elite vampire agent of Hellsing, Alucard, and his fledging, Seras Victoria. He appeared to kill Alucard, but amidst the pursuit of Seras, he killed two Hellsing guards and nearly executed Integra Hellsing herself. The organization was humiliated when it was forced to retreat, and left in a blood debt against Hellsing for the innocent deaths. Maxwell himself traveled to London with Anderson and Renaldo as his bodyguards to apologize on the Vatican's behalf by handing over in a gesture of goodwill a black dossier containing information on the Millennium Group, which had devastated Hellsing. Again, due to Maxwell's pig-headedness and incompetence, an international incident was only very narrowly averted, and Integra was left with an even poorer opinion of Iscariot.

Maxwell, upon being informed of the massive battle taking place on England when Millennium deployed its armies, was promoted to Archbishop and made leader of the Vatican's armies in the name of Christianity, in a great Riconquista to kill all Protestant "heretics" and force England to return to Catholicism with the death of London. He had Iscariot sent in first, led by their three greatest soldiers: Anderson, Heinkel Wolfe, and Yumie Takagi. Their mission was at first only to monitor the situation and provide reconaissance for the main armies, but Anderson chose to intervene and saved Integra from a Millennium detachment. Upon the deaths of the vampires, he had Iscariot move Integra to her manor, stating that if they let her go alone at the time (it was well entered in the night) the group as a whole would be no better than rapists. Wolfe protested upon the deployment of Maxwell's armies, saying they had been issued orders to capture Integra. However, Anderson replied Enrico was out of control, and would have fought his own men had a fully vampirized Seras Victoria not arrived to protect her master. Forming a shield with the shadows she had mastered by then, she drove away the priests; when Heinkel tried to battle her anyway, Anderson forced her to back out, as she had no means of truly wounding her opponent.

Iscariot, as a whole, was ordered to flee as Alucard returned, as Anderson wanted them to protect the organization and the religion, saying there were enough souls in Limbo. However, a strike team, reorganized and equipped, led by Heinkel, returned to aid Anderson by using suicide bombing tactics against the threat of the millions of familiars Alucard had summoned forth. Strapped with explosives, the vast majority of the organization died in this fashion, giving Anderson a final chance to kill Alucard. The most notorious survivors, again, were Yumie and Heinkel. They witnessed the defeat of Paladin Anderson, and were left to mourn him before one Millennium's last cards was used: the vampirized Walter C. Dornez. As he crushed the remains of Anderson, Yumie attacked him for his disrespect, and despite her nigh-superhuman speed she was sliced apart by his wires. Heinkel, despite all other Iscariot priests fleeing, remeained and sniped down Walter, losing an arm and a leg in the process after being heavily scarred in the face by the Captain's gun.

Thirty years into the future, the organization had been rebuild with Heinkel occupying the post left vacant by Anderson as regenerator. New leader M'Quve noted that despite their hunger for vengeance, the costly assault to London wrecked their ranks, forcing them to wait several centuries until they could gather enough troops to make another bid at destroying Hellsing; this made the aged Heinkel quite irate.

Section XIII's power lies in its paladins, fearsome warriors of the faith. All of them were equipped with special weapons and training against specific threats; for instance, Anderson was given apparently neverending silver bayonets and his regenerative abilities to confront vampires, while to deal with more mundane threats, Heinkel and Yumie were given large guns and a katana, respectively; in the wake of the deployment of Alucard's familiars, most of their priests were given explosives to strap on themselves to dispatch large amounts of enemies rapidly in the likely event of capture or death, and Anderson was given a long chain binding countless silver bayonets; these detonated when hurled, devastating the ranks of the familiars attacking him and Iscariot. Its apparent history is included in the extra Crossfire stories, which chronicle Heinkel and Yumie's adventures before the London assault.