Enlil's Citadel, Ki'Gal, Hollow Earth -
A little over a week had passed since Enki and Kael'Thara found a defeated and wounded Enlil in the desolate caverns of Hollow Earth. Thanks to the advanced Anunnaki healing technology of Ki'Gal, the Supreme Commander had recovered. His body had healed, and although the psychic wound from his defeat against the Cthulhu-Luciferin alliance still burned like a cold ember in his spirit, his regal and imperious bearing had returned, now tinged with a somber and pragmatic seriousness.
He summoned his brother Enki, Merlín, Aria, and Quetzal to his personal command center in the Kúr'Gal. The images of the Thirteen Families that had mysteriously appeared on the screens days ago were gone. In their place, the vast holographic map of Earth was slowly rotating again, but now it was peppered with innumerable red dots of conflict and energy anomalies.
Enlil, standing beside the round obsidian table, observed the small group from the surface. "I see you discovered my archives," he said, his voice a contained thunder. "My 'Protocols.' My vision for the Order of Terra." He paused. "A vision that is now... irrelevant in the face of the annihilation that is coming."
He turned to Enki. "Brother, your arrival and that of your... new allies, was timely. And your information about the plans of Amitiel and Cthulhu, alarming and, I fear, very accurate." He gestured towards the images of the Thirteen Families that were undoubtedly archived in the system. "But there is something you must know about them, about my... former servants."
"For some time now, I broke my direct communication with the leaders of the thirteen families," Enlil confessed, to everyone's surprise. "Long before Cthulhu fully awoke, long before my battle in the depths. I sensed... a corruption in their loyalty. An arrogance that was growing beyond their purpose as my administrators on Earth. Their actions became erratic, their internal disputes between the old and the young were creating a chaos that no longer served my Grand Design, but threatened to weaken the planet ahead of schedule. I stopped whispering in their minds, to see how they would behave without the hand of their 'god'."
"How did you control them so directly?" Aria asked, unable to contain her curiosity.
A cold, proud smile crossed Enlil's lips. "You mages use oaths and blood pacts. I prefer engineering. This is how I created those connections. In each generation, the designated leader of each of those families, in a secret 'ascension' ritual that they believed to be mystical, was actually infused with a nanomachine of my design. A biotechnological device that bound itself to their DNA, creating a... sympathetic resonance with my own energy signature. I could feel their loyalty, their thoughts of betrayal, and project my will directly into their subconscious minds as if they were their own ideas. They were, in the most literal sense, my eyes, my ears, and my hands on the surface world. Extensions of my will."
"But I never fully trusted mortal pawns," Enlil continued, his gaze growing more intense. "My brother Enki always believed in subtlety, in guidance, in inherent potential. I believe in absolute control and contingencies. That is why I have... sleepers."
He gestured at the holographic map, and hundreds of golden light points appeared, scattered across the globe. "I have an army of Anunnaki warriors from my own elite guard, strategically distributed on the surface for centuries. Hidden in subterranean bases beneath the world's major capitals, in stasis in underwater complexes in the deepest points of your oceans, or even disguised with shapeshifting technology, living among humanity itself as silent observers. Hundreds of them. Loyal only to me, programmed to awaken and act only under my direct command."
"Now," he said, and a current of power swept through the room, "I have begun to receive their first reports since I activated the emergency awakening protocols after my... recent defeat. They inform me of the global chaos that Nyx and Morgana have unleashed. Of the incursions by the Lyra factions in your skies. Of the growing and strange psychic calm left by Cthulhu's apparent withdrawal."
He paused, looking at each of them with a new and terrible strategic intensity. "But there is something crucial you must know. None of these agents of mine on the surface know that Cthulhu and Amitiel's faction have a new plan for global control. They don't know the ruse of the economic blocs, nor the mind-control station planned for Saturn, nor the facade of the 'Great Universal Fraternity.' Their last directive from me was to observe and prepare to impose my 'Protocols' upon a world in chaos. To them, Cthulhu is just the monster from the Void that has awakened, and the Netlin, an ancient and hated enemy."
Merlín and Quetzal exchanged a look of deep understanding. The implication was clear and of monumental importance.
"My defeat against the Luciferins and Cthulhu has cost me my shock troops down here," Enlil admitted with a cold fury. "But it has shown me the true face of our main enemy, the one that threatens Anunnaki and Terrans alike. I no longer seek to impose my 'Protocols' on a world on the brink of being devoured. I seek the annihilation of Amitiel and his unholy alliance with the Void."
He stood to his full height, his Anunnaki power now focused on a new and singular purpose. "My agents on the surface are your best weapon, your only defense, against the plans Amitiel and Cthulhu have just devised. They are your eyes and ears in a world our enemies believe they already completely control. They will not know we will take control of their new systems from within, that we will continue to deceive them with our own agents. Let us use them to sabotage their 'Great Universal Fraternity' before it is even born."
The revelation was astonishing. Enlil, the would-be tyrant of Earth, was now offering his secret army, his network of sleeping Anunnaki spies, as the main resistance force against a greater evil. The alliance, forced by desperation, was now compelled to consider working with him on a much deeper, much more dangerous level. Trusting Enlil was like embracing a rattlesnake, but perhaps, he was the only snake capable of poisoning the dragon that threatened to devour them all.