Children of Eden MC
Written by: Ripshot
And then there's these guys. Don't get me wrong, I'm not claiming any moral highground on behalf of myself, my group or any other go-gang in Raleigh, but it's not about morality: At least when a Pack enforcer guns you down for narcing or a Horse Dancer chases you for kicks, it's done with a sense of honesty, of believing in what you're committing violent crimes for, even if it's as simple as 'I want money' or 'I want ot be the biggest badass in the tri-state area'. The Children of Eden though, they don't have that honesty, they're not really a true motorcycle-club; They're a proxy for the Alamos 20,000 and to a lesser extent the Humanis policlub, playing whatever part's needed to angelicize the innocent human-supremacists of Raleigh and demonize metahumans in all sorts of creative ways. How do we know they're proxies? When they throw a punch at the metahuman communities, they'll do it in unmarked jackets with gear and training you'd never see in an actual go-gang. But when retaliation's due, every shred of evidence linking them to wrongdoing is gone in a flash, leaving behind a group of 'unarmed, peaceful motorcyclists' with disproportionate legal-protection.In some cases, the motorcyclists are actually legitimately peaceful or 'innocent' to a degree. A lot of the lower-ranking members (and the community-organiser, weirdly) aren't in the know about the club's true intentions but still get caught up in the retaliatory strikes, something the Children are more than happy to capitalize on.I spoke for a while with a guy who did work on behalf of these guys. Just like the folk they work for, they prefer to do things through proxies whenever possible, but they'll keep you way further in the dark. Hell, you might not even know you're doing their dirty-work, you might think you're just doing a milk-run for a rando Johnson right up until you turn on the evening newscast and realise you've unknowingly ruined the rep of a metahuman-rights activist or killed an innocent dude infront of a securicam with a big tusk-patch slapped on your jacket. Make sure to do some homework on your employers, chummer.
Structure
The CoE operate in exactly the way you'd expect a city-chapter of a motorcyclist's club to do so: You got a president and vice-president on top, followed by elected coordinators, treasurers and so on keeping everything organised, who give work to road-captains that then delegate to rank-and-file members and prospects. When they're not under the public eye, the structure takes on a more militaristic vibe, operating under the same structures but with a more coordinated chain of command and delegation.
Identifiers
Imagine your typical bikers in typical biker leathers, now imagine... well, don't bother, actually. Besides a black-and-silver motif to match their signs, these drekheads seem to go out their way to have a plain-jane bikerlook of jeans, jackets and safety helmets (HAHAHA). Even their "graffiti" (authorised in advance by property-owners) is generic skulls and flames crap...Public Agenda
Publically. the CoE put on a convincing facade of a 'Dad's Club' of motorcyclists, the kind that spurn criminal activity in favor of public events, volunteer-work and the occasional loud-ass drive down main street. The group don't have any official or printed anti-metahuman aggenda, but their ethos has a pretty obvious 'seperate but equal' subtext going on in their meetings and public movements, and don't do much to stop individuals from talking about how trogs are 'stealing their hobby'.
Assets
Like I mentioned before, despite putting on airs of being nothing but working joe-schmoes (and panhandling for donations like they are), the Children of Eden have some serious investment going on in the back rooms. Along with their main clubhouse not to far from the city-center, they've got at least three other garages around Raleigh in their pocket, and members are always riding the latest and greatest hogs or the real rare vintage rides. Whenever they go out to cause a bit of 'anonymous violence', they'll do so on brand-new bikes and toting some pretty high-end guns, the kind you'd only get with serious connections. And on top of all that, on the occasion someone actually tries and calls them up for some wrongdoing, there's always a highly-trained attorney or twelve ready to do some pro-bono work and 'clear their names'.
History
Not a whole lot to say on this one, considering how recent these guys are on the scene. The Children of Eden first came about in late '76, in the aftermath of the bombing at the Universal Omnitech School of Medicine. Up until then, a lot of anti-metahuman groups like Humanis had just enough clout and 'respectability' that they were a tolerated presence in Raleigh's political scenes. But Humanis dropped the ball when one of their lesser-known spokespersons, Alexander Clayton, made a big and public racket about his conspiracy-theories, how the bombing was a false-flag and the grieving next-of-kin were actors shilling for 'big government' and pro-metahuman legislation. Said survivors were understandably pretty piqued, and most of Raleigh joined them.
This turned public-opinion against Humanis and similar groups in a way that activist-groups and PR firms could only dream of. Politicians with known ties to the policlub went from being well-regarded candidates to pariahs within weeks, enabling local Elf Jimmy Spears to easily take the mayoral election and further ostracize Humanis. Sure, a lot of folk in Raleigh were still a little racist, but it suddenly became a little less acceptable to have that as part of your campaign-platform. Anti-metahuman policlubs left the Raleigh scene in droves, leaving only the most stubborn and enduring of 'em to hold the fort for their causes, and even then, only in more subtle, 'publically acceptable' ways.
Hot take, but a lot of those policlubs' turning of reputation was't entirely about racism and the such. When Clayton snapped in public, it got a lot of local hacktivists and shit-stirrers to look more closely into what Humanis' Raleigh-chapter and a lot of other anti-metahuman clubs did in their clubhouses. Turns out they were trying out a lot of old-world style secret ceremonies and pseudo-occult shit which used to have a lot of stock in making them look all mysterious and wise when everyone knew jack-all about it, but once recordings came out of their now-infamous handshakes and chants, the sense of mystery fell-apart and they started looking ridiculous. Kind of hard to take a politician seriously when you catch a trid of him reading the first word of every odd-numbered chapter in the ol' King James like it means something...Thing is, y'can't really keep a good policlub down. The smaller clubs dissolved, but the bigger ones just withdrew their outed politicians and replaced them with 'independant' politicians rattling the ol' 'traditional family-values' cup. Since they couldn't do big campaigns like before without hitting scrutiny, this meant they'd have to start from scratch in getting public opinion back towards humans putting race aside to team up against nonhumans. Sights were lowered a little and focus went into astroturfing their activities, disguising their influence as small grassroots groups that have politics as a secondary interest. Workshopping was done, things were thrown at the town to see what stuck (Here's some of the less succesful ideas, <LINK>). Eventually, their two and a half braincells found something they liked: Motorcycle clubs. Vintage, working-class, harmless-looking but able to throw the scent off any violence they commit by blaming actual go-gangs, and even provoking some homegrown violence from such gangs in retaliation. William Black, a local anti-meta 'moderate' who was partly responsible for Clayton's connection to Humanis, was chosen to found this new venture, and given a little slice of property and a fat credstick to do it with. Since then, Black's been carefully letting more of his own people trickle in, keeping a subtle but functional divide between useful-idiots who think they've joined a biker-gang and his own inner-circle of trained associates, ready to astroturf any desire of the politicians holding their leash. At first they stuck to low-level things like provocation and good old-fashioned anonymous violence, but now that Black's getting more 'unsigned' donations, we've started to hear about more grandiose ideas...
"The way biking should be."
Founding Date
2077
Type
Illicit, Terrorist group
Demonym
Sons/Daughters of Eden
Leader
Location
Notable Members
Tentative Peace
The Black Unicorn do very little to hide their dislike for the Children of Eden, despite their uncharacteristic willingness to assist their enterprises and act as disposable muscle for money, but continue to put on a polite show to keep them eager.
Peace
The Aoyama might be a little more egalitarian than most Yak clans, but old habits die hard, and the latest rumor is that old-man Fudo himself is on a first-name basis with William Black. More cynical sources, however, claim that the two have a mutual perception of the other as being full of useful idiots.
Open War
A lot of the biker-oriented gangs in Raleigh only tolerate the Children, seeing them as poseurs but not much more than that, but the Pack are completely open about wanting to turn them into a fine red smear, even going so far as to publically aggravate and harass anyone so much as wearing their colors.
Open Hostilities
The CoE make no attempt at hiding their disdain for the 'wreckless criminals' of the Metal Corsairs, who show similar disdain to the 'sanitized corporate-bootlicker' biker-gang. Violent classes are brief and rare, but very deadly.
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