The Circle

The Circle was an extremist militant sect of the Church of Unitology, led by Jacob Danik. Where the wider Church spread its faith through persuasion and patience, the Circle took up arms, waging open war against EarthGov to free the Markers from government experiments. Its campaign ended at Tau Volantis, where its armies were ground down between Isaac Clarke and the Necromorphs.

An army built on the Church's fortune#

According to Danik's own records, the Circle's army was raised on the vast fortunes of the Church of Unitology and counted its membership in the millions. Its people were fiercely fanatical, zealous in their loyalty both to the Church and to Danik personally. The sect commanded considerable resources, fielding well-armed soldiers carrying assault rifles, shotguns, stasis and explosive grenades, and rocket launchers, and operating a fleet of dropships that carried its war across EarthGov space.

Most of its zealots marked their clothing with Marker symbols to declare their devotion to the message of the Markers. Their fanaticism extended to their deaths. Where earlier Unitologists committed ritual suicide by stabbing themselves in the forehead, the Circle's footsoldiers cut their own throats, and in battle a soldier might charge an enemy with live grenades in a final suicidal attack. On one occasion a member turned his shotgun on himself while screaming the Unitologist refrain, "One Mind, One Body."

The war for the Markers#

The Circle's purpose was the deposing of EarthGov authority throughout the galaxy and the "freeing" of the Red Markers from the government's experiments, which it cast as restoring them to nature. To that end it launched a violent campaign against EarthGov, using its dropships and its numbers to press the fight from world to world.

The conflict drew Danik and his zealots to Tau Volantis, where they were led by EarthGov Captain Robert Norton in the hope of killing Isaac Clarke. To the Circle, Isaac was the "Marker Killer" whose resistance hindered Convergence, and Danik came to want more than his death once he learned of the device Ellie Langford was seeking. He intended to use the Codex to complete the planet's long-halted Convergence Event.

Tau Volantis#

The forces the Circle deployed on Tau Volantis were numerous at first, but they met fierce resistance from the waves of Necromorphs already loose on the frozen world. Isaac was caught repeatedly in the crossfire between the fanatics and the creatures. The Circle suffered heavy early setbacks: its attempts to kill Isaac and his team failed, and an effort to scavenge the expedition's Armory left much of the raiding party slaughtered by Necromorphs.

As Isaac pressed toward the facility that held the body called Rosetta, Danik regrouped and used his dropships to land fresh soldiers, fending off the Necromorphs even as some teams were overwhelmed. When Isaac uncovered the true purpose of the Alien Machine and unwittingly explained it within Danik's hearing, the Circle rushed to the Research Compound Silo that led down to the Machine. Danik and his men took the elevator while the remaining soldiers scrambled to defend it, but they were cut down by Isaac and John Carver and by the overwhelming numbers of Necromorphs. By the time Danik reached the bottom of the facility, every soldier with him had been butchered, and he called for reinforcements. Fresh dropships landed in the Alien City and the heavily armed survivors set defensive positions, yet they could not stop Isaac and Carver from reaching the Machine.

The new cult#

In the aftermath of the Convergence Event and the loss of Danik, the faith of the zealots deployed to Tau Volantis was shaken, and several finally accepted the futility of their belief. Those who held to it gave rise to a new Unitologist cult, one no longer devoted to the Markers alone but to the worship of the Brethren Moons themselves. The fate of the Circle's millions of other members elsewhere in EarthGov space went unrecorded, lost amid the Brethren Moons' invasion.