During The Chain’s long operational history, few agents have ever managed to successfully slip their shackle and act against the agency’s interest. Those that do are branded as Broken Links and are hunted down ruthlessly by their former comrades.

Harp’s Bane

Lieutenant Thomas Harp was an officer in the Union Army before he fell under an ancient Indian curse during the last days of the American Civil War. Whenever Harp falls asleep his body is taken over by his Bane – an inhuman and barely intelligent creature that resembles a giant mal-proportioned gorilla with a pit full of teeth where its head should be.

Thomas wandered for many years, wracked by terrible guilt for his nocturnal actions, before finally discovering a mystical solution of sorts – a spell that prevented him from ever falling asleep. In time a side effect of this cure became apparent – Thomas hasn’t aged a day since his Bane was caged within him. Always a reluctant monster, Harp joined The Chain willingly, seeing his service as a way to atone for past crimes. How and why he has now cast off his shackle are pressing mysteries that the higher powers within The Chain wish to see urgently solved.

Chicken Neck

A hulking Texas good old boy with the transplanted neck and head of a chicken. Never long parted from his trusted chainsaw, Betsy-Lee, Chicken Neck is an old rival of Texas’ other famous local psychopath, Cowboy 13. The two have clashed several times in competition for the same group of victims, to the general detriment of all those involved.

While currently in the service of Thomas Harp, Chicken Neck is himself not technically a Broken Link, having never been an agent of The Chain to begin with. Whatever force Harp has used to compel Chicken-Neck into his service remains a mystery.

Knife Mother & The Knife-kind

The young Japanese woman who would one day become known as Knife Mother began life as  a prostitute in the service of the Tokyo Yakuza. Possessed of a terrible beauty, the woman was a favourite among the worse gangsters of the Japanese underworld. Legend has it that she had slept with a thousand killers before she finally met her grisly end at the jealous hands of her last lover.

Eyes sewn shut for daring to look fondly at a rival Yakuza boss, the woman was stabbed in the back thirteen times and left for dead in a Tokyo alleyway. The supernatural force for revenge born in that alley became known as Knife Mother, a name that strikes fear amongst all Yakuza to this very day. Transfigured by death, small pods now grow from each wound on Knife Mother’s back and in each of these pods grows a child of a thousand killers; a Knife-kind.

Fully grown the Knife-kind are all identical, appearing as pale, shaven-headed Japanese men with their eyes sewn shut. Each dresses in a simple black suit (or appears to – the suit is actually part of their skin) and each carries a flick knife – a weapon every Knife-kind is capable of using with deadly force and accuracy. Knife Mother and her army of killer children have served The Chain for many years. But when Thomas Harp broke her free of her shackle, Knife Mother was quick to change allegiance. And wherever their mother leads them, the Knife-kind are sure to follow.