[Season.2] Investigation Report – A.B. : GRAY CROWS
[ Overview ]
They are the largest contract murder organization operating in Europe, with the most member count. They disguise themselves as homeless people and part-timers and operate in a wide area, without being tied to a certain time or place. Because the organization operates over a large area, many of its members carry out various types of missions, including espionage, murder-for-hire, and public opinion manipulation.
The GRAY CROWS were growing as an independent faction, but were incorporated into the A.B. (Anybody) organization, which was founded by defectors from the A.S. (Achromatic Servant). While the HARDWORKERS hold the front lines with their great combat powers, The GRAY CROWS support them by gathering intelligence, or by performing disturbance operations for the A.B.
[ Background ]
As Europe's industrial revolution accelerated, income polarization became increasingly extreme. The economic paradigm shift from agriculture to manufacturing led to a significant increase in the number of low-wage workers and unemployed. Some of them began to take on the biddings of the capitalist class to run "dangerous errands" for a living. Among the 'errand runners,' those who belonged to an organized group like A.S. were called 'Masters,' while those who did not belong in the group called themselves the 'CROWS'.
In the 20th century, a few well-meaning CROWS began to assert a sense of identity and ethics for the CROWS. The idea was that the CROWS would not accept work that would harm the common people and the poor and that the income they earned from commissions should be shared with laborers and the poor. The CROWS main work was to settle disputes between the upper classes, and the income they earned was used to fund the activities of labor organizations that sought to improve the status and welfare of the common people.
Toward the end of the 20th century, a fallout within the A.S. organization led to Mr. Anyone and Zero being expelled from the A.S. A few months later, one of A.S.'s internal organizations, HARDWORKERS, came out of the organization to follow these two men. Zero then set out to find the leader of CROWS, and they decided to unite the HARDWORKERS and CROWS under the name of the organization A.B. (Anybody). But the self-proclaimed leader of CROWS showed nothing but greedy and pathetic features, falling far short of Zero's expectations. In the days that followed, the leader of the CROWS was killed in a mysterious falling accident, and Zero set out to find 'Hand', a young man whom many of the CROWS truly admired.
Zero and Hand, who has an age different of a father and son, talked for days in private, and eventually reorganized A.B. and the Crows with Hand as the official head. Hand selected a few hundred trusted individuals from among those who called themselves CROWS and formed an organization called the 'GRAY CROWS'. Gray came from the idea of expressing their identity as an organization (black) and not an organization (white). Each GRAY CROWS member was assigned to a mission with the local crows in their area, as per A.B. and Hand's policy.
[ Characteristics ]
With many people spread across continents, it demonstrates the ability to execute missions quickly and synchronously.
Most Crows operate in top-down hierarchy organizations with one or two GRAY CROWS members leading the rest as point of contact, and their missions are usually information collecting or protest activities. However, when an assassination/political operation is commissioned by the head of an organization, it is broken down into smaller missions, and GRAY CROWS members will instigate their own crows to execute the individual missions simultaneously.
They are far from having a military-like organizational structure and mission capabilities, the GRAY CROWS are more about the diverse talents of the individual members and their ability to unite local crows. While they operate quite differently from the HARDWORKERS, they are similar in that they utilize a wide variety of weapons and equipment.
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