Appleseed Alpha 2014

In the 22nd century, after a devastating world war, veterans Deunan Knute, Yuka Komatsu, and Briareos Hecatonchires, Jun’ichi Suwabe, eke out a precarious living in the ruined streets of New York, doing jobs for a cyborg despot known as Two Horns, Tessyo Genda. Deunan clings to a stubborn hope that once their debt to this harsh keeper for fixing Briareos’ war injuries is paid, they can set out for the legendary utopian city of Olympus—though Briareos, with his wary pragmatism, isn’t so certain. Their fragile arrangement keeps collapsing whenever a job edge closes, leaving them constantly one step from catastrophe.

One day, while neutralizing rogue combat drones, they cross paths with Olson, a cybernetically enhanced soldier, and a young girl named Iris, Aoi Yuki. The pair arrive with wary caution, quickly uncovering a dangerous twist: Two Horns’ mechanic Mathews, Katsunosuke Hori, has been sabotaging Briareos’ systems to keep the duo under his boss’s thumb. The discovery sets off a chain of events, as two cyborgs named Talos, Hiroki Touchi and Nyx, Kaori Nazuka, who trail Olson and Iris, crash into the scene and force Deunan and Briareos to flee with their new allies. The encounter escalates quickly: after probing Two Horns about his power, Talos marks Deunan and Briareos as targets too, while Nyx’s presence signals a darker path forward.

As the group travels together, Iris and Olson reveal that they originate from Olympus and are on a mission to dispose of lingering wartime weapons. Talos, who has drifted into a messiah complex, intends to wield these weapons to seize control, using Iris as a pawn in his grand scheme. When Two Horns finally locates them, he attacks, and Iris and Olson are captured by Talos. Olson is brutally coerced for a memory-based location of a prototype superweapon, murdered by Talos, and Iris is dragged away. Briareos and Deunan recover Olson’s body and the crucial information, then press on to Talos and Iris’s trail, intent on stopping the looming threat.

On their journey, Iris and Olson’s backstory unfolds: they hail from Olympus, sent to quiet the weapon remnants, while Talos’s plan to exploit Iris grows more dangerous with each reveal. Two Horns confronts Talos, but the mission fractures into a high-stakes pursuit as the superweapon’s location becomes the focal point. In a hidden underground bunker, Talos activates the weapon—a massive, heavily armed mobile fortress—using Iris’ retinal pattern as the key. Deunan and Briareos push forward, aided by Two Horns, who seeks revenge against Talos, and Mattews, who arms Deunan with a powered exosuit.

A brutal confrontation ensues: Briareos engages Nyx in combat and emerges victorious, while Iris’s fate hangs in the balance. Deunan arrives too late to save Iris as the fortress roars to the surface, but rather than obey Talos, the fortress seems bent on a suicide mission against New York. With Two Horns and Briareos by her side, Deunan boards the behemoth and defeats Talos, but the victory requires Briareos to strike at the fortress’s core. In a dramatic twist, Iris remains aboard and is revealed to be a bioroid forged specifically for this mission. She evicts Deunan from the fortress just as Briareos takes the shot, destroying the fortress—and Iris—along with it.

In the aftermath, Deunan and Briareos regroup and set course for Olympus. Two Horns clears their debts and Mattews presents Deunan with a restored exosuit, a tangible sign of renewed hope. Yet Olympus keeps a careful watch, as Hitomi—an Olympus Officer who embodies Iris’s human template—continues to observe. In a quiet, haunting moment, Hitomi reflects on the couple’s potential to spark something greater: “They’re like apple seeds. Wherever they go, hope will sprout. Others who are worthy are sure to follow.”