The Manhattan Project

by Five X

Based on the Holy Grail War of Japan, a similar system of Masters and Servants is created in Washington, D.C. Set in the early 1960s, magi from the Soviet bloc and NATO allied territories fight a war that will end the Cold War. Or so some hoped.

1. Chapter I: Prologue

CHAPTER I

Thus, the first true battle of the Manhattan War was over.

The great black ship floating on the Potomac River was stricken with flames, and its dread captain stood at the helm, glaring with unspeakable rage at the tiny figure on the shore. The darkness of the night swallowed the ship and all its crew, disappearing downriver, and with it went the smell of burning flesh and wood, the stench of raw destruction. This Servant was not dead, but a tactical retreat on his part was close enough to a victory that the swordsman sheathed her sword and removed her battle cape, turning to face her Master.

It was early February in the year of 1963, in the city of Washington, D.C. It was a time of tumult, excitement, entertainment and change. JFK was the President, Beatlemania was about to explode across the Atlantic, and the Mona Lisa came to the States. In Alabama the governor cried, "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever!" months before Martin Luther would speak on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The Korean War was just a decade old, but Vietnam loomed on the horizon, not yet escalated to the scale that it would so famously reach.

And it was then, in Washington, D.C., that another war was beginning. It was not a war of ideals, not a war of money or land or natural resources; it was a war waged on such a small scale as to be invisible, but that was hoped to determine the future of the entire world. Beyond personal gain, this war was waged, between trained magi well versed in the secret art of magecraft, to decide a victor of the currently ongoing Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, as well as their allies across the globe. So it was that in Washington, D.C, their war began, with twenty-three magi summoning figures from history and mythology to aid them in winning the war for their country and their own side, be it the Warsaw Pact or NATO. Such was the goal of the Manhattan Project II, a union of science and magic heavily inspired by the Holy Grail War of Japan.

This was not the first day of this war, no, and in fact to truly understand the situation, it would be necessary to delve into the past, during the summoning of one of the many Servants, on February 3rd, 1963, in the living room of a Washington, D.C. apartment.