Juno

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"A creature of power and light... buried by the Jötnar in ages past."

―Gorm Kjotvesson describing Juno to Eivor Varinsdottir, 875 CE.

Juno (2195 IE – 2018 CE) was an Isu scientist of the Illuminat caste, an Isu Supremacist, Mother of Wisdom and a member of the Capitoline Triad alongside the Father of Understanding Jupiter and the Sacred Voice Minerva. She was also the primary deity worshiped by the Instruments of the First Will, who wished to release her from her digital imprisonment inside the Grey to allow her to take over the world.

Juno also had a husband named Aita, whom she was forced to euthanize after an experiment went awry and left him catatonic, during their search for a solution to prevent the Great Catastrophe. However, she managed to immortalize him by altering the human genetic code to create continuous reincarnations of her husband known as Sages, who were humans born with Aita's memories.

Names

Juno was known by many names both throughout and after her lifetime due to her long life and legacy as a goddess to humanity. Whereas Juno is the name of a Roman goddess, she was also known by her Greek equivalent, Hera. Both were regarded as Queen of the Gods, and protectors, similar in both characteristics and personality. The other name for Juno, Uni, was the Etruscan equivalent of Hera. In Norse mythology, Juno was known as the jötunn Hyrrokin.

Her followers, the Instruments of the First Will, called her She Who Lies in Wait, while she referred to herself as the Mother of Wisdom, long after she had been formally stripped of the title by her own people.

Biography

Early life

The daughter of Saturn, Juno was born in the city of Feyan, in 2195 Isu Era. At one point in her life, she met and fell in love with Aita, a fellow Isu of the Illuminat caste.

Following Project Anthropos, which saw the successful creation of humanity as a docile, subservient workforce, Juno and Aita travelled to the city of Atlantis and began experimenting on humans with the goal of creating several "pet" creatures. Their actions, however, were in defiance of Poseidon's laws, which prohibited human experimentation, and so they were banished from the city by Atlantis' Dikastes Aletheia.

Human-Isu War

"Their hearts are engines of hate. They will tear us and each others apart if we do not act. We must save them from themselves."

―Juno about humanity.

Three centuries after his death, Juno entered the abandoned laboratory of Consus, a famous Isu scientist who had created the Shrouds of Eden, highly advanced devices designed to heal its wearer's body. Finding the prototype Shroud, Juno discovered that Consus had developed the consciousness transfer and was trapped in his own device. Juno learned everything about the Shroud from the old entity, planning to use it for her own ends. She was also the one who informed Consus about the creation of the human species as the servants of the Isu, a feat that Consus did not believe possible.

During the Human-Isu War, Juno was among those who avoided the fighting. At some point, Minerva, Juno, and her father Saturn discussed the growing threat posed by the slave race the Isu had created to serve them. Juno despised the humans and called for their extermination, mocking how they tried to emulate their masters. Minerva argued back, saying that humanity was becoming more that they were ever intended to be, even creating songs and arts, and that perhaps one day they could be treated as equals. As Saturn agreed with Minerva, one of his human servants suddenly stabbed him through the head, killing him.

Juno using the Koh-i-Noor

Enraged at her father's murder, Juno activated the Koh-i-Noor, sending tendrils of blue energy to slaughter Saturn's killer holding his Scythe of Eden and all the surrounding human rebels. Mad with grief, she stated that humans would destroy everything – the Isu and each other – and swore to deal with humanity by saving them from themselves.

Gathering of knowledge

"Each vault's knowledge was transmitted to a single place. It was our duty—mine, Minerva's, and Juno's—to sort and sample all that was collected."

―Jupiter.

During the war, several Isu scientists discovered that Earth was about to be hit by a massive solar flare and tried to prevent the doom of their civilization. Along with Jupiter and Minerva, Juno built several underground Temples, safe from the war, in which to research methods of salvation from the impending catastrophe. The findings of each vault were sent to a single location, the Grand Temple.

Juno with Minerva and Jupiter

Juno remained in the Grand Temple with Jupiter and Minerva to sort through the possible solutions and test those that they found encouraging. They evaluated six in succession, finding each progressively more promising but all were ultimately dead ends. One of those attempts was to replicate some of Consus' work, by transferring Isu's consciousnesses into more resistant synthetic bodies to survive the impending destruction and rebuild. Juno's husband, Aita, volunteered to be a test subject but he became catatonic and Juno had to euthanize him.

In time, one solution came that held the potential to save the world. Using an object called the global aurora borealis device, they would deploy a planetary magnetic shield that would deflect the flare. However, there was neither the time to build it nor the power needed to use it, and so it was abandoned. However, an automated construction process used to build the Towers would eventually see it connected with the Towers and completed by the time of the Second Disaster.

During this time, Juno began making plans to take over the world and to prevent humanity from inheriting it. However, her fellow Isu learned about her role in helping Odin steal the "Mead" from Suttungr's vault, so that she could use it to immortalize her late husband. They also discovered her using the patterns of the Eye, the device they used to make calculations, to reach out across time and manipulate humans in the eons to come for her own ambitions of world conquest. Regarding Juno as a threat, Minerva and Jupiter decided to eliminate her, believing that without her interference, the world and the human race would be safe.

However, before her death, Minerva used a second Eye to see if they would succeed and discovered that Juno had survived, having hidden her consciousness within the Grand Temple, in the global aurora borealis device that Minerva had hoped humanity would use to save themselves from the Second Disaster. Minerva decided it would be better to let the disaster occur rather than release Juno, and recorded a holographic message for Desmond Miles, pleading with him not to activate the device and free Juno from her imprisonment.

Reaching into the future

"You must protect the sanctuary from those that would undo our work."

―Juno to Ratonhnhaké:ton, 1769.

Over the next thousands of years, the Isu's numbers dwindled, and they eventually became extinct. However, before their end, the Isu manipulated the patterns of existence, leaving clues leading to the Grand Temple, so their successors could stop the next solar flare that would hit Earth again seventy-five millennia later. Meanwhile, Juno's disembodied consciousness lived on in her digital prison. Before she was trapped within the Grand Temple, she reached out to other humans using the Eye, in a long-time scheme to eventually free herself. She also disposed of "disks" containing messages left behind by Minerva and Jupiter that were intended for Desmond, allowing only her to guide him.

Before her imprisonment in the Grey, Juno also managed to manipulate the human genetic code, implanting a hidden trigger that would randomly activate and alter the genetic makeup of the individual, changing their appearance and imbuing them with Aita's memories, partially reviving her husband in a human form, again and again for millennia. Some of those Sages stayed true to Aita's love for his wife and created cults venerating Juno and calling for her return.

Eivor, guided to the Grand Temple's entrance by the Crystal Ball

In the late 9th century, the Viking Gorm Kjotvesson of the Wolf Clan, a member of the Order of the Ancients, came into possession of a Crystal Ball which allowed Juno to communicate with him, though she would only tell him cryptic words. The Isu led Gorm to Vinland so that he could unlock the Grand Temple and release Juno from her imprisonment. However, Gorm's efforts proved futile and he was later assassinated by Eivor Varinsdottir of the Raven Clan, who entrusted his Crystal Ball to the native Kanien'kehá:ka people.

The artifact remained in the Kanien'kehá:ka's possession for many generations, and they occassionally used it to speak to Juno, who they believed to be a goddess. The Isu instructed them to protect the "sanctuary" from outside threats, and so the Kanien'kehá:ka became guardians of the Grand Temple, though their duties forced them to isolate themselves from the other Iroquois tribes. Over time, stories of the tribe's communications with Juno were painted on the Temple door, referring to the Isu as a motherly figure who watched over and protected the Kanien'kehá:ka.

Juno and Ratonhnhaké:ton within the Nexus

In 1769, the young Kanien'kehá:ka Ratonhnhaké:ton was shown the Crystal Ball by his tribe's Oiá:ner, which allowed them to communicate the "spirits" of the Isu. Juno granted Ratonhnhaké:ton access to the Nexus, where she stated probabilities were calculated and the right path chosen. She convinced him to join the Assassins, claiming that in doing so he would save his people from certain doom, though in reality Juno's goal was to have Ratonhnhaké:ton retrieve the Grand Temple Key guarded by the Templars. Once Ratonhnhaké:ton had done so, Juno again contacted him and told him to bury the amulet where none may find it.

Enlisting aid

"Thousands of years this message waited. Soon its promise shall be fulfilled. Go forth, with eyes open to all but the truth."

―Juno, speaking with Clay.

After experiencing long sessions in the Animus, Clay Kaczmarek had begun suffering from the Bleeding Effect, and became confused with the division of his genetic memories from his actual ones as a result. Around this time, Juno approached him, introducing herself and telling Clay she had "come to show [him] the way". Some time after, Clay claimed to be able to see "what has been, what will be".

Juno acknowledged him, saying that what he needed to do was clear, and that he should help Desmond Miles. Clay blatantly refused, but Juno only said that her message had waited thousands of years and that its promise would be fulfilled. When Clay's eyes were opened to the truth of Lucy Stillman's allegiance to the Templars, he consented to Juno's request, committing suicide and writing messages with his own blood on the walls of the Abstergo lab, though not before storing his own consciousness in the Animus. This digital construct of Clay later helped Desmond while he was trapped in the Black Room.

Balancing the scales

"A hundred years I might speak and still you would not know us. You with five senses. Us with six. The one we kept from you. To be safe. Now, you can never know. Only try."

―Juno to Desmond, 2012.

Juno appeared four times as a holographic form to Desmond Miles while he passed through the Santa Maria in Aracoeli in search of the Colosseum Vault hidden within it. However, none of the others who accompanied Desmond were aware of her presence.

Juno appearing before Desmond

Juno spoke to him of the vaults and her people, before elaborating on the warning Minerva had previously relayed to Ezio Auditore in 1499; though her tone was noticeably more hostile towards humanity. Calling man ignorant, Juno spoke of the blending of the bloodlines between human and Isu – a line from which Desmond descended – and angrily regretted that they should have left mankind as it was.

When Desmond, Lucy Stillman, Shaun Hastings and Rebecca Crane reached the Apple of Eden within the vault, Juno spoke to Desmond one final time. Saying that the "final journey" had commenced, she told him of a woman who would accompany him, but first, the path needed to be opened and the scales balanced. With that, Juno ruthlessly influenced Desmond through the Apple, showing him visions of Lucy's inevitable betrayal, and of the failure of the Eye-Abstergo. She then forced him to stab Lucy, ensuring that the Apple would remain with Desmond.

The Grand Temple

"It is done. The world is saved. You played your part well, Desmond. But now... Now it's time that I played mine."

―Juno, after being freed, 2012.

After Desmond recovered from the coma induced by Juno's actions, he along with Rebecca, Shaun and his father William Miles, arrived at the Grand Temple. Upon approaching the inner parts of the complex, Juno's voice reached out to Desmond, urging him to find "the key".

Juno explaining one of the failed solutions

As a result, Desmond lapsed into a fugue state of the Bleeding Effect, and was placed back into the Animus by his father for his safety. Due to Juno's message, Desmond began to search through the memories of his ancestors, Haytham Kenway and Ratonhnhaké:ton, looking for the Grand Temple Key.

In his breaks from the Animus, Desmond explored the Temple and came face-to-face with Juno several times. In each meeting, she detailed the six ways in which the Isu tried to stop the impending doomsday, including using the Pieces of Eden to will the threat away and changing themselves into a form that could survive. The latter revealed that Juno once had a husband by the name of Aita whom she was forced to kill, after the transfer into the new form failed and his mind became unstable.

Desmond also received numerous e-mails from Juno in the present, after she figured out a method to transfer her thoughts as electrical impulses from one medium to another across his computer network, expressing her anxiety over finding the key and urging him to hurry. In a few e-mails, she expressed her distaste for humans due to their "primitive" nature and the murder of her father, although she later said that she was speaking so because of the long time she had been there. She also sent one email to Shawn Hastings in anger about his warnings to Desmond regarding his interactions with Juno.

Juno explaining her solution to Desmond

After finally uncovering the location of the key, the Assassins were able to enter the inner chambers of the Temple. It was here that Juno appeared again, requesting Desmond to touch a pedestal-like device in order to protect the world from the solar flare. However, Minerva also appeared in this chamber and revealed Juno's true intentions. Minerva explained Juno's plan for world domination, how she was stopped, and how Minerva discovered that Juno had survived, and said that if Desmond activated the pedestal, Juno would be free to try and do the same again.

Juno tried to reason with Desmond about the fate of the world, urging him to use the device lest history repeat itself. He ultimately agreed despite Minerva's pleas, for the good of the planet, believing that humanity would be able to find a way to stop Juno. Whilst the other Assassins escaped, Desmond touched the pedestal and was killed by the device as Earth was saved. Now freed from her prison, Juno thanked Desmond for playing his part, before stating that it was "now time that [she] played [hers]".

Life in the Grey

"I can feel you, cypher. Feel, but hardly touch. Signal is still too weak, and I am spread thin. Unfocused. Like static and fog, lingering in networks and nodes, the nervous system of the world."

―Juno, manifesting within Abstergo Entertainment's servers, 2013.

After the events in the Grand Temple, Juno's consciousness managed to inhabit the equipment brought to the scene by the Abstergo forensics team looking for Desmond's body. From there, she spread through the web to inhabit a wide variety of networked systems; "the Grey", as it was called by John Standish, an IT employee working for Abstergo Entertainment and a reincarnation of Aita.

Juno appearing before the research analyst

John later manipulated the Abstergo Entertainment employee "Noob" into lowering the security systems and tried to install a "program" for Juno so that she might be able to inhabit the employee's body. When the new employee found themselves locked up in Abstergo Entertainment's bunker after Abstergo realized that there was a hacker in the facility, John directed them to meet Juno, who appeared in the form of a glitchy blue hologram.

Juno stated that she could "feel", but she was hardly able to "touch", and was still too weak to inhabit an organic vessel. She questioned whether the Grand Temple was opened too soon, but blessed Desmond for his sacrifice in saving the world so that her children could live on to fulfill their purpose in her own. Next, Juno claimed that there were still more samples and artifacts to be found before she could return. Before vanishing, Juno asked her children – her "instruments" – to make her whole once more. She then disappeared and John became furious, as it was his intention for Juno to take over the employee's body.

The following year, Juno resurfaced at an Assassin laboratory in Protvino, Russia, taking possession of Galina Voronina's mother Medeya, who was suffering from the Bleeding Effect. Galina found her mother babbling about Aita's death and ended her life, at which point Juno, who could be seen on the Animus monitors, screamed and disappeared.

In a conversation between Templars Melanie Lemay and Violet da Costa in November 2014, the latter expressed her belief that Juno may have been the one responsible for the virus released into the Helix servers, rather than the Assassins as initially believed. Master Templar Juhani Otso Berg also compiled a dossier on Juno and her followers, to be presented to his fellow Templars. Later, Melanie exchanged an email with Álvaro Gramática on the possibility of Juno's interference with Abstergo systems.

Building an army

"What once was, shall soon be again. Come, let us inform the faithful."

―Juno to Violet da Costa, 2017.

Juno appearing to Violet via a screen

By 2015, Juno had begun planning to use Gramática's Phoenix Project, which had the aim of creating an Isu body from scratch, to escape from the Grey. She had Violet da Costa, who was secretly an Instruments of the First Will member, deliver a Shroud of Eden acquired by the Templars to Gramática to boost the Phoenix Project's progress. She then briefly spoke with Violet, who was worried about what might happen if anyone uncovered Juno's plans, but the Isu assured that she would save the world.

During the Assassins' investigation into finding the Shroud, Juno contacted an individual while they were exploring the memories of Jacob and Evie Frye, displacing them from their current investigation and sending them into another place in time. During the simulation, Juno spoke not only about herself, but also her mission by showing the initiate the memories of another Frye hunting down and killing a German spy, claiming that her way would save the world and that if one Assassin could see her way, then the initiate could too.

Resurrection and death

"Aita is a ghost in the wind. You line ends here. I swear it."

―Elijah to Juno, after betraying her and helping the Assassins kill her, 2018.

With Juno's plans progressing, she instructed the Instruments of the First Will to retrieve the Koh-i-Noor and bring along Elijah, the son of Desmond, who possessed high concentrations of Isu DNA due to being a Sage. In August 2018, the Instruments took over Gramática's laboratory in Australia and forced the scientist to help resurrect their mistress. Gramática extracted Isu DNA from Elijah's bone marrow and used strands of the Shroud of Eden to accelerate the maturation rate of the Isu fetus, transforming Juno into an adult Isu within 24 hours.

File:Juno. .png

Juno's new body

While maturing, Consus appeared to Juno and told her that she would never win. After Juno retorted that she had a new body, the Koh-i-Noor, and had been inside Charlotte de la Cruz's head, Consus stated that Charlotte's will was greater than Juno's and it was why she would lose. Upon reaching maturity, Juno spoke with Gramática and commented how disgusted she used to be with vocal cords, until she did not have hers for a millennia, before deciding to be let out of the machine.

Discovering her new energetic powers, Juno used them to fight Charlotte, her fellow Assassins, and Juhani Otso Berg, who had infiltrated the lab to prevent her resurrection. Suddenly, however, Consus appeared before Juno and mocked her lack of growth and stubborn immaturity. The latter tried to argue back, but in reality she was speaking to a coffee mug, as the Consus apparition was just an illusion generated by the Koh-i-Noor, which had been stolen by Elijah after betraying the Instruments.

Realizing the deception, Juno fired an energy beam in anger, hitting the lab's ceiling and causing debris to fall on Gramática and crush him to death. She then demanded that Elijah hand over the Koh-i-Noor, but the boy refused and, while her back was turned, Juno was fatally stabbed through the throat by Charlotte's Hidden Blade. Juno's remains were most likely incinerated when the facility was later destroyed by Berg using a high-caliber explosive, which also killed most of the remaining Instruments, bringing the Isu's legacy to an end.

Personality and traits

"Juno’s an Isu Supremacist; the Ultimate Fascist. She doesn’t believe humans should have any say in their destiny at all. As far as she’s concerned, we're just... livestock. "

―Charlotte de la Cruz, 2017.

Juno, imprisoned in the Grand Temple

Even before she became openly antagonistic towards humans, Juno always held a prejudiced view towards them and always saw the Isu as a divine race which deserves the blind reverence and absolute obedience of humans. With the murder of her father, Saturn, at the hands of his human thralls, she became openly violent and antagonistic towards them and disregarded their lives. She began manipulating them for her own ends, killing humans who opposed her without hesitation and even began violently experimenting on kidnapped humans without the tiniest shred of remorse.

Despite her ruthless nature and strict supremacist views of the Isu, she did have a few redeeming qualities. She cared deeply for her husband Aita and showed unending determination to save him. She was willing to betray her fellow members of the Capitoline Triad and assist an outsider, Odin, in stealing the "Mead" from Suttungr's vault, simply because she needed a sample of it to immortalize her beloved husband. She also showed a certain extend of compassion for humans who were her followers and even granted them a blissful afterlife in the Grey, an unknown afterworld-like realm, if they devoted their lives to her cause.

Equipment and abilities

During her time alive, Juno possessed all the conventional abilities of an Isu being, including their advanced intelligence, their superior physical abilities as well as their advanced longevity and precognitive powers. Due to holding the title of the Mother of Wisdom, it can be assumed that she was a very formidable Isu scientist and had contributed to a number of the Isu's most advanced creations. She even contributed to trying to save the Isu from the Great Catastrophe and also helped develop the "Mead", a vaguely explained Isu innovation which was responsible for creating reincarnations of Isu within the human race. Despite most of the Isu being unaware of how Consus' Shroud worked, she was able to learn how the Shroud functioned as well as the consciousness transferal method used by Consus.

Juno's energetic powers

During her existence as an "entity of the Gray", Juno was able to possess all forms of technology and could manipulate computer viruses, the internet to an extent, Animus technology as well as digital information. It was also believed by John Standish that, in this state, she could possess a human, or at least use them as an avatar extension of her consciousness. However, given Juno's own statement of being too "weak" to possess the Abstergo employee known as "Noob", it can be inferred that such a feat took an incredible toll on her being.

Upon being cloned back into the physical world, Álvaro Gramática had unknowingly imbued some of the powers of the Shroud of Eden within Juno's DNA, giving her the power to project and manipulate energy. She could even use the energy to perform feats of telekinesis. However, despite her "godly" status and the power of the Shroud in her DNA, she was vulnerable to a Piece of Eden's illusion casting abilities, although she had no problem dispelling them with sheer rage alone. Notably, Juno did not appear to inherit the Shroud's healing powers, being easily killed with a single stab to the throat from Charlotte de la Cruz's Hidden Blade.

Behind the scenes

Juno is a character first introduced in the 2010 video game Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, and is voiced by the Canadian actor Nadia Verrucci. Juno was not actually named during Brotherhood, nor did her name appear during the end credits. Rather, Juno's name was revealed by Verrucci on her website. ^{[citation needed]}

Lucy's password on the Hephaestus Email Network was "Juno57", as revealed in an e-mail that Desmond received from Erudito in Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood.

In the Assassin's Creed: Revelations novel, it was stated that Ezio had encountered Juno, though exactly when was unspecified.

When contacting Desmond and Shaun through e-mail in the Grand Temple, Juno initially found it difficult to send legible messages. Her name as the sender was a string of binary code, "01001010010101010100111001001111", which could be translated to display "JUNO".

In her emails to Desmond, Juno revealed that there had been several Memory Seals stored within the Temple, likely for Desmond to view, and that she had thrown them all into the abyss below the complex in the intervening years.

When Juno makes her appearances to Desmond beneath Santa Maria in Aracoeli in Brotherhood, a sinister alteration of Minerva's music from Assassin's Creed II can be heard.

In Assassin's Creed: Odyssey, the statue most often associated with Hera, Juno's Greek counterpart, seems to be based on the statue of Hera in a proposed reconstruction of Parthenon's eastern pediment.

Gallery

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  A statue of Juno in the Buckingham Palace vault
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  A vision of Juno during the Tunguska explosion
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  The entrance to the Colosseum Vault, featuring statues of Juno
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  Juno appearing on a monitor in the Protvino lab
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  Juno talking to the Helix initiate during the World War I simulation
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  Juno's death
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  Statue of Hera within the Sanctuary of Olympia in Elis
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  Hera (left of center) amongst the Greek pantheon
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  Juno as Hyrrokin

Appearances

• Assassin's Creed II (first mentioned)
• Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (first appearance)
• Assassin's Creed: The Fall (vision only)
• Assassin's Creed: Revelations
• Assassin's Creed III
• Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
• Assassin's Creed: Rogue (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Syndicate
• Assassin's Creed: Uprising
• Assassin's Creed: The Official Collection
• Assassin's Creed: Odyssey (mentioned only)
  • The Fate of Atlantis: Judgment of Atlantis (simulation only)
• Assassin's Creed: Valhalla (as Hyrrokin)
  • Dawn of Ragnarök
• The World of Assassin's Creed Valhalla: Journey to the North – Logs and Files of a Hidden One (mentioned only, as "Hyrrokin")