Anders Hellman

Anders Hellman is Arasaka’s leading bioengineer, an expert in neural networks with a string of patents to his name, and the director of the Relic project. Starting from Soulkiller’s source code, he built technology able to communicate with personality constructs, a breakthrough that brought him prestige along with a good deal of controversy. The job put him in direct contact with Saburo Arasaka and his children, and he is on first-name terms with Hanako.

When Yorinobu Arasaka takes a Relic prototype to Konpeki Plaza, Hellman writes to warn him that the biochip is not ready. In the turmoil that follows, he decides his future lies elsewhere and arranges to defect to Kang Tao. Rogue Amendiares picks up word of the extraction, and V teams up with Panam Palmer to bring down his Kang Tao AV over the Badlands, then question him at the Sunset Motel. As the mind behind the chip, Hellman is the person V most needs answers from, and Goro Takemura has his own reasons for wanting him.

His database entry sums up his ego: Hellman believes he is irreplaceable and far too valuable for Arasaka ever to let him go. He still has a part to play later in the story, one that varies with V’s choices.