The Vigil were the first beings to ever use the Bleed and they had given themselves the job of recording everything that happened in the multiverse. However when under the machinations of TAO, an experimental vessel (using a black hole as power source) from the US goverment was launched and exploded into the bleed, also destroyed an Vigil ship, an enormous ship (5 or 6 times the size of the Carrier) that had been nearby. The effects were disastrous and in moments burning pieces of the ship and its passengers were falling on Florida. The destruction of their ship was especially bad because it had been a return trip to their home planet, bringing with it a millennium of information to be added to their main database. This loss of information drove the Vigil to a full scale war against Earth.

The Vigil have begun their attack in New York after threaten to attack Earth. Apollo killed many of them, and Hawksmoor threatens the others to cease their attacks and leave, until the Authority provides them with the person responsible for their plight, US president Patrick Kent.

The Authority present the President to the aliens, who are furious at being forced into combat after five hundred years of peace. The Authority executed summarily Kent to appease the aliens, who leave Earth unhappy and disgusted of what they had done to Kent.