Unknown

Unknown
Age	Unknown
Gender	Male
Selections	Declined
Reasons Cited	Still figuring things out
Trace Status	Non-recoverable
Function	Breach()

"You've reached the hopefully-not-permanent address of Mr Nobody." --Unknown

Unknown, also referred to as Subject Not Found and Mr Nobody, is the "narrator" and one of two main protagonists in Transistor. He is voiced by Logan Cunningham. The Breach() Function was derived from his Trace data.

Appearance

Although Unknown spends the game inside of the Transistor, his physical body is seen at the start of the game, in a flashback, and in the end credits. His face is always mostly obscured, but other parts of his body are still visible. In his physical body, he is taller than Red, with short black hair and what appears to be darker skin. He wears a jacket with a yellow equilateral triangle on the back and sleeves that go down to his elbows, which Red wears for a majority of the game. He wears gauze hand wraps around his arms, wrists, palms, and between his fingers.

History

Unknown first appears on the title screen, where his voice, emanating from the Transistor, begins the game. He is present throughout the game's events, trapped inside the sword which Red carries and uses to fight the Process, and his one-side conversation with her gradually explains the setting and reveals his history.

{{spoiler]} Unknown, a resident of Cloudbank, was unusual in his civic reticence, delaying the near-universal practice of Selecting dedicated areas of study and contribution long into adulthood. He may have begun serving as Red's bodyguard after violence broke out at one of her performances. The two eventually entered into a relationship and greatly enjoyed one anothers' company, spending time together at her apartment and at various locations around the city.

Both he and Red were acquainted with Sybil Reisz, who organized some of Red's concerts. He considered Sybil bad news from the first, but was unaware that she blamed him for Red's coolness toward her and believed he was turning Red against her. To get rid of him, Sybil told the other members of the Camerata, a secret society which had been secretly killing "unique" citizens to harvest their Traces with the Transistor, that they could find Red alone at the Empty Set one night after rehearsals, knowing that Unknown would be there too and hoping he would be killed trying to protect her.

When the Camerata came for Red, Unknown jumped between her and the Transistor as Grant Kendrell flung it toward her. The blade sank into his stomach. However, both he and Red were inexplicably teleported away from the site of the attack, and Unknown was left sprawled in an unmarked alley east of Goldwalk Bay, with his body dead and the remnants of his Trace trapped inside the Transistor.

Panicked at first, calling out for Red as he attempted to understand what had happened to him, he was soon found by Red and realized that the Transistor had taken her voice as well as his Trace. Having already known him, she was able to hear his voice despite his imprisonment, and once she had pulled the blade from his empty body, both his Trace-derived Function and her own became available to her as the weapon's User. Red would later learn from his Function Files that although Unknown's Trace data had somehow been corrupted during integration and remained disjointed and irrecoverable, the Transistor had been able to derive a suitable Function from it anyway.

While inside the Transistor, Unknown was able to briefly communicate with others' Traces during their integration but found himself alone otherwise, only able to see Red "where the sky should be." He was also able to read the Function Files of the Transistor's other stored Traces when Red reviewed them at Access Points, referring to his own as "the hopefully-not-permanent address of Mr Nobody" and asking if the Camerata had any dirt on him. He kept up a mostly one-sided conversation with Red during their subsequent journey through Cloudbank, reminding her of good times, warning her of impending threats, and speculating on their current situation. When they biked onto Goldwalk's Expressway, he advised Red to take the second right out of town, but realized when she turned left instead that she intended to search for answers at the Empty Set. Resigned to her choice, he asked her not to let him go.

Sybil, mostly Processed and waiting for them at the Empty Set, could hear Unknown's voice from within the Transistor and was shocked that her plan to kill him had not completely succeeded. He, in turn was shocked when Sybil attacked Red, but pitied her crawling remains somewhat after her defeat and told Red to kill her as a mercy. As her Trace was absorbed, Unknown questioned her and learned where to find Grant and Asher Kendrell.

In Highrise, a district Unknown had disliked before finding out Red lived there, he was adversely affected by proximity to the Spine, slurring his words and having trouble interpreting his surroundings. Red, distressed by his symptoms, begged him to hold on via OVC text and promised to find what was doing this and "break its heart." Unknown eventually blacked out during their confrontation with the monster high on Bracket Towers, but recovered once the Spine had been killed.

Upon finding Asher and Grant dead in their office, Unknown, still bearing a grudge against Grant for killing him, condemned them both as cowards. His brief conversation with Asher's Trace provided a lead to Royce Bracket's location, and as he and Red traveled back to Goldwalk, he acknowledged that the Camerata had not intended the disaster to be this widespread.

Back in Goldwalk, he was briefly affected by the presence of a Spine again, but he and Red left it behind by taking the Expressway. He was grieved by the devastation the Process had wrought on their beloved hometown, skeptical of Royce's Proxy, bemused to see that the location of his former body had been fully Processed, leaving no trace behind, and unsettled when some of the Gateways on Fairview led to areas with inverted gravity, remarking, "Let's never do that again."

Upon arrival at the Cradle, Unknown assured Red that he loved her, that returning the Transistor to its socket and resuming its control over the Process would not be goodbye, and that he would see her again. As the connection took hold, he promised that he had her and would not let her go.

Although Unknown was not able to communicate with Red during her subsequent battle with Royce, he celebrated her survival once she escaped the Transistor's hold and speculated hopefully about using its power to restore the city. When Red sang his empty body back into existence, he ruefully remarked that that wasn't him anymore, acknowledging that he had accepted his imprisonment as final. When Red embraced the Transistor, put it down, and seated herself next to the body, his concern for her turned to fear. Despite his horrified pleading, she caused the Transistor to rise and run her through, ending her own life in the same way the Camerata had ended his.

In the last image of the game's credits, Unknown stands in a wheat field under a brilliant blue sky, with a rustic farmhouse in the distance. Red, despite the Transistor's usual isolating effects, appears before him, reaching for his hand and responding to his tentative "Hi" with her own recovered voice.

Function Files

Background

Error: Subject background data corrupted during integration. Reason: Unknown.

Exceptions

Recovered data indicates Subject had no Selections on record. There is a remote possibility (less than 5%) that this information is inaccurate due to data corruption. In the more likely event that the information is valid, Subject by definition cannot be matched with the census data, as 0% of Cloudbank willingly chose nonselection.

Disappearance

Timestamp on Subject's integration coincides with timestamp of previous authenticated User relinquishing access and control. Although Subject's trace data was corrupted during integration, nonetheless such data has it's uses, and consequently derived a suitable Function. Subject's trace data remains disjointed and cannot be recovered.

Development

Unknown was originally intended to be the game's main protagonist, a boxer occasionally referred to as "Auden" on concept art and "Auden" or "the Boxer" in internal game files, though neither is his given name. The boxer would have fought foes with his fists while being guided through the events of a "more noir-ish" story by the spirit of his dead lover and trying to bring her back. After months of dissatisfaction with Unknown's story, Red and Unknown's roles were switched, drawing on a concept of a much older fantasy game idea about a woman whose traveling-wizard lover is killed by a demonic blade in which his spirit is subsequently trapped, after which she, able to hear his voice, wields the possessed sword in a quest for revenge. Galvanized by the new direction, the developers changed the blade and fantasy setting to a more high-tech one and Unknown became the dead lover guiding Red through Cloudbank, trapped inside the Transistor instead of appearing as a ghost. Although the developers had a lot written for Unknown, almost none of it ended up being used in the game.

Logan Cunningham, who had voiced the narrator Rucks in Supergiant's first and previous game, Bastion, was chosen to voice Unknown in Transistor. Under pressure to live up to Bastion's precedent without repeating it, the developers were concerned about Unknown's role as the game's de facto narrator, hoping that it would not be perceived as too similar to the way narration had been used in Bastion. However, audiences responded well to it. The addition of glowing effects timed to Unknown's speech also allowed players who had wondered where the voice was coming from to quickly associate it with the sword. The triangle in his design originated from Jen Zee's concept art.

Trivia

• In the game's files, Unknown is referred to as Auden, which was also the game's in-development codename. This could be a hint as to his true identity. The files also refer to him as Boxer, an indication of his career corroborated by his hand-wraps and the likelihood that he was the "protection" Red hired after violence erupted at one of her shows. The title of a short track played in Goldwalk, MysteryStingerAuden, seems to refer to the game rather than the character.
• Although the Transistor struck Unknown in the stomach, the generic image in his Function File features apparent damage, in the form of a teal starburst, at the center of its chest. However, the starburst might represent the individual's Trace rather than the injury.
• It is implied that Unknown isn't a registered citizen of Cloudbank, as the Transistor has no records of him whatsoever and he mentions being able to "put off selection a little longer" when Red observes the deserted Selection Office, although 0% of Cloudbank's residents willingly chose nonselection. Greg Kasavin confirmed that "something special" about him made the Transistor's interaction with him different than with other victims.
• As his Trace was corrupted and non-recoverable, he is the only person in the Transistor without a Trace Bank.
• Unknown mentions having disliked Highrise until he found out that Red lived there. Several images in the credits detail his life with Red before the Transistor, including watching sunsets with her, sharing a kiss, and bringing cups of a hot beverage to her while she worked on her music.
• He enjoys Junction Jan's Sea Monster flatbread and encourages Red to order it if they stop at the appropriate OVC Terminal. He also liked Highrise's drinking joints and the many locations provided for citizens to sit and look out over the city.
• While inside the Transistor and unaffected by proximity to the Spine, Unknown was able to see Red "where the sky should be." He could also converse with and gather information from people whose Traces were being taken into the Transistor, but was isolated from them once they had been integrated. He could not feel anything that was happening when the Transistor was used in combat.
• Unknown is familiar with Red's song lyrics, quoting The Spine and We All Become at various points and harmonizing with her in Paper Boats during the game's pre-credits montage. He also hums the tune of We All Become when the game's Voice Volume setting is adjusted and, while under the influence of the Spine, sometimes sings along when Red hums.
• When asked whether Unknown witnessed Red's fight with Royce, Greg Kasavin said that he "doesn't seem to be there" during the fight.

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