Tag: war

11/22/2012: Kusk, Child of Horus Weapons Dealer

| November 22, 2012 | 0 Comments

NAME: Kusk  SPECIES: Child of Horus  ORIGIN:  High Realm of Horus

Born to Clutch Startalon, Kusk was forced to leave the High Realm of Horus when the Favored of Anubis invaded, laying siege to his clutchs’ palace. Fleeing through the Hall of the Sun, Kusk eventually found his way to Nexus City. There, he develops energy weapons patterned from the technology of his home world and sells them to the warring gangs in the Undercity, Zero Syndicate criminals, and anyone else willing to pay for his wares. Though kind and affable, Kusk cares little for who ends up with his weaponry, his only concern gathering sufficient funds to return to his home with an army of mercenaries so he can liberate his people.

Model designed in Sculptris and TinkerCAD (3d print pending…)

https://tinkercad.com/things/bpWSMO0Xgdl-kusk-child-of-horus-weapons-dealer-30characterschallenge

DAY 3: La Fantasma de los Perros

| November 9, 2012 | 1 Comment

In 1976 the government of Isabél Perón was overthrown through a military coup, and General Rafael Videla established a military junta. Thus began a particularly dark period in Argentina’s so called “Dirty War”. The new far-right regime instigated a period of overall chaos wherein thousands of suspected “subversives” and left-wing sympathizers were kidnapped, tortured, or assassinated at the hands of the government’s “security forces” and roving right-wing death squads in a self-termed “National Reorganization Process”. Young or newborn children were commonly taken away from their mothers in various state-sponsored concentration camps and redistributed to couples affiliated with the regime in order to mitigate the proliferation of subversive ideas. While many of those captured were in fact members of militant left-wing rebel militias, the “Dirty War” was just as much a witch hunt wherein thousands of victims were indeed innocent.
While many of the mysteries surrounding the so called “Desaparecidos” (The Disappeared or Vanished) were revealed upon the instatement of a democratic government in 1983, little is known, or discussed for that matter, about the true nature of “Nuestra Fantasma de los Perros”. While accounts from eyewitnesses are sparse, the legend was very prevalent in the low income (and often socialist sympathizing) barrios of Buenos Aires, Rosario, Corrientes and Córdoba. Descriptions of a petite woman of native descent, wearing a worn, dark stained gray cloak, and a pristine white, flower-pattern dress underneath were prevalent amongst the many rumors circulating in the populace. She was always accompanied by at least 4 stray dogs—though the number was said to grow with every kidnapping that occurred. It was rumored that her canine followers obeyed her through a dark aura which seemed to emanate from her hands. Several Death squad soldiers would admit years later that during a run in with “La Perra” (lit. “Bitch”) the eyes of her dogs would cloud with what appeared to be smoking tar immediately prior to an attack. The gruesome visages of the would-be abductors and assassins resulted in a great drop in recruitment for the death squads, and had a profound protective effect on those neighborhoods where the woman had shown up. While superstitious citizens offered scraps of meat and bread on their doorsteps at night as a plea to the woman and her companions for protection, the president himself issued several city wide dog-hunts in an effort to curtail the threat of this “Perónist vigilante”. The hunts were called off very quickly due to a mysterious absence of all dogs during the hunts. The loss of a dozen more men to unknown causes also frightened many of the hunters from ever searching in the first place.
Since the woman never spoke or appeared for more than minutes at a time, her origins remain unknown. Some believe she is the restless spirit of a Mapuche shaman seeking revenge on the ancestors of European settlers. Many of the largely Catholic populace viewed her as a wrathful incarnation of the Virgin Mary and a herald of the end-times. The last recorded account of “La Fantasma” came from Cristina Silviatore, the wife of Marcos Silviatore, a prominent lieutenant in the Argentine Anti-Communist Alliance, who reported a cacophony of barking outside of her home. Stepping out to inspect the commotion she caught a glimpse of a cloaked figure staring mournfully into her daughter’s bedroom window. The figure vanished quickly having noticed Cristina, and the dogs subsequently fell silent. After failing to conceive on their own, Marcos had brought the child home one evening in 1976, claiming to have just finalized the adoption papers at a nearby orphanage. As hard as she would try to convince herself that what she had seen was just a trick of the mind, she was never able to look at “daughter” the same way again.

#13_War Cleric

| November 13, 2011 | 2 Comments
"War Cleric"

"War Cleric"

#1 Maurice Estlebraun the Gunpriest

| November 1, 2010 | 0 Comments

The air in the room hung low overhead, musty and thick like the grey grasping plumes of smoke at the Olde Sanctuary once did years earlier in celebration of a successful exorcism.

“A simpler time,” thought Maurice as he lifted the remains of the body slightly with the barrel of his abnormally long pistol.  A dry, black arm crumbled off at the joint with the small movement, settling on the smooth pavement below without sound. Small flecks of previously pink flesh darted upward from the resulting breeze, glad to be free of the charred husk. The smell that wafted into Maurice’s nostrils would make any lesser man cringe and wretch. There was something oddly familiar about this unidentifiable and burned corpse. He thought of flowers.

Maurice Estlebraun stroked his thick brown mustache outward in thought using his thumb and forefinger, surveying the scene. He had an intense face, a brow perpetually furrowed and a mouth like a razor’s cut, thin and sharp. His hair had gone years ago, even before he was consecrated. He wore the garb of the Gunpriests, white and red robes atop hinges and clasps of dull steel and worn leather.

As a Gunpriest of the Unified Church-States of the Judeo-Christian Order proper for the better half of his 39 years, Maurice had seen and smelled horrors such as this many times before. His Brothers in training at the Olde Sanctuary had told him stories… self-impalements, self-flayings, self-incinerations. The Demonkind would use these displays of mutilation as demoralizing examples, shock and awe. It is the first known instance of the Hellhounds’ adaptation of human combat tactics since the war began. It seemed so long ago now, so many lost and missing months as the fight spiraled into wanton destruction. So very many days in service to the Lord and his herd, so many hours since he had breathed in the hint of jasmine in her hair.

With an exhalation, Maurice grimly rose from his kneeled position and holstered his Crucifixion Device, the smooth golden hilt felt familiar as it slid down his palm and into its leather cradle. He closed his eyes and muttered a short prayersong for the deceased. Afterward his eye caught a glint in the death that laid before him.

A jolt of electricity shot from his gut to his throat.

Reluctantly reaching back down, he pulled the shining bauble closer to his face: a silver cross, its perfection starkly contrasting with the morbid surroundings of the cellar. Along the side, an engraving.

It read, “To my Rose: God is with you, even though I am not. I love you. -Maurice.”

The cross clanged as it hit the cold ground, a mark left on its face, never again the same.

***