Another piece of art I’d like to share while I’m home sick is one that I did last week. It is not a Staff-Master character, but it does share some behind the scenes connections, specificity an alternate universe version of the character Big Ed and his bar.
As some of you know, many years ago I was a small time professional wrestler. Back when I was training, I used Vampire: the Masquerade LARP as a testing ground and confidence builder in creating my wrestling persona. In both cases it was an adaptation of the Dungeons & Dragons character that I created for my 18th birthday. What I created was my signature character in both those mediums—the Freak.
Within the confines of Vampire: the Masquerade, Freak was a Malkavian (one of the insane vampires). He had served for the Union army during the American Civil war. Childhood abuse and an antisocial streak had him sympathizing with the plight of the enslaved and working to save as many of them as he could.
After the war, his story mirrors the real life story of professional wrestling. It started with soldiers wrestling in camps and evolved into traveling carnival style shows featuring supposedly legit competition.
The Freak played a bloodthirsty bad guy, and this fiction impressed a Sabbat Malkavian that kidnapped and embraced the wrestler. This insane Sire didn’t count on Freak’s self-destructive streak however, and a fight left behind a dead Sire and a burning building. Freak only survived because the widow woman living in the house pulled him out of the fire.
Lost in a frenzy, Freak nearly killed the woman for her good deed. Horrified, the Freak saved her life by Embracing her, making her a vampire too.
For most of the following century Freak and his childe wandered the world, using professional wrestling as a cover for an obsessive quest to battle the Sabbat wherever and whenever they could find them.
Pro wrestling provides the perfect metaphor for the Freak’s Malkavian derangement. He has problems telling reality apart from fiction. Fact and fantasy blend together in his mind, painting him as the protagonist in a strange and confusing world.
Eventually, the Freak’s childe tired of the ongoing violence and she left her Sire, deeply scarring them both with abandonment issues.
Over the course of two or three LARPS and several online games, story events built out the characters backstory. As part of the Primogen, he helped build up a strong Domain in Des Moines, only to dramatically turn his back on it all and join the Anarchs
He went out to California to learn from more established Anarchs. This is the strongest part of his history, having been played out in video chat games with the amazing B. Dave Walter’s.
Anywho, the Freak continues to be my signature character. I’m very tempted to do a webcomic detailing his ongoing adventures, but that would take time away from Staff-Master. I enjoy drawing him though, in part because he is probably the most demented Mary Sue ever made. Lol
