Trigger Guard
Gnaws-the-Dark
Red Talons
New Moon of the Scattered Stone Teeth
Fostern Guardian of the Sept of the Lost Fort
Description
Lupus: ~A lean red wolf with pepper highlights stalks into view. Trigger Guard seems circumspect, intelligent brown eyes scanning the horizon before approaching any closer. He moves with comfortable grace but veteran watchfulness, indicating a wolf not quite on the brink of middle age. Large “radar” ears twitch and swivel as he inspects the area. Once satisfied, his tongue lolls and he pads closer, tail erect with attentiveness.~
OOC: Appearance 2; Pure Breed 2; Glory 3, Honor 1, Wisdom 3
Hispo: ~As big as a pony, this wolf is unnatural, even prehistoric in dimensions. Powerful claws click out a dangerous rhythm as he slinks through the shadows, terrifying maw drooling with predatory intent. Trigger Guard’s fur darkens further, save for his mane which remains brick-red in hue.~
OOC: Appearance 0; Pure Breed 2; Glory 3, Honor 1, Wisdom 3
Crinos: ~When adopting this terrifying form, Trigger Guard rises to his hind legs and towers over eight feet. He’s bulkier, and heaving with pent-up energy and ferocity. His fur has now darkened to brown, save that shock of red down his back. Brown eyes blackened and now glint with malicious savagery.~
OOC: Appearance 0; Pure Breed 2; Full Delirium; Glory 3, Honor 1, Wisdom 3
Glabro: ~In truth, Trigger Guard did not even know he could take this form until he was experimenting while watching Lawson. His arms thicken with muscle while his forehead protrudes like a Neanderthal. His fur shrinks back into looser tufts of light-brown hair that cover most of his body, including a thick bush over you-know-what. Yes, he’s nekkid. He’s a nekkid caveman.~
OOC: Appearance 1; Pure Breed 2; Glory 3, Honor 1, Wisdom 3
Homid: ~The first thing people are bound to notice is that Trigger Guard doesn’t have any clothes on. Not even underpants. Cue old lady fainting. The man’s shaggy brown hair loosely hangs over his face, usually bearded. Supple muscles, if laced with some scars, ripple over his arms and torso. His round face is filled with almost gremlin-like mischief as he prances sideways, as if perpetually sneaking about. He’s very ungainly. But in the dark, one can see a glint of intelligent light shining in his brown eyes. This 30-something streaker has got something to say or do. Is it important? Who knows. Not like people are sticking around to ask. Someone give that man an old, dirty trenchcoat!~
OOC: Appearance 2; Pure Breed 2; Glory 3, Honor 1, Wisdom 3
"Being born a wolf doesn’t excuse you for being born stupid. You should just shut up."
History
Winter Cub
Gnaws-the-Darkness grew up in the cold, wet woodlands of Alaska. He was a cub in a litter of wolves who nearly all perished from starvation their very first winter. It was already a stark season, and then one day their mother never returned. While the other cubs waited for a mother that would never return, curiosity drove Gnaws from their den. He taught himself how to survive the wilderness.
But there were many things he never learned, things perhaps she could not teach him anyway. The young wolf discovered a pouch of fresh caribou on the ground. It seemed odd that it would be just lying there, but he was starved. So he ate. Unfortunately, it was poisoned. Humans, which he had never yet even observed, set that trap. He grew sicker and sicker over the next few days, unaware that he was slowly dying.
Finally, one morning he woke up and his legs refused to move. He couldn’t stand, he couldn’t walk. He knew then he would die. Fear overwhelmed the wolf and his terrified, painful whimpers and howls echoed in a harsh, unforgiving wilderness. He searched deep inside his body, looking for something more to keep him going, to stave off the darkness of death. He closed his eyes and felt his body consume itself to stay alive, which was of course a contradictory, negating effort. And yet, it was not hopeless. The anguish left behind rose bile into the wolf’s mouth. He was fighting death. Anger replaced fear. Death pissed him off!
Whimpers became growls, howls became snarls, until at last he simply snapped to his feet and rejected the poison. He shook it off, shook the snowfall from his fur, and lumbered off through the woods. Of course, he did not realize that in that effort he grown larger, more powerful. A new Hispo wolf was stalking the wilderness and heading into the Bloody Woods outside Lawson, Alaska.
Cry No More
Thus did Gnaws-the-Dark wander the bawn of the Grimbone Caern, a young cub unaware of his true nature. The Sept of the Weeping Daughter -- still just a single pack -- of that small caern came across him only a week after he arrived. They calmly approached the new werewolf and explained to him what he was, proving that this was no joke – how else could he explain why he understood what they meant, what was happening? Such abstract reasoning did not come easily to normal wolves.
And thus he trained and learned the ways of the Garou and the Red Talon Tribe. He learned that the poisoned meat he ate was set by humans, and that most homids were bad. Most. The Anti-Extinction Talons ran the pack, with only one notable exception (Eater-of-Bears). Another cub recently joined the Garou from Eater-of-Bears extensive line of Kin, an Ahroun named Crushes-the-Walls. Gnaws-the-Dark learned he was Ragabash, in some ways the mirror opposite of the Full Moons.
After one change of the moon, they are deigned ready to prove their worth. The Rite of Passage for both cubs, the Sept/pack leader (Heart-of-Winter) explained, would be savage but appropriate. They were to travel together and slay all human hunters within a 100-mile radius (“from the mountains to the highway”) and were not to return until the gruesome deeds were done. The Sept’s patience with Lawson’s human inhabitants was quickly slipping, because the homids had turned to more and more wolf-hunting and trapping. But, the elder Garou warned the two cubs, this would be more dangerous than it sounded. The Wyrm was growing in power in the area, and they had to take care not to be spotted. The Wyrm’s minions were many and powerful. Taking those warnings to heart, the cautious Gnaws and brutish Crushes targeted and murdered a dozen hunters, including a couple father-son pairs. And yes, they ate their victims. All the while, they managed to avoid notice by the Wyrmlings whose numbers in the area were growing.
Anti-Establishment
Two months later, the two returned in triumph and were awarded their rank into the Sept and Tribe. They were immediately added as Guardians of the Grimbone Caern, charged with helping maintain the “human traps” that Greasy-Fur often set, and watching for the approach of the Wyrm. Crushes-the-Wall was assigned the mountain perch, and Gnaws was given a perch overlooking Lawson itself. The Wyrm would come from either direction. So began Gnaws’ career as a watch wolf.
Over the next several years, he proved himself worthy and dependable. He helped repel many intruders, especially a number of state officials searching for all those missing people from Lawson. That was how he learned of firearms, and the sting of gunfire. Although he hoped the sting of his teeth hurt them more. (Oh, it did!) Because of his cautious nature and affinity for stalking gunmen, his packmates nicknamed him Trigger Guard. It took him awhile before he figured out what they were referencing.
Over the course of this period, he seemed to work best alone. Consequently, the honeymoon of obedience to his elders faded fast and he began to ignore Heart-of-Winter and Eater-of-Bears. Heart took it in stride, as he did most things. But Eater demanded and expected respect, frequently bullying and pushing around the younger Ragabash. It probably did not help Gnaws’ case at all that he found a pretty little she-wolf in Eater’s Kinfolk pack to mate with. It was Eater’s granddaughter, and she didn’t want her Kin mixing with a “punk kid” like Trigger Guard.
Absolution
Thus, it was a little suspicious when Trigger just “happened” to begin suspecting Eater was Wyrm-tainted. At least, Trigger feared it would be perceived as suspicious. Eater’s usual customs, like pretending to be a hitchhiker, and then murdering and eating the driver, was not Wyrm-tainted. From his liaison with the Kin wolf in Eater’s pack, however, he observed a strange infection spreading around the other lupuses. It was unlike any sickness he ever heard, and his mate told him it happened after they ate from a dead sick moose carcass outside the factory near Lawson. The question then became: why was Eater hiding this?!
Trigger, like most Talons, was not a complicated fellow given to assuming schemes or conspiracies. Eater wasn’t either; she was hiding it simply out of shame. Gnaws ratted the beta out to Heart-of-Winter. Eater-of-Bears was rounded by the whole pack, and her Kin were too sick to help her bully her way out of this pickle. Old Storm-Chaser, Master of the Rite and Theurge, chastised Eater. She was almost too tainted to cure now; a mere Rite of Cleansing was not going to be sufficient. Many of her Kin would have to be mercy-killed, and she herself…well. Old Storm-Chaser went into communion with the Weeping Daughter.
When he emerged, Eater learned she had three choices: excommunication (unthinkable), death and joining the Daughter and her Walker ghosts as an eternal guardian of the caern, or redemption. She chose redemption, of course. With that, Trigger and the pack witnessed a marvel. Two beautiful motes of pale light – Lunes – appeared and tugged Eater-of-Bears into the ground. Only a black scar remained where she stood. Storm-Chaser informed the pack that she had been accepted into Erebus, there to be purified and reborn in spiritual health. Trigger learned what Erebus was all about and vowed never to fuck up that bad.
Werewolf Hell
And this successful outing of Wyrm-taint helped propel Trigger’s renown up enough to challenge for the Rank of Fostern. So, he challenged Heart-of-Winter. Though Heart always had doubts about Eater, she was still his friend for much longer than Trigger. So, Heart acknowledges the challenge by demanding that Trigger fight him to “the death”. Even Old Storm-Chaser, whose wisdom Trigger respected, seemed to support this. Gulp. Trigger wished now someone else had discovered Eater’s corruption. But what was done was done.
So, he threw himself into battle with the pack alpha, a vastly superior opponent. It was a brutal fight, but Trigger gave it all. He figured if today was his day to die, he would at least give Heart a scar he’d never forget. Indeed, Trigger fought well, nearly ripping out Heart’s eye. But Heart pinned the young New Moon down and…Storm-Chaser called it. Wait, what? It was only to submission?! But he still lost! That was irrelevant, said Heart. Trigger only had to give it his best shot.
Over the next several seasons, the threat of the Wyrm seemed to peter off. The Sept couldn’t understand it. Wyrmlings didn’t just go away. There was some concern that they were simply directed elsewhere. That didn’t matter to the Sept though, their task was to protect the Grimbone Caern. Trigger meanwhile began to feel put off. Ever since Eater’s sentencing to “Werewolf Hell”, the pack’s social dynamics were rather icy towards him. He felt out of place there now. A vision from the Weeping Daughter showed him soaring over planes of ice on feathered wings, as if riding Griffin’s back. It was time, the spirits were saying, to fly. He needed to travel alone and find a new place to fulfill his life as New Moon. Despite the hardening feelings, the pack was reluctant to let him go. He bid his packmates farewell with all solemnity, and began his long trek south, southeast, as the vision suggested. He crossed North America slowly, taking years to travel ever further southeast. Someday, he would reach the big water, the Atlantic. Until then, he was taking it all in stride.
Fetishes
Baneskin
Level: 3
Gnosis: 7
Origin: Old Storm-Chaser made this fetish for Trigger Guard as a going-away present. It was crafted from a Scrag-possessed feral husky dog that Trigger killed near Lawson.
Description: This is a razor-sharp fang from a Scrag fomor wrapped up in lambskin and hung from a cord of leather, then tied around the neck.
Effects: 1) Deceive Banes into thinking wearer is a “kindred spirit”
Activation: 1) It must be worn and the words for “laugh at Banes” huffed out in Wolfstongue (making it impossible to use in Homid and almost impossible in Glabro).
Battle Scars
Class: Superficial
Description: Claw-like scars
Location: Along his left upper arm
Origin: Heart-of-Winter inflicted during Trigger’s last Rank challenge
Effects: none
Significant Other
Trigger Guard was roaming south-ish in 2014, as directed, and came upon Mavenshayne (in the rural outskirts of Boston). He did not know if she was Garou or not but detected her scent, that she was in heat. So, he didn’t wait to find out if she were Trueborn, he just pounced and had his way with her. The damage was done, and Trigger decided they had such a good time, that what the hell? So, he established a wanton, secret relationship with the Fianna, defying the Litany, as Ragabash sometimes do. Especially horny ones.
Mavenshayne
Weakness
Where's the Trust?
Trigger Guard is naturally distrustful and circumspect, no matter how cool he might play it. His apparent lack of respect for even rightful authority derives from this maladjusted nature. Ultimately, he doesn't always trust his own judgment, and this has of course extended to others.
Likelihood of Corruption
Low.
While Trigger is ambivalent about humanity, he isn't their friend either. On the other hand, he stays as true to his roots as he can.
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