Reuben Rosenthal's page

About Reuben Rosenthal

Reuben Rosenthal

Born 1844

Reuben was five years old when his family came to America, fleeing
the chaos of the European revolutions of 1848. They got away with
little more than the clothes on their backs. With four children,
plus two more born in New York, the family's life was hard and
poverty-stricken. Still, there were worse places for a young Jewish
boy to grow up, and a bright Jewish boy had many good teachers... but
he yearned for a different life.

1861 The Civil War begins

Reuben joined the Union army in 1863. This was not at all to his
parents' liking (or to that of his fiancee, Sarah Astor -- no, not
one of those Astors, but a very distant relative.)

1863 The world grows very weird

Reuben's regiment was on the field at Gettysburg when the dead begun to walk. In the nightmare he survived by calling on the Name of God and hiding; he fled from the field, his nerve shaken by what he had seen. When his regiment was sent to New York to suppress riots, he deserted. His family took him back, and Sarah was very willing to finally get married. There was always work for skilled hands and clever fingers, and Reuben buried nightmares working for a local gunsmith, relaxing in Sarah's arms, studying Torah and the Sefer Yetzirah, the Book of Creation, and most of all, raising three children.

1875 It all comes crashing down

A murderer stalked the streets of New York, killing children, and
women ... and Sarah, Judah, Asher, and Miriam Rosenthal. Reuben
returned home just as the murderer finished his work -- and nearly
managed to kill the thing. For Thing it was; Reuben recognized
the symbols carved into the flesh of his wife and children. They
were the same symbols he had seen at Gettysburg, on the flesh of
night-murdered soldiers.

He went mad. Some whispered that he had done the murders himself
(else why no screams from the long deaths?), but an investigator
named Petros Lorrimor proved Reuben's innocence, and stayed for
a month to investigate the other murders. Finally, he and Reuben
tracked the monster to its lair ... and barely got away with
their lives. The Reckoners protect their own. The killer got
away.

Reuben went in chase, and continued corresponding with Dr. Lorrimor.
He knew how to use a gun, and he knew that silver bullets were
the only thing that had hurt the monster badly enough for them
to escape the first time. The next time they met, he would have
more silver.

And maybe more ... there are more powers in the world than gunpowder,
the gun he bears is more than a gun, and the world answers to the Names
of Creation, as it did once before.

--------------------
Five Points
--------------------

1. Never get between Reuben and his book. Or his gun. He was caught by surprise once; not again.
2. No honest work is below a man. No work is more honest than vengeance for lost love.
3. His accent is slight but noticeable. ("Yiddish. Not Deutsch.")
4. He always keeps his clothes and person tidy. "Sarah, she liked to see a man neat.")
5. He always has time for children, and a sweet or two for them.

--------------------
Two goals
--------------------

1. Vengeance for his dead wife. The thing with red hands that murdered her will pay.
2. Love for Abigail, who kept him sane after Sarah's death, and wants to marry him when he's done.

--------------------
Two secrets
--------------------

1. He deserted from the Union Army after Gettysburg.
2. Unknown to him, Abigail is somehow in league with the Reckoners. I don't know if she was an unwitting agent of information for them, or a willing spy, or even a full betrayer who got them after Sarah so Reuben
would be free for her -- but she's tied in somehow.

--------------------
People ties
--------------------

1. Abigail Lemmer, a cousin of his dead wife, came out West for her health (she has tuberculosis) and is currently making a living as an artist sketching pictures. She kept him sane after his wife's death and
he's in love with her. (See secrets, above.)
2. Thomas Morton, his sergeant in the Army, also wounded at Gettysburg, settled in New York after the war and met Reuben at his gunsmith's shop. Morton thinks Reuben was invalided out. Morton works for a New York bank now, and might be found anywhere in the West.
3. Otto Buchmann, an itinerant German bookseller and purveyor of esoteric theories (and probably a Freemason), whom Reuben just ran across in El Paso, enjoys conversing with learned men of all religions and enthusiasms, and has, or can order, quite a stock of literature. Reuben is currently sharing a room with him in El Paso
4. Boaz Boanerges, one of the many bandits who infest the West, carries a massive grudge against the Wells Fargo guard who somehow managed to trick him into a patch of cactus-infested quicksand near Tucson. Reuben was working his way towards El Paso, and a quick illusion hid some important elements of the ground in front of the bandit's horse.)

--------------------
Key memories
--------------------

July 4, 1863...

Cemetery Hill at Gettysburg. The waning moon sinking in the west, partly masked by clouds and red from all the smoke and dust in the air ... but redder than dust, almost as red as blood. A young Jewish soldier, startled awake by a scream, waking out of nightmare into
nightmare, staring at a friend's corpse... a corpse standing up and laughing despite the bullets in its body and the brains leaking from its skull, hands red with blood as it tears into a wounded soldier's guts, fingers somehow impossibly longer and sharp as knives, pulling out what looks like a long and bloody rope, looking across the fire at Reuben and smiling.

"Your turn will come, boy. I'll find you. I'll eat your heart!"

July 4, 1871...

A small table, crowded with the remains of a meal. The quiet clatter of plates and glasses, and the contented murmers of a drowsing baby in the crib by the window.

"Sarah, heart." He rises, walks across to the bedroom door and back. "I repaid the loan today. And Mr. Morton found two more backers. We can open the shop!"

The woman smiles, tired, but there is laughter in her eyes. "So the Army did you some good after all -- they taught you to load guns, and now you make guns. Will you have enough customers?"

"Yes." Determination casts out fear. "Enough men want well-made gear suited to themselves. And ... there are the Names." His gaze goes to the shelf beside the window, with a dozen books in Yiddish, and one among them covered in blue cloth, embroided with Sarah's skillful knots and designs, and three names. "The good Lord, He is a Creator too, and He will not mind me using His secrets to help men guard their loved ones."

"Good," she says. Her hand drifts from the table to rest on her belly. "All their loved ones...." Her eyes are deeper than laughter now, deep with joy. "Make plenty of money. Next year, we will need another crib."

July 4, 1875...

White sheets. White walls. The shadows of bars in the window fallilng across the floor and then the bed. A woman, clad somewhat daringly, an artist's satchel by her side, sitting by the bed, looking down. "I believe you, Reuben. Sarah ... Sarah was dead before you ever opened the door. There was nothing you could have done."

"I could have been home--"

"You were working. Just like every weekday. Sarah knew that, and never let it worry her. This, this --"

"Redhands. Red hands. O God, he was skinning--"

"She was dead, Reuben. She never felt it." Her own white-gloved hand reaches onto the bed, clasps his where it protrudes from the cast. Tears trickle down her cheeks.

"No one heard anything. That's-- that's why they thought I-- I did it. No one heard anything till I opened the door... She was..."

"She was dead. Beyond pain. Safe in the arms of God."

God. Almost he speaks the never-spoken Name, crying out in his agony like Job. But unlike Job, he knows the face of his enemy. The man with red hands. With claws like steel, burning with hate.

"I have to find him. Have to. For Sarah."

"For Sarah." Abigail releases his hand, but her fingers drift up the cast, resting lightly on his shoulder before caressing his cheek. "For Sarah, then. For my cousin. But stay alive, Reuben. Stay alive ... and come back to me."

Her lips are tight, tense. "There's ... someone who's been investigating these deaths. Who pointed out to the police why you couldn't have been the murderer." She rises, skirts sweeping across the floor as she moves to the door, knocks at the barred window, speaks in a low voice to the guard outside. There is a clicking of locks, and then the door swings open and a tall, elegantly dressed man with a European cut to his clothes steps into the room. "Reuben, may I introduce you to Professor Peter Lorrimor?"

And so it begins

--------------------
Fear
--------------------

Red hands. Anyone with red hands. Bloody red hands. Red silk gloves. The young man with bloodstained hands at Gettysburg, and wearing gloves in New York made of Sarah's skin turned inside out... anything that looks like that breaks his heart apart.

----------------------
Meteor Crater, Arizona
----------------------

Somewhere in the darkness, Pedro screamed.

If I could see him, I could shoot him. It would put an end to the man's pain, at least. A Mexican cattle-hand, a Chinese cook, a Southern gentleman -- they all sounded the same, at the last.

A Jewish gunsmith would, too, if they caught me.

More screams, farther apart, as the waning moon sunk in the West. There were long shadows, and smoke wreathed the stars, from buildings set afire earlier in the night. The Professor thought he had the Mistwalker cornered. Wrapped in wards. Caught by flames. But it had all been a lure. Worse. A deception. Its lieutenants had stalked the shadows, coming behind them while the Mistwalker let them think the fire was hurting it. Twenty men had died in that first rush, taken from behind till panic drove the others.

"We could hide down there..." Samuel whispered, pointing across the street. The mineshaft head was crooked, the beams twisted by a blast of gunpowder. "Get underground. Get out of the light. Mask our scent with all the smells there." The Yankee looked up and down the street, trying to peer through the smoke.

Reuben pressed his belly against the alley, ignoring the wet stenches trickling down the wall, silent, shuddering. We are dead if they see us. But Barringer's crazy mineshaft might be safety -- the man had gone down hundreds of feet in search of starmetal before admitting failure. He thought a giant bullet from Mars had made this pit. Why not. It's no stranger than the dead rising. Which had happened too many times already tonight. The Mistwalker's lieutenants had more lives than a cat, and some of the Reckoners could call the dead, sending men's corpses to make corpses of their friends.

Like Gettysburg. Worse than Gettysburg.

"Get up!" Samuel hissed urgently. "There's no one out there. Get up and run for your life, man!" He crouched by the corner, ready to run.

"Not... the mine," Reuben managed to say. "Not underground. But... there's a vault there. For the starmetal Barringer thought he would find. A vault will hold them off till dawn."

"All right -- now now now!" He reached down, yanked Reuben to his feet. The two men dashed through the smoke, into the mining compound that had been the original reason for the town's existence.

"Left -- left!" Reuben gasped. They veered into a small building, and Samuel led the way around the abandoned desk and through the door.

Thank the Lord. The vault was open, door invitingly ajar. I thought Pedro had left it open after we searched through--

Samuel screamed, staggering back out of the vault, stomach torn open, guts spilling into his footsteps.

Laughter echoed from the vault. "I know you. I see you. Come and die, friend."

The thing that walked through the door had been a friend, once. Before Gettysburg. Before its dead hands had torn open the living guts of men, to feast on the lights within. Now they were huge, tipped with ivory claws. Blood dripped from them, more blood than Samuel had shed. As much blood as it had shed in the years of its second life. Sarah's blood--

His gun went off, a Minie ball punching through the thing's right lung. Bloody froth sprayed across the vault door --

It laughed, louder than the echoes. "Did you think to kill me without silver, friend? I died from lead already; it cannot harm me now." Its head tilted, disturbingly far sideways. "I will eat your heart, friend." A slow step forward, hands reaching out.

Terror froze his legs, but not his hands. He dropped the rifle, clawed the pistol from its holster, firing as fast as he could pull the trigger. "You have my heart already! You killed Sarah! Now die! Die! Die!" Gold and glass-black stone, rowan wood and blessed glass and moon-blanched silver, the bullets flew, a revolver loaded and prepared back when victory had seemed a chance.

Five shots, and the hammer fell on an empty chamber.

The thing smiled, as blood trickled down its body. Black and clotted, rotting, stench worse than the tang of gunpowder. "Not ... enough ... friend. Not ... enough ... silver." A step forward. "Come to me, and I will will not kill you. I will make you one of us." Another step. "Come! We will feast on our friends' flesh." A third step. "COME! We will eradicate hope from the very Earth!"

Reuben ran. Behind him, footsteps slapped the ground. Closer... closer... farther... farther... On wings of fear he opened distance.

Somewhere in the darkness, Samuel screamed.

--------------------
Statistics
--------------------

Male wizard 1 (spellslinger)
NG Medium humanoid (human)
Init +3; Senses Perception +1

--------------------
Defense
--------------------

AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10 (+3 Dex)

hp 7 (1d6+1)

Fort +1, Ref +3, Will +4

--------------------
Offense
--------------------

Speed 30 ft.

Melee bayonet -1 (1d6-1)

Ranged musket +3 (d10) (battered old Union Army Springfield)

Wizard Spells Known (CL 1st; concentration +5)

. . 1st (2) - color spray (DC 15), mage armor

Spellbook:
. . 1st - burning hands, color spray, detect magic*, fabricate bullets, grease, mage armor, mount, read magic, unseen servant
. . 0 - none (spellslingers don't get cantrips)

. . * - opposition school (requires 2 slots)

--------------------
Statistics
--------------------

Str 8, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 18, Wis 12, Cha 8

Base Atk +0; CMB -1; CMD 13

Feats

Exotic Weapons Proficiency (firearms) (B), Gunsmith (B), Point-blank Shot (H), Iron Will (1)

Traits

Against the Reckoners (Campaign): they are monsters, and one of them killed my family. I will have revenge on them! (+1 DC to spells cast against known members of the cult.)

Indomitable Faith (Religion): You were born in a region where your faith was not popular, but you still have never abandoned it. Your constant struggle to maintain your own faith has bolstered your drive. You gain a +1 trait bonus on Will saves.

Skills Appraise +8, Craft (alchemy) +8, Knowledge (arcana) +8, Knowledge (geography) +8, Knowledge (history) +8, Knowledge (local) +8, Knowledge (religion) +8, Perception +2, Profession (gunsmith) +5, Spellcraft +8

Languages English, Hebrew, Yiddish, Spanish

Combat Gear:

--------------------
Special Abilities
--------------------
Mage Bullets (Su): A spellslinger is adept at transferring spell energy into his arcane gun attacks. As a swift action, he can sacrifice a spell and transform that energy into a weapon bonus equal to the level of the spell sacrificed on a single barrel of his firearm. With that weapon bonus the spellslinger can apply any of the following to his arcane bond: enhancement bonuses (up to +5) and dancing, defending, distance, flaming, flaming burst, frost, ghost touch, icy burst, merciful, seeking, shock, shocking burst, spell storing, thundering, vicious, and wounding. An arcane gun gains no benefit from having two of the same weapon special abilities on the same barrel. The effect of the mage bullets ability lasts for a number of minutes equal to the level of the spell sacrificed, or until this ability is used again to assign the barrel different enhancements. This ability replaces cantrips, but the spellslinger gains the detect magic and read magic cantrips and places them in his spellbook. He can cast either of these as 1st-level spells.

School of the Gun: Four opposition schools (abjuration, divination, enchantment, necromancy)