Robert was a foundling, half starved on an island his parents ship had crashed on. The dwarven battleship that made to rescue found only him.
From then on he was raised on the goodship Thundersail by a crew of dwarven sailors. Needless to say, Robert became quite the salty lad.
His keen mind led him to be apprenticed to the master cannoneer, who was quite the heavy drinker. By the time he was ten he was doing the majority of the mixing and grinding, refining formulas and conducting his own experiments while Master Brassbeard lounged in a drunken stupor. Most of his childhood was spent without eyebrows. To this day burn scars speckle his hands and face. His knack for crafting explosives (and using them in small doses as part of ship board pranks) gave him his nickname aboard the ship. When the captain found out the powder was being manufactured and tested by a ten year old boy he said it was a miracle the ship never blew up.
Shortly after he discovered the ship was becoming uncomfortable for him as he was beginning to outgrow the low dwarven ceilings. The next time he put into port, he said his goodbyes to the crew that had been his family and linked up with a merchant of the same dwarven clan named Troublebrewer, a potion-mixer who's name was remarkably apt. Brewer quickly took a liking to the boy both as a traveling companion and as a test subject. He spent the next few years learning the merchant's trade and slowly recovering from various alchemically-induced ailments. He had blue hair for nearly two years. For six months his fingers fused together like mittens. By the time he became an adult Robert was a bit unhinged.
His prototypes and contraptions had them driven out of one town after another. Eventually they found themselves on the border of very uncivil lands. Brewer decided to retire. Boomer was alone in an inhospitable place, and he couldn't have been happier.
This was the place to test his theories and ideas, and just maybe make a little profit on the way.
