Cthu Lou
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
| |
| Ia, ia, yeah yeah. Where's my fuckin' money? | |
| Cthu Lou | |
| Player: @SusieBot | |
| Origin: | Magic |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Mastermind |
| Threat Level: | 18 |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Luigi Antonio Calamari |
| Known Aliases: | None |
| Species: | Unknown |
| Age: | 36 |
| Height: | 7' 6" |
| Weight: | 320 lbs |
| Eye Color: | Red |
| Hair Color: | None |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | USA |
| Occupation: | Waste Disposal Manager, Criminal |
| Place of Birth: | Dunwich, New Jersey |
| Base of Operations: | St. Martial, Rogue Isles |
| Marital Status: | Single |
| Known Relatives: | Antonio "Slick Tony" Calamari (Father); Vincenzo "Skinny Vinnie" Calamari (Brother); Maria Theresa Calamari (Sister); Angela Theresa Calamari (Sister) |
| Known Powers | |
| Darkness from Beyond, Flight | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Crime Boss | |
| Equipment | |
| .44 Auto-Mag Pistol, Goons | |
| No additional information available. | |
What do you get when you watch the Sopranos while reading H.P. Lovecraft? You get Luigi Antonio "Cthu Lou" Calamari, the mobster from beyond Space and Time! Inspired by the above mix of influences, and coupled with a desire to try the "Thugs" archetype without playing a common street criminal, Cthu Lou combines a fascination with mob movies with a fascination with Lovecraft to create a character that is wholly strange. Lou is generally portrayed as an average mobster, who just happens to be the unspeakable spawn of the Outer Gods.
Contents |
Powers
Darkness From Beyond
Cthu Lou appears to be the spawn of the Outer Gods, the unspeakable, unknowable dark things from beyond our reality that eat the sanity of common men, and wait dreaming in their crypts to reclaim the Earth when humanity's brief flame is extinguished. His flesh, which is not matter as mere men know it, throbs with the eldritch energies of his dark heritage, energies that long to be spent on the devastation of mortal men and the decadent worship of ancient gods.
What this means is that Lou can manifest pools, clouds, and bolts of dark energy, sapping the will of his enemies and bolstering the might of his friends with his indomitable, mysterious powers. His gaze will turn men mad; in the tainted wind of his great wings, flowers sicken and die; a nauseous miasma clouds the air when he is near. The very earth seems to cling to his foes, sapping their will and dragging them inexorably to the dark places.
Flight
Lou has wings, and can use them to fly. The laws of physics do not apply to his ponderous bulk, allowing his spindly wings to nonetheless carry him great distances.
Abilities
Crime Boss
For more than 20 years, Lou has played a major role in the Calamari crime family. Due to his massive size and intimidating appearance, he entered the family as a street enforcer, collecting debts and running a substantial protection racket in Cape au Diable. He worked his way up the family until he was made, a nearly unheard of achievement for an extra-dimensional being.
His years in the Mafia have provided Lou with an impressive range of knowledge: bookmaking, counterfeiting, drug trafficking, weapons, small unit tactics, leadership, management, banking, intimidation...the list goes on and on. Coupled with his powers, he presents an intimidating figure in the criminal underworld.
Equipment
.44 Auto-Mag Pistols
To supplement his otherworldly powers, Lou always carries two .44 Auto-Mag pistols concealed in shoulder holsters under his jacket. His prodigous size makes wielding the large pistols quite easy. However, he rarely uses them unless cornered -- Lou prefers to attack problems with money or influence rather than force.
His Crew
Lou manages his territory with the aid of several 'aide de camps', recruited by the Calamari crime family and proven to be loyal, tough, and merciless. These men are:
- James "Fat Jimmy" O'Rourke: An Irish Catholic kid from the back alleys of King's Row, Fat Jimmy is cool and professional. Hassled over his weight as a kid, Jimmy is a fitness nut. He refuses to drink, smoke, or over-indulge in women, and spends much of his downtime working out. Jimmy is also a black belt in jujitsu, making him an ideal tool for intimidation.
- Luigi "Lights" Dellamore: Lights is the technical wizard of the crew, adept at security systems, B & E, and boosting cars. A friend of Cthu Lou's since childhood, Lights is unfailingly loyal to Lou.
- Salvatore "Sally" Dellamore: Lights' older and wiser brother, Sally is pegged for big things one day. A lieutenant in the organization, Sally is completely merciless. Under family orders, he once blew up a nursing home.
- Javier "Zippo" Gonzales: Exhanged to the Calamari family in a peace agreement with a Honduran gang, years of good treatment and respect have turned Zippo into one of Lou's most loyal soldiers. Zippo's expertise is in demolitions and explosives -- any unsuccessful intimidation jobs are generally resolved with one of Zip's improvised explosives.
Weaknesses
The strange, other-worldly matter of which Lou is comprised is tougher than human flesh, but can still be damaged by weapons. Lou is also extremely protective of his family, and can be provoked into anger with a threat against his sisters.
Lou is also vulnerable to many forms of sorcery.
Background
The Dunwich Horror
As one travels the New Jersey Turnpike north out of the sultry climes of Maryland and Delaware and hearkening towards the gray miasma of New York, and if one should stray from the Turnpike and venture out along the maddening web of local highways and byways, one will shortly discover a foreboding, but outwardly charming village populated by all manner of burly, dark-haired and dark-eyed malcontents of unquestionably Italian heritage. One is inexplicably reluctant to stop and venture into one of the many sausage shops or delis, and after passing through several lights and turning right onto Route 331 at the mall, one would eventually discover waysigns indicating a path toward the Turnpike. And upon reaching his destination, one might be told that he had passed through Dunwich, New Jersey.
The village of Dunwich, whose history pre-dates the establishment of the country and is peppered with myths and tall tales of the most vile and stupefying nature, is home to many preeminent Italian-American clans, amongst them the notorious Calamari family. In the 1920s, Vincenzo Calamari arrived in the United States from his native Sicily, and plied his trade as a bricklayer, constructing the towering edifices of nearby New York. His son, Antonio Calamari, lacking the firm hand and strong moral fiber of his sire, drifted from honest labor into racketeering, smuggling, and intimidation. By the time of his death, Antonio had established strong ties to the burgeoning New York mobs, while establishing the otherwise sleepy village of Dunwich as a veritable fiefdom.
As the century marched on, the fortunes of the Calamari clan flowed and ebbed, until 1972, when they faced utter extermination, pinched as they were between the encroaching Russian mobs to the south, the unfriendly Maronis to the East, and a faltering ally in a New York mob that had tired of their southernly cousins. The Calamari's end seemed certain, for the current Boss, Antonio "Slick Tony" Calamari, was without a son, and their business was collapsing on all sides. But then suddenly, and for no apparent reason, their fortunes changed, after a strange and maddening evening that is still spoken of in North Jersey to this day.
The incident was reported endlessly in the papers of the time, so I shall merely summarize here what happened: on the evening of February 2, 1972, the Vostok gang elected to eliminate the last vestiges of the Calamaris in an all-out assault on the family compound in Dunwich. As the Russians gathered about the house, they reported lound chants, strange lights, and foul odors coming from the large residence, all of which became sufficiently distressing that police were called by neighbors. After several hours, during which no member of the family could be reached, and the local district attorney rushed to secure a warrant, the chanting and lights reached a fearsome crescendo, before suddenly disappearing, but for a horrible, other-worldly squalling that was later revealed to be the birthcries of Luigi Calamari.
The Mobster Out of Space
It was several years before Luigi Calamari was seen beyond the gates of the Calamari residence. In those years, the Calamari family fortunes took a sudden upswing. The Vostoks were all but eliminated, the few remaining Russians clinging to a life of veritable indenture to the Italians. Simultaneously, the Calamaris had established new ties with New York, bringing the family to new prominence. But twice a year, Slick Tony had to fend off inquisitive neighbors and police intervention when the bizarre lights and sounds that had heralded the birth of his son were repeated.
It was during a meeting of the New Jersey bosses that Tony presented his son to the assembled mobsters. Arriving late, his appearance at the door was greeted with a gasp, for his three-year old son topped five feet in height, was nearly as broad, and resembled a peculiar and indescribable fusion of frog, dragon, octopus, and human. Many of the assembled me crossed themselves, and none could ever chase from his mind the horrifying countenance of Tony's lad. Slick Tony, ever renowned for his boldness, introduced Luigi to the assembled bosses, and the boy attended him throughout the meeting.
While the boy's appearance as accepted as a matter of course in the Calamari family, his decidedly other-worldly visage was not so warmly welcomed by others in the underworld; and, indeed, it became a test of loyalty for soldiers of the Calamari family to attend the boy on his frequent trips out to night clubs, gambling establishments, and brothels.
In time, Slick Tony entrusted a large stretch of burgeoning territory in East Jersey to Luigi, who had by now solidified a reputation for being fearsome and cruel. Luigi -- now commonly called "Cthu Lou" by friends and enemies alike, an appellation granted by the more literate associates of the North Jersey mob -- quickly moved to solidify his powerbase in his new domain, setting up shop in a gentleman's club ("The Bearded Clam") and interspersing merciless raids and intimidation rackets with dark rituals meant to bridge the gulfs between our world and others. Seldom can a corner dealer in East Jersey speak of Lou without a shudder, for the chittering things that Lou unleashed in his territory were not meant for mortal minds to comprehend.
The Shadow Over St. Martial
While the younger Calamari was striving against the various criminal enterprises that determined to undermine his precarious kingdom, the FBI was not inactive. Agents of the federal government, long desiring to apprehend Slick Tony, conspired to apprehend his bizarre offspring and use Lou as leverage against the elder Calamari. The FBI rightly supposed that Tony, now approaching his last days, and wearying of the constant struggle required to maintain a criminal empire, would happily play the sacrificial lamb in order to keep Lou from prison. They possessed further leverage in that Lou's bizarre appearance and apparently extra-normal powers would empower the prosecution to press for super-human confinement at Ziggursky penitentiary, the country's only prison for extra-normal prisoners, and a cauldron of merciless cruelty and disenfranchised enemies of the Calamari family.
And surely they did set upon Lou at his first mis-step -- the employment of a human operative in the retaliatory elimination of a Russian gambler who was attempting to move a percentage of his earnings off-shore. The assassin was apprehended and, via the RICO statutes, Lou was picked up on a conspiracy charge. At his bail hearing, the DA pressed for Lou to be sent to the Zigg, while police detectives attempted to work a deal with Slick Tony.
The deal became moot, however; on Lou's second day in the Zigg, operatives of Arachnos -- the paramilitary army of the Rogue Isles and personal servants to the notorious Lord Recluse -- staged a jailbreak and Lou, utilizing dark powers that had previously only been rumoured, made good an escape to the unruly Rogue Isles.
Shortly thereafter, Slick Tony engaged a vessel to take several of Lou's most trusted associates to the Rogue Isles, with orders to abandon the East Jersey operation (to be maintained by Vincenzo "Skinny Vinny" Calamari in his absence) and establish a base of operations in the Rogue Isles. To this end, Lou set up shop near the Golden Giza in St. Martial and began to explore the economic possibilities of the Rogue Isles.
Trivia and Notes
Inspiration
As noted in the introduction, Cthu Lou was primarily concocted after an over-indulgence in Sopranos and H.P. Lovecraft -- which, strangely, presents an opportunity to create a Thugs/Dark Mastermind. While it's a fairly common combo, I'm going to go on record as saying that most Thug/Dark MMs don't have a really good story for why their guy controls the forces of darkness (or, alternately, why their guy is being followed around by a bunch of hoodlums).
Appearance
Surprisingly, Lou presented quite a challenge in the costume department, mostly in the area of his head. The common perception of Cthulhu has a tremendous octopus for a head, an appearance that I wanted to give Lou.
Unfortunately, the costume creator just wasn't up to it. Some thoughts:
- The head: While there is an "elongated" head option, the elongated alien head just sucks from a detail standpoint. The weird little tooth nubs make it look like he's smiling all the time, and the lack of eyes requires too many compromises. In the end, it was just better to mess with the head sliders.
- The hair: The cornrows are not supposed to be Lou's hair, but rather a series of head ridges. This was actually inspired by a stuffed Cthulhu doll that I have, which has these weird little head ridges that look like...well, cornrows.
- Tentacles: There's just to good way to pull off face tentacles. Until the day they add some, we have to be happy with Lou's sad little beard. It's not an ideal solution, but what can you do?
- The suit: The suit is obviously a riff on Tony Montana from Scarface. It's important that Lou's look says "gangster" as much as it says "Lovecraft". Putting him in a Scarface suit gets the point across, I think.
- The wings: Thank goodness there are wings in this game! More than any other element, the wings really say "Cthulhu". Well, the wings, and the greeness.
Musings
I am not, as a habit, prone to swearing, but adopting the persona of a notorious mafioso almost requires it. It's an excuse to let the id run rampant, and be as profane and confrontational (and, hopefully, amusing) as can be reasonably expected. It's easier to maintain this persona if one is constantly soaking up episodes of the Sopranos, or has watched Goodfellas or Casino recently. Good stuff.
