TRADER
Page Version 1.07
Sex: Male
Age: 50 (estimated)
Height: Unknown
Weight: Unknown
Hair Color: Grey (thinning)
Eye Color: Unknown
Distinguishing Features: Grizzled
First Appearance: Pilgrimage to hell.
Re-appearance Between Cold Asylum and: Shadowfall
Final Appearance: Shadowfall
Place of Birth: Unknown
Apache Name: The man who walks without friends.
Known Relatives: One younger brother: dead
Preferred Weapons: Armalite
Commonly Carried Equipment: Ammunition for the Armalite.
Favorite Quote: I'll be hung, dried, quarted, and left for the crows!
As with many of the other characters, very little is known about the man known as trader, not even his real name is known. It is suspected that trader doesn’t even remember his original name.
When he was young, he and his partner and friend, a man named Marsh Folsom, stumbled upon a hidden military supply cache filled with weapons, ammunition, food, and armored vehicles in the apps. With this find, the man known as trader was born. Trader met Marsh up in Maine, near the Acadia park. This is also where he encountered the man known as the Magus.
By using maps and clues left behind in the redoubt, he and his partner were able to track down more caches. Nine times out of ten, the clue lead to nothing. But that one time it was a huge pay off. Marsh was the navigator of the two. Trader never did learn how to read or write. He never had the time. However, his memory regarding maps is flawless, totally photographic. He only has to glance at a map and he can recall every detail, even years later.
In many ways, trader is the most powerful man in all the Deathlands. His huge supply of weapons and goods ensured this. Many a man and mutie tried to take him down, none have succeeded.
Trader was tough, but fair. But those who crossed him soon learned how powerful his wrath could be. A ville in the east crossed him and his crew. Every man, woman and child in the ville were killed. The reason why the town was attacked and destroyed has long since been forgotten. Even as his men destroyed the ville, he wouldn’t allow any of the townsfolk to be raped or tortured. It was a hard lesson, and a warning. Don’t mess with Trader.
There were times that Trader considered that every stranger encountered should be treated like an enemy and killed before they had a chance to attack. This wasn’t always the best policy because many of the people of the Deathlands were hard working decent folk with no thoughts of murder on their mind.
Trader met a young man named Ryan Cawdor nearly a decade in the past. Ryan had the drop on him, but Trader saw something in the man. He offered Ryan the chance to join him. Ryan accepted and quickly became one of Traders most trusted war chiefs. The story on how they met can be read here.
About a year and a half later, a diminutive man who’s knowledge of predark weaponry was second to none. The diminutive armorer known as J.B. Dix, just as Ryan, quickly climbed the ranks to become one of Traders most trusted men.
Trader had a young doctor who used to travel with him. His brother caught a round in the leg. The doctor botched the job in removing the round. The leg became infected and it killed his younger brother. Ever since that happened, Trader refused to let a medic even look at him.
Over the years, Trader and his people have traveled from one end of the ruined continent to the other. They have seen the boiling cauldron of the pacific, the powerful baronies in the east, the toxic swamps to the south, and the frozen tundra of the north. They have seen the ruins of once great cities, reduced to rad blasted craters filled with the crumbling skeletons of those who once lived, worked and loved there. They have seen the ruined launch sites where mankind ventured into the depths of space. They have seen the remains of what had used to be one of the most powerful countries on the planet.
One of the most disturbing finds he ever made was in Kentucky. He, Ryan, and Dix, discovered a huge cache of nerve gas (literally thousands of Litres of it). They quickly reburied it and did their best to forget about it.
Trader is suffering from rad cancer. He knows that he has little time left, so after losing the convoy to Cort Strasser in the ville of Mocsin, he decides that war wag one will head into the darks to attempt to find this legendary ‘Redoubt’ and ‘Gateway’.
It is in the hills of the Darks that he hands control of war wag one to Ryan he takes his old battered Armalite and heads off into the forest, meeting up with a old Indian. He isn't seen again until . He gives Abe a note that he had written for him. It is a goodbye to Ryan.
It was said that once Trader was asked if he had any enemies. He replied no, he didn't. None that were living.
He hates dogs. He was once heard to say that the only thing worse about than a baron with one dog is a baron with two dogs.
After Abe manages to find him it becomes clear that he did survive the Rad Cancer, but it left him changed. His mind tends to wander and he often loses track of what he happens to be talking about at the time. To make matters worse, he always was a brutal man, but it was tempered by wisdom. Since his near death from cancer, he has become more brutal, and sometimes for brutality sake.
He wears an old battered wrist chron that he won from a one legged whore named either Barbie or Barbara in the ville of Chimay.
Created on 07/14/97
Updated on 12/15/97