A wastelander app for a REAL southern fisherman.

[Steam Username]: weenis
[Steam ID]: STEAM_0:1:79736953
AGE: 22
-Faction: Settler [Standard wasteland Resident]
-Species/Human or Robotic: Human.
-Character Advantages/Talents: Kind hearted, fishing, carpentry, cooking, and basic wilderness survival.
-Character Disadvantages/Weaknesses: Kind hearted, uneducated, and mostly illiterate.
-Current Equipment: Double-barrel shotgun, x24 12 gauge shells, woodcutting axe, cutlery and cooking supplies, a small canteen, blue jumpsuit, beige ballcap, and a fishing pole.

Douglas Biggs was born and raised in the backwaters of Louisiana, near current day New Orleans. His mother Joanne, a seamstress, and his father Cleetus, a fisherman. His mother of course stayed home with Douglas, raising him as best she could whilst his father was constantly out on a river boat, bringing in loads of mutated crawfish, small mirelurk, and other river creatures for a measly paycheck of 20 caps a day.

When Douglas had reached the age of ten, his father quit his position on the river trawl to purchase a small, wooden fishing boat. Cleetus decided it was high time to teach his son to fish, and began regularly taking him out to check the traps along the long, winding Mississippi river delta. He taught Douglas everything he had come to know about fishing over the span of about 4 years, including how to identify the best places to set traps, the techniques to reeling in the large mutant catfish that stalked the river beds, how to take down the smaller mirelurks that crept along the shores, how to identify the most valuable mirelurk eggs, and a whole host of other fishing related things. By the time Douglas was 16, he had perfected the art fishing.

Over the course of a year, things had been getting better and better for the Biggs'. The families small fishing business was bringing in more money than they could have ever dreamed of. Cleetus and Joanne were already making plans to move into New Orleans proper.

On one of the last-scheduled trips into the delta, something had come through the swamp rather roughly, aggravating the local wildlife. It was a total recipe for disaster, but the father-son fishing duo were rather ignorant and rash when it came to danger. On the third or fourth creel, Cleetus felt a rather large tug back as he began pulling the crustacean cage up. Thinking the chain had simply snagged onto rock, he put his boot on the bow of the boat and gave a huge heave backwards. This time the response was much less mild. The chain was ripped from his hands, flying downwards and wrapping itself around the bow and around his boot before shooting the boat vertically up, throwing all of the cargo, including the passengers, into the warm and murky waters of the Mississippi.

Douglas surfaced after orientating himself towards the dim sunlight above, heaving and throwing up water for a moment. He looked around for signs of what had just flipped his boat, but the brownish-green waters of great river were only chugging backwards, the lone disturbance being the occasional fishing item floating past him. Douglas gave a sigh of relief before turning to his father and saying
"Pa! What in God's good name was tha-"
Douglas stopped himself when he realized Cleetus wasn't anywhere in the water with him. Not at the upturned boat a little bit upriver, not on the muddy shore, and not behind him downriver. He simply disappeared.

Douglas swam to a nearby cypress tree and climbed up its roots before looking all up and down river in disbelief. He didn't know what to say, or what to feel. His father had simply vanished. Wide-eyed and still in shock, Douglas walked back through the swamp towards his home, following the river. After about an half an hour of walking through swamp, he reached his family's little hamlet and swung open the wooden door, his mother looking at him startled.
"Douglas! What are you doing back home so early? Where is your father at?" She exclaimed in surprise.
"He's g-gone." were the only words that he managed to get out.
It took all but a few seconds for her to figure it out. She looked at her son's soaked clothes and hair, the look of shock on his face, all of this confirming her suspicion. Her face turned red and she covered her mouth as tears started running down her face.

The funeral service was fairly small. Grandpa and Grandma Biggs, a few aunts and uncles, and of course Joanne and Douglas. Cleetus was a simple man, he wouldn't have wanted much more. It was only months until Douglas moved himself and his mother into a small home in New Orleans proper with his fathers savings. Soon after moving Douglas began training under a local carpenter, as his days of fishing and crawfish trapping were over. Joanne continued her work as a seamstress and began regularly repairing many townspeople's clothes with a small time tailor. The pair working together managed to bring in enough caps for trading, and a little extra to save for a rainy day. They lived comfortably, to say the least.

Five years went by, and Douglas was now a grown man. His apprenticeship turned into a partnership, and was now working full time as a carpenter. He had learned to read basic sentences and words, but nothing too complex, as Joanne and Cleetus unfortunately could not afford a proper education for him.Two years ago, Joanne began growing increasingly frail, and after about a year she could barely move at all and began to refuse to eat. Worried, Douglas contacted a local doctor for an explanation. Evidently, she had cancer of the bone-marrow. There wasn't a thing they could do but wait. As spring began to turn into summer, Joanna Biggs passed away peacefully in her sleep.

There wasn't anything left for Douglas in New Orleans. He decided that it was best if he buried his parents savings, sold the house, and left. The only belongings Douglas had now were his fathers double-barrel shotgun, an old woodcutting axe, a flask given to him by his grandfather, the clothes on his back, and his trusty fishing pole. By pure luck, he found out about a caravan expedition sent by Gentilly Trading was about to set out East, heading towards Maryland.

It was the perfect opportunity. He signed on as a cook with a decent payrate and was provided with all the cooking supplies he needed. The traveling was a nice change of pace for Douglas, and was he glad to finally be away from his home. In the caravan he met a young lady by the name of Jacqueline Malvot, whom he quickly became close peers with. (Although Douglas' mirelurk stew made him a favorite among the entire caravan.) When the caravan at last arrived in Maryland, he chose to follow Jacqueline and left the caravan with her. The two have been traveling together ever since.

-snip-