Hunter Rose Bio

[VivatGrendel.com]

name: HUNTER ROSE

real name: Eddie

first appearance: Comico Primer #2

status: Deceased, killed while in battle with Argent in DEVIL BY THE DEED

bio:

**THE PRODIGY**

Somewhere in the latter part of the twentieth century, in an ordinary midwestern town, to a pair of very ordinary parents, there was born an extra-extraordinary child whose true name is known to us now only as Eddie. A genius of immeasurable depth, Eddie excelled at his every form of endeavor. At the tender age of four, he had memorized his own local phone book as well as that of the surrounding half-dozen counties. By six he could quote any line of Shakespeare, and by eight he had written over a dozen plays and fifty short stories, and was working on drafts for several different (apparently unfinished) novels at once.

Unfortunately, for both Eddie and the world, neither his parents nor his pedestrian teachers took much notice of his young achievements, and so the lad was nurtured soley on boredom. Initially Eddie found release from his frustrations in the world of competitive sports, but here too he overachieved and soon found himself competing at an international level on the fencing strip. True to form, Eddie took his zeal to the tournament finals, only to secretly throw the match in an agonizing denial of how very easy it all had been. It was at this point that Eddie met the woman who would be the most influential person in his young and tragically brutal life.

Jocasta Rose was a trainer for the British fencing team; she found herself fascinated with the daring young prodigy who, she was sure, had just deliberately relinquished his claim to the world championship. A hot-blooded iconoclast herself, Jackie confronted Eddie after the match and swept him off his tired and lonely feet into a world of glorious sensation and romance. Over the space of the next year --- which would prove to be the rest of Jocasta Rose's life --- she and Eddie never parted company again. A terminal illness killed her less than thirteen months after they first met.

**THE ASSASSIN**

The death of his lover devastated the young genius, but her fiery spirit lingered in his soul -- her will to fight and achieve was twisted by his grief into a monstrous and insatiable ideal. Returning incognito to the States, he adopted the name of HUNTER ROSE and soon wrote several best sellers, taking the literary world by storm at the age of seventeen.

But, still there remained an empty fury in HUNTER ROSE'S heart. The need to achieve became the lust to control, and so another alias to an already fractured personality was born.

The crime families of Manhattan were soon confronted with a presence even deadlier and more heartless than their own. The name of the masked assassin, GRENDEL, was spoken only in whispers, and many a seasoned killer prayed to avoid running afoul of whoever held GRENDEL'S contractual reins of the moment. In less than two years, GRENDEL had moved into a position of power over one of the major families, and he soon consolidated his realm to include most of the criminal activities within the entire metropolitan area. Once again, he had won easily over seemingly unsurmountable odds. But where was the challenge that would unseat him, the battle he could never win, the heart of fire that would rival his own?

**THE CHILD AND THE WOLF**

In fact, it was early in his nefarious career that GRENDEL first encountered the two lives that would ultimately prove to be the undoing of his own. The adopted niece of a crooked real estate mogul, STACY PALUMBO captured what little empathy still existed in HUNTER ROSE'S icy heart by her unnatural resemblance to his first love. Following the death of her uncle at GRENDEL'S hand, Stacy came to live with HUNTER as his legal ward. Ironically, the only other friend to this lonely child was GRENDEL'S greatest enemy, ARGENT, the mysterious wolf.

In STACY, HUNTER saw the potential and innocence that might have been his own lot, and in ARGENT he found the fury and power that were indeed his fate. This pathetic triangle was destined for tragedy, of course, and STACY'S discovery of her mentor's true identity precipitated the climax...and proved to be the ultimate doom for the man the world had known as HUNTER ROSE.

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