Flicker Street Studio

04/14/2023

Lineage of Talisyn Thorne, RIP 1982-2005.

01/03/2023

Recent work. Character is Augustine "Doc Animus" Amberson. Related to a number of key FLICKER STREET characters. This character was created in 2009 and is another character I "imported" to FLICKER STREET from other projects.

05/21/2022

Cedric Lykos from my tale FLICKER STREET
Quick ballpoint pen sketch.
Copyright 2022 George Henry Smathers Jr.

04/26/2022

My latest FS character portrait - my first in months. To be used on the Official Flicker Street website relaunch.

Ewen Cromwell
AKA The Carnifex, the Barbarian, Bringer of Sorrow, Ewen the Barbarian, Lonn Hoskins, Roscoe Finn, and many more. Co-founder of Hallmark, MA.

Bio in progress:

Ewen Cromwell was born in on the unfortunate day of June 8, 793 CE in Lindisfarne, England - the very day that Vikings raided the monastery in Lindisfarne. His mother, Finn Cromwell, was staying at the monatery at the time and had given birth to Ewwn not long before the Viking pillagers appeared.

This account from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle posits the fdate of the raid on January 15, 793, but scholars have settled on June as the accurate date.

"In this year fierce, foreboding omens came over the land of the Northumbrians, and the wretched people shook; there were excessive whirlwinds, lightning, and fiery dragons were seen flying in the sky. These signs were followed by great famine, and a little after those, that same year on 6th ides of January, the ravaging of wretched heathen men destroyed God's church at Lindisfarne."

Note the account of unusual weather, famine, and perhaps supernatural events perceived de facto as omens of the brutal attack.

08/13/2021

Finally posting part 1 of the Curio bio to accompany the portrait I posted in 2019:

Curio (Lance Drake)

Longtime major character (Created 1985)
Bio Part 1:

Lancelot Ridge Townshend Drake was born in 1968 in the town of Gossingham, south of Hallmark. From a very early age, young Lance was drawn to and fascinated by occult iconography and loud rock music. His mother Shirley encouraged these interests, as they had always been her primary ones as well. His father Shelby, a bitter Vietnam veteran and sometime Christian, tolerated the household “eccentricities”. When in Hallmark, the Drakes would invariably stop by the infamous Lucifer Club and Bradcroft LTD (commonly referred to as “the curio shoppe”, as that's what it was). At age six, Lance met taxi driver Alec Duarte at the Lucifer Club, and cast him in an avuncular role in his life.

The cynical Alec liked the Drakes, and was flattered by Lance's hero worship of him. Ironically, Duarte was considered a hero by some (and far worse by others) in his guise as the masked vigilante Cowan, who was cutting a bloody swath through “the Machine”, the mob that more or less ran Hallmark and was once run by Alec's own father, Tony Duarte.

Lance got into hard rock and heavy metal music at a rather young age, and his favorite band was the infamous White Rabbit, led by the rowdy British bass player Haston “Hasty” Greenhalgh. Lance wanted to play bass just like Hasty. In time, his rather impoverished parents managed to save up to purchase a bass and amplifier for Lance on his 11th birthday.

By junior high, Lance was heavily into the opposite s*x, and his status as an aspiring rock star didn't hurt his chances. At heart, however, Drake was a sensitive, poetic lad, a bit of a loner, but he could turn on the wild, partying persona with ease. His readings on ritual magick grew more intense. Lance's uncle, H. Sidney Drake, looked down on Shirley and Lance. In 1980, he had opened a comic book store in Hallmark called Origins, and also held mini-conventions at Norrland Mall in northern Hallmark. Lance was also a comics freak for a time, and hung out constantly at his uncle's store, until Sidney finally banned him from Origins in 1984, which led to a permanent falling out between Sidney and Shelby. Sidney was a devout born again Christian, as was his wife, and they were repulsed when they realized how deeply young Lance was steeped in the occult and “evil” music.

In 1986, Lance and two close friends, both of whom attended other schools, decided to conduct a true magick ritual. Lance and friends Blake Hawkmoor and Jeremiah Thorne consulted a legendary figure in Hallmark's underground scene, the left hand path witch Juniper Thoth. Blake's best friend, Jesputh Averil, had researched Juniper and warned the three boys that she was not to be trusted. Jeremiah's classmate, Vidal Wynan, a very religious young man himself, insisted they break their plans with Juniper. Vidal's friend, Dyson Bryles, scoffed at the so-called “Ritual to Eos” but actually encouraged them to go for it. Vidal and Jesputh nearly came to blows with Dyson, and Vidal ended up following the three lads to the place where the ritual was to take place. He said he would join them in it to protect them.

The ritual to Eos, to Lance's delight, amounted to a s*x magick ritual in which Juniper drugged the four lads – and had s*x with them, one by one. This was the first time Vidal or Jeremiah had had s*xual in*******se. The whole thing was like an acid trip gone horridly awry – the youths were not sure exactly what was real and what wasn't. Juniper had brought a small coven who chanted and played ritualistic musics in the adjoining chamber, behind curtains, while Juniper fornicated with the four friends.

What happened next remained unclear for some years. Allegedly, someone knocked over some candles, and the place caught fire. The place burnt to the ground, but some of Juniper's coven tried to get the young men to safety, When the conflagration had waned, only Vidal and Jeremiah emerged alive and, relatively, unharmed – physically anyway. They called the police and it was determined that the piles of ashes they found belonged to the coven members – and to Blake and Lance. There was no trace of Juniper. She did, however, send Jeremiah an anonymous note saying that she was leaving Hallmark for good. Her shares in her father's company, Vossius Metalwerks, were sold to Rask Industries, according to private investigator John Gauvin.

In truth, Lance had survived the fire, though he was in very bad shape. He was taken in by a coterie of voluptuous women to a place they called simply “The Chapel”. This chapel also had a medical unit, apparently, and Lance awoke after a few days, bandaged and connected to an intravenuous drip, and suffering from partial amnesia. He wasn't sure if he was still tripping or not. He healed in time, and bore some inoperable scars, some on his face. After he recovered, and he unsuccessfully hit on her, Luna Sumatra, the woman who seemed to run the Chapel for its unseen “Caretaker”, told Lance he could leave but should not return to his family. She gave him a large amount of cash, and apologized for not being able to help him further. He asked for new clothes and makeup. His blond hair had turned platinum white, seemingly from his traumatic experience; he liked the new look.

It was at this juncture that Lance Drake became simply “Curio”. He headed out to Los Angeles with the money given him, adorned in his new apparel and his face plastered with white and black makeup, which, along with his headband sash, covered his facial scars. He called himself Curio after the Bradcroft LTD shop.

In L.A., Curio made his way up the ladder of the frenetic metal music scene. His album, CURIO, debuted in 1987 and boasted two rather large hit singles. After a regional club tour, he was picked to open on the next tour planned by none other than White Rabbit themselves. All-girl glam metal outfit, UberVixens, was the 1st act on the bill, having released two solid but not very commercially successful LPs. Curio's second album spawned a large hit song, “ “, and he undertook a whirlwind tour of the West Coast. UberVixens opened for him on every show, occasionally after hardcore punk/death metal act Mutilated Christ (who were a huge influence on later black metal bands), led by European guitarist Desolator, only a teen but already a titanically gifted musician. Curio loved Desolator's sound and iconoclastic yet stoic attitude. Curio's own touring band consisted of himself on bass and vocals, Stevie Jo Latchkey on drums, Gretchen Strathmore of UberVixens on vocals, keys, and lead guitar (recently joined UV), and Glenn Saxby on rhythm guitar and vocals. These latter two were actually from the Hallmark area, and also rather young (Glenn more than Gretchen), but Lance hadn't known them from his time back home.

In any case, they gave him an idea: to do a massive show in Hallmark and a club show in Augensberg. He labeled it the “Coming Home” tour, though he told no one he was really from that area. White Rabbit crossed the USA, with Curio, UberVixens, and Mutilated Christ in tow. MC's name and the antics of their lead vocalist Abrader kept them off several shows throughout the American South. The generous Curio insisted they stay with the tour though. Hasty was more than happy to comply.

Glenn and Gretchen both noted that “coming home” was apt for their big shows in MA. Curio made cryptic comments but still never revealed his background to them – or anyone in his new life.

While Lance was away and believed dead, his mother, devastated by her loss to what she termed “Satanic ritual”, renounced all of her old interests and became a born again Christian. Sidney was pleased.

And so, the massive hell raising tour came to Hallmark in 1988. The shows were massive successes, and drew hardcore punks, metalheads, occult nuts, glamsters, and old school rockers. After the two shows, Curio opted to remain behind in the area for a time with his bandmates and UberVixens and book some regional shows for them, operating out of a cheap hotel where they partied endlesslyt between gigs. White Rabbit and Mutilated Christ took off for Europe, though the latter band soon split up, and Rabbit began opening for huge 80s metal act Diablos.

Curio was disgusted that his family had become religious fanatics. He was angry at them, and at others in his old life who'd wronged him in various ways, yet also he missed his old comrades. He began dating Lacey Corbensen, who was working with rising band Mercyless Dogg. He pursued, and usually attained, a number of women in Hallmark and beyond. Gretchen was by this time hopelessly in love with Curio, but he saw her strictly as a musician (though they had slept together). Glenn put aside music for a time to reconcile with his mother and try broadcasting school. The UberVixens wished to return to L.A. And the heartbroken Gretchen, as well as Drummer Stevie Jo, went with them. Gretchen would return home a year later, recovering from a nasty he**in addiction.

Bereft of a band, Curio, who'd already written his third album, elected to stay in Hallmark and enlist local musicians to record it. He was quite enamored of Mercyless Dogg's eclectic sound. He fell under the tutelage of Hallmark native Prester John Grey, ironically also a past lover of Juniper, who'd also returned home, after several years in Europe playing space rock and a stint in the aforementioned Diablos. Prester John set up a very high tech studio, and wished to produce Curio's next album. Grey also discovered Curio's real identity but kept it to himself. Soon, Lance finally ran into someone key in his past life, who had figured out who he really was: Blake Hawkmoor, who'd emerged alive and reunited with his family and friends, albeit acting a bit oddly at times.

Lance had been avoiding Jeremiah and Vidal despite his love of Dogg's music, but Blake went right to him and revealed that he, unlike the other two, recognized Drake from their “karmic bond”. Blake told Lance they were bonded (along with Thorne and Wynan) for life by the spell went awry that fateful night in 1986. Lance did not understand why the other two young men didn't sense him in this way. Blake soon revealed that he, unlike Lance who nearly died in the ritual fire, actually had died – and was able to be resurrected by an evocation of Eos by a sorcerer more powerful than Juniper could dream of being. This second spell, linked to the first, completed the bond between the four men, and allowed them all to potentially defy true death, as the power of the spell caused the life forces of each to be nourished, and revitalized, by those of the other three.

Bio Part 2 upcoming.

Copyright 2021 George Henry Smathers Jr. See Less

06/28/2021

Extract from
“Observations on Eos and on the Creed of the Neologues*”
Author Unknown **

Eos is temporally the youngest of Thee Presences - yet, as observed before, the most insidious. As Vaikuntha was the Presence most fondly attached to planet Earth (while heralding its doom; his dream was truly to die with the Earth, an or****ic su***de pact to shake the cosmos), Eos, as all the latter Presences (as few as they are in number), is driven by thirsts beyond fleshly cravings. Eos has no intention to perish. Its eternal existence is tantamount, and feeding its ever evolving urges as it grows into a boundless thing, is its way to extend its span to infinite measures.

Eos is ancient by born humans' metrics, its essence spawned when the First Seeds were nurtured on Earthen soil 20,000 years ago. But as a weakened babe exerting and imposing its birthing will on an unfathomably large world, Eos is all Need, Thirst, Hunger, Excretion, Pleasure. If found in a human brain, Eos would exist between the Reptile Brain and the Limbic Stage. Eos has always been sated, spoiled by a Presence neither young nor illimitably ancient. A guess is that a cruel maternal figure, likely the minor Presence Caprice, has both fed and starved, coddled and abused, young Eos. But pity not the infant terrible, for existence itself is at stake here.

Caprice was destroyed by the sorcerer who shut the Oblique forever out of the Known Realities. This double victory marked the First True Rite of this mage's ascent to primacy as the chosen caretaker of the Earth. Eos did not grieve; it had left the folds of its “mother” many many Earthen years before. No, Eos now saw its way clear to the Earth and its attendant planes. The most ancient of all Presences, Qua'Quoequoelne, had withered away in its moribund decadence and the sheer weight of eons, and Tyrlus Drexus, its heir, was rendered eternally inert in recent years, in the Entropic Wars. Vaikuntha was finally destroyed a short span later, and then Oblique was banished and its children, Caprice and Thrall, obliterated. The removal of so many Presences (who were always few in number, though vast in influence) in a mere thread of this corporeal Time Loom, overjoyed Eos. It now ruled, and its incremental feeding on the souls of the Earth would now reach ascendance, unfettered, unabated. Eos could not achieve such without instruments native to the Earth. These were eventually dubbed “Neologues”.

Eos was long believed to be an entity embodying balance – an Earthbound mage once dubbed Eos a “cosmic centrist” - a “non-extremist”.Vaikuntha, the most “human”, judged Eos to be cowardly – never prone to choosing a clear side in conflict. Eos Abstracta, the presence's raw form, is as inscrutable ideologically as corporeally, its methodologies unfathomable even to others of its kind. He has on occasion assumed animal shapes, even rarer humanoid forms. In these iterations, it is known as Eos Incarnata and can directly affect physical change upon objects of its interest, much as Vaikuntha was always able to do. Eos is often a semi-solid organism.

In all its myriad configurations, Eos is Hunger Incarnate. It feeds on suffering, physical and psychickal. Its most satisfactory feasts are upon the sufferings wrought by war, inequality, conquest, poverty – the seething frustration and endless exploitation of the powerless. Eos finds this dark energy the most sublime to imbibe – it has a certain taste to it, even a colour and a scent. Eos' cravings for it are eternal.

The more a people are oppressed, enslaved, violated, the delicious is Eos' repast. Earth has been very good for and to Eos, unwittingly as this may be. The Neologues see themselves as heralds and harbingers of a New Epoch. But they are deceivers of the highest order – endlessly equivocating to others and even to themselves. Their self-deception is a constant opportunity for Eos' sphere to further expand, for The Neologues, on a far more finite scale than their patron, feed upon the darkest energies unleashed by humanity's incessant urge to bloodshed. For what is the history of humankind but a journal of bloodshed?

These energies nourish the Neologues, and are then passed on to Eos itself, but at a toll to their scavengers. The more they yield to the malign Presence, the more their own souls wither and degrade. Eos happily feeds on their pain and loss as well as that of those they subjugate. Neologues are rewarded for their service by occupying lengthy spans in their carnal shells. They tend to very advanged ages and recuperative abilities. Still, they experience pain, decay, the limitations of the human body – but, no longer being exactly “human” (despite their outward appearances), they resist their own miseries as, like Eos, they prey upon the miseries of those they dub the “Less Fortunate”.

The more a Neologue hurts others, the more their own pain subsides. Neologues - “Eos' Chosen” - are essentially parasites feeding upon the Earth and its indigenous living creatures. Yet they have conquered this planet – by wielding their greatest weapon: Fear.

Fear – of death, guilt, reprisals, embarrassment; fear – of not belonging, of one's own s*xuality; of possessing nothing of one's own (even one's own s*xuality)– these fears and more have rendered large swathes of humanity (and even animalkind to some extent) largely inert. They wallow in mortal dread, unable to muster the energy or True Will to reclaim their world and their cultures from the blight of their oppressors.

The concept of 'Money' is their #1 control mechanism employed to instill these fears. 'Religion' is a close second (though its power is gradually receding in some cultures). Hence, in the 21st century as much of humankind reckons its span, the Neologues have escalated economic exploitation of the masses and exacerbated armed conflict between tribes. For blind, unwavering tribalism has proven to be an indispensable weapon in its psychic arsenal against humankind.

Eos itself is rarely spoken of by its attendants, and never aloud. It has managed to remain unknown, unseen, by many of Earth's most well-versed esotericists It manifests on occasion in the nightmares of humankind and curiously, more often in those of non-human animalia. While humanity is soaked in its waking dread, other species experience its terror in the subconscious.

On some level, at some time, the psyches of nearly all Earth's living creatures (save for the Neologues) are suffused with the influence of Thee Presence Eos.

NOTE: Chrome Genet is most likely the True Author of these extracts. The less formal structure and verbiage of this extract lends some credence to this supposition. The esotericist Nestor Blue hypothesizes that Chrome may have been under the influence of a mind-altering substance when these passages were composed.

Copyright 2021 George Henry Smathers Jr. All rights reserved.

05/28/2021

She's more popular with you guys than Franki or Shine, so Zapp will be the page's new muse/ mascot/ avatar.

05/21/2021

My latest character portrait now has an accompanying bio:

Zapp Valley (Zelda Lynn Valley)

Supporting character (created 2020)

Zelda Lynn Valley was born in 1975 in Beckett, MA (not far from Hallmark MA). Her father, Everett Valley, was a janitor at the old Beckett Sanitarium who met and married nurse Cora Stanley shortly after Cora's family moved to Massachusetts from New York in 1973. Young Zelda was named for her aunt Zelda Mae Stanley, Cora's younger sister. Both of them hated the name "Zelda" and the elder Zelda took to being called Mae until she became addicted to Atari video games in the mid 1970s and, because of the "Z" and the sound effects the early games made, started going by "Zapp" Stanley.

Young Zelda Lynn asked to also be called Zapp after her beloved aunt by the 1980s. In the mid 80s, Zapp Stanley, with a loan from her father, Preston Stanley, opened her own video arcade called, simply, Zapp's Arcade, in southeast Hallmark's Four Styx Shopping Center. Zapp the younger was quickly addicted to playing games at her aunt's store.

Zapp Stanley accompanied her friend and employee Kara Lorelei Kostopolis to Atlanta GA in 1988 when Kara's long lost father Hollis Baylen assembled a race rally as the bigoted demagogue the White Camellian. When TSD-transmuted government agent Eloy Queeq tried to stop the out of control riot, his special containment suit was sabotaged and his explosive power ran wild, killing himself and thousands more and destroying downtown Atlanta. Zapp Stanley was among the many killed, though Kara did survive (her biological father did not).

Zapp Valley grew increasingly rebellious when the Valleys moved to Hallmark in 1989. She and her younger brother James "Jazz" Valley, fell in with the hardcore punk and goth scenes but ended up on opposite sides of the fence when the race baiting Nihil incited a race war in Hallmark, continuing the White Camellian's work with a small army of N**i skinheads - including Zapp's boyfriend, Gordy Vorchett.

Gordy's brother Dis was a lieutenant of Nihil. Gordy tried to quit the toxic group when Zapp protested the group's ideology and promised Jazz she'd permanently distance herself from Nihil.

Zapp was also inspired by her former classmate Urania Fabricand, who was Nihil's lover at one point and turned on him to redeem herself. Urania is presently the leader of Zed, the group headquartered at 'The Compound', and a very powerful sorcerer. She and Zapp lost contact long ago .

A massive race riot eventually erupted in Hallmark in late 1994. Zapp was able to get Gordy to safety, but her brother Jazz was killed in an explosion. Dis and Nihil were fortunately also destroyed in the final conflagration.

It took Zapp and Gordy awhile to recover from all of this. They eventually married and had a daughter, Kadi, b. 2000. Their marriage gradually fell apart over the next several years, and Zapp's brief bout with cancer and Gordy's substance abuse issues ended their marriage by 2007. Gordy moved away, and Zapp strove to support her daughter, finally getting a decent job as a supervisor at Raskmart in south Hallmark in 2009. After all she'd been through, she carried a smouldering rage inside her.

It was at Raskmart that Zapp met three people in 2011 who altered the course of her life, all co-workers: Deric Pasquin, who fell into unrequited love with the cynical, androgynous, and still unapologetically punk rock Zapp; Jorry Jones, a much younger man that Zapp did fancy and began an intense s*xual affair with: and Amber Ledge, who was attracted to Jorry and saw Zapp as a rival on many levels.

All this came to a head in mid 2012, when, as Jorry and Zapp finished up a tryst in Raskmart's stockroom, they realized that Amber had observed their activity. Threatening Zapp with revealing their secret, Amber was taken aback by Zapp's fierce rage and retorts. Amber instinctively swung at her and the punch connected with Zapp's neck, snapping it and killing her instantly due to Amber's superhuman strength. Amber fled, not meaning to kill Zapp, while Jorry had no clue what to do next.

How the aftermath of Zapp Valley's untimely death will play out going forward has yet to be seen. It's certain that Urania will be interested in the final fate of her old friend and dispatch Zed agents to keep tabs on the ensuing criminal investigation.

Copyright 2021 George Henry Smathers Jr.

05/18/2021

AKA "Convy Lee and Anouk's Theme" :-)

Provided to YouTube by Universal Music GroupRide Into The Sun ("1969" / 2014 Mix) · The Velvet UndergroundThe Velvet Underground℗ 2014 Universal Records, a D...

05/18/2021

An awesome song written and performed by my dear friend Bill White. Included on my 'FLICKER STREET Soundtrack' YouTube playlist (link in comments).

Rock videoJunk Written by Bill WhiteSong produced by Gregg Keplingerperformed by ManicureRecorded at Avast, Seattle WAVideo produced by Second Unit FilmsLima...