Initially a struggling portrait artist, D. Marlboro began his career capturing the character of Ash Hill’s most lively citizens. Rarely getting paid for the pleasure however, he reluctantly turned his hand to forging fine art. His attention to detail and undeniable natural ability quickly made him successful and with this success came money, more money than he had ever dreamed of making as an artist. With the money however came pressure, pressure to churn out forgeries, pressure to perform, pressure to undertake more lucrative cons like counterfeiting…his small cosy studio quickly became more and more like a sweatshop with deadlines, backlogs, angry (and dangerous) customers. Coping poorly, and as many of the creatively inclined do, he turned to the bottle, and then, to various other…substances. This dependency quickly overtook him, driving him further from the artistic expression he cherished and pursued initially and culminated in a severe case of writer’s block. Unable to summon the energy to meticulously scour over and reproduce the more popular workings of the grand masters, his debt began to mount exponentially and it quickly became obvious something needed to be done. Being all too aware of the value of art (real and fake)and with his contacts in both the artistic community and black-market he figured he could flip an original painting or two for a tidy profit, pay off his debt and escape the criminals he had inadvertently fallen in with. The challenge however was doing this without any capital. A cheap plastic party mask and an old, rusted unreliable shotgun later he had pulled off what the press described as a ‘strong arm robbery’ but in reality was much more like a hectic smash and grab. Regardless, a new bug had bitten; he no longer craved the chemical highs but the massive and natural adrenaline rush which comes post heist. The arm full of paintings he had secured from his first job where enough to cover his debt and buy his freedom. Finally free but with only a couple thousand dollars to his name he retired the old shotgun replacing it with a much more manageable and reliable .45 pistol, replaced his plastic party mask with a non-descript black ski mask and began planning his next hit. It wasn’t long before the target of his heists became irrelevant and he branched out from galleries into local shops and businesses and eventually into the realm of banks and the ever more challenging stash houses of drug dealers and criminals who had harassed and threatened him in the not so distant past… Thoughts, feedback appriciated!