a dangerous gang of queers with a tough asexual member whose preferred weapon is heavy blunt objects. they call hir the “ace of clubs”.
“Four of a Kind”
- The Card Sharps – A street gang based out of St. Louis, MO. and known for tagging their territory with street art portraits reminiscent of face cards. Typically these feature celebrities, historical figures, and politicians, but city authorities are uncertain if these figures are viewed positively or negatively by the gang. Many consider the Card Sharps borderline vigilantes, as their victims are overwhelmingly sexual predators who have skirted justice, anti-LGBTQIA+ activists, and the more violent among the abortion clinic protesters.
- Ellen Hinson – An asexual trans woman of 28 years old and standing at 5’9 (when she’s not wearing her signature 5 inch stiletto pumps in bright red suede) with Harlow-blonde hair and bright blue eyes and looking like a silver screen vixen, Ellen is known in the community for volunteering as a face-painter at elementary school carnivals. She works as an optometrist, but spends her nights and weekends at Busch Stadium. She pitches for a community team— and heaven help you if you call her a softball player. But to the St Louis Police Dept, she’s known as the Ace of Clubs. While the alias has never been traced back to her, Ellen is responsible for the carefully-fractured kneecaps of the enemies of the Card Sharps— always carried out with a leather-wrapped Rawlings baseball bat.
- Katraine Webb – A second generation Dominican-American, age 34, Katraine has only begun to use the word ‘asexual’ to describe herself in the past 4 years, but she and her common-law husband Levi have both acknowledged her identity as such— without giving it a name— since they began their relationship in 1997. She is 5’6” and heavyset, and though she worked as an over-the-road truck driver for much of her life, she changed careers to open her own nursery in 2008, when treatment for melanoma left her without the use of her right eye. She teaches bonsai classes on Thursdays, but her weekends are devoted to snipping limbs of another type. She typically follows up on the people for whom a few innings with Ellen proved less than fruitful. At this writing, she is responsible for six unsolved deaths and two disappearances, and the people of the metroplex have come to fear the Ace of Spades.
- Lux Alexander – An asexual Scottish-Kiowa two-spirit, age 24 and standing at 5’7, Lux is working on her masters degree in communications at St. Louis University, with plans of working in social media. She lives a solitary life, as her parents (a highly successful public relations entrepreneur and her schoolteacher husband) took an early retirement and relocated to Denver. Lux remained, worked some years as a swimming instructor while her parents paid for her housing needs, and then invested her extra income in a classmate’s startup. When the startup took off, she reaped the benefits, set up a saving account and began building a retirement fund. With her parents continuing to pay tuition and rent, she began to amass a small fortune, and used it to purchase equipment and studio space for her own vlogging business. Having cashed the bonds that her parents purchased for her each year, she now provides the Card Sharps with a stream of untraceable cash. In return, they provide her studio with security while she films her LGBTQIA+ education series for YouTube. The Ace of Diamonds is all but unknown outside of the gang itself.
- Eli “Gran” Wilcox – A 64 year old former Air Force Colonel, Gran prefers “they” pronouns. They are 5’6” and weigh roughly 100 pounds soaking wet, and in their retirement they run a specialty bakery and catering business, partially funded by donations from Lux. Their bakery’s basement is used as a community storm shelter— and a base of operations for the Card Sharps. They don’t take part in the activities of the gang, but nevertheless provide its members with treats of all sorts. As they are medically trained, they are occasionally a boon to gang members injured on the job, when approaching a hospital would garner suspicion. Gran stitches up stab wounds and bullet holes, but they are also available to members who need a shoulder to lean on. Gran is entirely nonviolent. However, curiously, after Ellen spent a tearful evening sampling their newest macaron recipe and recounting her boyfriend’s infidelity, she later spotted the same boyfriend maneuvering with crutches and a swollen nose. He assured her he had slipped on his iced-over front steps. Gran is not an official member of the gang, but they are considered an honorary Card Sharp, and is occasionally referred to as the Ace of Hearts.
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Brinens and Things 