Leon "Hollowman" Kaufmann

= Summarized History =

1984: Birth to a Mr & Mrs Kaufmann in Hamburg, Germany. An average couple, they enjoyed fine food and drink, theater, and had a reverence for the fine arts.

1990: At the age of six Leon receives tragic news that his parents had been involved in a hit and run accident in Hamburg-Mitte, a bakery delivery truck had clipped their car near the national park sending the vehicle careening through a guard rail and into the lake.

1991: After bouncing around an orphanage for almost a year, on his seventh birthday he receives news that a relative still lives in Munich, Leon is relocated to a great-uncle Karl Kaufmann.

1994: Karl Kaufmann was a rather friendly man, but often spent time away on "business". As a bored child Lutz began to explore the house, and one day becoming ever so adventurous, found his way into the attic. Several trunks lay about the space, one with a lock so rusted, it could be opened with a whisper.

Inside this particular trunk was a stack of leatherbound books dating back to the second world war. Uncle Karl Kaufmann it seemed, wasn't the nicest chap afterall. He'd been involved in some rather curious study with the Occult, under the command of an Erik Bolough. This intrigued young Leon, who would sneak many reads in the years to come, everytime dear old Great Uncle Kaufmann would go out of town.

2000: At the age of sixteen, Leon Kaufmann watches German Federal Police arrest his Great Uncle on counts of money laundering at the ripe old age of seventy-six. By this time Leon knew all the secrets the attic had to offer, fate it seems, was a fair mistress indeed. Dear old Karl Kaufmann had it coming.

2002: Months after Karl Kaufmann was arrested and sent to prison he suffered a fatal heart attack. He wasn't missed, the attic had revealed to Lutz who he really was. Although as Karl's only living relative the things he left behind were rather nice. Leon sold the house and its contents and rented a small room in a hotel at the edge of Munich. He was able to live off the funds for two years. Until becoming restless that is. Being of age now, Lutz decided the military was a good choice and enlisted in the Bundeswehr.

2005: Having been in the German Army for his required amount of time, Leon could've left and been done with it. But after being approached by a Colonel of the Bundeswehr, and a significant payraise, he decided to stay on, joining Paratrooper Battalion 261. After his qualifications were met, Leon Kaufmann was deployed to Afghanistan to join the rest of Battalion 261.

2007: February 2007, an IED injured Leon and four other infantry in an attempt to capture an insurgent officer in Northern Afghanistan. Leon and two others survived their injuries, two did not. Pending rehabilitation for the arm and throat injuries he sustained, Leon was Honorably Discharged from the German Military.

2007: After months of rehabilitation, Leon had developed an addiction to painkillers. To make matters worse, the downstairs neighbors were loud, and annoying. One night after a rather brutal drinking binge and a rather large dose of pills, Leon was roused from his drunken slumber to one hell of a sound. Tired, fed up, and in an all around bad mood, Leon grabbed the handgun from the nightstand and went downstairs to give those bastards a piece of his mostly gone mind. The door was open, blood pooled on the floor, mutilated body of a man Leon hated for having a decent life. His wife cowering in the corner, trapped like a rat by some...thing. It was almost an oily black, shimmered ever so slightly, two tails, feet that looked like that of a dog or cat, and the badly deformed face of some horse from hell with a forked tongue. When it turn around, Leon could see it made no attempt to hide its body, as it was obviously male, and an excited one at that. After the split second of observation Kaufmann did what he could do. Fire. Fire until the magazine was empty, and whatever spawn of darkness this damned thing was stopped moving. The woman in the corner passed out from the shear shock. Hell, Leon might have to if he wasn't fucked out of his mind on pills and booze.

The men that showed up at the door hours later weren't cops. They were too smart and knew too much to be cops. But after seeing what Leon could do after a three day bender of hard liquor and a bottle of pills, they were almost happy to offer him a contact shooting other things like this. Of course, he'd leave everything behind, forget everyone he ever knew, and be flown to New York City within the day. Not like he had much to leave to begin with.

2008: After being brought up to speed on his new employers and that the rabbit hole was in-fact deep as hell. Leon began regularly partaking in killsquad hunts for things that go bump in the night, some quiet infiltrations, others all out raids and assaults. Demons, ghouls, zombies, shit they didn't have names for. But the money was exceptional, and thats all that mattered. At the end of the day, everything is powered by human greed.

2011: After two years and a short extension on his contract Leon Kaufmann was in essence a free man. Atleast in the physical sense, you don't really get over the shit that nightmares were made of easily. Turns out there were many freelance opportunities for crazy bastards with nothing to lose, all fighting shit that would've been in a fantasy book. Armed with new skills, and knowledge of the secret world. Leon wants to fill his wallet again.