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Buford Mack Hudson

Species: Human turned faux-reptile; remains mammalian. Reptile component is an anthro allosaurus Appearance: Green with yellow underbelly. Grey and dark green abstract markings. Body starting to show his age slightly, beginning to get fattier although still muscular. Sex: Male Age: Mid-40's Height: 6ft 2in as a human, 8ft in reptile form Weight: Not given Build: Muscular Siblings: Only child Sexuality: Bisexual, no preference; fairly active sex life but keeps this private Pets: Scarred calico cat named Queen (Buford found her after wild dogs had killed her family and left her for dead), currently aged about 10 years old and found by Buford when he was in his mid-30's; very much loved!

Buford is an assassin from the original work Mortuary. He is big, loud, and proud, and keeps to himself but dotes on his pet cat. Faux-reptiles like him are uncommon but not rare in this universe, with most of the population being human.

Trust & Confidence Baby

For the first months of Buford's life, his parents were both busy and weren't always able to give the time to him that they felt he deserved. With that said, they did the best they could, showering him with affection whenever possible and ensuring that he was safe. They took advantage of childcare opportunities offered by family members and babysitters.

Lacking the time to spend with him one-to-one, and trying to improve Buford's experience of childhood by indulging him, was a valiant effort on their part, but it felt like inconsistent care to him, so he cried a lot and became very sensitive to his intuitions about anything about his circumstances that seemed to be wrong or 'off' in any way. Since babies are hard-wired to be in symbiosis with one person, being handed around kept on breaking that and this was difficult for him as an infant. However, he did not come to harm so as he became a toddler and then a small child, he learned ways to reassure himself that he was, in fact, safe.

Freedom & Self-Determination Toddler

As a result of the symbiotic ruptures Buford experienced as an infant, by the time he reached toddlerhood he was already an old hand at being emotionally self-sufficient, and it came with a distinct "I'm strong and valuable but I'm not so sure about you" slant. This meant that he became self-confident in the sense that he lacked much in the way of self-doubt. As Buford grew up, he made up his own moral code and stuck by it over the years.

Pre-school age Buford's moral code ran as follows: he was quick to forgive the transgressions of people with whom he was stuck (early on this meant his parents, family members and babysitters, while in later years this would include work colleagues), and he held grudges against those who wronged him until they acknowledged their wrong-doing.

Judging others like this was a throw-back to his history of having parents who were often absent.

Avoidance on his parents' part to talking about the negative aspects of life (such as death and loss), and the fact that they never punished him, encouraged his self-belief. His parents felt so reluctant to punish him because they were too busy to spend much time with him and felt guilty about this, and wanted to 'make it up to him'.

Considering that Buford had to assess for himself whether he was able to handle many situations, he quickly overcame any tendency to under, or overestimate himself, often striking a good balance between the two. This came as a result of trial and error, as all skills do, and given Buford's skills at self-reliance he was happy to teach himself in this way. Along with this, Buford also learned to become the loudest person in the room. As a toddler it helped ensure that he would be noticed when he needed anything, however busy others around him were.

Knowing how to get attention by being loud was only part of his 'being noticed' skill-set, and he also became pleasing company. As he grew older he could be an uplifting presence to have around. With that said, Buford could be a hated or loved opponent, and he felt comfortable whether bantering with others or taking them down.

Ambition Young childhood

Buford became a very energetic child. He loved to explore, to ask questions, and to work things out for himself. For him, looking after himself became part of life's adventure.

He liked achieving things, especially since he felt that his achievements were really his. It should also be noted that by this point in his young life it felt to him as if his personal achievements were something he needed to achieve out of necessity, not just fun.

Buford never had particularly grand life ambitions. He wanted to provide for himself (very well, in fact. Being rich appealed to him, but only really for the sake of self-sufficiency). As an adult he would re-evaluate his thoughts regarding this as he came to realise the value of having a loving partner, but by then his life path felt too restrictive so it felt too late for this.

Because of his felt need to sustain himself, he could at times be cruel to the other children. This wasn't out of a desire to be sadistic, but because he felt he didn't have the luxury of being soft with others. To him, the prize either went to him or to the other person, and feeling bad for the loser was pointless. On the other hand, if cooperation achieved his goal of self-sufficiency better, he would cooperate.

Productivity Older childhood

Buford didn't particularly like school, especially in these years of his life when it became more regimented and structured. The assigned seats, standing in lines, enforced silence, and working from worksheets rubbed him up the wrong way, and although he tolerated it, he never really cared for it. Bearing this in mind, as an adult he took to the world of paid employment with much more enthusiasm. With paid work he could choose the career path he wanted - and he chose physical jobs! He also liked to work alone, mainly due to his approach to teamwork.

When Buford was put into groups at school he initially took leadership, and once he did, he would insist that his word was law. Often this didn't work out very well so he went through a period of time figuring out how best to approach the problem of his own need to retain control while working with others. Before long he decided that the best way for him to respond was to be a team player instead and let somebody else lead, and get what he needed out of the group by supporting his leader. Sometimes the task at hand (or outside influences) distract him from this, even in the present day, and he would default to taking leadership, but those of his co-workers whom he trusts help remind him.

At this age when children are busy grappling with the issue of their own capacity to be effective and productive individuals, some feel overwhelmed by the responsibility of this and berate themselves as failures. This became something of a pet hate for Buford. He had a firm belief in his own personal effectiveness, so if he ever heard somebody call themselves 'stupid' it irritated him and he would give a quick, sharp retort.

In the current day, when Buford is in a position to give feedback to others, it can be brutally honest, but he gives it in the spirit of being helpful.

Buford has always been a fan of the 'work hard, play hard' ethic. He particularly likes to hear other people express it, and he attributes it to himself, however what he really does is spend a lot of time around people at work and mistakes length of time spent 'at work' (ie., with colleagues) as working hard. In between hit jobs, he and his friends hang out and be rowdy with each other. This is certainly helpful for networking purposes but is not completely necessary given Buford's line of work.

With that said, Buford is not work-shy and was an especially hard worker when he was younger. He has simply learned the value of taking time off and not having regrets about work. For him, the practical upshot of this involves working hard to get the job done, and making sure he gets (and enjoys) his downtime.

Buford does however feel a compulsive need to party and attend social events in order to be active. Given the extreme requirements of his job, this gives him an opportunity to decompress and re-connect with a more 'normal' life. Buford's job is also, by it's nature, quite isolated so he feels a need to take any chance he can to socialise, despite his lack of a tendency to develop particularly deep relationships.

Child to Adult Transition Adolescence

Buford never lost the feeling that his personal achievements were very important. This wasn't in the sense of being arrogant; quite the opposite. Buford feels that doing is more important than being, so when he achieves one of his goals he immediately starts seeking out his next goal without celebrating the one he has just completed. His friends taught him to at least be aware of this, however he has not taken the lesson to heart, instead performing the role of somebody who is celebrating his achievements out of a sense of duty to them. However, this is more of a problem with 'doing' achievements. When he meets a goal with a tangible reward such as a new car or a raise, he is more able to celebrate these.

As he grew into adulthood and rescued his cat, Queen, he learned a little more about celebrating action in the same way as he does material gain: he considers saving her from the wild dogs that attacked her family is the only true victory of his life, and he celebrates that every day by enjoying his time with her.

Queen gets a lot of toys and play-time. Buford's job may be grim and tough, but his play-time with his cat is unashamedly sweet. Queen gets treated to his 'baby' voice, and, although he is not rude to guests, will still prioritise Queen's comfort over theirs.

An older couple watches over Queen when he is away.

As a teenager, Buford was a little more isolated than most teenagers. He had a few friends, but social cohesion wasn't the most important thing to him. This meant that he didn't have a strongly-defined in-group, nor did he particularly care about any out-group. To Buford, Buford's social group was Buford.

In a similar vein to this, Buford never had any role models either.

His relationship with his father lacked a certain parental quality. Instead, Buford's father was more like a very good friend to him. Although Buford resented his parents for the lack of time they devoted to him, he forgave them once he had lived as an independent adult for a while, as he came to recognise that they had little choice. Buford does take his father's advice to heart, but only if it fits with his own point of view. His father always supported his desire to change into a dinosaur, although he was never particularly invested either way. He chatted with Buford about it a lot prior to the procedure, but did not contradict Buford's wishes as he believed that this would be a waste of breath since Buford had made up his mind.

During his childhood Buford had developed an interest in true crime, which became one of his favourite genres. This was due to a murder that had recently taken place around twenty minutes' travel from Buford's childhood home.

The murder, committed by a young man who killed his cousin in order to get into their grandma's will, was a one-off in Buford's community. However, it became a common topic of conversation and this led Buford to consider some deep questions: what was the worth of a human life? When was it acceptable to kill a person? He researched everything he could about the murder and became obsessed with motives and methods of murder as he dug deeper.

His parents avoided talking about death - either the murder or death in general - .and to the current day Buford has never had to attend a funeral for anybody he is particularly close to.

Later, but still prior to his medical treatment, Buford's opinion about murder twisted alarmingly. He came to believe that corrupt, powerful individuals should be killed. When he began to work as an assassin, he came to enjoy the kill, either from the satisfaction of a job completed, or as part of a power rush. He has never believed that a person should be killed as a result of a socially-unacceptable problem such as mental health disorders or addiction to substances, however he will not allow morality to stop him from completing a job.

As Buford grew, he became a tall and strong young man. Given this, and his preference for physical activity rather than academia, he assumed that his career would involve mainly work that drew on his strength. At around this time Buford heard about genetic modification which could make him bigger and stronger still, and once he became aware of this he wanted it. He eventually managed to get this treatment when he was in his mid-20's.

Closeness in Relationships Young adulthood

Genetic One psychologically profiled Buford prior to his medical treatment, and subsequently passed this information on to Mortuary, having found him a good candidate to approach with an opening for the role of assassin.

Among his strength as a potential hit-man was his self-belief. Many people are crippled by self-doubt but Buford demonstrated that he was not one of them. He also considered 'providing for himself/building his nest-egg' to be his primary life goal, and this goal had no set end point which meant that in theory he would never stop aiming towards this goal. Since his life goal was so open-ended they hypothesized that he could be persuaded to take 'just one more job' as many times as Mortuary saw fit.

He also avoided truly deep, intimate interpersonal contact with others, instead substituting intimacy with persecutory mind-games such as his preference for banter, his anger at the Jerry Springer drama of the week. Genetic One believed that as he aged he would only become more set in his ways and continue to persecute and self-isolate, which would make him easier for Mortuary to control.

His basic "I'm right; you're wrong" position was also considered an angle worth exploiting, as they believed they could prompt him to escalate this enough to be capable of murder. They were right.

Buford continued to dream of having a genetic modification treatment to augment his size and strength. He mentioned it to his friends and justified it by saying that it would help him with his work, but the truth was he loved the idea in and of itself. It is worth noting that Buford's liking for rationality and logic meant that he didn't feel he could simply say, "I like the idea of having this done to myself" and for that to be enough: he felt he had to justify it logically. This is a side-effect of growing up feeling that one needs to prove one's worthiness to others.

His passion for this modification prompted him to investigate how to make it happen. Buford discovered an organisation called Genetic One who could make his dream come true. He took out several loans to get this treatment done.

Buford imagined that he would enjoy the procedure more than he did, that it would be like 'Santa' coming. As it was, the doctors treated him as just another patient, so although this was essentially a treat for him (albeit a very big one), it all felt more like a medical procedure than an event where he was given the thing he had most wanted.

With that said, although he thinks of this on occasion, he considers the event a positive one overall.

Buford's medical treatment landed him in a huge amount of debt. Once the honeymoon phase had worn off he realised that he would need to work two jobs to have any hope of ever being debt-free again. He had been vaguely aware that he would be in debt after his treatment, however the reality of the situation came to weigh on him a great deal.

When Buford was 27, he was contacted by a company unofficially known as "Mortuary". This company, he later learned, was closely affiliated with Genetic One and routinely contacted Genetic One's previous customers with a view to hiring. In particular, it hired assassins. However, when they first established contact with him they seemed to be solving the new problem of his debts.

Mortuary offered Buford a job which included many benefits that sounded tempting to him, including clearing any debts away, repayment of the costs of any genetic treatment undertaken, a 401k plan, paid vacations, classy meals, on-site vet care, and more. Their slogan was, "We say when you retire, but you get to say where!" which didn't sound too bad a deal to Buford not at all - after all, surely they would only use him for as long as he was capable of the work they asked him to do. Buford rushed to sign a contract with Mortuary.

He only realised his mistake after this, by which time he understood that the only way out of the contract was via death. Buford hates feeling trapped. Similarly, Mortuary became aware that they were holding a hot potato. However despite the secretive nature of the business they feel it prudent to keep him on their staff roll.

Buford has engaged his usual positive outlook to this as far as he can. Although being unable to leave bothers him greatly, he is one of many people in the same situation. Other employees of Mortuary feel the same way and this is of some comfort to him as he knows he isn't alone. His contractual obligations state that he is forbidden from speaking about this so he has not discussed this with anybody.

He doesn't see his colleagues much outside of gatherings. The nature of the role of assassin means that individuals have to try quite hard to be able to schedule arrangements to meet. Friendships between assassins are allowed by Mortuary and are even welcomed; it is simply understood that making connections is hard.

Buford is able to speak with his trainee, Nicholas, occasionally. They don't speak about deep moral issues but can talk over a particularly awful job or other situations nasty enough to get under their skins. Nicholas would drop anything for Buford, however Buford, in his usual style, continues to convince himself that Nicholas is young and busy with other things so gives him space, believing that he will disturb him unnecessarily otherwise.

Buford also has a connection with Rayroi, a client and good friend. Both of them recognised big reserves of energy in the other so they clicked right from the beginning. Rayroi however, is more empathetic than Buford. Once again however, their schedules rarely match up so they usually connect by telephone, messages, and social media posts (although neither feels particularly comfortable with social media). Despite the effort it takes, both consider the relationship worth working on so both devote time and energy to this.

Aside from this, Buford is friends with Macy. Macy is a receptionist at Mortuary, a woman who has always liked chickens and asked to be transformed into a hen by Mortuary, who used to be an assassin herself. She is in her mid-fifties, mothers Buford and everyone else, but sometimes unwittingly irritates Buford by being too directive and controlling. She is almost always right and Buford grudgingly respects her for it.

Other connections that Buford has within his line of work are the contacts he occasionally sees working for Mortuary's cover businesses. These can be funeral parlours, hotels, and any other resource Mortuary needs.

A side effect of all of this is that Buford can no longer tolerate any work in the true crime genre, as it reminds him of his situation and leaves him feeling paranoid.

Perhaps understandably for an assassin, Buford tends to be the third wheel at events as it is in his interests (and more so in Mortuary's) to avoid being emotionally close to anybody else, lest he say something he shouldn't. Instead, Buford is known for turning up to parties and doing his own thing a lot. Often he will leave parties early to do this (although only socially acceptably so, as he wants to continue being invited). He usually leaves with a few close(ish) friends and cool people, and they go and do something else. Failing this, he will often go home to his cat.

Another way he tends to filter out emotional connection is by only listening to people he deems 'voices of reason'. As such, this allows him to discount emotional connection as irrational if he particularly needs to at any time.

However, Buford is not entirely without emotional connections in his life. Queen, his calico cat, is his treasured companion, and part of the reason for his affection towards Queen is that she is unusual in being a presence he can trust. After all, animals cannot gossip and put his contract at risk. It is also true that having a pet as a primary companion like this means that he communicates with her on a level that works for her, so in effect he suppresses his short-term wants, fears, dreams, and anything else too personal. Looking after Queen's needs helps distract him from his need to attend to his own.

It should also be said that as much as Buford enjoys having Queen around, he doesn't collect pets. Instead he keeps just one cat at a time - currently Queen - and has quietly decided that dogs are not his companion of choice. He doesn't hate them, he just cannot envision himself having one as a pet.

Buford connects with others on a relatively low level of intensity. He could talk for hours about relatively meaningless subjects about which much can be said (ie., politics, TV, maybe sport, etc.). He will also inject some intensity into this by getting angry at the Jerry Springer Show and similar fare, which provides him with a harmless outlet for feeling strongly emotionally involved with other people.

Despite his tendency towards self-isolation Buford does have friends. Those who know him recognise him as stubborn, loyal, determined to learn and change at his own pace, and accepting of others' need to change at theirs. Those who don't know him tend to see him as big, loud, and intimidating. Buford also swears a lot, including out in public, and this can be confused with anger. People he knows but who don't like him tend to describe him as on edge around them and very territorial of his space. Buford also responds very quickly to threats, however minor they may be.

As far as his colleagues go, he has a great deal of respect for them as he understands what they have been through. Whether he likes them on a personal level is an entirely different matter.

Overall Buford gets along best with people who don't tell him what to do, and is supportive of those who are socially awkward. Previous quotes from him include, "I love awkward people!" and "No no, I see what you were trying to say!"

Aside from his approach to intimacy with others, Buford also grounds himself with a routine of mowing his lawn every Sunday, or make sure that somebody else does it.

Buford has a long-standing rivalry with a target named Abner. Abner is a demi-god who fashions himself to look like a fairly regular anthro but cannot die. This assassination contract is therefore is something of a fool's errand for Buford. Abner was an old god of hunting and uses this to evade Buford. Abner's presence in Buford's life is intermittent, and Buford just wants this contract to be over.

Buford and Abner have more than just an adversarial history. They found themselves near a tornado once and had to shelter, along with several other people. While sheltering they developed feelings for one another and decided to work together to help the other victims, with both wanting to do this out a sense of it being the right thing to do.

Buford also has a fairly active sex life so he does, on occasion, have night-time companions at his home. These also offer some much-needed connection. However, these are invariably one-nighters or flings with a short use-by date. When he was younger his partners often tried to change him, but when this happened he would drop the relationship. The closest Buford has to intimacy is with Abner, who seems to understand him better than anybody else.

Passing on Responsibility Middle age

Buford has always taken pride in a job well done, and for him, his job is a way of being good at something, along with being his way of getting paid, which in itself is the essence of self-sufficiency, which Buford values in himself. He currently has no plans to move on from his current job, partly because his contract means it isn't an option, but as he grows older will begin to like doing the occasional spot of lower-intensity work.

It is likely that in the fullness of time he will, in fact, retire, and when he does he will take less dangerous work, including running seminar-type events for younger assassins.

He has one other source of social connection, and like his other sources it is somewhat indirect. Buford himself is a seasoned hit-man, and he sometimes sees new recruits who have been acquired by Mortuary. When he does, he sees them as precious, pure children (even though they are young adults).

However, mentorship is a requirement of his job so he does this. He understands that his natural position of 'my word is law' doesn't mesh well with everyone and hands off rookies to someone else if he believes they are a bad fit. He is extremely picky but will always have somebody under his proverbial wing if needed.

He also has a respect for the new recruits' emotional needs. While he is not nurturative by nature, he believes that new assassins have enough to cope with so avoids making their lives any more difficult than it already is. He knows he can come across as scary so he downplays this as much as possible.

End of Life Old age

Buford has an unusual relationship with death, given that his is an assassin. He has been the reaper for so many other people that the idea of his own death is a role reversal of sorts.

His attitude towards his own death is quite simple: when it's time to die, it's time to die. He fears the state of not existing any more, however like with so many other issues in his life he believes he has relinquished the right to feel anything about this. With death, he has forced others to take the plunge, so as far as he is concerned, it would be hypocritical to fear it himself. Until that day comes, he is content to continue living life as he pleases and being himself.