Tatum Fowler - Concept Art 2023

PREY DRIVE

Prey Drive is a personal project still actively being worked on. It's a gothic-horror, gaslamp-fantasy labor of love that I'm excited to share!

The year is 1888. The Black Death never left- it merely went into hiding until people had a chance to forget about it. And while it hid, it changed. Now, the plague rises again, but it does not just kill: it changes. It mutates those infected into terrible, ruinous creatures, as if seeking revenge on humanity for beating it back the first time.

This method proved much more effective. The new plague spread across the world, rapidly mutating into different strains to adapt to different regions.

So the world came together, establishing uneasy peace long enough to create the first Royal Undercollege in London, England. The Royal Undercollege was founded to train the next generations of Plague Doctors: specialized hunters-slash-medical-professionals who dedicated their lives to protecting and aiding others against the Plague.

PLAGUE BEASTS

The plague first presented itself in two unique strains: loimotera lycanthropa and loimosanguia vampirifica.

Loimosanguia vampirifica was the first strain to surface. While no one knows its direct cause or origin, it is known to spread through blood and other bodily fluids. Once the infected substance enters the body, a fever is quick to follow. Once the fever breaks, the infected are swiftly overtaken by its other, more brutal effects. The skin turns pale and sallow and great amounts of weight are lost. Hunger overtakes them that can only be sated by human blood. Their eyes go bloodshot, and the telltale mark of infection develops: bright yellow irises. Once the infected reach this state, they are officially marked a vampire. The disease has a psychological impact as well, turning the infected into cruel, sociopathic creatures, or perhaps bringing out the innate cruelty that dwelled within.

Loimotera lycanthropa surfaced not long after, and was much more of a direct problem. It is transferred similarly to vampirism, but the disease may lie dormant for days, or even weeks. It incubates until the full moon, and then compels the infected to go out into the moonlight so the grisly transformation may take place. Those infected with lycanthropy turn into wolf-like monstrosities with bulkier muscles, dense bones, and sharp claws and teeth. They become superhuman in strength and speed, but lose their sense of self entirely and become slavering beasts. This transformation is permanent and lasts until the infected is euthanized. The most common method of infection is a bite from another infected.

Fledgling vampires can blend in somewhat easily with the regular populace. As they age past the confines of normal human aging, however, their bodies begin undergoing more drastic transformations.

A notorious known vampire is a woman known only as The Baroness, who has been a member of the nobility for over four hundred years. She has been cultivating her bloodline’s strain of Loimosanguia for generations, sacrificing those she deems close to perfect and injecting herself with their blood to replace hers. This “perfected” disease has given her extreme amounts of control over her body’s regenerative capability, to the point where she is able to fuse other peoples’ body parts into her own body. She pursues physical perfection while also creating macabre art with her own body. She keeps lycanthropes and other creatures, harvesting their body parts to add to herself.

Loimosanguia tsuchigumae are infected by a branch strain of Loimosanguia native to Japan. Vile spider-like bastardizations of the human body, they feed on the internal organs and fluids of their prey and subsume the limbs of corpses into their own form to grow in strength. Desiccated bodies haphazardly discarded are signs one is near.

PLAGUE DOCTORS

Where there are beasts, there must be brave souls to fight them back. Those brave souls are Plague Doctors, who can begin training as young as nine years old. The education/training lasts five years, after which one is christened as a Plague Doctor and may begin actively working in the field.

There are a few branches that Plague Doctors may specialize in, chosen after their fourth year. Each specialization has a unique symbolic mask that pays homage to the bird-beaked masks of the original physicians of the Black Plague that doctors are required to wear when operating on official business to indicate their status.

Plague Doctors are trained in a very harsh, rigid way. Their main strength is the Ritual of Inoculation, which has each student slowly introduce the disease into their bodies in a very strict, controlled way. Over the course of five years, they work to build tolerance towards the diseases and exert mastery over them through mystic and scientific means.

This leads to the Rite of Initiation: the full force of the plague strains are introduced into their bodies. If they can overcome it and keep it under control, they graduate and become plague doctors. If either plague gets the better of them, they are euthanized. Aside from the mask, the fastest way to spot a plague doctor is to look at their eyes: each doctor has one golden eye, a sign that they’ve encountered and overcome the plague and are qualified to treat it.

CYRIL HAWTHORNE

A genius from a long line of Plague Doctors. He fled the Undercollege to save his partner, who failed the Rite of Initiation and succumbed to the plague. He uses a prosthetic arm he crafted himself to continue hunting plague beasts as a “private practitioner”.

REHEMA MASIH

A kind, motherly figure who became a Plague Doctor to protect her village. She works to spread education and awareness, defend vulnerable members of society, and work on both preventative and palliative care. When pushed to violence, however, she will be one of the first to jump into the fray when the defenseless are in danger.

CON

An old friend of Cyril’s and a rowdy pit boxer. They use shotgun gauntlets designed by him. They became a plague doctor to escape life in prison but doesn't exactly follow their rules. They're considered a liability to be deployed as a last resort due to the sheer amount of collateral damage they cause. But if you want something killed quick and dirty, they're the one to call.

OTHER WORK

Included below are various portfolio pieces unrelated to Prey Drive. Thanks so much for viewing!