Gage Hotrodd

> "The first time, I thought it was going to be over and I’d die, but I guess I wasn’t out long, because I came to in the same chair, and I just couldn’t figure... how I’d survived. Why I’d survived.”
>
>

## Gage Hotrodd

* Toxic Turnabout
* Curdled Turnabout

### Appears In

The Toxic Turnabout, The Curdled Turnabout

### Occupation

HVAC technician, employee at Pennan, Inc., thug, mechanic

## Biological Information

### Family

Axel Hotrodd (brother), an unnamed father, an unnamed mother (deceased)

Gage Hotrodd is a non-player character in The Toxic Turnabout and The Curdled Turnabout. He likes cars and girls, and works for some period of time as a "goonie" for the antagonists. Of the NPCs, Gage goes through significant character growth, and ends up risking his life for the party.

## Pre- AA Dnd Canon

Gage Hotrodd is the child of an alcoholic father, and a mother who ended her own life because of what his father "did to her". His younger brother, Axel Hotrodd, got held back in school at some point, presumably for his low intelligence. Gage is fiercely protective of Axel.

## The Toxic Turnabout

### At Pennan, Inc.

Gage Hotrodd was an employee at Pennan, Inc., the stationary store in Cherry Mall, for some period of time. It is unclear when, or exactly how, but he got caught up in Mr. Pennan's larger, shady dealings, and ended up working as a hired thug as well. In the first session, Mr. Pennan threatens Axel, and Gage punches him in the face. Detective Gumshoe witnesses the fight, and drags them apart, and ends up picking up Gage's work ID, which he later uses to get them into the store.

### Confession and torture

At some point, Gage and a co-worker, Henry Schmann, are hired to kidnap one of the party members, and use them as bait for the others. This plan goes south when they run into Shelly de Killer, and when he sees his brother's girlfriend, Viper Hypnalis, among the group he's tracking. He stays and talks with them, and under assurance from Calisto Yew that she will defend him in court no matter what he's done, he tells them what he knows about who hired him. He falls deeply and immediately in love with Calisto's kind and calming nature, and trusts her quickly.

However, he is shortly removed from the jail, and taken to the Hiel-Yu Hospital by the higher-ups at Pennan, Inc., who torture him via electric chair, as a punishment to himself and Yew for selling them out. He is then removed from the building and left in the alleyway, where Calisto stumbles across his nearly-dead body. He begs her for a kiss, which she refuses, and although she calls an ambulance for him before she leaves, he manages to run away and end up at one of his friend's houses.

### Rescue

At his friend's house, Gage attempts to take his own life by drowning himself in the bathtub, but his friend finds him and saves his life. He's then put on a drug for the pain, and set up in a spare bedroom. While he is unconscious, he remembers more clearly plans that were made in front of him, during his time at the "hospital", and he wake up with a new determination to save Calisto and the rest of the party.

He makes it to the basement of Pennan, Inc., later than the rest of the group does, and finds them in Casper Python's office, where he expected them, about to be killed by Python himself. He screams at the man to stop, insisting that Calisto owes him a kiss before she dies. Calisto plays along, and he instructs her to scream loudly. He pretends to stab her in the stomach, covering her in fake blood, and Python grows faint, allowing the party to escape.

However, when they make it to the lower level of the area, Gage realizes that they're still trapped, and opens up the panels to two maintenance elevators and the duct system. Viper is the only one small enough to escape through the air ducts, and there is only room for four people in the maintenance elevators, so although Connie Icheon, Dick Gumshoe, Phoenix Wright, and Miles Edgeworth begin their escape, he and Calisto are left behind. There, he and Calisto share a heart to heart where they open up about their pasts, and he apologizes for objectifying her, thinking they might be about to die, but their lives are saved in time.

Gage gives Calisto his phone number, which she calls early the next morning as she leaves for the place she grew up, never to be seen again. He thanks her for the moment they shared, and then she is gone.

## The Curdled Turnabout

During The Curdled Turnabout, Gage is seen, still scarred, but working, as a mechanic who attempts to fix Stilton Heard's truck. However, Stilton kicks him out when it becomes clear that he won't be able to fix it in time for Stilton to escape the rest of the party.