Skeeter

**Skeeter** is a suppporting character in *Night at the Gates of Hell*.

## Description

### Appearance

Skeeter is a middle-aged Caucasian man with greying black hair in a flattop. He wears an olive t-shirt, woodland camo pants and light brown shoes. His face is constantly winced and his eyes are permanently squinting.

### Personality

Skeeter is a cynical, world-weary man, broken by his terrible experiences in the war and the recent death of his dear wife Martha, whom he loved above all else. He blames himself for failing to react in time to possibly save her and has been dealing with suicidal thoughts since, but Skeeter hopes that he can redeem himself by stepping up for the well-being of his fellow survivors and desires to go out a heroic death while saving others to make up for his mistakes in life.

### History

As a young man, Skeeter was drafted into an unspecified branch of the United States military to serve in a war, likely the Korean War (1950-1953), considering Skeeter's age, relatively short length, and the conscription effort. For this, he became shunned by everyone in his hometown except his girlfriend Martha, who stood up for Skeeter, at the cost of losing her place in the community as well. After the end of the conflict, Skeeter returned to the U.S. and continued dating her, eventually getting married. At some point, Skeeter made a promise to Martha that he would never touch a gun again in his life. Although Skeeter considers himself irreligious, he is agnostic about the existence of an afterlife and feels that he would rather take his chances atoning for his perceived sins on the off-chance that he would go to Hell and thus be separated from his beloved wife forever.

When the zombies invasion began, Skeeter and Martha managed to survive the first few weeks. Two days prior to being found by the events of the third act of the game, Martha was killed by zombies. Although he has since been in a depressed phase of grief due to his belief that he "froze up" in her time of need, hoping to do his wife proud, he set out to be of use to other survivors and joined forces with the Captain in the Coastal Village. Later, the pair were joined in their safehouse by Stan, Belinda, and Charles, after which they are trapped in the shack by a horde of Monk Zombies.

## *Night at the Gates of Hell*

### Coastal Village

After some time, David arrives and kills the sieging zombies. Skeeter tells David that he can't provide any assistance combat in combat due to the vow he made to his wife, but assures him that he will protect the group with his life nonetheless.

### Cap's Boat

On the boat, Skeeter takes note that the Captain lacks basic knowledge of seafaring, correcting him with ease as he misreads a map when trying to pin down their location. The Captain quickly fesses up to his lies and admits to really being a cabin boy, who can at best only recall that "the sun rises in the west and sets in the east", which, as Skeeter points out, is actually the other way around.

Skeeter is later seen on deck, reminscing about Martha, saying that she gave his life meaning, with her asking for little in return. He goes on to say that his only reason to live is to make things right by dying while sacrificing himself for the greater good, since he thinks that it would ensure that he and his wife would meet again in Heaven. Skeeter then apologizes to David for subjecting him to his woeful tale, joking that it was either that "or another war story".

When the Zombie Shark attacks the ship, most of the group decides to bail and escape in the lifeboat. Skeeter calls out for Stan to join up, but the latter states that someone has to stay behind to distract the shark for the others. Against Skeeter's pleas, Stan goes through with his suicide mission and is last seen being jumped by the enormous sea creature.

### The Island

After washing ashore on the Island, Skeeter is still in shock of seeing Stan readily give his life for the survival of the group and voices his admiration for his bravery, again faulting himself for missing the courage to take Stan's place in dying a hero.

### Imprisoned

Following the group's capture by the Cult, Skeeter is taken to one of the science wing's operation rooms, where a cultist was preparing to perform a dark ritual on him. David rescues him before anything can happen, for which Skeeter gives him a special key he stole from one of the guards as they transported him over. The group escapes to the cult's church with the addition of a naked prisoner.

### Prepare

At the church, as the group discusses the use of the tome David took from the cult's leader, Skeeter notes that it is unusually quiet, or as he puts it "quieter than a mute nun's pussy on Christmas morning". The prisoner scolds him for using profanity in front of Charles, to which Skeeter retorts that he, being completely nude in front of the same boy, has nothing to say about what's appropriate and furthermore questions whether Charles, for all his pecularities, even is a child.

Skeeter, wanting to redeem himself, decides to break his promise to his wife, believing that she would forgive him due to the circumstances, and will defend the church while David attempts to use the tome to revert the opening of Hell's gates. He is armed with a pump action shotgun and dies during the second wave, when he is knocked down by a zombie, which proceeds to tear open Skeeter's abdomen before ripping off his left arm. causing him to die of blood loss.

## Trivia

* On the deck of the boat, a monochrome polaroid depicting several soldiers can be found behind Skeeter. It can be assumed that these are his former squadmates. Interestingly, the back features a message signed by Jo, one of Skeeter's war buddies, who may possibly be Hobo Jo from *Bloodwash*.