Damien Cates (Earth-6161)

* Bedlam
* Unmasked

The Lethal Protector, The Shadow of Midtown, Supreme Clientele, The Comeback King

**Nicknames**
Dame, Damey, Dami, Morgan, Edward Kenway, Lil Dame, Adderall Admiral, morpheus., The Void Knight

**Editorial Names**
Bedlam: The Lethal Protector, The Shriek-Inducing Bedlam, The Savage Bedlam

**Given Titles**
Void Knight, The Wielder of The Oculusblade, The Would-Be Prince of The Void, The Black Sheep of The McFarlane's

## Affiliations & Relationships

### Relatives

Enzo Cates (father, alive)
Mylene Nash (mother, alive)
Lamar Nash (brother, alive)
Ilene McFarlane (adoptive grandmother, deceased)
Adam McFarlane (adoptive father, alive)
Mia West-McFarlane (adoptive mother, alive)
Lexi McFarlane (adoptive sister, alive)
Bedlam (Symbiotic Relationship)

### Companions

**Lovers**
Jazz Carter (girlfriend)
Imani Cruz (ex-girlfriend)

**Friends**
Marshall Lamont
Milo Jones
Kendrick Hays
Tarantula
Matthew Specter

### Affiliations

**As Damien Cates**
Dynamics Communications
Lauder University
Exhibition; formerly
St. Jude's; formerly

**As Bedlam**
Bruiser Brigade
The Neighbourhood (unofficially)

## Physical Information

### Height

5'6"
Variable (As Bedlam)

### Weight

175 lbs
Variable (As Bedlam)

## Origin & Living Status

### Origin

Bonded with a symbiote during an Arasaka science demonstration.

### Causing of Death

Killed by King Crimson's time travel device.

### Birthplace

Lincoln Free Clinic, West Las Vegas, Las Vegas, Nevada

## Personal Information

### Education

High school diploma
Some college courses

### Base of Operations

Brooklyn, New York City formerly; Detroit, Michigan; Las Vegas, Nevada

## Creators & Appearances

### Creator(s)

Morpheus

The black sheep of The McFarlane Family, **Damien Cates** is more well-known as The Intimidating, Shriek-Inducing, Lethal Protector, **Bedlam**. Born to two drug addicts in a free medical clinic in Las Vegas, Damien was named and immediately placed into foster care as his parents deserted him for drugs. He bounced between foster homes, living on the street, and racking up a criminal record by being affiliated with gangs until he was adopted by **Mia** and **Adam McFarlane** shortly after his thirteenth birthday, much to the dismay of their daughter, **Lexi McFarlane**. However, the two would eventually find themselves forced into a closeness as they attended an Arasaka Corp demonstration that went array and Damien became unwillingly bonded to an alien symbiote - later nicknamed **Bedlam** - while Lexi was gifted spider-like abilities. Lexi would become the hero, Widow, while Damien refused to use the symbiote.

Fate would have other plans as Damien was forced to become **Bedlam** after Lexi was injured fighting Hydro-Man in The Bronx. Primarily operating either as part of the team, **Bruiser Brigade**, or alone, Damien's life became much more difficult to traverse as he began to generate his own rogue's gallery. Villains such as **Dr. Octagon**, Calypso, Mr. Rager, Abstract, Phantom Menace, Overdrive, and chief among them, **King Crimson**. Regardless, Damien managed to get into Lauder University on an academic scholarship where he further balanced his life between Bedlam and college.

Recently, after gaining knowledge about Bedlam - him being a "Void Knight" - and something called The Void Hive, Damien got offered an internship at Dynamics Communications. He began to use Dynamics's resources to hack into criminal syndicates but this unfortunately resulted in Overdrive's return. Upon his defeat, Damien discovered that the CEO of Dynamics Communications - Levi Kessler - was bonded to a Void Knight named Solace. The two fought which resulted in Damien - using Bedlam - killing Solace and spared Levi's life. The CFO of Dynamics - Valerie St. Lauren - became the new CEO and actually began to *pay* Damien for his internship. However, it was here that Bedlam revealed that he remembered the name of his creator and it was only one word. **Cascade**.

## **History**

**Expand**

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### **Early Life**

Damien Edward Cates was born in the neighborhood of West Vegas at Lincoln Free Clinic to two drug-addicted parents, Mylene Nash, and Enzo Cates. At the end of his birth, his parents left the next day without notice or naming him and abandoned their child in order to find more drugs. Alone, a nurse took pity on the baby and named him, taking the maiden name of his mother and the middle and last name of his father. From here, she placed him into foster care, specifically at St. Jude's in Winchester. He was told - much later - that he was a perfect baby, never cried or fussed. However, as Damien aged, so did his darker inclinations. He would steal from people who came to St. Jude's, smoke weed, and oftentimes leave past curfew to hang out with the neighborhood boys by the time he was roughly twelve.

During one of these nightly rituals, Damien would rob an individual - Demo - who was gang affiliated. They found Damien two days later and instead of jumping him and getting their stuff back, Demo changed his mind. He instead gave him an ultimatum, either they jump him and he gets his money back or Damien works for Demo and pays off what he stole. Damien was smart, he could have thought of a way out of it but for some reason, he was inclined to agree and did. However, they did jump him in the end because that was the initiation to join the gang, Exhibition. However, Damien showcased a great street fighting skill which Demo would help hone.

### **Wu-Tang Freestyle, Part I: Where Ya Get Ya Coke From?**

Damien left St. Jude's and moved into a crack house where Demo told him to help watch to make sure that nobody stole anything. However, while he was there, Damien had an eye for details and access to a laptop. He created a security system that worked and Demo was happy to use but he had other plans. The security system was solid but Demo believed that Damien needed to do more than just sit on a computer all day so he took him for a drive. From Winchester, they ended up in Enterprise where Demo explained the situation to him. A rival crew, Northmob, was trying to move in on their corners but to keep Exhibition's customers, they were stealing their drops and posing as if they work for Demo which is why they were in enterprise.

## **Personalities**

Damien is a dark character. Everything within him, everything wants him to do good. To be good. To rise to the idea of being a hero and save people from evil-doers. However, this isn't the reality that Damien lives in. He prances around with Bedlam and tries to be good and save people but he falls short whenever he savagely beats a criminal and his costume scares innocent people. A costume that Damien has the power to change but upon bonding with Bedlam, this was the costume that his mind projected. A snarling, long-tongued, sharp-teethed monster that is something out of nightmares because that's how Damien sees himself and that is how Bedlam sees itself. They see themselves as monsters, given incredible opportunities. For Damien, he was adopted by a rich white family that wants nothing more than to give him the future he, otherwise, wouldn't have had and gained a sister who cares and loves him. For Bedlam, he has been bestowed the perfect host and achieved perfected symbiosis and gained a brother through it, one who cares and loves him. But in the end, their downward spiral wins.

Damien had a hard life growing up, oftentimes spending it performing illegal actions. And as every -ologist will certainly note, Damien had no strong male or female figure in his life. He was surrounded by gang life in a mad city and having no other choice, he joined gangs. Sure, he had a code. He had a belief, he had morals but as every person who was older than him instilled into him, there was nothing above getting paid. Surviving was his primary concern. He fought, shot, robbed, stabbed, and nearly killed people for things as simple as wearing the wrong color. This weighs on him and while yes, Damien became a vigilante to help Lexi, he kept doing it because he feels **guilty**. He feels so guilty in fact that on the day he was adopted, he was performing a drug deal when Adam found him because he missed his appointment to get adopted. Adam never told anyone but he never forgot either. His relationship with his adoptive parents is strained, specifically with Mia as he and Adam are on great terms, as Damien sees Adam as his father and Adam sees him as his son. Mia loves him but conditionally. Mia never wanted to adopt Damien as she saw a hoodlum while Adam saw a chance to give a good, but misguided kid a chance that Adam never had. Damien has heard all the arguments about him, the whispers he gets whenever they go to fancy dinners or parties because of his tattoos and how he dresses. The world is telling him that he is evil and all he wants to be is good. All he wants to be is loved. The two human beings who looks at him for what he is and not for what they believe him to be is Lexi and Ilene. They clashed in the beginning because she couldn't understand why he was adopted but the two grew closer. However, with Ilene, it was an immediate connection as she adored Damien and Damien adored her. The two were closer than most believe as he would spend many nights at her house in Yonkers but when she died, it only fueled his negative feelings. And those two were the only ones of the McFarlane family to accept him. This all resulted in his melancholic, nonchalant mood as he has become jaded by it all. He is indifferent to the pain and the assumptions. It is almost as if Damien has given up and is on the verge of embracing that scum and villainy. More recently, he has described it to Lexi as "I am staring down the downward spiral and waiting to blink".

Bedlam doesn't remember his life or his people. He doesn't remember his life prior to being taken by Arasaka and by extension, his connection to The Void Hive is severed almost wholly. However, all he wants is to be good. As he regains his memories and learns of his life from outside forces, Bedlam is in a similar position as Damien. Solace recounted stories about Bedlam, claiming him to be a wolf in sheep's clothing, that he killed people for the fun of it, and that he had no qualms about being recognized as a good man. The world - much like Damien - is telling Bedlam that he is evil, Solace even stated that Void Knights were created to be a dark force in the galaxy and that their hosts are meant to be used as tools, not partners. Bedlam's spirit was broken by this revelation and his faith in himself was shaken. Something that he has never truly recovered from. However, being bonded to Damien and not having any idea of wanting to take control of him or kill him has led to Bedlam thinking that Solace was wrong. Then Bedlam - by extension, Damien - is called Lethal Protectors by Rebecca Hitchcock and is considered to be the true vigilante out of the Bruiser Brigade and it's hard not to think that destines are set in stone.

Damien and Bedlam have always gotten along together. Bedlam saved Damien's life by bonding to him and Damien saved Bedlam's life by killing Solace. The list goes on and on about their dependency on each other but it is not co-dependency. There have been times when Bedlam will just leave to explore Brooklyn and Damien will just stay at home or vice versa. However, both of them know that when they need each other, they are there. The darker twist, sadly, is that while they both want to be good, they are plagued by visions. Solace explained that it is a by-product of them denying their true nature as conquerors. Initially denying this claim, the two would come to the realization that this is correct. Due to Jade Dragon's mysticism, the two of them saw their greatest fear. They sat atop a blackened throne with The Ebony Oculusblade, melancholic and surrounded by Void Knights as the galaxy burned. It was supposed to be their greatest fear and this is, but Zanzibar’tegore - The leader of The Zinchari - told Alexis that it was a repressed dream, that while they are trying to do good, their repressed darkness produced their vision. As they have become one and the same, that vision was of their own design. **Their own beautiful dark twisted fantasy.**

But the one thing they cannot deny when asked. They **really** enjoy cracking skulls.

## **Attributes**

### **Powers**

**Codex Rolodex**: As mentioned before, Bedlam has an extensive and massively powerful Codex that keeps him alive, stories his memories, and is later discovered to be affected by technology to gain new abilities within logic. This acts as Bedlam's brain and it should be able to house the collective knowledge of The Void Hive. However, whenever Bedlam was marooned near the moon, his connection to The Void Hive became limited and by extension, his memories were lost but have been slowly coming back through his adventures with Damien. The Codex is complex as it contains essentially, the secrets to the galaxy - or what the Void Knight Symbiotes have learned at the very least - and whenever Damien attempted to connect to it, his phone could not handle the amount of data. While it worked on Damien's computer, the problem is - after installing a package manager - that Damien could not find the missing memories to restore them. Regardless, the codex itself is incredibly intuitive and records data faster than anything on Earth as it has to record the data in real-time from Bedlam's visuals.

* **Perfected Void Knight Symbiosis**: The symbiote - dubbed Bedlam by Damien - is not of this native universe. Due to this, it does not function as a native symbiote - Klyntar - operates which grants Damien a litany of abilities based on two factors. The psyche of its host and the creativity of its host. While Bedlam is a sentient creature, it is also a highly-unstable and constantly in-motion liquid-based life-form that is able to change its shape, features, and matter on command from either itself or the user. While Bedlam does not remember its life fully or has a full connection to The Void Hive which would grant Bedlam an extreme amount of knowledge on both itself and the usage of its abilities, Bedlam has showcased significant abilities that extend to Damien as they share the same mind post-bonding. This is further revealed during their fight with Solace who used unknown techniques and morphed in ways that Damien and Bedlam could not, but it is because of this encounter that Bedlam remembered how to create The Oculusblade - more on this later - along with wings. However, it is important to note that while Bedlam has its base abilities, most of the spider-ques abilities come from two distinct abilities that all Void Knight Symbiotes have. In a darker aspect, many individuals who know the true history of Void Knights have commented that Damien and Bedlam have become one and the same, a perfect symbiosis. Only something that is within the myths and legends of the Void Knights as it is unknown how powerful they are. Because the last perfected symbiosis was the creator of the Void Knights, **Cascade**.
* **Mimicry/Monkey See, Monkey Do**: The baseline for all Void Knight symbiotes is mimicry - dubbed Monkey See, Monkey Do by Damien - which is powerful in its selectivity. Whereas native symbiotes in this reality can only copy abilities from genetics, Void Knight Symbiotes can copy abilities from visualization. The problem is, it can only copy abilities that the actual symbiote could perform. Meaning that if Bedlam saw someone use optic blasts, the symbiote could not replicate that because it does not have the capacity for such destruction nor the energy output to do so. However, if it is an ability that they see but feasibly, they cannot create but is still within the realm of logic, the symbiote will supplement the "conventional" version of this with something else to achieve the same effect. Two examples of this are Lexi's web shooters. While Bedlam could not generate webbing natively, Damien gained the idea of adhesive chains, which supplement webs for chains. The second example is whenever Bedlam saw that Solace was escaping by using a helicopter. The symbiote cannot levitate but in response, it generates wings to achieve the same effect. According to Bedlam, all mimicked abilities are inside of his "heart" which is known as the Codex and Bedlam can manipulate the Codex to remove or add abilities on command. This was shown during their first fight with Overdrive - more on this later - and the Codex acts as his memory bank as well. This allows Bedlam to retrieve erased abilities from his memories, however, he has to **remember** the ability to retrieve them.
* **Constituent Matter Generation/Manipulation**: As mentioned before, the symbiote can generate more of its liquid-based life form and manipulate it in ways that allow for it to be used in physics-defying ways. The primary of which is the chains which allow Damien to move freely throughout cities and other urban areas. The symbiote uses Damien's stamina to produce these and once he begins to grow tired, the symbiote will begin to use his stamina and even its liquid form which was shown during the fight with his parents. The drawback to this is also shown during that fight as the symbiote was badly injured as a result and mostly depleted, which brought it to near death as it used the last of its liquid form to save Damien's life. Later, this was further explored during the Solace fight as Damien was able to recreate The Oculusblade and produce wings to defeat Solace, however at this point, both Damien and Bedlam had strengthened their bond with time which allowed for them to exert themselves for numerous hours at full power before feeling drained. Interestingly, the first thing that Bedlam and Damien discovered was that Bedlam can clothe Damien by essentially becoming his clothing.
	+ **Constituent Matter Weapon Creation**: Damien has shown - as mentioned above - to create weapons from the symbiote's matter generation ability. This ability is not honed but it is incredibly useful as he has been able to create The Ebony Oculusblade which is a legendary item from the creator of Void Knight Symbiotes, Cascade. However, Bedlam has stated that since it remembers how to make The Oculusblade, it can generate other items. This was showcased whenever Damien threw a trident at Akria. While this ability is nice, Damien enjoys using the sword as it gives him a reason to learn how to use it.
* **Symbiotic Connection**: Referenced prior, Bedlam and Damien are connected through their symbiotic relationship, both mentally and emotionally. This allows for Bedlam to know what Damien wants to do before he does it and vice versa, this grants a nearly perfect symbiosis between the two. Both Damien and Bedlam can fight in sync without overlap as they both equally control the body they are in and this gifts Damien essentially a backseat driver who gives tips and fighting advice. For Bedlam, this gifts a host who is willing to take a backseat if Bedlam offers up a better solution, giving both equal opportunities to fight at the same time simultaneously. This was shown to great effect during Damien's battle with Solace as Bedlam and Damien detached from one another and Solace fought Bedlam while Damien fought Levi, however, Damien's bond was stronger as he still heard Bedlam in his mind and vice versa while Levi was completely cut-off from Solace. Another side effect of this is the appearance of Bedlam itself. After bonding with Damien and eyeing Lexi over time as Damien helped her, Bedlam developed a sense of style from her Widow costume and the physic of Damien's favorite basketball players (ie. Shaquille O'Neal and others). With these combined and whenever Damien finally summoned the suit, Bedlam became an amalgam of all of Damien's likes which is why Bedlam is bulkier but slim and the mouth came from Damien's dislike of how Lexi would sound muffled.
* **Native ESP**: Bedlam has a native sixth sense that allows him to be able to detect danger at a 365-degree field of view around both himself and Damien. This allows Bedlam to forcibly move Damien away from coming danger or alert him of dangerous individuals in the area. This is - according to Solace - a base ability for all Void Knights and Mademoiselle stated that all Void Knights are connected to The Void Hive by way of their natural ESP. However, it is important to note that while Bedlam tries his best, this sense is not always accurate and oftentimes - if the danger is severe enough - will harm both Damien and Bedlam. The interesting fact of this, though, is that Bedlam's ESP is more fine-tuned than Lexi's as Bedlam has had it longer.
* **Telepathic/Mind Control Resistance**: Due to the fact that Bedlam is bonded to Damien and they share a connected mind, it is incredibly hard to read the mind of them both for two reasons. The first is that Damien's mind is a literal hellscape. Barring his own personal darkness, his mind has become this because of his bonding with Bedlam who shares similar dark inclinations and this produces a near-constant state of visions of bodies being burned, death, murder, and other senseless acts of violence which would drive less experienced telepaths insane. Sadly, Damien does not realize this. Second, Bedlam's Codex is connected to The Void Hive which is the collective consciousnesses of all Void Knight Symbiotes across all realities, meaning that there is a constant stream of billions of voices inside the mind of Bedlam that he cannot hear. All of these crash together to make their mind very hard to read and even harder to control as it took Jade Dragon's ancient mysticism to even attempt to do so. The only reason why they succumbed was because the vision they showcased appealed to their darker natures.
* **Symbiotic Revitalization**: Having only happened once, Damien died whilst wearing Bedlam. During his first bout with King Crimson, he was killed whenever the two time-traveled to 1885 and Damien did not have the full protection of the suit as he was wearing Bedlam as his street clothes. However, it was here that Bedlam revealed that in the event of Damien's death but not Bedlam's, he will use his constituent matter manipulation to essentially rebuild his body and bring him back to life. This only further connected them for two reasons, the first being that Bedlam revived Damien and the second being that parts of Bedlam became parts of Damien. It does not only extend to reviving him either as Bedlam has used this ability to heal Damien from wounds that otherwise would have been either fatal or inconvenient for both of them. Interestingly enough, Bedlam has stated that because of this, Bedlam keeps Damien young physically to ensure that Damien can continue to use Bedlam and vice versa.

**Mimicked Spider-Physiology**: While not possessing any of the abilities that Zinchari Avatars have, Bedlam was able to simulate them to both great and lesser degrees from just being close to Lexi and having watched her for years. Upon fully discovering the totality of her abilities as she grew closer with Damien - and by extension, Bedlam -, he was able to simulate nearly all of them but missed a few as Lexi has specialized abilities which are not uncommon for Zinchari Avatars but impossible to obtain for Void Knights, leaving Damien with simply her baseline Spider-Physiology abilities. While Damien does not have these on the genetic level as Void Knights cannot affect the genetics of their hosts, Damien has all of these abilities as long as he is bonded to Bedlam. This was shown whenever he fought Levi but did it with his natural athleticism.

* **Superhuman Strength**: Before gaining Bedlam, Damien was an athlete for his high school, specifically playing basketball which allowed him to bench-press 200 lbs but after gaining Bedlam and him watching Lexi, Damien gained an extremely heightened level of strength that rivals that of Lexi. Depending on the situation (ie. emotions), Damien is slightly stronger than Lexi and sometimes Lexi is slightly stronger than Damien but consistently, they are essentially equal.
* **Superhuman Durability**: Bedlam is naturally highly resistant to most forms of damage, being nearly impervious to small knives and small-caliber bullets on account of the symbiote's liquid thickness. He has been able to absorb grenades and have them explode inside of themselves whilst keeping Damien safe, absorbing gunfire from handguns and sniper rifles (barely), and resisting powerful attacks from superhuman villains. However, there are limits and the primary weakness of Void Knight Symbiotes is sonic devices or sounds louder than 140+ decibels.
* **Superhuman Stamina**: As Bedlam hails from space, he can function - along with the host - in the vastness of space along with being able to breathe underwater. Similarly, he is also able to filter out toxic or otherwise hazardous gases which was shown whenever he saved Damien from inhaling The Lenore Equation which granted Lexi her abilities as Bedlam was only able to save one. Bedlam's overall stamina has improved over time as he can produce more adhesive chains than before and exert himself for hours, almost days, on end.
* **Superhuman Speed**: Bedlam is extremely fast for his race. He is physically faster than Solace while he was detached from Damien but when bonded, the duo can keep up with the likes of Lexi and others, in both running and web-slinging.

**Mimicked Technopathy**: Having only been done once and having been agreed upon by both Bedlam and Damien to never do it again, Bedlam mimicked Overdrive's ability to move through the internet with the use of psionics. While it was within the realm of logic because of Bedlam's native ESP, it was extremely painful and incredibly disorienting for both parties involved to perform this action. The mimicry worked as Damien and Bedlam were able to affect the lines of code within the network that Overdrive was in but it slowly began to drive Damien insane as he was affecting spacial reality around him (albeit inside of a computer) and by extension, it slowly drove Bedlam insane as well. After defeating Overdrive using this method, they both refused to do it again. Bedlam even removed the mimicked ability from his codex to ensure they can never do this again. While yes, it was removed, this does not mean that Bedlam could not retrieve the memory to mimic the ability again but they are both very determined to never do that again.

**Bio-Hacked Powers**: As a result of Damien connecting to Bedlam's Codex via technology, he was able to turn the Codex into lines of code that allow him to manipulate it in different ways. While on the surface, this should not be possible, it is only possible because Void Knight Symbiotes are a product of advanced technology and not an evolution from the universe, meaning that they were created, not born. Void Knights do have their own cognitive thoughts and feelings but they are not naturally occurring. With this newfound knowledge and Damien's experience with hacking, he was able to alter Bedlam by giving him abilities that can only work within the confines of what Void Knights have as their base abilities. Meaning that Damien cannot give a Void Knight abilities that are outside the realm of logic for a Void Knight to do otherwise this wouldn't work. Just like how a line of code can crash an entire website, one line of code can take down the entire system that is Bedlam.

* **Blue Lines Daemon**: The first ability that Damien wrote for Bedlam was a daemon known as Blue Lines. This ability works by way of having Bedlam expel itself from Damien and attach itself to a part of an enemy where Bedlam then reaches outward for random large items and then pulls them toward the enemy, slamming them against various different items of debris and equipment. As the enemy is dealing with this, Bedlam returns to Damien during the ensuing chaos and does not bond with the enemy whilst this occurs. While not insanely powerful, it is an effective tool to create a diversion or handle situations that otherwise would be nearly impossible to get out of. A great example of this usage was whenever Damien was surrounded by Steel Serpents and this was used to dispatch an entire group of enemies in one go.
* **Love Lockdown Daemon**: On account of Damien using chains as his main mode of transportation, Damien created a daemon that allows Bedlam to generate a series of chains that will ensnare a target with them. While Damien can just do this normally, the kicker is that the chains that ensnare the target will tighten the more that the target moves because the chain holds a part of Bedlam's consciousness that can act and operate independently of Bedlam but is controlled by him.

### **Abilities**

* **The Cyberpunk Supreme**: While some call him "The Wizard of Machines", Damien rejects this but his skills with a computer cannot be understated. He is a highly gifted coder which started when he was a kid during his tenure at his first foster home. Virtually overnight, Damien had completely changed the home's computer. Initially, Damien did this to get back at another child who was bullying him so he created and implemented a daemon into the machine to record his keystrokes, delivering it directly to the foster home owner's phone to get him in trouble. It was successful and this began his interest in coding. He has gone on to breach firewalls and create viruses to dismantle entire subsystems. His biggest feat is when he shut down Overdrive - a metaphysical living virus - from within his programming which was thought to be impossible as Overdrive had control of the local network at Dynamics. His second feat was rebuilding the firewall at Dynamics. While he is nonchalant, it's not overstating it by saying that Damien is a genius when it comes to computer sciences. His skills are even heard from across the multiverse as Damien was known as *The Cyberpunk Supreme* by Evan Edwards of Earth-505 during his time in a coma but he does not remember this. This skill of his has allowed him to create the literal definition of bio-hacking but for Bedlam. Connecting to Bedlam's Codex allowed Damien to convert the ever-moving liquid-based life form into lines of code that give Damien the ability to alter Bedlam without needing to be bonded with him such as implementing a daemon that allows Lexi to monitor the vitals of both Bedlam and Damien whenever she is away from them and also install a daemon known as *Blue Lines* which was mentioned before.
* **Wu-Tang Street Fighter**: Damien has a quote concerning combat. "Get a knife and get a gun, too. Hood motherfuckers don't do kung-fu" which is something that the *entire* McFarlane family dislikes when he says it. However, Damien lives by this. He is what some call the "Ultimate Street Fighter" as he has nearly mastered the art of street fighting because of his years in gang life and living on the streets which has hardened him. His way of fighting is savage and brutal as he uses anything and everything around him to win a fight. Especially now with Bedlam who shares the same sentiment. It doesn't matter if it is a parked car or a school whiteboard, Damien will defeat his opponent with whatever he has at his disposal. This style of fighting led to the news dubbing him "Bedlam, The Lethal Protector" which both Bedlam and Damien love. However, the downside to this is that Damien is incredibly violent which only leads to further situations that have the media label him The Lethal Protector. While this isn't a conventional method of combat, it is a highly lethal and effective one which has been praised by some of the greater fighters such as Jade Dragon, Adam McFarlane, and Jazz Carter. Jade has stated that Damien's street fighting capabilities are incredibly skillful and has admitted that he has gotten the upper-hand because he refuses to fight fair. Jade later expressed that if given time and more combat experience, Damien's fighting style could even rival her own. Jazz dubbed Damien's fighting style as "Wu-Tang Street Fighting" and has even taken personal notes on it to improve her already vast combat capabilities. Adam - who moonlights as Basilisk - even commented on it during one of their sparring sessions that Damien's biggest strength is that he sees the environment, not as a backdrop, but as hundreds of opportunities to harm his opponent which makes him truly a Lethal Protector.
	+ **Sword Fighting**: After Damien and Bedlam conjured The Oculusblade for the first time, they began to use it quite often as it has become synonymous with their visual style. This led to Damien becoming handy with The Oculusblade as it has become his go-to weapon of choice. While not an expert by any means, he is able to hold his own against Jade Dragon but loses whenever she begins to mix her martial arts prowess in with it. However, it is still an impressive feat to go a couple of rounds with Jade using only a blade. Paired with his Wu-Tang Street Fighting, Damien has an interesting mix as Damien will use the Oculusblade to block attacks and dish them out but even use the blade to manipulate the enviroment in ways that allow for him to fight dirtier such as using the Oculusblade to break the ground and use the debris to throw at opponents.
* **Gifted Poet**: Starting when he was a kid, Damien has showcased an impressive ability to write poetry but in the form of rap lyrics. He has filled several notebooks with rhymes that have internal rhyme schemes and lyrical content of the world around him. He has rapped over a couple of songs that Lexi produced but hasn't fully thought about taking it seriously, much to Lexi's outrage. He has - however - assisted in her song writing because of this instead. However, his rhymes are authentic and interesting to hear as he raps about growing up in gang-life, mental health and other types of themes. After Brooklyn Fest, an article was written about King Geedorah in which they labeled Damien as a "conscious rapper" and when they reached out for a comment, Matthew Specter denied it.

### **Weaknesses**

* **ADHD**: Having gone undiagnosed for the majority of his life, it wasn't until Adam got Damien tested for it which revealed that he has it. He is on medication for it but often, he is seen multitasking with Bedlam who doesn't help Damien's attention deficiency. However, he finds it comforting that there is another person there who inhabits his mind and knows how it works just as he does.
* **Nicotine Addition**: As a result of smoking blunts, Damien has gained a nicotine addiction which he alternates between nicotine devices such as vapes or straight cigarettes. It is a nasty habit but after learning that Bedlam can just heal him, he doesn't fully care anymore. However, he does still smoke weed.
* **Sonic Waves/Fire**: The primary weakness against all Void Knights is high-frequency sound waves or vibrations that have to reach over 140+ decibels. Anything lower doesn't affect the symbiote or the host. While, yes, sonic weapons and waves are its primary weakness, it is important to note that **high-tempt** **fire is a cross-species equalizer**. It can kill both the host and The Void Knight Symbiote with ease.
* **High-Caliber EMP**: Due to Bedlam being a technology-based life-form, this leaves Bedlam and by extension, Damien, vulnerable to extremely powerful EMPs as they can render Bedlam's Codex inoperable momentarily. After having experienced this during his fight with King Crimson, it was revealed that the type of EMP needed to knock out Bedlam's Codex has to be sufficient enough to eliminate power across the entire eastern seaboard.
* **Darker Inclinations/Broken Will/Mental Illness**: Damien is trying to be a good person and so is Bedlam. However, the two of them have darker inclinations and often have twisted visions - most notably, visions of bodies being burned - and to add onto this, how he is viewed as a person. His background lends itself to the idea that people believe that Damien should be a gang member or a different stereotype. Due to all of this, it weighs on Damien which led to a deep depression and resentment toward those around him. While grateful, he does not have a great relationship with his adoptive parents nor with anyone else outside of Bedlam and Lexi as they are the only ones who see it. To make matters worse, Solace revealed that Bedlam was a wolf wrapped in sheep's clothing, that he posed as a good man but was truthfully a snake who had no qualms with killing people or committing evil acts. While that is not Bedlam now - due to him wanting to be good -, Bedlam still does have those darker tendencies. This bleeds into their shared vigilantism as both Bedlam and Damien have thought constantly about killing their villains or even going on rampages across New York. Bedlam does not influence Damien but the two of them share similar mindsets which is why Solace called them a perfect symbiosis. Even prior to learning this, Damien's will has always been extremely limited and it results in survival first, everything else second. This was highlighted whenever Jade Dragon attempted to use mysticism to mind-control both Lexi and Damien. Lexi broke free but Damien succumbed to the control as the vision showcased Damien and Bedlam dominating the universe with Void Knights. The reason why he wasn't able to break free was because sadly, Damien and Bedlam *enjoyed it**.*** Damien and Bedlam want to do good but constantly hearing every day that they are "anti-heroes" or "Lethal Protectors" - which they do love the title of Lethal Protector - leads both of them to believe that maybe their heroic efforts are for not and that maybe, just maybe, they were destined to be Lexi's greatest villain.

## **Paraphernalia**

### **Equipment**

* **Akai MPC 2000XL**: During his first bout with Mr. Rager, Damien was unable to figure out a way to harm him. It wasn't until he learned that sonic frequencies are the answer that he decided to get creative. In the middle of his fight with Mr. Rager, Damien crashed into a music shop where he utilized an Akai MPC - connected to speakers - and created a beat on the fly. He defeated Mr. Rager because of this and as a thank you, the owner of the music shop let Damien keep the Akai MPC 2000XL. While he does use it to help Lexi with her musicianship, he doesn't have aspirations to go any further with it. However, Lexi has stated that he is a pretty good producer.
* **Bedlam, The Void Knight Symbiote**: As explained at **length** prior, Damien is bonded to the Void Knight Symbiote, nicknamed Bedlam.
	+ **The Ebony Oculusblade**: As a by-product of being bonded with Bedlam, Damien possess the legendary Oculusblade that allows for him to use it as a weapon. The blade itself visually looks dull but it is sharp enough to cut through limited materials such as wood, sheet metal, and a few others. However, the blade is dull because of a few reasons. Bedlam and Damien share an empathic bond and it is because of this bond that it affects the weapons that they create. Damien sees himself as a blunt instrument, a weapon to be used, much like a dull sword. This feeling results in The Oculusblade being dull instead of sharp as it is a blunt instrument - much like how Damien feels - to be used as a crude weapon.
* **Demo's Bandana**: Taken from his best friend after he died, Damien never leaves home without his black bandana on. Let alone never wears it. He even wears it at what would be considered "weird" or "unusual" times such as job interviews, fancy dinners, high-profile fundraisers, and Arasaka science demonstrations. It has no special properties or anything but he only continues to wear it because of sentimental value. Lexi has claimed that it is how she identities Damien in crowds, explaining that "if he doesn't have that bandana on, it's not Damien." The only time he doesn't wear it is to shower, as he has fallen asleep with it on by accident, numerous times.

### **Transportation**

* **Black Indian Scout Bobber** **Sixty "Midcity"**: Gifted to him upon gaining acceptance to Lauder University, Adam - at the time didn't know he was Bedlam - knew that Damien needed to get around faster than taking the subway and that cars in New York were essentially pointless, so he got him a motorcycle. However, Adam had Overture's R&D scientist, Ras Coltrane, make a few modifications to it. Ras rebuilt the engine, making it a dual engine combination of electric and gas which allowed for a base mode and a sport mode. The base mode runs as the Sixty was meant to but sport mode allows for the motorcycle to climb speeds faster, reaching 60 mph at roughly 3 seconds. With sport mode, it allows for a higher mobility which grants Damien the ability to weave in and out of traffic but it has also been used by Damien as Bedlam. Bedlam - being technology-based - can extend himself to the bike and manipulate it in unique ways that have led to some incredible mobile fights. While Damien can generate chains to swing, there is something about the bike that Damien can't get enough of and uses it more often than he swings. An example of this is whenever Damien slide underneath a semi-truck but because the motorcycle was an extension of Bedlam, the front end and the tail end disconnected, allowing him to do so and then when they cleared the gap, Bedlam reconnected the motorcycle at no reduction to velocity.

## **Trivia**

* Damien is allergic to seafood.
* Damien was born in 2002, the same year as Lexi.
* While Damien is titled **The Lethal Protector** and has stated that he has never actually killed anyone before nor will he unless it is absolutely necessary, there are a few instances where he has killed non-human individuals.
	+ He killed Solace, the other Void Knight symbiote. However, Damien didn't know that Solace survived.
	+ Damien killed an alien from the future during his first fight with King Crimson.
	+ Damien killed Calypso's "shadow-self". While not technically a person, Calypso commented that she felt her death.
* Damien says that his favorite color is orange but secretly - according to Bedlam and his costume - it is black.
* Damien has listened to more albums than Lexi, Adam, and Mia combined. However, Lexi finds this hard to believe while Adam can see it.
* He met Lupe Fiasco during his internship with Dynamics Communications.
* Damien - on a bet - flew into low orbit with Bedlam.
* Damien hacked both into the Pentagon and Arasaka simultaneously on his 16th birthday with nothing but a laptop, a hotspot, 2 Red Bulls, and Lexi's digital movie collection.
* An interesting fact is that both Damien and Lexi have items that help them in their respective vigilantism and Lexi believes that it was the universe telling them something.
	+ Lexi has The Widow's Strummer which fits her personality and outside interests as it connects her music to her alter-ego.
	+ Damien has Midcity which fits him more than swinging like Lexi does because of his combat-leaning mindset as it connects his mindset with his alter-ego.
* While Mia never abused Damien, she did take every opportunity to try to ruin his life such as:
	+ Mia allowed Lexi to apply to any college she wanted to but Mia forced Damien to only go to Lauder University. This was because Damien wanted to go to UNLV but Mia wanted to keep him in the city to monitor him.
	+ Damien originally had an internship offer for web-design with Defy Media but Mia used her connections to kill the deal by revealing his sealed criminal records to Defy Media. However, Adam would correct this by calling in a favor with Dynamics Communications.
	+ Damien was actually Valedictorian at Brooklyn Unlimited but Mia changed his GPA by 3 points which allowed for Alexis to gain it. However, Alexis gave Damien her Valedictorian Stole during graduation and he walked across stage with it on.
	+ During high school and later college, Mia allowed Lexi to access their families money but refused Damien access. However, Lexi just gave him money on the low.
	+ When Damien moved out when he entered Lauder University, Mia fabricated evidence that Damien had a history of withholding rent which stopped him from getting an apartment. By this point however, Damien had met Matthew and he took care of it.
	+ More recently, Mia refused to go to Brooklyn Fest 2022 because Lexi planned to bring Damien on stage. She even went as far as try to shut down Brooklyn Fest by lobbying it with her city hall contacts but this was thwarted by Matthew. Adam did go though.