| Mason Starkey | |
| Biographical Information | |
|---|---|
| Full name: | Mason Michael Starkey |
| Age: | 16 |
| Status: | Deceased |
| Cause of Death: | Strangulation |
| Alias: |
|
| Nickname/s: |
Storky |
| Gender: | Male |
| Affiliation | |
| Unwind Standing: |
AWOL |
| Allegiance: |
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| Family: |
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| Character Information | |
| Appears in: | |
Mason Michael Starkey is a storked AWOL who rebelled against Connor Lassiter and the others in the Graveyard with his Stork Club.
Biography
Mason was a child of uncertain race storked in Southern California, to a sienna family. Mason, once an intelligent child, grew up feeling unwanted, and Mason acted up because of it—fights, drugs, and even stealing a car at one point. He was constantly bullied by kids at school who called him "Storky", a nickname which sets him off and causes him throw a fit or lash out violently.
When he was three, his mother, all doped up on pain medication from his sister's cesarean, took him to a fire station and begged them to take him away and make him a ward of the state.
When he was a sixteen-year-old sophomore, Starkey had just gotten expelled from another school after getting into a physical fight with another student. Fed up with him, his parents decided to have him unwound. While his sister Jenna stood up for him, he was ultimately still sent away, but not before revealing his father's infidelity.
The two Juvey-rounders, Mouthpiece and Lady-Lips, as Starkey nicknamed them, took him to the county jail, but not before stopping at an In-N-Out to Starkey's request. However, the Juvie-cops only ordered for themselves. The employee that gave them their food was a girl Starkey knew from his last school. Instead of hiding, Starkey jokingly asked her to prom, but she took it seriously and rejected him without knowing that he was to be unwound. She later figured it out and says sorry, but Starkey knew that it was only out of pity.
On the way to the county jail, Starkey, skilled in sleight-of-hand, managed to escape from his handcuffs. With the penknife he kept in his left shoe, he slashed it across Lady-Lips's face and ran. Mouthpiece caught him, but when Mouthpiece called him "Storky", Starkey grabbed Mouthpiece's gun in fury. They wrestled for the gun; the gun, loaded with real bullets, fired, accidentally killing Mouthpiece.
Starkey, while on the run, did a number of things: he dyed his hair red, turned an AWOL that insulted storks into the Juvenile Authority, and began his hunt for the Anti-Divisional Resistance (ADR). At one point, he robbed what he thought to be a drunk man of his wallet which later stunned him into semi-consciousness on the ground. He first believed the man to be a parts pirates but, to his surprise, later turned out to be a member of the ADR.
The man sent Starkey to an ADR safe house. Starkey quickly gained popularity with his charm and charisma. He and the other AWOLs there were transferred around the safe houses until they were, one day, loaded onto a plane in the least conspicuous way: coffins. Starkey got inside one with a girl that was clearly infatuated with him. When they landed at the Graveyard, Hayden Upchurch greeted him and the girl.
When the leader of the Graveyard arrived and gave a speech, one Starkey observed was an "unremarkable teen", he and the people around him soon learned that he was the famed "Akron AWOL". Starkey had grown to admire the Akron AWOL and based his decisions on what he saw as the Akron AWOL's act of bravery. However, upon finally meeting him, Mason was gravely disappointed, even more so upon learning that he was supposed to follow the boy's instructions.
Mason grew even more dissatisfied with Connor's authority as time went by, and he began plotting his own rise to power with his fellow storks.
In UnDivided, his lust for power, ego, and willingness to give up his Storks to save his own skin would later lead to his being deposed by Bam and Jeevan.
Later, Starkey was taken to Divan Umarov's harvest camp, the Lady Lucrezia, where he was to be unwound and sold to auctioneers. Starkey would be the fourth unwind—considered the main event, with three Unwinds auctioned before him to warm up the auctioneers. Connor found him just as he was about to be put into the unwinding chamber. Starkey pleaded for Connor to save him, but it was too late and Starkey was tightly bound to his bed so, instead, he went on to beg Connor to kill him so he does not become unwound. Connor finally agreed after some convincing from Starkey, who reminded him of all the things he did, and strangled Starkey to death. While his body was still harvested, Starkey had died and would not have felt his unwinding.
Physical description
Mason is described as having straggly brown hair and an olive complexion, being a "genetic hodgepodge" who could could pass for any ethnicity. After kicking AWOL, Mason has since dyed his brown hair red and blond. He is short for his age.
Personality
Mason Starkey is extremely arrogant, manipulative, egotistical, violent, even murderous, and selfish. He thinks of himself as a hero, and usually overdoes what he sees as his own achievements.
He has always lived in a kind of protective paranoia. He is very distrustful of people, and tends to be self-confident while being unimpressed of others whom he sees as inferior to him. Unlike Connor, he brags about his deeds and even exaggerates them. He is said to be a natural born leader among sketchy outcasts and borderline personalities, building for himself a cult of personality status among other storks, which he takes great pride in, seeing himself as the savior of storks. Hayden has referred to him as "The Stork Lord" behind his back.
Trivia
- Since they could not figure out when he was born, the date he was left on his foster family's doormat was used as his official birthday.
- Mason, once an aspiring magician, is capable of performing magic tricks. He would use this skill to escape from his handcuffs when he went AWOL.