Signed lower left: “Paul Endres Jr.”

From The L#ST B#YS: Paul Endres Jr.’s Children of the Burden. Year 15 Post Burden:

The Assassination of Crispin Contra

If it were up to me, and as a historian it is, Everett Whipple is as much to blame for the 900 days of antics by Octavian and his lost boys. New Boston’s pressing real world needs were usurped by a need to play games and search for pastries, which was destructive behavior though not necessarily malicious. Like a bear at a picnic. Then things really turned sour.

Whipple had helped Octavian climb the celebrity ladder since the Cephalophoric War, where they had forged the Miracle of the Fisherman’s Flag to gain clout. The ‘eternal youth guarantee’ was simply the latest lie in a long history of cons pulled off by Octavian and Whipple. Whipple was cunning but not without a conscience. Historians agree that Whipple, racked with guilt for his part in the many lies, had been looking for a reason to oust his eternal-youth-radiating friend Octavian for some time.

And then it happened. Crispin Contra sprouted a single gray hair.

The group careened into hysterics. How long had they been lied to? Were they all still susceptible to aging or just some? There were whispers of mutiny. Octavian attempted to squelch the panic by calling a picnic to answer all questions concerning the gray hair, of which Endres has depicted the results.

The arrow used to assassinate Contra was whittled from Jacob Coffin’s humerus (supposedly), and possessed magical qualities. It was this death that divided the lost boys. Octavian had doubled down on his right to be their leader, while Whipple had found his martyr and rallying cry, “FOR CONTRA!”