Backstory Elmore Reid was born and raised in the deep South, tucked away in the quiet, wooded backcountry of rural Tennessee. His parents, Jeremiah and Sarah Reid, came from a long line of cattle ranchers and self-sufficient farmers being people who believed in the sanctity of the land, tradition, and living simply. For generations, the Reids had worked the soil with their own hands and tended to herds of beef cattle, rotating them across patchwork fields and forested clearings. Life on the Reid homestead bore a strong resemblance to the Amish way of living, despite not being Amish in name. The family shunned most modern conveniences, favoring a slower, more deliberate pace of life. Electricity was sparse and often limited to essentials, and machines were used only when absolutely necessary. Jeremiah preferred tools that didn’t plug in, and Sarah still churned butter by hand, wove quilts in the evenings, and lit oil lamps as dusk settled over the farmhouse. Their days started before the sun rose and often ended long after it set.
Their community, while not formally Amish or Mennonite, was heavily influenced by Plain traditions. Neighbors bartered more than they bought, and the weekly farmer’s market felt more like a gathering of kin than a place of business. Everyone pitched in during harvest season, and no one went hungry if another could help it. Modesty, humility, and discipline were prized virtues—taught not with harshness, but with consistency and example.
The Reids were also deeply religious, their faith the bedrock of every decision, tradition, and ritual in their lives. Elm was raised beneath the shadow of the church steeple, where sermons spoke of stewardship, obedience, and the value of a quiet life. Sundays were sacred, reserved for worship, family, and reflection. He learned early on that idle hands were the devil’s tools and that everything in life—from milking the cow to reciting scripture had a purpose. In that close-knit world, Elm learned to listen more than he spoke, to mend what was broken, and to carry the weight of responsibility without complaint. For complaint and grumbling was sin.
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(Power development)
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One stormy night, as thunder rumbled and lightning illuminated the sky, Elm felt an unusual sensation coursing through his body. He awoke from a restless sleep to find his room shrouded in darkness, darker than any night he had ever known. Like quicksand, the darkness began to press in and around him, consuming the young boy as his powers went haywire.
Hysterical he was blasted with visions of distorted demonic nightmares as they began to wrap around him and change as his powers matured and stretched. Every story, every fear he had heard muttered came true in this moment. The devil was real, and his powers spiraled. Elm only fuel it's shifts more as his nightmare got worse. His mother, who had been the only one home, rushed in with a lit gas lamp to see what the racket was about.
What occurred that night marks a change in the young man's life foreverElm managed to survive that night, though the emergence of his powers did not go unnoticed and certainly not unpunished. In the eyes of the church, what had awakened in him was not a gift, but a curse. Possession, they called it. A demonic affliction. A blight sent by the Devil himself. Almost overnight, Elm went from being a quiet, obedient farm boy to a pariah and an object of fear, shame, and wrath. The very congregation that had once smiled at him over hymnals now looked upon him with suspicion and disgust. His family handed him over to the church elders for spiritual correction without hesitation.
What followed was not salvation, but abuse cloaked in sanctity. Days spent in isolation, fasting until his lips cracked and his vision blurred. Nights spent under the weight of scripture and ritual, as the elders tried to "drive the demon out." He was bound, beaten, and doused in holy water until he shook with fever. They screamed prayers over his body, pressed crosses into his skin until they left burns, and forced him to confess sins he hadn’t committed just to make the pain stop. But he could not speak a word, his voice was shattered. Whether it was the trauma or some deeper retreat into himself, he didn't speak for years after.
Eventually, when his body broke under the strain of it, he had fortunately become a man. A quiet, lost man. He was given up and left to meditate on his life, forced to repent for the life he selfishly had. But alas, there was so much more that he had undergone. Elm had no place but the barn outside his family's home and the whispers of his brother Judge who kept an amber bottle of whiskey for his younger brother. They sipped and talked, Judge being the only one to speak to him but Elm knew he hated him still.
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(Phade: The Shadow Cowboy)
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Judgment was all he knew, but by the time he had turned 21, Elm was determined to find his path. Despite his best efforts, shadows seeked him out and strokes his senses. It was far easier to make friends with a shadow, to bend it and use it. It felt awful and terrible but the more he used it the pressure began to subside. He felt sinful for this, but his hands continued to experiment. And soon under the cover of darkness, he became a masked shadow figure who loomed in the night. With his powers, he grapple with his guns and filled them with shadow bullets to use the powers he had been plagued with like any tool, like any weapon. It was easier to comprehend that way.
But this shift, this disguise was a means for Elm to feel like he was more than the sum of his fears and the anxieties of those around him. He could not live like he had and he couldn't allow his powers to go unchecked again. In the cloak of night, he ventured into the heart of the city near his town, where his deeds as the shadowy vigilante began to stir whispers among the townsfolk. By day, he remained the quiet, pariah man who rarely travelled from his homestead, but by night, he was a figure of mysterious justice, using his powers to protect the innocent and punish the wicked. This duality allowed Elm to navigate his complex identity, balancing the boy he once was with the powerful, enigmatic being he was becoming.
Yet, despite his newfound purpose, Elm's journey was fraught with challenges and it pushed him onwards. No longer able to face the challenges at home and live the double life, he thrusts himself into the world of hero work to find himself and maybe… something worth all this hassle of the heart.
