Overseer Sturgess.
Overseer Sturgess is a minor character found in Dishonored. He can be encountered in the foyer of the Office of the High Overseer, giving counsel and answering questions for three citizens.
Dishonored[]
Sturgess's advice and sermonizing reflect the stringent social codes of the Abbey of the Everyman. One man says that he is worried about his youngest sister, who does not cook or clean, thinks on curious things like machinery and numerical calculations, and mentions a wish to read a book. Sturgess attributes these interests to the Outsider, saying that he might be influencing her. Sturgess tells the man to watch his sister, noting any sudden fits, laughing or crying for no reason, or speaking when nobody is present. The Overseer adds that maybe a disfigured man may stop by and ask about his sister or that he will find small objects "fused together as if by high heat" or rat bones in her bed. These are all signs that she is being influenced by the Outsider.
The next man asks Overseer Sturgess if it is true that the Outsider is a winged serpent. Sturgess answers that the Outsider takes many forms and that one cannot associate him with just a single physical shape, saying that he "is non-corporeal, but not without force or influence." Sturgess admits that "Coriander of Morley wrote that winged serpents are kin to leviathans and whales" and that sailors have seen winged creatures near Pandyssia, but he claims that these stories cannot be taken seriously.
A third man says that he has dreams about beating his child. Sturgess admits that it is possible that the Outsider resides in dreams, revealing that High Overseer Francis Perry spoke with the Outsider in his sleep, but he tells the man that raising his hand to his child is not all bad, confessing that he also regularly received physical punishment while growing up.
Five Attributes of the Outsider[]
Sturgess also recites the "Five Attributes of the Outsider," saying:
"…for the Outsider himself has these five attributes by which he hopes to defeat the righteous.
He is patient, for he waits every hour and every day of our lives for a moment of weakness or carelessness, that he may enter our hearts.
He is subtle, for many do his work and know it not.
He is strong, and only by utmost striving can he be resisted.
He is various, for there are seven gates by which he may enter a man’s heart, and seventy kinds of spirits which live on and beneath the earth, and the arts and tricks of black magic are without number.
And he is eternal, for he has lived long ages before we are born and will continue thus long after we are dust.”
Gallery[]
