VtM anyone?

Started by Darklyangelic, May 17, 2011, 09:03:55 PM

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Darklyangelic

Well I am sitting twiddling my thumbs mid way through my 1 week holiday. Nice to have leave to take but not so good to have not a hell of a lot to do with it other than study and tidy the house (god I feel old).

I was wondering if anyone would be up for a RP concept that goes something like this....

Kerri was a loyal Camarilla Gangrel who has slowly but surely been crapped on from a great height. An archaeologist before she was sired she has retained that wandering, investigative spirit in her unlife. Now 160 years later she has found herself in the worst situation to date. To get her companion out of a jam where he frenzied and breached the masquerade she agrees to go undercover for the prince. It was that or face death...so not much of a choice. The corrupt Prince wants information about the growing Sabbat population in the city and with the fact publicly there is a blood hunt on her head she makes the perfect patsy. 

With a vicious attack from the sheriff to make her escape that much more believable she flees to the unwilling arms of the Sabbat. Mistrusted by them and hunted by her own sect she is in a horrific no mans land where she has to do unspeakable things that destroy wave after wave of her humanity, to show the Sabbat that she wishes to be within their ranks. All the time she is listening, learning and trying to get some piece of information that would be of value and get her off the giant hook she is stuck on.

Luck was with her after a number of months when she is offered the opportunity by the archbishop to dispose of a traitor within his ranks...a final test and something that will prove of worth to the Camarilla. The target is a templar who has been making use of his comrades for his own gain and undermining the archbishop. A vicious fight ensued but one that she was ultimately successful in, leaving him mortally wounded, trapped in a basement as she set the building a light, fleeing with new injuries marring her body. Holding information on the hierarchy, locations and such she returns to the Camarilla.

When she arrives she discovers that the Prince that set her to task was in fact a traitor himself and has been destroyed by a Justicar and a replacement is now in situ. They know nothing of his instructions to her and no-one is there to validate any of it. She dumps the journals of information and flees for her life. Bloodhunted by the Camarilla, though the new Prince holds her journals of the events and now known by the Sabbat as a spy.

What I would love to do is see where this will end....Kerri is one of my oldest characters and this is actually the potted version of a storyline that spanned over a number of years but was never completed. I want to know if she is going to get out of this or if the corruption will mean that she is forsaken. I am game for whatever...so if someone would want to play a Sabbat trying to hunt her down or a member of the Primogen, sheriff or scourge that are hunting her with however much information the Prince chooses to provide them. Maybe even an Anarch who hears about the trouble and wants to get themselves a bargaining chip. If someone is up for this they could play multiple characters or we could go for multiple players. I love free form but if people would like to know her stats I can get them to you pretty easily.   

Darklyangelic

I found her old character sheet with a full history to it if this is of any interest :) I got her age wrong as well :(

Name Dr. Kerrinthia Phillips
Nicknames/Alias: Kerri
Age: 197
Gender: Female
Faction: Autarkis/Camarilla
Sire: Hecate (or claimed to be)

Power: Animalism (3), Protean (5), Fortitude (5), Celerity (2), Potence (2)

Misc: Due to her prior frenzy she has soft wolf fur coating her legs, feline ears that she covers with her riotous curly hair...these make her sensitive to loud noises. her nails are permanently hard, long, sharp and discoloured this was the last change that her body succumbed.

She is fluent in a large number of languages due to her continued love of archeology and travelling... these include German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Mandarin, Arameic, Latin, Hieroglyphics, Swahili, Parsi, Mongol, Hebrew, French, Aztec, Comanchi, Japanese, Vietnamese, Gaellic, Somerian.


Appearance: Kerri is 5’ 11”, exceptionally tall in her era she carries the height well and with an air of unconscious confidence. The moment you look at her the first thing you notice are her clear sparkling green eyes, they always seem to have the glint of laughter that has just finished. Her hair is a rich auburn colour, cut very short. Her skin is still tanned holding the same colour as when she was sired giving her a healthy glow, just noticeable on her body is a dusting of freckles.

Her muscles are very well toned and a cheeky smile plays on her lips almost constantly giving her a very open looking face. Down her left arm coming from her back is a large dragon tattoo, the design taken from a brooch, it twists down her arm with the head covering the back of her hand. Her clothes do not change, if she is seen in a dress you can tell immediately her slight discomfort and self consciousness.

She has gained some scars about her body, the most noteable is one cutting across her cheek from the outer edge of her left eye down to her jawline just off from her lips. It tugs at the edge of her eye giving her very much of a battleworn and slightly aggressive image. If seen with less clothing there is a slash of 3 thick scars on her side from the curve of her back around to above her belly button transecting a number of her ribs on her right side, overall 18 inches long. There is another cluster of 3 scars slicing from her outer upper right thigh diagonally down that measures about 12 inches.

Her scarred face destroys some of the image of carefree that she radiates.

Choice of Clothing: She wears tight fitting vest tops and a leather jacket, khaki or tan combat trousers and comfortable walking boots. She keeps a strange mix of items in her bag from maps of the badlands, Egypt and Mexico, a battered notebook and old lead pencil to a satellite phone and palm top blue chipped to her slightly bulkier lap top.

Around her waist is a twist of leather that unwraps to show it is a whip, but far easier to use it as a belt she finds. Wherever she travels she will have her Kawasaki Ninja sent to her and has often ridden the breadth of the US when wanderlust takes her.

Personality: She is very passionate about her interests and is fiercly loyal. She will never leave a man down when in a team and has often risked her own life to ensure others safety. She can be cheeky, and cheerful with a lot of the British spirit coming through in her as she calls most ‘mate’ but do not cross her for she will turn with an animals fierceness to slice you down where you stand

History: From an early age Kerri hated her name and shortened it a suitable tom-boyish one. Her parents had seen a lesser known statue on a dig in Greece and as she was conceived there they decided to name her after it. Not that they had been around for her to express her disgust at it in her youth. They had travelling feet and with her so young they left her in the care of an Aunt and disappeared to do more exploring. Their passion had always been archaeology and Kerri was a mistake that had nearly cost her mother her tentative place at her fathers side.

For this was the era where women were not to be seen on a camp site, not to be seen kneeling down uncovering lost treasures. Her father was scorned for having such a weakling as his wife at his side at all times, but he saw beyond the norms of the rigid Victorian society and saw the incredible brain that his beautiful wife had. Her intuition combined with his to make them a formidable team that even the Benbury Scholars had to bow their heads to after decades of successful dig after successful dig. This was their place and though they did not forget their daughter she was not the priority in their lives, something that was painfully apparent to Kerri from a young age.

Her Aunt Jacinta was much like her mother in mind and looks, very eccentric she taught her many skills…almost all of them for the time socially unacceptable for a young lady to know. By the time she was 16 she was an excellent horse woman, adept in some gymnastics, using tree branches to swing up into the highest of hiding places. Somersaults and fast spins becoming somewhat of a favourite of hers. Her Aunt had once been in the New World for a period and took pleasure in teaching her the finer uses of a whip and lasso. She was taught the classical languages being able to read write and speak Greek, ancient Egyptian, ancient Aramaic, Hebrew was apparently to be of use to her as far as her Aunt was concerned.

Along with the classical languages she absorbed most of the European languages. Alongside this language training her parents though absentee saw fit to ensure she received texts on the digs they were on at all times. Maybe it was in the blood but by the time she was 15 all she could think about was joining them in these fantastic far off places. It was not something that was allowed, they did not want someone they saw as still too juvenile to assist them fearing that her needs would be a hindrance despite her Aunt’s assurances that she was strong willed, inquisitive and fiercely independent.

Her natural curiosity often got her into trouble, with her knack of finding information forcing her to move from her Aunt’s costal house after she reported the ins and outs of the smuggling occurring close by. It was bitter to leave the home that had been the only place she had known all her life, leave the side of her Aunt knowing full well that the incompetent officials of the area would not ensure her safety should her links to her be discovered. She would hear nothing of it however, refusing to leave the family’s ancestral home and the coastline she so dearly loved. Her naturally tenacious nature meant that she desired the qualifications to gain a place in her parent’s lives.

With their blessing and generous funding she was allowed a place at Cambridge, something that caused much uproar at the time. Professors refused her in their classes, and even with her distant links to the dignitary of the country she was still a mere woman in a man’s world. She stuck it out however remaining there from the age of 17 to 25 gaining a doctorate in archaeology and ancient history she then finally joined her parents in Egypt and Greece for some years. It was with her finally completing these qualifications, proving her intelligence for they had tested her far more rigorously and harshly than her male counterparts, did she gain the begrudging respect of those professors.

At the age of 27 her parents retired, her father having caught Malaria was left weak and ultimately destined to die within a few months, something that killed her mother from grief the next year. It was a strange time for her; forced into the traditional grab of mourning, wearing the heavy black taffeta and satin that was required she felt none of the grief that should have accompanied it. They were strangers to her and as her Aunt clung to her grieving for the sister fallen so young in her eyes her eyes merely gazed tearlessly on the assembled academics mourning.

It was due to her name, the reputation gained in the company of her parents so soon after qualifying that meant she continued to get the funding they once had but this time on her own. A woman with such respect in that field was almost unheard of and many voiced their anger at such an occurrence but she shouldered the criticism well determined to prove them wrong and make her dear Aunt proud. It was only a year later that she uncovered an incredible find in Egypt that remains on display at the British museum to this day, the ancient Papyrus from the Abusir papyri. The notations from it gave a deeper insight into the funerary beliefs, administrative systems and economy of the time, something that finally gave her recognition with the Benbury Scholars.

On her 29th birthday she was in Mexico studying a possible Aztec ritual site. The dig had produced some incredible artefacts and she was in the mood to celebrate. In the evening she was persuaded to go to the local town’s festival to celebrate not only her birthday but her discoveries. As her workers drifted off to be with their families she noticed a researcher in her employ that had disappeared. Her worry for him had been masked by the work she had been doing, but his absence had been felt and noted, her moods often changing quickly from anger at his unannounced departure from the dig to unabashed concern for his whereabouts. Juno looked terrible as she approached; changing her stance from about to kick him around the square for disappearing on her to concern that he was up and about.

He smiled happily when he saw her and shook her vigorously by the hand insisting that she was to meet with a new friend he had made, a woman called Hecate. Leading her to a table away from the bustle of the music and dancing she came face to face with a dark haired beauty, she stood in a fluid movement offering her hand to Kerri. As she smiled shivers flew down Kerri’s spine. They sat and began to talk, Hecate fascinated with Kerri’s work at the dig. They continued for hours until the revellers began to thin. Juno was looking more and more nervous however as the time passed, shifting uncomfortably in his seat, glancing at both of the women. Hecate picked up on his discomfort and broke mid sentence to stare at him. Kerri noticed it took just a second for him to break her gaze, mumbling an apology he got up and wandered off.

A few jugs of Sangria later and Kerri was enthralled with this woman and her seemingly genuine fascination in her work agreed to take her to the dig. Not even considering the time as the church clock struck 2. The path was direct from the village, the camp for the rest of the workers and her meagre tent on beyond the dig site. She justified it for the simple fact that she would have to walk this path to rest her head for the rest of the night anyway and so she thought nothing more and continued to enjoy the company of this enlightened woman, so genuine in her interest and intelligence for the subject.

She thought nothing of it as Juno led the way Hecate continuing to quiz her about her work here and previously. Kerri didn’t realise what was about to happen before it was too late, Hecate lunged for her, pushing her to the ground with strength that she should not have possessed. Stunned as her head cracked the floor she felt the pain at her neck as she feebly attempted to struggle, and then the taste of blood on her mouth. As it touched her lips she could think of nothing but draining the source of this nectar, liquid fire coursing through her. It enveloped her body as she screamed out, the dig some distance from anyone or anywhere she was not heard. Writhing on the ground she could hear callous laughter.

Curling into a ball, weakness filling her burning muscles as she writhed for what seemed like hours begging to die she heard Hecate respond in a cruel voice that ‘She was already dead’. Suddenly it stopped, the pain ended as if it had never been there, her whole body tingled and she felt starved but for what she did not know. As she lifted herself from the ground a rabbit hopped past, without realising and with such speed she grabbed it and bit into its flailing body. Blood pouring down her chin as she threw it away in disgust.

‘So you know what you are then?’ a smug voice came from behind her. Turning she staggered to her feet to see Hecate standing there, blood smeared about her mouth and a cut on her wrist still dripping slowly. Loathing filled her being as she realised mythology had become reality and the thing before her had turned her into something terrible.

Over the next few months the loathing grew into pure hatred for Hecate but she remained at her side hoping to learn something of what this was all about. Her attitude was that she was stuck with this but that maybe it had its benefits. Her passion was realised, she had all the time in the world for learning everything she could.

She awoke one night some 4 months later to an empty cave and Juno lying dead at the mouth. Lying next to her was a note with a dragon brooch pinned to it.

Kerrinthia

You are the strongest I have met in sometime; Juno however was weak and undeserving. His death is no loss but I cannot remain around you, your hatred for me grows too much and I do not wish to kill you for it. I have got what I wanted from you so do not expect to ever see me again.

Travel to the New World and search out those of the Camarilla. Your siring was with permission of the Prince of Dallas. Find him and announce yourself for you are of Camarilla stock. These are words I have spoken before and I leave you knowing that even without me you have others about you that you are to serve and who one day will serve you.

Do no disappoint else you shall be staked out for the sun to consume.

Hecate


So suddenly she was left alone and strangely happy at her new freedom. Travelling to Dallas she announced herself as her sire had commanded, blessed to be free of her influence she was accepted into the ranks of the Camarilla as a fledgling ready to prove her worth. She carried on quietly, making neither enemies nor close friends. She performed tasks well, finding with some pleasure that the Prince was a Ventrue with a liking for unusual antiquities. This left her free to do much as she had done in her mortal life only now she had a tithe to present with each success giving him some of the more intricate items that she chose not to donate to museums or hold for her own collection. Funding sites from her inheritance she slowly gathered a formidable collection of rare antiquities.

In 1860 news of her Aunt’s violent death reached her, her beloved house burned to the ground with her in it. This crushed her for she knew that this was the long awaited revenge of the smugglers she had observed in her time there. Even though they had no contact Jacinta was her last living relative. Her family’s line dead she allowed herself to drop into insanity for years. The Prince did nothing to stop this, his collection almost as formidable as hers, her reknown beginning to spread not only from the New World but across the ocean to Europe both in mortal and kindred society. This disappearance allowed the memory of her in mortal circles to fade with the assumption that she too had passed away with much speculation that she had been in the house with her Aunt at the time of it’s destruction.

She could not bear to be around people, their living flesh inciting such jealousy that she would often fly into rages angered that she was an observer of lives but no longer a true part of them. It was the dark time in any immortals life where they realise that everything they know around them will wither and perish but they will stay the same, unchanging to the sands of time. The wilderness was her friend, it’s solitude offered her the space to think and study, to lose herself in the books that offered some timeless quality. Though she knew there must be other kindred about her she did not search them out, remaining outside cities and any contact until the early 1900’s.

The first World War had begun and in her hiding place amongst the forests of France she could hear the shells crashing and the smell of blood was almost overwhelming. Such destruction and death caused by the mortals of the world she could barely comprehend as wave after wave of fragile bodies were thrown against the metal of the tanks and artillery. A new age of war had begun and the strategies had not kept up with it. The loss of life was almost too much for her, it made her realise what she shunned they were so willing to throw away. It was that thought that pulled her from her self enforced hermit lifestyle deciding to travel back to the cities and rejoin her brethren within the ranks of the Camarilla.

She chose to return to her native land, the shores of England were once more welcoming even with the memories of her Aunt plaguing her thoughts. It was not enough to stop her from introducing herself to the Prince of London and taking her haven within the British Museum, close to the relics her own hands had plucked from earth, sand and tomb. She vowed she would never own a house but a section of the sub basement of such a venerable building was another matter. It gave her the sense of belonging that she needed, no longer would she allow ties to the fragile mortals but instead to her kindred brothers and sisters and to her beloved history… the only constant in her life and unlife.

And so was the continuance of a somewhat uneventful time. She focused on her digs with the patronage of the Prince as well as her own funding, her place as a neonate firmly secured with her reputation continuing to grow within kindred society. Her donations to museums now came under the guise of corporation and anonymous benefactors for she was dead to the mortal world and she was actually pleased for it to remain as such. She was not questioned for her presence within the museum after hours for she always looked as if she belonged, and in some respects she always had. It gave her the opportunity to observe and to regain some of that free spirit that had epitomised her previously.

Just as one war ended leaving a world picking up the pieces, mothers mourning their sons, children mourning for their fathers, another brewed with the growing power of Germany until in 1939 it exploded into war.

The patriot in her was disgusted as it unfolded, and she travelled to Europe taking great pleasure in making any overtly cruel German soldier she found disappear. Sabotage wasn’t beyond her and her knowledge of small explosives came in use during her stay in France and Germany. It was not the assistance of the war effort though that she would remember from that era but her friendship with a young Brujah explorer was the pleasure of the 40’s for her. They sparked in such a way there were times she felt like a mortal again, flush with love. But as with many relationships based on eternity breaks need to be had, and Kerri always needed her freedom, though she has never forgotten him. They pass each other like ships in the night, fleeting times that never seem to last long enough but have such time between them that it leaves an ache within her.

Her return to London after the war presented her with much that had changed. The Prince killed in the senseless bombings of the Blitz had placed a Toreador into the role and one that had a liking for the modern instead of the artefacts that she so treasured. Her status kept her safe but his dislike for the brash and often outspoken Gangrel was clear. She departed her haven, locking it safe for her brief returns, and allowed her wanderlust to overcome her drawing her back to the New World.

She has continued with her desire for knowledge, sometimes guest speaking in museums throughout the world, keeping relatively unknown she often uses her family name. The paper trail of her doctorate is easy to fake, her contacts expanding constantly within each university and so with each 10 years that pass she disappears only to return some 10 years later, a new name for the mortals to absorb and so it continues. Her passion is to teach, to learn and to share. With her vampiric resources she has gained a new level of understanding to the finds she makes gaining an extensive occult knowledge from it. Something she does not share with the kine of the world but something that has meant she has a baser understanding of the magics some clans use.

The harsh realities of kindred politics were forced upon her when her clan chose to depart the ranks of the Camarilla leaving her with the choice of to stay or to go. The beast that was the Camarilla had been relatively kind to her, resources and status within their ranks and though wild blood flowed through her veins she chose to remain for that was where her Brujah companion held his loyalties. This was to be tested to the limits when in LA under the control of the Toreador Prince she lost her love to magical forces as they did the Princes behest. Such cat and mouse they had always revelled in, Preston was the mirror to her personality and it was on the brink of discovery he revealed his true feelings towards her leaving Kerri holding nothing but the sand that floated in the thick magically charged air. He was gone and the Prince once given the artefact that Kerri had risked her skin and had lost everything of importance to her, chose to turn her back on the now angry Gangrel. Declining to help her retrieve Preston from wherever the forces had landed him was the worst rebuke she could have received.

she returned to the welcoming shores of England, fleeing the New World to lick her mental wounds she was not the same carefree soul that left, as distraction filled her, her smile would fade and her mind would wander to something that pained her deeply. The apparent loss of her Brujah love in Jesusalem tainted her mind, spilled into her dreams. It was fortunate that she slept alone for each night she would awaken screaming her subconscious creating horrific tortures that he was enduring with her powerless to do anything but watch before running the same gauntlet again and again.

She had almost given up hope when artefacts arrived in the museum that offered hope, her obsession was to find him and all kindred left her to that task for her anger was quick to rise and quicker to surface against them. With such a chance occurance he was returned to her, frenzied and confused they broke the masquerade to such an extent that they were captured and dragged before the Prince for judgement. So a deal with the devil was made, Preston still insensible was removed and Kerri agreed in return for his life to attempt to place herself within the ranks of the Sabbat as a spy for the Prince.

It was a task that almost broke her for with such a masquerade came the requirement of reality. The Gangrel sheriff took his claws to her almost destroying her body as she stumbling broken and bleeding into the unwelcoming arms of the Sabbat. Publically the bloodhunt was on her head so all of the Camarilla wished her dead, the Sabbat viewed her with the suspicion that any member of the Camarilla deserved in their eyes dishonoured or not. She worked hard, destroyed another piece of her being that kept the link to the world around her, forcing herself to view the mortals about her not only as fragile creations but as cattle for her pleasure. But it was something that she achieved and finally ensconced in their ranks she gained the information that would secure the pardon for both Preston but also herself.

It had all changed however. The prince that had set her to task was gone, destroyed by a Justicar for treason, his final act before he was put to justice was the destruction of many of the cities Primogen. It left her with no-one who knew of the truth, and a blood hunt that was no longer a facade but very much a reality.

So she escaped back to Europe, running for any kind of freedom but also hearing news that Dr King was in Paris. She chose to go there so in some twisted way she could relieve herself that he was ok but at the same time torture herself because she knew that he could not know where she was for fear that the information would be used against her. While her closest ally she knew that she could not trust him, more so when she saw him speaking to the cities Sheriff.

She was hunted in the city and knew she was, the grapvine was efficient at warning her that she was wanted for questioning by the Prince and she had no faith after what happened to her last time she was questioned. So with that she ran again.