I watch her lying there, stuck through the heart and left to die on the floor of my haven. I start by stripping off her clothes, revealing the cold, pale body of an undead brunette beauty. I put my greenish scabby dick, stinking of unmentionable filth, into the Toreador bitch's undead cunt and shove it in. She can't do anything about it because she's staked, but she knows what's going on. I can see it in her pretty brown eyes right before they start leaking blood tears. She wants me to just diablerize her already, but I won't. I grab onto her tits out of habit and fuck her hard, and it doesn't do either of us any good, physically. Being vampires, the only ecstacy we know is the blood. I don't think I ever raped anybody for the sexual thrill, even in life. I rape for the power and the control. I do it to humiliate and violate my victims. I relish in their feelings of pain and violation. And to think, just a week ago, I was just a poor ugly Nos childe.
They said similar stuff all through my school career. Poor, awkward Eugene. Couldn't get laid to save his life. I never felt any need to get laid. While the stupid assholes I went to school with were making welfare babies, I was studying to pull in a 4.0 GPA. I went to college for computer science and got a cushy job at Megatech as a programmer. Every vacation, I would hit the clubs, never the same one twice, so that I could find one special someone to stalk. I'd wait for them to go off by themselves, usually to the bathroom, and I would be there to knock them out with chloroform and fuck them in the handicapped stall. Looking back on it, it was the perfect training for becoming a vampire. I guess that's why Madame Carroway picked me for the Embrace.
I'll never forget that night. I was at a top forty club, staring at the women in the crowd when one caught my eye. She was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen, but she never seemed to go anywhere alone. I did see her chatting up another girl, though. I followed them out of the club and into a parking garage. I thought, maybe if I was crafty, I could get two for one. When I got to that garage I saw a hideous beast munching Carroway's girlfriend. A godawful hairy thing with sagging breasts and fangs of irregular length, crawling with lice and flies. Blood dripped from her misshapen snout as she turned her catlike eyes on me and growled. She pounced on me, sinking those giant fangs into my jugular vein. The blood left my body and it felt like some kind of fire replaced it in my veins. That pain lasted about a week, during which my body twisted into something monstrous and the good madame abused me relentlessly. She wanted me to kill my mom, for Christ's sake. She threatened to kill me if I didn't, and I knew she would have. When she gave me the Kiss, I felt like a daisy in Frankenstein's grasp. I walked in while my mom was watching Jeopardy and caved in her skull with a fireplace poker. Feeding on her would have been weird. The act of sucking someone's blood was to sexual for me to do to my own mother.
Shortly after I was forced to murder my mother, Carroway abandoned me. She didn't even teach me any of the neat tricks she knew. Luckily, I met Gatsby. He was a hell of a lot older than me and he was a hell of a guy. He was embraced back during the days of the Revolutionary War as a fucked up punishment for being a Brittish loyalist. Back in those days, he ran with the Sabbat. Now he mostly stays in the company of anyone who isn't hellbent on getting him back for his betrayal. Reputedly, he fed a bunch of his antitribu clanmates to something called the Nictuku when he defected to the Camarilla. He's got a sick sense a humor and a good taste for vengeance. I think that's what drew me to him.
This one night, I was hunting rats in the sewer. I didn't know shit about disciplines yet, and I didn't want to be seen by the bloodbags. While I had this filthy lice-ridden vermin with shit stuck to its fur in my mouth, I heard a disembodied voice.
"Tisk, tisk tisk," it said in a deep whisper.
I threw the rat down in a puddle of filth and looked around for who was talking to me. For all I knew, it was a goddamn Sabbat or worse. Finally Gatsby appeared before me, and he was one of the ugliest I'd ever seen. He was even shorter than me, with a crooked spine and a hunched back. He had a face like a fruit bat, minus the fur and the brown color. He was dressed relatively nicely, though. He wore what looked like 18th century finery. Stained 18th century finery.
"Why don't you go after some humans? It's a pity that you have to subsist on these foul creatures." He paced around me, sloshing in the shitwater and taking inventory of my hideous features. He had a Brittish accent.
"I don't exactly blend in," I hissed. I've heard of Nosferatu that can pass for human. I think it's bullshit, because I've never seen one. At the time, I certainly wouldn't have. I've got irregular, scaly patches of skin. My muscles are a godawful tangle of misshapen lumps. Thick black veins can be seen just under my undead skin.
"Didn't your sire do you the service of teaching you Obfuscate?"
"Obfuscate? What the hell is that?"
Gatsby disappeared. In his place was none other than Marilyn Monroe. I was beginning to think that it was some kind of weird prank.
"Obfuscate is the ability to disappear in the eyes of humans," Marilyn said in a lusty voice that was just a little too masculine. She turned back into Gatsby, the terrible monster. "Or you can use it to change the form that they see at your whim."
"That would be helpful," I said.
"I could teach you, but you would have to do something for me in return," said Gatsby.
"I think that what you're offering is too good for me to pass up," I said. "Whatever it is, I'll do it."
"Excellent," Gatsby said.
My mission was to gather some information on the Prince. The Prince is a speech writer that stays holed up in a playhouse that he's turned into his place of residence. Because I've got no way to walk around unnoticed on the surface, I have to make a deal down in the sewer. Whenever a ghoul or a Nosferatu besides Gatsby goes up for a little fresh air, I ask 'em to bring me back an errand boy. I tell them that I can pay money. I have a little saved up, I used to be a programmer at a major electronics corporation. Eventually a ghoul brought me down what looked like Hugh Jackman's fucked up cousin with red glowing eyes. He was furry, but he looked human. I could have bet money that he was Gangrel, but they're not known for their unwavering kindness, so I got down to business. I told him that if he dug up some dirt on the Prince for me, just a little bit, I would write him a check for a thousand bucks. He growled and then accepted my offer. I guess he needed the money. From what I've heard, the Gangrel are wanderers and gas is expensive. One night, while I was sitting in a corner with my mom on the phone, telling her everything was going just fine in D.C., my errand boy came back. He told me that the prince was showing greater leniency to the Toreador who created new progeny than to anyone else. I thanked him for his time and paid him. I relayed the information to Gatsby.
"Very well then," he said, before teaching me how to disappear from peoples' mind's eye.
The teachings continued until Gatsby said I had reached a proficient level of the discipline. I had the ability to walk around as anybody that I pleased. Gatsby offered to teach me further, but I would have had to support him in his bid for Princehood. I respectfully declined and returned to the surface.
On my first night above ground in a long time, I returned to my apartment, porno pasted to the walls, and lightproofed the place with some boards and black blankets. It beat the hell out of the sewers. On the second night, I attended Elysium for the first time.
Remember: almost all the vampires I'd seen up to that point were Nosferatu. I went in, looking all sexy and suave with the trick Gatsby calls mask of a thousand faces. As soon as I got in, some pale, relatively good-looking bald bastard in a trenchcoat tells me no disciplines are allowed. I took that to mean I had to drop my disguise. I got a good look at the licks gathered in that ballroom. Most of them were more beautiful than my best Obfuscate disguise times a thousand, but there were some ugly bastards like myself as well. One of them was a woman, I think. It had blackish skin and a soiled wedding dress. I gravitated over to her.
"What? You new or somethin'?" she asked.
"Yeah," I replied. "What's going on, here?"
"Basically, we're just shooting the shit. You can try and buddy up with the elders, if you wanna." She laughed at that last statement so I knew it would be a bad idea.
"You know anybody who needs any programming or computer stuff done? That's kind of my forte."
"Our clan's pretty good about that kind of stuff. The Gangrel used to come to us for that kind of thing. Now, we mostly deal with rabble and lunatics."
"This is my first time topside since I got the bite. Can you introduce me to any?" Old Gatsby told me a little bit about the clans. He came from a mostly objective standpoint, but it was clear that he didn't care much for the Toreador, the clan I'm now choosing to poke with a stick, pun intended.
"Yeah. But don't let anybody know you're new to the whole thing. We're fucking garbage to the beautiful people. They'd send us to our deaths just so they wouldn't have to look at us anymore."
"Alright. Why are you helping me?" I asked. There was a lot about the kindred I didn't understand.
"Because we sewer rats got each other's backs."
The nosferatu woman, Melinda, introduced me to a Ventrue lick who needed some encryption and decryption done. Easy stuff. The hard part was talking to the stuffy Ventrue guy. He wasn't that bad, himself. He was talking to the duo of Beaufort and Charlotte. I learned later that they were Toreador. Beaufort was a European dude with wavy blonde hair and a taste for designer clothes. Charlotte, his childe (whose dead pussy I currently have in my mouth) was a pretty brunette.
"My, my. It's so revolting it's almost beautiful," Beaufort quipped. A wicked smile spread across his face.
I did my best to ignore him. "I heard one of you might need some encryption and decryption done. I'm your man."
"So it does claim a gender. There's still the question of why." Charlotte smiled like a mischievous angel and reminded of some of my high school experiences with women.
"I'm good and discreet. Nobody'll even come close to finding what you're trying to hide." I made my case to the Ventrue. He looked me over disapprovingly with cold eyes. I was almost sure I lost the job.
"I don't blame you for your hesitance, Charles. I would sire a childe with an affinity for cold, mechanical things before I would in debt myself to this mongrel whelp."
"What is it you would ask in return?" Charles the Ventrue asked.
The first thing I thought of was money. "A thousand," I said.
"A thousand. Is that all?" the regal kindred asked. He looked amused.
"I suppose you get what you pay for," Beaufort sneered. He tapped out a little pattern on the tabletop.
"I'll pay you five thousand, if your work satisfies me."
My work satisfied Charles. Gatsby said that five thousand dollars was a ripoff. He said that blue bloods like Charlie had access to way more cash than that. I pretended to be pissed. What Gatsby didn't know was that I looked at those messages behind my employer's back. Charlieboy, one of the city's elder blue bloods, had been pen pals with a Lasombra bishop in Madrid. They were talking about a siege on the city. I decided that if I was going to live forever, I might as well save that information to use as a bargaining chip at a later date.
I went home and set up a computer in my apartment. Right now, I'm looking at the screen saver repeat its little motions over and over again as I build up a rhythm slamming my slimy cock into Charlotte's asshole. It's a lot easier now that I don't have to breathe. A couple of weeks ago I went back to hacking. I did it mostly to keep myself occupied between hunts. At that point, I had pretty much stopped raping. It didn't have the same effect it used to. I would download illegal software and then crack it to where it didn't need a disk or a key to operate. Kid stuff. One day, while I was playing The Sims, I got a knock on my door. I Obfuscated myself into a middle aged black woman I saw on the subway once and looked through my peephole. There was a little boy outside, but I recognized his voice.
"It's Gatsby," he said. I let him in. When he stepped in and I closed the door, he dropped the disguise. It scared the piss off of me. I'd forgotten what he really looked like. "Would you like to accompany me to Elysium?" Gatsby asked.
"I don't know," I said, "that's not really my scene."
"There's someone I'd very much like to introduce you to. A childe of mine."
"Yeah?"
"After... the change, she wasn't quite up to my standards, but I can't just abandon her, you see. I'd like you to teach her Obfuscate. Like I taught you."
"Fine then," I said. I locked my door and went with Gatsby back to the ballroom.
The scene was pretty much the same as before. Pretty dead people talked. Some of them looked at me and snickered; I recognized most of them. The most prominent among them was Charlotte. She sat in a corner with a bunch of her cronies drinking a wine glass full of what was probably blood and cracking jokes about me and Gatsby. At this point, Beaufort had forgotten about me. Gatsby introduced me to his new sireling. It was just as ugly as he was and looked similar in many respects. I talked to it, and explained what I knew about Obfuscate.
Charlotte walked by us on her way to talk to a Tremere apprentice. "It pains me to see that they're still breathing," she muttered. A Brujah yelled something about "taking it easy on the Nosferatu." I tossed the idea around in my head about doing something about Charlotte, but I didn't make any brash decisions.
The next night, I was out hunting with Gatsby's progeny, teaching what I knew about manhunting. I pulled a trick from my mortal days, and followed a beautiful redhead to a dark alley while she tried desperately to get phone reception, probably for a text message that was just oh-so-important. I listened to her heart slow and stop while I drained her completely. I felt the desperation die with her body. It bothered me. I think the desperation was what I liked about just raping people. I knew they had to live with it. A lot of people give their blood to vampires willingly. The whole thing began to sicken me. While I licked the wound away and threw the body in the dumpster, Gatsby's childe appeared in the shadows and congratulated me on a job well done.
"Your turn," I said. It did alright for its first time. It killed its victim, but at least it didn't do anything else to endanger the Masquerade.
I began coming up with my plan of action against Charlotte. I knew she was the typical filthy rich kid art student that made up the rank and file of the degenerates. I didn't know that I was going to wind up doing this at first. I just started by stealing the identity of an art dealer. I google searched artists that were popular and got some names. I called Charlotte. I lifted her number from Charlieboy's computer along with those of most of the other kindred in the city. I punched the number into a prepaid phone and it rang. I didn't expect Charlotte to answer it.
"Hello?" she answered. She had a hint of confusion in her voice. I liked it.
"I'm speaking on behalf of Mr. DeLafonte, the artdealer," I said. I impersonated an actor I saw on a TV show. In hindsight, I should have looked into how art deals go down, but I had no choice but to wing it at the time.
"Who is this I'm speaking to?" she asked.
I was freaking out, but I did my best to keep my composure. "This is Clint," I spat out quickly. Stupid name!
"Very good, then. What is Mr. DeLafonte offering?"
I was thankful I no longer needed to breathe. I dropped some of the artist names. She kind of huffed when I mentioned some guy that called himself Banksy, but as far as I could tell, she listened contently to the others.
"Are there any particular pieces Mr. DeLafonte is interested in selling?"
Another flaw in my plan was that I didn't research any paintings. "Mr. DeLafonte has quite an impressive collection. He has his favorites, but like everyone else, he can be bought. I'm sure that you're a busy woman. You probably have tons of important business to attend to."
"How could you possibly know that?" There was a playful, condescending tone in Charlotte's voice. I had to say something to pull my ass out of the fire.
"One of your aides said that you were a very important woman; not to be disturbed." It was a gamble. I knew that the Tories tend to keep a lot of pretty blood dolls around.
"Right," Charlotte said. "Where shall we meet?"
I struggled to hold back my deranged excitement. "There's this little coffee shop on the corner of 42nd and and 9th. You can meet me there tomorrow night."
"Very well. I'm free."
There was still the matter of what I was going to do with her once I caught her. I still wasn't quite sure. I brainstormed it. The most prevalent thing on the list I came up with was something that Gatsby insisted on calling "the dastardly amaranth." The other kindred laughed when I used the term. "The term's outdated," they would tell me, "they call it 'diablerie' now." They pretty much always call the blood hunt on diablerists. That was out. It was then that I started tinkering with the idea of rape. I knew my dick didn't work, but it would still stand up. I decided that I would do it just to humiliate her. Somewhere back in the back of my head, I knew I would enjoy it. I was right.
I enlisted the help of Gatsby's childe to pick up Charlotte. I met with it in Gatsby's underground lair. It was cowering in a corner, scanning filthy floor for rats.
"Can you drive?" I asked it.
"I can drive an automatic," it replied without making eye contact. It snatched up a rat and crushed it with its massive fangs to juice it like a piece of fruit. A bit of the blood ran down the Nos childe's neck.
"Beautiful," I said.
"I know how things work, Eugene," it said, "what do I get in return?" It still wasn't making eye contact. It seemed more focused on snatching up another rat.
"Do you know anything about vampire strength?" I asked.
"Gatsby calls it Potence. He finds it 'obtuse and detestable.'" It gave up looking for a rat and stood up.
"What do you think of it?" I asked.
"It might be cool," the thing said.
"I might be able to teach you how it works," I said. The vampire strength is one of the few things Ms. Carroway taught me after she gave me the Kiss. When I taught Gatsby's childe Obfuscate, it picked it up pretty fast.
Gatsby's child, who was still in the process of picking a name, drove me down to the coffee shop. Sure enough, Charlotte was hanging around outside. She kept looking at her phone. I Obfuscated myself into a ski mask robber and got out of the van with a tire iron. I wore an actual ski mask. Sometimes cameras can pick up your real face, even when you use your sneaky vampire powers. She looked at me, confused. I took the tire iron to her temple. It drew blood and snapped her head back. She staggered backward, blood pouring down the side of her face, I was beginning to feel something familiar. Something I was looking for. Charlotte ran for it, but wouldn't you know it, one of her expensive heels broke. I grabbed her by the ankle and used all of my strength to throw her hard against the wall inside my getaway van. I got in and slammed the sliding door behind me.
"What the hell, man?"
"Shut up and drive, lick," I commanded, accidentally using my real voice.
Charlotte's eyes lit up. She knew who I was. She got up and lunged at me, baring her fangs. She caught me off guard and tackled me. Disoriented, I groped for the stake I had ready while my accomplice sped through the city streets. Gatsby's childe slammed the breaks suddenly and threw the van into reverse. This caused Charlotte and I to tumble in such a way that I found myself on top. I dropped my disguise and got a rush at the sudden expression of fear that formed on the Toreador's pretty face. I grabbed her by the neck and pressed her corpse against the cold metal floor while I looked around for my stake and found it. When I reached for it, my target managed to scramble towards the doors in the back of the van. Before she could open them, she had a stake in her back that found its mark. She fell backward, almost lifeless, but I could feel a familiar fear and dread radiating from her.
Gatsby's protegé took me and my date back to my building. I had him take the van to a place downtown where it was almost sure to be stolen. I carried my prize up the fire escape so I wouldn't draw attention. I shoved her inside and admired her look of terror, brunette locks swept through the dust and grime of my floor. It was then that I went to work, taking off her clothes.
I take my thing out of her face. I'm done with her. I pose her, leaning against the wall, as if to suggest that she is experiencing a moment of private self pleasure. I sit in my computer chair and wait. If what I know about kindred society is right, it won't be long before one of the Toreador higher-ups is going to come looking for her. I get a stern, hard knock on my door. I undo the lock and step away. Beaufort walks in, looking out of place wearing an expensive suit in this slum tenement. He looks at how I've posed his childe and I think it's just hilarious. I can't help but laugh. Kindred don't often show emotion, especially ones as old as Beaufort, but I can see the embarrassment on his face. It's a fitting cherry for the top of my rape sundae.
"What have you done to her?" he asks, horrified.
"Nevermind. You want her back? You can have her. Take her. She's yours."
"Nevermind? Nevermind! How am I supposed to overlook this? The prince must hear about this! I'll not rest until you've seen another sunrise."
"I'll tell you how you're supposed to overlook this. It's pretty much a sure thing that your buddy Charles is next in line to be seneschal." All the beautiful ones want a step up the ladder. Beaufort is old, so I know he'll want some kind of advantage.
"Charles? Yes. I don't see what that has to do with-"
"-What that has to do with Charlotte? I'll tell you." I take a sealed yellow envelope out of a desk drawer. "Charles has some Sabbat ties. I'm sure you'd like to know about them."
"What's keeping me from killing you and taking the envelope?"
"Nothing, probably. But you won't be able to get the information."
"What are you proposing?" the elder Toreador asks. I can smell something in the air. Charlotte is rightly terrified that I'm going to get away scott free.
"You let me go to New York City. From there, I'll send you a program that will decrypt the information. I've set you up with a temporary email account. The information is all in the envelope along with the flash drive. Of course, I have to stipulate that you can no way pursue me to NYC. The Nosferatu are nothing if not an underground network. I'll know what's up."
"Very well," Beaufort says. "Give me the envelope."
I hand it over. Beaufort slings his child over one shoulder and heads out the door. On their way out, Charlotte's head tilts towards me. I can see a bloody tear stream out of an eye and into her hair.