IC: A twelve year old looking kindred walks in wearing a pair of worn, flared, blue jeans and a long sleeve white T-shit with a black Nirvana T-shirt over the top. She has dirty blonde hair that is pulled back in a ponytail. Her shoes are so worn that they look like they could speak themselves. She walks with a bit of an attitude but her face shows that it is a façade and that she is really a caring individual. She walks over to where you are and sits down. “So I guess you are who I came to talk to, it’s a long story just to warn you,” she smiles. She pauses and thinks for a moment before she begins.

“My name is, Sarah Clark and although I only look twelve becareful because appearances are deceiving especially among the kindred. I was born in 1920 on a farm in Wisconsin. My twin sister Becky was killed by a vampire in 1928 and I shared that experience with her that night even though I was not there when it happened. Due to this I went a little nuts according to my family and teachers I guess so they sent me to a private asylum where I met Ezra Blocken whom worked nights in the asylum. In 1930 he took me away from the asylum because it was about to be taken over by the state. He told me at that point he was a vampire and offered to protect me, my parents believe that at that time I died.”

“Ezra and I went to Europe and he would tell me about his family and his daughter who happened to look a lot like me in his eyes. He would go into a tangent and think that I was she and one night while in such a fit he embraced me. After that Becky began to visit me and talk to me again. We would argue about what a monster I became and she would try to prove it in my actions and those around me. She has not left since that day in1932. We stayed in Europe until the break out of WWII and then we returned to the states.”

“Not a whole lot happened in those years following our return to Europe. Ezra keep me in our house most of the time like an over protective father. During this time I did get Henry, my ghoul, who is basically my accountant and finical advisor and who was my link to the outside world that Ezra protected me from.”

“In the mid 1990’s Ezra began to act really differently and would not want to leave the house himself speaking of the ‘gray coats’ getting us. I remembered that he served in the military during the civil war and figured it was just another fit. Unfortunately this fit never came to an end and I left to find us food and I found myself in a world that was foreign to me, but similar in some was. As years went by and no relief from his ‘fit’ came I began to leave for longer periods of time and ran into a group of kindred.”

“The first one that I met was Julian and we became very close and he taught me many things during the time I knew him. They were members of a Sabbat pack and asked me to join of which I did because I saw this group as a new family since Ezra was slipping so far from reality. We lived on a Sabbat/Camarilla boarder. There were three other Malkavians there in addition to me. I was with them for a short time only because we all soon came to clash for I was to learn what monsters they were and I was not. Julian also had a view similar to mine and we were punished for our human actions and in the end Julian met his final death because of ‘human’ side.” Sarah breaks down a little after speaking of Julian looking like a teenager who has just lost their first great love.

“After his death the pack leader treated me totally different as if I was nothing and during an attack on the Camarilla after our haven was burned down he left me for final death. At this time however I had met Sydney previous to the attack and he brought me with him to Toronto. We got there just prior to the Rochester fire and that time for me was so terribly frightening. I wasn’t sure what would happen to me. Few knew yet I was a former Sabbat member but those who did would glare at me and even worse glares came from those who despised the Malkavians. I felt so utterly alone at this time and all I could do was wish that Julian was here still to protect me and hold me when I felt alone.”

“I guess that’s my story up to now, I am amazed by the hatred that some in the Camarilla has for us it matches and sometimes exceeds the hate I knew in the Sabbat. I don’t know what is going to happen to us now but I’m not going to run this time, I’ve ran enough in this unlife from those who have sought to destroy me.” Sarah sits there looking defiant like a teenager who is determined not to follow her parent’s rules at any cost. “If I meet final death in the coming months I want to know that I went down fighting. I want Julian to be proud of me and I want Becky to see that I didn’t give into the monster in me.”

“I gotta run see you later” Waves goodbye as she leaves.

IC: Inside a large open room, located in the basement of the apartment building called Skylight Towers (which is not at all true since there is only one tower and it's only 12 stories high), sits a man laboriously studying something on an easel. Scattered around him are various cans and tubes of paint, several used brushes, a pair of well-worn Doc Marten's boots, and a large boombox cranking out some tune by Depeche Mode. He sits on a paint-strewn stool, his dirty blonde hair looking a tangled mess as if it hadn't seen the business end of a comb in ages. He wears baggy black cargo pants and an equally baggy grey sweater. After comtemplating the painting before him for a few more seconds, he abruptly stands, lifts it off the easel, and unceremoniously chucks it against the wall. Along the walls, all around the room, are dozens and dozens more paintings, left there as if the artist had no more use for them once they were done.

The only other furniture in the room is an old refrigerator, a small tv sitting on top of a milk crate, and two mattresses which could be called a bed. After depositing his painting to one side, the man, perhaps in his late teens or early 20s, stretches out and plops down on the bed to sleep. Moments later, however, a phone rings from somewhere. After searching under and around the chaotic mess, he finds it and answers with a simple "Yeh?".

"Yes, this is Christian. Who's this?"{pause}

"Oh, yeh, my agent told me you were gonna call. You wanting to buy some of my work?"{pause}

"Oh really? I guess that makes sense. The more you know about someone's life, the better you can understand them. Well, there ain't much to tell. You want my whole life story or just the best parts?"{pause}

"You asked for it, but I gotta warn ya, it ain't no Gone With the Wind. I guess I'll start with the usual. I was born. I grew up. My pops, nice enough guy for a Protestant preacher. Mum, she was just a housewife. But she was different, she was. She had these visions, just like I do now. She'd see things, things that would happen for real sometimes. Drove her nuts, though. She couldn't handle it. Thought it was God telling her all that stuff was her fault or something. So she offed herself when I was about 13. Dad, he loved me and all, but he was a simple guy and didn't know what to do when I started having the visions, too. It was bad enough he'd lost a wife that way, so he wanted me taken care of. He sent me off to a mental institution. Not much they could do then. Places like that in England, especially in the 70s, they were none too effective. But they did show me how to paint, and that seemed to help. I don't know, something about putting it somewhere other than my head, ya know. Transference or something like that. But it was enough to get me out of the place when I was 20." {pause}

"Huh? Prophet? Oh, that's just some nickname people gave me, because of the visions. It doesn't bother me. Anyway, after I got out, I moved away from England and my father and all that stuffiness. I tried New York for a while, but it's hard to hold down a job when you're blanking out every half hour and waking up ranting about bizarre visions. Plus, my 'sponsor' had gone totally nuts, and I wasn't too welcome there anymore because of her. So I moved to Toronto, where I met Sally. She's my agent, but I guess you knew that. She said that an associate of hers from New York had shown her my paintings and she loved them. It took her a while to sell any of them. She was way ahead of her time. But finally they started selling, and here I am.

Setting In

The Modern Chicken Apothecary. The Housewives Guide to Chicken Dishes. 1001 Things To Do With Leftover Chicken. What Came First...A Discussion on Chickens in Philosophical Thought. Sydney shook his head as he put the books in thier designated spot in the refrigerator. His mentor (who was coincidentally his grandsire) had once told him that every vampire in thier lineage had an odd predeliction for chickens dating back to one of the oldest Vampires in thier line. Sydeny had never believed it before, but then again, he had never considered haveing an entire section of the bookstore devoted to chicken books as odd before either. Tonight it struck him as very odd. He shook his shaggy head again, and purged the concept of Vampiric lineage from his mind and stood up to take stock of his bookstore.

Sydney smiled slightly, and busied himself with dusting the body of a '63 Volkswagon bug that he used as a bookshelf and reading area. (The Carrot and The Stick was nothing if not eclectic) He drew patterns with the dust on the car before blotting it out with a dustcloth, and idily wondered if he should call Sarah and see how she was doing.

"He Gone!! GONE!!! Gone, gone, gone, gone GONE!!!!"

Sydney jerked around at the unexpected interuption, and caught a glimpse a curly red-haired man launching himself at the bookseller. Sydney instinctivily moved backwards, which only pinned him up against the VW bug. Trapped the curly-haired man took the opportunity to sieze Sydney's shoulders and shake him violently. "Heeeeee's GONE! Dead! Completely ash! Dead as a doornail! Deader that noon! And us?? We're dead in the water!"

"AAAAaaaaaauuuuugh!" Sydney yelped in return and clapped his hands down on the man's shoulders. "Stop it, stopit, STOP IT!!!!" The two men looked at each other, eyes bugged out, arms tense. Sydeny broke the silence. "What happened, Will? What is going on...And PLEASE explain it to me in a civilized fashion."

Will sat down, and blinked. "It wasn't me, son. But he's gone. Ash. They burned him up."

"Who's gone, Will?" Sydney asked, shaking a bit.

"Murray. The poor chap's gone. They cheated, burned him right up, they did."

"No!" Or at least that was what Sydney had wanted to say. It didn't come out, and he was left holding his face in a stupid o-shaped gape.

"I've gotta go, son. I've gotta tell the others - it's my job. Watch yer'self. watch yer'self good. They might come for you next" and with that the curly haired man ran out of the shop.

Sydney didn't move for a good long time, wondering excatly just what had happened. He didn't know the primogen all that well, but something in Will's demeanro made him think that somehow this was going to affect him too. He shook himself and wandered over to the phone.

"Sarah, you there?"

[Yes. Sydney, is that you. You sound...worried]

"yeah. No. I'm not...but I am. I mean. I don't know what I mean. Can you come over...?"

The Trip There (Setting In contined...)

IC- "Yes, i'll be over shortly."

Sarah sits there in her small effficency apartment for a moment after hanging up the phone. She sits and ponders what could be up that would make Sydney worried becuase he wasn't even worried when surrounded by the sabbat pack Sarah used to belong to.

She gets up and takes a moment to look in the mirror and make sure she looks decent, well at least like a normal teenager. She throws on a pair of worn out shoes and locks the door as she leaves the apartment.

As she walks down the street she looks at people that she passes and thinks back to when Machi called them cattle and how much that thought disturbed and still does.

~"Sarah, slow down" calls Becky~

Sarah stops and smiles a bit, ever since comming to Toronto Becky had started to speak to her again. "We have to get to Sydney's walk faster", people around Sarah look at her strangely as if she was speaking to them. As she arrives at The Carrot and The Stick Sarah walks in quitely and looks around at the books and their 'shelves'. She walks over to Sydney and says in a sweet voice, "We are here."

Anique,Introduction

Occ: On the street outside sydney's bookshop

IC: The crowd of nightime revelers did not notice the diminutive girl. She was about 5'5'' tall, stick thin, and very pale. Not unlike the majority of girls club hopping that night. The noticeable thing about her, however, was her hair. It was very long. Past her waist. I suppose you could say Lady Godiva long. And it was almost white. In reality, it was an extremely pale blond, almost silvery. But here, on the dark sidewalk, under the yellowish glow of the street lights, it looked to be the a whitish-silver. Kind of like your grandmother's silver when it becomes tarnished, the white patina of age settling over the silver, turning it cloudy. Her skin was like porcelain, and when combined with the bizarre appearance of her hair, she looked more like a wayward spirit floating down the street than a 20 year old girl.

She moved like a ghost as well, darting in between the crowds of party-goers and bar-hoppers without so much as touching them. So, despite her slightly odd appearance, she turned few heads. She walked past a group of goth teens who were playing hackey sack in the entrance to an alleyway. They did not see her. She moved into the alley, past the spraypainted dumpsters of tagger heaven, past the bags of rotten vegetables from the corner grochery, and into the end, towards the brick wall at the back. He was there, near the wall, waiting. She came up behind him silently, touched his shoulder, and when he spun around in surprise, she allowed him to see her.

"Hey, you made it! i was starting to think you were gonna stand me up!" he exclaimed. The boy in front of her was about 18, with spiky hair dyed blond at the ends, baggy khakis, and a ripped up t-shirt that said "RaNcId" on it. She spoke no words, just smiled. He put his hand out, and ran it through her silvery hair. "You're beautiful, you know" he said quietly.

"Fine, well, let's get down to buisness. I have places to be tonight that are not here. I like to move fast and efficiently." she replied in a louder, harsher tone.

"AllRIGHT!" He said, and reached for his back pocket, trying frantically to remember what his teacher had said in sex-ed about the correct way to put on a condom. As his head turned, she lunged forward, and grabbed his neck, sinking her fangs into his soft white flesh. Her teeth pushed deeper, seeking the vein. A burst of beautiful, sweet, sticky blood gushed into her mouth, and she felt the need, the hunger, rise within herself.she gripped him tightly around his neck, and supported his body with her other hand. THe urge to drink more and more was overwhelming. The blood poured into her mouth, and she swallowed in desperate, urget gulps, fighting the her body's desire to drink more and more. She felt his body rise beneath her, as her writhed with the ecstacy of the Kiss. As his body pressed against her, she felt the warmth of it, heard the beating of his heart, felt his hot breath against her neck. She conciousness snapped back in to focus. He was alive. She couldn't kill him. She stopped drawing the delcious blood into her mouth. With one expert, practiced move, she at once drew her fangs out of his neck and deftly licked the wound shut with her tongue. She gazed down at him, as he lay limp in her arms. She carried his limp body over to the wall of the alley, and tenderly lay him against it. She ran her hand through his hair, smoothing it down tenderly, like a mother would do to a wayward child. She felt for his pulse. It was strong. He would live. She took a little mirror out of the pocket of her jeans.

Her pale face was stained with his lifeblood. She wet her finger and wiped the remains of her supper off of her face. It was so good, so sweet. When her face was sufficiently cleaned, she took a slip of paper out of her pocket, with a pen. Carefully, she wrote. 'Call me in the morning, honey! (212)-555-6139. She slipped it in his pocket and smiled at the thought of him calling the Toronto Family Funeral Home sometime the next afternoon. She turned on her heel,and walked with confidence accross the street, through the throngs of drunken kine, and into the door of 'The Carrot and The Stick'.

Christian- Vegetables and Fishing Poles?

IC: "NOooooooooo!!!"

Christian woke with a yell after a particularly horrible dream. He looked over at his wrist to check the time. It had only been half an hour since he fell asleep. He lay in bed a few moments longer, trying desperately to recall what had been so horrible about this dream. This one was hard to remember, for some reason. He could see a few bizarre images in his mind, but there had been so much more to it. It seemed important, but he could produce no more than those images as he thought about it. Just a simple picture in his mind of a carrot dangling from the end of a fishing pole or something. And then a few faces, distorted but distinct enough to pick out some features. One young girl, a man, and what could only be described as a ghostly figure. Everything else was just lost, blurred in the haze between reality and the mind.

Climbing out of bed, still dressed in baggy cargo pants and grey sweater, he grabs his boots and puts them on quickly. Walking quickly out the door and locking it behind him, he makes his way down the short hallway, up the stairs to the first floor, and out another door into an alleyway which leads to the city streets of Toronto.

~This is so weird~ he thinks, trying to keep his mind off his growing hunger as he walks in a randomly chosen direction. ~Usually my visions are so clear. I can remember them for hours afterwards. They won't leave me until I act somehow. It was almost like this was... No, that's impossible. I haven't had a normal dream in... well, not since Mum.~ He walks along the streets, looking at shop signs and people going about their lives. ~Still, it's not like me to be so weirded out by a vision, but not have the desire to paint it, too. This one was just.. I don't know.. like a message.~

As he continues to walk, he is snapped back to reality by the sight of a lovely young girl window shopping. She can't be more than 20 or so, dressed in black like him, with long black hair. The typical goth chick, one might say. She stands looking at the window of an eclectic dress shop named Madame Tolouse's. The dress in the window, black of course, is quite haunting, with fine needlework and small intricate beads of blood red.

"That's very pretty" she hears behind her. She turns slowly to see Christian looking at the dress, also. "You would look simply delicious in that. Yes, yes, I think so." She continues to stare, as if she should know this stranger.

"You look so familiar." she says, shifting her head side to side and around, trying to get that just-so angle that will bring her memory back. Christian just smiles, still looking at the dress for a moment, then finally turning his gaze to her.

"This is going to sound absolutely mad," he starts, " but could I paint you?" The girl moves back an inch in momentary shock, but that inch seems to give her that perfect memory angle and she says with barely contained surprise

"YOU! Yes, I knew it! I've seen your work. It's just.. fabulous is all. Oh wow, you want to paint me, really? That would be so cool. I just don't know, I mean, I have class in a little while and then there's Matt.. we're supposed to go out, but it's just our second date so I don't suppose he'll be too crushed, especially if I tell him where I am, with THE artiste. Oh wow."

Christian, looking dazed by the seemingly endless dribble of talk coming out of the young woman's mouth, simply puts a hand to her lips. "So you'll do it?" She just nods with enthusiasm. "Good. Come with me then." They walk along the street, heading further into the collection of small unique businesses that populate this neighborhood. Suddenly, Christian stops in his tracks, staring up as if he'd just seen the heavens open up and holy manna rain from the skies. the girl is forgotten, and stands staring back at him in a state of confusion. Just above him, swinging in the slight breeze, a small sign hangs out over the street advertising the bookshop called The Carrot and the Stick. He walks in without a word, leaving the disappointed girl to wander off alone.

Cheap Romance Novels

IC: Anique steped into 'the Carrot and the Stick', ignoring the cheerful ring of the bell on the door. She looked around at the old cars with customers reading inside of them, and the odd assortment of everyday objects turned bookshelves. She breathed a sigh of contentment at returning to this familiar place. She put her hands in her pockets and walked in a determined fashion to her favorite section-the cheap romance novels.

Anique ran her fingers over the worn spines, looking for an interesting title. Her hand paused at "Passions And Pomegranates" and she pulled the book off of the shelf. Suddenly, she doubled over with laughter at the cover art. A blond man looking surprisingly like Fabio leaned over a thin woman with wild hair and big breasts, supporting her diminutive frame with his heavily muscled arm. Anique giggled some more, and removed a highlighter from her back pocket. She sat down on the floor, right in the middle of the aisle, and furiously paged through the book. She came upon a sex scene, and, taking the cap off of her flourescent yellow marker, highlighted it on the page. She continued to page through the rest of the book in a similar fashion, pausing only to houl with laughter or read a line or two out loud.

An old woman peeked around the corner and pressed a finger to her lips, indicating to Anique that she should shut up. Anique was so absorbed that she didn't even notice. When she had finnished highlighting what she called "the good parts' in 'Passion and Pomegranates", she removed several other books from the shelves. Titles such as "Amourous Undies", "Surrender to Saliva" and "Sweat and Latex" were far too tempting to leave behind on the shelf.

She carried a precariously balanced stack over to one of the tables, setting it down as the books fell all over the table top in a haphazard fashion, and sat down with her marker in hand.

Worries and Wonderments

Sydney had ushered Sarah to a table, and unable to sit still, had immediatly stood, got two cups of hot chocolate (which he couldn't drink, but it still smelled good) and sat back down. "Are you allright?" Sarah asked sweetly.

"Yeah, I think so. It's just that Will came in the shop about a half an hour ago, ranting that we were all dead in the water. I don't quite know what it means." He shrugged, and absentmindidly took a sip of hot chocolate, choked a bit, and spit it out into a handkerchief. A few patrons looks over as Sydney held up his hands, and shook thier gazes away. "My mind is not with me tonight." he murmured, shaking his head.

"Will is usually shaken up, right?" Sarah replied. "Maybe you just didn't understand him."

"Maybe." Sydney replied, wiping drops of hot chocolate off his chin.

The door for the bookshop chimed, and a thin woman with ephermal silver hair strode in, and wandered over to the romance section.

"Looks like Anique is here." Sarah stated.

"Yeah, I told her I got in a few new books." Sydeny shuffled behind the counter, and waited for her to finish her highlighting job, Watching the customers as they entered. He peered at the artist as he entered. Sydney had seen him once or twice before, but knew relativily little about him. He leaned forward, chin on his hands, and turned slowly to Sarah

"Know him at all, Sarah?" he queried, poinint out Christian.

Doomsday is Upon Us!

IC - Good thing some people didn't breathe anymore, or he would have died from a heart attack ages ago. As is, Will O'Leary was 42, bug eyed, and disheveled, and completely unable to find anyone who he was supposed to talk to. Oh, well. When all else fails, visit the bookshop.

Will ran down the street, and up the steps of The Carrot and The Stick, eyes desperatly searching for someone he knew. And there he found someone he knew. Alot of someone's he knew.

The door opened with a clang and a bustle, and the word 'Masquerade' flashed through his head momentarily. He frantically looked around, and fizated on Sydney's back store room, and grabbed the thin, white hair woman sitting to his left, and drug her into the storeroom before she could react.

Anique's eyes widened at the unexpected break in her routine, but Will's assault was relentless. Once out of sight of the kine proper, he let out a torrent of barely understandable gibbering, accompanied witha forceful shaking

"Anique! He's GONE! gone, gone gonegonegone!!! We are all going to die! ALL of US are going to die! Not see day, he is ash, and I justdon't know what to do now. GONE!!!! We areall goingtobehunted! Help me, Anique, help us or weareall going to die! He's GONE! gone, gone, gone, gonegonegone!!!!" He babbled, shaking the thin girl, and panting like a young pup after a run.

Shaken-up (Literally)

IC: Anique was so engrossed in her work at the table, carefully highlighting the sex scenes in romance novels, that she hardly noticed the frantic red-haired malkavian who burst into the bookstore. Suddenly, a hand grabbed her shirt collar and a fistfull of her hair, abruptly yanking her back to reality, and away from the torrents of passionate love on the page. She looked up into the dancing eyes of Will, who she recognized immediatley. He was quite well-known amoung the Malkavian community in Toronto. His eyes whirled with excitment and terror, hinting at the madness of his clan that surged through him with the blood of Malkav. She was too startled to say a word, and, without any further hesitation, she felt herself being dragged accross the floor of the book shop towards the back room. She felt the heat from the friction of the carpet through her bluejeans and she found herself glad she was wearing pants-carpet burns were quite painful. The strong grip Will had on her hair reminded her of the descriptions in her romance novels of'strapping young men with strong grips like steel'. She giggled at the thought of Will being the hero of a romance novel. He didn't quite seem like the type. He pulled her into the backroom, and the door shut behind them with a thud.

Suddenly, he began to babble at her, almost incoherently, about somehting having to do with politics. She stared up at him blankly, as he rambled on and on, bits of bloody spit landing on her face in his hurry to get the words out. She listened, wide-eyed, as he rambled. After a few minutes of this, she looked him in the eye,called upon the power of her blood,and said very resolutely,

"QUIET!!!". He calmed down, still panting from the exertion of his frenzied delivery. She looked at him with wide eyes, and said "For F&#^s sake, will...I can't understand a word you are saying! What the hell is going on!?"