Alister's Appointment at Roeststatd Medical

[Narg]

"Ya' did die Alister. I brought'cha back." Solomon looked over at Alister and then back over the clustered residencies before continuing. "I was gon' tell'y'all this in good time. But damn Saoirse just had to stick her stupid lil' nose where it didn' belong."

Solomon shifted on his feet, "I've never had to do this before. This is a... new experience for me." Solomon squared himself in front of Alister, facing himself directly towards his new Childe. "Alister, yer now immortal. A Childe of Caine, the first Vampire. You drink blood to function and will be killed by the mornin' sun. The nighttime has been yer life fer quite a while, but now it's your only home. The daylight gives no solace any longer. What you just drank was blood. Water ain't life anymore. What happened under the Hospital, that wasn'ta nightmare. That's reality. Blood, power, hunger, that's reality. Our reality."

Solomon opened his mouth wide and let Alister watch two long, sharp, canine teeth grow from his gums. He closed his mouth and said, "I'm one too. It's how I can move so fast, be so strong, smell so well, command people with my very presence. You'll learn to do it too. In time." He paused briefly, then started again, "I know you won't believe me Alister. You're a skeptic, I know. It's one of the reasons I like you. We were gon' be a team. And we still can be if you don' end up hating me for this."

[Alister Rockwell]

Alister just stared at Solomon. For a long, long time. When he finally, after a truly pained and uncomfortable silence, opened his mouth, he said,

"Quit fucking with me."

[Narg]

"I ain't." Solomon opened the empty flask and held it upside down above his hand. An unimaginably long moment later, a crimson drop fell from the mouth of the silver flask into the palm of Solomon's hand. It glistened in the moonlight, like a reflective rose. The scent caught Alister's nose. He would have asked what the smell was, but he instinctively knew. It was blood. He had consumed, and relished in, what was most likely, human blood.

"It was the only way to save ya' Alister. I thought this was betta than death. You deserve to be free, like we talked 'bout. I wasn' gon' let Saoirse enslave ya. She was gon' turn you into a ghoul. A druggie made immortal by Vampire blood, constantly cravin' the vitae of his masta'. I wasn' gon' let you be no slave. You were dyin' Alister. I couldn' stop the bleedin'."

[Alister Rockwell]

The silence dragged on and on and on. Solomon held his gaze with that same mixture of guilt and concern. The truth was, Alister didn't know what to think. That liquid was blood, and the taste of it had been so...intoxicating. He'd seen his own blood drawn out of his forehead by a woman controlling living beings like puppets. Was it really so ridiculous, in the face of what he'd already seen tonight, that he was a...a fucking vampire?

Except vampires weren't real, they were a bed time story made up to scare children in the 1500s. Whatever the answer was, surely it was something a bit more sensical than 'I turned you into a vampire'. And yet Solomon wasn't lying - and Alister was dead certain he wasn't off his rocker. He'd met crazies and druggies, Solomon was neither.

He argued with himself in his own mind, his heart believing Solomon's story as his mind rejected it wholly.

It was Alister's body that betrayed his acceptance of his new reality. His hand, almost without his knowledge, crept up his body to part a lip and feel the canine there. The tooth was long, and wickedly sharp - Alister drew a tiny pinprick of blood from his own finger as he ran his finger across the point.

Abruptly, he spun around and hopped back through the window. He went to a mirror hanging against the wall, and looked at himself. His skin was pale and pallid, his eyes still sunken - he still looked like he was on death's door. He still looked like himself - but when he opened his mouth, he saw those long teeth, like something out of a legend, sitting comfortably in his mouth, and the truth of his new state of being closed around him.

Alister's fist shattered the mirror - no, it exploded it, the sheer power behind the blow sending shards of mirrored glass flying throughout the room and knocking the mirror free from the wall. It crashed to the ground, leaving Alister feeling stupid, and guilty. 

When he returned to the fire escape, Solomon was still watching him. Alister was still quiet, still trying to figure out what to think. At the end of the day, though, he was still alive - if the stories were true after all, then he wasn't really alive, not truly. But he wasn't dead either, and that...that was something. Solomon had given him more than a new life - he'd given him a second chance. At long last, Alister figured out how he felt. Solomon hung on his words when Alister finally spoke.

"Okay," he said at length. "Okay. Vampires...are real. You're a vampire. And now I'm a vampire too. Which means I'm still alive - in a way."

He held out his hand for a handshake.

"Those thanks I gave you come with a condition now. You brought me into this...world. So you're going to teach me all about it. Sound fair?"

[Narg]

"I wouldn' hang you out to dry, Alister. This is my responsibility. We got a lotta time to learn, but it's a dangerous world you're a part of now. You'll need to learn quick, and Saoirse will be making trouble fer us. She's got a lotta sway, both in the mortal world and vampire society, and we made her mad. Enemies last forever unless you destroy em. Ya gotta learn to wait for the right time to strike. I'm gon' teach you how to do all o' this. Don'chu worry, Alister. Don'chu worry one bit."

The moon fell over the horizon. The black sky turned to indigo, and soon into grey, as Alister listened intently to the Solomon about the workings of vampire society. The century long feuds between the Camarilla and the Sabbat, and the machinations of the Setites and Assamites filled the hours of the night before the Beast demanded rest of both denizens of the night. In that way they were equal. No vampire was without their beast.

Alister found himself both cursed with undeath, and cured of his mortal suffering. Two sides of an unfortunate coin, that had dragged him into the darkness of a sunless world.

At least he knew his nights with Solomon would be long. An eternity with one true friend.

SPOILER: Click to show

Alister's story finishes for now. He is awarded 3 EXP. 1 for completion of the story, 1 for completion of an overarching goal (cure himself of SUPER AIDS), and 1 for the first dialogue with Solomon (I found that to be excellent role playing that really got to the heart of Alister's character, and demanded change and introspection that added necessary depth and complexity. Extremely well done!). Storyteller (Me) Gets 1 EXP for masterminding this whole thing (First story ever whoo!)