Interview with a (half) Vampire (IC summary of Dresden Files game)

Disclaimer: This is an in-character write-up/summary of a short Dresden Files RPG that I played in recently and is entirely fictional.

"You look disappointed that I look like a normal guy, what were you expecting? Brad Pitt or something? Sorry but the real world don't play that way, tell you what, you want I should make my tattoos glow red, no? Well perhaps it's not such a good idea anyway, they're not there to be pretty.

Okay, so, where to start.

Is this thing on?

Right, well my name is Luciano Santiago; you've heard saying 'unlucky in love, lucky at cards'? Well I was never very good with either, so my family saddled me with the nickname Lucky, funny thing is, i'm here now and they're not - so whose the lucky one at the end of things eh?

The Santiago family used to run the criminal world in this city, wasn't a shady deal or underhand enterprise went down without them knowing about it and taking their cut; it was a good time, things got done professionally, not saying that we were nice people, far from it, but we took pride in our work and kept the collateral damage to a minimum - no real sentiment involved, it just wasn't efficient. Well that all changed when some chump named Straiker grabbed me and my brother Giani when we were heading back from a job, I don't even remember how he got us to get in the car, but (even knowing nothing about the supernatural as I did) i'd seen enough movies to know what he was when fangs slid out of his mouth and he started snacking on my brother.

You ever know what it's like to try and move and not be able to? Well yeah it sucks balls, but I couldn't move a muscle, and I was straining so hard I was worried I was gonna pop something; but Straiker lets my brother go and puts the bite down on me, I started to feel myself drift away when from nowhere there was a loud crunch as another car hit us.

Lucky at cards right?

Straiker took a hit to the back of the head and I found that I could move again, so I scrambled out of the car, I thought that my brother must've been dead, it was only later when I tried to go back that I found out he was walking about; only he wasn't my brother any more, he was like Straiker some bat-faced blood sucker. Once Straiker got a taste of the criminal world, he decided he wanted to take a big bite out of it and began munching his way through my family.

All the while I could feel this churning hunger burning me up inside, I had to get away, the family would be looking for me either to kill me or to put the bite on me (I wasn't sure which one was worse); it was then I saw a young kid running out infront of a car, it wasn't going to stop. Before I knew what I was doing I felt a surge of strength flow through me and ran across the road faster than the car was moving, grabbing the child and putting her safely down on the other side; I was about to speak to her when suddenly the hunger pain returned, twisting like a knife in my gut, so bad that I collapsed at the side of road, groaning in pain.

The next thing I knew was that some guy (I later found out he was a senior detective) was picking me up, he'd seen me save the kid and introduced me to this weird group called the Order of St. Giles, after setting me a few trials they gave me these tattoos; yes I know, you can't normally see them, but when I get the hunger on me they start glowing, both to warn people and to help hold the hunger back.

So how does this relate to the supernatural war and the re-dressing of the balance?

Well I ended up hooking up with this american-indian woman called Wayaya who was pretty clued in to the world of the supernatural, had some kind of fierce sorcerous mojo going on that I wouldn't want to mess with, not least of which was that she seriously messed up any technology that she got near (well anything post-1950s); my other ally around this time was a Detective Howell, a young woman who (despite my best efforts) got dragged into the whole messy affair when she broke up a drug deal I was doing. Trying to hide from my family, i'd been forced to use outside help, they got sloppy and the police were tipped off - i'd written the whole thing off and was about to make myself scarce when one of the police officers fell of the boat they were on and hit his head. I've seen a lot of people die in my time but no-one deserves to go out like that so I dived in and rescued him, Detective Howell was his superior and was on the boat, turns out she had been with the old man who'd taken me to the Order but she didn't know jack all about the supernatural.

See the Santiago family were going to war with another criminal family over who owned the docking and shipping business, this would have all been fairly normal but this time they were getting sloppy, their street battles were spilling out and started to involve the public; I don't know if this was because the vampires were involved in it or not, but they certainly weren't making things any better. At about the same time we received a message from some kind of world spirit (Wayaya called it 'Gaia') during some trippy ceremony at an indian lodge where we were told that the balance was being tipped over and that unless it was restored the world would fall into darkness. Well, fuck that noise, so I sent a message to the family the only way I could, some would call writing on a severed arm in marker pen brutal but, when there's a lotta noise going on, sometimes you gotta shout to make yourself heard.

I knew they'd be coming for me and I didn't want to drag Wayaya and Howell into it so I headed for the one piece of neutral ground in the city, the one place where no supernatural would risk messing with me; the Crimson Moon looked like a normal club but it was run by some big power, called himself Van, who enforced the peace. Well Wayaya rocked up, she'd been doing some research on this symbol i'd discovered in my room at the club, turned out it was the resting place of some ancient spirit warrior or some such (I don't claim to understand that stuff, leave it for the wizards, I got enough shit on my plate as it is) called Kele or "the Fallen Man." Well after some talking with Van we were able to get him to take us to a hidden chamber under the club where there was this stone coffin thing; apparently only native-american indians could enter the secret area, even Van hadn't been able to get in, but since we had Wayaya with us we were sound apparently.

Well our indian friend had been hitting the books and had worked out that to awaken the Fallen Man we had to do all many of crazy stuff (don't even ask me about how we got a dragon to breathe fire on the stone) and Kele rose from his rest; unfortunately that kinda power sent alarm bells out the White Council (some society of occult big-wigs who like to think themselves judge, jury and executioner for the the supernatural world) and they launched a full assault on the Crimson Moon. It was pandemonium out there, people fighting and guns firing, the Fallen Man offered to evacuate us using the spirit world, but I couldn't take the risk there might be innocent people getting caught up in this war so I went upstairs to help evacuate the normal people before plunging back into the mass brawl that now occupied the dancefloor; next thing I know a huge tear opened up in mid-air and i was pulled through into the spirit world.

We gathered up some local materials (rocks, clay and the like) and Kele made them into paint which he used to draw some animals on us, he then asked if we would sacrifice some of our time in order to help re-dress the balance; we said that of course we would and he left us. The first to disappear was Wayaya, just fading from view and then Howell, leaving just me sat in the spirit world holding Wayaya's peace-pipe; there was a flash and I was back sitting in the club, pipe in hand with Van looking at me strangely, I rang Wayaya, apparently I had been gone for three months, Wayaya had appeared a few days after we had gone into the spirit world and Howell had appeared a month ago. Kele had used our time to manifest himself in the real world and selectively target and remove certain supernatural elements from the city, redressing the balance.

And that was that, you presumably know what happened next or you wouldn't be here talking to me?

Now I suggest you get out, i'm sure you've noticed the dull glow emanating from my tattoos, that means i'm getting hungry and, whilst I might not like seeing innocents suffer, I aint no saint."