HUNGER, AT LEAST, RETURNS

ONYX BEAKMASTER

Rising from the flesh of unholy divinity, HE has sworn loyalty to the HOUSE OF FIREFLY as an IMPURE BLOOD vampire. Blessed by the blood moon, his power comes from his HEARING. Turned at the age of FORTY, he has walked the earth for OVER SEVEN CENTURIES.

POWER

Every vessel and organ of the body, undead or not, has a unique sound and rhythm, a distinguishable syncopation that you alone can decipher from the the symphony of anatomy. Blood rushing through arteries, adrenaline releasing into the body — you can decipher each note and beat of intention. In humans, it is an unparalleled advantage for treating the source of illness and disease, granting you the ability to pinpoint the exact origin of a fractured bone or engorged blood vessel. In vampires, you can sense movement beyond a nanosecond of shifting skin and sinew, anticipating even before they realise their own bodies have begun to act.

HISTORY

TW: murder massacre

BETWEEN HUNGER AND RAGE, DESOLATION AND CONTROL, YOU STAND PERPETUALLY AT THE BALANCE OF ORDER AND TOTAL ANNIHILATION. You are a man of dichotomies: a monster born of blood and slaughter, and yet a physician committed to healing sickness and disease. Both the parasite and the cure. This polarity was born within you, planted in your veins like contagion, on the night you awoke to a sea of butchered corpses, a mountain of severed limbs. It is a tale for which there is no rational beginning or end or cause. So let us tell another: the story of a scholar, one who had dedicated his life to the pursuit of medicine, science and higher purpose. A noble man, a good man. Gifted with the sort of intellectual brilliance that defines a generation, driven with the insatiable curiosity and wonder that fuels discovery and revelation. In the age before anaesthesia and vaccines, they were a healer for the sick and elderly. A travelling nomad, they treated any that came under their care, regardless of what payment they could afford. On the frontlines of war, in the operating theatres of battlefield and graveyard, they helped stem the flow of plague and epidemic wherever it struck.

You always held a compulsion for the most dangerous things that mother nature yielded. In your human fascination you toyed with the nature of blood, mixing and synthesizing the age old curse that turned the tides of blood against the natural enemies of humans. You, in your science and wisdom took the Queen Camellia and used it upon yourself. Perhaps your human successes had made you careless and you offered your research to those you believed in. It was you who discovered this : embedding blood within the flower doubled the deadliness, it acted as a bait to lure while simultaneously killing.  But in the eyes of the wicked, they saw more . The flower bloomed, it ate and it too mocked you as it sowed its evil amongst men. You who had wanted to do good left a trail of blood behind, strengthening the scythe that beckoned death ten fold. Irony was cruel. Becoming the very monster you had been tasked to destroy is what could only be called divine punishment. Justice and atonement for what you had created as death, destroyer of demons. The night you were reborn, you awoke in hell. Around you, a slaughterhouse wasteland of carnage and butchery. Two hundred and thirty-eight dead, you learned later. A tragedy ascribed to a pack of wild, rampaging beasts. In Roanoke, in Whitechapel, it was you — blood smeared across teeth, your hands that were once used to save lives now the instruments of massacres. The traces of spider lily infused in your awakening had stained your blood irrevocably. It has blackened and poisoned you into the waking contradiction you are now: an uncontrollable, murderous beast wearing the skin of a righteous saviour of lives.

CONNECTIONS

SCARLET NIGHTMARE , MERLOT DOYEN & IVORY SLAYER — ( FOR WHEN YOU GAZE LONG INTO THE ABYSS )

As the Leader of the House of Firefly, you have born the title of Chief Doctor and Keeper of all knowledge and science rising from vampiric history for centuries. The Mother of Spiders and King of Beetles have been allies in maintaining peace and harmony for as long as you have lived in Hokuei. When you rose to the title of Leader of the House of Firefly, they welcomed you to the Council with suave diplomacy and politesse — a purposeful act to keep a potential enemy close. Of the Leaders, you are the most level-headed and impartial, lending your gravitas to both sides of an argument before making any judgements. If there is anyone to be wary of, however, it is your own second-in-command, SCARLET NIGHTMARE. Scorned by being passed over for the position, she was forced to swallow her pride and fall in line. You feel the fury of her violent ambition spark every time she glimpses your seat at the Head of House. Little does she know what savage multitudes exist in you.

IRON CROWN   — ( THE SANCTUARY BETWEEN FRIENDS )

Eternity goes hand-in-hand with solitude, an unending loneliness for all that you are constantly surrounded by people. She is singular to you in this respect, a true companion in every sense of the word. She has entrusted you with more than just her health and physical wellbeing, but with the unspoken secrets of her past. Your admiration for her is vast, your contentment to sit at the bedside she can never stay confined to for more than an hour infinite. In the stories you share, the quiet moments of friendship and warmth, you have become far more than doctor and patient. There are very few worthy of your trust, and more importantly your loyalty. You would do a great many things to ensure no harm ever jeopardises her standing and quest to become the Leader of the House of Cicada. 

VERMILLION VENGEANCE— ( THINK OF THE HEAT BETWEEN TWO HANDS ABOUT TO TOUCH )

Perhaps it is the duality of control and carnage that exists with you, but you have always found yourself innately drawn to rage. You are fascinated with violence and all that it reaps, and in him, it has never burned more viciously alive. He carries himself as if every step is a war with the world, and you know more intimately anyone what it means to carry the atlas weight of such a burden. You want to coax the truth from his lips, to hear it from his own mouth the terrors that plague him. Would you soothe them, or merely cast oil upon flame? Even you cannot be certain. In his eyes, you are a source of salvation, a chance for freedom from the nightmares that torture his soul. He’s never met your demons. You keep him at arm’s length, always just far enough to halt temptation. There is no more room in your heart for tragedy, and you do not dare to think what his would say if he learned the truth about you.