Character Name: Samuel Thomas
Nicknames: Sam (though he dislikes that unless it’s coming from a close friend)
Face/Model Claim: Ben Barnes
Age: 174 (apparent age, mid to late 20’s)
Sexual Orientation: Predominantly heterosexual
Nationality: American
Relatives (open for any players): He has at least one great great great great great (takes a breath) great grandchild. He’s sired several 2 baby vamps who can be elsewhere and not take part in the game unless someone wants to play one (they would be between 50 and 150 years old and open for adoption). His sire abandoned him, but had recently returned to briefly make his unlife even more of a mess.
Job: Retired
Skills: He’s particularly skilled in using his voice tricks.  He can play the piano, but isn’t a composer and has taken up painting, but hasn’t gained the skill to capture figures well.  He’s a decent dancer and a surprisingly good cook.
Weapon(s): He has a small silver knife he obtained years ago.  It has ‘sentimental’ value though he doesn’t ever carry it with him.
Special Item(s): None.

Height: 6’
Weight: 165 lbs
Eye Color: Brown so dark as to sometimes be mistaken as black
Hair Color: Brown
Scars/Marks: He still bears the wound which struck down his mortal life, a perfect circle just above his heart.

Appearance:  Even before they were revealed to the world, Samuel was quick to adopt the ‘image’ of a vampire, a certain manicured carelessness to his look whether in the slightly askew collar of a shirt making it seem ready to come off at the hint of a whispered breath or hair which is always just perfectly out of place.  He’s tended toward more dramatics lately, letting blood linger on his fingers or reddening lips, sitting and lounging with either boredom and disdain or intensity and menace.

“We’re not dangerous anymore,” he lamented, noting that was part of what had made them alluring, a sense of danger and risk in even being near.  Now, people knew they couldn’t risk mesmerizing them or biting without proper consent.  Not that he was against such rules, but it took some of the excitement out of it, especially for those tourists and novices who hadn’t met their kind before.

So, he puts on a show and plays the part, and in public that requires a costume, pale, but not pallid skin, eyes darker than the night sky, clothes stylish enough for the runway and movements as smooth as a snake.

Level: Adept (approaching Superior)
Powers:
Novice: Improved abilities, increased speed, improved senses, rolling, falsehood detection, telepathy (though his sire is absent)
Adept:
[~] Telepathic Blood Bond
[~] Defy Gravity
[~] Waking in Daylight
[~] Voice Tricks
[~] Feed Recall
[~] Voice Touch
[1] Vaporize
[2] Aura Perception

Weaknesses: He likes watching people and can become distracted by especially good ‘performances’.  He has generally low expectations where others are concerned, though he’s happy to be proven wrong.  He’s ambitious, though he’s a little less certain of what that means or what he’s ambitious for.  He had a talisman that allowed him to walk in the sun, but it was taken away as part of his 'punishment'.  Fortunately, no one told him he couldn't get another one.

Personality in Brief:  Like the costume he outwardly wears, his personality fits what you might think of in a vampire.  He can be charming and personable, but hides a bit of menace behind his smile and his words.  While more vocal than some of his kin, he’s reserved in how he speaks, often talking around things or using suggestion and innuendo rather than directly saying what he means, an old habit from the days before they could speak openly about things like feeding on blood.

Though somewhat exclusive with his attentions, he can be downright sociable.  In fact, he doesn’t actually like to be alone, though he’s careful of letting anyone know the truth of that secret.  As a result he tends to hang out in populated places, clubs and restaurants, theaters and parties, happy to be ‘alone in a crowd’ rather than simply alone.  He’s become a bit voyeuristic in that regard, often enjoying the sight of someone indulging themselves or performing in some way, something he does himself for ‘the show’.

Those tendencies remain true in private, though his sense of humor comes out more.

History: Vampire politics were… complicated…

Once upon a time, or so the stories go, it was simply a matter of bloodlines and age.  No one questioned it, or if they did they were quickly put out into the sun.  He blamed America for the change, instilling a rebellious streak in all creatures big and small.  It was a streak which seemed to inordinately affect the young and one from which he was not immune.

His mortal life was ordinary enough and one he doesn’t share easily.  Those close to him would know he’d been a devout and dutiful man in his life.  He had a family, business, responsibilities and influence, none of which he took lightly.

His death he shares more openly.  It began the morning of May 12th, 1864 near Spotsylvania County, Virginia, a place he pronounces in an exaggerated Eastern European accent when telling the tale.  He was part of the 26th North Carolina Infantry that fought at the base of the Mule Shoe in a place that became known as The Bloody Angle.

“We were the side that lost,” he would share without any remorse to those less familiar with history.

He, along with countless others lay wounded and dying under a pitiless moon that night, slumped against the stump of a tree.

“You can see that stump at the Smithsonian,” he would share proudly when he got to that part of the story, and it was true.  It had just been shattered and cut by fierce rifle fire  before he’d slumped against it and had been taken years later to remember the horrors of that day without anyone realizing the special place it held in his own tale.

~O~

At first, he’d thought her so radiant she must be an angel.  She was, he supposed, in her way, but demon as well.  He’d woken as she feasted upon his blood, a feral thing, drunk with the slaughter, her face covered in red.  He’d survived that night, and into the next, too weak too move, too strong to die. And he survived into the next, as his demonic angel visited again and again, until finally she met his gaze and smiled.  He never saw her again.

He barely survived the transformation, waking one dawn to feel his skin begin to burn before clawing his through dirt and mud to the safety of a shallow grave.  His hunger was intense in those first days and like his maker, it drew him to the killing fields of the war to finish those that had been ripped and torn apart by bullets and balls.  He fed like an animal, a vulture, a rat, until he was strong enough to think and plan.  He knew what he was or at least had enough sense to know the old stories were true, of bloodsuckers and undead fiends.  Only, he didn’t feel undead or even particularly fiendish, only hungry and lost and far from home.

~O~

Whether he returned home or not is something he omits from the tale, but if he ever did, he didn’t stay, instead finding his way to the growing towns and cities of the region, hiding like others of his kind in the days before Addison and their emergence from the shadows.

~O~

Vampire politics were complicated.  He learned that first hand.  He’d forgone his previous life, though not his nature.  He gained responsibilities and influence, but like his hunger for blood, his ambition drove him for more.  He was careful, he was clever and he was a young American.  The old ways and old views didn't hold as much sway as they should have.

It was that which eventually led to his downfall, though ironically, if the old ways truly held he would likely have been killed.  As it was, he’d done nothing so wrong as to warrant a death sentence under mortal laws and even vampires were subject to them now.  So instead, he was banished, imprisoned, cast aside, depending on your point of view.

‘The joke’s on you,’ he thought.  While he certainly wasn’t looking forward to being exiled to the small town, he knew it wasn’t just any old town.  It was a very old town, one with history beyond even his own.  Not that he was happy about it, but it could have been a lot worse.