Houston by Night: A Sabbat Chronicle (Vampire: The Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)

Born and raised in Houston, TX, Brianna was always a mild-mannered girl. Good grades, no trouble, friendly. Behind the facade, however, grew a steady feeling - at first just discomfort, then it slowly morphed into outright disgust. There was something wrong with her body, face in particular. The nose was too big, features too asymmetrical, lips too thin. She tried mastering makeup to hide the ever-increasing amount of flaws that she was noticing, but to no avail. She then turned to her parents, with whom she had a healthy and open relationship for advice and help, asking them to let her have some cosmetic surgery to correct her flaws. Their answer made her furious, a feeling she swallowed up and buried deep. It wasn't even about the money, they just did not think she needed it. She was "pretty the way she is", they told her. Their continued insistence on her "beauty", something they likely viewed as being supportive, drove more and more enraged. She didn't let it show though. She suffered through high school and then college, until finally, after a year or so of work, she managed to save up for her first surgery. Her family tried to talk her out of it, but Brianna was adamant - it was time to claim her true face.

Unfortunately for her, a shadow war was brewing in Houston, one she had no idea was being fought, and a violent pack led by a Tzimisce fiend also thought it was time to claim something - new recruits. Brianna was staying in a small hospital over night, recuperating from her first ever rhinoplasty, when she heard the screaming. The Ductus had a twisted idea - Embrace all the patients, since they desired a "transformation" so, but not before disfiguring them, thus earning their compliance. Brianna was hiding under a bed when the pack of bloodied rabid monsters pulled her out. The feeling of her Sire hands, messing up her face, its hands diving under her skin and muscle, playing with her face like it was putty, she will never forget. A horrifying mix of violation and ecstasy.

Brianna quickly realised her position, when she saw one of the other patients, the woman mad from the sight of her disfigurement, having her head literally ripped off. Bri fell in line and followed the others, desperate to believe the fiend's promise - if they helped the pack, they would get their faces back.

The next months were a blur of violence and blood. And then, just as sudden as it all began, the war was over. Brianna stood as one of the few survivors of the assault on the clinic. Her Sire gift for her survival? Instruction in the power of fleshbending. Bri frenzied and attacked her Sire upon hearing this, but was promptly beaten into submission. Now armed with the newfound knowledge of the flesh and bone crafting, she wonders - will she ever get her face back? Or perhaps the face that she always chased after, the human feminine ideal, was not her destiny? After all, she is not human anymore..

Finnegan grew up in New York, with his Irish mother and Persian father, who met a couple of blocks away from the hospital he was born in. Life was dull and monotone, seasons passed by lazily, he grew up, his parents moved to Ireland. Basketball, art, a broken heart, drugs, alcohol, more alcohol, art again, and Finnegan found himself a tidy stereotype; he was a broke painter sharing a shoebox with finance bros in the making, one brush stroke away from crossing the threshold of artistic enlightenment. Everything besides it felt uninteresting, his parents learned to detach themselves from him, though his mother still tried at times, his peers were starting families, his juniors were swarming galleries. He missed the starting gun, but he wasn't even in a race.

Following his eviction, Finnegan hit a lucky break and an Art Journal out of Houston suddenly wanted to include his work in an exhibit, along with a long-form interview about his artistic process. The defibrillator shock his ego received from this offer was enough of an incentive for Finnegan to uproot his entire life and move to Houston, where people clearly appreciate art more.

From here, Finnegan either gets turned into a Toreador (obvious), a Malkavian (a little bit less obvious), or a Tremere (woah). I really don't have a strong preference, I don't know too much about any, but the core principle of his obsession with art and the way he fucked his own life up thanks to, in no small part, the vagueness his mind holds to everything outside it would remain across clans. In terms of his role during the war, he'd be more of a political/social asset. He is out of touch with reality, but he isn't a mumbling buffoon. There is some gravity to his personality, in a way that isn't unlike a distant farmhouse being on fire.

The daughter of Guatemalan immigrants, Yasmine was accustomed to a humble, impecunious life in El Paso. This did not mean she liked it. Far from it. She was ashamed to wear hand-me-downs to school, accompany her parents to food banks and drowned in her own envy when compared to everyone else she was forced in close proximity to. She never spoke of her personal life if she could help it and distanced herself from her family, despite their ironically harmonious life and great love of each other. The older she got, the more she desired to change herself and make a clean, loud break from the Leal name. As soon as she graduated, she legally changed her surname to Medina and used the scholarships she earned to move to Houston to pursue fashion design, cutting off ties to her family.

Reinventing herself actually worked. She worked part-time aa a design-assistant while attending college, living in a rundown apartment she slowly transformed into a place worth bragging about. Keeping up on the latest trends and diving headfirst into hobbies like sewing, illustration and mood boarding, she sought out friends in high places, making connections, and pretending to be worth more than she actually was. By the time she graduated from university she was neck deep in debt for her outrageous spending. She was evicted, her possessions either re-possessed or sold to make up for her lavish lifestyle. She couch-surfed with the very few real friends she had. However, despite her issues, she was able to make a name for herself, attaining a job as a costume designer for the film industry, starting off with Indie films.

She was no longer this small, poor woman who vanished in the crowd. Now Yasmine had pride and money. For now, I am playing with the idea of House Gangrel, turning this uptown woman who finally achieved her longtime dream be turned into a beast that cannot control her urges, spiraling into the depths of depression and insanity; clawing her way through it to try and cling to something, anything, that will get her back into a life worthy of her.