Stream of Unconsciousness (Hypnovamp Hyperfixation Powerhours)

Bits and fragments dropped in chat:

A frequent donor is easier to trance, especially if they donate to the same vampire, and they develop what's referred to as the 'submission response,' where having their throat touched (again, especially if it's by a vampire that frequently feeds on them) will cause them to instinctively bare it

Caelia owns a bunch of clubs, art galleries, things like that, and a lot of the donors she sends Lexi are trading blood for connections or out of gratitude for her giving them display space and such
Other donors giving to the line...
Well, Caelia's line have a reputation and it isn't great. They're usually full-time involved with the line
How donors are treated usually depends on the line, since only a few non-founder vamps keep their own donors, and the donors' reason for trading varies- often also depending on which line they're donating to

Lexi... does not have a lot of friends.
It was one of the reasons Caelia took interest in him; he was smart, observant, kind of cute, didn't have a lot of ties to people (read: could get Disappeared easily) but wasn't obviously a Loner and could navigate tough social situations without overplaying his hand

Serene/Obscene's vamps are faiirly standard, though they're basically some old magic that went wrong. Mostly they're just hungry corpses, but there's the psy that lets them trance victims and they change very slightly based on their perception of self. This is why they have a hard time with haircuts- they have to already be thinking of themself as having short hair or it just yeets back to full length. It's also why vamps who were tall 2000 years ago are still tall now.
It's also why features smooth out when they turn- they tend to both expect to get prettier as a vampire and it brings them in line a little more with how they think they look. Changes as extreme as Lexi's are rare but happen. He actually still has top surgery scars, because despite his self image being pretty solidly male and his body changing to match the scars are also part of his identity.

So, as a Shade, Lexi mostly just. Observes. What little psy vamps have gets a lot more involved when they fight each other. His weird psy means that he basically no-sells everything (he's less "has defenses" and is more "completely invisible"), but he can't hit back either Also everyone's fairly certain Caelia keeps him around as a pretty pet because. Well. Most of her line were involved with her before she turned them, and if she weren't still infatuated why else would she keep this absolute weakling around and keep him supplied with donors?

But it means that he can only do half of his work. He can find problems, but he can't really fix them without handing them off
and Caelia's line are. Well. Almost exclusively her ex-lovers all trying to get back into her good graces

Vamps are usually turned as they die, or near enough. But fatal injuries that take longer- like a punctured lung- can be healed without risking a turn as long as it's within a certain window. Giving blood also creates a tie to that human as long as it's in their system- basically a half-trance. A vampire can find a human with their blood, and can command them for a couple hours after. Usually a human only stays tranced for a few minutes tops after eye contact is broken.
So Lexi gave her blood and saved her life. Now, hunters... aren't entirely what they seem? Namely, they were founded by a vampire instead of her creating a line, and they exist as basically her hand in the ongoing power games the vamps play. This is not exactly common knowledge among hunters. Or vampires, actually! But it means that there are rules that allow for them to play nice, sometimes, because they're actually operating within the vampires' greater ruleset
So Lexi just. Straight poached Lia from the hunters. "I saved her, she's mine now." And technically, there's nothing anyone can do.
So now Caelia's weakling baby has a pet hunter
So you have the quiet, forgettable weakling Caelia keeps around for some reason... and a barely-restrained murder gremlin who has made it abundantly clear she wants to and possibly could kill everyone in the room.

 

liadan not being able to sleep alone makes me ): and want to give her hug

 

Lia is very not OK. It's why she's such a hedonist. She starts hitting up on that not-okayness and goes "Wow it's time to pick a fight or get drunk or fuck or some combination of the three"

 

[Fixed some formatting issues with that one]

 

LIA NEEDS A HUG INTENSIFIES???

 

Next I should prooobably write up some of the fuckery going on with hunters because none of them are OK.

But some quick points

• the hunter's organization was founded by a vampire (Dalena, made by Daianera)
• most hunters are born into it, and come from one of the hunter families
• all are some degree of psychic
• they're not as reclusive as the mages but their childhoods are fairly isolated- they don't really interact with the outside world much until they take their oaths
• they start training at around 5. At around 8 they start to split into support roles and Actual Hunters. Hunters take their oaths at around 11, receive their first proper knife, and start training in the field. Lia killed her first vamp (with assistance) at 12, which is pretty close to average. Training's usually completed at around 15-16.
• the oaths they take bind them for life to the organization and, specifically, to Dalena
• Only a life debt can break this binding. Specifically, one gained by saving a hunter from dying in service to the hunters (and by extension Dalena)

ALMOST FORGOT

• Having lost one or both parents by the time they've started training is fairly common
• "There are no old hunters. Only dead ones."

 

HOW MANY HUGS MUST I GIVE TO HOW MANY PEOPLE?

 

A lot, to many

Spoiler: technically spoilers

the organization does not survive Serene/Obscene intact
Current planned destruction tally includes two lines and the hunters

 

gonna get to work. gonna hug all the hedonistic vampire hunters. gonna regret that probably when they imprint upon me like buzzards.

 

Hunters all have their own coping mechanisms and they're just kind of seen as "yep that's a thing" even the addictive ones

Sex and alcohol are the most common, some pick up a pill habit. Smoking's common too, though not as extreme. Chainsmokers are rare. (Lia has five a night like clockwork- Lexi's timed her- but will smoke more when she's stressed in public.) A lot of hunters pick up smoking for the same reason vampires will- it gives them an excuse to be alone with their prey. Because hey, I need to step out for a smoke, care to join me?

And they tend to develop their vices fairly young, usually just before or just after finishing training (15-16) and the older hunters kind of. Turn a blind eye to it. It keeps the kids going and it's not like they're going to need to worry about liver failure or lung cancer or whatever from longterm use. No old hunters.

Hunters aren't exactly disposable but they are basically raised to die, and are very aware of the fact that they're most likely going to be killed at some point. That's why the terrible coping mechanisms, and why sex and especially kinky sex is one of the most common. Lia is definitely not the only masochist hunter, a lot are sadists, and a lot are both.

Lia's perception of herself as less a person and more a weapon isn't uncommon either.

She wasn't actually joking here. She was being glib re: her tits, but she absolutely meant it when she says she's "just a knife"

 

):

lia is person not knife. ):

 

Lexi agrees. Loudly. Frequently. A lot of Things Happen because Lexi gets upset that she's 100% willing to throw herself away for the chance to be of use

 

I’m not too coherent atm, but I just really need to say that I misread this as physics instead of psychics. While I was a little puzzled at the choice of double jointed as the analogy for the likelihood and excitement factor for knowing physics and/or a physicist, I was equally confused about how this is different from real life.

But in seriousness, I’m enjoying this a lot, especially when I read it correctly.

 

What´s Lia pre-hunt or pre-fight routine? Like, getting equipped, does she have rituals etc.

 

[tea spit gif]

She usually wakes up before sunset proper- when she's with Lexi she wakes up an hour before sunset and relocates downstairs to the couch for a bit before he wakes up. She starts coffee and goes through practice forms while it's going. When she was on her own she'd either start breakfast with coffee if it was something slower that could be left unattended or make it once she finishes. Now with Lexi she hangs out until he's up and his donor arrives, because a lot of the time they bring her food. She showers, sharpens her knives, and checks her gear while she's waiting when she's with Lexi. Coffee gets drank during knife-sharpening and gear-checking. If she's out for someone specifically or working on a specific hunting ground she'll go over her information again. Her usual equipment is: five hunter's knives (at each wrist, in each boot, one at her back), one ordinary folding knife (worn openly on her pocket, mostly for utility and as an asshole deterrent), jacket, which includes her phone, her wallet, and a very small first aid kit (needle, fishing line, gauze, antiseptic, tiny bottle of kosher salt.) When she wasn't social hunting, or now that she's with Lexi, she usually has a couple of throwing knives at her thigh.

The closest she comes to ritual is the knife sharpening. They don't need a daily sharpening, and she goes through her entire kit to make sure they're up to her exacting standards every time, but she finds it meditative and soothing. She uses a set of water stones.

 

Spoiler: First glimpse of Caelia

He left her and locked himself in the office for the call. As expected, Caelia was disgustingly proud of his decision, and tomorrow’s donor would arrive with food for Liadan as well. Other things would need to be dealt with- any weapons she didn’t have with her, her clothes, potentially dealing with the hunters themselves--

“That won’t take much.” Caelia reassured him, her voice too sweet. “You weren’t the one to harm her, so they have no reason to declare the debt invalid. They will be very unhappy, but beyond killing you- it’s best that you don’t indulge in any more of these excursions for a few weeks- there’s really nothing they can do. She’s ours now.” He was sickened more by how little hearing Caelia talk like this bothered him these nights. He was used to her treating people as objects, tools if they were lucky and toys if they weren’t, was used to the fact that it was always ‘ours’ with her, wasn’t surprised at all how easy it was to slip into the role of seeing Liadan as a resource instead of a person. Ten years dead and it got easier every night, and he wished to hell it wouldn’t.

--all that, plus about fifteen minutes set aside for wrestling with his morality, would have to be dealt with in the next few nights.

 

Chronologically, this goes before the bit about Lia being unable to sleep alone

I just really, really needed to write that scene while it was in my head.

 

Still need to do the write up on the hunters and how they operate

for now, assembling more side character data

• Natalina Ciura, a slightly distant cousin of Lia's, is the current head of the Ciura family. She's not in Blusridge but in Portland.
• Raphael is the founder of the mage line. I haven't decided if he was made by the first or if he inherited the line after its original founder died.
• Violet is the second vampire Caelia made, while she was still in Rome. Her birth name was Helvia but she takes a new one every few centuries. She was turned in 162 at the age of 28, putting her age around "so old, y'all, old as balls." Was a fairly strong dreamwalker, which is one of the few forms of psychic ability that doesn't get converted to vampiric psy and so remains. Alternates between being Very Definitely Over Caelia and usually involving herself with mortals, or Caelia draws her back in and messes her up all over again. She took an immediate interest in Lexi when Caelia brought him in, though how much of that is jealousy, how much is politics, and how much is plain attraction is... a bit of a mess. She's one of the few who suspects he's a shade, but won't act on that knowledge; she has nothing to hide, after all. She also took an immediate interest in Lia, which is. Unfortunate. Because Lia doesn't like her but is also elementally weak to the crossroads between "hot" and "dangerous" that Violet stands at.

 

Oh, forgot:

Violet, with her combination of strong psy and her dreamwalking abilities, has a similar capacity for memory fuckery as Caelia. But, where Caelia can only remove memories with incredible accuracy, Violet can alter memories of a trance, including rewriting just the entire experience. Letting her in your head is a hat-loss plan.

 

Late but:
Lexi,
Caelia,
Lia