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The air reeked of clove smoke as TJ looked down a the spread of cards again, and again the visions came. Blood and violence, the prince dead, the scourge dead, the sheriff dead, and the anarchs who he had come to know and respect slaughtered en mass. He saw buildings torched, innocent people caught up in the tide of death and destruction, friends fighting and falling, and even glimpses of himself, the blade of his katana bathed in blood. Everything he knew and loved was about to be destroyed.



TJ shook himself out of the trance, clearing the scenes of horror, death, and violence from his head. he gathered the cards up without looking at them, lest they draw him back in. He didn't have time for that. He had to prepare.



"What fucking good is the ability to foretell the future if you can't tell anybody?" He asked himself as he stood and began to move. "Not this time. I can't stop this, but I can change it."



Phone calls were made to make sure that there would be an event at the Lounge of Iniquity so he would have a safe place to feed if he needed it. A sharpening stone was run up the blade of his katana, his heightened senses ensuring that it would have a razor edge. A prayer to the Kami was spoken in a language not often heard from a white man before a shrine in his apartment. He pocketed the dice he had carved from his long since regenerated finger bones as part of a deal with a spirit of luck, as he knew he would need every edge he could get.



As he lit up his first cigarette of the night, he reached for his cell and dialed. "Spike, it's TJ I just caught wind of some crazy heavy shit about to go down... Let the rest of The Saints know. War is coming. Tonight."



Hanging up the phone, he tucked his sword away in it's concealing Blueprint case, Donned his leather jacket, and picked up the phone again. "Bona Serra Duchess di Modrone, it's TJ... I'm well, but there's something I have been meaning to tell you and it can't wait any longer... I'm prone to occasional visions of the future, and I just had one... Yes ma'am, it's absolutely dire... I saw death, and burning, the shadow of war descending on the city... Tonight ma'am, it's coming tonight... I know you don't know me very well, and this talent of mine has been kept from you till now, but you have to believe me, I don't know who, or how many, but they're coming tonight, and this entire city will burn if we don't stop them... Thank you ma'am... Oh, and do me a favor, I really don't want my talent becoming public knowledge, so if we can keep it to ourselves, I would really appreciate it...Thank you."



He ended the call and pocketed his phone. Tonight he was going to have to put everything he had on the line, and win or lose, he was going out swinging. He slung the blueprint case and headed for the door. "Time to kick-start the fight" he said to himself as he locked his apartment door behind him and headed off into the night.

COMMENTS

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TiesOfMind
18:57 May 25 2016

A little background never hurts:



The Duchess Valentine di Modrone was the vampire who was in charge. She and TJ had a cordial relationship, as she was not as stuffy and set in her ways as most elder vampires, and she actually saw the potential in him.



"The Saints" was a group of vampires that TJ ran with. They named the group after a Motley Crue song "Saints of Los Angeles" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5YsyttcEns Trust me, for this band of misfits, it works.

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TJ stepped out of the unmarked tan building with the frosted glass. Sounds of a party going on inside and a red light on above the door were the only clues to the populace in this industrial neighborhood that the Lounge of Iniquity were anything more than yet another auto-body shop or other mundane business. He stretched and lit up a clove cigarette as he made his way back to his battered black Kawasaki motorcycle.



He was full and ready for tonight. As the BDSM club that he DJed at was slowly disappearing in the distance behind him TJ's thoughts drifted to what was to come. The fear, the pain, the rush of indescribable pleasure, he looked forward to it every time.



A little voice still nagged at the back of his brain, It told him about how wrong it was to manipulate the emotions and minds of others, and how having that kind of control over someone made him a bad person. When this little voice spoke up, he reminded himself of how SHE chose it, SHE was so much stronger than he was and there was no way he could make her do anything that she didn't want, SHE was the one who pushed this control of her on to him and how it now caused her distress to go without for a prolonged period.



But the little voice refused to give up, changing from little reminders to a mental conversation. "You were both wasted and YOU thrust yourself on to her fangs the first time, YOU showed the submissive posture and bared your throat to her the second, and what exactly did YOU think was going to happen when YOU pulled the stake out of her chest after she was stuck there for two freaking months? There was nobody else there. No other targets for her to feed on. YOU chose to be IT. YOU chose to put yourself in to those positions. YOU stole a portion of her free will, and all because YOU became addicted to the Kiss back when you were still breathing and Michelle was feeding from you".



The black Kawasaki roared through the streets of Pasadena, not knowing or caring for the battle between it's rider and his conscience. TJ thought to himself again. "Well, at least it's me that she's bound to. There are a lot of kindred in this town that would use and abuse her for their own gain. I actually take care of her and do what I can to her benefit. I mean, I do what I can to keep her stable and focused."



"You just keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better." comes the reply from his conscience. "Just don't try to fool yourself in to thinking that you didn't want this, that you didn't cause this, or that somehow her strength somehow absolves you of screwing with her free will."



The bike pulled to a stop in front of a nondescript apartment building and TJ climbed off. "Fuck you conscience. What's done is done. We're both junkies, and each other's fix. My blood, her Kiss. The least we can do is make the best of it."



He lets himself in to the building, and in to her apartment. The lanky albino woman stretched out on the couch eyes TJ the way a mountain lion watches a baby deer, knowing what was about to happen.



"Evening Spike" TJ says, dropping his jacket and brushing his hair away from his neck.

COMMENTS

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TiesOfMind
18:35 May 25 2016

Again, some background might be in order here:



Spike was a much older and much stronger vampire than TJ ever was or likely ever would be... Oh, did I mention that she's more than a little crazy?



In Vampire: the Masquerade, the blood of vampires is actually addictive to mortals and other vampires alike, and causes the drinker to have feelings that resemble intense (almost obsessive) love toward the one they drink from. These feelings can even override the will of the drinker and make them do things that are definitely not to their best interest.



Also, in that universe, having one's blood drunk by a vampire creates an intensely euphoric sensation of pleasure in the victim, and TJ was very much a sensation (and adrenaline) junkie.

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TJ sits alone in the cluttered room, surrounded by a liberal mix of occult knickknacks and high-tech junk. The aging leather bound tome on the coffee table before him having inspired him to his task. Mind racing and fingers flying, his laptop hunts the net for images, and photoshops them together.



Wands, swords, pentacles, and cups, the facets and aspects of life start taking shape before him. This deck was no Rider Waite, no crazy Al Crowley, this deck was all TJ Webb. This deck was Los Angeles and the people in it, and unlike the hundreds he sold at the bullshit little snake oil shop known as Eye of the Cat in his past, this deck wasn't a fraud.



His headphones pumped out a supply of driving beat and melody, slipping him in to the zone and keeping him on the edge of trancing out as he works. Pushing him to ride the wave of inspiration. Graffitied walls, towering glass and steel buildings, backyard fences, litter strewn sidewalks and potholed blacktop form the backgrounds for the cards. These backgrounds have other images layered upon them, images that convey meanings that he will understand, even if nobody else will. Images that will, no shit, give him honest to gods glimpses of the future.



In his burning flash of creativity, the major arcana take shape. A burning storefront from the Watts Riots becomes the tower, Charles Manson's mugshot the Devil, OJ's slow-speed chase becomes the chariot, and a bright smudge in the smog above Disneyland is the sun.



One card however seems to stand out in his mind, one card takes more out of him to make than any other. It's a hooded figure, face obscured, but definitely feminine in form. The figure seems to be playing the violin... The thirteenth card... Death. Completing this card brings a sad smile to his face and one hand makes it's way from the keyboard up his chest to where a tattoo resides under his shirt, A tattoo that will forever be 'only a few hours old', Simple black lettering that reads 'Best if used by Feb 12, 2008'.



Taking a break from his labors, TJ lights up a clove and shakes his head. "If my life goes through as many changes in two thousand nine as it did in two thousand eight... Man, it's gonna be a banner year... I fucking love LA," he says to nobody.



With that, inspiration strikes again, and he dives back in to his work.

COMMENTS

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TiesOfMind
18:20 May 25 2016

Bits of background that may make the story make more sense:



The one who made TJ into a vampire was a woman by the name of Michelle, and she was a concert violinist.



And yes, TJ got his expiration date tattooed on himself just a few hours before he was turned.

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As a few of you know, but most probably do not, I'm a gamer. I have played in all sorts of role playing games since I was a kid.



One of the games that I've played a hell of a lot of over the years has been Vampire: the Masquerade. A couple of the VtM chronicles that I've been in have encouraged their players to write literary pieces about their characters (stories, journals, short fiction pieces, etc). Well, something tells me that this crowd might very well appreciate the writings that I put up in games gone by, and so I plan on posting some of them here.



The character that I wrote the most for was a fledgling vampire of the toreador clan named TJ Webb. He was a heavily tattooed and pierced goth/industrial DJ who had an affinity for the occult (especially tarot cards), BDSM (especially shibari), and the katana. I played TJ in a chronicle called LA by Fire, and in another later... Anyway, I suspect that you would prefer to read his stories than my ramblings.



Enjoy.