Time: Early evening/late afternoon...the sun has just gone down.
Temperature: the High is 30 degress F, the low is 19 degrees F. Current temp is about 27.
Weather: Cloudy, with a 100% chance of heavy snowfall and a 60% chance of scattered zombies.
|
entering
the city ruins, there is broken sign that once said “welcome to Attone”…but
with time, destruction, graffiti, and age, the letters have broken and worn away and it
now reads “come
Atone” |
Smoldering
Ruins:
The New Attone
There wasn’t much left after the first and final shockwave hit the center of the city, shuddering buildings from their foundations, drowning the docks beneath the waves of a tempestuous harbor, toppling Attone’s tallest and most impressive structures and causing them to crush all beneath their shadow...all before the first tremor was registered in the minds of the citizens.
People, of more varieties than human, ran amok in the streets– out of fear and panic now, rather than out of the audacious lawlessness that had prevailed before the disaster.
Before that night...that night in which the very sky itself tumbled to the earth...Attone had not seen the light of day for many decades, but when the black veil of ichor that domed the city in darkness finally broke and fell, the sun finally pierced the city streets...much to the displeasure of quite a few non-human inhabitants.
The Kindred
With
fires sprouting up on every street corner, the pyrophobic Kindred either left
or skulked back into the darkness as much as they could, hiding from the
ever-present flames...as well as from the sun that now threatened to snuff them out.
A
handful of mortal survivors saw this vulnerability in the vampires and took it
upon themselves to hunt the Kindred down, putting a
great many to Final Death while they still reeled from the panic induced by the
fire and sunlight. The group was quickly put down, however, and surprisingly not by the
vampires themselves. Rumors of a young girl with frightening powers and blood
red eyes surround the seeming spontaneous combustion of the otherwise woefully
successful hunters.
Few
among the Kindred survived beyond the extinguishing of the city conflagrations and that initial, shocking burst of sunlight,
although the majority of those that did quickly allied themselves regardless of
clan or affiliation under the guidance of the third-eldest among them (as the
eldest was far too self-centered to care much about the survival of Kindred as
a race in New Attone and the second-eldest was far too insane). Loreli
Alexander, a Toreador who had lived in the city for two hundred years was the
chosen, if somewhat tentative leader.
The Mortals
The humans fared both
the worst and the best, respectively, of all the species dwelling in the city’s
nooks and crannies. For years, they had lived with the notion that monsters of
all sorts walked among them and so, for years, they had learned to adapt in the
face of the worst possible situations. For the survivors, rebuilding began the
day after. However, natural mortal susceptibility made their losses the worst;
almost 60% of the living human beings were killed in the earthquake, leaving
approximately 24,000 to rebuild their shattered lives.
Humanity,
too, elected leaders among them. Formerly influential
people who had somehow managed to survive were followed closely by the
remaining masses, as well as one or two seemingly ordinary citizens who had
stepped up to lead the effort.
Others
The demons, the angels,
the fairies, the werecreatures, the abominations, the zombies, and all other manner of
creatures having sought refuge in the city were far more disorganized than the
Mortals and Vampires, yet held their own and appeared to suffer the least, all
things considered.
Zombies. So what can be said about zombies? There are now more than ever in New Attone, but, luckily, they don't move very fast and tend to decay quickly unless in cold weather. Many inhabitants of New Attone have turned them into a sport, something to hunt and slaughter when there isn't anything else to do.
The red-eyed girl that
destroyed the hunters is considered in the "Others" group; some claim
her to be the Anti-Christ, boasting that the falling ichor was only a precursor to
the end of times, and while three or four individuals may know her true
identity, her origins are largely unknown. It would appear, however, that the
eldest remaining vampire in the city has taken a deep interest in this one. She is also
almost always accompanied by a cherubic young demon with black angel wings as
her protector.
Angels, while rare, were
never unheard of in Attone. Supposedly, a more influential and certainly the
most compassionate leader among the mortals is an angel named Adoniel-- or so
they say. Angel or not, Adoniel's influence did many great things that pushed
the rebuilding city closer towards a new life. For one, he, in conjunction with
the Lady Loreli arranged an agreement
between
the Kindred and Mortals and an unspoken accord between the two main groups and
the minorities. The Kindred would protect the mortals and assist them in rebuilding
their own lives if they, in return, consented to not interfere in
feeding--although the Vampires agreed not to kill them. As far as the
"Others" were concerned, they were welcome to remain without fear
just as long as they caused no harm. Naturally, there are those who would
disobey, however....
New Attone
Although nothing
like it once was, the city is beginning to show signs of life again. The
skyscraper husks have been abandoned, leaving half-shells of nothingness and
jagged edges pointing towards the almost forever-black sky. Fueled by the
ever-present need to drink, there is still a smattering of taverns and while
most homes were destroyed, many remain, particularly the newer, middle to
upper-middle class homes, as they were built far sturdier than the 50 year old
tenements and century-old mansions. There isn't much local government to speak
of, but the mortals have their "mayor" and the Kindred claim Loreli
and her small entourage as their leaders, although she has refused to accept
any particular title of authority.
