[i:399e5fb859]I am not entirely sure how to join in anyone else's chronicle right now - I am afraid of simply leaping in at the moment, so I am starting my own thread to which I invite others once it catches up to present day - what is below is background. Once it reaches 2006, its fair game. Or perhaps, it will blend into someone else's story. Who knows.[/i:399e5fb859]


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San Francisco. It occupies the northernmost 7 miles of a peninsula only 7 miles wide. Its mayor has called it “49 square miles surrounded by reality.” He is more right than he knows. The locals simply call the city, “the city.” Visitors often call it “Frisco,” unaware of the ferocious hostility their ignorance will reap. But Herb Caen, the city’s most celebrated columnist, gave the city its most colorful title: Baghdad by the Bay. His collection of writings by that name was published in 1949, but he had coined the term almost a decade earlier while writing his man-about-town column, “Its News to Me” for the San Francisco Chronicle. On October 1, 1940, Caen wrote in his column: “The crowded garages and the empty old buildings above them, the half-filled night clubs and the overfilled apartment houses, the saloons in the skies and the families huddled in the basements, the Third Street panhandlers begging for handouts in front of pawnshops filled with treasured trinkets, the great bridges and the rattletrap streetcars, the traffic that keeps moving although it has no place to go, the thousands of newcomers glorying in the sights and sounds of the city they've suddenly decided to love, instead of leave. ...This is Baghdad-by-the-Bay!”

It would be 50 years before the first Gulf War would change the way Americans looked at Baghdad and more than 60 before the second Gulf War would change the way Baghdad looked. What Herb Caen could not have known, however, was that another war, a secret war, a secret [i:399e5fb859]jyhad[/i:399e5fb859], would make San Francisco far more like the Baghdad of the future than anyone could have ever imagined …

*****

[b:399e5fb859]Summer, 2003[/b:399e5fb859]

Thirty five miles to the east of San Francisco, the suburb of Concord lay beneath the shadow of Mt. Diablo. Concord was a typical California suburb, comprised of tract homes and strip malls, high schools and parks, fast food franchises and convenience stores. Its 120,000 residents were mostly white, though the Hispanic and Asian populations, especially the Philippino population, were growing rapidly. Many of the residents commuted into San Francisco on the BART train. Others work locally at one of the thousands of “pink collar” jobs that had sprung up in the last 15 years; as the price of office space in San Francisco climbed through the stratosphere on the power of the dot-com bubble, many of the traditional brick and mortar business moved their floor-space intensive data processing units to less expensive east bay locations. Bank of America, prior to its merger and subsequent digestion, had moved thousands of these clerical jobs out to Concord. Sterile, utilitarian concrete office buildings rose where once there had been empty fields or post-war cookie-cutter homes. Money poured into the region, oft known to those in San Francisco as the ‘far east bay’ or simply as ‘the sticks.’ New strip malls appeared and old strip malls got face lifts. Concord prospered, but it was not unique; the wave of the dot-com boom that had washed ashore in San Francisco and into the south bay’s Silicon Valley was finally reaching inland.

Prior to the dot-com boom, however Concord did have one asset that no other far east bay community had; nuclear weapons. Since sometime in the 1940s or 50s, the Concord Naval Weapons Station, which incorporated the Port Chicago Magazine, had served as a storehouse for much of the Pacific Fleet’s nuclear arsenal. For decades this fact was viewed with some favor by local residents who figured that in the event of a nuclear war with Russia, at least they would be targeted directly and thus killed quickly. Suburbanites living elsewhere would face lingering deaths through starvation or radiation sickness; an instant vaporization was much preferable.

Predictably, this attitude changed following the end of the Cold War. As defense spending decreased and as protests against the housing of nuclear weapons at the Station increased, the Navy decided to decommission the facility. The nukes were moved out along with the conventional munitions and by the start of the second gulf war, only the northwest portion of the 12,000+ acre facility was still in use by the military. Of course, bunkers built to house nuclear weapons are quite strong, and facilities designed to protect those bunkers can be quite secure; such attributes were not lost on everyone who lived in the Bay Area and while the military had pulled out of the bunkers, other folks had moved in.

**********

Deep inside a decommissioned bunker, Sara Ann Winder, the blond, Ventrue, Camarilla Prince of San Francisco stood and rapped the blunt metal end of a hunting knife on a WWII-era wooden folding table. The 60 year old relic shook violently and nearly collapsed. Sara frowned. “Was it not possible for you to find something better?” Her voice was English-accented, intelligent and sassy. She directed her question to a dapper white man who appeared to be in his early 40s, though his hair-cut was that of a much younger man.

“I thought it particularly fitting for the locale.” The man replied. “It adds ambiance.” His voice was Irish accented, though the accent had clearly faded over time. “Consider it a reinforcement of the ‘bunker mentality’ that permeates this whole affair.” He smirked with satisfaction.

Sara’s irritated frown faded into peeved acceptance. “Fine. Lets call this meeting to order.” A hulking brute lurking in the shadowy corners of the basement snorted derisively. Sara ignored him and continued. “Many of us have not met yet, and some of us know each other only by reputation. Let’s start this by going around and introducing ourselves. Tell us your name, who you are affiliated with and anything else you feel is relevant, such as why you are here. We don’t have to go into who our sires are or through a recitation of our complete histories, but it would be good if we all knew a little about each other before we begin.” She paused, looking from person to person. “I will lead off. My name is Sara Ann Winder, and I am the Prince of San Francisco. I was embraced a long time ago and since that time I have served the Camarilla and through the Camarilla, all kindred.” Another snort came from the brute in the corner followed by a chuckle from the man to his right. “I am here because I am the one who called this meeting. The reason I called this meeting I will make clear when we are done introducing ourselves.” She paused again, looking around the bunker at the assembled kindred. Finally her eyes settled on the dapper Irishman to her right.

He smiled wanly. “Well then, I am called Sebastian, at least at the moment. I am the proprietor of the Alexandrian Club as well as the, shall I say it aloud? The ‘Vampire’ Club.” He looked up at Sara with mock fear. “Will I be going to Camarilla hell for saying Vampire? Its such a dirty word I am told.”

Though Sara had not breathed a breath of air in more than a century she made the effort to sigh. “Lets stay on track, shall we Oscar?”

The previously insouciant Irishman grimaced at the mention of the name he had held in life. “I told you never to call me that again.” Before Sara could respond, he quickly added, “which is precisely why you have now called me that I suppose. Very well. I am Sebastian, I am the proprietor of a club located in the City I am sure you have all at least heard of. And I am here because dear Prince Sara has requested me to be here. Why? I cannot possibly fathom, though she did ask me to bring tables and chairs, which I have, apparently to her great displeasure.”

“I asked Sebastian to be here because there is probably no kindred who knows San Francisco’s politics better than he does.” Sara explained. She looked at the woman to Sebastian’s right, a thin, palled creature of grey-white hair and ivory-white skin, bedecked in a snow-white frock.

“I am Luna Demian.” The woman said, her voice cool and measured in keeping with her stark appearance. “I am the Tremere Regent and Primogen for San Francisco. I am here because I would like to see the Cathayans driven out of San Francisco, and I am hoping this meeting moves us towards that goal.” Luna looked around the tables at her fellow kindred imperiously and then to Sara.

“Thank you Luna. Kokopell, I believe you are next.”

A deformed creature, sitting away from the table, to the rear of Luna, peered out from beneath an olive-drab wool army blanket. “I am the Kokopell Mana, kachina of my people. I am here because Coyote told me to come; that my people would need my council and my protection while in their stone lodge beneath the shadow of 'Oj-ompil-e.”

Sara nodded, but avoided looking directly at the hideous face that threatened to emerge from under the blanket. “Kokopell is the Nosferatu primogen of San Francisco.” She elaborated.

“I am Kelvin Wee.” Offered a large Asian man at the end of the row. “I am Ventrue, as I am sure most of you know already. I am also the Camarilla’s chief negotiator with the Cathayan’s New Promise Mandarinate. I work closely with Prince Winder in our relations with the Cathayans, and I am here because I wish to see Camarilla influence extended, not restricted.”

“Thank you Kelvin.” Sara’s said graciously, her voice lifting along with her eyes as attention shifted from the ugly, warped, old Nosferatu to the beautiful, muscular, young Kelvin. “I can assure all of you that Kelvin’s efforts have helped our cause in the City tremendously.”

“Your cause you mean.” Chided the chuckling man in the back.

“I mean our cause.” Sara replied crossly. “If my cause is lost, then you are lost.” The man chuckled again but made no further reply. “Introduce yourself then, Gustavo. Its your turn.”

“Si. I am Gustavo Morales. I am not some Camarilla lick, though I might let some Camarilla lick me.” He laughed at his own joke but no one laughed with him so he cut his chuckling short. “Anyway, I ain’t no Camarilla, like I said, but I always get along fine with them in the past. And I hate the zips and the chinks. ‘Specially the zips. They killed mi hermano, my brother, in world war two.” Gustavo spared Kelvin a look. “No offense bro. When I say zips and chinks, I only mean them, not you.” Kelvin gave Gustavo a flat smile and said nothing. “We cool, yeah?”

“Of course.” Kelvin offered.

“Right on.” Gustavo replied offering Kelvin a pat on the shoulder. “So, yeah, so there it is man. I am here to kick those fuckers out of our city.”

Sara rubbed her brows and shook her head just slightly. Gustavo was not the sort of kindred she would normally ever sit down with or even talk to, but he had proven himself over the last few years in the City. He and his hulking partner who was lurking in the shadows nearby had made the city’s northern parks, Golden Gate park and the Presidio, exceedingly dangerous for the Cathayans.

Silence followed. Sara waited for the hulking figure in the back to speak up on his own but finally decided to prompt him. “Mirko?”

The hulking figure leaned forward into the dim, flickering light of the overhead fluorescent tube. His face was like chiseled granite; a three day growth of coarse hair covered his jaw like moss on stone. His voice rolled and tumbled like a rock fall. “Who is the woman behind you? The one you skipped?”

To Sara’s right stood a lithe blond woman of great beauty, dressed in a black bodysuit with a red-sarong tied at her waist. “That is Miriam. Miriam Caravaggio. She is my bodyguard, Mirko. I did not introduce her because, while very important to me, she is not here to lend her council to this meeting. I already know her mind. Now how about you?”

The hulk grunted. “I be Mirko Mirkonen. I be old, probably older than all of ye’, and I been in a scrap or two. I be here 'cause the Prince asked and I decided to come.” His face was an expressionless as the granite it resembled. Causally he relaxed back into the darkness, squatting against the concrete wall of the bunker at the far end of the table.

There was but one person left in the room who had not been identified; a woman. She sat alone on the far side of the table across from Luna, Kelvin and Sebastian. Delicate hands with delicate fingers adorned with ruby-red manicured nails pulled back her cloak’s hood revealing a stunningly beautiful face framed by silken auburn locks. Clear, deep blue eyes stood out on alabaster white skin. “I am Michelle.” She said, her voice tinged with just a hint of French. “Michelle St. Claire to some, Michelle Du Claire to others. And I have been sent back to San Francisco because the Camarilla is going to war.”

((pure excellence! you certainly don't show any ring rust! i can't wait until it catches up to modern nights.

[b:8c3ce5d424]2003, continued:[/b:8c3ce5d424]

Michelle was bored; she and the other kindred summoned by Prince Winder had been discussing, plotting and scheming for hours down in the concrete bunker and there was no end in sight. The conversation was dominated by Prince Winder, the Tremere Regent Luna Demian and the Ventrue negotiator, Kelvin Wee. Occasionally Sebastian would interject with a witty comment, Kokopell with an enigmatic one, or Gustavo with some absurd macho posturing. Michelle and Mirko remained largely silent, however. For Michelle’s part, war planning bored her. While she was of noble birth like many Ventrue, she was not preoccupied with the acquisition and maintenance of power; she was far more focused on experiences. Where most Ventrue were driven by a lust for status or money, Michelle’s motivations were substantially more carnal. For centuries her predilections had kept her on the fringes of Ventrue society despite her age and generation; she was not a proper Ventrue in the minds of those whose defined such things. She it knew it too; often she wondered if her unlife would have been better, or at least easier, had she been embraced by a more hedonistic clan, such as the Toreador.

Michelle was not incapable of waging war of course, it just bored her. She was an expert fencer, having studied under no less an instructor as Lucinde at one time. Since that time she continuously developed her skill. For the last century or so her lethality had kept her enemies at bay; while many Ventrue might not respect her attitudes or consider her a proper Blue-Blood, few would cross someone so skilled with the blade.

As the meeting dragged on Michelle found that Sebastian was equally bored. Clearly war planning was not his forte either. The two of them exchanged glances across the rickety old wooden table as Winder, Demian and Wee droned away the hours. Through their glances, Michelle learned that Sebastian was taking a fancy to Kelvin. She in turn was intrigued by Mirko; the bestial man was laconic to be sure, but that silence only piqued Michelle’s interest.

Sebastian, however, grew bored of stealing furtive glances at the massively built Ventrue negotiator, and began injecting his own particularly scathing brand of humor into the conversation more and more.

“Enough.” Winder replied angrily to one of Sebastian’s quips. “If you have nothing constructive to contribute, then contribute nothing.” Sebastian, rarely at a loss for words, turned away in a huff. The conversation resumed but Michelle could see the wheels spinning in Sebastian’s head behind his indignant expression.

“You are approaching this in the wrong way altogether.” Sebastian announced, to no one in particular. It was the first time he had said something that even approached the topic at hand and it brought the conversation to a halt. Seemingly stunned by his own success at halting the talk, he looked about the table as if seeking permission to continue. “Look here then,” he said, the petulance draining from his voice as he spoke, “San Francisco is not like other cities. Here the beggar is king. You are all working at controlling the Mayor, the city council, the businesses, the society matrons and the politicians. And that is exactly what the Cathayans are doing. You control the United Service Workers Union, so they took control of the Confederated Health Care Workers union. They built a political machine so now they have the mayor under their influence and got their own police chief installed, a Chinese woman. They also have the port authority and numerous other positions. You counter by getting your wunderkind, Ventrue, ghoul, playboy Garret Newman elected as a city council man, but what next? Your respective law firms fought it out, now one of them is dead and you control the silicon valley hi-tech industry, but so what? What has it accomplished? Have you won back San Francisco? Not a chance. Neither of you realize that in San Francisco is the folks who are traditionally disenfranchised who make things happen; people in San Francisco want to be different and they do that by embracing differences. You want to control San Francisco, you need to control the queer folks.”

“Sodomites?” Winder asked incredulously. “You want us to base our power in cursed Sodomites?”

Sebastian’s pursed his lips. “I was among those god-cursed Sodomites once.”

Winder recoiled a bit but regained her composure quickly. “Yes, I am aware. A grave disappointment to your fellow countrymen, so grave indeed that you had to flee your native land and spend the rest of your living days in Paris if I recall.”

“Qui,” he replied insolently, “and such days they could have been. Paris is a lovely city but alas, I spent my years there mostly feeling sorry for myself and lamenting my lot in life. I should have enjoyed it while I could. Be that as it may, what I am telling you is still sound. You would do well to seize control of those folk in San Francisco who are discriminated against the most by the rest of the world; its those folk who rule San Francisco politics. This is a city built with a soft-heart for the oppressed, and a cold-heart for those in power. The Cathayan’s ignore this; they look at the city and its institutions like you Ventrue do. All you see are those glass and steel towers of downtown or the faux classic edifices of the Civic Center. You miss the real heart of this city, the Castro, which is most ironic because you live in it. Do you what the single largest even is in this city every single year? That gay parade they hold. Its grown from a small picnic in the park to a three day long extravaganza of, well, whatever they want, in a mere thirty years. Then there is film festival, a lovely think you know, especially as most of the good films are shown at night. Anyway, before I expound upon the loveliness that is the Castro movie palace, let me conclude by saying that if you want to control this city, control that group, that community as they call themselves. And the best part is that you will be unopposed; the Cathayans disdain these people even more than you do. You can form a powerbase right under the Kuei-jin’s noses without them ever realizing it. Do that, and you can get your wunderkind ghoul elected Mayor, not just into city council.”

Silence followed. Prince Winder sat down, her eyes searching Sebastian’s face for some sign of humor or deceit. Sebastian’s outburst had caught Michelle’s attention; she had never had cause to put the thoughts together coherently, but now that Sebastian had, she could see the truth in it. Once the gays and lesbians had been discriminated against terribly here, but now they dominated local politics and more importantly, the general concept of liberal thinking was considered morally right in the City. Here, vampires and heretics and witches were not the enemy; racism, chauvinism, nationalism were and to that list of age old hatreds were added new hatreds like homophobia. Michelle looked across the table at Sebastian with a new found respect; the man was more than just a font of biting sarcasm and witty retorts it seemed.

Kelvin broke the silence. “So, Sebastian, if we wished to use this community, as you suggest, who do we need to gain influence with?”

“Well…” Sebastian answered, stalling as he thought through the question, “I suppose the leaders of the community.”

Prince Winder rolled her eyes. “And who would that be? If you had suggested some decades ago that I should gain control of the American negroes, I would have known I had to gain influence with the likes of Martin Luther King, Jr. and that Malcom X chap. Even now I could look to people like Jesse Jackson, or that new politician, Obama. But who in your world of sodomites do we look to?”

“If you go calling them sodomites you are not going to gain influence with any of them.” Sebastian replied testily. “For a woman who maintains such a cosmopolitan air about her, your attitudes are surprisingly dated.” Without letting her retort he continued. “I do not think that this community has a leader like those you mentioned, not at the moment, and it might never. Its too fractured. There are gays, and lesbians, and bisexuals and transgenders, and intersexed and who knows what else and each group has its own speakers, activists, playwrights, musicians and culture. They only seem to band together for political purposes. So, I suppose you need to gain influence over their politicians. There are some state senators and city council members who are among the ‘sodomites’ you know.” Sara flinched at the jab but did not riposte. “I think you need to infiltrate and subvert all the communities”

“Very well then.” The prince said simply.

“Hmm?” Sebastian asked without asking. “What do you mean?”

“I mean we will subvert them all. Of course, we need to know who these communities are, so, who are they?”

Sebastian could not conceal his surprise. “Well, they…uh….well yes…I suppose we need look only so far as their own labels. This LGBT, which stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender. So, infiltrate those four communities and you will have your powerbase.”

“So be it.” Winder announced. “Though I may not have turned my attention to these sodomites in the past, I have lived in the Castro long enough to see that many of the females find me attractive. I will infiltrate the lesbians then. Sebastian, I would presume you can gain us influence with the male sodomites?”

The Irish expatriate crossed his arms. “I will do nothing of the kind if you keep using that word.”

“What word would you prefer than, love?”

“Lets try ‘gay.’ It has such a happy ring to it.”

“Very well, you will gain us influence with the gay.”

Sebastian sighed and rolled his eyes. “Yes, as you command my dear Queen, I shall rally all the world’s ‘gay’ and bring them to your pseudo-lesbian banner.”

“Good.” Sara said simply with an amused smile. “Now then, what about these bisexuals? Who are they and who should go amongst them?”

Sebastian peered over the table at Michelle. “Her I think. Our shy French lass has several centuries of rather debauched experiences with men and women, thus making her somewhat uniquely qualified to enter that community.”

Sara nodded but it was Kokopell Mana who spoke up first. “No.” Said the deformed old Nosferatu. “She is for the two-spirits.”

“What on earth does that mean dear? Who are the two spirits?” Prince Winder asked, impatience evident in her tone.

Sebastian answered. “Two-spirits are how natives of American describe those we might call transgender or transsexual. Its not an exact fit, the concepts are different, but for one who labels all these people sodomites, I am afraid the subtle distinctions might be too…subtle.” He smiled.

Kokopell Mana tilted her head. “The two-spirits are born with the spirit of man and woman. They are both, and they are neither.” She pointed to Michelle. “This one is of two-spirits, so it is to the two-spirits she should go, to lead their kachina.”

Michelle frowned. “What are you talking about? I am not of two-spirits. I am not even of one spirit anymore.”

For the first time in hours Mirko spoke up. “Maybe she means you are hiding something.” His voice tumbled through the bunker like stones falling on the ground. “Maybe you are still that cursed Setite in disguise.”

Anger swept over Michelle. “I am who I am.” She hissed. “I’ve fought the anathema. in France, just months ago. This all of you know.” She looked around the table, challenging any of them to contradict her. “And all of you know that the anathema could not have taken my form again. I have been before the Inner Circle on this matter and I am who I say I am. The Tremere can confirm this; my blood is Ventrue, not Setite! Do not suggest such lies about me again!”

Mirko did not flinch or get angry or even argue. He just looked at Michelle for a moment, then sat back in his chair and leaned up against the wall.

Her beautiful face alight with anger, Michelle turned on Kokopell. “Why do you say this about me? I am not a, whatever you call it, a two-spirit or a transgender. I was born a woman, I died a woman and I am a woman still. And I was never possessed of another spirit; the anathema did not possess, she imitated me. I spent the better part of a year in torpor with a stake through my heart.”

Kokopell nodded as Michelle ranted. “Yes.” She said softly. “But you are of two spirits. You have blue blood, but you have a black heart.”

Michelle let loose a stream of curses in her native tongue and rose from her chair, a delicate hand moving swiftly to the hilt of the sword she had carried into the bunker. Eyes wide, Prince Winder leapt up and put a hand on the irate Ventrue’s shoulder. “Enough. I know, through more than one source, that Michelle is who she appears to be. After what happened with the Anathema, no risks were taken, no tests were left undone. She is Ventrue. But…” Sara paused. “We still need someone to approach this transgender community if we are to heed Sebastian’s plans, and it might as well be Michelle. Kokopell Mana has demonstrated considerable wisdom in the past, even if it is not always decipherable at first. So, I am going to trust in her opinion, just as I am going to trust in Michelle.”

Mirko snorted incredulously from the darkness, but said nothing further. Kelvin nodded, while Luna and the others seemed to await Michelle’s reaction.

“D’accord.” Michelle said finally. “Alright.” Her hand let go of her sword’s hilt and she sat back down in a whirl of black silk and auburn hair. “Who are these people anyway, and how do I find them.”

Sebastian raised a hand in a distinctly effete manner. “I can show you dear. You are going to love them, they are good people.” He looked up at Prince Winder with an insouciant smile. “They are about as far from the likes of noble Ventrue as you can get.”

((holy shit. welcome back baby. Missed you)).

((thank you, I am glad to [i:371f1424f8]be[/i:371f1424f8] back - I missed you all too!))

((more posting!!! bring it to 2006!!!! allow me to offer a humble suggestion

********Two years later*****************

is how your next post should start! :D