Simon Temple
Overview
Basics
Attributes
Abilities
Advantages
apparent to all. The bearing modifier affects all rolls
that rely on the vampire’s image as a devout Kindred
and scholar of Caine’s teachings.
Merits & Flaws
Rituals & Paths
Experience & Derangements
7- Thaumaturgy to 3
1- Leadership to 1
Expanded Backgrounds
Rights & Possessions
Blood Bonds/Vinculi
Description
History
Simon was born to Elias and Myra Temple in Towson, Maryland. He was born albino and became the subject of ridicule for his strangeness. His parents were both high earners and Simon wanted for nothing except companionship. His parents were always working and his peers avoided him because of his strange looks, so Simon found solace in books. He developed an obsessive interest in history, particularly the time period of the Crusades. He found out he was descended from a Templar knight, and this fueled his interest even more.
His intellect got him ahead and he skipped grades. He started high school at age 12 and graduated with honors at 16. His parents were proud of his academic success, but still spent no greater time with him. He started college at Johns Hopkins with a double major in Engineering and History. He earned his bachelor's degree with honors, as well as a master’s degree. He was in his first year of doctoral studies when tragedy struck.
His parents died under mysterious circumstances. They had gone on vacation to the islands, but their plane crashed overseas and was never recovered. Simon was devastated on a number of levels; anger that his parents had now completely abandoned them and regret that he’d never gotten to reconcile their distance from him.
Luckily for Simon, his parents had left him an annuity that would pay out for the rest of his life, but he did not care. They were gone and there was nothing he could do to change that. He dropped out of school and drifted for a time. He got into the occult; at first as a chance to make contact with his parent’s ghosts, but as he got deeper into it, his natural curiosity took over. One night, he left a lecture from an occultist of some note who’d been discussing his theories on transubstantiation and bridging the physical and non-physical worlds. Simon was in his own head. The theories seemed sound, but he could not see how they could be actualized. As he mulled this over, he did not see the shadow that parted from the wall of an alley he passed. Suddenly, he was clocked over the head and the world went black.
He couldn’t move. Something surrounded him on all sides. Hunger like he’d never experienced before roared within him. Panic. Primitive fear of being trapped. His instincts kicked into overdrive. Animal frenzy blotted out his mind and he clawed and scratched through what he realized was dirt and bodies. Sheer terror flooded his body with adrenaline, and he screamed as he suffocated. It seemed like an eternity, but he finally broke through the nightmare morass into the open air. He gasped; shock rolled over him like an ice bath. He looked around. Others were struggling out of a writhing mass of half-buried bodies and detritus. There were others there. They were laughing. Rage. Simon lurched and pulled his legs from the pile. He charged at the ones who were laughing. He was in good shape. He’d had to fight against bullies his entire life and he’d realized quickly that the better shape he was in, the less likely the bullies were to pick on the albino kid.
Simon swung hard at the first figure he reached. They laughed harder and backhanded him with careless ease. Simon flew through the air and landed in a heap. One of the figures walked up to him and put his foot on Simon’s chest.
“He’s got fight", the figure said, still laughing, “we’ll keep this one.”
Without another word, the figure lifted Simon up into the air and bit into his neck. Simon expected pain, but it was the opposite. Pleasure beyond anything he’d ever imagined flooded his senses. He was drifting, but he didn’t care. It would be an end and he’d finally be able to ask his parents all the questions he’d wanted to. They would have forever to be together…
The pain returned. Something hot was pouring into his mouth. His nerve endings lit up like a livewire. Something within him drove him to drink and keep drinking. Too soon, the font was pulled away. Simon wasn’t thinking. All he wanted was that hot liquid. Someone tossed him into the back of a box truck with a number of others. He could tell they were as hungry as he was. They beat against the walls of the truck, desperate to escape and feed.
Not long after, the doors were opened. Simon did not know where they were. All he knew was they had to feed. He and the others ran into the streets and memory drowned in a sea of red.
When he came to himself, he was in a room. There was someone else in the room. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was sure of it. A candle flickered alight. For some reason, the sight of the candle unnerved Simon. There was a woman walking toward him. Some odd mark glowed on her forehead. He must be seeing things.
The woman introduced herself as Clarissa. Much of what she said flew over Simon’s head. What was a ‘Tremere’ or ‘House Goratrix’? She said something about thaumaturgy, but at that moment it all flew over his head. The one thing she said that stuck was that he was dead and was reborn as a child of Caine. He didn’t know what that meant, but he learned soon enough.
As the years passed, Simon learned exactly what Clarissa was talking about. He also learned that he was part of a sect called the Sabbat. They were an odd theocracy with the mission of eradicating the Antediluvians, the traitorous grand-childer of Caine, the first murderer and the first vampire. Clarissa encouraged him to study not only the arts of Thaumaturgy, the magical system created by their mutual clan of Cainites, the Tremere, but she also urged him to study the lore of Caine, their progenitor.
At first, Simon tried to hold on to who he was before. He remembered what it was like to be human and felt cheated that it was stolen from him. Yet, the more he studied and the more he became entrenched in the nightly affairs of the Sword of Caine, the more his memory of humanity faded.
Clarissa taught him what it was to be a Cainite. He spent ten years with her and her coven before he decided to move on. He’d heard the Sword was building once again in Baltimore. He’d survived for a decade. It was time for him to thrive.