By Reverned K.
Time is a funny thing.
It acretes like pearl around a grain of sand. I can remember things
in the deep dark past. I can remember what it was like to meet a real
elder and the fear it engendered. I can remember the first life i
took and the tears i cried over it. I can remember the deep sadness
of my first years as a vampire. The loneliness, the solitude, being
set apart from people even while being surrounded by them.
The beast is my constant companion these days. It is never far from me. I imagine that i am much like the elders that frightened me so when i was young. There are times when the rage is on me and in some ways I feel...Well I'm glad that i can feel anything at all.
-From the Journals of
Douglas Aaron Boggs Jr.
The Beast is a phenomenon that is the cross that all Kindred must
bear. Some learn to bear it better than others. But even in Golconda
there is no complete freedom. The power of Kindred existence exacts a
terrible price.
So what is it exactly?
I got a theory. ( I usually do.)
When a person becomes a kindred, they go through a number of basic physiological changes. It's been remarked that they tend become paler and slimmer. The organs change and in some cases whither away.
Why do we assume that changes stop at the body? Each of us carries a holdover from our evolutionary past. It's called the R- Complex. it is the lizard brain. it's where our fight or flight reflex comes from and is the seat of our primate aggresion and instinct.
I believe that the embrace has a marked effect on the R-complex. It tends to "supercharge" the natural aggression and instinctive behavior of it's bearer.
Let's take a look at the Evidence:
Fun with Endocrines
The changes that a vampires body undergoes are not limited to the R-Complex. The body, being dead, no longer creates hormones.
Vampires no longer have the basic physiological apparatus to control their emotions. Think it through; Do you remember what it felt like in your body the last time you were head over heels in love? Do you remember your body's responses to grief and anger?
Over time, a Vampire forgets all that.
If a vampire falls in love it's almost allways an aestheticly based love.The biological drive to procreate is no longer there, nor is the chemical "high" that comes from meeting somebody who flips your switches hormonally and pheremonally. In other words, Their love is all in their mind and is based on a memory of what love is like. Vampires are shallow by design. Is it any wonder that vampires are "emotionally challenged" in the realm of relationships?
Look at it the other way; A vampire also doesn't have any physiological checks against rampaging emotions. I don't know about you but when i get really angry for a long time i tend to get tired and if left alone i'll cool off and feel way down. Vampires don't cool off when seriously pissed. in this situation, the emotional apparatus is like an engine that has no opposing force to pull against. It will keep spinning and spinning it's drive train until it burns up.
Vampiric Psychology 101
So you undergo this horrificaly painfull transformation. You get pushed around by everybody older than you. You find that you've lost control of your mind and your temper. Sunlight and fire cause you to absolutely freak out. You have this unnatural hunger for blood which forces to prey on your former species. You have a plethora of secrets and an inverted sleeping schedule which segregates you from the bulk of humanity. The only people who can possibly understand everything you're going through are easily as fucked up as you. As you get older you get more powerful but you also begin to forget what it was like to be a human being. You don't even consider yourself one of them anymore. Vampiric politics is more than capable of seperating a person from their moral center or any sort of scruples. The alternative is solitude...which is worse. The more isolated you become, the more alienated, hatefull and vicious and selfish you become.
The comes the day when you realize that you're having trouble even feeling hate or fear. Sooner or later you begin to realize that the only thing that can get your juices flowing anymore is a good frenzy. The fear and terror of humans is no longer enough to whet the edge of the appetite. Someday, you might even find that you need kindred blood to survive. The psychosexual component of feeding from humans is no longer enough to give you what you need....Of course, you can only take from them twice before...
Well. Best not to think about that. Best not to think about a lot of things. It may help to distract yourself with the endless jyhad but that only helps for a while. The endless paranoia, the smiling friends with knives behind their backs. Yeah, that's gonna help. Add to this the occasional sneaking suspicion that you may not be acting of your own volition and may have memories that don't gibe with fact and the paranoia quadruples.
What do you do when fear and rage become the release that sex used to be?
Golconda?
So what is the out? Well.... You can struggle and strain to walk the narrow path. You can rigourously keep the beast on a short leash, You can fight it tooth and nail with the only thing that keeps it in check. Abstract thought. Paths and Roads are all abstractions of some sort. By keeping to paths, you at least are given the opportunity to try to claim the grail of Golconda. This is the point where we leave the world of science behind and venture into the spiritual realm. But the process of entering and surviving Suspire is much like a Mage's seeking in that it is a profoundly internal journey.
There are a couple of problems. It's hard, hanging around other vampires makes it even harder because it's too easy to get entangled in their intruiges, plus there is the inevitable jealousy and hatred that go along with being "Too good for Vampirism." Plus it intevitably means facing all the mean rotten things you did and facing all those nasty fears. To live as a vampire is to know fear, so you've probably got a lot of them that have been keeping you awake days.
Good Luck.