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Saturday, October 17, 2015

Schuyler Lavey

Concept:Charlatan/Cult Leader

AKA:Schuyler Nesbit (His actual birth name) Grandmaster Lavey (To his followers)

Desc: Corded muscle on his frame. Thinnish. Vain about his appearance. Somewhat cut.  No Ink. One piercing in his left ear. Facially resembles Trent Reznor a little and as a result grows his hair long and colors it black. Cat clean. Wardrobe tends towards black and other wintry colors. Favors turtlenecks. Not much of a one for jewelry, but has one pendant he likes and one ring.  Will wear one or the other but rarely both at the same time.

History:  Schuyler is the sort of fellow who got into occultism for pussy. He’s always been good at talking a good a game. Always been very adept at cold reading people. Might even have some skill at reading micro-expressions and have done some work at memorizing the statistical percentages of psychology and sociology. Schuyler is the kind of guy who can watch Derren Brown work with a real appreciation for the art. He could probably teach a course in Neuro-linguistic programming. At least, he could if it weren’t for the fact that he’s bent most of the actual effort in his life to gratifying his darker impulses.
   He’s built a cult out of a dog’s breakfast of Sumerian, Mesopotamian, and Egyptian ideas and concepts tossed into a blender and set for “Frappe”.  He’s created a harem of extremely submissive and self-doubting women and men that hang on his words.  He’s usually very careful to feel out a potential initiate for any sign of a backbone before bringing them into his little corner of the occult community. He refers to his cult as the Adepts of the Underground Teachings. and spends much of his time managing their soap-opera-like peregrinations, when he isn’t swilling absinthe and getting himself hip-deep in flesh.
   But lately, that hasn’t been enough.
Two things have taken place that have changed Schuyler’s trajectory some.  One is that the pendant he occasionally wears has occasionally given him prescient flashes.  He hasn’t figured out yet that it is the pendant doing it, so naturally, it doesn’t happen all the time...He just thinks that maybe his inevitable apotheosis is taking longer than usual.  He never really doubted it. He’s got that kind of ego.
   But also, he got jumped one night at a club by a Nosferatu who had been watching him for a while and intended to vindictively embrace him. Sadly, the pendant showed Schuyler what would happen, and he managed to overcome the vampire...Who was young and not all that strong.
   Schuyler’s read a dozen books on vampires, so he took this opportunity to sample the power of vampire blood first-hand, and then left the staked vampire out for the sun.
    Schuyler is an opportunist first and foremost. but this new knowledge of vampires, and by extension, a world of potential secrets and lore galvanized him into a level of action no one had ever seen before from him.
    Schuyler reasons it thus: There is power out there. It can be taken from these creatures. I will find a means to do so, and I will do it.
Schuyler is dangerous in a way that he never would have been as a clove-smoking date-rapist. And you know, there might come a night where one of those dusty rituals in one of his books, pays out like a vegas slot machine for him and his little cult.

Attitude: “I am a philosopher. And in ancient times, Philosophers were kings.  They were kings because they understood a deeper world than most people can even perceive. I and my followers are going to be a new vanguard in the age to come. We are truly, each and every one of us, a legend in the making.  You...You could be part of that Legend.

Skills: While Schuyler isn’t trained in any particular combat discipline, He is abnormally fit for a person of his general attitudes. While he generally prefers to think of himself as a spider at the center of his own personal web, The one bit of actual discipline he practices he learned from a short stay in prison over a “misunderstanding” (short-con) He lifts weights and although he is social primary, his physical stats are nothing to sneeze at. (Although his stamina training will always lag behind. It requires an amount of discipline he simply doesn’t possess.)  He’s a quick thinker but again not much for the long haul scholastically.  The only things he ever manages to keep in his mind long terms are the sort of things he can use to make money or get laid. (Academics: Poetry specialization, Occult 4,)  He’s got social stuff out the yang. Encyclopedic memory is also a good fit for him. 

Gear: Dumb phone, A Day-runner notebook that he carries everywhere. A vial of DMT that he keeps with him for interesting new friends. If expecting trouble, he carries a snap baton.
The pendant that he wears is slowly amplifying his latent psychic abilities. He catches precognitive and retrocognitive flashes on touch contact. and while he’s always been really good at reading people cold, he’s beginning to get super close to the bone when he does it now.  Eventually,  the pendant will cause these powers to become natural, but it takes time and since he doesn’t wear it all the time, it hasn’t completely set yet. Lately, he’s taken to carrying a stake or two in his car.

Home: A large victorian home, which is actually owned by one of his followers. While Schuyler never lifts a finger if he can help it, his followers keep the place neat as a pin. They also grow pot in the basement. (Pretty good pot too.) The house doesn’t have much in the way of actual security. But it’s possible that the warding spells that he and his followers have enacted aren’t complete bullshit. Unlikely to damage, but likely to squawk if a supernatural creature enters the domain.  There is a deep freeze in the basement where Schuyler has stowed the torpored corpses of vampires. He’s learned over time how to slowly bleed them dry of vitae. 

Circle: Schuyler is a known name in occult circles. He’s not very well liked by more serious practitioners, but to the beginner or the rube, he is impossibly glamorous and fascinating. Even the ones who don’t like him much have to admit that he always brings interesting trade goods when he comes to parley and that he throws a great party. Schuyler has invested a goodly pile of points into retainers, (His Followers) No one in his cult is exactly rich or powerful. but they have a nice commune style living arrangement with drugs, and orgies thrown in for good measure.

Story Uses:
“I think you have real potential.I’d like to see exactly what you blossom into.”
Woe betide you if you have an impressionable younger female relative or ex-girlfriend. Lavey can scent them on the breeze and will set his cult a-hunting. It’s WAY worse if they happen to have ANY supernatural mojo at all. Because in addition to figuring out how to use, degrade, and throw them on the bone pile, he’ll be trying to figure out how to take their mojo too. If he can.

“Look. At this moment, our aims are aligned. Destiny wants us to work together”
Schuyler could make an interesting if entirely untrustable ally in certain circumstances. He might be willing to help hunters if he’s allowed to dispose of the “Corpse” and is allowed to keep the books they find. It’s not as if he doesn’t have resources to work with and he’s occasionally useful, as well as increasingly impossible to surprise.  The only problem is, he might see your plans coming and plan accordingly.

Connections:
*John Patmos met him once at a party of interested Occultist at The Vermillion House. They traded phone numbers. No telling if or what Patmos has in mind for him.
* Considers Lillian Penobscot to be a good friend and great in the sack, but has had little luck in convincing her to join his cult and sign over the bulk of her assets to him. Lillian's actually got too much spine for that. But Schuyler IS a decent lay and while he may be full of shit, he at least knows quite a bit about the occult in areas where she does not.
*By extension, Schuyler has also met Lorna Crane and naturally, hit on her all damn day. Lorna, for her part, would like to fuck, marry, and kill him, but he's just not rich enough.
Schuyler, as you would imagine, is a regular at  The Grimoire. Bear enjoys arguing with him. Luna (and Noel) think he's pre-eminently fuckable. and Penny...
Penny gets a weird vibe off of him and finds reasons to be away from the store if he's around. 
Katherine Parker, sister of Trent Parker of Parker Mortuary and Black Creek Cemetery is a member of the cult. And Kathy has keys...You know, just in case.

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