Part 68: XII - Let Us Sing of a Hollow Victory

Well... I've got nothing. As you correctly predicted in the thread, the changes to the Giovanni mansion when the player character is a Giovanni are completely minuscule. It essentially boils down to "you can tell the doorman to let you in because you're part of the family and he does" and that's it. So fuck it, let's try something different. I've wanted to do a narrative Bloodlines LP before I took this over, so let's try a narrative chapter. The answer to "why?" is the same as the answer to "why?" regarding most decisions made in this mod. "Why the fuck not?".

Note: As you may have noticed throughout the LP, Victoria is not a very nice person. As such, she is not above lying. If you notice something that doesn't sound right and isn't visible in pictures, chances are that she made it up to make herself look better in some way.

Introduction

Greetings! If you're reading this, that means you're interested in purchasing my book, "A Life of Despair and a Life of Unrecognized Genius: The Victoria Giovanni Story", by me, Victoria Giovanni! And with that, I would like to congratulate you on your excellent taste! You will be embarking on the greatest story never told - until now! The story of a Kindred genius that was never recognized as what it was, that defeated the odds and a system going against it, deposing a violent dictator and repulsing foreign invaders from Los Angeles.

In this sample chapter, I had been tasked to recover the Ankaran Sarcophagus by soon-to-be ash pile Sebastian LaCroix, and after several heroics like defeating a local Sabbat cell, rescuing a Nosferatu from hunters and more, I had tracked it down to the Giovanni mansion in Los Angeles. We rejoin the story after recovering that information, during the last preparations before making my return to the family.



Chapter 27: The Triumphant Homecoming

While there was no doubt that the family would welcome me warmly and we would easily be able to work out a deal to overthrow the despot LaCroix and take the city for ourselves, it never hurts to be prepared. As such, I had some business to take care of. Mr. Ox turned out to be a sub-par business partner - while I enjoy the idea of getting more and more money for things like stealing eyeballs and murdering people, there is such a thing as having too much money for us Kindred, and I was sure that somebody like him would have had some interesting artifacts for me, but no, all he had to give me was cash.



On the way out, a newspaper caught my eye - there was already a news story on the shootout in the Glaze club? Hadn't that just happened a few hours ago? Was the news media that fast, or had a night already passed? Was I passed out at some point during the Mandarin's experiments? The heroics I have been selflessly bringing to the Kindred of LA must have taking a toll on my lifestyle - the sacrifices I make for the sake of the community...



Now, before I describe what happened at the Giovanni mansion, I feel the need to make a bit of a clarification. When I say I am part of the Giovanni family, I mean that I draw my heritage from the mainline, Italian Giovanni, not the Californian Giovanni under Bruno Giovanni (whom I will be referring to as the "Californians" throughout this chapter). This might explain some things that happen throughout this story. However, I still figured that that difference was not going to be any sort of issue, we would surely be able to put aside those minor differences and work together to a larger goal.



Upon arriving at the mansion, my eye was immediately drawn towards a couple standing outside the fairly quaint fountain that marks the centerpiece of the courtyard - a fountain which, while impressive to American eyes, is nothing special to those of us that have seen Roma and Venetia. There seemed to be some tension between the two, so me being the gregarious friend to all I am, I decided to join them and mingle, maybe pick up some points of interest from the Californians.



However, my information gathering plan was cut short when I noticed that the woman was inebriated to the point that I wasn't entirely sure if she was still supposed to be functioning or not, and as such was not actually one of the closer inner circle of Kindred the Giovanni have, or even one of the outer inner circle of ghouls, but just regular Kine of the family. What little I managed to gather from her was that the two were Rosselinis and that they were married, but beyond that it was hard to even comprehend just what she was saying.



Of course, since I was concerned for the social standing of the husband, I brought the matter to his attention. He seemed unconcerned, as this was apparently a regular occurrence, but I continued to press the poor sod, for he did not know what he was doing to himself. He was about to tell a story of the last event they attended that would have been interesting, but it would turn out that my issue would be solved in a much more straightforward way.



The wife simply started vomiting up copious amounts of blood, which not only seemed to be a sign of an incredible health risk that should be dealt with immediately, but also ruined my best set of shoes, which would have been unforgivable if I wasn't the gracious person I am. The husband thought that this situation meant "time to leave" and not "call an ambulance immediately", and he dragged his half-conscious wife across the courtyard like a carcass, blood dripping from her mouth and all. It was a stunning display of lack of common sense, and would set the tone for what was to follow.



After cleaning my shoes as well as I could, I decided to make my way to the main entrance and get this evening of pleasantries and intrigue underway. And yet, my optimism was harshly destroyed by this hunk of a man they made doorman. When I say "hunk", I mean that literally, as in "he looked like he was roughly chopped off some sort of block", and his speech pattern was only a slight step up from the drunk, probably now dead woman I had just dealt with. In this case, the patterns seemed to indicate less "inebriation" and more "imbecile", to the point where he might just be giving Charles II von Habsburg a run for his money. While I knew that incestuous tendencies are a big part of the Giovanni lifestyle due to our insular nature, I had figured that we had at least figured out how to reduce the number of straight up brain damaged people - but apparently, the Californians saw no problem with this. It was at this point that I was doubting the integrity of this sub-group of our family - this was a private party, and they put a mentally handicapped person in charge of the door? Did nobody see the security risk here?

Summoning up my saint-like patience and using the easiest words I could think of, I managed to get through to him and convince him that I was part of the inner circle of the family and therefore should be allowed in, even without an invitation. In retrospect, I really should have just Dominated him, it probably would have been the easiest thing ever and probably could have been amusing. Hell, I could have drawn an invitation in crayons and he probably would have bought it.



With that business cleared, I found myself inside the mansion. Once again, the interior decoration was nothing spectacular - in fact, for the refined tastes of those such as myself, it might even be described as tacky. It had the distinct impression of somebody particularly wanting to impress, as opposed to somebody that simply displays good taste, and as such, it falls flat on those that actually know some things about art (as is mandatory with the Venetian Giovanni such as myself) and aren't just impressed by shiny things.



While mingling with the guests was a possibility, I felt the need to make business quick, and as such, headed straight for the central set of doors that hid some sort of meeting room behind them, to meet with Bruno Giovanni. Or so was my plan, which was quickly shot down when the guards simply told me I couldn't enter. I tried all I could - I argued, they stayed stubborn. I dropped the power words "Ankaran Sarcophagus", "LaCroix" and more, they stayed stubborn. The only way I was getting in there was killing somebody, and I wasn't willing to do that, so I decided that I would continue with the original plan of stealing the sarcophagus - perhaps there would be some opportunity to contact the higher-ups later and maybe strike up a deal? Surely I would see success once I got to talk to some of the actual movers and shakers - surely they would see that my proposition would help them greatly? Surely not everybody with the Californians is this fucking stupid?



After that disappointing outcome, mingling seemed like the best thing to do, but it wasn't very insightful either. A lot of low-level gossip, and pretty much everybody reacted in a way that suggested they only knew about it as a news item, which I suppose made sense, since all of the guests at the party seemed to be Kine, with the guards probably being ghouls, and all the proper Kindred I needed to talk to being in the meeting room I couldn't reach. However, there was something halfway interesting to be heard. Apparently, there was a "contest" of sorts - reading between the lines, I gathered that two people were going to be Embraced on that day (or as they put it, "accepted into the inner circle", and they would elect one to ghoul ("bring with them into the inner circle"), with there being three different people in the running for the ghouling. I talked with all three of them, and they were all eager to gain some dirt on the other two in order to move up in the pecking order - a natural thing for a Giovanni-would-be to do - but nobody was really willing to air their dirt to me in exchange for help, so the whole situation sort of went nowhere. And speaking of these three - if you're out there somewhere and are still looking for somebody to take you under their wing, I would be more than willing to do so. Just put the word out in Sacramento that you're looking for Victoria and leave your name so I know it's you.



And then there was Nadia. She was different from the others. She, above all, seemed like she didn't fit in with the Giovanni spirit of competitive favor-currying, rumormongering, character assassination and the likes. She seemed like the kind of person one could actually cooperate with, as opposed to the rest of the Californians. Persistence paid off, as she seemed to be more interested in the family "secrets" (i.E. things that any Kindred within the group would obviously know) than the others and knew something that could help me. Through some consistent pressing, I managed to get her to open up to me and show me what she had discovered.



We made our way to a study of sorts, with plenty of bookcases to be found. I gave the room a cursory glance to see if I could find the book that Pisha was talking about, but the literature around seemed to be a lot more banal - I guess it was to be expected, since this was a publicly accessible room and all. She gestured me towards a sword hanging in the corner and pulled it, which caused a bookcase to reveal a hidden corridor. While I knew that this mansion had to have had hidden passages - it wouldn't have been a proper mansion if it didn't, though I would have believed you if you told me the Californians skimped out on that - it was just that I had no idea exactly how to access them. She also revealed to me that there were many more passages, but that they were simpler to work out - you would simply push a certain spot of a wall and the wall would give way to reveal a passage, a large web of which spanned the mansion, allowing quick covert access to any part of it. I made a mental note to take a second look over the mansion for those hidden passages and followed Nadia down the corridor.



What we found would have been shocking if I wasn't in the know - a sort of hybrid of a embalming room and a morgue, obviously something to do with the Californians' necromantic pursuits, as is the norm with all of us Giovanni. Nadia was trying to stay cool, but was very much giving off an air of unease - since this stuff wasn't daily nature to her, I could wager that this would freak her out something fierce. I feigned surprise as to not come off as suspicious, but found myself legitimately surprised when I felt a scratch on my back. I didn't notice anything on the way in, what could be scratching me?



I turned around and was staring straight into the empty eye sockets of a skull. A skull attached to the rest of a skeleton, which was currently holding a sword and ineffectually flailing at me. The sword must have been incredibly ancient and dulled, because it could barely scrape the leather clothing I was wearing and probably couldn't have made a proper cut on my skin either. He'd have had a better time of it using the hilt to try and bludgeon me to death, a prospect that was however just as unlikely. Nadia, meanwhile, was staring vacantly into the void, completely ignoring the animate skeleton right in front of her. It seems like I had my answer as to why she was so cooperative - she was high as a kite and friendly to anything that was willing to talk to her. Brilliant - the one person willing to collaborate, and she wasn't her normal self. She also didn't react when I smashed it to pieces and took the sword for myself - a bit of sharpening and it would be a useful weapon.





With Nadia having drifted off into some sort of dream world, I took initiative and searched the room, finding the book that Pisha was looking for - turns out that it's a fairly low-level necromantic guidebook, certainly nothing I would have needed, but somebody that wasn't privy to our ways would have found it to be interesting, I guess. Furthermore, it turned out that the table they lay the bodies on also was some sort of elevator that led down to the crypt - a crypt being an excellent place to hide a sarcophagus, of course. Making a mental note to check that out, I left Nadia to her devices and returned to the upper level of the mansion to analyze the passages further.



Once I got there, it was actually simple to find the spots in the wall that could be opened - it was a rather rudimentary setup that indeed just required you to push a certain way. I leaned on the wall as to give it that specific push "accidentally", and stumbled into the hidden passage, face first. What I saw was rather interesting: The hallways were shoddily built - there were no walls, just the wooden supports, the floor was dirt, and the only part that seemed like any work was put into it was a one-way window that allowed you to peer into the central room where pretty much everybody had gathered.



Oh, and there was a skeleton there as well. At that point, my brain started firing on all cylinders, attempting to reason things out. Why was there a skeleton in the hidden passage? Was it supposed to keep watch? If so, what does it do when something happens? It's a skeleton with a shitty sword, it can't do anything! It can't talk, either! Does it just run to Bruno, rattling like it's Lassie trying to tell somebody that Timmy fell into the well? Furthermore, why is the skeleton attempting to kill me? Is it ordered to just kill on sight? What if somebody actually accidentally fell into the hidden passage? What is going on here? Have the Californians really gone insane?

That's when all hell broke loose. Now, my recollection of the following events is fairly rough, but that's mostly because it was complete anarchy.



Apparently, everybody at the party was really fixing for a fight, because the moment they heard the skeleton's sword clanking against the wall, all the guards left their post and stormed towards my location, guns drawn and some already shooting. That wasn't the crazy part, though.



No, the crazy part was when the door to the meeting room was violently busted open and out stormed Bruno Giovanni in full medieval armor and wielding a battle hammer, flanked by knights, once again in full armor, and wielding swords and maces. While I was desperately trying to flee into a side hallway, Bruno started screaming something about cross-dimensional conspiracies and galactic wars that apparently revolved around the Ankaran Sarcophagus and I really don't fucking know what he was talking about. At that point, I was convinced that the entirety of the Californians had gone mad, be it from Sabbat influences, some rogue Malkavian fucking around, or just the general oppressive atmosphere of LA finally getting to the paranoid Bruno and through him to his family. No matter the situation, one thing was clear - they had to be culled, for the sake of Kindred safety. No way was a group of mad Giovanni running roughshod through LA going to cause anything but massive trouble. Like a rabid dog, they had to be put down.



The battle itself was insane. I took a defensive position in the entrance hall and laid down fire with my AK-47 while attempting to dodge sword-wielding Giovanni, with mixed success.



It spilled into the main chamber, with me trying somehow to lay down some sort of suppressive fire to keep knights with maces off my ass and eventually deciding that the best action was to just straight up run and hope my lighter armor gave me better mobility as Bruno continued raving, summoning zombies and attempting to lock me into position through some other spell.



Succeeding in taking the high ground, I tried my best to somehow take down the knights while ducking fire from down below...



...but that proved problematic, as Bruno was apparently not only capable of spells that immobilize, but also teleport, and I suddenly found myself right in front of a sword that seemed decidedly sharper than the ones the skeletons were wielding, though thankfully, a bullet from my revolver took care of him. As the fight was starting to draw to a close, with me having taken out most of Bruno's cohorts and summoned minions, he managed to pull his trump card:



He somehow managed to teleport me half-way into a wall!



So there I was, stuck in a wall with no way of getting out, with Bruno bearing down on me with his battle hammer while ranting about the Andromedans and the Beta-Centaurians. That was it, I thought. The illustrious career I still had ahead of me, cut short because the Californians proved to have terrible judgment when it came to picking guards for their secret hallways. The Kindred of LA would continue to be oppressed by the tyrannical regime of Sebastian LaCroix, or even worse, culled by the Kuei-jin that were encroaching on full-scale conquest of the city. And yet, I couldn't let it end like that. Summoning up every bit of willpower I could, I focused every drop of blood I had left into sustaining as much damage from Bruno's blows as possible and somehow managed to still pull the trigger on my rifle despite my predicament. I wasn't going to be able to reload due to a lack of a left arm, but it was the last shot I had, and as such, I unloaded into Bruno, hoping desperately that it would be enough to put him down.



And just barely, it was. Killing him dispelled his relocation magic, and I found myself back on solid ground, with full control over my faculties and limbs and nothing stuck inside a wall. I took some time to realize just what had happened - I just singlehandedly wiped out most of the Californians, including their leader, and as such once again saved the people of LA from a threat they didn't even realize existed. Furthermore, I did it because... I committed a social faux pas? I didn't even do that intentionally - well, I did, but I framed it like an accident, and for all they knew, it was an accident. I know we Giovanni take our social situations very seriously, but for the love of Caine, we're not Ventrue, guys! A bit of levity and a bit of a more casual attitude can go a long way to maintaining your respect and also your continued existence! Learn from the Californians' mistakes, friends!



After that, things get rather hazy. I vaguely recall dealing with some more scattered guards, who were no match for me, even in a rather banged-up state and probably experiencing a fair share of blood loss (and blood lust!) at the time.



I also kind of recall heading back down to the morgue-area, but I can't remember what happened to Nadia. I assume she eventually came down from her high and scampered off... if you're out there somewhere, Nadia, please get in touch! Even if it was due to the drugs, I would still love to have another chat with the only Californian that was actually helpful, and I would definitely take you under my wing.



My memories start coming back clearer at the point where I'm heading down to the crypt. That crypt was a quite strange place, even for a Giovanni crypt, as zombies were just randomly rising from the grave, even after I had driven pretty much everybody capable of necromancy from the mansion. There were still some sort of problems afoot here - this should not be happening. Furthermore, there were skeletons with crossbows at the other side of the hall, monotonously shooting some sort of magic bolt along the hall in regular intervals, not even caring whether they hit something or not. An excellent security system this is not.



It was at this point that I found something interesting - for some reason, there was a hockey mask just laying around in the crypt. No idea who put it there, but it was mine now. Any sort of protection I could get would be appreciated. Of course, I now looked more like an ax murderer with my shoulder pads, leather clothing and now a hockey mask, but honestly, at the rate I was going, I was going to be knee-deep in the dead anyway, might as well look the part. The sacrifices I went through for the sake of this town...



Furthermore, I picked up a mace - probably dropped by one of the skeletons, their medieval armory, while somewhat ineffective, was rather varied - that would very much come in handy against these boneheads. While it was kind of aggravating to switch between blades and blunt weapons to deal with each threat that arose, but it was a lot better than having to try and smash the skeletons against the walls - however, that probably would have been a lot more amusing.



Also, it turned out that the crossbow skeletons were in fact capable of aiming, they just needed me to be close enough so that they could actually see me, I guess. Really, it's anybody's guess just how these things operated - as we've previously established, the Californians were straight-up mad, so they could have cooked up any sort of reasoning for these things, and with most of those that were in the know now having met their Final Death, I suppose we will never know.



That wasn't the only strange thing I encountered by any stretch of the imagination, no. The next oddity I ran into was a skeleton that was pretty much fully armored. Once again, the questions rushed into my head the moment I dispatched it: Why is this skeleton wearing armor? Who made it wear armor? If it was some sort of better skeleton, why wasn't it guarding the secret passages instead of the entrance to the crypt? Given that everybody flipped their shit the moment I stumbled into one, you'd think they would want their best animate corpses on guard up there! Actually, let's ask one question again, WHY is the skeleton wearing armor? Do these people not understand how skeletons work? You raise a whole ton of them and use them as shock troops alongside your zombies, not some sort of bizarre elite troop! They're WAY too fragile to be given anything important - I thought that's why they had all those terrible weapons! I guess we could add "warfare" to the list of things the Californians had no clue about.



Advancing through the crypt, I found a series of traps, hidden passages and levers, all littered with zombies and armored skeletons. It really was a bizarre concept - was this supposed to stop me? I just tore through the actual Kindred upstairs, do they really think some zombies and skeletons are going to be a hindrance?



In one particularly strange series of events, I entered a long, hallway-like room, as the doors shut behind me. This would have been a perfect opportunity to unleash flamethrowers, or spinning blades, or a slowly falling ceiling, really, anything but more zombies. They just plop out half a dozen zombies like it's any sort of obstacle, I shoot them in the head, which instantly dispatches them, and once they were all dealt with, I was on my merry way again. Was falling into this trap a regular occurrence amongst the Giovanni hopeful and as such needed to be easily dealt with in case of emergency? This entire escapade had completely soured my opinion of the Californians - had I not ensured we would never be working together by killing their leader and assorted higher-ups, I would no longer be trying to get in touch with them. And to be honest, I probably will have more problems with them trying to get in touch with me. And then trying to murder me. Oh well, it hasn't worked yet, suckers!



While meandering and murdering my way through the crypt, the most threatening thing I ran into was this big skeleton knight, which was in full armor, had a massive weapon, and was also capable of casting spells. Why is a skeleton capable of casting spells and given better armor than even Bruno himself had? What in the FUCK was going on here? You can see why I'm going with the "insanity" answer - there is just no logical explanation for this. The Californians had gone absolutely mad. Not to mention, that skeleton had the most formidable defense I had seen in this entire mansion, but then again, being a skeleton in medieval armor, he was still very much susceptible to being bashed very heavily by a mace. It's these kind of design flaws that really ensured that the Californians were never going anywhere.



So there I was. I had just slogged through an immense number of zombies and skeletons, barely any of which caused me to break a sweat, and yet were all incredibly annoying in their own way. I had also just come off of destroying the California chapter of the Giovannis completely and utterly based on a complete accident. At that point, I was incredibly pissed, in the mood to spill some more blood, and wielding some righteous fury against anybody that would come between me and that sarcophagus, my instrument of destruction I would wield against LaCroix. So then I enter this large chamber and find the sarcophagus, only to find it claimed by two Kuei-jin that claimed that there was some sort of alliance between LaCroix and Ming-Xiao. Now, they say this as if it were going to change anything. For one, I was going to end up killing both LaCroix and Ming-Xiao, so really, driving a wedge between the two would be an interesting idea. Furthermore, these two shits are coming between me and that sarcophagus, and we've established that that would be a recipe for disaster. Finally, they were just being assholes about it, constantly repeating themselves with how there was an alliance and I was breaking the agreement and that they were going to kill me, and it just pushed me over the edge - as patient as I can be, sometimes that patience just runs out, especially when some people prove themselves to be unworthy of it. So I simply snarled an assortment of expletives at them and jumped into battle wielding my trusty grenade launcher, the weapon that comes out when the going gets rough and some serious damage is needed.



I've found throughout this quest to save LA that nothing much can stand up to the power of that grenade launcher, and those two idiots didn't last long either. In fact, they managed to put nary a single scratch on me - if that was supposed to be the best the Kuei-jin had to offer, then I would have had an easy time dealing with them. But that is for another time.



With the mansion pretty much vacated of all sentient life beyond a few shambling zombies, getting the sarcophagus out was a cinch, especially given that LaCroix already dealt with getting a delivery truck to transport it. Next time, we would find that things are never quite as easy as they seem.

So there's that, a narrative chapter. Should I keep doing the narrative thing or switch back to my regular style? Please drop some comments in the thread.