The Vampyre War

[Photo courtesy of Myko M via Unsplash]
== Origins ==
The origin of the Vampyre War is as old as the Vampyre race, with many attributing the starting factors of the war itself with Sonya and the Valencia Siblings' flight away from England after the First Infection. Although none of the participants actively sought a conflict, the Creature's primal nature to kill its 'wounded prey' and the surviving Vampyres' self-preservation created a series of skirmishes that continued to escalate as the years went by. 
Although many of the early years that Kara and Sonya spent as Vampyres were dedicated to self-discovery and the control of their budding Abilities, they both (alongside Valterius) eventually found the Creature stalking them in the American Colonies and realized that the incident causing their affliction was far from remaining in their pasts. There were multiple fights that took place between the four, regardless of where the innocents of the group lived, and the fear of Valterius' demise eventually led to Kara infecting him without his consent. Once the three were strong enough to face the Creature, the attacks lessened in frequency and were instead replaced by new Vampyres assaulting their home instead. This led to the realization that the Creature had infected others, and the trio of allies began taking a more offensive approach. 
This series of back-and-forth assaults continued across decades and through most of American history, merging some of the most well-known conflicts around the world with a supernatural agenda. 
== Major Battles and Encounters ==
For a complete accounting of the events leading up to the events of the main Legacy of Sorrow series, see the Official Timeline.
=== The First Infection ===
This attack by the Creature caught Sonya, Kara, and Valterius off-guard as they fled the home of their deceased guardian. The Creature leapt at Sonya from within darkened forest and dragged both her and her horse to the ground. While biting and clawing at Sonya to feed on her blood, Kara attempted to intervene and was bitten, inflicting extensive damage on her neck. Valterius stabbed the Creature, driving it away and saving his sister and Sonya. 
=== The American Revolution (Revolutionary War) ===
Although the causes of the American Revolution in the Sorrowverse hold true to real history, some deviations exist due to the various characters' involvement. The Creature, seeing open conflict, began using this period as an opportunity to convert those he deemed strong enough to serve him. This, as a process, was not well known by Sonya, Valterius, or Kara, but the increase in his soldiers' numbers was noticed as they found it necessary to hunt and kill new, reckless Vampyres who used their newfound life for their own gain. 
The Creature had undergone his first 'evolution' of sorts, being more akin to a disfigured human than an animal and being able to utter a few words in the most basic form of communication. This led those he converted to believe he held the power of a 'devil' or was - in fact - a demon, and followed his direction under the fear of such assumptions. Attempting to track him down amidst the chaos, Valterius used his connections to Benjamin Franklin to lead Kara and Sonya along a trail of rumors that ended at Valley Forge. This historical location held an encampment of American soldiers under the command of General George Washington, and it was there that Allison and Catherine (Krystal) were discovered. The Vicente sisters were the first humans (other than Valterius) to be converted. 
=== The American Civil War ===
Although much less of an impact to the overall war between the now-five Vampyres (Kara, Sonya, Valterius, Alice, and Krystal) and the Creature, this time period represented a critical turning point for the manner in which the mentality and approach was taken toward eliminating both the Creature and its followers. 
After having returned from incidentally carving the Oregon Trail, Kara and Sonya found Valterius stewarding Alice and Krystal's safe upbringing while cautiously watching their volatile natures. Krystal, in Kara's absence (having grown an intense fondness during Kara's training of Krystal's powers) had become something of a vigilante while Alice desperately strove to lead a normal life. Their individual plans were put on hold as rumors of the Creature arose once more, having stalked Kara and Sonya back to the East Coast of the United States. These rumors were barely believed, but were corroborated by captured Pyrates who alleged their master was a man: a warmaster who sought to take sovereignty over a piece of the budding country once the Union and Confederacy had worn each other down. Seeing that his continuing transformation and growing intelligence was a risk, the group came together to develop a broader strategy. 
The development of Aerael began in 1862, with more new converted Vampyres from Kara and Sonya's lifesaving efforts contributing to both the war effort and new project. Aerael was often used as a holding area for escaped slaves, since security and privacy were already a primary focus for the growing group. Having connections with politicians throughout the northeast United States, Valterius was able to help many of them relocate on the promise of reporting signs of the Creature or his Pyrates. 
This time period also signified a massive change in the emotional nature of the group. Kara, seeing a conflict without end, grew to steel herself and avoid the tender vulnerabilities of significant emotion. While she still shared in moments of joy and despair with the group, her cold and calculating nature reached an apex during this time, with all of her focus on control over her abilities and the concepts of warfare. Sonya developed opposite of her, needing to keep Kara in check and provide an opposing viewpoint to allow for a wider perspective on decisions. After helping freed slaves, her commitment and mindset toward helping human and Vampyre kind alike became a silent promise to herself. 
Valterius fostered both of these mentalities, embracing logic over emotion in times of need but finding it impossible to remain consistently neutral and the guardian and chief guardian of Aerael and its early citizens. This duality was heightened by Alice and Krystal, each also taking a side for or against the need for compassion. While both of the VIcente sisters felt it necessary to care for others, Krystal did so by imitating Kara's outlook while failing to truly keep her own emotions at bay. Alice fell deeply in love with Valterius and embraced the joys of emotion in her boundless affections for him. 
By the end of the Civil War, both sides of the Vampyre race were radically different than before its start, indicating a shift in priorities and in focus for both groups. 
=== The First World War ===
Beginning in 1914 with the maelstrom of a World War beginning to unfurl, Aerael took notice of a sudden stoppage in attacks from either the Creature himself or his allies. Fearing that the cause of the silence was due to the Creature's habit toward profiting from the bloodshed of battle, Sonya and Kara pursued leads in England, taking Krystal along as a form of training exercise. After a few short weeks, Krystal returned home to Valterius, distraught that Kara made the unilateral decision to send her home. Although she was tight-lipped about the issue that caused such a drastic decision, Krystal insisted that the fault was Kara's and never elaborated on the circumstances of the argument. This began to drive the pendulum-like behavior's of Krystal's feelings toward Kara: sometimes professing her love and other times serving to be a nuisance until she was given the attention she desired. 
Few pieces of information were discovered during the First World War, although Krystal's time back in America was spent among the wealthiest individuals in the country. Using Val's guidance and her sister's panache for intellectual discussion, she leveraged herself positions that accrued significant wealth, advancing the capabilities of the city of Aerael and its progress. Kara and Sonya, meanwhile, developed no small number of overseas connections and brought home with them more than thirty new citizens for Aerael. 
=== The Second World War ===
Having evaded all attempts at discovery, the Creature was less careful in his selection of allies during his second instigation at a worldwide culling of the human race. Allying himself with a well-traveled and ruthless Soviet named Kilkovf, the Creature adopted an alias known as Robert Schillinger while surrendering his army to his new lieutenant. Claiming to pursue more intellectual goals, Schillinger disappeared while Kilkovf turned the Pyrates into a formidable, shadow-like fighting force that decimated entire military units for their supplies or nutritional value. 
Thankfully, a massive stroke of fate fell upon Kara and Sonya as they met with Valterius and Alice in the Nazi prison camp Dachau. Intending to steal the designs for synthetic blood, a project belonging to one of Adolf Hitler's chief scientists, the confrontation revealed both Kilkovf's existence and the slip of Schillinger's new identity. Forging evidence that the scientist was intentionally setting back Hitler's efforts, he was arrested on charges of treason, but this failed to stop Schillinger's goals in any meaningful capacity.
On August 6th, 1945, the American military detonated an atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima and rendered both sides of the Vampyre War stunned. Returning home to investigate the source of the technology, both Schillinger and the Vampyres of Aerael realized the destructive capability of humans on August 9th, 1945, when a second bomb was detonated over the city of Nagasaki. This began a long thought exercise between the Vampyres of Aerael, and fearing that any plans would escape the city from spies or interrogations of a captured resident, Kara delegated the main duties of Aerael to Valterius, Krystal, Allison, and Sonya, referring to them as her Counsel during planning and discussions. 
=== The Vietnam War ===
While Schillinger's silence was still deafeningly loud to those who searched for him, his presence had largely faded into myth within Aerael. As many residents having seen him firsthand or been involved in early planning sessions against him were killed in battle or moved away from Aerael to live normal lives, his existence began to fade into a dark, unknown burden on Kara and her Counsel. Kilkovf, on the other hand, was an exploitable weakness, having sparked conflicts that he financed and gained significant influence from. After his involvement in the Korean War, it was no surprise that the same signature hung over the Vietnam War, and the Counsel were better prepared than in years prior. 
Keeping spies in the ranks of the United States military, intelligence was passed along to Kara that Kilkovf would be present for a meeting deep in the jungle of the Vietnam countryside. Having little time to act on the information, she left with her entire Counsel and met with her contact at the Chu Lai Air Base near Tam Ky city. Shortly after boarding a helicopter under the guise of CIA assets delivering medical supplies to a special operations unit, the craft was shot down over a thick region of dense foliage. The pilot of the craft, a human, was killed instantly, and Sonya was ejected from nearly forty feet above the ground. Krystal suffered an impalement through her right shoulder: a piece of jagged and bent steel eviscerating the muscle around the joint. While Alice was required to use most of the on-hand medical supplies to keep Sonya alive, she could do little for her baby sister except ease the pain with morphine. 
Although Kara had a working radio and called for a U.S. Army unit to rescue them, the group came under intense gunfire shortly after the crash. Alice, Val, and Kara engaged in multiple gunfights over the next 64 hours, with Krystal being fed a steady supply of morphine since no one could remove her without further damaging the area. After the radio was destroyed in an explosion, the group fell back to the helicopter's wreckage and was kept suppressed by withering machine gun fire. Believing she could help turn the tide, Krystal ripped herself free from the wreckage, nearly severing her arm in the process and erected walls of ice to help stop the onslaught of bullets. The VC troops fled after a USMC unit arrived to rescue the group, but two damaging effects had set into Krystal's body: an addiction to morphing and the improper healing of her shoulder. 
The fight lasted a total of 78 hours, with Sonya being able to join them only in firing a weapon, as Alice believed using her abilities would have induced a stroke. The report from the USMC commander regarding the rescue later went missing, but reportedly described the five Vampyres as "demons that would have sent Satan packing" and "people that only God and the VC would ever know about." 
=== The Cold War ===
Finally believing that their European intelligence network had wrestled a lead from Kilkovf's mistakes, Aerael learned of a project - described in Russian as "The Transformation Company" but improperly translated to English as "Shift Company" in 1987. Believing that Gorbachev's restructuring of the economy was a direct result of Kilkovf's manipulation to gain more money, influence, and power to grow this new project, a second leak in 1988 left the Counsel with no time to spare as Alice, Kara, and Sonya, hastily fled to Russia to kill or capture Schillinger's lieutenant. As Krystal and Valterius were away at the time, they returned too late to be the voices of reason and correctly suggest that the information lined up too perfectly to be anything but a trap. 
Imprisoned in a Russian Gulag that was supposed to have been shut down and decommissioned, the three women found themselves guarded by the second-largest army in Russia: Kilkovf's Pyrates. The full forces of the Soviet and his master at hand, Schillinger finally appeared after three weeks of continuous, failed interrogation. Kept in separate cells open to one another, Alice and Sonya watched as Schillinger visited day after day, staring at Kara for hours on end before walking away and leaving them to wonder why. During one visit, Schillinger arrived with a large contingent of security, forcing Kara from her cell and into the depths of the Gulag. Although neither Sonya nor Alice ever found out what the precise nature of Schillinger's intentions were, Kara's earsplitting wails could be heard even into the countryside for several hours before she was returned to her cell, mute and detached from reality. 
For two weeks, Kara stared at the wall opposite of Alice and Sonya, saying nothing and moving only when one of Kilkovf's Pyrates injected her with a dose of Vampyre medicine to keep her alive. Finally, after fifteen days, Kara fell to her side in agony. Alice and Sonya quickly realized the pain and accompanying physical effects as Vampyre childbirth, and the two annihilated the space between the cells in order to help their friend. Once Kara's child had been delivered and met Sonya's hands for the briefest of moments, Schillinger himself entered the cell with Kilkovf at his side, whisking away the child and giving orders to the guards on duty that the women would no longer be given sustenance. As he disappeared, Kara continued to show signs of agonizing pain and quickly delivered a second child. Enraged at what had transpired and with Kara on the brink of death, Alice and Sonya obliterated anything that stood between themselves and escape, fleeing in separate directions so as not to get caught by the few surviving Pyrates. 
Sonya was lucky enough to find safe passage to America with the child, which she named Anna, while Alice and Kara were far less lucky. Having to stop repeatedly to allow Kara to feed from a Pyrate being dragged along as a prisoner, the lifesaving measures worked while slowing them down. Kilkovf's close ties to the Soviet government had USSR troops and Pyrates hunting for the women while they hid in a gracious host's house. Requiring an extensive stay due to Kara's health, Alice sent coded messages back to Aerael, speaking only in codenames and cryptic language while hoping for a rescue. Kara's codename became 'Sorrow': the only word to which she nodded when Alice desperately spent days garnering an answer on how what felt. 
=== The Global War on Terror ===
The broad stretch of time from the end of the Cold War onward brought uncertainty to Aerael and the Counsel, as Sonya, Alice, and Kara ordered 'rotations' of infiltrators to high-profile locations in order to gain intelligence as to Schillinger's whereabouts. These were to hide Kara's state of mind and slow recovery, but were felt by many as punishment for having failed to protect the three of them from something. The forced children were kept secret, a deathly-sacred vow that Kara struck with the only members of her Counsel who knew it happened. After several years of silent struggle to regain her grasp on sanity, Kara and Sonya took up the forefront of "hunting," a process of finding, capturing, interrogating, and killing agents of both Kilkovf and Schillinger. 
During a brief trip home, Sonya's confidant within the foster care system took notice of a Child Protective Services action against Anna's foster parents and met with Kara to quickly devise a plan. Although Kara was far from ready to face her past and had no belief that she could ever be a mother figure, Violet was adopted into Aerael as somewhat of a mystery, dismissed as a rescue effort to save a young girl from abuse. As Alice maintained watch over the city in the rest of the Counsel's frequent absences and worked to develop a cure for the Vampyre Virus, she and Valterius brought Tony and Eric into the city in 2005. Quickly realized for their potential, Sonya and Kara mutually agreed to make the young men members of the Counsel after a period of testing and trial. Although there was no intentional expansion of Kara's inner circle, Jared brought into the fold in 2008 and given the role of being a close friend to Violet, who had been converted a year prior at the age of 19. 
Feeling as though she now had the safety and security she needed for her family, Kara became ruthless in her hunting for Schillinger, allowing nothing to stop her from catching even the slightest glimpse into his world and machinations. Unfortunately, he remained a master of evasion until Eric uncovered documents assigning him a history and identity within the human realm in 2013. Fearing that he would escalate to a more broad-scale attack on humanity, Valterius began systematically hunting and killing the Pyrate hierarchy until information was revealed concerning a primary informant for Kilkovf. In September of 2014, Krystal flew Sonya and Kara to Afghanistan to find the informant, only discovering an injured Special Forces operator, Jalix Kane. The group, and the Special Forces unit they were on the search and recovery mission with, were ambushed, with Sonya suffering total amnesia and major brain trauma in an explosion. 
=== Project Cerberus ===
While Sonya recovered, Kara's mental state was tumultuous and unpredictable, leaving Eric the unexpected duty of issuing a mission to the rest of the Counsel - which now included Jared and (informally) Violet - to prepare for an attack on the United States headed by none other than Robert Schillinger, a publicly-known industrialist who hid Shift Company, the Pyrates, and his secret agenda behind the purchase of a multi-billion-dollar pharmaceutical company. Three teams of two were dispatched to areas likely to be targets in order to prevent an attack, but none of them were targets of Schillinger's efforts. 
The closest Kara had ever come to facing Schillinger was in February of 2015 when she answered Violet's cry for help during her mission to monitor Los Angeles with Jared. Discovering a warehouse full of Pyrates - supposedly rendered nearly extinct by her brother - she brutally slaughtered dozens of them before confronting Schillinger directly. As he was holding her daughter and a member of her Counsel hostage, she hesitated at their exchange and allowed him to escape in order to secure the freedom of those she loved. This action was likely due to her increasing compassion, tied to her new relationship with Jalix Kane. Shortly after arriving home, the Counsel discovered that Schillinger had been manipulating them, intentionally drawing them away from the primary target of his attack: Washington, D.C. The entirety of the Counsel - minus Violet and Jared - launched a successful mission to stop the attack, a biological warfare maneuver that would have infected the country with a deadly version of the Vampyre Virus, but Kara fled at the end of the battle to pursue Kilkovf. 
Finding his destination without the man himself, Kara confronts Kilkovf's girlfriend and uses her as leverage to reveal Schillinger's location during a threatening phone call. After Krystal catches up with Kara and kills the girlfriend for the sake of keeping their Vampyre status a secret, Kara shuns her and heads directly toward a vulnerable Schillinger. Cornering him in his own office building, she has the chance to destroy them at the cost of both of their lives and one other that she couldn't bring herself to sacrifice: the man she loves, negotiating a charitable deal with Schillinger's public-facing company on another floor of the building. For the second time, she allows him to escape and realizes that Schillinger is now aware of Jalix's affiliation with her. 
=== Project Catalyst ===
Having converted Jalix for the sake of protecting him, Kara introduces her fiance to her way of life and the city of Aerael only to suffer an attack from one of her own residents. After a brief and peaceful interrogation, the captured man only reveals a connection to Raven, the namesake of Schillinger's company and the given name of his daughter, before he suffers a massive brain hemorrhage and dies. This revelation is upsetting to Jalix, who realizes he has been accidentally helping finance the enemy of his beloved over the past many months. Forgiving and under stress, Kara takes the drastic measure to empty the city, fearing another attack by a brainwashed citizen, and later hears out a plan crafted by none other than Jalix. 
As one of the primary drivers of funding to their company, Raven agrees to meet with Jalix after he threatens to leave their negotiations and render the company less valuable. Offering a tour of their newest projects, Jalix brings Kara, Alice, and Val to one of their facilities to see Raven showcase a device that implants the memories into the brain of a subject and an experimentation on the Vampyre Virus that would make the Pyrates far deadlier. Being separated, as Schillinger wished to negotiate terms of surrender with Kara and Val, the group reunites and discusses the implications of a seemingly nonsensical string of experiments. 
Jalix, briefly returning home to gather his belongings before moving into Aerael permanently, is captured by Pyrates working for Shift Company, the dark underbelly of Raven Biopharmaceuticals, and taken to the facility to be experimented upon. Unconscious for the entirety of the duration, he is unaware that Kara launched a rescue with Val and Alice, with Val appearing not to have made it out of the facility alive. As each one is rigged to implode should they be compromised, Kara clings to hope and searches for Val under the rubble after dropping Jalix off in Aerael under the care of her friends. Those friends, however, have different plans. 
Eric discovers that Schillinger will be at one of his remaining two laboratory facilities and a group consensus is formed that an attack would be launched without Kara's presence, awareness, or approval. Although Krystal is still healing from a serious injury suffered at Kara's hands in a heated argument, the assassination is successful, and Schillinger is slain while Kilkovf escapes. Celebrating Schillinger's death, Val's rescue, and Sonya's return, Jalix and Kara are married in Aerael followed the next day by Alice and Valterius. The second wedding is interrupted by an ominous call from Raven and Kilkovf, demanding that Kara offer herself as a sacrifice for the crimes committed against their goals. As the lives of her innocent residents are threatened, now living aboveground and vulnerable to Raven and Kilkovf's agents, Kara complies while bringing her brother as well as Jared, Jalix, and Alice for protection. 
Hoping to turn the tables on Kilkovf and end his life with her elite group of highly-trained friends, the plot is quickly foiled when Kilkovf orders his security to send a hail of bullets into the back of the car where Valterius and Jared were hiding. Kara's Abilities tear through the environment, telekinetically ripping apart the surrounding soldiers and leaving Kilkovf exposed for a malicious and satisfying death at her hands. The victory is short-lived, as she immediately goes into labor, being unknowingly pregnant with Jalix's child. Without medical aid, Kara dies while her third daughter - her first as known by anyone but Alice (due to Sonya's amnesia) - is brought into the world. Jalix immediately and successfully seeks vengeance on Raven, but not before finding out that the experimental variant of the Vampyre Virus she worked on would be bringing Kara back to life to serve as Shift Company's thrall and new leader. 
The ultimate rescue is launched with Jalix, Alice, and Sonya at the helm while Krystal is tasked with ensuring the facility doesn't come down on them before Kara is revived. Although Kara and Valterius are both successfully brought back to life and implanted with their own memories, Krystal chooses suicide by sacrifice, claiming that she couldn't live a life where Kara is in love with someone else. As funerals are held for Jared and Krystal, a visit to the site of Krystal's death freezes a bouquet of flowers and suggests that she is still alive. 
=== The Outbreak ===
After digging through the rubble of the collapsed facility where Kara and Val were resurrected, Krystal is found to be alive. The uncovering of the laboratory, however, serves to set loose one of the experimental Vampyre strains that infects others through airborne transmission. Months lapse with few infections, but members of the Counsel meet with the United States government to prevent a pandemic and save human lives by revealing themselves and their history. While Krystal is comatose, the borders of the United States are closed, and although no one enemy threatens the Vampyres of Aerael, the city's leadership is blamed for not considering others in their reckless acts to end the Vampyre War. Infection rates skyrocket, killing roughly seven-eighths of the human population in the United States, and some of the Vampyres in Aerael rebel. After Val is attacked and injured by a gunshot, a deadly fight ensues and the rest of the Vampyres of the city leave in disgust at Val's actions. 
While Amy grows and matures quickly as a Vampyre by birth, she is still unable to affect the change she wishes to see in the world, learning medicine alongside Alice, diplomacy alongside Val, and leadership skills from her parents. The Counsel eventually loses hope in much of their once-noble goals and divides itself to watch over Krystal while Alice continues to work on a cure. The outside world deafens themselves to the cries of the country, focused only on keeping the infection contained. 
=== Legacy ===
Shortly after Krystal finally awakens, nearly twenty years after she believed she had died, a new threat is unveiled in the form of a man who calls himself the Legacy. Possessing a weakened form of the telekinetic Ability Schillinger possessed and memories from the same man, his motives are revealed to be the same as his predecessor, but without the cloak-and-dagger theatrics. Wielding the nuclear arsenal of the United States and a shadow government that feeds disinformation to other nations, he heads an army of Vampyres that are tortured into compliance. Divided, the Counsel attempts to reunite against the new threat while meeting an unexpected ally: a supposedly-dead Raven. 
The chaos induced by this new threat unfolds by way of Legacy demonstrating his nuclear power through a devastating bombing of New York while Jalix and Val retaliate by capturing the heart of his military might: Quantico Marine Corps Base, Virginia. Although his troops are stationed in Washington, D.C., Legacy loses much of his firepower and the source of his new Tortured soldiers. Raven brings the Counsel to her own hidden city - named Vanaheim -similar to Aerael but awaiting the Counsel so her intelligence against Legacy and her plans to end him can be put into place. As part of a plan to buy themselves time, Violet negotiates with Legacy by pretending that Kara and Amy have fled to the opposite side of the country. Wanting to use Amy's blood as a cure to the Vampyre Virus, a result of the experiments done on Jalix many years ago before she was conceived, Legacy's position is weakened and he is forced to submit to her demands. After being instructed to leave Quantico alone and pull back his troops, Violet's death is staged so she can't become a target of Legacy. Ending the negotiations, Legacy comments that he hopes no more of Kara's daughters are killed, revealing to the group that Violet is the daughter of Kara and Schillinger. 
As the group reels with this new information, Amy hopes to help Krystal recover from a new injury to her shoulder through the use of her own Ability: healing. Although the attempt doesn't go as planned, she experiences Krystal's death, and in doing so, helps heal Krystal psychologically. Amy sees this experience as something that few others have the strength to recover from, and reveres Krystal for her inner strength. 
<<CONTINUE FROM HERE ^^^>>
== Outcomes and Impact ==
Many Vampyres living among humans were widely disconnected from the happenings of Kara's Counsel, but those within the cities in which the Counsel resided were subject to rumors and transient pieces of overheard information regarding the pursuit of Schillinger, the Pyrates, Legacy, or his army of Tortured. In the early days of the Vampyre War, civilians were kept far removed from the bulk of information regarding the conflict, and only knew of a vague threat that was being handled solely by the diligent hand of the Counsel. Throughout the events of Sorrow and Affliction, the persistence of the Counsel's enemies coupled with visible desperation led to a much more wide-ranging awareness of the war and, ultimately, the voluntary involvement of a few persistent civilians.
During and after the events of the Outbreak, to include the timeline of Desolation and Despair, the Counsel saw no option but to prepare their people for the impending and unavoidable warfare that threatened global stability. Most civilian Vampyres volunteered their lives as soldiers, although many were turned away in favor of providing support and operational reinforcement to keep Vanaheim and Quantico running at peak efficiency.
The emotional and psychological impact of the war was unavoidable, and after the attack on Vanaheim, the Battle at Washington, D.C., and other skirmishes at Quantico, the need for mental health care was undeniable. Many suffered the effects of PTSD or similar disorders after seeing brutal and bloody devastation at the hands of the Tortured. While most families remained intact and maintained support systems for their close friends (and other families), death, dismemberment, injury, and trauma pervaded the population with significant ripples across the general welfare of the Vampyre community. To a lesser extent, the effects and results of the Outbreak and actions occurring in Aerael during that time also caused long-lasting damage in the form of lost trust in the Counsel's ability to lead, serve, and protect.
== Names of the Fallen (deceased, dates, and their killers/battles) ==
Under construction
Name of the deceased	Manner of death	Date	Alignment	Comments