Darla

Darla (born 1583, sired 1609) is a vampire and a former member of the Order of Aurelius. Brought back from the dead in 2006, she currently resides in Los Angeles.
==Bio==
After living her life as a prostitute, Darla became desperately ill in the year 1609. While she was being bled by leeches, a man who she thought was a priest entered her room. He told her that she would be dead by the time the sun set.
He asked Darla if she was ready to beg God for forgiveness. She told him that God never did anything for her. It was then that the man cut his wrist and dropped blood on Darla's lips. He removed his hood and revealed himself as the Master.
Darla thought that he was the Grim Reaper. He told her that God may not have done anything for her, but he would.
It was then that Darla began her life as a vampire.
In 1753 Darla came across a young man in a tavern in Ireland. This young man was known as Liam, but would later become known as Angelus, the Latinate of Angel.
She led him, half-drunk, into an alley, where he offered himself as an escort. It was there that Darla made Angel a vampire. The two of them stayed together for 150 years, travelling the world.
In 1760, Darla introduced Angelus to her sire, the Master, in London. Angelus was not impressed by the Master's bat-like features and living conditions in the sewer. He told Darla that she deserved the world, and Angelus would see to it that she had it. Darla chose Angelus over the Master. The Master gave them 'a century, tops!'.
In 1860, Darla came across a young virgin woman with the ability to see into the future. She offered her to Angel as a gift. The girl was Drusilla, and Angelus visited every conceivable form of mental torture on the her before changing her into a vampire. After this, Drusilla accompanied Darla and Angelus in their travels, with Dru often referring to Darla as 'grandmother', a term which Darla did not care for.
Twenty years later, Drusilla became sick of being neglected. She complained that Angel was too consumed with Darla to pay attention to her, or even torture her, which she apparently enjoyed. Angelus told Dru that she should make herself a companion, and she did. The vampire Spike then became another of Darla's travelling companions.
In 1898, Darla brought Angel another girl as a gift. This one was a beloved daughter of the gypsy clan known as the Kalderash. After killing this girl, the gypsies were outraged and cursed Angel with a soul, with which he would be eternally tormented by his conscience over what he had done. Darla was terrified and disgusted and turned Angel away from her. Taking Spike and Drusilla with her, she set out to find the gypsy clan in Romania. She told the head gypsy that she would protect his family if he removed Angel's soul. However, while she was in negotiations, Spike and Drusilla had already killed the man's family, unbeknownst to Darla. After finding out, she killed the gypsy man and left for China with Spike and Drusilla where a rebellion had broken out.
It was the Boxer Rebellion, and Angel also was drawn to the place, as he knew Darla had a weakness for religious conflicts. While there, Darla was again disgusted to see Angel's humanity, as he refused to kill a small baby. He ran away from her, and she finally parted ways with Spike and Drusilla.
Darla went back into the service of the Master and the Order of Aurelius after the ordeal. She was there in 1996 during the Harvest. The Master gave her the responsibility of removing Angel from the scene, so as to help weaken the Slayer. She attempted to turn Buffy against Angel, however, she was killed by her own fledgling instead.
Four years later, the corrupted Los Angeles law firm Wolfram & Hart resurrected Darla to help stop Angel again, who had moved from the Hellmouth to Los Angeles to help the unfortunate in the war against the demonic forces of the city, whom Wolfram and Hart represented. She was brought back in human form.
After sending Angel visions of their past together, including a great deal of sexual exchanges, Darla attempted to re-enter Angel's life. It was her intention through the dreams to give Angel the one moment of total happiness needed to rid him of his soul. However, Angel promptly reported that his 150 year relationship with Darla could never hold a candle to what he had with Buffy.
A few weeks later, Angel rescued Darla from the clutches of Wolfram & Hart, and discovered that she was infected with a fatal disease. Darla had become plagued by her human soul, and needed Angel to help her through the ordeal. Angel was faced with the choice of seeing her die from the disease that had infected her, or turn her into a vampire himself.
But Angel did not have to make that decision. Wolfram & Hart made it for him. Summoning the vampire Drusilla, Darla's vampiric granddaughter, Wolfram & Hart had Drusilla turn Darla back into a vampire.
Upon being reunited with Drusilla, Darla returned to her former vampiric self, taking Dru on a killing spree in a clothing store, and then another later on in Holland Manners' wine cellar when Angel turned his back on the gruesome twosome and let them feast on the lawyers.
The fun didn't last, however, for Angel soon came after both of them, setting them on fire. After taking Darla to Lindsey, Drusilla fled to Sunnydale, leaving her "daughter" to fend for herself. Darla recuperated slowly in Lindsey's care, mostly still in shock from Angel's episode of pyromania, before she went to seek out her wayward childer herself.
The welcome she got, however, was not one she expected. After pitching her through a glass door, Angel gathered his sire-come-grandchilder in his arms and carried her to the bed for a night of passion.
As if this weren't confusing enough, the next morning, Angel returned from hot to cold, driving her out of his bedroom at the point of a stake and telling her to get out of his life.
Tired of the mind games involved in the relationship, Darla finally abandoned it and left Los Angeles, leaving a repentant Angel and a heartbroken Lindsey in her wake. What she did not yet know was that she harbored more than mixed feelings inside her.
No one really knows when or how Darla must've made the discovery, but somehow, after her flight from L.A, she found herself pregnant with Angel's child.
This discovery led her on a journey around the world, seeing "every seer and shaman in the Western hemisphere", trying to find out how it was possible, all to no avail. Eventually, she had no choice but to return to L.A, and enlist Angel and the gang's help in figuring it out.
Sadly for her, they had no answers, but they did have a hotel with plenty of room. Darla stayed on to wait out the last days of her pregnancy, where the worst of her deeds was an (perfectly justified, she felt) attempt on Cordelia's life. This led to minor difficulties with Angel that resolved themselves as soon as she gave birth to their son.
Connor, as he would later be called, entered the world in the dead of night on the roof of a local building on December 7th, 2001, mere seconds before Holtz shot Angel in the chest with a crossbow, appearing to kill him. It was thanks to Darla's sense of smell that the gang learned the ashes on the ground below were not her darling boy's, and were able to keep looking for and rescue Angel.
No sooner did they solve one crisis, however, than another popped up. The hotel was swarmed by hordes of demons, vampires and assassins, all drawn to Connor, hoping to get their hands on the prophesised child. The siege lasted for two days before finally an escape plan was made, with one vital component: someone to stay behind and fight the besieging demons to buy the others time to escape.
Angel volunteered, at first, but Darla, realizing that, should the horde in its entirety not be vanquished, Angel would be better able to protect their son than she would, insisted that it be her, that Angel take the baby and run.
Both knew it was a suicide mission. But Darla, in the first truly unselfish motive of her life, would willingly sacrifice herself that her baby might have some kind of a chance. Finally, Angel obeyed her wishes, and let her go.
The final battle was hard and bloody, in which the other volunteer to stay behind, Joe (the bodyguard assigned to Connor by the Powers That Be), was literally torn apart. Darla continued to fight on her own, not letting anything get past her to the group's escape route, killing them all almost to the man.
Finally, a demon from some cult, they never learned what, outmatched her, driving a stake into her heart at the same instant she cut off his head.
Darla died bravely and with honor, becoming the first soulless vampire to ever get into Heaven. Years later, in 2006, a hole in the afterlife would return her to Earth, where she has since remained, in a constant struggle not to return to her vampiric ways.
==Trivia (interactive)==
1) Darla was born in America, in the part known at the time as New Spain (now Florida). She grew up primarily on merchantile ships, influenced by multiple accents, until eventually the strongest one she had was modern American with a slight English bend to it. Incidentally, her parents were French. Her name at birth was Zoe Marie St. Croix.
2) Darla was not "a whore." She was the whore, the madam of a house. She presided over about a dozen other whores, some older than she herself was when she built the place. Seven children were born in that house in the six years she ran it before her death. She would be celibate for days, occasionally even weeks, after each birth. When she found out that becoming a vampire meant no chance of babies in her future, she heaved the world's biggest sigh of relief.
3) Darla first spotted Liam-who-would-become-Angelus while slacking off on a mission for the Order. The Master had sent her to Ireland to retrieve some sacred text or other, and she was just enjoying the new surroundings so much, she was totally blowing it off. She followed Liam for two weeks after her first sighting of him in the bar, trying to see if he got boring. He never did.
4) Darla and Angelus have had sex on every continent, except Antarctica and Australia, because neither was a happenin' place to visit during their time together. Holtz was completely (if indirectly) responsible for their sex in Africa.
5) Darla stayed with Spike and Dru after Angel left them in China until sometime in the twenties. She lived by herself after that until 1971, when The Master sent Luke after her with a gracious invitation to come home. This occasion was the only one in which she and Luke, who had jealously despised each other from Day One, had sex.
6) Darla realized she was pregnant somewhere outside Tijuana about three months after she and Angel had had their ill-fated tryst. She noticed something felt off inside of her when the embryo's heart started to beat, but it had to develop considerably before she could actually discern where the feeling was coming from and that it was a heartbeat. Around that time, her skin had started to be warmed from the inside. It was another two months before she stopped freaking out completely. She never figured out how many people she killed in those two months.
7) Darla ignored her pregnancy for as long as was physically possible. She bought bigger clothes when she stopped fitting them, but didn't get maternity things until later. What finally cracked her so that she went into an actual expectant mothers' store was when a stretchmark appeared on her hip. She took a deep breath, swallowed her fear, then went into a small shop. She killed the propreitor, the clerk, and two customers inside, then helped herself to maternity clothes and stretchmark cream.
8) The last time Darla saw Dru was on her way back to Los Angeles to tell Angel he was going to be a daddy. (Note sarcastic inflection she uses for this in her head) Dru brushed her hair for her, gave her a bath, then had the gentlest sex with her those two have ever had.
Not just each other. With anyone.
Darla hated herself for liking it.
9) The last time Darla saw Spike was in New York in 1969. They were coincidentally picked up by the same van of hippies whilst hitchiking their way to Woodstock. They killed the hippies and then got stoned together. Spike kissed her, then Darla ripped her fingernails down his cheek and licked the blood off of them. They made out a little, then went their separate ways. Spike went on to the concert. Darla grabbed another ride with another set of hippies on their way home and went to San Francisco.
10) Darla had no name during the hundred intervening years between her siring and being given the name "Darla." In that time, she was called one of two things by all the members of the Order: "childe" (The Master and Timothy, the "priest" she would later outrank, who also taught her how to read) or "sister." (Everyone else, though whenever Luke said it, it was with a disdainful edge to it that made her grit her teeth and remind herself that the Master'd be pissed if she killed him)
11) Darla picked the name "Connor." Angel found a slip of paper in her things where she had feverishly written several possible names down while she was alone in Lorne's bedroom before she died. It was the only name on the entire list he could both make out (her handwriting had turned into distorted scribbles from the pain) and that he actually approved of (no son of his was going to be named after the Master).
It was derived from his own last name--O'Connor--when he was human.
12) Darla was taught to waltz in Vienna in 1765 by an exceedingly boring count that she ate two hours later. She was better at it than he was, anyway. Also, his French was appalling.
13) Whether he ever knew it or not, Darla neither knew nor cared to know, but Holtz is actually the one that started their fight. He and a team of hunters he worked with attacked and nearly destroyed the Order's Haven in the London Catacombs. Only Luke and the Master survived the attack. Luke wrote her a very scathing letter to recall the entire thing.
When Darla sank her fangs into his daughter's throat, she thought of the siblings she'd lost and smiled.
14) Darla started smoking in the fifties. Everyone smoked then, it was a great way to blend in when she went to clubs or partiers, and it was painfully easy to attract men to her by smiling coyly and asking for a light. She laughed out loud when it was discovered that smoking is a health hazard.
She quit in the nineties, but started again shortly after Angel drove her out of his bedroom at the point of a stake. Her brand is Morley's, just like Spike.
15) Darla remembers, to the day and hour, when she turned Angelus. Even after he was ensouled and gone forever, she celebrated it every year. When the date rolled around in Sunnydale the year they were both there, she left a dead woman--blond, of course--and a bottle of champagne on his porch. She never found out if he understood why, or if he remembered the date's significance.
16) When Wolfram and Hart brought Darla back as human, she was catatonic and half-amnesiac for several days.
She remembered Angelus' name before she remembered her own.
17) Darla never slept with Lindsey, but she was damn tempted to when she had her psychotic break as a human. She wondered for months afterwards if he still would've called Angel to come and get her if he'd known that fact.
18) Darla does not believe monogamy has any place in a committed relationship. This does not mean she's incapable of jealousy. On the contrary, it's bruising to her ego to think that she didn't thoroughly ruin anyone she's ever slept with for sex with anyone else.
19) Darla thinks Jack is a sad, pathetically ordinary name for someone with the title "The Immortal" to have.
20) Darla actually can count on both hands the number of people she's ever felt anything resembling love for in her entire life. If she ever tried to make a list, her son would be the first one she thought of.
She counts Angel and Angelus separately.
==Trivia (non-interactive)==
Darla...
#Never minded not having a soul.
#Never lacked the capacity for human emotions because of it.
#*Frequently* had threesomes with Angelus and Dru.
#Fours after Spike came along.
#Loves Connor, Angelus, Angel, the Master, Dru, Spike and Luke. In that order.
#Would never, under any circumstances, call Holtz “Daniel.”
#Though she sometimes wants to.
#Speaks perfect French and Italian, good Chinese and Korean, and decent Spanish.
#Died because she really did love Connor, not because his soul made her feel like she had to.
#Also died because she loved Angel.
#Never wears underwear.
#Except on special occasions.
#Considers a birthday slaughter to be a special occasion.
#Hates silence.
#*Really* hates being alone.
#Regrets only missed opportunities.
#Does not keep mementos.
#But really enjoys going through the mementos other people keep.
#Never loved Lindsey.
#Loves the irony of religious wars.
#Was an Atheist.
#Doesn’t feel like having gone to Heaven should overly affect that viewpoint.
#Is hurt more than she lets on that Angel never loved her.
#Never has nightmares.
#Rarely has dreams.
#Liked Connor with Joy.
#Is mostly okay with believing Connor didn’t love her.
#Would never submit sexually to anyone but Angelus.
#Would have to be bound and shackled to a headboard before she submitted that much.
#Still thinks of the Master as her father.
#Does not hold a grudge against Holtz for kidnapping Connor and raising him in Quor Toth.
#Is not sorry for killing Holtz’s family.
#Or anyone else, for that matter.
#Would rather have every single one of her teeth pulled out with a pair of rusted pliers than actually admit she’s jealous of Dannie.
#But she is.
#Does not hold a grudge against Denna for being Connor’s primary mother figure.
#Doesn’t actually think she’d be any good at being his primary mother figure, anyway.
#Is not dealing as well with being jerked out of Heaven as she says she is.
#Does not think of Dru as her sire.
#Would bitchslap the hell out of anyone but Dru that called her "grandmother."
#Would probably bitchslap Dru, too, if she did it more than two or three times in a day.
#Is unsettled by how much she liked it when Connor called her "mom."
#Still thinks of Connor as being pure.
#Has not thought of him as her baby since he was eleven days old.
#Didn't think of him as her baby then--preferred to think of him as "ours," hers and Angel's both.
#Does not think Angel's a very good father.
#Will never admit that to anyone.
#Got angry about it when Cordelia volunteered to take care of Connor if anything happened to her.
#Really meant it when she said that she'd take Dru caring for him over Cordy.
#Used lotion on Connor as a baby instead of powder because the smell of baby powder reminds her of Buffy.
#Has mostly gotten over her grudge against Buffy.
#Probably will never like Cordy, though.
#Probably not Dannie, either.
#Tried once to breastfeed Connor.
#Thought of how she’d bled her breasts to feed Liam and change him into a vampire.
#Never tried again.
#Doesn’t like to fight.
#Loves to dance.
#Was never that eager to end the world.
#Still misses Angelus.
#Avoids going out because she often catches herself inadvertently hunting when she’s among groups of humans.
#Has actually shackled herself to Angel’s headboard to avoid killing people since she’s been back.
#Feels like an idiot every time she does that.
#Considered Connor to be her conscience.
#Was indeed the one to tattoo Angel.
#Is secretly hurt that Angel never told that to Connor.
#Thought she’d kill Angelus someday when she first turned him.
#Realized she never would when she chose him over the Master.
#Has never quite gotten over it that Angel killed her.
#Would have stayed with Angel and Connor, like Angel asked her to, to raise him as a family.
#Still doesn’t believe that would’ve ended well.
#Doesn’t believe in happily-ever-after at all.
Category:Characters
Category:Vampires
Category:Vampires
Category:Active Characters
Category:H's Character
Category:Francophone Characters