Derrick Ferguson

*A Reluctant Vampire*

* Overview
* Sheet
* Background
* 'Ships
* Logs

Turned into a vampire against his will, Derrick is just trying to learn how to exist in his new state.

## Personality

Derrick's a good example of a bad thing happening to a good person, when the supernatural intrudes on the life of a normal person. He's pretty indicative of the "typical joe", vampire or not, and this is normally pretty clear in just the first few moments of interacting with him. In a nutshell, Derrick is generally a good person trying to do the best he can with whatever hand he's dealt. He's kind of a shy sort, due to not having much of a life in his teen years, but he's not lacking in manners.
Music is very important to him. It's a part of him, and as such, he feels very connected to it. Whenever possible, he's someplace he can listen to music somehow, even if he's just standing outside a club and listening to the music coming from inside the place. Since he can hear that well now.
The current dilemma he's facing has given Derrick a better understanding now, that it's not how the man changes his situation, but how the man is changed by his situation. Who -- or what -- will he become in the face of this new development? He's probably always going to question himself and his place in the world with his "new lifestyle", but so long as he asks "Why?" and not "Why not?", particularly where killing is concerned, he should be all right.

## SKILLS

More of his era of performing arts, Derrick is able to follow choreography, either to copy a choreographed dance that others have done, or to make his own by rearranging the steps.

Much like his singing, due to Derrick wishing to be a popular musician, he spent a great deal of his teens learning how to play the guitar.

Most of Derrick's young life, he had dreams of being a rock star. So most of his teenage years were spent cultivating his voice and his ability to perform in front of a crowd.

Derrick was never taught how to properly stalk human prey. Not that he'd do it anyway. He knows how to catch and kill rats, mice, and birds, and other small city pests, though. They don't taste great, but it's better than starving.

Survival is different in the city than from the wild. And it's a little more different still for a vampire. But Derrick has learned to get by in the city, by stalking and killing rats and other pests. Additionally he knows of several hidey-places he can duck into when dawn approaches and sleep. It's not glamorous, but he's surviving.

## POWERS

Derrick can talk to rats and crows, perhaps because that's his other two forms. Maybe it's because he doesn't have a dominant personality, he can't really CONTROL them, but he can always ask them if he needs help. Rats at least are social enough to appreciate a human that can understand them, and he can usually bribe crows with food.

Derrick's fangs are strong enough to puncture very tough leather. That's about all they need to be able to do to get the job done, since they're generally not for defense anyway. His claws are a little stronger, able to shred automotive-grade sheet metal. It's still on the lower end of vampire capabilities though.

Derrick has physically died, so his body no longer ages. And he does regenerate damage done to him. Barring accidents, he could potentially UNlive forever. But he CAN die.

Unless a wound is made with something silver, it will eventually regenerate. This includes lost limbs, which it takes about a week to regenerate. Small injuries can heal in minutes, medium injuries (palm-sized gashes and the like) can heal in hours.

The strain of vampirism that Derrick was infected with gives the infected the capability to change other other forms than their human ones. Usually this has to do with the personality of the infected. In Derrick's case, a rat and a crow. Not a swarm of rats or crows. A single, solitary rat or crow. Either form is generally for slipping away unnoticed, not for doing battle.

The strain of vampirism Derrick was infested with tends to grant a special "boon" of a sort, depending on the infected. For Derrick it was his speed. In human form, he can run nearly fifty times as fast as the fastest human, and even catch bullets in his fingers (though this takes effort and concentration, and he's always going to hurt the hand he uses in the catching). But his true skill is not merely "going fast", but in the precision with which he can apply his speed. While running at this speed, he can also dodge pedestrians while on the sidewalk, with most of them merely believing a gust of wind passed them. This extends to his manual dexterity, too; he's able to quite literally wear the strings of a guitar out with the speed of playing, though this takes a number of hours for him to do.

Derrick's senses are about twice as strong as they were when he was human, with the exception of his sense of smell and of touch. His sense of smell is roughly fourteen times stronger, and his sense of touch is sharp enough that he can sometimes detect attacks directed at his person by the air currents created by the ones responsible.

Derrick didn't get the same degree of enhanced strength that most get when turned. His is still within the realm of human possibility. He can lift a little under 1000 pounds if he uses all his strength. This is still impressive, but it's nowhere near the capabilities of other vampires.

## WEAKNESSES

Much like a human being, if he doesn't eat at least once a day, Derrick's body will shift into starvation mode. For him "eating" means drinking something's blood. After about a week though, he'll fall into hibernation and won't be able to wake until he's fed blood. And when he wakes from it, he's likely going to attack the first living thing he can get his claws on, so obviously he wants to avoid this.

Derrick was never taught "How To Vampire", as his creator was rather insane and neglected this part of his training. So whatever abilities he has, he's going to end up discovering them on his own. Unless by some chance he happens to find a mentor.

Derrick cannot enter any private building that he doesn't "own" unless invited in. He won't burn if he does, he just plain can't do it; it will be like walking into a wall. Public buildings -- malls, churches (ironically enough), stores, etc. -- don't count, and if he's taken into a private location against his will or without his knowledge (such as if he's unconscious), it counts as an invitation.

Derrick hasn't lost a great deal of his humanity in the transition to vampire. He's not a mage, nor a fae, a were creature, or any OTHER kind of supernatural being. And he doesn't think like a vampire. But at the same time, he isn't human anymore, and he's keenly aware of it. Though he has no difficulties making friends, he doesn't feel there's anywhere he really "fits". This feeling leads him to be something of a loner -- even if he isn't one of those "brooding on gargoyle statues" kinds -- and to move around when he has perfectly safe places to go. It can also mean he doesn't have a lot of immediate help when he gets in trouble, and may have to wait for someone to realize he's been gone longer than he usually is before rescue attempts are made.

Derrick is unable to speak when he's not in human form, unless the person to whom he's speaking can understand the language of either of normal examples of his other forms. So if he's trying to get someone to understand him, he needs to be in human form. And there are doubtless going to be situations where he's not going to be able to do that.

Derrick doesn't instantly burst into flames in the sunlight. However, it instantly hurts his eyes, and forces him to seek a place to sleep, as it makes him lethargic and sluggish. When the sun reaches its zenith, if he hasn't found a place to sleep by then -- or at least to get out of direct sunlight -- THAT'S when he'll start to burn.

Most of the weaknesses of Derrick's particular strain of vampirism are the typical storybook fare (where they are not, they've been listed separately). He has no reflection in mirrors; but curiously he can still be captured on digital media such as cellphones and digital cameras. Silver hurts him quite a bit; he can't even stand the touch of silver on his skin. It feels like acid. Forget wearing silver jewelry, or using implements that have silver in their construction. He can't stand the smell, taste, or touch of garlic. Staking with anything pointy enough to penetrate to his heart will immobilize him, but if the stake is removed he will eventually recover (unless the stake is silver, then he's dead). Decapitation, however, will kill him permanently.

Derrick's father was a sheet metal worker in Memphis, his mother a freelance photographer. They were poor, but managed to survive, mainly because his father worked all the time. He didn't see much of the man, and that meant that his mother had to completely shoulder the burden of household tasks as well as her photography clients. Derrick had to learn to help out relatively early; this saw him helping his mother with small household tasks by the time he was ten.

Because he had to come back immediately from school to help his mother with the house -- increasingly so as he grew up -- that he didn't go out a lot. Most of his free time was spent at home, listening to music, and reading. It was a little boring, but he managed.

When he was twelve, his parents gave him a present that they thought would help occupy him a little better. It was an acoustic guitar, a new set of strings for it (Derrick was left-handed, and so had to string the guitar backwards to play it), and some beginners' guitar music books. And it did indeed occupy him, more than his parents ever thought it would. Over the next few years, he played that guitar for hours a night. At first, he sometimes played it until his fingers bled. But he quickly grew accustomed to the strings' cutting pressure on his fingertips, and his skill improved steadily with the acoustic guitar.

High school was a particularly rotten affair for Derrick. He was not really interested in parties, and had grown into too shy of a young man to really have much luck with the ladies, and he didn't have many friends. Between this and a few teachers that went out of their way to make things hard for him, his parents decided to pull him from school, push him to get his GED, and put him directly into college.

In retrospect, Derrick realized that going to college at sixteen was probably a bad idea. Either he was viewed as a little brother, or he was viewed as a stupid kid who didn't belong there. He'd been putting out demos of himself singing and playing the guitar; one would think that Memphis would be a place that appreciated that sort of talent.
But it was a letter from San Francisco, of all places, that reached him just after he'd gotten out of a two-year college stint, asking him to come out and play at a club there. He accepted, and moved out there officially. It wasn't that bad of a gig, but he had to hide his age while he played there.

He stayed out in San Francisco for a few years, playing at clubs here and there, though he never really got an official gig. And then his life went down the toilet.

During one of his shows, Derrick caught the eye of one Alexis Bisset. You see, Miss Bisset was in the market for some new blood. Quite literally; she was a vampire. And Derrick's energy onstage drew her to him. She came to several of his shows, and grew more attracted to him. At a party that was being held after one of his shows, she made his acquaintance. She introduced herself, waited until he'd drank a little more than would let him stay very rational, and then invited him to her apartment with the offer of "a good time". He accepted, and accompanied her back to her apartment...and into a nightmare.

In the apartment, she overpowered him, and ended up restraining him there. She kept him there for a few weeks, draining enough blood to keep him weak enough that he wouldn't try and escape her. Derrick finally figured out that the only way he was going to get away from her was to pretend to care about her. So he started to quit fighting her, at least outwardly, and seemed to become more and more accommodating to her whims. She gave him more freedom in response, though she kept him literally on a leash that wouldn't reach past the room she kept him in.

Eventually he convinced her that he was completely smitten with her, and she let him off the leash. But made him keep the collar. Then came the day he planned to make his escape. He'd been so drained by Miss Bisset the previous night that he was too exhausted to try until it was almost sunset. And unfortunately, she caught him in the attempt. A scuffle occurred, he was overpowered, and she thought of the perfect way to keep him.
She changed him into a vampire.

When he woke the next night, Alexis wasn't there. Derrick didn't know what else to do, so he waited for her to return. But she never did. She had, however, left him unrestrained. A few days went by, and she didn't return, so Derrick made good his escape. Now he just needed to figure out what to do next...

Logs featuring Derrick Ferguson:

*Coming soon!*