Louis XVI

Louis

LOUIS XVI (August 23rd, 1754-January 21st, 1793)
King of France and then some!

The last king of France, Louis XVI is considered among the most decadent rulers in world history. Sexually promiscuous, violently oppressive to his subjects, and entirely unconcerned with matters of state, his lackadaisical rule led to the French Revolution of 1789, which, in turn, sparked revolutions across Europe.

## Biography

Like most monarchs of the age, Louis could trace his lineage back centuries, and even further. His earliest roots can be traced to the Biblical Moses and other great leaders, as well as relative failures, such as the Roman Comicus. Some, such as Tomas de Torquemada, were inspirations for Louis, who used tortures not unlike those of the Spanish Inquisition on his own peasantry. However, many of his ancestors, such as the English Rabbi Tuckman and other Jewish figures, were downplayed by the heavily Catholic and anti-British French nobles.

Another interesting fact of Louis' court was a plague of vampirism that pervaded his rule. Louis' genetic predisposition, perhaps due to his ancestral ties to Hungarian nobility, a region plagued by neighboring Transylvanians, may have been a cause, or perhaps his wife, the Archduchess of Osterlich. However, he was able to combat this, top French scientists inventing a cure for vampirism that would be used for centuries. However, one of his courtesans, Coraline Duvall, would remain as such, along with a small clan of other vampiric nobles who escaped the future revolution.

Louis's early life was typical of 18th Century monarchs, pampered and protected from the abject poverty of the peasant class. At the age of sixteen, he was wed to the young Marie Antoinette, whose out-of-touch nature is often cited as a cause of the revolution. While initially wary of marriage, Antoinette was able to seduce the heir, and their marriage was, for the most part, happy. The two took the throne as king and queen in 1774.

At time of ascension, the government was heavily in debt; despite this, Louis spent money on extravagant clothes and jewelry, and events such as the "Affair of the Necklace" orchestrated by Joseph Balsamo, aka Count Cagliostro and resulting in his death before his return as a Vampire, only further discredited the king and queen. He gained a brief period of popularity in his support of the American Revolution, and his soldiers aided in the defeat of the British forces. Unfortunately, the American ideals soon crossed the Atlantic, and revolutionary thoughts began to simmer; such horrors as the 120 Days of Sodom only furthered the peasantry's ire, offering proof of the corrupt nobility.

In 1789, the pot came to a boil. The people of France saw Louis XVI as a bumbling \*\*\*\*old and his wife as a promiscuous idiot; when told the people of France were starving, Marie was quoted as saying "let them eat cake." Even more than usual, the court at Versailles did nothing to address the problems of the peasantry, instead focusing entirely on exchanging witty barbs. Revolutionaries such as Madame Defarge and Joseph Balsamo organized the masses, and the French Revolution began with the Storming of the Bastille on July 14th, 1789. Many nobles would be caught up in the storms of revolution, along with many relatively innocent individuals, such as Charles Darnay, despite the efforts of individuals such as the Scarlet Pimpernel.

A few days before, however, Louis was warned by his chief advisor Count de Monet to flee his palace and go into hiding. After finishing a game of human chess, he chose Jacques, "le Garcon de Pisse," to impersonate him, and fled the city with Marie after being abandoned by his Prince Consort Dracula. Before leaving, however, he promised to free the noblewoman Mademoiselle Rimbaud's father in exchange for sexual favors. That night, she entered his room, only to meet Jacques in his place. At that moment, the peasants stormed his castle and took the faux-king captive.

The next morning, Jacques, Rimbaud, and her father were all slated for execution by guillotine; a sudden miracle saved their lives, and the three escaped to the countryside for a brief period. In 1792, however, Louis was recaptured, whether this was the true king or still Jacques in disguise is unknown. Along with Marie (or, perhaps, Rimbaud), the two spent roughly three years imprisoned by the revolutionary government.

In this period, Marie carried on a one-sided affair with a young man by the name of Maurice Lindsey; Lindsey's infatuation with the queen accidentally implicated him in a Royalist plot to rescue the monarchs and re-install them, under the command of the mysterious Knight of Maison-Rouge. Unfortunately he, along with other would-be saviors, such as the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel, were unable to carry out the conspiracy in time. Louis and Marie were executed by on Charles-Henri Sanson January 21st, 1793. The royal treasury was raided and spread throughout France, most famously the Heart of the Ocean, which sank with the Titanic.

Though a majority of the French nobility was killed in the chaos of the French Revolution, yet many would survive, including some children (both legitimate and otherwise) of Louis himself. Most would cross the Atlantic to America, though others would remain in Europe; Abraham van Helsing could trace his lineage back to the French courts, slaying the same vampires that once plagued his ancestors.

In America, his descendents would find great success, becoming doctors, powerful businessmen, and in the case of William J. LePetomane, President of the United States. Of all of them, perhaps, Mel Funn is the most interesting. An acclaimed director, he would produce many award-wining films, including the screen adaptation of *Springtime for Hynkel* and a number of historical epics. Funn would eventually create *History of the World, Part 1*, showing his ancestor's fall from grace, a fitting legacy for the last King of France.