By Darren Wheatcroft
"We travel, because we are free. Not like you, trapped in your little houses with their gardens. The world is our back garden, the streams are our plumbing. The magic is ours to enjoy. Magic of the open road, magic of the soul.
Lend us a fiver?"
The Tremere clan of vampires, in the late 19th century began the popular movement of spiritualists that prevailed in that time. The Ventrue, assisted by the Technocracy, beat down this movement mercilessly.
In the middle of the 1960's, the Tremere deemed it the time for the movement to reappear, and created the 'Hippies' of that time. Environmentalism and mysticism combined to make a group of people that could successfully mask the workings of the Tremere. Many new Tremere were embraced from this time.[1]
The Ventrue and their
In the mid eighties, a hundred years after the birth of the spiritualist movement in the UK, the Tremere once again began to tinker with reality and the 'New Age Travelers' were born. Many are failed students, disenchanted by the structured learning of the Universities, often controlled by the Technocracy. Many more are drop outs, unable to keep a work ethic for very long in this Ventrue dominated country. This suited the Tremere purposes well, for those who were suspicious of technologies, who shunned that that was 'material' were prime targets for covering the actions of Vampires. The Tremere leaders successfully turned several 'leaders' into Ghouls, accidentally awakening them in the process. With their new powers, these leaders (known in the outside world as members of the crusty band, the Levellers) began to learn the 'inner' secrets of their world, and became adept in the spheres of Life and Spirit, causing many of the Traditions to mistake them for either Verbena or Dreamspeakers, quite falsely. As the movement grew, more were awakened and learn the arts of magic.
As yet, the group have no real agenda for using their powers, except for confusing the Police and Beaurocrats as to who they are, so as to claim larger welfare cheques from the government. Politically, they are active on the side of environmental issues, anti nuclear protests and (against the wishes of their Vampire masters) are predominately vegetarians. In fact, so much so, that they believe the eating of meat or animal produce affects their magic, rendering it dormant until they purify themselves.[4]
The Tremere use them to disguise 'recruiting sessions' and to raise the general publics perception of the Supernatural. As such, they are hated by the Technocracy, revilled by the Ventrue (they may break the Masquerade) and thought of as weirdos by most sleepers. However, despite their vampiric connections (known only to a few of the order) the Traditions tolerate them, since they have succeeded in weakening the gauntlet in several key cities, manchester being the largest.[5]
Organization: The New Agers have no real organisation. The leaders are not true leaders, they only suggest ways to go. The Tremere dominated Levellers are at the moment attempting to attract new followers through their music. The basic unit of any group of these orphans is one.
Meetings: Every free rock festival is a traditional meeting place for the Travelers. The main ones are Glastonbury and Reading. Otherwise, they meet nightly in pubs accross the country.
Initiation: To be awakened, the hopeful must have been a Traveler for at least three years. Upon awakening, they hold a party, and all the group attend. There are two of these initiations every year, at Glastonbury and Reading festivals.[6]
Chantry: The main chantry is in Dublin, Eire.
Acolytes: New Age Travelers, Drop outs, 'Greenies'
Sphere: None, but show a preference for Spirit and Life.
Foci: May not eat meat, or else they lose their powers.
Concepts: Drop outs, New age travelers, 'Greenies'
[A] MAGES
Akashic Brotherhood: Too much introspection means that They can catch up with you.
Celestial Chorus: Once this was a good way, now, they are the pawns of the establishment.
Cult of Ecstacy: Hey, now these guys can throw a party! We always invite them to ours, and they even play sometimes!
Dreamspeakers: They are to be trusted, they care for the environment much as we do, but they are lost in their path.
Euthanatos: Aren't these guys working for Them?
Hollow Ones: Who? [7]
Order of Hermes: MATHS! SCIENCE! these are the ways of Them. Avoid!
Sons of Ether: hey, didn't I just... oh that was for the Hermes guys. Well, these are the same. Nearly. Pretty cool ideas though.
Verbena: If they could do away with the need for so much blood, we could get on with them. As it is, they pollute almost as much as they purify.
Virtual Adepts: Geeks with computers. Still sometimes they can f**k up Them!
Iteration X: Who?
NWO: Now, THESE guys are Them... all of them deserve to be fried.
The Progenitors: Messing with life! Inhuman!
The Syndicate: Hey, these guys pay for our parties, but they don't know that yet!
Void Engineers: They don't bother us. Mind you, all that rocket research must be paid for by the military.
Marauders: These nutters... well, we don't mind them. Except when they frag us.
Nephandi: Devil worshippers, they make even Them look friendly...
[B] VAMPIRES
Ventrue: Upper class, they rule the country. But so do our parents. Stake em.
Tremere: Hmmm. They seem to like us. Can't think why. They have cool spells though.
Nosferatu: Who? never heard of them. Oh you mean like in the film?
Tzimisce: Abominations, but wasnt Drac one?
Brujah: Some of these are OK towards us. Especially in Manchester and Liverpool.
Notes:
[1] : Including my own PC, Moonchild, an ex hippy and twelfth generation Tremere now a computer genius in Bonn. *smirk*
[2] : Uneasy because the technocracy want to destroy all supernature, and what are vampires but supernature incarnate, the Get of Caine! They have to be allies however, since the government (Tory party) is Ventrue controlled. They wait the next election with eager anticipation...
[3] : Hence, the UK is home to many more Fae, Ghosts and supernatural entities than most would expect. The gauntlet is significantly weaker in the countryside, treat rural country as deep wilderness (a 2) there is no Deep wilderness in the United Kingdom.
[4] : If a Crusty eats meat, their avatar temporarily weakens, and all spheres are treated as being one less until the Mage Fasts for a day.
[5] : Treat as one level less for purposes of breaching the gauntlet, downtown becomes a 4, the rest of the city becomes 3. Nodes still need one success however.
[6] : Which is why the police always show a greater interest in stopping these festivals...
[7] : The Hollow Ones are a purely American order, and have no branches in the UK. If they did, the response would be "SAD GOTHS!" :)