Melanie Rachael Havnos

Melanie Rachael Havnos

Race: Vampire
Age: 36, but she appears 22.
Gender: Very female

Character
Looks: Melanie has silky, soft, brunette hair, slightly on the lighter side, that flows down about six inches past her shoulders. It’s not quite wavy but is so light that it has tendencies in that direction most of the time. She is 5'7 and her eyes are light brunette that seems to have some yellow to it on certain days in the right lighting. She likes to wear jewelry, but not overpoweringly so. And she has a way of applying make-up that is still very visually appealing despite the excessive use. She tends to dress a bit more on the revealing side, but never obscene. And she’s quick to dress up and look nice for even the most mundane occasions.

Personality: If there’s a party, she’s the center of it, likely in the process of dragging the hottest guy in the room onto the dance floor. She’s all about the flirting with none of the commitment. She’s not looking for a relationship, just for a good time. She lives day by day with no real sense of planning for the future. She simply tries to make the most out of every second she has. She tends to treat every guy like her personal boyfriend and every girl like her best friend for life; even relative strangers.

If she dislikes someone, she’s not above gossip, though it never contains intentional lies about the person. If someone really upsets her and makes her snap, if she gets aggressive, it happens briskly; likely with her smiling one moment trying to be best friends to pulling a knife on them because of something they said that really stung. She tends to have a long fuse though so this isn’t a common occurrence. unless it’s her time of month.

She hates herself and the fact that she’s a vampire. She covers herself in makeup even when home alone because she can’t stand being slightly pale. She lives with humans and acts just like them in an effort to ignore that she’s any different.

Her outgoing personality is a conscious change she made recently due to an overwhelming feeling of isolation and loneliness. Any display of confidence and self-reliance is likely a front for her loneliness and self-hatred. The only thing she's genuinely proud of is her fighting abilities as she feels it's the only positive thing about her.

Likes:
Boys
Music
Alcohol
Candles
Jewelry
Makeup
Quiet evening walks
Beaches
Rain
Pasta

Dislikes:
The sight of her own blood makes her queasy; very physically ill
Any reminder that she’s a vampire
Males that are only interested in getting into bed
Carrots
Celery
Smell of fish

Fears:
Fear of being alone
Fear of spiders
Fear of heights
Slight fear of the dark that can be amplified in the right atmosphere
Fear of falling in love with the wrong person and getting her heart broken

Special Characteristic: Her Ambient Magic allows her to passively read body language a little better than your average human. With this she can pick up on a person’s emotions quicker, if they’re lying, and have a slightly higher chance of dodging an attack she can see coming. This ability doesn’t make her perfect at these things by any means. It simply gives her the upper edge.

Her fighting style is very acrobatic and mainly defensive; focusing on dodging two-thirds of the fight and fighting back for one-third. Her weapons would usually be daggers but she’s open to using whatever is available if the moment demands creativity; like an empty wine bottle.

Backstory

History: Growing up, Melanie was an only child. A quiet kid that often kept to herself. Her mother was a nurse who seemed to care about injured strangers more than her daughter. She was very rarely home. And Melanie’s father was an alcoholic blacksmith who became violent whenever he drank. Anytime her mother and father ran into each other, he’d accuse her of sleeping around and a fight would break out; often becoming physical. For this reason, Melanie took to being home as little as possible even at the young age of fourteen. She’d wander the streets of Malana; her home-town. Neighbors would become concerned after seeing this occur day after day and began to investigate and became aware of her home-life. A few kind neighbors occasionally took to inviting her in for lunch now and then to keep her off the streets for a couple hours and give her a safe place to be.

One day, three years later, a silver haired, dusty blue-eyed boy invited her out of town into the nearby woods with him. He was calm, well kempt, intelligent, and in his own charming, quiet, way, charismatic. She was hesitant to trust someone closer to her own age as adults felt safer, but she finally agreed. Once outside of town, he introduced himself as Vertigo. It was a nickname a friend of his gave him. He didn’t seem to appreciate it much but he didn’t seem to fight it either. He told her she looked lonely and that he was too. And maybe they could be lonely... together. Melanie smiled for the first time in years and accepted his friendship. Everyday from then on they’d meet outside of town and just talk. They became very good friends in the short time of three months.

Finally Vertigo introduced her to a friend of his, Vincent. He was charming and had this one-sided grin that just made her heart melt. She learned Vincent gave Vertigo his nickname because he had Vertigo as well as a fear of heights. It was a tease that stuck. Vincent wasn’t saying it to be mean though. In fact he was a very calm, romantic type that dressed a bit like a cowboy with his standard trench coat and cowboy hat.

They spent the next year developing a really strong friendship, the three of them. Then, one night, Melanie’s father was drunk and more violent than usual. In his drunken rage he stabbed Melanie’s mother with a kitchen knife and Melanie fled for her life. She assumes her mother died that night and her father was locked away but she never did return to find out.

She ran out into the woods and found Vincent and Vertigo, they were talking about her but she didn’t catch what they were saying before she interrupted them. She broke down and started crying, explaining what she witnessed through her tears. They comforted her until a loud howl sounded from a distance. It was then that Melanie noticed the overcast and rain-droplets hitting her arms. In the darkness of night, with the storm obscuring the moon reducing visibility drastically, the wolf struck, racing into the group and fighting them, rabidly, wildly; as if it’s very survival depended on killing the three others. Melanie saw only flashes of the scene thanks to the lightning that crackled above. A few times she was able to dodge the attacks. But ultimately, she was bitten, yanked at and thrown to the ground. She then felt it’s mouth ease off and it run off, fleeing. The scene calmed and the night was quiet.

She felt wet on her right arm. But this wetness wasn’t due to rain which had grown heavy, it was thicker. It was her own blood. There was no sign of Vertigo or Vincent, she was worried they’d been killed. But before she was able to gather the strength to look around and check, she passed out.

Upon waking up, she found her arm bandaged, Vincent and Vertigo were nowhere to be found. Part of her was relieved that at least they hadn’t died, but then, the must’ve abandoned her. The thought pained her greatly. She then noticed a girl around her age. She informed Melanie that she had bandaged her arm for her and introduced herself as Terri. She had jet-black hair, wavy, with dull, blue-gray eyes. She was calm, leaning against a tree, arms crossed. she looked beautiful in a lonely sort of way. She avoided eye-contact with Melanie. Melanie had noticed the storm had stopped by now, the sun was shining and it was morning. Terri was in the shade of a large tree.

Melanie inspected her arm and thanked Terri; who didn’t reply. Melanie sat up. She asked if Terri had noticed two guys by the names Vincent and Vertigo, but she shook her head no. Melanie sighed. Terri finally replied 'You're welcome.'

Terri finally looked toward Melanie and admitted she probably shouldn't stick around too long. It had been a while since she fed and she didn't want to harm anyone; especially when they were in such a vulnerable state. Melanie stood at that, taking offense, stating she was perfectly capable and not weakened at all. Though as she said this the rapid motion of standing caught up with her and made her dizzy and unsteady. Terri will look to her simply as though this confirmed her previous statement. Melanie will realize what Terri said though and fixate on it. 'Feeding?' It wasn't a term Melanie was familiar with growing up with humans all her life. At least it wasn't common to talk of eating in that manner. She'll appear confused and Terri will notice. She'll shake her head disliking the need to state it aloud. 'I'm a Vampire. If I stay here too much longer, I'm inclined to attempt to drink your blood. I don't think either of us want that.' She'll continue that she only stuck around to make sure Melanie would be alright after bandaging her.

It happened suddenly, Melanie noticed it only seconds before it struck. A poisonous snake from the limbs of the tree Terri leaned against snapped forward, biting Terri with venom intended to kill. Terri dropped immediately to a kneeling position from being startled and from the pain. Melanie rushed over. After thinking over the best option, Melanie resorted to sucking the venom from Terri’s upper left arm. Terri interrupted stating that if she did this, she would likely ingest Terri's blood as well as the venom. Terri explained, falsely, that this would turn her into a vampire as well. It was clear Terri would at least become severely ill if not die without aid though and they were too far from any town to get help in time. Melanie accepted the risk, willing to become a vampire if that meant saving a life. It worked well enough. While Terri still became very ill over the next couple of days, Melanie saved her life. Melanie tended to Terri as she recovered from the snake venom. However, as Melanie began experiencing her own illness from the transition into a vampire, Terri bailed on her the first night of symptoms leaving a simple note that read: 'Thank you. I'm sorry'.

In the coming days, Melanie became violently ill with a fever, vomiting, sweating, etc. She felt like she was going to die, and in all honesty, she should’ve, but somehow, just barely, she managed through it. After recovering, she felt weak. She got extra sleep, drank a lot of water, ate more food. Nothing seemed to work. The next day, she was very drained and felt a strange urge for blood. It was then that she realized what must’ve happened and she began to cry. She was a vampire; turned from the blood she ingested along with the snake venom when saving Terri’s life.

She looked to her arm, was she not also a werewolf? She wondered about this, worried for weeks. Would she know for sure? Was there any way to tell before the next full moon? Surely if she was infected with both viruses back-to-back she would’ve died, she assured herself. And she learned within the month, at the full moon, she wasn’t a werewolf at all. But then the question remained, was that a normal wolf? And either way why did it attack her and her friends so violently?

From that point forward she attempted to starve herself of blood many times, at first thinking that maybe she could stop her ‘addiction’ cold turkey. But it only left her extra pale, frail, weak, tired, sluggish, depressed, and overall miserable and ended in a frantic, desperate feeding session. The longest time she starved herself was five days, and she looked very ill and barely survived. The longest besides that was three days. Even now she starves herself occasionally but more out of self hatred when depressed and not in a futile attempt to stop drinking all together. She often draws a comparison to her father’s alcoholism and her feeding and hates herself for it.

She now works for herself going around collecting rare herbs and materials to later sell to towns, mainly Zalsabad where she now lives, for a profit. Often it’s a dangerous job that puts her in conflict with wildlife, other races, or even nature itself. She’s been a loner only making acquaintances here and there; but she’s finally reaching the point where she’s willing to try to make friends again, despite what she’s become.

Try as she might to put her past behind her. To forget it and ignore what she is now because of it. Sometimes your past just won't leave you be...