From: thanatos@interaccess.com (Timothy Toner)
Subject: The Caine Files (4 of 6)

	After the privations of the first two speakers, I felt
it neccessary to take a respite before continuing on.  Thus,
I sequestered myself in a village not far from home, where I
could relax. 
	It is not the job of the chronicler to become
personally involve in the history he records, and yet here,
how can I not?  I have not breathed a word of these papers to
anyone except the four I must speak with to compile the
record.  It seems, however, that its mere existence draws the
strangest types to my door; many who claim to have met and
known Caine, and not a few Malkavians, claiming they are the
First.  I would brush all this aside, if not for the fact
that St. Arond, or at least a corpse resmbling his form, was
found in an alley not two days after our discussion.  One
detail that was left out:  there was no sign of a silver
cross in the remains...

	The next speaker is an odd sort of man.  A student of
Galen, according to rumor, he has chosen to take quite a
different approach in analyzing the philsophical condition of
vampires.  
	Erasmus (a name he admits stealing from one of his
favorite writers) has spent his unlife seeking out every
crackpot who claims to state a bold new theory, which usually
leaves him with egg on his face, and a long trip home for his
troubles.  His success rate, however, has vastly improved in
the past two centuries, as he has "discovered" such notables
as Isaac Newton, Gregor Mendel, and a new player on the
scene, Charles Darwin.
	One of the more curious idiosyncracies of my colleauge
is his desire for complete anonymity.  No part of his own
life history will be recorded here, as, in his own words, he
would hate that some part of himself would remain in the work
of greater men than he.
	One would wonder why I would bring in someone so
concerned in the affairs of mortals when discussing Caine. 
However, recent evidence unearthed by the likes of Pasteur
show that there may yet be a physiological genesis to
vampires.  There is no better authority on this than Erasmus,
and thus I bring him forth.

	"If you do not wish to be remembered to history, why
then do you seek out such notables?"
	"An interesting question, and one that lies like a trap
before me.  Put simply, I cannot help but to seek these
people out.  My Sire saw something within me, lo those many
years ago, worth preserving.  The day after, while still
weakened from the Turning, I collected my things, and was on
my way, much to the consternation of my Sire and his friends,
who had enjoyed my company.
	"I am told that this manuscript will not be released
generally, so I feel safe imparting the following to you. 
When I was young, my mind filled with dream:  dreams of great
ships of wood, with sails larger than my village, sailing to
unknown lands. I would see people, people dressed strangley,
and speaking in alien tongues.  Above all, however, the
dreams seemed to have patterns, sequences, and that if I
followed a few key ones, they would lead me to others.  In
this manner, I found my Sire.
	"He was fascinated with my claims that I could see into
the future.  I shrugged it off, claiming that it was a
useless gift, for I would be dead long before any would come
to pass.  When he asked me if I wished to live to see it
_all,_ naturally, I leapt at the chance.  I would have done
it if he was Satan himself.  I was given a gift, and I was
going to _use_ it!
	"So I became what I am now, and began following my
wayward dreams.  I wasn't very good at first.  Like Hume,
cause and effect have always haunted me.  I have seen the
finished product, oh, so far away, but I must guess if this
particular event is the cause. That's why I chased down so
many wrong paths in the past. Now...now I am better.  Much
better.
	"Many of the things I speak with to you today, you will
not understand.  Copy them down, nonetheless, for a reader
100 years from now will, and perhaps will gain greater
insight into our nature."
	"An interesting philosophy.  Your evidence is not
explainable in the past, but only in the future.  A Futurist,
perhaps?"
	"True Philosophers _never_ pigeonhole.  It show
laziness in thinking."  I felt like a schoolboy.  He
continued, ignoring my statement.
	"You must, by now, be aware of the discoveries of
Charles Darwin.  A marvelous fellow, if perhaps a bit timid
in coming forth with his discoveries.  He has theorized that
Man is a dynamic creature, not made of clay and dust by some
uncaring god, but rather a child of nature, as organic as the
rest of the flora and fauna.  The only distiction is here, in
the brain, and here, in the stomach.
	"It is quite fascinating to realize mankind made
himself what he is today.  I liken it to Michaelangelo's
rock.  Adversity chips away at what does not belong, leaving
us with the form we see today."
	"So the 'true form' is already in the rock?  Who placed
it there?"
	"I have seen too much in the way of miracles to doubt
the existence of some vast, benign and malevolent power.  My
training as a philosopher and scientist tell me to allow for
_all_ evidence, and not discard what cannot be clearly
explained.  Thus, there is room for a god in my system.  It
placed the form in the rocks, and it is up to us, with the
not so gentle coaxing of nature, to find it.
	"So humans gain a superior placement in the Created, or
Evolution, as Darwin put it, by manifesting a supreme
intelligence, and an efficiency in diet."
	"I fail to see what role diet plays in superiority. 
Should not numbers play a role?"
	"If it did, the lowly ant would be king of us all.  You
think only in terms of competition in the same species.
Outside of the species, it becomes a question of whether or
not I can eat you, and whether or not I can out think you..."
	"...or kill you with my teeth or horns, or run from
you, or a thousand different things."
	"Do you know how to use a gladius?"
	"A Roman short sword?  No...I prefer modern weapons,
such as the rapier, or pistols."
	"If I told you we were to fight tomorrow, and you had a
choice between the rapier and the gladius, you would choose
the rapier. Why?"
	"Because...I'm better at using it."
	"And if I told you that I would be dressed in a
chainshirt?"
	"Then I would pick the gladius, since the thrusting
weapon would be more useful against that sort of defense."
	"There!  You proved my point.  It's not a matter if a
creature uses its teeth, or runs, or anything, if the
creature pursuing has the intelligence to anticipate any
eventuality, and compensate accordingly.  Weaponry only comes
in to the equation when the predator slips up, and loses its
advantage.  Humanity has used its intellectual superiority,
to build weapons that give it options. Whereas the lion would
threaten with claws, now the human hunter attacks with a long
spear and shield.  Wheras the graceful deer runs away from
the threat, now the human hunter shoots it hundred of feet
away with a rifle."
	"Hm.  Yes.  I see intelligence, but what of your claims
that _diet_ plays a supreme role?"
	"This is a bit difficult to explain, since the proper
research is being done now, but the proper conclusion will
not be drawn for years hence.  Tell me, have you ever worked
on a farm?"
	"No...I _did_ ride...before..."
	"Good enough.  Horses must eat a tremendous amount of
food, relative to their body mass, correct?  I mean, take how
much you weighed, and how much you ate, and think of how much
your horse weighed and ate.
	"Now, let me tell you that the further down the
evolutionary system you go, the less efficient digestion
becomes.  Creatures must consume more and more to get basic
nutrients out of food. This, however, is a misnomer.  Humans
get so much out of food becuase they prey on creatures that
have done the work for them. These 'lesser' creatures store
the essential nutrients, and expel the detritus.  Humans
merely process the best of the environment.
	"Were you a child of privelidge?"
	"Well, all my needs were cared for, if that's what you
mean. My father was a banker..."
	"Excellent.  Have you ever noticed what the lower
classes dined upon?"
	"Well, once I stayed at my friend's home for breakfast. 
His father was a factory worker.  They had huge steaming
bowls of gruel.  It wasn't good food, but there was lots of
it."
	"And what did you have, when you were young?"
	"Porridge, mostly.  What does this have to do with
vampirism?"
	"In a minute.  It must have occured to you that the
quality of your repast was the result of your wealth.  I
challenge that notion.  I say that your wealth was the result
of the food you ate.
	"Now of course, you claim this is utter nonsense, but
look at the facts.  Poorer individuals eat cheap foods, heavy
in starches, such as breads and potatoes.  To gain the same
amount of sustenance as you did, they would have to eat a lot
more, and, I would suppose, _still_ wouldn't get the same
nutritional value, since they never ate vegetables."
	I looked at him, searching for understanding.  He noted
my confusion.
	"Sorry, I got carried away for a moment.  Green
vegetables are loaded with nutrients, nutrients essential for
organism growth. Since you could afford to buy foods rich in
these nutrients, your quality of living was higher.  You
would be sick less, and undoubtably live longer.  Correct?"
	"I suppose..."
	"Of course it's correct.  Now, the lowly ant must eat
hundreds of times its weight in food each day to survive. 
The elemphant, grand creature that it is, cannot take a break
from eating, lest it starve.  We can even see that for the
most part, human fool themselves into doing the same,
thinking they must eat much more than what is necessary to
survive.
	"Now, extrapolating from this principle, we can see
that a creature higher up in this 'food chain,' as I envision
it, would require a substance loaded in nutrients, but in
relatively small quantities."
	It was only then that it hit me.  "Blood..."
	"Correct.  We vampires are as terribly natural as any
other thing, simply higher evolved."
	"Nonsense!  A creature cannot subsist on a single
food!"
	"There is a curious creature in Australia, known as the
koala, I believe.  It spends the better part of its existence
wrapped in the branches of the Eucalyptus tree.  It gets
_everything--_ nutrients, starches, water-- from eating
eucalyptus leaves.  It is so highly adapted that pure water
is poisonous to it, whereas the leaves of the eucalyptus are
poisonous to most creatures.  Is this so different from the
vampire's inability to consume normal foods?"
	"By your rational, we are merely well developed
koalas!"
	"Ah!  You spot the difference.  Intelligence, my boy.
Intellect!  Diet can only play a small part in freeing us
from the past.  There is something wholly remarkable about
vampiric digestion that allows them to waste merely a
fraction of their time each night in acquiring food.  Most
humans must work _hours_ to earn enough to feed.  But
intellect is what truly carries us above the rank and file of
humanity."
	"We are _spiritual_ creatures, not _natural!_  The
light of the sun repulses us, burns us, the flame destroys
us!  We live forever!  There can be _nothing_ natural about
us!"
	All he did for a great while was smile at my outburst. 
In that moment, I let out a malestrom of frustrations,
frustrations I had buried for longer than I cared to admit.
	"The best of science can only remotely guess at what
really constitutes food.  What makes a rock inedible, and a
piece of wheat undigestible until cooked?  Could it be that
in the process of rendering food from one stage to another,
the basic engine of life, the sun, translates its energy in a
hitherto spiritual way, that cannot adequately be measured?
	"Suppose that this energy is not useful to us as
humans. Plants need it to grow, and thrive, but creatures are
found in caves completely devoid of light.  Somehow, the
sun's energy is essential for plants to grow.  These plants
are consumed by cattle, who refine and reprocess the energy. 
The humans slaughter the cattle, and devour it, once again
diluting the sun's original energy.  Then we devour this mere
fraction.  Perhaps this fraction is all we can stand.  A
mortal fair of skin will brun readily in the full sun. 
Perhaps we Kindred are a furthering of that dynamic example."
	"As for living forever...I perhaps need to go on.
	"Mortals have an appendix, which, apparent to most
scientists, does nothing except become occassionally
infected, threatening the patient's life.  Some have
suggested that the appendix once served a greater function,
but time and experience have stripped it of usefulness.  Now
we as vampires have that case taken to an extreme. Since our
digestion has grown so efficient, the need for the majority
of it has dissipated, and our organs shrivel accordingly. The
only organ we truly need, the heart, continues to do its job,
pumping precious life.  If it is impaled, we cannot function.
	"We know that the starfish and sponge have wondrous
regenerative capabilities.  How is that so different, so
unnatural from what we do?  Monks in Russia and China have
been found to survive for a hundred years or more.  They
claim that it was through diet and meditation that such feats
can be explained.  The average lifespan of a mortal when I
was alive was twenty-eight. The average lifespan, despite a
polluted world, is now fifty-five. The only explaination is
the gradual improvement in diet.  What would happen if a
super-diet would be developed?  Would not people live further
yet?"
	"All this is so...insane!  We do not grow, we do not
age appreciably.  We are locked in time!  This is not living! 
This is not life!"
	"Oh, but we _do_ change, my boy, if only someone would
stop and notice.  Tell me, have you ever been to a castle,
built over 500 years ago?"
	"Yes.  There was a castle not far from my Grandfather's
home."
	"The doorways...did you notice something wrong with
them?"
	"I marvelled at how silly it seemed to make a doorway
one had to duck to get through."
	"When that castle was built, the soldiers that manned
the walls were no taller than those doorways.  Now you,
descended from that stock, five hundred years later, must
duck.  If the noble Critias visited that castle when it was
built, he too would not have to duck.  But clearly, he is our
size today."
	"So...we grow?"
	"Yes.  Very slowly, mind you, but we grow nonetheless.
Otherwise, the Masquerade would be pointless.  Hunters would
have quite an easy job.  Just look for short, pale fellows,
and stake where necessary.  No more elders.  I have even seen
signs of aging amongst some vampires.  Oh, mind you, nothing
_drastic,_ but evidence does exist that the vampiric form is
more mutable than originally thought."
	"Then what of those Embraced when children.  Any signs
of aging would be most noticeable amongst them, but none seem
any older at all."
	"That has perplexed me as well.  It could very well be
a function of lack of maturity in their form.  Whatever
chemical response initiates the change to vampirism is not
completely done in the juvenile form.  It could also be a
spiritual thing. Children are far more innocent, and thus
their form is less corruptable, although, as I know too well,
their soul is easily degenerated.  Finally, there could be a
mental factor involved, which brings me to my next topic.
	"Descartres was one of the first to formally declare
that we live within our minds.  All we touch, smell, see, and
hear is suspect.  It could be illusion, it could be reality. 
All we can know is that we can think.
	"Vampires seem to be the ultimate proof of this
theorem.  They can take phenomenal amount of damage to their
forms, and as long as the head remains intact, they can
survive.  Some claim the heart is the center of vampiric
existence, but that simply is not so. Staking is a mental
handicap.  How do I know?  A Gangrel potent enough can
overcome this impairment, and remove the stake.
	"Now I have claimed that it is man's supreme intellect
that puts him above all.  It is the vampire's intellect that
puts him above man.  But, you argue, we are no smarter from
the stock we rose from.  True.  Looking at the average
Brujah, such a statement seems abusrd.  
	"However, I have seen idiots who could crank out
mathematics in seconds that would take days to compute. 
Complex calculations do not intimidate them, but tying their
shoes is a frightening concept.  We are these savants. 
Somehow the Change boosts our intellects into the dark,
forgotten corridors of the mind.  Magi can use Vim to
activate this hidden potential.  We use the Blood.
	"Man uses his intellect to outwit his prey and his
fellow predators.  Language, both written and orally
rendered, gives him a tremedous edge.  He can use his mind to
create camouflage for his form, to build weapons and armor to
fight and defend with.  So too do we.
	"Every discipline is the natural extention of what man
attempts to do, but internalizes within the body.  We need no
armor, Fortitude defends us.  What is a sword when Potence
and Protean can rend and tear just as well?  Presence and
Dominate are a logical magnification of man's ability to
outthink animals, as, of course, is Animalism.  And Auspex is
the true expression, the ability to look through the
illusions that reality manifests, and to stare within.
	"In short, diet allows us to live longer, but our
intellect allows us to tap into unimaginable forces locked
within the frail human shell."
	"This is all fascinating, but it is far from the
subject.  It is apparent you hold no regard for the Caine
legend..."
	"Stop."  And he did, transfixed, half getting up from
his seat.  "Sit.
	"Caine...existed, but not in the way any of us imagine. 
We dream of a cunning, an intent, something to hate for the
Curse, and something to admire for the Gift.  Caine was none
of those things.
	"To go any farther, I will require use of my gift, and
impart upon you knowledge, wisdom that I presently have no
true proof for. However, hold these words to yourself
tightly, for one day, they will have relevance.
	"Pasteur theorized that microbes could be responsible
for sickness and disease.  Leeuwenhoek spotted them with his
microscope.  Cause was spotted, and effect was apparent. 
However, what occured in between cause and effect still
eluded them, as it eludes us, until sometime in the 1940's."
	"Nineteen-Hundred and Forty?"
	"Yes.  I told you this was a tad confusing.  Allow me
to finish, and copy this all down.  It is incredibly
pertinent!
	"There are two major disease vectors:  viral and
bacterial. Through these two microbes disease can travel. 
Bacteria work to produce poisons that kill the host.  Viruses
take over the body, slowly, making the organism do what _it_
wants the body to do.
	"This is no clumsy Domination, but rather a subtle
effect, a slow usurpation of the body on a microscopic level. 
Most of the time, a virus will be cleansed out by the body's
ability to heal and adapt.  Someties, the virus kills the
organism outright.  And sometimes, sometimes it does much
worse.
	"Inside yourself is a library, filled with books that
tell the various components how to do their job."
	"Memory, right?"
	"Deeper than that.  Locke was wrong in assuming we had
a complete tabula rosa.  This library dictates how we will
react on a primal level:  heat, cold, disease, exertion, all
truly cannot be controlled by you consciously, but your body
maintains them nonetheless.  Your conscious body possesses a
threat response, which can be rewritten by new information.
If you feared dogs because you were attacked when a child,
that fear can be largely removed.  But books in this inner
library cannot be changed, except by viruses...
	"As I said, the library controls things on a primal
level, a cellular level.  A mortal eats a slice of bread, to
feed himself. Yet you cannot offer his hand a slice.  It must
be broken down into simpler things; starches, sugars, and so
on, until it is put in a form that the librarians can use.
	"However, what would happen happen if someone came in
and changed the books?  Rather than the normal "human"
responses, the body would have to conform to a new code, and
be rebuilt accordingly.  To most organisms, this rebuilding
process is lethal. Only humans possess the similarity in
libraries to accomodate the virus.
	"We are children, then, of this virus.  If the virus is
introduced into our blood, we become ghouls.  It takes over a
certain portion of the blood, and instills that blood's
libraries with the new information.  On a very small scale,
the virus feeds the body, keeping it young, and activation
the inner potential.
	"However, blood dies and is replaced constantly. 
Eventually, a new dose is needed.  If a new dose is not
applied, the body builds up an immunity, and the virus cannot
take hold.  The organism will never be a ghoul again.
	"If, however, the virus does not encounter blood, but
instead, the body itself, something else entirely different
happens.  Rather than stopping at the libraries in the blood,
the virus rewrites the body itself, so that it can produce
the virus itself.  However, it still requires blood as the
transmission fluid."
	"But what you're saying is that we are little more than
_factories_ for this virus!"
	"Yes.  That is _precisely_ what I am saying.  We as
humans _died_ in the Embrace, but our bodies did not.  On a
cellular level, they survived.  It is in that five minutes
before the cells themselves die that the virus can be
transmitted, and do its job. However, something was left,
something chemical, in the brain.  We retain that, as we
retain all our memories.  It could be a soul, it could not.
	"Now, onto Caine at last.  As you can see, Caine was
not a killer, or even a necessarily bad person.  He, or she,
was merely a victim of a virus, one who caught a cold, and
died, only to rise up, and be reborn.  I would imagine that
the virus, in its first form, was particularly dangerous. 
However, something was strange in Caine's library.  Some
books did not get discarded properly, and when the virus
tried to make more, a new virus was created.
	"This virus, which we will call A, took over Caine's
body. Already wracked by the disease, it was rather simple. 
It contained within it information that would allow a virus
to survive in any environment, affected only by sunlight and
heat, and capable of surviving on the simplest foods.  It
transmitted these properties to the organism in general.
	However, A, which was largely immortal, was changed
when it took over Caine's form.  It could make more of
itself, thus allowing for healing, but only on a cellular
level.  If it wanted to make more viruses, they would have to
be a mew strain, B, which was not as strong as A.
	"B had similar properties.  It could infect another
organism, first taking over the blood, and if no blood, then
the organism itself.  However, it was less efficient in its
job.  As it took over the new organism, it too was changed,
into not being able to produce virus B, but rather a still
weaker virus C."
	"Generations..."
	"Correct.  Although all human's libraries are
different, enough similarities remain that the same response
always occurs. The virus is always changed upon taking over
the host organism, and it can only produce viruses of the
next grade down.
	"Diablerie, then, is a bit difficult to explain.  When
the blood is drained and consumed, the body goes into torpor. 
On a cellular level, the libraries seal up tight.  Since
there is not blood to transmit to, they all go into a state
of dormancy.
	"However, if the change is sudden, such as in the act
of diablerie, the cell membranes are ruptured, and the
essence of the virus rush into the Diabolist.  If it is of a
better grade, the virus rewrites the diabolist.  However, too
much of a change is not possible.  The virus can only be
rewritten in discreet units.  Any more, and the excess
"books" are discarded.  That is why a D vampire cannot jump
to a B.  He must first receive the instructions to be a C
before he can effectively move to B."
	My head was swimming...D...C...B?  Was that all we are?
Microscopic organisms, controlling my hand, my heart, my
HEAD?  He somehow read my mind.
	"It can esily be seen that nature emulates itself on
various levels.  Your cells have facitilies for breathing,
food production, replication, and a central "head" area,
where information is kept. You, as a mortal, had lungs, a
digestive system, testes, and a brain, where your knowledge
was kept.  We, as a society-organism, have factories to
produce food, hospitals to care for the sick and newly born,
and libriaries to store our knowledge.  Where are the viruses
in that final system, Wilhelm?  Where are the parasites,
immortal, usurping the knowledge, the food, the newborn,
controlling and dominating the society-organism?  It cannot
come from within, but it does come from without.  Vampires,
Wilhelm. Vampires.
	"A virus exists because it weeds out the unfit, whether
it be cells or whole organisms.  Beyond philosophy, that is
our role in existence, in nature.  We are the predator
within, the hidden danger, the Great Equalizer, which brings
all men low."
	I stopped writing.  "Is that all?"
	"I sense your disappointment.  You expected much more,
a great daring answer to all things.  Nevertheless, this is
an answer to your question.  Take it or leave it, as you
will.  But if you desire to look into the face of Caine, as
one of his true descendants, look no farther."
	He withdrew a wicked knife from his pocket, and cut
deeply into the palm of his hand.
	"Behold the legacy of a thousand years, of generations
of pain and suffering rendered unseen and unseeable, the
concept of the invisible, Prime Mover, rolling and flowing. 
Behold the taste of forever."  He squeezed his hand tightly,
and the blood suirted out in tight rivulets, splattering on
me and my page.
	"'I will show you terror in a handful of blood...' 
Write that down, too.  It will be the final proof of what I
say.  They will reach him, the Camarilla, and compel him to
change the word to dust, but that is my final message to my
brethren."
	He stood sharply, and strode for the door.  "One more
thing, Wilhelm."  He turned toward me.  "April 26, 1999.  A
new recombinant DNA technique," this said slowly, so that I
could catch every word, "is discovered, allowing researchers
to undo the damage done by that AIDS virus.'
	"It should have been triumph.  Instead it was tragedy.
The bastards slew them all, from the head researcher, to the
custodian who cleaned at night."
	"Erasmus, I do not understand what this 'AIDS' virus
has to do with what you spoke of..."
	"There was a chance that the technique could cure
vampirism. It was seen as a threat, and all involved
destroyed.  It would seem even the lowly virus has a defense
system...
	"Write down on final thing.  The project was named
after the small town in Illinois where the research was being
done.
	"Golconda, Illinois."
	And he was gone.  And once again, I was left with the
answers I thought I wanted, but which left me numb and alone,
answers which spawned a thousand more questions.  Would there
ever be answer?

thanatos@interaccess.com