The Poison Man
"The Poison Man" is the moniker bestowed on an entity first encountered in Chicago a few years ago. Various Kindred encountered an individual who seemed to be rotting away at an ever-increasing rate, and whose touch burned more painfully than acid. All that was known about the entity was that it was extremely strong, it was hostile to Kindred, and it had a flair for the dramatic. Initial suspicions that it was an insane Samedi were soon dispelled when the first Poison Man was killed - torn limb from limb by a heavy-machinegun toting Assamite who escaped into the night before the Prince's forces to could give chase.
A couple of evenings later, the remains were identified as belonging to a prominent banker who had gone missing some weeks previously. Also found on the body was an old leather cloak, a facemask and a necklace.
When these were handled by the coroner - a visible change occurred in the hapless ghoul - his posture changed and became more feral, a dull light began to shine in his eyes, and observers with auspex noted violent fluctuations in his aura as something appeared to over-write it. The ghoul fled the building, evincing similar powers to that of the first Poison Man.
Despite a Blood Hunt, the Poison Man remained untraced for a number of months, striking both at Kindred and mortal targets and bringing a new climate of fear to Chicago's Kindred. Ryan was eventually able to track the entity once he formed an unlikely and increasingly unstable alliance with the nosferatu of the city.
Over the course of those months, the Poison Man had been leaping from host to host as each deteriorated with successive bursts of high activity to avoid the Blood Hunt. Research among ancient texts showed the artifacts that seemed to be the key to the possessions had Viking origins and pointed towards an extinct Kindred Clan of Berserkers who specialised in bringing forth and riding the Beast.
At length, the Poison Man was intercepted by Ryan and representatives of the Nosferatu and Malkavian Clans and beaten. The artifacts were carefully moved with long poles into three separate chests and removed to the Nosferatu Warren. It is rumoured that the nosferatu had further problems when one of their number handled one of the artifacts and fell prey to the curse - and that the Tremere of the city managed to get custody of at least the cloak in the subsequent melee.
Further rumours that the Chicago Chantry were researching the Poison Man phenomena with the aim of tapping the power in a more controllable form have been flatly denied.
At least one of the artifacts is now rumoured to be in the South West of the United Kingdom, several disturbing incidents having been linked to Kindred owning a certain piece of jewellry. Justicar Glimmer of Clan Malkavian has been investigating the events of the past few months very closely...
