Almiro Suarez

Background
With the advent of industrialization and globalization, the dense cities of many nations become places of opportunity. Those who manage to learn technical skills stand to make a great deal of money as laborers or investors when international businesses come calling to set up their trades. Almiro’s family managed such a feat. Originally from lower-class stock, Almiro’s family moved to Rio while he was young. There, his father secured an education at night while working as a manual laborer by day, and managed to land a job working for a telephone company. Almiro went from a scruffy kid in the streets to having real prospects, and he took advantage of them — he educated himself in electronics and communications engineering, and went on to follow in his father’s footsteps.

Almiro made many contacts during the course of his employment, often through radio, computer or other anonymous media. One such contact was Ramon Alvaro, who initially called for aid in repairing the phone lines in his home — the old cabling had degraded with age, and Almiro had to replace several connectors. Ramon, explaining that he worked nights, invited Almiro to stay for a drink, ostensibly so that Almiro could explain the technology behind the phone cabling, the repair work he’d done and how to modernize the structure. Eventually the discussion spun off into soccer teams, with Almiro and Ramon championing their favorite players and animatedly discussing the universal stupidity of coaches. Almiro and Ramon kept up correspondence thereafter, but Almiro didn’t realize that Ramon was considering him for the Embrace until two months later, when Ramon asked Almiro to drop by for an evening party and didn’t specify that the partygoers were Kindred. Almiro awoke from the affair as one of the undead, and had to juggle his work schedule to keep his job (he managed by shifting to emergency response for nights and evenings, in cases where storm damage or disaster had destroyed parts of the phone network).

About a year after Almiro’s conversion, Regent Johansen’s coterie arrived to track a local cult, one that used encrypted e-mail, distributed networks, stock trading and industrial espionage to spread its occult missives across Rio, New York and Bangladesh. Brazil’s Tremere weren’t so much bothered by the cult as interested in how it had acquired texts with worship rites for She Who Screams in Darkness, the cult’s malignant goddess(?)-figure. Unearthing the cult’s sources required someone capable of defeating the cult’s communication systems, which meant a modern Tremere. Almiro fit the bill, and Varya requested his assistance. Almiro saw the job as a challenge, and although it took him several months of dedicated work, he managed to tap one of the cult’s computer lines, copy their data for two weeks and uncover the original sources. Following his success, Almiro requested the chance to follow up on the case, and joined the coterie as it headed back to the States for the New York branch. Almiro relished the work and also saw the opportunity to make more widespread contacts, especially important given his relatively high generation and modern heritage.

Image: A congenial, snappy fellow, Almiro in many ways exemplifies modern Kindred. He wears slacks and button-down shirts that one would expect of a technological professional, carries a beeper, pays attention to personal hygiene and often has a small black briefcase with electrical diagnostic equipment and a laptop computer. Almiro’s just under six feet tall, with a slightly overlarge nose and browned skin that’s become ashen with his Kindred condition. He smiles often out of habit.

Roleplaying Hints: Intellectual puzzles still thrill you, which is a good thing because you’ve found yourself slipping away from your usual even temperament with increasing frequency. You enjoy talking, just about whimsical topics, or about nothing in particular. From time to time you try to catch up with soccer scores, but you’re starting to give up; you just don’t have the time. On the one hand, you resent some of your treatment in the coterie — Varya flaunts her age and authority — but on the other hand, your handle on modern technology makes you indispensable. To compensate, you don’t bother to explain what you’re doing when a tech problem comes up; you just solve it and, if someone asks what you’re doing, you give a pat explanation to make it sound simple (and make the inquiring party look stupid). You relish the opportunity to meet other Kindred and enjoy trading stories, be they actual events from your respective pasts or just sociable anecdotes.

Sire: Ramon Alvaro

Nature: Celebrant

Demeanor: Architect

Generation: 12th

Embrace: 1991

Apparent Age: mid-20s

Physical: Strength 3, Dexterity 3, Stamina 3

Social: Charisma 3, Manipulation 2, Appearance 3

Mental: Perception 4, Intelligence 4, Wits 4

Talents: Alertness 3, Athletics 2, Brawl 2, Dodge 2, Empathy 1, Streetwise 2

Skills: Craft (electrical engineering) 4, Drive 2, Firearms 1, Security 2, Stealth 2

Knowledges: Academics 1, Computer 3, Finance 2, Investigation (computer searches) 4, Linguistics 2 (Latin, English), Occult 3, Science 4

Disciplines: Auspex 1, Thaumaturgy 3 Thaumaturgical Paths: Elemental Mastery 3, Technomancy 1 Thaumaturgical Rituals: (Level One) Communicate with Kindred Sire, Encrypt Missive, Expedient Paperwork; (Level Two) Bureaucratic Condemnation, Principal Focus of Vitae Infusion; (Level Three) Telecommunication, Sanguine Assistant

Backgrounds: Allies 1, Contacts 3, Resources 2, Status 1

Virtues: Conscience 4, Self-Control 3, Courage 3

Morality: Humanity 7

Willpower: 6