From SuspireWiki

Vivianne's parents said she was born with a rope in her hand. Her dad was especially proud when she'd got old enough to swing one and catch the heels on a dummy calf. Her mother was especially displeased by the effect the boys had on her when she caught her little cowgirl with a can of Skoal in her back pocket. She could ride horses, muck stalls, and get down and dirty if she wanted to but when the spotlight was on her... she needed to be a lady and carry herself with a sense of dignity. Vivanne knew thats what was expected of her but she didn't care. In fact, she never cared for stereotypes. She was gonna do it her way and to hell with what everyone else thought about it. No doubt she'd seen her fair share of backhanded slaps to the mouth and a few swats with daddy's belt over her headstrong, stubbornness. But a few whippings wasn't going to slow her down. She was wild and that's how she liked it. "You only live once, so live it good" she liked to say. Horses were her passion. She rode the living hell out of them. The rush of going full speed on one of those massive beasts was a rush Vivianne considered herself addicted to. She had a fierce sense of competition, and if she couldn't win then there wasn't any point in paying the entry fee. She was a hard worker when it came to winning. Unfortunately, that didn't carry over too much into things that Vivianne didn't find worth being passionate about.

College wasn't a prospect when she graduated high school. PRCA - Professional Rodeo Cowboy Association - was where she wanted to be. Her parents weren't good with that. Even professionally, rodeoing was a precarious career riddled with bad luck, possible fatal injuries, and living too fast and hard. Vivianne was pretty convinced she could "be somebody" by making it to Las Vegas and winning big at the PRCA events. She climbed into her pickup truck, hooked the bumper trailer up, and pointed her north to Dallas. Then west to Albuquerque.

Albuquerque gave her a run for her money. Those cowboys were about as good as she was, to hear her tell it. After a particularly close call, Vivianne took her winnings and headed down to the bar where everybody usually met up. She was going to buy those boys a few rounds to soothe their pride from getting their asses whooped by a girl. She even wore a pink shirt just to rub it in. Every one called it a night before she did. Vivianne sat hunched over her beer, which she'd taken to drinking entirely too often, staring down into it. She fought the loneliness with one-night-stands in just about every town she passed through. More times than she could count a boyfriend had left her standing in a blaze of dust with only the tail-lights staring back at her. But her daddy would be proud, he taught her that no matter what, get back up your horse and keep going. You're a failure if you have to lead him out by the reigns.

The guy who sat down next to her on the barstool wasn't a cowboy. He didn't know a flipping thing about horses. But he knew about people and he knew a lonely pretty face when he saw one.

Vivianne was an accident. She wasn't supposed to be embraced, she was a good time gone wrong. A little too wild, maybe too rough, whatever the case... it brought out the vampire in Christopher and he couldn't help himself. He apologized for killing her, but Vivianne wasn't in the mood to be forgiving and went out to get a drink, figuring out the hard way how the blood works. The worst part for Vivianne? Her best friend hated her. Big Gus didn't want anything to do with her anymore. It'd have broke her heart if her beast hadn't seethed to the surface first. By the time she came to, the animal was dead on the ground in front of her. It was all Christopher's fault, she decided, and never forgave him for it. After that horrifying incident, she glutted out on a mortal who was three sheets to the wind. The alcohol-laced blood seemed to dampen the emotions. Vivianne took a vow to herself to learn how to handle animals, as a vampire, after that.

Vivianne hated the other vampires in Albuquerque. But she sucked it up and joined in society to make Christopher shut up, which was entirely against her nature! But he was good at harassing people to do things they didn't necessarily want to do. At first, she just wanted to convince someone to teach her Animalism. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that she could get more out of being part of things than she could staying away from everybody. It wasn't in the cards to join the Carthian Movement, at least not according to her. But it was lonesome on her own, which is something Vivianne knew a lot about. She formally joined them, and found that she liked having people around to argue and fight with. It was like having a family again. In the beginning she didn't really understand all the nonsense about politics, and never really developed into a political prodigy. She knew just enough about politics to get into trouble, and if she was lucky, out of it. But she found her niche with them and society in general.

It started with making Albuquerque into the ideal Carthian city. The ground-work was laid by the time she was Embraced, but she wanted to be part of something big and saw her chance to do that by keeping the mortals together and secure so the Kindred could feed at their leisure. Vivianne took care of them, nursed them back to health when they were ill, and provided them places to stay and food to eat if necessary. She thought it was an interesting turn of events given that she wasn't a stranger to the concept of a herd as a mortal, and now she was doing it in her Requiem too. Yes, indeed, this was a great niche for Vivianne.

She made it a point to build relations with Kindred, despite her distaste for helping non-Carthians with things like retainers. But she understood that if she intended her Requiem to be one of progress then she had to work with people in other covenants. She hated stereotypes with a passion, since her parents made her miserable trying to force her into them. It made her careful about passing judgements on whole covenants. Instead, she wanted to judge people for themselves and not the labels they wore.

Vivianne could appreciate the Lancea Sanctum's view on Kindred. For the beastial aspect of her, being the boogey-man seemed appealing and some people really needed a wake-up call for their behaviors. But she didn't want to be God's Holy Monster, mostly because her faith had been severely damaged after the Embrace. Even if the theological debate was mostly for academic kicks, she enjoyed it. For the most part, Vivianne kept good relations with them as long as they weren't badgering her too hard with the Testament of Longinus. The Circle of the Crone caught her attention purely because of it's worship of females, Vivianne liked that idea given the oppressive nature of women in history. The Ordo Dracul was weird for her, though. She liked their passion for change but that whole religious undertone thing really never made sense. But she tried not to let their misguided points of view on change ply her opinion too much. Vivianne didn't believe in hating entire covenants of people, but the things they stood for and how an individual applied the principals and values made the most difference to her. The Invictus were probably on to something with their application of becoming powerful, but Vivianne settled into the idea that just because something is effective doesn't mean it's the best choice. It wasn't always hearts and flowers between Vivianne and other individuals. She was stubborn as a bull and once her mind was made up, she wasn't going to budge on the topic... unless she wanted to.

Debates didn't start out as being her favorite. But she'd participate in them just enough to keep Christopher from riding her ass incessantly about it. The truth was, Viviane was a sore loser. She hated losing a debate. After dozens and dozens of them, she learned to like them and who cares about winning, it's a debate and it keeps people talking and minds moving. When Vivianne realized she could have arguments with these Kindred and that she wasn't going to die for being in disagreement, she blossomed into the fiery sort of Carthian, instead of the quiet one. Sometimes she argued for the sake of it, but as she got older she became more of a Devil's Advocate. She felt it was important that theories and ideas be questioned - everything should always be questioned.

Since she found her place with the Carthian Movement, Vivianne has protected them and stood by their side. It didn't matter if they were right or wrong, they were the only family she had left to speak of. She might clobber the fuck out of them in private if they made her look like a moron. Ultimately, though, she meant it when she stuck up for them because some night she might need them to stick up for her in return. The protective obligation she felt sometimes crossed lines into other peoples' jobs, like recruiting. If Vivianne felt someone wasn't going to be a good fit for them, she protested very loudly, obnoxiously if necessary.

Vivianne still rode her horses long into her Requiem. She owned an expanse of property just so she could have her own, small, arena built. Each night, if time permitted, Vivianne could be found there. Her ghouls remarked to each other how sad it seemed that Vivianne was re-enacting the last rodeo she rode in, specifically the part that won her champion in the roping division. Leaving Albuquerque meant she'd have to sell it off and start it all over again, which wasn't appealing. But it wasn't a deal-breaker either. Vivianne didn't think it was a good idea for Carthians to stay in one place for their entire Requiem, that it'd make them stagnant and lose sight of their goals. To be honest, Christopher probably put the idea of Phoenix in her head. He could be subtle like that. He was tired of her being a pain in his ass, most likely, even if it was harmless. Vivianne still hadn't forgiven him for her horse dying like 30 years ago so she took every opportunity she could find (and even made some up on occasion) to fuck with him.

Phoenix was so ugly. Vivianne couldn't believe anyone would actually want to live there. But her sister, Sonja Black and her rag-tag groupies were Prince there so she decided to be polite. Their sire, Christopher, was nice enough to warn her ahead of time that Vivianne was coming to visit. Vivianne had a much smoother time getting to know Phoenix's Kindred than she had in Albuquerque, after 30 years she'd learned a trick or two.

The Valley of the Sun was a good learning curve for Vivianne. She was able to get in touch with other Carthians besides the ones living in the ideal city. The tables had turned and now she was the one whose beliefs and ideologies were being questioned. It frustrated her in the beginning, and she almost walked the dark path of feeling indignant about that. But she stopped and reminded herself that this is the stuff Carthians are made of. She didn't subscribe to one particular social theory or another, mostly because she didn't believe in pidgeon-holing herself into one thing. What worked for Albuquerque maybe wouldn't work for Phoenix or some other city. Her idea was to experiment, duh, until they found what did work. Vivianne elected to do for Phoenix what she'd done in Albuquerque; cultivate a good herd of people for ease of hunting. Once she had everything set up and good to go, Vivianne recruited some of the younger Carthians to continue handling the affairs of the herd.

She decided it was time to put a little gravel in her travel and pointed the pickup toward Las Vegas. Phoenix was never supposed to be "home" but she didn't exactly know where home was going to be either. She'd always wanted to go to Sin City anyway. Each time she made a stop, though, it was important to her to contribute something significant.

When she came over the mountain and saw the lights up ahead it was an exciting moment. Lots of emotions passed through her, but ultimately she felt like she had arrived and made it to her dream. Though, only time would tell if she really wanted to stay. There's more to a city than the city itself. Much to her surprise, Las Vegas was at the end of a war....

To Vivianne it was outrageous that Kindred were murdered, some even in their damn beds, just so The Hawkes could conquer the territory. There wasn't anything she could do about it now, but maybe she could be part of the rebuilding of a city where that sort of thing doesn't happen. She took it upon herself - because someone had to - to start doing the things any sheriff should do; investigate the rumors associated with the Masquerade and get them cleaned up as quickly as possible so no further attention was drawn to the Kindred. The last thing they needed right then was having the Overlord come down on their heads for breaches that were left unattended. The aftermath of a city-wide take-over left a lot to be done in terms of clean-up. It was like coming into your house after it was robbed and in utter disarray - the clean-up was essential, and maybe someone might notice her hard work and care-taking. Keeping the Masquerade in check was only the half of it, though. Someone had to be sure no one was breaking the laws of the Hold or the Kingdom, at the very least. Vivianne kept her eyes open. She didn't want to be a tattle-tale, but if nefarious things were underway... she needed to know about it, so they weren't caught unawares by a sword of course. She didn't want to see anymore mass murdering, but it certainly wouldn't hurt her feelings if she could make good on keeping someone's secret.

A Carthian Prince? Yes, please. Maybe she was more than a little biased, but Vivianne felt that the Carthian Movement was the best covenant suited for keeping a city. Most people thought they were disorganized and clueless about how to run anything, much less a city. But the truth of the matter is that Carthians can be very well organized if they have someone to keep their minds on what's most important. Deion Sanders was nice to look at, that was her first thought. She shook her head and rolled her eyes at herself. Even if Vivianne hated stereotypes, she couldn't help her Daeva blood sometimes. All the time she'd been in the city she kept a dossier on the goings on, mostly to keep herself organized but it happened to be a handy way to get her foot in the door to speak with him. She wasn't going to throw herself at him as the best possible candidate to sheriff his city, but it didn't hurt to modestly toot your own horn on occasion. Her attitude was very much that it needed to be done, so she did it... just so you know.

He didn't hire her on the spot, which was to be expected. She'd have to show him what she was capable of, a dossier was just words on some paper. When his laws were complete, she decided that she would police them like she had with the Hold and Kingdom. As a Carthian she felt obligated to make sure Kindred were obeying the laws, but it was deeper than that. Vivianne had a vested interest by then to see her goals come to fruition. As a person who believed in skill being more important than who you know, it put a bad taste in her mouth to even consider paying off someone to support her for the position of sheriff. She'd steer clear of that if she could, but she didn't throw it off the table as an option. Allies were important, and with the influx of Kindred coming to town she'd have to be swift in making some. But enemies would always crop up to make life more difficult. That's just the nature of being Kindred.