Premiere Portfolio
by Al Worthington & Joseph Kuehner

'The Truth will set you free,' modern man has so proudly proclaimed. So foolishly he clings to such delusions, still so very ignorant of the mysteries of the World, so forgetful is he of his own Darkness. Many mysteries I had witnessed in the eternal darkness of this damned existence and a most terrible secret I have learned. Behind these cold stone walls of my sanctuary, it now imprisons me, its damning revelation tortures me with its insanity. No salvation does it hold for you, mortal. Only foreboding of certain impending doom awaits your kind. Hear my words and be afraid. Heed what you're to learn and fear the night once again. Know now what had been stricken from the memory of Humanity and dread that which your 'enlightenment' has banished as myth.         Sodom and Gomorrah, their terrible fates had been immortalized as a warning of the Creator's terrible fury, the blasted valley they laid in, an everlasting reminder to those that would defy His Will. But not a remnant of ruin, not a whispered fable upon forgotten fragments of parchment remain to testify of a great city existing before them. Utterly from the face of the Earth as well as from the history of Man it had been eradicated.         Its queen was a proud woman, refusing to bow to any man or to their laws, the Commandments of the One that had created them. Only to the demoness Lilith did her allegiance belong. With great ceremonies of human sacrifice and the drinking of the blood of her enemies did she worship her. To the people of her city, a messenger, one of Heaven's hosts was sent to offer His Salvation. To them the Angel came in the guise of a mortal, a meek woman bearing His Word.

Seized by the queen's guards, the Angel was taken shackled before the queen. Before the people of the city, the queen scorned the Angel's message and sentenced her to death. Only one of the many assembled spoke out, calling for mercy for the Angel. A futile plea it was. A defiant message, an unholy ceremony, the queen had planned. Viciously the Angel was tortured, her earthly shell brutally abused and violated, then slain by the guards. And with the killing blow the city was damned. Drinking the Angel's blood, the queen and her guards wrought the most horrible of curses upon themselves. Freed of its mortal shell, the Angel rose bodiless high above all assembled, its glory blinding all below. "Since none shall disavow your ruler's sins," the Angel did declare with a voice of thunder, proclaimed to the city its doom, "then her damnation shall be your destruction."         Swallowed up by raging sandstorms, the city was lost to the other kingdoms of Man, all routes of escape away from its curse consumed by the maelstrom. The queen's sacrifices continued, her own subjects her only fodder. Like ravenous beasts, she and her guards were, none were spared from the hunger of their curse, their unholy lust for Life's blood. Once her city laid empty, devoid of any life, a firestorm descended from the heavens to cleanse its blasphemous legacy, its curse from the earth. The queen and her guards escaped their fate, led by Lilith into caverns lying deep beneath the doomed city.

        But they were not to escape all reckoning for what they had wrought. Unbeknownst to them, one other had survived the city's doom, the man who had spoken out against them, who had pled for mercy for the Angel. Tightly he had sealed the caverns' passage, trapping them in their refuge in the bowels of the earth and to the restless slumber of the undead. His fate remains forever a mystery, for into the Wilderness he had vanished.
        And hidden the Damned would had remained forever, trapped in an undying sleep, had it not been for the greed, the ignorance, of man. The sealed passage was discovered, breached and the crypts of the damned were violated. No treasures awaited the grave robbers, only their demise and the bane of mortal Man. Unto an unsuspecting world the queen and her guard were freed. Their memories devoid of their past lives, their grievous sins, their separate ways they parted. Throughout the centuries since their awakening, they had damned others to share their cursed existence, their hunger for Man's blood. Syndicates they had formed to serve them, to effect their will upon the world. The Maladar. The Kabal. The Sept. The queen's Sisterhood. And the Scavens. Of them, at least, I shall tell you of..."

registered copyright © 1997, A Worthington & J Kuehner for Lethal Comics

The 'Scaven' link above will take you to the artwork of the portfolio but not all of it<g>. To see all the artwork and this intro in a custom font in manuscript form (the way it should be, instead of this standard font in unformatted form), you'll have to get the portfolio.

Vampire Syndicate: Immortality in Ruins is the creation of Joseph Kuehner (formerly of Tempest Presents..., an independent comic from Houston) and has been 5 years in the making. Vamp fans in Houston have been waiting all that time for Vampire Syndicate, while Joseph searched for a writer. The good news is, it will finally be published as a monthly adult graphic novel starting in the first quarter of 1998 (tentative date) by Lethal Comics (also from Houston). E-fan mail for Joseph can be sent to Lethal.

This being the author's personal home page, it is also the unofficial Vampire Syndicate: Immortality in Ruins page. And the reason why you get to see the complete intro/origin story (which won't be seen other than in the premiere portfolio for some time) plus some of the graphics.

The ghoul (as the author is known by most) and more of his work can usually be found in CompuServe, haunting the Literary Forum, Section 7 (Vampires/Anne Rice fans). The pages of some of the other vamps from Section 7 can be found on the links page.

Escape

webpage © 1997, Al Worthington
artwork registered © 1997, Joseph Kuehner
Vampire Syndicate © 1997, Al Worthington & Joseph Kuehner
Vampire Syndicate logos ©, ™ 1997, Lethal Comics
Vampire Syndicate logos originally © 1992 Joseph Kuehner
Vampire Syndicate created by Joseph Kuehner
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