Johnny Rayflo (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bloodcoveredcherries) wrote2036-06-12 01:36 am
bloodcoveredcherries) wrote2036-06-12 01:36 am
[OOC] Application for ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
midnightsyndicate (WIP)
PLAYER INFORMATION
NAME: Preferred handle. Must match your reserve.
ARE YOU 18 OR OLDER?: Yes
CONTACT: spkathrine[@]gmail.com, PM,![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
chocolateisbrainfood
CURRENT CHARACTERS: Felicia McCready (notsoheavenly)
CHARACTER INFORMATION
NAME: Johnny Rayflo
CANON: Vassalord
CANON POINT: Chapter 22, after sending Chris a steamy love letter detailing his intentions to escape from Alford Wayne’s cage.
CHARACTER AGE: looks to be in mid to late 20s (is closer to 1000, shh)
HISTORY:
Much of Rayflo’s life and history has been obscured and distorted, partially by him to keep people from knowing the truth about his past, and partially by Barry, to keep others from getting to close to him.
What is known is that Johnny Rayflo (going by his true name at the time) was a religious knight during the Middle Ages in Europe (placed before the 13th Century, but likely after the 10th Century), and the crown that he had sworn his fealty to was Princess Marie of an unnamed principality. The castle was under siege by a great force, people were suffering from the blockade, being trapped within the walls for so long with little food, water, or sanitation. To save the little girl he was sworn to, Rayflo damned himself and sold his soul to the demon Belial in return for the wish to have the strength to protect her and the rest of the people. With that wish, he gained the power to save her, but was also turned into a vampire.
Marie was injured during the fight, near death, and Rayflo turned her into a vampire hoping to spare her life. When Rayflo was losing himself, corrupted by his new nature and bloodlust, it was Marie who pulled him back. But this didn’t last. Eventually as time went on, Marie was twisted and corrupted, mostly likely due to her young and impressionable age when she first became a vampire and the long centuries of being one. It is one of Rayflo’s greatest regrets.
The demon whose name Rayflo cannot speak became quite infatuated with the idea of owning such a selfless, religious, and loyal knight and watching him slowly corrupted, to the point that despite not being able to remain indefinitely on Earth himself, he created a copy of himself, Barry the incubus, to watch over Rayflo and act in his stead. He also took one of Rayflo’s ribs and created a female copy of him, Rayfell, in a twisted mockery of the story of Adam and Eve. He cursed Rayfell so that she would be doomed to be unfaithful to anyone she loved, always giving into carnal desires and base need, which in turn also feeds Barry as he gains strength from Rayfell’s infidelities. Rayflo is thus bound to both of them. Barry is capable of controlling Rayflo by using his true name against him and Rayfell will live as long as he does.
Over the years, Rayflo has had a love/hate relationship with Barry, often to the point that Barry abuses him in violent displays of his authority and possession of him (killing people Rayflo comes close to, slaughtering villages in his name, sexually assaulting him on more than one occasion), and Rayflo himself gave into his own negative nature to appease Barry and keep him from harming other people. He drinks blood, has sex with multiple partners, collects massive amounts of wealth and luxuries just because he can, and does as many different things that he can to prove he is indeed a terrible person. He even worked with the Catholic Church to lock Marie away in suspended animation, which was a great show of betrayal since he had sworn a holy oath to her, but he did it because he believed that she had become too much of a danger to herself and to others. During this time he also gained a cat familiar, Minea, who is his dearest companion that also transforms herself into a maid when it suits her to be useful for him, by saving her from a freak show.
Then he wandered his way into a war torn French-speaking nation in the late 1800s (alluded to being France but not stated specifically), knowing how easy it would be to pick his food from the dying or unassuming soldiers on the battlefield. What he did not expect was to find a child left alone to die in the rubble of a church. The little boy was young, innocent, naive, and traumatized to the point from his experiences that he barely knew how to speak and had no memories of how he had come to be there. Rayflo cared for the child for a month, and even gave the child the name “Chris” (later to become Christopher Michael and then Charles J. Chrishunds), but realized it was too dangerous to keep a child with his lifestyle and Barry always a step behind. So he took the boy to a church to be cared for by the nuns and priests there.
He stayed away for years, but eventually couldn’t keep himself away and came back, taking on the guise of a priest to look after Chris and help teach him. Their relationship deepened over the years, becoming very strong bond, to the point that Chris all but worshipped Rayflo himself, but everything changed the night that Chris was fatally injured and Rayflo found him near death. Chris did not want to die and leave Rayflo, so he turned him into a vampire, knowing that Chris would regret his choice. And he did. He regretted it so much that he came to hate himself and hate Rayflo for what he had done to him.
Chris gave up the name Rayflo gave him and became Charles J. Chrishunds, but refused to drink human blood. He only drank blood from Rayflo, and even that he would put off doing for as long as he could. Rayflo had to all but force him at first because Chris was so ashamed. Charles became a sanctioned vampire hunter of the Catholic Church and Rayflo went on as a rich playboy who did as he pleased and only sought to have fun. The more reckless and sinful Rayflo’s actions, the angrier Charles was with him.
In part, Rayflo’s actions were to drive Chris away from him, but Rayflo could never do that completely. His own need to know Charles was okay and that he could come to him if he needed was just as strong as Charles obsessive need to hunt him down whenever he ran away. It became a twisted game and went on that way for decades. Rayflo would run and create a decadent, indulgent image and lifestyle and Charles would go on missions for the Vatican while hunting Rayflo down.
It was after one of these fights that Charley informed Rayflo that he had been requested to go to a mission in China and that he was taking Rayflo with him. He didn’t really want to go at first, but Rayflo agreed. Sister Famille revealed that they had Princess Marie and that was when Rayflo realized that the true person who had brought them there had been her all along. Mary wanted Rayflo back and was willing to kill Charles to convince him, but instead Rayflo let Cherry feed from him and almost died when the sun rose and he turned to ash, but instead Mary tried to save him, turning to ash herself. Rayflo was spared because one of the bats that he shapeshifts himself into hid in a cave until nightfall and he was able to heal himself. It was after this event and how severely Charles took what might have been Rayflo’s death that they moved in together, Rayflo spending almost all of his time at Charles’ apartment and he began to avoid Barry, cutting off their affair.
Sometime later, there was a party at a cathedral supporting the various denominations of the Church in the area and Charles was invited so he took Rayflo with him. They ended up in a compromising position and met Cheryl, a vampire hunter and a vjedogonia (human descendant of a vampire who has the powers of a witch and shall become a vampire upon their death), the lover of Rayfell. She had wanted his help in trying to solve a case as several women had ended up dead around the Church that the party was being held at. They tricked Cherry into thinking that Rayflo had somehow transformed his body into a woman’s but really it was Rayfell pretending to be Johnny. They used her as bait at the church to try and figure out who the culprit was and it turned out to be Father Kazan of the Neo Union Church himself. His follower Father Mailer had been watching over the Church while he retired due to “illness” and he fed on the women to try and cure himself, but had not completely turned into a vampire. Mailer was injured and left in a coma near death, but was later cured when someone used Vassalord, a drug created from vampire blood and ended up becoming one himself, while to the public it looked like a medical miracle.
Months later, Cheryl invited them to a beach resort so she and Charles could talk, only their flight was interrupted a rising star actress named Miranda tried to highjack the plane so she could get her cargo to her destination without anyone messing with it. It turned out to be a box of body parts with a bomb inside and Rayflo and Cherry subdued her only to realize they couldn’t defuse the bomb in time so they threw themselves out of the airlock with the bomb. Rayflo cushioned their fall—breaking his back in the process—and they all survived so that Charles could flag down a shipping boat nearby to take them to the mainland.
Rayflo had to feed his blood to Miranda because she was going through a hunger frenzy from the shock—which is when they realized she was a vampire herself. It was after they finally were at their hotel and Rayflo was bedridden from his injury that they finally let go back to her agent. Then her car was blown up and Barry made sure Rayflo knew he had done it because Rayflo had given blood to her.
Rayflo tries to distance himself from Chris after that. Detective Craig Bernstein began investigating them because he was the head detective on the Mailer case at the church and knows they were on the plane Miranda high jacked. Rayflo runs away so he won’t have to answer questions, cleaning out his mansion.
Cherry follows him there later his robotic dog alerts them to a paralyzed child he found outside on the property. It hits Rayflo that the boy, Harold, looks a lot like he did when he was young. It makes him uncomfortable and he’s rude to the boy, something that surprises Charley considering Rayflo’s complete adoration of children. Rayflo even tells him that the boy might be a vampire of a sort, but he won’t tell him anything else. Rayflo doesn’t like staying in the house with Howard there so he goes off into the woods to burn all of the records he has of his and Charles’ life in the mansion, then goes off to Charley’s apartment to hide out.
Barry finds him and assaults him, leaving him a bloody mess on the bed for Charley to find when he arrives. Rayflo tries to hide what happened, but Charley isn’t fooled. Instead he goes into a frantic rage over how Rayflo was injured and Rayflo has to calm him down. He then asks Charley to drink from him because having his blood drank by Charles has been purifying it, something that even Barry noticed. Barry seeks to force Rayflo to feed from him because he knows it taints him more every time. But then Rayflo realizes that Barry is still watching them and pushes Charley away, walking out on him.
When Charley infiltrates a prison in Italy to find out more about the drug Vassalord while working on a case with Detective Bernstein, Rayflo has to go to the prison to save him, despite knowing that Barry is still chasing after him and that he would have to do it in broad daylight without turning himself to ash. He doesn’t stay, but instead leaves almost immediately, only to be confronted by Barry again. He decapitates him and leads him on another chase, but a few weeks later he knows that Cherry will need to feed again so he sends him an invitation to a masquerade ball with an opera perform of The Phantom of the Opera.
But Barry is there, too, and when Rayflo tries to flee Charles won’t let him. He refuses to let him go again and Rayflo almost consents to stay, only to have Barry attack them and try to kill Cherry. He uses the guise of Rayflo when he was a priest to confuse Charley and is too powerful for Cherry as a weaker vampire to kill alone, but Rayflo realizes that if Charley can use Barry’s true name against him, he will have the power to at least severely weaken him. But Rayflo is bound by his contract with the demon and thus cannot say his name. Instead he chooses to hurt himself by quoting passages from the Bible, which he knows Charley will know by heart and will thus lead him to figure out what Barry’s true name is (which is the same as his maker, Belial). This tactic works, but it was so harmful to Rayflo that he almost dies right then. Charles calls out for help and that is when Harold arrives with Father Mailer in tow.
Only he is not truly Harold, but instead Alford Wayne, the “man” who has been making Vassalord and using it to spread vampirism in his quest to study Rayflo, who he calls Adam, the first vampire. Alford heals Rayflo, but Cherry becomes his puppet, a high fashion model and public face to push his agenda so as to better circulate Vassalord to the rich and famous, while also doing other things in shadows. Rayflo on the other hand is kept locked in an underground cell designed to look like a natural garden where he can be experimented on and his blood can be taken. Rayflo and Cherry are kept separated while they fulfill whatever roles Alford demands of them, but neither likes the situation. To keep Rayflo more docile, Chris tells Alford and Mailer about Minea, who they go and “collect” from Chris’ apartment and give her to Rayflo as a companion in his cage while Charles is fulfilling end of their bargain.
PERSONALITY:
Johnny Rayflo is not his true name, but it is close to the name someone dear to him used to call him. Johnny is an enigmatic character because he has layers upon layers to his personality, to his behavior, and his history. On the surface he comes across as this sexy, flirtatious, teasing, affluent playboy who just loves having fun and taking what he can out of life, but beneath that is also his large soft spot for children and his love of cute things (animals, toys, etc). Going even deeper is his affection for Chris and how everything in his life begins to revolve around their relationship in both healthy and unhealthy ways.
Johnny lets Charles feed from him to exclusion of everyone else even though Chris gets pretty violent and rough (he will go days and weeks without feeding, starving himself as long as he can until he eventually gorges himself), while also professing his undying anger and hatred of him, and it wears on him (although Johnny is also more than a bit of a masochist and likes it). Johnny despite appearing selfish and arrogant is rather selfless, doing things often that contradict his surface facade, such as jumping off of a plane when he finds there is a bomb on it and taking the bomb with him so that the passengers on the plane won't be hurt (which leads to him breaking his back).
Despite being a playboy who loves to flirt (and he will flirt with just about anyone) and someone who quite enjoys sex on a regular basis (except when he's with his "Cherry," aka Chris/Charley, because Chris is still a virgin and won't give it up), Johnny has a bit of fear and dislike of women. He will flirt with them, flatter them, and even help them, but if they show sexual interest in him he has problems handling it. On the outside he'll still seem flirtatious and enjoying himself, but inside he's having a breakdown. After being kissed by a woman he had saved, he even claims he has been poisoned and needs a kiss from Cherry to save him (of course, only doing this after she has left the room, and only Cherry can see him taking it so poorly). It shows that Johnny only really lets his guard down around people he's comfortable with and otherwise the mask of chronic flirt and rich playboy stays in place.
Johnny's sentimental, but secretive. The people closest to him still do not know all there is to know about him. He's also an emotional person who can be teased and at times hurt by words from those who mean a lot to him (Cherry uses this against him at times), but then he can also turn around and make everything into a game. He doesn't like showing how weak he can be to people so he tends to just play it off and make jokes, or flirt. He would rather be seen as selfish, ignorant, or a tease than to show just how deeply he can let himself get involved in things or how big of a masochist he is, because many of his surface traits and the facades he wears are very self-destructive. In the past he even used to sell himself, having sex and letting people drink from him (but only in very minute amounts), and in return be allowed to feed from them. He treated himself like an object to be used and it took Cherry crashing more than one of these parties and showing a lot of possessive judgment for him to put a stop to it. Not that it stopped Johnny from still fully believing that being used and abused is a fitting punishment for him, but he keeps these feelings close to his chest. Even with Cherry, who he is very open with, Johnny cannot give all of himself without feeling some guilt because parts of his past Johnny doesn't want him knowing about.
Another layer to Rayflo is his relationship with Barry, which shows just how self-destructive Rayflo can be while still holding onto a lot of the values he believes he’s forsaken. Barry exists to torment him, to take from him all that he cares about as payment for the deal he has with Belial, while also pushing him even deeper into depravity. When Rayflo is giving into Barry and doing as he wishes, Barry is pleased and things go easy for him, but Rayflo isn’t as far gone as he believes himself to be and so Barry will become violent with him or hurt people near him to push him back into the dark places again. So Rayflo will go back to him, part because he feels it’s what he deserves and in part to keep Barry’s attention away from innocent people and only on him. What Barry didn’t realize for many years was that the person who was consistently purifying Rayflo’s soul is Charles. He avoids being around Cherry in order to keep Barry from trying to involve him, but as soon as he knows that Cherry needs him to help escape a mafia prison, he goes to his rescue, even in broad daylight. No matter what, Cherry comes before everything for him. He will sacrifice anything and everything for him. He even quoted the Bible despite knowing that, as a damned being (as he is a vampire and sold his soul), it could kill him. When forced to fight against Cherry at the behest of Princess Marie, the little girl he had sworn fealty to all those centuries ago, he was willing to let Cherry kill him because he could not go against Marie’s orders, but refused to hurt Cherry, either.
For all that Rayflo can be flirtatious, melodramatic, and immature and purposefully tries to rile him up, Charley is the center of his world and to some it may not seem important, but it greatly defines Rayflo’s life, goals and self-image. He raised him, gave him the name Chris, turned him into a vampire (to save his life, though Rayflo did not want to), and all the good he believes can ever come from him exists within Charley. There is a lot of mystery to Rayflo, some of it due to his long life that he doesn’t like to discuss, and some because he intentionally likes others to desire him for his mystery so they don’t try to look deeper. Truthfully, Rayflo isn’t that complicated a man to understand his motives. Everything he does is driven by love, lust and self-loathing and Charles is the proof, the culmination of all of those feelings. He loves him and will do anything for him, but also believes that no matter how good and pure something in his life is, he’ll taint it. The romantic and sexual feelings he has for Cherry are just as sign of how he perverted their original relationship and turning Charles into a vampire is the greatest regret of his life. He is damned and it is a contagion that spreads no matter how he tries to prevent it.
ABILITIES: Rayflo is the progenitor of vampires, the Adam of the species, which affords him abilities not all vampires have, including the ability to pass on abilities not even he has onto other people. By drinking only his bood, his thrall, Charley, can even go out in sunlight (which Johnny himself cannot do without special protection). Johnny also has the ability to turn into a horde of bats and squeeze himself through very small cracks and holes. If he is ever turned to dust by the sun, as long as one bat is spared (or his ashes are saved and buried), he will heal himself. Johnny also has the ability to fly, supernatural strength, speed, agility, very high pain tolerance (he has his limbs ripped off and his chest torn open with bones removed and is still able to make witty remarks), the ability to heal himself in a matter of hours or days from any injury that isn’t fatal (and some that are) and what appears to be a higher than normal charismatic appeal (whether this is because he is a vampire or because he is just naturally sexually appealing to a variety of people is not explained, but humans seem to either hate him or be drawn to him).
He has a power called “regeneration” which is really an ability to create items air using his own blood (and sometimes out of thin air), whether it be inanimate objects or blood dolls he dressed up as maids, named Michaela and Julia. Oh yeah, there’s also that ability to turn humans into vampires if he gives them enough of his own blood. Johnny does need to ask to enter a home that is not his, is weaker against silver, holy water, and other blessed weapons/items, cannot quote the Bible without it burning him from the inside out, but can go into churches without a problem.
Other basic skills that Johnny has are that he's very good with swords and physical combat. He's lived for centuries and been around the world more than once so he's picked up a lot of things, so it stands to reason he is probably familiar with various languages, cultures, and has learned from them.
SINS & VIRTUES:
Sloth because be he’s lazy when it comes to doing any work himself, to the point he’ll create dolls to do the work for him or get his familiar Minea to wait on him like a maid. He’d rather lay about and read instead of do any cleaning, working out, or even handling his financial affairs if he can get out of it. Sloth also ties into the fact that he’s lost his way, stagnating in his growth spiritually and emotionally, due to the fact he sees himself as damned and undeserving of salvation. He blasphemes more than once to show how far he’s become removed from his pious roots, such as the time he enticed Chris in a church saying “My body is your bread” to get him to feed.
Lust for his sexual appetite (he was having a lot of sex before moving in with Chris and even when imprisoned he gives in to an affair with Mailer), but also for his yearning for love and acceptance despite believing he doesn’t deserve it. His lust for Cherry is shown multiple times, trying to get Charles to have sex with him no matter how often he refuses and declares his desire to be a virgin priest (once even trying while they’re fighting each other). Or he’ll try to manipulate him into declaring his affection for Rayflo, such as when they’re in flight on a plane and Chris appears to be sleeping. For years bloodlust was also a problem for him, he would lose control and slaughter whole villages to satiate himself, but it’s not something he has a problem with now unless he’s angry or severely injured.
Gluttony for his overindulgence of sex, wine, food (that he doesn’t even need to eat) and in a way his enabling of Cherry’s overindulgence. He eggs him on more than once to feed and drink from him in perverted locations (again in said a church) as much as his likes to the point where Rayflo himself will lose consciousness. Instead of feasting, he turns himself into the feast for Chris and has done the same for others by giving them sex and blood in return for money, favors and influence.
Pride because despite all of his self-loathing he has a lot of it. He’s prideful of Cherry and what he’s done to raise him and proud of the kind of person he’s grown up to be. He prides himself on his looks and demeanor, on being desirable to others. Looks are very important to him and he also prides himself on the persona he presents to others. He wants people to see him a certain way and strives to make sure they do (such as how he is very against dating women or having sex with him, but goes out of his way to flirt with them).
Greed because despite him not needing to create the persona of a rich, flighty person, it’s just what he does. He has houses around the world and then leases others if he doesn’t plan to be in a location for long. When he plans to move on, he will simple burn everything he had in the house, sometimes even down to the expensive accoutrements because he sees them all as worthless and replaceable. His greed isn’t so much an active coveting, but more the fact he has far more than he would ever realistically need.
Wrath because he has a lot of self-hatred and recrimination, to the point that he demonstrates a lot of very self-destructive behaviors, all turned inward. Prostituting himself because he values his own body so little and letting himself be brutalized by Barry as an unhealthy form of punishment for all the wrongs he’s ever committed (or that Barry has committed in his name). He intentionally eggs Charles on to the point of violence not just because he lusts for him, but because he’s a masochist who feels his humiliation and degradation are justified. When the anger and hatred he feels is turned outward toward someone else he can become like a monster, lost in a bloodlust until he sees the person dead and it may not even stop there. It’s rare for him to get to that point, as most of his wrath is directed towards himself but it’s happened more than once over the centuries, such as when he slaughtered the invading armies that wanted to capture and kill Princess Marie.
For virtues, Rayflo demonstrates charity in his selfless and continuously giving feelings for the people he truly loves. He also has a huge soft sport for small children and spent a month raising an amnesiac, orphaned child despite owing him nothing. Kindness goes along with that charity in a more general way because he gives to the less forturnate, helps people without expecting anything of them in return (such as when he broke his back saving a plane full of people from a bomb), and despite his long life, he generally has faith that humans are good. Some are bad, but he believes most of them want to do good and will if given the chance. Patience also comes into play in that he had suffered greatly in his life but rarely holds it against the people who do him harm (except for Belial and Barry). Even if he acts angry or annoyed, it’s more for show than because he means it. He would rather pretend they never happened or that he fully deserved it than to place the blame on someone else (because he forgives others far more than he’ll ever forgive himself).
SAMPLES
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NAME: Preferred handle. Must match your reserve.
ARE YOU 18 OR OLDER?: Yes
CONTACT: spkathrine[@]gmail.com, PM,
CURRENT CHARACTERS: Felicia McCready (
notsoheavenly)CHARACTER INFORMATION
NAME: Johnny Rayflo
CANON: Vassalord
CANON POINT: Chapter 22, after sending Chris a steamy love letter detailing his intentions to escape from Alford Wayne’s cage.
CHARACTER AGE: looks to be in mid to late 20s (is closer to 1000, shh)
HISTORY:
Much of Rayflo’s life and history has been obscured and distorted, partially by him to keep people from knowing the truth about his past, and partially by Barry, to keep others from getting to close to him.
What is known is that Johnny Rayflo (going by his true name at the time) was a religious knight during the Middle Ages in Europe (placed before the 13th Century, but likely after the 10th Century), and the crown that he had sworn his fealty to was Princess Marie of an unnamed principality. The castle was under siege by a great force, people were suffering from the blockade, being trapped within the walls for so long with little food, water, or sanitation. To save the little girl he was sworn to, Rayflo damned himself and sold his soul to the demon Belial in return for the wish to have the strength to protect her and the rest of the people. With that wish, he gained the power to save her, but was also turned into a vampire.
Marie was injured during the fight, near death, and Rayflo turned her into a vampire hoping to spare her life. When Rayflo was losing himself, corrupted by his new nature and bloodlust, it was Marie who pulled him back. But this didn’t last. Eventually as time went on, Marie was twisted and corrupted, mostly likely due to her young and impressionable age when she first became a vampire and the long centuries of being one. It is one of Rayflo’s greatest regrets.
The demon whose name Rayflo cannot speak became quite infatuated with the idea of owning such a selfless, religious, and loyal knight and watching him slowly corrupted, to the point that despite not being able to remain indefinitely on Earth himself, he created a copy of himself, Barry the incubus, to watch over Rayflo and act in his stead. He also took one of Rayflo’s ribs and created a female copy of him, Rayfell, in a twisted mockery of the story of Adam and Eve. He cursed Rayfell so that she would be doomed to be unfaithful to anyone she loved, always giving into carnal desires and base need, which in turn also feeds Barry as he gains strength from Rayfell’s infidelities. Rayflo is thus bound to both of them. Barry is capable of controlling Rayflo by using his true name against him and Rayfell will live as long as he does.
Over the years, Rayflo has had a love/hate relationship with Barry, often to the point that Barry abuses him in violent displays of his authority and possession of him (killing people Rayflo comes close to, slaughtering villages in his name, sexually assaulting him on more than one occasion), and Rayflo himself gave into his own negative nature to appease Barry and keep him from harming other people. He drinks blood, has sex with multiple partners, collects massive amounts of wealth and luxuries just because he can, and does as many different things that he can to prove he is indeed a terrible person. He even worked with the Catholic Church to lock Marie away in suspended animation, which was a great show of betrayal since he had sworn a holy oath to her, but he did it because he believed that she had become too much of a danger to herself and to others. During this time he also gained a cat familiar, Minea, who is his dearest companion that also transforms herself into a maid when it suits her to be useful for him, by saving her from a freak show.
Then he wandered his way into a war torn French-speaking nation in the late 1800s (alluded to being France but not stated specifically), knowing how easy it would be to pick his food from the dying or unassuming soldiers on the battlefield. What he did not expect was to find a child left alone to die in the rubble of a church. The little boy was young, innocent, naive, and traumatized to the point from his experiences that he barely knew how to speak and had no memories of how he had come to be there. Rayflo cared for the child for a month, and even gave the child the name “Chris” (later to become Christopher Michael and then Charles J. Chrishunds), but realized it was too dangerous to keep a child with his lifestyle and Barry always a step behind. So he took the boy to a church to be cared for by the nuns and priests there.
He stayed away for years, but eventually couldn’t keep himself away and came back, taking on the guise of a priest to look after Chris and help teach him. Their relationship deepened over the years, becoming very strong bond, to the point that Chris all but worshipped Rayflo himself, but everything changed the night that Chris was fatally injured and Rayflo found him near death. Chris did not want to die and leave Rayflo, so he turned him into a vampire, knowing that Chris would regret his choice. And he did. He regretted it so much that he came to hate himself and hate Rayflo for what he had done to him.
Chris gave up the name Rayflo gave him and became Charles J. Chrishunds, but refused to drink human blood. He only drank blood from Rayflo, and even that he would put off doing for as long as he could. Rayflo had to all but force him at first because Chris was so ashamed. Charles became a sanctioned vampire hunter of the Catholic Church and Rayflo went on as a rich playboy who did as he pleased and only sought to have fun. The more reckless and sinful Rayflo’s actions, the angrier Charles was with him.
In part, Rayflo’s actions were to drive Chris away from him, but Rayflo could never do that completely. His own need to know Charles was okay and that he could come to him if he needed was just as strong as Charles obsessive need to hunt him down whenever he ran away. It became a twisted game and went on that way for decades. Rayflo would run and create a decadent, indulgent image and lifestyle and Charles would go on missions for the Vatican while hunting Rayflo down.
It was after one of these fights that Charley informed Rayflo that he had been requested to go to a mission in China and that he was taking Rayflo with him. He didn’t really want to go at first, but Rayflo agreed. Sister Famille revealed that they had Princess Marie and that was when Rayflo realized that the true person who had brought them there had been her all along. Mary wanted Rayflo back and was willing to kill Charles to convince him, but instead Rayflo let Cherry feed from him and almost died when the sun rose and he turned to ash, but instead Mary tried to save him, turning to ash herself. Rayflo was spared because one of the bats that he shapeshifts himself into hid in a cave until nightfall and he was able to heal himself. It was after this event and how severely Charles took what might have been Rayflo’s death that they moved in together, Rayflo spending almost all of his time at Charles’ apartment and he began to avoid Barry, cutting off their affair.
Sometime later, there was a party at a cathedral supporting the various denominations of the Church in the area and Charles was invited so he took Rayflo with him. They ended up in a compromising position and met Cheryl, a vampire hunter and a vjedogonia (human descendant of a vampire who has the powers of a witch and shall become a vampire upon their death), the lover of Rayfell. She had wanted his help in trying to solve a case as several women had ended up dead around the Church that the party was being held at. They tricked Cherry into thinking that Rayflo had somehow transformed his body into a woman’s but really it was Rayfell pretending to be Johnny. They used her as bait at the church to try and figure out who the culprit was and it turned out to be Father Kazan of the Neo Union Church himself. His follower Father Mailer had been watching over the Church while he retired due to “illness” and he fed on the women to try and cure himself, but had not completely turned into a vampire. Mailer was injured and left in a coma near death, but was later cured when someone used Vassalord, a drug created from vampire blood and ended up becoming one himself, while to the public it looked like a medical miracle.
Months later, Cheryl invited them to a beach resort so she and Charles could talk, only their flight was interrupted a rising star actress named Miranda tried to highjack the plane so she could get her cargo to her destination without anyone messing with it. It turned out to be a box of body parts with a bomb inside and Rayflo and Cherry subdued her only to realize they couldn’t defuse the bomb in time so they threw themselves out of the airlock with the bomb. Rayflo cushioned their fall—breaking his back in the process—and they all survived so that Charles could flag down a shipping boat nearby to take them to the mainland.
Rayflo had to feed his blood to Miranda because she was going through a hunger frenzy from the shock—which is when they realized she was a vampire herself. It was after they finally were at their hotel and Rayflo was bedridden from his injury that they finally let go back to her agent. Then her car was blown up and Barry made sure Rayflo knew he had done it because Rayflo had given blood to her.
Rayflo tries to distance himself from Chris after that. Detective Craig Bernstein began investigating them because he was the head detective on the Mailer case at the church and knows they were on the plane Miranda high jacked. Rayflo runs away so he won’t have to answer questions, cleaning out his mansion.
Cherry follows him there later his robotic dog alerts them to a paralyzed child he found outside on the property. It hits Rayflo that the boy, Harold, looks a lot like he did when he was young. It makes him uncomfortable and he’s rude to the boy, something that surprises Charley considering Rayflo’s complete adoration of children. Rayflo even tells him that the boy might be a vampire of a sort, but he won’t tell him anything else. Rayflo doesn’t like staying in the house with Howard there so he goes off into the woods to burn all of the records he has of his and Charles’ life in the mansion, then goes off to Charley’s apartment to hide out.
Barry finds him and assaults him, leaving him a bloody mess on the bed for Charley to find when he arrives. Rayflo tries to hide what happened, but Charley isn’t fooled. Instead he goes into a frantic rage over how Rayflo was injured and Rayflo has to calm him down. He then asks Charley to drink from him because having his blood drank by Charles has been purifying it, something that even Barry noticed. Barry seeks to force Rayflo to feed from him because he knows it taints him more every time. But then Rayflo realizes that Barry is still watching them and pushes Charley away, walking out on him.
When Charley infiltrates a prison in Italy to find out more about the drug Vassalord while working on a case with Detective Bernstein, Rayflo has to go to the prison to save him, despite knowing that Barry is still chasing after him and that he would have to do it in broad daylight without turning himself to ash. He doesn’t stay, but instead leaves almost immediately, only to be confronted by Barry again. He decapitates him and leads him on another chase, but a few weeks later he knows that Cherry will need to feed again so he sends him an invitation to a masquerade ball with an opera perform of The Phantom of the Opera.
But Barry is there, too, and when Rayflo tries to flee Charles won’t let him. He refuses to let him go again and Rayflo almost consents to stay, only to have Barry attack them and try to kill Cherry. He uses the guise of Rayflo when he was a priest to confuse Charley and is too powerful for Cherry as a weaker vampire to kill alone, but Rayflo realizes that if Charley can use Barry’s true name against him, he will have the power to at least severely weaken him. But Rayflo is bound by his contract with the demon and thus cannot say his name. Instead he chooses to hurt himself by quoting passages from the Bible, which he knows Charley will know by heart and will thus lead him to figure out what Barry’s true name is (which is the same as his maker, Belial). This tactic works, but it was so harmful to Rayflo that he almost dies right then. Charles calls out for help and that is when Harold arrives with Father Mailer in tow.
Only he is not truly Harold, but instead Alford Wayne, the “man” who has been making Vassalord and using it to spread vampirism in his quest to study Rayflo, who he calls Adam, the first vampire. Alford heals Rayflo, but Cherry becomes his puppet, a high fashion model and public face to push his agenda so as to better circulate Vassalord to the rich and famous, while also doing other things in shadows. Rayflo on the other hand is kept locked in an underground cell designed to look like a natural garden where he can be experimented on and his blood can be taken. Rayflo and Cherry are kept separated while they fulfill whatever roles Alford demands of them, but neither likes the situation. To keep Rayflo more docile, Chris tells Alford and Mailer about Minea, who they go and “collect” from Chris’ apartment and give her to Rayflo as a companion in his cage while Charles is fulfilling end of their bargain.
PERSONALITY:
Johnny Rayflo is not his true name, but it is close to the name someone dear to him used to call him. Johnny is an enigmatic character because he has layers upon layers to his personality, to his behavior, and his history. On the surface he comes across as this sexy, flirtatious, teasing, affluent playboy who just loves having fun and taking what he can out of life, but beneath that is also his large soft spot for children and his love of cute things (animals, toys, etc). Going even deeper is his affection for Chris and how everything in his life begins to revolve around their relationship in both healthy and unhealthy ways.
Johnny lets Charles feed from him to exclusion of everyone else even though Chris gets pretty violent and rough (he will go days and weeks without feeding, starving himself as long as he can until he eventually gorges himself), while also professing his undying anger and hatred of him, and it wears on him (although Johnny is also more than a bit of a masochist and likes it). Johnny despite appearing selfish and arrogant is rather selfless, doing things often that contradict his surface facade, such as jumping off of a plane when he finds there is a bomb on it and taking the bomb with him so that the passengers on the plane won't be hurt (which leads to him breaking his back).
Despite being a playboy who loves to flirt (and he will flirt with just about anyone) and someone who quite enjoys sex on a regular basis (except when he's with his "Cherry," aka Chris/Charley, because Chris is still a virgin and won't give it up), Johnny has a bit of fear and dislike of women. He will flirt with them, flatter them, and even help them, but if they show sexual interest in him he has problems handling it. On the outside he'll still seem flirtatious and enjoying himself, but inside he's having a breakdown. After being kissed by a woman he had saved, he even claims he has been poisoned and needs a kiss from Cherry to save him (of course, only doing this after she has left the room, and only Cherry can see him taking it so poorly). It shows that Johnny only really lets his guard down around people he's comfortable with and otherwise the mask of chronic flirt and rich playboy stays in place.
Johnny's sentimental, but secretive. The people closest to him still do not know all there is to know about him. He's also an emotional person who can be teased and at times hurt by words from those who mean a lot to him (Cherry uses this against him at times), but then he can also turn around and make everything into a game. He doesn't like showing how weak he can be to people so he tends to just play it off and make jokes, or flirt. He would rather be seen as selfish, ignorant, or a tease than to show just how deeply he can let himself get involved in things or how big of a masochist he is, because many of his surface traits and the facades he wears are very self-destructive. In the past he even used to sell himself, having sex and letting people drink from him (but only in very minute amounts), and in return be allowed to feed from them. He treated himself like an object to be used and it took Cherry crashing more than one of these parties and showing a lot of possessive judgment for him to put a stop to it. Not that it stopped Johnny from still fully believing that being used and abused is a fitting punishment for him, but he keeps these feelings close to his chest. Even with Cherry, who he is very open with, Johnny cannot give all of himself without feeling some guilt because parts of his past Johnny doesn't want him knowing about.
Another layer to Rayflo is his relationship with Barry, which shows just how self-destructive Rayflo can be while still holding onto a lot of the values he believes he’s forsaken. Barry exists to torment him, to take from him all that he cares about as payment for the deal he has with Belial, while also pushing him even deeper into depravity. When Rayflo is giving into Barry and doing as he wishes, Barry is pleased and things go easy for him, but Rayflo isn’t as far gone as he believes himself to be and so Barry will become violent with him or hurt people near him to push him back into the dark places again. So Rayflo will go back to him, part because he feels it’s what he deserves and in part to keep Barry’s attention away from innocent people and only on him. What Barry didn’t realize for many years was that the person who was consistently purifying Rayflo’s soul is Charles. He avoids being around Cherry in order to keep Barry from trying to involve him, but as soon as he knows that Cherry needs him to help escape a mafia prison, he goes to his rescue, even in broad daylight. No matter what, Cherry comes before everything for him. He will sacrifice anything and everything for him. He even quoted the Bible despite knowing that, as a damned being (as he is a vampire and sold his soul), it could kill him. When forced to fight against Cherry at the behest of Princess Marie, the little girl he had sworn fealty to all those centuries ago, he was willing to let Cherry kill him because he could not go against Marie’s orders, but refused to hurt Cherry, either.
For all that Rayflo can be flirtatious, melodramatic, and immature and purposefully tries to rile him up, Charley is the center of his world and to some it may not seem important, but it greatly defines Rayflo’s life, goals and self-image. He raised him, gave him the name Chris, turned him into a vampire (to save his life, though Rayflo did not want to), and all the good he believes can ever come from him exists within Charley. There is a lot of mystery to Rayflo, some of it due to his long life that he doesn’t like to discuss, and some because he intentionally likes others to desire him for his mystery so they don’t try to look deeper. Truthfully, Rayflo isn’t that complicated a man to understand his motives. Everything he does is driven by love, lust and self-loathing and Charles is the proof, the culmination of all of those feelings. He loves him and will do anything for him, but also believes that no matter how good and pure something in his life is, he’ll taint it. The romantic and sexual feelings he has for Cherry are just as sign of how he perverted their original relationship and turning Charles into a vampire is the greatest regret of his life. He is damned and it is a contagion that spreads no matter how he tries to prevent it.
ABILITIES: Rayflo is the progenitor of vampires, the Adam of the species, which affords him abilities not all vampires have, including the ability to pass on abilities not even he has onto other people. By drinking only his bood, his thrall, Charley, can even go out in sunlight (which Johnny himself cannot do without special protection). Johnny also has the ability to turn into a horde of bats and squeeze himself through very small cracks and holes. If he is ever turned to dust by the sun, as long as one bat is spared (or his ashes are saved and buried), he will heal himself. Johnny also has the ability to fly, supernatural strength, speed, agility, very high pain tolerance (he has his limbs ripped off and his chest torn open with bones removed and is still able to make witty remarks), the ability to heal himself in a matter of hours or days from any injury that isn’t fatal (and some that are) and what appears to be a higher than normal charismatic appeal (whether this is because he is a vampire or because he is just naturally sexually appealing to a variety of people is not explained, but humans seem to either hate him or be drawn to him).
He has a power called “regeneration” which is really an ability to create items air using his own blood (and sometimes out of thin air), whether it be inanimate objects or blood dolls he dressed up as maids, named Michaela and Julia. Oh yeah, there’s also that ability to turn humans into vampires if he gives them enough of his own blood. Johnny does need to ask to enter a home that is not his, is weaker against silver, holy water, and other blessed weapons/items, cannot quote the Bible without it burning him from the inside out, but can go into churches without a problem.
Other basic skills that Johnny has are that he's very good with swords and physical combat. He's lived for centuries and been around the world more than once so he's picked up a lot of things, so it stands to reason he is probably familiar with various languages, cultures, and has learned from them.
SINS & VIRTUES:
Sloth because be he’s lazy when it comes to doing any work himself, to the point he’ll create dolls to do the work for him or get his familiar Minea to wait on him like a maid. He’d rather lay about and read instead of do any cleaning, working out, or even handling his financial affairs if he can get out of it. Sloth also ties into the fact that he’s lost his way, stagnating in his growth spiritually and emotionally, due to the fact he sees himself as damned and undeserving of salvation. He blasphemes more than once to show how far he’s become removed from his pious roots, such as the time he enticed Chris in a church saying “My body is your bread” to get him to feed.
Lust for his sexual appetite (he was having a lot of sex before moving in with Chris and even when imprisoned he gives in to an affair with Mailer), but also for his yearning for love and acceptance despite believing he doesn’t deserve it. His lust for Cherry is shown multiple times, trying to get Charles to have sex with him no matter how often he refuses and declares his desire to be a virgin priest (once even trying while they’re fighting each other). Or he’ll try to manipulate him into declaring his affection for Rayflo, such as when they’re in flight on a plane and Chris appears to be sleeping. For years bloodlust was also a problem for him, he would lose control and slaughter whole villages to satiate himself, but it’s not something he has a problem with now unless he’s angry or severely injured.
Gluttony for his overindulgence of sex, wine, food (that he doesn’t even need to eat) and in a way his enabling of Cherry’s overindulgence. He eggs him on more than once to feed and drink from him in perverted locations (again in said a church) as much as his likes to the point where Rayflo himself will lose consciousness. Instead of feasting, he turns himself into the feast for Chris and has done the same for others by giving them sex and blood in return for money, favors and influence.
Pride because despite all of his self-loathing he has a lot of it. He’s prideful of Cherry and what he’s done to raise him and proud of the kind of person he’s grown up to be. He prides himself on his looks and demeanor, on being desirable to others. Looks are very important to him and he also prides himself on the persona he presents to others. He wants people to see him a certain way and strives to make sure they do (such as how he is very against dating women or having sex with him, but goes out of his way to flirt with them).
Greed because despite him not needing to create the persona of a rich, flighty person, it’s just what he does. He has houses around the world and then leases others if he doesn’t plan to be in a location for long. When he plans to move on, he will simple burn everything he had in the house, sometimes even down to the expensive accoutrements because he sees them all as worthless and replaceable. His greed isn’t so much an active coveting, but more the fact he has far more than he would ever realistically need.
Wrath because he has a lot of self-hatred and recrimination, to the point that he demonstrates a lot of very self-destructive behaviors, all turned inward. Prostituting himself because he values his own body so little and letting himself be brutalized by Barry as an unhealthy form of punishment for all the wrongs he’s ever committed (or that Barry has committed in his name). He intentionally eggs Charles on to the point of violence not just because he lusts for him, but because he’s a masochist who feels his humiliation and degradation are justified. When the anger and hatred he feels is turned outward toward someone else he can become like a monster, lost in a bloodlust until he sees the person dead and it may not even stop there. It’s rare for him to get to that point, as most of his wrath is directed towards himself but it’s happened more than once over the centuries, such as when he slaughtered the invading armies that wanted to capture and kill Princess Marie.
For virtues, Rayflo demonstrates charity in his selfless and continuously giving feelings for the people he truly loves. He also has a huge soft sport for small children and spent a month raising an amnesiac, orphaned child despite owing him nothing. Kindness goes along with that charity in a more general way because he gives to the less forturnate, helps people without expecting anything of them in return (such as when he broke his back saving a plane full of people from a bomb), and despite his long life, he generally has faith that humans are good. Some are bad, but he believes most of them want to do good and will if given the chance. Patience also comes into play in that he had suffered greatly in his life but rarely holds it against the people who do him harm (except for Belial and Barry). Even if he acts angry or annoyed, it’s more for show than because he means it. He would rather pretend they never happened or that he fully deserved it than to place the blame on someone else (because he forgives others far more than he’ll ever forgive himself).
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